More character customization, please

Nerfbat hates current MMORPG character customization, and I can't blame him. Either the artists cop out and force the players to screw up their characters' propotions or they offer a very limited set of options from which to choose from. You then spend 90% of your time looking at the characters from a faraway viewpoint where you can't even see their faces, even when they're not helmets or or other armor. And when they do, it feels like you're surrounded by clones. Everyone wears the same gear and thus look the same.

However, there are games that do customization right. Wrestling and boxing games are a good example, and GTA: San Andreas isn't bad, either. These games do allow you to customize everything from body shape and facial features to clothing. They have presets but allow the player to fine-tune their avatars up to the most minute detail. But this model also has caveats that MMORPGs can't ignore. In most fighting games, your character's clothing has no effect on his statistics (except in Def Jam series) and all action is up-close and personal, leaving ample opportunities to marvel at your avatar.

MMORPGs are a bit tougher, because your gear is a direct gauge of your character's strength. Even if a particular item looks like crap, you have to wear it for the stats. And most of the time, there are only a few or no choices if you want the best gear. A tauren warrior in full tier 5 gear will always look like every other warrior in tier 5. In WoW, this problem is made worse due to the fact that only a few of your items change the way your character looks, especially with casters. A robe covers your pants and boots, and gloves cover your bracers. Your ranged weapon and your offhand are hidden when you're not using those. That leaves your main weapon, robe, gloves, belt, shoulderpads and your hat. And if you wear a tabard, that hides your chestpiece.

Having the tier 0-2 sets available as different recolored versions is a good start. So is having both robe and vest versions of cloth gear. But a better solution would be to increase the ways to customize your character. Animations should be changed to display pants and boots under robes. All enchants should be visible, and so should ranged weapons, gems and trinkets. But WoW could also steal one idea from the venerable Ultima Online: being able to wear clothes over your armor.

One other improvement would be decals. Decals are partially transparent detail textures on top of the existing textures. Other games use decals for tattoos, facial hair, logos, scars, fractures, bullet holes, scorch marks and other additions. With these, even a fully armored character could be made to look distinct from others.

An Inevitable Outcome

"..and make sure that you pick up the next shipment of bandages from Nutral. Oh, and don't forget the letter to Baron Revilgaz about our purchase order. Those jumper cables will be direly needed if the Betrayer makes a move."

"I'm on it. Is that all, Sha'nir?"

"For the moment, yes. Also.."

Sha'nir did not finish her sentence. She heard a scraping sound from outside. Like metal on stone. She glanced over the shoulder of the human volunteer and at the tall figure standing in the doorway of the Shattrath Infirmary.

"Can I help you?"

The figure took a step forward. As Sha'nir's eyes adjusted to the light, she could see the figure better. It was a slim one, obviously a female. It was wearing a blue robe, tattered with blood. The right arm was hanging limply and the left arm was lazily holding a long sword. The tip of the blade was being dragged along the floor. The arms ended in large, ornate shoulder guards. The head was resting on an unnatural angle on the left shoulder guard, with dirty dreadlocks covering the face. An undead?

Before the figure could answer, it collapsed on the floor.

"Quick! Get my kit and prepare the table!"

---

Sha'nir's report on unnamed female troll admitted into the infirmary at the eighteenth hour of the sixteenth day of the month.

Third and fourth ribs broken on the right side. Right shoulder dislodged from it's socket. Right elbow shattered and flesh peeled off. Deep lacerations on abdomen, possibly caused by a large feline or other wildlife. Superficial horizontal cuts on both sides of the face, neck and torso. Small amounts of salt found in several wounds. A horizontal burn mark on the left side of the face and a small, deep burn mark in the middle of the chest. Several tendons on the neck severed. Both ears cut off by a large blade. Severe blood loss. Numerous vertical cuts on the back. The formation of scar tissue suggests that these wounds were inflicted much earlier than others.

Treatment: Subject stabilized. Elbow reinforced and immobilized with temporary metal bars and shoulder re-attached. Wounds cleaned and bandaged. Head supported and tendons stitched together. Prescribed Strong Troll's Blood intravenously. Subject is still unconscious, but is responding to treatment.

At the time of admission, the subject was wearing an enchanted blue robe with gray trims. Andrion Darkspinner indentified the material as Frozen Shadoweave cloth, but declined to identify the subject. The subject was also holding a long, deep purple, ornate sword. Superficial examination revealed that the sword is enchanted, but offered no hints on the subject's identity.

Gold selling ads on Nihilum's site

After months of denials, Nihilum has finally introduced blatant goldselling ads on their site.

The Grand Crusade

Aah.. there they are.

Shalkis adjusted the zoom on her goggles to get a better view. With a quiet whirring sound, the ragged band of humans came into view. Their numbers had halved since they had fled from their ill-fated assault on Brill. Among the withered plants lie at least a dozen of the survivors. A few of the figures were standing and judging by their gestures, having a heated conversation.

Shalkis adjusted the zoom again. Unsurprisingly one of the figures was Seiken Trollbane, but she did not recognize the others, but there was one of the humans' holy men among them. Apparently Trollbane now had official approval for his.. crusade. Of course, by now it was obvious that the crusade had turned out less glorious than they thought. She had heard that the bulk of the forces were now maggot food at Arathi. Additional reports spoke dismissedly of the combat prowess of these forces. Just a few soldiers, but many apprentrices, younglings, old people, feeble human females and other rabble. These were the hard core, the zealots. And even among them, the morale was obviously crumbling.

Shalkis heard a growl behind her. Before she could turn, the growl was followed by the dull humming of her barrier. One of the mangy beasts inhabiting the area had made the grave mistake of picking her as it's next meal. Without looking behind her, she extended her arm and grabbed the wolf's muzzle with her hand. Her soft whisper was followed by a muffled yelp, and the beast struggled for a second to free itself from her grip. The struggling stopped. She released her grip and pulled her arm back. With her other hand, she broke away the bloodied icicle extending from her palm.

With the distraction out of the way, she was free to monitor the humans once again. The wounded were being helped back to their feet. The conversation had stopped, and the Trollbane was standing in front of the others, barking out commands. Whatever disagreements they did have were now resolved. Those who still had horses mounted them.

They started to move at a walking pace south, towards Brill. Surely they were not foolish enough to attempt an another assault against the heavily guarded town? She followed them, making sure to keep at least a hill or a tree between herself and the humans. When they reached the outskirts of Brill they broke formation and started running, past Brill and towards Undercity. But a few of them could not run anymore.

This is insane, even for him.

That move made no sense whatsoever, but one should not doubt such obvious blessings. If Trollbane really wanted to die, all he had to to was to ask. But to bring so many down with him.. She took off her goggles and strapped a wooden mask to her face. The pale glow from her hands illuminated the grim features of her mask.

Shadra, bless these fools.

A frozen missile erupted from her hands and pierced the lung of an elf. The next one found his heart.

For they have listened to the lies of the infidels.

An another bolt struck the leg of a dwarf, shattering it and sending him tumbling down a hill.

And know nothing of your grace.

An icicle impaled the dwarf, halting his fall and his life.

Let them fall into your web, and not to the darkness.

A female Draenei's head was engulfed in ice, causing her to fall backwards and shatter her head on the gray cobblestones.

Let them not be judged by the sins of others in the afterlife.

A gnome was completely encased in ice. Shalkis saw him futilely gasp for air.

And may their next life be a trollish one.

The frigid winds shattered his prison, along with him.

A single voice yelled from inside the city. She still couldn't understand Gutterspeak, but she knew the meaning of this particular phrase.

Once soldiers of Lordaeron..

The yell was answered by a chorus of voices behind her.

Always soldiers of Lordaeron.

What followed was inevitable. In a few minutes, there was nobody left to bless.

Mage vs Warlock itemization

I've been watching the "debate" about Evocation with some amusement. Like most mage issues, this is about feeling inferior to warlocks. And in a way, is more of an itemization issue than a specific skill issue, not unlike the one protection paladins face versus protection warriors.

Simply put, a PvE mage needs more types of stats than a warlock.

Mage:
+Spell Damage
+Spell Hit Rating
+Spell Critical Rating
+Mana per 5 seconds
+Intellect
+Stamina
+Spirit

Warlock:
+Spell Damage
+Spell Hit Rating
+Stamina
+Intellect
+Mana per 5 seconds

Each item has a set amount of "item points" at their disposal, depending on item level and rarity. These points are used to "purchase" stats. Different stats also require different amounts of points. For example, Stamina is cheaper than Intellect and Spell Damage is cheaper than Spell Critical Rating.

If we assume that mage and warlock items have the same amount of item points at their disposal, warlock items will always have superior stats, since the item points are spread between fewer and cheaper stats.

If you are a smart mage who wishes to optimize your damage, it is very tempting to skip mage gear and use warlock gear exclusively, even if you won't benefit from all that stamina as much as a warlock could. Many have done exactly that, and I'm one of them. I'm offsetting the negative sides of this choice with a liberal use of consumables.

In a sense, the mage itemization is also a vicious circle. If you are running out of mana even after all of the tricks mentioned in the original thread and here, you might feel tempted to stack up on spirit, but that gimps your damage. Since you do less damage to the raid boss it won't die as quickly and thus the fight gets longer. Which of course requires more spirit gear for you _and_ the healers.

Corpse graffiti spam - a way around spam reporting

Apparently the gold spammers are now using hacks to transport a bunch of gnomes to Ironforge and having their bodies spell out the URL of the goldselling site.

