Stay Classy San Diego

Greetings and Salutations everyone. It has been awhile since I've blogged properly so I figured I'd take some time while my target machine at work makes it 8 minute powercycle to hop on the blogosphere and do the bad thing. To make sure I get it all in, we'll start and the end and work our way back.

I finally caved in and bought Wrath of the Lich King. I always thought WoW was a great action-rpg and provided a good enough "solo during multiplayer" experience to scratch my stat-crazy side. After finally hitting that point where I could not stand playing my existing characters anymore, the only main thing that brough me to Lich King was the new Death Knight class. As many have stated about the expansion, this is for existing WoW players. Nothing about the Death Knight is simple and while the class is pretty freaking awesome (both gameplay and visually) it can be incredibly overwhelming trying to figure out how to fight. My interest in the Death Knight stems from being a Warcraft fan from way back and any spell that lets me get closer to being a necromancer is always a good thing. So far my feelings are kind of mixed. The starting area was really cool and provided a unique twist for WoW quest standards. However, like many have also stated, its a totaly let down when you go into the Burning Crusade content and realize you have 10 levels of pretty much boredom before you can experience the new cool stuff. A new thing I'm trying to do is be more balanced about how much I play the game. This isn't so much about addiction, but about not getting burned out quickly on what could be a very enjoyable game. This sort of leads into my next topic, which is again more on Left 4 Dead.

My friend Adam came to visit me last weekend and I sat his WoW-Raiding ass down on my couch and we rocked L4D pretty much all weekend. After he got the hang of it, we did a few campaigns then were joined by 2 other buddies who convinced us to try Versus. Now this mode (for those who don't know) is the same as standard co-op except that up to four human players will play as boss infected when the game decides to spawn them. On top of that, the infected players can even pick where they spawn and work together to come up with insanely devious tactics. The suriviors will get as far as they can go until they beat the level or die. At that point, they are given a score based and then the teams switch places. You do this until the campaign is over and the team with the best accumulated score wins. This mode was pretty foreign to me and from what I had originally heard it made the survivor experience very unbalanced so I was a little nervous about playing it. For lack of better words, boy was I wrong! Versus adds a much stronger reason to stick together (for both sides). If you are the survivors and you keep calm and most importantly work as a damn team you can overcome just about anything the infected can throw at you. Its pretty clear that Valve playtested the living hell out of this. It still amazes me how many surivor teams we fought that simply had too many "Master Chiefs" to stay alive. Master Chief is a term I've applied to any surivor in L4D that believes he can run out several rooms ahead/behind of his team and solo. "I've got a sniper rifle guys, I'm gonna snipe ahead or stay behind and Snipe." This is pure Master Chief ie the belief that you bad ass skillz (note the z) can have you decimate the entire Infected team. Now I understand if once this person was able to get the 2 hunters, smoker, and boomer all from getting him but that ultimately is luck. What happens when a hunter keeps you busy so a smoker can get you? What do you do then? Like suriving a hit by a car, it does not mean you are stronger. It was luck. Anyhoos, this Master Chiefs make the job of being an infected player oh so easy. With swift actions, we seperated the opposing team and tore them apart. When our team had to run the gauntlet, we stayed close as possible, always watched our backs and constantly remind each other of our distance from one another. Thats how its done son! Well I figured I'd share my infected/survivor fighting tips with y'all:

Survivors

• Stick together! If you find yourself leading, always stop every so often and spin around to make sure your team is with you! If you are trailing or want to step of in a different direction, make sure the whole team knows. If for whatever reason the team is not into going that way then don't fight it. Go with them. You always stand a better chance together without that Molotov you were struggling to find.
• Do not search! Now this can be a mixed bag. Searching can offer up goodies such as medpacks and bombs but can also leave you wittled down and low on ammo before you know it. In my opinion, searching naturally splits a team up as people step into rooms randomly. You are better off moving forward and progressing through the level.
• Do not hunt or chase! When entering a new room, do not start scattering and hunting down every zombie you see. In many cases you can just walk past'em or close a door to make your life easier. This isn't too big of a deal, just make sure your team knows where you are going. Now chasing is a serious problem! When you miss that hunter and he goes running off, do not chase him blindly leaving your team behind. Odds are him and his friends will find you and get you before you get them. If you are going to hunt down boss infected, do it as a group. Call out where he is and move together to find him or wait for him to catch up again.
• DUCK! For some reason, people are die hard against ducking in L4D as if it pains them to do so. Lack of ducking results in 90% of friendly fire. If you are leading, duck. This way your team can fire over you and keep your ass alive! If you get puked on by a boomer, DUCK! This way your team can get clear head shots on all the zombies are about to pound you.
• When in doubt, Melee! Punching in L4D is incredibly powerful. You can shove zombies back several feet and buy yourself more time to reload. In fact, if you are puked its better for you to melee and allow your team a more clear line of fire (and prevent you from shooting them). Its is much faster to melee a hunter off a surivor. Do not wast time shooting if you can punch them. This goes for teammates who've been tongue tied by a smoker. Punching them will release them much faster then trying to shoot the smoker or hit the tongue.
• Rear Guard. If you are in back tell your team you will get "rear guard" and keep an eye out behind you. Make sure you keep up with your team and make sure they know you are looking backwards, especially the guy right ahead of you. Its important to keep an eye on your rear especially when you heard the horde music. When that does happen, be the smart guy who looks in the opposite direction and prevents zombies from rushing you.

Oh scrats...need to get home. I'll finish this later.