The 50 Pound Cat's MMO Adventures

Aion is here!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Mon, 21 Sep 2009 11:36:02 PDT

It's here! It's finally here! As a player of both Lineage 1 and Lineage 2 I can say I am a huge fan of the team behind Aion. (perhaps I'm not such a big fan of NCSoft, but maybe they will do better with Aion, they seem to be doing OK so far)

And so here it begins. :) I start my journey on the Luminel server. Elyos side of course! I always liked the Elyos from the first time I saw them. Funny enough, I thought Elyos would be the most popular side. I guess I just wasn't thinking straight, because the Asmodians outnumber the Elyos by far. Which is fine to me, I don't mind being the underdog one bit!

The forests of Elyera are beautiful and mysterious.. filled with the power of Aion mixed with the light of a nearby star! A wise elder treant waits to help you on your journey.

Here I await, the battle within! (Hehe this game is so pretty)

A new shield I got... nothing too special. Hey I am only level 7!

And not to spoil anything, but I just wanted to share this glimps of the Abyss.

I know you might have seen this in other places but I love the little leaf-holding animation. And the rain sure is nice and refreshing.

Plenty of little runts to kill...

Mushroooooom! Oh yeah.. this is a great shot. And I shall leave you with this parting image while I go back for more Aion! :D

Cow Nose's Take on Darkfall, and A Farewell!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Fri, 28 Aug 2009 09:28:23 PDT

A yes, another MMO, come and gone in the life of Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat! So here is my farwell post, and my little review of the game.

DarkFall is a beautiful world. It's strange and interesting and I was pleasantly surprised by the varied landscapes. DarkFall stretches it's engine to the limit and the game ends up looking great. I found myself looking around with true wonder at the different cities I came across and the strange sights.

Of course, death is a common experience in DarkFall! However, as an experienced Ultima Onlinen gamer, it never bothered me too much. OK let me explain, see in DarkFall when your character dies she leaves everything on her corpse. Any other player can walk up to your corpse and take everything you own! (Actually it's a gravestone in DarkFall, in Ultima Online it was the same thing but you left a body behind, and when looted completely you were left naked, and not to compeltely sidetrack but in Ultima Online you could also cut up your enemies body and take whatever parts you wanted as trophies)

I've talked about this in past posts, probably my Ultima Online posts. See, this kind of gameplay system makes DarkFall a completely different class of MMOs. It's a style of MMO forgotten to the average WoW gamer, but it's one familiar to many vets.

Everything changes in a free-loot based game. Epic swords are still epic, but common swords do great damage even compared to said epic swords. This is because gear MUST be expendable! So decent or even great gear is cheap to come by.

However gear is used up much more quickly, therefor a game like DarkFall has a GREAT crafting element. There is a huge place for crafters in DarkFall. (Even if it is not nearly as fun as PvP)

Plenty of interesting dungeons to explore in DarkFall! :)

So what is there to do in DarkFall? Well, PvP of course! And the PvP IS a lot of fun. You need to like ganking, and you need to like conflict. And conflict and ganking go so well hand in hand together. DarkFall is the ultima PvP MMO I've played, hands down. It has many of the great PvP elements of Lineage 2 without the awful asian grind that really ruined the game imo. Castle sieges, random PvP out in the world, and many skirmishes between cities is the best fun the game has to offer.

And believe me, there is NOTHING as satisfying as running along side your mates on your mounts heading towards the enemy for battle. It's a very very rewarding experience that no PvE MMO could ever offer. Just takes some stones and a lust for battle!

This is DarkFall's version of Bone Armor. It's great for mages because it has good armor but doesn't have a big impact on your magic skills.

So why am I leaving DarkFall, for now at least, if my review of it is so positive? Well the reasons are two fold.

The reason I am leaving, is because I can not afford it at this moment. I recently switched jobs and I just needed to conserve that $15 for other things untill I get back on top of bills and such.

So then the second reason, is not why am I leaving, but why may I not return? Well, that is because DarkFall does not have the grab-and-go gameplay that I have kind of come to be used to and enjoy. It's the same thing that drove me from EvE. Yeah, it's fun and really exciting! But it can also be kind of empty and boring at the same time. Just you and your skills and your mates and your loot. Yeah, that really is all you need, that's why DarkFall is not a bad game by any stretch. But were are the quests? The story? I suppose perhaps I am maturing in my RL life and my MMO life. I no longer have the stamina (lie) to game for 8+ hr stretches. I prefer a MMO were I can be doing RL things and just jump in when I have an hour or two, have some fun, maybe even a PvP battle or two, and then go to bed or go to work.

