OT: The Daily Thread

[John Remedy]

RL: It's my weekend. Can't do much in this heat except stick a desk fan in my face and rest up ready for work on Wednesday.

D2: Saw the recent Poison Necro thread and decided to level one of my own. It's a welcome break from Baal running and may well end up being my char of choice for the MFO.

OVG: With my recent Xbox Game Pass purchase I tried out Deep Rock Galactic, but it wasn't for me. The Touryst seems like a pretty fun, if short, game - though I've only put an hour into it so far. Trim and I are taking a well-earned hiatus from Rocket League. Mostly some modded Rimworld in preparation for the upcoming 1.3 patch and paid DLC.

 

[Trim]

RL: My stepfather passed away yesterday afternoon. He's had it rough for years, so it was one of those bits of news I was dreading but expecting for a long while now. We weren't super close, so I'm sad but not devastated. He and my mother moved to South Carolina some years ago, so I'll be taking a trip out there for the services at some point. Things to do to prep over the coming days. Dentist appointment Monday to assess some ongoing tooth pain. I honestly don't know which I dread more -- seeing most of my family for the first time in over a decade, or the dentist's diagnosis and planned solution.

D2: Only the weekend MP forays w/ John Remedy. Got a session planned for tonight; I'll get to see his new PNecro in action. His brief talk of it almost got me to build one myself this week. ...Almost. Getting psyched for the MFO!

OVG: Between the Steam summer sale and picking up the XBox Game Pass (PC), a list from the last few weeks --

Spoiler

NGU Idle - about five months in and still going pretty much 24/7.

Melvor Idle - Runescape turned completely idle. It's all progress bars and timers, plenty of skills and a lot of interface to look at but no explicit goal driving one to do anything specific and achieve something. I love idle games, but this one... it's dull. Stopped running it after a couple weeks.

Farmtale - a small idle / clicker. 100%'ed it in about 20 hours. Not bad, but it's flawed, limited in scope & content, and not recommended.

Time Warpers - a real curio in the idle genre. Uses the devs' previous game, Time Clickers, as its backbone. How does one take the concept of an idle game, turn it into a 3D FPS... and make it good? They did it! But for whatever reason, my computer doesn't like it. Plagued with inevitable crashes. If I can't leave an idle game running in the background, I lose interest pretty quick. It's a shame, would like to 100% it.

Earth Defense Force 5 - fantastically dumb 3rd person shooter, fighting hordes of overgrown insects and aliens to prevent humanity's destruction. I love it; there some real strategy and skill needed to succeed. Has become a go-to game series for when I want to mindlessly waste an hour or two.

Streets of Rage 4 - ugh, DISGUSTINGLY good. Somehow retains its old school feel while infused with modern mechanics. It just works so well. As a fan of the series, I'm angry with myself for not picking it up earlier. My only complaint is that there's never enough new stuff to see as it's designed like a bite-size arcade / console brawler. If they could import everything about it into an open world, RPG-lite experience that lasts 10-20 hours instead of just 2, I'd be a happy dude.

River City Girls - speaking of RPG-lite indie brawlers. Terrible story and presentation. Nice cutesy graphics. Slow and awkward to play at the start but built into something decent at the end. Pays homage to the series mechanics well. Great references as RC devs have merged its universe with that of Double Dragon in recent years. Simpler than River City Ransom: Underground from a few years ago, but it actually was better for it. I'd reservedly recommend to fans of the genre.

Battletoads (2020) - no no no no no no no no no. NO!! Absolute garbage. You've changed, Rare. And not for the better.

The Touryst - small 3D exploration / platformer with light puzzle solving and fetch quests. Don't care much for platformers anymore, and this one didn't save the genre. Finished it -- it was fine, just not for me.

 

[Grisu]

@Trim: My condolences to you and your family! I hope seeing your family again (and seeing your dentist) went alrigt?!

