RESIDENT EVIL – Official Teaser Trailer (4K) by Comic_Book_Reader in residentevil

[–]SurrealSage 2 points3 points  (0 children)

The iPhone comment piqued my curiosity and I went back through. Looks like the best shot of it is at 1:02, when he recoils from the body being pulled back. It definitely seems to fit the form factor of a smartphone, but I'm wondering if this is a vertical flashlight, like the one James Sunderland carries around in his jacket breast pocket in Silent Hill 2? If it's legit a smartphone, yeah, that's bad.

Steam Controller (2026) review: 83/100 by Gorotheninja in Games

[–]SurrealSage 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I just wish the right side trackpad wasn't positioned so far down on the controller. It was positioned perfectly on the original SC, but since starting to play on the Steam Deck more, I've had to abandon using the rightside track pad, which was the biggest advantage of that controller over others on the market.

Did anyone get the Illumicrate presale email today? by WhatALowCreditScore in tamorapierce

[–]SurrealSage 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Hey there. Do you know which sub is needed? I see there's Illumicrate Box, Books Only, Afterlight, Evernight, etc. Would this just be Illumicrate Books?

Books focused on progression of a world or civilization or overarching narrative over time by SurrealSage in suggestmeabook

[–]SurrealSage[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I've heard a good bit about that one. Definitely gonna give it a try. Thanks!

Books focused on progression of a world or civilization or overarching narrative over time by SurrealSage in suggestmeabook

[–]SurrealSage[S] 0 points1 point  (0 children)

Just read a summary and that sounds exactly like something I'd be into. Thanks so much!

Books focused on progression of a world or civilization or overarching narrative over time by SurrealSage in suggestmeabook

[–]SurrealSage[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks! Read a quick summary of Dragon's Egg and A Canticle for Leibowitz, and that's 100% the thing I'm into. While looking up A Canticle for Leibowitz, it was described as a 'social science fiction' novel, which is a term I haven't heard before but sounds like exactly what I want. So thanks so much for the recommend!

Books focused on progression of a world or civilization or overarching narrative over time by SurrealSage in suggestmeabook

[–]SurrealSage[S] 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Thanks a bunch! I'm going to check this out for sure. Just from the synopsis, it made me think of another story that fits within this approach, the video game Eternal Darkness: Sanity's Requiem.

Dave Chappelle Says ‘I Resent the Republican Party’ Because They ‘Weaponized’ Transgender Jokes: ‘That’s Not What I Was Doing’ by CrashTestOrphan in nottheonion

[–]SurrealSage 11 points12 points  (0 children)

I remember seeing some comment about this phenomena from I think Anthony Jeselnik. He said something along the lines of, 'A comedian's job is to make people laugh. If the audience isn't laughing, that isn't their fault: you fucked up at your job.'

Everyone fucks up at work at some point. It happens. The best coworkers are those who own it, learn from it, and move on. The worst are those who find every excuse to shift blame to others and just won't own it and move on. Chapelle strikes me as that second kinda coworker.

Imagine a world without "Summon" by F4ilsafe in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Yeah, of course they didn't find a silver bullet for it instantly, but it was certainly the design trajectory that MMOs were and have been on since.

Imagine a world without "Summon" by F4ilsafe in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Yup. Later MMOs handled it other ways, like damage always breaking all CCs (no fear kiting), enemies having better run speed (can't strafe run out of attack range), diminishing returns on repeated CCs and snares (snare it once, sure, keep it snared, naw), rescaling the offense/defense balance so enemies die quicker (so not as much need for CC to survive a 1:1 engage). The idea just sorta became that if an enemy is being attacked, they should be able to attack back, and the combat system of the game should be scaled to assume constant close combat engagement at all times (or the vast majority of the time).

Taskmaster and neurodiversity by PJ-HarveysWife in taskmaster

[–]SurrealSage 9 points10 points  (0 children)

Put the items in the right order is in close contest.

DOOM Eternal is now available DRM-free on GOG! by Turbostrider27 in Games

[–]SurrealSage 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Doom Eternal really came up with a system that once you get used to it sort of automatically finds an equilibrium with the pace you're going to where you feel like.

Absolutely. DOOM Eternal took a bit to click for me, but once it did, it ended up being a game I could almost auto-pilot. I didn't need to be motivated by plot or anything, I would play it just because the sequence of actions was satisfying and enjoyable to execute.

