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il-predestinato · 2 years

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milton keynes’ finest sounds very interesting…very interesting indeed, love the idea!

An anon left a message in my inbox almost A YEAR AGO saying that people kept saying Kimi's race engineer sounded a lot like Charles. It really stuck with me and thus race engineer!Charles fic was born! I stole the tentative title name from "Piltover's Finest" (ship name for Caitlyn/Vi... any Arcane fans out there?).

It's still very much a WIP but if anyone is interested, here are a few snippets.

Title: Milton Keynes' Finest

Pairing: Driver!Max/Engineer!Charles

Excerpt #1:

Charles had nothing but criticism over the analysis of his FP1 and FP2 lap times. He was unfailingly polite, as if carefully ensuring that Max could find no fault with his manners and bemoan to Christian (not that Max was a tattletale - he huffed at the thought), but he found fault in almost every corner and straight, in both the short runs and the race runs.

“There isn’t an extra tenth to be found through turns 1-3.” Max finally could not hold his tongue anymore.

“My analysis of your entry into turn 2 and exit out of turn 3 suggests otherwise,” came the ever polite response. Charles’s piercing green eyes issued a challenge. “Take the entry you used on lap 13 - it’s perfect but you shorted the corner out of 3. Now if you combined that with the exit out of 3 that you took on lap 29, that’s where the extra tenth will come from.”

Max threw up both hands in frustration. “You’re not making sense. A minute ago you compared it to Checo’s racing line and said his was optimal. He did the exact same thing out of 3.”

To combine the entry he used on lap 13 with the exit he took on lap 29 was … well, if not impossible, then driving on a razor’s edge.

Something flashed across Charles’s eyes, and his brow creased into a frown for the first time. “The line was optimal for Checo, that’s true,” he informed Max coldly. “But you’re capable of more. Or am I wrong about you?”

Max wanted to strangle him.

The most irritating thing about Charles is that Max ends up proving him right.

The whole thing was a trap. To prove him wrong, Max would have to fail to go faster. And there has always been a part of him that recoiled at the thought that he had somehow reached his ceiling, that this version of him was the finished product, all too ready to be tossed aside in lieu of new talent.

Nevertheless, he was practically spitting mad by the end of FP3. Charles would not shut up on the radio. He refused to give Max the space to process. Charles was clever enough not to speak to him in the high speed corners, never crossing the line into truly aggravating or dangerous territory. But that further irked Max. His new race engineer was so deliberately calculating, clearly well-briefed in advance, that no true fault could be found with his communication, and yet Max had never felt so demeaned in his skills.

He thought GP was stoic and reserved, never lauding him with too much praise. By comparison to Charles, GP was practically effusive in encouragement.

“Your gain in the last lap was 0.2,” intoned Charles as Max crawled into the pitlane with grinding teeth and a tense grip on his steering wheel. “Our target is 0.3.”

Soon his target would be Charles’s vocal cords. At least he was now certain that British accents are far less annoying than French accents.

Excerpt #2:

Temporary race engineer, he kept reminding himself in order to maintain his sanity.

Because he hasn’t even made it through the whole race weekend with this impossibly aggravating individual, and he’s not sure he will survive to see the next race weekend. He’s already drafted his resignation letter for Christian.

Dramatic did not suit him, but desperate times -

To his dismay, his usually indulgent team principal laughed at him.

Dismissively.

“Come on, Max, give him a chance,” he chided, as if he found nothing of value in the well-crafted ten minute rant that Max just bestowed upon him. “He's a prodigy - Adrian Newey’s prized disciple. He was head-hunted by Ferrari, McLaren, and Alpine. We are lucky that he chose to stay with us.”

Max rolled his eyes. “Yeah, perfect. A prodigy at annoying me. Did you hear him during Qualifying?” He didn’t usually let anything linger, but even talking about it brought back a grimace of irritation. He mimicked the French-accented voice: “‘No, Max, focus on turns 7 and 9 where you need two extra tenths each. You let me worry about the leader’s times.’ Like honestly, what the fuck, Christian. I want the lap times. He acts like it’s a fucking secret, and then lectures me. It’s unbelievable.”

He is most definitely not being dramatic.

(Okay, fine… so he got pole position, and yes - it was because he gained a few extra tenths in turns 7 and 9… but still - it’s the fucking principle of it. Because fuck that guy, and hopefully Christian doesn’t mention the pole position thing -)

“Well, you topped Qualifying, didn’t you?”

Damn it.

He then tried another approach. “He’s arrogant.”

Christian raised a single wordless eyebrow, and well... Max sort of had that one coming to him.

“Why can’t we send him back to the factory?” he suggested instead, which he thought was a perfectly sensible decision. That’s where Charles Leclerc came from, and he should be promptly banished from whence he came. If Charles was indeed an oh-so-gifted aerodynamicist and ICE expert as they all claimed him to be, then he can rant about shaving a few tenths off this and that corner into the void of the wind tunnel - because seriously, fuck him and fuck that snide French accent.

“He’s going to be your race engineer until GP is ready to return.” Christian’s voice was terse and left him no room for argument. “These are Helmut’s orders.”

#charles leclerc #max verstappen #lestappen #*#my fic #elle.ask #anon #lestappen fic #f1 rpf

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swampgallows · 4 months

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as someone who loves maxing out professions in wow, timegated reagents make me fucking cuhraaayyzeeeeeee. like to skill up in bfa cooking you have to either wait for specific world quests to be up or you have to grind out reputation just to get "rank 2" of a recipe you already know but it uses fewer reagents or w/e and grants skill points again. or in legion even NOMI had a command table of sorts where he'd "research" and you'd HOPE youd get those recipe scraps til you could combine ten and get a new one. but as a tailor i know im gonna be haunted by all those appearances i can't unlock yet because they all require sparks, sometimes TWO!!, and i cant just churn em out. im still working on damn BFA!!! tailoring appearances because they require reagents from eternal palace and nyalotha—not even for the recipe itself but for a "loom" (abyssal focus) to craft it at.

like on one hand maybe they didn't want players to be able to craft themselves a "raid-grade " set—which like, why? BC and wrath you could easily craft yourself a raid-ready set; hell even in the vanilla felcloth and mooncloth sets were pretty useful. it was time-gated in its own way i guess (could only make cloth once a day at a specific location) but if someone REALLY wanted to they could get reagents on the AH. and at the same time i dont know why there aren't 'base' versions of the recipes, or why sparks themselves are tiered. it seems like with primal infusions and all the fixins they added you could just make the base item and then "socket" it when recrafting to be a higher ilevel. especially because it requires a matching spark to use it! like!!! why require a spark (cap 395) AND a matching infusion (cap 408) just for the smallest ilevel upgrade? this late in the xpac these items are useless. why wouldnt they just roll over/consolidate, or better yet be currency (e.g. crests)?

so not only am i just dumping them into something i'll vendor (since i just want the appearance), i cant even do the whole crafting order roulette through my alts and get them upgrades out of it. it's two entire sparks to craft one of the inscription staves just to be able to skill up my inscription, which means i'm wasting sparks (a time gated resource) and also NOT getting a worthwhile item out of it because my scribe's skill points arent high enough to craft a higher quality item because he needs sparks to skill up aaaaaaaaaaaaaa

basically all im saying is that dragonflight profession gear/appearances are not gonna be very retroactive-friendly. since i missed a chunk of this xpac im already way behind in terms of gathering sparks and have no way to catch up just to complete content that's already irrelevant (save for collection/maxing/transmog).

#blathering #world of warcraft

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soulofapatrick · 1 year

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Cup of Joel - Joel Miller x Reader

Summary: A regular of your coffee shop - Tommy - brings his brother with him one day

Words: 1.6k

Warnings: none

Notes: idk if I'll make this a two part or a series (also I'm really living up to my nickname of the coffee addict here)

Y/N’s POV

Coffee. Something so plain and simple yet so many varieties and tastes. As a barista working at a small coffee shop in downtown Austin, Texas, I can't help but agree with the sentiment that coffee is something plain and simple yet endlessly diverse. Every day, I wake up early and make my way to the coffee shop, preparing myself for the rush of customers that inevitably floods in as soon as we open our doors.

