Carrie Fisher, 1956-2016

The year 2016 really seems to be on a murder spree. I don't think I have ever written specifically about any celebrity deaths, but this one's a bit different. Of course, like many fans, I know Ms. Fisher mainly from her work as the take-no-prisoners Princess / Senator / General Leia Organa. No wilting wall flower, this damsel turned tropes on their heads as she fought alongside her more traditionally male protagonists.

Ms. Fisher was no different, using wit and talent to turn her personal struggles into bestsellers, even as she continued to steal scenes throughout the 1980s and '90s. She was a powerful presence in and out of the spotlight, renowned as a script doctor, and as an advocate for mental issues.

On a more personal note, my lovely bride and I, geeks that we are, identify with the Star Wars power couple, Han and Leia; who, when declaring their love for one another, each responded to the other matter-of-factly.

Carrie, we love you. But I'm sure you know.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

And Then There Were Five . . .

I did not expect to have such a long break between posts. It's been a momentous couple of months, what with the unexpected election results, the breakdown of my gaming computer, and finally the loss of a family member this weekend.

Our Pack at Its Peak

This is from a couple years ago, before he lost weight.

Thank you to all who expressed condolences for the loss of our sweet old dachshund Dexter. He had developed congestive heart failure, which became acute over the last week. We took him to the vet on Saturday. Sadly, while he could have been treated temporarily, his prognosis even in the short term was not good at all. So Scooter and I made the decision to be with him in his final moments and say goodbye together, rather than risk him passing away while we were at work, struggling to breathe, essentially alone.

I thought I had prepared for this, especially after we lost Zane so unexpectedly. But that didn't make Dexter's passing any easier. There's an empty space at the foot of the bed where he belongs, softly snoozing under a blanket or obsessively licking his forepaws. And there's an empty space in our hearts, where Dexter has left his paw prints on his way across the bridge to play with Zane and Ginger and Didi, his mate.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

The Post I Never Thought I'd Make

If you don't want to read about politics and the U.S. Presidential election, you should probably just skip this one. If you plan to plug your nose and pull the lever for the Republican candidate because you think the Democratic candidate is so much worse, then I urge you to stick around after the jump.

Pandarens, Brewfest, and Other Matters

I started this post last week, but then Brewfest happened. And then . . . other things.

Yes, yet again, Scooter and I have started new characters. But for now, Meeah Snowblossom and Táozi Emberbock will have to wait for their introduction. My stable is full on Argent Dawn, with only the character I haven't actually played being nameholder DK. Scooter's is close, though she's talked about deleting a couple redundant toons. I have maybe three solo toons. But, thanks to the Invasion XP boosting two of them to new places, I kinda lost their thread. I don't have a good handle on their personalities and goals.

Meanwhile, our reborn Mage/Priest combo, now called Mayliera and Robinia, are parked in Ironforge for the duration of the Brewfest event. While I have completed the Long Strange Trip achievement, Scooter never has, and she wanted to give it a go. Unfortunately, some of the the things require a much higher character, so it will be at least a year before she finishes. Of course, it took me forever, as well, due to varying interest levels on my part through the years.

Y'know, reading that "Long Strange Trip" post, I seem to have a perennial issue with erratic posting. It's not that I don't like to blog, but it seems my energy is going to other things. For instance, I have been following the U.S. presidential election closer than I have in a very long time. I have a rare overtly political post percolating. This isn't really the best place to post it, but it is the only place.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Many Worlds Theory

Brian "Psychochild" Green and the MMOBro recently had a little debate about whether it is better to have a single mega-server architecture for an MMORPG or multiple independent servers. Many of Psychochild's arguments for independent servers reflect a developer's concern for technical issues. While design and implementation are important considerations, ultimately both serve to enhance or detract from the player experience.

I like the idea of monolithic MMOs, but I get Psychochild's point about communities and playstyle. Allowing communities to congregate based on common interest gives the developers a chance to tailor aspects of the game to serve those interests. At the same time, isolated communities tend to develop elitist, exclusionary attitudes that may not be healthy for the game. I agree that some communities need to be protected from trolls and bullies, but it should not come at the cost of ghettoizing individual players who might like to branch out.

