Server was down as mentioned all night for maintenance, so no play time for a certain diminutive dweomer-caster. As promised, I'll instead touch upon the mechanics behind the crafting system.
First up, you're allowed two "professions" and they can be broken down as "gathering" professions (herbalism, mining, and skinning) or "production" professions (tailoring, leatherworking, blacksmithing, engineering, jewelcrafting, scribes, and alchemy, and enchanting).
Gathering professions are somewhat self-explanatory...either you'll be gathering from resource nodes scattered around the world or you'll be ripping the virtual flesh off various creatures (but not other players and/or other humanoids).
The production professions work like this, mostly: obtain a recipe for an item by hook, crook, or trainer (most of which are crooks themselves), gather the ingredients for it and click a button. It is one of the simplest systems I've seen, with no chances of failures or complications during the crafting process itself. There's also no completing work orders for skillups, so you're forced in many professions to make hundreds of worthless items to skill up as cheaply as possible. As your skill increases, more "difficult" (read: costlier to make) recipes must be employed to guarantee a skill increase upon crafting completion. Most professions are massive resource sinks.
This being said, there's a thing that encourage people to grind the highest levels of skill at two crafts, as well as reputation with various factions to obtain key recipes from faction-aligned vendors. That thing? Special equipment that can only be used by people with that level of skill or gear that can only be used by the creator.
The production professions in a nutshell:
Tailors - bags, cloaks, and cloth armor. Apparently they suck so bad, Blizzard had to give them extra perks like bonus cloth resource drops from humanoids and a flying mount only tailors can ride.
Leatherworkers - leather armor and permanent enhancements to certain pieces of armor through the use of armor kits
Blacksmiths - heavy armors, weapons, shield spikes, other miscellaneous bits
Engineers – explosives (!) and general utility gadgets, both expendable and permanent. Most of the permanent gear can only be used by other engineers.
Jewelcrafting - Cuts gems that can be crammed into socketed armor, a la Diablo II.
Scribes - Create glyphs that permanently enhance a player's spells or skills.
Alchemy - Potions, potions, and poisons.
Enchanting - Permanent statistic increases on armor and weaponry, as well as the ability to reduce magic items to raw materials.
Personally, I picked enchantment for the "magic to slag" feature. The components generated often sell for more than the item itself is worth and is a great way to "recycle" unwanted quest rewards. At some point I'll need to start upping the skill again, as I'm starting to encounter rewards that require a higher level of skill to "disenchant".
Wednesday, June 30, 2010
Tuesday, June 29, 2010
Sweet Gnome Alabama
Go to login and the first thing that greets me is a warning that most of the servers will be offline all day and night Tuesday for maintenance and patching. Lovely. That would leave me just Wednesday for the summer festival, so tucked that into the back of my mind as I recalled to Booty Bay. At level 38 I was now tall enough to take on a lot of the quests I had previously postponed, so I dove into the jungle north of Booty Bay and began culling raptors with a ferocious err...ferocity. Along the way I found several pirate encampments, and gleefully obliterated them as I collected a few trinkets for the townsfolk (read: other pirates) they had wronged.
After a few dozen close encounters of the raptory kind, I headed north west to the shore line to investigate an island inhabited by water elementals and a spectral and thoroughly untouchable goblin wizard. The elementals were completely immune to cold magic, so I had to rely on my ghetto fire spells to down them. The drawbacks of being a specialty wizard.
From that point, I dove underwater to explore a sunken colony of murlocks that were guarding a stone tablet inscribed with trollish legends. As a side note: swimming is a utilized mechanic in this game with some content deep in the water for those who explore. You have a limited amount of air (barring spells I don't have) and failure to surface before its expiration will result in your own. After retrieving the tablet, it was on to storm a garrison of trolls to recover several other similar tablets. Finally returning to Booty Bay, I hit level 39. That's when I decided to have a little extra fun.
I opted at that point to take a break from grinding to take advantage of the Festival before it ended and thus began a long and circuitous flight path to hit a number of waypoints that had bonfires to honor. I visited the western continent to the city of Gadgetzan and came across a horde bonfire before I found my own. I stamped it out and got double the experience of one of my own fires. Hmm. I checked the map. I was heading north anyway to honor a couple of flames and turn in a couple of quests in the neighborhood, so I decided to go the extra mile (or three) and head into the starting zone for the Tauren, the Horde minotaur race. After stamping out their fire there, I decided I'd try for the big prize: the flame in the middle of their capital city of Thunder Bluff, situated on a massive mesa another couple of minutes north of my then-present position. I knew it'd be killed, but maybe...just maybe I could pull it off.
I ran north along a path to the rise and hopped on an elevator that carried me skywards. No sooner had I reached the top and taken three steps, but one of their NPC guards hit me once and sent me straight to the graveyard. Not easily dissuaded, I ran back and resurrected 20 or so yards from my corpse behind a building. This afforded me a few seconds of reprieve, so I got close to a suspension bridge that emerged from the second story of a building I'd need to enter...and promptly got one-shotted again. And back again I ran...
