Our TSW Family Is Growing

Another month, another deposit of bonus Funcom points in my account when I logged in to The Secret World last night. I used them to buy the outfit shown above, the new Gladiatrix armor, so I can finally look like a tank (and so my guildies can’t claim that I only do all my tanking in skimpy clothes, at least until the next time I decided to buy a new mini-skirt).

There appears to be an increase of interest in the game lately, and as always it gets me giddy to see TSW getting attention because there really is no other MMO out there right now quite like it. Our Monday night TSW sessions continue to thrive as we get new people joining us some nights and current members experimenting with new decks and roles. We’re a pretty casual group, mostly splitting up individually or in groups while hanging out in cabal chat or teamspeak.

Anyway, in light of this I thought I’d plug our guild some more as well as provide some info to common questions I often see about TSW. Yep, it’s buy-to-play now, which means you pay for the game and play for free, and these days you can often find it at retail on sale or for pretty dirt cheap. As far as I know, it also comes with a month in which they treat you as a full subscriber and you get the perks like the XP booster drink and free in-game gift.

My character’s name is Tamerlaine “Laeyn” Berard; your nickname in the middle is what everyone in the game goes by. Feel free to add me to your friends lists or ask me any questions. The Mercy Gaming Knights TSW branch are the Knight of Mercy. We’re Templar guild, though your faction only matters for cabals and cabal features; when in game, members of the Illuminati, Dragons or Templars can group together to do quests or instances no problem. Aside from the intro as well as your faction quests, everyone pretty much experiences the same content, though each faction has its own unique flavor and you’ll see differences in things like quest completion text, etc.

Server also doesn’t really matter unless you want to PvP with others on your home realm. No matter where you end up you can still play with anyone in this game, though most of KoM are on Arcadia, the RP server. So you see while it’s not completely restriction-free, I still think the degree of flexibility is one of the best things about the game.

A lot of people have said that TSW has a rather steep learning curve, and this is probably true especially towards the beginning. I remember it took me a couple hours to really get into it. The good news is, once you get the mechanics down, the the drive to create and experiment with new ability decks gets pretty addictive. Still, the game being so niche, some never really get into it or are turned off by the horror themes, which is totally understandable too. Even now I still frequently run across features that make me want to tear my hair out, and personally there are certain quests I really wish I hadn’t done at night. In the dark. All by myself.

The Pet Hunter Diaries: Notes From The Great Azerothian Safari

Dear Diary,

New Acquisitions: 96
Current Total: 251

Uh, yeah. Just as I thought — it’s pet collecting madness after the release of World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria, as evidenced by my new acquisitions count and current total, which illustrates a huge jump in numbers from last week. There are so many new pets to hunt and collect.

My guess is, if I’d spent as much time leveling as I did pet hunting and battling this week, I would have reached level 90 by now. But it’s the perfect thing to do in the middle of an afternoon when your baby is napping. Or any time you have a moment to spare, really. What I’ve been doing is methodically going through Azeroth zone by zone, hitting the low level areas first and working my way up. Basically, the higher the level range of the zone, the higher level of the pets you’ll find in them. Here’s a good rule of thumb: if you can defeat the NPC trainer in one zone, then you are most likely good to go to move on to the next level bracket.

Other notes I’ve picked up from my great Azerothian safari:

• It’s all about the team! Team make-up is probably the most important aspect of pet battling, and you’ll probably find yourself constantly switching around and tweaking yours depending on the type of fight. At least, you should be. Always mix it up, and don’t be tempted or feel like you have to be stuck with the same 3-pet team.

• Consider leveling up at least one of each type of pet (e.g. Flying, Magic, Critter, etc.) because you never know when one of them will come in handy. Variety is key! I definitely would not recommend filling your team with three pets of the same type; it’s a bad idea, as evidenced by some of the NPC trainers you will no doubt tasked to defeat. For instance, I wiped the floor with the goblin Cassandra Kaboom, using a strong Elemental pet against all three of her Mechanicals. You don’t want the same thing to happen to you.

• If you’re going to be leveling at least one of each type of pet anyway, and seeing as there are 10 types all together, it’s perfect to level several teams in tandem. When looking for battles in one zone, rotating 3-4 teams also lets you take advantage of the 8min cooldown on your heal/revive pets ability, so no need to visit a stable master every time you get battered up. When one team gets low on health, simply switch to another one. This ensures you’ll have about a dozen pets all around the same level no matter where you go, also allowing for minimal downtime.

