Technically Small World

Matticus is one of those bloggers that has been around seemingly forever. Quite frankly, I'm sort of at the point in my blogging career when I feel that way about anyone who has been around longer than me. Four years is a long time in the blogosphere.

I was pretty thrilled, then, when I got to play League of Legends with him last weekend. Shhhh, don't tell him. Wouldn't want it to go to his head.

Now, Matticus would probably be the first to say he's no celebrity, even in the niche WoW-blogger world. (Maybe he is, I don't know). I didn't geek out on Mumble or anything (I don't think I said a whole lot period). It's not like that.

I grew up with several folks who are now professional athletes. I would consider them family friends. We played on some teams together growing up, maybe hung out several times, but I wouldn't say that I'm close with them.

From a closer-than-average viewpoint, then, I can say that there's a certain amount of celebrity that goes with being a professional athlete. I'm not the sort of person who gets starstruck, but there is a tangible excitement. Something in the air, if you will.

It's not like that, either.

I can't explain it, but there's this weird phenomenon that I've experienced several times now. I've been fortunate enough to be able to virtually hang out/play with several of the bloggers that I read. And every time, there's this semi-awkward trill of excitement.

Perhaps the best real life example I can think of is when I've done a bit of traveling -- further away than, say, a couple of states -- and I run into someone that I went to high school or college with. Not the sort of person where you're like, "Oh, no. Not him." Rather, the sort of person where you chuckle and say, "Small world." This is especially the case if you're attending the same niche event. You know, so that the next comment is "You do this stuff, too?"

What do you call that?

I hope it's not pretentious of me to say that I get this same sort of vibe when I bump into readers. Part of me is always surprised. Like, "Oh, you read that?" The old page-hit counter has been above 0 for some time now. You think it wouldn't be news to me.

I guess my whole point here is to sort of geek out about technology. How cool is it these days that we can so easily rub elbows with people who share our passions? It's the Technically Small World Phenomenon, if I had to put a name to it.

If you run into me, you should probably be aware that I'm a pretty solid introvert. I've never been a social butterfly. Oft times, I feel guilty for being short with people. I reflect later on all the wonderful, elegant, witty things I could have said. It is what it is.

I had a lot of fun playing with Matt this last weekend. This is probably news to him, as I didn't say much. I also learned a lot. I have fun any time I get to play with like-minded folks, even if I have to be coaxed out of my shell a bit in the first place.

So thanks to Matt for hitting me up. And thanks to the other folks that have popped in, commented, just said hi, whatever. If you think it's cool, rest assured that I think it's pretty cool, too. The world is a crazy place. It's always nice to know that you're not as crazy as you might have thought.

#SWTOR - Here's a Free Blog Post

Apparently, there's quite a stir going around with TOR's Free to Play announcement. My blog has always been free to read, so I'll be the first to welcome the TOR folks as brethren in the free entertainment movement. Hopefully they'll have more luck turning this into a full time job than I have. (The Day Job I'm forced to keep is really cutting into my writing time right now... ah, consequences...)

Joking aside, there are a whole bunch of opinions over at The Melting Pot, and my buddy Targeter chimed in. I don't have a whole lot to say on the issue. Having spent a lot of my recent gaming hours in League of Legends, I've now experienced a stellar Free to Play setup. Riot does a great job. They seem to make smart moves, and understand what their players want.

Free to play can be good. It can also be cheesy. I hope TOR errs on the "good" side.

I was probably going to cancel my sub once it ran up, but with the entry price being free... I could see myself picking up the ole' lightsaber now and then. I'm glad the story is free. As for the rest of it? Well, I'll just have to see.

I think that about sums it up. Especially for the price of "free." You want more content? Leave comments. That's like blogger currency. (Or you can just pay me money too. I'm sure we can work out the comment currency exchange rate. Last I checked the going rate was... a penny? Suppose that depends on how much thought you put into it.)

