This weekend I have been mostly playing…..

Ive decided that every Monday will be this post.  This weekend I have been mostly playing: Lord of the Rings Online.

 

Since the free week we had a while back ive been pottering about Middle Earth a little.  As I said to Mrs B “Theres nothing actually wrong with the game, I never got burnt out with it, I just moved on to other games I had my eye on.  It seems to be the game I turn to when I get burn out from OTHER games.

 

Well the recent stoppage in playing has basically come about as im finding WAR less fun than I wanted it to be.  My subs have lapsed and will be staying that way unless something takes my fancy.  Again theres nothing WRONG with WAR really, if im in the guild group for RvR its fun, ill let it settle down a little then play some more I think.
Anyway back to LOTRO.  Having stopped before Moria was released I am a little behind the curve so to speak, I stopped with my Guardian at 46!  Well some mad levelling skills and a purchase of the Moria expansion now puts me close to 51.  The world itself is what keeps me hooked in Middle Earth, I love Tolkein.

 

So this weekend I managed to get Mrs B to play!  We dinged her Minstrel 44 and fired out some of the fellowship quests before she turned to make an RK last night.  I thought RK was the best way to entice her back and it seems to be working she hit level 10 in about an hour! That’s quick! I remade my champion and it mustve taken me 2 days to get that, maybe because I get distracted by anything shiny and run off to look at it though who knows.

 

The tank rot has set in with me again though.  I remember when I first started LOTRO I spent a little time umming over a champion or a guardian.  I picked Guardian.  I wish now I went for champ.  Right now I don’t think I have the want to tank again.  I play games to get away from stress and pressure.  If you need to know the instance inside and out to tank then is it fun?  Part of me says yes as you are still playing the game and tanking is actually (in my eyes) easier than anything else.  With a simple tank and spank mob you literally grab aggro, turn the mob and tank.  That’s it!  DPS needs to worry about tail swipes, cleaves etc but not me, as long as im doing ym job then fine.

But having to know the instance inside out is what gets me, I hate that feeling of not wanting to tank anything for anyone as I don’t want to make one mistake and be labelled a bad tank.

I think the test for me on this will be the 3 man instances, we can go in around 51/52 so if I can get Huns minstrel up then we can play with an old Kin mate who is about to see how my tanking goes.

 

So Mrs B hit 44 and 10

I hit 50 and 15.

 

Also hit Grand Master Farmer, just Supreme to go, no real point to it but it’s a good distraction.

Its Like Herding Cats!

The above is a term which is banded about a fair bit when talking about leading a PUG warband.  I have had some pain when IN a warband but have really refrained from leading one due to this fact.

 

Last night I logged into WAR and joined the alliance only warband who was busy pushing for zone locks.  We managed to take down Shining Way and we began to work on Reikland.  All of a sudden the WB leader disconnected and couldn’t get back in.  “You are now leader of the warband”  awwwww crap.

 

However it was actually ok, people listened, I shoved down waypoints in WARCommander and led our warband for a flank attack on an Order controlled Battle Objective which we eventually took from the warband defending.

 

We pushed into Reikwald but time was getting on for me so I had to leave them to it.  I hope we did smash Altdorf yesterday as we had all 3 forts going at once at one point.  Defence at Reikwald seemed light.

 

I also managed to push myself into Master Farmer on LOTRO, I really like the farming as a bit of a time waster, if you have 10 mins you can easily farm a field whilst reading the internet or listening to a podcast.  Its great.

 

Plan for today will be to totally finish the master level and maybe some more RvR in WAR.

Artisan Farmer!

Not a lot was going on in WAR last night, plus I was coming off early to go watch the Deadliest Warrior on TV so I spent a little time in LOTRO raising my farming skill.

I really like the crafting in LOTRO, its not as involved as some but it’s a lot better than most games.  In the case of farming I got some seeds, some water and some fertiliser and headed over to the farm fields.  First you must grow your crop, once done you harvest it.  Most of the time you will get usable crops and unusable crops.  The usuable you turn into the end product, the unusable you turn back into seeds…. What a cool system!

I pretty much always make a provisioner character of some description whenever I play these games and my guardian was no different.

I spent the evening growing Onions and managed to finish my whole level out and become an Artisan farmer, next up are Strawberry fields which I need special water and fertiliser for, methinks ill need to research where to get that from, ill try Bree.

 

Depending on whats happening in game ill either be playing WAR or LOTRO tonight, I would quite like to raise my crafting skills even further, but if theres RvR on the agenda then ill be doing that.

