Month: March 2005

The Quest To Find Ravenholdt Manor

[World of Warcraft] My Rogue trainer recently gave me a quest, simply to “find” Ravenholdt Manor. The only information provided was to search in Hillsbrad. So, I journeyed to Tarren Mill and made that my base of operations for the evening (I am a night person).

Tarren Mill always seems to be a hotbed of activity. Alliance and Horde often come together in skirmishes around the town. I myself have taken up my blades in defense of the town on occasion, but tonight I had more important plans; to find Ravenholdt.

I first hiked south and eventually ran into a town which appeared to be controlled by the Alliance. I was attacked by some guards and was almost knocked out. How did they know I was there? It was as if they could smell me out. I came over a hill and looked down to see two guards on a full out charge right at me. Thankfully, I had the Warchief’s Blessing on as without that I would have been beaten to a pulp. As it is I was beaten to within a thread of a pulp.

I walked west, only to find creatures strange and powerful, too much for me to handle. I did manage to do a little mining in this area so all was not lost. Back to Tarren Mill.

I surveyed my incomplete maps. Noting the empty areas to the east, I decided to head that way. Once across the river, I found a well hidden path up into the hills. The path ended at the entrance to a cave, guarded by Alliance guards. Well, at least they appeared to be Alliance at first glance. They allowed me to pass but not without first giving me a sly smile.

I entered the cave and discovered it was actually a tunnel. I walked along until I spotted a treasure chest. Well, being a curious sort of fellow, I had to investigate. I looked around, nobody here to see me. I inspected the outside of the chest and was just about to open it when I noted that it was trapped. I could not figure out any way to disarm the trap, so I left the chest planning to revisit it later.

Exiting from the end of the tunnel, I arrived at a building guarded by more guards. They seemed surprised to see me, but at least they were not hostile. I was told to go upstairs and have a chat with someone named Fahrad. A brief greeting was followed by an assignment, go back outside and see if the guards had any tasks for me. Feeling a bit weary from all my travel that evening, I decided to call it a night.

I told one of the guards that I would be back shortly, after some sleep and a supply run (need to mix some more poison for my blades). Perhaps I’ll see if I can’t disarm that trapped chest as well, hehe.

1.5 Million Subscribers

Irvine, Calif. – March 17, 2005 – Blizzard Entertainment today announced that World of Warcraft, its massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG), has surpassed the 1.5 million subscriber mark*, underscoring the game’s continued success around the world. Building on its record-breaking debuts in North America, Korea, and Europe, World of Warcraft has reached global peak concurrency – the number of subscribers playing at the same time in each market – of more than 500,000 players.

Read the rest here.

It’s A Trap!

[World of Warcraft] I spent some time today getting my Rogue to level 24. Two levels in the last two days played, not bad for me. I only got two new skills so that was somewhat lame; an improved skill of one I already had and a new skill to detect traps.

My brother and I went through Shadowfang Keep and the Meteor Shard dagger (that Inhibit and I had tried so hard to get a few weeks ago and failed many times) dropped on the first try. Sweet dagger too. The most enjoyable part of going through Shadowfang Keep this time is that we stealthed through all the way to the end. Was a challenge for me at level 24 to not be detected, but I did it. Great fun.

I also spent some time travelling on foot, running from Sun Rock Retreat through Ashenvale and down to Crossroads. Then back to Ashenvale, over to Sludge Fen, back to Ashenvale and finally over to Orgrimmar. That was a lot of running around, but I was able to clean up several quests that had been gathering dust.

At one point, I was running along a mountain ridge between Ashenvale and Sludge Fen and all of a sudden it got very dark. I walked over to the edge and looked down on Demon Falls Ridge or something like that. Looked really creepy. I wondered what that area was all about, but I was not ready to jump in there unprepared.

I also recently found the schematic to make mechanical squirrel pets. I was hoping I could make some decent money selling them but so far it seems a poor seller. Too bad, I think they are kind of cool.

All and all it was a very fine WoW weekend. Indeed.

