User:Mtew/Diaries/GW

General
I like to chew on games. I will play the same scenario over until I feel comfortable with it; until I have learned how the game designer thinks. I get lots of play time out of each game. I do not particularly like rushing through a new game. I do have a few 'challenges' that I have to deal with. I read a little slowly and take a little longer to follow instructions than others seem to. It also takes me a while to learn action sequences. My reaction time is also slow and inconsistant. I am a bit clumsy; closely timed sequences cause me problems. I dislike games where reaction times are the key to winning. On the other hand, I am good at puzzles, but I am not great at riddles. I like the Guild Wars series so far. If I am particularly grumpy, I can go off and do things by myself. If I feel sociable, I can listen to the chatter in the towns. The shallowness of some of the players is absolutely amazing. The depth of other players is awesome.

05:52, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Survivor
I have tried to get a ranger through Prophecies pre-Searing without getting him killed. I have learned quite a bit in the process, but the most important lesson is to not to push too hard. I just lost five weeks work by letting myself get distracted at the wrong time. The longer the game session, the easier it is to lose it. Two hours is about my limit.


 * Quests:The experience gained by doing quests early in pre-Searing is somewhat pointless. The level of foes there is limited: 5 south of the wall, and they usually appear as singles or pairs.  There is one situation where a sequence of 5 level 5s can be constructed that I will describe shortly.  There are groups of level 7 and 8 north of the wall, usually in groups of four or more, but the risk of getting killed is much higher there.  I only know of two groups of three.  There are also some level 10s there.  Since characters do not get experience from defeating foe more than 5 levels below them, level 11 is the limit for characters gaininng experience from foes south of the wall and 16 is the limit for characters that go north of the wall.  The experience from doing quests before these limits are reached displace experience from defeating foes.  The experience from quests does not decrease as the character's level rises.  To gain the maximum amount of experience pre-Searing, as many quests as possible should be finished after the foe experience cap is reached.
 * As just mentioned, finishing quests can limit the maximum level gainable pre-searing. However, some quests are worth starting because they provide benefits before the quest is finished.  These benefits include equipment, skills and extra foes to fight.  There is also at least one quest that can not be started at higher levels.  Once the benefits have been gained, the quest can be abandoned.  Quests that provide extra foe are particularly useful for 'farming'.  Specifically, the Charr at the Gate quest provides 4 extra Charr to fight and a support crew to help keep you alive.  With the Rogue Bull near by, this sets up the sequence of 5 level 5 foes I mentioned above.
 * There are a few quests that only provide rewards on completion that really have to be done early. In particular, the primary profession test has to be completed before many of the other quests become available.  Completing the primary profession test makes two other quests unavailable.  The first such quest is Message from a Friend and the second is War Preparations.  These might as well be taken even if they do not contribute to the maximum experience obtainable pre-Searing; they can save having to kill half a dozen foes, maybe.


 * Gwen:Gwen, after you do the Gwen's Flute (quest) and give her a replacement flute, will heal your character for +20 fairly frequently. This reduces the need to use healing spells during fights.  She does get in the way sometimes and can trap your character in a corner.  She also 'eats' Red Iris Flowers which are equivalent to 5  a pop.  She is not a party member, so does not take a share of the benifits for defeating foes.  (The Gwen's Flute quest has to be started at level 1 {or 2?} and the amount of healing done becomes relatively small above level 6 or 7.)


 * Equipment choice and upgrades:TBS Research in progress.


 * Choice of profession:TBS Ranger?

05:52, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Guilds
These could be great if I could find a good one; one that would put up with my idiosyncrasies. The one I am currently in has very nice facilities. I have contributed to their creation. It is very quiet; I am often the only one online and I get no response on the alliance channel when I ask for anybody in pre-Searing. There is another guild I am interested in, but its leaders seem pretty hard nosed. If members are inactive for more than 30 days, they kick em out. While not a problem in my present situation, I would like to be in a situation where I do not have as much time on my hands as I currently do. Even now I sometimes will go for a few days without playing.

05:52, 1 March 2009 (UTC)

Effect of Equipment attribute requirements
What exactly is the effect of the attribute level requirements? If you don't meet them, what are their effective attributes?

Poisonous Nevermore Flatbow

 * 'Poisonous' is useless in pre-Searing – There are no skills for inflicting poisoning with a bow available.
 * As a bonus item, upgrades applied can not be recovered.
 * Test procedure:For each Marksmanship attribute level, Start from Ashford Abbey and take 10 shots at Plague Worms and record the total damage Do the same for other bows.


 * Damage:The first number is the sum of the high and low range values. (Approximately twice the average damage expected.)  The +x% is the total percent damage increase from all applicable sources.
 * Note:First round testing failed because the conditions of each run are too different. Specifically, Marksmanship 1 should not produce a significantly lower score than Marksmanship 0, and it did.  Adding a restart from the Abbey to improve consistency.  Removing old data and starting over.  Adding Ascalon longbow.  Separate lines for type and damage.

12:59, 2 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Conclusion 1:The noise level is still significant. Taking a larger number of samples would help.
 * Conclusion 2:There is a factor that increases the effect of attribute increase beyond the nominal 9.05%.
 * Conclusion 3:The Nevermore flatbow performs significantly below what its ratings say it should. The nominal attribute effect formula says it should be 2.18 times as effective at level 9 as at level 1.  That is, it should have a rating of 19.7 with marksmanship=0 which is 16% better than the Ascalon longbow; that is it should do about 1/6 more damage the Ascalon longbow.  The data shows otherwise.

10:29, 17 March 2009 (UCT)

No real change in results with Marksmanship=8. A new bow has become available with an @6 specification.

15:13, 24 March 2009 (UCT)

Finally, the Marksmanship=9 data, and a major breakpoint shows.
 * Conclusion 1:The noise level is still significant. However, the needed sample size should be at least twice, ptobably five and maybe ten times the current size.  That means multiple restarts from the Abbey since there simply are not enough worms in the sample area.
 * Conclusion 2:The additional attribute increase mentioned earlier is small and might just be noise.
 * Conclusion 3:There is a large increase in the effectiveness of the weapon when the attribute specification is met. In this case it looks like there is about a 10 attribute point difference.

16:14, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Work log

 * Joe Prophet needs resurrecting.
 * Jack Killchars needs work. He can kill small groups of Charr now. There are a number of upgrades that need to be salvaged.
 * I need to make regular arrangements for transferring stuff from the old incarnation of Joe to the new.
 * I need to make regular arrangements for transferring stuff to the trucker for use in post-Searing.
 * Quest and mission logs for all characters.

05:52, 1 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Resurrected Joe.
 * /Bonus and initial setup.
 * Message from a Friend
 * War Preparations
 * Gwen's Flute (quest)
 * Krytan Boots
 * level 2 18:30, 1 March 2009 (UTC)
 * level 11 16:14, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

18:30, 1 March 2009 (UTC)


 * Nevermore Flatbow tests complete.

16:14, 26 March 2009 (UTC)