The Queue: Happy boys and happy girls
by Mathew McCurley 
May 4th 2011 at 11:00AM
It is no secret that most of my writing gets done against the backdrop of Europop and Europop-inspired artists. When I sit down to write articles or posts, I turn on Pandora and hit my awesome Aqua station, ready for the sweet, sweet Europop to blast in my ears. Why Europop? I don't know. For some reason, I am more productive when rocking out to fast beats.
What? You're going to listen to every second of Happy Boys and Happy Girls, and you're going to like it.
Felix_rew asked:
Did Blizzard explain why Ysera's eyes are open in Hyjal?
Yes. Usually her eyes are closed, but when her power is needed and she needs to be running on all cylinders, her eyes open and her influence is greater. Otherwise, her eyes are closed, but you can see her eyes moving under them watching the mortal races and the dream. Read more about Ysera and her Green Dragonflight.
Jirisundstrum asked:
Question for the queue: With the change to Blind in the patch notes adding yet another ability with different effects in pve and pvp, why doesn't Blizzard just accept the shift in paradigm? Players simply need different toolkits for raiding and arenas, and it seems the game is moving in that direction organically. Why fight nature Blizz?
My guess is that this is something Blizzard wants to do but will roll out very, very slowly and very specifically. Every single ability won't get the PvP/PvE treatment, but for where it makes the most sense, it will happen. Blizzard is reluctant to do it, but I think at this point in time, it's a no-brainer for PvP/PvE balance. I wish that it would have been a design aspect earlier, but at least the dual-purpose abilities are finally happening.
Having Blind as a regular CC option is great because now a rogue is doubly important for a good amount of Cataclysm dungeon content. Good call, Blizz.
Gauldrin asked:
Why do worgen have a cast time when they transform to their mount mode? They arent really changing into anything but dropping on all fours. Also why cant they pick herbs while in that mode? Druids can pick herbs while shapeshifted and insta-transform.
The worgen ability Running Wild is a type of ground mount with the ground mount standard cast time. It just has a unique animation fitting the worgen race. Druids, on the other hand, get the benefit of a flight form that is instant-cast. The class has a "mount" advantage, not a race advantage. In keeping with the race's relatively balanced nature, instant-cast ground mounts in places like battlegrounds, Tol Barad, and other ground mount-specific areas would favor worgen too heavily.
Worden asked:
Alright, since this is for asking questions. I was looking to start(after putting together some ach. first.) getting into heroics. I always hear about Gear and item level and DPS. How do you get these unbelievable levels of gear and strength. Can it be done soloing or camping at the AH? Or is it Raid gear that you have to hope!? that someone will let you join in if you don't meet their minimum levels? I'm just curious because I don't know.
Any help would be fine, and folks seem nicer here than on the normal forums
Here's my main strategy for gearing up alts to get ready for heroics. At level 84, you go straight to Twilight Highlands. The gear differential is just plain higher than the stuff you get in Uldum, and the end rewards for long quest chains are ilevel 333 blues, which are pretty great. Also, at 84 and 85, you want to queue for dungeons and have on a reputation tabard that has some good revered and exalted gear for you. Running level-85 non-heroic dungeons will grant you reputation based on the tabard you have on.
A combination of level 85 dungeon ilevel 333 gear, as well as blue rewards from quests in Twilight Highlands and reputation gear from friendly and above, will get you into heroics faster than you know it!
Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW Insider 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 10)
Grovinofdarkhour May 4th 2011 11:03AM
My ears are not happy with you. They are demanding guitars.
Tim May 4th 2011 11:11AM
Aqua sucked major ass. Thanks for reminding me of Barbie Girl. Ug. Cool if u like them but gouge my ears out with a spork, please.
Pyromelter May 4th 2011 11:42AM
Uprated for funny use of the word spork. +1 to Tim.
Noyou May 4th 2011 1:03PM
But why a spork cousin? McCurley you lied to us. You said Euro pop. The pop part implying there would be some degree of music. This was more like some teen on X throwing a cat on a chalkboard. Repeatedly. I remember "Barbie girl" and while very repetitive was listenable. Surely you can do better.
Oldbear May 4th 2011 1:23PM
But why a spork cousin?
slim1256 May 4th 2011 1:29PM
Cause it's dull, you twit! It'll hurt moooore!
zach.l May 4th 2011 1:42PM
i spork is a spoon and a fork!!
MisterRik May 4th 2011 4:59PM
I see your spork, and raise you a runcible.
Bronwyn May 4th 2011 6:07PM
Jeez why all the Aqua hate. I love them :p
Just because something's popular or not your taste doesn't mean they suck :p
Ihrme May 4th 2011 11:13AM
Question for the Q
How do blizzard explain the death of bosses lore wise? Who was it for example battled the lich king when Tirion was playing the worlds biggest ice cube, just a random bunch of crusaders?
Thanks in advance
Amanda A. May 4th 2011 11:18AM
Apparentlly, in lore there's a couple of dozen adventurers who do all the stuff the player characters do. In the case of ICC, I'd presume it was mostly the Ashen Verdict that did it.
beedub May 4th 2011 11:19AM
From what I've seen, anything having to do with lore where players killed a boss or something, usually mentions "a group of adventurers" or something like that.