The sound of the espresso machine hissing and the aroma of freshly brewed coffee fill the air, signalling to our customers that we're open for business. As the day goes on, I take orders, grind beans, steam milk, and pour shots of espresso with the precision and skill of a seasoned barista. But amidst the chaos of the busy coffee shop, I can't help but embellish the lives behind each cup of coffee that I serve. The woman who always sits in the corner nursing a cappuccino is a new mother, desperate for the moment of peace and quiet that comes with this place. The man in the smart suit orders an americano on his way to work, always rushing about and panicking about sleeping through his alarms which makes him almost late for his meetings. As I hand each customer their cup of coffee, I can't help but wonder about the moments of joy, sorrow, and contemplation that will be shared over that simple cup of coffee. For me, the art of being a barista isn't just about crafting the perfect cup of coffee - it's about connecting with people and being a part of their stories, one cup at a time.

The customers are usually the same few with one or two new faces, often students or people who have recently moved to the area. But even though I see some of the same people day after day, I'm always excited to learn something new about them or to see what kind of coffee they'll order next. After all, with so many varieties and tastes to choose from, every day at the coffee shop is a new adventure.

Today was no different, Nancy came in and took her seat in the corner with bags under her eyes and a tiredness a first time mother possesses, sipping at her cappuccino. Andy came practically sprinting in, apologising about slamming the door, thanking me for having his latte with three shots of espresso ready for him, paying and charging back out. It always makes me laugh how things like Andy and his lateness never change. Other regulars come and go, a shy student comes in, stuttering her way through an order of a caramel macchiato, surprise on her face when she sees her name written on the cup: Amelia.

Other than those three the morning rush came and went, some customers rude and snappy and others sweet and keeping to themselves until all was left with Nancy and another semi regular that I am still to learn the name of. It’s coming up to lunchtime which means my favourite customer is going to be showing his face with that flirty grin that he thinks will work on me one day. Those dark curls, sun-kissed skin and freckles and those cognac eyes. They remind me of a cup of rich, dark coffee - deep and intense with a warm and inviting tone. His eyes have a certain smokiness to them, much like a bold espresso shot, but with a touch of sweetness that reminds me of a caramel latte. The way his eyes crinkle at the corners when he smiles gives them a comforting and familiar feel, like the first sip of a creamy cappuccino on a chilly morning. Just like a perfect cup of coffee, his eyes have the ability to comfort, energise and uplift me all at once. But, he is too much like my brother for me to ever see him more than a friend no matter how hard he tries and he tries.

I know Tommy’s order off by heart: Caffe Americano. I grab the tall cups and place it under the spout of the espresso machine, pulling the handle down to extract two shots of espresso. The aroma of the rich, dark coffee fills the air as the hot water is added to the cup, creating a smooth and bold flavour. I top it off with a bit of whipped cream and caramel drizzle as Tommy has quite the sweet tooth. As if on cue, the bell chimes and Tommy comes strolling in, calling a cheerful, “Afternoon Mouse.” His nickname has me rolling my eyes at him and handing him his cup of coffee before I realise there’s someone standing just behind Tommy, his eyebrows raised at Tommy who sends him a smug smirk. The man has me fumbling behind the counter, knocking some of the cups down and Tommy’s smug smirk has morphed into a knowing one, “Mouse, this is my brother, Joel.”

Joel’s more rugged than his brother, sharp cheekbones and a strong jawline. He has dark, loosely curled hair that looks oh so fluffy and falls in disarray around his face, framing his features perfectly. His eyes are dark and piercing, with a hint of mischief that contradicts his easy smile. Joel stands tall and confident, with broad shoulders and a lean build that suggests he takes goo care of himself. He has a light beard, adding to his rugged and handsome appearance. When he smiles I think my knees give way and my heart tries to skip through my chest and that glint in those mesmerising eyes, the colour of dark roast coffee with hints of hazelnut and chocolate tones buried deep within.

Tommy’s addictive laugh snaps me back to reality and I realise I’m staring, Joel’s hand is held out for me to shake and I’m flushing, ducking my head out of embarrassment. I take his hand, revelling in the largeness and warmth of his hand enclosing mine, feeling the roughness of the callouses from working as a contractor with Tommy. I introduce myself, “I’m Y/N, pleasure to finally meet you.”

Joel’s voice is velvety, with a deep and southern drawl as he responds, “Likewise, Tommy won’t shut up about you.” His eyes twinkle with amusement, as if sharing an inside joke with his brother. I can’t help but feel a flutter in my stomach at his words and the way his eyes linger on me as I move back to the coffee machines before realising I don’t actually know Joel’s coffee order so I hold the cup up for him to see, “Oh, just plain black coffee with do sweetheart.” I drop the cup at the way the pet name rolls of his tongue and am clearing my throat, kicking the now unusable cup towards the bin and retrying with his order.

I quickly grab a new cup, placing it under the coffee maker and pressing the button for a regular cup of coffee. The simplicity of it makes me smile to myself as most order very complicated drinks and I think this is the first order of a plain black coffee I’ve had in a few weeks. The sound of the hot water filling the cup echoes in the small space and the aroma of freshly brewing coffee fills the air again. I can still feel Joel’s gaze on me, watching me intently and I try to maintain my composure as I add the lid, by some miracle snapping it on with no spillage or anything. Glancing at Joel once more I swallow thickly and take a risk, grabbing my sharpie and writing his name on the cup, followed by my number. Last minute I cross out the unneeded words on the ‘warning! The contents of the cup you’re holding may be extremely hot’ so it says ‘warning! You’re extremely hot.’

Nervously, I’m handing Joel his cup, feeling my cheeks flush even more as I try to avoid his piercing gaze. He takes the cup with a soft thank you, his fingers brushing mine for a brief moment, sending an electric shock through me. I have to quickly look away, not wanting to give away my very obviously thoughts and feelings. Tommy having to step in with a playful roll of his eyes, “Same time tomorrow Mouse.”

I nod trying to shake off the sudden shyness and send the pair a smile, “Of course, Tommy.” Joel flashes me a warm smiles and gives a small wave before following his brother out of the coffee shop. As soon as the bell chimes, signalling their exit, I let a deep breath, feeling my heart rate slowly return to normal as everything is out of my hands now. If Joel texts or calls me it’s up to him, and I can’t do anything about that.

As I start cleaning up the small coffee shop, I can’t help but replay the encounter over and over in my head. The way Joel’s eyes looked at me, the sound of his voice, the brief touch of his fingers on mine, it all feels like a dream. I snap out of my daze when the next customer walks in, and I put on my best smile, ready to take on the rest of the day. But deep down, I can’t help but hope that tomorrow will come sooner rather than later, and that Joel will be there for his plain black coffee once again.

------------

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hikari-ni-naritai · 7 months

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How do you get started on fishing? I want to start the grind but the sheer amount of fish is daunting af. Anything specific you did to make it easier to get started?

Well!!! The first thing to do is like. Level fisher. If you have fisher leveled, do the fisher quests. You don't have to do feast of famine bc that's a fuckin Huge Ordeal (though if you do commit to the grind, you'll catch the legends you need for it anyway so you may as well) but all the job quests and such. The grind I'm doing is not recommended if you're not at max level and idr if the job quests give you skills, but you'll want them if they do.

Now, what *i* did to get started was my friend had a fishing contest that I won and it filled my brain with so much dopamine that I've been on a fishing high for weeks. So it's been very easy for me. But even so, it IS daunting, so here's the method I used. I just opened the fishing log (I think the hotkey is Y?) And started from the top! The first fishing zone is limsa, so grab some low level bait and go to town. When you stop finding new fish, then it's time to flex your research muscles. There's a real useful website I use a lot for this, if you Google "fishing log limsa lominsa lower decks" you should get a result from the console gamers wiki. The wiki has every fishing zone catalogued pretty extensively, so you can reference it against your fishing log to see what you're missing and how to catch it. Your inventory will fill up with bait. This is unavoidable.

This will be enough to get most of the normal ARR fish, but we'll need to change gears for Big Fish. Each fishing hole has one Big Fish (and some have an additional one that serves as the Living Legend for that region), and these are significantly harder, requiring specific times, weathers, and baits. For these, I highly recommend the Fish Tracker <-(link). This website tells you what Big Fish are up right now, which ones are coming up soon, and the easiest method for catching them. You can go into the settings to filter out later patches if you want to focus on one expansion at a time (like I am!) And you can pin Fish you're Super interested in to the top of the list, so you always know when they're coming. By default, if there's more than one up at a time, the list will sort by rarity, so you don't accidentally chase a Fish with 60% uptime when a 0.2% fish was up at the same time. You can mark them off as you catch them, and if you accidentally mark one off that you didn't catch, you can change it to show you caught Fish only and then uncheck it. It's a very versatile little website and it's completely invaluable for Big Fishing!

