I am very, very excited about this new expansion for Lord of the Rings Online. There are so many great things about it and so very much for me to do, especially over the next few weeks, that I consider it a moral victory to do things like sleep, go to work, and perform at concerts. Those people you read about who take time off work on update day - I get it now - I wish I'd done the same, but I know better *sigh*. Here are some of the attention-grabbing features of this update:
Skirmishes!
These puppies are the ultimate in customizable game-playing. You can scale the size, the difficulty, and the levels of the baddies you're fighting (rewards will vary according to your selection). You can start them wherever you want - no more travelling for 15 minutes to get to the battle site. You get your own soldier companion who definitely has a mind of his/her own. You can customize your soldier's race, gender and 'class', and you can control how they get stronger - skillwise, levelwise, and attribute-wise. You can pick from a variety of instances, and there are oodles of things to spend your reward skirmish marks on.
Mirkwood!
I have not paid much attention to this yet, considering the presence of skirmishes in combination with all these obligations (sleep, work, concerts) hogging my time. However, it's a new region, with new monsters, a new rep faction, new quests, new places to see and explore, and new raid content as well.
Crafting!
With the inclusion of 5 more levels to gain comes the need for shiny new gear, and shiny new things to stuff into your shiny new legendary items. This expansion features more than just new recipes - it comes with a few new kinds of recipes. Now you can craft a 4th type of relic for your LI (some tradeable, som BoA). You can also craft new armour that comes out in different ways (I will have to check this out sometime soon!).
Item Management
This update comes with an optional adventure pack, which comes with new shared inventory of up to 20 items (I think?) that you can share with all your alts. Even if you didn't purchase this adventure pack, you can still take advantage of the new mount system to gain a free bag space slot or two (or in my case, 6) by converting your mount token to a mount skill. Each horse token becomes its own skill! You'll probably need this space too, for your different types of skirmish marks. Aside from inventory, you will also have to re-spend your legendary points on each of your legendary items, because they all got a make-over as well. And, while you're fiddling with all this, you can also customize your toolbars so that your choice of buttons display.
Along with this expansion, the website utility known as my.lotro.com has also been revamped to accomodate skirmish info as well as a host of other tweaks. It's all very neat to see. My.lotro now keeps a skirmish log for you, with all kinds of stats and even some charts. One thing it came with was a big reminder of all the characters I've made over various servers. Their new lottery feature includes a list of all your characters that are eligible for the lotteries, and today's lottery looks like it is available to every character. Seeing this, I looked over at my character list, and I have an even 30 characters, including monster characters. This number is about to change to 31, as I am planning on taking advantage of my new character slots that came with the adventure pack I purchased.
I think I will be verrrrrry busy over the next little while!
Showing posts with label Happiness is.... Show all posts
Showing posts with label Happiness is.... Show all posts
Wednesday, December 2, 2009
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Welcome Home!
I went on a road trip across the United States last week, and while I'm unwinding and preparing some posts about that, I thought I'd start with the last thing first: our garden bounty from when we returned home:
Monday, July 6, 2009
Delicious Treat
This may seem totally weird but once you try it, you won't think so. For kicks I thought I would try Rice Krispies on my vanilla ice cream with blueberries. It is so very good I can't believe I only just thought of it today...
Friday, May 29, 2009
Painting
Artpad.art.com is a neat website where you can make a painting, and it remembers every brush stroke you make (less the stuff you did right before you hit the 'undo' option). At any time during the painting process, you can have it replay what you've done so far. When you're happy with the end result, you can save your painting and it will give you a link so you can show other people what you've done, and there's a whole gallery full of people's paintings.
I drew the Shire:
http://artpad.art.com/?kkfkn623a9g
It's really neat replaying how other people drew their paintings. It's kind of like free art lessons!
I drew the Shire:
http://artpad.art.com/?kkfkn623a9g
It's really neat replaying how other people drew their paintings. It's kind of like free art lessons!
