SWTOR – Hindsight Nostalgia

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From both Wilhelm’s post, and Shintar’s reply.

I wrote a LOT about SWTOR in the day – nearly 1/3rd of tagged gaming posts were about this.  I’ve always been fascinated by MMOs, and the Star Wars mythos has held a special place for many years.  When SWTOR was announced, I was giddy.  Even when the Lightsabers were 3x larger than normal.  I seem to recall the main pitch

  • The mystical 4th pillar of story
  • The feeling of a hero vs the masses.  Less busywork, more large scale fights
  • The ability to support a grey playtstyle
  • Applying lessons learned from other MMOs, with a focus on accessible content

I played beta from the first day until launch.  I submitted more than my share of bugs, I interacted with the devs, I wrote very long guides, I wrote DPS calcultors, I played a stupid number of hours and was one of the first folk to hit 50.

I was playing up until the massive server merges (90% population drop from launch) and go back maybe every 18 months for a look around.

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Finally dead. (that is a busy UI)

If we consider an MMO launch to be the first 3 months after go live, then SWTOR was a massive failure.  It was riddled with bugs, the max level content was almost non-existent, the professions were broken, the social tools didn’t work, the loading/travel screens were ultra long, PvP wasn’t balanced, and the Hero engine clearly had issues.  The F2P conversion will certainly go down in history as the floor from which no other game could possibly reach.

Still, let’s cover those larger points – in relation to the game at/near launch.

The 4th Pillar

We were spoiled rotten with KOTOR 1 & 2.  Expectations were set for a multiplayer KOTOR 3.  I would say that Act 1 supported that notion… then it just died as the game grew on.  The planets and storylines from Act 3 onwards were very bland, and there was simply too much Darth Malgus.  The Imperial Agent class storyline was amazing, but that simply shone a negative light on most of the Light side classes.  It was somewhat clear that it was more than could be chewed upon.

The idea behind dungeon storylines was neat, but after the 10th run, you had memorized every speech.  It was a race to skip dialogue.  Which also impacted the overall replayability of a game.

Companion storylines were all over the map, some with really interesting backgrounds and other were just a background for your story.  I really like Khem Val, much better than Talos Drellik.  And Skadge… that guy didn’t work.  The issue here was that you had a primary companion that you enjoyed, and the others just sat there.  Very little dynamic between them.  And to unlock more stories from them, you needed to feed them with gifts.  Where Dragon Age and KOTOR always had 2 with you, this seemed like really cool idea that just didn’t pan out as well as it could have.

Do You Want to be a Hero?

The idea of being the savior of a galaxy is certainly intriguing.  The storyline certainly pushed that mind set, and the leveling content with class story quests was big on that idea (for most classes at least).  But it broke down with the masses.  How many heroes can there be?  It’s certainly better than green jesus in Cataclsym, or Yrel/Khadgar in WoD – as your character was essentially an assistant to the in-game heroes.

In terms of actual gameplay, this did work out for single player content.  Quite a few personal instances had you taking out a veritable army of opponents.  It felt epic.  Group content… that part was painful.  The Hero engine just couldn’t give the right amount of data to players to figure out what to do next.  Interrupt, move, defend, attack…it’s hard enough against 1 large foe – but 5 or more?  The enemies had to be down-tuned to trash mode.

I’ll compare to the depiction of Legolas in the LOTR trilogy.  His level of awesomeness in combat has nothing to do with his ability to react, but everything to do with his ability to turn enemies into fodder.  It’s almost pure offense.  We have that in MMOs.  It’s called AE grinding.  Never in Star Wars would you see a hero take on 5 enemies in a climatic battle.

All told, I think the system worked better after that realization came to pass.

Grey Playstyle

It was certainly possible to play a grey playstyle.  You were just punished for it, due to the MMO mechanics.  The best loot and power items were locked into deep alignment requirements.  This was probably the first bit of beta feedback I had, and the problem arguably got worse after launch with even more alignment-focused items were deployed.

So if you did end up playing grey for most of it, and wanted to swap, there was a fair bit of grinding involved.  I do think this system worked well, if you ignore the rewards handed out for alignment.  Especially if you turn off the light/dark visual cues for decisions.

Lessons Learned from other MMOs

When SWTOR launched, MMOs were in the transition from slog fests to games of convenience.  LFG may not have been the best thing for WoW but it was miles better than EQ’s version of finding other people to play with.  SWTOR had no real social or grouping tools at launch… or for 6 months after launch.

Alt support, through the Legacy system was pretty neat.  I think this was one of the few highlights from SWTOR that other games should have attempted to replicate.

