I was chatting on the MUD with P, C, and E when A turned up. A, a middle-aged lady in real life, was better known to P (same order) and C, E (all imms) than I was.
P and C liked to play male characters online. I am not sure of the reason why, presumbably because they see advantages to doing so in that the largely adolescent male gaming population tends to hold them in more respect and not try to flirt with them. However, I’ve never seen them expressed inclination to consider themselves anything than female.
If any of them decided one day that they are to be considered male, henceforth you will never hear a single female pronoun escape from my lips. I’m quite capable of calling 1.8m big sturdy fellows “her” and bodaciously curvy fellows “him”. But as I said, none of them have ever expressed any inclination outwardly.
We were chatting by ourselves as players to players in the room, when A turned up. I made a comment about C, using the pronouns “she”. Immediately, A used some emotes on me and accused me, in a patronising manner, of not keeping C’s secret.
What kind of secret is it? Everyone in the room knew of C’s real life gender, and she seems quite happy and comfortable to be in that gender, and for us to refer to her in that gender.
So I typed, “I find this quite funny, because I am a real life transsexual, but you are the ones playing gender games online.”
Dead silence. Then, E went, “thanks for making everything weird.”
Why is it “weird”? P, C and E know who I am. We’ve seen each other real life. I’m quite unapologetic about who I am, really. If they know it, why make it sound as it if is a horrible thing that I must never, ever speak of to them…even though they already know?
A, the hitherto champion of gender expression, went silent. After a few moments, she made an generic excuse of needing to do something and left. No response to a tell I sent her.
No. I am quite unapologetic.
Sunday, September 28, 2008
Thursday, September 25, 2008
Teaching is a Bardic Profession
Or at least what I'm doing seems to be.
Just like the greek bards of old, one has certain phrases, certain stanzas, certain jokes, certain demonstrations, certain tricks for maintaining audience attention, certain lines that are used and re-used and carefully polished and honed and crafted over a long length of time.
Each class, each tale of Cunning Odysseus or swift-footed Achilles (note the traditional epithets preceding the name that help the meter flow and basically take up space) is slightly different, and yet is the same. It follows essentially the same formula, the same patterns.
The Trojan War is over. Odysseus braves lots of dangers. Odysseus makes it home. The specifics change, but the story remains the same.
Maybe it's just the whole oral tradition of presentation in general.
I just find it amusing how easy (for humans) yet tricky (in a craftsman-like sense) it is to build up an hours-long aural flow, from cobbled together parts used over and over.
Just like the greek bards of old, one has certain phrases, certain stanzas, certain jokes, certain demonstrations, certain tricks for maintaining audience attention, certain lines that are used and re-used and carefully polished and honed and crafted over a long length of time.
Each class, each tale of Cunning Odysseus or swift-footed Achilles (note the traditional epithets preceding the name that help the meter flow and basically take up space) is slightly different, and yet is the same. It follows essentially the same formula, the same patterns.
The Trojan War is over. Odysseus braves lots of dangers. Odysseus makes it home. The specifics change, but the story remains the same.
Maybe it's just the whole oral tradition of presentation in general.
I just find it amusing how easy (for humans) yet tricky (in a craftsman-like sense) it is to build up an hours-long aural flow, from cobbled together parts used over and over.
Monday, September 22, 2008
The Paradox of Polish
I'm going into paroxysms of indecision on whether I like Warhammer, or if I will get bored once the new MMO smell wears off.
Part of the problem is the level of 'polish' and elegant design that is evident in the game. No, I'm not kidding. It's the same thing that turned me off WoW.
I'm a bit of an immersion freak. I crave the feeling of being inside a pretty world, imagining myself to be my character and participating in the stories being told.
So far, the MMOs which have managed this to a certain extent are CoX (making your own character costume/background, plus nicely written story arcs help), LoTRO (the fact that it's timesinky makes it simulationist, plus lore = uber cool), and AoC (sweet high-resolution textures, small simulational touches in level design, and intriguing lore.)
Alas, I've finally tired of the -game- behind CoX, at least for now. LoTRO takes too damn long, with too much time and grinding I can't really spare, and grouping is traditional MMO difficult, so achieving anything in that game is kinda impossible. And AoC, well, heh. So much promise, and ruined by the lack of engineering or design brains behind the whole game. Achievement is more than impossible, it's downright flummoxed by every patch that turns up.
WAR, on the other hand, is dotted with achievement signposts. Littered, in fact. You can't spend 30 mins in the game without having something unlock in your tome of knowledge or just feeling like you've made progress on something. XP, renown, kills, loot, crafting skills, you name it.
Unfortunately, this catering to the achievement need is in conflict with my need for immersion.
It's damn hard, if not downright impossible, to immerse in WAR. For me, anyhow.
First, the UI gets in the way. There's too much valuable info in there to turn it off. There's too much out-of-character stuff going on, like scenario queues and open groups and big zergs and RvR opportunities and PQs you stumble across. The railroad of intended path across the map is clearly laid out, just like WoW, with increasing level distributions in the nearby areas and questgivers that shuttle you to the next little town or settlement full of more quest NPCs.
What makes WAR tolerable and kinda fun for me, where WoW wasn't, is two things. There's the option to take a branching path and go against the flow, and still progress. Plenty of horizontal progress options too (tome unlocks, leveling crafting, renown, and xp), whereas WoW is very vertically linear. Get levels, find the real endgame is WoW's message. In WAR, you can do what you like, and you'll end up getting levels and getting to the endgame.
And there's the question of endgame and purpose. I can't stand WoW's selfish me-get-kewl-loot-you-don't-have-it-you-scrub-haha endgame. Just...can't. Sets people up to indulge in behaviors I would rather NOT be exposed to on a nightly basis for entertainment. In WAR, there's a strong encouraging push in the direction of cooperation, and working together for your realm to win. Sure, it's still not perfect because we've had a flood of WoW kiddie mentality rush into the gates of WAR, but in time, we'll get there. More or less.
So yes, I like doing things in WAR. I lose track of time when I play it. I've got a nice guild to join to do random cool things in, when I need the organised group boost. WAR sets you up to stumble across and join in neat cooperative stuff by means of geography and open groups and the whole inclusive cooperative RvR deal, so it's really easy to intend to do one thing, see something happen and change your mind to participate in impromptu fun.
The achievement side of me is having a field day.
The explorer part of me is a little more hesitant. The finding trivia bits part is thrilled, if kind of overwhelmed amd intimidated because of the sheer size and randomness of the tome unlocks - so many more competent and thorough spades out there than me. But a random discovery is cool.
The figuring out the numbers and optimal build part of me is not too bad off. It's just waiting until I get more advanced and can do like CoX and figure it out.
The immersion-seeking side of the explorer is throwing a little bit of a tantrum. It's just really hard to lower oneself into the world, when the game makes itself obvious at each step and my brain shoots up immediately into higher order thinking, into the levels of tactics and metagaming and admiring elegant game design.
And the more nifty the game design is, the worse the immersion gets.
