By most estimates, Cataclysm is two to four months away from release. With it, everything relating to crafting and professions changes again. Some materials will become junk for a time, while others will soar in value. People are also playing less, raiding less, crafting less. Demand seems to be down for materials everywhere. My gut feel is if I’m going to be making money in this expansion, this is the last chance I’ll get to do it.

As such, I’ve been taking a good hard look at my bank contents, my professions and my gathering skills and trying to work out just how to turn it into a healthy amount of gold. There are still a few things I’d like to pick up on my main (like the Traveler’s Tundra Mammoth), plus there are a couple of alts I’m planning to level that will need riding skills and so on. I’m trying to lay the groundwork now while there’s little to do so that I’m not having to scrimp and save when the expansion hits.

Trouble is, actually making money as a Mage seems to be a bit of a tall order. I’ve started off by following Jaedia’s guide on setting up an auctioneering alt in order to start clearing through my various bank vaults. As I mainly tend to play on roleplay servers, Wilfred T Fuselage was born to take care of all the junk, surplus reagents and so on that I’ve managed to find on my characters. So far he’s doing a fine job, although getting to grips with the nuances of the auction house seems to be a bit tricky.

My main mage, Shaemus, is a tailor-enchanter. Currently most of his gold is earned through daily quests, as well as going through all the Northrend quests he missed while levelling. Any BoP blues and all greens that he finds get disenchanted and shipped off for selling. BoE blues get a chance at auction before being disenchanted as well. I’m having a bit of a rethink on this strategy, as Dream Shards tend to sell for about 5g each while the item could sell to a vendor for more.

Apart from this, I’m not selling enchanting Scrolls on the auction house at present as the market seems to be particularly fierce. I’m currently looking for tips on how to make this market more playable, but I’m worried that with raiding winding down that people won’t be upgrading their gear as much, which means fewer scrolls being bought.

Tailoring’s a bit of a bugbear for me at the moment – Frostweave bags don’t seem to make any money, while Glacial Bags only become viable if you’re a Moonshroud tailor (Shaemus is Spellweave). Sales on the speciality cloths are sluggish at best. Sometimes I get the feeling the best thing I can do is make a bunch of greens, disenchant them and sell the result.

That said, using skill barkers while I’m in a city helps a huge amount. I’ve managed to turn around a fair bit of gold by making items on demand for people, as it seems they prefer to obtain the materials then hire someone to do the crafting.

My other main contributor is Mendelev, a miner-jewelcrafter. I’m sending him out once or twice a day to go mining around Icecrown. Saronite at the moment gets sent straight to Fuselage for auction. Epic gems also get auctioned uncut – again, I’m nervous about entering the cut gem market even though it could make more money purely because of the competition. I’m also selling my surplus blue quality gems, although some get shipped to my alchemist for transmutation. Green quality gems are currently hanging around doing nothing – they won’t sell at all.

All the titanium that Mendelev mines gets prospected for gems. Eternals that he mines up either get placed on the AH, or go into the transmute queue to become epic gems or more valuable eternals.

Voltimand, my herbalist-alchemist, is currently being used as a transmutation robot. Herbs seem to be pretty flat on the auction house, mainly because no-one’s making flasks any more. As a result, once a day he makes an epic gem or an eternal transmute. He’s making me about 100g a day for five minutes work, but I can’t help but feel he could contribute more.

So this is how things are now, a few days in. I’ve managed to make nearly 3000 gold from the clearout and a few simple things, but I feel like I’m pouring in a ton of effort (and materials) in order to make money. The next challenge is to move on from this and see if it’s possible to move from selling raw materials to finished items safely. I’ll be on the lookout to find more simple tips in order to help with this over the next few days, but if you have any advice then feel free to share!

How about you though? Are you running down your stocks in anticipation of the expansion, or are you still holding on? Are you building up reserves of old-world materials to cater for an avalanche of Worgen and Goblins with professions to level?

Image taken from the Wickham Market Hoard, one of the largest hoards of coins found in the UK.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• The Obscurecast: Episode 6
• Under the Hood
• The Obscurecast: Episode 4

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Post tags: auction house, cataclysm, proffesions
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In the episode this week we have:

• Throne of the Four Winds
• Blizzard Auras (Built in Power Auras) – new graphics
• New Mounts!
• Archaeology – not much known, except Harrison Jones as trainer!
• NCSoft being sued for making Lineage too addicting?

For this week’s Obscurity we discussed our gamer heritage – where we came from as players, where we hope it will lead to and what our fears are for the future.

For a future show we’re hoping to examine the Warcraft cultural divide – how do you play WoW that you think is unique to your country? Have you noticed anything that players from other countries do? Mail us your thoughts at the address below and we’ll use them in the show.

Intro music was  Decimal Places by I Concur.

You can subscribe to us in iTunes. While you’re there, please rate the podcast and leave us a review.

As always, if you want to contact us about anything on the podcast you can mail us at obscurecast@manaobscura.com, post a reply here on the blog or tweet us at @manaobscura.

Thanks for listening!

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Clearing My Head
• The Obscurecast: Episode 6
• The Obscurecast: Episode 4

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 3 comments
Post tags: archaeology, cataclysm, mounts, ncsoft, raiding
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Let me give you an example. I don’t play anything with FIFA in the title because I don’t like sports games as a genre. I’m not morally opposed to them though, even though my hatred of football (soccer, not American football) is fairly well known. On the other hand I know people who won’t play World War II shooters out of respect of those close to them who lost their lives. It’s this latter kind of objection I wanted to look at.

So why bring it up? Well, it turns out that I may have found the first game that I’d object to buying or playing on moral grounds. It’s surprising because it was one I’d been interested in playing for a while. Since then it seems that the focus of development has shifted somewhat.

When I started looking at TERA, I was intrigued by the style they were planning to use. Giant city-wide machinery, sprawling vistas and gorgeous models all combined to give an image of a game I wanted to play. Couple that with a new skill based combat system and a character set that seemed to tick all the boxes, and I was all set to buy this one. The way that spellcasters were split into both Sorcerers and Mystics appealed to me, making me want to dig further.

Since then my perception of the game has changed. A hands-on video of Castanics, one of the playable races in the game, managed to put me off completely. If you listen to the commentary, it’s the way the camera tilts to give an upskirt view when the character runs (even though she’s bent almost double to achieve this). Later on there’s a lapdance-style casting animation, which just adds to the whole tacky image.

