User talk:SBEyes

Welcome on Guild wiki. Hope you have fun --   † F1 ©  Talk  10:46, 17 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Thank you, and you've indirectly helped me learn a new trick, thanks to those naughty dangling asterisks of yours. :p  Nwash 10:49, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Welcome! You've proven a definite asset, and we do lack people who like to dig into wikicode. :) Be sure to watch Forum:Coding. -- ◄mendel► 08:58, 26 May 2009 (UTC)
 * Thanks, and thanks for helping me unlock the skill .  Might come in handy in removing other Parser Fial hexes in the future, among other things.  I noticed  in the magic word list on the MediaWiki wiki, but didn't read close enough to see it was the missing piece I needed.  I'll make sure I get Forum:Coding on my watchlist. Nwash 10:49, 26 May 2009 (UTC)
 * I've been collecting tricks like that for a year now. :) If you notice any yourself, please share! -- ◄mendel► 17:20, 26 May 2009 (UTC)

Why ULC?
"Because the MediaWiki designers hate those of us who learned proper article capitalization" &mdash; actually, the reason is probably that it allows linking to other articles from wikitext without adjusting the link target - I have changed a lot of end of the world to end of the world as I adjusted those links. But it does take getting used to, I had to adjust at first as well. -- ◄mendel► 17:42, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Meh, I don't blame GuildWiki's policy. Given the way the linking works in the software, it makes sense.
 * But a case-insensitive comparison in any programming language I'm familiar with, and SQL, for that matter, isn't exactly hard to do, so I'm not sure why the designers of the MediaWiki software chose only to make the first character case-insensitive in links. Then the case of the entire article title would not be relevant for linking.  I can only assume they saw some advantage in case sensitivity for some reason... one that currently eludes me.  At any rate, that's the only reason I made the comment--because I'm confused not about why ULC is a good idea, but why the software was designed in a way that makes it so.  Nwash 17:52, 2 June 2009 (UTC)

Decisions, decisions
For the first time, I've actually managed to amass and hold on to more than 100 platinum. Sadly, I'm divided on what to do with it... signets of capture for the Skill Hunter titles? The two additional armor sets I need for Terra's Monument of Resilience? Getting the skill trainer and scroll trader for the Temple of Courage guild hall for the sake of completeness? ... Decisions, decisions. Nwash 20:52, 2 June 2009 (UTC)


 * My vote goes towards the Skill hunter title, or maaybe the armors, for what it's worth :) --- [[Image:VipermagiSig.JPG|Ohaider!]] -- (contribs) &emsp;(talk)  20:58, 2 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Skill hunters. You'll never regret that. As soon as I get my z-keys, I'm gonna do Prof. Arnout aka The Emperors Angel 06:43, 3 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I was thinking along the same line... it's just I only have only about half the platinum I need for that. So many elite skills left to cap... Nwash 15:55, 3 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Elite Skill Hunter... you might... just... make it.
 * You'll get loot from bosses and their friends (and other mobs) but not from crafting armor... :P A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 15:59, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Hi there!
I saw your reply, so don't forget to add the userbox if you want to! =) Just copy 'n' paste it and it'll be done like dinner. Hope you liked my pic of the boots.    A F K When Needed 12:04, 3 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Why not indeed :D A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 12:29, 3 June 2009 (UTC)

Zaishen Menagerie Title
I should start advertising my new userbox for those of you working on filling up your Zaishen Menagerie. Just add to your page. Template:Zaishen Menagerie Title has more instructions. Nwash 19:24, 4 June 2009 (UTC)
 * See Userbox_gallery. -- ◄mendel► 21:48, 4 June 2009 (UTC)

Userbox
The first row has four userboxes, and I can't see all of them :P A F K When Needed 16:33, 5 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Layout improved for your lower resolution. :)  Nwash 16:36, 5 June 2009 (UTC)

