Hel and the Cube World Max Level

I decided to try out Hel during one of my recent bouts of Smite. She is the Norse god of the Underworld, and is a Support/Mage. She has two kits, one for damage and one for support. Her R switches between them and causes her to change from dark and sinister to light and semi friendly looking and back again. I forgot most of what her abilities do, but she is fun and awsome looking!

The other day I did some research on the Cube World Leveling system and what I found out is pretty interesting. The higher your level, the easier it is to get to the next level. Cube World is set up so you can potentially level up infinitely so you never feel like you've finished the game and in order to achieve this, they put in a Power Level system.With armour, weapons, jewellery and consumables you require an appropriate Power Level to use them. The max Power Level is 100 and the closest you can get is Power Level 99 at around Level 300. This is interesting because it might cause some monsters to be infinitely more powerful than you, but as I am only around level 30 on my highest character it's still speculation!

-Xalaram

Green Ribbons and Ranked Stupid

Today I decided to play a ranked game of League of Legends in the infamous Bronze V solo queue on the Oceanic Server. After that game I promptly vowed to never play solo ranked again until I regained my Green Ribbon, which is for Teamwork. The amount of stupid in the lower tiers of LoL and probably any MOBA is too damn high!! When I play ranked I normally play Support Janna because people don't seem to be able to ward properly and end up feeding the enemy Jungler or Mid, but the problem is; You can't support stupid. In today's match the enemy team got so far ahead that when I tried to help out the other lanes, if anybody got caught my shield was meaningless because of sheer burst.

Anyway, when you manage to get a Ribbon you normally get matched with others with that ribbon. So if you get the Teamwork Ribbon, you are alot less likely to be matched with retards for team-mates. And that helps you proceed in ranked ALOT easier.

-Xalaram

Smite and Neith

Today I played Smite for the first time, and I really enjoyed it! I immediately took a liking to the Egyptian Goddess Neith. She is a Carry/Support and at first I was like; "WTF you cant have carry and support on the same character!". Turns out you can. She has a long range poke as her Q and it snares on hit, her W is an AoE damage that slows attack speed and heals you, her E is a backflip that damages and places a "Broken Weave" where you were and damages people, her R is a super long range sniper shot with homing and her passive causes enemy deaths to leave behind "Broken Weaves" that interact with your abilities in some way. The game play is pretty similar to any MOBA with similar heroes except that you play in Third Person, Attacking is your Left Mouse Button, Moving is WASD keys and spells are 1-4 on the keyboard. It took me a bit to get used to for instance, the enemy Fenrir (similar to Warwick from LoL, and Ursa from DOTA with an ult like Skarner also from LoL but with a silly leap) would run out of lane into the jungle and then the next thing you know is he has leaped from behind you and is tearing you a new one. Tunnel vision kills! It's a pretty fun game overall.

-Xalaram

AP Skarner and Cube World Lava Lands

Recently I tried Skarner, looked at his abilities and noticed they all scale off AP. He has ridiculous sustain close to being broken, a huge shield, fun ultimate and alot of damage. All you need to do is start with his E for early healing then max it by level Nine, followed by his W (the shield) and then Q (a great slow/aoe damage) with his ult being attained at the appropriate levels all the while building AP. I recommend building; Rylais, Rod of Ages, Sorcerers Shoes with Alacrity, Will of the Ancients, Rabadons and either Lich Bane or Nashor's Tooth for some auto attack damage.

Today in Cube World I was exploring and I came across the most hostile of biomes, the Lava Lands. Sort of like the Nether in Minecraft except no Ghasts, Blazes, Lava Slimes or Zombie Pigmen. Instead of these, the fauna are more demonic; Imps, Demons, Ember Golems and Mosquitoes. The flora is very sparse consisting of small clumps of red grass, bright red thorny bushes and large thorny wood vines curling up from the ground. The landscape is coloured to look like there are lava cracks everywhere but this could do with some work. Overall I am impressed, but I also have high hopes for this biome and the game in general.

-Xalaram

DayZ Strongholds and Cube World Mounts

I forgot to write up a post yesterday, oops. I'm not going to write a double length one to make up for it though.

Yesterday I was on DayZ a bit and the group I play with now has a stronghold! It is a giant wooden square monstrosity with a lookout tower in each corner, it has tank traps around the base and at the front gate is a few hung corpses. I believe it's the first in the server to be built so its quite prestigious. It provides a great defensible location along with huge storage and room for a vehicle or two.

I've been playing Cube World alot and it hasn't failed to disappoint. I've been quite lucky in my exploring and have come across two portals, which I can use like waypoints from Diablo. I've been collecting alot of pets, and the amount of mounts in the game is quite high! Some of the mounts I have are; Bunny, Cat, Crocodile, Turtle, Porcupine, Peacock, Camel a Horse and some other ones. I am still yet to tame a Slime as they require the same colour jelly that they are to tame. (cannibal slimes, anyone?) But the slimes look the best when ridden because they only bob up and down and slide along the ground. So damn cute!

-Xalaram

EVE's First dead Revenant and, MUNDO!

Earlier today, the first Revenant class Super Carrier exploded in a fiery ball of death in EVE Online. This particular class of spaceship is extremely expensive (and pretty rare) in game and in real world money is worth a few thousand US dollars. It was the victim of a successful AWOX attempt. AWOX'ing is when an enemy spy either causes the target to be in a vulnerable position or finds it in one and then proceeds to call in a fleet to destroy the target. AWOX'ing targets are usually faction battleships, freighters and jump freighters and capital ships. The Revenant belongs to the later class, capitals. Every capital in the game is worth over 1,000,000,000,000 (One Billion) ISK, which is the in game currency of EVE. And $20USD roughly converts to 1.2Bil ISK. Thats enough for the hull of a cheap dreadnought or carrier, let alone modules to put on it. I hope Pandemic Legion (the faction that lost the Revenant) learns from this and recruits more carefully in the future. It would be a shame to lose another super expensive asset.

I have recently been playing a bit of Dr. Mundo on the Oceanic server, but have been running into an annoying dilemma. The enemy team either wins or surrenders before I can complete my fourth item whenever I play Mundo. I rush Warmogs followed by Mercury Treads with the Furor enchantment and then a Blood Thirster! At this point the game is normally around 25:00. I plan to build Rylai's Crystal Scepter, Randuins Omen and Spirit Visage after the Blood Thirster but I never get around to it. Hopefully I'll have better luck soon.

-Xalaram

The BotRK or Blood Thirster Debate

But first, the title of my previous post was a little misleading and should have been "...and how to Support with High Utility Champions". I'm not sorry, but I will try to refrain from making the same mistake again.

OK. There has been some (alot) of debate about whether BotRK is superior to the Blood Thirster and I will shed some light on the perks and downfalls of both. Early game, a BotRK is far superior to a Blood Thirster for a number of reasons:

1. Its cheaper!
2. Percentage of their health is done on each hit.
3. Doesn't need to be stacked like a Blood Thirster.
4. Attack speed!
5. A nice active; percentage slow, small nuke and a health injection from them to you.

This is all well and good but the counter to a BotRK is armour! So if you go against a Graves, BotRK isn't the best choice but is still good if you want to rush some early lifesteal. Mid to Late game is where the Blood Thirster comes in, if your team is giving you the farm (which they damn well should be) you can get your stacks up pretty fast giving you nice damage and life steal. Or you could buy a BotRK and then get Last Whisper and Black Cleaver to shred any armour that they may build to try and counter you. Or get both a BotRK and a Blood Thirster. Whichever you choose, you now know the ups and downs of both.

-Xalaram