Slowly is the only way to go

Thanks to a guildie (hello Tarc) I have completed the Nalak phase of the Legendary quest and am now killing bosses again in Throne of Thunder LFR for the x12 bling-things part. Twelve, that is better than Twenty; right?

Well yes and no. There is no indication that the drop rate is better or worse, unless you suspect that the change to an auto-drop from Lei-Shen might indicate that these little tokens were even more rare that the 20x odd of the previous type. I got the first one last night from Lei-Shen and I guess I’m ok with it taking 12 weeks to get the others. I like Legendaries to be hard and painful. Patch 5.4 will likely be out in production before I reach 12x drops, so I’ll hopefully be able to use the cloak in p5.4 content.

From a lore perspective I do not understand how it makes sense that Wrathion would ask for this many too. I mean there are 12 bosses, and these are rare things, and they drop from bosses only…and somehow we got 20x of them. No wonder Wrathion has us doing this, it is not logical in the setting. I bet he is amazed! Not a new theme though if I remember the Hand of Sulfuras correctly either.

Happy killing, TyphoonAndrew

FlexRaids in 5.4, and LFR is apparently killing wow?

I’m reading about the Flexible Raid feature which is likely for patch 5.4, and I really dislike where the community is already taking it.

Ultimately, my guess is that in the next expansion, as long as there are no technical difficulties with the Flex Raid system, is that it will replace LFR completely.  I sure hope it does.  LFR is a stone around WoW’s neck and needs to be killed as quickly as possible.  For this reason I welcome the Flex raid system with open arms, and hope that it succeeds.

WTF!

While LFR might be killing the game for some, you are the not the entire player base.

If not for LFR I could not see the raid content. I don’t have a huge social network of raiders with RealID to sync with, and therefore I need LFR for the game to be viable.

I would not have some of the gear I have which allows me to sub-in to help our guild’s regular raid team. I am a pitch hitter who helps fill gaps, and removing LFR only makes that a shitty experience to try and keep up with where our raid team is. Our Guild raids three nights a week and is about as social a group as I have ever played an online game with – because I know a bunch of them from real life and have played with others for years. Years and years in fact.

So this new system is designed for social…good. What I will then need to do is open up and connect with new folks to form irregular raid times to try and suit my irregular schedule? Nah, I’ll just keep doing LFR when I can.

I love that the Flexible Raid feature is being added, it is a great step that will benefit the game, but to say that this renders LFR obsolete is plainly wrong. It might be true that many players who begrudgingly play LFR now will only do Flexibel Raids, but I doubt that too.

Many players will try to do all three, and that is a bad thing. It means burnout and boredom are present faster. i.e. Weekly LFR, Flex, Normal on the same content? Nope, no time. Bah, move on.

Links: I Like Pancakes – Flexible Raid Preview. and MMO Champ’s article.

Rumour – Final stage Legendary, might not be a weapon…

The final stage reward for the legendary quest might not be a weapon, as hinted by Bashiok in this little thread. Yep, I know that is a rumour, but it raises that question of expectation on rewards for effort. Let the conjecture begin…

It could be that we have a choice of trinket, or any other gear-slot. Given how the rewards through the quests have allowed a choice on reward it makes sense that WoW could reward players with an option.

Would that suck? Kind of, but mostly not. It might fit well.

Kind of sucky as I think getting to THE LEGENDARY is the goal. By tradition in previous expansions these have been weapons, and Pandaria has gone the Gem, Gem Slot, enhancement, and now Cloak route. It is easily conceivable to not be a final weapon.

Take the lore into consideration for a sec too and ponder why Wrathion would give another person a great weapon in the first place. He’s a Black Dragon and they are an evil selfish kind of lot. I wouldn’t trust him to not give us a cursed weapon, and then giggle about it while he attempts to subvert things to his own agenda.

But what if the item was something which is not a fixed mechanical advantage at all?

• Imagine the final reward is a ilevel “high” widget, which always continues to scale to the level to your other highest gear +5. You’d want it, and you’d always want it. Legendary. It could take a trinket slot, add gob-smacking a mounts of two stats, and be done with it. eg. Haste & Mastery +nnnn, with a proc on cast or melee to look swirls and wonderful. I’d want that.
• A reward that allows the wearer to assume a constructed illusory appearance. Like your own little transmog illusion over the top of whatever you wear. No more transmog costs, just this widget in your bags. I’d want that too, especially if I could turn it on and off.

And so on with all sorts of blisteringly cool features which will cause every player to want this item on all their characters. And despite my previous rants about legendary being a little washed out, or the process being odd – that is what they are: something that all toons should desire.

Just a thought, TyphoonAndrew.

Great feature – Loot Spec Selection

One aspect introduced recently in World of Warcraft was the option to select your preferred spec for Loot. By golly! It is great. If you are a hybrid class and not doing this then you should really should give it some thought. My Tank set has been improved by this feature more than once already.

It is one of the best quality of life type improvements I think have been made ever.

Impressions of new content for patch 5.3

I played the new content released in the WoW patch 5.3 last night, and here are a few observations (also here is Wowheads guide – which is darn handy).

Overall: Great to see new lore. Excited to have two new scenarios, specific quests to advance the story, and an experience across both the old world and Pandaria. Great too that the legendary quest keeps rolling, and I cannot wait (but will take months and months) to get the high level cloak.

Whatever comes in 5.4 will hopefully still value that cloak’s ilevel 600. Otherwise it seems a short term reward. Or imagine what the next jump after 600 will be, and how that will devalue all other gear for the patch.

