Fist de Yuma - July 8, 2003

This and that. Rosa has been gone a week and I miss here a lot. Nevertheless it has been fun to pretend to be a batcher again. (grin) Of course it is not very good for me. I think I have gained a little weight but I'll get back on my bike and work it off. The one thing I have been able to do that I cannot do when Rosa is home is smoke cigars. I'll need several days to clear out the smell and I'll still take hell for it anyway. Of course not as much hell as when she sees the discover bill from the cigar store. Speaking of cigars stores I was not surprised, I was shocked to find one. No only do I live in the sticks I live in the sticks of the sticks. So having one near me was stunning. I found it when going to a Chinese fast food place that was next door. It was lucky because the food place closed a few months later. It is a small store with a nice homey environment. He has a couch and TV set to a music channel. I can go there, sit back and relax, talk and listen to music. The owner is Mike Byelick and we have clicked very well. I was surprised to find most of his business is off the internet. His web site is WW.MDGARS.COM. If you smoke, or want to by a box for a special, occasion check out his site and tell him I sent you. Speechless We had something happen today that I still don't understand. It was so strange and out of character for MS that I have to wonder if I have all of the story. I'll give you what I know and let you decide. As I logged on Cher told me her vassal had been hacked. It seems he was using a problem called Kazaa that hid a key logger in it. Everything was lost and the player was deleted. She then told me that an Admin was repairing him! Dragon logged on and off several times during the next hour. At times an Admin was running him. They were checking the database and doing their best to put him back to how he was before he was deleted. This meant not only his levels but his items. We are sure that he lost his villa over it and over 100 sings but I'm not sure if anything else was. They were able to recover anything he had inscribed. I applaud MS for taking the time to reverse this tragedy and save the player. I'm not sure why they did it but I'm sure glad they did. Vassals This does not happen to me much because most people know better. You get someone coming up to a relatively high level player and asking them to be their patron. They are generally below 10th level. Most of us know better than to just take someone like this without asking a few questions. We want to know more about them and what they expect from a patron. Of course there are those who have not really played the game, just level, who see the vassal as just an XP source and little more. I was in the Marketplace meeting Mike de Archer. Mike had been with me in Elder for a while. I really like Mike but he can be a chore at times. (grin) He has leveled up to 115 in Og II and wanted back. In our alliance he is one of the highest players so we will be putting a lot of weight on his shoulders. A short time later a 5th level player came up and asked me to be his patron. Rather than reject him out of hand I decided to talk. I had no room in vassal slots but if he had the right answers another player might be able to help him. About half his answers were good. He wanted friendship out of his patron and help when needed. Other answers were not so good, wanting high-level armor and weapons. To be kind I brushed some of what he said off as a joke. I told him I did not have any room but would put him in contact with someone who might fit his needs. Mike was not taking vassals at this time. I hope that changes but admire him for it. I hit the Mansion and talked to a few people there. I warned them that the guy was a risk and to put time but not too much "Stuff" into him. As we learn more about him that would change. One friend of mine, a 53lv player, said he would go talk to him. I got a tell from the new player a few minutes later. "Hay you sent me a 53lv player." I told him it was a good player who would help him out. "I need someone who can toss Imperil VII". LOL they guy did not want a patron he wanted a pet mage. I told him I was sorry and good luck with his patron hunt. Paraduck One of the hated figures on MT is a player by the name of Parduck. Those who use the VN boards a lot will see his name. He has taken on a lot of responsibility with the VN board, and for my money, done a great job. I'm not here to praise or condemn Paraduck. He has done some things that were of great determent to MT in general and the game in particular. If we counted mistakes he might well hold the record. Nevertheless there is one thing that many overlook with their hatred of Paraduck, he is one of the best players in the game. You'll see a great example in my next VN column. Doing the Caul quest I was stuck right off the bat because I don't have lockpick. That will change soon but at that time my quest was ended. Paraduck showed up to help me out. From then on he basically soloed one of the hardest quests in the game. I killed