Which is the best way to level up a Pokemon?

Question

At the moment I am using this strategy:

• Pokemon as the first in party (engaging in all fights, even when I need to switch for a more powerful/better suited Pokemon).
• Exp.Share equipped.
• Fighting the Elite Four + Champion (30 Pokemon with range of 7x)

This strategy works great when I am leveling a low level Pokemon. I tested with Sawk level 18, and he finished at level 82 after one pass (all 5 trainers).

But with Ho-Oh 82 I only got to level 87 (I was expecting 89 or 90). I know that the amount of experience is different, but am I doing it right?

• Should I go full fights with a high level Pokemon (even with disadvantage elements)?
• Should I use Lucky Egg instead of Exp.Share?
• Should I use some other method?

How can I improve my technique?

Note: I am playing Pokemon White (5th Generation), but I could use some generic advice.

Asked by Michel Ayres

Answer

Your strategy is good for lower level Pokemon. In Black/White, a lower level Pokemon will gain more EXP than a higher level one when fighting the same Pokemon.

For higher levels you would be better off letting the Pokemon KO opponents by itself, holding a Lucky Egg. If you are level 82 you shouldn't have too much of a problem tackling the whole E4. Try and get a range of move types for coverage and you can probably OHKO most Pokemon.

There is also the Large and Small stadiums in Nimbasa City which have high level Pokemon you can fight daily, Cynthia appears in Undella Town in Spring with level 75 Pokemon, and a guy in the Game Freak building with level 75s al well.

Answered by DisgruntledGoat

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When is the best time to deploy ECM Jammer?

Question

There are multiple defense mechanisms that are provided as unlocks for air vehicles in Battlefield 3. My friend and I were debating when to actually deploy ECM vs Flares. Personally, I have my own system with my gunner to evade missiles / getting locked but he was assuring me that my practice was wrong.

His version: Deploying ECM when missiles are fired and tracking to the target.

[I told him my version:]

My version: Deploying ECM after about 2 seconds of 'getting painted' or getting locked on. While ECM is being deployed, I either try to asses where the threat is coming from or bug out. If they are able to gain another lock on my helicopter, I coordinate with my gunner for when to deploy his flares. Most of the time, the missile misses us and my ECM jammer is reloaded. In theory, this would keep us up for a long time [ as long as we don't get killed by a SOFlam / Javelin combo or guided shell].

When is the best time to deploy ECM Jammer ?

Side Note: I have already seen this post, and they are not the same question.

Asked by Foxtrot

Answer

Your version will actually help against Soflam + Javelin/Guided shell (assuming they didn't fire in that two second window). Your friend's will not.

However, if you discount that situation, your friend's way is better because then the chopper is only using the ECM/flares when you have a missile coming your way and thus you can stay in the fray longer (since not every lock results in a missile being fired and, unless really close/unlucky, should send non Soflam projectiles astray).

Your way is safest in terms of staying alive. So, really, you can answer your own question by answering this question: What is most important, staying alive as long as possible, or staying in the midst of battle as long as possible?

Edit: With the new patch, I'm thinking the best strategy now will be to pop ECM instantly on solid lock, and have the gunner pop flares on any missile locks and never leave the midst of battle. When ECM dies out, the gunner would fire flares if a missile locks on after ECM is gone. By the time the flares are gone, your ECM should be back. Hypothetically, you should be able to stay up in the air a damn long time since now Javelins and such can miss because of flares. Of course, it's now also a lot quicker to lock onto targets with most missile launching vehicles/weapons.

Answered by AHungerArtist

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How to optimize your chances to catch a survivor with your special infected?

Question

Everyone knows how glitchy hitboxes can be with the Source engine. Its a problem for Left4dead just as it is any other Source game (TF2, CSS, etc). But some friends and I have the feeling that it became even worse in Left4dead 2, especially while playing the special infected (more specifically those who can "catch": hunter, smoker, jockey and charger).

I've been reading the whole changelog of L4D2 together with the L4D wiki, looking for answers, but couldn't find anything about nerfing the special infected in the way I'm about to describe here.

Also, please consider we (my friends and I) have been playing the game for hundreds of hours on multiple servers/networks, including local networks. So we can leave the lag and other major network issues out of this problem. ;)

---

Achieving a perfect pounce with a hunter is harder than before: most of time, we gently land on the shoes of the survivor we were aiming at without inflicting any damage or pinning him down, while we couldn't have missed him in L4D (the first). Does anyone know if the "pouncable hitbox" has been reduced between L4D and L4D2?

Also it seems that survivors can more easily escape from the smoker's slobbery tongue in L4D2 than in L4D. It's easier to run in a blind spot while the smoker has launched its attack and escape without getting caught. Does anyone know if the time between the moment where the smoker "shoots" and the moment where the survivor is actually immobilized has been increased ?

And last but not least, the most deadly special infected from Left4dead 2. The one which could (nearly) instant kill a whole survivor team: the charger. 40% of the time, while playing charger, I find myself in this kind of situation:

I don't know if I'm the only one; I don't think so, judging by the frequent rants of my teamates playing the charger. Does anyone have any idea on how to improve the chances to catch a survivor while charging ?

Asked by Anto

Answer

I can't give you a definite answer for comparisons between L4D1 and L4D2, but I have racked up hundreds of hours on both games and continue to play both daily. I'll give you my tips for each SI class, and perhaps it'll help you a bit.

Hunter

The obvious:

25 damage pounce is of course, wonderful. Some people are pretty good at bashing you out of the air, and it can be quite obvious when they hear you leaping. Practice makes perfect on this, after the hundreds of hours I have put in, I can land high damage pounces even on moving targets.

Pounce when people are stationery, or pouring a can. On scavenge this works better as people will shoot you and often hit the can, igniting it and causing fun.

You can bash hunters out the air just through practice, eventually you'll get the timing right.

The less obvious:

Most of my pounces are done by instinct. I don't point down to see where I am going, I just guess where they are. Surprisingly, I land quite a lot of pounces this way. By facing downwards to see where you're going, you'll often fall short.

If you hunter someone, surrounding people stagger back, and can be forced off ledges.

Hunter can run very quickly, if you're bashed off someone, it is often better to attempt to run away rather than crouch/pounce. In many situations you can dash behind a corner and pounce away.

If you miss, don't pointlessly leap onto a survivor, instead retreat and try again. It takes 20+ seconds to spawn, but only 5 to pounce away, onto a roof, and try again.

You can pounce off walls, so practice jumping between buildings to improve your height.

Pounce damage seems to be based on your height when you begin the pounce, not when you end it, so pouncing very high and landing on the same level does not do much damage.

If you pounce repeatedly against a wall you can distract people who get nervous from the sound.