Eternal Grove
Hi there. Do you need Masters in NM or HM? A F K When Needed 18:03, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Just normal mode. So far, I've managed to hero/hench master's in normal mode in almost every mission, but I don't know if I'm going to be quick enough with flagging and running around to do it with this one.  Maybe with enough practice... it's one of those missions I haven't played much since I went Luxon first and have only recently done any Kurzick stuff.
 * And I should get around to trying hard mode stuff... I just haven't felt the desire to experiment with more defensive builds yet. I'm like Cynn... I like short fights.  >.>  Nwash 18:11, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I can help you, if you want. Have 2 people, 6 heroes.
 * Each person is a "team" with their heroes, standing at the gates.
 * Have a healer, MM, and 2 damage dealers in each team, Rits are nice 'cause their ...ally... spirits (e.g. Recuperation) can heal any minor damage the Tree Singers get. If a Turtle comes along, the closest team goes for it, kills it, and retreats to the gate. A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 18:16, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Yeah, I'm pretty sure I could do it with another player helping. I already managed to get as high as 11/12 tree singers saved once.  Just something got through at one point and I never got a chance to go back and kill it before it offed one of the tree singers.  So yeah, when are you usually on?  (Thankfully, Terra has both ritualist heroes, but I'll have to check and see how many resto spirit skills I've unlocked.  Rits are the one profession I haven't found a build for that I like... not that I've played it much.)  Nwash 18:23, 7 June 2009 (UTC)


 * I could tag along too if you decide to go ~now/in half an hour or something.
 * As for HM: 6 Monks ftw <3 (or, in my case, 5 Monks and an Ele :P). RoJ got me through all 8 man places (I used Discord in 4 and 6 man areas). --- [[Image:VipermagiSig.JPG|Ohaider!]] -- (contribs) &emsp;(talk)  18:24, 7 June 2009 (UTC)


 * The master's reward section of the Eternal Grove page is specifically written to explain how to get master's reward in easy mode with only henchmen and heroes. With henchmen only, it's very hard, but if you have heroes, too, you can readily split your party in an appropriate manner.
 * Heavily offensive builds give you short fights in hard mode, too. The problem is that the reason the fights are short is that you wipe quickly.  Mostly, hard mode requires every character to bring a couple of defensive skills or so, and except for healers, the rest of the skills can be offensive.
 * If you have two players and six heroes, splitting it as one player and three heroes at each gate is a bad idea. You might be able to make it work in easy mode, but that would be very rough in hard mode.  Mobs don't distribute themselves between the gates evenly, so neither should you.  Quizzical 18:29, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Oh, I agree that the guide is well written and that the strategy is sound. It just requires you to be rather quick and have enough experience to know when things are going to happen, especially if your character is damage dealing too.  I doubt I'd have too much trouble if I was playing my monk since I normally get to spend so much time preening during combat.  So it's not that I think it isn't doable.  It's just I think I wouldn't get it unless I repeated it enough to have it half-memorized.
 * And I've read the hard mode article too, and personally experienced what happens to too-heavily-offensive teams. I'll probably get around to tweaking my builds for hard mode eventually, but I just haven't felt much desire to yet.  Nwash 18:50, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I'm rather fond of 2 people + 6 heroes, but if you think it'd be better with me and Viper, fine with me. (I just find it handy that, by and large, AI does what you tell it to, so there's the factor that the whole "team" is trying to accomplish one thing, and only one thing, at a given time)
 * I'm GMT, and play over six hours a day between about noon 'till midnight. Drop me a message on my Talk Page like half an hour in advance or reply here if now works for you. A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 18:32, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Quizzical - I found in HM the same basic tactic works. Two people, six heroes, each person is responsible for their own gate. You can send 1-2 heroes off to help, you can, and I did... once... outright abandon your gate to help. But, by having half the team each devoted to one objective, makes sure than you can be flexible without losing track of what's happening "over there" A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 18:34, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * @AFK: I might be able to log on about a half hour or so.  It's been a little busy today.  Nwash 18:50, 7 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Rather than waiting until one gate is in trouble to send help, it's better to know ahead of time which gate will have most of the mobs and send help before the mobs show up. Regardless, if you're sending heroes to the other side, that's not a simple four characters at each gate strategy.  Quizzical 18:55, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, I'm logged on and ready to give it a whirl. Nwash 19:26, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Right-o A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 19:29, 7 June 2009 (UTC)

