Concepts of two books that relate to TSW mod

The title may looks weird that you may think: What or why are the two books related to TSW mod? But for me, they are related, I am not kidding. Although they are not slim, on the opposite they may be thick to someone, I still think they are interesting and useful in many ways.

Since I don't want to talk about things too serious in the article. Let me come back and just talk about how they are related to TSW mod. So let's go back to the time that I played HC in vanilla D2. This was my first transformation of my concepts of playing D2.

Let's begin with one question:
Q:What is the most important thing in playing D2 HC?
A:To Live.
So what would change if you need to live longer instead of only be quicker and quicker? That may be some transformation of your concept, and it turns out to be changes of buildings and mechanics. And if you don't learn, the death of you characters will help you to learn. This was what happened to me, by the death of each character accompanied with grief, I learned something from them. For example, when my Summon Necromancer died by archers, I learned that block rate was better than only HP. And I felt rage as I played my Sorceress with high ping and died, which was a stupid way of dying that I could not accept. That taught me that don't play HC when the internet was not good unless you want to feel regretful for it. And many other examples.

So, those concepts are useful in life,too. At least for me it is. And I finally found them in those two books.

• Antifragile: Things That Gain from Disorder
• The Black Swan: The Impact of the Highly Improbable

Both are written by Nassim Nicholas Taleb. (And of course I read Traditional Chinese version. Just mention it in case someone misunderstand.) I just make a brief here. They told me that to avoid the largest damage or bad situation is more important than to achieve the fastest or largest benefit. This is equal to the concept of playing HC in vanilla D2, be alive, not be the fastest. And also, in TSW mod, to have a plain solution for extreme case is better than to have an optimized solution for general case. Or to avoid damage will benefit more than making more damage in TSW mod.

To learn more you need to read the books. So the concepts that apply in TSW mod also apply in my real life. The books integrate my most concepts into one or two simple concepts which is fundamental for me to make decisions. As the writer, I am a realistic player as well. In D2 I don't research things that can not apply in TSW mod. What I am interested is connected to characters, buildings and etc. Well, the books give me confirmation that I am right. Even what I learn from a game is valuable. The years that I spent on it are not wasted. Without Diablo 2, I may not understand and believe the concepts in the books so quickly and deeply. This is the first time that I prove to myself that it is valuable, it is not just a game even I realized it but I couldn't prove it before.

There are definitely many serious things that I get from TSW mod. It is related to the philosophy of my life. And it also contributes to my later ability. But I will skip them until I find some interesting way to express.