This time I was able to bypass the building altogether and resurrect on the bridge itself. I crossed it without any interference and saw my prize! I dove for the flame just as my screen flashed "Entering combat!" and the half-second I was able to touch the fire was enough! I died, but not before stealing their flame. As a side note, my death provided an unintentional diversion for a level 80 night elf who was attempting the same. I snickered when I saw it was a member of SCARAB, Brian's guild. Not bothering to recover my corpse, I took the 10 minute resurrection sickness and 25% armor degradation option, then teleported to the alliance capital of Stormwind to trade in my prize for a bounty of goodies.
It was about then that I looked at my in-game calendar and realized I was wrong-- very wrong. The festival won't end for another week! It was just missing because the month changed to July at that point. D'oh! Still, it would give me a little more time to collect bonfires and credits for more festival toys. It wasn't a waster tour, however. I was now well over halfway to level 40. Once more into the breach!
I ground out the rest of the level on pirates and ended the night upgrading my spells and my mechanized ostrich. My new ride doubles my overland speed and I'm very happy now!
After a few dozen close encounters of the raptory kind, I headed north west to the shore line to investigate an island inhabited by water elementals and a spectral and thoroughly untouchable goblin wizard. The elementals were completely immune to cold magic, so I had to rely on my ghetto fire spells to down them. The drawbacks of being a specialty wizard.
From that point, I dove underwater to explore a sunken colony of murlocks that were guarding a stone tablet inscribed with trollish legends. As a side note: swimming is a utilized mechanic in this game with some content deep in the water for those who explore. You have a limited amount of air (barring spells I don't have) and failure to surface before its expiration will result in your own. After retrieving the tablet, it was on to storm a garrison of trolls to recover several other similar tablets. Finally returning to Booty Bay, I hit level 39. That's when I decided to have a little extra fun.
I opted at that point to take a break from grinding to take advantage of the Festival before it ended and thus began a long and circuitous flight path to hit a number of waypoints that had bonfires to honor. I visited the western continent to the city of Gadgetzan and came across a horde bonfire before I found my own. I stamped it out and got double the experience of one of my own fires. Hmm. I checked the map. I was heading north anyway to honor a couple of flames and turn in a couple of quests in the neighborhood, so I decided to go the extra mile (or three) and head into the starting zone for the Tauren, the Horde minotaur race. After stamping out their fire there, I decided I'd try for the big prize: the flame in the middle of their capital city of Thunder Bluff, situated on a massive mesa another couple of minutes north of my then-present position. I knew it'd be killed, but maybe...just maybe I could pull it off.
I ran north along a path to the rise and hopped on an elevator that carried me skywards. No sooner had I reached the top and taken three steps, but one of their NPC guards hit me once and sent me straight to the graveyard. Not easily dissuaded, I ran back and resurrected 20 or so yards from my corpse behind a building. This afforded me a few seconds of reprieve, so I got close to a suspension bridge that emerged from the second story of a building I'd need to enter...and promptly got one-shotted again. And back again I ran...
This time I was able to bypass the building altogether and resurrect on the bridge itself. I crossed it without any interference and saw my prize! I dove for the flame just as my screen flashed "Entering combat!" and the half-second I was able to touch the fire was enough! I died, but not before stealing their flame. As a side note, my death provided an unintentional diversion for a level 80 night elf who was attempting the same. I snickered when I saw it was a member of SCARAB, Brian's guild. Not bothering to recover my corpse, I took the 10 minute resurrection sickness and 25% armor degradation option, then teleported to the alliance capital of Stormwind to trade in my prize for a bounty of goodies.
It was about then that I looked at my in-game calendar and realized I was wrong-- very wrong. The festival won't end for another week! It was just missing because the month changed to July at that point. D'oh! Still, it would give me a little more time to collect bonfires and credits for more festival toys. It wasn't a waster tour, however. I was now well over halfway to level 40. Once more into the breach!
I ground out the rest of the level on pirates and ended the night upgrading my spells and my mechanized ostrich. My new ride doubles my overland speed and I'm very happy now!
Monday, June 28, 2010
It's getting hot in here, so take off all your gnomes.
Bit of time since my last update-- vacations without access for gaming will do that. Fortunately, I remembered to park my butt in an inn before I logged out and I returned to nearly a level's worth of rest xp. It only accumulates when you're in an inn or a capital city. So, although I hada short amount of play time, I made what I could of it, and made my way back to village of Southshore. Southshore had a few quests that pointed me up to the north-- the mountainous and snowy area of Hillsbrad, so I hiked my way up that way to test my might against a dangerous extremist organization called "The Syndicate" and a crapton of ogres.
Humanoid monsters are, in my opinion, a pretty good target. They generally all carry cash, they drop cloth (useful for tailors, some quests for reputation, or selling on the AH), have better magic loot, and generally have less 'trash drops'. Couple that with many of them try to flee when their health gets too low and it's like getting free shots when you're a ranged character.
