Gaming – Page 274 – A Pixel Nomad

EverQuest Adventures on Phinny (Progression Server)

I know, it has been said time and time again – you can never go home (in this case the home they are referring to is your first MMORPG love). In my case this is EverQuest. Of course I’ve never really been one to listen to what everyone else says, so when I found myself drawn to Twitch streams of people playing EverQuest I decided to subscribe for a year and play along on one of the more recent progression servers.

Just like that.

I didn’t plan anything out, and I am pretty busy with the newborn so why on earth I decided to pick one of the most time-intenstive games to play I have no idea. I’m determined to make it work – plus the little guy spends a lot of time sleeping right now.

The first hurdle I had to figure out was getting the game to run on my macbook pro without having to install a lot of nonsense. Thankfully steam came through. Any game that isn’t native to my mac I can stream from my PC. My main reason for gaming on the macbook is because I’m typically on the couch rather than at my PC. It’s easier to watch the little guy and just closer to everything I want to be near. So I installed EverQuest on steam and remote to my PC. Easy peasy.

Once I was in game I had to make a decision about what to play. In a perfect world I wanted a class that could find groups easily so I’d have very little downtime – but in my actual world I knew this wasn’t going to be possible. The little man isn’t on a schedule (or rather he is, it’s his own schedule) so I can’t just join a group and hang around for hours at a time. I needed to be able to spend time soloing (for now) with the ability to group up when I find myself with an hour or two here and there.

I initially decided on a shaman, and then scrapped that idea for a beastlord. The progression server has unlocked up to the Luclin expansion at this time, and my first character was a troll named Beautiful. After grinding my way to level 3 I decided I wanted to bind myself in the Nexus. I also wanted to visit the bazaar. Unfortunately that’s not an easy walk for a troll.

I did make it all the way to North Karana and I was waiting for the wizard spire to whisk me away to the Nexus when all of the sudden a guard roamed into the centre and in half a second the hour progress I had made walking was wiped out and I was back in Grobb.

Ugh.

This is what EQ is all about though – and I love the game for that. Unfortunately because time is not my friend as much as it used to be, I ended up rerolling my beastlord as a Vah Shir instead, named Meowsical. Fitting name for a bard, even if I’m not playing one.

I spent the remainder of my game time catching up to where my troll was, which means I’m now level 3. Then I wandered to the Nexus with far fewer deaths even though I did have to run through some pretty intense zones (intense for my level, especially).

Once in the bazaar I found an amazing deal on a new weapon – a heavy iron ulak for one plat. I had exactly 4 plat to my name. I also grabbed two insignia rings (very cheap because everyone has been getting experience in PC), and a new tunic with 11ac. Over all I was incredibly pleased with my beginner purchases. Time was getting late, so I set up my own merchant in offline mode, and called it a night.

The next expansion to go live in Planes of Power in February, and I’m hoping to catch up by then. I don’t know if that’s a realistic expectation given my current situation at home, but we’ll see how it goes. I do plan on streaming what I can of my adventures to my twitch account, and writing about it here, of course.

I also want to find my way into a guild of some sort. I haven’t even begun to look for a place to call home, but I’m hoping I can find a family orientated guild with an older audience. Given the age of EQ I don’t think that will be too much of an issue, but since I don’t have the best of luck with guilds we’ll just have to see how that goes, too.

All in all, I’m pretty dang excited about these new-ish adventures!

As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself! You can find me in EverQuest on the phinny server as Meowsical – feel free to add me to friends and say hello!

Wurm Online Just Got a Whole Lot More Interesting

Today update 1.3 was released for Wurm Online – you can find the lengthy patch notes on their site (and posted on the forums too). A lot really cool things have been added, but the biggest addition (and probably one of the most anticipated) is the changes to cooking. I don’t even really know where to start when it comes to talking about this amazing change.

Every player now has a virtual cook book, where you discover recipes (and you’ll have a few in there by default too). Food gives players stats now, like calories, carbs, fats, and proteins. When you eat a particular food you’ll be granted a player specific affinity that lasts for xyz amount of time (the amount of time the affinity lasts is based on how much of the food you eat, the quality of the food, and the difficulty).

With all of these new recipes come new items to create those recipes, and new food basics like herbs, spices, and new vegetables. There’s also a new fruit tree (oranges) and a bush (hazelnut). There’s a pretty awesome guide posted on google where you can look up more details about everything involved – and MAN is it involved!

Bees have also been added, along with hives, and a bee smoker. I haven’t found any yet, but I’m pretty sure I want to have a hive or two and create my own honey.

Runes have been added, bugs have been fixed, there were also some changes to the Epic servers and a handful of misc. changes took place as well.

As soon as I logged in I crafted myself a fork, spoon, and knife. Then I set about making some pie plates, a measuring cup, and other items out of clay. I need some marble to create a mortar and pestle. Pesto is a recipe, and I can’t wait to figure that out. I didn’t own any cows but it looks like milk and milk items play a pretty big role, so I went out and found four cows and two bulls (so I can keep breeding) and then I took my fork, whipped some milk, and made four things of butter.

I know it doesn’t sound that exciting, but I’m pretty excited.

Using my butchering knife on some potatoes gave me fries – I’m wondering if they’re an ingredient in anything. Maybe I can make poutine!

In any case, if you’re a fan of Wurm Online, or you’ve been thinking about trying it out I highly recommend it after this latest update. So. Much. Goodness.

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

Appreciating Streamers

Now that I’m a first time parent with a tiny little one who seems to do nothing but eat – I REALLY appreciate streamers. I tend to watch people who stream on twitch because my Roku has a plugin for that which makes it easy to watch on my TV while I’m nursing. I’ve also got a handy laptop that allows me to watch streams on Beam and Forge (though Forge announced today that they’ll no longer be supporting streaming, which sucks).