a few things but was really just along for the ride. We finished it faster than many powerful groups have and did it with little danger or fuss. Of course his killing things with a maxed out sword and me resisting most spells helped. (He is around 214lv and I spec'd magic defense.) Nevertheless this is not only a fighter's dungeon. It is a mental puzzle with a lot of twists and turns. Even if I had a cheat sheet beside me and no monsters I don't think I could have done it quicker. This was not my first run in with Parduck. Those that have read my column may remember my hunting with him on the Lady's Island. This was well before chains and macros made high levels a joke. At that time a melee in the fellow was an XP drag. Not so with Paraduck. If I had a chance to team with him I would jump for it. I'm sure Mage was a higher level then him at the time so it was not power that made him good, it was skill. There is a lot of complains that many of the chained players don't know one end of a sword from the other. I find that is sometimes true. From personal experience I can say that Paraduck is one person who can use the power he has. Many may hate him for some of the ways he has treated people. Many, including myself, can condemn him for how he ran his alliance. There is no excuse for his quest jumping, general arrogance and other things he has done. In the end you have to give him his props as a player. If AC were real life and I need someone beside me, Paraduck would he one of my choices. (Elder, Mars Hill, Moby Dick and The Crippler would be on the list as well. There are likely those as good or better but these I know for sure.) I don't write this lightly. Some of my best friends in the game loath Paraduck. I hope they can accept this in the manner I want it. For good or bad you have to respect him as a player. His work alone on the VN boards makes him worthy of respect. Paraduck joined under Exception as I said last week. This week there was a problem that seemed to stem from disrespect and expectations. I'll not judge one way or the other as the true details are unknown to me. The result was Paraduck leaving Exception and becoming a much smaller alliance than before. Paraduck now has a decision to make. Does use his skill as one of the most powerful players in the game to help the game? Or does he try to hook up with another chain and continue to act has he has? It should be an easy decision as there is little he can do to improve Paraduck. If you check him out at http://treestats.com/index.php?Name=paraduck&Server=5&Type=Char you'll see there is not much left for him do to. I feel his best choice would be to form a PK, no loot alliance. That is not likely as it really does not fit him but I would love to see it. It will be very interesting to see what happens in the next few months. The bottom line is we need to give him a chance to decide what he wants from the game. He is young, 17 years old. This means he started playing when he was 14. It also means he is just learning control over himself. In the next few years he will hit the real world. We will not know who Paraduck really is for many years. They did a study on the US youth a while back. Because of our poor education system and other factors we enter the work force as one of the worst producing people in the world. And yet by age 26 we are the most productive people in the world. Those are a harsh few years where the best succeed and the worse are tossed aside. If I were a betting man I would put my money on Paraduck. Letter to the Players We got the letter to the players today and there is some exciting news. It will mean my mules will be working overtime this month but that is part of the fun. Making stuff "no vender" will be the biggest change. We have lost a lot of good items through that kind of stupidity. My best wand was sold off that way. One thing I did not see I hope to see in the future. This is a way to make items no drop. If they can do that the debate over PK looting will be over and the fun can begin. Like I said, it is not here now and may never be but I have hopes. I can see half the server being PK if they add that in. The carry load on Melee's will really increase. We will need a lot more infused weapons, maybe double. Of course that really depends on how good the new changes really are. If they suck we will not see them used much. I see Turbine going lower rather than higher. The mistakes they made last month have to be fixed next month. That will force them to be more cautious for a while. I'll be spending a lot of time getting the material together for making minor jewelry. A minor Willpower and Minor Life bracelet would rock on Mage. A minor Coordination, Focus and Melee (neck and two bracelets) will give Fist a leg up. Jr, Deadeye and FA will also be needing items but, like the armor, will likely be swapping off with Mage and Fist. I have only read a little bit about the new PK stuff this month. All I'm really getting is that many of the items are overpowering and must be reduced. Why they gave Mages a more powerful PK weapon