A Pixel Nomad

A fair number of my friends have already written glorious posts about Star Trek Online’s latest episode titled “The Vault” so if you want a good read with information that actually makes sense (as opposed to my ramblings) be sure to check out Tipa, BlueKae, and MMO Gamer Chick and their write ups. I don’t want to give away any spoilers but it was a lot of fun, although I found the reward a little lacking. It’s a ship device that launches level 9 (for me at least, no idea if rewards vary or upgrade based on player etc) ships that fight for you. The item only has 20 charges, so once they’re used up that’s it.

The experience on the other hand was awesome and I managed to hit Lieutenant 10 which means I am just one small level away from 11 – and tier 2 ships. It will be my first promotion (I don’t count moving from Ensign to Lieutenant as a real promotion since that happens as soon as you’re done the tutorial) and I’m pretty excited about it. Yesterday was a nice glitch-free play session, and I think I’m finally beginning to understand things a little better although I can still never remember the names of weapons/gear/places and I don’t speak the “game language” at all so I end up fumbling around talking about “that thing over there” and pointing while waving my arms.

Missions are broken into categories and I’ve noticed there are a few public quest types. I’ve had a lot of fun with public quests no matter the game they seem to be implemented in and it sort of surprised me to see them in STO. You may consider this the lazy mans method of grouping since you’re not actually forced to communicate or group up with anyone that you don’t want to, but you’re still all working towards a common goal.

Next? Hitting Level 11 and obtaining a new ship!

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself.

I inched my way to Lieutenant 8 this weekend and learned a lot more about what I should be doing in game. Sadly my learning was also hampered by some pretty annoying bugs in an area I was attempting to do missions in. One required me to deliver products to a planet in need – you may be familiar with this quest called ‘The needs of the many” the problem is there appears to be a respawn timer for you to be able to help planets. Plus it took me an exceptionally long time of scanning in the Delta Volantis Sector just to find a place with a planet to aid. Once I received the message that I should go help I entered only to fly around in lazy circles. Turns out they didn’t really need my help after all.

In that same sector I was helping a friend scan down and explore different locations. One place we were sent to had a ground mission that started off wrong right off the bat. We were there, but our bridge officers were no where to be seen. Well, that’s not exactly true, we could see where they SHOULD have been standing on the mini map. We just couldn’t actually SEE them. Our mission was to clear out groups of Klingons, so we decided even though we couldn’t see our bridge officers we’d attempt to do just that. Except it wasn’t just our bridge officers who were lost under the terrain, it was also the Klingons. It’s really hard to fight things that you can’t see. We knew we were surrounded, but we may as well have been fighting ghosts. The one saving factor was that our bridge officer ghosts could see these new Klingon ghosts, and we could target through them. It was a lot of melee combat that ignores shields and after dying a few times we decided the ghost Klingons and bridge officers were really not worth it, and called it a night.

Despite the bugs I still had a lot of fun. I answered questions for Q’s son (thank you Tipa for letting me know this was not actually who I thought it was) and won some nice items. I sold a few extra things that I didn’t think I’d use in order to fund some purchases. Picked up some photons for my ship and spec’d down that line for space combat. I’m really excited about getting to the point where I can fly a different ship, an actual science vessel would be nice.

Tipa asked me what I thought of STO compared to EVE and I replied that I felt it was much more hands on. Since you’re in control of a character that can leave the ship, and because you actually control the movement of the ship in specific. In EVE I’m so used to orbiting around the bad guys as I fight them (or some other entity in space) where as in STO I actually have to move around lest my shields get low on one side. The crafting on the other hand is far superior in EVE, and the learning curve in EVE is also a lot higher. Both games feel foreign to me since they involve science fiction which I know little to nothing about. Playing a game that’s basically written in a completely different language from the one I am comfortable with still proves to be quite challenging. I had the same feeling with Perpetuum as well.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!

I played a little tiny bit of STO when the game was in open beta and wrote about my impressions over on NomadicGamer. My point of view comes from someone who has never even seen the TV show before let alone been a fan of the IP. A huge thank you to Petter who helped me get started when I had a few worries about picking up the game; once more I’m reminded of what a fantastic community I’ve become involved with.

I deleted my old character who had never even made it out of the tutorial and decided it would be best if I started from scratch. I had to relearn everything – lets not even call it relearning because I’m not confident that I ever really learned it to begin with. I had to learn the game. Starting with the basics of movement, how to spend skill points, and building up my bridge officers. I created a Zhen, Shen Andorian and decided to go down the science path as it fits my ‘typical’ game style quite well (healing, buffing and debuffing). I have some engineer bridge officers as well as science, a mixture of Andorian and Borg. I took a lot of really neat screen shots last night only to discover that since my STO client is launched from steam and not a stand alone, the print screen button doesn’t actually take screen shots. Fixing that as we speak and reminding myself to keep Fraps open so I don’t forget to capture those neat moments next time.

How did I spend my first evening? I managed to hit Lieutenant 4 (almost, I am just a smidgen away at the time that I write this) which I hear is equal to level 4 in basic terms. I did space and ground missions, finding myself enthralled with both types. I’ve just been following the quest chains that I pick up and hopefully that’s what I should be doing. I’m still a little lost when it comes to things like how to fit my ship but I don’t have to worry about things getting too complicated until I hit the next Rank. For now I only have one option of ship, and it’s pretty easy to tell if something I’ve looted or won from a quest is an upgrade or not. I’ve been training myself down the science lines to make my science skills work better.

I have really surprised myself with how much fun I’m having. I enjoy the challenge the game presents to me because it may as well be a completely different language than one I am used to. I find myself encouraged to learn more, to try to figure things out, and explore. I want to know about the different races and how they interact, and the politics behind everything. I know there are so many key points that I’m missing because I just don’t know anything about Star Trek. Like who is Q, and why does he float and is Club 47 a place in the TV show as well? I did his quest this morning and had to ask friends for help because I didn’t know a single answer. I’m not big enough to do the Saturday uhm.. I don’t know what they’re technically called. I’ll call it a mission for now *sheepish* give me time here my brain is on overload! I need level 6 for that, but I’ve been having so much fun playing I expect I’ll keep with it for some time to come. Don’t be afraid to have your MMOs challenge you, and to break out of your ‘usual’ game to try something new! Even if you don’t enjoy it or keep with it, at least you’ve tried.

Happy gaming, no matter where you find yourself!