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Mayhem in Mathosia

October 3, 2013 by Belghast

Just a Gigolo

Last night I was feeling fairly antisocial. I logged into Rift for a little bit, but was feeling overall meh about the game, especially since I knew the bulk of the guild would be in FFXIV anyways. I still feel bad about the fact that almost all of the Rift guild moved rather abruptly to Final Fantasy… but that just kinda happens with recent games. Since I was not super amped about doing things with people… I decided to run around as a Bard and grind FATEs. I have been working up the class so I could have something dpsy to play when we had too many tanks and not enough other things. I had originally intended this to be my Dragoon that is sitting at 32…. but as I started to play the Bard it just leveled so much faster.

At level 45 in FFXIV you get a series of quests that give you four of the 5 pieces of your archetypal class look armor. This is commonly referred to as the Artifact gear and through the first series of quests you get every slot but your chest piece. This often leads to some bizarre looks, but honestly I am not sure the bard set COULD look goofier. I am somewhere between a rockstar, a gigolo and a movie style gypsy. In no case does this make me feel epic and awesome… and in the matter of a single quest I went from looking like the Dread Pirate Roberts to David Lee Roth.

Vanity Slots to the Rescue?

Supposedly there are vanity slots on the way… and they seriously cannot get here soon enough. I am mildly depressed to think I will have to wear a pair of pants that look like they were crafted from a circus tent until then. The above image is the set I loved to wear… Foestriker. This comes from the first three dungeons… and I have been slowly gathering the rest of the pieces of the outfit. Everything about the look seems epic to me… and I felt like the elite archer I was supposed to be. The bard outfit on the other hand looks like I am 5 years old and got to dress myself for the first time.

Apparently I am not alone in this assessment, as most of the major forums have at least one “wtf is wrong with the bard gear” thread. Overall most of the other class outfits I have seen have been amazing looking. Dragoon looks like everything you would expect it to be, as does Warrior, and Paladin looks very much like the defensive tank that they are supposed to be. Even Scholar with its quirky “I bought this jacket at an army surplus store” looks pretty cool. So right now the bard outfit seems to be the “Moon Moon” of the crowd. Which is kinda sad… considering just how amazing the bard class as a whole really is. If I knew just had bad I would end up looking… I might have focused on leveling up the dragoon instead.

Server Shuffling

Yesterday it was announced that Final Fantasy XIV A Realm Reborn would soon open up server transfers. In an attempt to reunite friends and loved ones… the first five days of server transfers will be completely free. This is generally an extremely good thing… since there were a few Stalwarts who were not patient enough to play the “get on Cactuar” game that usually involves creating characters at odd hours. The only negative is that if you look at the list below… our realm is specifically flagged as one of the three US realms that are extremely highly congested.

As a result… the opening of server transfers may make our server queues even worse. Essentially every night there is a very small queue when we attempt to log into the server, the hope is that even if the queues increase we will never have to go back to using our login macros to get through the sea of 1017 errors. As a guild we would consider moving elsewhere, but it would mean starting over from scratch and moving separately. It feels like they planned this poorly in that they did not offer a guild move option. Currently we have essentially maxed out our guild, and all the frenetic questing of the first few weeks in part is what pushed our level up to where it is now. Without the assistance of the quests… it would likely be far harder to reach.

Additionally we have almost maxed out our faction with the Immortal Flames… which means we could consider switching factions and starting the process of leveling our reputation there. So the prospect of having to discard all this progress and start from scratch just does not seem like something we would want to do. We have very few people on other servers, so for the most part it is not a huge ordeal. I imagine that the folks transferring TO Cactuar however will have to do it during off peak hours, which could be a bit tricky since there is only a five day window to get that free transfer in. No word yet has been posted as to when the server transfers will begin.

Mayhem in Mathosia

I think this week why I have been so focused on trying to push up the Bard is that I know I will be spending most of my weekend playing Rift. Last week they announced a brand new server event called Mayhem in Mathosia. The goal of the event is in essence to get Rift back to its roots… massive large scale invasion events spanning multiple zones. During the event there will be unique planar drops that include new colors of Hellbug Mount, a unique Kirin, and some cosmetic gear. I want it all… I want it now.

