World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King

[law90026]

Seriously, you don't need any of those guides to level efficiently in WoW. WOWhead is all you need.

Some of the basic mods I would recommend are:
1) Cartographer (already listed);
2) Titan Bar (this displays information like XP, gold, etc);
3) a good customizable UI mod (Bongos2, Bartender, etc) if you don't like the default UI.

A lot of mods can be found on www.curse.com.

Take your time to level, it's really fun the first time around (not so much thereafter unless you play something really different).

[spleen1015]

You picked a good time to start. The 3.0.2 patch is getting released today and a lot of the classes are changing. At level 10, you're not too far into to the game where you'll get confused by the sudden switch.

Along with the other recommendations, I would recommend a bag addon called Bagon. It lets you see everything in your bags as one big bag instead of several.

My main is a Shadow Priest. You'll have a much easier time leveling as a Shadow Priest.

Just wondering, what server did you create your character on?

[Thomkal]

haven't played WoW in forever, but curious about the class changes. what's happening with them?

[EagleFan]

Adding a couple suggestions for mods:

Auctioneer - great help for using the auction house (just remember to scan once a week or so)

Quest Helper - Plots a nice route for questing within a zone

Tom Tom - Nice map mod to allow for plotting points

Light Headed - Another nice quest helping add-on that lets you see posts about the various quests from other players

WoWMatrix - A GREAT tool for helping keep your mods up to date and find new mods

[tyketime]

Originally Posted by spleen1015

Just wondering, what server did you create your character on?

It recommended the Bronzebeard server, so that's where my first character resides.

I downloaded the following Addons:
1. Lighthead
2. Tom Tom
3. Doublewide

I also noticed that the Blizzard Downloader tool was very slowly downloading the new 3.0.2 patch. Instead, I went in and manually downloaded the three files from a Mirror Site, and put them into the correct Updates subdirectory. When I tried to run the Patch Installer... it said no patch to install. Is that because I have to wait for the big Server Upgrade to complete today that will "trigger" the update, or do I need to perform another manual step?

I still need to read thru all of the documentation to understand the various trees/paths my Priest can take.

[tyketime]

Originally Posted by EagleFan

Adding a couple suggestions for mods:

Tom Tom - Nice map mod to allow for plotting points

Light Headed - Another nice quest helping add-on that lets you see posts about the various quests from other players

dola

Yep... I'm with you there. But do Quest Helper & LightHeaded co-exist nicely?

[law90026]

Originally Posted by Thomkal

haven't played WoW in forever, but curious about the class changes. what's happening with them?

The 51 pt talents will be implemented for every class and some pretty major changes for some of the talents.

Can only really speak from a warrior PoV (since that's my main) but the Arms, Fury and Prot trees changes quite significantly and will result in a different playstyles once the patch is live. One good thing is that it looks like all 3 trees are now viable for levelling, grinding and pve, possibly even PvP.

There have also been some major changes to the classes in general, such as trying to ensure all DPS is relatively equal (though pure DPS classes are still tops theoretically).

There are also changes to buffs while in a raid as well as consumable usage.

Essentially, I think the game is going to feel somewhat fresh right now since classes make quite a dramatic change.

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by law90026

Seriously, you don't need any of those guides to level efficiently in WoW. WOWhead is all you need.

Absolutely. A free guide like Jame's might help you make sure you don't take a quest that's tedious, but you'll figure that out on your own.

Also, if you're going to use Wowhead.com to look up stuff, look into the Lightheaded Addon, which is basically wowhead implemented into the Quest UI. Saves you from having to alt-tab, and the comments are usually very helpful.


For a current path for your priest's talents, I'd say just pick talents you like the sound of for now. Since everything just got changed, it'll be a while before a lot of people can weigh in on which talents (and groups of talents) are worthwhile and which aren't. At that point you can always respec.


It's hard to summarize what's changing in the various classes with the expansion because there's so much that's changing (as happened with the last expansion).

[spleen1015]

How is everyone liking WotLK so far?

I am really enjoying it. I've managed to level my Shadow Priest to 76 so far. I've mainly be doing quests. I've ran Utgarde Keep twice. Other than that, just questing.

