LFR Tool…shrug

The LFR tool has some more details announced, but really its as expected. You’ll be sorted into a 25 man raid team, and given an easier version of the current content. Game By Night posted about it, and asked why it is not creating more of a stir, after all it should affect the entire MMO Community.

I made a comment to him:

“Why aren’t bloggers talking about it?!”
Because I think it will fail, but my blog is almost a Blizzard bashing blog anyway, so I don’t want to be too negative.

We have a raid finder tool already, and nobody uses it. Maybe making this across a series of realm is good, but as I said in my blog – it is almost pointless for current raids, but fantastic for older ones.

An old raid can be stomped by players who have no clue, but current tier content will be difficult regardless. I hate pugs, this will be like pugs on speed, wielding chainsaws.

Yup, Chainsaws. Speed freaks yelling gogogogo, and pointless wipes. I hope I’m wrong as I really need something like this so to support my progression, and I am planning to use it a lot.

To give it any less than an incredible amount of patience and time will be a poor review, and impact poorly for MMOs in the future. Blizzard is trying a new thing here and that should be applauded. Lets raise a glass to 25 man random Raids, and hope that the people joining them are useful, informed, and tolerant.

If they really wanted the feature to be a 100% seller it would be available for old school raids too. That would meet the transmogrification needs too.

Help! I’m frustrated by Mains and Alts

There is some background drama in my guild at the moment, which centers on the topic of rewarding Alts vs Mains in progression raiding: Should there be a penalty for switching mains, what about regular alts, and how do you handle loot in these scenarios?

Without naming folks I’d like to get some feedback from people who read this blog (as you’re clearly an intelligent bunch of high spec people).

I’m pretty open about having a more relaxed attitude toward my personal progress, but I take the policies of the guild very seriously. Heck, I’m the GM I should take it bloody seriously. I think a guild needs guidelines to protect against the people who would abuse the system, and sometimes that causes some angst to the players who would never dream of being selfish.

I said this in 2008: Often the feel of a discussion about progression can hurt feelings, or call out those with strongly held beliefs.

Yep, it sometimes sucks, but its the way of things. We have laws for the same reasons. A guild needs to protect the many, through consistency. I’ve seen more than enough dickheads in guilds in the past, and thankfully they are now all ex-guildies. The set we have now in Insidious are pretty solid people.

What is happening now is that we have a few raiders who wish to switch to different roles or different characters within the raid team. It raises potential drama as until now we’ve never created a policy that stipulated how that occurred or what the affect was.

A player joins a team, and selects a role (meaning a Class and Spec choice) in a team and should stick to it. Sometimes that role might be a Tank, Dps, Healer, whatever. There are also times when the player needs to switch spec for some reason. All good, that is normal. The actual reason for the change is basically irrelevant to me.

This so so that the team can learn to be cohesive, progress well, and be rewarded. Gear and entertainment are essentially why people are Raiding, so the team should do everything to make that happen.

But what happens when a member wishes to switch either character or spec?

I don’t mean for a fight, or even for a single run, I mean what happens when the Druid Tank wishes to become a Death Knight Tank (eg. a change of Character with the same role)? If that is allowed, is that new DK also OK to grab Plate Dps gear before the Warrior Tank? What about all the leather Agi gear, trinkets, and other items that druid has taken which is “lost” to the rest of the team.

Or when a main Dps decides they wish to Heal? What do you do when that really nice Staff drops and two healers both want it – one has been waiting as healer for months, and the other started healing last week.

After many years playing my gut tells me that switching mains causes drama and disruption within the team. The affect might be small, but it is there. It could also be large, messy, dramatic, and a total pain in the arse.

What happens when the player has to play the old-main because the raid can’t fit the new main selection, or they need the old role because now they need to recruit? Do they gear gear as a main or alt?

I believe that there should be a period where the player is de-prioritised for loot. In affect I think that any character that the player brings to the raid should be treated as an Alt for loot distribution while the team adjusts.

This is so:

• The switch over to a new Main is discouraged. The carrot is the new character or role, the stick is that they have to give something up too.
• The other raiders are not competing straight away for loot against the new Main.
• If the player decides they don’t like the new role after all and change again, they have not taken gear away from another player.
• If the player has to play the old role, they do not take loot which they won’t use in the long term either.
• other players can know and see directly what is a Main vs an Alt.
• when the raid leader decides, the interim penalty period is dropped and the person is now a Main.
• That period might be a day or a year depending on all sorts of things like gear ilevel, participation, attitude, competing roles, flexibility, competency, etc. I suggested the period be flexible so that we have choice.

