June 11, 2012

Picking Up My Second Tapestry #GuildWars #GW

stargrace June 11, 2012 0Comment

In my effort of ‘catching up’ my Hall of Monuments so that I’m ready for Guild Wars 2 I actually discovered a few things. First of all, I apparently picked the worst class combination for PvE ever. The Mesmer / Ranger combination (with Mesmer being my main ‘profession’). I was looking for some builds for this combination and about 99% of the posts I found were all about how this was the worst possible combination ever for PvE and is made for a PvP setting. Great.

I thought about how much effort (long term) I had put into reaching level 15. Not that much, in fact barely a weekend when all is said and done. So I decided to start over with a combination that was more suited to my play style. This time I took the easy road, and made a monk / warrior combination. I absolutely adore the monk, and when I’m playing with my friend Ninga Turtle, I make great use of my heals. When I’m soloing I switch the spec around a bit and stick to being a warrior with mercenary and a few heals. I need to be level 10 before I can do the quest to unlock the Hall of Monuments (again), but at least this time around I’ll know what I’m doing. I also already have 4 points, and they accumulate account wide so it’s not like those will be wasted. Four points unlocks a few pieces of gear according to the calculator.

Since I used my first tapestry from Gwen after visiting the hall for the first time in the wrong monument (not wrong per say, but not the one I wanted to unlock) I decided (before making the new character) that I’d unlock a second one. Thankfully there’s a great Guild Wars Wiki that I made much use of. I decided to work on ‘Northern Allies‘ since it was one of the new quests I had picked up, and after a lengthy quest chain I was rewarded with a lot of experience and the new tapestry, which I used to unlock the miniatures monument.

Of course now I’ll have to do that all over again once the new character reaches 10, but at least I’ll know what to expect. Ninga was also brave enough to run me all the way from my starter city over to Lion’s Arch, so now I can port there. It was quite an adventure, too. Hopefully I’ll get caught up before too long. It’s been neat getting back into the game. I feel a bit more confident at my ‘skill’ and I’m having more fun this round than the first few times I played. One huge enormous bonus to me is the fact that the game has no subscription fee, and during these times I really appreciate that I can pay for the base game and then not have to pay anything extra. Granted, Guild Wars does play much more like a single player game to me than an MMO, but the ability to group with others is there.

I’m looking forward to sharing more of my adventures, as always!

Gaming

Vanguard Loyalty Rewards #VGD #Vanguard

stargrace June 11, 2012 3Comments

Thanks to some wonderful posts by Ardwulf, I decided that I should log into Vanguard for the loyalty rewards they are offering until the game goes free to play – and I’m very glad I did. I missed the May rewards which included a boat for players, but June was just as exciting. On my players below 50 I received a free small house (you still have to purchase the plot, but this saves a lot of building should I ever decide to move), as well as some appearance gear which my 50 monk is showing off above. It’s a plate graphic which doesn’t really suit her style, but there’s a lot of details in the pieces which I really appreciate.

There’s a bit of controversy about the level 50 rewards, which include 2 chests with augments, and 5 crates that you have to use a special mallet from KDG to open. The mallet costs 1g each, and you must be level 50 to get to the zone to begin with in order to purchase these. I was able to save up the crates on my level 47, but I only have one level 50 character at this time, so only she was able to open them. The crate rewards were various pieces of (to me) awesome gear, some yellow and some orange. Sadly, none of the pieces were of any actual use to me, being better suited for plate classes, but perhaps I can save them for alts or put them up on the broker.The controversy comes from players who argue that giving away these augments as loyalty rewards trivializes farming / raiding for them. On one hand I can understand their perspective, however, personally, I don’t raid nor do I farm, so this is a chance for me that I would otherwise not have. I still think players spend too much time worrying about what everyone ELSE is doing with their characters, rather than enjoying the game themselves and being preoccupied with their own business. How someone else plays the game or what gear they have shouldn’t have such a dire impact on how you view things (personal opinion only here).

It would be great to get my blood mage to 50 (55 ideally, as that’s the new cap) so that she could participate in these rewards, but I’ve little to no idea of where to level these days. Still, my interest in Vanguard is once again piqued (along with my ever wavering interest in Guild Wars) which is never a bad thing. I’ve loved Vanguard from the very start, and I’m pretty excited at the prospect of getting to share that love with others as they realize what a great game it truly is. I hope the free to play model goes well.

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

June 11, 2012

Picking Up My Second Tapestry #GuildWars #GW

Vanguard Loyalty Rewards #VGD #Vanguard

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