TERA is an unfortunate creation. Designed and built by Korean developers Bluehole, it’s now going through a reconstruction and regionalisation by En Masse in the US. Even so, that doesn’t really excuse what seems to be a significant shift in the way the game is being marketed and promoted.

Do a Google image search for TERA Online and you’ll find a heavy abundance of the Castanics race in a large chunk of their promotional bumpf. Whether it’s wallpapers, box art or in-game screenshots, it seems that the big focus ins now on emphasising the scantily clad character type as much as possible.

So what’s the big deal? After all, it’s just polygons, right? Doesn’t World of Warcraft have this kind of thing with the infamous Black Mageweave set? Don’t single player games like Bayonetta or Dead Or Alive: Extreme Beach Volleyball have similar content? Well, yes and no.

You see, Warcraft is an MMO. And like other social games, one of the big draws is playing with (and against) other people. Blizzard’s creation works well, in that it appeals to a broad spectrum of people from all demographics. You never know who you’ll meet from one encounter to the next. By overly sexualising content in the way TERA have done, you focus on a niche market. Will you get the same rich melting-pot community? Unlikely.

Also, Blizzard’s marketing and advertising has been done to showcase the world, the environment and the rich lore and potential for adventure. To me, TERA’s advertising has been focused on the appeal of one race.

The other big issue I have is where it takes gaming as a hobby. I’m one of the lucky ones – I’ve been playing videogames since I was two years old. That’s nearly thirty years experience of mashing buttons and pressing start. There are others that haven’t been so lucky, who only wandered into this by accident. Part of it is because the industry has “grown up” – it’s no longer the reserved club of the geeky white teenaged male, and is now accessible and relevant to huge numbers of people. Games like TERA are a step back for us as gamers – they hark back to a white male exclusive past. They ignore the progress we’ve made, both as gamers and as part of a wider gaming community.

There’s also the feel of the game. Do I need to play a game which is tinged with something slightly creepy, slightly seedy? Not really. I mean, if those games were popular then Leisure Suit Larry would be making a fortune. Ideally, I’d like a game to stand on it’s graphics engine and mechanics, not on a few strategically placed polygons from the modelling team.

I like being an inclusive gamer – I get to meet people I’d never bump into otherwise, and believe me people are fascinating. But by the same token I want to play games that are also inclusive, that have wide appeal. When a game tries to appeal so hard to a target audience that it handicaps itself from others, it moves away from that ideal.

So how about you? Is there anything you wouldn’t play? Can you see yourself giving TERA a go?

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Spoiler Warning:

One thing I promised to do as part of my beta coverage was produce some videos of the mage changes in Cataclysm. They say that a picture tells a thousand words, and sometimes it’s more helpful to produce a video showing something than a blogpost describing something.

This is the first video, covering an intro to the new spells and effects and a quick look at rotations. I’m hoping to put subsequent videos together to go into further detail on particular aspects.

Apologies for the low quality. Although I’ve bought a copy of FRAPS, I’m going to have to wait a few weeks before I can get a copy of Sony Vegas. After that, things should definitely improve.

If there’s anything that you’d like to see in a video, feel free to ask and I’ll do what I can. No promises though!

Thanks for watching!

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact
• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage
• New Mage Experience: Pt 1

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 2 comments
Post tags: cataclysm, mage, video, youtube
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In the episode this week we have:

• Cataclysm Collector’s Edition announced
• Curse of the Worgen Comic announced
• Private Server Co forced to pay $88m in damages
• Huge Cataclysm Guild Updates
• New Cataclysm Achievements
• Wrath released in China
• MagicMelonBall’s 3 Dragon Azeroth t-shirt

For this week’s Obscurity we discussed your Cataclysm hopes and fears. We got a great response on this – it seems a lot of people are really concerned about their favourite classes.

For next week’s show we’re hoping to examine the Warcraft cultural divide – how do you play WoW that you think is unique to your country? Have you noticed anything that players from other countries do? Mail us your thoughts at the address below and we’ll use them in the show.

Intro music was  Decimal Places by I Concur.

We’ll be broadcasting live on uStream every Wednesday from 9PM BST/ 8PM GMT. Feel free to join us if you’re around. You can also subscribe to us in iTunes. While you’re there, please rate the podcast and leave us a review.

As always, if you want to contact us about anything on the podcast you can mail us at obscurecast@manaobscura.com, post a reply here on the blog or tweet us at @manaobscura.

Thanks for listening!

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Will My Computer Run Cataclysm?
• The Quest Converyer Belt
• New Mage Experience: Pt 1

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 5 comments
Post tags: beta, cataclysm, collector's edition, comic, development, private server, worgen
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As a result, I’ve done some basic testing in order to be able to answer this simple question. Trouble is, it’s not an easy one to answer. There are so many variables to consider – do you raid, what graphics settings do you use, etc. The best I can hope to do is give you a relative idea of how my machine performs in the beta and provide you with enough information so that you can make your own comparisons.

Before I begin, I’m going to be clear that this is beta software, and as such usually contains a bundle of debugging code. It’s not been compiled to produce the best possible performance. As a result, these figures are only likely to improve between now and release. If it’s not clear if you should upgrade, you might want to wait and see. Don’t let me stop you saving though, just in case.

The Baseline

To start of with, let’s establish some specs. My desktop machine is an Intel Core 2 Duo 6600 running at 2.4GHz. It has 4GB RAM and an nVidia 9600GT graphics card with 1GB on board RAM. I have a 20.1 inch TFT monitor, running at a resolution of 1680×1050.

Sitting in Stormwind at peak time, outside the bank, I can comfortably manage 64-70fps. In Dalaran that usually drops to around 30fps, although it varies hugely with the time of day and how many people are in the city.

10-man raiding runs with no problems at all, but I occasionally have to drop down a few settings to cope with 25-man raiding comfortably. By this I mean that my framerate drops below a comfort minimum of 20fps. Below this number, stuttering becomes noticeable and input lag can start to impact performance.

Smoothing Things Out

Before looking at the myriad of other settings (and believe me, there are lots) it’s worth looking at the bare basic settings that you use. Running in fullscreen rather than a window can improve performance, as can being strict about pruning addons that you don’t really need.

