This is Your Brain on Life

Still one of DerrickComedy’s best. That hand motions on...

dreamcastaway — Wed, 17 Oct 2012 21:07:19 -0400

Still one of DerrickComedy’s best. That hand motions on “skateboard!” alone.

I don’t get political. And there’s a lot of work I want to get done today for my...

dreamcastaway — Mon, 08 Oct 2012 15:30:59 -0400

I don’t get political. And there’s a lot of work I want to get done today for my Youtube subscribers, few as they are. But this election makes me fear. We will either continue the attempt to move forward or move backwards.

This trend towards regression in our country, towards intolerance and suspicion and denial of rights and invasion of privacy worries and wearies me to think of. This century has been marred by tragedy and a terrible, terrible presentation of this country I love to the face of the world. A world full of country and people I fell no ill will with but a direct kinship with as a human being. And I pray to God or whatever force may or may not guide affairs that we do not take the backwards step.

I fear it. And what it will mean for this country. Melodramatic, perhaps. But true sentiment, nonetheless. I was told, in sixth grade that the world was full of bad people. I watched as bad people did bad things and my countrymen went to die fighting those people for reasons that were noble in intent, perhaps, but then spiraled out of control. The nascent years of this century have, as Hunter Thompson said, worked with ‘fear as the operative ethic”. And we a just now moving away from that. Moving on. Forward.

And this is a big chance for us to fail to continue that. In this country and even potentially around the globe in some cases.

A more technical look at a condition damage based Thief in Guild...

dreamcastaway — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 20:08:10 -0400

A more technical look at a condition damage based Thief in Guild Wars 2. We break down some of the math behind the mechanics and talk about what I did right and what I did wrong in the match.

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dreamcastaway — Mon, 01 Oct 2012 18:23:04 -0400

So, I just pulled off one of the best long cons in my list, roleplaying wise. Spending over a year...

dreamcastaway — Sun, 30 Sep 2012 04:12:00 -0400

So, I just pulled off one of the best long cons in my list, roleplaying wise. Spending over a year with an alt character who applied to my own guild, going through the whole vetting process….all for the purpose of having him turn out to be a spy and traitor the whole time. Well, I use “he” but it was a she. Shapeshifter. Made for a good final event with a lot of intrigue and IC finger pointing

Went out with a bang. Good stuff. If anything, I know that for about an hour or two in my life, I had people sitting on the edge of their seats.

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dreamcastaway — Wed, 26 Sep 2012 17:58:10 -0400

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dreamcastaway — Tue, 25 Sep 2012 03:55:07 -0400

Everything about this is perfect.

dreamcastaway — Sat, 22 Sep 2012 22:52:00 -0400

Everything about this is perfect.

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dreamcastaway — Sun, 16 Sep 2012 22:02:36 -0400

For Gethard - Anonymous asks: Gethard I know you've talked bout depression and anxiety issues before and if you don't answer this cause it's a complete downer i understand but I'm curious if you ever had suicidal thoughts. I admire you and your show and have just been in a really bad place lately. I used to see your show as the last thing I had to look forward to but I haven't even been back for months and can't even bring myself out the door to get there without panicking. I'd appreciate any advice really.

dreamcastaway — Sun, 16 Sep 2012 01:40:00 -0400

thechrisgethardshow:

I just got this message and am going to answer it. Anonymous, this one is just for you, but since this came into our inbox anonymously I have to post it publicly. My apologies. I feel very unsure of if this is right to post this, but I want to help if I can. Anyone else can feel free to skip reading this one. - Geth

Read More

Read it all. Because it is important that people understand that no one should be abandoned. No one should be left alone. Every cry for help should get a response. And even if we have our own troubles, we should be ready to drop everything for another human being, even a stranger. Always.

Never forget that people are people. That fact alone means we should love them.

