World of Warcraft Comments by Ellie Gibson

People unable to see the difference between the running costs of a game like Guild Wars, and that of World of Warcraft, are silly.

There is a diference, Guild Wars is heavy instanced so the servers dont take as much stress as in World of Warcraft were only some dungeons are instances.

However they both need a lot of severs, maintence cost on GW might be much lower that in WoW but they still spend money in the servers.

The main diference is that WoW actually have content as GW content is far fewer, lacks any updates (dont compare to GW summer update to WoW main updates, WoW added several entire instances) and unless you are into PvP there is no point in playing the game.

I think the reason GW is free is because nobody (in its current state) would pay for it.

Of course that is the reason WoW have a fee ... the support team (GW have a nerf team) and high maintence costs.

My mate also baulked at the cost. I then noted he smokes a pack of snouts a day, which in the UK would cover your sub in 2 days. To each his (or her) own "drug" I guess. I consider the numerous games I have gathering dust on my shelf (at 50 bucks a pop) were more of a waste of money.

I play quite a lot, mostly because I play with my girlfriend - nice to have a shared interest after all. I also have a job/mortgage/bills etc, so cannot fall into the 16-hour-a-day category even if I wanted to (which I do not incidentally).

As for value judgements about what a waste of time it is, well fair enough. But to my mind pretty much all hobbies are a waste of time if looked at objectively. Would I be a "better" person if I took up samba dancing/bird watching/restoring old cars/supporting a football team instead? I doubt it very much.

Video games are a big waste of time and money, one I very much enjoy along with watching movies, listening to music, eating out and smoking joints. I would suggest that anyone who is spending their time reading and posting on a video game forum is in no place no deem this "sad"

The amount of playtime I've got out of my monthly fee is phenomenal, quite simply. In theory, it should be saving me a fortune in not spending money on other games.

*Looks at still-growing pile of unplayed games*

Curse my lack of willpower...

Having played both Guild Wars and WoW quite a lot i can confirm they are totally different games. I wouldnt want to pay subscription for GW as the game itself is quite limited in terms of what you can do. I dont mind paying for WoW as it is constantly being updated and there is always tons of stuff to do aside from just straight questing.

I am worried about hitting 60 though, i do play the game mostly solo and have no desire to make an alt. Also my character is a rogue and i am told out of all classes this is the worst for the endgame content. I will probably quit at that point, but so far its been a hugely enjoyable game that has taken up more time than anything else i have ever played.

BTW to the people who use the "get a social life" comments, i do have one, and a long term girlfriend and a well paid job. That also goes for the people in my guild. So shut the fuck up.

What happens at level 60? I know nothing about WoW, so I have to ask daft questions like that.

All this talk of the "endgame"... when you reach it do you have to drop your character and start another one?

I'm not going to play this, I simply don't have the time for MMO games, but I'm all curious anyway.

I have been on warcrack since a week after release and after 2 months hit lvl 60 with my priest, i was by that point playing it 12 hours for most days (with breaks ofc) and silly amounts on weekends, I raided molten core and got my epic staff then got kicked from the raid for refusing to join the guild that run the raid and ended up quitting my account. A month later i started it back up and got a small guild with just local mates and relatives and quit raiding, it was a nice wake up call and now i play for 2-4 hours in the nights running instances with my mates and not worrying about getting epic gear or beating ragnarous (sp?). Its a much better game to me now, priest burn out should be a recognised medical condition :)

Edit for spelling

"People unable to see the difference between the running costs of a game like Guild Wars, and that of World of Warcraft, are silly."

Or, to use another word, 'stoopid'.

Guild Wars is fun until you've completed all the content or feel like playing PvP. I'll be restarting when the new expansion comes out but that's just because i'm a sucker for plot. And I'm probably about to buy my first copy of WoW - tbh the only thing putting me off is I have so many friends playing on so many different servers I'd have no idea which one to go on.

Can you have your alt on a different server?

Talking of WoW addiction, check out Episodes 6 & 7 of Pure Pwnage.

You can download them from the link below

http://www.purepwnage.com/episodes.html

Can you have your alt on a different server?