Role balance for leveling was ok, but had some balance tweaks needed.  It wasn’t really practical to level as a healer with a tank companion.  It also heavily favored specific companions for leveling, even if you may have found another one more interesting.  The concept of any companion filling any role took a bit too long to come to fruition – but again this was due to the MMO mechanics getting in the way of the storytelling.

Travel took forever (loading zones!) and the zones with the most travel tax were empty (Illium).  While it was fun exploring Hoth, there were limits to the sanity of a player spending more time travelling to have fun, than the actual duration of the event.

I’d talk about crafting, but the less said the better.

Side quests were a near requirement for progress.  Which is fine, if those side quests have any merit.  They often didn’t, had horrible respawn timers, significant bugs, and moving from one area to the next was train city.

Stat balance was all over the place.  In nearly all cases, Alacrity (haste) was a downside as it certainly made you attack faster, but that caused your ‘mana’ to drain faster too – with no way to speed up recovery.  Ooh, this one brings back memories.

Player-driven story elements.  Remember that SWTOR triggered the shut down of Star Wars Galaxies, which was mostly player driven (NGE excepted).  People really wanted to set up their own piece of the large world, and SWTOR allowed next to no flexibility in that regard.

PvP had a really interesting mechanic where if you were sub-50, your stats were buffed to level 50.  The downside was that actual level 50 players had much worse stats – so it was better to be level 49.  PvP zones were randomized based on faction balance, and the only zone that allowed the same 2 factions was Huttball.  So PvP ended up being something like 90% Huttball.  I loved me some Huttball!  But PvP gear scaling, and pre-made groups really took that fun away quickly.

Sense of ownership.  At launch, the only piece that was yours was the spaceship.  Sure, everyone had one, but it did feel like it was yours once inside.  It took a long while to get personal quarters – and even then it’s not exactly intuitive or easy to make work.  Better than most other games mind you.

Overall

The biggest challenge for SWTOR was trying to be one game while delivering another.  It really wanted to be KOTOR 3, but was also clearly mandated to be a WoW copy.  For every risk it wanted to take with telling a story, it was shackled by the MMO construct of number-based progress.

It lacked the tools (Hero engine) and the experience (this is another long post) to build a real number-based MMO.  It needed a solid 6 months of more work before launch in order to iron out the bugs and build the social tools to keep people connected.  SWTOR today is a much different game, with many of those earlier mis-steps corrected.  It’s both unfortunate that it had to learn the lessons the hard way, and good that we still have it around.

Nailed It

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And I was just throwing some bull to the wind at that!

Be forewarned, this is more rant than much else.

Wyatt Cheng

I think it’s fair to say that Diablo 3 would not be here today without Wyatt at the helm.  He took the junk that Jay Wilson delivered and somehow managed to give us Reaper of Souls.  Seasons, real legendaries, Kunai’s Cube, sets that mattered, balanced skills, adventure mode, nephalem rifts, GRs, drop rate changes, and the removal of the auction house.

At no point does anyone question Wyatt’s devotion to the Diablo franchise.

The people who Wyatt works for… those are the ones that put him on stage this weekend.

Diablo Immortal

It exists and I honestly thought it would be a great April fool’s joke when I posted earlier.  I have tried a few dozen ARPG games on mobile – all of them follow the exact same formula.  The best ones are fun for a week or two, never past that point.  It’s the limitations of the medium.  Certainly it supports the infinite grind.  Mobile is all about infinite grind.  What’s missing is the controls. (and the monetization, but there’s no details on that so I’ll skip it)

Controls from the perspective of people who will sink hundreds of hours into detailed and complex builds.  The quick info that I’ve read from the demo that proves that point with gusto.  The Barbarian build works due to whirlwind being a caster-centered AE attack.  The Monk struggles a bit more since you need to aim some attacks.  The Wizard doesn’t work since you need to aim almost everything, and some attacks have such a large wind up time that the creatures are dead before you get the cast off.  Will the game make money?  For sure.  Will the playerbase be those that went to Blizzcon?  No way.

And that is entirely the problem.

Head in Butt Syndrome

There’s a problem in large companies where people are conditioned to believe that they are correct and the client is not.  In most cases, those companies are taking advantage of a specific customer base and ignore both their feedback and the trends, while making disastrous decisions with long term impacts.

Kodak is right up there.  US automakers are a group that nearly everyone was impacted by.  At the ground level, the people who are helping the customers see the extremely boneheaded decisions.  Their feedback is either ignored, or so filtered that it’s near useless when it reaches the people who make the actual decisions.  Marketing seems to run all.  It takes a heck of a management team to course correct, or tell the execs that they are wrong… and great execs to demand that type of team.

