Proper use of Thanksgiving!

[John Kettler]

Thanks to brother Ed, who drove way over here to get me, took me to have dinner there, then drove me here again, I got to have a fabulous Thanksgiving. Did I plunk myself in front of the new huge curved widescreen, beer in hand? Nah, I saw about 30 sec of the Cowboys getting wiped across the field. Instead, besides seeing Ed's enormous and superbly equipped man cave of big RC bird building, he showed me the pretty impressive naval version of WoT, called WoW (World of Warships), which has the same sort of Tier and upgrade system, but this one also gets into stuff like CO experience in type, which materially affects combat performance. Skippers have to be worked up before they can even be assigned, and it must be type releavant. You don't go from a destroyer skipper to commanding a battleship.

I should explain that Ed is a full-blown naval grog (would love to have his library) and has extensive credits, including Harpoon and a bunch of Command at Sea titles (by CoA), which was how I wound up doing credited work in the scenario book (wrote 3-4 scens) on the late war in the Pacific's Steel Typhoon. On balance , he was generally impressed with the game as to weapon performance, ROF, gunnery accuracy, speed, maneuverability, etc. Some arcade elements appear in certain small vessels, but he and others are pushing hard to sort that out. The visuals are breathtaking. In fact, with the fabulous sunlight treatment, atmospheric effects, stunning models and such, it is a feast for the naval buff I find hard to convey. Scenes on par with collectible prints. Some it looked like the German battleship Tirpitz operating in and around the fjords1 He showed me the game because he thought I might like to go buy it for my rig. But fair is fair, right?

He was surprisingly amenable to my suggestion to DL our perfectly innocuous (e-crack--heh, heh) CMBS Demo. Doomed! Doomed, I say! Sadly, this was not my finest hour, nor my finest week or even month in showing him the game, for a I was under the weather, acutely sleep deprived, largely brain dead and very rusty, having not played since Sublime and I went at several months ago.  All in all, I think I was a fairly good exemplar of a punch drunk but game worn out leader. It got really ugly after that, for I'd forgotten many things, and some things were utterly unfamiliar. After getting into it a bit, I discovered we'd missed setting it for Turn based and were playing RT--which I'd never done before. Mr. Befogged like to went nuts before that trying to deliver the promised replay. Even so, Ed found out the hard way just how fast life could end while heading a Bradley M2A2 platoon with dismounts, with attached FIST, MK-19 and sniper team. Insert (bad things happen, much carnage). With that debacle sorted out and finally be able to  issue correct orders, he reset. He didn't pay much attention to the ground, located as he was on Olympus, so despite my numerous operational degrades, I got him to come down and really eyeball it it before again zooming aloft for the big picture. I also showed him hom to toggle trees, run the camera and such. Those things I did remember. I also showed him how to Slow into position with snipers and FIST, and he got pretty excited over the drone, putting it up as soon as he could after I explained to him its capabilities and search options. He never got to do a fire mission, though, for dinner was called. While I felt mortified by my terrible walkthrough, replete with numerous procedural recall problems, he still seemed to dig it, and on the way back asked lots of questions, with an acute interest in CAS, so I explained some of that, complete with the now traditional lament over the A-10's absence, as well as the fearsome nature of the Su-25 and the vital importance of Stingers. Greatly contributing to the awful teaching process was having to keep my eyes closed many, many times when he, who has no brain injury imposed restrictions regarding rapid image shifts, kept whipping about. to a chorus of ""Sorry, John." What little I saw made me queasy and induced the start of a headache.

He had major problems with the following: The Briefing wasn't full screen size, and he had problems reading the tiny text, as do I; the UI had similar issues (am going to find a UI mod, for there's plenty of room to go bigger and better on font and point size) , and he did a lot of squinting, which he found quite annoying. I should explain he's got two displays and isn't forearm length away from the screen, as I am (2' x 4" folding table is my desk, so no depth), but somewhat farther. Made a bad situation worse. Even so, his naval game has far better readability of all the considerable info needed to fight . Also, he found doing things at the micro level tough because of the way the camera would abruptly jump at blazing speed at ground level and also had issues with zoom. I explained settings could be adjusted, but having done that here long since, I still have issues on the deck. The margin between slow camera and warp speed is quite slim. On balance, I believe CMBS intrigued and excited him. I know he found it fun and engrossing, to the point where he completely missed his wife's announcement we could start with salad, a message delivered at 2' range!  

