12.31.99

Win 98 Upgrade Code NEEDED

I'm a fucking schmuck. I lost my Win98 upgrade book (which has the code on it) and I have to upgrade my mother's computer today so she can use some zip drive that requires 98 instead of 95.

Anyhow, since I can't find my book and a full version Win98 code doesn't seem to work, if you have a Win98 Upgrade code - help a guy out. Gateway, surprisingly enough, refused to help me even though they were the ones who send me the upgrade for the computer I later gave to my mother. Strange considering they're normally a quality company. Ahh well, fuckem.

Help me out. Email me a code if you have one. - Nighthawk

More AC Rambling For 99'

First and foremost I would like to give a shameless plug to Stormcrow over at PvP World. I have not exactly given him the credit I feel he is due. Check the site if you have yet to venture that way. I'm sure you'll find some info you can be one with.

Also, if you are looking for Greybeard, he can be found busting his ass working on the Honorbound Shard. You can always just click right here to see what he's up to.

Now onto less important things, some of the same old stream of unconsciousness I am used to bringing you. I'll try to flow a bit smoother than usual, despite my raging winter-flu fever that's going to launch me into the New Year unfortunately.

I of course have had a good deal of fun in AC the past few days I played, but I have also been exposed to more of it's unpleasantries. Beginning with the new improved log-out method, deemed "jump logging" by those who deem things what they are deemed.

If you thought the little 3 second delay to the standard log-out procedure was terrible, wait'll you get a load of the new non-powder instant log-out - just add jump. It skips the necessary (still too short) 3 second log-out animation, and just makes you disappear instantaneously. I can only imagine the sweet sensation this brings to the loins of AC's biggest wankers.

Couple in of course the still-existent Jumping-Heal-Self capability of Dereth's hardiest life mages with the "Where the hell did he just go?" Jump-Log, and it makes one shining example of just how fucked-up Jumping is, in AC.

AC is quickly turning into that one scary Van Valen video back in the 80's, yeah you know, the one where you get to watch a big-haired David Lee Roth jump for no apparent reason. He jumped, and now no one knows where he is, either, I don't think. I bet he wishes Jump was fixed. I know I do.

Even if it means bringing back Lee Roth.

Moving on, I was also exposed to a brand new "So very EQ-Like" killing method, and I was introduced to this by Dartide's wonderful group of Mercs, also known as "The Mercs." This method, much like EQ's "Hey, let's completely annihilate a guy who's zoning into our zone before he has a chance to do anything since the game has him incapacitated" is pretty much just as lame. You portal somewhere basically, and on the other end you have 2-12 assclowns waiting for you at the other end, and while you are twisting and turning your way through the purple bunghole, you get to watch helplessly as your chat-window is filled with you taking damage from Life Magic spells, until finally before you finish your trip through the anus to get wherever it was you were going, you take a detour to another dookie-shoot, until you end up back at your precious lifestone short some valuable equipment, and with a swell of anger in your facial veins.

Now, this one I believe might be curable. I know for a fact that when you are (on your screen) still "in the portal," you appear as a group of purple blotches to everyone else on the other side. Now, after testing, you cannot hit this mass of purple blotches with arrows - you just hit the environment. You swing with a melee weapon, and you swing over and over, but hit nothing. If someone uses war magic on you, you receive the message "so and so tried to cast a spell at you, but was too far away." However, Life Mages can harm or drain you while you are in this state.

This is not a good thing, and I am hoping to god that it will be fixed.

Now, I don't mind a bunch of people camping a portal destination and you actually have a moment to run, not as a non-purple blotchy thingie, but as a person, and get shalacked by 6 guys. That I can deal with. When I die and I am stuck in an ass, I don't appreciate the fact that I cannot do anything to prevent it. I don't think anyone would disagree with me.

Turbine, please do something about it. It's things like this, and things like the Jumping bugs, that ruin a game, because all games are filled with uncontrollable dickfaces that get their kicks on kills they rack up due to loop-holes in game mechanics. The last thing we need is a world filled with a bunch of imbeciles who stand around portals and jump log instantaneously when they don't kill the helpless victim in enough time. We're halfway there.... let's, for the sake of ron-kind, not take a buggy leap off the Love-Boat into Merc-ky water.

Next to last and maybe least, I'd like to add that I feel that Darktide is full of some of the biggest fucking idiots in any other game. This of course, is incurable by Turbine, but I just had to throw in how stupid I feel more than 80% of the growing Darktide population is.

I'd like to call any of you out there with functioning brains, to please come play this server with some of the few of us existing here, who have brains, so that the ones of us with brains might enjoy the world a little more. I'm not going to mention any names, but if you are reading this, you just might be stupid. Go get yourself examined. Are you stupid?

Last and least, I'd like to add I dropped out of what is known as "AoD," and before anyone, especially Azile, gets the wrong idea, I want to explain why.

I am sick of politics, especially politics involving an aforementioned 80% brainless community. Sure hope I used aforementioned in the right context. I bet I spelled it wrong. Oh well, I feel smart now anyway.

As in the (large majority of) days of UO and EQ, I am going to be just me, no longer suffering, nor inflicting suffering on others, because of someone else's name branded on my or their platemail hauberk. I plan to have no vassals, nor allegiances. My political loyalty is to myself and myself only. Because I am a selfish prick. That or I am tired of the bullshit.

However, my friends and allies are the same people they always were. Yada yada. I still love all of you, but you have to give me your Bud Light. Because I am a selfish prick. That or I am thirsty.

Gotta leave you with the only funny line in all of Bicentennial Man.

So Budha walks up to a hotdog stand and says, "make me one with everything."

