Posts with tag opinion

No, this isn't an announcement of a new TCG about our Breakfast Topics (but wouldn't that be fun? I see your flamebait, and raise you an intelligent comment!!). But I would like to get all your thoughts on the collectible card game based on World of Warcraft.

Personally, I haven't really gotten that much into it, but since the Darkmoon Faire was in Chicago this past weekend, I went out there and obtained some photos and an interview or two for those interested to peruse. I learned to play the game and got to go one-on-one with one of the creators (his interview will be up today), and I have to say that the game itself is pretty fun-- lots of strategy, and plenty of inside jokes about our own little world of Azeroth.

I don't see it taking over my life, however, mostly because I don't have anyone around to play with-- even my boardgaming and roleplaying friends haven't picked it up yet, and probably won't any time soon. But I can definitely see the draw, not only of learning all the strategies of different decks, but actually collecting the cards that make them up.

So is it your thing or not? And why? If not, have you tried it and not liked it or just not tried it at all?

You'll forgive me for trying to inject a little reason into a nerf debate (an impossible task, probably), but that's what I'm about to try and do anyway.

Yesterday, mages, warlocks, and shadow priests were up in arms about the changes on the test realm to the tailoring epic outfits. Blizzard was experimenting with adding ability stats to the armor while nerfing spell damage, and tailors went ballistic over the changes. And so, within a matter of hours, Eyonix announced on the forums that the changes had already been reverted and would not go to the live servers.

Now, yesterday I said the nerfs weren't that big a deal, and since then, I've seen some good points that say they were-- lots of people spent lots of time and gold getting just these recipes together (some even leveled tailoring for just these pieces), and it definitely presents a problem to make serious changes to gear that people have already sacrificed a lot for.

On the other hand, there were good reasons behind the changes as well. As even a few tailors have said, these crafted pieces matched up to the Tier 4 and 5 pieces, and I see problems with basically requiring clothies to be tailors to be competitive in the endgame. Many warlocks cried the most about the changes, but because +spell damage doesn't translate directly to most of their DOT spells, in many cases, they would actually be the least affected (Update: In hindsight, I shouldn't have judged how affected anyone was by this change. But that's not the point of this article-- read on.)

But my point now isn't to argue whether these sets should have been changed or not. What I want to point out now is that being outraged on the forums and yelling at Blizzard about something that's happening on the test realms will actually impede the developers' abilities to make good changes on the live ones.

"This PvP thing is quite fun," thought I, several weeks ago.

Time passed. Lured on by cheap combat potions, armour and (of course) glory, I've been spending plenty of time attempting to kill Horde recently. I thoroughly enjoy the niche my druid has found in PvP, and have worked hard to become a better player. By slowly but steadily ranking up, the addictive microreward cycle has worked its magic on me, and what began as an experiment to see how far I could get PvPing when I had the time has become something more permanent.

Of course, such idyllic stories end in tears; the Drums of War have arrived in Azeroth, bringing with them shortened battleground queues. Previously, it was a case of occasional PvP games (usually short losses to elite teams) fitting nicely in amongst work breaks -- a little light relief from a heavy burden. However, now the queues are almost eliminated, and the games are much longer, I can't multitask any more.

All is not lost, however. Despite the joy of being a flag-carrying bear, sometimes it's fun to just get out there and burn faces. My mage alt is old enough to go into AV, and firing pyroblasts with reckless disregard for rank or reputation is a different -- and utterly refreshing -- kind of game.

A lot of Shamans (myself included) are under the impression that they've been getting the short end of the stick lately. First, we had pretty much the rockiest respec Blizzard has done yet-- half in one patch, half in the other, and we ended up getting nerfed anyway. And then there's the news that those despicable Pallys are going to be invading our side and taking our raid spots! Well, it's enough to make us Shamans feel like we're being left out a little bit.

But Hennifer of Khaz'goroth has been poking around the old Warcraft III site, and I think he's come up with a solution for Shamans that will make us all happy: Shaman pets!

Ok, well it won't make any of the other classes happy. But I have to say that giving Shamans a sixty-second summoned Shadow Wolf (say that three times fast) to use as extra DPS would be amazingly cool. And since the expansion will take all the talent trees ten points further, I think it would make a perfect addition to the Shaman's Elemental tree. Not all of Hennifer's suggestions are so great (portable totems? even I don't buy that one), but I think the Shadow Wolf is gold, Jerry, gold! After all, pallys get to summon a whole horse, don't they? We should at least get a wolf, right?

I've become increasingly bored with grinding on my main character, so it's time for another alt to feel the love. As I play late at night, it makes sense to level an alt while the BGs are out of action and the LFG channel is quiet, though this does make levelling a lonely pursuit.

Having grouped with the entire spectrum of mages in the past -- from the extremely incompetent to high-damage-dealers with a deathwish -- it's been interesting to actually get inside the class a bit more. Initially, it was one of the classes I couldn't stomach by the time I hit level 8; seeing their fearsome power at level 60 has possibly changed my mind. (After all, who doesn't want to be their own vending machine?)

VideoGameGeneration.com has launched anew feature called Weekly World of Warcraft, which takes a slightly diff'rent perspective from most of your other WoW sites; WWW is devoted exclusively to rants & raves about the player's frustrations with WoW & the things that need review; or at the very least, some acknowledgment.

This weeks edition, the 3rd so far, mainly deals with the implementations of the new dungeons in 1.11. The author has some opinions I don't necessarily agree with, but he makes some very interesting points & it's a good, informative read. Check it out over at their homepage.

While we might assume by default that every other player is a honourable and upright paragon of virtue, sometimes little quirks of behaviour manage to shatter our illusions beyond repair. From chat spammers to mob campers, we frequently run into some dirty tactics which serve to convince us that perhaps WoW isn't such a nice place to be after all.

Ganking aside, what are your favourite or least favourite tricks to employ in these situations? One of mine is excessive politeness--it may be the Englishness of it, but saying "I'm terribly sorry, old chap, but would you mind pushing off for a few minutes while I finish this quest?" has surprising effects.

Omnipotence, omniscience, and having to deal with users' complaints day in, day out; being a GM has its ups and downs. If you suddenly found yourself in the shoes of a GM, for one single day, what would you do with your power? Is it time for revenge, or would you seek out those in need of help? Would you run rampant on the forums? Glide invisibly around the world?

Of course, GMs can't make gameplay changes, but you could perhaps escalate a particular pet proposal that's in the pipeline. The notion of character transfers is one I'd like to put some weight behind, plus some mechanism for international co-operative play. With a GM's power, I'd love to just explore the world, invisible and untouchable. A day might not be long enough, though.