I've seen the world, baby!

I did it! I decided that there was a goal within reach for me before Cataclysm changes our world forever.

For those of you that are new to World of Warcraft, there are things called achievements. Some of those achievements are rewarded with a TITLE. What that means is that when others in the game see your name, they also see the TITLE. (If you have it turned on)

For example, (points up) that is a screen shot of Cantique achieving the Title "Explorer". All I had to do was check out each zone in the game. That meant lots of running around on a ground mount, flying where I could (there are fly zones) and sneaking a little bit to check out the other faction areas.

There are lots of titles a toon might have; several of which I will not attempt at this time for various reasons - not enough time, not enough skill, not enough will power!...LOL


Titles fall under several categories: (to check these out further see WoWWiki)


PVP (player vs player)
Reputation
World Events
Argent Tournament
Dungeons and Raids

I have the Title Jenkins. This is in tribute to a very funny video about Leroy Jenkins . (warning - a bit of swearing) I actually never wear this title. It is a surname and for RP reasons I created my own surname. I wish Blizzard would let us give ourselves a surname - sorta like when a hunter has the option to name his hunting companion.

I also have Champion of the Frozen Wastes title. What a mouthful! Some titles are pretty easy to come by, I wasn't even working toward this. What a nice surprise.


My newest title, the Explorer, falls under the category Miscellaneous.

I am in awe of people with some of the titles available, like Loremaster. Those folks had to complete ALL of the Loremaster quests for Eastern Kingdoms, Kalimdor, Outland, and Northrend. I'm not sure I've ever seen anyone wearing the title the Seeker. (3000 quests completed!)

There are titles for achieving cooking quests, fishing quests, even for simply using the dungeon tool in to finish random heroic dungeons with 50 random players - The Patient title. (A very nice thing is that - after you have done it with 100 random players you earn an in game pet - a nice little pug dog!)

Anyway, I just wanted to share my latest in-game happy, happy, joy, joy moment!

See you guys later!

Hey! That's my egg!

Camping for these eggs
Ninja standing on my head
Oh, I am one too.

In World of Warcraft there are holidays. These seem to correspond with RL (real life) holidays – for example it was Easter Sunday a few days ago and Noble Garden holiday began in WOW, Eggs, Bunnies, fancy clothes and all.

There are points for achievement to be done! There are areas (4 on Alliance side, and 4 on Horde side I think) where colorful eggs are liberally strewn about. If an egg is picked up by a character, pretty soon it will re-spawn. (Re-spawn means “show back up” for those of you new to some online gaming terms.)

There are achievements to be earned, quests to be done, and loot to be had!!! What that means is ….people are running around like crazy “finding” the eggs. This pretty much promotes what is normally considered rude in the game.

Ninjaing.

Ninja-ing something means that you take loot away from someone that has done something to get to the loot. Okay. I know that is vague. Scenario: You have just fought off three mobs in order to get to a plant that you really very much wanted to “pick”. Someone else runs by while you are fighting and “picks” it. They are considered a Ninja and people get hopping mad when that happens to them. I know I do.

So, here I stand in a spot (“Camping”. That means standing in one spot waiting for something to happen) near a bush (or whatever) and wait and wait and wait for the egg to re-spawn. If I blink just right someone else gets it first. Sigh. This holiday in World of Warcraft is all about getting enough eggs.

I am sorta forced to be a ninja. I am not the only one working to get these eggs, a gazillion other people are working to get the eggs too. I just have to be on my toes, quick to click, I must be the ninja.

Here I just imagine myself dressed in shades of gray, stealthily still, moving only my arm when the egg spawns. Quick. Quiet. No gloating. No, “ha ha…I got it before you did you sneaky wabbit!” Quiet, calm, quick.

I am a ninja today.

Any thoughts on this WOW holiday?

PRE WOW LOOT WOOT!

It was the year I was 9 and my sister was 7 – brother was 5. Life was wonderful for us We were always exploring our surroundings especially since our dad was in the service and we moved at least once a year. Stuff was always new and exciting.

We were in Florida this time and one day we found an unopened can of beer in the gutter and dropped it, causing a tiny, tiny hole. The hot beer spewed forcefully out of the hole arcing into the sky, seeming to us like a wondrous fountain of fun. We did NOT put that in our mouths, we played in it. RIBL. (rolling in beer, laughing)

Parents used to have friends over and they would play poker and smoke and drink * gasp * hard liquor. Siblings and I would get up early the next day after those parties (parents snoozing happily) and we would wander through the house finishing off the partial glasses of whatever and eating match heads. Yes. We would eat the burnt heads off the matches in the ashtrays. They were salty and very good. (Sulfer I guess doesn’t harm in small amounts – wait – maybe that’d explai. . . nevermind.)

