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Inside an old alt's vault
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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsWorld of Warcraft turns 7 years old next week
by Mathew McCurley 
Nov 18th 2011 at 10:00PM
We had heard about a potential tabard item for the anniversary a few months back during the datamining of patch 4.2, so this reward isn't unexpected, but it's still very welcome. The Baby Blizzard Bear and Onyxian Whelping were awesome rewards back in the day, and I love getting cool, fun items each year. The return of anniversary gifts is a welcome change.
World of Warcraft turns 7 years old
World of Warcraft turns seven on November 23, 2011! It's been a truly incredible seven years, and we'd like to thank you all for joining us for yet another fantastic year. To celebrate, players who log into the game between November 20 and December 3 will earn a feat of strength added to their Achievements and a "Celebration Package" item. Using your item will get the celebrations rolling by shooting off fireworks*, applying a (visual only) tabard to your character, and granting a 7% bonus to experience and reputation gains while active.
We look forward to another year of adventures ahead and many more to come!
*Please observe all goblin and gnome fire hazard warnings and celebrate responsibly.
We look forward to another year of adventures ahead and many more to come!
*Please observe all goblin and gnome fire hazard warnings and celebrate responsibly.
Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Review the official patch notes, and then dig into what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 4)
VSUReaper Nov 18th 2011 10:34PM
Be thankful they are giving anything at all.... you know they dont have to, don't you?
Hell, following social conventions, it's THEIR birthday, shouldn't we all be meeting at Chuckie Cheese, with a clown and a magician, singing happy birthday?
Farnoth Nov 18th 2011 10:37PM
Following the Bungie route with their reverence of the number seven? Blizzard are now members of the 7th Column, no doubt. Yep. That's it. Has to be.
Or, they just didn't make something last year, and needed a cheap, fast excuse to give, and were ready for it this year after all the forum drama last year? That's prolly it.
Prelimar Nov 18th 2011 10:44PM
...trying REALLY hard to think of a way the number seven is super-geekily appropriate as a milestone year.... but failing.
SamLowry Nov 18th 2011 11:03PM
"Be thankful they are giving anything at all.... you know they dont have to, don't you?"
They don't have to fix any bugs, either, or provide any more patches or content updates or expansions. But they do those things to keep us happy so their money will keep rolling in.
ninjivitis Nov 18th 2011 11:35PM
@VSUReaper Personally, I don't care if they give out anything or not, what got to me last year was the bullshit reason for it.
Jabouty Nov 18th 2011 11:56PM
In response to why the 7th year and not the 6th:
We skipped the 6th so that we could reap the wonders from the multiplicative benefits of both on the 7th.
7 x 6 = 42
The answer to life, the universe, and everything = 42
Geek problem solved.
Noyou Nov 19th 2011 12:05AM
"Be thankful they are giving anything at all.... you know they dont have to, don't you?"
I think they raised the bar when they starting giving out pets in year 4-5. Also, I have been throwing money at them since Jan. '09, sorry if it makes me bad for wanting something after I have given another $180 to them. So yeah, the least they could do is throw me a pet or how about a free customization on a toon I have been playing for almost 3 years?
As for the tabard, it will probably last for the duration of the anniversary event (11/20-12/3)
Jonisjalopy Nov 19th 2011 12:48AM
http://wow.joystiq.com/2011/11/17/breakfast-topic-are-players-becoming-too-entitled/
mem0ryburn Nov 19th 2011 8:10AM
Actually, Noyou, the least they can do is take your money and provide you the service you're paying for. That's the least they can do, as well as the most you can expect. If Blizz wants to give you a reach around in the meantime well then aren't they just the thoughtful lovers. If they don't, well that's par for the course. If you feel your service is not enough for what you pay then don't pay it.
Blizz shows so much appreciation for their fans already and they really don't have to, and certainly it doesn't hurt them to do it. If I were Blizz and all my fans were whiny entitled shits I'd certainly be far less inclined to give too much of a shit about them. Luckily the entitled shits seem to be outnumbered.
mem0ryburn Nov 19th 2011 8:29AM
Again, @Noyou:
"I have been throwing money at them since Jan. '09, sorry if it makes me bad for wanting something after I have given another $180 to them"?
I'm sorry, no, they've been offering a service and you've been choosing to buy into it. You are getting something for your $180, you're getting exactly what you're paying for. Enjoy what you have or don't bother with it. Why would you even play if you feel like you're getting nothing as you throw away your money?