I'll never know. They already dominate PK and really did not need any help. I felt that before tinkered armor got in the game that Melee had a chance against Mages. With a mages having the ability to absorb damage better the chance for a melee was reduced considerably. I know some will say I'm a moron for saying this but one need only compare the amount of Melees to Mages in PK to see I'm right. Most melee pick up a range weapon if they go PK. I was hoping that a group of melee ganging a mage would have a shot but with the mages ability to one shot with the new weapons I'm not so sure. If course if we can get our hand on one of the weapons that might change. Right now my only PK is below the level to get the stone. I'll know more in the future. I plan to question some of the top PK for their opinion. I'll report what they say here. Until then take anything I write as the ranting of a PK nOOb. The Slot Before meeting Mike I was hunting with Fist's Armorer in The Slot. The Slot is a lot different now, and the same. It is different in that almost every monster there is different. It is the same in that most of them are the same old monster in an upgraded form. I had not been using The Slot with FA because his low Magic Defense had him in trouble most of the time. Over the last few months I have increased his skill to a buffed 301. With the old Slot 301 magic defense was more than enough to safely fight. The upgraded monsters were having little trouble landing Creature and Life but I seemed to have just enough to keep the War spells from doing me in. Of course the Drudge that started chain-casting Life Bolts at me came close. I had to keep healing until he stopped and then finish him off. Fist's Armorer is 97lv now with 408 buffed War and 400 Life. (Using two minors, a focus ring and the drum.) I have put considerable points into War so he could be effective in VoD. My weakness in Life skills started showing up, especially when I was hit by de-buffs. Still I was not being overwhelmed and had a lot of fun. The XP is great by old standards but just so-so by todays. I was pulling in about five million an hour. Of course my main reason for hunting The Slot is adventure and loot. Tuskers provide little of either and I was about burnt out on them. My main goal is to find a Lightning sword. Fist de Yuma Jr is 117 and has a shot of hitting 125 by the end of the year. When I do I'll swap him to sword. I have some fair swords with the exception of lightning. I had a shot of bidding 35 Sings for a great one but tried to go cheap. Someone smarter than me bid the buyout. Of course I don't think I have 35 sings but with my vassals I could have raised them easy. Let me tell you, I have some great friends in the game. If I need something they would provide it. That generosity makes me hesitant to ask them. I have a hard time asking for help at times because I have seen so many abuse that kind of trust. One of my friends pointed out that I would be insulted if they refused to ask me when they needed help. I should not insult them. (grin) Like I said, I have some great vassals. So I got two very average lightning swords. I normally don't pick up anything below 37 damage and I think the best one was 34. Still that is a lot better than nothing. I'll keep looking but I'll attempt to infuse these two in the mean time. Leadership There are many forms of leadership. The Marine Corp correspondence course on leadership had many examples of what worked and what didn't. I was always amazed how the one listed as the worse form, the one with only a small exclusive use, was the one that most people used. This of course is the drill instructor type of leadership. The one use is initial training at boot camp and nowhere else. The form that I use is the Coach. In the Marines I took a lot of distain and abuse for not pushing people around, even though my style worked more often that not. Well that is ancient history and a possible study someday. What counts for me is what I can do with it today. A few people made fun of the name Coach as a leadership style but that was that the Marine Corp manual called it. Those that have a different idea about what a coach is I cannot help. The idea is to help people succeed. You cannot do that by tossing up your hands and doing it for them. You have to spend the time to teach them, encourage them and guide them. People are capable of great accomplishments if given the chance. They are also capable of giving up, griefing others, taking the easy route or just not caring. It is my job to insure the former and not the latter. Problem Solving I got a PM from one of my alliance leaders about xxxx harassing people for steel at the mansion. Xxxx was new to the alliance. He is a vassal of an old friend. When faced with a problem there are several options someone can take. Some might just take the easy route and boot them. Some might just order them to stop. Another might contact their patron and wait and see what happens. I take that approach more often than not. The best thing, if it can be done, is to contact the