TOR Fleet +10 Datacron fun

Last night the TOR Republic team did the +10 to all stats Fleet Datacron run.  Four people can do it, but I'd really recommend a larger group - you need people to open doors, lower bridges, fly around with the grappling hook, etc.

It was fun but loooong!  A few things we did discover:

1. Start at a designated time and plan on a couple of hours if it's your first time there
2. Everyone get their MGGS (Magnetic grappling thing) in advance - it's on Alderaan, 10K credits (it can be traded)
3. At least one (but preferably ALL) have the Corellian Museum Crystal  found on Corellia l (the red one - opens the door - and once you have your +10 it's gone!) People will die and you need to open the door to let them back in.
4. EVERYONE has to have the crystal found on the Fleet Museum - Cormium Crystal Shard (the big blue one opens the door to the datacrons - once you have +10 it's gone!)
5. Everyone read the swtor-spy.com walk-thru and watch one of the video's on YouTube, so you understand what's involved.
6. A force pulling sage or two is awesome to have along
7. Until the one grappling point is fixed, a smuggler with cover - yeah T'nk! - is a major help on that PiA one.

So having done our proper research () our intrepid group set out. 

Menana, Jale'penos, Redimere, Maxx, Herc, T'nk, Reymal and Lyril, but before we'd lowered the pretty pink bridge, we were joined by Blitzheipr, Psycheerose and Erickson.



A few of us watched the videos and read the swtor-spy.com guide while getting everyone into position.   This is a fun guild event for level 50's, and really requires thought and teamwork.  Which we're all so good at!!! 


Finally we had success and all were ready to grab their +10 stat datacron, only to find out we didn't ALL have the Cormium Crystal Shard!  . 

Being the great and supportive team that we all are, we took a quick break, re-assembled and back we went to get everyone their +10 datacrons!  Menana being the very clever lady she is, brought and alt that we parked inside the first door (the red crystal one), so she could log in/out to it, saving running time for everyone else.  As falling deaths happen, and you can't res people in the room.



Of course this time one of the grappling points was buggy as can be, which extended our time in there.  But being the guild we are everyone stuck it out to help their team.  T'nk, finally smuggled his way to the point.  Many of us had a very fun time being stuck inside part of the ship, wandering a black oasis of nothing, did I say buggy? Yea, very much so!

But we finally got it all together, Rose and Maxx, the sages pulled everyone up the last two points and success! A whole bunch of us with +10 to all stats!


Sadly Redimere and Jale'penos had to leave as they were well past their bedtime, so didn't make it in the final pic!

Raiding in Rift

Our guild is slowly progressing in our raid content and went into River of Souls last night. It was the first time for the majority of the team.

River of Souls is a 20 man raid instance in Rift.  We were short a few people, but decided to give it a try. Hammerfist Clan is co-raiding with Silent Strike guild to fill out for a 20 man. 

We did awesome on the trash, even being short dps.

The Dark Foci has mechanics that take some practice to get down, but once everyone understands it's fairly simple.  Being short dps we were having trouble getting the the Force of Corruption down as well as managing the Destabilizing Soul. 

So after a few attempts we decided to move forward to Warmaster Galenir as we'd cleared the trash to him.  As our raid time is strictly held to two hours we decided to have one attempt on the boss.

It was a fun raid, and we all had a great time.  Raiding with a casual focused guild does take longer to progress through content, but to be able to laugh and have fun as you wipe and clear more of a raid instance is more important than anything.



Rift Junkies Guide to River of Souls

Rift Dragon Parade

The Carnival of the Ascended continues in Rift, with the Dragon Parade.  This is Phase 2 of the first anniversary celebration for Rift.

There are new games at Fortune Shore including a race, fashion show and drinking contest.

The parade is pretty cool to watch, TRION really puts on a great show.  The world events in Rift are fun with great prizes.  Kudos TRION you did it again.

SWTOR Datacrons

Datacron hunting in TOR is one of those fun side activities.  There are some wonderful walk-thru guides out there (see list below). I do like Swtor-spy's one with screenshots/maps.
 
The passive stat bonus from each is helpful as you level (+2 to +4 stat increase) and if you get ALL of the ones for example for +Aim, , and the shards that can be made into a relic is really helpful as you  level and at max level.

Datacron on Alderaan 

Here is a link to the combos you can make with the shards.  Make sure to have a a power core for the disassembler, just in case you put the relic together wrong. The cost is 8,000 credits.

RIFT - Carnival of the Ascended

The Carnival of the Ascended is here!

To celebrate RIFT's one year anniversary, Telara is having a party!

