It’s always nice to see growth in games – and as I took a peek at Free Realms today I noticed a choice of 6 servers rather then two. Hopefully I’ll have some friends kicking around as well if the chat servers are fixed that is.
Anyone know how the server system works? Can you see your friends online on other servers? Can you change server mid game? Or are you required to switch to join your friends who may happen to be on another server? Let me know, thank you!
Pictured above, Darathar smiling with ‘the crew’ just before we battled him to steal a prismatic egg. Keyboard issues were fixed for Wpus and it was time to finish the quest. We started off by heading to three zones to raid various dragons and take the shards from their corpses that would allow us to resurrect Lady Vox. If you’ve never done this quest before it’s quite a bit of fun (and even if you have done it before) as you’re about to resurrect the dragon you release each one of the shards and then get killed. If you’ve done it properly you spawn a non agro version of her, if you do it wrong – you spawn an agro version and you get to do all of the raids all over again.
After you speak to her she sends you back down to talk to Nagafen (again) who sends you out to battle three more dragons for some rings, as well as a group instance of DFC to take down an orc. Once you’ve obtained all of the rings you head to the Oracle tower in Antonica and you have access to the Isle of Refuge.
Almost as soon as we got there it started raining, so the screen shots look a little washed out. Darathar was sitting as smug as ever, laughing at us (practically). I remembered this raid. I remembered positioning, and MOST of the strats – what I didn’t remember is that you want to position yourself just inside of his front paw so that you don’t get pummeled by the massive AOE that goes off.
You still need to do this, it doesn’t matter if you’re level 50 or level 80, we had a good 3+ deaths from folks getting one shot by that tail lash. Once I remembered where to stand things went much smoother.
I was sort of disappointed that the script was not the same, I remember him flying away at specific intervals and killing anyone who accidentally left a dot on him as we stood there stunned during the length of his flight. He never left this time around, though we did get stunned.
It was still a mighty battle, and in the end we won (just barely). One of the greatest things about doing this prismatic line (aside from the appearance weapon at the end) is that Darathar drops one of the guild hall trophies that you can place in your hall. We now own two of them (though we don’t have a hall yet). We have Darathar, and Gynok. Of course, we also don’t have the bases for them yet because the reflective shards are going for 5p a shot and the bases themselves are being sold for 8p a shot, but since we don’t have a hall yet, it’s alright, we’ll just hang onto them.
After we defeated Darathar it was time to head back to Nagafen – where I instantly killed the group, all save for the Shadowknight who had bloodletter up. Lucky. It was an accident though, honestly! I was attempting to turn on auto attack in order to get some action screen shots, and so I targeted a group member who just happened to have Nagafen targeted right then. I watched, practically in slow motion, as my character swiveled around and tried to hack at Nagafen’s ankles. Needless to say we were all one shot with a 25k nuke.
Ouch.
It’s these memories that make the game what it is though, truly. I’ll be teased about that for some time to come. Any time there’s something that relates to that memory, people will bring it up and we’ll all have a good chuckle. That’s what brings me to these games. That’s what keeps me playing, and that’s what I love.
I hope everyone had an amazing Wednesday! See you in Norrath.
Perhaps a better title for this post would be – why am I playing since I plan to explain why this game appeals to me (and maybe you the reader, too). I’ve been gaming for 7 years now, not a great length of time but I’d say every single MMO I’ve played has revolved around one ‘main’ feature with little sub components tossed in. It’s not hard to guess what this is, either. EQ, EQ2, VG, LotRO, WAR, even Wizard 101. These games all revolve around a ‘hack and slash’ motive. Killing the ‘bad guys’ and leveling up by defeating encounters. Yes, there is also some crafting in there, some housing, card games, and other unique bits to each game but the main focus has been and will continue to be leveling up through defeating various encounters.
After years of playing hack and slash games I find it VERY refreshing to find a game that I (so far) enjoy, that does NOT revolve around hack and slash if I do not want it to. I can still get cool outfits, I can still feel as though I am making progress through ‘levels’ I can still explore and see every bit of the world without having to fight a single thing if I choose. No, it’s not my ideal game obviously but it’s a start. It also gives me a much needed break from the other titles that I play.
I have had comments in the past that ‘blame’ it on me being female, and adverse to blood and guts but I don’t think that’s what it is. I’ve done my fair share of ‘pwning newbs’ and raiding, I’ve cackled and felt the thrill of the chase in BG’s and Scenarios. I can appreciate those aspects of games – but there’s so much constant fighting. I’ll admit it, it gets to me after a while.
