IamA marathon streamer AMA!

Why does chat always win?

Chat is great. Chat is mighty. Chat is love. Chat is life.

Will you be doing any mental tests to see how your mental functions change without sleep?

This time I will be! I'm looking forward to them. I haven't decided what they'll be yet.

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I start prep a month in advance. I cut out caffeine, and I do weekly 24 hour streams to get my sleep schedule confused. I'm still working out the kinks in the process and trying different ways of preparing. Its good to get 10-12 hours the night before I start.

Eating right before hand is good, but during the marathon I find a small but steady stream of carb heavy food helps a lot. Pizza, chinese, indian, etc work great to keep you going with the occasional turky sandwich thrown in. Still working on refining diet.

I know this would hinder speaking a bit, but caffeine gum is really great!! Gives you a crazy boost of energy, and it lasts for quite a while!

I've never considered that. Thanks for the tip.

have you ever gone full PainUser? And if so, then for how long?

You mean when he fell asleep? Once. It lasted only a few minutes till a friend called me and woke me up. There's a picture somewhere of me asleep with the 'defeat' sign from starcraft over my bowed head when I passed out mid game.

http://imgur.com/r/Koibu/L0IhGK2

You're welcome <3

-_- this picture will haunt me for the rest of my days.

How has being mafia affected your ability to do marathon streams?

There's no proof I'm mafia.

We have a video confession, you can't deny!

That was made under coercion! It doesn't count.

How do you keeps yourself awake and focused during the last ten or so hours? Any tips?

It's all about proper preparation. Cut out caffeine for a month ahead of time, use it sparingly, and make sure to get exercise during small breaks (3-5 minutes ever few hours). Dunking your face in ice water helps too.

We can ask you anything right?

When is the next dicing with death? I'm in severe withdrawal!

Ryan voice is so smooth...

Monday. Tomorow.

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Sleep is good. Get lots of it every day. I sleep 8-11 hours a day, only starving myself of sleep when it's important.

Work hard, don't bow to pressure from others, be who you are and don't lie to yourself.

do you plan on doing Solum/vigil etc?

Yup

If you were a salad, what kind of dressing would you have?

I'd be naked. Totally undressed.

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*amendment to the girlfriend question:

The first few times it was annoying because she didnt have access to her boyfriend and we couldnt even have a phone conversation. During the last stream, she got more involved, acting as support, helping out with food, shooting me with a nurf gun at random times in the night to make sure I was awake, which was more fun. She felt like she was apart of it, rather than just losing me for a few days.

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Kate did a lovebytes episode with me!

does anyone have a link to a vod of this?

I do: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZY_KnSjFOdk&list=PLPV88C9y83a50ovKmcqZeSD4e-NPzK8M9&index=9

Webcams are dumb. Some programs flip video, some don't. I don't understand them.

Income has been weird. Before the 90 hour stream it was almost all donation based, but after that I've had almost no donations, so subs have been extraordinarily helpful. I make waaaaaay less streaming than I did as a developer. Waaaay less.

I just can't work for other people anymore. I was tired of answering to people who didn't understand what/how I was doing, and didn't care about me.

She is very supportive, even if she does worry. She's understands that it's just a few days, so it's not a strain on our relationship. You might see her one-day, but not today :)

I'm not sure how to do this best. I think it's just an imbalance I need to work hard to fight.

Good luck Neal. I hope it all goes smoothly.

Small question. What is/will be, the biggest obstacle during the stream? Apart from not eating your keyboard unintentionally.

120 hours is a long time and I didn't properly prepare this time around because life has been throwing me all sorts of curve balls lately.

Misread title as IamA marathon streaker. Was a little disappointed at first, but this is good too I s'pose.

The streaking's just a hobby; I try not to advertise it.

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Nope. Never.

Are you not concerned about the problems that lack of sleep might bring you in that 120 hour run?

I've looked into the heath related issues and I'm confident I'll be ok. I'm no doctor, but it's my understanding that it's chronic sleep deprivation one needs to worry about.

Neal, will you swing your stick around in stream as you did in the previous marathons?

Depends on which stick you're talking about, but my new room doesn't have space for staff arts.

I am disappoint.

That's what she said.

Any tips for staying up for long periods of time without any preparations beforehand?

Eat small amounts of carbs often, but make sure you get healthy food too. Get some exercise when you can. Cold water on the face when you're tired.

Wow! I'm about 62 hours into Rollplay at the moment, been watching for a few weeks. Unrelated question to the AMA, but what is the next Rollplay series after the original, and when should I begin to watch it?

Now related question, do you have any sleep problems or no? I would imagine having insomnia or some kind of sleep-depriving issue would be really useful for this :P

Watching Dicing with Death - its the best.

