December IoTM

Could this actually be a December IotM that doesn't suck? Let's see:

I'll fix the graphic later.

I'm somewhat in a rush so apologies if this seems forced....WE ALREADY A FAMILIAR THAT SUCKS BUT DROPS AWESOME STUFF! IN FACT WE HAVE ENOUGH GODDAMN FAMILIARS! BOLDED CAPS LOCK IS AWESOME!

Who the fuck wants a cocoabo as a familiar let alone a betterer one? The original cocoabo back in the day was the original clusterfuck of a familiar, that was before Jick and Skully became money scroungers. The familiar itself I imagine would drop more meat, heal HP/MP for more, blah yada etc,. The potions however is where you can detect the awesomesauce that went into this flawed idea of a familiar. It'll occasionally drop 1 of 3 potions if you have a certain familiar equipment on it I believe. The BitterSweetTarts are +X stats where X is based on level and capped at 11. Piddles gives you X prismatic damage where, you guessed it X is based on level capped at 11. The Polka Pop however, is the must have as it's a +X to Meat drops and Item drops where X is 5 times your level capped at 55. If you're in dire of need of stats or damage, the first two are great for places to powerlevel, a clan dungeon, some sort of boss, yada blah etc. The third will one of the must haves for myself as it helps farmers out quite a bit.

Again, this is the second time that I recall where the familiar was shittier than what it actually drops. Case in point, the Llama Lama where the unnecessary half-ness of a volleyball brought it's usefulness way down but fortunately the gongs were there to help it out. Problem is the gongs were tradeable which effectively made the familiar a pile of monkey fuck in not worth getting if all you were going to do is daytrip off for stuff. Same thing here this time, only they give you a familiar that practically no one wants only to have the things it drops be really useful that also happen to be tradeable as well. So if you're like me, you'll skip over the familiar for the really cool potion effects. The only real downside to this is again, the limitedness of people actually wanting to use a cocoabo plus a high demand for the potions which will create a strictly tight stock of these things floating around in the mall.

Smoot's Verdict: Enough with the fucking familiars, seriously knock it off. Familiar would've been great had it not been designed by dipshits who think that a betterer cocoabo is worth having around. It's yet another quagmire of a concept (GIGGITY!) if it was an intensional design choice or not. So again familiar no, swagtastic cool potions yes. If anything, this IotM is a lot a better than the Crimbo event but alas I'm all out of time and will have to craft an entry about THAT clusterfuck in a few days.

Have a good one folks, I'm out!

That time of the year again...

...where a crappy iotm and a month long event go hand in hand together. I'll formulate an entry on both things later tonight when I get some free time.

Some Crimbo Tips - Poll Results - Quick Wrap Up

The following's brought to you by:

The xSmootx Blog (Currently in BETA). Check it out, you might actually nod your head to what I say.

Heya folks, Crimbo's right around the corner and seeing how Jick has fallen asleep on developing content, AGAIN...I'd figure I share a few tidbits of what to keep a lookout for as we're nearing what will probably be another shitty Crimbo event. Well wait a minute, it seems like I'm jumping the gun here. If Skully's the one in charge again this year, THEN it'll be a shitty Crimbo.

1.) Stock up on item supplies - If there's anything that I've learned with the Crimbo event is that you want to be prepared for the non-crappy story aspect of the event, aka, the special farming zone. You'll want to splurge on as much item stuff as your budget can allow. You also might want to go above and beyond as well. This meaning of course looking up items on The Wiki that aren't laid out in those shitty grey table slots, just in case in the event of them having an epiphany and don't want to make this year fucking suck again. Also, avoid meat increasing supplies mostly due to the fact that there hasn't been Crimbo farming spot that had meat in it since the Reindeer vs Elves Crimbo. You might better known as the Crimbo where the toy crafting mechanic should've ended right there and not been milked to death.

2.) Possibly stock up on common supplies - Last year we saw Fat Stacks of Cash being used as a combat which sored the demand for them through the roof. I wouldn't put it past them that they'll pull that shit again this year. Maybe not with fat stacks exactly, but with some other common item instead. Which common item exactly, is anybody's guess. I'd hold off on this step until exactly it becomes clear which common item will become the must have of the event. (Again, assuming they decide to pull that shit again) Also should be interesting to see how the new mall will play a role with this as well.

