Guild Wars: Hmm...

Okay, just check out Clamatius's place because he's apparently installed electronic listening devices inside the ArenaNet offices. He's got the goods on the latest reports from the Community Day from the always excellent Billiard (Some interesting stuff. Especially the news that by the way developers measure things, the game is growing. I'm a bit wary of any such internal crowing unless I see some actual numbers. But amidst the doom and gloom and talk of the candle flickering in the past few days, it's important to recognize that this game is still a success and on very good footing. All I'm trying to say is it could be even better still and I hope that's not too presumptuous of me. Though, as Clamatius says, nothing that's exactly going to rock your world.).

And he was quick to point out that the latest skill update hit a little early. I'm going to take a pass on talking about it because, you know, I'm on a break and all – logged in a bit earlier to get the update out of the way (Because, you know, those thirty seconds of files loading and decompressing is just too much to bear when I want to play. I'm serious.) but it's mostly the tweaks from last week with a little bit of number tweaking and some surprises thrown in – like the out-of-nowhere rebalance to the almighty Gale. I'm sorry but until the make it read “Target foe is knocked down for 1/4 seconds. You will disconnect after 30 seconds and your .dat file will be corrupted. Chance of failure: 90% with Air Magic 16 or less. This skill causes exhaustion and genital warts. Surgeon General's Warning: Pregnant women and children should not use Gale.” it's still the best skill you ever put in the game and I will continue to treat it as such.

I'm going to bang the old drum here and say, nice and all but it would have been nice to see these changes in advance. Sure, you can have some last minute tweaks and all but letting everyone know a week or a day in advance what's in the pipeline gives everyone more time to think about the changes and how they'll interact and you'll likely get better feedback when they actually go live. And that list is still huge. Now, before I play tonight I'm either going to have to pour over all the changes to see what might bite me (Ah, you say what happened to Shield of Absorption? Shame, I was just learning to like it.) or just head in game and be clueless. I was, you know, expecting this tomorrow, not today. And, of course, the game exists solely for my own benefit so I'm rather put out by this lack of common courtesy on the part of the developers.

And, of course, there's the news the automated tournaments aren't going to be around for another two months, at the earliest, and we're in for another silly season. First, just....le sigh. Second, a silly season sounds good and that it'll be a Swiss Tourney thing (just look further down in that thread Clamatius links to. Gaile's got more to say than just an announcement.) sounds promising. Along with the feedback from the community day, it sounds like they're going to be doing more with prizes than the Wintergreen folly of last season. Which, you know, good. If there's one thing PvP needs it's more things like what came out of the Snowball Fights – tangible PvE rewards for PvPing. I don't know about the rest of you but those 300 wins I did got me a fat stash of candy cane shards that I'm slowly but surely turning into real profit (One word: presents. Though I'm not doing much at the moment as I'm waiting a few months for the market to really mature.). That's the sort of thing that rewards someone like me who likes to do both and can even draw in people who might not PvP otherwise. It doesn't have to be something imbalancing, it just has to be something tangible so that just like time spent getting unlocks helps you in PvP, time spent PvPing isn't costing you what you'd get for spending the equivalent in PvE. It's, you know, as simple as prestige things like the championship trophies and cape skins – just a lot easier to get. If players could unlock, say, better armor skins for their PvP characters or fancy gadgets at their guild halls, say, by spending faction that wouldn't be a big carrot?

Guild Wars: Getting My Monk On

Last night I logged in for my nightly round of PvP practice. Despite the fact that I'm on break, I still want to get an hour's worth of playtime a day to keep my skills from rusting. The night started out pretty rough. I went up against a pair of Necromancers who'd hexed me into uselessness – Malaise and Backfire and Reaper's Mark and tons of covers. And there I was trying to fight through it with just Holy Veil and power healing (Which, you know, as I'm running what amounts to active prot with infuse, that's not exactly a good idea.). It didn't go well. And it wasn't until the end of the match when I realized “Oh yeah, I swapped in Divert Hexes last night because I was getting sick of this kind of thing. It might have been useful to, I don't know, cast it once.” That's not the worst part, though. At the start of the match I'd glanced at my bar and grumbled because I'd forgotten to swap it back out for ZB because it would help me deal with pressure better – once I got into the flow of things I completely forgot what Divert Hexes did! It was that kind of a night, really.

Still, after flaming out that round, I headed back in determined to make Divert Hexes work for me – because I didn't think I'd given it a fair enough test. I'd finally gotten sick of being neutered by hex pressure and had made the switch late the other night. That was pretty much my only change to the whole RoF, Shield of Absoption, Gift of Health, Dismiss Conditions, Holy Veil, Shield Bash, Balanced Stance I've been rocking. Basically, I'd stuck with ZB because I thought it was a better heal for dealing with damage pressure and resigned myself to taking it up the ass whenever I ran into a hexer. However, I'd been running into them match after match and I realized that I was using Zealous Benediction a lot like an infuse. Not my go to heal and only when the target was in trouble – it's the biggest heal I threw around but that cost made it unspammable if I wanted to last more than thirty seconds. So, I tried to use it only when I'd get that energy back while relying on everything else on my bar. Leaving it out means I lose a bit of that safety net but it's worth it to fight through those hexes. If I hit three Divert is an even bigger heal and it takes out any conditions on its way out the door – it's a beautiful thing. I can't reliably get that because no one ever calls out their hexes but when I do it's great – I find I don't worry about the first third or so of a hexed person's health bar when there's a hexer around because that hp is coming back. I probably couldn't have made this switch when I first picked up Monking again but I've gotten much better at learning when and where to use my other skills – anticipating, reading, the red bars to tell what's needed and quickly getting the needed protection out there.