Since the critters were, for the most part, ranging from two levels under to two levels above, I ignored my leveling guide which told me go hang out in a zone twenty minutes and a continent away and contented myself with grinding the aforementioned enemies into so much blood sausage. By the time I had killed and gathered my way to completing three quests, I had dinged 38. That meant new abilities and an upgrade to my primary attack spell: frostbolt. One teleport later, I'm chilling with my mage gnomies in Ironforge and spending hard-earned coin on the latest batch of upgrades.
Since solstice last Monday, we've had a "fire festival" holiday event going on. I was afraid it would end while I was on vacation, but it appears that it will last for another couple of days yet. With the celebration, there are a number of fire-related entertainment and quest options going on that provides a bucketload of coin and xp for lower level players and I took advantage of what I could last week.
To begin with, there are a number of bonfires around the world, generally a couple in each zone (one for Alliance, one for Horde) that can be visited and "honored" (read: click the NPC standing next to them). Honoring the fire gives an xp + coin reward, as well as a few burning something-or-anothers which can be used as currency at festival merchants in the capital city or as tinder to light an extinguished bonfire. If your side's bonfire is lit, everyone on your side gets a tasty little buff that randomly does hundreds of bonus damage as you're fighting. Alternatively, if you find an enemy's bonfire, you can stamp it out and get a lot more xp as a reward, ending their buff and flagging you for PvP for a few minutes. The risk is well worth it.
Additionally, at each bonfire is a maypole-type affair that you can dance around. Tendrils of energy will charge you up as long as you spin and twirl at the pole, granting a buff that gives bonus xp from kills-- the longer you dance, the longer the buff until it reaches a maximum of one hour of bonus for one minute of staring at your character twirl like an idiot. Also well worth it.
Aside from that, in cities there are daily mini-games of torch juggling and torch tossing that grant even more coin and xp. Finally, for dungeon delvers there's a big bad that can be bested for loot. I'm nowhere near the level to challenge that one, but the other games are a fun little side diversion.
Humanoid monsters are, in my opinion, a pretty good target. They generally all carry cash, they drop cloth (useful for tailors, some quests for reputation, or selling on the AH), have better magic loot, and generally have less 'trash drops'. Couple that with many of them try to flee when their health gets too low and it's like getting free shots when you're a ranged character.
Since the critters were, for the most part, ranging from two levels under to two levels above, I ignored my leveling guide which told me go hang out in a zone twenty minutes and a continent away and contented myself with grinding the aforementioned enemies into so much blood sausage. By the time I had killed and gathered my way to completing three quests, I had dinged 38. That meant new abilities and an upgrade to my primary attack spell: frostbolt. One teleport later, I'm chilling with my mage gnomies in Ironforge and spending hard-earned coin on the latest batch of upgrades.
Since solstice last Monday, we've had a "fire festival" holiday event going on. I was afraid it would end while I was on vacation, but it appears that it will last for another couple of days yet. With the celebration, there are a number of fire-related entertainment and quest options going on that provides a bucketload of coin and xp for lower level players and I took advantage of what I could last week.
To begin with, there are a number of bonfires around the world, generally a couple in each zone (one for Alliance, one for Horde) that can be visited and "honored" (read: click the NPC standing next to them). Honoring the fire gives an xp + coin reward, as well as a few burning something-or-anothers which can be used as currency at festival merchants in the capital city or as tinder to light an extinguished bonfire. If your side's bonfire is lit, everyone on your side gets a tasty little buff that randomly does hundreds of bonus damage as you're fighting. Alternatively, if you find an enemy's bonfire, you can stamp it out and get a lot more xp as a reward, ending their buff and flagging you for PvP for a few minutes. The risk is well worth it.
Additionally, at each bonfire is a maypole-type affair that you can dance around. Tendrils of energy will charge you up as long as you spin and twirl at the pole, granting a buff that gives bonus xp from kills-- the longer you dance, the longer the buff until it reaches a maximum of one hour of bonus for one minute of staring at your character twirl like an idiot. Also well worth it.
Aside from that, in cities there are daily mini-games of torch juggling and torch tossing that grant even more coin and xp. Finally, for dungeon delvers there's a big bad that can be bested for loot. I'm nowhere near the level to challenge that one, but the other games are a fun little side diversion.
Friday, June 18, 2010
Gnome if you want to, gnome around the world...
No game time last night, being a bit of a precursor for next week when I'll be without a PC for the balance of the week. So today, just a few words on some random things.
Professions are vocations that that come in a couple of flavors. They provide a bit of added variety to the game allowing you to sink ludicrous amounts of wealth in exchange for a little advantage in game or in resource gathering to make a little extra coin back along the way. You're allowed to pick two professions at any point and you can change out at any point, but in so doing sacrificing all of the progress made in the dropped skill.
Since I'm personally trying to hit level 45 or so about the same time as Brian, I haven't paid terribly too much attention to these side pursuits. I did pick up 'enchanting' as one, however, primarily to allow me to reduce various treasure and otherwise worthless quest rewards into salable material components. Enchanting will also allow me to permanently enhance weapons and armor with minor perks-- a couple of points here and there, nothing huge. Eventually I'll select the other once I've read a bit about some of the newer crafts... but it won't be a resource gathering one. I hate revisiting newbie zones for the sole purpose of leveling up crafting skills.
