KillTenRats - Ethic
October 10, 2008
06:02
My gamer buddy Andrew was late to my wedding reception. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I thought I had more time.” His wife looked irritated, but we just had to laugh.
Andrew had perhaps the worst time management skills in the world, a bad trait for a gamer, when there is always another shiny [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 9, 2008
19:00
Mourkain Temple is a Tier 2 Scenario (12v12) in Warhammer Online using the murderball mechanic - where one item is held for points but increasingly damages the player holding the item. Mourkain seems to get a bit of flak, but I really like the fast pace of the map (especially compared to the other slower [...]
Categories: Bloggers
14:26
The Azeroth Advisor is, according to their FAQ, “an electronic newsletter that is personalized to your World of Warcraft characters. It is automatically delivered to you by email, customized to your character’s current level and status. Our idea is simple: give you the information you need when it’s relevant to you. The Azeroth Advisor [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
Ardwulf claims to be for Order, but can we trust a man who lives a double life? Where was he when the forces of Chaos stormed Stonetroll Keep? Where was he when our Dwarf allies were routed at the Mourkain Temple? He was at Mount Bloodhorn, playing at being a Greenskin. [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
So you are off to fight the balrog or a dragon, or maybe just down to the local troll caves where they move in large, violent clusters. This will involve fire, sharp objects, and massive blunt trauma on all sides. And your plan for survival is to bring a Minstrel along, who will [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 8, 2008
21:00
I badgered a few friends to run back to some skipped Public Quests in Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning last weekend, and we decided to try out the more difficult Public Quest for Chapter 4: Chaos called Salzenmund, aptly named for the walled town that the Raven Host is corrupting from within. The Public Quest deals with [...]
Categories: Bloggers
18:02
The game is shaky on it, particularly with respect to floors and ceilings. If you use an area-effect attack in a cave, everything on tunnels above and below you might come running for you. That is if you are lucky: they also might start hitting you through the ceiling. This is a [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
800 new monsters, you say? How many of those are the same guy with a slightly different name and color pallete, plus or minus a few hit points or abilities? Heck, how many of those are new models, rather than declaring this green-ish orc the “orc mauler”? Would 40 be a [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 7, 2008
20:15
Hello. I have been strangely attracted here by Zubon’s Blog Posting Fury Method. He was what I consider one of the four lasting friends of the Southern Star Guild from the niche MMO A Tale in the Desert. While I am still searching for Dragynne and Aewl, the bloggers at Kill Ten Rats really grabbed [...]
Categories: Bloggers
18:02
Have a normal but CSR-controlled character logged on at all times. Wait for the spam. Ban the account.
Park the character next to a mailbox so you can check that. If general chat spam is your problem, go wherever that is most common (say Bree-town). You do not even need to pay [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
The near-universal consensus I hear is that Spore is four poor mini-games packaged with an odd version of Master of Orion 3 and a great creature creator. The connection between the games is weak, so you might as well play the good versions sequentially. Impressions of the spacefaring game vary, with the advice [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 6, 2008
18:02
About half the time, I am out-numbered in scenarios. In about half of those, the team will fill by the time we are down 100-200 points, but there is not a lot to be done by then. I have won one 10-on-12 scenario, but there is nothing to be done with 8-on-12. [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
Given last week’s fun and games, I would like to hit the wayback machine to 2007.
If the game is irredeemable dreck, there is no point in discussing its problems.
…
Bugs, queues, and crashes are upsetting because they stand between us and the fun that we know to lie just beyond them.
Or as Rog puts [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 5, 2008
18:02
Warhammer’s gold-spammer reporting tool has an odd feature in that it requires you to read the message and know the site that is spamming you. Mythic is making sure you have read and typed the site URL. I know of nothing that the spammers could want more.
: Zubon
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
I am in an abusive relationship with my cat. That he contributes nothing to the household except his presence is a given. He wants to be left alone to do his own thing for most of the day. When he wants attention, though, he wants it now and he wants it on [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 4, 2008
20:00
Every time I see “KOTOR MMO,” which is more or less constantly in the VirginWorlds feed there, my brain first registers “KOL MMO.” Because the world needs 3-D Pastamancers.
