Snips and Snails and Puppy Dog Tales

Okay, maybe not miles. In an effort at things, I'm trying to work up to that whole "walk 10,000 steps a day" thing. (I know for some of you out there, that's a joke. But for me, who is on a computer all day at work, then on a computer all day after work, it's not ever anything I've even gotten close to.) Apparently you can break that 10,000 steps down into as small of units as you want, so I'm breaking them down into 100 steps at a time. (The goal of this isn't to get your heart rate up, just to not be sedentary.)

Small steps. Not literal small steps. Small steps towards reaching 10,000 steps. Apparently walking in place counts just as much as walking to go somewhere, so I stand next to my computer and do 100 frequently. That's worked so far at home, but tomorrow I go back to the office, so I'm not sure how well that will go there...

And speaking of work, changes are a'brewing...

( Why would a company want to cut its workforce down by so much? )

In gaming news, the MMO I play (FFXIV) has an expansion coming out in June. Today was a four hour long preview of all the changes, all shown by the producer (man who saved the whole game). It was so fun and exciting to watch it all, especially since my whole guild watched it online together. It's such a cool, amazing experience to get excited over stuff with people from around the world. We have one person from Africa, one from South America, a bunch from across Europe, and lots from North America. All of us together, excited over this online thing. :)

Many, many years ago, I used to post about gaming more than anything else. As people left LJ and my friends list changed, I pretty much stopped posting about it, even though it's still a major part of my life. My friends list had been mostly gamers, and it became mostly not-gamers, so I figured I was probably boring everyone with my posts and switched to writing about non-gaming stuff.

I love it when tersa, fbhjr, and others post about their MMOs, so I think I'll start posting about mine now and then as well. I really need to make a FFXIV icon, it's kind of surprising I don't have one already...

Brief history: I played FFXI for more than five years, left for WoW where I played that nearly five years, and for the last year and a bit I've been on FFXIV. I love FFXIV in a way I haven't loved a game since FFXI (and one expansion in WoW: WotLK), and I don't see myself leaving anytime soon.

MMOs are a great value: I pay about $20/month and I get more play-value than I have hours in a day to take advantage of. I get home from work, log in, and stay logged in until I have to go to bed. On weekends I'm logged in all day. Sometimes I'm doing little but chatting, but even that is fun -- pretty game to look at while chatting! It's the best $20/month I could spend.

Despite the vast hours I spend in game, I'd be considered a "dirty casual" -- I have zero interest in raiding or endgame stuff. I don't even like the dungeons you run to level. So what do I do? I make money. In FFXIV, same as in FFXI and WoW, I'm very, very, very rich. In the previous two games, I was one of the richest people on my server, and though it's harder to tell in FFXIV, I believe I'm headed that way now as well. I enjoy "AH PVP" as I call it (auction house player-vs-player fighting).

My biggest goal in game right now is to buy a house. "But Thistle! If you're so rich, why can't you buy whatever house you want?" Two reasons: I'm on the most populated server, so there are zero houses available to buy. Also, I'm picky. I want a house in an area that housing doesn't exist yet, though will sometime in the future (a year from now!). So I'm waiting. Impatiently waiting.

I love the server I play on (FFXIV's unofficial RP server), but it being the most populated has big downsides for housing -- when new housing was last added, it was all bought up in hours; on other servers there are still plots for sale to this day. So when new housing is introduced, I'm going to need to take time off from work and not sleep, so I can be online the moment it's available. I do not like having to do that for a game, but I want a house, so...

While I do lots of different things in game (basically everything except endgame stuff, I do everything from leveling all the jobs to murderfacing in PVP), my favorite thing by far is RP (role-playing). I'm in a good position for that right now -- I'm in two different groups dedicated to it (usually I'm only ever in one). My life currently is jam-packed full of good RPers, which is so so so so rare. I hate to sound conceited, but its very rare for me to find people who are as good at RP as I am (I've been RPing longer than most current RPers have been alive, so that makes sense). I'm so happy right now, the only cloud is that I'm waiting for the shoe to drop and one or both groups to vanish. :P

FFXIV has an AMAZING dev team (developers, the people who created it and keep new content rolling out). I've never been on a MMO before where the devs actively care and respect their players so much. Not some of their players (looking at you, WoW and FFXI), but all of them. One of the things that always amuses new FFXIV players is that men end up in "plate bikinis" (skimpy, "sexy", unreasonable armor) just as often as women do! Yoshi-P (the game's producer) can and does interact frequently with the players, and he posts about why decisions were made, why something was handled X way, etc. The dev team is very fast to react, apologizing for and correcting issues when they come up, big ones or small. It's unlike any other game I ever played. I feel liked and respected, valued by FFXIV's devs. :)

I mean it quite literally: Other than the lack of housing, I couldn't be happier with a game than I am with FFXIV. :D