Reddit Digg-ing

 Remember Digg?  No? Remeber your answer to this question because in a few years I am going to ask if you remember Reddit.  They are playing the full Digg card.  The best quote from that thread (bold added by me).

Some people might not be old enough to remember when digg.com made a bunch of changes during the transition to v4. Digg was huge at the time. They thought they were literally unstoppable, but just like myspace and many companies before them, their names are unknown to many.

It will be weird transitioning away from Reddit like the companies before, but I guess, in the tech world it eventually becomes inevitable…

The most boring New World Season 1 challenge

 Finally done watching paint dry to complete the season 1 challenge for capping forts.

New (World) Ideas: Fort PvP Zones

 New (World) Ideas is a series of posts in which I present small changes that New World could make that would improve the game.

 There is nothing more annoying than running all the way out to a fort in the open world in New World and realizing you forgot to enable your PvP flag.  Back to town to set your flag, back to the fast travel point, and then the joy of running back to the fort (mounts please!).

 The new idea: how about the fort and the area around the fort is always PvP?  Upon entering players get a warning about being flagged automatically and can back out if they choose.  Otherwise after a few seconds they are flagged and go about their business of watching paint dry capping the fort.  If a player leaves the area they return to their previous flag or unflagged status.

New (World) Ideas: Upgrade Costs

 New (World) Ideas is a series of posts in which I present small changes that New World could make that would improve the game.

 For players that like playing a variety of builds in New World there are a couple barriers to switch too much.  First is acquiring gear; it can take years to get the right piece(s) of gear for a build with the random gear system.  Second; even if you have the gear it is prohibitive to have it all upgraded to 625 gear score via umbral shards.

 The good news is for those that like playing a lot of builds you don't need perfect 3-perk legendary gear.  You can get elite 2-perk gear that is more than sufficient for many builds.  The bad news is that 2-perk elite gear still costs the same to upgrade as legendary gear so it is a feel bad everytime you pump some precious umbral shards into a purple item.

 The idea for today: reduce the umbral shard cost to upgrade gear based on it's rarity.  Legendary gear stays the same as it is today but 2-perk purple gear could be reduced to 50% of the current cost and even blue/green gear could be reduced to something like 25%/10%.

 This would encourage players to try more builds and increase the use of the non-legendary items in the game.

Throne and Liberty bad?

 RIP Throne and Liberty.  It was good knowing you while you were just an exciting possibility.  I will still give it a try but the video from the beta test in Korea is not looking good.  The game looks like it plays like a decade old game with a fresh coat of current generation graphical paint.

Wayfinder Beta Day 1

 I can barely play this game with the damn watermark text spamming my screen.  I also can't talk about the game because its under NDA.

 But here is a video of someone that was allowed to share the first few minutes of the game:

Wayfinder beta?

 Wayfinder invited me to their closed beta today so will be giving it a go.

New World Paladin

 New World Paladin skins are available in the store!  Go go go!

Exciting New World News

 Big news from New World today! Season 2 is coming and with it a bunch of game changing features: transmog, cross-world OPR, new arena map, raid groups and content, seasonal event, and more!  New World is continuing to deliver on it's road map and make big exciting changes.

 Anyone that was doubting the commitment to New World after the recent Lord of the Rings MMO announcement should not have any lingering doubt.  This next season is jam packed with cool stuff and no doubt many other small tweaks and balance changes under the hood.  I am personally looking forward to this!

 Also hidden away in the announcement was a change that was not on the Road Map.  Some shenanigans will be afoot in First Light.

First Light Retraction

First Light has fallen to the might of Artemis and her Angry Earth horde! The Settlement, Fort, and Trading Post in First Light are now closed. A wall of thorns has erupted along the border, barring all access into the territory until further notice.

    All Housing related items will return to Storage and can be found under the “Old First Light” tab in any Storage shed.

    All Trading Post orders in First Light will eventually expire, but no new orders can be made in the territory.

    Companies controlling First Light at the time of Retraction will be refunded for their losses.

    First Light’s Faction Control Point (FCP) buff has been moved to Weaver’s Fen, and Weaver’s FCP buff has been discontinued for now.

We have big plans for the territory. This is only the first step. Stay tuned for more news about the future of “Old First Light.”

 They are basically wiping out First Light and all citizens housed therein.  This is a pretty big change not to have outlined in any sort of road map.  I am very curious to see where this goes!  Nothing shakes up the mundane like a full-fledged city in an MMORPG being taken out of play!

 There is so much in this update and probably much more hiding under the fine details such as balance tweaks and changes.  For a summary you can dive into the May developer update.

Farming Glyphs in New World

 What am I up to in New World?  Farming glyphs!  Specifically: Above Glyph Stone and Sun Glyph Stone.  Why?  So I can craft some Runeglass Case of Igniting?  Why? So I can make Runeglass Gems of Igniting for my heavy armor Flamethrower build!

 So if you need me I'll be solo inside "The Wall" or Solarium Khepri farming away.  As a note: I both dread the wall for being a maze but also for it's little escape rooms.  There is no feeling like opening the glyph doors, quaffing some potions, and rumbling with a few elites in a room that barely fits the chest you are about to loot.  The best part is when the door locks behind you and either you are leaving in body bag or with the loot.

 What are you up to in New World these days?

