Leafshine: Lust for Flower

Thank Elune That's Over

I really, really wanted to like the Molten Front stuff, I really did.

Parts of it were great. I liked the silly Mylune quests in Hyjal, and the random NPCs in Setheria's Roost. I quite enjojed peak-hopping via spider's webs. But the whole Druids of the Talon area is just damn painful (I've only once got through the intro escort without dying on the way), and the much-vaunted random quest mechanism just didn't have enough variety in it. I made a big mistake by opening that up before the Shadow Wardens stuff, which was much more fun. 

In the end, there was far too many "kill x of y" and not enough interested and innovative mechanics. The "rune dash" area and "bird collection" quests were the only ones that struck me as noticably new in feel and tone.

I admired the concept, and struggled through the execution.

Finally, I opened up the last vendors and grabbed the ring I needed to push me to iLevel 359 in my healing kit. The screenshot above seems to have captured the Ancient in mid-Phase…

You?

The Invisible War Against The Nightmare

I've just finished reading the pre-Cataclysm novel, The Shattering. And, on the whole, I enjoyed it. In fact, I'll go into what I thought of it in depth in another post. But first, I want to take a little time to rant, because there's something in it that annoys me beyond all reason. It's not the fault of the book or Christine Golden, its author, in any way. In fact, its roots lie in the previous book, Stormrage.

I bought and read Stormrage. I didn't enjoy it a huge amount, as I'm one of those people who just can't warm to Richard Knaak's writing style. His prose is just too over-worked for my tastes, and his characters feel like plot ciphers rather than real people. YMM, of course, V. But I enjoyed seeing what's happening with the druids, and getting a feel for the druid-y world in Cataclysm. And that's all cool.

The thing that annoyed me, though, was a single event that dominates the last part of the book, and which is referred back to in The Shattering: The War Against The Nightmare. Now, I don't want to go all spoilertastic here, but suffice it to say that this is a major event, whose effects are felt throughout Azeroth during the days it happens. The denizens of the world cannot miss its occurrence: everyone is affected.

Unless, of course, they're a World of Warcraft player character.

For, as far as I can tell, this major lore event, which tidies up many dangling plotlines we've been exploring since vanilla, is not going to be reflected at all in-game. The War Against The Nightmare will only happen in the book. Here's the thing: I don't mind them doing some elements of plot "off-screen". Personal events, like the return of Varian Wyrnn and the handing over of power from Thrall to Garrosh make more sense in books or comics. As long as you can get the basic story somewhere within the game, all is good. The spin-off media became an enhancement to your game experience. But to have an entire event, an invasion of sorts, happen to everyone but the players? That just sucks, in my humble opinion. That's shifting the balance far too far away from the primary medium - the game - to the spin-offs. If the events had been small and personal - Tyrande and others rescuing Malfurion and defeating the Nightmare, fine. I can deal with such events happening where Leafshine is not. But this is explicitly set up as a major world event. Which doesn't happen in the World of Warcraft. Madness.

Now, I could be ranting prematurely. These events may crop up in the weeks prior to The Cataclysm. But it doesn't feel like that's the case, from the hints from the beta of 4.0x. And that's a shoddy way to treat your players.

I Won't Miss Weapon Skill

So, I spend about half an hour griding that last point of Maces weapon skill and what happens? My bloomin' Achievement-grabbing screenshot addon messes up:

Still, Master of Arms is mine, and well before it becomes a Feat of Strength, which is a relief, and one to cross off my pre-Cataclysm list. Hurrah.

However, it did remind me just how annoying weapon skill can be. For instance, my baby Pally Tank Ularia is going through her regular pre-expansion levelling burst, and I just equipped her with a Battleworn Thrash Blade, ready to do some random dungeons to learn tanking and push her towards Outlands.

The thing is - I'd never bothered learning any Sword skill on her. Cue 20 minutes of hitting somewhat easy mobs until I can actually use the sword with something like effectiveness. And I really don't see what that time added to anything. 

Sure, it's a time sink, but a dull and annoying one, and one that limits the potential diversity of weapon use. It was a trivial, annoying mechanic, and I'm please the Cataclysm is sweeping it away. 

RealID, Social Theory and Blizzard's Community Problems

So, rather late in the day, it's time for me to weigh in on the biggest issue that came up while I was away:

Wow. Russia has incompetent but very sexy spies. This makes me feel better about the world.  