I -try- to read the quest text that I haven't read. But there's this handy bolded summary right below it. And a convenient quest tracker. Which links into the tome of knowledge for the instructions if I need to remind myself of it. And the tome-linked objectives are nicely marked in red on the map, so I can just run towards it and pull up the reference if I need it. Then there's the cunning design of making the quest throw you into the path of public quests or RvR opportunities, so by the time I've finished admiring that and leaping headfirst into the PQ or charged headlong at some red-flagged people...
...I've totally forgotten what the quest text was, and if there was a story to begin with. Oh, I guess there's a long story, chapter by chapter in my Tome of Knowledge, but it's going to be there all the time, maybe I can read it later!
And so on it goes.
I'm not the character participating in some big epic story. In a similar RoD or Guild Wars or later-CoX vein, I'm very much the player, looking on tactically making plans as my avatar, my tool, the extension of my hand and will, runs around doing stuff I need to get done.
CoX at least had solo opportunities to immerse and pretend to run around in a story of my own choosing. RoD had the initial RP spurt before I 'outgrew' it in favor of gloryhounding and doing raids, er, runs.
And despite the cinematic story of Guild Wars, I never really immersed into it except maybe during cutscenes, my character and my entire NPC team was a means to an end, a puzzle to be built up and rearranged in order to defeat certain PvE challenges.
Then there's the whole tactical group aspect. I can't immerse in CoX when I group. Gotta scroll out, see the whole picture and figure out what needs to be pressed when. Ditto WAR. Scroll in, are you nuts? I gotta see people coming in to backstab or flank me and so on.
I'm steadily failing to solo and immerse in WAR. Oh, I have plenty of solo opportunities. Being two hours behind my guild means I get late nights where I'm not obligated to join the group cos they've all gone to sleep. I get solo questing and leveling done, and I'm thrilled to find out that my chosen main, a Marauder, is absolutely ideal for AoE farming because I've got two crafting skills to level up. I need my potions brewed for PvPing, y'know. That kind of thinking puts a crimp in any immersion seeking.
And there's the whole geographical aspect of "lalala, minding my own business, oh lookie, something shiny going on, I'm in!"
That just totally and utterly fubars up the immersion cos now I'm trying to figure out the game. What's the gimmick behind the PQ. What do we have to do to win the PQ, and what do I have to do to increase my contribution score for better chances at loot. What's the best skills to be using. What should I press now to hit and kill that Order guy without getting myself killed. Where should I run to or dodge to next.
On and on and on.
And I suppose the slight stiffness and clunkiness of the animations and the slower, tactical pace of the combat does not help either.
WAR. Cool game. Nifty lore. Faithful graphics. Lousy world for immersion.
So do I like it? Well, most of me does.
Part of the problem is the level of 'polish' and elegant design that is evident in the game. No, I'm not kidding. It's the same thing that turned me off WoW.
I'm a bit of an immersion freak. I crave the feeling of being inside a pretty world, imagining myself to be my character and participating in the stories being told.
So far, the MMOs which have managed this to a certain extent are CoX (making your own character costume/background, plus nicely written story arcs help), LoTRO (the fact that it's timesinky makes it simulationist, plus lore = uber cool), and AoC (sweet high-resolution textures, small simulational touches in level design, and intriguing lore.)
Alas, I've finally tired of the -game- behind CoX, at least for now. LoTRO takes too damn long, with too much time and grinding I can't really spare, and grouping is traditional MMO difficult, so achieving anything in that game is kinda impossible. And AoC, well, heh. So much promise, and ruined by the lack of engineering or design brains behind the whole game. Achievement is more than impossible, it's downright flummoxed by every patch that turns up.
WAR, on the other hand, is dotted with achievement signposts. Littered, in fact. You can't spend 30 mins in the game without having something unlock in your tome of knowledge or just feeling like you've made progress on something. XP, renown, kills, loot, crafting skills, you name it.
Unfortunately, this catering to the achievement need is in conflict with my need for immersion.
It's damn hard, if not downright impossible, to immerse in WAR. For me, anyhow.
First, the UI gets in the way. There's too much valuable info in there to turn it off. There's too much out-of-character stuff going on, like scenario queues and open groups and big zergs and RvR opportunities and PQs you stumble across. The railroad of intended path across the map is clearly laid out, just like WoW, with increasing level distributions in the nearby areas and questgivers that shuttle you to the next little town or settlement full of more quest NPCs.
What makes WAR tolerable and kinda fun for me, where WoW wasn't, is two things. There's the option to take a branching path and go against the flow, and still progress. Plenty of horizontal progress options too (tome unlocks, leveling crafting, renown, and xp), whereas WoW is very vertically linear. Get levels, find the real endgame is WoW's message. In WAR, you can do what you like, and you'll end up getting levels and getting to the endgame.
And there's the question of endgame and purpose. I can't stand WoW's selfish me-get-kewl-loot-you-don't-have-it-you-scrub-haha endgame. Just...can't. Sets people up to indulge in behaviors I would rather NOT be exposed to on a nightly basis for entertainment. In WAR, there's a strong encouraging push in the direction of cooperation, and working together for your realm to win. Sure, it's still not perfect because we've had a flood of WoW kiddie mentality rush into the gates of WAR, but in time, we'll get there. More or less.
So yes, I like doing things in WAR. I lose track of time when I play it. I've got a nice guild to join to do random cool things in, when I need the organised group boost. WAR sets you up to stumble across and join in neat cooperative stuff by means of geography and open groups and the whole inclusive cooperative RvR deal, so it's really easy to intend to do one thing, see something happen and change your mind to participate in impromptu fun.
The achievement side of me is having a field day.
The explorer part of me is a little more hesitant. The finding trivia bits part is thrilled, if kind of overwhelmed amd intimidated because of the sheer size and randomness of the tome unlocks - so many more competent and thorough spades out there than me. But a random discovery is cool.
The figuring out the numbers and optimal build part of me is not too bad off. It's just waiting until I get more advanced and can do like CoX and figure it out.
The immersion-seeking side of the explorer is throwing a little bit of a tantrum. It's just really hard to lower oneself into the world, when the game makes itself obvious at each step and my brain shoots up immediately into higher order thinking, into the levels of tactics and metagaming and admiring elegant game design.
And the more nifty the game design is, the worse the immersion gets.
I -try- to read the quest text that I haven't read. But there's this handy bolded summary right below it. And a convenient quest tracker. Which links into the tome of knowledge for the instructions if I need to remind myself of it. And the tome-linked objectives are nicely marked in red on the map, so I can just run towards it and pull up the reference if I need it. Then there's the cunning design of making the quest throw you into the path of public quests or RvR opportunities, so by the time I've finished admiring that and leaping headfirst into the PQ or charged headlong at some red-flagged people...
...I've totally forgotten what the quest text was, and if there was a story to begin with. Oh, I guess there's a long story, chapter by chapter in my Tome of Knowledge, but it's going to be there all the time, maybe I can read it later!
And so on it goes.
I'm not the character participating in some big epic story. In a similar RoD or Guild Wars or later-CoX vein, I'm very much the player, looking on tactically making plans as my avatar, my tool, the extension of my hand and will, runs around doing stuff I need to get done.
