Nostalgic Holiday Weekend
I've had three-day weekends be too short or too long, this one worked out just right. Admittedly, I pretty much blew Friday being lazy, but I actually got some cleaning done after that. Yay.
I find the timing spooky, but just after I get to watching Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles, there's information released about the potential Robotech Academy. A week ago, I would have been excited. Now, I seriously doubt Harmony Gold's ability to produce anything worthwhile. The pitch alone is wedging events into a continuity in a place that seems questionable. There's a time lapse between the first and second wars, sure, but most of the children of the Macross-era heroes are accounted for.
Nevermind that they're running a Kickstarter for half a million dollars to produce a pilot episode. That doesn't really guarantee a series. Plus it seems like a lot of money. Data might be a few years old, but references I can find seem to indicate a half-hour anime episode runs less than half that. More money could mean better quality, but... eh... I don't have much faith after TSC.
I've also started playing the Steam-downloaded Enhanced Edition of Baldur's Gate 2. It's been years, and thankfully I've forgotten a ton of details, though I do still remember the "You have been waylaid and must defend yourself" and "You must gather your party before venturing forth" messages. Heh. It's quite a trip to be playing, essentially, 2nd Edition D&D again. Heck, the manual (which I still have from the physical version) is a spiral-bound monster that includes almost all the info required for a PHB, full spell list included.
The game runs well with all the bells and whistles of the day, but still has old failings - wonky pathfinding, no area markers for spells, and such. Having to walk everywhere and read through text makes it feel a much slower-paced experience than today's actiony games. That's actually a little bit relaxing. It does feel like it takes a long time to level, though. We'll see what play I get out of it - probably several times over the sale cost I paid, at least.
I've heard people talking about the released primer of the new Dungeons & Dragons edition (I think they dropped the "Next" and decided not to use "5th Edition"). It sounds like a flying leap back from 4E, which makes me wonder what makes it any better than 3E (or 2E?). I haven't looked closely enough to weigh in on it, and I don't really have any expectation of getting the main books - too expensive when I'm not playing much these days.
GW2 released the first part of their second Living Story year/season last week. Dry Top is a pretty small area, even with all the verticality, but it's a nice change of look from most other zones. It isn't as brutal as Southshore Cove, that's for sure. The return of the Zephyrite crystals for special movement is neat, but I hate the timer they put on - limiting you by time as well as charges. I always felt overriding weapon skills was punishment enough with those things.
The plot is pretty basic, really just the beginnings of the new story. The sylvari saboteur isn't yet explained, nor is where the Zephyrite Master is going. We get to see an old workshop of Scarlet's, which is utterly unnecessary and offers no real insights to me. The best part is listening to the "party" NPCs. Everything else is just sort of "okay," though it's too early to write off the entire storyline.
I find the timing spooky, but just after I get to watching Robotech: The Shadow Chronicles, there's information released about the potential Robotech Academy. A week ago, I would have been excited. Now, I seriously doubt Harmony Gold's ability to produce anything worthwhile. The pitch alone is wedging events into a continuity in a place that seems questionable. There's a time lapse between the first and second wars, sure, but most of the children of the Macross-era heroes are accounted for.
Nevermind that they're running a Kickstarter for half a million dollars to produce a pilot episode. That doesn't really guarantee a series. Plus it seems like a lot of money. Data might be a few years old, but references I can find seem to indicate a half-hour anime episode runs less than half that. More money could mean better quality, but... eh... I don't have much faith after TSC.
I've also started playing the Steam-downloaded Enhanced Edition of Baldur's Gate 2. It's been years, and thankfully I've forgotten a ton of details, though I do still remember the "You have been waylaid and must defend yourself" and "You must gather your party before venturing forth" messages. Heh. It's quite a trip to be playing, essentially, 2nd Edition D&D again. Heck, the manual (which I still have from the physical version) is a spiral-bound monster that includes almost all the info required for a PHB, full spell list included.
The game runs well with all the bells and whistles of the day, but still has old failings - wonky pathfinding, no area markers for spells, and such. Having to walk everywhere and read through text makes it feel a much slower-paced experience than today's actiony games. That's actually a little bit relaxing. It does feel like it takes a long time to level, though. We'll see what play I get out of it - probably several times over the sale cost I paid, at least.
