Category: Star Wars Galaxies

Unfortunately I was unable to attend the developers chat this evening hosted by Stratics.com. Fortunately, I was prepared for this possibility and had my IRC client logging. I filtered the logs to remove many of the join/part/quit messages and put them on my site. I haven’t had a chance to read them yet, but will be doing so shortly :).

Sony Online Entertainment had some problems with a patch they did this morning resulting in many of their galaxies (read, servers) being down for an extended amount of time this morning. This included the ones I normally play on. While I was waiting patiently (ya, right) for the game to be playable again I created a new character… as if I didn’t waste, I mean spend, enough time on the existing two. Anyway, this new character’s name is Oplem Koped and he resides on the Sunrunner galaxy. He hopes someday to be bounty hunter and a loyal servant of the Empire (even though some Imperials don’t like bounty hunters). I spent most of the day playing this character and helped him to learn a couple of skills. He’s about half-way to the required faction points to join the Empire… I really forgot how fast that initial 200 FP took to earn.

Came across a really slick site today: Stratics guide to Star Wars Galaxies. One of the features the site has is the ability to create character bios that are tailored to Star Wars Galaxies (such as what Skills the character has). I set up a bio for both of my characters: Aliena Shiring on the Valcyn Galaxy & Accacattiurra on the Kettemoor Galaxy. The site seems a little slow, but it’s probably because of people like me who use the service but don’t buy the advanced membership 🙂

Still spending lots of time playing Star Wars Galaxies. I’ve found this game to be a lot of fun, both in the interaction between other players and doing things by yourself. Although it is the former that is more fun. I’ve found that there are some people who are very generous and others who are so stingy that their proverbial wallet must creak whenever they open it… kinda like in real life! For example, one night I was talking with a person and mentioned that I had to earn a good chunk of credits before I could go to bed because I need to pay maintenance on my harvesters for the entire weekend. He completely floored me when he instantly handed me 1,000 credits. I certainly wasn’t expecting this, but do truly appreciate it. Another example was last night. I was playing in the cantina just to earn some musical XP when a player said he wanted to hire a musician for a couple hours. Though it was 10pm and I did kinda want to be in bed early, I decided I’d do his gig. He paid very well for that time. Although it wasn’t exciting as the cantina, it was worth my while. The ironic thing is, his shop isn’t too far from where my harvesters are and in the same neighborhood that I want to put my house. After that gig last night, I could certainly afford a small house, though I’m not sure if I want to hold out for a medium or not. The shop I was in was a medium and I think it was a very cool place. I guess I just need to see a small in order to make up my mind.

At some point in the future, I’d like to put up a Bio page for my characters. Maybe start making up some history for them and such. I’m not sure when this will happen, though, as I’ve intended to put up a personal Bio page for quite some time now. I guess I’m still waiting to find that magical round tuit… if you have a spare, please let me know!

As I play Star Wars Galaxies more, I begin to realize that this is definitely a game that can consume a lot of your time. And for some strange reason, I chose to start developing two characters at once, each in two professions!! I have one character that is a Medic/Marksmen and another that is an Artisan/Entertainer. They are both still in training in their respective skills, but I’ve managed to get some 2nd level of experience for each of them. They’ve got most of the first level stuff that I want for now (the one exception is my Medic still needs Chem I). What that really means is that it’ll take longer to advance again because 2nd, 3rd, and especially 4th level skills require a lot of XP and those take time to earn. Financially speaking, both characters are doing OK though neither one is getting rich quick. I still do a lot of delivery missions, especially if I want to go to another town. I generally try to find a delivery mission that’s going to end up where I want to… I figure if I’m going there, I may as well get paid to do it! One thing I have noticed playing the two different characters is that people tend to tip the medics better than the entertainers. I don’t know that I’ve gotten a tip as the entertainer yet, but I’ve gotten a few 500 credit tips as a medic. I’d say roughly 70% of the people I’ve healed wounds for (not just used a stimpack on) have tipped me. That is appreciated because the only two ways for me to heal wounds right now is to buy medicine on the Bazaar or take the hit on mental powers and battle fatigue. I think that will change as soon as I get Chem I. I will also say that it’s more expensive to be a medic than a musician. I’ve probably spent well over five thousand credits on medical supplies, but I’ve only spent 150 on an instrument (I did also trade some resources I had gathered) and that was only because I was too impatient to wait for Musicianship II where I would be able to make my own! So maybe it’s fitting that the medics get tipped better than the entertainers.

Yippee!! My “new” machine is alive. I got it running last night and got Windows installed (it has WinXP because I want to use it for gaming). I say “new” because it has a lot of old parts in it as well. The only things I purchased are: a Motherboard, a Processor, a stick of RAM, a cheap hard drive, and a Video Card. My grand total for this equipment: ~$470 after taxes and rebates. I don’t think that’s terribly bad for a new machine. I even got Star Was Galaxies installed and running. I created a Wookie medic. My wookie is a female who’s name escapes me at the moment. Unfortunately, I can’t play the game right now because all the servers are down for scheduled maintenance. It seems like they could bring them down one or two at a time instead of all at once for 3 hours. But I suppose that’s a separate rant.

After reading the review on slashdot, I decided to go out and buy Star Wars Galaxies. Unfortunately for me, the video card in my laptop (an HP Pavilion ze1250) doesn’t seem to be up to the task of launching this game. It was, of course, able to get through the part where I signed up for an account an gave my credit card number. I guess my choices now are either to cancel that account or buy/build a new machine. I must admit that the idea of putting together a new machine does appeal to me on some level, though I’m not really sure if I should do that, financially speaking. I think all I would need is a motherboard/processor and a video card. I’m pretty sure I have other hardware laying around that would by acceptable… I think I’ve almost convinced myself to do this 🙂