A Gameplan

Posted by FelizB on Aug 16, 2012 in Guildwars 2, The Secret World, Vanguard, World of Warcraft | 1 comment

It seems to me everybody needs a gameplan for the months of August and September. I am looking at all the options the game starved player will have in the next couple of weeks. Guildwars 2 is due roughly in a week, World of Warcraft will publish their 5.0.4 patch at exactly the same date and Vanguard went free to play this week. Of course there’s my current favorite game “The Secret World”. Aside from that, I am also working on getting my business as a website and blog designer going, which indeed takes the majority of my time. I also have a one week trip to Rhode Island coming this weekend.

With me working hard, I don’t have that much energy left to play. I’ve played in the earliest GW2 beta weekends, but skipped the last one and the recent stress test. There was the fear of spoiling my fun, but also dwindling interest. It looks like I am not the only one with this dilemma.

Ever since it became obvious that Vanguard was bleeding subscribers, the majority of us have waited for it to go free-to-play. Now it’s here and I feel no desire to play. Obviously the same reason applies here as well. So many things to do, so little time.

Which leaves the Pandas. I unsubscribed about 5 months ago, planning to return when MoP goes live. I’ve pre-ordered my wive’s copy of the game, but had no desire to order one for me. (A couple of weeks back she expressed some interest in Guildwars 2, but all offers from my side to let her play in a beta weekend were rejected.) Thus, this will remain a divided house when it comes to gaming. However, I am still fully involved in WOW when I hear the occasional blow by blow account of her raids or other exploits.

And there we have it, my gameplan:

1. Form a strong, stone wall type defensive game of website, blog and plugin development. No prisoners.
2. Once the defenses are secured, liberate yourself with an easy passing game full of riddles and puzzles. Show your opponents the secret world. Add some running plays to mix it up a little.
3. If things get boring or the front lines are dug in deep, try to open things up with a reverse run by Guildwars 2. Don’t hesitate to use the tight end.
4. WoW and Vanguard remain benched until somebody gets hurt or once couple of weeks have passed.

Now that I think of it, the football season starts in three weeks, which could slow me down, too. — Not really. I am German and I have no idea what I am talking about when it comes to football. The above gameplan is complete fantasy and I apologize to all true fans of the game.

In case you haven’t seen my company’s logo, or aren’t subscribed to Scarybooster’s Scary Worlds. Here it is one more time:

I got those nice football strategies through flickr from Avinash Kunnath. Find the originals here, here and here.

I Can’t Keep Up With The Secret World

Posted by FelizB on Aug 15, 2012 in Blog, The Secret World | 3 comments

Oh boy, I am such a slowpoke. Always trying to take it in to the fullest. And then I get dragged elsewhere to do it again. Let me admit it freely: I am on my third character in The Secret World. I started out with a Dragon, but got myself frustrated when I stepped seriously under powered into the Blue Mountains. So I tried an Illuminati while also working toward a new ranged spec. That got me even into the desert, but I skipped some content in the Blue Mountains. And then comes the free trial weekend and increased activity among my blogger friends Kadomi, Belghast, Syl and Shadowspawned. Not to mention Rowan who tells us to never reroll our characters. I even told Kadomi not to reroll (if she likes her faction). Trouble was, the majority of their guild was Templars. Well, this forced me to roll a Templar. Now I am at the Innsmouth Academy for the third time around. But this time Carter will talk to me.

The other reason I can’t keep up is this:

Funcom announced the next content patch for the end of August with more missions, the introduction of the auxiliary weapon slot using a handy rocket launcher, a plastic surgeon and a hair and makeup stylist. Follow the link to the newsletter for TSW Issue 2. I’ve barely scratched the new content from Issue #1, how can I expect to stay on top of all this if it comes out this fast.

Plus, there will be another free weekend starting August, 15th. Funcom published their quarterly reports recently and had to tell their investors that results had come in below expectations. In my opinion it’s a case of to high expectations. They’ve made a wonderful and intelligent game, but it is a niche game, considering the difficulty levels at times. The good thing is, they act on it by introducing the trial weekends. And I for one can tell you that they are successful doing so. You’ve seen I’ve posted 5 spoiler quest guides (can’t keep up with those, either). Those quest guides have increased my visitor numbers significantly, but fell off as soon as the majority of players moved away from Kingsmouth. During the free trial, that number climbed to about 45% of the peek and is now one week after the trial at 3 times the number of visitors just before the trial.

