Comparing EverQuest Legends and Project Gorgon

While playing EverQuest Legends, I can't help but compare it to Project Gorgon. I was kind of a poster child for Project Gorgon like six years ago, singing praises for anyone who would listen! When I lost my game design job, I actually reached out to them asking if they needed another for their team . . . they did not and could not, but Sandra was sympathetic and cool. (She was a good soul RIP.)

PG is a skills-based game where you can (almost) infinitely level a player's skills in any number of combat styles, mixing and matching to your heart's content, resetting and rethinking builds on the fly. While playing, I started out as an Animal Handler (of course . . . because I'm a beastlord through and through) and mixed it with Fire Magic, Shield, Knife, and eventually embraced the full beast inside, turning into a Fox / Animal Handling combo.

Me, my illusion, and my Fire Rat Pet in Project Gorgon overlooking the Fae Realm

EQL on the other hand, while you can level skills, is a class-based game where you can (almost) infinitely level all the classes, mixing and matching to your heart's content, resetting and rethinking builds on the fly . . . and not just two skills, but THREE classes!

I knew exactly what I wanted to be when I started this journey: a Beastlord and a Cleric. Those were the two classes I played in original EverQuest, it was a moral imperative that those be my two classes. Shadowknight was just a happy accident that I stumbled upon because I wanted something kind of tanky and awesome. 

A mummy that's also a ninja monk . . . quirky, like Project Gorgon

Now that I'm at max level, I'm not sure I want to switch to anything else just yet (also because this latest patch seemed to buff beastlord pets) . . . Although, being a bard or an enchanter or a berserker could also be amazing. Swapping out Beastlord for Magician could be fun. There are OPTIONS, which is great. 

That ability to swap around your build just wasn't a part of EverQuest Classic unless you wanted to start a new character or multibox. Later, they added spirit shroud forms so you could play as a different class and be the same but different (also so you could group with your low-level friends). It didn't really stick, and they never improved the system (/sigh). Even later, they added mercenaries so you could get the power of more than your class without multiboxing.

Life was legitimately hard in EverQuest playing as a soloing Evil Eye.

Beyond that, PG and EQL both have that old-school, early 2000's computer game charm about them. Back in 2019 I talked about converting to a paying player in Project Gorgon and listed off seven reasons:

1- Oodles of skills and combinations of skills to play with.

2- Quirky charm. 

3- Good Danger Balance. 

4- Nice people. 

5- The price is right. 

6- Demo Level cap at the right spot.

7- Nostalgia trip. 

I would say that all of that is clicking for me with this version of EverQuest. Unfortunately, there's no demo of this game, but if there were, I'd put that cap right at 15. And to the Project Gorgon people, I would have upped your game and included a subscription (Not just a VIP Membership program). To be honest, I might not have played your game as long as I did if I were paying for a membership. I'm fickle like that, but if you had, maybe you could have hired me as a designer! I would have loved to work on your game! As I was taught, you kind of have to be an ASS (Always Sell Something) when you're in games to, not just survive, but grow.

Anyway, I'm glad I jumped on the EverQuest Legends bandwagon at the launch here. I think there's something there. The Nostalgia trip is strong, the price is right, there's a good danger balance (not nearly as punishing as old EverQuest), and the people in my guild are nice (let's not talk about general chat too much in any MMO). 

( . . . I just remembered the Runes of Magic had a dual-class system. Man, I'm a sucker for this stuff.)

Happy Dueling

D4, Project Gorgon, and Riding the Road to Redemption

Team . . . I just haven't had the will to blog!  Like at ALL!  What is going on with me?

Well, since you didn't ask:

1- Diablo IV!! -- Dylan and I have been playing the new Paladin class in the most recent season. Now, we've had some great themes before like The Southern Gentlemen and the half-muscled twins, Skip Legday and Tree Trunks McSkinny.  So in that vein, I present to you MonteCarlo and GranTorino, our 70's Cars in Hell!

Riding the Road to Redemption!

The new paladin class is pretty cool and currently it feels really good to play. Dylan made a type of character where really he just walks around and things die in his presence. I opted for the Hammerkuna Shako variant of the Blessed Hammer build up on MOBAlytics. Basically, I hold down right-click and hammers swirl out from me in a whirlwind of death.