• Make sure to still keep a good number of pets at every level or level bracket. You never know when you’ll be traipsing through a lower level zone one day and see a wild pet that catches your eye, and you’ll want a battle pet at a similar level to capture it. This shouldn’t be too hard if you’ve been an avid hunter already, as pets keep their levels when you catch them.

• Admittedly, leveling pets can be a bit of a grind if that’s all you’re focusing on. The best way to make it not feel like one is by making it a hunting expedition. Time flies when you have a goal in mind, especially if that goal is adding a new unique pet to your collection. Still, even when you catch a new pet, why stop there? Chances are the quality of that pet can be improved, because you’ll probably be catching a lot of “Common” ones.

• Don’t settle for “Poor” quality! I certainly don’t. Hunting uncommon and rare quality pets can help you level up quick by keeping your mind off the grind. Kill all Common pets you encounter that you already own (there are addons out there that help let you know), and usually by the time you finally bag that your Uncommon or Rare, you would have gained a healthy amount of XP for your team(s).

• When you find you need to focus on leveling one particular pet, you will want to take it to a zone where there are wild pets appropriate to its level, but see if you can give it an advantage by choosing areas are that teeming with opponents that are weak against it. For example, when I found I needed to power level my Lil’ Tarecgosa, I took to the wilds of Feralas, where the Flying type Nether Faerie Dragons there were getting one-shotted by her strong Magic type attacks. The quick XP gain meant I was able to level her from 8-11 in a matter of minutes.

• Pet hunting comes with a whole other set of rules, since your goal is not to kill, but to capture. Before you set out, it’s good to have a good mix of pets at varying levels on hand. Usually, a good rule of thumb is to have pets about 1-2 levels above the ones you hope to catch, meaning they are strong enough to not lose the fight, but at the same time they aren’t so strong that you’ll risk killing your opponent outright. Also, be careful not to use abilities that your targets are vulnerable to or you’ll risk doing too much damage, leading to a dead pet and a botched hunt.

• Also good to have are pets with “small” attacks (like leech life or abilities that do periodic every turn). They’re good for those annoying situations where you’ll get your opponent just a sliver of health above the threshold which activates the trapping ability, when all they need is a tiny little nudge to put them in the sweet spot (25-30% health range). Always look at the numbers, especially when your opponent goes under 50% health. Calculate the damage of your attacks, and pray you don’t get a freak crit that kills the pet you hope to capture.

• It’s also helpful to have a “tanky” pet on hand, one you can use to soak up damage between turns while you try and capture, because the truth is sometimes the trap misses. This can prevent your other pets from being whittled down and dying on you, because once they die they get no experience at all, no matter how much they participated.

• While I do prefer to level a bunch of pets at once and keeping them all at around the same level, admittedly it’s sometimes good to have along a “brute” that’s higher level than all the rest. They come in handy during those times where you find the need to completely and utterly destroy your opponent, without delicacy or any of the subtleties. Fighting against NPC battle trainers, for instance. Or, say, when you’ve caught the pet you were after and now that a second pet has joined the fight, you just want the battle to be over. Brutes are good as a back-up plan, and I find bears especially good for the job (Baby Blizzard Bear, Hyjal Bear Cub, etc.)

• I’m finding that each zone has at least one pet unique to them. Not always, but in general this is the case. Sometimes, that pet can be a bit hard to find. Maybe I just got lucky, but I wonder if server resets can be used to your advantage? All I know is, after days of hunting around the Wetlands for Tiny Bog Beast or Arathi Highlands for Tiny Twister and having no luck, one time I showed up in both places after a server reset and there were a bunch of them all over.

• Some pets will only come out during certain conditions. For example, Widow Spiderlings in Duskwood or Stone Armadillos in Desolace will only appear at night. Baby Apes in Cape of Stranglethorn only when it’s raining. When it comes to finding out information like this, sites like Warcraftpets.com are your friends.

• Once you get out of the starting zones, you’ll find most wild pet battles will consist of two opponents; you’ll get an alert that another pet has joined the battle after you engage, and it will sit in the sidelines until you defeat the first. Some wild pets only show up as the “second” pet of a team battle. I suspect the Snowshoe Hare in Hillsbrad Foothills may be one of these. Keep in mind, you can only capture one pet per battle.

Happy hunting,

MMOGC

Latest field notes and recently hunted pets:

Too many to list all of them, obviously. And anyway, most of them are the same variations of your common models of rabbits, mice, snakes and spiders, etc. Believe me, after a while, you get so sick of seeing rats and rabbits like in every zone you go. Anyway, I’m just going to showcase some of the more unique ones I’ve found on my travels, or a few that I personally like.