But … no way in hell I’m doing the “gather 150×4 materials” every bloody week. I started the quest yesterday, and it took hours and hours to progress through it. I’ve got around 450 of the 600 drops needed, and I’m already really bored with doing the same four tasks:

1. Kill mobs in one of the four areas, infrequently opening boxes too. At the moment I can kill and loot mobs faster than I can sneak past mobs to loot boxes. Druids however can loot the boxes in bird form and snaffle them quickly.
2. Kill one of the special bosses which randomly spawn. After death they drop a better amount of each material, but they also can now (hotfix 223 May) be tagged to the alt faction and also take a bit of time to kill. That change at least means it is faster to gather the mats.
3. Escort a caravan, so that it arrives safely and hope than a faction opponent does not dps it dead. The caravans as so easy to kill its a joke. Trust me – I took revenge on a horde group by nuking their caravan.
4. Find the random exploded boxes. Periodically somewhere on the map a lot of boxes spawn all spread out. Run around looting them for 1 or 2 mats per box.

Dull, dull, double-dull is all I can say about this weekly quest.

I’ve already read comments from other players saying they’ll do this quest twice and then never again. My advice is to do this now while people still want the pet and the few other odd rewards so that you gain the advantage of big groups killing those NPCs. It is a blisteringly stupid move to create such a grind.

But apparently it is great for alts, as they can gear up this way? FFS no. Each weekly grants a 489 item when better rewards are in the new heroic scenarios, but only if you have also looted one of the special drops too. Derp.

Otherwise the scenarios and new quests are great. Fast, easy on normal, and fun to blow through. I get the impression that after a few times I’ll recognise all the lore elements and begin to get tired of them, but for now it is something new to play through. My last task is to get the end of the “help the lost old hermit” chain, for the boots, and then that will be all the lore done. A few nights and the content is “encountered”.

Regardless, I hope you’re liking it. TyphoonAndrew.

Related articles

• WoW p5.3 this week, highlights include (typhoonandrew.wordpress.com)
• WoW patch 5.3 review (dendory.net)
• wow Loot Specialization Menu (typhoonandrew.wordpress.com)
• Redemption (qelric.wordpress.com)

Pet Battles and HearthStone are distractions

I think Pet Battles and HearthStone are distractions. Darn good, but distractions. I’d try and play these games on my iphone or ipad, but can’t take it seriously while actually in World of Warcraft.

I will certainly try HearthStone when it is live, and perhaps when this expansion is ending I’ll try a pet battle too.

I have a fair pool of pets all of whom are level one and never been used. It seems a waste in a way to have some rare stuff but never use them in game. Alas time online actually playing my main is rare enough for me, so spending that time swapping cards or poking pets is not justified.

But on a portable device while I wait for a late trains or have a quick lunch? Ohhhh yeah, I’ve got time for that. I know HearthStone is going to be delivered to portable devices, and I’d think that Pet battles could be valuable there too.

Is LFR progress?

It is funny to think that LFR can grant players “progress”.

Strict progression is typically for normal and especially for hard-mode guilds, who are focused not only the hardest content, but also getting through the hardest content faster than their peers. Server rankings, kill times/strats, and sometimes even achievement points are ranked against each other to see who is first, and who is the best. LFR however is generally accepted as being easy, or scrub mode.

I ran a lot of LFR this week and was able to kill each boss in the current tier in LFR raids. It took more than the four nominal run through, as sometimes I joined mid way through, or the groups disbanded amid the raid.

That does not at all mean though that LFR does not have a place in terms of “progress”. Perhaps it is just progress for me, but I think there is merit in the system.

wow Loot Specialization Menu

MMO Champ reports a fine new feature for Patch 5.3 in WoW:

The new Loot Specialization menu is in, allowing you to choose what spec you want loot for when getting bonus rolls, Raid Finder gear, and Pandarian quest rewards

Yehaw. Darn good feature. Its very welcome. A good step toward getting a friendly loot system. It might be seen as a change which makes World of Warcraft more friendly to casuals, which is true and not a bad thing but it is also something that makes the loot system more friendly for hardcore players and those player who love Alts.

I cannot see a drawback which is not related to a whine about “back in my day…”

Related articles

• World of Warcraft Patch 5.3 PTR Patch Notes (wow.joystiq.com)
• The Azeroth Ethicist: Is it cheating to trick the LFR loot system? (wow.joystiq.com)

Scholomance mod for Skyrim

Great looking mod for Skyrim which creates the WoW instance of Scholomance. It shows what a non-cartoon style of game might look like. Very darn appealing.

Cartoon style allows forgiveness for a huge range of visual issues, including a place not looking correctly fitted out with junk, details on surfaces, and all the other illusions that a human can detect, but need to be “designed by hand”. Probably relates to that old Uncanny Valley concept.

The image above looks like the entry bridge for Scholomance. Have a view of the rest on the link Steam Workshop: Scholomance.

Love those non-sensical raid mechanics

Matticus has a really nice post from a while back about the raid mechanics in encounters which frustrated or challenged us. (ref: 13 Punishing Raid Mechanics Which Made You Go “PICK ME PLEASE!” | World of Matticus). He points out 13 which deserve attention.

There seemed to be more gimmick / click challenges in raids in Cataclysm than other expansions, and thankfully the raid content I’ve seen so far in Pandaria does not have many of these gimmicks. Feng the Accursed is the exception who has a special clicky-action-fun-time-button.

To be clear I think a fight mechanic is a gimmick when it is not logical in the setting or story. It might be shallow but if the mechanic makes lore sense then it is far easier for me to integrate into my understanding of the fight, and therefore defeat. There are great, poor, and average special mechanics in the game, so here are a few I thought to note.