The second biggest thing that happened while I was away was the whole kerfuffle about RealID as it applies to the forums. That's not something that can be as easily summed up in an image (although some have tried) but it's something I want to devote an unusually long post to, because I have a slightly different take on it to most, and because I've been devoting a lot of brain space to it in the last 48 hours. 

Two things you need to know:

1. My guild is composed entirely of real world friends. You have to be a "real world" friend of an existing member to get in. The majority of us are in our late 30s, or early 40s. There are exceptions - we have one foetus in his 20s, the cad - but generally, this is a direct effect of the way the guild is structured.
2. I've been working professionally in blogging for four years now, as those who heard my Twisted Nether interview will recall, and over the last year, my job role has expanded to take in community development. Some of the issues Blizzard is addressing - or is claiming to be addressing - are exactly the ones I'm looking at and planning for in my day job. 

With those disclosures made, let's plough on. 

RealID in-game

When the basics of RealID were announced, I was very happy. I was only ever going to add real world friends to it - those who know my e-mail address(es) anyway, and it would be a great way to keep in touch with them if they were playing on another server, on Horde-side or in another game. It's opt-in, so no problems. Great addition to the game. And, having played a little with it since it was implemented, I still think this part is a great idea. Part of me wishes that this was a service independent of Blizzard so it could be applies to other games, too, but I understand the commercial imperatives behind that not being the case. (Still, and open-sourced game status protocol that Blizz could hook RealID into would be kinda cool).

Don't They Know Who I Am?

Over four minutes for an Ahune queue? LONGER THAN AVERAGE? I'm a healer, dammit! We don't queue! 

Contact the healer's union. Someone is going to pay for this… 

Can't Play / Won't Play

Today, I'm annoyed.

I'm annoyed because I can't play WoW. Steamwheedle Cartel EU, the chunk of silicon in a blade farm I call home, is down for 24 hours in that pre-Cataclysmic maintenance thing. So I can't play.

The weird thing is: I probably wouldn't have played anyway. Of late, I've only really been playing on Mondays - our raid nights - and occasionally on weekends. But still, the knowledge that I couldn't play if I wanted to annoys me.

I am, it appears, a contrary tree. 

Update: Of course, as soon as I post this, an e-mail arrives from a guildie saying that it's back up...

Taking A Step Back From Hard Knocks

I've been quiet again.

Why?

I've been fighting an internal battle. 

Oh, sure, I've been distracted by christenings and elections, but the other thing on my mind this week has been WoW. And, more specifically, Achievements. And they've become a problem.

Somehow, somewhere along the way, Achievements have become a burden to me - especially the ones around the World Events. A set time limit to do a number of pretty complicated tasks? That's pressure, especially in a life where I only get a few free hours to play WoW every week.

Now, I'm not doing badly. I am all but two achievements away from Long, Strange Trip. One of them is to do with Children's Week. Yes, it's the 'orrible School of Hard Knocks. And it's actually stopped me logging in this week. I just didn't want to do it. I didn't want to feel obligated to do it. So I didn't. Children's Week ends tonight, and I don't care. I'm letting go of Achievements, and I'm letting go of WoW pressure. I really enjoy only two things in WoW: questing and doing dungeons or raids with my guild. 

I have come, in the last few weeks, very close to quitting WoW for good. I found myself feeling bad that I didn't have time to do the things that I was working on, and then steadily realising that I didn't want to do them. I'd been sucked in by the time sink spiral that makes MMoRPGs so compelling, chasing Achievemnets and emblems from daily randoms and all the rest of the distractions built into the game, and it was twisting my life around in ways that I didn't find comfortable. Instead, I've chosen to work on my photograph, or to spend time with my wife, family and friends. It feels good. And, maybe, tomorrow I'll do some dailies and some quests on one of my lower level toons. That'll be fun.

But WoW can't be a chore, because life has enough chores. It's a game, and games are fun. It's a pity I need to remind myself of that from time to time.

My Little Changing Everything Pony

This, I think, changes everything about buying mounts and pets in WoW:

Queue time of 4 hours. Nearly 60,000 people queuing. And that's just Europe.

I don't think anyone believes that the queues are because of Lil'XT. These are all about the Celestial Steed. 

Presuming that everyone ahead of me in the queue is just buying a pony - that's €1,169,640 before I buy mine. That means £1,027,159 or $1,584,043. That's a late evening queue, hours after the goods launched, in one of many stores.

Blizzard has made millions today, on a virtual item, that costs them virtually nothing to distribute.

This is not going to be a one off. They'll be coming back to this table for second, third and fourth helpings.

I think World of Warcraft has just changed forever.