Sunday, December 28, 2008
Arthas' underpants
Saturday, December 20, 2008
Don't tell your future boss
Why not?
Well, aparently some head-hunters have been told to avoid recruiting people who play World of Warcraft. How silly is that!
There've been other news posts in the past exclaiming how some of the people with top-job functions have played World of Warcraft for a good while, even been guild leaders. Even how WoW can teach players project and time management skills that they might otherwise not learn in school. (Strange, but, ok.)
So, if you were to apply to a job there, you're not likely to get hired because some head-hunter's boss has the notion that all gamers are slackers. Pfff. Where DO they get these ideas?
Update: Turns out the story was in fact wrongly interpreted by a large number of news sites, and cascaded across the internet as a result. See here for details.
Original src: Tweakers.net / intermediair.nl (Dutch sites).
Also see: Geekologie on the same subject, werblog games as social software and warcraft identity.
Some Site updates
Having removed those two, the site seems to load a bit faster as well.
Poll end
How fast did you reach level 80?
Some interesting numbers. A lot who want to reach level 80 fast have done so in under 2 weeks (83 : 45%), then there's a large gap of about 7 days for 10%, and all the rest are taking longer 39%.
Another poll then
How much time do you spend in raids each week? 10 man, 25 mans, either.
Myself, I'm in a raid group around 3 hours 5 days of the 7 day week. Usually more. Some may spend even more time, some less. How about you?
Sunday, December 14, 2008
Busy busy busy
Alright, progress update:
We've been mostly working on the 25-man version of Naxx, but since the lag on the thaddius fight is SO RIDICULOUSLY bad, and the fight seems to be quite tightly tuned, we've not managed to properly take that guy down yet. Other guilds on aszune are complaining about the exact same thing, so at least we know it's not just us having the problem. Over the weekend, and last night we figured the 10 man naxx needed a proper cleaning as well. And so we did.
Sadly his reach doesn't seem to glow when enchanted... lame.
Naxx25 : In progress
Trade skills : In progress
Alts : In progress, slowly
Kalu'ak reputation : In progress
Frenzyheart reputation : In progress. The blue item is pretty cool.
Sons of Hodir reputation : In progress
Video card problems : Not so much in progress.
Huh, video card problem? What are you talking about?
Well, here's a few pics to give you an idea.



The problem usually occurs after an hour or two (weekends are funfunfun playing like this!) and the symptoms change every few minutes. It's probably overheating, but since the pc is starting to get rather old (going 5-6 years now) it's getting time to replace the whole thing anyway. So, that's in progress, sorta.
Achievements
25 tabards, should be doable right? It's a bit tricky though. You need a lot of different tabards, and to get some you have to go all the way to exalted. Getting Exalted with all 4 battlegrounds.. no thanks. There also seems to be a bug with the loremaster / explorer tabards, they don't count when you pick them up from the mail. You'll have to page a GM to get them added to your total.
There's a nice list on the wowhead page, which basically shows you that there's:
12 tabards from TBC factions to be had at exalted. (one extra if you're crazy enough to get both scryers and aldor)
4 tabards added at honored for the WotLK factions.
4 from "other" sources
5 from PvP
1 from a quest for each faction. Only for blood elf / draenei it seems.
2-3 from achievements.
8 from the damn loot cards
4 that are no longer available
Here is the full list. So, in theory, even without the 8 from the loot cards it should be quite possible to get that achievement. 28-32 tabards, or 40 if you get all the loot cards. That's a lot of faction grinding though... Especially the PvP ones can be quite dull.
The only really annoying part of this achievement, is that you can't see which ones you've already got unless you keep them all in your bank. Fat chance at that.
Linky
Here's an interesting link to wow-achievements. It shows the players in the world with the highest achievement points. It was bound to be done sometime or other, but there's a lot of people with over 6000 points already, even one with 6365 already... Go outside and see the sun sometimes...
Also, WowJutsu has been updated. It's still showing the same weird inaccuracies as before, but it's still interesting to keep around. Same for wowrankings and even wowprogress.
Funny
You ever seen the "carebears"? If you're an average 14 year old you may be thinking I'm talking about PvE.. Well you'd be wrong. Look it up. For all you slightly older readers, here's a hilarious link. The comic is called Bear Nuts and it's basically a carebears parody. Notice the icons on their front.
Also worth checking out is Nerf Now, it's a comic which focuses on games as well. Starcraft and team fortress among others. Be warned, it might not be suited for the very young readers. Not like you care though right?
Ah, and do you remember Mr.T's night elf mohawk? Well, he enjoys Flavourwave too. I pity the fool who eats frozen food.






