The Ancient Gaming Noob

Just a reminder that there is only ONE WEEK LEFT in the 365 Day LOTRO Anniversary Contest!

And, frankly, there is only ONE real entry so far, so that person is going to WIN a 30 Day key for Lord of the Rings Online unless you enter the contest SOON!

You can read all of the details about the contest HERE!

UN-altered REPRODUCTION and DISSEMINATION of this IMPORTANT information is ENCOURAGED!

We now return you to the normal rules of capitalization.

So far the production of Badgers, the Caldari industrial ship that is one of the most ubiquitous haulers in the game, has gone well.

Production and sales have been steady, while the prices I have been able to get for the ships has been well above my initial target price, thanks in large to the previously mentioned regional price differentials.

One of my goals for this production experiment has been to minimize the outlay of ISK. So after buying the blueprint original and doing the material efficiency research on it, I have kept the actual ISK expenses to just production station costs.

That meant mining my own minerals versus buying them on the market.

Not a problem, at first. Each production run of 15 Badgers requires the following minerals:

Tritanium   372,000 units
Pyerite      98,865 units
Mexallon     37,860 units
Isogen        5,760 units
Nocxium       1,980 units
Zydrine         375 units

The first four types are all easily obtained by mining in high security space. And Nocxium can be found in high sec as well by mining Pyroxeres, though the rate and which you get it is pretty slow.

And then there is Zydrine.

I do not need a ton of it, but it is not readily obtainable in empire space. There is at least one mission where Gneiss asteroids show up, and refining Gneiss will get you some Zydrine, but it is a roll of the dice actually getting the right mission.

I managed to get through the first half dozen production runs without going to market just based on the Zydrine I had collected from missions. Reprocessing every equipment drop from every NPC will supply a little bit. The drops from drone missions will get you a little more.

But, in the end, I had to start buying it.

Granted, it is totally worth the expenditure.

But something about it rankles. I like to be self sufficient in my trade skills and not at the mercy at the market.

But that’s just me.

As I mentioned in my post “Moving to Amarr Space,” the regional market into which I dropped was close to ideal for making money, at least at a slow pace. The competition was low, variation in pricing was huge, and buy orders were relatively scarce.

What I did not know at the time was that I was sitting close to where three regions come together. In the past, I have tended to end up right in the middle of a region, so that no matter which direction I went for 3-5 jumps I was still in the same market.

Now, however, I am one jump in one direction and three jumps in another from different regional markets.

And they are very different.

One jump away from where I am happily selling Badgers for 800K ISK a piece, the regional price drops by nearly a third.

Three jumps the other way, I would have to slice 25% off of my asking price to be competitive.

So I am looking for a good way to exploit the differential between these two markets.

While I cannot haul badgers, I could certainly buy them and fly them I suppose.

Or I could find something smaller.  Something to exploit these regional differences.

And I have to keep my customers from finding out that they need only one more jump to beat my prices!

Ars Technica reported over the weekend (via Private Equity Hub, which unfortunately charges for their content, so I couldn’t follow up on details) that Turbine has secured $40 million in additional venture capital (bringing their total up to $88 million) and will be announcing a new project soon.

That brings up two immediate question.

First, what will Turbine’s new project be? Another MMO surely, but an original IP or will they be licensing again?

So far they have two original IP MMOs:

Asheron’s Call - success
Asheron’s Call 2 - failure

And two licensed IP MMOs:

Lord of the Rings Online - success
Dungeons and Dragons Online - still open, but hardly a smash

Which route to go?

Second, what is the cash out plan? Those venture capitalist dollars are not angel investments, they will want their money back somehow.

For the second question, there are two obvious routes, go public and sell the company to somebody bigger.

Going public for the sake of going public (to pay off the VCs) is almost always a mistake and ends up damaging the company in the end.

But selling to another company can also shake things up more than people like. Plus, my thoughts immediately stray to one big company that wants to get into the MMO market, but that has failed to so far: Microsoft.

The cash out plan is almost inevitable because of the venture capital involved. It is just a question of how and when.

On the new project though, speculation can go wild. What will Turbine do?

