Once Team Grumpy’s stealth alts were Novice Combat types, Grumpy announced that they needed to join in on the Galactic Civil War (the GCW as the kewl people call it). It was high time that Grumpy showed the yo yo dawgs how PVP was REALLY supposed to work…mostly with them dead and Grumpy blowing the smoke off of his weapon. Maybe Grumpy would add a “have a nice day, sir” if he was in a cheery mood.
Grumpy was vaguely aware of how to join a faction and that people can buy extra stuff, like Machines of Death and furniture, if they bribe the right people. Initially, Team Grumpy needed to choose a side, however. His gf/business partner suggested that since they aren’t roleplayers, Grumpy should be a liberal zealot and she should be a long-suffering moderate. While Grumpy enjoyed the contemporary political humor (however untrue!), he needed some serious input on this decision.
Grumpy would like to say they spent alot of time weighing the opposing ideologies and, after days of heated political arguments, thoughtfully aligned themselves with the faction that they passionately wanted to defend.
But he won’t lie — they chose the most conveniently-located faction mission terminal in their preferred noob town.
Up to this point, Grumpy had only done destroy-Lair0937 missions where mobs keep springing out of the lair, so he was pleasantly surprised that faction missions only involve, A. killing a bunch of NPCs hanging around a flag pole and then, B. kill the flag pole. What could be easier? Grumpy even got credits for killing the flag pole! And faction points! Whatever those are.
A few flagpoles later, Grumpy told his gf to find A Recruiter and this NPC would magically turn them into political idealists! Apparently the recruiter near their faction terminal was on a smoke break because he kept sending them on stupid missions to talk to this NPC and then find that NPC and deliver this noob item that they wouldn’t even dream of keeping because it’s so stupid … and still no overt status! Team Grumpy decided that recruiter was broken (similar to vendors, Yavin I – III, zone rollbacks and poofing vehicles), so they ported over to the Bestine/Anchorhead area where SURELY there must be a working recruiter.
And there was, because… justlikethat, they were overt. Grumpy and his gf admired each other’s political symbols, then admired their own. Now! It was time to go kill people! Since they were just Novice Combat types and were going to kill an ENTIRE CITY of actual players, Grumpy suggested they might want to park their swoops a good distance away. No sense in losing their bikes if one of the enemy players escaped their grasp.
In hindsight, there were a few problems with this plan. First, there are only about 3 players that ever walk around overt, two of which are Grumpy and his gf. Second, that third player was a TKM that kicked the ever-living sh*t out of them when he came back from AFK. Third, they should have parked the bikes even farther away.
Grumpy’s gf, ever an observer of the obvious, said…wow, TKMs sure hit hard and fast. Gee, ya think?
Now, they didn’t have enough faction to be political idealists AND had to take a shuttle back to their own faction terminal, like peasants. A few flagpoles and 2 new swoops later, they were back in the good graces of their recruiter and swooped back to try again. For crissakes, Grumpy wasn’t even close to learning his lesson yet, he needed to be schooled at least two more times by his new lord and master.
One of the lessons Grumpy learned was, it’s difficult to type /g RETREAT!!! or /g MAN DOWN!!! when lying flat on his back enjoying the Tatooine night sky. Possibly, he should hotkey that to make it easier. And spammable!
His gf was tired of strategy changes and admiring the Cloning Center interior, oh so familiar to them now, so Grumpy called a cease-fire for the evening. Best to let his troop(s) rest up for the big battles to come…
…After a few more combat levels. Maybe some buffs. Some extra swoop deeds. And if more overts wanted to go along to make an assault on another day, Grumpy wouldn’t exactly discourage them.
The Grumpy Master Architect ©