Archeage and a little bit of Guild Wars 2

    Aelithar has passed the level 38 hump and made his way safely (for the most part) to level 42 so far. Hellswamp was interesting, pretty yet creepy.

     But he caught a ship bound for better pastures and is now enjoying the wonders of lovely tropical Sandeep.

     Mostly it's been questing though here and there when the labor points build up high enough I feel comfortable there's been a bit of crafting. Mostly more Hereafter Stones.

     Which is what he's industriously working on here. It's no secret that Archeage is a pvp game. I also make no secret of the fact that I am bad at pvp and (probably as a result) don't particularly like it. I still love this game. I'm glad that the pvp doesn't give xp penalties, because one of the other reasons I dislike pvp (aside from being bad at it) is that pvpers for the most part seem to fight like cowards. I've been killed by several level 50s. Two at once even. And people like to wait until a mob's got my health down a good bit and then start something. But the guy today takes the cake. He was only a few levels higher but such a coward.
     Fighting mobs in Sandeep I'd just finished a couple that had Aelithar down to a sliver of health when this fellow attacked him. I fought back some but the result was inevitable. Respawned at the shrine, rebuffed, filled my health bar and then noticed the guy was just up the hill where I'd been fighting the same mob. His health was down to about half when I thought turnabout was fair play and went up to give him a go. Charge off horseback, hit him hard with my shield... out of range... what, where is he? Spin around flailing only to see him running off at top speed down the hill into the safe little no combat zone around the shrine. I couldn't help rolling my eyes.

     Finally got to try the Jury Duty thing once one morning when I logged on quickly after downtime and got a low number in the queue. It was interesting.  I'd wondered what it was like and now I know. Like a true paladin Aelithar thinks evildoers should get the maximum sentence.
     So I'm still loving this game and pvp cowards or not I'm feeling very confident that Aelithar will get to level 50. What he does then I'm not sure. Maybe he'll build a ship.

     Tonight though, a bit late I felt like logging on for something, but warzone didn't sound like fun so I thought Guild Wars 2 (which I bought at half price a while back and semi-abandoned for Archeage) might be good for just a quick session. It is.
     I'm still trying to decide on my Guild Wars 2 main. I made a Sylvari Ranger to start: Tamyrlinn Ferahn but he felt so squishy and it was frustrating. (Probably partly because mobile combat)

     So after 100% map complete in Caledon Forest and the Grove I gave him a little break and rerolled my originally Norn Guardian idea into a Sylvari as well.

     Alystaer Starleaf is definitely growing on me, though the new feature pack's changes for low level characters soured me briefly even before Archeage released. I don't like the changes, don't like the Skills on my map that I apparently just can't do yet when Tamyrlinn could before. I don't like the nagging indicator up top. But I do like Alystaer and he's definitely in the running for main against Tamyrlinn. The plan is to get Alystaer through Caledon as well and then decide who the focus is moving on. But tonight was a nice relaxing play session, which I needed. Did two hearts and an event and then completed the Grove map. 

     I do think it's a good game it was definitely relaxing and enjoyable tonight. But even as a very big noob to GW2 I can't help thinking it was better before they made it noob friendly. Still I'll be poking around in there off and on, and in a few more sessions maybe I'll have picked a main.

Alts and Screenshot Spam

      I hadn't really meant to make an alt on my main server in Rift (Faeblight) unless another friend came to play there with me. But then I saw Kaozz at ECTmmo had a post on Dimensions and the Dreamweaver profession which had mildly intrigued me but which I can't really looked into enough to realize what it actually did. When I found out... I really wanted one. But Daethrys has put a fair amount of work into keeping his Outfitting, Butchering and Foraging leveled so I didn't want to drop any of them. Well, there's an alt for that. At least there is now.