Have a safe happy new year folks, may all of our computers explode, and may all of you be as completely sick and shit-faced as Joe and I are going to be. - Ron

12.29.99

What AC Needs

A paralyse spell. I'm glad that fights don't last for 20 minutes in AC, but to get the finishing blow on someone you normally have to chase them until you happen to catch them running in a straight line with an arrow or magic or they get to a portal to log out safely. If you're chasing someone and you don't have a ranged weapon, consider the fight over because you'll never hit them with a melee weapon.

And people wonder why there are so many Archers on Darktide. Why? Because when I start stomping you, it's the only way I can possibly catch you before you insta-log.

Turbine - add a delay to logging out, especially when going through portals. Make logging out take 20-30 seconds. That's not a long time and god knows it's used as an escape too much due to the 7 second quick-log time. - Nighthawk

12.24.99

Happy Holidays

Note the politically correct salutation. If you happen to celebrate Christmas, then Merry Christmas tomorrow. If not, then I probably missed what you celebrate.

Either way, the WTFMen would like to wish all of you a safe and happy holidays.

- Nighthawk

Fun with Meta Tags

Yanno what's funny? Well, lots, but specifically what I'm talking about is search engines. I'm sure that very, very few of you have looked at the code on the WTFMan page, but in the beginning is a section for Meta keywords which is specifically to draw in hits from search engines. If I do or don't make sense yet, worry not, this is going somewhere.

So, being bored one day at work, I decided to put just about everything under the sun in there to generate more hits for the site. Being the funny guy that I am I added several sexual phrases on top of the semi-relevant keywords. What's amused me is that according to our tracking site, of our last 20 referrals from search engines, two have been because I added the phrase "nude Brittainy Spears".

It amuses me that people looking for porn get suckered into coming here. I don't know why, but it does. I guess if you're sick enough to look for nude pics of that underage (isn't she?) chick, then you're sick enough to come to wtfman.

- Nighthawk

12.22.99

Silver Bells

It's Christmas time, and I'm shitty.

Heading out to St. Louis tomorrow for the weekend, perhaps I'll be lucky enough to lose all of my money out on the Mississippi playing a little Caribbean Stud (I plan to use this an excuse for no one having any gifts from me).

That or I hope that that fatass, Santa, (since it's the time of giving) gives me a Royal Flush for Christmas, since the bastard didn't give me Salma Hayek last year like I had asked. If any of you kiddies see him at your local mall, please piss on his leg for me.

Going to be seeing my family down there and all of that jive, so at least I won't be huddled around my fireplace in my wooby cursing Ohio for it's chillin' ass winter air. I get to do that in St. Louis now. Such a difference. Maybe my daddy will let me sit on his lap, though.

Just wanted to tell everyone to have a good Christmas, because I am sweet like that and you know I love you all and cherish every moment I spend bitching with you. Hold me.

Or as Kira Argounova would call it: "whining" with you. It's just this serious problem I have, being incapable of hand-eye coordinating my switches to war mode and all. It's really tough for me, maybe one day I'll grasp it. It's weird I can't learn after playing an archer/life mage since I began. I never get any practice.

In other Christmas events, J. posted 2 new columns over at the Dr. T SB site, definitely good reads for those of you with brains larger than OSI's "to 'fix'" list. Go give the man the recognition he deserves.

Won't be around much during the holidays, might stop in and lay out a bit more blatant use of cuss words before 2000, but in the event that I don't, hope you have a Gay Christmas, and a Y2K compliant New Year.
- Ron

OSI Removing Pre-Casting

For those of you who enjoy pvp and are in UO, let me be the first to say bwwaaaaaaaaahahahahahahahahahahhaha. OSI just fucked all of you... collectively... right in the ass. No lube, no reach around, not even so much as a "brace yourself".

Removing pre-casting from the game has to be the stupidest thing OSI could EVER do to pvp, but for some reason they think it's a good idea. You wanna know why? I do - it's very simple. They don't give a shit about their customers.

Man, you would think after we tell people how stupid OSI is, that you guys would listen and leave. Granted, there is no pre-casting in AC, but that's because it doesn't need it. God, the dicking you people are getting amazes me. I can't believe all the hardcore people didn't instantly go to the store and buy AC and put their UO accts up on Ebay while they're still worth something.

- Nighthawk

12.21.99

Targeting Self

Thank you, you horde of people, who have responded to the targeting self issue. I tested your method and it indeed works. I am now a happier man. I was just an unhappy boy. You have changed me.

I received about 30 responses to the issue, as well as one from another guy named Jason. I thank you all for your time, and I hope you all die in The Pit. To a Mountain Rat. While archery bugged. Afterwards I hope you all warp lag back into a room full of jump healing Magma Golems. In the snow. With Colonel Mustard. In the Pit. With the BD IV'd snowball.

Anyway, apparently the key to targeting yourself is by dragging your main backpack icon into a hot key # slot. Then, that hot key # slot is your target self hot key. One less thing to complain about. Amen.
- Ron

Random AC Complaints

Heed my words Turbine, and I suggest you take a serious look at the whines and groans I have wasted 10 minutes to type, or um, nothing will happen to you because I am too lazy to pursue something for too long. I'll just type them here as they come to my head.

Since it's Christmas time, and you filled our land with snow, and of course snowballs to throw at people, I must ask you : why can't I cast Blood Drinker IV on them anymore. Now I can't kill newbies in Shoushi with snowballs. WTF, Man. I don't care what level you are, 132nd or 67th..... killing any level 1-5 with snowballs, is fucking funny, and we deserve, as devoted AC Bastards, to be able to kill newbies with snowballs during our holiday season.

And what the hell is with this snow, man? Now I can't find my way around anymore, and sometimes when you have no landmarks around you, you can't even tell you are moving. And climbing hills or steep slopes? Forget it, you can't see slopes anymore. Damn you and your father.
BR> Fix The god damned Pit. I am not sure what in the hell has happened to that place in the last month, but I went back tonight with Nighthawk and it was absolutely the worst experience of my short-ass AC life as far as lag was concerned. Azile and Rich can both tell you the same thing.