CoX at least had solo opportunities to immerse and pretend to run around in a story of my own choosing. RoD had the initial RP spurt before I 'outgrew' it in favor of gloryhounding and doing raids, er, runs.
And despite the cinematic story of Guild Wars, I never really immersed into it except maybe during cutscenes, my character and my entire NPC team was a means to an end, a puzzle to be built up and rearranged in order to defeat certain PvE challenges.
Then there's the whole tactical group aspect. I can't immerse in CoX when I group. Gotta scroll out, see the whole picture and figure out what needs to be pressed when. Ditto WAR. Scroll in, are you nuts? I gotta see people coming in to backstab or flank me and so on.
I'm steadily failing to solo and immerse in WAR. Oh, I have plenty of solo opportunities. Being two hours behind my guild means I get late nights where I'm not obligated to join the group cos they've all gone to sleep. I get solo questing and leveling done, and I'm thrilled to find out that my chosen main, a Marauder, is absolutely ideal for AoE farming because I've got two crafting skills to level up. I need my potions brewed for PvPing, y'know. That kind of thinking puts a crimp in any immersion seeking.
And there's the whole geographical aspect of "lalala, minding my own business, oh lookie, something shiny going on, I'm in!"
That just totally and utterly fubars up the immersion cos now I'm trying to figure out the game. What's the gimmick behind the PQ. What do we have to do to win the PQ, and what do I have to do to increase my contribution score for better chances at loot. What's the best skills to be using. What should I press now to hit and kill that Order guy without getting myself killed. Where should I run to or dodge to next.
On and on and on.
And I suppose the slight stiffness and clunkiness of the animations and the slower, tactical pace of the combat does not help either.
WAR. Cool game. Nifty lore. Faithful graphics. Lousy world for immersion.
So do I like it? Well, most of me does.
Wednesday, September 17, 2008
Bottom Line Purpose
Can't remember which blog post gave me the seed of the idea, but it built into one of those common-sense revelations that had to be noted down for posterity. Just to remind myself.
I only get into and play MMO games in which I agree with the purpose / 'overall lesson' being taught.
Cue WoW. Greed. Selfishness. Me me. Phat Lewt. Put in lots of time, get a lottery ticket for big winnings, yay.
Er, no thanks.
Sure, it feeds on the hope of many mainstreamers - if the lines at the TOTO and 4D booths are anything to go by - that we have a hope of striking it rich and deserve stuff if we work hard, so that we can be better than the Jones...
But er, yeah, no thanks. Not very uplifting, I think.
Eve? Mwa ha ha, the universe is driven through profit and politics. See the isk flow. Enjoy a sandbox where you can do anything you like, and if you're clever and cunning, well... PROFIT!
While I think this is a rather intriguing way to see the world in general, the whole microcosm experience reflecting some potentially valuable reflections on life and human nature, well, I just don't think it's that emotionally enriching to experience a society driven by purified motives of profit and betrayal.
Some day I need to try a Tale in the Desert. The idea of a society built on crafting, on creation and socially-agreed on principles. Intriguing, to say the least.
I vacillate on Vanguard. The whole idea of exploring a big vast world harkens back to the good old nostalgic days of MUDs. But I'm not keen on the standard staple of raiding as endgame, and groups = get to see more stuff/do more stuff and all that.
I already have that in LOTRO, and that's all the standard game I have room for. Not much bottom line purpose in LOTRO except "Live in Tolkien's world" and do what you like + stick around to grind progress bars.
CoX's bottom line purpose has always been rather fun. Enjoy the journey, beat up bad guys, be a hero, work together if you like, win either way. Simple, but rewarding enough to immerse into a character of your own creation.
I'm still not 100% certain about WAR. In a sense, it's quite a fun fantasy. It taps into the whole "Us vs Them" tribal mentality. The 'them' gives us someone to fight, while the 'us' leads to the encouragement of an inclusive mindset where anyone from the 'right' side is more or less okay, as long as they are trying to help - not just selfishly out for themselves at the cost of the group, etc.
Of course, you can have an argument that this sort of mindset promotes racism or social exclusion of a group, maybe hate, but I don't really think so. Mostly because you can't trash talk an opponent. You can only kill 'em. Nuthin' personal. So it's more a friendly rivalry at most.
Still there are some differences between the lessons taught by a PvE game and a PvP one, depending on its design. More on that in a later post.
I only get into and play MMO games in which I agree with the purpose / 'overall lesson' being taught.
Cue WoW. Greed. Selfishness. Me me. Phat Lewt. Put in lots of time, get a lottery ticket for big winnings, yay.
Er, no thanks.
Sure, it feeds on the hope of many mainstreamers - if the lines at the TOTO and 4D booths are anything to go by - that we have a hope of striking it rich and deserve stuff if we work hard, so that we can be better than the Jones...
But er, yeah, no thanks. Not very uplifting, I think.
Eve? Mwa ha ha, the universe is driven through profit and politics. See the isk flow. Enjoy a sandbox where you can do anything you like, and if you're clever and cunning, well... PROFIT!
While I think this is a rather intriguing way to see the world in general, the whole microcosm experience reflecting some potentially valuable reflections on life and human nature, well, I just don't think it's that emotionally enriching to experience a society driven by purified motives of profit and betrayal.
Some day I need to try a Tale in the Desert. The idea of a society built on crafting, on creation and socially-agreed on principles. Intriguing, to say the least.
I vacillate on Vanguard. The whole idea of exploring a big vast world harkens back to the good old nostalgic days of MUDs. But I'm not keen on the standard staple of raiding as endgame, and groups = get to see more stuff/do more stuff and all that.
I already have that in LOTRO, and that's all the standard game I have room for. Not much bottom line purpose in LOTRO except "Live in Tolkien's world" and do what you like + stick around to grind progress bars.
CoX's bottom line purpose has always been rather fun. Enjoy the journey, beat up bad guys, be a hero, work together if you like, win either way. Simple, but rewarding enough to immerse into a character of your own creation.
I'm still not 100% certain about WAR. In a sense, it's quite a fun fantasy. It taps into the whole "Us vs Them" tribal mentality. The 'them' gives us someone to fight, while the 'us' leads to the encouragement of an inclusive mindset where anyone from the 'right' side is more or less okay, as long as they are trying to help - not just selfishly out for themselves at the cost of the group, etc.
Of course, you can have an argument that this sort of mindset promotes racism or social exclusion of a group, maybe hate, but I don't really think so. Mostly because you can't trash talk an opponent. You can only kill 'em. Nuthin' personal. So it's more a friendly rivalry at most.
Still there are some differences between the lessons taught by a PvE game and a PvP one, depending on its design. More on that in a later post.
Tuesday, September 16, 2008
Monday, September 15, 2008
The Psyche of Defence
Call me a coward, but I notice I'm not like those other guys. You know, the ones who charge off, frothing at the mouth for the honor of being focus fired or instagibbed before returning back to the spawn point for another go.
Be it in Team Fortress 2 or in WAR, I am noticing the tendency for me to fall back on my defensive survivor-y wiles.
