Relocated to Tyria

Yes, it's been a long, long while...

Almost three months since I've spent any significant time in LOTRO... two of those months spent with work travel, summer vacations, and a small Skyrim mod project.  Then there's been the last 25 days...

It's been almost a month now since I started playing Guild Wars 2. I started on launch day, and now, nearly 300 hrs later, I've finally managed to come up out of the Tyrian air, for a blog update.

I have to say up front - WOW - it takes a lot to impress me with something more than LOTRO, but this game may just have done it! I have to admit, that I tried the game on a whim, most intrigued by the pre-release concept art that began floating around the internet a while ago.  I'm a visual person, and love beautiful digital art - games being one medium which makes great use of digital art, often for my personal enjoyment.  It is one of the many reasons that I have stuck with LOTRO for so many years, but recently I've just not been impressed with the direction of the game, and found myself easily distracted with other pursuits like Skyrim, and more recently GW2.

To all my friends and fans still in LOTRO, I did pre-purchase RoR a while back, so when that content "finally" releases, I will probably stick my head back into the game to say "hi", level up a bit and test some of the new content, and maybe spend some time giving some of my accumulated wealth and goodies away...

But I think I've found my new home for a while, and that home is in Tyria.  You can join me on the Fergueson's Crossing server, look me up "Sarharien" in-game, a member of [PIZA] Pizza Delivery Guild.  I hope to see some of you there!

Sarharien the Sylvari in Pictures

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, so here are 59,000 "visual words" expressing my adventure from humble beginnings, to a max-level 80 character.  Not everything I've experienced is shown below, just some of the highlights where I remembered to press the PrtScr button. ;)

Before I go further, a small bit of info about my system specifications:  Windows 7 Home Premium; 8GB RAM; 64bit O/S; Intel i7 2.8GHz CPU; NVIDIA GeForce GTX 560; ViewSonic VX2250.  I also play the game on reasonably high settings as shown below:

59 Reasons making it hard for me to justify returning to LOTRO

I will also try to share just a few of the reasons captured in these pictures, that make it difficult for me to justify returning to a monthly, subscription-based MMO, when all this yumminess is available to me for a single-purchase price of $60...

An easy-to-use and learn UI, which maximizes the screen for the visualization of the world.

 

A nice selection of cosmetic choices for each armor class, and a fun (RED) dye system that requires discovery.

Interesting characters and companions along the way... frogs, plant-people (like me), and crazy Asura...

Numerous "public" events that spawn all over the zones, encouraging player group participation for a common goal.

Here's more than a dozen of us escorting a pack mule of cargo for some farmers.

Did I mention beautiful armors and RED dye? Not to mention details in the scenery...

Some friends from LOTRO (like Orgee) have joined me on Fergueson's Crossing server...

A number of opportunities during questing to find yourself turned into something new... in this case, a Minotaur!

Underwater adventures and battles... this is my pet shark, "Sharkbaitoohaha" ;)

Incredible vistas and view distances which smoothly update into further detail as you approach them, all with little to no frame rate impact (at least for me there isn't).

Sub-plot storylines and NPC interactions that you can pursue outside the main questline - some will make you cry!

Pirate hats, aaaarrrgh!

Opportunities to bow-flame the crap out of wargs.  Always a good past-time ;)  (Sorry, Kyoku! lol)

Beautifuly rendered skies, clouds, moons, grass, ground cover...

Hilarious storyline adventures (and multiple choices depending on your race, profession, etc.) - oh, and TANKS!

Cute girls with big swords, completely ignoring their God-given common sense to dress appropriately for cold weather. >.<

Dungeon battles with crazy bosses...

More dungeon battles with pretty ghosty-girls who won't listen to reason, and have to die.

NPCs with my kinda style - big, redheaded, and an attitude of "shoot first, ask questions later".  ;)

Chances to break out the dance moves in public... with some people maybe going a bit too far... hehe.

Colourful beach battles with big fishes.

Scolding sessions with dead big fishes about letting go of my pet jellyfish now that the battle is over.

Did I mention chances to being turned into other random creatures, like a pink Moa?

Friends who know how to bust a move as a pirate (go Kyoku!)

