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KI Teases Earthquake Fairness in Test Realm

So, after my big ranty rant last week about Wizard101, addressing the Earthquake spell exploit in PvP, and how the cash-shop equipment making it possible for anyone to buy the highest PvP title in the game, KingsIsle goes and launches the test realm today.

One of the updates being tested? Earthquake will no longer remove stun shields.

If this makes it to the live realm, and actually WORKS, I’ll be impressed.

There’s lots of other updates to truly be excited about, including the much-desired ability (for cash) to change the appearance of your wand/sword. New pets, new spells, and new content (the Wintertusk area, which is linked to the storyline in Grizzleheim). There’s also a new dungeon (i.e., optional quest area with high-quality drops) for players who have hit the level max.

I’ll investigate the Test Realm for a few days before asking you to suffer through an in-depth analysis. But I’ll leave you with this thought:

When will KI realize it’s not too smart to release new questing areas if they aren’t going to raise the level cap at the same time?

/facepalm

[Rift] Not My Problem

I am in the mid-high level zone of Moonshade Highlands still. My vacation slowed me down for a week. I am pretty sure I am nearly finished with it being level 41 and nearing the final Guardian quest hub. I am starting to see an interesting change in these lower populated zones, especially during the week (i.e., even lower pop.). It sadly reminds me of Warhammer Online’s descent. The problem is that fewer people care about lonely rifts that open up. Invasions still seem to draw a raid group or two since they give rarer tokens and an achievement if beaten. Rifts, especially major ones, seem to be drawing less people.

Continue reading [Rift] Not My Problem

[GW2] One Unique Snowflake

At the beginning of charr week, there was one interview at Now Gamer that asked broader questions including one that touched upon one I’ve had for awhile. What are race and profession conventions?

Unlike other some other MMOs, all races in Guild Wars 2 will be allowed to play all professions. Therefore, a height-challenged asura could become an aggressive warrior or a hulking norn could become a sneaky thief. My first lore-based thought came with the release of the guardian. The guardian professions had mechanical ancestry with the Guild Wars monks. Monks drew their power from the human gods. Where did the guardians draw their power from, especially the godless charr (and quasi-scientific asura)?

Continue reading [GW2] One Unique Snowflake

[GW2] Charr Rule

How can this iconic Guild Wars race get any cooler? Their pseudo-leader is named Smodur the Unflinching. They are badass. Possibly one of the most badass fantasy/sci-fi races ever created, especially on the protagonist side. Take the hardness and grimness of Sparta, the structure and purpose of Ancient Rome, and make them anthropomorphic, meat-eating predators.

I remember an old Ang Lee interview where the director talked about making the movie Hulk where he really wanted to play up that childish impulse to just smash things recklessly. It plays to our id, if you will, that we usually repress so we can have nice things and bigger wallets. The charr are the Guild Wars 2 race that call to similar primal instincts to dominate, to bully, and to win at any possible costs. Hey look, Guild Wars 2 is also a PvP game that will attract PvP players.

Continue reading [GW2] Charr Rule

Who’s getting it their way now? The Saga of the Burger King Amulet continues

Remember that I’ve previously asserted that I’m not President of the KingsIsle fan club. Here be well-founded anger.

On Friday, April 8th, the Test Realm for Wizard101 opened to test new equipment. These amulets allows a player to convert otherwise school-specific double-powered pips (sort of like combo points) for equal-strength use in a different school. For example, if you play Ice school you could buy a Myth school amulet and have essentially the same power with Myth spells.

The amulets went live in a shockingly short amount of time: the following Wednesday, April 13th. In more than two years of playing the game, since five months after its release, I have never seen anything move from test realm to live so rapidly. I can’t fathom why KingsIsle moved so quickly. They knew, without a doubt, that the programming on this equipment was clearly, deeply and unfairly flawed in regards to the PvP component of the game.
Continue reading Who’s getting it their way now? The Saga of the Burger King Amulet continues

Interview with the Gaiscioch Guild

I went a different route in Rift, and I joined a very large guild, The Gaiscioch Family. Usually I join guilds with about 40-50 members or smaller so this has been a much different experience for me. I am finding in an open-grouping MMO game, specifically Rift, the larger guild has provided a great experience. I wanted to interview the guild leader, Foghladha, about some of the unique aspects of a “mega-guild” or one big family.

What’s your elevator proposal for joining Gaiscioch?

