Reflections on a Year of Binge Watching

I can be a bit of a luddite when it comes to television.  There are times when I miss the warmth of the cathode ray tube and the warmth of its colors… and its ability to render black and white shows and movies correctly.  I am certainly in no hurry most days to jump on whatever the latest trend is.

On the other hand, I do eventually catch up and have been at times in the vanguard.  We had a DVR from ReplayTV back before Tivo came and went as a generic term for the device.  With streaming channels we were able to start off with Netflix and Amazon on our PlayStation 3 when they launched.

But a combination of events pushed us into streaming as the default television mode at our house, and the first of those events was Baby Yoda.  Or Grogu, as we now know his name.

My wife wanted to watch The Madalorian, which was only available on the newly launched Disney+ service.  However, as the PS3 was days from going out of support Disney declined to build an app for it, so we needed another device.  I got a recommendation from a friend who works over at Roku and we picked up one of their Roku Stick devices in order to stream.

Then, or course, came the pandemic.  That meant we were home a lot more watching TV.  But sports were cancelled… my wife watches ice hockey… so we were looking for something to fill the void on that front.

And then there was Comcast/XFinity, which implemented a new compression algorithm which makes their HD channels look as grainy and dull as standard definition.  In comparison content streamed through the Roku look sharp and clear.

So from some point in February forward we have pretty much watched only stream on demand video content.  The only ads we have seen are the previews for other titles that sometimes get padded into the front end of shows on demand.  We have watched when we wanted to, often as many episodes in a row as we have wanted to, all from the comfort of our couch.

Based on that, I have the following thoughts.

• No commercials is pretty nice
  

I would have underestimated this, but then we went to watch 60 Minutes live on cable to see the presidential candidate interviews and the commercials were interminable.  Even when we record things on the DVR I have to fast forward and skip back to get past them… and the cable channels are wise to this and have deliberately started injecting quick scenes from the show your watching into the middle of five minute commercial blocks to make you stop and check to see if you’ve missed something.  Not dealing with that at all… and not watching any commercials… has changed my tolerance level for them.

• I still won’t buy pay-per-View

I like a service where you pay a monthly fee and can watch all you want from their selection.  And since that is readily available in the form of Netflix, Hulu, Disney+, and even HBO, the value proposition of spending $6-$20 on a single showing of show or a movie when there are so many other options is a non-starter for me.  If it is special enough that I need to see it now, I’ll go see it in the theater… back when they re-open.  And the idea of “owning” digital content that the provider can take away from you later is ludicrous.  Comcast has literally screwed my on that with the one thing I bought from them.

• There are too damn many streaming services

I mean, we knew this already.  But when you go to the Roku channel store and see the multitude of services available, you start to get a feeling of how big the eventual culling will be.  And even the big channels are eyeing some consolidation.  Hulu has had all of the FX stuff folded into it and it feels like Hulu and Disney+ might eventually co-join.

• Finding things is hard

The most difficult part of coming to the end of a show is that you now how to find something new to watch.  My wife and I spend time comparing notes with friends and reading online articles about the ten best things to watch on this service or that.  And it is a multi layer problem.  The UI on any given service is quickly overloaded by too much choice.  There are multiple services and some content swaps between them.  And when you can find things, then figuring out what is worth the effort and investment can lead to decision paralysis.

• I am torn on weekly versus all at once content

I complained in one of my binge watching posts about services that still dole out episodes once a week rather than just giving us the whole series to consume at once, the way Netflix does.  But for a popular show, where everybody watches on the same day lest they be beset by spoilers, or when everybody in our house is invested in the show, the once a week schedule still works out and becomes a point in time when we all get together on the couch.

• We have been biased towards shows versus movies

For whatever reason our pandemic binge watching has been heavily biased towards series.  When we sit down in the evening a two hour movie is a commitment, but a show that is 22-60 minutes per episode is something you can take in pieces.  The irony here is that we almost inevitably watch two hours or more when we settle in after dinner, but we have this idea that a movie is too much.  Well, that and movie selection can be odd.  There is still a very old school, HBO monthly selection situation going on where movies come and go and are on this service then that for short stints.  So even finding a movie you want to watch on a service to which you are currently subscribed can be even more of a chore than finding shows.

