Sandy the Rogue: Ding 9!

Seems like Sandy levels insanely quickly, so I finally managed to remember to check /played. I'm not going for any land speed records, but she's got 9 levels in just under 2 hours, 40 minutes. That's three levels per 53 minutes, or a level every 17 min, 47 seconds. That's fast. Jalindrine's screenshot collection doesn't start until level 14, and I'm not sure I checked played much at all, but perhaps there are a few places where I played straight through a level and can approximate his TpL (Time per Level, of course). Sure wasn't this fast... was it?



I also thought I'd mention that this quest map is awful. Look at the range of these quests and turn-ins! Man, I miss being mounted. Almost makes me wistful for the DK alt.

I still don't have time to log Jal back in, so I'll probably keep putting in a few minutes of Sandy now and again. I'd like to give LFR a try. My blog roll keeps coming back to it as a topic, and I'd like to see how it works. And I do occasionally wonder how much trouble it'd be to grab a few more T12 pieces, and if that'd be enough to get Jal into PURs.

Pandaria hasn't really given me much more to be excited about. I've read through some argument about its simplified talent trees (looks like this was Lissanna) being an improvement, saying that the Cataclysm trees were pretty sorry. Though complex, there were (and are), Lissanna argued, essentially "right" and "wrong" talent distributions, where the stuff that's up to personal choice boils down to meaningless fluff.

I did have someone once in a PUG ask me about my points in Cataclysm... second time ever. The first was years ago, in Vanilla, and the fellow said that they liked that I had points in what's now Naturalist (wasn't that before, was it?), showing I knew that I was going to be doing more than just DPSing. This second set of comments that I got told me how I'd gotten the distrib wrong, sure enough. They'd Armoried Jal and very politely told me I should move points around. I did, np, but the point holds: The system still looks complex, but "thanks" to the community of theorycrafters, we "know" there's only a few distribs worth keeping. This will change in Pandaria, and Lissanna thought it was an improvement. I think I tentatively agree, though I don't know much about the expansion yet. Well, other than the Activision-Blizzard-Dreamworks marketing synergy. I did find myself considering a mace for a quest reward tonight, and lamented that there are no longer any weapon skills -- if Sandy wants a mace, there's no reason not to take it, though she's never (iirc) used one herself.

Remember back when you'd have your staff knocked away and your Unarmed combat skill would start shooting up? Ah, the good old days. ;^)

Well, that's it. I'm too tired to write something awfully interesting, it turns out. My only other comment regards the tiny screenshots. They're native res. I've moved, and my only computer right now is an HP Pavilion dm1. It does okay for a really cheap ultraportable with Win7 64-bit, and even runs Visual C# 2010 pretty quickly, all things considered, but it's no screamer. Thus the 800x600 screenshots (I also have an old Dell CRT monitor out; don't ask). fps is sticking in the 30-40 range for Sandy, but I don't think I'd want to raid on this box! Reminds me of the old iBook G4 screenshots I put up.

VP Changes to 4.3 PTR - Forums - World of Warcraft

VP Changes to 4.3 PTR - Forums - World of Warcraft:

We've made slight adjustments to the Valor Point (VP) drops on the 4.3 PTR which testers can now see. In both 10- and 25-player raids, bosses will now drop 100 VP each (down from 115 and 135 respectively). We’ll also be changing Firelands raid bosses to drop 50 VP per kill upon release of the patch.

This change is being made to further emphasize the desire to kill bosses for the items they drop. In the 4.3 raid, tier sets can only be earned from boss drops, and as Raid Finder will allow for just about anyone to get a chance to kill bosses, we think there will be less need for Valor overall. We want to try to match the lower desire for VP with a slightly slower acquisition rate.

Argh, I'm already looking back into gear. This doesn't sound good for soloers, who could bag three tiered pieces without ever raiding in T12. I hope the LFR tool is as good as they hope, though that would greatly de-emphasize the importance of guilds.

Eridan's comment pretty much sums what I'm thinking/afraid of:

I think you may be vastly overestimating how well the Raid Finder is going to work when you're making these plans. Right now it mostly seems to be allowing people to wipe on Morchok once or twice before the calls of "U ALL BADS" and the ragequits begin.

