RaveN950

EPIC Changes for Maple Story Weapons!

RaveN950 — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 05:32:33 +0000

You have to go check out the post for the latest game update on maple story. It’s about the new ranking system for weapons and the incorporation of an item potential system. I’m actually really impressed with what nexon is trying to achieve with this new system of ranking weapons as well as giving weapons, and other gear of course, a well needed boost in stats. I’ve all ready come across a few people with some ridiculous equipment. A friend of mine had a potential overall that had something on the lines of 25 additional int… and that was clean!

Potential items with a ranking of “rare” or higher simply need to be identified using a magnifying glass that can be purchased through most of the NPC merchants to unlock additional potential stats. If the item is just a regular item, the potential can be unlocked using potential scrolls which can be dropped from monsters AND created by buying the miracle cube cash shop item which will yield scroll fragments. Combining 5 fragments will create a normal potential scroll and 10 will create an advanced potential scroll. I’m also very excited to see the “item revamp” equipment enchantment. An equip enchantment scroll can be used on an item that is fully scrolled to unlock additional stats. Unfortunately, using more scrolls reduces the success rate and failing a scroll results in immediate destruction of the item. I would definitely call this a double edged sword.

Dual Blade is Out!

RaveN950 — Sun, 25 Jul 2010 05:20:08 +0000

Well, the long anticipated dual blade character is finally out in gMS (Maple Story Global)! If you haven’t made one yet, then you’re definitely missing out… and unfortunately, that includes me as well. I haven’t had the time to go and make a dual blade, but instead I had the chance to play my aran that has been sitting at level 10 for the better part of 6 months. It’s at level 15 now, and I have to say that it is actually rather refreshing playing a different character for a change. Playing from the very beginning really made me realize why I enjoyed maple for so long. I have to say that the game is actually very inviting and a pleasure to play, at least until you realize that you’ve locked yourself in a grindfest for all eternity. Aside from that, the aran class looks pretty sick. I can’t wait to continue leveling up my character and unlocking the other skills arans are capable of learning. Anyways, this was supposed to be about dual blades, but I’ve started on a tangent again, as usual. So, to make a long story short, go make a dual blade!

Dual Blade

RaveN950 — Wed, 21 Jul 2010 02:33:07 +0000

Yep, that’s right. After quite some time of waiting, dual blades are finally coming out. It sounds kinda weird calling them dual blades and not dual bladers. I’m not sure, but maybe that’s just me. I find that when I talk about them, I throw in that R cause it sounds more natural. Anyways, the new class was supposed to be added this past Wednesday, July 14th, 2010. Unfortunately, there was a delay that caused nexon to hold off on the patch for this Wednesday, July 21st, 2010. I’m pretty sure there was a lot of flaming on the nexon forums, as well as the top forums in the maple community, including basilmarket and sleepywood.

I’m looking forward to seeing what this new class is capable of. Not sure yet as to whether I’ll be making one though. It seems like too much time and effort that I just don’t have the liberty of spending. No doubt that the servers are going to be swamped tomorrow after the patch. Usually it’s just those annoying trolls setting up their mushie shops in FM1-3. I remember when the markets were so inflated, people started selling their shop spots for millions. Now I’m just rambling. Anyways, can’t wait for the new class. Shadowers are gonna have to watch their backs. Well, at least until the big bang patch comes out. More on that later.

Summer Maple

RaveN950 — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 16:16:34 +0000

I’ve been touching up on MapleStory here and there now that I’m back for the summer. It’s been rather hard especially since I lost everything on my character. I never would have guessed that it would happen to me, but my Marksman’s account was hacked and stripped of everything that was at least half decent. I remember back in the day I used to ridicule the countless number of people who claimed they were hacked, but only because they used the term “hacked” very loosely. As soon as I found out what happened to my Marksman, I contacted Nexon and made sure I could reclaim my account and reset my security preferences. I’m glad that Nexon finally implemented another form of softkey security with the new PIC in addition to the PIN, but it was a little too late for me haha. No worries though, I’ve been trying to salvage what I could in order to make a return in the game, but the inflation on Maple has not changed, the rich keep getting richer and the poor end up giving up and dropping the game. It sounds alarming similar to how the economy has been for quite some time… but we’ll save that for another day haha.

