Get your walker before it's too late

To all slot machine addicts spending hours on the machine for a mythical walker:

Slot machines: it's hard to wield the nerf bat

Since the nerf of the popular slot machines, blogs all around are buzzing with the news. As you might remember, I advocated against the large amount of purple crating items they dropped and explained in what detrimental ways they disrupted the in-game economy.

When the developers realized what was going on in the community, they took their nerf hammer and hit the slot machine. Only they underestimated their own strength and nerfed it into the ground. 

Am I surprised? Not really. Disappointed? Maybe a little.

Now where's that wookiee rug?!

We had been stuck on Torque HM (in the Ravagers raid) for several weeks. Not stuck as in the annoying "we don't know how to continue from here" fashion, but in the (maybe just as annoying) "we almost killed it, gah, just one more try" manner.

Slot machines: great fun or game breaking?

When I came home, Conrad was bouncing with excitement: "Rav, you need to login and get one of these for your stronghold. Now!"

I must admit I was curious about this so called 'slot machine'. If it had managed to get stronghold-hater and self-proclaimed vagrant Conrad enthusiastic, it surely must be a special thing.

Happy new year: looking back and forth

Happy new year and welcome to the new Ravalation.

SWTOR: Bears in space

The laptop is back! Looking back it took two months to get the repairs done. And even that wasn't exactly how it happened, because we ended up not getting the original laptop back but a new version with better specs. Annoying that it took this long, but on the other hand it was worth the time and money because this means we can use it for a few years longer before having to replace it.

Guild troubles

Unfortunately, we found upon our return to Star Wars that both our Republic and Imperial guilds had become inactive, due to a combination of us not being able to attend and the release of the Elder Scrolls Online (ESO). The situation was especially severe in our Imp guild, with almost all officers, members and guild leader having left off to ESO without any plans for Star Wars. A real shame, because we had a solid team of good players doing progression raids and our characters are ready for the new nightmare modes. For the moment we've joined a larger guild called PC Mint Imperials, so hopefully we're able to get raiding there.

On Rep side activity luckily seems to have returned, and we have some raids planned again. I'm really happy about this, because Tiger and I have played and raided with these people for years in Lord of the Rings Online. It has been great raiding with Asylum in Star Wars now LotRO has a far more casual character and lacks proper endgame.

Drawing bears

I also had amazing fun designing a new website for our Rep guild. I've given up on getting better at drawing on the Bamboo tablet for now, because it dawned on me that improvement will mostly have to do with getting to know tricks and buttons within Photoshop, something that I simply lack the energy for. Instead, I've found great fun in illustrating blog posts and now designing our guild website. I feel this simple back-to-basic style has its own charm. And by just doing it a lot, I might even learn a few things and, in time, improve a bit.

For our guild's banner, I was inspired by whoever decided our URL should include "bears in space" and our guild's mascot Norman. Taking these quite literally, the result was a rather silly retro-looking website including some bad humour. I was anxious to hear the reaction of my guildies, but luckily they have been exclusively positive so far! I'm happy with any feedback, though, so if you want you can check our website out over here.

ME 3: Omega DLC

So while the laptop is still (!) away for repairs, I've started playing Mass Effect 3 again. Mass Effect was one of the games I played when I just started this blog, so that's two years ago already! However, I was very disappointed with the ending, and I never came about writing about it.

Now Tiger has installed the DLCs for Mass Effect 3, which also should include some changes to the disappointing ending. Time to replay the game and see what it's like.

We are playing this 'together' again, for as far that is possible with a single-player game. In our case, this means Tiger does the controls, and I tell him what to do.

The rest of this post will contain some spoilers about the Omega DLC, so if you don't want to know anything you better stop reading.

The first DLC we got to was the Omega one. Omega is taken by Cerberus (a sort of terrorist organization) and former leader Aria has fled to the Citadel (central space station when the galactic council is situated).

Now Omega is some sort of space dock full of criminals, so maybe it's not the first choice of a world to free. But Aria helped you out in Mass Effect 2, so it's time to return the favour. Also, there's the fact that she promises you the help of the major crime gangs in your fights against the evil Reapers if you help her reclaim the station.

What I really liked about this DLC is that it explores the character of Aria a bit more. Aria is this really ruthless person that does everything for the power of what she sees as 'her' Omega. At the same time, she is also your ally and I can't help but feel sympathy for her. The situation gets tense when a turian is introduced. She has taken control of the underground movement while Aria was away and wants the best for her people. It then turns out she also has a special relationship with Aria.

It didn't occur to me earlier, but Aria is kinda purplish for an assari. Maybe it's that Omega air she's breathing in. She's also an expert at looking sulky.

I won't spoil more of the story, but overall, this DLC was fun. A nice surprise is that Shepard could get access to the special (pretty overpowered) biotic attack you see Aria doing all the time. This makes this DLC extra cool for biotic Sheps.