Return to Hyboria

On the hunt again for something interesting to play, Scooter and I have poked our heads into Age of Conan (the second time around for me). It's amusing to play this "sexy" game with my bride. Over the course of a couple nights, we have progressed through the initial phase of the Tortage tutorial more or less intact. I had forgotten many details of the story, but some of it came back to me. Also, the personal story is slightly different for Scooter's Dark Templar, Anfrea, than it is for my Bear Shaman, Bjornek. Much like TSW, Funcom chose to tell different facets of the story through different classes, which makes it interesting to see both.

Scooter is a much bigger fan of the Schwarzenegger movies than I (I still haven't seen any of them, to be honest), and so she gets a kick out of the world of Hyboria. But I have read some of the original stories, and the game is more a reference to them than the '80s sword-and-sorcery flicks. It's definitely more fun doing them as a pair than when I was all by myself three-ish years ago.

I think Scooter likes the Dark Templar playstyle, and I like the organic healing of the Bear Shaman, though I wish there were more choice of weapons. Basically, I am limited to large hammers (two-handed blunt, lol insert 420 joke here) for melee (and all my special moves), though I have access to all the ranged weapons (for pulls?).

Unfortunately, I did something to my computer on Sunday that caused all the USB ports and sound card to become unresponsive, impairing my ability to play much of anything. These pics are from Friday. We'll see if I'll have much to blog about in the coming days and months.

~~~

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Flight from Denerim: Impressions of Dragon Age

WARNING: Here there be Dragon Age: Origins spoilers.

I'm stuck with a spell of gaming doldrums. As pointed out by Big Mikey Ocho over at Casual Aggro, The Secret World is in a holding pattern as we await the opening of Tokyo, the first new major zone since the launch of the game almost two years ago. And with their limited resources, our friends at Funcom have decided to focus on said playfield rather than interim holdovers like new scenarios (which I personally think are greatly needed). While I have stuff to do to progress, most of it involves repeating content. My interest the Landmark alpha also waned in the past few weeks leading to the beta reset. After all, any progress I've made has been lost (other than templates I'd saved). Everquest II kind of petered out for me and Scooter, as well. It's too much a step back in terms of game mechanics—though the Lore/History is rich—the same I couldn't get into Pandaria.

Enter Dragon Age. A couple years ago, I picked up both Origins (Ultimate) and DA2 on sale from Amazon. But I'd never gotten around to starting the games, partly because of my subsequent disenchantment with EA/ BioWare. The game can be played offline, but requires an initial internet login to satisfy DRM requirements.

Speaking of which, while I need to check if they have synced up, I was unable to log in to the Dragon Age social stuff from within the game, despite having just changed it with Origin and being logged in to the site through Chrome. So I am not sure whether the game knows I am entitled to the DLC included in the Ultimate edition. Very aggravating, but at least I could get the game started and play through the opening bit.

Anyway, meet Rowan, a "City Elf" Rogue. As you can see, she's a redhead, much like LoneStarBelle and many other characters I've created. I picked the City Elf story because the initial description involved the disruption of an Elven wedding by arrogant bastard humans attempting to exercise some sort of Droit du Signeur. Naturally, in the end, the young nobleman and his companions were dead in a pool of blood at her feet, satisfying my overdeveloped sense of justice. I'm pretty sure Rowan beheaded him.

Rowan is saved from certain execution for her crimes through conscription by Duncan into the Grey Wardens. Yada, yada, battles and tests. I haven't played further than the fall of King Cailan's army, following the betrayal of Loghain Mac Tir, his trusted general.

So far I really like the story, but I am reminded of reviews at the time DA:O was released that this game is more about story than game mechanics. The combat is pretty basic, though control of an entire party (potentially taking over the various characters individually) is pretty cool. The game enables and requires strategy as much as simple combat prowess; which I like, as well.

The game is also very bloody, which may or may not be a turn-off for some people. As you can see in the picture below, my entire party is covered in spatter on a regular basis. I didn't mind it exactly, I found it more amusing than anything.

Unfortunately, DA:O is very much a single player game as far as I can tell; so no joining forces with Scooter to play together. Therefore, my progress through the content will be rather slow, as I will likely only play when she is unavailable. Meanwhile, trying to combat those doldrums, we have decided to give Age of Conan: Unchained (F2P) a go. Aaand Landmark is entering the beta phase, which we'll want to get in on. More on both later.