person and get their side of the story. This is not always possible but should be tried. The worst thing you can do is to ignore a problem and hope it goes away. While at the mansion to check the story out xxxx showed up and immediately started asking people for Steel. I told him I needed to talk to him and, to add a little to it, logged Fist de Yuma to do the talking. This is a touchy thing to do. Jumping down someone's throat is a sure way to make a small problem into a big one. I started by telling him that people came to the mansion to relax. If they get asked for stuff more than once it is hard to enjoy the mansion, the feel harassed. He told me that a Tinker had stolen his leggings. He was rebuilding a set and needed steel. I could understand his feeling there. I told him to be sure to use me or one of the family members for Tinkering from then on. I then told him that steel was very common and he could get a bag an hour if he hunted the right spot. While talking I asked him if he wanted to see a good spot to get Steel. I also pointed out that this spot has small amounts of granite. He could easily trade a bag of granite for several bags of steel. He was not sure if he had been to the Grotto or not. I buffed him up with Mage and give him a portal to Lin with instructions on how to get to Nanto. I find that Nanto is the best spot to head to ML from. I then loaded up Fist's Armorer to go with him. This was not out of my way as was headed there next anyway. I had noted FA needed pincers when I logged him to work on a member's armor. I ported to Nanto and started to buff. Our run to the Grotto was uneventful. I showed him the river route, as it is the safe way to go. It may not be as fast as a direct run but I like it. I stopped to take down a few Virindi and we said hi to a few members as we past EVL. The Queen is coming! I imperiled for xxxx as we headed down. At 40lv he was just good enough to fight them but was taking a lot longer than I thought he should. I was taking a lot of damage as well. I thought it was because I was not attacking but in hindsight I was taking a lot more damage than I should have. In the pincer room it was a big dance. Xxxx ran right into the room. I tend to draw a few at a time, mostly to save mana. With xxxx charging I had no option but to follow. After a few imperils the majority charged me. I hit xxxx with one 80 point heal but I was getting into big danger. It is a good thing I started with 100 endurance as I was below 50 points of heath a few times. When I saw xxxx was not taking a lot of damage I started concentrating on killing off my attackers. I killed several but I was doing a whole lot of draining and having trouble keeping ahead of the damage. With my al 400+ base armor this should not he happening! At the time I did not think anything of it. I advised xxxx to keep a close watch on his buffs and not to get overwhelmed. I think that by teaching him to find steel it will solve the problem of his asking people for it. That is what coaching is about. The teaching to fish parable is over used but makes a good point. After leaving xxxx to his hunt I took the portal outside and started running to EVL. On the way I saw a Virindi along with two Armored Tuskers. I figured I would knock off a few points. What I had forgot was with EVL buffs I was not banned or protected against bludgeoning. The Exec fell fast but the two Tuskers started playing me like a basketball. It is a good thing I had trained when drain was nerfed because you cannot drain an Armored tusker. Using a lot of heals and getting a spell in ever so often I was able to take one of them down. After that I took a lot less damage and was able to finish off the second one. Greed kills. (grin) I hit EVL and it was packed with hunters. I can honestly say that at one time or another every EV was dead. There was still pockets where I faced a few of them. Mostly I was tossing Imperils for others. I fellowed with a Swordsman just to make the trip down with but there was not much to fight. A Swordsman's lack of bludgeoning attack is a pain for me. I have a program that lets me use one key for all attacks. The problem with this is if you have to use a different attack than normal. So when fighting Olthoi with a Swordsman I have to use the mouse. After getting the pincer I started on my way out. In the hall I ran into a spawn of five or six. Normally that many EVs is not problem, I would pick up a little XP and some loot. This time was very different. I was killing them but I had to heal a lot more than normal. A few times I was a resist or a fizzle from death. It was very strange, almost like I was using un-tinked armor. After I ported to the mansion I asked if anyone else had noted a problem with Olthoi. Several said that Olthoi were hitting harder and were harder to kill. Thinking about the lore it hit me. The mature Queen is coming! The Queen we had been facing on ML is a young Queen. It is still about as nastily a beast as we have ever faced. If not for a stupid AL and a lair that allows exploits few if any would be taking