Since half of the fun is dressing your character in an outfit, I opted to model myself after a light blue trim Gran Torino.

Blue Metal Power, Baby

Also Blue Metal Power, Baby

As for Monte Carlo . . . he just kind runs around with no shirt, economy-class style. It didn't take us too long to get ourselves up to Torment 4 and equipped with a few pieces of Mythic armor.  At this point we're just finishing out the season journey and working up to 250 skill points. (I think I left this morning at around 217?) It's a good time.

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2- Some Project Gorgon news -- YO! Did you hear that Project Gorgon officially launched?! What the heck!  Yup, that quirky MMO I put a thousand plus hours into back in 2020 finally did it, they moved out of Beta like a boss. So proud of that game! 

Part of the launch was to implement improved character models, so when you launch the game now, you can update the look of your dude to something a bit sexier.  The Human Models look pretty deluxe tbh.

What a freakin' model . . .

The Raksasha on the other hand . . . mmm . . . I'll get used to it.

Those teeth though . . .

Anyway, it was great to earn my Beta Tester Badge, log in, and play a couple games of match 3 in the casino. Looks like whatever guild I was in has disbanded, and it felt a bit like a thing of the past for me. it's almost like I'd have to start over and play from the starter island again to get a feel for it.

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3- Real Life -- Honestly, it's a good thing these days when I don't have to mention something.  I've just been living, and that's pretty amazing. I'm vertical, and it feels good. We've shifted CAT Scan reviews to every 9 weeks from every 6 weeks because I've shown a lot of improvement. Let's just hope that holds, right? 2026 is going to be amazing!

One of my new favorite pictures of 2026 is me giving my older sister a hug. She came for a quick visit as we had a celebration of life party to celebrate what would have been my mom's 93rd birthday.

My sisters are amazing!

It was a great way to start off the new year. I hope it's only up from here. I'm continuing to connect with old friends and get more used to my new normal.  I can't believe it's almost been 2 years since moving back to Utah.

Speaking of Utah . . . Go Mammoth!  Cheering for the newest NHL Hockey Team has been consuming a lot of time. I even started collecting a few Hockey Cards because of it. Who woulda thunk I'd ever get all sport ball about something . . . I actually am starting to understand how the game works LOL. If a Mammoth game is on, Uber Wife and I are usually watching it.

From Coyotes to Utah Hockey Club to Mammoth. Let's go, Team!

Happy Dueling!

Project Gorgon: The New Povus Playground

Yesterday the new high level zone of Povus was released in Project Gorgon and it's a swampland full of terror and ratkin.

A trio of Hexapi waiting in the distance

I started out my adventure mapping out the edges of the zone, by doing so I ran into plenty of things to fight: Ratkin, Hexapus, Tentakillers, Swamp Vipers, Kuvou, Mushrooms, Skeletal Triceratops, some other dinosaur skeleton, and (my favorite) ORCS! The only way I can really explain the skeleton dinosaurs is that I believe Paleontology is new skill here. Yup, it's Project Gorgon.

Of that plethora of monsters, my only death of the night was handed to me by a Kuvou, which statistically seems to be like a cousin to the troll in that it has high regeneration and reacts to Poison and Acid like a troll would to fire. 

Enjoying my well-deserved vengeance moment on a Kuvuo

Oddly enough, though the Kuvou is vulnerable to Acid, it also sprays it out when you're fighting it. Lucky me, that also gave me some new death experience since I had never died by being melted by Acid before.

Woot! 50 XP in Dying!

I also found an elusive Yellow Perch swimming inside the swamp waters! There were some cooking reciepes that were supposed to use Yellow Perch, but I could never find any before . . . now I know where to look!

I also managed to pick up a couple fleas and ticks while hunting around in Povus. It appears the zone had a mechanic where you can pick up parasites and then have to buy a curative from one of the NPCs to remove them (or use the First Aid skill).

Truly though, the centerpiece of the zone is the town of Povus itself.

Sitting on the walls of Povus as the sun rises could be my new thing!

