World of Warcraft discussion

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Bluebird55

World of Warcraft discussion

Post by Bluebird55 »

Hello all,

I actually haven't checked if this is the only wow discussion, if it is please guide me to the post via a post on here and close this post.

Anyway, as a veteran player of WoW, I feel it is good to reminisce and start a discussion where we talk about everything WoW.

So, to start off; what's your best memory of WoW? Mine is definitely when I killed Alani and got the Thundering Ruby Cloud Serpent, took around half a year but soo worth it.

Also, as a side question, does anyone play on Private servers? I'm not willing to pay ten quid pcm for appalling customer service and poor levels of respect for loyalty (learned the hard way Blizzard doesn't care for 8 years of loyalty, or about a thousand pounds worth of subscription fee)

Cheers all 🐦
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dezm0nd
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Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by dezm0nd »

My favourite memory of WoW? It's a toss up between getting the Loremaster tabard (Finish all Horde quests) and being the first on the server I played to get the Mechanohog.

Such a good time in that game.
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AndrewBrown
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Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by AndrewBrown »

At the end of Wrath of the Lich King, I organized a ride of Mechanohogs and Mekgineer's Choppers from Everlook down to Gadgetzan (the breadth of Kalimdor). There were a couple dozen in attendance total. The funniest part was when all the Alliance people (including myself) had to ride straight through the middle of the Crossroads. There were casualties. There was a video out there of it for a time, but it seems to have been taken down. That was the high point of the game for me; it was all downhill from there, for various reasons.
Bluebird55

Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by Bluebird55 »

I bet Darren! I never managed to get that one, I went out of my way to get the Explorer's tabard (and I really mean that, I probably spent at least a week exploring, bearing in mind this was Lich King era where flying was restricted, yes it's not easy), was worth it though.

Oh cool Andrew, I organised a similar event with my first guild (I was co owner and it was massive, it hit 1000 members and glitched the game in the process), we all gathered outside Tarren Mill and went and raided it, same with Crossroads (this is all Lich King, again), man it was jokes! Then another time we went to the inn at Ironforge (the first one on the left as you go in) and just got plastered, I miss Wotlk drinking because you could run while being sick, now you just stand still. With my recent experience on Legion, with the players? You'd be lucky to get even a group, people have become so isolated on the bloody game; it's bollocks.
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MajorGamer
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Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by MajorGamer »

Getting server first heroic 25 man Lich King kill was certainly a moment. Could have sworn it was done on the server prior but it was a surprise to us all when it popped up when he went down. To confess, this is my joke answer whenever something like this comes up. Getting this is completely true. Except it was in a PuG. Several months after Cataclysm's release. Yeah, my server, Dethecus, was that far behind.

For a serious answer, our guild's kill of Nefarian (BWD). We were a small guild so could only attempt the 10 man versions which were also the harder ones. Don't remember how long we were stuck on him but it was awhile and then patch notes came out that they were significantly nerfing him the following week. We got him down our last raid day before that patch went out.
Bluebird55

Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by Bluebird55 »

MajorGamer wrote: July 3rd, 2017, 3:36 am Getting server first heroic 25 man Lich King kill was certainly a moment. Could have sworn it was done on the server prior but it was a surprise to us all when it popped up when he went down. To confess, this is my joke answer whenever something like this comes up. Getting this is completely true. Except it was in a PuG. Several months after Cataclysm's release. Yeah, my server, Dethecus, was that far behind.

For a serious answer, our guild's kill of Nefarian (BWD). We were a small guild so could only attempt the 10 man versions which were also the harder ones. Don't remember how long we were stuck on him but it was awhile and then patch notes came out that they were significantly nerfing him the following week. We got him down our last raid day before that patch went out.
Wow, I never had the chance to get into stuff like that, mind you, Terenas isn't the most...social server, having said that, groups are bloody critical. I did manage to kill Onyxia pre-Cataclysm in my first guild, good grief she was tough! I didn't get the mount on that kill, but I did after Cataclysm. I remember the Eyes of the Beast, perhaps the best skill in World of Warcraft, where hunters could fully control their pet i.e. you could run around, jump, sit etc. After Cataclysm they removed it because apparently it's illegal to have fun.