At some point, I need to find out what guild/group/kinship/legion/cult Brian is hiding out in and get an invitation to join. As usual, being guildless gets daily requests from random people to join their merry band of people. This in and of itself might be flattering, if it were based on watching me fight or on the merits of my banter in local chat, but 100% of them are guilds whose only requirement and standard to join is to not already be guilded. That being said, I typically don't accept such offers unless the name of the group amuses me to some degree (Spastic Newbs of Asmodae, anyone?), but I will help anyone to form a guild and usually drop seconds after the creator gets all of the necessary signatures (10 in this game) to register it. The fact that many tip a few gold for the trouble is just gravy.
When people wave guild charters in my face, I typically sign them without reading them. Unfortunately, I also do the same with insurance policies and will thus stand to reap handsome profits should a volcano ever erupt in central Georgia. It was in such a manner I became a founding member of "ioncewrestledabear". I seriously doubt I'll be with the group 48 hours from now, but it was amusing enough to not drop immediately.
Professions are vocations that that come in a couple of flavors. They provide a bit of added variety to the game allowing you to sink ludicrous amounts of wealth in exchange for a little advantage in game or in resource gathering to make a little extra coin back along the way. You're allowed to pick two professions at any point and you can change out at any point, but in so doing sacrificing all of the progress made in the dropped skill.
Since I'm personally trying to hit level 45 or so about the same time as Brian, I haven't paid terribly too much attention to these side pursuits. I did pick up 'enchanting' as one, however, primarily to allow me to reduce various treasure and otherwise worthless quest rewards into salable material components. Enchanting will also allow me to permanently enhance weapons and armor with minor perks-- a couple of points here and there, nothing huge. Eventually I'll select the other once I've read a bit about some of the newer crafts... but it won't be a resource gathering one. I hate revisiting newbie zones for the sole purpose of leveling up crafting skills.
At some point, I need to find out what guild/group/kinship/legion/cult Brian is hiding out in and get an invitation to join. As usual, being guildless gets daily requests from random people to join their merry band of people. This in and of itself might be flattering, if it were based on watching me fight or on the merits of my banter in local chat, but 100% of them are guilds whose only requirement and standard to join is to not already be guilded. That being said, I typically don't accept such offers unless the name of the group amuses me to some degree (Spastic Newbs of Asmodae, anyone?), but I will help anyone to form a guild and usually drop seconds after the creator gets all of the necessary signatures (10 in this game) to register it. The fact that many tip a few gold for the trouble is just gravy.
When people wave guild charters in my face, I typically sign them without reading them. Unfortunately, I also do the same with insurance policies and will thus stand to reap handsome profits should a volcano ever erupt in central Georgia. It was in such a manner I became a founding member of "ioncewrestledabear". I seriously doubt I'll be with the group 48 hours from now, but it was amusing enough to not drop immediately.
Thursday, June 17, 2010
Gnomeward Bound
A bright, shining day in Menethil Harbor! After purging the landscape of a number of extremely frost-resistant murlocks (fishfolk) and recovering priceless supplies for the townsfolk and a new staff for myself, I cleared out a couple of dozen dragon whelps and a company of orcs, taking their warbanners as trophies. I retired to the town for a time to turn in quests (Ding! 24.), repair my damaged gear, and hassle the locals. In time I found myself sitting on the dock of the bay, watching the tide roll away, and thinking I should write a song about it. Suddenly, a ship pulls up!
The nice thing about taking a year or two off from a game is that you forget some of the things that you take for granted and the appearance of the masted marvel reminded me that this was a departure point for the other continent, Kalimdor. If I remembered correctly, I'd be whisked over to the forested lands of the night elves. I hopped aboard and noted that the designers had stuffed the ship with guards since the last time I played-- this was a welcome change from the old days when raiding parties of the Horde would attack us from our own ships. There was a merchant aboard, so I sold off a few things as the boat launched and I quickly made my way to a place that was not at all what I was expecting.
Rather than the Elven areas, I was whisked to another human zone that was a major fortification beside a swamp that made the Wetlands look... well... less wet. I believe it was "Darkshore", but as I was pulling into port, a massive sea monster that dwarfed my craft was besieging the city. I skirted around it and explored the town for a few minutes before teleporting back to safer climes. I wasn't ready for the lands beyond the walls, so further exploration in Kalimdor would just have to wait.
I had forgotten that my hearthstone was still set to Duskwood, so I continued my running theme of arriving at destinations with mild surprise. Well, as long as I was here, I figured I'd go get my ol' buddy, The Hermit squared away. I rode down to where his tools had been misplaced and headed down a very beaten path towards an ogre mound. The ogres at the outskirts were only slightly more powerful than I so I tested one out. Hard hitters, but fall harder. Generally if things are 2 levels above me I can hit them and if I can hit them, they -will- go down. At +3 levels... it's a little dicey as I start missing more frequently and missing with snares and roots equals a very flattened gnome. At that point, it isn't mana-effective to hunt critters, to say the very least. At +4 and above, it's pretty much a lost cause.