There’s also a setting about multisampling that you can tweak to improve the overall image quality. Put simply, it’s a technique used to smooth out jagged edges between two high-contrast models. You can see it clearly in the picture below – the battlements contrast against the red roof – on the left there’s no multisampling while on the right there’s the maximum applied.

While having full multisampling switched on might look nice, you might want to dial it back a few notches. Depending on your graphics card, you might find a significant performance boost with little or no multisampling applied. Of course, your mileage may vary.

The Five Options

Rather than going through each individual slider in this article (and tripling it’s length) I’ve chosen to examine each of the main performance settings available. These options are Low, Fair, Good, High and Ultra. As a guide, I generally tend to play on Ultra.

Now, remember I mentioned that I get around 67-70fps in Stormwind? In the current beta build that drops down to around 30-32fps at the same location with roughly the same population. Like I said before, this is beta code and performance is likely to improve before release.

Low detail (click to embiggen)

The lowest detail setting cuts things back to the bone. Low viewing distance and low texture detail help bring performance up to an impressive 110-130fps. If you’re happy to cope with this detail setting then it’ll help stretch your hardware as far as possible. If on the other hand you’ve grown used to all that nice detail, you might want to look at at the later options.

Fair detail (click to embiggen)

Moving up a notch, fair detail pushes out the view distance and ups the texture detail slightly. It also runs at a pleasing 64-70fps on my system. That said, there’s not a huge amount of difference between this and the next setting.

Good detail (click to embiggen)

At the Good detail level, things start to come alive. You can start to see the high resolution textures in areas like the pathways, while the background mountains start to creep into vision. You can also see doodads start to creep into camera range – notice the hatches on top of the nearest towers? Good detail comes in at 55-60fps while floating above Stormwind.

High detail (click to embiggen)

Moving up to High doesn’t introduce many changes. The most significant one is the introduction of dynamic shadows, along with a further extension of view distance. There’s also an increase in the doodad range (the banners on the canal fort are an example). High plays at 44-47fps in this beta build.

Ultra detail (click to embiggen)

At a glance, it’s hard work to tell the difference between High and Ultra Detail (even though Ultra runs at about 27-31fps). Looking at the details though, there are some subtle improvements to shadow quality. The view distance has also increased, with the edges of those mountains in the distance now becoming visible. The doodad range has increased further as well.

Although I’m confident that performance will improve on this between now and release, I think that falling back from Ultra to Good quality will be acceptable if it’ll save the cost of a few upgrades.

The Conclusion

Overall, if your computer runs Wrath then it’ll be able to handle Cataclysm. You might have to hop between the settings or even fine tune a few sliders to get the right balance between performance and quality, but overall you should be fine.

If you’re hoping to take advantage of the new water and sunshaft effects, as well as the improved shadows from Wrath, you might want to take a closer look at your system. If your machine comfortably runs Wrath without any issues then you should be fine. If however you’re struggling with framerate problems at the maximum detail settings you might want to look at upgrading.

In a future post I’ll be looking at some of the new settings, various upgrade options and what you can do to save yourself a few pennies at upgrade time. In the meantime, if you have any questions please fire away.

Photo taken of the Difference Engine, held at the Computer History Museum

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• The Obscurecast Ep 14: Hopeful Fear
• The Quest Converyer Belt
• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 7 comments
Post tags: beta, cataclysm, development, graphics, hardware, performance
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A whole slew of mage changes came out in the most recent patch. The main ones were around armour specialisations and talent masteries. Wearing our normal gear (complete cloth armour) nets a handy 5% increase in Intellect. For fire mages, Mastery now gives us a tasty bonus to the DoT component of our spells. Both the specialisation and mastery appear in our spellbook once we’ve learned them from the trainer.

The new teleport bar that I mentioned after the previous patch has now been fleshed out with all teleport spells. The only snag is that only the Dalaran and Shattrath spells work now, meaning that for most mages it’s now a two-hop trip to wherever we want to go. Even so, it’s still better than catching a boat everywhere.

Apparently there are new teleport and portal spells available to the new Tol Barad PVP zone, although I haven’t had a chance to test these yet. There are currently no teleports or portals to Vash’jir, Deepholm or Uldum, although there are static portals at Stormwind and Orgrimmar.

The other big change is that creature damage has been heavily ramped up from level 65 onwards. Level 82 outdoor creatures now do four times as much damage as they used to, which is horrendous news for cloth classes with little to no damage mitigation.

Currently, solo questing involves constant use of mana shield, counterspell and frost nova. And that’s for every single pull, just to stay alive. Going toe to toe with mobs in Deepholm is an excruciating experience – you have to work hard to take down a single mob. If you have anything add to the fight, you’re toast. Don’t forget that Polymorph won’t help you there as almost everything you fight is an elemental of some description.

Making An Impact

In terms of talents, Impact finally found a purpose outside of PvP. It’s main purpose now is to be used as a DoT spreader, pushing any periodic spell effects to other nearby creatures. It’s something that feels limited to fights where the tank is trying to hold a number of mobs, but where you’re unable to open up with AoE spells. In this case you’d mix Fire Blast into your rotation when impact procs in order to get a boost to your overall damage output. It also increases the likelihood of triggering Pyromaniac, but more on that later.

The AoE Speciality?

Way back in the mists of Wrath, mages were told what their particular niche was. Rogues were supposed to be the single target damage dealers of choice, while mages were intended to be masters of area-of-effect damage. At the end of the expansion, it doesn’t feel like that design philosophy has rung true – there seems to be little point being able to do high AoE damage when you aren’t given the opportunities to use them. Most dungeon and raid bossfights tend to rely on single target damage with fast target switching. It’s only the trash in heroic modes that work with AoE, unless you’re out farming on your own.

So what happens in Cataclysm? Well, mobs now hit like a truck, so taking on a single one is a tough act. Trying to use your AoE talents outdoors isn’t going to happen unless you like being the centre of a truck sandwich, and we all know how much that appeals to cloth classes. AoE grinding is definitely off the menu.

A Different Dungeon Approach

I’ve kind of alluded to it before, but a mage’s standard role within dungeons is changing. Previously it was all about dropping down Blizzard on trashmobs and helping the party get through the experience as fast as possible. With the expansion, your role changes much more to one of crowd control and placement. You’ll need polymorph (and I’m really hoping they bring out a glyph that allows you to control two targets for half the duration).