Is their commitment to Dungeons and Dragons and their relationship with Wizards of the Coast strong enough that there might be another IP in that domain they want to try? Say, a nice outdoors IP like Forgotten Realms?

Or will Turbine lay down the sword this time and pick up the gun or the laser?

What will be the next project?

What do you think Turbine should do?

After losing my Mammoth a while back, I went looking for a way to get another Cargohold Optimization Rig I built for its replacement.

The sticking point was alloyed tritanium bars, which currently run for around half a million ISK on the market.

The blueprint original I have for Cargohold Optimization required 100 alloyed tritanium bars.

50 million ISK for one set of ingredients alone. Too much.

While I was slowly collecting those bars by running missions (I have 34 total now) I decided to see if material efficiency could save me a little ISK.

The blueprint original I had been processed to a material efficiency level of 20.

To get it to a material efficiency level of 80 would cost half a million ISK.

If getting to 80 would cut the bill or materials by even ONE alloyed tritanium bar, it would pay for itself.

So I queued up the blueprint and waited.

After a 30 day wait, I got to see if my bet paid off.

The answer is: No

At material efficiency level 80, the blueprint still requires 100 alloyed tritanium bars.

So the jump from 20 to 80 does not change your bill of materials by even 1%.

Be warned!

im here on behalf on goonswarm and would be interested to know if you and your small corp would be interested in moving to 0.0 space with us

That was the beginning of a conversation with a complete stranger in EVE Online. He sent me a convo invite and pretty much opened up with that.

Goonswarm? Heady stuff for a noob like me.

I was interested at once because, say what you will about the Goons, they do seem to live an exciting existence in New Eden.

The temptation was great.

I did explain that my corp was so small that I was the only active member, but that did not seem to be an issue for him.

There were, of course, issues for me.

The first was the 150 million ISK up front security deposit, promised to be returned once they were sure I was not a spy.

Money up front is a concept I generally associate with entangled Nigerian assets and contractors who don’t finish the job.

Given that Goon philosophy described elsewhere about winning the game by making the other guy quite, I would not find it far fetched if this was just a way for somebody else to come off 150 million ISK richer at my expense. There are no rules against that sort of griefing in EVE, so woe to the fool who is parted from his money easily.

And then there is me and my own EVE play style which, given some of the feedback I’ve gotten, frustrates the crap out of a few readers.

I tend to plod around, exploring dusty corners of the game, completely ignoring what people often tell me is “the point” of EVE, which is PVP in 0.0 space. But that is the way I end up playing most games.

And there are always more of this little corners to explore in EVE. Just yesterday Van Hemlock posted a guide to exploration and scanning. This has been on my “To do” list for a while. Something new to occupy my hours!

So I am torn on the decision. Continue on my usual path? Try something radically new and potentially be bilked out of some ISK?

To bee or not to bee, that is the question.

Saturday night found us one player short. Bung was out with some sort of contagious crud. So we decided it might be a good night for working on alts.

Unfortunately, while our main group is fairly well coordinated when it comes to being able to work as a team, our alts are a little more chaotic. So this is who we had roving Hellfire Peninsula on Saturday night.

59 Warrior - Scscla
60 Hunter - Nodens
64 Hunter - Tistann
70 Warrior - Earlthecatwo

Tistann is my own hunter alt, while Nodens is Skronk’s. Scscla (pronounced on Skype as “shizz-ill-uh” and not “scuzz-claw”) is Ula’s gnome warrior alter ego. And Earlthecatwo is Earlthecat’s… well… level 70 warrior alt. Earl can be a binge player at time, so his alt hit 70 a while back, has a flying mount (which we got to see finally) and is doing the daily quests to grind cash for his epic flying mount.

Between us and out pets, we had lots of tanking, plenty of DPS, no healing unless you count pet healing, and not many other options.

We briefly discussed our potential for doing Hellfire Ramparts, but decided we had best stick to group quests.

On the plus side, Earl and Tistann had not done any of the group quests in Hellfire Peninsula.

The downside was that Sccla and Nodens were not yet eligible for those quests.