Wednesday, December 10, 2008
Fortune Cookie
I had the good fortune to eat Chinese food for lunch today, and the even better fortune to have gotten from my cookie, well, the best fortune ever:
(Yes, I know this post is vacuous, but it's the best I've got today, and I want to try being more consistent with my posting habits. Plus it made me happy!)
Your good nature will bring you unbounded happiness.First off, the fortune flatters, and secondly, it tells me I deserve something precious. I always like it when my food is nice to me!
(Yes, I know this post is vacuous, but it's the best I've got today, and I want to try being more consistent with my posting habits. Plus it made me happy!)
Friday, December 5, 2008
Vegas, Baby!
So... we went to Vegas this past week, and we had quite a fun time. First we went to Edmonton to visit family, and then from there we went to Vegas for a few days. On our way to Edmonton, we saw a whale from our airplane window (which actually does make sense, as we had to switch planes in Vancouver). Once we were in Edmonton, we rented a car and proceeded to immediately get lost. We were doing fine (for being on the wrong road), looking for 34th Ave, when the sequence of off-roads started looking something like this: 32nd Ave, 9th St, 4th St, 10th St... At this point we decided Edmontonians can't count, and turned around to look for sanity. Once we were correctly on track to our destination, we saw a sequence where 19th Ave was between 23rd and 34th - this was also confusing. After consulting the map, I was able to verify that yes, this is actually what they meant when they were labeling their roads. Anyways, enough about Edmonton - this post is supposed to be about Vegas!
Because we don't have passports, we had to cross the border by land rather than by air, so we flew to Vancouver, hopped on a bus to Bellingham, and flew to Las Vegas from there. We had to taxi from the bus depot to the airport, and the taxi was very late (watch out, this is a recurring theme). We did make it to the airport on time, though, so we were okay. When we checked in, we saw the airport was packed full of people (and that room did not smell nice). It turns out that there was another flight to Vegas scheduled for earlier that day that ended up just never showing up. Fortunately there are laws saying that when our flight arrived we got first dibs on our seats, but our flight ended up being cram-packed with very angry people from the other flight as well - and not everybody got on our plane either. We ended up being late, but at least we got there! This is where we stayed:
This building makes me feel very very small. The effect is magnified whenever you step inside - it's pretty much hollow inside, so from the lobby you can see the top of the pyramid, more or less. We are such party animals, we went straight to bed. The next morning we ate a humongous breakfast at a buffet, and then set out to explore. We visited a lot of casinos that day, including the Excalibur, New York New York, MGM Grand, the Bellagio, Paris, and the Flamingo (which was oddly balanced, demographic-wise - it seemed like everyone there other than us were old). We also went to the M&M store, which is four storeys tall and features a free 3-D 'movie', which kind of hurt my eyes since at first it's either out of focus or just hard to focus on.
We stopped inside all these places to see the attractions. At the New York New York, there is a giant outdoor roller coaster, which we went on:
We found that there were a lot of people trying to sell us time-shares, which was okay the first time and really annoying the other fifty million times. You start to recognize their shtick pretty quickly, and my boyfriend had a great time thinking of different ways to rebuff them. They pretend they're interested in where we come from, whether we are married, whether we at least live together, how long we're staying, et cetera. They offer you dinners, tickets to the shows, and/or gambling money, as long as you're willing to spend a portion of your day at their time-share presentation. We didn't want to waste our precious time in a high-pressure sales situation, especially considering how insistent the advertisers were. We did, however, find a place that sells tickets to shows half-price, so we did go to one, which I thought was passable, if a bit uncomfortable at times, considering topless girls are not my thing. The price was right, though, and the drink was very good.
