Following is a summary of the initial interview questions.
.
Additional questions are welcome; they can be added as posts to the thread. If you think that the question you have might be a sensitive one, then ask it by private message to Zed, and he can decide for himself whether to answer it in public.
ShadowHM: Please give us some general information about yourself. For starters, where were you born? Where were you raised to adulthood? Where do you live now?
Zed-F: I was born in Edmonton, AB, Canada, and lived there all my life through university. My first bachelors degree was in Genetics, but I found pursuing a career in that field didn't seem appealing, so I got another bachelors in Computing Science. Along the way, I met and married my wife. Once I graduated, I found work in the R&D section of a large telecom manufacturing company, and we moved to Ottawa. I have continued to work at that company despite the burst of the internet bubble and still live in Ottawa with my wife and 4-year old.
ShadowHM: Who influenced you the most in making you interested in games? How? Were there any other gaming influences?
Zed-F: I had a few friends growing up who liked games, both the role-playing kind and the computer sort. Most of my gaming influences came from associating with other people who liked to game as well.
When D&D Basic first came out, I got a copy for a birthday gift when I was around 9 or so. My brother and I and my father opened it, and tried to figure it out, but we couldn't make heads or tails of it! We eventually took it back and got a more traditional puzzle game instead. A couple years later I made a friend who was very much into that sort of game and showed my brother and I the ropes, however, and that made all the difference. I have enjoyed a good roleplaying game ever since and currently spend some of my gaming time on an online play-by-post roleplaying site known as HeroCentral. I actually met my wife by virtue of our mutual interest in roleplaying games; we were both members of the role-playing club at university.
As far as computer games go, when I was young it was again more a matter of having a couple friends who were into computer gaming. It wasn't until I was nearly a teenager that my father brought home an IBM PC (at a whopping 4MHz) for work purposes, and a couple games we could play at home. I would play the occasional arcade game as well, and there were a couple I got good enough to beat on a single quarter, but I never really played that many of them, and I never got into the head-to-head type. Still, the home computer allowed us to play the early text-based adventure games from Infocom and a variety of other games, and from then on it was a matter of keeping up with the PC gaming scene. We never did own a console.
I have a dabbler's interest in other types of games as well, such as war gaming (both board and miniatures-based) but those have always been sidelines that I would play when I could get together with someone else who was interested. For a while in university I had a friend I would regularily play WH40K Epic-scale miniatures battles against, but he has remained in Edmonton while I moved to Ottawa, and I was never able to find someone to take his place out here. He still keeps me up-to-date on goings-on in the WH40K universe when I visit, however. I also enjoy a good card game. I wouldn't say I'm an expert card player, but I like to think I'm at least competent. My wife and I have come to play bridge online on a fairly regular basis, even if we always play in the social and not the competitive rooms.
ShadowHM: What games have you played in the past? What games do you play now?
Zed-F: For the sake of brevity, I'll restrict my answer to computer games.
When I was younger, I played too many games to easily list. These days I tend to be far more selective with my purchasing dollar. However, my brother still buys many games each year and I will occasionally borrow some from him that he's finished with.
At RB I have played Diablo 2, Moo, Civ 3, GalCiv, MOO 3, and Guild Wars. Other games I have played in the last few years include Starfleet Command, the Homeworld series, Half-Life and Half-Life 2, Dawn of War, Starcraft, and I'm sure a few more I've forgotten. I have a big stack of games I borrowed from my brother that I have yet to play, so I don't feel the need to purchase many new computer games unless they are must-haves for whatever reason. Generally I go in cycles where I'm playing one game consistently for a long time, then I switch to something else or another game and do that for a while. I don't tend to jump around a lot between different games within a short time interval.
ShadowHM: What non-computer games did you play as a child? Who introduced them to you and which types did you enjoy most? What non-computer games do you still play and why?
Zed-F: All sorts of games. Most of the highlights I already went over in my previous response, in the answer to the questions about gaming influences. The ones that stand out most in my mind were roleplaying games such as D&D (in various incarantions), Champions, Call of Cthulhu, and many more, and strategy boardgames or wargames, such as Axis & Allies, Warhammer, Warhammer 40K, and a variety of others. I also played my fair share of card and dice games, especially hearts and bridge, as well as many others. Since in Unversity I was a member of long standing in the roleplaying game club (more accurately, the gaming club, since various members of the club were engaged in a variety of kinds of gaming beyond roleplaying games) I had exposure to a wide variety of games. I enjoyed that diversity and was often willing to try my hand at new games that seemed interesting, regardless of the format.
