Monday 12/19/2022 Post

 A day-ish late but not a dollar short!  Still in the play off hunt BABY!

New World COMMUNITY QUESTION: What do you want to see happen with the Territory Game?

 

 First, watch the embedded video from the New World developers on the territory influence system.  Then read on for my thoughts and my answer to the question posted to the community.

The video covered

• Leaderboards and how they will track influence related data points
• They talk about timing windows for pushing influence to compress the action for attackers and defenders
• They are in early (EARLY was stressed) concept phase of control point activities for influence pushing

 The changes mentioned between timing windows and control point activities are steps in the right direction, but they are small changes on top of a system that is fundamentally not fun.  The missions are boring run here and then run back.  It is too easy for one side to out zerg the other sides.  Once a player dies they are worthless for PvP experience for a good bit so it gets really annoying having to kill someone over and over and over and over and over and over and over and what was I talking about again?

 Oh right! The territory push via PvP missions is crap. Which brings us to the community question: What do you want to see happen with the Territory Game? 

 First and foremost this system has to become more about the faction and not just the individual company.  No offense but my faction's companies are equally as likely to screw me on taxes as any other faction so why do I care... at all.. about the system?  The Territory Game needs to be more about the broader faction than single companies.

 We also JUST started getting way from super companies with shell companies owning the entire map.  Even with the changes there is still examples of large companies still owning more than makes sense.  These large companies already organized and plan territory pushes so they are really setting "timing windows" already.  Official timing windows just means they can take a breather until the actual window and be even more prepared for it.

 And this goes right back to point number one: the territory game is for the elite WAR gang.  So the answer to the question, in my view, STOP MAKING THE TERRITORY GAME ABOUT ONE GOSH DARN COMPANY!  Make the territory game relevant faction-wide!

 A few ideas (outside of getting rid of the idea of companies owning towns since that is not on the menu):

• Give all faction members a clearer reward and benefit for a territory being owned by that faction (tax break, access to a unique crafting station, free fast travel, etc). 
  
• Add aspects to territory influence that are not tied to combat and boring missions; involve the crafters and gatherers.  With more wide reaching rewards for the faction this gets more players involved.
  
• Update the taverns to be full of cool stuff for the controlling faction; stop in to get unique food and music related buffs.
• Instead of the repeatable faction quests; just give every player in the faction a set of task-like quests to complete when the influence window opens.  Then let players share these quests with other faction members so they can be completed. Once the window closes the quests go away.  The key is faction members get them automatically so they know there is something to go do.  Some examples:
• Gather 10,000 X resource that can only be gathered while PvP flagged in the zone and prevents fast travel.  The resource drops if you get killed and the defending faction can also turn it in.
  
• Kill "named boss" while defending faction has "defend named boss" (boss would have to be unique to the territory game)
  
• Capture points; goes with the boss suggestion
• Remove companies from owning towns (sorry couldn't resist); let home owners elect governors
   

How would you answer the community question?  Leave a comment and tell me.

Fixed: Battlefield 2042 Matchmaking Failed

 With the most recent Battlefield 2042 update players have been getting a Matchmaking Failed error.  I started getting it myself and figured out a workaround (which was also confirmed by others using similar methods).

The error: 

Matchmaking Failed
Error Code: 3:2907J:2903J P:84955732

The fix: 

 Queue up for co-op solo, cancel, and then rejoin the mode you were trying to join and you will not get the error.

 Quote from the Reddit post with their steps "If you get the matchmaking error, search for a game of coop/solo and wait for the countdown to start. Cancel the lobby and then try online again."

 Hope this helps!  It has worked for me every time.

Farmable Heavy Armor Ward Sets in New World

 Credit to the Reddit post embedded below outlining some farmable +Ward heavy armor sets in New World.  Enjoy!

Copies of the pictures from the post:

New World: A different option than changing gems between mutations

 Caught this video from BDLG on a different approach to mutations in New World that doesn't require you to swap out gems on all armor when the mutations rotate.  This approach saves thousands of gold and expedites swapping resistances (basically now just one click).  Watch the video or read below for the basics of the approach.  Hope you enjoy the tip!

