Blaugust Day 31 - Gaming recommences and the end of Blaugust.

Today the PC has continued to frustrate And Lotro simply refuses to run smoothly even on low graphics settings. What I did try was to run Guild Wars 2 and amazingly it ran as smooth as anything. I suspect it might be unrelated to my overheating issues, and perhaps a recent patch is clashing with something. Eve seems to running reasonably ok but I was delighted to be able to play a fantasy game so Guild Wars saved the day.

I managed to rack up about four levels, more than I've done in the whole of last month and even obtained a new companion, I little piggy!

And so this is my last post for Blaugust, and although I came a little late to the party, I've enjoyed having a reason to post every day. I'll certainly be making a concerted effort to post often through September...(Bleptember, anyone?) and hope you'll continue to read.

Blaugust Day 30 LOTRO lag and Lips

It's on somewhat of an anticlimax that Blaugust draws to an end as I'm barely gaming thanks to my PC that is now slowed to a crawl. I did manage to log into lotro and complete my Hytbold dailies. I've now got 5 out of the 6 armour pieces and I've unlocked the smithy to run dailies for compendiums (used to make relics for Legendary Items) so once I have my final piece, I'm done with Rohan, or at least the first section. I don't need to see Hytbold completed - I did it on Windfola already so I'll be wending my way to Wildemore and not a moment too soon..at level 88, everything is just a little bit too easy, even with the soup like lag.

On a brighter note, today we celebrated my nephew leaving for University and my upcoming birthday, with Big ole BBQ. We had some unseasonably good weather and afterwords the alcohol had flowed suffieciently that I was asked to fire up the Xbox for family favourite 'Lips'. This is the Xbox version of Playstations Singstar, a karaoke game with two wifi connected mics. My sisters in law love the game and after numerous attempts at Aha's 'take on Me' Mariah Carey's 'Touch my Body' and Destiny's Child 'Survivor', everyone went home happy.

Blaugust Day 29 - Spyware stops play

Been a quiet few days, gaming wise. On top of the fan issues my PC has been reduced to a crawl by a bunch of spyware I managed to infect myself with. Things seem to be almost back to normal though I definately need to get the fan sorted out.

Got in a little LOTRO. Pinestro the warden has hit 88 and crafted his Second Age level 85 spear. I was almost not going to bother, as at the rate he's levelling he'll be looking for a 95 and then a 100 but according to Turbine, the legendary item grind is coming to an end as you'll be able to 'lock in' the item you have from100 onwards. The endless grind every ten levels is ridiculous currently so that will be a welcome change.

Also played a little Eve but nothing more than mining and training. I've established a trade between myself and my corporation for the sale of the Ice I'm mining, so hopefully the profits will start coming in soon ( as I'm down to a paltry 10 million Isk after buying and fitting a second Mackinaw.

Blaugust Day 26 - Postcards for Josh

A couple of days ago I wrote about about my history with gaming. One of the good friends I referred to, in fact the first person I corresponded with through PBMs and subsequently met years later, is Jason Johns and he or at least his son, is the subject of my post today.

Joshua Johns is seven years old. He's already an avid gamer, a huge Minecraft fan, so he's definately "one of us"

On the 6th of March this year, Joshua was diagnosed with Pre B Cell Acute Lymphoblastic Leukaemia.  Since March Josh has been treated with seven different types of chemotherapy and has spent time in hospital on four different occasions with suspected infections. He has had a central line inserted into his chest and now has an ng tube in his nose which is used to feed him as his weight dropped drastically. The chemotherapy has affected his legs so he is unable to walk very far and has a wheelchair. It has also affected his hands and so he is also unable to write. Josh hasn't been able to attend school since he was diagnosed in March. At the end of the school term Josh was sent homework for the holidays which included writing a diary of what he did in the holidays and to send a postcard from his holiday. Unfortunately he is currently going through a particularly intensive block of treatment and so won't be able to go away on holiday this summer. 

For this reason his folks have decided to make his summer homework a little bit different. They have bought a large World map and are asking everyone to send a postcard to Josh from wherever you are if you have the chance. They will then mark the areas he receives postcards from on the map and send this map into school with the postcards in September. 

So if you're going away on holiday or even if you fancy sending a postcard from home please send to Joshua Johns at 2 Swansmoor Drive, Hixon, Staffordshire ST18 0FP. 

