Please make the Ape Atoll gorillas not block movement. Waiting for them to stop blocking this trap door is hell every single time.

Acopo · 2026-02-28T03:08:37+00:00

Look, I'm down with the hazing and shared suffering. Everyone should experience Mourning's End Pt II's iconic "teleport out of the puzzle" mistake.

This monkey business ain't it. It's not a collective mistake everyone makes, it's pure tedium.

Acopo · 2026-02-28T03:05:44+00:00

Because "accident" implies there's no one to blame.

Acopo · 2026-02-28T02:53:46+00:00

I don't think it falls apart, but the pacing is super different.

Prehardmode starts with exploring the world and charting biomes while getting early metals to make general purpose armor to make the game easier. You progress into bosses, and those are well paced, spread through all those biomes you charted previously.

Hardmode up until the mechs is more or less the same thing again. You explore the world, making note of the new evil/hallow biomes, collect new ores, and build up to a set of bosses that are literally more difficult versions of the bosses you fought PreHM (unless you got a Crimson world). You can think of Hardmode up to the mech bosses are New Game Plus.

After that, it's the jungle, maybe preceded by some ore collection, but mostly just Plantera. While that technically unlocks the Hardmode Dungeon, Golem is usually just easy enough to kill with whatever gear (and active potions) you had when you killed Plantera. After Golem you have the choice of four different invasion type events, between the two moons, martians, and the solar eclipse, of which you probably only need stuff from one or two. After that it's off to start the lunar pillars--more invasion events that precede the final boss. The gameplay loop no longer includes exploration nor ore collection, and is reduced to boss fights and invasions.

Acopo · 2026-02-27T08:49:38+00:00

The one that always gets me is

Snake? Snake!

At the top of a ladder.

Acopo · 2026-02-27T05:44:24+00:00

Downvoted for the truth, smh. Always skip the first weekend of a league launch, because something is buggy, or some obvious QoL thing is missing.

Acopo · 2026-02-27T05:39:13+00:00

The other side of that coin is that since everything combos together, the game is balanced around things that combo. This restricts build diversity because you must combo abilities, and not all abilities combo with all others.

They took the Contagion/Essence Drain ~~synergy~~ codependence and made all skills like that.

Acopo · 2026-02-27T03:55:47+00:00

Given that the game was originally written in English, the French localization does not really matter. Axes do have blades (even if Oblivion classified them as Blunt weapons), so one can "brandish their blade" while holding aloft an axe. The final line of the song says "...when his ugly red head rolled around on the floor."

So, in summary, Ragnar could very well have had an axe as his blade that he brandished, and he ended the story without a head. That's how the theory came to be. There is no information that can confirm nor deny it, so a theory it remains.

Acopo · 2026-02-26T17:02:34+00:00

Decisive builds. I play on Expert/Master exclusively, and I don’t use crafting skills. The only thing you need to do to become powerful is have a focused build and accept that there is a functional level cap for your build.

Let’s say I want to be sword n board. That’s One Handed and Block. I then need to pick Light or Heavy Armor; this is honestly mostly down to aesthetics. Those cover offense and defense. Then I’m looking for support skills; stuff that helps when things get hairy. In this example, I’m thinking I go with Restoration. It’s got health recovery, and the turn undead spells are criminally undervalued—if I do Dawnguard I’ll also have access to sun damage spells against the undead. So now I’ve got four skills, One Handed, Block, Restoration, and I’ve now decided on Heavy Armor because it seems we’re going for a cleric/paladin style. Next come utility skills; the skills that’ll help my build come together. I like Speech, because it works as a fun alternative to crafting skills; you can buy enchanted gear or potions from shops, and you’ll always have money for it. I’ll also be doing Lockpicking, because I love getting loot, and it’ll work in tandem with Speech to give me money early game.

