Epics of a Different Sort

When you don’t have an adventure level epic to work on – that must mean it’s time to work on yet another crafter epic, of course! Aside from the 8(?) epics I’ve completed for various adventure classes, I’ve also completed a number of crafter epics. I have completed them for carpenter, jeweler, woodoworker, provisioner, and as of yesterday my tailor is brandishing her new title and cloak proudly.

The other epic crafters are all on Najena, so I haven’t had anyone who was able to harvest the wonderful red shiny that are out in Norrath, invisible to anyone not wearing the earring of the solstice. The quest was fairly simple. It starts out with a quest that is shared by all and is broken into sections. One portion requires you to head to Steamfont and Loping Plains to harvest bits for a gnome, and the next sends you to a crafter version of the Drafling Tower in Rivervale, to throw down smoke bombs and get rid of bixie. Afterwards each subclass has their own unique instance to defeat. Mine last night was quite simple, it was a version of The Nest in Barren Sky and I had to run around avoiding agro from the feathered fiends within and collect bits to make a mask (which helped me avoid them further). It was by far the easiest of the three subclass quests, my least favorite being that of sage, alchemist, and jeweler.

Of course, the most difficult portion of the entire quest is finding other crafters to make the components you need. I could make the tailor one for myself at least, and Kasul provided the jeweler portion. I donated 1p per piece that others helped me out with and spent most of the evening tracking down those who could aid. It took a few hours, but eventually I finished. Next is to get my alchemist to 80 (she’s part way into 79) and complete her epic as well, adding it to the collection. Once server transfers are affordable I’m looking forward to having all of my crafters together again.

I also managed to do a quick Obelisk of Ahkzul run, no the shield I want didn’t drop but we did see the fighter one handed which has also never dropped for us before, so maybe there’s hope. Aside from that, it was a fairly quiet day (but at least I felt productive!) I hope everyone has a fantastic Monday today!

More Fan Faire Details (EQ2)

One site that seems to have been over looked this Fan Faire (at least on twitter) is the EQ2 Wire – you may remember them from last year, they were the ones frantically posting all of the guild hall information, and they were fantastic in keeping things up to date. Take a peek over at their site for an in depth (although not always flowing) look at what is to come for EQ2. Some of the changes I noticed right off the bat that I wanted to mention here are:

  • Certain new adornments recipes will be muter only
  • Extend eof and kos trees
    50 more AA points
    250 cap
  • End abilities at bottom of eof and kos trees will be combinations instead of additional buttons
  • Aa xp slider
  • Spell ranged melée heal taunt crit merged to just crit
    Double attack and RDA merge to just DA
    Each class has crit coefficients
    Same gear adds diff crit % for diff classes
  • Reduce mitigation types to
    Physical. Elemental. Nox. Arcane
  • Consolidate common self buff lines
  • Gear scaling system — old gear scales down
  • Druid heal over time with expiration heal for groupmate
    Druid should be viable healer
  • No need to bring 8 support classes
    Raidwide buffs for chanter and bard
    Illy time compression 4 ppl – 1 per group
  • Summoner debuffs spell dmg
    Rogue debuffs melée dmg
  • All of these changes will be on test for a long time
  • May make T9 version of some TSO dungeons
  • Mythical will not be #1 weapon. It will be usuable in another way.
  • Ore nodes will respawn as ore nodes
    Gem nodes will respawn as gem nodes
  • Summoner dumbfire pets will just be a spell with a debuff, won’t be something that has survive.
  • Heal over time is third place behind wards and reactive heals, so Druids are getting another component to heal over time.
  • Let enchanters do crowd control on raids
  • Stonebrunt mountains
  • End of the void storyline
  • What happened to the Erudites and Odus
  • Ratonga lore
  • Contested dungeon
    The Hole
    82+
  • 3 different wings. Spawn in the middle.
  • Raid mobs in new zones will have a choice of difficulty so no zone will be completely unbeatable
  • Some mobs will have multiple loot tables
  • No new deities with expac
  • Guild level 90
    More amenities and more slots
  • 2 overland zones
    1 contested zone similar to sanctum of scaleborn
    12 group instances
  • Level by grouping or soloing
  • Be able to clear instances and then progress to the next zone.
  • New Halas free download gu55
    Streamlined new player experience
    Rework thundering steppes
  • Will see Erudin and Paineel explained in new expac
  • Shouldn’t be any one class that is required to raid
  • Swash and brigands pick up some of each others class abilities.
  • Upgraded quest window
  • Auto mentoring system
    Hail an NPC in the cities to mentor in 5 level increments
    No aaxp bonus
  • Aaxp slider

Be sure to check out their notes for the rest of Fan Faire, but it looks like some pretty great things are headed EQ2’s way eventually. Now we just have to play the waiting game.

Now We Know

Fan Faire had their big release last night, and I caught parts of it on twitter this morning and watched the video since I was unable to at that time. Now we know:

EQ2:

  • – Odus will be the next expansion, including the starter city of Halas
  • – Level cap going to 90
  • – Auto-mentoring (I’ve always said trivializing your content is a bad idea) inc with GU53, as well as shard of love
  • – Doesn’t come out until February (not cool)
  • – 3 months between GU’s
  • – Character transfers via station cash for $25 (best announcement of the night personally)

I was disappointed that Vanguard was not mentioned this year (nor was it last year) if anything it would have at least been a nice tidbit for those who play the game and attended Fan Faire (Joodah and your crew, I’m looking at you).

I was also sad to hear that the new 51/50 EQ server is only open to those at the moment attending Fan Faire, which means achievements and discoveries go to them. Those people who perhaps could not afford to go but who have been loyal EQ customers for 10 years now can play later when it opens for the public in a week. I understand the need and desire to give ‘swag’ to people who are attending your events, but everyone is already getting auto-access to beta, and free copies of both EQ and EQ2. What more did they really need?

