Path of Exile: I got a challenge reward!!!

I'm really happy to have achieved an in-game souvenir for my time in Betrayal -- that's the golden helmet attachment at the back of my character's head. I completed my first 12 challenges and that pretty much will wrap the Betrayal League for me. I've been too busy with work and feeling under the weather to have the time for more. So I'm posting this up to cheer @supersoju on as well, she's been super busy and has only just got back to completing hers. Having done the awful grind for the last few challenges on and off, I feel sorry for the poor woman. But ever the determined girl gamer that she is at heart, I'm sure she'll get it done! I'll use this opportunity to remind her: Time's ticking, kooky!!! lol

Despite me not seeking it, I got help with getting these challenges. There's always the odd joke that people will help me more because I'm a female, but I just think Path of Exile is an especially friendly community. I try not to take things unless it's pretty (I love looking at pretty things..) or if it's an item with interesting mods that I can test out. Here is my favorite weapon, one that dropped for me personally, that I love:

See, here I made crankyoldwoman looking lovely. She has a pretty rose staff and a nice chest piece befitting of a necromancer witch.

Only...

This configuration is useless to me!

Here is the reality, as far as being equipped to fight the mobs more effectively.

Note: supersoju kindly visited my hideout to be in our selfie. I look like I've gained weight, and she has a bucket over head...

As for the zombie looking on? He's probably not impressed with either of us!

The social aspect of the game has been a lot of fun and I have met a few people I like. It's not been a smooth path either, I have had my disagreements, which resulted in me leaving my previous guild. I just wasn't in the mood to listen to their reasonings. So I've now based myself with a smaller group from someone who responded to my Facebook post. When I mentioned to them I finished my 12 challenges:

This was a response I got...

Hmmph!

I will not be completing 24 challenges for Betrayal. It was exhausting for me to even get to 12 since both supersoju and I started late this league. For Synthesis, I am going to aim for the next tier which I assume will be 24 as well.

Anyway, I'm interested to see the social dynamics of this group once the new league starts too. That's been one of the reasons I wanted to spend time with a guild, to see the buzz and interaction at league start.

Last weekend, this group pulled me into a breachstone run --not even sure what that is and I'm too lazy to figure it out for now. I ended up being an extra body on the runs so the item drop rate increased. I wasn't contributing to the fight as they were killing everything while I just kept up. But I thought I'd best try to be helpful since I am constantly spamming their discord server with unhelpful commentary. lol 3 maps in and without doing anything much, I jumped from Level 77 to 82. It demonstrated to me the power of groups for certain conditions.

I also thought it was funny how someone explained at length to me to follow until we get to an altar at the end. When we got there, we all needed to exit and leave one player remaining to fight the boss. This was to ensure that the boss isn't made tougher by the presence of more players. I was given one instruction: do not go on the altar and through the boss portal.

So what did I do by accident?

I went through the boss portal, and died very shortly thereafter.

I'm hopeless. XD

Once a couple of the guys realized I was only interested in picking up Uniques for one of the ID 100 unique items challenge, I was given a stack of unique maps to identify instead. In a couple of minutes, I checked off that challenge. Anyway, I always try to get a broad range of opinions, but this group seems knowledgeable and helpful. I am appreciating them a lot at the moment, so let's hope this second attempt at a community works a bit better!

To close this post off, I wanted to demonstrate how badly I played, so I made a vid last week. I've edited out a lot of the time wasting, missing entries, running the wrong way, but you should get a general gist of how not to play. You'll see a lot of problems like bad flask management and my spells aren't optimal either. It was so interesting though when I went back to watch myself and notice things I didn't notice when I was playing. Like those chains that came out of the ground. What are they?! I also thought it would be funny to demonstrate what a non-gamer who just started gaming around a month ago looks like in Maps. Don't worry, I added music and some text to keep it from being too boring.

If you pay attention, you'll see all the stuff that is wrong about my character. She is weak, but I love play her anyway. So despite people telling me that if I didn't follow a build guide I'd have a terrible time, I can confirm that was never the case. She is mostly the result of just playing the game and making adhoc decisions. I did a lot of experimentation along the way too. It's also been said to me that our first PoE character will suck, and that's definitely true. Trying to fix her has been difficult. Regardless, I've enjoyed my Betrayal League experience and I'm definitely won over by the game Grinding Gear Games have released.

I'm really excited for the Synthesis league to start. And if you have played any Path of Exile, keep an eye open for @mattclarke's upcoming Hardcore race at league start. It's a good opportunity to challenge yourself and win some steem!! Which brings me to my final shout-out. I've really appreciated that Matt drew my attention to this game. It's been an invaluable entry into the world of gaming for the purposes of research for my novel. He's definitely to be blamed for me being bitten by the gamer addiction! :)