It started with Pinata's scattered around Telera dropping a variety of items from collectible pets to glass beads. Sadly, if you're not ontop of a Pinata when it drops, you may miss out!

Now into the first phase, carnival games are available (and repeatable) available in the main city as well as in Shimmersand.  Also in Shimmersand is the daily Tales of the Ascended I raid which rewards you with 10 Prize Tickets and a box of Random Artifacts. This is set on the boats at Fortune's Shore and there is a portal to and from Meridian/Sanctum to the event.

Overview of the Meridian Carnival

SWTOR Datacron's

SWTOR (Star Wars The Old Republic) has datacrons which are fun in a PiA way to get as they add to your stats, and you can make a relic which is useful.

Here are different links to them.

SWTOR-spy.com is my favorite for the walk-thrus.  I waited until 50 to start going back and getting them, as I was always thrilled to stumble across them out in the world.

I lost the thread on the datacron locations, so starting one with a variety of links.


Walk-thru on Swtor-spy.com:  http://www.swtor-spy.com/datacrons/
** I've been told some of the locations were incorrect, but I haven't had issue with the walk-thrus

List of ALL datacrons (by codex #):  http://swtor.wikia.com/wiki/Datacron_Locations
** You can check your Codex #'s to see which you have/haven't done

Datacron - mixing shards: http://swtor.wikia.com/wiki/Datacron

>>Matrix Cubes function as relic-type items, and are equipped as a part of the player's gear that grants a passive stat boost. Depending on the color combination, the Matrix Cube will give a different statistic boost and will also vary in level requirement. The level requirement has no relation to the current level of the player assembling the cube, but rather the colors of the three shards. There are four tiers of cubes at levels 15, 24, 32, 50 [3]. Though it's not always the case, usually the more of a single color shard in a cube the higher level it is. Therefore a cube made with Red, Blue, and Yellow, some of the first colors acquirable, you will have a very low-level cube.


Other location sites:
http://www.ign.com/wikis/star-wars-the-old-republic/Datacron_Locations

http://www.swtorstrategies.com/2011/10/complete-datacron-location-list.html

TOR World Boss Tour

World Boss Tour

The guild I’m in Hammerfist Clan’s (Star Wars The Old Republic ) TOR Republic team does a weekly World Boss Tour for fun on Wednesdays.  The purple drops are great as they're BoE, so those with alts can pass the gear along versus everything being BoP and useless to the higher levels.  It's great fun having 15-20+ of us in vent at one time, running through the different planets.  

We start at Coruscant (SD-0) if we have enough low level players that need/want it.  

Otherwise we start at Taris (Subject Alpha), proceed to Tatooine (Trapjaw), Nar Shaddaa (Battledroid R4-GL), Alderaan (, Quesh (Rogue Cartel Droid) and the two on Hoth (Snowblind and Gargath). 

Gargath on Hoth has eluded us, and with the two hour timer (approximately) for the World Bosses, you never know if they were recently killed or will respawn shortly. 

Nar Shaddaa fight Battledroid R4-GL

Quesh fight Rogue Cartel Droid

 We've been lucky to get a bit of world PvP in on Quesh, Alderaan and Tat a few times which many of us enjoy and annoy the few anti-pvers as they get flagged too!

Some of the World Boss fights are a hike for lower level players that do not have the taxi/speeder points, and we've had a few running as a guild to pick those up for people.  It's all fun as it's an enjoyable guild event that is always well attended.

We’re working on the Belsavis boss, Primal Destroyer, in the next couple of weeks now that we have enough 50’s to make up the required group.

List of World Boss locations can be found here: http://www.ign.com/wikis/star-wars-the-old-republic/World_Bosses

SWTOR a month out

 A guildmate asked recently if I was enjoying TOR (Star Wars the Old Republic), and I said yes and no.

There are aspects of TOR that I absolutely love - it's visually breathtaking and it feels like real worlds and huge cities (maybe should be more people running around), but the major cities look/feel like what you'd visualize futuristic or syfy cities would look like.

The worlds are gorgeous - even the Hutta kinda ugly ones - are amazing.  The overhead fighting, pollution on Corellia, the details are there and just fantastic.

Add to that the mini-cinematic cutscenes with awesome voice overs (I still want to track down a list of all the actors - my guild guesses alot of them!) and you can see where the money was spent on in TOR.  