Even when playing a melee DPS Marauder. But then, my life expectancy and resultant opportunities for death blows is a whole lot higher.
See, it's ridiculously common for some idiot tank or MDPS to charge screaming into a pack of 4-6 Order and then wonder, wtf, where were my heals?
Please. I've played a healer. We can try our very best to drop heals on you (if you haven't run out of our range), but we're not going to run up into that shitstorm to get focus fired, we're hanging back and you're not, guess how often heals are going to get to you.
Certainly, cracking open the other team's line with an offensive charge is a valid, effective and IMPORTANT tactic. Normally works better if you've got at least 2-3 tanks (no, MDPS are not tanks) supported by their own dedicated healers.
No, you + 3-4 PUG healers in their own groups do not count, unless they're all looking in the same direction and there's that number or less of Order around.
It's psychology. People are not going to charge unless they think they have a good chance of winning, and then you have the whole intimidation factor going for you and the other side will tend to pick up and run. The morale breaking effect is lovely to see.
Otherwise, if you're on the outnumbered side, you may want to consider that a bellowing charge into certain death is not going to be an avidly popular strategy - especially among healers who tend to be very fond of self-preservation (or preservation of all health bars as a general principle).
Hence, my reverse Marauder strategy. I have gotten PLENTY of heals from healers. All without uttering a single whimper. Why? I make it convenient and in their best interests for them to heal me, of course.
I lag a little behind the initial offensive charge. This makes sure all those tab-targetting (hey, even I tab target, though I switch to optimal targets quickly) have gotten someone else other than me on their to-hit list.
Then I go in and do my wrecking ball/headless chicken impersonation on things with low health bars and squishy things, preferably both at the same time. Doubly preferable if also being attacked by a fellow ally in the process, so the other guy cannot decide who to hit back and is in a double-teamed OMGIneedheals panic and trying to break off.
Anytime I start to get targeted and have my hp drop, and before half my health disappears, I reverse direction and run back towards the healers. This breaks off LOS and range from the ranged DPS, and gives me a nice reservoir of 1/4 hp to stand by healers and wait patiently.
Simple psychology. If a guy with a hurt health bar is standing next to you, and you aren't otherwise occupied, you're just going to target him easily and drop off some green numbers. Him getting healed increases your purple renown numbers, after all.
Then there's the bodyguard option. If your chances are not going to look good running off solo into a pack of 10 Order, then duh, hang around by the healers and spellcasters. Cos very soon, the more rabid of the Order MDPS is going to plunge into OUR back line, where THEY are now out of reach of THEIR healers.
And generally, healers do not like rabid MDPS cutting them up, shooting holes in them or otherwise pounding their heads in.
Enter the friendly neighborhood MDPS who actually *gasp* notices the healers being attacked by ninjas, trips them up, stuffs his burly body in between the enemies and the healers and starts playing slice and dice with them.
Guess who's going to get healed?
Obviously everyone in the panic stricken healers' vicinity, that's who.
I've pulled off a brilliant number of these decimate-the-wave-of-charging-idiots strats before turning it back into a now-you're-outnumbered-cos-some-of-you-hung-back charge back at the Order guys. Who then break and run or die fighting back.
The only time it doesn't work is when we're outnumbered 7 to 4 and the number of Order reinforcements keep rising to 15 then 20. Then it's time for us to run and die horribly, and no amount of heals would have stopped it anyway.
The brilliant thing about mainstream RvR and things like WAR and TF2 - quick painless respawns with low death penalty. Sure, personal death is meaningless. That's the point.
It's all about whether you win the scenario and get a better xp/renown score, or if you lost and need to settle for the consolation prize and check your own personal stats to assuage yourself that you didn't suck, but just got out-teamworked by the other guy.
Be it in Team Fortress 2 or in WAR, I am noticing the tendency for me to fall back on my defensive survivor-y wiles.
Even when playing a melee DPS Marauder. But then, my life expectancy and resultant opportunities for death blows is a whole lot higher.
See, it's ridiculously common for some idiot tank or MDPS to charge screaming into a pack of 4-6 Order and then wonder, wtf, where were my heals?
Please. I've played a healer. We can try our very best to drop heals on you (if you haven't run out of our range), but we're not going to run up into that shitstorm to get focus fired, we're hanging back and you're not, guess how often heals are going to get to you.
Certainly, cracking open the other team's line with an offensive charge is a valid, effective and IMPORTANT tactic. Normally works better if you've got at least 2-3 tanks (no, MDPS are not tanks) supported by their own dedicated healers.
No, you + 3-4 PUG healers in their own groups do not count, unless they're all looking in the same direction and there's that number or less of Order around.
It's psychology. People are not going to charge unless they think they have a good chance of winning, and then you have the whole intimidation factor going for you and the other side will tend to pick up and run. The morale breaking effect is lovely to see.
Otherwise, if you're on the outnumbered side, you may want to consider that a bellowing charge into certain death is not going to be an avidly popular strategy - especially among healers who tend to be very fond of self-preservation (or preservation of all health bars as a general principle).
Hence, my reverse Marauder strategy. I have gotten PLENTY of heals from healers. All without uttering a single whimper. Why? I make it convenient and in their best interests for them to heal me, of course.
I lag a little behind the initial offensive charge. This makes sure all those tab-targetting (hey, even I tab target, though I switch to optimal targets quickly) have gotten someone else other than me on their to-hit list.
Then I go in and do my wrecking ball/headless chicken impersonation on things with low health bars and squishy things, preferably both at the same time. Doubly preferable if also being attacked by a fellow ally in the process, so the other guy cannot decide who to hit back and is in a double-teamed OMGIneedheals panic and trying to break off.
Anytime I start to get targeted and have my hp drop, and before half my health disappears, I reverse direction and run back towards the healers. This breaks off LOS and range from the ranged DPS, and gives me a nice reservoir of 1/4 hp to stand by healers and wait patiently.
Simple psychology. If a guy with a hurt health bar is standing next to you, and you aren't otherwise occupied, you're just going to target him easily and drop off some green numbers. Him getting healed increases your purple renown numbers, after all.
Then there's the bodyguard option. If your chances are not going to look good running off solo into a pack of 10 Order, then duh, hang around by the healers and spellcasters. Cos very soon, the more rabid of the Order MDPS is going to plunge into OUR back line, where THEY are now out of reach of THEIR healers.
And generally, healers do not like rabid MDPS cutting them up, shooting holes in them or otherwise pounding their heads in.
Enter the friendly neighborhood MDPS who actually *gasp* notices the healers being attacked by ninjas, trips them up, stuffs his burly body in between the enemies and the healers and starts playing slice and dice with them.
Guess who's going to get healed?
Obviously everyone in the panic stricken healers' vicinity, that's who.
I've pulled off a brilliant number of these decimate-the-wave-of-charging-idiots strats before turning it back into a now-you're-outnumbered-cos-some-of-you-hung-back charge back at the Order guys. Who then break and run or die fighting back.
The only time it doesn't work is when we're outnumbered 7 to 4 and the number of Order reinforcements keep rising to 15 then 20. Then it's time for us to run and die horribly, and no amount of heals would have stopped it anyway.