her on. The Lore said that the Olthoi became weak and disorganized when the Queen died. This made Cragstones sacrifice worthwhile, if tragic. As the mature Queen grows in power the Olthoi will start to be come more focused and dangerous. I cannot imagine what the mature Queen will be like but I guess Fist or Mage will be finding out. (grin) Meanwhile the Olthoi we face will be harder and smarter, so be careful out there. Leadership by Jaafar Al-Saladin I saw Faile's thread exploded there and I figure I can blast a little from the past and try to explain what can drive a real leader insane. First, the fact that chains will conceal jackasses and label them as "good people" because they meet their quota. Nothing is worse than trying to resolve a situation, contacting that persons "Monarch" and having them say "Oh, I am not really a monarch, we are just a chain." Then you come to boards and see people praising their wondrous Monarch's leadership, when that person can't lead their way out of an Olthoi Horde's Nest. THAT really disgusts you. I can't count the number of times I heard someone referred to as a leader who didn't do anything more than keep up an excel spreadsheet. Leadership is about inspiring and directing people, not about forming an efficient accounting method. The other thing that really gets to people who actually played the game to advance are the level 100+ wunderkinds that can't survive worth a damn. Back in the day when experience was earned by doing, if you saw someone who was level 100+, you knew they could play. Even if I hated their guts, I knew they could play and would not hesitate to rely on them to do some sort of task. I even used KMFDM on certain quests that I led and gave him responsibility and I couldn't stand him. It's frustrating to have people who have gained levels by doing nothing other than downloading a program (which they didn't write or work on) and then want to take on some kind of leadership role. Look, if you suck at staying alive, stay in the back. Don't run around like a goofball, claiming your greatness, while getting your head ripped off by an Eviscerator because you forgot to buff your helmet. (Editor: We know EV don't hit the head, it was an expression.) We used to do things like the Shendolain Quest on 10 minute buffs when level 50 was considered high. When someone comes out and says "Man, I missed when Monarchs used to stand for something and people used to know the game." Pay attention, because that time did exist and maybe, just maybe, there is something to be learned from that. Leadership Rebuttal by Rudin Just to play devils advocate. lead·er ( P ) Pronunciation Key (ldr) n. One that leads or guides. One who is in charge or in command of others. One who heads a political party or organization. One who has influence or power, especially of a political nature. Music. A conductor, especially of orchestra, band, or choral group. No where does it say anything about a leader is supposed to "inspire" people. The people who sit at the top of XP chains are GREAT leaders. Leaders in the sense that they can bring a lot of people together, organize them for a goal, and achieve that goal with uncanny preciseness. Running an XP chain is a full time job, being a monarch of a guild is also a full time job, the two often mix but usually one person cannot handle the strain of doing both. Thus why most heads of xp chains don't call themselves monarchs. And to address the statement of XP chains standing up for so called "total jackasses" in the chain because they make their quota, I've seen many of the same people residing under not only PoA tags but pretty much every other monarch on the server. The same gets done about them, pretty much nadda. So really the argument doesn't hold any water with me because you are stating a moot point. It's totally ridiculous to say that "back in the day when you saw someone level 100 you knew they worked for it" after the game being out now for 3+ years, I mean come on that's hilarious for you to even say that. Even without XP chains a lot of people would be well over 100. I also find it amusing that you say "worked" for their level. I don't admire someone for spending 1000+ hours in front of a mob killing it over and over again just to attain a high level. I admire someone who organized an XP chain and got their high level the smart way. Emmortal My take I'll be short here as it is getting late and I need to close out the column. Of course I agree far more with Jaafar Al-Saladin than Rubin but really both are right. The problem is they are talking about different things. There are different types of leaders and one will be better according to the situation. A great war leader like Patton was the worst person to have in peace. Both a game leader and a chain leader are doing a job. Each would have a big problem doing the others job. I don't have much respect for chained players but they are allowed and there is nothing we can do about it. The real test will come when you are required to lead people into battle. A chain manager need not apply.