I skirted around the ogres on the outskirts to see if I could get to the toolbox, which was lying just outside of a cave. The ogres there were level 30. Yikes. Well, maybe I could ninja it. I crept up from behind my target on top of a hill, sliding down to land behind a stone outcropping. On the other side of the rock was my prize with only one angry mage-mashing, club-wielding, doom-bringing Shrek-wannabe guarding it. Slowly I moved into position and when the Ogre had wandered the farthest from the box that he was going to, I swooped in for the grab.
The club cracked me hard across the head, sending me rolling. My hand had latched on hard to the handle and I tucked the tools away as a second ogre joined the fracas. Invoking Rule #2, I darted for the spot I had been hidden at beforehand. Swift and painful death notwithstanding, I could count this one as a "win" and one quick corpse recovery later I was on my way to see The Hermit.
He was tickled pink to see me! There was just one more tiny thing to do for him: deliver a note to the mayor on Darkshire. Well, I was headed there anyway-- it was late and the hermit was positively slavering to work on some project with the supplies I had procured. By the time I get the note translated for the mayor by another local, alarms were going off all over town.
Apparently, there was a massive undead abomination heading for town! The note revealed the unpleasant truth-- I had been duped by the hermit! He was really a NECROMANCER all along and was going to destroy the town! (I really, REALLY love this quest line.) The Night Watch rallied on the road to town and promptly got smooshed by the hulking and appropriately named "Stitches."
Stitches made it to the town proper before he was overwhelmed by the NPC guard, but not without taking a few with him. It made it all totally worth it.
The nice thing about taking a year or two off from a game is that you forget some of the things that you take for granted and the appearance of the masted marvel reminded me that this was a departure point for the other continent, Kalimdor. If I remembered correctly, I'd be whisked over to the forested lands of the night elves. I hopped aboard and noted that the designers had stuffed the ship with guards since the last time I played-- this was a welcome change from the old days when raiding parties of the Horde would attack us from our own ships. There was a merchant aboard, so I sold off a few things as the boat launched and I quickly made my way to a place that was not at all what I was expecting.
Rather than the Elven areas, I was whisked to another human zone that was a major fortification beside a swamp that made the Wetlands look... well... less wet. I believe it was "Darkshore", but as I was pulling into port, a massive sea monster that dwarfed my craft was besieging the city. I skirted around it and explored the town for a few minutes before teleporting back to safer climes. I wasn't ready for the lands beyond the walls, so further exploration in Kalimdor would just have to wait.
I had forgotten that my hearthstone was still set to Duskwood, so I continued my running theme of arriving at destinations with mild surprise. Well, as long as I was here, I figured I'd go get my ol' buddy, The Hermit squared away. I rode down to where his tools had been misplaced and headed down a very beaten path towards an ogre mound. The ogres at the outskirts were only slightly more powerful than I so I tested one out. Hard hitters, but fall harder. Generally if things are 2 levels above me I can hit them and if I can hit them, they -will- go down. At +3 levels... it's a little dicey as I start missing more frequently and missing with snares and roots equals a very flattened gnome. At that point, it isn't mana-effective to hunt critters, to say the very least. At +4 and above, it's pretty much a lost cause.
I skirted around the ogres on the outskirts to see if I could get to the toolbox, which was lying just outside of a cave. The ogres there were level 30. Yikes. Well, maybe I could ninja it. I crept up from behind my target on top of a hill, sliding down to land behind a stone outcropping. On the other side of the rock was my prize with only one angry mage-mashing, club-wielding, doom-bringing Shrek-wannabe guarding it. Slowly I moved into position and when the Ogre had wandered the farthest from the box that he was going to, I swooped in for the grab.
The club cracked me hard across the head, sending me rolling. My hand had latched on hard to the handle and I tucked the tools away as a second ogre joined the fracas. Invoking Rule #2, I darted for the spot I had been hidden at beforehand. Swift and painful death notwithstanding, I could count this one as a "win" and one quick corpse recovery later I was on my way to see The Hermit.
He was tickled pink to see me! There was just one more tiny thing to do for him: deliver a note to the mayor on Darkshire. Well, I was headed there anyway-- it was late and the hermit was positively slavering to work on some project with the supplies I had procured. By the time I get the note translated for the mayor by another local, alarms were going off all over town.
Apparently, there was a massive undead abomination heading for town! The note revealed the unpleasant truth-- I had been duped by the hermit! He was really a NECROMANCER all along and was going to destroy the town! (I really, REALLY love this quest line.) The Night Watch rallied on the road to town and promptly got smooshed by the hulking and appropriately named "Stitches."
Stitches made it to the town proper before he was overwhelmed by the NPC guard, but not without taking a few with him. It made it all totally worth it.
