Aristes

My guild's problem is that some folks don't want to appear greedy while other folks understand that hitting greed is not greedy. SO, a piece of cloth armor will drop. The Warlock, who KNOWS that she is the only person who can use the cloth armor hits greed soas not to appear greedy. Well, two folks pass because they don't give a crap but two others hit greed because that's what I tell them they should do. So, the warlock doesn't get the cloth item, the hunter does. Now, it's true that I could be angry because my guildies need crap all the time, which they don't. ...But it's almost as bad for people who desperately need the gear (and whom the guild has a stake in seeing get good gear) lose out on stuff because they're afraid of the accusation of "greedy." Even worse, a few people have gotten pissed off and refuse to go anywhere because of some mistakes where one of our members (the library director no less) has accidently hit need because he couldn't get it through his head that NEED means you're saying you NEED it. So, he's gotten epic wands. Now, because we all know each other in real life, there are some folks who refuse to do any instances without a master looter. haha It's like your virtual crime thread, man! It's politics in the WoW guild! hahahaha

Wow. That's interesting. More and more, virtual reality is taking the place of reality. That's interesting, but also disturbing. Can they try these folks in virtual court?

I think you should vent about the terrible campaign McCain has run. It's not that it's more brutal (don't make me laugh. Jefferson hired a slanderer to write things about Adams and tried to paint Washington as a dottering old fool). It's that McCain has been stupid. Hey, the proof of the pudding is in the... tasting? Something like that. Anyhow, the point is, McCain will look super smart if he wins, but he looks pretty dumb to me right now and, frankly, I'll go to my grave thinking he's an idiot stick for that whole "suspend my campaign" debacle.

That's pretty much what happend to us. The real problem was that our best dpser is also our best tank, which meant that we lost a lot of dps in order to tank. ...But my guildies do stupid things. I get so frustrated sometimes, you wouldn't believe it. We must have done that battle 30 times... and I can't get out of doing it because they wouldn't even go with out me. In all those times, that damned remote didn't drop once for me. Not once. The headless horseman? I think we've already done it 30 times and we've already had the blade, the plate helm, the vanity helm and pet, and the broom drop. I think there's only a cloth wearers helm now. Unless the vanity helm counts as a cloth helm. My wife has already gotten the achievement for getting the two vanity items. Here's another thing I hate. My guildies can't figure out the damned need/greed thing. I hate it. Seriously, dude, I'm going out of my mind. We're talking a chemist and the Director of a library and Retired Seargent from the police force and a damned exec for a mail order company. ARGHGHGHH How hard is it to understand need/greed? So, I have to put myself on master looter all of the time. I always get whatever novelty drops last because I need to super careful to be fair.

Nope. That Direbrew battle with the mole king. I know, I know. A lot of folks did it with level 5 characters all in grey gear, but it was pretty tough for my guildies to do at level 70 with green gear. By the way, I did do it and beat him consistantly with my guild. However, the main point is that, while Direbrew could be a tough fight for my guildmembers in their sucky gear, the headless horseman fight is easy as cake. I could beat Direbrew with a PuG easier than with many of my guildies. ...But I suppose mentioning that might have come off as idle boasting when my main point revolved around how much easier the game is now.

It's the nature of democracy (for lack of a better term) that sometimes our candidate wins and sometimes not. I would rather live with the mistakes of my redneck bretheren with their 82 IQ or follow my ovisian bretheren in their mad dash following the pied piper than be placed under the heel of a despot. We might not like the policy decisions foisted on us by opposing views, but we can hope to change those policies later. So, if your guy doesn't win this election, take heart that the force of your argument might take the day in the next one. As for myself, I am voting for McCain, but the Republic will endure (and hopefully thrive) whether McCain or Obama wins. I agree with taks, though. McCain is not the Republican candidate I would have chose for this elections. Probably not the one I would choose for any election. ...But he's closer to me ideologically than Obama.