The counterpoint view to this is that people should be able to switch characters and roles as they wish at any time, and they everyone can be trusted. I’ve been told that there is actually no problem here at all. Having a policy is not needed, and that it is insulting to some people within the team as it seems I don’t trust my raiders. Thus this post was born.

And that counterpoint is partially right. I don’t trust that we won’t have drama, and therefore I want a policy. Make it a rule that applies equally, and there can be no favorites.

To me the idea of no rule is just chaos, and serves people who have many alts more than it serves focused players. I think it will lead to wasted loot and drama very quickly.

I see the new Main as being almost the same as a new player joining the team. There is a time where you’re not sure how everything will share out, so having some protection in place for the people who have been consistent is important.

What are your thoughts?

Please post, comment, etc as I’d really like to know if I’m off my rocker on this issue.

New gear, art, strats, and info on Patch 4.3 from MMO Champ

New gear, artwork, strategies and all sorts of lovely information has been data mined by MMO Champion for patch 4.3. There are some nice armor sets for us in Season 11 PvP, although I am reminded of the old Warrior set with the bladed helmet built for head butting Tauren.

DK PvP Season 11 gear set

There is also a stack of great new gear. iLevel 378 gear will drop from the 5 man dungeons, and some of it is rather wonderful. Like this Axe for 2H Weapon wielders.

Whats your Guild style?

A snappy little shared topic was raised by Tzufit in the Bloz Azeroth forums.

Every guild has a certain personality, style, and even traditions all of its own. Do you have certain abilities that you always need to use on a boss kill screenshot? Or perhaps your guild holds an annual holiday party? What special traditions does your guild have?

From my perspective, we have a few consistent jokes:

1. We rant about killing Dragons, often. Rawr!
2. We always try to blame one of a few players for small mistakes. If you slip and fall from the AH roof, then it’s time to find that scapegoat. Firstly its Ram’s (boomkin/resto Druid) fault, then its Dia or Gen’s fault depending on who you ask, and then if that fails we blame Ram anyway. We used to blame any Shadow Priest, but they’re scarce now. I wonder why?
3. Most raiders argue about who should get loot instead of them. That is so great.
4. We help each other. We ask questions, and we go a little extra for each other.
5. Most of the guild types almost complete sentences, and we have a few folks who are grammar fanatics. I love that, the avoidance of leet-speak makes me happy.

Happy raiding

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.

Initial 4.3 patch notes for Death Knights

The first set of patch notes for 4.3 have been released, and there are some interesting things for Death Knights (source, mmo). A lot of things will likely change between now and the release.

Noteworthy is:

1. Healing from Death Strike is automatic, and the damage is subject to a successful hit.
2. Abom’s Might has the melee attack power increased, all other affects are the same.
3. Blade Barrier is a base % damage soak reduction, which is a change away from being dependent on rune usage.
4. Howling Blast’s base damage has increased, while the scaling from attack power has been slight reduced.
5. Veteran of the Third War now also reduces the cooldown on Outbreak by 30 seconds.

For DK Tanks this is a change toward a more consistent inbound damage, a reduction on replacing our diseases. The change in Abom’s might will be reflected elsewhere in identical buffs, so that melee dps is bumped. I am not sure if the HB change will increase or decrease the damage. Overall its good, I feel that we’ll be less spikey.

In other news:

1. A few enchants for Tanks are slightly increased, not overly huge change, but welcome.
2. You’ll be able to dethrone an inactive GM, so play nice.
3. GC has posted a summary and some background thoughts on the patch changes.
4. And yes, the artwork for the Priest and Hunter gear has been released. The Priest helm looks incredible. Where are the Death Knight models?
5. Archaeology areas of interest will now show on the mini-map, in addition to the World Map.

Happy killing, Typhoonandrew.

Warcraft’s Dungeon Difficulty

I’ve been trying to write a post about the difficulty of heroic 5 mans for a very long time, but kept deleting them as they ended up being too much of a rant (even for my standards – sheesh).

With the initial release of Cataclysm expansion, then the exposure to Heroic modes the dungeons felt fairly tough, and at the many in the community saw this as good and a return to the difficulty of The Burning Crusade. Then the Trolls were released and they made the other dungeons seem friendly. There was a slow softening of the mechanics in the old dungeons too.