If I ever get back onto WoW, I would definitely finish getting the pristine projects for Archaeology, it's rather satisfying looking at the Legion Dalaran shop/Garrison/Pandaria collection complete, plus Archaeology is slow yet extremely rewarding (you can make a small fortune selling the junk projects, although it would take aeons getting the Spider mount from Legion Dalaran for 1 million gold (yes, one million - it took me months to get the Grand Expedition Yak for 120,000g).
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Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by AndrewBrown »

You've got to get in early. I sold so much Ghost Iron Ore at inflated prices in the first few weeks of Mists of Pandaria that I was able to the Grand Expedition Yak and still had hundreds of thousands of gold left over. When I decided I was done with WoW for good and quit, I deposited all of that gold into my guild's bank, to general astonishment.
Bluebird55

Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by Bluebird55 »

AndrewBrown wrote: July 3rd, 2017, 10:51 am You've got to get in early. I sold so much Ghost Iron Ore at inflated prices in the first few weeks of Mists of Pandaria that I was able to the Grand Expedition Yak and still had hundreds of thousands of gold left over. When I decided I was done with WoW for good and quit, I deposited all of that gold into my guild's bank, to general astonishment.
Yes, very true although at the time I never had the real time to invest in farming (I had gotten my first job by then which was physically demanding), I know this because when Cataclysm came out I went on a farming spree for the ore in Cat zones to get the Sandstone drake ingredients, with flying now added to Legion the competition will be extremely high, adding realm merging it's without a doubt very difficult, although not long before I quit, I noticed pre-Legion mats were selling for quite a fair amount! As much as I would love to go back on WoW, it simply isn't worth it, with my most recent experiences.
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Re: World of Warcraft discussion

Post by raisinbman »

I can’t remember whether I started w/ Starcraft or Warcraft III, but I played them regularly in rotation as my mom’s computer couldn’t handle much beyond Starcraft. While I didn’t dive as deep into Starcraft as WCIII, I did enjoy my time. Blizzard, at their best, emanates an aura. It feels like they mix sugar, spice, and everything nice to somehow come up with something akin to nostalgia. Not to betray my own age, I think much like history or comics, this was very much an ‘age’ of gaming and blizzard itself(think Gold, silver, bronze, etc.). I was pretty young, so I didn’t really grasp SC at that level, but custom games were fun(and many were predecessors to their more famous and evolved counterparts in WCIII). Besides, SC was much more fun than watching the same reruns on TV, if anything was even on. Helped a lot knowing I had at least 1 constant in my life, as I didn’t have friends near my mom’s house.



Obviously WOW took over the world, but WCIII was huge too. As much as I enjoy reminiscing a bit, I couldn’t possibly do justice to the seeds WCIII planted throughout the Gaming Multiverse and you’re probably already familiar with them: DOTA, League, MOBAs as a whole, Battlechess, etc. It isn’t an exaggeration to say I spent most of my teenage years in WCIII or WOW. Much like with Starcraft at my mom’s house, WCIII(and later WOW) at my dad’s house was very handy to have as I didn’t have friends near me as I “illegally” went to a school that wasn’t near my house(Education problems and America, name a more recognizable duo!). On WCIII: The story and concept, while people will say it apes from other things, as a kid I definitely didn't notice, and I still think it makes it work, and plays to Blizzard’s strengths. They’re very good at doing broad strokes; iterating. It’s when they dive deep they run into issues. Orcs that weren’t mindless killers? Dark Elves that aren’t bad guys and the men stay at home(and sleep) while the women go to war? Arthas is DUN-DUN-DUN a bad guy? It may not have been Shakespeare(but then again, Shakespeare had dick jokes) but it clearly had enough of an effect to mount an entire expansion(TWICE! Maybe 3 times?; The Frozen Throne, Wrath of the Lich King, and the upcoming Shadowlands). The unit quips were great – I can’t help but smile when thinking of them, and sometimes each and every time they talk, die, or what have you. The graphical style still holds up – while, I’d say even at the time, isn’t pretty, they tend to compensate for that with cinematics and it holds a unique charm to it.At its core, they all had a unique build and silloutte so you wouldn't mistake them for one another. But I guess I don’t need to defend graphics anymore with Minecraft being a thing. I’m sure part of their strategy was to have graphics not kill computers a la crysis in order to keep userbase high – much like it’s different-genre-sequel. They also took measures to make sure every unit could be identified based on its team color, something that plagues games even still today. Custom games were huge, needless to say, and that’s where I spent a lion’s share of my time – Tower Defense, MOBAs, weird lewd images, you name it, it was in custom games. But it was a great thing, not wanting to play the campaign and being able to jump over to proper multiplayer or custom games – it provided endless entertainment unless the servers were down.