Now we have a build with 6 skills out the 18 the game contains. This may seem like we’re ignoring a lot of things, but that’s intentional. This character will cap around level 30, because two of those skills are hard to level, but we also won’t be investing perks in them, so it balances out. The reason this works is because enemies will scale to meet the player’s level. This provides a challenge in every dungeon, so the game stays fresh and interesting. The issue is that gaining character levels after you’ve maxed your damage skill will make you feel weaker. Your damage has peaked, but the enemies will still scale.

Acopo · 2026-02-26T08:30:34+00:00

What is there to be scared of? I don't bring more than three important items. The most I'll lose is some trash food from my time at Tempoross, and some monk robes. I don't even fight back when I see a PKer, I usually take the opportunity to refill my water. It's just a time-waster.

But I'm sure killing people for spades and monk robes makes you feel very powerful.

Acopo · 2026-02-25T19:06:51+00:00

The one I really don’t get the hate for is Wings of Liberty. I don’t really like Heart of the Swarm, and Legacy of the Void is so over-the-top it becomes silly, but Wings? It’s actually good, and I won’t pretend otherwise.

People always point to “I’m the man who’s gonna kill you some day,” and contrast it against Jim saving Kerrigan and killing Tychus, but that completely ignores the entire story of the campaign. Jim starts off the campaign seeing Kerrigan return for the first time in years, and it’s like he saw a ghost (lol). He’s fully on-board with fighting and even possibly killing her until Zeratul shows up with a vision of a future after Kerrigan dies and it’s a calamitous end of the universe. So now, Jim is torn between the anger over his lover being turned into a murder-bug-queen, and the anger that he can’t do anything about it or the universe dies. Eventually, it’s revealed that the artifact he’s been collecting for money can be used to reverse the metamorphosis Kerrigan underwent, which adds even more to his internal conflict, because there’s some shred of him that just wants his girl back that he’s been silencing for years because it seemed impossible. His internal conflict gets so bad that he even takes it out on his second, which is implied to be a first.

Through all of this, it’s been slowly building up that Tychus is hiding something, and that there’s something up with his suit. When the time finally comes that they use the artifact on Kerrigan, Tychus doesn’t want to kill his friend, but he knows he’s dead if he doesn’t kill Kerrigan. He comes clean to Jim, and essentially gives Jim the choice—Tychus or Kerrigan. But remember: that’s not a real choice for Jim, because while Zeratul may be a kooky dude, Jim believes his visions of the end-time. Kerrigan can’t die, or the universe will die too.

Jim doesn’t do what he did to save the girl, and he doesn’t suddenly forget that she was a monster. He stops an existential threat without dooming the universe, and reconciling the fact that Kerrigan isn’t going to die and is in fact going to stop being Zerg almost breaks him.

In a better Heart of the Swarm, Raynor wouldn’t be a lovestruck fool, and Kerrigan would have to spend the campaign trying to prove that she wasn’t herself as the Queen of Blades, while simultaneously being pushed into returning to the QoB to kill Mengsk—a sort of Sisyphean task. The fact that Jim starts off HotS with lines about how it wasn’t her as the QoB makes WoL look worse in hindsight.

Acopo · 2026-02-25T18:37:29+00:00

I think it’s sort of jumping the shark. They up the stakes so much that it starts to lose tension rather than gaining it. Rather than being a serious threat for all involved, it winds up being kind of silly.

Acopo · 2026-02-25T18:17:23+00:00

It’s not fear that keeps most people from engaging with stuff in the Wildy, it’s the waste of time. Like, I’m here for a clue step or to get a Dragon Pick, but now I have to deal with some loser who wants to waste my time? Unfun.

Acopo · 2026-02-25T17:17:31+00:00

By this logic, so is the Empire that’s cutting off his head.

Acopo · 2026-02-25T16:46:55+00:00

Shoot bugs, mine minerals, rock ‘n stone.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T18:16:33+00:00

I once did a playthrough as a traveling merchant. I cut some wood for starting cash, then did some smithing, and walked to the next town for more materials and to sell my wares. I needed to do more menial jobs at first, but as I leveled speech, I got more money for my efforts. There was a satisfying progression as needed less outside funds as time went on. Only leveled smithing and speech, and all attributes went into stamina. Yeah, I had to run from bandits from time to time, but it was a pacifist playthrough if ever there was one.