In other words, I'm getting my Monk fu back. All the subtle things born from hard won experience and repetitive practice that a simple “make sure the health bars are full” doesn't cover. I'm able to tell now just by watching the health bars what kind of damage people are taking. What kind of conditions they have. Who's in trouble and who's not – are they taking degen damage? Are they getting spiked by a Sin? Are they hexed with something nasty? These aren't things I'm thinking about, these are things I'm internalizing and instinctually reacting to. Which, you know, makes it hard to talk about because it's at a level of cerebration below the verbal one. But after that initial disastrous foray I had some very strong matches. Still no glad points and I'm starting to worry about bad habits and the level of competition (Positioning, for example, and kiting around I think I'm getting solid at but it's hard without an organized team. I need to start hanging around TA or HA, I'm thinking, although I really don't have the time or enthusiasm.) but I'm leaps and bounds better than this time last week. And I'm damned tough to kill. My matches either go quickly because my team manages to roll the other one or they last forever because no one can get a kill – and that last one is, generally speaking, all about the Monking. I'm not invincible, mind, and I still lose teammates but it's because I'm sucking the zero point or they've overextended not because I'm misclicking. I'll still lose matches but only because I can't actually kill anyone myself – and I don't care how good I get, I can't singlehandedly fight off another team forever until my teammates get lucky. That's not what being a Monk is – it's all about delaying the inevitable. Hopefully, delaying it to the point where it doesn't matter anymore but you can't keep people from dying, you're just extending their life bars.

But, alright, here's something I'm proud about – Shield Bash. I'm getting nasty at smacking an attacker in the face with it (Multiple attackers I have a bit of problem with because it's single target and I can't tell who to concentrate on right away. But that's when I power through it. Since Shield Bash is there to keep me from getting spiked down while I'm concentrating on other things, I'll take it.) and spoiling their kill. To the point where I'm not just throwing it up blindly, I'm watching them and trying to get something juicy. It's easiest, of course, with hammer Warriors (And, okay, to ratchet down the cockiness I'm not completely on the ball. Last night I saw a Warrior with a two handed weapon coming towards me and instinctively put up the Balanced Stance – turns out it was a W/D with a scythe. Still not a bad move as it took away the scary crits from that thing but humbling and all.) but I'm at the point where I don't even need to C+Space and poach (Although if there's nothing better to do, I will. It's, you know, much easier.) – I'm learning to recognize the attack animations that presage pain. And I'm at the point where I'm starting to complain about pings and the desynchronization that makes my computer think a little differently about the timing of events than the server when, for example, I press the button in plenty of time but the icon doesn't flash up before I get hit. Shield Bash should be instant meaning as long as I press it before the hit lands, it should work. That it doesn't sometimes is down to latency and a host of other things that you care about when you're trying to interrupt. Because, that's what Shield Bash amounts to – an interrupt. And that I'm getting the reflexes to pull it off reliably pleases me no end. But it's that I'm doing it while keeping the healing flowing that impresses me.

Once upon a time, I was talking with an extremely good Monk about a common topic, energy management – Monks have, traditionally had poor energy management options like the wretched Peace and Harmony or Succor (There's a very good reason for this, of course. Healing is very powerful, relatively speaking. And if the energy tap is wide open then it's free flowing and the game turns into a defensive slugfest. That Monks have to scramble and claw for every point of energy to convert it into something else for their team is a good thing – doesn't stop me for looking for ways around that crunch and all but, you know.). And they suggested I use Power Drain which they personally loved. I politely insisted they were insane because hyped up on 100% caffeine I wouldn't be quick enough to pull that off while focusing on healing. It's the passive stuff like Mantra of Recall or Offering of Blood that I liked because it wasn't dependent on the enemy. But he claimed he was able to pull it off. And, you know, I believed him. Even though this was in the days of the old skill activation bar and getting an interrupt off wasn't as easy. It's definitely possible to keep one eye on your opponent and wait for the opportunity – for those visual clues – and pull off an interrupt without even looking at a skill bar. That means you can focus on another bar. Say, your teammate's.

For me, though, doing so requires being deep into the reactive zone I call Monk fu (Still not going to be able to scroll through targets and find a juicy cast for a Power Drain. I'm not sure that's really viable anymore, anyway. This game's gotten, if anything, a lot faster. And there aren't as many three, four, and five second casts and people aren't as likely to use them.) It took me a bit of a running start to get there last night but here's the scary thing: Without ZB on my bar, I don't have any energy management. I'm doing it all through weapon swapping and managing my casting. And I'm not having many problems (besides the odd dying on a bad focus but I'm generally swapping up for more energy when I'm in trouble so that's understandable.) - I'm playing on difficult mode and it's really paying off.

So, of course, perfect time for me to get busy with other things, isn't it?

Bless Me Now With Your Fierce Tears

Goddamn, I loves me some Dylan Thomas. This poem is one that's been on my mind lately for, I'd think, obvious reasons. The backstory here is that it was written to the poet's dying father – a man as vigorous as Thomas in his prime but brought low by illness and infirmity. This, then, is hardcore shit. There's weakness here and vulnerability and – because of that – strength beyond measure.

Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night.

Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night.
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

-Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good Night by Dylan Thomas

I look at that and realize I'm never going to write anything half as well. But so good is it that it makes me want to keep trying.

