On the way I encountered someone by the title of ICC Bio Inspector who (naturally) had a few errands he needed run and had some nice equipment to trade for the task such as a scope that increased my chance of a critical strike when fighting (which somehow works with my knives as well), and a bracelet that makes me withstand a little more damage. The tasks were quite easy, cull 3 each of 3 critters then target (but not kill) each of the five 'boss'es on the beach. The Rollerrats on the north end of the beach were quite aggressive coming charging from quite a ways off. However they were quite easily dispatched. After completing his tasks he suggested I talk to Adri Afeli near the docks.

Next: The Dockworker

Bought the expansion the other day and right away I was able to add research trees to my xp grind. New abilities, and boosts to stats for each line, and (of course) more time spent learning them.

For my engineer (the Level 60 temple twink who may never reach 61) it was great, popped out the best robot she can self cast and let pet hunt legos and Lien till I maxxed the 10 trees at third level each (they are each 10 levels long, but locked to your level so you can't get L4 researches at level 60, next is at 75 I think)

Now comes the odd part... I couldn't find the LE mission area... There seems to be little documentation on it, and what there was wasnt too clear. Since I've never visited the Alien Play Field (APF: Level 180+ alien raid zone) I didn't know where that was or how to use the 'beacon' north of ICC.

Directions:

Whompah to ICC from Rome, Tir, Newland (etc...)

Follow the tunnel north from the cavern

There's a Landing pad to the north, head there.
on the north edge of the landing pad there's a tower with a blue ring pinging on the ground beside it. Stand in the ring till the shuttle arrives and you get warped to the staging area.

At the base of the ramp & stairs is the APF and LE mission recruiters. You will need to be in a team for the LE mission recruiter to give you a job (I don't know about the other, I think you have to be 180+ or so to get work from him).

On the Level 60 engineer I got a wrangle to get my best possible bot out (Level 131) and teamed with a non expansion character to qualify to pull a mission. The mobs inside (I selected easy mission!) were surprisingly tough, and the boss at the end repeatedly punched my ticket to reclaim. I did get decent alien XP from the aliens in the mission, but (In my opinion at least) a twinked character like that should not be so easily killed in an 'Easy' mission. This character easliy solos Level 80 team missions in regular Rubi-Ka (RK) content.

Haven't found the Battle-Station sign up device for my level yet either, I did find one for level <30 (I think it was) but when I hit it with a character in the right level range the character stayed 'in queue' for hours. (you need several characters of the same level range and both sides before a battlestation will start)

Next up: MP or False MP?

Made a froob Adventurer today, surprisingly powerful on the newbie island. You have heals, decent ranged (pistol) or melee (1 hand edged) combat, and armor shields and damage shields. At level 2 I solo'd a miniboss easily with melee swords. I ran into some trouble however doing the ICC Bio Inspector's quests. He asks you to inspect each of the five minibosses, but the roller-rat boss was stuck inside a wall. After about an hour (trading off with others to watch for the spawn to appear) I /petitioned the problem to get an ARK (Advisor of Rubi-Ka) to help. That took another hour, with over 30 min of that being next in the queue (zero people ahead of me). Once the ARK arrived he looked for the mob, then called in a senior ARK who found it inside the wall and killed it so it would respawn properly (then we could finish the quest). Quite the hassle, but satisfactory help once it arrived.

While waiting (& trading off with another person watching the spawn point) I had lots of time to complete the rest of the newbie island quests, getting my armor, upgraded weapons, and the backpack. Then back to the spawn to watch while he did the same. would have taken about 2 hours to reach level ten and complete all the quests I estimate if it wasn't for the snag. That is the fastest I've done it yet with any class.

Going to head to the mainland next and continue the character. I want to see what she can do against the dyna camps around Omni forest...

Aside from that I did get a newer used car. Not as nice as my old one I think, but newer, and looks sportier and ... standard transmition... (I didn't realize they still made those?!?) Probably going to head on over to Vangard to check out their game & see if its worth playing.

Ron

New Quests!

The old quest that used to take six 'animal parts' and guve you 25 low quality health stims (for first aid) now requires only three pieces, and gives 25 health stims, 25 nano stims, 50 health packs, and 50 nano packs. That new machinery someone dumped behind Brandon sure increased his efficency! Most characters will probably be L15 before they use up one set, but the nano packs are an incredible improvement. Before Docs and Nano technicians would burn through the 5 point 'starter' stims and 15 point 'starter' packs taking forever between fights. The new packs let them get 35 health or nano from the packs and IIRC it is 15 from the stims (health or nano, not both as the starter ones did, but this is much better!).

A slight change to the belt quest is that now the belt he gives you is nonworking and the neutral vendor fixes it for you and gives you a memory unit as well (a basic 3 point one but good for your level)

The snake boss has been moved from his hiding place within the cliff and moved to the shore where he is supposed to be.

