Warlords Closing Thoughts

The Legion prepatch is upon us and Warlords of Draenor came out 11/13/14. Perhaps a more relevant piece of information to note would be that the most recent major patch came out 6/23/15, or over a year ago. Just wanted to start out with that.

Legion is set to release August 30th, 2016. Last year, er, a year and a half ago, I was prepped, ready, and roaring to go. I had enough of Mists and while I was still playing nearly every day, I was ready for some new monsters to kill and pixels to loot.

While I am still very ready for some new monsters to kill and pixels to loot, the "preparation" for this expansion has been dramatically different. I have not been playing every day, I am very much not prepared, and I haven't exhausted every possible piece of playable content in Warlords. The reason being that Warlords was rather disappointing.

especially this thing

It's Another Flying Post - Pre-Legion Edition

I made a disclaimer earlier that I'm purposefully keeping myself ignorant to announced Legion features. If I say a thing or things that have already been discussed, announced, explained, or debunked, that is because I intentionally did not research this topic. My reasoning can be summarized by saying that I don't want to spoil the game before it even comes out. My reasoning can be lengthily explained by this particular blog post. Please excuse me and any accidental uneducated nonsense.

Blizzard decided to enter into Warlords without allowing flying. They nudged at maaaybe adding it later, only to kind of backhandedly "announce" in a random article somewhere that they maybe might not be adding it back to the game ever probably most likely. Of course, throughout the entire debacle, people were very fervently internet-campaigning about it, and this just took the cake. I mean, if you somehow missed the whole thing, you must have left mid-Mists or earlier and just come back to the Warcraft community scene like, yesterday.

actual depiction of pro-flying protest rally

Everyone was writing about flying, so I tried to keep my posts about it to a minimum. My first two posts were before they had announced that flying would be back, where I ended the second stating I was sorry and wouldn't write anymore flying posts. Then I made a third one when they made the decision to add flying, insincerely apologizing for lying about not writing another flying post. Knowing better this time around, I did not, in fact, promise to not write about flying again, so here we are!

The Grand Garrison Mistake

As of this moment, I simply cannot stand my garrison. Just a few moments of walking around in my garrison reminds me that I'm sick of it and I'm sick of Warlords.

That's just how I feel. I'm sure not everyone does, but I'm definitely not the only person. But why? What did they get wrong?

Garrisons were a decent idea that got implemented poorly. There is one particular aspect of garrisons that is not only a problem on its own, but caused a huge problem in Warlords entirely.

I'm Not Buying a Ticket for the Legion Hype Train

As everyone knows, the next Warcraft expansion was announced.

wait wait

there, this one

I really don't want to know too much about it before it comes out because I don't want to experience the same kind of uncontrollable hype followed by months of disappointment. Of course, no matter how hard I try, there is only so much I can avoid learning beforehand, since the majority of people I talk to and follow are all talking about it like crazy. I can only expect that they will continue to talk about it until the day of release.

If you knew me back when Warlords was about to be released, you may remember just how hyped I was. It won't be like that for Legion. It's not that I'm not excited about it - my only impressions so far are bits and pieces I've put together from the unavoidable internet and I'm already super excited. It's just that I realized long ago the benefits of not spoiling yourself - learning everything about the game before it comes out is like reading a full script of a movie before you see it.

For these reasons, my blog posts before release will not be about Legion hype. I understand, too, that this will mean far fewer people will have interest in my blog for the time being. My most viewed posts are Warcraft posts about current content, controversies, or upcoming or recently released features. People aren't going to care about Terraria and what my guild was doing six years ago while there's Legion hype being thrown in everyone's faces.

But I'm okay with that.

This means, too, that I may make posts with thoughts, opinions, or discussions about things that are embarassingly irrelevant. For example, I may mention that I'm happy to be leaving my garrison, but in fact Blizzard has announced that your garrison as is will be air lifted into a new zone in Legion. Now, this is just an example, but I may make a faux pas like that. I don't know. That's what happens when you purposefully don't know things.

Speaking of garrisons, I am thrilled they won't be in Legion. They won't, right?

...

Wait, don't tell me!

Jungles, Shipyards, and Orcs Oh My

So 6.2 came out yesterday. This was me, today, on Wednesday.

zeroed in on the druid changes

Yesterday, I went on a day trip and played MH4U, forgetting there was a huge patch. So, I dove in today.

I updated my addons, - except for Master Plan since it wasn't updated and doesn't work and my life is in shambles - half assed some of my garrison chores, and built a shipyard. I'm killing orcs in Tanaan Jungle, and vaguely remembering that there was something about being able to fly.

pigeons?