While many commentators find this hilarious, there is a very strong reason why the goldsellers are doing this. With the current reporting feature, the spammers are up against every single player that doesn't like spam. With the corpse graffiti, only a GM can stop the spam. It's much easier to overwhelm a bunch of GMs with spam than to overwhelm all WoW players.

Azeroth Movie Top 3

Beware the wrath of Murkzilla.

If it walks like a duck..

Apparently Wandering Goblin isn't convinced that Affinity Media is out of the goldselling business.

Beyond the Dark Portal Novel

Apparently the novel version of Tides of Darkness was fairly good, since there's a sequel in the works. The new novel will follow the plot of the Warcraft 2 expansion, including Grom Hellscream's antics at Azeroth and the shattering of Draenor. Too bad Tides of Darkness isn't available as an ebook (hint hint)..

Poor downtrodden gold farmers

Anda's Game, a goldfarming sob story by Cory Doctorow.

Won't somebody think of the poor girls in the sweatshops?

(Via MapWoW)

WoWDigger, an alternative to Affinity Media sites

Well, that didn't take long. Just mere days after Affinity Media almost got a monopoly on WoW database sites, IncGamers (owners of WorldofWar.net) launched their own database site. Unsurprisingly, their announcement emphasizes IncGamers' anti-RMT stance. A good move.

WoWHead sold to IGE?

There goes the neighbourhood..

Update: The official announcement is out. John Maffei, the (former?) Senior Vice President of IGE says that Affinity Media has nothing to do with IGE anymore. I'm trying to verify that claim now.

Serpentshrine and the Eye attunements removed!

Lo and behold, someone at Blizzard is listening.

Tigole:
After a lot of thought and deliberation, we’ve decided to remove the attunement requirements to enter Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep: The Eye. While many of our attunements in the Burning Crusade have been good progression checks, a few of the attunements have turned out to cause unnecessary stress on guilds either doing the content or attempting to do the content.

Gold farming in raids? Unlikely.

New York Times has a new article about gold farmers. Most of it is the usual whining about poor downtrodden farmers working in sweatshop conditions and being harassed by racist westeners. However, the article gets more interesting near the end. The writer laments how mean old Blizzard has shut out the farmers from a large part of the game: raiding. And then offers a solution: Goldfarming guilds. 24 skilled goldfarmers who take you (for a price, of course) to the raid instance of your choosing, kill the boss for you and let you loot the item you wanted.

This caught my attention since several guilds do this already, although not for real-world money. Pre-TBC it was not uncommon to see a high-end raiding guild advertise runs to Molten Core, Blackwing Lair or even Temple of Ahn'Qiraj. You paid them a certain amount of in-game gold and they would let you tag along and grab any epics that their own members did not need.

However, I think this article has more hot air than glimpse of future gold farmer tactics. Why? Gold farming raid groups are a very risky business. TBC had already diminished these "charity" runs since the importance of a single raider increased when Blizzard shrunk raids to 25 people. The goldfarmers would have to be overgeared for the instance to complete it while being handicapped by the presence of their customer(s). Getting that gear requires a whole lot of effort and thus carries a significant risk. Playing and gearing up 24 hunter bots takes a whole lot less time than playing and gearing up a 24-man balanced raid group in full epic gear. And all that effort can go to waste if Blizzard bans your goldfarming guild. Getting your main raid group banned would be a devastating blow to many gold farmers.

There are also limiting factors. The raid timers prevent you from killing a specific boss several times in a week, so only one of your many potential customers would even have a chance to get that piece of loot each week. If the piece doesn't even drop you have an unhappy customer on your hands. Unhappy customers don't like to pay you money. Raid IDs prevent the customer from joining other raids, so you can't sidestep the problem with multiple groups, either.

Diablo the Movie

Apparently Legendary Pictures did negotiate rights for more than one Blizzard franchise..

The Trollish Art of Diplomacy

Shalkis had spotted a contingent of Red Blade works exiting the jungle outpost of Grom'Gol. Windclaw tilted his head quizzically. The raptor was as intrigued as his mistress. With a tug of the harness, Windclaw darted into the jungle. It was not time to reveal herself yet.

Shalkis directed Windclaw on a small hill overlooking the road to the Arena. She sent the raptor away and sat next to the tree. She adjusted her goggles to get a better view of the road without compromising her position. And waited.

Eventually the orcs came into view. Young orcs. Old orcs. Strong orcs. Weak orcs. Even Taerak. Leading the group was a female orc with a wolf at her side. She must be the Matron. Akesha. As Shalkis had guessed, they were heading towards the Arena. And there was only one group that called it home. The Second Gurubashi Empire.

The Empire and the Red Blade? Odd. Ever since Tziak had taken over, the xenophobia had run rampant within the empire. Why would they even allow the orcs inside their Arena? It had to be a trap. And although the orcs would probably consider it dishonorable to even think to avoid a head-on confrontration, they would always appreciate some tactical advice. Shalkis dug deep into one of her pockets and retrieved a small whistle. If the Empire was indeed there, one extra raptor call would not be considered odd.

In less than a minute, the familiar figure of Windclaw appeared from the bushes, his fangs gleaming with fresh blood. He had eaten his fill, and would not mind waiting outside the Arena. She mounted the blue raptor and rode to the road and towards the Arena.

The orcs had taken up positions at the southern end of the Arena, and the Empire was at the north side. The ramp was filled by Blood Elves. Their presence was not surprising. A few months ago the Empire had sent a crate of elven heads to Silvermoon. Now they sought to return the favor. But since they were still not completely accepted into the Horde, they could not act rashly. There would be no point in charging the trolls, only to have the orcs charge them. They had to wait for the orcs' approval.

Rlaris, one of the Blooddrinkers was acting as an announcer. The standards had indeed been dragged through the mud if they allowed him into the esteemed ranks of the Blooddrinkers.. Once they were trolls of the highest honor, champions in the fight against the Hakkari, upholders of the law. Now they were simple thugs..

Shalkis heard the words and could not believe her ears. A negotiation for peace? Preposterous. There had to be a trick. Something that gave the Emperor leverage to force the orcs to submit. The Blood Elves around her were as sceptical as she was.

The two forces circled around the arena edge towards the ramps. As the orcs passed her, Shalkis spoke.

"A word of advice about trollish politics. Always prepare for a fight."

The warning had been given.

The orcs settled on the southern end of the Arena floor, and the trolls on the northern end. Akesha and Tziak approached each other, flanked by bodyguards. They were ready to start. But one of the orcish bodyguards eyed the crimson sand with suspicious eyes, aimed his flare gun and fired. The flare landed on the western part of the arena, right next to the ramps. And right next to the brightly burning flare was a very surprised assassin. An orc, but her tabard was one of the Sixty Thieves, an organization that recognized no wows or racial unity, only the will of the highest bidder. The female looked around sheepishly and leaned on the arena wall. Maybe this was Tziak's plan? To get an orc to assassinate Akesha to spark a civil war among the orcs? No.. there had to be more to this.. What about that Forsaken at his side? He was in plain sight and clearly in the favor of the trolls. If he acted it would be too obvious. There had to be more.

The trolls were shouting insults, mocking the blood elves and claiming that they had ridiculed the orcs' ancestors. No doubt it was true, but.. the orcs remained relatively calm. A few stinging rebukes were uttered. This can't be Tziak's grand plan, either. A shouting match?

Shalkis adjusted her goggles to get a better view, but the two negotiatiors had started to walk back towards the ramps. Was it over already?

At first the trolls did not notice him and walked right past her. Akesha, the matron addressed the blood elves. Tziak did the same, although he spoke no words himself, but instructed Rlaris to speak for him in Orcish. The Blood Elves were asked to leave. They of course resisted and wanted their revenge. But for a change, the cooler heads prevailed and the Blood Elves moved back to the entrance of the Arena. With the issue of hecklers somewhat resolved, the negotiations continued.

Oh yes.

Shalkis adjusted her goggles to get a better view. She could not hear Tziak's words from this distance, but the reactions of the orcs were more than enough. Their anger grew, word by word. Distrust turned into dislike, apprehension turned into disgust. Slow, calculated gestures turned into sharp, rash movements. What could he be saying to them to anger them so? And yet, he seemed oblivious to the effects. His face was hidden by his mask, but his gestures were as disinterested as always. Then.. Akesha's surprisingly strong voice echoed in the Arena.

"You all heard, Tziak admits he plotted to kill me."

That.. was Tziak's grand plan? To admit his treachery to people who value honor more than their lives? Before Shalkis could fully grasp the meaning of Akesha's words the warcries of the orcs.. and the elves filled the air, along with blood, fire and death of various colors and forms. The trollish bodyguards were cut down in seconds and the masked face of Tziak vanished in the veritable sea of angry orcs. Scores of elves were already jumping into the arena, raining down death and destruction upon the shocked trolls. In less than a minute, there were only orcs and elves standing on the Arena.

"What a mess", a male voice spoke in trollish. Shalkis was sure that she had heard him before.. but when she turned she did not recognize him.

"Ah yes. Tziak still has the touch. I have to admit that this was quite impressive. Not only has he allowed the Alliance to roam the vale, he also brought the wrath of thee orcs and the elves upon the trolls.", she replied.

That comment sparked an angry glare from the unknown troll male. But before he could act, he spotted the orcs walking up the ramp and wisely stepped aside.

---

The orcs were celebrating, brawling and drinking at Orgrimmar, under one of the few palm trees still left in the city. A veiled figure, dressed in blue from head to approached them.