As for supplies, you'll need a LOT of Hi-Cordials. These are available at the scrip exchange for white gatherers scrips. No need to farm, really, I'm doing fine with my proceeds from custom deliveries. I also like to keep a supply of regular Cordials on hand for when the situation isn't urgent but I want more gp. These are sold at the grand company for company credits. As for bait, you can get most of it at the junkmonger in residential areas, but some lures you'll have to either craft or buy on the marketboard.

I do recommend sticking to just one zone at a time at first! Hell, there's so many fishing holes in eastern la noscea that I only focused on the Costa del Sol side at first. Take little chunks and work through them one by one. Make sure you have a cute glam, and make sure you put the /sit emote on your hotbar so your wol can have a little chair to fish in! And most importantly, be patient and have fun! Fishing can be intensely frustrating, especially with living legends, but catching one after struggling always feels great. I hope you can learn to love fishing like I do! 💙💙💙

#ffxiv

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fereldanwench · 2 years

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I'm going to be obnoxious and presumptuous and tell everyone how to live their lives because I feel like the Cyberpunk 2077 fandom* has an endemic problem with this self-imposed expectation to post new ~*content*~ on a regular basis that is just not sustainable for like 95% of us. And as someone who has also, unfortunately, grappled with that anxiety even though I know it's silly, I feel compelled to tell everyone (myself included) to stop doing that to themselves and slow the fuck down.

(*Probably other fandoms, too--I have many, many Thoughts™ on how ~*content creator*~ culture has had detrimental effects on fandom on the whole, but that's a broader topic for another time.)

Participating in fandom is a hobby, not a grind. No one is going to be upset with you for letting your queue run out or missing a themed day. Nobody expects anyone to have multiple original posts on a daily basis. Your friends aren't going to forget you if you need to take a break. There is absolutely no reason to feel guilty or stressed because a real-life obligation has to take priority over a hobby.

Recognize the ebb and flow of your creativity so you don't burn yourself out. Give yourself the time and space to work on long projects and learn new skills, even if that can't come with regular updates. Let yourself be in the moment while you create. Savor your art--Stop asking yourself "What do I post next?" immediately after you finish a project. Take pride and joy in the work you've already made without wondering how you can make your next post even better.

Understand your limitations and accept that others might not have the same limitations you have. Someone who is single and unemployed is going to have more time to dedicate to learning virtual photography than someone with a family and a full-time job. Someone with chronic fatigue is going to have a harder time churning out fic than someone without that condition. Don't compare your output to someone else's. We all have different creative processes, different backgrounds and skills, and different demands on our time and energy.

What works for me to break out of this mindset might not work for everyone, but these are the 3 main things I find helpful to keep me from succumbing to the darkness:

Intentionally break a streak Have you been posting every single Thirsty Thursday for the past 6 months but are having a hard time keeping up currently and feeling stressed about breaking the streak? BREAK IT. Skip one. Even if you have a post, schedule it for the following week. It'll feel wrong at first, but on Friday you'll realize it didn't matter, your friends are still here, and you will no longer be beholden to this inconsequential posting requirement that exists only in your head.

Revisit old posts/drafts/WIPs/outtakes Go through your old stuff! Let yourself enjoy what you made in the past. Reblog it so new friends and followers can see it. Remember what it was like to work on it and the sense of accomplishment when you finished it and what you learned from it. You might even get a bonus and find yourself inspired to revisit an idea or create a new take on it.

It's an obnoxious cliche at this point, but yes: touch grass Online fandom spaces have been a cornerstone of my social and creative circles for over two decades, so I am not by any means suggesting that there is no value in spending a lot of time here. But you absolutely need to take breaks from your devices and reconnect with the physical world or you will go nuts. Go for a walk, spend a day outside with friends or your pets, pick up a tangible craft like coloring books or journaling--Just find something to get you away from your computer and phone.

tl;dr - Creating in fandom should be fun and enjoyable and a reprieve from all of this shit, not an extension of it. There's absolutely no reason to put this burden on yourself to be some superfan posting new work 37 times a week. If you're in the zone and you've got that flow, roll with it, of course, but don't feel like it always has to be like that because it won't be. And that is completely fine.

#t: wench.txt

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verminjerky · 1 year

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Arcanist Leveling Cheat Sheet

How to Level Your Arcanist - Fast, Cheap, and Solo

The following is meant to be a straightforward and easy-to-follow guide to leveling an Elder Scrolls Online character in a single sitting, on the same day the character is made. It will work for classes other than Arcanist, but I will make recommendations for Arcanists specifically.

This guide is not comprehensive, you may wish to add other activities into you grind. Personally, I prefer to do those after my character is leveled to CP, so I just focus on getting to 50 with as many skill points as possible.

There are other options for leveling a character, but giving inexperienced players too many options can get overwhelming, so this guide is simple, streamlined, and effective for getting a well-rounded character.

Leveling this way will achieve level 50 in about 3 to 5 hours of gameplay and will help level skill lines and get extra skill points during that time, not just levels 4and attributes.

Check out the actual Excel-style cheat sheet here!

If you have tips or tricks you like to use, please drop them in the comments!

Race, Role, Attributes, Mundus, and Consumables

This guide is for leveling as a DPS as it’s the easiest way to level solo. I prefer to level as a DPS even if I intend to change my new character’s role later, as you can easily change all skills and attributes after leveling.

Choose the race that’s best for the role you want to play, even if it isn’t DPS.

Mundus: The Thief

If you’re struggling with low resources, switch to a sustain mundus:

Magicka: The Atronach

Stamina: The Serpent

Health: The Steed or The Lord

Here’s where you can find each mundus stone, and most guild halls also have all mundus stones available.

Food & Drink

These foods and drinks work for characters of any level so you will never need to change them. They are all reasonably affordable or free.

Magicka: Witchmother’s Potent Brew

Stamina: Dubious Camoran Throne

Either: Bewitched Sugar Skulls or Crown Fortifying Meal

Crown Fortifying Meals are often given away as daily login rewards. Now is a great time to use them up, they’re a perfect leveling food!

Potions

The easiest thing to do is use Crown Tri-Restoration Potions, which are great potions that work for any level character and are free daily login rewards. You may also choose to use "trash pots”, which are the magicka, stamina, or health potions you can loot off of enemies or purchase from NPC General Goods Merchants. NPC shop owners will present you with the correct level of potion for your character, making this an easy, inexpensive option. If you prefer to craft potions of spell or weapon power at the correct level for your character, go for it, but we’ll keep it simple here.

Experience Boosts

Gather up your experience scrolls! These are constantly given away as free daily login rewards. Stick them in your bank and withdraw them on your new character.

Grand Gold Coast Experience Scroll (150% XP boost for 1 hour)

Major Gold Coast Experience Scroll (100% XP boost for 1 hour)

Crown Experience Scroll (50% XP boost for 2 hours)

Alternatively, you can use Psijic Ambrosia, Aetherial Ambrosia, or Mythic Aetherial Ambrosia, but I don’t recommend it. These will stack with other food and drinks but they do not stack with experience scrolls, which are free and abundant. Ambrosia, by contrast, is very expensive.

Gear (Armor, Weapons, Jewelry)

Gear Qualities

Normal (White) (Cheapest)

Fine (Green)

Superior (Blue)

Epic (Purple)

Legendary (Gold) (Costliest)

Use the best gear quality you can afford up to Epic (Purple). This gear is disposable, don’t waste money making it Legendary (Gold) quality for this purpose. Normal (White) or Fine (Green) is totally fine, what matters most is which sets you’re using.

Highest Priority for Quality: Weapons, followed by large body pieces (head, chest, legs).

Lowest Priority for Quality: Jewelry is very expensive and upgrading low level equipment is not worth the return. Use Normal, or Fine at maximum.

Glyphs: Relatively inexpensive, try to use Epic or Superior.

Gear Sets

STAMINA CHARACTERS

MAGICKA CHARACTERS

Adjust as needed based on what you have available for each piece. As long as you have 5 Order’s Wrath and 5 Heartland Conqueror active at all times, with a 2-piece for weapon and spell damage, you’re fine.

Upgrading

Training gear needs to be upgraded periodically. Low level gear will be weak on higher level characters. Optimally, make gear for every 10 levels (1, 10, 20, 30, 40). If you prefer fewer sets, every 20 levels (1, 20, 40) is fine. Backbar is unlocked at level 15. Make your first backbar weapon level 14.

More Info

A bit more information about these sets, with alternatives. Feel free to skip this part if you don’t need it.

