(Not to be confused with "Twitter Staredown: Roshirai Raids Again", coming this summer.) (NOTE: Near the bottom of the post is an EXCITING CONTEST, so scroll down to there if you hate Roshirai, but love contests.) Greetings! I have returned from lurking to tell SurgeonFish to turn off his giant image sig! Just kidding. Well, not about the turning off the image sig part, but rather about the part where that was the reason I was returning. No, I've actually returned to summarize some of the juicier bits that have come out of the Rudolpho feed since its inception*, partially because some of you may not be so obsessive to follow every last morsel from the feed, and partially because its provided us with another rich opportunity for... wait for it... baseless speculation! I'm so happy right now. Anyway, let's get to it. Hey, so we now know that fresh characters come with some form of starting equipment. These are probably "starter decks" that can be replaced piecemeal, but can't strictly be removed (no naked Wizards). This in and of itself isn't necessarily interesting, except when combined with... So, new characters not only get some form of starting item sets, but they unlock additional item slots as they are leveled up. This has several repercussions... Presumably, character decks increase in either size or maximum size as a character is leveled up. This would be accomplished by Blue Manchu either giving newly unlocked slots a piece of "starting equipment", much like new characters get, or leaving the slot open, allowing you to increase your deck if you wish to. Since it's reasonable to assume that particular cards will be associated only with particular classes of item, certain types of cards will likely be locked to a character until it levels up. Finally, and probably most obviously, this means that character decks will have a "soft" minimum and maximum size. By "soft", I mean to say that the proper minimum/maximum size can only be determined by looking at the full set of equipment available to a particular class/race, but that the "practical" min/max will be very strongly correlated to how many cards are generally in an item's card suite, and how many equipment slots a character with start with a grow to. As an example, if all Wizard items generally average around 3 cards per suite, and the Wizard starts with 6 equipment slots and grows to eventually have 10, the "soft" min and max size of the Wizard's deck would be 18 and 30, respectively. Phew. Finally, and probably most exciting, these tweets would likely indicate that equipment is probably starting to get a pretty fierce round of nailing down. Lots of stuff we can speculate on here, but it'd probably be easier to wait for Jon/Rudolpho to reveal the mysteries themselves. What card rarities did you eventually end up with? What's the level range? How many tabs is "lots", given that's how many types of equipment slot there are? How many pieces of equipment do you have complete at this point? Anyway, I wanted to end this post with an EXCITING CONTEST, so I'm going to do just that! Note the tweet above mentioning that Dorian has added 45 new low-level items. We already have a reasonable number of equipment name examples at this point, so I propose that we all attempt to guess the names of as many of those pieces of equipment as we can. One ground rule for sanity: only five guesses per poster, and only one "entry post" per player. No going through the dictionary in search of a win, and no spreading guesses across a bunch of posts. Seriously. It'd make my brain hurt. The Card Hunter fan who gets the most of their five guesses correct will win both showcases! OK, I can't back that one up. But maybe there'll be some sort of other prize. Maybe Blue Manchu will name a piece of equipment after you. Maybe they'll name a Goblin after you. Maybe I will name a sandwich after you and then engage it in mortal combat in your honor with my mouth! To start things off, my five guesses! Rusty Sword Tarnished Chainmail Splintering Bow Old Hat Cheap Shield * BWAAAAHM.
Staff of Worm Charming Itchy Wool Kilt Engraved Tin Breastplate Penknife of Stabbing Barbarian Two Handed Sword - 'Blood Sipper'
Deformed Chalice Whoopin' Stick Obnoxiously Loud Boots Eye Patch of Slightly Less Vision Over-Sized Helmet
I'm going to spill the beans on some of them: Box of Used Matchsticks Sharpened Pencil Mithril Mail Underpants Sandals of Schlepping Wand of Unlikely Occurrences
Choose your own forum post: A). If this is any indication, the forumers are going to be even more wonderfully gullible than I ever could have imagined. B). Awesome. Give me a Wand of Unlikely Occurrences.
Flail of horseshoes ("bludgeon of luck") Pen knife ("mightier than the sword") Skull cap ("creepy headgear") Chaucers ("poetic footwear") Buckly buckler ("a little worse for wear")
Why would all those monsters be wearing gear that fit me? Cyclopean Helmet Belt of Constricting Circumference Merfolk's Pantaloons Fingerless Gloves Socks of the Unwashed Goblin
Oh, I so want a Wand of Unlikely Occurrences. That's the one with the little adapter on the end that plugs into my Infinite Improbability Drive, right? So, let's see, my starting party will pack: Five Spikes Halberd - Unbalanced and hard to swing straight, but the sheer look of it should scare off most. You hope. Pearl Ring - A parting gift from your agèd grandmama. Surely the faint gleam you see under moonlight is an illusion . . . Comfy Boots - Because it's a long road ahead of you. Flawed Scrying Orb - If you see anything, it's probably the bubbles in the cheap glass rather than grim portents of fate. "Holey" Chainmail Vest - The armpits and several other spots are rusted out. But it should still stop some blades (just maybe not the sharp ones).
*ponders how to make his sig bigger* In the meantime Conventional Guesses: Cloak of Daggers Staff of Fireball Boots of Speed Sturdy Armor Fire Brand Non Conventional Guesses (more or less joke guesses) Delicious Kobold Spear Axe of Bad Financial Decisions Giant Spoon of Gluttonous Punishment Armor of the Marmot Turtle Speed Boots
Happy Triple J Hottest 100 Day everyone! (aka Australia Day) My guesses are: 1. Broken thongs 2. Barbecue tongs 3. Potion of Sun Protection 4. Inflatable Orca (mount) 5. Slightly Leaky Beach Ball
