Scout Archive

Alright, before you read this post lemme tell you that it DOES have a point, just give it a second to get there

:-D

Well, I've been playing for about a week now, but I've been looking at these boards for quite a while before I got the game, particularly the Scout and Ranger boards. You know, to figure out if I would like the game. And I have noticed that the most commonly talked-about thing around here is "The Grind".

Yes, anyone who has ever played a game even similar to SWG knows what the grind is. For me, my introduction to the grind was with a little Java game called RuneScape, in which a character could level upevery skill in the game until they maxed out an 99. Indeed, the coveted 99. I strove for it for months, hoping to finally be able to go out into the wilderness and own EVERYONE. Not just the noobs (although it was fun getting tells from them "I thought you couldn't kill me yet at that level!"), but everyone would die at the hands of my Runite longsword. Indeed, this "level 99" was a thing sought after by everyone in the game.

And then, one day, I did it. I had leveled up EVERY skill to 99. Even the skill used to chop down trees. And finally, I went out into the wilderness.

I slaughtered them, noobs and seasoned veterans alike, without mercy. And I looted their corpses- I found wooden planks and bronze armor on the noobs. BAH! Who needs that (besides the unfortuante noob, of course)? I looted the better, more advance players. A fire staff? Got five of them! Every once in a while I would find something good, or some idiot carrying 100k on him 'cause he'd forgotten to bank after that big Runite trade. But what did I need that for? I had the most advanced weapons and armor in the game, and got all my runestones from dead magicians. And it wasn't like I was going to die and loose any of it.

Eventually word got around of me, and some smartass new players decided taht they would come out and kill me. So they came, yes, all twelve of them. And I knew they were coming. I waited in the wild until the skull above my head, identifying me as someone who had just killed another person, went away (similar to a TEF, but if you were killed withing thirty minutes of attacking another player you lost all your items). Once the TEF thing was gone, I sought out the noobs, parading around as a frightened newb with no armor and weapons.

Noob 1: Let's kill that noob overthere!

Other Noobs: Yeah! Kill him!

Me: Oh my God!

Noobs: Oh my God!

System Message: You have defeated twelve noobs.

That was when I got out of runescape. There was nothing left- I had meticulously climbed my way to the top of every skill, to be the best I could be. Noob after noob I had killed. Monster after monster. And it was not enough.

And that's where SWG came in. The idea of having to interact with other players intruiged me. A guild- not just something like "Hey, let's all go to the wilderness together" but a REAL established Guild! And of course I would have to talk to toher people now- how exciting! And the possibilities for playing- there was actually a limit to the skills you could learn! What an original idea! Briliant!

So, after a computer upgrade... no, wait a sec, not an upgrade, a whole new computer... I was able to play this exciting game. But what would I be in this game? Medic- ugh, boring. Artisan and Entertainer? Boring-er. Marksman and Brawler- everybody's probably got that skill. Scout? Ah, there's something- original, helpful to other players, and at least will have a little bit of self suffiency. Sounds fun.

So I got in the game as my super short Bothan Scout. Traps, camps, uber-CDEF pistol- it was awesome. I immediatly went out, and, well, started lagging.

Coronet city is a place that I'm sure no Scout wants to be in. AFK, macro, spam, all the undesirables of the Star Wars Galaxy. But it is a place NO ONE wants to be when they don't even have HALF of the requiredPhysical Memoryto play the game (although it must not have been required if I could still play it...)Oh, and quick offtopic question, is Physical Memory the same as RAM?

Anyways, my hopes of playerr interaction were nigh abolished. Sadly, I piloted my brand new hut fighter (curtesy of CorSec) to the Correlian moon, Talus, never to return to Correlia. It wasa sad moment.

But it gets worse. With no one to interact with (as we all know, Talus has about twelve people on it, maximum), I was forced to get Medic, Artisan, and Marksman on my very first day. And then, with nonthing else to do, I began to grind.

Yes,The Grind, again. I ran out of Nashal (well, more like jumped a few meters every second with teh lag), and furiously began killing everything in site with my CDEF pistol. That is, everything that I knew I could beat. Me, get killed? NEVER! I killed every frightened fynock youth in the area, then went back to where I had started and went aound the loop again, catching all he repawns literally as they came into being. I harvested a good three hundred Talusian Avian Bone, then decided to start making some money. I got two paralope missions and finished them, getting Hide this time. Once I had around a hundred and fifty Hide I stopped and made traps (yeah, all two of 'em). And camps. And then I started completing thhe tasks my helper droid gave me for every profession I had. I put on a firework display. I revelled in my mad XP that I was getting for scout as I hunted all day.

The next day I figured I ougt to get a house. And a speeder. And a cu pa. Sadly, none were to be had on Talus, so I went to Mos Eisly. Thirteen hours later (lag agin) I had all three- my pet, my speederbike, and my small Correlian House Deed.

SO I went back to Talus and began looking for a good place for my house. I surveyed as I went along. You qualify for Survey 2. Yey. I killed whatever paralope or fynocks I saw.You qualify for Trapping 1. Yay. I made camps to heal myself. You qualify for Wilderness Survival 1. Goody. And then I saw a house. With really good steel deposits underneath it, too. So I went to teh side and surveyed/camped for an hour.

