A Theory of Fishing November 13, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in EverQuest, EverQuest II, Humor, Lord of the Rings Online, MMO Design, Warhammer Online, World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Fishing
15 comments
A post in which I draw two points and declare there to be a line.
Before I start, I just want to point out the humor tag on this post. Some people will miss that and not read the post in the spirit in which it was written. It is Friday. Relax and just chuckle at my folly.
I have a theory about fishing and fantasy MMORPGs.
Fishing Yet Again
I believe that there is a correlation between how well a fantasy MMORPG does relative to its contemporary competitors and how deep and interesting the fishing mechanism that is available at launch.
So, the better the fishing is at launch, the better the game will do relative to other games that launch in a similar window of time.
My data set so far:
EverQuest: Launched March 1999
Fishing: A relatively straightforward but deep fishing mechanism. You needed a fishing pole which had to be equipped. You needed bait, which got used up as you fished. You could fish in just about any water you could find. And you caught a wide variety of things, from fish that could be used for cooking, to rusty weapons that could be sharpened, to junk for the vendor. So in many ways very much like real fishing; pick your spot, grab your pole, make sure you have bait, and fish away.
Market position: Rapidly became the king of the hill, declining only when the next generation of competitors came along.
EverQuest II: Launched November 2004
Fishing: Barely a fishing mechanism at all. No fishing pole or bait required. Fishing was reduced to harvesting “fish nodes” which at launch would yield at most a single fish per try before the fisherman had to move on to the next node, so you were constantly on the run. And then all you ever caught was fish, never the stereotypical old boot or rusty dagger.
Market position: A strong start that rapidly faded with the game never achieving anything close to the popularity of its predecessor.
Lord of the Rings Online: Launched April 2007
Fishing: None at launch, added later (too late by my theory)
Market position: Mid-pack, never a contender for market leadership.
Warhammer Online: Launched September 2008
Fishing: None
Market position: Mid-pack after losing more than half of their early subscriber base
The Wild Card
Now, the whole in my data set is World of Warcraft, but only because I did not play on day one so I cannot speak personally to the state of fishing back then. But from what I have seen since I started playing five months after launch is that WoW has a very EverQuest-like fishing paradigm. You need a pole. There is no bait, but you can attach a lure. You can fish wherever you want.
And furthermore, WoW has continued to improve fishing as time went along. There are fishing tournaments, fishing achievements, fishing quests, some truly special fishing poles, and even some pets that you can obtain only by fishing. You can fish up an amazing amount of things. Plus there was that fishing chair that was in the card game.
Don't mind me, I'm just fishing
What Am I Saying?
Now at this point you may wonder if I am somehow suggesting that fishing is the most important feature of an MMORPG.
I am not.
I am moving more towards a “canary in a coal mine” view of fishing. If a company has had the resources to deliver a reasonably polished game and has had the time to include fishing as something more than an afterthought, that the game might have the makings of a winner.
More Data Needed
Of course, to test a theory one of the things you can do is see if it would have predicted the same outcome for similar events outside of the current data set. In this case, other MMORPGs that have launched. I have taken two sample cases of good and bad fishing and drawn a line and then forced a couple of null set results onto that line and called it a theory.
So what other games have had fishing at launch, how good was that fishing mechanic, and how have the games done?
For example, while I wasn’t there, I am going to guess that Ultima Online had fishing of some sort. I mean, if you could be a shepherd, how could they miss fisherman. And while I tend to see UO as more the culmination of the long running Ultima series of games rather than a game on the D&D-Diku-EQ-WoW trajectory of MMORPGs (which isn’t a bad thing), it was the market leader in its time, it exceeded the expectations of the developer, and it lives on today.
What about Aion, Runes of Magic, or the upcoming Alganon? Alganon certainly took a cue from WoW on interface, did they also borrow fishing?
Something on the hook
Other Questions
Should this theory include PvP oriented games or not? I put WAR on the list because Mythic invested in a PvE game.
Is it limited to fantasy? Did Star Wars Galaxies have fishing? Could this have been an early indicator for the fates of Auto Assault and Tabula Rasa?
Is there another game mechanic besides fishing that fits the theory better? I cannot bring myself to generalize this to a good resource harvesting mechanism because fishing generally represents such tangential feature to the game that I think it is special.