Smoker

The obvious:

Best to pull people away from a group, or off a ledge. You can hold people still for a pounce or charge.

The less obvious:

Smoke people who are reloading to stop them spinning and shooting you. Smoke people off ledges and have your team distract. It only takes a few seconds of distraction/interrupting someone for smoker to reload and get the next guy. You can counter smoker with most melee weapons by immediately striking the tongue. Also by spinning and dropping (not throwing) a gas can onto the tongue.

There are many spots for smoker/hunter instant death pounce. It's worth researching these if you play with a friend, as there are many more than the obvious well known ones.

Smoker can instant kill or incap people who are walking up escalators as it can drag them up and over the side, and they won't grab on.

Running up to people and smoking them while standing right next to them will grab them without any chance of them bashing or escaping. This also bypasses the generator bug on no mercy rooftop scavenge.

You can smoke people next to ledges, and chargers standing on the ledge can grab them, allowing you to charge people off the map. There are many good smoker/charger combo points that people don't expect if you're working with someone else.

Charger

The obvious:

Charges people, knocks people back, has a very high damage punch that can hit multiple targets. Can kill people by charging them off the map, or by causing others to fly off the map.

The less obvious:

Charger can do more damage with a punch than by charging into a group and getting killed. Works well with boomer.

Charger can do ridiculous damage to someone who is smoked by punching them, incapping them in a few seconds.

The best way to connect a charge is to judge the player's skill throughout the game. If they have high skill, they're likely to be listening for the charger charge sound and dodge. If you adjust your charge accordingly, they will often dodge into your charger.

Always aim charger in front, charge earlier, etc.

There are many places where you can charge two people, and have the 2nd person go flying off the map. There are lots of less obvious places, such as the mall finale - instead of the obvious top of the stairs charge, you can hide in a side room and when two people run back with cans, you can charge them diagonally for an instant kill, etc.

Survivors in spit take less damage when huntered, jockeyed etc. which makes it less effective. However, survivors that are hit by a charger and go flying through the air continue to take regular damage. Charging and spitting in a confined spare therefore does a huge amount of damage, including if you spit into the place where survivors are landing.

Cautious survivors who think you're waiting at the top of a ladder will popup and go down to try and get the charger to waste their charge. If you stand along the top of the ledge and charge diagonally, you can in some cases hit the survivor by falling off the ledge and catching them half way up the ladder.

Exploding boomer can free a charger. Consider this if a charger has incapacitated someone as they can free the charger to move to another target.

It's very hard to charge someone who is getting up from being pounced, as in the video.

If someone grabs a survivor with a jockey or smoker, and you have the opportunity to charge them off the map, consider if you can do better by charging the person who comes to rescue them.

Don't charge at point blank range, as it will often bug and you will either not connect, or you'll just end up thumping them at close range.

Jump up and down when punching people as it throws off their aim. Charger takes more damage if shot in the head, so don't give them an easy target.

Honorable mentions:

Spitter - always spit in the center of the room, never in the corner. The radius of the spit is bigger than it appears on screen, and players will think they can escape by running to the edge of the room where it looks safe, which is often not the case. You can spit upwards and hit the roof, the spit will then fall down and you can stay hidden. Spit that bounces tends to spread out more, so try to bounce it off walls if possible. If you spit and then die in the right place, the modifier for spit damage increases even if they change from your spit spit to your death spit and it can inflict massive damage if you chain both together.

Boomer - Spawn and fire, don't run forward after you spawn. Aim upwards for increased range. Run as a ghost, jump, and spawn in mid air to get a speed boost that makes you go flying.

Jockey - Sucks, but if you incap someone near a ledge and time it just right, you can insta kill them as their incapped body will fall off. Jockey also refreshes its pounce very quickly if you pull someone off a ledge. Some windows/ledges cannot be hung onto, so it's possible to instant kill from some windows/ledges, especially if you have forward momentum.

Tank - You don't lose control if one or more survivors are in the safe room. This means your team can chip away / keep trying to get a good boomer, while you chill outside. Very effective on maps that have retardedly easy to camp safe rooms. Punching cars etc. is best. You can shoot the thrown rocks out of the air. Anything the tank can bash can also be destroyed by the grenade launcher, so it's good to note these as you can only see them as the tank. Always incap one survivor, then hide nearby. When your bar gets low, bash the incapped survivor.

If you play the game a lot as you say, you probably know most of these, but they're there for others. I didn't notice any difference in pouncing difficulty between the two games, they're both pretty tricky. There was a hunter bug in the first game that I don't know if it was patched, whereby if you tap crouch while standing (as a ghost) inside a car, it bugs you so that if you then spawn, you can sprint silently while crouched.

Answered by SLC

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What apparel can I acquire to quickly close the alchemy/enchantment loop?

Question

My goal is to smith the strongest possible armor set I can, then enchant said armor to best fit the needs of my mage. I'm leaning towards dragon armor at this point as I have enough of the required components for myself and my NPC companion.

My character currently has 100 smithing, 75 enchantment and 30 alchemy. I am aware there is an alchemy/enchantment "feedback loop" (as utilized here) that can be leveraged to enchant "smithing armor" capable of pushing the smithing perk to +29% for refining my final set of armor.

Instead of grinding my alchemy/enchanting skills to 100 I'd like to know what the best apparel is in the world of Skyrim to boost these two skills? Hopefully this will give me the ability to craft my goal armor sooner than later.

For example: I know the Krosis Mask when equipped grants me a +20% alchemy. I'm assuming I don't need to forge/enchant a alchemy-boosting helmet and just use it instead, no?

What else is out there that can boost these two skills for me? Do I need to get my all of my "enchanting apparel" and "alchemy apparel" to +29%, or is that a waste of time?

Answer

The information you are looking for is currently at this location. I do believe it safe to call this thread the origin of all this madness as its now on its 7th incarnation and they are still working on the math of it all.

However, to sum it up: The max cap gear is pretty much based on maxing out those skills to 100 as well. The reason this is done is because it saves you perk points. Wasting perks when they could be put into other areas other than making your gear work better is pretty much the point of that thread... How few perks can you use so you can be whatever character you want to be and still have very effective gear. Its honestly not that hard to do in the long run and will always net you a surplus in cash when leveling them up.

Now, that being said. There is the Restoration Loop that, if done enough in a row can likely get you what you want... Though I honestly think it easier to get those skills to 100 rather then try to meet the timings of the restoration loop. (I do not even consider trying to do that loop until my skills are at 100 each).

My usual caution with the restoration loop, it is possible to make game breaking items by utilizing it, even though it is 100% through in-game mechanics.. Just take care not to ruin the game for yourself and use it where appropriate. For instance, I have a character who will only ever wear Fur Armor (I collect ever piece of it I can so I can improve my enchantments on it and so forth). I will eventually use the restoration loop to make a very nice set of armor for the character.. which is a mage... and let me tell you, not using those -cost +regen robes realllly makes for an interesting time :)

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What's the exhaustive set of items I can use to make Dwarven Metal Ingots?