Part of the reason for this change is because of crosshealing mobs that will just keep eachother up while you waste mana trying to kill them. The other side is that a tank’s ability to keep aggro on multiple targets is being severely nerfed. A paladin in Wrath can quite happily keep a number of enemies stuck to him like glue. In Cataclysm that drops to maybe one or two, with only about a quater of the aggro on other mobs nearby. That means that dropping spells like Flamestrike on a group of mobs are a sure way of making lots of friends. And by friends I mean creatures that want to kill you.

Fiery By Design.

So let’s look at Pyromaniac again. Basically, the idea is to get your fire DoTs on as many targets as possible so that you can get the spell haste bonus. Sounds lovely, right? More spell haste equals more DPS, while more mobs affected by your DoTs means more bonus from your mastery talent. It’s all beginning to tie in together.

Except there’s a snag. As I’ve mentioned earlier, you’ll only be taking on one mob at a time without help. For solo questing and PvP, talents like Pyromaniac and other AoE enhancers are pretty much a lost cause – you’ll never get to use them outside of artificially unbalanced situations because you’ll be torn to shreds before you manage to kill anything. You won’t be using it in dungeons because the tank will lose aggro on most of his mobs the second you drop a blastwave-flamestrike, leaving him like some kind forty-something accountant watching his hair all escape and trying to keep hold of the little that remains.

Sharing The Love

We’re mages. We like to ensure that as many creatures as possible get to experience the wonder that our spells have to offer. It doesn’t matter if it’s Fire, Frost or Arcane, we love to share. But currently it’s only really our Frost-laden types that can manage to pull it off.

There’s a couple of adjustments that can be made in order to make Magecraft more successful in Cataclysm again, particularly in making AoE useful.

• Make Mana Shield soak more damage. Currently it feels like a cardboard coating on the tissue paper that is mage cloth armour. With the amount of damage that mobs are doing, it would be nice to have a spell that would soak more than a single hit.
• Add a debuff to mobs under AoE to reduce their damage output. Call it something like Crippling Flames, but basically make sure that mages don’t get pummelled into paste when they try and take on more than a single mob. Otherwise, there’s very little point in having AoE abilities in the first place.
• Make Frost Nova a bit more flexible in non-frost specs. If you’re going to force us to go down the root-blast-root-blast path, at least improve the rooting ability so that it doesn’t break if we so much as tickle the mob.

I’d like to think that we can start to have a bit more utility around AoE. Right now, it feels like those talents are the ones not to take.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Early Look: Mage Talent Revamp
• Polymorph or Polydeath?
• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage

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Post tags: cataclysm, design, mage, talents, theorycraft
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Back in Vanilla, Warcraft was mainly a scattering of quest hubs, each with their localised set of quests. Sure there may have been prerequisites such as a minimum level, but by and large you could quest where you liked. In Cataclysm the experience is streamlined into quest tunnels that guide you through a zone from one end to the other. To help with this, phasing is the toy of choice in the quest designer’s toolbox.

Phasing as a technology started out with a single quest in Burning Crusade. “Intercepting the Mana Cells” was added in patch 2.4.0 as part of the daily quests for the Shattered Sun Offensive. These quests were part of the overall Sunwell Plateau content update, adding the final dungeons and raid instances before the release of Wrath. In the quest, the player used a device to move “out of phase” and be able to interact with the items they needed to complete the quest.

Since then, phasing has evolved even further. It was put to heavy use in the Death Knight starting area in order to enrich the storytelling experience by changing the location of NPCs and even the weather after key quests were completed. It’s also heavily used in the Icecrown zone in Northrend in order to show the impact of player actions on the game world.

That’s not to say that it’s been entirely without it’s problems. One of the most common issues is with the summoning stone outside the Icecrown Citadel raid instance. Because players need to be in the same phase in order to interact with each other and the stone, both must be at the same point in the Icecrown quest chains in order to start summoning others.

Enough history. In Cataclysm, phasing has been extended even further. It’s not just the NPCs that change, it’s the entire environment. Buildings crumble, rivers turn to streams of lava and entire villages sink under the waves. It’s impressive to watch and absolutely epic to play through. For a storytelling mechanic inside an MMO, it’s very compelling.

Like everything there are pros and cons. The con in this case is the linearity of the gaming experience. If you’ve played an RPG like Halo or Mass Effect, or even Dragon Age: Origins you’ll know what I mean. The shift of the game changes from being a world where you wander from zone to zone picking up quests as you go, to one where you go through a very structured tunnel. Go off the beaten path before it’s time and you can find yourself lost and lonely. You haven’t progressed to the next phase of the game yet.

The real frustration with phasing creeps in because of the quest tunnel it places you in. Currently if there’s a quest chain you don’t like either because it’s frustrating as hell or because it goes against your character’s (or even your own) moral compass, you can ditch it and move on. The next town over will welcome you with open arms, showering you with jobs and stuffing your mouth with gold coins. As Pewter describes over at The ‘mental Shaman, there’s a risk in Cataclysm that your progression will grind to a halt if you reject a quest for whatever reason, ideological or otherwise.

At the moment, phasing is a new toy or effect. It’s like when Hollywood first discovered CGI – it ended up everywhere you could possibly imagine it, partly because film directors wanted to play with the new medium and partly because it was the must have tech for a while. Nowadays, CGI is a subtle affair that’s carefully applied for the right situaions. And of course, the best CGI effects are the ones you don’t notice.

In time, it’s likely that the use of phasing will be toned down a notch. Quest and level designers will work out how to introduce them subtly, rather than at every opportunity. In this regard, Cataclysm can be seen as something of an experiment for both the dev teams and the playerbase.

After all, we’re playing MMOs because we like interacting with other people, and that interaction should extend outside of raids, dungeons and battlegrounds. Being the lone hero in a massive world is just that – lonely.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• The Obscurecast Ep 14: Hopeful Fear
• Will My Computer Run Cataclysm?
• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 3 comments
Post tags: beta, cataclysm, development, phasing, questing
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In the episode this week we have:

• Cataclysm Preview: Darkshore & Southern Barrens
• New Pets & Companions
• New NPC Models
• Password Security Reminder

For this week’s Obscurity we answered your Beta questions. We had a batch of them sent in already, plus we got round to a few that were asked live on the show!

