In more recent years, I often find myself disinterested in video games on the whole for a period. Everything just sounds like too much effort and I want to be with my books, my cross stitch, my movies and series, my TTRPGs, whatever it is I’m filling my time with. But back in April, I found myself spoonless and all I could think to do, was load up Classic World of Warcraft and plug away at a game I knew so familiarly that I didn’t need to learn new systems, focus much at all, follow a story, I could just plug in some music and roll. And so I did just that!

Azerothian Comfort Food

I am struggling to untangle my memories of this time, I know I installed Classic Era (vanilla) but it was right around season 2-3 of Season of Discovery so I believe that’s where I started. I was having a lot of fun, and then as I always do, wanted to peek into Retail WoW to check on my characters there, learned there were drops active on Twitch for something or other, started watching a Bear’s Adventures stream, and got hooked back on Retail. SoD I entirely intended to continue with, I really wanted to do some Classic progression and raiding, and the twists were fun to boot, but I just didn’t end up fitting it in. There was too much I wanted to do in Retail!

So fast forward to today, I’m still playing Retail World of Warcraft, have uninstalled all versions of Classic, and I’ve successfully managed to complete Keystone Master (reach 2k rating in Mythic+ and get an exclusive mount for your troubles) for all four Dragon Flight seasons. I did miss out on season 3 (that’s the Emerald Dream stuff) raiding but I caught up mostly on the zone and loved it, and then got the Awakened mount from season 4 raids, which had you revisit each season’s raid in “awakened” mode (the gear is a higher item level and the raid difficulty becomes up to par to match current gear levels) rotating each week.

All in all, I am super proud of what I’ve achieved and maintained through Dragon Flight, even with my 7 month break, all thanks to my lovely guild Whitestar, of course.

At present, I’m still maining my Human Mage Jaedía (because of course somebody has been sitting on the name Jaedia since at least WotLK on my server) who has been Frost specced throughout the expansion. I’m sorely tempted to make her a Void Elf but.. I just don’t know. It’s a lot of money and right now I’m not wholly sure where I’ll be come The War Within. I plan to level through to max level, explore what the new expansion has to offer, get myself geared up and join in for our casual guild guilds and Mythic+ nights. However, I haven’t felt particularly hyped about the expansion or the game since mid-June. There was some stuff going on in my life that just squashed all of that right down and… I dunno. It may come back, or maybe right now just isn’t the time. I’ll keep plugging away casually and see what happens. And I also have to think about my TTRPG groups, the time and energy I’ll need to spend on the one I want to be running (we’re on an extended break for the time being but we’re hoping to poke around a bit very soon). I’ve got my blog and my streams to keep plugging away at, and I have very very limited energy resources (see, spoons, again). Time will tell!

Elves and Friends in Tamriel

Since I reconnected with my dear friend Aeyvi through our World of Warcraft guild, we’ve been chatting and hanging out a lot. And she started her streams back up with some Elder Scrolls Online. I had reinstalled the game to claim the free house they gave away through daily login rewards a couple months back, and watching her exploring Tamriel took me back… I had to peek back in!

I started by making a fresh alt, as I logged into my Warden and couldn’t remember what I was doing, where, why, or how to play and figured hey, if I’m overwhelmed, starting fresh is always a nice way to reacquaint yourself with a game. So I made myself a High Elf Arcanist, the newist class to ESO and one I did not have in my roster yet, and I did the starting zone which has been updated since I last played. It now introduces you nicely to the game, and at the end you can choose which zone you head off to quest in via a series of portals! I loved this. Previously you could do the Coldharbour start, and once finished you’d generally get dumped into the newest zone you have access to, which may not always be where you wanted to be. So I picked Vvardenfell, as there was a free teleport appearance in the store that you can only claim if you’ve finished the Morrowind Chapter’s main quest line, and I had not. So I did that! Streamed a little bit of it too, which was fun, and unlocked my Gold Road teleport appearance. It’s really beautiful, you basically swirl autumnal leaves around you and vanish in a leaf pile.

Anyway, by the time I’d done all of that, I’d got to grips with the game again and peeked back onto my Warden to work out where she was up to in her quest to complete all quest content in release order, and what her crafting was at and all of that jazz. Apparently I’d started on Cadwell’s Silver, the game’s way of encouraging you to complete the other faction’s questlines, yet still had two Aldmeri Dominion zones to play through so I decided Cadwell’s Silver could wait, that sounded like something that would take up too much time so I figure I’ll revisit that once I feel more “caught up”. For now I’m working on Malabal Tor, a really beautiful like.. jungley-forest that the Bosmer call home and yeah. It’s nice.

Me and Aeyvi also decided to make Snow Elves. They aren’t super high level but they both came out so pretty! I love them.

And Maybe I Can Final Those Fantasies?

Add to all of that, I also re-subscribed to Final Fantasy XIV at… some point between April and July. I could go check my message history to see when specifically, but I don’t want to, so vagueries you get! I just recall really missing my Mi’qote, and perhaps there was an event on I didn’t want to miss the rewards for? Heck knows now. My memory doesn’t work so good, if that hasn’t been made clear enough yet. But come back I did!

Out of the three, this is the one I have put the least amount of time into this year, and I’ve considered cancelling my sub a couple times. However, I dearly love the game and I just think it’d be neat to actually get on with the main story (MSQ) and be  le gasp caught up!! I’m right at the tail end of Heavensward now, which means Stormblood is, at long last, in sight! Yes, I have owned this game since the early days of A Realm Reborn. And no, I don’t want to talk about it right now. Just know that FFXIV is the MMO I wish I could put more time into. And once I do feel “caught up”, perhaps I could finally play my alts a little… though by that time we’ll probably be able to play and chat across datacenters. I forever hope!

All in all, I’m actually trying to balance all three which never goes well, but I just cannot choose. The Elder Scrolls Online is probably my personal favourite MMORPG. World of Warcraft is my comfort game, it’s familiar, I understand it and so it’s really nice to spend time with it and the friends I’ve made through it. And Final Fantasy XIV is incredible. It has perhaps the best story of any MMORPG out there and it’s truly gorgeous. I really want to put more time in and play more with Rini. And then there are all the MMOs I want to fit in, and all the non-MMOs too! At some point I’m sure the tower I’ve built myself will crumble, maybe. But for now I’m really enjoying puttering around in the three I have chosen and who knows what the future will bring.