The second day, we were tired from all the walking around from the first day, but we decided to do it again, this time pushing ahead even further so that we could try to score free tickets to the Mac King comedy show, an endeavor which we were unsuccessful at. We did a lot of gambling along the way, which was fun because we tried the table games. We did best at roulette but ultimately lost all our money. We had all-you-can-eat sushi at a restaurant across the street from the Bellagio, so we got to watch the fountain show quite a few times over the course of dinner. By the end of that day, we were very tired and worn out, so we sunk into another round of roulette, this time taking advantage of the free cocktails that kept coming around. We won twice on 23 red, which was cool because we always made sure to put a whole chip on 23 instead of using the kitty-corner wallpaper tactics that we used on other numbers.
On the way home from Vegas, we had to go through Bellingham, the cesspit of lost time, again. This time, our bus showed up around an hour late, causing us to miss our connection (which may have been the bus that would later get in an accident with a couple of trucks, but we didn't know that at the time). Luckily there was another bus leaving for home that night, so we got on that one, which had to turn around partway through and go the long way around, since the short route was closed. We did eventually make it home though, hungry, sore and worn out.
Because we don't have passports, we had to cross the border by land rather than by air, so we flew to Vancouver, hopped on a bus to Bellingham, and flew to Las Vegas from there. We had to taxi from the bus depot to the airport, and the taxi was very late (watch out, this is a recurring theme). We did make it to the airport on time, though, so we were okay. When we checked in, we saw the airport was packed full of people (and that room did not smell nice). It turns out that there was another flight to Vegas scheduled for earlier that day that ended up just never showing up. Fortunately there are laws saying that when our flight arrived we got first dibs on our seats, but our flight ended up being cram-packed with very angry people from the other flight as well - and not everybody got on our plane either. We ended up being late, but at least we got there! This is where we stayed:
This building makes me feel very very small. The effect is magnified whenever you step inside - it's pretty much hollow inside, so from the lobby you can see the top of the pyramid, more or less. We are such party animals, we went straight to bed. The next morning we ate a humongous breakfast at a buffet, and then set out to explore. We visited a lot of casinos that day, including the Excalibur, New York New York, MGM Grand, the Bellagio, Paris, and the Flamingo (which was oddly balanced, demographic-wise - it seemed like everyone there other than us were old). We also went to the M&M store, which is four storeys tall and features a free 3-D 'movie', which kind of hurt my eyes since at first it's either out of focus or just hard to focus on.
We stopped inside all these places to see the attractions. At the New York New York, there is a giant outdoor roller coaster, which we went on:
We found that there were a lot of people trying to sell us time-shares, which was okay the first time and really annoying the other fifty million times. You start to recognize their shtick pretty quickly, and my boyfriend had a great time thinking of different ways to rebuff them. They pretend they're interested in where we come from, whether we are married, whether we at least live together, how long we're staying, et cetera. They offer you dinners, tickets to the shows, and/or gambling money, as long as you're willing to spend a portion of your day at their time-share presentation. We didn't want to waste our precious time in a high-pressure sales situation, especially considering how insistent the advertisers were. We did, however, find a place that sells tickets to shows half-price, so we did go to one, which I thought was passable, if a bit uncomfortable at times, considering topless girls are not my thing. The price was right, though, and the drink was very good.
The second day, we were tired from all the walking around from the first day, but we decided to do it again, this time pushing ahead even further so that we could try to score free tickets to the Mac King comedy show, an endeavor which we were unsuccessful at. We did a lot of gambling along the way, which was fun because we tried the table games. We did best at roulette but ultimately lost all our money. We had all-you-can-eat sushi at a restaurant across the street from the Bellagio, so we got to watch the fountain show quite a few times over the course of dinner. By the end of that day, we were very tired and worn out, so we sunk into another round of roulette, this time taking advantage of the free cocktails that kept coming around. We won twice on 23 red, which was cool because we always made sure to put a whole chip on 23 instead of using the kitty-corner wallpaper tactics that we used on other numbers.