 

Rock on peeps.

Lack of updates due to holiday!

I had two weeks off of work and didn’t find the time to update any of this, well now is the time.

 

I rejoined The Merry Men briefly but have recently disbanded the guild completely.  Most of the TMM guys joined Rage another alliance guild. I was lucky enough to be offered co-GM of Rage so took the opportunity and so Hun and I both joined. I ran in a guild group last night for RvR and it was the most FUN ive had in Warhammer for a good while.  Group was: Zealot, Zealot, Chosen(Me), Blackguard, Sorc, Choppa.  Most of the time I was floating swapping guard amongst the squishies, once they were secure id join the train and we would drop targets.  AWESOME FUN!  This is what its all about.

 

Rage also left our old alliance, it was slowly growing stagnant and we all knew it was at an end, my only hope is that Delirium can find their way to this alliance too as they are the other main guild that was alive and I love those guys.

 

 

I have also resubbed to LOTRO and bought Moria.  It’s a great fun game, and im happily levelling my artefact weapon things.  It still looks as good as ever and I do enjoy it a lot.  Right now though im trying to find the best time to play as im now more engrossed in WAR.  I think the best bet is to play for a little when I get in then settle down after the kids are in bed for WAR.

 

Ill hopefully update more often now im back at work, I really should do this from home when I get in so I can include screens… ah well.

TMG in Afghanistan: Day 80

Hi guys, after getting in from work last night I didnt even go out onto the internet, I just couldnt pull myself out of bed hahahaha.

Well today is the market day again which means I can go and get some more DVDs which are by far and away the biggest expenditure for me out here, if anyone wants to send me some more then please feel free haha. 

On to some gaming talk now and namely: When does LOTRO get fun?

The question posed above was what someone put into a search engine and found my blog.  Obviously this person is struggling to find the “fun” in LOTRO.
Now just in case others start to ask the same question ill put a couple of answers.  LOTRO in itself is “fun” in its entirety if you are a massive tolkein fan as I am.  Every little detail will have you giggling with delight.  However if you are trying to sever an addiction to another major MMO (WoW??) and you arent really “up” with the lore of midlde earth you may struggle.  What a lot of players seem to forget is that the journey is fun itself, take time to READ the quests and allow yourself to get immersed in the story, dont jsut click through them all for the “phat” rewards.

LOTRO is a great game dont get me wrong, the only reason im not playing it right now is the fact that im a huge Warhammer fan also and cant dedicate my time to both.  However now and again ill resub for a month and have a blast playing it again.  It really is great fun.

So apart from Jingly market there wont be much else to do, the power is due to go off soon so it will be a short day because of that.  Hope you all out there take it easy and enjoy your weekend!

Day 40 Update: My Gaming Future?!

(TMG in Afghan post to follow later on!)

 

Having been forced away from gaming due to my Op Tour it gives me a lot of time to surf the internet and make decisions on my gaming future so I figured it would be a good time to write down where I think im going in the next year with gaming.

 

World of Warcraft

With Wrath being out maybe a week before I came out I had a small time to play and even did the Nexus once.  Im still semi interested in WoW and will most likely take my Warrior to 80 and perhaps my DK but recently its not been the game which is really keeping my interest.  At least by the time I go home the expansion will have been out for a while and things will have settled in regards talents, raiding and instances.  I do not know if I will be playing WoW as much as I was though.

 

Everquest 2

Im yet to try TSO but ill take a peek at it when I come home for some R&R in January but at the moment it seems that this will be my “raiding” game.  I can only really focus on raiding in one game at a time anyway so might as well make it EQ2.  Ill have to step back and take a look at what I want to do with myself in EQ2 regards raiding but a decision will be made in March.

 

LOTRO

Moria has come out and although LOTRO does have a special place in my heart, I really cant see myself spending much time in Middle Earth, the game isn’t bad, it just doesn’t hold my attention as much as it should.  It doesn’t matter that everytime I actually do play LOTRO I say how great it is, I still end up stopping.

 

Warhammer Online

I left this one to last as its my current game that im getting into.  Yes I played it way too much during beta including powering two characters to level cap in order to test T4, come release I was burnt out, big time, I couldn’t find the drive to play the game due to it being the same as before.

However I think this break will do good for me, once I get back I think that WAR will be my “Main Game”  This means the majority of my time will be spent here with raiding done in EQ2.  My goals are to try out the Blackguard and if they suit my style of play then get one to 40.  My Chosen is my next choice.

