kudos Effect

I thought I would document the kudos Effect so that there is some record of it somewhere on the Internet. This is a well known phenomenon to the Rabid Fans of the Cyberlore Forums. Note that it is spelled with a small 'k' and a capital 'E'.

The Kudos Effect with capital 'K' and capital 'E' is something else entirely. I think it is someone else's business or product.

Anyway, the kudos Effect is a phenomenon that happens in an Internet forum. A newbie would start a topic and ask a seemingly innocent question and make some remark about the topic. Then someone will make a post answering that question and comment about the remark. After that, someone else will comment about the comment about the remark.

More and more posts are made about the remark. By the the time the original poster returned for his/her answer, the topic would have gone off on a tangent. There have been flame wars, lightsaber duels, astronomy and all sorts of nonsense created from the remark that the original poster had made.

Somewhere along the line, someone will point out that it is a kudos Effect. Something like:
---
For those of you who have just joined us, this is a phenomenon known as a kudos Effect. This occurs when a topic is hijacked and diverted to an alternate subject of discussion, usually when the person who started the topic is away and unable to reply to the thread (thus preventing the effect).

We now return you to the kudos Effect in progress.
---

The kudos Effect was named after 'kudos', the first ever victim of the Effect.

The Cyberlore Forums no longer exist. However, most of the Rabid Fans are still around, scattered throughout the Internet.

Wakfu: My Short Time in Beta

I recently tried out the beta of Wakfu.

It is an MMORPG. Most of the game is real-time, except for combat, which is turned-based. What got me interested in the game are the things the player can do other than combat. The player can gather resources and craft items. There is the player's nation, which they can build. There is also the ecosystem to manage, which will give the player's nation bonuses if done right.

Yes, I was excited to play the game. I had not been this excited for a while.

Then less than 36 hours after I started playing, the server closed.

Because the Beta had ended. The full game will be released next week on 29 February.

There is a freeplay part of the game, but it restricts access to a lot of the game's features. Especially the parts about ecosystem management and working with other players to build a nation. And there is no getting or spending money.

Subscription is not very expensive at 52 Euros for a year subscription, with shorter subscriptions available for those still uncertain. However, my concern is not the money - it is the time. Paying real-world money is a commitment to spending time on the game. So the question is whether I am willing to commit a significant part of my next 3 to 12 months into grinding in an MMORPG.

It would be interesting to see how the economy in the game develops. Wakfu uses a player-based economy much like Puzzle Pirates. The players have to create everything, even the hard currency. Baddies do not drop currency - they have to be minted from ores. There are no NPC shops - everything has to be bought from player-run stores. There are no products - everything has to be crafted by players from resources that are crafted by players from even more resources that are gathered by players from the wild.

The game is going to start with everyone having zero money. So I wonder how the economy will start.

There is also the political system but this is nothing new since many MMO-games already have this. Basically, each nation elects its leaders who will then run stuff. In Wakfu, the leaders manage laws and can obtain challenges for the nation's citizens to play around with. I hear that the leader can also manage the ecosystem policies but I am not to clear on that. I did not look much into this since I was not so interested in politics.

As already mentioned, there is the ecosystem to manage. The players have to keep the population of the flora and fauna in an area within specified limits in order to give bonuses to ALL players of that nation. This is were casual players can contribute to their nation and is another feature of the game I wish to try.

So, should I play the release-version of the game? I have to decide soon since there is a 'Subscribe in Advance' offer right now for subscribing before the game is launched. If I do, I get a few items which is going to take up my limited inventory slots, including a pet.

Buddy Rush: Bangbang's Set (1.5)

Bangbag's Set is the second set I have completed on that day.

Bangbang with all his loot.

There are four items in this set, each of them obtainable from the reward chest given after beating Bangbang. I wonder where he keeps the can of Motor Oil.

