ShapeShifting
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Shape-shifting interface lets you touch computer simulations
Researchers want us to better interact with machines via screens and VR, but let's face it, we humans like to touch real objects. MIT's Tangible Media Group has been playing with that idea for awhile now with projects like InForm, an uncanny telepresence interface. It has now taken it further with Materiable, a shape-changing interface that lets you see and even touch physical simulations. The idea is to let users visualize and interact with materials or mathematical models of things like earthquakes and landslides.
Frozen oil could be the key to shapeshifting materials
Those odd, glowing shapes may look like they're straight out of a weird puzzle game, but don't laugh... they may be crucial to a future of ever-changing materials. British and Bulgarian scientists have discovered that oil droplets will form octagons, triangles and other not-so-natural shapes if you slowly freeze them while they're in a soapy solution. On top of that, they'll revert to their original states if you warm them back up. The results are more than a little odd, as you can see here -- they're non-living chemicals taking on artificial shapes in a lifelike way.
Microsoft and Samsung demo Illumiroom display, fill room with images (video)
Microsoft just demonstrated an interesting display technology called Illumiroom at the Samsung CES keynote that apparently fills up the room with images and lights beyond the confines of a television screen. We were shown a video of someone playing Xbox games and making it seem like it's snowing in the room, for example. It's unclear how the technology is being implemented, but we were promised it wasn't just video tricks and was indeed a video of a lab demo. We'll try to suss out the details for more. Update: It's actually a Microsoft Research project that uses a Kinect for a Windows camera combined with a projector. It apparently "uses the appearance and the geometry of the room (captured by Kinect) to adapt the projected visuals in real-time without any need to custom pre-process the graphics." Sure it's still in the prototype stage, but color us intrigued. We'll be sure to follow up with the Redmond giant to see if we can get a bit more up close and personal with this. Stay tuned.
Breakfast Topic: What's your favorite shapeshift in the game?
Druids, man -- they have all the fun. They get to be bears, big cats, sea lions, birds, and, umm, owlbeasts? I'm not sure on the last one. Let's just stick with moonkin. But some of the rest of us can shapeshift, too! If you're a worgen, the animation shifting between your true form and your human form is pretty cool, and that's a shapeshift that doesn't require druidic skills. But there are many other shapeshifting opportunities in WoW. You can be a skeleton, if you're lucky, with a Noggenfogger Elixir. You can be a bat, as per the header image, with a Bat Costume. You can be a pirate with a Savory Deviate Delight or a huge Naga with Bones of Transformation. There are a many other shapeshifting effects, but my very favorite has to be the Potion of Illusion. I loved it before I read Anne's article, and I love it even more since then! What's brilliant about it is stealing other people's appearances -- transmogs, character looks, you name it. I love using it in raids on people who are AFK and /dancing with them. One day, I'm hoping my entire raid will steal one character's identity for a photo. What's your favorite shapeshift? Were you also converted to the Potion of Illusion by Anne's writeup? Are you a die-hard fan of the Noggenfogger's pot-luck powers? Or is it the pirate life for you?
GDC 2012: Frogster shows off Eligium: The Chosen One
At GDC, there is much to see and do. And one of the best things to do (besides try to win a really cool fuzzy hat) is to actually experience a game through a demonstration or even some hands-on play. I had the opportunity to do just that with one of Frogster's upcoming games. No, not that one; the other one. Ellen-Jane Austin, Country Manager UK, and Marco Neubert, Director Product PR, took me on a brief tour of Eligium: The Chosen One. Although this game from Shanda Games Ltd. is pretty similar to other games in many respects, there are a few features that give it a unique flair, especially the virtue system, mounts, and my personal favorite, an ability to shape-change into a two-headed dragon!
Breakfast Topic: Do you love to shapeshift?