The schedule looks a little something like this…

Phase 1: Friday, Oct. 4 – Saturday, Oct. 5 – Silverwood / Freemarch
Phase 2: Sunday, Oct. 6 – Monday, Oct. 7 – Gloamwood / Stonefield
Phase 3: Tuesday, Oct. 8 – Wednesday, Oct. 9 – Scarlet Gorge / Scarwood Reach
Phase 4: Thursday, Oct. 10 – Saturday, Oct. 12 – Moonshade Highlands / Droughtlands

RIFT_POSE_CinderHellbug_02

So I will likely be spending most of my time over in Rift this weekend and most of next week trying to gather up all the goodies. I will of course be popping back into FFXIV if someone needs a high level dungeon run, or to help out with instances as needed. We have been trying our best to be available anytime a guild member is on high center due to needing to do a specific dungeon run. I still would like to get my rogue to level 60… but the 50+ leveling just feels like a tedious process. Which is a bit disturbing considering I am right now playing a game where I am forced to level unaided by quests. By completing enough of the various invasions you can win the unique appearance Hellbug above, so that will be what I am working towards.

Sponsors Unite

October 2, 2013 by Belghast

Class of 2013

Yesterday the 2013 Newbie Blogger Initiative officially kicked off and the new blogs are starting to trickle into the forum. Yesterday I updated my blogroll to include the five blogs that had signed up to date, and over the night another two have joined the fray. Here is hoping that the effort will continue to grow throughout the month. Last time we ended up with I believe 110 new blogs starting the process, so we have a long ways to go before we see those numbers.

I will update my blogroll accordingly later today… but currently this years crop looks a little something like this…

Check them out and give them some link love.

Sponsors Unite

Similarly, yesterday kicked off quite a number of “advice” posts from the sponsors. Like always these varied in topic greatly covering general tips, where to find inspiration, and various technical tidbits. I am sure in the coming days we will be seeing a lot more of these posts but so far here is the run down of topics that were posted as of this morning.

I am sure as the month rolls on, we will see quite a few more sponsor posts as well. I think for the first day, the program was pretty well represented. My goal is to do a short daily synopsis of what all has been happening on the days I am not posting an advice article myself.

Heroic Characters

A few days ago I had posted about the fact that October 1st was the beginning of the ability to create a free Heroic Character in Everquest 2. Most of us initially thought this was for subscribers only… or in EQ2 nomenclature “Gold Members”. However yesterday Stargrace of MMO Quests pointed out that ANYONE can log in and create a free level 85 character during the October 1st – October 15th period. Additionally they have once again tightened the reins of the free to play restrictions. Previously it was extremely frustrating to play a free to play character, because you could not equip Legendary or higher items… which meant that essentially you could not equip anything that came from a dungeon or most world drops.

With the introduction of Heroic Characters, all of these item locks are gone… as are the various items that were sold on the store to unlock the ability to equip them. Additionally as of yesterdays patch… much like they did in the past with other expansions… Destiny of Velious is now included for free. This gives you access to content up to level 95, and covers all of the newer zones added into the game. They have also broken up the Age of Discovery features into bite sized chunks that allow you to gobble up only the pieces you want, for example you can buy access to mercenaries only, or just the beastlord class. Since they are removing some of the appeal for remaining a gold member, they have added in a permanent +15% coin loot bonus and +10% mount speed bonus to all existing gold members. They have also mentioned they will be adding more perks into the equation to keep maintaining gold level a valuable thing.

The Swash and Berserker

Wanting to take advantage of the free promotion, I logged in both of my accounts last night and created and or upsized characters on each. For some time I had been trying to level a dps character on my main account, and had created Belgrifter a Ratonga Swashbuckler. Namely the Swash is a very high survival dps, and I was having a decent time leveling him. Ultimately I ran into the same roadblock I ran into with all of my characters however. Once you have had flight in EQ2, you simply do not want to level a character without it. So essentially I was stuck with a decision… either grind up tradeskills or grind up levels. I managed to push him up to 55 before something shiny caught my eye and I abandoned the effort.

Since I could not really see myself returning to playing him until I had flight… I decided to go ahead and use that accounts token to super size my Ratonga. The gear that they give you is extremely nice… far nicer than the gear I have ever started velious content in before. I seriously doubt if I will replace any of it during the Othimir quests, it seems to be on par with that level of item. The weapon choices were a little wonky, giving me a sword and a mace… but I can live with that. The big problem is I have NEVER used a mace on my rat… but they auto leveled all of my weapon skills for me… so that really is not a problem.

