The difference between weekends is wild. Two weekends ago was action-packed. We went to the playground so many times and went down so many slides. We stomped on leaves, we watched birds and watered the plants, we threw Dad’s panda toys down the stairs, we jumped around the house yelling BOING BOING BOING. We went to Costco (and BB had a full lunch of samples because he had the whole squad getting him MORE on demand). We went down to the basement numerous times, which I think is the most boring part of the house, but BB thought otherwise. He was really impressed by the furnace.
Last weekend, I didn’t particularly do anything. I sat at my computer. I didn’t even play games most of the time. There was no raid because meisnewbie, the linchpin of society, was away. On Sunday afternoon, I went to the playground across the street to do a half hour of sketching; at least that’s something.
On Sunday night (technically Monday morning because it was past midnight), I finally decided to do something in the form of the Occult Crescent. This was HGR’s idea. He’s been grumbling about how they stripped out the soul of Eureka to make a casual-friendly streamlined grinding experience. But by the same token, he thought I might like it (big diss but also accurate) as an easy way to get tomes and gear upgrades.
(Same hat as when HGR was telling everyone how much Hundred Line sucked, but told me, “I think you’ll like it. It’s just very juvenile.”)
So, the Occult Crescent. I don’t dislike it (damning with faint praise), but I see why Eureka fans have issues with the design. Like, Eureka was rough as a casual player going solo. Leveling up on random mobs was super grindy. I think I reached level 7 before I quit? A lot of zone advancement was based on fighting NMs, but I couldn’t get to any NM without a higher-level friend escorting me (and reviving me whenever I accidentally aggroed a mob), and then I’d just die constantly to the boss due to being underleveled. But that’s what Eureka fans liked. It had challenge. It had progression. It required teamwork (lfg bun/nm). It had classic moments like Dante and HGR trying to sneak past dragons that were way too high level for them to fight.
Meanwhile, in the Occult Crescent: (1) You get mount access from the beginning. (2) Critical Encounters (the new NMs) automatically spawn on a loop, instead of needing to be spawned by players. (3) CEs do not require zone levels. Like, they function entirely on your regular player level. So I get to be Mr. Casual at occult level 1 and ride my mount to every CE and get full credit. For anyone wanting to engage with content instead of treating it like a tomestone drive-thru, it’s not so great.
But hey, I almost got enough silver for 745 pants! And about enough tomes for tome gloves, though I may want to save up for chest instead. Point is, Sugar Riot isn’t going to know what hit her adds.
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