Real Life

So You Decided You Needed a Break…. From What?

Lack of posts over the past week are one sure indication that in the MMO world, not much is going on. That indication would be correct! After taking some time to look at my life (lack of one?) I decided very spur of the moment, that I needed a break from EQ2 for a little bit. Why?

 Well, I’m blessed (cursed?) with having the life of a house wife pretty much. I have no children, I stay at home, I cook clean and do all that fun stuff. I’m 25, so fairly young. The life is not a bad one. It’s not always an easy one though and anyone who tells me other wise I will swiftly give a great boot to the head. There are reasons life is the way it is right now and without spewing my emotional garbage all over my blog that should sufice.

Anyhow

I have a huge amount of free time on my hands. My boyfriend and I decided to try EQ1 5 years ago, and have been playing MMO’s together (in some degree) ever since. There comes a time though when everyone at one point or another can think of someone or themselves and know, hey… they play too much. I’m one of those people. Not even ashamed to admit it. It was getting to the point where I’d just log on for the sake of logging on, not even acomplishing anything. Granted, I still did all the things in real life that needed to get done, but even I know when too much is too much.

 So I wrote a quick note to my guild letting them know I needed a break for a bit (it is the christmas season anyhow, most of our raiding if not all has slowed to a stand still as various people are on vacation / visiting family / drunk) and have been EQ2-free for… *checks the calander, ignoring her shaking hands* 6 days now.

Are MMO’s addictive? Sure. They draw you in and can keep you there, and I don’t think there’s anything wrong with admiting that. When you have the free time to devote to it (and hell, even when you don’t) it can become a pretty powerful thing in your life. So does this mean I’m giving up my MMO’ing ways? Naw. Just means that I took a step back, and decided I need to limit my playing a little more then I had been in the past. Sounds sort of weird to write about, but I’m sure there are those out there who understand exactly what I’m saying and where I’m coming from.

On the flip side, finding 15+ hours of something to do has been a huge challenge. I shopped. Worked on Christmas presents, read, did some drawing, did some writing, and whatever else I could find to fill in the empty gaps of time that seem longer some how these days. I decided to limit myself to 4 hours of play a day. Longer on weekends since… well, this is a major form of (cheap) entertainment these days for myself and my boyfriend. I’ve braced myself for all of the “WTF Get a Life!” comments, and “OMG L0Zer!” and all the rest. It’s all about the moderation.

Just a brief note..

Account is now closed for now, but if you’d like to keep in touch or read other things I’m writing, feel free to check out the WoW Travels blog linked on the right hand side, as well as my Reveur Artwork site. With Vanguard coming out in January, and no expansions due until November, we’ll just have to see where things take me.

Little bored, little break..

Taking a small break from EQ2, while I piddle around again on WoW, my account’s not cancelled so don’t you all start jumping for joy quite yet, anyone who knows me is aware that every few months I flip flop games for a short time. EQ2 just doesn’t seem to have anything to offer me right now. With no expansion coming until November I’m bored and restless. I’ve got a very small WoW blog that I’ve got linked on the right hand side for anyone who’s craving updates, I’ll post on either or depending on my mood. Though more and more I’ve just simply been doing other things.

Gah.. tailor book prices and other rambles.. (oh, and Qumana ftw!)

While my tailor may have hit 30, there’s no way I am going to be able to gather the books that I’m missing when they’re going for obscene amounts of gold. I felt bad even spending 21g on one of my books (which I did simply because I needed to make something from it). It wouldn’t be quite so bad if it were only the tailoring books that were going through this sort of price spike, however it is all crafts. My sage is experiencing the same thing, as well as my jeweler. I haven’t even seen advanced jeweler 28 on the market for the past three weeks. There are some sage books that are currently selling for over a plat.. That seems drastically high to me.

So who prices them this way? Farmers? Typical players out there trying to make some money? I admit, I have priced a few of my level 20 books for 15g. It was well below what they were typically going for, and I sold them the same day I put them for sale. But I would never charge more then that for such a low level crafting book, of that I’m certain. It doesn’t do me any good to vent about it really, but it’s on my mind none the less. I realize most of my posts have been about crafting lately, but it’s because that’s simply what I’ve been spending my time doing.

A huge thank you to Cordanim for posting about Qumana Blog Manager on his site, which is actually pretty spiffy and is what I’m using currently to type out this post, while I get a feel for it. It’s user friendly (for the most part) and not complicated, and gives you slightly more user interface options then just the basic word press template.

In other news. I ended up raiding Labs two nights ago with Second Dawn, which was an experience. I had applied to their guild last week, and received no word from them back at all. Assuming this meant I was not what they were looking for, I thought little more about them because well, I know my abilities, and I know I’m a damn fine healer. So I applied to Shadow Syndicate, as well as Souls of Betrayal. SS invited me along for a labs raid, but were not 100% that there would be room for me. While I was gathered outside waiting to see, SD came along and spotted me. Their raid must have had an empty slot or two, because they asked me if I’d like to tag along. Since SD was my primary choice (at the time) I agreed, and explained the situation to SS who said that was fine they understood, SD is a completely different atmosphere then most guilds, being the ‘best’ raiders on Najena. The raid went fine, no deaths aside from one silly wipe where the healers were not curing the MT’s debuffs in time before he would die. Vyemm was pretty easy, and I was doing my job just fine (in my opinion), being a completely new raider with them, and not par taking on their teamspeak channel, meaning I had no clue what tactics they used for any mob, nor resists, nor anything really since they didn’t speak up to me about where to stand. That’s fine, I’m not new to this game I can look and follow where the other healers are just fine. Afterwards an officer told me they liked what they saw, and that they would be in touch next week.

Now the issue is, I’m not actually certain I want to join. Hey, why not? Is what most people would ask. But I think it’s just nice knowing I am good enough to get in if I wanted. I take pride in knowing my character, and playing her well. I like knowing I am not only good, I am the best, at what I do. I feel as though I am. However. I like to play this game on my terms for the most part. I like to do what I want to do, when I want to do it. Hence the 10 characters I have currently. I can flip flop to any one depending on my mood. I can farm or craft or play a lowbie or play a level 70, or play mid level characters based on my whims. A raiding guild does not allow for that. So, my thoughts currently, are that I’ll just stay un-guilded, and play my alts and enjoy the game and have fun, until November when the new expansion comes out, and then perhaps see where things sit. I don’t need a big uber raiding guild, I’ve done that before. Meh. We’ll just have to see how it goes.

Nomadic Gamer