If you look at the image from the above paragraph you will see Belglaive my new 85 Iksar Bezerker. On my second account I mostly had support classes, as I used to regularly dual box before the release of Mercenaries. As a result I really did not have anything “tanky” on that account. If I ever wanted to dual box again, I figure it would end up extremely handy to have access to a tank, and Bezerker is the one I have never really played to high levels. I have a very small dwarven one on my main account, but I think he is somewhere in the 30s. The best thing is… the changes give me full access again to my Dark Elf Warden, since I had stopped playing him due to the item restrictions and not wanting to maintain a second subscription.

Wrapping Up

The ability to create a free level 85 character is an extremely amazing offer. If you have ever considered playing EQ2, I highly suggest you make an account during the 1-15 period and create a level 85 even if you do not intend to play it right now. You can do a lot of cool stuff with an 85, and even use it to feed lower level characters items. I have always loved EQ2, and I will admit the prospect of fresh high level characters has gotten me pumped about playing it some again. Just not sure how often I will do so… given my current addiction to Final Fantasy XIV. If you do end up rolling characters, I highly suggest Antonia Bayle the Roleplaying server. It has probably the best community I have seen in any game… other than potentially Landroval in LOTRO.

Reverberating the Praise

August 9, 2012 by Belghast

So honestly… I started writing this out over on a friends blog. She posted something that resonated with me so much, that I just had to respond. However as I cleared the end of my fourth paragraph, I came to the realization that I was not posting a response, but writing an entire damned blog post on her site. Granted it is not unusual for me to rattle off a two or three paragraph response… but this was entering the territory of the ludicrous.

The Spinoff Post

I’ve been pretty lousy at keeping up with Google Reader lately. So after a busy morning I sat down to read a few posts, trying to grind down the massive count a bit. I know I have said this before, but my blogroll is literally what I read, so I try my damnedest to read each and every blog that I am in essence “advertising”. It was to my pleasure that near the top of the stack, MMOGC had thrown up a brand new post.

First off you have to go over there and read it right now, because it covers a topic that has become very near to my heart. In her post titled “Funcommunication” she goes into a length how amazing Funcom has been at bringing us, the players, into the experience. I have to say that I agree completely, and she managed to put it into words far better than I have done to this point.

A Bigger Shout Out

I mean I have given shouts out to the Funcom staff in several posts, but I don’t think I have really covered the magnitude of the experience. I’ve thought a few other companies in the past have done a great job interacting with the community, but that said Funcom has really taken it to the next level. Players tend to have completely unrealistic expectations for games companies, I am just as bad as anyone about this. However having this level of constantly interactivity, has been extremely humanizing.

So while we get frustrated about the bugs, seeing a constant effort to try and fix things makes the pill a little easier to swallow. As a programmer I know, that you have to pull off a lot of layers of false assumptions about a bug before you can really get to the root of it. In the case of the chat system issues, they were basically occurring in a way that could not be lab tested. There is no real way to get hundreds of thousands of players to connect to your development server.

While it was annoying, and I am glad that time is behind us I cannot describe how much I appreciate being “kept in the loop” about what was going on. So much marketing babble and spin works its way into patch notes and announcements, that it is really refreshing to see the equivalent of “we thought we fixed it, but I guess we didn’t, we are trying something else”. No one is all knowing, and as a programmer we usually operate on our best guess. When dealing with extremely complex systems, the wrong answers are often times more telling than the final solution. Be it through the forums, live streams, official blog posts, or twitter, I am always impressed with the level of candor shown towards the community.

Amazing Customer Service

Another point that I have to harp on is just how great the customer service has been. GC writes in her post:

Honestly? I was pleasantly surprised. On a Saturday evening, right smack in the middle of a busy celebration weekend, both my husband’s and my tickets were answered by a helpful in-game representative within ten minutes, and within another five we were all fixed up and ready to go. Let’s face it, bugged quests are irritating as all hell and no one ever likes running into them, but the sting sure is lessened by a prompt response and swift resolution to the problem. I was very satisfied.

Granted, based on the inevitable complaints on the forums, not everyone has been as fortunate. So maybe you can say that my husband and I just happened to hit the GM lottery.

I can say without the shadow of a doubt that she did not win the GM lottery. It might be because of the level of evolvement with the community, but for whatever reason I have simply cared more about The Secret World than I have most games in the past. Always in the past it felt like my petitions had little to no effect on the game world. I am notorious for figuring out a work-around to avoid bugs, and then just ignoring the fact that they actually exist rather than reporting them. In this game however I have been a bug reporting fiend.