Arkonn May 4th 2011 11:20AM
*points to The Deadmines HC*
Zal May 4th 2011 11:26AM
I think it is just credited as a group of adventurers that helped Tirion. The Crusade and Blade were busy fighting the considerable amount of scourge still in and trying to get into the citadel. So they left the fight to the adventurers who cleared out the Lich King's lieutenants and most powerful minions as well as Fordring.
Yams May 4th 2011 11:27AM
I think that the Lich King may just be the first boss that we, the adventures, actually did kill lore-wise. All his RP during the fight is about how he put us through tests to lure Azeroth's strongest fighters to his throne so he could raise us as his greatest champions ever. Tirion (and Terenas' spirit) foiled his plans and helped us defeat the Lich King, but I do believe we actually get some credit for it.
Of course, everything that happened on the top of the Frozen Throne is top secret at this point, so the general population of Azeroth probably has no clue the adventures were there, but the way I see it... lore probably does say that a merry band of Azeroth's finest random people helped bring the Lich King to an end.
This is quite different from other bosses, like Onyxia where lore has been written to give Varian all the credit :P
Neofox May 4th 2011 11:48AM
Yes, it's just a random group of heroes according to lore. In fact, if you go to Dalaran and watch the cut scene we get after killing the Lich King, you'll notice that Bolvar says to Tirion, "You and these brave heroes have your own destiny to fulfill." He is talking specifically about the players who are technically also standing there after the battle. There have been many groups of these "brave heroes" or "adventurers" who have defeated big bosses, and that is how the lore reads.
araquen May 4th 2011 11:50AM
IMO, Blizzard keeps these things relatively ambiguous, otherwise, let's be honest, the world first guilds would have the credit.
So for the most part, since most raiders geared up for ICC through ToC, all raiders who went into ICC were members of the Ashen Verdict and therefore the Ashen Verdict, and by extension, the leaders of the Ashen Verdict take ultimate accountability and credit for Arthas' death. At best, the raiders themselves are the anonymous "task force" that ends up being the support and the "cannon fodder." In any event [spoiler] anyone who makes it through the LK fight learns that they are the crème de la crème of the AV forces, and as such are tagged to be the greatest of the Lich King's subordinates - but then Blizzard set that up from Day 1 in Howling Fjord (if you're not a dope like me and actually get yourself "killed" by the LK during one of the quests - otherwise, I *think* it's the necklace quest in Zul'Drak that drops the first clue that the LK has his eyes on you).
So as far as a take-away, Tirion Fordring takes ultimate credit for the kill. You, the raider, are the Ashen Verdict "Special Forces" that did the dirty work.
From a quasi-role-play perspective, in essence players have to do a little bit of ret-conning. Instead of thinking you've killed the same bosses dozens of times, the perception is more along the lines of the cumulative time spent from starting trash to ending boss represents the initiative - so even though we may say we killed end boss A 37 times in the last 3 months, as far as a storytelling perspective, we spent 3 months hunting down and killing the end boss. At least, that's how I perceive it.
This, of course, is all rendered moot if Blizzard clearly states who killed something (ie: Varian Wrynn killed Onyxia).
In any event, there is a lot of willing suspension of disbelief once you get into raiding, since Blizzard isn't yet at a point where the bosses will remember you from the last time you ransacked their homes...and I'm not sure we want to go there. Even though it would be funny for a boss to say "what, you again?" You know that it wouldn't take long for the Goblins to start selling bosses "dungeon-owner's insurance, and I'm sure that's going to play rough with raiding economy. Insurance isn't cheap, you know.
Pyromelter May 4th 2011 11:50AM
It's usually explained as "A small band of heroes" or "Famous NPC and a small group of heroes," for example, for Illidan in Black Temple, it would have been "Maiev Shadowsong and a group of heroes defeated Illidan Stormrage after storming through the temple and defeating Illidans minions."
In terms of YOUR personal perspective on it, you can put your own spin on it. You can choose to say "I was there, I helped kill Illidan, I was a part of the group of heroes." Or you can say, "Well, it wasn't me, but I was able to vicariously experience that event in an alternate reality universe that allowed me to re-enact those noble deeds." There is always room for interpretation of the "and a group of heroes," because Blizzard never specifies which heroes, and in fact rarely even hints at which faction did the deed.
That is the fun of an open-ended MMO, you can make of it whatever you wish. Blizzard will usually identify certain lore characters as leading the fight (Tirion, Varian, Maiev), and the rest is up to you to role play or simply decide what you really think happened.
IDes May 4th 2011 12:28PM
Kinda like SEAL Team Six taking out bin Laden and President Obama taking most of the credit.
Maccabeus May 4th 2011 1:05PM
@ Yams
I don't quite think thats the case. If I remember, "adventurers" have taken down Ragnaros, Nefarian, C'thun, Kel'thuzad, etc etc. In fact it may be the opposite, where unless it specifically states a major lore character did it alone, it was always almost a group of adventurers and possibly and major lore character helping them (recent examples being Illidan, Kiljaedan, and the Lich King.)