A big thankyou to everyone who’s donated to the site. We’ll be ploughing it all back in to making more cool stuff for you all.

Intro music was  Decimal Places by I Concur.

You can subscribe to us in iTunes! While you’re there, please rate the podcast and leave us a review.

As always, if you want to contact us about anything on the podcast you can mail us at obscurecast@manaobscura.com, post a reply here on the blog or tweet us at @manaobscura.

Thanks for listening!

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Spoiler Alert: Pictures of fish! With funny names! And funny faces! And nothing at all to do with anything else really, apart from the funny fishes! It’s not even mage-y!

As you probably know already, Cataclysm ushers in a whole range of changes. New places to explore, new creatures to see. For the seasoned adventurer it’s like being a kid in a toystore – you want to look at everything all at once, and your determined to try growing a bazillion eyes in order to do it.

Since I’ve been spending a lot of time gawking at these strange creatures instead of actually doing any beta testing, I thought I’d share some pictures of them. Be warned, there are pictures of fish ahead.

The Subservient Trayfish is the butler of the deep sea. He’s at his happiest when ushering around small plates of canapes and sandwiches on his back. The Lazy Susan of the underwater world.

Some trayfish have been known to go rogue and decapitate several guestfish at classy evening dinner parties. Fortunately, such instances are rare. Even so, it is important to treat your trayfish with respect and to never ever overload them.

The Superhappyfish is always super happy. With a broad smile on his face and wide eyes, he’s always managed to find something to be cheerful about. Maybe it’s because he’s found a date for the fishy prom? Maybe because he’s found some very sugary plankton and is running around in a sugar rush super happy frenzy?

The current theory is that the Superhappyfish is one of those unnaturally happy creatures of the universe. You’ve probably seen them – you probably work with some of them. Why are they always super happy? No-one knows…

Closely related to the Superhappyfish, the Caffeinated Greenfish is a nervous fellow that seems to be easily startled and quite jittery. He can often be found sidling up to Barristasharks, or cautiously nibbling at coral. He tries to smile, but it’s more of a frown.

The Caffeinated Greenfish can be hard to spot during the daytime, particularly at mornings. When woken, he often bubbles in annoyance and pulls a blanket of seaweed over himself. Apparently mornings are something that doesn’t happen to the Caffeinated Greenfish.

The Deadly Omnomnomfish is a formiddable creature that should be approached with caution. Almost hunted to extinction by those seeking to make imitation druid shoulderpieces, the Omnomnomfish takes revenge by attempting to nom anyone who dares attack it. You think sharks are bad?

Once the Omnomnomfish latches on to you with it’s nommning teeth, it drags you away from wherever you happen to be to it’s lair. Known as the Pit of Nomming, this is where you will be slowly nommed to death over the course of several weeks. You see, the Omnomnomfish doesn’t believe in good dental hygiene, meaning that you’ll mostly be brutally gummed.

Wrapping up our undersea voyage, the Old Rockerfish is a bitter creature with a foul temper. He can remember the good old days when the music of the sea was filled with powerful riffs and moving lyrics. He even had a part in a local band playing sea-bass.

Those days are long gone, and for the grumpy old Rockerfish it makes him sad. The irritating “choons” that the Superhappyfish keeps on playing FAR TOO LOUD just give him headaches.

Occasionally, groups of Old Rockerfish have been known to reform, playing that old music in undersea jazz cafes to groups of hip young things like the Caffeinated Greenfish. But he plays his tunes with a tear in his eye. It all runs deep to him. Real deep.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Games Within Games Within Games
• The Obscurecast: Episode 6
• Blizzcon? I’m Virtually There

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 7 comments
Post tags: cataclysm, fish, silly
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The latest beta realm patch was recently released, bringing with it a range of changes to the Mage fire tree (full notes in the forums). I’d been holding off doing any serious work on my level 80 transfer because these changes were inbound, and it’s definitely been worth the wait. The subtle playstyle changes have livened up the spec, both for PvE and PvP fans alike.

First up, let’s look at the baseline. Comparing my mage to his Wrath counterpart, his health pool has crept up almost 10k hp while his mana pool has remained flat at around 25k. Spellpower, haste, hit and crit percentages are also broadly in line with those in the current live game (although Spellpower is slightly higher in beta). Making the transition should be fairly smooth. The biggest issue will be the wasted spirit statpoints on non-set or filler gear – reforging or replacing may be the best way to deal with these items.

The spellbook has been completely overhauled, with spell ranks being removed and additional abilities creeping into the spellbook. Skills such as Guild Perks can be found on the general tab, alongside weapon and armour skills. This is useful if you quickly want to know what perks you have enough guild reputation to be able to use.

Teleport Totems?

Looking more closely at Mage changes in the spellbook, it seems like the teleport and portal UI is going to be redeveloped in Cataclysm. There’s a new test teleport spell in the back of the spellbook, which pops out a Teleport-Dalaran icon when clicked. The number in the bottom-right corner is the number of teleport runes remaining.

When this is dragged onto the actionbar, it works in pretty much the same way as a totem – just click the button to expand out the list of teleports available. Again, currently only Dalaran is included.

It looks like Teleports and Portals will be merged into a single spell with a collection of options in order to reduce space on both actionbars and spellbooks. It also means that addons that were normally used to manage portal menus are eliminated, reducing the overall addon load. I’m also hoping that Polymorph also gets added to the set of spells that receive this treatment.

Taking Talents

It’s worth taking the time to look over MMO-Champion’s updated talent calculator, as it really helps to show the changed ethos behind how fire talents are laid out. For a raiding mage, it’s beginning to feel as if you’re being forced to take the bad talents in order to get at the ones you want.

By placing Blazing Speed as a pre-requisite for Molten Shields, or Dragon’s Breath for Living Bomb, it feels as if I have to waste talent points on “fluff” in order to get to the stuff I really want. It’s not such a big deal – you end up having to take a lot of these talents anyway in order to reach Living Bomb, but it’s still annoying.

The big news though is Cauterise – the talent that heals the mage from a killing blow, only to kill them again. It’s a really interesting concept as a “buying time” talent, in order to get rid of some of that squishieness that fire mages typically suffer from.