Or is this all just the view of somebody who has maxed out the fishing skill in every MMO he has played?
Ragefire Chasm Redux November 12, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in Instance Group, World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Ragefire Chasm
10 comments
We finally reached the point where there were no more holiday events to go after and no more fresh instances to run for the group. It looked like we might spend a Saturday evening playing our new characters, the ones we rolled up on Lightninghoof, one of the RP-PvP servers.
But what should we do?
With five of us, running around the Barrens seems like a bit of a waste. We had all progressed into the teens with characters though, so Ragefire Chasm seemed like a good plan. It is a nice, low level instance. Yes, we did it before, though not exactly as it was intended.
So an objective was set. Now which characters should we play? Each of us had at least two or three characters in the right level range.
We shuffled through the deck of possibilities and ended up with the following roster:
14 Troll Rogue – Azucar (Bungholio)
15 Tauren Druid – Hurmoo (Vikund)
16 Tauren Druid – Azawak (Skronk)
17 Orc Shaman – Earlthebat (Earlthecat)
19 Blood Elf Paladin – Enaldie (Ula)
This gave all of us somewhat different roles than we had in the old group.
Azawak became the tank, leaving the healing role behind. Azucar and Enaldie left behind ranged DPS for… melee DPS. Earlthebat got to stand back and take the ranged DPS route. And Hurmoo was no longer in close doing melee DPS, but got to stand back and heal.
Fortunately, to support the learning curve for our new roles, we were, on average, a bit over level for the instance.
The first order of business was to get all the quests for the instance lined up. A few were easy and could be shared, but there was one quest line that starts at Thrall that we had to all run through. And run is the operative word, since it meant running back and forth around Orgrimmar for a bit.
Finally though we had all the quests and were ready to go. We had all the quests. We had a laundry list of things to kill. We were at the instance door.
Somehow I, as Hurmoo, was nominated to be the group leader. Usually that is a mistake on the order of going up against a Sicilian when death is on the line, but things did not go too badly. I need to go off and find some macros for putting up raid icons, but otherwise the floaty crownie thing on my portrait was not the mark of death.
Considering how new we were to our roles, the run went smoothly. None of us died despite some teething problems.
Azucar got some on-the-job training about stealth and sap, which was required because he was our only crowd control option. Being the lowest level in the group meant that his stealth was not as effective as it might otherwise have, but that just reinforced the lessons.
We do have to get used to having somebody stealthed and leading the way in the group. At least one group member kept following our stealthed rogue as he was trying to sap, triggering the expected proximity pull. Again, we made it through despite the that.
Having a druid bear tank worked well enough. At this level he also put out the most damage, thanks largely to the retribution aura Enaldie had up.
Ragefire Chasm itself is somewhat odd in its design philosophy. There is a whole side path of mobs that leads to nowhere and the main boss, Taragaman the Hungerer, is the second of four bosses you kill, so the achievement comes up when you’ve still got work left to do.
He was not an epic fight for us. We cleared some of the surrounding groups and then went after him. Soon we stood over his corpse.
Taragaman Defeated
That left us the clean up of the two passages behind Taragaman’s area, which we worked our way through slowly as we tried to fit into the new dynamic of our group.
In the end we stood looking out over the dungeon having made it to the far end.
Mission Accomplished!
And then we had to walk all the way back to where we came in because there is no back door to Ragefire Chasm.
The ironic twist of the night was the loot. Formerly we were a group that wore only plate or cloth and we seemed to get a huge amount of leather or mail armor drops.
Now we were a group that wore only leather and mail. So what dropped all night? Cloth.
So cloth much dropped that I later trained Hurmoo as an enchanter so that we could at least disenchant items we cannot use if we get a repeat performance.
Ragefire Chasm is nice, and served as a good place for us to start working on our grouping skills. In fact, we were wondering why there wasn’t an Alliance instance at the same level before you got to the Deadmines.
Of course, Ragefire Chasm is something of a single use dungeon, so investing in an Alliance version might not be worthwhile, though who knows what Cataclysm will bring.
