Blue Stew: 9/2/09
Posted by 
Amatera on Wednesday, September 2, 2009 - 7 Comments Tags: Death Knight, Hunter, crimson whelp, elitist jerks, forums, ghostcrawler, guild housing, pet, thundgot, wryxian, xzibit
Amatera on Wednesday, September 2, 2009 - 7 Comments Tags: Death Knight, Hunter, crimson whelp, elitist jerks, forums, ghostcrawler, guild housing, pet, thundgot, wryxian, xzibit
Blue Stew is a new daily column bringing you a delicious concoction of developer news, thoughts, and opinions straight from the boiling pot that is the official World of Warcraft forums. The highlights of each day include additional commentary by Project Lore staff.
It's Day 4, and somehow I'm still truckin'. All of this info-gathering business can really take it out of a guy, but I've still got some juicy tidbits for my loyal readers! Without a doubt, the biggest piece of Official World of Warcraft Forum-related news today is the opening of the Cataclysm section. There's not much to be found there yet, but it's sure to be the place to go for developer thoughts on the next expansion in the near future. I think I'm going to shake up the format a little bit today, if that's alright with you folks. Don't worry, I'll keep all the commentary and silly non-sequiturs intact. I just think it might be a tad more readable if I stay away from the bullet points. Paragraph breaks are a good thing, trust me!
Guild Advancement Suggestion
Quintas wants a Ferrari that brews coffee for you and irons your clothes on the way to work. Outside of some Xzibit-brand charity, she's going to have a hard time making that happen (and she'd probably have to actually own one of those zippy, Italian roadsters in the first place). Likewise, she wonders why we can't have our own Guild Houses that do everything for us, defeating the need to ever visit the outside world again! As WoW players, don't we already have that problem? Amongst her proposed "enhancements" is an Artisan system that attracts specialist NPCs to your guild, supplying them with unique patterns and schematics.
Yo, yo, yo! It's yo' boy, Xzibit, here teamin' up with West Fall Customs to bring you the tightest rides this side of the Thandol Span!
Like most "good ideas," though, it quickly spirals out of control, and soon enough you're running back and forth around the world collecting materials, doing dailies, and trying your best to woo this demanding NPC for what amounts to very little in return.
I'm sure Blizzard isn't short on good ideas, it's more a matter of whether or not they're worth executing, something that I think Qunitas forgot to consider while in the midst of her illustrious proposal. I highlighted this post to once again address the issue of Guild Housing: it's just too much of a hassle. If you ask me, Blizzard's got the right idea. They're implementing most of the features people have always asked for, but they're doing it through the UI, instead of spending resources on constructing virtual domiciles. Think of it this way: why go through the trouble of having to meet up in a Guild Hall every time you want to do something when all of your normal business can be conducted through Guild Chat?
Player housing is great when you can implement it from the ground up, and when you have the opportunity to incorporate it into PvP play (sacking fortresses and whatnot), but it's not worth shoe-horning into the game for purely cosmetic purposes. Will we ever see it in WoW? Maybe. Blizzard always used to rebuff the idea of changing Azeroth and, well, look where we are now. I just wouldn't expect it anytime soon when there are clearly so many more interesting things for the development team to work on.
My Tiny Crimson Whelp Story
Judging by the thread title, Velliana either writes articles for Highlights or has seen one too many episodes of Taxicab Confessions. I'm not sure what a "Tiny Crimson Whelp" might entail in the world of prostitution, but I bet you could find out for a couple Benjamins. The (admittedly short) story details her jaunt into Grim Batol, and the epic, emotional struggle she underwent wondering whether or not it would be worth killing a whelp for the mere chance of a drop! You'll have to click through to the thread for the shocking conclusion!
What I found most interesting about this post is that it attracted more attention from the Community Management team than even the worst nerf complaint thread. Not one, not two, but three chose to respond, each detailing their own attempts at collecting all of Azeroth's tiny whelps. Thundgot had an especially tough time. It took him over an estimated 5000 kills to lock down all four. Thankfully, he made some extra gold along the way, but it just goes to show you that even Blizzard employees don't get everything handed to them on a silver platter.
