Setting out from Starbase 1

It has been a while again, but I tend to drift ever again back to Star Trek Online, or STO for short.

Which considering I am a Trekkie, and where that badge with pride, isn`t to strange I recon.

Especially since I have been playing this since it's initial release waaaaaaay back in February 2010... albeit on and off, especially since it became free-to-play.

So this week, I reinstalled the game, and have been doing some catch up on the new features and episodes that have been released since then (last I played was the Iconian storyarc, so a few have been added now), checking on my bridge officers and all the likes.

And so the adventures of Captain (well, actually Admiral) Aldades Vongalzthag and the USS Procyon continue once again... 

Back to Eorzea

Paint decompressions... that's how I should call it.

After painting, basing and varnishing almost 300 figures for the AHPC8, I'm taking a step back for now.

Not that I quit painting, but I just am turning down the speed, and work through the figures at a far lesser deadlined rate then the past three months. To that end, I'm also filling the "geek-time" with returning to my favorite MMO, Final Fantasy XIV.

Just like Noshi, who came out of her winter break for the game this month.  So that lines up nicely, and we can go on dastardly duo-ing the instances.  Or better, she rules them and I'm her wind-up minion being dragged along, as I'm way behind her, just rounding out the main storyline quests.  Now the whole gear grind and instance unlocking is upon me...

I finally joined her guild as well, in an effort to on the one hand get some old raid contents sorted out, but more importantly to not be solo grinding and queue waiting the whole time.

Now for the next weeks, my goals are on the one hand to level up my gear with my 'main' class of Red Mage(power to pouf and panache!) and on the other hand boost up the crafter alt in tailoring and botany to unlock at first the desyntesis parts. Because that way I can trash all the loot from the lower level instances, as well as push on in the end game content and "sponsor" the bloody expensive Materia VI's...

And try not to get to distracted by hunting down minions xD...

Project Red Mage cosplay

Okay, I did it before for the StarCom set a few years ago, and now I have this idea in my head and will try to do it again.

Using the "trade upwards" priciple (you know, the boy scout game), I`m going to try and get the materials together for a Red Mage costume to go back to cosplaying in 2018.

The deal is, my GF is into cosplaying, geeky things and all that sort of stuff, and we made a "pact" to visit conventions in the latter half of 2018, all dressed up.  While she aims for an anime character, I settled on the class I love playing in Final Fantasy online, the dandy mages of the Red Mage order, or Duellists.

Decked out in (deuh) red garbs with a heavy renaissance feel, they are using a combination of a casting crystal and rapier to toss their spells around, so not only will I have to go and get me a costume (the example shown costs about 250 euro including shipping and duties, so that's the nominal target I set myself, 500 incl tickets, hotel and accessories), but will also have to study YouTube on working with LED lights to make myself a rapier and the crystal.

So I`m going to scour my boxes of mostly vintage accessories for toys first, stuff like shown below, and start from there to trade around until I end up with the costume in the end.

And who knows, if all goes perfectly you might meet us at for example MCM Comic Con London in october 2018 :-)

The End of Minifigures Online

This is a small build I made when Minifigures Online was still in closed Beta, and I got the joy of already playing it.

Over the roughly two years it ran it has seen some changes, last week, on the 30th of September, it closed down as this little free game came to an end.
I actually enjoyed the game personally, and back then made this build in "honor" of the three characters I preferred to play with, each with it`s representative "class colour" and small setting.  Being a more historical / fantasy based builder, I as such chose those three as being most representative for my intrests when i started playing.






It was a fun little game, and the storyline was enjoyable, but it just couldn`t stand up to the big MMO's in the end.

But in the end, I managed to complete about 70 - 75 % of all obtainable achievements in the game, even though it was repetitive after a while (finish instance x or y with that figure, get that far in the portal with that other figure)...

Star Trek Online: Future Proof (continued)

So with the latest expansion, the Future Proof storyline has been expanded.  

After completing the previous storyarc, Yesterday`s war, we where left with the Envoy and his allies forming the Temporal Liberation Front, and now you`re out to stop them.

In the first of the two new episodes, it turns out the Envoy and his forces have besieged New Khitomer, the colony in the future that regulates the temporal agency. 

As you fight your way in, you learn there is another player on the board, as the Envoy, who turns out to be the Krenim scientist Noye from all the way back in your Delta Quadrant storyline, kills Daniels.

He has enlisted Admiral Leeta from the Mirror universe to do his fighting.  While you manage to overcome and capture both the Nak`hul and Vorgon representatives, the loss of Daniels puts the whole timeline in danger.

Captain Chekov, from the 23rd century, is now in command of your group and he informs you the battle for time will be the conflict at Procyon 5 (as seen in Enterprise).  You must go there, and with the Tox Uthat the Sphere Builders can be stopped.

The only vessel capable of doing this though, is the Enterprise-J, and with the help of another time displaced legend in the form of Mister Scott, you defend the Enterprise, overcome Leeta who promptly withdraws from the conflict, and install the machine.

The Enterprise succeeds in disableing the Spheres and the expanse disappears, so all you now have to do is to turn in Noye, who tries to flee aboard the timeship Annorax.

After succesfully capturing him, Daniels is brought back to life due to the changes in the timeline, as you stopped Noye before he was free to kill him... yeah, time mechanics are a bitch.