(Cut to 12-Step meeting begins; members intone)

"Came to believe we were powerless over CM e-crack..."

(Ed stands up)

"Hi! I'm Ed"

(In unison they respond)

"Welcome, Ed."

Now, I could be wrong. He might yet, as a busy man who already has two of what he bluntly calls time sucks (the aforementioned hobbies, not to mention writing wargames), somehow tune out The Call of CM™; might somehow escape its all-consuming fatal embrace. That might happen, but I think the odds favor another hapless person will succumb and become aCMilated. Other than the great food, company and wonderful conversation, this was my Thanksgiving. And you have no idea how happy I was to get away from this pit and how sad to return! But hey, I got to CM by proxy today and show off our peculiar delight to another one of my brothers! Only one remains to see it, and he did this stuff for real during the Cold War (Bradley CFV TC and later PLT SGT Master gunner), In Bahrain (ODS) and OIF (SFC with first Stryker BCT ever deployed). I'll see him in March. And soon, my nephews will fall! (cackles) I  already greased the skids years ago with AH's totally clueless on actual Cold War  US/RUS armor/antiarmor situation but still cool MBT. 

Regards,

John Kettler

Edited November 27, 2015 by John Kettler

[c3k]

LOL...Thanks.

[John Kettler]

c3k,

You're welcome. Happy to provide some light/blight fare on a planet on which major crises seem to be sprouting like toadstools after the rain ends.

Regards,

John Kettler

 

[John Kettler]

BEGIN SCENE

(We see a rather scared young man, dressed in street attire. He is getting reamed by his senior, a female, in a gang dealing e-crack)

Boss

What do you mean, fool, he didn't come BACK after swallowing the free sample? 

Corner Dealer

I swear, Boss, it's true. I even called him up to make sure he liked it.

He did!

Boss

Didn't you tell me earlier he was already on some stuff called RC Plane and had it bad?

Corner Dealer

Yeah, Boss. But this time he was goin' on about somnethin' called P-47 Drop Tank.

He needed a fix. Or needed to get it fixed--before he could even think about doin' more e-crack

Boss

(blisters wall and nearby ears with epithets, then summons her enforcers)

Go find out about the P-47 Drop Tank, whatever it is, and come back immediately.

There's a bonus for you if you can get me a sample so we can get it to our chemist. Maybe she can figure out why e-crack doesn't own him body and soul by now.

(she muses aloud)

Maybe it's some weird drug interaction that's keeping e-crack from taking him over like it did with the others. How are we going to make money if there's actually a way to resist e-crack?

(screams in frustration)

Gah!

END SCENE

(The previous scene was just displayed at an academic conference on addiction)

This is precisely the issue I shall address in my upcoming paper on Hobby Addiction, called Jealous Mistresses Who Fight: A Study in Competing Addictions: Maybe it Is Possible to Avoid E-Crack Addiction?

(rumblings, murmurs, snorts of disbelief from the audience)

Academic

We're scientists, aren't we? Shouldn't we maintain an open mind to at least the possibility of such a thing?

(glances aside, calls over  to Intern while covering the mic and whispers in his ear)

Academic

We could be in big trouble over this! Our research grant from Battlefront could be blown away as effortlessly as a maple leaf  hit by an autumn wind gust in Vermont. Might have to let you go. Sorry.

(Cut to anguished looking Intern)

Intern

Please, I beg you. Don't do that.

(expresses alarm in face and subtle movements)

END SCENE

 

Seriously, I'd like to ask other members whether the issues my brother raised regarding CMBS (outside his tutor being an incompetent wreck at the time) were mentioned by anyone they showed the game to?

Regards,

John Kettler

 

Edited November 28, 2015 by John Kettler