~~~

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Updated History

Cheating a little here:

My current repertoire includes EverQuest II and The Secret World.

My main game right now is The Secret World. My lovely bride, Scooter, and I loved sunny Egypt after months in soggy Maine, but we're now traipsing through the snowy mountains of Transylvania. It's the smartest story and skill/ability system on the market, in my humble opinion. The recent updates "The Last Train to Cairo" and "A Dream to Kill" feature the most enthralling storylines I have followed in an MMO. I currently have a toon in Egypt's Scorched Desert, and two in Transylvania's Carpathian Fangs.

Between Christmas and New Years Eve, we decided to try something a little different, after looking into a couple F2p titles, we started playing EverQuest II. Our first two characters were OK, but we chose poorly on our starting area and tired quickly of the polar tundra around New Halas. Picking up again with a Ratonga Conjurer (me) and a Half-Elf Warden (Scooter) we restarted in Greater Feydark and are currently in the second zone of the continent, Butcherblock Mountains.

Guild Wars 2 is on the back burner. I had a blast in my recent stint as a Norn Mesmer—Greatsword Mage, FTW. GW2 is a ton of fun (the most important thing in a game), easy to jump into and play for a few minutes or a few hours. The game has a good skill/progression system, great graphics, plenty of lore, and just a touch of whimsy—without going overboard. I have a human Engineer at the max level of 80, and several other characters at lower levels.

I love Rift, playing regularly from the beta tests in January of 2011 through October of the same year, partnering in-game with my beloved Scooter. I cannot say enough great things about this game, or the developer, Trion Worlds. It's not perfect, but the polish and responsiveness of the game and company are things other devs should aspire to. For reasons not really clear even to me or Scooter, when our toons hit 50 (max level) the wind went out of our sails, and we really had no desire to continue playing the game. We recently got involved again, with House Stalwart, but discovered that something about the game causes us both eye strain.

I played Star Trek Online from just after its release in February of 2010 until May of 2011. I dipped in a toe again in June of 2012, checking out the Duty Officer system and other developments to the game. With the recent Legacy of Romulus expansion, I started up a new Romulan Captain and got my Main up to max level. Amongst all my MMO characters, I am still most attached to my STO crews in many ways.

I had a lot of fun with Star Wars: The Old Republic, from mid-December of 2011 into August of 2012 after pushing to achieve 50 (max level) and finish up the story on my Imperial Agent. I was initially very excited about the story-centric gameplay. The game has a lot going for it; but in the end, the way BioWare and EA have managed the game and community has left a bad taste in my mouth.

I played World of Warcraft from June of 2006, when a friend got me hooked, until October of 2011. I have two level-80+ characters, plus many more lower-level ones. I tried the Pandaren starting area in the Mists of Pandaria expansion (in October, 2012), but got a "been there, done that" feeling from the experience.

Neverwinter is a fun third person shooter/D&D hybrid, and I love my half-Orc Great Weapon Fighter. I didn't get very far, but it was a nice diversion.

I have tried Lord of the Rings Online, Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, and Defiance, but found them not to my taste.