• I could cut the cord were it not for sports

Seriously, I could turn my back on the cable company… well, except for the fact that they are also the internet company.  But my wife likes to watch hockey and texts back and forth with her pals about the game and, while I can get the games on a stream, they are inevitably 30-60 seconds behind what is on cable and my wife hates hearing that one side or the other has score before it happens on our screen.

• It really sucks when the internet goes down

The cable company is also the internet company… that is our only high speed internet option and we live in the middle of Silicon Fucking Valley… so when they go down or are doing maintenance, you get a quick and hard accounting of just how much you depend on that pipe for your entertainment.

• It does not replace the theater experience

I know a bunch of people who are not at all sad that movie theaters are in trouble and that many may not open back up when the pandemic passes.  I still value the theater experience though, and miss it.  Seeing something on the big screen, like a James Bond or a Star Wars film, is not something that can be at all replicated in our living room, no matter how big of a TV we purchase.  Of course, most everything I would have gone to see on the big screen has been delayed due to the pandemic, so if there are theaters this summer I hope to return.

• I still cannot watch exactly what I want on demand

I wrote a few years back that the most cost effective way to watch exactly what you want is to get an old fashioned, disks through the mail, Netflix subscription and get things that way.  That remains true today.  I saw that Geoffrey Palmer had passed away and wondered if I could watch some of the early things he was in, like The Fall and Rise of Reginald Perrin.

Nope.  Not available.  I could get it on DVD from Netflix through the mail, but even the niche British TV streaming services like BritBox, GranadaVision, BoB, and Acorn, don’t have it.  There isn’t even a pay per view option, not that I would use it.

WoW Classic Characters Four Months In

WoW Classic is four months old today, so we’ve been through a third of a year with it so far.  I figured this would be about the right time to look at how far I’ve gotten with actual character advancement and levels and such.

Tistann

Tistann and Pet

• Level 35 hunter
• Leatherworking: 186
• Skinning: 225

The first character I rolled out with in WoW Classic, joining Skronk and Ula in the dwarf/gnome starter area for the opening night of scrounging for mobs and standing in polite lines.  He was also there at the founding of the Cragboar Rebellion guild and is the guild master.

With all of that however, he is my designated solo character.  It is not that hunters are not good in groups… they have their place… but I wanted a character with which I could range ahead in levels if I so desired.  And Tistann has served that role.  He was level 30 when the core of the group was at level 20 or so.  He has kept ahead of the group and is still the highest level character in our guild, but he isn’t so far out in front anymore.

Guild levels

Tistann is also the guild leatherworker and has made items for several members of the guild… though we don’t have that many leather wearers.

Viniki

Viniki

• Level 33 warrior
• Blacksmithing: 110
• Mining: 119

Tank for what I will call “group one” in the guild, or maybe “the guild group excluding those currently residing in Japan.”  He was actually a late addition to my list of characters, rolled up just in case we needed a tank as a backup.  He has since become my most played character in group instance runs.

I trained him in blacksmithing with an eye to having him run up the weapons side of the trade, though I haven’t spent a lot of time working on him.  Like almost all of my characters with mining as a skill, he is still in that ugly gap between tin and iron.  Have to get him out to mine some more.

Wilhelm

Wilhelm

• Level 31 paladin
• Engineering: 150
• Mining: 132

The first character I reserved… I finally got Wilhelm as a name in WoW… and the second one I got out to start playing.  He started on the path as a protection paladin, until I was reminded how bad they were.  After that he concentrated on retribution.  He is a possible alt in groups when we have Earl along tanking and we shift roles.

I made him an engineer out of tradition.  My main paladin on live went that route back when I started.  I did get him up into iron for mining at least.

Alioto

Alioto

• Level 31 druid
• Skinning: 223
• Mining: 118

Another character rolled up in a “just in case” moment.  He is full on restoration, which is much easier to play as a spec than a holy priest when you need to go out and solo a bit.  He is the backup group healer.  His intro to the role had him way low level for the task, but I have since caught him up.

I opted just to make him a supplier or raw materials, so he skins and mines.  Still needs to get to 125 so he can mine iron.