 The basics of the approach:

• Cut Pristine Opal gems on all armor slots (increases all elemental resistances)
• Amulet with specific protection (nature, fire, etc) + a gem that matches that protection (amber for nature)
  
• In the video there is the example of Eyes in the Abyss named amulet which has Nature Protection and then you slot an amber gem; total nature protection is now ~27-28%.  

 For each mutation it is then as simple as swapping your amulet and leaving the opals in all the armor.  That is gold saved (not buying new gems each rotation) and time saved (not having to swap gems out).  Brilliant!

Note: another named amulet with protection mentioned in the video was Scorpion Stone.

New World Has A Problem

 New World has a problem.  This weekend is a free weekend for the game, but it doesn't seem anyone cares.  Based on player activity on nwdb.info and Steam charts, other than the highlighted "Free Weekend" note on Steam charts, you would not know anything was happening.  There is no discernible bump in player populations.  This was the case the last time a free weekend was tried.  Why is this the case?

 I think the main reason on the lack of interest for the free weekend was New World's massive success at launch when we saw a peak of 900,000+ concurrent players.  Most gamers that wanted to try the game bought it and tried it already.  As there is no subscription cost for the game players can return at any time "for free"; they don't need a free weekend.

 And what brings back players to New World?  New content.  Brimstone Sands and the fresh start servers were hockey stick charts for the game.  Players returned in droves, consumed the content, and now are settling back out to wherever the came from.  I am sure the next big content drop will see the same sort of bump and settle.  That is where resources need to focus; not free weekends.

 The question is what level of resources does the free weekend cost?  And what is the loss to other development efforts?  Nothing ever happens in the world of software development free of cost; there is always a trade off.  Only AGS can answer this so I don't want to dwell on it and I hope AGS is considering it when planning these events.

 At least with this free weekend they didn't create 70+ new servers (yes, they literally had 70+ dead servers for the last free event and none of the servers hit more than a small handful of players).  This free weekend players just play on the existing servers.

 What do you think?  Leave a comment.

My Twitch 2022 Recap (lulz)

 Twitch has their 2022 recap posted.  You can check yours out here. Here is my recap:

 I lulz over this because I'll be honest I had no idea who my third most watched streamer, Mukluk, was until I looked him up.  My guess is I watched him for a Guild Wars 2 drop which goes into why I even have 500+ hours watched on Twitch: drops.  That is basically the only reason I am there outside of dropping off my Amazon Prime sub to a streamer in need.  And let's be honest; I am not watching actively 99% of the time... it's buried in a muted browser tab somewhere.

 Also lulz is BagginsTV.  Not that I don't like him or that he is not a good streamer, but the only reason I think I have hours watched there is because his stream is embedded and auto-plays on the New World Database website.

 Anyways, like my Reddit recap, 2022 was the year of New World!  

 What does your recap look like? Drop a comment.

How I Reorganized My Storage in New World

 It's not quite spring, but my New World storage couldn't wait!  I worked on and off the last few days to devise a way to best organize my storage in a way that would make it easier to find what I was looking for.  The main target was to make my various piles of gear more easily accessible to fit into different slots in my build.  Below I've outlined my thought process and where I've landed.

Some data points I had in mind as I worked through this:

• There are 20 town storages available (three were added in Brimstone Sands)
• There are 13 weapons
• There are 3 armor weights (light/medium/heavy) with 5 pieces each; total of 15
  
• There are 3 accessory slots (amulet/ring/earring)
• You can own 3 houses
• A tier 4 house can have 4x storage chests

We'll start with the towns where I have houses.  After paying up for cursed storage chests and paying for a Tier 4 house I was able to jam all crafting materials (except cooking) into my Windsward storage.  I then used a second town where I had  a Tier 1 house for all cooking supplies and some misc gathering/crafting gear.  My third house is Tier 3 and is the town I do my trading post flipping in so it is off limits for this exercise as its regularly maxed out on weight.