Maple sure seems to be making some BIG changes and doing so with a lot of haste. I don’t remember having so many large patches adding new characters, new skills, new locations, new quests and new coveted items at such a ridiculously fast pace. A friend of mine and I were talking about how, in our own opinions, it seems as if Nexon is doing so because they want to continue expanding their market and by appealing to and attracting more people, including those that fell off the horse and left the game. I remember reading something recently from Nexon’s website about how they actually had their own booth and presented a few of their games at the E3 conference that took place a few weeks ago. I’m surprised that Nexon is moving forward in the gaming market faster than expected. No doubt we’ll be seeing a whole lot more coming our way soon.

If you follow Maple and watch videos of game play on Youtube, then there’s a good chance that you’ve come across the user AristosMS who posts videos from several versions of Maple, specifically from KMS and KMST, the Korean test server. If you’ve been living in a deep dark hole, or just haven’t been up-to-date with Maple, then you’re missing out on the new classes that will be appearing sooner than we all thought. You can find more information on the Dual Blade character that will be released soon on Nexon’s dedicated DB website here which has a nice teaser video and a background story on the DBs as well as an insight into the NPCs that are involved with the DB class. I also highly recommend checking out AristosMS‘ videos showcasing the new Wild Hunter and the Battle Mage from the KMST server, and don’t forget to comment on how you feel about the new arrivals. A good idea for another dagger/cutter user? What’s gonna happen to the market, more inflation surrounding already extremely expensive thief gear? What about the creativity or lack of creativity in new class/skill design?

The Speed Gamers

RaveN950 — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 15:29:16 +0000

I’ve only recently come to appreciate what the group known as The Speed Gamers are all about. For anyone that does not know what TSG is, it is a community of people who work together to raise money by playing video games for charity. I watched their week long marathon of the Final Fantasy series last summer around this time and actually enjoyed watching as well as listening to their commentary. I had the liberty of watching them again a few weeks ago, as they were raising money for the organization known as ACT, which stands for Autism Care and Treatment. Congratulations to TSG for raising $60,000 dollars for ACT!

Now they’re working on a summer Zelda marathon that will last for approximately the entire month of July. Their goal this time is to win 1st or 2nd place in the Pepsi Refresh project, and by doing so, they would earn another $250,000 for ACT! TSG will be playing every evening from now until August 1st, when the winner will be announced by Pepsi. Please visit their website here and check it out for yourself. All it takes is a simple vote via the widget on their homepage to help them reach their goal. In addition to earning money for ACT, winning this Pepsi Refresh project will allow TSG to move forward with their plans in developing a TSG headquarters. If you haven’t seen their latest video describing it, I suggest you go check out their Youtube page right here. The Speed Gamers all ready have a great community of people and it’s a community that ‘s ever expanding, so join in!

My Apologies

RaveN950 — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 15:09:16 +0000

I sincerely apologize for not posting up anything in the past several months. I actually posted something up early this year, during the month of February, about how I was back at school for the spring semester… but unfortunately something happened to that post and it went poof. Well, to make a very long story short, this past spring semester was a living nightmare. I don’t ever remember having such a hard time at school, but then again I made the mistake of taking solely science classes. Now that it’s all over, I look back at it and laugh, because I am the kind of person that over analyzes everything and makes simple tasks rather complex. Although it’s the summer now and I should be out there enjoying the sun, I’m taking summer classes just to keep myself active and stay a head of the game, so to speak. I’m glad this is the fourth of July weekend, it’s been a while since I’ve been able to see Independence Day fireworks. Anyhoo, I’ll be posting frequently from now on, just updating here and there on what’s been going on as well as how things are going in MapleStory.

My Florida Vacation

RaveN950 — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 05:07:02 +0000

I had a great time in Tampa during my winter break. It was only for a few days but I enjoyed it a lot. Tampa is great but I’ve been told that you have to leave the area to find fun things to do. I went down there with a good friend of mine from high school to visit my best friend who I also went to high school with. I still can’t believe my parents let me go down to Florida, with a girl, all alone, to visit a friend, with no chaperon. Susan loves animals so we went to a nearby zoo. She wanted to get a picture of the pygmy hippos. It wasn’t as big as the Bronx zoo, but it possible to get a good tour of the entire zoo in a day, which you can’t possibly do at the Bronx zoo. We went to Bush Gardens and had a great time there. It’s a decent sized amusement park and the rides are amazing too. Chris is not afraid of heights, but he is afraid of free falling, but surprisingly we actually got him to go on a roller coaster with us.

