2007

Enter.. the Paladin?

stargrace September 21, 2007 4Comments

Goudia, camping in Everfrost. Her poor little nose is getting cold..

I made another alt. I know, bad me. Eventually though I’ll run out of classes that interest me and the alt madness will have to end, right? Faralithe is the newest addition to the alt-army, a little fae, high elf, iksar paladin. I wanted something a little different. I have an arasai (or two) I have dark elves, I have a regular fae, I have a ratonga. I love the look of the female iksars and the way their fins (are they even called fins?) along the side of their heads flare out as you fight. Of course, iksar are evil (typically) so I’m a shadowknight for now. She’s also only level three. But she’ll betray around level 18 I think if I can handle it then (to Kelethin of course, where the quests are far easier to complete for betrayal). That way I can do the evil aligned starter city quests and the good ones as well. An iksar paladin eh. Not sure what her role play story will be yet, but I do plan on creating one. I typically do with my characters even if I don’t post about them.

I suppose I’ve been feeling restless in game again. I completed three heritage quests yesterday on Goudia which was a fair amount of guild status. Even though the quests themselves were very boring at level 70 completing them for the fourth or some times fifth time. I’m looking forward to RoK in a way that I’ve never looked forward to an expansion before. I know there are mixed views on a level cap increase, but honestly, it’s about time. I need to feel some sort of linear progression again.

Aside from the paladin creation, I worked on my armorer (who is new), Sensual reached level 20. Which is nice. She in fact made all of the gear for the paladin. Now I need to harvest metals (again) which is never fun, as any weaponsmith or armorer can agree. So why am I doing it? Who knows, maybe I’m just crazy. Naw, actually. I just find it so much more useful if I have one of every sort of crafter. I like being self reliant in as many aspects as I can in game. That way I’m not waiting on someone else to craft something for me. Since I have so much time to play, I figure that there’s no reason I shouldn’t be able to do these things myself. A skewed way of thinking perhaps, but hey, whatever works.

Ack, 24 hours EQ2-less?!

stargrace September 20, 2007 8Comments

Goudia in Everfrost, fighting off the Numbnuts Numbfoot

First of all, eeks, it was announced earlier today that EQ2 (and forums and what not) will be down for a full day, 24 hours. Starting on Tuesday September 24th. No time given as of yet. Not just EQ2 but all SoE games. That sucks. I am sure that people will be upset over it. That’s a long period of time to be game-less if you play at all. So I’m sure lots of blogs will be updated and people will be dusting off those ‘other’ video games that they play. It’s of course an understandable reason for being down, but that doesn’t mean it doesn’t suck.

Ok, second of all, Cordanim, tagged me for this new style of meme on which races should be aligned to which classes. (Or in Cord’s words, who should play what). Well. My opinion on the matter is pretty simple. I hate being restricted. I think that anyone should be able to play anything. Of course base stats would differ due to the racial abilities (exactly as they are now, with ogres having more strength then elves for example) but I think that having specific races only being able to play specific classes sucks. I’ve played both methods, in EQ2 there are no restricts besides good and evil, and even then the line can be blurred as you betray. However, in WoW (gasp, I said the dreaded word) races are very strict towards which class they can be. I hated the restricts. What if I wanted to be a orc paladin (or any other combination). People are not restricted in real life (these days at least.. they shouldn’t be..) as to what they choose for their profession, especially not based off of race. May seem like an odd analogy but that’s the best I can come up with. So I can’t really do a full write up like he’s done with his post, aside to say that why have restrictions at all. Everyone wants to be unique, and no one wants to all have to be restricted to the same race if they’re playing a particular class.

In game.. I’m doing heritage quests on Goudia. At least at this exact moment I am camping the three named needed by the Eye for Power HQ. It’s boring. But the guild is almost level 24, and then it’s just one more to be able to purchase some new guild status items from the merchant. We’ve been working really hard on it lately, and it’s great to see. Aside from working on the old HQ’s that I haven’t bothered with (once you do them the first time you sort of loose the excitement) I’m also doing tome quests. Lots and lots of tome quests. I adore them (as always) and eventually maybe I’ll finish a few collections off on numerous characters. Or if I ever settle down to a character and not 10. We’ll see how it goes!

Hrms, What to do Now

stargrace September 19, 2007 1Comment

Faydai, my 56 necro, is well behind where she should be in regards to achievement experience

So I’ve been contemplating what I should do in game now, I’m basically just waiting for RoK to be released. Working on smaller alts and crafting here and there. Storing coin aside in the guild bank to help afford the cloak as well as new spells that’ll be coming out. Still not even sure which two characters I’ll be taking to 80 first, I’m sure I’ll decide the day of the expansion or some such. In the mean time, I decided to dust off my 56 necromancer, Faydai. She’s way behind in achievement experience (or aa as it’s typically called by old EQ1’ers) and it’s going to take me forever to get her caught up. Or I could stick with her, or something. Not sure.

I love playing the necromancer. The dps they have is very nice and a huge change from my typical healers. Except she’s slightly… less well off. Then my other characters, simply because her spells just cost so dang much. I used to say that everyone and their dog had a druid (which still holds true) but now I think everyone is running a necromancer of some sort or another. Not that I mind exactly, it’s not as if I am really playing mine, but they’re everywhere.