New World Arena Win

 Just sharing this sweet scoreboard from a 3v3 arena match in New World.  Playing as my Heavy Armor Flamethrower build.

Idea: Fix to balance New World range DPS in PvE?

 Ranged damage in New World end game PvE is a problem.  Here's an idea to fix it!

 New World recently changed the Bane perks on ranged weapons to do more % damage than the % damage increase bane gives on melee weapons.  This was meant to "fix" that ranged damage was under-powered compared to melee in PvE content.  This was a poor "fix".

 My idea for a true fix would be to nerf the crap out of melee.  Seriously!

 The reason melee is so good in PvE for the most part it hits multiple targets on normal attacks (light and heavy) while ranged does not.  Ranged hits a single target on normal attacks (yes there are a few upgrades where there is some splash but its not default like it is with most melee).

 It seems like the better approach for melee would be that it does high damage to the first target hit but reduced damage to any additional targets hit.  The game has the tech to do this; it already understands first vs additional targets hit for perks like Trenchant Recovery.  

 This would create more value for true area-of-effect abilities instead of the default melee attack being area of effect.  It would also balance damage between ranged and melee as they would both be primarily single target damage.

 And if this sort of approach was taken the response would be apocalyptic from the New World community. Good.  We need a little drama.  If this idea sounds as dumb as you think it does; leave a comment!

Start digging New World's grave?

 The studio behind New World has announced it is starting work on a new MMO set in the Lord of the Rings universe.  The natural question is: who's gonna start digging New World's grave?

 Amazon Games has announced it’s making a new massively multiplayer online game based on The Lord of the Rings. Development is being led by New World studio Amazon Games Orange County. This is an all-new production, separate from an earlier attempt to make a Lord of the Rings MMO that was canceled by Amazon in 2021.

 

 First I want to say my inner geek chafes when these announcements say "Lord of the Rings" when really the setting is Tolkien's Middle-earth.  If the announcement had read "Middle-earth MMO" my interest would have been doubly peaked.  So I am long term hoping

 Of course this announcement hit the New World community with many now jockeying for position to be the first one in line to get a shovel for the grave digging.  Clearly Amazon Game Studios is going to starve New World to focus on this new game.

 Combine this with the "gear reset" fears and we all should just stop playing New World I guess.

 RIP: New World 2021 - 2023

New World Gear Reset?

 New World can't stay out of the crosshairs of the content creators.  This time answers to a Discord Q&A are making the rounds (sorry don't know if/how I can link to Discord posts). Specifically comments regarding the Season 3 road map item around a gear score increase and what that means for player's current gear .  The answer was short and sweet, but lacked clarity on what it really meant so of course the community is taking it as "New World full gear reset! Stop playing now!".

If you want a larger summary of the Q&A along with the tidbit stoking the gear reset discussion watch the video I linked (embedded below as well).

 

The gear reset tidbit is screenshotted below (along with Jay Oddity's spectacular noggin top).

 As I said in the intro: short and sweet, but lacking clarity.  On one hand it is saying 625 (max gear level currently) gear is not upgradeable and then saying some sort of new system is coming for gear progression (which is assumed the Season 3 road map bullet item for "gear score increase).

 At face value a level-headed reader is walking away with "player's won't upgrade gear that is 625".  A less-than-level-headed reader walks away with "625 gear will be worthless! Don't waste time playing the game!".

 Unfortunately MMORPG history is sort of on the side of the less-than-level-headed readers here.  When World of Warcraft launched its first expansion many players (a lot who were brand new to MMORPGs) were shocked to find out that a green item from the expansion trumped some of the best gear gained in original World of Warcraft.  Every expansion since has reset gear in a similar manner so the assumption is this is where New World is headed.

 Personally I take the statement as an indication they are increasing gear score and coming up with a new system for adjusting gear score.  The key word I hit on there is "adjust".  That reads like gear may not be upgraded in the future and may have other methods for adjusting to meet gear score requirements.  I am hopeful this means a more horizontal approach than a strict vertical approach.  Or possibly automated scaling up and down based on other factors which would allow

 New World already has a gearing problem.  There is no real way to ensure you get the gear you need excepting for some farmable named gear sets that have niche use cases (such as the Harbringer gear sets for Angry Earth content; useless elsewhere).  If players want best in slot gear in New World it's basically a lottery system.  Either they get a drop from a high level mutation, an Outpost Rush crate, or through the mystic toilet that is crafting.

 Knowing that there is an underlying gearing problem I am hopeful this statement is AGS taking a good look at the problem and working towards new and exciting solutions instead of bandaid fixes over the top of what we have.  If this is intended to coincide with Season 3 then we are likely to find out more details a few months from now.  And months are like years in MMOs; so if you are questioning if you should play New World and upgrade your gear then all you need to ask yourself "are you having fun?".  If yes; then upgrade away.  If you answered no; stop being a troll and go somewhere else.

What'd they do to my boy!?

 Changes to the specialist Irish are coming to Battlefield 2042.  EA DICE announced the changes on their latest Inside Battlefield podcast.  The big change is a significant NERF to Irish's APS-36 Shootdown Sentry.

 Irish's sentry, as it stands currently, takes effect immediately once deployed (i.e. it starts shooting down explosives) and intercepts all explosives until such time that the sentry is destroyed.  Basically it is an infinite explosive defense if it is not destroyed.