I still play roleplaying games online at HeroCentral in a play-by-post format, though I haven't made a serious effort at finding a local group to roleplay with in a face-to-face environment due to transportation issues and other difficulties. My wife and I play bridge at Yahoo Games on a regular but unscheduled basis as a social activity for ourselves. Unfortunately I haven't had opportunity to continue to pursue my wargaming passtimes since University other than the occasional computer game.
ShadowHM: How did you choose the username Zed-F?
Zed-F: I'll let you all guess where the name Zed comes from. It's an obscure reference to an old but well-known science fiction television character.
The -F appendix is not properly part of the name, but it's something I often add to distinguish it from all the other Zeds floating around out there. There is no particular reason why I chose -F other than habit.
ShadowHM: How did you come to the Realms Beyond?
Zed-F: I used to play Diablo in a now-defunct legit gaming organization by the name of Honor-Might. During the interval between Diablo I and Diablo II, the lull proved to be too much for many such organizations, and such was the case for Honor-Might. However, I happened to know Shadow from those days, and one day when I happened across her (I forget where) she mentioned RB. So I stopped by, liked what I saw, and decided to stick around.
Since then a couple former members of Honor-Might have become peripherally associated with RB, such as FlashNPan. Most, however, continue to play other games, such as UO and EQ.
ShadowHM: Please tell us about your playstyle.
Zed-F: I am a strong proponent of the RB variant philosophy for keeping things interesting. In part, this comes from indecision; when I'm starting a new character, I often am not certain exactly what I want to do with the character, so I will save resources/points/whatever until I have occasion to decide what I want to do. Even once I've made my decision as to a path to take, however, it's often an additional challenge to continue to make do without those resources. While this slows down the pace of the game, I find I'm not a big fan of rush-style games in the first place; a more moderate pace is helpful for safety, situational awareness, and ultimately enjoyment, at least in my case. I can be a pretty patient sort... though there are of course limits.
As such I've tried to participate in and promote variant games across RB, and particularly the type of variant where the variant rules are easy to understand but significantly limiting. I was a member of the FoS hardcore challenge for much of the course of that series of games, and also the proponent for the Slackers <http://realmsbeyond.net/diablo/vlodslackers.html> games that are still ongoing (when everyone can get together.) I also have an even more strenuously hampered Slacker variant character, AssIsGrass, who is making slow progress through Hell difficulty, and am participating in the BN challenge KoP came up with. Most of my characters are restricted in one way or another to varying degrees, though I do run the occasional unrestricted character.
ShadowHM: In terms of the playstyle you favour:
Is this a continuation of your approach to your work? Or is it an anodyne for the work you do? Or is it a choice because it is a counter-point for other aspects of your work or lifestyle?
Zed-F: I don't think my playstyle really has anything to do with the nature of the work I do. I think it has more to do with setting challenges for one's self, and then overcoming those challenges. Without new challenges to overcome, any endeavor becomes stale.
ShadowHM: Could you please give more details about that FoS hardcore challenge series, for those who are not familiar with it? Who was involved? What restrictions did you have? What were the most diffictult challenges? What does FoS stand for anyway?
Zed-F: FoS is short for Friends of Sisyphus, which was an attempt in v1.08-1.09 to get a closed team (no-twink outside of what the team found) of HC characters through the game, completing all quests, with as low a clvl as possible. The initial participants were Occhi, Hawkmoon, CelticHound, and someone else whose name escapes me at the moment. The team had some trouble coordinating their play times, however, and took a long time to complete normal difficulty. This was compounded by the fact that every time a player died, a new instance of that character would have to be created from scratch and levelled to catch up with the rest of the group -- hence, Friends of Sisyphus.
By the time the team reached nightmare, the fourth original player had dropped and Doc and I came on board. Doc dropped out again partway though nightmare, but I stuck with the team, and eventually, with much tribulation, we managed to defeat hell Baal. The experiment was definitely a mixed success, however, in that the Ancients quest pushed our clvls up higher than what we had intended. I remember taking my backup sorceress through the game and skipping the Ancients to see how far the concept could be pushed without that artificial level inflation interfering. I eventually managed to solo her as far as nightmare ancients while holding her clvl down to about clvl33. Since she was supposed to be a hydra/orb sorceress, and there were no synergies back then, she made it the majority of that way relying pretty much entirely on a +3 Glacial Spike/+3 Fireball leaf staff and her Iron Wolf Ice merc. Needless to say, it was very slow and careful going.