I ran Mines of Meldrath today, managed to get three legendary useless drops. Transmuted them all, and got powders (also quite useless). 22% experience for the zone, which is not so bad. Groups in the 50’s seem to be far and few between, so I’m contemplating questing my way through them, or being constantly LFG (me? LFG? Eh, no thanks…) to at least try to break into the T7 bracket before RoK comes out. Since Faydai is already a 70 sage, that comes in handy, I can at least see the higher level channels.

Slightly peeved, last night was going to go on an Unrest run, but the servers said they were going down randomly for two hours. Group decided to go to a smaller instance, and the server message said they were not going down after all… of course. Once my group had already decided to go do something else. Ah well, it was getting close to midnight anyhow, so Shadowgeist and I just decided to call it a night.

Just fun in General

stargrace September 18, 2007 3Comments

Playing around with Photoshop and screen shots (there are three screenies incorporated here)… too much fun

So I decided to kick back and relax yesterday, spending most of my time on Qutey, the monk. She’s completed 310 quests or so now I believe, hit level 28, and 28aa. 28 carpenter as well, which is always nice. I’ve come to the conclusion (though I am not the only one) that Thundering Steppes quests suck. Yes that’s right I said the S word. The rewards are barely worth it, the mobs are scattered all over and are far too rare especially if you don’t have track. Of course as is the way with quests, I had to kill 16 hawks. Barely saw any, struggled for a few hours hunting them down, once I’d completed the quest there were hawks everywhere. Bah.

The new level meant a new feign death though, and that was a welcome upgrade. Since I was only wandering around killing solo encounter mobs I turned combat experience back on for the majority of my travels, not that it netted me much. I’d like to get to 32 though, means a new set of gear and some new pretty weapons. I have a good chunk of quests to complete in TS before I wander anywhere else, at least the majority of the rewards are tradeable, and my transmuter’s been having a lot of fun ripping things apart.

Other then that, things are quiet. Last night in guild we had myself, Cordanim, Calreth, Gothun, Shadowgeist, and Lader all on at once, it was odd. I haven’t heard from Kilanna in a few days, hope everything is going well down at her end of the world. TK is almost level 24, the writs keep coming (maybe that’s what I’ll do today instead of slogging around on the baby monk, who knows). I’m excited about RoK, and hoping to get into the beta, we’ll see how it goes!

Busy Weekend? Not Overly

stargrace September 17, 2007 6Comments

I love the Bristlebane pet, Meatbeast from Shimmering Citadel

Well, there was no time for posts this weekend, but that doesn’t mean I wasn’t active in game. It was my Mom’s birthday so I headed to my folks place on Sunday, and of course did all of the typical household things on Saturday. I switched Goudia from Rallos to Bristlebane and the cloak is quite impressive. In fact it sort of puts the other deity cloaks to shame, as far as reward goes. I think I completed a heritage quest, Stein of Moggok, but it was lost in the amazing spam of status from both Calreth and Gothun, who have been working their way through our guild levels. Torrent Knights is almost 24, at 25 we get to add a new design to our guild cloak, as well as unlocking a few more things from the status merchant, always a good thing.

After some heavy contemplation, I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m just not a raider. I felt almost obligated to raid because I’m level 70 and know my characters fairly well — but that’s not how I enjoy the game. I have far more fun piddling around on a level 20 character doing a quest I’ve never done before or exploring an area that I glimpsed over long ago, then any end game raid or instance. Maybe it’s because I find the game slightly stale, it’s been over 18 months since we’ve had a level increase. But the game doesn’t bore me – so I’ve decided it must just be my play style. I’m much more comfortable crafting and chattering then traipsing around for hours on end in Emerald Halls. Even if I am “good” enough or know my class well enough, it’s just simply not fun to me.

I’ve been having fun leveling the coercer lately. She’s almost 47 and that’s when she can finally use her m1 of dominate. I’m excited about it. It’s been a while since I’ve played a coercer, though the pain from leveling up the last one still throbs from time to time. The master charms really do make a large difference. I’ve also geared her up finally, and moved her from Neriak to Freeport, to escape the lag monster.

The wizard that I made is sitting at 22 (un-geared) and I’m sure I’ll make some items for her before too long and begin questing. My favorite by far is still the monk (though I was contemplating a bruiser) who hit 28 carpenter. I haven’t heard from Kilanna much this week, but I’m sure she’s doing wonderful. Cordanim poked in last night so he’s back from his business trip and in game (where he should be!).

I finally found my photoshop CS2 CD (ok, ok, I “found” it over at my folks place, dad graciously gave it to me) and I’m going to be delving into manipulations hopefully over time. I’d like to be able to work on my screen shots and produce some art work from them. The uh, cow image above is the first thing I’ve done with photoshop in about two years. If anyone has links to some tutorials please feel free to email them to me! I have found a few on the Eq2 forums, but I’d love more. Everything I’m trying to do is just self taught. It was nice to re-install the drivers to my wacom tablet (Mine? I actually mean Shadowgeist’) this morning now if only the cat would stop trying to chew on it…….