I have no sleep problems, but i am a night owl.

You mentioned something during a rollplay show about consulting a doctor before this marathon stream: find out anything new/helpful?

I couldn't schedule a visit before the stream sadly. Life has been complicated.

Have you seen doctors about it before? How did they react when you told them what you planned to do?

I planned to see a doctor before this stream but I waited too long and couldn't get an appointment in time.

How do you feel after waking up ? (after your previous 90 h + streams) ?

Tired. I slept for 11 hours, was groggy for an hour or so, then 4 hours later I slept for another 8 hours. Then I was totally fine.

Hi Neal! How different is it to dm a show on a livestream? How much do you and the other rollplay crew prepare off-stream?

It's so different doing it via the internet than in person. So different. In person it's more silly and fun, more casual and friendly. The in person social interaction is really enjoyable and can't really be recreated.

The difference between steamed and not streamed is small but significant. I feel the need to censor somethings that would be be understood between freinds in person, but that someone online might get offeneded by or might not understand.

We don't prepare together at all. I prep all week long, rollplay is always on my mind and I'm always thinking about the campaign and what's next.

Would you like to do a face to face stream of Rollplay?

A what?

Like get everyone from Rollplay and around a table to play rather than over Skype. For a special episode or something.

That'd be hard, but super fun.

Have you thought about getting a large group together for a 2 or 3 day D&D stream? It could be interesting watching how people's actions change as the stream goes on longer.

I've thought about it. We'll see...

Any tips for a completely inexperienced D&D group trying to start up? Good luck on the stream, see you in chat!

Just have fun and trust your DM.

Unless he is Mafia like Neal.

I am not now, nor have I ever been, mafia.

Do you have any tips for learning to stay up longer? I can do 24 hours fairly easily but it's way more difficult for me to much longer, mostly because there's not too much for me to do.

I need more context. What are you trying to stay up for?

I'd like to be able to stay up for long periods of time, and I want to know if there's anything that I could do to train myself for it.

I'd like to be able to stay awake for the entire stream.

Practice. Get used to living without caffeine. Get good sleep everyday that you do sleep. Eat right before hand, and be constantly snacking during - no big meals.

How much crystal meth will you do over the 120hrs?

Enough to put Walter White out of commission. ;) No, but seriously, the only drug I use is caffeine.

how do you make cartography so interesting to watch ?

I snort crushed unicorn horns before I go live.

What rank do you plan on hitting after 70 hours of CS:GO?

Silver 1. T.T

<3

<3

Ok, so being awake for too long might have some negative effects for your health. Do you know if there is any signs you should be aware of to know that you don't harm your body or mind beyond a certain point? Or is there even such a point to begin with? I watched you champion on last time and you were awsome; did you ever seriously think about quitting then at any point? All the best on your big marathon stream man! :)

I've done a lot of looking into the health effects, and I feel confident I'm not hurting myself with acute sleep deprivation.

I didn't think about quitting last time. I was so pumped.

Neal, thanks for doing this for our somewhat sadistic viewing pleasure.

Do you have any plans to do even longer streams in the future? Will you keep pushing yourself until you see how far you can possibly go, or will you wait to see what this stream does to you?

Thanks

There's a radio host who just did something like 190 hours and there was a guy a few decades ago who did 260+. I dont know where I'll stop, but if I do 120, I'll probably do 144 as well. We'll see.

That radio host was the Dutchman Giel Beelen, here is a Dutch source.

He got 5 minutes of sleep every hour, which he could save up for a longer nap. And every other day he got another 3 hours of sleep.

What! Bullshit. That so doesn't count.

I managed a couple of 24 hour streams before plying myself with lots of energy drink. By the final hours I could hear cracking in my brain. Chat were amazing and helped loads towards the end keeping me occupied. The skyrim marathon involved them giving me cheats and such to unleash dragons in cities. And in my terraria marathon they all joined in on a server and helped me do shit. That viewers are amazing at times.

Anyway no question just I know how it feels and good luck with all future streams.

Thanks buddy.

How do you handle your caffeine intake during the stream? Also what do u think is the best way to wake up when crashing?And what games do you think will help you staying up.

Finals week in Greece so i won't be stopping bye too often so good luck :D

No caffeine for as long as I can, and none for a month beforehand. On the second or third night, when I feel I'm about to crash, I will have an energy drink. The next night I'll have two, and from there on I take as needed but try to keep it to a minimum.

If I'm about to crash, I dunk my head in a pre-prepared bucket of ice water. Other options include yelling at myself in a mirror and slapping myself in the face, or doing jumping jacks and stretching.