Once we were through the dungeon and had turned in all the quests, our group had all leveled at least once and three of us leveled twice. So our group looked like this at the end:
16 Rogue – Azucar
17 Druid – Hurmoo
18 Druid – Azawak
18 Shaman – Earlthebat
20 Paladin – Enaldie
At those levels, there is little point to heading back into Ragefire Chasm.
But now where to go next? Do we face the PvP aspect of the server and try to get to the Deadmines? Or should we try the long and winding road that is Wailing Caverns?
Faults of the New Shaman November 11, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Shaman, Stealth, Travel Form
8 comments
Our move over to the horde side of the Lightninghoof PvP-RP server has been progressing slowly.
We’re trying new classes and getting used to new home towns.
One of the classes I have been playing with is the shaman. It is a fun class so far and I have a lot to learn about it, mana management being high on the list.
But I have a problem with the class.
At level 16 I got the ghost wolf form, which is a travel form that gives a speed boost akin to the druid’s cheetah form. That part is great.
The problem is that the ghost wolf is… well… a ghost. Unfortunately, for somebody who has spent a bit of time playing a rogue and a lot of time playing a druid in cat form, being a ghost has the same visual effect as being stealthed.
Ghost Wolf
And while I know at some higher intellectual level that being a ghost is not the same as being stealthed, something in my brain keeps making that assumption.
I’ll be running across the Barrens and see something to harvest on the far side of a few aggro mobs, so I’ll just weave between them like they can’t see me.
Only they can see me.
At that point it is usually a good thing I am in travel form because I have to run away for a bit while I remind myself that I am not stealthed.
That lasts for about five minutes and then I do something similar.
It is really annoying. But it is like breaking any habit, it is going to take time.
24 Slots is a Portable Hole? November 10, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in Blizzard, World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Portable Hole
9 comments
WoW.com has a post up today that says Haris Pilton, vendor of the “Gigantique” bag in Shattrath, will be getting an even bigger bag when WoW patch 3.3 comes out.
The new bag, called the Portable Hole, will have 24 slots and will cost 3,000 gold. It will no doubt be a boon for OCD packrats everywhere in Azeroth.
Picture stolen from Wow.com
But to call 24 slots a “Portable Hole” seems a bit of an over-statement in my book.
After all, I’ve see what a Portable Hole can hold.
Blizzard, call me back when your Portable Hole can carry all of that or change the name.
Or do you think we’re never going to see a bigger container in game?
And We Were Upset About a $10 Horse… November 6, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in Blizzard, World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Companion Pets, Pandas, RMT
13 comments
Where is Darren when we need him?
Surely this will bring him back for another post!
Yes, Blizzard has turned that corner at last and is now selling in-game items for real life money. No more buying trading cards… well, actually, you’ll probably still have to do that if you want every possible item… the cash store is open, show us the money!
For Sale - $10 Each
For myself, I am going to again restate my indifference to buying items in game. It is a PvE game, so my fun is generally detached from your fun regardless of how many trinkets you buy. You want the $10 pet? Knock yourself out.
Will I buy these pets? I am going to say no. $10 seems like a lot of cash for either of these guys, the panda’s contribution to charity fig leaf not withstanding. Get back to me when there is a special mount for sale.
However, this evening my daughter will get to log into WoW and she is going to see that Panda on the splash screen and she is going to want it.
At that point I will have to start on another futile discussion about money and how it is not infinitely generated from the plastic cards in my wallet. Then she will want to spend her own money on it (her saved up birthday, holiday, and tooth fairy money adds up to the low three figures, so she has declared herself “rich”) and I will feel compelled to nip that in the bud.
My big hope is that she’ll just zip through the splash screen the way she zips through quest text and miss it completely.
But at some point she is going to see it or see a panda in game and the question will come up. Pandas have that effect on a sub-set of females in my experience.
In fact, you should have seen Ula’s reaction when I mentioned a panda on guild chat last night. Sorry about that Skronk.
The Ringless Horseman November 5, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in Instance Group, World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Hallow's End, Headless Horseman
3 comments
(Post title courtesy of Kaozz)
It was 10pm on Halloween night.
Real life Trick-or-Treating was at an end, our own little trick-or-treater was in bed, the candles in the pumpkins had been blown out, the porch light had been turned off, and all was finally quiet. Even the cats had settled down,
On Eldre’Thalas, which runs on Eastern Time, the Hallow’s End had faded. Trick-or-treating was also at an end, the decorations had been stowed away in their various bit buckets, and Azeroth was back to its usual self.
Fortunately, as we learned at Brewfest, the instance servers run on Pacific Time, so they are late to start and late to end when it comes to Azeroth holidays.
Which meant that we had a few more shots at the Headless Horseman to try and get his mount. Four to be exact.
Ula was not on, but Gaff, in the form of his druid joined us for another round of Headless Horseman fun. So we were:
73 Druid – Nerral
80 Priest – Skronk
80 Warlock – Bungholio
80 Warrior – Earlthecat
80 Paladin – Vikund
Unfortunately, you need to be level 75 to summon the Headless Horseman, so having Nerral along did not add another shot at the mount.
As before, the battles were pretty manageable. Not totally easy, but the only way we were going to lose was to screw up pretty badly.
But in the end, no mount.
We got lots of rings, hence the title of this post. We’d all be surprised if he had any rings left after our haul.
Not that the rings were bad (Vikund is wearing the Ring of Ghoulish Glee now), but by the end we all had most of the rings. You cannot sell them. You cannot have more than one of each. Nerral has a couple of rings now that he can use when he hits level 80.
Other than rings, we did get the Magic Broom to drop four times, and Vikund picked up the Horseman’s Baleful Blade. It isn’t quite a Tankard of Terror, but it looks nice.
But no Horseman’s Horrific Helm (which would have been nice for Vikund or Earl) and no Horseman’s Reins, the item that gives you the Headless Horseman’s mount.
Did anybody get those reins?
And with that, Hallow’s End was over for us.
Last Call for the Headless Horseman
Until next year Sir Thomas Thompson!
October in Review October 31, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in Dungeons & Dragons Online, EVE Online, Lord of the Rings Online, Star Trek Online, TorilMUD, Warhammer Online, World of Warcraft, blog thing, entertainment.4 comments
The Site
I’m now fully a month into the fourth year and I still manage to pollute the blogosphere with 20-25 posts a month, many of which contain a “TL;DR” amount of text. I am surprised I have kept going this long.
Of course, we are at a bit of a crisis point, what with the main thread of the blog, the instance group, at something of a crossroads.
On the other hand, I have apparently not mined out the rich vein of gaming nostalgia yet. Of late I have been returning again to TorilMUD and how things used to be.
Of course, unlike a lot of past online games, TorilMUD has the advantage of still being around so I can go refresh my memory. Even it has changed a lot over the last 16 years though. (But they have a nice new web site up now! Heck, they even have a Twitter feed!) And they have been trying to align the combat systems more with the current d20 system that D&D uses. Farewell THAC0!
One Year Ago
In one of the worst kept secrets, it was announced that BioWare’s MMO project was in fact Star Wars: The Old Republic. Their subscription goals were, of course, quite modest. (NOT!)
I celebrated my 15 years of playing Sojourn/TorilMUD with the first in a series of posts that I am still working on. Nostalgia FTW!
And speaking of Nostalgia, Tipa was out looking for EverQuest blogs. I’m not sure any were discovered.
The instance group formed up a guild and was running in Warhammer Online. We had our best night and our worst night, plus a few that were somewhere in between. All in all though, things were not as exciting as we had hoped.
Mythic was trying out incentives to get better server balance while starting to talk about new stuff coming soon. Not a word about the quest log however.
In EVE Online Potshot, Gaff, and I were playing with fleets and I was flying a shiny new ship.
And I stared logging into World of Warcraft again to get things lined up for the upcoming Wrath of the Lich King expansion. I managed to survive through the controversial scourge event and was intrigued by these shiny new achievements.
New Linking Sites
The following sites have been kind enough to link here. Please take a moment to visit them in return!
Most Viewed Posts in October
- Play On: Guild Name Generator
- How To Find An Agent in EVE Online
- Professor Oak’s Letter and Shaymin
- Heroic Deadmines!
- Arceus Event Annouced!
- Scouting DDO
- The Battle.net Conversion
- XP vs. Vista vs. Windows 7
- Diablo! I mean Torchlight!