Chris bought the new Army of Two and we played pretty much every night. I never played the first one, but that game has some pretty sick game play. I really wish I had a 360 here in my dorm room so I can play some right now. While I was in Florida, I had to share a room with Susan, which wasn’t weird or anything. We shared a room before when she came to my school last year during spring break. I never got the chance to go visit her, which I regret, but hopefully I’ll be able to head up during my spring break and go see her. We spent a whole afternoon bowling at a nearby bowling alley. I’m pretty bad at bowling because I rarely get to play, but I managed to win a game to my surprise. We had our traditional baking night that we dedicated to red velvet cake with cream cheese icing. Mmm, it was delicious! Chris treated us to a traditional Italian restaurant and we ordered a whole bunch of food. My trip to Florida was more than fun and I hope I’ll be able to head down again sometime soon.

XBOX 360 Wireless Adapter

RaveN950 — Mon, 11 Jan 2010 04:40:28 +0000

My neighbor actually called me up today asking a few questions about the wireless network adapter the XBOX 360. It’s pretty expensive to buy an actual wireless adapter, and using a really long 50-100 foot ethernet cable was not an option. I was browsing youtube a while back and came across an episode from HouseholdHacker, describing how to create your own XBOX 360 wireless adapter using a macbook or laptop. It turns out my neighbor recently got a new laptop and was in need of a working wireless adapter. I figured this would be the perfect opportunity to see if HouseholdHacker could really save the day.

We took his laptop and first disconnected it from any wireless connections it was currently connected to. After that, we simply bridged the LAN connection and the Wireless Adapter connection through the network configuration settings. I found out that this was originally meant for Windows XP and for Vista, but his laptop runs on Windows 7 and everything worked fine. Once the LAN and Wireless are bridged, a new icon will appear for the two bridged networks. All you have to do now is connect the netbook or laptop back to the wireless network and then physically connect the XBOX 360 with an ethernet to the netbook or laptop. You can now log onto XBOX Live by using the laptop as your wireless network adapter. Amazing, you just saved yourself $99! I imagine that the macbooks must also follow a similar setup, bridging the LAN and Airport network connections together. Now my neighbor is grinding away on Live, playing Modern Warfare 2 online in a matter of minutes.

- RaveN.

Florida!

RaveN950 — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 05:31:18 +0000

I’m really excited about my upcoming trip to Florida. I’ll be leaving in two days, this Tuesday, for a four day vacation in Tampa Bay. My best friend from high school lives there, and I’ll be traveling down there with another close friend of mine. We haven’t made any plans yet as to what we’ll be doing once we get there, but I’m sure it’s going to be nothing short of a blast! I’ll post up some updates once I get there, depending on how often I can get online and when there’s enough time to blog.

Papulatus

RaveN950 — Sun, 10 Jan 2010 05:18:31 +0000

I was in a spontaneous mood the other day and went to Pap with a few friends of mine. I’m usually not into boss’ing but it wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. I guess it’s because the last time I went was about 30 or so levels ago and the majority of my party disconnected. My friend, who is a NL, and I started off together with apples and we cut down Pap’s HP down to half in about a minute, but those really annoying bombs spawned on my friend and 1HKO’ed him. I managed to dodge them, but they got me the second time the bombs spawned. You can imagine how ridiculous that felt, wasting two apples in a single minute and dying in the process.

Anyways, we were determined to beat down Pap and a couple of our friends logged on. We rounded up a DK and priest and gave Pap another try. My NL friend and I did this run without an apple and I was surprised as to how fast Pap’s HP was dropping. It’s amazing what a difference HB and a healer can make. Actually, having a healer kinda made things a little more awkward because I wasn’t sure when and when not to pot. I just potted regardless, just to be safe rather than sorry. We knocked out Pap’s first form with no trouble at all, and it didn’t take long to chop away at Pap’s second form. We were about 3 hits away from finally killing Pap, when I got hit and spammed my melted cheese to make sure I wouldn’t die. It turns out that my pots didn’t kick in when I wanted it to, so I ended up dying. Pap dropped nothing in particular so it was a bummer. On a lighter note, we decided to make Pap a regular in our boss runs. With some luck we might end up with some good worthwhile drops.

- RaveN.