My sister ate the head of a fly once while I watched. Ewwww. A babysitter in Germany let us have raw bacon sandwiches for lunches. “Mom, mom, we like it raw!” …”WHAT!?” (ummmm bacon)

I remember crying with my tongue stuck to a frozen pop treat one day as mom and dad tried hard not to laugh at me. That was NOT funny!

Anyway, where was I? Oh yes, this one day when we were 9 and 7 and 5, we were sooo excited. We played and had sooo much fun with our find. Then, it was time to go in for dinner. Mom and Dad got so . . . Well, as a child I wasn’t sure what. They weren’t really mad, but they were yelling at us. They were very stern, yet we didn’t get sent to our room for a paddling. We stood, dumbfounded, eyes wet with fear, and nodded listening.

“But we found it, it’s ours, (sob)”
“Where!”
“Outside. (sniffle)”
“Outside where? (stern look)”
“In the back alley where we play with rocks.”
“Was it in a box or a sack or anything?”
“No, Daddy, we didn’t steal it, it was lost on the ground. (poutyfaces)”

They admonished us sternly and then they took our free, not broken, funny balloon away, and let the air out of it. WAH!!!!!

We learned, never, never put balloons we just “find” outside or “ANYWHERE for that matter!” in our mouth. They never did tell us why.

(I did not understand the seemingly irrational behavior of my parents until years after this event. I laugh still.).

What does this have to do with World of Warcraft? /loot woot!! It's mine I found it!! /nod I know it has a gazillion armor and stamina and I'm a priest...but it's purty!!!

“Is This A Role-play Realm or Not?”

I see that question in General Chat and Trade Chat often. I understand why people ask. The fact that there are Role Play realms indicate that there might be people actually doing it. However, some of the answers coming across the channel indicate that the only people watching the channel are non-role players. That makes sense as people that role play probably turn off the extra channels in order to keep up with and thoroughly enjoy the role play without loads of “chat” interruption. /shrug?

On the game World of Warcraft, characters inside a city are busily running from the bank, to the auction house, to the mailbox, to the trainers for either their class or their skills -- cooking, sewing, first aid, blacksmithing, jewel crafting, leatherworking, etc. You get the picture. Busy, busy, busy! Usually the only ones walking where I play are NPCs that are selling something like bread, fruit, or guards that are busy making sure the THEM aren’t going to get me. LOL.

I have found that it is a good thing for me to change my pace in the game sometimes. It becomes more relaxing and fun to simply walk, not run. On my keyboard my forward slash key toggles from run to walk. Believe me, in a city where everyone is running on foot or riding fast through the city, someone walking stands out. If you want a bit of attention (I admit at times I do), just walk. What I desire when I do this is some nice role-play adventure.

So the other day, I went to realm Argent Dawn and walked around in Stormwind with my little female dwarf. She is only level 3 or 6 (why can’t I remember?) and she has absolutely not one cent left to her name. Here is why. She walked into the city and went to the inn and talked to the inn-keeper there . . (imagination must come into play) …The inn-keepers’ prices were too high for Cantique, so she told her she was welcome to build a fire outside near the inn, “But don’t harm the tree out there, mind!”

Cantique walked outside and found that she didn’t have a way to make fire. She realized that she needed to seek out a cook somewhere in the city and get a fire kit. She walked up to a guard in the trade center and asked for directions, which he promptly gave, smiling and nodding his head before snapping back into his watchful stance on the corner.

(Note, all this was played out verbally in the chat pane, of course the NPCs didn’t /say anything, but Cantique acted and spoke as if they did.)

She walked out of the Trade Center and stopped at each signpost and sounded out the words to make sure she was finding her way to Old Town. During the walk (I) looked around and noticed that there was a night elf following and listening. I attempted to draw him in by smiling at him. No response.

Anyway, when Cantique arrived at the Pig and Whistle and found the cook, the price he wanted for the training to learn to cook and build a fire was more than she had. She needed 95 coppers. Cantique looked at the woman standing nearby who had flour and spices to sell and she asked the woman if she would like to purchase her dress. Well, Cantique must’ve look pretty desperate, because the woman did indeed purchase the thin dress and Cantique ended up with 95 copper. She looked into her coinkeep and there was not another penny. She could now make fire.