Thursday, December 04, 2008
Engineering, lacking?
I'm going to be cheap and post a reply I did on the MMOC forums, hopefully the info reaches blizzard somehow. Be it trough the official forums, or blue people reading this. Let me know what you think.
So, what's wrong with engineering you ask?
The only "real" problem currently with engineering, and to some extent tailoring, is the lack of self buffs. Not actual buffs etc, but look at these other professions:
Skinning : crit bonus worth about 25 stats
Mining : Stamina bonus worth about 25 stat points.
Herbalism : Herbalist only herb consumable which gives ~ 32 stats if seen over time-cooldown. Also a small self heal which is awesome.
Alchemy : When flasks are used provides ~32 stats more than the default flask.
Inscription : ~ 32 stats worth better shoulder enchant
Blacksmithing : 2 bonus sockets worth about 32 stats
Leatherworking : ~ 32 stats worth better bracer enchant than the default one.
Enchanting : 2x16 = 32 stats worth for ring enchants.
Jewelcrafting : 3 awesome multicolor jewels which will provide ~ 21-32 stats when socket bonusses are kept in mind.
Craftables exist for all professions, most are worse than the ilvl 213 items from heroic raids.
Which is fine.
However
Tailoring : Only ~ 12 stats better cloak enchant than the default
Engineering : Glove enchant that's 2 stats WORSE than the maximum available ones.
That is the main thing that's bothering me right now about engineering. And I really don't see why blizzard didn't give us something on par with the other professions unless they simply forgot.... As it appears there's awfully few patterns for engineering to begin with. Especially compared to JC and Inscription. Zero rare drops, and no pattern vendor at all. Do we need to wait until patch 3.1 then? Also, the last leveling part from 435-450 is quite silly. Not to mention that there's no goggles available for several class specs.
Poll end
Poll question : Did your WotLK box arrive on time?
Well, did it?
Yeah ! :D - 78 (64%)
No... :( - 43 (35%)
An awful lot who didn't arrive on time. Bad planning, poor delivery service, bad luck?
New poll up: What professions does your main have?
Wednesday, November 26, 2008
Onward from 80

