I Want to Be Just Like That When I Grow Up

This is why I like PvP. Yes, you may be the first guild to clear Ulduar, you may have fancy gear and you may treat the game as a job. But nothing compares to that feeling of "OMG I pwn!".

P.S. I'm pissed about the machine scaling in Lake Wintergasp.

And Grunty sucks.

Stop Enjoying PvP!

<=== This guy is not amused

Blizzard has come up with another spectacular idea. Make Lake Wintergrasp dailies weekly. It seems that it has become too popular, so in order to avoid server lagging Blizzard decided to curb the amount of people rushing into Lake Wintergrasp every day. Outrage... Blizzard states that the amount of shards and honor points per daily (now weekly) will rise. It will now be 10 shards, and 3723 honor points per weekly. How are 10 shards a week even close to 3 shards a day? The same with honor. I am used to doing the Wintergrasp dailies almost every day and so are some of my guildies. Getting some of the PvP gear for some of us will soon be a much more tedious task.

It seems strange to me that Blizzard is now trying to get people out of PvP after having rushed them into it. Why even make Lake Wintergrastp if you now try to get players out of there by turning it into a playground for those who go in just for the sake of slaughter (like me)? "Newsflash" - people are most certain to be doing the weeklies the day they reset. That will mean that that day will deliver a massive blow to the server. Is that any better?

It turns out that Blizzard can't handle open world PvP. It is too much of a strain for the servers and blah-blah-blah. Well that is more or less understandable. But why advertise Lake Wintergrasp so much? I mean, it turned out not as intended from the very launch of Wrath. There were no flying machines. Plus the server issues that caused the players to crash to desktop if they logged out in Northrend. If you pimp your product so much - deliver!

Why make PvP gear so accessible just to take it away later? It used to almost be a breeze to get the Hateful Gladiator set, which is pretty good, it gets the job done. You could get it fast and fairly easy. The change does injustice to those who are yet to ding 80. The chunks of honor you got in Lake Wintergrasp were the main source of gear for me and for loads of other players that were fond of PvP. Now it is back to BGs. And personally, I don't really enjoy the BGs. These "PvP mini-games" get very annoying after a while. And it feels much more like a grind to try to get honor points by running several BGs in a row. It is like Blizzard wants to halt PvP after letting it loose. And in the process it's just screwing over the lovers of PvP. The company is so sure of its firm leadership at the MMO market that making a big chunk of players dissatisfied with the gaming experience doesn't seem like such a big deal.

/bored

*Yawn* It's one of those periods of time when nothing interesting is happening in the MMO world. Yes, the Land of the Dead is coming soon. But as I had said in my previous posts, Mythic isn't exactly selling the "free expansion" to me. Too many PQs, a bit too complicated for my liking and still no major improvements to end-game. So...yeah, I'm not interested.

Free Realms looks nice. I bet it's a nice game for nice people. The more gameplay videos I watch, the more I read about it, the nicer this ultra-casual game seems to be. My only issue with this MMO is it being too nice. I really want something more rugged and fantasy-like. Pixies are cute but I'd rather kill orcs or take keeps. So even though the game itself may turn out to be awesome, it just isn't my style of an MMO.

WoW is being WoW. I'm still playing. Not as much though, I mostly log on to Lake Wintergrasp and an occasional BG. Although BGs are getting really old really fast. They say that there is a new BG coming our way, so that is something to look forward to. But guess what, it's not enough for me. More open world PvP please ^_^. In PvE non-news, I got pretty fond of the Argent Tournament. The fact that there is something under construction there makes room for some expectation. Another stage of the Tournament? A new arena? Perhaps a jousting arena? Or maybe a new dungeon? We'll have to wait and see.