These days it might actually be possible to start again and be true to the FoS spirit since the ancients always give only one level. However, if I were to try again, I would do it in softcore to avoid the frustration of starting completely from scratch every time. Ironically, though I lost several backup characters, I never lost my main character until after we had completed our quest.
ShadowHM: What about Slackers
<http://realmsbeyond.net/diablo/vlodslackers.html>?
Zed-F: As far as slackers go, there should still be links around somewhere to the concept there. The original version was a very straightforward no-twink team variant that simply restricted the total skill and stat points available to the team members to about half of what would normally be available. Some team members chose to voluntarily take additional restrictions on top of that. Currently the slackers team is in A5 Hell, and consists of:
TyrFune - windy druid played by Shadow
VandyGraff - Lightning sorcy played by Hawkmoon
BringOutYerDead - CelticHound's no-stats Lord of Mages necro
SmOcchiTheBare - semi-naked trapassin originally started by Occhi but currently run by Shishak
Systah - Zed's no-stats Enchantress -- the only weapon-oriented character in the group, still using Ravenclaw 'cause we haven't found anything better!
I have since come up with a significantly more complex and more restricted version of the slacker variant and have off-and-on been running an assassin to those rules. AssIsGrass is currently in A1 Hell and looks like she will ultimately be capable of completing the game, if at quite a slow pace. Her story so far is posted on the board <http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showthread.php?t=86> and inside the RBD tales section here <http://realmsbeyond.net/diablo/taleassisgrass.html>.
ShadowHM: Since this interview is about 'The Making of a Gamer", what steps, if any, have you taken to ensure that your four-year-old will be a gamer too? i.e. what games do you play as a family and/or what games have you purchased for your child?
Zed-F: None in particular. I think she will likely become interested in gaming by osmosis, but it's not something I want to particularily encourage or discourage. In particular, I am trying to avoid encouraging much interest in computers at this time -- I'd rather she spend her time learning in other ways until she's a bit older. Once she's school-age will be soon enough.
We do have a few educational board games and the like that we do occasionally play together. Simple jigsaws, alphabet games, matching games, and story games are about her speed.
.
Additional questions are welcome; they can be added as posts to the thread. If you think that the question you have might be a sensitive one, then ask it by private message to Zed, and he can decide for himself whether to answer it in public.
ShadowHM: Please give us some general information about yourself. For starters, where were you born? Where were you raised to adulthood? Where do you live now?
Zed-F: I was born in Edmonton, AB, Canada, and lived there all my life through university. My first bachelors degree was in Genetics, but I found pursuing a career in that field didn't seem appealing, so I got another bachelors in Computing Science. Along the way, I met and married my wife. Once I graduated, I found work in the R&D section of a large telecom manufacturing company, and we moved to Ottawa. I have continued to work at that company despite the burst of the internet bubble and still live in Ottawa with my wife and 4-year old.
ShadowHM: Who influenced you the most in making you interested in games? How? Were there any other gaming influences?
Zed-F: I had a few friends growing up who liked games, both the role-playing kind and the computer sort. Most of my gaming influences came from associating with other people who liked to game as well.
When D&D Basic first came out, I got a copy for a birthday gift when I was around 9 or so. My brother and I and my father opened it, and tried to figure it out, but we couldn't make heads or tails of it! We eventually took it back and got a more traditional puzzle game instead. A couple years later I made a friend who was very much into that sort of game and showed my brother and I the ropes, however, and that made all the difference. I have enjoyed a good roleplaying game ever since and currently spend some of my gaming time on an online play-by-post roleplaying site known as HeroCentral. I actually met my wife by virtue of our mutual interest in roleplaying games; we were both members of the role-playing club at university.
As far as computer games go, when I was young it was again more a matter of having a couple friends who were into computer gaming. It wasn't until I was nearly a teenager that my father brought home an IBM PC (at a whopping 4MHz) for work purposes, and a couple games we could play at home. I would play the occasional arcade game as well, and there were a couple I got good enough to beat on a single quarter, but I never really played that many of them, and I never got into the head-to-head type. Still, the home computer allowed us to play the early text-based adventure games from Infocom and a variety of other games, and from then on it was a matter of keeping up with the PC gaming scene. We never did own a console.
