Yesterday was ‘the day’. I had prepared for weeks for this event. 13 people showed up (12 partook in the actual hunt) and hopefully everyone had a blast. I of course was nervous. Very dang nervous. I’d never run a guild event before, let alone one in Vanguard. I had visions of no one even showing up. A huge thank you to those who did. I gave out the list of items I required, as well as a list of questions to be answered. The hunt was two parts, so that everyone could feel included, no matter if they were a crafter, adventurer, or diplomat.

I had everyone form into teams, by a random rolling of dice. They worked out fairly well. Less known members were teamed with officers and guild mates by chance rather then me organizing it that way. The winners (everyone was a winner in the end) walked away with 1 plat each. There was actually a tie, so I gave away more money then I’d have hoped, but my account is closed on the 9th and I’ve honestly no need for it. First place tie was between Herger / Growlius, and Siddiqah / Sevrance. Had I been thinking clearer I’d have had the teams come up with team names real fast. Oh well, future event maybe.

The rest of the teams came in as follows:

• Aedilwulf / Cyrcle
• Lanatra / Esspee
• Gozad / Sky
• Zindan / Joodah

I gave away sloops, armor pieces, horseshoes, money, jewelery, rare and ultra rare crafting supplies, crafting gear, and whatever else I had kicking around. The guild has been fantastic to be a part of, and I’m glad I made so many friendships as I did. Herger did stop and ask me after the event if it meant I was returning to Vanguard, to which I sadly replied no. I just honestly don’t have the time that I think Vanguard requires in order to actually get any where within the game. Plus as amazing as it is, it’s still got so many quirks and bugs, that I just couldn’t warrant paying for it any more.

Anyhow. A good time was had by all, and again a huge thank you to all those who participated. Hopefully my brief time as officer is remembered, and more people will pick up on running guild events (once a month is perfect for folks, so they don’t feel overwhelmed) that can encompass the  entire guild. I really did have a lot of fun (even if by the end I was drained and tired, it was such a long day I ended up going to bed before 10, which is just weird on a Saturday).

Well, like the title says, yesterday I was promoted to Officer within Safe Haven. Came as a surprise to me, but at the same time I could understand why. Not because my leadership qualities are all that extraordinary, but mainly because I play during the day time and the guild has a small lack of officers who play during that time, the majority play during the PST hours, when I’m headed off to bed. Of course I accepted the position and was tickled pink that my name came up none the less. It doesn’t mean I’ll be acting any differently in guild for the most part, aside from being able to recruit people to the guild and adding them instead of just telling them to wait until an Officer logs on.

Screen shot above is my house, coming along slowly. The fireplace I built myself, and there will be fire in it once I buy some. Yes, I have to actually buy the fire to put into the fireplace. The bed was a gift from Skaara, fellow officer, one of his veteran rewards (that are not supposed to be on live yet, but there’s a small bug where people on test who claim theirs can now claim them on live) thankfully this time around it’s per character, and not per account. At least on test it is. The rug is a thestran round one from Lanatra, who is one of the guilds resident tailors. A huge thank you to her, who also crafted that basket by the fireplace that you can just barely make out on the left hand side.

Last night Growlius and I teamed up with a bard and a sorcerer from guild (their names escape me right now) to work on the shadowhound quest. I found out you can do both mount quests (thank you Skaara for the information) so I’ll do the unicorn another time. We ripped through everything we had to kill, which was great. Spent a few hours working on it and Growlius managed to ding level 27, and I hit 28 which meant new spells. Nothing exceptionally exciting there, it seems that level 30 will be the new ‘big’ level I get spells at.

Borgio was on this morning, showing off a weapon he made for his wife, and I had to giggle at the pride we all take in our crafted goods. Satia hit level 36 crafter, and today I’m aiming for 37. Of course if a sigil or two dropped along the way I wouldn’t complain. It will simply be nice to hit T5 in something, even if it is crafting. Upgrade recipes will come with time.

Mayahdros (hope I spelled that right, I’m going by memory) was on last night as well, and I’m going to assume today has a snow day (though maybe not everyone is experiencing the huge storm Ottawa is being pelted by right now) so maybe I’ll have some company in guild at least. Things have been nice and calm in guild for the most part, we did just recruit 7 new people from another guild, so there’s been an influx of new members. Of course officer or not I make it my duty to get to know everyone and say hello and what not. Community is key in a game like Vanguard especially (it’s key in most mmo’s) and without it, folks will leave. I’d rather them stick around and explore Telon as long as possible.