Wednesday, June 16, 2010
Gnome is Where the Heart Is (behind the ribcage)
Meandered on the fringes of Duskwood, finishing up a few collection quests, slaughtered the local fauna, and sent more than a few soulless abominations back to the grave from whence they spawned, hitting level 22 in the process. Along the way, I collected some ingredients for the local tavernkeep so that he could brew up some zombie juice for my old friend, The Hermit. The bartender warned me it was strong enough to raise the dead. I laughed and gave it to the old man, who promptly thanked me for my "fooli--, I mean kindness" and then sent me off to collect undead parts so he could build a scareghoul to keep the undead away from his rickety cabin.
After gathering a bagful of that rot (literally), I wandered back just to find out he'd lost his tools near an ogre mound. Hmph. The ghouls had already tested the limits of my ability to kite effectively, so I was somewhat loathe to place myself in an even more precarious situation. I told the hermit I'd be right back...just had to run to the store for cigarettes... and hopped on a gryphon and flapped my merry way to a different zone. I'll revisit Duskwood when I've got a little more experience under my robes.
In time, I found my way to Menethil Harbor-- a small walled port city on the edge of a large marsh, known affectionately as "The Wetlands." Over the past *cough* years, I've leveled up a few characters, but some zones I'd avoided like the plague. The Wetlands was one of them, not for any particularly good reason other than running around a swamp for an extended period is a little depressing. Since I'm playing this character with a side goal of seeing more content than my usual "must grind to live" mindset, I took a few quests, found they were right at and slightly below my level, so I figured I'd give them a go.
The rewards were as mediocre as I expected and not overly challenging, with the exception of falling face-first into a pit of velociraptors, costing me more dignity than time. If nothing else, it was my sole "oopsie" on the way to level 23. I'll continue to explore this area a bit longer before returning to Duskwood. I'd hate to keep Mr. Hermit waiting too long.
After gathering a bagful of that rot (literally), I wandered back just to find out he'd lost his tools near an ogre mound. Hmph. The ghouls had already tested the limits of my ability to kite effectively, so I was somewhat loathe to place myself in an even more precarious situation. I told the hermit I'd be right back...just had to run to the store for cigarettes... and hopped on a gryphon and flapped my merry way to a different zone. I'll revisit Duskwood when I've got a little more experience under my robes.
In time, I found my way to Menethil Harbor-- a small walled port city on the edge of a large marsh, known affectionately as "The Wetlands." Over the past *cough* years, I've leveled up a few characters, but some zones I'd avoided like the plague. The Wetlands was one of them, not for any particularly good reason other than running around a swamp for an extended period is a little depressing. Since I'm playing this character with a side goal of seeing more content than my usual "must grind to live" mindset, I took a few quests, found they were right at and slightly below my level, so I figured I'd give them a go.
The rewards were as mediocre as I expected and not overly challenging, with the exception of falling face-first into a pit of velociraptors, costing me more dignity than time. If nothing else, it was my sole "oopsie" on the way to level 23. I'll continue to explore this area a bit longer before returning to Duskwood. I'd hate to keep Mr. Hermit waiting too long.
Tuesday, June 15, 2010
Gnome Alone
PvP in WoW can be broken down into four different realms: dueling, arena, world, and battleground. Dueling is exactly as it implies: consensual knock each other around until one 'yields'. Arena matches are 3 vs 3 and 5 vs 5 groups to the death. The last two are a bit more complex.
World PvP works like this: each faction has areas that are 'theirs' and the rest of the world is 'contested'. Whisperwind is a 'normal' server, being neither free-for-all-PvP or a non-PvP RP one, so there will be danger in the great wide world at some point. By default, in your 'home areas', you're not flagged for PvP and are non-targetable by enemies who happen to visit, unless you flag yourself for PvP, attack an enemy player or aid/heal/buff a friendly player who is already flagged for PvP. In cases where you didn't turn on your own flag, you remain PvP-enabled for five minutes. In the enemy's realm, you're fair game regardless. In contested areas-- I'm not entirely certain. It's been a long while, but I'll assume you're fair game. I reserve the right to be pleasantly surprised to be wrong. Either way, you don't really hit those areas until your upper 20s unless you have wanderlust.
The Battlegrounds are the 'fairer' optional PvP content. As you level up, different battlegrounds (BGs) become available for play with different objectives and gameplay mechanics. The first is "Warsong Gulch", a simple 10 vs 10 Capture-the-Flag game that runs 25 minutes of 3 captures by a team. The battlegrounds for 'lower' levels are tiered like so: level 10-19, 20-29, 30-39, etc... so you never have to worry about your level 18 getting thrown against a level 80 in a BG. I'll describe the other battlegrounds as I encounter them, but really my mage isn't designed for BG play, as was evidenced by my first trial run.
The character I had been playing most recently before Strev was a warlock. It's a pet class with nasty damage over time spells that have no casting times that can be thrown down while running as well as a fear spell on a stupidly short timer that takes control away from other players for 10 seconds. (read: long enough to rape the average cloth or leather-wearer). After playing something like that, you get spoiled. Still, if your team scores victories in a BG you get experience points, so it was worth checking out. I queued up for a random team and 30 seconds later, I was entering Warsong Gulch with murder on my mind.