You can now sign up for Starcraft II beta. I know, it's not an MMO. But it is a potential base for a new MMO by Blizzard. The Universe of Starcraft, Starcraft Ghost or even a new IP will be big even if it will suck. And I hope it won't. I want a great new game and unfortunately I don't see any other developer company that is able to create something genuinely terrific, a WoW-killer. In any case, the new Blizzard MMO is too far ahead. But who knows, maybe they'll reveal their secret next-gen MMO at this year's Blizzcon. Or they could at least announce the third expansion to WoW.

Maging through PvP

When you get outdamaged by an equally-geared druid in heroics it really gets to you. How, why and WTF? You start thinking that either you stink or that there is definitely something wrong with the class. Personally I get discouraged. And what do you do when you're down in the dumps? Go to Lake Wintergrasp or BGs and kill some dudes there. PvP is the best thing for boosting your self-esteem.

Frost spec is meant for PvP. It is my favourite and you can surprise a warrior that is following you while you run away for your life waiting for the cooldowns to pass. And when they do - meet my elemental friend and watch your feet. The elemental is such a huge asset for a frost mage. The ranged frost nova and AoE are doing wonders for honorable kills. But of course there are some classes that make me cuss at the screen and kick my WoW-watching cat off the table.

Rogues. The arch nemesis of any cloth-wearing class. Death Knights and AoE-friendly content have done their job. There are fewer rogues. At least on the Alliance side. But the Forsaken are still being "original" and stick to rogues. Vanish, sapping, backstabbing - all that makes rogues deadly and extremely annoying to me personally. Rogues still roam BGs. And the fact that they aren't very viable in raids and Lake Wintergrasp makes them pissed and they take it out on mages in BGs. And they are vicious. Sometimes I get lucky and run into a careless rogue. I hear a stealth sound behind my back and "Blink! Ice Barrier! Frost Nova! "Do I dare to turn around?" Elemental! Triplify! and Ice Block!". And when I manage to kill the unfortunate rogue I get happy as a little kid on Xmas. I don't even mind being hit on the noggin by a Death Knight at that moment.

Death Knights. The OP class, the Hunter of today and the blue-eyed hunk of unholy power plowing through our ranks. They do sick amounts of damage and their ghouls are a big pain in the butt for a caster. Even though the DKs are a bit OP I don't really mind their hard-hitting moves. At least you can see them coming at you. What really pops my baloons is Death Grip. I guess Blizzard decided to make DKs so awesome that they wouldn't even have to actually charge at anyone. They casually extend their hand and make the foe come to them. Special delivery for Mr D. Knight! When I'm standing in some cosy spot spamming Frostbolts, minding my own business, the last thing I want is to pop up in the middle of the enemy zerg. Which isn't as grave for an arcane mage. Instant vanish is such a nice thing to have. But I usually go in on Frost and enjoy the Ice Barrier. So when I see a dozen of red names around me the first instinct is Blink. Which doesn't really help a lot. I guess I should just do a /dance macro for just such an occasion. At least the Horde won't expect me bursting into dance.

Paladins. Seriously, my notion of a martial healer is a Warrior Priest kind of guy. Paladins in WoW are sick! Sicker than DK. They sap. They heal. They have their damn bubbles. Killing a Paladin is like killing a concrete slab. Instead of damage you see "Immune". Instead of "target is dead" you see a metrosexual stomping your head into the ground. Paladins shouldn't be more deadly than Warriors. It just doesn't make sense. All in all I feel content with where I am now in PvP. I'm scared of some classes and I'm intimidated by Paladins. But that is OK, PvP should be challenging. The only sad thing about it all is that some classes like Rogues, Mages and even Warriors are better off PvPing than running Instances. It seems that Paladins make better tanks than Warriors, Rouges don't really have to sap anyone in raids, just as Mages don't really sheep anyone these days. Neither do they do sufficient damage. But at least I get to do PvP and I enjoy me some good PvP. The only problem is that not everyone likes it. But everyone wants to have fun playing.

