Thoughts about Role-Play

Something something, “Me not that kind of orc!”

Not THAT kind of role-play, you goofs.

It’s time for a confession. I’ve secretly wanted to role-play in WoW for almost as long as I’ve been playing. I don’t have any idea how normal RP people do these kind of character sheets or even how they figure out how they want to go with their characters, but here goes! If I were to RP my current “main” characters, this is probably how it would go :

Byx

She’s a Pandaren enhancement shaman. I would undoubtedly tie in her race’s love for food and drink, though I can somehow see her going more for the rare, expensive foods rather than the more common comfort foods. Personality wise she would be sassy as all hell, always ready for a laugh. Fiercely protective of her friends, and gets along well with all of the members of the guild. The class she would envy the most would be hunters, due to their ability to tame wild beasts. She would get along best with any class that has healing abilities, as she tends to die a lot. It’s totally not her fault though, it just happens, you see.

Repeat image, but this sums her up nicely.

Hexxia

The warlock – she basically just hates everything and wants to kill everyone, but she likes fluffy little animals. She also is very vain about her appearance, and her armor has to look just so before she can even think of doing anything else. Have I mentioned she just wants to kill everyone?

Orlaithe

She’s my warrior, I’m leveling her through Outland right now, but I would say even though I’m not leveling her protection, she is still cautious and wary about her surroundings. She misses Mulgore greatly, the green rolling hills, the peaceful life. She knows she has to fight though, for there is evil in the world and she must smash it into pieces. She isn’t a mindless killing machine, but she does want to try to fix the world as best she can, for those still living in Mulgore, and other peaceful lands.

 

All that being said, I still haven’t ever actually played this game with an RP mindset. Sure, in conversations I’ll joke around and talk like I am my character, but it’s not an all the time thing.  Well, what’s stopping me, you may ask? A couple different things, as it turns out.

Time

Being myself, I would want to invest a lot of time into the back story of my character, getting their name exactly right, picking the right character and not wanting to restart at level 15 or so. I would want to keep copious notes on all my characters, everyone they met along the journey, NPC’s that they spite or that spite them.

The main issue is just the time to do this. Life being life, it is busy, and most of the time I spend in-game is already taken up by the usual things I do. Raiding, leveling alts, working on achievements, etc. I feel like this huge undertaking would happen, and I’d have to devote a lot of time to the process of creating and nurturing my character.

Knowledge

I would feel like the noobiest of noobs stepping foot into RP. I’m positive I’m over thinking this, like most everything else I do in life and gaming, but I like to know what I’m getting myself into, so sue me (Don’t sue me. I don’t have a ton of money and it will be embarrassing for both of us.)!

I’m just actually not sure how to even begin, is the main thing. I’m sure if I am interested in doing this at some point, I could do my usual thing of just winging it, rolling with it, making it up as I go along. It would be fun though to create a back story, figure out the why and how of my character’s interactions with others and how she acts when no-one else is around. They’ve added a great deal of content that I can see being perfect for RP.

 

In conclusion:

Huh. Maybe I will RP, this was a fun post to write ^.^

Do you role-play in any of the games you play? Do you occasionally RP on your characters but not devote your entire play time to that? I’m interested, leave some comments below!

Onwards and Upwards

So, here we are, less than a week away from The Patch.

And I still have things left to do.

I am leaving them undone, and I shall explain why.

Here’s the thing. Every one of us plays this game for different reasons. Some play it for the hardcore, bleeding edge raiding, are into running the numbers, simcraft, being the best they can be at raiding. Some play it for Player versus Player, running the numbers on that,  getting the macros, the gear, the teammates, the compositions just right. Some play it to get ALL the things, and play the collection game; lists galore, spawn times and locations mapped out to the minute. Some play it for Internet Fame, with different angles to achieve this depending on the above. Some play it for the social aspect, to keep in touch with family and friends, chatting away whilst they accomplish their in-game goals.  Some do a mix of the above, dabbling in everything, and not really being able to or wanting to take the time to perfect everything, but to just be the best they can at it and be happy with that.

