Well, I'm kind of nervous this will become a "thing" for me since I have a history with it. It's to be feared since if you get into it, it can be a real time sucker. If this is starting to sound like a drug, you're right. That, my friends, is the signature business. There's one thing everyone who frequents a messageboard forum wants: a signature. Something they'd make themselves if they had the software . . . something they HUNGER for. Something uniquely them. Well, maybe it isn't all that ominous. It can become a job though.
It's been a while since I've been in the signature business. I used to do signatures all the time when I was in Everquest.
Here's a few examples:
Anyway . . . you get the idea.
So, I decided to try my hand at a couple signatures for people over at Wizard 101 Central. I'm not going to let this overpower my playtime. Seriously, sig work can take up a lot of time and if you run into someone picky, well, I'm not kidding you . . . it can become a second job. So I'm taking this with more caution than before.
So here's the two sigs I made for Oran Shadowsmith and Cheyenne Darkwhisper.
Oran wanted one pretty much exactly like Cheyenne's, so it may look a touch formulaic . . . but not. I have to say it's an honor to have my signature work shown off by the number 1 poster over on Wizard 101 Central though . . . now that's exposure!
Sorry all, I've been lacking in updates, but I have a good reason.
It is because I said . . . NO MAS!
Except mine wasn't about being a chihuahua. It was about hair drying my monitor.
NO MAS!
So I went a little crazy with the credit card, but my work actually offers this really cool deal where you buy a computer and then spread out the payments over a year interest free. So I ended up buying this orange and black magic of gaming awesomeness machine.
Sure, I could have built it myself (I did that with the last two machines I've owned), but what I was going for here was a number of things. 1) quietness. This machine is nice and silent. I like that. 2) not a bad price yet upgrading my rig. 3) I don't have to call in any favors when I screw up installing the SATA hard drives.
Apparently I bought at the right time and saved myself around 300 bucks.
I also purchased two monitors. One is a small 18.5 inch wide screen for the now second computer, which will be used exclusively for music production. The other is a little bit larger 23 inch wide screen, which will be for GAMING! WOOT!
I've been busying reloading programs and archiving stuff and . . . you know, all that good stuff that goes along with getting a new rig.
Ok, so after loading up the test server, I promptly pranced to Dworgyn, the death professor, in Nightside. He was super excited to give me a quest for my level 48 spell, Scarecrow.
Sorry about that, but seriously, no more reading if you don't want to spoil it for yourself. Things about this quest are destined to change since it's on the test server and is not live yet.
Step 1: Go talk to Dworgyn.
Step 2: Go talk to Dimitri in the Labryinth and listening to him tell a spooky story about how you don't want to splash any of this liquid on you or it's pretty much nightmares for the rest of your life.
Step 3: Go fetch the Quintessence of Fear in the Necropolis. This was actually easier than it should have been. I put in a bug report on it since the mobs don't attack you when you go get the Quintessence. Sorry about that to the people who just like to skip past the hard stuff.
Step 4: Run the Quintessence of Fear back to Dworgyn.
Step 5: Now go fetch the seed of Destruction from Kagemoosha in the Tree of Life instance in Moo Shu. Kagemoosha is the boss right before the death oni in the instance. So you'll have a fight or two before you get to Kagemoosha.
Step 6: Run back to Dworgyn. Dworgyn then requests that you gather some sticks from Mortis, the death tree, and some sackcloth from Gloria Krendall. Mortis shakes a few twigs down for you, and Gloria just hands over the sackcloth, while wondering why the heck you would want to wear something so scratchy. You explain it's not for me, crazy, it's for my scarecrow doll! Yup, you make a scarecrow doll. How very gothic of you.
Step 7: Run back to Dworgyn. Dworgyn then says, yo, go put this nifty doll you just made into the ground near Nightshade's castle and stand back for the fireworks! Now I want you to look really closely at the quest reward in the graphic below. Notice anything that is SUPER special about finishing this quest? Maybe a pig with wings icon? I thought so. I really hope this reward happens still when the quest goes live.
Step 8: Run your little wizard shoes down to the Haunted cave and plop yourself in the dead grassy area right before Nightshade's castle. When you find that right spot there, boom . . . the scarecrow essence pops up and tells you WTG!
Step 9: Run back to Dworgyn one last time and collect your rewards! A wraith pet, a scarecrow card, a clump of exp (if you're not 50 like moi), some cash, and I believe I even got a badge for doing that . . . but I was so excited about the wraith pet (which comes complete with a blue wraith card), I didn't pay attention. SORRY. I should go back and look. *time passes* ok, yup, it looks like "master of death" is the badge you get. nice.
Step 10: Equip the spell in your deck and run into the sunken city and suck the life out of everything you see with your new spell.
You have searched or contacted me and asked questions and I have answers . . . or quasi-answers . . . or links to where you can get answers . . . or just sarcastic remarks. FOR FREE! Can you believe it? FOR FREE! Well, I don't ask much. You could click through my advertisements on the sidebar every once in a while. That would rock. They pay me like a penny or two every time you do that. I'm up to like two bucks now since I added it. $2 for a labor of love. Not bad.
OK, enough about me, let's talk about you and your searches.
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1- Nightside video
You asked, and I couldn't find any . . . so, I made one. :-)
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2- Stingite fan fiction
Hey! I'm flattered you found this site by searching on my name to see if I have any fan fiction available. I actually did write two or three chapters of a short story way back when I started playing. My character was around 25th level or so and so I didn't have much to go by when writing it. I'll have to see if I can finish it up. Here's a snippet from Chapter 1. Let me know if it catches your interest.
