Elder Scrolls Online: Summerset

When I am not playing Final Fantasy XIV,  I play Elder Scrolls Online. I enjoy it because I can play it with friends or do a lot of adventuring on my own. I was looking forward to the latest expansion of Summerset so I pre-ordered it. If you got the collector's edition, it came with some pretty nice perks in the way of items. My personal favorite that I got to use right away was the Nightmare Senche mount.

The Nightmare Senche mount is very cool. 

The other great items that came with the Summerset collector's edition pre-order are: Court of Bedlam costume (costumes are like glamours that go over your armor), two non combat pets; pocket salamander and a baby gryphon, treasure maps, Psijiic vault crown crate, experience scrolls, and a Psijiic spectral horse mount. 

Court of Bedlam armor and baby gryphon pet. 

The spectral horse mount is fun to summon because it comes up from the ground. Its speed is fairly okay as well. You can add it to your collection if you bought the collector's edition of Summerset. Mounts are just for fun and a great way to travel around the world of Tamriel. 

The spectral horse mount is great too.

To start the Summerset quest line is easy enough. You can find it in your user interface menu. Once you accept the quest, you can travel to the realm of the high elves in the isle of Summerset. This is also where you start the Psijiic Order quests.

Accept this quest to go to Summerset.

Summerset is beautiful. The pretty colors of the trees and the surrounding areas as well as the cities show how much thought went into the new area. The high elves are pretty too of course, but as with the lore many of them are incredibly snooty and racist towards anyone who is not one of them. My little Khajiit, Piroluna had to tolerate many of them calling her an intrusive cat or a meddling foreigner and yet they needed her help for the main story quests. 

Piroluna arrives in Summerset.

The main story itself is pretty interesting and you meet with your old friend Razum-Dar who is investigating for Queen Ayrenn since he's known as the Queen's Eyes. The quests themselves are a lot of go to this location and defeat this villain or fetch this item which can get tedious at times, but the big thing is the story. The characters that are introduced are complex and interesting and of course exploring Summerset is a lot of fun because of the scenery and towns. 

Talking to Razum-Dar.

The Psijiic Order quests are a bit boring. Part of the problem is one quest that has you trying to find time breaches on a map. The thing is, the breaches are not marked on the map. You have to use a key item in your inventory and then play the most frustrating game of Hot and Cold ever. I don't mind a challenge, but this was incredibly time consuming to the point of frustration. I had to look up a guide showing breach locations on the map just to get it done. 

Another part of the quests was having to wait around for abyssal portals to open so you could defeat enemies. You can do this with a group of other players which is fine, but it can be a long wait for these portals. I spent a lot of time fishing while waiting. They need to make the waiting time a little shorter or at least give you an idea of how long the wait will be. You do get rewards for completing the Psijiic Order quests in the form of weapons, gear, crafting materials, and scrolls. A lot of the gear seems more beneficial to the mage class, but there are some items for damage dealer and tank classes too. 

Piroluna visits the Psijicc Order.

There are a couple of public group dungeons you can do as well. However, be warned these are very challenging. The enemies here are stronger and hit harder. Using your skills and teamwork are key here. That being said, the dungeons are fun and the rewards of armor and weapons for your job class are pretty nice. There are group raids you can do also that are fun to do with your friends. The great thing about Summerset is you can play solo if you wish or you can join group events. There is something for everyone here. 

Summerset overall is colorful and full of a lot of things to do and see. The main story is pretty good with nice rewards while the Psijiic Order quests are a little boring, but they offer good rewards too. It has something for veterans of the game and allows newbies to dip their toe in the water without overwhelming them. Summerset is a solid chapter in Elder Scrolls Online and offers a lot of adventure that is fun to play by yourself or with a group of your friends. 

One of the costume rewards from Summerset. 

*Elder Scrolls Online is available to play on the following platforms: PC, Playstation4, and Xbox One

The Adventures Of Pirotess: Gathering With Miner

Botanist is not the only gathering job in Final Fantasy XIV. Miner is another gathering job that is useful. Miners gather ores, precious stones, and fossils that can be used in various crafting jobs. To unlock the Miner job, visit the Miner's Guild in Ul'dahh and talk to the receptionist at the desk. Once you have your trusty pickaxe equipped, you can go gathering.