For Me, Summer Hath Ended

Things may get sparse around here for the next three months. Football season has officially begun (for Indiana High Schools anyway). As a volunteer coach at the varsity level, I'm kept pretty busy. It's a lot of work, but a lot of fun.

The downside is that gaming takes a back seat. I think LoL will be easy to squeeze in a game here or there, but I'm not sure how much I'll have to write about. We'll see how it goes.

MoP looks like it's going to come out right smack in the middle of our season. GenCon Indy is also coming up. I'm sure I'll find ways to experience both.

I'm going to try my darnedest to dig into Warlock stuff once MoP hits. Since I started this blog, it's pretty much been my non-official policy to wait for things to go live before I really delve into them. Part of that was the lack of access earlier in WoW. These days, it seems like open beta is more hype than testing, and by the time something has gone live, others have already hashed it out. Doesn't work well for me because I actually prefer to wait until release. Call it old fashioned, or something. I just can't really get excited for extended beta play when it's all going to be reset or changed.

For what it's worth, I don't re-watch many books or movies. Even favorites. I suppose I just find it hard to re-bottle lightning. Diff'rent strokes and all that.

The point is that I want to fully experience something... once. That's it. I don't want to waste the good surprise on beta. I think it makes me a sucky Warlock blogger, though. There are plenty of others that will cover what I do not, and then what do I have to add?

The good news is that I've never really held myself within the delusion that y'all are coming here to be told how to play your class. Likely, you get plenty of that elsewhere. People come to KeS for the attitude and the atmosphere. (So maybe I just need to wear more flair). Thus, I'll be writing about MoP when it drops. If it's all a repeat to you, hopefully it's at least an entertaining repeat. That's all I can offer.

I suppose I just wanted to write this post today to reaffirm the direction of the blog. I've been writing a lot about other games, but once there are live, new things to talk about in WoW... I don't plan on ditching. Now, if MoP sucks... eh, I'll still call myself a Warlock and write here. It's fun, and writing is simply what I do.

Thanks for making it worth something by reading.

On Being Called a Noob

I've been called a lot of names in my life. Who hasn't?A lot of them were actually fitting. Yes, even one's meant to mock.

In a gamer's life, few insults a hurled as vehemently as "noob." Or even the alternate spellings: n00b, newb, nub (where's my umlaut key? cntrl+???). They all amount to the same thing. Someone feels the urge to deride your lack of mastery of a game or gaming concept.

I talked about my graduation in League of Legends earlier this week. The gameplay ante has been upped. So too has the trash talking.

Last night, I was accused of being a noob for the 572nd career time. Because I keep track of each time. It means that much to me.

And as I was sitting there, trying to come up with a smartass comeback (the only acknowledge method for responding to the comment, if you deign respond), I suddenly had a change of heart. I realized I've only been playing LoL for a couple weeks. I was a noob!

Then I wonder, wtf is this dude's problem? It's not like I'm playing ranked matches at Summoner level 30. This is level 12, normal mode, blind pick. Summoner's Rift map. What did this person expect?

So I'm being a bit facetious. A very large part of me expects immature behavior any time I venture into a PvP setting. I'm fairly confident in my gaming competency, and not afraid to learn in those areas where I may be deficient. Which is why I strive to block out the nerd rage and sift for the nuggets of wisdom hidden within "noob" statements. Because, all joking aside, there is often a lesson tucked somewhere in there. If you can block out the rage, that is.

Not to lend credibility to the trolls, but often players aren't simply pissed to be pissed. I will admit that this is sometimes the case, and often seems like the case, but generally players get pissed for a reason. Something you are or aren't doing is completely obvious to them, in their infinite wisdom, and they believe that they know better. I'm not saying that they're objectively "right." I'm just saying they think they're "right."

