Project Lore

PC peripheral maker Razer introduced a brand new mouse today called 'Naga' which is focused on MMOs (which coincidentally comes right before BlizzCon). Full disclosure, Project Lore has a video content partnership with the ZAM Network which is running a promotion along with Razer for this product.

Razer goes on to describe it:

The Razer Naga is the ultimate Massively Multiplayer Online Gaming mouse that shifts the balance between keyboard and mouse by putting an unprecedented number of in-game commands in one place. A multi-button thumb grid and Razer’s MMO game interface add-on combine to place every command you need in the palm of your hand. An ergonomic form shaped to maximize ease of use lets you game in comfort for hours on end. With the Razer Naga, you will Get Imba.

The Razer Naga, Razer's new MMO Mouse

As a fan of Razer's mice (I use the DeathAdder) I'm a little taken aback by this device. It seems extremely bulky and almost too big for it's own good.  Positively thinking though the keys look like they have a nice size especially at seventeen buttons. One of the features I have loved about Razer mice is their comfort. The DeathAdder fits perfectly in my hand and is not overly complicated with buttons (which this mouse won't be able to claim). Thankfully all the buttons are fully customizable via Razer software, although how it handles macros remains to be completely seen.

While this isn't the first MMO mouse (and not even one that has features specific to WoW) the Naga looks to cram as much as possible onto one device. The last MMO mouse (the WoW MMO Gaming Mouse from Steelseries) was met with mixed reviews, especially because of it's initial price at $99 (while this has come down a bit) and it's handling of macros. The price of the Naga is $79, which means consumers will need to be serious about picking this up.

Until we get our hands on it (which we should at BlizzCon this weekend) we can only speculate at this point. I'm being cautiously optimistic, but I generally like simplicity in my mice. Interestingly, they are marketing the mouse as "Be Imba" (be imbalanced) as if this mouse might give the player an unfair advantage over another because they're using this mouse.

What are your initial thoughts on the mouse? Will you consider picking one up? Are specialized mice necessary?

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My long-awaited vacation has finally arrived. And one of the top items on my priority list (although I'm sot sure yet whether it will happen) is playing more WoW and getting a feel for all the 3.1 patch changes. The only problem: I'm more than 800 miles from home and in a much different atmosphere than usual. Here, there's no permanent desk setup, which isn't a huge deal since I normally play on my laptop anyway. It's just a bit less comfortable playing from a hard, wood chair than in my much softer desk chair. But since I need my mouse accessible, I can't exactly sink into a couch. I wish I would have remembered to bring my lapdesk - that would have solved that issue beautifully. Thankfully, latency isn't much of an issue. The DSL here versus cable back home both have me hovering at about 200 ms. But I doubt we'd have enough bandwidth here to run two (or three) windows of WoW simultaneously. Needless to say, my escapades with dual-boxing have temporarily halted. I'm just glad I'm not staying with someone who still runs dialup! So it's not quite the same as back home, but I'm able to squeeze in a bit of WoW in between fun vacation-esque stuff. Enough to feed the addiction. For any of you all looking to leave town for spring break or whatever reason and still hope to get in some gaming on a laptop you can travel with, I recommend: find a comfortable spot - bring a lapdesk (do as I say, not as I do). Don't forget your mouse - touchpads are incredibly difficult to use in-game. And if you have anything like a Zboard that you can fit in your luggage, bring it along, too. Even if you can't fit your entire desktop, a keyboard doesn't take up a ton of space. Of course, if you CAN bring a more powerful desktop, that also would be nice. Though it may limit your options for a spot to play. And no matter what the case, remember: You're on vacation! Don't forget to run some RL quests for fun, too! So what's your WoW routine while on vacation - do you still find the time to squeeze in some playtime? And do you have any more tips to offer for those traveling?

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While browsing around the new Project Lore forums (you do know about the forums, right!?) I came across a great thread about your WoW set ups. The thread is "Lets see those setups!" Taking a look through the pics got me thinking about how much your gaming “gear” can affect your performace. When I started playing WoW I had an incredibly basic set up. Just my iMac with the stock Apple keyboard and mouse. I have never been much of a PC gamer, always favoring consoles. That all changed of course when I found WoW, and over the course of the last couple years I have made some purchases that really made my experience much better. Strangely enough my first purchase was a second monitor. I run lots of other applications along side WoW. At any given time I usually have Ventrilo, iTunes, my web browser, and from time to time movies going at the same time. While I used to be tabbing out every few minutes to check something, change a song, or see who hopped into my vent channel, I found that having a second moniotor opened up my whole world! I can now keep tabs on all that stuff, without having to break away for a second. It is partuculaly useful when researching achievement strats, or keeping an eye on the vent channel to see who exactly is talking. I would have to say this is the single biggest upgrade I have made to my WoW experience. Second thing I got was a new mouse. While the stock Apple mouse got the job done, it really left something to be desired. The vast majority of my movement in game is done with the mouse, and investing in a gaming mouse made all the difference for me! The one I use is the Logitech G5, but I’m sure any specific gaming mouse is a huge upgrade over any stock mouse. I love mine because it offers very precise tracking, on-the-fly adjustable tracking speed, lots of additional buttons, as well as adjustable weight. The extra buttons alone made this worth the purchase. I am now able to bind vent to my mouse, which freed up some spots on my keyboard for more important things. Last but certainly not least I bought a gaming pad. There are a few of these available, and the one I am using is the Belkin n52te. This awesome upgrade allows you to put all your keyboard bindings on a single pad that is designed to make things as easy to get to as possible. While it definitely took some getting used to, after about 2 weeks I have no idea how I ever played without it! It makes such a difference in the control that I have. How about you guys? Are you using anything to up your game? I’d love to hear if there is anything out there for me to discover, or if you get along fine on a 12" laptop! Also, don't forget to post your set up in the forums, I would love to see more of what you guys are working with!

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Welcome back to my UI. I've got a number of addons I love to use, but since this week's episode has me in healing mode, I thought I would go over another one of the addons I use to make myself awesome. Whenever someone asks me which addons I would recommend for a healer, I say, "Grid and Clique." I went over Grid last week, so this week let's talk about clique. Clique will allow you to cast a spell, run a macro, use an item, or perform other actions on a target by clicking on its frame. When would you want to use this? Whenever you have multiple targets you need to quickly switch between, using different abilities on each. A great example of this is healing! Not convinced? Let's take a look at how I utilize the functionality as a shaman. While acting as a healer, the spells I use most are ranks 8 and 12 of Healing Wave, ranks 4 and 5 of Chain Heal, and rank 7 of Lesser Healing Wave. I also use Cure Poison and Cure Disease even while I'm just kicking ass in my enhancement spec. So, instead of wasting precious moments by pressing multiple keys to target and then cast (or vice versa), it's nice to combine them. Using Grid's range check, missing health, incoming heal, and debuff indicators, I can immediately know which spell to cast. After installing Clique into your interface folder, you will see an additional tab on the right side your spellbook. Clicking it will open up the setup menu, and you can then click on any non-passive ability in your spellbook with the desired modifiers and mouse button My settings are as follows: right click is rank 8 Healing wave, shift+right click is rank 12. Button 4 is rank 4 Chain Heal, shift+button 4 is rank 5, shift+left click is Lesser Healing Wave, alt+left click is Cure Poison, and alt+right click is Cure Disease. I keep left click as target, but that's just my personal preference. These settings keep everything at my fingertips, accessible quickly and accurately. The main project page on WoWInterface has some great notes about additional features, such as conditional function changes for harmful vs friendly targets, out of combat keybinds for buffing, or editing what frames are affected.

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