QoTW: Planting and Plundering

*Note: QoTW means Quest of The Week – it was a weekly post I’ve started in the past but never managed to stick with it. Maybe this time it’ll last more then two weeks*

Those dwarves at Fort Irontoe need your help (again) and yes you’re the only one who can help them! If you’re one of those people who love to work their faction up, then you’ll love these quests. Goudia is 80 and they’re grey to her now, I never had an opportunity to complete the quests when they were coloured to her. It’s a level 60 heroic quest, that first sends you to pick up some traps at the Arms Hall of Fort Irontoe, and then sends you off to Kaladim to place those traps and collect some fur – as well as collect two whips from the Frothbark Whipcrackers (who I am still waiting on right now. Instead of the Whipcrackers spawning I keep getting the named, I hope that’s not a pattern).

Having faction is always a good thing. This quest also opens up another one with other rewards. I’m not sure what the ringlet from the quest does quite yet, but I’m looking forward to figuring it out!

The only down side to this quest (or perhaps just downside in general) is that Kaladim is completely empty. While I do enjoy having an entire zone to myelf, it wasn’t that long that it was just packed with people working on their soulfire updates. I dislike content that you can “out level” or that can become “useless” to a player. In EQ1 (and a few other mmo’s) the content can at least sort of stay fresh because mobs don’t grey out. Quests don’t become trivial to you. You can be taken down by a massive swarm of level 5’s if you’re not careful.

Oh, and yes, for this quest Goudia broke out the little Christmas hat. Doesn’t she look stunning?

Then and Now

Just for fun, I searched through my site to see what was going on almost two years ago today in game. I had this post here, about my new necromancer, Willamina. In the two years since I made that post, Willamina moved from Najena where I created her, over to Antonia Bayle, and just yesterday or so, moved back to Najena. Creepy. She’s also hit level 80 as a sage – but never made it above 58 so far as a necromancer. The other characters mentioned in the post, Calicia has been deleted – and Ricotta? Well that’s Goudia. Who is of course no longer a dirge, or a jeweler, but an 80 troubador, and a 62 weaponsmith.

It’s amusing to see how things have changed – but in the end they’ve also stayed the same. Particularly this quote, “I envy those who can create one character, or even two, and stick with them for so long without a break. I’ve never been like that, even on EQ1 I had a plethora of alts that I would randomly log on to play. I wish I could settle.” Which I ended up giving up on.

Just last year, there was this post. Misako has since been deleted, she stayed on the same server, but moved accounts which I decided to deactivate when I got station access. I believe she’s 72 now though. I created another defiler recently to make up for the loss of that one. Of course I still talk about housing just as much as I ever did. Friends have changed slightly, as have guilds since that was me on Antonia Bayle and not Najena. The game has stayed the same though.

I enjoy reading through the older posts. I’ve been writing here for so long now. I had multiple blogs before this one hosted on wordpress, but never managed to stick with them. I like to think that for the most part I keep MmoQuests a possitive blog – specifically because there are more then enough people ranting and raving and griping about all of the bad aspects of mmo’s out there. That’s not to say I ignore the parts I dislike. There’s just no reason for me to go on and on about them though unless it’s “one of those days” and it’s something that really gets under my skin. I think some times bloggers forget just how much influence they have over their readers – and that badmouthing a game over and over will eventually get to other people. In my methods I prefer to speak as highly about the game as possible – and if the reader chooses to play they can form their own decisions and memories while playing. If they don’t play, how will they ever know if THEY enjoy the game since every play experience is different.

With the griping on forums, and other forms of media, there’s just no reason for it here.

Last night I was unfortunately busy with other non game related things, and didn’t get to play too much. Checking sales though and wow are the provisioner items selling like hotcakes. I’ve decided to write down what I sell out of each time I check the market, so that I can restock on those specific items. I’ve always been keen on keeping track of things like that.

I also logged into EQ1 to do some Nostalgia guild invites, since no one else was around. Welcome to those new members (and alts of course!) I’m sure you’ll have a blast.

It was a Goud(i)a Day

Was a long day, yis yis! See these nails here? They used to be all shiny, oh so very shiny. I used to polish them and made sure that no dirt ever got near them. Needed to, you see, to play the music songs that people love. Can’t play that music with messy fingers, on noes. I had to dig dig dig for these other shiny. Ten of them. The first five was not so bad, I was persistent, but then my stamina started to wane. So I went home for a bit, I buried what I found under the front steps.

I thought maybe when I sleep that the guards would come along and they would sees it, but they did not! Bright and early I got up the next day, and mourned over the dirty fingernails again. Not too much longer now though, I knew I was almost done.

