Breakfast Topic: How do you tag necropolis mobs?
by Adam Holisky 
Oct 26th 2008 at 8:00AM
It was an interesting time in Azeroth yesterday. Thousands of people on each server showed up to fight against the scourge invasion. The masses were tagging mobs left and right, all in hopes to get some elusive Necrotic Runes.All this open PvE fighting has brought up an interesting question, one that many people have some strong feelings on. What is the appropriate way to tag mobs? Is it okay to camp spawn points and AoE immediately in order to grab some scourge? Is it okay to take away another person's Shadow of Doom? What about if you accidently tag something you shouldn't have? Do you give them some gold in exchange?
I have to admit, after trying for over two hours to summon a Shadow of Doom and tag it, my group decided to go a different route. We went to a new spawn point, summoned all four, and threw out as much AoE as possible. Our thought was that doing this would mean we'd at least be able to get one Shadow (we ended up getting them all). This of course upset everyone else that was there – but we had tried for a while before hand to get a single one. And we did summon all the Shadows ourselves.
While this might be a questionable activity to some, it's what we did. But what would you do? How have you handled, and will you handle, tagging these mobs?
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Events
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 4)
The Hammer Oct 26th 2008 8:03AM
I think this is where WOW could learn a hell of a lot from Warhammer's PQ system.
PimpyMicPimp Oct 26th 2008 8:33AM
Public Quests are one of the most intriguing aspects of WAR to me. I'm sure the WoW devs will pick up on it, however, you have to be fair and realise that this event was being designed before WAR launched.
Still, I'm sure that both MMO's will take hints from each other and make each game stronger.
Omega Oct 26th 2008 8:43AM
the event bugged on whisperwind and was uncompletable by anyone the entire day. :\ no attacks even took place from what i was told by many who sat around all day waiting for it. they showed on maps but you'd go to location and find nothing.
WyrmKing Oct 26th 2008 4:49PM
LOL Warhammer PQ System? This was my experience with WarScammer's PQ system...
"Ohhh according to the game, I'm first and had the most contribution during the PQ event! And it's given me a significant advantage for the loot roll!"
*dice rolls*
"WTF! Why am I 8th on the loot roll and didn't get my just rewards?!"
That PQ system sucks.
The Hammer Oct 26th 2008 8:13PM
It's better than the kill-stealing everyone for himself nature that we have going on right now, though.
(Interestingly, I always thought that the PQs should have given rewards to everyone, which varied in importance and size. Maybe some cash and food and drink for the "losers".)
Muse Oct 26th 2008 8:07AM
I got lucky on my main character, me and my guild group were the only people on the site at the time the shades were ready to spawn. Every subsequent alt I've attempted to do the same with have gotten the shades stolen. And trying to get enough necrotic runes for both quest and tabard is a venture doomed to fail unless you feel like waiting at an empty site until the scourge turn up.
Lesley G Oct 26th 2008 8:16AM
Our first attempt was just chaos. Then we decided to camp a stop and waited about two hours (yes, really) for the scourge to turn up, but they didn't. We'll probably be camping again.
sosei Oct 26th 2008 8:16AM
What I've seen on my server has been masses of people waiting around the stone just as it gets under 2%, AoE at the ready. It then becomes a who-can-click-first battle, usually between Paladins (who prematurely Consecrate, shame on them) Druids (Hurricane is good for something!) and oddly enough, Priests (who spam Holy Nova). My group would at least end up with one, but a few times we snagged 2 or more.
Viper007Bond Oct 26th 2008 8:16AM
Blizzard really needs to "fix" this. By the time I even fly out to the invasion, everything is dead. *sigh*
D.O.T. Oct 27th 2008 9:19AM
Apparently Blizzard wants you to camp the spot and do nothing with your main/alt for the X number of hours you have to wait for it to spawn. _-
It's rather annoying trying to even find a spot without having a jerk load of players steal every mob around you.
Or worse, have some idiot player flag and intentionally jump in front of you as you're trying to loot a mob. Not fun getting killed by a group of horde who thought it was funny at time.
Viper007Bond Oct 27th 2008 8:41PM
I actually ended up getting over 100 crystals yesterday. We did it late at night and few to less populated areas (for example, Tanaris and Blasted Lands). We had nearly the whole thing to ourselves.
Me and the other lock would run around and take a ton of them and then Seed them down as a priest healed us. Worked well. I was only 5 shards short of being able to buy everything.