Since there have been so many positive reviews from the trial weekend, I expect a pretty solid number of participants and subsequently, a good number of new subscribers. Of course they set the trial weekend just before the GW2 rollout, otherwise, they’d probably have to wait for 3-6 more weeks. It’s business after all. And they seem to have business sense. Nothing wrong with that.

The Dimski Rule

Posted by FelizB on Jul 25, 2012 in The Secret World, World of Warcraft | 3 comments

Over at the Secret World Forums people are starting to complain about the elitist attitude of some players when it comes to creating groups for their dungeons. “QL10 only !” Most MMO players know this as “must have gearscore >5000”. A couple of people just don’t want to fail in their dungeon run, or just want to rush through it, because they are farming this or that.

What they fail to see is that they make things harder for themselves by having to wait so much longer for a matching candidate. Plus gearscore, or whatever measure your game of choice offers is just a single measurement out of a lengthy list of parameters. On top of it, it can be easily falsified. Who hasn’t fudged their gearscore by equipping that piece of purple PVP armor, or dps gear when running as a tank or healer? And of course it leaves one major component untouched: a player’s skill and knowledge.

Which brings me to Dimski, the shining beacon of light, aaaahmm, death. Dimski was the second death knight I had leveled. We had transferred servers and my wife had been raiding with a guild for a while. In the meantime I brought Dimski up without much haste. Eventually I joined my wife’s guild, mostly in purple dungeon gear plus a piece or two from the Wintergrasp vault. That guild certainly took their raiding seriously, fielding three 10 man raid teams and of course 25 man raid. Of course they had gear requirements for raid participation and of course I didn’t qualify by a good amount.

But rules go out the window when a raid is one head or two short and I didn’t have to wait for long to be a part of the my first 25 man raid. They modified the raid rules afterward. Have a gearscore of 2700 or generate 4600 dps.  (number’s are made up, i really don’t remember the exact numbers). 4600 dps was the number my little death knight had created in inferior gear beating 2 other guilded and geared deathknights. And all I had done was reading Elitist Jerks, using the proper specification and a good spell rotation.

It certainly wasn’t that much work for me to learn what was taught by the players at  that website. But it was already enough to overcome weeks of raiding for better gear. I don’t want to show off with this post what hot shot I am. I am certainly not. But it shows me and now hopefully a few more people, that a pure gear or experience requirement, like it is requested in many games, just doesn’t cover everything.

In fact, players should be happy that our games of choice aren’t gear dependent in a way that it blocks a player with less time invested, but that it allows to make up for this time investment by deploying smarter or more skillful play. This actually broadens the base of players to pick from for any one dungeon or raid, or any other undertaking for a group.

Of course there is a “downside”: A min/max player doesn’t have choices, or only a very limited number, since he can only pick the best choices. Which lead to Ghostcrawler’s decision to limit the number of talent choices in Mists of Pandaria to, in the end, allow for more choice.

How to Exploit the Chain Subtype with Ranged Weapons

Posted by FelizB on Jul 17, 2012 in Blog, Guides, The Secret World | 0 comments

English please. I realize this title is completely meaningless for somebody who’s not playing “The Secret World”.  But hopefully it catches somebody’s interest who’s gotten a bit deeper into the workings of the combat abilities in TSW. For the record: this is not an exploit in the standard MMORPG sense. This is using a game mechanic in a way the developers intended.

Each weapon group in TSW has its own way to build resources: Melee weapons build up with each use of a builder attack and slowly out of combat. Which means, for melee, you can open your attack with a finisher using maximum resources. Magic is building up resources only when builder attacks are being used. And finally, ranged weapons build up resources with each builder attack, but they are bound to a single target. If the target dies, the resources are lost. Magic and melee attacks are independent of the target. They remain usable after a target’s death.

However, with chain attacks things become interesting. A chain attack hits a first victim and then jumps over to up to 4 more targets. Imagine a lightning bolt not only hitting you, but the 4 people right next to you. If a ranged resource is built through a chain attack, it is built up on each target hit by the chain. Which means, you can execute a finishing attack with maximum resources, switch to the next target and execute another maxed finisher. Rinse and repeat.