Wednesday, November 19, 2008
Wednesdays, bloody wednesdays
It's wednesday, and here in Europe that means it's "scheduled maintenance" from 05:00 to 11:00 CET.
If you have a day off, that means you can sleep late :P
Or as I'm doing right now, write some text while you're waiting for the servers to kick into life again. And a long wait it is indeed.
So, yesterday I got tired of having to break open my current mouse, replacing the duct tape and paper I keep stuffed under the buttons to ensure the buttons still "click", and ordered myself a new sword. Sword? well, see for yourself:
It's a Logitech G5 laser mouse. With a cord yes.
If you think "wireless" is cool or (omg) believe sales drivel spoon fed to you because it's "a useful thing of the current age", then you're obviously a gullible casual gamer, or simply forced to play on such crap because you're not using your own computer. Batteries suck, avoid them like a plague. Anyhow, It's been ordered last night, and I've gotten confirmation that it's been mailed and due to arrive tomorrow. Total cost: 34,95 Euros, ex 4,95 E shipping.
What a long strange trip it's been
Christmas soon, so we can get started on the second part of that achievement. Keep in mind the final reward is a proto-drake of 310% flight speed. Much like the gladiator's drakes and ashes of al'ar.
There's a quest in the howling fjord which allows you to ride one of the beasts for a quest, as a teaser I guess. Somehow I managed to stay mounted on my raptor while doing that, so that made some interesting screenies. It also gives a nice perspective on the SIZE of that thing. It's huge!
The expansion is great, leveling goes steady (mailman was a bastard and delivered it a bit late though) If you haven't already gotten it, be sure you do. There's grizzly bears fishing for salmon, herds of animals going around, animals fighting each other for territory, new models and so much more. But that's not all! I'll let a few screenshots speak for themselves.
I've been an Iron Dwarf:
Ridden a storm giant. See that small green thing on top of his head?
That's me glaives mon:
I've been a zombie, again:
And taken on a rather unceremonial flight as a zombie:
Dalaran is quite a sight:
So, currently level 77 and able to fly again!
A word of warning though, while it's tempting to immediately start flying everywhere and obtaining the World Explorer achievement. Don't. Seriously DO NOT get that achievement yet. There's a very annoying bug with it, which causes the tabard to be mailed to you every single time you change zones. Some guild members have complained about having as many as 100+ of the tabards in their mailbox, with no sign of the steady stream slowing down. So seriously, do NOT get that achievement yet. Hopefully blizzard will fix it soon.
Onward to 78 today!
ps: Extended maintenance until 13:00.... bloody french!
ps2: Extended until 15:00 ... /sigh







Wednesday, November 12, 2008
Critter Visitsplosion
Well, it looks like we got a post linked on WowInsider, which caused a slight,,, somewhat large...,, err. Alright let's face it this blog in it's current form was not build to support the sudden appearance of about 28K more visitors than usual in such a short time.
I suspect in part I should thank mania for the spike, as the Wowinsider scouts picked up the link trough her blog.
Here's what I woke up to this morning :

Normally we're at around 1-2K views in a day. So we've just been hit by about a month worth of traffic, in the time of less than 12 hours. It's only reasonable to see the web server give a little hiccup at that. I've had the issue before, and took some measures to ensure it's not as likely to cause trouble in the future. But apparently the measures were only a half fix. The CSS trick seems to have worked and the site loads fine for the most part. You'll just notice that there's a couple of images that will refuse to load.
Well, it's a good thing the site gets stressed so and then, it forces me to think of a way to make it more efficient in the future. Let's see how soon the images come back up and we'll work from there.
Poll
Another poll reached it's ending date, and as such we'll be starting a new one. Not without posting the results of the previous one however.
What do you feel as being the most enjoyed play style?
DPS - 75 (41%)
Melee - 61 (33%)
Tank - 40 (21%)
Caster - 38 (20%)
Healer - 37 (20%)
Ranged - 30 (16%)
Physcal - 14 (7%)
Since the blog audience has a slightly larger number of rogues, and focuses for some parts on DPS I guess the results were fairly predictable. The total number of votes on that poll could have been higher though.
Since WotLK will be releasing at 00.01 tomorrow (tonight), I'm wondering where you've ordered your CD / DVD. You can leave that here in the comments here if you wish though. The poll the next few weeks is a bit more straightforward :
* Did you get your WotLK box on time?
Mine is currently in the mail, slooowwwwly making it's way to my house.
I suspect in part I should thank mania for the spike, as the Wowinsider scouts picked up the link trough her blog.
Here's what I woke up to this morning :

Normally we're at around 1-2K views in a day. So we've just been hit by about a month worth of traffic, in the time of less than 12 hours. It's only reasonable to see the web server give a little hiccup at that. I've had the issue before, and took some measures to ensure it's not as likely to cause trouble in the future. But apparently the measures were only a half fix. The CSS trick seems to have worked and the site loads fine for the most part. You'll just notice that there's a couple of images that will refuse to load.
Well, it's a good thing the site gets stressed so and then, it forces me to think of a way to make it more efficient in the future. Let's see how soon the images come back up and we'll work from there.
Poll
Another poll reached it's ending date, and as such we'll be starting a new one. Not without posting the results of the previous one however.
What do you feel as being the most enjoyed play style?
Since the blog audience has a slightly larger number of rogues, and focuses for some parts on DPS I guess the results were fairly predictable. The total number of votes on that poll could have been higher though.
Since WotLK will be releasing at 00.01 tomorrow (tonight), I'm wondering where you've ordered your CD / DVD. You can leave that here in the comments here if you wish though. The poll the next few weeks is a bit more straightforward :
* Did you get your WotLK box on time?
Mine is currently in the mail, slooowwwwly making it's way to my house.
Tuesday, November 11, 2008
WotLK - Boost your XP advantage