Guild Wars: Appreciating Fine Whine

Here's why I love the Guild Hall – you can find people ranting and raving about everything. Case in point – this thread bemoaning the lack of PvP players at the recent community event. Which, you know, misses the point completely. That's not so much an opportunity for feedback or actual constructive criticism so much as it is to reward the various fansites for keeping the flame burning. It's a day long photo op aimed at the people who frequent the forums. Beyond that, freaking Billiard was there. Can't say I've ever had the pleasure of meeting him but, frankly, that's exactly the sort of PvPer I'd want to be grilling the devs. Someone like Chuckles would grab the nearest dev and deliver a forty minute monologue on why Fireball needs to do 100 damage at Fire 14 instead of 105 (What's that? Me? Um, you realize I'm not a PvPer, right?). He'd have graphs and charts, people. That, or you know, he'd get into a fistfight with Mr. Cartwright before day's end.

And maybe because it's Superbowl season and we just had media day so I've seen plenty of athletes try their inept hand at interviews and being interviews but the hardcore PvPer cares about things that most people, most devs even, can't follow. It's arcane, obscure stuff that doesn't translate well. They wouldn't ask very interesting questions. And they wouldn't provoke any interesting responses (Certainly not in an event as scripted as the Community Day, anyway.) because they'd be talking a separate language. Just like those athletes that mouth the right words about commitment and hard work and respect and whatever other talking points they've developed to deal with the media – knowing how to do something doesn't necessarily translate into being able to talk about it. Not with people who aren't in that same subculture, anyway, and not in a way that anyone else can relate to. They care about things that the rest of us just don't. Because we haven't been there, we can't relate, and that gap in our respective languages prevents us from understanding. You don't want someone from a top ten team, then. You want someone calm, rational, dedicated, and able to step outside of that box because they're not so far gone that they've lost that detached perspective. Someone who understands PvP concerns and has experience in that realm but can also relate to the concerns of people not playing at the top-flight level if they play competitively at all (Because – newsflash - there are a lot more of those sort of people than there are who keep the PvP scene going.)

So, as the various posters point out the premise is ludicrous. It being TGH, though, that hasn't stopped anyone from throwing the napalm around. What I'm here to talk about though is what comes up late on in the thread – after the audio of the day's Q&A has been shared. Someone brings up that one of the questions was about a jump button. You know, like in WoW. And it's rightly mocked – the game just isn't built to support that kind of thing, the ruleset gets all kind of screwy when you start dealing with the y-axis (Although, you know, all of those Chapter One maps weren't made with the ability to teleport at will in mind, either. And that didn't stop them from including teleporting.) as anyone who's conducted melee through thirty feet of open air and a bridge will tell you. It's a bad suggestion that betrays a lack of understanding about the game.

At the same time, I've actually talked to people who don't understand the game. Who don't play it. Or who sampled it and moved on to something else (I mean, put aside my friends, I helped run one of the biggest Guild Wars forums when the game originally came out – you think I didn't have to deal with questions and complaints from the uninitiated on a daily basis? I'd like to think I helped them but there was plenty of data to mine there.). And I'm pretty sure that jumping would make more people happy than automated tournaments ever will. It's probably too late now as the impressions been made but one of the biggest complaints I've heard about the game deal with how “on the rails” it is. How you're led along a path where you can't deviate. And you're given the illusion of free roaming exploration that, in fact, a lot of people enjoy but it's not really there.

They don't put it like that, of course, as they talk about things like invisible wall and rocks you can't step over. But if there's one thing I heard the game was (and is) missing at the time it was the ability to jump.

It's a seemingly easy feature that's horribly complex and adds something – freedom of movement. It's a subtle thing but since it's available in other games people have come to understand that they really like it. The game EverQuest 2 recently introduced a race who's main selling point is that they don't take falling damage. That opens up new realms of exploration as they glide around areas that would kill other characters. That are, in so many words, they're restricted from because they lack that apparently simple freedom of movement.

People make their own games, after all, and play the game in ways that weren't intended – if, of course, the game's deep enough to support that sort of thing. And feeling free to explore an open world is part of that.

I'm sure whoever asked that question has been bothered about the lack of jumping, and asked about it, and heard it requested on their site for, well, years now. It's, I think, a legitimate complaint. Just one that your average PvPer has absolutely no way of comprehending. The same way that question would gaze upon someone like Chuck or Silmor and recoil in horror.

I bring this up not to reinforce the already existing gulf between these two tribe but to point out that this was a community day. And there are all sorts of player types to be represented whose views are nearly mutually incomprehensible. Yet they're all under the same umbrella of the community that supports and enlivens the game. A little understanding and cooperation to make the game better for anyone wouldn't be a bad thing. Of course, avoiding easy generalizations and incendiary insults is not exactly what people go to TGH for.

And that, motherfuckers, is how a real TGH vet flamed someone back in the glory days. Maybe not as well crafted as a good Scrivening but, you know, I'm just warming up.

Guild Wars: What Would Happen If They Gave Me A Column

I know like too many people who've gone on to write and/or work for ArenaNet at this point. It makes me wonder what it would be like if for some odd reason they ignored history and decided to offer me a job doing a column like the PvP Primer or something. Oh, I'm sure they'd want me to work up some thoughts on skills or go over the scene in the RA and the Halls or something but, me, I'd make sure they gave me creative control before I agreed to anything. That, in so many words, I'd be allowed to write whatever I wanted to write about and they could either post it or not, either let me do it again or fire me, but I'd have, as they say, the final cut. Then I'd work up a few dummy pieces dry as dirt that I could show to them before they let me do one for real. And that's when I'd go nuts.

Here's how I'd start things off....

From the Throne One: Mais Oui, It's Good to Be the King

Hello. I'd like to waste some not so precious bandwidth by....typing.....very......s.....l......o.....w......l.....y. There, I might just have added a kilobyte to the server load. Or loaded a kilobyte onto the server. I really have no idea, I'm just hoping to get the IT boys hopping mad so they stop by to yell at me and I can get them to fix that cursor. Darned thing keeps blinking.