Weapon & Jewelry Set: Order’s Wrath (High Isle, 3 traits) This is the best crafted set for DPS in ESO, and requiring only 3 traits, almost any crafter can make it.

Body Set: Heartland Conqueror (Blackwood, 7 traits) This set doubles the bonus of the Training trait on your weapons, increasing that XP bonus from 9% to 18%. We’re putting this on the body because it requires 7 traits, and armor traits are easier to come by.

Alternative sets requiring fewer traits: Law of Julianos (Wrothgar, 6 traits), Sload’s Semblance (Summerset, 6 traits), Hunding’s Rage (Base Game, 6 traits), Claw of the Forest Wraith (Galen, 5 Traits), Innate Axiom (Clockwork City, 2 traits)* *If you use Innate Axiom as a 5-piece set, do not use it as your 2-piece set.

2-Piece Set: Innate Axiom (Clockwork City, 2 traits) Any set with a 2-piece bonus of weapon and spell damage will work. (Weapon and spell damage is better than critical damage in this slot.) Innate Axiom requires the fewest traits.

Alternative 2-Piece Set Options: Diamond’s Victory, Dragon’s Appetite, Oblivion’s Foe, Pelinal’s Wrath, or Red Eagle’s Fury

Note: I had originally intended to give an alternative option of overland sets for those who can’t get crafted sets. I was unable to find most overland gear in my chosen sets in levels below level 160 so I can’t recommend this.

Skills / Abilities

Class Skills

While you’re leveling and gaining more skill points, you’ll want to fill out the Herald of the Tome skill line first. This is the DPS skill line for Arcanists. (Remember, this can be changed later if you want to play a different role.)

Choose your preferred morphs as the abilities rank up, but here are the suggested morphs for DPS:

Runeblades > Writhing Runeblades

Fatecarver > Exhausting Fatecarver

Abyssal Impact > Cephaliarch's Flail

Tome-Bearer's Inspiration > Inspired Scholarship

The Imperfect Ring > Fulminating Rune

The Unblinking Eye > The Languid Eye (Ultimate)

You will also want to begin taking passives under Herald of the Tome as you gain skill points. Simply take them as they become available.

If you need defensive skills, Curative Runeforms is the healing skill line and Soldier of Apocrypha is the tanking skill line. You can add some easy defense to your bar with:

Soldier of Apocrypha > Runespite Ward > Impervious Runeward

Curative Runeforms > Runemend > Evolving Runemend

Curative Runeforms > Remedy Cascade > Cascading Fortune

Curative Runeforms > Chakram Shields > Tidal Chakram

Racial Passives, Armor Passives, Weapon Abilities, and Fighter’s Guild

While leveling, you’ll also want to take skills from other lines as they become available. Use your best judgement about what you need as you’re playing, but here are some suggested priorities.

Racial passives (All) > Skip any skills useless for leveling.

Armor passives > Light Armor (Evocation, Spell Warding, Prodigy, Concentration) > Medium Armor (Dexterity, Wind Walker, Agility)

Weapon abilities > Bow > Volley > Arrow Barrage > Destruction Staff > Wall of Elements > Unstable Wall > Destruction Staff > Force Shock > Crushing Shock > Dual Wield (Daggers) > Blade Cloak > Deadly Cloak > Two-Handed (Greatsword) > Critical Charge > Stampede > Two Handed (Greatsword) > Cleave > Carve

Fighter’s Guild (More about this in Leveling) > Trap Beast > Barbed Trap > Expert Hunter > Camouflaged Hunter > Dawnbreaker > Flawless Dawnbreaker

Leveling

Leveling this way will achieve level 50 in about 3 to 5 hours of gameplay and will help level skill lines and get extra skill points during that time, not just levels and attributes.

Create your character. Your character will be level 3 when complete, whether or not you skip the tutorial.

Unlock Fighter’s Guild. (How to join the Fighter's Guild.) You will want to level this skill line while leveling your character. You can skip this if you don't plan to play DPS or PVP.

Grinding

Use your XP scroll and set a timer for its end time so you can refresh this buff.

Do not join a group if leveling solo. Popular grind spots will often see people grouping up with strangers, but if you do, you won't be able to use the Group Finder for random dungeons.

Group for a Random Normal Dungeon using the Group Finder. Set your role to Damage. (Don't fake another role! It's not only rude, it won't help you here because you want downtime between dungeons.)

Each time you get a dungeon you have not done before, be sure to take the quest at the beginning and complete it. This will give you a skill point each time.

Choose a grinding location to gain XP while you wait for your dungeon to pop. (More Below.) The recommended grinding locations have plenty of daedra and/or undead, which level your Fighter's Guild skill line.

Continue cycling through random dungeons and your grinding location until you've achieved level 50.

Grind Locations

Craglorn Spellscar

This location is usually very populated and has relatively high-level overland enemies. Overland enemies are worth more experience than other types. It's excellent for characters with unleveled mounts as it's small and easy to travel across on foot. The smallest area with the easiest enemies is the fire area. It's very easy to get massive XP doing circles here.

Alik’r Dolmens

This is probably the most popular XP grind in ESO. Each of the Dark Anchor dolmens in Alik'r is very near a wayshrine, so it's easy to cycle from one to the next. This offers a great deal of XP but may be harder for characters who don't have leveled mounts because the dolmens go down quickly and it's easier to ride from the wayshrine to the dolmen mounted.

Duo Grind Locations

For use if you want to group with one friend. This still works while cycling through random dungeons. These locations are better for more experienced players. You can also use the solo grinding spots with a friend.

Skyreach Catacombs

Blackrose Prison

If you notice any errors or want to contribute a tip or trick, please comment below or tweet me. You can find the handy dandy sheet version here.

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luckydiorxoxo · 1 month

Note

Aba is not learning in 6 months if she does not change... her Karma will come.

10 of Coins and 6 of Cups show she wants long-lasting fame and approval dating back to childhood dreams

8 of Coins reversed means she doesn't want to put in the slow, grinding work usually needed to attain high skill levels

Instead of paying her dues over time, AB hopes to shortcut to recognition without honing her actual talents

She seems motivated more by a hunger for attention, wealth and adulation rather than passion for her art form itself

AB craves the glamour and prestige of fame, without wanting to dedicate years toward genuine mastery through humble practice and study

In summary - the cards indicate AB is fame-hungry, seeking glory without graft. She wants applause before achieving excellence. Recognition appears more enticing than the disciplined self-improvement craft demands.

Unless this viewpoint shifts, longevity may elude her.

In fact, with the page of coins RX- I see it happening in 2- 3 months. She is moving to LA and that will not work out well due to her ignorance.

In 6 months more will happnen and soon enough she will face her tower rx.

When i asked what was in store for her - I got 2 of swords, the tower RX.... Alba.... grow up you overconfident dumbass

I really don't care. You've got to get over Alba. She's not going anywhere. Like please find a new obsession. It will be better for you. When you write things like this, it only makes me think you need to find God. And if you disagree then you can go fight the air. Have a good day.

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cryophagecritiques · 4 months

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Undertale Yellow Review (PC)

The fangame scene can feel like the chaotic wild west at times, as one can discover creations with drastically differing qualities. Everything from countless recreations of infamous viral horror games to absurd ideas like Super Mario Bros. but with the gun from Portal exist thanks to those with both passion and skill. However, developers occasionally take these traits to extreme heights and craft a game with quality on par with the series that inspired it, such as “Another Metroid 2 Remake” and “Pokemon Emerald Rogue”. The recently released “Undertale Yellow” joins this upper echelon of fan projects by creating a thoughtful and detailed expansion to the concepts and world of the original game, albeit while repeating said original game’s mistakes.

The creators of Undertale Yellow brilliantly recapture the spirit of Toby Fox’s masterpiece. The comedic moments, new locales, intriguing characters, heavenly soundtrack, and bullet-hell gameplay all mesh perfectly with what one would expect from the original game. The several details throughout the experience help accentuate the game’s atmosphere and showcase the development team’s understanding of the original material, as the plot approaches familiar concepts from new angles.

Undertale Yellow also provides fantastically difficult yet balanced encounters that do not seem impossible to overcome. Whether one pursues peaceful paths or opts for more violent routes, bosses all feature hard-to-evade attacks that do not typically feel impossible to dodge. Aside from some tough encounters, it always feels like one can only ever blame themselves for failure, and they need to become skillful enough to overcome any challenge the game throws at them. Combined with fewer fights wherein the player cannot lose and the balancing of difficulty via limited healing items, the gameplay of Undertale Yellow stands miles above the original game’s.