Beautiful and detailed main-story characters (eyes to the CENTER of the frame, gentlemen...)

Mega-boss and champion boss battle events that kick off a few times a day in various map locations (in this case, the megadestroyer in the middle of a volcano!)

Cross-server PVP with purpose!  20-100 players per side massive castle/keep battles to earn points every hour and conquer four separate map areas.  Strategy, supplies, siege weapons, and remembering to heal downed teammates all come into play.

Another view of a World-vs-World (WvW), server-vs-server-vs-server PVP match.  Our team of about 30 is working to breakdown a gate to a keep so we can capture it.

Another dynamic public event battle with a Champion boss.

A chance to recover from fatal wounds before having to respawn at a waypoint - great game functionality!

Simple to learn and understand "bleed/condition" system, where various attacks and skills you have can put DoTs on targets or combine for special attacks with other players' skills and conditions.

REALLY big girls (a Norn in this case), with pretty dresses and fancy face masks.

Polite NPCs that welcome you into their home...

...only to turn on you later during the latter part of a dungeon.

Sarcastic, ironic, humerous, and creative NPC chatter to entertain all over the world of Tyria.

Cute little Asura friends like Jesse, who will carry around a bucket of water for you, just so you never go thirsty!  :P  (Doesn't he look so cute you could just stuff him into your pocket?!)

Other friends who just take their professions a bit too seriously (Josh), but in their defence, craft some pretty amazing stuff!

Sadly, some friends won't listen to reason, and have to learn their crafting professions the hard way... "Brandic, you've left the gas running a while now - might want to wait a few minutes before lighting a match... Brandic?  Are you listening?"

Nope.  Oh well, anyone for overdone mutton steaks?  Just pick yours up around town... literally - they're all over the ground.

Battles in the frozen lands of the north.

Skill points to earn all over Tyria.

Oooh, warrior princess statue!

Chances to care for little woodland creatures like this fluffy, big-arse bunny (whom later you will probably end up killing for no other reason than to get an achievement for offing 1,000 helpless woodland creatures).

Guild armor and guild backpacks that display your guild's logo (in this case, a beer mug on a RED background, because we all know Pizza and Beer go together!)

Every game has its glitches... in this case, half a deer stuck in the ground...

Friendly spirits willing to pose for photos... "That will be 50 copper please."

Some cool armor choices from cultural and special vendors.

Friends that know you love red, and are willing to show off for the camera (blast those photo-bombers!)

DRAGONS! Run!

Beautiful dresses... some even seem to be magically embued with the ability to defy gravity while gravitating the eyes.

Friends who still love you after you throw them into a fire pit.

Trolls to hate.  Trolls to shoot.  Trolls that stomp you with their boot.

An amazingly talented art department that goes all-out in nearly every zone in the game.

Cheeky pirate ghosts that torment you with puzzles and mazes, only to award you with crap loot while laughing at you.

Did I mention an impressive cosmetic/armour system?  Certainly not all the choices and flexibility that LOTRO provides, but its a great start that still allows for a huge amount of customization, colouring, and choice.

Friends that will hug a pole for you.

Crazy jumping puzzles!

And I mean CRAZY (this one SHAKES every few seconds, making it really hard to concentrate and make the jumps).

DRAGONS!  Quite a few of them that you end up battling in 3-4 zones during your story quest and various daily public events.  They're huge, painful, spawn dozens of ads, and typically require 30-50 players to burn them down.

Cows that fall in love with you... (awkward)

Guildmates that you fall in love with (I'm a sucker for a big brawny teddybear in heavy armor that protects me while questing, even if he runs on a "Sar-speed" higher than I do - lol).

Guild backpack armor :)

I am a bird!  A crazed-attack-frenzied-bird!

My own singing quartet - "Sar and the Lizardz"

Where's the beef?  Oh wait... that's me!  No one say "hamburger" right now... I'm trying to chew my cudd.

Knowing that just as in RL, there's still some buxom blonde that's more top-heavy than I am... hopefully she distracts the boys long enough for me to swipe some good loot ;)

INCREDIBLE interior detailing... this is just one of the NPC houses... and although housing isn't "yet" implemented in game, if they can pull off options like this place for our player houses, I will be colour-me-impressed!