What I want you to do is take 3 of your most trustworthy QA people and have them all go into the Pit just to hang out for a bit. I'm willing to bet if you required them to stay there and "play" for an hour, they'd insist on being paid doubletime or they'd tell you to kiss their asses. That place fuckin sucks, fix it. I would go into detail, but if you have those 3 QA Testers run around in there from top to bottom, you'll see what I mean and I am sure for the double time pay and then a 10% Salary Christmas Bonus, they'd even write you a full-detail report even though you frustrated them with the hour long task of trying to play AC in The Pit.

The Problem with the Pit then brings me to :

"Rubberband Lag" is something I thought I left behind when I quit UO. Damn you and your mothers for bringing this unholy scourge upon me, and in even worse form than was inflicted upon me in Britannia. Why just earlier I was on level 4 in the Pit running in place for a few seconds, then the next second I was catapulted back to level 2 surrounded by about 386 (rough estimate) Crude and Rough Monogua's, at 2 life, wait BANG, whirl whirl I am back in the long Purple Anal Canal swimming toward my lifestone with some lovely level 30 "fuck me it costs 3k to raise 1%" vitae. Worse yet, I am stuck in the long windy asshole, guess I need to log out and back in because it fuckin stinks in here.

Do something about the warp lag. If you do, I'll give you a shiny 50-cent piece. God Swingers owned.

War Mode just plain blows, man. While I am agile enough to leap flat footed 20 feet into the air and, with the dexterity of UO Tailor, perform the necessary inflections of the words Malar Zhapaj while moving my fingertips (and wand) in the complex patterns needed to summon the divine magical power of Heal Self I fourteen times, while in mid air, before touching the ground..... you are now trying to tell me I cannot walk backwards with my bowstring pulled back in mid fire, or that it takes me 10 seconds to go from standing still, stand up tall and straight, pull out my sword, gently and easily bend my knees ever so slightly and assume what is to be a feared and vicious position necessary to battle a foe? God damn, did that make any sense? Didn't think so, ok summation : Why does it take so damned long to get in and out of war mode. And an even better question : Why can't we get in and out of war mode while running? The little goofy animation doesn't have to be spurred when I am in mid stride, making me come to a sudden halt, standing up straight, and then ever so slightly bending my knees to assume a battle stance. That shit gets people killed, and it doesn't get them killed for the right reasons. People are afraid to stop running in fights just for the fact that let's say, if you are an archer and are in war mode and have to move, or run away, and then make the mistake of stopping, you have to wait for that god-forsaken "raise your arm up, pull arrow out of quiver, pull back bowstring" animation, just to get out of war mode when you don't even want to try to fire at anything. Nobody needs to die just because the game is making them do shit they wouldn't be caught dead doing, of course, you make us get dead by catching us doing it.

I am just trying to speed up the pace here, because I think there isn't one single class out there be it Archer, Melee fighter, or Mage, that hasn't gotten killed, or damn near killed, just because of switching to/fro war mode. Be realistic, wtf is "war mode." That's a mental note, not a physical one. And I can damn sure pull back a sword while I am running, or pull out an arrow of my quiver and knock it, while running. Healing, of course you should have to stop and do. However, healing while you are in war mode, should not require you to have to pull your bow up, pull an arrow from a quiver, and then knock it, in between each heal attempt. Nor should you have to go back to that knees slightly bent position in between a healing attempt. Think about it. Do something about it if able. Pay those QA testers more. Somethin.

Archery Bug - have spoken to many another archer about it, and they, too, have the same problem - 2 different Scenarios : #1) You get in war mode, and do your normal firing procedure, except when the bar reaches it's appropriate accuracy level, nothing fires. So of course you press fire again, bar goes up, nada happens. You either have to drop out of war mode and back in (which as noted earlier, going to and fro war mode sucks some serious ass), or sometimes it even requires you to unequip the bow, and then reequip. Has cost me my life several times. The bug probably occurs because we are forced to switch to and fro war mode in fights so often (especially us healers, because as mentioned earlier, healing in "war mode" is a time consuming "hey please kick my ass while I stand around and do retarded animations" situation). No likes to take that 10 seconds to get in war mode, then go to do their usual assraping, and then no arrow shoots even though we wait another 10 seconds to pull back the bowstring and fire the damned thing. Because then we have to do another 10 second process involving us getting out of war mode to fix gay bug, and then wasting another 10 seconds getting back into war mode praying (if we're not dead yet) that the goddamn bow will fire.

#2) Sometimes (and I can pinpoint this one) when you are in magic war mode and then equip a bow into war mode, since you for a second have no weapon equipped, the game fucks up and thinks you are in unarmed war mode even though the bow is equipped and your arrow knocked. This one is major. This is the most prevalent archer bug. Since it thinks you are in unarmed (even though it does that - you guessed it - 10 second bow animation) you go hauling ass towards whatever you are trying to fire at just like you would if you were attackin it with your fists - except, nothing fires from your bow, you just run around like a fuckin retard trying to stay as close as possible to whatever it is you are attacking, as if in auto-follow or something. Gotten me killed, oh let's see, a good 25 times, to monsters. When I am across the hallway from a room full of monsters, and I wanna shoot the one I see, from a distance, like any archer would, and I end up running as fast as I can INTO the room full of ferocious beasts, well, it gives me a one way ticket through that blasted purple asshole again. Or when I am 30 yards away from some bitch ass faggot ass dex monkey whore melee fighting piece of shit, and I stop to shoot, I don't like it any when I go hauling ass towards him after I have been running for 10 god damned minutes to get enough room between us to fire at him. You get my drift. Or you don't. just mentioning it.