I read the 10 Commandments of Altitis yesterday and thought perhaps an 11th ought to be something along the lines of “if you plan to do more than solo with your alt, you might try to plan alts with your friends.”

Not that that is what alts are about, but here we were at the picnic and everybody ignored instructions and brought potato salad.

So we got together to just plow through some level 60-ish quests together.

At the time the experience for killing mobs did not seem to bad, running to 250-300 exp per.

However, when I thought about it, I realized that, solo, these guys were 1000-1200 exp. I think the fact that we were playing LOTRO the night before and were killing light blue and green mobs for a quest, 19-27 exp per kill, might have colored my perception.

There was much node harvesting as we quested and Tistann, who is a leatherworker, made out well skinning ravagers and boars.

And Scscla hit level 60. Always a landmark level.

We still have not decided our path for next week.

The Site

My post, “SOE Announces Graphite Realms,” was popular enough to make April 1st, 2008 my highest traffic day ever. (Brenlo is never going to give me SOE office supplies again!)

It was, of course, me indulging in one of the two long held April Fool’s Day traditions. The first tradition is pranks and similar tomfoolery. The second tradition is complaining about all the pranks and tomfoolery. Together they have a perfect symbiotic relationship.

I supposed that I will never earn my curmudgeon certification until I leave the first tradition for the second. Maybe next year.

The worst thing about hitting a peak though, is the fact that there is always that slope down on the other side as traffic returns to normal.

Roller Coaster!

On another topic, WordPress.com has added a new feature that generates links to possibly related posts. If you opt in, some links, under the heading “Possibly related posts: (automatically generated),” may end up at the bottom of your posts. Your own site only gets linked if you opt in.

I opted in, just to see what came up. So far, most of my posts lack possibly related links, though “Angling in Angmar” has a few connections to fishing blogs. Imagine that!

And, finally, I have received a SINGLE entry in response to the LOTRO Banner Contest post. And that guy doesn’t even play LOTRO. So the next entry could be the winner! A 30-Day time code there for the taking!

If you are having problems with the 730 x 140 size, just get close (a little bigger is better than too small) and you won’t be disqualified. Having made a hundred or so banners, getting the sizing right is easy, but I understand that some people have problems in that regard.

Get your entry in by May 16th!

One Year Ago

Back in April 2007 we were wondering what was going to happen with Sigil Games Online after their less than stellar Vanguard launch. (*snort*) There was much speculation. Soon, however, we would be free from the rambling posts of Aradune.

In EverQuest II Gaff and I visited Emperor Fyst, I ran around in Nektropos Castle with the Everling clan, and complained about experience in Splitpaw.

While our WoW group was winding down for the summer, with Earl off to Broadway, the remaining four of us went off to Middle-earth with the launch of LOTRO. Titles were the new thing! A year later, I still have yet to get any of those emote titles.

I answered the musical meme question, “Five Reasons Why I Blog.”

Van Hemlock was leet.

Our Wii finally came out of the box.

And, finally, I had a problem with a video card that eventually had to be RMA’d, which sounds a lot like this April. I hope this won’t turn into a yearly thing.

New Linking Sites

A big thanks to these sites who link to TAGN. I encourage you to give them a visit in return.

• Ignoratio Elenchi
• Killed in a Smiling Accident
• The MMO Notebook
• The Squirrel’s Den
• World of Blogcraft

So maybe it will be next month when I cannot find a new site linking to The Ancient Gaming Noob.

Most Viewed Posts in April

1. Play On: Guild Name Generator
2. How To Find An Agent in EVE Online
3. EVE Online - The Tutorial
4. SOE Announces Graphite Realms!
5. My LOTRO Video Crash
6. 2008 MMORPG Progdictionations
7. What Is A “Tank” In EVE?
8. Mammoth Explosion
9. Moving To Amarr Space
10. Is There Hope for a Science Fiction MMORPG
11. TAGN Central
12. LOTRO is Go!
13. The Profusion of Interdiction
14. Five New EVE Online Wishes
15. One MILLION Chinese!

