Penny Arcade

The newest comic is available here - one of the servers isn’t syncing up at the moment, so just try again a little later if you don’t get the juice.  Also, Gabe’s tablet is still screwed up, so you get the pencil treatment today.  His new pen should arrive in a few hours, God willing and creek don’t rise, and hopefully it’s that and not the whole pad.  I like today’s illustrations, maybe we can get him to upload some larger versions.

We exaggerate our affections for many games in the comic for effect, so when one of us actually becomes one of these caricatures I don’t know what to make of it.  He plays it absolutely any time he has a few consecutive minutes.  He can convert a conversation about anything else into one about Warcraft in two steps. 

Me:  I’m pretty hungry.
Him:  Build more farms.

This is the kind of shit I’m talking about. 

He’s so far ahead of me in terms of strategy at this point that I don’t know if it’s even worth it to play on Team Gabe.  You should have heard the stuff he was talking about when we wrote this strip - it was like a doctorate thesis compared to my own approach, which consists of making Orc Raiders until they kill them all.  I think it’s a lot of fun, and I like to play it, but I accept that I’ll never really be competitive.  Gabe, though.  I think he could be.   

The Ministry of Peace LAN Party was fabulous indeed, as LAN Parties tend to be, and any event that requires nearly a day of recuperation has served it’s intended purpose admirably.  As my friend and associate Clinton remarked at the event, every get-together of this nature has exactly the right game for it, you just need to figure out what it is, and pluck it from the ether.  At the first LAN I went to in Seattle, that game was indubitably Team Arena, which never received its proper respect in my opinion.  At the MOP LAN before this one, Jedi Knight II Duels stole the show.  We spun that wheel several times the first night, moving through Warcraft and the Army Game, but the real hero this time around was Soldier of Fortune 2.  A good patch can make a game seem new, and the four maps, new gametype, and new weapon in Soldier of Fortune 1.01 virtually reincarnate the experience.  It’s shocking how good the multiplayer is when it was never supposed to have it in the first place, and I think I’ll probably continue to play it regularly after the party.  Actually, hmmm. 

We said that we’d set up another gaming weekend, like we did with Phantasy Star Online a few months ago, and SOF2 would almost certainly do the trick.  Or Warcraft?  That’s got that cross-platform shit.  Actually, the Army Game would be good, since nobody needs to buy it.  Clearly, this is something that warrants further consideration.

(CW)TB out.

green light, now begin

I like to play videogames quite a bit. Contrary to popular belief though, I do not often go absolutely crazy over a game. There have been a few titles recently that have made me forget about things like eating and sleeping though. Warcraft 3 is one of those games. When I am awake I am playing it, when I am asleep I am dreaming about it. Even right now as I type this post I am thinking about how I could improve my NE build order. When I do take a break to eat something I eat it in front of the computer while reading message boards for NE strategy. Not since the lord God almighty himself sent us REZ have I been this totally consumed by a game.

I mentioned in an earlier update that I disliked playing on Battle.net because I got beaten so bad and so consistently.  Well that has changed recently. Oh I still get beat, but I have discovered that I learn a lot more when playing against human opponents than I do when just playing the computer. I have gotten quite a bit of mail from people asking me for some of the hints and tips that I have been sent. Well the biggest one is to play against other people, and when they beat you save the replay. Watch what they did. What is their build order? How could you have beaten them? Did you rush with huntresses only to have them beat you with air units? In that case you need to switch things up as soon as you see that first gargoyle. Make Dryads like they were going out of style and watch his flying abominations drop like undead flies. There are also plenty of places to download replays of players who actually know what they are doing. I was sent a series of replays that showed a player named Rooks absolutely dominating his opposition with the Night Elves. I learned more in just five minutes of watching him play than I could have in a month reading strategy guides or playing the computer. I learned simple things that I just never realized I could do, like setting the rally marker for your ancients of war on your hero and then keeping him mobile. So my advice to you if you really want to get better at this game is watch people who are already good at it. You will be surprised how fast you improve.

I have one last thing not about Warcraft 3. I have never heard of this site before but they have some bad ass new screen shots of Clone Wars. I got a chance to talk with a couple of the guys working on this title at E3 and they showed me some really cool stuff. I talked about it at length after E3 so I will spare you my fan boy ramblings here, but seeing these new shots has got me excited all over again.

Don’t be surprised if you see Monkey or Batjew on here a little later talking about Warcraft 3 and Battle.net. We saw some pretty crazy shit last night and If I know those guys they are gonna wanna talk about it.

-Gabe out

I’d like to address all these people that get all puffed up and what not over the “strategy” of rushing that people usually complain about.  A lot of people think this is a viable strategy, and I’m not going to say it isn’t.  But, I AM going to say it makes the game REALLY boring and irritating.  What’s the point of having all these units when all you do is create 2 barracks and a bunch of farms then send out a group of the first attacking units you can make 3-4 minutes into the game to end it?  How is this fun?  I can appreciate the fun in being a dick, BELIEVE ME, but even I give it a rest sometimes.

