Why I Love the Game: Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor

Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor is a delight to play, in spite of the fact that the game basically has no story, and what story it does have is mostly told through annoying load screens. The key is simply this: the routine combat of the game is the best I've seen. It reminds of the best of Assassin's Creed and also the FMV combat of God of War. The environment is gorgeous. The game takes place almost entirely outdoors, in a green countryside filled with orcs, their human slaves, and the ruins of human and elven fortresses that were built to keep Sauron at bay. There are a few caves.

Orcs are stupid, which explains why you can sneak around them without being seen, why they will lose you quickly if you run away, and why their own fortresses are not terribly secure. Orcs are lazy, which explains why dozens appear when there's an alert, but there are relatively few standing guard (perhaps 50 in an entire fort).

Two very small quibbles with movement, both of which have to do with the fact that one key has multiple uses (due to the fact that it's a console port): 1) I stand next to walls trying to climb them and tumble instead of climbing the wall, and 2) the controls for sneaking while riding a caragath can be confusing.

As RPS said, "Unlocking more abilities doesn’t make the combat simpler, nor indeed does the game make itself more difficult. It does something so damned rare: it becomes more interesting."

I love this game. In order to enjoy it you, you need to know that, early on, you'll have to run from combat (the game does not tell you this).

What We Want from XCOM 3

There is an article on RockPaperShotgun about the next XCOM, written with the usual intelligence of the website. It is called Fear Of The Unknown: What We Want From XCOM 2. Sure, I'm calling it XCOM 3 in honor of the best game ever made, which I'm now calling XCOM 1. It was released in 1994, and I remember it as XCOM: UFO Defense.

I have the following suggestions

1. Alternate Realities

First of all, I would like there to be more options. A long list would substantially increase playability, such as the list in Endless Empire or SMAC or the Civ IV mod Fall From Heaven 2 (the best game of its type ever made).

It would be especially nice if the game did something that SMAC could have done but did not: code alternate realities. Why not be able to go into a game not knowing whether or not psionics exist, whether or not the lowest enemies have 3 HP or 5 HP?

It would be nice if the aliens could have different goals. They might have the goals in the original or new XCOM. They might want to harvest something specific from the earth. One of my favorite unexpected moments in the original XCOM was walking into a kind of alien ship I'd never seen before and finding a cow on board (this time, please have it alive instead of on a dissection table).

2. Alien Vision

One key element of alien superiority was the fact that aliens could see farther than humans, especially at night. The original XCOM (released in 1994) made night fights especially dangerous, but gave humans light bombs in compensation. In addition, a flammable environment generated usable light, which was a significant innovation for the time.

One option would give the aliens better vision. A second option would give them better night vision. The light bombs could stun anyone using nightvision. Humans would be able to make nightvision goggles at the start of the game, but human nightvision would be inferior to alien nightvision.

3. Alien Bases

The original XCOM made locating alien bases one of the goals of the game. In the new XCOM, ships simply move back and forth within a nation's borders until you catch them or they leave. In the original XCOM, they had missions that would cross national borders, and you could eventually guess the location of alien bases, which were in truly interesting locations, such as Iceland or the Himalayas.

One suggestion is for an option changing alien movement. A second suggestion is to implement the base scouting mechanic from the original XCOM. The alien bases themselves were the most challenging maps in the game. There were far more aliens than on most maps. Running out of ammo was a real concern (I like the current implementation of ammo in the new XCOM). Bases were defended by powerful aliens and alien tanks. Bases had teleports, not elevators, so aliens could always appear behind you due to normal movement. Some aliens would have alien blaster rockets, the most deadly weapon in the XCOM arsenal.

4. Attacks on XCOM bases

In the original XCOM, human bases could be attacked. Human bases would be defended by every soldier stationed on that continent, allowing you to field more human units than in any other battle, and potentially giving all of your lower level units some combat experience. It would be nice to have these attacks re-implemented, but the current system uses only one human base.

It was especially nice that the layout of the base that you had built generated the map that you fought on. In the new XCOM, the base has many levels connected by a single elevator. I can imagine falling back, defending several levels. I can imagine aliens rescuing those held in containment. It would be excellent. I recommend an option in which the aliens may attack your base, understanding that the system may not be ready to have several dozen humans on the screen.