Bitter, I know. If I were one of the people at Fan Faire I’d be all over that stuff, but I’m not.

I played very little yesterday, but today is looking better. I’ll post more when I have more to say! In the mean time I hope everyone is having an amazing Saturday and a great weekend in general.

Things Break

After spending two days in bed due to a particularly nasty gallstone attack I’m feeling far better, and able to sit at the desk again which makes me exceptionally happy. I have completely changed my diet (no meats, no dairy, no sugar, no coffee, clear liquids only, etc) for the next month in an attempt at preventing these attacks completely until I can have my ultrasound and doctors can determine whether or not I need my gallbladder removed. Since the attacks are directly related to what you eat and how much cholesterol is in it this is about all I can do. For anyone out there who has dealt with gallstone attacks before you have my deepest sympathy, this is some of the scariest stuff I have ever had to deal with.

I spent the majority of yesterday (when not sleeping) playing Sims 3 and although at times it chugs a little slow on the laptop it runs fairly well. I learned a few new things.

First of all, my sim-self has a fairly small starter house. Deciding to throw a party with as many people invited as she can possibly add is a bad idea. A very bad idea. The majority of people showed up to the party and then spent a few hours all crammed into my kitchen while my sim-self stood there holding a plate of pancakes, unable to move. People told me I threw a pretty cruddy party and I had to agree, I couldn’t mingle and by the end my sim-self bladder was about to explode. Oh, and thank you whoever it was that broke my sink, because that was just what I needed!

My sim-self also quit her job, after taking on numerous ones in an attempt to find her calling. She tried to be a criminal mastermind for a little while and found the hours too annoying. Plus my first day there the boss asked me to stay late and work for some mafia leaders. I took up gardening which is a pretty neat feature in the game that I enjoy a lot, and promptly quit my job. Why not just create my own farm and sell that at the local grocery store! My meager seeds were not enough though and I headed over to the neighbours house to harvest their plants too. Then I used their garlic, onion, potato, and bell pepper seeds to cultivate my own plants, giving me even more selection. They won’t even notice that they’re gone.

Speaking of which, my sim-self is a kleptomaniac, so if things are missing, well. I can’t help it!

While selling veggies at the local grocery store is fairly good money (I was making 200 a day or so) earning money was still pretty slow. While my sim-self is not THAT hung up on material things, the extra coin is pretty nice, so she took a part time job at the book store a few hours a night. This still gives her lots of time to work on what she wants to do, including a grill-a-thon that the town held in the community park – I was SO CLOSE to winning! Off by one serving of hotdogs and if it wasn’t for the fact that my sim-self had to use the washroom so badly she ignored all other commands, I would have won.

I have noticed one drastic change for me in playing Sims 3 vs. the other sims games. In all of the other games I was a builder. I enjoyed creating and designing the houses far more then I ever enjoyed actually playing a character in game. This time around it’s the opposite, I have spent little to no time building aside from adding a garden and little upgrades here and there – almost all of my time has been spent following my little sim-self along and watching her life. It’s interesting to me, and something that I would not have guessed would change.

The achievement system within the game also appeals to my gamer self, and I find myself aiming for lifetime rewards and goals, something that I previously wouldn’t have cared about.

All in all, it was a great way to spend a few hours, and I’m looking forward to seeing what trouble I can get into today!

Oops, I did it again

I resubscribed to WoW, even though it has been almost a year since I last played – I know, I know. WHY. Right? Well, I have reasons (I always do) so here they are. Number one would have to be the fact that for the past two months I’ve been suffering from gallstones which are exceptionally painful. I have one more month before I can even be considered for an operation to remove my gallbladder, in the mean time I have good days and bad days as everyone who has read my blog knows (I try not to vent about it but it happens, I’m sorry). The day after a ‘bad day’ is spent in bed for the most part, recuperating. Laptop is thankfully never far from my side (notice this post has no screen shot? A sure sign that I have been dealing with health issues and it’s not just pure laziness) along with lots to drink and a warm kitty watching over me.

In any case, WoW is one of those games that runs on anything, which I appreciate. Sure, EQ2 also runs on the laptop, but I ‘m used to boxing in that game and I feel like half a person playing from the bedroom and not the pc. No fault of the game to be sure, it’s just my personal view. Also, being confined to my room means I don’t have the wonderful gaming selection that my PC has, so I’m restricted. I have EQ2, EQ, WoW, W101 and Sims 3 installed on the laptop and they run wonderfully. You can expect that with so much time to do nothing, I get bored, easily. This will also help a little.

I’ve played WoW off and on since release. I’ve never gotten a character over level 50 and I’ve never been end game in any sense of the word. I’ve never made much money, and I’ve always found it amusing that the ‘easiest’ game out there was also the hardest for me at least in terms of leveling. Probably because I’ve never had a steady guild or known anyone else who was playing. I love pvp (but can’t run WAR on the laptop) and while it is HIGHLY doubtful that I will play for more then a month (it’s about all I can handle at a time) it does fill the gaps of my gaming needs for now.

I just need to decide what I’m going to play, and where. I have some characters on Uther (44 priest and my 50 hunter) as well as Ravenholdt, or maybe I’ll just start some where new fresh. I always felt like WoW was the sort of game where it really was too late to start over anywhere new, but I guess we’ll just see.

No, I’m not giving up EQ2, or EQ, or VG or any of the other games I play, but if you see a post or two about WoW or notice my xfire time I didn’t want anyone to think I had betrayed over to the dark side or some such.

In other news, Fan Faire starts today. I’m incredibly jealous. I hope everyone has a safe and fantastic time, I’ll be cheering from the sidelines!