That done, I'd like to talk a little bit about things here because this is my first column. And the powers that be haven't realized it yet but they've just approved the first comedy column here at the house that the thumpers built – I'm told by the game's grand masters and all mighty poobahs that they're really handy with a hammer because they can swing it so fast, they must have put this place together in no time flat, then.

Yes, I said comedy. (bit about Gaile trying to wrestle the keyboard away from me) Like the fine folks at ArenaNet you were probably expecting something completely different (In which case, come back next week.). Because when you think of Sausaletus Rex the first thing that comes to your mind probably isn't bringing the funny (It's more like “Huh, who's that?” followed by a mental shrug.). In which case, you probably haven't seen me PvP lately.

But, no we're going for the comedy thing here. It's all down to open waters, green grass, and fish with very long tails apparently. This was explained to me in great and powerful detail but it's all very secret so I can't tell you more - which you can take to mean that I really didn't understand it at all and don't want to look ignorant. But not comedy like Giggle Pit funny. No, in the words of the great Mel Brooks - “Tragedy is when I cut my finger. Comedy is when I walk into an open sewer and die.”

So, if you're looking for a detailed treatise on some mechanical issue or skill review aimed at the intermediate skill level market, well, look elsewhere. There's plenty of that kind of stuff around including at my blog (zomg teh self-promotion linky! And you doubted my pro skillz!) but how many columns are written by crazy people? I'm not going to be trying to bust your gut so much as I am to present you with the absurd and the amusing. The things that make me smile – but quickly so I can go back to scowling. I'm supposed to be a big cranky meanie, after all, and smiling totally hoses my curmudgeonly rep. But this column's going to be about whatever I want to throw up against the wall of public indifference whenever that deadline looms. Some days I might talk about that nub I ran into in the RA who was using Frensig (And...cue afterschool special music. That nub....sniff, that nub was me! Dun dun duh! And scene!) and some days I might talk about how shifting Healing Signet from Strength to Tactics was the greatest balance change ever. Some days I'm going to curl myself into a ball and rock back in forth as the existential horror of the blank page drives me further into a spiral of madness I'll never recover from.

Today, though, in honor of the great Mr. Brook, I'm going to devote this column space to talking about the Producers. I saw the movie recently and, I have to say, the new version based on the stage play isn't half as good as the original movie that play springs from – the one with Gene Wilder and the late, great Zero Mostel (Has to do with the timing of the thing. Coming out only twenty or so years after WWII the very idea of “Springtime for Hitler” was daring. And there's some flower power stuff in there that just doesn't make sense outside of the context of the original release date of 1968.) It's, of course, the story of a pair of hapless producers who try to make a bunch of money by putting on a show that's bound to fail. Their plan backfires and they succeed by failing. (An intercom switches on. “.” “Gaile! I told you call me Rex when I'm working!” “Saus.” “I'm a king.” “Yes, I saw the paper crown. It's very...flattering.” “Thank you, it's from Burger King.” “Lovely. However...” “Look, this is going someplace.” “Yes, into the recycle bin. This is a Guild Wars website. People are here to read about Guild Wars. Not about musical comedies.” “Look, I'm trying to make a point here.” “And I'm trying to say you need to make one soon.” “Quiet woman! I'm trying to work here and the ceaseless prattling from your braying mouth isn't helping. I don't see how you expect me to get anything done with these interruptions and....why are you eyes glowing? Oh god, the pain!”) How does this relate to Guild Wars you ask? Well...

The sad thing is I could very well write the rest of that article. Something about how you deal with a plan blowing up in your face is important - “no plan survives first contact with the enemy” and all that. But I think I've proved my point – they'll never, ever let me do anything like that. I have far too big of an absurdist streak and I'd be too tempted to just smash things for the pretty sound when they break.

More's the pity because it's exactly the sort of thing, I'd think, they should be adding to the official site. There's a place for things like the PvP Primer and the State of the Game series and the Scribe and more like them. But there's also a place for the cutsey stuff that people can pass around and e-mail to each other – call it the Leeroy effect, if you will – because those, more than anything, build a sense of community. There's more than one demographic niche that comes to the official site and it should be catering to as many of them as possible. Not everything has to be technical and hardcore. This is a game. It's fun. And people are going to have fun with it.

Special bonus content: The second article I'd write:

From the Throne: Skill Combinations For Improving Your Play

I play Monk a lot so I'm used to being yelled at. It's okay, I'm a masocist so I kinda like it (The old intercom buzzes “Yes Gaile?” “Take that link down. Now.” “Yes, Gaile.”). But it's never anyone's fault if they die. It's always mine. It's never “Blargh! I dieded because I ran across the map and out of range. I should stop eating paste because it's getting all over the keyboard.” No, it's “C'mon Monk get it together!”. It's just a fact of life. As a Monk I should be able to perform miracles on demand under any circumstances short of my computer bursting into flames because it can't handle my sheer awesomeness (This has claimed, by my scientifically approved estimate, more harddrives than all viruses and mechanical failures put together.) and decides to commit electronic seppuku.

There's only one exception to this ironclad rule – the ultimate skill combo. The pinnacle of all Guild Wars strat. The quickest way to pwn someone known to man (Not to girls though, they don't play video games and can be ignored. Also they're icky and never want to go on dates with me.). I'm talking, of course, about the masterful use of Frenzy and Healing Signet at the same time! Better known as the Frensig.