During the daytime, Povus is pretty chill. It'll also be relatively empty UNLESS the Town is leveled up. That's right, Povus is basically an event town. As it levels up, more shops, amenities, and NPCs appear for you to talk to.  You level it up by protecting it from invasion during the nighttime starting at 7pm in gametime. When you do, you receive rewards for helping -- just check the town board and it'll tell you what level the town is and reward you if you have rewards coming to you.

. . . and you're additionally motivated to help level Povus and protect it because you can earn the central currency of Povus: Xognite Chunks.  Yes, Xognite Chunks are what all the high level trainers that can be found here are going to want in exchange for their knowledge they'd like to pass down to you.

Since day one of playing Project Gorgon, I knew I wanted to use Animal Handling as one of my main skills. Once I found out I could tame a rat and make it fight for me, it was game over for the rest of the skills. This particular update had bundled with it a brand new twist to Animal Handling since "Animal Husbandry" is now a thing. Yes, as long as you can make cages to hold your new pets in and have spots available in your stable, you too can become a pet breeder! OH, and just realize you'll need 20 Xognite/Xogrite (I saw two different spellings -- I don't know if they're different items or if it was a typo) Chunks to start your Animal Husbandry business.

. . . and yes, I did say "business" because that's right, you can sell your pets to other players. If you manage to get a really great pet with amazing stats, it'll be super attractive to those of us interested in Animal Handling.

Currently only bee and wasp pets in game have the ability to be bred, but eventually the devs promise that there will be a whole lot more on the way. Before the update hit, I actually had 3 bees in my stable: Buzz Tightrear, Wasabee, and Frosty the Buzzman. 

Visually my bees didn't change a lot. I think Buzz Tightrear has a bit more blue in his wings than he used to, but it's hard to tell the differences. Apparently I have two more bees waiting for me to claim!  The devs gave EVERYONE two new bees to put in their stables. 

Once I get 20 pieces of Xognite, I'll be sure to let you know how my adventures in Animal Husbandry go. Until then . . .

Happy Dueling!

Orcs Must Die in Project Gorgon #Blaugust2021 Day 31

How's that for a deceptive clickbait title? No, while Project Gorgon has match 3 play and a little text adventure minigame you can play inside of it, there is no Tower Defense here ala Orcs Must Die . . . at least yet. (I'm just going to subliminally drop that in there in case one of the devs ever reads my blog.)

In actuality, the orc areas of Project Gorgon are still a work in progress. The word from the developers seems to indicate that eventually you'll actually be able to play as an orc, but it will be an advanced race where you complete quests to unlock the ability to play the race . . . similar to how the Fae race works currently. 

As it is now, the Orc areas of Project Gorgon are deadly locales deep in cold zones, and I have a legitimate problem. I'm addicted to killing them. I really have no reason to kill orcs, but I thoroughly enjoy it for some reason.

It's a quaint town full of death

Deep in Gazluk is a giant orc town. When you're inside the town, you're safe from the cold environment around you, and it's always vacant. In all my times of grinding orcs, I've never seen one other person killing orcs in this town. Not once. I'm sure when level 70 was the max level, this place was probably like the Fae Realm is now, You'll always see a player or two out farming mobs for experience.

It could also be that this place can get really nasty, really fast. The orc archers are the culprit here. They tend to stick in one place and call for help from the orc mages, soldiers, and other archers hanging out in this town. I'm getting better at clearing this place out and have learned how to not leave as many tombstones around as I used to. Don't get me wrong though, I still die -- there's only so many orcs I can take on at once.

Fox and Mouse vs. orc and orc and orc and orc and orc and orc

If I'm feeling especially brave, I'll sneak into the entrance of Gazluk Keep within this town and test my metal against orcs that are tuned for group play. It's pretty satisfying to down an enemy with 5x the hitpoints, and typically the loot is of a better quality, which is also satisfying, but ultimately it's just vendor trash. I made a quick video this morning getting back into the groove of this . . . it's been a bit since I soloed the entrance. It's really all about the single pulls. I'm not prepared to handle two at once just yet.

The real find with orcs are their manuscripts that teach you how to read orc. Back when I was playing Knife as my main skill, I was all hot and bothered about trying to learn how to read orc since there was a synergy level associated with learning how to read orc and using the knife skill. Anyway, I remember thinking, man, no one is selling these orc manuscripts in the player shops . . . and that's when my fascination with killing orcs really took off.

