Breakfast Topic: A new recipe for anachronisms
by Deb Montague 
Jun 10th 2010 at 8:00AM
My guild runs all content. In doing this, we frequently find ourselves in Burning Crusade raids. Last night, for instance, we downed Lady Vashj. I got another couple of handfuls of Badges of Justice, essentially worthless currency even for someone who hangs onto things for nostalgia. We had a couple of level 70+ players in the group, new players who are leveling as fast as they can to 80. They asked what they do with these badges. We old hands laughed and said, "Not much." Beyond buying gems from the Isle of Quel'Danas to level my jewelcrafter's skills, there's nothing my level 80 finds interesting in BC badge gear. We talked about the changes in Wrath badge gear and how we wished for something to spend our accumulations on.
This led to a discussion of the patterns that had just dropped and how they aren't relevant to anyone other than a newly minted 70. How nice it would be to find a use for all these patterns, recipes, schematics, etc., in addition to simply leveling a profession.
I am an alchemist, and I've often thought it would be neat to combine some of the potions I know to make better potions. Combine rage and healing potions to make a potion for warriors that heals them over time, based on the amount of rage they generate during combat ... a spellpower and fire potion combo for fire mages or warlocks using fire spells ... a tracking and invisibility combo for hunters or druids or rogues ... Take it one step further and allow all sorts of combinations where on occasion, you get something you weren't expecting: a third eye, an extra arm, laser gaze, 3x growth. I'm a former dungeon master from Dungeons & Dragons; I know all about "side effects."
There must be thousands of things in the game that could be combined in new ways to make them useful again as we progress to 85. What are your suggestions?
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
uncaringbear Jun 10th 2010 8:09AM
I would combine Hogger and Gamon and create the ultimate raid boss. All of Azeroth would tremble in fear! Muhahahaha!
thegatherer Jun 10th 2010 8:10AM
This would make a fabulous contribution to the game, make it more fantastic, and make alchemy more "mad science-y". However, it would also make Alchemy overpowered and I cannot see a way to do something similar for the other trade skills. That isn't to say that the Dev team is more imaginative than me, its just that I cannot see this happening.
However, if what I hear about spells loosing all ranks, and just scaling to level, the same thing may be done for non-healing/mana regen potions. Making the potion scale with the alchemist's skill level, and cost different herbs....and just give them more different potions, some of the more fun ones, like "potion of orc stench" turning you into an orc, "potion of fleshy decay" turning you undead...etc....man, it's too fun to think of names like that....
I can see it now....an Illidan sized demo'lock.....mmmmm giant PvP target lol.
Anuillae Jun 10th 2010 8:36AM
Well... engineering you could combine machines, for example put Turbo Boosts on the Mechanical Sheep, to make a super fast sheep!
Blacksmithing, Leatherworking and Tailoring, you could use old armour pieces and bolt/sew them onto new ones to increase stats.
Inscription/JC... I dunno, dual glyphs/gems? That would be waaay OP though
Although it would be a pain to balance around, it could (probably) be done.
Anyway, whats not to like about an explosive rocket sheep?
thegatherer Jun 10th 2010 8:43AM
I actually agree....now I want explosive rocket sheep!
I can see it now....Elwynn Forest: where men are men, and sheep are no longer scared butrocketpoweredhighexplosivemachines!
SunGod228 Jun 10th 2010 9:42AM
Perhaps you could give jewelcrafters the ability to combine superior gems to make epic gems. and the color that would come out would be based on the gems you used. Think gem tower defense.
Wulfkin Jun 10th 2010 8:14AM
Combine 3 sandviches to make 1 scrap metal!
SunGod228 Jun 10th 2010 9:46AM
rofl this is win
A5 Jun 10th 2010 8:25AM
It's not very fun but I've always thought you should be able to combine 2 [cloth] bandages into 1 heavy [cloth] bandage.
Namy Jun 10th 2010 8:41AM
Yes I agree! You make far more bandages when levelling the skill than you could ever use, then you are on the next bandage up. I end up wasting so much cloth that way. Yes I could sell them on AH but who bothers buying lower level bandages? I end up selling them all to the vendor. To be able to combine my old ones into a higher level one is a great idea!
Whirlahurl Jun 10th 2010 8:37AM
A third eye???? That would be awesome, would that increase haste because you could see more and react faster....random side effects (good and bad) other than the goblin/gnomish ones could add a cool randomness to the game. What if disarm really cut off your arm for a specified amount of time...the possibilities are endless...
