Compelling talents, real choices, and diversity.

Stubborn at the Dead Good Tanking Guide posted a great response to the request for class feedback. What impressed me the most was the comment:

Compelling talent choices not on offer elsewhere, mobility other melee dream about and unique utility that can change the face of an encounter.

Oh hell, he said it so bloody well.

To me this mean keeping the play styles of the tanks different. Keep each tank type as different and we’ll see choices again. Those choices might might one class better than others for specific encounters, but overall we’ll have an interesting diversity. The same can be applied to Heals and Dps too. Choice empowers and supports class selection, where limiting controls prohibit it.

That does not mean that classes should not have some parity in abilities though. We do not want a scenario where a single Tank class is so much better (unless its the dks -joke!). Each tank class should have principally the same set of core controls, but the implementation of those controls can be different.

Think of it as the difference between a Requirement and and Solution. The Requirement is a statement of need, typically based upon on a set of broad goals. The solution is the specific method whereby that need will be satisfied.

In Stubborn’s example there is a goal to provide competitive dps, a requirement to allow Warriors to move through the battlefield efficiently, and a requirement to maintain the movement style of the Warrior class. The solution is to grant Warriors a set of abilities and talents that have them charge and leap amongst the melee. That is a key part of the feel of the Warrior way. Some other classes also have charge abilities, or leap abilities, but not all by a long way.

Paladins by example seem to call opponents to them. The Avengers Shield, Consecrate, and such play like a more stoic class. They might be “slower”, but that could also be seen as less “jittery” as well. Your mileage will vary.

Bears have a range of abilities that imitate many of the Warrior abilities, although they have a sub-set that is slightly better suited to AoE. Death Knights are again different, and that is excellent. I’d hate to see Warriors get a Death Grip style ability, and likewise it would not make sense.

Now that my third Tank is level 85 I’m seeing enforcement of my previous opinion that each is totally viable and very different. They all have taunts, AoE capacity, facing issues, movement considerations, cooldowns, resource shortages, and special tricks. Each is pretty darn good at a base level, yet diverse.

I’d like to see an expansion in the diversity, so that the choice of what to do and play remains (or returns to) a valid and powerful choice.

Happy gaming.

More creative and consistent names

Update: As this was published I noticed that the patch 4.3 name rules have changed too:

North American realms (excluding Brazilian, Latin American, and Oceanic realms) no longer permit letters with accents in character or guild names. Existing character and guild names with special characters will be unaffected by this change.

How many times have you seen these type of names?

Ãrthás, Ægigbird, ìcemage, lololas, undeaddeath, or ikillsunow. Iamatank (who is dps), pvpggodd, or any darn name which uses a keyboard crushing special character. It is a short step to bigtool7 as a character name, and most of the examples above are from actual toons.

Moons ago I wrote a small blogpost about naming a Death Knight, as at the time the Wrath expansion was announced but not released, and players were creating and reserving names left and right. It was done as a PSA type post so that (I hoped) the wow population would have less silly and unpronounceable names.

How’d that go? I saw no direct affect; but then didn’t really expect to see a major shift. I was more just standing on my soapbox yelling at the world (now we have twitter for that, and bloggers have multiple avenues to shout about the things that frustrate them)…and shitty names still frustrate me.

The characters like “Bloodelfdk” are still happily jumping around in WoW, and it seems that players are keen to use every special keyboard character they can when re-using names. I guess that won’t change much either.

It would be interesting to see an MMO which prohibited these type of names more, and if that rule had a significant affect on the player base. Would a restriction such as that hinder the growth of the game?

Take the SW-ToR game coming in December – can I create a character called DarthVedar? Hanssolo? Chewiebacka? Aaanakin?

These names are just as silly as Arthaaas and all the rest based on the Warcraft lore, and as ToR is based on story arcs and events, it seems something they might wish to consider – especially if the NPCs will be using the character names in some way:

Npc: The elderly noble rises from his ornate throne and says “We hail PrincisLayher, you efforts to force back the Imperial troops were a boon to my people. What would you ask of me as reward?”