And what about friends you meet outside of the game, whether online or in the real world? I've met plenty of people in my travels who play World of Warcraft, for example, but never any who actually play on the same servers I do. When character progress becomes the driving force behind most games—and don't deny that it is in MMORPGs, despite the "RP" factor—it sucks to divide time and resources between servers because you might occasionally like the thrill of open world PvP, but still enjoy high-end raiding with your friends to don't PvP at all.

The big issue, as MMOBro says, is whether friends can easily play together if they meet or discover their common interest after establishing themselves in the game. Much of the problem with multiple servers could be solved by lowering the barrier to play together. TSW (which I am not currently playing, but which I consider one of the better games out there) does this fairly seamlessly. While there are multiple servers, the game design (and the story) work around the idea of a hub (called Agartha) where, unless you are in a group or get invited to another server/instance, you always return to the default server. The default server becomes more of a home rather than a confinement. The servers definitely have their own flavor, but there is no barrier for players who want to (occasionally) play together. And some world events encourage the mixing of the entire playerbase.

I have no problem with multiple servers if transferring characters from one to another doesn't involve a money grab by the developer. As Psychochild points out, in the currently typical MMO, people have to make hard choices about who they are going to play with. Friends have to coordinate ahead of time what server they want to play on and what community they want to be part of, as in real life. But isn't that kind of what the internet is all about, being able to form friendships and communities that are not based on a limiting factor like geography? The real world forces these choices, but why should the gaming world?

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

For the World is Hollow . . .

In some ways, it seems silly to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the premier of a show that limped along in the ratings until it was mercifully killed off at the end of its dismal third season. But, of course, Star Trek is so much more than a failed TV show. Like many cultural phenomena, Star Trek was not well understood by those in charge of its fate on television.

As a child of the 70s, Star Wars, with its cinematic luster and cutting edge special effects, loomed larger in my young mind. Star Trek, like Lost in Space, was a relic of an earlier, less cool era. I was 7 when The Motion Picture was released. Not that my parents were likely to have taken me, I had no interest in seeing it.

My love of Star Trek began with books. My brother had a copy of Death's Angel that I borrowed when I was maybe 9. More aliens that were more alien than 1960s television production technology could have permitted, much less the budget. Let's say I was intrigued. This was not the lame show that came on in reruns after Saturday morning cartoons. More books came from the library, until I was primed for The Wrath of Khan (even though I had never seen the episode that inspired it.) And then Spock died. And this ten-year-old bawled.

Then came The Next Generation. More movies, more shows. I've attended a few conventions, including the 25th Anniversary TrekCon in Los Angeles with my brother (we could only afford passes to the vendor floor). Made my ex-wife watch so many episodes that my nerdy daughters were shocked by her Trek Fu when they were watching reruns decades later. Scooter and I are in the middle of a Voyager re-watch, and I'd love to actually see all of Enterprise (military deployment caused me to miss a couple seasons).

I was so excited by the new Star Trek (Kelvin timeline). While Into Darkness was disappointing, I wanted to see Beyond, and finally got my chance this past Saturday. It was amazing, and has me excited to see where they take the franchise next.

It's been 50 years since Captain Kirk led the crew of the Enterprise on a trek through the stars and into our imaginations. Countless people have been inspired to pursue careers in science because of Star Trek. Others have been inspired to pursue the kind of society where everyone can fulfill their potential regardless of their race, gender, or whatever makes them seem different. People have met, fallen in love, and had children because of Star Trek. Is it silly to celebrate a show that made history and impacted (created) so many lives, including my own?

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Blaugust Blowout

My anticipation of the Legion launch yesterday was such that I almost forgot August has thirty-one days, leaving with a chance to another post. This much more casual Blaugust was a bit more to my taste, I think. I did mange to post 12 times (including this one), which on average is about every three days. On the other hand, I don't know that my posts were any deeper than last years' on average.

Scooter and I, playing our Demon Hunters, did the quests to transport Dalaran to the Broken Isles and then our Artifact Weapons, plus a little dabbling in Azsuna. We finished out the evening on two new characters (I know!) in Teldrassil. It was actually nice and quiet after the crowds and minor chaos of the expansion zones.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Legion Launches

Today's big event seems almost anticlimactic. Much of the changes to basic game mechanics (e.g., the talent system, spells/abilities, transmog) came out over a month ago. Demon Hunters have been available to play since early August. And, of course, the ever increasingly frequent Invasions of six prime targets had everyone in a frenzy of XP and loot. After creating and boosting a pair of characters, Scooter and I started our own DHs, ran all four through the high-level quests prepping us for a counter-invasion of the Broken Isles.