As its still on my mind this post has two parts; the first was my initial impressions when the cataclysm dungeons were released, and the second is where my head is now that we’re about to get the last 3 dungeons for this expansion.

Raiding is a Party not a Sport

Maintaining the weekly raid roster is a bloody hard thing to do; just ask any recruitment or guild officer. With the holidays, life, and general grumpiness of raiders these days, there is little to do except be constantly supporting the ego and feelings of the current team, and potentially recruiting for replacements at the same time. WoW Insider has a post up that talks about the concept of rebuilding years, akin to a sports team that has an off year while they train up younger players.

The sports team analogy does not mix with WoW though, due to the expectation and flexibility that raiders have vs the sports teams. In fact I think the sports team example actually makes it worse for the players who are left behind because it might make them think the social mechanics are different to what they really are. Why?

• Raiders are not in financial contracts, and nobody is being paid.
• Raiders cannot be forced to login.
• An off-season for a raid team is enough for many to leave, or slow further.
• There is no glamor or praise for the bench & support roles.

So cut it with the sports analogies. Also the job/work comparisons are moot too for exactly the same reasons. You think I go to work for fun every day? I can see that the amateur sports team comparison as closer to the raiding structure, but it still misses the range of social & community aspects that MMOs teams often have.

Ok then, what would be a good comparison? Dinner parties.

• You probably want to attend because its meant to be fun. The invite list is finite, but sometimes a bit of stretch can be accommodated.
• If you’re invited regularly it means you’re probably in a core group of some sort who often catch-up.
• You’d like to believe that the people are friends, or at least will be civil to each other. You also might not like your old friends new partner, but hey – its their mistake.
• Real life or other events will get in the way and make you late or not attend. The importance of the person in your life will probably dictate if you go. If the devotion is akin to family you’ll probably go regardless and apologise, and might even ring ahead.
• You’re meant to bring something to the party as a gift, but its ok if you don’t. The gifts are just like Pots, Food, and Flasks. Some people never bring anything, and everyone knows who they are, but its unlikely they’ll be abused for it.
• Sometimes you’re a ring in that hardly knows anyone, and that is a double edged sword. You might end up standing in the corner (or dead on the floor) half the night.
• God help you if its a date too – as you’ll be scrutinised the entire night by strangers.
• Some parties suck and are a total waste of time. Other parties are good even if you don’t do a lot, as you just hang out with your friends.
• There is a chance of meeting some new people, or knowing them better.
• And if you’re desperate for people to attend the party you can just invite almost anyone and see what type of person you get. Generally that does not work very well though.

So what does that mean for raid composition? Well that is where you need to remember that just like the birthday party the participants are looking to have their expectations met, and the people running the party have a huge amount of work to do while its going on. They carry the balance of all these aspects with them.

They stress about it all through the process, and they plan all that they can before hand. Sometimes all the plans go to hell 5 minutes before the party should start, other times the party goes badly mid way through (anyone got a bad uncle or mom who drops in?). During the party they are the hosts who try to keep everything flowing. And afterward they are the idiots who have to clean up, and deal with any issues.

What can you do as a good Dinner Party attendee / Raider?

• Don’t be an ass if you don’t get an invite. Sometimes there is just not room.
• Bring a positive attitude, and bring a gift or two.
• Respect everyone, and know when to keep your mouth shut.
• Don’t expect that you can just turn up with two extras, even if they’re hot.
• If you really miss out, get off your ass and organise your own party. Do that for 5 weeks and then talk to the normal leads – your attitude might have changed a bit.

As an aside, these comparisons come to mind too while I wrote this, and while they’re a tad odd they are still very demonstrative:

• When the Fury Warrior throws up in the garden and needs to sit quietly inside for 5 minutes, its the raid leaders who arrange that break.
• When the Princess can’t be happy until everything is just her way, everyone groans quietly but keeps on anyway.
• When that loud annoying nerd won’t shut the hell up about Dr Who, its the team leads who must assign somebody to “handle” him.

In closing – respect the raid leaders and organisers, and try to have fun. They have far more to stress about that just one person. I hope all your parties are fun and you get a heap of gifts.

Advice for <3k dps DKs at level 85

My Death Knight Dps rotation: Tongue, Nose, Forehead, Chin or Cheekbone (on proc), then Forehead until my eyes & nose water, then wipe face on keyboard. Repeat.

Ahem, sometimes I’m amazed by the facerollers, and wanted to help them improve. I hear league of legend is good too. Happy killing.