Please see also my character pages. Links above.

~~~

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution NonCommercial ShareAlike 3.0 Unported License. If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

My MMO History, Updated

I updated my MMO History page (is that cheating on a post?):

Guild Wars 2 is currently my main game. It's a ton of fun (the most important thing in a game), easy to jump into and play for a few minutes or a few hours. The game has a good skill/progression system, great graphics, plenty of lore, and just a touch of whimsy—without going overboard. My main, which I play with a character created by my lovely bride, Sctrz, is currently 72, eight levels away from the max of 80. I have several others that are lower levels.

I just picked up The Secret World again since it went sub-free. The "grimdark" atmosphere can be a little too much for constant play, but it's the smartest story and skill/ability system on the market, in my humble opinion. I currently have a couple toons in the Savage Coast area, and one in Blue Mountain.

I had a lot of fun with Star Wars: The Old Republic, from mid-December of 2011 into August of 2012 after pushing to achieve 50 (max level) and finish up the story on my Imperial Agent. I was initially very excited about the story-centric gameplay. The game has a lot going for it; but in the end, the way BioWare and EA have managed the game and community has left a bad taste in my mouth.

I loved Rift, playing regularly from the beta tests in January of 2011 through October of the same year, partnering in-game with my beloved Sctrz. I cannot say enough great things about this game, or the developer, Trion Worlds. It's not perfect, but the polish and responsiveness of the game and company are things other devs should aspire to. For reasons not really clear even to me or Sctrz, when our toons hit 50 (max level) the wind went out of our sails, and we really had no desire to continue playing the game.

I played World of Warcraft from June of 2006, when a friend got me hooked, until October of 2011. I have two level-80+ characters, plus many more lower-level ones. I tried the Pandaren starting area in the Mists of Pandaria expansion (in October, 2012), but got a "been there, done that" feeling from the experience.

I also played Star Trek Online from just after its release in February of 2010 until May of 2011. I tipped in a toe again in June of 2012, checking out the Duty Officer system and other developments to the game.

I have tried Lord of the Rings Online and Age of Conan: Hyborian Adventures, but found them not my taste.

I need to update my character pages. Links above.

Bugs, Glitches, and Misunderstandings

I was reading MMOGC's post this morning about past and current issues she's had with Funcom's Age of Conan and The Secret World. It's actually a positive post overall, more about not letting problems with prior games deter you from trying new ones from the same company. I tend to agree overall. While I didn't have the same technical issues with AoC that GeeCee did, I couldn't get into the game the way some have. It never really clicked for me, even though I found the original Conan short stories entertaining.

So along comes The Secret World, a game I didn't really intend to play. Even now, with it being the current shiny, I'm trying my best not to jump on the hype train. But I gotta say, I haven't had this much fun playing a game since my first couple years of WoW. SWTOR was exciting to start. The opening crawl of "my" story really revved up my excitement, the first time I saw it. I quickly lost that rush with each succeeding character.

Don't get me wrong, SWTOR has been a lot of fun. However, I haven't even logged in at least two weeks. Battlechicken's issues, even though they were resolved, still soured me on BioWare's game. It may seem silly to stop playing a game because of something outside the game itself that didn't even happen to me, but there it is. I haven't even gotten my main, Versteckt, up to max level or finish his story. My other characters languish at various stages of the game, and on my SWTOR character page. Mostly, it feels like an effort, a chore, to log in and play. I'd probably enjoy it if I do, but the incentive to is gone. CORRECTION: My lovely bride wants to finish the stories of Versteckt and Chic(c)o, so we'll be doing that.

On the other hand, TSW has drawn me in, in a big way. I encountered my first major bugs yesterday, with the chat going haywire (which happened to everyone) and a major quest, "Something Wicked," bugging out at the worst possible time, making it unfinishable. Hopefully, both will be fixed quickly. I did manage to finish that quest on another character the night before, but did have some trouble deciding what to do to solve the puzzle. And trying to figure out if I was doing it wrong or it was bugged. So I can understand the frustration of GeeCee and others.

None of that is game breaking, though the chat problem made it difficult to resolve the quest bug.