Question

I know there are a series of items that can be melted down to make Dwarven Metal Ingots, but I'm not sure about all of them (levers, cogs, etc.) What is the exhaustive set of items that can be smelted to produce these ingots?

What are the best item(s) I should be preferring over others given its weight-to-ingot ratio?

Answer

From UESP, here are all the items that can be smelted down and their ingot/weight

• Small Dwemer Plate Metal (1.5)
• Large Decorative Dwemer Strut (0.1333...)
• Bent Dwemer Scrap Metal (1.5)
• Large Dwemer Plate Metal (1.5)
• Solid Dwemer Metal (.2)
• Large Dwemer Strut (.15)

Of the three items that melt down to a ratio of 1.5 ingots/weight, they all weight 2 and produce 3 ingots from the smelting and thus are the most valuable to collect.

Of note from the uesp entry:

You are liable to find many other items in dwemer ruins that look metallic but can't be smelted. An easy rule of thumb is that if it starts with the word "Dwemer" (dinnerware, cogs, gyros, etc.), it can't be converted, not even Dwemer Scrap Metal . Bent Dwemer Scrap Metal can be smelted. The Small Dwemer Lever is an exception; its name doesn't start with Dwemer, but it still can't be smelted.

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Is it best to stick together or spread out in MW3 team deathmatch?

Question

This question regards to which method is more effective in winning matches, not necessarily gaining experience or proficiency. Usually, my first instinct tells me that I should always stay close to my teammates in multiplayer shooters. However given how easy it is to die, and how fast it is to respawn, is my instinct still correct?

I'm starting to feel like there's not much advantage to sticking together. And spreading apart at least makes you less vulnerable to explosive damage. Which course of action gives your team the best chance of winning?

Answer

Keeping a group together, but reasonably well spread out helps to protect you from an experienced enemy team. Keep in visual range in order to be able to provide covering fire, and use your role strengths.

If you are close together, you can lose 2 or 3 people before you can get to cover (the enemy can concentrate their fire and move rapidly from one target to the next) whereas if you keep a looser group you are harder to 'box', less susceptible to a well placed grenade taking out more than one, and force an enemy to have to spread out more.

This looser unit requires very good comms to work well.

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How can I beat the Bobsled Bonanza Mini Game?

Question

I just purchased a new mini-game pack in Plants vs. Zombies on my iPhone. One level is Bobsled Bonanza, which puts you against a ton of Zombonis and Zombie Bobsled Teams. To kill these zombies you have to use either the jalepeno (which costs 125 sun points) or the Cherry Bomb (which costs 150). The problem is, there are not enough spaces to plant on or time to plant flowers to generate the sun point to buy jalepenos or Cherry Bombs quickly enough. I have:

• Used the imitater plant to mimic the jalepeno, so I can use two back-to-back. This works, but I also rarely have time to generate enough points to buy two quickly.
• Used the Squash (which is a cheap 50 points), which efficiently takes out Zombonis. The problem is they don't take out the entire Bobsled Teams and regenerate slowly. I don't see any other cheap options for taking out Zombonis, and no cheap options for taking out Bobsled Teams.
• I tried planting sunflowers in the water, to free up grass space for Peashooters and Potato Mines, but I have to plant lilypads if I do that, which takes an extra 25 points, and means I can plant fewer sunflowers in the same amount of time.

I have made it 75% of the way through this mini-game before being overwhelmed by the onslaught of zombies. What strategy am I overlooking?

Answer

This page lists a variety of strategies you can use.

Here are just a few of the strategies they suggest:

Alternate Strategy One: The player will be most vulnerable at the beginning. Get a double column of Sunflowers up fast and three in rows 1 and 6. Plant a Cattail after the first eight Sunflowers and as soon as they finish their cooldown after that. Plant Potato Mines as soon as they are available, but prioritize Spikerocks. If a Zombie Bobsled Team makes it past the ice in an unprotected row, drop a Wall-nut, wait for them to bunch up, and use a Squash. Once the lawn is under control, you can replace Sunflowers with more Threepeaters (on land) and Cattails (in the pool). Use the Squash, Jalapeno, Cherry Bomb, and Spikeweed As written here, this strategy includes 11 plants: 1 Sunflower 2 Lily Pad 3 Cattail 4 Potato Mine 5 Spikeweed 6 Spikerock 7 Wall-nut 8 Squash 9 Threepeater 10 Jalapeno 11 Cherry Bomb

Alternate Strategy Two: This strategy is so simple, nine words can describe it: two columns of Sunflowers and two columns of Gloom-shrooms. Nothing will get past it. [Note]The trick is building it. The iOS version only has 3 ice free columns, and the bobsledders will overrun you early. You need a lot of defense before you can build the columns.

Alternate Strategy Three: Plant eight Sunflowers on the first and second columns at the 1st, 2nd, 5th, and 6th rows. In front of the Sunflowers, plant at least two Peashooters at every lane. Plant two Peashooters for the pool lanes as well, on top of Lily Pad, to have Defense against Ducky Tube Zombies. Melt the ice as soon as possible with Jalapeno. After melting ice, add Spikeweeds and upgrade to Spikerocks as soon as possible to prevent more ice from coming in. Plant Cattail and Wall-nut or Tall-nuts for more Defense.

Alternate Strategy Four (the “Armageddon” method): Plants: Lily Pad, Sunflower, Wall-nut, Squash, Potato Mine, Jalapeno, Cherry Bomb, Doom-shroom and Coffee Bean. Plant a minimum of eight Sunflowers in the leftmost ranks.

Use the Squash (cheap) wherever possible to stomp Zombonis, and plant Potato Mines (cheap and quick to regenerate) as backup Zomboni killers and to take out entire Bobsled Teams. As things get more chaotic, move up to the heavier explosives. When things get really crowded, place a Doom-shroom on a Lily Pad midway down the pool, then drop a Coffee Bean on it to detonate and clear the yard nearly fence-to-fence. Clean up smaller groups with Cherry Bombs (if they are compact) or Jalapeños (if they are strung out along the file).

Bide your time and wait till the last possible moment to detonate your Doom-shrooms; they take a long time to regenerate and the longer you wait, the more zombies will enter the yard (and the kill zone). If you wait too long and miss a few, or want to wait longer to draw more in, or need a few more seconds for a plant to recharge or to gather more Sun, drop in a Wall-nut to slow ’em down, bunch ’em up, and give you more time to Squash ’em or blast ’em.

