Gaming Diary – Haddens Earing HQ

Sitting on the docks in Nek Forest I shouted up in channel 37 Defiler LFG, virtually straight after, 4 other 30somethings shout up LFG. So I quickly decided to put a group together and see what we could do. We were short of a tank, so I shouted up for a tank, and whilst waiting, trotted over to the Enchanted Lands to Kill Burnspear – I hate that wasp.

We decided that a romp around the Ruins of Varsoon was in order and headed over to the Thundering Steppes, at the same time, I got a tell from a 41SK – bingo we had our tank and off we went. Most of the mobs in RoV were green to us – which meant faster kills and faster xp. I think that we took down every named in RoV at least once, including Varsoon himself. Master Chests were falling like confetti at a wedding and I think it is fair to say we all left with a huge amount of ‘phat lewt’.

Whilst inside RoV I finished all the required parts for Haddens Earing, namely killing Hrath T’vol a 32^^^Heroic Skelly so when I left all that was left was speaking to Kerath McMarrin on the docks of Thundering Steppes, then killing the nasty little gnome who is Captain Krieger, a 31^^^Heroic. I recruited a bit of help to kill him, as he hits like a train and would have wiped me had I tried solo. Once dead another chat to Kerath McMarrin and was rewarded with a Fishbone Earing (+8 STA   +8 AGI   +31Health   +25 Power +202 vs. Disease   +134 vs. Divine   +168 vs.Magic,  AC 55, Effect: Water Breathing) and 27,900 Status Points

Not bad for a nights work.

Congratulations Cuppycake

Listening to the ‘Shut Up. We’re Talking Podcast’ last night, Cuppy aka Tami announced that this would be her last podcast due to the fact that she has a new job. So it is with sadness I say congratulations Cuppy, I hope that all goes well in your new position as Community Manager for Areae Inc.

Cuppy, you are a brilliant podcaster and your departure from the podcasting community will be felt by many of us. Conversley what the podcasting community loses the MMO community will gain in spades, so I hope that all goes well for you, both in your relocation to San Diego and in your new job with Areae.

You can read more about Cuppy’s new job here.

I hope that Raph realises that he has someone special in employing you and looks after you well. Best Wishes

Mushii

EQ2 and UK Distribution Problems

Since returning to EQ2 I realised that I was 2 expansions short, EoF and KoS so I decided to visit my local Game to see if they had boxed copies of either – in short they had neither. I asked if they could order a copy in for me, to be told no. So I decided to trawl the web to see if I could order a boxed copy online – not one UK supplier had a copy of EoF. One or two placed had KoS but they wanted £30 +p&p !!

Some of you may say, well just buy the electronic downloads and in the end that is what I did, but firstly I like having a box (especially all the nice little in game extras that you get with a boxed set) and secondly as EoF had all previous expansions included, why should I pay twice when I could have got everything for half the price.

So my question is what is the problem? Is it as I have always suspected UbiSoft dont give a rats ass about the MMO market in the UK. Or is it that SoE dont really care about the UK market? My gut feeling after 7 years of playing SoE MMOs is both. Anything to do with PS2 or PS3 SoE seem to move heaven and earth to fill shelves with their games – so why did they let UbiSoft handle the european distribution of their flagship MMO?

Combine this distribution issue with the lack of advertising (unlike Blizzard’s WoW campaigns) and I really do wonder what SoE’s intent is with regard to their European market. At every turn European gamers feel marginalised compared to their NA couterparts – few live events, no Fan Faire (ever), no limited edition boxed sets and now no boxed copies of games at all!! Now I am no marketing major but this sure seems like a strange strategy for a company to market its products, particularly in a market where the likes of Blizzard have shown what the actual potential is.

Gaming Diary – Guise of the Deceiver HQ

As I have previously stated I am a bit of an HQ junkie in EQ2. Jitter currentluy has 5 HQs ongoing and 5 HQs completed so far, so last night I decided I need to go and kill Lord Everling in Nektopos castle to advance my Haddens Earing HQ and get the Guise of the Deceiver HQ at the same time. Fortunately one of my guildies who also wanted to advance Haddens Earing and get the Guise of the Deceiver HQ done, had access to all of the castle, so we went to get a group. 20 minutes of shouting up for a group in channel yielded no response, so we decided to shout up for a group to get the GOTD HQ – I was flooded with tells – including 2 tanks (and they are harder to find than hen’s teeth on Spltpaw at the moment).

Anyway we went on a romp around Nektropos Castle, we got the HQ and within 2 hours found our way down to Everlings Chamber. Just as we were about to kill Everling , Kayto, my guildie went LD. It was too late and we had to finish Everling off. The remaining 4 of us all got our update (by clicking the chest in the corner) and the other 3 gated out. I felt kinda bad as Kayto helps me with so many of my HQs so I decided to wait. 10 minutes later Kayto logged back on, his PC had crashed and his quest journal had not updated. Just out of chance I invited him back into group (as I know that in many quests the whole group gets an update for kills etc) and told him to click the chest, he was kinda sceptical but did it anyway. Bingo, in guild chat it pops up ‘Kayto has completed Guise of the Deceiver Heritage Quest – Earning status for the guild’ . I guess the moral is, if a group member goes LD on the final part of a quest, dont zone out, wait for them and see if they get the group update when they rejoin.

Hello world!

As I seem to spend my life either playing EQ2 or listening to podcasts about EQ2 and MMORPGs in general I decided to start my own blog.

I currently play an Arasai Defiler on the Splitpaw server called Jitter. He is a member of Band of Brothers, level 60 guild, who are a great bunch of mature, casual gamers. We dont raid much, but we do have fun and help one another with HQs and other quests.

My gaming background is EQ1 – Pre Luclin. I had a 59 HIE Paladin called Mushii and a 59 Barb Shaman called Leillanni on Mith Marr server. I pretty much quit EQ1 about a month after LDoN.

After EQ1 I went back to my FPS roots playing CS, where I was an admin on a CS Server called Shady. I played WoW beta and hated that, then got into EQ2 beta – where I played till launch. Post launch I played a DE Defiler called Leillanni, again on Splitpaw - but quit and deleted her after 6 months. Stupidly I also gave away about 40pp to a noob, Lei was a high end jeweller and pretty well off.

I returned to my FPS roots for a while, playing CS and BF2 until I got into Vanguard Beta 3 – a game that had so much promise, yet failed so dismally. I quit Vanguard on launch day and went back to BF2. Between times I have been listening to lots of podcasts, SOE’s official podcast; MMOG -2 truly funny guys; Virgin Worlds – Brent is scarily professional and recently EQ2 Ratcast. The combination of all of these and the launch of EoF drew me back (much to the other half’s disgust) and 2 weeks ago I rolled a new Arasai Defiler – Jitter. Jitter is now lvl 36 with 32 AAs and levelling like a demon.