So far it has not mattered what I have reported, be it a problem with geometry or the chat issues not actually being fixed… I have always received a prompt and courteous response. I’ve put in somewhere between five and a dozen petitions since launch, and in every case I have had a tell from a GM within ten minutes. The vast majority of these times, it was far closer to five minutes. In one instance, I reported a bugged encounter in a dungeon, and we moved on to the next boss. The GM responded before we were through the first phase, and patiently waited for us to finish the fight so I could more properly respond.

I remember one night, I had petitioned a GM about a geometry issue or as I call them ‘”The Potholes” of City of the Sun God. There are a few places in the world, with gaps that you cannot see before accidentally falling into them. While I was typing up my petition, another player fell in the hole with me and used /reset to get out. I could have done the same, and ultimately I did to free myself, but I figured that if I didn’t report it, it might not get fixed. The GM took the time, and asked me to go back to the hole, so they could properly document the problem, and make sure it was on the list of known issues. This little attention to detail really gives me hope for the future of the game.

Phenominal Community Team

I know specifically I have harped on this before, but if I am going through the process of making this post anyways, I have to take a moment to talk about Ragnar and Morteia. Other companies have been involved with the community, but Funcom really sets the standard here. They are constantly responding to players, and answering questions directly. Maybe it is silly, but it feels somewhat awesome to have the Creative Director or Community Manager share your post with the community.

Thing is it goes so much deeper than just rebroadcasting links. It feels like we are getting let in on some secret, like they are leaking little bits of information to the diehard fans. So when they answer a question, or hint at some upcoming feature we get all giddy with excitement. MMOGC gives the great example of Ragnar talking about upcoming work from Peter Stormare. I mean that is awesome, while he might not want to be known for this, I cannot picture Satan without thinking of his amazing performance from Constantine. This man belongs in The Secret World so much it almost hurts!

Why This Matters

The Secret World still has a lot of bugs, and there are a good number of features that have been frustrating to deal with. In most other games, these would have been deal breakers, because the layer of clinical distance from the user community gave the impression that they frankly did not care about my gameplay experience. Normally my tolerance for frustration is pretty low, I have trouble looking past a bad UI or controls to see the story underneath. While I really like the UI and controls, you can read my original review of beta weekend and see that I was less than favorable.

So upon reading that, you might ask yourself what changed? In many ways the game has changed drastically since beta weekend, and improved in almost every way imaginable. But I have to say that a good chunk of why I can look past the rough edges at times, is thanks to my experiences with customer support and the community team. They are the face of Funcom to me, and my regular dealings with them has allowed me to handle the quests going wonky, and getting stuck on geometry. My frustration is always tempered with the feeling like they actually care, and are working to try and make the game a better experience for everyone.

Not Just a Love Song

So it is pretty easy to write this post off as a love song towards the company that runs the game I happen to be playing. I mean I have rambled on for 13 paragraphs at this point, about my awesome experiences with them while playing their game. For me it goes deeper, as bloggers it is so easy to dwell on the negative aspects of a game. It is so much easier for me to pull myself away from a game I hate, to write an angry rant than to log out of a game I am really loving. The problem is, all this negatively just turns into a wall of sound, where every opinion, dissenting review and frustrated plea becomes a indistinguishable from the mass of angst.

Instead I think we are better served spending our time, pointing out the things that are going well, the individuals that are in fact doing right by the community. Each week it seems like we hear of another game flailing, another round of layoffs, and more pox upon the industry. We need to highlight the good in gaming, and make sure those people feel appreciated. So here you go Funcom, I really appreciate your efforts, and that of the amazing team that has created The Secret World. While I am somewhat angsty, about not being able to get the nifty Steam swag, I wish you all amazing success with that new venture.

Good Job!

106 Miles to Chicago

August 8, 2012 by Belghast

It seems like the Secret World community as a whole is still coming down off the high that was the Monthiversary celebration weekend. As a whole I think the weekend was a rousing success. It gave several friends of mine time to get in and see if the game was for them. I know of at least four converts, and two of those are now proud holders of a lifetime account.

Coup De Grace

Honestly I think the concept behind the weekend was a master stroke. The 24 hour buddy passes are just simply not enough time to decide whether or not the game really resonates with you. There have been some discussions in my cabal, namely between myself, MMOGC, and PaganRites… and the basic idea is that it takes at least 10 hours of gameplay for you to really “get it”. That is to really understand why this game is so unique, why it is worth playing, and grasp the deeply intricate combat system.