That said... I am very much looking forward to Aion! So, stay tuned to Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat's MMO Adventures and you just may see some great Aion action. :D

In the meantime.. stay tuned for some free MMO updates! Runes of Magic, and Wizard 101, wohoo! Two MMOs LONG overdue for an appearance on this blog.

DarkFall scenery and the all-might Clan Stone

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Tue, 04 Aug 2009 16:44:01 PDT

I love our city. It's so defensible. You even need to take a flying boat just to get at some of the entrances, and being stuck in a small boat makes you very vulnerable! Here take a look!

Yeah just another foggy day in Dark Fall.

It sure can be beautiful though!

Ahh, and there is our mighty clanstone! Source of much power.

Cow Nose is back!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Mon, 03 Aug 2009 07:12:42 PDT

Hey guys! Thanks so much for your patience between posts. Here at Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat's MMO Adventures things have been really busy. I've been working hard in the RL side of life, and to be honest I just needed to take a bit of a break from blogging.

But, I feel the creative spirit again, (and I'm playing a freakin' awesome game which must be documented) so lets get to the blogging! Remember, as usual, just click on the screenshots to make them bigger. My pictures are always available in a much larger size.

So, what would be the first things you see when you go to DarkFall? Well, goblins and newbie getting ganked of course, but for me, it is our city!

I say our, because I have joined a great clan by the name of FOUR TWENTY. Yes I know it's a silly (but awesome) name, and hey, it's a PvP MMO! I was lucky enough to meet up with these guys through a friend of mine, they have their own city and are very good at PvP.

The picture above is a shot of one of the walkways to our clan walls. Our city is an elf city so it is very nature themed.

Here you can see just how defensible our city is. It was not luck getting this city believe me! My clan knew what they were doing when they picked this city, and it is awesome. Definitely the best city in DarkFall I've seen yet, and VERY defensible.

Well, that's it for now. I thank you so much for returning to read Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat's MMO Adventures and I can promise you many exciting DarkFall blog posts in the future. It's a very unique game and just the type of game for this blog! I just can't wait to see what kind of experiences and stories come from this one. :)

Thanks for your patience!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 13:25:50 PDT

I apologize for the delay in getting the dark-fall-ness into this blog.

There are a few reasons to this delay: DarkFall does not have a working screenshot button, and I am trying to find a decent program to take screenshots for me externally.
If anyone is reading this and has a suggestion on that, that would be helpfull.

Additionally, DarkFall does not have a "hide-UI" button. Neither did Lineage 2 and I got used to that so I guess I can get past this... it doesn't make it VERY difficult for me to take the beautiful screenshots I want though, and it also adds a lot more work into the blogging process. That's OK though this is still something I want to do.

Also, I am getting deep into the PvP of DarkFall. I actually was really excited about blogging about the PvP aspect.. till I realized I might be giving our enemies a lot of insider information and that sort of thing. I'm not sure what to do about that.

How do you brag about your exploits and accomplishments without giving insider information to your enemies they can use against you, such as castle wall strength and other vital information. (Like what we plan on doing, and how we plan on doing it!)

Comments?

Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat's to be re-amped soon!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Sun, 19 Jul 2009 08:13:42 PDT

Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat's MMO Adventures will see a complete overhaul in the upcoming week. Please stay tuned for details! DarkFall is here!

The 50 Pound Cat's MMO Adventures Temporarily Delayed

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Mon, 16 Mar 2009 08:48:37 PDT

Hi everyone! As you may have guessed, I have not been around recently. I recently have run into some real life troubles. I lost my job and thus have no internet, additionally I moved to a new apartment and haven't set up said internet there. Crummy, I lost my job just as I got a new place! Bad timing.

But, I will be back! You guys know that. So... people who have me in their feeds, please keep me there! People who just read the website manually... well check back in a couple months.

And people who have me on their blogrolls, you can take me off them if you wish. I will contact all bloggers when I return and ask you to add me again.