The brilliant thing about mainstream RvR and things like WAR and TF2 - quick painless respawns with low death penalty. Sure, personal death is meaningless. That's the point.
It's all about whether you win the scenario and get a better xp/renown score, or if you lost and need to settle for the consolation prize and check your own personal stats to assuage yourself that you didn't suck, but just got out-teamworked by the other guy.
Friday, September 12, 2008
Team Fortitude 2!
Evil Ed has finally brainwashed me into buying TF2 with the 3 day code.
So far, I've tried medic, engineer, spy, scout.
I'm a dismal failure at the spy. I keep bumping into people or getting shot to death. However, I did manage to down a heavy with a backstab... not that heavys are that difficult to backstab, with their lumbering gait.
Scout was rather fun in the traditional run around and shoot people sense. Did I mention that I cannot aim?
I find medic and eingineer most fun though, but my n00bish self tends to get lost. Let's not even talk about constructing strategic buildings. However, I felt rather proud when I used my dispenser and turret to hold a chokepoint in a capture two sites map. We lasted until 15 seconds before the end of the mission, then the opposing team broke through and won.
Finally, we get to medic, which is my favorite class so far. Maybe because I can't aim very well, but apparently Ed plays nothing but medics, engineers and soldiers. He suggests that we all head off and play TF2 some time. I'm supposed to "healz0r" his heavy and he can scream at me if he dies. =P
Thursday, September 11, 2008
The Psychology of Archetypes
So apparently there’s some article in the Escapist that discusses the psyche of someone who always tanks in a game. And there are those who always heal, of course. Or those who just do DPS while backseat driving both tank and healers to do their @#)*& jobs.
I wonder what it says about the psyche of people like me who just gotta try it all?
My WAR compulsion has now led to a 4th planned alt. This successfully rounds off all four main archetypes from tank, healer, melee DPS to ranged DPS.
I guess I just like being in different parts of a fight depending on the situation and what I feel like doing at any time. And it’s just more effective for everyone if you’ve walked a mile in somebody else’s footsteps and know what makes it easier and harder for another to do their job and all, y’know?
Priorities have changed somewhat after trying them out though. I’d initially been dead set on playing a Black Orc first for the tankiness and lore immersion aspect, but I’ve been finding it a very slow starter whose lowbie levels are like pulling teeth. The combat mechanics of ‘hit ‘em’ ‘gud plan’ ‘best plan’ limit me to repeating the exact 1, 2, 4 button combination ad nauseam for the greater part of five to six levels, doing pathetic damage and having little opportunity to improve it because all the good gear goes to people who are actually DPSing or healing, while you don’t even get a taunt until level 7.
Admittedly, things begin to improve past level 8, with more abilities beginning to offer a bit more tactical choice and all the nifty defensive skills that you can use to protect people start arriving, but it takes an effort to get there.
The synergy of a healer attached to your tank’s butt is also important. If I had a guaranteed healer buddy that I could always play with, I would totally be there as a Black Orc. Not that it’s a healbot I’m looking for. On the contrary, I would actually have a FUNCTION. Because I do cruddy if passable damage, but am a great meatshield who will steadily get a bunch of ally buffs and cc/debuffs to mess around with an opponent. Not to mention, have someone to actually…y’know, guard and protect. With skills and collision detection and what not.
In essence, WAR has gotten tank function down pretty pat. It’s a great ally support class, with dps that is godawful and slowly gets to passable then decent and better in your teens. But it’s hard finding an ally to protect and who will top off your brimming health bar from an onslaught of 4-5 opponents.
Because as usual, few people are playing healers who actually heal. So what else is new?
I guess the news is that -I’m- about to enter the healer’s world as my class of second choice.
I have been finding the Disciple of Khaine exceedingly thrilling. I dual wield (so I’m like Drizzt on a really bad Chaos warpstone day) and can produce very decent melee DPS that is higher than my tank can. So far, I’ve two heal over times and I’ll probably get a few other lifesteal/single target heal things and group heals eventually.
I already stand out for the sheer novelty of actually bothering to heal other people from time to time, as opposed to all the other n00b DoKs who will stand and stare dully while their teammates, or me, or themselves are taking rapid nosedives in hp from the onslaught of opponents.
Being able to assign a defensive target as well as an offensive one is very freeing. It leaves me able to mix attack and heals at the drop of a hat, and I’m thrilled after the limitation of “you can only pick these two skills until you have a gud plan, and these other two skills can only be used with a best plan, and did we mention the best plan evaporates after what seems like 2 seconds, and your skill global cool down is 1.5 seconds, so you better be on the ball and not lag” to be able to pick what I want to cast now, when I want it, thank you.
At lowbie stages, healing is placed on a pedestal in terms of value and effectiveness. I confess to not being as keen to heal once people have learned to target healers first and foremost (and yes, the pansy dark elf in robes with two swords is a melee healer, not a melee DPS nor a tank, as opposed to the pansy high elf in robes and a big two hander who is an Order tank) and have gotten all their healing debuff act together…
…but I suppose past level 10, it’ll give the many people playing tanks (my guild seems to have a ton of people playing BOrc or Chosen) a chance to shine and actually put some guarding tactics to use. Pre-level 10, all I can do is try and keep out of the way, in the background, when there are way too many to fight. Which isn’t the best of situations for a melee healer, dammit. I should be right up there, next to and being guarded by a tank, and keeping the frontline healed while chopping stuff up. Not easy when you get focus fired and your tanks are a bit too dumb to notice or don’t have the abilities yet to save you from it.
Anyway, the success or failure of tanks and other characters seem to hinge critically on if there are enough healers around to sustain them, and I’m always so rotten tired of looking around on a tank and not getting any heals.
So by Khaine, I shall do the healing, dammit. I will heal to the best of my ability, which also means I have to get up close and hit crap, thank goodness, and I shall proceed to multitask both happily, and the only thing you PUG putzes have to do is stop me from getting focus fired if I get noticed (and I try hard not to be), and if I die (or decide running away is the better part of valor) because you can’t handle that, then you get to die too shortly after because your heals have gone bye-bye.
For some reason, this strikes me as a infinitely more “fair” and less frustrating situation than the first, because half the time I can’t even find the existence of any healers as a tank, and without them, I’m just meat for a bright wizard’s BBQ anyway. It’s like, we had no chance at all.
Versus, “look, I’m healing you, we’re doing fine, we have a chance, AAAARGH, savemehelp, seriously, needhelphere, ohbuggerit” – see, that’s why we lost, we had a good chance but the other side was more competent and outmatched and out-organized us and ripped apart our healers (me included). At least we started out -having- a faint chance.
And the more healers the merrier. One healer is just asking to get raped by a sneaksy witch hunter. A pack of 4 pumping each other full of heals while going snicker snack slicey dicey will give any lone melee DPS a run for its money.
My altism also has led me into trying out something I normally don’t do – ranged DPS. Mostly because I’ve gotten too frustrated as an unhealed tank getting decimated by these jokers.