Noblegarden...meh

I was definitely going to finish the event and get a title at some point in time. But, as it often turns out, I was too lazy to devote several hours of my weekend to trying to snatch eggs from other bunnies. Season events in WoW just don't get me going. Clicking on a hundred or so eggs, finding mates for your pets, planting flowers in deserts...booooring. Yeah, I think I have a couple of extra hours of my life to waste on some Easter festivity in a non-existing world.

I actually like the Warhammer approach to holiday events. "Xmas is coming, people! Let us all kill each other!" Now that is fun. It is actually one of the few features of the game that I still like. I just wish WoW could have the same brutal and yet funny way of celebrating. I want squid pies in my foes' faces! Don't make me blow kisses or eat chocolate eggs all day, make me go to Lake Wintergrasp and throw Easter egg-bombs at people.

I have to admit that making holiday events not just a PvE waste of time (not that PvE itself is a waste of time, rather the egg clicking is) in a PvE game is not an easy thing to do. You can't really rush people to do instance runs, because some players just can't afford it, and Blizzard has to think of non-instance-goers too. PvP objectives (which I would prefer) are even less likely to be accessible to the majority of the players. So I guess that the only way of structuring the events is the way it is done today. Boring, "there and back again", "gather ten this and eat ten that" quests. Simply because that way most of the players can finish them.

But why not give the players and alternative? Give the PvE players their gathering quests and the PvP players their killing quests. I'd rather search for eggs in Lake Wintergrasp than in Kharanos. And the eggs should be explosive!

Land of the Dead and WAR Issues

Mythic is putting out some hot content. The new RvR dungeon or rather a zone, bigger than the Lost Vale and "RvRier" than most of the zones in the game. Making epic content is a great way to get people back in WAR. At least if I were a frustrated lvl 40 I would definitely log on to check out the content. The official podcast explains a lot right here (part 1) and here (part 2).

The problem with such an expansion, to my mind, is that it won't keep the players interested for that long. It is huge, it is hardcore, you have to purge the place of the opposite faction when the zone flips, but what is there to do when you clear all the PQs and instances? It is back to trying to sack Altdorf or the Inevitable City. Which is still the worst part of the game.

The system of controlling Nehekhara is again based on zone control and killing the players of the opposite faction. That takes time and determination. You can't just fly up to the Instance and enter, you have to spend several hours fighting other players for resources first and then get to see the new content. That sounds fun but how can a casual player fit in such a game? Mythic was portraying WAR as a game that you can play casually and not worry about the content "running away from you". But in reality Warhammer forces gamers to spend hours and hours fighting for objectives (which isn't fun). Otherwise you can just log on to your alt and run around Tier 1 and 2. Personally I doubt that I would have enough time on my hands to dedicate to City Sieges.

When I first heard of Warhammer Online and the City Sieges I was sooo pumped. Really, what can be better than fighting other players for a whole city? I was sure that it was going to be all about RvR. It turned out that it wasn't. It was mostly PvE. I'm actually glad that I haven't gotten to 40 with my Engy. And the truth is, I don't really want to level that fast because I know that the higher you are - the less fun the game is.

So it seems that even with the introduction of the new content Mythic isn't addressing the issue. What they really need to do is make the end-game actually fun and worth striving for. Not to mention fix all the bugs that still pop up every now and then. I'm now playing around with my squig herder in Tier 2 and I'm having a fair share of fun. But unfortunately the buzz of the game is gone for me. Everything gets repetitive after a while and keep sieges are no exception. The thing is, I don't even see the point of leveling my toon. I'm not convinced that Mythic is going to overhaul the City Sieges and make them actually RvR. Its all about the objectives, no end-game - no game.

Is That?...

In my previous post I was ranting about the lack of vehicles in dungeons. That's what you get for being behind with the gear. I was watching YouTube and this is what I came across.





If that is what I think it is then all hail to Blizzard! More of the same please!
*Note to self: watch YouTube before ranting.