Sypster over at Bio Break theorizes that the celebration weekend, is essentially a way to offer a “free trial” without actually saying those words. I totally think this was the core of the weekend, it let anyone who has a Funcom account try the game. But even more than that I think it was a great way of building customer loyalty. While getting to your 30 quest mark, might have been a daunting task for someone brand new to the game. For those of us who are veterans, we were able to easily cut a path through some of the easier quests.

As a result it also made Kingsmouth an extremely active place. For all that activity, I was pleasantly surprised in the relative lack of “asshattery”. People seemed genuinely helpful to the new guests inhabiting our servers. I know I answered more than a few “newbie” questions, and in my time trying to knock out some of the easy quests, jumped in and saved more than a few overwhelmed players. So while this was a great trial weekend for new players, for us veterans it became a really easy way to earn enough item shop currency for some spiffy items. The positive is that there are very few items on the cash shop that cost more than the 1200 points you earned from the quests. The only negative however is that they are in fact “bonus” points, and will expire in September.

A Mission from God

They’re not gonna catch us. We’re on a mission from God. – Elwood Blues

Over the last several days since the release of Issue #1, I’ve been on a mission that has completely consumed me. Essentially I decided that while everyone was off doing the brand new content, and trying to get in their thirty quests for the celebration weekend, I would start my hunt to kill all the rares in the world. I still have a long ways to go, and some of them have been rather maddening (Mr. Freezie I am looking at you), but I’ve made a pretty massive dent in the total. I have no clue if I actually get anything for doing this, but it is one of those things that I am obsessing over.

So far I vanquished 27 of the 38 total “achievement rares” in the world. Here are the ones I have found and destroyed (minor spoilers):

Nattfari – Draug in Kingsmouth
Mr. Freezie – Zombie in Kingsmouth
Soloman’s Omen – Undead Bear in Kingsmouth
Father Appleby – Undead Priest in Kingsmouth
Dunwich Road Horror – Mud Golem in Kingsmouth
Coach Roarke – Zombie in The Savage Coast
Lurking Revenant – Revenant in The Savage Coast
The Collector – Scarecrow in The Savage Coast
Umbral Brood King – Ak’ab in The Savage Coast
Penumbral Elevated Caste – Ak’ab in Blue Mountain
Algernon – Wendigo in Blue Mountain
Bastard of the Brine – Deep One in Blue Mountain
Billy’s Muse – Shadow Thing in Blue Mountain
Gronarch the Exiled – Sand Golem in Scorched Desert
The Lost One – Ghoul in Scorched Desert
Deathstalker – Scorpion in Scorched Desert
Ainn the Harbinger – Plague Golem in Scorched Desert
Corrupted Egyptologist – Filth Infected Cultist in City of the Sun God
Kiya, the Pharaoh’s Concubine – Tomb Guardian in City of the Sun God
Emissary of the Dead Nations – Ghoul in City of the Sun God
Cretaceous Shisocerca – Wasp in City of the Sun God
Village-Eater – Troll in Besieged Farmlands
Ursine Horror – Undead Bear in Besieged Farmlands
Demolisher – Siege Breaker in Besieged Farmlands
The Nameless One – Deathless in Shadowy Forest
Traitor of Basarab – Vampire in Carpathian Fangs
General Blasius – Filth Infected Human in Carpathian Fang

I won’t lie, some of these have already been a massive pain in the ass. There was one specific spawn that I essentially camped most of the weekend, killing the placeholder every 15 minutes. It took two full days of doing this off and on before the rare I needed spawned. Others like Mr. Freezie and The Lost One, spawn in such high traffic areas, that essentially as soon as they are up they have aggro’d onto someone. I am sure I will take a break before too much longer, since I too would like to se the new content. Up to this point however, I have had a blast tracking down all these dangerous beasties.

The Nightmare Begins

A few weeks back the little five man team I have been running with, finished all of the elite dungeons and with much effort especially on the part of the dps, managed to get through the Gatekeeper encounter. I have to say, that even looking back the dps version of The Gatekeeper was insanely difficult, and I am still shocked I managed to get through it without lowering my standards and changing to one of the more standardized builds. I still plan on doing a write-up for exactly how I managed to down The Gatekeeper as Shogtun/Blades, but I just haven’t had the time to finish it up.

