Endgame Viable

The topic of discussion from the NBI Talkback is whether or not PvE and PvP mix in MMOPRGs. At long last I have some time to write about it, now that everyone else has moved on. The answer is no, they don’t mix. Thanks for reading. But seriously, we’ve all seen the sharp divide between the PvE and PvP communities within any given MMORPG. In my opinion, it’s not because of the games or the players. The problem to me is that PvE and PvP require two entirely different competitive mindsets. (1298 words.)

I need a new name. I’ve been thinking about this for a while. I like the name of the blog, Endgame Viable. But I don’t like using UltrViolet as my personal identity. It’s weird, because I am UltrViolet. Ever since I was in the Crayola Clan back in NetQuake days. Ah, good ol’ ]CC[-UltrViolet. But in this age of cross-media brand recognition and whatnot, it’s a terrible name. There’s no ‘a’ in my UltrViolet, which is vitally important to the name. There’s a reason there’s no ‘a’ which goes all the way back to Quake in 1996. (Reason: “]CC[-UltraViolet” was one character too long to fit in the 15-character limit.) (519 words.)

Tuesday night’s stream of Elder Scrolls Online, wherein I completed two whole quests, including the level 40 story quest “Shadow of Sancre Tor.” Link updated. (25 words.)

I happened to get a closed beta key for Black Gold Online from an MMORPG.com giveaway (I think) a while back. I was super excited, because I thought I was getting a Black Desert key. But alas, Black Gold is not Black Desert, so I forgot about it until I tried it out in a fit of boredom over the weekend. It seems that there is no NDA so I guess it’s safe for me to post this. (566 words.)

Google is buying Twitch, apparently. Or YouTube is buying Twitch. Or something. I don’t report news, I just talk about it. This seems like one of those “surprising but inevitable” plot resolutions that we aspiring authors are always told to strive for. At first you read it and think, “Whoa! Google is buying Twitch! No way!” Then a second later, you think, “Oh, of course Google is buying Twitch. We should have seen that coming a mile away.” (274 words.)

May has been an MMO crisis month. I can only stand to play ESO for a quest or two at a time. There’s nothing wrong with the game (except the horrible inventory management and dungeon grouping tools). I accept full responsibility for my lack of enjoyment. At level 41, my stupid Two-Handed Templar build feels weak and ineffective, and it has almost no AoE damage capability. Everyone around me in public dungeons is burning down big groups in seconds, but I have to wack on mobs one at a time. (535 words.)

(Resurrected from my Drafts folder.) Trials in FFXIV are cool little instances that consist of a single boss in an arena-like setting. The normal ones require four players, and you queue for them just like a dungeon. (Or if you actually know real humans who play games, you can go in with a pre-made party I guess.) I find them quite fun. This is an 8-man Titan Hard Mode trial, but you get the idea. (607 words.)

In honor of the Newbie Blogger Initiative, in this post I’m going to talk about “how” I blog for Endgame Viable. That is, the actual process. I don’t recommend doing it this way. :)First, I play some games. Usually they are MMORPGs. This typically happens on weeknights and weekends.After I’m done playing games, the next morning I often go to a place where I can’t play any games, which is a place that rhymes with the surname of a famous Star Trek captain. There, if I have time, I read some blogs and tweets about what else is going on in the gaming world.By this time I have some ideas of things I want to write about. I might want to make an observation or vent about something that happened in my last play session. I might want to report about something new I did. I might have an opinion about something I read on the Internets. Most of the time, these are not particularly earth-shaking thoughts, and quite possibly not in any way unique or unusual.I open a plain text editor window and resize it to be fairly small. It usually stays open throughout the day. (At this time, I’m using WriteMonkey, but it doesn’t really matter.) I prefer writing in plain text like this because it’s unobtrusive on the screen and I’m a software developer by trade, so I’m very comfortable using text editors. (1378 words.)

It occurred to me that I should probably post the YouTube videos of my streaming “shows” here on the blog. (I am nothing if not a consummate professional broadcaster.) So here is the first episode from Thursday, May 1, showing the long journey to Cinderstone Moor to find PvP. Others to follow. Link updated. (54 words.)

According to my site statistics, I should be writing about ArcheAge and nothing but ArcheAge. But since I’m no slave to the SEO system, I’m going to write about WildStar instead. (Because everyone else is.) The skinniest hero in the land. I’ve already pre-ordered, but lately I’ve been forcing myself to play in the open beta anyway. I use the word “forcing” deliberately, because I’m having a hard time getting excited about this game. (559 words.)