At the end of the day, my biggest joy is still the comraderie of friends in the guild.  :)  Say cheese!
Thanks to Shadow, Kyoku, Valldos and Macasa for clearing another dungeon with me!

Sarharien's other things I love about GW2 over LOTRO:

• Amazing visual world - every zone is unique, every zone has amazing details, NPC clothing, landscape, jumping puzzles, and all with very little impact on frame rate and gameplay performance.  When you see how amazing it is, and how detailed, AND that it's hosting a large MMO player base, it makes you wonder how games like WOW and LOTRO have managed to stick around this long.  IMHO graphic quality of this game just doesn't compare to the competition, it blows them away.
• Public cooperative events - randomly but regularly occuring events that spawn throughout each region, are broadcasted to nearby players, encouraging greater participation and help for one another.  Add to that some pretty large XP and Karma gains, and they really make it worthwhile to spend 5-15 minutes on.
• Down-levelling in zones - this is one of my most enjoyable features in this game.  If I'm level 80, but head back into one of the L1-15 starter zones, I'm immediately down-levelled to L13-15 while I'm there.  Although I retain all my skills and armour bonuses, I don't one-shot everything in sight (mobs, especially veterans and champs are still challenging), and I still gain XP while running around lower-level zones!
• No node ninjas! - Every resource node in game is rendered per user, so eventhough everyone "sees" the same tree or ore vein, when they all rush in to harvest, everyone gets the resource!  This is an awesome feature, as it ensures that everyone can find things to use for crafting, and also encourages players to help one another... "Hey, I can't find any Gold - where is that again?" (people respond in global chat, because they're not loosing out by sharing!).
• A discoverable/craftable colour-dye system for armor/clothing - dyes are consumables that can be found on mob drops or can be bought in the auction/trade house.  Some are common, some rare, and some ultra-hard to find.  You can choose to keep and use the ones you want, and sometimes sell others for a pretty penny (or gold or two!).
• Exploring rewarded and encouraged - *HUGE* - I love to explore worlds in MMOs, and one of the most frustrating things with LOTRO, is how frequently invisible walls are put up to prevent and discourage players from climbing around on things.  In GW2, exploration is encouraged across all lands and maps.  There are (at this point) 31 known jumping puzzles located in Tyria, which encourage the extreme end of exploring.  Add to that hundreds of "vistas" which are special locations you typically have to climb up to, which earn you a "world exploration" point, and give you a breathtaking view of the land around you (often revealing hidden secrets in the little movies that play when you reach them).
• Great achievement system - able to earn daily and monthly repeatable achievements for extra XP and Karma, plus many one-off achievements (like kill 1,000 harmless creatures - I picked on bunnies, because after watching Monty Python, little white bunnies that live out amidst monsters and trolls, just make me nervous).
• Busy and talkative NPCs - there are lots of NPCs out in the world, the cities actually feel like midieval cities (sure they're not Tokyo-crowded, but it's a good balance). Many of them will interact with you, give you hints and tips about things within the game, and some when you talk to them, will even kick off random dynamic events!  Always talk to everyone you come across is my rule of thumb!
• A cow-launcher - Yep, I said it - a COW launcher.  You can even go for a ride in it to achieve one of the "vista" map discovery locations, if you know how to sweet-talk the NPCs that run the machine.  ;)
• Once you reach max-level 80, XP gains are still important - Unlike many other MMOs, when you hit max level in GW2, you still gain XP.  Every time you "complete" a level bar of XP at max-level, you gain a skill point.  Skill points are critical items needed to buy exotic and legendary crafting recipie items.  All this means that it's still viable to run around, work at completing your entire map achievement, help in low and high zones, re-run dungeons and content with lower-level guild friend ALTs, and keep earning those skill points.
• Large-scale PVP (called World-vs-World in GW2) with purpose - it's pretty much a glorified capture-the-flag-and-hold-it-for-points type of landscape in WvW, but it has defined goals that are achievable, a varied landscape (battle across 4 separate zones all for the overall points awarded between 3 different server teams that change every week).  The Moors has never impressed me in LOTRO - it was okay about 18 months ago, when there was a large population out there on both sides that actually tried to "do" something, but even then, it never remained viable for long - it still came down to a competitive environment where everyone was trying to earn their own achievement points for armor/status/whatever.  In GW2 you're encouraged to play cooperatively, not solo - keeps and castles require coordination, supplies, seige weapons and large groups to overcome.  Smaller supply depots can be ninja'd by smaller groups of 3-6 players (often hiding out and waiting for the enemy zerg ball to pass them by).  Everything contributes to points for your server - and more points, means more class/profession based rewards that apply to you back in PVE.  Add to that the fact that 100% world map exploration requires you to fully explore the PVP locations, and you end up with an ever-busy environment that can be different each time you log on.
• An active, friendly Twitter and Support Staff crew - enough can't be said about the friendly, patient and often humerous Twitter and Support Staff that GW2 is blessed with.  They do a very good job of keeping the player base informed of changes, patches, crashes, work-in-progress, hacking attempts, and ban-hammer situations.  They're vocal, passionate, and working hard to make and keep GW2 a great player game.

