Long Weekend Spree, 30 December 2023 to 1 January 2024

[Ensign Cthulhu]

Streamed. Finished off the credit grinds for battleships and destroyers in this week's Michelangelo dockyard mission.

Decided to play only at low level for Monday and Tuesday. The next phase requires 150,000 ship XP in each of two ship types, so I'm going to be quite busy then! I'm going to use it to get two of my grinds finished and start upgrading their successors.

[Wolfswetpaws]

I think I viewed more American Footbal games watched by my Wife (when she wasn't binge-watching the TV series "Grimm") than I viewed Twitch streams.
I did catch some of @Lord_Zath's and @Ensign Cthulhu's Twitch streams, though.

I played both World of Warships and Star Trek Online. 

I reached stage 22 of the Holidays with Santa battle-pass, in WOWs.

In STO, I played a series of Episodes of the "Romulan Mystery" story-arc, in order to acquire the "Reman Prototype Covariant Shield" (as a reward from the "Coliseum" episode), for one of my ships, a Malem class Warbird named the Dirty Shirley. 
(Side note.  I name most of my ships after a coctail recipe or alcoholic beverage.  Researching beverages and drink recipes has been an interesting side-venture in my personal education.)
Based upon what I read in the STO wiki pages, some STO forum topics and relevant reddit articles, I hoped that it could become part of a 3-piece set of equipment for my ship.  The other two pieces of the set, Reman Advanced Prototypes of a deflector-dish and an impulse-engine, I had previously gained via particpation in the STO character "Reputation System".
After playing for several hours over the course of a few days, I had completed the Romulan Mystery story-arc and gained the shield-array that I wanted.
But, when I initially installed it into my ship, it didn't work with the other two set-pieces.  It worked, as a shield, yes.  But it wasn't recognized as a set-piece and the in-game performance bonuses for having a completed set weren't materializing.
So, my next task was to use the equipment "upgrade" feature of the game to improve the shield and make it compatible.  This step was mentioned in the wiki pages, so it wasn't a complete surprise to me.  The process required the spending of "energy credits" to purchase some "superior tech-upgrade" consumable items/materials and the spending of a portion of my dilithium inventory as demanded by the in-game equipment upgrade feature.
Result?  
Success.
The upgrade process automatically renamed the equipment Reman Advanced Prototype Covariant Shield Array and made it compatible with the other pieces of the "set".
I re-installed the shield on my ship and the 3-piece set now provided all the applicable bonuses.

Links for more information.  (By the way, the character I'm playing is a Federation faction character.  Yet, STO is like WOWs, in the sense that there are ways for characters of nearly all factions to acquire and sail starships from nearly every shipyard in known space.)
https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Story_Arc:_Romulan_Mystery
https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Mission:_Coliseum
https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Reman_Prototype_Covariant_Shield_Array
https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/New_Romulus_Command_Advanced_Prototype_Space_Set
https://sto.fandom.com/wiki/Malem_Light_Warbird
My post on the STO Forum, including a screenshot taken while on New Romulus.  https://www.arcgames.com/en/forums/startrekonline#/discussion/1272584/reman-prototype-covariant-shield-successfully-upgraded-to-advanced-reman-prototype-covariant-shield

I posted in various forum topics, including a bit of creative writing in the topic "If Our Captains Could Talk... again".
https://www.devstrike.net/topic/40-if-our-captains-could-talk-again/?do=findComment&comment=27739


Here's hoping everyone enjoys a happy new year.    

 

[GandalfTehGray]

Finished most of the dockyard missions, one stage left this week, credits in battleships. 

Finished my Chung Mu grind and purchased Yueyang. 

 

Wrapped up snowflakes, was able to purchase 16 "free" megas. Rolled 2 ships, the only Rares I didn't have. Asashio and Colussus. 

 

Spent doubs for 40 megas and picked up 8 more ships (Tulsa, Flandre Fenyang, Numancia, Indomitable, Constellation, S-189 and schill) and other goodies. 

 

(56 Megas, 10 ships) 

180 days of premium 

1.3 million capt xp

7.5k doubs 

9 million silver

100 blue ship xp boosts 

140 blue credit boosters 

20 blue capt xp boosts

40 blue free xp boosts 

7 red ship xp, free xp boosts 

7 red credit boosters

37,500 coal

And a couple sets of camo that I'll sell once I'm done opening crates. Will probably buy a few more as I didn't get the usual clan mates to watch as I open as we usually do. 

Edited January 2 by GandalfTehGray

[DoW_]

Finished the grind to Bongo, actually had a couple of Assyms over 200k in the tier 9. 
 

Up to level 24 on Santa

Finished dockyard stuff by Saturday (I’m on the minimum gold  investment plan)

 

[Asym]

Collected all of the flakes and opened a bunch (since I wasn't really keeping track) of crates of all varieties.  A lot of ships.........and now, I've lost count (over 15 though) and it was a fun Holiday season.  One of the best since I joined.  Now, I am thinking about one last sale of Santa crates in the outside chance of the Musashi......  The last ship I really want.......and, missed when I first joined.

I am at level 34 after I play two matches this morning....  Dockyard was done weeks ago. 

Now, a new year and new adventures (GoD willing !)  I hope to see you all out there !

[MidnightPhoenix07]

I’ll actually extend your “extended weekend” a bit more. At the very least Friday to Monday, and I’ll throw in today too.

Finished up my last two “primary” grinds for this snowflake season (Vauquelin to Fantasque and Maerker to Schultz), unlocked and cleared their flakes, and made a bunch of progress on other ship grinds. I definitely haven’t been abusing AB and the 200% bonus this last week to power through grinds. Nope, definitely not. I’d already done all my flakes minus the new additions before Christmas, so it’s just been mission and tech tree grinding until the end of the patch when AB leaves.

Still need to play more cruisers to finish up the week’s dockyard stage (and I’ll probably be a day late unlocking the next set of missions), and I have a couple bonus flakes being held in reserve for the salvage ships I’m getting later this week. 

Edited January 2 by MidnightPhoenix07

[Ensign Cthulhu]

13 hours ago, MidnightPhoenix07 said:

I definitely haven’t been abusing AB and the 200% bonus this last week to power through grinds. Nope, definitely not.

Sure, we believe you. 😜

Schultz is one of the ships on my list for the next few days. I figure if WG is going to make us grind a metric ship-ton of ship XP, I might as well put it to use; right?