The Liebster Game

I've been chosen to play the Liebster Award game by the Grumpy Elf over at the Grumpy Elf's blog.  I can't say I really know what this is, but it's always nice to have a guideline for posts, rather than just think of them off the top of my head, so thanks, GE.

Rules:

    Write a blog post about the Liebster Award

    Thank the person who nominated you and link to their blog

    Display the award on your blog

    Answer the eleven questions that the blogger who nominated you gives you

    Give eleven random facts about yourself

    Nominate five blogs that you think deserve the award

    Create eleven questions for them to answer

    List the rules in your post

    Inform the bloggers that they’ve been nominated and provide them the link to your post

Blogs I Nominate:

JC Sway at Lolsurvival.
Darkbrew at the Brew Hall.
Bendak at Eyes of the Beast.

Kurn at Kurn's Corner.

Dayani at Healiocentric.

My Questions For Them:

1. What's the best (and/or your favorite) blog post you've ever written, and why?

2. If you could take any moment from your life, and relive it, what would it be?

3. What was your favorite tier in WoW?

4. Where would you, and where would your characters, like to grow old, once they're finished killing dragons?

5. What book are you reading right now (or the most recent book) and why did you like it?

6. If you could have any super hero power, what would it be?

7. If you could change any one thing in WoW, what would it be?

8. What was your favorite lore moment in WoW?

9. If you had to be stranded on a deserted island with on NPC from WoW, who would it be?

10. What other games do you like to play?

11. What's your inspiration for writing WoW blogs?

My Answered Questions:

1. What is your favorite expansion of warcraft and why do you think its your favorite?

This might be a really unpopular answer, but MoP was my favorite from a lore perspective.  I've never really been violent enough to really fit in with WoW, so I really liked where they went with Pandaria's make peace campaign.  With that said, I also really liked that we got to destroy Garrosh. There was a moment in one of the remade cataclysm zones, when garrosh called my queen a bitch, right to her face, with me standing their watching but somehow, magically unable to attack him... Well, since then I've been biding my time, finding a moment when I could strike out against Garrosh, and Pandaland gave me that opportunity. I suppose I also killed him several times during Cata, too, but only on my ally characters, so MoP gave me an opportunity to kick his ass with all my characters.  :-)

Anyhow, to everyone who thinks I'm crazy, I'd have to remind you that I barely played at all during classic wow, and didn't come back to the game until late Wrath, not even hitting max level until after the lich king was dead.  So I didn't really get to experience any of those xpacs in full.

2. What is your favorite fantasy book of all time? (fantasy, sci/fi, horror, they all fit)

Cat's Cradle, by Vonnegut, basically gave me enough hope to get through highschool, and then it helped me get through college.  It's still helping me get through life, a little happier, a little less alone.  I think I was in the 8th grade when my dad gave me the book, and since then I've re-read it at least once every year or two. The cover came off a few years ago, as I'd read it too many time (was a cheap paperback from the sixties, perhaps not meant to last this long).  I should probably get a new copy, soon. 

Dune, by Frank Herbert, was another huge one in my life.  I can't remember how old I was when I first read it; some point not too long after reading Cat's Cradle.  I was convinced that I was a mentat, and that at some point, my parents were going to let me know that they'd actually been secretly training me to be one all those years.  I suppose I can be honest with your here, I still kind of think that I'm a mentat. :-P   I kept reading the series all the way up to the point where (spoiler alert?) he turns into a sand worm.  It got kind of weird.  But that first book was amazing.

3. If you could make one change to warcraft what would be it?  

I don't know that there's any one change that would make a huge difference.  I think it's more likely that there are lots of small changes that need to happen.  I think, the thing that most discourages me about WoW isn't any aspect of the game, but the player base, so I'd make it that anything you write in trade chat gets emailed to your mother.  Or grandmother.  Maybe that's to vindictive of me, I mean, I imagine most of the trolls in game are doing what they do because they're lonely and depressed, so maybe that would be the best change to the game, if everyone who played it could somehow, magically no longer feel like they were alone.

4. Where would you have your character/(s) call home?

Grizzly Hills is my favorite spot in the game, and if I lived in Azeroth, that's where I'd be.  It's beautiful and has great music and great forests and mountains.  Plus it's really close to some of the more extreme landscapes.  As for my characters, they're not really good at calling any place 'home'. They all need to be out, exploring and saving people.   

As they age, my DK might like to settle down near half hill in pandaland.  He's had a really rough life; wrought much destruction.  And I could see him settling down on a farm for the simple life, one day, much like Thanos on his Mars Farm after realizing he'd intentionally given up the Infinity Gauntlet.

My hunters and my druid, however, would remain nomads in the wild.  Like Rexar, they may be called upon to fight from time to time, but their home isn't in a silly garrison or city, it's in the wilds. (I'm still very annoyed that I get a "well rested" buff by being in cities, when I'm obviously much better rested in the wild).

5. Have you ever met anyone in real life that you met online first?

Sure,  I have an OKCupid account, and have gone on a few dates from there.  And I've of course been to blizzcon, to meet many guild and hunter friends.  Even here in Chicago, as it's not the smallest of towns, I've met up with a couple of Warcraft Hunters Union members, when we found out we lived near eachother.  NBD

6. If you could add one race not currently in game at all to the game as a playable race, what would it be?

Hmmmm...  Not in the game at all is hard.  If I could choose any race, it would be Mok'nathal.  But not in the game is really hard to choose, as it's really opens up the possibilities.  I realize that humans are already in the game, but I would like for their to be a separate race of humans.  They'd be feral humans, living in anarchistic band society.  And they'd definitely be against the dastardly tyrant Varian Wrynn, which would lead them to siding with the horde, in a battle.  

