Posts with tag behaviour

In WoW, as with real life, I'm a bit of a hoarder. Give me space and I will fill it with things that might be useful, or perhaps were useful (you never know when you'll need them again). After one or two ill-advised disenchantments, I've started keeping non-replaceable gear around in my bank, and as a druid I have multiple sets of equipment anyway.

Of course, I'm also an enchanter and engineer, so I have to store materials and equipment for those professions -- not to mention a vast number of quest items that are collecting dust waiting for me to finish the quest. Non-combat pets, items useful in certain instances, items useful for PvP, Darkmoon Faire tickets... my bank just isn't big enough to hold it all.

There are a couple of solutions. Firstly, I can try culling the trash and actually getting rid of some of my quest items, disenchanting equipment I haven't used in weeks, and choosing which of my non-combat pets is my favourite.

Secondly, as I have multiple characters (including a bank-only character), I can send the majority of my non-soulbound items to an alt, who can hold on to them or return them in the mail for easier access. I always lose track of who has which items; I used to use the BankItems mod, but I haven't found one that tracks mailboxes yet.

The final option is, of course, to get more bagspace. Not easy when all your bags are 16-slotters already; I've recently finished the grind for an Argent Dawn Supply Bag, and I'm also hoping I'll come across an Onyxia Hide Backpack or Panther Hide Sack at some point. The materials for Bottomless Bag are offputting, though -- twelve mooncloth for two bag slots? I think I'll have to manage.

We all have our little quirks and habits; things we do without really thinking, routines we slip into every day. When you first log in, do you run to the mailbox even though you haven't any auctions up? Do you routinely jump on the Stormwind fountain or jump about the Undercity bank? Always repair at the same out-of-the-way vendor? Dance in bear form and wait for the tells to pile up?

It's the little habits that make WoW special, so -- what are yours? (All of the above are mine!)

Update: Sorry about the comments issue. Fixed-- comment away!

I'm a serious alt-a-holic, with dozens of characters spread out across servers, factions, races and classes. After getting my first character to level 60 a few months ago, I've been exploring the endgame, but still spending time with my alts too -- and now my first real 'alt' character is about to reach 60.

At the moment, I'm considering how to approach the 'main'/'alt' situation. There are many things I want to achieve with my main; the pvp and reputation grinds are nowhere near done, and there's plenty of bosses to fight and items to collect. However, I'm a little bored of the sameness of it all, and being able to experience these encounters from a different class's point of view is going to be refreshing -- and will involve a lot of relearning.

Many of the raiding players I know tend to focus on their main character, only bringing out alts for special encounters or when the raidgroup feels generous enough to gear up the alt. Class balance being what it is, my main character (a druid) is more likely to be needed for raids and instances -- but I don't want my alt (a mage) to sit gathering dust in greens for the rest of time.

For the time being, I think I will continue playing both characters, attempting to gear up my alt when I'm not raiding or PvPing with my main. Playing my alts is something that I do for a change of pace and scenery, and I'd like to keep it that way.

It's tempting to get immersed in the world of Azeroth; perhaps too immersed. As a natural night owl, I've found myself (on several occasions) seeing the night through -- dawn falls in WoW slightly earlier than outside my window, the cities start filling up and a new day begins.

I don't recommend this behaviour, of course -- as I've found, one all-nighter begets another -- but it's interesting from an observer's point of view. The world is a different place in the small hours -- I use this time to grind popular spots, or level alts in deserted zones. PvP dries up, there are no raids, and you can almost hear the continents sleeping.

The breakfast topic part: How does this compare to the American servers? In Europe, we're generally at most one hour distant from the server time, so while there's something of a staggered night, there's a definite "quiet period". With more timezones to span, however, do the US servers ever get quiet?

What do you do when the pressures of endgame all become too much? When the PvP grind gets you down, and raiding just isn't doing it for you any more?

Spend some time away from it all, in an exotic location where everything's new again -- make an alt. Preferably a cross-faction alt.

It sounds idyllic, in principle. Start life from scratch again, in a town where nobody knows your name. Learn new skills! Have fantastic adventures! Spend four hours killing wolves and only regain a fraction of your former power! (Eh?)

Insults flying, duels at twenty paces and "your mom" jokes filling up the LookingForGroup channel. Welcome to the Test Server.

After queueing for over three hours, I popped on to the US Test Server yesterday to see if I could get a glimpse of Naxxramas. There are a few improvements over previous test experiences -- actually having flight paths is a nice touch. However, some of the fellow inhabitants leave a lot to be desired.