Winki

Winki

• Level 24 warlock
• Tailoring: 124
• Skinning: 183

Probably the most “on a whim” character in the group.  At one point we were holding at level 20 and literally all of my possible group characters were already 20 so I rolled something new just to try it out… and got it to 20 as well.  As it turns out, a warlock get the ritual of summoning spell at level 20, which meant I could pre-position Winki in order to bring people out to whichever instance we were running on a given day.  That has paid off a couple of times.  I have leveled him up a bit more just to make running places a bit easier.  Otherwise I have mostly neglected him.

I trained him in tailoring mostly because he had a ton of linen cloth at one point.  Otherwise he is another supplier of skins for Tistann.

Chadwicke

Chad about town

• Level 21 rogue
• Skinning: 150

Alas, poor Chad.  When we started to form up the first dungeon group, it seemed like my rogue would be the best fit.  So he was along for the run to Ragefire Chasm, the first big guild project.  And then roles go swapped around and I picked up tank with Viniki while Chad got put on the bench.  I held him at level 20 for a while as Earl caught up.  But Earl caught up so fast he passed by 20 and hit 30 while I wasn’t looking.

Which is a bummer because Chad had his own tag line and everything.

Just time for a catch phrase

I still get him out now and again, but rogue life has been left pretty far behind.

Others and Such

I have rolled three other characters on the Bloodsail Buccaneers server, but the highest level of those is the one I used for the running of the gnomes event, which got him all the way to level 3, which hardly counts.  Still, six characters past 20, and four past 30, is probably enough to keep me busy for quite a while.  That shows my usual inability to stick with one character.

I have been a bit distracted from WoW Classic off and on with the EverQuest II anniversary and new expansion, but I carry on.  The group is still going and I am in this for the long haul.  Also, I haven’t had to worry about gold for a mount yet.

But that is my progress so far four months into WoW Classic.

Daybreak Sells Out Lifetime Membership Limit, Decides Money is Good and Opts to Sell More

Daybreak was offering a limited number of lifetime subscriptions for $299 last week.

Firiona Vie never gets cold

The count of 4,000 was reached on Christmas Eve, at which point the sale was done.

The Lifetime All Access Memberships have sold out. If you missed out, the 12 Month + Bonus Memberships are still available through 12/31/18! https://t.co/aX3QjS9gdL

— Daybreak Games (@DaybreakGames) December 24, 2018

However, Daybreak has relented due to “popular demand” and has decided to take more money for lifetime subscriptions through the end of the year.

LIFETIME ALL ACCESS MEMBERSHIP (PC) BACK DUE TO POPULAR DEMAND!!

This is not a drill! Lock in membership to your favorite games with the Lifetime* All Access Membership. Available for a limited time, this special offer grants lifetime membership benefits in every All Access game. All Access currently includes DC Universe Online, EverQuest, EverQuest 2, and PlanetSide 2.

No more resubscribing. No more recurring payments. All the access. All the time. Plus, if you already have an active All Access membership, we will convert your unused time to Daybreak Cash when you upgrade to this offer!

The Lifetime* All Access Membership is available on PC for $299.99 USD, now through December 31, 2018. Get yours today!

I’m going to guess the that the 12 month “bonus” deal, which was only double the price of a normal one year subscription wasn’t as big of a hit as they expected.

Anyway, if you were on the fence about the lifetime subscription, you now have a few more days to dither about the whole thing.

Players Will Optimize

I remember back to the early-ish days of TorilMUD, back when I was first getting into groups to do zones.  Doing a zone was akin to what we would call raiding now, where a max size group, sixteen characters total, would set out to fight their way through a series of rooms and bosses, culminating the in the main boss of the zone.

Specifically, I remember doing the City of Brass zone.  It was a popular zone to do for quite a while, one done almost every boot. (See an old post about how MUD crashes were a good thing back in the day.)  It was an older zone, it wasn’t too big, there were a couple of possible drops for class quest items so somebody was always keen to go, and the general loot was pretty decent if you were just starting off doing zones.  There were upgrades to be had and everybody wanted that flaming halberd for an alt.

Back then the approach to the zone was slow and plodding.  Once through the Plane of Fire (you needed flying gear or the spell plus a fire protection item to go on this run) , the group would assemble and prepare outside the first room.  Once spells were up the tanks would roll in, engage the mobs in the room, call everybody else to come in, and we would unload everything to clear the room.