 This left me with 17 town storages to sort gear into.  At first I went with putting all light gloves into one storage and down the line with each armor slot/weight getting its own town (15 total).  This actually turned out to be a little annoying so I collapsed all light armor into one town, all medium into another, and all heavy into another.  Less searching over all for gear pieces and you can sort storage by weight of each item to neatly organize gloves by gloves, etc because the slot all have the same weight (note: this is not true of weapons; some rapiers were heavier than others as an example).

 Next that left me with the 13 weapons.  For this I just put one weapon in each of the first 13 storage available.  The exception is sword and shield which are together (not sure I like this since there are three sizes of shields but leaving it for now).  This makes it easy to peruse my collection of weapons I'll never use but am too afraid to salvage because I might think about using them.

 I then put all accessories into a single storage.  That was a mess as visually it is impossible to figure out an earring vs an amulet.  Then I mixed them with armor, but they get mixed together in the armor section.  So I ended up putting rings, earrings, and amulets each in their own storage opposite a weapon.  This worked out very well.

 I was left then with two empty storage units which is useful for making bulk transfers.  A note as well is I keep all consumables in my active inventory (potions, food, buffs) so that does not require a separate storage.  I use one town for miscellaneous storage for things like extra recipes and piles of fishing bait I own for some unkown reason.

 In the end here is what storage looks like:

Town Storage	Category 1	Category 2
Brightwood	All Cooking	Crafting/Gathering Gear
Brimstone Sands	Blunderbuss	Light Armor
Cleave's Point	Bow	Medium Armor
Cutlass Keys	Firestaff	Heavy Armor
Eastburn	Greataxe	Ring
Ebonscale Reach	Trading Post
Everfall	Greatsword	Earring
First Light	Hatchet	Amulet
Last Stand	Ice Gauntlet
Monarch's Bluff	Life Staff
Mountainhome	Musket
Mountainrise	Rapier
Mourningdale	Sword and Shield
Reekwater	Spear
Restless Shore	Void Gauntlet
Taberna Mercatus	Warhammer
Valor Hold	Extra Recipes/Songs	Fishing Bait
Weaver's Fen	NOT USED
Wikala al-Waha	NOT USED
Windsward	All Crafting

 

New Map Coming Dec 15th for Call of the Wild: The Angler

 

Call of the Wild: The Angler has a new reserve (map) releasing Dec 15th and it's FREE until Jan 5th.  

Trollsporet: A Gorgeous New Setting

The Norway Reserve, or Trollsporet as the locals call it, is 37 square miles (96 square kilometers) and features three distinct biomes: Nøkkensjøen, Huldraskogen, and Fossegrimfjorden. Full of opportunities for exploration, You’ll find idyllic villages, hidden paths to secret fishing spots, and astonishing views from the tops of its towering mountains. As a perk of the region, you’ll also get to enjoy the midnight sun and the Northern Lights as you explore the wilderness.

 Most importantly the new Reserve will feature 14 fish (13 new species and Northern Pike from the original map).  This is not the hundreds of species that can be found in other fishing games such as Russian Fishing 4, but its a step forward.  With that said some early comments based on the teaser trailer cast worry that the "new" species are just slightly modified versions of existing (for example: European Perch indistinguishable from Yellow Perch that exist on the current map).  I am hopeful there is some behavior and other changes that will separate the new species out.

 Also with the new map comes a bunch of open world quests and places to explore.  I am still not convinced this is a selling point for the game.  Before launch I thought it would be but having played a good bit of the first reserve, Golden Ridge, the open world aspects sort of fall flat.  They have zero hook into fishing and are very basic "find this thing".  I'd prefer the development effort going into the open world go into some form of progression system for fishing (perk, skill, don't care - something more than what is there today).

 I will give the new map a try on the 15th as it's been a bit since I went digital fishing.  Hope you enjoyed my cleverly hidden puns in the post.  Leave a comment if you found them.

Boring Final Fantasy 16 Trailer

 The Final Fantasy XVI (16) trailer has hit the web and I have some thoughts on it.  First go ahead and watch it and then read on for my commentary.