Ignoring the character model there for a minute (they’re getting revamped, eventually) one of the things I absolutely love about Vanguard, is the crafting. Why? Because it’s hard, and not hard to the point of impossible, but hard enough. In WoW everything is an instant combine, you can make batches (so long as you have the materials on you, also just called “mats”) and EQ2 has slowly been moving away from complicated by introducing various new things through the years. How many people remember (and miss) subcombines. Then everyone was given the ability to make everything (when we started, if you were a sage, you had to find an alchemist to make ink, a woodworker to make quills, an alchemist to make the WoRTs (washes oils resins tempers) and so on and so forth). Now it even sets up your entire crafting UI for you, and uses far less power then it ever used to. There’s also no craft below pristine any more, in stead you just get the item back.

Such is not the case with Vanguard crafting. Pictured above is my artificer (level 6 /flex) working away. Literally. It sort of feels like you’re playing the sims when you craft because everyone does little auto-emotes like “Hmmm” Or “ARRRGH!!” and then stomps their foot if a process has gone bad. Quite amusing (though if you’re crafting in long batches it can get tiring). Crafting is basically a management of points - gear - fuels - and tools. Number one, you have an entire tab for it since it’s a sphere. You get crafting clothes (and attributes where you can designate points later). I’m not going to try to explain the entire complex process, but I will try to explain basically what it’s about. It’s all about getting from point D to point A (hopefully) before running out of points. You also get complications showing up along the way - more frequently if 1. Your gear sucks. 2. Your gear needs to be mended (that’s right, you need to repair even crafting gear, not just adventuring gear) and 3. Tools suck 4. Recipes are just too far over your level.

There are 4 processes basically to every item you make. There’s finishing (a complete item that would be ready to wear afterwards) and refining (making those sub components). You use points for everything, and crafting has grades, A of course being the best. Or rather - 100% A. Since you can be into the A zone and not be at the end of it. That’s the green bar along the top left of the crafting UI (says I’m at C grade, I’m doing a work order here and I try to aim for C-D depending on the difficulty). Name of the game is to make the item and not run out of points before the end stage (or else you have to stop the process - and you loose everything.
You load your “table” with items - fuel, raws, and then items to counter complications. Most of the time you have to guess, and you only have a limited amount of table space. So you could have fuel, raws, and then bandages and water. Then a complication comes up that uses something you don’t have on your table, and you’re screwed, you have to craft through it. Which can of course damage the piece you’re working on. In the screen shot, Faralithe is using bandages and stretching to stave off a complication (which is the weird icon on the far right of the crafting UI).

Anyhow. The point was - I love crafting in Vanguard. It’s complex. There are guides for it - there’s crafting quests. There are crafting styles. If I want to go craft in Thestra, I’d have to earn faction with their tradeskillers, and then learn their style of recipes. This is really pronounced in ships as well. If you buy a Kojan sloop it has a different graphic then the Thestra one. Gear has different effects based on where it was crafted. It’s the first time since EQ1 where I’ve actually felt some pride in my work. In EQ1 you had hefty chances to fail at combines completely and loose your materials (though they did start ‘changing’ that with a large amount of aa you could put into your crafts to prevent failing and losing materials). What Vanguard realized early on is that there’s a niche of players out there who LOVE crafting. They take hefty pride in their work, and complicated (now granted, not TOO complicated) is a good thing. It’s a timely sphere to level up but well worth it. It’s also one of the best examples at relationships between crafters and adventurers. There is a huge market of people who don’t want to put in the time it takes to level a craft - which is great, they’ll harvest, and sell to crafters. Who in turn, sell back to adventurers. A nice little path. Now, there is some complaints of course, of people who feel crafters charge too much, that crafters are making far too much coin - but you can still make a good amount from selling your resources alone, especially rare ones.

On a non-crafting related note, I joined “Safe Haven” last night, which is one of those guilds who span across multiple games (they’re also located on Antonia Bayle in EQ2). I applied a few days ago, just looking for a simple home with some quiet chatter from time to time. They’re nice and friendly and plan out guild events, about 11 of us on constantly last night. Most of the people I’ve seen so far range from level 30-40 or so, even though I’m quite a bit smaller it was nice to feel welcome.