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Post by Duke Pikachu on Jun 15, 2023 17:22:59 GMT -5
Guess who just got ALL-STAR!... Wait, am I really going to post another parody of Smash Mouth's All-Star AGAIN? I'm part of Team Meridell, a medieval based team, I should post a song that they would have heard around the time of knights and kings. Something a bard would be strumming in a tavern. Yeah, and I think I know just the song: (I never said it wasn't All-Star... )
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Post by Breakingchains on Jun 16, 2023 9:29:31 GMT -5
I'm getting really close to hitting all-star at this point, but I just got a "OOPS!! Failed Captcha validation." message and I'm scared to touch anything >.>; It's only the second one I've seen the entire cup but I do NOT wanna get flagged again. Last year was agonizing towards the end because I was playing like crazy and successfully sending maybe 50% of my scores. That's weird. :x I haven't had any failed Captchas this year, and I just got to all-star yesterday. I don't think it has anything to do with play frequency. Try checking your Internet connection maybe. From what I've heard, the validation can fail if your connection switches to a different IP in the middle of a game. Some people have had success using a different connection method (e.g. mobile data instead of wi-fi) when they ran into Captcha validation issues. That could be it, yeah! I have a wired connection but it's with a rather flakey local ISP so I could see that being the problem. Might try the mobile data thing if it becomes more of an issue, thanks for the tip. EDIT: WOO-HOO ALL-STAR
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Post by Gelquie on Jun 16, 2023 21:16:18 GMT -5
Congrats to those who reached All Star!
I just reached Rank 13. Fell behind on the Altador Cup because I was busy with other RL things this week. I'd like to reach All Star though, if in part to just have it so I can check it off my list. I might try to do extra this week so my daily average is lower. But I keep wondering if more will come up, or if I just... won't want to keep grinding the games.
Ultimately, one thing that helps me is to remind myself something (similar to what) someone told me in a different chat: If I look back on this year from the future, say 20 years from now, would I regret not reaching All Star? Will I ever go "darn, I didn't grind enough for a Neopets game"? Especially in the face of other RL things I do regret not doing?
So I remind myself to just do my RL things. Do my projects. Make those cookies. Go on day trips. Maybe play if I feel like it, and maybe still try for All Star this year if I can do it realistically time-wise. Ultimately, doing well on AC would be a brief little dopamine hit in the face of everything else in modern life competing for dopamine hits, but that's about it. So I guess it helps me to keep that in perspective. (And keeps me from actually doing too much grinding that I come to not actually like after the first few plays.)
(I also in part think this because my team is losing badly. xP Still, that's not the main reason.)
Still, I think I'll try to catch up a bit this weekend and see how close I can get to All Star in order to get that at least once, because I think I can still do it realistically, and lowering my daily average will give me more time and leeway for RL things. My average rose to 23 games per day, but maybe I'll lessen that if I try to get closer to maxing today. Depends on what I get to. Helps that this is a downtime day for me, and there are things I can just watch to make the time go faster.
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Post by Stephanie (swordlilly) on Jun 16, 2023 21:27:53 GMT -5
Ultimately, one thing that helps me is to remind myself something (similar to what) someone told me in a different chat: If I look back on this year from the future, say 20 years from now, would I regret not reaching All Star? Will I ever go "darn, I didn't grind enough for a Neopets game"? Especially in the face of other RL things I do regret not doing? The funny thing is, now that I'm 32, I DO wish the me of 20 years ago - 12-year-old me - had done things differently on Neopets xD Because I wouldn't struggle so much in-game now if younger-me had indeed invested more. But, I don't know if I'll still be interested in Neopets by the time I'm 52. It's hard to tell, though. There are definitely some older adults who play, like Patjade, for example. There just aren't very many of them in my specific friend-group. But by the time I'm that old, my friends would also have aged. Soooo I don't know. Of course there's also the possibility that Neopets itself just wouldn't be around in 20 years, too. Always important to keep in mind. (Also, I was a witness to the conversation you're referencing and it's kinda funny that the person who gave that advice is grinding the AC themselves. There are just so few ways to earn things in this game that I can completely understand why we do this insane thing. I do think it's a massive waste of time though, hence why I critiqued it in my NT story this week. Next NT, hopefully, my article about the Neo economy will make it in.)
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Post by Gelquie on Jun 16, 2023 22:21:12 GMT -5
Maybe it'd be easier, but honestly, that feels more like an internal game motivation than an external life motivation to me, which is more what I was getting at. (I also at one point just gave almost everything away before going on indefinite hiatus, and I found upon returning it was pretty easy to get more money than I ever had from Food Club.)