You can, I have characters on several different ones and though there's a limit to how many you can have on each server, I don't think there's a limit on how many servers you can create chars on. Useful if you want to split time between a PvP/PvE one, for example.

"The whole server (Horde and Alliance) working together and contributing items to the war effort to unlock the Gates of Ahn Quiraj? Yes please. :) "

I dont think theres any point trying to debate WoW with you, since you think the world event was great.

Nope. I've never played an MMORPG and never want to, because I would never stop. More levels could never make up all the money I would throw into the game.

I dont think theres any point trying to debate WoW with you, since you think the world event was great.

Excellent condescending there. Go to the head of the class, that man. :)

I think that there an huge imbalance between Alliance and Horde numbers (in favour of the former). The quests in Ahn'Qiraj open up the possibilities for the quests to be co-operative between the two. I think that's an interesting and innovative way to resolve an obvious imbalance (the new race in the expansion pack being the other).

The point I was making is that such a large-scale level of server interation is simply not a feature of games like Guild Wars (which was the title put up against WoW in this thread). And for that I applaud it.

Did I say it was my "number one uber leet reason for playing WoW"? No.

But hey - you reach whatever conclusions you want. My comments to this point have been pretty balanced (despite my obvious enjoyment of the game). It'll be no great loss not to have to 'debate' with you further. Have a nice day. :)

I suppose I'll be buying this now then.

Dammit.

"Excellent condescending there. Go to the head of the class, that man. :) "

How is it being condescending? You think the following is great, and that speaks to your character(ie, wow fanboy):

The WoW World events team took 1 year to come up with
"Hey I know, let's make everyone collect completely useless shit, and LOTS of it so they can open another instance!
No, we dont need quests, or a story, or anything remotely intelligent, we just require them to collect hundreds of thousands of items!"

As I stated, ave, I was using it as something representative of the larger scale of WoW vs. something like Guild Wars. And if you think that's the one and only thing Blizzad have done to the game in the last year that suggests that you know very little about the game. I'm not an idiot - I'm not going to blindly pay a subscription fee unless I'm getting my moneys worth. I feel that I am. End of story.

I like the game, I make no bones about it. Am I a fanboy? Well, I don't think so as I've joined many other people in this thread in decrying the fact that the game almost totally loses its way at level 60. The game is far from perfect, but it's still the best experience I've had in many a year.

Quite why, out of the blue, you should isolate one thing I've said and then lambast me for it I don't know? Especially as I had gone out of my way to be even handed. Preferring one thing over another does not make one a fan boy by any means.

And as for "speaking to [my] character" there you go again - being condescending. But, since we're going down that road I'd suggest that your responses in this thread speak equally well about your own character. What had been a fairly open and interesting discourse (with other people, not your monosyllibic quips) has now left a sour taste in my mouth - congratulations.

/edit: removed suggestion that ave lacks character - I don't know the person at all, just visibility to some tosh on a forum thread.

"As I stated, ave, I was using it as something representative of the larger scale of WoW vs. something like Guild Wars."
I'm sure guild wars could easily introduce something like the AQ world event, after all the AQ world event required massive SOLO effort.

"And if you think that's the one and only thing Blizzad have done to the game in the last year that suggests that you know very little about the game."
There actually is a "World Events Team", who's only job is world events.
And that really is the only thing they've come up with so far.
Which suggests that you're the one who knows less about the game, not me.



"Quite why, out of the blue, you should isolate one thing I've said and then lambast me for it I don't know? Especially as I had gone out of my way to be even handed. Preferring one thing over another does not make one a fan boy by any means."
Because I read what you said, and thought it was hilarious.
You're actually the first person I've ever heard say the AQ event is good(or a good thing about wow), and I idle in 2 wow channels on irc and read the forums semi-regularly.