CS:GO really helps a lot. Civilization and Total War are good for keeping you going without realizing you're tired.

I thought this was going to be about someone who could pee for a long time without breaking the stream. Oh well.

That's a different challenge. In my own home I test to see distance from the toilet I can stand and still hit my mark, but not duration of piss.

if you do complete this marathon stream, the whole 120 hours, will you try to do a stream for even longer? or is that just not humanly possible based off of the doctor you said you talked to.

I didn't speak to a doctor, but people have done well over 200 hours before. I expect I'll try for more, but I don't want to think about that now. Let's focus on doing 120 hours first.

Just to want you to know Neal that #TeamChat will win. How do you feel about this fact?

I feel smug in my convictions that I will prevail.

what do you do for a living?

I am now a full time streamer!

Do you use any supplements to stream, i.e caffeine, drugs, etc?

I use caffeine, and this time around I'm going to try taking vitamins at their normally prescribed rate. Morning other than that though.

Thanks for answering! Do you take it in coffee, 5 hour energy, or another form?

Unnamed brand of energy drinks. I tried coffee last time, but I can't drink it, it's so gross. I've never tried a 5 hour energy, I might have to at some point to see if it's better than straight energy drink.

I accidentally requested the days of your stream off of work, I'm so excited. Is CS:GO Going to be your main game again once you're exhausted?

We'll see. Hopefully I'll mix it up more.

I actually got back into CS after the last marathon. though, I got ranked much higher D:

Good for you!

Anything?... When's your birthday?

August 1986

No question, just wishing you all the strength in the world because holy shit, 120 hours... 5 days without sleep.

Most I've ever been able to do was about 60-65.

Good luck man!

Thanks man.

What is your favourite Dungeons and Dragons edition and why?

Also, I just wanted to say thanks to you and just about everyone who participates in Rollplay, you guys encouraged me to find a D&D campaign, something i wanted to do for a few years and i've been having crazy fun.

2nd edition is my favorite. It's so minimalistic and complicated at the same time, and it's easy to adjust because it takes the view that not all things are balanced.

I don't like stunt no-sleep endurance streams (say past 24 hours). Not sleeping is not a badge of honor but it's so often boasted about.

To me it's like having a stream where you sit in the least ergonomic position possible and suffer through pain, or only eat twinkies every day for sustenance as long and keep going until the scurvy becomes unbearable.

Best of luck to you, I guess...

Haha, I do my best to keep it healthy and to take care of myself. Hurting myself would be counterproductive, but I totally understand your reservations. Thanks for the luck, even if you don't approve. :)

Any new outrageous marks to hit? As far as donations/subs etc.?

:) Love the streams and hope you prevail over the zerg that is chat.

I haven't made up the donation leader board, I'm doing that in an hour.

We'll see how it goes, but the more the merrier.

I'm sure you've answered before but any fun hallucinations?

No hallucinations yet. I've had some interesting mental changes, but they were too subtle to explain. I've had more serious side effects from just drinking a lot of energy drinks, to be honest.

So no, nothing from sleep loss that's significant.

Neal, 120 hours is an ungodly amount of time to stay up and continue to be entertaining. But my question is, besides not completing the 120 hours, do you have any fears/worries in regards to taking on this task? If so, what precautions have you put in place to combat them?

Best of luck, I'll be sure to tune in when I can.

My only fear is that I'll fall asleep. This time I have 4 people that will be looking in on me and making sure I'm healthy and alive. If something bad happens, or any health issues come up, I will kill the stream and seek medical attention (if needed).

So Hi, just wanted to wish you luck & health for the marathon <3, you are awesome!

p.s: why did you remove the info?

I didn't. I don't know what happened. It got deleted by /r/iama staff I think.

Have you ever thought of adapting to an Uberman-like sleep schedule to make marathon streaming easier?

But then I'd not be marathoning! I'd be sleeping.

@Koibu / Neal: Have you ever considered somehow helping out psychology or neuroscience labs and helping them by doing little tests to monitor mental changes throughout the marathon? I'm sure they would love to take it as a great opportunity to get some research.. For instance they may create some performance tests that you could take every x amount of hours or something like that. They may even be interested in the what the things you eat and drink throughout the marathon etc.

I've considered it, but I don't know how I'd get involved with that.

Have you tried playing the moba smite?

I did, only for a bit, but I wasn't a big fan. I only played it for 45 min though so it's hard to say.

What does it feel like to "hit the hay" after one of these marathons? I'm talkin just laid down.

I wouldnt know. I'm asleep right away. No time to enjoy it.

Y tho

Why not? It's fun, it's a challenge, and it helps connect with my audience.