PS: And I'll be honest with you, there just isn't an MMO I'm terribly interested in at the moment. So when this blog comes back there might be some great new games to cover!

PPS: This is NOT goodbye or the end, I love The 50 Pound Cat's MMO Adventures and I will continue to post my adventures here as long as I am playing!

Kamolka

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 06:54:27 PST

One of the recent additions to Lineage 2 is an instanced dungeon called Kamolka. There are different versions of the dungeon for different levels. You are limited to one run through the instance per day. I have found that the dungeon is a nice way to meet new people in Lineage 2, you can almost always find someone your level looking to do the instance.

The other day, I did the level 54 Kamolka with my clan SilverMoon. Here’s a few screenshots from the event!

Our tank, Bestregards, takes on the enemy.

Take him out!

Death comes to the enemy! And the rewards to the victorious.

Bot Killing, A Lineage 2 Past Time

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 09:19:21 PST

One of my favorite activities in Lineage 2 is bot killing. This sport involves the finding and slaying of bots. They are pretty easy to find, just head to the nearest Catacomb or Necropolis and they will be there, grinding away and doing what automatons do.

Once found there are a number of ways to kill the bots. You could try to “train” them. This involves attacking a roomful of monsters, then running to the room with the bots in it. The monsters pursue you but then see their friends being killed by the bots, who they then attack. If the botter team is not too strong, then the monsters will kill them. This is a good tactic because it keeps your hands clean of any actual killing.

Another way to kill a team of botters is to just PK the healers. If the team isn’t smart, and they don’t resurrect their healers (and they often don’t), then the rest will die without their support! This is often the quickest way to kill a bot team, though it does come with Karma. Karma is an entirely different aspect of Lineage 2’s gameplay that I won’t get into here.

Alright, so with that said the following is a few screenshots of my Bot Killing exploits in the underworld of Lineage 2.

See, sometimes people see what you are doing and they either don’t kill you when you turn red from killing bots, or they jump in and help out! And in these screens you see the real fun of bot killing, when they fight back! When bots fight back it means you have a pissed off farmer (likely from China, or wherever else they have gold farming businesses) on the other end of the computer. And for me, that makes it all the more fun when I kill them.

PS: Speaking of killing bots, and therefore pissing off farmers in China, that brings up an interesting moral debate that has been kicking around in my head for the past week. Is it worse to kill a farmer, someone just trying to do their job and make ends meet, or to kill a real player (who is botting themselves)? OK I probably lost you there, let me set this up a bit: In Lineage 2, there are two different types of botters. There are the farmer-botters, people from very poor parts of the world just trying to feed themselves by farming gold and selling it to westerners. They are just doing their job day-in-day-out. Killing them is a frustration to them and may even be taking food out of their mouths. But the other type of botter is the player-botters. These are people who feel they must bot to succeed in Lineage 2. These people bot so that they can get to the high levels, and they bot for money. To kill these people is to take away their money their time, their fun essentially.

The killing of either botter, pisses off the person behind the screen. But which is the worse, or the better, to kill? I don’t know, but it’s something to think about.

Another Ding!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Fri, 09 Jan 2009 06:09:11 PST

Ding! Level 51! This is a big level. B grade equipment is only two steps away from the best stuff in the game, S grade. Ahh, I love to bask in the sweet glow of that new level. OK check out some of the new equipment I can wear:

This is an almost full (I’m missing the gloves as you can see) set of Doom Light armor. It has good bonuses to your physical attack attribute as well as a bonus to your attack speed! I think it looks pretty good too. I get a little tired of the “panty”-ness of the armor, but it’s OK. Still, I would prefer some shorts.

Oh, and this is my new weapon, a Kris. This is a top B grade dagger, meaning it’s the best there is! Some people even use a heavily enchanted Kris ‘till S grade, so that gives you an idea just how close I am (or at least, feel) to end-game Lineage 2. Oh yeah, I know, I’m sure level 75 and higher is still a long ways off for me. But, this weapon is one step closer to that eventual goal.

Shartak update! Completed circut of Shartak

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Thu, 25 Dec 2008 19:22:21 PST

So as you can see I have successfully swum around the entire island of Shartak. Just, not in one trip.