Maybe I'll still play sometimes then and maybe it'll still be up, maybe not, dunno! Too far away for me to think about. And I don't like to think about The End Times when playing a game in my downtime. Just taking it as it comes.
(Eh, doesn't make the advice any less true. They're prioritizing life too, but that's all I'll say about someone who isn't even here. xP My point is less "don't grind" (maybe some people want to) and more prioritize healthy things as things occur or if things start to drag on. Grinding isn't for me, so I'll probably try All-Star once while balancing it, and then after that probably not care so much.)
Hit my daily number, so now I'm doing more to lower my average. My average is around 21 games per day, and if I max I can get it to 20.5, I think?
I've been informed that there's about 13 days left to the game, including today. So today I'm dividing by 12.
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Post by RielCZ on Jun 17, 2023 2:17:56 GMT -5
Just made it to All-Star myself, congrats to the others that have, and keep going as you're able to everyone else.
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Post by Breakingchains on Jun 17, 2023 23:46:30 GMT -5
Ultimately, one thing that helps me is to remind myself something (similar to what) someone told me in a different chat: If I look back on this year from the future, say 20 years from now, would I regret not reaching All Star? Will I ever go "darn, I didn't grind enough for a Neopets game"? Especially in the face of other RL things I do regret not doing? This is no doubt the healthiest way to look at these things. On the other hand, I am a silly basement creature driven by impulse, and my current impulse is but I want staaaaaaaaamps. Presently going for my first double all-star but we'll see how long that lasts. xDDD
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Post by Gelquie on Jun 18, 2023 0:10:51 GMT -5
Breakingchains - There is always that impulse! xD Nothing inherently wrong with that impulse or goal at least. Everything in moderation, as they say, wherever that is for someone. (If we never forsook healthy for goals, we'd never get far at anything. And I'd never play more than just a couple games or get into the spirit of AC. As long as it's not to the point of being unhealthy.) It sounds like you have a system. You do you! If you reach it, let us know so I can celebrate with you with cake, lemonade, ice packs, and wrist braces. (But hopefully you won't need the latter two.) If you don't reach it, I'll give you the latter three anyway, because All Star is already really good. (Maybe it'll be easier this year with the max cap reduced, at least. If it weren't for that, I probably wouldn't try for All Star.) I just reached Rank 15, and I brought my daily average down to 18 YYB games/day for All Star. (So 54 minutes, or two Lets Play videos.) Hopefully I have enough time next week to bring that average down further. But with life as it is with its "suddenly you have to prepare for this thing," that remains to be seen, so if nothing else, my daily average is 18.
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Post by Stephanie (swordlilly) on Jun 18, 2023 0:36:42 GMT -5
This is no doubt the healthiest way to look at these things. On the other hand, I am a silly basement creature driven by impulse, and my current impulse is but I want staaaaaaaaamps. Presently going for my first double all-star but we'll see how long that lasts. xDDD This is a mood. xD I'm also going for double all-star mostly because I'm tired of always struggling to save up for one thing, and then being completely broke after I finally catch up to inflation to be able to afford that one thing. It was just such a long and bitter struggle to complete one stamp album page that I don't even dare to look at stamps now. I guess my biggest want for now is just to get a decent amount of passive income. To have enough NPs in the bank to comfortably click a "collect interest" button and just be able to afford stuff based on that. Of course real-life responsibilities have to take priority though, so if I can't have what I want in-game no matter how hard I try then... that's that. I may eventually just lose interest and go on hiatus, like I have in the past. xD Anyway, according to my calculations I need 35 yooyuball wins per play-day to reach double all-star. That's about a 2-hour commitment on each of the 11 play-days left. Thankfully, tomorrow will be a rest-day.
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Post by Carolyn on Jun 18, 2023 4:01:06 GMT -5
I'm slowly creeping towards All Star, that's the main goal, anyway. Anything else is just icing on the cake. Rank 15 now, so it should be more than doable.
Double All Star is probably where the top prize will be, so that'll lead to the best prize to effort ratio. Back in the day I hit that once but this year that's definitely not gonna happen. xD Which hey, it's all good. I'll get the gold trophy and hopefully a cute wearable out of the deal.
