Sporadic Posts – But I’m Here

Yikes, it has been over a month since I posted last, right after I made a personal decision to try to be better. Unfortunately life has been hectic, and some days my hands just don’t want to type so I have to decide between a bunch of things – and blogging has fallen a bit to the side.

I am still gaming, but it has been pretty limited and sporadic. I’ve been spending a little time all over the place (yay for restlessness) including: WoW, FFXIV, GW2, BDO, Wurm Unlimited, Wurm Online, and even LotRO. I’ve also been knitting, trying to keep up with my French, and drawing when I’m able to. My last post mentioned that I was working towards completing 52+ pieces this year, and I am on schedule for that and I can see myself improving, which really makes me smile. Back to the games!

FFXIV: I never played Endwalker when it came out, but I did pick it up. I didn’t realize the level cap went to 90 instead of 80, so I’ve just been taking my time and playing through the story. I am probably 0% into the MSQ so far, but my little bard has been having fun exploring the new areas. I still have dreams of one day owning a house, for now I still reside at an apartment.

WoW: Still my comfort game of choice. I’m playing two accounts in WoW. One is just for auction house stuff so that I can continue on my main account in the meantime and I’m not tied up reposting things all the time. I finally completed leveling 12 horde characters to 60 (one of each class) and I’m working on leveling 12 alliance characters to 60 (again, one of each class). It’s a bit of a quiet time in WoW, a lot of maintenance mode. I’m not enthralled with Shadowlands or any of the grinds Blizzard wants you to take part in (the grind in korthia feels exactly the same as the grind in zerith mortis) but it’s a comfortable and familiar game. Plus there are still some lovely people who work there and I do like to support them (of course I’m also paying for both accounts with gold, so it’s not THAT much support).

GW2: I just recently updated this game, I haven’t picked up the latest expansion yet and I have no idea what I was doing / thinking. So much has changed since I last played. Still, it has always been a game I enjoyed. There’s always so much to do. I appreciate that. I also like that there’s no subscription requirement and I can just support them here and there with store purchases if there’s something I want.

BDO: Still one of my ultimate favourite games of all time – because I can play it my way (randomly, afk, etc). The new winter zone was released (free content, might I add) as well as the new class (also free) and they’re releasing a new mount is coming out shortly. I still favour my Shai as my main and I spend a lot of time fishing, crafting, and leveling mounts. This game is beautiful and I rarely ever have anything bad to say about it. It’s certainly not everyone’s cup of tea, but it suits my playstyle perfectly.

Wurm: My 1st ultimate favourite game of all time. I still have an active account on the regular online servers and I check in a few times a month. I did just purchase a huge deed on one of the newer servers, but now I’m thinking of dropping it as I simply don’t have the time (or desire) to play there. I prefer the older servers, and my older characters. I keep hoping they decide to merge the north and south servers together but so far that hasn’t happened after two years and I am beginning to doubt they will ever merge them (players prefer them separate, which is understandable). I also still log in and play the unlimited version on the Sklotopolis server. There is a dedicated community and amazing developers who continue to update the game despite the fact that official support from the main game ended years ago. I have a lovely deed there, and I log in to make sure it doesn’t get disbanded.

That’s what I’m up to in gaming these days – it seems like a lot, but I’ll log in to one or two games throughout the course of a day, peek around, maybe do something for a few minutes, and then I tend to log out. It’s a combination of being too sore, too tired, and restlessness. We are planning for a cross country move soon(tm) so I don’t imagine my posting will increase in any great amount, but we’ll see.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

A Lot More Art

In the before times (eg: before I had kids) I used to really love art. Drawing, in specific. I took art all through high school and while I didn’t have any grand ideas of doing it professionally, it was certainly something I really thought I had a knack for (practice, practice, and more practice). Eventually as life progressed I got involved with someone who didn’t share that passion, didn’t encourage or motivate my skills, and while they never actively discouraged my artistic endevours, there simply wasn’t any place for it in my back-then life.

That was around 20 years ago, and my sketch books have gone unused for the better part of those 20 years.

The thing is, it’s part of who I am. I love drawing. I love art. I love landscapes and architecture in specific. I’m not really one for drawing characters or people (I suppose I’m a hermit even in my artwork) but I decided ‘why not’ even though so much time had passed. I’m almost 41, I have two kids, and a loving husband who encourages and motivates me in ways I had never dreamed of. A little over a year ago I started doing digital art as a means to compensate for my multiple sclerosis issues. My hands shake a lot some days, and I have a lot of pain. Digital art gives me some freedoms otherwise not allowed, and without needing so many ‘tools’ I was able to pick it up and put it down much easier.

Last year I completed a total of 50 pieces, almost one a week for the entire year (though that was not my schedule). This year I’d like to at least match that, and perhaps even surpass it. To date, I’ve done 14 pieces. Some large and involved, others just quick studies. I picked up some Udemy courses on digital painting, and I’ve been following along. I’m learning sometimes brushes matter – and sometimes they just don’t. Relying on my own artistic instinct has been incredible. I’m at the stage now where after just a few brush (pencil) strokes I can ‘phase’ into that artistic mindset where time passes and I’m completely unware.

My latest piece took almost 3 hours to complete, and it didn’t feel any longer than the ones that take me twenty. My hands of course know the difference and constantly remind me, but I’m hoping with time and (even more) practice that perhaps that will ease into a comfortable dull ache rather than the blindingly annoying pain I get now. I’m happy with my progress. I’m happy seeing my skills grow. Honestly? I’m just happy.