 

Well there we have it, a fast MMO roundup, decisions made are to play WAR and EQ2.  Ill have to see if I can rope Mrs B into dropping EQ2 a bit for WAR, I doubt it 😛

Halp! I have no internetz!!

Been a massive delay in posts from me but its due to a couple of reasons.  One being that as I reported a while back, im being sent to Afghanistan soon and ive been busy busy sorting all the courses and training.
Also! we are moving house!!  With Mrs Borgio having kid number two on the way the good old military is letting us have a 3 bedroom house.  So whilst ive been away on a course Mrs Borgio, supported by many friends and family, has moved us in.  Apparently its a nice place, Ill be home today to look at it (writing this from where my course is)

Only bad thing about moving is that the british telephone and internet companies are CRAP!  Its going to take around a week to connect the phone and another week for the broadband……. FUCKING TWO WEEKS WITHOUT INTERNET!  Im going to die…..

So anyway what have I been doing with my time?  Well mostly WoW.  Raided Black Temple on my Warlock for some experience but as usual with WoW, once ive had a break away from it I cannot be bothered to come back.  Im back to full time GMing the guild again and it really does suck the fun out sometimes.  I play games to enjoy myself, but sometimes its just not fun.  Levelling doing little instances is fun.  Organising a months worth of raids, dealing with problems with forum access and dkp problems… not fun!

So where will I go from here?  I will probably not step down, ill keep doing the GM thing, but I think I might cut back my raiding.  Only hit a couple of times a week.  This way it gives me time to do other things.  Such as hit cap in LOTRO (got 45 yay) play some more EQ2, play Conan when its released..

There is so much id like to do, but its that small leash tying me to WoW that is stopping me. But trying to cut that leash is like trying to pull off your own arm.  It doesnt matter how hard you try because in the end you stop cause it hurts.  Nothing against wow but the game in intself is shallow in what you can do once you get to the “dizzy heights” of a raider.  Im at the stage where I can only progress myself by raiding.  Alts are a bore (I have 3 level 70’s and a 66) so what can I do? Rediscover the fun.

Who knows where I will go.  If I had the willpower and the wanting to quit then it would be a delete to all my characters.  But with WotLK around the corner, I am at least a little compelled to see it.

Ill end with a quote: 

I know you’re out there. I can feel you now. I know that you’re afraid… you’re afraid of us. You’re afraid of change. I don’t know the future. I didn’t come here to tell you how this is going to end. I came here to tell you how it’s going to begin. I’m going to hang up this phone, and then I’m going to show these people what you don’t want them to see. I’m going to show them a world without you. A world without rules and controls, without borders or boundaries. A world where anything is possible. Where we go from there is a choice I leave to you.

A choice I leave to myself………..

Update on Life, the Universe and Everything (Game Related)

February!!!  well nearly the END of February to be exact. A few different things have been happening lately both in my personal life and in game!

I see my last update was to say SSC 5/6.  Well ill just add that we did kill Vashj and Alar leaving just Kael’thas to go but then the guild split.  One guy rebelled and took the rest of the guild with him leaving roughly 10 or so active people in Aeternitas.

Whilst this was happening, Mrs Borgio and I were without internet so we didn’t witness any of it. We didn’t have net as we were moving house!  Im UK Military and got moved roughly an hour away from where I was.  Net is sorted now and its lovely.
However now we are in a pretty much crappy situation WoW wise, im GM again, which is nice, of a guild capable of clearing SSC and TK, but we just don’t have the numbers any more.

Recruitment is a bad thing as, at the moment, people are waiting on the new patch which removes BT and MH attunements.  What this means for guilds in our position is that nobody cares and they will wait for the attunements to be removed then just apply to large guilds already in there.

WoW talk over!!!!

  

What else have I been doing then?  Well actually revisiting a lot of my other MMOs the main one being Lord of the Rings Online.  It has always had a place in my heart but the WoW addiction always used to drag us back to it.  This time however we are making serious headway.  The thing about LOTRO is that it is just pure fun, theres no pressure to raid, no pressure for anything, we can just log on and have a ball.  SO right now I have my Guardian at 44 and Mrs Borgio has her Minstrel at 41.  The new Angmar helped a lot with that. Hopefully we will be able to get another level before the weekend.

Vanguard didn’t hold our attention for long and I cant for the life of me remember why, I think it was because the PC I was using at the time made it unplayable, well since ive rebuilt then it might be time to try it again, ill see if Stargrace is still knocking around and say hi, I miss our chats in the bloggers channel. I might patch this tonight and take a look around, im almost sure it was the PC issue which stopped us.