I’ve avoided the straight out offensive ranged dps for now because I prefer the Order Bright Wizard over its Destruction mirror – a near nekkid Sorceress (or -rer). Who cares about dark magic if I can be throwing *giggles insanely* Fire fire FIRE. *prances around with pyromaniac glee*
Well, maybe on another server, anyway.
The Squig Hunter looks interesting as a utility ranger-like DPS class, but plinking things full of arrows wasn’t quite the initial ‘magic glass cannon’ aspect I wanted to experience, so again, he keeps for another day.
That left the defensive ‘turret’-setup area-defence DPS class to experiment with. Dwarf engineers had been driving my Black Orc nuts, so I gave the mirror class, the Chaos Magus a try.
Amusingly, this finally seemed to be one class that ‘fit’ the Lycaeus moniker.
(I mean, a Black Orc named Lycaeus just wouldn’t make any sense, he wouldn’t get beyond pronouncing one syllable. I’m already using Stormscar for my Marauder cos it sounds a lot more Norse-y violent bragging rights over Lyc. And while I was initially thinking of naming the DoK Lycaeus, the son of a bitch elf stared back at me through the screen and said his name sounded much better starting with a “Mord-“ prefix type name.
But a noble dark archmage sort of bastard is just perfect for a Greek-Romanish wolf type name.)
Movement is unique, since the Magus floats around higher-than-thou on a Tzeentch disc. Funny bug in the character creation though, because after 15 seconds, this guy decided to float and flew his face beyond the screen so I couldn’t see what options I was changing. :)
He also feels a bit less mobile than my other characters. He can’t run away in a hurry. As I found out on a very badly imbalanced in Order’s favor scenario, which was all about being mobile enough to run to three areas to capture. Everybody ran off in various directions, I was puffing along behind, and when some pimped level 10s and 11s (near the upper limit, buffed out in renown gear) ran up to slice and dice the robe wearers… well, ouch. No chance whatsoever. I had tried to run, but it was a lost cause. Again, actually having a functioning tank + healer team around me might have helped. (Like such a thing exists in the first PUG scenario.)
Still, I found this fellow a monster in PvE situations. There’s nearly always a tank around to sponge off. All I need is five seconds set up time to conjure up my ‘turret’ – some type of pink or blue horror, and then me and my pet turn into a stationary sentry gun of destruction. I have spells for long range high damage sniping with longer cast times, some mid-range DoT/debuff spells that make me think of a WoW warlock, and one or two supershort range, decent but not great damage spells to defend against things that get into melee range.
I can also forsee some situations in RvR that this guy could get useful. Defending high ground areas. Especially in tandem with other Maguses. In big zerg standoffs where the melees don’t dare to approach each other, we could still snipe stuff, etc.
Anyhow, it was a nice change of perspective, especially since the class that I’ve settled on for a mostly-main is its nemesis. The melee-DPS brawler known as a Marauder.
I’ve come to the conclusion that I need to do decent damage in RvR. My playstyle tends toward being a wussy/canny survivor in PvP, ready to add on to a battle in progress to shift numbers from even to unfair in my favor, and being mobile and flanking things while having enough oomph in my attacks to either kill or be a significant distraction/impediment.
Plus being up close and personal hitting things with something sharp.
Tankiness is all very well. I can do it. I can play with collison detection and shoving my meaty green mass in between someone and my squishies. If I ever got decent cc skills, I can play the cc manipulate and control role right along with being tanky, but this assumes I actually have someone to be tanky FOR. Not to mention, a healer buddy that I can rely on.
I think it’s just not guaranteed to happen every time I log on. So why waste my time waiting for the team to align just perfectly when there are going to be guild mate tanks with their spouses as their pet healers, and other spare tanks with no healer companions?
Heck, we’ll play another role. Melee damage/debuffing, and squishy harassment. It’s not as core a function as tank+healer, but benefits very well from having such tank+healer teams in place. It can be done alone or as part of a group. I get to be even more mobile than most because I’m a brawler-type melee DPS rather than a stealther melee DPS, so I get a charge skill to add to runspeed, which is good for pursuit and capture objective/flag type games.
And I like the flexibility inherent in the class. I can pick one of three mutations at any time. One turns me into a single-target killing machine. Another is more of a throw-on-so-many-debuffs-you’re-no-longer-a-tank-or-healer sort of debuff spec. And the last is a cone AoE carnage spec, which should be good for chokepoints stuffed full of opposition or mass burning down of things in PvE.
I think the main problem is deciding which mutation to focus on and buff in my tier
tree. I’ll probably buff the single-target damage one because that’ll be useful both in my loner forays as well as in a group (more DPS on a boss or just plain dead people, nothing to sneeze at). But I like the option of converting into a debuff machine or aoe machine when the need arises. So I won’t do it as well as someone who’s spec’ed for it, but sometimes picking the right cheapo tool at the right time is more functional than an expensive tool for the wrong occasion.
I wonder what it says about the psyche of people like me who just gotta try it all?
My WAR compulsion has now led to a 4th planned alt. This successfully rounds off all four main archetypes from tank, healer, melee DPS to ranged DPS.
I guess I just like being in different parts of a fight depending on the situation and what I feel like doing at any time. And it’s just more effective for everyone if you’ve walked a mile in somebody else’s footsteps and know what makes it easier and harder for another to do their job and all, y’know?
Priorities have changed somewhat after trying them out though. I’d initially been dead set on playing a Black Orc first for the tankiness and lore immersion aspect, but I’ve been finding it a very slow starter whose lowbie levels are like pulling teeth. The combat mechanics of ‘hit ‘em’ ‘gud plan’ ‘best plan’ limit me to repeating the exact 1, 2, 4 button combination ad nauseam for the greater part of five to six levels, doing pathetic damage and having little opportunity to improve it because all the good gear goes to people who are actually DPSing or healing, while you don’t even get a taunt until level 7.
Admittedly, things begin to improve past level 8, with more abilities beginning to offer a bit more tactical choice and all the nifty defensive skills that you can use to protect people start arriving, but it takes an effort to get there.
The synergy of a healer attached to your tank’s butt is also important. If I had a guaranteed healer buddy that I could always play with, I would totally be there as a Black Orc. Not that it’s a healbot I’m looking for. On the contrary, I would actually have a FUNCTION. Because I do cruddy if passable damage, but am a great meatshield who will steadily get a bunch of ally buffs and cc/debuffs to mess around with an opponent. Not to mention, have someone to actually…y’know, guard and protect. With skills and collision detection and what not.
In essence, WAR has gotten tank function down pretty pat. It’s a great ally support class, with dps that is godawful and slowly gets to passable then decent and better in your teens. But it’s hard finding an ally to protect and who will top off your brimming health bar from an onslaught of 4-5 opponents.
Because as usual, few people are playing healers who actually heal. So what else is new?
I guess the news is that -I’m- about to enter the healer’s world as my class of second choice.
I have been finding the Disciple of Khaine exceedingly thrilling. I dual wield (so I’m like Drizzt on a really bad Chaos warpstone day) and can produce very decent melee DPS that is higher than my tank can. So far, I’ve two heal over times and I’ll probably get a few other lifesteal/single target heal things and group heals eventually.