Try to reserve the Jalapeno as your ace-in-the-hole; if your explosives timing is off and you miss a few zombies, you can use it to zap the endangered file. If you can, wait while they eat a Sunflower or two (easily replaced) and you may also be able to nail a Zomboni or Bobsled entering from the right as a bonus.

Alternate Strategy Five: Pick the following plants: Sunflower Jalapeno Imitater Jalapeno Cherry Bomb Squash Repeater Lily Pad Spikeweed If you have 9 slots, pick the Torchwood, and if 10 slots, pick the Twin Sunflower. Procedure:

1.) Plant Sunflowers on the first two columns of the lawn (making you have 12 Sunflowers).

2.) When a Zomboni appears, plant a Spikeweed in front of it.

3.) When a Zombie Bobsled Team appears, use the Jalapeno to kill those four.

4.) If a Zombie Bobsled Team appears and your two Jalapenos are still recharging, plant a Repeater immediately. (I assume that you have enough sun for it at this point.)

5.) You must have planted Repeaters on the third column (and later on, probably on the fourth) before or during the next huge wave of zombies.

6.) Use the Squash or Cherry Bomb whenever some zombie get past your current defense.

7.) Only use Spikeweeds to kill Zombonis!

8.) Use again the Jalapeno when a row gets huge amount of ice. (Use the Imitater if the zombies are far away and use the real one if the zombies are near.)

9.) If you have enough sun and time, plant Torchwoods and Twiin Sunflowers.

If there are too many Zombie Bobsled teams in one row, use the Cherry Bomb in the middle of them. Reserve your Jalapenos for urgent uses. Don't waste them on rows with just ice and no zombies! If a Zomboni crushes your Repeater, use the Squash to prevent them from proceeding to your house.

Alternate Strategy Six: Plant Sunflowers in the back and build up Starfruit in the pool while you hold the initial waves off with Potato Mines, Squashes and Jalapenos. Once the Pool is full of Starfruit, nothing can get past them.

Also, here is a Youtube video that illustrates another strategy you could try.

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Tips for warding in League of Legends?

Question

I tend to like to play a support champion. Since I'm slowly making my way to mid and high level play its getting more important to get good wards up because ganks become more common.
I am therfore interested in some tips how to ward effectively?

• What are some good/important spots for wards (especially on Summoners Rift)?
• Some good timings to leave the lane to get up some wards?
• What other important points to keep in mind such as normal wards or detection wards?

Answer

I like to play support too. First thing about warding is :

• Any player should be responsible for its own warding

Meaning that the support player should not be asked to ward top+mid+bot all the time and especially in early game.

What to ward

Early game

Places you want to ward are :

• Bushes

That pretty all for the start. However, you won't have many wards, so you must chose the right spot:

1. Normal setting, no advantage on the map, the battles are mainly located at mid-map.
2. The enemy has very high usage of their bushes and intel is more important than gank protection (if affordable go for 1+2 in these cases). Note that the enemy sould have a HIGH usage of bushes for themselves (not traps). Low usage of bushes and traps can be dealt with your CV!
3. When your tower is under siege, it's better to go for ward 3, as you would see gankers from 1 early enough.

Mid and late game

The bigger map show multiples points. Red one are for attack, blue for defence and yellow for special. Let's talk about yellow first.

You want to know when the other team goes for dragon and baron. You will place the ward near the entrance of the wells since it let you see the all thing in case someone jumps the trees. Soft yellow spot are to be placed whenever you attempt to kill the corresponding dragon so as to be able to back-off if enemy come (or get them before they can gather)

On attack, you have the advantage and you need directions intelligence. If you can predict where the defenders are going, you are able to track them.

Critical positions are red and blue bush. Defenders will try to get any advantage to counter the rushes you put on them. Denying red and blue is good for you.

Small bushes near the wraiths is also a good indicator to protect you from being flanked. Sometimes a ward in the enemy base is very practical to ensure they are still defending against super minions while your are killing the Baron.

On defence, you need to see the attackers as much as possible. So ward positions differ from the attacker's one. For our objective we do not want to control directions anymore, but positions. Note that the soft blue spot indicates places you can ward from defensive positions (over trees, or wall) if you can't afford putting a better ward.

When should you go to ward:

Early game:

• Any time you can afford to lose tempo

Every time I pushed my lane and know I won't be able to do heavy damage to the turret and the supported champion in not in immediate need of support, I go refresh some wards.

• When ward has/will expired

It is critical to have a good sense of timing. If you can anticipate ward expiration, you would be able to refresh it at the best possible time.

• When switching lane

When you switch lane for some reason, be nice: drop ward for your new lane friend(s).

Middle game

By that time, you should be gathering with your team. Use any occasion when your are moving with your team to leave ward behind you. Do small detour when necessary, but not too much.

When not to ward:

• I never go warding alone on late game unless I'm sure I'm not going to be cornered in the forest. The ward is not worth your death!
• Avoid warding when you can be seen (it's always better to stay under the radar): delay, use confusion or change position if you can afford it.

When should I buy wards

If you are playing support, ward is your first and your last item, it appears in the tab menu and in the statistics. My build uses gold items, so I buy the first element for it and 3 wards at start. Then I always try to buy ward when at the base (at least 3 if I really need other item badly). Don't delay buying wards or you won't. When you run out of ward, notify it. Refill when you can: 5 wards are 375gp.

Vision ward and Clairvoyance

The last words I can drop here too are for vision wards and CV.

Vision ward are expensive, but they could be useful sometimes to uncover invisible heroes. My view on this is : every invisible heroes tends to hide in bushes before going stealth, at least in early games (to maximise stealth time), thus falling in our sight ward intel. Furthermore, stealth is detected by towers. I honestly rarely use those wards. And they are outmatched by a good oracle late game. But should I use them, the placement differs from normal sight wards. Objective here is to cover the largest valuable area. This can be problematic on top and bot lanes, as we would be interested in covering bushes but that renders half the ward area useless.

Clairvoyance summoner spell is very useful. Use it every time you can. With a 55 cooldown reduce at 50 by Mystical Vision mastery, you can literally spam it. On early game, a well placed CV (see picture) should be able to reveal all bushes.

If you do not need CV on your lane, use it on other lanes. Try to know if teamates could use it. If nobody needs it, check reds/blues for jungler and dragons to be sure the enemy is not looking at them. At start, try to know how the enemy leaves the fountain to have insight on who you will see top/mid/bot. Use it to cover your jungler from being gank before start, or try to detect their jungler if your going to try a kill.

I think I'm done now. Good luck.

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Counter mass Thor + SCVs as Zerg

Question

Recently I've notice that Terrans do less bioball/tank against Zerg and go for a thor heavy play. The first problem with the mass thor push is that it's really difficult to distinguish from a standard mech play (hellions, tanks, thors) when you scout the Terran base (you just see "a lot" of factories with Techlabs on them).