 The upcoming changes are:

• There will be a "boot up" time before the sentry is active
• There will be an "active" mode where it can intercept explosives
• There will be a "inactive" mode where it cannot intercept explosives; aka cooldown mode

 Oh boy!

 These are significant nerfs to Irish's sentry and I have some reservations.  One of the long standing problems with Battlefield games is "explosive spam".  Trying to defend a point?  Trying to defend the little bit of ground you took over on attack? Prepare for a never ending flood of explosives being lobbed into your general area; especially in game modes like breakthrough.

 Irish's sentry is critical in the current state of the game to combat explosive spam.  Without the sentry confined spaces or bottlenecks would be unplayable.  Anyone that has played a round of breakthrough without anyone playing Irish know how miserable the experience can be.

 Pushing players into open areas exposes them to other Battlefield detractors such as vehicle campers and snipers.  In modes like breakthrough it may become impossible to either defend or attack some points (attackers rely heavily on Irish's sentry to push forward and hold areas; resetting the sentry position a few feet forward as the push makes progress).

 While the sentry is great for combating explosive spam it also has some areas where it can be abused.  The most egregious abuse is vehicles camping just off the main battlefield protected from any long range anti-vehicle attacks since the rockets are considered explosives.  In modes with out of bounds areas for defenders; attacking vehicles could park, drop a couple sentries, and be impervious to attack.

 What confuses me most about the changes is that it hurts defending against explosive spam in close quarters but is not much of a deterrent against the abuse by camping vehicles.  Vehicles are often far enough away that even with a cool down period the sentry is still a near-impervious defense.  Outside of multiple players coordinating attacks there isn't much risk to vehicle campers still.

 The developers also stated they wanted to improve the pick rate of Irish (and Dozer who they also covered in the podcast).  As I see it there is even less of a reason to select Irish now than there was before.  As an Irish fanboy; I can't see myself picking him if his sentry is gutted.

 So in conclusion: what'd they do to my boy!?  The only change needed was to make it so the sentry didn't stop rockets so vehicle campers couldn't sit untouched, but instead we are getting changes that will actively encourage more explosives spam...

New World Hardcore?

 With the recent buzz around hardcore play in World of Warcraft Classic hardcore it has folks in the New World community talking about alternate game modes.  Of course hardcore (if your character dies its deleted) is the mode that occupies mindshare, but I want to propose a different game mode for New World I'd like to see.

 I call this game mode "Open New World".  The key changes:

• No instanced content (no Outpost Rush, no PvP arenas, no Expeditions, no Trials)
• Factions are optional (i.e. players are not required to join a faction)
• If a player joins a faction; PvP is always on

 The big change here is "no instanced content".  I really enjoy New World's open world content.  I love looping around the open world and doing stuff.  I don't dislike the instanced content but wish there was more content in the open world and more players there doing it.  Removing instanced content will force players into the open world.

 Now that we have players forced into the open world let's enable PvP by making it so joining a faction is electing to be always-on for PvP.  Players can remain faction-less if they don't want to PvP and companies can be either factionless or faction (if faction; all members must be in the same faction).

 Some other changes to go with this:

• Make it so certain resources can only be gathered by faction players so that players compete over resources at the top end.
  
• Update fort captures to be events that encourage players to show up (basically an OPR replacement)
  
• Move OPR caches to fort capture as rewards
  
• Update Elite POIs to have mutations and have former expedition rewards (expedition replacement)
  
• Rewards scale off players in the area; the more players the less the rewards

I'd play this version of the game in a heartbeat :)  Would you?  Leave a comment.

 

Challenging No More

 And we're back (nothing too major; thankfully).

 While I was away New World decided things needed to be less challenging.  Update 1.9.3 is on the live servers as of 5/10 and with it numerous season pass challenges and activities were dialed back making them challenging no more.

As an example; this challenge was reduced:

Outpost Rush Domination
    Reduced required Outpost Rush wins from 100 to 30

 The season is approximately 97 days long (Apr 3 - July 6).  For this challenge at its original goal of 100 it would mean a player would need to net at least one win a day if they play every day.  That seems like a good challenge.  It is not something everyone will get and feels like an accomplishment if you do make it.  But moved to 30; that isn't much of a challenge and many more players will hit the challenge complete.

 If you follow the release notes an axe was taken to many of the challenges.  This is unfortunate for anyone that was pushing for the original targets in the hopes of gaining the coveted "look at what I did!" feeling.  In my own experience I logged into several challenges and season journey steps being completed; netting me 5 pass levels (putting me at 90+; cruising to 100).

 On one hand I am a fan of when things are made easier on players, but at the same time I like actual challenges.  So I'm on the fence with all these changes; though considering I am pretty much done with the season pass and journey it doesn't really matter much.

 My hope is the New World dev team learns from Season 1 and makes future season's and their challenges actual challenges.  Tie unique rewards to them so that players can feel rewarded for hitting the challenges.  These don't have to be game changing rewards, but there is nothing wrong with throwing out some unique housing items or cosmetics or titles.

 With that said I do want to give credit to the devs on other changes that made things less challenging for the better.  My favorite is the reduction of Flame Cores required for a cast; down from 10 to 3.  Also you can now create 6 casts per day - up from 3.  Also the gear you get from the casts is much improved.  This will make the "craft X casts" season challenge really easy now, but there is some great benefits from this.  

