Video Games: Now with a Chance to Win a Complimentary Membership to Gambler's Anonymous

[Toth]

Okay... so... how exactly does war work now in the Niven patch of Stellaris? Because currently I am a bit struggling with how the hell you are supposed to win shit.

The Deltans and Bolians overruled me and dragged my current coalition into an "Impose Ideology" war against the Sheliak that needs a total surrender of the Sheliak to actually succeed. The problem is that I am stumped at how ridiculously little the war progresses despite the Federations utter superiority. The war is between the Federation, Deltans and Bolians against the Sheliak and Lurians. Starfleet has utterly vanquished every single fleet of theirs, occupied 100% of Lurian systems, around 95% of the Sheliak systems (among those being all their fleetyards) and around 75% of the Sheliak planets. Up until now, I haven't lost a single damn ship. But they are still at -55% agreement to the whole Impose Ideology thing and just at 35% war exhaustion.

How the hell do you win?!? This war now already dragged on for DECADES and the Sheliak were always just loosing horribly, but there seems little to no way that they agree to anything. Even worse, I'm not sure how much I should dare when occupying planets. When I invaded one on which there still was an army, I immediately took heavy losses and my own war exhaustion spiked up from 0% to 11% just because of that single engagement. I looked up and saw that if I hit 100% war exhaustion, they white peace out and the whole stupid thing was for naught. That's why currently I wait until the bombardment only left a single enemy unit on a planet before I sweep in, but it feels like such a waste of time.

[Meera of Tarth]

14 hours ago, Rhom said:

I have played that game off and on for ten years.  Never extensively.  Always fun to get on and mess around.

Yes, it's fun. I'm still on my first mission, going very slooowly, and sometimes today  I wondered if my laptop is enough to play (since for some reason the weapons' option doesn't work as it should...although so far I've not needed it) but I guess I'll have to take my time.

[RumHam]

11 hours ago, Inkdaub said:

Too late for refunds I'm afraid, I do appreciate the condolences though.  Bright side is I may never even play it.  I have several games in my stack that I bought and never played. 

I'm not comparing it too much to Skyrim.  Skyrim is just my only Elder Scrolls experience is all.  I have a co-worker who loves ESO so we'll see.

I tried to buy a PS4 Pro today but they are apparently sold out everywhere.  Sony stopped sending shipments the guy at Best Buy said. 

Only MMO I ever played, but I reall yenjoyed it for a month or two before moving on. I'm sure it's changed a lot since then, but the PvP mode was crazy fun. I'd never seen teams of 30-60 players clash over a fort like that before in a multiplayer game.

It was also really fun to go out solo or in small groups to clear the PvP dungeons, especially in enemy territory. I can remember hiding under a bridge as a huge enemy army rode over it worried someone was gonna notice me before I could get to this cave. Good times. 

[Luzifer's right hand]

11 hours ago, Toth said:

Okay... so... how exactly does war work now in the Niven patch of Stellaris? Because currently I am a bit struggling with how the hell you are supposed to win shit.

The Deltans and Bolians overruled me and dragged my current coalition into an "Impose Ideology" war against the Sheliak that needs a total surrender of the Sheliak to actually succeed. The problem is that I am stumped at how ridiculously little the war progresses despite the Federations utter superiority. The war is between the Federation, Deltans and Bolians against the Sheliak and Lurians. Starfleet has utterly vanquished every single fleet of theirs, occupied 100% of Lurian systems, around 95% of the Sheliak systems (among those being all their fleetyards) and around 75% of the Sheliak planets. Up until now, I haven't lost a single damn ship. But they are still at -55% agreement to the whole Impose Ideology thing and just at 35% war exhaustion.

How the hell do you win?!? This war now already dragged on for DECADES and the Sheliak were always just loosing horribly, but there seems little to no way that they agree to anything. Even worse, I'm not sure how much I should dare when occupying planets. When I invaded one on which there still was an army, I immediately took heavy losses and my own war exhaustion spiked up from 0% to 11% just because of that single engagement. I looked up and saw that if I hit 100% war exhaustion, they white peace out and the whole stupid thing was for naught. That's why currently I wait until the bombardment only left a single enemy unit on a planet before I sweep in, but it feels like such a waste of time.

I can only speak for vanilla Stellaris but going for a Status Quo peace should form a new nation out of the territory you have fully occupied. Getting them to surrender before 100 war exhaustion is really difficulty though having a massive fleet helps a lot. However I must admit Impose Ideology is the one wargoal I have yet to use. 

