a bit of this and a little of that

What have I been doing lately? Well, what started as a few game-notes and milestones ended up as a rather large blog update.

Gyb

I forgot how many fun words there are when sailing, Chandlery is another good example. Sometimes I can cut upwind really well, twisting my hip and holding a stiff front leg will all the weight on my shoulders and the kite stable but fully powered on at 45°above the water. When its working well it feels just like being on trapeze of the Hobie 18 on a screaming reach. Other times I can not seem to get the board set, either holding it too flat against the water or bouncing across the surface and some times the waves are really unsettling, causing me to lose balance altogether. Light (~10kn) or heavy (~25kn) seems to make no difference to my ability to cut upwind.

Load&Pop seems to work well for me from the first time that I tried it and I’ve yet to faceplant while failing an attempt. Launching from the crest of a wake makes it a lot easier, I’ve managed sequential jumps and a jump+gyb but have no clue how high I get and need to go immediately into recovery mode as I’m generally unsure as to where my kite has ended up, granted I try to keep it fairly constant in the sky unless I intend to turn while I’m in the air.

Waves still pose a bit of a challenge, partially due to my inability to consistently cut upwind. White horses seem to knock me off my feet and the extra speed gained from coming down a wave makes me lose traction on my kite. Plus it takes a lot of concentration to stay upright.

Downwind has been fun the few times I’ve attempted it, the safest method seems to be keeping the kite on a starboard tack >70° above the water

~

Finally figured out why I’m crazy to go out with such a large kite, all the extra force negates my ability to cut upwind. The extra sail area is not that hard to control and I don’t feel like I am in danger and can generally still walk backwards against the kite when on the beach. But when I’m trying to tack and a gust hits it either stands me up (regardless of how much my board is cutting in) because my centre of gravity is below my harness; Or my board loses grip on the water and I scoot across, directly towards the kite with the board sideways until the gust finishes, this when my centre of gravity is at my harness or above. Net effect is that I’ve spent a lot of time going back and forth on the same line.

The other problem with my tack was that I had only one corner of the board in the water, to make a big splash, whereas it was much more effective to try and keep the whole side of the board in the water, to ensure I have sufficient friction to lean backwards. Also letting go with one hand and putting it near the water helps with leaning out further.

To summarise

Larger board = more surface area, stable, easy to launch

Smaller board = more maneuverable and responsive, better for heavy winds and swell

Larger/longer kite handle = easier to turn kite, clearer haptic feedback

Small handle = needs more vigorous steering but can still fly the larger kites

Larger kite = to catch more wind, slower to turn, can be use in lighter winds, too big and I cannot cut upwind.

Small kite = for small people and heavy winds, too small and it wont be able to pull you.

Also when starting/stopping/resting I Sheetout the flagout line to reduce the tension on the lines, make the kite luff and make the bar Softer. Then when I want to go I sheet in the flagout line to make it shorter relative to the steering lines to a point where I rarely have my bar fully powered on. For example there is not enough wind and I want to cut upwind then I’d reef in all the way as there won't be too much bar pressure and I can still fully power up the kite without trouble and can still reach the bar as I lean back lots.

 

Space Rangers

Cash and XP boosted, saving human me a bit of time, without breaking the game. I may want to boost the Dominators later by the looks of things. I still want to farm Government missions for more medallions, until the current tech levels make my starting combo of engine +Fuel obsolete.

But for a bit of variety I’m also hunting the warp for artefact's. From my last playthrough I recall the planetary battles and arcade hyperspace being the most fun parts of the game. Though it’s the plot and story that holds it all together.

What weapons should I stock? There are achievements for certain ones and I cannot recall what was great for hyperspace, only that it was counter intuitive, ie. My energy weapons now shoot missiles. The life steal ?Rethone? probably, because I’m Anoiki, though dominator gear is pretty good. Incidentally…

I arrived in a system recently saved from Dominators, looted corpses of the dominated dominators and more than doubled my ships speed, while decreasing my net mass ~50%. A massive increase when compared to what I could find in the shops. Then as an added bonus most of my artefacts are doubled in effectiveness due to the proximity of complex technology.