"Matron Akesha of de Red Blades, a few words if ya will..."

The luck-based reputation grind

Shalkis on a Netherdrake,
originally uploaded by Shalkis.

After a few weeks of grinding, I got my Netherdrake. It's time for a few words on this new type of a reputation grind.

I had gotten my epic wyvern about a week after I dinged 70, so I had already cleared the largest hurdle in the Netherwing questline. I had also defeated Zuluhed the Whacked in some of WoW's most memorable and epic fights on top of the Dragonmaw Fortress. With the two prequisites out of the way, I started my reputation grind on the day after the 2.1 patch went live.

The daily quests were a good idea. You only require an hour (more if you're playing on prime time) to finish the quests. And since you got new daily quests on each reputation level in addition to the previous quests, your daily experience gain ramped up every time you moved up a notch on the reputation-o-meter. In addition, the daily quests solved many problems relating to reputation farming. Since there are several quests, you can always go elsewhere if one particular spot is crowded. And even if it's crowded, you can tolerate fellow players since they'll be there only for a short while and then be gone for the rest of the day.

At friendly you become the proud owner of the infamous booterang and get to re-experience the joy of smacking people in the Valley of Trials. Only this time you can do fly-bys. Quite hilarious.

At honored you can start racing against the Dragonmaw. The first few opponents are quite easy, but once you reach Ichman and Mulverick, the races become quite interesting. I couldn't help thinking that the races are a test on how aerial PvP could work. Basically, the racers fly on a set path and try to dismount you by throwing turnips, lightning bolts or even meteors at you. While the NPCs are easily bested by memorizing their paths and staying out of their range, fighting against fellow players could be quite interesting..

So.. Neutral to Revered. So far so good. Thanks to the ramping-up daily quests, there's now 9 quests you can do each day. Nice varied quests at different areas, which only take about two hours in total to complete. Quite casual. Except... There's the tenth quest, which is not a daily quest. It's a normal repeatable quest for the Netherwing Egg, a Bind-on-Pickup drop from any resource node or mob at the Netherwing Ledge. Since the daily quests are enough to gain a reputation level until Revered, you don't pay much heed to the eggs until that.

Why is a normal repeatable quest a bad idea? Because it undermines the attempt by Blizzard to make the reputation grinds more tolerable by limiting the amount of reputation you can gain per day. The Netherwing Eggs are an incentive to farm the Netherwing Mines over and over, even after you have completed all your daily quests there. Since the eggs are rare and have a very significant effect on your reputation gain, there's also quite a lot of competition. You can't loot eggs in combat, so be prepared to have people train mobs to you and steal the egg while you're trying to fend them off. If you live in the mines, you can shave off days or even weeks from the time it takes to complete the grind. Or not. You might not find any eggs at all, while others find dozens of them and complete the same grind much faster with the same or even less effort. Why try to control the amount of reputation gained per day if you aren't willing to go all the way?

IGE sued.. poorly

While suing a gold seller is all well and good, one should take a look at your legal arguments before filing the lawsuit. Handing a favorable precedent to the gold sellers is counterproductive at best.

Raiding is from Satan..

.. and other insights are now available, courtesy of WoW Insider. A prime example of hilarious WoW Drama.

Blizzard vs Peons4hire

Blizzard is going on the offensive against gold sellers. They have sued Peons4hire. Interestingly enough, Blizzard is not suing them for gold selling or Terms of Service violations per se. This lawsuit is about spamming. Since there are successful precedents of email spam victims and ISPs suing spammers, this lawsuit might even succeed.

World Of Warcraft: Dancing

A video showing where the various WoW /dance emotes originated from. It's missing a few races, though. For example, trolls, Forsaken, gnomes, female orcs, female tauren and female humans. I hope a part 2 is in the making. :)

TBC raiding: linear and non-progressive?

Tobold recently post his impressions on patch 2.1. The general consensus seems to be that raiding currently requires a full-time commitment and it is killing WoW. While WoW is quite unlikely to collapse outright, because the effects of MMORPG interia will reduce the collapse to a slow bleed. Would you abandon a character and the community that you spent the last two years overnight? I don't think so, because there is no alternatives available that are significantly better.

While I agree that WoW endgame has several outstanding issues, I don't think that the problem is as bad as the doomsayers make it sound. Patch 2.1 did have a lot of changes that should make somewhat easier. They do not address the major flaws, though.

What are the major flaws then? In my opinion, strictly linear progression and non-progressive content.

One thing that TBC has done really well is the 5-man instances. There's lots of them and they stay a viable option at level 70 thanks to the Heroic system. They are and remain challenging to even raiders, but are not too difficult. Since every individual heroic instance has a 1-day reset timer, people are encouraged to try out different isntances to stop them from getting bored. However, this freedom of choice vanishes the moment you start raiding.

Although the attunement chart suggests that Karazhan, Gruul's Lair and Magtheridon are your starter raid instances, the only real choice is Karazhan. Gruul and Magtheridon will wipe the floor with your raid unless you are epicced out from Karazhan, PvP or Heroics. Gruul is generally considered to be the easier of the two, so once you are farming him and Nightbane, you can enter Serpentshrine Cavern. Once Magtheridon goes down you can enter the Eye in Tempest Keep. Once both Lady Vashj and Kael'thas Sunstrider die, you can enter Mount Hyjal. Once you have killed the first boss there (and A'lar, the phoenix god boss in the Eye), you can enter the Black Temple.

Do you see the prevalence of preconditions there? Let's compare it with Vanilla WoW.

Zul'Gurub, Ruins of Ahn'Qiraj and the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj are instantly accessible. Molten Core, Blackwing Lair and Naxxramas require a single attunement quest each, are not linked and at most require a single instance run. Onyxia has a lengthy attunement quest, but is required only after you have progressed deeper into Blackwing Lair. While the relative difficulty of the instances does set a recommended sequence, you can switch instances if you choose to do so.

TBC raiding is strictly linear, with the trouble spot at Gruul and Magtheridon. These are very difficult encounters at first, and you cannot proceed any further until you defeat them, leaving Karazhan as the only place you can go.

The status of Gruul and Magtheridon as gatekeepers is enforced by the nature of their instances. These are very short instances in the style of Onyxia. A handful of trash mobs, followed by a boss. The trash mobs do not drop any interesting loot, nor do you gain any crafting materials or reputation in the process. If you keep wiping, there's nothing to show for your efforts, just a hefty repair and consumable bill. This discourages guilds from even attempting these encounters.

In small-group/solo PvE content, PvP and vanilla WoW raiding, the idea of progressive content worked. Any effort was rewarded by something, be it random epics from trash mobs, reputation or crafting materials. Even if you wiped horribly on some boss in Molten Core, you did gain something which made the next raid slightly easier. This is not the case with Gruul and Magtheridon. Each time is as hard as the previous one.

Gatekeeper encounters are fine when they are buried in the middle of normal raid instances, since you can clear everything up to the gatekeeper encounter. However, Gruul and Magtheridon are Onyxia-like encounters, not full instances. The progressive content model breaks down, which discourages guilds from trying these encounters. So, they return to Karazhan. So if you were looking forward for endgame raiding consisting of 6 instances instead of one, it's no wonder people became frustrated. As well-designed as Karazhan is, I can see myself become bored of it eventually. The upgraded loot will keep people interested for a while, but will it be enough?

The introduction of Zul'Gurub back in the day was a very welcome addition to raiders who were burned out by Molten Core (pardon the pun). I hope Zul'Aman has the same effect for TBC.

You gotta know who's the boss..

A gnome explains the fundamentals of a relationship to all those silly females.

Even the mighty can fall

The Dark has claimed an another casualty. A long time ago, Sargeras, the champion of the Pantheon, despaired in the face of his great task. And just like him, Tseric has now succumbed as well. He too fought forces that desired only chaos and strife. And just like Sargeras, his eventual downfall was foretold by the numerous cracks and fissures on his metallic skin. Once the fiends got under his skin, the breaking point soon followed.

Quag Done Quick

One of the great things about the Internet is that there's billions of people that come up with stuff that you've never thought about. However, this is not one of them. Soloing bosses by making them run back and forth is an old trick, but this time.. there's epic loot involved. While Blizzard should have prevented things like these from happening long ago, it's still a neat video.

Blood, Fire, Death

"The Weaver has certainly blessed me today.", Shalkis thought. No bodyguards.. no sycophants.. not even servants. The prey is completely exposed. He slowly walked around the edge of the arena, oblivious of the two red eyes starting at him through the thin slits of Shalkis' wooden mask. She carefully walked around the outer edge of the stony steps of the auditorium. Too much was at stake to be caught now.. She followed him around until he sat on the edge of the Arena. She was now convinced that he was alone and approached.

"Hello."
Tziak turned slowly and gazed towards Shalkis.
"Greetings."
"I didn't expect to see you here, but.. Could you step into the Arena?"
"Hmm...A familiar voice...Shalkis?"
Shalkis drew her sword and held it lazily, with the tip pointing towards the ground.
"Pretty please?"
"Planning on making a sacrifice? Not wishing to converse? How unlike you, Shalkis..."
Tziak stood slowly.
"Of course not. An example."
"An example of what?"
"Patience.. you'll find out soon."
The pair started walking towards the ramps. Tziak in the front, and Shalkis following at a swords-length behind him.