I don't have any of the whelps myself (I've barely even tried), but how about the rest of you? Were you as lucky as Miss Velliana here or was it a much more laborious and frustrating experience?
Elitist Jerks Closes Thread on Unholy DK
Ghostcrawler's been on the warpath today, dealing primarily with massive amounts of Hunter QQ. But that's not all! The Death Knights are itching to have their say, too. Now, I'm always a little wary of people who obsess over min-maxing their characters, but I can't deny that Elitist Jerks is one of the best sites to look at if you really want to understand how to play your class (that is, if you can sort through the long threads and gobs of esoteric information). Why Skaven is whining to Blizzard about something someone else decided to do on another forum, I don't know, but he sure is upset about them closing one of his favorite threads.
GC reminds us of why he likes Elitist Jerks so much. They conduct the kinds of conversations he likes to see: "One of the things I personally appreciate about the EJ forums is they tend to focus on what is, not in their opinions on what should be. That tends to lead to discussions based on facts and not opinions. Their Unholy DK threads focus on how to maximize dps as Unholy not on petitioning Blizzard to buff Scourge Strike."
The way I understand Skaven's complaint is that changes made to Unholy spec now favor one skill over another similar skill. Now we all know that sometimes even small modifications to a class can have a greater impact on the way they work in practice. But, as Ghostcrawler points out, he and so many others, like to complain because their class no longer fits the idea of what they think it should be. In other words, he's freaking out over having to re-learn the ins-and-outs of his Unholy Death Knight, even when the change itself is miniscule. This may seem like pointing out the obvious, but it's clear that there are many people out there who have yet to learn that crying on the forums isn't going to help or change anything.
I think that about wraps it up for this edition. Please chime in with your thoughts on all of these topics below, and let me know if you prefer this format over the other one!
It's Day 4, and somehow I'm still truckin'. All of this info-gathering business can really take it out of a guy, but I've still got some juicy tidbits for my loyal readers! Without a doubt, the biggest piece of Official World of Warcraft Forum-related news today is the opening of the Cataclysm section. There's not much to be found there yet, but it's sure to be the place to go for developer thoughts on the next expansion in the near future. I think I'm going to shake up the format a little bit today, if that's alright with you folks. Don't worry, I'll keep all the commentary and silly non-sequiturs intact. I just think it might be a tad more readable if I stay away from the bullet points. Paragraph breaks are a good thing, trust me!
Guild Advancement Suggestion
Quintas wants a Ferrari that brews coffee for you and irons your clothes on the way to work. Outside of some Xzibit-brand charity, she's going to have a hard time making that happen (and she'd probably have to actually own one of those zippy, Italian roadsters in the first place). Likewise, she wonders why we can't have our own Guild Houses that do everything for us, defeating the need to ever visit the outside world again! As WoW players, don't we already have that problem? Amongst her proposed "enhancements" is an Artisan system that attracts specialist NPCs to your guild, supplying them with unique patterns and schematics.
Yo, yo, yo! It's yo' boy, Xzibit, here teamin' up with West Fall Customs to bring you the tightest rides this side of the Thandol Span!Like most "good ideas," though, it quickly spirals out of control, and soon enough you're running back and forth around the world collecting materials, doing dailies, and trying your best to woo this demanding NPC for what amounts to very little in return.
I'm sure Blizzard isn't short on good ideas, it's more a matter of whether or not they're worth executing, something that I think Qunitas forgot to consider while in the midst of her illustrious proposal. I highlighted this post to once again address the issue of Guild Housing: it's just too much of a hassle. If you ask me, Blizzard's got the right idea. They're implementing most of the features people have always asked for, but they're doing it through the UI, instead of spending resources on constructing virtual domiciles. Think of it this way: why go through the trouble of having to meet up in a Guild Hall every time you want to do something when all of your normal business can be conducted through Guild Chat?