The game makes each route equally interesting, and significantly more engaging than Undertale’s non-true ending routes. The pacifist route’s endings both feel emotionally charged, the neutral route’s ending adds some interesting depth to the lore, and the game’s darker routes not only reproduce the original game’s unsettling atmosphere but add a hint of moral ambiguity via the player character’s ethos of unflinching justice. In fact, Undertale Yellow’s best aspect comes from how it handles the main character’s ideals, and how they stay true to those ideals regardless of the choices made throughout a playthrough.

Disappointingly, the game still makes the same mistakes the original game did regarding its darker story routes. If one wants to see the game’s darker outcomes, one must kill every enemy in an area before moving on, which combines with the lack of variation in regular enemy encounters to quickly generate an aura of tedium. This literal and figurative grind- which only becomes more unbearable when one runs out of encounters in a room and must find a different locale to fight monsters in- feels like the game gatekeeps a portion of its content behind a barricade that boasts an unnecessary toll of time. Thankfully, the snappiness of the overall gameplay cuts down on the time spent chasing after these darker story routes.

All in all, I give Undertale Yellow a 8/10 and HIGHLY recommend playing it!

#video games #game review #cryophagecritiques #video game review #pc #review #video game reviews #Undertale #Undertale Yellow

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divineerdrick · 2 months

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Grinding Gear Games Live Stream for March 21, 2024

So I wasn't the biggest fan of the Adepticon live stream from last night. I'm hoping Grinding Gear Games can make up for that a bit with new details on Path of Exile 2 and Necropolis. While not the first time I've reacted to a League announcement (I think that was Synthesis?) this will be my first live reaction on this blog.

I absolutely love Path of Exile. When I was trying to do the YouTube thing, I tried my hand at making some PoE content. Unfortunately I hate editing, especially sound editing (does not go well with migraines). So that put an end to that. This is one of the reasons I've tried to move to a blog format, despite the fact that blogs get far less attention. But somehow, it never occurred to me to do blog posts about Path of Exile!

I might also try putting some content on here about Last Epoch, since I'm falling in love with that game as well. Don't know if it will replace PoE as my favorite ARPG, but it's definitely a ton of fun!

With that preamble out of the way, let's do some predictions!

Predictions

For Path of Exile 2, we know they're probably going to be giving us some Ranger gameplay. Johnathan has also talked about the Witch, but I'm gonna guess she's not ready based on things he said in a recent interview. So, for my prediction, I'm going to say we'll also finally see a reveal of one of the itemization systems.

As for Necropolis, that sounds so much like it would be a dungeon League. But we just had one, so I'm thinking this will mostly be a map mechanic. Judging from the preview, I'm betting we're going to have to dig up relics, as in bones and possessions, of heroes of The Eternal Empire. We'll then probably have to earn the respect and favor of these heroes through combat. But that still seems like easy predictions, so I'm gonna go a step further. We will be fighting alongside these heroes in special, juiced, boss encounters.

This League is also turning out to be quite the QoL patch too. Though, if you've been following the teasers and reveals, not all of the changes are actually beneficial. There have been some pretty heavy nerfs revealed, probably to bring the game more in line with design intent. The big one is that we can no longer bind skills on click to move. Instead, we will have to use the new support gems to automate those skills for us. This not only takes away a popular feature, but also takes away some of the control that click to move auto-casting gave us while also increasing socket pressure. My guess is that there will be some more grinding of teeth after the patch notes as well.

I'm gonna guess we're not done with new features yet though. The reveal of a separate PoE2 means that many of the announced features are now up in the air for PoE1. I'm guessing we'll hear some more about features coming back to PoE, even if we don't get them this patch.

I'm also gonna guess we're not gonna get any new transfigured gems, despite how popular that feature is. I'm thinking a great deal of the patch notes will be dedicated to balance changes on these gems.

And I think that's where I'm gonna stand for my predictions!

Announcement Stream

Oh nice! Simultaneous expansion release! While this doesn't affect me as I don't enjoy trying to play PoE on console, it's nice that development and developer tools seem to have caught up to the point where they can release the expansion on all platforms at once.

Oo! I heard deep crafting system~

Jumping right into Path of Exile 2! Here we go with that Ranger preview! We're really focusing on the bow it seems for this preview. For those of you not familiar, your class in Path of Exile does not come with a fixed playstyle, just things the class might be better at. So, for example, melee and grenade rangers are a thing. But for these previews they've been trying to focus on specific things to demonstrate.

Oh! Mounted combat! Diablo 4 eat your heart out!

We have some NPC villain reveals too! They're slowly giving us teasers for the story and setting of this new campaign.

Rangers are getting that move and shoot like the Mercenary. This is huge! One current problem with PoE is that you almost always have to plant your feet to use your skills. This means the difference between being a bow build or spellcaster is whether you're scaling attack damage or spell damage. And the less said about melee the better. Giving bow users the ability to move and shoot helps make the playstyle feel different, instead of just casting AoE spells from a bow.

Speaking of, it's smart to have the finisher have a bit of AoE. Melee already has a little bit of built in AoE, but arrows are still just pure hit or miss. Especially with that wind up on Sniper Shot, hitting multiple enemies and making sure you hit your target will be important.

Johnathan then starts going through the skill system for all the new people who have become interested in PoE2. Thanks again, Blizzard! All you sweet summer children, waiting for the sequel to play PoE for the first time, will never understand just the incredible upgrade this is. I love it so much!

You'll also be starting with such a better looking game! These new lightning effects are so good!

Interesting . . . Barrage has been changed to a cooldown skill. This support skill currently just greatly reduces your damage while rapidly firing our 4 shots. Now they want you to set it up a bit first. It feels a little like another support that exists called Unleash that lets you build up repeated castings over time. So this does feel to me like cooldown finishers will be a thing, but maybe you'll have to choose to opt into them by using a support gem.

But man! Sitting here watching this I just love all the skill and combo interactions in this game! Path of Exile 2 is going to become a theory crafter's dream! I mean detonating gas clouds! That's awesome!

Of course we end the preview with an epic looking boss fight. This boss appears to have a few bullet hell mechanics. I wonder how rolling interacts with these sections.

Wait! Not the end of the preview! Here's that mount, and it's a Roa! I wonder how much of the game you get to use it for.

Oh man! Beta delay . . . Oh well, I prefer they delay and make the game as polished as they can. Even if this does mean we have to wait till the end of the year. But hey! Now it won't be competing with Shadow of the Erdtree!

With that, we're onto Necropolis!

Oh! This does look like a dungeon League! Possibly more Rogue-lite mechanics too! I honestly didn't think they'd do two in a row.

Woah! New Tier of Maps and new bosses. I though we weren't going to see endgame reworks of this nature yet. I guess PoE2 is getting to the point they can divert more resources back to the original.

Yes! There's one I'm glad to be wrong about! New transfigured gems! Can't wait to see what we get!

Oh! No it's not a dungeon League or a Rogue-lite! This is definitely an in map mechanic. I like these modification manipulations, though it might slow things down a bit. I also really like that this is much more control over difficulty than last League.

This is a lot of information we're getting here too! New players can potentially use this to make more informed decisions on how to move through the game.

Oh wow! Cool rewards here! Though this is a weird collection mechanic. But hey! I knew bodies were involved somehow. And talk about a wonderfully morbid form of deterministic crafting. I love it! They keep revealing more and more you can do too! The reveals don't stop keep happening! You can even use these to craft and get better rolls on Uniques!

Oh that's an awesome jewel!

And the corpses are tradeable! I love this league so far!

What! There's even more to the mechanic! You can modify the monsters in the maps! That's so cool! This can help get rid of problem monsters!

And Tattoos are back! This is insane!

Oh interesting! We're getting direct Atlas Tree support during the league! Pretty good, since I'm betting this mechanic isn't going core.

Okay, this is an interesting way to get to Ubers. Now the value of these maps won't be determined by your Atlas Passives. You unlock the original bosses the same way you always did. But then, you move onto a new Tier of maps. You farm those for shards to make your attempts on the pinnacle bosses. These maps also make good intermediate content to gear up on before the attempts.

Oh wow! Nice way to rework some Uniques that have fallen behind. Instead of just improving some and making them rarer, they're going to some of the new bosses.

Looks like they're adding almost all the optional content to Scarabs. Not sure how I feel about this, though it does give a lot of control if you can get the Scarabs you need.

