So Friday I finally decided to get back to working on my Legendary Defender of Ascalon title in Guild Wars. I'm not much of a title grinder at all. Just a few days ago I surprised a guildmate who asked about my titles and found that I've only maxed two, where he was getting ready to get another 25 maxed on another character (25 maxed titles get you the auspicious title of "God Walking Amongst Mere Mortals").
The whole appeal of Guild Wars to me has been the casual aspect of it. Titles are not required for power, strength or playability. They're just a little footnote to "wear" under your name, and sometimes give a little extra emote animation or some such bonus, none of which affect one's ability to beat the game, nor do they give you any bonus in PvP, as GW is set up so that PvP play is on an equal footing from the get-go. It's a measure of practice and skill rather than a measure of how much time you've spent trying to get uber gear, and this is why I respect it so.
The "uber" gear in GW is for looks only - the stats are available to anyone using PvP unlocked equipment sets. Sure it might not be pretty, but the pretty stuff doesn't have any advantage over pure vanity. And so with the titles. Since they don't get you any advantage (and I wouldn't play the game if they did anyway), I only work on the ones that appeal to my personal sensibilities, such as the Drunkard title I am determined to max out on my main character eventually.
So anyway, I decided to go work on this LDoA title, one of which a lot of people choose to neglect because it does require such a frustrating amount of time (set up minimum 30 minutes, more usually it takes more than hour, then just leaving it running for six to eight hours) left to hope your connection to the server doesn't get lost (which happens approximately half the time) while the Charr level up by killing you repeatedly at the rez shrine in the Northlands of Ascalon - the only way to get all the way to level 20 in pre-searing thereby attaining the Legendary title.
It's been several months since I last worked on it. It's an easy title to get burnt out on. Not anywhere as bad as Legendary Survivor (that's one I won't be even trying to achieve), but still repetitive and requiring a great deal of patience.
Friday morning I set up my first session, and then left the Charr to their leveling while I went outside and played in the yard, occasionally coming back inside to check on their progress and kill a pack as they reached my mesmer's level, 16, for the 100 xp each they give me. By Friday evening I cleared all those packs and set up another session for killing Saturday morning, and then set up another pack Saturday afternoon and killed a couple of those packs Saturday night, leaving just two more packs of Charr to level overnight.
Fortune had it that I awoke shortly after 3am and couldn't sleep, so I got up and slew another pack that had reached level 17, netting 120xp each, and left the last lonely trio to level up, killing me over and over while I went back to sleep. I consider myself lucky that this was the only pack I lost - when I got up a few hours later my connection to the server had been lost, and with it my little trio of Charr.
Not bad for having gotten three death leveling sessions out of one log-in back on Friday morning. Suppose I will set up another session again here in a bit, to let them level while we go to see the new Tim Burton "Alice" movie. But first, off to scan the job postings!
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