About gold and gems

So about a week ago all hell broke out when Arena.net posted about their micro transactions. I'm not sure what people were expecting since for me it was pretty much a given that their would be micro transactions.  There was at the same time, and my say with malicious intentions imho, leaked images from the store.

The reasons seems people are angry that Arena.net is trying to make from their game.  I mean how "dare" a business try and make money.  It's a totally absurd to point of view.  How do you expect Arena.net to maintain servers over the coming years with just the upfront payment when you buy the game?  A game I might say that is cheaper than most other PC games at places like Kalahari.net (linky)

Then their are others that are saying that people can buy power.  Being able to buy small XP boosts that last an hour is hardly going to make you more powerful that someone who plays the extra 10 or so minutes to get the same amount of XP.  Everything that has been leaked of the shop relatively benign and you don't need them to succeed in the game.

And then their is being able to trade the gems you buy with real money for ingame gold and vice verca via the Auction House.  I applaud this.  Hopefully this will cut down on gold spammers in general chat.  It also gives a solution to both those who want to buy gems with real money and those that don't want to.  It will give both groups access to the shop.  Don't want to spend your real money to get something from the shop, play more. Want an item from the shop and you don't want to play more then pay for it.  As Benjamin Franklin would say: "Time is Money".

Who am I

Posting this as an entry for blog carnival for character diversity that GuildMag is holding. I first heard of it from the Under the Pale Tree blog (brilliant Guild Wars 2 blog btw) and decided to make my own post as well. This is the character I will playing in Guild Wars 2

My name is Rhymelark and I was awakened from the dream to the gentle light of dawn filtering through the leaves of the Pale Tree. Our mother gifted me, while I was in the dream, with images of ships with graceful sails navigating the currents of rivers. The images entice my imagination and I know I can not long stay here in the Grove for the river calls me. Quickly I will have to learn what ever I can in the Grove while I can still resist its siren call.

With a last glance at the Grove I will cast off and follow the river and explore its length and follow its hidden the tributaries to the wonders that they may hold. I will cast my lines in its flowing waters and at night feast on its bounty under the setting sun. Who knows what adventures it holds for me and what joyous memories I can add to the dream as thanks to our mother.

On the far horizon a storm is building and I may have to lay anchor and help defend the world from the threat that the dragons pose. When that time comes I shall not shy from the conflict but ride out its tides and resume my journey once they have been delt with.

My fellow sylvari describe me as wistful and slightly absentminded. They are incorrect in thinking so. I pay close attention to everything thing that happens around me. I just do not cast the same importance on things as they do. While they endlessly wish to discuss the Ventari tablet I would rather watch the world around me and learn from it. I sometimes even sympathize with the nightmare court in their view that we rely to much on the tablet. I have even been approached a few times by them to join them. That will never happen though. Their ways are vile and they are blight on our mother.

I am a peaceful person and would rather rely on words to solve conflict. When words fail though be careful that you are not caught in the rapids of my anger for it will wash you away in a wave of steel . Never mistake me for being a lone easy target for I am never alone. Swiftleaf, my constant companion and friend, is always with me. She like me was born from our mother and we mirror each other perfectly. Where my sword strikes from the front a fanged bite is sure to follow from behind.

[For those who have not guessed Swiftleaf is a Fern Mastiff (image below)]

Swamp Thing

I will shamelessly admit that I was first introduced to Swamp Thing by the old animated series. The show was terrible and got cancelled after a few episodes. But till today the character itself as always been something special to me. The character has been brought back into mainstream comics with The DC Blackest Night event (2009-2010)

With the DC reboot end of last year Swamp Thing has been given a new ongoing series with Scott Snyder at the helm. He has taken the world of Swamp Thing and instead of scrapping the old taken it and built it into something much greater and much more far reaching.

The art in this new series is just amazing. Yannic Paquette brings every single panel alive. When he is depicting nature you are astounded by the beauty. Plants look like they are about to grow from each page. Each panel is also beautifully decorated with intricate borders which just add so much to each page. Where he really shines though is where he needs to draw something disturbing and with this being a horror comic it is really needed. You will feel revolted and disturbed when you meet the creatures Swamp Thing will be up against.

This is not a fast comic. It takes it's time to set the scene and build the atmosphere until we Reach the end of issue 6 and then issue 7 where the gears start shifting setting the stage for issue 8 where characters will no longer just react to the horror around them but fight against it.