I wonder if some of the "bugs" people encountered during beta were misunderstandings of the game mechanics or even game terminology. For instance, the mechanic called "Dodge" in many other games—like WoW—avoidance of an incoming attack, is called "Evade" in TSW. The thing is, "Evade" in WoW means a mob has stopped attacking and is returning to its default position. This sometimes happens if the mob is bugged for whatever reason. So there I am, swinging at a zombie, and I see the word "Evade" fly above its head where damage numbers should be. "It's bugged, dammit!" No, the mob merely avoided my swing.

The "clunky" combat, turns out to be fairly subtle. With the possible exception of the "hearth" spell to Agartha, which I have not tested, every spell in the game is castable on the fly. Which means I can be moving to avoid an attack at the same time I am setting up my own. This makes the battles more dynamic than I realized at first. Also, each school of combat has things that make it unique, beyond the superficial animations. For instance, Blood Magic allows you to sacrifice some health in order to cast a power-consuming spell; something that is impossible for the other two schools of magic. Unless I am mistaken, melee consumers hit the same whether you have one power or five. (Please forgive my inexact terminology)  Ranged (gun) consumers are more powerful the more combo points you have on the target. Those subtle differences change the way each school plays; on top of which, you may (should?) have abilities from two different schools of combat, further changing how you approach combat. It's not simply a choice of guns, magic, or melee.

I have never gotten this much into the combat theory of a game. Most of the time, I'm either just taking what looks good, or following the advice of someone else far more interested in theorycraft. And that says a lot to me about The Secret World.

What Kind of MMO Player Am I?

I do entirely too much soapboxing on this blog and not enough storytelling. But like most people, I have an opinion; and this is my personal venue for expressing it. A lot is being said in the gaming Twitterverse and Blogosphere with regards to community. Scarybooster has made several posts lately about the quality of the community in various games. Something inspired MMOGC to post about honorable PvP. And Syp, just yesterday, made a post about dealing with Anti-hype. I should have read his advice before getting into a squabble myself on Twitter yesterday. Haters will keep hatin'. Fanbois will keep . . . uh . . . fanning?

The world has a label for those people play certain games: Gamers. Athletic-game players are usually not included in this term. The net nanny at my office blocks gaming news sites, but not ESPN and the like. Reminds me of the way Dex Jettster referred to the Kaminoan "Cloners" in hushed tones in "Attack of the Clones." Much like the terms "Muslim" or "Christian" actually encompass hugely diverse groups of people of differing opinions and philosophies, this broad term, "Gamer," encompasses many different styles of gameplay, from tabletop role-playing and war games, to video-game console first person shooters, RPGs, and massively multiplayer online games. Within MMOGs, you have gamers who prefer player vs. player combat, and others who are so-called end-game raiders. You have casual as opposed to hardcore, long-time veterans and newcomers. Also like the religious terms, the groups encompassed by the term "Gamer" are often at each other's throats over what is the one true way to play the game. Sometimes a player's choice not only of gameplay but their game choice, itself, is derided by other gamers. Frankly, I am sick of it.

I quoted Robert E. Howard in a post in early September:

"Civilized men are more discourteous than savages because they know they can be impolite without having their skulls split, as a general thing."

This is more true today in the Internet age than it ever has been in the history of the world. I read in either the book Collapse or Guns, Germs and Steel, both by Jared Diamond, that the people of New Guinea are both smarter than the average American and far more polite. This is because they are more likely to die in a homicide than any any American or European could dream of. Of course, we're not talking about dying in your sleep with a knife in your back. As Captain Malcolm Reynolds once told Doctor Simon Tam in the TV show Firefly:

Diamond said that strangers who meet in the New Guinean jungle complete a ritual wherein they recite their ancestry until they determine whether or not they are distantly related. If they are not related in some way, one or the other is probably not walking away from the scene. If forum users ran the risk of death by their comments--myself included--Internet dialogue would likely be far more civil in tone.

Why are we so quick to disparage someone's intellect or character because of their preference for one game over another? So I don't like Lord of the Rings online and you do. Do I have any right to call into question your mental acuity or parentage? So I prefer PvE leveling and questing to PvP or end-game raiding. And I somehow less of a gamer--less of a person--as a result?

Wolfshead, in a rant about the deficiencies of Rift on Syp's BioBreak, closed with the following:

"There is nothing ahead that has me excited about virtual worlds. I’m tired of the hype. The caliber of the “community” that is dominated by selfish spoiled kids, teens and adult slackers is at an all time low, the game design predictable and stale. The typical virtual world of today feels like a MacDonald’s playground. When I started playing MMOs 12 years ago I couldn’t wait to get home from work to log on. I haven’t had the feeling for years."

I thought for a second he was going to yell at all of us to get off his lawn. The number of people playing MMORPGs today has skyrocketed, thanks much to World of Warcraft, but also other games based on popular Intellectual Properties like Conan the Barbarian and Star Trek. I personally communicate with several people who never played an MMO before Star Trek Online launched. Star Wars: The Old Republic will be the same. These people have differing expectations and outlook than the relatively very few who played the first MMOs. Thousands of people who have never played an MMO will buy it and play and love the game. I plan to play; and though it won't be the wondrous experience I had when I first logged into WoW, I look forward to the fully voiced dialogue and various storylines I will experience.

Many have derided the emphasis on single-player questing in SWTOR and other MMOs. "What happened to the grouping we did in early WoW and other true MMOs?" they say. I have rarely been on the same level as players in guilds I have been part of until I reached max level. If someone has needed or asked for help in an area of the world I was playing in, I helped. I was sociable, but few of them turned out to be lifelong friends. I currently play Rift with my lovely bride; and we occasionally play WoW with a few friends I know in real life. We are doing our own thing and being peripherally sociable with the Rift guild. Why force me to group up if I don't want or need to? Because of the time that I started in WoW, mid-2006, there were not many players around to help me when I needed to complete group-oriented quests, and they sat in my questlog until I could finally complete them on my own, or I just dropped them. I've done end-game raids and enjoyed them. However, the endless repetition for meager reward got to me, and I ended up dropping out of that style of play. I prefer to learn the stories of the areas I am in. Raiding is all too often a matter of learning when to stand where to avoid damage while maximizing our own. Some call this skill, and I suppose it is, but not in the same sense as actually learning to fence, or play the piano, or build a house.

There was a Google+ discussion yesterday about the merits of gentle "grinding" in the new game Glitch, and how it can be therapeutic. Many players, who PvP or otherwise want an intense game to give them an adrenalin rush, cannot fathom this preference, even if it is occasional on the part of "casual" players. I understand it, even though I rarely feel the need to indulge in it. Again, I am in it for the story and for the visuals. I rarely watch television any more, because I prefer my virtual worlds and their interactivity, even if they are themeparks. Do I think some go too far "on-the-rails"? Yes, but that is a matter of degree, and my opinion differs from many others.

Tobold Stoutfoot has opinions I don't always agree with, but in two recent posts, I think he hit several nails right on the head. The long term veteran players are probably not the target audience for modern MMOs. I can be considered mid-term myself. I am just about done with World of Warcraft after 5+ years, but I still enjoy the basic gameplay style. I have long thought that the vast majority of people playing WoW and other MMOs are not reading or posting in the forums, nor are they reading or writing blogs about the games. As Tobold said, listening to the extrememly vocal minority in the forums broke WoW, perhaps irrevocably.

"Nobody ever listened to the needs of the silent majority, who actually liked leveling, and would have liked the expansions to lengthen their leveling fun, and make it more challenging."

I can remember the first time on my priest (Rowanblaze) that I defeated several wolves my own level in combat while soloing in the eastern Hinterlands. This and a thousand other awesome memories have I of WoW, both soloing and playing with others, even raiding and PvP. Despite what some people say, I find Rift to have similar challenges, even though I am almost always playing in a duo with my bride. I have learned to tank and enjoy it, though I am by no means an expert. I doubt I'll have much interest in the large Raids at endgame. But the recent addition of duo instances sounds fun and perfect for this spousal leveling team. I am hoping--and there good signs--that our playstyle will be accomodated in SWTOR, as well. Rift's unified storyline decreases its replayability. I enjoyed learning about the different races and factions in WoW with unique starting areas for every race. SWTOR's unique starting areas and branching storylines for each class promises a similar experience.

So to answer the question in my post title: I am a mostly solo--or small-group--PvE quester, who enjoys the support roles more than pure DPS. I am a carebear, not a cutthroat. I value a good story above heart-pumping gameplay. I play MMORPGs to relax, not to get excited. I am an altoholic. I like roleplay and can become attached to my characters. I want a challenge, not an impossibility. I like WoW, Rift, STO, and anticipate playing both SWTOR and Guild Wars 2. If you think I'm dumb for any or all of that, I honestly have no time for you.