I have a dabbler's interest in other types of games as well, such as war gaming (both board and miniatures-based) but those have always been sidelines that I would play when I could get together with someone else who was interested. For a while in university I had a friend I would regularily play WH40K Epic-scale miniatures battles against, but he has remained in Edmonton while I moved to Ottawa, and I was never able to find someone to take his place out here. He still keeps me up-to-date on goings-on in the WH40K universe when I visit, however. I also enjoy a good card game. I wouldn't say I'm an expert card player, but I like to think I'm at least competent. My wife and I have come to play bridge online on a fairly regular basis, even if we always play in the social and not the competitive rooms.
ShadowHM: What games have you played in the past? What games do you play now?
Zed-F: For the sake of brevity, I'll restrict my answer to computer games.
When I was younger, I played too many games to easily list. These days I tend to be far more selective with my purchasing dollar. However, my brother still buys many games each year and I will occasionally borrow some from him that he's finished with.
At RB I have played Diablo 2, Moo, Civ 3, GalCiv, MOO 3, and Guild Wars. Other games I have played in the last few years include Starfleet Command, the Homeworld series, Half-Life and Half-Life 2, Dawn of War, Starcraft, and I'm sure a few more I've forgotten. I have a big stack of games I borrowed from my brother that I have yet to play, so I don't feel the need to purchase many new computer games unless they are must-haves for whatever reason. Generally I go in cycles where I'm playing one game consistently for a long time, then I switch to something else or another game and do that for a while. I don't tend to jump around a lot between different games within a short time interval.
ShadowHM: What non-computer games did you play as a child? Who introduced them to you and which types did you enjoy most? What non-computer games do you still play and why?
Zed-F: All sorts of games. Most of the highlights I already went over in my previous response, in the answer to the questions about gaming influences. The ones that stand out most in my mind were roleplaying games such as D&D (in various incarantions), Champions, Call of Cthulhu, and many more, and strategy boardgames or wargames, such as Axis & Allies, Warhammer, Warhammer 40K, and a variety of others. I also played my fair share of card and dice games, especially hearts and bridge, as well as many others. Since in Unversity I was a member of long standing in the roleplaying game club (more accurately, the gaming club, since various members of the club were engaged in a variety of kinds of gaming beyond roleplaying games) I had exposure to a wide variety of games. I enjoyed that diversity and was often willing to try my hand at new games that seemed interesting, regardless of the format.
I still play roleplaying games online at HeroCentral in a play-by-post format, though I haven't made a serious effort at finding a local group to roleplay with in a face-to-face environment due to transportation issues and other difficulties. My wife and I play bridge at Yahoo Games on a regular but unscheduled basis as a social activity for ourselves. Unfortunately I haven't had opportunity to continue to pursue my wargaming passtimes since University other than the occasional computer game.
ShadowHM: How did you choose the username Zed-F?
Zed-F: I'll let you all guess where the name Zed comes from. It's an obscure reference to an old but well-known science fiction television character.
The -F appendix is not properly part of the name, but it's something I often add to distinguish it from all the other Zeds floating around out there. There is no particular reason why I chose -F other than habit.
ShadowHM: How did you come to the Realms Beyond?
Zed-F: I used to play Diablo in a now-defunct legit gaming organization by the name of Honor-Might. During the interval between Diablo I and Diablo II, the lull proved to be too much for many such organizations, and such was the case for Honor-Might. However, I happened to know Shadow from those days, and one day when I happened across her (I forget where) she mentioned RB. So I stopped by, liked what I saw, and decided to stick around.
Since then a couple former members of Honor-Might have become peripherally associated with RB, such as FlashNPan. Most, however, continue to play other games, such as UO and EQ.
ShadowHM: Please tell us about your playstyle.
Zed-F: I am a strong proponent of the RB variant philosophy for keeping things interesting. In part, this comes from indecision; when I'm starting a new character, I often am not certain exactly what I want to do with the character, so I will save resources/points/whatever until I have occasion to decide what I want to do. Even once I've made my decision as to a path to take, however, it's often an additional challenge to continue to make do without those resources. While this slows down the pace of the game, I find I'm not a big fan of rush-style games in the first place; a more moderate pace is helpful for safety, situational awareness, and ultimately enjoyment, at least in my case. I can be a pretty patient sort... though there are of course limits.
