How many people really are elitist jerks?

This comment from one of the guild leaders of a worldwide top raid guild:

"im yet to see a rogue switch his agility gems for armor pen because of an encounter or their own thought process.

if they do change it, it's because some spreadsheet says it's now the best way to do it and it's completely pointless ... the actual number of people that properly understand the maths of stuff like armor pen is TINY"

I myself have wondered how many people on EJ actually have a clue, and how many are more like me "tell me what works".

As Tobold mentioned how restricting being able to choose any number of skills would be, we'd all just pick whatever the best choices are at the time.

I've also pondered how many guilds actually work out content on their own? And how many of us copy what we've seen done elsewhere?

Stopping yourself

The reason why Keen's post (see my previous post) stood out to me is because I'm often guilty of finding ways to make what I'm doing in WoW fun, when it initially isn't.

It somehow reminded me of an old Simpsons episode where Bart and Principle Skinner had this exchange:

Principle Skinner: Oh, licking envelopes can be fun! All you have to do is make a game of it.

Bart: What kind of game?

Principle Skinner: Well, for example, you could see how many you could lick in an hour, then try to break that record.

Bart: Sounds like a pretty crappy game to me.

Principle Skinner: Yes, well... Get started.

Amazing Aion?

Go read about Keen's Amazing Aion experience and let me know if you think he really is enjoying Aion.

I'll wait.

Okay no I won't, after reading it I'm thinking the title shouldn't include the adjective Amazing. Comments have their meanings changed when they are taken out of context, would you think Keen is enjoying himself if you read this:

**Levels 22-25 aka “Hell levels”

**I won’t lie to you… these really were hell levels. Exp seemed to crawl and there weren’t enough quests available to me. I was dragging my feet and resisting something I had done for years: Grind.

**A switch needed to be thrown in my head to accept this form of grinding as nothing different, even though it felt different.

**Between the Morheim Ice Fort and the winding path that leads to the Fungus stuff there are tons of soft mobs — kill them ALL and don’t watch the exp bar.

**However, I do not find it to be as amazing as most people were saying.

**Okay, so this place is great exp but is it fun? There’s nothing really amazing to look at here and the content is rather straight forward: Pull, tank, spank.

**I was really getting tired of the drab looking spriggin area with washed out gray colors in the area after the boring snow.


**Grinding is still prevalent at this level and I find that I end up killing stupid amounts of mobs to get the quest drop and work my way to mobs that I need (lots of wading through aggro mobs)

**I never reached the point of not liking the game, but I did become indifferent to it for a few days as I was struggling to find time to invest into the 18-23 span.

**Yeah, it’s a themepark-like “end-game” mentality oriented goal but it’s a goal nonetheless and it’s something I really needed in Aion.


**For anyone struggling out there to feel Aion’s soul, to feel what this game has to offer and what it’s all about, reach level 25. I know, I know, you shouldn’t have to play a game to level 25 to feel this and I’m not going to justify it at all (trust me, in hindsight I didn’t like 1-23 either) but it changes for the better.


As someone commented to Keen "...even with you now framing your Aion experience in a positive light, it sounds pretty dire to me."














First off he describes “Hell levels” and he agreed they were!

Failnight

It became evident to me last evening, that our guild will never progress very far if we continue to accept other guilds' alts as main raiders.

There are some skilled players who can switch characters on a dime and perform well. We don't usually get these players.

These players show up on their alt death knight or hunter, because everyone has a dk or hunter alt.

They aren't gemmed and enchanted the best because they "save that gold for their main".

Instead we get players searching through their spellbook looking for spells and asking who to use what spell on (this actually happened in a heroic, needless to say we wiped a few times and called it a night).

My plan is to figure out what it is I want on my own main and then take another break from raiding again. I shouldn't feel like I'm running 80s through Stockades.

Why don't we all have 214,748 gold?

The other day I started pining for a chopper. I suddenly realized how gold poor I am when I think about purchasing the mats necessary to get my motor running.

Greedy Goblin says there are easy ways to make tons of gold. I realized something else. I don't believe him.

If I believed him I'd be doing it. What is stopping me from at least trying one of his or any other savvy player suggestions?