"Very well... You wish to fight, yes? Not exactly my strongest skill, but still...i shall fight, if you will speak with me first.."
Shalkis stayed silent.
"Answer me?"
She prodded Tziak with her sword. Tziak eyed the dark blade and then chuckled.
"A sword in the stomach, hmm?"
"Keep moving."
Tziak rolled his eyes and walked down the ramp onto the crimson sands.

"Good."
"Spill his blood all over the sands!"
"Feast upon his heart!"
The voices were still whispers, but loud enough to be heard clearly. Shalkis could almost smell Tziak's delicious blood, pumping in his veins.. then he turned and spoke.
"Now, shall you speak?"
Before Shalkis could reply, he heard an another voice from behind her.
"It is an honor to be in your presence once again."
Hidden behind her mask, she smiled. Audience. And judging by his words, a Gurubashi. The blessings are numerous today, she thought. And before she realized it, a red haze filled her vision and words escaped her lips:
"This might sting a bit."

...

Tziak was lying on the ground.. frostbitten. As was the other troll. Shalkis would have preferred if he was conscious, but one cannot have everything.
"Now.. get up.", she barked towards Tziak.
"The reason why we're here.. I've been thinking what the warcry of the Empire really meant.."
Tziak slowly opened his eyes, and his flesh was already regenerating rapidly.
"P-pardon...wait till my ears r-regrow...", he smirked and coughed up some blood.
"The Blood.. that corrupts us.", she bellowed and drove her blade through Tziak's hand.
"The Fire.. that consumes us.", she continued yelling. Flames danced on her fingertips and jumped to Tziak, burning away the regenerated flesh.
"The Death.. that sets us free.", she screamed on top of her lungs, drowning out the wailing winds circling around her.
Tziak was trying to whisper something.
"Of course.. you're not getting away that easily..", she spoke and smiled.
"Of course not, Shalkis.", he replied and then whispered..
"But answer me one question....Do you regret that your lips, who even now quiver with jealousity, shall never again grace my skin?"
He started to laugh, but it quickly turned into a cough.
"Now sleep.. and dream of horrid things..", she spoke omniously and pointed the tip of her bloodied sword right at Tziak's face.
"Wait..", he smiled again.
"Will you not answer my questions?"
"I have no regrets. My task in this world is done. This.. is just a bonus.", she replied from behind her mask.
"That was not my question."
Shalkis heard someone walk towards her from behind. She turned, still keeping her sword pointed at Tziak. An another Gurubashi.
"I did not come here for you. Wait your turn.", she quipped and turned towards Tziak.
The other troll spoke: "Me be ´ere to ´elp me Emporah."
Shalkis ignored the troll and carefully cut Tziak's tabard off him with her sword. When the blade nicked Tziak's skin, the wound closed even before it could bleed.
The troll behind her started to chant: "From da earth yah call da Powah..."
Shalkis grabbed the tabard and held it up, marveling at the handiwork. Even in it's burnt and tattered state, the twin snakes still looked majestic.
"This.. is now mine..", she spoke to herself. She then turned her gaze back towards Tziak.
"As for your life.."

Shalkis' sentence was interrupted by a snarl from behind. Before she could turn, she could feel and hear metal grind against bone. Blood gushed out of her back. She whispered a word and she was beyond the axe's reach. The troll wielding it pulled the axe up from the ground and started running towards her. The other two trolls were already hurling lightning towards her, and from the corner of her eye, she saw Tziak, shimmering with frost and an elemental at his side. She had a wicked grin behind her mask, but that was only a facade. Of course he had only been stalling, waiting for more Gurubashi to show up. Each second here would increase the chances of him winning. It would have to end now.

Shalkis muttered a long-forgotten blessing, and she too was protected by both a frozen shield and an elemental. The elemental turned it's featureless face towards one of the shamans while Shalkis was already introducing the berserker to his ruminant side. Bolts of lightning, ice and water criscrossed around the Arena. The first shaman succumbed.. then the other. She looked back at Tziak, and the blood haze filled her vision again.

...

Shalkis stood next to Tziak, looking down on him.
"Now.. where were we?"
"I believe you where going to take my life? Amusing, really.", Tziak grinned.
"All things have an end. You are fortunate to encounter yours so soon. However.. your end will not come today."
"You know, if you let me live, what shall happen..", he shook his head.
"You.. will bring your own downfall. This.. is simply a long overdue reminder.. of your mortality. That even a 'God-Emperor' can bleed."
"Breaking my body serves nothing to remind me of 'mortality' ...you should know, as an 'Aspect' ...the Flesh means nothing", he replied.
"Of course.. so here's something for you to dream about."
"I have long stopped dreaming....but continue.."
Shalkis' sword flared briefly as she thrust it towards Tziak.

...

"Sleep, Emperor of the Gurubashi.. and dream of your fate that you have brought upon yourself!", Shalkis bellowed. Her work was done, for now. The wound on her back was not bleeding anymore, but she could not handle any more Gurubashi. With great effort, she climbed on top of her raptor and rode north from the Arena.

Snacky's Journal - Episode 2

There's something about gnomes that always makes me chuckle. Especially when they're getting beat up and thrown around.

Curse Gaming & Markee Dragon?

I was a bit surprised to see a post in Curse Gaming which denounces the most recent wave of bans for botting, trading gold and trading accounts. Although it appears in their "Editor's Notes"-section, it was not written by the staff of Curse. The post was submitted by AlexandraMD, but the post itself mentions that it was written by Marcus Eikenberry of Markee Dragon. And sure enough, Alexandra is one of the editors there.

The Markee Dragon site doesn't hide the fact that they do support botting, gold trading and account trading. WoW Glider links, IGE ads, botter interviews, links to gold selling sites. .. you name it, they've got it. Apparently Markee Dragon has personally been banned by Blizzard as well. One other thing that I found was an utility called FreeGameCam (not to be confused with the GameCam), which can be used to monitor your bot's progression remotely.

If I were a Curse staffer, I'd be more careful who I allow to post on their front page.

Misguided Alleigances

Sigh.

Shalkis looked at the tabard one more time. The crimson background had faded some time ago, and the edges were frayed. Only the black sword motif remained, as sharp as ever. She carefully straightened the tattered cloth, then folded it. Once, twice, thrice.

They had failed offer any answers, either. Those who had once challenged the dominance of Frostmourne now.. just gave up. To some, the call of the grave proved to be too seducing. Others returned to whatever places they called home. Some found new employers. Whatever they did was now irrelevant. There would be no voyage to the north.

With a thud, the male Draenei set a metallic box on the counter and opened it. Shalkis' eyes lingered for a moment on the stack of cloth in it, each one with different markings. Only the top one with a hellish mouth motif was visible, but Shalkis knew the others as well. A golden scepter, a silver sun, a blue wolf's head, a red drake, poison-green eyes, golden twin spires, a red Naaru motif.. and the twin snakes.

"Too many..", she thought.

Shalkis snapped out of her reverie and set the latest tabard on top of the pile. The Draenei put the lid back on the box and unceremoniously picked it up. The self-devouring snakes reminded her of one other thing she needed to do now. News of the collapse would eventually reach their ears and lure the scavengers in, looking for an easy kill. She glanced on the Draenei, who nodded slightly and vanished into the back room for a moment. A few minutes later he re-emerged, carrying an another box.

The stench of forbidden magic greeted Shalkis when she opened it. She would use their superstition to her advantage. In their eyes, she was the betrayer, the heretic, the corrupt. Fine. Let them come and test their bravery before their strength. The first item she removed was a fiery robe with intricate patterns. Then a set of shoulderguards. Three monstrous mouths, locked in an eternal howl stared back at her. Finally, the most important part.. a wooden mask. The dried blood still lined it's insides. The draenei looked at her with a well-hidden frown on his face. She nodded, and the metallic container was sealed and hurried out of sight.

The robe was gentle to the touch from the inside. Like finest silk, straight from the Spider Queen's chosen. Yet the outside looked like it was molten and would scar from the slightest touch. As soon as she slipped it on, the faint whispers started to circle in her mind. Barely recognizable promises of power, of vengeance, of dominance. For such a small price.. yet too steep to even consider. Still.. detecting and fending off the temptations would be good practice. There was no leeway to let delusions of grandeour fester. Any overestimations would be the death of her. Literally.

Next, she grabbed one of the shoulderguards and attached it to her right shoulder with the leather straps. Then the other. From the corner of her eye, the eyes of the beasts seemed to flare. In her mind's eye, she could see the false prophet writhe and scream in agony. Her mouth sharpened into a grin. The price he would pay for his betrayal would be high indeed. But.. not now. Patience. Discipline. These would be her allies in the coming months. Not the rage that was offered to her.

Finally.. the mask. As soon as she lowered it to her face, all seemed so clear. Short-sighted fools. Heretics. So many times she had offered the ingrates the truth. And an equal number of times it had been rejected. Their downfall would be of their own doing. All she needed to do was to watch.. and judge. With their dying breath, they would all admit that they were wrong. But then again, she had been wrong so many times before. So many misguided alleigances. So much trust for those who never deserved it in the first place.

But maybe there would be some who would be worthy. Those who also see the mistakes of the past and follies of the future. It would be so good to talk to someone who would understand. It has been too long since the last time. As she saw it, there was now two alternatives before her. She could stay in the shadows, in the sidelines, to catalogue all the mistakes of the world. It would serve as a warning for the future generations, should there be any. Or.. Perhaps..

Oh yes..

With a smile hidden beneath the mask, Shalkis climbed on her wyvern's back and guided it towards the sky.

Engineering will get this, and much, much more!