Cane and Rinse isn't big on hyperbole, so brace yourself: in terms of music, I haven't heard of ANYTHING like this. Even in WOW. While there are weaker tracks like the undead ones, much like Zerg they're more atmospheric and still perfunctory. Actually, I'd say the undead music comes into it's own in WOW(Naxxrammas, WOTLK). I still get the hairs on the back of my neck standing up on hearing most of these tracks.

As for the prescribed multiplayer, when I eventually became mostly tired of DOTA, I did actually try this. I think this gets buried a bit under the weight of SCII’s perfection and WOW, but apparently its quite the hit in China. While I definitely don’t have the APM to go pro, I did surprisingly enjoy myself in live multiplayer games – something I really enjoyed was that if you liked a unit, there generally was an upgrade path for it. So I personally really liked Troll Spear Throwers, which I could, in the later game, turn into troll berserkers. I think, especially as a kid, this helped me have at least one strategy and focus – which was also found with their Hero system. I don’t know if WCIII was the first(I remember them in Warlords Battlecry), but it allowed you to recruit heroes, which were more powerful than your footsoldiers, could level up, had skills, and could hold items. This was obviously a huge change from 2, but much like Street Fighter IV, we saw(and still see I guess) the genre adopting things like this. As with most blizzard things, entry is easy, but the depth is near infinite. Eventually, I moved on but I’d probably be able to go back today. Well, actually I can’t because WCIII: reforged is an outsourced hot mess, which we’re kinda seeing with Diablo?



Well, there’s 2 new studios of ex-blizzard employees that has been announced recently, with one proclaiming to bring RTSes back to greatness. As we increasingly see with the gaming industry, it seems if the studios that leave their properties in a vault somewhere, indie devs, fans, or even old heads still remember them and will either be continuing them properly, or through their own means.

Moving on to WOW proper, I will fully admit I was too much of a noob in Vanilla to even hit the level cap. WOW was my first MMO after all. Once burning crusade hit, and some of the difficulty left(though not much, it was mostly due to new level cap and benefits from that), I finally started to get the hang of things. Burning Crusade was still pretty freakin' tough, so I remember really coming to my own and understanding the gameplay loop, among other things, in Wrath. I really did enjoy Wrath, as it was a momentous occassion as a WCIII fan to finally re-meet the lich king. But with this expansion came probably the biggest split in WOW I know of. I believe with Naxxrammas, or maybe it could've been Ahn'Qiraj, Blizzard had remarked they made this raid content that was only seen by a fraction of the playerbase, and the changes they made in Wrath really show them backing this mindset. As much as it was said dismissively or as a meme, the game had become much more accomodating. Gone were the days of getting killed by a normal quest mob. Hell, you could probably solo elite enemies now. Purple gear was once a rarity, but as new patches and content came, it was given to nearly everyone. Heroics were the new standard, whereas normal runs were doable by nearly anyone. And with this came some other things - homogenization, instancing, and not much world left in the world of warcraft. Homogenization brought some classes on par with others, so it wasn't entirely a bad thing, and fit the M.O.. Instancing brought a new cinematic experience to players and showed them they had an effect in the world, but came at the price of seperating the playerbase greatly. And with that and many other modern conviniences, WOW became a game of standing in cities and waiting for your dungeon or raid. Oh, and did I mention there's a REALLY strong hero class? While these things all have their pros and cons, I do think this is where the game started to change, truly, from what it initially was.