Oh! I love that Divination Scarab! I hate farming the same maps over and over! See this is one of things I love about this game. They're always trying to find ways to allow you to progress the content you want to progress. And to that end, they're also increasing our ability to get content into our maps.

Oh wow! They easily saved the best QoL change for this reveal. We now get three Atlas Trees we can swap between! Again, this gives us more control what content we experience.

Oh! New campaign improvements, huh? Nice! I think that settles it. I'll be playing this League.

Here's the note again on the new and reworked transfigured gems, plus our two most controversial inclusions, Automation and Call to Arms. We're also getting a new support gem for wanders.

Okay! I wasn't sure if I was going to comment on the supporter packs, but I really like the turtle hideout. And wow most of these are still just fun and silly, between that and the mimic pet I might have to see if I can find some money for PoE this League.

All and all, a very impressive live stream!

Interview Stream

I'm gonna follow right on over to the interview with ZiggyD. The amount of extra detail and discussion this always gives us is so worth it. I'm wondering why we're not getting more of Chris this time though.

Interesting. We won't be getting a new monsters or bosses for this the League mechanic. They focused on the new maps instead. This League will instead be all about augmenting our existing content and getting these new crafting mechanics.

Hmm. Not sure I like the fact that you can't sustain T17s. Still because the drops are tradeable, they need to gate them somehow.

And here's some of that conversation I mentioned. I noticed right away that this was probably gonna slow things down a little, as you'll want to try and optimize your monsters in each area. While Mark does suggest that some people might just ignore the mechanic and select whatever they get dealt, and we're even getting a Atlas Passive for mapping that way, they definitely want us to slow down and think it over.

Interesting! They've also made it so that you only get the best modifiers the first time you clear an area in the campaign. And the more of the campaign you do, the better your potential rewards. Combined with campaign improvements and new secrets to find, this is another reason I'll want to play this League.

And while I was impressed with all the information we're getting in game now, it looks like they're not done. They're going to try and add more information to the UI on release. So we'll potentially be able to prepare or min/max a lot.

Okay! Looks like we're going into binding click to move.

It looks like they're making changes to this. The bad news is, they're not ready to revert yet. The good news is that it seems that when they changed this, they suddenly discovered everything the community has been using it to fix. This means that even if they revert, I hope they continue to address these things and make the game better. At the end of the day, this is a lot of annoying stuff that, as Ziggy puts it, we've been using left mouse button as a band-aid for.

Okay! That's not a bad fix for mines. But I'm not sure about the passive changes. We'll need to see the changes directly to see if they're any good.

"Oh, he's doing it again!" Thank you, Ziggy! Pausing coming to PoE1! Doo eet!

They're definitely still trying to come up with systems so you don't have to trust people with your items. Again, in their world we wouldn't use trade for clears or bossing either. But anything they can do to provide tools to keep us safe from scammers is good.

For more on the economy, it feels like they're moving a bit away from the idea of how drops should feel or the economy should feel, and just paying attention to the community and how the game feels. This is obviously the correct choice. First, you won't be able to please everyone. I know plenty of people who hated how easy it was to get gear last League, especially those who enjoy juicing maps. But I know builders like Ziggy loved it.

Bye bye rucksack. F's in chat . . .

But hello Town Portal button!

Moving onto Path of Exile 2!

Woot! Active block! Can't wait to see the new Souls comparisons that will come from that! I love the sound of it personally. Being able to walk forward with your shield raised might be a huge boon to melee.

Oh no! More monsters with tracking! That's going to be fun! Again, Elden Ring says "Hi!" But still, this will be much more engaging than running around in circles.

Still, I wonder if they ramped difficulty for the people they invited to test the game again. I think a lot of people are still very curious as to how difficult this game is going to be.

Oh nice! Multistory dungeons! Wonder if we'll get some scene transition boss fights? Get some Mortal Kombat style beatdowns going.

Sounds like they're trying to make the Beta the entire game, though we might not get all the classes or the full endgame. They definitely want to know if the campaign is good to go before release. If possible, it sounds like they want changes in the beta to be just bug fixes and balance changes. So we'll be getting all the content they can give us.

Finally, we get a little mention on the life globe changing color. I'm surprised they'd never thought to put poison on the life globe before. It's a classic ARPG mechanic.

I honestly feel this was a great interview. I know some people are insisting on being salty about "LMB" right now, and I'm already seeing people take Mark's "deal with it" out of context. Again, I do think this has revealed some real mechanical flaws that need to be addressed. If it comes back, it should be because it's a feature players like and not because we need it for our builds.

Patch Notes

I'm following along with Zizaran for the patch notes on this. I'm a huge fan of his content and He'll catch way more than I ever could.

It's RAW!

Ziz thought this was going to be a Vampire Survivors League! Oh man! A bullet heaven league would be great! I do hope we get something like that in the future. Bet they're already trying something out along the lines of Blight.

"Added a new Intelligence Support Gem - Sacred Wisps:"

Definitely need to see how those wisps play out. I've always enjoyed Wanders and have been wanting to try one again. I'm also curious about Elemental Hit and Tornado transfigured gems.

"The following currency items now have a stack size of 20:"

Woot! QOL stacks!

"Added a myriad of small improvements and surprises to the Campaign."

Again, the campaign changes demand I come back.

"Alternate-art Unique Items can now be converted to account-bound microtransactions . . ."

Oh wow! Very nice! You can now make account bound alternate art items! This . . . probably doesn't affect me? I don't think I have any alternate art items. Nearly all of them have been from races, and I don't think I ever did well enough to get one. You'd think I'd remember if I had, but migraines often make things fuzzy.

"The Dark Seer Unique Sceptre now has +2 to Level of All Spell Skill Gems . . ."

Dark Seer is +2 to Level of All Spell Skill Gems! Wow! That's gonna be a chase item.

But I'm with Ziz here. Not sure that's a good enough change on Malachai's Endurance.

"The Manastorm Unique Shield now has 1-100% increased Mana Recovery from . . ."

This sounds like a blast!

"The Wraithlord Unique Helmet now has 4 Abyssal Sockets . . ."

And this just seems completely amazing! To be fair, minion builds often have to deal with a lot of a socket pressure, and this kills a full 4 of your sockets. But this is so powerful and they're taking steps to bring some needed QoL to minions too.

"The Yoke of Suffering Unique Amulet now has Enemies take 5-10% increased Damage . . ."

Yoke of Suffering seems fail at first, as the buff has only increased by up to 5%, and nothing else. But that extra 5% can stack up pretty quick with all the ailments you can inflict in this game.

"The fifth slot in the Map Device is now unlocked upon completing a non-Valdo's Tier 17 Map."

Oh nice! We no longer have to do Legion for this. Again, we get to do the content we want.

"You can no longer earn Einhar, Alva, Jun or Niko Master Missions . . ."

Yeah, I'm not sure on the Master Missions. But if you can target farm the Scarabs properly, this should be an improvement.

"Added a new Atlas Keystone Passive to the Necropolis Atlas Tree . . ."

As Ziz points out, we can't know how good the Necropolis keystones will be. They all depend on how good the mechanic turns out. If the mechanic is garbage all around, no one will care about these. If the rewards from the maps are good, but not the crafting, then all we'll care about is improving those and vice versa.

"Added a new Atlas Keystone Passive, Thorough Exploration . . ."

If you like clearing your maps the way I do, this will be great. If you just run to bosses you'll pass on this. Again, helping you to play the way you want.

But there's a lot of changes here. I mean, a lot of changes! Like many of the passives around the League content really change a lot!

"The Amplified Energies Atlas Notable Passive now causes . . ."

Looks like a bit of an Essence nerf here. To be fair, Essences are a powerful mechanic for both farming and gearing. But they're so useful for when you're trying to get your build going, especially in SSF. I kind think this first change is okay, but the second one seems pretty bad.

"Essence Monoliths in White Maps can now spawn up to a maximum tier of Screaming . . ."

Okay, that's a better change for Essences. I never liked White Map Essence farming.

"Vorici's Research Safehouse reward is now a stash of Harvest Scarabs."

RIP white sockets.

"The Unique Cortex Synthesised Map can no longer drop from Atlas Map Bosses . . ."

Did we just lose Cortex? Okay, there it is.

Here's the part of the Patch Notes where we get the map changes for the League. And I agree with Ziz that these are mostly good map changes. There's a few we've gotten that I'm really not fond of (Cells and Dungeon), and a few we lost I really like (City Square, Mesa, and Racecourse). But overall this seems like a pretty good pool.