Currently situated in vendor stall B-9

My vendor's tag line in Project Gorgon is "learn to read orc! It's fun!" And selling orc manuscripts from farming orcs kind of became one of my things. I price 'em relatively cheap and people learn how to read orc . . . it's a win win. It's definitely not a good way to get rich though. Killing orcs is more of a passion project if you get what I'm saying.

I don't know if I'll play an orc when the race finally makes an appearance in Project Gorgon, but I'll be interested in seeing how this changes my old farming spot.

Happy Dueling!

Cooking up the Crafting Caravan -- #Blaugust2021 Day 27

Project Gorgon has delayed their August update, and I was SO looking forward to blogging about it this month during Blaugust!  Well, don't worry. I'll still post about it in September (or whenever).

Instead, the developers of Project Gorgon are dropping a big weekend event on us called The Crafting Caravan! I've posted a bit about it before, but it's kind of in the middle of a post where I'm catching people up on me watching the Dragon Prince and playing World of Warcraft. (I'm still in awe of that Donner Party-esque cooking quest reward)

Dang . . . I actually ate this . . .

Here's the thing about the Crafting Caravan. As much as a pain as it is, it's also very worth it. Crafting at the high end of Project Gorgon can be a battle of inches as you creep toward a goal line where new recipes open up. It's time consuming, fills your inventory with random ingredients, and typically requires you run all over the world. It is a game unto itself. Some people love it, some people hate it. For me, it's always been a necessary evil. 

Crafting NPCs lining the walls of the Casino during the Crafting Caravan

The crafting caravan allows you to take big leaps forward with repeatable quests that give you solid experience in exchange for crafting. They also give you Crafting Caravan Tokens, which you can then turn in for rare items and dyes -- specifically Black Dye, which you really can't get anywhere else. There's a few other carrots as well, like a cosmetic pet and a special in-game title.

Keep in mind that Project Gorgon at some point is going to officially launch and then all of our money will be gone as they reset the game. Luckily, they assure us that what will remain are our characters and their skill points that we've earned up to this point, so it's not as bad. The more skills you have, the better off you'll be when they actually launch the game.

So, I've got my shopping list for the day:

• 50 string
• Rough Leather Shirt
• Decent Leather shirt
• 10 Simple Armor Stakes
• 10 Gur Horta potions
• 20 Chicken and Broccoli
• 10 Chicken Casserole
• 10 Venison Jerky
• 1000 Basic Arrows
• 25 Expert Metal Slabs
• 10 Blood Mushroom Smoothies
• 30 Disastrous spore bombs
• 10 Boletus mushroom smoothies
• 10 Shoddy Chairs
• 10 Crude storage crates

It'd be a larger shopping list if I had more crafting skills where I could contribute, but MY WORD, it's large enough as it is. Consider that, if I am to craft all of those items, each of them have multiple ingredients, steps, and require time to craft. It's a solid weekend of crafting.

Since it's Project Gorgon, I'm honestly not sure if I want to know what they use string for.

Of all those listed, probably the ones that are most important to me are the cooking items. My dislike for cooking in Project Gorgon is legendary (it's my number one gripe about Project Gorgon of all time), but let me tell you why cooking is an absolutely essential skill to own. There's a complimentary skill to cooking called "Gourmand." I had to look the word up because, although it looked familiar, I wanted to double check -- The word itself shares the same word root as gourmet and basically means one who really enjoys food . . . probably too much. 

You level Gourmand in Project Gorgon by eating food. The higher your Gourmand skill is, the better stat food you can eat. This means you should EAT ALL THE THINGS, and I mean ALL . . . THE THINGS! Re-eating the same food will only give you 1 experience point in Gourmand, whereas the first-time bonus for eating something new is around 200-500 exp.

So, anyway, if the only thing I get done on that big list is making 20 Chicken and Broccoli, 10 Chicken Casserole, and 10 Venison Jerky, that'll truly be enough for me and I will call it a successful Crafting Caravan.

Wish me luck!

Happy Dueling!

