OT: The Daily Thread

[Steven Q. Urkel]

RL: Today is the national championship game for American tackle football. I grew up 2 hours north of Kansas City, MO, and Kansas City has been my home since 2007, so I will be rooting for the Kansas City Chiefs. Also have overnight guests coming to the house on Tuesday, so I'll need to spend some time today getting the house ready.

D2: Continuing with some Hell Mephy runs (If I have time to play). Now that I just found the HoZ, I just need a Vamp Gaze, Gore Riders, and a Venom Grip and I can resume questing with my Pally. Also Im extremely light in the unique jewelry dept, so if I could get a Saracens or Eye of Etlitch that wouldnt be totally out of line either But between watching the game, cooking food for the game, and cleaning the house I may not have time for D2 today at all

OVG: Finished the Judgement Day showdown event in WWE Champions this morning. There may be one one more tour added after the daily reset as well. I wont get the new card, but in this game you are rarely able to get new content unless you are a so that was to be expected lol

 

[Trim]

Hi, all. Bored on break, so I thought I'd stop by.

RL: Got super burnt out in my career spanning fifteen years, so I started a new job about three months ago working as a microchip tester. ...Not as cool as it sounds, as it's mostly automated and all I really do is load wafers into machines and do my best to keep them running well. It's overnights and 12+ hour shifts, too, so I feel wasted by the end of each work week. Half of my days off are dedicated to sleep & energy recovery. But it's different and I'm no longer angry or frustrated every single day, so I'm mostly thankful for the change.

D2R: Not as much playing as my brain thinks about it. Between the crazy work hours and the ever-dying computer that causes the game to crash with frequency, I'm mostly just getting in some bro time with John Remedy on weekends. Sunders certainly mixed things up in recent months, but with season three around the corner it'll be a new grind and another reason to keep going after all these years.

OVG: Again, dying computer, so it's mostly idlers. Antimatter Dimensions is the most recent, and for a title that lacks any graphical components it's managed to hold my attention for a while.

Happy Valentine's, everyone!

 

[BBS_Agonistes]

I figured I'd resurrect this thread since I wanted to post on the subforum, but am having difficulty playing...

RL: My arm/shoulder/neck/wrist/hand on the right has been giving me trouble for some time. Sadly, it seems D2 particularly aggravates it. Which leads me to...

D2R: I tried to get started on MFO running a FB Sorc and my UT 99er paladin, but with little success. Something about the repetitive mouse movement just really bothers my wrist.

OVG: Finally I have something to post here! I decided to try some other games, thinking maybe questing would give the arm a break. This may sound crazy, but Diablo 2 is basically the only game I've played in adulthood, and I really only played a few first-person shooter games as a teen decades ago (Doom, Rise of the Triad, etc.). I'm not really much of a game guy in general.

So I tried some other games.

Grim Dawn: I got pretty far as a Forcewave Soldier. I really enjoyed the world, looking at a different skill tree, trying to make sense of all the different gear, etc., after years of only speaking D2. I'm at level 46, and enjoying so far, but got distracted with...

Path of Exile: I had also heard this named as something fans of D2 would like, and it certainly has that feel. I started a Righteous Fire Inquisitor and blasted through all 10 acts pretty quickly. It wasn't nearly as complicated as I first thought, and it felt like it was actually too easy? To put it in D2 terms, the RF Inquisitor feels like an expensive, fully-geared Auradin that just melts everything while charging around and dropping fire traps when need be. But I didn't trade at all and just used self-found gear. Now that I'm to the maps, I don't see quite much reason to keep going.

After this, I was more open to exploring other kinds of games but not sure where to go. I love the aesthetic of Elden Ring (medieval fantasy type thing) but I'm thinking as someone who has never played that sort of game with a first-person perspective where you can really rotate in full 3d. I don't even know what that's called, but all the games my kids play are like that, but my experience with first-person games was just being able to rotate in a circle and maybe crouch. As FromSoftware games have a reputation for being difficult, I'm sure I'd probably not make it very far.

On the bright side, my nerve pain is better.

 

[SirName]

@BBS_Agonistes I get that too if I play too much of D2. For me I think it is due to that my index finger is either continuously clicking at 2 clicks/s or continuously holding down mouse1. Keep that up for an hour and… I know I do the “press harder to emphasize intent” which could be unlearned I suppose to lessen wrist problems. But I get none of that playing an FPS.

RL: winter is coming. I have started using the same wool shirt I wore the whole last winter and also wearing slippers at home. Need to tighten some windows and the doors.

OVG: World of tanks has been taking more of my game time than D2 for a good while now.

LoD:
When I don’t have enough time to fire up Wot but have some time at my disposable I play LoD. It is just perfect for those short stints of “get to next WP” or a few runs as loading times are practically nonexistant. This short bursts style also negates any wrist problems.

