2016

Cliques? Sure, they’re Everywhere

stargrace April 21, 2016 2Comments

No matter what game you play, you’re always going to encounter cliques. Groups of people who are reluctant to let anyone else into the circle. It’s hard being an outsider and being constantly reminded of the fact. In wurm I applied to be a CA so I could assist players who had questions and generic things like that. I like to help people out, and most of the time I think I’m pretty friendly. However, a small portion of the CAs belong to a clique together, as any group of friends would. It’s awkward to hear them inviting each other into Teamspeak and being the one who is left out. Since I’m new it will take time before anyone is comfortable with me being there and I’ve already butted heads with some folks because I was not in favor of the new faster timers. What can I do? Just duck my head down and keep enjoying the game, helping players out where I can.

Which brings me back to the deed! Maya has been doing an amazing job in getting her fields terraformed and planted. Moumix has also been terraforming the top tier and I completed the rice field and worked on the docks. Thanks to the faster timers I raised my natural substance to 45, and my channeling is at 35. My Fo priest should be able to cast genesis soon and that will help Maya out with her animals.

Anders contacted me yesterday which was a nice surprise! A fellow Wurm Online player, they’re currently working on a road. Moumix bought a few weapons and tools from Maradesade who lives pretty close by, his deed is beautiful. Zekseidu will be taking a bit of a break, but I hope to see her around again soon, and me and Cennydd had a good chat this morning. It looks like new players (not alts but actual new players) have slowed down a bit but there are still a few each day which is really lovely to see.

Don’t forget if you decide to come play on Sklotopolis – say hello! I’m there as Stargrace, and you just /tell to open a chat window with me. I love answering questions and if you’re a new player don’t hesitate to give me a nudge.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

How Fast is Too Fast?

stargrace April 20, 2016 2Comments

Today wild growth is the name of the game. I’m helping Mayameran out with her hedge pens by casting on them to encourage a growth spurt. Then she can create gates for the pens and move the animals over. After that the old stone pens will be knocked down and hedge pens placed on the other side.

I spent a bit of time locating a few water tiles on the top tier of the deed, easy enough. One is in an awkward place right outside the warehouse but a second tile was under the trash heap which is not a bad location.

I’ve been taking a small break from digging the dock area to work on other skills, like pottery. I’d like to make some compass’ and having nice pottery levels will come in handy for that. Right now I’m at 30, and I’m hoping to reach 50 before the end of the day. I brought my Fo priest over to the deed so she can help out doing odds and ends. I’ve almost reached 40 meditation, and I’m a few days away from rank 7 on the path of knowledge. My goal is to reach .. well, rank 12. I’ve still got a while to go.

Timers were changed today so things are even faster. I’m not really happy about the change at all, but c’est la vie. All I can do is go with it. I’m not fond of being able to raise my digging skill to 90+ in just a handful of hours, but I know there are many out there who have no issue with that. I ranted a bit about it and then realized that ranting would get me no where, so I apologized for the rant. I love wurm because of the sense of pride and effort that comes from creation within the game. Shortened timers felt like it was taking away some of that pride and effort – which it is, but in an MMO it’s not a single person’s vision that creates a server. If it REALLY bugs me, well, I don’t have to play, or I can find a server more to my liking.

With that bit of knowledge, I went back to working on the docks. I should have the whole area flattened today without any trouble at all. Then it’s just a matter of digging out the rice pens, and flattening out the rock areas with dirt or sand. I haven’t decided which yet. I’m thinking dirt, and then I’ll pave the entire dock (or have Moumix pave it with slate). I do also need to create some sections that branch off of the dock for boat parking. I’m hoping to have lots of dirt so that I can give some to the top tier as Moumix evens it out, but I may just end up using it all.

We shall see!

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

Digging, Mining, and More Digging

stargrace April 19, 2016 0Comment

When I mentioned that most of my time has been spent digging and clearing a portion of a mountain in order to extend the dock by 8 tiles total, that’s exactly what I meant. It’s very boring grunt work. The left hand side of the screenshot is flat, and exactly how I want it to be. The right hand side used to be mountain, so I expose the area to rock, and then mine down the tile so that it’s one below the flat area. Then I can drop sand on it to even things out. It’s time consuming but the end effect should be beautiful. At the far end where you can just barely make out my horse and cart is where two rice fields are going. That section will be easier, I’ll just mine or dig down to a slop of 8 all around. I’m not quite at the halfway mark yet, but I’m hoping the other section of the dock will be easier. I don’t think there’s much mountain there to get in the way.

Of course I could be completely wrong. Maybe it will be a lot more silly work than I imagined.

Yesterday my champion wolf gave birth to a champion pup! I was pretty excited about that. When you breed a champion there’s only a chance for the pup to also be a champion. That statistic is increased if the mother is the champion one which is what happened in my case. Her pup is male, so now I have male and female champion wolves. They’re much larger than regular wolves but aside from that don’t really hold any special traits. I just like to breed them because it’s a neat aspect to Wurm. You can’t ride wolves or hitch them to carts, but they do make for neat guard dogs.

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

Inspiration

stargrace April 18, 2016 2Comments

There are some absolutely beautiful deeds in both Wurm Unlimited and Wurm Online. Each brick crafted by hand and mixed with mortar to create fantastic buildings. Moumix has been showing me some castle deeds to use as inspiration for our own place. We have a beautiful hedge animal pen that is being build up by Mayameran and I’m completely in love with it. Our buildings have started up, and we’re leveling the top portion of the deed while I work down below getting the dock situated.

The dock is coming along nicely, even if it’s a pain. About 2,000 dirt have been removed so far, and a few hundred rock shards. The portion I’m at doesn’t require any surface mining so it’s just a lot of plain digging. I’ll be taking a break from it shortly to work on mortar (which we need a LOT of) and small nails. Moumix has been taking over the construction of the buildings (thankfully, because creating buildings is not something I’m fond of) and he’s doing a fantastic job. I can’t believe how fast things are coming together.

The blue drake hatchling was finally found last night and I expect that there will be a server event to smush the thing this upcoming weekend. Maybe I’ll get lucky and finally win a set of drake for myself but I have a feeling that there is going to be quite a crowd of people there, and my luck has never been that great. Still, I’ve never seen a blue drake before, and it should be interesting even with the crowds. I’ll take screenshots and post about it just like I did for the kyklops slaying.

So far it’s been a pretty good week. Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

The Big Move – Day 2

stargrace April 17, 2016 0Comment

A day has passed and the deed is slowly coming along. Moumix has been busy working on the top tier of the place, this is where we’ll have a castle and a small village enclosed. Mayameran has been helping out too making bricks and fountains and collecting camellia sprouts for hedges. I’m working on the dock area. My first task is to flatten the dock area, which is about 8 tiles wide by 50 tiles long. That’s a huge area. Normally this task is more annoying than difficult, but there’s a mountain in the way, so I’ll actually have to dig until I hit rock, clear the tiles of all sand, and then mine the rock down to make the area flat. After I can just put down sand or dirt again to flatten it all out.

So far I have a tiny little portion cleared, approximately 2×12. In order to surface mine it’s not just the tile you’re working on that has to be cleared of dirt, but also the tiles touching it. So instead of a 8×50 path I’ll need to clear 10×52, give or take.

It’s a lot of work. It’s not especially difficult work, but it’s pretty boring to just stand in one spot and dig down to rock and then stand in another spot and dig down to rock. Once I’ve got all of the rock exposed the surface mining part should be pretty painless. In the meantime, Moumix has been working on completing our first building on that top tier. I haven’t actually been up there to see it yet since I’ve been working away at the dock area (and napping, and puking.. such is the life of this pregnant lady) but I’m excited to see what he has done, and it’ll be nice to have an actual building again. That way when I need a break from working on the deed (and I will) I can go do something else for a while.

Things are moving along at a nice pace. With three of us all working together I’m sure we’ll have a castle town up in no time.

OH! Also, a blue drake hatchling spawned on the server. A few of us ran around for hours trying to find it yesterday but we had no luck. Instead of heading out again, we’re waiting for it to eat someone and we’ll be able to figure out the location that way. It would be awesome if I won a set of drake, though RNG hates me pretty passionately so I’m not expecting anything out of the kill – still, it would be neat to see the drake and participate in another community event.

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