March 24, 2009

Sverag, and lots of Planes

Yesterday was another combination of things in game. I decided to stick with the necromancer and the enchanter. The first portion was spent in Sverag, Stronghold of Rage. 

Part of the Plane of Rage, access to this stronghold is gained by breaking down a door in the wall surrounding the tower of Razorthorn in The Devastation. Which faction of mobs you encounter in Sverag depends on which faction “controls” The Devastation. They do not get along with one another, and can be any of or a mixture of: 

Barbarians (Furies of the North); Bolvirk Giants (Legions of Sverag); Drachnids and Spiders (The Venom Swarm); Dwarves (Stormbreaker Furies); Evil Eyes (The Irebound); Kobolds (Wildfang); Ogres (Bonecracker Furies); Orcs and Goblins (Redfist Legionnaires); Shiliskins (Deathshed Legion); Trolls (Blood Furies); Vah Shirs (Furies of Shir); Werewolves (Ragefang); and Zombies, Spectres, Knights (Ravenous Undead

At the very center of this stronghold is Razorthorn, the Tower of Sullon Zek, host to numerous tasks. Most mobs see invisibility, travel in packs, and hit for a wallop. The experience in a well-balanced group, however, is quite worth the effort in establishing a camp here. – Zam

This came out with the Prophecy of Ro expansion, and we spent a few hours there last night waiting for a named who drops an augment that would really be nice for our fellow shadowknight (a weapon augment I believe for that nice swarm weapon we got him the night before). Alas, the named we needed decided to be reclusive and didn’t spawn. It was fun to watch the npc’s all fight with one another though. About half way through our camp the Drachnid invaded, and we had 20-30 of them on us all at once. Not through any real fault of our own as we didn’t spawn them or even agro them but they were the invading force and we were in the wrong place at the wrong time. Thankfully, a monk, shadowknight, and necromancer could feign through the invading army. The enchanter didn’t fair so well and was smushed part way through the first invasion, and I believe the cleric gated out just in time. Oh, and the monk didn’t actually feign, he decided it would be smarter to put on his gate hammer and escaped to The Overthere. Sneaky!

Afterwards we decided to try to find some more fabled to take down, and we headed to Torden, Bastion of Thunder. The zone was not too camped, but all of the ‘good’ fabled were. We did manage to find one up, and it dropped a new 1h weapon for the enchanter, a nice one at that. There were a few other items in the zone I would have really liked but we decided to head to Plane of Air next, and then following that, Plane of Fire. Why those planes? Well, I really want to get myself the fabled gate necklace. It requires having completed the regular necklace which I can do any time (although it will take a good amount of time) and it also requires 1 fabled piece from each plane as well as a container – which you can only pick up during fabled season. I have 3/4 pieces so far, the final one I require is the one from Plane of Fire. There was a raid headed through the zone when we showed up, and then afterwards it was quite camped so we didn’t stay long. Not to mention by the end of the evening I was feeling quite tired and so I decided to call it early. 

There’s still so much to do in game that I haven’t even started yet. I do want to do the anniversary events before they are gone for another year, but keep getting side tracked with other projects. Ah well, I suppose there are worse things that could be going on in game aside from being too busy!

Emotional Price Tags – How much is your character worth to YOU?

I was hanging out in EQ2 checking sales and the like when I happened to notice the comment on the right – the one at the bottom of the screen shot where the person was talking about how much they would sell their EQ2 character for if they were ever offered. It got me thinking about the monetary value of characters – not from the perspective of say, selling them on the bazaar for real life money – but from a personal perspective. An emotional price tag if you will. What exactly are our characters worth to us? For myself in particular, it was a difficult thing to think about. Why? Because I have so many characters spread throughout so many games. I had to look at it on a game-by-game basis. 

For example, EverQuestII. My characters (I have a lot) don’t have the greatest of gear. They don’t have raid gear, they don’t have mythicals. They have a LOT of hours dedicated to them though, and I put a lot of time and care into each one, especially the ones over level 80. Of course I’d never sell them for real, but if I were to associate a price with the account in general, it would probably be somewhere around the $10,000 mark. Keep in mind this is an emotional price tag. Do I honestly think my account is worth that much and would I really sell it for such an outrageous price? No, of course not. It’s simply what the account is worth to me. 

Wow, why on earth so high? Well because of the memories and years associated with it. Those characters are not just characters to me. It’s not that easy to part with it. I know that if I ever DID sell them, I’d be remiss for the rest of my gaming time. Constantly wondering about those characters I gave up. Lets say that the person purchasing the characters decided to strip them all, or betray, or change crafts and basically erase the hours and hours of work that you had already provided. They have no emotional attachment to the account, so feel no qualms in doing this. It’s not just a character that I’ve created and leveled up – not for that game at least. It’s five years of my life, five years of friends (and family) of ups and downs. Yes. I place an emotional price tag on the character. That’s what it is, it’s not what I actually think the account is worth because lets face it no one is going to pay that – but it’s what I personally think the account is worth to me. 

Now take a different game, lets say Vanguard. I’ve put in only two years of time and have significantly less characters. I’m a few levels away from the cap. I have a good guild there but no steady friends who continue to play. The account is worth less emotionally to me then my EQ2 account. The price I associate with that one is significantly less. 

I didn’t play EQ as much as some others. I played for a solid year before EQ2 came out and then switched games. I’ve played EQ off and on since then but I don’t have the history that others may have. I expect that their emotional attachment to the game and to their characters would be significantly higher then mine – now, if you’re not currently playing the game and have no desire to ever return to said game do you lower your emotional price tag? I’m really not sure. 

Those were my rambling thoughts of the morning in any case. I’m always interested in people’s thought process, and would love to hear any comments anyone may have. I’ll post a regular gaming post in a little bit!