I know streaming isn’t easy. Making conversation, deciding whether or not to be on cam, ignoring the (numerous) trolls, none of it comes naturally, but it does come with practice. If you happen to know of an interesting streamer, be sure to leave a comment so I can follow them (and make sure to tell me what platform they use to stream).

I’m glad that there’s competition between streaming platforms, but I wish there were an easier way of watching them all on my TV with the Roku.

In the early mornings (we’re talking 4am PST) I tend to watch a WoW streamer (or two). Later in the day I watch a Minecraft streamer. I follow streamers for games that I’m particularly interested in or streamers whose personality I resonate with. Having good equipment also helps, I really dislike drastic volume changes within a stream, and obnoxious sound effects just get in the way.

I’m hoping once my little guy is sleeping for longer periods that I might be able to fit in a stream here and there myself. For now I’m just doing a lot of watching and hosting on my own channel.

Do you enjoy watching gaming streams? What are your favourite ones to watch? Let me know in comments!

How About We Play What we Enjoy

How about I just play what I enjoy.

Sounds like a pretty simple task, no? Except for me, due to multiple reasons reason, it just hasn’t been.

I think it started way back with EQ2. See, I didn’t always used to have a plethora of alts. Nope, I used to be a one character only type of person. I played a druid (warden in specific) in raids and I absolutely adored it. Then it came to be that the raid needed an illusionist. Back then raids were ‘easier’ mechanic wise and I was able to two box my druid AND my illusionist. This opened up a whole lot of possibilities. As time went on the raid wanted my druid less and less and a different class more and more. Since I had already compromised once I continued to and before I knew it I had an overloaded stable of characters for as many classes as I could handle, learning the ins and outs of their combat specifics. It grew from there and carried across the different games that I played until it manifested itself into the current form. I rarely have less than 10 characters in any MMORPG, and my method of thinking of what I should play has changed drastically.

In the past I would just play what I wanted to play and it was a simple answer. Maybe not at the outset of a new game because I’d have to find what I was comfortable with but I already had a good idea of what that class was. As time went on it became a question of “what can I play that will be valuable to other people, so that I can be of value to other people too”. That mindset stayed with me and it’s a really hard one to shake off. In World of Warcraft that meant playing classes that had more than one specialization so that I could be flexible and not have to create a brand new character. Classes where you can tank, dps, or heal are ideal. I very rarely ever thought about what I wanted to play, instead I constantly questioned what I thought everyone else wanted me to play.

Except everyone else really just wants me to play whatever I want, and they don’t even have any thoughts on the subject, and it’s just all in my head.

This is the reason why right now I’m playing a hunter.

Yes, lots (and lots) of people play hunters. That’s why I’ve never actually played one as a main before, but left the character as more of a background character that I would pick up here and there. I didn’t want to be one of a million other hunters, I wanted to be needed and valued. Turns out you can still be of value to yourself and others while playing something you actually want to play. Go figure!

I’ve been playing the hunter through Legion content for one day and I’m already level 104. It’s faster than I had expected because I’m having so much fun with it. She’s also my jeweler, so she’s got 700 mining and JC. Having professions makes me feel bonded to my characters and is pretty important to me. As I mentioned in my previous post I faction changed from a troll to a human, swapping from horde to alliance – a choice I don’t regret at all (aside from the fact that my server is 97% horde characters). This gives me the ability to group up with more of my bnet friends who are playing alliance (and lets not forget I already have the 110 priest on the horde side). I’m having an absolute blast – and this is after a week of me waffling about trying to decide what to play. I just couldn’t decide what I felt like because my frame of mind was all over the place. I’ve got no doubt that I’ll be reaching 110 before too long and I may even do dungeons and (gasp) work on getting into some groups with people. It’s amazing how much more freedom I seem to have when I’m playing something that is just pure fun.

Paying for Pleasure

Over the years I’ve spent more than my share of ‘extra’ money on various MMORPG features. One of these features includes server transfers, or in the case of World of Warcraft, faction transfers. Now, I understand that I don’t NEED to pay for these extras because technically I could just swap servers, or create a new character in the faction of my choosing – but that’s not always the ‘best’ decision and it’s not always a decision that makes me happy.

I just finished grinding 10 characters to level 100 in preparation for Legion. I have a set of alliance and a set of horde – but to be honest I prefer my horde classes to alliance. I decided to play my horde characters first when Legion came out, too. Not a huge deal except that a good portion of my bnet friends are playing alliance, and I want to be able to group with them and do dungeons. The decisions I was left with included creating a brand new alliance character in a class that I actually felt drawn to playing, toughing it out with horde but not grouping as much with my bnet friends, playing a class I was lackluster about but being alliance, or paying $30 for a faction change on a current horde character, and swapping them over to alliance so that I could 1. play with friends and 2. play a class immediately that I was interested in playing.

I decided to go with the payment option.

I didn’t want to level up (yet another) alliance character. I didn’t want to boost someone (even more costly) and my horde character had no real ties to that faction aside from the fact that every other character I have on the server is horde. It was a quick process (not even 5 minutes) and my troll hunter became a human hunter. Bada bing, bada boom. Once I completed the transfer I breathed a sigh of relief. For me, such extra costs are completely worth it. It’s not a cost I would want to indulge in on a regular basis, but I had set aside some money for my hobbies and lets face it, gaming is a hobby of mine. I have no doubt it will bring about more than a few hours of enjoyment for a character that I was completely lackluster to play before I faction transferred.

Have you paid to transfer servers before? What about faction changes? If you have, what was your reasoning behind paying the extra cash – and was it worth it? Let me know in comments, and as always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

(P.S. If you happen to know of an alliance guild on Area 52, please give me a nudge, I’m Arysh, looking for a home!)