Happy Memorial Day
There are many things I love about this image, such as the R2D2 BBQ grill and the wookiee apron saying “kiss the wook”. But the absolute best thing about it is what’s actually on the grill. Can you tell what that is? It’s the head of Jar Jar Binks. Lol. Brilliant. Also, I should mention this image was stolen from the interwebz, namely HERE.
Ohai there. Long time no see. I apologize for that. It’s been all my fault and I could attempt to explain it to you but it would likely bore us all to death. Suffice it to say I am still interested in blogging here. I have not quit, don’t give up on me. But for today I just wanted to pop in here and wish you all a fun and safe holiday weekend. Yes, I know the majority of said holiday weekend has passed. I’m a procrastinator. As if you couldn’t tell already.
New To Blogging? Want To Start A Blog? Read this…
Whether you are someone who is thinking of starting a blog, once dreamed of starting a blog, or have recently started a blog, May is a good month for you. Why? Because right now there is a fantastic event going on for the entire month of May called the Newbie Blogger Initiative, also known as NBI. The post I just linked to was written by Syp over on BioBreak and while that is the introductory post from May 1st and includes all the basic information you need to know, be sure to look through the newer posts for even more information about the NBI and for some new blog love and linkage.
There’s even an official NBI Forum that’s already filling up with Question and Answer threads and various other helpful topics. I encourage all of you to register there and begin participating whether you are doing so from the Newbie perspective or as an experienced veteran who is willing to help others. But let me point out that while registering is free, as soon as you fill out your information and hit submit you get 3 or 4 spam/advertising messages trying to get your cellphone number and various other info. So be paying attention and just click the red “PASS” link you will see at the top right of these messages. I have registered this morning, but since I’m neither a noob nor an expert I will likely just lurk and soak in some knowledge. There is always something to learn somewhere.
Now let’s make a deal. Since I have brought this to your attention and since I love to see blogging communities grow, if you start a blog (or have recently started) related to either Star Wars: The Old Republic or World of Warcraft then leave me a note in the comments here or email me at the address you see in that there column on the right side and share your new blog link with me. I’ll add it to my blogroll here if it’s SWTOR related and my WoW blog if it’s WoW related and I will try my best to drum up some traffic for you.
Okay, that’s about it. I don’t know much about the Newbie Blogger Initiative since I just stumbled across it last night, but I recognized it’s a good thing and I knew I needed to share. Which reminds me, I should give a shout-out to Matticus of World of Matticus because I heard about NBI while reading his blog. And speaking of reading Matt’s blog, all bloggers, whether new or otherwise, need to check out his post: Does Your Blog’s About Page Answer These 7 Questions?. He has totally convinced me to do something about my “About” page. But even though he has inspired me, he can’t make me unlazy so I’m sure it will take me a few days.
In closing, I’d just like to say … GET OUT THERE AND START (CONTINUE) BLOGGING!
Bits And Pieces
There are generally 2 reasons why my blog posting will temporarily slow down. One is life is too busy, work is too hard, not enough time in the day, etc. The other common reason is the one I’m currently suffering from… I”m so absorbed into the game that I don’t log out and leave myself enough time to do everything else I need to do.
Thanks to our guild’s very own “Mad Crafter”, Njessi, Kristalys is wearing a lot of augmented orange gear, is in a good routine of doing dailies (though not daily 
), and doesn’t require as much constant attention. Which means I finally get to spend some time working with alts. It’s been a total blast getting back into the amazing storyline questing that SWTOR does so damn well. It’s sucking up a lot of my time. I’m still not a super-fast leveler because I still spend a lot of time gawking around. But it’s keeping me very entertained.
I am also getting comfortable with raiding and don’t spend all day Friday and Saturday freaking out about how I may derp things up. And speaking of raiding, we’ve got a guildie who’s new to raiding who recently hit 50 and is starting to run with us. We also have a new trial member who answered our recruiting call for a healer and HOLY COW SHE LEVELED TO 50 IN 2 WEEKS so she could get in some raiding with us before it’s time to decide on her permanent status with us. So raiding has been a bit more light-hearted recently as we’ve welcomed these noobs into the fold.
During the first Eternity Vault clear with the noobs, our new trial member healer, Graceless, won the big-daddy Caddy that dropped. After we got back to the fleet she and I totally went cruising in style together.