 The change opens another path to turn gold into umbral shards as you can just buy 18x flame core each day, craft 6 casts, and each one rewards up to 400 shards for up to 2,400 shards a day (not to mention you get improved Human Ward/Bane gear from the casts as well).  Combine these shards with shards you can "buy" via infused fragments and there is a good path for converting gold into umbral shards for those players that don't want to get them via other means (players like me!).

 Anyways; I am off to grind more named gear drops which is my current kick in New World.

 

Emergency Room; No Gaming

 What a week.  My phone died (original Google Pixel was 7 years old) and then my youngest ended up in the Emergency Room.  No gaming this weekend.  My youngest is good though; just had to rule out something more serious than a common stomach bug.

May the 5th be with you!

May the 5th be with you!

Ha!  See what I did there?  #legend

Cuatro De Mayo!

Happy Star Wars Day

May the 4th be with you!  You'll need the force if you are trying to run Star Wars Jedi: Survivor.

New World: Farming The Tangle

Farm. Sleep. Repeat.

 With my Infernus farm build resulting in acquiring Infernus I wanted to look at what else I could farm up using the build.  Fortunately there is plenty of stuff to farm in the general vicinity. Specifically I am now on the hunt for parts of the Corrupted Rage set: specifically the gloves and helmet (as I have Chardis pieces for my other Ancient tank gear set).

 And the helmet dropped for me last night so just need to nab the gloves! 

 So I will be in The Tangle farming away if you need me!  If you have any other recommendations on items to farm for drop me a comment.

Ashes of Creation Looking Better: Mage

Mage Preview

 Ashes of Creation featured the mage class in their most recent monthly update.  This was the most promising look at the game in a while.  

 First, I want to highlight the format to this archetype preview was better than it's predecessors.  There was structure and thought behind what was shown and why it was shown.  Details of abilities accompanied the on screen display.  Abilities were showcased before jumping into content.  I walked away understanding the direction they are headed with the mage.  In past archetype previews I didn't walk away with an understanding of the class.

 Second; USER INTERFACE! We saw USER INTERFACE!  Finally.  The UI is critical to understanding the game.  We saw two stacked hot bars, some indication of equipped weapon, cool downs, and a little bit of the inventory.  UI needs to be featured more.  It is the biggest missing piece to help drive confidence the game is making more progress than just being able to show off animations and basic combat.

 We also got to see a few other things.  Most notably was the gliding (flying?) mount (23:12 in the video).  The animation from take off, gliding, to landing were awesome.  Enemies also aggro'd as the mount glided or walked past and there was quite the train of enemies gathered up.  I am not sure if this is how aggro is intended in long run, but definitely some early-days MMORPGs vibes there!

 Also numerous times in the video we got to see the character traverse various world obstacles. The traversal looked smooth and gave me confidence that they are headed in the right direction for movement and how it feels to the player (i.e. I can climb that rock in front of me vs it being an invisible wall).

 This is the first class preview where I can give a solid "thumbs up".  The more of the various game aspects that are mixed into these previews the more confident I will be that the game is heading towards a test! 

Why New World! Why!?

Wispy Spritz and Fire Motes!?

 New World's new spring event is live: Springtide Bloom.  The event has players zipping around the world killing wasps and picking flowers.  There is a trick to killing the wasps you can harvest the flowers and that trick is having Wispy Spritz on hand.  While plenty of Wispy Spritz is given away in the event the crafting recipe is a head scratcher as it requires fire motes; the most expensive motes in the game... so the price... as expected... is going up (2 to 2.48 gold per on my server).

 This highlights this weird imbalance New World has with some components. Some are overused in many different recipes and then get scooped into event recipes like this situation; and other resources in the same family have significantly less use.  In the mote example; Fire Motes are the most used mote and now is the most-most used because of the event kicking off.  Why New World? Why!?

Why!?

New World Discord

Goodbye New World Forums

 New World is shuttering their forums and moving their community interaction to Discord. I would link to that forum post but whats the point when it won't be there in the future so here's a screenshot instead.

 Maybe I am just an Internet boomer but I liked forums and I am going to miss the New World forums.  I thought the forums were well organized and functionally strong.  I really liked the dynamic timezone conversion capability so that I was always seeing event times in my local time.  It was also easy to search via search engines.

 I enjoy Discord as a voice comm platform but I really have not liked it as a means for replacing a game's website and forums.  I just don't find Discord functional in the way a web sites are.  It is also "yet another" program I need open on my computer.  I get it that many gamers live in Discord but I am not one of them; I live in my web browser (yes... I know you can use Discord in your browser... but that doesn't mean it works like a normal website).

 Either way I didn't spend much time in the forums.  The main use was when I am encountering a bug or connection error and seeing if others were in the same boat.  Discord should be good for this as I am sure folks will pile in with any widespread issues.  So I'll give Discord a try and lament not having the forums anymore.

 What are your thoughts?  Leave a comment.

Steam Backlog: Battlefield Bad Company 2

One of the best!

Funniest Battlefield ever sir!

 Next on the journey through my Steam backlog: Battlefield Bad Company 2!