I didn't read up a lot on the new patch. Honestly, I haven't been keeping up to date with what's coming in and going out in patches for awhile. This is the biggest patch of Warlords so far, and here is an exhaustive list of what I knew about it before today:

• A meta-achievement to grant flying but apparently not yet or something
• Timewalking and relevant weekends (which I wrote about)
• Tanaan Jungle, supposedly kinda like Timeless Isle
• New raid instance
• Shipyards are a thing

Funnily enough, I've really been looking forward to 6.2. Not for anything in particular really, since I haven't been paying that much attention, but for a dive into some (hopefully) exciting new content.

The Flying Purple People Eater

Yesterday, I wrote about flying. Well, no, I wrote about Warlords of Draenor's lack of interesting and engaging content. I am a person with various opinions that require many words to reveal their true nature, and in my previous post I precariously left unspoken the matter of my actual opinion on the flying debate. It sparked some feedback, where it seemed to me that I may have implied I think the flying debate is unimportant.

not working as intended

While there may have been parts that alluded to my beliefs, the reality was shrouded. Here is the thing, though: my opinion doesn't matter.

What am I trying to say? That, as one singular individual within the vast Warcraft playerbase, my opinion isn't important? Am I implying, in this statement, that all of your opinions don't matter?

No, no. Here's the situation at hand: the voices of those so opposed to the flying restriction that they have continued to voice their concerns for more than a year are more important than my opinion.

The Flying Scapegoat

The flying restriction in Draenor is one of the biggest controversial topics in the game to date. From the moment it was announced until now and guaranteed into the future, there has been heated discussion on the topic.

this thread was started in March of 2014 and was only just recently locked at 2241 pages

One of the opinions I see that a lot of pro-flyers share is that not being able to fly keeps them cooped up inside of their garrison. They feel that without the freedom to soar over inconsequential enemies and mountains to head to their exploration or farming destinations, they have no desire to leave their garrison at all.

It's my amateur opinion that being flying restricted isn't actually the cause of this garrison-hermitism, and I'm going to tell you why.

Warlords Subscription Prescription Description

If you already read forums or read trade chat (why would you do that, though?), you don't need to read anything else about the state of World of Warcraft's active subscription numbers, I'm sure - but I don't usually talk about the active subscription counts, so hear me out for a moment.

This is the (cropped - view full, interactive chart here) chart of WoW's active subscriptions. At Warlords release, subscriptions skyrocketed to be as high as they were at Mist's release, clearing the leap upwards from the dismal sub count that Mists had earned after overstaying its welcome with over a year of SoO. With this latest report, we're seeing that in record time of only six months, subs dropped back down dramatically to almost as low as they were at Mists' lowest point,

However, in case you forgot, Mists' release came with that Annual Pass deal - free beta access, a mount, and Diablo III for free - if you had already paid for Diablo III, you had game time credited for the worth of the game - if you agreed to subscribe to the game for a full year. Cancelling before your year was up revoked your mount and Diablo III access. Of course, after the Annual Pass ran its full year course, the subscription count was 7.6M.

I Think I Hate Garrisons

Garrisons, as a functional mechanic, are pretty cool. I am the commander of my own little army of duders who go out and get me gold and loot, I can make them work for me or follow me around, and I build workshops and gardens in my own little outcrop of Frostfire Ridge.

I am master of my domain

I found no fault with garrisons as Warlords made its first impressions. I wrote before about how I actually love follower missions. I thought garrisons were cool and I found that they were entirely optional if you wanted them to be. I was in favor of them as a non-stressful daily activity that gave you access to a lot of cool stuff.

I haven't been playing a lot lately, but I've started to notice something when I do log in.

I hate my garrison.

What Warlords Did to Guilds

8/10H thanks to random pugs and lots of perseverance

My guild has been through a lot since Warlords came out, but after finally being able to relax for a minute, I realized that it's not just my guild that's suffering - Warlords' new raid system set up has had a widespread, far reaching effect on the vast majority of guilds.

As we know, Warlords removed 10 and 25 mans as a thing and replaced all difficulties with flexible roster numbers, except for mythic, which is exclusively 20 - a number Blizzard probably looked at as a 'happy medium', and a solution to the 10 vs. 25 drama.

The problem now is that there's a large number of small guilds that need to recruit for 20 man rosters and not enough potential recruits to go around. Every 10 man guild from Mists is looking to bring on 10 or more new people just to reach mythic content, but there are nowhere near that many recruits looking to join new guilds. It's not like 25 man guilds had to shed any of their members - those extra five people simply had to compete for their spots and the losers likely stayed in their guilds to warm the benches. The result of the 20 man "happy medium" was that 10 man guilds were expected to scrounge for a minimum of 10 more people, while 25 man guilds had to do nothing.

written out it's something like this

Hallelujah Heirlooms

With 6.1 we saw a revamp of the heirloom system - MMOC has a short little video about it if you haven't seen it yet, or you can read the screencap summary below!

