The Queue: July 4

Last night, I finally had a solid Zul'Gurub group -- the very first one since patch 4.1. Now that I've been able to topple the place in a good, solid group that was willing to take its time and actually experience the instance, I have to give props to Blizzard for the amount of effort it put into the zone. All of the little optional mobs and bosses are very cool, and it felt a little like classic WoW again. You are actually rewarded for exploring and doing more than going from Boss A to Boss B.
I know I tend to rail on how dry WoW instances tend to feel nowadays, so I felt I should give Blizzard a high-five for the work the developers put into this one. Good job, team.
raingod asked:
I've noticed since Firelands dropped my queue time wait looking for a group has dropped considerably for regular dungeons. I mean from 10-20 min (I'm dps) to under 5. Have they tweaked this or have I gotten very lucky this week?
Since it's a new tier of raiding, players need valor points for gear again. Queue times will be good for a few weeks, maybe a month or two, and then I expect them to drop off again. As soon as players have purchased all that they need from their valor points or they can get all of their valor points for the week from Firelands and such, they won't have any need to queue anymore.
Enjoy your awesome queue times while they last.
Dennis asked:
My heirlooms say bind on battle.net account. Is there a way to send them to an alt on another server?
Not currently, no. Well, I think you can do a paid character transfer, but that's a little extreme. Blizzard has mentioned that it wants to make it possible to send your heirlooms to other servers, but it's not something that has been implemented yet.
Yvl asked:
How do you guys keep your cool even through the stupidest of questions?
The cliché answer to that is that there are no stupid questions. We have readers that are seasoned raiding vets who have been around since 2004 and have killed every single raid boss in the game. We also have readers who started the game within the last 24-48 hours and can get lost in Northshire Abbey. There's room for all sorts of players in World of Warcraft, and we legitimately enjoy being able to help all of those sorts of people.
There are, of course, plenty of questions that are just people trolling or being jerks. The ability to roll with that and let it slide off your back just comes naturally when you've been doing this kind of job for years. And if you don't have that sort of capability, you shouldn't have this sort of job. It's the internet, after all. I don't think anybody has managed to actually make me angry in years, and good lord, have people tried.
Tat asked:
In the Thrall Questline in patch 4.2 I find it annoying that when Thrall gets taken away by the Druid of the flame while the following are powerless to stop it: The Aspects, Malfurion and us. What are your thoughts???
Blizzard tends to overuse the "plot stun" in its cutscenes. When the developers want to give someone a chance to monologue, they just lock everybody in an unbreakable stun, extremely powerful NPCs included. Yes, it does give that NPC a chance to speak their dialogue unimpeded, but it feels very not-good to players and doesn't make a lot of sense when looking at the relative power levels of various NPCs.
Maybe development time doesn't allow for it, but I personally would have liked the Flame Druids to show up in force with Ragnaros's crew. The Aspects would be busy fighting them off in the background while Fandral made off with Thrall. You could still get a front row seat to what was going on, but it would explain what the heck all the other powerful people there were doing while Fandral spoke his lines.
It felt double-bad because it wasn't the only time the devs used a plot stun in this patch. They do it to you when you meet Leyara, too.
Teryn asked:
Since it's another BBQ holiday in the States, can you give us another side dish recipe Alex?
Sure. Buy a bunch of tomatoes -- it doesn't matter what kind as long as they're good and ripe. Slice. Salt or pepper if desired. Devour.
Simple!
Filed under: The Queue
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Reader Comments (Page 4 of 8)
Zaraphiston Jul 4th 2011 12:35PM
Question for the queue:
I've noticed that killing mobs whith grey health bars (which means other player hit them before I did) on Molten Front count towards completing related quests, even if the only hit is a FFF in cat form. Am I exploiting a bug?
(Sorry about my english)
Chris Gonzalez Jul 4th 2011 12:57PM
No, it's intentional. Enough mobs don't spawn for the number of players that are there during peak hours, so Blizz apparentoy decided to allow you to jump in on other people's kills. This actually goes for most of the new dailies, I think. Now, if only they'd do the same for injured Protectors of Hyjal...