Sure, you may find that Free Realms is not challenging enough. You may think it’s aimed for small children based on the bright colours and cheerful atmosphere, but that doesn’t mean you won’t find something on some level that appeals to you just like I have. After 7 years of taking down dragons and running over orcs, goblins, skeletons, elves, and any other manor of creature I am more then ready to lay down the sword from time to time and find a new way to explore.
Sound Crazy? Maybe.
This does not make me any less of a gamer (at least, not in my opinion). I don’t want things easier, either. That’s not what I’m saying. I’m just feeling glad at the idea that I don’t have to bash someones brains in and steal their weapons in order to progress through an MMO and explore a world.
Plus, my cat Princess (pictured above) looks awesome in her new pirate gear. You’ve got to admit.
The other bards laughed at me. Why on earth, they sneered, would you want to go visit Nagafen and resurrect Vox when there was so much NEW stuff to do. So many better adventures. With void creatures running a muck there was never a lack of stories to tell. I shrugged at them and continued with my path. They asked me why but to me it was simple. So many others were already traveling down those paths. It was getting redundant. I had already heard about the void creatures in various songs ten times that day alone. Had everyone suddenly forgotten the lore of days gone by? It was these things that pulled me in, these memories and thoughts that drew me to them like a moth to flame. And so I found myself staring face to face with Nagafen, asking the details on how to resurrect Vox, talking openly about Darathar as memories flooded past. It would make a great song, one day.
Needless to say I spent most of my in-game time working on ‘to speak as a dragon’ the language quest required for a number of other quests out there. I eagerly freed the sage from his dungeon in Lavastorm, and from there headed to Antonica to speak with the Oracles. Of course nothing is ever easy with them and they sent me out through the Shattered Lands hunting for runes in order to translate the language. 26 runes later (and quite out of breath) I returned and they imparted their wisdom. I dragged the bard and mystic along to accomplish this, if I was going to get it done it may as well be for both characters.
Once I’d mastered the language I headed back to Nagafen who shared with me the method of reviving Lady Vox, and how I would have to (eventually) travel to the Isle of Refuge and confront Darathar. This was all fine and dandy and I looked forward to it excitedly. Just like I looked forward to it four years ago.
Things have obviously changed. To obtain the draconic language now it’s a heroic instance, and no longer a raid. There are portals in Solusek Eye that will bring you to the lower levels instead of having to walk the entire way – and encounters are grey and worthless. When I first did the prismatic 1.0 quest none of these things were true. It took an incredibly long time to wander to and from Nagafen as many times as you had to for this quest. You had to bring a two group raid in order to even begin it – and all of this was for a LEGENDARY weapon. There were no such things as mythical. Fabled were practically unheard of. Adept3 were rare, and if you had adept1 you were doing great. There was no such thing as +heal or +spell damage.
I remember playing my templar (my first EQ2 character) with an Australian raid force on Najena. I was level 45, still five levels away from the current cap and they needed healers. I was THRILLED that they asked me to go. I was nervous. The raid force had to position itself numerous times. It was exciting to kill our way down to the beach where Darathar was sleeping and then learn the (at the time complex) strat to killing him.
Then the enormous let down as you didn’t get your weapon until AFTER you managed to walk back down to Nagafen. All of that work and you still had more ahead of you. After a few hours of raiding the last thing people typically wanted to do was kill their way back down, but we did it. Oh yes we did. We sported our ‘of the shard’ titles proudly. I still have the weapon on my templar, the only character of mine who has ever completed this raid.
The plan last night was to finish off speak as a dragon and then complete the first three raids that are required for Fire and Ice, then if there was time, to complete the next four raids for Deception, and face Darathar on the Isle of Refuge. Unfortunately one of the trio currently has a broken keyboard, and we’ve put the raids on hold until this gets sorted out. No use doing it if you’re not side by side with your friends. I’m excited though!
With all SOE games being down for a few hours yesterday I didn’t play a great deal. Last night the trio (with me as my 73 dirge and 80 mystic) headed to Crypt of Agony which was surprisingly fun even at level 72. I was hoping that Cardiocutter would drop because we’ve yet to see it drop, but alas my luck holds as true as ever and we saw nothing of use this run. After we decided to head to The Anathema in Everfrost. The bard picked up a new pair of earrings, a new charm items, and Ultann’s healer picked up a few goodies as well.
Aside from that, the day was fairly uneventful and my mood was sour to boot in a typical-Monday-but-not-so-typical-for-me mindset. Ended up calling it an early night and getting some much needed sleep after getting only 4 hours the previous night. I hope everyone else had an incredible day.
stargrace