You are currently browsing the monthly archive for November, 2007.
(With apologies to Don Martin) Aargh, run! Splash! Faloop faloop faloop! Tum ti tum! Yike! Crash! Gersplash! Faloopfaloopfaloopfaloop! Blaargh! Runrunrurnrunrunrunrun JUUUUMMMPP! Splash! Faloop faloop faloop! Lolz newb…
Anyway, I’m on the boat at last. No more briny mishaps and we’re off. Hard a-port Mr Captain. Steady the tethers, bosun, frame the mainsplice or something. Zone boundary sighted off the starboard bow and so on. All seemed to be going well at last until my very own iceberg loomed into metaphorical view. Seems we had no sooner zoned into Butcherblock when EQII/my PC/the great god Thor and his vengeful minions decided they weren’t done taunting me just yet and the game froze. Stone dead. As lifeless as a wax museum in a mausoleum.
I tried my usual three-point plan for dealing with this sort of thing, but since swearing in a Russian accent, hitting the monitor with a shoe to try and dislodge the pixels (don’t ask), and stomping around the room occasionally turning to glare menacingly at the screen didn’t seem to be working, I went for the old Vulcan Death Reboot instead, thinking that at the most I’d have to respawn at the docks and start the boat trip again (minus the theatrics of last time). More fool me.
Relogging into the game I find myself not amongst the tranquil sea and sarcastic seagulls of the Thundering Steppes dockside, but standing amongst towering rock formations, parched looking desertscapes and a small outpost of dwarven folk. Seems that rather than respawn me in the sensible position of anywhere near the point I was at when the game froze, it dropped me randomly onto the map several miles from safety and surrounded by arcane beasties that would sooner use me as a toothpick as look at me.
Did that rock just move? What about that tree? That mound of dirt is definitely looking at me funny.
Ordinarily my reaction to such imminent danger would be to hit the old Call Of Qeynos hotkey (always got that one on standby dontchaknow) and warp the hell to the safety of my tavern room. But I didn’t think I could face all the hassle of getting back to TS, messing with the docks and having people point and laugh once more, plus I have a handy stealth power that should see me safely past the beasts of fearsome size and dubious formation (I mean, really, how does something made of rock breathe?). Only problem is that stealth isn’t a permanent state. It only lasts for as long as I have Power in the tank. And naturally there isn’t nearly enough to get all the way to the docks from here, especially as I don’t really know which way the docks are. Sigh.
So I did what any right-thinking man in my shoes would do, I cheated. A quick scan of EQ2Map.com, just to point me in the right direction (and to scare the jebus out of me) and I reluctantly set off, like a ginger ninja of the night. The aim was to keep heading for any spot that looked safe enough from wandering mouths, recharge the battery packs and head off for the next one. Eventually I figured I’d reach safety and be able to start my new life proper.
Except that wandering mouths, well… they sort of wander, don’t they? So every time I holed up thinking I was safely out of aggro range, over an Earth Elemental or similar menace would start to stroll, causing me to flee on many an occasion, several times halfway up the sides of sheer rock faces just to widen the gap as much as possible. Death teleportation wasn’t really possible as I’d already tired that and was only given the option of rezzing even further into the wilds than I already was.
A pretty nervous half an hour then as I hopped from one relatively barren spot to another, each time barely making it through a patch of wild things before the stealth power wore off. The final moment of terror came as I could see the goal, only to pop back into the visible spectrum just as an unseen winged, razor-tooth thing came around a corner and started charging as if I was trying to steal its eggs or something. Flashing my RSPB membership card didn’t have any effect so instead of heading for the entrance to the docks (cut off by more nasties), I sped for the only way out I could think of – the cliffside that led to the Butcherblock waters below. I think the rationale was: death by plummet is marginally less painful than death by gnawing.
Then salvation! The dwarf-devouring birdman gave up the chase just as the cliff edge came into view and somehow the impression of a dwarf-sized hailstone didn’t take place as my little monk instead hopped over the side and started to clamber vertically down. Now I’d heard that climbing had been put into the game a while back, but outside of some fun in the training area for Fae with my alt, I hadn’t actually encountered it. What larks!
Don’t look down. Or up. Or off to the sides for that matter. In fact just closing your eyes entirely would probably be best.
To cut a long story short, I proceeded to spend the next half hour scaling up and down every off-coloured wall I could find, now that I was free of aggro, before finally making my way to the dockside. All’s well that ends well. At least until my first quest task asked me to run around on an island outcrop full of auto-aggro aqua goblins. But that’s a story for another day (probably tomorrow if I’m to keep this blog going). If anyone wants to offer advice for a mid-20s monk with a yellow streak the size of the road in Oz, just making his way around this new land, I’m open to suggestions. Just don’t expect me to be any good, is all.
People say that with any trip, the journey is half the fun. Let me tell you a little about my journey to Butcherblock and why I think the word fun needs to undergo something of a radical overhaul.
As we all know (but took me a fair amount of searching to discover), the boat from the established world (in my case, Antonica/Qeynos-aligned) leaves from the pier in Thundering Steppes. So far my sole experience of TS is feeling the icy hand of zombie death as I foolishly took a quick excursion that way in my early teens. At least this time round I could slip into the shadowy embrace of my Monkly stealth ability to slip by any dangerous beasties unmolested. I’m still not brave enough to actually battle them myself, but it’s progress of a sort I suppose.