[Toth]

17 minutes ago, Wolfgang I said:

I can only speak for vanilla Stellaris but going for a Status Quo peace should form a new nation out of the territory you have fully occupied. Getting them to surrender before 100 war exhaustion is really difficulty though having a massive fleet helps a lot. However I must admit Impose Ideology is the one wargoal I have yet to use. 

Thanks for the reply! And yes, the info for vanilla is enough since I think they left that unchanged.

Good for you! Given that it was the first wargoal I had to fight for... and it sucks. I managed to win by now, but I had to conquer every single sector and every single planet of both enemies just to switch one of them to egalitarian pacifists. It took me 30 fucking years, despite the fact that all the Federation members helped with the conquest.

It's just ridiculous for so little gain... especially since it kinda backfired. Directly after the war the Sheliak joined the Federation and the Lurians became a Federation protectorate, but since the Sheliak were still loathed by their neighbors, I wrecked my relationship with the Ferengi (who revoked their Federation Association and allied with the Cardassians instead) and the Breen (who cancelled their migration treaty and then made their own Federation). It's kinda frustrating, especially since it was damn diffictult to get the Breen to like me...

But again: This war system sucks. If it is so damn difficult to defeat two empires that are so pitifully weak, how the hell am I supposed to go against an equivalent oppenent? Though admittedly, the only opponents that are still equivalent are Unaffected Races (Star Trek's equivalent to Fallen Empires) and of course the Borg... who by now have eaten almost the entire Delta Quadrant and seem like they are set up as the Endgame crisis...

[Luzifer's right hand]

1 hour ago, Toth said:

Thanks for the reply! And yes, the info for vanilla is enough since I think they left that unchanged.

Good for you! Given that it was the first wargoal I had to fight for... and it sucks. I managed to win by now, but I had to conquer every single sector and every single planet of both enemies just to switch one of them to egalitarian pacifists. It took me 30 fucking years, despite the fact that all the Federation members helped with the conquest.

It's just ridiculous for so little gain... especially since it kinda backfired. Directly after the war the Sheliak joined the Federation and the Lurians became a Federation protectorate, but since the Sheliak were still loathed by their neighbors, I wrecked my relationship with the Ferengi (who revoked their Federation Association and allied with the Cardassians instead) and the Breen (who cancelled their migration treaty and then made their own Federation). It's kinda frustrating, especially since it was damn diffictult to get the Breen to like me...

But again: This war system sucks. If it is so damn difficult to defeat two empires that are so pitifully weak, how the hell am I supposed to go against an equivalent oppenent? Though admittedly, the only opponents that are still equivalent are Unaffected Races (Star Trek's equivalent to Fallen Empires) and of course the Borg... who by now have eaten almost the entire Delta Quadrant and seem like they are set up as the Endgame crisis...

I must admit I only conquer a lot if I have access to the total war casus belli. With that you assume direct control of systems as soon as a conquer them but the enemy gets the same ability. 

You get that one if you start with it(only the 3 genocidal civics and driven assimilators in vanilla), if you build a colossus or if you fight a war against an empire which has it(End Threat wargoal). The claim warfare system you can use as a non-pacifist in offensive wars and as a pacifist in defensive wars is a bit too tedious for my taste and usually I only conquer FE territory useing that war goal.  

I have used the subjugate wargoal a bit in recent games and it works OK if you use it together with a colossus. You do not need destroy a lot of planets to give an enemy 100% war exhaustion. 

 

 

[Centrist Simon Steele]

Witcher 3 is my favorite game ever, and I just went back and finally played through Hearts of Stone. I thought it started slow, but by the end, I couldn't stop playing. Excellent writing.

I have a Blood and Wine question--a general question about the main quest. 

Spoiler

I'm not far into Blood and Wine, so no spoilers please, but is this main quest storyline based on the Beast of Gevaudan? I mean, Toussiant feels like France, and the Beast is punishing the nobility and the knights. The way it's described as attacking feels reminiscent of the Beast of Gevaudan. I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into it. But that's all I can think of since I arrived in Toussiant.

 

[briantw]

2 minutes ago, Simon Steele said:

 

  Hide contents

I'm not far into Blood and Wine, so no spoilers please, but is this main quest storyline based on the Beast of Gevaudan? I mean, Toussiant feels like France, and the Beast is punishing the nobility and the knights. The way it's described as attacking feels reminiscent of the Beast of Gevaudan. I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into it. But that's all I can think of since I arrived in Toussiant.

 

I don't think it's exactly based on it, although I can see why you might think that early on in Blood & Wine.  Certainly possible the early parts of the story were inspired by it.