RL: Had a few rough months lately. Family and work stress cumulated and between working overtime and taking care of my kids during the pandemic, I lost the enthusiam and joy for other things. My dad's ALS is progressing, which is straining my mom both emotionally and physically. I started seeing a therapist myself to get some things old and new sorted. Will have to do some changes related to work, I guess. At least decided to up my official work hours, because I was working 50%+ anyways without getting the pay for it. The plan is to keep the work hours the same while getting them paid...will see how that works. Luckily I am on vacation now for the next 3 weeks. Even some time away planned with the family Also, I have to redecorate my daughters' rooms - the little one will be starting school in September, the older one wants to change her room's look from "childish" to "teenage" (she is 9.5 years old...). I am not the most skillful craftsman, so my brother will come around to help out

D2: Just didn't have the drive for it. My orange tournament character is still parked in late Hell (Ancients, IIRC). Probably will finish the tournament in the next few weeks just to have it off my mind

OVG: Started Divinity: Original Sin II. A great game. But being the packrat/completionist I am, I am still in Act I after 25 hours Some MTGA now and then - will probably compete in the Arena Open today. Last time, I went 2-3 two times, but I had serious lag issues...

 

[Vang]

RL: Had a business meeting last night with my future partners to make sure they were both on board with our thing we are going to do. Went well overall, though I had to talk to one (my father-in-law) today because he felt left-out since my wife and other wife was present see we are going to be fronting a fair amount of cash.

D2: Got my Commoner Amazon to Arcane Sanctuary this week.

OVG: A bit of D3, though disappointed that New World got pushed back a month.

 

[maxicek]

RL: Holiday time. Lots of reading, swimming, sun. Too much food and wine.

D2: No

OVG: Diablo 3 on Nintendo Switch, I’m playing a necro.

 

[John Remedy]

RL: Just had eight well-earned days off, in preparation for the chaos of August in Tourist Town, as well as to celebrate my birthday. I hate being back at work already. Went to a pro-wrestling show at the weekend. Their women's champ had to relinquish the title as she's been signed full-time by WWE. In the semi-main event, my favourite wrestler lost, but his foot was on the ropes, so he should get a rematch. In the main event, the bad guys cheated and won. I hated it. Those guys suck. Eff those guys. Great show. Worth every penny. A welcome respite before capitalism erodes my soul once more.

D2: Dabbling with the Poisonmancer to see if I want to use him in the MFO. He found me Astreon's in the Pits, so there's that ;-)

OVG: Just a few idle games that help with my ADD. I still haven't gotten around to Rimworld's new DLC and update. I've been back at Caves of Qud - I got a psychic build with eye-lasers to clvl25 but after absorbing the soul of an interdimensional psychic assassin he accidentally got his arms, legs and face bitten off by piranhas. He used a Potion to regrow his legs and run away, but realised he couldn't hit anything without arms, and *then* got his legs chewed off again (new updated piranha swarm mechanics, but I am also terrible at the game). My new character is a four-armed duelist with a sword in each hand and a penchant for crafting. It's a great timesponge and the writing is superb. Weekly updates on Steam with a big beta update on the way.

 

[hackedagainanda]

RL: Waiting for August 24th 3:30 pm for my return to school! I'm taking Algebra, will be fun. Just doing odd jobs ( house sitting, gardening, dog walking, etc.) Hoping the delta variant doesn't shut down in-person classes, a little worried about that, not a huge fan of the zoom school. Been binge watching Eureka on prime and reading Martin Gardener's puzzles and mathematical games.

D2: I've mostly been running LK in short bursts with Pitzerker, pretty much waiting for D2:R

OVG: Playing The Longest Journey fun point and click adventure game from the 90's. That's all.

@maxicek

Where did you go for the Holidays?

@Trim

My condolences.

 

[Arjan]

RL: Well, this post for one thing. Hi everyone, I am fairly new here (this is my second post) but have been reading the forums and the Pure Diablo Guides for some time after starting to play Diablo 2 again with new vigor.
My name is Arjan, I live in the Netherlands and have been playing D2 for ages, but always in a leasure kind of way. A couple of months I started fresh with a new D2 install on my new PC and after reading all kind of guides I decided to build a Fury/fireclaw Druid and after a fairly short time I find myself in new teritorry in D2 farming in Hell for beter gear (you will without doubt see question about this on the forum in some time )

D2: doing Meph runs in Hell with my Druid or level up my new Javazon some more. Just trying to find the characters I enjoy playing the most. And in time when I feel less of a newby in Hell act V try to built an untwinked HC character (but that's probably a 2022 D2 goal)

Edit: fine D2 day, found a Ravenfrost on Andy. One more piece of gear less to worry about

 

[Kartongen]