Previously, before Warlords, heirlooms were datamined to be available to purchased with gold at release, but they scrapped that and they were unable to be purchased at all for quite awhile, except with darkmoon faire tickets, with the promise of a future new heirloom system. I wrote a bit about my baseless theories on the impacts of removal of the valor point system, like months ago, but it looks like heirlooms are just about the only things that are able to be purchased with gold, and apexis crystals are the 'new valor points'.

Meowlords of Draenor

Wow, I did not update at all after Warlords came out. That launch was something else, but writing about it seemed redundant. It's not something I'd like to relive in writing.

I've been having a blast, to be sure, and there is plenty to write about. Unfortunately, I've been sick and writing a blog post is the last thing on my mind. I keep trying to go back to it, but for now I've been hiding in bed with a roll of toilet paper and my cat. I'll reevaluate my schedule and get back on track in a jiffy, but for now, have this.

meow am cat

All Aboard the Hype Train!

Warlords of Draenor is coming out TONIGHT!

unless you're in any of those last three places, sorry

The Hype Train is reaching its destination!

CHOO CHOO

Friday and Saturday's updates are up in the air for now. I have no idea how I'll react mentally to such a huge influx of new content after our year long drought.

See you in Draenor!

Goodbye Pandaria, Hello Draenor!

farewell, pandaland

Warlords of Draenor comes out in just a few days! With its release comes the end of Mists of Pandaria (finally), our fourth expansion to World of Warcraft.

Mists came out on a Tuesday, September 25, 2012. Mists will have lasted two years, one month, and 18 days once Warlords is released this Thursday.

While two years in itself isn't super crazy long for an expansion in WoW, the fact that its final content patch, 5.4.0, lasted for a year, two months, and two days is a little dizzying. However, they did a pretty decent job keeping that last patch relevant for a long time - by adding heirloom weapons off of the last boss, and subsequently removing their drop chance with the release of Warlords, they created an incentive to continue to do the content up until the very last few days.

Addon Highlights: A PSA

Now that 6.0.2 has been out for awhile, most addons will work properly and should continue to work properly after Warlords release. If you use addons, it's important to remember to update your addons correctly and to try not to go into Warlords using out of date ones, as addons can cause really weird things to happen to your game. Not just limited to LUA errors, addons can cause disconnects, inability to use skills on your hotbars, and I've recently had an error where my bags didn't update while I was filling them up.

dun dun dunnnn

The Homestretch

We're closing in on Warlords with only about three weeks left. While still awhile away, I forgot to keep count since back when we were in the ~40 day range, so it snuck up a bit on me. The pre-patch helped me find a stop to get off of the Hype Train for awhile, but a little more than a week of 6.0.2 and I'm back to the jitters when I think about how excited I am for November 13th.

Should Your Guild Use "Personal Loot"?

With the overhaul to the raid difficulty system, we saw the added loot option of "personal loot". Personal loot is how loot is distributed in the LFR difficulty, and was the unchangeable loot distribution method of flex. Now that "flex" is no longer a difficulty but rather both normal and heroic modes are flexible, personal loot has become a choosable option, just like group loot or master loot.

First, a bit of explanation:

Passing Time Before Warlords

yes please

There's a little more than a month until Warlords of Draenor release on November 13th. We will likely see patch 6.0 soon, most people assume approximately a month before release (taking bets on the 14th of October), but the prepatch only adds so much excitement until the actual expansion release.

Many people have given up raiding and gearing up as most gear will be quickly outdated in the early zones of Draenor. However, if you are in a progression guild, remember that a lot of current gear, as discussed earlier, will be useful for quite a few levels into 100, aiding in leveling. If you are shooting for 100 ASAP, getting more normal and heroic mode gear will be beneficial.

I keep feeling excited to play, logging in, and not being able to think of anything to do. Knowing most of your efforts will be pointless in just over a month makes it hard to find something to do in game. Like probably a lot of you, I can't figure out how to not play Warcraft, so I've composed a handy list of things to do while waiting for November 13th!

Legendary Legacies and Content Removal

As most of us know, Blizzard decided to remove the legendary cloak quest from the game as of Warlords of Draenor release. This was just one change of quite a few things, some of which were expected while others were a shock.

A recent blog post overviews each thing that is being changed and removed, while there are other posts clarifying these things in detail.

Not Everything Will Go Perfectly - and That's OK

A few days ago, I noticed that I hadn't killed Garrosh on flex mode. My guild is 11/14H and I've killed him on normal several times, so I thought it was silly that I hadn't killed him on flex.

I joined a group in oqueue for a flex Garrosh kill. The group was incredibly stacked and the fight went flawlessly, we one shot him with a few inconsequential deaths. That's when I got my first heirloom.