Nomadic Gamer

Raid Leaders, not just Raiders, Have Obligations

stargrace September 3, 2007 0Comment

Misako did an LoA run, and managed to get a new pretty

A long weekend, always awesome to get one of those. I meant to finish up this post yesterday but (of course) got side tracked with other things. I’ve been doing some off and on raiding with a few guilds, and I learned a few things. Just as a raider comes prepared to the raid (on time, with potions and whatever else they may need) there is also an obligation on the part of the raid leaders. Here is the wrong way in my opinion and personal experience from raiding this weekend:

~ Not explaining encounters in difficult zones. Raid leaders, PLEASE remember when you take new members that not everyone has done these encounters before, and even if they have and you’re a top notch guild who’s expecting their recruits to know their stuff – they have not done it with YOU. Which means you probably stand some place new, or you use a different tactic, or you cast a different spell. It does no harm to make sure your guests understand what is going on.

~ Not making your recruits / guests feel comfortable. When your new raider joins vent or ts or whatever it is you use, try saying hello! Be nice, and make them feel welcome after all there is a reason that they’re along on your raid to begin with. They were obviously interested in it, and you were interested enough back to give them a chance. There’s nothing worse then a new raider who does not know anyone logging in and no one saying a word at all. New raiders are nervous enough (believe it or not) and that little bit of extra to make them feel that they are at least appreciated for being there, is important.

~ After the raid is over, not saying a word to the new raider. Come on people, they’re not lepers, even if they were awful raiders. Even if they didn’t know their roll. Just be open and up front about things. Let them know if you want to have them back. If not, let them know that too. Don’t just feign interest.

I went on three raids this weekend, the first was Emerald Halls, the second was Lyceum, and the third was Labs. I know, that two were just boring ‘ordinary’ KoS raid zones. I did them with two separate guilds, and let me tell you, the KoS boring ‘drab’ raids were two of the best raids I’ve ever been on. Not because they were easy and simple and I didn’t have to think (which I didn’t) but because the raids made me feel welcome. They were friendly, and out going. They talked to me before the raids and after. To me personally, it doesn’t matter WHAT a guild is taking down raid wise, if I’m not feeling at least some sense of community when I play with them then chances are I’m not going to stick around, what reason would I have. I most certainly don’t play this game for the loot aspect, and yes, I agree it’s nice to get into those end game zones, but again. I really need the sense of community.

I consider myself a fairly good player, I know my characters, I learn fairly well. I know my capabilities. I still play for the community though. It’s probably the number one reason I’ve avoided high end raiding guilds. NOT that they don’t have a sense of community – they do. But it’s gradual. You have to prove yourself to them first. They have their own community that you don’t belong to really from the start. Harder if you don’t even know anyone in the guild, it can take time. Which is of course a good thing, but not something that I want to deal with in the game. I know it takes time before you’re “one of the gang” and I admit right now I have little to no patience.

Anyhow, just wanted to make this post to say that it’s not all the raiders responsibility when it comes to the raids. Please try to make those new raiders feel comfortable. They’re nervous and it’s not going to kill you. Of course if it does kill you, there are bigger issues to look at.

Ugh.. Downtime.. and Bugs..

stargrace August 31, 2007 9Comments

So my server’s been down for over 12 hours now due to the latest (huge) bug that I got to experience first hand this morning. You can read about the servers going up here
if you’re curious when yours is next on the list. Since it’s 11pm EST here now I suppose I’ll just call it a night.

For those curious what the bug actually was, no it was not LoN related. When servers came up at 11am EST characters were experiencing what I like to term as the “oh-gawd-nothing-is-saving-bug”.  It was not numerous bugs, it was just one bug. It was not LoN related at all, they even said they were working on a separate bug that involved a few characters, and as they worked on it they made a bigger boo-boo. It happens. What the actual bug did:

When you zoned, your character basically wiped (minus coin gain and experience gain and aa gain) to how it was the last time you logged into the game (pre-patch). So that meant if you completed a quest, then zoned, the quest magically appeared back in your journal. If you added new buffs, and zoned, each of those buffs dropped. If you bought a spell at the broker, scribed it, and zoned, you instantly lost the spell (and did not get that coin you spent back). I discovered and re-discovered the same entrance to loping plains 5x in a row. Also completed the same quest in Mistmoore Catacombs 3x in a row, gaining aa each time, then zoned out only to find it entered into my quest journal again. When you completed an instance and then zoned out the timers on that zone were wiped, allowing you to enter again right away.

So of course drastic measures had to be taken. Servers came down approx. 2 hours after this bug was running ramped. Roll backs were of course incoming since there’s no way they could just leave characters as they were. Now Antonia Bayle is a huge server, so I can understand the lengthly down time it’s experienced thus far. I’m really hoping it comes back up tomorrow at least since I’ve got that Emerald Halls raid, but I’m not going to hold my breath just in case.

Am I overly upset? Not really. These games are huge, and things happen. One hour after browsing forums though is more then enough to realize that not everyone understands that, and that there are some VERY angry people out there, demanding money back, and other extra compensation for their missed play time. Me? I’ll just wait for the game to come back up. Unfortunate that it happened, but I know it’s being worked on and my ranting and raving about it won’t make it go any faster.

A Discreet Meeting – Sensual

stargrace August 31, 2007 3Comments

(( Just the beginning of a little story I’m working on involving my Arasi brigand, Sensual. Not all mapped out yet, but it was a fun start. I’ll add to it as I come up with ideas, here’s hoping I get a lot of them, I do enjoy writing, so if you don’t enjoy it, oh well!))