I do have a deviantART account that is quite ancient and filled with art from my entire lifetime (as it were) so if you’ve got one feel free to friend me there. I’m out of touch with where people are keeping their art these days, so I may shift my activity some place else over time but for now, that’s where I am. I have no goals at the moment to monetize this or to turn it into anything more than what it is – me finally doing something for myself, and working on a skill that gives me great joy. It just feels nice.

TSM Lightning Round: DBMinbuyout

A comment that comes up a LOT in the WoW economy discord is that the price of crafted goods in TSM doesn’t match up with the math on the auction house, or with the math in their head. That is usually because the method they’re using to reach an overall craft cost does not match the one that TSM is using. Players tend to use ‘dbminbuyout’ as a price source in their mind (ie: I am looking at the AH right this second, and THIS is the price, so THIS is my profit), which isn’t reliable (especially if you’re crafting more than one item) or recommended. The reason is quoted in the discord:

TSM does not reference dbminbuyout by default, and it’s not recommended to do so. You are not in a contract with a supplier to obtain all materials at the same price, and the lowest buyout is only representing the individual cheapest auction as of the last price snapshot, which may be old. Any reasonable craft, or crafting queue, needs more than one material, so what happens if the next auction is 10x more expensive?

You will always have to compromise somewhere between what you could pay, which is the market value, or what you have paid, based on your accounting data.

TSMBot 03/13/2022

To explain DBMinbuyout further:

DBMinBuyout is the lowest priced auction on your realms Auction House, as of the last pricing update processed from Blizzard’s Auction House API. This value is not ‘real-time’, your pricing data may be 30 minutes or older before the next pricing update. If an auction is posted between pricing updates, this value does not get updated with the new lowest priced auction until the next pricing update. If there are no auctions for a particular item on your realms Auction House, DBMinBuyout could be an invalid price source.

Support.Tradeskillmaster.com

Some what related: if you’re wondering why your prices are the way they are when it comes to crafting and profit, make sure you enable your crafting tooltips, and work out step by step the cost / price sources of each stage so they make sense to you.

If I want to craft a glyph that is displaying a nice profit, I can see I need 15 sallow pigments.

It’s really easy to stop here and think ‘well TSM must be wrong! How on earth am I getting 6k profit when I need 15 sallow pigment at 1380g each?!

So then you mouse over sallow pigment:

Now I can see where the pricing data is coming from, and the profit makes more sense.

TSM might seem like a huge daunting prospect when you’re trying to learn all of the components all at once, but break it down into smaller bite sized pieces, take your time, and listen to what others have asked before you. It will make sense, it just takes a bit to get there.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

BDO – Seasonal Fun

I know I have too many BDO accounts (the total right now is three for those of you keeping track at home) but I have to say, this is probably one of my top favourite MMO of all time. It’s just that good. Anyway, I decided to cut down playing all three accounts and I’m trying to focus on just one. I swapped my 60 tamer for a newly boosted 60 guardian in the season, and I’m hoping to finish off the achievements they have before it ends, but one of those achievements is to kill 5k mobs and that one I’m a bit reluctant to get started on because ew.

Like most games I play I tend to spend all of my time crafting or doing life skills, so going out and slaughtering bad guys for a few hours doesn’t exactly speak to me. That being said, I have been having a LOT of fun in game. Artifacts were added, and new content releases just a few short weeks from now. BDO also recently celebrated their 6 year anniversary, a huge congratulations on that milestone!

I am unsure as to whether or not I’ll participate in the next season event. I think I have more than enough characters by now, and running through the same content at ultra fast speed has never really been my thing. I’m quite taken with my Shai, and I play very little else (the guardian is a close second, and the lahn is my combat character of choice). Next? Maybe working towards a dream horse…

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Solway Firth – The Largest Deed I’ve Ever Owned

Back when Wurm Online had their black Friday sale, I bought two years of game time (30% off) on two of my accounts. One on the Northern Islands, where I live on Independence (Hermit Island) and the other on the Southern Islands, on Cadence. It has been two years and I’ve waited for these islands to be joined together so I could condense things, but so far that hasn’t happened. In the meantime, I had done very little work on the Cadence deed. I’ve spoken about this before, but I am not a huge fan of building a deed from scratch. After playing this game for 10+ years, I prefer to work on my characters, decorate, and look at pretty things. Building from scratch isn’t something that has ever interested me that much.

I decided the best thing for me would be to see if anyone was selling a completed deed. I had 50 silver to spend, and I posted on the forums that I was looking for something with highway access so I could make use of wagoneers, something I’ve never been able to participate in before because I always seem to live on some secluded island.

Before the day was out, I had a response. Kookii was interested in selling Solway Firth, an enormous deed on the Cadence island. The deed was worth well more than what I could afford, but they seemed in a hurry to sell, and they were willing to accept what I was offering. This place is amazing, to say the least. It has over 1g in upkeep paid, and the monthly cost is 15s (I’m planning on downsizing it slightly to reduce this cost). It came with 10 completed buildings, a full mine, an enormous amount of bits and bobs, a magic chest, guard tower, clay and tar on deed, pens with animals, and so much more.

Considering I am only one player, it will take some time to get it set up the way I want, but I am VERY excited about this deed. I’ll have to remember to work slowly, so as to not burn out. It is large enough for multiple players to live here comfortably but I don’t think anyone I know is actually playing WO these days. I do know quite a few who continue to play WU (the self hosted steam version). I wish the company had not stopped support of WU, the new WO UI is so much easier on my hands and I absolutely love the graphic chances they’ve made to the game and the new features they’ve added over time (caffeine is their latest). Anyway, expect lots of pictures in the future!

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself.