moondog
Stalker
- Joined
- Feb 4, 2012
- Posts
- 1,636
- Location
- Behind You
- Society
- Stockholm Syndrome
- Avatar Name
- Charley Moondog 1969
I am working on Chronicle Part V at the moment but i have collated parts I to IV below as they were on differenrt forums under different user names
From Noob to Grunt in 3 Months permalink
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Ok this is not intended as a set of instructions, these are observations I have made in the last 3 months playing Entropia. The beauty of this game is there are no rights or wrongs, although remember like Real Life actions have consequences. I am not an Entropia expert and so i apologise in advance for any error listed below.
If possible when you start playing try to become a member of a society (soc). Other members of the soc will advise and help you, if you know somebody in Real Life who plays the game, ask if you can join their soc if they are in one.
Mentors - You can get a more experienced player to be your mentor, they will take you to locations (for hunting, mining, construction.) My mentor has been helping me since I started and after 3 months I am 56% through the mentor process.
Before You Start
You need to decide which planet to start on. Traditionally this would have been on Calypso the most developed planet. However since the last version update the New player mission on Arkadia gives probably the best introduction to the game, with lots of free stuff (see Below)
The three main professions are hunting, mining and crafting, you can choose to concentrate on one or have a stab at all three. I am mainly a hunter and a lot of information below relates to that profession.
lets say you start on Arkadia and complete the new player missions. By then you should have learnt basic controls and how to hunt and mine.
What next : well below is some information to help you, THIS IS NOT a walkthrough, just my observations as a new hunter.
Before we begin - Acronyms and Game Locations
Due to the high level of instant messaging a lot of Abbreviations are used. A lot are common
to texting and other messaging services - but here are a few you might not know along with some words that might need clarification
EU - Entropia Universe - The game in general
MA - Mindark - the company who runs EU
PED - Project Entropia dollar (10 ped = approx 1 USD)
Caly - Calypso - main planet in game
ARK - Arkadia - another planet in game
RT - Rocktropia - another planet in game
NI - Next Island - another planet in game
CP - Crystal Palace - Space station near Calypso - has 4 biodomes
FOMA - Or F.O.M.A Fortuna - Asteroid near Calypso - 20 biodomes
Mobs - Movable objects - creatures to you and me
Loot - Prizes extracted from mobs when you kill them.
AG - Ancient Greece - Accessed from Next Island
Prison - Prison is located north of RT arrival point
Hell - Mining location with some creatures on Rocktropia
Club Neverdie - Various locations in game where these Clubs are - main one on RT
RL - Real Life
soc - society - you can become a member of a society if you are invited by a senior member of that society
PVP - Player vs player Area - Free for All - at your own risk
The Rig/Oil Rig - located on Calypso at 83352.79328.130 (pvp zone usually reserved for more experienced players
VU - Version Update
UI - User Interface - how you interact with the game
Stackables - Items in your inventory mainly under materials and mined resources that other players can loot off you, either in space or PVP areas
any other abbreviations can usually be found on Urban Dictionary
http://www.urbandictionary.com/
My Starting Inventory
Clothing
Colonist Standard Issue Jumper
Colonist Standard Issue Slacks (trousers)
Urban Nomad Walker Shoes
Armour
Vigilante Armour
Weapons
Sollomate Opalo - Laser Carbine
Ammo
Ammunition - Laser - 1500 shots
Tools
Omegaton Fast Aid FAP-35 (FAP - First Aid Pack)
THE ARKADIA NEW PLAYER MISSION
Arkadia Noob mission with freebies incl hoverpod starts by talking to the
barman at the 30183.18047
NNW of resolute firebase
To repair vehicles need RK-5 repair kit (from Auction) and welding wire
Locations of Interest
F.O.M.A Fortuna - Asteroid and Space Station near Calypso
Biodomes and creatures located in them
1 Ambulimax
2 Virtualy Empty
3 Virtualy Empty
4 Virtualy Empty
5 Virtualy Empty
6 Lvl 31 Caperon Mature Big Looks like a tripod (more legs war of the Worlds)
7 Big Lake - no creatures
8 Lvl 8 Molisks, Lvl 5 Foul Young, Lvl 6 Tripuditon young (bouncer)
9 Misty - very few low lvl creatures
10 Lvl 1 Plumatergus and other low lvl creatures
11 Lvl 8 Molisks, L8 Tongu
12 Lvl 21 Neconu (stay away)
13 No Creatures - I am advised good mining in this dome
14 Orange and Rocky - No creatures
15 Lvl 19 Allophyl Young
16 Lvl 39 - 55 Daspletors - Team only
17 Lvl 97 Daspletors - No way not yet
18 Lvl 7 Argonauts
19 Lvl 25 Cornoanterion
20 Lvl 61 Cornoanterion
Crystal Palace
Biodomes 1 - 4
There are no creatures in these Biodomes that can be killed alone at this player
level
Locations of creatures for rookie to grunt level
Arkadia Mobs
Bokol lvl 16 ARK 22801.25919
Zadul lvl 12 - 15 ARK 14353.15037
Oro lvl 12 -17 ARK 21895.24957
Hadraada lvl 15 - 14639.12924 - 14722.14316 - 13955.14088
Zadul lvl 13 12942.14590
Calypso Mobs
Calypso, good mobs 83164.80541
Argonauts 758.914
Cormundacauda 734.814
Combibos 687.732
just so you know after 3 months playing my inventory is as follows.
Clothing
Polar Bear Head
Colonist Standard Issue Jumper
Colonist Standard Issue Slacks (trousers)
Urban Nomad Walker Shoes
Settler Suit - Free from mission
Carapace pants - Free from ARK noob mission
Carapace boots - Free from ARK noob mission
Chiton - Free if you go to Ancient Greece on NI
Armour
Shogun armour - purchased at Auction
Vigilante armour - donated by soc. member
Carapace Communication Helmet - free from ARK noob mission
Carapace Vest - Free from ARK noob Mission
Pulsar Armour Plate Trainer - free from ARK noob mission
Weapons
Sollomate Opalo Laser
Breer M1a Laser
Genuine Design Clone (GDC-97) BLP
Herman ASI Trainer - Free from ARK noob Mission
Manta K-1 - looted from creature
Mako trainer - free from ARK noob mission
Tools
Vehicle RK-5 and welding wire - for repairing vehicles when taking damage (auction)
Omegaton Fast Aid - FAP35 - donated by soc member
Gyro FAP-6 First Aid Pack - looted from creature
Gyro Fap trainer - free from ARK noob mission
VSE Mark 1 - Sweating tool comes free when you join EU
Terra Master Trainer - Resource finder (finding mining deposits) free ARK noob mission
Terra Master 1 - Purchsed from trade terminal
Probes trainer - used by terra master to find deposits - free with ARK noob mission
Ziplex Z1 seeker - mining tool to find deposits - uses probes - purchsed from trade terminal
Rock Ripper Trainer - for extracting found deposits - free ARK noob mission
Rock Ripper 1 - for extracting found deposits - purchased from TT
Earth excavator ME/01 - Resource extraction tool - purchased from Trade Terminal
Blueprints
Creative Juice - Free on ARK noob Mission
Misellaneous
Vehicles
Hoverpod - Free from ARK noob mission
Sleipnir - VTOL - uses half the fuel of a gungnir (helicopter) - Auction prices vary
i believe it can go into space with addition of thruster - slow
Quad Wing Interceptor - Faster than Sleipnir and space worthy (must be fitted with a spacethruster to go into space - Auction/private purchase - prices vary
Saehrimnir - Basic 4x4 truck Auction - prices vary
Jormungand - Basic power boat - auction - prices vary
Cocktail - not sure where this came from think it is part of RT mission prize
Club Neverdie Guestpass - given free as part of RT mission
Rocktropia Mobile Phone - Given free as part of RT mission
Caseys Number - Given free as part of RT mission
Frankies Number - Given free as part of RT mission
Julklapp 2011 - Empty box - MA Christmas Present
Space thruster - attach to vehicles to enable them to fly in space - not all vehicles and ltd use
A note on PED, ok so how much did this all cost, well so far I have spent about £80 GBP / about $130 USD in game so far for 3 months playing and i play every day for at least 3 to 4 hours.
You can do it for much less if you dont get carried away with shooting loads of creatures, ammo burn is the biggest money sucker, and you either have to replace or repair weapons and armour on a regular basis.
To keep costs down do as many missions on each planet as you can, this uses small amounts of PED and there are often prizes when u complete a mission, not always though.
Vehicles - These really free you up to move around the universe but cost PED, it should be noted that compared to other purchases in EU they represent very good value for money. Since I started playing the prices have dropped dramatically, for example 3 weeks ago a memeber of my soc. commented on how cheap Quad Wings had become at 234 ped, one week later I bought a quad for 150 ped (from another player). This vehicle will enable you to fly to any planet (need space thruster), but beware of space pirates who can loot your stackables (items you have looted from creatures- NOTE THIS DOES NOT INCLUDE weapons, vehicles, clothes, armour etc - mainly the stuff you find in your inventory marked materials and mined resources) You can add weapons to your ship to defend against pirates.
NOTE - before going into space sell or store all your stackables
For now thats about it, if there is interest in this post I will post more details as I progress through the game.
Good Luck
Moondog
UPDATE 06 Feb 2012
Ok yesterday after this post I flew to Rocktropia to do the mission "Hunt The Thing"
If you have no weapons you can do this mission by using the weapon and ammo supplied
The weapon supplied is Assault Rifle (FA) (L) - The (L) on a weapon means limited and the item will wear out and cant be repaired, you also get low grade Ammo to use with it. Note when told to pick the gun off the table see if there is an alternative weapon (shotgun), take this instead as it is easier to kill the thing with.
If yoyu already have evena basic gun this mission is a breeze. My sollomate Opalo easuily killed 2 things on its own. Note if you only have supplied mission weaponry you made need to team up with another player to defeat the thing and escape.
Once you commence the mission you will be supplied with an Artic Truck to help u complete the mission. Note the thing will seriously damage the truck
As I already had armour and a sleipnir (VTOL craft), i didnt use the Artic truck but flew from way point to way point to complete the mission. If you have armour then u do not need to drive through the group of things at the end of the mission, u can just run out. Once outside the cave you will receive gungnir (helicopter) as a prize. Note helicopter and artic truck cannot be traded at Trade Terminal, but then u are going to need them to move about EU.
So if you can get from ARK to RT, taxi service available for about 10 ped you can do 2 missions and receive amongst other things , a hoverpod, an artic jeep and a gungnir all for free. Remember the vehicles have a limited life but can be repaired using Vehicle RK-5 and welding wire (from auction). also all vehicles run on oil so make sure yours has some in it. Oil is available from the auction
The Life of the Grunt - Moondog Part 2 permalink
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Moondog Part 2 - The World of the Grunt
Ok its been a couple of months since my last post and things have moved on.
I'm going to lament a little about weapons and SIB's (Skill Increase Bonus)
So far my theory has been to always have two weapons, as I use Laser Carbines I will concentrate on those, however the general observations apply to all weapon types.
So far I have been using (L) (limited) weapons, these as the name suggests have a limited lifespan and need to be replaced when they are used up. The advantage is that most of them have SIB attached to them, this allows to you to increase your skill levels at a faster rate than most (UL) - (Unlimited) Weapons. The advantage of (UL) weapons is that although they decay, you can pay to repair them at a repair terminal, on the downside you usually dont get SIB's with them.
So intiallly when I started out with the Sollomate Opallo, I waited until it was half used up then purchased a breer M1a which is the next level of weapon up. I used both weapons until the Sollomate was used up and then purchased the next weapon up, which in my case was the Riker UL1. Sometimes I would have to buy more than one of each weapon if my skill level had not reached the requirement for the next weapon up.
I have been sticking with this theory but last week my skills got to Level 14/11 (that is Ranged Laser Hit 14 and Ranged Laser Damage 11). On looking into the next weapon up I was faced with the purchase of Herman Law 202 or a Montgomery Anabolic. After visiting the auction I discovered neither where available (beware of the Herman Law-202 desert or arctic, these are quite expensive and the skill level required is 15/15). So at the advice of more experienced players I visited the various Malls on Calypso, looking for said weapon. After much hunting I arrived at Cillix Weapons shop, in Deer Mall, i think it is shop 6 on floor 2. This was the only place I could find a basic Herman Law-202 and so I duly bought it. It was a 133 ped which was around 120% of its TT value.
On reflection I realised that as I played the game the price of the weapons was going up, as well as the ammount of ammo required to fire them. On the upside my hit rate was improved and I could take down bigger mobs. This got me thinking about the cost of all this. Did I want to keep getting bigger and better guns to improve my skill level and also the ammount I looted ? Currently my favourite mob is the Low level Argos at places like East of Twin Peaks. I can kill them without taking too much damage and they seem to loot at a rate that means I dont have to depo too often.
On talking to more experienced players the suggestion was made that I look into (UL) weapons, where the skills come slower but if you are low on funds you can just repair the weapon enough for whatever ammo you can afford. A couple of suggestions were made of weapons that I was unable to locate, but in the a friend and I went through the list of available (UL) weapons on auction that were just about right for my skill level. Bare in mind that a lot of (UL) weapons do not require any skill level at all to operate. In the end I settled on an A-3 justifier not in 100 % condition (but that doesn't matter as you can repair it) for 108 ped. Once again mindful of my desire to reduce the ammount I depo'd I decided to sell my Herman Law-202 on auction, to get back my investment.
Bearing in mind that there were none available at auction, I was hopeful for a quick sale. I put it up on a 2 day auction at 138 ped opeing bid and a buyout price of 140 ped. The gun sold in 42 minutes at the buyout price, so minus the auction fee I was 5 ped up on the deal and had got the new (UL) gun I wanted. Now I could have asked more money for it but I have been advised that players wont generally pay over the market value for an item and anyway it got me where I wanted to be with a small profit to boot.
This whole incident turned out to be a complete disaster, it might seem like sound logic but after 2 days with this gun I am definately changing back to SIB weapons and in fact I am going back to using my Riker UL3, the reason, the A-3 justifier sucks. The hit rate is inconsistent and the miss rate is nearly 50%, which is a serious ped drain. This leaves me with a slight problem as I am not sure what to do next. Last night one of the more experienced players told me he had a similar problem a few years back and had wasted 10K before someone else pointed out what the problem was. One suggestion was to change weapon types, maybe to a pistol, currently I am at level 7 pistoleer which is only half my carbine/rifle level, so my hit rate would be down by about 50%, leaving me unable to handle the new mobs that I have only just started to hunt. After chatting with a weapons guru, thank you Warden Coz Coz, I have decided to go back to (L) SIB weapons and am currently waithing to get to 12.4 on my ranged laser damage, before purchasing a Breer M4a. So what have I learnt, there is no real cheap way to play EU. You are better off sticking to my original plan and absorbing the increased weapons and ammo costs, these can be offset against the increased ammount of loot you obtain.
If you want to know which weapons are right for your level have a look at this link
https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/fo...uot-on-weapons
Chips
This is an area that I have only recentlty started to explore. A few weeks back, I had my highest loot of 34 ped, this came as a TP chip. My mentor had mentioned these to me previously and suggested that I get one at some stage. So rather than sell the chip, i kept it. To use it you need an implant, (from trade terminal) and an implanter (which looks like a chicken wishbone - from auction). You load the implant into your brain using the implanter. This is a rather gruesome process to watch, my son thinks it is hilarious, but once its in you can use various types of chips. The teleportation chip allows you to TP from your current location to any where within the designated radius zone. The higher the level chip the greater the radius, beware though, I have TP'd onto steep mountain sides that you just fall off and die. When you first use them they are not that accurate but like everything else this improves with practice. Beware also that they are no good for escaping deadly mobs as they take a while to charge and wont charge at all if you are being attacked. Attack chips come in different varities and as the name suggests allow you to attack. I have a cryogenic and and lacerating attack chips both level 1. The attack rate is weak to start with but a good place to practice and build your skills is Rocktropia. The main start area on RT is full of low level mobs which are good to practice on but my favourite spot is opposite the Club Neverdie in City of Dreams where there a some low and middle level mobs. The chips used mind essence, think of it as ammo for the mind, this can be purchased from trade terminals, the TP and attack chips use different types of this, much the same as BLP and Laser have different ammo types.
Mentoring
Basically to complete the mentoring you need to fullfill 3 criteria, hunting, mining and crafting. I think I have covered the hunting. You only need to successfully mine once to complete this process abnd you can do it for free buying doing the noob mining missions on Calypso or Arkadia. The crafting can also be done by following the noob crafting mission, but you will need to purchase a few cheap items to complete it. You only need to successfully manufacture once to complete this element of the mentoring. As long as you complete the basics of each of the disciplines the rest is down to your ingame time, so the more you play the quicker you complete the mentoring, it took me about 3 months but I am quite a heavy player. Once you complete the mentoring you are rewarded with some items, I received adjusted Pixie Armour and a Mk1 Explorer in red and blue (truck to you and me)
Armour and My Mistakes
All armour can be plated - this involves adding armoured plates to your armour to increase their effectiveness. YOU CAN ADD PLATES TO EACH PIECE OF ARMOUR. I didnt realise this until another player asked why I kept getting killed so often, "Have you got plates", "Yes I said", but I had only plated the Harness and not the other 6 items. So a brief trip to the auction and a few ped later I had a full set of Armour Plating 2a. This is a lot more effective particularly against the larger mobs where I was struggling to FAP and defeat the mobs at the same time. I am not entirely satisfied with the plating at the moment and will be looking to upgrade to Armour Plating to 5a shortly.
Team Hunting
If you are in a soc or have friends you can team hunt the larger mobs together. I have found this great fun as the feeling of being part of a team is great. Although you can team hunt with anyone, I would suggest that you try to find players around your level. The loot from each mob is devided amongst the team depending on who caused the most damage to the mob. This can be a little depressing if you are in a team with say your mentor as they are likely too loot much more than you (well its only fair after all, they did most of the work) Teaming with players of your level gives a much more level loot distribution. Furthermore in your team you can make your own rules about looting, so for example in my society the general rule, unless agreed before the team is formed, is that any single item over 20 ped is split equally between the players in the team. This may seem unfair to the stronger players but there is a reason for this, as prooved by my friend Slasha who took me out hunting. Just as the mob was about to die he told me to go in for the kill shot and to my amazement the mob dropped a pair of arm guards (value 54 ped), which ended up in my inventory. Along the way Slasha also looted some arm guards and after the hunt we split the items value between us. So if the mob is going to drop a valuable item it will go to the player who gets the kill shot. In general the stronger players will have a better hit rate and are more likely to pick up the valuable items. Splitting these is a way of giving the weaker players access to the luck of the game. This is not a hard and fast rule and I know some players like to stick to "You keep what you loot", but your playing with friends and friends ar supposed to help each other out, right !!
Also when team hunting there are other advantages. Lets say a strong player is taking all the aggro off the mob and there health is going down, you can activate your FAP and go in and heal them while they are wearing the mob down, ergo players die less often. Again a feeling of comaraderie is developed in these situations.
Stop the Press !!!
Ok earlier I mentioned that I liked to hunt low level Argonauts when I am solo hunting. This had a lot to do with my level
at the time. With the weapons and armour upgrades I have recently done , I'm a bit more "hardcore" now and to be honest it can become monotonous doing the same runs over and over again. The other day whilst waiting for others to arrive for a team hunt I was hanging around at Fort Medusa and thought I would go out for a hunt alone. The area has Molisks (horrid little buggers), Argonauts and level 19-28 Allophyls. I had only hunted the bigger ones in team before so I thought I would have a crack alone at the smaller ones. It was great, just like when I started hunting the Argos. I can just about get them without too much damage, I still have to FAP a bit but generally I can stay on top of things. This sort of advancement really opens up the game as it gives you more areas to play in. Finding the right mob for your level is one of the joys/pains of the game but it is always nice to find something else to do.
Ok lastest news, this weekend I have a had a great time both team hunting, over 100 ped run and last night I went to Fort Medusa and had another 100 plus run. My first loot was off a lvl 9 Molisk Adult which looted 36 ped, great start, I also looted a new attack chip.
Analysing the Markets
Ok hours and hours of shooting can become boring and quite often I like a complete change. One of my favourite passtimes is analysing the markets. This may sound boring and a couple of my friends think I am mad doing this but if you are careful and a bit lucky you can make a small ammount of ped at this. Just like real life supply and demand affects the value of items, see above ref the Herman Law - 202. I always buy quads if players are trying to sell them off quickly at a decent rate and then sell them back on auction, usually for only a few ped profit but compare that to how long you would have to sweat to gain 5 ped from that activity. Stay away from items that are given away in noob missions as their value is pretty worthless. Saying that at the moment there seems to be a lot of hoverpods on auction at very inflated prices. The question is, whether it is the novelty value thats bumping up the price and more importantly, is anyone bidding on / buying them. I think they are worth around 15 ped TT and the buyout bids are around 100 plus ped. However I also noticed that the starting bids are just over TT so I think a lot of players are trying to figure out what their real worth is. I have been trying to sell a braqnd new Saehrimmnir for a week now. I put it on at the lowest buyout on auction (around 50 ped), but nobody was interested. A couple of days later I saw one at auction for 15 ped and that to, is still up for sale. My advice for items like this is to keep them, as they will return you very little ped and you never know when you might need one. I gave one to a fellow player who only had 1 vehicle in exchange for a gun, so they can be used as gifts or for bartering.
No Beer In EU - Boo Boo Boo
......But in real life a lot of players have a drink while playing which means later on in the evening - depending on your time zone there will be players who are slightly tipsy, I am often guilty of this and one of my other favourite pass times is to stand and twin peaks and try what i call "contagious dancing". It doesnt always work but sometimes if you start dancing it encourages other players to do so as well and occasionally you can get a dozen or so players jigging away. I have most of the dance moves from the actions library loaded onto my number pad on the right hand side of the keyboard. This allows you to do dance combos and whilst some of the moves are a bit rubbish, the overall effect can be quite good. Try listening to your own music while doing this and it improves the effect even more.
On more thing about beer (or lack of it). A favourite conversation amongst some players I know is virtual beer. This would work along the lines of for each beer you drink your accuracy goes down by 1 point whilst your courage increases by a 1 point. The more you drink the more courage and less accuracy you get. I dont know if the powers that be in Mindark are all teetotal but it seems odd that they provide in game bars and nightclubs, but nothing to drink. I cant remember which planet it is on, but somewhere in the game there is even a mission to try and find beer. I think it must be some kind of private joke within Mindark, because there is no beer at the end of the mission and one of the NPC's even gives a lecture about there being no beer. At Twin Peaks you can also find the ex-barman who moans about loosing his job, because of a lack of beer. On Rocktropia at the stadium you can loot Motorhead beer kegs and I have also seen them for sale in various shops, but alas they are either empty or there is no way of getting the contents out of them, again I think this is a Mindark joke directed at the players. Come on MA - give us some beer. The only other alcohol I have seen is bottles of champagne, I dont know whether they can be opened or drunk though.
I know all of the above might just sound like me rambling and for that I apologise, but its just my own observations as I play the game and I like to write it down for myself as much as you guys. Enjoy EU and feel free to comment or disagree with anything I have said. I enjoy reading the thread responses as much as I enjoy writing them. Good Luck to you all and see you back in the real worlds, Entropia Universe that is.
Moondog (Glory Hound Grunt 25th March 2012)
Moondog Part 3 - Lets Get some Vehicles permalink
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Moondog Part 3 More Ramblings from a Grunt
Sorry folks, everytime I think I have said all there is to say about my time in EU, more stuff pops in my head.
A big thanks to all who have read my posts so far and commented on them. Today I am going to start with on of my favourite topics - Vehicles
Vehicles
It wasnt so long ago I am told that there were no vehicles in EU, that must have been slow pace but I am sure some players remember it as the Halcyon days. Me on the other hand being a long time petrol head and sci-fi fan love the fact that you can cruise around in futuristic machines from one location , or even planet, to another.
When I first joined the universe like everyone else I was on foot and spent a couple of weeks running or swimming around, trying to visit TP locations and generally getting a feel for the environment.
I felt daunted by the size of Calypso and after a while started to long for a vehicle of my own.
all the vehicles in EU run on oil so remeber to fuel your vehicle otherwise you are not going anywhere. Oil is available from the auction and does not cost much relative to other expenditure in the game. If you have more than one vehicle you may want to split the oil into smaller amounts. Once you have retrieved your oil from the auctioneer (I always forget to do this) go to your inventory, it will be located under mined resources.right click the oil icon and select split stack, you can devide your oil into whatever amounts you want. To fuel a vehicle, spawn it and then go to your inventory select the fuel stack you want to use and drag it onto the vehicle. You will be asked if you wish to fuel the vehicle, select yes.
One point as oil is a stackable item and can be looted, i always use all of it up to fuel my vehicles. This way if you are attacked and looted the fuel is safe as it is already in the vehicle and cant be taken from you. If a vehicle runs out, just remove the fuel from another vehicle, split the stack and refuel both vehicles. This is a bit labourious but an excellent safeguard to stop you loosing it.
I always keep my Quad heavily fuelled, well you dont want to run out in the middle of space , where you cant remove fuel from another vehicle
My first purchase was a Gungnir (helicopter), this was before I realised you could get one for free in the "Hunt the Thing" mission. Anyway with a few ped of fuel, I was off flying to various TP locations so that I had a good network covering the whole planet. It seems like slow progress these days but when you have been running around on foot for two weeks, dodging every mob you come across, the ability to fly over the danger was very welcome. The Gunginir is more tricky to fly than the VTOL's but it is a good way to learn you piloting skills.
The only problem is unless you fly very low it is very difficult to see what mobs or POI's are on the ground which is half the fun of exploring.
Next up I purchased a Saehraemir (Jeep). Now I could drive around at ground level and view more of EU. The only problem with this vehicle is it doesnt really like rough terrain and you have to be careful as it handles just like a real jeep, very badly. You have to drive slowly over the rough stuff and it is susecptable crashing into things. After being a bit jealous of the avatars with Sleipnirs, I looked into the prices which seemed quite reasonable so after a depo i purchased one at auction. Now we were really flying, bear in mind that the Sleipnir only carries 2 people whereas the Gunginir will carry 4. It should also be noted that the Sleipnir uses only half the fuel of the Gungnir, so it is a lot more economical if you fly around a lot.
Getting off the planet, your very own spaceship
Bring out the Quad ! - The Quad Wing Interceptor, ok now we are really talking. This is the most basic spaceship and while you can get a sleipnir to fly in space it's very slow and an open invitation to pirates. Oh yes there be pirates out there in space and they will kill you, destroy your ship and take any stackable items you are carrying, this includes anything under materials or mined resources in you inventory. even so owning a quad does not mean you can escape the pirates, they tend to use quads as well and are heavily armed.
NEVER CARRY STACKABLES IN SPACE
again in case it didn't sink in the first time
NEVER CARRY STACKABLES IN SPACE
...reapeat after me 7 times..........
OK you get the idea
Before going into space - technical Stuff.
You cant physically go into space even as a passenger without downloading the space patch, neither can you visit any other planet without downloading the patch for that planet. This is quite easy, go to your map on your screen, click on the drop down menu where your current planet is listed and select "space", the space patch will start to dowload. The same goes for the planets, once you are in space select the drop down menu in the map again and select the planet you wish to visit, again that patch will start to download. IF YOU DO NOT DOWNLOAD THE PATCH YOU WILL BE EJECTED FROM THE VEHICLE YOU ARE IN. If this happens in space on the way to another planet, you may end up lost in space as I was in my first week. I just floated around for about 36 hours before logging a support case. Eventually a kind EU advisor returned my Avatar to the nearest space station. Remember to load those patches, it is often overlooked by even the most seasoned players. If you do revive on a space station and you have no ship of your own , it costs 7 ped (i think) to teleport to the planet surface. This was the cause of my first depo, as my lift was long gone and I only had 3 ped from what i had so far looted, so I had to depo to get down to the surface.
Going Into Space
This has it's own issues. First of all neither the Quad or the Sleipnir will fly in space without a space thruster. These can be purchased from the auction for around 10 - 15 ped. Once you have purchased one you need to equip it to your spaceship. Go to inventory and drag the space thruster onto the vehicle you wish to use. Ok you are ready to fly in space. Get in your ship and go up up and up, eventually the screen will shake and you will get a message saying "Do you wish to enter space", click the green tick box and it will all go dark and fuzzy for a while. Eventually you will spawn in space normally near the planets space station. The area around the space station is a safe zone, you will see alot of other ships as well, these are larger ships which cannot enter the atmosphere, usually they will have a blue triangle above them indicating that they are non threatening. If you see a red triangle above a ship, this indicates that it maybe a threat, potential pirate. Around the space station they cant attack you but as soon as you try to make a dash for another planet or space station they will home in on you and invariably kill you.
Solutions.
- Well you could hope there is no red triangles
- Or you could choose a quiet time to make your run, like early morning GMT, but remember Mind Ark does a lot of funny update stuff on EU around 8.00 am GMT and you quite often either cant get online or you get dumped .
- Out manouvre the pirates, its worth a try, but so far I have never managed it, although to be fair I am not the most experienced pilot
- Add some weapons to your ship, the pirates may think twice before attacking you if they know you are armed. if they still attack you can always shoot them back. This is quite an expensive option and to be honest if you dont fly in space much, probably not worth the
expense.
- Go out with another player, especially if they have an armed ship, the odds are worse for the pirates if there are more than one of you.
- Hide in the space station, wait a while and hope the pirates get bored and look for another target.
- Wait for another player to make the run first and then go, hopefully the pirates will go after the other player who leaves first
- Try and talk to the pirate, use local chat. This may seem futile, but in one instance i was looking at being attacked and when I looked at
avatar name of the pirate I realised it was a friend of another soc member. When I mentioned the soc I was in and who our mutual friend
was I was allowed to leave unhindered, thanks Jetsina, sometimes in a big universe it can be a small world.
Having said all this, usually I make a run for it and hope for the best. If you do die, it's not the end of the world, or even your ship. You will revive at the nearest space station and your ship will be returned to your inventory in a very sorry state. You can fix it but you need a vehicle repair tool and some welding wire, both available at auction. Spawn your very mangled ship and shoot it with the vehicle repair tool as you would use a gun. Eventually it will be repaired to as new state and you can fly off in it again. You still have the same issues with the pirates but generally I have found that once they have destroyed you once they may not bother to attack you a second time having looted any stackables you may have had in your inventory. On a couple of occasions, I have even been messaged to say, "Go on I will let you out this time", it costs the pirates a lot of ammo to attack you and they may not want to waste anymore knowing you dont carry anything valuable. Beware though I know some players will leave their valuables on the space station, then go out and deliberately get destroyed, come back and pick up there valuables in the hope that they wont get attacked a second time. The pirates are wise to this and just like in real life, dont trust anyone unless you know them very well.
Once you do get away from the space station, unhindered, you are in deep space, the void between the planets. Although the whole area is a lootable PVP (person versus person) zone, the most dangerous areas are those just around the space stations, but outside of the safety zone. The pirates dont really leave this area because the highest concentration of lootable players is located here. If you make it away you are usually safe until you get to your destination.
In Space.
Although empty, space does have some things including its own special mob, Space Horrors, but unless you someone with a very large well armed ship they should be avoided at all costs. I have hunted these on a soc members Pathfinder and its good fun but expensive on the ammo. As well as this there are also training grounds in space usually near the planets, as well a couple of hunting Biodomes, FOMA Fortuna and Crystal Palace (see my first post "From noob to grunt in three months"). There are a few other space stations not linked to planets but so far I haven't visited any of these.
Traversing Space.
It is not like a flat map, it is obviously three dimensional and to be honest a bit confusing. Do not point your ship at the planet you want to visit and fly off. You can end up going out of bounds. I have found the best solution is to find the space station for the planet you want to visit on the map and create a waypoint there. This will appear on your HUD display, head for this waypoint even if it looks like you are not going directly to the planet, this will prevent you going out of bounds, once you are within 1 or 2 AU's of the space station you can turn into the planet.
I have also noticed that quite often the planets appear on the screen differently to the map, so for example you maybe heading to Arkadia and you can see Rocktropia behind it even though on the map it will seem to be behind you. Maybe this is because of the curvature of space or more likely its a general EU bug. I have learnt to ignore these anomalies, stick to the waypioint theory it has always worked for me.
Arriving at a New Planet
MAKE SURE YOU HAVE DOWNLOADED THE PATCH, i cant reiterate this enough as I have been caught out a few times here. Space travel takes a while about 20 minutes to half an hour real time, in a Quad, depending on where you are flying to, go and make your dinner or phone a loved one because once you are away from the pirates there is not much to do. Upon arrival at the planet beware of pirates again although they are much less frequent than around Calypso. A message will appear asking if you want to land on the planet, if you do you have to pay a 2 ped landing fee. Things go fuzzy again for a few seconds then you find yourself in the atmosfear, usually above a teleporter, land your ship and you have arrived.
i have noticed that the arrow indicating your location on the planet surface doesnt appear until you land, which is usually OK, but a couple of times when arriving at Rocktropia you dont land above a teleporter and hence you dont know where you are. If this happens, just land anywhere, pick up your ship and press the "T" button, this will take you to the nearest teleporter and your avatars location arrow should reappear.
More about the various planets later ................
Other vehicles.
Jormungand - Boat.
This is very nice bit of kit and one of the first vehicles I had a ride in on EU. It may seem without purpose but a number of missions require you to explore the sea and it is very useful for this. When I was a bit flush one day I treated myself and whilst it doesnt get that much use i wouldn't part with it.
Hoverpod
As the name suggets its a pod for one person that hovers. Initially it was only available by completing the Arkadia noob mission and I had reservations. I thought it looked like a flying techno pig and before the update the texturing was a bit rubbish. This has been fixed now and I have to say that for short journeys it is my favourite mode of transport.
The view from inside the cockpit is a bit restricted and it gets in the way if you view it in the third person. Having said that it will handle the rough terrain better than the Saehrimmnir and uses virtually no fuel. It also will go between land and water with no trouble. I also discovered while sat at a bar on Arkadia (not having a Beer) that it will go under water. This takes a bit of practice but it works like this. Fly over the water, make sure it is not too shallow, exit the vehicle, let the Hoverpod sink to the bottom. When its on the bottom, renter the vehicle and away you go. It may seem like a bit of a novelty but can be useful for getting away from the fish if they start attacking you.
A couple of problems if you try to go up too steep an incline or fly off a ledge it will somersault although it invariably rights itself without too much damage.
The other major problem is its durability, it will not take very much agro from any mobs so try to avoid them while you are flying about.
On a lighter note when the hoverpods first appeared in EU I saw a player flying it off a very high landing pad, this was great fun to watch as it somersaulted over and over again before crashing to the ground, dont knock the hoverpod too much, i am a convert, i think they are great.
Pitbull
One day when i am really drunk i will buy one, only on the basis that they look wicked, in honesty they are rubbish unless you plan to do some major PVP action with friends.
OK think i have covered the vehicles I know about for now,
Moondog signing off for now, dont forget to comment or disagree with anything I have said
Enjoy EU and Good Luck to you all
29th March 2012
moondog part 4 - The ongoing chronicles of the Dog permalink
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Moondog - Part 4 (What Already)
Well more ramblings from the dog, nothing specific this time just more experience I have picked up along the way.
Currently I am Laser Sniper Hit Level 18 and Ranged Laser Damage 14.69, just waiting to get to level 15 so I can upgrade my weapon, so what's been happening.
Well my hoverpod has finally died and I have stuck it in storage, it served me well but as a limited item , all good things must come to an end. i could by another but at the moment the prices on auction vary from 30 ped buyout to 495 ped for a salmon coloured one (March 18th 2012), bit of a waste of ped if you ask me as you can buy a full TT Sleipnir for the same price so I think I will stay clear of these. The general trend on the price of Quads has dropped so now is the time to buy one, i dont see them going much lower unless the market becomes really flooded, currently cheapest buyout is 140 ped and even then you can can probably find one cheaper in private trade. My son's avatar bought one very cheaply that was about 75% of TT from a private trade and currently on Calypso there is one with 17 hours to go, current bid 52 ped.
I have got into the habit of storing a lot of stuff, which decluters your inventory but more importantly reduces the weight you carry around and thus speeds your avatar up. Good things to put in inventory are Nova fragments, Blazaar Fragments and any worn out (L) item that has no TT value,like the aforementioned hoverpod. Similarly a lot of stuff I loot on Rocktropia I tend to put in storage (remember storage is planet based so sweat you store on Calypso is only avaiable from storage on that planet)so in particular records, tapes, cd's and phones I keep in storage on Rocktropia, the records are required for some missions so dont sell them at TT.
I have finally found a use for Nova fragments and Tier 1 components. You can Tier up your armour when its gets to a certain level, to do this you need certain raw materials, these include Nova fragments, Tier 1 components, oil, Garnets and Blausariam. You have to wait till each piece of armour is ready to be tiered up and the process is similar to crafting in that when you try to do it you may or may not be successful. Having said that I succesfully tiered up 2 pieces of my armour, very satisfying when it happened, i have already collected the rest of the raw materials for when the other pieces are ready to be tiered up.
A Bit of a Mellee.
I get bored quite easily, and in my last post I had started to excperiment with mindforce and while the attack chips are ok I am very impressed with the regen chip, think of it as a mindforce FAP. It looks great when its activated and has a pretty good heal rate.
A couple of weeks ago I went out hunting with a proper veteran, the leader of my soc "Oscar Skyquake Hurrikane" who due to internet issues had not been online for a while. We hunted robots, me with my Herman LAw 202 and him with what can only be described as a baseball bat with nails sticking out of it. Hwe strode right up to the robots and literally beat them to death, it was quite a sight to watch.
He gave me a Rep Edge battle Axe and i bought a Castorian Combat Enblade (basic TT sword 15 ped). Using the basic armour recieved from the ARK noob mission and the 2 melee weapons I went to the swamp just outside Port Atlantis and hacked away at every puny mob I could find. It was great fun, put your avatar in third person to get the best visual effect. No ammo burn and some reasonable looting (for the level of play). After that I got a bit more adventurous and went to Fort Medusa,if you go uphill through the argos molisks and foul there are some lower level shinkiba and snarblesnots. I used my armour and had a good old fisticuffs with them. Be aware though that mellee weapons decay very quickly, well you arent paying for ammo. I got my basic mellee skill levels up and really enjoyed getting up close and personal with the mobs. Use no armour or the free stuff and you dont even have to worry about the decay on that either. I have been short on the old ped for a couple of weeks, but the first thing I did when i Depo'd was repair my mellee weapons, its a cheap way to waste a few hours in EU.
It can get a bit depressing when you keep having to depo and dont seem to get a return. I have felt the drain recently, but yesterday I went out with some soc members and was happy to see that whilst i wasnt getting the biggest loots I was holding my own and after spending 80 ped on ammo I managed a return of 70 ped, no bad, however the icing on the cake was I got the last shot in on a proteron and looted an ISIS CB28 which is a level 47 blp rifle, TT value 325 ped with an average of 150% mark up, between the four team members that should see a return at auction of about 125 ped each which means my 80 ped ammo returned me 195 ped (minus armour and wepons decay of course)
What a happy chappy I was so tonight I went out hunting with my long term RL friend and EU mentor "Rooster Matty Gee" who is well above me in the heirarchy. Not phased, I thought, well I did OK last night so if I loose a bit of ped on the hunt, I'm not that bothered (after all i dont expect to play for free). So another 80 ped on ammo and off we went. We did some mining robots and another mob feruk (or something like that, dont really remember the name) loot not to bad but nothing huge. After that Rooster suggested that we go do some ATROX (now in our soc the rule is that to move from grunt to veteran you have to solo an ATROX guardian, witnessed by another soc member, so I think he was gettting me used to the idea of it ). We went to fort Ithica which is an Atrox haven. They are quick and come at you in groups although their damage isnt that high, even for me. Its brutal 4 or 5 at a time and you just shoot, shoot, shoot, FAP, shoot, FAP some more and shoot. Most of the time you are not sure whats going on, but while Rooster was taking care of 4 of them i was hacking away at just one mostly one my own. I would have never killed it solo but I did most of the damage and the reult was a 368 ped hof of which i got 190 ped. Coupled with my other loot this gave me a 250 ped run off the back of 80 ped ammo. To be fair I have to give total respect to Rooster because I couldn't have done it alone and he was constantly looking out for me,but hey ho thats what friends are for.
I would like to take a moment to thank all the people who have not only read my previous posts but taken the time to respond to them. This is a great way for me to learn and I think I should comment on an issue that I haven't properly understood until recently. This is to do with SIB weapons and your skill level. As far as I can work out in order to make the most economical use of your PED you should use SIB weapons that say "NOT ANYMORE" under the two learning sections. This means that you are getting the maximum effectiveness from the weapon. So while I get slightly faster increased skills with my Herman Law-202 it is not as effective or economical as my Riker UL3 which is "maxed out", ie I am always getting the best effect from it.
Ranged Laser Hit vs. Ranged Laser Damage.
Having started out using rifles as I progressed My Ranged Laser Hit increased faster than my Ranged Laser Damage. This difference meant that it is sometimes awkward choosing weapons as Ranged Damage is lower. To compensate for this I was advised to start using a pistol. I didn't want to do this at first as my pistoleer level was only half my rifle level, but I persevered for a few weeks and am now using a Breer P3a, which is a great little weapon, approx 50 ped to buy and good enough to take on the mobs at Fort Medusa, to the extent that the Riker UL3 I bought a few weeks ago remains largely unused. I always keep a sollomate Opallo and a M2100, both UL weapons that are available from the Trade Terminal. I keep these for hunting very small mobs, they use very little ammo, so you dont need to loot massively to keep them going.
Important note to self and other players who get on the bigger, better bandwagon. "YOU WILL LOOSE LOADS OF MONEY FROM DEPOING AND IT WILL BE YOUR OWN FAULT" Why do you need to hunt level 65 Rexteleum. There are plenty of ugly nasty mob that are much lower level. The game play is the same amount of time, the mob (or you) still die and you still, hopefully loot something. I am beginning to believe that in EU bigger is noy
So from being down to 50 ped 48 hours ago I am sitting pretty on 410 ped which is good cos my poor old herman law 202 is nearly warn out, but I have reached level 15 ranged laser damage which means i can blow my winnings on a new gun and not have to depo this weekend.
Thats it for now but before I go, a massive thank you to my soc especially Rooster, Trix, Omen, Raptor and always Coz
GL out there Moondog signing off
April 18th 2012
From Noob to Grunt in 3 Months permalink
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Ok this is not intended as a set of instructions, these are observations I have made in the last 3 months playing Entropia. The beauty of this game is there are no rights or wrongs, although remember like Real Life actions have consequences. I am not an Entropia expert and so i apologise in advance for any error listed below.
If possible when you start playing try to become a member of a society (soc). Other members of the soc will advise and help you, if you know somebody in Real Life who plays the game, ask if you can join their soc if they are in one.
Mentors - You can get a more experienced player to be your mentor, they will take you to locations (for hunting, mining, construction.) My mentor has been helping me since I started and after 3 months I am 56% through the mentor process.
Before You Start
You need to decide which planet to start on. Traditionally this would have been on Calypso the most developed planet. However since the last version update the New player mission on Arkadia gives probably the best introduction to the game, with lots of free stuff (see Below)
The three main professions are hunting, mining and crafting, you can choose to concentrate on one or have a stab at all three. I am mainly a hunter and a lot of information below relates to that profession.
lets say you start on Arkadia and complete the new player missions. By then you should have learnt basic controls and how to hunt and mine.
What next : well below is some information to help you, THIS IS NOT a walkthrough, just my observations as a new hunter.
Before we begin - Acronyms and Game Locations
Due to the high level of instant messaging a lot of Abbreviations are used. A lot are common
to texting and other messaging services - but here are a few you might not know along with some words that might need clarification
EU - Entropia Universe - The game in general
MA - Mindark - the company who runs EU
PED - Project Entropia dollar (10 ped = approx 1 USD)
Caly - Calypso - main planet in game
ARK - Arkadia - another planet in game
RT - Rocktropia - another planet in game
NI - Next Island - another planet in game
CP - Crystal Palace - Space station near Calypso - has 4 biodomes
FOMA - Or F.O.M.A Fortuna - Asteroid near Calypso - 20 biodomes
Mobs - Movable objects - creatures to you and me
Loot - Prizes extracted from mobs when you kill them.
AG - Ancient Greece - Accessed from Next Island
Prison - Prison is located north of RT arrival point
Hell - Mining location with some creatures on Rocktropia
Club Neverdie - Various locations in game where these Clubs are - main one on RT
RL - Real Life
soc - society - you can become a member of a society if you are invited by a senior member of that society
PVP - Player vs player Area - Free for All - at your own risk
The Rig/Oil Rig - located on Calypso at 83352.79328.130 (pvp zone usually reserved for more experienced players
VU - Version Update
UI - User Interface - how you interact with the game
Stackables - Items in your inventory mainly under materials and mined resources that other players can loot off you, either in space or PVP areas
any other abbreviations can usually be found on Urban Dictionary
http://www.urbandictionary.com/
My Starting Inventory
Clothing
Colonist Standard Issue Jumper
Colonist Standard Issue Slacks (trousers)
Urban Nomad Walker Shoes
Armour
Vigilante Armour
Weapons
Sollomate Opalo - Laser Carbine
Ammo
Ammunition - Laser - 1500 shots
Tools
Omegaton Fast Aid FAP-35 (FAP - First Aid Pack)
THE ARKADIA NEW PLAYER MISSION
Arkadia Noob mission with freebies incl hoverpod starts by talking to the
barman at the 30183.18047
NNW of resolute firebase
To repair vehicles need RK-5 repair kit (from Auction) and welding wire
Locations of Interest
F.O.M.A Fortuna - Asteroid and Space Station near Calypso
Biodomes and creatures located in them
1 Ambulimax
2 Virtualy Empty
3 Virtualy Empty
4 Virtualy Empty
5 Virtualy Empty
6 Lvl 31 Caperon Mature Big Looks like a tripod (more legs war of the Worlds)
7 Big Lake - no creatures
8 Lvl 8 Molisks, Lvl 5 Foul Young, Lvl 6 Tripuditon young (bouncer)
9 Misty - very few low lvl creatures
10 Lvl 1 Plumatergus and other low lvl creatures
11 Lvl 8 Molisks, L8 Tongu
12 Lvl 21 Neconu (stay away)
13 No Creatures - I am advised good mining in this dome
14 Orange and Rocky - No creatures
15 Lvl 19 Allophyl Young
16 Lvl 39 - 55 Daspletors - Team only
17 Lvl 97 Daspletors - No way not yet
18 Lvl 7 Argonauts
19 Lvl 25 Cornoanterion
20 Lvl 61 Cornoanterion
Crystal Palace
Biodomes 1 - 4
There are no creatures in these Biodomes that can be killed alone at this player
level
Locations of creatures for rookie to grunt level
Arkadia Mobs
Bokol lvl 16 ARK 22801.25919
Zadul lvl 12 - 15 ARK 14353.15037
Oro lvl 12 -17 ARK 21895.24957
Hadraada lvl 15 - 14639.12924 - 14722.14316 - 13955.14088
Zadul lvl 13 12942.14590
Calypso Mobs
Calypso, good mobs 83164.80541
Argonauts 758.914
Cormundacauda 734.814
Combibos 687.732
just so you know after 3 months playing my inventory is as follows.
Clothing
Polar Bear Head
Colonist Standard Issue Jumper
Colonist Standard Issue Slacks (trousers)
Urban Nomad Walker Shoes
Settler Suit - Free from mission
Carapace pants - Free from ARK noob mission
Carapace boots - Free from ARK noob mission
Chiton - Free if you go to Ancient Greece on NI
Armour
Shogun armour - purchased at Auction
Vigilante armour - donated by soc. member
Carapace Communication Helmet - free from ARK noob mission
Carapace Vest - Free from ARK noob Mission
Pulsar Armour Plate Trainer - free from ARK noob mission
Weapons
Sollomate Opalo Laser
Breer M1a Laser
Genuine Design Clone (GDC-97) BLP
Herman ASI Trainer - Free from ARK noob Mission
Manta K-1 - looted from creature
Mako trainer - free from ARK noob mission
Tools
Vehicle RK-5 and welding wire - for repairing vehicles when taking damage (auction)
Omegaton Fast Aid - FAP35 - donated by soc member
Gyro FAP-6 First Aid Pack - looted from creature
Gyro Fap trainer - free from ARK noob mission
VSE Mark 1 - Sweating tool comes free when you join EU
Terra Master Trainer - Resource finder (finding mining deposits) free ARK noob mission
Terra Master 1 - Purchsed from trade terminal
Probes trainer - used by terra master to find deposits - free with ARK noob mission
Ziplex Z1 seeker - mining tool to find deposits - uses probes - purchsed from trade terminal
Rock Ripper Trainer - for extracting found deposits - free ARK noob mission
Rock Ripper 1 - for extracting found deposits - purchased from TT
Earth excavator ME/01 - Resource extraction tool - purchased from Trade Terminal
Blueprints
Creative Juice - Free on ARK noob Mission
Misellaneous
Vehicles
Hoverpod - Free from ARK noob mission
Sleipnir - VTOL - uses half the fuel of a gungnir (helicopter) - Auction prices vary
i believe it can go into space with addition of thruster - slow
Quad Wing Interceptor - Faster than Sleipnir and space worthy (must be fitted with a spacethruster to go into space - Auction/private purchase - prices vary
Saehrimnir - Basic 4x4 truck Auction - prices vary
Jormungand - Basic power boat - auction - prices vary
Cocktail - not sure where this came from think it is part of RT mission prize
Club Neverdie Guestpass - given free as part of RT mission
Rocktropia Mobile Phone - Given free as part of RT mission
Caseys Number - Given free as part of RT mission
Frankies Number - Given free as part of RT mission
Julklapp 2011 - Empty box - MA Christmas Present
Space thruster - attach to vehicles to enable them to fly in space - not all vehicles and ltd use
A note on PED, ok so how much did this all cost, well so far I have spent about £80 GBP / about $130 USD in game so far for 3 months playing and i play every day for at least 3 to 4 hours.
You can do it for much less if you dont get carried away with shooting loads of creatures, ammo burn is the biggest money sucker, and you either have to replace or repair weapons and armour on a regular basis.
To keep costs down do as many missions on each planet as you can, this uses small amounts of PED and there are often prizes when u complete a mission, not always though.
Vehicles - These really free you up to move around the universe but cost PED, it should be noted that compared to other purchases in EU they represent very good value for money. Since I started playing the prices have dropped dramatically, for example 3 weeks ago a memeber of my soc. commented on how cheap Quad Wings had become at 234 ped, one week later I bought a quad for 150 ped (from another player). This vehicle will enable you to fly to any planet (need space thruster), but beware of space pirates who can loot your stackables (items you have looted from creatures- NOTE THIS DOES NOT INCLUDE weapons, vehicles, clothes, armour etc - mainly the stuff you find in your inventory marked materials and mined resources) You can add weapons to your ship to defend against pirates.
NOTE - before going into space sell or store all your stackables
For now thats about it, if there is interest in this post I will post more details as I progress through the game.
Good Luck
Moondog
UPDATE 06 Feb 2012
Ok yesterday after this post I flew to Rocktropia to do the mission "Hunt The Thing"
If you have no weapons you can do this mission by using the weapon and ammo supplied
The weapon supplied is Assault Rifle (FA) (L) - The (L) on a weapon means limited and the item will wear out and cant be repaired, you also get low grade Ammo to use with it. Note when told to pick the gun off the table see if there is an alternative weapon (shotgun), take this instead as it is easier to kill the thing with.
If yoyu already have evena basic gun this mission is a breeze. My sollomate Opalo easuily killed 2 things on its own. Note if you only have supplied mission weaponry you made need to team up with another player to defeat the thing and escape.
Once you commence the mission you will be supplied with an Artic Truck to help u complete the mission. Note the thing will seriously damage the truck
As I already had armour and a sleipnir (VTOL craft), i didnt use the Artic truck but flew from way point to way point to complete the mission. If you have armour then u do not need to drive through the group of things at the end of the mission, u can just run out. Once outside the cave you will receive gungnir (helicopter) as a prize. Note helicopter and artic truck cannot be traded at Trade Terminal, but then u are going to need them to move about EU.
So if you can get from ARK to RT, taxi service available for about 10 ped you can do 2 missions and receive amongst other things , a hoverpod, an artic jeep and a gungnir all for free. Remember the vehicles have a limited life but can be repaired using Vehicle RK-5 and welding wire (from auction). also all vehicles run on oil so make sure yours has some in it. Oil is available from the auction
The Life of the Grunt - Moondog Part 2 permalink
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Moondog Part 2 - The World of the Grunt
Ok its been a couple of months since my last post and things have moved on.
I'm going to lament a little about weapons and SIB's (Skill Increase Bonus)
So far my theory has been to always have two weapons, as I use Laser Carbines I will concentrate on those, however the general observations apply to all weapon types.
So far I have been using (L) (limited) weapons, these as the name suggests have a limited lifespan and need to be replaced when they are used up. The advantage is that most of them have SIB attached to them, this allows to you to increase your skill levels at a faster rate than most (UL) - (Unlimited) Weapons. The advantage of (UL) weapons is that although they decay, you can pay to repair them at a repair terminal, on the downside you usually dont get SIB's with them.
So intiallly when I started out with the Sollomate Opallo, I waited until it was half used up then purchased a breer M1a which is the next level of weapon up. I used both weapons until the Sollomate was used up and then purchased the next weapon up, which in my case was the Riker UL1. Sometimes I would have to buy more than one of each weapon if my skill level had not reached the requirement for the next weapon up.
I have been sticking with this theory but last week my skills got to Level 14/11 (that is Ranged Laser Hit 14 and Ranged Laser Damage 11). On looking into the next weapon up I was faced with the purchase of Herman Law 202 or a Montgomery Anabolic. After visiting the auction I discovered neither where available (beware of the Herman Law-202 desert or arctic, these are quite expensive and the skill level required is 15/15). So at the advice of more experienced players I visited the various Malls on Calypso, looking for said weapon. After much hunting I arrived at Cillix Weapons shop, in Deer Mall, i think it is shop 6 on floor 2. This was the only place I could find a basic Herman Law-202 and so I duly bought it. It was a 133 ped which was around 120% of its TT value.
On reflection I realised that as I played the game the price of the weapons was going up, as well as the ammount of ammo required to fire them. On the upside my hit rate was improved and I could take down bigger mobs. This got me thinking about the cost of all this. Did I want to keep getting bigger and better guns to improve my skill level and also the ammount I looted ? Currently my favourite mob is the Low level Argos at places like East of Twin Peaks. I can kill them without taking too much damage and they seem to loot at a rate that means I dont have to depo too often.
On talking to more experienced players the suggestion was made that I look into (UL) weapons, where the skills come slower but if you are low on funds you can just repair the weapon enough for whatever ammo you can afford. A couple of suggestions were made of weapons that I was unable to locate, but in the a friend and I went through the list of available (UL) weapons on auction that were just about right for my skill level. Bare in mind that a lot of (UL) weapons do not require any skill level at all to operate. In the end I settled on an A-3 justifier not in 100 % condition (but that doesn't matter as you can repair it) for 108 ped. Once again mindful of my desire to reduce the ammount I depo'd I decided to sell my Herman Law-202 on auction, to get back my investment.
Bearing in mind that there were none available at auction, I was hopeful for a quick sale. I put it up on a 2 day auction at 138 ped opeing bid and a buyout price of 140 ped. The gun sold in 42 minutes at the buyout price, so minus the auction fee I was 5 ped up on the deal and had got the new (UL) gun I wanted. Now I could have asked more money for it but I have been advised that players wont generally pay over the market value for an item and anyway it got me where I wanted to be with a small profit to boot.
This whole incident turned out to be a complete disaster, it might seem like sound logic but after 2 days with this gun I am definately changing back to SIB weapons and in fact I am going back to using my Riker UL3, the reason, the A-3 justifier sucks. The hit rate is inconsistent and the miss rate is nearly 50%, which is a serious ped drain. This leaves me with a slight problem as I am not sure what to do next. Last night one of the more experienced players told me he had a similar problem a few years back and had wasted 10K before someone else pointed out what the problem was. One suggestion was to change weapon types, maybe to a pistol, currently I am at level 7 pistoleer which is only half my carbine/rifle level, so my hit rate would be down by about 50%, leaving me unable to handle the new mobs that I have only just started to hunt. After chatting with a weapons guru, thank you Warden Coz Coz, I have decided to go back to (L) SIB weapons and am currently waithing to get to 12.4 on my ranged laser damage, before purchasing a Breer M4a. So what have I learnt, there is no real cheap way to play EU. You are better off sticking to my original plan and absorbing the increased weapons and ammo costs, these can be offset against the increased ammount of loot you obtain.
If you want to know which weapons are right for your level have a look at this link
https://www.planetcalypsoforum.com/fo...uot-on-weapons
Chips
This is an area that I have only recentlty started to explore. A few weeks back, I had my highest loot of 34 ped, this came as a TP chip. My mentor had mentioned these to me previously and suggested that I get one at some stage. So rather than sell the chip, i kept it. To use it you need an implant, (from trade terminal) and an implanter (which looks like a chicken wishbone - from auction). You load the implant into your brain using the implanter. This is a rather gruesome process to watch, my son thinks it is hilarious, but once its in you can use various types of chips. The teleportation chip allows you to TP from your current location to any where within the designated radius zone. The higher the level chip the greater the radius, beware though, I have TP'd onto steep mountain sides that you just fall off and die. When you first use them they are not that accurate but like everything else this improves with practice. Beware also that they are no good for escaping deadly mobs as they take a while to charge and wont charge at all if you are being attacked. Attack chips come in different varities and as the name suggests allow you to attack. I have a cryogenic and and lacerating attack chips both level 1. The attack rate is weak to start with but a good place to practice and build your skills is Rocktropia. The main start area on RT is full of low level mobs which are good to practice on but my favourite spot is opposite the Club Neverdie in City of Dreams where there a some low and middle level mobs. The chips used mind essence, think of it as ammo for the mind, this can be purchased from trade terminals, the TP and attack chips use different types of this, much the same as BLP and Laser have different ammo types.
Mentoring
Basically to complete the mentoring you need to fullfill 3 criteria, hunting, mining and crafting. I think I have covered the hunting. You only need to successfully mine once to complete this process abnd you can do it for free buying doing the noob mining missions on Calypso or Arkadia. The crafting can also be done by following the noob crafting mission, but you will need to purchase a few cheap items to complete it. You only need to successfully manufacture once to complete this element of the mentoring. As long as you complete the basics of each of the disciplines the rest is down to your ingame time, so the more you play the quicker you complete the mentoring, it took me about 3 months but I am quite a heavy player. Once you complete the mentoring you are rewarded with some items, I received adjusted Pixie Armour and a Mk1 Explorer in red and blue (truck to you and me)
Armour and My Mistakes
All armour can be plated - this involves adding armoured plates to your armour to increase their effectiveness. YOU CAN ADD PLATES TO EACH PIECE OF ARMOUR. I didnt realise this until another player asked why I kept getting killed so often, "Have you got plates", "Yes I said", but I had only plated the Harness and not the other 6 items. So a brief trip to the auction and a few ped later I had a full set of Armour Plating 2a. This is a lot more effective particularly against the larger mobs where I was struggling to FAP and defeat the mobs at the same time. I am not entirely satisfied with the plating at the moment and will be looking to upgrade to Armour Plating to 5a shortly.
Team Hunting
If you are in a soc or have friends you can team hunt the larger mobs together. I have found this great fun as the feeling of being part of a team is great. Although you can team hunt with anyone, I would suggest that you try to find players around your level. The loot from each mob is devided amongst the team depending on who caused the most damage to the mob. This can be a little depressing if you are in a team with say your mentor as they are likely too loot much more than you (well its only fair after all, they did most of the work) Teaming with players of your level gives a much more level loot distribution. Furthermore in your team you can make your own rules about looting, so for example in my society the general rule, unless agreed before the team is formed, is that any single item over 20 ped is split equally between the players in the team. This may seem unfair to the stronger players but there is a reason for this, as prooved by my friend Slasha who took me out hunting. Just as the mob was about to die he told me to go in for the kill shot and to my amazement the mob dropped a pair of arm guards (value 54 ped), which ended up in my inventory. Along the way Slasha also looted some arm guards and after the hunt we split the items value between us. So if the mob is going to drop a valuable item it will go to the player who gets the kill shot. In general the stronger players will have a better hit rate and are more likely to pick up the valuable items. Splitting these is a way of giving the weaker players access to the luck of the game. This is not a hard and fast rule and I know some players like to stick to "You keep what you loot", but your playing with friends and friends ar supposed to help each other out, right !!
Also when team hunting there are other advantages. Lets say a strong player is taking all the aggro off the mob and there health is going down, you can activate your FAP and go in and heal them while they are wearing the mob down, ergo players die less often. Again a feeling of comaraderie is developed in these situations.
Stop the Press !!!
Ok earlier I mentioned that I liked to hunt low level Argonauts when I am solo hunting. This had a lot to do with my level
at the time. With the weapons and armour upgrades I have recently done , I'm a bit more "hardcore" now and to be honest it can become monotonous doing the same runs over and over again. The other day whilst waiting for others to arrive for a team hunt I was hanging around at Fort Medusa and thought I would go out for a hunt alone. The area has Molisks (horrid little buggers), Argonauts and level 19-28 Allophyls. I had only hunted the bigger ones in team before so I thought I would have a crack alone at the smaller ones. It was great, just like when I started hunting the Argos. I can just about get them without too much damage, I still have to FAP a bit but generally I can stay on top of things. This sort of advancement really opens up the game as it gives you more areas to play in. Finding the right mob for your level is one of the joys/pains of the game but it is always nice to find something else to do.
Ok lastest news, this weekend I have a had a great time both team hunting, over 100 ped run and last night I went to Fort Medusa and had another 100 plus run. My first loot was off a lvl 9 Molisk Adult which looted 36 ped, great start, I also looted a new attack chip.
Analysing the Markets
Ok hours and hours of shooting can become boring and quite often I like a complete change. One of my favourite passtimes is analysing the markets. This may sound boring and a couple of my friends think I am mad doing this but if you are careful and a bit lucky you can make a small ammount of ped at this. Just like real life supply and demand affects the value of items, see above ref the Herman Law - 202. I always buy quads if players are trying to sell them off quickly at a decent rate and then sell them back on auction, usually for only a few ped profit but compare that to how long you would have to sweat to gain 5 ped from that activity. Stay away from items that are given away in noob missions as their value is pretty worthless. Saying that at the moment there seems to be a lot of hoverpods on auction at very inflated prices. The question is, whether it is the novelty value thats bumping up the price and more importantly, is anyone bidding on / buying them. I think they are worth around 15 ped TT and the buyout bids are around 100 plus ped. However I also noticed that the starting bids are just over TT so I think a lot of players are trying to figure out what their real worth is. I have been trying to sell a braqnd new Saehrimmnir for a week now. I put it on at the lowest buyout on auction (around 50 ped), but nobody was interested. A couple of days later I saw one at auction for 15 ped and that to, is still up for sale. My advice for items like this is to keep them, as they will return you very little ped and you never know when you might need one. I gave one to a fellow player who only had 1 vehicle in exchange for a gun, so they can be used as gifts or for bartering.
No Beer In EU - Boo Boo Boo
......But in real life a lot of players have a drink while playing which means later on in the evening - depending on your time zone there will be players who are slightly tipsy, I am often guilty of this and one of my other favourite pass times is to stand and twin peaks and try what i call "contagious dancing". It doesnt always work but sometimes if you start dancing it encourages other players to do so as well and occasionally you can get a dozen or so players jigging away. I have most of the dance moves from the actions library loaded onto my number pad on the right hand side of the keyboard. This allows you to do dance combos and whilst some of the moves are a bit rubbish, the overall effect can be quite good. Try listening to your own music while doing this and it improves the effect even more.
On more thing about beer (or lack of it). A favourite conversation amongst some players I know is virtual beer. This would work along the lines of for each beer you drink your accuracy goes down by 1 point whilst your courage increases by a 1 point. The more you drink the more courage and less accuracy you get. I dont know if the powers that be in Mindark are all teetotal but it seems odd that they provide in game bars and nightclubs, but nothing to drink. I cant remember which planet it is on, but somewhere in the game there is even a mission to try and find beer. I think it must be some kind of private joke within Mindark, because there is no beer at the end of the mission and one of the NPC's even gives a lecture about there being no beer. At Twin Peaks you can also find the ex-barman who moans about loosing his job, because of a lack of beer. On Rocktropia at the stadium you can loot Motorhead beer kegs and I have also seen them for sale in various shops, but alas they are either empty or there is no way of getting the contents out of them, again I think this is a Mindark joke directed at the players. Come on MA - give us some beer. The only other alcohol I have seen is bottles of champagne, I dont know whether they can be opened or drunk though.
I know all of the above might just sound like me rambling and for that I apologise, but its just my own observations as I play the game and I like to write it down for myself as much as you guys. Enjoy EU and feel free to comment or disagree with anything I have said. I enjoy reading the thread responses as much as I enjoy writing them. Good Luck to you all and see you back in the real worlds, Entropia Universe that is.
Moondog (Glory Hound Grunt 25th March 2012)
Moondog Part 3 - Lets Get some Vehicles permalink
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Moondog Part 3 More Ramblings from a Grunt
Sorry folks, everytime I think I have said all there is to say about my time in EU, more stuff pops in my head.
A big thanks to all who have read my posts so far and commented on them. Today I am going to start with on of my favourite topics - Vehicles
Vehicles
It wasnt so long ago I am told that there were no vehicles in EU, that must have been slow pace but I am sure some players remember it as the Halcyon days. Me on the other hand being a long time petrol head and sci-fi fan love the fact that you can cruise around in futuristic machines from one location , or even planet, to another.
When I first joined the universe like everyone else I was on foot and spent a couple of weeks running or swimming around, trying to visit TP locations and generally getting a feel for the environment.
I felt daunted by the size of Calypso and after a while started to long for a vehicle of my own.
all the vehicles in EU run on oil so remeber to fuel your vehicle otherwise you are not going anywhere. Oil is available from the auction and does not cost much relative to other expenditure in the game. If you have more than one vehicle you may want to split the oil into smaller amounts. Once you have retrieved your oil from the auctioneer (I always forget to do this) go to your inventory, it will be located under mined resources.right click the oil icon and select split stack, you can devide your oil into whatever amounts you want. To fuel a vehicle, spawn it and then go to your inventory select the fuel stack you want to use and drag it onto the vehicle. You will be asked if you wish to fuel the vehicle, select yes.
One point as oil is a stackable item and can be looted, i always use all of it up to fuel my vehicles. This way if you are attacked and looted the fuel is safe as it is already in the vehicle and cant be taken from you. If a vehicle runs out, just remove the fuel from another vehicle, split the stack and refuel both vehicles. This is a bit labourious but an excellent safeguard to stop you loosing it.
I always keep my Quad heavily fuelled, well you dont want to run out in the middle of space , where you cant remove fuel from another vehicle
My first purchase was a Gungnir (helicopter), this was before I realised you could get one for free in the "Hunt the Thing" mission. Anyway with a few ped of fuel, I was off flying to various TP locations so that I had a good network covering the whole planet. It seems like slow progress these days but when you have been running around on foot for two weeks, dodging every mob you come across, the ability to fly over the danger was very welcome. The Gunginir is more tricky to fly than the VTOL's but it is a good way to learn you piloting skills.
The only problem is unless you fly very low it is very difficult to see what mobs or POI's are on the ground which is half the fun of exploring.
Next up I purchased a Saehraemir (Jeep). Now I could drive around at ground level and view more of EU. The only problem with this vehicle is it doesnt really like rough terrain and you have to be careful as it handles just like a real jeep, very badly. You have to drive slowly over the rough stuff and it is susecptable crashing into things. After being a bit jealous of the avatars with Sleipnirs, I looked into the prices which seemed quite reasonable so after a depo i purchased one at auction. Now we were really flying, bear in mind that the Sleipnir only carries 2 people whereas the Gunginir will carry 4. It should also be noted that the Sleipnir uses only half the fuel of the Gungnir, so it is a lot more economical if you fly around a lot.
Getting off the planet, your very own spaceship
Bring out the Quad ! - The Quad Wing Interceptor, ok now we are really talking. This is the most basic spaceship and while you can get a sleipnir to fly in space it's very slow and an open invitation to pirates. Oh yes there be pirates out there in space and they will kill you, destroy your ship and take any stackable items you are carrying, this includes anything under materials or mined resources in you inventory. even so owning a quad does not mean you can escape the pirates, they tend to use quads as well and are heavily armed.
NEVER CARRY STACKABLES IN SPACE
again in case it didn't sink in the first time
NEVER CARRY STACKABLES IN SPACE
...reapeat after me 7 times..........
OK you get the idea
Before going into space - technical Stuff.
You cant physically go into space even as a passenger without downloading the space patch, neither can you visit any other planet without downloading the patch for that planet. This is quite easy, go to your map on your screen, click on the drop down menu where your current planet is listed and select "space", the space patch will start to dowload. The same goes for the planets, once you are in space select the drop down menu in the map again and select the planet you wish to visit, again that patch will start to download. IF YOU DO NOT DOWNLOAD THE PATCH YOU WILL BE EJECTED FROM THE VEHICLE YOU ARE IN. If this happens in space on the way to another planet, you may end up lost in space as I was in my first week. I just floated around for about 36 hours before logging a support case. Eventually a kind EU advisor returned my Avatar to the nearest space station. Remember to load those patches, it is often overlooked by even the most seasoned players. If you do revive on a space station and you have no ship of your own , it costs 7 ped (i think) to teleport to the planet surface. This was the cause of my first depo, as my lift was long gone and I only had 3 ped from what i had so far looted, so I had to depo to get down to the surface.
Going Into Space
This has it's own issues. First of all neither the Quad or the Sleipnir will fly in space without a space thruster. These can be purchased from the auction for around 10 - 15 ped. Once you have purchased one you need to equip it to your spaceship. Go to inventory and drag the space thruster onto the vehicle you wish to use. Ok you are ready to fly in space. Get in your ship and go up up and up, eventually the screen will shake and you will get a message saying "Do you wish to enter space", click the green tick box and it will all go dark and fuzzy for a while. Eventually you will spawn in space normally near the planets space station. The area around the space station is a safe zone, you will see alot of other ships as well, these are larger ships which cannot enter the atmosphere, usually they will have a blue triangle above them indicating that they are non threatening. If you see a red triangle above a ship, this indicates that it maybe a threat, potential pirate. Around the space station they cant attack you but as soon as you try to make a dash for another planet or space station they will home in on you and invariably kill you.
Solutions.
- Well you could hope there is no red triangles
- Or you could choose a quiet time to make your run, like early morning GMT, but remember Mind Ark does a lot of funny update stuff on EU around 8.00 am GMT and you quite often either cant get online or you get dumped .
- Out manouvre the pirates, its worth a try, but so far I have never managed it, although to be fair I am not the most experienced pilot
- Add some weapons to your ship, the pirates may think twice before attacking you if they know you are armed. if they still attack you can always shoot them back. This is quite an expensive option and to be honest if you dont fly in space much, probably not worth the
expense.
- Go out with another player, especially if they have an armed ship, the odds are worse for the pirates if there are more than one of you.
- Hide in the space station, wait a while and hope the pirates get bored and look for another target.
- Wait for another player to make the run first and then go, hopefully the pirates will go after the other player who leaves first
- Try and talk to the pirate, use local chat. This may seem futile, but in one instance i was looking at being attacked and when I looked at
avatar name of the pirate I realised it was a friend of another soc member. When I mentioned the soc I was in and who our mutual friend
was I was allowed to leave unhindered, thanks Jetsina, sometimes in a big universe it can be a small world.
Having said all this, usually I make a run for it and hope for the best. If you do die, it's not the end of the world, or even your ship. You will revive at the nearest space station and your ship will be returned to your inventory in a very sorry state. You can fix it but you need a vehicle repair tool and some welding wire, both available at auction. Spawn your very mangled ship and shoot it with the vehicle repair tool as you would use a gun. Eventually it will be repaired to as new state and you can fly off in it again. You still have the same issues with the pirates but generally I have found that once they have destroyed you once they may not bother to attack you a second time having looted any stackables you may have had in your inventory. On a couple of occasions, I have even been messaged to say, "Go on I will let you out this time", it costs the pirates a lot of ammo to attack you and they may not want to waste anymore knowing you dont carry anything valuable. Beware though I know some players will leave their valuables on the space station, then go out and deliberately get destroyed, come back and pick up there valuables in the hope that they wont get attacked a second time. The pirates are wise to this and just like in real life, dont trust anyone unless you know them very well.
Once you do get away from the space station, unhindered, you are in deep space, the void between the planets. Although the whole area is a lootable PVP (person versus person) zone, the most dangerous areas are those just around the space stations, but outside of the safety zone. The pirates dont really leave this area because the highest concentration of lootable players is located here. If you make it away you are usually safe until you get to your destination.
In Space.
Although empty, space does have some things including its own special mob, Space Horrors, but unless you someone with a very large well armed ship they should be avoided at all costs. I have hunted these on a soc members Pathfinder and its good fun but expensive on the ammo. As well as this there are also training grounds in space usually near the planets, as well a couple of hunting Biodomes, FOMA Fortuna and Crystal Palace (see my first post "From noob to grunt in three months"). There are a few other space stations not linked to planets but so far I haven't visited any of these.
Traversing Space.
It is not like a flat map, it is obviously three dimensional and to be honest a bit confusing. Do not point your ship at the planet you want to visit and fly off. You can end up going out of bounds. I have found the best solution is to find the space station for the planet you want to visit on the map and create a waypoint there. This will appear on your HUD display, head for this waypoint even if it looks like you are not going directly to the planet, this will prevent you going out of bounds, once you are within 1 or 2 AU's of the space station you can turn into the planet.