5. Levelling up

In the original XCOM, units levelled slowly but infinitely based on their actions. Experienced soldiers could even move further. They had better aim and reflexes. I recommend an option in which each successful action improves a statistic incrementally. I further recommend that soldiers have more statistics than just Will and Aim. Understand that this levelling system is subject to exploitation.

6. Retake lost nations

The original XCOM did not allow the player to retake nations that had surrendered. An option allowing this -- basically an attack on an alien base -- would be great.

7. Great design decisions already made

According to Gamespot, the XCOM designers have already re-introduced looting, added stealth, and written new mission types. They have re-introduced procedurally generated maps. I hope that the new system will allow humans to fire plasma and laser bolts at walls. This is not permitted in the current XCOM, and it reduces the human player's strategic options.

I hope that the mission types will go beyond the well-known tropes (escort, kill, find). The final two bonus missions in the Slingshot Content Bonus Pack DLC were delightful. I hope that the same game staff are working on the new game (failure to do this led to the terrible Neverwinter Nights 2 after the brilliant learning curve in original Neverwinter Nights).

8. If there's stealth, are there detection devices?

In the original XCOM, you had to devote two or more soldiers to using faulty detection devices which, like that scene in the movie Aliens, had predictable flaws, which only made the game better. If there are invisible aliens, there should also be detection devices.

Conclusion

I'm looking forward to the next XCOM. I hope that it's a step forward and not a step back (Just Cause 2 likely had no playtesters).

XCOM designers, please continue to focus on fun, but this time, allow the hardcore fans to choose options that will make the game more difficult and more complex.

Solved: Trouble with Assassin's Creed and NVIDIA and Windows 7

I just built a Windows 7 system and Assassin's Creed was crashing regularly.

The solution is to run the DX9 version, even if yours is a DX10 system. The screen will still flash occasionally as the NVIDIA drivers encounter a problem, and your system will run astonishingly hot, but it will recover from its brief blackouts in DX9 -- it doesn't recover in DX10.

Have you played Fall From Heaven Yet?

I will write more on this later, but if you are a fan of Civ IV and have not played the Fall From Heaven mod, you should. It turns a scientific, logical positivist game into a fantasy world with angels, demons, and magic.

What Are The Odds of Rolling a Six?

I've been playing the new Third Reich with its new combat system, which uses Bucket of Dice (BoD) instead of odds / Combat Results Tables (CRTs) to resolve battles. In CRT system, you add up the attacking factors and defending factors and divide attackers by defenders to get a ratio. You then roll once on a table. This is fast and useful, but it delivers extreme results too often.

In the BoD system, you roll one die per combat factor, and each roll of "6" is generally a hit. So knowing the odds of rolling sixes is important.

The odds are not simple.

Many of us simply multiply the odds of rolling six on one die (1/6) by the number of dice to get the odds of actually rolling a six. This system seems intuitively to be right, but careful thought will show that it is not: if you roll six dice, you are not guaranteed to roll a six.

Simplify the problem: what are the odds of rolling a 6 on two dice? Intuitively, you might guess the odds are 1:3. You'd be wrong.

Simplify it further: what are the odds of getting "heads" at least once on two coin flips? It's certainly not 1/2 + 1/2 = 1. The matrix of possibilities of two coin flips are:

HH HT TH TT

There are four possible outcomes of two coin flips and only one of them does not have "heads" at least once.

The odds of getting "heads" at least once on two coin flips is 3:4 or 75 percent. No matter how many coins you flip, it is possible, though very unlikely, that you'll never get "heads" at least once.

The matrix of possibilities for two dice

While there are only 4 possible results from flipping a coin twice (2 x 2 =4), there are 6 x 6 =36 possible results of rolling two dice.

If you roll a six on the first die, there are six possible outcomes for the second. However, if you roll a six on the second die, there are only five unique possibilities for the first die, because we have already covered the possibility of rolling a six on both dice. The odds of rolling at least one six on two dice are 11/36, slightly less than 1/3 (and there's a 1/36 chance of rolling two sixes).