The second problem is that this push often occurs before the Zerg player techs up to broodlords, which could be a pretty good counter to this.

What can Zerg do about it ?

Answer

As Artosis said, an army made mainly of Thors is quite immobile so you can abuse this with Mutalisks and Zerglings.

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DotA: placing mines by Goblin Techies

Question

I am interested in some good strategies of playing by Techies. Mostly, what is the most profitable place for placing mines in the game beginning ? Such places as near the top/bottom shops work rarely because it's the first place where the opponents do NOT send their heroes having techies in opposite team. Also I wonder when it's the best time to leave the line and start patrolling over the map and mining. I understand that it of course depends on the concrete game and heroes pick, but I'm interested in opinion of experiences players.
Thanks in advance.

Answer

First of all, you are right, most players are aware that you will most probably place bombs on the shop area so they are carefull. However, early game, while lanning, you can notice that your creeps will go only on one half of your lane(left side on bot lane and right side of top lane). So it's a pretty good idea to place your mines anywhere in the lane on the side which is not crossed by creeps. However, you should be very carefull because by attacking an enemy hero you will provoke enemy creeps to come to you and attack you and therefore they will get outside their normal lane track. If you keep this in mind, this is a pretty good strategy to start with. Classic spots like runes will however get you a kill if the enemy player isn't cautious. If the enemy team starts buying sentry wards or gems, you might consider yourself useless. Even so, it is not the case. Use ramp fog to your advantage. Place your mines on the upper part of any cliff. This way when the enemy comes even if it has a gem in his inventory he won't be able to see the bombs because of the fog. If they also have the map filled with observer wards, then you are pretty much screwed. In this case your only option would be a force staff. But if you want to play a good all around game, you should definately go for aghanim. On lvl 16 with aghanim the damage output of a single remote bomb is just outrageous. In team fights just place bomb and instant detonate. If the opposing team has a few agi/int or non-tank heroes, I am telling you: "They WILL fear you!". I hope you find this helpfull. If you have any more questions or just need general advice with anything dota related feel free to ask .

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Any tips for the Insane AI co-op matches with AI allies?

Question

This other question has several good tips for how to get the Insane FFA achievement. I tried one of the strategies and it worked well.

However I'm trying to do the ones where you have to have Insane AI allies (3v3, 4v4) and for some reason my allies do nothing. I've tried 4-5 matches and it pretty much goes down the same way each time. My allies build up a decent force very quickly (no defense at all though), and they don't do any thing. The computer will then team up one on of them, by the time reinforcements get there the ally is already destroyed.

I thought maybe my allies were just waiting for me to initiate an attack, but when I tried that it didn't go so well. They stayed at the bases and my entire force was lost.

Any tips to make this easier? Or should I just stick with the FFA tactic and go hide on an island and build up an Battlecruiser army. (Of course, then it becomes 1v3 or 1v4 since my allies will all be dead).

Answer

For the 'Kin' achievements i had a hard time until i ended up using silly tactics for each of the 3 races to allow my team the win with a lot more ease, and a lot less frustration at my idiotic teammates.

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Protos

Cannon Rush. You can see my description of it here.

The basic gist is: send a starting probe to their base (on Megatron) and set up a pylon and forge, then start planting cannons until they are all hampered enough that your team rolls over them.

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Zerg

Spine Crawler Rush.

This works best on maps where all the bases are seperated.

This means your opponents all need to be zerg.

Harvest for < 1min with all of your drones. Build 1 or 2 new drones. Then save up for a pool. After the min has past send 2-4 of your drones into the opponents base. Then split them up 2 per opponent base. As soon as you have the resources turn those drones into spine crawlers behind their resource line. Use the minerals to funnel the drones so only one can attack your spine at a time.

If all goes well you will land 2 crawlers behind 2 different bases and it will cause enough economic damage that the other 3 players on your team will be able to roll over the opposing AI. If all does not go well, they will have attacked your crawlers and killed them. Save yourself the time and pack up and surrender. Just try it again.

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Terran

I chose Protoss for my opponents on this one.

This works best on maps where there are two players per base.

I built fast into 3 barracks with tech labs and mass produced Reapers.

I then proceed to reaper harass the opponents, watching for striders and zealots to come defend while cleaning house of probes. If you are able to take out a nexus early, that's always very helpful.

If all goes well you did enough damage that your buddies can clean house, otherwise start over.

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Hope this helps out, this is exactly how I did them.

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What's the best counter to marine spam?

Question

I've seen this cheesy strategy a few times now - loads of marines with all the upgrades and medivacs. This wasn't a rush but still wasn't able to counter playing as zerg.

What's the most effective (zerg) way to counter this strategy?

Answer

There are a number of ways you can handle this, and I'll try to break them down for you:

• Roach Work
• Baneling Style
• Infestor Harassment
• Brood lord
• Back Dooring

Roaches are what many people consider the Marine's natural Enemy. With high HP (almost 3 times a Marine) and that 1 base armor its not surprising people would believe this. Unlikely in Starcraft 1, Marine's can't upgrade their attack range, so the shorter range of the Roach is punished less. The biggest issue you have to worry about with Roach based play is where you engage your opponent. Ideally you want to engage on open ground, on creep, and with a nice arc. Try to remember that because of the Roaches' short range remember to "move" into melee range, instead of "attack move."

Baneline Style is very popular against MMM in general, and usually used to compliment Roach or Hydra work. If you initially engage with your Roaches (in more Marauder based play you'd use Hydralisks here), and then bring in Banelings from the side or behind (flanking in military terms), you can usually make quick work of any Marine based force. Remember you never attack with Banelings, as they explode on death to do damage. Instead just "move" near the Marine force and let the Marines kill them off. I cannot stress how important baneling speed upgrade is against a Marine force, even on creep.

Infestor Harassment is also a nice compliment to dealing with Marines. While Medivac will heal most of the damage quickly, in the middle of a fight, Infestors can prevent Marines from backing up, while dealing incredible dps (9*#of marines). They are an excellent compliment to a Roach or Zergling based strategy. If you're dealing with Infestors alone, remember that it will usually require 2 Fungal Growths to kill a pack of Marines; where "usually" is influenced by the use of Stim and the presence of Medivacs.

If you're coming from a late game Air strategy it'll make more sense to use Broodlords. Brood Lords are effective because of their high damage, and because Broodlings draw fire from Marines. Because Broodlords are slow, its normally useful to engage from the edge of a cliff, where few Marines can hit you. Unless you have a very large number of Broodlords, this kind of play is unlikely to be effective on its own, and is best complimented with a cheap ground force (something ling based).