Quick Tips for Brewfest Boss

As Brewfest Holiday event is half way through, I thought I’d put up some simple guidelines (far too late) for how to get through the very short fight that is Corbin Direbrew.

That black hearted sod Direbrew is just an ale swilling mongrel. Kill him.

For everyone:

• If the Tank or Healer is undergeared, then the Dps should burn down the spawning dwarves as too many can the healer’s job difficult or the tank die.
• If the Dps are all undergeared, then you’ll need to kill the Brewfest maiden who spawns, as she stuns people.
• Roll Greed if the loot is not your primary role.

For Tanks:

• If you are undergeared/newbie, say so at the start. Better to let folks know that have a Mage try to Tank 6 monsters.
• Start with an AoE attack opener, to gather up the boss and three adds. This is really important to do well.
• Then get a good threat lead on the Boss (duh).
• Throw in an AoE affect every now and then, or taunt the extra monsters that spawn around the place. That makes the group happy. If the Dps are idiots or rude, let the monsters hit them.
• Roll Need on the +Dodge and +Stam trinkets. They’re not too bad at all, the dodge one especially.

For Dps:

• Wait for 2-3 seconds for the Tank to get some threat.
• Use Single target/dots on the Boss as openers.
• Stand in the AoE affect if the Tank uses it. They’ll get aggro that way.
• If the Tank or Healer is undergeared, then burn down the additional monsters quickly with either AoE or single target, but keep damaging the boss too. A good misdirect is wonderful for too.
• You might need your battlerez ability if something odd happens. Please be prepared to use it.
• The +Stamina trinkets are useless for you, don’t roll Need please.

For healers:

• I have no real idea, but the healers don’t seem stressed by this fight at all. Some have been doing Dps as well – one Shaman did almost 6k. YMMV.
• Keep yourself alive, then Tank, then the best to worst of the dps (duh).
• If the Tank or Damage crew is using any type of AoE then stand in it. It’ll keep the nasties away from you.

My level 84 Warrior has successfully Tanked the fight against dps who far out-scaled her; to the point where the dps were doing very nice damage, but i was still able to hold threat. One fight saw a Mage doing 22-23k dps while I still held aggro on the nasties.

Happy Brewfest. Hic!

Death Knight Tier 13 Set Bonuses

Death Knight Tier 13 bonuses, as published by WoW Joystick (or whatever that blog’s name is now):

• Blood, 2P — When an attack drops your health below 35%, one of your Blood Runes will immediately activate and convert into a Death Rune for the next 20 sec. This effect cannot occur more than once every 45 sec.
• Blood, 4P — Your Vampiric Blood ability also affects all party and raid members for 50% of the effect it has on you.
• DPS, 2P — Sudden Doom has a 30% chance and Rime has a 60% chance to grant 2 charges when triggered instead of 1.
• DPS, 4P — Runic Empowerment has a 25% chance and Runic Corruption has a 40% chance to also grant 710 mastery rating for 12 sec when activated.

Overall this looks interesting, and subject to so many smaller factors like up-time and usage that I can’t see any of these as great overall; useful, but not great.

The bonuses also seem somewhat different to some of the other class bonuses in the tier 13. Priests and Hunters specifically seem to have a direct damage increase here, and although I hate to be doing cross class comparison (as its often not at all valid), it does seem odd.

Stealing 10 things about me

Azerothian Life wrote 10 things about me, and I thought it might be nice to nudge this into a post here too.

1. I really love what I do for a living, despite the fact it is stressful and takes up too much of my time. Busy is better than bored any day of the week. If I was not being paid to muck about with software and applications, I’d probably be doing it anyway.
2. I grew up in the outer suburbs of Melbourne Australia, and really didn’t like it. Now that we live in the inner city I can see the appeal, especially for folks who have kids (there is a comment to be made about age and perspective, but I’m not ready to admit that fully).
3. My favourite music is not repetitive music. If the artist’s music is not different from what as come before its likely that I won’t listen to it.
4. I really like my DK character in warcraft, and still think I have a lot to learn. eg. How to use Dark Simulacrum correctly? No idea yet.
5. I’m in love with my wife. Probably should go without saying, but its important.
6. I enjoy a good metaphorical soapbox, making generalisations, and the discussions that ensure.
7. I wish I had more patience, and am amazed by anyone who can remain calm while stating a request for a third time.
8. I think there is so much more to be developed and created in the online industry, for both games, mini-applications, and full blown service based applications. It is exciting.
9. Conversely I’d an advocate of offline as a viable range of product to develop, and also as a valid choice for life. Sometimes being away from technology is fantastic too.
10. I think being subversive is often useful. The difference that is typically wrong is the intent of the action. I feel that changing expectations and pushing boundaries is good – the intent and timing is the key between a good or evil action.

What are yours?

No more casual vs hardcore?

I think we need a better set of terms for players than Casual vs Hardcore. The two terms cause constant arguments and are about as subjective as calling somebody out for not being ethical.Your ethics are not mine, just like your version of Hardcore will be different from mine.Is it time spent, completion-ism, performance, consistency, background knowledge, or what..? Well its all those things and more.

Once its (obviously) recognised as being subjective, the problem then becomes that the same vague interpretation and personalisation that affects the terms Casual and Hardcore also apply to almost every other set of words you’d use. Viewing any of the options as definitive extremes poor and it becomes an absolute disaster when you try to use one word to surmise a person’s goals.

There is also the problem of viewing the terms in isolation within a single game like World of Warcraft, or broader to all MMO’s, or even to open as wide as possible to any type/style of gamer. For this measurement I’m sticking to Warcraft. The reason is that a measurement of games is too wide, and the same person might play 12 different games, and play each in a different manner. By way of example I play WoW, a few iPhone games, and some basic strategy and card games. I cannot think of a way that the play styles and dedication could be rationalised in a cohesive manner. Solitaire is too different from Warcraft; its comparing Apples to Spacecraft.

Basically its a huge mess, so as a solution I’m offering this post into the already overly populated sea of opinions; in the hope that it somewhat floats.

Joystick had a very logical summary last year, which covered the basics as far as WoW was concerned. If you’re hunting for a reasonable compilation of the basic issues, or a perspective of what the wider community was thinking around the mid-Lich-King days, then its a darn handy resource. Also check out some of these other links, which all cover the types of gamers in the Casual vs hardcore debate in some way. Even a post from the official forums. They’re all good. These linked posts also identify that many of the community fell outside the range of classifications in these posts too. Commenters offered up new types such as “Serious Hobbyists”, or “Definitely Time Crunched”, and so on. The posts, terms, and comments were all fine, but still missed the mark.

I also commented and linked a post many years ago (whoa – in 2008 no less) by a mate of mine who also had a perspective, mainly born from the conflicts found within a guild for the more casual members vs the more dedicated players. My take at the time was based around the amount of time it takes to explain to somebody else:

• If you have to explain why you’re not hardcore in more than one sentence; you’re talking to a softcore or hardcore.
• If it starts an argument or takes 15 minutes, you’re talking to a hardcore.
• If you grief somebody for non-attendance you are hardcore (and a wanker).
• If you have sacrificed a good time out of game for WoW, then you’re at least softcore. If you didn’t view it as a sacrifice, then you’re hardcore.
• And if fun is more important than any of these questions; then you’re casual. In which case I’d like you to consider finding a great casual (not softcore) guild on your sever, or join ours.

Three years of time has only slightly changed my perspective, and generally I still hold those comments as true. They are though as lacking as the other posts.

For this alternate definition I’m mainly thinking of World of Warcraft, but I think that some of the logic should apply very widely. What I was thinking was changing from having two binary options to chose from, to creating more a Myers-Briggs personality type play-style measurement, which details what a person is using a short acronym (AELOSF – see below). A few of the pages above offered stylistic templates rather than binary choices too, much like a horoscope; where a player could read the description and pick one that matched them the closest. I guess I’m trying this as I fell through the definitions of both those approaches.

The Myers-Briggs style picks a set of paired terms that are fairly ambiguous, that can also be placed diametrically opposed to each other with a fair degree of logic – and then has the reader pick which they match better to. In effect they pick between the two extremes in the same manner as the Casual vs Hardcore, but where they sit is expanded due to the range of options in the definition.