When someone uses it sounds something like this: “Yowtch! What the hell just hit me for 300 damage and, whoops there it goes again! Wow, I sure died fast there. I guess my brave Monk teammate is completely free of blame and repercussions because there's no way anyone could have healed through that.”

Well, actually it really sounds like “Yow—rez me rez me rez me rez me pls?” Because it happens just that quick. When you activate your Healing Signet and then trigger Frenzy or vice versa not even the healing hand of our almighty god – Superman himself – can save you. Sure, you might live and all but if anyone takes a screenshot you're never going to live it down. It's like a scarlet N around your neck. Oh sure, you can try and tell people it's a sideways Z and it stands for Zed because you're all British and sophisticated but everyone knows it's an N. An N for n00b. And really, if you didn't figure that out three sentences ago you just might be a nubneck.

Here, listen to this service announcement by acclaimed voice actor Robin Atkin Downes (Anyone? He played Rurik? From Prophesies? “As a child I spent much time in...” Okay, forget it. You all suck and I'm going to do it myself.)

Kids, your friends might tell you that taking double damage while halving your armor is the “cool” thing to do. But they're wrong. Don't listen to them. Friends don't let friends use Frensig. Or airquotes. Totally for lame-wads.

Guild Wars: I Lost Sleep On This One

I've calmed down somewhat from yesterday's rage against the dying of the light. Mostly by reading a lot of the ghosts in the machine at my old stomping grounds – if there's anything I've gathered from the various boards I've glossed over it's how little it all matters. Or, rather, how much from a certain perspective that's not necessarily the point of the universal observer.

All the crying, screaming, and whining as posters point fingers at one another, try to one-up each other as they score points on some invisible scoreboard trapped forever in the finite storage of the ether makes me nothing if not apathetic. It's all so...small. And so important to these people that they burn such time and energy to fuel these things. They argue about whether they should even be arguing. And, well, I've played that game and I've burned out on it.

The pointlessness of the bickering. How lines are drawn and e-peens waggled. How the developers never seem to respond. It's all just spinning in a circle. Why does anyone bother with it?

The other day when I finished the game I did something most people probably don't do – I sat and watched the credits (After, of course, picking up a sweet scythe for my Derv. Vamp of forty over 50? And it looks like nothing so much as a giant chicken claw? Sold.). Not because they were particularly interesting but because there was a name on there I wanted to see. I've got this friend – and if you know me and your history of these things you know who I'm talking about - who works for the company now. His name's in those credits. And I wanted a screenshot of it superimposed on my character because, well, I'm a big girl at heart. But this guy and I, well, we go back even though we've never met in person (Not even sure we're still friends but that's what I get for disappearing for months on end as is my want.). I could say the same thing about a lot of other people, of course, but the time I spent talking about the game, bouncing ideas back and forth, making them stronger, making them better, and figuring out how to get them across to others and get them to listen, to carry those tempered ideas forward as if they were their own is time that I'm always going to treasure. Even though, you know, from a certain point of view it didn't matter and most of those idea – especially mine – never went anywhere. But this guy he was good and I knew it and just being around him made me want to be better – and I wanted to bask in that reflected glow just once more.

I always knew he was going to go on to greater things. Figured it was only a matter of time before some organization or other scooped him out of the ranks of volunteers in the community and gave him a job. He deserved it, of course, just as he deserves every ounce of happiness and success all his hard work has brought him. Everyone playing the game benefits from his involvement in it, even if they'll never know it. To most of them, he's just another name in a long list.

Never to me, though.

Because I've been there – talked to the developers, the artists, the writers, the musicians. Just as I've been there watching, listening, and learning from other testers and posters and admins and all the other people I've only known through the computer screen. They exist, to me, as characters. As letters. As symbols floating on beams of light through the darkness. As nothing more than words in a list. But to me, if no one else, they're still people. Just as much as the people I see when I turn away from the screen and walk out into the world. All of them. The people in the credits to the denizens of the boards, they're all individuals with their own identities, their own qualities, and that mass of humanity is involved in this project we call Guild Wars. Some of us do a little, some of us do a lot, but just like my friend even if they're not acknowledged our contributions matter. If only in the sum total of things.

Even though I never talked with him about it – not directly, anyway – I know my friend feels the same way. It's what makes him such a good person and, I'm sure, is no small part of his success. And I wonder why, with all the work I've put into things, don't I have a similar story? I suppose you could say it's because I tend to fade away for months on end out of disgust or neglect. But there was a time when I was staunchly involved in what I felt was the thick of things. I cared about Guild Wars and the people who played it – no, scratch that, the people who were going to play it – for longer and for more than I thought I'd ever care about anything. Especially something as fleeting and intangible as the lines of code that govern the game. I've, you know, been on lists for it.

It's been expunged, I think, from the record for reasons I'll get to in a bit. But back when the game was coming out the developers wanted to thank all the testers for all their hard work – as they'd promised to all along (No doubt to encourage testers to participate and work just that little bit harder.) - and one of the things they did was to release a list of the best testers. Not a ranking per se, although I think everyone around had a good idea of what the pecking order would be, but the top twenty five testers. The friend I mentioned earlier was on that list (Definitely in the top 5.) as were a lot of people I knew and liked at the time.

I wasn't.

My name was on a separate list. Of the testers who didn't quite make the grade. The honorable mentions. And when I saw it, I flipped out because, by that point I'd basically stopped testing for the past few months having washed my hands of the test and everything it tainted (Seriously, the game improved about as much in the first few weeks after release as it did in all my time as a tester – because people just played and didn't have any preconceptions or axes to grind and that gave the developers much better feedback than the pack of testers they had and probably still have ever could. This is, as I gather it, generally speaking the case. It's like book publishers say – the worst typographical error you'll ever make is the one that's not going to be noticed until the first time someone picks your book off the shelf. Forrest for the trees and all that.) and stormed off after pitching a huge fit over something that, in retrospect, really wasn't important. So I fired off an e-mail to Ms. Gray and not-so-politely asked to have my name removed from the list.