 I am too obsessed with Battlefield 2042 currently to jump back into Bad Company 2 so this post will just be about my fond memories of destroyed battlefields!  This is one of my all time favorite Battlefield titles!

 Not only did this game have great multiplayer, but it also featured a great single player game.  In fact its the only single player campaign in the entire franchise that I can remember playing.  The characters were memorable and I can still hear "Rainbow Sprinkles"!

 Just watching that video brought back so many funny memories from this game's dialogue. I would even go as far to say that if Battlefield gamers were turned into virtual soldiers these yahoos would be the result.

 And talking about the rainbow sprinkles on the top: not only was Bad Company 2 amazing but so was it's Vietnam campaign.  For years I returned to play the Vietnam multiplayer.  Great maps and even better features! Ever see a helicopter airlift a tank into the middle of the battlefield?  Well guess what you can do in BFBC2 Vietnam!  Oh and the river patrol boats were overpowered... just saying.

 Regardless of Vietnam or the game proper the underlying gameplay was spot on.  Guns felt great.  Map destruction was top notch.  Vehicles felt balanced.  And one of the most controversial changes was removing the prone position.  If you wanted to snipe you had crouch as your best bet.  

 So many good memories here and this spot in the backlog is also timely as, unfortunately, EA is desisting Bad Company 2.

 

This post is part of my running series: My Steam Backlog (see all MySteamBacklog tagged posts).  

Another Diablo 4 Beta!?

 The rumor mills are in full motion this morning after a "accidentally" posted Slack message tweet hit the Twitter from Rod Fergusson.  It suggest a secret announcement is coming with the upcoming Diablo 4 End Game stream.

 

 

 Combined with a tweet from the official Diablo account the suspicion is we are getting another beta; likely focused on the end game content of Diablo 4. 

 

Get ready to block your calendars folks!

Note: I am opting NOT to link to Twitter; so screenshots is all you get!

Infernus!

 Infernus dropped!  Woot!  The Infernus farming build and guide I put together paid off.

Look at that bad boy (the sword; not bunny face)!

It dropped! It dropped! Woot!

Frustrating x4!

 Seriously!  New World developers... this is so frustrating.  To go with yesterday's picture; now I have four completed activities I can't get rewarded for.  This design is so dumb!

Frustrating!

 New World developers: this is frustrating!  I've completed a task and there is no place to stamp it on my card.  This is dumb!

Battlefield 2042 Shutdown

 Battlefield 2042 has a new special event, Leviathan Rising, and includes a game mode called Shutdown.  

Attack, Plant & Protect - Infiltrate enemy objectives & plant the Lances; a new mode objective in Shutdown, protect them, and score as many points as possible.

Defend, Locate & Disable - Locate and eliminate Lance Carriers, prevent their dropped Lances from being picked up, and defuse any that do get planted, with prejudice.

 Basically it is conquest but players get to plant the flag (the Lance).  It is also infantry-only so no vehicles.  Combat is all close quarter as the maps are small.  This is an entirely different experience than normal Battlefield.

 Personally, I do not find the mode to be much fun.  I enjoy the change in pace with the infantry combat, but matches can get lopsided quickly and it's pretty miserable spending 7 minutes (max for half of a round) getting killed repeatedly.

 This mode may be fun in a coordinated group, but as a solo player with unorganized teams this is a mess.  I will play enough to get the rewards but then I'm done and back to breakthrough.

2 hours, 400 rabbits

New World: Defiled Storage Chest of the Hare

 After about two hours of grinding and killing 400 rabbits I have my Defiled Storage Chest of the Hare.

 Now to find a spot in the house I want to put it!

Internet Outage

Offline Gaming

 My internet was out this morning... of course the one morning where I woke up early to play some online games.  Instead I had to settle for offline gaming.  My offline game of choice is Wreckfest and I nabbed first place in a race on my favorite track: Tribend.  Woot!

Look ma! First place!

Rabbit Face

Hip hop mother f*ckers

0.50% drop chance

 I jumped on to kill some corrupted bunnies in New World's "Rabbit's Revenge" event that started today.  One of the drops that is possible, with a 0.50% chance of dropping, is the Corrupted Rabbit Mask skin.  On my 6th kill; it dropped. Woot!

Why are runeglass gems so expensive in New World?

 Why!?

 Just a quick gripe: why are runeglass gems and their components so expensive in New World?  The game actively requires players to change gems between content... why make it so runeglass gems and their components cost thousands of gold or hours to farm together materials?  Why can't they be on the same level as regular gems that cost a few hundred gold?

 #frustrated 

Look at these prices!

New World: Infernus Farm Build

AKA the Solo Myrkgard Build

 As I mentioned in my last post I have been working to obtain Infernus in New World.  I am doing this solo which requires a build that can take a lickin' and keep on tickin'.  This means heavy armor and the ability to self heal.  And since we are in Myrkgard already; we may as well farm it... solo!

 The key's of the build are:

• Heavy armor with corrupted ward
• A warhammer with Trenchant Recovery
• A sword with life steal

Note: see image at the wayyyyyyyyy bottom for all of my current gear.

