Video of the Day - August 18th, 2014

Raptr just added some new BETA code that allows you to do videos of the last 15 seconds -- an Instant Replay capture.  I've used it a couple times.  This is from my Skyrim run -- Late July -- a Bosmer I've gotten up to level 72 at this point.  I've had to go several skills to legendary to keep him leveling up.  Hopefully I'll have a legendary dragon before too long.  I also hope to try some longer videos -- but the first one didn't work too well since it was 1 minute longer than Youtube allows.

Skyrim Modding -- Too much of a good thing?

I find myself spending a lot of time in Skyrim.   Recently I had to unload and reload most of my mods to stabilize some STEAM errors that popped up.   In doing so, I kind of had to examine what I had applied.   Various clothing and graphic mods seemed to be harmless.   Even a few that add missions and minor content aren't bad.    Some minor rules changes aren't damaging.   But start combining them?   Play balance goes out the window.

I mean some I really like -- I've seen Breezhomes that are WONDERFUL compared to the standard one -- roomier, with chests galore, definite locations for armor and weapons far beyond the basic home.   Even with a full forge in the basement -- right next to the heated bath.   I love most of the ones that remake the familiar towns by adding more trees -- even if periodically I see NPCs stuck trying to continually walk through something that isn't there on a default game. 

Some mods are not lore friendly - but frequently you don't find that out until you get into them.  Some go beyond mods and really become cheats. But hiding under the banner of "mod", it makes them somehow less a cheat.  At least at first.

One of my favorite mods was one that allows you to use multiple rings.  It makes sense -- I mean most games allow you to have at LEAST 2.   But when you have enchanters that can't double enchant the jewelry, that means you've added two more enchantments to your total.  But another mod allows you to spend ANOTHER perk to get 6 enchantments per item, and another to get 20.   Wearing 6 rings and one amulet gives you 140 enchantments -- ON top of your armor, which adds another 80 or more.  I'm not saying that it isn't fun to have a character that can one shot giants and handle multiple dragons at once.  But you do lose a true sense of accomplishment.   Part of me says I earned it by getting a character with 100 enchanting AND spending the perk points to max out the number of enchantments.   

I found myself playing the XBOX version to escape the mods -- I really didn't want to turn them off - but if I play a Nord through to level 60, I find myself wondering if I could do it WITHOUT the mods.  If you start turning them off, where DO you draw the line?    The XBOX version is still MOD-free, save the DLC.  

The thousands of hours I've put into this game -- IS it a waste at some point with the mods?    I'm having fun, and that is a good thing.  But did I accomplish things?   I can make enchantments to overpower my low Two-handed weapon skill, or my low Sneak -- But is that the same as EARNING the skill?  

Considering my next venture into the Elder Scrolls universe will be in the MMO in a few weeks, and that such mods will be off limits, I can't help but wonder.   Is the appeal of the game in part DUE to the mods?  Can a MMO based on the world work without them?  Or will the players get bored playing with only what is in the game -- not being able to paint their armor to be like Captain Americas or add that oversized Anime sword to the game.   Makes me wish I had an Elder Scroll to see what the future of the game would be...

Skyrim -- On a Roll...

My toon, Fridina Ice-Eyes has completed most of the Dragonborn DLC content and is now 52, halfway to 53.    She's bounced back and forth betwee Dragonscale and Light Stahlrim armor.  Currently her Dragonscale armor is now giving a rating of 1012.  I don't hink I've ever gotten 4 figures from an armor rating -- definitely not from LIGHT armor.    Light armor is up to 80+, with 5 level bonuses (giving 100% bonus, and bonuses for all light armor and matching set.    One handed is high 70s, although of not done more than the level perks.   I've got a deadric sword overblacksmithed and overenchanted thanks to potions, with absorb health of 47 and 119 chaos damage on top of 278 regular damage.   I've tried a matching mace with chaos and absorb stamina, but it slowed me down a little.   A couple times I did need the shield -- but not often.  The healing from the sword has lessened my needs  for Restoration magic.   