Player housing is great when you can implement it from the ground up, and when you have the opportunity to incorporate it into PvP play (sacking fortresses and whatnot), but it's not worth shoe-horning into the game for purely cosmetic purposes. Will we ever see it in WoW? Maybe. Blizzard always used to rebuff the idea of changing Azeroth and, well, look where we are now. I just wouldn't expect it anytime soon when there are clearly so many more interesting things for the development team to work on.
My Tiny Crimson Whelp Story
Judging by the thread title, Velliana either writes articles for Highlights or has seen one too many episodes of Taxicab Confessions. I'm not sure what a "Tiny Crimson Whelp" might entail in the world of prostitution, but I bet you could find out for a couple Benjamins. The (admittedly short) story details her jaunt into Grim Batol, and the epic, emotional struggle she underwent wondering whether or not it would be worth killing a whelp for the mere chance of a drop! You'll have to click through to the thread for the shocking conclusion!
What I found most interesting about this post is that it attracted more attention from the Community Management team than even the worst nerf complaint thread. Not one, not two, but three chose to respond, each detailing their own attempts at collecting all of Azeroth's tiny whelps. Thundgot had an especially tough time. It took him over an estimated 5000 kills to lock down all four. Thankfully, he made some extra gold along the way, but it just goes to show you that even Blizzard employees don't get everything handed to them on a silver platter.
I don't have any of the whelps myself (I've barely even tried), but how about the rest of you? Were you as lucky as Miss Velliana here or was it a much more laborious and frustrating experience?
Elitist Jerks Closes Thread on Unholy DK
Ghostcrawler's been on the warpath today, dealing primarily with massive amounts of Hunter QQ. But that's not all! The Death Knights are itching to have their say, too. Now, I'm always a little wary of people who obsess over min-maxing their characters, but I can't deny that Elitist Jerks is one of the best sites to look at if you really want to understand how to play your class (that is, if you can sort through the long threads and gobs of esoteric information). Why Skaven is whining to Blizzard about something someone else decided to do on another forum, I don't know, but he sure is upset about them closing one of his favorite threads.
GC reminds us of why he likes Elitist Jerks so much. They conduct the kinds of conversations he likes to see: "One of the things I personally appreciate about the EJ forums is they tend to focus on what is, not in their opinions on what should be. That tends to lead to discussions based on facts and not opinions. Their Unholy DK threads focus on how to maximize dps as Unholy not on petitioning Blizzard to buff Scourge Strike."
The way I understand Skaven's complaint is that changes made to Unholy spec now favor one skill over another similar skill. Now we all know that sometimes even small modifications to a class can have a greater impact on the way they work in practice. But, as Ghostcrawler points out, he and so many others, like to complain because their class no longer fits the idea of what they think it should be. In other words, he's freaking out over having to re-learn the ins-and-outs of his Unholy Death Knight, even when the change itself is miniscule. This may seem like pointing out the obvious, but it's clear that there are many people out there who have yet to learn that crying on the forums isn't going to help or change anything.
I think that about wraps it up for this edition. Please chime in with your thoughts on all of these topics below, and let me know if you prefer this format over the other one!
Reader Comments (7)
I couldn't care less about mini pets I have 1 a Baby Blizzard Bear and I probably won't get another until some other free pet gets given or sent to me. As for this STUPID S-T-U-P-I-D Deathknight and Hunter QQ get over it, Hunters own end of, they are one of the most fun challenging dps classes I've played and are completely pro, dunno about this dps business but my friend pulls 3.5k dps with tier 7.5 so I don't know, never heard him QQ. As for Deathknights, who ever has abandoned there 60-70+ main to roll one and made it their main are lame, you all know who you are roll a real class instead of your "corrupted paladin" who are so OP it's a joke nerf them so all they can do is auto attack ffs, leave them to the NPC's.
