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15th
Anniversary of the Valar Guild
October 4, 2012
by Varda-(Valar)
page started Aug. 27, 2012 for
planning and to be completed as news
Intro
AIM Marathon chat
Forum
Dragon Shots
WoW
LotRO
Dungeon Siege
Tolkien Site
Gamers
WoW
LotRO
Games
Site Mass Update
State
of Valar Gaming 2012
Intro:
When is the 15th Anniversary?
October 4, 2012. That's a Thursday.
The theme this year is Dragons.
What happened worthy of an anniversary celebration?
We were founded October 4, 1997 in our current
form by Eru-(Valar) with the able assistance of Manwe-(Valar).
Eru-(Valar) set the vision of a haven from the unpleasantness
ruining the Diablo 1 community by bringing together like-minded folk
who were literate, courteous and wanted to actually play the game. He
set the goal of literacy and similar ideals and tastes by requiring
that members must have completed reading the Lord of the Rings
and liked it (It's hard to finish for people who don't like it!)
Manwe-(Valar) set the ambience of friendly light-heartedness,
remembering that we are *playing a game* with other good folk.
From
there we went on as a co-operating, communicating unit into new games
while working together to create a Tolkien Site as a service to all
other fans of Tolkien's works. This business of creating is why we are
called a "guild".
As the
group became larger and included more areas, organization passed
to the Council of Mahanaxar. Some members helped the Council even as
the Maiar and Free Peoples helped their brothers, the Valar, in the
books.
Just being around this long still including original
members as well as new blood is pretty amazing for any online group.
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Marathon Chat:
Where? AIM room (reachable also by Trillian and
Pidgin) Valar Guild Meetingplace
When? Starting Sunday meeting Sept. 30, ending after
the Sunday meeting Oct. 7, 2012.
Who? All members of any kind and guild-friends.
Doing what? Guild members and guild-friends
endeavor to keep our AIM meeting place continuously open or as near to
it as possible from one Sunday meeting through the next to include the
anniversary date. This is a way to participate in the
anniversary nuttiness with other members even if you can't game or put
up anything for the Tolkien Site, and is credit for participating in
the guild that gives membership extension into the next year as well.
This is also a nifty way to see
members from all parts of our pan-game or Tolkien Site only,
international guild. At times we will just chat or do trivia or quotes
for fun.
We are also collecting book quotes from the Hobbit, Lord of the Rings, and the Silmarillion for the others to vote
on for inclusion in the rotating quote for the News page.
Participants:
Members: Arien, Ar-Pharazon,
Eonwe, Fladrif, Gilraen, Glorfindel, Ioreth, Varda
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Forum:
We have a thread
where you can say plan, report, or say things like "Yay 15th!" and
"howdy".
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Dragon Shots:
We're showing some of the screenshots of dragons in
our games to go with the dragon-theme for this year's anniversary.
Click the thumbnail for the enlarged picture.
From World of WarCraft:
Shots by Arien-(Valar) who plays Merrla
and Justicia:
Merrla fighting Malygos in
phase 3, while riding Kerastraza
Justicia meeting Yulon the Jade
Serpent (the Guardian of the Jade Forest) for the first
time.
Shot of Tarecgosa by Ar-Pharazon-(V):
"Screenshot against the moon from my legendary quest-event; me
(Calaron) in dragonform in the front, the associated dragon pet just to
my right, and what appears to be some sort of ghost image to the back
of my character on the back of Tarecgosa,
a blue dragon central to the questline, hovering high above Stormwind."
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From Lord of the Rings Online:
Shots of Echrud by Tulkas-(Valar) who plays hunter
Astald:
Echrud the Fire Drake landing on the house of the Old Woman of the
Mountain, fought in the instance "Storm on Methedras".
Echrud the Fire Drake about to blast.
Echrud the Fire Drake, not a good house guest.
Shots of Draigoch the Fire Dragon after death by
Varda-(Valar), giving
an idea of scale, and yes that's a really big heap of gold coins. Varda
is the hobbit minstrel Tinwetari.:
Draigoch: most of his front where he fell across a rock.
Draigoch is bearded.
That's a part of his wing on the left, sticking through the rock. He
fell hard.
The people are still a fair distance in front of him, but this gives a
clue of scale.