On the way home from Vegas, we had to go through Bellingham, the cesspit of lost time, again. This time, our bus showed up around an hour late, causing us to miss our connection (which may have been the bus that would later get in an accident with a couple of trucks, but we didn't know that at the time). Luckily there was another bus leaving for home that night, so we got on that one, which had to turn around partway through and go the long way around, since the short route was closed. We did eventually make it home though, hungry, sore and worn out.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Kinships in LotRO
The other night, the LotRO kinship I'm in (kinship = guild in MMO language) promoted one of our recruits to a full-fledged member. We've recently taken to making an event out of promotions as it gives us an excuse to see each other 'in person', as well as making the recruit feel welcome and a part of everything. We all don our matching unofficial uniforms, the officers change our display titles to 'Officer', and the leader changes his to 'Leader'. Then our leader beckons the recruit(s) in question to the top of our 'stage' and gives the recruits a graduation-style speech, whereupon they become promoted. Then there is much congratulating, cheering, clapping, and general celebrating, during which the leader continues his official duties by 'giving' the recruits the unofficial uniform too (in LotRO there's a cosmetic outfit system where you can equip an item cosmetically and then even when that item is no longer in your inventory, you still are wearing it - we keep a couple copies for the kin that we share around). Then we celebrate some more before visiting Matilda, our inn-league keg.
The more of us that are present for these promotion ceremonies, the cooler it starts to feel to be a part of it all. This most recent one featured our biggest turn-out yet, so I captured the moment above. It is really neat to be part of a kin that seems to be so unique. I haven't seen any other kins doing a uniform the way we do, and while I can't claim to know for sure, I've never heard of any other kin making a production of promotions, either. Our leader commented yesterday that other players all seem to blend together with their different outfits, whereas we stand out by all dressing the same, and he is absolutely right (plus, our outfits are really sharp!). When we roam around the countryside, crawl through dungeons, or charge through a busy city, we turn heads with our matching outfits. Players will often send me tells complimenting our outfits, and sometimes the comments reach the public chat channels. On explaining this all to my boyfriend, he commented that our kin sounds like what a kin is supposed to be like. I've also gotten some comments to that effect from several of our members. It feels really good to be a part of such a group.
/em raises her glass to the Guardsmen of the Free Peoples.
The more of us that are present for these promotion ceremonies, the cooler it starts to feel to be a part of it all. This most recent one featured our biggest turn-out yet, so I captured the moment above. It is really neat to be part of a kin that seems to be so unique. I haven't seen any other kins doing a uniform the way we do, and while I can't claim to know for sure, I've never heard of any other kin making a production of promotions, either. Our leader commented yesterday that other players all seem to blend together with their different outfits, whereas we stand out by all dressing the same, and he is absolutely right (plus, our outfits are really sharp!). When we roam around the countryside, crawl through dungeons, or charge through a busy city, we turn heads with our matching outfits. Players will often send me tells complimenting our outfits, and sometimes the comments reach the public chat channels. On explaining this all to my boyfriend, he commented that our kin sounds like what a kin is supposed to be like. I've also gotten some comments to that effect from several of our members. It feels really good to be a part of such a group.
/em raises her glass to the Guardsmen of the Free Peoples.
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About Me
- Anacredenza
- Anacredenza is a screen name I made up back when I first joined a debate forum. At that time, I was just about finished figuring out what my beliefs are, and the name, which means 'renewed belief' reflects that. I cannot claim to know everything (not even remotely close!), but I'm now comfortable with what I believe, which I discovered were my deep, though covered-up, thoughts all along, and have therefore been renewed. I may be right, or I may be wrong, but at least now I'm being true to myself. After figuring this out, I went back and talked with people who hold beliefs that I used to share, to test my new (and old) thoughts on the matter. After several years of that, I am much more comfortable with what I believe. I don't care very much about what other people believe any more, as long as they don't use their beliefs to justify harming other people. That said, I care a great deal about how people come to their conclusions - thorough, critical thinking skills are important, and if more people just knew how to think, the whole world could be a much less hostile place.