Don't tell moonkin blogger Tyler Caraway, but I sort of like druids. Whether or not they're the best at tanking or the best at DPS never really matters to me, though. I just like being able to change shapes and forms. Beating things up as a bear is cool. Being a ferocious cat is cool. Being a ferocious cat that's on fire -- even cooler. There's only one thing I can think of that would make me even more excited to play a druid: more shapeshifting forms. So how about it? Do you like playing in shapeshifted form, even if you have to rely on trinkets to do it? Is there a new shapeshifted druid form that you'd like to see? Maybe the ability to play as a naga or a ferocious timbermaw?
The Perfect Ten: Shapeshifters
Because we are true geeks, last weekend my wife and I went to see X-Men: First Class. Afterward, we got into a discussion about what mutant power we'd pick for ourselves if we had the choice. I was torn between teleportation and quick healing, while my wife wanted to be able to turn into cash to pay off our mortgage. I think one of us is more grounded in the real world than the other. But the more I think about it, the more I was intrigued with the idea of a shapeshifter. To be anyone would give you unparalleled freedom -- and plenty of chances to get into mischief, too. Come to think of it, it's probably best I'm not granted that particular superpower. However, plenty of MMOs do give players the chance to shift between their normal forms and something else entirely. While there are far more than 10 examples that the brain trust over here came up with, I'm going to pick out my favorites to highlight.
DARPA's programmable matter initiative strives to make the ultimate Swiss Army knife
Remember Intel's shape shifting matter concepts? Well, those realty-bending cats at DARPA are looking to put their own spin on it with a Programmable Matter program of their own. As is their mantra, the long-term goals are pretty wild: researcher Dr. Mitchell R. Zakin is hopeful they can one day build a container that looks like a paint can and will form universal spare parts or tools such as hammers and wrenches based on the soldiers' needs, using a building material they call "mesomatter" that range anywhere from one hundred microns to a centimeter in size. Currently five months into the program's second phase, there's still another fifteen to go before they move on. By then, the group expect to be able to use the technology and assemble four or five different three-dimensional solids. Best be careful, if this falls in the wrong hands, we'll have more "leaked iPhone" images ever previously thought possible. [Via Wired]
Shifting Perspectives: A brief history of time
Every Tuesday, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting Druids and those who group with them. This week, we plagiarize from Stephen Hawking, jack a WABAC Machine, and begin a joyride through the evolution of the Druid class.Dear Blizzard,There are too many bosses to write about in Ulduar. I find this vexing. Please eliminate 5. Sincerely,Sleepless in SilithusSalutations, Druids. As is probably obvious, we're going to take a detour out of Ulduar class strategy this week, because I'm going to shoot myself if I have to write about another boss I haven't been able to smack around since the PTR. We'll be back for Freya, Thorim, and assorted vaguely Norse-sounding entitites wishing to destroy the world for some unspecified reason but they drop phat lewtz so who cares next week.Anyway, one of the things that's fascinated me about the Druid class since Burning Crusade is the growth in its popularity. Historically we have never been among the more commonly-played classes, and for a wide swathe of classic WoW and BC, were actually the least-played class or within the bottom 3. While there are various reasons for this (and I could devote a column to how this probably happened), Druids became more popular as time went on, and an increasing number of people began to play the class without knowing just how far it's come. A little time spent reading through Wowwiki's list of the game's patches makes for interesting reading. A little more than 5 years ago, Druids could Feign Death, the Feral 31-point talent was Improved Pounce, and Moonkin form wasn't even in a gleam in a designer's eye.
Intel's shape-shifting programmable matter shown on video, sadly not for real
If you were as confused as we were by Intel's talks of programmable matter, an intelligent amorphous blob formed of microscopic glass spheres and able to take any shape, you'll want to check out the video from CNN embedded below. It shows the stuff in action -- albeit rendered, conceptual action -- allowing a group of designers take a car that looks a lot like a Cadillac and make it even more slab-sided, changing its color a few times, and then causing it to explode in what can only be a 1/18 scale preview of another installment of The Matrix. We can't wait to have a blob of this stuff on our desk to play with (it'd be the ultimate stress ball), but we're guessing it's going to be a long, long time before that happens.