My usual response is I don't think I'd have fun playing the market to the lengths necessary to turn a profit. But I also I have this odd feeling I'd do something stupid and lose my gold and probably end up as one of GG's morons of the week. Have you heard of old people who hid money in their mattress because its "safe"? Yeah, I think in a past life I lived through the Great Depression because I can relate*. I'm risk averse.

Either I take the plunge and try one of their suggestions, or continue to put around on my boring mount.


*This doesn't even have to date back to the depression, recently, June 2009 and Israeli woman threw out a mattress only to find her mother had stowed away her life savings of $1mil in it!

Less is less

As I mentioned earlier about not being as much in the loop as I used to be about WoW...I didn't realize they haven't added "Less is more" achievements to Ulduar and ToC.

This was a good choice on someone's, whoever makes these type of decisions, part. While attempting to complete an instance with less than the usual amount of people is challenging for those who do it, it really defeats the purpose of raiding - where a larger group of people get together to complete something.

A few times I was part of a less is more attempt because it was unplanned or someone didn't show up. But if a guild decides to 8-man something ahead of time, who gets left out? Of course you can plan around doing it over and over again swapping out people, but that's a headache and I have yet to be involved in a "let's do it for everyone" scheme from start to finish. The person who plans it, usually gets their achievement or mount and the next week comes down with a cold.

And then there are these "dps it down" achievements that run with fewer tanks and fewer healers. I guess that's the payback for having a easier time finding 5-mans.

There is a thread over at the Raid and Dungeons forum about removing the uber cloak drop from the perfect heroic run (no wipes I believe from start to finish of the whole instance). Even the top guilds complain that since their are connectivity issues they shouldn't be punished.

Then there's the issue of cohesiveness again. Do you sit out the guy on Comcast every attempt because you don't want to risk screwing up just one attempt?

For 10 man regular runs we try to get as many teams going (usually 2) as possible. But for heroics we end up being choosier, because we know it takes a little bit more. You should be "punished" for lack of dps or lack of situational awareness, not a crappy computer connection.

More is more, because when you have to compete for a raid spot you tend to do better. I remember playing with very competitive people who still didn't really up their game until they joined a further progressed guilds and realized they actually could put out more dps. What was stopping them before? A guaranteed raid slot.

So there are things that promote success in a raid and things that can undermine it. I still haven't recovered from Undying and Immortal attempts. And it sad to admit the reason we got undying is because we didn't include some players we normally raid with.

While it may not always be possible, I want to succeed in spite of whatever drawbacks our guild may have. Not end up trying to run things when Player Y isn't online.

In the dark

Over and near the end of the summer I was playing less WoW. As a result, I was reading less about it as well. Now that I've started playing again I realize I'm playing in the dark. Since I haven't been kept abreast of WoW goings-on, I'm coming across things by accident. Some things I wish I hadn't missed, like lots of easy xp in battlegrounds (they've since nerfed it), but others have been nice surprises, like a small new area of land added. I won't say where so it may be a surprise to you too!

Downtime

Yes, compared to RL, wow *is* my downtime. But I'm speaking about a different kind of downtime - the downtime that is between pulls, corpse runs, etc. As I've commented about commenting this is my least favorite group behavior.

Recently I've had a chance to play more than usual. One evening I had a ton of fun, the next evening, not so much. And the one thing I can point to as being the difference was downtime. There's really no resolution, because things were out of our control. The first night everyone was on, we had even more people than we had room for. We buffed, we killed, we buffed, we wiped, we ran back, we killed, wash, rinse, repeat, good night, cya next time.

The next raid session, half the people didn't show up like they said they would. We had to find replacements, we had to figure out who was going to do what. We wiped several times before trying something easier. Since the something easier was old content, people swapped out to alts. We waited awhile longer to see if the no-shows would show. ZzzzzZzzzzz.

The night eventually turned out to be successful given what we had, but I didn't really have that great of a time. Because waiting around is torture. A top 100 (top 20?) guild, Fusion, realizes this and devotes time to speed runs. Well I think for them its more about testing their limits, but I'm sure its also about keeping everyone engaged.