Its been a weird trip -- Starting off the wizard side, she's always been a glass cannon.  Unshielded and vulnerable.   Now in armor she's a force to be reckoned with using sword and shield.  Now with her current weapon and armor, she can wade through lots of foes with the sword.   Some missions are pretty thick with mages.   Those missions usually force her to back to magic.

As I said, Mirak has been defeated.  One of the things I did on the final Waking Dreams pursuit of Mirak was to use the un-perk stuff that you get at the end,  and get my restoration perks back (3) and put them into Smithing so I could do Ebony and fully smith Stahlrim.   Eventually Deadric followed, making it the first character with ALL smithing perks.   IF I had it to do over again, I would have gone and unperked Smithing, and reversed sides.     I wouldn't be using anthing other than Sthalrim , Dragonscale or Deadric, so why go that route?   I'd have 3 perks that I could use on something else.  

I managed to get further through all the Dragonborn DLC than ever before -- I got all the armor pieces from out of the crypt that you work with a dark elf to unbury.   I found 2 of the resonance gems, and new where to take them -- and apparently that was all that was needed to finish that dungeon.  Well that and figuring out a few puzzles.   

Dragonborn stuff is underway, and I've gotten to the point where I've done several missions for the Gunmar and Sorine Jurard.  To that point I'd not done anything to get a bounty over 80 -- hard to think I'd went through 50 levels like that.  But I had to defeat a masquerading bard and was forced to do it publically.   1000 bounty for Dawnstar.  Ugh.    

One of the Go-for missions for Sorine had me getting dwemer schematics from a location in Solstheim -- That's right .    Dawngard DLC sending me to Dragonborn DLC location.  It must be semi-random or something, and that location qualified. 

She's probably got around 165000 gold by now -- making her the richest Skyrim character I've ever had.  I've lots of unfinished shouts -- where I know 1 or 2 of the words, but not all 3.   Even said, with close to 50 dragon downed,  there are plenty of gaps if I want to make that a goal.  

I've been a little hampered lately.  I think the LB button on my PC Xbox style control has broken -- I can't seem to SPRINT anymore.  Which has been a problem sometimes in battle ---- NO sprint means even some bunnies can outdistant you unless you resort to Whirlwind sprint.  I suspect it will have to be replaced.   

 I can easily see getting a few more levels on this character for the DLC content.   After that I'll have to search for all the unexplored locations.  I'm hoping I've forgotten some big ones -- I don't see how anyone gets to the likes of 70 without redoing a lot of contents. 

That being said I think I'm going to give it a rest.   The Dawngard stuff can get tedius -- You've got the long backstage wandering of the castle, followed by all the stuff in the Soul Cairn, then you have to pursue the Bow by playing errand girl for the Snow Elf through the falmer filled caves and canyons hidden in northwestern Skyrim.  I really don't like doing that again.  But I would like to get another level or two on this character.  It would officialy become my higest toon.  

Gaming log

I've gotten a character back up on in Skyrim to level 46.   My battlemage has gotten enchanting up to 100, Destruction up to 100, and smithing is in the mid 90s.   I soon hope to begin work on my DragonScale armor set, which I will double enchant.   Even in my second set of Glass armor which I double enchanted I can go weapon or spells without changing into archmage robes.   Destruction spells cost no magicka.   

I've made it through the companion quests, and cured her  of lycanthropy.  I've gotten the elder scrolls, red the magic portion of the Oghma Infinium, and pursued Alduin to Sovangarde.    I've no interest in doing Thiefs guild on this character, and with the Dark Brotherhood no more, I've only got the Dawnguard and Dragonborn DLC content pending.   I'm holding off on the final stage of Potema in Solitude, and haven't done the Bards college quests either, although I did find the lute doing other things in far east Skyrim.

I'm so close to getting my main goals I can taste it -- I'd love to have a level 50 again on the PC.  Doing it as a battlemage is just icing on the cake.