Lucky Quilen Cub

What the heck is a Quilen you ask? Apparently a lion dog thingy with disgustingly huge blue watery doe eyes. Finally got this after entering Collector’s Edition code to upgrade my game. Holy crap, this thing is so cute it’s ugly, didn’t even know that was possible. It kinda hurts just to look at it.

Giraffe Calf

No safari is complete without a giraffe. Caught this little (um, maybe not so little?) guy out in Southern Barrens among roving giraffe herds, just swooped in and stole him away from his parents. WoW has turned me into poacher. Next up is training him to become a killer in underground fighting ring. Anyway, pet is TALL. Towers over gnomes. Throw a pet treat that increases its size at it, and it also gets as big as a hunter pet. Got loads of comments.

Lost of Lordaeron

These ghosts are all over the place out in Tirisfal Glades, common but very cool model nonetheless. Also shows you can capture of some of the most unique and pretty pets right in the low level zones, like Gazelle Fawn in Mulgore or Ravager Hatchling in Bloodmyst Isle. Best looking pets are not always locked in later parts of game, though not sure how respectful it is to be able to capture and own and treat the spirits of the dead like…well, pets. Game has turned me into monster.

Tiny Harvester

All over Westfall, very commonly seen in the fields. Essentially miniature of annoying Harvester mobs that try to kill you, but starting out in the human lands it was first wild pet I saw that got me really excited about pet hunting. But also special to me as first catch of this pet also happened to be my first Rare. Very detailed and unique little pet.

Tiny Twister

We have pet models of earth elementals, fire elementals, etc. about time we get an air elemental pet. Found only around Circle of Outer Binding out in Arathi Highlands, but rarely seen because of possible long respawn times. Hunted for two days without seeing any until after server reset, and then there were many. Good luck if you go, and pray some jerk hasn’t caught or killed them all.

Tiny Bog Beast

Yet another “Tiny” pet. Also seems to be quite rare because of possibly long respawn times. Found in Wetlands around the Green Belt, northwest of Greenwarden’s Grove. Finally bagged myself one and only shortly after a server reset, may be harder to find but very awesome looking, well worth it to hunt.

Fishy

FISHY! Oooh, fishy fishy fishy fish! A fish, a fish, a fish, a fishy, oooh! Oooh, fishy, fishy, fishy fish! That went wherever I did go… My first pet quest reward out in Pandaria, that lives in a floating water bubble. To be the greatest pet hunter, quests must not be neglected!

Feral Vermling

And of course, the achievement reward for collecting 250 unique pets, a fairly easy one to do now these days. Kind of a scary-looking little bugger with its red eyes and evil smirk. I think it might be planning something…

KoM Does Ascalonian Catacombs

Last Saturday night, the stars must have aligned because I finally managed to cobble a Guild Wars 2 group together for Knights of Mercy’s first completed run of Ascalonian Catacombs. Ultimately we had one level 80 (Kahill), one 60ish (Bippa), one 40ish (Kriin), and two 35s (myself and the mister) but in keeping with the game’s philosophy of level and adjustment we were all scaled down to the story-mode dungeon’s appropriate level of 30.

Before I begin, I want to separate and make a distinction between the overall experience I had (it was a blast!) from my thoughts and opinions of the actual instance itself (on this matter I have a lot on my mind).

I’ll just start by saying this — whether you will enjoy AC (or I guess GW2 instances by extension) will be heavily dependent upon your personality type and on the reasons why you choose to do group instanced content. If you like the traditional order and planning that goes into an instance run, can appreciate the beauty of everything running smoothly like a well-oiled machine and the myriad steps coming together just perfectly to culminate into success…well then, you’ll probably find GW2′s instances lacking. In contrast, if you’re the more laid back type, enjoy working creatively with others, are less achievement-driven and don’t mind too much the occasional randomness or when things get chaotic…you’ll love it.

Myself, I think I fall right smack in the middle of these two extremes, which is why I’m not surprised I came out of AC with mixed feelings. As someone used to playing support roles like healers and tanks, I have to say the experience distressed me — but not for the reasons you would think. In fact, I initially thought that getting used to not being part of a trinity would be a problem for me, but here I surprised myself because in reality, moving past that was so very easy.

Yes, in most games I’m usually a healer and more often the tank — but do you know why? It’s certainly not because I particularly relish the role of being the meatshield and taking damage for others, and I was actually more than happy to shed that responsibility. While I like playing support roles, they’re definitely not as fun as being DPS and being able to pew-pew-pew-pew-pew to your heart’s desire. Plus, as any experienced tank or healer will tell you, sometimes it’s stressful as HELL. But I do it anyway, because what I really love is helping others. As in having the ability to keep others, especially my friends, alive.