Backdooring is usually an effective technique for shutting down late game Terran pushes. Terran style tends to be fairly turtle dependent, so most Terran players will run for their base when ever its in trouble. You can leverage this with Muta Harass, Zergling Drops, or even Nydus Canal. The very fact that you are in his base will often make a Terran call off his assault, giving you more time to prepare.

With the exception of the last strategy, all these strategies are what I like to call "meat and potatoes" strategies. They have some method for killing the Marines and some method for distracting them. This is because Marines are extremely cost effective dps and once they hit critical mass, almost impossible to destroy for a short range based Zerg force. You strategy should look something like this: I need something for him to hit (let's say Ultralisks) and something to kill him (let's say Hydralisks, two units I didn't recommend). You would then engage with your Ultra heavy force, backed by long range Hydra. The Marines will naturally target the Ultra who have high HP and Armor, while the Hydra do the lion's share of the damage. When designing an anti-Marine strategy keep this in mind.

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I used to include an explanation of Arcs here, but I've since moved it

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What is the best strategy for beating the final Campaign Mission “All In” on brutal difficulty?

Question

Has anyone beaten this mission on brutal difficulty? If so what was your strategy?

I tried both paths:

Path 1 - Taking out the nydus networks

Path 2 - Taking out the flying units

I found path 1 to be significantly easier as the nydus worms spewing tons of units seems much harder to deal with than flying units. Especially later in the level when the worms are very far from your base and are guarded by spore colonies and overseers+hydra. Also, if you go mass tanks, Kerrigan will do AOE to your tank groups.

My current strat which got me to about 76% using path 1, is to mass battle cruisers and vikings. On the ground I use a few tanks and some flame towers.

For my next attempt, I will try mass BCs and Vikings, but will use a barracks wall at the choke points. Money is pretty tight (not enough mineral patches...), but I'll probably try making use of the zerg mind control towers too, which I forgot I researched.

If anyone has a better strat please chime in :)

Answer

Ok so I ended up beating it. 100%!

Here's a video of someone else beating it on Brutal with a different, and possibly better, strategy than I describe below.

Again, there are probably infinite ways to do it, but here is how I did it:

• Heavy use of save and load. Save before Kerrigan shows up and after she retreats. If you lose too many units (like 3 BCs to Kerrigans stupid magic hand wave instakill bull), then reload.

• Take out the Nydus worms as flying units are easy to deal with

• Build BCs to make use of Yamato cannon on Kerrigan and the Leviathan (the giant flying guy).

• Build Marines and medics; make use of stim.

• Build a few Science Vessels to help with healing your BCs. Build them early.

• Build, and never stop building, SCVs. Trust me, I had the research that lets me train 2 SCVs at once, and I NEVER stopped building them. You need them for repair and to keep up with the mineral gathering.

• Keep SCVs near chokes to repair

• Construct flame towers near the choke. If you didn't get flame towers, build a few planetary fortresses at the chokes and have a bunch of SCVs there to auto-repair (no seriously, it'll work, lots of HP, lots of splash damage).

• Construct a few flame towers sporadically in your base to deal with random drop pods.

• Construct Barracks at each choke point to serve as a wall between incoming enemies. This also helps keep Kerrigan back.

• Get as many ship and infantry upgrades as you can. Do it early.

• Make use of mind control towers. Build them early on the left and the right sides.

• Use mind controls towers to grab as many brood lords and Ultralisks as you can. Broodlords are imba and you want to make use of the infinite infantry they can provide. Mind controlling Ultralisks is amazing too. Especially if you have medics there to heal them.

• Build a mind control tower and turret behind your mineral line to mind control brood lords that attack from behind. Mind controlled units will NOT be affected by the nova blast (lulz)

• Make sure you have mind control energy when the big ultra push happens toward the end of the mission.

• Save a Nova blast for when the Leviathan attacks. It will decimate you otherwise because it constantly spawns Mutalisks and Broodlords

• If Kerrigan or the Leviathan isn't around when you needed to nova blast, then it's likely that you need to reload a recent save. Though don't Nova blast too soon when Kerrigan shows up. The blast has limited range, and you want to wait for the next wave of flyers/worms that quickly follows her.

• Just before the Leviathan shows up, start cranking out some vikings to deal.

• The drop-pod research is useless. Get the Tech-reactor research.

• If you ever lose too many key units or structures (especially in the beginning), reload from the last save. It will end up costing you the mission in the long run.

• Tanks don't work so well because Kerrigan's area of effect attack can easily clean out 4-5 tanks and there's not much you can do. This makes units like BCs more cost effective because they can get out of the way.

• Buildings work great at attracting Kerrigan's focus. She will spend her energy doing an AoE to the building and not doing it to your units. Also, keeping a building alive is much easier against her because they have tons of HP and huge surface area to repair

• Don't use supply Depots at your choke. They do not have enough HP or surface area to repair. You aren't going to leave your base anyway (not with units that don't fly that is...)

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How is it possible Zerg, with the biggest advantage, can still lose to Terran?

Question

This replay exlains it all. T Tarson versus Z Bly play on Xel'Naga Caverns.

Bly destroys Tarson's expansion, and pushes into his base, does a TON of damage, and kills all his SCV except for 2. Then he retreats, to defend against Tarson's final push (since it's his only choice at this time). The Bly now has two expansions, an army, more used supply, while Tarson has only his army, and almost no economy. But guess what, Terran is able to wipe out whole Zerg army and both of his bases, while still having a sizable force in the end (look at the units tab).

I don't want to flame, but I just find the Marauders too strong. They are almost perfect counter against Banelings, since they have Concussive Shells (and Marauders will shoot the first Banelings they see, so in reality it will usually slow down the whole "Baneling train"), are armored, and have 125 XP. So when Terran sees Banelings comming, he just has to pull his Marines few meters behind his Marauderes. This way, Banelings will explode only on his Marauders, because not a single one is able to get it that far to hit Marines (30 HP is really ridiculous). And I think this is what caused the Terran to win that match, while he should loose. Roaches are also countered by Marauders, and mass Zerglings are countered by those Marines.

So what the Bly should have done differently in this match to be able to defend himself against that final push? If it wasn't possible to defend against it, what should he have done differently to win that match?

Answer

Do you want to know how someone can lose or how he did lose?

Bly lost because he played very poorly: he did not build enough drones.

Take a moment to let that sink in, because its a very very big mistake and its the difference between a good Zerg player (like Fruit Seller) and a bad Zerg player (like Bly).

Instead of backing off after taking the Terran Natural, he continued to press in. He sends wave after wave of a consistently sized army. He does this because he's not building more drones so he cannot afford a larger army. By comparison Tarson's army gets larger and larger after every wave. He's able to continue to accumulate units because he has a fairly healthy economy. This is due in part to MULEs, but largely because Tarson built enough SCVs. Even after losing his Expo he still has as many workers as Bly does. Think about that for a second. He lose an entire base and all his workers in it and he still has more workers than his opponent.

