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Decided to get back into Witcher 3, after a year or so abscence because Witcher season 2 was fun for the most part.

Made the poor decision to select “Death March” difficulty. Quickly regretted it, started over at normal.

Not sure if it’s just because I’m playing on easy, but turns out in Doom Eternal that when you replay a level, the 1ups refresh.

This is welcome and useful, as I wasted a great many on the super irritating early platforming bits.

Right now i'm trying to pick out whether i should buy Hearts of Iron 4 or WH40K: Battlesector. Both look fun but i can't quite buy both due to funds left.

I also bought Tails of Iron since the idea of good guy Skaven reuniting a skaven kingdom to take down evil frog-men (lizardmen) and voiced by Geralt's voice actor from the Witcher games is very appealing to me.

I played a bit of WH40k: Gladius as well recently. I feel like i'm not doing too badly in it but somehow i can't keep playing it for extended periods. I don't know why. Ofc i'm overall finding most of the games i have to be boring either due to not playing anything new for too long (as well as many recent games sucking) or reaching a depressive state with games. On the plus side i've done more painting and a bit more hobbying with 40k than i normally ever do.

For me, Gladius is simply a shallow game. Did you slowly move enough rocks/papers/scissors across the too large and cluttered map? And is it a big enough envelopment to slaughter the ridiculous carpet of enemy units?

Actually, I'm not even sure Gladius has scissors, with the way the damage types work.

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battle sector feels unfinished to me. Needs more units and factions

Battle Sector is typical Slitherine fare: expensive DLC will bulk things out. Necrons have already been announced and the first faction expansions have been put up for sale.

That sounds like you two would prefer hearts of iron 4 then. I kind of want to see what it's like but WW2 isn't as much my thing as cold war alternative ww3 is.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
That sounds like you two would prefer hearts of iron 4 then. I kind of want to see what it's like but WW2 isn't as much my thing as cold war alternative ww3 is.

Mods for hoiv have you more than covered.
Problem is the DLC policy of paradox.

Started playing Guardians of the Galaxy and for the most part like it. The combat feels a little MMO weightless though.. It controls like an action game but you're mostly spamming cooldowns. The story is loaded with the stuff that makes both the movies and comics great though and is enough to carry me to the end when I get back to it.

First though, my wife and I picked up It Takes Two and are absolutely loving it. It's basically a barrage of clever pure co-op gameplay that really demands communication and teamwork. I think its biggest weakness is that the levels are overly long. There's some decent breakpoints, but its a solid 2-3 hours to get to a new chapter and that's hard in co-op. It is in no way repetitive though, as the game is constantly switching up mechanics and gameplay styles in endlessly creative ways. It's like a huge pile of experiments that constantly sparks that novel joy. There's just like... a lot of it.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
That sounds like you two would prefer hearts of iron 4 then. I kind of want to see what it's like but WW2 isn't as much my thing as cold war alternative ww3 is.

Kind of? I don't really like HoI4, so I didn't really mention it. Its a more complete game (now), but I honestly I find WW2 a little... dull and overplayed.
And I've got too much of a history background to intentionally do it 'wrong.' I just don't find that appealing.

I like the map system and the combat front model, but my preferences are solidly more fantasy or sci-fi.

 nels1031 wrote:
Decided to get back into Witcher 3, after a year or so abscence because Witcher season 2 was fun for the most part.

Made the poor decision to select “Death March” difficulty. Quickly regretted it, started over at normal.

I think I turned down the difficulty as I found the combat was a bit sloppy, and it was kind of ruining the story for me (which I thought was the strongest part of the game).

I'm actually trying to hold on replaying until the PS5 remastered version comes out later this year, which I think is rumoured. That's assuming I can get hold of a PS5!

I decided to pull out one of the older games in my steam account: Sacred Gold.

It's a bit of an odd duck but I'm having some fun with it.

Been playing a Plague Tale, which is good fun until the final boss fight, random bs gooooo.

Also played through RE7 in an afternoon and evening, fun to revisit, did not go for the full 100%, but did get awfully close.

 krijthebold wrote:
I decided to pull out one of the older games in my steam account: Sacred Gold.

It's a bit of an odd duck but I'm having some fun with it.

Oh! I tried that one a bit when I was on a "Does this game let you play as a dwarf" kick.

It's interesting. Interface is a little clunky to someone who grew up on Diablo II, though.

Yeah, it's definitely got some clumsy feelings to it. Fortunately it's not too bad, just occasional moments of "wait, how do I do this again?"

I haven't tried playing as the dwarf yet, mainly been messing around as the vampire.

Been playing Surviving the Aftermath. Changes made with the release are interesting. Rare metals were removed as a resource you could get from the colony (world map only), though it looks like that's going to be changed in an upcoming patch). And a plot arc was added about building a Fallout-style bunker in your colony to shelter your survivors.

Wheeee. Mass Effect just turned up in EA play. Glad i didn't buy it


Now to rrelive the niftyy heatsink effect before it gets removed for evermore in the other games

 Flinty wrote:
Wheeee. Mass Effect just turned up in EA play. Glad i didn't buy it


Now to rrelive the niftyy heatsink effect before it gets removed for evermore in the other games

Excellent, another reason I love the xbox gamepass. I knew it was worth holding off from buying it.

