Wednesday, June 17, 2009

World of Warcraft - Content Update 3.2 Preview

Major changes coming for mounts. Blizzard wants to decrease the travel timesink for new players to the game and to enable current players to upgrade their mounts faster!

Apprentice Riding REQUIRES LEVEL 20 (previously 30)
  • 60% land mount speed
  • Cost: 4 gold
  • Mount cost: 1 gold
  • Mail will be sent to players at level 20 instructing them to the riding trainer
Journeyman Riding REQUIRES LEVEL 40 (previously 60)
  • 100% land mount speed
  • Cost: 50 gold
  • Mount cost: 10 gold
  • Mail will be sent to players at level 40 instructing them back to the riding trainer
Expert Riding REQUIRES LEVEL 60 (previously 70)
  • 150% flying mount speed; 60% land mount speed
  • Cost: 600 gold (faction discounts now apply)
  • Mount Cost: 50 gold
  • Can now be learned in Honor Hold (Alliance) or Thrallmar (Horde)
Artisan Riding REQUIRES LVL 70
  • 280% flying mount speed; 100% land mount speed
  • Cost: 5,000 gold (faction discounts now apply)
  • Mount Cost: 100 gold
Coldwheather Flying to remain the same




New Argent quests and dailies. New rewards like mounts, an upgraded squire boy, and more heirloom items.

New Battle grounds.

Saturday, June 13, 2009

You are the First in Your MMO

The following is a response to conversations of a week prior. It addresses players who have achieved a goal and would like to move on to another goal, but instead self destruct.



It's 6pm here in Seattle. I sit down with a cup of coffee and begin my loading screen for World of Warcraft. My husband will be home soon and we shall sit down to run a heroic or two. Or so.. I think

Immediately as my cute human priest enters Azeroth, I begin to receive whispers in abundance from acquaintances or random players. Some of them are wanting to meet up or simply to chat. My guild can also be very chatty when people are online. Soon I'm sucked in to all the mindless banter and drama of the day. I begin to forget the reason I came online and what I wanted to accomplish.

There was a time when I was younger and could devout countless hours of time to any online video game and I raided often. Progression eventually lead me to a server uber guild. The kind of guild that was labeled "superstar" by the community. The kind of guild that game designers feared as we soughtto break their design.

I have responsibilities now, and am playing a different style of gaming. Now I suffer the pain of what I call "Guilds without Cause" The guilds with players that are new to Massively Online or simply play as they go. It has been a challenge for me because I have never lost the focused mindset approach. I know what armor I want and where to get it. I read information on my class and listen to the community outside of the offical forums. And I go after what I want.

I sit here confused with my head beginning to hurt. Sometimes I join in on the bantering. Someone doesn't like someone. Someone seems angry they didn't get an invite to a raid or heroic. People in the guild aren't logging in and it's the end of the world! "Will you come healz NAXX PLZ?"
In the midst of all the noise, clarity comes. I am always trying to analyze players and/or grouping of players. What makes THESE guys get this or do this? Why don't they have trouble in their raids. These were questions I already knew the answer to. After the following is established the work begins to fall into place.

"They know what they want"
"They go after it"
"They don't let others waste their time"

These three phrases echoed from a memory long past. I've made it my mission to convey this as a gospel to other new gamers. It is sacred and it applies to everything in a persons life

We all have goals. It's easy to lose track of what those goals are. Stumbling blocks will be placed ahead of you. I've met many players that have quit the games because of drama which caused a lack of desire. Don't let anyone keep you from your game. Recognize that people have goals and they might be different than yours. Different is neither a good, nor bad thing.. It's just Different.

Wednesday, June 10, 2009

Playing WoW AGAIN! NEW DISCOVERIES!!

So, we've decided to play World of Warcraft again. It's amazing to see how much World of Warcraft Wrath of the Lich King expansion is alot like Everquest 2. Since Blizzard began designing smaller raids and changing talents, it was easy to see that both were similar games on different time tables. Let's take a look at whats new:

Solo Content:
One thing that WoTLK implements very well is vehicle game play. A player can interact, fight with, and along side vehicles, animals, or sometimes giants and control their UI. I akin it to the old Coercer ability in EQ2, possession, before it was changed, but a hell of alot cooler.
Another thing that Blizzard does really good, is phasing. It's a form of instancing within a zone. It's almost like changing realities during game play. This allows Blizzard to be very creative and weave multilevel progression of storyline. As an immersion tool, I found it very entertaining.
Allowing all players to interact with the storyline and to see the focus of the expansion, Arthas is probably the most praising attribute about WoTLK. Through quests that phase, a player constructs zones relative to their point in the questline which also follows around the villain.

Grouping Content:

Gone are the painful faction grinds and access requirements from Burning Crusade. A player can choose to run non Heroics or otherwise Normal instances that begin at lvls 71-80. At level 80 a player can choose a talbert from the many factions from the solo quest series in various zones and recieve faction from any 80 zone be it normal or heroic. Because the loot is so much better in Heroic Modes of the dungeons, players often opt for these.
Heroic dungeons aren't overly difficult in Wrath of the Lich King. Many of these dungeons don't require certain classes for crowd control and players bringing two dps'n Death Knights shouldn't have trouble.
The end boss of each of the instances drops an epic item. Players will recieve 3-5 tokens from each of the bosses and can save them to purchase gear. The Vendor is shared by Heroic 5mans and release WoLK 10man raids. There are many items including tier 7 chest and gloves. Another cool introduction to WoLK are Heirloom items that bind to an account. By purchasing Heirloom items with tokens, a player is able ensure that his next twink is badass.

PvP:


PvPers can delight in a PvP zone with vehicles and utilize a vendor just like in the 5man Heroics. When either side wins the zone, the winners side can recieve Stonekeepers Shards which are awarded serverwide for killing any boss.

Raids:

To be continued..