Polearm fanazealot is slowly moving through hell. I have made a 2h zealot before and this just feels too much like that one. It’s missing THAT something to make it special. Which lead me to start a bowbarb which is level 22 atm with Leap soon maxed. An upped Wildwitch string and Fortitude are ready for use when the time comes.

D2R: owned but not yet installed.

 

[LouB]

@BBS Agonistes The wrist is probably Carpal Tunnel issues. That gets a lot of people as we get older. Maybe a wrist pad to support your hand and change the angle of your wrist. As to the rest of your problems I suggest taking a close look at your overall posture/positioning. I'm left handed, but have noticed that my right shoulder will bother me if I don't sit correctly.

Try using the mouse in your left hand. That will be a double challenge. Ge3tting used to moving the mouse and finding the buttons with your right. If you try you will probably want to use a totally different set of buttons.

 

[Jpy]

The idea of the sheer dedication to Diablo to learn keyboard/mouse with non dominant hands after decades of the opposite makes my heart warm.

 

[LouB]

@BBS Agonistes Just remembered that several years ago I had a woman that worked for me that had Carpal Tunnel issues and she switched to a trackball which she said helped. They also have mice that are basically flipped on their side that supposedly help.

 

[HanShotFirst]

I'm sorry to hear that arm/wrist/hand problems are going around. In the last seventeen months I've come to know all about that ...

I myself tried a bigger mouse, a vertical mouse, a game controller ... nothing helped. In the end, the underlying muscle, tendon, nerve problems, continued to make themselves known. Switching hands may sound like a good idea ... to a healthy person. But alas, if you're struggling through an injury it's not that simple. When the dominant arm/hand gets injured, the other arm/hand moves to compensate. You might not realize you're doing it, but trust me, it will happen. Pretty soon both arms are messed up .

I'm right handed. When I started physical therapy six weeks ago, my right arm could exert 30 lbs of pressure. My left arm could exert 35 lbs of pressure. When demoing the test, the physical therapist was exerting 85 lbs of pressure. After six weeks of physical therapy, and probably more importantly, changing roles at work, my right arm is now able to exert 65 lbs of pressure, and the left arm 60 lbs of pressure. So, neat! The right arm has got it's dominance back ... barely. I've also improved my range of motion by about 30 degrees in all directions! Still, issues remain.

I've tried playing a bit of D2 recently and mostly it's felt pretty good. But today it was just a flat 'no'. I suspect it has something to do with the harder strengthening exercises I was doing before hand. I'm hopeful it will pass and I'll keep getting stronger ... but I could just have easily re-injured myself while trying to get stronger ...

In short, tendon problems suck. They really, really, suck.

OVG: (Am I doing this right? I've never posted in this thread before.) No. I've been saving my strength for my D2R would-be-UT99er. However, yesterday I did buy Civilization IV at a thrift store for $4. I figured even if I didn't end up playing it I could still have $4 worth of fun with its expansive game manual and other printed materials. (Remember when games came in boxes and had those? ... good times ... ) I haven't played Civ IV, my computer at the time wasn't strong enough back when it was released. But, I did spend about a year playing Civ III. That was right before I discovered D2 ... and, well, the rest is history.

I'm going to finish my current UT99er. Period. But as @BBS_Agonistes and @SirName have noted, D2 does seem to be particularly bad for struggling arm/wrist/hands. If my problems persist indefinitely, I think a turn based strategy game like Civilization is my best option for continued gaming. I hope it doesn't come to that ... but hey, I suppose I could do worse .

 

[Vandersus]

Hey, everyone! Just got back from the grocery store. Ran into a woman I'd met at the bar a couple of times. I just moved to a very small town in Missouri. The bar is the social epicenter. Anyway, I got her number. I'll probably take her out this weekend if I can stay focused and knock off some items from my to do.

She said something which I found really funny. She said, "I don't want to come off as creepy but I know a lot about you for someone that I've never actually met." I make friends pretty easily and she is friends with a bunch of people I've just recently met and been having a good time with. I thought it was funny because that same scenario applies here. I know a significant amount about most of you but you know very little about me. I've been reading most of your posts for years. Some of you I've been reading posts from since 2003 (or pretty close to there, anyway).

It's nice to finally meet all of you and I am really excited to collaborate. Most of my personal projects and challenges I've done myself have been created from ideas you all have helped me come up with even if you weren't aware! That's pretty cool to me.

D2: Sitting in A2 Nightmare. I am searching for a 4os 'Spirit' weapon base and a 4os 'Spirit' paladin shield base with +resists. Unsure what max +res all can spawn on white paladin shields in A2 Nightmare. I'm just casually farming. I tried toying around with the terror things but I don't like the rotating schedule. I also don't like running most of the areas and, so far, I've found nothing of interest from normal terror zones. I'll have to do some reading to see what makes these so special and what benefits they bring. Usually, with my untwinked playthroughs, I am very close to level 50 by the time I actually get to Baal in normal. I don't think normal/nightmare terror zones are going to provide me with anything.