I think we’re at the point now where it’s pretty clear that gamer-first culture is gone at Blizzard.   The ridiculousness of WoW’s BfA work.  The tone deaf responses on Hearthstone until M:TG launched.  HotS which still can’t seem to find forward progress.  Overwatch is one space where it seems to have something positive going – this from Kaplan.

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Does it make sense to make Blizzard Immortal?  From a business perspective, 100%.  They should have a ton more presence in mobile.  Does it make sense to have people PAY to come see you and decide to launch a product you KNOW they don’t want?  In what world would you run your own convention and get booed?  Wyatt knows this.  Everyone that has ever set foot at Blizzcon knows this.  That they decided to make this the item of discussion for this year is insulting to everyone involved – both fans and developers.

All Could Have Been Avoided

Blizz built the hype, which was pretty clear after 6 years that people were looking for something.  They tried to douse expectations, but that ship had clearly sailed.  Instead of just dropping this with nothing else (and no release date), they could have pitched a new D3 class with a TBD date.  They could have announced a D2 remaster, with a TBD date.  They could have just had a D4 trailer with pure cinematics, and a TBD date.

Or they could have simply waited to announce Immortal until a PAX-like event, or in Asia where 95% of the playerbase is going to be anyhow (like they did with Starcraft 2).  Hearthstone wasn’t even announced at Blizzcon – it was at PAX.  That makes sense since CCG games were already at PAX.

Blizzard is a billion dollar company, with some of the most hardcore fans on the planet.  It dwarfs all competition in terms of self-run conventions (EvE would likely be 2nd).  The company knew what it was doing.  Any possible defense to the opposite would mean that someone needs to be fired for incompetence.  A 10 minute google search would have told you that.  A 10 second visit to any fan forum would have made that super clear.

Customer Service

And to be again quite clear, none of the people that were on stage deserve any personal attacks.  They do however deserve every snarky comment.  They are the face of the company, just like any help desk agent would be. For every ovation a presenter may get, it comes with the risk of heckling and boos.

Someone isn’t toxic when they disagree with you.  They are toxic when they focus on the personal aspects rather than the business decisions.  There’s plenty of hyperbole.  The world is ending nonsense. But it’s a drop in the bucket compared to say, LoL chat.

What really sucks here is that clearly the fans and the developers are highly invested in the franchise.  A near 25 year relationship.  The players are looking around at things like Path of Exile, or Torchlight:Frontiers and wondering how their BFF Wyatt can improve on that model.  There is a still an opportunity here for dialogue.

Other Sites Feeback

Bears and Horses

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Not so much lions and tigers.

Some folks have seen the videos about hunting in RDR2.  Aside from the fact that there are so many animals around, the actual act of hunting is relatively close to real life.  The location, light, movement, noise, and weapon type all impact the success rate.

One quest related to hunting a legendary bear.  It teaches the basics, and then drops you down to finish the job at your leisure.  You learn about hunting rabbits, making a campsite, cooking food, benefits of sleep, and how to craft bait.  Then the game give syou back control/

The seas were angry that day!  I plugged that bear at least 4 times with shots to the head and he still bull-rushed me.  Somehow I was able to get the hunting knife to take him out, then skin him for the pelt.

Apparently there are plenty of legendary creatures in the wild – they show up on the map when you are in their range (VERY large range I may add).  Kill, skin, then bring the pelt to the Trapper.  That then opens us some unique clothing options, based on the animal pelts.  But….

I mentioned before how things were slow in RDR2? The bear you find is next to O’Creah’s Run.  The Trapper seems close, but it’s a 5 minute canter to get to him.  During that time, I crossed:

  • A lady pinned by a dead horse, who I could not escort home due to the pelt on my horse.
  • A horse thief
  • A massive herd of deer
  • Was run over by a wagon

Trapper met, sold the pelt for $60 and didn’t buy the now-available $40 bear skin hat.  Looks sweet as heck, but I need the cash for something else.

Now the trek from the Trapper to anywhere I know is extremely long.  And there’s no way to speed up that type of travel except with better stats on the horse.  I had a large draft horse (War-type if I recall).  Strong but slow.  Internets to the rescue!

Polygon has a quick piece on the White Arabian, a top tier horse that I could simply capture in the wild.  Sadly, he is at the NW point of the map and the Trapper is pretty close to the middle.  It was at least 15 minutes of horse travel to get there.  Lessons learned on this trek.