I understand that it's very appealing to want to try out a new level 60 character, but the general level of competence was frighteningly low -- both in PvP and an instance group. Multiple wipes on trash mobs led me to much despair, with little strategy or organisation. Add to that the fact that almost everyone is playing sexy classes such as rogues, and it's hard to even get a full instance group together. Players in my group kept switching characters, as if playing another class ham-fistedly would help with our wiping problem.

The Test Server is a fun place to mess about and try things out, but the immense amount of lag and lack of co-ordination drive me to despair. If only the serious players could be separated out from the less serious, then some actual 'testing' might happen. For now, it's waiting in a queue of thousands to see players with names like Omgwtfpwnbbq raiding Crossroads.

I've been having fun with sheep recently. Admittedly, I am Welsh, but I'm talking WoW -- and odd behaviour. While skilling up in Engineering I made several mechanical sheep; I tried making them attack nearby Horde players, who were thankfully laughing too much to retaliate. There's nothing like an angry sheep in the morning to get your blood boiling.

I also wasted valuable minutes of my life repeatedly polymorphing a sheep, just to see what would happen. No prizes for guessing the result! So, what are some of the weirdest things you've found yourself doing in WoW -- with or without farm animals?

In stark contrast to yesterday's wonderful tales of altruism, today we're looking at the flipside -- unwarranted cruelty. Have you ever ganked someone just because you could? Pulled a quest mob knowing that those nearby would have to wait another 15 minutes for it to respawn? Given a newbie purposefully bad directions? Summoned people to their death?

There are quite a few nasty tricks you can play on others in WoW, whether they deserve it or not. I like to think I'm a nice person, but I've done my share of "run in, get the named quest mob before anyone else can, run out" -- sometimes it's an easy way to finish a quest, as everyone nearby will fall on the mob in hope it becomes theirs. On the other hand, the excuse "everyone else is doing it" doesn't hold much weight amongst grown adults.

What are your tales of cruelty and horror towards other WoW players? What's the worst trick you've fallen victim of?

Travelling in WoW can be helped or hindered by the casual application of a hearthstone. Hearthing can be a quick way to get out of an instance or cave, a shortcut across continents or even a handy thing to do before logging off.

Sometimes, though, it's annoying rather than useful. I've acted hastily and hearthed from Un'Goro Crater to Stormwind a couple of times -- the repeat journey isn't something to be casually undertaken. Fortunately, several classes -- as well as engineers -- have tricks to help with travel, from the Shaman's Astral Recall to the Druid's Teleport: Moonglade.

Where is your hearthstone set? Have you found an efficient way of getting around that relies on these travel tricks to work? My druid is parked in Stormwind, as Moonglade gives her access to Kalimdor, although the flight from Moonglade to Gadgetzan or Silithus is still a long one. On some of my lower characters, I've forgotten to set the hearthstone at all -- I managed to run a level 10 dwarf to Darkshore, but left the hearthstone near Anvilmar. Oops!

Aggro Me suggests a list of MMOlympic events that players could compete for -- ranging from a camping competition to a tricky roleplay race. Some more WoW-specific events that we're all longing to see:

• Chest Competition -- Juggle bag space and run speed as you try to collect all the treasure chests in a zone; no dwarves allowed!
• Auction House Wheeler Dealing -- Pit your salesmanship skills as you compete to sell AH items in the Trade channel for a profit
• Hunt the Ninja -- Run instances with PuGs; try to be the first to find a ninja-free group
  
• Survivability -- Level 1 characters race from their starting area to the furthest capital city via high-level zones; first through the gates alive wins!

I've heard of the last event taking place under several themes -- the Running of the Bulls sees baby Tauren characters sprint for survival, and gnome footraces have also been run on a few servers. While some of these events exemplify the bad side of behaviour ingame, others are just plain fun.

[via Wonderland]

It might be good being first, but the residents of the Medivh realm aren't too happy with their new-found popularity. Topping the war effort rankings, all their war effort needs is some additional bandages and they're good to go--however, a flood of newbies eager to witness the event is threatening to topple the server.

From n3rfed's commentary:
Recent days have seen a flood of level 1 alts on Medivh as players from other servers make the pilgrimage to Sithilus (sic) in order to watch Ahn'Qiraj finally open. Additionally, the wait queue of this previously modestly-populated server has multiplied to over 500 and new guilds going by such names of "OPEN TEH GATE", "Aq Opens" and "Get In Queue Please" have swelled in their ranks.

Wouldn't it be more sensible for all these alts to concentrate on farming resources for their own servers? Perhaps there is some glory in being there the first time the Gates are opened, even if you didn't contribute at all yourself. There's not much Blizzard can do about it now, but I wonder if they saw it coming.

[via Wonderland]