"And as for "speaking to [my] character" there you go again - being condescending."
Saying something is X, without actually giving a reason why - speaks to your character.

oops, there we go again :(

"But, since we're going down that road I'd suggest that your responses in this thread speak equally well about your own character. What had been a fairly open and interesting discourse (with other people, not your monosyllibic quips) has now left a sour taste in my mouth - congratulations."
Oh no, I picked a part of one of your comments that was funny, you dont like it and now you have a sour taste in your mouth :( A site suitable for you

I thought I'd made it quite cleary _why_ I think the Ahn'Quiraj world event is a good thing - clearly that isn't the case so here I go again with my reasons behind the statement:

Many guilds have deliberately scheduled farming events to collect the materials necessary. Since the materials required are from all levels of the game (low level mobs right up to high level areas) it encourages cooperation between guild members and also many people have re-rolled new lowbies for this purpose (again, mitigating the lack of things to do for many people at 60 by giving them a reason to reroll).

Also, the event goes beyond just opening the gates - Alliance/Horde cooperation is a theme that Blizzard have suggested they're going to develop significantly in the coming months and with the expansion pack.

All of these things are knock on effects of "just collecting millions of things." I suppose it just depends on how you look at it. I look at the above and see a good thing encouraging cooperation and activity. The fact that you look at it and just see a waste of time is your perogative - but to find it "hilarious" still seems strange to me.

And, as an aside, the "World Event Team" is responsible for all the holiday celebrations (Lunar Festival, Winter, New Year, etc. etc.) and is a much smaller team than you seem to think it is.

But hey - if you want to label me a fan boy and dismiss my (very reasonable) arguments out of hand then that's your affair. I bristle at accusations at fanboyism, though. Always have, always will. Your posts rub me up the wrong way (oo-er) - doesn't mean I've gone cryin' home to momma or anything. :)

"Many guilds have deliberately scheduled farming events to collect the materials necessary. Since the materials required are from all levels of the game (low level mobs right up to high level areas) it encourages cooperation between guild members and also many people have re-rolled new lowbies for this purpose (again, mitigating the lack of things to do for many people at 60 by giving them a reason to reroll)."
Some of that doesnt make sense, particularly(sorry, have to paraphrase)
"The AQ world event is a good thing, because it gives lvl60's something to do, like rolling a new character to collect items"
That just doesnt make much sense to me.

The guild farming thing may be going on, I havent really seen it, but again it's adding a repetetive(filler) task just to open a new dungeon(and any guild that does BWL/MC/Onyxia doesnt really need more co-operation.)
It almost seems as if they're trying to do anything to stop 60's quitting before the new expansion.

Also, the event goes beyond just opening the gates - Alliance/Horde cooperation is a theme that Blizzard have suggested they're going to develop significantly in the coming months and with the expansion pack.
Sorry, here I'll just foam at the mouth about how ****ing lazy blizzard were going with a Red vs Blue system in WoW(the simple/easy/lazy option)

I loved wc1/2, quite liked wc3 and was really, really let down to find that races had been randomly lumped together to form two great sides, it's also bad in many many ways for gameplay.

d'ya know what, I think you guys have got more in common than dividing you. You both love that WoW, you just show the love in different ways. Now there's a nice happy Sesame St ending...


/goes to hang with Cookie Monster

Some of that doesnt make sense, particularly(sorry, have to paraphrase)
"The AQ world event is a good thing, because it gives lvl60's something to do, like rolling a new character to collect items" That just doesnt make much sense to me.

Well, the clearest example would be this: I've been teetering on the brink of rolling myself a Warlock but (as I mentioned earlier) I'm attached to my 60 Hunter and enjoy playing it. The low-level farming for the AQ War Effort was the straw that broke the camels back, and tipped me over the brink and I created the character (now level twenty something). I'm finding it a lot of fun - I'd taken a couple of other classes up to 30 but didn't really get on with them, and so was pleased that a Warlock was fun for me to play. Without the AQ thang, it's possible that I might not have bothered.

The guild farming thing may be going on, I havent really seen it, but again it's adding a repetetive(filler) task just to open a new dungeon(and any guild that does BWL/MC/Onyxia doesnt really need more co-operation.)

