(A door slams, followed by footsteps)

Dorothy: What the hell… 

Julie: Morning neighbor.

Dorothy: What the hell…

Julie: (interrupting – louder) MORNING NEIGHBOR!

Dorothy: Morning. What the hell is that?

Julie: (Cheerfully) what’s it look like?

Dorothy: It looks like the Good Year blimp landed but stopped off at the National Guard armory first.

Julie: It’s not a blimp – it’s an airship.

Dorothy: Ya. Well you wanna get your “airship” outta my driveway please? I have to get to work.

Julie: It’s not in your driveway, it’s in my driveway.

Dorothy: Well maybe your blimp…

Julie: (interrupting) …airship.

Dorothy: Airship, Blimp, Gasbag – whatever it is it may start in your driveway but it ends in mine.

Julie: Actually the airship is that big gas bag up there with the gondola attached – what is sticking out into your driveway are the nine pounders that are going to be mounted on the gondola.

Dorothy: Right. Well you wanna get your nine pound cannons out of my drive?

Julie: Well they aren’t cannons per se they are actually a demi-culverin guns.

Dorothy: Right. Whatever. Just get all this crap out of my driveway.

(A car door slams and an engine starts)

Dorothy: Say. You are really into all this steampunk stuff aren’t you? What are you going to do with a blimp –

Julie: (interrupting) Airship

Dorothy: Airship, and demi –whatsits-culverin guns…

Julie: They aren’t real they fire nerf balls.

Dorothy: That much I had figured. What are you going to do with all this anyway?

Julie: You know when I started all this I hadn’t really thought that far ahead. I guess I will do the same thing I do in Warcraft.

Dorothy: Which is?

Julie: Sit inside it and float in front of the bank in my blimp.

Dorothy: Not blimp – Airship. Julie: Right. Dorothy: So now you’re an aero-nut.

Julie: Aeronaut

Dorothy: Right. I just got one question aeronut.

Julie: What?

Dorothy: When I get back from work can I have a ride?

A wise man once said, “You may find that having is not so pleasing a thing as wanting. This is not logical, but it is often true.” Well, maybe the man wasn’t so much wise as being a case of out of the mouths babes. This sage advice was spoken by Leonard Nimoy as Mr. Spock in Amok Time during the original Star Trek series. No matter what the source it is good advice.

Many of us go through our lives, both real and virtual, feeling that we will finally be happy if we obtain a particular object. It is this very factor which allows mmos to be a continuing service rather than a onetime sale. If there was never the eternal quest for bigger and better virtual bling, usually in the guise of fancy virtual armor and bigger mounts, a lot more players would hit the level cap and log out for good. The main problem with bling of course is that it does no good unless one can be seen to have the bling. What Gore Vidal should have said was it is not enough that I succeed – I must be seen to have succeeded.

Still, if you don’t have a hobby you could well end up spending your spare time weeding the lawn at night with a flashlight, playing solitaire all winter long, or alternatively slowly decaying into your chair as you become one with the television, computer or game console.

Still, if you don’t have a hobby you could well end up spending your spare time weeding the lawn at night with a flashlight, playing solitaire all winter long, or alternatively slowly decaying into your chair as you become one with the television, computer or game console. Among those reading these words we all share one common trait in our lives – we enjoy mmos. Have you ever asked yourself why you play mmos? It’s not like playing golf, tennis, or chess. In my case my interest in theatrics, role playing, writing and the like began long before I even heard the word steampunk. Unlike most events in my life I know the moment my interest began – it was as the curtain rose on the forest scene in A Midsummer Night’s Dream by William Shakespeare.

While many scoff at the concept, we are all role-playing to a greater or lesser degree. Somewhere inside each of us is a part of us that has managed to recapture the moments of childhood when we would make believe, before we all decided it wasn’t grown up enough. Maybe we all share that part of the human genome that craves creativity that goes all the way back to the story teller – the part of each culture that once carried with them an oral tradition.

Beyond that, each of us has the desire to be part of the story, rather than simply sitting on the outside of it as a member of the audience. But even then there is only so far we will each allow ourselves such an indulgence. As long as we can log on to our favorite virtual world and still tell friends and co-workers that we wouldn’t be interested in such as thing we are safe. But simply being able to live vicariously through an avatar of some sort seems like part of the experience. It’s like eating your favorite food while holding your nose shut – you can certainly taste the food but as any good chef knows, presentation and smell are a large part of the experience. Being able to play an mmo an pull the virtual electronic strings to make the avatar character somehow seems a bit insufficient. This is, no doubt, why activities like larp and cosplay began.

And that, of course, brings us back to full circle to what to do with the wonderful steampunk outfit once it is complete. In my particular case I hadn’t thought that out too much. There are always conventions, and a friend has a large annual costume party. While LARP and Cosplay seem interesting (and I am just the sort that would give it a try) finding individuals who are willing to let go of some of attitude that tells us such things aren’t acceptable is more difficult than it sounds (at least it is in the Chicago area where all of the members No Prisoners, No Mercy team live). So while I finish off my blaster, converted by way of a good bit of metal work from a very old drill, I will think about what to do with it all when I am done – maybe I will go sit out in front of the bank here in town.

See you online,

Julie Whitefeather

[posted for Julie Whitefeather by The Webmaster]

New and Interesting:

Derek Smart may be a smart ass, a jack ass or “large and in charge” depending on you look at it, but he is great for getting publicity.

EA may have set the bar so high for Star Wars The Old Republic that even Superman couldn’t clear it. 

And now for the rest of the story…

Kaltxi everyone,

The interesting thing about those mmos that have actual “role playing servers” is that no one on them ever role plays.  Even if you try, the average player will look at you like you have fifteen heads.  It’s sort of an odd aspect of the hobby considering that one of the acronyms often applied to it is massively multiplayer online role-playing game.  The sad truth of the matter is that the only reason most people gravitate toward a role playing server like World of Warcraft’s (WoW) Earthen Ring server is that they somehow feel that the decent person/asshat ratio will be very low.  While it hasn’t happened in WoW, in other mmos we often see role playing servers merged with other servers, or eliminated altogether if there is more than one. Fortunately for those of us with active imaginations (I am certainly one of them) there is only one server in Star Trek Online.  And so, as mentioned yesterday, I present my latest effort, Na’vi me, with a special thanks to whoever the player was that first had idea – it was a good one and it is A LOT of fun.

Name:  Erzuli Taronyu “The Hunter”

Profession: Captain of Pandora’s Revenge

Favorite Quote: “Do you know how difficult it is to fit a tail into a Starfleet Uniform.”

Favorite Entertainer(s):  Blue Man Group*

Favorite Music: Blues… “The blue’s ain’t nothin’ but a good Na’vi feelin’ bad.”

Favorite Song: “Am I blue?”

Turn offs:  Ketuwong (Alien) people who attend a Na’vi wedding for the first time and think no one has ever heard the joke, “Something old, something new, something borrowed, something blue – say there’s always something blue at a Na’vi wedding!”

Biography:

She gained her immortality and lost her tail after recreating an “accident” involving two rubber bands, a nuclear particle accelerator and fifteen hundred gallons of Saurian Brandy.  Many people had attempted to recreate the famous accident that cast immortality upon Wowbagger “the infinitely prolonged” but no one had ever achieved it.  It is said that those who tried ended up looking silly, dead and usually both.

The situation immediately brings two questions to mind, the first being, “What does one do with immortality?”  Let’s face it friends, forever is a mighty long time. Most sentient species have some concept of an afterlife, but few people ever consider what they would do with an “eternal reward” even if they had it. Oh there are, of course, some cultures (especially on Earth) that believe they come back in some grand continuous cycle of lives repeating endlessly – and to tell the truth just considering the concept gave her the screaming heebee geebees. 

Those who know the history of Wowbagger (and may have even had the good fortune to be insulted by him) know that he occupies his portion of forever by insulting the universe…individually, and “here’s the clincher, in alphabetical order.”

Of course, after successfully repeating Wowbagger’s accident, Erzuli was immediately faced with a second question as well.  She could spend a few millennia hanging around the forest. However when you are part of an indigenous tribe that communes with nature through their tails (unlike some Earth men who,  rumors have it, talk out their posteriors – a remarkable concept to be sure) what do you do when you have suddenly lost your tail?  Well, without the tail, communing with nature, let along actually hanging around in it would be darn difficult to begin with.

Then the words of those who invaded her happy home as a child sprung to mind. It was something that Earth people belonging to a club they called “Starfleet” with what they called a “motto” – travel the universe, meet new and interesting people and kill them. There was another expression that an Earth woman had taught her. She wasn’t like the others. She once told Erzuli “before setting out for revenge you must first dig two graves – One for the one upon whom you seek vengeance, and your own.” It seemed fine to Erzuli, and as good a way to occupy forever as any…time to start digging.

Until later my friends,

Kiyevame

Na’vi words were from “Learn Na’vi” (http://www.learnnavi.org/)

*A popular comedy/performance art group in Chicago.

** Wowbagger the infinitely prolonged” is a character by one of my favorite authors, Douglas Adams.

Side Notes

Another peculiar aspect of roleplaying, a slight problem really, applies only to Star Trek Online.  Many of the players will be fans of one of the series: The Next Generation, Deep Space 9, and Voyager.  The star ships like those that were featured in each series are there for the player to obtain – Voyager, The Enterprise, and the Defiant.  The only problem is that these ships are not in the top tier of ships (Tier Five).   What this means is that they are much weaker in combat, whether pve or pvp, than their Tier Five counterparts – and even updating them with Tier five weapons and consoles does not make them competitive.  So as you level from the Captain tier to the Rear Admiral Tier, you are forced to leave behind that ship you enjoy so much, as it sits unused in the shipyard.