AggroChat #239 – Sticking the Ending

Featuring:  Ashgar, Belghast, Kodra, Tamrielo and Thalen

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Tonight we have a bunch of not entirely related topics, but there is at least a minor theme of how you end something is extremely important.  Bel talks a bit about his experiences with the latest brand name beta in the form of Division 2. From there he also shares some frustrations with the way Assassin’s Creed Origins is ending which leads its way into a larger discussion about what makes a satisfying game ending.  We talk about what this means for passive media and how it might be different for interactive media. We then get into a discussion about progression systems and why fixed ones often times feel better than completely random ones. Finally we have some assorted digression about us looking forward to Anthem as a non-PVP mmo that somehow leads its way to FFXIV housing?

Topics Discussed:

  • Division 2
    • Military Fantasy Fallout but no Nukes
    • Worthy Successor to Original
  • Assassin’s Creed Origins
    • Great Game… But
    • Forced Character Swaps
    • End of Game Without “Your” Character
  • Satisfying Finales
    • Twist Endings
      • Mass Effect 3
    • Resolution Endings
      • Plot Twist Ending
      • Plot Twist at Beginning of Final Chapter
    • Fixed Length Shows
      • Anime
      • Babylon 5
      • Russian Doll
    • Revisiting Choices From Game in Ending
  • Fixed vs Random Progression Systems
    • Warframe Blueprint System
    • Destiny Random “Powerful Gear” Frustrations
    • Warframe Economy
  • Excitement over Non-PVP MMORPG
    • Anthem
    • Free PVP Gear from FFXIV Retainers
    • Lacking Money Sinks in FFXIV
    • House Reclamation

AggroChat #177 – Extreme Home Makeover

Featuring: Ashgar, Belghast, Kodra, Tamrielo and Thalen

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This is one of those weeks when we seemed to have more topics to discuss than could possibly fit in a single show.  We even had to drop one for the sake of time that we will hopefully revisit in a future episode.  We start the show off by talking about Shirogane Extreme mode…  or the land rush for housing in the newly opened district in Final Fantasy XIV.  Ash and Tam took one for the team and sacrificed sleep schedule to get us a brand new house.  From there we talk about Guild Wars 2 Path of Fire expansion and some of the things we have noticed so far.  Belghast talks a bit about the Iron Banner 2.0 in Destiny, and some miscellaneous discussion about how clans work.  Ash and Thalen discuss Dragon Quest Heroes 2 and the Heroes game genre in general.  We wrap up with a discussion on Warhammer starting with the brand new stand alone Shadespire game and then talk a bit about Warhammer 40k.

Topics Discussed

  • Shirogane Extreme
  • Final Fantasy XIV Housing
  • Guild Wars 2 Path of Fire
  • Destiny 2 Iron Banner
  • Dragon Quest Heroes 2
  • Warhammer Shadespire
  • Warhammer 40k

AggroChat #173 – Vampire Pirate Dinosaurs

Featuring: Ashgar, Belghast, Grace, and Kodra

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Tonight we are down both a Thalen and a Tam and get off on some meandering topics.  We start off with some discussion about the Final Fantasy XIV Rising event that just finished and the introduction of the cheap dungeon.  From there Belghast gets pretty deep in the woods talking about infusion mechanics and Destiny 2.  We branch off from there into a discussion that is really hard to describe.  Functionally we were having a chat about MMOs and whether or not the devs are obligated to provide a uniform experience for all players and all activities in a game.  This branches out into a bunch of directions from the PVP/PVE debate to how uneven some of the artifact weapon quests felt in World of Warcraft Legion.  Kodra talks a bit about his recent journey into the iOS port of one of his favorite Vlaada Chvatil games…  Though the Ages.  Ashgar gives us some updates on his experience playing through Monster Hunter Stories and we delve a bit into the new Magic the Gathering expansion Ixalan.