(And THAT is odd because she had some few coppers and the sale of the dress made the EXACT amount she needed – I’ve always been fortunate IRL with having exactly what I need when I need it…that this carries over into the game is spooky. My hubby is always amazed that when I make new toons I “loot” bags pretty regularly. /grin)

She looked into her coinkeep and had not another penny, but she could now make fire.
She walked (did not run) back to the Trade Center and found her way back to the front of the inn, build a fire and sat down, her tummy grumbling.

During all this time, no-one spoke to me, neither role-play wise nor OOCly (out of character). A couple of folk stopped and “listened” and/or watched but did not comment or interact. I was amazed at the lack of even a derisive comment. Maybe I was in an alternate universe. (play eerie music here) But more likely the timing was wrong and when I go back and walk again, so many toons will talk I won’t be able to keep up with all the chatter.

But that day, I simply finished out my story and faded away. LOL…I still had fun. Am I crazy? Please tell me.

Screenshots of life.

In the spirit of Spring I did some cleaning in game this week. My friends list updated, my ignore list ignored and last night I cleaned up my World of Warcraft screenshots folder. (While you are playing the game, at any time you may push the [print screen] button on your keyboard and a picture of your screen is automatically saved in a folder in your World of Warcraft folder. This folder is titled “screenshots”.)

I had pictures of pillows on a bed in an inn in Dalaran, flowers on a ledge, ceiling detail, the picture at the top of this blog (Ulduar) and many, many shots of my character flying off into the sunset. /laugh.

Just as some of my screenshots took some time and thought to get them to come out “just right” it also took some thought before I deleted them. My character’s life is just like rl (real life) in that there are things that happen that will never happen again for her. The day she turned 80, the day she got 11,000 damage per second in a 5-man raid, the day someone whispered something really nice to her. (In World of Warcraft, people can whisper to you and it shows up on your screen in the chat box.)

I had screenshots of heartfelt conversations with other characters that were telling me how they felt about this or that in the guild, or how they dealt with something in their real life. I kept the majority of those. I had some screen shots showing a couple of acquaintances telling me how stupid I was in my rps. I deleted those. I don’t need the reminder of the bad times. I kept those screen shots initially as a defense if anyone else tried to grief me about the same subject. They are gone now, as are the tears and hard feelings.

Thinking of all this makes me wish someone were taking “screenshots” of me as I sit at my computer laughing at silly chat or being totally immersed in a dungeon. Reminders of how much fun I’ve had with this newfangled kind of game. I know there will come a day when I am no longer able to raid with my friends and will only be able to slowly make my way around Azeroth picking flowers, standing on my corner in Stormwind or Orgrimar looking wistfully around for someone who will stop long enough to role play just a bit about nothing much -- the weather or the prices in the auction house.

Being an older person gives a different perspective of what it takes to be able to raid. My fingers hurt sometimes. They don’t move as quickly as they used to – All the fish oil in the world won’t make my hands young again. My eyes lose the cursor more often. I wipe my glasses and get a larger monitor, but I still wish I could make my cursor a vivid hue of color so I can find it again. I wish I could reach up and touch my monitor with my finger and have the cursor center to my touch. That would be very good. I would target the enemy with my finger - /point /say “Okay you oogly damned scourge, time to pull up yur panties and get serious.”

Please don’t tell me to get a life. I have a life. This IS what I want to do right now. Playing this game isn’t any worse than sitting for hours watching soap operas or other non-interactive shows on the television. I choose my entertainment to be World of Warcraft. I at least get to have a part in the drama. It is very entertaining. It uses more of my senses than television. It tugs my heart like a good movie, it makes my heart race like an action film.
Cleaning out my screenshots file was necessary, to make room for memories of new in-game experiences. AND I AM READY!

The Magazine

Sweet! The new World of Warcraft magazine arrived. It was in a plastic cover so a bit protected from the elements and the machines of snailmail, but I cringed a tiny bit inside when I noticed the edge of it dented in. The magazine is so pretty I wanted it to be in perfect condition. It is full of glossy artwork and the cover is heavy duty like the cover of a paperback novel.

I took it to work with me yesterday and since most of my time at work is spent on hold I spent all day perusing it. I am thoroughly impressed with the layout, the look, and the information. There were enough bits of information of particular interest to me, so the pages are loaded with stickynotes. The editors have done a good job making the magazine visually appealing as well as informative.