Bangbang's Vest

Bangbang's Bandana

Bangbang's Glove

Bangbang's Motor Oil

The complete set gives the following:
Att+160
Def+46
HP+512
HP Regen+2%
MP+216
MP Regen+3%
critical+0%
Evade+0%
Stun+2%
Hit Speed+8%
Skill Pow+36%
Skill CoolTime-2sec

Update 16 March 2012:
Bangbang's Vest now gives HP+160, HP Regen+2%, Def+36.
Bangbang's Bandana now gives HP+160, MP+80, Att+20, Hit Speed+5%

The new complete set stats are:
Att+160
Def+50
HP+432
HP Regen+2%
MP+216
MP Regen+3%
critical+0%
Evade+0%
Stun+2%
Hit Speed+5%
Skill Pow+36%
Skill CoolTime-2sec
---

Note the high HP and MP. Att, Def and Hit Speed are good too, along with a few bonuses in other stats. It has low HP Regen, MP Regen and Stun along with nonexistent critical and Evade. The last two equips slots should be used to provide bonuses that boost the stats required for the character's playing style.

I equipped Bangbang's set on Skully:

Futuristic biker chick with an old cannon?

I chose equips to give Skully more Att so that her Bleeding will do more damage. High Att and Hit Speed makes her regular attacks more powerful. I chose this because, when controlled by the AI, the AI does not move Skully into the best spot to use her skills. With good regular attacks, at least the AI-controlled Skully has some effect on Oblins.

The extra MP Regen from the Ancient Cannon along with the high MP boost from the set keeps Skully supplied with MP for a long time. Cutie's Wing (red - I do not have the purple) gives a lot more Hit Speed bonus. The extra Att, Evade and Skill CoolTime bonuses are also welcome.

The main drawback with this setup is the low HP Regen. Skully can take hits. However, she will take far too long to recover from damage. This will be less of a problem if a healer is in the party, or healing consumables are used.

Update 23 July 2012:
I completed a second Bangbang's set. It is equipped on Worrier. Note that this information is from the third mini-wave of the Seventh Wave, which has double the HP Regen.

Worrier likes armor.

Bangbang's set gives Worrier better offensive stats at a small cost to defense (compared to Armored Tiger's set). However, the setup still has low HP Regen. Lately, with the extra red orbs released by defeated Oblins, low HP Regen is less of a problem.

I also equipped the Titanium Armor set to further boost Worrier's offense stats.

Buddy Rush: Contents

Buddy Rush: Magic Cane Set (1.5)

Here is the first of the three purple sets I have completed on that one day, the Magic Cane Set. There are two items in this set.

The first item is the Powerless Magic Cane, which can be bought from the shop.

Powerless Magic Cane

The second item was found from a treasure chest dropped by an Oblin during Bangbang's Raid. Actually, it was before the raid since I looted the chest before entering the arena where Bangbang was. I think that this item may also be looted from regular mission drops in C'est Mang.

Magical Essence

If anyone wonders how much the Magical Essence is worth:

It is priceless.

I equipped the set on Nagne.

Dual Purple Set FTW!

The combined Philosopher's stone Set and Magic Cane set give:
Att+284
Def+46
HP+360
HP Regen+4%
MP+80
MP Regen+4%
critical+14%
Evade+8.5%
Stun+8%
Hit Speed+4%
Skill Pow+57%
Skill CoolTime-3.2sec

Overall, both sets give Nagne decent all round bonuses, with good critical for his Forgetful Nagne skill. With this setup, all equip slots are taken by both sets. Thus the only flexibility would be in costume and accessories.

Update 19 March 2012:
Rumor has it that there is also a blue Magical Essence (the one in the screenshot above is red), which gives a different Set Effect. Rumor also says that it is possible to equip both Magical Essences for both bonuses. However, I am skeptical about the latter since the Magical Essences share the same name and unique items of the same name cannot be equipped.

