Vanguard Goals for the First Week in April

For me, Ratook my main, is going to be making everyone new harvesting gear. Okthank, my blacksmith, is going to be making a ton of arrows and iron horseshoes for all my alts. Dagulas, my carpenter, needs to get up some levels and do his Banisher quest line up to the point he gets his gem of NT port.

I also want to get Daarnash and Pumpkinpuss out harvesting a ton of metal and textiles.

I have a handful of other alts that I wouldn’t mind taking to Lomshir and into the depths of that dungeon in that beached boat along the coast — that is a little secret spot between you and me. Don’t tell anyone else.

I will be posting some pictures of the guys later on tonight. Can’t wait until I get home to start the weekend.

Vanguard Macro

I could just steal this great information, but its best to go to the horses mouth:

http://forums.station.sony.com/vg/index.php?threads/macros-complere-adventuring-crafting-diplomacy.549/

A great article on Macros.

First Week Back playing Vanguard

I do not remember the last full week of game play that I had in Vanguard? But today marks the first full week back to playing the game in a long time. I am the type of player that doesn’t just “mess around” with a game. I either jump in with both feet or I just don’t play it. In the old days I had two accounts, those that followed me from Everquest I and Everquest II and hence they also made their way to Vanguard. I also toyed with the idea of playing for free, but it isn’t as if $30 a month kills me financially and I don’t like the feeling of missing out on stuff because of it — so I resubscribed.

I was a bit dismayed that Sony does not offer other ways to pay for the accounts. I would have liked to used Paypal but in the end just put it on a credit card. I was thinking of doing the 3 month plan for $30 but opted for the standard $14.99 a month. I would like to note that a reason for seeking other sorts of payment options was because I have often had problems using a credit card with Sony Online. A card that works flawlessly on Amazon will balk and fail on buying a subscription at Sony.

Originally I started playing almost immediately at launch, and according to the various websites, this would have made it probably around February or March of 2007. At the time I was listening to podcasts over at http://www.virginworlds.com with a weekly show by Brent Lassi. It was specifically Vanguard that made me want to make my own show and thus I created a Voyages of Vanguard. I played Vanguard furiously for at least 2 years, using my experiences as my commentary at Voyages of Vanguard. I had a great host named Karen that made  shows with me back then, and she is now writing for many online MMO websites.  By 2009 I had stopped playing and for 4 years I had nothing to do with the game.

One of the many detractors from Vanguard was the that I had friends playing other games. Vanguard is also a tough and unforgiving world and as time went by the writing was on the wall. It also seemed that Sony had given up on the game. There was great chaos it seemed over at Sony and Vanguard simply slipped through the cracks — and it was highly obvious.

Back last August the smartest thing Sony has done in years they made the game free to play. Although that sort of model does not fit well for me, and nor have I ever truly supported this model, it made perfect sense for Vanguard. They also made some very intelligent moves in making the game liberal with what you got for free — so much so that it is my opinion more players are using Sony Cash to buy ingame items. My verdict is out still on some items you can purchase as it circumvents crafting and questing, something that seems wrong. Time will tell, but I hope they do not fall victim to the idea of placing all highly sought after items in the game as something you can just buy.

I am having a great reunion with the game. My friends and I are back to playing it. They are playing for free and love it. I am paying for two subscriptions and having a blast too. I am doing both adventuring and crafting, but perhaps will venture into diplomacy sometime too — but that seems as daunting as crafting.  I have made up so many new characters it is ridiculous. Each class plays differently and they all seem so fun to play.  A ton of adventuring quests keep me busy at night with friends.  And trying to level in crafting on the odd times is both exhilarating but exhausting.

Many troubling aspects are still in the game. They lag and the chunking are as bad as ever, but now at least we all have computers with so much more horsepower that it is less noticeable. I tend to fall through the earth at least once a week and die horribly or get snagged on some simple rock and spend 5 minutes figuring out why I can move. Many quests are broken and some character classes seem far more powerful than others.

Overall though I enjoy my return and tell others that it is worth downloading and playing — Hey! It’s free so how can you go wrong and my friends can attest you really, really don’t need to buy anything to have a blast in the game.