Also, you just made me want to watch Brotherhood of the Wolf.

[l2 0 5 5]

8 hours ago, Simon Steele said:

Witcher 3 is my favorite game ever, and I just went back and finally played through Hearts of Stone. I thought it started slow, but by the end, I couldn't stop playing. Excellent writing.

I have a Blood and Wine question--a general question about the main quest. 

  Hide contents

I'm not far into Blood and Wine, so no spoilers please, but is this main quest storyline based on the Beast of Gevaudan? I mean, Toussiant feels like France, and the Beast is punishing the nobility and the knights. The way it's described as attacking feels reminiscent of the Beast of Gevaudan. I don't know, maybe I'm reading too much into it. But that's all I can think of since I arrived in Toussiant.

 

Blood and Wine is fantastic. Enjoy!

[Centrist Simon Steele]

16 hours ago, briantw said:

I don't think it's exactly based on it, although I can see why you might think that early on in Blood & Wine.  Certainly possible the early parts of the story were inspired by it.

Also, you just made me want to watch Brotherhood of the Wolf.

Oh! Me too. What a great movie. I should show that to my son this October season. I've gotten a little further, and I can see the story is diverging from the classic Gevaudan tale. Still, it was kind of cool thinking of Geralt as Grégoire de Fronsac.

7 hours ago, l2 0 5 5 said:

Blood and Wine is fantastic. Enjoy!

Thank you!

I love it already. I think it has been a lot better from the moment it started. The honorable knights are a lot of fun in the world of the Witcher. Either way, this game is just hands down the best thing ever. 

[l2 0 5 5]

1 hour ago, Simon Steele said:

Oh! Me too. What a great movie. I should show that to my son this October season. I've gotten a little further, and I can see the story is diverging from the classic Gevaudan tale. Still, it was kind of cool thinking of Geralt as Grégoire de Fronsac.

Thank you!

I love it already. I think it has been a lot better from the moment it started. The honorable knights are a lot of fun in the world of the Witcher. Either way, this game is just hands down the best thing ever. 

Agreed. Sad to say, being as it's over 3 years old now, but The Witcher is the last great game I played. 

[The Anti-Targ]

On 8/11/2018 at 8:31 PM, Inkdaub said:

Too late for refunds I'm afraid, I do appreciate the condolences though.  Bright side is I may never even play it.  I have several games in my stack that I bought and never played. 

I'm not comparing it too much to Skyrim.  Skyrim is just my only Elder Scrolls experience is all.  I have a co-worker who loves ESO so we'll see.

I tried to buy a PS4 Pro today but they are apparently sold out everywhere.  Sony stopped sending shipments the guy at Best Buy said. 

What does that even mean? Does that mean that particular store has a slow turnover of PS4 Pros and so they are not bothering stocking that store with PS4 pros? Sony has certainly not stopped shipping PS4 Pros generally. Possibly there's a new PS4 Pro sku coming out for Christmas so maybe they've stopped shipping the current sku but not yet started shipping the new sku.

[Azzanadra]

Finally got a Switch and the opportunity to play Breath of the Wild last month and I've put quite a bit of time into it (somewhere between 30 and 40 hours?) and its been fun. I'l be honest its not as groundbreaking as the hype would have led me to believe, Zelda may just be my favorite gaming franchise so I was looking forward to play BOTW even without its stellar reviews. 

The first 10-20 hours are the best, but afterwards the magic kind of wares off.. its still enjoyable to play, but the game mechanics and loop become obvious and rote. At this point I may just stick to the golden path- finish the main dungeons, get the master sword etc. but i won't bother with 100%ing it or anything like that. I wish I loved it as much as everyone else did last year but alas I wouldn't put put as my game of the year for 2017 as so many others did- for me Divinity: Original Sin 2 remains the best game of 2017. 

I feel like the main issue for me is the story/characters, its just so...bland in this game. That's not to say i need anything Oscar worthy, even games that sport b-tier writing like Resident Evil have interesting enough plot points and character moments to be compelling, but with BOTW their seems to be a dearth of anything remotely interesting about this world, the characters or the plot. Its a fun sandbox, but that's really all it is. Take, for instance, The Witcher 3- The Witcher 3 has just serviceable combat and is nowhere near interactive as Breath of the Wild, but I still found the former more compelling to play because the writing and characters propelled me to play further and engaged me more with the world. Because of this The Witcher felt "real" and its world meaningful, whereas Breath of the Wild seems to say "yep, this threadbare story exists only to apply some cohesion to this big sandbox we made". 