In Champions I've gotten a few levels here and there.   I did do one thing -- trying a freeform Darkness character that actually got over the hurdle.  Called Eidolon (as in apparition - ghost), it may remind City players of the Vahz Eidolons.    I finally used some of my zen and got the Cape Glide power for that toon, and it turned out to be good.   I had thought it wouldn't be able to gain altitude and just be a controlled falling.   Not so.   You can gain altitude, but albeit you don't do it as fast as horizontal or downward movement.  And of course, you can't hover.   It takes a bit to get used to.   It distorts the cape as it spreads it out.  A flat bottom cape goes into a semi-circle.   A scalloped bottom cape looks neat stretched out.   I used a black & purple design.   Leather, with thin purple inlay stripes.   I started with a golden age hood, but it really didn't look right.   I ended up doing a full mask, also with purple lines.   The cape is gradient. In flight the gradient inperceptible on the cape at rest is very noticable.  I've had to go with a very deep purple.   I've got a magic origin -- changed by touching an ancient medallion.  He's already up to 15 and is very fun to play.

Its hard to find time for it all  -- Everytime I play one of these two games  I want to play the other.   I've a few games I bought during the Steam sale that I've not touched yet.  Xcom, Orcs Must Die 2, GTA IV to name the main ones.   All in good time.   I hope.  

Mid Summer Blues

I'm still getting over a chest bug which knocked me out for the better part of a week.   Nasty thing that had quite the kick.   It gave me some time to play , but it was Skyrim mostly since Champions was still blocked by the Subscription bug.  

I had a couple starts, but finally decided to play a Nord battlemage.   I tend to to a lot of Skyrim as a Nord.  It just makes things less complicated.    Female this time.   I went with darker hair -- Anyone else feel compelled to do blond Nords?   Simple white war paint over one eye, and made the eyes light grey.  She ended up being called Fridina Ice-Eyes.    I got to play a little of her last night -- and ended up with a level 34 character.   She's primarily Destruction, Conjuration with some Restoration/Alteration.   Her magics are up in the Adept to Expert range.   She knows some Alchemy, and is Expert in Enchanting.  Currently wears the Archmage robes with lots of Destruction enchanting gear.   Now Destruction magicka costs are completely nulliified.   Dark Brotherhood has been destroyed, the Stormcloaks have won the civil war.   I've been crowned Thane of Whiterun, Falkreath, Morthal, & Windhelm and have a house in Windhelm. I've not gone after the High Elf Embassy, so much of the main quest is not yet active.  Smithing is only up to the sixties, working up the light armor side.  Light armor has been raised mostly by training seeing as she wears robes.  But I hope to end up in Dragonscale.  Eventually.

Champions finally got fixed and I got a few levels in on Flagborn, Bellringer, and Bobcat.   Bobcat finally got into the Young Sentinels.   Flamewing is waiting on contact from Nexus Academy -- but I've yet to see any action on that.   I've got several characters now in the low twenty range, and Bobcat is tied with Psideways for the top billing at present.   Some of the groups seem that some of the older character seem dead -- with no one around, and only a handful of people having been on recently.

Work is getting weird with projects looming.  I'm hoping that it won't interfere with Dragon*Con this year.  I've not gotten pre-registered yet -- and it is too late now for a discount.   I'm thinking about ordering some shirts for Dragon*Con -- I've seen some Atlas Park 33 designs that would be so cool to wear and see if anyone catchs it.   Things like that are big conversation starters.   So if you go to Dragon*Con and see a balding guy with a cane wearing a City of Heroes or AP33 shirt, it will probably be me.

Due to the bug, I've not been to see a Movie since Lone Ranger.   Still want to see Despicable Me 2, Pacific Rim, Turbo, Wolverine, among others.   Anxious also for the Flashpoint video release at the end of the month.

I've been taking pics in Champions of other player characters.  I hope to start some daily toons to intersperse with covers.   Maybe I can keep daily updates going for  a long stint until we hit the convention....

The fight goes on...

Gaming wise I've gotten back into Skyrim lately a lot.  I started another few characters , each unique.  But some of it is getting old.  The Elder Scrolls online game can't come out fast enough.

