Ragefest IV: Trolls & Tribulations

[HF Makalov Fanboy Kai]

i wonder how else you can break it

[47948201]

I thought it was about average--it wasn't really great, of course, but it wasn't awful either. By the standards of previous iterations of the contest it would've been pretty alright, but the overall higher quality of submissions present this round makes the creator's lack of eventing knowledge stand out. Based on the writing early on, he probably could've salvaged it with that, but the game proper was probably too rushed for (The)Bladehero22 to polish up later dialogue. And the map size seriously should be cut by 3--condensing the chapter would've helped in a lot of areas.

[Pwntagonist]

And the map size seriously should be cut by 3--condensing the chapter would've helped in a lot of areas.

People make their maps big to add content. In this case I think his map size was okay, he kept it interesting the whole time because there was always some event going on, or houses to visit, or loads of enemies catching up to him. Marc was never just mechanically moving his units in an open field with no enemies around.

[47948201]

Yeah it wasn't devoid of content but if it were more condensed, it could have been more tightly designed because units wouldn't just be in whatever position they happened to be after 10 turns of moving based on their AI. Yeah, he was never really alone in an empty field, but that's because he had like one or two units trailing or approaching him--if he waited and killed them, he would have been, but doing that would've been kind of a waste of time. Marc would often have to deal with multiple challenges at once instead of having a brief break between them if the map were smaller, which would automatically have made it harder, too. Houses to visit don't really deserve to take up as much space as they did--I feel they were spread out so Marc would try to visit one but be unable to, but between his dancing and Rideshot's horse, plus all the disposable units that weren't Rideshot, that never became an interesting scenario so much as something to do while walking to the next challenge.

EDIT: tl;dr it wasn't huge to the point of being awful because of it, but it could've been better if it were much smaller without really sacrificing anything

Edited March 3, 2016 by 47948201

[MrNight48]

Not going to pull any punches here, I like most of the jokes and I understand all too well what he was going for with his limited skills. The map didn't exactly hit it's mark simply because there was much he just couldn't do but it could have been way worse.

Unfortunately the real problem was the commentary. That was...unpleasant because it seemed y'all both got annoyed with each other at certain parts. Also what happened was something we predicted might happen on this thread about having the creator watch you break their hack. Pointers were given when not needed, jokes fell flat, things said that didn't seem to sit well with you, and finally you breaking his chapter in front of his eyes when by yourself, would have made a shorter video. Instead you had to draw out the submission which you did offscreen so it was moot anyway.

In any case, I enjoyed the gameplay part of the video.

[47948201]

Yeah I don't think the cocommentary really benefited the video. I didn't think Dylan really said enough in his stream either, though you tried to get him to. I hope between the two of them, Wolfram and Orange will be able to work out better with you.

[Maritisa]

...Given Wolfram, I'm expecting him to do the exact same fucking thing "The"BladeHero22 did here.

And it won't even be littered with his hilariously bad engrish like it used to be for comic relief. *shot*

I don't know Orange enough to say anything about him, but I really feel like cocommentary with the creator just isn't gonna turn out well unless the creator is an experienced commentator and/or is really good at suppressing the need to explain things, or hiding their intents. It's just too likely to devolve into a mess like this and it just kind of ruins it for everybody involved.

[Nanami Touko]

marc if you ever need someone to laugh at fire emblem with you i'm hanging around ~'3'~

[the cool guy]

I don't know Orange enough to say anything about him, but I really feel like cocommentary with the creator just isn't gonna turn out well unless the creator is an experienced commentator and/or is really good at suppressing the need to explain things, or hiding their intents. It's just too likely to devolve into a mess like this and it just kind of ruins it for everybody involved.

Isn't this exactly what we all concluded a while ago?

[Maritisa]

Isn't this exactly what we all concluded a while ago?

I guess we got ignored then(?)

[Avraxas]

I think co-commentary is just an all-around dangerous game here, unless it's someone Marc knows pretty well already.

But you all already said that

It's especially bad if the other person is the creator, since they then have the urge to spoil things/defend weak points of their submission.

[Mekkah]

Agree that this commentary format just does not work. What's there to say for the creator besides "oops. didn't think of that", "that wasn't meant to happen" and "here's what's going to happen"?

[47948201]

I guess theoretically they can give insight into their design decisions but most of what it was in this case was "I didn't know how to do that" or "I was too lazy to do something better" and it's pretty easy for that to turn defensive.