Shifting Perspectives: State of the class, part 1 - Balance
Every Tuesday, or possibly Thursday when the writer votes on Tuesday and spends Wednesday screaming and beating her laptop over formatting errors, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting Druids and those who group with them. This week Allison Robert steals John Patricelli's column once again, secure in the knowledge that she will never be forced to atone for her crime as long as she writes something nice about ferals and keeps a respectful distance from Dan O'Halloran's whip.I hate Tauren cat form.Good. I got that out of my system and can write something productive. Although, believe me, if I could get away with it, an entire Shifting Perspectives would be devoted to just how much I hate Tauren cat form. I mean, just look at it! Look at the angle on the horns! The cat can't bite anything! Christ, I just -- hi, Dan. Yes, I'm totally writing the column! Look at me go!This week, mindful as always of American election-year politicking, I'm going to borrow a page from presidential duties and write a little something I like to call "State of the Class." Druids have undergone a number of changes in the transition to Wrath of the Lich King, and will acquire even more as they level to 80. We are one of Blizzard's primary targets for both gear and role consolidation, which raises a few questions over how comfortably we're going to scale in relation to pure classes and what we can realistically expect on the march to a new level cap.The TL:DR version of this article -- I believe our future is generally bright, the Druid community continues to have a few concerns over certain aspects of the class, our focus in PvP seems to be changing the most, and I hate Tauren cat form. This is a three-part post, so let's get started with balance. However, if you want to jump ahead to feral, you'll find that here; and the third part, restoration, is here.
Big Feral changes coming post-Wrath
We've been hearing rumblings about Feral stuff from Ghostcrawler, but wow. These are some big shake-ups. I'd better get it out on the table before I start raving about it: Bonus armor on items (rings, necklaces, trinkets, and cloaks) will no longer be multiplied by bear forms. So while leather leg armor with 253 armor will still give us about 1190, a ring with 100 bonus armor will only give us 100 (not about 470, as now). Feral staves will no longer have armor. However, armor modifiers will be adjusted as necessary so our net mitigation does not go down. An as-yet undecided deep Feral talent (such as Primal Tenacity) will gain the added effect of reducing the cost of shifting to Cat and Bear by 50%, stacking with Natural Shapeshifter for a total cost reduction of 80%. This will help PvP druids shift cheaper if they want to. Protector of the Pack's group requirement has been dropped. It now simply increases attack power by 2/4/6% and reduces damage taken by 4/8/12%, whenever you're in bear form. These changes will not be going live with Wrath of the Lich King; instead, they will come in a patch before the 3.1 content patch that introduces Ulduar. Call it 3.0.4 for now.
Champions Online developer post roundup
Having an insatiable appetite for all things Champions Online, we've gone and searched their official forums like rabid info-hounds and complied a nice list of developer quotes. Of course there's no official dev tracker in the forums and for a while we were sort of wandering around manually searching for Cryptic employee posts until we found this very helpful thread. Big thanks goes to poster Foo for coming up with the idea -- it certainly makes our monstrous thirst for information easier to quench.This time around we've got tons of topics ranging from XP dept to underwater missions -- trust us when we say you'll be happily surprised by many of the dev posts.
Is Druid insta-shifting overpowered?