This game could have easily been one that was featured on Day 9's Newbie Tuesday

I could point out a dozen mistakes that Bly made, but none of them matter nearly as much as his poor drone usage. Because of his lack of drones, his assault becomes almost an all in. So in response to your question How is it possible Zerg with biggest advantage can still loose to Terran? Bly didn't have a big advantage. He sacrificed his economy on a gamble and it didn't pay off.

But let's imagine another universe, where Tarson wasn't playing Bly but was playing against a better Zerg like IdrA; and let's assume IdrA made the same early push.

Now IdrA is sitting on 2 bases to Tarson's 1, but they have equal workers. So instead of continually pressing his advantage, IdrA decides to play like he always does: Macro. He sits back and takes a third base and powers drones. Tarson retakes his natural and now he's down 2 to 3 bases. Not a big advantage for IdrA, but remember a Zerg can make drones faster than a Terran, so it takes Tarson longer to saturate that 1 base than it does for IdrA to saturate his 3. Now IdrA has a huge economy and he goes Roach/Hydra (or these days he's favoring Muta/ling, but pretend).

Imagine that battle for a second... or don't, because it actually happened. IdrA knocked out Tarson in IEM, exactly like I described.

The smartest thing you can do in Starcraft if you are ahead is to get more ahead. Anyone who played seriously in Broodwars knows this because if you pressed like Bly did, you got destroyed 100% of the time. Now Starcraft 2 is still new so a lot of people feel like they can do crazy 2 base play, but if you look at the high end GSL matches you see less of that and more of people trying to get more ahead.

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You also mentioned a quote talking about Marauders vs Banelings. Now I don't think that the relationship between these two units had anything to do with this loss, but let's talk about them for a second.

Banelings are a highly specialized unit. Their role is to act as Zerg splash damage on light units. By comparison the Marauder is a more generalized unit, designed to act as a Meat shield (much the way the Roach acts for the Zerg). So it makes sense that a Baneling doesn't function well against Marauders (as that's not their role), and it also makes sense that Marauders do a good job of preventing Banelings from striking other units (as that's their role).

I would hesitate to say that a unit is broken because its functioning in its role and another unit isn't functioning in something outside its role. But let's say you want a way to deal with MMM balls. Instead of sending it waves of Banelings on their own. Consider mixing in more Zerglings (Bly actually does this to large effect). Now let's vary our composition based on their unit mix. More Marines? More Banelings. More Marauders? More Zerglings. Can't find a good place to engage? Burrow/Drops/Fungal Growth/Wait and Flank.

Here is the key thing, none of this is any assessment of Banelings against Terran, but rather an assessment of the tactics used.

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Countering tanks/assassins as a ranged character

Question

I have been playing LoL mostly as ranged (Annie and Heimerdinger), and if the other team happens to stack a couple of tanks/assassins, then I basically get slaughtered if I go after any critical point.

Are there any generic strategies that could be applied to be a credit to team? Many times I will get stunned/snared/frozen and cannot run away, and just get cut to pieces.

Answer

Generic strategies:

• Don't recall in unprotected spaces
• Don't scout bushes with your face
• Use Flash (summoner spell) to escape traps
• Use Cleanse (summoner spell) or Quicksilver Sash (item) to remove CC
• When running from traps, be aware of allies and plan accordingly
• Use items that boost Tenacity to reduce the duration of stuns
• Buy potions/lifesteal to remain at high health. This helps to prevent ganks.
• Buy wards/use abilities (teemo's mushrooms) to maintain map control
• Don't overextend. If you don't know what's in the bushes, stay away!
• When not laning, stick with another hero (but NOT another carry!)

• Call MIAs. Consider using Skype, Mumble, etc to make this easier and more effective.

• Annie specific: Always keep your stun up. Use spells to charge it at base, etc.

These are just some rough guidelines that apply to all characters, and are within your control. If you find yourself being the target of an assassin, make sure your team knows it; a good team will anticipate this and assassinate the assassin.

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Good way to obtain all the 'Cooperative' achievements (Patch 1.4.1)

Question

I'm looking for a guide to obtain all the cooperative achievements in SC2. The whole process is extremely time-consuming and it would be nice to do that in an optimized and quick way. There are many achievements making it very troublesome, for example:

• Win 250 Cooperative games against Insane A.I. opponents.
• Win 250 Cooperative games as Random against Medium A.I. opponents.
• Win 15 2v2 Cooperative games in a row against Insane A.I. opponents.
• Win 15 3v3 Cooperative games in a row against Insane A.I. opponents.

I have lots of questions about that task and I would really appreciate any advice you may have.

Knowing that 'Random against Medium' is required, is it good to play as Random against Insane as well? On the other hand, winning 15 games in a row may be difficult, so maybe it would be better to stick with Protoss and cannon rush? Are there any reliable strategies for Randoms for that particular achievements? Please share your experience!

Answer

Getting all of the Co-op achievements turns into a pretty boring grindfest once you know how go do it.

To get all achievement in fewest games as possible you should play as Random vs. Insane AI, because - like Sorean mentioned - it counts for lower AIs. Also try to do the each race combination vs. 3 Insane AI and 15 Win-streak vs. 3 Insane AI first, because after that you only need to play vs. 2 AI where the games end quicker.

Beating Insane is not hard if you use basic rush strategies for each race:

Zerg

• 6 Pool
• 10 Pool + Gas with Speedlings
• Inbase Spinecralwer if up against at least 1 Zerg
• skip Zerglings and go for Mutalisks from 2 Bases - this is only safe if your allies distract all enemies so they do not overwhelm you before Mutas are out

Protoss

• Cannon-Rush with 1st Pylon and Forge as Proxy
• transition into mass Proxygate Zealots if up against Zerg (creep is so annoying for cannonrushing)
• for very long games maybe get Void Rays

Terran

• 3 proxy Barracks with mass Reaper - fastest for killing worker and buildings - consider to get +1 Attack for more efficency in later game stages (if it occurs)
• Proxy Barracks and mass Marines - get some bunkers too if you don't have uber micro (so get them almost always)

Also make sure to distract the AI with a Extractor/Pylon/Engeneering Bay in his base. This way the computer will pull workers from mining and try to kill your building. Make sure they lose as much mining time as possible and have less stuff to hold your rush off. When your units come out, go for their harvesters first if its possible, but do not sacrifice too much of your army.

Obviously getting some friends in to have a relying team will make the win-streak much easier than getting random people that might fail and deny your achievement after 14 successful games.

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Hoes does Revenge of the Titans money flow work?

