Quick Post : This is it

Well, I've gone and done it. Last night,  I closed my swtor account. I haven't played in weeks, and even the patch 1.2 wasn't enough to get me excited about the game.

Don't get me wrong. It's a great game. The leveling experience is a lot of fun. I just don't feel like logging on anymore. I haven't deleted my characters. And I'm not saying I won't ever play again. Maybe in a couple weeks I'll miss my little marauder and I'll come back. With me, anything is possible.

So it's not goodbye. Not really. 

But yeah, it is.

Quick Post : New Patch

I saw over on Targeter's blog that the next patch will be live this week.

I can't seem to get excited about it.

I do love the Legacy thing, and being able to determine how my characters are related to each other. But that's about it. I didn't even read the patch notes (which are, by the way, massive). All the class changes and talent reset only seem to annoy me. I don't feel like relearning everything and respeccing all my characters. Sigh.

Truth is, as you've probably noticed by now, I've been suffering from a lack of interest in Swtor lately. I've been going back to my first love, WoW and still find fun things to do, which I thought wouldn't be possible until at least next patch. But that's for my other blog. 

The point is, I still want to level my marauder to 50 and see her class story. But I won't be looking for a guild. And I won't raid. And I most likely won't create new alts. In fact, I've already started deleting some (juggernaut and assassin).

I might change my mind, because that's just what I do. Today I almost feel like un-subbing, and tomorrow I might fall head over heals for the game all over again. It's not a bad game, it's actually very fun. But it's not what I'm looking for right now.

I'm happy for all of you out there that feel at home in the Swtor universe. I wish you all luck and lots of fun! This is not goodbye, but I probably won't be posting often, unless the patch blows me away with its epicness!

Quick Post : Update

Just a quick post to let you guys know I now have a World of Warcraft blog as well! I love to write, and since I'm playing more WoW than Swtor lately, I decided to create a new blog to share my adventures in Azeroth. I didn't want one blog for both. They are very different games, and I love the Sith Code too much to mix it with WoW stuff.

And I promise to post here again soon™. With something actually related to Swtor. XD

Three months later

I decided to do as Kristalys asked, and think about what those first three months in Swtor have been like for me.

I've only been levelling so far, and I have yet to reach level 50 on any of my toons, so that's the only part of Swtor I know, but to me, this game is pure fun. I think my favourite part is the class stories. I've tried lots of advanced classes so far and enjoyed most of them, at least for a while. Each advanced class has a little something that is unique and absolutely fun to play, so I can't pick just one and run with it. The stories are so varied, and engrossing, you just have to know what's happening next! And the voices! I just never get bored of listening to myself (my characters) talk, for some reason. It adds a brand new dimension to the characters and their personality. It can make or break a character, if the physical appearance you picked just doesn't fit with the voice. I just love to try and create the perfect character for each class, to have all these elements work well together. 

So for me, the Swtor experience has been amazingly fun. I'm the kind of person who likes to create a lot of different characters, and who enjoys levelling more than anything, and I think Bioware did an amazing job at making the levelling experience incredibly enjoyable. For some reason, there's a voice in the back of my head telling me that I have to hurry and get a toon to level 50 soon so I can experience everything. But it occurred to me that I have plenty of time to see the endgame content before it all becomes obsolete. There will be time later to do dailies, and farm gear and raid. Right now, what's important is to have fun, to play the classes I feel like playing, and see all the stories of as many classes as possible, because those are really great stories that are totally worth seeing at least once.

So over the last three months, I've created a lot of characters, deleted some, and am quite happy with my little family of alts. I have a strong preference for the Empire classes, but I do want to eventually level at least one of each republic classes also, if only to see their story. 

There will come a day when I grow bored with the characters I have, when they are all level 50, and when there's no new content to see. But that day is still far away.

Quick Post : Still here

Sorry for the lack of posts in the last couple of days, but I've been sick, so I haven't played much swtor. I've also been kind of sucked in some WoW activity lately, and am eagerly awaiting an invite to the MoP beta, so I'm not sure when I'll actually be able to have something to say about swtor. But I'm not going anywhere. I still love the game a lot. I'm just busy elsewhere at the moment.

Commitment Issues and Raiding

Warning : Wall of text incoming. 

Back when I was playing WoW passionately, I looooved to raid.

For all the WotLK era, Kizu and I were raiding together pretty casually. In Cataclysm, we got into - I'm not sure exactly how or why - a progression oriented guild. Not in a six-nights-a-week-five-hours-a-day kinda way, but progression was important to us. We wanted to be in the top guilds of the server. For many reasons, we didn't last long. in Firelands, we got 6/7 heroic pretty quickly. And then we hit the wall that is Heroic Ragnaros. 

Frankly, raiding was making me sick to my stomach at that point. I didn't even want to log on to raid by the time we got to Rag on heroic. I was hating the "push harder, kill faster" attitude, and more that that, I was hating my fellow raiders for putting so much pressure on us to succeed. We just couldn't kill him, and as time went on, we were getting more and more discouraged, and mean to each other, and you can imagine the rest.