  • Cinematic mode will auto-pilot your horse if you have a waypoint marked, and if you are on real road.
  • Cinematic mode will not avoid trains, or trees, or gangs, or toll bridges
  • Cinematic mode goes at the 2nd slowest possible speed.  Just above grass growing.
  • RDR2 seems to have random (?) events show up on the trail every couple minutes to compensate for the very long travel times
  • Drawing a weapon through a bad button press while at a toll bridge will kill you
  • Manual saves are located in the pause menu, under Story.
  • Finding a white horse in snow is hard
  • Taming a wild horse requires a very slow and deliberate movements
  • Riding a bucking horse in the woods is hard
  • You need to swap the saddle from your main horse to the new one, then manually call that original horse while travelling so as not to lose it
  • The travel time from anywhere to anywhere is directly related to your personal sense of urgency
  • It is oddly relaxing to pet/brush a horse

 

Going through this I’m reminded of the elevator scenes in the original Mass Effect.  They were glorified loading screens of just nothing meaningful.  RDR2 is astoundingly slow – and it’s clearly intentional due to the events you come across.  It feels like an ancient relic in game design.  It is my largest struggle with the game.  I find myself turning auto-pilot on and then doing something else for 5-10 minutes.  This isn’t FO4 or Skyrim, where you want to explore and find neat new niches that hide other environments.  There are no interior environments in RDR2 – what you see on the map is what’s there.  Exploring serves no larger purpose than expanding the map. You may find a random event, but that event starts and ends on the map (like saving someone from a wolf attack).  It doesn’t go farther (that I’ve yet to see).

In that sense, travel in RDR2 is a tax on time.  Staring at my character on a horse for 15 minutes at a time is not fun.  There’s bound to be a balance here to make travel meaningful without it being painful.  I need to change that mindset is order to find more enjoyment of the rest of the game.

The Slower Speed

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RDR2 is slow.  Infuriatingly slow.  Purposefully slow.

I’m down from the mountains and the snow, which is essentially the tutorial section of the game.  I’m now in the town of Valentine, which is where the game proper opens up.  Pieces of the game are still opening up to me.  Bounties, the concept of snitches, bar fights, sub-missions, general stores, stealing horses, exploratory events…  It’s starting to feel like a never ending list of things to do.

But they always seem tempered by game speed.

The bar fight is a good example, where in many games it’s more about offense and active dodging.  Here, it’s about methodically taking apart your opponent with strikes, chokes, blocks, and movement.  God of War may have a 10 hit combo chain, here you have starts and stops of fisticuffs.  It’s both jarring and oddly realistic.

Even the time spent between the various events is slow.  The distance from town to camp is a solid 3 minutes of just following a road/trail.  The farther a task takes you away from a hub, the longer it takes for you to get back to said hub.  You know this is a factor since when you complete a task it actually has timed targets in order to increase your rank in said task (e.g. getting a bronze medal).

Yet I am in no way motivated to do any of these things faster. I’m in no rush to complete anything faster than the game projects the options.  And in an immersive sense, this works wonderfully.  If you can find the time to sit down, play through, and just enjoy the experience.  It doesn’t work at all if life is pulling you in a dozen directions, or if you have but a moment to spare.  It doesn’t work if you are playing any other game and jumping between.  It is the antithesis to real life.

But good golly is it rewarding when you take it in.  When you consider the effort put into each little detail.  The fact that your hair grows and you need to keep it clean/trim is an insane detail that someone must have dreamt of. The mo-cap details for some of the interactions (and there are seemingly infinite interactions) are spot on.  Even things we take for granted, like camera angles, are in nearly all cases put in the perfect spot to capture what’s going on.

The purposeful slow approach to this game really makes you take in all the pieces.  I am continually amazed at what pops around the corner.

Red, Dead, and a Full Hard Drive

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92gigs.  I can still remember when floppies had massive games.

I could pay more for better download speeds, but I don’t need to.  Netflix on 2 boxes is about the peak requirement, and that’s a really rare occurrence.  Downloading on Steam + Netflix… well I need to throttle Steam.  This sucker made my internet melt for 8 hours.

Slight gripe to start.  I’m struggling to figure out why this isn’t on PC, or at least scheduled to be. It’s the same engine as GTAV…

The Start of the End

RDR1 is set after this game, so we have a decent idea going in how this thing will bookmark.  The starting intro cards also speak about the end of the wild west, as the east’s laws start coming across.  Pretty clear this story will not be a cheerful one.

The game proper starts you off in a blizzard.  I’ve seen a fair my fair share of snow storms, and rarely are they well represented in games.  The visuals here are super solid, really capturing the desolation of snow.  No one sounds like they are in a Blizzard though.  And the way everyone’s tracks are not only captured in the snow, but maintained for a long time…that’s got to be first.