If you can figure out what they think they're right about, you can begin to develop impressions on what I'll call "average" gameplay. What is expected from a competent player? What are the moves a team is supposed to make and when? You may not agree with the logic behind them all, but generally behavioral trends will crop up in a game for a reason. If you can identify and understand that reason, you can use that information to your advantage. Being able to anticipate your opponent can pay dividends.

Unfortunately, the two individuals calling the rest of us noobs last night didn't have much in terms of wisdom to offer. I asked several times what they would rather we be doing, or what we were doing wrong. The constructive answer was "don't suck." Mind you, their stats lines were far from impressive. I said something along the lines of: "Yes, I am a noob. What's your excuse?"

That shut them up.

The one pearl I got: Apparently, "assist kills add carry." I have no idea what that statement means. I think it was meant in a bad way, which baffles me. Isn't it good to help each other kill an enemy? And what is "carry?" Anyone care to take a shot at explaining?

LoL - Graduation

I hit level 12 late last night. This was exciting for me, because it opened the spell "Flash." It's a short teleport spell. From what I've seen, it's going to be incredibly useful. I had been running with the mana regen spell and Ignite (for a finisher). I'm going to keep Ignite.

I've also apparently graduated to the next level of LoL play. I say this based on my experience being matched with random teammates. I'm not sure if there are brackets, or how exactly the matchmaking works, but if I had to hazard a guess, I'd say that there's roughly a 1-10 bracket.

Levels 1-10 are characterized with several unique things. First, there's not a lot of strategy. Sure, you get the occasional mouth smurf (a term a learned that seems to mean a high level summoner that has re-rolled an "alt" if you will). But in most cases, you're all newbs. People pick things up at different rates, and have different gaming backgrounds. You're just as likely to get a team that completely stinks, or blow the other team out of The Rift.

The 1-10 bracket is a bit more forgiving. It seems like a lot more folks are feeling out their champion. You can wander closer to the fire without getting burned. You can make mistakes and not always pay for them.

Sometime after 10, I noticed a distinct uptick in play. All of a sudden, people were calling "dibs" on lanes. Rough strategies were outlined. Terminology was used. You'd actually see someone "jungling." None of this is routine until you "graduate."

I'm typically pretty quiet when I play. I like to let my playing (or lack thereof) do the talking. Instead of typing things in, I'm more likely to ping the map. In this respect, I'll bet some folks have suspected me of not speaking English (Spanish speaking players seem to be decently common). I'm just an introvert. It happens.

As I've mentioned in the past, I'm most at home on a mage-type AP carry champion. Morgana is my favorite. I did pretty well on Brand this weekend. I stink up the house on anything melee.

I'm learning that my type of champion is generally assigned to "solo mid," which puts me in the middle lane, alone. It is also a highly sought-after spot. Whenever there are two AP mage-types, the other one is generally quick to "call" mid. And they get real touchy if you encroach on their territory.

There's a lot more intra-team bickering in this second level of play. People enjoy e-peening more. (Hence how I learned what a smurf is.) There are certain players that like to dictate when to do what. For the most part, I'm happy to oblige, but sometimes I suspect they wish to use me as a sacrificial lamb so that they can mop up the kills. That, generally, does not fly.

It's also somewhat humorous when one of these talkative types makes a mistake. It's obviously your fault for not bailing them out. I usually respond with a neutral: "What would you have had me do?" Generally, that is met with silence, or something super-constructive like "don't suck."

I found the "block" button this weekend. Bring up the scoreboard. It's on the right. Little crossed out chat window icon. Very useful.

I also reported a feeder this weekend. We had a player go off the deep-end into a nerd rage, frothing about how awful we were. He/she/it was playing on Ashe, and proceeded to spawn and run straight for the enemy base. Ashe did not veer, did not attack, and just died. Over, and over. And after every death, the summoner said "nice." Obviously, we lost, but I have a hunch a few more people learned about the block and report features, too. Even the other team got in on the reporting, because feeding is no fun for anyone.