We would then sit down, mem up our spells, then stand when we were done.  When the call “spell up” came again, we would hit all our targets… as a druid I would cast vitalize, a hit point boosting spell, on some of the non-melee characters and maybe barkskin on the tanks and anybody who requested it… then the tanks would move into the next room, call us to come in, and we would burn down the next room.

It was rinse and repeat, taking down every room as a set piece battle.  At boss mobs we would get special instructions.  When spell feedback was introduced, a mechanic that would damage players if two people cast the same area effect damage spell at the same time, there would be some coordinating of who would cast which spell first.  But otherwise it was the same thing every room, and it stretched out the time it took to run the City of Brass into a three hour event.

But as time went along the runs began to speed up.  First, the overall quality of people’s gear began to improve.  This made players more effective at slaying mobs as well as surviving fights.

Then there started to develop an ideal group composition.  For example, whoever was leading the zone would never take more than one druid unless there was an empty slot that they couldn’t fill.  They wanted a caster who could do the “dragon scales” spell on the tanks rather than the lesser spell “stone skin.”  There were classes with buffs that were deemed essential for a run.  Getting the right group comp made runs go more smoothly, especially at boss fights.

And the zone itself became a solved problem.  The efreeti never changed.  There were a couple of random spawns, but otherwise how to do the run was well understood.  There were no surprises, a well defined route existed, and the boss mechanics were old hat.

Finally, there was a big change in how zones were run.  Groups stopped doing each room as a set piece battle.  Clearing up the trash mobs on the way to the boss was now easier due to gear upgrades, so we would roll through all of that with the various casters just keeping critical buffs up, refreshing them at need.  To sustain this, the concept of “mem out” was introduced, where the raid leader would call “mem west” or the like to indicate where the casters could move to refresh their spells while the battle was still raging.

The latter kept everybody busy.  Rooms with trash mobs took marginally longer without everybody blowing their whole catalog of damage spells, but that was heavily outweighed by the reduction in pre and post battle activity.  Only boss fights got the big “spell up” treatment. The time to run the zone, from starting out in to returning home to Waterdeep, approached an hour if everything was going right, and it almost always did.

That is a pretty big speed up compared to three hours from the doorstep of the zone.  And the time improvement didn’t stop there.  TorilMUD, around for more than 25 years at this point, has never raised its level cap.  Instead, it has maintained some semblance of stability by adding in new, harder zones for those at the level cap while re-balancing equipment over time with an eye towards keeping most level 50 zones viable.  That generally means any gear that seems over powered, like the glowing crimson dagger or the haste enhanced grey suede boots, are likely to get a nerf sooner or later.

Still, even with that optimization happens.  Old hands who have run a thousand zones have a bag full of gear so can pull out a set perfect for each task.  I bet if I told long time zone leader Lilithelle I needed something from the City of Brass today, she’d throw together a group of eight to ten people and drag me along, finishing the zone in 30 minutes or less.

As the kids say, “Cool story bro.”  But what am I getting at here?

This is what happens to content over time.  Player optimization alone pretty much cut the run time for City of Brass by two thirds.  And that three hour number was after the “learn the zone and the bosses” part of the process.  Add it some of the usual gear inflation and that time is now down to one sixth the original time, and doable by half a raid group.

This is what happens to content over time, especially PvE content.  It becomes a solved problem.  Players learn how best to assault things and share that knowledge.

Sometimes that is okay.  In MMORPGs where expansions use levels and gear to gate content, it is pretty much expected that older content will be made obsolete.  Often, after enough time has passed, old raids become solo projects that people run to collect gear for cosmetic reasons or to fill out missed achievements.  That is certainly the accepted state of affairs in World of Warcraft.

In other games it can be problematic.  In EVE Online optimization is an ongoing battle for CCP.  Without levels as a gating mechanism any new PvE content is pretty much solved immediately.  So, despite there being something like four thousand NPC missions in the game, the PvE is generally considered boring and is subject to pretty extreme levels of optimization.  This goes especially for null sec anomaly running, where titans are the latest high yield ratting option.