I've been thinking alot about Greedy Goblin's coined (no pun intended) "worse than grind" phrase. (I typed up something about it but didn't post it, maybe later.). It describes when the majority of a guild knows the fights, knows what they need to do individually, but the failures of a few cause just enough problems that they never progress. Or they progress really slowly (usually just enough to keep them satisfied with being in the middle of a "worse than grind".

I think this can apply, in a way, to people who suffer from delays. There are players who have signed up and show up on time, make sure to have everything repaired, stocked on reagents/food, head to the instance early to help summon or show up right on time, are fast on their corpse runs, eat up or bandage, when necessary afk makes them quick. Those who don't take care to try to do all of these things, cause everyone else to suffer "worse than grind" or maybe it is better describe as "worse than wait".

But all of this is the nature of the MMORPG beast. You group, you find yourself bobbing in the waves caused by the group.

Tier 10

The WoW blogosphere is abuzz with Tier 10. (okay maybe just the druid blogs because the helms are so weird looking).

For some reason at first I thought everyone was talking about tiers in a new 10 man dungeon.

Yeah, somewhere along the way I lost track of tiers.

I knew Tier 0.5 would start nothing but trouble.

And Aion...

Aion will not hold me past my initial subscription purchase. For some reason, I keep feeling the need to say "It's not Aion's fault." I think its a great looking game, the beasts and humanoids are imaginative. It's easy to play if you've played any other WoW-similar MMO.

At a few points during my play session over the weekend, I found myself checking my xp bar. I typed up a big long post about it, but I can sum it up in a few words: "That is not a good thing."

Pugs Revisited

Speaking of going solo, and I was in my previous post. I wandered into that dark, scary forest of pugs over the weekend. Given what low expectations I have, they went exceedingly well.

My irritations, as I commented over at Big Bear Butt's blog, didn't come up as much. Though we still had a delay for getting everyone to Heroic Violet Hold (yes the one right smack dab in the middle of Dalaran).

Everyone is trying to get emblems, so finding a group hasn't been very hard. The old instances have been out for a while, and the new ToC one is weirdly short and easy. ToC is truly a gimme instance. So far I've done one boss without a weapon (lance equip ftw), a run with the odd make up of only rogues and death knights (who needs buffs?), One with someone who just hit 80 a few hours beforehand (they couldn't outdps the tank). Easy gear and emblems, no complaints.

But this is coming from someone who hardly ever does heroics. How fun is it to do day after day? I'm not going to try to find out.

When WoW becomes casual for everyone

A friend of mine tried in vain to get something going with a bunch of friends and family (some in different time zones) in WoW Sunday.

All of us can be considered casual now, with only a few raiding here and there. The problem was unwittingly expecting we'd all be free to do something right then and there.

My friend logged off exasperated, and a bit overblown in my book, commenting about quitting WoW completely.

Yet I think it explains how WoW has become for me perfectly. I want to play casually, when, where and for how long I want to. I thought this only affected raiding. You can't progress very far if everyone in the guild has my attitude. (Keep in mind if you're down two person that's actually an achievement.) So if more and more people have my attitude and decide not to show up that doesn't fare well for the raids.

But actually it works the same for smaller instances too. If a group of friends all have the attitude of logging on when they want to, the odds of them actually accomplishing something together are low as well. What each of us are doing is asking our friends to keep their schedules free on the chance we want to do something together. You might do that for a movie, or a night out for wings, but it doesn't feel right anymore to do so for WoW.

I think casual WoW really means going solo. If you log on and want to do something with a group, it will probably end up being a pug. Because if you and all your friends play casually and no one wants to adhere to a schedule, its just not going to happen.

Endgame betas

Is it just me or does it seem odd no one seems to mind that they never get to beta test the endgame of their MMOs. (I say never, what do I know?)

We beta test levels 1-10, or whoo 20! We make our predictions, we decide to buy or pass based on the short time we've beta'd. And then are angry when, let's not even mention getting to endgame, level 21 sucks.

I guess testing things on PTRs count but that's after we've purchased the game.

An MMO lasts on average what 6 mos to 7 years (I made that up) and yet we're okay to beta a month or so of that time (or follow the reviews of someone who did) and make final decisions on something.