It wasn't part of some insidious plot to keep my identity shrouded in mystery (Which probably wasn't a bad idea. I play a bit coy with it around here but that's because this place is public. Anyone can come here or skim information from this place so I find it best not to get into too much detail. But my friends know who I am – I don't try to hide from them.) I just didn't feel like I'd been contributing much of anything as a tester. That even though it never meant much to me, it was an important thing (Honestly. I mean, it was nice and I liked being singled out and all. I wouldn't turn it down given the chance to do it all over again. But it wasn't something I sought out or planned for. It just...happened. And I could take it or, obviously, leave it freely.). An honorable thing, a prize that many people coveted, and recognizing me as a good tester when I'd been anything but cheapened the efforts of everyone else.

That's probably why I'm not working for ANet or anybody else in the community – I'm a horribly self-important little prick. But I've come to realize there was a deeper reason why I shunned that supposed honor that everyone else seemed rather happy about. And that's because around this time it became apparent that I was right. My friend and some other testers were going to be hired. And I, you know, was going to suffer through release and give up on the game for a time. With the only reward for my efforts a name on a list that only a handful of people would ever read or care about. Never even got so much as a T-shirt when, let's be honest here, I practically killed myself trying to do everything I could to support the game for a while there (The developers were very generous and would often mail things like copies of the game or clothing and what have you to various people around the community. Just not to me because, well, see aforementioned prick statement. I understand this probably sounds a bit bitter but just hold on – it's really not because it's never been about me. Well, maybe a little. But I'm only human.). And it wouldn't have matter what the company sent me because it would be a pittance compared to the value of the time and effort I'd sunk into volunteering my services for them.

Happily, but unwittingly, I'd been working for them all along – and so is everyone who ever makes a post or passes along the word of mouth. The marketing department, the PR department, the community relations department, whatever you want to call it, the people who work there get paid good money to do that sort of thing. And they get paid good money because they come up with things like outsourcing those kind of things to the volunteers – I'm sorry, the fans – who sweat and toil for only the merest hint of appreciation. An interview here, a t-shirt there, a pat on the head and an extra helping on their plater and it's amazing what kind of hoops people will jump themselves through. They create this monster we call the community, they feed it and tend it and make it grow as part of their jobs the way a gardener creates a garden – by letting it grow on its own. They deserve that money, of course, and all the other compensation they get for a job well done because just like a gardener, that's hard, dirty work they have to do.

Maybe at the time I could see the gears in the machine just a little too clearly. Or I was foolish enough to think I was too smart for such things, I don't know. But the truth is I worked as long and as hard as anyone in the community and while I wasn't doing it for a tester slot or a resume or a trip to the company or any other perks I was still doing it for the rewards. Which, for me, were just being a part of interesting things as they happened. Not a big part, mind, just another cog in the great machine, but a part of it.

So don't tell me that doesn't matter. Don't tell me I wasted the precious seconds that measure out my life for nothing. I cared about it. That makes it matter. That makes it important. That breathes that little portion of my life into everything I've done and, along with everyone else's fraction of a soul, it takes on a life of its own. It's a community we've built, a tribe united by the single thread that we all play Guild Wars, and while it might have been the developers and their marketing department that kicked things into motion they've long since lost any control (Except that which holding the power switch for the game's servers gives to them. But that's like holding a gun to our heads while we have one trained on theirs – pull the trigger and something's going to happen and you can't quite be sure what it is. It's not just a symbiotic relationship – where we need them and they need us – it's an adaptive one – they and we have become “us”.). We're all part of the grand weave now. Each little comment. Each little whisper. Each connection forged in light through the darkness of the unknown.

From a certain perspective, it doesn't amount to much. But from another one it's terribly important. In the end, we're all going to be dead and gone, the sun's going to cool and the planet's going to become uninhabitable, and I hope the story of humanity goes on past that but I'm betting I won't be around to see it and neither will anyone who knows me – from that point of view nothing matters. But from the perspective that lets me wake up in the morning and move around it's what we do in the here and now that's the most important thing in the world. That bleak sense of doom that comes from acknowledging you won't survive is scary but it's also what drives us to create these monuments that are bigger than ourselves – the lasting kind. Families, tribes, communities, and, I'd like to think, things like Guild Wars even though they're built on the flimsiest of materials – the ties that bind one person to another and the tiny particles racing through wires and circuits. On, well, information just like the ones and zeros that encode that screenshot I'll be able to look at to remind myself whenever I forget - we might not be able to see the results, they might not even be what we wanted...but it all matters.

A Breath of Fresh Air

Man, the Daily Show has been on fire lately. Just knocking them out of the park (Although I think they missed a big opportunity with not putting "Mr. I'm a PC". Hodgman and Mr. Gates together - still, the fun they had with his hasty exit almost makes up for that.). The new correspondents have really jelled and are approaching Colbert/Carrel levels of sustained excellence in the cause of making me laugh. They've been just hammering the Veep lately. Who richly deserves it, of course. But even things like the interview with Mr. Tyson - who's awesome, by the way - have been just spot on. I mean, I've been watching TDS since it started and it's always been a pretty entertaining half hour but it's just sublime at the moment.

Sarah Silverman, on the other hand? Not so much.

