Monthly Archives: April 2007

Blizzard to Alchemists: Retrain as Tailors

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Blizzard giveth and taketh away. The details of the upcoming World of Warcraft profession changes are available, but there’s not a lot of giveth, plenty of taketh: “Profession Notes for 2.1”. As you read through these at work, try not to groan alot or plead “God no. Please stop.” because that would just freak out the nongamers among us.

The fishing changes, however, seem nice.

So does this one: “Profession recipes that had 24 hour or longer cooldowns, have had their cooldowns reduced by 1 hour.” I’m going to consider that one an early Christmas present, it’s that good.

Karazhan Could Be Worse. It Could Be Raining.

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Shoju, level 70 warrior of the Dalaran World of Warcraft realm, is having some issues with Karazhan and his smaller raid guild. (Oh how I envy him his guild’s smaller size!) Anyways, he outlined the problem in this thread, “Trash should not be a pacing mechanism”:

Our guild is small. We are finally starting up Karazhan after spending our time doing as many quests as possible, and getting the most out of the 5 mans as possible, and are finding that our progress isnt hindered by gear, or even by our own play styles.

It is being hindered by 30 minute respawn timers because we are not allowed time to get in boss attemps. Now granted, some would say, give yourself the wipe prevention. Of course, a Soul Stone, a Shaman, or even a DI’ed priest would work wonders, and we do this of course. I mean, every good group would do this of course to give yourself a chance at a given boss.

…

In Karazhan, you wipe once, or twice, and you dont have your wipe prevention up, you all of the sudden are stuck at the beginning again, and all of the sudden, you are staring at respawns that you have already cleared out.

And several posters try to get more info to help him with his problem, and then Drysc, Blizzard minion, veers off-topic by discussing Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep trash and tuning, which Shoju’s guild will never see since the first two Karazhan bosses are bringing them to their knees, and there’s only so long that players will knock their heads against a brick wall before they think, “fuck this game”, and make good on that. But thanks for jumping in, D.

Two amusing responses: A link to a ytmnd file, The Black Temple Instance Map (hadn’t seen that before — it’s funny cuz it’s true. True, hence funny) and #19, responding to Drysc’s GOOD NEWS! about Serpentshrine and TK:

The dungeons three or four guilds in the world are more important than every other dungeon the 99% majority of other guilds are in.

Clumsy wording, but the message is clear. And true. And funny.

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Elrond as Afterlife Theorist

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LOTRO LardAs a World of Warcraft vacationer in Lord of the Rings Online, I got to thinking about the differences in the two worlds, especially with their use of humor. Seen here, one example of the subdued humor of LOTRO.

And by “subdued”, I mean there’s not a whole lot of it. WoW is stuffed full of clever wisecracks and pop culture references — LOTRO is a rather sober environment. They can’t very well have Madonna on their loading screen, can they? The Tolkien crowd, fans and The Estate alike, would sue.

I imagine that’s one of the challenges in creating an online world for a franchise you don’t own outright — remaining suitably respectful of a creator’s world. Blizzard is free to create a brothel inside Karazhan (that Maiden is no maiden, bytheway); Turbine has to maintain a certain reverence — the orgasming women in Bree, a notable exception.

Which you will want to check out before they patch it. Seriously. Bree-Town Jail, with the guardian and captain, etc. trainers inside. Stand around for a few minutes and listen — there’s a woman (or women) having sex in there. Some very good sex too, by the sounds of it.

It’s actually a quirk of the audio track for human female crits and dodges, but I like to call it home. Could be, once word gets around, the Bree-Town jail will have more players stuffed inside than Strider’s room.

So, even though I would think it hilarious to give Elrond the surname Hubbard and have him wander the streets of Rivendell muttering about a mysterious spaceship arriving at any moment to whisk the elves into the west, there’s probably more people who wouldn’t think that was funny at all.

They’d be wrong, of course.