Also I can't help but want to clear up this little detail for you, where you said "sorry if it makes me bad for wanting something [more]". "Bad" is not the appropriate adjective, I would say ungrateful. What else is not appropriate is your assignment of which is the cause and which is the effect, since it's not the wanting more that makes you ungrateful, it's the being ungrateful that makes you want more.
I haven't slept in 32 hours so your comment is probably irritating me more than perhaps it should. Not that I think anything I said is wrong or should be apologized for, absolutely not, rather that four (now five) paragraphs over two comments is probably unnecessary retaliation for an annoying comment made by 'anonymous' :/
Noyou Nov 19th 2011 10:23AM
@memory
Hope you get some sleep dude.
PeeWee Nov 19th 2011 1:33PM
@Jabouty
By your math, last year should also have been celebrated, since 6 x 7 = 42 as well.
Anteia Nov 19th 2011 7:49PM
I was sad that we didn't get a pet last year, and wish we were getting one this year. You know, the pets are just a fun way to mark that you've been around in the game for a while. and unlike a tabard, you can have them all with you and just pull that one out whenever you want. So I'm sad we're not getting a pet this year again, I admit. Do I think Blizzard OWES us? Well. Kinda.
I'm a Dev in another game and basically, I only owe the players what they're technically paying for, yes. But we have several holidays we always celebrate in that game. If all the devs got together and said, "You know what, eh, we're not celebrating that" after the expectation has been created that we would... then it is certainly not WRONG of the players to be disappointed. Nor is it ungrateful for them to be disappointed as someone else said. My -Job- and the success of the game I am a dev in... depends on keeping the players in a relative state of happiness. And this means trying (often failing because players can be irrational) to meet expectations. And if I CREATED an expectation of something and then just decided not to do it the next year, that is certainly our right as devs to make that call, but we as devs are not clueless. We don't go, "Huh? What? You expected it? Golly. You could appreciate the other things we're working on instead." We KNOW the players are going to be disappointed.
Blizzard isn't any different. Honestly. They're human, sometimes they won't have managed to do something, or sufficiently improve a holiday or whatever. There'll be bugs and there'll be screw ups and there'll be disappointment. They shouldn't be held over a fire for it. But come on, people, don't give excuses like "What you're paying for is only the base game!!!" because that's not true. That's not been true since the first time there was a game-wide event or a a holiday was celebrated in game. Blizzard created a trend in those years of giving something to the players for the anniversary. BLIZZARD made those concepts part of the game we are paying for now. People aren't being ungrateful for being disappointed that last year, this trend did not continue. It's basic understanding of the nature of the world. Even DOGS get it. You give them a treat for something, they associate that treat with that something, they're pretty darned puzzled when suddenly you stop giving treats for it. They eventually get that they should just do the trick and not necessarily expect the treat, but they're not wrong in being confused at you suddenly stopping giving them something. The difference being that humans pay subscription fees and decide whether they're going to continue to subscribe. I'd say the screw up was in Blizzard starting a sort of tradition that they suddenly just decided one year not to do. And that's okay. To me, they screwed up in doing nothing last year, and I accept that. They've screwed up a lot on different things, but I still enjoy their game and still respect what they've managed to do. I'm still signed up for a year and looking forward to the next expansion.
You can consider not giving anything last year to be a mistake without hating Blizzard. And people can be disappointed without being ungrateful. Both extreme sides need to calm down. It wasn't a betrayal, but it was a disappointment. Blizzard does not 'owe' it to us. But subscriptions are what gives them their paychecks and disappointing players isn't great business. They're also human beings and human beings are going to disappoint sometimes. Players need to also be able to accept that. :)
Jason Nov 20th 2011 6:44AM
@VSUReaper
Guapa Nov 21st 2011 7:45AM
as to the question of no. 7's geekishness: Geeks typically count the zero whereas humans start at 1. The most popular mistake of young programmers is to call the n-th element of an array whereas they should have used the n-1-th element because there is a 0-th element.
With birthdays it's the same, you should count no. 0 because it's the actual birthday/release date, so in fact this is not the 7th but the 8th birthday of WoW. And 8 bit = 1 byte.
So WoW is now officially 1 byte old! Happy Byteday!
K.B. Nov 18th 2011 10:35PM
If the tabard looks good and is re-usable that would be cool. It would be a shame if it was just a one time thing though.
Al Nov 18th 2011 10:49PM
Visual only? So we just look like we're wearing a tabard for the day?
Meh.
Pyreo Nov 18th 2011 10:55PM
"Cosmetic only" probably means x-mog.
JattTheRogue Nov 18th 2011 11:30PM
Except for the fact that you can't transmogrify tabards ...
Al Nov 18th 2011 11:30PM
Link has "visual-only".. we'll see.