Thomas’s foot swung softly from the bridge as he presented his card deck of necromancy from his side pocket. He held to the new vampire cards he had just acquired and sung a tune that the Death School Master had taught him. His eyes glowed a faint red.
Thomas shuffled the cards before him and drew a quick six pick of cards. He laid the cards on his legs to get a good look. His hand showed five myth magic cards and one death magic card. “Interesting,” Thomas mused to himself. Usually his hands were more balanced between myth and death.
“. . . and very troubling!” breathed Thomas as he noticed a grievous error. A Cyclops card from his deck had torn at the corner. This was bad. This was very bad.
It was a strange sight--not completely unheard of--but still a strange sight to see since magic cards were made of blessed paper soaked in the tears of the magic beast whose essence they summon (along with some other combination of materials mostly too vile or too blessed to mention in the standard classroom environment) and laminated with the sap of the tree of magic the card represented. It was quite a process and resulted in a magically sturdy creation that could be used again and again. Torn cards, meant less effective spells, which could mean defeat, which could mean more lectures from teachers. No one wanted that.
“Well at least it wasn’t one of my death cards,” mumbled Thomas as he flipped the card between his fingers. It was a cool trick he had learned from his friend Calab, an Ice Wizard and a trusted ally. The card began between the pinky and ring finger and quickly made its rounded trip up to thumb and index.
Thomas held his torn Cyclops card up now to the dancing rainbow mist above him and used it to shade his eyes. Something seemed different about this torn card . . . the colors or the depth . . . maybe it was leaking some magic? He couldn’t tell.
I would link you to some fan fiction I wrote for Everquest, but I'm too embarrassed about it. haha. __________________
3- Wizard 101 new spells and worlds
Well, as it turns out, I played a little April Fool's joke yesterday and listed a number of the spells that we will be seeing. One that was not correct in that list was the new Balance spell, which is actually called power nova.
**NOTE: THIS IS NOW A DIFFERENT SPELL THAN THE ONE LISTED ABOVE**
How do I know this? People over at Wizard101 Central have been talking about the spells now being on the test server. So guess what? New spells are coming soon!
As for new worlds . . . keep your eyes peeled for Celestia and Grizzleheim, which are both mentioned in quest logs while you journey through the spiral.
Images graciously lifted from the Wizard101 Central website.
Of course, we're going to see player housing come out before you'll see either of those I'm guessing. __________________
4- Wizard 101 Dueling Diego Secret
I have no idea what the secret is. Let me know if you find out. I imagine it involves developing macros with a third-party program to win and score big numbers, which is cheating. So, don't do it. Just play the game to have fun. __________________
5- Error posting over at Wizard101 Central.
I recently received this message:
"speaking of wizard 101 central, I have a question about it. Whenever I want to post or something, it says my account does not have sufficient options to post or it sometimes won't let me view things that people attach to their post."
I had never experienced this, so I did some legwork for you. I posted your question over at Wizard101 Central for you! There were a lot of great answers!
Go check out the post for yourself. It's a great read. The people there are super friendly, or as I say, Friendly Necromancer Approved. __________________
Well, I have to go to work now! I'll catch you all on the flip side. Hope that helps! Stay tuned and we'll get more questions answered.
(*Wanders off to the shower muttering something about making a Nightside video*)
I caught this over at MMO Gamer from Steven Crews. It appears he had an interview with Todd Coleman at GDC and will be compiling it sometime soon in an article titled, "From Shadowbane to Child’s Play: Kingisle’s Todd Coleman on Wizard101"
We'll have to keep our eyes peeled.
Also! If you haven't gone to check out the newsletter yet, there is a wonderful section on player housing published by KI themselves.
Here's a reproduction of the article in case you can get to my site and not KI's site:
Wizard101™ Housing The next major new content being developed by KingsIsle Entertainment for Wizard101 is an elaborate housing element called Wizard Castles. At the basic level, all players, including Free-to-play (FTP), will be able to decorate their dorms at the Ravenwood School of Magic with hundreds of new items from wallpaper to in-game trophies. In addition there will be modest and luxury private housing options that give players a place to invite their friends and showcase their Wizard101 style inside and outside their own virtual space.
All players start out with a dorm room. Upgraded housing can be purchased using in-game gold. Beginning in the world of Krokotopia, a turtle character will be the housing vendor. A separate real estate agent NPC will help players activate their selected house. Players will teleport to their own house or over to a friend’s house via their Friends List. KingsIsle expects to launch housing to subscribers on the test realm in April, followed by a live launch for all Wizard101 players shortly thereafter.
Housing features include: • Three tiers of housing: Dorms, Modest private Castles and Lands, Luxury private Castles and Lands • Two different housing styles for each Wizard101 world, beginning in Krokotopia • More than 800 decorative housing items such as plants, statues, wall hangings, columns, pictures, furniture, etc. • Many variations, including more than 20 different types of detailed wallpaper and flooring • Ability to decorate interior and exterior of houses • Obtain decorations through in-game gold, PvP Arena Points, quest rewards, exploration, defeat of select bosses, common or rare enemy drops, and Crown (microtransaction) purchase. Click on these screenshots to see more!
They also have a picture from each house style on the newsletter as well.
