Project Lore

QuestHelper/Carbonite & Extended QuestLog/DoubleWide Features Incoming I've never been one to play on the PTR.  Like many other players I don't want to spoil the upcoming content or experience "unfinished" gameplay.  And yet I spend hours a week just staying current with the latest news and revelations, from the Live realms and the PTR.  I guess that would make me a bit of a hypocrite - I won't spoil by playing, but get spoiled by reading occasionally - but that is the price I pay for knowledge.  So when my buddy noticed that the patch notes had changed again, he knew I would be interested. Blizzard began implementing QuestHelper functionality as part of the Secrets of Ulduar patch, and I was okay with it.  They have been trying to make leveling easier for some time now, and that change was the next logical step.  The devs seemed to have found a happy middle ground between the hardcore and the casual players thanks to additions to the tooltips.  In essence you still had to read the quest text to find out where mob X or item Y was located.  Only when you were in the general location - being able to mouseover an objective - would you be tipped off.  No biggie.  Enter Call of the Crusade, which is taking it a step further.

• A skull graphic will be placed on the map in the general area where players can find creatures they must kill for a quest.
• A skull graphic with red eyes will be placed on the map in the general area where creatures can be found that must be killed in order to collect quest objects.
• A gear/cogwheel graphic will be placed on the map in the general area where players must loot quest objects found in the world.
• A chat bubble graphic will be placed on the map in the general area where players must interact with a specific NPC for a quest.
• A yellow question mark graphic will show on the map to provide the location of a NPC whose quest the player has completed.

Aside from these obvious benefits, former downloaders of quest helping mods should see an increase in available system resources and (slightly) more secure accounts. Okay, this is way further then I expected Blizzard to go.  Before the hardcore base goes all "reading comprehension" on us let's take a step back.  Remove yourself from the discussion and just look at WoW as a product.  Blizzard, the creator of said product, is looking at QuestHelper, and mods like it, and realizes that it is one of the most downloaded add-ons for World of Warcraft.  What would you expect them to do?  Would you want them to simply ignore the actions of millions of players?  No, of course not. Here's the rub, many other UI changes are getting the option to be toggled on or off, but Zarhym's updates make no mention of that for the topic at hand.  If you want to play WoW the hardcore old school way it doesn't seem to be an option.  The freedom of choice is what the hardcore should be complaining about, not the dumbing down of a part of WoW that you are no longer a part of. Under what circumstances would you accept the added features to the world map?  Would it have been acceptable to you if it was implemented back in 2004?  Should the option be defaulted off?  Are you going to abandon your helpful questing mod if the feature goes live?  With the amount of subscribers reaching a plateau, does it even matter at this stage in the game? Let the QQ begin. <popcorn>

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Here at Project Lore, the last week has had us evaluating the balancing act that is playing WoW and still maintaining a social life. ITZKooPA pointed out the difficulties of doing just that, and how indeed, RL should always come first. So for those of us who readily take on this challenge of balancing the two, I thought it'd be fun to talk a bit about what challenges casual gamers face when playing WoW, and what steps we can take in-game to maximize our limited playing time. I've never been able to commit to playing WoW, or any game for that matter, on much more than a casual basis. On my relatively obligation-free days, like on the weekends, I can maybe play for a few hours. Most days during the week, I'm lucky if I can play at all. Since I'm working on leveling my main, one of the most important aspects to keep up with is getting that needed experience through quests. When I log off for a few days at a time, I oftentimes forget what I'm working on by the time I log on again. This past weekend, I went back to the Borean Tundra to catch up on some easy XP quests I had skipped over when I first made it to Northrend. But it takes a little while to get on the ball again. I read back through my quests, and refreshed my memory on several that I had awaiting in the dreaded mist. Then there's the matter of remembering where everything is located. Maybe I just have a poor memory, but when I log back on after a few days and am in an area where I haven't been for very long, I have a difficult time finding my way around. Especially in areas where I still haven't discovered a significant portion of the map. Thankfully, both the problem of not remembering quests and a poor sense of direction can be assisted with AddOns. My favorite quest and direction helper is TomTom (which you can see in use in Dorkins' soloing escapades). Not only can you read comments that give specific instructions for each quest, but the addon also puts an arrow on your screen pointing you to different quest objectives. Also, don't forget to read up on comments that let you know if you can complete any other quests in the same area. That helped me complete four quests in the mist in only one trip and, in the end, I got a fun parachute ride back to Warsong Hold after beseiging the Scourge army. Now, there are other plenty of other difficulties with playing WoW on a limited basis, and I find a lot of that comes in the area of housekeeping - keeping track of your professions and reagents, listing your auctions, remembering to use your new abilities or items that you may have gotten just before logging off a few days before etc. I have a few tricks beyond addons to keep it all straight - mainly in the way I sort my bags. I group all my leatherworking together, all my quest items together, all my gear for guildies in one spot, all my unwanted BOP to vendor in another, and any BOE items to auction someplace else. My main backpack is strictly for the items that I must keep with me always. And whatever isn't sorted tends to be grays that I can sell to the nearest vendor. And anytime I get a level, I take a few minutes right away to spend my talent point, get any new skills and put them on my action bar so I don't forget about them. With a little organization, I find that my time playing is more fun and less confusing. What could be better? So does anyone else have trouble keeping up with the wide World of Warcraft? What addons or tricks do you use to keep track of everything?

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