Fallen Earth

What a gem of a MMO I missed out on when it released last Fall!  LOL  On a lark, I had hubby download the 20-day free trial and he was hooked from the beginning.  One day into the trial, we both purchased the game and one month subscriptions.

The graphics are phenomenal, they are realistic and extremely well done.  The character creation is beautiful.  There are multiple starting zones depending on what your main aim is when you start, I started in South Burb the crafting starting zone.  There is an extensive crafting system, and you aren’t limited to one or two crafting choices.  You can raise your skill in any and all crafting choices from cooking to ballistics.  There are quest rewards in South Burb that are designed for the crafter.  Other starting zone have zones designed for melee or ranged characters or support characters. 

There are no set character classes in the game, you can design your path and pick your faction choices to further enhance your skills and abilities.  Luckily, faction choices aren’t determined in the early part of the game.  You don’t level at lightening speed and not all quests can be completed alone. 

My toon is only level six but it has been a truly enjoyable experience.  Hubby and I are leveling together and thus are working around his schedule, so leveling may be slower than previous games but I’m enjoying playing with him so much.

Gnomes

The second character I ever made on my non-trial account was a Gnome mage.  She was cute and so I went down that path with bind glee.  But soon I was faced with camera angles that drove me absolutely batty, a run that was hunched over like a bad case of scoliosis, and a whining voice that while cute grated after a while.

I convinced hubby to make a Gnome warlock to play with me, a plea I later regretted somewhat.  He has no trouble playing a Gnome, much to my disgust sometimes.   He managed to play a Gnome with no issues, I just couldn’t get over my issues with my mage and I eventually deleted her.  She was mid-50’s at the times, with maxed professions to 350 at the time. 

Then this was released last week, http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/3p9/gnomeregan2.xml.  I instantly didn’t regret re-subscribing  and was again excited to play WOW.   (Damn, I’m easy to please sometimes!)  I immediately logged in my main and traveled to IronForge.  I ran Gnomeregan for the first time, didn’t run a single instance while leveling until turning 80.    My main was now ready for the fun and games, but I wanted a Gnome to help regain Gnomeregan.

Hubby suggested making a Gnome.  It meant killing off an existing toon but I was game.  i had three choices in their 40’s, and picked my level 44 warrior to kill off.  He was my only male toon and he was frustrating and just too big sometimes.  Not to mention he’s dps output was pathetic most of the time.  So I killed him off and made  Gnome.  Shockingly, I picked warrior as the class for my new toon.  LOL

So with bright pink hair and what I knew would be a constant struggle with rage deficit, I set out to level my new Gnome.  Imagine my shock when I wasn’t struggling with rage management, things were dying right and left with ease, and her personality wasn’t nearly as annoying to me. I’m quite sure my heirlooms have made playing a warrior MUCH MUCH MUCH easier, although my killed off warrior had them too.  I created her last Friday in an effort to get to level 75 in time to get to participate in retaking the Gnome homeland.  Well, as off this morning’s maintenance she’s level 32 and leveling is so much easier than I thought it would be. 

She is a Fury warrior who only tanks when tanks rage quit an instance.  I have PVP’d with her and it’s a blast.  I top the charts and laugh constantly when stomping my way through Arathi Basin.  I will be 40 tomorrow, Thursday at the latest, and then I will attempt to get to 50 by next Tuesday.  Leveling slows down after 40, with the roughest patch being between 50 and 58 for me, needless to say I will level through Alterac Valley. 

More later on my adventures as a Gnome warrior…

WOW Sucked me Back In

Dammit, I canceled my subscription less than a week ago, and I’ve already re-upped it.  DAMMIT! LOL

Why you might ask?  Basically, because hubby doesn’t want to invest in another MMO extensively, just to end up going back to WOW.  So, I’m stuck running toons around collectin Eggs and hoping for a spring rabbit to drop. 

With all the recent class previews released and being released, I’m now prioritizing which toons to play and what gear I need to assemble before the expansion releases later this year.  I guess that also means I need to decide on what class is going to be my main.  I have already decided what toons I can kill off to make room if I need to come expansion release and no new character slots available.

Games Currently Played

With the recent delivery of my new pc, which is the awesome-sauce I must admit, the games I have installed has increased greatly.So without further delay, here's the list:

- Neverwinter Nights 2
- The Witcher
- Oblivion
- Dungeons and Dragons Online
- Runes of Magic
- World of Warcraft

DDO and RoM were installed to test them out and to see if they were a viable replacement to WOW.  DDO has great promise but mouse movement isn't allowed and for this gamer, keyboard movement in an MMO is incredibly frustrating.  My DDO toon, is level 3, so I need to give DDO more of a fair shot before deleting the client.  I will say this, DDO and LOTRO share the same problem.  Flat character models that have no life to them and an INCREDIBLY frustrating user client interface provided by Turbine.  Turbine might be headed in the righr direction for F2P game-model, but my god, their user interface and webspace are horrible and not user-friendly. 

RoM is clearly a WOW clone, but it isn't at the same time.  The character models are fantastic, especially the hair choices.  I particularly love that player housing is available at level 1.  Admittedly, the starter "house" is a one-room hovel but it IS player housing.  This was the one thing from Everquest 2 I wasn't initially excited about but missed as soon as I stopped playing EQ2.  My highest level toon in RoM is a level 11 Warden, so I have plenty of exploration left to do. 

WOW - it's like crack for the MMO player.  Most other MMO's can't compare to the polish of WOW, which drives me nuts to be honest.  WOW is a great introduction to a more complex MMO then let's say Guild Wars.  I have 5 80's and 5 other toons on my primary server between level 40 and level 72.  I am bored to flippng tears in WOW.  The quests are the same and the game is just a grind fast once you reach 80.  There is no social aspect to the game, I play with hubby but otherwise it is basically a single player game for me at this point.  I just recently canceled my recurring subscription (third time in a year).  I refuse to dedicate my life to raiding, it's a game not a job, and thus there is nothing left for me to do.  I will undoubtedly be back, but I need a WOW break.

Well, my coffee cup is drained and thus I'll cover single player games in my next post.