A Pixel Nomad

A Dancing Frog and a Gnome Walk into a House #EverQuest

This weekend was spent trying to finish off that many-piece hand aug – and I actually managed to finish it thanks to some help (mostly company) from Oger. The final portion was doing two missions so that we could afford to spend doubloons on the 7 containers that are required for the final combine. I’m really pleased that we finished it, and that the 20+ pieces of the quest are out of my bags. The aug is an upgrade for me, so I expect that I’ll be using it for quite some time. There were a lot of achievements with finishing this item, one for each island you complete, then two for finishing all of the islands and also doing the final combine for the hand.

The remainder of my weekend was spent decorating my humble abode. I had previously owned a house but since I had been away for more than 90 days they evicted me. I received a nice little parcel with my belongings all packed up. So I moved into the guild neighbourhood, picking the best plot of the zone, of course, which is right beside a lake. The old house I owned still had all of its items inside which meant that I really only had to work on making the outside look presentable.

While I was decorating and placing a few paintings – my curious box item (a statue of a frog) came to life with a top hat and a cane and began dancing and singing around me! It was hilarious and so completely unexpected that I couldn’t help but take a few screen shots.

EQ doesn’t have nearly as many quested items as EQ2 and I find that to be the one downfall to the games housing. There are merchants who sell house items, there are crafted house items, many in-game items can be placed, and there is of course the station cash store. There is a small handful of quested house items but it leaves a lot to be desired and I found absolutely no way to get this list without specifically requesting it on the forums. Google search brought up pretty much nothing. I suppose that’s what comes with a 14 year old game. At least there’s some information about it out there.

I also learned that there’s a taxidermy ability that came with VOA that allows you to mount a few mob heads to your wall as house items. These items are technically crafted, so they’re also not listed on any housing item list per say. The best way for me to figure out what sorts are out there was to do a search for ‘mounted‘ in zam. Sadly it doesn’t look like any new ones were added with RoF but hey at least it’s something.

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

Enter Breeding Grounds #EverQuest

Last night was a trip to Breeding Grounds to complete an instance, the mobs were red con to my 95 enchanter, but that didn’t stop Fremder and Nonpoint from taking them down for Oger and myself. The experience was pretty good, without grinding any experience my enchanter is part way through level 95. I still have a ways to go, but it’s moving at least. I’ve also been camping lion skin pelts in North Karana – something I absolutely hate doing. They’re incredibly rare, and used in an awesome quiver that my ranger wants. At 170k it may be quicker to farm the plat than it is to farm these pelts. On the plus side I also farm a lot of grizzly bear tufts along with wolf bits, and these sell for a fair amount in the bazaar. Offline selling has been a blessing, especially since I have two accounts.

Our mission began with Glimkar, we were completing “The Rise of the Ancients” which really went a lot more smooth than I thought it would have, considering our level compared to the level of the encounters. We also got an achievement for not killing any of the little rat mobs that were scattered throughout the zone. A nice bst neck piece dropped for an alt of Fremder, as well as a level 99 spell component. All in all, it was a nice relaxing way to spend an evening.

Unlike the rest of the week where I’ve been working on that hand aug.. Ugh.

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

Dungeon Delving – The Cloak Tower #Neverwinter

My guardian is level 16 – almost 17 at the time of this post. Some fantastic things came with reaching those levels. At 15 I was able to access the foundry, which is dungeon creation. I haven’t begun to even attempt to create a dungeon yet, but they’re coming. I’ve had a lot of fun playing through the few foundry missions I’ve done so far, they have had some great stories. One tip I would give to people is to read the description of the foundry carefully first. They’re very specific as to how many people should be attempting them – I began one that said it was ideal for 2 people and it was a painful experience – but I did manage to complete it. It was also the first time I died.