I started a solo mage and leveled her to 52 purely through running Invasions, only completing all six last night after a couple laborious treks because I was missing flight points. I know others have gotten fresh characters from 1 to 100 due to the event.

It's been fun—if a bit frustrating at times due to the vagaries of random number generators. My level 52 still has the level 1 staff she started with, and Scooter's Paladin never got a weapon drop. But I suppose it kept us on the hamster wheel. Frankly, I'll be happy to return to regular questing. It will be up to Scooter whether we return to leveling our low-to-mid level duos, or jump into the Broken Isles stuff—or both. Scooter still hasn't really seen Outland or Northrend, and neither of us has seen Pandaria or Draenor at all.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

A Leveling Play Field

Belghast hit on something today I've been contemplating for a bit since the Legion Invasions started. If you've been following him this month, Dear Reader, I am sure you are aware of his progress in getting several characters both leveled and geared solely by running the Invasion content. I am sorely tempted to do the same thing, but two things keep me from doing so.

One, Scooter is resistant to the idea. We leveled our rogues up about 20 levels and got some great gear along the way, but on our freshly minted 100s (mine a warrior, hers a pally) she has been frustrated by the RNG gods and still doesn't have a Felforged Weapon. Meanwhile I am fully geared with a couple Warforged pieces and a Mace seems to drop for me every other Invasion. If they weren't soulbound, I could share. But the past few trips to Invasion zones have only led to disappointment and frustration for Scooter.

Two, having a raft of 100s is not the reason I returned to World of Warcraft in the first place. I've essentially missed three expansions (due to my own burn-out), and that's a lot of content I am now interested in checking out. It's been long enough that, while I recognize many of the old quests—in slightly modified form—it's more like returning to an old favorite book rather than rehashing content for the umpteenth time.

I've said it before—just the other day, in fact—that leveling is not as important to me as experiencing the quests and storylines, a major reason I disagree with the "story is bunk" philosophy of MMOs espoused by C.T. Murphy, for example. I agree with Belghast (and Murphy) that Blizzard has left the leveling process a bit disjointed, and Scooter and I have skipped entire zones to get somewhere challenging. But hey, with a little planning, we can get those zones with other characters on a different occasion.

It's not that I don't want to level. If I wanted to do that, I could turn off XP gains while running through a zone. But I wish the leveling were smoother, more in line with the vast amount of content available in WoW.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Classocalypse

OR

How I Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Legion

I'm going to admit right now that this post is the imperfect melding of three only somewhat related posts. Let's get to it.

Which Main Felbane Reigns Gamely in my Brain?

Syp has been debating which character he wants to be his main during World of Warcraft's impending Legion expansion. As it turns out, Belghast was trying to decide the same thing.

Having just gotten back into the game myself, I am still on the fence about many of the classes. Druid has versatility, but like always, it lacks focus. I’ve always liked enhancement shammies, I had one as my main of the last year I played. But I wish they hadn’t nerfed the tankiness of the class. When Blizz abandoned Shammy/Pally parity, it seems like shamans got the short end of the stick.

My own altoholism is already rearing its beautiful head, I already have 11 toons on Argent Dawn after only a couple months back. Granted, two of them have been created but never played, and two I played to about level 5 in a single session and have not returned. So I’ll be no help to you there, Dear Reader. Given the trinity roles, many of the classes seem like rehashes of each other. Do I kill with my fists or my daggers? Do I send in my cheetah or my doomguard? Maybe the order halls will restore that feeling of uniqueness.

Classocalypse

I'm lying, Fury Warrior feels way different than Enhancement Shaman or Outlaw Rogue. But I haven't played any of them in the past few years prior to June, so I am not sure how they are different since the 7.0 patch. It might be better to say many specs overlap from one class to the next. For instance, Destruction Warlock and Fire Mage. As an altoholic, my reaction to Destrolocks is that they give up on what makes a Lock unique in favor of imitating another class. However, if I were only ever a Warlock, I might want to distinguish myself from other Locks, taking what is perhaps a path less traveled. And I indicated above, even within specific group roles, like melee DPS, individual classes and specs feel very different, even if they look similar to an observer.