My Top Memorable Locations in #ProjectGorgon -- #Blaugust2021 Day 25

 Back when I did my first Blaugust in 2015, I made a fun series of posts that talked about my top memorable locations in most of the MMOs I had some longer tenure inside.

• DCUO
• DDO
• EQ
• WOW
• W101
• P101

I can't believe that was six years ago. It's so long ago that some of the videos and multimedia I linked to are now dead. Anyway, carrying on that tradition, today's Top 10 Memorable Locations have to do with Project Gorgon! I've played so much, that it's definitely worthy of a memorable locations post. :)

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Gazluk

Staring across the mountainous death zone

Ahh Gazluk. It's a love hate relationship with me -- let's be honest, it's more of a hate relationship. After spending hours and hours there farming radioactive crystals and hunting for hidden Superb Metal Nodes, I'm 100 percent sure this is where most of my tombstones reside. I've fallen off mountains. I've frozen to death. I've been munched by polar bears. I've been impaled by orcs. I've died to world bosses. I've held radioactive material for too long.  There's just so MANY ways to die here.

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Ilmari Desert

It's my own personal burning man moment

dust storms, evil cats, and lemon trees

On the opposite end of the spectrum is the desert of Ilmari, but I haven't had "as many" issues staying alive here as I had in Gazluk. combating thirst I can do. What I remember Ilmari most for are the nights spent killing manticores with my old guild and making art out of art on the vast canvas of the desert.

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Goblin Dungeon in Eltibule

Entrance to the New Goblin Dungeon

The multicolored hallways of the Goblin Dungeon

This dungeon has two parts to it. The upper part, where most level 20-30 heroes grind levels, and the lower part, where an infinite spawn bug allows heroes of any level to grind levels. For me it was part of my daily run to pick up blank poetry books for use during the Poetry Jam community event that happens on Saturdays. They updated the graphics in here a year or so ago . . . looks great!

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The Crypt

Enter if you dare

The first dungeon most players brave beyond tutorial island is called The Crypt. It's full of spiders and skeletons mostly, but it's also full of fun bosses that really make the lower levels of Project Gorgon interesting. Ursula being one of those. If you die to her hands, you obtain a curse that causes her to spawn randomly and start attacking people around you. Personally I've spent a lot of time here farming Deer for Anchor Runes that can be used for a powerful attack used by Animal Handlers. It's an awful grind, but you'll make some decent money here for sure.

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The Fae Realm

Fae Realm at Night

Fae Realm by Day

The Fae Realm has been the top level zone in Project Gorgon for so long now that it really feels like end game; however, it's sounding like the new zone to visit with be Povus when it releases sometime later this month.  Every day in the Fae Realm, the god of trolls offers players a daily quest to kill the big baddies in the zone in exchange for councils. The great thing is that you can visit him daily and pick up a backlog of quests, so that when everyone gets together in a big group, you can take down all the baddies and make a lot of money.  

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Wolf Caves in Gazluk

Pre-fox me creeping around in the Wolf Caves

I'd be remiss if I didn't mention a small dungeon that is completely over run with farmers looking for experience and profit. It's a series of tunnels in Gazluk where you can escape the cold, catch a lot of fish, and kill and skin a lot of wolves. One time I ran into a lady here who was playing as a cow. She died, and I milked her dead body. This is Project Gorgon at its finest. Mostly my memories here are farming groups of wolves over and over and over as I leveled up. This cave also contains the zone out to the Fae Realm, so passing through is commonplace.

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Treasure Caches in Ilmari

Ominous hallways under the desert

Though most of the Treasure Caches in Ilmari look exactly the same, they definitely aren't. I've written up a whole guide to doing Treasure Caches, and it is hands down one of the most fun solo experiences you can have in the game. I think these dungeons are the pinnacle of what a game like Project Gorgon can bring to the table. Really the finest design work in all of Project Gorgon.

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Casino

Really really think the house doesn't win when they have Mantids for Game Masters?