KJP Jun 10th 2010 8:38AM
This may not be the way you intended to take this, but I've had a yen for wanting to try to implement one facet of the EvE economy in WoW: relevance of lower level materials in endgame. Thus, have the latest tanking breastplate not just be crafted from pyrite and elementium, but maybe include some silver or gold or thorium or khorium as well.
I would like to see the game de-emphasize those as leveling mats (and make JC 300, for example, attainable without financing), and make them a part of the endgame. My dream scenario: some level 15 put a couple stacks of bronze on the auction house, which is bought up by someone whose uses them as the final ingredient in forging the weapon that proves to be the key to a server first boss kill.
Jonisjalopy Jun 10th 2010 9:03AM
I support and endorse this idea! It would get lowbies some needed gold for leveling, as well.
I also like the idea of combining low-level equipment/gadgets into something a bit better. Combining low-level grenades into some sort of seige bomb for WG, for example. The above idea of rocket sheep makes me warm and fuzzy inside :D
Roy Jun 10th 2010 9:26AM
That's kinda freaky. Last night I was laying in bed thinking about this exact same idea. I was thinking that there was no reason why we couldn't use things like steel in our armor/weapons and use the new materials to add the magical qualities... much like how we added gems to some of the first recipes in order to give them stats instead of being white quality...
While this effort would be high for the dev teams to attain, I agree that this would be very worthwhile.
Hal Jun 10th 2010 9:33AM
What about the AQ war effort, when materials were collected server wide? Sounds like exactly the sort of thing you're looking for.
I wonder if Blizzard would ever do such a thing again.
(cutaia) Jun 10th 2010 11:00AM
"or khorium as well"
NOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOoOOOOOOOOOOooooOOOOOOOooooooOoOooOOoooooooooooo!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
KJP Jun 10th 2010 1:54PM
Hal: I suppose that's one possible implementation of it but that really only scratched the surface of the possibilities. I'm picturing an alchemist testing out a tanking elixir and muttering, "hmm, maybe some briarthorn would help."
Cutaia: Sorry if I brought up bad memories. If it'll help, think of it as something by which the truly elite can prove themselves. "You may have defeated the Lich King on heroic 25, but can you farm five stacks of eternium?"
Hal Jun 10th 2010 8:40AM
I liked the BC crafting model where an item was upgraded through several iterations. Though most of us have trashed items such as Titansteel Shield Wall or Spiked Titansteel Boots, it would certainly be interesting if there were options for continuing to upgrade such items across expansions.
The only difficulty in such things is finding the older items once an expansion is finished. Today most of us would struggle to find the mats for a Breastplate of Ancient Kings (or at least pay a huge sum to the AH), and I suspect in the future we'll have the same problem with Titansteel and Frozen Orbs.
Umehte Jun 10th 2010 8:43AM
I think cooking should work this way as well. Allow for combinations of different raw materials (eggs, meats, flour, fish, veggies...etc) to create your buffs. For example, boar ribs could always add a certain amount of stamina boost which you could cook into a meal with eggs for a mana regen or maybe spiced bread for a little spell power. You could have a maximun number of ingredients to use to customize your own buff. So use three, for example, as that number. So if you made a buff food with all three boar ribs you would get a large stamina boost, but substitute an egg in there and you would get a medium stamina boost and a small Mp5...
Njay Jun 10th 2010 8:57AM
One major overlooked solution to the whole of WoWs 'code re-use' is that they should scale all dungeons via a menu that would scale up older dungeons for higher levels and the loot also. (a rough example would be that the loot and enemies dame gets increased by a % and the loot has a tag/ilvl to differentiate it from new/old loot.
This would open up ALL content, make the game 80% bigger and give it a good few years of shelf life more along with no more QQing about the 'good old days' as you'd be able to walk into ZA and experience wipes as if it was yesterday...
Shade Jun 10th 2010 10:40AM
Keep in mind this creates far too many opportunities for hardcoars to bitch.
ZOMG 80 HAROIC VANILLA IS MOAR HARDMODE THAN 80 HAROIC WRATH ONLY MY GILD CAN DO IT HOW COME ITS EQUAL LEVEL LOOT GIVE US MORE LOOT BLIZZ STOP MAEKING EZMODE FOR CASUALS