3.) Don't get your hopes up for new content - As mentioned earlier, chances are pretty good that they're going to re-use the same mechanics of Crimbo that I for one, am personally tired of seeing. Toy making, the Crimbo Town Restaurant, nothing particularly new from the Advent Calendar are just a few things that'll probably get a fresh coat of recycle paint this year. Be prepared to see things like "Modern Candy Cane" "State-of-the-art Yo-Yo" and "We-haven't-run-this-joke-and-gimmick-into-the-ground-hard-enough Pet Rock". Granted, the Halloween event this year was fresh, new, and worthwhile but this is Crimbo we're talking about here. What are the odds of them applying any of that to this shitnugget of an event? Speaking of which, the payoff leads me into tip 4

4.) Gift Return - When it comes to bonus events like Crimbo, a certain someone has gone on record a few times saying that it's "a gift from us to you" and what better way to show your approval of their gifts than by returning them back to whoever came up with the idea to have shitty presents at the end of the event. Now if the items happen to be crap, I'm not saying throw them back in the face who made them.......You may just want to add a little note to something like "*in a snooty french tone* I cannot masturbate to this, MAKE IT AGAIN!" Also, I'm not gonna say who you should direct your hate at either, though his name does rhyme with Schmister Schmullhead, in the event of them trying to pass off yet another equip item that does something assy. Assuming of course they make it tradeable to which you can dump it off on some scrub who doesn't want to work on getting the intial rare items, otherwise we'll all be stuck with crap and have the similar satisfaction of getting the Mayfly Bait.

Now do what you want with these tips, these again are just heads up things to keep you alert for what may be coming in the next two weeks. For all I know, someone from the dev side of things could be scouting this entry and intentionally develop something the opposite of what I laid out for you. Granted I'm sure I've been off the radar for sometime now but you never know. Though I really encourage you folks to buy supplies so that you can make folks like myself rich and happy

Hey it's the "I DIDN'T FORGET THIS TIME!" Poll Results:

COMMENTS:

PrettyCoolGuy said on Nov 01 2009, 06:16 AM:
I'm kinda aggravated that this event was supposed to go somewhere on Halloween and it clearly didn't. The bark and hats were kinda neat, but I think there should have been at least 1 more use for bark.

playhavock said on Nov 01 2009, 05:20 PM:
i missed it - couldnt get into it fast enough no idaa what i missed since its not "on" ah well c` la v "the airfares" is my capatcha

toe76 said on Nov 05 2009, 05:18 PM:
Is there no end to horrible mini-event? Rocks, Halloween, what's next, a rouge group of macaroni warriors? Seriously, the devs need to stop dicking around and do the 8,000 things they threw on the backburner. Can't wait to see how they butcher crimbo.

Smoot's Input: PrettyCoolGuy, I agree perhaps having some sort of bonus effect with whatever item you chose and having some sort of interaction with the bark you collected would've been nice. It's like they made the spooky bark purposefully knowing that they didn't know people were going to horde as many as they can, like with almost every other item in the damn game. A second use of some kind would've been nice. Playhavock, you didn't miss a whole lot. And toe I'm calling it right now, Ravenous Turkeys on Thanksgiving. Glad to see I'm not only one sick of seeing these content droughts.

New poll in place, be sure to vote on it!

That's going to be it for me for now. Again, if you want more doses of me tackling other various stuff then you might want to check out my site as linked above. Or you can also check out my twitter at Twitter.com/xsmootx to see what crazy, idiotic, funny, bland things I may have to say. Uh, that's gonna do it for now. Until next time folks, have yourself a good one. See ya! :D

November's IotM

Day or so late but here it is.

I think I need some time to come up with the right words for this miserable pile of what the fuck.

EDIT: And so I tried wrapping my head around this Mr. Store item and to be honest, who are we trying to surprise here? I'll say it sucks they'll keep pumping out more dumb shit items that will swindle you out of 10 bucks one way or another. With that said, this thing reaches a new low standard for what the hell donation content is in this game. Just when things were looking good for them and that I had a glimmer of hope of "Y'know maybe these guys aren't full blown retarded? Maybe they don't have water loosely whooshing around in their skulls" with the Halloween event and then they go and make this. I mean this thing is more terrible than a Joss Wheldon TV show. I think out of all Mr. Store items, this one has brought the least amoun to the table so to speak for the player's benefit. I mean, this probably the only Mr. Store in history to where the graphic has more to say than what it actually does. As crummy as this month's item is, it does have an upside to it. Yes this item is sucks but, it is controlling an aspect of the game that's on a balancing act of "Should they or shouldn't they mess with this" and that's the market.

Mr. a's have been soaring ever since speculation ran rapid about the floaty stone sphere being involved with at the time Rock event which was planned to be the familiar at the event's conclusion but was switched out at the last moment. With already high prices still looming, another Tome came out which made everyone go into a "OMG I MUST HAVES THISSS" frenzy to where prices when near a staggering 7 mil. With yet another fucking familiar that wasn't all that impressive and now a Familiar Equip that makes the box of fireworks look decent in its category Mr. A prices have fallen down to 6 mil. Clearly this item was a power move to calm the debacle in the mall which I'm not going to remotely get into, maybe another day at another time, but the correlation is pretty evident that this was made purposely terrible.

Oh and yeah if we're talking pure Mr. Store items,  I would go so far to say that the Mayfly Bait is way better than this because the Mayfly Bait isn't this functionally retarded unlike the Moveable Feast......or Jessica Simpson.