I am even thinking of returning to Podcasting. I am waiting a month or two but would love to hear from others on if they would be interesting into listening to my show again.

My Pickup Group — Vanguard

Last couple of weeks I have returned to Vanguard: Saga of Heroes and with that I have been getting involved with good old fashion pick up groups. Of course with that, you tend to see a stereotypical pattern of players. Here is my imaginary, yet so real, pick up group player makeup.

Terry, a twenty-eight year old guy, living in his grandma’s basement, out-of-work, and lives and breathes the game. He has eighteen alts, all the crafting classes covered, the best gear, and you always find him as a guild leader or group leader. Strangely, he is so highly organized and knowledgeable you ask yourself why he is living in the basement, without a girlfriend, and no job?

Jeff Jefferson, who plays an Ogre mage aptly named JeffJefferson. This kid is twelve-years old, and his mom has found that the recent MMO is a cheap and proficient babysitter. While mom is off getting some at the bar, the group is getting their fill of Jeff who constantly begs for money, equipment, and cheats. He is of the age and mentality that he thinks there are special power-ups and moves in the game — what little he reads, he still trying to get that special power to unlock by moving North, North, Jump, West, Duck, North, North?

Wanda, a forty-five year old, divorced over weight mom of six, who has no apparent income and often complains her kids have no shoes, socks, or pants, yet she is playing twenty-four — seven on the game with a rig that would make Jeff Gordon blush. She is a whiz at statistics, spells, and skills yet she tells you she can’t find a job. The only thing that grates you more than her stories, is that she calls you “Hun” all the time — belittling you down to one of her six mangy kids.

Mike, the thirty six year old bachelor, who is tanked by 5 PM on three cases of beers — and for the love of god don’t ask him which beer is better, or you better close the chat channel. Mike is introverted and without girlfriends; yet all his characters are scantily clad females with names like LargeTitus InYourFace. After you comment on his deplorable name, he keeps telling you, “Get it!!?!! its Large tit s in your face, get it? Get it??”. after about a minute of you shaking your head sadly, he says: “Get it!!?!! its Large tit s in your face, get it? Get it??”. Ya, Mike I get it!!!

Brad Jockitch, the over-the-hill-muscle-bound-boob, that recalls his glory days when all the world bent over backwards for him, how the chicks dug him, his boss glorified him, and his family put him on a pedestal of pure ivory. Now Brad is sunk to poppin’ oxycotin every fifteen minutes, half of the time AFK while he is off using the “bio-break” or getting himself another whole-wheat tuna sandwich. “I was one-tenth of a second away from making the Olympic Shot Put team!!” ahhhhh Brad, shot put isn’t measure in time? …………… Long tenable silence, “Did I say Shot Put ((gurgle)) ((gurgle)) I meant Lacrosse, sorry I have sixteen various kinds of painkillers in my system.

Tina, To-Hot-Handle, Torres. Oh ya baby, I often get Tina in my group, ya baby!! Twenty-two, hot, and sexy….willing to talk the talk, and walk the walk….go to her website and she is dripping all over the site in hot and sexy poses. She is willing to find backwaters of any world and seek out the promiscuous in all and all a good night. The strange thing is, is that she has a horribly sounding voice — something between a buzz saw and a pig being strangled to death? Ahh, Tina, lets not do Teamspeak…..

And finally, Svenoluntski Horg’ufanslengorthoria, some swedish multi-millionaire who could pay me more money than I can dream of, to dance naked in Time Square …. could even make Bill Gates blush with envy, yet he is more concerned with playing with a bunch of fat American tools in a dungeon called Chaotic Chamber of Scintillating Hellfire. He types perfect grammatical English, yet can barely chirp a word in English — everything he says sounds like he is asking for another scoop of Hagen Das Ice Cream — Sorry, Sven, I don’t have any Strawberry Ripple HagenDas!!

Ahh yes, my fantastic a typical MMO group. The problem is, you ask, is where do I fit in that list of characters? Well, mull that over while I pop another 1995 Bush Lite (excellent year for American beer), I walk my sixteen dogs, papoose four of my troll looking kids on my back, pop a few painkillers, order my next $8000 dollar Dell, while filling out my government cheese request, and talking to my rabbi why I can’t find the perfect man — man, did I say man, I meant woman, yah, that’s it woman — darn those meds….

