The Queue: The League
by Michael Sacco 
Jan 7th 2012 at 12:00PM
If you're not watching this show, you really, really should be. Get caught up on Netflix. You don't need to know anything about football to enjoy it.
mtsadowski asked:
Why are all the Night Elf demon hunters blindfolded? I remember there was one in Nagrand and then there's Illidan. What's the deal with the blindfold?
Demon hunters blind themselves to gain access to spectral sight, which allows them to track demons, undead, and other baddies. If I remember correctly, Illidan's case is different, because as the first demon hunter, his eyes were actually burned out by Sargeras to gain the sight. Newer demon hunters perform a ritual that imitates the original action, though obviously not to as great an effect as Illidan.
eel5pe asked:
So I just had a fridge logic moment; I don't play horde so I was hoping someone who's played through Twilight Highlands as horde could answer this for me. Given that the Dragonmaw Clan basically enslaved and raped Alexstraza for the duration of the Second War, and the Red Dragonflight's prominent role in the zone, do we see her or her dragonflight bearing any emnity at all towards the Dragonmaw Clan and the Horde's subsequent acceptance of them? Is it not addressed, handwaved away, or perhaps something that redeems the clan in her eyes?
Like many, many other unforgivable atrocities perpetrated by various factions and individuals in-game (all Horde allies, coincidentally), it's hand-waved away due to "needing all the help we can get!" It's the same reason that orcs can freely walk around Hyjal and interact with Cenarius.
Unowitz asked:
I heard that they will be fixing the Raid Finder drops so that you can no longer win two of the same item from the same boss.
I assume that is for one raid lockout, as if when aboss drops two of the same item at the same time, you can't wind both. Right? Or are your prevented from getting future tokens if you already one the token from a previous lockout?
I hope or assume it's the first option....but I can't seem to find it anywhere.
It's only per boss. Winning your tier gloves from Morchok (or whoever) won't keep you from winning another pair on Yor'sahj (or whoever) this week or any boss next week.
Lennox asked:
I have a question. Do we have an idea how tall the Pandaren models are in relation to the other WoW races? I have heard everything from as large as a Tauren to Blood Elf size.
They're roughly the size of a male draenei.
nathan.kreps asked:
I find the lore for DS confusing. Maybe because I've never been able to breeze through a raid like this before (in LFR), so I was always too distracted by the whole killing bosses thing to ask questions but ... why are we diving into holes in the ground to kill two bosses that aren't in any way standing between us and Deathwing?
Well, your aim at Siege of Wyrmrest is to make sure that the Aspects can devote their time and energy to defeating Deathwing, and they can't do that if there's no Wyrmrest. You take down all the major threats to the temple, and then you go after D-Dub.
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!
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
fudge Jan 7th 2012 12:04PM
As someone who‘d never raided before the raid finder, I have a couple of questions/observations from a newbie‘s standpoint I thought I could share with more experienced raiders:
What‘s the point of trash? It takes up far too much time and seems mostly uncoordinated and confusing to me. I find myself to enjoy trash in a raid much less (that is, not at all) than in a dungeon, where often the main challenge is trash packs.
Why is everything so full of blinking lights and ground effects? Probably a stupid question, but 25 people glowing in different shades of gold and green are confusing as heck to me. More often than not, I find myself in the middle of the melee pack with no idea as to where I‘m actually standing. Plus, couldn‘t ground effects be colour-coded? Usually, gold and green are „good“, but then the Elementium Bolt in the last Deathwing fight has a golden ground effect as well. And yes, that killed me the first time.
- Although I like the raid finder as a way for me to experience content I could not before, I find myself only motivated by loot. The fights are too simplistic to keep me engaged once I‘ve figured them out. So far, I‘ve won about one upgrade per lockout, so the loot system seems fine to me personally, but we‘ll see how long loot alone will keep me motivated (probably another two or three weeks).
It seems to me that the raid finder actually requires less of a team effort than heroic dungeons. 25 people are far too many to coordinate without a dedicated leader and (probably) voice communication, so it usually devolves into a shouting match with people barking (often contradictory) orders. It still works, because the fights are easy enough to be managed without much coordination.
Arrohon Jan 7th 2012 12:14PM
Well, trash is funny. I doubt anyone likes trash. Yet, we had a trashless raid (ToC), and everyone hates it. I've never bothered doing ToC, so I don't truly know if it's disliked because of the lack of trash (psychology), bad boss encounters, or that everyone did it four times a week. It's interesting none the less...
Scooba Jan 7th 2012 12:17PM
Regular raiding in guilds is more social, typically involving friends, voice chat, chit chat, jokes, and friendly banter. So typically its friends catching up on the week and etc, less about loot for most I think. LFR is not like real raiding in a lot more aspects than that though.
They should have never included the word "raid" to LFR and just call it "25 man adventure loot time with ass hats"
...or u know, 25mALTWAH...
Rai Jan 7th 2012 12:21PM
There's normally some kind of reputation faction associated with a raid, of which trash contributes reputation towards when killed, not to mention Bind on Equip items that can drop.
zackwbrandon Jan 7th 2012 12:22PM
Trash = Gold (I know, big deal) and World Drops.
Blinking Lights make everything better? Right? If not an entire generation of game design has been wasted.
Not but a few do raids for anything besides loot. Some do them literally because they are required to by their teams in order to be included when new loot comes along in new raids.
And the low coordination is working as intended!
Toren Jan 7th 2012 12:32PM
Trash serves a few purposes.
Partially, it's a pacing mechanic. Meant to control the tempo of raid groups, and how long a given instance takes to run. In the Good Old Days, it effectively limited the number of attempts a guild could get in on a night, since re-clearing the respawns frequently took the raid past bedtime.