I even tried a little bit of Fallout3.   I used to play that to death -- but it now seems clunky and dated.   Not as bad as Oblivion or Morrowind.  Try as I might, I still can't get into Oblivion due to the interface.  I can't make heads or tales out of what is set or not -- so I don't know what is going on. Listing to Elder Scrolls Off The Record podcast it sounds liike I'm missing something in not playing the games.

Picked up Gunslinger (Call of Juarez) -- cheap but fun so far.   Tricky , lots of cliche's.  Like the way the work stuff in to the story by having the storyteller have to work against the dime novel versions of the story and show BOTH ways the story would have played out.  

Tried a little of Defiance and Champions.  Neither is really pulling me in.  Maybe ESO will break the MMO blight I'm suffering from now.

That being said I've come to a realization on the NCSoft actions versus City of Heroes.   It hurts, but  I think I see what THEY see.

They want as many BIG titles as they can in their roster.  They want big numbers.  Not just profitable, but something that brings in the money.  World of Warcraft numbers of old are a Holy Grail as it were, and probably aren't doable because there aren't that many MMO players in existance.  Or at least not enough that actually have funds. 

I think that when DCUO and Champions hit the market they expected City's numbers to fall, and then they could get rid of it.  But that didn't happen.  To NCSoft the numbers weren't high enough to justify a sequel, but not low enough to outright cancel.   I think they expected City to fade away to the point they could get rid of it easily.  But City proved to be the game that would not die.  It had a high equilibrium of numbers that didn't fall far enough for NCSoft to declare the party over.

Paragon Studios probably helped with that.  Ultra Mode graphics and stuff made the engine less dated and the game look far better.  At least to the point it could contend with more modern games.  I have to wonder if NCSoft was clear on what they were doing.  The end result gave the game more life.

I think the Free to Play approach was something else NCsoft probably thought was a game-ender.  But there was too much that made you want to pay to play DESPITE it being free.  Vet awards, new content, and other perks kept people paying and playing.   How many Free To Play players came in that way and eventually started paying so they could join in on that fun?   And even for those not paying, they were in the form of micro-transactions so they could get those precious costume pieces.   It kept that level of profitibility high enough that it was't a superhit -- but it wasn't a failure either.

I suspect that NCSoft desired to get rid of it and try something else better suited for success.   Look at their current offering.  Wildstar excepted, it is ALL variations on a theme.  I don't hold much hope for Wildstar.  Unless it goes superhit, under NCSoft I expect it to be axed in under 3 years.  Maybe even 2.

So we get to the point last year -- NCSoft finally decides to get rid of City.  They can't publicly say why becaus that would show how easily they could justify the termination of ANY game.    They can't sell the property because it has a history.  There might be legal implications -- Remember Cryptic had owned it originally, and other companies got involved when comic books were made.  And Novels.  The cost of clearing everybodies hold on the property might up the cost of selling to the point it would lose them money.    But selling it might mean that someone else could remake it into a superhit.   A non-NCSoft City of Heroes 2 would have been a night mare for them if it got popular.    Can you imagine them explaining stock holders that a new competitor is using their old product against them?   So City gets an "execution" date, less than 2 paragraph of say-nothing nonsense as "explanation", and that's that.  Right?

Not so.  The Unity rally a week after their annoucment spawned the 33 zones of Atlas Park. in hours.  Despite the somber last days of the game, people still played up to the end.   I saw more people on that last day that I've not seen in years than ever before.  

But now we have Heroes & Villains, The Pheonix Project, Missing World Media, Icon 5, etc. all focused on bringing together a new Super hero MMO in the likeness of City of Heroes.  And it looks like they are further along than I would have thought -- going strong.   We might just one or more of these things seeing the light of day. One can only hope. 

Most of the people I knew in City have shown up in Champions.  While not the same as City, it is the closest of the two remaining Superhero MMOs. I've seen several characters inferring City concepts quite cleverly.  There is a City of heroes global channel on Champions that is ALWAYS busy with ex-City players talking away.

