So today I wanted to write about how I'm making the move back to Adgamorix - my original angry bald Paladin. I've been tanking in Firelands, healed it some more, and even have a viable ret build. Slipping back into the Paladin role has been like putting on an old pair of shoes, fits perfect every time.
Blizzcon goers taken hostage
Unfortunately, I can't really talk about that today. As I'm sure you're well aware, Blizzcon started today, and there has been an overwhelming ammount of WoW info coming forth. As I expected, the next expansion has been announced, and I'm sorry to say that I am underwhelmed to say the least. If anything, I'm terrified.
The only thing I can really hope is that everyone at Blizzcon, and watching the stream, is currently sitting there with a gun to their head preventing them from admitting that the news we're getting is really just the world's best April Fools joke. Please let this be true, otherwise I'll probably be found setting fire to my authenticator if all the announced items actually go live.
Issue number one - it actually is Jack Black
Kung Fu Panda here we come. Not only are we getting Panderans, but the new class is a freaking Monk. Panda racial is "Bouncy - take 1/2 damage from falling", and other such nonsense. The trailer video looked like "Kung Fu Panda" gone crazy.
Not. A. Fan.
Issue number two - talents revamped again!
This one isn't really so much of an issue, as it is something that makes me laugh. Every expansion, hell every Blizzcon, they talk about wanting to make talents count, and your decisions matter. They wanted to move away from cookie cutter builds, and focus you more into your particular spec.
This was a HUGE fail for Cataclysm, since the revamp to 41 points, with 31 minimum in your selected tree made for the greatest cookie cutter builds of all time. There is little to no variation in your builds, even going from PvE Holy to PvP Holy involves shifting two or three points. Glyphs are the same thing, there's no variation - your choices are pretty cut and dried for most classes.
So I'm happy to see the talents changing, but I don't seen them really making any significant impact on the whole system. I could be wrong of course. It has happened before.
Issue number three - Pokemon gone wild
I honestly was speechless when I saw this news. Your pets, our little non-combat pets, will now have stats and be able to battle? And you can battle "Masters" to get more powerful abilities? I really have no response for this. This is so far away from what we have now, much less what Vanilla was, that it's actually difficult for me to comprehend it on any rational level.
My only hope
Much like the announced changes to guilds, the Archeology system, and many other sweeping changes announced at Blizzcons of yesteryear, I can only hope that many of these changes go the way of the Dance Studio and dissapear into the Twisting Nether. Maybe I'm totally wrong and they will be the greatest changes ever, but I kind of doubt it. To be perfectly honest, if I hadn't seen the new Heart of the Swarm trailer, I probably would have already written the whole convention off.
The other truly scary thing I see (for WoW) is that if you commit to a one year subscription, you will automatically get a Beta invite to MoP (right now I need a mop for my vomit), a mount that looks like the Sparkle Pony and the Winged Gaurdian had a baby, and....Diablo III for free.
That's right. Spend up to $180 (it's less if you pay for it all up front obviously) and get a copy of D3 (which will be what, $60?), a BoA mount (typically $25) and a full year of WoW. Plus the Beta invite, if that's worth anything. This to me says volumes about the state of the game. HoTS and D3 will do well, no matter what WoW does, so you know that 2012 is going to be a banner year for Activision/Blizzard earnings. Maybe they need the extra cash infusion at the end of 2011 to push over some bonus numbers - who the hell knows.
What I do know is that if I had to commit right this minute to playing MoP, I'd probably pass. While I haven't actually seen the footage from Blizzcon, I'm just feeling pretty sour about the whole mess.
My biggest fear of all
Right now I'm truly afraid that we are looking at another year of Cataclysm. While I can't put my finger on exactly when ICC launched vs Cataclysm, I know it was a long damn time. Twice now they've hit us with "shit, we need more content" patches, and both the Sunwell and Ruby Sanctum felt like failures (though for different reasons). I'm afraid 4.3 won't launch until Thanksgiving, and I truly hope and pray they aren't waiting for Christmas to directly compete with TOR. I don't think I can handle eight more weeks of Firelands. I am not a groundhog you know.
My parting gift
I won't show the MoP trailer here, but I will at least show the truly awesome trailer for HoTS. I cannot wait for this to launch.
I disagree with you somewhat, but the hilarity of your line about needing a mop for your vomit made me forget anything I had to say. Kudos.
ReplyDeleteI have tried to think of some way to say this without it sounding snarky, I hope I succeeded. The year long commitment marketing deal strikes me as a brilliant way to use their whole portfolio to try to stop bleeding players over the year as SWTOR and GW2 release.
ReplyDeleteI have to say, that after watching/absorbing/typing until my fingers bled - I have to echo many of your feelings. I was initially angry and dismayed at the announcement. Then I went a bit numb. Then I watched the WoW Preview panel where they talked about it a bit more - I still think the Panda thing is pretty silly, and more an excuse to have an "Asian" feeling expansion than anything. I think the monk class looks interesting. The actual locations and environments are pretty awesome, though, AND I also have good news in the form of (from someone who has watched all the stuff): I think it's closer than a year out. Compared to previous expansion announcements like Cataclysm, it is already very polished. I mean, I could be wrong, but it seems to me that they've never announced an expansion with so much content already available to show (the entire starting zone complete, dungeons seemingly complete, etc.)
ReplyDeleteI'm still not sure how I feel about it. The Pokemon thing is also pretty jaw-dropping. And I mean, I like collecting mini-pets and even I was flabbergasted (never did play Pokemon).
I'm upset about a fair amount of the changes, but I won't be bothered with any of it honestly until its officially released. If it goes live as is I will probably hang my hat after giving it a week or 2 try.