Friday, November 07, 2008
WotLK vs Madonna
The numbers game
The 13'th of november 2008 World of Warcraft - Wrath of the Lich King will go live around the world. The game we play with over 11 Million other players.
But, even while it's currently the largest MMO in the world (and likely to stay that way for a while yet) The amount of attention it gets in the media is quite sparse. Why though? At the clock of midnight 12-13 november a large number of stores worldwide will be opening their doors to begin the sale of this latest expansion. It is expected to sell several million copies within the first week of time. Several million, times ~30 euros per sold copy, makes for several tens of millions of cash flowing from our pockets into that of Blizzard. And that's just one week.
Blizzard released WoW at 23 November 2004 to the USA and 11 Februari 2005 in Europe and other countries. 11 January 2007 there were 8 Million players, and at 22 Januari 2008 there were 10 Million players worldwide, currently 11 million. This Chart shows the growth rate of the game we play. As you can see it's just shot trough the roof unlike any other MMOC out there. What makes it so successful? How does "one" game company manage to make a game so large that you can get over 11 million game subscriptions running across the planet?
WoW and the media
A game unlike any seen before, with a number of followers larger than some of the states in the USA. And yet, how often do you see or hear anything about it in the newspaper, discovery channel, general news? Never if at all. If I hadn't told my parents I was playing it they would probably have never heard of it. And when you "do" see it linked in some way trough the odd link on BBC it's because some chinese guy stabbed a fellow player to death for hacking his account.
Is that how we want people to see our game? Something that creates so much violence among players that we're willing to go out there and stab each other to death? I don't think so. Yet that's the only news "worthy" of being shared with the world aparently. Addicts dying of thirst because of a game addiction, addicts killing each other, addicts dying of sleep depravation, addicts running into a school and shooting up their class mates out of sheer frustration.
That is not our game. Yet the media seems to want to make us believe so. Well, for any concerned parents, I suggest you buy the game yourself and try it out yourself before letting your kid play. You'll see the game itself is quite harmless. Perhaps you'll even be able to enjoy playing the game together as several people I know have and do.
Freaks?
What makes a WoW player a WoW player? Dressing up like it's some halloween party? No. With a a large enough fanbase you'll see people like that for really just about anything. Dressing up as your favourite characters isn't just something that's done for games. And certainly not just for WoW. Mind if I show you this link? Indeed, Starwars. If you don't know what that is.. what rock have you been living under all these years?
Startrek has the same freaks. Though fanatics or devotees would probably be a better term. Movies such as predator and alien have people create costumes just as well. Even sick freaks (and in this case it's allowed) dress themselves up like power rangers or teletubbies.....
No, dressing up like freaks is not something the average wow player does. Not even Medieval reenactments like those. No, the average wow player is either a kid who does school at regular times and plays 4-5 hours when school is finished. Or a regular working person you'd never have expected it of playing from 9-12 after dinner. There's even a youtube video of a guy playing wow while he's working at the stock market. (can't find that link right now sorry)
World of Warcraft is everywhere, yet at the same time, it's being kept quiet like it's something secret and personal. Like it's something to be ashamed of.
Bigger than?
More of the numbers.
As the subject of this post gave a hint, madonna. Personally I don't like the frigid old corpse, so she's the perfect target to use in this post. Reasons? Well she's done some anti piracy stunts and is actively opposed to P2P sharing of her creations even though she's a millionaire a few times over already and doesn't even make more than 2% per sale. Robbie williams (even though I don't like his music) Is an active supporter of P2P and sharing his music. It's free advertising guys, anyone enjoying the crap you probably didn't even write yourself is going to buy that CD anyway, anyone who doesn't simply won't. But that's another story.
Since starting in 1982 the old crone (M) has sold over 250 million albums and 150 million singles. I've never bought a music CD in my life, ever, and never will (Music radio for the win) so I'm not sure what the exact price on an average single or album is. Though I'm quite sure it's outrageous.
The apple iTunes store sells most songs under a single dollar. And according to cd-universe her albums are switching owners for about 8-15 dollars.
So let's see, old ugly hag sales:
250 mil albums * 13$ : 3.250.000.000
150 mil singles * 1$ : 150.000.000
Blizzard, World of warcraft sales:
6 mil Original CDs * 30€ : 180.000.000
11 mil TBC CDs * 30€ : 330.000.000
11 mil WotLK CDs * 30€ : 330.000.000
4 years * 11 million users * 12 months * 14€ : 7.392.000.000 isn't quite accurate as it starts low, then goes high. So we'll take the median which is ~3.696.000.000
Total profits from sales:
* M : 3.400.000.000 $
* B : 4.536.000.000 € - converted: 5.795.647.200 $
Now, that's not including the concerts that M has given, or the profits she gets whenever a radio station runs her crap, or any profits off movies and other fees she'll get for doing absolutely nothing. But still. Based on pure sales along blizzard is leading by a none too shabby 2.395 million $ for World of Warcraft alone.
Now, take into account that it took the old hag 26 "years" to produce those sales, while blizzard has been producing World of Warcraft for only "4". So, is World of Warcraft is bigger than Madonna? I'd think so yes, and still growing.
World of Warcraft. What's your game?
--
The above article was inspired by Tweakers.net (Dutch)