It’s currently really hard to use properly, partly because the old Fire Ward animation is used to show when it kicks in, along with a ticking debuff. There’s no audio alert or combat text, which means you have to quickly deal with the situation before you burn to death. A PowerAuras config or audio alert is going to be compulsory to use with this.

Recovering from Cauterise has a couple of options. You can iceblock through the debuff, but that still leaves you with mobs pounding at your fragile skull. Mage Ward can also be used to absorb some of the fire damage. Molten Shields can also be used when Mage Ward dissipates to give you a movement speed boost – handy for when blink is on cooldown to get away from those mobs or out of the bad stuff.

Mage Ward won’t absorb that much damage though. Considering that at 80 you’ll have about 25k-30K HP, you’re looking at around 2700 damage per tick. Mage Ward will probably eat one tick, leaving you on about 4% health once Cauterise finishes burning. You buy yourself a bit of time, but you’ll need to act fast to make the best use of it.

The other big change is the introduction of Firestarter. This simple talent allows you to cast Scorch while moving as long as Molten Armour is up. The excellent news is that fire gets a further mobility boost, both for PvP (Scorch can trigger ignite) and PvE (being able to DPS while moving out of the bad stuff). It’s come at a cost though – Improved Scorch now feels like a waste of a talent spot, while Fire Blast is relegated to being either a finishing move or a way to consume Impact procs.

AoE Options

Fire Mage AoE has also received a boost in the beta, although I’m struggling to make the best use of all the tools available at the moment. Pyromaniac increases spell haste if three or more targets are taking DoT damage from my spells, while Improved Flamestrike reduces the casting time while under Pyromania. The two talents are designed to work together, yet I’m struggling to get them to mesh properly at the moment.

Blast Wave has also changed – it ‘s now a ranged AoE with a slow effect added on, much like Blizzard. It’s also instant-cast. The removal of knockback gets rid of one of the biggest problems with the talent for raiding and dungeons, but also removes it’s usefulness for PvP. It’s possible that a glyph will arrive to remove the slow component and add the knockback, but it’s uncertain at present. It’s also not clear if this AoE is really needed when compared with Flamestrike.

Next Up

Once the AoE playstyle is nailed down, I’ll be looking to record some videos to demonstrate exactly how these new abilities work. I’ll be also looking at mage rotation changes now that the Spell Vulnerability part of Scorch has been pushed out into Critical Mass.

I’ll also be trying to look at how mages feel when levelling from 80 to 85, as well as having a bit of a closer look at the interplay between Flamestrike, Blast Wave and Flame Orb. This should really help with AoE farming and rapid-instance clearing, but getting the balance right should be interesting.

I’m also still working at the other end of the scale with the Worgen mage. I’ll be releasing an update on the early mage experience soon.

As always, if there’s anything you’d like to see or find out more about, please ask.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact
• The Obscurecast Ep 11: Beta Rage
• Early Look: Mage Talent Revamp

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 4 comments
Post tags: beta, cataclysm, mage, stats, talents, theorycraft
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The more astute of you will realise that it’s only been a few days since our last show. Why so soon? Well, last week’s was delayed because Gaz was taken to hospital. He’s fine now though, so everything’s back on track. We are looking at getting a regular show slot organised so that we’re not continually bouncing around people’s schedules.

In the episode this week we have:

• The new Cataclysm beta build download mechanism
• Guild contest winners announced
• Uldum footage unveiled
• The new elemental concepts

The Obscurity made a return this week in the form of Gender Bias in videogames. We got a huge response on the topic, and covered it at some length. We’d also like to thank Kim Baker, Education Liason Manger of Blitz Games Studio for talking to us for the show.

Coming up in future Obscurities – your Beta questions answered, plus a Mage extravaganza. More details to come.

Intro music was  Decimal Places by I Concur.

You can subscribe to us in iTunes! While you’re there, please rate the podcast and leave us a review.

As always, if you want to contact us about anything on the podcast you can mail us at obscurecast@manaobscura.com, post a reply here on the blog or tweet us at @manaobscura.

Thanks for listening!

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact
• A Good Beta Tester?
• Games Within Games Within Games

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 6 comments
Post tags: blitz games, cataclysm, design, uldum
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After firing up the Cataclysm beta on Friday evening, I’ve since tried a handful of characters. My level 80 mage has now been copied over, mainly so that I can have a look at the fleshed out talent trees. Because there’s a whole batch of changes to the Fire tree due to land in the next beta build, I’ve instead focused on the experience of rolling a new mage.

I initially started off by rolling a Gnome but there are currently a handful of bugs for both Gnomes and Trolls at character selection. As a result I decided to try a Worgen so that I could get a feel for the new starting area at the same time. Don’t worry though, I’ll be keeping this all Mage-centric.

Starting With Fire

The first spell you start off with as a mage is Fireball. And that’s it. No self-buffs, no other schools. You have one button to press and you’ll be pressing it a lot. The aim here is to streamline the experience and introduce new spells gradually. Great for those new to the class, but seasoned Mage veterans will be a little shocked.

For the most part it’s a smooth introduction, with mobs falling over after a couple of strikes with your trusty spell. It gives you a chance to get used to the area and the controls rather than worrying about what button to press

The Proc Pickle

At Level 3 you learn Arcane Missiles. Normally this would be a great thing, but in Cataclysm AM is purely proc-based. Cast almost any other direct-damage spell and there’s a chance that you’ll proc Arcane Missiles.

Anyone who’s played a raiding Arcane Mage will be instantly familiar with this mechanic, as it’s an almost direct copy of the old Missile Barrage talent. There are two problems I have with this choice, the first being that the procrate feels low to me. It might be that I’m missing procs due to limitations of the Standard UI – I’m used to using Power Auras and Mage Alert in order to tell me when a proc is available for me to use.

There’s another problem with having a proc based ability available so early on – how to actually make use of it! At the early levels you’re typically burning things down very quickly, so the proc usually gets wasted. Sometimes you’re lucky and can use it to pull a fresh mob, but it’s not optimal by any stretch.

Not Thirsty

One of the big uproars that initially came out of early beta announcements was the removal of Conjured Food and Water until the later levels, where mana pies and strudels would replace the individual food and water spells.

The strange thing is, I haven’t really missed it. Downtime seems to have been drastically reduced at the earlier levels, with both health and mana regen getting a significant boost. The old sequence of fight-drink-fight-drink is largely gone.