And the main stories are once again `on par` for me.  Enjoying these time hopping adventures, I`m still in doubt wether to try my hand at a Temporal Agent, as I have a LOT of things to do still in order to catch up where I left off those years ago, so I`ll be grinding and exploring mostly the coming weeks... and get me a T6 vessel to my tastes (Geneva class, I have my eye on you!)

Star Trek Online - Yesterday's War

A series of 4 episodes (well, an intro and 3 episodes), this was part of last weeks new expansion, Agents of Yesterday where you could start a character in the 23rd century TOS timeline.

I didn`t do that personally, nor am I intending to, but I did play the story which Daniels (from Enterprise) gives you, and which leads up to two new stories in the Future Proof chain.

In the first episode, you are transported back to the mid 23rd century, where the Romulans are about to make a pact with the Nak`Hul.  They will provide the Romulans with a Doomsday Machine, and you, disguised as Tal Shiar agents, must discover what is going on.

However, you are soon discovered as a mysterious Envoy arrives at the scene, and the battle moves into orbit to destory the activated machine.

You manage this, but at a great cost as the colony world is destroyed when the Doomsday Machine crashed into from orbit.

You then move on and have to save the scientist Kal Dano, who will in turn become a Temporal Agent himself (again, see the Future Proof storyline), before being killed and found by Captain Archer in the 22nd century.

However, you fail in doing this as Voth interfere, and you go back to Archer`s era to prevent the capture of the Tox Uthat, which would otherwise fall in their hands as Picard wouldn`t have found it.  You learn though that the one he destroyed was a fake and it rests in Starfleet`s vault, which you breach in the middle of the Dominion attack on Earth during the Dominion War, stopping the Voth and keeping the timeline steady.

In the final episode, you travel to the Delphic expanse... in another reality.  This Kelvin Timeline is the line created in the reboot movies by JJ Abrams, and you fight alongside the android crewman from that movie franchise to stop the Sphere Builders.

Under guidance from the Envoy, they have enlisted the Klingons in this alternate reality to do the job the Xindi did in the regular one, and using sabotage techniques you manage to destroy the Sphere.

While Daniels gets wracked more and more due to injuries "elsewhen", you await further orders to see how this plays out... to be continued in the new episodes of Future Proof.

Star Trek Online: Risa Vorgon Xyfius ship

Woopie, got my first Tier 6 vessel.  Well, that`s the good news, on the flip side this years special summer event vessel is a Tactical vessel... and I`m a scientist.

Now, it doesn`t really matter per se what kind of vessel you fly, but I prefer science ships for their bonusses on my main weapon, the Photonic Fleet skill, and their `Target subsystems` special trait.

But at least it`s a free ship that will be of use in the Admiralty system, as it has some great statistics.  Now to keep refining my dilithium and aim for some cool vessel from the ZEN system when the exchange lowers back after the current lockbox craze.  I just wonder how the temporal storyline that will launch this week will work, one of the boxes can contain the "Abramsverse" Enterprise and while I`m not that much a fan of the movie series, it is a damn pretty ship.

Oh heck, I`ll be rolling a toon anyways to play the temporal thingie of the past, and see where that goes in the coming weeks. 

Good times ahead!

Star Trek Online: Future Proof

Roight, I caught up with the episode missions right on time before the Agents of Yesterday, which will take us to the TOS era, hits the 6th of July.

In Future Proof, which spans 4 episodes, you will travel through time, to both the past and the future, and all that because of a star showing strange readings.

It all begins as you pick up a team of specialists over on Deep Space Nine, and travel to a remote system where a star is doing strange things.  Arriving there, you find that one of the moons is inhabited by the Lukari, a race just into the use of warp technology.  A Temporal Agent, Kal Dano (from the Enterprise series) intervenes, but his equipement is stolen by the Tholians.

As you try to get the Tox Utah back, you are to late to save the Na'Kuhl star from being extinguished, and this causes ripples in the timeline.  You manage to recuperate the device, and bury it on 22nd century Risa, long before it was a paradise, for Picard to find and destroy it in a few hundred years.

Kal Dano is thrown in a temporal vortex, but Captain Walker contacts you and explains the Temporal Cold war and the founding of the Galactic Union.

You are invited to the signing of the Temporal Accords in the future, but something goes odd there, as Krenim scientist Noye interferes and captures the delegates.  He has learned that prior to the resolvement of the Vaudwaar storyline, he had a wife and child, but your incursions have wiped them from the timeline.  He now seeks to rectify this using the Annorax and avenge them, with the aid of the Na'Kuhl who over all those centuries have evolved in a time travelling race.

Travelling back to the current day, you learn this truth, but Noye eventually escapes in the time-stream with the Annorax.

The Na'Kuhl however keep causing trouble.  A rogue group of them, under the leadership of general Vosk, tries to alter time, and you travel to the 29th century after a failed assassination attempt on the Federation president.  Here you discover a huge structure, a "time portal" the Na'Kuhl have build, and you must prevent them from using it.

Upon succes, you learn that Vosk, who had escaped in the timestream, was killed by Jonathan Archer in the far past... but the incursions by the Na'Kuhl continue...

And now... it`s about a week for the next expansion to hit, so I`ll be preparing myself for it by doing some reputation missions, as well as the Risa event where I`m just a few days away from the Tier 6 reward vessel.  Perhaps some forge missions or such, and my dilithium mining claims who have been stacking through the roof can be handled, but in any case, the main goal is to get some upgrades to the vessel first and foremost...