Oh, sorry, that last description was me ^.^

I hate defining myself, applying terms and words that are open to interpretation. I’ve had words applied to me throughout my gaming experience that I won’t share, not that any of them are particularly bad, but I just choose to not revisit them. When you’ve been playing a game consistently for a long time, you can look back at past actions and wonder what the hell you were thinking, and also see A LOT of personal growth and development. I’ve made mistakes, bad mistakes, lost a lot of friends due to my own actions, but at the time I thought I was doing the right thing for me, and didn’t see the repercussions of my actions and words.

The point? Yeah I’m getting there, hold your horses.

I have seen a lot of negativity both in-game and on social media, calling out people who didn’t get things ‘done’ this expansion for one reason or another. I know I unsubbed for a good chunk of time, and the rest of the time I was caught up in other things and didn’t feel like applying the time to WoW. A week or so ago I felt like I had set myself up for disaster, so to speak, by not planning my time properly and getting the things done that I needed to. I thought I had all the time in the world, when really time was slipping away faster than ever, as it tends to towards the end of a journey.

Throughout every expansion, there is something I didn’t get done. Something left unfinished, that was removed from the game, or changed, and guess what? I’m okay. I am still playing the game, still enjoying it. Sure I will miss not having gotten my legendary cloak on my main, or not completing the green fire quest while it was relevant. I didn’t ever do a full gold CM run and get a transmog set of gear or a cool mount. I never raided SoO at all with a raid group, only with LFR.

Guess what? It’s okay to leave things unfinished. It is okay to realize that things change, that sometimes you don’t always get what you want. I’m trying to put a positive spin on my life currently, and I’m letting that bleed over into my online life as well. I’m trying to turn negatives into positives, so I’m looking at this as the start of a new adventure, new goals to achieve, new lists to scribble down and cross off progressively.  The thing I love the most about this game, the thing that keeps drawing me back, is it’s constantly changing and evolving, and it just feels like home.

Change is scary, ’tis true, but like most other humans I both abhor and adore change.

Throughout all of Mists, I’ve felt behind. It’s not that I didn’t want to get into the story, or get into the raiding, or what have you, but I’ve felt like I’m scrambling behind.  Every other expansion I’ve known the ins and outs of almost everything. I’ve had all the boss fights down, every enchant and gem cut and stat priority for my main down to a science. I had my farming routes down, my dailies down… But this expansion I just felt like I was flailing along the entire time. So I’m ready to start anew. Learn new boss fights. Maybe raid some, with an actual group of friends instead of LFR. Learn all about Garrisons (so freaking excited for this feature), LEVEL MY MAIN AGAIN!! There is so much that I’m looking forward to!

 

To steal a line from a friend (you know who you are ^.^), it’s time to draw a line and move on.

 

See you in Azeroth!

Feeling Lost in Lore

I think today marks the mid-point of #Blaugust? That, in and of itself, is quite exciting! Also it’s Saturday, and I’ve got fun real life things going on this weekend again! On with the show…

Warlords of Draenor has a fresh and shiny release date of November 13, 2014. With that announcement came our cinematic trailer, which was very orctastic. After watching it, I realized I know next to nothing about this upcoming expansion. In the past I’ve always been in guild with a huge lore-buff, real life things have ensued and he and I aren’t online at the same time as much anymore, so I’ve kind of lost (and greatly missed) the lore discussion that we used to have. Well more him telling me stuff than discussions, but… Combine that with my slight disinterest in WoW the last couple months, and I’m very in the dark about the expansion. I know we’re going back in time, or to an alternate universe, but that’s kind of all I got.

And that’s a weird feeling.

I love lore, I love knowing the how and why of what my character is doing, the end result of everything. I like knowing why we are taking down the big bad bosses, why the new factions are springing up, just generally what’s going on in the politics and behind the scenes in the world. I don’t have that (yet) for this expac, and that has me kind of worried in a sense. Not that I won’t play, or won’t get it, but usually by this point in the development process I know more than I do now. I guess it’s off to the internet I go, to read up and do my homework so I know what the heck I’m talking about in the future!