Healing Bugs - On another note, sometimes healing kits stop working when you press your hot keys for them (if you have some hot keyed). Makes you have to dbl click them to use them, which takes too much mouse movement (too long) just to target yourself. To cure, you have to log out completely, closing all windows, and then log back in. It's a bitch. Speaking of which, healing kit targeting cursors are all fucked up, too. If you accidentally mouse over something else on screen besides yourself it seems, the target cursor just disappears. Then you gotta waste more valuable fighting time just to click the thing again in hopes that you can target yourself. Add targeting cursor in with your hot keys not working = too much mousing and too much valuable fighting time wasted, resulting in dead you. Not fun. No one loves the purple spiralling anus.

Perhaps you need to make some "target self" keys, as well. I for one have no idea how to heal myself when I am in !st person view. Is there a key I didn't know about? Maybe consider makin one.

Anyway, that's all I can think of at the moment. Other than that, game is fun, yada yada, Disco. - Ron

12.20.99

Ronald McDonald on Baja

There has been a bit of discussion about the fake Ronald McDonald on Baja. I wanted to clarify that this guy is a fake and give you all a bit more information in case you ran across this person.

Until yesterday, he was the GM of a guild named J*V. How sad to be a hardcore wanna-be. Now, he is the GM of Ron's Pimp Squad, PK. He even had the audacity to put PKC in his guild title, even though he's blue and obviously not part of PKC as my old JoV guild was/is.

For all of you who were curious about how I feel about this guy, I guess this screenshot from my 2nd to last day in game sums it up (yes, I was BigSexy) :

AC Experience Last Night

Last night was the most fun I've had in AC yet... and that's saying something because I've had plenty.

I was playing on my newest character Crum'. He's still pretty much a newbie at lvl 16, so I was up at The Pit leveling him on the mons. I ran into a mage named Volnair who asked if I could help him out. Being the great guy that I am, I said "sure". He apparently was on some quest and needed to get some item from the Lich Lord on the bottom level of The Pit.

Let me clarify two things before continuing. First, Lich Lords in AC would analy dominate LLs in UO. There is no survival unless you are just an unbelievably hardened individual. Secondly, being the lowly peon that I am, I had never seen the bottom of The Pit - I wasn't even sure how far I'd gone, but I was pretty sure it wasn't halfway.

Anyhow, to continue, Volnair asked if I had any friends in the area to help us, since a 21st lvl mage and a 16th lvl multi-class just wasn't gonna cut it. The Pit is in the middle of no where (more than a 40 minute run from my "home town"), so I didn't know a soul up there. Vol said he would call a couple of people and hopefully get some troops as we worked our way down.

Going through dungeons is much harder in AC than in UO. You can't just run past a simple monster before he even realizes your there, mainly because monsters normally have several friends who will box you from the front if you run past another one. Monsters work as groups much better in AC - and that makes it slighty harder to go down levels (read : sarcasm on the word "slightly").

Anyhow, we get down to lvl 3 and get owned. Just as I die and he escapes, a crew of folx show up to help out. Kabal, Crank and Shobaffum join up and it's the fuck on. We rage through the dungeon with three melee fighters and two mages spreading mass destruction. The way that everyone worked together was indescribable, so suffice it to say that everyone did their parts very well - especially considering we'd never hunted together.

We passed through parts of the dungeon that had me genuinely concerned. Yes, mountain rats scare me... especially in groups of 5 or more. Anyhow, we handled it all and got to the final room with a 60th lvl Revnant, the Lich Lord, and several other fun undead things like liches and skel lord/warriors. Volnair buffed to the extreme with enhancement spells, finally took out the Lich Lord after everything else was killed.

The down side was that controlling the respawn became a bit too much and a couple of us died before we could get the quest item. However, it was a success as far as fun and teamwork was concerned. It had nothing to do with pking, yet I had a blast. That dungeon crawl (along with pking) is exactly the type of experience that MMRPGs are all about. Kinda sorry that Ron missed it.

Thanks guys, it was fun. Call me for round 2 anytime.

- Nighthawk

I Understand AC Naming

I've gotten a few emails and Forum posts about this. I understand how the naming rules apply to AC. The long and short of how it works is that there are two type of error messages you can get about names.

"That name is in use - choose another"

and

"Invalid entry, try again"

I'm not 100% sure on the wording, but you see what I'm saying. Now, when I first tried to create a character named Nighthawk, I got the "name is in use" msg. I said "Damnit", went on with life and created a character named Crum. When I started my new character, I decided to try Nighthawk again - this time it gave me the "Invalid Name" error. Basically, sometimes when a character is deleted, the name becomes invalid even though it's no longer in use.

SO, someone had a character named Nighthawk, deleted it, and now the name is unavailable. That's the bug. Now stop telling me I'm stupid, because with as little info as I gave in my post yesterday, I'd say anyone who doubted me just wanted to be an ass.

- Nighthawk

12.19.99

UO and AC

Since a great number of the visitors that come here play UO and not AC like Ron and I, I figured I'd take a step back and talk about UO before getting to my AC rant. There are some things that I do miss : lag, res killing, no magic in town-wars, tons and tons of broken promises from the Dev Team and most importantly - the GREAT customer service. Granted, I was banned, but I sure as hell was leaving soon anyhow because of all of the above. Does anyone else realize that if any company ran a non-online company the way the OSI runs UO, it would be out of business within a week? They are the epitome of bad customer service. To get any worse, they would have to come to your house and fuck you in the ass.

But I digress. Looking back, I realize that the game was unbelievably fun until about a year ago. If you started playing UO thereafter, you missed out on the golden days. The Dread/Great Lord days and the pvp thief days were easily the most exciting and challenging times of UO. Anyone who tells you differently is lying to you.

I'm enjoying AC easily as much as the old days of UO. The graphics are obviously better and the pk shard is a complete challenge. Killing, dying, shit talking, power leveling and even roleplayers/antis to bash on. You can't beat that.