EQ2 is also back in my sights, managed to patch up and log in the other night but did nothing more than the valentines quest and “attempt” to kill some mobs.  I say attempt because ZOMG have mobs been buffed? Or have Zerks been nerfed.  A simple WHITE con was taking me down to 50% hp before it died…. Im not rusty at the zerk, far from it, but that was insane.  I pulled two mobs and died!  More research needed on this methinks. The epic weapons have also been put into EQ2 which is a massive pull for me.  Being in a casual raiding guild it gives me a lot of time to work on the first steps of it since we aren’t raiding the high stuff just yet.

Talking about the Epic weapons there seems to be a lot of chat about the Berserker epic, and after reading the comments I can kind of see where they are coming from.  The main thing about the weapon is that it turns all attacks into AOE.  Which seems like a nice boost to the Zerks niche, AOE tanking but its true what has been written, it doesn’t help when 4 orange cons are mezzed and then you wade in and break it!   In comparison the Guardians epic is just that, EPIC.  There main thing is the immunity to RIPOSTE (WTF) and the removal of shield requirements, so yes, they can use buckler reversal with a TOWER SHIELD.  If this doesn’t make a whole new Swathe of Zerks betray I don’t know what will.  I kinda wonder what plans SOE have for zerks, cause at the moment they are being nerfed into the ground.

DARN IT!

WoW is starting to suck me back in again, I really want to cut away from it but my wife is still an avid player.  Im not even sure what I want from it anymore.  I try to kid myself that I am having fun but im really not.  I handed over the guild leadership as I said I would, but in that instant it sucked me right back in.

I think I might know what it is I am missing, the cameraderie.  I think I like MMOs which I can jump in to, have some fun with friends and just generally enjoy the game.  WoW does not do that for me anymore, seeing content which will not further my character at all (as WoW is at the moment) is no fun for me.

But theres the problem all over again. How to stop my addiction to this ball of suck.  I need to go cold turkey and find a new game but I cant do it if my wife is still playing, still raiding, its taken over her life even more than mine but she is too blind to see it.  All I can think to do is to transfer my chars off their current server, that pretty much stops me raiding with my friends.  But im a chicken shit, I cant do that to myself, cant delete them either.  Only saving grace is that my subs run out in November, but what is there to stop me simply starting it up again.

WoW WAS a good game, but I think I need to get myself out again, I was doing SO well! Now im addicted… sort of again.  Writing this blog really opens my eyes as to what im doing, I mean I was raiding last night, and was going to tonight, but now im signing out.  I need to find something else to do!  Subs I have are LOTRO which is fun and I should play, WAR (cant say anything about it atm sorry) EQ2 which is great fun, but I need to find the right guild, one which is talkative and fun, and CASUAL.  maybe on another server who knows. And a couple of random games ill prolly never play again.

I think I know what my problem is with a lot of games… they are more fun when played with OTHER PEOPLE!!!  Shock horror!!  I remember in DAoC finding a AVC group of total randoms for some AoE for an evening.  Then WoW came along and the “dumbass kiddies” with it which destroyed my faith in PUGs.  Now when I play an MMO I hardly ever group up….. unless its duo with my wife.  Ive not even given grouping a chance at all in EQ2 since I came back, nor LOTRO, maybe thats my problem, and I should jsut cut loose.  Maybe ill reactivate EQ2 again and try grouping, or try it on LOTRO.  The only thing EQ2 has over LOTRO atm is that I play a Berserker, a DPS tank, whereas in LOTRO im a guardian, a def tank…

So the main question is (if I get anyone reading this) how do I quit WoW in such a way to stop me coming back?  Transfer? Deletion?

DARN IT!!!!!!!!!

Currently Paying for NO Game Subs

Yup you heard me, Im not paying for ANY games at the moment.  Main reason?  Finances, I just couldnt afford to pay anymore.  So I cancelled them all. WAR BETA helps a ton as I dont have to pay.

 But anyway, its been two weeks since I played Warcraft, and I barely check the forums at all now…… I really think I need to log in one more time before my account is closed and transfer the guild leadership.  I cant see myself returning. 

Been chatting to an old friend from DAoC who I played LOTRO with, and im thinking of going back to it.  The games had a lot more time to be out now so its improving. Maybe ill think about that tonight.

Nothing much else to add, RIP WoW!!!