Real Life MMO Characters

Disclaimer: All names are pure concoctions, its their personalities that are real: believe it or not.

Josh, Fizzlegiggle Tizzletops, the emoter, thirty-something guy who plays the off-the-wall classes, that no one else wants to play, but often critical to group mechanics. Josh is the player who just loves using his emotes at the end of every battle and chest drop. He plays the dancers, the cook, cabin boy, the grease fitter, or seamstress. Josh spends more time researching and implementing the craziest emotes one could imagine – his gear and skills are all underpowered but man he can shake his ass and do head stands until the dragons come home.

Greg, the Griefer, Henderson — a guy who has been stepped on all his life and finds nothing more pleasurable than to grief all groups of players. This sadistic fiend will sneak his 100th level assassin into a newbie zone and constantly challenge new players to duels – often under the cloak of some role-playing flag. He finds great pleasure in training hordes of mobs onto unsuspecting groups; and his favorite tactic is finding items with nearly identical names of rare finds, then rob unsuspecting shoppers with such audacious gimmicks. He has the best the world can offer, but all gained through nefarious exploits. He lives in a shadowed world awry with his own logic and twisted view of reality – never understanding why he can’t find acceptance among his fellow gamers.

Gary, the Righteous-Ninja-Looting-Paladin. He is the guy, who if you are unlucky enough to group with, will ninja loot every single drop in the game and explain that he as use for the item on one of his many alternate characters. Gary invariably plays righteous, noble, and moralistic classes like paladins, clerics, jedi, or knights – yet will rob you blind and screw you out of every single copper coin he can get his mealy hands on. Gary will whine and waffle on about how he never gets anything good, yet when you examine him he has legendary and epic gear that you only dream off – his response is that is that he has friends that have gear that makes his look like newbie crap.

Mitch the Malcontent, a forty-five year old family man with wife and kids, a great job, and rosy income yet everything sucks: the game sucks, the company sucks, the world sucks, just everything sucks. No matter how good the experience is, it sucks….no matter what kind of loot is found, that sucks too. Talk of where the game is heading and how the development of new expansions ends with Mitch forcasting its demise, and that sucks as well. Mitch just brings everyone down with his low balling stories of getting screwed, and how in the end, the Man is just grubbin’ you into the ground.

Thanksgiving Sci-Fi Marathon 2011

So as the holiday approaches, I am thinking of repeating my Labor Day Sci Fi marathon. What to choose?

I will be accessing most of my content via the Netflix streaming so what should I try? Should I keep to my favorites and watch something I know will enjoy, or should I venture into new ground.

I will update this entry this week, listing all the great movies and classics that I can find on Netflix.

First movie to launch the marathon: Super 8 — a classic story of youth and aliens.  Great story with many inspiring and funny moments.

Next: Way of the Warrior — Solid but often over used story of mystical martial arts set in the 1850s of psuedo-western style America.  Great fight scenes, but sketchy story and ridiculous dialogue.

Decided to try Hellboy next. I heard it was good, but didn’t know how good.  What a great movie for sci-fi and fantasy fans. It has it all: magic, technology, multiverse, fighting, and a bit of a love story.  Great!

While fixing dinner and putting up the Christmas tree, I turned on Star Trek The Animated Series. I remember it as a boy, and it holds up surprisingly well for a cheap animated show.  If you never have watched it, take some time to watch various episodes!

Sadly the weekend is over and the Thanksgiving Sci-Fi Marathon goes into the history books.  Overall, I was very surprised at the shows I watched.  I would have liked to watched more movies, but gaming and family obligations got in the way.  Next year, I plan on having a bigger, larger, more massive marathon.

Updated Blog

As I try to better represent myself, as well as my ideas in Gaming, History, and print I have made some recent changes to the Emerald Tablet.  Please take note of some additional and modified tabs at the top, most specifically “Other Writing” to which I added my novel for easy reference. I have also significantly updated my “Troy Christensen” tab with a number of cover images from my games over the years as well as a listing of all my credits.  I also will be making two new additional entries into my Civ 4: Mod tab, as I am releasing a new version of Extreme2 and my reformatted mod Multiverse.