Only the Abyssal deadspace content isn’t completely solved, and that is only because it has a random aspect to it.  Once you start one you are committed and cannot go back and refit if you have chosen poorly.  And even that is only an issue for the level five runs.  CCP last said that the percentage of Abyssal deadspace runs that ends in a PvE death is very, very low.  I cannot find the number at the moment, but 3% springs to my mind.

Then there is PvP content in New Eden, where The Meta constantly strives to find the optimum ship for given circumstances and CCP is constantly tweaking ships in order to try to bring balance to the force, only to find that suddenly every big alliance is now focused on a specific hull for its main doctrine while the small gang and low sec forces have a new favorite of their own.  And then there is suicide ganking in high sec.  That has become one of the few PvP solved problems at this point, something CCP needs to shake up somehow.

And so it goes.

The thing is, a game’s core player base will always optimize.   But outliers and new players tend to get left out of that.  If a studio focuses only on the core, a game can become impenetrable to new players.  But if you don’t focus on the needs of the core your most loyal fans may get bored and walk away.

Winter Movie League – Darkest Jumanji

The big four day Christmas weekend has come and gone for the winter season of our Fantasy Movie League.

The question of the week was really whether or not Star Wars: The Last Jedi would prevail as the best anchor choice or if one of the week’s new arrivals would take that spot. The options for the week were:

Star Wars                  $815
Jumanji                    $275
Pitch Perfect 3            $251
The Greatest Showman       $110
Downsizing                 $72
Ferdinand                   $67
Father Figures             $54
Coco                       $51
All the Money in the World $31
Wonder                     $28
Justice League             $17
Daddy's Home 2             $20
The Shape of Water         $23
Darkest Hour               $16
Best of the Rest           $15

It was a given that Star Wars would rule the four day box office, but pricing would allow players to pick but a single screen of that.  The other likely anchors, Jumanji and Pitch Perfect 3, were both good for three screens.  Would three screens of either beat out one screen of Star Wars?

I went back and forth on that through the week.  Star Wars seemed like the safe play.  Pitch Perfect 3 was capping out the marketing side of the equation by a fair margin.  And then Jumanji, which opened early in the week, seemed to be coming on strong.  As the deadline for picks closed in I opted for safety and went with Star Wars as my anchor.

Meanwhile it was clear by Thursday that the pricing for Darkest Hour was really low and it seemed likely to be the price/performer of the week, so my initial inclination to pick Best of the Rest fell by the wayside.  There was still a fair amount of budget left behind so I put a screen of Downsizing in the mix since that seemed likely to do better than Darkest Hour, even with the bonus.  So my screens looked like this.

My Winter Week Four Picks

I settled on that with about 20 minute left before picks were locked.  And then it was time to see what the weekend would bring.

Saturday looked good, with Star Wars estimates marking it as the winning anchor.  However, I do not call it the “Saturday of false hope” for nothing.  Reality has often changed radically between the Saturday morning estimates and the final score.

Sure enough, come Sunday the balance had tipped in favor of Jumanji.  Star Wars was still strong, but not strong enough, and Pitch Perfect 3 faded and did not come close to being a viable anchor in the end.

The perfect pick for the week ended up being three screens of Jumanji, one screen of Greatest Showman, and four screens of Darkest Hour, a select worth about $191 million.

Winter Week Four Perfect Pick

Nobody in the Meta League picked that.  Most of us anchored on Star Wars, so the four who anchored on Jumanji led the way.  The scores settled out like this:

1. Aure’s Astonishingly Amateur Amphitheatre (M) – $163,392,215
2. Ben’s X-Wing Express (M) – $163,392,215
3. Paks’ Pancakes & Pics (T) – $163,168,241
4. Darren’s Unwatched Cineplex (T) – $155,499,222
5. Corr’s Carefully Curated Cineplex (M) – $154,230,311
6. Dan’s Decadent Decaplex (M) – $154,230,311
7. Wilhelm’s Broken Isles Bijou (T/M) – $151,781,915
8. Biyondios! Kabuki & Cinema (T) – $146,964,536
9. Po Huit’s Sweet Movie Suite (T) – $146,964,536
10. The Filthy Fleapit (T) – $120,913,670
11. The Bean Movie Burrito (T) – $120,612,642
12. I HAS BAD TASTE (T) – $120,243,581
13. Logan’s Luxurious Thaumatrope (M) – $119,841,779
14. Movies Movies Movies (T) – $118,023,711
15. Vigo Grimborne’s Medieval Screening Complex (T) – $117,892,261
16. Joanie’s Joint (T) – $117,668,287
17. Kraut Screens (T) – $116,225,055
18. SynCaine’s Dark Room of Delights (T) – $113,081,211
19. Dr Liore’s Evil House of Pancakes (M) – $110,925,055
20. Elly’s Elemental E-Plex (M) – $109,357,237