     Meet Falharan. He's a Silenus Cleric for the sole reason that I wanted the fae pets. Turns out that so far it's also a lot of fun. He's a Dreamweaver, Daethrys is dumping all the artifacts at him to salvage now and he's set up his default Dimension as a workshop from which to make lovely things and dole them out to Daethrys first and foremost but also to the two rl friends I got to poke into Rift a bit with me.
     I love the idea of the Dreamweaver profession. It got me all enthused over Rift professions and over playing in Rift again, just as I am having a big slump in WoW. So Daethrys has gone from level 34-37 in the last couple of days and Falharan's already level 13 (mostly as a side effect of trying to get more burlap.)
    And because Rift is one of my very favorite games to screenshot in... there are lots of screenshots.

Falharan and his Satyr, Silaun.

Falharan and Alarie look like they hear something.

I don't usually leave the helms showing, but I'm kind of getting a kick out of this one, so for now it stays.

Some of my favorite shots of Daethrys are in moonlight. Shortly before he left Scarwood Reach.

Managed a half decent archery shot finally. Poor Friend sometimes dies because I dropped the UI and stopped paying any attention to anything but screenshotting :P

I don't think I was supposed to really get up here. But looking for the way up to a quest that I couldn't find I climbed way up on Lantern Hook. So of course. Screenshots.

Nice break on the hammock between killing things. I seem to have a thing for nighttime shots of Daethrys.

One of the many shots I took attempting a decent archery one... kept because the bloodspatter was too much fun to pass up.

I love going into new zones in Rift. Or in any MMO really. That feeling of exploring all over again. Didn't think I was a fan of desert zones really, but I love Droughtlands (and Uldum for that matter.)

More Aion

     Last night when I meant to pop onto LOTRO for a few quick shots of my housing for a post about housing before popping onto Aion... well I got very distracted and ended up not hitting Aion at all. But this morning I wanted to see what the housing was like in Aion too. What I found was that Tirasiel needs a few more levels before he can find out.

     Since I've been having fun with him and enjoying the music now that I can hear it, I wasn't one to shy away from trying to get a few more. But as I was popping in an out of game for other things I noticed that he'd been wearing this same leather chest since the first area. Well, I thought I should probably go buy him some chain. Guess my brain was stuck in the WoW mindset and I'd actually bought him a chain top from a vendor before I realized there was a plate tab. He could wear the plate and since he's a Templar which I do at least know is the tankiest of tanky things in Aion, plate was probably a good idea. So the chain top got sold and replaced with some plate.

     Well in poking around doing some of the city quests at that point I found the crafter people. Ooo he should probably learn to make stuff. So he took up construction and then armorsmithing, only he couldn't do any armormithing because he needed iron and he couldn't get iron. I knew because I'd tried back in Moslan forest and got that... you can't do this yet message. So he went back and gathered a bunch of fish and things outside Altgard until he could gather iron.

     Mind you, Daeva don't mine, they suck the iron out of the iron with magic and then use it for their own ends. I'm not complaining, looks kinda nifty, doesn't involve toting around a pickaxe. He got lots of iron, went back to do quests, learned some things, gained some skill and then learned a recipe for new plate boots. So after training to make and then making all the components he was all set to make new boots. Only he needed Aether Powder. Back out to Altgard to fly around and suck the powder out of vortexes.

     And after all that he failed at making the boots. And didn't have enough flux to try again. I was sad but decided to pick up a few quests in hope of getting some more. He managed to do that -and- hit level 16 and then not fail at making the boots the next time. In fact he channeled through the first time and made a super nice pair. Only four or five levels until he can check out housing! Which will hopefully be slightly less frustrating than the crafting is.
     Then before I logged off I popped over to say hi to Malieth in his mixed armor. Stared at it and the vendor for a while when I realized -he- could wear cloth, leather, or chain. This time I used google and found out, rather surprisingly (but pleasingly) that Chanters rock the mail gear. So he got some, and did a couple quests before I logged for the night, partly just so I could soak in some Elyos side music.