And wow! They took away Seventh Gate and just gave us all the map options! That's a totally worth while trade! Again, it's about letting us pick how we want to play the end game.

And now for the big list of gem changes! I'm honestly seeing a lot of buffs here. There were only a handful of gems that seemed really over tuned, so it seems like they're happy to bring up more options in power while only nerfing a few.

"Essence Drain of Desperation: Now deals 50% more Damage over Time at all gem levels."

Hee! GGG's gonna force Ziz to run ED again . . .

"Sniper's Mark: Now causes Cursed Enemies to take 10% increased Damage from Projectile Hits at gem level 1 (unchanged), scaling up to 29% at gem level 20 (previously 35%) . . ."

Big nerf on Sniper's Mark! That will affect a lot of builds.

"Summon Raging Spirit: The Raging Spirit's melee attack no longer naturally gains 0-38% more Damage as it levels."

RIP vanilla SRS. But as Ziz points out, minion instability will still be very good.

"The Ralakesh's Impatience Unique Boots no longer provide 30% increased Movement Speed."

Ralakesh no longer that impatient.

"The Void is now considered a Boss-exclusive Divination Card."

That's an interesting change to The Void. Ziz is wondering if that means Void can grab boss exclusives.

"Scrolls of Wisdom can now be used on items that are Corrupted. As a result of this, most items that previously dropped identified now drop unidentified."

As Ziz, says, "Oh no!" And yeah, I'm just gonna hide any non-six link corrupted items. The only advantage these had was you knew what they were when you saw them.

"The Veiled modifier that provides reduced Mana Cost of Skills during Effect can no longer be unveiled or crafted on Flasks."

Massive nerf to Pathfinder!

"The Jewel Suffix modifier that grants 3-5% reduced Mana Cost can no longer roll."

Yeah, I'm with Ziz on this. Not sure why they killed the Jewel Mana Cost mod.

Wow! This is a lot of changes for Tattoos and many of them are really good! It's great to have these back!

"Rare Monster item bonus mechanics are now rarer, and the following item bonus mechanics have been removed: Items dropped are converted to Gems, Items dropped are converted to Scarabs, Items dropped have all White Sockets . . ."

RIP white sockets! Why are they reducing them like this? How were they a bad socket fixing mechanic? The whole of PoE2's skill rework is socket fixing! Why does PoE need to have vanilla socket fixing?

Also, I really don't like the changes to Rares. The drop mechanics made Rares feel so much better. They made me want to engage with the Rares in my maps instead of just boss. And they definitely didn't feel overly generous to me. They do remember this was offsetting a drop in loot, right?

Well that was not the best way to end the patch notes section. There are definitely some bitter pills in all of this. But as Ziz keeps pointing out, we're getting so much! But that is GGG for you. They're not afraid to take harsh measures to fix things, but they do fix things. The click to move binding is probably still the harshest thing, but I'm willing to give them a league or two to fix the mechanics it was propping up. At the very least, they've got as long as it took them to realize Archnemesis was a bad idea.

Final Thoughts

That was definitely a nasty way to end the patch notes, but it's not souring me on this. This League looks like it's going to be a ton of fun! Obviously, click to move casting is going to continue to be contentious until they either fix everything or end up reverting. Other than that here are my primary concerns.

1. Scarabs are doing a lot of work.

They've shoved a ton of mechanics that were all previously separated onto Scarabs. Want sextant modifiers? Scarabs. League content? Scarabs. Master missions? Scarabs! Plus they're even adding new and interesting modifiers to them to top it off. If getting the Scarabs we want is too inconsistent or we just can't get enough from drops, then we're just vanilla mapping.

2. Pressure to Run Tier 17

Right now it often feels like you need to get to the point you can run Tier 16s as soon as you can, and there isn't any point running anything less. This often causes newer players to wait to do certain content until they've geared up to running those maps, making progressing their gear harder. I even catch myself doing it! I'm hoping the way they drop will incentivize players to engage with content instead holding off until they can do the highest tier maps.

3. Drops

This has been a concern for a while now, with some not being happy about it since Expedition. It didn't help that Leagues had gotten way wealthier previously, with many players forgetting how lean drops could be originally. But especially given how wealthy Affliction was, players might be feel poorer this League. And now they've made Rare drop mods, um, rarer. Even though this is a crafting League, that could cause some problems.

However, even with those bad things let's look at what we're getting.

1. More control over the endgame than ever before!

They just keep knocking down barriers to experiencing the end game the way we want to experience it. Well, except maybe if you're playing SSF. But if you're playing any form of trade league, you can probably make money farming the content you want and trading for anything you need.

2. So much QoL!

Just so much! So many little things we've been asking for or that are sources of friction are gone!

3. More build diversity than ever before!

Transfigured gems really did cause a ton of new builds to pop up. Yeah, some have gotten nerfs. But for the most part, it's all broken stuff. And some of that looks like it survived pretty much intact. Add in new gems and buffs to older ones, and hopefully theory crafters like myself will have content to chew on for months!

4. An honestly awesome looking League!

I'm still a little concerned with fiddling with monsters between maps, but I think many builds will eventually get to the point where you just grab random enhancement for increased rewards. The changes to the campaign seem really interesting though. And the potential crafting power might lead to some awesome items. We obviously won't know until next week, but I'm honestly really excited to log in!

#live blog #live blogging #liveblogging #liveblog #grinding gear games #path of exile #poe #path of exile 2 #poe2

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nancy-plays-dutp · 1 year

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The Problem With DUTP Updates

On March 6 2023, the app Time Princess received a major update. It added major new game features, and was even delayed from the initial release date from March 5 and received a hotfix a few days later. This update had new clothes and a new story, but more significantly introduced new game mechanics and a new type of gameplay into the app: the Story Kingdom. And I can think of no better feature to use as a perfect example of the strange and fascinating development of this little app, from the perspective of a player who may have a slightly large number of thoughts about this sort of thing.

Why do people play video games? Not in general, but the specific games that they choose to put their time and effort (and money) into. To put it broadly, video games have two ways to motivate you: extrinsic and intrinsic motivation. Extrinsic motivation is the game giving you a reward: experience points, in game coins, achievements, and unlocking new areas and skills. The game gives you something to signal that you have, in some way, made progress. Intrinsic motivation has more to do with the player becoming better at the game. This varies a lot according to the game's mechanics, but basically its you becoming "skilled" at playing the game, and are playing it not to change the game but to change how you engage with it. For example, if you've got a sudoku game you're probably playing it so that you get better at solving those puzzles, and not because each puzzle solved will bring you closer to unlocking a new colour of game board.

Games that use one or the other kind of motivation are not inherently better; it depends on the intended experience and player expectations. (I've learned a lot about this from SuperEyepatchWolf's video on Shenmue 3, which I will link in the comments .)

The basic pitch of DUTP involves both types of motivation: players obtain clothing and use stamina to play through stories. The collecting clothing and receiving awards for scoring highly on stages is extrinsic motivation: the game is giving you something for performing a task. Intrinsic gameplay is more subtle: while there is some skill involved in styling an outfit, usually that goes out the window when you're playing stages because of the tag scoring system. Instead the intrinsic motivation comes in the form of the choices the player makes through the story as they work to find all of the different endings, and the satisfaction that comes from finishing a story. In game features like crafting clothes and playing minigames similarly have both motivations: you might craft an outfit to unlock a new level or get a higher score (an extrinsic motivation), but may also use this outfit piece when styling a look that you find more visually appealing (intrinsic motivation). Minigames likewise give rewards that are used in other portions of the game, but also involve some degree of skill and can allow players to improve.

There are also some incredibly unbalanced areas of DUTP gameplay, and these things I often personally find frustrating and limiting. For example, the lantern gives mainly extrinsic rewards: you unlock new levels, you get gift boxes and diamonds, and you unlock achievements. The only intrinsic motivation lantern companions provide are their voice interactions, which are pretty limited, and the three letters you unlock pretty quickly when levelling them up. I suppose you might also enjoy spinning their model around, but these are pretty low rewards for the very high cost of crafting more gifts and continuing to level the characters up, especially since most of these intrinsic benefits are unlocked right from the start. Anybody levelling their lantern companions past certain levels is almost assuredly doing it not because they enjoy it, but because they want the reward the game will give them for doing so. There is also no skill involved, beyond rudimentary resource management, so it becomes something to grind through to get the extrinsic rewards rather than a feature that people enjoy for its own sake.