This is the comic I most look forward to every month and can't wait to get my hands on. If you decide to pick this comic up I recommend you pick up Animal Man as well. They are both dealing with the same enemy and will carry on to a crossover arc later this year. This is not to say you can't read Swamp Thing without reading Animal Man just that it will add so much more to the experience.

Thank You

I have a lot of people to be thankful to in my life. But one person has given me much to be thankful for.

To say I had very little interest in reading when I entered high school is putting it lightly. I was more interested in watching TV to be honest. Yet when I entered high school my English teacher decided to give us the choice of either reading or getting homework. We either had to read 4 books no matter how thick they are or read 400+ pages. To say I started half heatedly is putting it mildly. I remember my first few reading lists consisted of Tintin and Astrix graphic novels with a few choose your own adventure titles thrown in between.

After the first quarter of standard 6 I discovered the Belgariad series and my love for fantasy was born. I quickly started reading more than my target I should read each month. If I heard of a book that was not in the library I asked them to get it. (of course this normally took more than a month or so to come since I lived in a small town) I still read at least 3 books a month these days. I have my favourite authors, Trudi Canavan and Robin Hobb being my top two :)

Because of my love for reading and fantasy I started playing DnD and made some good friends and through them made even more.

And this all started through one simple homework assignment of reading.

So Thank You Mam for introducing me to the wonderful world of books. I am eternally grateful to you for it.

Excluded

I've been feeling pretty good lately and been a tad more positive than I normally am. Yet yesterday I noticed that I am being excluded from groups of friends and their activities. I often can't make it cause of the remoteness of where I live. But as often as I can afford I make the effort to drive out to these so I can join them even if it means I will have very little sleep for the next day of work. I want to hang out with my friends even if I can only do it once every second week. It is something I look forward to and I enjoy.

It feels like that is being taken away from me. It may not be intentional (or it may be *shrugs*) but it does hurt.

I start wondering what I did. Did I offend them? Am I not good enough?
Some people think they are being nice and that they are not hurting my feelings by not telling me. More often than not this makes me feel worse. Be direct tell me what's wrong and at least give me a chance to work on it if it is something I did. If you decide that you don't want to be friends with me anymore just tell me. I will keep my interaction with you to a minimum with you without being rude to you. I do ask though that you are considerate in the same way by not removing me from the whole groups activities which contain other friends of mine as well.

The Honeymoon Period

This is something that most MMOs experience from launch date to +/- 2 months after release. A flood of people get the game and with glossed over eyes they recommend the game to everyone they know. Queues to log into servers are extremely long; new servers get added to the server list and low level areas are flooded with players.

This I have seen and myself been engulfed in numerous times. (WAR, Aion, AoC, etc)

1-2 Months later though you suddenly see a dramatic decrease in players. Some server become ghost towns. People who proclaimed loudly for the game are now the ones that sneer at people still playing it.

The reason I am bringing this up at the moment is because I am being assaulted with this honeymoon infected players of Rift. People who have just started playing and those that have not played it yet but have become devoted advocates for the game. I get that they like the game or what they hear about the game at the moment but till the honeymoon period is over I am going to take what they say with a bucket load of salt.

Stab from the shadows

You've all seen them before or in this case not seen them until you suddenly see your character stunned and dead in a few seconds. Yes I am talking about those anoying stealth classes in MMOs.

The reason i am brining this up is because Guild Wars 2 has just revealed another class and that class is the Thief. To say I despise this class type is an understatement. Only game so far that I know that has gotten the class in an acceptable way is Lotro with it's burglar class.

These classes are normally high DPS classes that can pounce from total invisibility and kill you in a few seconds with out you being able to do anything to stop them. They also tend to get a bonus to dps with their first attack from invisibility and from the back. This is all supposed to be offset by the fact that they have light armour low hp. The problem is this is not really an offset since they can stay invisible near you for ages until it is the perfect time to kill you.

I do not believe these classes should have total invisibility. Slow them down when they want to move invisibly; make them slightly visible with distortion waves when they move; add a timer for how long they can stay inivisible; make it use up their stamina slowly as they stay invisible. Somehing has to be done to avoid giving them carte blanche.

I am hoping more info on the offsets of being invisible will be come available on how this class works when the class page comes up on the arena.net website.