There is a really cool event that happens in the Dragonblight. You'll know what I mean when you see it. I think Blizzard has really stepped up this time.

This should have been the first expansion. Outland doesn't feel like it belongs in the game.

[Rizon]

The scenery is nice. WAY too easy though.

[spleen1015]

Originally Posted by Rizon

The scenery is nice. WAY too easy though.

How far into BC did you get? I'm decked out in full T6 gear. I won't see my first gear upgrade until I start raiding in Naxx. Things have been pretty easy.

[Atocep]

I didn't bother with this expansion. I've just lost interest in WoW.

A few from my old guild have tried it and their opinions seem fairly split. Some think its the greatest thing ever, some think its not really any different than TBC, and a couple have already quit because of how easy the game has become.

The 2nd expansion is typically the decline phase of a MMO, so we'll see if blizz defies this or if they can hold onto their subscribers. Towards end of TBC their North America numbers were way down from their peak (according to the numbers I saw), but the Asian market continues to grow.

[Atocep]

dola

Nehilum/SK gaming cleared all raid content in Lich King in 2 days. Pretty ridiculous achievement but has you wondering what the hell blizzard was doing the past 2 years with their billions when they could only get a recycled 25 man and two Onyxia/Gruul type encounters out for release as end game.

[spleen1015]

Originally Posted by Atocep

dola

Nehilum/SK gaming cleared all raid content in Lich King in 2 days. Pretty ridiculous achievement but has you wondering what the hell blizzard was doing the past 2 years with their billions when they could only get a recycled 25 man and two Onyxia/Gruul type encounters out for release as end game.

Have you played the expansion?

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by spleen1015

Have you played the expansion?

In beta, yes.

[flere-imsaho]

Folks like Nihilium/SK Gaming are missing the point, which is illustrated very well by their self-righteous "announcement" on their website which accused Blizzard of not knowing what they're doing given that this group could clear the content in 63 (or whatever) hours.

Sure, I can "see" all of Europe if I take a flight from Madrid to Moscow.

My understanding is that there's a ton of content in the expansion, with lots of smaller instances, lots of good quest chains, and some really interesting, exciting and diverse zones. There's plenty and plenty for the average gamer to do.

Plus, Blizzard has a roadmap for expanding this expansion (through free updates). Like neither Hyjal nor Sunwell Plateau were implemented at the time of the TBC launch, there's going to be an geometrically-increasing difficulty of instances over the next few patches.

Nihilium/SK Gaming can say, in their self-righteous announcement, that they think Blizzard's made a bad business decision by catering to casual players when they (the elite) can "clear the game" in 63 hours, but given that 11 million people play the game, and of those, only 25 are going to "clear the game" in 63 hours, I'd say Nihilium/SK Gaming should leave business plans to the professionals.

It's like when a 20-year-old tells you that if he was in charge of GM, it would be so easy to fix everything.

I know I don't play to be back online until January/February, but I'm not concerned that I'll have plenty of stuff to keep me entertained for as long as I want.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by flere-imsaho

Folks like Nihilium/SK Gaming are missing the point, which is illustrated very well by their self-righteous "announcement" on their website which accused Blizzard of not knowing what they're doing given that this group could clear the content in 63 (or whatever) hours.

Sure, I can "see" all of Europe if I take a flight from Madrid to Moscow.

My understanding is that there's a ton of content in the expansion, with lots of smaller instances, lots of good quest chains, and some really interesting, exciting and diverse zones. There's plenty and plenty for the average gamer to do.

Plus, Blizzard has a roadmap for expanding this expansion (through free updates). Like neither Hyjal nor Sunwell Plateau were implemented at the time of the TBC launch, there's going to be an geometrically-increasing difficulty of instances over the next few patches.

Nihilium/SK Gaming can say, in their self-righteous announcement, that they think Blizzard's made a bad business decision by catering to casual players when they (the elite) can "clear the game" in 63 hours, but given that 11 million people play the game, and of those, only 25 are going to "clear the game" in 63 hours, I'd say Nihilium/SK Gaming should leave business plans to the professionals.