Player: “dude epix, lol”

Npc: …{shakes head}

It breaks the story, and makes me a little sick just thinking of it.

OK what to do:

1. Valid Random Names – The random name generator in the character creation screen should not show you names that are in use. It frustrates me that a name is shown, might actually be useful, but is not available. As an armchair programmer this does not seem to be a huge issue, the list could be updated on batch, and then re-checked every day to ensure the error rate would be low.
2. Prohibit special characters – I know this affects some legit European names, but then you’re not playing yourself in Second Life, you’re playing Warcraft. Names like Redhand are far more lore worthy than Phîlll. And yup, it would wreck a huge amount of current character names, but hey – I hate those names so on this point I’m going to be inconsiderate of those players.

My class of Choice

Back in 2008 I wrote a post about My class of Choice. At the time I was an alt-a-holic, with 3 characters who were regularly played in Warcraft, and many more who were used as profession mules.

Fast forward to now and my warcraft time is as different as my life is, then from now. The Paladin, Warlock, and Druid has been replaced by Mortigen, the Death Knight. Wrath saw this class released upon the game, and I’ve never looked back.

The Death Knight was my first character to level 85, and the first I wanted to take to raids. I also now have a Hunter and Druid at 85, and the Paladin, Warlock, and Priest are stuck at 80, with a shamble of Shamans and others throughout the 30s to 70s. In 2008 I said I’d not ever have a Hunter and now its 85 – the game changes you.

Lifestyle wise in 2008 I was living in another city, where my partner (now wife) was regularly working away from home or doing long hours. This facilitated a huge amount of time where i could do as I pleased. The Alts came out in force, and the content was getting smashed left and right.

It is funny to ponder how wow and life changes. Happy Killing.

A huge weekend

After a huge weekend, there is a little to brag about for my venerable Death Knight. Playing for a huge stack of time intermixed with housework and food is a great way to swindle away a weekend, although I do think there could have been a few more productive activities off-screen. Perhaps another day huh. I was able to achieve the following:

• Grand Master Cook (525) – man is that a pain between 350 and 450.
• Archaeology to 120 – this is a grindy profession if there ever was one. The only goal is to get some BoA gear, and possibly a mount. The rest of the stuff is vendor trash.
• A DPS upgrade for Neck, from Ramkahen, along with the Exalted Rep. Finally! Ramkahen is a pain in the arse if you can’t regularly run heroics, as it is so god damn slow.
• A few Tank upgrades for Legs and Bracers, but only the Bracers will be keepers for any length of time. I’m now 10% dodge, 15% parry, and 108% mastery – more than ready to smash through heroics as a tank when the great goodie bag bribe is added to the game.
• 50 cooking awards, which is kind of meh when I see that almost all the current recipes are useless for me. No great change in cooking from previous editions.
• Heroic Deadmines and Halls of Origination completed. Blarg.
• Working Day and Night (2nd Profs now at 525) via Blacksmithing. This profession will end up just being a place to get buckles and gem slots from now on. I can’t see a huge market in these, but handy none the less.

Wish I could spend 7 hours a day playing more often, but not too often. I’m finding so many aspects of the game difficult to enjoy, but others highly satisfying – which I guess is what a lot of folks are finding as subscribers start to drift off. This might be a thought for another day.

All the best, happy killing.

How to (not) raise your Weapon Skill

Quick note, as one of the most popular posts I’ve made is about how to raise your weapon skill, Google searchers should not that in Cataclysm the concept of a weapon skill will be removed from the game. Having spent a long time swinging at low mobs, I really like that I don’t have to micromanage a set of skills. It is a good change.

So I’d say if you’ve not got that feat of Strength achievement, then get it now.

And if you have no interest in the achievement, then don’t burn the time raising the skill – as you won’t have to. Go read a book, grind for that rare drop, or farm gold and send it to me.

Happy killing.

What would you start over as?

If you had the chance to start all over again in WoW, what would you play?