I realize now that I was blaming the other's attitude when in reality, I was the one who made raiding frustrating for myself. I was worried that I was holding them back, which made me question myself and my abilities, which made me grumpy, which made raids anything but fun. It took me a while to realize I just didn't want to raid like that any longer. I've raided almost non-stop since Naxx, with a small interruption around the time Ulduar came out, and then, Firelands made me hate raiding. I say it was Firelands, but really, it wasn't the raid at all. It was me. I made myself hate raiding.

Here's a cute little Nerf to break the boring wall of text.

Yes, I have a point that has to do with Swtor. I'm getting there.

So now, in Swtor, I'm leveling a shit-ton of characters. Because it's a lot of fun. I don't even have a designated main. But I see other bloggers talk about raiding, (I know it's not called a raid, but I'm not saying Operating of Ops'ing. Sue me.) and I'm torn.

The raider in me is yelling "Come ooooon! Le's gooooo! Pick a toon already and make this happen, lady!" I want to experience everything in Swtor. I'm having so much fun with leveling, I don't want it to end. I want to level at least one of each Empire classes to 50. I want to run all the dungeons. I want to do dailies, and farm nice gear. I want to see some of the operations, if not all of them. But I'm worried that I'm not ready yet to make a commitment to a "serious" raiding guild. I'm not sure I want to spend a predetermined day - or two or three - each week, killing internet dragons, or droids or whatever, when I'd rather do something else, like level alts, or gather mats, or read a book or watch a movie! 

I guess what I'm trying to say is, I'd love to raid in Swtor. At some point. Hopefully before it all becomes obsolete. Because it looks like fun. It'd be great to raid maybe once or twice a week. Two to three weeks a month. Just sign up when you feel like raiding, and don't sign up when you don't feel like it. But I don't need - nor want - to see hardmodes or nightmare modes or whatever it is that they call it in Swtor. 

What I want, is to kill bosses with people that know what they're doing, but don't take themselves too seriously, and who don't get upset over a couple wipes, or killing new bosses at a slow rate. (I don't know what's the rush to kill all the bosses as fast as possible. You just get bored faster when you run out of new content to chew on.) I want to see the content, I want to have fun while killing bosses, preferably with friendly people that are serious about raiding when it's time to raid. 

What I don't want, is to feel like I have to be there every fucking day, wiping for three hours on a boss that just won't die. Because for me, that's just not fun. Wiping is part of it, sure. But I want to have fun, whether the boss dies or not. Not beat myself up for not progressing quickly enough, and not getting the server first, or some other nonsense. 

I know most guilds wouldn't want someone like me. It would make dealing with attendance and group composition a nightmare. But it's still what I want today. Maybe someday, I'll get rid of my commitment issues, and I'll find a fun bunch to raid with.

Planning Ahead - My Sniper Marksmanship talent build

I started a new Sniper alt not long ago, and you know what that means! Yes, another "Planning Ahead" post! Your mileage may vary, yada yada yada. The link to this build can be found here. Again, you could chose to use your points in a different order. I just went with what seemed most logical to me. Feel free to let me know if another order works better! There's always room for improvement. Also, I know there's another build, which I will probably try at some point, but this is the one I chose for now. More info on both builds can be found on SithWarrior.

Marksmanship

Tier 1

10-12 Marksmanship

13-14 Steady Shots

Tier 2

15-16 Precision Ambush

17-18 Ballistic Dampers

Tier 1 (Backtracking)

19 Cover Screen

Tier 3

20 Diversion

21-22 Snap Shot

23-24 Reactive Shot

Tier 4

25 Sniper's Nest

26-27 Between the Eyes

28-29 Sniper Volley (2/3)

Tier 5

30 Followthrough

31-32 Recoil Control

Tier 4 (Backtracking)

33 Sniper Volley (3/3)

34 Sector Ranger

Tier 6

35-39 Imperial Assassin

Tier 7

40 Rapid Fire

Engineering

Tier 1

41-43 Gearhead

44-45 Energy Tanks

Tier 2

46-47 Explosive Engineering (2/3)

Lethality

Tier 1

48-50 Lethality

The End of Act 1 : Sith Warrior Edition

Disclaimer : This may contain spoilers about the Sith Warrior questline. 

Quinn, Lyr, Andronikos and Kizu in Alderaan

Yesterday I finally saw the Sith Warrior Act 1 ending, and I enjoyed it quite a lot.

"I'm going to enjoy kicking
your face in."

All the time we were questing on Alderaan, all I could think about was how anxious I was to see the Sith Warrior's Act 1 ending, and get my new companion as well as the Lord title. All along, I chased a padawan called Jaesa that can see the light and dark side in anyone. Which means you can't exactly hide your intentions where she's around. Jaesa's master, Nomen Karr, tried to hide her from us, to protect her from Baras, whose spy network is compromised by Jaesa's unique ability to read people. In an attempt to lure her out of hiding, I had to (among other things) kill her parents by using force choke on them. That ability never ceases to amuse me. (Ever since I got the ability to actually do it in combat - around level 26 I think it was - I've been using it on cd. It gives rage, it keeps the mob from hitting you while you are channeling, and it's just plain fun to see.)