Update 3 October 2012:
Just looted the blue Magical Essence from the Arena! Here are the stats (as of 1.7.1):

Blue version of the Magical Essence

I have tried and found that it is not possible to equip both the blue and the red Magical Essence at the same time.

The blue Magical Essence is great for skill spammers with extra MP, Skill Pow and Skill CoolTime. However, with the new additions (especially the latest raid boss loot), the blue Magical Essence is less impressive.

Buddy Rush: Contents

Buddy Rush: Three Purple Sets in One Day

I completed three purple sets in one day!
(Or was it one hour?)

Wow.

No, it is not that I got all the items in one day. For two of the sets, I was just short of one item. For the third, yes, I did get each and every piece of that set in one day.

I got Bangbang's Glove to complete Bangbang's Set.

Yay!

After that, I got Armored Tiger's Scale Armor to complete Armored Tiger's Set a second time.

Yay (x2) !

But before those two, I got the Magical Essence.

Ok, I was way too slow to grab the screenshot for this one.

This is all happy and exciting until I consider the work that follows. I have the sets to try out. Then I have decisions to make on the best equips to complement the set. After that, I have lots of screenshots to take and writing to do.

So be sure to read the resulting articles once a day all week in gratitude. :p

Update 21 February 2012:
Finally finished writing/updating the articles! Happy reading, people!

Meanwhile, I still have a little more work to do before I can go play. -_-

Buddy Rush: Contents

Super Samurai Sweeper (RPG, puzzle)

Many years ago, I came across a scratch card which had plenty of boxes arranged in rows. When a box is scratched, it revealed one or more arrows pointing the path to a prize. The idea is to scratch a line of arrows towards a prize in the end, picking paths if there were more than one arrow revealed behind that box. Super Samurai Sweeper reminded me of that scratch card game, though it uses a much different game mechanic.

This is not the scratch card part of the game.

Super Samurai Sweeper by nerdook is puzzle game with RPG elements in it. I classified it as a Puzzle, rather than a Strategy game, since it felt more like one. It is a rather short game, easily completed within an hour of play. However, this makes it easily replayable on a higher difficulty setting for a higher score.

Selecting a target.

The game challenge is to beat the boss character Daimyo in each of the seven levels, called Provinces in the game. Once that is done, the Province with the Shogun is unlocked. The player must defeat the Shogun to win the game.

At the start of the game, the player selects a Province to begin with.

Scratch card!

Within a Province, the player is shown a scratch card map where a target boss Daimyo is hidden and given limited Clicks to find the target. The objective is to find the Daimyo with the limited Clicks and defeat him. Revealed boxes may reveal bonuses/penalties to help beat the Daimyo or it may reveal footsteps, which is a trail leading up to the boss.

Unlike scratch cards, Clicking on a box also reveals partial information in neighboring boxes. This makes the game much easier (and bearable).

Footsteps may be misleading since they do not show how close they are to the Daimyo. It is possible that a newly reveal set of footsteps is further on a trail compared to a previously reveal set. It is also possible that the Daimyo is in between two sets of revealed footsteps. A little bit of judgement is therefore necessary.

The red marks on the map are groups of Mooks that the player may battle immediately or later. The final battle with the Daimyo will include all remaining Mooks on the map. It is easier to fight a smaller number of them earlier to reduce the number faced in the final battle. However, searching for Mooks requires Clicks.

When the Province is completed, extra unused Clicks give additional Score and Exp. The player has to decide whether to defeat many Mooks before the facing the Daimyo, or risk attacking early for more Score and Exp.

Red-green blindness helps me ignore the blood.

Battles are for the most part automatic. The only decision the player gets to make is when to use Chakra for special abilities or reviving followers (more on followers later). Chakra is charged by defeating Mooks or spending a large amount of Silver for a certain item in the Market (more on the Market later).