But before we headed back to the fleet we decided to strike a pose and get a screenshot to commemorate the event of the noob’s first clear. I got a little distracted.
The next night, during a joint event with The Church of Alvis, we ran through Karagga’s Palace and all busted up laughing when we rounded a corner to see that Biscotti had ran ahead and lounged himself on a couch in the hallway. I don’t know exactly why it was so funny, but trust me, it was. You can see him in the bottom right corner just chillin.
Last, I started a new Sith Inquisitor on Juyo to take advantage of the Legacy system and I’ve had a lot of fun working with her. This is like the 4th time I’ve leveled a Sith Inquisitor up to the fleet and it’s still a blast every time. Jordynn here is level 14 and she’s a keeper. I can’t wait to see how much more fun the class gets as I keep going.
The end.
Friday Link Love – Where To Go For All The Info
Patch 1.2 was a big deal. Like, a REALLY big deal. It included so many things and made so many changes, I’m still discovering stuff. I would like to announce that I have sat down and taken the time to completely analyze every little detail of the patch and can easily explain it all to you.
I would like to announce that, but it would be a lie.
Luckily, you don’t need to wait for me to do so because a) it’s never going to happen and b) it’s already been done. There are some amazing posts out there that can help you, me, and everyone else understand some of the most important things the patch has given us and how they work. I highly recommend everyone check out the following links:
Legacy and Companions from Psynister.
“Today I wanted to talk just a little bit more about companions and how they relate to the Legacy system. I’ll start off by going over what perks exist in the Legacy system for companions and why you would want to unlock them, then we’ll get into how and when you unlock those perks.
I’m also going to talk about companion gifts and how they relate to each of the companions in the game as well as methods you can use to maximize your affection with your companions outside of companion gifts.”
Companion Gifts and Crafting Bonuses for 1.2 from Dulfy
“Hey everyone, with patch 1.2, you can finally gain affection with your annoying ship droid and make him get better at certain crafting skills. I thought this would be a good time to update all the previous companion gift information and add in all the crafting bonuses in one page.”
Reverse Engineering, Fashion, and Set Bonuses After 1.2 by Njessi
“…I’m editing as I find out new things..” – it’s true, she’s totally editing and updating this post continually.
SWTOR Patch 1.2 FAQ’s from Anexxia
“With a Patch as extensive as 1.2 it’s no wonder there are a lot of questions cropping up right out of the starting gate. I’ve started off with the ones I’m hearing most often. Have a question not answered here? Or keep having to answer the same question over and over for guildies? Leave it in the comments and I’ll add it to the FAQs!”
Legacy Unlock: Ship Repair Droid by Blackferne at Church of Alvis
“With the Legacy system unrolling with 1.2 there are plenty of perks that people can now get. These range from social emotes to unarmed combat attacks to items you can get for your ship. As I’ve been working hard on crafting as of late I decided to get the ship repair droid.”
Patch 1.2 Flashpoint and Mini-Pet Guides from Mikro at SWTOR Life
“As part of our coverage of the newly released Legacy Patch 1.2 we have compiled two high quality guides that are a must read for any Star Wars: The Old republic player.”
Pretty awesome stuff, right? And there are probably even more pretty awesome links related to patch 1.2 that I haven’t even discovered yet. So pay attention, cause I’m getting ready to pass out some orders. First, seriously go read these amazingly helpful things I have posted above and leave some love and appreciation in the comments section for these blogs. Second, if you know of any other awesome articles about this subject that I haven’t yet discovered, link them here in the comments of this post so I can bring attention to them too.
And remember, the force is with you … always.
My Custom UI
One thing I was excited about when Patch 1.2 hit was being able to work on customizing my UI. While I had obviously gotten completely used to the default UI, I really wanted more open screen space. The first thing I did, before moving anything around, was to use the “Global Scale” option to make the entire thing smaller. I settled at .8 because I gained a lot of extra area but I could still clearly read all text and see the icons for each of my icon buttons easily. Once I got the overall scale where I wanted it I just started moving things around. Some elements did get scaled individually once I got them in the position I wanted them. This first screenshot shows how it looks when in an 8 man Operation. You might notice that the action bars are just a tiny bit out of alignment. The two main bars in the center are fine, but the re-arranged one on the left is a tad too low and the one on the right is a tad too high. I promise you, I have fixed that since this screenshot was taken. It was driving me crazy. The other thing to point out is that my companion frame is what you see in the upper left corner but since I’m in an Ops group, he’s obviously dismissed. Finally, I want to talk about the fact that I have 2 chat boxes, one on the bottom left and one on the bottom right. People are always curious about this. Basically, the one on the left is set to only show the Guild channel, anything related to Ops or Party, when a guildie logs in (so I can say hi) and when someone whispers me. The chat box on the right only shows what is not shown in the left. The reason for this is not because I want to read general chat with no distractions, but because I want to be able to read guild, ops & party chat with no distractions but I still want to be able to see what loot I just picked up or when a boss goes into a frenzy, etc. This is actually pretty similar to how my WoW interface is setup.