Syp is lamenting the recent changes to the Beast Master Hunter spec. I have a relative lowbie BM hunter that I have no intention of changing (except maybe raiding, if it comes to that). I agree that it seems a little stilted, like they expect a chunk of damage to be auto-shoot. I expected more beast commands, but right now I basically have 4 abilities of any consequence, three of which are on cooldowns and only two of which involve beasts.

On the other hand, they've made it super easy to switch talents and even specs (making trainers nothing but decoration). I am not afraid to experiment. If you're looking for guidance on the "best" specs and talents, Icy Veins is a great place to start, and may be the only thing you need. I also recommend the developer blog posts about the various classes/specs in order to get a feel for their intent.

Too often, we get caught up in being optimal—myself, included—when the focus really should be on having fun. Soon enough, Blizz will take the nerf bat to any "überl33t" spec, which will then be "teh suxxors." Maybe it makes me an awful player, but I rarely listen to the commentariat regarding ideal/garbage specs. The one recent exception is when Manglehaft and Psynister tempted me into creating a Fury Warrior, which is now my boosted-to-100 toon in full 700 gear (thanks to Invasions). However, it is mostly the "fun factor" they sold me on, as opposed to any statistics.

You worry too much

I think Legion will probably be fun; that doesn't mean it will be perfect. Just the other day, I saw a suggestion to make the Demon Hunter resource "Preparedness." When there's not enough to perform an ability, your character could say, "I am not prepared." It's clever, and just the sort of tongue-in-cheek that WoW means to a lot of folks. Then again, I thought Pandaren were a natural fit, but thousands raged about the race. You probably know, Dear Reader, that Blizzard did not follow that DH suggestion.

Blizzard has already tweaked the Invasion XP several times, to the consternation and delight of various bloggers, including me. There will be more changes to come, as there have been in the past. And there will be "winners" and "losers" who will perhaps have legitimate concerns. I feel that I have some myself. It will be interesting to see how it plays out, and how long it will take before people will start bitching about the lack of "content" again in one of—if not THE—most content-rich MMORPGs on the market.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

The Sisters Spinoza

or

CSI: Sentinel Hill

The Spinoza sisters come from a privateering family that helped keep the sea lanes open near the town of Southshore. Their father captains the sloop Lady Legace (named for a former paramour). After the destruction of Southshore by the Forsaken, Captain Spinoza set sail for warmer waters. His daughters, tired of life at sea, disembarked during provisioning at Stormwind Harbor to make their fortunes ashore.

While they look very similar, you can recognize Beyleigh by her slightly longer hair and impish grin. And Beyleigh certainly is the more mischievous of the two, preferring shadows and the subtle sting of a dagger in the back. Meyleigh has shorter hair and a canny gaze. The younger Spinoza is quick with a cutlass or boarding axe, or a pistol shot to the face.

While their father may or may not have slipped into outright piracy, the Spinoza sisters have ended up a crime fighting dynamic duo, helping solve a murder mystery and uncovering a plot against Marshall Stoutmantle of Westfall. But when Vanessa VanCleef and her co-conspirators retreated to the Deadmines, who actually got justice . . .

(•_•)
( •_•)>⌐■-■
(⌐■_■)

And who got the shaft?

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.
Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Livy and Manerva: Reborn

I am way behind on my profiles. I say this a lot, but in my defense, given the chance, I normally would rather play MMOs than blog about them. So if a post doesn't mostly happen at lunch, it's not likely to happen at all.

Livy and Manerva Honeywell
[IPA: ˈlɪviː & məˈnɜːrvə] (Manerva—derived from the Roman goddess of wisdom and war—is Scooter's character, with lively eyes and a mischievous grin. Livy—short for Olivia—stands behind her, a more sober—dare I say it: grave—twin.

The Honeywell cousins lived and died in Southshore before the Second War with the Orcish Horde. After the defeat of the Lich King, Sylvanus Windrunner implemented a program of expansion and re-population of the Forsaken territories. The graveyard containing the Honeywell family plot fell into Forsaken hands, which they used to replenish their "Human Resources." Though they were simple folk in life, the resurrected cousins showed talent for magic. Mystical Manerva delves into the Arcane, while her more disciplined, priestly partner mixes the best of Light and Shadow. The budding adventurers performed some services for the denizens of Brill and the Bulwark before being sent on to Silverpine Forest to meet with the Dark Lady herself.

