New Cataclysm Bucket List

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About six weeks ago I posted my cata bucket list. I also included my general warcraft bucket list under the ‘one day but not today’ heading. As those were very general and all encompassing goals which will take a long time, if ever, to complete. However, I’ve finished my cata bucket list which has made me wonder “what now?”. With no indication of when Mists is likely to be released I’m facing, at the minimum, a couple of months until then. So it’s time for a new bucket list, or an expanded one anyway.

Hopefully in two months time I won’t be having to post another bucket list, as Mists will soon be on the horizon.

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Gear: What is it good for?

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The Grumpy Elf wrote a post the other day Is Gear the Great Motivator? which really got me thinking. I’d had a conversation the night before with a friend, guildie and often fellow raider. He was saying that if Mists wasn’t released soon then he’d quit the game and wouldn’t come back. He said there was nothing to do, that all he was interested in was kitting out his character in the best gear he could, that the only better gear he could get was from heroic raids which he didn’t have the opportunity to run, so he was done.

People play for different reasons, this guy plays for gear, I personally can’t do that. I think that there’s a lot left to do in the game but he said he wasn’t interested in any of the content I listed. He’s all about the gear and once he’s got it (or as much as he’s able) then he’s completed the game until they bring out another tier of content.

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A Single World: Good or Bad?

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This is Blog Azeroth’s shared topic for this week and the first shared topic I’ve participated in. Technology has moved on a lot since Warcraft’s debut in 2004. Realms or servers were necessary then as there wasn’t another way to handle the population, or if there was it wasn’t a feasible option back then.

It’s something that I don’t really appreciate most of the time. I was 14 in 2004 and so it seems like only a couple of years ago to me, it was high school and that’s very recent, but it’s not. 2004 was eight years ago, nearly a decade, and in technology terms that might as well be hundred years with how fast things advance now. Did I even have broadband in 2004? I don’t remember as it seems impossible that I haven’t always had it.

So if it isn’t technology that is holding back the single world what is?

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Beauty of the World

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When they announced that you couldn’t fly in Pandaria until level 90 I wasn’t best pleased. I remembered how annoying it was in Outland when you had to wait until 60. Even on my very first character, who had never flown before, I was counting down the bubbles until I could fly. I have a loathing for Hellfire that is quite unreasonable. However, that attitude is completely unreasonable. I am thoroughly disgusted with myself for it. No flying is the best decision they could have made.

I wrote a post the other day about Warcraft and difficulty. I think some of the same arguments apply to flying and the ease it represents. I didn’t say this in that post but sometimes we can’t and shouldn’t have what we want. Some people think that should apply to raiding in that it’s ok if most people can’t raid as it’ll just inspire them to get better. I don’t agree with that, as I think that people are how they are, and they shouldn’t be forced to be something else just to get to play the game. Raiding should be accessible to a certain extent, much like it is already but people just need to change how they view it. Let the elite 1% or whatever batter down hard modes when they’re current. Let the rest of us mere mortals kill normal if we want to group up with a guild and work towards that goal. Let everyone else kill it on raid finder to see the conclusion of the story who don’t have the time or the inclination to be able to join a regularly scheduled group. Let everyone be happy with the level that they play and accept that even if they strive for more that it might be out of reach. I’ll never clear hard mode when it’s current as I don’t play like that and I don’t want too.

This applies to flying in a way. We wanted flying and we got it but did we know what we got? Did we realise what we gave up for it? I love flying and I never want to see it go. However, I’m not convinced that I always like it for the right reasons. I also think that we have the best of both worlds by restricting flying to level cap.

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Warcraft and difficulty

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This is an endless debate and the problem is no-one is wrong and no-one is right. It’s about how you feel and no-one can, or should, tell you that what you feel is wrong. If you think the game is too hard then it’s true, if you think it’s too easy then that’s also true. Whatever, someone thinks is their own personal truth. It also doesn’t matter why they think that, after all people’s views are usually shaped by circumstance and experience. The problem is some people are very vocal and this is a debate that the community as a whole is quite passionate about. It’s easy to feel ‘got at’ if you don’t agree with the game is so easy people, it’s easy to feel disgruntled and like no-one cares if you do think it’s easy. Everybody is right and everybody is wrong and that’s the true problem.

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Cata to Mists Beta – Initial Class Impressions (Part One)

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I mentioned in the previous post “What are you playing in Mists?” about the changes in classes between expansions. I have one of every class on live, not all at max level, but I have a feeling for how most of them play. I haven’t played all specs of course therefore not all of these will mention differences. If I’ve not played it on live I won’t know what the differences are. However, some classes have changed a lot so even though I loathe them on live they look like they could be a firm favourite in Mists.

It’s all about how they feel and I say how they feel because I’m not one of the super smart theory crafters. I don’t know whether changes are good or bad in terms of the numbers, I just know how the class feels to play. So this is about how I think the classes feel. Might be light on details, this is not a class guide for Mists, this is just a what I like and what I don’t I guess. I’m not including the healing specs as unless you level by dungeons they don’t come into play until the end game. Even if you do level using dungeons most people quest a little which requires an offensive spec, that’s what I’m covering here.

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Why I quit swtor

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It wasn’t so long ago that I wrote a post explaining why I was still subscribed to swtor even though I wasn’t playing that much. I meant every word that I wrote and the only thing that has changed has been time. I realised that I couldn’t justify paying a subscription to something that I wasn’t playing at all.

Swtor was a ton of fun, it really was, however it was an mmorpg. The mechanics and everything were just too similar to warcraft. When I was burned out of warcraft I didn’t want to play swtor either, when I wasn’t I was back to playing warcraft. Part of what kept me playing warcraft was my friends, playing swtor was a lonely business. Another part of it was concrete goals. I’ve been playing warcraft for nearly two and a half years now and I have a list of what I’d like to accomplish, I actually posted about that the other week. It also just feels like there’s more to do in warcraft. I know that the comparison isn’t fair as warcraft’s been out eight years and has had three expansion packs. If it’s any consolation swtor’s graphics are better. With swtor I was levelling from the beginning and there’s only so much questing I can do before the novelty of the voice acting wears off.

Anyway, I cancelled my subscription today and made the modifications to this blog turning it just into a warcraft blog. I will, of course, blog about other games occasionally, but the main focus is no longer split. I had high hopes for swtor but at the end of the day it just couldn’t hold my attention. There wasn’t enough hours in the day to play them both and without the social connection swtor was always going to lose.

What are you playing in Mists?

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It’s funny how things change over time. When I first started playing (January 30th 2010) I rolled a mage, as the friend who introduced me to the game played one and if he played it then it must be the best. I didn’t do much with them in wrath but I did eventually roll a couple of alts: Vladamir a warrior who I decided would be my tank, Alverez a paladin who would be my healer and Zoya a rogue who I’d play if I wanted to pvp. Now two and a half years later things are very different. All three of them have different names, I’ve levelled but loathe the warrior and rogue, and my paladin spends more time as a tank than a healer. If that can happen over the course of one expansion, what will happen in the next?

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Franchise Games and Laziness

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I’m a big fan of certain TV shows – even my wardrobe reflects this. I’m currently writing this wearing a t-shirt with NCIS stamped across it, the sweater I was wearing earlier read “he’s standing right behind me, isn’t he?” which is a quote from the same show. I love NCIS, and CSI and quite a few more TV programs. I’m highlighting these two in particular as they have been made into computer games. Now, obviously as this is a gaming blog I quite like playing games. Therefore combining two of my favourite things together is always going to be a winner unless the games are awful which unfortunately they are.

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