Spellborn grinding and loving it? WHAT?!?
I have rediscovered my love for Spellborn. Perhaps it has something to do with the fact that not only am I getting further into the story quests and learning more about the lore, but I am getting further into my levels. As of right now, I have the game minimized and my character is about to ding 19. Grats to me? Yep. I am getting back into what attracted me before I quit: the mystery of the game. I kinda’ lost all want to play when I had to re-roll my same character. I rediscovered the love when I was able to access my original character and was able to skip having to re-do all those missions.
But, my character is also sitting there in wolf form (an ability of the “rogue” class, you can shape-shift to hide amongst animal and human mobs) while I write a bit. I kill a few more mobs, write a bit, kill a few more mobs, write a bit…
The quest is called “Typical Ringfell Items” and it essentially is a quest to go out and kill 25 of three different types of animals. Before you guess it, not all quests are kill X rats like this one, (but many are) and not many at ALL are kill this MANY mobs. This is a special mob-killin’ quest, and it gets you a sigil (think a stat gem that you can add to a weapon) and a ton of XP. This quest will level me when I turn it in.
But as I am sitting here killing mob after mob, I am enjoying myself. I don’t know what it is. Perhaps it’s the classes ability to sneak ANYWHERE to find the prime hunting spots, or perhaps it’s the FPS-style-ish combat that is surprisingly easy on my wrists, but I am having a ton of fun. Yeh, yeh, I normally HATE just killing mobs for quests, I normally would rather explore, goof off or role-play. But I DO level like anyone else, just much much slower. But something about this is…relaxing?
I still have Bhagpusses comment in my head about how he has fun organizing his banks every Sunday, and I think this is a similar feeling. I am not trying to kill mobs way over my level, but enjoying trying different attacks and different abilities. I love the scenery, am role-playing with players running by (the game has been busier than ever once it went F2P) and writing this blog. All in all, an enjoyable evening.
But what’s CHANGED? I think it’s my recent wrists impatience that has given ME more patience. My wrists doesn’t like constant clicking, and demands me to slow down even more. So my playing has bec0me almost this Yoga-like experience (from what I can tell, I’ve never “Yoga’d”) and it’s flowing and feeling relatively good. Maybe sometime our bodies force us to stop doing something that we hate even LESS, but while doing that forces us into an entirely higher level of doing something that we enjoy.
My play has now become very…slow..no, not slow. What’s the word?
Slower? No.
I’m kinda’ playing like someone that really enjoys just playing. I have officially lost all worry of any rule or goal. I officially care even LESS than I did before about getting to any “end-game” or any certain level. I have reached a much higher level of noobnessocity. Noobnessishness.
And I don’t give a crap.
I just wish I knew exactly what cracked in my brain to make me ENJOY killing mobs over and over like this.
Beau
It’s nice to have your body and mind working on the same page. I found that it was very calming to raid in WoW (we’re talking Tier 1 days, so like 2006) and just press “1″ over and over again. It almost was meditative, the button pressing. The farming for mats and guild drama…that wasn’t calming.
“the farming and guild drama..that wasn’t calming..” haha!
Yeh I’m enjoying it a lot. Spellborns combat is going really easy on my arms.
Beau
I spent most of this week mining in WoW to raise my jewelcraft. I found it very relaxing, apart from having to compete occasionally with level 80s on superfast mounts.
I tend to enjoy most MMO tasks that are both easy and repetetive, and which have counters that increment – gathering mats and watching the stack sizes build, or watching the skill increase; killing mobs for a “Kill X” quest; even just watching the xp bar move up % by %.
It depends why you are playing in the first place, though, doesn’t it? If you are playing for thrills and excitement, then clearly these activities are not going to attract or satisfy you. I play more for relaxation than excitement, though, and to some degree the more things go along the same, the more relaxing it gets.
Nothing more relaxing than the good old bank sort, though. Four hours from breakfast to lunch yesterday and only got two characters done to my satisfaction, so I might do a bit more today as I’m not at work
Typing one-handed while holding a baby is tough. So, here are some screen shots from my time in The Chronicles of Spellborn.
Totally meant to post that on MMO Voices, LOL!
I wonder if the guys from Spellborn really did have to go into bankruptcy and Acclaim took all the assets, or whether someone back in the Netherlands will at least get some money out of this game when it comes back?
Seems a shame. We all cry for originality and once a game comes along that isn’t a WoW-like, no one appreciates it
Is that the games fault? Granted, the game-play is unique, but the quests can be fun but repetitive. People are used to some MMOs levels of sophistication when it comes to quests. I mean, I really enjoy the questing in Spellborn, but it is a story driven game, and I think that limits it’s re-playability quite a bit. Once you play through it, you don’t need to again really.
I will bet the same issue will pop-up with the new Star Wars game.
But minus all that, the MMO audience can be a very bored one anyway. I wouldn’t say mostly, being that MMO’s are bigger business than they have ever been, but a lot of players just get bored because they are used to getting bored. It’s like training yourself to appreciate the small things in life: after a while you really do.
Beau
I felt that way about harvesting and crafting in EQ2. I always wanted to write a post entitled, “Who can I Screw at SOE to make EQ2 Questing more Fun?” Never got around to it. That game had all of the features I wanted except that the leveling was sooooooooo boring to me I couldn’t stand it. I tried so many times to love that game.
I can totally get how a mundane tasks like farming or even mob grinding in an interesting setting can be very relaxing.
I hear you, its a brilliant game, we are currently trying to save it from extinction *sighs*. My wrists feel it too so the slowing down is imperative for me. Do you two still play? x
Edit – Do any of you still play? x
I do occasionally. But, I’m always alone and the game can get pretty hard to play alone.