And, since I'm the one making this up, they wouldn't be able to play any of the annoying classes. They could be druids, hunters, rogues, shaman, monks or warriors.  Shamanism and the druidic arts would be the only forms of magic they'd practice.  And definitely none of those holier-than-thou religious type priests or pallies.

7. What inspires you to write a post?

Well, in the practical sense, I generally write a post when I'm curious about something. A huge number of my posts started with me hearing something Solar said on his old podcast, or more recently on the hunting party podcast, and wanting to explore the idea, look into the math behind it. Basically me just seeing if I could prove or disprove it.  

In a more broad since, what inspires me to write in general is curiosity.  I think curiosity is the greatest of virtues.  Long before I started this blog, I was basically making the same posts just for myself, where I'd spend hours making spreadsheets and looking at various ways to model playing a hunter computationally. And I guess, me making this into a blog instead of just writing it completely for myself, is a hope that others will join me in curiosity.  I realize that I'm just writing about playing video games, but I hope that, even if just a little bit, I'm encouraging people to think critically; to not accept things people tell us, but look for reasoning.

8. What other types of games do you like?

I like good stories, so that's definitely something I look for in any game I play solo.  If it's not as good of a story as I would get from reading a book, then I'll probably go read a book instead.  Games like the Dragon Age series have definitely met that criteria.  Mass Effect, Witcher III, or on console, I really liked the Xmen Legends series and the actionRPG version of Prince of Persia that came out back in the early aughts.  Which brings me to my other love in gaming, which is puzzles.  I like to solve logic puzzles, so of course, portal and portal 2 are two of my favorite games of all time.

9. Do you snack while gaming, if so, on what?

I don't know if this is normal or not, but one of the reasons I'd rather get my stories in game form rather than TV/Movie form is it keeps my hands busy, which is my primary reason for snacking (that it gives me something to do with my hands).  However, I do tend to drink while gaming.  A lot.  By the end of a raid night, it is not uncommon for me to have my keyboard on my lap, as my desk becomes covered in beer bottles. :-P  

In fact, one of the reasons I'm such a strong proponent of Focusing Shot for hunters, is it gives you a couple seconds where you can take a drink.

10. If you were stranded on a desert island with three CDs and they were the only three you would ever have, which ones would you bring?  (no greatest hits or live, only standard release)

I do like listening to music, but only when I'm doing something else also (like cleaning, or driving, or playing a game), and there are no three CDs I'd want to, only, for the rest of my life.  Instead of bringing CDs and some sort of CD player, I'll bring a guitar, instead.

11. What is your favorite lore moment and how would you inject your main character into that story?

I don't know that I really have a favorite moment.  I recently enjoyed the cut scene where Thrall killed Garry.  But I was already there, and didn't really help, kind of just watched.  As I mentioned above, I'd liked to have really been there when Garry called Sylvanus a bitch, and then we would destroy Garry right then and there; my love would assume the role of warchief, and I'd serve beside her.

One of the nice things about WoW, is all the best lore moments you are there for.  So it's not like you're missing anything. Is it?

11 Random Facts about Me

1. I grew up in the Ozarks; if you've ever seen that Jennifer Lawrence movie, Winter's Bone, yes, that's pretty much dead on accurate.  As with most little kids in the area, climbing trees was my favorite past-time.  And playing with legos.  
2. I studied Logic when I was in college. 
3. I lived in Beijing for a couple of years after college, but never made it to Zhangjiajie, which is still on my list of most important places I need to go before I die.
4. I work for a not-for-profit organization that provides housing for homeless and low-income folk in chicago, as well as providing a lot of job training and other resources.  
5. Doug Hofstadter's book Gödel, Escher, Bach: an Eternal Golden Braid, is probably the most important book in my life, as far as shaping how I think. 
6. I'd consider living in a hobit house.  The indigenous people to the Ozark Plateau were nomadic gatherer-hunters and often lived in one of the many, many caves.  Due to the thick vegetation and rough landscape, they were able to remain in band society much longer than other north american indigenous people, who became more civilized nations/empires, like the near-by Cahokia, or later on, the Osage.  Also, Caves:  warmin in the winter, cool in the summer. 
7. Wittgenstein's Tractatus Logico-philosophicus is a close second. Though I read it much later in life (well, you know, relatively later, for someone my age).
8. Sometimes I get quite distraught that I wasn't alive roughly 10 - 15 thousand years ago, on this continent.  The ice sheet had just receded; mastodons and bison were everywhere.  We could hang out and play all day with nomadic gatherer-hunters, living in bands...  Sometimes I get quite distraught that there are no more mastodons.
9. I teach a class on bicycle mechanics at a local community bike collective.  
10. In school, I was classically trained in percussion.  I love learning new instruments, and would count among the instruments I can play at least proficiently:  tympani, marimba, vibraphone, most hand drums, the drum kit, guitar, banjo, piano and mandolin.  I'm currently working on learning to play the accordion (I can play a few songs so far, but I'm not amazing).   I love the accordion music coming out of the sort of folk/cajun/street music scenes in New Orleans right now (check out Why Are We Building Such a Big Ship, or Hurray For the Riff Raff).  I do not know how to play any woodwind or brass instruments. 
11. Sometimes the mountains call to me.  Chicago's incredibly flat, and it takes hours to get out of the city, and even then, you're just in industrial farmland.  Sometimes I dream of being in the the Lizard Range in BC, or the Chugach in Alaska, or the Tibetan Plateau, or Southeast Asia / Thailand / Vietnam, or the Andes in Chile, or the Tetons in Wyoming / Montana, or the Southern Alps in New Zealand.  So many great mountains out there...