(Sidenote.  In Spider-Man, they recorded all of his lines twice.  One at normal rate, another to simulate him exerting himself while moving across town.  That touch was super immersive.  So far, all the lines in RDR2 sound like they came from a recording studio.)

The first couple missions are just intro work.  The starter has you enter a firefight while searching for food.  In one, you see how John Marsten (main guy in RDR1) got his scars.  In another you attack another camp with your seeming arch-rival.  They are exposition quests that provide fancy tutorials.

I won’t sugar coat this; the controls are like molasses and the UI is attrocious.  The number of button presses and menu options is so very high. It is so jarring as compared to pretty much any other modern game (God of War really hit a new benchmark for me).  It’s almost justifiable since it’s not like the West had auto-rifles, or accelerators.  It feels much more like a simulation in that sense.  But then you get things like auto-aim, or auto-navigation.  It’s a weird mix.  I’m not sold on it.

Simulate Me

You need food to stay healthy, you need to keep your horse in health, you need to keep the gun clean, you need to rest, you need….That’s the entry fee for just playing the rest of the game.  I’m not a fan of survival games.  Primarily because they do such a horrible job showing what survival really is about.  Survival isn’t about eating one of the 100 cookies you have in your bag.  Survival is about never having enough.

I am really early in the story, but that’s certainly the theme all around.  Surviving in the world when your type of life is on the way out.  The characters all have an air of desperation, of defeat, of one more hill to climb.  They are somewhat sympathetic.  Feels a bit like rooting for the most likeable bad guy.

I think the series Firefly did the best job of showing what it’s like to live out on the edge of civilization.  Mal had his own way of thinking, but it failed as often as it worked.  They never made it big, but were always chasing the next big score.  They had their own set of moral code to follow.  It worked because everyone was a bad guy.  Mal is isolation would come off as a jerk – put him in a room full of jerks and he’s pretty OK.

I’m certainly looking forward to RDR2’s story moving forward.  Rockstar’s characters have always been impressive, and I’d expect no less here.  Going to take a long time to get through it all.

Star Wars Existential

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I’ve been pretty firm in my overall dislike of the direction take in The Last Jedi.  It would be fair to say that the general mood isn’t positive either.  Got me thinking.

Religion

Star Wars is a religion.  No question there.  Prior to Disney, there was an agreed upon canon.  A set of rules and history that people flocked towards.  Knight of the Old Republic was the foundation for light/dark, how the various empires built the galaxy, how lightsabers were made… everything.  The defining moment was the Battle of Yavin (destruction of first Death Star) – commonly referred to as BBY or ABY.  Think about that for a second… we use BC/AD for our dates.  Lord of the ring uses Ages.  Star Wars is big enough, and complex enough, that the dates are referred to by a specific defining event.

ABY brought episodes 5/6 and a significant part of the expanded universe.  Mara Jade, Thrawn, Yuuzhan Vong, Jacen Solo… all come after the movies.  Even the stories prior to the movies pretty much dictated how Vader came to be.  Sure, there were details in the films that didn’t align (the hatred of sand) – but the 3 storylines were written 20 years before the movies were made.

People celebrated Star Wars (May the 4th).  They spent 40 years dressing up as them.  Not only consuming the product but building upon it.  Nearly all of it had the Lucasfilm sign of approval too, which was notoriously hard to get.

Then Disney bought it all and torched it.  Significant parts of the expanded universe is now referred to as Legends.  I was somewhat cautious of this, since that lore had a significant impact on the story telling.   Maybe they wanted more freedom to explore certain characters.

The Films

The Force Awakens was a remake of episode 4, with all the telltale signs of a JJ Abrams mystery box.  Rey’s heritage, how with no practice she beat a force user who was trained since birth, who Snoke was, how this new empire established itself so quickly.  Plenty of promise for future development (if heavy handed).

Rogue One was an interstitial story – we knew how it ended but not so much how it began (in this new storyline).  It was a pretty good story.  The investment people had in these characters were more archtetypes of the SW cannon.  All of them are dead, and no one has ever referred to a single one of them since.  Remember the BBY/ABY item, the most important event in all of Star Wars?  The film explains how that was setup, then never heard of again.

Last Jedi’s goal was to subvert the established lore.  Where the two previous items stretched the imagination, it was still close enough.  The stories hit the right notes.  You could suspend disbelief with the promise of future explanations.  (There’s a LOST analogy here).  This movie instead took the baseline rules of the most foundational items and broke them.  People can now use the Force across a galaxy.  The Jedi code for harmony is wrong.  Luke, who managed to convert Darth Vader, was willing to kill his young nephew for the potential of the dark side. That lightspeed can be tracked.  That any ship can be turned into a super weapon.  Each of these items breaks the previous movies.  Why shoot missiles in the Death Star when a Corellian Crusier can just lightspeed and crash into it to destroy it?