It would be unethical reporting if I didn't point out that these asshats were the outliers. I played a good smattering of games, and each game generally with 9 other players. Out of the perhaps 100 or so players I played with this weekend, there were two that I blocked and one that I reported. That's not a bad rate for a PvP-centric game. Heck, that's not a bad rate for any game.

All in all, I've really been pleasantly surprised at the whole League of Legends community. Riot seems to understand their fans, and the fans appreciate the game as presented. People are generally helpful, which is always neat. So, if you notice that I'm on a LoL kick, here... that's why. It's a lot easier to play and write when you feel warm fuzzies about the game and community. This isn't to say the other games I play have deficiencies, just that I'm unabashedly enjoying my LoL time.

Which brings me to my final, newb-tastic question: What is "elo?" Can one of you vets explain it to me? If not, I'm sure Google can...

LoL - Ebb and Flow

In every game that I've ever played (that has a PvP component), there is an obvious ebb and flow to player skill. Likely, I"m not the only one to notice this. In WoW, I generally knew that weekends were easier in BG's than weekdays. Tuesday nights were rough in arenas, but they calmed down by the time Monday rolled around. Certain holidays threw the normal cycles right out the window. The regular PvP player notices things like this.

A lot was dependent on the type of server you played on. SWTOR was my first experience on an advertised West Coast server. That meant that toward the later end of my own Midwestern playtime was when the masses would start showing up. PvP before that was a bit slower, more relaxed. Also, the queues took longer.

League of Legends is no different. It doesn't have a "reset" day like WoW or TOR. At least, not in terms of dungeons (since, you know, there aren't any). There is a bit of a weekly cycle when you consider the free to play champion offerings for the week. They change on Mondays. Also, I don't really know what sort of server I'm on. It's all one big server, I believe. I think it plops me in the North America region, but I've also seen folks from Brazil in my games. I wonder if East Coast vs West Coast is taken into consideration.

Not that it needs to be. Queue times are quick. And there aren't any capital cities to observe a crowd or lack thereof. I'm just observing things here.

Now, keep in mind that I'm only a level 10 summoner .(Prolly will ding 11 tonight. Go me.) I'm sure things shift a little as you level up, and my opinions are perhaps ill-formed in the first place. Still, I wanted to share what I've observed so far. (For reference, I'm in the Eastern time zone. Also, I'm primarily playing Summoner's Rift, Blind Pick.)

• Later than 10PM, I'm generally paired with better teammates. Competition seems better as well. "Real" players play late?
• Along with that, the folks after 10 are more likely to flame you for poor play.
• Early in the week (Monday being the start of LoL's game week), you're more likely to see characters that summoners own/are comfortable playing.
• Later in the week is when people are more likely to bust out the freebies. Not always the case (some people jump on the new guys right away), but seems to hold.
• Along with that, you're more likely to see other skins for champions early in the week. My guess is that people grow bolder as the week goes on, both in terms of the champion they play and the foes they're going to be facing.
• The few 3v3 matches we're tried have been feast or famine, not sure how it correlates to time, but we either hit very good teams, or very poor teams... nothing in between. Perhaps that's just a function of the smaller game (more emphasis on individual skill, thus just seems starker).
• Despite the different times, the approximate queue time for me has almost always been under a minute. I think I can count the number of times it's estimated longer on one hand. Actual wait time is always longer, but not by a crazy amount.
• Not matter what time you play, there is always exactly one (1) player with a crappy connection/computer. Everyone else has finished the pre-game sync and he/she/it is at 9%.
• As soon as Nikasaur begins talking in a Summoner Showcase, your queue will pop. Doesn't matter if you were just waiting on your buddy to snag a glass of water or were contemplating checking your SimCity Social setup or even if you've actually queued. Seriously, the little video taunts me in the corner. It's all "Watch me, wtf else you gon' do? Facebook? Again? Pschaw!"  And I'm like, "Whatevs. I'll check out some art. It's cultural and junk." BAM. "Wanna finish what you're doing?" "Nah, can't risk it. Someone may choose my champion." (Seriously, the one time I clicked wait, someone snagged Morgana. Though she was free at the time so I shouldn't have been surprised. But they were AWFUL at her. The whole match was like a personal affront to me.) I've made it through the July patch update like seven times. I swear.