If you want to see his progress, there is a Facebook group called Postcards For Josh.

Blaugust Day 25 - the Treasure Hunt grind is over!

So pretty much most of the weekend was spent In LOTRO, in the damn Treasure Hunt. Now I've been sucked into this occasional event on a number of occasions, each time testing my patience to its limit. The hope of a random drop of the Treasure Laden Goat or the grinding of tokens for a emote I'll never use.

 So what attracted me to bang my pick into the ground over and over and race other hungry treasure hunters to berry bushes every fifteen minutes to earn a new pick (and risk being called 'rude' as I was on one occasion!)?

Cosmetic pets....

Turbine have finally release these to non-Loremasters and everyone is after one, and for a mere 300 treasure tokens, an ugly beast with a blade for a beak could be yours. So I did it...I dug and dug, and chased berry bushes using caffeine induced speed boosts, and I got 300 tokens. Now I'm the proud owner of a green beaked beastie that I'll probably summon a couple of times before I forget he's there.

Oh MMOs, you do like us to run round your little hamster wheel, don't you?

Blaugust Day 24 RPGs - my potted history

The history of my love of fantasy gaming goes back to around 1982. My sister bought me a copy of basic Dungeons and Dragons. I'm not entirely sure she knew what it was and neither did I but a friend and I pored through the rules of that game and tried to figure out how to play it. He managed to roll characters and even run a few fights, but without any kind of mentor, our 11 year old brains couldn't get our head around the concept of role playing.

It was then this kids brother came on the scene. A good five years older, he got the concept straight away and began DMing basic adventures for us. We then got a grasp and brought others into the fold. The group grew, spread out and soon enough, we moved to Advanced D&D. That was the heyday of RPGs. Huge Monster Manuals with reams of creatures and hundreds of prepublished adventures at our fingertips.

At around the same time, I discovered Warhammer Battle, a mass combat tabletop game, and found other people who enjoyed that. Not long after, the Warhammer RPG came out, a favourite if mine and among other games Dragon Warriors, Rolemaster, Middle Earth Roleplaying, Paranoia, Judge Dredd, these became our bread and butter. Summers were spent morning til night running through games. I fell into the role of DM for most games, and he 80's flew by. 

Toward the end of the decade, college began and I started playing games by post, Play by Mail or PBM games. Through that I met several friends, some of whom I'm still close with today and as I moved away from home and our gaming group disbanded, I turned to PBMs for my main source of entertainment. it wasn't long before I started to run my own games by email, incorporating some of the players from home, along with my new friends from other Postal games. Craig's PBeMs was born. Several years later, computers caught up and email took over from post as the form of communication for these games. Cheaper and more efficient, the pace stepped up and the amount of games I ran increased. At one point I was running 6 campaigns for various game systems. Craig's PBeMs became Knifesedge PBeMs and the name stuck as my handle for most internet dealings.

As work and families have grown, most games have come to an end. Currently, Knifesedge Games runs just one game, set in the 1920's Lovecraftian world and even that drags as players have less time to commit, but I still hold out hope. Computer games fill the gap that RPGs left behind and while I still not for those good old days, MMO's are a good second best.

Blaugust Day 23 - Epic Grumbles

I didn't get up to much gaming today, the wife took the baby hobbit to the in laws so I got to do jobs around the house and garden I don't normally get done when they're around (much as I'd loved to have spent the whole day playing games!)

I did, however, get into LOTRO in the evening and ran Helms Dike with a kinnie. Now a lot of people have complained about the Epic Battles but ideally enjoy them. Yes, they're a challenge to solo and. Bit of time sink but they're fun if you know what to do. However, my recent experiences have started to cloud my love of the system.

I was informed by another kin mate that the catapults are bugged and can crash the instance, so I avoided using them (which happen to be my favourite part of the battles). Then today I found the Powder at the Gate side quest to be bugged. Having wiped out the opposition effectively, the instance ended before it registered our victory, thereby robbing us of valuable rewards.

I don't understand how these instances, that are working perfectly well for the most part, can now be so riddled with bugs. I really hope Turbine sort these out before launching any more!

Oh and another thing, if you are in the Treasure Hunt and rob a berry bush under another players nose, don't get all butthurt when said player uses a speed boost and beats you to the two next bushes. You had it coming!

/endrant