While there are several similarities between the old Ultima Online and Asheron's Call, one similarity I never hoped to see is obviously the bad support/service. Well, I've already found it (goddamnit). I found a bug in the way you cannot name your character the same as another character your shard. Seeings how this bug was keeping me from naming my character Nighthawk, instead of Crum', I wanted to report this and get it fixed. After paging GMs for close to 8 hours on my day off, I finally got a response. The sentinal of course couldn't do anything since it was a bug in the software and not really an in game issue.

He was helpful enough to give me an email address to try to seek assistance. Well, since a week and a couple of days have gone by with no response, I guess I won't be getting one. You'd think these companies would figure out that the customer deserves to at least get a response - if not help.

Anyhow, for those of you looking for me on Darktide, the reason you can't /tell Nighthawk is because I'm on as Crum or Crum'.... pretty gay, huh. - Nighthawk

12.15.99

The Holy Writ of Shit

King Ron's version. 1999 AD

On the first day of UO, God said "Let there be Shit." And it wasn't good.

It has come to my attention in the past 2 years in online gaming that there is a special time set aside by all of us in our daily gaming plans that is reserved specifically for the highly delicate matter of what is commonly known as "Shit Talk."

Other names for this dialect would include "talking smack," "smacktalk," "talking shit," (Which is not necessarily a piece or pieces of shit speaking verbally, though in many instances this is certainly the case) "speaking through one's ass," and various others. So as not to confuse you, for our purposes I am going to refer to this sacred time of any online game as "Shit Talk" and "Talking Shit."

Though Asheron's Call is the game that has currently forced me to speak out on behalf of proper shit talking etiquette, it is, and has, certainly been a topic to discuss in other popular online games such as Ultima Online and EverQuest.

While I most definitely value shit talking as a vital and necessary communication tool between two or more fellow game players, (Shit Talk is my primary English dialect, I could assume from my mother's words throughout my 21 years that it is a skill passed onto me through my father's Levi's 501's, and his father's before that, who received it from his father before that and so on and so forth) I, without a doubt, can say that it is a language not to be uttered by those who do not know the rules and regulations of the beautiful art of shit talking.

"And every word uttered from their mouths strangled me. So now every thought I express, shall sew the seed for the noose around their necks..." - Zach de la Rocha, Producer

Proper Instances Requiring Shit Talking Attention.

The first step in Shit Talk, is deciding when and where to begin appropriate shit talking.

In this section I will discuss various instances that require a few words or possibly even paragraphs of shit talk, as well as samples by which you can easily review your current shit talking methods, to see if your method(s) requires minor tweaking, or as a worst case scenario - complete revamping.

Instance One - You defeat a more powerful player in single combat. Note the word "combat." This instance does not include accidentally stumbling upon a higher level person who happens to either be low on life, shopping at the time, AFK, etc. etc. For such instances, please see the next section titled "Instances Unbefitting Shit Talk."

Now, I am perfectly aware that just because a character is higher level, he certainly does not have a clench on all player versus player combat situations. In UO, while a Journeyman can sometimes easily win a battle with a Grandmaster, it should never be the case, nor should a higher "level" character (EQ/AC) lose to a lower level character. When created properly, a character should have no weaknesses that a lower level character with a different skill set can exploit. Thus, when a higher level character gets wailed on by a lower level or younger character in a fight, and loses, shit talk should always be spoken by the lower level victor when a fight actually occurs. It is not required, but it is certainly warranted. You have earned the right to talk shit. Exercise your rights.

Instance Two - Shit is being spoken to you from the mouth of one whom has not yet been deemed worthy of speaking the language of Shit. Example, you are just walking along a path and all of a sudden some guy you don't know or have never seen begins to tell that you suck and that you possess the fighting skills of a buried dead bunny. How did he know you had no l33t skillZ? You don't remember having ever told him that. Hence, it is your Keyboard-given right to tell him how bad he sucks right back, following my philosophy that if no one in the room is making sense, why should you make sense. These instances are acceptable times for bashing his Mom or Dad. What do they have to do with anything. Be abstract, creative.

Instance Three - You are minding your own business, and some assrammer decides to take it upon himself to relieve you of your life, and you end up kicking his ass instead. This is one of the only times where Shit Talk is actually required to maintain a healthy Shit Talking existence. You sure showed him. Take this opportunity to further show him what you can do. Be strong. Talk shit.

Instance Four - You get completely and utterly destroyed by someone without question of whom is the victor. Oddly enough, this is a fine time to make up for a short battle with a little Reverse Psychology Shit Talk. This celebration of Shit Speak can be further enjoyed when they think that the shit coming out of your mouth is genuine. If they don't understand sarcasm, and begin to tell you what an abslute fool you are, their screen should be filled with more Spam than is stocked in a Hormel warehouse.

When you have been destroyed by someone with profound Shit Talking experience, your session can become quite joyous, as your fellow Shit Talker will recognize his duty as a Shit Talker, to join you in a half an hour of Reverse Psychological Shit Talk. These sessions usually end up with one or more extremely delirious gameplayers. Stay up all night. Enjoy the Shit while it lasts.

Instances Unbeffiting Shit Talk

The key to a healthy successful Shit Life, is to put down the lid when she is around.

No one likes it when they receive flak from Unauthorized Shit Talkers. Don't give Shit Talking a bad name. Know your boundaries. Shit is to be enjoyed only when the moment is right, and you are with that special someone....not when it occurs all of the time. If you Talk Shit too much, you miss out on the true meaning of Good Shit Talk, and you could quite possibly be pitied by your Conservative Shit Talking Peers.

In this section I will include instances where you are not to tap the almighty power of your Shitty vocals. For instance, The Smashing Pumpkins. Don't be like that faggot. Please. Shut your hole.