The Gaiscioch Family began in November of 2001 as a channel for people of similar hobbies to make new friends by participating in something they already have in common. Our roots are set in the Celtic Mythological Cycle and take the name Gaiscioch from the Lebor Gabála Érenn where a group of Warriors chosen by the Tuatha de Danaan — The Celtic Gods — to fight along their side in the First Battle of Moyturna. These warriors not only displayed honor to their own troops but to the enemy troops as well. They took the time to teach the Fir Bolg warriors their technologies, their weaponry, and teach them to use it in hopes that the battle would be more fair for both sides.

This type of thinking is exactly where the Gaiscioch family has grown to become. We are an outward thinking family who looks to improve the community that they are part of by hosting large scale public events open to everyone including the opposite faction. They organize server wide events and provide them with the publicity for people to hear about and flock to attend. While most “Guilds” focus inward and strive to make their own better, the Gaiscioch strive to make the whole server better. Our focus is on community development and involvement and with this comes several benefits and several curses.

The Gaiscioch Family has consistently grown over the past decade reaching over 1,400 members from all around the globe. We feature an out of game leveling system within the family which rewards members from participating together through gaining ranks, badges, achievements, and even family currency called Family Vault Credits. Using family vault credits you can purchase things from the family Marketplace, or request resources to help fill crafting orders. We have a dungeon planner system in place to help people find others who need the same dungeons at the same time and have one of the most in detail list of guides and discovery locations on the web. With thousands of members you will rarely have trouble finding a group.

Continue reading Interview with the Gaiscioch Guild

Shades of Zoo

A zoo is a different kind of theme park, but there are many different kinds of zoos. Guild Wars 2 fans are trying to envision that upcoming game through the lens of Rift. I wouldn’t say it’s like comparing apples and oranges, but it might be better to say the arena is Disney’s Animal Kingdom versus the San Diego Zoo. Disney’s Animal Kingdom is on the borderline of being a theme park in the harshest MMO sense. The caretakers call the exhibits “stages” or “sets” (my former zookeeper wife couldn’t exactly remember), and they want every zoo patron to see exactly the same experience. On the other hand, San Diego Zoo is a “progressive” zoo, which seeks to put the animals in as natural a cage as possible without it being a nature reserve.

Like real zoos, MMOs with dynamic event systems can vary along these shades of gray as well. In Rift, events are like a calling. I drop everything I am doing and run towards the rift, invasion, or my favorite a planar tear, which I can open with a skill to start a rift. They are the exciting thing going on when the rest is filler by comparison. It gets even more interesting, in a Skinner sense, when players are rewarded more so for attacking specific colors of rifts, such as death in the latest world event Grim Harvest. I’ve seen other players completely ignore, for example, a dominating life invasion to go for that one death rift in the corner of the map. In Guild Wars 2, since everything was an event, I didn’t really care whether there were other players or how active the event was. I just went where I wanted to play during the demo because activity was everywhere.

Continue reading Shades of Zoo

Apparently On Break

Noticing that I was on my 3rd or 4th flash game of the weekend, I concluded that I was probably about done with The Lord of the Rings Onlineâ„¢ for a while. I lack that urge to log in and play, and I wonder if I would have made it this far without the motivation of an alt. That alt is at 58.95 or so, just about through Moria except that her epic book is starting 2.5.5, which is rather good these days what with the new skirmishes. Highly enjoyable and recommended, although the 21st Hall was the least exciting of the three. This is also the point at which I burned out the last time I used an alt to keep me going in-game: I finished pushing that Minstrel to 60 and have rarely taken him outside the 21st Hall since.

I won one of the lotteries from my.lotro.com this week, but the prize never arrived in the character’s mail. Then I did not feel like bothering to pursue it. Then I realized that I must really be ready for a break.

: Zubon

Difficulty

Spinks comments, inspired by Pete:

I’m firmly in this camp where feeling overly threatened by a game just makes me turn it off. When I see a hard mode, I automatically think, “Oh it’ll be too hard for me,” and switch it to normal (or easier) even though I’m a fairly experienced gamer.

Pete suggests that he is old and the reflexes are failing, but I submit another explanation: anyone in that age bracket grew up with Nintendo hard games that featured a lot of fake difficulty, and since everything has “RPG elements” now, fake longevity. We have seen “hard” done badly hundreds of times, versus some smaller number of good challenges.

If you tell me that this next mission is really hard, it could be because the developers have an interesting encounter that will force me to re-examine my usual tactics, react quickly, and understand complex patterns. It could also be that this next mission expects me to grind levels/gear for hours, memorize a Battletoads-like series of arbitrary dance moves, escort fast and suicidal NPCs, deal with a drunken camera, and/or guess the one trick someone thought would be a “clever puzzle.” Unless a trusted source tells me otherwise, I am likely to assume that “hard” means “unfair.” Someone has already consumed the benefit of that doubt a dozen times over.

: Zubon