The matrix of other results contains all the numbers between 1 and 5. It is, in fact, 5 x 5 = 25 possible results (1 and 1-5, 2 and 1-5, 3 and 1-5, 4 and 1-5, and 5 and 1-5 = 5 x 5). 25 + 11 = 36, so our math checks out. The odds of _not_ rolling at least one six on two dice is 25/36, slightly over 2/3.

What are the odds of rolling one six on three dice? Now we're dealing with 6 x 6 x 6 = 216 possible outcomes. It's easier to calculate the odds of not rolling at least one six. Those odds are 5 x 5 x 5 / 6 x 6 x 6 = 125 / 216. That means that the odds of rolling at least one six on three dice are 89 / 216 or about 41 percent.

If you visualize the matrix of possibilities as a 6 x 6 square, with columns 1-6 across the top and rows 1-6 across the sides, you'll see that the outcomes containing a six are in the 6 row and 6 column. There are six possibilities in each, but rolling a 12 (two sixes) is a duplicate, so there are 11 possibilities. To confirm the truth of this visualization, imagine the 5 x 5 grid made up of the 1-5 rows and 1-5 columns that contain no sixes. That's 5 x 5 = 25 out of 36, as described above.

What are the odds of most people's favorite attacks, trying for one six on six dice or two sixes on twelve dice?

The odds of not rolling one six on six dice are 5 ^ 6 / 6 ^ 6 = 15,625 / 46,656 = very close to one-third. This is counter-intuitive if you're calculating odds through addition. If you are doing it that way, you'll think you need six combat factors to be guaranteed to get one hit. As I show here, it's not true. There's about a 1/3 chance of failure.

Nine factors give you a better guarantee of at least one hit: 5 ^ 9 / 6 ^ 9 = 1,913,125 / 10,077,698. There's still a 1/5 chance of failure (actually 18.98 percent, which is very slightly less than 1/5).

But I need two or three hits

Calculating the odds of getting two or three hits is much tougher. We're no longer rolling two dice, so the matrix would be a six-dimensional or nine-dimensional. So let's start with the odds or rolling two hits on three dice.

The matrix of possibilities is a cube with 216 entries (6 x 6 x 6). There are three sets of six outcomes containing two sixes, with a duplicate at the remote possibility (1/216) of rolling three sixes. The odds of rolling two hits on three dice are 5 + 5 + 6 = 16/216 or almost 7.5 percent. It is exactly 2 / 27. It is very unlikely.

Math check: the odds of not getting two hits on three dice is 6 x 5 x 5 = 150 possibilities if the first die is a six, 25 possibilities if the second die is a six, and 25 possibilities if the third die is a six.

It is 6 x 5 x 5 + 1 x 5 x 5 + 1 x 5 x 5 = 200 / 216. Math check complete.

So what are the odds of getting two hits on twelve dice?

The odds of not getting two hits on twelve dice are, I think, (6 x 5 ^ 11 + 11 x 5 ^11) / 6 ^ 12 =

(292,968,750 + 48,828,215 * 11) / 6 ^ 12 = (292,968,750 + 537,109,375) / 2,176,782,336

= 830,078,125 / 2,176,782,336 = 38 percent, which is very close to one third, just like the odds of not getting one hit on six dice. I am not certain that my math is exact here, but I am certain that it's close to accurate.

6 x 5 ^ 11 represents the possibilities in which the first die is any number and the subsequent ones have no sixes. The remaining 11 x 5 ^ 11 represent the possibilities that involve a six rolled on any one of the other elevent dice.

What are the odds of rolling three sixes with eighteen dice?

The odds of not getting three hits on eighteen dice, I believe, are made up of

6 x 6 x 5 ^ 16, which are the possibilities of rolling a six on the first two dice

x 16, representing the possibilties that involve rolling sixes on the first die and any of the remaining sixteen dice.