I'm with mkreku. Once you get past the hype, the game was pretty good. Not a classic, but not made of suck or whatever. (Although I thank you, Starwars. I'm going to remember that phrase.) Maria had it right, the atmosphere was fine work. The "difference between a man and a slave" cutscene was awesome. The gameplay was a bit lackluster, but the thing that really made the game a chore was the respawning people in areas the player was forced to traverse more than one. It made the game a little boring. I don't care that it was easy. No problem. Just don't make it so tedious to get from place to place. That was one of the things that really ruined Wizardry 8 for me. Slogging back and forth over the same areas fighting more of the same mobs just isn't fun. Let us clear an area and put respawns, if we must have them, in certain central areas and let us enjoy the sense of accomplishment otherwise. Even if it's so easy that you don't feel any sense of accomplishment, at least you can enjoy the scenery. If you couldn't even enjoy the scenery in the first game, piss off.

I seriously have a hard time believing you have any difficulty with tradeskills at this point, Calax. Just buy everything. Getting a good set of epic gear does suck. However, I think the latest patch made it much easier for the casual folks in my guild to succeed with blues/low scoring epics. One thing I can say is, take a look at the Direbrew battle as compared to the (haha) headless horseman battle. I 'm telling you, Direbrew could be tough with my guild. Not enough dps, not enough bonus healing. Tanking is easier, healing is easier, and the baddies don't take as much damage. Still, it's a lot of fun and all the changes really did is make it easier for folks to progress different story-lines. I don't think getting to 70 was really all that much of a grind. I agree with Calax and Hurl that gearing up is a terrible grind. There are some really neat things about the new patch. Inscriptions, it turns out, are quite good. With three major and three minor inscriptions available at 80, along with some of the really great inscriptions available, folks who choose the insriptionist tradeskill will have a lot of work and might actually make some coin for themselves. Achievements are kind of gimmicky, but I've enjoyed achievements (or badges or whatever the latest iteration is) since I started with City of Heroes. The dock in Stormwind is really neat. I like that and it's about damned time they made it easier for Night Elves to reach the Eastern Kingdom capitols. Along with the talent trees and buffed out characters, I don't see that leveling is going to be that much of a grind at this point. Sure, there are going to be some levels that are more entertaining than others, but nothing that bad, especially if you have a group of folks to help you. WoW has moved up to second on my current favorite list for MMORPGs. Warhammer is way too buggy and is too sparse for my tastes. It's lacking in PvE but not populated enough for PvP. I'm in a straight PvP sever and I desperately want to kill more Destruction players, but I have not been able to get into an RvR scenario in less than a half hour, ever, and I have to choose between progressing as a character or going way the hell out of my way to get to the Dark Elf lands in order to fight folks. I like the PvP. I enjoy the battlegrounds immensely. At the end of the day, though, the PvP doesn't make the other nonsense worth it.

As someone who thinks well of both D2 and LotRO, I have to say that LotRO has more variety. D2 had some great gameplay, and the search for better loot really was addictive, but it was not nearly as complex as LotRO. That said, there's always more to a successful game than simply click and watch. D2 did favor a streamlined approach, but the player still played the game. It wasn't like watching paint dry, regardless of how many painters in the members' list who say so.

Okay, W:AR is really good. In fact, in terms of just plain gameplay, I prefer it to WoW. I probably like LotRO online the best. So, I guess that would be LotRO, W:AR, and WoW, in that order. Nevertheless, each game has a distinct advantage of the others in some respect or another. I think the comparison deserves its own thread.

Let's Dance -- David Bowie

Hey, at 70, that should be edging up on 1% for 15 cs rating. That's not bad at all. ...And the healing ability and extra health wouldn't help, say, a hunter as much as that crit %. I wonder which class is mostly likely to see the benefits of skinning. I think it's a fabulous ability, not because it's so powerful, but because it's free. Skinners get extra crit. If you think about who will use the ability the most, warriors and pally's are probably the best candidate for end level blacksmithing, and I don't think a few extra hundred hit points they get from mining adds as much as a percentage of their health as 15 crit strike does as a percentage of a hunter or shammy's crit %. I'm not much of a number cruncher, though, so I'm not sure. I can say that even for my warrior, I don't turn my nose at even a couple hundred free health. Hell, I'm not going to complain about 50 extra health. ...And the healer won't mind it either. You know who really gets screwed by this? Folks who designate their scrub 70 to gather, like I do. haha My scrub just got two decent free buffs. Maybe I'll play him for a while. lol Seriously, though, I think it's a great move. Really good ideas in this patch. I can't think of one off hand I hate so far.