click to embiggen:
Here’s what the interface editor looks like to achieve the screenshot above:
And here’s an alternate version I created in case I ever get in a 16 man Operation. The only difference is moving the lower right chat box up to the upper right and expanding the Operations frame out to the right to show 16 instead of 8.
Rakghoul Invasion Screenshots
The Rakghoul Invasion World Event has been a total blast. Other than the fact that I killed the 3 world bosses on Sunday and did NOT get the title, I’ve loved every minute of this infection party. Below are some screenshots I’ve taken of the people and places around the event.
as usual, click to embiggen
Is it sad that I am so amused by the plague parties on the fleet? I find myself standing there just getting infected and dancing til I die. Lol. The simplest things amuse me.
So Many Things, So Little Time
I seriously don’t know where to begin. SWTOR has had an amazing past few days. There’s all the great things about patch 1.2 that I could tell you about, like guild banks, UI customization, flying in spaceports … the list goes on and on. Or I could get my whine on and talk about how my spec changed and I can’t quite figure out how to adjust myself to be at my most efficient. Maybe I’ll write up my opinion on the patch later this week and expand on the great things and the tiny little list of not so great things. I’m quite sure there are changes I haven’t even discovered yet, so I’ll likely be reading the official forums quite a bit this week. Which I had already planned on doing (in addition to many other sites) because I have got to study up on the new Operation, Explosive Conflict. My amazing guild, The Snark Side, dipped our toes into EC on Saturday night and while we did make progress and started to get into a bit of a rhythm on Zorn & Toth, we probably should have been a little better prepared.
Of course there’s also a surprise world event currently going on with an infected Rakghoul invasion on Tatooine. How fun is that thing? I haven’t collected enough DNA to purchase anything cool from the special vendor yet, but I did do the special “Tracking the Origin” quest last night before work and when I turned in the quest, I got myself a little rakghoul pet. He’s called a Crimson Rakling and he’s so freaking ugly he’s adorable. I love this guy.
But my little rakghoul guy is not the only pet I have recently required. A great friend of mine was lucky enough to be able to attend PAX East last weekend and after she returned home and got rested up, she presented me with a code for an in-game Tauntaun pet. Yep, I owe her big time. After the patch went through, I received my taun fawn in the mail. He’s so cute the Twi’lek bartender kept staring at his ass. (side note: why do I make all of my pets male? I even do that in WoW.)
Oh man, so many other things. I definitely need to extend a couple of thank you’s. One big one goes out to Alexx for REALLY helping me get over my white color crystal depression and loaning me a lot of credits for me to spend foolishly. Another huge thank you goes out to NJessi for selflessly making me (and other guildies) countless variations of orange gear simply for us to try on and see if we like the way it looks. And I’m not talking about just making us useful gear, I’m talking about making me 4 or 5 different shirts/tunics and 4 or 5 different lower robes/pants JUST FOR FASHION. She rocks. She spends all of her time and money on synthweaving just so I can try on a BoE piece of gear and then say “no, I didn’t like the way that looked”. Have I mentioned I’m in the best guild ever?
Told you there were lots of things. I never fell out of love with Bioware like some people seem to have, but after the last several days I love them even more. They’ve given me plenty to talk about… if I can force myself to log out of the game long enough to write something up.
I Can’t Believe That Just Happened
I’m a procrastinator. I openly admit it. So of course I waited until the last minute (yesterday) to decide I wanted to buy a white color crystal before the patch hit and they disappeared. Unfortunately, I didn’t have nearly enough money. I needed to make roughly 800k between the time I got home from work yesterday morning (3rd shifter) and the time the servers were scheduled to go down (11pm my local time). As soon as I got home, I logged in and started trying to make money. Someone told me pvp was a quick and easy moneymaker, so even though I never pvp I queued up for several matches. While I did have way more fun than I expected, I did not make much money from them. Not compared to the time spent, anyways. I do have slicing maxed out, so I was sending out all 4 of my minions on slicing missions the entire time. But I needed more than that.