Talk to this NPC at the Miner's guild to unlock the job. 

There are tons of places you can gather on Miner. In order to find these items, you need to make use of your skills and abilities. Abilities like Lay of the Land show you where you can harvest items on the area map. They will look like small golden pickaxe icons on your map. These locations are where you go to gather materials needed for crafting jobs like blacksmith or armorer.

Use Lay of the Land to locate materials to be gathered.

In your gathering log, you can look to see what items are in the area that you can gather on Miner. As you level up a new gathering log will unlock revealing more items that can be gathered in different locations. A check mark will appear next to items you have successfully gathered. 

A list of items that you can gather in an area are in your gathering log. 

Places that can be harvested will have a sparkling point known as a gathering node. This shows that this is where you can gather materials. You can also use abilities like Sharp Vision which will enhance your mining abilities and help to ensure successfully gathering materials. 

Gathering nodes will sparkle like this. 

When you start gathering, your gathering log will pop up listing items you can harvest from the node with a percentage next to them. This shows you the average success rate of gathering these particular items from this node. Don't forget to use your abilities to help get the best rate of gathering on your Miner. 

Pirotess uses her gathering log to harvest materials.

 Just like with the other disciple of the hand and land crafting/gathering jobs, when you hit certain level caps you get a job specific quest from the guild master. For Miner, talk to the guild master NPC Adalberta for the quest. When you complete these quests you get your choice of gear for Miner. 

Talk to Adalberta for your job specific quests.

Miner is just as useful as Botanist for all your crafting jobs. As you can see, you can gather the elemental shards you need for crafting as well as the various materials needed for crafting on these jobs. Pair Botanist and Miner together and you will be able to have a majority of the things you need for your crafting. Get out there and start gathering. See you at the next adventure! 

*Final Fantasy XIV is available to play on the following platforms: PC and Playstation 4

Saying Goodbye To A Dear Friend

This is one of the hardest Mother Gamer posts to write because it is about a dear friend of mine who passed away suddenly. I had a difficult time writing about my friend MrsMagik/Tara when she passed away a few years ago from Cervical Cancer. It is never easy to say goodbye to the people we love and it is one of the parts of life that is truly heartbreaking. Today I'm writing about saying goodbye to a dear friend who has been part of my life for fifteen years, Rob who many of us knew by his gaming handle when we played Final Fantasy XI with him, Nedstark.


I first came to know Rob (Ned) when I started playing Final Fantasy XI. He came into our linkshell Crimson Kindred invited by our friend Cothius. He was cheerful, friendly, and cracked hilarious jokes that would have you laughing. I mentioned I liked his name and that was how we got to talking about the Game Of Thrones books and about how we both loved the character Ned Stark even though his story ended abruptly. I don't think he ever had a bad thing to say about anyone. That's just who he was. Level grinding could be a bit tedious sometimes in the game, but Rob made it fun with his banter, jokes, and the fact that he was just happy to be having fun with his friends.

It was Rob who gave me the nickname Killer. It was an inside joke about something that happened when we were level grinding in the game. Rob was leveling his paladin and I was leveling my samurai. We had a black mage in our pick up group and the mage was more than a little rude to him about holding hate. The thing is the mage was going to town with spells which many of us Final Fantasy veterans know is something you can not really do because it will make the beasties go for you. You have to space it out and tone it down. Rob was polite and explained this many times. We commented in our linkshell chat that we did not know how he could be so nice about this. Rob laughed it off saying it was just a game and he was trying to give the mage a chance. We keep going and again the mage is nuke happy, but Rob was actually a very good paladin and did his best and managed to keep up. However, the mage is again being rude and throws some insults his way. By that point I decided I had enough and did not like the way this person was treating my friend. I told them that I thought they were being incredibly rude and that even though my friend was being polite and doing his best they were on him and maybe they needed to remember it's just a game or they could do everyone a favor, take their nasty attitude, and go. There was a pause and then the mage apologized to all of us. Rob in our linkshell chat tells me, "Dang, Killer I think you may have made him cry. Remind me to never make you mad or at least give me a warning so I can hide all the knives." which had all of us laughing, but the name stuck. Rob was the only one who ever called me Killer and the only one who was allowed to. Even when we spoke on the phone he would always say, "Hey, Killer what's up?" and it would always make me smile.


