Going Solo in Warcraft

Blizzard has officially embraced the idea of Solo'ing in World of Warcraft. I'd like to throw out there that Follower Dungeons are much more fun than Delves. I really wish they would realize this and make Heroics available and allow for better gear improved experience gain. It's nice to have Dragonflight dungeons available from 10-70 but that's a long time to devote to just a few dungeons. Seeing more of the old world and lower-level dungeons would be great.

Right now, Delves appear to be where it's at. Although I am still hopeful that Follower Dungeons will get some love in the future. I have a dream to be able to roll through some dungeons with all of my alts. The current AI being used is really nice and well thought out. They will remove curses, apply buffs, and lay out Mage Food. They even give suggestions for short cuts. If you haven't joined any Follower Dungeons recently, I highly recommend it. It's a great way to learn your role (Tank/Healer/DPS) - and Captain Garrick is a pretty awesome tank.

Right now, with my Warband Mentored Leveling at 20% I am getting almost a whole level per dungeon at level 13 while running Dragonflight dungeons. That's not too bad. And you can pretty much do them blindfolded if you want. You just have to keep up.

EA rants and marketing

I'm really tired of the ranting and complaining about Early Access and 'making' people pay for it and all that bullshit. Blizzard is a company that makes money selling a resource that is created by people working for them. That resource is more or less all digital in form. You pay them to access that digital material. Everyone thinks that the way that THEY access that material is better than the way that other people access it. We all have our opinions, but we are all still just accessing the same material. 

If I pay extra to access it sooner than others, great. In a month, nobody will know or care aside from you. 

If I pay extra to access a specific look or object, great. In a month, nobody will know or care aside from you. 

If I pay extra to access a sweet set of Bookends designed to look like that main character of the expansion, great. Nobody will ever know or care aside from you.

Blizzard has created different aspects of this material for a reason. Each one appeals to a different subset of people. And each one contains things that appeal to a different subset of people. Some people want early access, some want beta access, some want special pets, and some want transmogs.

You are all complaining about paying for EA when you don't want it or feel like you shouldn't have to. Or paying for Pets when "nobody uses them". Or paying for Tender when they promised you would never have to. I swear, some people would complain about free gold being too heavy. If you don't like what you're paying for, then don't pay? Stop making it bad for others. Stop bringing your negativity into something that others enjoy.

I look at each expansion like "Okay, am I willing to pay this much for this item?" or "Will I be able to get this item later in the game for free?" All of the rest is just a bonus. If I don't want it, or think I can get it later, I won't spend the money. But paying money to access something sooner than other people is just foolish to me. You gain nothing. If that's what you're paying for, I think you need to rethink how you spend your money. That's just my opinion. 

We all have a different opinion and that's why this is such a great marketing tool. They are able to appeal to a wide variety of opinions with the same product and we are all willing to pay for the part of it that's important to us and share our opinions on why ours is better than yours. I'm just happy to have been a part of it for 20 years. It's been quite a ride.

 

Run Speed Bags in TWW

While I can't stand toys and other items that are zone-restricted, I can get behind this effect in a new zone where we won't be able to fly. Running around new content doing daily quests before 'earning' the right to fly is so BFA.

I also find it shocking that people are complaining in the comments about giving up bag space to get the effect. I can't imagine running around with 34 slot bags and not having enough room. Who carries around that much crap in their bags? I have bags purchased from the Grand Expedition Yak on most of my characters and rarely run out of space. If I do, it's 90% vendor trash that can be sold or discarded. I swear, some people would complain about free gold bars being too heavy.
 

Extended maintenance...

So Blizzard, what is it? 9am, 10am, 11am, noon, now we are shooting for 1pm. I sure hope the Trading Post is worth it!

Why not just roll this into the regular patching instead of making it a "special" patch that happens on the 1st of the month?

But I Like the Lich King Dungeons

What kind of BULLSHIT it this? So now all of my 80+ alts can't do Lich King dungeons? Is it that hard to get people to do the new content? There are a lot of achievements and drops (drakes) that I want from Lich King dungeons. Now I have to go to each zone?

It seems they developed the random dungeon finder for a reason and that wasn't to force us to do specific content, it was so we could do things easier.

Not to mention I don't always have time to spend 2+ hours on new content. Sometimes I want to be able to do a quick instance and enjoy the older content. Some of us don't get to spend hours a day in the game. What a load of crap.

Give me back my dungeon finder!!!!