CowNoseTheElf Turns Level 40!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Tue, 23 Dec 2008 16:12:11 PST

You haven’t seen many pictures of CowNoseTheElf lately because I have been focusing my efforts on CowNoseTheKitty, my human character. However, I decided to level my elf up to level 40 so that my clan, SilverMoon, could get Clan Reputation points from my leveling. See, in Lineage 2 clans have an incentive to recruit new players in the game, and that’s in the form of Clan Reputation points. You get the points when a new recruit hits level 40.

And here I am, ding! Level 40! *Does the happy level dance!*

Some Fun in Catacombs

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Sun, 30 Nov 2008 10:20:01 PST

It all started out as a normal dungeon crawl. Well more like normal dungeon camp, because that is what you do in the Catacombs sprinkled throughout the Lineage 2 landscape. Find a room, and camp it!

Looking down into the bloody water... I know the entrance to the catacomb is down at the bottom somewhere, but dare I dive in? Of course!

Once inside, I start killing things like usual!

Except... this team of bots decided to attack me! Well, actually, I attacked them. But they decided to fight back. It's always fun fighting these guys, especially when I win and kill them all.

Only later, a high level Tyrant came for me! He wanted revenge for my killing of his bot team. Thankfully a high level player helped me out and killed the guy for me.

So, I resurrect our fallen comrade Captain Beefheart and continue the adventure.

Just Playing Around With Settings

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Fri, 28 Nov 2008 09:41:01 PST

I was just playing around with settings and having fun taking screenshots like I always do, and I got this cool picture. Nothing much more to this post then the screen! But.. I think it's good enough to post. :D

The Tower of Insolence

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Sat, 03 Jan 2009 07:40:53 PST

The Tower of Infinity is one of my favourite areas in Lineage 2. Not to hunt in, but I love the architecture and the design of the place. Everything about ToI reminds me of the architecture described by H.P. Lovecraft in his stories, and indeed I strongly suspect the place was heavily influenced by his work!

The walls just feel... wrong.

The whole place feels, like it doesn't belong here!

And the tower rises far into the heavens...

Swimming around the Isle of Shartak

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Thu, 27 Nov 2008 09:16:58 PST

I'm making progress in my goal of swimming around the entire island of Shartak. I so far have made it past the farthest point I got my last attempt, and I have managed to avoid cannibalistic natives, angry outsiders, and ferocious sharks. Not much further to go and I'll have made it around the entire Island!

Rockin' Out The Forest of Mirrors

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Sat, 22 Nov 2008 16:37:00 PST

The adventure I'm going to take you on has some amazing screenshots. Really, they are some of the best I've taken. That's really credit to the designers of Lineage 2 who have created a truly beautiful game.

This right here is probably one of the best I've ever taken. Really, amazing. I had no idea Lineage could make a forest like this. I have taken a lot of great screens over the years, but this one is really special!

Continuing our adventure deeper into the forest...

This shot is more to point out the light coming from the ceiling of the forest. Another great effect that I had never noticed before, and you can only see it at night.

The Captain and I came across this interesting statue... a lizardmen relic? Or something left over from an age past?

All lizardmen must die!

The Barrier

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Fri, 21 Nov 2008 16:15:29 PST

In Lineage 2 there exists a part of the land infected with a strange fungus. This fungus, or fungi, infects everything it touches. It corrupts the land and the monsters, it's a great evil and a great danger. Thankfully, the magicians of Aden have used their powerful magics to create a barrier that keeps the infectious spores from spreading.

Well anyways, check out these pics of the barrier!

C Grade!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Sat, 15 Nov 2008 07:37:00 PST

Wohoo!! I got C grade! Yes I have had this armor saved for awhile, waiting to be used. I may have gone a bit overboard overenchanting three crystal daggers till I got this one at +5 but hey! It's all good fun. So here I am standing at the entrance to Dragon Valley showing off my awesome dagger and excellent Theca armor.
Don't I look great?

Who is this guy? And why did I kill him? Er, I forget actually. I'm sure he deserved it though.

Looking out towards the adventure ahead!

Hunting around Death Pass

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Thu, 13 Nov 2008 07:36:44 PST

Hunting in Death Pass, the grass surrounding me.

When wandering closer to Dragon Valley I ran upon this person with the cutest name! LostKitten. Now is that just so sad and sweet at the same time?