Now I’m not saying you don’t have that kind of dynamic in GW2 groups, because if anything, you’ll find that pretty much everything you do will be helpful to your party, just in more subtle ways. The only difference is, there will be nothing like an “oh-shit heal” or “snap aggro” to save the day. Chances are, you will be watching your fellow friends and adventurers fall to defeat like flies around you, time and time again. In the end, it was this nagging guilt I ultimately found to be the most distressing, because I am used to being able to “rescue” others, not because I missed not having a role.

Fallen.

The good news is, I got over it quick. I had no choice, because the truth is, you will probably die in AC. Not only that, you will probably die a lot. You get used to it, and that’s just the truth of it. In fact, I see many indications that this is actually meant to happen, which I will go into later.

Like so many aspects of GW2, when it comes to the matter of difficulty, the first instance also serves to illustrate an example of yet another duality — in some ways it’s so easy, in other ways it’s so hard. Initial trash mobs actually gave us more trouble than two of the bosses, namely Master Ranger Nente and Kasha Blackblood, as we took both of them down first try without anyone being defeated. Other encounters, like the lovers Ralena and Vassar required our group getting a little creative. Having no tanks and aggro in this game, we instead relied on knockbacks, roots and boulders to separate them and keep them apart.

King Adelbern was another story. There really is no other way to put it, he was a bitch of a fight. We fell to the final boss again and again and again. And yet, there was actually never any uncertainty that he was going to go down and we were going to come away with a dead, grumpy ghost at our feet. Not once did we ever have to stop and say to each other, “Oh crap, guys, there’s a real possibility that we might not be able to do this,” the reason being a waypoint located a mere hop-and-a-skip away from the encounter. Yes, during the fight it’s best to try and stay alive, but if defeated, continuing the fight involved no more than warping back up and running back in again.

Once again, I thought I was going to hate this aspect of GW2′s dungeon fights, but in the end I found myself strangely fine with it. As one of my guildies said, “EMBRACE THE ZERG!” That became my mantra. Not only that, these instances were tested extensively and I have faith in ArenaNet’s competence that I do not doubt that the encounter would have been what it was if they hadn’t intended for things to be like this. I truly believe everything is the way it is for a reason.

I have some thoughts as to what those reasons might be, of course. For one thing, taking the away the “fear of wiping” allows the group to become more confident in experimenting with their abilities — an important effect, considering this is story-mode in a starter instance. With experience, I’m sure the reliance on zerging will go away, but at this point, without that threat of failure looming over our heads it was amazing how much of the pressure was lifted. It made us more relaxed and apt to get creative, encouraging everyone to look around and try to string combos with our fellow group members.

Speaking of combos, all I have to say is: learn them, try to remember them. After Kahill primed our group on combos, we all took a moment to inform each other of our builds and skills, as well as learn how to recognize what to watch for from others and how to follow up with our own set of abilities. I won’t go as far as to say combos will make the instance easier, because with constant movement, issues with positioning, and just in general random unforeseen circumstances happening all around you (not to mention that most combo effect durations are very brief), chances are you won’t be able to pull off most of the ones you attempt. But, it does make things infinitely more fun!

Utilizing combo fields.

So that’s what I was doing during the last fight when we weren’t worrying over wiping or failing — experimenting, getting creative, messing about, thinking, observing, learning. Admittedly, it does take the fun of organization and execution out of group play, but then again, the type of freedom I just described would not have been possible in a million years if the encounter had been designed any other way. At one point, Blue Kae (Kriin) mentioned that the fights actually reminded him of those from Champions Online, and I have to agree. That was another MMO which allowed you to embrace “the self” and superhero-dom, relying more on simply letting you enjoy your own skills, and less on adapting them to roles.

That said, I shudder to think what my experience in AC would have been like if I had been with a PuG. At least in this learning phase, I highly recommend going with a guild group or people you know (but then again, I advocate that for all group content anyway, regardless of game/instance/experience!) because the more you communicate and learn your own and each others’ play styles, the easier and more predictable things will get, not to mention the many more opportunities you will get to synergize. It’s much better than trying to second guess or anticipate a stranger’s actions every time.

Ultimately, my AC run with my guild has been an eye-opener. There were aspects of it that pleased me greatly but at the same time things that irked me to no end. Going back to what I said at the beginning of this article, how you personally feel about them will depend on who you are. I for one would not get too hung up on people’s claims of what GW2 did “right” or what they did “wrong” when it comes to their instances. To me, that’s akin to debating what thunderstorms do right, or what the color red does right, or what the taste of pickles does right. GW2 dungeons are different, but they are what they are.