I already stand out for the sheer novelty of actually bothering to heal other people from time to time, as opposed to all the other n00b DoKs who will stand and stare dully while their teammates, or me, or themselves are taking rapid nosedives in hp from the onslaught of opponents.
Being able to assign a defensive target as well as an offensive one is very freeing. It leaves me able to mix attack and heals at the drop of a hat, and I’m thrilled after the limitation of “you can only pick these two skills until you have a gud plan, and these other two skills can only be used with a best plan, and did we mention the best plan evaporates after what seems like 2 seconds, and your skill global cool down is 1.5 seconds, so you better be on the ball and not lag” to be able to pick what I want to cast now, when I want it, thank you.
At lowbie stages, healing is placed on a pedestal in terms of value and effectiveness. I confess to not being as keen to heal once people have learned to target healers first and foremost (and yes, the pansy dark elf in robes with two swords is a melee healer, not a melee DPS nor a tank, as opposed to the pansy high elf in robes and a big two hander who is an Order tank) and have gotten all their healing debuff act together…
…but I suppose past level 10, it’ll give the many people playing tanks (my guild seems to have a ton of people playing BOrc or Chosen) a chance to shine and actually put some guarding tactics to use. Pre-level 10, all I can do is try and keep out of the way, in the background, when there are way too many to fight. Which isn’t the best of situations for a melee healer, dammit. I should be right up there, next to and being guarded by a tank, and keeping the frontline healed while chopping stuff up. Not easy when you get focus fired and your tanks are a bit too dumb to notice or don’t have the abilities yet to save you from it.
Anyway, the success or failure of tanks and other characters seem to hinge critically on if there are enough healers around to sustain them, and I’m always so rotten tired of looking around on a tank and not getting any heals.
So by Khaine, I shall do the healing, dammit. I will heal to the best of my ability, which also means I have to get up close and hit crap, thank goodness, and I shall proceed to multitask both happily, and the only thing you PUG putzes have to do is stop me from getting focus fired if I get noticed (and I try hard not to be), and if I die (or decide running away is the better part of valor) because you can’t handle that, then you get to die too shortly after because your heals have gone bye-bye.
For some reason, this strikes me as a infinitely more “fair” and less frustrating situation than the first, because half the time I can’t even find the existence of any healers as a tank, and without them, I’m just meat for a bright wizard’s BBQ anyway. It’s like, we had no chance at all.
Versus, “look, I’m healing you, we’re doing fine, we have a chance, AAAARGH, savemehelp, seriously, needhelphere, ohbuggerit” – see, that’s why we lost, we had a good chance but the other side was more competent and outmatched and out-organized us and ripped apart our healers (me included). At least we started out -having- a faint chance.
And the more healers the merrier. One healer is just asking to get raped by a sneaksy witch hunter. A pack of 4 pumping each other full of heals while going snicker snack slicey dicey will give any lone melee DPS a run for its money.
My altism also has led me into trying out something I normally don’t do – ranged DPS. Mostly because I’ve gotten too frustrated as an unhealed tank getting decimated by these jokers.
I’ve avoided the straight out offensive ranged dps for now because I prefer the Order Bright Wizard over its Destruction mirror – a near nekkid Sorceress (or -rer). Who cares about dark magic if I can be throwing *giggles insanely* Fire fire FIRE. *prances around with pyromaniac glee*
Well, maybe on another server, anyway.
The Squig Hunter looks interesting as a utility ranger-like DPS class, but plinking things full of arrows wasn’t quite the initial ‘magic glass cannon’ aspect I wanted to experience, so again, he keeps for another day.
That left the defensive ‘turret’-setup area-defence DPS class to experiment with. Dwarf engineers had been driving my Black Orc nuts, so I gave the mirror class, the Chaos Magus a try.
Amusingly, this finally seemed to be one class that ‘fit’ the Lycaeus moniker.
(I mean, a Black Orc named Lycaeus just wouldn’t make any sense, he wouldn’t get beyond pronouncing one syllable. I’m already using Stormscar for my Marauder cos it sounds a lot more Norse-y violent bragging rights over Lyc. And while I was initially thinking of naming the DoK Lycaeus, the son of a bitch elf stared back at me through the screen and said his name sounded much better starting with a “Mord-“ prefix type name.
But a noble dark archmage sort of bastard is just perfect for a Greek-Romanish wolf type name.)
Movement is unique, since the Magus floats around higher-than-thou on a Tzeentch disc. Funny bug in the character creation though, because after 15 seconds, this guy decided to float and flew his face beyond the screen so I couldn’t see what options I was changing. :)
He also feels a bit less mobile than my other characters. He can’t run away in a hurry. As I found out on a very badly imbalanced in Order’s favor scenario, which was all about being mobile enough to run to three areas to capture. Everybody ran off in various directions, I was puffing along behind, and when some pimped level 10s and 11s (near the upper limit, buffed out in renown gear) ran up to slice and dice the robe wearers… well, ouch. No chance whatsoever. I had tried to run, but it was a lost cause. Again, actually having a functioning tank + healer team around me might have helped. (Like such a thing exists in the first PUG scenario.)
Still, I found this fellow a monster in PvE situations. There’s nearly always a tank around to sponge off. All I need is five seconds set up time to conjure up my ‘turret’ – some type of pink or blue horror, and then me and my pet turn into a stationary sentry gun of destruction. I have spells for long range high damage sniping with longer cast times, some mid-range DoT/debuff spells that make me think of a WoW warlock, and one or two supershort range, decent but not great damage spells to defend against things that get into melee range.
I can also forsee some situations in RvR that this guy could get useful. Defending high ground areas. Especially in tandem with other Maguses. In big zerg standoffs where the melees don’t dare to approach each other, we could still snipe stuff, etc.
Anyhow, it was a nice change of perspective, especially since the class that I’ve settled on for a mostly-main is its nemesis. The melee-DPS brawler known as a Marauder.
I’ve come to the conclusion that I need to do decent damage in RvR. My playstyle tends toward being a wussy/canny survivor in PvP, ready to add on to a battle in progress to shift numbers from even to unfair in my favor, and being mobile and flanking things while having enough oomph in my attacks to either kill or be a significant distraction/impediment.
Plus being up close and personal hitting things with something sharp.
Tankiness is all very well. I can do it. I can play with collison detection and shoving my meaty green mass in between someone and my squishies. If I ever got decent cc skills, I can play the cc manipulate and control role right along with being tanky, but this assumes I actually have someone to be tanky FOR. Not to mention, a healer buddy that I can rely on.
I think it’s just not guaranteed to happen every time I log on. So why waste my time waiting for the team to align just perfectly when there are going to be guild mate tanks with their spouses as their pet healers, and other spare tanks with no healer companions?
Heck, we’ll play another role. Melee damage/debuffing, and squishy harassment. It’s not as core a function as tank+healer, but benefits very well from having such tank+healer teams in place. It can be done alone or as part of a group. I get to be even more mobile than most because I’m a brawler-type melee DPS rather than a stealther melee DPS, so I get a charge skill to add to runspeed, which is good for pursuit and capture objective/flag type games.