RL: Well, this post for one thing. Hi everyone, I am fairly new here (this is my second post) but have been reading the forums and the Pure Diablo Guides for some time after starting to play Diablo 2 again with new vigor.
My name is Arjan, I live in the Netherlands and have been playing D2 for ages, but always in a leasure kind of way. A couple of months I started fresh with a new D2 install on my new PC and after reading all kind of guides I decided to build a Fury/fireclaw Druid and after a fairly short time I find myself in new teritorry in D2 farming in Hell for beter gear (you will without doubt see question about this on the forum in some time )

D2: doing Meph runs in Hell with my Druid or level up my new Javazon some more. Just trying to find the characters I enjoy playing the most. And in time when I feel less of a newby in Hell act V try to built an untwinked HC character (but that's probably a 2022 D2 goal)

Edit: fine D2 day, found a Ravenfrost on Andy. One more piece of gear less to worry about

Welcome @Arjan. Glad to see another face here. I look forward to reading your threads (in part since I will be asking similar questions aswell. Fury seems fun. )

 

[Trim]

Appreciate the sentiments, all. And welcome, @Arjan! *kicks shins, then hands over some dented shin guards of deflecting*

RL: No, thank you.

Work is heading down a curious path -- my company has been managing the operations piece of a call center-like project for about nine months, and all aspects have been struggling to stay afloat. We can't take all the blame, as our client hired a couple 3rd party software developers to create all the systems & interfaces required for everything to run. They've finally admitted to themselves that all of it is garbage, causing us on the operations side to work more slowly than expected, demanding much greater staff than originally planned to handle volumes, and therefore is costing them much more money than was scoped (e.g., my team was forecast to require 80 heads; we're now at 250 and barely keeping up).

Obviously, our client is not content. They're now seeking solutions, and among them is openly floating the idea to us of outsourcing 100% of my department's work to a completely different company. Tomorrow they're having a meeting to discuss these groups' merits and price points. I've worked both with and for these outsource groups over the years; they have their own better proprietary interfaces, and they're cheaper to staff. My professional opinion is to completely support them making such a choice, even going so far as actively suggesting the idea to them months ago on the sly away from my company's ability to hear it. It's the logical decision. But it'd also mean our department would disappear entirely. There's been egg shell preliminary discussion among my management, and they claim I'd be safe from any layoffs since I have way too much experience in the field and have proven my worth. Never know, though. Nothing's guaranteed in my line of business. And who knows what the client will decide to do in the end. I can't allow myself to get worried about it. Always too much to do to keep the ship steered in the right direction.

Besides that... bad food, chain smoking, a horrendous sleep schedule, and an ever-growing "I can't bother to give an eff" attitude. It's quite liberating, if not potentially destructive.

D2: Very little lately. MP sessions with John Remedy stalled out due to a one-off night with internet issues. Still looking forward to next month's MFO, though!

OVG: NGU Idle; I'm approaching the six month anniversary of my time with the game and plenty more remaining to see. Started some new seasonal D3 characters with Remedy a couple weeks ago, but that's already died off; never can come up with a satisfying goal to keep playing once we get decently geared up. Got Final Fantasy XV back on the brain, and I'm fighting the urge to fire it up yet again. And I remembered yesterday that I picked up the content-rich DLC for Monster Hunter World during the summer Steam sale, so maybe I'll roll a new character and see what that has to offer.

 

[Zedwardson]

Hi, New here.

Friend bought me D2R, and after the beta I realized that I really enjoyed playing D2, and found my old codes and now getting my feet wet again in D2. Came across the fourm from a build post and now I realized that I wasn't the only player who mostly plays single player. The Fact that I can play it on my old laptop that uses Linux is a nice bonus to get some playtime in.

 

[maxicek]

RL: Installing some loudspeakers in the living room whilst the girls are out shopping.

D2: I have been playing the open beta of D2R to see how it runs on my laptop (2018 MacBook Pro via Bootcamp). Runs well on lower end graphics settings but I’m not really pushing it with my untwinked Barb. Good enough for me to make it worth purchasing anyway, which was the main point of joining the beta.

OVG: I was playing a bit of D3 and Breath of The Wild on the Switch.

 

[Skezla]

RL: Very tired. Moved states recently, settling in has taken a toll. Every time I think I'm nearly done.... something comes up. My wife is also pregnant, and due sometime in Late Feb/Early March 2022. Just been a whole lot to absorb these last few months! Thankfully, after a three month wait, I finally have my PC again, which means I have an outlet....