Oh, I'm not saying it isn't repetetive. But an aversion to repetition in a MMORPG is pretty fatal, so let's not single this one thing out for abuse for that. ;-)

Guilds that raid MC are fairly hardcore. The point of most discussion (for me) in this thread is the dearth of activities post-60 for the casual player. The War Effort is something I can dip in and out of, and so suits my playing style. My Warlock would have been grinding something for its levels, now it's at least grinding something with a purpose, no matter how hilarious you find it. ;)

It almost seems as if they're trying to do anything to stop 60's quitting before the new expansion.

I would say that's _exactly_ what they're doing. Were you expecting anything different?

Sorry, here I'll just foam at the mouth about how ****ing lazy blizzard were going with a Red vs Blue system in WoW(the simple/easy/lazy option)

I loved wc1/2, quite liked wc3 and was really, really let down to find that races had been randomly lumped together to form two great sides, it's also bad in many many ways for gameplay.

Well, there had to be a compromise to support its goals of accessibility but I too share some consternation with how they had to be very heavy handed with the black marker and tippex to get it all making sense in terms of the lore.

Bugger - I just said something anti-Blizzard; I may have to check my fanboi credentials at the door.

Warlocks a nice choice, up to ~40 you'll die alot though, but it's pretty much a magic using hunter(unfortunately no escape spell though) in PVE.

PVP is where warlocks really shine though, 1v1 they're pretty much unbeatable :)

Warlocks a nice choice, up to ~40 you'll die alot though.

It's holding its own thus far - I think a lot of my Hunter survival instincts (i.e. knowing when to run like buggery from certain situations) are helping out here. I'm gonna miss Feign Death, though!

PVP is where warlocks really shine though, 1v1 they're pretty much unbeatable :)

If only I had the time to spend hours in the queue for Battlegrounds. I tried a couple of PvP servers last year, but the ganking really did ruin it for me so I retreated to the Shadowsong PvE server.

On the subject of unbeatable Warlocks, I found this pretty funny: http://forums-en.wow-europe.com/thread.aspx?fn=wow-general-e
n&t=817077

It was linked on the WoW Europe site the other day. :)

Anyways - I hope I've sufficiently demonstrated why AQ isn't a total waste of time for all players. Give a thought to the poor bastards with only a couple of hours a week to play next time you're raiding MC. ;)

They've also put the AQ quests in as a way of gaining items and reputation too. At the moment most people grind runecloth to turn in wherever they want reputation. Now they get tokens to chip in.

It's the same with other world events - the Lunar festival gives you 50 rep on all Alliance / Horde (depending what side you are) factions per guy you visit, and there's about 50 of them, so that's between 1/2 and 1/4 (depending how high up you are) of XP for all factions practically gratis.

There were similar things for the Halloween and Christmas world events - you got rewards in the form of food items with loads of buffs - the Christmas parallel festival gave you mistletoe that added 20 Spirit.

And there's a Valentine's day-esque fest starting soon too. So... the overall world events are kinda not all crap. The AQ one is linked to a dungeon, for sure, but you get more back for the turnins. Rep, buffing scrolls, armour and junk like that... All for harvesting some cloth or ore. The game is mostly about grinding with a social element overlaid, so any flavour they add to it is welcome.

Thing about Blizzard and WoW is this:
They are good at creating games, very very good in fact. WoW is an absolutely incredible game.
They are also bad at support, very very bad. Check out the WoW forums for one horror story after another.

The 'recent' login issues have been happening since oh... the day the game was released. Seriously. It gets better then worse then better. WoW has a long history of horrendous servers and login issues and such. And if you need support from them for anything, oh God help you, your gonna need it.

Incredible game, near criminal support.

I didn't realise all 5 million people paid £9 or whatever...I was told the pay structure was different in the east (handled by a third party, and people buying game time in hours rather than months).

The waiting to get in to the game isn't so bad. It's at its worse on a Friday night and then is back to normal by Sunday. Longest wait I've had on Turalyon (a full server) is about 11 mins.

Blizz shut quite a few of the servers down -in January I think- and made any new people, registering for the first time, sign up to new/non-full servers. This situation has now been resolved and most (one or two ar still closed to new players) servers are back up for new members to join.