Two Lies of Guild Wars 2

dreamcastaway — Wed, 12 Sep 2012 23:44:00 -0400

I’ve been playing GW2 fairly extensively now and I want to preface this by saying that I still think it is a very solid game, worth the value of the box price. It does a few things very well. Some are even better than I initially feared they might be. Dynamic events is an example of this. They repeat, yeah. But they always seem rewards thanks to level scaling. And PvP, although it has problems and I will be talking about them, gets a great boost from having the exciting open world PvP than I wish TOR managed but it failed to deliver on. Bottom line: there’s still a lot of good here.

That said, as alluded to in my previous post, the game and its developers offer a few claims that just don’t really match up with what we’ve been told. This is to be expected of any title. Gamers, by now, are used to half delivered promises and overstated developers claims but considering that many people are eager to hang their hats on Guild Wars 2 as something utterly genre changing, it seems only fitting that we examine how they are wrong just as much as how they are right.

Now, I’m focusing on the negative here but that’s only because it is important, I think, for us to get some true perspective on the game. So let’s look at the first major claim:

1. This game destroys the Trinity.

Okay, well…this is true. To a point. Individual classes do not really have any strongly defined role. This comes from traits, skills, and weapons. You generally have a lot of freedom to create a build that works for you. However, two central pieces of content really call into question the notion that this game doesn’t have the Trinity or at least, that it doesn’t heavily incentivize a variation of the theme.

The first, and this one makes the most sense, is competitive PvP (ie. tournament play). Obviously, group composition is huge for something like this and you damn well be ready to have a few alts on standby for your team that fit into the group composition. And that group composition generally means having at least two burst DPS, a support character/buffer, a node defender (read: a tank or tankier build), something more sustained (ie. a burn/bleed build or a class that can manage high uptime, like a skilled Mesmer).

As I said, this makes sense. It’s competitive play but it’s still a similar form of the rock, paper, scissors we see in a lot of games. It just takes a slightly different form. Sure, there are not really any healer (although people can spec into some healing type roles) but there is a proper way to compose a team and not and it relies on certain roles. A node defender like a beefy Guardian or a tough Engineer is, to all intents and purposes, a type of tank, for instance. And you’re not going to want to have a team without that. We can make allowances for really skilled teams (say a team of 5 Mesmers that are really good) but really, those are exceptions to the rule.

Now, you might expect this in PvP but the other area this comes into play is instanced dungeons. Which might be the game’s biggest failure in terms of content. Not necessarily because they are not interesting. They are. But they are not something that you can just take damage dealers into and do great with. Sure, you might do okay but that’s if you’re all strong players. And while, say, you can’t tank in this game in the sense that there’s not really any way to manage threat based on skills, you’ll still want a tougher support character with you. You’re still going to want someone who can send some group healing out or at least who is spec’d in healing power strongly to revive people from the downed state.

So, while class have no pre-defined roles, certain content in the game pressures groups to have certain compositions with certain synergies. At least in the sense that the ease at which they approach the content is higher than those who do not. Solo questing? Dynamic events? It doesn’t matter there. But instanced content like dungeons and competitive sPvP? Not as much. You need to know your class, your build, and your role in the group. It is completely Tank, DPS, Healer? Not quite but the feeling is there. Trinity might not be completely alive in this game but it did not eliminate it. It merely obfuscated it somewhat. Damage/Control/Support is the new paradigm. But the fact is that the existence of a paradigm at all runs counter to ANet’s claims to a degree.

2. Personal Story is personal!

No, it’s not. And having come off a game where class stories were entities to themselves (The Old Republic), this is very clear. The personal story in GW2 follows the same general arc for everyone. Starter zones have the most “personal” content. Then you join one of three orders. Then you get drawn into a larger story about the dragons where you tend to play second fiddle to lackluster and uninteresting “heroes”.

There’s some good writing to be had. Some memorable characters. Yet, the process feels stilted at times. Artificial. Choices made in the character creation screen lack meaning as time goes on. My charr had a father who was a disgraced shaman. That comprised a story arc but once that’s done, it’s pretty much done. She was in Ash Legion but once I join one of the three Orders, that choice means nothing. It’s done. My Sylvari dreamed of a Green Knight who could not die. By the end of the Sylvari home area, I’d killed him.