Han Solo story.  If this wasn’t a Star Wars movie, it would have had much more praise.  Square peg, round hole.

Impacts

It is an existential crisis for the Star Wars fans.  They have spent years living in that world.  Finding the links between one story and another.  Seeing characters come and go.  Finding more minute details of a given world that adds life to that world space.

Disney underestimated what Star Wars meant to people, they saw it just as a pre-built story foundation.  They did it with Marvel to great success.  But Marvel was never about world building – it was about characters with a specific powerset and attitude.  Not like we had Wolverine giving hugs and shooting lasers from his toes.  In Star Wars the characters are simply agents to the world.  Tatooine is a much a character as Leia.  The Battle at Hoth is arguably more important that the death of Luke’s aunt & uncle.  There are hundreds of those events.  Many of it thrown aside and directly conflicting with what happened before.

This is a lore reset event.  If somehow LotR was reset and Sauron could teleport anywhere, and Frodo could kill Orcs with his eyes, you’d see the same reaction from fans.  Disney has to build an entire world, a new history, a new set of rules, a new set of characters to move forward from this.  Then it needs to convince the fan base that this will stick and be worth the investment.

Or, they could simply disown the attempt made here and move back towards the established rule sets.  Seems to be a whole lot more money to be made there.

Tangents to Others

Change is certainly difficult.  Massive change typically has massive repercussions.  There are enough religious and political upheavals to illustrate this point quite well. When we’re talking about fictional stories, then we need to look at things that are simply massive in scale.

Lord of the Rings has a rather tight grip on it’s lore.  The Hobbit was an atrocious series of movies, but was not a large afront to the lore.

Star Trek has about 23 days worth of TV shows and Movies to go through… before you talk about any written media.  Even with an entire reboot of the timeline, the foundational lore of the series stayed the same.  There are 2 stories that did not follow this model – Speed Limit and Threshold – both of which have been disowned.  It follows true.

Even Game of Thrones has a set of rules that need to be followed, and it would be hard to argue that the extension through the TV series broke that many rules (except maybe time travel to cross large distances on foot in less than a day).

And World of Warcraft comes to mind here.  The time travel in WoD has been practically erased (Yrel who?).  The rather ridiculous character arcs and “morally grey” characters in BfA feel like sand in your teeth.  Seems they are trying to address that in 8.1 – we’ll see how that turns out.

Point is, when you have a very large audience and a very complicated lore foundation, it is not possible to please everyone.  People are willing to accept bits of change, but not large swathes that go counter to years of previous effort.  Even less so when you’re impacting the stories that the fans themselves have developed.  People become fans because they see themselves in that world.  When they stop seeing that, well, there’s not much world left.

Doing It Over Again

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The first time I played Monster Hunter: World on PS4, I reached the Tempered Kirin fight, which had a requirement of hunter rank(HR) 49.  It was a fair chunk of time invested.

On the PC, I’m currently HR 23 which isn’t exactly reflective of the middle point of the game.  In fact, I’ve killed every single target but the two who were not in the PS4 version when I stopped (Deviljo & Lunastra).  Now it’s about taking on monsters to fill out specific armor/weapon sets.  So I guess you could say I’ve killed half the monsters that I did last time.  Now it’s about putting my head down and running investigations on repeat.

One of the neat things about RPGs is the player flexibility when it comes to power progression.  MH:W is a prime example, where all power increases are based on player choices.  If I took off my armor, I would be as powerful as a level 1 character.  Every weapon, armor, charm, decoration has a direct impact on power.  Every temporary buff (potion or food) has a direct impact.  And it’s time/effort to unlock those various pieces.  Not like all of a sudden you get that 1 unlock and game transforms – it’s a slow and steady build.

Example.  I had forgotten about Power/Armorcharms.  There are two items you can buy that sit in your inventory and provide passive boosts to DEF and ATK.  You can boost this effect through crafting by combining a drop from Bazelgeuse.  Then buy the base items again.  The progression goes 0/0 –> 12/6 –> 18/9 –> 30/15.  To compare, one piece of rank 5 armor has ~40DEF.  Rank 7 has ~70DEF.  So when you first get this piece, well it’s a near 20% boost of power.  As you get much stronger, the effect is still there but the overall impact is lesser.  To compare again, a large food buff is 15ATK, but goes away when you faint. Every bit helps.