Best Search Terms

somebody thinking
[not here]

faux wood computer
[Like those station wagons from the 1970s?]

isk exchange rate wow
[I don't think you can spend ISK in WoW... not yet, anyway.]

EVE Online

I had the big move to Amarr space which has started me on a big mission-running grind for standings. I have been running lots of missions. I have also been mining lots of kernite. And then there was my industrialist aspirations, producing Badgers for fun and profit. I still rarely see anybody I know in EVE, though Van Hemlock was nice enough to convo me to say “Hi!”

EverQuest

I embedded that Sayonara Norrath video in a post to help promote Tipa’s EverQuest Nostalgia Trip campaign, and it darn near snagged me as well.

However with LOTRO coming back into vogue, EVE still simmering, and the instance group still going, I knew the free time for another venture wasn’t going to be there.

It will probably be Fall again before I return to pre-cataclysm Norrath. Next time around I’ll get Gaff and Potshot signed up and we’ll see how far we get.

Lord of the Rings Online

A replacement 8800GT card fixed my video issues. I still use the nVidia control panel to turn up the fan on the card when I play LOTRO though. The “automatic control” seems to think turning the blades at 29% of max rpms is the solution for all heat issues. I crank it up to 60% when I venture into Middle-earth, which keeps the card in a reasonable temperature range, if you consider 60 C reasonable.

New criteria for the next video card: Better heat sink mechanism.

Once in LOTRO, fun is there to be had. Some of the instance group plus Gaff “three box” are back in Middle-earth as well. There is fishing, fighting, and crafting. And, in general, the game seems a bit smoother compare to our last venture into it. Combat has been tweaked so it feels a bit less awkward. It still isn’t at the WoW level of responsiveness, but it has been improved.

Random trivia: A dwarf guardian yells A LOT in combat!

World of Warcraft

The instance group has been moving forward, though with the failure at the Mana Tombs, it appears that the difficulty level is starting to ramp up. Aside from Earl though, we do not seem to be spending much of our non-instance group time in Azeroth. Middle-earth is stealing that time.

Wii

While the Wii has not been getting a ton of use, it still entertains guests. Lots of Mario Kart 64, Mario Kart Double-Dash, and LEGO Star Wars gets played with visitors, along with the usual Wii sports.

A friend of ours brought over Endless Ocean. Our friend is big into the scuba diving, so thought it was a great game. My daughter likes it quite a bit. For my part, “endless” seems to be an apt description, as the game seems to slowly plod along with no end in sight. More like Interminable Ocean to me.

DS

My daughter has been distracted from Pokemon Diamond a bit over the last month. First it was Pokemon Pearl. She wanted to get going there to capture the Pokemon that aren’t in Diamond. Then there was a one week love affair with Horsez 2, which we got through GameFly. All this has allowed me to catch up, somewhat, with her in the game, and we both stand with 7 gym badges and are chasing around Team Galactic with a vengeance. She still has the advantage in that a couple of her Pokemon are in the low 60s, while my highest level Pokemon is only 42.

Coming Up

Instance group, adventures in Middle-earth, the ongoing struggle in EVE, and perhaps the defeat of Team Galactic?

It has been a while since I have written anything on the topic of ancient gaming. Perhaps I should dig through my notes and post on that topic. My Stellar Emperor/MegaWar III posts seem to be getting a lot of traction of late.

On Witty Ranter # 7 we spent some time thrashing about trying to get people with somewhat different viewpoints to get together and create a plan for an MMO given a hypothetical $50 million war chest.

My initial suggestion was to hire some Bulgarians to do some sort of multiplayer version of Bejewelled and then split the remaining $49.5 million between us.

That was against the spirit of the whole premise, plus it would have made for a very short show. Instead we came up with some sort of rated M for mature, free to play, micro transaction, space game with no swords allowed EVER! A proud moment for all of us, to be sure.

But I had another idea in mind. A way to take $50 million and turn it into a magical everlasting money machine.

I said the magic word, the word that drives this idea about 27 times during the show, so Adam couldn’t have edited them all out.

The magic word is Pokemon.

I have been aware of Pokemon for some time now, not just since a DS wandered into the house. Heck, I have some real Japanese Pokemon cards stashed away somewhere.