I also meant it when I said that I believe everything is the way it is for a reason. Whether you like them or not is going to come down to taste, which is as personal as whether you like piña coladas or getting caught in the rain (and in case you’re wondering, I think piña coladas are too sweet, though I don’t mind getting caught in the rain. It’s incidentally why I also like thunderstorms, though I am ambivalent towards the color red. Pickles, on the other hand, I happen hate hate hate hate hate hate HATE the taste of them).

If you’ve stuck around this long and are still reading, I just have one final thing to say: if you find yourself heading into AC for the first time, the best advice I can give, and that I personally followed, is: 1) play with friends! 2) stay flexible and keep and open mind! 3) Just sit back and enjoy this gripping tale about a fallen city — being a fan of the Ghosts of Ascalon novel, being able to stand amidst the ruins of this significant place was especially poignant. Do all this, and it won’t really matter how you feel about the instance or its fight mechanics or its design and all that crap…because you will be having too much fun to care.

Group shot.

NBI Wrap Up

As we come to the last day of May, so ends Newbie Blogger Initiative Month. I would like to thank Syp once again for organizing the event, and by all accounts it was a huge success.

I’d like to wish the best of luck to those newbie bloggers who have taken the plunge. It’s a great experience, and I hope it brings you as much pleasure and joy as it has brought me.

It’s also a wonderful way to meet friends, and for me that’s the best part of all. I didn’t get a chance to do a proper write-up of why I first decided to blog, but I will say now that a big part of it had to do with a lack of people in my real life to whom I can talk about my gaming hobby. It’s not so fun when you’re excited about something but have no one to geek out with. This blog, however, has led me to others who shared my interests. I learned that game bloggers are part of an extremely welcoming community. Some I’ve had the pleasure of meeting in the flesh, others I have not; regardless, I consider a lot of them to be my closest friends.

My final piece of advice: keep blogging. Write about what you like, write about makes you feel happy. When inspiration strikes, blog. When you feel burnt out or life gets too crazy, take a break. Just don’t stop.

I wish I had had the chance to write more NBI articles this month, but the schedule just didn’t really permit. But other sponsors have written fantastic advice articles, better than I could have done anyway. Following the happenings from the NBI website, I’ve enjoyed checking out the posts that have popped up. They have been fantastic. If you’re still on the fence about starting a blog, don’t let the end of NBI stop you. You can start anytime, and the advice articles will always be there.

I’m also happy and amazed by the number of newbie blogs that come about because of this initiative. Syp has compiled a list of all the new blogs as well as a list of the sponsor articles, and you can find them below, please check it out! Congrats to everyone involved on a job well done, I look forward to doing this again next year!

New blogs to check out:

• Lotro Family of Flosiin Nightsong
• Red Neckromonger
• Casual Aggro
• SWTOR from Scratch
• Elfkina vežička
• Unwavering Sentinel
• Windy Acres Ranch
• TL-DR
• Saali in Taborea
• Bad Tauren
• Musings of an Altoholic
• Neurotic Girl
• Geo’s Ironman Challenge
• Crafty’s Corner
• Scattered Thoughts
• The Poison Mushroom
• My Staff is Bigger Than Yours
• Vagabond Goes for a Walk
• EVE All Night
• Dreadblade
• Priest All The Things
• Brazokie’s Blog Space
• Warp to Zero
• Altaclysmic
• Winniekin’s Adventures / Winnie goes F2P
• Diminishing Returns
• World’s End Tavern
• Warrior Needs Time Badly
• We do it the WASD Way!
• Middle-earth Initiative
• That Was An Accident!
• Aggrolicious
• Conveniently Placed Exhaust Port
• Adamant Nomad
• Toastman’s Blog
• Ravalation
• Gaming for Introverts
• The Incidental Analyst
• Funsponge
• Bloodthorne
• AntiPlasmaFrequency
• Kemwer Game Blog
• The Adventures of Danania, Supergirl of Lorien
• Unliving a Death Knight
• Deathstomp
• MMO Juggler
• White Charr
• Not Too Heavy
• Flask Half-Empty
• Raspberry Jammed
• Click to Loot
• Kaw Kaw! Get in the Bag!
• Mistress of Illusions
• Malefic Incantations
• MMO One Night a Week
• Omens of Onterion
• The Blue Haired Geek
• TFScribbles
• Glimpses from Middle-earth
• Goetia’s Letters
• /con mmob
• Gaming Abroad
• Backseat Game Design
• Divinity’s Reach
• Big Numbers
• Trippin Tyria
• Eons and Eons Away
• Horrible Ball of Fire
• Image Heavy
• Casually Vicious
• The Frugal Gamer
• Gaming Brew
• The Roaring Silence
• MMOARprz
• Game Delver
• The Diverted Muse
• Newbie Hobbit
• Battlemastered
• thenotsonewnoob
• Auction House on Farm
• Giddeon’s Hammer
• Noob Raider
• The Altoholic
• stnylan’s musings
• The 10th Level of Gaming Hell
• commentarilies
• Inside the Magic Shop
• Beyond Tannhauser Gate
• Argus or Bust
• Lotro Cinna
• Warlockery
• Stabby McStabStab
• Healing Mains
• The Loony Bin
• Warcraft Street
• Real Adventures in Fake Worlds
• GnomeGates.com
• Hipstalotro
• The Butterfly Gamer
• The Mighty Viking Hamster
• Why I Game
• Wald’s Wanderings
• Ald Shot First
• Sephora’s Closet
• Donovan Drones
• Beyond Reproach
• The Horn & Ivory Gates
• Landroval Style
• MMO Asylum
• Renai Hunter
• Space Fiddle