I hope you will return to the site regularly, as I update the blog on a weekly basis trying to add in new original content on my thoughts, aspirations, and ideas on gaming and history.

As always, I am looking for opportunities in Publishing, History, Gaming, and Print Production and would be interested in talking with anyone about such endeavors.

Troy Christensen

September 14th, 2011

Osprey Opens Their Art Library

I am not big at posting videos on the Emerald Tablet; I believe I did it once before for a huge dinosaur puppet, but this is just such an incredible offer that I cannot but post it here. For all the modders, gamers, academics, students, and history aficionados out there this new offer from Osprey is just so cool.

Signing up for their services allows you access to all their art assets from over the last 40 years. Gone are the days of hunting endlessly for an Image of a T-34 Calliope or a Hurricane Fighter or even a Greek Phalanx! For a small membership fee, you have access to all this art.

As a modder, I know I will use this in endless iterations of new mods. As a student, this will be an incredible addition to papers and research. I too know that as a student, professors need a lot of help in creating presentions — come on guys in the new millennium, ditch the photocopied old maps and use these!

Endless….Endless possibilities

Simply fantastic!!

Black Keep of Serpent Lake

One of the few published Phantasm Adventure modules. The only other official module was called the Maldake Adventure. The Black Keep of Serpent Lake was published in 1988 by Dai Nippon Kaiga, the Japanese publisher of the game.

I cannot remember much about the game, and sadly the English version has been lost in time. It do remember writing a number of module packs for the game, but do not remember having a lot of contact with Dai Nippon Kaiga after the game was published.

I am still in negoitations with the Dai Nippon Kaiga and another Japanese game company about re-printing the game. If you would like to see another print, I ask you to write Dai Nippon Kaiga and express your interest: takagim@kaiga.co.jp

Thoughts on Civilization IV Modding

So, as I sit here on the cusp of ending two development cycles at the same time, I can look back at the two and clearly see the direction I am going on both.  As with any mod for Civilization IV, it is always hypothetical game of chances, what if’s, and possibilities. With that said, however, I wanted to create two different kinds of games with the mods.  The first mod was born in the early days of my modding experience and included some rather fanciful stuff, while the second mod was based more on more or less realistic boundaries.  I preface that phrase knowing all to well that the game itself lends to weird possibilities such as Lincoln with long bows, Hitler with the jets, or even Solomon with a tactical nuke — that is just the game.

In the first mod, ExtremeMod, I decided to rename it so that it better represents the game at large. Drawing from my RPG of the 1990s, I gave it the name Multiverse.  Rightfully so, it is full of magic, steampunk technology, dinosaurs, psionics, weird technologies, and endless combination of the bizarre.  I also wanted to make the game a resource battle, and thus I placed almost every item and building on the need of owning a particular resource. I also created at least 30 new resources and the appropriate technology and improvements to support it.  Multiverse will grow in the coming years, if I have the chance, to be the pinnacle of fantasy design with new player cultures  (such as the elves, amazons, dwarves, dark forces, and perhaps even a zombie king). It will also have new units, technologies, and experiences.

In my second mod, I wanted to create a game that had a rich source of Unique Units and Buildings, drawing on history to recreate some of the greatest technologies and wonders.  It is not necessarily about having specific resources, but more about experiencing all the different cultures and civilizations in the game.  There are some aspects of the game, most notably combustion units, that require a specific resource (oil), but for the most part it is open to building anything with the minimal number of resources.  This game so far has proven great fun in play testing and I hope the game will continue to grow with new UUs and UBs.   I am finishing up the second test phase of latter half game play, basically starting after the Renaissance.

I also want to specfically thank the designer known as Tsentom for provided me with such a great base to design my game. I love what you have added and have learned so much from you.  I have never met the guy, nor even had a correspondence with him, but feel indebted to him. It has been a scant year since I started modding for the game and I have learned so much — I wonder what another year will hold for me.

Troy

August 21, 2011