Getting our Asses Kicked

As difficult as the encounter was, I have to say it really did nothing to prepare me for the difficulty of nightmare dungeons. This week our little team finally started attempting the hardest mode of the dungeons currently available. At first we decided to dip our toes into Darkness War, since so many of the instances have a number of little painful bugs right now. We were completely overwhelmed by the amount of damage taken, and the amount that we needed to output.

After some regrouping, we decided to start working on the first instance, Polaris. I think we were a bit gunshy in trying to assume that the first dungeon was going to be the easiest. We attempted that login in SWTOR, and found out that honestly The Esseles ended up being one of the most difficult of the hardmodes. Thankfully Funcom did not do this to us, and we’ve managed to make a pretty big dent in the dungeon. It is funny that we are treating this 5 man as though it were a raid essentially.

OHGODSQUID

On our first night, we struggled our way through the encounters, learning the mechanics as we went. All of us are pretty reluctant to try and look up strategies for the encounters. It is so much more enjoyable to have those “aha” moments for yourself, than to try and do things the way someone else says you have to. Honestly most of my raiding career was this way as well. We invested in taking the time to find a strategy that worked for our specific groups makeup.

Last night we returned and had most of the bosses “on farm”, as it were. We are still struggling massively with the “OHGODSQUID” as I refer to it. I think towards the end of the night we were formulating some new ideas on how to beat the encounter. Hopefully we will go back in tonight, make some adjustments and dine on some mutant calamari. Then of course will come the real challenge, but I won’t go into it for sake of spoilers.

I Has Purplez

The awesome thing that makes the struggle worth it, is that pretty much everything in the zone drops much better gear than we have seen to this point. So only going in and being able to kill a few bosses is completely worth the effort. So far we have managed to outfit our tank in a number of really massive upgrades, and our healer in a new headpiece and weapon. The amount of difference this has made has been significant, in the difficulty of the encounters. They have gone from “OMGWTF” to hard but manageable with a lot of work.

Last night we got our very first purple dps item, and through the luck of random numbers I managed to win it. So I have a little purple tint to go with my blue tones. The funny thing about gear in this game, is that always before people would link the item and dressing room it, and there would be a chorus of “man that looks cool”. In The Secret World, these items are just better stats, so in a way you just don’t get nearly as attached to any one item as you did before.

Honestly I am completely okay with this. My emotions are wrapped up in my outfits, my cosmetic items, and the ability to mold any weapon to look like whatever happens to be my current favorite. The talismans, simply become a means to an end, a way to perform better and make life easier on your friends. Always in the past I was reluctant to upgrade out of full sets of gear, because I hated looking like an unmatched hobo. But now when the gear comes down, with slightly better stats, swapping it out becomes a completely no-brainer.

Linkspam

Going to wrap up this post, since I have the development live stream going in the background. I still have to give a shout out about how badass it is that they have been giving us a semi-weekly view into the inner workings of the game team. In closing going to throw out a series of links. There have been some great articles posted about the game, so these are definitely ones you should read. Please note, not all of these are super positive about the game, but that is completely okay. I’ve always said this was not going to be a game for everyone.

First up we have a review of the weekend by Kadomi at Live Like a Nerd. She went into the game expecting nothing, but got completely hooked. Talks about the “missing time” concept many of us have experienced while playing the game. I swear it was only thiry minutes!!
GC over at MMOGamerChick, also a guildie, does a great write up about her post celebration “hangover”. Great read, because really the weekend was so much fun it was draining.
Maeve over at Multiplaying, gives a great review of the game that has become her latest addiction.
Kotaku gives a pretty even-handed review of the game. You can tell the writer actually played it in production, unlike some of the other reviews I have read.
Psynister and Fynralyl are a husband and wife duo that tried the game together this weekend. While they liked some things, they were overall turned off by the game. Both are well worth the read, because a lot of the things they mention, are things some of the TSW diehards love the most.
Rowan over at I Touched the Sky, posted a rebuttal of sorts. Not in the sense of trying to state that Psyn and Fyn are wrong by any means, but to answer some of the points they brought up. Also extremely worth the read.
The new episode of Enochian Frequency is ready to go. I highly suggest listening to the podcast regularly especially if you are interested in the real world lore behind the lore.
Lastly I wanted to give a real quick shout out to Scarybooster and Feliz. Feliz has created a beautiful new skin for Scaryworlds.com, I highly suggest you check it out and tell them what you think.