I guess Age of Conan is the best example, how in the world did Tortage turn out so well (so I've heard), yet no one mentioned the fun ended there?

Maybe everyone is like me after all, only expecting to have a month or so of fun, until they go back to whatever they were doing before the new game was released.

No Aion update

I was expecting to play Aion a little more and have a little more to post about it. But I haven't felt like logging on.

I think I'll end up playing Aion in long sessions maybe on the weekends instead of frequent short bursts throughout the week. Playing longer sessions lets me feel like I can take my time and explore instead of get X amount done before the evening's over.

Death and Taxes and Loot disagreements

I was going to post this yesterday, but felt I hadn't reached a conclusion, so I just left it to die a slow death in draft form. Instead after seeing Elnia's post over at Larisa's Pink Pigtail Inn, Defining 'Fair' in Loot Distribution I decided to put it out there in the ether of the internet, unfinished but topical.

I think I'm more curious why Rohan started this topic over at Blessing of Kings than the topic itself. Did Rohan miss out on some loot recently?

Rohan posits when Player A passes to friend Player B, loot distribution is still fair to Player C because Player C's chance at the loot has neither lowered or increased Player A's decision.

But I'm lead to ask why Player A is rolling to begin with if they are just going to pass. If player A just dropped out before the roll, Player C's chance is now greater.

And as some have commented there is the issue of perception. I remember playing in a guild with a husband and wife. The husband would roll along with the wife and if he won would pass it on to his wife. His win, his decision right? Rightly so, some disagreed. Two chances at loot are better than one.

And that is what Rohan discusses. As long as you still get your one chance, should it matter that others get two?

Ultimately we all want to feel like we are getting rewarded for what we put in almost to a equal degree. Many of us probably want to get rewarded for more than we we actually do.

If you try to make it black and white, fair and unfair, someone being friends shouldn't enter into the equation. You shouldn't be allowed to pass to someone.

That's why no dkp system, loot rules, work perfectly. Because no matter what is set before us, we all come into it with our own varied experiences.

I made a post on WoW forums that everyone should have equal access to the Tankard of Terror. My reasoning was it's boe and able to be sold at auction and make the same amount of gold for everyone. Of course when I finally did some Direbrew runs, it dropped (twice so far) and I didn't even roll. Logically I felt I could roll on it like everyone else. But deep down in side, it felt greedy on my part. Greedy Goblin would have a field day with me, but I digress.

I've never had a problem with main tanks getting geared up earlier than the rest. But what about the secondary tank, what about the off-tanks. What about the tanks that sub in when all of the above aren't available? And what about the classes that share tokens with tanks?

I've been in several different raid groups, and every main tank I've ever raided with no matter what personality they have, at some point says "I really, really could use that" and which point inevitably whoever else is rolling against them says "I'll pass to you then". Do loot rules take guilt into account?

And forget about tanks, healers they are important too, should they get geared up second? And melee dps are at more risk than ranged, should they get geared up sooner?

My issue with alts getting gear against mains is a subject I could make its own post. A main still has the same chance at loot, but watching alt after alt come in and win and be on their way can be disheartening.

Any time I read about loot council (all loot decisions made by a small number in the raid), those in charge of the loot council always say it works well. You usually don't hear the same from those not on the council.

Even though I mentioned not giving in to greedy feeling above, overall I have become a more greedy player. In fact our guild's system promotes it in a way. If you pass on things to other players they get it at no cost. I got burned by that once, and have learned to be "greedier".

A few Aion likes and dislikes

Disclaimer: The dislikes are minor - nothing that stops me or should stop anyone from enjoying Aion.

Dislikes first:
The personal stores. Rudy giuliani cleaned up the streets, moving vendors to their own little sections in New York a few years ago. As someone who doesn't actually live in NY I feel like they removed part of the "NY feel". On the other hand they removed eyesores.

That's how I feel about personal stores. Players setting up shop anywhere they please makes the city look bad! And their banner ads are as bad as...well banner ads. And the banners aren't set apart in anyway, so it all blends in with other text of things you actually want to see.

And many of the ones I've looked at aren't actually selling anything anyway. For example, putting up 1 cheap potion for 20 million kinah (currency in Aion) without any intention of someone purchasing it. I've read this is a way of going afk without being kicked out of the game.