- DDO Guild Creation FTW! Almost…
- Exciting Ways to Die in Kobold Village
- Weighted Jack-o’-Lantern Fun
Search Terms of the Month
dead disney caracter
[Bambi's Mother?]
explosive mushrooms
[not the kind with which you want to experiment]
i got to the place where shaymin is but
[but?]
“i own a freighter”
[me too!]
how to do headless horseman twice
[first get him drunk...]
herve villechaize
[Da plane!]
Spam Comment of the Month
Don’t let porksword rust
[Is that a Kingdom of Loathing thing?]
Dungeons & Dragons Online
As part of the continuation of the instance group, we have begun scouting other games that might lend themselves to our play budget. Dungeon & Dragons Online, now available with a free to play, item store supported option seems like a possible fit. Potshot, Gaff, and I have rolled up characters, but we have not decided yet whether the title is worth pursuing in the long term.
EVE Online
Still mostly dormant for me. I have been skilling up my main character. He will be able to fly a Hulk soon, so he will have some flexibility in mining ops if/when we get back to New Eden. Since flying the Orca got me most of the skills for a Hulk, I figured I ought to finish that off. After that, I’m not sure what training goal I will go after.
Lord of the Rings Online
I pre-ordered that Adventurer’s Pack, which means that the Siege of Mirkwood expansion will be available to me come December 1st. Of course, I still haven’t seen Moria….
Star Trek Online
I didn’t get in the closed beta, but I am on the press release email list, so I get nothing but teases about the game. Still, I hear it is coming out next year.
Torchlight
Another distraction!
World of Warcraft
The instance group still lingers in Azeroth. Certainly the “swap to horde” idea was an easy decision for the group, since the barrier to entry were so low. We will see how well that sticks.
In fact, we haven’t played the horde guys too much over the last two weeks, since Hallow’s End has been going on. Instead we went after the Headless Horseman and the achievements, stopping off at the Trial of the Champion while we were there. But if you go to Pugchecker now, you’ll see that we are flagged green for all of the standard 5-person instance bosses.
Coming Up
I am sure there will be some more highs and lows with Torchlight. It is a v1.0 (or v1.1) product, so there are always issues, some of which I have already encountered.
There is more nostalgia to be squeezed from TorilMUD.
And we’re getting to the point where I am going to have to look back and see if wacky predictions I made at the start of the year have managed to come true.
And, as always, tales of the instance group.
Horsemen and Champions October 29, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in Instance Group, World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Hallow's End, Headless Horseman, Trial of the Champion
3 comments
While we finished the last, real, official, current, canonical five person non-heroic instance last week, swatting down King Ymiron like the bug he is, there were still things on our agenda. Some loose ends to tie up.
The whole group was on.
80 Priest – Skronk
80 Warlock – Bungholio
80 Mage – Ula
80 Warrior – Earlthecat
80 Paladin – Vikund
And the first order of business was the Headless Horseman, a Hallow’s End standard.
This is our second year hitting the Headless Horseman in hopes of getting his mount.
The Headless Horseman Takes Off
For the group this represented attempts 16 through 20 to get the brass ring. But it was not to be. We now have quite a selection of rings, so many that we had to leave one horseman corpse unlooted, but no mounts.
Going after the Headless Horseman did not take us long though. Compared to last year taking him down seemed quite easy. There was no question that we were going to win. Last year we lost once and it was work to win the rest of the time. This year we previously went at him minus Earl and with a level 54 shaman in tow and it still seemed more like a chase than a fight. (The shaman died a couple of times, but that didn’t change the balance of the fight.)
I don’t know if this means that were are just better this year in skill/equipment or if the HH didn’t get big enough boost over last year, but we beat him down 5 out of 5 times on Saturday and are 20 out of 20 overall so far.
Which left us enough time to go take a full group run at the Trial of the Champion.
We tried to do this as a four person group previously, and were not successful. This instance is supposed to be a bit of a step up from the other five person instances in Northrend, so we were back again to give it a try.
Mounted for Battle
The first part, the mounted combat segment, was a bit chaotic as before. Three of us died during that part. However, the graveyard is close and if you run back you can mount up and join the battle again. So after a lot of running around, we defeated the first three bosses in mounted combat.