Still my strategy in unaltered, more government missions, Rethone for lifesteal, may unlock the unique science ship first but will get more bang for my buck from the pirate ship I think. I’ll Level up maintenance next as I hunt for the artefacts and upgrade, when past 50 missions I should be able to start building a fleet, then I need to upgrade the 30,000 point commander skill. Primarily to hunt trade ships, for a pirate ranking? I wonder if I can take my fleet with me into hyperspace?

~

And at this point I realise that the steam achievements are no longer progressing, thus the reason it was hard to confirm the life stealing lazer. So I’m restarting the game to get the tutorial droid and move some of the difficulty sliders up to impossible. Possibly I will use probes to explore some of the uninhabited planets otherwise I think my strategy above will remain (may try to scavenge dominator gear sooner though)

Marvel Heroes

Daily quest is great for XP, when to Co-Op again though? If never, then I may as well switch to Warframe.

Deadpool restarted, so I have two pets now. It may take a while before I can use my “I don’t die” abilities again. I don’t know if the random hero box gives any teamup-heroes. So they are my next goal I think. While Magik works well with Loki with all the summons. I think other than that I’m better off with a Teamup that I never summon. Mostly all the AOE abilities seem to look after the minions so overall I think my heroes lack was to focus bosses. I’m still using my level 60 Black Panther to farm SIF items and uniques. The most effective use of the Omega system seems to be upgrading XP/SIF/RIF so that I can play the game less.

Yet to try any PvP or 60+ game content, mainly because in GW2 it was always easy to play with friends. Whereas here my Loki keeps outleveling Josh so that we cannot play together and when I play with randoms I feel like the weakest link. I really don’t like games that have “Best in Slot” items, it means that there is one effective way to play, and anything else is sub-par and since I have a job and nolonger go to Uni I just don’t have the time to dedicate to something like that.

Further to this the daily login rewards will lose their allure when I go to SA for xmas holidays to see family. subsequent to that I may play this as much as Chivalry.

Artemis the space ship simulator sounds succulent since it’s synchronised social setup requires several sailors. Sadly several allies sunk the experiment succinctly. So this spaceship may subsequently succour to sleep in a cycophogus.

LoL will always be on deck though, along with minecraft and Terraria we keep coming back for more. While Mechwarrior online is OK and I still play it occasionally it really lacks teamwork and camaraderie. The few times I’ve tried to play it with others I end up in a kamikaze rush to start the next game. Divinity Original sin may have been a good co-op game for Levi but now that he has finished his play through he is not so interested and since I don’t read manga I’ve found it to be incredibly slow. For the most part I miss doorways and have had to use environmental effect to stun-lock enemies and my highest DPS ability is dropping treasure chests on things. Overall I think Dragon Commander was a more enjoyable instalment of this franchise and don’t think I’ll see the end of original sin.

 

Bass Bass

Another project to put on hold for the time being. I’ve underestimated how many bills I get in a month and overestimated the amount of home loan repayments I can make. The next result being that I have very little cash to spend on food, let alone fun. Though I’ve Found an ex-student Double Bass that I may be able to acquire, and it seems best to get some actual lessons to start off with (I’ll need extra motivation until I have proper callouses on my left hand fingers). If that works out OK I may be able to join the church band and pretend I’m a drummer (or country bass guitarist) that way two cords would be sufficient to begin with. If I get decent the only other play I’ve found to practice is the Play house theatre. And the Rocksmith computer game, apparently double bass and base guitar are similar enough to be interchangeable, though a Base Bass is cooler. Maybe I could call it the Acid Base?

 Girls, girls! girls?

Apparently if I were clean shaven then I'd get a girlfriend straightaway, funny thing is I've spent a lot more time clean shaven than bearded, and at least my beard is a talking point. Aside from being another side project I never really thought I would be still single at this age but here I am. I dont think it's even possible to find a girl gamer, and I'm cool with that, not like I want to do everything together. but I thought it mayt have been easier to find some sweet cheeks at the beach, or gymnastics, or Rotaract, or Salsa. Somebody cuddly who would be generally very pleased to see me and at least fringe an interest in whatever it was Iv'e been doing, merely because it is me doing it. There have been a couple of girls that I've been interested in who where just not flattered by my interest and a couple that didn't think I was interested. Conversely there were a couple who were interested in me but that I didnt notice. So overall I really need to be better at talking. Communication breakdown, it's always the same. Having a nervous breakdown, driving me insane.