Indecisions

Have you ever sat down to do something and then couldn't quite figure out what you wanted to do exactly? Here I sit, well it's more of a lounge really, trying to to decide what I want to do with the rest of my afternoon. It's kind of interesting that right when I joined an interesting community of bloggers like AyAitch, GeeCee and Gordon, and joined new games, RL stepped in and I feel busier than ever.

Do I play WoW? The venerable, really incomparable; not the first, but the one that got it right? It's flawed, but still better than any other MMO I've played. I raided for the first time in almost two months last night, but I am tired of getting through the first level of ICC25 only to have the commitment of the second wing or more. And we seem to stall out at Festergut and Rotface. This is my personal opinion, but it would be nice not to have to run the first wing in order to get to the second. We one-shotted everything but the ship battle, and that was in heroic mode (I got a new hat!). But that is time consuming, and now I and my guildmates are stuck together if we want to move on; but of course RL commitments may prevent. That, and it all starts over on Tuesday. I am not complaining. I guess long haul raiding is not really for me. I love the story and immersion of WoW, not the gear race. Others have commented that various elements of the game break their immersion, but I think at least for a long time, it suited me just fine. My characters have stories, or least personalities, and I love playing alone and with friends. Which brings me to . . .

Star Trek Online. I love jumping in and blowing up ships or taking an away team to rescue the princess (yes this was a mission in STO). But the balancing issues they are having mean constant changes on what is "the best" ship equipment/configuration--something I don't want to care about. Not to mention the people who want to both PvP and PvE crying that they can't min/max and still be versatile. OK, this is a problem in WoW, too. It is more flawed than WoW, but I love playing it. I love the crew concept. I love the customized, already-cool uniforms. Maybe I should find a nice offline game I can play at my own pace, with no balance issues.

Of course, there is always Age of Conan. Interesting stories, I guess. Hyboria's mature themes have definite appeal. But every time I consider playing AoC, I hear the siren song of STO, or WoW. I got a six-month subscription on this game, more of a financial commitment than STO, which I pay monthly for. But that may be part of why I do not feel such an urgency to play it. I think I may need to read a novel or two of Robert E. Howard's works to get a better feel for Hypboria. I do think Blizzard's stories of Azeroth helped me appreciate the lore of WoW better, though I was already committed. And my love of STO stems mostly from my love of the IP it is based on. But for now, Chamomile languishes in Tortage, waiting to break out or overthrow the Red Hand or whatever destiny awaits her. I haven't even been through all the leveling content, but I am already aware of a thin world; like STO, you will level new characters through the same content over and over. Contrast that with WoW, which currently has eight distinct starting areas for 10 races, soon to be 10(12?) starting areas for 12 races. STO has . . . one for each faction. Are there even factions in AoC? There is only one way to level as far as I can tell. And when you hit max level, you've probably hit everything in the vanilla version. I realize there is expanded content in the Rise of the Godslayer expansion, but I have not purchased it yet, because of my ambivalence toward the game as a whole.

Oh and then there is the blog. Obviously, I am choosing to blog right now rather than raid, but mostly because this topic piqued my interest in getting my thoughts "on paper." You, Dear Reader, get to suffer with me. However, what I mean by including the blog as a choice is that this is where much of my actual roleplaying occurs, sort of. I like creating backstories and inter-stories for my characters. They become more real to me then. But while I am playing, I am not necessarily thinking of myself as being the toon. I have unfinished stories, both published and unpublished, that people have expressed interest in--that I want to finish. But that takes time, maybe more for me than for other short story/vignette writers. Time that cuts into my game time.

Because my game time is limited by my RL commitments. I have have both voluntary and obligatory things going on my life that do not involve the computer or the internet, at least not in an unrestricted way. So when I am online, blogging or writing stories, it means I am not playing. Right when I started expanding my horizons in the MMO community, my overall interest in gaming has started to wane. Is it because my focus is spread too thin? Is it because the hack on my WoW account and subsequent break from that game helped me realize how much time I actually am spending on something very ephemeral? Is it because I am realizing the need to spend more time with my daughters before they grow up; and less time with friendly strangers, few of whom I'll ever even meet in person? Is it because an ex-girlfriend whom I dragged into the gaming world axed me, stopped playing, and seems much freer for it? I can't decide.