: Zubon
It would be pretty cool if a mainstream MMO tried the “Ascension” scheme of letting you start a character over with something [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
Playing The Lord of the Rings Online™ Volume 1: Shadows of Angmar™ this weekend, I was reminded that it has a soft death penalty but one that still encourages you to stop playing the game. When you die, you take item damage and get dread. Dread reduces your hit points (”morale”), reduces the [...]
Categories: Bloggers
03:34
Copra has a great point on Warhammer:
the characters are soldiers fighting for their faction. And this is where it becomes a different bowl of porridge. The players assume their role as warriors for a cause, and are not in fact expecting to be the heroes or the protagonists of the great storyline.
I criticized The [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 3, 2008
06:02
How many people do you think they could get to sign up for this deal:
Due to popular demand, CCP is proud to announce EVE Offline! This evolution in MMO gaming allows you to create a new type of character, one accessible from the internet or your mobile phone, without the full game client. [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 2, 2008
06:02
The Chosen is the Chaos tank. His special mechanic is auras: +x to you and your allies, -x to your enemies. He uses them one at a time, but the effects last 12 seconds and you can switch them every 4, so you could be a fair melee-range debuffer if you focused on [...]
Categories: Bloggers
October 1, 2008
14:08
Despite claiming to be serious about goldspam, I have been getting tells from the same guy since last night. This would not be a problem except that the game’s ignore list does not work. Why is Mythic advertising an add-on? Because it cannot program basic functionality. I have canceled my account, [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
In case your relationship is not geeky enough, we present the videogame wedding of an artist at Sparkplay. Themed tables and everything! Note the Mario cookies at the bottom. I don’t know what kind of cookies they are, but they are obviously made of win.
: Zubon
Categories: Bloggers
September 30, 2008
18:02
Finding myself awake early, I decided to log in and finish a few quests. I was reminded that, while Warhammer may have been the most ready-for-release MMO I know of, it is still not possible to play for five minutes without hitting a bug. In about an hour:
Attack animations do not always play. [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
Previously
The class is coming into itself a bit more, with a shift towards AE DoTs. It does two things very well: single target burst damage and AE damage-over-time. Survivability is still low, but it is adequate for PvE and improving in PvP as I learn how to play better.
By level 20, the turrets [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 29, 2008
17:56
Due to a hectic work and school schedule, I’ve been forced to put gaming on the back burner. That’s hard when you enjoy it as much as I do, and thus when you know you have some time to play, you look for completely different things in a game. Also, taking a step [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
I like him. This is what the creep Defiler aspires to be.
The slower pace of Warhammer fights makes the healer role more manageable. Unless a squishy aggroes a keep lord, no one drops in three hits. Contrast this with City of Heroes, where I often need to start the heal animation before [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 28, 2008
18:02
It is back. Do not forget to harvest your mushrooms (although the reward is not that stellar). Because this is Turbine, there are masks. Those are actually the character’s eyes peeking through the holes, not just something painted on the texture, one of those details that shows off the graphics but [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
September 27, 2008
18:47
I am not sure when we added them to the blogroll, because I paid Warhammer almost no attention until this month, but The Book of Grudges is full of interesting Warhammer content. If you want to see the difference between what we do here and an actual fan site for a game, definitely check [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
September 26, 2008
23:34
As I write this, Mythic has a “Banhammer” image saying, “4051 banned for selling gold.” If that is accounts, that is $202,550 in Warhammer boxes. I know that retailers, publishers, etc. see a lot of that money, but it should be enough to pay for whoever is tracking down and banning spammers.
Frankly, I [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
City of Heroes has moved the mission editor to Issue 14 in 2009. Issue 13 will be adding all the content that was missing from Issue 12: they are finishing up Cimerora and the Midnight Squad. Because releasing incomplete content and getting to it 5 months later is acceptable on a four year [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 25, 2008
06:02
Captains are the most under-rated class in The Lord of the Rings Online™: Shadows of Angmar™. They are the most hybridized class I have seen in any game, and they still work. We are used to seeing broken hybrids, either brokenly powerful (and therefore overshadowing the classes they are hybridizing) or too weak [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 24, 2008
18:00
Maybe you wonder where you are
I don’t care
Here is where time is on our side
Take you there…take you there
We’re on a road to nowhere
- Talking Heads
I was fighting in the Battle at Bittermore when I noticed a trail heading north and west into the mountains. Being more of an explorer than a fighter, I slipped [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
I know that I complain a lot about the games I play. Complaining is kind of what we do here in the blogosphere. And then there is Yahtzee. Yahtzee is the popular video blogger who likes Portal, Psychonauts, Guitar Hero, and cursing whilst wearing a hat. That seems to be all [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 23, 2008
16:37
But I’ve been playing Spore a lot, hence the absence.
