The Queue: Fluffy
by Adam Holisky 
Feb 8th 2010 at 5:00PM
Today's Queue is dedicated to snow. May all your flakes be fluffy.
Xan asked...
"Kind of a lore question... I understand that resurrection type spells are part of game mechanics, but as far as lore goes, is there such a thing as resurrection, and if so would your standard run of the mill (ie: low level) Priest, Pally, etc, have this capability?"
First and foremost, suspend your disbelief with resurrection. If we didn't have it, then we'd have permadeath, and that would be hell. Seriously, it'd be the worst thing to ever happen to any game, ever.
But, given the necessity of it, let's take a look from a lore perspective. Warcraft lore itself is based off of the plethora of myths, religions, and other stories which comprise the foundation of western thought (although there is certainly a lot of eastern philosophy included as well). Resurrection in the western world, while physically impossible for human beings (queue some BSG music) right now, it is a generally accepted metaphysical principle. You don't necessarily need to believe you can be resurrected after getting a sword stabbed through your heart, but the concept is not a shocking or unfamiliar one.
Thus, resurrection is part of our collective understanding as a people -- whether or not you think resurrection is possible or not is unimportant; it is understood and thus makes a good element to include in a video game where such things, which are not common place in reality, are common place in Azeroth. Given the underpinnings of why WoW, and other games, include resurrection, it's not hard to say that every day players are able to resurrect people, lore wise, because of their metaphysical connection to gods and the greater world.
Who wouldn't want to be able to bring back from death a loved one? There might be arguments if such a thing should be done, but at the end of the day, I'd do it in a heartbeat.
Thus, players are put in a position of having such power. Their ties to the gods of Azeroth allow them to function as their super-natural vessels, bringing forth life to which it was prematurely taken from. It doesn't matter if you're level 1 or level 85, you still have that tie to the gods, and at the time they see fit, you get part of their power to give life.
Xues asked...
"When Cataclysm hits, do you think non-DK's will be able to fly into Archeus?"
I would assume so, although it's just an assumption since we don't know for sure.
Trefpoid asked...
"Will we ever be able to send gold across factions? I'm sick of losing 1000g+ every time I want my Hordie to have some cash. A mailbox in a goblin city with a neutral AH would be great. Maybe even with a fee. Sending heirlooms across factions is possible, why not gold?"
I admit it would be nice, really nice. It's obvious that the technology is there to send things across factions, but there are artificial limitations in place that prevent this (sans heirlooms). Blizzard could, technically, allow gold to be sent across factions one day, but we haven't seen any indication that they're going to let us do it.
Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW.com crew is here with The Queue, our daily Q&A column! Leave your questions in the comments and we'll do our best to answer 'em!Filed under: The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 7)
ahsanali Feb 8th 2010 5:08PM
Why can you not just put up enchanting mats on a neutral AH for a large amount of gold? There is no deposit on enchanting mats and the cut you'd lose to the AH would be lower because of the lack of a deposit.
Or am I missing something?
wrinklestein Feb 8th 2010 5:12PM
The AH fee is based on the sale price. The deposit is a separate charge.
Kriegle Feb 8th 2010 5:13PM
I've tried sending gold/items to my Hordie from my Alliance toon through a neutral Auction House and it didn't work. The game recognizes that you're bidding on your own toon's items and pops up with some sort of "You can't bid on your own auctions" message.
Of course the last time I tried this was ages ago, and with the plethora of changes (including faction transfer, etc.) it could've changed since then.
Music-chan Feb 8th 2010 5:18PM
It's not changed. Most people get a second party to help them sell things across faction. For instance, I use my husband. I give him a set amount of money, I put up something cheap for that amount of money, he buys it and voila, I now have money on the opposite faction.
Jabbaprime Feb 8th 2010 5:28PM
the best thing to send are enchanting mats, get a friend to post them for you and you buy em for 1 copper and sell them over there.
Zanathos Feb 8th 2010 5:45PM
Much better way to do this. Transfer mats, not gold. Example: Enchanting mats sell for similar amounts on both factions. Buy mats off alliance auction house, transfer to horde alt via neutral auction house for a nominal cost, then sell the enchanting mats on the horde auction house. The problem with this is you run the risk of someone sniping your auction, but that doesn't seem as common these days. I sell things for at least 1 to 5 gold to keep snipebots from bidding on cheap auctions. This largely avoids the cut of the neutral auction house, so more money for your alts.
Of course, even better would be to transfer something that's more valuable on one faction than the other. Here's a couple of reliable options. Faction specific pets, argent tournament pets, and faction specific cooking recipes. For a tiny amount of extra work, you can go from losing money transfering from horde alliance, to making money doing so. Make arbitrage work for you.
Karuna Feb 8th 2010 5:47PM
Your best bet for not losing value when u move things over to another faction is to put items on the ah for one copper, having someone buy it out insta on the other side and then selling the item on the ah of the faction you transferred it to.
I usually try and buy items specifically on horde ah that i know know will sell alliance side. Stacks of frost lotus sell quickly, as do enchanting mats. Also, i've managed to acquire a couple of cheap boe epics that have doubled their value when transferred over, so sometimes you can even make money on it.
machoflaco Feb 8th 2010 5:50PM
I've tried sending gold to my horde by putting up auctions in neutral towns, but got an error message that I couldn't bid on my own auctions. This was a while ago, it's still surprising how many people think u can do this when you cant.