The first thing I realized as I was running for my life, is there is a distinct 'gazelle' mentality when playing a cloth caster that can't heal himself and must stop to cast most of his spells. If you lag behind the pack of people dashing for the enemy flag, you are deemed 'weak or sick' and will be pulled down by the cheetahs comprising the other team. Against melee classes I could likely hold my own fairly well. Unfortunately, I never saw any. My brief stint in Warsong was marred by a perpetual barrage of arrows and spells with better range than mine. At this level Frost is a really horrible PvP spec. As I understand it, it matures into something decent with the ability to root, stun, and generally asplode people into shards of meat-sicles, but for now I was just an easy target with less health than the average leper.
For now it is back to leveling and if I just -have- to kick someone's butt, I've got a large number of alts that do well in PvP I can play instead.
The zone transitions in the world of Azeroth are seamless, but very distinctively "flavored"... Westfall, for example, is themed around farmsteads in autumn; Rockridge is craggy meadows, and so forth. After hitting level 21, it was time to venture southwest-ish into a new adventuring area: Duskwood. As the name implies, it is a haunted forest replete with spiders, wolves, and more undead than you can shake a bishop at. After settling in at the inn in the town of Darkshire, I grilled the locals on the goings on then set off on a grand exploration of the zone. Seven deaths later, my revised plans were to stick to the roads as closely as possible and pray things didn't notice me.
Killed a mess of smallish spiders and some starving wolves-- not exactly heroic, but you have to build up to that sort of thing. Along the way I started a couple of Very Important story arcs for the area, beginning to unravel the mystery of how Duskwood came to be cursed by undead and started a series of fetch-and-go-carrys for the local hermit who lives just outside the cemetery. As a side note, the hermit line of quests is my personal favorite in Warcraft and I'll speak more of it some other time. For now, I have procured for him thread spun from the hair of a ghost and have begun a quest to find him some booze. Hermits are my kind of people!
World PvP works like this: each faction has areas that are 'theirs' and the rest of the world is 'contested'. Whisperwind is a 'normal' server, being neither free-for-all-PvP or a non-PvP RP one, so there will be danger in the great wide world at some point. By default, in your 'home areas', you're not flagged for PvP and are non-targetable by enemies who happen to visit, unless you flag yourself for PvP, attack an enemy player or aid/heal/buff a friendly player who is already flagged for PvP. In cases where you didn't turn on your own flag, you remain PvP-enabled for five minutes. In the enemy's realm, you're fair game regardless. In contested areas-- I'm not entirely certain. It's been a long while, but I'll assume you're fair game. I reserve the right to be pleasantly surprised to be wrong. Either way, you don't really hit those areas until your upper 20s unless you have wanderlust.
The Battlegrounds are the 'fairer' optional PvP content. As you level up, different battlegrounds (BGs) become available for play with different objectives and gameplay mechanics. The first is "Warsong Gulch", a simple 10 vs 10 Capture-the-Flag game that runs 25 minutes of 3 captures by a team. The battlegrounds for 'lower' levels are tiered like so: level 10-19, 20-29, 30-39, etc... so you never have to worry about your level 18 getting thrown against a level 80 in a BG. I'll describe the other battlegrounds as I encounter them, but really my mage isn't designed for BG play, as was evidenced by my first trial run.
The character I had been playing most recently before Strev was a warlock. It's a pet class with nasty damage over time spells that have no casting times that can be thrown down while running as well as a fear spell on a stupidly short timer that takes control away from other players for 10 seconds. (read: long enough to rape the average cloth or leather-wearer). After playing something like that, you get spoiled. Still, if your team scores victories in a BG you get experience points, so it was worth checking out. I queued up for a random team and 30 seconds later, I was entering Warsong Gulch with murder on my mind.
The first thing I realized as I was running for my life, is there is a distinct 'gazelle' mentality when playing a cloth caster that can't heal himself and must stop to cast most of his spells. If you lag behind the pack of people dashing for the enemy flag, you are deemed 'weak or sick' and will be pulled down by the cheetahs comprising the other team. Against melee classes I could likely hold my own fairly well. Unfortunately, I never saw any. My brief stint in Warsong was marred by a perpetual barrage of arrows and spells with better range than mine. At this level Frost is a really horrible PvP spec. As I understand it, it matures into something decent with the ability to root, stun, and generally asplode people into shards of meat-sicles, but for now I was just an easy target with less health than the average leper.
For now it is back to leveling and if I just -have- to kick someone's butt, I've got a large number of alts that do well in PvP I can play instead.
The zone transitions in the world of Azeroth are seamless, but very distinctively "flavored"... Westfall, for example, is themed around farmsteads in autumn; Rockridge is craggy meadows, and so forth. After hitting level 21, it was time to venture southwest-ish into a new adventuring area: Duskwood. As the name implies, it is a haunted forest replete with spiders, wolves, and more undead than you can shake a bishop at. After settling in at the inn in the town of Darkshire, I grilled the locals on the goings on then set off on a grand exploration of the zone. Seven deaths later, my revised plans were to stick to the roads as closely as possible and pray things didn't notice me.