Then we were treated to a change. The event has been altered since last we ran it so that now, once the mounted portion is done, the bosses don’t just turn around and start wailing on your lance equipped character. Instead, they just retire to the gate through which they came, allowing us to get ourselves together and plan out attack.
We faced Morka the Skullcrusher, Zul’tore, and Deathstalker Visceri. Visceri had a mana bar, so we figured he ought to be first on our list. We went straight after him.
Earl was able to keep all three on him and, while healing got a little scary for a moment or two, once Visceri was down, the drama ebbed and we were able to drop the other two.
The first round was complete. We were now further than last time.
Next up was Eadric the Pure, who shows up with nine trash mobs in three groups of three. We were surprised to find that none of these groups were linked with Eadric, so we were able to mow them down and then move on to the big guy.
His big move is Radiance, a flash of light that damages and blinds you for a short time. However, this attack can be defeated by simple turning away from him, which the announcement that heralds the attack pretty much tells you to do.
We figured that out pretty quickly, though we all turned around at the announcement of another of his attacks, having fallen for the old “Simon Says” gambit, which did not diminish his Hammer of the Righteous.
In the end, Eadric went down.
Which left us facing the bonus round, the Black Knight. He was a pushover out on the tournament grounds, but now he was back from the dead and seemed a bit more formidable.
We had to face the Black Knight three times to get through the encounter. He comes at you in three phases, first as a scourge, then as a skeleton, and finally as a ghost, and each segment has its own flavor, which we had to learn the hard way.
The first phase was straightforward. We never had a problem there.
The second phase, when he is a skeleton, sees the Black Knight summon a group of minions who got out of control the first time we ran into them, leading to a wipe.
The second time around, we took care of the second phase by getting Earl to collect all the minions and then Bung and Ula rained area attacks on them, swatting them all down pretty quickly. Then we smote the Black Knight, which lead us to the third phase, where we wiped again while trying to come to grips with the constant damage to the whole party and the “Marked for Death” special that hit and caused the death of Skronk early in the fight. Another wipe.
So we ran through the the three phases one more time, there being no partial credit for the Black Knight, and at the final phase just had everybody keep a close eye on their health while we burned him down with maximum DPS. We still ended up losing Ula and Bung in the fight, but they poured enough damage onto the Black Knight that we were able to finish him off.
And so we stood in victory over the orb that was all that remained of the Black Knight.
Black Knight - Not Invincible
Unfortunately, there was no achievement. The Trial of the Champion achievement requires you to defeat all the possible bosses in the instance. One pass through leaves at least three bosses left undone. So if we want the achievement, we are going to have to come back for another visit.
On the upside, the loot chests were pretty nice, with a couple of nice, purple upgrades for the casters and a good cloak for Vikund.
And so we made it through the Trial of the Champion. Since it was Hallow’s End there were a few out takes from the victory shot, since everybody seemed intent on scarfing the candy from the Headless Horseman.
We all had the Out With It achievement already, we just like throwing up in public.
As for next week. I’m not sure what we’ll do on Halloween. Probably five more shots at the Headless Horseman and some more puking.
Hallowed in Alterac Valley October 28, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Achievements, Alterac Valley, Hallow's End, Pilgrim's Bounty
5 comments
Like Potshot, I have been trying to finish up the Hallow’s End achievements to get the meta achievement and the title of “The Hallowed.”
Once I figured out that the flimsy mask achievement was not a prerequisite for the title, I figured getting the meta achievement would be easy. After all, this is our second pass through Hallow’s End achievements. I picked up most of them last year at this time, so there were just a couple more to get.
And I was even more encouraged that I got the Sinister Squashling on my first trick-or-treat. Things were looking good.
In fact, very quickly I was only waiting for somebody in the group to get the Leper Gnome wand. That was all I needed to complete the Masquerade achievement. And nobody in our guild had one.
I could have paid somebody to hit me with the Leper Gnome wand. People were shouting offers to do so for 5-20 gold. However, after my daughter got ripped off by somebody offering that service, my faith in my fellow man dipped just a little lower. There is no real recourse if you give somebody money and then they decline to wand you.
And so I waited for somebody in the guild to get one of those wands. A week went by. No Leper Gnome wands.
