Perfect Timing

So August 28 for Guild Wars 2, awesome! I was really expecting a much later date: December, maybe November. Not that I think the game needs that much more time, I was just excepting ArenaNet to take as much time as they could to continue tweaking and polishing it.

But I had to just laugh at myself for the launch date and the last BWE dates. I have two “work things” going on this summer. The first is a company gathering during the July BWE and the second is a business trip the week of launch. Luckily I’ll have early access and a couple of days before I leave for a week but I still found it funny.

On another side note, that release date made up my mind on whether to go for Rift or WoW. I don’t have time for both before GW2’s launch so it’ll just be Rift.

When it rains, it pours…

I’ve been trying to come up with ideas for regular posts and the first one, and as of yet the only one implemented, is that my first post of the week should be a review of what I did the previous week and weekend. Real life, of the most serious variety, stepped in last week and made that first post of the week also my last. I was also unable to play much: my Sith Assassin gained half a level, I created but didn’t play a Dwarf Rogue in Rift and I got a handful of World of Tanks matches in. Since I don’t have anything to share about what I’ve been playing I thought I’d share what I’m planning.

Is that a Marder II on cinder blocks?

I got an okay session of World of Tanks in yesterday, only a handful of matches but I felt good about it afterward. I did realize one thing though: my garage is a fucking mess. When I first started last summer I gave each nation’s tier I tank a try and then decided to attempt to elite the entire German tree, with a focus on the tanks. I’m currently sitting with a Wespe, Hetzer, Panzer III/IV, Panzer IV, Leopard, and various old tanks from the journey (the Panzer III being the only old one I actually ever play). And of course being the altoholic that I am I branched out: I “needed” a Sherman, wanted to give Soviet heavies a try, and their lights, and when I started back up I wanted to try the French tanks. So now I’m just a tank pack rat with a full garage.

Time for some cleaning.

Step one: sell all of the old tanks I’m saving “in case I want to play them again later.” I play the Panzer III, and even bought a camo skin for it, so I’ll keep that one but the rest have to go.

Step two: decide my goal tanks and the progression paths I want to follow. Elite-ing the entire German tree is a fool’s errand, especially when I’m not running a premium account. I don’t even like playing arty and although I enjoy TDs, I have to be in the right mood for them and I’m more interested in the US tree. The the new plan for the German tree is to get a Tiger. I’m going to elite and then sell my Wespe, Leopard and Hetzer, shelf my Panzer III/IV (until I later come back to work toward a Panther) and focus on my Panzer IV to progress toward the Tiger. I haven’t progressed far in the Soviet tree (just a T-46 and a T-50) so i’m just going to stop it for now. I’ve barely progressed on the T-50 so I’ll sell it to free up the space while I’ll unlock everything for the T-46 before selling it. I’ve come to really enjoy the Sherman so I’m going to stick it out with the US mediums and continue down that path. I’ve started on the French medium tree and plan to continue to try and get a feel of them.

So my goals for World of Tanks are: (1) clean shop, (2) get a Tiger, (3) progress all the way down the US medium tree and (4) give French mediums a fair shake.

I can taste the freedom.

As much as I’ve been enjoying my little sabbatical into Rift Lite, and am excited about the upcoming expansion, I’m trying not to get hooked. My SWTOR sub is up in July and I’m finding myself excited about being liberated from a subscription. I’ve had at least one active MMO subscription running constantly since I started playing WoW in July of 2005. The big reason I’m excited is for the freedom from feeling like I have to play game X to get my money’s worth. Then again I might just wait for Guild Wars 2 to go subscription free.

Stepping into the Mists

I already know I’m not going to have much, if any, gaming time next weekend. I originally had some grandiose plans for the second Guild Wars 2 BWE but have paired them back, maybe next time. Instead, if I get some time to play, I’ve got a very short list of what I want to see: PvP.

I never got around to PvP during the first BWE and only stepped into the Mist for about 1/2 an hour during the stress test. This time I’d like to try taking my Guardian and/or Engineer into both sPvP and WvW. We’ll see how things pan out.

So that’s about it for now. I’ve got a couple of plans for the blog this week: take more screen shots for posts (I know I’m horrible about that), complete the blogroll (lots of NBI blogs to add), add podcasts to the blogroll, and follow my desired basic post schedule: Monday, Wednesday and Friday.

Give Peas a Chance

“Who does ArenaNet think they’re fooling? Sylvari are obviously just plant elves.” When I first read about Guild War 2’s Sylvari I quickly dismissed them as mere plant elves. I might be eating my own words. When ArenaNet had Sylvari Week I thought the redesign was beautiful but I still just saw them as plant elves. My mind might be changing.

After the BWE I was jonesing for some Guild Wars 2. It started simply enough: hitting the “F” key every time I walked up to a quest giver, wondering why my Jedi Knight wouldn’t dodge. But it kept growing, eventually I just decided to pick up a copy of Ghosts of Ascalon. It was a relaxing, easy read that proved to be an excellent introduction to Tyria for a Guild Wars neophyte such as myself. The book gives a sort of Cliffs Notes version of Tyria’s history through different characters explaining “their” side of the story, most in a human vs Charr manner. It also introduces readers to the four playable races in the members of the party of adventures at the center of the story. Each character seems to be a poster child for their race: the down-but-not-out human, the battled-hardened Charr, the vivacious Norn, the arrogant Asura, and finally the inquisitive and adventurous Sylvari: Killeen.

I may have been blinded by elf hatred but Killeen isn’t what I was expecting from the Sylvari. She is intelligent but with a child-like sense of wonder, inquisitive and adventurous with a thirst for knowledge. Best of all she has a complete disregard for social norms in the name of curiosity. She doesn’t mean harm or insult through her eccentricities but that doesn’t stop her from relishing in them. While her teammates are apprehensive about encountering ghosts, as a necromancer she’s overjoyed at the opportunity. She knows that they don’t want to be used as her undead minions if they die but she doesn’t fully understand their reasoning behind that request. These aspects of her personality intrigue me and, as an explorer Bartle-type, I can relate to her sense of wonder and thirst of knowledge.

If Killeen is a model of the Sylvari, I may be finding myself playing one sooner than anticipated. I’m hoping that the next BWE will add the race so I can grab a better picture of the their zeitgeist and see for myself. I still plan to start out with a Norn Guardian but I might just roll up a Sylvari Mesmer along side of him.