I think it’s worth listening to instead of reading the summary. The stasis explanation makes more sense, I think. I got the impression that it wasn’t so much about it being irrelevant, just that freezing things didn’t feel all that good. Why freeze things and delay dealing with them, when you could just play a subclass that allows you to directly deal with the problem instead of freezing it to deal with it in a few seconds? So they pushed it stronger and stronger so that it felt good to play.

I still maintain that getting frozen feels so incredibly bad and unfun that it outweighs any positives of however fun it might be to use, but that’s sort of a separate conversation.

In any case, I’m about halfway through the podcast, and it is fantastic. I understand why it’s not possible all the time, but it’s the sort of frank communication I really wish we could get more of. Most people are understanding (at least theoretically) that making video games is complex and difficult and not an exact science—I think it’s possible to talk about design philosophy and goals and such without the community taking those things as promises.

I don’t disagree.

Boring maybe isn’t exactly the correct word, but I get the sentiment. It wasn’t active. With new Hawkmoon, you have to actively land headshots to build the buff, it’s not just a luck of the draw random bullet.