The “Save Replay” option in Warcraft has really given me insight AND PROOF into just how boring and annoying most of you are.  We played 3 games last night.  Only one of those games actually paired us up against people of the same skill level.  And that was a good game!  Not just because we won, but because it gave us a chance to attempt working together and trying to figure out what works and what doesn’t.  The other games just consisted of “higher level” people using the 2 barracks 5 farms strategy to end the game in 5 minutes.  Sure, it works, and you end up winning, but seriously, what the hell is the point?  How is that fun?

What I’d like to see are some replays of two teams of rushers going against each other.  I’m curious to see what it is when you play each other.  Maybe it’s a totally different game from what I’ve been seeing.  And maybe you just wipe out each others farms and then look confused when you’re standing in each others bases on opposite sides of the map.  I’m not a completely close-minded prick you see.  I’m willing to give you the benefit of the doubt that you’re all actually AMAZING DESKTOP GENERALS, and not just redundant idiots using a tried-and-true tired tactic from 2 sequels ago.

The new pen for my tablet arrived today from Wacom and it totally fixed my problem. Thanks to everyone who wrote in to help me on this one. It turns out that those of you who suggested my pen was just boned had it right.

-Gabe out

I’ve been getting a lot of interesting replies to my Warcraft questions, and I’d just like to thank everyone for proving me wrong and not sending me slew after slew of insulting emails about how I’m just “R0X0Red” or whatever.  I feel I have a better insight to what’s being done and now I have a new beef.  My beef is with the Battlenet MATCHING SYSTEM.  Level 1 people should not be paired up against Level 7.  Seriously, it’s just wasting both our time and making ME frustrated and angry.  Not all rushers are off the hook though.  There are plenty of BAD PEOPLE out there who do things just to be MEAN and UNFUN.  Herr Monkey also mentioned something about some people who have been playing a long time creating new accounts for themselves just to womp on newbies, simply because they’re bad people.  BAD, BAD PEOPLE.  I DO NOT LIKE THEM.

I agree with Batjew about the matching service. From what I understand (and I could be totally wrong here) its first goal is to match you with someone of similar skill level. Barring that, its second goal is to match you with someone within 30 seconds. I think that Blizzard should implement a system that allows you to see who you are going to be paired up with and cancel out of it if it’s someone much higher than you. They should also give you the option of turning off the thirty second timer. I would rather it search for a few minutes to find another player close my skill level than drop me into a game with Keyser fucking Soze. Of course that still doesn’t solve the problem of people creating new accounts just to appear as lower level players.

-Gabe out

We played a bunch of games today and each time we fell victim to the “Hero Rush”. Nothing makes you feel more like a retard than having your base destroyed by a hero and some ghouls a couple minutes into the game. Here is one of the more miserable replays I saved. As embarrassing as it is I am showing you this because I would like some advice. Those of you out there who use this tactic, how could someone beat it? Since everyone seems to be using this now I really want to know what we can to counter it. Thanks.

-Gabe out

Some more needs to be said about the Battle.net matchmaking service, because it’s one of the more critical (and cool) services provided, yet it is largely broken, in my opinion.

The system as it exists now works like this:  Invite your friends, choose your race, tell the system if you have a map preference (doesn’t mean you’ll get that map, but it’ll try), click Play.  You’re automatically thrown into a game with folks you may or may not have met before.  It never takes longer than 30 seconds or so… sounds pretty cool, right?  It’s certainly quick and simple.

I’m rated Level 1 on Battle.net.  Last night I tried to play a 1v1 game, and was matched against a Level 7 person.  I knew I was going to get my ass kicked before the map had even finished loading, and that’s bullshit.  Players need more control over choosing what to play.  For starters, like Gabe said, you need to be able to turn the 30-second matching off.  In a perfect world, I’d like to see a system where both teams enter into a chatroom for a little sit-down.  That would give both sides a chance to look at the stats for their opponents ahead of time, and maybe even give them a chance to negotiate on variables like the map or maybe even a handicap (Team A is marginally better than Team B, Team B agrees to play if they can have a 500 gold 300 wood handicap).  If the matchup isn’t to your liking, no problem:  Decline the match offer, and ask Battle.net to keep looking.  There’s also no reason there shouldn’t be some kind of ban list or filtering in place.  If I play with someone who’s a total dick, why should I ever have to play with him again?  If we harness the power of 21st century technology, there’s no good goddamn reason.

The point of any match-making service should be to provide the users with a fun, worthwhile match.  Hey, I’ve got news:  If there are only 3 games available, and they’re all against folks 10 times my skill level, it’d be more fun for me to read a book.

Hey, as long as I’m out here, Gabe seemed to get a lot of mail when he asked for NE strategies, so maybe I’ll do the same thing.  I’d really be interested in hearing what some of you folks do with the Undead.

(CW)Safety Monkey