These are some of the ideas I had for the juxtaposed measurements:

• Professional vs Amateur – where a Professional is being paid money to participate, and an Amateur is unpaid. There is a very clear difference, although not overly useful to most of the community as I’d bet most people are not paid to play games. I’m not sure if this has practical application or not, and if it was applied, if it should be applied to a game on a case by case basis.
• Experienced vs Newbie – where a Experienced player is one who is very familiar with the game, and a Newbie is learning the basic concepts. Now this is a far more subjective range, where there is a much greater range between the two ends. As terms they’ll create debate unto themselves, but I hope when added to the rest of the mix the terms themselves will become more descriptive of the player’s goals.
• Unlimited time vs Limited time – where the unlimited person has high availability to play, and the limited person has almost none. This could also contain a sub-range of people who have interruption free vs constant interruption, but I’m not sure yet if that level of granularity is needed.
• Optimal vs Relaxed – as to their use of their time and their resources. This is an interesting one, as the style of use of resources is the focus of many blogs and websites, and they themselves are often focused on maximum efficiency. The gold per hour type measurement, kills per raid, and if the player cares how long it takes to get a dungeon done. Some players are very relaxed and are not overly fussed if a dungeon completion takes 20 extra minutes, but others are excited by the prospect of beating a record, or even frustrated by 30 seconds of dead time after a boss kill.
• Social vs Hidden – is a measure of how important the interaction with others plays is for their valuable gameplay. There are players who raid (which obviously requires other players) but would not otherwise interact with anyone. There are also the players who only play due to the social aspects, and there are players who may as well be playing a solo game, as they talk to nobody.
• Focused vs Wide range of focus – are you a player who seeks to complete all your chosen activities? Professions, archaeology, or participate in both pvp and pve content, or have a range of alts vs. just one character.

So we end up with a set of choices, still somewhat binary, but not as restrictive as a single word.

I would be: (A)ELOSF.

This is because I’m an unpaid Amateur but Experienced WoW player, with very Limited time, who always plays Optimally. I highly value the Social aspects of the game, but tend to Focus on pve for a few characters only. The Brackets are there as I think almost everyone will be an “A” as far as World of Warcraft is concerned.

So what are you? What type of gamers are out there?

ps – The Dead Good Tanking Guide as a great comment:

I know, I know – why would you bother reading yet another diatribe about who falls into what category? But I’m working from the knowledge that the same could be applied to EVERYTHING I write, so I’ll continue safe in the knowledge this piece is no better or worse than my usual offerings. 🙂

He’s spot on, and added to my feed reader.

What non-tanks need to know: CC

Dangfool/Kallixta from the Blog Azeroth shared topics created this thread, and its darn topical to me:

It was a little change and we’ve had some time to adjust. What’s life like now that Tanks need not worry as much about threat? What should tanks be aware now they have one less thing to stay aware of? What bad habits have DPS been freed to pick up?

While the change to threat is the obvious inspiration for this topic, it could just as easily be “What non-tanks need to know about tanking?”/”What tanks need to know about non-tanks?” We’ve never had that as a shared topic either.

The TLDR version of this post is:

• Crowd Control is critical to a successful run – this has not changed since day one, and the threat change has nothing to do with it.
• Interrupts are not optional. Dps need to do them, and so does the Tank. ZG is a bastard if nobody uses interrupts on trash and bosses.
• If you don’t understand the fight script / mechanics, then ask beforehand. There is only shame on you if you ask afterwards, or don’t ask at all.
• If you can’t do more than 7k or better dps on a single target, non-moving fight then do not sign up. You’re not ready. By comparison I’m wearing a jumble of gear that is basically similar to tier 11, and I can do 8-9k as the tank. You had better be able to keep up with me.

It resonates as the Tanking change has made Tanking better for threat but had no affect on the overall skill in the LFD community. It even looks like some dps have taken the stance that as Tanking is now easier then the fights are easier. No! The threat change means that it is much harder to pull threat, but all other constraints and limitations still apply.

I Tank the ZA/ZGs regularly to try to cap my valor points each week. Typically this means spending 45 minutes to 1.5 hours in a single run, hammering my way through the instance. Often I’ll do these back to back, as I get a few nights a week to play, and I don’t want to “waste” them on other activity when I have Valor to earn. This provides me with a wealth of experience on what it is like as a Tank in the LFD system.

For example recently I tried to complete ZA three times.

Group One:

• The first Shaman healer left straight away, and I suspect he/she didn’t want to run ZA. The second Priest healer stayed until I left.
• One of the dps (Warrior) insisted on pulling, and wiped us on two occasions. He was kicked, just after the first boss.
• Nobody killed the Scouts, even when they had a Skull icon over them.
• The Mage dps did not want to CC, and had to be told every time.
• I quit after the 4th wipe, which due to battle res was my 5th death. We didn’t successfully kill the 2nd boss. Apparently a key fault was mine for not gathering up all the small birds, although I was regularly dying due to the amount of damage from the same birds…I’d say they we not being dps’ed at all.