Okay, so those last two may have degenerated a bit. I don't really think they have anything to do with, well, anything. But there you have it. Anyone notice any other trends?

LoL - Home On The Ranged

I took my first tentative steps into the world of the league of the legend of the world of the.... um, what was I saying? Oh yeah, PvP. League of Legends. I upped the ante.

Quite frankly, I probably should have started PvP runs sooner. Trying out a character on AI bots is all well and good, but the true test is against human players. At my low level, I'm not sure there's much of a difference. To be honest, the human players may be easier. It's sort of like the bots are less prone to error, but more predictable. Human players show flashes of inspired play, but will also be derpy on occasion. You trade frustrating deaths for free kills, essentially.

I expect that as I level up, players will become more unforgiving. Thus, AI bots will be more necessary for trying out new characters. For now, I've actually been trying the freebies in PvP games. My experiences have been mixed, but rarely am I a drain on my team. That is to say, I take care not to feed kills. I may not always contribute to the kill count, but I take care not to die a lot as well.

I've learned a few things. First, I'm not so great at the melee playstyle. Every melee toon I've tried so far, I feel like I do a lot of fumbling. I've been on the receiving end of some stellar melee play, where I'm just getting chopped to pieces but Master Yi (and can't run away because F that guy. Seriously). Good melee seems really tough to play.

Ranged is a bit more forgiving. On Morgana, I've become a force to be reckoned with. most games, I'll at least triple my death count. I've become "Legendary" quite a bit. With other ranged toons (Miss Fortune, Sivir), I've had decent success as well. Not quite as effective as I feel I am with Morgana, but generally about double kills v deaths. And in all cases, I stay on the top end of the leveling push.

Oddly, my wife has taken to the melee playstyle. She's been chumming around on Sion, and doing a pretty darned good job. One on one in a lane, she generally wins. And when the two of us share a lane, we tend to do very, very well. Sion is a turret killing machine, and Morgana can bring some nice burst to bear on enemy champions, while offering some support.

Here are a couple of my replies to comments yesterday. I wanted to mention them here because I elaborated a little, and this is an elaboration post. Plus, I got great feedback from folks. So thanks for that.

• Matticus gave me some stellar tips, and I replied thus: 
• Re: items - "Typically, I snag a Doran's ring, then rod, then hat, then hourglass. That's been my basic progression and it seems to work out well." 
• Re: Morgana's Ulti - "The running INTO the crowd takes a bit of getting used to. As a caster, my natural instinct is to run away. I gotta remember that the ulti is "blood in the water" time. Feed, shark, feed!"
• Diablokls offered a tip about runes, which launched me into a bit of a diatribe on the Free to Play model:
• "That's really why I'm growing fond of this whole F2P model. I'm a little hesitant on games that gate content behind payments and the like... but a game that lets me choose between grinding (time) and paying (money), I'm okay with that. It's sort of like the company is saying, "We believe in our product, and will let it speak for itself. There are no gimmicks here." The Riot team really seems to put value in their content. The skins are gorgeous, for instance. Purely cosmetic, but you can tell thought and enjoyment goes into them."
• Also, Mobafire.com was suggested, and I'll second the referral. I'd found the place via Google earlier in the week. Great resource for builds. 
• I've got a running list of Morgana "alternates" for trial when the free to play rolls around to them. Malzahar and Cassiopeia are on the list.

There's nothing quite like quoting yourself. Am I right? Lazy blogger is lazy.

That's enough for today. Pleasant LoLing.