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Post by Duke Pikachu on Jun 19, 2023 16:04:20 GMT -5
Staff Tourney:Been meaning to post this all week, today is last day. First round is over and the results are interesting. The new staffers did far better than most if not all returning ones. For Forwards I replaced Weirdough with Fae, for Defenders replaced Aesop with Ivy, and for Goalie replaced Binary Supagoo with Willow. So, yeah, a rather major shake-up with only Dingo and Kikocat remaining on my team. And looks like the Star Players are going to be the new players again. Why even let us have the option to pick the returning staffers if you're going to do that? Or, hey, why not TELL US THE CRITERIA. Ugh, whatever, being I have a batch of new staffers on my team decided to go with Fae (though now watch them pick a returning staffer). Looks like the Staff Prize are LEGO minifigures (called Block Figurine). Cute idea, though it looks TOO much like a LEGO minifigure that it's almost distracting. JN's Player Of The Year:Huh, they didn't post last round's results. I asked if they would, but I'm wondering if they don't want to influence other rounds? Also not sure how they're doing this because there's now a whole bunch of new players, notably to me is MD's Fiorina. Oh great, Windelle is up against Hughlis and Ethel is against Fonnet, not that I expected Meridell to win but hopeful most would get past round 3. Fenny Vail IS super cute, there's something unsettling about her design though. I mean that in a good way, her design strikes me as being a spooky little trickster of some sort lol. Not unsettling, but off model. They replaced her ears with ponytails. Or her hair grew over her ears and she tied them like ponytails but also means she tied up her ears? Huh, I hope they don't do that again. Seriously, what were they thinking? What was, 4 Album items, 3 being Stamps. There's making the items feel valuable, and then there's spamming a valuable item type. You either focused on getting the Stamps (and the very powerful BD item) or you give up on one to actually get a selection of the other items (or at least the wearables and books). I was having a small problem myself but it cleared up by now. All I can suggest to do is keep another tab open and, before you send score, refresh that page so it validates the captcha. If you do that you hopefully should never have a problem. I just reached Rank 13. Fell behind on the Altador Cup because I was busy with other RL things this week. I'd like to reach All Star though, if in part to just have it so I can check it off my list. I might try to do extra this week so my daily average is lower. But I keep wondering if more will come up, or if I just... won't want to keep grinding the games. Ultimately, one thing that helps me is to remind myself something (similar to what) someone told me in a different chat: If I look back on this year from the future, say 20 years from now, would I regret not reaching All Star? Will I ever go "darn, I didn't grind enough for a Neopets game"? Especially in the face of other RL things I do regret not doing? So I remind myself to just do my RL things. (...) (I also in part think this because my team is losing badly. xP Still, that's not the main reason.) (...) Helps that this is a downtime day for me, and there are things I can just watch to make the time go faster. Ugh, yeah, the grinding is the biggest issue with the AC. I like that they lowered the caps (and they also said the prize shop costs) but that doesn't stop Slushie Slinger taking forever, Make Some Noise doesn't feel quite the same as it used to, and Shootout Showdown being annoying with the goalie's super fast & random movements. All the games need a good redo; Yooyuball simply needs some fixing, but the side games should be completely redone so they're quicker and less frustrating. That looking back 20 years later thing is an interesting way to think about things, though I think for me 20 years is a bit too far off. 20 years later? Probably not, too much time and who knows what would happen. But looking back a year or two later? I feel that's more imaginable. Now I already have All-Star, so I guess the question for me would be simply would I regret not having gotten as many points I could have gotten. Like instead of making this post I could have played a few extra games. Well, for me the answer all depends on how the Prize Shop turns out. I think I already play plenty so I go into the Prize Shop with plenty of points to spend, so me complaining I didn't play more is like complaining how I don't have the Bank Interest Boon even though I make more NP from daily interest than I ever could making from playing flash games in a week. But overall I don't think I'll ever regret it but just be annoyed. There's more things to be concerned about in life than not reaching a certain rank or points in a virtual game. As I've always said to people who are worried about not being on Neopets as much as they'd like to: Real Life over Neopets. While Neopets can be a stress reliever, if its taking away something that's making your real life better it's best to step away until you can get things handled and hopefully comfortable for you. Yeah, MD isn't doing so great either this year which has me a bit down, but how I look at it is we're not last and have a chance to move up (plus the more I play the more prize points I have) so I keep myself playing. Try to keep to this plan: Max out Yooyuball everyday (takes me about 2 hours to play 35 games), and then I play the following amount of side games in one sitting session: 5 SlSl, 20 MSN, & 20 ShSd. After I finish a session I get up and do some stuff, though I'm usually back to doing another session. Not gonna max out the side games any time soon, but I feel