Its especially a shame because while Zelda was never known for its story, I always thought the older games had good world building, interesting and zany characters, a simple hero's journey story and enough charm to make their worlds seem compelling and worth caring about. 

[Toth]

So... as it happens, I've played far more Stellaris New Horizons over the course of the weekend as I initially intended. Anyway. A lot of crazy happened, but also a little bit that was quite frustrating.

First oddness: God help us all! The Cardassians have watched Futurama: http://fs5.directupload.net/images/180813/jwzl3vfc.jpg

Meanwhile there is a lot of hearsay in the galaxy. Since every first contact causes a chain reaction of first contacts with their acquaintances, I've pretty much uncovered the entire galaxy by now. Gamma and Delta quadrant are too far away yet to play any role in the shenanigans of Alpha and Beta quadrant, but it is always interesting to watch what happens there. Something happened in the Gamma Quadrant, for example. The Dominion is gone, replaced by a surprisingly powerful Federation of four powers, and when I click on the Founder's planet, these guys are greeting me: http://fs1.directupload.net/images/180813/uu2ygijo.jpg

Okay... what the hell?!?

In any case, after my frustratingly long war with the Sheliak, the state of the Federation is this one: http://fs5.directupload.net/images/180813/lqp3booo.jpg

The amazing thing is that from then on a quite cool second age of exploration came upon me, given that the galactic core is full of uncharted space and ripe for the taking: http://fs1.directupload.net/images/180813/a6ma8lsq.jpg

Quite a few classic Star Trek inspired episodes popped up when I sent my exploration ships in there. Quite cool how complex they are in writing out these missions with alternate outcomes. Next to some good old-fashioned fistfighting with torn shirts, I also found a certain android on an abandoned human colony... giddily I activated him, thinking it is Data, but it turned out to be Lore... who... now somehow became governor over one of my sectors... Is... is that a good thing now?

Also I managed to grab some humpback whales to deal with this guy here: http://fs5.directupload.net/images/180813/kscpciwg.jpg

And just as I thought I had averted that fate, a bloody Doomday Machine spawned upon one of my colony worlds. That sent me into a panic, I scraped together all ships that were currently sitting and Earth Spacedock and threw them at it at maximum warp. I can only thank the sacrifice of my starbase that kept this monstrosity busy until my fleet arrived, so my colony wasn't blown to dust: http://fs5.directupload.net/images/180813/h6nsmcgs.jpg

And yes, you've seen right. Those are Galaxy-class ships! I unlocked them in 2260. I'm pretty much a hundred years more advanced than the actual Federation from the series here. I also already developed the Defiant class, but right now I'm not quite sure whether I like it as much. She does a ridiculous amount of damage, but is rather frail.

Then the Federation was drawn into just another war. And again, it was an aggressive one declared by the Deltans who now overruled me again together with the Sheliak. It was their last 'let's fuck things up' before the Federation ate them. A process that, as expected, fucked the war up. Damn it... in any case, our target this time was: The Romulan Empire! Okay... in canon, just blatantly invading the Romulan Empire with the intention to install a puppet regime, might have been messy. But in this game, you almost feel sorry for the Romulans: http://fs1.directupload.net/images/180813/lxryd5wk.jpg

Seriously, this pic portrays quite neatly why the Federation is overpowered on pretty much all fronts. Since each member remains an independant actor who has his own fleet, wars of the Federation snowball quite horribly, with Starfleet doing the heavy lifting while the enemy otherwise gets swarmed by a plethora of tiny little fleets. The war went better this time. Only 10 years, not 30, but still horribly long for my taste. The utter refusal of the Romulans to submit to any victory conditions whatsoever is really frustrating. Despite just how horribly outmatched they were: http://fs1.directupload.net/images/180813/wgbvo6r7.jpg

Admittedly, that might be related to the Romulans still almost only using these frail little suckers here: http://fs1.directupload.net/images/180813/bcp36mkp.jpg

Still... because I ate the main attacker, the war bugged out at the end. I won. But the Romulans didn't change their ideology and instead I just got a truckload of threat for nothing. Bloody hells... This was just a whole lot of wasted time. Have to wait out the threat now while I do my exploration missions and expand into the galactic core. That should work well.