That won't be any fun at all. You might say, "Join a guild!" but honestly, I just want to solo as much as possible to ensure I'm geared well enough for a few PUG/PUR runs. Not needing a guild to raid would be nice. Kills the mystique of raiding a bit though, I think. Will be interesting to see if LFR works well or not and how it'll affect the game's feel.

So it looks like, if, say, you're a druid who hasn't played since July, that the gear you're hunting is exactly the same as it was when you quit when it comes to valor points. I'd really hoped my old VP had magically appreciated a little. New gear is out there, but it's only from bosses.

The first hit of heroin is always free...

... as is the one when you've been sober for six months.


I'm trying to keep myself convinced that it's a bad idea to sign back up, even for a free week. It's hard.

Update[d video card for $20] and Pandaria Licensing with DreamWorks

Okay, I'm still not back-as-in-back to playing. Right now I'm waffling between, "Pandaria seems pretty cool, in spite of it being, um, pandas," and, "How the heck can they release this expansion without paying DreamWorks through the nose?!!"

I mean, really, "bouncy" and "inner peace" racial traits? You've got to be kidding me. Right? This is a giant prank, isn't it?

But then "Activision Blizzard" seems to have Kung-Fu Panda in their licensing bag already? Maybe they're crazy like a fox? Maybe the whole point is to take the standard Oriental Expansion Idea and up some Kung-Fu Panda sales while you're at it? It's so crazy, it just might work, right?

I'll admit that I can't keep up with who owns what company any more. I'd managed to forget about Activision and Blizzard. It's crazy. But let's face it, somebody owns rights to Kung-Fu Panda, and Blizzard (now Act-Bliz) obviously owns WoW. This is cross-promotion of Disney-ESPN proportions.

In any event, I've already seen Kung-Fu Panda 2 (not nearly as good as the first, but there is a bit of the "2 is just here to get us to 3" feeling -- hey, so what are the chances that Kung-Fu Panda 3 is coming out about the same time as this expansion? Imagine the coincidence of that!), and I'm sure I'll bag Mists release day. The attention to the single-player game, if it happens, will be neat, and I'm excited to check out the monk class and new zones, even if I have to do it as a panda. If done right, the zones could be pretty cool.


In other exciting news, I finally broke down and stopped using the GeForce 8500 with 256 megs of VRAM that's still listed on this page, and that I've had for years. People that read this blog too closely know that I've been considering spending as much as $170 for a new card over the last year, but a CyberMonday special at NewEgg had a GT430 with a gig of RAM for $20 shipped after rebate (here's the item, back up to $45 after rebate now). Too good to pass up.

GTA IV finally plays in a resolution over 800x600, which is awesome. I did this with GTA3:SA too... the late video card upgrade was like getting a new game.

I also played Sandraevia, the freeplay Blood-Elf Rogue I've got, for a few more minutes, which means, of course, that I bagged yet another level, though I was a little slow snapping the shot.



Just for kicks, I'll include two pictures, one with something approximating my old settings and another with the new. I'd always kept draw distance to Ultra, as that's the only setting that really affects gameplay (other than summing their performance into fps), but now I've got it all maxed out. Soloing in the starting area is no problem. I'd almost like to raid again just to see what happens.

Old Settings:

New Settings:

It looks better, no doubt, and looks even better in motion. For $20, it's an obvious win. Sure, the fan is a little loud, but my CPU fan doesn't really slow down either, so I can only barely hear the GPU. That said, the CPU fan is so loud, I really can't believe that I can just barely hear this GPU fan over the CPU, but I can. Wow. For $20, I'm not complaining.

I often wonder how a game reviewer should considering each game's "artistic" effects. In short, does pretty eye-candy make for a better game? I hate to say it helps. I still recall being wowed by Ironforge (no pun was intended there, sorry) the first time -- and Darn too, the first time I walked up on it before seeing IF. Blood Elf architecture is cool, and Lich King had some nice expanses too. Each of those impressed me and increased immersion -- not so much because it was realistic, as that the game was essentially imprinting me. These were unforgettable, tell your neighbor moments. I should also add Nagrand to the list. Beautiful. Eye candy is the difference between driving down a bland Interstate and hitting the PCH.