it gets me a good amount of plays in the side games and I get to do other things during the inbetween. And yeah, while already I have Youtube open up when not playing the AC. During the AC it's non-stop Let's Plays, usually ones with each part being hours long. I mainly listen to them for the conversation the hosts have than the game, but it's something to keep me distracted as I grind out games. Though sometimes I'll listen to some music soundtracks and older video series I've watched if I get in the mood. The funny thing is, now that I'm 32, I DO wish the me of 20 years ago - 12-year-old me - had done things differently on Neopets xD Because I wouldn't struggle so much in-game now if younger-me had indeed invested more. But, I don't know if I'll still be interested in Neopets by the time I'm 52. It's hard to tell, though. There are definitely some older adults who play, like Patjade, for example. There just aren't very many of them in my specific friend-group. But by the time I'm that old, my friends would also have aged. Soooo I don't know. Of course there's also the possibility that Neopets itself just wouldn't be around in 20 years, too. Always important to keep in mind. 33 here, and began playing when I was 11. Oh we all wish we had the hindsight we had now. Would have done Stocks and Food Club more. Would have trained my Neopets and battled in war events more. Of course if we had that power would we really waste it on Neopets... Anyway, while the past is behind us, its good to keep in mind if you see a new player that maybe dropping some of this advice could help make their experience a little bit more enjoyable (or they see how much of a grindfest some aspects of Neopets has become and decide to leave ). I don't plan on quitting Neopets, it's just has become so much a part of my life that at most I may not just compete in longwinded events like the Altador Cup. But dropping in to do Dailies or an event which doesn't require more than an hour attention, I think I can handle that. Though, as you said, with the way things are, Neopets is on shaky ground and who knows how long its luck of dodging closure will keep going (or what would happen to the IP if it ever does). But that's something both our of our hands and in the future, so pointless to worry about. I don't regret playing Neopets or spending so much time on it, they're mostly happy memories and made plenty of online friends. Well you're in luck, 35 is the Yooyuball cap now. Double All Star is probably where the top prize will be, so that'll lead to the best prize to effort ratio. Back in the day I hit that once but this year that's definitely not gonna happen. xD Which hey, it's all good. I'll get the gold trophy and hopefully a cute wearable out of the deal. Ugh, it annoys me that hitting All-Star, the FINAL RANK, doesn't guarantee you getting the top prize! WHAT'S THE POINT OF THE RANKS THEN! Well, anyway, good luck everyone! This was a nice break but now its back to the grind!
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Post by Breakingchains on Jun 22, 2023 16:46:40 GMT -5
Wow. I seem to be on track for double all star, which has never happened to me before lol. Usually I hit all-star, burn out and quit. Fenny Vail IS super cute, there's something unsettling about her design though. I mean that in a good way, her design strikes me as being a spooky little trickster of some sort lol. Not unsettling, but off model. They replaced her ears with ponytails. Or her hair grew over her ears and she tied them like ponytails but also means she tied up her ears? Lol I see what you're saying now that you mention it. I was actually mostly thinking of her eyes. They're super bright and partially hidden. Combine that with the jester aesthetic and she feels... off-kilter to me. (...I am definitely going to be wondering what's going on with her ears now though)
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Post by Twillie on Jun 22, 2023 18:48:37 GMT -5
Lol yeah I've noticed that before about Fenny too, but I mean off-model art is basically a part of Neopets brand at this point haha. Not sure where her ears may be since those are ponytails, but outside of general Usul context it still looks cute, so I can look past it xD
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Post by Stephanie (swordlilly) on Jun 23, 2023 0:24:11 GMT -5
Wow. I seem to be on track for double all star, which has never happened to me before lol. Usually I hit all-star, burn out and quit. Same! The reduced caps are helping a lot this year. It's looking like there are 7 play-days left after today: tomorrow and Saturday, then Tuesday through Saturday. Almost to the finish line!
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Post by Lex on Jun 23, 2023 8:42:34 GMT -5
Congrats to everyone at or about to hit All Star. My original goal this years was just to get the gold trophy, which I did! (rank 17 currently) but I'm so close now that I might as well just go for the big 20.
I'm still extremally sore over the stackpath/google fiber ISP issues that were keeping me from playing. 3 days of the cup limited by this nonsense, forcing me to play on data which I DON'T like to do since I'm part of a family plan and I don't want to be the reason data gets throttled for the rest of my family. I was on a roll with maxing YYB, but switched to playing the bare minimum of games just to keep on me on course for gold instead. Frustrating, especially considering it also functionally locked me out of the rest of the site; no shop, no bank, no inventory, no customizing, the list goes on. Really lame it took them so long to figure out and "fix" it (I'm waiting to see if it comes back today, given the last "fix" only lasted about 12 hours...)
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