//Star Trek Online

It's a new year and I decided to leave Warhammer at the end of the month since Fat Princess can replace it as my "PVP fix". I've had some good times on Warhammer but I cannot for the life of me play 5 mmo's at once. I might return later on but I don't know for sure. It's a good time to leave since I played it for about 14 months and I hit the level cap n' got pretty good gear already.

//Star Trek Online


I pre-ordered the Collector's edition from Amazon and received an Open Beta key. Downloading the game took nearly eons (around 10 hours) but I had no problems logging in last night. Seems like the game is polished when it comes to space combat but land in person combat needs a little help. Character movement is a little strange..a bit like LOTRO. The only really good character movement/camera and targeting in a game I have played was probably Warhammer and FFXI. Character Customization for STO is pretty nice and there a lot of options. I wish there were more long-hair styles but the amount of color choice was pretty vast.

I really enjoyed ship combat. You can change your status to either defensive/offensive/balanced and you can control power of your shields on diff quadrants on your ship. Wish there were more ways to dodge photon torpedoes and stuff but other than that..it's top notch.

More to come later!

LOTRO: Beer fight!

//Skirmish System

I've been playing LOTRO a lot more now since they had the Mirkwood expansion update. So far it's been fun but the Skirmish system is slightly difficult to solo if you are a squishy. First off, the Skirmish system are instances where you can either do as a party, raid or solo. So far there are 3 that are offered for my current level, which involves protecting weathertop, a dwarf fortress and a small hobbit town called truckburogh in the shire. The enemies are always random except for the last boss and there are hidden extra bosses in the instances that you can take on for extra loot.
The rewards are pretty niffty. It's a bit like Warhammer where you collect medallions to trade for gear/weapons, but you can purchase skills for your NPC solider, crafting items and reputation tokens.

Only issue that I have encountered so far is the NPC solider you control gets stuck everywhere and he sometimes ignores me when I'm getting pummeled to death. And the death penalty is pretty steep too. The more you die, the more they deduct skirmish tokens from your loot table. It's not easy mode like other games, that's for sure.

//Fly you fools!!!

For the Yule festival, there is a new event called the Beer Fight. If you go to Thorin's Hall and under the throne room, you will find a party area. The beer fight starts every 10 min. You flag the quest from the Dwarf then as soon as the event starts, make sure you quickslot the Club weapon given to you. The objective is to interact with the party keg that randomly spawns on any of the 3 tables and hit people that get in your way. The club weapon knocks people back a good 5 feet and it's called "Fly you fools!". It's pretty hilarious to watch and it was a lot of fun. The quest is repeatable too and you get yule tokens and a "Party Keg" replica to put inside your house.

Gnomon School of Visual Effects

This is a bit off-topic but... I'm currently enrolled in a Maya class at Gnomon. It's a private school that has instructors that work in the Game and Movie Industry. My class is actually taught by my coworker, which is amusing in a way since I tend to give him a hard time in class.

Anyway, I thought it was pretty cool that employees from Blur studios are teaching classes there now. They worked on the Warhammer Online trailer and also the Star Wars: The Old Republic Trailer for E3. Their work is pretty phenomenal. I plan to take more classes in the future as well, but it's really difficult since I basically have no weekend since I have class and homework on top of working full time.




For my final project I have selected the Starship enterprise-D since I'm a Star Trek fan and it's a lot easier to do 'mechanical' objects opposed to organic forms. This is my current progress. I still have a long ways to go :(
Anyway, I highly recommend Gnomon as a school. It's pretty pricey but well worth it. They are a govt. accredited school as well, so I am able to take the class for free since 'the mouse' is paying it for me.

I hate NURBS!!!

UI game design

Currently I am creating the User Interface for the POTCO new inventory system. I can't go into details but it will be a huge upgrade for the game. Do you think it's redundant to have a character page that displays your armor while your character on screen displays the same exact thing? I see it done in Warhammer, WoW, LOTRO, Dragonica and in most games that I have played but I'm not sure if it's the most practical.
I like Warhammer's inventory bags because it stacks together into one panel...where as LOTRO has floating bags, which gets in the way sometimes.

It's been pretty tough to work out the kinks, but I'm curious on how other people feel about game UI's and which ones do you think is the most intuitive.

//warhammer - no wai?

This from last week, but when Order was invading IC, I was solo defending the Monolith BO cuz everyone else was in the center dying. This SM named Reggimus starts attacking me while I was alt tabbed. I tab back and start fighting back. We were at it for a good 5-10 min..and it was getting tiresome. He was barely getting hurt by me and whenever my HP dropped, I just healed myself so it was getting no where fast. Finally, a group of Order shows up and obliterates me. I was kinda glad tho cuz the fight was probably be going on forever. I admit that I'm not the greatest DoK.. I consider myself more of a support job with the way I'm spec'ed but it's good to know I can last against a Swordmaster who was only a few RR levels below me.

P.S. Also to the lamers from Neighborhood Wankers, hope you enjoyed your stay on Iron Rock. You'll be running and cryin' back to DC soon enuff. ;)

// The Lord of the Rings Online - Balrog

LOTRO had a pumpkin carving contest and I entered. I did a sketch first then my hubby did most of the carving of the pumpkin. Didn't win, but here's 3 hours of effort!


My Sketch (pencils to photoshop)


The pumpkin, end result

:D

//Warhammer // I'm in your SC's, Pwning yer arse

So I rolled an Alt Marauder (named Hyoga) for fun in Tier 1 of Iron Rock. I heard about it being busy since a lot of people from DC and trial testers were in there. Order seemed to not know what the hell was going on in the SC's. ORVR seemed a lil better but wow, Destro Roflstomped Order hard in SC after SC. My favorite SC of all time is Khaine's Embrace. So fun and watch ppl get obliterated by Khaine. heh.

Tier 4 is the opposite. Destro PuG's haven't a clue what to do in the SC's I have been in lately. I'm the only one ever at the BO's. >.>