I ended up stopping playing during Mists of Pandaria, not because "BLIZZARDRUINNEDTHE GMAE" or anything like that, but actually because my college started getting bad internet(or,I suspect, prioritizing certain traffic) whenever I tried to play. I also had realized a long time before then I was playing catch-up to the raiding content and never had much success there. Luckily MOBAs still had good connections on campus so I moved on from there. Oh, and in part I was waiting for WOW to go F2P.

It's funny, they opened the WOW classic server, and I actually would be interested in going back(despite their horrible Reforged treatment and Blitzchung mess) but NOT to vanilla WOW classic. I would like to do things I've missed, but know how harsh WOW classic was. Whether through schoolwork or just generally getting distracted, I think I'd be willing to go back to a WOTLK classic, or some of the other expansions I didn't experience at all.

I still fondly remember the world, its color palette, the music. I also think WOW is one of the best examples of how to do achievements right. Can't remember the history of it all, but obviously achievements have become somewhat regulated, when not every game is the same, and this causes problems. But in WOW, you're given achievements for things you'd be doing normally. And if you want to chase them as milestones, that makes sense.

But because I've been gone for so long,I would be interested in hearing about how the game's been faring.

Vanilla: Very hard game, unrefined as well. Raiding was very simple from what I've been told, but herding 40 cats was a nightmare. People enjoyed and reminsced about this version of the game to the point illegal servers were put up, and blizzard brought in one of the biggest runners of them to brreak bread, and of course, release WOW Classic.

Burning Crusade: Still hard, but they added flying. Started the trend of players going on to killing Warcraft figureheads which seems to be their narrative crutch. Does come up a bit when people reflect on 'which expansion they liked most', etc.

WOTLK: Revisiting another lore figurehead, many quality of life features and huge changes were made to the game to make it more accessible. Modernization brought impersonalization. First hero class(which ended up not meaning anything beyond a higher starting level, coincidentally they were pretty OP). Unlike BC, we really go to dig into the Arthas story and there was alot of build up to that. Tends to be a favorite expansion.

Cataclysm: Not only do we revisit lore Figurehead(s, plural this time), we revisit....all of Azeroth! I don't remember this one much, but this was for the most part a graphical upgrade, period. This was pretty major, lorewise IIRC with lots of cameos happening.

Mists of Pandaria: Somehow divisive even though Pandaren were in Warcraft since WCIII, I do think the opening cinematic and overall tone brought it back to WCIII instead of being completely self-serious. I didn't play this one much so I can't do too much commentary. I'm not sure if this is a bit of the same thing happening with GW Bush, but seems like people have softened their stance on this expansion, and in hindsight, see it as an overall good one. And for the record, this did the Make America Great Again thing before even Trump(though I think that was 1 or 2 expansions ago where it started). I believe there was also a lack of post-release content? Please feel free to fact check me there.

Warlords of Draenor: Did not play this, time travel tends to be the point in when a franchise jumps the shark. I will say the music for this expansion is a treat - although all of WOW's music(except for legion) is great, it really seems like going back to the OG horde let the artists dig deep and come up with something great(there's even at least 1 video games live track - Magnificent Desolation). I believe there was a content drought, please feel free to fact check me.

Legion: ????

Battle for Azeroth: ???? Again, did not play this one, but people seemed disappointed from the scuttlebutt I've gathered.

Shadowlands: This isn't out yet, but interestingly, the final 'area' and 'dungeon' on this map seem to be taking a page from RPGs like Persona and various roguelikes respectively. If they actually pull this off, making dungeons roguelike is actually pretty genius. At a certain point, it becomes boring and routine - especially with the public primed and hungry for roguelikes, this could do well.
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