Then the owner of the house showed up. He growled at me. And then roared. "Yo dude, do you speak Basic?" Ia sked him. He shook his head and then typed ":wants to group with you so he can teach you wookie language comprehension because he cannot speak basic and you cannot speak wookie." it showed up as a little spee ch bubble above his head. I can read his mind but not his lips all of a sudden? Odd.

So I grouped with him and talked to him. His name was Booschwacca. He was a Swordsman. He was the first person I had talked to in all Eclipse server. I got to know a little bit about his character. I told him about mine. A friendship was born.

So, after clearing it with the wookie, I plopped my house down on a hill overlooking his house. It was awesome. There was a lost Aqualish across the river. Shot him dead. Looted his corpse. Made a rifle . Killed animals. You qualify for rifle 1. Goody.

So this went on for a few days, with me staying sane by talking to Booschwacca. And then around new years eve, five days or so ago, he went MIA. Still haven't seen him, gotten any replies to my emails, and have still talked to no one else.

And so I began to grind AGAIN. And with my sanity wearing thin, I began to spend more and more time contemplating the appearance of my character and how he looked like a fox. And then I studied his behavior (or my behavior, I guess). He acted liek a fox too! January through Feb.- survive winter by getting faty with lots of Talusian meat. March through April- find nice she fox (well I didn't do that) make a den (did that though) and find bunches of food and resources to store in my den to feed little ones (did that, but the resources were for myself of course).May- November- ahrvest the bounty of the fields while it's still there (aka get all the hide, meat and bone before there's a resource shift and it all goes away). December, winter starts, start cycle all over again.

AN animals life is the ultimate grind, They live so that they may procreate and bring more of tehir species into the world, who will do the same thing, and then they die either of old age, or they are killed by a predator better than them. Unfortunately they don't have cloning facilities liek we do. However, we, as grinders, are not doing much more than an animal. "How do I get Trapping XP?" Whines an impatient 12 year old. I don't know, go out and throw some traps. "How do I go camp most efficiently?" My advice- get an RV and go to Yellowstone, I hear it's got some awesome wildlife spectacles this time of year.

So I have come up with a plan for my gameplaying enjoyement: take it easy. I don't want to play a game with my activities comparable to that of an animal whose sole purpose is to survive and procreate. A game is for for fun, right? Then why worry about completing eight missions today? I've got my maitnenance payed for a month, plenty fo time to get some cash. And if I don't level up today or the next or the next, who cares? I'm bound to get it sometime. So I will use traps when I want to, not when I want XP. I will no longer assaul paralopes for the sole purpose of getting Rifle XP. I will camp when I have wounds or want a safe place to craft, not when I realize that I jut need 350 more XP to be ready to level. And I will rejoice when I forage bait, now that I have discovered the pure pleasure of fishing for an hour. But most importantly, I will play to have fun, not to better than all the noobs on Eclipse server.

And that concludes this rambling regarding "The Grind". The End.

Gledako Fo'Kray- Retired Master Ranger
Encoded until further notice!
Proud Captain of the YT1300 Vasarian Escape- Confirmed Stats from Last Battle- at least 3 kills, 5 disables, 2 spacebombs to the rear shielding and 4 snubs to take us down. Go crew!
Current one-on-one win-loss ratio for the Escape and her Crew- 11:1

Gledako -- Mercenary Dog of Spice --

Good reading and a good point. I recently created a new character on Starsider because my main one is currently locked in the eternal neverending FS xp grind (why oh why did I decide to add smuggler and pistoleer in the middle of that?). Anyway, the new character is going to be part Ranger and master Rifleman because I thought it would be fun to just go hunt stuff, and of course sell it for $$$. When I created it my intention was not to just rush through and grind out the skill boxes as soon as I could and then go sell the stuff I harvested and get rich, instead like you I want to just work through it as I go and enjoy it. Of course I constantly find myself getting away from that and having to remind myself of why I created the new character.

It's also really fun, or maybe I'm just twisted, starting over again. I got finished running a few faction missions last night and was on my way back to Theed when I just jumped off my bike about 1200m out and decided to walk back and see what I could hunt along the way. This was further enhanced by the fact that my Bria toon hunted on Dath in a group and Dantooine solo/grouped in order get 95% of his weaps xp, so I've never hunted on planets like Naboo or Corellia which makes all of the creatures new to me lol. Even more cool, to me at least, was that I did something last night that I've never done before in my 6 months of playing, I went fishing and caught my first fish. Anyway, you were sharing your grind experience, just thought I'd share mine, didn't mean to make it this long but oh well.

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Mekar: Jedi Padawan, future Master Enhancer, demoted to the lowest Rebel rank after an incident involving a JSF and an Imp recruiter

Proud member of the "Village of the Damn".......as in "Damn I only get 30K of FS for a million regular?"......."Damn that's a lot of XP".......and of course "Damn this commute sucks!!"

Paks
Master Ranger/Master Creature Handler
-I support ATK play

I respect Scout the most because the only part which requires no real interaction with the game is Survival macro crafting tents every other tree makes the characters go & work for their abilities even ifExploration/huntings a little too easy.

Star Wars - Published 1977 written by George Lucas (Allegedley) ISBN 0-7221-5669-3
' "Your father's lightsabre," Kenobi told him. "At one time they were widely used. Still are in certain galactic quarters.'

Explanation for only Jedi PCs using them is .....?