Mystic Worlds

Tera Online: Early Impressions Part 2 of 3

Continuing a discussion on my early impressions of Tera Online...

The Classes Shine

Where Tera shines for me are the classes.  The world can be bland if the classes are cool.  Back to the basic party trinity of tank, healer and damage, you have at least two options for each role.  I messed around with a few and ended up enjoying Lancer (tank) and Mystic (healer/support) the best.

From a pure combat point of view, I think the Lancer is pretty sweet.  His moves have a visceral feel to them.  I feel the impact in combat and his animations are tight.  Who wouldn't enjoy slamming a wall of mobs in the face with a shield???  Or a basic lance attack that inches you forward with each thrust, with the 3rd delivering big damage if you can pull it off.  Think fencing moves with a lance 2x your height and a big whomping shield. It's muhaha goodness.  We don't have macros but there's a spell/skill chain feature which lets you link abilities together into sequences that are advanced using the spacebar.

Not Gaming Related: Oh Lance

If the rumors are true, famed cyclist Lance Armstrong admits to using performance enhancement drugs during an interview with Oprah Winfrey.  Oh Lance, I thought there must be something to the allegations when he stopped fighting the charges.  I can understand the cost of being tried in the court of public opinion but for me at least, I'd go down fighting until I was deaf, dumb, blind and broke, before I'd let false accusations silence me.

I sympathize with his plight, as his life's story is now tainted with the fallout.  This confession if true, will cast a pall on the great humanitarian work he did outside of the sports arena.  As a fellow cancer survivor, I feel some affinity there and respect for the money he's raised for that cause. Sadly, although we can forgive, we can't rewrite history.  We can't undo how he himself, potentially changed the course of sports history, and lessened opportunities for others who were overshadowed by his fame and glory.

Life is hard.  It's a snake pit waiting for any of us to make the wrong decision.  To be tempted down a road whose actions will reverberate louder and farther than we dared imagine when we put the first footprint on the path.  Unfortunately, many of those choices cannot be undone, nor the bell unrung.

Late in life with soul shaking regrets is a tough suit to wear. Perhaps this public admission is his first step to forgiving himself, asking for the same from those impacted directly and indirectly.  Making peace with his past and moving forward into a more resolved future.

 

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2013 Resolution - Live from Love, not Fear

Since the sudden and unexpected passing of my mother, I've been living in a state of fear. Fear that I haven't achieved enough, didn't do all that I could have done with my life or waited too long to pursue passions and dreams. I clearly waited too long for her to see some of them. 

Engulfed in that fear, that at times crashes over my like panic, I've been trying to force myself to choose between persuits that bring me immense pleasure, joy and are creative outlets - blogging, writing fiction and designing jewlery. Going on the "one big thing" concept, I began to worry that I'd never achieve the end goal in any of them, if I couldn't narrow myself down to doing just ONE.

I forced a decision to dedicate myself to only one. I packed the others away like broken toys. Slowly, piece by piece, the tools of the trade of the others re-appear at my side. An irresistible force pulls me back and as if overnight, the decision is undone.   I'm back to juggling my time between them all, yet again. I'm left feeling guilty and tortured that I'm passionate about more than one thing and have brought myself back to square one.

Green Monster Smoothie - Getting Your Gamer Body Back into a Swimsuit

 

SUMMER'S ALL UP IN YOUR FACE

If you’re like me, you didn’t start thinking about swimsuit season until it was staring you in the face.  If you’re like me, you’re a geek by day whose job entails mostly sitting behind a desk or sitting in a chair for way too many meetings.  If you’re like me, many of your hobbies also involve long periods of sitting – reading, writing and creating handcrafted accessories.  And then there’s the gaming.

I’m not into fad diets or putting myself through excruciating machinations.  Life throws enough of that my way without me fueling the curve balls.  What I wanted was a sustainable holistic approach to losing winter weight that also promoted a healthier lifestyle overall.

 

DETOX ME

My first inclination was that I wanted to detox my body of the negative foods, thoughts and emotions I’d been consuming the past several months.  I wanted to cleanse myself and then start down a healthier path.  That idea led me to a 15-day raw foods diet by Ani Phyo.  Raw foods for 15 days, why not?  I’d use that as my body detox then shift into sustainable low-carb eating that included reducing processed foods and eliminating caffeine and carbonated sweet drinks.  Unfortunately, reading through the recipes gave me pause.  I knew that if I couldn’t stomach the basic premise of her smoothie vegetable drinks, I was sunk.

Ever the problem solver, I backed up and decided to research the “Green Monster Smoothie” in hopes of finding versions that I could stomach and combine with the knowledge from Ani’s book into a personalized 15-day regime.  That decision was a complete game changer.

 

Oh No, Not 38 Studios

The first time I heard of 38 Studios was during my first multi-boxing experiment in World of Warcraft. During that time of my WOW career, 38 Studios acquired one of my all-time favorite add-ons, Azeroth Advisor.  If you never used it, you missed something I thought was very special.

Like many gamers, I was pulling for Curt Schilling and his company.  What gaming enthusiast hasn’t dreamt of developing their own game some day?  I sure as hell have daydreamed about it.  Personally, I think that’s one of the reasons MineCraft is such a huge hit.  The sandbox environment is ripe territory for would be game designers to build mini games to share with others. 

Politics and drama about what did or did happen aside, it’s a tragedy all the way around.  People are out of jobs, some after having relocated to work for 38 Studios.  And someone’s dream has died a very public death, one that will be dragged out in the media for years to come. It will serve as a point of reference for what not to do and bear the brunt of tasteless jokes.