Instance One - You defeat a less powerful player in short combat (if any combat). Don't make yourself look like a complete goon by telling the level 1 how bad your level 45 ass just mauled him. You murdered him, the exchange was not long enough to constitute Shit Talking. You know nothing about him, other than the fact that you just murdered him quickly and efficiently. Move onto the next victim. Don't make it look like you feel you earned the right to speak on his Shitty behalf. He knows he cannot compete with you, obviously. Plus you never know, given time, he could mature to be your Shit Talking Master. Until that day, just go away.

Instance Two - You kill someone whom was obviously tied up with something else (shopping for instance), or you finish off someone whom was already weakened by another source (fighting a monster). If some guy is at half life, and you wax his ass, don't explain to him how you just whooped his ass, unless it's an Instance of Reverse Psychologial Shit Talk. He had neither the time to prepare for your coming, nor the slightest clue that you were about to take complete advantage of the situation to quench your killing thirst.

Once again, it was just a quick murder, you never said you were his better, you killed him. Leave it at that. Leave as fast as you came. If he talks shit to you afterwards when you never claimed you were his master, prove to him then that you are indeed his master, by simply ignoring him. It's funny to watch people whine and bitch and groan and Talk Lame Shit when you never made any of the claims they said you made. Let them continue to waste their time bitching at you while you make the best of yours, by finding some more hapless victims to wax.

Instance Three - You have a great fight with one or more individuals. Never ruin a good fight by following it up with unneeded shit talk. Only if shit is spoken to you first, do you retaliate. Good long lasting fights are to be cherished, not tarnished with skid marks. Nothing ruins a good fight worse than a bunch of Shit. Tell your fellow player(s) what a great fight it was, and that you anxiously await the next time you can pull off a well earned victory.


Hopefully I have enlightened your bowels. If at any time you feel you have lost the way of a true Shit Talker, remember the Brown Rule, Shit on others as you would have them Shit on you, or return to my blessed guidebook.

Using my methods, perhaps we can all bind together and help make our gaming worlds into truly Shittier places. Arise and Shit my sons. Let's return the glory to all that is Shit, and make examples of those who use the Holy Shit's name in vain.

If anyone takes away from these writings, they'll be in a lot of Shit. For I was in the Alpha, and the Beta. I am the Shit, and the Talker. When I come, I'm done. Go home. Forever and Ever. Amen. - Ron

12.14.99

I met my first Merc. His name was T.

Supposedly "The Mercs" are a group of hardened individuals who terrorize Darktide with their ability to camp all of the hot AI Exploit sites. I met my first one, his name was T. Due to rumors, I was pretty frightened.

I was just chillin out in Cragstone giving some booty to the local female NPC, Shundigua A'l Kabob'ojar, when I begin receiving fire from a Merc named T who happened to be watching my exchange from afar.

I dumped some debuffs on him, to prepare for some patented Ron asswhipping, and he informed me that fucking with a Merc was way out of my league.

I said, sure fine, we'll see, excelt I typoed it, and began to fight him. Being extremely confident, I tell him of his impending doom and he scoffs and tells me men of his stature never die.

Ph34r the mighty Mercs. Their shit talk carries with it the pungent odor only emitted by genuine caca.

I commenced my trading booty with Al Kajajabar.

On another note, I received this funny screenshot from Oreo Twist. Conversation between him and some person I don't recall meeting, named Shimano. I think he mistakes me for a roleplayer. - Ron

Banks? Who needs banks? I'll tell you what AC needs.

I think the reasons over at Twister's are a good summation of why banks are bad for the game, people. Look what they did to UO. As a vault, for me all it was was a place for runes I could recall off of from anywhere I was via the almighty UOE enhanced delete key, and for others it was a place to store 125 more items you wouldn't once use, but would take out and look at once in awhile with an ID wand. As a social club, the bank became the home of Britannia's worst lag, from the numerous idiots who liked to mull around there three hours a day. Then occassionally the bank would lose everything in it to some unexplained black hole or something and the admins had no way of tracking what was ever there, and thus you were never helped. Fuck banks. Why does AC need them.

Housing? Maybe. Banks? No way. If AC got banks, everyone would then want some guards to teleport around town and smack people with halberds. Let's not turn AC into UO, please. Let's keep it different.

AC doesn't need horses, it doesn't need banks, it doesn't need houses right away, it doesn't need new exciting monsters, nor does it need new spells or anything else that would be considered an "add on." Some of what you guys are crying for, if implemented, might possibly turn into a downhill stretch of new exciting patches that will steamroll the glory of the game just as the 134 erroneous mutations known as OSI Patches did to UO. Personally I think it's a bit early for the new "Dereth changing events" currently making their way into the game. Turbine doesn't need to get ahead of themselves.

Don't you people despise Road Construction? Like when they go and fuck up your normal route to work with a bunch of orange barrels, digging old road up, fucking up 2 of the 3 lanes that exist in the process, and painting a snafu of new white and yellow lines all over the road, leaving you clueless as to which lane, if any, you are even in most of the time. Don't you just FUCKING DESPISE road construction?

Now what if those guys with the orange hats decided "hey, check this out, we should build a new road that leads to Rome" and just left your usual I-270 route to work all fucked up and covered with barrels and road construction signs so they could go start on a new road that connected Rome to Kansas City. Wouldn't that piss you off? Let's allow the Turbine Devs time to get the pot holes and barrels out of our way before we introduce new moronic ideas please. I want to be able to get to where I am going in 10 minutes, not 45. So shut your blathering pie-hole, your ideas are dumb. And so is road construction.

However, my ideas are not dumb, and so I bow bring forth ideas that the Turbine Dev team should most certainly take a glimpse at.