Luciferious Oct 26th 2008 8:19AM
Depending on what time of the day you're trying to get the Shadows, I think its entirely appropriate to do what you did. I spent several hours soloing, trying to get runes, and barely got any. Granted, this was during peak server times. Finally I just tried to pick a good spot and spam Consecrate, but even that didn't work. At this early point in (this stage) of the Invasion, its seems to me that it is every man for himself. I get mad at some tactics, but only because they work for other classes and not mine. So I say get your runes and Shadows however you can, because nobody else is going to be nice and ask your permission.
Mindbasher Oct 26th 2008 2:44PM
I've tried talking to groups when its sparsely populated, I'm without fail ignored
So now I don't spend xtals on enginners, I just take stuff
shadowhatpriest Oct 26th 2008 8:28AM
i agree, frustrating and badly designed quests, and re-useing all the old stuff from the original Naxx release, how lazy can Blizz get!even the same ring models out the front of cities!What next a war effort and hand ins?Get a tabard for just being around?re hash lol.I agree with the 1st post, open party questing would make these annoinly designed quests much more social and interesting. How about a bit more design effort blizzard-u certainly dont lack for funding.
TCITH Oct 26th 2008 8:25AM
I started this morning on my main - did some necropolis sites, learnt the mechanics - very few people around, have more runes on my main than I know what to do with - decided to get out my alt who could use the gear being served uo, why did I not use him for my learning phase?
All spawn spots now maxed with AoE people, any summoned mobs are poounded without any thought to the original person who summond - after multiple attemps at various locations my alt was left with 3 stones - my main has 60 he cannot use as he already has everything
silly
yendorii Oct 26th 2008 8:35AM
AOE is the wrong way to go to tag the mobs for the most part. My group farmed for 3 cycles of attacks last night. Prot pally, ret pally, warlock, rogue. We would summon all 4 shades and use exorcism. We would always pull away a minimum of two, usually all 4 though if we were quick with the follow-up hammer.
As for the fairness of it, take your queue from Blizzard. If they didnt want it to be an every man for themselves tagging race they had plenty of time to change the mechanic between the launch of naxx and now. The moral of the story is dont try to solo it, find some friends and become much more effective.
Teaspoon Oct 26th 2008 8:31AM
My party of 5 started initially in Ashzara but things were busy so we figured looking at the map and guessing that the one least busy would be Blasted Lands. We arrived and pretty much had them to ourselves. Oh the rep grind was awesome, have went left, other went right then we met at the crystal where I Thunder Clapped and shockwaved maybe 30 mobs and we then aoe'd them down.
In the end, we got several of the rare mobs to complete my Blue Judgement set and when it came to the shades, it was terrible. People were waiting for others to use 8 runes to then try and steal them away. Shame shame. Because they didn't activate them, it left my group to pulling em and we would get all 4 to ourselves, 120 tokens, epics and rep.
I am now a proud owner of a paladin trinket that I will say is the funniest trinket evar!!
N3RD Oct 26th 2008 8:39AM
I've been using a single target instant cast for tagging since I'm really only interested in tagging the one I summoned. I've managed to get a good fast tag off that way a couple times. The biggest problem for me though is that if someone else grabs aggro (which is not that hard for them to do against me since I'm resto) they can kite the mob away from his spawn point until he evades and resets. Then when he resets he comes untagged again and the AoE tagging gets him before I can. I've wasted more than a few runes this way and I wish they just had them tagged as yours based on you summoning it. Right now there is almost no reason to even summon one unless its really late at night.
Branu Oct 26th 2008 8:45AM
Like many of you i thought the way to tag the mobs was to get the first hit HOWEVER the tag goes to the person who handed in their runes to summon the shadow of doom.
Myself and several others on skywall server started a raid of about 7 people and we traipsed around azeroth for about a half hour QQing about tagging when i realised that i always got a tag because i was the one handing in runes. After 3 hours 9 times out of 10 my group had tagged over 25 Shadows and almost everyone now has their chestpiece (except me :'()
Adina Oct 26th 2008 9:22AM
I wasted 16 runes last night to people being quicker on the draw than I was then it came to the mob I summoned. Once when an entire raid's worth of AOE started as soon as they saw summoners, and a second time to a moonfire. So no, they're not auto-tagged, trust me on that one. :\