I tied the Honeywell ladies's story back to a period prior to much of the contemporary struggles of Warcraft, so they have no loyalties/resentments with regard to the Cataclysm era politics of Azeroth. Tying into my own history with WoW, I discovered upon arriving in Southshore during the Vanilla/BC days an NPC named Julie Honeywell, who had the exact same features I'd used for my blog namesake, Rowanblaze, and her twin sister Hollyhammer. If I had not already come up with a surname and backstory out of Redridge for those two, Ms. Honeywell would definitely have been part of it.

I think of their in-game monikers as what they call each other. Manerva has a nickname for Olivia, whereas Livy tends to address her cousin by her given name. It's also mildly amusing to me that I envision both Livy and Meyleigh as more practical than Scooter's more mischievous characters, since I think Scooter herself is by far the practical one in our relationship. As far as why they'd be so well preserved when it could be assumed that they'd be nothing more than dust; in my head canon, the magic of the Val'kyr is sufficient to restore some flesh to Forsaken bones.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog. 

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Invasion: Azeroth!

Scooter and I spent the weekend when we weren't preparing for the family dinner party) questing with Meyleigh and Beyleigh. At some point, I also got some solo time on my Tauren, Sedgeweaver. As you may already be aware, Dear Reader, WoW's pre-expansion Legion invasion event is going on right now, since the introduction of the Demon Hunter prestige class on Tuesday, 9 August (maybe it started this weekend, I'm not sure). I had assumed that the event was for high-level characters only, and didn't figure on participating. However, a flight from Thunder Bluff to Orgrimmar took me through the Northern Barrens during one such event, so I headed to the Crossroads to check things out. As it happens, the event mobs are tuned to my own character levels, so I was able to participate and get some rewards.

On Sunday afternoon, I suggested to Scooter that doing a couple events would be fun and rewarding. She turned out to be at least enthusiastic as I was, and we were able to complete all the events in the Eastern Kingdoms before migrating Meyleigh and Beyleigh to Kalimdor on Sunday evening. Of course, we're hoping to get at least four more events in tonight—including all three in Kalimdor to complete the Defender of Azeroth Achievement/Feat of Strength. I guess there's another one involving collecting pamphlets that players are literally killing their characters to get "efficiently."

The event is a bit of a mixed bag, from my perspective, though mostly positive. I like the invasions themselves, which remind me of Rift invasions. And the rewards are nice. I liked leveling and gaining more abilities, which seem few and far between compared to WoW 1.0-3.0. On the other hand, the massive amount of XP and levels gained from participating in the events is exactly the opposite of how I would like to progress through the game. Our Rogue ladies leveled twice per event; which, along with some regular questing, meant they went from level 21 to level 33 on Sunday. So our Redridge quests turned grey before we were done, as did Duskwood before we even arrived. We completed the Bravo Company (SPOILERS) questline anyway, which was entertaining, but decided to skip Duskwood entirely in favor of Desolace—at this point, more level appropriate. [EDIT: As of Monday night, Meyleigh had hit 40, with Beyleigh on her heals. Desolace is barely green, and we quested in Dustwallow Marsh instead.]

If I were more inclined to race to 100, I would eagerly welcome the boosts the events give. But as always in RPGs, it seems to me that the journey is the better part.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog. 

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Damn Lucky

@Karinshastha @sctrz I am damn lucky.

— Summer Blaze (@rowanblaze) August 10, 2016

MMOs are, of course, far easier and more enjoyable when you have a steady partner to play with, and there is nothing steadier than having your partner in the game be your partner in life, as well. Scooter has been a fixture on this blog practically since we met almost five years ago. [No, it's been almost six. ~Scooter] When we first started dating, I curtailed my MMO habit quite a bit, though I didn't quit entirely. 'Twas in the last days of WotLK, just before Cataclysm dropped, and there were still a few things I wanted to accomplish. It was early December before she asked me if she could try playing WoW on my account. I would say I created a monster, but she already had the gaming bug from her youth playing D&D. She'd left off gaming to raise three wonderful kids (other than kicking their butts on the Nintendo), but returned to a new era of online fun. I still tend to play more than she does, but usually due to differing office hours rather than lack of interest. But it is cool that Scooter enthusiastically shares my interest in adventures both in virtual worlds and in the real world. Just yesterday, we went to the supermarket on a weekend afternoon, and had a house full of family. I am damn lucky.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted). If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