Lost kitten showed me her pig transformation. You get it from buying the Lineage 2 4th Anniversary Edition box.

Where am I though? And what are those things? Well, I don't know what these are, but what you see is the entrance to the Lair of Anthras. Anthras is the fire dragon. This place is much too high level for me, but I think it's great how sometimes low and high level areas are mixed. There are only a few other places that are like this, the other that springs to mind is the Catacombs in the newbie Dark Elf area. Those are level 60+ dungeons in an area designed for a level 15! Indeed writing this it starts to seem like maybe that was a bad thing to do, indeed it was confusing as a lower level character to see all these high level people in my newbie city, but on the plus side it gives you a chance to get a look at the higher level armor.

Action pose!

To the east, always to the east.

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 06:23:13 PST

On the island of Shartak there is a conch shell rumored to hold great power. There is only one of these shells on the island and it is passed by blood from person to person. (You must kill the conch bearer to obtain it.)

What are the conch's powers? I don't know. I have yet to obtain it, though truthfully I haven't been looking for it as I care more for the hunt then for anything material.

Perhaps someday I will blow the conch!

Silver Moon

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Mon, 10 Nov 2008 07:34:57 PST

Finding the right clan in Lineage 2 is difficult. There are a lot of PvP clans out there, a lot of clans that are only looking for high level characters, and a lot of botter clans. Oh, and there are a lot of clans that are newbie start-up clans that can be awesome but are kind of hit-and-miss, sometimes they don't have the best orginization or leadership.

So when I found SilverMoon I was pretty happy.

SilverMoon isn't the perfect clan for me and I'll get into why, but I have been making an effort to fit in because I like the people in the clan and it's nice to have a place to call home.

SilverMoon doesn't do clan wars or PvP, it's a 100% carebear clan. And that's fine. Because really, if you look at what I actually spend my time doing in Lineage it is 90% carebear and 10% PvP.

So in joining SilverMoon I had to lay down the sword and stop PKing people. However, a member explained to me that if you PK too many people you can get on the bad side of the big clans and they can make it very difficult for you to level in the end game.

Basically SilverMoon tries to play it nice and not make any enemies. This is why I like Lineage 2's PvP! I would like to see Warhammer have such a level of politics and intrigue. (That is why to me Lineage 2's PvP is more "real" while Warhammer's is more of a "game")

Anyways, that said, say hello to our wonderfull leader Hunie!

I also ran into SyntesizeR in giran. Grats on getting hero!

Dr Oleg I'll get you!

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 15:56:34 PST

I log in today to find that I have been under attack! Thankfully the person wasn't able to finish me off... Who are you Dr Oleg?

Well I did a bit of sleuthing, and I found that Dr Oleg has only killed 3 pirates. So he is not a major PKer. And yet... I see that one of his most recent pirate kills was a member of my Anti-PK clan the Bloody Jewel! Is this guy a Jewel hunter? What did we do to him?

I don't know the answers to these questions, but perhaps someday I will find out.

I tried to track were Dr Oleg went but with all this water around it's hard to find a good trail. (I found his tracks at one point, but they just went into the river, and I couldn't find them again on the other side.)

But who knows, Shartak IS an Island and chances are I will run into this Dr Oleg again to exact my revenge!

I knew it would happen, did you?

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 09:14:32 PST

Yes that's right, I'm back playing Lineage 2 again! I don't really have much else to say, but I (of course) do have a couple pictures to show you.

Fresh Water

cownosecat@gmail.com (Cow Nose the 50 Pound Cat) — Thu, 06 Nov 2008 09:03:49 PST

If you don't remember, Shartak is a jungle adventure MMO you can play in your browser. Here I am at the river by the shipwreck getting some water for the adventure ahead.

In the days ahead I plan to continue my exploration of the island. Here, let me show you my map.

As you can see, I spent the last few weeks swimming the west coast of Shartak. I was unfortunately attacked by a shark somewhere around the southern part of the island. Injured but not dead I managed to make my way to York but unfortunately before I was able to get healing a hostile outsider killed me.

Thankfully, the native shamans here on the island weild incredibal powers. They have the ability to draw your soul back to your body and return you to life. That is why I am now back in the NE part of the Island.

This time I plan to try and swim the east coast of the island. I will keep you update on my progress in the days ahead.