Reaching the dock wasn’t so much of a struggle (once I learnt to turn left at the end of the entrance valley instead of right and into Ravenholm. I should have realized though that the biggest danger I face these days doesn’t come in the shape of rotting flesh-covered bipeds, but in the far more familiar guise of my own stupidity. Spying the boat already moored at the end of the pier and not knowing how long before it weighed anchor and set sail I hit the sprint button, slammed on auto-run and started a 100-metre dash that would put a drug-addled Olympian to shame. At which point a passing do-gooder, seemingly thinking he could help, cast a Spirit Of The Wolf buff onto me moments before I step on board. Everyone ahead of the story here?
No actors were harmed in the recreation of this scene.
A screaming mass of ginger hair and blurred feet pelt straight onto the deck of the ship and, before I can stop it, right off the other side and into crystal blue waters below. Hoping no one saw such mania, or at least hoping that they thought I was recording some sort of stunt for a reality TV series, I sheepishly wade ashore, watching the boat casually head off to adventure land without me.
Checking myself for limpets, I take stock and decide to just wait patiently by the end of the jetty this time for the next ferry to arrive. Unfortunately, my inner three-year old soon kicks in and I find myself exploring the spiral gangplanks around the curious little building next to the pier as the boat arrives. Panicking, I start to hurry back down, cack-handedly misjudge a step and find myself exploring the watery depths once again. Realising that if I hurry I might just make it this time, I quickly swim back to the side entrance to the pier. Unfortunately as I dash towards the boat it starts to slowly move off. Ah hah, I foolishly think to myself. I can put Indiana Jones to shame here and I veer off to the left and up the spiral stairway once again, hoping to reach the top just as the boat sails past. With the kind of heroic leap that would put a salmon to shame I sprint and dive for the deck…
I call this piece ‘Epic Fail in Blue’.
… sadly missing by several clear yards and ending up straight back in Davy Jones’ locker once again. Sigh. I’m sure by this stage that I’ve got half the server watching this lunatic of a half-dressed, orange dwarf trying his very best to commune with his watery deity in the most flamboyant way possible. I drag myself out of the briny once again, stroll carefully and slowly back to the end of the pier, press the sit button and perch my physical self as far from the keyboard as it’s possible to get without defying the EULA.
Think that was the end of my travel troubles? Stay tuned for part two… Arrival At Butcherblock for the rest of this tale of one man’s madness.
I think I’ve finally given up on Antonica (cue: wild applause and back slapping from the learned). One thing that always stops me from making too much progress in any MMO I dare grace with my esteemed presence, is that I’m forever changing my goals. One day I’m determined to crack the crafting nut and set out with my many bags to the nearest tier-friendly hunting spot, gathering nuts aplenty. The next I’m seized with a desire to power level my way to Win city by farming whatever mob happens to rear its head (so long as it poses no real threat, can be easily dealt with before my own health drops to below 80% and doesn’t have sharp, pointy teeth for the biting and the gnawing and oyyyyy, glavin!).
My latest bête noire – I really wish I could just sometimes, you know, play the game for itself – was to try and heroically (in my mind) finish EVERY LAST DAMN QUEST ANTONICA HAS TO OFFER. Damn OCD. A combination of the EQ2I wiki and the EQ2 Questlist websites saw me in good stead regarding direction, and I’d managed to reach a level with The Littlest Hob… er, Monk that I could safely handle whatever the East and West could throw at me without too much pain and suffering and nightmares waking me at 3am. I suck at games.
First step, clearing the backlog of Far Seas Requisition Forms cluttering my quest journal like dusty relics of a more innocent time when hope and optimism filled my life, twin beacons of benevolence and happiness guiding my path and seeing me right. Now they were just grey annoyances that must be taken to the mouth of the volcano and dispatched with tremendous haste and extreme prejudice. A spate of animal genocide later and that was that. Between me and Lara Croft, it’s a wonder any animals ever sign up for video game duty at all. Natural ecosystem be damned. Take that Mother Nature!
Next up, the ‘Dancer’ mini quest line by the Claymore Memorial, by dint of it being first in the alphabetical list of uncompleted quests. So whose bright idea is it to make a quest that involves killing seven of a specific gnoll type of which only one spawns per day/night cycle? I know, I know. Mob camping. Old a concept as the MMO hills, but I thought we were getting past all those old sores these days? Not as painful as I was fearing though and with the ability to distract myself with real-life work while perched atop a rocky outcrop waiting for the spawn, we were swiftly done.
About then was when I took another look at the quest list in front of me and begun to realize the absolute folly of this chosen stone around the neck. Over sixty still to go and me nearing the upper regions of tier 3 and frankly I think I’ve just about had enough of this green and pleasant (and somewhat too widespread) land.
Oi, piss off. This is my dramatic ‘leaving home’ montage.
So I find myself contemplating life in Butcherblock Mountains, the thinking going that if I can’t complete every quest a zone has to offer, I might as well opt for a zone that still matches the level range I’m in, has some sort of lore-based connection with my chosen race, and is part of the ‘new’ content so that I’m not stuck in aging, ‘first-draft’ areas but in a place that other people actually seem to inhabit. To the Thundering Steppes I go! There’s a boat with my name on it.
My new home, some damp patches.
Okay, as I understand it, any new blog has to go through a mandatory early flurry of activity, followed by a slight drop off, then a promise of regular updates from there on in, rapidly proceeded by a lull lasting just enough months to make people start wondering if the author has given up the ghost, then finally a triumphant return to action for at least several months while the writer works through the guilt of his imagined neglect to the all-too few people who paid attention in the first place.
So that’s that taken care of then. On with the posts…
I give it till Christmas this time.
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