Leveling with my baby!
Posted by Jay | Filed under Blog, Game Industry, World of Warcraft
When I think about the rewards that a game like World of Warcraft offer its long term subscribers, often the methods are overlooked by its players. Rewards from World of Warcraft come in the form of items. Always tangible, always taking up inventory space. In fact, the only rewards given by WoW that are not items, are in fact titles! Displayed with pride by the wearers. Such a sight!
It comes as no surprise then that with the introduction of heirloom items that indeed, they are items. Blizzard never disappoints! They scale and allow for a low level character that can’t find a regular instance group to gather necessary equipment. Since the leveling speed has been increased, the lower level areas are almost completely devoid of life. It’s nothing like it was 4 years ago. I would suggest anyone that began WoW post Vanilla, IE BC or Wrath to try an mmo they find interesting when it launches. I wonder if the denizens of Shattrath or even Hillsbrad ever get lonely? Remember those times when you spent countless hours at those locations? I certainly do. Those two locations were densely populated for roughly 2 real world years! I bet they do and they’ll never show it!
While reminiscing, it came as a surprise that I came home one day to find my baby playing on her shiny white mac. While macs reflect the sun, the screen reflected the World of Warcraft world. “O Rly?” I asked. “Ya srsly!” She replied. And so I sprinted to my PC, logged into my main, purchased a bazillion heriloom items, 3, weapon, shoulders, bow and created a hunter.
After numerous gaming sessions I’m realizing that my reward for the above isn’t one available through Blizzard. While they may be involved by the sole purpose of providing the arena, they aren’t reponsible for the adventure my baby and I are experiencing. Blizzard isn’t sitting next to my baby and training her on MMO terminology and game mechanics. Mmos are renown for not training players. Even I remember the first time I learned about “aggro”, “tanking” and DPS. Another useful lesson that came way to late; leveling a cleric in EQ meant that I should try to find a group and not solo!
Back to my baby!
They don’t even get to watch her freak out every time she has to kill a spider. While cute, on occasion a jump, “WHAT THE FUCK!” Followed by “EWWWYW EWWYWY EWYEWYY EWYEYWE” And then “GROOOSSSSS!”
No, my reward from leveling with my baby are different. They can’t be summed up with any heirloom item transferable amonst X characters on my server. They can’t be displayed in a title over my head. They can’t even help me level. No my rewards are memories and bonding. Now that’s leveling with my baby!
Streaming Consciousness: Moment to Moment Raid Twitter
Posted by Jay | Filed under Blog, World of Warcraft
Tonight is going to be exciting! Tonight from 8:45 est pm until our raid night concludes I will twitter my thoughts and experience on this site.
Bring on the fun times!
Green Twitters on Black
Posted by Jay | Filed under Blog, World of Warcraft
That’s right folks!
As a social experiment I’m going to twitter during my raid time. With that in mind, starting at 8:45 EST PM Tuesday and Wednesday I, Green Text on Black will twitt. Why might you ask am I twittering? Excellent question! I was inspired by Tony’s blog post about twittering on Zappo’s website. I figured why not! WoW has a great community and live posting seems an interesting social experiment.
Disclaimers:
- I play a Disicpline Priest
- I don’t really know how to use twitter
- Follow me here or @GrnTxtOnBlk
- I am well geared.
- I will not be sharing my guild name
- I will not be sharing my characters name
- With a little work, you can already find all that information
Here’s looking at you twitt!
1 Shot KT
Posted by Jay | Filed under World of Warcraft
I’m happy to declare that yesterdays rant about loot was answered. Our guild leader made a statement to the raid the very next day declaring smart choices when choosing loot. Problem solved.
WE ONE SHOT KT! WOOT!
Every raider in my estimation has moments of pride. Moments where the late night, wiping, new specs, new gear bear fruit, not of the forsaken kind but of a succulent “Hey I earned that” flavor. Fully Clearing Naxx, is one of those moments for me. On top of that, we ran with 5 healers instead of the usual 7.
Hats off to my guild! What a glorious evening we shared!
My first and last rant about loot.
Posted by Jay | Filed under World of Warcraft
I’m normally not one to rant. This is my first rant about loot and will be the last. Without further ado:
I wouldn’t have minded had we had Naxx on farm. I wouldn’t have minded had the upgrade been a side-grade for the cloth rollers. I wouldn’t have minded had there been a small discussion of the events in question or the loot distribution that normally occurs when a class rolls on lower armor tier loot. The fact remains that we don’t have Naxx on farm. The upgrade was not a side-grade for the cloth involved. And there was no discussion. The druid won and within a couple seconds the loot was given.
So who was the culprit? A druid rolled on a piece of cloth gear. In fact a very good piece of cloth gear for many of our raiders. Not the best by far, but at least in the top 10 for most classes involved. On said piece of loot, Boots of Forlorn Wishes , every cloth wearer in the raid rolled on it, save our three geared priest, myself inclus. And a druid won it. A fucking boomkin no less.
There was an immediate morale drop. Many on both vent and in raid as we called bullshit. I was peeved. I can’t explain why I feel cheated. I’m more upset that the cloth wearers lagging in the dps meters didn’t get the upgrade. I’m more upset that the raid overall didn’t get an upgrade. I’m really upset that the raid didn’t discuss it.
How have you handled this in the past? How often do you let Paladins roll on mail/leather/cloth upgrades? How about shaman? Is it appropriate for the druids, shamen and paladins to roll on lower tier armor classes before said class? What do you think?