Also, trash is easy. Especially after downing a heroic for the first time, it's nice to have that time to simply take it easy, not have to worry about maxing out my rotation. Part of the reason ToC was such a painful instance was, you never got the down time. It was 5 brutal, intense, performance-heavy fights in a row....and nothing else. Sure, you could get through it in an hour. But it felt like four.
Trash can also be educational. Mobs leading up to many bosses gives you a taste of what the abilities and mechanics are. The ooze trash in front of Yor'sahj, for instance, are toned-downed versions of what you'll encounter in the fight. My raid hasn't attempted it yet, but I know on heroic Zon'ozz, it's necessary to kill trash tentacles that spawn during the burn phases (which is now, I suppose, an add phase).
Finally, flavor. You're fighting the biggest, baddest bosses in the World (of Warcraft!). Bosses gotta have flunkies. C'mon! We're the heroes of action-movie legend. We've gotta slice and dice our way through waves of henchmen before the ultimate showdown!
fudge Jan 7th 2012 12:32PM
Well, I do enjoy those pretty lights as much anyone, but there is a difference between modest spell effects and seizure-inducing sensory overload.
Emile Jan 7th 2012 12:50PM
The reason for trash is mostly story/immersion/reality of a raid. If an army is assaulting Wyrmrest Temple, there should be an army there to defeat.
Also it gives guild some time to chitchat, warm up, raidleader/officers can talk over plans/tactics etc.
Nadia Jan 7th 2012 12:57PM
Another reason we didn't like ToC; no scenery change. It took place in the same setting the entire time, except for the last boss.
As far as trash goes, it also allows things like Heroism/Bloodlust time to cooldown before the next boss. In ToC, we had to sit there after the first boss was dead, and wait to attack the next boss so we would have Heroism et cetera available to use.
Matthew Jan 7th 2012 1:35PM
Blinking lights are why I can't play melee in this game. Too confusing for me to see anything! Thank Goodness I'm not the only one
Arrohon Jan 7th 2012 1:56PM
My dps is absolute crap during the trash before Ultra. There's so many effects flying around that I lag like crazy and can't see a thing.
MisterRik Jan 7th 2012 2:09PM
Yeah, sometimes the blinking lights (or more specifically, "ground effects" are just too much. I don't raid (or even do dungeons any more), but I PvP now and then in BGs. When fighting near a flag and a DK drops Death and Decay (that's the AoE that turns the ground red, right?) and there are 48 totems scattered around, and everybody's running around in circles, I literally cannot find my targeted enemy. The red targeting circle just blends right into the red effects on the ground.
Rimar Jan 7th 2012 2:47PM
I feel your pain with all the effects and beams and glows and mists and whatnot all over. I have only one seeing eye and it's vision is not very good. So in the middle of "all hell breaks lose" fights, I have a hard time finding a target or knowing when something bad is coming my way.
I just do my best but I do tend to lose valuable seconds searching for a target.
Cyno01 Jan 7th 2012 3:34PM
Theres an graphics option that was added in 4.0 IIRC to deemphasize spell effects that arent your own or an enemys.
Titusx Jan 7th 2012 4:37PM
I see your point, but the fact that you as a person that never raided before ARE raiding NOW is why LFR exists in the 1st place. That's a sound victory for Blizzard right there! True, trash can be a pain but it really help set the pace of things (when done right) and when they are really clever they manage to give you a heads up on whats to come (like the slimes before that slime boss in DS).
If loot is the only thing keeping you coming back, that's ok for the time being if you ask me. Remember that this will be pretty much the only time there will be just 1 raid available for LFR. Imagine if you could have done all the raids like this, you would have done all the raiding content on this expansion like it wasn't much of a deal.
Honestly, if you feel like LFR is too easy try finding a good guild. With 10 men raids handing out the same loot as 25s its easier than ever to get into a guild and manage to see some raiding and if all else fails you can all go into LFR together and have so fun while gearing up to tackle regular raiding.
SR Jan 7th 2012 5:25PM
ToC failed because there were only 2 areas to engage bosses from. It didn't feel like a raid dungeon; it felt like a shitty arena.
And guess what? It WAS a shitty arena.
Ozzard Jan 8th 2012 3:37AM
Trash exists for the same reason that action movies have a plot as well as action scenes: to give a variation in the pace of the experience. The job of a raid - originally - was to be fun for a specific type of player who gets their reward from doing something very difficult, potentially failing lots of times, then getting a massive rush when they succeed (www.brainhex.com, Conqueror type). This type of player may burn out if presented with an entire experience of doing something extremely difficult for high rewards, so building in a pacing mechanic improves their experience.
That's fine for Conquerors, but it's a problem for people who are motivated by other rewards :-).
Stray Jan 11th 2012 9:21PM
Aside from the other points on trash, my raid leader likes to drag those still at the computer through trash to give them something to do while a couple of us might go afk after an encounter.
I halfway wish DS had FL's initial amount of trash (trash leading up to the first boss, I mean), because it gave those of us who had a concept of "on time" something to do while we waited for those who were late or spent time finding replacements.
Trash: a distraction for cats while the remainder are herded back together.
trefpoid Jan 7th 2012 12:06PM
We did have to prove ourselves to the Red Dragonflight to earn their trust and had to convince them that these Dragonmaw were not the same crazy ones that grabbed Alextrasza and enslaved her, so in the end we gain their trust, or at least my toon did. I doubt they trust the Horde as a whole at all, but they trust individual Horde members that helped them. I was relieved, I didn't want them to be pissed at me :( I like them dragons.
fudge Jan 7th 2012 12:20PM
Is it the same questline for Alliance? Because I had to prove my worth, too, even though Alliance races did not have their hand in dragon enslavement.