It's like when a 20-year-old tells you that if he was in charge of GM, it would be so easy to fix everything.

I know I don't play to be back online until January/February, but I'm not concerned that I'll have plenty of stuff to keep me entertained for as long as I want.

I think its just as self righteous for anyone to tell them they're playing the game the wrong way, though. These guys do bring in attention and PR for blizzard as well as help fine tune instances/encounters for other players. They get paid to play the game the way they do. Its their job and some of them pull in a decent living doing so.

They may make up a very small percentage of the player base, but they're more important to the game's development than a lot of people probably realize.

[spleen1015]

Keep in mind that they had seen all of this content already. They were some of the very small number that saw Naxx the first time around and they were running it on the beta. It is no surprise to me that they were able to blow through it.

So, they downed all of the end game content. Do you know how they leveled? They did AOE grinds of 3 dungeons to power level just so they could get to 80 and blow up the first couple of raids. They skipped 95% of the content of the expansion.

[Atocep]

What I was getting at earlier was that the game has changed a lot since it first game out, which is inevitable, but its moved away from what was fun for me. Its still a good game and obviously there's millions that enjoy it, but I enjoyed the difficulty of MC at launch, BWL when it was first released, and Naxx the first time around.

TBC seemed to simplify content to an extent and from what I see in Lich King they've taken it a step further. It looks like they're focusing on other areas of the game. That's fine, its just not a game I enjoy playing at this stage of development.

[spleen1015]

Originally Posted by Atocep

What I was getting at earlier was that the game has changed a lot since it first game out, which is inevitable, but its moved away from what was fun for me. Its still a good game and obviously there's millions that enjoy it, but I enjoyed the difficulty of MC at launch, BWL when it was first released, and Naxx the first time around.

TBC seemed to simplify content to an extent and from what I see in Lich King they've taken it a step further. It looks like they're focusing on other areas of the game. That's fine, its just not a game I enjoy playing at this stage of development.

I didn't play until BC came out and I didn't step into Kara until 8 months after that, so I didn't experience vanilla raiding or BC raiding until after some patches. From what I have read though, raids at the release of BC were extremely hard and they had to be nerfed. If that is the case, then I think it contradicts what you say about BC simplifying content.

Did you ever fight Vashj or Kael? Simple my ass. How about Archimonde or Illidan? None of those encounters were simple.

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by Atocep

They may make up a very small percentage of the player base, but they're more important to the game's development than a lot of people probably realize.

I don't know. I think their usefulness is largely limited to basically being an "on-call" beta-testing group for high-end instances. Of course this is a double-edged sword, in the sense that all of that exposure to high-end instances in beta is part of the reason they roll through it on live.

I expect that if they're some of the same people who live over on the Elitist Jerks forums (the home of the best minds/number-crunchers for WoW) that they're also helping with development by exploring the upper boundaries of min-maxing in a way that it's hard for Blizzard to do in-house. So that probably helps with understanding how things get balanced at max level, who's overpowered, when talent changes don't make sense, etc....

But what matters to the bulk of the 11 million who play the game? If I had to guess, I guess it would be:

Easy UI
Fun quests
Artwork & Sound
Variety of things to do
Ability to do something fun in 30 minutes or less
...and much more.

The "l33t" min-maxing raiders don't contribute to any of this.

Anyway, they can play the game how they like (once upon a time I used to be a control-freak min-maxer in other games), and they can complain that there's nothing there for them. But it's very rich to suggest that the game is crap because they can "beat" it. I wonder if they realize how whiny they sounded when they wrote that.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by spleen1015

I didn't play until BC came out and I didn't step into Kara until 8 months after that, so I didn't experience vanilla raiding or BC raiding until after some patches. From what I have read though, raids at the release of BC were extremely hard and they had to be nerfed. If that is the case, then I think it contradicts what you say about BC simplifying content.

Did you ever fight Vashj or Kael? Simple my ass. How about Archimonde or Illidan? None of those encounters were simple.

Vashj and Kael were two encounters specifically made difficult to block guilds until BT was released. Once BT was released the encounters were nerfed to hell. The rest of those two instances? Fairly easy.