The biggest problem doing Eternal Grove by yourself is that the henchmen are simply inadequate for the mission. When you have a proper setup - a minion master at each gate, a monk or two, and some other damage dealer/tank - the mission is laughably easy, and the hardest part is just being patient and not running out of the grove. But the hench team tends to die over and over (even against the Luxons sometimes!), or even wipe, and things go downhill very quickly from there... Entropy (C) 20:31, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * It could end up being one of those missions I'd find easy enough if I tried it again. I thought I was going to fial so hard when I tried to get master's in Gate of Pain for the first time.  I used to fial hard just trying to get the normal reward... tried to get master's a few weeks ago when I hadn't played that mission in months, and got it on the first attempt.  *shrug*  So, yeah, some of my fears aren't really justified anymore... Nwash 20:37, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Wut?! GoP first attempt? Hm... I might need to bug you about telling me how you did than when I finish becoming a Slayer of Wurms... A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 20:49, 7 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, it wasn't pretty. I think everyone in my party died at least once, and I did almost wipe once (but that was a moment of stupidity--I should have known better than attacking that group of torment demons where I did.)  I don't really think I did anything too special, but maybe it's the fact that Terra routinely carries Pain Inverter, and it certainly is effective on the Terrorwebs.  I also targeted them with extreme prejudice.  Funny how fire eles are usually at the top of the "kill it, kill it, kill it!" list. Nwash 08:42, 8 June 2009 (UTC)

In honor of the userboxes I just added...
I once recall hearing about a study that found that something like 54 percent of male players play female characters and something like 70 percent of female players play male characters. (When I get a little less lazy in a bit, I'll find a link.) They seemed to think female players were trying to dodge the kind of attention they get while male players were seeking it. At any rate, it seems clear that it's safer to assume the person behind the keyboard is the opposite sex of the character you see. Reflect and discuss. Nwash 14:29, 9 June 2009 (UTC)

Update: The numbers I recalled were off, and I've now fixed them above. This article seems to refer to the same study, but I thought I found one that went more into the reasons, which this one does not.
 * for such a mild difference, they're trying to say the two genders are completely different, which simply is not backed up by the findings given A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 14:36, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't think the conclusions are questionable on those grounds. Men and women are treated differently in the real world, so it isn't unreasonable to assume that the reasons for playing opposite sex characters would be difference and possibly even opposite.  What I wonder about is if it's just a little too simplistic and generalized an explanation--it certainly seems to be the most common one given, but I suspect the typical motivations in both cases are more varied and complex, and that's what I'm curious about.  Nwash 15:59, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Leapfrogging ftw
 * Nwash, you disagreed with me making the same post I did for such a mild difference
 * I never said "wrong" I was saying that they had a small difference in percentage, and then started coming out with extreme things, when small percentages only explain small things A_F_K_sig_2.jpg A F K When Needed 19:16, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I don't mean to be picky, but that is a very dangerous reasoning shortcut people take. All these data points tell us is that a majority of MMO players of both sexes are playing avatars of the opposite sex.  That's all we can infer from it.  The problem with your point is that it assumes that both data points are directly related because they seem to show a correlation, and they may well be, but just because the study only looked at two data points doesn't mean there aren't other independent factors involved.  All I'm saying is that it may be two completely different factors pushing each sex toward this in-game gender swapping, and the closeness of only two data points cannot possibly rule that out.
 * See, even if there was a big difference between the genders, like if 70 percent of male players played female characters and only 20 percent of female players played male characters, we couldn't assume there was a big difference in motivation in either despite the big difference in percentage. It could be the same thing that pushes both sexes toward playing the same sex, for example--looking at that fake data from another viewpoint, we'd have 70 percent of males and 80 of females playing female characters.  You see, the data points are close when viewed from one perspective but are very different when viewed from the other perspective.  The numbers can only tell us what; they can't tell us anything about why, even that the reasons are similar.  We have to speculate beyond the numbers for that--that's what the authors apparently did, and the reason I'm doubting them has nothing to do with the numbers, but a belief that human behavior and gender issues are just not that simple. Nwash 20:15, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * I bet you €5 that there's plenty women who simply prefer looking at a man's behind. --- [[Image:VipermagiSig.JPG|Ohaider!]] -- (contribs) &emsp;(talk)  16:08, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * So, same basic reason a lot of us guys play female characters? :p  (Well, I still think there's a little more to it, but I do think that's certainly an element.) Nwash 17:20, 9 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Yep (As I said, plenty, not all). --- [[Image:VipermagiSig.JPG|Ohaider!]] -- (contribs) &emsp;(talk)  18:30, 9 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Have you looked at male mesmers/warriors/paragons/necromancers (lesser extent) ? I wouldn't waste a character slot on that shit :< Entropy [[Image:Entropy Sig 2.jpg]] (C) 19:12, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Heh, true enough. It does seem a strong argument can be made that Guild Wars might skew the results even further, since most of the female avatars are at least reasonably good looking. The "barrels," on the other hand (by which I mean the male warriors)... Nwash 19:15, 9 June 2009 (UTC)