Building the Music

Things become a little more interesting around the level 5-7 mark. Mages are known for being a glass cannon, and you really begin to feel it at around this level. Mobs start to build up and swarm around you, yet without any crowd control or mob management ability, it can become a frustrating experience. Careful pulls are the order of the day to get over this hump. All the same, get used to seeing the spirit healer at the graveyard.

Fire Blast makes an appearance at level 5 as a great finishing move, but it’s not until Frostbolt arrives at level 7 that you get some ability to control the mobs around you. Frost Nova finally appears at level 8 in order to finally give you the mob control you need. You’re still running without Blink, but new mages can start getting to grips with the old-school mechanics of rooting and kiting as the way to control mobs.

Rounding things out, Counterspell becomes available at level 9. Being able to pull casters into melee while kiting them slowly using frostbolt is a classic tactic, so it’s good to see it being encouraged here.

That Mage Has Talent

Once you hit level 10 and talents become unlocked, things become substantially easier. The talent interface locks you into a specific tree until you either unlearn your talents at a trainer or reach the end of the tree. The talent interface is a slick affair and a huge improvement on the one I’m used to, so I’ll be covering it in detail once the Fire talent updates arrive.

For the moment I’ve decided to go with a frost spec, partly because I’ve not used one in a very long time (think Molten Core back in Vanilla). The other reason is that RandomPetName is ridiculously overpowered – I can pull a mob with Fire Blast and the water elemental will take it down in a single hit. In terms of mob control it’s almost an essential companion, especially if you’re going to be focusing on the kiting/rooting tricks as a way to get quests done.

Gazmundo has reached level 12, having just picked up Arcane Explosion. My next instalment will document his journey into the 20s and possibly beyond, depending on how smooth the ride goes. In the meantime, if you have specific comments, questions or things you’d like to see then please ask below.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• The Obscurecast Ep 14: Hopeful Fear
• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage
• The Obscurecast Ep 11: Beta Rage

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 9 comments
Post tags: beta, cataclysm, mage, worgen
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In the episode this week we have:

• Cataclysm Masteries, Armour proficiencies and upcoming mage fire talents
• Mage, on a raptor, on a shark, with lazer beams!
• Camel mounts and related achievement
• Authenticator required to post on forums
• Blizzcon Live Stream on Sale
• Starcraft 2!

We also cover off an awesome reader email on storytelling in videogames that we’ve been holding on to for a while.

The Obscurity returns next week in the form of Gender Bias in videogames. After that, we’re going to be planning a Mage Extravaganza for an upcoming show to finally cover off all things mage. We’ll be looking for some guests to help us out with this, so shout us with your reccomendations!

We’re also thinking about doing a Live Show next week. Details to be finalised, but Stay Tuned!

Intro music was  Decimal Places by I Concur.

You can subscribe to us in iTunes! While you’re there, please rate the podcast and leave us a review.

As always, if you want to contact us about anything on the podcast you can mail us at obscurecast@manaobscura.com, post a reply here on the blog or tweet us at @manaobscura.

Thanks for listening!

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage
• Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact
• New Mage Experience: Pt 1

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 8 comments
Post tags: beta, blizzcon, cataclysm, lore, mage, talents
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If you’re interested to know what I’ll be covering then please take a look at my Cataclysm Rules of Engagement. This basically means that I won’t be posting spoilers on quest X or Y, but instead will stick to coverage of class mechanics, spells and talents.

Current plans are to document the mage leveling experience, both for new races and existing ones. I’ll also be looking to talk about the level 80 experience when faced with a completely new talent tree. More on that soon.

If there’s something you’d like to know more of then please ask and I’ll add it to the stack of things I’m going to cover. I’m also going to try and record some videos and put them on Youtube (complete with British Accent commentary)! If there’s something you’d particularly like to see, please let me know.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage
• New Mage Experience: Pt 1
• The Obscurecast Ep 11: Beta Rage

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 3 comments
Post tags: beta, cataclysm, mage
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I hate to go all forum moderator on you guys, but we’ve seen a recent downward spiral in the quality of some of these threads and posts here on the beta forum.

Story time: I started posting heavily in the Lich King beta forums. It was a great experience and lot of players enjoyed the opportunity to be able to have intelligent conversations directly with the developers. I’ve heard over and over ever since then what a positive experience that was for a lot of players. It’s for that reason that I am going to be fiercely protective of the quality of posts here in the Class Discussion forum.

If you see a locked thread, chances are we thought it crossed the line. If you keep making the kinds of threads that get locked, then you’ll be removed from the beta and we will replace you with someone who can provide intelligent feedback. Sorry to sound like a jerk — I hate making these kinds of posts. But we want participating in the beta to be a positive experience.

Now I’m guessing that almost anyone reading this would be inclined to think that they’d make an excellent choice for a beta tester, and that Ghostcrawler should boot someone else to make space for them. It’s an easy gut reaction to make.

There’s a bigger question from all of this though – would we actually make good beta testers?

Myself, I’m not so sure. I’m a blogger, I like to blog about the games I play. How those games evolve and change is a natural extension of the whole thing. I consider myself lucky that there are a handful of other people that like what I write. Mainly though, I do it for the fun of writing.

One of the things I like to write about is change. The events that bring about change, the context that the change sits in. You can see this when I look over the patch notes – very high level stuff, what the changes are and how they relate to overall playstyle and mechanics.

Trouble is, sometimes it feels like I’m writing a review of a film based on a plot synopsis or promotional poster – it’s fundamentally flawed and doesn’t take account of the finished product. It’s a struggle to talk about a musician or a comedian if you’ve never heard them play or listened to their jokes

Can you imagine what it would be like if I was in beta? It’d be like having your film reviewer sitting on set, being a back-seat director and generally being a nuisance. They need people who will describe their experiences, tell them what works and help them improve the game. They certainly don’t need an armchair psuedo-developer being publicly critical of them at every turn.

Who makes a good beta tester? The hardcore theorycrafter that can look at a tooltip and give you an excel spreadsheet in five minutes profiling how that ability would work. The pug maniac that has more emblems than gold and has a set of badge gear for every occasion. The altoholic that has levelled each class of each faction to 80 twice and remembers each quest like they’re items on a shopping list.