As such I've tried to participate in and promote variant games across RB, and particularly the type of variant where the variant rules are easy to understand but significantly limiting. I was a member of the FoS hardcore challenge for much of the course of that series of games, and also the proponent for the Slackers <http://realmsbeyond.net/diablo/vlodslackers.html> games that are still ongoing (when everyone can get together.) I also have an even more strenuously hampered Slacker variant character, AssIsGrass, who is making slow progress through Hell difficulty, and am participating in the BN challenge KoP came up with. Most of my characters are restricted in one way or another to varying degrees, though I do run the occasional unrestricted character.
ShadowHM: In terms of the playstyle you favour:
Is this a continuation of your approach to your work? Or is it an anodyne for the work you do? Or is it a choice because it is a counter-point for other aspects of your work or lifestyle?
Zed-F: I don't think my playstyle really has anything to do with the nature of the work I do. I think it has more to do with setting challenges for one's self, and then overcoming those challenges. Without new challenges to overcome, any endeavor becomes stale.
ShadowHM: Could you please give more details about that FoS hardcore challenge series, for those who are not familiar with it? Who was involved? What restrictions did you have? What were the most diffictult challenges? What does FoS stand for anyway?
Zed-F: FoS is short for Friends of Sisyphus, which was an attempt in v1.08-1.09 to get a closed team (no-twink outside of what the team found) of HC characters through the game, completing all quests, with as low a clvl as possible. The initial participants were Occhi, Hawkmoon, CelticHound, and someone else whose name escapes me at the moment. The team had some trouble coordinating their play times, however, and took a long time to complete normal difficulty. This was compounded by the fact that every time a player died, a new instance of that character would have to be created from scratch and levelled to catch up with the rest of the group -- hence, Friends of Sisyphus.
By the time the team reached nightmare, the fourth original player had dropped and Doc and I came on board. Doc dropped out again partway though nightmare, but I stuck with the team, and eventually, with much tribulation, we managed to defeat hell Baal. The experiment was definitely a mixed success, however, in that the Ancients quest pushed our clvls up higher than what we had intended. I remember taking my backup sorceress through the game and skipping the Ancients to see how far the concept could be pushed without that artificial level inflation interfering. I eventually managed to solo her as far as nightmare ancients while holding her clvl down to about clvl33. Since she was supposed to be a hydra/orb sorceress, and there were no synergies back then, she made it the majority of that way relying pretty much entirely on a +3 Glacial Spike/+3 Fireball leaf staff and her Iron Wolf Ice merc. Needless to say, it was very slow and careful going.
These days it might actually be possible to start again and be true to the FoS spirit since the ancients always give only one level. However, if I were to try again, I would do it in softcore to avoid the frustration of starting completely from scratch every time. Ironically, though I lost several backup characters, I never lost my main character until after we had completed our quest.
ShadowHM: What about Slackers
<http://realmsbeyond.net/diablo/vlodslackers.html>?
Zed-F: As far as slackers go, there should still be links around somewhere to the concept there. The original version was a very straightforward no-twink team variant that simply restricted the total skill and stat points available to the team members to about half of what would normally be available. Some team members chose to voluntarily take additional restrictions on top of that. Currently the slackers team is in A5 Hell, and consists of:
TyrFune - windy druid played by Shadow
VandyGraff - Lightning sorcy played by Hawkmoon
BringOutYerDead - CelticHound's no-stats Lord of Mages necro
SmOcchiTheBare - semi-naked trapassin originally started by Occhi but currently run by Shishak
Systah - Zed's no-stats Enchantress -- the only weapon-oriented character in the group, still using Ravenclaw 'cause we haven't found anything better!
I have since come up with a significantly more complex and more restricted version of the slacker variant and have off-and-on been running an assassin to those rules. AssIsGrass is currently in A1 Hell and looks like she will ultimately be capable of completing the game, if at quite a slow pace. Her story so far is posted on the board <http://realmsbeyond.net/forums/showthread.php?t=86> and inside the RBD tales section here <http://realmsbeyond.net/diablo/taleassisgrass.html>.
ShadowHM: Since this interview is about 'The Making of a Gamer", what steps, if any, have you taken to ensure that your four-year-old will be a gamer too? i.e. what games do you play as a family and/or what games have you purchased for your child?
Zed-F: None in particular. I think she will likely become interested in gaming by osmosis, but it's not something I want to particularily encourage or discourage. In particular, I am trying to avoid encouraging much interest in computers at this time -- I'd rather she spend her time learning in other ways until she's a bit older. Once she's school-age will be soon enough.
We do have a few educational board games and the like that we do occasionally play together. Simple jigsaws, alphabet games, matching games, and story games are about her speed.
