I just finished the audiobook for Ender’s Game, which I have never read before. I’ve missed quite a few science fiction classics over the years, so I’m trying to make up for it with my Audible credits. The audiobook, by the way, was very well read. I don’t know what I would have thought if I’d read this book when I was younger, but now, I found it to be a tragically depressing story. Basically it’s about the military using a child to commit genocide on an alien race. (420 words.)

I played a fair amount of Firefall over the weekend, which they are still saying is in Open Beta, driven mainly by boredom with everything else I’ve been playing. After you go to an Internet guide and read up on what it is you’re actually supposed to *do* in the game, it’s a bit more fun. Of course, that means the game itself is not providing any bread crumbs for the player, which one could argue is poor design. Previously I would log in and play around with battle suits during character creation, then it would set me down in the starting zone of Copacabana and I’d think to myself, “Okay, now what? Nobody is giving out quests.” Then I got bored running around looking for somebody to give me something to do and exited. (403 words.)

I finally defeated the second boss in Dark Souls. I say “finally” because I spent quite a lot of time wandering around dying in the Undead Burg, leveling up with the meager amounts of souls I could accumulate from the skeletons there, and gathering bits and pieces of gear. I feel like I know the stretch of the map between the campfire and the boss like the back of my hand now. Two skeletons, run across bridge, three skeletons, up stairs, three skeletons, up the tower, one skeleton sniper, down the stairs, two skeletons and a tough dude, then another skeleton comes running down, and then you’re going up the spiral stairs to the boss area. (353 words.)

I watched some very amusing “Let’s Play” videos of two of the GWJ guys playing Dark Souls, and decided that I finally needed to get this “killer” game. By killer I mean it has a reputation of being mercilessly difficult. So I got the “Prepare to Die” PC version from Steam. Okay. So yeah, it’s hard. But it’s not hard in the way you might think. It’s hard because the controls and camera management are impossibly obtuse for a PC game, at least initially. I’m used to playing with mouse-and-keyboard, but the mouse-and-keyboard controls for this game are just horrible. It doesn’t even hide the Windows pointer. So you really have no choice but to play with the keyboard only, where in addition to the normal WASD controls on the left, your right hand has WASD-style controls on the right side of the keyboard, which controls your camera view and target-lock. It’s a bit awkward, to say the least. (525 words.)

I got into a couple of particularly bad Rift dungeon groups all in one night, and they both basically came down to a fight between the tank and the healer. “You’re a terrible tank” vs. “you’re a terrible healer.” One group was in Realm of the Fae. The tank was a dwarf warrior who clearly didn’t have a tank soul setup, and played with a two-hander generating no threat whatsoever. He didn’t attempt to gather any mobs that got away from him either. He was not good. And the healer not-so-subtley let him know, too. “So we’re going with a two-hander, then?” he said, at the start. But it was RotF, so it didn’t really matter. You can get through RotF with no tanking whatsoever, and we basically did, until we wiped on Twyl at the end and then all the flaming really got started. “I’m so sick of people who don’t know what they’re doing!” yells the healer. For god’s sake, it’s the very first dungeon. Chill out. (839 words.)

I started listening to steampunk audiobook Leviathan by Scott Westerfeld, which I have heard from multiple sources is a great series, and the premise intrigued me as it is an alternate history of World War I. Also, later books in the series won awards and stuff. Unfortunately, nobody told me that this was a young adult series, where the two protagonists are 16-ish. In fact, I would argue that this is not just young adult, but middle grade, because the kids act like middle grade kids and are usually accompanied by adult guides. They aren’t “rebeling” like most of the kids in young adult books. (444 words.)

I spent most of the holiday weekend queuing for lowbie dungeons with my new collection of lowbie Defiants. I’ve realized that I don’t like tanking with a warrior … dealing with the builder/finisher mechanic interferes with focusing on the tanking. Maybe I just need to forget about finishers. Anyway I generally prefer the cleric tank, where you don’t have to really do anything but spam the AoE attack. (I say that knowing full well that you almost never see cleric tanks in raids or expert dungeons. I wouldn’t ever want to be a raid tank anyway.) (360 words.)

Since there are a lot of new people flooding into Rift, there have been complaints on the forums from the usual suspects about how easy it is to level. I can confirm that yes, it’s really easy to get from 1 to 50, and it’s now easier than ever. It used to be harder, but even back when it was hard, it was still pretty easy for a veteran gamer to get to 50. If the last MMO you played was EQ1 or vanilla WoW, you’re not going to be challenged. But if you’re coming from almost any other modern MMO, it’s about the same. (514 words.)

I am writing this newbie guide because there are a surprising number of people who go into the first couple of normal Rift dungeons without knowing these basics. Perhaps they have never played Rift before, or they have never played an MMO before, or they have never played in a group before. General Do remember that playing in a group requires different skills than soloing. Do avoid using tank pets because they interfere with the actual tank. (342 words.)

Again, it is hard to mess up Iron Tombs on Normal. My Bahmi warrior uses a Reaver/Paladin build, with more points into damage abilities than armor/endurance abilities for better threat. I also now have a Cleric that I tank with, for which I use the standard tank preset. When you start, first determine if people need the quests. If they don’t, you can skip a lot of side stuff. The trash mobs are straightforward all throughout. Run to the mobs and hit your AoE builders. That’s basically all there is to it. Occasionally a mob will run off toward the healer or a DPS, but not as often as in RotF. Use your lure abilities to grab them back. Pull casters to you with the Warlord Sergeant’s Order ability if you have it. (566 words.)