Group Two:

• We started in ZA again, with two Hunters from the same server, but different guilds. They were clearly friends, and both hated to trap. One didn’t seem to understand the idea or a re-trap at all. The other was slow, but generally polite.
• The Hunters left just before the 3rd boss, both quit without explanation. They were replaced by a Mage and Hunter from different servers, who also didn’t know how to CC properly.
• That team also had a Rogue who didn’t like to sap or interrupt, and just responded with “Lol” when asked. I decided early that he was a waste of oxygen, but was at least more useful than the Paladin dps who stood in front of the bosses next to me and did less than 5000 dps.
• I quit just after the 3rd boss when the dps started insulting the healer. Now the healer was doing an average job, but to my read was busy keeping the fire-standers alive more than herself, so perhaps not valid criticism.
• So many deaths.

Group Three:

• Polite. Everyone said hello when we started.
• I joked about having a metal head suited only to tanking, and the healer (priest) thought I was cake to heal and we started a casual banter through the rest of the run. Even when we had the odd death, it was ok as the mood was lightened.
• The dps Shaman and Mage used CC regularly, with the Mage never being needed to be told. The Shaman was not as good, but got better as we went.
• We lost a Warrior to a disconnect, but gained a DK who was basically the same. Both did what they should have, and despite them having average dps (~10k) they were still useful.
• We completed the run after a long time, but we finished. Even the otherwise silent players said thanks at the end, and I would contemplate recruiting that healer if she was not on another server.

Now I know that a few examples do not create a rule, but the disparity of attitudes seems to be present in almost every session I sit down to play in.

What needs to change:

• Crowd Control is critical to a successful run – this has not changed since day one, and the threat change has nothing to do with it. If your class can CC then you must learn when to use it, how best to use it, and how to reapply mid battle.
• Interrupt the casters, mobs, bosses…etc.
• Don’t be told every time to do it. Just use it and assume it’s needed.
• Don’t face pull through moving, stay aware.
• Don’t pull if its not your role. A tank may ask for a Mind Control or other affect that starts a fight, but nobody should ever take it upon themselves to start a fight when they’re not the tank. You just look like an idiot when some or all the group wipes.
• Ask for help if you need it.

It is not a revolutionary concept to think that people should know what their role is, and do it without complaint. Further I have more respect for people who are less skilled or unsure, but will ask a question than those who will proceed regardless and just make a mess.

Asking questions and making mistakes is how some people (like myself) learn. I respect it. Staying silent just gives the impression that you are OK, and don’t want or need advice. If you are silent in a group I assume that you will be quick, efficient, and not screw-up too much.

Happy fighting, and may all your LFDs be graceful, educational, and error free.

At least a few upgrades

Last week I was finally able to purchase the third t12 item, and I decided to craft the 365 weapons rather than waiting for either a price drop, or a totally lucky drop in Firelands. It feels good to have some upgrades.

It took me a long time to get the third t12 item, and I worked hard for it – was it casual? Yup. But you can get stuffed if you think it didn’t take a very long time. I’m not the best geared in my guild at all, but considering that I have never had a raid upgrade in Firelands, and have barely stepped in there, being around position 12 to 14 on the guild list is a small achievement.

Today I read news that the t13 items will not be available for purchase with Valor, but other gear will be. Initially I was totally disenfranchised by this. I think this is OK as long as the gear is almost the same as the tier gear. A tad less powerful is fine (eg. missing a Tier set bonus), but if the items are no more powerful than the 5 man rewards, then I will not be grinding Valor at all – and cannot see a reason to do the 5 mans beyond the basic gear-ups.

That will have a drastic affect on the tank population, and the amount of players we’ll see – so much so that I doubt it is even plausible for the Valor gear not to be almost as good. Not granting t13 rewards makes having those items more special, and I like that. If you are a raider and you got lucky enough to get them, then kudos. Just don’t penalise my role in the raid because I’ve geared a few items using Valor. That would be stupid.

So what does this all mean? It means I’m watching closing the announcements for gear as part of 4.3. Very closely.

Lore question: Why the Dragon Soul?

A long time ago I read the books where the Dragon Soul (later called the Demon soul) was used by Deathwing to fight and subjugate the other dragon aspects, the puny elves, and the hordes of the Burning Legion.Then after much heroic effort a human destroyed it using a scale from Blackwing.