Get the peddlers off the city streets!!!

Gold sellers. Cuppycake said she never wanted to hear complaints about gold sellers again. But I'm going to say it. Gold sellers. What a blight on the MMO genre. The constant whispers are a pain, and I'm not sure yet how to avoid them without removing myself from the normal social activity of chat channels.

Get the sellers off the channels!!!

Ascension.I never understood why flying was such a selling point and after ascending I still don't. Perhaps I rushed through something, because I think I missed the part where I got my wings. I didn't notice until a quest giver said, "Now that you have your wings...".

Now for likes.
Character creator. For once players actually look different than one another. The ultimate in character creators - City of Heroes, may have finally been surpassed. For once, CoH face choices seem limited.

Cut scenes. Cut scenes aren't something Aion invented, but what they've done I don't think I've seen in other MMOs - they actually include the character you created (see above) in the cut scenes. I hope I'm not spoiling anything by saying my future character looks hawt.

Innocence. I like how right now I don't know what the best manastones are for my class. I don't know what the best stats are, or what armor I should be wearing. I don't know the optimal place to quest. And that's alright for now.

Exploration. I happened on something due to simply exploring. The quests didn't lead me to it, I just happen to go off the beaten path. It wasn't anything extraordinary, but it felt good to get a payoff for doing something I wasn't directed to do.

What a Short, Familiar Journey It Was

I completed Long, Strange Trip over the weekend. I already had a 310% mount, but I do like how the violet one looks better. :)

Another ballast released.

What's kept me playing WoW consistently are these virtual goals I've set. I felt like getting Loremaster would expose me to just about everything Blizzard created for us. I set a "skill" goal of getting one of the dungeon drakes. And I felt any self-respecting longtime WoW player would complete long, strange trip, amirite?

Loremaster would have been much easier if I hadn't changed mains along the way. Had I stuck with the character I created back in 2004 I might have some rare things to look back on. But eventually I didn't enjoy playing my frist or second main, so who's to say I would have stuck with it if I had stuck with them. And actually the character I play now, kinda sucked with how things used to be. Hats off to anyone who chose a character at release and managed to enjoy playing it in all its incarnations throughout these years.

Anyway, after Loremaster I still have 25 quests in my log. Some dailies, some old quests that I fear if i drop them I won't be able to pick them up again. I might finish some of them, I might not. But if they add a "Master Loremaster" or "Loremaster: The Questening" with 500 more quests to complete? I have no desire to go through it again. Overall I enjoying completing Loremaster, but at the end it became something I was just trying to get finished.

I have never been a hardcore raider so many of the raid achievements were beyond my reach. But due to crossing paths with some great players with casual schedules (the only reason our paths did cross) this past spring I managed to get a raid proto-drake. But in the end the experience was so unsavory (guild drama), I decided I would never set a goal like that again. The journey was not worth destination.

And lastly Long, Strange Trip. As I've mentioned many times I've played since release. For some reason, knowing that fact and not completing Long, Strange Trip felt wrong to me. It's like going to Arizona and not visiting the Grand Canyon. So I made it a point to get the meta requirements done, although I had taken a break last October. Many of them I really enjoyed, but once again (see a pattern), in the end I felt like I was doing something because of the goal, not because I was having fun with it.

I want to learn my lesson here. My only goal from now on should be "have fun".

I have one last thing I said I would do, play a horde character. I made this goal fairly recently, with the announcement of Cataclysm. I found myself doing battlegrounds instead of the questing like I said I would. My old goal "complete horde quests" has been replaced with "have fun". If I get back around to doing quests so be it. If they remove some quests and I never get a chance to do them so be it. I'll live.

I've reached a fork in the road. One path is structured with checklists and achievements and endless milestone markers of virtual goals and raiding schedules. The other is unmapped.

I've traveled the first path long enough.

Aion: First impressions

Was able to purchase the game. Had a very slight problem with installation. But no queue at all when I got the chance to log on. Later on that evening there was a queue of ~600, but by then I had something else to do so it was okay. They gave an estimated time of 30 minutes, which for a new release I guess isn't so bad.