Except... well... this: http://fs1.directupload.net/images/180813/i3gygm65.jpg

Holy shit! The Borg are carving their way in a straight line towards the Alpha quadrant! Even though the 24th century just began! I now gathered three of my fleets near their current location to keep an eye on their expansion and am just building a fourth one to reinforce my numbers. each has 22k fleet power... that... is nowhere near enough: http://fs5.directupload.net/images/180813/d6wq2iw8.jpg

I tracked three fleets of that size. This... is actually quite terrifying... Now I'm torn apart. The Borg main territory is far in the Delta quadrant: http://fs5.directupload.net/images/180813/vpde376e.jpg (with this being an old screenshot, they've eaten the Vidians and Pralor by now).

I now have two possible wargoals against them: "Cleansing" and "Defend against Assimilation". Since cleansing sounds like the vanilla thing, that might turn this into an all-out total war where I have to be ready to send Starfleet deep into the Delta quadrant to destroy every single trace of Borg activity. Which... I'm not quite sure I could ever win, given how ludicrously far the Borg are away and how I don't have any fleetyards that far up north to recover from losses. I also have to think about what happens if I take heavy losses and my neighbors take advantage of that. Right now I have 3-4 fleets ready to take on the Borg, but still have one on the Romulan border, one on the Klingon border and one on the Cardassian one, just to be safe. I'd have to pour more fleetpower into such an expedition if I want to dare all-out war against the Borg. I only know that sooner or later I have to do something, because what the Borg do with the planets they conquer isn't pretty: http://fs1.directupload.net/images/180813/35n3jxil.jpg

Oh my god... I'm thinking about defeating the Borg, while my officers still wear the Wrath of Khan uniforms...

[aceluby]

Put down Wizard of Legend over the weekend.  Made it to the final boss a handful of times, but could just never take him down.  It's a pretty fun game, but it seems like there's a lot of luck involved.  Between drops, available arcana, and available relics I felt like there was just so many runs I made where nothing through 6 dungeons helped my build.

Started up Salt and Sanctuary and it took me quite a while to figure it out.  Ended up rage quitting on Friday night because no matter what I did I was just getting demolished.  Read a quick newbie how-to, swapped out my weapons, leveled up, did a few upgrades, and then it was pretty smooth sailing.  Tough, but fair.  Really, really enjoying it now; though I started out as a magic user to do a spell sword build and I'm now thinking it's not as viable as a plain sword user since you can only swap out 'sets' of weapons, not individual hands like Dark Souls.  Seems better to have a sword + shield or two hand a big sword w/ item buffs vs sword + wand/buffs.  So I'm just using the wand for kiting enemies to me.

[Durckad]

@Toth I just want to say your Stellaris write ups are amazing and really make me want to play that mod. Holy shit does it sound fun.

[Werthead]

19 hours ago, l2 0 5 5 said:

Agreed. Sad to say, being as it's over 3 years old now, but The Witcher is the last great game I played. 

We can but await Cyberpunk 2077. Tyranny and the Banner Saga trilogy have also been pretty good, and the Divinity: Original Sin games. None quite hit that same spot between graphics, production values, story and character as The Witcher 3 have though.

I did complete the main quest and many (but apparently not all) of the side-quests in The Witcher 3. I left it installed as I want to go back and try and clear out all of the question marks and armour and treasure quests. I barely bothered doing the question marks, so all of the maps are still covered in them.

[aceluby]

I played like 10 hours of the Witcher and nothing about it grabbed me.  Maybe I was doing to many of the side-quests too early, or should have ignored them since every one I did spawned like 10 more?  The same thing happens in Skyrim, but I felt like I wasn't really doing anything in the Witcher.  I don't know, but I'm thinking I should give it another try soon and focus on the main game and just ignore the side quests.

[Fez]

29 minutes ago, aceluby said:

I played like 10 hours of the Witcher and nothing about it grabbed me.  Maybe I was doing to many of the side-quests too early, or should have ignored them since every one I did spawned like 10 more?  The same thing happens in Skyrim, but I felt like I wasn't really doing anything in the Witcher.  I don't know, but I'm thinking I should give it another try soon and focus on the main game and just ignore the side quests.

By side-quests, do you mean witcher contracts and treasure hunts or do you mean the secondary quests? Because the former, yeah, definitely skip most of those unless you absolutely adore the combat system. But the later are basically the core of the game, at least for the first 3/4ths of it, so if you're not enjoying them, the game might not be for you.

[briantw]

1 minute ago, Fez said:

By side-quests, do you mean witcher contracts and treasure hunts or do you mean the secondary quests? Because the former, yeah, definitely skip most of those unless you absolutely adore the combat system. But the later are basically the core of the game, at least for the first 3/4ths of it, so if you're not enjoying them, the game might not be for you.

I thought the witcher contracts were a lot of fun.  They almost all had a nice little story to go with them.