You go through a few important stages. At 11 you can begin invocations (I think that’s what they’re called, basically its’ prayers). There’s an NPC you visit in the main city near the Northern part, she’s surrounded by a blue circle much like you see at a campfire. You can pray every hour, and earn buffs and astral diamonds from these blessings. The first time you pray every day you’ll earn some seals that you can collect and turn in. You also learn how the broker works, although to be honest I didn’t even bother reading the text on that quest, so far I’ve just sold everything to vendor.

I am also able to queue for dungeons now. The first one being ‘The Cloak Tower’ – and it was a lot of fun, but you have to be alright with ‘typical’ dungeon mechanics. What I mean is if you’re going with a group of strangers expect there to be that ONE person who rolls need on absolutely everything that drops. There’s those who don’t recognize anyone as being the tank and who are constantly rushing forward, etc. If you don’t enjoy PUGs you may not enjoy doing them in Neverwinter. However, I didn’t let that stop me, and just went with it. I didn’t win any gear, but I couldn’t use it for my class anyhow. I did earn a bunch of seals, and I enjoyed the little stats at the end that mentioned how much “stuff” everyone did (healing, dps, etc). I have no idea what the seals are for, or where to spend them. I think I saw an npc standing outside of the actual zone-in entrance, but I’ll have to check tomorrow to be certain.

Anyhow. It was fun, I had fun, and I’m having fun. More details tomorrow! For now I need some sleep. As always, happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

Lets Play #Neverwinter

Surprisingly enough I am having an absolute blast in Neverwinter. There are queues but as far as stability I think this was one of the smoother “open beta” launches I’ve seen in quite some time. When the servers were first opened to the public there was some incredible lag and “rubberbanding” which is where your character seems to fling around backwards after you’ve moved, like a rubber band snapping back into place, but that issue was solved quite early on (and they even let the public know it was due to a bad firewall at one of their data centers). There are still queues and they are still annoying BUT they’re the lesser of two evils I like to think. I don’t mind doing something else while I’m waiting to log in, it isn’t as though I’ve dedicated any money to the game (yet).

Which brings me to the next great point. The game is free. There’s apparently no moment where you will be stopped because of not paying. I asked that in specific this morning because I couldn’t see where they’re going to make any money from. So far I’ve reached level 10 and haven’t felt an urge to spend any coin at all. I have two bags and there are enough merchants around that I can sell before either of them fill up. I’m crafting without any issues and I don’t mind waiting for the crafting to complete instead of spending gems to quicken it along. I do have some Zen on my account, I’m guessing this carried over from STO where I have a lifetime subscription because I’ve never purchased any.

I can see where appearance gear is going to be a nice money maker. It doesn’t seem to matter what class everyone is playing, we all sort of look alike. Above is Blesse, my guardian fighter. I had to inspect two friends to see what classes they had chosen because we all looked very similar. I had a shield. They didn’t. That was about my only indication.

This morning the queues are longer than they were last night. There’s also down time starting shortly for a number of hours. Still, I’m excited and can’t wait to start playing again. This one certainly caught me off guard.

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

Giving Neverwinter a Chance #Neverwinter

When I played the beta I was pretty unenthusiastic. The controls gave me motion sickness and I couldn’t see myself spending $60 for the options that were granted, so I didn’t get that excited about the game in general. Then a few close friends of mine started playing and I decided to give the game another chance today when it went into open beta.

I’m very glad I did.

I created a Guardian Fighter, Dwarf, named Blesse (on the Dragon server for those who are looking for me). She’s level 6 so far and I’ve had a blast with the character despite the fact that there has been some incredible lag on the servers since the masses started logging in. I’m looking forward to inching my way to level 10 so I can start professions, and aside from that I know absolutely nothing about the game. Maybe that’s for the best. I played through one of the foundry missions that someone had created and I can’t wait until I can make my own.

Will I stick with it? Well, as a nomadic gamer that’s a pretty hard decision. I’ll just have to take it day by day for now!

Are you trying out Neverwinter? What are your thoughts so far? What are you playing? Let me know in comments!