February 20, 2017

Back to Sklotopolis

Time. There’s never enough of it. Between the chunk that we humans have to spend sleeping (more or less hours spent here depending on what happens to be going on in our lives at the time of question) eating working and various other mundanes, there’s still just not enough time to do what we want. I’ve been trying to keep up with gaming since having my little bundle (how on earth is he almost five months old?!) but lets face it, life happens.

I like having an MMO on my radar because it helps me keep ‘social’ when I’m dealing with a life that has me heavily tethered. Food provider is something I take a lot of pride in, but it sure doesn’t let me get a lot done – and I’m OK with that.

The point of this long winding story is that I’ve managed to wander back to Wurm Unlimited, and my old server of choice, Sklotopolis. “But Stargrace,” you might ask. “What happened to Ages of Ulrath?” Or whatever that other server was called. Welp. As is the case with servers you don’t run yourself, something happened while I was away (I have no idea what, I was busy pushing a human being out of my body) the server seems to have folded, and now it’s locked with no indication of anyone actually playing. Shame, but I honestly should have known better. Sklotopolis is a steady server with a fantastic history, run by people that I’ve known from Wurm Online for years.

My main deed which I share with Moumix and his wife was (thankfully) still standing, even if none of us had been playing. My second, personal deed, had since been disbanded. Despite that, my buildings and the walls around the location still stood, and so I re-deeded the place and restored it back to its former glory.

There are a lot of familiar faces on the server, and some new ones which I’m really happy to see. The head GM is currently Alpha testing the latest changes that will be coming (eventually) – this includes the cooking update that’s already live on Wurm Online. Unfortunately I read that the 500 recipes that they added there will NOT be making it to WU – and that has me pretty angry. The Wurm Online developers justify it by saying that they’ll provide GMs the ability to create their own recipes, which is great but who wants to deal with all that coding. Most people just want to play (or host). Their decision saddens me especially because they flout WU as being a replica of WO in their sales pitches on steam. What’s the point if they’re just going to leave out a bunch of content. Hopefully someone develops a bunch of recipes and releases it to the GMs who can then decide to add it to their servers. I’m still wondering why there’s no steam workshop for WU and instead we have to hunt down server and client side mods on the forums. I think it would be incredibly beneficial to have them stored as a steam workshop file. There’s probably a logical explanation on why that hasn’t happened yet, but it’s hard to see past that missing part every time you go to update your mods.

On my foray back into Wurm Unlimited I happened to be just in time to help take down the Troll King. The event was made even more fun because the GMs have allowed event teleportation. Normally rounding people up to walk to an event can be a tiresome chore, and less people show up because they don’t want to leave the comfort of their homes. A teleport to the event allowed me to get there instantly, and then I just used my karma port back home to my own deed after. I didn’t win any of the wonderful prizes that were donated, but Moumix’ wife did win herself a large magic chest that is now sitting in our shared vault.

So what will happen to my deeds in Wurm Online? For now I still have them and the rent is paid for over a year on each one – but I’m considering passing them off to my alliance mates, and moving to WU full time. It’s cheaper (no monthly fee), and fits in with my play style better (since things are sped up). I just don’t have the time to grind away in WO for hours on end like I used to. It doesn’t mean it will always be that way, and I’m incredibly thankful that I can still play a version of the game, but I just can’t dedicate the amount of time a game like that requires.

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

Nomadic Gamer