Armor and Attributes

 The good news on the heavy armor front is there is plenty of corrupted ward heavy armor.  If you've run Tempest Heart chances are you have various pieces of Tempestuous armor.  Or the Lorica Squamata chest piece from The Ennead.  Or from the Winter Convergence event you have the patterns that come with corrupted ward not only do you get the ward but also +Luck.  Upgrading the armor to 620+ also goes a long ways and the set can double for tanking corrupted expeditions.

 For gems I just went with opals in the armor.

 Attributes are 300 CON / 200 STR.  If you want to spend a lot of time being flung around but have a little more damage you can go 300 STR / 200 CON, but with the Season 1 patch moving the grit passive to 300 CON I am preferring the 300 CON build (with my heavy builds in the past I always went 300 STR because of the grit passive).

Weapons

 For the weapons I go with Warhammer and Sword and Shield.  For the hammer the key is Trenchant Recovery so you can self heal with heavy attacks.  For Sword the key is life stealing and shield you want the corrupted ward.

 The weapon builds are focused on defense and gaining life. Don't overthink it; there is a lot of flexibility here as long as you get the parts of the trees that boost defense and life gain.  I use Path of Destiny on my hammer because I have a hammer with Leeching Path of Destiny perk.

Warhammer Build

Sword and Shield Build

Misc.

To go with the armor and weapons you will want the following consumables:

• Corruption Tinctures (I use Strong as its the most cost effective) - this stops the damage ticks from corruption (my tincture running out in a bad spot is the only reason I am at risk of death).  These only last 5 minutes regardless of level so take lots of them.  Note: if a group clears the portals then the corruption is not active until the portals respawn so no need to use tinctures if the portals are cleared.  Also read below on a spot you can sit between kills that is safe from corruption all the time.
  
• Infused Health and Regeneration potions; don't use many as you heal mostly from your attacks but good to have in a pinch and if you end up with more than one group of enemies (you can tank quite a bit at once with this build).
  
• Hearty Meals.  They are cheap and I eat one before each kill for a little bit of healing.
• Carrot Cake.  It is the cheapest attribute food for STR/CON and I always seem to forget to bring enough so I get them in bulk!
  

 Where/what to farm?

 Simple: Disciple of Disorder in Myrkgard is the only enemy that drops Infernus.  Fast travel to the Tempest Heart shrine and it's a quick jaunt over some stairs and down to where Disciple of Disorder spawns.

 There is approximately a 5-6 minute respawn time.  In-between respawns I either do PvP arenas, recall to the house, or wander around Myrkgard farming other stuff/opening elite chests.

Map from linked website

Fight Mechanics

 The fight is straightforward.  Disciple of Disorder spawns waves of hound minions, but with your ward armor, 300 CON, and Trenchant Recovery and life steel on abilities you should be near full health the entire fight (remember to use corruption tincture or the corruption ticks will make it a lot harder to stay alive).

 My normal rotation is Shockwave followed by heavy attacks with the hammer.  I use Clear Out if I get surrounded by the hounds.  I throw in a Path of Destiny if a group of hounds are lined up (it can really charge up your heartrune).  Then I use Detonate whenever I can to speed up the fight but be careful as you take extra damage while using it.  I try to dodge the knockdown waves.  Dodging (so I don't have full stamina) also increases my damage due to my runeglass gem on my hammer and also triggers shirking fortification.

 I only swap to my sword when I am bored with hammer or if I end up with a bunch of extra adds that need to be blocked.

Safe spot from corruption

 There is a spot where you can sit up on a rock between a wall and a house right next to Disciple of Disorder that does not tick corruption.  Note: you cannot fight Disciple in this spot; it will leash and reset.  You will also aggro Disciple and the other corrupted that spawn here so it's not safe safe; just safe from corruption ticks between kills.

 See the screenshot below for the spot:

Safe spot!

Current Gear

All my gear for farming Myrkgard and for Infernus!

Farming for Infernus in New World

Great Tanking Sword

A farmin' we will go!

 

I am solo farming Infernus, a tanking sword, in New World.  I will post more info and a guide with my build and the consumables in the near future, but for now here is a screenshot of try number 20 or so (not sure how many times I'll have to do this until RNGesus answers the prayer)!

New World Rabbit's Revenge (2023)

Rabbit's Revenge: 2023 Edition

 Rabbit's Revenge is back in New World starting 4/12 and with it comes this creepy poster image!  Also it comes with some quality of play improvements; rewards are now guaranteed after 200/400 slain rabbits (last year there was no guarantee; I gave up after 600+ kills without the chest reward).

 

 

 Sorry Stanley, everyone will be gunning for you!

Day 3: New World Season 1

Bugs Bunny

 My day 3 in New World Season 1 featured bugs.

 First; I ran into a bug where refining Tier 5 materials doesn't seem to count towards the activity card task.  The first 5 counted, but the rest did not so the task sits at 5/50 and cannot be completed as far as I can tell.

 The next bug I ran into was that you sometimes cannot change the skin on your gear.  This is irritating considering you are awarded several skins in the season pass (and there are skins on the Twitch drop currently).  It is also random which piece of gear will not let you change skin and then on your next login it changes which gear is bugged.  For example; I could not change my chest piece skin this morning but all other slots were fine.  Yesterday it was all gear slots I couldn't change.

 While frustrating; these are not game breakers.  I am still over all enjoying the season and finding myself doing more and more of the card activities.  I tackled the first couple of quests in the storyline and hit level 39 now on the season!