If the player underestimates the battle with the Daimyo and loses the fight, he/she is penalized 5% of his/her Score. The player then has to restart the Province all over again, with only the wisdom gained from the lost and none of the Silver and Exp. The exception is the Nightmare difficulty level. Defeat in Nightmare means that the player has to restart the whole game.

The final battle with the Daimyo.

There are Restart and Quit buttons to hastily back out of a losing map. However, at the time of writing, using those buttons on Hardcore or Nightmare difficulty level downgrades the difficulty to Normal. It is uncertain if this is a bug or game feature.

The game can be stopped after completing a Province and continued at a later time - the progress is saved. There is an interesting animation behind the 'clear current campaign' option in the main menu.

The reward for beating a Daimyo and completing the Province.

Exp earned in the game may be used to purchase Upgrades after completing a Province. In addition to that, Companions may be recruited to fight on the side of the Super Samurai. The next screenshot explains a lot more about this than mere words can.

The Upgrade screen between Province battles.

Fallen Companions may be revived in battle.

Silver is the other limited resource in the game. It is spent at the Market in a Province. The Market provides a different set of Upgrades for the player along with consumables that are replenished when a new Province is attempted.

So many Upgrades, so little Silver.

The Upgrades in the Market provide more varied bonuses. With the limited resources, the player has to decide on the Upgrade to purchase to best suit his/her playing style.

More unlocks... for the opposition!

As the player defeats the Daimyos in each Province, more and more gameplay features are unlocked. These may be new locations to be revealed on maps or new units and abilities for those people on the other side.

The game has a difficulty setting, which is selected at the start of the game. Higher difficulty settings are unlocked by meeting High Score requirements.

Higher difficulties are not only harder, but also more rewarding in terms of Score and Exp. More Exp means more Upgrades that may be purchased for the Super Samurai and his Companions. This extra Exp makes it a good reason to play the harder difficulty.

(On a side note, all screenshots in this article are from the Nightmare difficulty.)

Super Samurai Sweeper is a short game with decent challenge and some luck involved. The player needs to execute a lot of judgement in the game to decide on the amount of risk to take for the best  Score. The presentation is good with decent art and sound and cute animation. The High Score system and different available Upgrades are good reasons to replay the game.

The following are more screenshots from the game.

The Daimyo is a Mook!

Barely managed to defeat the Shogun in the final, final battle!

It was Nightmare.

That was the final score for the game I barely managed to win. 11 HP left in the final battle with the Shogun. And it was at Nightmare difficulty!

One final screenshot from a different game of a Province with the Shogun (labeled as 'daimyo'). It is a little hard to see, but the Daimyo was sitting on a Booby Trap. Smart fellow.

Smart final final boss.

Buddy Rush: King's Set (1.5)

A buddy of mine just donated a red King's Set, so I guess it is time to write this article.

Update 14 February 2012:
My buddy just donated more items - the blue set and a couple of pieces of the green set. They are added further below.

Update 23 February 2012:
My buddy donated the green set.

Update 5 July 2012:
Finally completed the colorless set.

Update 11 June 2013:
disboima sent in screenshots of the silver King's Set that came with the latest Mini-wave.
---

The Sixth Wave introduced the Arena where the player may battle random parties of other player characters. If successful, the player will be rewarded with a treasure chest, which may contain an item of the King's set.

There are five qualities of the King's Set, each with different level requirements and increasing stats. All four items of the King's Set to be equipped must be of the same color quality for there to be a set effect. Also, two equips with the same name cannot be equipped, even if they are of different colors.

The level requirements are:
colorless - 10
green - 30
blue - 50
red - 70
purple - 95
silver - 100

The King's Set does not have HP or MP Regen. Neither does it have MP or Evade bonuses. The character equipping the set likely would run out of HP and/or MP early. The set does, however, have good Att and Skill Pow, making it good for offense. The last two equip slots may be filled with items that help the character last longer in battle.

Colorless
(Update 5 July 2012)
Finally collected the colorless set. Note that these are from the third Mini-wave of the Seventh Wave.