And I like the flexibility inherent in the class. I can pick one of three mutations at any time. One turns me into a single-target killing machine. Another is more of a throw-on-so-many-debuffs-you’re-no-longer-a-tank-or-healer sort of debuff spec. And the last is a cone AoE carnage spec, which should be good for chokepoints stuffed full of opposition or mass burning down of things in PvE.
I think the main problem is deciding which mutation to focus on and buff in my tier
tree. I’ll probably buff the single-target damage one because that’ll be useful both in my loner forays as well as in a group (more DPS on a boss or just plain dead people, nothing to sneeze at). But I like the option of converting into a debuff machine or aoe machine when the need arises. So I won’t do it as well as someone who’s spec’ed for it, but sometimes picking the right cheapo tool at the right time is more functional than an expensive tool for the wrong occasion.
Saturday, September 06, 2008
Doctor Stranglelove: How I learned to stop worrying and love the Bub
I haven't been gaming much recently. The looming January deadline is becoming too close for comfort and now I have to get two papers out simultaneously. Still, when I have time, I pop into good old CoH. Here, the simplicity of play that comes from two years of experience makes for a very relaxing hour or two.
I'm rather liking my plant/force fields controller. It is such a lazytroller. I almost do not have to use my control powers, because force fields is really good at what it does: raising defence. Controller bubbles are weaker than defender bubbles, but with one more controller or defender around the entire team becomes invincible.
Since I am not that much of a slacker, I throw Seeds of Confusion out. Mostly, I just toss two bubbles on each teammate every two minutes.
Stop worrying about crowd control and being anal about lockdown.
Just love the Bub.
Bub bub bub bub bub....
Friday, September 05, 2008
Nowhere Land
Been an odd sort of week.
Mild depression. Could be hormonal. That part of the monthly cycle and all.
Also, MMO withdrawal. After a month of dedicated play to one game and deciding to stop, there's this aimless "no avatar to improve" feeling.
Puttered around with Portal. Done. Endgame song is cute. Made by Jonathan Coulton, I hear. Have always been a fan of Code Monkey.
Speaking of which, they made a Portal spin-off song "The Device Has Been Modified" which got used in Ashcraft's CoX video about Freakshow and Nemesis - which only proves the geek world is a ridiculously small one. Half thinking of joining in the contest, but feeling lazy about it. Maybe this weekend.
Tinkered with Team Fortress 2. It was okay for a while, but I truly miss grenades. They've over-purified TF2, I think. The class roles are now too stratified to stay interesting for long. As an engineer, I'm now chained to my sentry gun since I have nothing but a shotgun to offer me a chance of killing anyone. As a medic, you are now a shadow with a healing gun to pump other teammates full of hitpoints, you can't conc jump and be a potent offensive force anymore.
Removing the VIP escort missions also took away some of the charm, I think. Now it's all "capture the flag" or "take control points" or "push a payload to some point" = attack/defend, attack/defend, attack/defend, ad nauseam.
It would probably be better once all of the updates for all classes are in, so that you could gain achievements and feel rewarded for what you're doing. At the moment, only the Heavy, the Medic and the Pyro has achievements to unlock, so those classes tend to be overplayed. Not to mention, I note some "achievement farm" maps that have sprung up like mushrooms. It sickens me. So these people just purposefully jump through hoops and fulfill all the criteria to unlock their nifty weapon - so they can fry me with more extra numbers.
The one positive is that they've done away with the kill/deaths number. It's all a "Score" now, so team focused activities can put you higher on the ranking than some kill-hungry sniper.
Ultimately, 3-4 days of repeating this felt a bit hollow. That makes me slightly concerned about WAR, since it's built around the same idea, but I figure that the lengthier pace will give a greater sense of accomplishment.
Lounged about in LOTRO since I was missing the MMO feel. I can still barely level, but I earned enough money to keep my house going, and did a few quests. Ran around in monster play a little bit. They have open groups too, in Monster Play, which is quite nice, though I always feel a bit inferior joining since I have zero infamy ranking, and the rest of them are like elite kill veterans.
Ironically, the enforced isolation did wonders for my creativity. Without an MMO avatar taking up the forefront of my mind, my imagination started spinning just enough for me to sit down and type out one or two pages of 'story' and did a bit of solo roleplaying for an hour or two.
Also read a few books.
Preview Weekend Plus for WAR is starting this weekend though. Heh heh heh heh heh.
Mild depression. Could be hormonal. That part of the monthly cycle and all.
Also, MMO withdrawal. After a month of dedicated play to one game and deciding to stop, there's this aimless "no avatar to improve" feeling.
Puttered around with Portal. Done. Endgame song is cute. Made by Jonathan Coulton, I hear. Have always been a fan of Code Monkey.
Speaking of which, they made a Portal spin-off song "The Device Has Been Modified" which got used in Ashcraft's CoX video about Freakshow and Nemesis - which only proves the geek world is a ridiculously small one. Half thinking of joining in the contest, but feeling lazy about it. Maybe this weekend.
Tinkered with Team Fortress 2. It was okay for a while, but I truly miss grenades. They've over-purified TF2, I think. The class roles are now too stratified to stay interesting for long. As an engineer, I'm now chained to my sentry gun since I have nothing but a shotgun to offer me a chance of killing anyone. As a medic, you are now a shadow with a healing gun to pump other teammates full of hitpoints, you can't conc jump and be a potent offensive force anymore.
Removing the VIP escort missions also took away some of the charm, I think. Now it's all "capture the flag" or "take control points" or "push a payload to some point" = attack/defend, attack/defend, attack/defend, ad nauseam.
It would probably be better once all of the updates for all classes are in, so that you could gain achievements and feel rewarded for what you're doing. At the moment, only the Heavy, the Medic and the Pyro has achievements to unlock, so those classes tend to be overplayed. Not to mention, I note some "achievement farm" maps that have sprung up like mushrooms. It sickens me. So these people just purposefully jump through hoops and fulfill all the criteria to unlock their nifty weapon - so they can fry me with more extra numbers.
The one positive is that they've done away with the kill/deaths number. It's all a "Score" now, so team focused activities can put you higher on the ranking than some kill-hungry sniper.
Ultimately, 3-4 days of repeating this felt a bit hollow. That makes me slightly concerned about WAR, since it's built around the same idea, but I figure that the lengthier pace will give a greater sense of accomplishment.
Lounged about in LOTRO since I was missing the MMO feel. I can still barely level, but I earned enough money to keep my house going, and did a few quests. Ran around in monster play a little bit. They have open groups too, in Monster Play, which is quite nice, though I always feel a bit inferior joining since I have zero infamy ranking, and the rest of them are like elite kill veterans.
Ironically, the enforced isolation did wonders for my creativity. Without an MMO avatar taking up the forefront of my mind, my imagination started spinning just enough for me to sit down and type out one or two pages of 'story' and did a bit of solo roleplaying for an hour or two.
Also read a few books.
Preview Weekend Plus for WAR is starting this weekend though. Heh heh heh heh heh.