But which setting do you use to review a game when some of your readers are playing on laptops with integrated graphics and others have top of the line SLI? What experience is the "right", representative one that you should be using?

I don't know. But I will say that if it's been a while since you upgraded, keep an eye out. $20 is a no-brainer, and there've got to be similar deals coming up soon.

Item inflation, disillusionment and return

Well, it's been a while, I'll admit. I hate to say it, but the raiding didn't do it for me. It's fun to be part of a group, and to have the peer pressure on you to get gear, learn the instances, and wack difficult bosses, but, honestly, it's still just grindy. Worse, it's grindiness with deadlines, and that really does turn gaming into work. I'd still like to meet up with a fairly social guild for a weekly run through level-appropriate instances, but I'm not sure I want to commit to 3 hours a night of grinding in preparation.

I mean, if we could even get gear that keeps its power... you know, like a permanent piece each expansion that you'd never really have to grind for again -- and be done with the shoulder slot forever with a heirloom-like scaling as you hit new expansions and gathered better gear in general, then maybe it'd be worth rolling into raids. But to know all these hours go to nothing, that item inflation means your hard-won items will be worthless in six months really makes the all the work feel empty. Sure, you're making your story, but the connection to the main storyline is so tenuous, particularly with the fact that your actions don't have serious, visible consequences for anyone else playing, means there's no real payoff in virtual goods or contributions to the plot.

So Jal took a break.

Yesterday, after a few months off, I finally got sucked back in by one of the "play for free" side banner ads. There're really only a few combinations that are wholly new to me. I've had alts, really low level alts, but alts, in everything but rogues (strange, as I was always a thief of some sort in D&D and AD&D) and orcs. After downloading, I remembered that Burning Crusade was free to everyone now too, and though I'd played a blood elf warlock for a few levels, I didn't care much for the warlock part. So I started putting together a blood elf rogue.

Look, there's no way a guy can play a blood elf guy. There's just not. The guys look too, um, well... feminine. The "facial hair" selections are all soulpatches of one sort or another. Their chests are, well, strange. And the hair seems to suggest they got switched at the unisex-apparently-means-one-sex-not-either salon. So even though my last "mainish" character, Jalyndrine the Death Knight was a chick, so is this one. It's almost as if the blood elves were made not just to have a "pretty" horde race, but to encourage virtual cross-dressing. Honestly, if the percentage of girls-with-guy-avatar ratio isn't highest for blood elves, I'd be surprised. That's a weird race.


One quest later, I'm level two. I guess inflation's hit all over, huh?

(Arg, and their free hit of heroin is already working. Reading back through my own blog, I'm reminded of the burning treant bonus for the T12 gear. Tell me that isn't worth paying to play?!! (Yes, I realize it's really not, but the evil cash-burning magic's still working on me...))

Time to spam Starfall

And the game gets easier. There are three spells you have to watch very carefully -- well, two spells now. They were Starfall, Force of Nature, and Typhoon. Each of these had the ability to aggro outside of what you were intending to DPS and had to be used very carefully.

Treants will often pursue new groups of trash if you forget to tell them to stop and follow. Starfall would aggro *anything* nearby, which, honestly, was great for the Fireland dailies that require smashing charred mobs. Typhoon travels a ways, and tends to aggro things that seemed to be too far away... or yellows you forgot to factor in. An unglyphed Typhoon is even more difficult, as you sometimes had to make sure you didn't push mobs into the wrong areas. Touchy tanks hate typhoon pushback as well. Both are occasionally reasons to line up to the side of the mobs and Typhoon them into a wall if you're unglyphed. (I really enjoy Typhooning mobs into walls for some reason.)

Anyhow, apparently it's time to strike Starfall from the list of spells that require skillz. I used to be overly careful about using it, as I've accidentally pulled some trash, especially in Grim Batol, with SF. But now, well, SPAM AWAY!! (I'm on a trip right now or I'd check it out.)

Patch 4.2 hotfix roundup:

Starfall is no longer hitting targets that are within 40 yards if they are not in combat with the druid or his/her party/raid members. It is targeting all hostile characters in combat with the druid's party/raid members, is not hitting Stealth characters, is not breaking crowd control effects, and is not targeting nearby critters.

Note to self: T11 and T12 Point Gear

All six items on WowHead.com.