The cutscenes are really cool, most of the time.  Some are a bit overdone, like when I have a cutscene with a rock, to watch a 30 second clip of the rock doing something. WTF???  That isn't immersive to me, that's disruptive.  The major quest chains and class quests are great, but every NPC. I guess I would have been happy with the dialog in the game, not a cutscene for every quest.  The class ones are definitely great, but a rock? /sigh

The story lines are fun and distinctly different for each class as well as based on the choices you make will affect how things turn out.  That's a bit fun and as I play with the dark/light point indicator off, I'm sometimes surprised at what I get dark or light points for.  I saved his life and get dark points? Why? lol

Rift Holiday Event

Trion is doing a wonderful job with World Events coming out regularly and the variety of new vanity items associated to each one.  Continuing with that Telara is celebrating the Holidays in typical style - the Fae Yule Celebration. It's scheduled to be a three phase event over six weeks.

Daily quests to be completed in town and of course destroying specific Rifts, as well as a Christmas Village feel, complete with random snowfall.

A lineup of Christmas Corgi's.  Various edible treats will turn you into a Corgi or an odd-looking reindeer (see below).

Both the Rudolph-red-nose Corgi and the Reindeerish mount, the Spotted Festive, Fae Yule Vaiyuu (that's a mouthful!) can be purchase during this World Event.  Vanity clothing and Lesser Essence are also available purchase.

There is still time to get your vanity gear and other goodies before the event ends.


Rift Zam guide to the Fae Yule Celebration.

SWTOR

After the long holiday beta weekend - all I can say is WOW regarding SWTOR.  I've honestly been so lukewarm over TOR - preparing myself for it to be more hype than substance. But EA has created a wonderful player experience.

 So, I really put in some time Friday-Monday on testing the different classes, start zones, some crafting, PvP, exploring and Flashpoints.  I didn't get past level 13, as I do want to keep the advanced storyline and questing fresh for when TOR goes live.

No screenshots though, apparently that is still turned off by EA as part of the NDA.

But even without pics, I did test every class over the last two beta weekends and it's really hard to pick a favorite.  They're all fun.  My preference would probably go to the Bounty Hunter/Trooper - just a ton of fun to play - but I honestly liked all the classes.  Some of the races (I think they're technically called species), I preferred (personal taste) over the others, and a couple of the male/female choices will have to be worked out as I didn't care for the female and/or male voice acting combo.


The start zones, I'd have to say the Sith Inquisitor/Warrior had to be my favorite as far as quest lines, not necessarily the look of the zone. Least favorite and I really found it to be on the boring side was the Smuggler/Trooper start zone on Ord Mantell.  I really don't know why, but I found it to be a bit of a yawn.  The other two start zones were excellent and definitely gave the feel for the classes starting there.


The worlds are completely wonderful and each has a different feel to them.  The capitol cities were truly unbelievable - huge, with tremendous detail and felt like a city or at least what SciFi tells us futuristic cities will look like.  Everything seems BIG in TOR.  Lots of running pre-mount (level 25), so definitely bind an auto-run key!  It's going to be truly amazing to see the other planets after launch.


Crafting is definitely different, but you really get hooked on the send the companion off to do the crafting while you carry on doing whatever - in this case my GM, another guildmate and I were doing a Flashpoint.   By the time it finished we had a bunch of crafting mats and a couple of  pieces of gear/potions - pretty sweet!


PvP in TOR is fun.  Huttball has to be experienced to truly appreciate it.  I love the added humor from the announcers, the speed of the game and learning the strategies.  There were some players that had obviously mastered the game - as they had nice titles and really knew the strats for the different PvP zones.  Each has a different feel.  Not a drop you in a zone and duke it out, but you felt like you were there with a purpose.

 
I only had the opportunity to try the first Flashpoint, but it was great.  The first time we did it three players and a companion. While the second was two of us and companions.  I don't know if it scales, but it was definitely do-able for two with pets.  I did do both Empire and Republic side of the Flashpoint to see the differing view points.  (Now to find out what a Moff is?  I'm sadly lacking in Star Wars lore/info.)


Any down side to TOR?

It still needs work, and I hope they'll have time to fix the issues before launch.  It's not horrible but definitely things you really hope will get fixed.

We've all experienced the bad MMO launches that make us cringe, and many of us were extremely impressed with the wonderful launch Trion accomplished with Rift,  They really raised the bar on what we all expect with a quality launch. 

I do hope EA can achieve that, they have an awesome game, but too many 'issues' will make people leave, it's happened before.

Changes I would make?

The UI - make it movable/sizable.  All the crucial info is at your fingertips, but I something's don't move and are larger than many of us need/require.

Characterization - sliders for the different facial features (eyes, eye brows, body height, size, etc.)and more variety of hair/skin tone/colors.



That said, I'd recommend TOR, if you're any kind of Star Wars fan, or an MMO player - it's definitely worth buying and playing.