Liebster Award

A couple weeks ago, Zernebog nominated me for a Liebster Award!  He’s one of the many SWTOR players I’ve met outside of Jedi Covenant through Twitter and blogs about his characters, tanking, and his adventures with his guild.  Zerne plays on The Ebon Hawk and Jung-Ma servers and thanks to the cheap server transfers this year, I’ve gotten to raid with him and his guild several times.

Thank you for the nomination!

How the Liebster Award works is pretty simple – answer the 11 questions asked, add 11 random facts, then ask 11 questions to those nominated at the end.  Hopefully, they’ll repeat the process and nominate new blogs, spreading the award around the blogging community.  As Ravanel pointed out, it’s a way to get bloggers to open up and talk about something personal rather than the topics they generally blog about.

Zerne’s Questions

1. If you would get to pick a lightsaber (or blaster for you tech weapons lovers), what color crystal would be in it?
   Blue is my favorite color, so I’d probably pick a blue crystal.
2. Do you prefer PC or Console gaming?  Why?
   That’s a hard one.  I prefer console gaming for social/group games, such as Mario Kart or Unreal Tournament, and (ironically) PC gaming for when I’m feeling solitary.  I think a lot of it has to do with the level of civility, or lack thereof, that I’ve noticed – when you’re playing with friends and/or sitting together in the same room, no one’s going to scream about how they had carnal relations with your mother when they lose.  Most of the PC games I play are solo anyway and even in MMOs, I stay within the guild at this point.
3. What is your favorite game that you have played (board games, console games, mmo’s, table top rpg’s, miniatures, the world is your oyster)?  Why?
   Probably The Sims 3.  I never got into the generations system, dressing up the characters, or actually playing the game much – I spent most of the time making houses.  I spent a good deal of my life thinking I was going to be an architect so this is probably why I love the home-building aspect so much.  I haven’t tried The Sims 4 yet.
4. Do you consider yourself a “hardcore gamer” or are you more “casual-core”?  Why do you consider yourself such?
   I addressed this somewhat in one of my earlier posts about being a gamer (or not), but basically, I don’t give a shit.  Here’s why: I can call myself a hardcore gamer, but there will always be someone who will say I’m not because I play the “wrong” games or don’t spend as much time as they do on gaming.  Simultaneously, if I say I’m a casual gamer, someone will say I’m hardcore because of the types of games I play or that I spend more than a couple of hours each week on them.  Somewhere in the middle is the truth.  So, hardcore?  Yes.  Casual?  Yes.
5. In games, do you have a preference for creating a character of a specific race? If you check your characters, which race is in the majority?
   No preference.  In SWTOR, I try to have at least one of each race (the only one that’s been difficult to work in is Miraluka, mostly because I dislike the forced headgear).  However, I have 3 humans solely for biological reasons.  My Jedi Knight’s backstory was that he had a twin so I had to make his brother human as well.  After I finished his story, I thought it might be interesting if he had a long-term relationship on the side (as they’re supposed to not have relationships).  Rather than make a Twi’lek female, which seemed utterly cliche, I opted to have her be a cyborg, which was a little different but essentially human.
6. If you could live in any fictional universe, which would it be?  Why?
   I’d love to live in the Star Trek universe.  Exploring new planets, starting new colonies, and the heavy emphasis on diplomacy and alliances is far more interesting than going in with guns blazing to assert the dominance of humans.
7. You may choose 3 people (living, dead, or fictional).  One is a dinner guest, one is a lover, and one is your arch enemy.  Who are they and why?
   1. Dinner guest: My mom.  She passed away a few years ago and I’d love to have a chance to sit down with her one more time and just talk.  I miss her a lot.
   2. Lover: Aren’t lovers supposed to remain secret?
   3. Archenemy: Confucius.  That asshole promoted the subservience of women.  I’m supposed to obey my (hypothetical) grown-up son when I’m old, simply because I’m female?  Fuck that shit.
8. What inspired you to start your blog in the first place?
   I’d been wanting to start a blog for a while but couldn’t settle on a topic.  Eventually, I just decided to dive in and write about whatever was on my mind while I had coffee (hence the name).  It quickly became apparent that SWTOR was the dominant topic; however, it was never my intent to solely be a SWTOR blog.  Recently, I’ve been thinking about making it more like the personal blog I had intended it to be – I’m not entirely sure what else I’d blog about but I would like to do more for FFXIV than food.
9. Do you play games for the story, the gameplay, or the social aspect?
   All three, but probably story and gameplay over anything else.  I’ve been told I’m incredibly picky about games – if the game has a great story but horrible gameplay, I won’t play it.  Similarly, if the game has challenging gameplay but horrible graphics/music, I won’t play it.  I generally don’t preorder games unless it’s a series I already enjoy and even then, I wait as long as possible so I can read more reviews.
10. What is your greatest gaming achievement?
    This one happened rather recently – being able to play games without experiencing videogame motion-sickness.  I attribute a lot of the progress to tanking and healing during operations, where even though I’m zoomed out, I’m constantly turning to check the position and status of enemies and teammates.  I still occasionally get a kick in the stomach, like when the camera resets or if I’m on a map with a lot of narrow hallways and confined spaces, but it’s a lot better than it used to be.
11. What do you collect (either in the physical or the virtual world)?
    I collect Japanese temple seals.  My former coworkers all said it’s an old person hobby but it’s a great souvenir and doesn’t cost much per signing.

11 Random Facts

1. I’ve eaten a lot of “weird” foods but one food I’ll never eat again is limburger cheese.
2. My favorite TV shows are Frasier, The X-files, Bob’s Burgers, Desperate Housewives, and Futurama.
3. The ASVAB test said I was best suited to become a tank driver.  Women are not allowed to drive tanks.  I went to college instead.
4. I read a wide variety of genres but my favorite books are the Discworld ones by Terry Pratchett.
5. I hate the sound of my voice, which is why I’m hesitant to speak in voice chat and don’t stream.
6. I’m absolutely in love with mid-century modern design.
7. A bird pooped on me while I was at the Mt. Fuji shrine.  It was somewhat ominous.
8. I went to the Star Wars: The Magic of the Myth exhibit at the Air and Space Museum for my birthday one year.
9. My favorite dessert is fresh fruit.  Maybe a chocolate chip cookie, gelato, or creme brulee.  But nothing crazy.
10. I was naturalized in the mid-90s.  We had celebration tacos afterwards.
11. I dislike Pinterest.  A LOT.

My Nominations

Most of the blogs I read have already received the Liebster Award (some of them several times over)!  So I’ll put a twist on this and nominate all the writers of Gamers’ Decrypted – Noctura, Canis, Murf, Mylex, and Pyxis!

My Questions

1. When did you start playing MMOs?
2. How do you choose your character name(s)?
3. What other types of games do you like?
4. Aside from gaming, what other hobbies do you enjoy?
5. What’s your D&D alignment?  Do you think it’s accurate or not?
6. What do you put on your pizza/hamburger/sandwich (pick one)?
7. Design your trip around the world – which 5-10 countries would you visit?
8. Are you a glass half full, or glass half empty kind of person?
9. What motivated you to start your blog?
10. How did you come up with your pseudonym and/or what does it mean?
11. What’s the most stressful part of blogging?