Do they need people like myself? Nope. I am not a good beta tester candidate. I focus ferociously on a single class, I am fickle and critical, and I generally grow bored of things easily. If something is too frustrating, I’m likely to give up rather than persevere.

I also do not think that I’m a special case just because I write a blog or record a podcast. So what? There are hundreds of other blogs out there, many of them informative and well written by knowledgeable and articulate people. Type Warcraft into iTunes and you’ll find pages of voices all discussing Blizzard’s games. My blogger/podcaster status doesn’t automatically grant me rights to the beta. I’m in the same pot of random as everyone else.

So those who are in beta, test well and test hard. Give Blizzard as much information as you can on your experiences. Help make it an expansion we can all enjoy. Eleven million gamers are depending on your work.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• The Growing Yet Shrinking World
• Under the Hood
• Mage Cataclysm Preview

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 14 comments
Post tags: blogging, cataclysm, design, development, ghostcrawler
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Feel free to head on over to the fourms and join up. Registration is quick and easy, and you can dive right in and start posting as soon as it’s done. You don’t need to be some mage guru to join either – both newcomers and old hands are welcome to join.

There’s also a couple of spots on the forums for you to talk about the blog, The Obscurecast podcast and anything else that may take your fancy.

Let’s hope that this place grows into a flourishing new home for mages.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Entering The Youtubes
• Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact
• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 3 comments
Post tags: community, forums, mage
Check out the Mage Resources Page for everything Mage related
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In the episode this week we have:

• New Beta Build – further spell and talent changes
• Icecrown Citadel buff now at 30%
• Guild Levelling and Guild Perks
• Twitter Dev Chat & RealID Updates
• MMO-Champion Bought by Curse

The second hour of the show we spend discussing Pewter, the focus of her blog and some of the subjects close to her. Topics like videogaming with disabilities, what geek feminism actually means and even Computer Engineer Barbie get covered.

We’ve also added some discreet advertising to the site in an effort to help contribute to the cost of producing the show. If you like what we do and want to help, you can also donate to our “Coffee Cache” through the button on the site.

Intro music was  Decimal Places by I Concur.

You can subscribe to us in iTunes! While you’re there, please rate the podcast and leave us a review.

As always, if you want to contact us about anything on the podcast you can mail us at obscurecast@manaobscura.com, post a reply here on the blog or tweet us at @manaobscura.

Thanks for listening!

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Clearing My Head
• The Obscurecast: A Beginning
• A Snipe at the Socials

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 7 comments
Post tags: cataclysm, curse, guilds, icecrown citadel, mental shaman, mmo-champion, pewter, twitter
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Basically, do mages want or need their own spot on the web?

There’s a handful of reasons why I think it’d be a good thing, plus I think it’ll sit alongside places like The Warlock’s Den, Tankspot, Shadowpriest.com, Shadowpanther and so on. Even the Shaman are getting in on the act with Operation Totemspot.

So please, PLEASE, leave your comments on this. Do you think it’s a good idea? Would you use it? What would you expect it to do? Would you be interested in getting involved? Anything else you can think of?

That’s it for now – I have a podcast to prepare for!

UPDATE: Following the enormous response, I’ve opened up a new set of forums! You can find them here or by clicking the “Forums” link above. Please go there, register and join in!

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Entering The Youtubes
• Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact
• Entering Beta: The 80 Fire Mage

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 46 comments
Post tags: mage, portal idea
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Singe I started playing Warcraft, I’ve bought what, maybe a handful of games? All of them titles that I’ve wanted to try out, that have looked cool, that have felt right.

Know how many I’ve completed? Zip. Nada. Zilch.

I must suck as a gamer or something.

So how comes I’m still logging in day after day, week after week? Isn’t there something else that’d be more entertaining to play? Something that’ll actually feel satisfying to do? Shouldn’t I be busy finishing Brutal Legend or Red Dead Redemption or Guitar Hero: Metallica?

Let me put aside the whole social side. Yeah, I have some good friends in Warcraft and it’s cool to play games with them. But I’ve done most of the content, and the content I’ve not done is so damned samey. Raiding. Questing, Instancing. Battlegrounds.

Wash, Spin, Rinse, Repeat.

I was thinking of this while looking at the BlogAzeroth shared topic this week, about what the game has taught me. I could have gone on about the things I’ve learned about the behaviour of groups, social dynamics and so on. I could have even talked about how it’s taught me to like being bored. But that’s not me.

It got me thinking about what Blizzard’s brought to the game design table. I wanted to write about how I’ve learned a lot about game design and game theory from analysing the game we all play. But then I realised I’d look like an overweight sports commentator, expounding the virtues of this tactic or that one even though I’d never coached a team or run a club.

The joke is, none of this really matters any more. Larísa says that we’re in the twilight of Wrath. Going on from this,  we’re not even playing Blizzard’s game any more. Yes, we might still be raiding, we might be doing the odd arena match. But who can say they’re doing much more than just marking time till the next expansion?

Achloryn can. He’s been soloing the heroics of Burning Crusade. Not because of the loot but because he wanted to see if he could, if it was possible. Gnomergeddon’s doing it, torching up the old places for a little bit of fun and adventure.

I’ve been doing it as well by having an achievement war with a few friends. We’re constantly battling it out to get more points than anyone else. I’m currently leading, but a few old world raids by my friends will put me back in last place again.

So what game are we playing, if it’s not Blizzard’s? Truth is, it’s whatever game we want it to be. Warcraft is becoming a bit of a school playground with small groups of us running off to do do our own thing, to play our own game. We’re tired of the swings and slides.

I think it’s an achievement to have built a world that’s still fun to be in, even when parts of it become repetitive and boring. It’s why I don’t think that the “theme park” description  fits – would you still go to the funfair every week if you were bored of all the rides?

I’m curious though – what other games are people inventing? What else are people doing in this world that they’ve built? What are you doing with the swings and the slides to make them fun again?

I know that Cataclysm’s going to arrive sooner than I think, and it’s going to be back to business. But for a while, just a while, it’s fun to goof off.

Like this? Try these other related posts:

• Beta Patch – The Pyromaniac’s Impact
• Under The Sea
• The Obscurecast Ep 12: Live Experiments

© Gazimoff for Mana Obscura, 2010. | Permalink | 8 comments
Post tags: cataclysm, design, shared topic, silly
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