Just kidding. Apparently the Engineering patch got turned into an Alchemy patch, and Ommra picked the short straw to deliver the news. The major Engineering overhaul is as follows:

• 11 goggles, which you may or may not be able to use.
  
• Engineering bags can now contain some Engineering items.
  
• 1 new grenade.
• Engineering bags can now contain some Engineering items (just in case you missed it the first time).
• When skilling up Engineering, you now have more than 2 items you can craft at any time.
  
• Craftable Fused Wiring, because not every raid instance comes built-in with repair NPCs.
  
• Next rank of Seaforium Charges, which can now actually open locks. You have to farm rep for it, though.
  
• An item that sells for 50g might now cost less than 1.5k to craft.
  
• Nigh-Invulnerablity Belt kills you less often now.
  
• Gnomish Poultryizer makes your opponent /lol less.
  
• Goblin Rocket Launcher can actually help you catch someone instead of giving them a head start.
  
• New icons for mana and health injectors (Ya rly).

That's all folks.

Professions preview and the trouble with Engineering

Nethaera has come forward with a professions preview, and I have to say.. it's not much.

First, let's get the obvious out of the way. Limiting elixirs to one per type is going to hurt raiding a lot. I'm not even near Serpentshrine or Magtheridon and I'm routinely using at least two elixirs. On paper this is doing exactly what Blizzard promised it would do: reduce the money needed for consumables in raiding. However, if the encounters are not balanced accordingly, it will just mean that the cost is transferred from consumables to repair costs. It's not the end, however. It will simply slow down raiding progress on gear-dependant encounters.

Next up is enchanting. The changes are nothing to write home about, simply some slight tuning. Making the spell damage bracer enchant cheaper is always useful, and changing spell damage enchants to both spell damage and healing will help healers in soloing stuff, and is in line with previous changes.

Fishing buffs are always welcome. Starting up fishing with 300 fishing and +25 skill fishing pole in Zangar Marsh was a pain. Since cooked fish are actually useful nowadays, this will hopefully inspire more people to take up fishing.

Jewelcrafting got the UI changes it needed, and got a few of the gaps filled out. I'll be ordering some spell hit gems as soon as possible. I'm also stockpiling ores for the improved Prospecting.

Leatherworking got a few cosmetic changes, so I won't comment on those. But I'll comment on my profession, Engineering.

The listed changes miss whatever feedback that has been given to Blizzard. 11 goggles? With any luck, they'd all require Engineering and/or are Bind-on-Pickup. Nobody's going to pick Engineering because they can craft 9 goggles that are useless to them, even if they are epic. If you pick Blacksmithing, you are a melee class, most likely a warrior or a paladin. If you pick Tailoring, you are a clothie. Rogues, druids, hunters and shamans pick Leatherworking. Everyone can use Alchemy potions, and you can always sell them. Ditto with Jewelcrafting. Now compare all of the other crafting professions to Engineering.

90% of the Engineering items require Engineering to use, and only a handful require a specialization to craft. This means that the market for Engineering items is nonexistent, especially when the guns are substandard. Currently, the only classes that get the most out of Engineering are Hunters and Warriors, and even then there's some clothie items left.

IMHO, Blizzard has to do some soul-searching with Engineering. What do they want it to be? Do they want to limit it by class like Tailoring, Blacksmithing and Leatherworking are now? Or do they want it to be a general-purpose profession like Alchemy or Jewelcrafting? Or just a novelty profession with some minor benefit on very limited circumstances? Because that's what it is now, a novelty. And if this is the best that Blizzard can do, it isn't going to be enough to make Engineering viable anywhere.

The mechanics of Death

The debate about death mechanics in WoW has continued for a while, and recent nerfs in Vanguard's death mechanics sparked my interest, since their system is relatively close to an another Blizzard game I used to play.

Diablo 2, the previous Blizzard net hack n' slash had a very similar death mechanic to Vanguard. You lost experience and gold upon death, and your character would spawn at a friendly city naked (figuratively speaking). If you successfully made your way back to your corpse, you'd retrieve all your gear and regain some lost experience. At no point you would lose a level through experience loss, though.

Interestingly enough, this death mechanic scaled throughout the game. Dying at low levels was relatively harmless, since the amount of experience and gold lost was small. But after you went past level 85 or so, a single death could set you back significantly. At level 90+, going to a dangerous situation was simply stupid.

How did it affect the game? Obviously, risk-taking decreased when you progressed in the game. High-level characters would not even go near hazardous situations, like Iron Maiden-casting Deathknights in Chaos Sanctuary, Nilthalak's Corpse Explosions, Arreat Summit's Barbarians or Lister's deadly loading lag. A high-level player would pick a risk-free spot and farm it. While the death mechanic did instill a healthy aversion to death upon characters, it also made the game boring, since increased risk was very rarely met with an appropriate increase in rewards. It was much more worthwhile to farm Mephisto than to risk dying without even reaching Baal.

Contrast this with WoW, which has one of the most forgiving death mechanics ever used in an MMORPG. The only penalties are a monetary penalty in the form of repair costs and a time penalty for corpserunning. You only lose experience if you really want to. Death in PvP only incurs a time penalty with no lasting effects. The difference in player mindset when compared to Diablo 2 is striking. WoW players are much more receptive to the idea of trying something different and quite likely fatal. Like attempting a raid encounter that could even be untested and completely unbeatable. This in turn is both a blessing and a curse. It lets players try to perform at the very edge of their gear and abilities and thus provide them that much-needed challenge. On the other hand, many players do get an optimal performance out from their characters, which sometimes results in players finishing off content at a faster pace than Blizzard would like. This results in bored players. To keep them interested, Blizzard has to keep making more and more content and new encounters.

A harsher death mechanic is not really a solution, and it could even backfire. One of the things that keeps the so-called casuals playing is that even short sessions benefit them. A short grind session, a quest or two, a bit of PvP, an instance run. Even though the benefits might be neglible, you always gain something, be it a bit of honor, some reputation, some gold or a sliver of experience. You never lose anything that would take hours upon hours to reacquire. That's currently reserved for bleeding-edge raiders.

Speaking of raiders.. A raider can currently burn several hundreds of gold in consumables when trying to down a new boss. If they also had to regrind experience and reacquire lost gear, raiding progress speed would grind to a halt. A few dedicated guilds would keep trying the new content, the rest would stick to farming easy encounters. Blizzard's current focus on new content development would most likely be a waste, since only a handful of people would even try to reach it. Raid encounters would stay bugged for months and months until Blizzard would eventually give in and nerf them enough for safe farming. If you think that having to clear trash mobs after a few wipes and farming 500g worth of consumables for a night of raiding is bad, you haven't seen anything yet. It could be much, much worse.

Dynamic music and World of Warcraft

Melmoth is annoyed by the randomness of WoW's music and wants it to change according to the situation. While I agree that dynamic music would add a lot to immersion, there are several significant hurdles that make dynamic music hard to implement.

First of all, time and cost. If you want appropriate music for every situation, someone has to compose, arrange and perform all of it. When we are talking about a game with dozens of zones, thousands of subzones and an incalculable amount of different situations, that's a whole lot of music. A lot of video game music, including WoW's, is composed for a full symphony orchestra and a choir. Hiring an orchestra, a choir and managing the logistics of getting them all into the same place to perform your music before the deadline is a lot of work.

However, there have been some instances where games have used dynamic music successfully. Probably the most well-known is LucasArts' iMuse. The reason why iMuse worked was that games of that era used MIDI. The music was stored as notes, not raw sound. This allowed iMuse to rearrange and remix the human-created soundtrack on-the-fly. Nowadays many of the soundtracks undergo extensive post-processing and use vocals. A home computer would have a hard time redoing the post-processing in real time, and adjusting and replicating vocals would be very hard.

So, now we have to settle for the next-best alternative. WoW uses around 3-4 different themes for each of the capital cities, and 6-8 (one set for daytime, and one set for the night) for every type of zone. Each theme lasts less than a minute, and has manually created transition points. Normally the capitals have an intro theme that is used whenever the player enters them, and then the game plays the other themes randomly. In addition, there are some themes that are triggered whenever a player enters a specific sub-zone or activates an event. For example, demon- or Scourge-infested areas have a specific theme. Certain NPCs, like Jin'do and Gul'dan have their own themes. In theory, WoW's system could be extended to include more triggers, like combat, population density, type of enemies and so on. However, there's still the question of time and cost. Currently, Blizzard has introduced more music only when a new raid instance was released. AQ, Naxxramas and Karazhan were accompanied by their own soundtracks. Creating more music for a raid instance is relatively straightforward, since you have a specific theme every individual piece of music revolves around. Adding triggered themes that would not sound out-of-place in any of the zones currently in game is much harder and much more time-consuming, because you have to create a lot of new music.

In the end, the issue boils down to a more generic question: Given the resources Blizzard currently has at their disposal, should they use those resources on creating new content or improving the old? Remember that for most of WoW's history, Blizzard has simply been working on the backlog of content they wanted to have ready for the release, but couldn't finish. When the game was released, some of the zones were blatantly unfinished, like Silithus or Searing Gorge. Blackwing Lair, Ahn'Qiraj, Zul'Gurub, Naxxramas, Caverns of Time, Maraudon, Dire Maul and Karazhan were eventually implemented. Gilneas, Kul Tiras, most of Timbermaw Hold, Grim Batol, Uldum and present-day Hyjal are still missing. Nazjatar and the Emerald Dream are somewhere deep in the backlog (although parts of them are in the game files), with the Black Temple currently occupying the top spot. After the Black Temple is implemented, Blizzard will hopefully finish some more of the backlog and improve Azeroth before setting their sights on the next expansion. Although I do roleplay an ice troll, I'm not in a rush to see Northrend.

No such thing as a free epic

Totalbiscuit recently pondered the effects of the attunement chain in the Burning Crusade. One side-effect of such an extensive attunement chain is that raiding is limited to your main character only.

Let's assume that you belong to a raid guild that's halfway through Tempest Keep and you get tired of the fireball spam / healthbar whack-a-mole / buffbotting and want to try out other roles as well. In classic WoW, you could always roll an alt, powerlevel to 60 and jump back into raiding. Thanks to the attunements, jumping back to the raiding is easier said than done. You just can't jump into MC or BWL in greens, stay out of the way and pick up some epics. To even zone in to Tempest Keep you need to do Heroic Steamvaults, Heroic Shadow Labyrinth, Heroic Shattered Halls, Heroic Arcatraz and Magtheridon. To get to the Heroics, you need Revered reputation with four factions, which you get from running the level 70 nonheroic instances. To get to three of those, you need keys from the previous instances. Suffice to say, that is a lot of work. Too much work for just an alt. By the time you have completed the attunements, you should already be in full blue gear and spent dozens of hours of game time.

So what does this mean for raiding guilds? Replacing burned-out raiders is going to be expensive. You just cannot "retrain" one of your existing raiders when a critical member quits, takes a vacation or generates enough guild drama to get kicked. It's more worthwhile to recruit (even cross-realm, like TotalBiscuit did by offering to pay for a transfer) a character that already has the attunements and gear.

What does this mean for the so-called casuals (read: anyone who doesn't raid)? One effect that I'm hoping to see is that the envious and confrontrational attitude against raiders will gradually dissolve. Belonging to a raiding guild is no longer a fast-track to epics. If you see someone in T4/T5/T6, they have worked for their gear. Getting epics via raiding is not easier than crafting or PvP, it's just different. And until Hyjal is on farm, the gear you get from raiding is probably more or less equivalent as well.

"Hacked"

I had this interesting conversation today:

[10:37:31] [Rachiel] whispers: Greetings Brave soul i was thnking of how rich you looked and then i was wondering if you could give a poor little girl some money for some weapons after a visit from hackers it will be very please??
[10:40:04] To [Rachiel]: Unequipping your gear does not make you a victim of a hacker.
[10:40:57] [Rachiel] whispers: i know thats why i havent taken of my gear off
[10:41:19] To [Rachiel]: When did this "hacking" take place?
[10:41:28] [Rachiel] whispers: a week ago
[10:41:46] To [Rachiel]: Is that so? According to the Armory, you still had your gear yesterday.

Of course, she didn't give up that easily..

[10:42:20] [Rachiel] whispers: cant be me another maybe what armory did i have?
[10:42:35] To [Rachiel]: Well, there is just one Rachiel on Defias Brotherhood.
[10:43:21] [Rachiel] whispers: well it could be another blood elf with near the same name
[10:43:46] To [Rachiel]: An another blood elf with the exact same name and in the same guild?
[10:44:11] [Rachiel] whispers: i didnt say so with nearly the same name
[10:45:20] [Rachiel] whispers: but if you say i had my armory yesterday then what armory did i have?
[10:47:12] To [Rachiel]: For example, your weapons were [Dazzling Longsword] and [Sword of Omen]
[10:47:50] [Rachiel] whispers: really because i used dagger
[10:48:59] To [Rachiel]: Oh really?
[10:49:08] [Rachiel] whispers: yes really
[10:51:49] To [Rachiel]: Let's assume for a moment that I'm looking at the wrong Armory profile.. How supposedly this hacker with a similar name also belongs to the same guild as you?
[10:53:13] [Rachiel] whispers: nope but listen if you dont wanna give anything just say no what is the problem?
[10:53:35] To [Rachiel]: I'm saying that you are the scammer and no hacking took place.
[10:54:36] [Rachiel] whispers: well why does i then walk around with 6 copper and a dress worth 1 copper and dont have any weapons?
[10:57:51] To [Rachiel]: First of all, that dress is crafted and costs more than 1 copper. Secondly, you know I can't confirm how much money do you have, nor I can confirm what you have in your bags or bank. But I can confirm that you still had gear yesterday, a week after
[10:57:56] To [Rachiel]: the supposed hacking.
[10:58:48] [Rachiel] whispers: okay okay i dont have got a visit from hackers but i maybe soon get because i have a payoff to someone i know and if i dont pay him unless friday he will hack my acount (this dress comes from the valentine event last month. =(
[11:00:17] To [Rachiel]: ..or you could just report him to Blizzard and they'll probably be more than happy to return your gear if this supposed hacker does succeed.
[11:00:25] To [Rachiel]: At least they would be able to bust him for harassment.
[11:01:09] [Rachiel] whispers: i know but i have a problem i dont know his character name
[11:01:28] To [Rachiel]: If you don't know his character's name, how can you pay him?
[11:02:24] [Rachiel] whispers: he will find me in school and then tell me that was the deal he dont wanna get his name out before i can pay him
[11:03:11] To [Rachiel]: Then why don't you report him to the school authorities for harassment?

Of course, there could be a real bully cleaning out their classmates' accounts, but it would be easier to just intimidate them to give out their virtual possessions than to make them co-conspirators.

Frankly, I'm doubtful that she'll learn. So just in case she tries this same angle again, I'm posting this as a warning.

Stealing from a thief..

..is okay according to Blizzard.

I have to agree.

Engineering and the Bling Bling

Since Tobold is covering most of the other tradeskills in the Burning Crusade, I'll cover Engineering, my tradeskill. Short version: Engineering is the Bling-Bling of WoW: It's expensive and mostly useless.

Before the Burning Crusade, Engineering was commonly seen as the PvP profession. It argueably still holds that title, but it's nowhere as good as before. Engineering did get new bombs and grenades, and these are still the bread and butter of engineers. A well-placed stun is always useful in PvP, and can give you the advantage in many fights. However, that's about the only really useful thing in Engineering now.

Aside from the grenades, Engineering was mostly known as the trinket profession. Deathrays, jumper cables, reflectors, combat pets, net-o-matics.. An engineer had a trinket for every occassion. With the introduction of Jewelcrafting, Engineering mostly lost that mantle. We did get some new trinkets, but we lost most of our previous trinkets due to diminishing returns. A Hyper-Radiant Flame Reflector is not going to stop a pyroblast from a level 70 mage. In addition, the new trinkets are less impressive than their stats would suggest. For example, the Goblin Rocket Launcher is completely useless against flying targets. It won't dismount them, it won't stun them, it won't even damage them.

The third category of items craftable with Engineering is various helmets, goggles and boots. While pre-Burning Crusade had a selection of cloth, leather and mail helms, the arrival of Jewelcrafting changed the focus a bit. Useful goggles are now for gnomes only, and new items are mostly leather.

The fourth and final category is guns and bullets. We got those as well, but the prices are.. well.. prohibitive. For example, my primary way of skilling up Engineering past 360 is the Felsteel Boomstick. To craft one, you need 20 Adamantite Ore, 56 Fel Iron Ore and 32 Eternium Ore. Getting the Adamantite and the Fel Iron isn't really a problem, but the Eternium is. It is an Uncommon drop from various veins. All in all, a Rare-quality gun is more expensive than many craftable Epic-quality melee weapons. Would you spend all that effort to obtain the materials or would you rather make a quick instance run and get a better one?

So for the four main uses for engineering, a mage like me can use.. one. Suffice to say, I'm looking forward for that Engineering revamp.

Borrowing raid IDs for fun and..

..well, mostly malicious fun. Accepting an invite to a PuG can be hazardous to your raiding.

The Armory

Apparently Blizzard is going to put all those profile and census sites out of business with the Armory. While the official stats site is always going to be up-to-date and thus more accurate than third-party sites, it can also be too accurate. For example, I occassionally log off wearing my roleplaying gear, which is nowhere near the power of my normal grinding/instancing gear.

The trouble with small raids

Back when Blizzard announced that new raid instances would be 10-man and 25-man, many feared that it would cause guilds to be divided. Because only a part of the guild could raid at the same time, subgroups within the guild would form. Now, Tobold is struggling with that exact problem.

My current guild had the same problem at first. The first ones to complete the attunements formed the first core raiding group, and if you weren't part of that core group.. well.. good luck getting a raid invite when you weren't even told of an upcoming raid.

However, this is not a new problem. Whenever there were significantly more potential raiders than raid slots, strifes like these have been there. The only difference is that it's much easier to encounter this problem with the reduced raid group size. Raid alliances and super guilds have struggled with this back when Molten Core was the only raid content around.

The only solution that I see is to build a fair way to handle raid signups and invites. Even the core raid group members have to step aside to let others in. This is not a problem when the raid content in question is in farm status, so less-than-optimal contribution from a single raider doesn't cause a wipe. However, because the reduced size of raids, the role of a single raider is amplified, and the margin of error is much, much smaller.

Gear-wise, suboptimal contribution is less of a problem than before because the raid attunements are chained. People can't enter a high-end instance in greens anymore. To get to Karazhan, you must have completed the most difficult non-heroic dungeons. While doing it, you probably got yourself some adequate gear. To get to Serpentshrine cavern, you had to clear Gruul's Lair and Karazhan. And so on. Completing the attunements forces you to get gear for the next step. By the time you step into Mount Hyjal, you have completed all other dungeons. Tactics progression follows the same path. If you don't learn, your group will most likely wipe.