You get up to 5 ranks (at 375) for your gathering skills. They're not game breakers by any stretch, but pretty good. Extra hit points for being tough as you progress in mining. A not so bad ability to heal yourself by absorbing energy from the earth as you progress through herbalism. Finally, like alan said, critical strike rating as you progress through skinning. Personally, I think the crit strike rating is the weakest ability, but all of them are good. I especially like the healing power that comes from herbalism. It has a 3 minute cooldown, which sucks, and it's only 1200 hit point. However, it is free. After all, I'm an herbalist anyhow. It's not like I had to waste a talent or anything to get it. I'm getting the ability gratis. It also doesn't cost mana. Finally it's an instant cast ability. So, for my healer, who happens to be my herbalist, I have an ability that I can use mana free that won't cost precious time just in case I have to heal myself while I'm trying to keep the tank on his feet. Will it come into play often? I doubt it, but I've already used it to save my sorry butt once.

I have to say that I prefer the PvP in W:AR. That's probably because there's none of this "we're not really enemies but we kill each other and do petty things like grief the NPCs on Sentinel Hill all day." I'm in an RvR (full PvP) server, and there is no doubt that you will kill the enemy when you see them. The PvE, as it seems to me, is entirely secondary in W:AR. I like a lot of the new stuff in the latest patch. In particular, they made it a lot easier on a warrior to AoE tank. Still doesn't compare to a Pally, but the new tricks help a lot. If you could do it before, you're better at it now. If you sucked before, you have a good chance now. Hell, if anything it makes it far too easy. No more having to really think/create macros to manage a high threat party.

I don't know. I wasn't around here when the news of Fallout 3 hit the newstand. However, where I was it was almost exactly the way you characterize it. "I've seen a lot of people who have come to hate Bethesda because of the decisions Bethesda has made regarding Fallout." However, there were some who hated Oblivion and therefore, they added their Fallout fanaticism to their hatred of Bethesda and it sounded like "'Bethesda? I HATE THEM. I hate everything they and will do and say'" with "They had the audacity to buy the Fallout license." Sorry, Tigranes, I hate to see someone who's been more or less sane forced to defend undeserving people. That's your choice, though. The fact remains that Fallout fanaticism has a reputation, not just here but in the gaming industry as a whole, and the fanbase did not get that reputation without going a long way to earn it. The response to Fallout 3 was and is remarkable. No, not unique. Yes, we have to do be discerning about anything we hear or read, but to trivialize it as if it's the same thing as, say, "Mirror's Edge" or any other game coming out just doesn't make sense. I've been lurking through this thread for a while and only recently decided to comment. So I'm really a latecomer to this debate, if it's a debate in the first place. I'm happy to leave my statements as is, but the whole Fallout 3 phenomenon is not your run of the mill scenario.

Bioshock was alegedly the System Shock sequel, but I don't think it lived up to the idea. However, since I didn't play System Shock when it was first released, and I can't get sound to work on it after the fact, I'll never know for sure.

The real problem is that so many of the Fallout fanbase have either poisoned the well against legit criticism or muddied the waters so that folks can't tell the difference. I mean, sure a lot of folks won't like the graphics. ...But some folks will. Some folks, like mkreku (from what I understand and you can correct me if I'm wrong, bud) like certain aspects of the graphics and don't like others. I'd probably fall into the same category. Some folks will like the first person perspective, some won't, and some won't care. However, Fallout has a built in controversy that is truly remarkable. Before the ink was dried, folks were tearing up the newsprint in a fit of rage. How can we trust all of the criticism when some folks clearly had an agenda the very moment Bethesda announced the game. Sure, you might not like Bethesda. In that case, I sympathize. Really. I don't think it does much good to carp on teh game just because you don't like the company, but at least you have a more or less clear reason for attacking the game. However, some folks didn't care one way or the other about Bethesda. They literally just hated to see any changes in the Fallout schematic, even though the original game came out over a decade ago. The folks who argue from the 'ol' skool' position have tainted every charge leveled against the game. I don't think it makes a lot of sense for folks to go out of their way to attack the game simply on the basis that they hate Bethesda, but it's downright stupid to attack the game because you're a fan and hate seeing the license go to anyone other than Troika or Black Isle Studios. Even worse, some of the ol' skool Fallout fans honestly hate Bethesda, which has caused something akin to a sharks feeding frenzy at chum time. In that case, it transcends ridiculous, suprasses sublime, and actually becomes offensive. It's hard to read up on the game without going out of your way to decipher peoples' positions because you need to know if the source is tainted or not and some of these people are pretty good at hiding their tracks. For the record, I don't think Bethesda was the best studio to do the game. ...But they're the studio that did the game, and so I'm going to see how I like it. I enjoyed Oblivion, for all of its faults, and I hope to enjoy Fallout 3 even more. I don't even think of it as Fallout per se so much as an entirely different game set in the Fallout universe. ...And I'm not directing this comment at anyone in particular. At least, not anyone recent, but if you really feel defensive, I guess you can call me out and I will candidly respond.