Sponsor advice posts:

• Stropp’s World: Being a blogger superstar, Just do it, The pros and cons of self-hosting
• StarShadow: Some blogging advice, Themes and widgets, Screenshots, Menus, categories and tags
• In An Age: Advice for new bloggers
• Tish Tosh Tesh: Who Am I?, Blogging is a social activity, For love or money, Thinking linking, Traditions
• Tastes Like Battle Chicken: Build your own boss, Week 2 challenge, A few words of wisdom, Week 4 challenge
• Tales of the Aggronaut: The Google Reader blogroll, Getting started, Be open-minded (unlike me)
• Wadstomp Gaming: The importance of social media, Submit a guest post, The best advertising payouts, Be sure to burn your blog to feedburner, Create your own voice
• Beau Hindman: General advice, Indie games and bloggers
• Games and Geekery: Why you should blog, Learning about blogging from perfect strangers
• Skycandy: Blogging wrong, blogging right
• Shards of Imagination: Choosing the subject of your blog
• MMO Compendium: Keeping up with the industry and bloggers
• Contains Moderate Peril: Some general guidance, Mind your language, Stats, Episode 61
• Lotro Fashion: Screenshots make your blog interesting
• High Latency Life: Finding your voice, You need a thick skin
• Scary Worlds: Mobile blogging, Creating a good title, Advice you don’t want to hear
• ETCmmo.com: General advice
• Nerdy Bookahs: Why do you want to blog?, Why haven’t you started your blog yet?
• World of Matticus: WordPress plugins, Finishing your blog setup, Making connections
• World’s End Tavern: General tips
• Parallel Context: The best advice
• Tremayne’s Law: Read Think Write Edit
• Jaded Alt: So you wanna be a blogger?, What’s in a name?, If you remember nothing else… write!
• Avatars of Steel: Curling up with a good blog
• Blog de la Burro: Why I started blogging, Some advice on blogging, Does traffic matter?, How to deal with writer’s block, What you should blog about, Are comments important?, Is it ever okay to rant?, How to get noticed
• Inventory Full: How the Bhagpuss came to be, Take a moment, Backing up your blog
• Gamerlady: Tips to start
• Just One MMOre: How to be consistent and make it painless and easy, One question high-traffic blogs ask
• Spinksville: Picture manipulation tools and copyright
• T.R. Red Skies: Quick tips, Objectivity, relating and heart
• Live Like a Nerd: WordPress plugins for bloggers
• I Have Touched the Sky: Avoid barriers to commenting on Blogger, Blogs lists and RSS
• Thade’s Hammer: Advice for the new bloggers
• Levelcapped: Tell me about yourself, None of my business
• Psychochild: What makes your blog special
• Bullet Points: The worst advice you’ll ever receive about blogging, You are your blog
• A Casual Stroll to Mordor: Learn how to podcast, Writing for the web
• Contains Moderate Peril: Episode 58, Fine-turning your blog
• A Green Mushroom: Blogging tips and hints
• Too Many Annas: Picking a name
• Grimnir’s Grudge: It feels good to be a blogger
• Gankalicious: Never tell the truth, Meeting interesting people, Who the hell reads this?
• Herding Cats: Creating a podcast on the cheap with WordPress
• Distilled Willpower: 8 blogging tips they won’t tell you
• Vicarious Experience: From there to here
• TL-DR: Protect your blog!, Tags and Categories
• Multiplaying: You should be blogging
• Blue Kae: Advice is a strong word
• Screaming Monkeys: Top five tips
• Caer Morrighan: Get started with WoW blogging
• Hawt Pants: New blogger advice
• Tiger Ears: Why I started blogging
• Berath’s Brain Burps: Sage words, How to get lots and lots of hits
• Just One More Unlock: Newbie blogger tips, Opportunity
• Hunter’s Insight: An idea is formed, What not to do
• ALT:ernative: Starting at the beginning, The first idea
• Epic Slant: Tips and links, Guest post
• MMOGC: 3 little things
• A Journey through the Mind: My 0.2 ISK
• Red Cow Rise: What and why to post, Blog setup and community building
• Epic Slant: Writer’s block
• Creeping…: So you think you can blog
• The Ancient Gaming Noob: Playing blogroll breadcrumbs
• Dragonchasers: How not to build an audience
• Welcome to Spinksville: What you should write and how to write it
• The Stories of O: Top 4 tips
• A Ding World: Blog posting
• The Wild Boar Inn: Blogging tips
• Professor Beej: Stop writing!
• Nomnom.info: 4 blogging tips
• Gamer BC: A solid foundation and a step forward
• Casual Is As Casual Does: Tips, tricks and who am I kidding
• Roll One Hundred: Managing screenshots
• Bullet Points: I refuse to call it a blogosphere
• KIASA: Good advice
• Pumping Irony: Before taking the plunge
• Life is a Mind-Bending Puzzle: Wrapping up advice all in one place
• Rikna’s Rants: The blog rings, By this keyboard I rule!, Guests and cross posts
• Sheep the Diamond: Advice from an old bull