I’m in that in between phase in servers on WoW, where I’m leveling an alt on a server that I will most likely be calling home in WoD, but I have yet to transfer my main over. Part of that is due to the $$ involved, part is because I’m kind of hesitant to change servers yet again. This will mark the fourth server my main girl has been on since I’ve started playing. Every move has happened for a reason, some more drastic than others, and I would love to think that this will be the last move. I’ve had a tumultuous experience on a couple servers, and I’d love to have one I can just call home. There’s going to be drama everywhere, but I think this time around I really found the right group. Even if I don’t end up with a spot on the raid team (which would be fine, it’s a long established guild/group and I’m the newbie of newbies coming in so not expecting a darn thing) just a comfortable place to hang out in-game would be all I could really ask for.

*looks down, sees a low word count* Bah. Don’t tell me how to live my life, WordPress!

In gaming news, the aforementioned druid alt is now level 36, and off to the Western Plaguelands. She’s still feral spec, I’m having a lot of fun with it, although I should probably do more dungeons to practice that aspect of it. I think that’s the one reason I don’t really play melee characters in groups, because the constant running around is something I’m not used to, being primarily ranged for most of my WoW career. I don’t mind challenges however, and I’m not grooming this character (as of yet) to be my new main or anything, so we’ll see what happens!

I’m off to prepare for my day, now that there is actually an announced date for WoD, I will dust of my WoW To Do List and start checking things off!

Have a great weekend!

 

My Favorite Zones

Today I’m feeling super uninspired, so I am gladly poaching a writing prompt from the pile that Belghast has gathered together on Anook!

• What is your favorite game biome? Games often have the same kinds of generic climates spread through the zones and levels. What is your favorite type of climate and why?

Growing up in Tennessee (for the most part) meant I was more outdoorsy than I am now. My dad used to take me on hikes all the time, our family would go camping, I spent a lot of time in the mountains and forests. Even now living in New York (state) I like to try to get to some kind of hiking trail at  least once a year. It’s fun for me, and challenging, plus some of the scenery is breathtaking. That being said I think my favorite zones in-game follow a similar theme.

In WoW, Grizzly Hills has always been a favorite zone of mine. It is lush, with the tall slender pine trees, the ground almost looks mossy and then gives way to snowy hills. The music too, gives a lot to the atmosphere. Ironically, the questing in the zone is average for me, not my favorite one to be an errand girl in. This is one of those zones where I have my little quest hubs that I go to, I know the drill, and once I do all the quests I want to, I move on.

I love this river

Another zone in WoW is the starting area for the Pandaren. I mean, it’s on the back of a huge ancient turtle, so if that in itself isn’t cool enough… It gave a great insight lore wise to their culture, as well as the cutesy humor that was a nice break from the gloom and doom of Wrath and Cataclysm. That and playing a Pandaren always makes me smile, they are cute and I can’t help it, kay?

 

I haven’t explored enough of FFXIV to call a certain zone my favorite, but I do like the city of Ul’Dah. It looks gorgeous, and it is fairly easy to get around in!

Other games follow a similar theme, in Skyrim I like prowling around the mountains near Solitude, and that climb up to the Greybeards is always fun, even though it takes an hour and a half. There is something about not knowing what’s around that blind hill, climbing up a slope that you’re not sure if you can traverse without slipping all the way down. It adds mystery and challenge to the game, as well as filling that “I have to explore!” want that a lot of us gamers have.

In real life, I live in suburbia and work in the city, so for me, exploring the untamed wilderness, seeing what’s on that hill, looking out and down across the land from atop a mountain, that’s fun for me. Being of (not so recent) import to the area, snow is still enough of a novelty to me that I enjoy seeing how different games incorporate it. Skyrim in particular does very well with the atmosphere, enough that when I’m exploring a particularly snowy, windy area, I do actually feel cold!

It’s really nice to see the immersion that comes with how a climate or zone is laid out in a game. How it may influence how you feel about the game, how you feel about the questing zone, dungeon, or raid.