The 'Manager' Travis Molen now offers quests to get you your newbie armor for free, freeing up that time that used to be spent camping the various bosses for sellable loot to buy the parts to productive time slaughtering spiders, robots, sabateurs, or whatever you feel like.

The only thing I still want (but isn't there) is energy weapon ammo so we can turn the alien's ranged weapons back on them for more than a tiny number of shots (the weapon gets a full clip when you equip it the first time). I think they did this intentionally to keep the aliens challenging, but just makes it more isolated and different from the main game. (Running out of ammo does happen even if you buy 50,000 rounds of each (bullets and energy) then forget about ammo long enough. Though it took Mimorydoc 110 levels to use up the 60k of energy ammo she bought at level 20... (Burst & full auto burn ammo fast however).

The quests also add several new areas to fight in to gain experience though they don't seem to drop any loot, so the other areas are better if they still offer you exp. It certainly beats camping the robot bosses from level 7-10, then aliens from 11-15 thugh if your trying to get your AI level 3 before leaving the island.

The last few levels I've (Mimorydoc) been killing Hecklers in Elysium with groups, some were good, others not so. The good ones get you levels quickly, the not so good ones get you lots of xp pool that you can earn back later. Your XP Pool is the experience you had earned between the time you died and the last time you gained a level (Or 'saved' at a medical terminal or Shadowlands Garden). You get back some of this xp every time you earn xp on a percent basis. I think the basic amount is around 10%, but a Beurocrat can increase the recovery rate substantally aat higher levels.

Mimorydoc is now level 143, and has 9 AI levels from various raids she's been invited on. AI experience is tracked seperately from normal exp and there is a limit to how much AIxp you can have at each 'Title' level.

Next Interlude 7 --- New ICC (Newbie) Island ---

--- Interlude 6b --- War Bot time!

With her new robe my now Level 60 Engineer used some of her saved IP in one hand blunt weapons and got a buff from an enforcer to equip the pillow the MP usually uses to put out better pets (+15 to 3 nanoskills). Customized a few implants to even out Matter creation and Time/Space as high as I could get them, a few Shadowlands symbiotic implants, and added the pocket MP's masteries... New bot Time!

Although at this stage its an advanced gladiatorbot about L89 or so, (quite tough enough for most targets in the Temple of the Three Winds) but of course bigger is better. I calculated the best bot I could control with the masteries, then what (additional) buffs would be needed to put out (cast) that bot...

I took my Doc on a mission to get the Warbot nano (A level 112 pet) and with a trader wrangle (for an exorbitant 'Tip') managed to learn/cast the warbot. Of course wrangles last barely 2 min, and if the masteries wear off I can't control the bot anymore, but while it lasts it is quite a feat for me. While I was in Rome I happened to see someone selling 'Beacon Warp' a really useful engie nano (Quality level 90) for 400k and bought it. I can actually use it "self buffed" with the pillow equipped, and it lets me summon any team member to my location as long as I'm not inside certain (level locked) dungeons such as TotTW. I couldn't cast it (or the bot) without the Alien invasion 'Perks' that improve nanoskills.

In order to learn the nano, and cast the bot I needed a 100+ boost to my nanoskills for about 2 min or less. I found a high level trader to cast a 'Wrangle' for me and learned the nano and cast & activated the shell. The bot is summoned as an inactive box in your inventory you need to activate by right clicking on it while you have the same requirements to meet as casting the bot. A couple of times I've been able to get a Wrangle cheaply, or even free from guildmates to get started. Once going an engineer can continue with the same bot as long as she can keep control of her bot (about 80% of the skill needed to cast the nano in the first place) and keep it alive.

I actually stopped using the pillow and went back to the 2 hand edge scythe from temple of the three winds, I'll eventually have the skills to equip the Stygian I took from Aztur's corpse one of the times I killed him but for now the scythe does very good damage.

Next: interlude 6c -- Temple twink
(Hmm, these interludes could be their own tree rather than interruptions couldn't they. )

--- 19d Grid House ---

This is the open building that looks like a cotton candy stand.
It allows players to exit the transport grid right in their city.

Grid House Computer Literacy
Quality level:289
Requirements:
Use:Must have expansionset: Alien Invasion

Modifier:
Comp. Liter (52 at lvl 200)

Well, I had volunteered to try out this game and begin with a new character, plus doing progress reports as we go along. But alas I haven't been able to get the game to run since the patcher likes to do checksum's of the patches it downloads, which then has a tendency to fail said patches. Funcom has been trying to help, but I think they are just as confused.

One very nice person is Terri who has been my go between with Funcom is just as perplexed. Believe me, when I say we've tried nearly everything to get it up and running. About the only thing I haven't tried is downloading their big one, and when I say big one, this baby goes for over 1 gig. So you can see the reluctance there.

At the moment I'm stuck on one patch that seems to hate me, and till that gets resolved we are dead in the water. My intentions are to email her again with some *.txt files that say why the system is burping up foul gases! For the moment all I can do is update every so often.

See ya till then!