I've heard people talking about the released primer of the new Dungeons & Dragons edition (I think they dropped the "Next" and decided not to use "5th Edition"). It sounds like a flying leap back from 4E, which makes me wonder what makes it any better than 3E (or 2E?). I haven't looked closely enough to weigh in on it, and I don't really have any expectation of getting the main books - too expensive when I'm not playing much these days.
GW2 released the first part of their second Living Story year/season last week. Dry Top is a pretty small area, even with all the verticality, but it's a nice change of look from most other zones. It isn't as brutal as Southshore Cove, that's for sure. The return of the Zephyrite crystals for special movement is neat, but I hate the timer they put on - limiting you by time as well as charges. I always felt overriding weapon skills was punishment enough with those things.
The plot is pretty basic, really just the beginnings of the new story. The sylvari saboteur isn't yet explained, nor is where the Zephyrite Master is going. We get to see an old workshop of Scarlet's, which is utterly unnecessary and offers no real insights to me. The best part is listening to the "party" NPCs. Everything else is just sort of "okay," though it's too early to write off the entire storyline.
I'll give a little list of what I like about D&D over 2nd and 3rd so far: 1) Unified Bonus. Your attack bonus, saving throw bonus, and skill bonus are all one thing. +2 at first level for anything you've got skill in, and +0 for anything you don't. These all go up at the same rank, from +2 at 1st level to +6 before you even reach 20th. The rate of climb is gradual, meaning that you're not going to have the insane bonuses from 3.5 (+20 to hit at 20th level for fighters, meaning you damn near never miss anything). It's also easier to calculate than THAC0, which is nice. 2) Saving Throws. Every attribute has a saving throw now, meaning that there's no such thing as a 'dump stat' - every attribute is critical to getting the job done. I'd actually considered this a few years back as a possibility, and I'm glad they're doing it. 3) Everything in the game now seems to be Stat Modifier + Proficiency Bonus + 1d20, and since the bonus is unified, it's pretty easy to remember what it is. I also like that as you go up levels, you do get attribute increases, but they cap at 20 (+4), meaning that your design should give you a +10 bonus to 'whatever' as you approach level 20. I actually find this better than having to assign points all the time as I level, like in 3.5, or Pathfinder, and it's more consistent than how non-weapon proficiencies worked in 1E and 2E. 4) Spells. The entire revamping of the spell system is a godsend. You get your Attribute Mod + Level 'spells known', which you can refresh each day. You then have your spells / day, which can be pulled from the list of spells you've got prepared. These spells don't 'vanish' when you cast them. This is similar to what Sorcerers did in Pathfinder and 3.5 - but the list will be generally bigger, and is more flexible. You don't need to prepare '3 1st level spells, 2 2nd level spells, and 1 3rd level spell' when you hit 6th level. Instead, you'll have (say, Int 16), 'prepare 9 spells from anywhere between 1st and 3rd level as you see fit'. The other good thing is that Cantrips have 'oomph', and a number of them get better as you level. So a wizard can whip out a nice elemental shot every round, for reasonable damage, and the cantrips never become useless. In addition, most spells can be 'prepared' at a higher level for greater effect. Magic Missile starts with 3 bolts, but for each higher level you prepare it at, it gets another bolt. Some spells provide additional targets, others do more damage, and so forth. 5) They have something in-between 'Kits' and 'Prestige Classes'. When you hit Level 2-3 - depending on your class, you can choose a path associated with your class. You get your primary class abilities, but you also get secondary class abilities depending on the path you took. For example, a Cleric chooses a domain from his god, a Wizard specializes in a type of magic, and Rogues and Fighters choose an archetype of sorts. (The example they gave for Rogue is 'Thief', and for Fighter, 'Champion'). I think if you want to, you'll be able to design your own paths for your game - so I'm sure we'll see things like 'Shadow Dancer', perhaps, or 'Samurai', or what have you. 6) They kept short rest / long rest. This is something I liked in 4E - the chance to catch your breath and recover some. A short rest restores some hit points, replenishes spells / day, and gives other benefits, and I like the idea of 'okay, we're taking a break for an hour' over 'okay, we're camping here for eight hours' that you'll normally get in a dungeon crawl. All in all, the rules seem direct and fresh - which is NOT what I got from 4E. They seem to have made everything more uniform, which is not what I got from 3.5 and Pathfinder (which seems very convoluted in comparison).
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