Healing Burnout

I guess I am in a burnout stage. I log in to heal but I just can't bring myself to queue up. I don't know if it's boredom or what but I just can't seem to get into it. I should start reading up on Cata stuff. I know it's right around the corner. I guess I'll just have to start workign on the Shaman again...

Raid Rx: Is addon-less healing possible?

It's not impossible, just harder. And why make things harder just to prove you can? I use Clique to make it easier and avoid huge cumbersome macros. Does that make me less of a healer or just lazy? I use Grid because it's just easier to set up compared to the default raid frames.

I don't think it changes your knowledge or performance. It's just a matter taking shortcuts or a different route to get to the same place.

Raid Rx: Is addon-less healing possible?:

Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand pooh-bah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related.

I see a fair number of emails and messages about this topic. Is it possible to heal without using any addons of any sort? Naturally, the default user interface (or UI) includes a limited number of features where this is possible. Is it recommended in dungeons or raid instances? No, not quite. I've seen opinions from some players where they practically insist that healing without addons should be the way to go. Anyone who does use addons is relying on a crutch. I don't think that's quite fair to say. It's not like these addons are scripts or anything that can 'think' and heal for you.

To pull or not to pull... a healer's perspective.

Okay, I've been healing in this here game for years (since the beginning I suppose). I have a Druid and a Priest running heroics and a Pally waiting in the wings at 71 so I am familiar with most aspects of healing.

I mainly stick to random dungeon pickup groups. As you can guess, the latest changes have been a great benefit to me in many ways. As a casual player I rarely get time for raids. This post is applies to pickup groups as raids always have a mechanism for this type of thing.

I've come across all kinds of Tanks and all kinds of DPS. One thing I've never understood is the agreement on when to pull and when to wait. Sometimes, rarely, but every once and a while this will be agreed upon in the beginning. Some times there will be the simple "r?" in party chat, other times it's just pull, pull, pull until someone says something. Here are the 3 methods I've seen.

• An agreement before the first pull on who sets the pace of the run. This is ideal but slows things down a little bit.
• The generic "r?" in party chat. This is bad because nobody EVER waits for everyone to respond.
• Pull, pull, pull until something bad happens or someone says "Wait a sec...". This is bad because something bad usually happens before anything changes.

The other day in Utgarde Pinnacle I was running with a particularly eager DK Tank (I know, hard to believe) and he runs like two rooms ahead and charges into a large group. Now we were outgeared for this instance in general but he pulled the whole room, around 8-10 mobs. By the time I get there he was dead and the Pally DPS was next in line. I backed away and with a little luck, melded successfully. I proceeded to apologize and rez people. The first thing he says is... "Wow, that sucked... I didn't get one heal.".

My suggestion to every tank or aspiring tank is to make a quick macro. If nothing else just use it in random pickup groups. It will save the party from much grief and your healer will thank you, I promise. If nothing else it can just say "/y The tank is pulling now...". If you want to get creative you can throw in an audible emote. This makes things great for that errant healer that might be watching the television while drinking or alt-tabbed out to browse applicable loot. It gives just enough warning that when the flesh starts to fall, a greater heal or a regrowth should be right behind.

Lucky Fishing Hat

I finally got a fishing hat. It isn't the Weather Beaten Hat from the Fishing Daily quest like I have been wanting but it's a start. I'm starting to think I'll never get anything from the daily fishing quest. Everything that I want (the hat or any of the 4 pets) have managed to elude me. I would be willing to bet I've done that quest over a hundred times too.

I managed to get 34/40 at this weeks contest. It's the sole achievement keeping me from my "Salty" title now. I can't help but wonder how many people have won that contest with no plan whatsoever of getting the title. I just wish Blizzard would wise up and remove that requirement. Only having a maximum of 52 people a year with that title just seems extreme. I can't even imagine being on a different time zone from your server. I heard some Aussies have to do the contest on Monday morning.

Warcraft Puzzles

Here are a few things about World of Warcraft that have been puzzling me.

• Why can I ride my Elekk through a giant bush or the limb of a huge tree but a bamboo tiki torch stops me dead in my tracks?
  
• Why can I fly all the way across Outland for 10s but flying half way across Northrend costs almost 2g?
  
• Why are some keys destroyed when you use them but some remain on your keyring forever?
  

Hunter, Warlock or Priest?

My Hunter, Wilgrun, hit 70 the other day in a rather dull, unexciting moment deep in the heart of Blades Edge Mountains. This makes my third level 70.

I am now grinding my pet Gorilla up to 70 and farming some gold for flight training. I can't decide whether or not the honor farm is worth it right now. It won't be too long until a whole new range of gear will be flooding the game.

