Another good night, although it turned out to be not as productive as it could have been, at the cost of good karma…

Once again I got into a fellowship early on that was doing a large quest that I needed; Book 1, Chapter 11, which is another Great Barrows quest. We had a full contingent of folks including a minstrel, but I was one of the higher level players, as opposed to the previous night when I was the lowest. We started the quest and were doing well until we were working on the last big elite character and the minstrel got defeated. The rest of us were able to finish the quest, but she didn’t end up getting credit for it, unfortunately. I guess we were all in a good mood, since we all said that we’d find a reflecting pool to do the quest again so that she’d get credit.

One kind of cool thing that happened was that I leveled up during the quest, and during the time we were getting to the reflecting pool a couple of the fellowship members congratulated me. That was a social interaction which I hadn’t had before, and it was kind of nice.

Anway, we got through the quest again without any real problems. After we were done a few of the folks needed the Lalia quest, which I had already done, but said I’d help out with. Once we finished that, it was almost 11:00PM, so I had to go. But, like I said, it was a good night, but I spent a lot of time working on quests that I didn’t need, so it could have been a more productive night.

I was pretty excited to see what new skills I received at level 20, and there were some cool ones. Rain of Arrows is a pretty intense shot which sends multiple arrows at a target. I also received the ability to use fire, which means I can put fire oil on my arrows before I shoot them, thereby potentially igniting a target that I hit. I also have the “Desperate Flight” skill which allows me to teleport to the nearest rally point in case I’m in a really bad situation.

tim: 1.5h

Pretty good night. I joined a fellowship early on that was going to work on An Ancient Story of Evil, which is a quest that I’ve had for quite a long time. Once we were all together (one member was quite a ways off), we ventured into the Great Barrow and got started. A couple of the members needed to collect chalices for another quest, so we worked our way through the maze for a while looking for those. This didn’t bother me, since I also had a quest where I needed to kill 25 wights in the Great Barrows, so that got done pretty easily, especially since any wights killed by the fellowship counted towards my tally. I did have a little trouble with pulling MOBs to me, however, which is a problem for hunters. Ideally we will sit back and throw pop shots into the crowd, letting the characters which are better at melee handle the up close combat. The problem arises when I hit a character too many times, and they decide to come after me, instead, and the other characters have to then chase after them. I need to remember to switch my targets to spread out the damage, I guess. I’ll pose that question on the forums for advice.

The questing took quite some time and after about an hour and a half, we finally completed it. We did have to hunt around the maze for a while before we could find the one character that had the item we came for, however, so that added some time. Once we were done, the other hunter in the group used one of her skills to teleport us back to Bree. I  can’t quite remember what the skill is called, but I can’t wait to get it.

The Fellowship broke up once we got back to Bree, since most of us had to logoff pretty soon after. I was going to logoff quickly, but realized I was only about 1000 points from getting to level 20, and I wanted to see if I could get there quickly. Grinding like that takes more time than I had, however, since I couldn’t find any high level MOBs close to Bree, and I didn’t want to venture too far away. So, I had to logoff around 11:15 with only 600 points to go. Oh well, I should get there easily enough the next time I play.

time: 2h

Last night was a mixed bag. I got up to level 19 pretty easily, but didn’t get much questing done. I did get through one quest, A Blade for a Life, with a player that was a few levels below me. It was kind of neat because he actually got defeated mid-quest, but I was able to complete it without him. He still received the credit for it, though, which I appreciated. I wouldn’t have been able to do it solo, and his help at the beginning was enough to get both of us the completion.

I’m getting really frustrated with groups that won’t even attempt a quest without a minstrel. For those that don’t know, minstrels are the healers in LOTRO. If you have one in your fellowship, they can take certain actions which will restore everyone’s health. It’s certainly a useful person to have around on very difficult quests, I’ll admit. But people waste a lot of time waiting for a minstrel when they don’t even know if the quest is that difficult. Besides, with enough high level characters, you can get through some quests without a minstrel’s assistance.

At one point I joined a group that was going to try An Ancient Story of Evil, but gave up because they couldn’t find enough people. Now, there were two in the group that were over level 30, which probably would have made the quest a cakewalk for the four of us. The most annoying part, for me at least, was that when I joined the group I was working in another area and they disbanded right as I was getting to them. I wasted close to ten minutes because they didn’t even want to try the quest! There was another group that literally stood in front of the Great Barrows for probably half an hour waiting for a minstrel, I don’t know if they ever even tried the quest or not.

I also had a minor setback money wise last night. I forgot that traits needed to be equipped by a Bard, and they of course charge you for their services. So, I spent about sixty silver equipping some traits that I really wanted. Oh well, by the end of the night I had made it all back, so I guess it wasn’t a huge deal.