As I type the word "Casino" I instantly hear the zone's jazz music in my head.  This zone is the major hub of the game. If there's a good place to "bind" yourself in Project Gorgon at higher levels, this is the spot. There's a sparing pit in the middle where NPCs duel it out and you can bet on the outcomes. There are slot machines with match 3 games and Monsters and Mantids tables all over. There's even a high stakes gambling room in the back.  Here you can get daily quests, store goods, and have access to a variety of vendors.

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Sun Vale

The less than friendly natives of Sun Vale

Staring down a giant coral reef in the ocean of Sun Vale

There's old Sun Vale, and there's new Sun Vale . . . and I remember 'em both. Old Sunvale had two edges of the zone that were beach themed with a giant river that ran through the middle. It was so buggy, you could literally drown in mid-air at times. New Sunvale is a series of islands in the ocean, with beautiful patches of coral and tons of sharks. Both versions also had a spot called "Animal Town" where only people who were playing animal skills could visit.  Everybody else better stay out! It's a cool scene in Animal Town.

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Serbule

Party time, it's excellent!

If the Casino is the hub of mid-to-late-game, Serbule is the hub of the early game . . . and truly still a hub even if you're late game. All the player vendors are there in Serbule even though the Casino has vendors, nobody really uses them . . . it's kind of weird actually. Anyway, once you're out of the tutorial zone, you're in Serbule and right in the middle is the large castle that hosts all the players. Every saturday at a specific time, the tavern turns into a party and all the players of the game gather to listen to poetry, drink free beer, and get incredibly buffed up with community buffs. There's always a raffle or two running, and it's Project Gorgon's big weekly party. Watching the virtual sunrise in Serbule will always be one of my favorite moments in game. 

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And that's it . . . really every zone in Project Gorgon has something quirky about it, and even now I'm wondering why I didn't list Eltibule, Kur Mountains, Kur Tower, Wintertide, or the Rahu Desert, and the answer is that those just weren't the first that came to mind.

Happy Dueling!

Diary Post -- #Blaugust2021 Day 24

Pardon me, y'all. I'm going to do a bit of a diary post today. Yesterday was a pretty interesting day and things are starting to get busy.

1- School has begun for all the kids. ALL the kids. The youngest is now in Middle School. The middle kiddo is a senior in High School. The oldest is in their second year of college. My job with all of this is to make sure they're up, fed, ready to go, and drive 'em around as needed. Check and done.

My dudes.

2- The Cats -- Zoodles is staging a small rebellion with her food, and Timmy is an absolute maniac. Timmy leaped all the way up on top of the countertop yesterday. Zoodles NEVER did that. Not happy with Timmy's newfound vertical freedoms, but we're adjusting.

3- Work is in full swing. I'm currently working on two games at once, and it's great! Lots of work, lots of fun. No details for the general population -- just know that I'm excited for all the stuff happening at WIMO.

4-  I played Overwatch with my buddy Mercedes last night. It was only a handful of games, but to be honest, a return to Overwatch for me is a big deal. I kinda sucked, but I tried, and we still won 3 games. Mostly it was great to talk with Merc again. If any of my highlights were even remotely worthy of showing off, I would.

Torbjorn my boy!

5- I also played Project Gorgon a bit yesterday. I sold a bunch of stuff on the Auction House and had an absolutely horrible time farming for Superb metal. Yuck. I also got sucked into a guild group to run the Wolf Caves daily mission, and it took FOREVER to complete. This tends to happen when you have groups leap frogging over each other and party members that afk.

MAKIN' THAT PHAT CASH!

6- Greek Food!  Uber Wife bought some frozen gyro meat and I used a sparse amount with a ton of salad and a touch of taziki sauce to make a sort of a gyro taco on a corn tortilla for lunch. Ahhh, gotta love the struggle of trying to limit carbohydrates and fat while being diabetic, but it was still good. Dinner was the left over greek salad that I used to make the gyro. :)

7- Music -- I've been working on a new collection of music, but it's slowed down a bit here for some reason. I want to blame my lack of music on the overabundance of blogging I've been doing, but it's something more. I want to write 2 more songs in this style and then edit them all down into a cohesive album of music.  That's the plan at least. Here's a small peek at a new track I've been working on.