Now I need to decide which class gets the bulk of my effort on getting to 80. Who would you raise; hunter, warlock or priest?

Epics for everyone!

I will never understand why some people seem to think they are more entitled to epics than others. We all pay the same amount to play this game. And when you strip off all the QQing and PWNing that is all that matters.

Do you really think that Blizzard cares HOW MUCH you play? Do you really think Blizzard cares how well your 3s team plays? They just want to make sure you keep playing and paying. So, in their eyes all players deserve the same chances/abilities to obtain epic items. They are rewards to keep you playing.

Do you really think that the ability to play 8 hours a day makes you more worthy of an epic item? Does the ability to coordinate 25/40 people to properly play their class make you more worthy of epics? If it did, then only raid/guild leaders should get them. Does the ability to roll through AV after AV just going through the motions make you more worthy? How about the ability to work with 2-4 friends and grinding away in the Arena? How are any of these examples any more difficult than the others? Explain how anyone can't accomplish any of these tasks. It doesn't take talent. It doesn't take skill. It just takes time and that is not reason enough to think of yourself as "better" than other players.

Sure, there are a few truly hardcore players. People who really love the game itself not just the love of beating the game. People who know the lore and have followed Warcraft through the non-MMO stage (yes, Warcraft was around before Wow). These few truly hardcore players follow the storylines, play on PVP/RP servers and participate in true Pvp. They conquer evil and reach goals that most people don't even know exist. These are the people who truly deserve epics.

It's too bad there is no reliable way to distinguish these players from the epic-farmers in the game.

Scalable Instances

Why oh why can't Blizzard make instances scalable to the number of people who enter?(It should be noted that my main is covered in "welfare epics" and my other 70 has simple blues and greens because this is all the content I have time for, not because of leet puprz)

It burns me up to think of all the content in this game that I will NEVER see. There is absolutely no way most people will ever get to see the best parts of the game. I don't care about the gear. I just want to see the zones and experience the fights.

I don't understand why Blizzard does it. Why do they develop so much content only to restrict it to the few people who have the time to spend 4-5 hours a day playing? Don't we all pay the same amount? Why can't instances be scalable? I don't expect to have the time and flexibility to be able to be the first person to see the new content but sure as hell want to see it eventually!

It happened first with BWL and Nax when TBC came out. These places are all but deserted now. Now it is destined to happen again with most of the BT, Eye and who knows what else once WotLK is released. I guess I can always keep raising my rogue in hopes of stealthing parts of it at level 80.

Raid vs. Pvp Rewards -- The Real Answer

I understand Raiding takes a lot of time and effort, Pvp does too. I also understand the people who excel at these deserve to be rewarded properly. But rewarding them with "better gear" is not the answer. Simply because as soon as the next batch of content (Pvp or Pve) comes out that gear is just trashed and any sense of accomplishment is gone. They need to be rewarded with "unique gear" (not just in color). Something along the lines of the "Champion of the Narru" or Gladiator titles. Or perhaps the "Purple Trophy Tabard of the Illidari" (I know that is not raid level gear, just an example). And I don't mean unique as in just one drops each time you take 5 hours to kill one boss. I mean unique as in each raid member gets a "My guild made it to the Black Temple and all I got was this lousy teeshirt" kind of deal.

I still have my Benediction staff because it's unique, not because it's a great staff. I don't use it but I can whip it out and cart it around to show it off as an accomplishment in the game. I'm sure the same goes for many GM staffs.

If Blizzard would stop re-shading and upgrading stats on old gear and work on unique equipment/rewards this whole argument would go away.

I know there is the whole argument about performance issues and character models and how much RAM is required but that just doesn't make sense to me. The idea of unique is that there aren't thousands of them. If there were a few people on each server it wouldn't create that much overhead (the unique mounts for example).

How many people on each server get to see the real end game content? Is it too much to ask that they can show it off for more than a couple months? In Arena Pvp you have titles with some meaning why not more of this in for the raiders? Perhaps this gear does exist but is indeed so rare that most people never even seen it.

It seemed for a short time there we had a distinct division between Pvp and Pve rewards. There was the title system for Pvp, restricted barracks, and officers quarters. There was unique gear for raiders (tiers 1-3) and unique Pvp gear. I think the problem started when Blizzard got lazy and started merging this gear (the graphics anyway). At least the weapons haven't fallen into this trap. It is usually easy to tell a Raider from a Pvper by the weapon they carry. Why can't armor be the same way?

There is clearly a distinction between playing style, there should be the same distinction in gear.