12.13.99

Dr. TwisTer... err... Vader

For those of you that don't know, the Ultima Online portion of the Dr.Twister Network is being closed. Why? Well, the long and short of it is that Origin Systems is a company that is full of ass assassins. Any company that sues a customer AND HIS FAMILY because he posts information about an upcoming product is homosexual. I mean, if people weren't excited about the product enough to want to hear ever tidbit about it, Origin should be worried about sales next year. Instead of being encouraged by their fanbase, they want to sue them.

Anyhow, Ron and I have known Vader was DrT from the beginning. The first week DrT was up, The Joy of Villainy and McDonaldland both posted a link to the new bug site on the block. We didn't do it just because we knew and liked him, but because he did it right from the start.

Personally, I've spoken to DrT on the phone on several topics - from the GM Darwin events revolving around me to the lawsuit around him. He's a great guy in game and out and I have a lot of respect for the information he provides and how he handles the massive amounts of positive and negative feedback he gets.

On that note, DrT, now that you're away from UO 100% - get yer ass in AC and beat some ass with Ron and I. =) - Nighthawk

WTF Happened, Man

Back in November after the move here to Ohio, I had changed my address and new Credit Card info for our web host Digiweb, but apparently none of the changes ever went through the little script on their site, thus, the site was down for the weekend, as they were charging my muchus maxed Mastercard rather than my Philip's 66 Platinum.

So, if you were wondering why everything was down, now you know. If you had sent me E-Mail over the weekend to ron@wtfman.com, I am sure you have it returned to you already. Re-send, and I will reply to them in the quick manner I am reknowned for replying with. - Ron

12.8.99

Are you saying you didn't like it Rich?

Bwaha.

If you are reading this post, then you are gay.

That is all. - Ron

Congratulations

If you read that entire rant by Ron, then you're either bored as shit, have a hardon for Ron or you're just that desperate for us to update.

Either way, congrats. - Nighthawk

The Ramblings of Ron the Bored

I have been busy being unbusy. Therein lies the reason for no updates being completely irrelevant to whatever WTFMan holds relevant. Perhaps I should change the banner up top to "please tell us what the fuck." Speaking of which, it is certainly time for a new banner. Each time I hear those swooshes and swishes I want to kill myself for being responsible for them.

I am in one of those modes lately where everything I do bores me. Not sure if you've ever entered that mode of life. When in this state, I tend to start doing something for five minutes, then become increasingly bored as the seconds go by until I quit whatever it is I am doing and begin doing something else that I can get bored of within a few minutes until I bore myself to sleep, wake up, and go to work to repeat the same boring process of Ron's Bored Mode. Pretty boring, isn't it?

But I am not here to talk to you about being bored. I am here to talk to you about the New! Ruffles brand Flavor- Rush Ruffles with Ridges. How the hell did they fit so much flavor into a bag of potato chips? The zesty flavoring on these chips is everything I could ever want in a potato chip. More colored powder on each individual ridged potato slice provides your fingers with more fingertip-coating gnarliness than any other brand while coating your mouth, gums, and teeth in a pure salty goodness that even an hour and a half Regular Flavor Listerine swishing ritual couldn't hope to cleanse. The flavoring in these chips is so potent you'll taste them 3 days after they have been consumed and shat. I highly recommend eating just one.

Actually I wasn't here to talk to you about the New! Ruffles brand Flavor-Rush Ruffles with Ridges either. It's just that it is more or less the most exciting news I have to offer at this point in time.

We get a lot of heat from some of you in E-Mail and on boards for "not updating" and the like, and I just want you to know that it's not that we don't care, it's just that we don't care. Understand now?

Typically, an "update" would be news that is new about something old, it's just that sometimes we are so busy in life being bored that we have nothing to say, nor the inclination to do so. You see, if we were to update daily, it would look like this here post by yours truly. And you don't want that. And Ringo here, definitely doesn't want that. So perhaps rather than bitching about the fact that we have nothing to say for sometimes long periods of time, you should just deal with it rather than gripe about it. We all have other shit to do you know, and lately nothing I myself have been doing is worth even telling you about. "I played 3 hours of AC last night - killed a Wild Monogua...then I killed another Wild Monogua, found Nighthawk, and we killed some Wild Monoguas" isn't a very exciting "update" you know. So we prefer to do without telling you how boring much of our online time is. Maybe after this update, you will be glad we don't do so. At least we're honest when we have nothing to say. Consider it like, one of those comfortable silences Uma spoke of. The kind where you don't yak about bullshit, you just "shut the fuck up."

That sounds like a good invention actually. Perhaps I could make as much money as that guy who "invented" the pet rock. Within the next few weeks I might change WTFMan.com to www.STFU.com, where you can go and stare at a screen and just shut the fuck up. We'll be able to share comfortable silence together. I'll never update or anything, no no, just a blank screen, that or a few days worth of old boring updates from our archives to look at.

In all seriousness though, i think WTFMan.com holds true to it's name, we are providing you with news that hurts, we are "telling you what the fuck."

"Nothing exciting."

See? Now of course you can list a few worthy sites who make attempts at what is news, but personally I am so bored with every other site out there on the web that I just masturbate. After finishing I am always bored again, so I do something else useful like sleep. In all seriousness, if what is on all these other hot sites is exciting gaming news, then I think Online Gaming has reached the plateau of suck.

Personally, I am so goddamn sick of reading about how some dumb guy or group of dumber guys got banned for this or that, sick of hearing how some president of some company said this and that about the game, sick of hearing about how some new game is coming out that will rule the world and revitalize our masturbatory juices, sick of hearing of which game is better than the other game, then sick of course of reading each person's retaliation to the insults some other dumb guy made about whatever game he held true to his heart, sick of hearing about some game administration official unjustly fucked some dumb guy over (if you aren't dumb, this isn't meant for you), so sick of it all that I feel like telling you what I am sick of in a long windy ass paragraph-sentence filled with commas about what I am sick of.