I finally managed to do the "bad romeance" achievement in HOIV.... horrific. Horrific. All i wanted to do was to finally get it so i did run ahisotircal and it went nonsensical really fast.

First the axis took away my core territory via releasing a turkish puppet which went independent due to the focus tree still being broken and a kurdish puppet after i declared byzantium. Which meant that i had to leave the axis and declare on them however to smaller the frontline i had to release albania and bulgaria, which i then had to painfully reintegrate.

then i had to fight tooth and nails to reconnect my rail line due to beeing still cut in half in greece from my already aquired anatolian provinces.

The allies proved incompetent enough that they got nearly kicked out of iraq by a kurdish puppet.

after that i had to grind with medium tanks divisions away.
Conlcusion, i am still fairly sure that the german AI cheats in regards to supply.
Ahistorical can be amazing and really fun but not if you are fighting in the balkans, the second worst place to fight in after china.

Finally finished a playthrough of Expedition:Viking, just to hype myself up for Expedition:Rome dropping late this month.

My opinion, this is a very solid rpg/turn based game. Very much like Fallout 1/2 and the recent Wasteland games. Alot of options for different sorts of build for your party(ies), seemingly branching storylines and some degree in freedom in how you want to play and explore the game. Combat gets kind of repetitive, but thats usually because of the nature of the time setting and that I choose fairly vanilla builds (2 swords and boards, 2 healers in the back with ranged weapons and either a beserker with 2 hander or a warrior with spear fighting behind the shields).

Not sure if I want to try another playthrough as a thegn deadset on war, conquest and pillage(the opposite of my very diplomatic playthrough)or give the predecessor Expedition:Conquistador another shot to see if thats also one that flew under my radar.

Finally started to play the base hearts of iron 4 game. Played the tutorial which felt slow and then started playing the 1936 campaign which is ungodly slow and unfun. I spent hours just to get to the end of 1938 not knowing too much of what I’m doing. I feel like I should’ve jumped into the 1939 campaign. This games really needs a campaign between those 2 others so you have less of a slow burn.

I’m playing as the British because I didn’t want to get roflstomped as France. Also I didn’t want to play as commies or axis. Italy might have been ok but not totally my thing. If I did go Italy I’d probably focus on navy. Perhaps I should’ve gone for the Soviet Union after all.

Well hopefully I don’t get curbstomped as the British. I dunno if the moves I made are any good. I feel like there’s so much about this game I’m clueless about esp. with when to do what.

Anyway fill me in as to how this game is so awesome. So far playing it feels something akin to playing an over complicated game, playing a game you hate with friends (misery enjoys company I guess) and watching paint dry.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
Finally started to play the base hearts of iron 4 game. Played the tutorial which felt slow and then started playing the 1936 campaign which is ungodly slow and unfun. I spent hours just to get to the end of 1938 not knowing too much of what I’m doing. I feel like I should’ve jumped into the 1939 campaign. This games really needs a campaign between those 2 others so you have less of a slow burn.

Normally, the 1939 start is all but ignored by players. The reason for this is because starting in 1936 gives you the most time to prepare your country before war breaks out. When you understand how the game works (and it will take a while), you'll be able to set things up much more to your liking during those early critical years.

As for learning the game - the tutorial gives a very basic explanation of stuff. But I don't think it's been updated since the game was released. I recommend that you check out some online videos that will provide a more in-depth explanation of what's going on, and what you probably ought to be focusing on.

Taking a break from Returnal and cranking my way through Miles Morales Spiderman. I'm really enjoying the story, but the combat in this one feels off. I'm having a lot of moments where miles dodges into enemy attacks, or the spider-sense prompt appears after the rocket launcher has already fired, and it's too late to avoid the splash damage. Very frustrating.

Going through another play through of Witcher 3.

This time around using a sort of build guide and actually planning a decent build, preparing for a NG+ run.

balmong7 wrote:
Taking a break from Returnal and cranking my way through Miles Morales Spiderman. I'm really enjoying the story, but the combat in this one feels off. I'm having a lot of moments where miles dodges into enemy attacks, or the spider-sense prompt appears after the rocket launcher has already fired, and it's too late to avoid the splash damage. Very frustrating.

I didn't have too much trouble, but they do seem to want you to dodge less and focus more on things like returning rockets with webbing. The main different is just how much Miles relies on the venom sting.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
Finally started to play the base hearts of iron 4 game. Played the tutorial which felt slow and then started playing the 1936 campaign which is ungodly slow and unfun. I spent hours just to get to the end of 1938 not knowing too much of what I’m doing. I feel like I should’ve jumped into the 1939 campaign. This games really needs a campaign between those 2 others so you have less of a slow burn.

I’m playing as the British because I didn’t want to get roflstomped as France. Also I didn’t want to play as commies or axis. Italy might have been ok but not totally my thing. If I did go Italy I’d probably focus on navy. Perhaps I should’ve gone for the Soviet Union after all.