Question

Recently i picked up Revenge of the Titans again. I noticed a lot has changed, upgrades no longer cost money, and half the game mechanics seem to have changed with it.

What i never quite could grasp in RotT was the money flow. I've been experimenting a bit with income, and it doesn't make sense at all. Building more refineries sometimes yield less income, taking the refineries tech path doesn't help a lot either. Sometimes i spawn tons of turrets, it feels like a bad attempt, and i end with tons of money. Next i build more efficient for my feel, and i end up with less money :(

Some things i noticed so far are:

• There is a max of 4 refineries per crystal.
• Losing/damage to buildings is fatal for money.
• Replaying missions gives a huge randomness in remaining money.

I'm at loss for the money remaining at end of mission formula, as well as half the strategy guides i find are for old versions of the game. What would really help me too would be a lite of suggested amount of money win/loss per mission. I noticed that some missions let you gain 1k mineral easily, while others can only be solved with a negative total.

Answer

The money that you carry forward to the next mission is simply any unspent money at the end of the previous mission, plus the sell value of all buildings that you still have alive. I can't remember exactly, but I think the resell value of a building is either 10% or 25% of it's original value.

I believe the game also increases the difficulty if you have lots of cash, and reduces it if you're running very short. So don't worry too much about losing some cash over a specific level - the game should help correct for it.

With than it mind, I'd put forward the following advice:

• Losing buildings is very bad - not only to you lose their resell value, you often have to pay to replace them.

• Building too many buildings is bad - because you get less money back than if you'd just left it unspent.

• Selling buildings so you can spend more cash is bad - you're basically spending the resell value of the first building and devaluing it further by exchanging it for the (reduced) resell value of the replacements.

• Don't always saturate crystals with refineries - 4 × $250 refineries for a single $1000 crystal is a waste, in the end you only really get the resell value of the buildings back .
  I try to spend half roughly half the crystal value on refineries, so 2 for a $1000 crystal, 4 for a $2000 crystal and whatever makes sense for groups of near-by crystals (remember that a refinery can only work on one crystal at a time, but if the one it's working on is finished and another is in range it will start work on the second).
  Only use the booster buildings (Reprocessor / Collector) where you have big groups of refineries, they rarely make you more cash in the long run.

• Barricades are a permanent cost - they can't be sold, so no resell value at the end of a level. By this same token, don't be afraid to lose them, it's much cheaper than losing a turret!

And finally, remember that you don't need to sell buildings manually, you automatically get the resell value of everything still alive at the end of a level.

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When is switching tiles in Wordfeud the best option?

Question

I've never used the option to switch tiles. I always manage to get by one way or another even if I have triplets of one letter. I figure that giving a turn away will benefit my opponent more than me.

Is there a way for me to make some estimation of when switching tiles would be better than "getting by"?

Answer

If your letters are incredibly bad, you can't get rid of many of them, and you think there are some good letters left for you to swap some, you might want to do it. If it's early in the game and you have a lead, so much the better. If you have a bunch of consonants and no vowels, a swap might be a good idea. If you've memorized the Scrabble dictionary and know that all your possible plays suck, it might be a good idea.

Edit: Dave's answer, and the answers on the question he links, further expand on when it's a good idea; check it out.

It's very rarely worth it. Actually calculating this, without programmatic help (cheating), is infeasible; see below. Even with help, there are a lot of factors you just can't appropriate account for.

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To calculate the decision, count cards. Err, tiles. If your tiles are bad, there's some likelihood that the tiles you swap for will be better than yours. You can figure out that likelihood by subtracting your tiles and the played tiles from the set off all tiles, then factoring in the probability that someone else has the "good tiles" and the probability that you actually pick them up from the pile. Then you calculate an expected point value and decided whether the swap is worth it.

Say you want to swap one tile, for a particular letter Ψ. There are x Ψ's in the game, a have been played, you already hold b of them. That leaves c = x - a - b left.

There are y tiles on the board, plus 21 held by the other players. That leaves d = 102 - y - 21 left for you to choose from (there are 102 tiles in the game).

If you ignore the fact that the tiles picked up by another player also effect everyone else's probability of picking them up, not just yours, the probability that you pick up a Ψ is e = (c / d)(1 - ((d - c) / d)²¹). I am ignoring that fact because I haven't taken combinatorics in a few years and don't want to re-learn how to account for it :P

Now multiply e by your expected point value for the new word, j, to get f: the expected value of this move.

Now recompute f for every possible Ψ. Add them all up and divide by the number of them, to get g, the expected value of swapping one letter.

If g is greater than the value of the best move you can make right now, then you should do the swap if you're following a greedy algorithm.

Other factors to consider:

• Would the other players hold the letter for an abnormally long time if they picked it up earlier? The above assumes all letters are treated equally.
• Will someone steal the spot you're considering for your next move after the swap? Do you have other spots? Will a better one open up? You can't account for the behavior of the other players.
• If you swap more than one letter, you have even more complicated math to do.
• As mentioned above, this doesn't properly account for the other players' tiles. It will overestimate your chances slightly.
• How does this affect you in the long run, beyond only the next move?
• What's the probability that you pick up good letters if you play some of the bad ones you're holding, instead of swapping?

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TL;DR Even the simplified math says you're wasting your time even thinking about it, most of the time. When you think you're really stuck, try a swap; develop a gut instinct for when it works and when it doesn't. I don't think you can do much better than that, apart from rare situations where it's very clear.

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How do you recover after a coaster crash in Roller Coaster Tycoon?

Question

I realize this is an old game, but it's fun to pull out every once in awhile. However, I've found that I never make it very far into the game because I'll end up crashing one or more roller coasters on a particular level.

It doesn't seem to be avoidable. The crashes just happen eventually, even if your maintenance worker is checking it every 10 minutes. Every time this has happened, I can't recover or re-open the coaster after it's fixed. All I can do is delete the entire roller coaster, which can be costly and very annoying.

Is there any way (without using a cheat) to avoid the crash or recover after it?

Answer

Try switch to the red flag and click the red flag again, It worked for me in R.C.T.2 but I am sure it should work in the first version too.

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What are the different custom scenarios for Age Of Empires 2?

Question

I've been a member of GameRanger for a while, and I am familiar with RM - Random Map, and CBA - Castle Blood Auto, but I have noticed other game types such as Path Blood and Michi.

Can you give me a quick overview of each type of game that there is?

The community isn't great with new players, like myself!

Thanks, Jake.

Answer

I'm not familiar with Age of Empires 2 scenarios, but I found a list of scenarios with explanations which includes Path Blood at a blog called Gaming Lan.

It doesn't include Michi, but there's an explanation up at Urban Dictionary.

... a type of game map that uses impassable terrain (usually forest) to prevent players from rushing or coming into contact until the intervening terrain is cleared.

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