In Practice

Great games operate on the concepts of gradual improvements, and a world that grows with you.  There are times where it’s fun to just faceroll through an event, but people typically play for the challenge.  MH:W has ever increasingly dangerous enemies that you can tackle, either through pure skill (bit of luck too), or through investment in power levels.  I’m sure I could kill Teostra in beginner gear… it would just take 50 minutes to do and a whole lot of attempts.

In my journey so far, Diablos was the one that gave me the most headaches.  I was trying to learn to guard point (use shield to be invulnerable) and it really wasn’t working for me.  I’m sure I tried that quest a dozen times until I got the timing just right.  Well, I needed to capture the bugger for a quest and ended up fighting him in the Arena the other night.  He died in 4 minutes.

Rank 8 weapon and  Rank 7 armor, all the canteen items unlocked, a Palico with rank 8 gear and a maxed Palarang.  I put on the Vitality Mantle (prevents some damage) and went to town.  Running up walls and crashing down to mount him for massive damage.  Dodging at the right time.  Using Guard Points on every charge.  I felt like one of those instructional YouTube videos on how to play the game.  With a Charge Blade and long windups, you really need to have some luck on your side for a couple of the swings.  Felt super easy.

That was the last arena battle in normal mode.  I’ve done nearly every optional quest available, but one hidden part of the game is the need to capture monsters and fight them in the arena.  I have most of them for High Rank mode… now to get 1 or 2 more.  If it goes anything like Diablos, it should be fairly smooth sailing.

If.

WoW Sub Numbers

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It has been many a year since WoW published subscription numbers – pretty much this time in 2015.  Since then we’ve had nothing but speculation, mostly from 3rd party sites.  It would be fair to say that the general trend has been downwards.  This is entirely subjective, based on the number of people present in any given area – or simply the number of large scale world quests available.  Dips and spikes.

WoW did let us know how many copies of BfA sold initially – 3.4 million.  The wording here is a bit suspect, as it’s unrealistic that this would be the total number of sales on day one so much as by day one.  It would be fair to argue that this number would encompass both those who were actively playing in Legion, those who stayed after the free weekend in July, and those curious about the traditional WoW expansion fever.  I was in the 2nd category.  I am certain there is a long tail when it comes to expansion purchases, but a tiny fraction of those on “day 1”.

A recent tweet from the makers of WeakAuras intimates that the subscription numbers are a tad different.

It’s an interesting bit of “news” in that it can’t really be substantiated, right?  Does it align with subjective viewpoints?  Sure.  Is it mathematically accurate?  Not so sure about that.  Is it possible Blizz exposed data that it shouldn’t have?  Yeah, 100% on that front.

 

I barely squeezed out a month out this expansion.  But that’s my experience.  Plenty of folk still having fun.  And without substantiated numbers from Blizz, human nature is to always trend towards the less pleasant of all rumors.    Doubtful that will make a difference though – they are still making money hand over fist.

End Curve

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Where the true journey begins.

Xeno’Jiva is down, which effectively marks the transition from story game (and High Rank) to end game.  From the start until this point, there was mostly linear progress.  I am now in the horizontal progress phase.  What I mean by that is that I never felt the need to hunt a specific monster for a rare drop.  I just kept plugging away at the Assigned (story) quests until I got here.  It’s provided me with a rank 5 (of 8) weapon, which has been quite enough for most cases.  I’ve also acquired a fair chunk of armor upgrade, making earlier battles a lot easier.

What’s next is the question.

Breadth & Depth

In terms of weapons, I need to fan out with a few more Charge Blades that address specific monster weaknesses.  The one I have now is focused on Blast damage (build up for an explosion), but it would be extremely practical for a set of water/fire/ice/dragon weapons to dramatically speed up specialized farming.

Some high level theories on damage.  Some weapons provide innate elemental damage.  That listed damage coverts ~10% per attack (depending on weapon speed).  So if a weapon lists something like 500 normal, 250 elemental, then on a monster weak to that element, you will be doing 50% more damage per attack.  In practice most weapons have a 25% bonus through elemental damage.  This can be further boosted through weapon enchantments (gems) up to their cap.  That cap depends on the base damage… more complicated than need be so here’s a link to explain it.

This is all discounting the fact that some weapons are just plain better on some enemies than others.  The Charge Blade (Hammer and Greatsword are similar) are skill-based weapons that require very good positioning.  Something like Dual Blade or Sword and Shield can be much more mobile.  Some enemies spend way too long in the air, or have some seriously deadly AE attacks, making ranged weapons a better alternative.

A Good Defense

At the base, everyone needs armor.  It has a linear relationship to the amount of damage you take.  High rank gear makes a tremendous different when it comes to a generic armor set.