She danced with the shadows, weaving in and out between them. Her feet barely touching the floor. Violet eyes glinted in the dark, and nothing could be heard aside from the faint swoosh swoosh of her daggers moving. The little Arasi was called Sensual, though most barely even knew that, and she loved to dance with the shadows. Her wings painted patterns on the floor as she moved, her body lithe and trim.

Her blades glinted once, and then twice, piercing imaginary foes who had done her wrong. Or perhaps people she had been hired to kill, as that was not beneath her. Her mouth curved in a smirk, and she continued to dance. Her mind drifted and wandered and she forgot where she was, almost forgot herself. Such was the way of the dance.

The dance can be dangerous

A voice echoed through her head, and she worked to shake it out. Dangerous? This? She practically laughed. She was not complete without her blades at her side. The connection she felt to them was something beyond what most could understand. Certainly her own family had not understood her desire, her need, to lose herself in the dance. She had left them as early as she could, saying not a word and simply disappearing from her home in the dead of the night years ago. She did not expect anyone to stop her or try to find her, if anything Sensual imagined they would be quite relieved that she had ‘disposed’ of herself, ridding them of one more problem.

A cat cried out from across the cavern she was practicing in and caught her attention for a fraction of a second before she turned back to her knife play. It was nearing two in the morning and the only people who were wandering through Neriak at this time were drunks and whores peddling their wares. She’d floated silently through the caverns to the older sections that were constantly deserted where she could be in peace. She needed to clear her mind.

Earlier that day an emissary had arrived to speak with her. Or so the person had claimed. From the Queen none the less. Sensual was both intrigued and nervous about the meeting. The man had been wrapped from head to foot in some sort of rough scarf material, his eyes glinted out in slits, and his voice rasped out with a heavy lisp. There was not much Sensual could figure out from him aside from the fact that if she needed to she could burry her daggers into his brain without him crushing her. He’d come to her with a task, but would not speak more about it. He wanted her to accept before knowing fully what it entailed, and Sensual was not sure she was comfortable with that. He’d given her the rest of the night to contemplate it, and asked her to meet him at the Fair in Darklight Woods the next day. She’d agreed, after all money was money, and he promised this would give her plenty of it. He’d shaken a purse before he left and the promise of coin rang through her mind even now.

One of Those Days

stargrace August 31, 2007 1Comment

Goudia, browsing through the vast volumes of books in the Tower of the Moon, Maj’Dul

So what do you do when your character hits level 70? You have a number of choices. You can work on chains of quests (Claymore, SoD, MoA, Godking), you can get yourself into a raid guild, you can finish off your aa, and you can craft. You can become obsessed with questing, start an alt. Work on a house. There’s still so much to do. Of course, if you play long enough none of these things will interest you, and you’ll more then likely end up just wandering around Norrath — or find yourself lost in a few games of LoN, which is a popular choice these days as we all wait for the release of RoK.

So what do you do once you’ve hit level 70?

I’ve already come to the conclusion that I want to “finish” my characters, the ones who are already at 70. What does that mean? Well, I already said in a previous post I want to get them all to 70/70/100. Level 70 in adventuring (I already have 5 at that) 70 crafting (Three of them are there already) and 100aa (only Stargrace has met this goal so far, with Misako close behind at 96, then Arysh at 89, and Goudia at 87). I’d love to delve back into questing and seeing what there is out there. I know I have yet to do a single Butcherblock quest for example. I want to finish off the HQ I haven’t done yet for some guild status, and try to help get the guild to at least 30 before RoK comes out. Not sure if that’s even a viable goal any more with the way guild experience works. Smaller guilds used to have a benefit over larger ones as the % of status was divided between total members and not just a base percentage. Now though the more active members you have the more status you’ll be inputting into the guild. Since my small guild has only five members or so, we move slow. Not a big deal though I suppose.

I watched another Avatar fight last night, the Avatar of War, though I was saddened to see it go poorly. I hate to watch guilds compete with each other – only because eventually it turns mean. People get mad at one another, they try to sabotage each other, they shout and scream and spam and all the rest. So while it was probably one of the more exciting fights to watch just because it is quite complex, it was also one of the few I watched and grimaced each time I saw the guilds confront one another. I understand that rivalry is normal, and even healthy, but there is a good way and a bad way to compete for contested mobs. After watching for over five hours as they battled between each other I decided that it was well past time I went to sleep. It was just one of those days anyhow, and I was out of sorts by the end of it.

Goudia managed to hit 45 weapon smith today. Not a huge accomplishment but I’m pleased. She has vitality for another level or two, but I’ve not decided yet if I want to actually craft more or go play and have fun with some quests. We’ll just have to see I suppose. I’ve been working down (slowly) her L&L list. She has 15 left to go, which is not so bad. Her house is filling up nicely with weapons and I’m eager to create a sort of display / sales area for her trophies. I think it’s fitting since she is a weapon smith. Saturday I’ll be doing an Emerald Halls raid, and I’m excited (and nervous!) about it. I have not really raided since January, though I have certainly raided and done some EoF content, none of it was exactly on par with what I’d been doing in the past. I’d only gone to EH three times, and was on the second floor. I’ve not stepped foot in it since then and I know a lot has probably changed. The guild I’ve applied to is not sure whether they want me to play the bard, illusionist, mystic, or fury, so I’m to park each one outside of EH. I’m secretly hoping they want me to play a healer, because I feel that I can shine with those classes the most (you don’t get 3 level 70 healers and not enjoy them a little bit after all). Hopefully I’ll have some screen shots and good stories to tell after my adventures tomorrow! We’ll just have to see how it goes..