King's Ring (colorless)

King's Necklace (colorless)

King's Plate Mail (colorless)

King's Flamberge (colorless)

The complete set gives:
Att+70
Def+10
HP+136
HP Regen+0%
MP+0
MP Regen+0%
Critical+2%
Evade+0%
Stun+1.5%
Hit Speed+3%
Skill Pow+21%
Skill CoolTime-0.6sec

Green
(Update 23 February 2012) 

King's Ring (green)

King's Necklace (green)

King's Plate Mail (green)

King's Flamberge (green)

My buddy donated another set. Maybe I should have ordered the screenshots from the most powerful down rather than the other way around.

Anyway, the complete green King's Set gives:
Att+96
Def+14
HP+232
HP Regen+0%
MP+0
MP Regen+0%
critical+3.5%
Evade+0%
Stun+2.5%
Hit Speed+4.5%
Skill Pow+31.5%
Skill CoolTime-1sec

My buddy now has 13k+ Honor points. A few more k's and maybe he will donate a colorless set. :p

Blue
(Update 14 February 2012)

King's Ring (blue)

King's Necklace (blue)

King's Plate Mail (blue)

King's Flamberge (blue)

The complete blue King's Set gives:
Att+134
Def+19
HP+320
HP Regen+0%
MP+0
MP Regen+0%
critical+5%
Evade+0%
Stun+3.5%
Hit Speed+5.5%
Skill Pow+46.5%
Skill CoolTime-1.4sec

I have not been at level 50 for quite some time so I cannot say for sure but those stats look good for level 50 equips. However, I do like to have some HP Regen and MP Regen.

Oh, and my buddy's Honor points are now 11k+ (he sent the blue set after the red set).

Red

King's Ring (red)

King's Necklace (red)

King's Plate Mail (red)

King's Flamberge (red)

The complete red King's Set gives:

Att+162
Def+23
HP+400
HP Regen+0%
MP+0
MP Regen+0%
critical+6.5%
Evade+0%
Stun+4.5%
Hit Speed+6.5%
Skill Pow+58.5%
Skill CoolTime-1.6sec

The red set's stats are almost as good as the purple sets from early Raids. Though the red set is definitely better than Genzir's Set. Unlike the purple Raid sets, the red set can be gifted, so it is easier to complete. Also, it can be donated to buddies to help them. :)

I am not sure how many Honor Points are necessary for the red set equips to start appearing. The buddy who donated the red set had his Honor Points at 9k+. Then again, he also has purple King's Set items.

Update 4 October 2012:
I have finally completed the purple King's Set! The stats below are after the 8.1 Hotfix (1.7.1).

King's Ring (purple!)

King's Necklace (purple!)

King's Plate Mail (purple!)

King's Flamberge (purple!)

The complete purple King's Set gives:
Att+222
Def+33
HP+520
HP Regen+0%
MP+0
MP Regen+0%
Critical+8.5%
Evade+0%
Stun+6%
Hit Speed+8.5%
Skill Pow+81%
Skill CoolTime-2.2sec

Seems obsolete with the new raid loot.
---

Silver
(Updated 11 June 2013)

King's Ring (silver, 1.8.2)

King's Necklace (silver, 1.8.2)

King's Plate Mail (silver, 1.8.2)

King's Flamberge (silver, 1.8.2)

The complete silver King's Set gives:
Att+366
Def+38
HP+768
HP Regen+0%
MP+80
MP Regen+0%
Critical+12%
Evade+0%
Stun+7%
Hit Speed+11.5%
Skill Pow+141%
Skill CoolTime-6sec

The silver King's Set has more Skill Pow, better Skill CoolTime and even comes with some MP. It also has some Stun but bad Def. This set is probably better for characters who do not take lots of damage in combat (i.e. not for tanks).
---

Buddy Rush: Contents