Zanathos Feb 8th 2010 5:58PM
I wouldn't recommend putting things up for 1 copper, in case there's someone running a sniper bot at one of the neutral AHs. They don't seem to common now, but I prefer to list big ticket items for a few gold to discourage that.
@machoflaco
That's correct, you can't bid on your own auctions, even cross-faction. You need to use a second account, either your own or a friends, to make cross faction transfers.
Azizrael Feb 8th 2010 6:06PM
The free transfer of gold and items from Alliance to Horde and vice versa could completely destroy the economies of imbalanced realms. I know there's almost no Alliance left on my realm, and a lot of the stuff with heavy competition hordeside sells for a much higher price on the Stormwind AH. If I could make 100 Netherweave Bags with cloth bought Hordeside for a couple of gold per stack, send them to an Alliance bank alt and post them there, I'd make twice as much profit easily. The knock on effect is that the Alliance folks making gold from selling much rarer items for a premium lose their source of income, AND there's a lot less players buying so the market is slower.
Draelan Feb 8th 2010 10:16PM
If you REALLY want to ensure that your neutral AH auctions get across safely, there IS a way if you've got some friends with some spare time... simply have you and your friends spread out to the various neutral AH NPCs. the person selling the items, and the person buying them should make sure they're at AHs where there are no other players. When you're ready to transfer, have your extra friends kill any AH NPCs that are being watched by players not in your group. Then post/buy the goods before the other auctioneers can respawn. Of course, given that you'll be doing this cross faction, you'd either need the seller/buyer at the same AH, so they can give an emote signal, or have them on vent to coordinate. Also, it's extra work for everyone involved, and may prove an annoyance to players who aren't AH bots, so.... yeah.
Gothia Feb 9th 2010 6:01AM
Sending gold using the neutral auction house is always costly and you have to depend on a friend to help you because you can not buy things from the same account.
I am hopeful that one day the magic mailbox will work across servers because it is very challenging to start new from scratch. Spending $25 is not a solution for me to send another toon to a different server.
Why do we have to feel like we are stuck on an unbalanced server or and have to pay to get out of a situation that should have never existed in the 1st place?
thebitterfig Feb 9th 2010 9:16AM
The idea of transferring items at low cost to sell on the other faction's AH will work fine on a lot of servers. However, it is not without flaws. The first is that server economies can be differ greatly between factions. Some servers have had one side or the other decimated by faction switching, and this has lead to collapsed economies in some cases. The second is that there is inherently more risk and work involved. You have to list the new items on the AH, and even presuming that the prices are comparable, it might take a long time to sell, or you might only be able to sell at a loss.
There is an instant, no-hassle alternative if you take a 15% AH cut, so it is up to you.
trefpoid Feb 9th 2010 10:34AM
sending enchanting mats sounds good. Maybe I'll try that. Enchanting scrolls o Vellums don't requiere a deposit either.
Usually, when I sent things over, I just log on to my account and my girlfriends in the other PC and just buy everything as soon as I put in in the AH for 1 copper. It's really nice. Of course, like u said, I just go with my hordie, put something for 8000g and buy it with my girlfriends account and voilà, I get my cash, but the 15% tax destroyes a large part of this sum, which sucks badly. I just hope blizz allows this, I thinks it might even help economies.. the Horde AH on my server (Ragnaros) has TONS of anything and the price is ridiculously cheap for everything. Alliance, on the other hand, has everything a lot more expensive. The Horde/Alliance ratio is 3:1 in my server, so of course the Horde AH has a lot more of everything with a lot more people. It would really help alliance if you could get cheaper mats on the other side and send 'em over.
Let's just hope blizz realizes this :(
VSUReaper Feb 8th 2010 5:08PM
How would a prot warrior determine the cap for SBV. I'm trying to redo my threat set for 5 mans since they nerfed SBV (I used to be one of those crazy warriors that are feeling this nerf since I geared for it - running 5 mans with a ret pally healing me with AOW procs was fun).
Is there a hard set cap on SBV?
Kevin Feb 8th 2010 5:09PM
+1 for BSG music :-)
dhofland Feb 8th 2010 5:09PM
about the acherus question of this queue, won't the deathknight starting area be entirely obsolete with the death of the Lich King? We will be able to make goblin and worgen deathknights. however if they "were made before the Lich King died", why don't we see them now? its just kind of contradictory.
Reuben Feb 8th 2010 5:13PM
That's not really how it works. Arthas would only be "boss dead." You know, the sort of dead that all the dungeon bosses are every time you kill them. From a lore perspective he'd be considered dead, but not from a game perspective. I can keep going to Outland and do quests that involved Illidan, and I can even run Black Temple (not that I can get a group) multiple times, and he'll be there every single time.
Hades Feb 8th 2010 5:18PM
dhofland,
each player "lives" in his/her own timeline. as characters level, they sort of catch up to the current timeline in the game. phasing in Cataclysm will help this concept flow more naturally into the game though.
Ithas Feb 10th 2010 7:49PM
That's wrong, though. You can go to outland because that was in the past (a year ago lore-time). Your level 60 whatever is a year in the past, and by the time he gets to northrend it is current time. Archerus is in the past as well, and since goblins and worgen are going to be able to become death knights, even though the lich king is dead timeline wise, this means that they should be there now. Which they aren't.