But in fact, we want to use a different mathematical function. We want to calculate the exact number of ways we can roll two sixes on eighteen dice. The number of possibilities are 17 given a six on the first die, 16 given a six on the second die (with a six on the first die already covered) ... the number of possibilties is 17 + 16 + 15 + 14 + 13 + 12 + 11 + 10 + 9 + 8 + 7 + 6 + 5 + 4 + 3 + 2 + 1 = 153.

I think that the odds of not rolling three sixes on eighteen dice is 153 x (6 x 6 x 5 ^ 16) / 6 ^ 18 =

153 x (36 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25) / 216 x 216 x 216 x 216 x 216 x 216) =

153 x (5.49316406 × 1012) / 1.01559957 × 1014 = which doesn't help at all, so I'll just plug the numbers above into Google and I get:

a number that does not work, so I take out the "36" and I get

153 x (25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25 x 25) / 216 x 216 x 216 x 216 x 216 x 216) = 23 percent.

Again, I'm not certain that this is correct, but it will, I think, explain your actual experience with bucket of dice games. You need to know the odds.

Mass Effect 2 First Thoughts

Bioware has learned some important lessons from Mass Effect and those lessons make Mass Effect 2 a much better game. While Mass Effect had more role playing player upgrade options than Mass Effect 2, the original game suffered from several key flaws (that few reviews seem to mention).

The biggest of those flaws was at the helm of the ship, the Normandy. You could spend 15 minutes trying to reach a console, locking on to it while too far away and then failing to see it when you were in front of this. You interacted with this console frequently, every time you wanted to go from one planet to another. Now, Bioware allows you to interact with consoles from farther away and the problem has mostly disappeared (you still don't want to get too close to something you'd like to examine, but you should never have to).

The dialog is better, and the software (surprisingly) runs better on my PC, the noob build, which is now underpowered.

Your interactions with planets have changed completely. There's now a mini game for finding elements on planets, instead of just click and you're done, and you walk around planets instead of driving on them in a vehicle that, in Mass Effect 1, was virtually impervious to fire but which could get caught in a ravine, forcing you to reload the game.

The interaction with characters and between them is much, much smoother, and the stories are more believable. It is in the writing and the voice acting that the new game really shines. The old one had some excellent performances from very actors, such as Seth Green as the ship's pilot, but he's even better in Mass Effect 2, where he gets to play some light comedy in addition to serious moments. Mass Effect 2, as the article says, is full of stars.

It is also gorgeous -- without straining my PC -- which makes the game even more enjoyable. Part of the joy of a space romp is visiting strage alien lands that are beautiful. Too many science fiction games take place in dark and narrow spaces or monochromatic wastelands.

Strategy for "Falling Seeds" in Plants vs. Zombies

Plants vs. Zombies is an excellent tower defense game. This strategy guide covers "Falling Seeds", a particularly interesting and replayable mini game.

1) The opening

You will get three seeds before the zombies start coming. Hopefully, they will be shooters. If not, place any lights and magnets farther back than you would usually place them.

If you get lily pads, you can either place them at the back of the water row or forward. Since you know that none of the first wave of zombies will go through the water, if you place a lily pad forward and then get a star, light, or magnet, you can place it on a lily pad.

Which row should you place the shooters in?

There are two top rows (1,2), two water rows (3,4), and two more grass rows (5,6). I like to place shooters in 2 and 5.

Note that you can always see zombies through the fog in row 1, and can often see zombies through the fog in row 6.

If you get a threepeater, place it in 5. If you get a second, place it in 2. If you get two in the opening, you have already covered all six rows with shooters!

2) The first wave

Once the zombies start coming, try to get one shooter in each of 1,2 and 5,6. Initially, if you get an expendable plant, such as a spud bomb, you can place it in a row and consider that row covered by a shooter. I also like placing expendables (and the little puff shrooms) on lily pads as far forward as possible, but at least 3 columns from the end.

If you get spikes, place them on the far right and use their sound to warn you of a zombie attacking that row. If you get spikes later in the round, place them right in front of a nut (this is from the gamefaqs.com strategy guides: http://www.gamefaqs.com/pc/959255-plants-vs-zombies/faqs -- the survival endless guides contain some very creative and powerful strategies).