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From Dungeon
Siege:
Shots by Ar-Pharazon-(V):
Scorch breathing fire.
"Dungeon Siege: a couple of screenshots I managed to drag up from the
depths of past documents of years gone by, which happened to be about
my solo (I do have npc companions, but I tend to leave them behind and
proceed only with my main, and therefore they're greyed out in the
shots) character (not sure about his name, but since it appears to be
my archer, I think I named him Legolas) fighting a large named dragon
called Scorch. If I recall, it's the enemy with the biggest amount of
health in the game, but rather easier than later bosses because of the
damage it does and the fact that it can't follow you around. First
screenshot has us locked in combat with the dragon breathing fire over
me, and the second screenshot shows a dying Scorch."
Scorch dying.
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Tolkien Site Contributions:
Art:
Articles:
Ioreth
by Ioreth-(V)
Smaug by Varda-(Valar)
Poetry
The Fall of Smaug by
Arien-(Valar)
Stories:
Athelas by Ioreth-(V)
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Gaming:
World of WarCraft:
Dragon-slaying!
Deathwing must die. October 5, regular
Friday run time: slay Deathwing. Take screenshots of the dragon for
posting for the anniversary. Called off due to small sign-up.
Fireworks!
Made, won, and bought fireworks to
shoot off at
major cities in WoW. 7pm Eastern.
Participants: Bilbo, Eonwe,
Glorfindel, and Varda.
Gnomeregan gate where we set off fireworks. Click to enlarge.
Left to right: Glorfindel, Varda, Eonwe, and Bilbo.
More pictures will be going up on the Games Site.
Gaming!
The guild gained Ashen
Verdict rep.
Participants:
Bilbo, Eonwe, Glorfindel, and Sauron (back from work).
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Lord of the Rings Online:
Dragon-slaying!
The
planned Draigoch run may be Oct. 6, Saturday, 1pm Eastern to go with
the anniversary's dragon theme. Please sign up to let us know you can
come on the forum at this
thread. Take a screenshot of Draigoch for the anniversary! Called
off due to small sign-up.
Fireworks
celebration!
Who can come?: Members, friends, and family
are welcome to join in.
Time: Oct. 4, 2012 at 1pm Eastern and and at 8pm
Eastern October 4th to accomodate different time zones, classes, and
work
schedules. You're welcome to come to both.
What to
wear: This is a good time to wear those fancy party clothes (cosmetic
system) or show off fancy armor.
Fireworks can be collected during festivals such as
Summerfest. Shooting them is also a deed.
Meet at the kin house to distribute fireworks
(somebody is sure not to have any, so we'll fix that!). A
hunter can drop us just outside the west gate so that we can slow ride
our horses to the Prancing Pony choose a person (different each time)
to shout "Happy 15th Anniversary, Valar Guild!", and shoot off
fireworks. Then we can
hop to other major towns: Michel Delving fast ride to Hobbiton;
Thorin's and slow ride in a circle around Frerin's Court once before
shooting fireworks; Celondim either at the docks there (or fast ride to
Duillond if we get lucky and have lots of time); then Galtrev and
Stangard with slow rides in town before the fireworks.
Swift travel, hunter guides/ports and captain
summons speed up travel between the large cites.
For late members, join us at whichever town we're in or hop to the next
one (or we may have a captain for summons). Just ask where.
For folks who couldn't come at the scheduled
times (or forgot, would we do that?), solo or grab kin and
guild-friends at a time of day that works for you,
collect fireworks from the kin house, and travel together to do the
ka-boom!
Participants: Varda
Screenshots may be posted here or on the Forum.
Screenshot: slow
ride from West Gate to the Prancing Pony,
fireworks
Ride!
Another suggestion (from Tulkas) is a ride from
either the Shire or South Bree to Rivendell on another day, perhaps
higher levels escorting lower levels for exploration and stables as
well as fun. This was a success the last time we tried it and its time
to do it again!
We might also try a race from Bree's south gate to
Rivendell's door of the Last Homely House using +68 horses only.
Costumes:
We can try a costume contest with the
participants only able to vote for others rather than themselves, in
categories such as: look most like a member of the Fellowship, most
dramatic, and silliest. Other suggestions are welcome.
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