 * Orange Barrels ftw <3 --- [[Image:VipermagiSig.JPG|Ohaider!]] -- (contribs) &emsp;(talk)  19:24, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * The full study is online at http://www.labmeeting.com/paper/9611417/hussain-griffiths-2008-gender-swapping-and-socializing-in-cyberspace-an-exploratory-study.
 * Unfortunately, they don't give the exact wording of the gender question; I assume that many players play characters of both genders, and that these would be included in the numbers cited, so your conclusion that the player behind the avatar has the opposite gender appears unsupported to me. -- ◄mendel► 22:19, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Hmm, fair point. It does seem to say they only asked if a player ever had gender-swapped their character (which makes me think the original article I read made the mistake of assuming more).  Real life always has a way of getting complicated.  A very quick look suggests that the study gives more varied reasons for the gender swapping too.  And ugh, a self-selected sample?  With only 157 participants?  Including games where certain classes were limited to one gender?  (Might as well count that as about a 50% margin or error or some such... why, oh why, does anyone bother reporting on such things?)  There's got to be something better out there.  I'll have to take a better look tonight--this study is weaksauce in terms of any statistical reliability.  May be the best available, though.  Maybe MMOs haven't been around long enough for anyone to do anything truly rigorous.  Nwash 22:38, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Let's roll our own study: design a questionaire, put it up on the web, link to it from our site notice, we ought to get 100+ participants easily. -- ◄mendel► 22:48, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Probably would. It'd be much better if we had a way of choosing random players, but by having it limited to the wiki anyway, we're already at a bit of a fial there even if we do that.  Letting anyone who wants to participate do so probably doesn't make it much worse, and maybe a greater volume of responses could make up some for that, and it's interesting enough a topic to go on with even if we'd end up with some flaws in study design.  I'll see about coming up with a rough draft for a questionnaire during the night tonight, and we can let the wiki help clean it up.  Nwash 23:03, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * (edit conflict) Quoting investigaming:
 * Research Highlights:
 * 119 participants completed an online survey
 * 83 males (69%) and 32 females (26%) r
 * age 18 to 69.
 * 73% from the United States; 8% from the U.K. and 3% Canada
 * Males played online nearly 7 times a week compared to females 5 times a week
 * Now let's do the maths correctly. Assuming online times to be distributed 5:7 (hah!), the chance of encountering a female player is 21.2%, and 78.8% for male. Now here's the matrix:
 * {| class="stdt"

! rowspan=2 | ! colspan=2 | player ! female !! male ! female avatar ! 49.4% ! male avatar ! 50.6% ! total !! 21.2% !! 78.8%
 * 6.8%
 * 42.6%
 * 14.4%
 * 36.2%
 * }
 * So your "safe to assume" is a 57% chance, and a 119 player sample size: a coint toss at best, it's the same as saying "it is safe to assume the coin will come up heads". To check whether these numbers are in any way valid, have a look in GToB or Kamadan and check whether the male/female avatar ratio is 50/50; if it's not, these numbers are even more off for real-world Guild Wars. -- ◄mendel► 22:45, 9 June 2009 (UTC)
 * Just a small note... I said "safer to assume," and even there, I mean that in an absolute sense, in that you were indeed slightly more likely to be right that way than making the opposite assumption. (Though the problems now apparent with these results throws even that into doubt, admittedly.)  The best course is always not to assume at all; I never meant to imply otherwise--I meant to compare one assumption against its opposite.  Nwash 22:51, 9 June 2009 (UTC)