And if you go to social media like Twitter, check out posts involving @NCSoftGames.   You'll find it MOSTLY posts by City supporters who do not support NCSoft, and still daily demand their game back or the IP released. Such steady negative publicity against NCSoft is not going to go over well indefinitely.   Check out #SaveCoH #CityofHeroes #AvengeCoH and others.  People aren't happy and still demand to be heard.   

How long can NCSoft ignore it?   They tried the MMO equivalent of a Scored Earth policy to make sure this game was history.  And expected players to accept that.  And that in itself is the problem.  If you make these artificial worlds you are obligated to keep them running until it isn't possible.  NOT until you don't feel like it.   City was the game that wouldn't die -- so they tried to bury it.  Alive.    They've got to be confused if not appauled that it is not only still kicking in its own way, but that it is spawning NEW properties they don't control.

Eventually I expect NCSoft to speak out again.  Whether that is in defense of its actions, to quell complaints and anti-NCSoft commentary, or to sue someone for use of their property, I do expect them to come out again.   I expect the players to continue to revolt against them.   I expect NCSoft to become less and less a big name in the business and more a pariah to be left alone and not touched at all.   In essense, trying to kill City only started them down a path to their own corporate demise.   At the very least I expect them to DITCH the now stained NCSoft name and come up with a new name & logo, hoping they can hide behind that mask.

I don't see anything working for them now.

Gaming for January/February

My gaming for the last couple months, during my silence , has been primarily SKYRIM.  I've tried to get away from it but I keep getting drawn back to it.

I finally got one character to 50 on the PC -- something I've done once before on the XBOX version.  This character was a nord, Jorgar Rock-Slide.  He's primarily Two Handed Heavy Armor with Smithing and Enchanting. All of the main skills are at 100, and he's been doing Daedric and Dragon items with double enchantments.  Most of the time he breezes through opposition.  It takes me by surprise when he takes damage.   He's made it through both Dawnguard and Dragonborn DLC and then some.  He's started doing some one handed shield work, but hasn't much perks in that area.  Thankfully a special set of armor with one hand and block perks suffices to fill in for the lack of skill perks.

I still like getting into some pure mages -- My Breton pure mage is the best so far.  He's got enchanting high enough to negate all Destruction school costs, which means he can throw endless fireballs, incinerates, wall spells and more that would fatigue the average wizard in seconds.  He's one of the few mages that hasn't done much with conjuration.    I've another mage - a Dark elf.  He's gone from Mage quests to becoming Stormblade to joining the Theif Guild.   Primarily he's a conjurer.  I've tried to get his destruction up but keep going back to Conjuration.   He's over halfway through the collecting the "unusual gems", and only has one more hold before the guild is back on its feet and he becomes leader.   I need Morthal quests and keep getting an endless supply of Windhelm and Whiterun jobs.    I found some of those so annoying.  I've stollen the same 3 objects 4 or 5 times each.    I even helped out the Battle Born in White run getting his help in the hold, but have to steal from his house before I leave?  Sometimes these quests seem at ODDS with each other.   After getting his favor, stealing from him would seem to be the LAST thing the guild would want to do...

I would still like to try an illusion mage at some time -- but it has never been something I could master so far.

I have put in some pinball time, both on Xbox and iPad.  The new Star Wars pinball is out and it is growing on me.  I hope they do more of these.  Sounds like they got the original voices for the most part, and definitely duplicated most of the sound effects.   Seeing a lightsaber act as a ball ramp is ... bizarre.   Not to mention tie fighters flying over the board.  Sadly I've only scratched the surface.

I tried Champions again briefly.  It still isn't thrilling me.   I like seeing old COH friends there from time to time, DJs from the Cape, but is that enough to keep me there?   Even before City's demise, DCUO and Champions seemed to be pale imitations.   Trying hard to be superheroesque but missing elements.   I wonder if either will be here in a few years....  I probably will try the Marvel game when it comes out -- but it will be an MMO and NOT an MMORPG.  If I'm stuck doing the 673rd variation of their characters, it just won't have the flare for me.   If the gameplay works, and gives me the COH teaming/action vibe I'm missing, I may stick around.