The archimonde fight was a joke. You needed 25 people that could time clicking 1 button correctly and play their classes with average skill.

I quit playing before we reached Illidan.

Do I need to post a full resume of my in-game accomplishments to validate my opinion further?

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by Atocep

I enjoyed the difficulty of MC at launch, BWL when it was first released, and Naxx the first time around.

TBC seemed to simplify content to an extent and from what I see in Lich King they've taken it a step further. It looks like they're focusing on other areas of the game. That's fine, its just not a game I enjoy playing at this stage of development.

Originally Posted by spleen1015

Did you ever fight Vashj or Kael? Simple my ass. How about Archimonde or Illidan? None of those encounters were simple.

I don't really raid, but I'm part of a guild with a hardcore component, so I can speak based on their assessments.

The view so far is that the LK "levelling" instances are just as hard as their counterparts were in TBC - i.e. not very. Utgarde Keep, for instance, isn't harder (relatively speaking, given the levels) to Hellfire Ramparts. In general, you'll see the true difficulty at Level 80 instances.

For this, a real problem with TBC was once you got to 70, the instances available there (Gruul, Mags, SSC, TK) were exceptionally hard at first, and had a lot of irrational/random barriers to progress/completion. Blizzard have worked hard for this to not be the case in LK.

I think the problem the "l33t" guys have is that they were still able to overcome the irrational/random barriers, generally by min-maxing to extreme extents (i.e. go visit 3 NPCs in the world to get random buffs before each boss), loading up on consumables, grinding up the very best gear and enchants, etc... and then running the instances for 16 hours a day until they beat them.

That's dumb.

Far more likely what we'll see in LK over the next few patches are endgame instances like SWP, which sure, needed good gear, but typically didn't need ridiculous other requirements outside of every member of the instance group being a good and knowledgeable player. What it means is that endgame content, which has grown more challenging, interesting and varied with each year, will be available to be beaten earlier by good players who nonetheless don't have to spend 16 hours a day in the game in order to attain it.

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Do I need to post a full resume of my in-game accomplishments to validate my opinion further?

Not at all. Your opinion is perfectly valid. Whether or not playing a game is fun for a particular individual is a completely subjective and personal assessment. I'm not calling you out here in my posts, just putting my viewpoint forward.

[spleen1015]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Vashj and Kael were two encounters specifically made difficult to block guilds until BT was released. Once BT was released the encounters were nerfed to hell. The rest of those two instances? Fairly easy.

The archimonde fight was a joke. You needed 25 people that could time clicking 1 button correctly and play their classes with average skill.

I quit playing before we reached Illidan.

Do I need to post a full resume of my in-game accomplishments to validate my opinion further?

I'm just trying to get an idea of how much you have played since I have no clue. I'm not looking to invalidate your opinion. I'm just trying to see what it is based on.

[law90026]

Originally Posted by Atocep

Vashj and Kael were two encounters specifically made difficult to block guilds until BT was released. Once BT was released the encounters were nerfed to hell. The rest of those two instances? Fairly easy.

The archimonde fight was a joke. You needed 25 people that could time clicking 1 button correctly and play their classes with average skill.

I quit playing before we reached Illidan.

Do I need to post a full resume of my in-game accomplishments to validate my opinion further?

MC was never ever difficult. It was long, it was boring but all the fights were essentially tank and spank. BWL was a good instance as was Naxx but again, BWL was never a terribly difficult instance. AQ40 wasn't too bad either though the trash was a disaster (something that Blizz will hopefully learn ... Kara trash was a pain too).

TBC raids were a lot more interesting though the 25-man dynamic changed things a lot (more min-maxing, less ability to carry weaker players). The key change I felt was the fact that other classes would end up tanking (think boomkin for Maulgar, locks for Illidan and Leo) and dps was actually important once more because of enrage timers.

Re 25Nov: they overhype their importance. Yes, I do follow their accomplishments because I used to raid hardcore and the top guilds were a benchmark we could gauge ourselves again. However, at the end of the day, most of the players in WoW will not know who they are or care what their accomplishments are.