Now I don’t know why on earth somebody would choose to restart from scratch, as I think there is always a strength in using your old toons. Starting a level 1 Alt is very different from starting on a new server clean. I tried this once, and did not last long until I transferred a higher level toon over to make the process easier.

TLDR – I’m too lazy to start over without a high level toon to grandfather gear and bags.

Would you switch to a new class or race at level 80?

I would only consider switching to something else if I had decided to switch Factions, then I’d grab an Orc – as I see it as the perfect Unholy Death Knight race / class combo. But I like my Draenei Death Knight, it has the mass which matches a Death Knight. Tauren would be another OK choice.

Maybe a Worgen in the expansion.

And also what if your account was destroyed and you needed to start from level 1? What and why choice of class, race, and faction?

I’d probably not play for a long time, if at all. Starting from scratch would be such an ending, that I don’t think it would work. Unless I was supported by a few high level mates.

Given a bit of time to get past the grief; my characters would be x2 bank toons, a DK main, and a Hunter, Paladin, or Warlock as alts. Got to have something to do when the rested runs out.

And most of all what would you plan to do with it? Raid, PvP or just hang out in Dalaran?

I’d keep casually raiding and running 5 mans. I only like PvP in bursts, and can’t take the RP side seriously. If  real life permitted I’d raid seriously, 3 times a week.

And yes, I’d be one of those guys who are also hanging about in Dalaran, looking for a PuG or some such to entertain me.

Proudly pinched from the Blog Azeroth Shared Topics

Armory RSS Feed

Quick note: You can now get an RSS feed of your recent activity on a character. eg. Mortigen’s activity.

Awesome!

NameScore mod

An outstanding satirical mod for Warcraft called NameScore, which scores characters based upon their name.

a) Because GearScore was not arbitrary enough. This will really set the cat amongst the pigeons.
b) Because I’ve been banging on about bad player names for years, but not seen this.

Pure excellence.

Malign of Nagrand – LFM NAXX 25, MUST BE GEARED, 5k+ GEARSCORE, 75+ NAMESCORE, 5K+ DPS, PST ACHIEVEMENTS.

Prepare your toon for Cataclysm

Although the hype and glorious content of Patch 3.3 is still to arrive, I’ve started pondering Cataclysm.

What will the leveling process will be like, and what will we need to be successful on release?

Well geared toons will be killing machines

For starters I’ll assume that like me, most folks here have a Death Knight as your main toon, or a toon that you play a lot. This means that even if you’re only in middle range gear you’ll massively over-gear the monsters in the level 80-81 areas in the new game. The starting areas (if history repeats once again) will have mobs around 79-81 and as a well geared DK you’ll find them quick work. This is because those monsters will be tuned for players who are questing though 79 to 81 without the time spent at level 80 getting epic gear, and all the advantages that offers. And unlike last time the Death Knights will be first on the ground next to all the other classes to play thorugh the content.

What I also expect though is the creatures in the “new” zones to be far tougher than the creatures in Northrend. This is for two reasons. Firstly Blizzard wants us to feel like we are stepping up to a changed world. I expect that the mobs will hit harder, have more resistance, and possibly even have smarter AI hanndling them. I hope that we need to engage our brains and kill tactically, rather than just zerg through the content like we could in Hellfire Pen.

Secondly there will only be 5 new levels for characters to advance. That means that each level will be longer, and the jumps in difficulty will be broader across those levels. I’d expect a level 82 mob to be a tough challenge for a well geared 80; and to basically to be borderline impossible for a 78-79. Just like fighting a level 7 when you were level 4, you ‘ll need luck and skill to pul it off. Again ponder the challenge of being a level 79 wearing green ilevel 174-200 gear, vs being a epic geared Champion of Wrath wearing ilevel 260+. It will be a totally difference experience. Some players will not be replacin gear till late in the new leveling process, which is kind of to be expected.

A possible flaw in this theory is if Blizzard include a radical ”re-adjustment” when the change the stat balance and itemisation on the gear. It could be that all the gear levels get hashed to far more granular numbers, and that an old ilevel 213 epic is similar in power to a Rare 200, and a better 219. We really don’t know what will happen when all the peripheral stats are squeezed  from the items in place of base stats. This could see the difference between the 200s and the 232 items being far less.