The amount of money invested seems staggering.  We know from indie game successes that it is possible to develop a game for much less.  I’m certainly the type of player that appreciates all the bells and whistles but for goodness sake, this scenario seems to have been a slice of Little Caution topped off with Pie in the Sky frosting.   Note to self that if I ever have millions to risk, it would be safer to do a Dollywood version of my Steampunk idea and NOT the MMO version.  *smile*

I was impressed by the number of sales reported for Reckoning (1.3M).  My household contributed 2 to the number.  I wasn’t very interested in playing the RPG.  I considered it paying it forward to get the MMO out the door.  To now read that they needed 3M in sales to break even is mindboggling.  I can only name a couple of IPs I’d expect to have a prayer at that number and an unknown IP isn’t going to be among them.

38 Studios’ sudden demise, so close in proximity to the underwhelming performance of SWTOR and the resultant layoffs, should serve as a warning.  World of Warcraft is an aberration, one that is not likely to be repeated in the MMO space for a long time to come, if ever.  No studio should be banking on millions of subscribers to break even.  Hell - has any subscription MMO of recent history reached 3 million within the first month after launch, let alone retain that many?  Just seems like these budgets are banking on obtaining upwards of 2 million subscriber mark and were financially structured that way but are failing hard.

Sad news all the way ‘round.  I was pulling for this studio and their game.

The MMO Gaming Community

I love my MMO gaming community. It's millions strong but still feels small at times. I've yet to meet anyone in person but over the years, I've exchanged phone numbers with  a few and consider them friends.

What inspired a post this morning was an email from Tiny Speck about their new game, Glitch which came to me via Warrender / Winged Nazgul. It's been FOREVER since we've played the same game! It made me smile, that knowing the sorts of very particular things I tend to enjoy, he thought this might be a fit and had an email sent.

Unfortunately I'm too busy right now but will keep it on the list. I'm not overly social. Don't do much social media but I do consider myself part of ONE and only one, online community - MMORPG gamers!

I love fantasy/scifi games but it's also the community members like Tipa, StarGrace, Kinless, sometimes emo _Heartless, Capn John, The NPNM Sisters, Warrender, Bhagpuss, Gillian & Mike from my AC2 days, Sarazan, Ludo, Eagel and my other Casualties of WAR guild mates, the crew at Massively, the GBTV folks and countless others who make the gaming experience more special.

The gamers themselves and the community, are an integral part of my gaming history. They add the extra seasoning I love even though when it comes to leveling, I still prefer to solo. *smile*  Yes, I know - some forms of madness never die.

BTW I've evolved to Facebook. Better late than never.

Rolling Along

I continue to be extremely busy at work and at home.  I still haven’t played anything in the past several weeks.   On the weekends I catch up on gaming news via my favorite videocasts and podcasts.  I’m very excited about the upcoming content updates for Rift.  Most especially, I’m chomping at the bit for the solo dungeons being introduced by Trion.  As it stands, I might have 30 of 45 minutes here and there to play which doesn’t lend itself toward participating in group content.  Sitting at max level in Rift, all I’m really interested in is doing the instanced content.  I’m over questing and instanced PVP doesn’t appeal to me enough for it to be a steady activity.  I’d love to do the Rift raids.  However, there’s no way to ensure one is taking place when I actually have time to play.  The ability to match my wits against solo scripted instances is something I’ve wanted for YEARS.

Crafting in Real Life

It’s been several weeks since I’ve played Rift.  I didn’t stop playing because I like the game any less.  I initially stopped because gaming ceased being enough to hold my attention.  I was sick, worried and stressed to a point that not even my love of fantasy could hold me.

I had a distinct craving to create.  I tried working on a few of my stories but my writing felt flat and uninspired.  I toyed with the idea of returning to EQ2X and my furniture and design shop, which remains one of the highlights of my gaming adventures.  I was close to re-subscribing until I decided that I should create something in real life – at least give it a try.  I wanted to make something that would exist even after I’m gone.  Yes, my thoughts had turned rather morbid at the time.

Rifting the End Game. WTF Happened in New Eden?

Not Gaming Over Health Reasons

I haven’t blogged in a while because I haven’t been gaming.  Over the past several weeks I’ve had health concerns that were leaning toward a very scary place – again. Thankfully, after weeks of tests it doesn’t appear to be cancer.  An outpatient biopsy this Friday will hopefully confirm that it’s just an unusually large hemangioma on my liver.  They’re not a health risk and normally go undetected.  Mine just happened to form in a spot and develop to a size where I was experiencing pain, discomfort and a persistent state of nausea - not fun.

I'm still dealing with the symptoms but the overwhelming panic and depression over it are gone.  I feel much more in the “clear”.  Even knowing it will have to be treated, it’s several orders of magnitude away from liver cancer. For people who spoke to me here and there, in game or email, sorry.  It was just easier to say I was busy with work and stuff than explain when there was still so much uncertainty. Crossing my fingers for the biopsy results.  The doctors feel confident so I do too! 

Update 7/1: Biospy went fine.  Had a decent 4th. Have consult for results on Friday 8th.

 Update 7/8: BENIGN!!!!!!  Dodged a bullet.

Hit Level 50 in Rift

I returned to actively playing Rift again last weekend.  In two days I hit level 50 – FINALLY!  I’m such a scrub.  Most of the Casualties of War guild members have multiple 50s at this point.  They’re such a great bunch.  The night I hit level 50, they organized back-to-back Tier 1 dungeon runs to help me upgrade my gear.  My accessories, staff and shoulders were all replaced.  I cringe at using LFG tool to do some runs but I might have to in order to catch up.  My one good experience was quickly followed by a bad one.
 

Not Abandoning EVE

I need my wider blog layout for a few upcoming posts so it's back to the original Mystic Worlds format until my next installment of EVE adventures.