Up next: Ravenholdt Manor – Rogue Quest

Mapserver Disconnected

[City of Heroes] I swear I get disconnected from the mapserver at least once every gaming session. Often it is 30 seconds after I log in, more often it is when I zone into (or out of) a new area or mission. I don’t have any disconnect problems with any other MMORPG. Anyone have any ideas? I have tried everything I could find in the CoH forums and nothing helped.

It’s enough to make me say goodbye to CoH again. If there is anything I hate in MMORPGs, it is server problems. Even if it is something on my end of the connection. If I can’t fix it, I can’t play. If I can’t play, I won’t pay. Simple as that.

Busy Super Hero, No Time For You

I think it is funny when you are playing City of Heroes that as you go up in levels, you stop saving citizens if the badguys aren’t worth your time. You see a crowd of greys picking on some lady, taking her purse. You think, “No XP there, sorry lady!” and run along figuring that some junior Super will be along shortly. Certainly she can wait a few more minutes.

Sad thing is, fighting a mob of greys is about the only time you feel like a Super Hero. One or two punches and they are all down for the count. Boom baby. Run through a dangerous part of town and you are suddenly made of glass. That just ain’t right.

Return To Warcraft

[World of Warcraft] With the weekend filled with plans away from home, I did not have any time for online gaming. When I finally got home tonight I decided to spend a little time back in WoW. It felt good to be back.

I levelled my Undead Rogue to 23 (that’s him in the title above) and for a change of pace I played a female Night Elf Druid up to level 5. The Druid is on a totally different server than my normal server. I started her on a Role Play server. I don’t normally play female characters so this may be interesting. It was one of those cases where I had a character already envisioned in my mind and the name I came up with did not feel right as anything other than a female. I don’t really plan to play the Druid too much, but I just wanted to try something different tonight.

On another note, well wishes go out to my good friend Inhibit. He’s been fighting off illness for a little while now. Hope you feel better soon, bro.

City Of Heroes Court Victory

In a March 9 order, U.S. District Court Judge R. Gary Klausner agreed with NCsoft that some of Marvel’s allegations and exhibits should be stricken as “false and sham” because certain allegedly infringing works depicted in Marvel’s pleadings were created not by users, but by Marvel itself.

The judge also dismissed more than half of Marvel’s claims against NCsoft and Cryptic Studios, including Marvel’s claims that the defendants directly infringed Marvel’s registered trademarks and are liable for purported infringement of Marvel’s trademarks by City of Heroes’ users.

Important quote:

The judge dismissed all of these claims without leave to amend, meaning that Marvel cannot refile these claims.

Read the rest.

Super Day 10

[City of Heroes] The static group rides again. We did a few missions in the Hollows and one in Atlas Park. The XP flowed like cool tar, slow. At the end of the night I had three more bars than when I started (1/3 of one level). *yawn*

My brother commented before the third mission that he was done after we finished it. Asked why and he said he can’t take much more of that game in one setting. He said it is too repetitive. He is right on that point, CoH does feel very repetitive, always has to me. I had hoped the static group would make up for that, but it is starting to make itself rather obvious.

When you compare to other games like World of Warcraft, you can really see the intelligence behind the design of the quests. It certainly hides the repetitive nature of the game better than CoH.

Is there more to CoH that shows up in later levels? It certainly feels like the missions are all mostly the same. Kill all the guys indoors or kill 10 outdoors. Sometimes they toss in something to destroy or someone to rescue, but the motions you go through in each mission is exactly the same. Need more variety.

Migration Day

[Asheron’s Call 2] I was finally prompted to migrate my billing from Microsoft to Turbine last night. What a relief. It is my opinion that Microsoft held down both of the Asheron’s Call games, keeping them from being the best they could have been. AC2 is really going through an upturn in quality design decisions, but I wonder if anyone will come back. The expansion pack coming soon is adding a lot to the game, but is it enough to tempt many people to give it another try (or try it for the first time)?

I also joined the Beta Rewards Program, so bring on those MEO and DDO betas!