Thursday, January 1, 2009
Wednesday, December 31, 2008
Sailing in Mainland
I had never taken a tall ship into mainland waters before. Too risky. The canals are narrow and one has to move around ban lines and security devices.
Yet, all the buzz about the Linden waters around Nautilus and the future plans about the Blake Sea and moving the USS convinced me to try.
I TP'ed around Nautilus City and I spent quite some time looking for a place where I could rezz the Battlestar. If the Lindens plan to support sailing grid-wide they have still a lot of work to do. Almost all the sims were no-rezz and sometimes even more strictly limited than the usual sims in any private estate, so that even wearable technology did not work.
At the end I found a friendly dock on a privately owned plot on the southern shore opposite Nautilus City and there I was able to rezz the Battlestar.
Yet, all the buzz about the Linden waters around Nautilus and the future plans about the Blake Sea and moving the USS convinced me to try.
I TP'ed around Nautilus City and I spent quite some time looking for a place where I could rezz the Battlestar. If the Lindens plan to support sailing grid-wide they have still a lot of work to do. Almost all the sims were no-rezz and sometimes even more strictly limited than the usual sims in any private estate, so that even wearable technology did not work.
At the end I found a friendly dock on a privately owned plot on the southern shore opposite Nautilus City and there I was able to rezz the Battlestar.
Once the ship was rezzed the experience was great! Nautilus City is surrounded by several sims of Linden water and it was easy to take the ship all around the place, easily circumnavigating all the area.
It is clearly a much better situation that all the other mainland continents. I wish Sansara or the Atoll or Jeogeot were so easily sailable.
After circumnavigating Nautisul City I decided to see how far I coud go, so I turned the bow north and I reached the northeastern corner of the Nautilus continent. It was mostly an easy navigation. Only once I barely avoided a security orb - nastily set to just 10 secs warning. Fortunately I was just at the edge of Linden protected water so I avoided to be kicked home.
As I reached the NE section of Nautilus SL began to misbehave and I crashed. A pity that the channel connecting it to the Corsica continent is on the NW side. It would have been fun to cross into Corsica :). It was late anyway and it had been already a lot of fun.
The Battlestar was very successful. Several people came out to admire her during the navigation and shouted to me tha tis was a nice ship. Chase Speculaas did such a great job: the frigate model is fantastic for sea battle and roleplaying, but even for fun sailing she is a a beauty ! :)
Fair Winds and Happy New Year !
W
Saturday, December 27, 2008
Introducing the WFS Battlestar
I have been thinking about her since late September, when I noticed her being tested at Beek Haven, even before the release, and now I got it. Don't you find she has a wonderful line ? :)
Fair Winds
W
Friday, December 26, 2008
Gifts
Last year. for Christmas, I mostly gave my SL friends framed pictures of images I took in RL. This year, since I was in full creativity wave, I decided to make something that I could give as a present.
I have had in mind to create the mechanical model of the solar system for some times and so I did, trying to give it a steampunk look. You can see the result in the picture.
I tried to keep the ration between the distances and between the speeds realistic, even if that forced me to limit to four planets, since Mars it is already far enough from the Sun. I think it is okay. Beside the distances, Jupiter would have been so big that the inner planets would have looked invisible.
I am quite happy with the result. One of the friend I gave it even asked me to purchase a few more items to give in turn to her friends. I was happy she liked it that much ! :)
Danielle and few others tell me that the rotation of the Earth and Mars is too fast. Despite the fact that I maintained the correct ratio between rotation and revolution I quite agree with them and I am working on a more heavily scripted version where the different speeds can be set by the user.
I would also like to add the Moon. After all it is just slightly smaller than Mercury, but it is going to require some work to create the movements of a satellite.
I think it is going to be fun! :)
Happy Holidays
W
I have had in mind to create the mechanical model of the solar system for some times and so I did, trying to give it a steampunk look. You can see the result in the picture.
I tried to keep the ration between the distances and between the speeds realistic, even if that forced me to limit to four planets, since Mars it is already far enough from the Sun. I think it is okay. Beside the distances, Jupiter would have been so big that the inner planets would have looked invisible.
