Gaming Weekend Highlights: FFXIV, Landmark, H1Z1, Windward
How was your weekend? Got much gaming in? I did a little bit of a lot of things, I suppose, and here’s my highlights!
FFXIV: Crafting, Crafting, Crafting
I’m continuing to make that push to finish up as much crafting as I can before Heavensward drops. I’m moving slowly, but surely, to getting all of my classes to 50. The gathering classes have been much easier than the crafting, but as of last night, I’m at least level 40 in all disciplines! Yay!
I was also in the middle of indecision with which healing class I wanted to finish to 50. I had been working on Scholar, but I’m a little intimidated by the thought of trying to micro-manage the healing pet, heal and DPS all at once. I’m not a healer by practice, so I thought that maybe I should concentrate on White Mage, which was actually the first class I ever began leveling, and get a feel for healing before I try something more complex. I have a ton of ilvl 100+ gear waiting for me to finish leveling one or the other (I’ll likely do both since Scholar is at level 38), so I’d like to start working on some of that in between crafting when I can.
Otherwise, things are pretty quiet in the game. It’s getting to be that lull time as summer rolls in, and a lot of FC folks are taking breaks or logging in far less than they used to. Only have a month to wait until early access for Heavensward, and I’m ready for it!
Landmark: Finally A Monster!
I hopped in Landmark briefly this weekend, looking to see if I could finally finish that “Kill a Monster” in the caves quest objective. As I noted before, this isn’t as easy as I’d hoped because it seems the monster respawns are broken. So they’re almost impossible to find unless you can drill down deeper and stumble upon hidden caves.
Only, you can’t do that easily without the pulverizer. And you don’t get the pulverizer unless you can kill one monster to complete the achievement. So it’s a vicious cycle of getting nowhere.
I logged in early morning Saturday and hopped to different islands searching out a monster to kill. I finally did find a few, and was quite happy to complete the objective. Only to find that the objective that follows it is “Kill 10 Monsters.” Thanks. I would if I could find that many.
Instead, I went ahead and crafted a new sword (because that’s an objective, too). Killing monsters in Landmark with nothing but starter gear is tough. I always get really close to death every time I try to take down anything there. Of course, I’ve only seen chompers and abominations, which I remember being the tougher monsters. And this probably changes once you get some gear, which I don’t have.
I’ll keep trying to make progress bit by bit, and hope they fix the spawning thing soon.
H1Z1: Base Building
Things have been pretty uneventful in H1Z1. The team has manage to stay alive for the most part, and we continue to build up our base. The newest patch has given us the gift of “Max Number” crafting, which means we no longer have to craft one painful thing at a time. So, things are getting better there.
We’re working on setting up two adjoined metal bases on two upraised platforms side by side. This takes a lot of metal, but will be worth it when it’s done. We already had a run-in with a couple of jerks who thought it was okay to come and steal metal out of our furnace while I was trying to melt it down for crafting. They were running around in a car already, so it wasn’t as if they really needed it. Getting those walls up will help prevent stuff like that, so I’m working hard at getting that done.
I was interested in the Reddit feedback thread where Smed announced:
We had a very interesting report run just now. It shows a much higher percentage of people log out when it gets to night. We play the game too, and we’ve tuned it as best we could to be fun and not too dark, but the data is quite stark. We are considering experimenting for a few days with no nighttime on the core PVP servers (hardcore would still have it).
Personally I love the night, but data is data and it’s you, our players doing the logging out when it gets dark. You are literally voting with your feet on this issue. We may also end up with a compromise..
I thought it was pretty interesting, though I personally don’t go roaming around at night in H1Z1, and am more likely to log out or hug camp when it gets dark. For my monitor, it’s just too dark at night (see above screenshot) to brave the one-hit-kill-bears and annoying wolves. There’s no gamma adjustment, so I adjust with my behavior and don’t take stupid risks. Instead, I do my building, crafting, cooking and sometimes nearby tree-chopping come night. Come day, my team heads out to scavenge and explore.
That’s just how it goes until we can see better. It looks like that might be coming, too, as per Smed:
We’re also going to make night shorter and maybe try to brighten it up a bit more.
Thank you!
Windward
Syn got me Windward as a birthday present, and I’ve been playing this on and off when I find the time. I’m having a lot of fun, actually, and almost have my first little ship up to level 10. While some of the quests you do are repetitive in nature, it’s really a pretty cool game to just relax and chill with. Navel battles can kick it up a few notches, but those are pretty fun to play, too.
Once I get a few more hours under my belt, and explore a little more, I’ll write up a proper post for it. Until then, look at this lovely ship and ocean! This game is really pretty!