The next thing I tried was space missions. I had heard you can make pretty good money off of those. I have always basically avoided space missions because I just don’t seem to be very good at them, but decided I would grin and bear it if they made me some quick money. I only had grade 1 gear for my ship, so the first thing I did was upgrade everything to grade 5. That took approximately $100,000 credits. I was definitely going the wrong direction. But the day was still young and I was now prepared to head into space. I will say that combat was much easier with the new upgrades and I did manage to complete several missions with no issue. But the money wasn’t as big as I wanted it to be, so I moved on.
Of course I did my dailies on Ilum and Belsavis, those are pretty good money makers. I even managed to find some random stranger to do one of the daily heroics with me. So I made up a pretty good chunk there. Next I headed to Corelia and finished up some quests there I had never bothered to finish. Also, I should mention, this whole time I’m stopping for every slicing and bioanalysis node I pass and I’m playing the Global Trade Network by mailing everything to an alt every couple of hours and putting all the mission schematics I’m getting from my slicing up for sale. Those things sell good, I made quite a bit of money just from those.
From there I went to Voss and completed bonus quests while watching for chests and nodes. Rinse and repeat. Tried another pvp match. Tried another space mission. Started the whole process over. Blah, blah. Basically all you need to realize is two things: 1. this took all day 2. I had not had any sleep since I woke up and went to work on Tuesday evening … and I am supposed to be back at work at midnight on Wednesday.
You guessed it, I called in sick to work. I’m not proud of it. I’m actually rather disgusted with myself that I put the damn game ahead of my job for even a day just because I wanted a white color crystal. As the day went on, I obviously grew more and more tired. By 7pm I had been up over 24 hours and since my job requires sitting in front of a pc and the game requires sitting in front of a pc, it was an exhausting 24 hours of sitting on my ass staring at a pc screen. Ugh. The more tired I became, the slower I was making money. But I was close and I knew that unless something major went wrong, I WAS going to make it.
Finally, about 2 hours before the scheduled server shutdown, I had collected all the money I needed for the crystal as well as a small pocket of extra money so I would be able to pay for repairs over the next few days while I tried to rebuild my bank. I used my emergency fleet pass to get back to the fleet. I logged into my alts and sent all of their money over to my main. As I went to the crystal vendor, I realized with only like $10,000 more I would have enough money to get a white crystal and one of the purple ones. Woot! I still had several minutes before my companions all returned from their missions, so I decided to make a quick run back through Belsavis because I know where several lootable chests are.
You guys, here’s the bad part of the story. I really don’t even know exactly what happened next. I remember thinking about buying both crystals, being a tiny bit short and deciding to go to Belsavis. I should have been able to get there, round up 10k in like 20 minutes and get back to the crystal vendor with over an hour to spare. But that’s not what happened. What happened was I startled myself awake about 3 hours later and found myself hunched over my keyboard, staring at a server list on my screen because maintenance had started. I fell asleep. I hadn’t bought any crystals. Even though I had just been at the vendor and had enough money for the white one, I didn’t click the fucking button. I wanted to do one more thing first. And then my body betrayed me.
So, yeah, there ya go. I’m a loser who chose to play SWTOR over going to work because I had one very big goal I was trying to achieve, and then I didn’t achieve it. I really can’t even describe for you how I felt when I woke up at my desk and realized what happened. Or how I feel now, for that matter. I guess I would say I’m disgusted. Disgusted at myself for being so stupid. I’m so disgusted with myself I can’t even really be angry. It was just a stupid day full of stupid decisions. Being stupid doesn’t pay, kids. I just proved that. I’m trying to make myself concentrate on the silver lining here, and that is I now have plenty of money in-game for anything I may need. Sigh. Yeah, it totally wasn’t worth it.
Because Everyone Needs A Good Laugh
Yep, those are two of my guildies all decked out in Columni gear after a good month of raiding. It’s okay, you can laugh at them. We certainly do. Clearly whoever designed this particular set of gear has a thing for bananas. And priests. I should stop there.
(click to get a better view … it’s totally worth it)