Burning Down the House -- Talking Heads

Black is the Color of my True Love's Hair -- The Twilight Singers

You know, I just can't take any more NWN. I really enjoyed MotB. I mean that sincerely. One of the best RPGs in a long time. I thought the writing was good, the story was refreshingly non-chosen one driven, and the characters were memorable. ...But I can't take any more of the things that have plagued the franchise from the very beginning. I haven't passed on buying a DnD title in a long time, but this one seems unlikely. I'm more inclined to buy the Alien game and much more likely to buy Alpha Protocol at this point. Well, that depends on whether Alpha Protocal is Console only or not. I can take RPGs on the console, but shooters are still too tough for me to learn. I dunno. I guess anything is possible, but I've had my ear to the ground on this one and I'm just suffering from NWN fatigue. On the other hand, nothing would make me happier than to be wrong. This will especially be true since I have been such a DnD fan over the years.

That's definitely the impression I got. Hell, even your face is blank at the beginning of the game. It did have some over the top goofy looking graphics that I found interesting, but it's definitely a pass for me barring something unforseen. As for WAR. It's not so bad. Everything looks absolutely grim for Order as far as I can tell. Hell, not only in terms of the backstory, which has always been the case for the Warhammer universe, and probably even worse for 40k than Fantasy Battle, but for the player demographics. Granted, I'm a complete noob, but it looked like the order players are way outnumbered according to that launch box. Hell, the game immediately offered to give me a sort of "signing bonus" of experience for playing order on some server, which I accepted. I think there are just a lot more Chaos players, but I don't really know. What I do know is that Order stomped the crud out of the Chaos in my first battleground. Of course, I had no idea of what I was doing, although I did make the top half of overall damage (and was only level 5 out of a grouping 1-10) and the top third in overall kills. I only managed one killing blow, however, which disappointed me. Something I find unhappy is that it looked like we were rolling for Hordie equipment. Ugh, I don't like that because I don't want to lose really great gear in battlegrounds. Absolutely sucks. I'll have to look into that. Anyhow, we almost completely shut out the Chaos guys by 500-22 or so. Complete mastery. I was a little more upbeat about that. I was going to write a really long (okay, an even longer) review, but I'll wait to do that until tomorrow when I actually pen a thought or two on the subject of Warhammer Online. So far? Pretty good.

Thanks. I always figure that folks who are into a game usually know the best pages for the game. Sadly, doesn't look like my speed. Kind of like GTA.

Do you have a link for Saints Row 2, Kitty? I'm still patching WAR, but the install didn't take. I think it's because I was playing LotRO when the disk finished and must have inadvertantly clicked cancel for the next one. Sooo, finally installed, account created, and patching as we speak.

Alright, I'm installing WAR right now and right off the bat, something that makes me itch to reactivate my LotRO account... PvR. At it's heart, WAR is a PvP game. Fair enough, but if it is, I'm going to cancel my subscription pretty quickly and return to Duilond. One of the things that appeals to me about LotRO is the lack of player (and not just PvP but players in general) stupidity. No trade chat filled with so much crap you end up turning it off. No general chat that makes you do the same. Sure, I saw some other players, but I could go on my merry way and do my own thing. However, I will say, while I'm loading it, that Warhammer has always been a miniatures game for me, and so it has always been PvP in RL. So, maybe the PvP in the game will reflect the sort that I enjoy.

You right click on your mount in inventory. The mount disappears, but you have it as a new "skill" of sorts in your character sheet. When you open your character sheet, click on the "pets" tab at the bottom and you can place your new mount ability on your toolbar. Hey, my wife has one of those little pet ellekk things named "peanut" and it works for those too. So, my wife ends up with three new slots! You can use the ability from your character sheet OR by putting it on your toolbar.