[Baldrick]

This hack seems slapdash to me. Not so much the eventing (I'm hardly one to talk about that anyway) but there was almost no thought put into it. Like when Marky activated the Mine glitch; it's not an obscure exploit, when you give the player a Mine you should anticipate they'll do that.

But it could be the new direction of Ragefest: instead of raging at hacks, have co-commentary with the creator and watch them rage as he breaks their hack.

[RandomSwordmaster]

Solution: Make all weapons Treasure weapons.

[47948201]

Solution: Make all weapons Treasure weapons.

This would actually have been amazingly trolly, Marc is totally done so he thinks he's going to just break the chapter, but he can't do anything meaningful and at most he gets a turn of enemies not attacking.

[SilverHairedFreak25]

Solution: Make all weapons Treasure weapons.

This is what makes a submission good: when people like you think ahead when exploiting glitches.

[MarkyJoe1990]

I thought it was about average--it wasn't really great, of course, but it wasn't awful either. By the standards of previous iterations of the contest it would've been pretty alright, but the overall higher quality of submissions present this round makes the creator's lack of eventing knowledge stand out. Based on the writing early on, he probably could've salvaged it with that, but the game proper was probably too rushed for (The)Bladehero22 to polish up later dialogue. And the map size seriously should be cut by 3--condensing the chapter would've helped in a lot of areas.

I see what you did there.

People make their maps big to add content. In this case I think his map size was okay, he kept it interesting the whole time because there was always some event going on, or houses to visit, or loads of enemies catching up to him. Marc was never just mechanically moving his units in an open field with no enemies around.

Despite the map's faults, BladeHero did a good job keeping things happening throughout. The issue is that most of the things happening are kind of simple challenges that you can blaze through, or even straight up ignore if you know what tiles activate them. The most difficult part of the chapter is the tunnel of fire.

Yeah it wasn't devoid of content but if it were more condensed, it could have been more tightly designed because units wouldn't just be in whatever position they happened to be after 10 turns of moving based on their AI. Yeah, he was never really alone in an empty field, but that's because he had like one or two units trailing or approaching him--if he waited and killed them, he would have been, but doing that would've been kind of a waste of time. Marc would often have to deal with multiple challenges at once instead of having a brief break between them if the map were smaller, which would automatically have made it harder, too. Houses to visit don't really deserve to take up as much space as they did--I feel they were spread out so Marc would try to visit one but be unable to, but between his dancing and Rideshot's horse, plus all the disposable units that weren't Rideshot, that never became an interesting scenario so much as something to do while walking to the next challenge.

EDIT: tl;dr it wasn't huge to the point of being awful because of it, but it could've been better if it were much smaller without really sacrificing anything

More importantly than condensing the map, the enemy variety and positioning needed to be considered more. You spend most of the chapter fighting soldiers, brigands, and archers, and they're all placed sort of thoughtlessly throughout. The only exception is the beginning, which is consequently the part of the map that requires the most thought to get through.

The map also needed to be more than just fields separated by doorways, and...

Alright, I'll just summarize by saying BladeHero just needs more experience and knowledge on how challenge in FE works. >_<

Not going to pull any punches here, I like most of the jokes and I understand all too well what he was going for with his limited skills. The map didn't exactly hit it's mark simply because there was much he just couldn't do but it could have been way worse.

Unfortunately the real problem was the commentary. That was...unpleasant because it seemed y'all both got annoyed with each other at certain parts. Also what happened was something we predicted might happen on this thread about having the creator watch you break their hack. Pointers were given when not needed, jokes fell flat, things said that didn't seem to sit well with you, and finally you breaking his chapter in front of his eyes when by yourself, would have made a shorter video. Instead you had to draw out the submission which you did offscreen so it was moot anyway.

In any case, I enjoyed the gameplay part of the video.

I... have no excuse. He asked to be part of the commentary, and I didn't think for a moment that the result would be super bad. I'm sorry. =(

On that subject however, I think there is a way to make the format work. What if the author made a chapter I couldn't break, and - instead of helping me - deliberately gave me misleading instructions, and instead of defending their submission, they instead went on the offensive and criticized my skills?

... I can already think of ways that wouldn't work, but there HAS to be a way that the format can work. I'm just not with the right people for it.

...Given Wolfram, I'm expecting him to do the exact same fucking thing "The"BladeHero22 did here.

And it won't even be littered with his hilariously bad engrish like it used to be for comic relief. *shot*

I don't know Orange enough to say anything about him, but I really feel like cocommentary with the creator just isn't gonna turn out well unless the creator is an experienced commentator and/or is really good at suppressing the need to explain things, or hiding their intents. It's just too likely to devolve into a mess like this and it just kind of ruins it for everybody involved.