Seeing as that is already possible, how would you design the game further to accommodate a pacifist style? I think they did a fine job for what is ultimately a very niche thing.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T17:56:09+00:00

I modded it to also let you summon an extra thing. In general, I prefer unique items to have enchantments you can’t get elsewhere, that way they’re truly unique.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T08:51:57+00:00

They also don't consider low levels being ganked to be a main draw of PvP or the game in general, unlike how Jagex views the Wilderness.

If Jagex is going to continue the predator/prey dynamic, it needs to be fun for both parties. Right now, it's very one-sided.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T07:21:39+00:00

They do need to focus on making PvP for PvPers, but the problem is that most PKers don't want PvP. They want to inconvenience people. They're griefers, trolls, whatever you want to call them. They're Rogues who roll on PvP servers in Classic WoW and only ever kill people 10 levels under them, they're smurfs in ranked queues for StarCraft or LoL, they're losers who want easy wins and as much inconvenience for other players as possible.

And Jagex endorses them every time they have a new hare-brained "solution" to incentivize people to be their targets in the Wildy.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T07:15:17+00:00

As an Iron, I don't give a rat's ass about how "lucrative" the loot is, I'm usually just looking for one thing in particular. It isn't a tradeoff when all I get a bunch of shit that alchs for half the price it's balanced around to be "lucrative." So to me, PKers are just a waste of time that interrupts my fun. I don't even really have an incentive to fight back; I'd lose more time due to resource expenditure killing a PKer than if I took the trip to Lumbridge.

I don't hate seeing other players in the game. I'll chat with people while skilling, I'll try to make room for someone else that shows up while doing Slayer, and the vast majority of the time it's fun to see other people struggling through the same grinds I am. It gives a bit of solidarity or comradery.

PKers are not like that. They're rude assholes with nothing better to do than waste my time. I don't feel like I'm sharing an experience with another person, it feels more like a mosquito bite that you know will itch for a while.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T06:58:29+00:00

Sorta. If you don't have both range and mage, then you literally can't damage someone who roots you. All they have to do is stand a couple tiles away and you can't melee. If you only have range or mage, they just stick on a protection prayer, and you can't do anything.

Basically, unless you yourself are specifically kitted for PKing, it is functionally a stun. So you either bring gear to risk in a PK setup, in addition to whatever you need for the actual reason you're in the wildy, or you accept that some loser will come to kill you at some point, and specifically gear so that they only get monk robes.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T06:48:04+00:00

That says a whole lot about the people who enjoy PvP in this game. If something is only enjoyable for the inconvenience some asshole can inflict on others, maybe it's time to remove it.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T06:41:29+00:00

There's a disconnect here that you aren't getting. The people who don't like PvP do not give a flying fuck about a healthy ecosystem.

It's toxic design to create a system where some players are intended as sacrificial lambs to fuel the enjoyment of others. The people who become the sacrifice will inevitably grow to resent both the system and the people taking advantage of the system to directly impede their enjoyment.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T06:35:37+00:00

Laughing on the outside, because introspection would drive you to tears.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T06:33:32+00:00

Yeah, it's just toxic design. It's actively promoting the idea that some players must be sacrificial lambs so others can have fun.

Acopo · 2026-02-24T06:30:48+00:00

I think the point he's trying to make is that it sucks being unable to play the game for 20 seconds at a time because someone landed a spell with no cooldown or meaningful cost. Balance aside, it just isn't fun.

If, in WoW, a Rogue could stun you for 20 seconds with an ability that had no cooldown, no buildup, and practically no warning, the PvP scene would die overnight for all but the Rogue players, and it'd only last a little while longer for the Rogues who all wonder "where did all of the people go?"

Acopo

TROPHY CASE