Beyleigh and Meyleigh

or

Mispronunciation Blues

So Team Rogue has shifted. When she read* my post about Livy and Manerva, Scooter asked if it would be better to create rogues of another race and re-role our fledgling Forsaken to something else. She also said that after thinking about it, she thought Manerva should be more magical than a rogue. I agreed that it might be better to follow our respective character fantasies. So Livy and Manerva became a Priest and a Mage, respectively, and we rolled two human female rogues.

Meyleigh and Beyleigh Spinoza
[IPA: ˈmeɪliː & ˈbeɪliː ɛspɪˈnoʊsə]

Simply known as Meyleigh and Beyleigh in-game. The names themselves are currently slightly more interesting than the histories of these intrepid sisters. Scooter came up with "Baylee" first and hunted down an acceptable spelling that hadn't been taken. Interestingly enough, the Urban Dictionary describes Baylee as "an incredibly hot female, typically with beautiful brunette hair. Loves animals and books. . . Has a great smile and round eyes."

Meyleigh's name is based on a common mispronunciation of the term melee, generally construed in MMORPGs to be the distance at which combatants can strike each other with swords, maces, etc. Since I was having a hard time coming up with a good plant-related name, Scooter suggested a departure from my habit. While I like the name, I have a hard saying it out loud. "Spinoza"—with various alternate spellings—is a common Hispanic surname indicating a family association with the hawthorn plant.

More later. . .

*Scooter proofreads almost all my articles before I post them, for which I am very grateful. However, any mistakes are mine and mine alone (unless otherwise noted).

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.

The Trouble With Transmog

"After all... the true end game is looking awesome."
~ Belghast the Aggronaut, Rubber Band Thief

Since my recent return to World of Warcraft, I have not become involved in the Transmogrification game in the sense of running old content to pick up cool pieces. In fact, I avoided the original system entirely, knowing that before the end of the summer, it would replaced by the revamped version for Legion. If not for a major flaw (which I will discuss below), I could have avoided it for quite some time, given my focus on new, lower-level characters. Most MMOs have come up with various systems to help people express their sartorial preferences. As has been mentioned with some regularity elsewhere, having some kind of color matching or dyeing system in place goes a long way toward making "original" outfits that don't look like you stepped out of a clown's closet. Outfit systems that allow players to project an image independent of what they have equipped for attribute boosts are even better.

"I Feel Pretty, Oh So Pretty"

Star Wars: The Old Republic has a fairly decent cosmetic system. Your mileage may vary, of course; partly depending on your subscription status. The paired-colors dye system is somewhat cumbersome, but this is mitigated by the match-to-chest feature. With one or two really awesome pieces, MtC helps me look cool without necessarily breaking the bank. And while BioWare at one point restricted player characters to cosmetic outfits that matched the armor class of the gear they could actually wear, a lot of the coolest stuff was Adaptive, matching whatever "hardness" the character would typically equip. Eventually, BioWare developed an outfit system that would allow the player to "imprint" a piece and still use it for other purposes. This meant that I could more easily match my Trooper Companions to my own uniform; whereas previously, I had to have two matching pieces for each slot.

With the KotFE expansion last fall, SWTOR eliminated gear-based stats for companions, (among other things) making it even easier to dress them them sharply. (Mako always wanted Mando armor!) In the meantime, the outfit system was broadened so that my character can "wear" anything, regardless of armor class. Additional outfit spaces are available for credits or cartel coins (RMT), but I am not sure what the ultimate limit is. It also costs an increasing amount of credits (based on character level) to imprint outfit slots. My only real criticism of SWTOR's cosmetic system is that if a given outfit slot is empty, whatever piece is in the actual stats gear slot is visible and doesn't necessarily match. "Bare-skin" versions of each slot are available through the random loot Cartel Packs, but high demand items (notably, the gloves) go for extortionate rates on the Galactic Trade Network. Since I have not been running top-end content, it is easier for me just to leave the slot empty if I want to go bare-handed.