Well hopefully I don’t get curbstomped as the British. I dunno if the moves I made are any good. I feel like there’s so much about this game I’m clueless about esp. with when to do what.

Anyway fill me in as to how this game is so awesome. So far playing it feels something akin to playing an over complicated game, playing a game you hate with friends (misery enjoys company I guess) and watching paint dry.

How many DLC do you own? A lot of the interesting stuff is locked behind DLC paywalls since well, paradox.


Basically you also made multiple mistakes which hinder your enjoyment:

1. You picked democratic nations. Quite literally these are the nations most inhibited by design to act and move. That is not to say that they can't be interesting but you are forced into an reactionary position in the initial phase of the game or take them off the rails or just play them as non-democratic.

2. You picked Britain. The combat, division design and the planning and executing of offensives whilest maintaining air superiority and logistics is the strongpoint of this game. Britain by being an island basically is the single worst country to pick to learn the game aswell as to enjoy the game, just like japan, however Japan has the advantage of the china war which is interesting mechanically and challangeing for beginners aswell as also able to teach puppet mechanics.

3. You seem to have first run the tutorial and then face first into the maingame without knowledge about division design, logistical aspects or fundamental game mechanics, f.e. what is the guarantee threshhold, what is world tension and how is that tied to my government ideology for what i can and can't do, what part of the tree will any of the movers go down.

4. Getting your teeth by the AI kicked in is a good way to learn the ropes. Hence why france is a better pick, especially since france teaches you how to defend especially via terrain due to an underdevelopped armaments industry and when to shift from defense to offensives aswell as how to first fix up and make ready a country to be able to be run.

Stellaris, now with all the (Major) DLC thanks to Chrimbus. (No species packs except Lithoids, no Distant Stars, no Leviathans.)
Hoo boy... the vanilla experience is nothing compared to the full game!
Feeling out the new govt types one at a time (Hive minds are fun!) before I finally bump the difficulty up, and slowly making my way through all the most defining civics. I love customization and rp/headcanon-based gameplay, and Stellaris facilitates both marvelously! I've sunk a few dozen hours in already (not counting the plenty in vanilla), and I can easily see myself sinking dozens more

...and eventually, once the well runs dry, opening the floodgates that are the extensive modding scene for the game!

@not_online: So in HoI4 i've mostly played a 2nd single-player campaign and a co-op campaign where i'm probably in early 1938 still as UK and in the co-op campaign (my co-op partner as USA) i think both of us are giving each other useful tips from new stuff we figure out by ourselves. It's actually fun in a way. We're both new so we're discovering it together and sharing our new knowledge with each other.

——-

Update: war was started with Germany which is pushing through still fairly hard. Managed to fight back Italy in Africa and push them back as well as take a small bit of their territory. Navy seems to be doing alright. France will fall soon and I need to push back out towards the UK. I figure I have a few weeks at best before Paris falls.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
@not_online: So in HoI4 i've mostly played a 2nd single-player campaign and a co-op campaign where i'm probably in early 1938 still as UK and in the co-op campaign (my co-op partner as USA) i think both of us are giving each other useful tips from new stuff we figure out by ourselves. It's actually fun in a way. We're both new so we're discovering it together and sharing our new knowledge with each other.

——-

Update: war was started with Germany which is pushing through still fairly hard. Managed to fight back Italy in Africa and push them back as well as take a small bit of their territory. Navy seems to be doing alright. France will fall soon and I need to push back out towards the UK. I figure I have a few weeks at best before Paris falls.

You always need a bit to warm up to HOIV, right now the division meta is a bit up in the air, 10 widths with basically all the support arty seems to have become kinda meta in the multiplayer realm with superior firepower doctrine.
If you need some help or have some questions feel free to ask though.

GL with the war, btw, have you done the fighter production cost reduction foci?

I’m having issues with low manpower. I heard of some ways to handle that (field hospital, volunteers and so on) but I think we lack the expansion that allows me to conscript from my subject nations or whatever it was.

I decided of all my lands I may just need to focus on the Mediterranean, Africa, Gibraltar, the suez and my home country and maybe leave most of the other stuff to their own devices because I don’t think I can handle such distant supply lines.

I’m gonna see if more war support as well as focuses and side things for it helps my manpower situation. It hopefully should.

 flamingkillamajig wrote:
I’m having issues with low manpower. I heard of some ways to handle that (field hospital, volunteers and so on) but I think we lack the expansion that allows me to conscript from my subject nations or whatever it was.

I decided of all my lands I may just need to focus on the Mediterranean, Africa, Gibraltar, the suez and my home country and maybe leave most of the other stuff to their own devices because I don’t think I can handle such distant supply lines.

I’m gonna see if more war support as well as focuses and side things for it helps my manpower situation. It hopefully should.

You need to get rid of the "war to end all war" national spirits. It lowers your manpower availability by 25% to my knowledge.
Then there is also the conscription law. War support doesn't help with manpower, rather it helps with mobilisation of manpower.
Field hospitals are a trap, as is battleplanning.