Serennia, a gnomish warrior on Tichondrius, believes that the changes to druid shape-shifting [shown in the video clip above] in patch 2.3 make it too easy for druids to get out of snares without being caught in their vulnerable caster form. She puts it very eloquently:In 2.3, druids can shift from any form to any form (ie cat to bear; bear to travel, etc) without having to enter human form. But, it gets worse, they can shift from the same form to the same form also (bear to bear). Why is this significant? It's basically a free snare removal without ever having to expose themself in human form, making it much more difficult for anyone to kill them. It still costs them mana to do it, yes, but it's an easy trade-off for never being locked in caster form with no armor anymore to get away from a melee. So much for those well-timed caster-form kidney shots, right? Druids needed help in 5v5 with a bit better caster form survivability, and they got that with the new Natural Perfection changes and a bit more utility. However, they did NOT need to be even harder to kill with this short-sighted change. Melee might as well not even attempt to catch a good druid anymore, and well, casters never could to begin with. She says that this may or may not be what Blizzard was intending when they decided to go ahead with this change, but for my part, I think it's a buff druids really need, especially feral ones, who are likely to get the most use out of insta-shifting between forms. I've said before that, although restoration druids enjoy a lot of success in PvP, it's very hard for many feral druids, and personally, I think this sort of mobility can help make up for other areas where the druid is not as strong, and can provide more synergy between the druid's different forms and abilities without some of the risks that made this synergy impractical before. What do you think?
Shifting Perspectives: That special versatility
It's often been said that druids are the three-in-one class: we can mimic warriors, priests, rogues (and even mages), but can't fulfill their respective roles as well as they themselves can. While in recent times druids have been able to gear up and perform as well as their parent classes in many respects, we are far from "warriors with stealth" or "rogues that can heal" or "priests that can off-tank in a pinch."Our problem as druids is that we cannot but neglect the full breadth of our abilities when we must specialize in only one aspect of our class. Of course, any class works best in situations where most or all their abilities might be needed to succeed, sometimes even in the course of a single fight -- it's just that for druids these abilities include tanking, damage, and healing all together. If you're playing with an experienced group, each player is likely specialized to one of these three roles, and his or her whole purpose is to minimize the chance that backup tanks, healers, and damage-dealers will be needed. That leaves druids trying to compete with warriors, rogues and priests (and mages), trying to do just as well at the same task, but with fewer abilities to call upon in the fight. Locked into these smaller roles, we must gear up and spend our talents in such a way that even if we were to shift out of our main role into another when the need arose, we wouldn't be able to do very well at it at all. This brings me to the adventure at hand: Today we will go on an journey of the imagination together, exploring the potential future of druids, considering how this problem of specialization versus versatility might be approached. Indeed, as I gaze into my crystal-ball-shaped paper-weight, I see two possible futures: one, called "The Path of the Pandering Pedant," seeks nit-picky perfection in a class designed for breadth and scope, while the other, "the Way of the Multitudinous Master" brings the full manifest of all our abilities into harmonious use with one another.
Shifting Perspectives: How to group with a druid part 1
Every Tuesday, Shifting Perspectives explores issues affecting druids and those who group with them, brought to you by David Bowers and Dan O'Halloran.No one likes to be told how to play their class. We've each learned through trial and error what works and what doesn't. Yes, there is room for improvement, but, I swear, if one more person screams "HEAL PLZ" then I'm gonna make a macro that spams "TAUNT PLZ", "DPS PLZ" and "CONTROL YOUR AGGRO PLZ". And I shall refrain from uttering "Does your daddy know you're on his account?" No, really. I will. Ok, after tonight. I promise.My point is, when you group with a warrior, you know what to expect. Same with a rogue, mage or priest. They all have clearly defined roles. But druids, oh my, you never know what you're going to get. Will you get the guy who refuses to shift out of cat form to spot heal when the priest is OOM and the tank is going down for the count? Will you get the overcaffeinated shifter who can't decide if he is dps'ing, off-tanking, patch healing or nuking? Or what about the b00mk!n that insists he can tank Illidan because he has high armor rating even though he lacks significant dodge, resilience or snap aggro?I'm not saying these play styles are wrong or bad. There are many situations where these tactics are valid. I'm saying that groups need to know what kind of druid they are grouping with so they can all have an enjoyable and profitable pick up group. And to help you do that, I'm going to cover the major play styles of different kinds of druids and what you should and should not expect them to do for you. I'm going to start with the feral spec.