There was information about PVP play - Particularly using line of sight (LOS). I don't PVP much but the article was still a very interesting read. Information about the Trading Card Game (TCG) which I will never be involved in but I did enjoy reading about it, and an Interview with Blizzard Entertainment's president, Mike Morhaime as well as interviews with WOW players of note. I am glad I purchased the subscription. As I turned the last page, I wanted more, but it only comes out 4 issues a year (sigh).
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Okay, enough about the magazine. Last night was family night on WOW. What that means is my Son, his son, and my husbands brother all gather at my and my husbands home and play together. I have 3 computers set up ready to go all the time and two guests bring their laptops. Last night was a bit different as my sister came by, so I set up my laptop and there were six of us for a bit. That meant we needed to do a 6 person raid. Five people constitute a group, more than makes makes a raid. The dynamics of the game are that there are areas that will only allow a group and there are areas that will only allow a raid. My sister's character is a level 51 (at this point in time you can only achieve level 80 but that is changing soon) and the rest of us have all levels of toons but we decided to play with our 80s in a place called Zul'Gurub. Bless her heart, she is so patient. Thything told her to stay by him whatever we do (he was heals for this), Omin the pally tanked, Shadew is a druid and I am Cantique, shadow priest.

Okay for those non players...a Tank is the person with the most ability to stand face to face with the enemy and with the necessary heavy armor to engage an enemy and take a pounding. The tank has to make sure the enemy player (computer generated character- not a real person) stays focused on him/her and leaves the rest of the group alone. While the tank is being beat up, the others in the group have roles -- they stab or cast spells etc, they do what they can with their special abilities to hurt the enemy. The healer makes sure the people in his group/raid stay healed. Spell casting Healing spells is his/her job. (There's much, much more to this - This is simply a tidbit of info.)

So we went into the instance to basically help her get loot for when she levels to 60. The characters that you kill have "loot" on them. Loot can be coins, clothing, cloth, potions, food, weapons, bones and other junk. I love to loot to see what I get for my trouble! Sometimes the loot is very, very nice and will enhance your game play, sometimes not so much! LOL. Loot is so important in the game of WOW that if you don't have good loot armor and weapons and trinkets, rings, and necklaces you simply can't continue on in higher level fights. Luckily you can go to the auction house and get better stuff if you can afford it. But to afford anything you have to loot money, loot junk and sell it, loot good stuff and sell it or use it to make good stuff that other people need for their game and sell it on the auction house. Does this all make sense? In the World of Warcraft, you can have a profession! I think that is amazing!

What that means to me is this: If I don't feel like fighting today, I can work to gather materials (ore, or leather, or plants, cloth etc) and use these items to create things -- armor, potions, elixirs, weapons -- you get the idea? Then I can spend time setting them into the auction house for sale. Later other people playing the game, go to the auction house and look for stuff they want or need and might buy your stuff. You get the gold in your mailbox in the game. You use your gold to buy what you need. See? Anyway, there is a lot to buy, and alot of stuff to find, and a whole world to explore!! It's amazing.

Another thing I do If I don't really feel like stressful war/raid/fight is I stand around in the city and just talk and look at other people and check out what they are wearing (with a couple of keystrokes, you can try their clothes on) - it is very fun for me. Before I joined The Illuminati, most of my time was spent doing this kind of thing. I called the game "High Tech Paper Dolls".

I will write later about how joining a guild, The Illuminati, helped me learn so much more about this game. And yes, my sister did get good Loot last night, but she now has to level up her character to be able to use the equipment, weapons, Armor that she found in there. It's incentive.

Is This Wise?

Hello everyone. This is my first attempt at "blogging" -- (unless you count Facebook or guild website entries as blogs. Do you?) LOL. And let me start right there. "LOL" is a sample of a new language I've been picking up since I began playing World of Warcraft. I am sure there are many, many, people out there that are my age and beyond who are enjoying the world of online gaming. LOL is how I feel when I play WOW. (I intend to make posts here about the not so LOLish times as well - It seems I have my fair share of emo moments.)

A bit of history -- as of current writing I am 56 years old, a female playing a female Dwarf Shadow Priest (main) on Earthen Ring in World of Warcraft - Cantique. There is more to me than the game though, so there will be posts about other things as well. I will begin by posting some earlier things that have made their way to the guild website I belong to. The Illuminati - great guild!

If you know me as Cantique, please forgive the redundancy of these beginning posts....*Hug*