Monday, November 03, 2008
Search and Find

Saturday, November 01, 2008
First

Tuesday, October 28, 2008
Brains?
Well, no more brains, the event is over, a cure was found, the infection will no longer spread. A shame really, even with all the stupid crying and cursing from people who just haven't got a clue on how to entertain themselves if they got itching powder in their panties,,, it was fun. You weren't safe anywhere, even Shattrath City. Heck, "especially not" in Shattrath.
Lets just say it was very entertaining. Who knows when / if / ever we'll be able to do this again. Sure it's annoying if your battlemaster, banker or flightmaster is dead just when you were planning to use it. But seriously, 90 seconds isn't that long to wait for a respawn.
You can still get brains to still your hunger, but it won't ever be the same for a while. I suspect many will have a more lingering thought on where to go afk now. Will a zombie bite me here? What was that sound?
Headless
Aside zombies, it's halloween. With the violet proto-drake (310% speed) looming large in everyone's mind we've gone around and gathered some people together, brought a warlock and about 10-12 alts and did some repeated headless horseman pounding. The end result was quite funny. Sadly a number of corpses did despawn, but everyone got their heads and pets in the end. Not a single mount sadly...
Bucket
Could somebody please tell that bloody walrus that I found the bucket?
I've been using it to collect all the QQ tears of nerfed retribution paladins and AFK players that I've zombiefied or killed at the bank, flightmaster, etc. Even managed to put out some fires with it in brill, imagine that.
Poll end
What sort of music do you listen to when playing wow?
It appears rock is quite popular among the readers. The default ingame music is used still more than I thought it would be. Trance scores high, along with players multitasking wow + TV. Rythm n bass, classic and modern are low low down the bottom as I figured they would be. Who seriously listens to classical music while you're pounding in heads in PvP, or getting shafted by a big dragon? o_O
Rock - 55 (50%)
Ingame music - 35 (32%)
None / Other - 28 (25%)
Trance - 20 (18%)
TV - 18 (16%)
Radio - 10 (9%)
House - 8 (7%)
Dance - 7 (6%)
Classic - 3 (2%)
R 'n B - 3 (2%)
Modern - 2 (1%)
New poll is up. Brains?





Saturday, October 25, 2008
Inscription 1-350 Guide





