Weeping, Wailing, and Mashing of Keys

So maybe it was me, but I don't remember seeing any "pre-patch downloading" on Age of Conan over the couple weeks before I left hot, sunny Texas for cool, rainy Germany. Since then I've tried a couple times to download the patch associated with AoC's recent expansion "Rise of the God Slayer." The problem is, even though the hotel I am staying in has an excellent internet connection, the "Ticket" has to be renewed every 500MB or 24 Hours, whichever comes first. This week I have tried to download the patch several times, but the break in the connection forces it to start over from scratch; no starting from where I left off like most download managers I have used.

I am glad I did not purchase/download the actual expansion yet, which would have been even more headache. Frustrating to say the least. I'm not blaming Funcom  . . . exactly. But it means I can't even log on to play with Chami, right when a bunch of online pals are starting and leveling new alts. Guess I'll have to wait. :c

Tales from Tortage: Chamomile and the Duchess

Chamomile strolled through the marketplace of Tortage. While it was still fairly early, most vendors had arrived at their stalls and were preparing the displays for the day's bargaining. It had been a long night, and Chami had yet to return to her bed at the Thirsty Dog. The old man on White Sands Isle had helped her in discovering more about her past prior to the shipwreck, but there many gaps still.

Arias had given her much to ponder. As she wandered past the vendors, browsing their wares without really seeing them, a rather finely dressed woman standing in front of a poultry stall attracted her attention.

"Excuse me, milady," Chami greeted the woman. "Forgive me for saying this, but you seem a little over dressed to be selling chickens."

"Silly girl, I am not selling this rubbish. I am only out because I cannot bare to sit in my mansion these days. Oh, how I wish I could book passage back to Aquilonia."

"Ah, you are Aquilonian?" Chamomile asked with sudden interest.

"Of course, girl. I am Junia, of House Tarant, one of the oldest noble houses. The Tarants founded a dynasty in Tarantia, before the unification of the Aquilonian kindoms. You, on the other hand, have the look of the Southern Hills about you, if I am not mistaken."

"Hmm, yes, mayhap," Chami responded guardedly, storing the new clue to her identity away. "What is wrong with your mansion, that you do not wish to be in it?"

"Pirates, unchecked by the Red Hand, stormed the house some weeks back, and plundered most of the precious things inside. Since then, my house slaves have slipped away one by one. They are gone, camping with the pirates, and living off the profit from my family heirlooms. And there is no one left to maintain the house. Damn them all!"

Thinking of her own recent change of fortune, Chami looked up at the noblewoman with little sympathy. "You should let them be. They took their chance at freedom."

"What do you know of it, girl?" Junia replied haughtily, "Clearly you have never been in a position to own a bar of soap, much less a household which needs caretaking. I paid for my servants and they had a good life, considering their station. They deserve justice, not freedom."

At this point, Chami could think of nothing else to say. Junia looked down at her with a sudden idea. "You apparently have some fighting skill. I would be avenged of the wrongs done to me by those pirates and my ungrateful servants. How much would it be worth for you to take care of this situation for me?"

Chami gazed at the woman through narrowed eyes. "I must think upon this. Perhaps I will discuss it with you later, milady. Farewell."

OOC: This was the first quest in AoC I decided (at first) not to take. Normally, I am fairly mercenary about taking quests; after all, they're simply XP. Plus, WoW rarely, if ever, presents this sort of moral dilemma. But from a former slave's viewpoint, especially one I think would possess a higher sense of justice as a priest of Mitra, this seems an untenable quest to undertake. After thinking about it though, and looking into Junia and her quest, I realized the pirates she was referring to had given Chami a lot of trouble, chasing her through the streets of Tortage and even killing her a couple times. So I may end up taking the quest after all, out of my own sense of revenge.


And to answer a question posed by Adventure Historian, I am enjoying my time in Hyboria, though I can't wait to get away from Tortage, or be involved in the downfall of its current ruler. I don't know if the current regime remains unchanged at the end of my time here, but I hope not.

Offline Leveling on Age of Conan

Adventurer Historian and MMO Gamer Chick have both alerted me and/or opined on Funcom's recent implementation of offline leveling. Here's my perspective as a brand new inhabitant of Hyboria.

Cons:
*For other Players: Max level players who have no clue how to play their role.

*For Funcom: Players who are "easily bored" getting to the max level, becoming bored and not playing, canceling subscription, etc.

*For Funcom: Players disgusted with the new policy canceling their subscriptions out of spite.

Pros:
*For the Player: The chance to more quickly level an alt, bypassing certain grinds, if you're already a veteran player with at least one max level main character.

*The chance to catch up with your friends if you're a newcomer to the game or a more "casual" player.

*The chance to gain a little advantage and kill that mob or finish that quest sooner, because you picked a low DPS but otherwise valuable class (tanks and healers).

*The chance to enjoy more content because this is the third online game you are subscribing to. (Because let's face it, otherwise Funcom might not even get those potential subscribers, or retain them for long.)

*The chance to level and keep up with friends even if you are not a pimply faced fourteen-year-old kid (what are you doing playing this rated-M-for-mature game anyway, where are your parents?) and actually have a job and a life, and therefore limited time to play any game. (see above)

OK, I rag on teenagers a lot because I find that they (and some immature college kids) don't understand that adults may also be interested playing in the game, but do not have time, nor interest, to be "hardcore" PvPers, raiders, etc. I could be wrong, but I have a feeling that most hardcore players, the ones that look down on so-called casual players, fit that demographic. I personally consider myself a hardcore casual player. I am online a lot, but certainly not as much as some, given my RL responsibilities. On the other hand, I am a hardcore "loremaster." I know much more than the average player about the backstory in WoW and Star Trek, and I nerd-rage over people who refer to Malygos as female or Onyxia as male. But I do not care if I have the greatest gear score, nor would I spend hundreds of gold to get a couple more points of spell-power.

Hopefully, Dear Reader, you have read enough of my blog entries to know that Content and Story are of paramount importance to me. The journey to the max level is as important, if not more so, as end-game content. I have repeatedly said to fellow players that if they are bypassing content/quests and grinding/racing to the top, they are playing the wrong game, and wasting their money every month. I had a friend who was a hardcore raider on WoW prior to the the release of the Burning Crusade. He told me the game didn't even start until you hit the end-game content. I disagree. Of course, he quit the day TBC came out. The thing is, he also described the experience of hardcore 40-man raids as long bouts of boredom punctuated by minutes of adrenaline. Even though I am now running Ice Crown Citadel (the current end-game raid dungeon in WOW) with my guild, I hardly consider it more enjoyable than having the game story unfold as I explored Azeroth and Outland. Other than logging on in order to raid and do the occasional daily, I honestly hardly play. There is no story left. I like going through the storyline on STO and AoC. When I hit the max level, I may either curtail my playtime or (more likely) start an alt.

Having said all that, I understand that there are times when the content is thin at certain levels and it may be better to "skip" a level or two in order to properly enjoy the story Funcom has prepared for me. This actually reminds me of my own thoughts of a few days ago and the discussion started by Tipa. What is more important, experiencing the story of Hyboria or killing a few extra mobs in order to level?

Age of Conan: Welcome to Tortage

This was going to be an awesome introduction to my new character, Chamomile, a former galley slave who gets shipwrecked off of the Isle of Tortage.

Chami (still working on a nickname, because Chamomile is kinda long) is an Aquilonian Priest of Mitra, currently level six. She has no memory of her life before the shipwreck, but is discovering an ability to heal herself and her friends and smite her enemies through the power of faith.

I like the spell animations. I took a lot of screenshots from the beginning, only to discover that, unlike STO and WoW, Funcom in their infinite wisdom decided to key bind the screenshots to F11. Couple of quick shots of things and here we are.

I am feeling uninspired as far as cleverness. But I do want to say that I have enjoyed the beginning quests. The world seems different enough from WoW to keep my interest, as opposed to LOTRO, which was different from and yet the same as WoW in all the wrong ways, IMHO.

I feel the need to say here that I loved reading the Hobbit and the Lord of the Rings, and watching the Peter Jackson films. OTOH I have not read any of the Conan books, nor really seen the movies. Now that I think about it, I had no preconceived notions of WoW, not having played any of the Warcraft RTS games. So the element of discovery about a world may contribute to my enjoyment of the game. Of course, that theory is shot to hell by my enjoyment of Star Trek Online, a universe about which I have considerable knowledge. Meh, I don't know. More later, I promise.