Oh, I also bought a Lute so I can make music now! I have to remember to take a screenshot of my character playing it so I can show it off (how dorky is that?).

time 1.5h

Had a pretty good night, last night. When I first signed on I did a few solo quests and then decided to head into the Barrow-Downs, hoping to find some folks to quest with once I got there. I met up with someone pretty quickly and we were trying to decide which quests to do, since we both had different ones to complete. We decided that we’d try Lalia’s Safe Passage, since we both needed that one. We failed miserably, but found a few more people to help out. By the time we had a good fellowship together (we actually had six in it, including two minstrels), someone else had grabbed Lalia and we had to wait. After waiting a little while, we decided to try Book 1, Chapter 10 since a few of us needed it and the rest were willing to help out. We completed the quest without any problems, but when we went on to try Chapter 11, the fellowship got divided.

At least two members had already done the quest, and one left the fellowship all together. Another member went back to Bree to find a Reflecting Pool, which allows you to participate in a quest which you have already completed, but by the time he got there, the rest of us had been defeated. We decided to try Lalia again picked up another member. After waiting for her to appear we completed the quest without too much difficulty.

I wanted to hang out more and help the guys that still had other quests to complete, but it was after 11:00PM and I really had to get to bed. I realized a little later, though, that I was only about 1000 points shy of leveling up, so maybe it would have been worth hanging around a little longer. Oh well.

I had some problems getting to sleep after playing, so I’m starting to think that I need a little cool down period after playing. That also means that I’ll have to start logging off sooner, in order for that to happen.

time: 2h

It started off as a pretty boring night, although I did manage to get to level 18 pretty quickly. Other than that, I completed a couple of minor quests and was about to logoff around 10:45 but then saw someone looking for fellowship on two quests that I needed. I knew it would take a while, but decided not to pass it up. We ended up getting a pretty big group together and completed the Bone Man and the Find Malin quests. So, in the end, it turned out to be a pretty good night after all.

time: 1.5h

It was a pretty good night. I met up with someone fairly early and we tried Book 1, Chapter 1 with just the two of us. We almost completed it when the character we had to defend got killed. We asked for more help and someone said he would use the reflecting pool (meaning he had already completed the quest) to join in. Turns out he was a level 41 captain, which was completely awesome. We got through the quest without any real problems.

After that quest, the two of us made it through Chapter 7 and then the other guy had to stop for the night. I completed a couple of minor quests and then stopped. Oh, and of course, one of the quests got me a better bow! I guess I shouldn’t have spent that money last time. Oh well.

time: 1.5h

I wrote a php page which processes the time markers that I have been including on some posts. It performs a query on the database to grab the posts which include the marker, and then calculates how many hours are marked per category. It’s a stand alone page right now, but I intend to create a page within Wordpress which will display the data. Eventually I may write a plugin with some more functionality. There’s a link on the sidebar for Time Tracking (under Things here), which you can click to see the results.

time: 1.5h

[I have decided to start journaling my experiences playing Lord of the Rings Online]

Last night was a little disappointing. I logged in and was working on a couple of quest when someone messaged that they’re looking for fellowship for An Ancient Story of Evil, so I messaged back, since I need that quest. I was already out by the northern entrance to the Barrow Downs, so I hung out and waited for the other two to arrive. Once they showed up, we went in and picked up another person, making our fellowship four. Two of our members got defeated and were sent into the Old Forest, there’s a quick way back into the Barrows, but I guess they didn’t know it, so they went the long way, out to Adso’s camp and back. That wasn’t a huge deal, I guess.

Things started to get annoying when one member of the fellowship kept getting attacked by Barrow Wights. It didn’t help that he kept going back towards The Dead Spire, which is a spawning point for wights. He got defeated again, and rather than wait for him to take the long route back, I ran over to the spawn point to show him the short route. Well, he apparently decided that would be a good time to go get a snack or something, because he didn’t respond for almost five minutes. When he did respond, he didn’t notice that I was there to help him and took off running the other way. Eventually he turned around and followed me back into the Barrow Downs.

It turned out that none of us knew how to find the Great Barrows, so we ended up just running around killing wights and what not until the fellowship just fell apart. One of the members completely just left the area and never came back, as far as I know. Eventually I gave up and left the fellowship, since it wasn’t functioning very well. I explored the Downs some more and found the Great Barrows, but since that’s a pretty high level area, I didn’t try to complete the quest, but made my way back to Bree to sell my loot and repair my equipment. I also picked up a new bow.

Time: 2h

Apparently the streets in Manhattan are at 29^o degrees off earth’s axis. From:

From BldgBlog:

As it happens, then, Manhattan’s mathematically rational street grid is actually rotated 29º off the north-south axis – and this angle has interesting astronomical side-effects.
In other words, because of the off-center orientation of Manhattan’s street grid, you can only see the setting sun “down the middle of any crosstown street” on two specific days of the year: May 28 and July 13.