Anyhow, I'm in a good mood because today was another 10k day. Actually, if you take all the comments I've been making into consideration, I'm probably well past that mark already. I have a bit of tweaking to do on a lynchpin post before they all roll off the assembly line, but they'll be up soon enough. It's like the dam broke today as there's just so much to talk about.

Things like the passing of Molly Ivins. A great columnist and one of those people who kept me sane in the dark days before the last election. The world's a little poorer now - and I only found out in this morning's paper. The last column she ever published says it all in the title - Stand Up Against the Surge. As she said, "we are the deciders". And, so in tribute, I think it's time to go out and raise a little hell.

I got a bit distracted by happenings in Guild Wars land. The patch came a day early and it looks like the collective fit the community was pitching has provoked a response. Or at least some communication. I did a lot of teh blogging about it today but, you know, I'm just burning it out of my system. We're moving on to other things for the moment. I didn't log in at all today and it's just a refreshing feeling (I'll hit it up for my nightly PvP session and all but, you know, baby steps.). I got momentarily tripped up by the happenings but, really, it's time to start working on other things.

Like that math test. I decided to take a break from studying today. Just a day to relax and get my batteries charged up before delving into things over the weekend. I'm going to be hitting the books tomorrow and through Monday so we'll have to see how things go. At the moment I feel like if I had the time I could write another 10k. I'm going to cut it short, though, before I get too exhausted and spoil tomorrow before it even begins.

Outlook: Why do I have more fun with this game when I'm not playing? Ah, yes. Because I suck.

[1] - 20 minutes.

Analog Hole

The sound you hear is me congratulating myself – I finally finished off the Nightfall campaign today. I'll have a writeup...sometime, I hope (I've probably just jinxed any Progress Update into the next year with that half-hearted promise, of course.), and there's still the whole Domain of Anguish to explore to say nothing of the few missions I skipped and all my other characters. But, you know, it feels good. I was having a bear of a time with Shiro the other day but by playing ultraconservatively - you know, actually pulling and stuff – I got to him with no DP and thanks to some deft henchie flagging work to avoid the AoE death bomb when he gets low on health I whittled him down. Abaddon was a punk compared to that – One Nine Five Five means you got served, Mr. End Boss man. That's right, on my first run through I finished the last mission just five seconds under the mark for the full bonus and I ain't proud so Imma take it and run.

It's a good as time as any to take a bit of a break. There's a new test weekend with the promise of new skills to explore coming up and all – although, given that I just realized how far away the new ladder replacement is I'm not exactly sure if I'll be playing or driving across country to join the picket line at this point (I'm late to the party, I know, but that just means my anger's fresh. Let the next gen of revolution begin! Gamers of the world unite! You have nothing to lose but your highscores! I propose a communist LAN party where fun will be distributed according to need.). So, the angry music's being cranked up here at the Office of Yearning (Where our motto is: “It's all about not getting paid and not getting laid”) and I'm totally E/Mo at the moment. But I've also got my first math test in....longer than I'll care to admit coming up next Monday. I want to blow this one out of the water so I have plenty of studying and preparing to do. Because I'm a little bit worried.

It's not so much the subject matter I'm worried about – the professor went through a few example from last year's test and, well, I was not impressed. It's also a multiple choice (Which, you know, I don't think outside of ludicrous standardized testing – teaching to the test is just a pet peeve of mine, sorry - I've ever had a math test that was like that.) and I tend to test extremely well because, you know, I'm a gamer and I can game anything given the time and motivation. My motivation here is self-imposed – I refuse to let a math class at a crummy little community college get the better of me - which is the best kind for me. But I'm worried about the format. Am I allowed to have a calculator? Scratch paper? How many pencils should I bring? In other words, all the little details that are going to fill me with anxiety and dread because I have no idea what I'm doing and I'm frightened someone's going to find out.

I would have liked to ask the professor these sort of things but he ducked out of class before I could get a chance to approach him afterwards. I was a little surprised at how quickly he got out of there considering we finished early. And, you know, he's tending to show up late too. This is, I think, something that marks me out as someone who's returning to school as opposed to a first time collegian. On my first trip through the halls of higher learning, I'd have been thrilled about such things but, now, I'm pissed because, you know, I'm paying good money for that class and I don't want to skimp on the learning. I've seen what things are like outside of school and I understand that it's important. You know, back when I was in college for realsies instead of taking this nightclass my professors would always say how they liked the adult education students for pretty much that same reason – they were really there to learn. Unlike, say, young punks like me who were there to party and waste someone else's money (There's some kids in the class, too. I guess I look young enough to be a student still as they invited me to a study session over the weekend. The siren call of the Wisconsin cheese mama notwithstanding, I passed because, you know, they're damn young. And their stupidity is getting on my nerves. They were surprised that I begged off because of work, family, and other sundry adult things. Kinda flattering and depressing at the same time.).

Me, I'm always late so punctuality is really important to me. I can't stand not being on time and I'm always rushing to be someplace or another. I was a bit frustrated on the way to class today when my normal route to the freeway was closed off. Not so much after I saw the accident that was clogging off traffic. I'm no stranger to accidents (Not many of my own, thankfully, although I have had a doozy or two. No, it's my one sister who's cursed in this regard. She can't go a month without something running into her car.) I'd gotten wind of it before setting off but I figured it would be that bad and would probably have been cleared away because when I hear that there's been a car overturned I'm not expecting an SUV flipped on its side sprawled across three lanes leaving a path of debris like a comet's trail roped off by police who've cordoned off the street while they're taking crime scene photos. Not on a residential street I drive down every day.