So what is the Story Kingdom? Upon opening it after the update I was quite fascinated and confused as to what this was meant to be. I knew this was going to be a continuation of the Mirage Forest storyline, which explains the framing device of the magical book we use to travel in different stories. The gameplay loop of Mirage Forest very closely resembles a game like Animal Crossing, where you have a map that you run around in to complete quests and unlock collectables. By using energy you can harvest these collectables, which are flowers and berries and crystals, which you can spend on unlocking new areas with new collectables and the occasional story stage.

It's easy to spot the extrinsic motivation in this gameplay: you are collecting resources, which unlock more resources. Eventually you'll get enough resources to purchase clothing items, or unlock new resources to gather, and there's even achievements for each type of resource that you can collect. Yet a lot of these resources are already oddly disconnected from the rest of the game: there's a new kind of energy, and the rewards you gain in Story Kingdom can only be used in that specific map, or in the specific shop where you can redeem a few clothing items or crafting items. These items appear to be limited to the ones used to level up relics and fashion academy: these are score modifiers that make it easier to pass levels and get high scores, which is not a matter of skill.

As for intrinsic motivation, Story Kingdom is severely lacking. The gameplay is more tedious than fun, as it is made of waiting through timers to get another resource. There is no skill, no nuance, and no way for the player to engage in any deeper level of gameplay. The story is an attempt at intrinsic motivation, but it's quite shallow and has an incredibly loose narrative, mainly consisting of scenes where you "purify" a shadow demon with relics.

There are very few customization options for your stylized avatar, and there are no choices in this story. You appear to be investigating why there are shadow monsters, but the story takes quite a while to work through on account of all the timers, and you don't really form a deep understanding of the world or characters. The shadow monsters also appear to be caused by bad feelings. I honestly was expecting this kind of quality from this story, but the problem is that this remains the most intrinsic motivation the Story Kingdom offers. While you can style your characters with the clothes you earn through this story, they are incredibly expensive and may take months or years to unlock, creating a system with low rewards and a lot of effort.

And now let's discuss the fishing. There is a fishing minigame that must be played to earn fish, which function like any other collectible in completing Story Kingdom quests. The main difference is that it costs double the energy for a single fish, and upon completion of the minigame you get a random fish. As far as I can tell there is no way to raise your chances of getting a required fish, so you're often left spending quite a bit of energy to amass the required fish to progress past this roadblock.

Mechanically, this fishing game is a reflex game. The fishing bobber slides back and forth on its scale, and you must tap the "reel in" button when it's in the dark blue "target" range. This is a personal concern, but I find this game incredibly frustrating. I have uncontrollable hand tremors, which leads me to avoid games that require fast reflexes. The other minigames that require reflexes are optional games, but this fishing game locks Story Kingdom progress. There is no other way to obtain fish aside from playing this.

There are three kinds of bait that you can use to fish, one of which is 10 energy, one of which can be purchased with diamonds (you can get a free one every day through quests), and finally you can buy bait with money. The target gets larger with each type of bait, but it's still possible to miss. And if you miss? You get absolutely nothing.

There was a hotfix update released very quickly after the original update, which changed this minigame so that losing did not consume energy. But the difficulty of the minigame remains the same, and the random aspect of fishing is still quite frustrating. Not to mention that it can be possible to "win" but fish up a completely useless item, like a soggy boot or seaweed, which as of right now has no current use in the game.

So why is this bad? Overall the Story Kingdom weighs down the rest of the game. It adds new materials and incredibly shallow and repetitive gameplay, which requires grinding for long periods of time at games of luck to get what few rewards there are. It's also disappointing considering the state of many other neglected features of the game, such as the custom contour mechanics that allow players to dye and pattern certain clothes (with extremely limited options), or the limited range of player character appearances.

I'm not saying they had to work on improving these aspects of the game, but I do think it's strange that so much effort, time, and money was presumably put towards developing Story Kingdom, which fails to build off any previously established elements and offers nothing compelling in its own right. It even makes aspects of the game more difficult: players have long complained about the lag and hefty memory and storage requirements for this game, and Story Kingdom only makes these problems worse.

How could we fix this? There's plenty of opportunities to make Story Kingdom better, and it honestly baffles me seeing how so little effort was made to integrate this feature with the rest of the game. It wouldn't be too difficult to add Story Kingdom energy to the minigame rewards, or add better rewards to the Story Kingdom shop.

The fishing is the most frustrating aspect of the Story Kingdom, and it really doesn't need to be. For starters, many games with this kind of fishing game will have more than one "target" range, with increasing probability at getting a reward, and a lower chance of failure. Additionally it would be nice to see some kind of trading mechanic, where you could swap certain types of fish for ones you need, or even a "fish market" where you could buy or trade fish with other players. Perhaps there could be different types of bait with a greater chance at attracting certain types of fish, and they could all be bought with energy, or crafted from those garbage items that are currently doing nothing in my inventory.

Finally, I see a huge missed opportunity in Story Kingdom. To me, a lot of DUTP's appeal lies in the customization options. It would be nice to expand those through Story Kingdom, such as unlocking new dyes or stamps or patterns for outfits. (The story even takes the character through a dye shop...) The items you gather could perhaps be used as ingredients to craft dye that you could then use to alter clothing items.

I honestly don't think we even needed the Story Kingdom map, as it seems like that took a lot of time and effort to create and animate, but is ultimately wasted space. I'd recommend instead focusing on the current in game map: the bedroom from which the player accesses stories, minigames, crafting, and so forth. The bedroom we have is part of the game's meta narrative about us journeying through stories, and often will have new accessories or lighting based on seasonal events, but players have no options for customizing this space. If we could get a new bedspread, or choose which items are displayed on our shelf, or buy different hanging lights, I think that simple aesthetic change could really enhance the game experience. Such options are intrinsically motivated, since we're doing it for our own enjoyment of aesthetics rather than an external game reward. It could also be a feature that could be fleshed out, with event specific bedroom items, and perhaps new bedroom themed backgrounds for taking selfies, and options for displaying achievement trophies in the room to further a sense of accomplishment.

There is one thing that can change in the static Story Kingdom, namely the player character's appearance. Because it's a new art style and new character model, I do understand why the options are so sparse. But more than the "Default Look" options, I find the "Set Look" category to be quite interesting.

If you choose "Set Look", your character will take on the appearance of the chosen companion. You can unlock more companions through levelling them up in the lantern. I find this somewhat hilarious and quite sad, because it must have taken a good deal of effort and time to create these models, and I simply cannot see the purpose of them. There is no official way to take photos of these avatars, so you are limited to screenshots if you want to display them, but the customization options are so few that it holds very little appeal.

It's easy to dismiss these choices as "fanservice," but I think that's too simplistic. It's fanservice that fails to understand what fans of the game enjoy, and its at best superfluous features that will not be used by most players. Unlocking the companion set looks is extrinsic, but doesn't have much to offer for intrinsic motivation. And I think it would be relatively simple to add intrinsic motivation; if the static map of the Story Kingdom could be populated by companions from stories, then it would be much more engaging. Perhaps you could unlock a certain number of slots to place companions, and companions according to which stories you've played and your relationship levels. Perhaps each unlocked companion, once placed in the world, could have a couple of voice lines when you interact with them, and maybe they'd even have a chance to give you some resource or more energy. This would create actual rewards for progressing in the Story Kingdom narrative, and allow the map to be customized. It would also theoretically be easier to create, since you'd only need to model each character as a static character, or perhaps with one idle animation, instead of needing to give them all walk cycles and the ability to turn around, face new directions, and play a fishing game. Players would also be able to show off which companions were populating their Story Kingdom.

I only play games, and I don't create them. I don't know how difficult it would be to implement these changes, nor do I know the reasons for the choices DUTP has made with this update. But from my perspective, it seems like the developing team has put a lot of effort into the wrong features. They've created many new assets but failed to provide sufficient reasons for players to want to use them. Games don't need to have compelling narratives or engaging mechanics, but they still need some intrinsic motivation to encourage players. This update is indicative of poor management and design choices, and I have to wonder if the DUTP team believes "new" is automatically better. Players often ask for improvements on existing features, but each update appears to deliver new stories and event clothing without building on what was established previously. I can only hope that DUTP shifts its development and begins to look critically at the current game features and work towards improving them, rather than tacking on new half finished features.

#dutp #dutp update #dutp story kingdom #honestly this update baffles me #did they put any thought into it at all #dutp stop spending your budget on assets and think about gameplay please #tl:dr i love this update but not because its good #rather because it shows that dutp is struggling to understand the appeal of their own game

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