Topics Discussed

  • Final Fantasy XIV – The Rising Event
  • Destiny 2 Mechanics
  • Providing Uniform MMO Player Experiences
  • Through the Ages iOS
  • Monster Hunter Stories
  • Ixalan Pre-Pre-Release

Not Squishy At All

Not Squishy At All

I am having one of those mornings where I am struggling to find anything I feel is worth actually talking about.  The last few days I have been sick and as a result I have been living in this weird little bubble world.  I mean prior to this I had already been in a pretty deep turtle phase where I largely kept to myself, but when you add illness to the mix its like I forget the world exists.  As a result I have been deep into comfort gaming territory, which in this case means World of Warcraft and doing all sorts of random PVE stuff that no one is actually doing.  I’ve been spending a fair amount of time in old raids attempting to get set piece drops.  Similarly I have been roaming all over Draenor which is almost completely empty these days, and picking off rare mobs left and right for achievements.  I spent a good deal of time yesterday for example in Tanaan Jungle killing the big named mobs for mount chances and farming up Apexis crystals for that moment eventually when I get 150,000 and can purchase the spiffy fel themed mount.  All of which are not super important activities but give me just enough focus to take my mind off the fact that I can’t actually breathe.

I of course have also been keeping up with the Broken Shore content… even though it feels like I should be wrapping that in quotes.  Broken Shore feels like the most “more of the same” items I have seen in awhile.  Sure there are world mini bosses that are constantly spawning, and sure there is a new batch of world quests for you to do… and sure there is a weirdly futile base building mechanic…   but it all sorta feels like we have done it all so many times at this point that it is just busy work.  I mean it is busy work that I am doing because at least in theory it is busy work that should someday lead to the class themed mount.  However I am wondering how much more I care about it at the moment, and if I don’t shift into a “only hanging out on Friday nights” mode for the raid.  I have been greatly enjoying doing that and seeing the people I missed.  It is even sounding like I might cycle into a primary tank role for Friday nights to let the Wednesday night tanks have the night off.  In truth Fury is a fine spec, but it will probably only be something that I use for farming old world content or if someone really needs me to dps something.

I am just a prot warrior through and through.  Other than the two expansions where I flirted with playing a Deathknight…  I have been a Warrior for as long as I can really remember.  Sure my first raid main was a hunter, but as soon as I could get into tanking raid content I did…  even to the point of joining a completely different raid team to make that happen.  There is just something about the player fantasy about being this unstoppable object that appeals to me.  Like for example I really enjoy the fact that protection is a reasonably viable spec for player versus player content.  I take great pleasure in watching enemy players decide it is a good idea to attack me.  Like I am the least aggressive player while flagged, and I am generally going to leave you the hell alone pending you leave me alone while I do those PVP flagging world quest dailies.  However there is always somebody that wants to poke the bear…  and in doing so they get to learn the lesson of just how impossible it is to take me down in a one versus one situation.  In truth there are lots of times I am easily juggling three players as they attempt to attack me.  There was a moment from some time ago where it finally took five players focusing down on me to bring me down out in Stormheim.

So last night when a random Fury warrior decided it was a good idea to attack me while doing the PVP Naga daily…  and never actually managed to take more than 10% health off of me…  I had to chuckle.  I am definitely a PVE minded player, but if you mess with me I will stun your ass and wreck you.  That said I am normally more in the mode of helping out my fellow cross faction buddies and spent some time last night pulling packs of murlocs  so that people could get their Squirky battle pets.  This was apparently a limited time event and spawns on an island off the west coast of Azsuna.  Said island is filled with a bunch of elite murloc packs that are hyper aggro just like any other murloc in the world.  As a result I spent a good time just gathering stuff up and farming it down so players could fly in and get their pet… then get the hell out.  I have to say it was a challenge just clearing myself of enough aggro to be able to get out of combat to fly off the island when I finally decided it was time to go.  The end result is an extremely high fidelity Murloc battle pet…  albeit a fairly ugly colored one.  However since I love my murlocs… I will add this to all of the blizzcon themed murlocs I have hanging out in my pet storage.