I have to admit changing too many things, including the things fore-mentioned could have a bad impact. Player housing would be stupid and a waste of time. How about blizzard just go back to making crazy, new, wacky tier/season gear models rather than reusing what has already been out. If anything should be brought back it should be world PvP and all Azeroth and Outland instances and raids have a Heroic Dungeon mode for the current level cap.
I know some people feel that it wouldn't fit in with lore ect ect. but lets face it. WotLK failed in terms of instances and annoying fixes and retorical modelled spikey shoulders and PvP gear, what good came out of it was basically features and some decent mechanics on certain bosses. So why not bring back old content to fit the current level cap, I think Alex and Jeff are going to be right, when blizzard see how many people go back to those instances they will think about it...
@General
Like the new format, seems to give more insight.
@Leegion
I agree that DKs are unbalanced, but they're also a unique and well-crafted play style, like any other class. Don't bash em all just because they happen to be the easiest noob class.
i came into WoW with only a couple of months left in BC. in that time i managed to lvl a prot warrior to 51. and that's where i was when WotLK dropped. i found a warrior to be very frustrating, and not as much fun as i thought it would be. i had no alts at the time, because, although i wasn't happy with warrior, i had invested far to much time to start over at lvl 1, so when my warrior hit 55 (about 3 days after LK came out) i rolled a DK. i found their play style to be much more enjoyable. while i agree that someone who played a different class since vanilla and had t6 in BC should not abandon that toon for a DK, for someone like me it made perfect sense. i have dealt with the QQers from other classes about being OP, and i have seen my DK get nerfed in every single patch so far (seems like we are the new mage) and while i find that they do lend themselves to n00b button mashing better than some classes, i also have noticed that just like any other class, to play them to their maximum potential, it does take skill and time to learn the nuances of the different raid rotations. before i even had t7 gear, i could out dps fellow DKs in full t 7.5, and continue that trend now that i have pieces of ulduar and ToC gear. it's a shame that people jump ship so easily, and i am sure we will see it again when worgen and goblins become available. i consider myself a DK through and through, and he is still my only 80. (that warrior is still way back at 57) the changes they have made to DK for balancing sake are fine with me. i will adjust and continue pwning elite mobs (even if it is with less AoE) :)
Hunters qq sounds right i played a hunter and recently took a break from the game and equipped with mostly items that are lvl 226...i noticed certian hybrid classes out dpsin me like shadow priest, shamans,and death knights...Hunters and mages are maybe the most balanced classes in the game its prolly why no real big changes happens to these classes. If we all remeber a really geared warlock and rogue at the beginning of lich king was maybe the worse dps in the game... But seriously a true dps class like rogues hunters warlock and mages should ALWAYS be the tops for dps in any raid providing they are specced ,gemmed, enchanted properly and hit capped . My reason for why those classes should be top dps is simple we cannot heal and we cannot tank!
@Scorp
Im with you all the way there. I may not have the best gear or the correct gems and whatnot, but I still do better dps on my ffb mage than most people in my guild(before i went broke that is) and they were 25man naxx geared and i only have a few from naxx-10 and i think that is the way it should be because as Scorp said " we cannot heal and we cannot tank!"
I think the problem with most QQing DKs now is they miss the days where they could face roll their keyboards and come top of dps. Or better yet as tanks smash their faces repeatedly into the keyboard and garner so much aggro it would take God's own crowbar to get the mob off them.
The real DKs are those that suck it up, roll with the changes and still come out top of the dps charts. Tanking wise my bf now finds it only takes a little bit less of an effort to get a mob off one, maybe not needing god's own crowbar but still a Ragnaros sized dollop of aggro.
As for pure dps classes, I'm happy with the way things are now. The top dpsers in our guild are the rogues and the mages (we have no active hunters or warlocks) with only the our DK, ele shaman and myself as shadow priest occasionally out DPsing them only because we have better gear.
@leegion WTF are you talking about dks being op. they have not been op ever. the only reason you think they are op is cause you are a baddie and get raped by them in arena....go QQ somewhere else noob