What I remember was that Deathwing was immune to the dragon/demon-soul’s abilities, as he chose to not add his own power to it when it was forged, as he wanted to have the talisman for nefarious deeds. This is why it was his scale that was able to destroy the talisman.

Why then would Deathwing be vulnerable to the Dragon Soul now? I don’t get it.

Should DPS Death Knights learn to Tank?

Good topic on wow insider a while ago asking if Healing priests should learn shadow, and it has resonance with a DK’s dps role. So I’ll rhetorically ask:

Should DPS Death Knights learn to Tank? And vice versa?

I’d like to give you a balanced and well rounded opinion on this, complete with examples and war stories, but I can’t. The answer is so bloody obvious it makes me wonder how you could have the opposite view – my answer is by hell and damnation they should.

Everyone will play better and understand roles better when they have a wider set of experience. If you have not done it, go try a different role in 5 mans. Do 20 runs in each role, and then see if it changed your attitude.

Disagree? Please tell me why.

Transmogrify – Old Rep Gear

Edit: as this look uses primarily white items, its not really a transmog set; more an rp set.
More cool old gear, now from the Bloodsail Buccaneers – you know, the bad guys hanging around near Booty Bay. Arrrr.

Remember too that it is Pirate Day soon, so expect a few scallywags and such to shiver your timbers. The Rep gives you all the basic kit, Hat, Shirt, Pants, etc. the groovy weapons are from elsewhere.

The be all and end all of this rep is that its bloody long and hard to do, it makes you hostile with a variety of Neutral cities, and you get to look like a Pirate. Whats not to love about a huge red hat, fluffy shirt, and a ship’s wheel as a shield. Nuff said really.

Image is straight from wowhead, a pirate surrounded by corpses was too sweet to resist.

You want hardcore? Then burn

Divine Plea as a post about the QQ on Nurfs. I agree mostly. The qq on the nurf makes me mad too, especially when it comes from folks who were in no way even close to being negatively affected; so I commented:

How about this – Blizzard rolls back the nurfs on HMs, in fact they increase them. Make HMs so brutal that only 0.25% of the player base can stand it, and add a month long attunement to them as well. You want a way to prove how godlike you are, fine. I hope Blizzard gives it to you in spades.

You want hardcore? Where is the limit, and what about your neighbor’s limit? Oh, right, screw your neighbour…its all about you.

Mostly I mean that. But a little of me knows that there is a rational argument for why its not OK to just sweep the nurf bat around. I suspect it is mainly the timing and the lack of notice that is the real issue for some players. If they’d known about it sooner, or perhaps if it had happened at the same time as 4.3 they’d care a lot less. If their personal progression was a little faster, they’d be less bothered?

By no means am I having a bitch or rant, I’m actually finding this change to be a very interesting way to understand the players. People are coming out on all sides with great perspectives on the affects – this “drama” shows us more about the shades of grey.

Progression is somewhat an illusion. Some people fight to get 7/7, and others fight to get as far as they can, and others fight until they must sleep. It is relative. There are darn handy websites who track your exact progression relative to others, relative to every other bloody guild playing the game. You want an idea of your progression? Then track and measure yourself by your server ranking. Then Battlegroup, then Region, and then across the playerbase. Then you’ll know where you sit.

If you are 5/7 now, you’ll probably get 7/7 soon after the nurf, and if you are progressing based upon competition with others, or for some sort of experience validation – then this change should have no real affect.

…but then I know it will in the back of your mind, and I know that it still feels wrong somehow. Like an itch you just can’t scratch, it drives you to say and do things that are unusual. All I can offer to you folks is the advice that you’ll get another chance in patch 4.3.

All this talk of progression and difficulty also makes me think that along with an Easy mode for Raids, perhaps we could see a DEATH-MODE as well. There are the fights where the bosses are just bastards. They’d be like me as a DnD games master after too much sugar and not enough sleep. Giant blue lightning bolts from the sky…indoors!

Give me a Total-Party-Kill counter in the GUI.

A rolling debuff that must slay a team mate at a random time in the fight, so you don’t get to “save” a res.

An artificial latency increase by 500ms.

And fire…more fire than you’ve seen since the first rpgs were written.

and Burn.

I see nothing wrong with giving the really cutting edge guys quasi-impossible tasks that mere mortals are not meant to do. In fact don’t even give them a reward for it, the suffering and final completion are the reward.

Or just the suffering. Happy killing (now with 30% less hit points).