Besides the spikes, there are only two plants that hit more than one zombie in their row: the watermelon and the big fume shroom. These are very valuable and should be protected. The watermelon can be placed at the back, but the fume shroom has a short range and is best placed 2 spaces behind a barrier or, if necessary, protected by a pumpkin.

Also valuable are the plants that slow down the zombies: the butter and freeze plants. These should be protected. In the early part of a level, they can save you when a zombie gets farther than you'd like.

Also try to place chompers directly behind a barrier (or garlic) or a pumpkin.

Place one shooter in each row before you place a second shooter in any row unless there is a conehead advancing on a valuable plant.

In particularly difficult levels (after you've played the game at least 10 times, they will happen occasionally), you will not get enough shooters to cover even the start of the first wave. If two zombies have progressed far enough down one row, let them get to the end and let them meet your lawn mower.

Once you have placed a large number of lily pads, you desperately want to prevent zombies from reaching the end. Protect the lily pads.

Never place in the back: nuts, single use plants, spikes, marigolds.

Never place far forward: threepeaters, watermelons, and scaredy shrooms.

3) Using garlic

Garlic is a very difficult plant to use correctly. If you ever get two in a row, you can place them adjacent to each other, and the zombies will go back and forth. If you ever have one row poorly defended, or you lose a lawn mower early in the game, you can protect that row with garlic, but then you must take care to place powerful plants in the adjacent row. The row with garlic should have some shooter in it. A freeze or butter plant is preferred.

If you are depending on garlic to protect a row, and you get the garlic early on, you will need to place a second garlic in the same lane after a few waves.

4) Using bombs, chilis, and nukes

If you get these too early, they're useless. Hold them for as long as you can. They are especially valuable in destroying the bungee zombies.

5) Using chompers

The chomp zombies can be used to protect key plants. They will eat a zombie that is attacking the plant in front of them, but then they need time for digestion. If a chomper needs time, an ice shroom can help.

6) Using torchwood

These are the most difficult to place. For best effect, they need to placed forward but they are vulnerable. Chompers and pumpkins can protect them, as can barriers. Note that if you place a split pea to their right, they will protect the plants in the lane against bungees.

Note that torchwood will drive back a very small amount of the fog.

7) Using nuts and pumpkins

These barriers are the key to the survival of your most valuable plants. Early on, you may want to place them in the grass rows, but later on, it's great to also place them in the water rows.

Place them forward so that you can place the following behind them (in order of value): lights, magnets, fume shrooms, stars, and chompers.

Note that if you get another nut of the same type, you can place it directly on top of your existing nut to heal it and make it stop crying.

8) Zombies to fear

The metalheads (football players, pailheads, and screeners) are especially dangerous if you're playing in a level that has no magnets. Otherwise, they (and the jack in the box) are relatively harmless. The metalheads must meet a barrier. Even if you fill a lane with shooters, the football player will get through.

The jack in the box is the most feared zombie. Make sure that by the late first wave, you have enough plants in each row to defeat a jack in the box. Generally, this means 2-3 shooters per row. A jack in the box that explodes can destroy your barrier and completely disrupt your strategy faster than any other zombie (except the bungees, who can do the same).

The newspaper zombie is feared in the early stages of the game, before the barriers are set up. This zombie is particularly likely to get to your short range plants, the puff and fume shrooms. If necessary, place an expendable plant such as a marigold as a barrier.

The bungee zombies can be your most challenging opponent. I find that freeze, bomb, and butter plants do the best to stop them. If you have a large number of stars in a column, they can help fight the bungees.

9) The endgame

Wave four differs from the other waves in that it: a) attacks the water rows more than the grass rows and b) some zombies appear in the water row. Towards the end of wave 3, place more firepower in the water. Also, some of the single use plants will be particularly useful in the end game. If you get a nuke, the end game is over very quickly

Note: You should occasionally look at the bottom right hand corner of the screen. It shows the progress bar. The start of each new wave is marked with a flag.

10) Why "falling seeds"?

My gf pointed out to me that of all the mini games, this one offers the greatest variety precisely because you do not control what plants you get. The fog adds to the variety and uncertainty, but I try very hard to eliminate the fog.