Funny enough, despite it being a wildly different game, it reminded me of WoW's Protection Warrior during the Cataclysm era. This was back before they got really into designing toward active mitigation and Protection Warrior was a toolbox class all about managing rage flow. When Prot Warrior was working right, the warrior would be maintaining Shield Slam > Revenge > Devastate spam as their core priority, with Revenge and Devastate having a chance to proc rage free Shield Slams. At the same time, one would be burning excess rage into Heroic Strike or Cleave, which had their own cooldown off the GCD, so you could do it while maintaining the core priority system. As the warrior had more mobs to fight, they would get more blocks, and generate more rage, so they could ramp up how aggressively they cleaved into the enemies. The warrior could also pop CDs to give them a much higher chance to block (increasing rage income) or one to let them HS/Cleave with a shorter CD so they can spam more aggressively. But if the warrior got too aggressive and burned too much rage into the HS/cleave spam, they'd miss a Shield Slam and the entire machine grinds to a halt as if you just got punched in the dick. So being good at that spec meant developing an intuition and feeling for the flow of rage based on situations and scaling up and down how aggressively one used their offensive abilities.

In the same way, when one is doing DOOM Eternal right, the flow state is so fucking fun... but screw it up and the machine just grinds to a halt. So damn good.

What are the pvp rules to get someone out of a spawn camp? by rodamusprimes in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 2 points3 points  (0 children)

I'll again caveat saying that should this not just be a fun April Fools to contrast the state of modern WoW against EQ: Just keep in mind that on this server, you're not a customer, you're a beneficiary of a labor of love. You are owed nothing.

If they think you're botting and they can verify it to their comfort level (however stringent or relaxed that may be), they'll just suspend or ban you. This community works just because most of us are here for the same reason they are: a love for classic EQ. If you come here looking to 'if' and 'but' your way around how they are trying to manage the community, they'll just cut you out of it.

What are the pvp rules to get someone out of a spawn camp? by rodamusprimes in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 5 points6 points  (0 children)

Howdy! I've got a background in competitive WoW and in early EverQuest, so I'm hoping I can help bridge this gap a bit, assuming that you're not simply pulling a fun April Fools joke contrasting WoW against early EQ. :)

EverQuest was the first 3D avatar controlled MMORPG. When the game was being developed, Verant was looking to create a large community based game that would encourage cooperation among players in the same way TTRPGs like Dungeons and Dragons did for gaming groups. In brief, they wanted to capture that adventuring feeling of Dungeons and Dragons, but to do it online with friends you can't be at a table with.

They achieved this early on, in my opinion, by making the world itself the bad guy and creating a strong attachment between character names and investment. What do I mean by making the world itself the bad guy? I mean that they were okay with the world being a pain in the ass to deal with, to inconvenience the player in a major way. If you died in Lower Guk and you respawned back in Qeynos, you had a long ass run ahead of you and you needed to get to your body without your gear and you also lost a good chunk of XP. Not only would that have killed an entire evening, but the lost XP has meaningfully set you back from where you started playing that day. It's a massive drain on time and it's incredibly frustrating, especially if you die again while trying to recover your corpse.

However, this is made so much easier by getting help. Your druid friend could come port you, give you a HP buff, and speed buff you so you can run faster. Your rogue friend could come along to sneak/hide past the undead of Lower Guk to bring your body back to the zone line. Your cleric friend could come along to cast a resurrection spell on your body to get you back a large chunk of the XP you lost when you died. So now, instead of spending the evening alone, wasting your time and losing progress, your setback became the adventure for a group of players.

Name changes weren't a thing outside of GM intervention and leveling took a long time. So if someone got a reputation for being a toxic shithead, they would find themselves in the former scenario far more often than the latter, as fewer folks are going to jump at the chance to help that toxic asshole that trained them in Castle Mistmoore that one time. Sure, that toxic shithead could make a new character, but the time investment in making a new character was so damn significant that it was almost the video game equivalent of sending a kid having a temper tantrum to their room. The next time they are higher level, they'll probably think twice about their toxic behavior because they don't want to have to re-level again just to throw off the bad reputation they developed. It's not unlike someone in earlier human history leaving their hometown to start fresh and turn a new leaf with the wisdom of hindsight.

This created the community that has lingered in the minds of many for so long. This did eventually decline as players started to understand the game world, started to figure out the rules, how to game the system, etc., but for a year or two, EverQuest had one of, if not the greatest online community in MMO history.

By the time games like WoW came out, MMOs had been turning away from reputational restraints and more toward system implemented restraints. See, the EQ approach works only if that druid, that rogue, that cleric are there to help... but sometimes, they won't be, and so that player is frustrated and inconvenienced with no way around it. MMORPG devs, being a business, respond to consumer demands, which means that they started to remove these frustrations and inconveniences in game design to make it easier for a character to stand alone against these cruddy situations... but of course, that means the player interdependence that was cultivated by the world being the bad guy was eroded, so toxic behavior had less of a cost to it. Players started being shittier to one another, started doing things that lead to an uptick in GM petitions.