Great looking game. Runs smooth so far. If you've played WoW, etc. you'll be able to jump right into this game as well.

Disappointing to see the gold sellers. In the starter area you see as many Mxcxmsc's as regular players. And they whisper you. Do I really want someone selling me powerleveling services for a brand new game?

Did it make me feel like I did when I first played WoW. No. But that's really nothing to hold against Aion.

It's way to soon to pass final judgement. But I like it so far. I think I'll at least get my money's worth out of it.

Aion jitters

I'm hoping to play Aion this weekend. Yes I want to experience it for myself so I don't keep making unsubstantiated reviews! And yes, I want to see the graphics for myself, they really do look great from what I've seen in screenshots. But more importantly I want to start playing soon because MMORPGs are simply more fun when the worlds have PLAYERS in them!

As Jaye vividly describes in text and picture, leveling later in a game's life is tiring.

I leveled several characters to 70, but only one to 80. When I thought about how it would be to come back after quitting for a while I was daunted by the fact I would not have to just level to 80 but 85, or if I'm gone long enough 90 or 100! The act itself was daunting and realizing I'd probably be doing it in empty areas made it worse.

Maybe I'm the only one that feels this way, but I like seeing other players around even if I'm not constantly interacting with them. Maybe that's why I like pvping on my new horde character more than questing.

So I want to level in Aion NOW while other players are doing the same, while the world is bustling with activity. I'm getting unexpectedly anxious that I might miss it.

Getting what you ask for

I continue to prefer doing bgs on my horde character instead of leveling during my Questing through Vanishing Azeroth experience.

I always get pumped from being able to contribute in a bg when I'm on the lower end of the bracket. But being on the high end means you get to participate more than just being a free hk. So when I hit the max for the bracket I'm in I decided to go visit the Slahtz "Experience Eliminator".

Easter Egg side note, the horde EE's name is Slahtz, while the Alliance EE's name is Behsten. Behsten Slahtz (Best in Slots). They both wear level 19 twink gear and are level 19 themselves. They whisper things about wanting twink gear (Lucky Fishing Hat) and losing twink enchants (Nethercleft Leg Armor). I assume after players noticed his hp didn't match a twinks his health was buffed to 1100 with the recent patch. No detail overlooked by Blizzard!

I quickly realized how it feels to be gold poor again as the fee to turn off XP gains was 10 gold. A mere pittance for my Alliance characters, but a large percentage of my lone Horde character's gold. But I chucked the gold pieces to Slahtz and rejoined the queues. I went about my normal activities while in queue, and didn't really pay attention at first that I wasn't getting queued up. Queues in lower brackets usually don't go past 10 minutes and are usually around 1 minute or so.

I knew there had been a patch so I searched to see if something was going on with it. Turns out hardly anyone is queuing up for the non-xp bgs!


Cynwise writes "The only twinks in the upper brackets are now ex-twinks. I sat for hours in queue with my experience frozen and never played a game once 3.2 hit. With XP gains on, I play in under a minute. The queue times speak louder than anything I could write. If you want to twink in the 50s or 60s, you won’t play."


So either twinks don't like playing with just other twinks (as they cried loudly about in the past). Or there really isn't as many twinks around as it seemed.

Now if a twink comes into a XP bg, they can still rip through non-twinks but they risk leveling out of their bracket. I can't imagine anyone is going to bother twinking much if they can't get a bg or if the bgs they get level them out of their twink gear.

The weird part is heirlooms give players the same advantage original twinks had. And not everyone has access to them, at least not until leveling one character to max. It's like Blizzard encourages twinks with one hand and discourages them with the other.

The whole thing has left me with mixed feelings. I have actually been enjoying pvping around the levels there isn't such a great gear or spell availability disparity. I'm the last person who would want to turn off XP but there I was actually wanting to freeze a moment in time.

The queues are so bad for non-XP bgs that it isn't an option for me. At this very moment I like pvping more than question so not being able to pvp doesn't work. I don't need to be able to level in BGs but it was nice to be able to do so. I heard at upper levels in AV you really could fly through some levels, but I heard they nerfed it.

I paid yet another 10 gold to turn XP back on and immediately got into a bg. Oh well.