Only pistols, elemental and blood magic have chains as part of their standard abilities, but the use of this mechanic is not restricted to these weapons. Some passive abilities can turn certain attacks into chains. As long as the resource building is done with a chain attack by one of those weapon types or triggered by a passive ability and the finishing move is using a ranged weapon, this mechanic can be used.

Caveat: Right now, my pistol/elemental character delivers pretty good dps. I just don’t get around to tab target through 3 or 4 enemies and dispatch them one by one with finishers. They are down way earlier. That’s why it took a while to notice this great option.

Conspiracy Theory of the Day

Posted by FelizB on Jul 14, 2012 in The Secret World | 0 comments

It looks to me as if in this alternate reality the Orochi Group or one of its subsidiaries has the population convinced that keypads, accepting three digit codes, are safe enough to protect the deepest mysteries of secret societies. They did convince the Illuminati in Kingsmouth. You either spend some time googling the code. Or an hour or two trying all 1000 codes. Okay, you may have to bring a gun for the zombies. I bet there will be more of those easy to unlock keypads throughout this world. Its cheaper than back doors or little holes in the frame to reset the device with a pin.

I should mention that the code they protect their own facility with is 6 digits?

Gravity [Spoiler]

Posted by FelizB on Jul 9, 2012 in Guides, The Secret World | 0 comments

Nicholas Winter has been dealing with his father Nathaniel Winters estate, the Atlantic Island Park, a haunted amusement park on the Savage Coast,  in particular. He’s let you already run two missions for him during which you learned about secret forces binding Nathaniel and now Nicholas to the place. A third party is interested in the park as well and everybody is out to control the power emanating from it.

Tier 1.

Nicholas Winter was heartless and calculating and his obsession with the park was for a reason, just like his decision to leave the park to his son. Decipher Nathaniel Winter’s Last Will and Testament and uncover what Nicholas was meant to see.

Hint 1

The will is in the car on the seat next to the deceased driver. Nicholas Winter is the sole heir. However, the quest will not be updated by just reading the will.

Hint 2

You need to use the monocle you got as a result from the previous quest “The Carnival of Souls”. There you will learn more about the park and the next step.

Hint 3

Go inside the barn on Henderson’s farm and pick up a piece of the plan from the floor.

Tier 2.

Another party is looking for the plans of the park as well. That’s why they have been divided and hidden. You have to think and see like Nathaniel Winter to decipher them.

Hint 1

Use the monocle on the plans you just found. You’ll see a park map with some white symbols imprinted on them. Follow the symbols and search thoroughly along the path.

Hint 2

You’ll find the next part of the map on the outside of the Bumper Cars’ cage just where the white symbol runs through.

Hint 3

A bit further along, at the Ferris Wheel, you will find a red lens in the middle of some shards.

Tier 3.

Continue your search, your deciphering attempts and stay ahead of the other party.

Hint 1

The map you found doesn’t look special at all. But the red lens looks just like your monocle. Insert it into the monocle, using the assembly window (Y). Now look at the plans again: Red Symbols will lead you to the next piece of the plan.

Hint 2

It’s affixed to one of the vendor stands.

Hint 3

Not far from here, among the stands, are again shards right in front of a vending machine. This time you’ll find a blue lens.

Tier 4.

Keep going and find more pieces to the plan. Follow the hints given to you by the pieces you found so far.

Hint 1

The map is again a standard map. Lets pop in the blue lens. But you need to remove the red lens first, using the disassemble slot. Now the plans reveal another symbol, which you can follow.

Hint 2

At the Roller Coaster you’ll find the next piece on the eastern ramp on the fence.

Tier 5.

The park is a gigantic Anima Capacitor, designed to accumulate energy and channel it into a subject. Neither Nicholas nor the Phoenicians must be allowed to accomplish this goal.

Hint 1

We’ve run out of lenses for the monocle. There’s only purple light around, annoying us. But red and blue makes purple. Build a monocle with a purple lens.

Hint 2

The last piece of the plan leads us to a shed in the center of the park. Assemble the plan by clicking on a purple symbol on one side of the shed. The full circuit is drawn upon the wall.

Hint 3

To overload the circuit, you need to click in order on the electronic parts that make up the diagram. Start with the AC voltage source and then work your way around the drawing counter clockwise (Resistor, Diode, Inductor). A cut scene will show the Phoenicians moving in and getting killed by a purple energy storm, which brings the park finally into a more peaceful state.