Yet similar to weapons, armors have elemental resistances.  Something like Teostra who is pure fire, would be best served by fire resistance.  It’s entirely possible to find a piece of gear with amazing armor stat but resistances that make you into a wet tissue.  Fighting Kirin without Lightning resistance is key to a bad time.

I will say that elemental resistances are the safety net of battles.  If you are significantly overpowering your target, then it doesn’t matter that much.  If something like Teostra is taking half your life with a single swing… then get some fire resistance and see a world of difference.

Putting it into Practice

Bazelgeuse.  I need his horns.  I wasn’t too flustered with him in the past as a dual blade user – easy to get in and out.  Charge Blade is more of a challenge since you can get move locked and then he decides to blow up everything around him.

This particular mission decided to have Deviljo show up.  For those unawares, he randomly spawns in HR zones and is top of the food chain.  He will attack anything, and doesn’t give up chase.  I didn’t realize he was in this zone until he roared (stunned me), which gave Bazel ample time to finish his dive bomb and wipe me out.

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He is massive.  He’s even deadlier when he has a monster in his jaws.

My second death was also due to that bugger shoulder checking me into the wall, then body slamming Bazel on my body.  Ok, enough.  I knew I had Bazel on the ropes, he took a nap and I put a barrel bomb to get things going again.  Deviljo was far away, so I figure to finish it off with a mount.

Sure enough, as I’m in the middle of the final swing of the mount attack, Deviljo shows up.  Maybe I lucked out, maybe it’s the code, but he didn’t attack me while mounted.  He did however attack me when I dismounted and couldn’t move.  3rd faint and will need to give it another shot.

So now the journey begins to round out the gear set.  Less large jumps in power and more about targeting specific builds for specific monsters.  Make a goal and work back from there.  Fun times.

Hype for Diablo

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Or not.  The Diablo panel is on the main stage right after the opening ceremony, which is usually reserved for ultra amazing news.  From Blizz.

BlizzCon 2018 is almost here and we’ve seen a lot of rumors flying around about our plans for Diablo at the show. These are very exciting times—we currently have multiple teams working on different Diablo projects and we can’t wait to tell you all about them . . . when the time is right.

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We know what many of you are hoping for and we can only say that “good things come to those who wait,” but evil things often take longer. We appreciate your patience as our teams work tirelessly to create nightmarish experiences worthy of the Lord of Terror.

While we won’t be ready to announce all of our projects, we do intend to share some Diablo-related news with you at the show.

November 2 will be an especially diabolical date—not only is it the first day of BlizzCon, it’s also when Diablo III arrives on the Nintendo Switch. If you’re planning to pick up the game (the digital download will be available starting at midnight on launch day) and are joining us in Anaheim, be sure to bring your console. We’d love to slay some demons with you on the show floor.

Again, we want to thank you for your patience and support. We are eternally grateful to you and the millions of other Diablo fans around the world whose passion for this franchise inspires us and keeps our fires burning.

We’ll see you in hell . . . and at BlizzCon!

There are two ways to read this.

Downplay the Hype

Blizzard is aware of the hype for a Diablo 4 announcement and are attempting to temper expectations.  I can’t think of anyone who wants to spend an hour listening to Diablo 3 on the Switch.  Realistically, there’s no way that Blizzard would announce a new title in 45 minutes and then not have any reasonable follow up sessions.

The ol’ Switcheroo

That was a bad pun… but it could be that they are throwing water on the flames to only throw gas back on it during Blizzcon.  That would require significant META thinking, which honestly… no.  Blizzard can’t go a week without leaking a new Overwatch character, or HotS option through seedy internet means.  The Diablo team  is the least subtle of the bunch.  Really feels like the no-BS dev stream.

Other Options

Thinking about this a bit more, I find that Blizzard is oddly quiet regarding the mobile app space.  Hearthstone is manageable.  The WoW mobile app seems designed by a slow witted chimp.  Diablo, Overwatch, HotS all have zero presence.  Could D3 work with mobile controls?  There are certainly other ARPGs that make it work, and it’s not like D3 has that many buttons to press.

Even a large stretch, Diablo has enough lore built in to make some sort of large media push – maybe a Netflix series – some sort of animated one.  I can’t really see them financing a movie.  There are likely still fresh scars around the Warcraft movie.

Blizzard rarely initiates anything – they react.  Torchlight Frontiers is out next year… so maybe they are trying to get in front of that message.  Hard to argue that D3 isn’t the most accessible ARPG on the market now.  PoE seems to require a degree in spacial physics, and Grim Dawn lacks an effective end-game.  Be curious to see how that turns out.