📣 Welcome (back) to LotD’s member spotlight! 📣 We have been on hiatus for a bit, but look for these to kick back up again. Our next spotlight is on Xpade, a fellow Floridian who recently helped with running our Crowfall chapter. This chapter (and their alliance) consistently had epic battles and topped the PvP charts!

Tell us about your favorite part of gaming.

Typically my favorite part of any game is the group PvP, especially smaller fights that require a little more cohesion and planning put into synergy (pre-made groups).  This usually ranges from 3-15 people in size, as anything more than that turns into meat grinder and attrition instead of well-coordinated tactics and skill.

If you had to go bury a body in a game, who were you grabbing to come help?

Regardless of which game, I’d take Wooglin… cuz he has a little Garth tendencies in him and he’d do it right.

What was a typical night like for you in a game?

Ideally it is to log in and be pvping immediately.  With general trends of games, this usually implies you have to play a game that is instanced or arenas based.  Over the years you can find various games that allow you to open world pvp but the consistency varies (e.g. DAoC, Arche Age boat pirating, or various MOBAs).

Whenever you think back on gaming, what jumps out as your favorite memory? It’s ok if there are a few

Almost all the greatest laughs come from Dark Age of Camelot (DAoC) or Arche Age.  DAoC was a game some may know while others have heard about.  There was a class called an Animist which specialized in summoning small plants/mushrooms to do its attacking, buffing and CC.  One day half the server created alternate characters of Animist and proceeded to storm the supposed unattackable or bipassable racial keep.  Hundreds of Animists spammed out as many buffing pets as possible to hold guard agro (they didn’t attack, only body pulled – so no agro transferred to caster).  With literal thousands of neutral pets in the area, all of the players present then proceeded to blitzkrieg past the faction guards and defenses to gain access to the enemy realms “safe zone” where they do their questing and leveling.  We then proceeded to make our way to the main capital.  We were able to occupy the main capital for a couple hours before finally being killed off by the near unkillable realm guards.  This caused an almost immediate patch of a portal being placed to teleport you outside a door, verses the door opening and closing. 

Another great game for some open world shenanigans was Arche Age (minus what we all know its’ demons are).  In Arche Age I would tend to be a lone wolf and always on the prowl for boats.  You could regularly hear me in discord laughing as I drown somebody with their own boat or stealing a boat with a full group on it while I’m solo.  Many guild all-calls would come out after acquiring a boat and handing over the booty for a secure turn in. I was generally one to steal boats for the fun of it and not money. A very notable memory was controlling a part of the map right off the enemy continent. I would regularly receive cross faction mails with tirades, rants and rage-quit messages that promptly made their way to the salt-mines.  There may still be a very funny, and very long rant spanning dozens of in-game mails about how I forced an entire group of friends to quit the game, as I was harassing them too much when they just wanted to fish (in contested pvp waters).

What notable accomplishments did we do in this game that you think people should know?

One thing that DAoC was notable for was the intrinsic value of chivalry and code of honor.  They specifically ranked guild success based on accomplishments per player in the guild and reinforced the 8v8 or solo pvp.  Our little 8 man guild at the time was able to hold a spot in the top 3 rankings on “I Remain Standing” boards for almost 2 years. 

Closing Comment

With the above said, PvP doesn’t get better with more people…. think quality over quantity.  Some games won’t always work with horde like siege numbers. Sometimes you have to change your tactics to make use of the numbers you have and not be a META Monkey.  Learn to use your A,S,D keys and terrain properly… there’s more to life than W keys.  Relying on the W key likely means the zerg behind you is too big to command properly.