You know, it isn't really that all of these games, UO, EQ, AC, are bad games. Naturally they all suck in their own way, but it's not that they are bad games. Doesn't mean they are good games either. They are just games. Games that I think have all lost their luster, and personally I don't think the games, the game administration, the bugs, the gameplay, anything of the sort, is to blame.

Want to know who I blame? Sites like this one. And Patches of course, but that's another story. Certainly I don't think WTFMan is the prime example of the kind of site I think ruins these games, as we really don't say much about anything really, but I might as well include us in this rambling.

Really it's the Web in general responsible for making these games "suck." It's like we don't even play any of these games anymore to have fun. We play these games to make web page updates, to claim how we roleplay far better than other roleplayers, to get some screenshot of someone we hate in game dying to us, to horde millions and millions of useless bullshit in our virtual homes to quell our inner pain, to make "news" about some GM who fucked us over and deserves to die of Syphillis, to create funny stories, to make our opinions heard about whatever game, to advertise games we want to be good, to produce bugs others can exploit in the games, to get photographs of players we hate in game and tell them how dumb they look, to get pictures of Lady MOI and make movies of them, to make fun of people we hate in game, to create game-stories with a lot of cuss words, to tell ourselves the game does suck and come up with valid reasons why it does so we can tell the one dumb guy on a messageboard he was dumb, to sell accounts on eBay, to hack some other guy's acount so we can sell it on eBay, to sell shit on eBay, to talk to "friends" we have met in game, to keep us from masturbating 24/7, as an excuse to smoke a lot of cigarettes and drink a lot of Mountian Dew, to do things in game we can post about on messageboards, et cetera et fuckin et cetera that we get not a single bit of fucking enjoyment in a game because we are so worried about doing other things that have nothing to do with actually playing the game.

Games didn't suck so bad when we didn't have 127 sites to surf to that we saw said a game sucked and actually had a public forum we could waste our time on all day discussing how bad it sucks. Nothing sucked when there were no bug sites, nothing sucked when none of us were surfing around to find out things that could and would make things suck, these games didn't just suck when we shut the fuck up and played them and we kept all gaming things where they needed to be - in the game.

That is why UO was so much "better" than any of these other games in my opinion. Because back when I first played it I didn't even know how to fucking operate a web browser much less play the game. I didn't spend any time jerking off on one of a thousand web sites meant to jerk you off over a game. I just played the game, dealt with glitches or inconviences, and had a ball. I didn't sit around and compare the gameplay and mouse interface to 14 other games on the market, creating hot-lists between the games to calibrate the probes in my brain to direct me to the game I would enjoy the most. There were no alterior motives to in-game actions, I wasn't trying to be some big shot on a messageboard trying to get my voice heard, I wasn't PKing people just so the thousand or so people who read my site could see that I killed a lot of people and would think I was a hardass, I wasn't involved in the web, I was just dickin around in leisure time doing shit that was pretty fun in a game, thinking about how it was cool others were able to do the same thing in the same game I was playing at the exact same time I was.

Now look at what games are to people : They are numerous messageboards, the game sites themselves, being banned from games, fighting for accounts, corrupt administrators, "producer's" letters, bug sites, interviews, real audio shows, pictures, comics, movies, just a bunch of useless bullshit. Man, when I played UO back in the day, I couldn't give a rat's ass which sections of owo.com weren't updated, didn't care that the "comments from the dev team" had been blank for 2 months, didn't care to peer into the minds of Game Designers about what was coming next in some lame ass Fear interview, and damn sure didn't listen to a guy named Ronald McDonald, Lum the Mad, Nighthawk, Fuckface, or whatever handle they chose when they threw a page full of shit in front of my face about why a game is good or why it sucked, and what was missing in it.

Do any of you actually <>have fun in the game you play anymore? Or are you having fun or not having having fun talking about the game, or reading about the game?

I think you get my point. That, or as usual, my point was too hard to figure out.

Lately, I've just been playing the game. Having fun I guess, getting bored of course, but just playing. Nothing exciting. Killing people there, killing them there, getting killed everywhere, and I haven't played just so I could update to you about playing, and I am not going to play AC just for the sole reason of making some update to you about it.

Not saying I am not ever going to have anything to say about my doings in AC, because I certainly do, but I am not about to sit around and do shit in game just so I can tell you about it on a daily basis, nor am I going to surf around and give you a bunch of useless information on some game that isn't out yet, or give you horror stories about some producer or scripter in a game you play said this or that and then renigged on it, or nerfed this or nerfed that, fucked this or fucked that, etc. etc. etc. just so your dumb ass has something you can read for a minute of your life each day.

If you are looking for daily updates, you won't find that here,from me anyway, and obviously not Grey or Night. As absolutely cool a fucking guy that I am, I don't always have something to say. So just as I don't expect you to visit www.wtfman.com on a daily basis, don't expect me to give you some funny story or funny movie on a daily basis. There's always the archives if you're looking for reading material. And if you think those suck, too, then What the Fuck are you doing here, Man.

Who says you have to update everyday anyway. I do love your hits people, but do know that your hits to this page mean jack shit to me when it comes time to gas the car, pay the bills, finish a beer, watch a movie, jerk off, use the john, or wake up in the morning.

I am done rambling now. - Ron

12.3.99

Turbine Dev Staff Update

Everyone else linked it, so to be as cool as the rest I figure I might as well also, in case you are one of those poor unfortunate souls who have better things to do than surf sites all day for links to good rants by AC Staff members.

It's a really good update, cool to know you have someone with the mindset such as his working on a game that you play. So be sure to check out Chris Letoile's view on AC's Status, Whiners, and Ranters. He even mentioned me, the sweety. Azile and Joe pretty much summed up what I feel for the update already, so I won't give my thoughts on it.

I am just surprised Letoile saw the nonsense I type as informative, not just the blatant use of naughty words that I thought it was.

I'm a poet, I know it. - Ron