Overall I expect anyone in gear of ilevel 213-219 or better to be fine and have no real issues. Like having a set of nice entry level epics when Wrath was released, it made for nice gear to have until your quest rewards let you sell it to a vendor.

So what can you do now?

Prepare now, and plan ahead

Grab plenty of pots, have bandages, and all the other useful leveling items ready. I aim for zero downtime when leveling, and that can mean HP regen food, entry level potions, and even simple bandages can accelerate the time between kills.

It is far too early to be putting together a leveling team, but think about who plays regularly at you time. Come early 2010 when the expac is released (total guess) you’ll want a set of guildies and mates to streamline the leveling. Nothing makes leveling more fun that chatting about how awesome it is on Vent while you all experience it together.

Start building your warchest now

Stockpile the items you think folks will want. Ore, herbs, cloth, everything will be valuable again when all the alts hit the servers. I think most players will roll a Goblin and Worgen at some stage just to see the areas, and that means more that a few will be hitting the AH to grab mats for profession grinding. Remember all the Draeni and Blood Elf toons, and what that did to the price of Tin and Mithril ore? Well expect that to happen again.

Bonus XP will Dissappear

I’d guess that when Cataclysm is patched into our game all the +10% experience gear will have a 1-79 limitation placed on them, as I can’t see Blizzard delberately putting in only 5 levels and then letting us accelerate our way through. I can however see the logic of allowing the existing leveling process before 80 to be sped up. All the new classes that roll a Goblin or Worgen should get full advantage. On that note, perhaps the current items will be a token that is used to purchase the upgrades ones at level 85 a few months after release?

But you’re a scrub, alt DK huh?

If however your Death Knight is not your major character, and is played casually then you’ll have different needs when the expansion hits. Expect the mobs to crush and hurt you if you get even slightly out of your depth.

Quick aside: please keep your DK as your Alt, there are a heck of a lot of DKs already and rolling against 5 others in every bloody 25m raid is a pain.

What will change from last expansion?

Last expansion the Death Knights were slightly behind the curve of leveling. We hit the game at 58 and had some repeat work to do before we saw Northrend at 68. This time we can teleport back to the old world straight away with everyone else, and see what Deathwing has done first hand. I could not help but see some content with an old 70 when Wrath was released, as it was just too darn exciting, and this time the Death Knights will be on the front line straight away.

That said however the Death Knight starting exerience was pure unholy cream. The “starting” gear was very nice, and this made leveling easy. If you are leveling thorugh from a low level toon please expect to die.

Some predictions?

Roleplaying will get a minor revival

As an aside I look forward to the huge RP opportunities for my Death Knight – as seeing a world torn apart by flame and destruction is nothing new for a Death Knight, but will be new for the host of old world races. The opportunities abound to listen to them cry, bitch, and moan about what an awful creature Deathwing is. Frankly, it will be nice to see some suffering…

I still contemplate if the Death Knights will be used by as many folks in the next expansion, or if the new class race options will see a revival of options.

Gear might get totally insane

It is possible that through the use of creative drop rates, phasing, and level requirements that monsters and encounters for level 80+ characters might be very hard, and therefore offer upgrades in the order of ilevel 270+. This is because it is possible that the gear reset will be so radical, that granting a green quest reward with stats akin to a lower epic are ok. It gives the less to mid geared toons a slight upgrade, and also would vendor for a small fortune for those who don’t need the item. I would not be surprised to see the vendor price being easily 12-15g.

This will being a raft of bitching from some players, but nothing that we have not turned off trade chat to avoid before.

How to have a casual Alt character?

Been struggling with which toon to play other than my Death Knight, and circling around the problem of so little reward for so little time spent. Adding an alt as a casual toon will mean even less time playing the already casual Death Knight; which will slow the even further his advancement. But I really feel the need for an alternate to always doing melee tank or dps all the time. Just a quick break on another toon now and then is what I’m after.

So what are good strategies for gearing a casual alt?