D2: Continuing the journey of my Avenger. Currently parked farming Normal Pindle for an eternity. I find it relaxing... and I don't know if I'll leave before gambling a GG hammer from Anya. Unless things don't go quickly enough, because I want a Guardian thread in the SPF before D2R releases.

OVG: My brother purchased 'Vigil: The Longest Night' as a gift on Steam to celebrate having my PC back. I played a couple of hours and it seems interesting and fun so far. But I've got the D2 bug bad so this will be played... sparingly.

 

[Klonki]

RL: Tired today.. Hangover again but was out running 7 am.. Ghonna watch some movie later today

D2: Some days ago my d2-urge got stronger again and im glad! Hunting for a shaftstop for more DR %
and a nature piece, having a plan for massive nitha-runs to find some goodies!

OVG: Played some FF6 yesterday, was a long time ago! enjoyed it alot!

 

[Arjan]

RL: been to class with the puppy today and running some errands. Schools about to start for my daughters so we need to get some getting ready to do.

D2: put some levels on Guthrie, my HC three-legged race wind druid. Reworked my play style with his newfound axe of Fechmar. Kinda liking that thing, but would be better with a fury build

OVG: put some time in D3. Choose a wizard but the Archon build with the set you get from season journey is really gear dependent it’s slow going

 

[John Remedy]

RL: Squeezed in some D&D this week, after a long break from it. Started Stephen Amell's new show Heels, it has potential.

D2: Some solo Baal runs with the LiteSorc, and some MP Baal runs with the Poisonmancer and @Trim's BlizzSorc.

OVG: Still delving into the Caves of Qud.

 

[BullHorn]

Hi, I'm totally new here. Just discovered the SPF community and reading through 2 decades of forum posts, this is slightly overwhelming but fascinating!

RL: WFH, not much else...

D2: Reinstalled D2 recently and started playing a single-player Javazon with some QOL mods, but now I'm thinking I'd like to get into SPF-rules... Is there anywhere/anyone to speak about this without spamming the forum with a bunch of noob questions?

 

[Zedwardson]

Well I am new here, but the idea in a nutshell.

Everyone plays by the same rules, only a handful of mods are allowed (Basically, GoMule to have a big extended stash, A glide wrapper, and a specific runeword mod, and one or two others (The rules go over in detail)

A important thing is not to comingle your stuff, HC and SC stays separate, your stuff from pervious plays that where not under this ruleset can't be comingled with the stuff here, and so on.

There is a lot of tournaments, most of them are a lot of fun and have you play with various challenges. I am enjoying the three legged one a lot.

I played a lot of D2 years ago, but recently game back (D2R beta got me hooked again).

 

[maxicek]

RL: It is public holiday here in the UK today. Just been on a 10Km walk, now cooking a very late lunch.

D2: Finally moved a Paladin to 1.10a to collect Hellforges. He has great gear from when I farmed for BKWBs - HoZ, Wizardspike, Shako, Guardian Angel etc. I may level him a bit later. Also messing around in 1.07.

OVG: I bought Skyrim for the Switch on sale last week, haven't really go into it yet.

 

[Vildecor]

RL: The warehouse I work at just changed hands from one 3rd party logistics company to another today. The supervisor for our shift stayed with the old company, and many requested that I take over his position, so I applied for it and will be interviewing for the position in the next day or so. The only downside is that the current team lead for our shift also applied and thinks it isn't fair that I should even be considered, since I stepped down from the team lead position a couple of months ago after being fed up over our (now gone) supervisor's failure to hold anyone accountable for literally anything, turning everything into almost a free-for-all.

I'm excited for the changes coming. Work has been stupid crazy for way too long. It will be nice to hold the reins if I am chosen, which will hopefully be the case as I have a good amount of experience being in a supervisor role. The transition period will be very rough, considering 80% of our shift's work force has been there less than 10 days....

D2: Got my MFO Baal runner ready. Mixing up my time lately between a SC twinked-out summon necro and my 2 characters in the Three-Legged Race tourney that I left a couple of months ago.

OVG: Played a bunch of Morrowind recently, still trying to find the right combination of mods. Also tried out FFXIV for a bit, but even though it was fun, I really don't want to play an MMO at all.