How is it? Mini-review: It’s like going on a date with a cute girl. She’s smart, funny, makes you laugh, very easy to be around her and you two have a blast. Then you take her home at the end of the evening and realize she’s [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
Pretty much the same as ranged DPS anywhere, but I like the turrets and multiple, stacking, instant-cast damage over time (DoT) abilities.
The Engineer’s big class feature is the turret. You get three options: long-range, short-range AE, and medium-range grenade turret. I have not been using that last one much, although I might toy [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 22, 2008
20:08
Today is, first and foremost, my wife’s birthday. Happy Birthday, sweetheart! Feel free to wish her well in the comments…
She is also happy to share the day with Bilbo and Frodo Baggins. It’s a good day.
- Ethic
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
Hypothesis: There are far more players interested in RvR on Destruction than Order.
Expected outcomes: Order scenario queues are trivial, while Destruction scenario queues are lengthy. Open-world RvR will be dominated by Destruction. At lower tiers, when scenarios are the dominant method of gaining renown, Order will have an advantage; they will have more [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 21, 2008
06:02
Many comic book writers, artists, and publishers are truly lousy at keeping deadlines. I recall the early days of Image, with about two comics that managed to publish monthly. This proud tradition continues today, with monthly comics that publish five times a year and quarterly comics that will someday get their second issues. [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 20, 2008
06:02
I made my Shaman the night before retail release. After leveling a bit and connecting with the guild for some public quests and RvR scenarios, we decided to hit open world RvR. By the half-way point, we had a full warband. Smile for the camera, guys!
The night before the game went [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 19, 2008
06:05
I was totally going to translate that last post in honor of the holiday, but I discovered that my diction does not convert well. It was just the same with a few “t’” and “be”s.
I have several government meetings on Friday. I will see how many of them are observing the holiday.
[...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
Warhammer seems to have decided that players need to scroll through and clickwrap-sign one useless, unread document per login, rather than two. This is intended to be a fig leaf for court action, despite Mr. Jacobs’s explicit statement that they do not expect players to read it every time. I will leave you [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 18, 2008
06:02
A great thing in the Warhammer lore is that the dark elves really are that evil. Everyone is violent if not genocidal, but the dark elves get a category of their own.
Most of it involves slaughtering peaceful high elves. Look, they are lining up for honorable combat; to the siege weapons! A [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 17, 2008
06:02
J. and the Australian Gamer Podcasters have realized an important truth, namely that most user-made content is crap. Then again, most x is crap for all values of x. The question, I comment there, is whether you have tools to separate the wheat from the chaff (to jump metaphors). The goal is [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 16, 2008
16:00
Last night in Warhammer Online felt like a waste of time. Being in a limited head start really kind of sucks. There is not enough people playing. I ran around to 5 or 6 public quests and it was like a ghost town. Nobody around, at all.
I rolled up a Warrior Priest (check out them [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
I spent far less time than usual in MMOs this weekend. I am still in the habit of being in my computer chair, but I had a few reasonable play sessions rather than a continuous binge. The weekend felt so much longer.
MMOs are great for flow, as well as being ideal Skinner boxes. [...]
Categories: Bloggers
September 15, 2008
18:34
The Warhammer Online Collector’s Edition head start began yesterday and since I still had a functioning CE head start code on my account (I had canceled the order) I was able to play. The following is a summary of my adventures on day one.
I had to work in the morning but I thought I’d try [...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:02
I removed a half-dozen or so sites from the blogroll due to inactivity. If I should re-add you, add you in the first place, remove someone else who has been silent (or not discussing gaming/internet/online gaming), etc., comments are open.
Those who have been purged are saved, just not displaying. Re-adding is easy.
[...]
Categories: Bloggers
06:01
Two years ago today, I started blogging about MMOs at my old blog, Existential Worlds, though I haven’t written there since joining the KTR staff, June 9th, 2007. It really hasn’t seemed like a long time, but it has been rewarding. I have met so many amazing people, many of whom I now call guild-mates in [...]
Categories: Bloggers
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