If they leave the game, there isn't going to be a mass exodus of players because the "all-stars" are gone.

Could things be harder? Can't say for sure since I'm not in Naxx yet but having an easier tier of entry-level raids can only be a good thing. There were people who were stoked to see the TBC content just before the expansion when everything was nerfed to hell and that kept them going and playing while waiting for WotLK. That's what Blizz is doing right, by catering to the masses rather than the top 0.1% of the game.

[Schmidty]

I don't understand the arguments.

If you like the fucking game, play it.

If you don't, then don't play.

I still love the game, and am very happy so far with WotLK. My wife and I have met lifelong friends through WoW, and quite a few we've met in person, so even if the game isn't always perfect, we more than get our money's worth. Oh, and raiding isn't easy when it's a new place, and unless you are one of the giant, bloated raid guilds, there's always a new challenge.

[EagleFan]

Originally Posted by Schmidty

I don't understand the arguments.

If you like the fucking game, play it.

If you don't, then don't play.

I still love the game, and am very happy so far with WotLK. My wife and I have met lifelong friends through WoW, and quite a few we've met in person, so even if the game isn't always perfect, we more than get our money's worth. Oh, and raiding isn't easy when it's a new place, and unless you are one of the giant, bloated raid guilds, there's always a new challenge.

I agree completely.

The arguements in here about it remind me of some of the crap you see in the trade chat where is seems to be "in" to bitch and moan because you are l33t and the game isn't. Then don't play the damn game, problem solved.

[Atocep]

Originally Posted by Schmidty

I don't understand the arguments.

If you like the fucking game, play it.

If you don't, then don't play.

I still love the game, and am very happy so far with WotLK. My wife and I have met lifelong friends through WoW, and quite a few we've met in person, so even if the game isn't always perfect, we more than get our money's worth. Oh, and raiding isn't easy when it's a new place, and unless you are one of the giant, bloated raid guilds, there's always a new challenge.

I believe I said I felt the game was still good, its just moved in a direction that isn't for me. I stated my reason why, was questioned on it, and answered.

But of course a forum that discusses different games at length must not be the place to actually discuss a game I guess? If you don't understand the DISCUSSION, then stay out of it and maybe read the entirety of what I said next time.

The game isn't for everyone, some enjoy it a great deal and some don't. Don't act like someone that doesn't like the game can't express their opinion just because its different than yours.

[Schmidty]

Originally Posted by Atocep

I believe I said I felt the game was still good, its just moved in a direction that isn't for me. I stated my reason why, was questioned on it, and answered.

But of course a forum that discusses different games at length must not be the place to actually discuss a game I guess? If you don't understand the DISCUSSION, then stay out of it and maybe read the entirety of what I said next time.

The game isn't for everyone, some enjoy it a great deal and some don't. Don't act like someone that doesn't like the game can't express their opinion just because its different than yours.

It's not so much that people aren't allowed to discuss games, it's just irritating hearing the same tired arguments against the game over and over and over. It's been the cool thing to do for 2-3 years now. I'm not saying you are one of those people, it's just that the same complaints wear thin after a while. I'll never understand the people that take the time to laboriously criticize a game that they don't enjoy playing.

(Again, this has nothing to do with you, just the perpetual antites out there.)

[Bearcat729]

I enjoy it so far, I have my druid to 74

[RomaGoth]

Well, I have been one of those people who plays every night. I have three level 70's. I also have a level 61 Death Knight, and love playing him. Unfortunately, I have decided it is time to come back to real life. I started playing WoW right after TBC came out, so never saw many of the end game raids and instances in vanilla WoW. I finally raided Kara a few times right before Lich King came out. Also ran some heroics, but never progressed further than that.

There is a lot to do in this game. Professions, leveling, PvP, raids. I did a little bit of the content in Howling Fjord and the scenery was really nice. I just can't stomach another grind of ten levels, especially for multiple characters. I was never a hardcore player, yet I played every day. Because of my real life, I cannot commit to huge raids and long runs, in case of interruptions by my wife or kids.

