I find it very amusing that Trion has called their latest event currency a “unique snowflake”, considering the actual event sounds like a rehash of every other event. I’m laughing, but not WITH you Trion.

I’m still playing a lot of Skyrim, and I’m still enjoying it just as much as I did initially. My current character is a destro(fire)/resto mage, with a sword/board companion. Initially a mage is very plain, but once you get some additional spells, and start to combo some stuff together, it’s very entertaining. Sending my brute in first and hiding behind him while channeling a healing spell works very well, especially once I got him geared up a bit (this also makes finding heavy armor/weapons not ‘pointless’ for a mage).

I can also safely state that while the main storyline is good, there are side-quests that completely blow it out of the water in terms of surprises or just fun gameplay. The ‘sandboxy-ness’ of Skyrim really shines here, as it’s very easy to bounce between longer quest chains and just hitting up a random cave to bash some skulls. I’ll also grudgingly admit that while it still sucks, the UI has somewhat grown on me and it’s not getting in the way nearly as much as it was previously. That said, selecting chat options is still a huge killer for me, and I can’t wait for a patch/mod to fix this.

Finally things in EVE are going very well. Since the loss of my Rattlesnake, I’ve purchased a Navy Raven to run missions in, and it does the job very well. Seven cruise missile launchers put out some serious DPS, while the active shield tank I have going has so far held up in every mission. I initially wanted to save up the ISK for another Rattlesnake, but I’m now leaning towards putting more ISK into the Raven and getting it in really good shape. Currently it’s mostly T2 fitted, but many of the builds I see online use faction mods, and assuming the Raven does not meet the same fate as the Rattlesnake, I can always sell those later on if I opt for a different ship.

I’ve also started messing around with Research agents on my industry pilot, and his Planetary Interaction setup has so far been very profitable. This week I’ll have the sixth and final planet up, which I plan to use as a processing center to turn lower-tier goods into high-end stuff. I’ll have to play around in Excel to see where the best profit margins lie of course.

The Crucible expansion hits this week, and like everyone else, I’m very excited for all the changes. I’m sure I’ll have a post up about that either later this week or early next.

My buddy invites should refresh shortly, so anyone who did not receive one last time will have another chance to try the game out for 21 days. Soon as they refresh, I’ll put up a post.