April 10, 2009

Nostalgia The Guild – Happy Anniversary

We are a small group of friends who are doing the 1-80 progression one untwinked level at a time, seeing the old world as it was meant to be seen while seeing all the bits of the newer world we may have missed.

We group once a week on the Luclin server, Fridays at 7PM Eastern Time.

We are not currently recruiting, but we’re always interested in meeting new friends and if there is interest, we will make a third progression group.

Regardless of whether or not you want to play in one of the progression groups, if you just want to hang out with a bunch of friendly people and are fairly low level, we’d love to see you in guild chat, once we get the guild made. 

Register and leave a message here if you’d like to join!

That was the welcoming message posted by one Tipa almost exactly a year ago on the Nostalgia web site. I was thinking back on everything that’s happened since that point in time. It was a turning point for me, I met a lot of people, made a lot of close friends. We’ve drifted over the course of the year but most of us wander back in one shape or form and leave comments on blogs, forums, emails, xfire, or twitter. We’ve changed games (some times a lot) but we all had something in common when we joined the guild and I think to some degree still do. 

We’ve kept small. It’s an aspect I’ve really liked even though I (at times) wish we were more steady. Maybe that’s just not our play style as a group though, maybe we’re just not the sort to all settle down. I look at Casualties of War (which I’m also a member of) and envy their following at times. In day to day activities I’m not really one for crowds and this carries over into my gaming habits. 

Nostalgia the Guild started out on EverQuest. It has since carried over to EverQuest II, and most recently Lord of the Rings Online. They are some of the best friends I could have ever asked for, and I am thankful I’ve gotten to know such an amazing bunch of people. Especially since they’ve (to date at least) put up with me and all of my ‘quirks’ (such a kinder word). What an amazing world we live in that we can experience such things. I feel lucky. I realize that there are other guilds, older guilds who have spanned across a greater time period, more games, and bigger trials and tribulations – feel free to give a shout out to them below if you’ve got a great story to tell or just want to share.

Ding, 19!

Tom just wasn’t all there. Wait, not that Tom. Oh, not that Tom either. There we go, that’s the one. As he sang his tunes and started dancing around I turned and looked at Kasul. We were supposed to follow him? Was that even safe? It didn’t seem like it would be. Of course, good ‘ol Tom ended up leaving Kasul and I standing outside of a big deep cave with lots of creatures inside so maybe we should have followed him after all. 

I was so close to hitting level 20 without a death. So close I could taste it. Then book one, volume one, chapter 11 came along. I died. I died a lot. I died from heal agro most of the time and when we went back to Bree broken and torn, my repair bill was 75 silver and I’ve never seen it that high before. I can’t even remember the number of times I died, but it seemed like I was always trying to make my way back to Kasul. Once we decided that there really was no way that we could complete the instance without a group or at least a few more people, we headed back to Bree to see what our options were. 

We managed to gain almost two levels in the time we played. I am a little shy of half way to 20. I gathered together more supplies to craft with (story of my life) and contemplated switching to a cook because the food is quite handy, as opposed to a tailor where most of my gear seems to come from quests or drops and it’s far better then the items I can actually make myself. I’ll think about that more when I’m back in game again. 

I’ve mentioned before how alive the world feels to me, and I’ll stress it again. As we were running through the woods it was dark, the music was scary and I FELT as though I was in the woods. As we fought our way through The Barrows and I looked across the rolling mountains with ruins scattered every which way, it just felt so atmospheric. Of course, there is also a lot of walking in the game which means I spend a lot of time trying to get from point A to point C (because point B would be silly!) and things are starting to get REALLY expensive (skills and what not) but I’m still having a great time. Were it not for the few items I’ve sold on the market I wouldn’t have even been able to afford my repair bills yesterday let alone my newest skills. 

I’m looking forward to hitting 20 and finally getting some appearance slots although my hopes of ever owning a home are quickly diminishing, I have no idea how anyone manages to afford anything, especially since the home I wanted is over 900 gold and I learned that there is a thousand silver to every gold. The most money I’ve had on me has been 400 silver. This could take a while.