Day 2: New World Season 1

Day 2 of New World Season 1

 New World Season 1 hit the servers this week and yesterday I posted about Day 1.  Day 2 is now in the books.

 For Day 2 I focused on starting my progression on the Season levels.  I opted not to start the story quest line and instead focused on some of the tasks in the season journey as well as completing activity cards.  

 I like the season journey as it gives a good cross section of activities to try out in the game.  Two of the activities, duels and playing music, brought me to parts of the game I've not touched in months.  While they were brief visits back to these systems it was good to be reminded they are there and to get rewarded for participating in them.  This, to me, is the best way for battle passes to work in games.

 The activity cards are mediocre.  They do hit that theme of encouraging players to explore different parts of the game, but I question why there was a need to add the complexity of the bingo card system.  There is too much time spent looking at menu screen for the card and tasks; time better spent actually playing the game.  I would much have preferred just a simple daily/weekly task list where a quick glance tells me what to go knock out.

 At least the task list on the cards can be refreshed because there can be a big discrepancy in level of effort between tasks.  One task will be "complete an expedition" that will take 30 minutes while another will be kill 10 enemies that will take a couple minutes while yet another will be "eat 10 food" which takes 30 seconds.  Refreshing, which costs azoth the more you refresh, can result in a simple bingo completion.  And again this micromanagement is happening in the menu taking away from engaging in the game.

 Another gripe of the activity cards (and season journey) is that it's all housed in the menu.  I would have loved if I could add tracking to the overlay UI so I could see progress the same way that I can pin a quest or recipe.  I spent way too much time in the menu and it took away from my engagement with the game world.

 These complaints may seem like I am not enjoying the season, but that is not the case.  I am enjoying it a bunch.  I really dig battle passes in games as it gives me defined purpose to my playtime that is not just a repeat of what I've been doing for the last year (gypsum + OPR/arenas + the same faction quests in Ebonscale).  It will wear off as the season winds down but then I look forward to season 2.  I also don't mind the cost of premium as the rewards are outstanding in my book as a more casual player.

 If AGS cleans up the card system to be less annoying they are on the right path with Season 1!

 So what else is on the agenda with Season 1?

• I still want to get going on a New World Paladin build with all the Season 1 changes, but have to admit my sword and shield/greatsword build (medium armor) is holding up without any gear swaps.
• I need to try out the new Empyrean Forge expedition
• I need to do the season storyline 
• I need to jump into Outpost Rush and PvP Arenas to give them a whirl with all the balance changes
• Watching more Twitch to get the !drops - watching Work2Game this morning
  

Day 1: New World Season 1

My Day 1 Experience

 New World Season 1 hit the servers yesterday and with it a ton of changes.  So what did I do with my time on Day 1?

 The first thing I did was log in and drop $100 on marks of fortune.  Then I bought my six additional gear sets.  Following that I grabbed the Premium season pass with the +20 level boost (because time is my limiting factor these days; I'll just have to forgo avocado toast this month to make up the dollars).

 Then I just... did... nothing.  The original plan a lot of players had, which involved saving up a ton of stuff too turn in, was nipped when the production version of the Season XP Booster was found to only apply to passive experience and not all experience gained so those saved up activities were not going to be a "complete the pass in two hours".  Honestly this was a good change for the health of the season pass and the content surrounding it, but it did shoot my day 1 plans in the foot.

 I also watched BDLG's stream.

 I also started theory crafting my next build.  I wanted to go back towards heavy armor PvP tank or maybe a sword and shield/lifestaff build (aka the New World Paladin build).  With the changes to heavy armor it may be more feasible this time around.  Until then I am just rocking the sword and shield/greatsword build I've had for months.

 More to come as I move forward into more content later today.

New World Season 1 IS HERE

Season 1 FINALLY!

 New World Season 1 is rolling out as this post is being written (morning of 4/4/2023). Hype!

FIXED: Discord Install Failed: Can't find PresentationCore 4.0.0.0

Fixed: Can't find PresentationCore 4.0.0.0

Update: 4/11/2023 - I finally fixed this error.  The final fix was updating .NET framework to version 4.8.1 (which I got from here).  As of 4/11 the recommended version is 4.8, but multiple uninstall and reinstall of that version had no change in the error on install.  However, on a lark I tried the most recent version 4.8.1 even though it is not recommended a voila; problem solved!

Original post

Note: I have a support case open with Discord but no resolution yet. Figured I'd post here as well and also on Reddit.

History of issue:

• One day Discord stopped opening; click icon and nothing opens - no process started that I could see in Task Manager
• Figured I'd uninstall and reinstall.
• Used Windows uninstall; would click uninstall and nothing would happen.
• Ended up downloading Revo Uninstaller to uninstall which was successful
• After uninstall I am now unable to install

What I've tried

• Tried all steps for a corrupt install: https://support.discord.com/hc/en-us/articles/115004307527--Windows-Corrupt-Installation
• Tried installing the Canary client; still errors
• I also unpacked the DiscordSetup.exe with 7zip, copied to my root folder, and then extracted and ran the files inside (I followed guidance on YouTube but lost the video link)
• This at least causes the Discord opening screen to show up, but then it fails to a JavaScript error noted in this Screenshot https://imgur.com/lSFtVuO

What is happening?