Meta League Legend

• TAGN Movie Obsession – players from it marked with a (T)
• MCats Multiplex – players from it marked with an (M)

Aure got the win for the MCats league while Pak got is for the TAGN leagu.

Those numbers are not “official” because the Jumanji numbers are still estimates at this point.  Hollywood is mostly off this week, so some numbers take time.  But I can’t wait any longer so that is what I am reporting for now.  I doubt anybody will change in the lineup once the final numbers are in unless Jumanji is way over-estimated.

We also have one new person in the TAGN league as of week 4, making the Meta League a total of 20 in size.

The stratification was those who went with Jumanji at the top, followed by those who went for Star Wars and Darkest hour, in turn followed by those who went with Star Wars and something besides Darkest Hour.  Nobody went with Pitch Perfect 3.

That left the overall Meta League rankings at the end of week four looking like:

1. Corr’s Carefully Curated Cineplex (M) – $418,221,987
2. Ben’s X-Wing Express (M) – $410,294,826
3. Biyondios! Kabuki & Cinema (T) – $386,208,484
4. Darren’s Unwatched Cineplex (T) – $385,720,281
5. Aure’s Astonishingly Amateur Amphitheatre (M) – $384,745,077
6. Po Huit’s Sweet Movie Suite (T) – $383,010,343
7. Wilhelm’s Broken Isles Bijou (T/M) – $381,349,688
8. Dan’s Decadent Decaplex (M) – $380,133,410
9. Paks’ Pancakes & Pics (T) – $377,780,532
10. Logan’s Luxurious Thaumatrope (M) – $355,895,828
11. Vigo Grimborne’s Medieval Screening Complex (T) – $351,494,606
12. Elly’s Elemental E-Plex (M) – $344,267,851
13. I HAS BAD TASTE (T) – $341,678,005
14. The Filthy Fleapit (T) – $338,997,819
15. Joanie’s Joint (T) – $338,357,463
16. SynCaine’s Dark Room of Delights (T) – $331,395,978
17. Kraut Screens (T) – $325,810,538
18. Movies Movies Movies (T) – $324,614,661
19. Dr Liore’s Evil House of Pancakes (M) – $315,947,954
20. The Bean Movie Burrito (T) – $120,612,642

The Jumanji gap and the bonus from Darkest Hour was enough to shake up the rankings a bit.  It wasn’t enough to shake Corr from the top of the tree however.

And now we are off to week five.  Star Wars still looks like a strong anchor while Jumanji looks to be getting punished a bit for exceeding expectations so much in week four.  Likewise for Darkest Hour.  The options for week five are:

Star Wars                  $610
Jumanji                    $588
Pitch Perfect 3            $242
The Greatest Showman       $143
Ferdinand                  $131
Coco                       $110
Darkest Hour               $93
The Shape of Water         $73
Downsizing                 $64
Father Figures             $48
All the Money in the World $40
Wonder                     $32
Molly's Game               $21
Best of the Rest           $21
Lady Bird                  $20

Justice League and Daddy’s Home 2 both fell off the list this week, the latter meaning SynCaine will have to find something else to pick to fill out his screens.  They were replaced by Molly’s Game and Lady Bird, which returns to the list at an odd $20 price, below the Best of the Rest pick. I’m not sure how that works out, but there it is.

The conservative streak in me at this point says Star Wars all the way as an anchor, but I know my mind has been changed on picks as late as Friday morning.  Still, the weekend estimate seems low.  My own informal polling over the holiday weekend ended up with most people I spoke to having not seen Star Wars: The Last Jedi yet but were planning to see it.  However this is also a dead week, so there was opportunity to see if before the weekend.  We shall see.