Yeah... I think I should just play the bloody thing on my own. Wolfram's gonna be upset, but I don't know the guy, nor Orange that well, and this is their creation. It'll make a better video, and it'll make the game look better too.

This hack seems slapdash to me. Not so much the eventing (I'm hardly one to talk about that anyway) but there was almost no thought put into it. Like when Marky activated the Mine glitch; it's not an obscure exploit, when you give the player a Mine you should anticipate they'll do that.

But it could be the new direction of Ragefest: instead of raging at hacks, have co-commentary with the creator and watch them rage as he breaks their hack.

I'm not sure the problem is that BladeHero didn't put effort/thought into the submission so much as, well - based on my experiences with him - he just doesn't have the knowledge and experience in FE to realize his ideas to their fullest. That and... well... let's not beat around the bush here, he clearly took inspiration from Marc's Special Day and Rondo Of Madness.

Regarding everyone else's comments, it's sort of a breath of fresh air to see that people didn't like the video. I didn't like it either. Sadly, I only get one first impression, and that's the one we're stuck with. From now on, I'm sticking to my guns; no co-commentaries with the authors at all.

Edited March 4, 2016 by MarkyJoe1990

[47948201]

What about Wolfram/Orange being in the stream chat while Wolfram's game is being played? Even though they'd be easier to ignore for both you and the audience (editing if needed), they have the opportunity to say all the same stuff (though I don't anticipate either of them being too defensive, just that Wolfram might give away too much information)

I mean I think that sounds like probably a better solution than putting them in with audio, but it's a coarse filter.

[Augestein]

What about Wolfram/Orange being in the stream chat while Wolfram's game is being played? Even though they'd be easier to ignore for both you and the audience (editing if needed), they have the opportunity to say all the same stuff (though I don't anticipate either of them being too defensive, just that Wolfram might give away too much information)

I mean I think that sounds like probably a better solution than putting them in with audio, but it's a coarse filter.

There's something distinctly different about being in a text talk and in a verbal talk. People feel compelled to say things to fill the void of silence. But in a chat stream, there's enough going on to where it's not so bad in my honest opinion. Not many people come prepared to have enough to say and that makes it hard to say anything for them.

[Lord Wolfram]

What about Wolfram/Orange being in the stream chat while Wolfram's game is being played? Even though they'd be easier to ignore for both you and the audience (editing if needed), they have the opportunity to say all the same stuff (though I don't anticipate either of them being too defensive, just that Wolfram might give away too much information)

I mean I think that sounds like probably a better solution than putting them in with audio, but it's a coarse filter.

Ok, so I was talking about this with several people like last year. I wouldn't give away stuff because I see that being silent is better. (Tho even if we were to co-commentate I wouldn't say much as I am not a talkative type anymore. )

And it won't even be littered with his hilariously bad engrish like it used to be for comic relief. *shot*

shess! Whty you said me engrish is nogood none should ever found it in.

Also looking back at my old texts, I feel so embarrassed. What to say, using English for only 2 years and it's self taught.

Yeah... I think I should just play the bloody thing on my own. Wolfram's gonna be upset, but I don't know the guy, nor Orange that well, and this is their creation. It'll make a better video, and it'll make the game look better too.

Well it's fine.

I would really appreciate if you could keep the animations on. I really enjoy animations while watching ragefest otherwise it's very boring to me. Also a lot of work was put into some of the soundtracks in the game and there were also animations that were not easy to implement.

Regarding the Bladehero22.

The Wolves are gathering!!!

[Maritisa]

FEXP doesn't function properly without animations on, anyway, Wolfram, so don't worry about that.

Just be prepared for his inevitable complaining about how FEXP is super clunky and sucks horribly! It's obligatory at this point, you see.

[Lord Wolfram]

FEXP doesn't function properly without animations on, anyway, Wolfram, so don't worry about that.

Just be prepared for his inevitable complaining about how FEXP is super clunky and sucks horribly! It's obligatory at this point, you see.

It's all just a part of the plan.

I'm gonna count how many times Mark will complain about FEXP.

[MarkyJoe1990]

Yeesh, it's been a while, eh?

Let's get this shit on the road.

Ragefest Revengeance By HeyItsKyo

LET'S GO

[MarkyJoe1990]

Got back from my recording session.

Holy cooooow. This one's AMAZING.

I might just go and edit the first part cause god damn, this is awesome.