The personal story is a reverse tree branch. There’s a lot of variation at the start but as you move forward on the x axis, those branches all converge. Which is fine enough. The end game at Orr and fighting Zhaitan is exciting. But the story is not personal. It is only personal because it follows your character. Your choices are even more superficial than The Old Republic. At least there, sometimes a character I betrayed or left living would come back. It would affected the story. My Bounty Hunter spared a Jedi Padawan, only for her to attack him again later in the story. He killed her then and it was pretty great.

GW2’s “personal” story has a limited pallet of choice. Some diversity that comes from your race, your biography choices in the character creator, and your Order choice. Eventually, you’re on the same path as everyone else. And it’s not even a very interesting one, largely do to the fact that it is very clear that the story is not really “yours” at all. It only presses forward from there. I won’t spoil, but I will mention a name: Trahearne. Suddenly, you’re Eddie from Brutal Legend and Trahearne is Lars.

There’s more to discuss. More misconceptions. These are two of the biggest. I could talk at length about PvP and I will. But the notion that GW2 kills the Trinity and that the story offers something personal and engrossing are essentially falsehoods. It might seem like a quibbling thing to discuss but it’s true. Other issues are systems based. Poor PvP matchmaking or some unclear explanations of game features. Badly managed security and hacked accounts.

These two things are core gameplay and narrative components. And while Guild Wars 2 does offer a lot of freedom, these are areas where the content disappointingly fails to deliver.

Some people have been requesting TOR videos again so I made a...

dreamcastaway — Sat, 08 Sep 2012 19:54:00 -0400

Some people have been requesting TOR videos again so I made a Gunslinger video. Alderaan. Recruit gear. Still a solid match. 720 and 1080p but I’m using a new video program unless I splurge on Premiere Pro and register my trial version.

It was the BLURST of times!?

dreamcastaway — Sat, 08 Sep 2012 03:23:08 -0400

It was the BLURST of times!?

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dreamcastaway — Sat, 08 Sep 2012 02:50:05 -0400

My Answer to a Nitwit...

dreamcastaway — Sat, 08 Sep 2012 02:41:26 -0400

“Why then, should we believe that there is one exception to the rule … gender? Why is the only thing society is expected to accept be the identification of a different gender from what is clearly not the obvious choice?”

Because transgendered people are real and not unicorns. Because it is the exception to the rule. Because sometimes brain chemistry doesn’t match body physicality and morphology. Because no one knows themselves better than themselves. Because you have no right, credentials, or other merits to validly call someone insane besides the token gesture of your freedom of speech. Because I can use my freedom of speech to call you an ignorant shitwig. Because gender identity and sexual identity most certainly are not the same thing. Because sexual identity is not merely ‘preference” but something you are often born with. Because no one wakes up in the morning and says “You know what? I want to be part of a hated, feared, misunderstood, and oppressed group of people!” Because your heart never lies. Because people don’t understand or bother to try to understand things that deviate from the norm. Because people are vibrant, unique, and no mind alike. They can be bigendered, asexual, androgyne, or more. And that diversity, that vibrancy of life is what makes the world beautiful.

But mostly because we’ve moved forward from the backwards psychology of the fifties and even moved on from Blanchard and the moronic and insulting notions of the previous era.

Shall I go on? Or have I answered you question?

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dreamcastaway — Sat, 08 Sep 2012 01:00:00 -0400

Trying out a new thief build by Guidance. Bleed stacking can...

dreamcastaway — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 21:34:58 -0400

Trying out a new thief build by Guidance. Bleed stacking can reach the mid twenties. A nice change of pace from my Berserker thief’s non-condition damage. Will have fun alternating the builds.

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dreamcastaway — Fri, 07 Sep 2012 15:21:01 -0400

“I’ve got good news. That gum you like is going to...

dreamcastaway — Tue, 04 Sep 2012 00:49:00 -0400

“I’ve got good news. That gum you like is going to come back in style.”

I enjoy this game, perhaps more than I should. It isn’t...

dreamcastaway — Mon, 03 Sep 2012 23:46:12 -0400

I enjoy this game, perhaps more than I should. It isn’t perfect but it tried. I look forward to Beyond: Two Souls.