Our group of friends was pretty close knit and we would do a lot of things together in the game. Brenner was one of the things that we did as a group (it's like a game of Capture the flag) and it was something fun to do together in between level grinds and quests.

Everyone in Crimson Kindred meeting for Brenner.

Another event we liked doing together was Dynamis. Dynamis was much more challenging and there were so many wipes, but again it was something Rob made fun with his jovial nature and jokes. That was the thing about him that stood out the most, he was always happy to be there and having fun in the game with us his friends.

Doing a Daynamis run. 

Many of us became more than gaming friends, we became real life friends. We exchanged phone numbers, emails, and eventually Facebook. Rob and I would have a lot of great conversations about books, gaming, and what was going on in our lives in general. When I was going through the divorce with my ex-husband it was a very low point in my life. My three daughters were very young at the time and I was doing everything I could to keep it together, but I was struggling. Still, I did my best to put on a brave face, but I think Rob knew and he would call often and say he was just checking to see how I was doing. I was grateful that he did that because it helped me immensely to feel less alone. He encouraged me and offered supportive wisdom about how to handle everything. I am glad I was able to thank him for being there when I needed a friend. All he said to me about that was, "That's what friends do for each other, Killer. I'm glad I was able to help in some small way." No, Rob. It was a big way and I'm forever grateful for it.

Final Fantasy XI is also how I came to be friends with my husband Ron (Sheitara) and he was friends with Rob too. When I first mentioned having reservations about my first date with Ron, it was Rob who said he thought Ron was a good guy. He told me, "Give him a chance, he may surprise you." I did give Ron a chance and he did surprise me with how incredibly kind he was, how much he understood me, and how we liked a lot of the same things and had fun together. Rob was genuinely happy for both of us when we got married saying it was a perfect match. 

My character and Ron's character from Final Fantasy XI together. 

There were so many adventures we had together in Final Fantasy XI. Rob couldn't be there for all of them, but we understood. Real life comes first. He had a wife and two young sons and work of course. Whenever he spoke about his family there was always love and joy in his voice. He loved his family and you could hear it when he spoke about them and see it on his Facebook in every photo and video he shared of time with them. We did a Christmas party in the game and he couldn't make it, but I sent him the picture we took and he stated that it made him smile, that he missed everyone, and he was glad we had fun.

Final Fantasy XI Christmas party.

Rob played when he had free time here and there. We'd go exploring in the new areas with updates, we'd check out scheduled events, and do level grind sessions when we all had time. Our favorite event was the one where you ate a cookie and it turned you into a little kid. Rob thought it was hilarious us running around as little kids in town in the game. No matter what we were doing, we always had fun together.

Doing the turn into kids event with Nedstark.

Last week Rob was taken from us suddenly when he died in a tragic accident while he was on site at work. He was only 38 years old. All of us who knew him are struggling with why this happened and coping with the loss of his light from this world. Rob was one of those rare souls who could talk to a total stranger and make them feel like they had known him for years. He was always able to make you laugh or smile with his humor and good cheer. His love for his family and friends was immense. Rob was a kindred spirit and all of us who loved him are missing him terribly. Our hearts are heavy as we mourn his loss with his family. Saying goodbye to a dear friend is painful and sad because of how much they meant to us and how they made us feel when they were here. Rob made so many of us feel happy and loved just being around him or having a great conversation with him. He was a husband, a father, a son, and a friend. He was someone that shared his love of life with all of us and it is hard to believe that we'll never hear his hearty laugh or see his happy go lucky smile again. I hope he knew how many people loved him and appreciated the incredible person he was. Until we see you again, Rob. Thank you for sharing your light and joy with us. We love you. 

Goodbye, Rob. We love you and miss you. 

*Note: This link is a fundraiser for Rob's family. This is to help them with whatever they may need during this difficult time. Please donate if you can or share it. Thank you. Much love to you all. To donate and share click the link here:  https://www.gofundme.com/love-for-the-smith-family