NBI: 3 Little Things

So, you’ve started a blog, and of course now you want people to read it. Blog promotion is certainly important, and those thousands of hits aren’t going to come after just a day. Readership is something that needs to be built from the ground up.

I didn’t plan on this NBI article being the first I write for the blog, but my schedule is so sporadic these days (read: so dependent on the moods of my infant daughter) that I am driven to bang out the words whenever the inspiration strikes. I got the idea for this post talking to my brother, who is studying corporate communications and is playing around with the idea of starting his own blog. The other day he asked me for some advice on getting his blog noticed.

Look around and you’ll see tons of tips for promoting your blog and networking — tips getting onto Twitter/Facebook/Google+, keeping a schedule and posting consistently, being yourself and honest with your readers, etc. etc. etc. — all very good advice, a lot of which I follow myself. But of course, my brother already knows all this; it’s stuff I’m sure he’s studied in his courses on the importance of social media. What he wanted to know was some of my personal experiences, the other things I do on this blog that I feel has helped increase my readership over the last couple of years. The three little things I told him:

1. Ooh, pretty pictures!

Maybe you’ve noticed, but I love me some pictures. With only a handful of exceptions, all my posts are accompanied by one or more images.

As an artist, I understand all too well the way we humans are drawn to visual stimuli. Sometimes, having a picture helps pull in your audience’s attention. Even if the title of the post doesn’t interest the reader right away, the picture might. When adding images, keep things tidy and neat, make sure it’s not too distracting and that it doesn’t make a mess of your formatting. And keep it relevant to your subject! A lot of people do image searches, and when they find your site they might very well read your post as well. Who knows, it might earn you a new regular reader.

And okay fine, it’s also an excuse for me to show off some of my pretty screenies. Screenshot whore that I am.

Tee hee.

2. Keep it clean!

Opinion might be divided on this subject, but I personally opt not to swear on my blog, or at least, I try hard to keep things PG-13. No, I am not a prude; you can ask my husband, who will attest to the way I swear like a sailor when I’m at home in real life. In fact, maybe more than a sailor (something I am striving to change, now with this whole pesky role-model-for-my-children thing and all). I also don’t have a problem with other blogs that let loose; a lot of my favorite blogs that I read do. Swearing is just something I don’t want for my own blog.

Firstly, it’s because it might deter people from sharing your articles. For example, I used to share all sorts of cool things I find on the web with my boss, because she was cool. And yet, probably not cool enough that I would be comfortable sharing with her an article that had a naughty word every other sentence. Like it or not, I also find people are also more willing to heed your opinions when you’re not spouting them off with a potty mouth.

Secondly, I don’t swear on my blog as an exercise in writing. If there’s a better way to express something without dropping an f-bomb, I challenge myself to find it.

3. Reply to comments!

Before I go on, I just want to say that when it comes to replying to comments, I believe in doing it for its own sake. That doing so has had a positive effect on social networking and building readership is just a side effect. A happy side effect. Never mind that if someone took the time to read my writing and leave a comment, I feel I should also take the time to acknowledge and reply. I just love comments, period. And I very much enjoy replying to them, it’s one of my favorite things to do in my day. I’m a little sad that I am not so good with it now, due to time constraints.

