The Queue: Facts of life
by Alex Ziebart 
Apr 2nd 2010 at 5:00PM
To celebrate my most recent level 80, a protection warrior, I was going to use a screenshot of it in the header of today's edition of The Queue. Unfortunately, I'm writing this on my laptop and when I play WoW on this thing the character models... well, let's just say they mutate a little bit. It's not pretty. So instead, I'm using a screenshot of one of Matt Rossi's warriors and we're all going to pretend it's a white-haired female draenei. Sound good? Great. Now let's move on.
Kar On E asked...
"If you could trade out one of the new race/class combinations coming to us in Cataclysm for one that will not be there, which would you trade out? Which would you instead trade in? Why?"
Can I pick a worgen combination? Because if I can, I'd drop one of the worgen caster classes so we could have worgen paladins. Playing a huge badass werewolf that stands behind a bush throwing icicles at his enemies just seems wrong. While a werewolf retribution paladin pummeling his foes with an enormous axe seems so right.
I would also drop tauren paladin and take troll paladins instead. I have no good lore explanation for this, but come on. Troll paladins would be awesome.
Tim asked...
"How does the random name generator work? I know the simple answer is it give you a random name, but the main issue is many of the names are taken. You click random name, then click enter world and boom name taken. Weird right? Seems like this feature is broken. I tested it about 6-7 times. Maybe I was unlucky or something. Thoughts?"
It's not broken, it just has a very limited set of names it offers. The list isn't stored on Blizzard's servers. The random name generator pulls from a list that is in your game files. It won't know something is taken until you try to submit it. In other words, it's working as intended.
It's safe to say every single name on that list is probably taken on your server. Use it as inspiration instead if you're looking for help picking a name. Hit random until you find something that sounds neat, and tinker with it until it's unique. I don't mean just add Zs and Xs to the end, but if it recommends Spartacus then pick out what part of the name you like. If you liked the last syllable, break it off from the rest and use that syllable in a new name.
@evolsoulx asked...
"Has anyone ever attempted to seriously kill Flame Leviathan without vehicles? Any success possible ever?"
Well, Flame Leviathan on his easiest level of difficulty has 23 million health. 70 million on his highest difficulty. The Lich King has less than that. That's an incredibly long time to need to weather Flame Vents, Missile Barrage, and any melee abilities you weren't able to kite from being slow on foot. I think it might be totally impossible without finding some way to cheat it.
@Ndiayne asked...
"Do you think gnomes and goblins will ever merge engineering technologies and end up exploding Azeroth?"
The two races are doing pretty good on their own, I don't think they need to merge. Keep in mind that it was goblins that riveted metal plates to Deathwing to keep him from being torn apart under his own power. And with what's happening in Cataclysm... yeah, the goblins are basically doing it without the gnomes. No merger necessary. Blame them when Azeroth gets torn apart later this year.
Tokkar asked...
"When is the Armory going to work again?"
Grass grows, birds fly, sun shines, and the armory breaks.
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: Analysis / Opinion, The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 8)
Tomatketchup Apr 2nd 2010 5:05PM
Grass grows, birds fly, sun shines, and brotha', I hurt people.
boatarific Apr 2nd 2010 5:19PM
Ive been inspired to have the first 85 human paladin on my server come cataclysm. In light of this I've been wondering what is the best way to get a beta key?
blizzardsprules Apr 2nd 2010 5:40PM
Troll Paladins make no sense lore wise? So how do you explain Heathens?
brian Apr 2nd 2010 6:10PM
Bonk!
Shane Apr 2nd 2010 6:20PM
This is exactly what I said out loud as soon as I read that line. Bravo!
jbodar Apr 2nd 2010 7:08PM
If you were from where I was from, you'd be *bleep* dead!
matt3270 Apr 2nd 2010 7:12PM
Tell me, Are you the scout?
boatarific Apr 2nd 2010 7:39PM
is asking how to be more likely to get a beta key a terrible thing?
jbodar Apr 2nd 2010 9:18PM
@boat
It's probably mostly because you threadjacked. It has this strange effect of making everyone reach for the "downrank comment" link.
Shassar Apr 4th 2010 5:52AM
That condiment is a SPY!
paul Apr 2nd 2010 5:06PM
How come Dalaran Lags so much? I mean, really its quite a ghost town. I never see anyone else there at all. In fact, when Im mounted, I sometimes dont even see myself...
Aurigo Apr 2nd 2010 5:11PM
your EPEEN meter is too high
Hëx Apr 2nd 2010 5:51PM
Just a thought, but it could be from the amount of textures needed to load for each and every piece of gear worn by all the players there. I just built this gaming rig last summer and it's a beast, but occasionally I get the whole invisible everybody for a whole minute.
@Aurigo: Epic comment! And someone over at MMO-Champion has actually made an EPEEN addon.
Thread: http://www.mmo-champion.com/interface-macros/%28addon%29-epeen-inspired-by-blizzard%27s-april-fools-joke/
Download: http://www.wowace.com/addons/e-peen/
Lokanaya Apr 2nd 2010 6:01PM
How slow/fast is your computer? If it's really slow, then, assuming you spend a short amount of time in Dalaran, it might simply not have time to load the player models and/or the NPCs. I know that mine takes like five minutes to load the models, but only one or two for the landscape. That could explain the seemingly ghost town-ism and the lag.
If it's not that, all I can say is BUG. ( Or something I don't know about, which is entirely possible.)
Alanid Apr 2nd 2010 6:24PM
@hex yeah I get the same when I log into Dalaran. It's the amount of objects with high res textures your comp has too load at the same time - it slows it right down, funnily enough my character tends to be the last one for it to load.
emperorshishire Apr 3rd 2010 1:29AM
It's due to the technical difference between Dalaran and everywhere else. WoW mainly uses bump-maps for their ground texture. Bump maps are exceptionally easy on your processor and gpu, they take almost no memory to render, and store as a very small image. The problem though, is that there can only ever be one layer, i.e., the ground. Since crystalsong forest already has a ground, Dalaran has to entirely use the second type of object, which is known as a mesh. Meshes are very heavy on the computer in large quantities, and the entire city of Dalaran is one giant mesh. Suffice it to say that Dalaran is hard on a computer regardless of how many people are currently in there. More people only makes it worse.
NekoDaimyo Apr 2nd 2010 5:08PM
"drop tauren paladin and take troll paladins"
Bad blogger. No biscuit.
Randy Apr 2nd 2010 5:18PM
I think its BS that Worgen can't be pally's because well that big friggin cathedral fits the lore. The main reason I think it's crap is because now Tauren have the ability to be EVERY SINGLE CLASS OF TANK THAT EXISTS!! Thats complete BS. No alliance race has that ability....don't see Night Elve's getting pallies anytime soon. Worgen get druids....but then so do trolls. What is the alliance getting that the horde side can't say they are getting?
Ricohardt Apr 2nd 2010 5:23PM
Gnome paladins. Even Mekkatorque rerolled:
http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2010/february/mekkatorque_33.jpg
Andostre Apr 2nd 2010 5:51PM
Hey, Randy:
"The main reason I think it's crap is because now Tauren have the ability to be EVERY SINGLE CLASS OF TANK THAT EXISTS!!"
So? Why is this a big deal?