Rift's outfit system is even more versatile. It's been a while since I played, but as I recall, several outfit spaces were available, all with independent slots. And you didn't have to worry about gear pieces showing through if, for example, you decided to leave your hands bare for a given outfit. Rift was also the first game I played that had a dye system allowing me to alter the colors of my gear. While dyes could get pricey on the player auction house, you could still look elegant. And unlike SWTOR, Rift's primary and secondary dye slots could be filled independently. The biggest drawback to the outfit system seems to be the outfits themselves—that is, the art design. But that is a different post all together. The last time we returned to start new characters, Scooter and I splurged on RMT store outfits to make our toons look fabulous.

Guild Wars 2 has an excellent dye system that almost makes up for the lack of actual variety in the costume choices. The system was expanded at some point to be accessible account wide. I tended to prefer some of the more easily obtained dyes, leading my daughter to refer to my characters as Christmas Girls. I don't recall being able to alter outfits independently of stats gear, but it's been a long time since I played GW2, and I know there are various outfits on offer in the Gem store (RMT).

Another cosmetic system worthy of mention is The Secret World, where they've completely divorced fashion from stats. And the costume pieces go into a "closet" where they are easily retrieved. While there are lots of outfits and pieces based on achievements—meaning occasionally you can show off your accomplishments—most of the people I saw were dressed in things that fit their (or at least their characters') personal sense of style. A few drawbacks: no dyeing system, but most costume pieces come in a variety of colors, such that I rarely felt like there weren't enough choices. Also, as of the last time I played, there isn't a built-in way to save entire outfits. However, there is at least one excellent add-on that enables you to do just that. Lastly, while the costume interface is arguably both minimalist and a bit cumbersome, the same can be said for the rest of the TSW interface. You just get used to it.

But what about Transmog?

Which brings us back to the new Transmog system. I can't speak to the way transmogrification worked before WoW v7.0.3; however, it seems to be the most cumbersome costume system I have yet to experience in an MMORPG. Prior to the Legion pre-patch, for instance, I could go to the Interface settings and hide my head piece, and my back piece at will. And now that functionality is part of the transmog interface that is only available when interacting with the transmog vendor in a single capital city: Stormwind for the Alliance, and Orgrimmar (I assume) for the Horde. There may be other places to do transmog, but the point is that the places are limited; whereas, at the least, hiding the head and back slot pieces used to be available anywhere in the world, because it was part of the Interface settings. It's still "free" to hide those slots (and now shoulders, as well), except for the time and perhaps coin required to get to the transmog vendor. And each piece must be hidden (or transmogged) as I acquire it. For a game with a reputation for making things ever more convenient ("dumbing down the content"), this a serious step backward.

Why does all this require me to go to a vendor anyway? Why could it not be done from anywhere? Half of the transmog interface (the images of my acquired pieces) is available at all times through the Collections window. Just like I can use that interface to summon my mounts and minipets, why could I not use it to transmog my stuff at will? Contrast this with the new talent system allowing folks to switch between all specs at will, in any resting area (i.e., Inns and Capitals)—or for that matter, the costume systems of the four other MMOs I have mentioned here.

Also, rather than making cosmetic costumes independent of stats gear, each piece must be transmogged as I acquire it, if I don't like the look. And still no dye system. It is my understanding that the color/texture system Blizzard uses won't allow for dyes. However, based on only my current transmog "inventory," they are fond of "dyeing" the same patterned piece a bazillion different ways back at Blizzard studios. Are they doing that "by hand" the way I might use MS Paint?

Now, to put this all in perspective, transmogrification is not a make or break system for me. Blizzard has done a lot to make outfits less random at the lower levels, at least if you're using quest reward gear. But in a game where most of the customization/creativity that players crave is tied up in their character's appearance (as opposed to, say, housing), you might think Blizzard would have done what they used to do best, look at what other developers are doing, and do it better.

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This article from I Have Touched the Sky is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License. If you repost part or all of the work (for non-commercial purposes), please cite me as the author and include a link back to the blog.

If you are reading this post through RSS or Atom feed—especially more than a couple hours after publication—I encourage you to visit the actual page, as I often make refinements after the fact. The mobile version also loses some of the original character of the piece due to simplified formatting.