So, the gear and the tactics are not really the problem. Getting the raid invite is the major one. One interesting way (that Death & Taxes uses, presumably) is that you get the normal amount of DKP even when you are not accepted to the raid itself, as long as you are prepared (no pun intended) and stay available for the duration of the raid. There are several advantages to this approach.

1. Not getting an invite is not a big deal.
   

   When you do get an invite, you have more stored DKP than the others (who have spent their DKP on drops), so you can catch up on gear quickly.

2. Because the raid leader requires you to stay available for the duration of the raid, the system encourages you to pay attention.
   

   Listening to text and voice chat isn't always as effective as doing it yourself, but it's a whole lot better than not doing anything.

3. Because the benchwarmers can quickly catch up to raiders, the raid leader has an easier time replacing raiders.
   

   This applies even to progress raids. Because you can keep up with gear and tactics, the raid leader doesn't compromise the group too much by inviting you. Having a pool of suitable replacements allows the raid to go on longer than it could otherwise.
   

High King Maulgar

High King Maulgar,
originally uploaded by Shalkis.

After an evening in Gruul's lair, High King Maulgar finally succumbed to the Great Dark.

Damn you Faxmonkey!

Some time ago the mages' Spellsteal was nerfed. Buffs that we stole used to take into account our spell damage. While it was fun stealing aggro from bear tanks with 1.7k ticks with the Astromages' Fire Shield, Faxmonkey found an another mob with Fire Shield in a much more interesting location. Alterac Valley. Soon afterwards, the nerf arrived.

Strangers in the Capital

The Magisters' lessons had done wonders to Alanduin's health. Although he was never officially tutored in the art of magic, drawing power from his enemies seemed almost too simple. All it took was a bit of concentration. But he never would have thought of it himself, it took a Magister to figure it out for him. In his mind, it was simply making the most of prey. He had already grown accustomed to using the entrails of beasts in various ways, from sinews used as bowstrings, certain organs as food, the skin turned into furs and leather clothing. Drawing power was simply making good use of the beasts' spiritual energy as well. His skin had started to regain a healthy color, and strength once again filled his limbs. Once again, he could hold his head high in the capital. People greeted him again.

Ah, the capital. With newfound vigor in him, Alanduin could once again appreciate the majestic craftsmanship. It was amazing how quickly Silvermoon had recovered from the devastation. The Magisters had explained how the Prince had found new sources of power, and ways to store and use it. And the knowledge was indeed in much use. The new green crystals adorned many of the spires, including the royal Sunfury Spire. The rebuilt capital looked better than ever.

The rebuilding was not the only news that had contributed to Alanduin's good mood. At first, it was isolated reports that not all undead were either mindless or ravenous. He had travelled south to investigate these rumors. Not only were the rumors indeed true, but these.. Forsaken were actually helping in the eradication of the Scourge. It had taken a few days for Alanduin to gather enough courage to actually talk to one, but the tales he had heard were incredible. From what they told, the cursed human prince had actually attacked his own kingdom before marching into Quel'thalas. He had ended King Terenas' reign with his own hands. Not only that, the undead claimed that they were being led by the Ranger-General Sylvanas Windrunner, who had organized a resistance after she was slain and reanimated at the battle of the Sunwell. A ranger that had given more than her life in the defense of the High Home? It sounded a bit too good, but the ambassadors sent to Lordaeron did confirm it. Quel'thalas had allies. Unfortunately, so did the Forsaken.

Sometimes it's not a good idea to share. Vile orcs, trolls and bullmen from beyond the sea had travelled to the High Home. All elves, including Alanduin were decreed to extend their hospitality to these beasts as well. Years, even centuries of war and now we're just supposed to let them walk in our beloved city? But it was the word of the Regent, and it could not be questioned. But perhaps he could be convinced to reconsider. Since ages past the Rangers had always been the first to spot threats to the High Home. Now that the Blood Knights had assumed responsibility for day-to-day defense of the land, the Rangers could again assume their role as the eyes and ears of the elven nation. If he could just gather some evidence of the mongrels' treachery, the Regent would see the wisdom in rescinding his order.

The first few investigations were fruitless. Appearing friendly in the dubious company of the beasts was becoming his second nature, but he could maintain the facade for only a few minutes at a time. The savagery of the mongrels was apparent, but a simple breach of public peace was not enough to kick them out. Not all of them, anyway. It had to be something more.. tangible. He needed to catch them in the act.

A few weeks later Alanduin received his first solid lead. The weather controller had malfunctioned. It was officially blamed on the savage night elves caught sneaking around, but that explanation seemed too simple for him. It would take some time for the controller to be repaired, so Alanduin walked the empty streets of Silvermoon in the rain, thinking on how he could connect the mongrels to sabotage. Deep within his thoughts, he failed to notice an armored raptor approaching quickly.

"Hey! Are you blind?", he snapped as the raptor almost ran him over.

The rider, dressed in blue from head to toe, did not respond. Two blue ears, adorned with earrings peeked from the edges of the cowl. Obviously a troll.

"I am talking to you, troll!"

The blueish raptor snarled at him, but the rider did not move.

"Are those shriveled ears just for show?", Alanduin taunted while walking around the raptor to get a good look on the mongrel. The raptor tried to grab his arm between the powerful jaws, but he was safely out of reach.

The rider was also wearing a veil in addition to the cowl, and the wet clothes were pressing on his.. her body. The female troll slowly extended her right hand horizontally to her side, and he could hear the female whisper a few unrecognizable words. Water dripping from the hand slowed, and then froze. More rain kept falling and freezing along the rapidly-forming icicle hanging from her hand. A witch, and a powerful one at that. The icicle was already almost as tall as Alanduin, and the troll seemed to have no problems holding her arm straight. Her red eyes, the only visible part of her, gazed straight through him. Leaving the bow at the inn seemed like a really bad idea now.

The witch opened her fist, letting the icicle shatter on the cobblestones. By the time Alanduin regained his composure, she was already long gone. The evidence of the threat was already melting away. He looked around, but he didn't see anyone who would be useful as a witness. If only he knew where the witch was going..

"Damn trolls", he muttered as he headed back to the inn.

Best laid plans of mice and elves..

Alanduin was a simple man.

He was drafted to the Rangers when the borders of Quel'thalas were threatened by orcs, but he was no marksman. Sure, he could hit an orc from a hundred yard's distance, but that was the bare minimum expected from his people. The others had younger, sharper eyes than him. War was not the proper business for someone of his age. Fortunately for him, his unit saw little combat. The few times he did see a living orc were from a safe distance. Still, the aftermaths and the horror stories were more than enough for him. After the battle of the Spire he received a honorable discharge from the Rangers, alongside a humble salary. Just barely enough to pay the carpenters to build a small cabin for him deep within Eversong.

Alanduin's retirement hasn't gone as he had hoped. The first winter was colder than he anticipated, but at least he didn't have to starve. While hitting a rabbit or a lynx was tougher than downing a lumbering orc, he eventually got the hang of it. When the spring finally arrived he had a nice stock of furs to sell. He bought some salt and other supplies and returned to his cabin. As far as he was concerned, the life of a hermit was more than enough for him.

Although Alanduin was living healthily, his health deteriorated during the winter. But since he got somewhat better during springtime, he didn't think much of it. Old age, he thought. But one winter it got worse, much worse. His insides ached constantly and his mouth felt like sandpaper. But there was no priest who knew of his predicament, and he was in no condition to travel through the blizzard back to Silvermoon. As the months progressed, so did his condition grow worse. Food did not sate his hunger, and his skin started losing it's color. He had always known he would eventually die, but.. not like this. Not like this!

Against all odds, Alanduin survived through the winter. His skin was as grey as ash and he was unnaturally thin, even for an elf. The cart he used to transport the furs felt heavy, although he knew there were less furs than before. The previous winters were good, so there should be enough money to see a priest. He would get himself fixed up, restock on supplies and be on his way again. Eventually, the walls of Silvermoon glinted on the horizon and the cart felt slightly lighter. It was good to see the sun again. Still, something was wrong. Alanduin did respectfully greet the passersby, but his greetings were never answered. Young people, no manners. Eventually, he arrived at the eastern gate.

The gate guards stood like they always did, as majestic as the statues that adorned the capital. But instead of a simple glance, this time the guards' eyes stayed locked at him.

"Greetings, gentlemen. Could a humble trapper enter the glorious capital to sell his wares?"

...

"I know I look less than presentable, but.."

Alanduin's explanation was cut off when the guards both took a single step towards him, moving their shields in front of their faces and readying their glaives.

"Look! I know I'm sick, but.."

"At least you are not delusional, Wretched."
"Is he salvageable?"

"Salvageable? I know this looks bad, but the first thing I'm planning to do is to see a priest to be cured!"

"The Magisters will decide your fate. Or us, should you give us an excuse to do so."

"I will not raise my hand against the defenders of the High Home."

"A pity. Now, come on."

The guards escorted him inside and straight into the prison. Whenever he tried to look around, the guards prodded him. Why was he being treated as the enemy? He had seen the city hundreds of times. He was no spy.

It did not take long for them to reach the holding cells. Alanduin's eyes took a minute to adjust themselves to the nonexistant light, but when he looked around, he realized that the other prisoners shared his ailment. This was not isolated. It was an epidemic! All of them shared the ashen grey skin color, but many had already lost that Elven posture and hunched like trolls and other beasts. And some of them had something glowy growing from them.