It makes me think of the accident my mother and one of my brother had once upon a time. Not on that road and not in that kind of car but someone ran a red light and spun them around until they were hanging from the ceiling by their seatbelts on their way home from the movies same way they'd driven a countless dozen times before. They were fine – the car not so much – but another few miles per hour or a sharper turn of the wheel and, well, I just hope whatever happened to that car left everyone involved in one piece. The scary thing for me was that I'd begged out of going to the movies with them that day. And if I had gone I'd have been sitting in the passenger seat – right next to the that the apparently colorblind lady's car managed to crumple like a wad of paper (My brother liked the back seat. I liked to sit up front and play with the radio. Go figure.). It's the kind of thing that makes me think about possibilities and alternate universes and butterflies flapping their wings and all.

In other words, about the paths we tumble down in life. Since I'm at something of a crossroads myself, it seems appropriate. A reminded, if you will, that I can go one way or I can go another – but there's going to be lasting consequences. Especially when I get blindsided.

[1] – No clue. Wrote this in class while I was busy not paying attention to remedial shit.

Guild Wars: From Laying My Sight On the Official Site

Looks like there's going to be another test weekend starting this Friday. The changes are supposed to be permanent this time but, again, this weekend comes about a week too late. And the whole “significant number” of changes is not something to crow about – it's pointing out how infrequent balance changes have been. And a lot of changes obscures the testing of any related changes – as has been said, if you buff hexes and nerf removal which tweak makes hexes better? Which one do you want to do in the future because it's more effective and which one do you want to avoid because of the trickle down problems? When you change everything and the kitchen sink, you really can't say and that makes any future changes more difficult, I'd imagine. Hopefully, now that these things are going to be a regular thing the changes can be made more frequently and in smaller doses (And, you know, hopefully some really wacky ideas can be tested out. I mean, if I was in charge of these things I'd toss energy costs back onto adrenal skills just to see what happens. I am, though, an Elder Troll and no one in their right mind would ever let me near the levers to do anything like that.).

Not to crib too much from the big Clam and all but I like the GvG map guide/tutorials he linked to a lot more than the official one. At times, it's best to crawl before you walk. But at other times you need to take the training wheels off and find the steepest hill you can.

There's also this PvP Primer following on the heels of last week's oh so enraging guide to skill templates (Oh, don't worry. I'm not done with savaging that one yet. I've just been busy.) there's this...thing on obscure PvP mechanics. Which, alright, I'm fucking pissed at the moment but....

One, if that's your idea of obscure mechanics then you are not primed for PvP. Come back when you want to talk about the Guild Lord's Health, body blocking the gates for the catakill, ping times, and more. This is beyond beginner's level shit. This is basic game information that you should know when you're playing the game – we're talking about how skill descriptions and energy work. That's stuff my eight year old cousin can follow (She likes WoW, unfortunately, because of the cartoony graphics. Still haven't given up on hooking her, though.). And I don't know how to put this gently but she eats paste. We're not exactly talking dean's list here[1].

Two, if you have to publish an article on obscure game mechanics before people can take part in PvP SOMETHING IS SERIOUSLY FUCKING WRONG WITH YOUR DESIGN AND/OR SUPPORT!! I'm not talking about increasing accessibility through well-made functions and in-game tools the way skill templates bother me, or even blunders like alienating the PvP community by kicking some vocal critic/testers in favor of lapdog yes-posters. I'm talking about the fundamental philosophy of your design that for some reason creates such complicated and hidden things that are acting as an impediment to people enjoying a large part of your game. That this information is going to be out there more for people to find is a good thing. But, I mean, someone was asking in the lobby of the RA the other day what a “pip” was – too much basic information is too hard to discern. The game's complicated and deep enough that this shroud of opaque mystery that surrounds everything from balancing to the game's very clanking gears is just so amazingly wrongheaded that I'm surprised the game's managed to get to two expansions at this point. This is exactly the kind of high-handed, seemingly insensitive behavior that drives people away – and people came to your game because it's fun game but like most other online games they stay because of the community. Every customer you shove out the door makes your product worse. Other people are getting this right. Why can't you?

Honestly, I don't even know why I bother sometimes.

Still, this thread at TGH reminds me about why I still love that place. Oh so tempted to post there again (Not where the poster, the myth, the admin, the one and only Rex was birthed but where my legend was trained - TGH and I are like this, son. But I can only post there so often.) if only to reassure Diablo (nice guy, I believe I remember recruiting/training him to mod at one point.) who says “I went inactive in GW a few months ago but came back because I had nothing better to play. So now I do it at a casual basis, hoping I will find a new game soon so I can quit GW for good.” that he's never going to escape. Guild Wars is a siren and you've been entranced by her song. Leave, but you'll be back[2].

[1] – Sorry, Sea Bear but it's not your fault. Tell your father he shouldn't have lived under those high tension power lines. Oh, and ask him to show you his flippers.

[2] – Or, you know he won't. Do the devs really want to keep making that bet?

Guild Wars: Someone Shoot Me Please

Late to the party – as usual – but people don't come here for news they come here to learn my considered opinion on important topics (What's that? People don't actually come here? ...shut up.)I actually can't look at this because there's a picture of Spooky and I have this weird thing about not seeing him (He's completely a girl, this whole “man” thing is just a carefully constructed ruse to throw us all off the trail.) but as I noticed at pal Clamatius's place the other day the whole Automated Tournament system that was going to replace the ladder, cure scrofula, end world poverty, and give everyone a pony has, indeed, been delayed.

Now, for my carefully considered, well reasoned, and moderate opinion – this blows. Big time.

Looks like I picked the right time to bail on this game. Again. I'll be back – maybe – when this shit is sorted out.