But only since my daughter started drinking the Pokemon Kool-aid have I really started to see how Pokemon is everywhere.

So suspend your disbelief for a few and tell me if this wouldn’t be a money maker.

First, it has to go on the PC. Yes, I know, Nintendo will never go there, but that is why I said to suspend your disbelief. Come on, suspend it! Now!

Grahpics won’t be 3D. Instead it will be a mild upgrade to the Diamond/Pearl level of graphics. This will let it run on every PC made since 2000. You’ll be able to run it at home, at the office, on the road.

Then there will be the world. It will be done GuildWars style. Towns, contest areas, arenas, and the like, those will be shared areas. But when you and your friends go off into zones, it will be instanced. This will keep overhead down as every bit of action won’t be sucking up server resources.

Finally, it will be inexpensive. You’ll have to buy a box or a download copy, but $14.99 a month? forget about it!

The base game will be free to play. You will be able to buy expanded content as it comes out or subscribe to plan on the order of $20 a year to get access to all the content.

Of course, there will be micro transactions via the standard “spend cash to buy in-game points, use those points to buy cool stuff” model.

And, to tie it in with Nintendo’s standard game plan, while there will be some items and some Pokemon that will only be available on the DS Pokemon games, but that can be brought over to the PC version via Nintendo WFC.

So what does the PC player get?

Aside from slightly better graphics and a bigger, zoomable window on the world, the PC will have the option to go through the game with friends. I envision being able to form a group of two to four players to explore with a scaling encounter system that will adjust the number of opponents relative to your own group. There could be areas with epic Pokemon encounters, where you would need not just four people, but four people with the right Pokemon with the right skills to take down the bad guy.

Plus you can add on all of the tricks of the trade from MMOs past and present. Things like player housing, gym factions, live events, seasonal items, storage and travel options, all infused with micro transaction upgradability goodness.

In the end, Nintendo would never go for it. But I think it would have the potential to be a serious money maker.

And it must be a good idea. I got up this morning to post this article and found that Massively had a post on the same topic. Go go Pokemon MMO!

As promised, Lord of the Rings Online’s Book 13 update included fishing!

Woot, fishing!

For no good reason, I have done fishing in every MMO I have played that made some sort of angling mechanic available. I have had characters with fishing skills at the cap in EverQuest, EverQuest 2, and World of Warcraft.

Therefore I knew when Turbine announced fishing for LOTRO, I would be there.

Friday night I found the NPC that grants the fishing skill in Bree. He sends you off to another NPC in Staddle, by the pond of course, who finishes up the “how to” and will sell you some bait.

LOTRO follows the WoW model, where bait enhances your ability to catch fish, but is not required. This is compared to EQ where, at least back in the day, you needed bait for every cast and EQII where not only don’t you need bait, but you don’t even need a fishing pole. One just appears miraculously when you need it.

Equipping my new pole (and hat), I was soon fishing.

In my usual haste to get to the good part, I skipped through all the… well… words… and just started casting. So it took me a minute or two to figure out that you have to hit the fishing action button both to cast your line AND to reel in a fish when you get a strike.

I noticed other people making the same mistake, so I passed along that tidbit wherever it seemed appropriate.

And speaking of getting a strike, LOTRO’s fishing, like so much in the game, is a quality experience. You actually see a fish in the water approach your bobber and take the bait. Granted, it seems to always been the SAME fish, one that bears almost no relation to what you actually end up catching, but it is a damn good looking fish, there in the water, and it makes the experience that much richer. See, look:

So far I have caught weeds, goldfish, minnows, and, no doubt in homage to EQ fishing, rusty daggers! (Too bad my weaponsmith cannot sharpen them for skill improves.) All of them are vendor trash as far as I can tell.

Of course, also like real fishing, once you find a decent spot where the fish are biting, everybody else in the world seems to show up.

The final LOTRO touch, as you might expect, is titles. I fished until my skill hit 10 (out of 200) at which point I got the first fishing title, Apprentice Angler.

Now I just have to make my way to Nen Harn for some fishing.