That’s kind of all I’ve got in my little brain for today, off to real life things now…I’m noticing my posts are short, less than 1000 words. Personal challenge, accepted!

HAPPY FRIDAY

 

Some Brief Thoughts

My mindset on WoW has shifted dramatically all over the board for the last couple days. Everywhere from me packing up and moving shop to another game, to stubbornly sticking it out, because of all the time I’ve invested in it. With the notes released yesterday morning about the stat changes, I was stuck between the middle of those. One one hand, I like the idea of the new ‘minor’ stats; Avoidance, Movement Speed, Indestructible, and Leech. This gives more… flavor… to each piece of armor you pick up. While certainly one would be desirable over the other, none of them are horrible enough for me to /table flip.

As I was reading further though the dev watercooler I was starting to get grumpy. Why? All these stat changes seemed like they were making the game, the gearing game especially, a little more complex than I particularly liked. I don’t play my tanks anymore, other than messing around on baby alts, so the tanking stats I don’t have much input on, just due to my lack of knowledge on how they work this expansion. Change is scary, I don’t care who you are. It might be varying degrees of scary, people might handle it differently, but when things change which aren’t in our direct control, we all get a little antsy. Then I realized something, as I was driving home form work last night. Blizzard has a rhyme and reason for what they’re doing. This game has been around and has been popular and known and played for 10 years for a reason. Yes, I am positive they listen to input from the community, but they are still a company that exists, as all companies do, to make money. They’ll listen to input, they’ll see stuff posted on the forums, social media, heck, they prowl Tumblr for all I know. But they are still going to do whatever they feel is best for the game, to progress their company further. 

At the end of the day though, what they’re doing, their goal, is to make dolla dolla bills ya’ll. 

My attitude has (literally overnight) shifted dramatically. I welcome this more as a challenge to me as a player, the new stat changes, the item squish, the everything that is changing. It’s a new expansion, the world is going to change, if you don’t like it, don’t play it. You are free to do that. There are certainly enough games out there to suit anyone’s fancy. I personally will probably be frolicking around Wildstar until we get closer to launch. I am however getting far more excited and jazzed up for Warlords. I think it is going to offer a lot, for raiders and non raiders, for hardcore raiders and for more casual raiders. I honestly don’t even know if I’ll be raiding, I’m not 100% sure where my warlocky bum is going to be parked when the Savage Expansion of Savagery hits. 

I am excited though. And ready. And feeling far more optimistic than I was about 20 hours ago. The wonderful thing is, as people, we can change our minds. We can take a day, revisit things, can embrace and welcome change. This has been brief, but it’s just some things I’ve wanted to get off my chest. This is always an interesting time in the game. Some people are seeing it, experiencing it firsthand now that the Friends and Family Alpha invitations have been extended, but for those of us who are viewing from afar, it’s easy to become jealous or jaded. Please just remember that this is, at the end of it all, a game, and it exists as such. So please be nice to one another, in game and out, and leave the savagery till when it’s needed =)

-C

The Freedom of Summer

Spring has sprung, people.  I don’t know about the rest of the country/world, but this has been a terribly long, brutally cold winter. I picked a good one to move out by myself, huh? Today marked the end of my semester, took my last test in accounting, done with that nonsense. I’m probably going to take two classes in the fall semester, otherwise my 2-year Associate’s degree will take me about 8. I know that there’s no rush, but I would prefer to get it over with, mainly to preserve my sanity.  One of my best friends worked full time, and went to school full time, and I am forever going to be in awe of that. I’m exhausted as it is, working mostly full time, and just taking one class. 

With only work on my plate this summer, I am very optimistic about the summer. Heh. Only work. I’m sure in about a week or so, I’ll be right back to being as busy as I was, if not more. I’m going to continue to pretend I’ll have a ton of free time though, dangit.