A few days passed. Some of the fellow inmates were not taking their incarceration well, and were trying to test the strength of the bars with no success. Alanduin had taken the opportunity to get a bit of much-needed rest. Still, he felt hungry. The guards did give them food, but it had no flavor either. Like eating leather. His meal was interrupted by sounds of the outer door being opened. A young male in red flowing robes and a staff entered the cellblock. He gently tapped the base of his staff against the stone floor and the headpiece, the regal golden eagle, started to shine. He took out a piece of scroll, a bottle of ink and a quill from a shelf next to the jailor's post. He spoke a few words and the scroll rolled itself open and the quill dip itself to the bottle of ink. He slowly walked towards the cells, and the writing implements floated behind him.

The magister pointed his staff towards the first prisoner, illuminating him better.

"No."

The prisoner slumped down in defeat. Alanduin heard the quill scribbling on the scroll. The magister walked to the next cell.

"No."
"No."
"Yes."
"No."
"Yes."

Eventually, the magister reached Alanduin. The magister pointed his staff towards him.

"Maybe."

Maybe what? What was this illness? Did he have a cure? Questions raced in Alanduin's mind. The Magister spoke a few words and the scroll rolled itself up, hovering slowly to his hand.

"This, this and.. this. Arrange for their transport."

The Magister handed the scroll to the jailor. The bottle of ink hovered down to his desk and the quill lowered itself down to the jailor's hand. The jailor dipped the tip into the ink and signed the scroll. He folded the scroll and dipped a small amount of wax to the seam. The Magister flattened the wax with his ring, completing the seal. It was done. Alanduin felt optimism take over him. Perhaps this day would end well.

This time the guards were as courteous as expected from the Royal Guard. A carriage, drawn by one of the purebred hawkstriders waited outside. The Magister slowly lifted himself from the ground and sat on the front seat. The three climbed on. The Magister spoke a few words and the bird pulled the carriage into motion. This time there was no guard to stop Alanduin from looking around. The citadel looked mostly the same as before, but he did not remember seeing the large green gemstones before. As they passed the eastern gate, he noticed that his cart was no longer there. The bird steered the carriage along the western road.

"Citizen Windwalker, your donation to the Silvermoon Reconstruction Fund was most appreciated.", the Magister spoke as he turned towards Alanduin.
"Oh, the contents of my cart? Anything to serve, but.. what reconstruction?"
"You'll see shortly. I understood you have been away from the capital for a while?"
"Yes, but.."
"A very wise decision in retrospect. Look."

Alanduin could not believe his eyes. A long strip of the woods had been.. burned or something, and the land was as black and sickly. The black path ended on a collapsed piece of the outer wall, an another incredible sight. Never before had an enemy reached the capital itself, let alone breach the walls themselves.

"It is called the Dead Scar. It was a memento from the thrice-cursed human prince."
"There was a war against the humans?"
"And not just any war. Look to the left."

Undead? Here?

"But how.."
"They are called the Scourge. All will be explained soon."

Questions filled Alanduin's mind again. The orcs had used the foul arts of necromancy before, but humans as well?

The western gate slowly moved into view, and the bird pulled the cart towards it. As they entered the western gate, the magister spoke up again.

"Not all of the destruction was caused by the war. Prince Arthas' goal was our beloved Sunwell, and his foul deeds had reprecussions beyond our anticipations. The loss was devastating in more ways than one. Not all of our people could stand it. You too felt the loss, but simply couldn't know what caused it. Too many were simply driven mad."

The ruins around the road underscored the magister's words with great effect. Broken sentries still patrolled the other roads, and Alanduin saw a couple of these.. Wretched fighting over a single orb of mana. The smaller one yanked the orb towards him. The taller lunged forward and grabbed the other's throat. They lost their balance and tumbled down the small incline together. The taller ended up on the top, but did not release his grip. Alanduin had to look away.

"Will that happen to me as well?"
"Hopefully not. That would mean that I was wrong about you. Do you have the will to resist?"
"I had sworn to never raise my hand against the High Home. That oath binds me now stronger than before."
"Good. We're almost there."

The carriage passed through the northwestern gate, towards the Sunstrider Isle.

"On the hour of our greatest need, His Majesty Prince Kael'thas Sunstrider sent Grand Magister Rommath back to us, armed with power, hope and knowledge to sate our hunger and to
rebuild our city. And here, on his royal estate, you three will learn how to sate your hunger and regain your strength and pride.

The bird slowed down and finally stopped. Armed with more questions than answers, Alanduin climbed off and walked towards the main building.

Finally, a canonical source for Warcraft 2

WoW Insider reports that Warcraft 2 is being turned into a novel. While the events are familiar to many Warcraft fans via the games themselves, there was always a slight problem when using the games as a lore source.

Unlike in Starcraft and Warcraft 3, the human and orc campaigns in both Warcraft 1 and 2 not only intersect, they sometimes directly contradict each other. For example, the orc campaign in Warcraft 2 ends with the Horde sieging Lordaeron and killing King Terenas Menethil II long before his son could even lift a sword. Of course, the canonical ending for the Second War was the Alliance one, where Anduin Lothar is slain at the base of Blackrock Mountain and Turalyon leads the troops to victory.

Turning the events into a novel brings needed consistency to a phase in the history of Azeroth that direly needed it.

Now, if someone would just turn it into an e-book..

The Final Twilight

Physically Shalkis stood on top of Oshu'gun, but her thoughts wandered elsewhere. In her mind, she was on a verdant hilltop in a faraway land, looking towards the sunrise and the city just beneath it. The majestic golden eagles atop the spires glittered in the morning light. A city of crimson and gold. Barely visible between the buildings, small figures scurried along the narrow streets.

The sound of approaching wyverns interrupted her thoughts. The sun was blocked by shapes of two wyverns. The beasts landed gently on the smooth crystal and let their riders dismount. A hooded figure accompanied by a bulky tauren.

"Infidel."

"Voidcaller."

Shalkis told the hooded figure of Oshu'gun, of the unwilling pilgrims and the being who called them. In turn, he told Shalkis of his master and his goals. With the formalities out of the way, it was time to make the proposal. The hooded figure pondered it for a while, but eventually seemed to agree. But then his tone changed from merely brooding to adamant. He turned to his companion and spoke a few words. The tauren was enthusiastic to obey. He took a few steps and then broke into a stride. With a smile on his face, he fell. Something resembling a grin appeared on the hooded figure's face. Hers was hidden behind a veil. The figure called for his wyvern, climbed on top of it and rode away.

Shalkis' thoughts returned to the hilltop. Morning had turned into day, and day into evening. The spires bathed in the colors of a setting sun. The figures stopped, as if they had heard something. Shalkis knew what it was. They turned towards the center of the city and started walking. She let her gaze wander away from the city. Groups of people had started to emerge from the settlements surrounding the capital. It had started. They all slowly moved towards the city. She felt the urge to join them. But.. not yet. Under her veil, she smiled. It would indeed be glorious.

Fun with Spellsteal

Fun with Spellsteal,
originally uploaded by Shalkis.

An observant mage can have a life-altering experience with Spellsteal.

No questable netherdrakes yet

Apparently the Netherdrake questline is indeed incomplete. Drysc confirmed this, so the Arena will be the only way to get a Netherdrake until the next content patch.

The Incredible Shrinking World

Tobold has noticed that the effective size of the world has gone down. Because many high-level characters have little or no reason to go back to Azeroth, the old continents seem quite deserted. This is not a new phenomenon per se.

I started my current character on a brand-new server, so most of the time I spent the time with the majority of the population in the same zones. When a server matures, the majority of the population flocks to the high-level zones and capitals, which leaves the mid-level zones relatively empty. When the server matures further, the outside world quiets down when the majority spends their evenings in instances. The same thing is now happening with Outland.

However, there is one significant difference between the level distribution of Azeroth zones and Outland zones. On Azeroth, the high-level zones are spread all around the world. Silithus and Winterspring. Eastern Plaguelands and Burning Steppes. In addition, the low-level zones were always close to the capital cities, where high-level players spent their idle time. This meant that high-level players had to travel across several mid-level and low-level zones to reach the high-level zones. On Outland, all of the zones qualify as high-level zones, and they are right next to each other. Shattrath, the new de facto capital is there as well. A high-level player has little reason to go back to low-level zones, even to just pass through. While the theoretical land mass of the game has increased, less of it is put into use. For a high-level player, the World of Warcraft is practically composed of only Outland.

This is an another example of "lost content". Blizzard is in essence depreciating their own game, piece by piece. I gladly admit that the new zones and capitals are indeed much better than the old ones and there's lots of things you can do in them. However, there is a danger that Blizzard is setting itself up for a vicious circle. If the amount of content that interests the majority of players keeps getting smaller and smaller every expansion, there will be more and more pressure on Blizzard to keep making new content at a faster pace. They can't keep building new stuff faster than the old keeps crumbling from under them. Content is always consumed faster than it's created.

To prevent the vicious circle Blizzard needs to ensure that old content stays relevant even when the game world is expanded with new continents (Northrend, South Seas) or entire worlds (the Eredar homeworld Argus). One way to do this is to update old content while you keep making new. Opening Caverns of Time and Karazhan is a start, but there's still a lot of unfinished business back on Azeroth. Enabling heroic mode for old dungeons could help a bit. Filling out unused zones in Azeroth would be better. I hope I'll someday be able to see what lies east of Badlands, sail to Zandalar Isle or discover whether an Old God really sleeps in Tirisfal..