Well, actually, there were five Leper Gnome wands, but they were all on my account. I was having no problem getting them.
At one point, Skronk got the random wand.
We met up and he hit me with that. On the third try, I rolled Leper Gnome!
And I didn’t get the achievement.
The achievement is quite clear. You need to be transformed by the Hallowed Wand – Leper Gnome, not just turned into a Leper Gnome by a wand.
Back to trick-or-treating.
Then, one afternoon I was in the Alterac Valley battleground. I was just shy of the honor points I needed to buy something new. And as we say waiting for the battle to start somebody said, “Anybody have the ninja wand? I need it for the achievement.”
I had the ninja wand. Heck, by that point I had most of the wands. So I hit him with the ninja and he got the title and the achievement.
Seeing his success, I asked in the raid if anybody had the Leper Gnome wand.
Nobody responded.
Seconds passed.
The gates started up and the battle was just beginning when suddenly somebody hit me with the Leper Gnome wand.
Hallowed in Alterac Valley
The title was mine! I am not sure who got me, but thank you very much!
And then we went on to win AV in record time.
Of course, about two hours later, Ula logged on and got the Leper Gnome wand trick-or-treating. That is the way it always seems to go.
Now I just have to work on that flimsy mask achievement while we wait for the next big WoW holiday event, which is apparently Pilgrim’s Bounty. I’m not sure how that is going to play outside of the US, but we’ll see.
Right Ho, Jeeves! October 26, 2009
Posted by Wilhelm2451 in World of Warcraft, entertainment.Tags: Engineering, Jeeves, P.G. Wodehouse
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I have at time considered dropping the engineering profession.
I picked up engineering originally with my paladin, Vikund, primarily to support my then main-character-of-the-moment Tistann, who is a hunter. Among the many things that engineers can make are guns, gun enhancements (scopes), and upgraded ammunition. All very useful to a hunter that has specialized in guns.
But while the engineering recipe list has some other interesting items, it can be a less than thrilling professional path.
It is certainly not a money maker as most of the interesting items you can create require that the user have an engineering skill close to what it requires to build. So most of your wares can only be used by other engineers who would probably rather just make the item themselves.
And there are a couple of flat spots when leveling up the engineering skill where you either have to keep grinding inexpensive green items that give rare skill ups or very expensive to build orange items that always give a skill up.
Still, there was some utility for a paladin back in the days when they had no generic ranged attack to have a supply of thrown explosive weapons to pull bad guys. And there were those seaforium charges to open up chests, though I have yet to find something in a chest that would sell for more that the cost of the opening charge.
So I have persisted with the profession, grinding it up in bursts then letting it idle.
Finally though, in Wrath of the Lich King, Blizzard decided to focus a lot on one of the engineering profession themes, convenience items. There have been a number of cool things, like the wormhole generator, that have made pursuing the career worthwhile.
But the ultimate item on the convenience list is Jeeves.
Named for the “gentleman’s gentleman” of the P.G. Wodehouse novels, Jeeves is a repair bot extraordinaire. When you summon him, your party can repair its gear, sell items to him to clear bag space, and buy reagents and ammunition.
In addition, if you are a master engineer, you can also access your bank via Jeeves.
I have been working towards Jeeves for a while now, getting all the parts required to make him lined up and grinding those final 10 expensive skill points. Last night, I was finally ready.
First, I had to go get the recipe. The recipe is a drop that engineers have a chance to get by salvaging any mechanical corpse in Northrend. And after killing and salvaging nearly 200 mechanicals by the Inventor’s Library, the recipe showed up. It was time to make Jeeves.
An Expensive Parts List
The parts list is a bit pricey. The Titansteel bars are about 200 gold each and the King’s Amber around 150 gold each, plus what goes into making the other repair bots that get folded into Jeeves. But I managed to harvest everything but the King’s Amber, so the out of pocket expense was not so bad.
So once I put all those parts together, I was able to summon Jeves.
Jeeves in the Morning
There is a one hour cool down on summoning him, and he only stays around for 10 minutes because it seems he has other things to which he must attend.
Still, a gentleman’s gentlerobot indeed.
Of course, now that we’re somewhat done with the five person content, I am not sure how often I will need to call on Jeeves.