Killed a mess of smallish spiders and some starving wolves-- not exactly heroic, but you have to build up to that sort of thing. Along the way I started a couple of Very Important story arcs for the area, beginning to unravel the mystery of how Duskwood came to be cursed by undead and started a series of fetch-and-go-carrys for the local hermit who lives just outside the cemetery. As a side note, the hermit line of quests is my personal favorite in Warcraft and I'll speak more of it some other time. For now, I have procured for him thread spun from the hair of a ghost and have begun a quest to find him some booze. Hermits are my kind of people!
Monday, June 14, 2010
A New Beginning
Fresh from leaving Aion, I was eager to revisit an old favorite MMO haunt: World of Warcraft (1 Billion People Can't be Wrong!). I'd played the game when it was first released for a long while and left long before the Wrath of the Lich King was released.
Now many things would be fresh, exciting, and new. Best of all, friends of mine were playing and that, more than anything, will keep me in a game long after I've otherwise grown bored with it (I'm talkin' about YOU, City of Heroes!).
So this past week I created a gnome mage named Strev in the hopes of someday being big enough to run around with a good friend on the Whisperwind server. He's level 39, so I figured it'd take me a month or two to get up to speed. The big pain in WoW when it comes to leveling isn't the challenge the critters present (at least at lower levels), but rather the time it takes to run from point a to point b. Everything is kind of spread out, so questing, which generally gives decent xp, eats up a lot of time just jogging hither and yon.
While researching a good specialization for leveling, I discovered a leveling add-on. Basically, it's a third party interface (Blizzard -loves- these and made it easy for developers to hook into their program) that gives step by step recommendations for the order to do quests in the different zones for level ranges to optimize the time spent running around like an idiot. I'd be doing the quests anyway, but this made it a bit happier. The fact it ALSO puts an obvious arrow on screen pointing you towards your next target, along with distance in yards and estimated time of arrival based on your current speed is just gravy.
Over the years I've leveled an army of alts in the game, so I had a base familiarity with all of the starting zones, admittedly the human area much more so than the dwarven/gnomish one, but I dove into the game with more than a passing clue on how to get things done.
Upon reaching level 10, it was time to decide the 'career path' for my aspiring half-pint wizard. The forums recommended frost (control) over fire (raw damage) and arcane (wtf--weaksauce), so after a bit more reading, I agreed and dropped my first point into the frost tree. You can 'respec' when you feel like it by spending gold, so many people use frost to level up, then respec into different builds in endgame depending on how they prefer killing time: raiding or PvP primarily. Frost works on the general principal of 'slow it down while you nuke it into oblivion and kite as needed'.
Following the guides (and my heart when I felt like it), I breezed through the next few levels, clearing out swaths of content in 4 zones, ending at level 20 last night. My final act before teleporting 'home' and logging out was purchasing my first "horse": a mechanical ostrich that belches smoke from its tail feathers. This pleases me.
Now many things would be fresh, exciting, and new. Best of all, friends of mine were playing and that, more than anything, will keep me in a game long after I've otherwise grown bored with it (I'm talkin' about YOU, City of Heroes!).
So this past week I created a gnome mage named Strev in the hopes of someday being big enough to run around with a good friend on the Whisperwind server. He's level 39, so I figured it'd take me a month or two to get up to speed. The big pain in WoW when it comes to leveling isn't the challenge the critters present (at least at lower levels), but rather the time it takes to run from point a to point b. Everything is kind of spread out, so questing, which generally gives decent xp, eats up a lot of time just jogging hither and yon.
While researching a good specialization for leveling, I discovered a leveling add-on. Basically, it's a third party interface (Blizzard -loves- these and made it easy for developers to hook into their program) that gives step by step recommendations for the order to do quests in the different zones for level ranges to optimize the time spent running around like an idiot. I'd be doing the quests anyway, but this made it a bit happier. The fact it ALSO puts an obvious arrow on screen pointing you towards your next target, along with distance in yards and estimated time of arrival based on your current speed is just gravy.
Over the years I've leveled an army of alts in the game, so I had a base familiarity with all of the starting zones, admittedly the human area much more so than the dwarven/gnomish one, but I dove into the game with more than a passing clue on how to get things done.
Upon reaching level 10, it was time to decide the 'career path' for my aspiring half-pint wizard. The forums recommended frost (control) over fire (raw damage) and arcane (wtf--weaksauce), so after a bit more reading, I agreed and dropped my first point into the frost tree. You can 'respec' when you feel like it by spending gold, so many people use frost to level up, then respec into different builds in endgame depending on how they prefer killing time: raiding or PvP primarily. Frost works on the general principal of 'slow it down while you nuke it into oblivion and kite as needed'.
Following the guides (and my heart when I felt like it), I breezed through the next few levels, clearing out swaths of content in 4 zones, ending at level 20 last night. My final act before teleporting 'home' and logging out was purchasing my first "horse": a mechanical ostrich that belches smoke from its tail feathers. This pleases me.
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