When everything isn't roses, lollipops and sunshine...

I will be the first to admit, that not everything in GW2 runs perfectly or smoothly.  There's been plenty of hiccups along the way: an auction house that still doesn't seem fully stable 100% of the time (but is way better now than last few weeks); glitches with some skill points and events across a few zones that are still being addressed; annoying fee imbalances with things like repairs, fast-travel and the auction house (you loose 15% on everything you sell there, and many ppl dont realize that and post things way under priced not realizing they loose money with every sale, and prevent you from making any profit); issues with some exploration areas being temporarily broken (and thus disabled); immensely difficult dungeons presently, due to an over-reaction to "speed farmers" (we're all hoping this gets brought back to a reasonable level so as to be achievable consistently); cosmetic clothing limitations (currently mostly $$ store based; you can't just wear armor as a cosmetic; you can't use armor cosmetically that is outside your class); insane mob re-spawn rates and large agro zones in the higher L80 zones (kill one mob, move to the next one, and by the time you're half-way done on mob #2, mob #1 has spawned and agro'd on you too); the painful accumulation of wealth (this is a game to play SMART and not spend money unnecessarily... eg. avoid excessive crafting until you can afford it; maximize use of craft XP boosts; minimize use of TP auction house for small-value items; vendor all your trash for coin; avoid waypoint travel if you can).

My recommendation to all GW2 players - avoid the General Discussion GW2 forums. There is a painfully high number of whiners/trolls/QQers posting ridiculous crap in that section of the forums (and to some degree in most of the other forum areas), and frankly they should all just keep their oppinions to themselves, and leave the game if they're not happy.  Guild Wars 2 is not GW1, it's not LOTRO, not WoW, not EVE, and makes no attempt to say that it is.

This game is very different than many other MMOs that you may have played - you need to come into it with an open mind, with an appreciation for the things the game does well, and the direction and intent that it's development staff is taking.  Doing that, will result in a higher level of appreciation and contentment within the game.  As always with change in our lives, be prepared to come into the game with a resonable degree of patience.  This game encourages collaboration with other players/strangers - not everything is designed nor intended to be "soloed" - expect to need to work with others, and enjoy doing so!

However, inspite of these minor frustrations (and other issues not popping to mind atm), I still find myself enjoying GW2 thoroughly, even a week and a half after hitting max level.  There are tons of things I haven't yet done on my main character (need to finish exploring the WvW zones and L80 content before I'll have 100% map completion; I am still missing about 20 of the jumping puzzles; still haven't fought each of the 4 available dragon events), and I've also started a second character with a different race and profession, so I can experience a different version of the storyline quests.

Wishing all my fellow Dwarrowdelfians a wonderful time in LOTRO, and hoping that maybe I'll bump into a few of you in GW2 now and then!  (Plus, when RoR launches, I will be sure to come back for a little while to say "hi" and pass out some yummies!)

Sarharien the Red Sylvari
>>--------> Still red, still carrying a bow, still shooting everything I can.