OVG: Playing They Are Billions. I'm not good. At all. I am learning though. Doing it without looking up spoilers. Just tens of hours of mistakes! I think at this point I'm probably sitting at 100 hours played and I'm still very much a novice. I'm playing Subnautica and building a mega base.

Spoiler

I really miss the danger aspect of this game. Now, when a Leviathin gets near me, I look at it more like a teething puppy than anything dangerous.

I'm looking for other games to play now that I have this ROG Strix Scar 16. The last PC I had with a dedicated graphics card was a desktop I built with SLI EVGA 770's. So it's been quite a bit of time since I've actually gotten to sit down and game on a PC. If you have recommendations, please share! The only gaming I'm not really interested in are those games on Steam with the erotic anime characters. More power to you if you want to play them but I'm probably good haha.

RL: Working on selling this Macbook Pro 14" and two Dell 32" gaming monitors. I'm not advertising the sale here because I'm not going to ship anything. This next part is just a small vent. Macbook Pro was purchased last year and has Applecare until Nov 2025. It comes with a USB C extension hub, a traveling case, a hardshell case, original box, original charger, a $200 docking station and two 32" Dell S3222DGM monitors. I'm trying to sell everything together as is with no blemishes and I'm having a hell of a time. Mostly scams but I figured some college kid or someone working from home would jump at the chance to buy all of this for an even $1200. I figured that was low enough that it would move fast, I MIGHT have to take it and help set it up for the buyer, and it would clear up my desk space so I can get my lockpicking space back. I've gotten plenty of offers but nothing over $700. At that price point I'd rather just donate the lot to a non-profit or something.

Books: always taking book recommendations! Anything about the water. Underwater horror. Awesome stories. Real life diving stories. Biographies about divers. WWI history, WWII history. Thrillers, horror (to an extent). Anything. I am a sponge and I've hit a brick wall with finding new books/games.

 

[LouB]

Here are some books I really enjoyed

Non Fiction
Shadow Divers, Robert Kurson - Finding a WW2 German Sub off New Jersey

Never Quit, Jimmy Settlke - Air Force PJ

Collision Course, Alvin Moscow - the story of the sinking of the Andria Doria

Into the Storm, Tristram Korten - the sinking of the Le Faro in Hurricane Jaoquin in 2015

The Last Stand of the Tin Can Sailors, James D Hornfischer - WW2 Battle of Samar

Cold War Navy Seal, James M Hawes - Seals in Africa in the 1960s

Alone at Dawn, Dan Schilling - Afghanistan story of Medal of Honor winner John Chapman and the Air Force Combat Controllers.

We were Soldiers Once and Young, LTG Harold Moore - Vietnam and the beginning of Air Mobile

Fiction - The author is Mike Lunnon-Wood. He's British and he wrote military fiction stories involving the British Military. He also wrote "Let Not the Deep" which is about a sea rescue by the British Royal National Lifeboat Institution.

 

[maxicek]

RL: Not much, just the usual December stuff. Dishwasher is playing up so that may be my Christmas present.

D2: Doing a few TZs every now and again with my UT99er. XP bar is moving slowly.

OVG: I picked up Diablo Immortal in the summer and I'm still playing & having fun. Despite all the negativity from the fanbase, it really is a great game, not just a great mobile game. And there are a lot of free to play / low spend players, so you really don't need to spend a fortune to enjoy it.

Reading: https://www.purediablo.com/forums/threads/ot-what-are-you-reading.288/page-5
On the last book of The Witcher Series. The last books are meh IMO, so I have slowed down to almost zero. Also winter tends to be inside gaming, summer is outside reading.

 

[djmbbandie]

RL: on vacation till the 2nd. Currently in NC.

D2: I find my favorite build to not think about anything nowadays is a zoo druid.

OVG: Been totally obsessed with ATS and ETS2 lately (combined +1000 hours in steam). Basically trucking with a load and a destination with lots of driving.

 

[SirName]

*casts revive on thread.

RL: somewhat stressful period at work. But going to an office for a second time this week (To our own on tuesday and to customers today) is a nice change to sitting at the home office every day. Reminds me of a time showering was a daily thing vs the nowadays standard style of when-absolutely-necessary. Feels good to freshen up more often. (Who would have thought?) Need to try to keep this up even without getting out of the house.

D2: tried running Countess and Andy and came to the conclusion that running anything for a long period still is not for me.

Usually I only have one character in development at a time but now there are two. Bowbarian is at Nightmare Act 3 and an auraless Zealot (Paladin) is in Hell Act 3. Both are starting to slow down at P8. Which atleast for the Barb is worrying as usually for me not being able to handle P8 NM means trouble in P1 Hell.

OVG: Still playing World of tanks. I think my personal goals are reached this year so maybe this is the final year. They killed their forum and switched to Discord for discussions. That was a real bummer and really idiotic as they killed a community. Playing hasn’t been the same since. A good reminder I should pony up and get a subscription to this forum to help keeping it going.