The Queue: Pumpkin Spice

This part of the year is always the worst for me. I hate the heat and fall is my favorite season, so when people start talking about how fall is well on its way when we haven’t had an overnight low under 75 F in a month, it feels like a taunt. But I’m stubborn, so I’ll just curl up under a fuzzy blanket with a seasonal beverage and sweat.

This is The Queue, our daily column where you ask us questions and we supply the answers with a dash of nutmeg.

I don’t usually like the actual fruit, pumpkin, so when it’s pumpkin plus spice, as opposed to just the spice blend, it’s a no from me. However, I’m a fiend for nutmeg, so my answer is apple, with pumpkin spice. My favorite fall combo is warm apple cider with those crappy supermarket cinnamon powdered sugar cake donuts. There’s just something about that combo that hits, man.

1 Depends a little on why I’m feeling down. High Hopes by Panic! at the Disco is usually a go-to mood lifter when I’m feeling insecure or am in my head about stuff. But when I’m in need of instant shot of dopamine, from the very first instant of the song, there is absolutely nothing like You Give Love A Bad Name. 80s Stadium Rock makes it impossible to think of anything but scream-singing the chorus.

2 is tricky to answer, given the timings of everything slamming in the next few months. In a vacuum, I’d expect 10.2 to land at the end of October, but there are a couple variables. One is the Hallow’s End event, which is new and revamped, and I’d expect that they wouldn’t want to drop a whole new piece of content in the middle of it (and vice versa). The other is BlizzCon, which is November 3-4, and I don’t think they’re going to want to put the patch too close in advance of that, giving the timings of splits, and the fact that they may need to hotfix certain aspects of the fights when the Mythic race gets underway. It also seems like it would be penalizing some of their most dedicated players if they threw the patch live as BlizzCon was happening.

I wouldn’t expect it before October, regardless, so if you’re truly over it you may want to dust off Hearthstone Battlegrounds or something in the meantime.

I’d say to explore God Mode, because that helps drop the burnout factor, since each death does give you some feeling of progression even if you eat dirt in the very first chamber. Remember to start awarding your Nectars to your favorite pals so you can smooch them — this is weirdly motivating to me over time in the same way as the God Mode progression can be. I’ll also add that, as you get more weapons, if one is boosted, use it unless you seriously cannot stand playing that weapon (THE SHIELD). It adds a lot of variety that prevents the runs from feeling too same-y over time, which is what generally gets to me about Roguelikes over time. It’s not the feeling of futility; I just get bored.