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Tom Purdue (@tompur2)

So that's it . . . that's the blog post. I'm kind of struggling here at Day 24 to get a daily blog post out, but I'm managing over lunch and early in the morning to find some time to write. (Listen . . . it was either this post or talking about how it's the fifth anniversary of Loot Chests in DCUO.) 

Happy Dueling!

Project Refresh in Project Gorgon -- #Blaugust2021 Day 22

Ever since getting the new PC, I wanted to try logging in to Project Gorgon to really see what the game looks like at its highest graphics settings because, as awful as the game looks anyway, my computer was so awful that I had to lower the graphic settings to not experience lag.

Me and my rat buddy hanging out in the graphically improved flowers

I couldn't really tell much of the difference in the world, but what I could tell a big difference in was with seeing other people move around in that world. Being in Serbule was a much nicer experience.

Stingite, the dancing fox with a street musician on top of a well. yup. It's Project Gorgon.

The next item of business was figuring out what to do with this incredible mess in my inventory.

What in the world is going on here?! Why am I so full of stuff?

Dealing with inventory will forever me my woe in any game I play, and Project Gorgon kind of triples down on that because your storage locations are mostly mini-banks located all over the world. Truly, the fact that you get a bump in available inventory slots is a good sales point for VIP membership.

Anyway, after dumping a bunch of stuff, the next item of business was contacting an old friend I saw online and asking if her guild had room for another, which of course it did, because my guild died a horrible death. It was one of the things that caused me to stop playing. I won't get into the specifics of the drama. Ain't nobody got time for that.

So now I'm a part of guild called Alharth Rebels. ("Alharth" would be congruous to "Azeroth" in World of Warcraft terms.) One of the first orders of business as a new member of the Alharth Rebels was running ye' old Daily Dungeon quest, which happened to be the Winter Nexus dungeon. 

Winter Nexus is a pretty quick run to kill a small handful of bosses, and it was good to flex the old fox muscles to remember how to play. It's been a hot minute y'all.

Indeed . . . just like old times

Now comes the hard part . . . finding motivation to get a goal and try to play again? The only goal I had previous to this was to just bank a bunch of money because I had maxed the spirit fox skill and . . . well . . . ok. What else is there to do besides leveling cooking. I have over 1000 hours logged into this game, and my major goals have all been accomplished.

I guess what I'm most excited about is the upcoming Animal Husbandry update sometime in August. On the official Project Gorgon message boards they shared a screenshot and the following information:

BEES! Blue Bees, Flowy-Winged Bees, and Big-Headed Bees! Hooray!

"(August update dev screenshot: Animal Husbandry/Genetics) Very advanced players can learn the secrets of genetic analysis, and can perform extraordinarily deep dives into their pets genetic potential. "

So there you go . . . I'll be waiting for the update and figuring out what to do in the meantime, but it was good to log into the game again and see what's what.

Happy Dueling!

MMO Brain Dump 5/25/2021

Just wanted to get a few things out of my brain that have been rolling around inside it, and for some reason I'm feeling the drive to write more, so I might as well go for it. You know?

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1- SOLO -- I've been hearing a lot about Swords of Legends Online . . . FROM MY WIFE of all people.  One of her friends was streaming game play from the Beta and she seemed super interested. Honestly, I'm a bit nervous when I look at the graphics that I'd probably need an upgrade to my computer to really play it well.

My gut wants to label it as Guild Wars 2 that's deeply based in Chinese mythology, but you never know with a game like this until you play it. It's due out some time this summer, so I'm sure we'll be hearing more about it.

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2- WoW -- I've jumped in and started a new character Horde side because guess who else also got interested in the game lately . . . Beau and Leala! My old partners in crime from the Overwatch Potato League. Thus Gobbolicious was born!

trike mount ftw

So there you go. I've got someone new to hang out with in WoW for a bit. Should be fun exploring the game with them. I'm all about replacing those old bad memories with some good ones.

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3- Wizard101 -- There's a new pack that features a itty bitty streetcar mount, a blimp pet, and all the various clothes you'd find on The Art of Warlord's OC (as I teased them about yesterday).

My boi Blaze Lifehammer did a great video pack opening and seemed less than pleased. I'm always entertained by watching pack openings like this.

The three items that appeal to me here are the tiny streetcar, the blimp, and the hairstyle. 