Plus, one reason I started blogging was because I wanted to be part of the community. Sharing opinions and having discussions is what it’s all about, and for me that was the whole point of this blog. After all, it’s not as much fun when the interaction is only one way, at least not for me and probably not for the reader as well. I know that personally, I am more likely to revisit a blog again and again when I know the blogger will have a response to any question or comment I might have. I also feel a stronger connection to that blogger.

Believe it or not, I owe many great friendships to those little conversations in comment sections!

NaNoWriMo Week 2 Update: Effusive

Now that we’re coming to the end of week 2, I’m just practically vomiting words onto the page. It stinks, it’s messy, and I’m spewing a lot of it–so I personally like the metaphor. Thankfully, that seems to be whole point of National Novel Writing Month.

Just a quick update to celebrate my successes (and bitch about the challenges).

Like I was saying, the words seem to be coming a lot easier, but every once in a while I still fight the blasted urge to edit. Can’t help it. I’m just so used to it, not to mention my obsessive-compulsive perfectionist side kicking in at the worst of times. Speaking of which, I also read a great piece of advice from one of my favorite authors this weekend regarding research for your NaNo novel, which in a nutshell can be summed up as “STOP IT! STOP IT NOW! RESEARCH LATER DURING THE EDITING PHASE!”

That’s one pitfall I always find myself in, all right. The other day, I was writing a scene in which two of my characters are making hot, sweet love on a couch. I had the whole scene in my head, but all I was obsessing about was how to describe that stupid couch. I went on furniture and antique websites and the whole shebang trying to figure it out, until I stopped and asked myself WTF I was doing. No one is going to give two flying craps about the couch. Not if I do the scene right, anyway. I finally made it a damn Chesterfield, and moved on.

As of last night, I am at 30,028 words, but that’s basically me making the most out of the lead I gained during the first week. This weekend saw the first signs of slowdown in my progress. With my husband getting into the Star Wars: The Old Republic beta, my spare time went mostly to play with him. So we’re not even factoring The Elder Scrolls: Skyrim yet at this point, which is a little scary. The game box has been lying on my coffee table unopened since Friday, but that’s going to change this afternoon.

NaNoWriMo gods, if you can hear this, in the coming days please help me in my quest to balance dragon-y goodness with my writing.

Rift: Prelude To Riches

Yesterday marked the beginning of Rift’s mini-event which will last until May 9th, heralding the Spoils of War 1.2 patch expected to drop on the 10th. My anticipation levels are officially through the roof as I await the arrival of new features like Appearance Slots, Crafting Rifts, as well as the addition of a new type of event called “slivers” which are entrances into alternate time streams. I plan on checking all that out regardless, but this prelude event is nonetheless a welcome diversion to tide me over, injecting some fresh lore into the world and allowing me an excuse to spend more time on my Cleric and giving me some activities to do in the meantime.

Corrupted coin! I knew it was too good to be true…

There are four new daily quests available; one requires you to gather up coins found around the city, the other three asks you to collect Ancient Golden Dragon Egg Shells that drop from creatures of the fire and earth planes. In other words, nothing really all that special. Okay, so I’m not exactly the biggest fan of dailies, that much is true…but to me, the grind for shells also makes these quests an even bigger pain in the ass than the ones from the first phase of River of Souls.

But the rewards? Oh, dagnabbit, they actually are quite nice. Considering how this thing is only going to be on for a few more days, and completing all the quests took just a little less than an hour and a half, I conceded to myself they are probably worth doing. Yep, these “gifts of burning greed” have decayed my usual sensibilities indeed.

To complete the “Gold Aplenty”, “Heroic Spoils”, and “Hunting for Riches” dailies, I needed to gather 80 shells in all. Collecting the coins already gave me 10, so I struck out into the world and murdered me some planar creatures to get me the rest.

Sticking together...

As a level 50, I hit Shimmersand and found that the best thing to do, if you’re lucky, is to join up with the first raid group you see and go rift hopping across the zone for fire and earth incursions. Traveling with this convoy made up of both Guardians and Defiants ranging from the mid-30s to 50, I was able to get all my shells within 90 minutes, at 4-6 shells at each rift depending on whether or not there are also invasions present. People were very cooperative.

As for my rewards for the first night, I managed to rake in a pile of platinum, a couple ultra rare artifacts, and best of all, a dozen Artisan’s Marks for crafting. Unfortunately, no “Gritty Kitty” companion pet in my plunder…yet. Cross my fingers for another day.