All installs fail and generate a log and in that log everytime is a failure noting something in regards to being unable to find something called PresentationCore (assumed to be a DLL; part of Microsoft .NET)

Unhandled exception: System.IO.FileNotFoundException: Could not load file or assembly 'PresentationCore, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35' or one of its dependencies. The system cannot find the file specified.
File name: 'PresentationCore, Version=4.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35'
   at Squirrel.Update.Program.executeCommandLine(String[] args)
   at Squirrel.Update.Program.main(String[] args)

I have verified PresentationCore.DLL is in the correct folders. I have used Microsoft's .NET framework repair tool.

As a note I went into Windows > Assembly folder and I see PresentationCore listed twice - both as version 3.0.0.0. It seems like I am missing version 4.0.0.0 but no real idea, even after a ton of googling, how to get 4.0.0.0 to show up in assembly.

Appreciative of any ideas anyone has while I also work with Discord support.

New World Season 1

For Real, Maybe

Two more days of waiting; 4/4 for the Season 1 launch in New World.

Steam Backlog: Bejeweled 3

How did this get in here?

 Next on the journey into my Steam backlog is Bejeweled 3.  I don't ever remember buying this game or even remember wanting to buy this game.  But it's in the backlog so it must be played!

 

  The game is a straight forward puzzle game.  Swap gems and line up three.  Get lucky (or plan strategically) and an avalanche of combinations is possible.  Line up more than three and get special gems that explode or have other effects on the board.

 I put in my hour of playtime and feel satisfied enough to check this one off my Steam backlog checklist.  My final score:

This post is part of my running series: My Steam Backlog (see all MySteamBacklog tagged posts). 

New World Season 1

Still Delayed

Looks like we'll be waiting a few more days for New World Season 1.  April 2nd is the new target.

New World Season Pass

Complete the pass in 2-3 hours?

 I came across a video by Lemoni that explains how to complete the New World Season 1 pass. According to Lemoni, the pass can be completed in just two to three hours, which is significantly less than the "50 hours to complete" quoted by the developers in a recent video on seasons. Watching Lemoni's video has left me wondering where the developers got their estimate of 50 hours from, and why the pass is structured in this way.

 Video embedded below:

 To speedrun the Season Pass, the key is to pre-stage objectives and have items ready to turn in, which many regular players likely already have. Once the player has prepared, they can use a 2x season experience potion and turn in all the pre-staged objectives to receive double the experience. This way, players can maximize their returns within the short time the potion is active and quickly complete the pass. While it may not be possible for every player to complete the pass in just a few hours, this method demonstrates how players can make progress much faster than the estimated 50 hours. 

 I'm not against maximizing return in a video game, but I think this shows a poor design to the season pass where experience is rewarded lump sum and the potions apply to those lump sums.  This is counter to pretty much every "battle pass" I've come across. Just using the Battlefield 2042 Season 4 pass as a comparison; any experience boost only applies to passive experience gained for actions taken.  Any mission completed that rewards experience is not affected by the pass.  Also you can't save up to "turn in" a mission later on; it just completes when you reach the criteria.

 The main two issues with the New World season pass as I see it: passive experience is negligible and there is too much tied to the moment something is turned in (aka lump sum).

 Passive experience is what is gained by just playing the game.  Kill a wolf; get season experience.  Complete an arena match; get season experience.  For some reason New World decided passive experience was going to be so small that it would be impossible to use just passive experience to complete the pass (even though they try to say it's possible in their video).  Yet, in the "card" system player's can get a lump sum reward for things as simple (and dumb) as eating 10 stacks of food.  Not even eating 10 stacks of food over normal play where you have to let the food buff expire; you can just ram down 10 in 10 clicks and be done!  Yet going on an open world adventure and fighting through hordes of enemies will barely be noticeable on the progress bar.

 Since passive experience from just playing the game is not the way then what is the way?  That is the lump sum card system where players get a literal bingo card of objectives to complete (like the eat 10 food).  However, the bingo card spots don't autocomplete.  Player's get to choose what part of the bingo card are completed after fulfilling the requirement. This is why Lemoni's method works: you just keep saving up completed items to cash in during the boost.

 There are also lump sum reward challenges for the season; quite a few as Lemoni notes in his video you can get ready ahead of time since they are all turn-in related actions and thus you can cash in with the double experience.  It is so bizarre that lump sum rewards get doubled by the boost potion.  Unaware players are going to be punished for not knowing and those that do know are going to progress faster than the developer planned 50 hours.  No doubt speed runners will then complain about a lack of content for the season.

 The sensible way for this to have worked is that players get passive experience for almost all of their activities and the boost potion doubles passive experience gain for a short period.  Lump sum rewards should be static and unaffected by the boost.  This would mean players get more rewards for just playing the game instead of putting together a shopping list / completing a task list and lumping it all together for one giant boost.

 Also while I have not played the pass on PTR myself just watching the videos I am not a fan of the bingo card system.   The game didn't need another system to define objectives; it needs to drive players to existing structures such as town boards.  The season story quest line and challenges are fine, but the addition of the bingo card as the proposed main way to progress is overly complex compared to just rewarding us for playing the game.

 Season 1 is still delayed from the original planned 3/28 launch so we still have some time to wait.  What are your thoughts?