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4- DCUO -- Y'all . . . I'm right on the cusp of getting that chroma pack . . . 99/100 seed pods.  Thank goodness I still have tomorrow morning to finish this up.

I cri everytime . . .

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5- Project Gorgon -- whoa whoa whoa . . . they're adding a subscription to Project Gorgon?! To be honest, adding VIP is something they've batted around for a while now. It's kind of cool to see it finally come to fruition.  Good for them!

The extra bag space sounds so nice. I'm such a hoarder when it comes to MMOs that, honestly I'd probably do it just for the bag space alone.  Although the neat .csv exports of data is pretty cool and the ability to level skills while not being logged in sounds fantastic right about now.  I haven't logged in to the game in forever, so building up the hammer skill without all the grinding sounds fantastic.

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That's it. Just a few thoughts I wanted to brain dump out there into the void. Lemme know what you've been thinking about in the MMO world!  I'd love to hear from you.

Happy Dueling!

of Love and Wardens In Project Gorgon -- When Pigs Fly

 The past week in Project Gorgon I decided to finally take a look at the animal only sub-class in the game that was added about . . . when was that? a year ago? Anyway . . .

THE WARDEN!

Wardens are like animal cops and being an animal cop is a legit gig: you get your own warden-specific quests, your own special currency, you have access to a special wardens-only area of the game with a special wardens-only vendor that has warden-only food . . . you get the power of flight and electricity . . .

Off we go! Into the wild grey yonder! Off we go! Above Kur Mountains!

You heard me right, you get to fly! At level 40 there's a skill you can unlock that gives you 12 seconds of flight every two minutes. It's just enough time to get you to troublesome Z-axis locations you wouldn't have access to otherwise.  I dig it. Not to mention the big electricity thorns damage and the cool fire chain pulling trick. (I love the cool fire chain pulling trick! It yoinks mobs right to you!)

Even better, you start the class at level 30. I guess they did that since you went to all the trouble of leveling an animal class and doing the lengthy prequest?  I'm not sure actually.  

DING! DING! DING! DING! DING! (You get the idea)

About that prequest . . . they really have you running everywhere for this thing. You see, it all starts with a suspicious cow. Literally that's the name of the NPC, and it's an NPC that will only talk to you if you're in animal form.

The cow sends you off to talk to a spooky door in Kur. 

Creepy Door is Creepy!

I've passed this creepy door several times in the past and thought to myself, hmm, "future content thing?" And merrily skipped along my way. Now I know better.  That's the door way to the Sacred Grotto of the Warrens.

When you get there, someone behind the doorway asks you for the secret phrase "Horse-Rabbit-Maelstrom" and then . . . doesn't let you in. Apparently they're short staffed and the best they can do is give you the name of the "External Resource Coordinator," which happens to be a pig named Norbert in Animal Town in Sun Vale.

"A little sullen, for a pig."

Ol' Norbs tells you that the External Resource Coordinator title was just an inside joke title that Pickles the Panther gave him. Then he realizes they must be in really dire straights and does his best to make up a "ritual" to get you in. It involves collecting 10 bananas and killing some ranalon (frog peoples). After this, you take vows to protect intelligent animals, defend nature, and always side with intelligent animals.  After that, Norbert sniffs you and you pass the nose check. You now smell like an animal cop, gratz!

This time when you go back to the spooky door in Kur, they literally smell you coming and let you on in. Milton, the head sheep around the place finishes the process of becoming a warden and you're given a handful of delivery quests that will earn you the precious Warden currency that allows you to purchase things from the shop and train your spells.

The whole thing is quite charming, and I have to say I love getting the new Warden-only quest every day. They seem to typically just be a kill quest, but still, it's kind of fun, and after doing today's daily Warden quest, profitable as well!  Trekker laid down two Vervadium for me as a quest reward.

VERV YEAH!

I think what I'll do with this class is kind of level it on the side after the big exp buffs you get at the Saturday Poetry Jams. I don't think I have the fortitude just yet to grind up a new class beyond that. Those poetry jam buffs is how I raised the class up to 41 and unlocked flight.

. . . of course Project Gorgon has flying animals . . . of course . . .

Happy Dueling!