I am quite happy with the result. One of the friend I gave it even asked me to purchase a few more items to give in turn to her friends. I was happy she liked it that much ! :)
Danielle and few others tell me that the rotation of the Earth and Mars is too fast. Despite the fact that I maintained the correct ratio between rotation and revolution I quite agree with them and I am working on a more heavily scripted version where the different speeds can be set by the user.
I would also like to add the Moon. After all it is just slightly smaller than Mercury, but it is going to require some work to create the movements of a satellite.
I think it is going to be fun! :)
Happy Holidays
W
Wednesday, December 24, 2008
an airship crashed at Star Port
Another proof that travelling in SL may be dangerous :)
This is what I found this morning at Star Port when I logged in
This is what I found this morning at Star Port when I logged in
Saturday, December 20, 2008
if only ...
this morning I woke up reading some interesting news in my google reader, concerning the move of the United Sailing Sims to an area east of Nautilus City and their connection to the mainland through a new Linden region called the Blake Sea. You can read about it here and here.
I was very happy at first to see that there is some growth in a period of shrinking and that this move will surely improve the sailing experience. After a while I had some doubts about the lindenization of such an important group of estates, and I see that in the forum the sual flamewars has started about favoritism toward some groups of residents vs. others.
But after a while my thoughts drifted. The United Sailing Sims are one of the biggest regions in SL, yet, looking at the map shown in the SL blog announcement, I realized how small they are with respect to the mainland landmass. And this made me think what the SL experience could have been (and it still could be) and what a lost opportunity mainland has been so far, if only the Lindens had taken a bit more care of it.
As I have posted before I love to explore, both sailing and walking through the land. And the mainland is a great place for explorations. One can chose an area or a path on the map and spend literally days going around, finding new flaces and meeting new people. Yet the experience is almost always spoiled by ugly landscapes here and there, wastelands (fortunately ad farms are mostly gone), banlines (how much I dislike banlines, especially those covering the waterways !), aggressive security devices, inconsistent settings of rezzing and script rights, even on Linden land.
I value very much the privacy of the people in their plots, yet I cant help but wonder how much better the experience on mainland might have been if some of the issues I listed had been given a consistent set of rules.
The Lindens have shown in the past months that they are somehow getting away from their laissez faire attitude and this move about the USS goes in that direction too. I hope this also mean that in due time a more consistent set of rule of behavior will be created for mainland, that save both the privacy of the residents and the possibility to explore a mainland that has a neverending potential for creativity and beauty.
Have a nice week-end and Happy Holidays
W
I was very happy at first to see that there is some growth in a period of shrinking and that this move will surely improve the sailing experience. After a while I had some doubts about the lindenization of such an important group of estates, and I see that in the forum the sual flamewars has started about favoritism toward some groups of residents vs. others.
But after a while my thoughts drifted. The United Sailing Sims are one of the biggest regions in SL, yet, looking at the map shown in the SL blog announcement, I realized how small they are with respect to the mainland landmass. And this made me think what the SL experience could have been (and it still could be) and what a lost opportunity mainland has been so far, if only the Lindens had taken a bit more care of it.
As I have posted before I love to explore, both sailing and walking through the land. And the mainland is a great place for explorations. One can chose an area or a path on the map and spend literally days going around, finding new flaces and meeting new people. Yet the experience is almost always spoiled by ugly landscapes here and there, wastelands (fortunately ad farms are mostly gone), banlines (how much I dislike banlines, especially those covering the waterways !), aggressive security devices, inconsistent settings of rezzing and script rights, even on Linden land.
I value very much the privacy of the people in their plots, yet I cant help but wonder how much better the experience on mainland might have been if some of the issues I listed had been given a consistent set of rules.
The Lindens have shown in the past months that they are somehow getting away from their laissez faire attitude and this move about the USS goes in that direction too. I hope this also mean that in due time a more consistent set of rule of behavior will be created for mainland, that save both the privacy of the residents and the possibility to explore a mainland that has a neverending potential for creativity and beauty.
Have a nice week-end and Happy Holidays
W
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