Tap tap tap went my little hammer, and then I scrambled to dig the gems out of the rocks. T’is hard work you know, some folks they came by to see me toiling but I was not allowed to have any help. I was so strong and brave. I tried to scare some critters away, I thought maybe they wanted to steals my shiny! That could not happen, not when I was so close.

I lost track of the hours that went by, but the shadows started moving along the ground while I worked. Thank Bristlebane I has fur! I have no worries of sunburns.

By the time all was said and done, I had 2,500 loams, 2,646 metal, 11 spongy loam, and yis yis, even my 10 xegonite. It is over, finally. In total it took me 7 hours of ruining my nails to gather everything I needed. Now I can finally feed that flame, and then see what happens next, I move on to bigger shiny! That’s always the way it works, t’is never completely done, there’s always something to move on to.

That is very good though, hmms? It keeps me out of people’s pockets. Not that I go there often, no, only when I am trying to put something back that has fallen out. What do you mean it didn’t fall out? Ohs, you must have not seen it like I did, I have wonderful eyes. Can see little specks from so far away. I assure you, that was there when I found it. It looked exactly like that…

Only Five More to Go

Day two of the troubador Xegonite hunt. The screen shot above is my permanent home, or has been for the last little while. I need only two more xegonite, and then I’ll have my 10. So far I’ve spent a total of 4h30m harvesting, which isn’t too bad. I have 10 spongy loam, and so many common materials I think I can supply alts for a while. I’ve made some money while I worked on this portion as well from the shinies that spawn on occasion close to where I’m harvesting.

The area is fantastic. There’s three alcoves with nodes, roughly 3-6 nodes in an alcove. From time to time someone wanders by, and I send them a tell explaining I’m here for my troubador epic and if they’d like the common materials I’d kindly pass them off in the hopes of being able to harvest my last two Xegonite. The first two people didn’t reply back, but they did move. The next two wished me luck and also moved. I don’t like “claiming” an area, but I do really want to get this quest done.

I also caved in yesterday and moved my 58 necromancer / 80 sage over to Najena. It was the last transfer I’ll do – vowing to myself to stay here until I’m old and decrepit. I’ll be starting the sage epic on her later on, hopefully. I’m going to look for the same guild who helped me out last time and see how that goes. I’m excited to have the necromancer over on this server, even more so to have an 80 sage kicking around.

I did manage to squeeze out a carpenter level last night too, hitting level 62. The grind has slowed down some, but mostly just because I’ve been busy with other things and can’t devote quite as much time to it as I’d like. The recipes for this tier are exciting and fresh to me, I knew once I passed T6 it would just be a wonderful experience. I’ve been browsing the housing forum on EQ2players, the Norrathian Homeshow. If you haven’t checked it out (and some of the absolutely amazing creations people have in there) I highly suggest it.

Anyhow, I suppose it’s back to xegonite harvesting!

Simple Leveling

Last night Mayadhros and I decided to hang out in Enchanted Lands and try to get a little experience, and maybe complete some quests. I tagged along with Melisand, my 32 defiler, and mentored down to his 29 paladin. We picked up the quests from the docks and began smushing all the cute cuddly woodland creatures – which the paladin was quick to point out to me since it went against his nature. I told him it was ok, he could just blame me for defiling him, I was sure the Queen would understand.

It was a lot of fun just to hang out and do things that I haven’t done in a very long time. I can’t even remember the last time I was actually doing quests in enchanted lands.

I did manage to get my 5th xegonite, after 3h and 36m of harvesting. I was at one spot and there was someone there – or someone who would stop by every so often on their rounds of harvesting other areas. I asked them if they could just let me harvest for a bit since it was for my epic, and I’d give them everything else I got while I was there, but they didn’t reply. So I moved on, and it went much better. I managed to get a total of 5 xegonite, 8 spongy loam (which I will probably save for my monk), 1,079 porous loam, and 1,311 adamantine clusters. There were some shinies close by, so I grabbed those and hopefully can make a little coin from the time I spent there. I feel worse for warlocks, who have to harvest 10 mantrap roots — and also need to harvest 35 smoldering materials. Seeing as I only got 12 scintillating materials while I was out there, I can see how painful their harvesting must be.

It feels good to be playing EQ2 again. The guild is leveling a little slower now, as I’ve been taking a break from the crafting grind. It was bound to slow down. We invited a new member, Ssirius, you can find his blog over at Stroppsworld – so be sure to check it out. He’s from Australia so our time zones are not exactly optimal, but I warned him of that before hand. It’s still always nice to have a ‘home’ in a game and a number of people to talk to. If anyone else is wandering around EQ2 and happen to stop by Najena, be sure to /who all nostalgia, and say hello!

I’m hoping to get a few levels on my monk today – but we’ll see. It’s currently 110F outside, and 90% humidity, so I’m definitely not feeling too great. I’m already grimacing at the thought of what my AC will cost this summer.