A game like WoW is ultimately aimed at an audience who has very little real life issues to consider. Can you play it casually? Of course. But it gets more and more difficult to play "casual" when everyone around you is geared to the teeth, and you are still in quest greens. If you don't raid much, like me, you run out of things to do in the endgame. I have decided to stop playing for this very reason. Why level to 80? Yes, the scenery is nice and the storylines can be compelling. But I will never see the majority of the content in end-game. This makes me feel as if I wasted a lot of time getting to that point. Did I waste my money on the game? Not at all. Did I waste the time leveling? Not really. But I cannot allow WoW to suck up any more of my life at this point. It is too difficult to play this game casually, at least for me, without wanting more out of it.

Sorry for the wall of text, but I have been struggling with this problem for a long time now. Maybe less WoW means more FOFC?

[mauchow]

$25 on Amazon....

[Bad-example]

Originally Posted by mauboy1

$25 on Amazon....

Beats every local price I have seen to date. Thanks for the heads up.

[Surtt]

Originally Posted by mauboy1

$25 on Amazon....

I saw that and ordered a copy.
I haven't played in a couple of years now and am not sure I want to start up again.
But I couldn't resist the price.

[Tyrith]

Originally Posted by Surtt

I saw that and ordered a copy.
I haven't played in a couple of years now and am not sure I want to start up again.
But I couldn't resist the price.

That's how it starts...then soon you forget what the sky looks like...

[Lathum]

Originally Posted by Tyrith

That's how it starts...then soon you forget what the sky looks like...

I am currently there

[flere-imsaho]

Originally Posted by Tyrith

That's how it starts...then soon you forget what the sky looks like...

Depends... are we in Outland or Azeroth?

[Khorium]

Sorry for the thread rez... was just wondering if anyone here still plays?

Saw another thread about a FOFC guild, but it looks like that's pretty dead.

[sabotai]

I do, but not much. My main is a lvl 74 Druid. I'm very slowly leveling him, but I also have a bunch of alts I like to play. I like messing around with tradeskills and such, so I play my alts some, farm for materials (and level in the process), send materials to all the other alts that need them, etc.

Very much just a casual gamer with regards to WoW right now.

[Rizon]

I've been running through a lot of heroic dungeons with my 80 warlock, doing dailies, etc. And I also have a 73 priest I'm working up too.

[Bad-example]

79 rogue main, mostly just screw around on achievements and daily cooking quests. I bust out the 70 druid occasionally but have completely forgotten how to play my 70 paladin.

[Bearcat729]

I still play. I have a 80 druid now and my hunter just hit 80 a couple weeks ago.

[spleen1015]

I play every day, raiding for 3 hours M, W, TH, and F.

Greatest game ever.

[dubb93]

Originally Posted by spleen1015

raiding for 3 hours M, W, TH, and F.

Greatest game ever.

Really? How? We clear 25 naxx in 3 hours and then down malygos and sarth with everything up in like 2 hours the next day. I guess if you are doing the 10 man raids this could be the case, but meh, whats the point right now.

[SnowMan]

Yea, pretty bored with current content as well. Hopefully they'll push 3.1 quick, as they plan.

[spleen1015]

Originally Posted by dubb93

Really? How? We clear 25 naxx in 3 hours and then down malygos and sarth with everything up in like 2 hours the next day. I guess if you are doing the 10 man raids this could be the case, but meh, whats the point right now.

Well, last week we didn't raid on Monday because we cleared everything. That will be the case this week as well.

I guess we're progressing slower than you are. We have 4 Horsemen, Sapph and KT left in Naxx this week after starting it last night. Last night was our first Patchwerk under 3 minutes kill.

We started 25 man content later than most I think. Our first 25 man raid was on 12/10, almost a month after the expansion came out. There were many folks in my guild who took their sweet ass time leveling to 80.

[spleen1015]

Dola, this week was also our first week trying Sarth in 3D.

[Khorium]

Originally Posted by spleen1015

Dola, this week was also our first week trying Sarth in 3D.

So, how'd it go?


My guild only does 10-mans, and even Sarth 1D kicks our tails.

[Lathum]

so the new patch today undid everyones talent tree. Hope you remember your build.