Being a Jedi sucks. When I grow
up, I wanna be a Sith!

After looking for Jaesa on Tattoine and Alderaan, I finally found her master on Hutta, where he tries to kill me to save his padawan. I had to defeat him three times before he finally gave up. (Those encounters were fairly easy with Quinn healing me. But I kept thinking, "What, you want me to kick your ass some more, stupid Jedi?") That is when Jaesa showed up, despite her master's order to stay away.

After I defeated her, Jaesa realized that the dark side is stronger than the light, and she wants to be a part of it. It really didn't take her long to jump ship. It's as if she was only waiting for an opportunity to switch sides. She finds the dark side to be a lot more easier, more enjoyable and more fulfilling than being a Jedi ever was. Well duh! Welcome to the dark side, Jaesa. We torture, we kill, we dance naked, covered in the blood of our enemies. Oh and we encourage you to fuck as much as you want. Hope you love it here!

I'm not sure  exactly why, but
the song "Bad to the bone"
comes to mind.

I'm quite happy that Lyr has got an apprentice who is as evil as she is. Lyr killed innocents, tortured people that had information on Jaesa's whereabouts, and she betrayed people that had helped her, only to get what she wanted, and it was all worth it. Jaesa's affection will be easy to gain.


So in conclusion, I'm pretty pleased with the Sith Warrior storyline so far. It's been good fun, and I'm looking forward to see what's coming next. I'm a bit sad though that Lyr hasn't been able to flirt with anyone, yet. At that point, my Sorcerer had shared sexy time with a fellow Sith. Quinn is pretty stuck-up, and hasn't been much fun in the romance department so far. Here's hoping that will change soon.

How Crew Skills forced me to roll another alt

Kizu and I finished Tatooine this week, so this weekend, we were ready for Alderaan and the end of Act 1 (which will be the object of my next post). As we were maybe halfway through the zone, Kizu pointed out that our gear was pretty outdated and suggested that we upgrade our orange pieces to kill more efficiently. Lyr being an Artificer, I started looking for enhancements and hilts to craft for us. It took a couple (way too many) tries for me to get the blue quality version of the Might enhancement I needed, and only one try for Kizu's Resolve enhancement. The same thing happened for the hilts. Someone out there must hate me. I also got us some neat +14 crit red crystals.

But we also needed mods and armoring! Kizu's Bounty Hunter is a Cybertech that can craft those, but since he was pretty low on mats, he made us only some armorings, and we bought mods with Alderaan Commendations. Needless to say, once we upgraded all our orange gear, we started killing mobs noticeably faster. I think we spent more time Saturday night crafting upgrades then actually playing. But that's fine, because it was fun.

Kizu's main being his Sith Assassin, his Bounty Hunter hasn't had much love in a while, except to do the space mission dailies occasionally for credits. In order to support us all the way through level 50 on his own, he would have to get scavenging mats solely through missions, which would be way too costly.

That is why I needed to start a new alt! Say hello to the new addition to the family!

Fredrick, my future Sniper

Fred will be our scavenging mats farmer, and our slicer for cash and augments. I know I said I wouldn't start another alt yet, but it's for a good cause! I blame crew skills for being so fun and the craftable stuff for being so good. The quality of the gear really does make a difference in the leveling process. Being able to craft our own item modifications is totally worth it.

Hopefully, I'll be able to level him enough this week so he can get level-appropriate mats for Lyr and Kizu as soon as possible.

Planning Ahead - My Juggernaut Vengeance (dps) talent build

Here is how I plan to use my talent points in the Vengeance tree (dps) for my Juggernaut. The link to this build can be found here. I found it on SithWarrior. As always, your mileage may vary. This is just how I see things. Feel free to let me know if my shit makes no sense.

Vengeance

Tier 1

10-12 Single Saber Mastery

13-14 Decimate (2/3)

Tier 2

15-16 Dreadnaught

17-19 Accuracy

Tier 3

20 Shien Form

21-22 Draining Scream

Tier 1 (Backtracking)

23 Decimate (3/3)

24 Improved Sundering Assault (1/3)

Tier 4

25 Deadly Reprisal

26 Ruin

27-29 Vengeance

Tier 5

30 Impale

31-32 Eviscerate

33-34 Savagery

Tier 6

35-37 Rampage

38-39 Deafening Defense

Tier 7

40 Shatter

Tier 1 (Backtracking)

41 Improved Sundering Assault (2/2)

Immortal

Tier 1

42-43 Enraged Sunder

Rage

Tier 1 

44-45 Ravager

46- 48 Malice

Tier 2

49-50 Brutality

The last 10 points (after you get Shatter) could be taken in a different order. You could decide to wait to finish Improved Sundering Assault at level 50 and get better talents before. I chose to do it this way because I like finishing a tree before switching to another, unless it makes more sense to add points in another tree earlier in the leveling process.