I’m still quite happy/excited to be working with the NBI, I haven’t had as much time to participate as I’ve been wanting to, but now that my schedule is a bit more relaxed, hopefully that will change! I am really happy to see all the people in my WordPress feed, and even my Twitter feed, posting their articles and getting feedback from the community. It’s quite awesome! I’m trying to get better at posting on a regular basis, and to stick to a common theme in my posts, instead of wandering everywhere, like I usually do. Perhaps that’s just my style of writing though. Stream of consciousness.

 I am probably going to extend my blog out into other games, but I’m going to try to keep it focused on WoW. I do love the game, still enjoy playing it, still have PLENTY on my to-do list.

For those keeping score at home, and sighing in exasperation:

-Still need to finish the legendary cloak quest on my warlock

-Still need to actually see/finish SoO

-Still have crafting I want to level/work on before WoD

-Still working on leveling battle pets

-As always, occasionally running dungeons/old raids for transmog/mounts/pets.

That’s a lot of /’s.

Even with all this Stuff to Do, and more time available to me in which to play this game I love, I’m trying not to get burnt out. I’m sure it will happen, it’s happened with me every expansion, happens to most everyone, every expansion.  It’s there, looming, and people handle it and deal with it in different ways. I’ll probably do what I end up doing, which is just not play it for a few days, get obsessed with another game, and then be like ‘Oh yeah, WoW, I miss that. C’mere, you” Cuz I’m crazy.

What about you? How are you dealing with burnout? Or are you merrily raiding along, perhaps on an alt, in a different role, and mixing it up that way? I’m going to try to get better about responding to comments. I read them all, I just do that thing where I mentally reply and don’t actually type anything, like 90% of the texts I receive.

 

-C

Operation: Get Moar Loots

I’ve decided to finally get my act in gear and get my legendary cloak on my warlock.

 

So yeah. Work in progress.

 

Now, I haven’t raided with my guild since fall of last year, I moved, was taking a class, and work was starting to get crazy busy so I just didn’t have the time to commit to it. Now we’re in the pre-expac slump, which I totally get, but I miss raiding. I raided (and raid led) through Wrath, Cata, and the first half of Mists. Like a lot of players, I’ve jumped servers and guilds but I still had been raiding pretty much consistently: up until last fall.

 

And it feels weird

 

I feel out of touch. Out of the loop. I used to be able to rattle off the enchants I needed, gems I needed cut for which gem slots, right off the top of my head. Now, however, I’m feeling kind of lost. I do like that I can jump in and run a wing of LFR, and the cross-realm raiding (while I haven’t myself participated except for a couple Ulduar runs) is a really nice feature, but I feel like I’m missing out on a big part of the game. Yes, WoW for me is about a vast number of things I enjoy doing, not just about getting together with a  bunch of friends and killing some big angry thing, but still.

 

I’m really not meaning to sound whiny, I promise.

 

Jeeeeeez I need to clean up my UI, WHY DID NO ONE TELL ME I CAN’T SEE ANYTHING

 

So I’m now 6 Sigils of Wisdom away from the next step in the process. I noticed that contrary to the quest text, I got one to drop in SoO, so I’ve decided I’m just going to run Seige to get them, I still haven’t done all of the wings of it, and I should probably help smack Garrosh around at least once! The group I had was actually a pretty decent one for a Friday night, we only wiped once on the Sha of Pride, and nobody was being immature or rude, so that was a pleasant surprise! Also, my damage was a lot higher than I figured it would be, no idea what was going on, my meters must have been broken….

 

To end my blurb:

 

I’m really glad Blizzard is putting forth the effort to make it possible for more people to see more of the content they offer. They spend a lot of time making those raids, creating the boss fights, making more Bad for people to stand in! I need to read more into detail about it, but what I’ve seen so far makes me very optimistic for the future of the game, and of raiding. Raiding is a huge part of this game, from a lore standpoint as well as a “welp I’ve beaten the game, yay!!!” standpoint. 

 

What do you guys/gals think? Is raiding super important to you? Are these changes making up your mind on whether or not you’ll play, or are you just taking it all in stride and eager to see what the next chapter brings?

 

-C