I have also noticed that quite often the planets appear on the screen differently to the map, so for example you maybe heading to Arkadia and you can see Rocktropia behind it even though on the map it will seem to be behind you. Maybe this is because of the curvature of space or more likely its a general EU bug. I have learnt to ignore these anomalies, stick to the waypioint theory it has always worked for me.
Arriving at a New Planet
MAKE SURE YOU HAVE DOWNLOADED THE PATCH, i cant reiterate this enough as I have been caught out a few times here. Space travel takes a while about 20 minutes to half an hour real time, in a Quad, depending on where you are flying to, go and make your dinner or phone a loved one because once you are away from the pirates there is not much to do. Upon arrival at the planet beware of pirates again although they are much less frequent than around Calypso. A message will appear asking if you want to land on the planet, if you do you have to pay a 2 ped landing fee. Things go fuzzy again for a few seconds then you find yourself in the atmosfear, usually above a teleporter, land your ship and you have arrived.
i have noticed that the arrow indicating your location on the planet surface doesnt appear until you land, which is usually OK, but a couple of times when arriving at Rocktropia you dont land above a teleporter and hence you dont know where you are. If this happens, just land anywhere, pick up your ship and press the "T" button, this will take you to the nearest teleporter and your avatars location arrow should reappear.
More about the various planets later ................
Other vehicles.
Jormungand - Boat.
This is very nice bit of kit and one of the first vehicles I had a ride in on EU. It may seem without purpose but a number of missions require you to explore the sea and it is very useful for this. When I was a bit flush one day I treated myself and whilst it doesnt get that much use i wouldn't part with it.
Hoverpod
As the name suggets its a pod for one person that hovers. Initially it was only available by completing the Arkadia noob mission and I had reservations. I thought it looked like a flying techno pig and before the update the texturing was a bit rubbish. This has been fixed now and I have to say that for short journeys it is my favourite mode of transport.
The view from inside the cockpit is a bit restricted and it gets in the way if you view it in the third person. Having said that it will handle the rough terrain better than the Saehrimmnir and uses virtually no fuel. It also will go between land and water with no trouble. I also discovered while sat at a bar on Arkadia (not having a Beer) that it will go under water. This takes a bit of practice but it works like this. Fly over the water, make sure it is not too shallow, exit the vehicle, let the Hoverpod sink to the bottom. When its on the bottom, renter the vehicle and away you go. It may seem like a bit of a novelty but can be useful for getting away from the fish if they start attacking you.
A couple of problems if you try to go up too steep an incline or fly off a ledge it will somersault although it invariably rights itself without too much damage.
The other major problem is its durability, it will not take very much agro from any mobs so try to avoid them while you are flying about.
On a lighter note when the hoverpods first appeared in EU I saw a player flying it off a very high landing pad, this was great fun to watch as it somersaulted over and over again before crashing to the ground, dont knock the hoverpod too much, i am a convert, i think they are great.
Pitbull
One day when i am really drunk i will buy one, only on the basis that they look wicked, in honesty they are rubbish unless you plan to do some major PVP action with friends.
OK think i have covered the vehicles I know about for now,
Moondog signing off for now, dont forget to comment or disagree with anything I have said
Enjoy EU and Good Luck to you all
29th March 2012
moondog part 4 - The ongoing chronicles of the Dog permalink
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Moondog - Part 4 (What Already)
Well more ramblings from the dog, nothing specific this time just more experience I have picked up along the way.
Currently I am Laser Sniper Hit Level 18 and Ranged Laser Damage 14.69, just waiting to get to level 15 so I can upgrade my weapon, so what's been happening.
Well my hoverpod has finally died and I have stuck it in storage, it served me well but as a limited item , all good things must come to an end. i could by another but at the moment the prices on auction vary from 30 ped buyout to 495 ped for a salmon coloured one (March 18th 2012), bit of a waste of ped if you ask me as you can buy a full TT Sleipnir for the same price so I think I will stay clear of these. The general trend on the price of Quads has dropped so now is the time to buy one, i dont see them going much lower unless the market becomes really flooded, currently cheapest buyout is 140 ped and even then you can can probably find one cheaper in private trade. My son's avatar bought one very cheaply that was about 75% of TT from a private trade and currently on Calypso there is one with 17 hours to go, current bid 52 ped.
I have got into the habit of storing a lot of stuff, which decluters your inventory but more importantly reduces the weight you carry around and thus speeds your avatar up. Good things to put in inventory are Nova fragments, Blazaar Fragments and any worn out (L) item that has no TT value,like the aforementioned hoverpod. Similarly a lot of stuff I loot on Rocktropia I tend to put in storage (remember storage is planet based so sweat you store on Calypso is only avaiable from storage on that planet)so in particular records, tapes, cd's and phones I keep in storage on Rocktropia, the records are required for some missions so dont sell them at TT.
I have finally found a use for Nova fragments and Tier 1 components. You can Tier up your armour when its gets to a certain level, to do this you need certain raw materials, these include Nova fragments, Tier 1 components, oil, Garnets and Blausariam. You have to wait till each piece of armour is ready to be tiered up and the process is similar to crafting in that when you try to do it you may or may not be successful. Having said that I succesfully tiered up 2 pieces of my armour, very satisfying when it happened, i have already collected the rest of the raw materials for when the other pieces are ready to be tiered up.
A Bit of a Mellee.
I get bored quite easily, and in my last post I had started to excperiment with mindforce and while the attack chips are ok I am very impressed with the regen chip, think of it as a mindforce FAP. It looks great when its activated and has a pretty good heal rate.
A couple of weeks ago I went out hunting with a proper veteran, the leader of my soc "Oscar Skyquake Hurrikane" who due to internet issues had not been online for a while. We hunted robots, me with my Herman LAw 202 and him with what can only be described as a baseball bat with nails sticking out of it. Hwe strode right up to the robots and literally beat them to death, it was quite a sight to watch.
He gave me a Rep Edge battle Axe and i bought a Castorian Combat Enblade (basic TT sword 15 ped). Using the basic armour recieved from the ARK noob mission and the 2 melee weapons I went to the swamp just outside Port Atlantis and hacked away at every puny mob I could find. It was great fun, put your avatar in third person to get the best visual effect. No ammo burn and some reasonable looting (for the level of play). After that I got a bit more adventurous and went to Fort Medusa,if you go uphill through the argos molisks and foul there are some lower level shinkiba and snarblesnots. I used my armour and had a good old fisticuffs with them. Be aware though that mellee weapons decay very quickly, well you arent paying for ammo. I got my basic mellee skill levels up and really enjoyed getting up close and personal with the mobs. Use no armour or the free stuff and you dont even have to worry about the decay on that either. I have been short on the old ped for a couple of weeks, but the first thing I did when i Depo'd was repair my mellee weapons, its a cheap way to waste a few hours in EU.
It can get a bit depressing when you keep having to depo and dont seem to get a return. I have felt the drain recently, but yesterday I went out with some soc members and was happy to see that whilst i wasnt getting the biggest loots I was holding my own and after spending 80 ped on ammo I managed a return of 70 ped, no bad, however the icing on the cake was I got the last shot in on a proteron and looted an ISIS CB28 which is a level 47 blp rifle, TT value 325 ped with an average of 150% mark up, between the four team members that should see a return at auction of about 125 ped each which means my 80 ped ammo returned me 195 ped (minus armour and wepons decay of course)
What a happy chappy I was so tonight I went out hunting with my long term RL friend and EU mentor "Rooster Matty Gee" who is well above me in the heirarchy. Not phased, I thought, well I did OK last night so if I loose a bit of ped on the hunt, I'm not that bothered (after all i dont expect to play for free). So another 80 ped on ammo and off we went. We did some mining robots and another mob feruk (or something like that, dont really remember the name) loot not to bad but nothing huge. After that Rooster suggested that we go do some ATROX (now in our soc the rule is that to move from grunt to veteran you have to solo an ATROX guardian, witnessed by another soc member, so I think he was gettting me used to the idea of it ). We went to fort Ithica which is an Atrox haven. They are quick and come at you in groups although their damage isnt that high, even for me. Its brutal 4 or 5 at a time and you just shoot, shoot, shoot, FAP, shoot, FAP some more and shoot. Most of the time you are not sure whats going on, but while Rooster was taking care of 4 of them i was hacking away at just one mostly one my own. I would have never killed it solo but I did most of the damage and the reult was a 368 ped hof of which i got 190 ped. Coupled with my other loot this gave me a 250 ped run off the back of 80 ped ammo. To be fair I have to give total respect to Rooster because I couldn't have done it alone and he was constantly looking out for me,but hey ho thats what friends are for.
I would like to take a moment to thank all the people who have not only read my previous posts but taken the time to respond to them. This is a great way for me to learn and I think I should comment on an issue that I haven't properly understood until recently. This is to do with SIB weapons and your skill level. As far as I can work out in order to make the most economical use of your PED you should use SIB weapons that say "NOT ANYMORE" under the two learning sections. This means that you are getting the maximum effectiveness from the weapon. So while I get slightly faster increased skills with my Herman Law-202 it is not as effective or economical as my Riker UL3 which is "maxed out", ie I am always getting the best effect from it.
Ranged Laser Hit vs. Ranged Laser Damage.
Having started out using rifles as I progressed My Ranged Laser Hit increased faster than my Ranged Laser Damage. This difference meant that it is sometimes awkward choosing weapons as Ranged Damage is lower. To compensate for this I was advised to start using a pistol. I didn't want to do this at first as my pistoleer level was only half my rifle level, but I persevered for a few weeks and am now using a Breer P3a, which is a great little weapon, approx 50 ped to buy and good enough to take on the mobs at Fort Medusa, to the extent that the Riker UL3 I bought a few weeks ago remains largely unused. I always keep a sollomate Opallo and a M2100, both UL weapons that are available from the Trade Terminal. I keep these for hunting very small mobs, they use very little ammo, so you dont need to loot massively to keep them going.
Important note to self and other players who get on the bigger, better bandwagon. "YOU WILL LOOSE LOADS OF MONEY FROM DEPOING AND IT WILL BE YOUR OWN FAULT" Why do you need to hunt level 65 Rexteleum. There are plenty of ugly nasty mob that are much lower level. The game play is the same amount of time, the mob (or you) still die and you still, hopefully loot something. I am beginning to believe that in EU bigger is noy
So from being down to 50 ped 48 hours ago I am sitting pretty on 410 ped which is good cos my poor old herman law 202 is nearly warn out, but I have reached level 15 ranged laser damage which means i can blow my winnings on a new gun and not have to depo this weekend.
Thats it for now but before I go, a massive thank you to my soc especially Rooster, Trix, Omen, Raptor and always Coz
GL out there Moondog signing off
April 18th 2012