ReplyDeleteAs far as a release date I would almost bet we are looking at a time frame after June of 2012 due to the company contracted to make the game booklets having a deadline of mid June 2012.
I see they are moving the talents/trees the way of D3 in the readily available change from talent to talent but only having a set amount at any given time.
Pandas...no thanks, I thought Worgen was bad enough but this is a little over the top for me and it seems to lower the game to a more childish/silly standard.
Pokemon battle pets? Maybe, and the jury is still out on this one. I would give it a shot for 2 reasons...
1.)I liked the (keep you busy card game in EQ2)
2.)I loved the Monster Rancher series of games on the original PS1 platform.
I did find positives in the notes though. I do like the changes to hunters not having a melee weapon (brings up the realism). I like the fact that wands are main hand items. I recall priests in MC packing around the Ben-Gay for their tennis elbow from throwin those things around. In addition I always thought melee classes should through their weapons (see "The Decapitator" from Karazhan).
In the end I'm on the fence, I'm glad to know that I already have Battlefield 3 downloaded and installed and my wife is going to pick me up some nifty rudder pedals and a new joystick for the extra flight vehicles, and if that wasn't enough to whet my appetite I have TOR and furious masturbation.
Space goats were horribly done but at least they made logical sense in an expansion on draenor...Worgen worked out well to explain what happened to gilneas, and really, there weren't a lot of options for playable races...Goblins were a great idea but were the worst executed new race blizzard has had, they are the jar jar binks of warcraft. Where the fuck do pandas come in at.
ReplyDeleteAnd to make them the focus of an expansion? Kill Nef, kill Illidan, kill Malygos and arthas, kill mother fucking deathwing...go play pokemon with a panda?
I don't even mind them getting added in so much, but at least give us a better title that focuses on a bad guy.
The pokemon game might actually be fun as long as it doesn't impede too much on the rest of the game, my mini diablo is gonna own some fools.
Next announcement, Goblin Casino! For those people that aren't already addicted enough, here's some slot machines to gamble away your gold for a chance at a rare mount or tokens to buy epics.
There is nothing in the new expansion that has made me unhappy; not one thing.
ReplyDeleteAt level cap the more things there are to do outside raiding the better, so the pokemon pet thing to me is just something extra to do. I don't see why that is a problem.
Pandaren? They might be silly, but no more silly than Gnomes. I play a Dwarf Paladin, and I'm happy with it, but if other people want to play pandas, that's fine. In a raid I couldn't care less what race people are.
At some point in the future maybe Blizz will do away with talent trees entirely. Supposedly they are there for us to make choices, but in the end we pretty much have to choose the same builds, and if not, the choices we can make have minimal effects. Until I played WoW I had never seen games with talent trees, and I don't think losing them would make us any worse off. Smaller and smaller talent trees seems a good thing to me.
As for Firelands, our raid still has plenty of challenges there, so I'm happy for the next patch to come out in December, and the later the better.
It seems we are poles apart on our views right now!
I was at Blizzcon Adg and I to was concerned but after playing on the demo, the world was drawing me in. Don't think I'll play a Panda but will roll a monk to make 5/5 healing classes.
ReplyDeleteAs far as the pvp pet thing, "What pvp pet thing? I know nothing of such sorts nor never will."
The new talent system change. I just go with the flow and will make it work.
I think the expansion itself will be fine, and as long as I'm not "required" to Pokemon - I'm ok. I don't have an issue with Pandas per se, but the annual sub is what's really got me worried. I think it's genius, but I'm really afraid that we're a year out from MoP.
ReplyDeleteFrom dungeons and dragons to pandas and pokemon. It isn't just sad, its pathetic. All they need is to dumb it down a bit more, add some motion controls and port it to the Nintendo Wii. This game is for toddlers.
ReplyDeleteThe D3 bundle is a flare gun, a distress signal, a call to man the life boats. It tells anyone who is paying attention that Blizzard has no faith in the WoW IP to stand on its own merit any longer. Instead they have to dangle the carrot of their highly anticipated other game in order to try to secure as many subscriptions as they can. Of course the fine print they don't tell you is that when you cancel your WoW subscription, you immediately lose your access to Diablo III.
Many of my old friends from the game have already quit. For many more this was the last straw. For anyone else, I have to conclude that many of them are trapped in a marriage of convenience with this game. Its safe. Its familiar. Wake up people! The old girl isn't what she used to be and she's not getting any younger or prettier.
The only way your opinion matters in life centers on where and how you spend your money. There is no way in hell Blizzard sees a nickle from me spent on WoW ever again. I'll be perfectly content playing for free on a private vanilla server with about 5000 other people.
Let's look at the bigger picture, people are losing jobs left and right, everyone is getting squeezed. Whilst mmo's are a cheap form of entertainment, people are more choosy, savvy, picky, selective, then they have ever been. Especially when interest rates are at an all time low. I think people are finding other, cheaper, more basic forms of entertaining, hosting parties is becoming more popular, everyone needs to eat right.
ReplyDeleteIf people do chose an MMO as a form of entertainment, rather than spending that time updating job skills because they are scared, rightly so, that will lose or have lost their job. Then they need to be 100% sure that they got great entertainment from it. I don't think an ageing game on it's fourth expansion just excites people enough to fork out money. Especially if it is based on a joke, Easter egg, largely unpopular race from a game released 8 years ago.
I'll skip the MoP news and go right back to your first paragraph. As I mentioned on Vidyala's post last week, I'm happy to see you going back to the pally.
ReplyDelete