Sea Update - Halloween Event - Poll Results - Wrap Up

Howdy! Still undergoing PHP stuff for those wonder so let's see what I can tackle this time! Hmm looks like the Sea got some new stuff. This of course means a call for:

So to refresh your memories, sometime back in the spring or even last winter. The autistic genius that is HotStuff had brainstormed on something for the Sea that stole items, something like Dolphins that would just take your stuff. Not exactly when they brought this up on the radio shows but I believe it was one of those in-depth discussion segments that they did a couple of times which one show discussed why the Sea was, quotey fingers, an utter failure (which it still is). They theorized that people just like to see items drop, doesn't matter what, as long as it's some items. Continuing, they were wondering about the players emotions and how if they had something that decreased shit dropping or took it away how it'll affect the player. As I'm typing this myself it's starting to sound vaguely familiar. It's like it's all coming back to me now. Anyway, fast forward to Fall of '09 and they finally set forth on putting their crappy theory into motion thus implementing it into the game. And just like it was ass on paper, it's ass in the game. So if a dolphin happens to steal your shit, you can go to the Brother/Sister NPC castle place and buy a whistle for a sand dollar that'll put you into a fight with a dolphin for a chance to get your shit back. Why Why Why? What's the point of this? There's enough aggervation in the Sea for one lifetime why do you need to tack on more dumbshit that just overall wastes more of your time. Now granted you supposedly get the item that the dolphin steals from you, 100% of the time or so I hear but even then, you have to go out of your way to get something of yours back in a zone that's already cursed with ridiculous penalties.
Well, make that one less penalty...sorta. Turns out they loosen the clamp on the testicles with the meat penalty for the Briny Deeps. And by loosen, I mean barely nudged. Again, still nothing to help the Sea's case to make it worth it to adventure there.

KoL seems to be experimenting with special events happening because Halloween has some doohickey thing going on which reminds me, Happy Halloween everybody! So prior to the 31st here, there were a couple of days to where you could do some early trick-or-treating in town as well as go over to the what I like to call The Less Sucky Arboretum zone and fight spooky trees. Some of the trees will drop spooky bark which if collect enough of them grants you an outfit. Put the outfit on and you'll get a special adventure which grants you an ax. Equip the 2-hander ax and after awhile, like say 20-30 turns you'll wind up with a boss fight. Defeat the boss to get special rewards which have yet to be implemented. Aaaand that's where we stand as of right now. Could be something ass like the conclusion of the Rock event which was a ploy to spring the new spell damage crit onto people. Or, it could end with something decent, just like uh.........umm......the uh.......Well let's hope that it just won't suck too bad and that it's tradeable so that we can throw it back into Skully's face. Also from the less sucky Arboretum you can aquire some major elemental resistences along with one piece one turn costumes that you can trick or treat with. I'm not expecting too much out of this event seeing their rap sheet of shittyness over the years, but at least it's the thought that counts, I guess.

So uh, yeah. that poll thing.....that I meant to post......about two weeks ago. Yeah. My bad:

COMMENTS:

Pretty Cool Guy said on Oct 05 2009, 07:47 AM:
I would agree it's not particularly that great, or original. The extra turns are nice if you're doing a speed run or something. But hey, at least Mr. A prices are going down a bit, right?

Your Mom said on Oct 06 2009, 04:48 PM:
My favorite part of the Polyp is I can skip it and it's driving down Mr. A prices. The Wild Hare mechanic is appealing to newbies, and 40m is really expensive for your average player. Polyp is basically CCC 2.0 with better flavor and the time mechanic added on. Mostly it's a very niche aftercore familiar for those doing gimmick clan dungeon runs.

playhavock said on Oct 28 2009, 12:45 AM:
boring familar is boring. whatever it crashed the mr a market i guess also they threated an in game existing item to make the iotm better. this does not bode well... but at least they did leave that alone

SMOOT'S INPUT: Gotta agree with PrettyCoolGuy on this one, not really all that awesome but as long as it makes Mr. A prices tank it couldn't be all that bad.......or could it? I'm looking forward to next month's item being another familiar cause y'know, they just absolutely love pushing those out all the time. If not, some kind of equip item that won't be worth it yada yada yada. Also, Hi Mom! New poll THAT I WON'T WAIT AN ETERNITY ON! will be placed at the bottom of the page

Aaaand that's going to do it for me tonight, thanks for reading! Either during or after the other blog site maintence, I'll update some things around here like that banner at the top and I'll have that WoW to KoL entry as well hopefully. Really been swamped with personal stuff so time for me has been limited. Not going to promise the next time I'll have an entry (excluding the IotM one of course) but I'll be more frequent here or attempt to be at least. I really appreciate your dedication on sticking around through all this even though I somewhat trash this game on a constant basis. Double thumbs up to you guys. Alright I'm just rambling on and sucking up now so I'm gonna go. Have a good night and a safe holiday and uh, 'til we meet again I guess.