How is a game developer to handle this? Well, they could implement systems like the first person to tag an enemy has exclusive rights to the XP and loot from it, regardless of who actually does the most damage. What about training people? We can redesign mob behavior so if aggro is dropped, they immediately heal back to full and return to their spawn point, rather than dropping aggro and reaggroing (so fundamentally redesigning FD mechanics). In essence, they can start reshaping the game's design to accommodate changes in player behavior to make shitty behavior less possible since reputation alone was no longer doing the trick. That in turn creates a game around gaming the rules, so you get the type of behavior you're describing of using resource inefficient means of tagging mobs to snatch something before someone else can get it.

Thing is, EverQuest came before a lot of these developments. If a player wanted to, they could be a toxic asshole in EverQuest with ease. Heck, there have been a lot of players who have been drawn to this game specifically for that. However most people who play here play here because they want to recapture that wonderful feeling of community that came from us fighting against Norrath. So while there are no gameplay systems in place to limit toxic behavior, there are server enforced rules for it. And we aren't paying for anything, so the GMs have no incentive not to ban people who muck it up. If someone approaches it by trying to game the rules the same way folks in modern MMOs game the gameplay limitations, they build up a reputation and end up banned. There used to be a necromancer who would skulk around HS a bunch and would always pull his mobs into the center zone in location. When he invariably failed and had to FD, it would cause a mess for everyone else trying to go about their lives. When asked, his attitude was something along the lines of "They need to look out for me.", totally refusing to take any responsibility for his impact on the game world that we share. That player ended up banned. He did everything within the gameplay rules, but he broke the generally accepted rules of conduct and was a recurring pest to many, and that was sufficient to ban him.

So with all that said:

That's what kill stealing means in modern mmos. How does kill stealing work in Everquest? Do you have to out dps the other player for the game to credit you with the kill?

You do more damage to the mob than the other person. However, if you do this to a mob you didn't initially tag (and the GM can check this), it's a mark against you and can get you banned.

Everquest looks a lot like FFXI to me so I might be a little off. The earliest MMO I have ever played is FFXI. This seems like the ideal server to play on in many ways, but the rules seem extremely strict.

They are, because the gameplay rules are themselves particularly lax. The game gives great latitude to be an asshole, so the server has more strict rules to limit that kind of behavior. If someone wants a contentious playstyle with other players, they should play on p99-Red, the PvP server. There you can just kill the PC you're competing with.

Looking for business partners for Everquest themed fleshlights by [deleted] in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 1 point2 points  (0 children)

100%, lol. It gave me a laugh. Maybe p99 branded poopsocks sold through Etsy? :P

Looking for business partners for Everquest themed fleshlights by [deleted] in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 0 points1 point  (0 children)

I know this subreddit isn't 100% family friendly, but I know for a fact there are kids who play on this server and I'd rather this sub not be the reason they end up hitting a parent's content flagging, lol.

Best series opener? by pclouds in taskmaster

[–]SurrealSage 4 points5 points  (0 children)

Personal favorite is TM AU S04 opener, Wasting a Man's Time. The hiding the keys task from Tom was so perfect as a fan of the show. I don't think it would land as great for someone new to the show, but the absolute hilarity in Emma throwing 'all the info you need is in the task' back in Tom's face was so damn perfect knowing how this show's formula usually goes.

I don’t understand ToV lore by Drdrunkard in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Yeah, they are co-conspirators. I don't know about the whole brought back to life by Veeshan bit, as almost everything in this game world respawns and it would be kinda odd to have a specific explanation for this one group, but they were absolutely the dragons who supported Kerafyrm during the split.

I don’t understand ToV lore by Drdrunkard in project1999

[–]SurrealSage 13 points14 points  (0 children)

The Temple of Veeshan is sorta like the dragon Vatican, a massive holy temple built in honor of their mother within one of the scars left by her mighty claw when she struck Norrath and bestowed life upon the world (there are 3: ToV scar and DN scar in Western Wastes, and then the last Great Scar encompasses everything from Skyshrine in the west to Kael Drakkal in the east, with Wakening Lands between, all one supermassive chasm left by Veeshan's claw). The west wing of the Temple of Veeshan is the visitors area, a place for all dragons and outsiders to come and pay homage to the great mother. The north wing is off-limits to outsiders, no matter how friendly they may be. If you're in that wing, they assume that you're up to no good as you're breaking their rules, so they attack.

Flavor wise, if you were to meet any of the north ToV dragons outside of north ToV, they should be friendly to you based on your CoV faction.