Ilmyrn Jul 4th 2011 12:56PM
I've noticed that too, and I'm deeply hopeful that it's intentional. Certainly it's made daily questing MUCH more enjoyable.
jonas Jul 4th 2011 1:20PM
Doesn't seem to apply to the dogs for the daily that was active yesterday :( That alone made me appreciate how awesome it was that mob tagging didn't matter on the other quests - the dog quest took a good 20 minutes to finish. Didn't help that there were flagged alliance standing exactly on spawn points, so you couldn't just lay down an AoE.
Ilmyrn Jul 4th 2011 1:35PM
@ Jonas: For what it's worth, as long as you're NOT flagged, you should be able to dump all the AOE on a flagged player of the opposite faction without flagging yourself. The AOE won't affect the flagged person at all, and you should remain snugly unflagged.
Skarn Jul 4th 2011 2:41PM
Correct, AoE abilities should NOT flag you. Single-target ones do, which is why flagged people will camp on top of quest givers trying to get you to right click them instead of handing in your quest.
Randomize Jul 4th 2011 3:48PM
If you're on the dog quest, just move away from the general battle area. There are packs of dogs all over the place that are just sleeping. They're easy pickings and almost no one approaches them.
crimsonmage331 Jul 4th 2011 12:37PM
Far and away the most heinous Plot Stunlock of this patch was [OBLIQUE SPOILER FOR FIRELANDS DAILY ZONE LEAD-IN QUESTLINE] when Leyara roots you and kills that one important lore figure with lots and lots of fire. It takes her like a minute to get him extra well-done, and you get to mash your trinket button in vain while she pour on the flames. At least they let you sling a quick spell or two as she flies away! (I almost got in a Deep Freeze on her, heh.)
Amanda A. Jul 4th 2011 1:12PM
I wonder... if you did that quest at the same time as a lot of other people, if you could collectively kill her before she escaped....
Jaq Jul 4th 2011 1:13PM
Fun fact: it apparently doesn't (or didn't at one time) root pets. A guildie's pet remained free and opened up on Leyara.
Andrew Jul 4th 2011 3:10PM
The choice to make Leyara at that moment a targetable character and not some stupid "Invalid Target" NPC was one of the most satisfying parts of this questline so far.
Noselacri Jul 4th 2011 4:11PM
Here's another spoiler.
That important lore figure isn't dead. He's taking a nap in a tent at Malorne.
Murdertime Jul 4th 2011 10:08PM
Sometimes, I go there and jump up and down on him.
Just cause.
Amaxe Jul 5th 2011 12:37PM
I tried to death grip her, but she was immune to that
Landis Jul 4th 2011 12:59PM
I have a question about the Runetotem/Leyara encounter, is this blizzard waving the root nerf in the collective face of druids? One of the most powerful druids gets rooted and all he can say is something like, what's this, i can't move, someone help! Then he gets pwned. Welcome to the world of nerfs my friend.
Killik Jul 4th 2011 1:45PM
I would not be surprised if it *was* intentional.
Skarn Jul 4th 2011 2:42PM
He should have been Resto.
Killik Jul 4th 2011 6:58PM
He's Feral spec - why was he trying to cast Wrath?
wow Jul 4th 2011 1:00PM
Q4Q: RE: Strange Download.
I don't know if anyone had this issue come up, but when I tried to play Saturday (CDT), my launcher decided to download a 15.6Gig update. I had accidentally canceled it and restarted my launcher and it says my WoW is up to date?
Anyone know what gives? I don't think this is 4.2, since I've been able to access all the new contact including the raid. So anyone know what is up with this 15.6G file?
Thanks
Shinanji
Jaq Jul 4th 2011 1:12PM
It's an odd bug that periodically happens to everyone. Happened to me about a week before 4.2. What it means, I don't know.