The Queue: The one where I meant to go to bed early

In yesterday’s Queue I asked for questions early in the day so I could write the Queue early and get to bed, because by the time you read this I will be on an airplane to New York to spend time with family. And you gave me some excellent Gnome-themed questions — with my sincere apologies to the ones I have not bothered to answer —which were very helpful.

And yet somehow I’m still writing the Queue after midnight and my alarm is going off at 5am.

So, not that I want to rush this or anything, but let’s get to the questions.

For the most part there’s no reason to bother with past expansion professions, however, there are a few things that may be of interest, most importantly the fact that some things from past expansions are still really useful. For example, Goblin Gliders are from Warlords of Draenor Engineering. Tome of the Tranquil Mind is from Legion Inscription. Both of these are still the best versions of these things, and if you want to make them yourself, you need a crafter with that level skill. (As an added bonus, you could sell them on the auction house. Tomes go for about 400g each on my realm, so heck yeah do I have a Legion-level scribe to make them myself.)

Other than that, there’s transmog and toys. Most professions have at least some little interesting thing they can make — like Engineer’s Mechanical Pandaren Dragonling — though your interest level will vary. (And considering the hassle of leveling and gathering the mats, you may find you just don’t care that much.)

Gnomes have been here since the beginning, but have had so little story. Already Void Elves and Lightforged have about as much in the way of in-game story as Gnomes, and they’ve been around for like a week. (I checked the calendar. It’s absolutely been a week.)

So, first off, I’m glad that we’re seeing a somewhat more diverse selection of races in the main storyline. (At least on the Alliance side — I’ve only barely started a Horde playthrough.) For a very long time World of Warcraft has been all Orcs and Humans and Elves and maybe occasionally an Undead or a Dwarf can show up. Maybe.

But now we have that tiniest bit more. Mekkatorque and Gallywix have a confrontation in the next raid, and it will be interesting to see the petite races (briefly) take center stage. And the spoilers surrounding the encounter suggest a continuing story for Mekkatorque (maybe). More stories and more diverse stories are good because they’re interesting. They aren’t the same Orcs vs. Humans story we’ve had (with brief interruptions) for the past twenty-four years. While today’s stories are still very human-centric, I hope the story will keep branching out.

This is a difficult question precisely because I have played almost every class in the game to some extent or another. I only have a single 120 right now, but other than my Monk, I’ve played Paladin, Priest, Rogue, Death Knight, Shaman, Mage, and Warlock at max level at some point or another. I’ve never played a Hunter or Druid to max level, though I have a Druid alt in the 100s that I may race change to a Kul Tiran and get in on that wickerpunk thing. I’ve tried Demon Hunters but don’t care for them.

If you’re doing the math, though, you’ll realize there’s one class I haven’t mentioned.

Yep. Warrior. I have never played a Warrior beyond level 20 or so, and I really can’t say why. For some reason the class has never sounded particularly interesting to me. The whole class fantasy is hitting things with big swords, or letting things hit you with big swords. If I want to hit things with big swords I have my Death Knight, who can also draw power from blood, ice, and undeath (how cool is that?!). If I want to hit things in general, I have my Rogue, who can stealth and poison. Then there’s my Monk, Shaman, Druid, and Paladin… all of whom can hit things but can also heal, which is what I usually do them.

So, back to the point. There are no Warriors in my collection of characters, so that would really be it if I were to do something new and different. But the problem is… there is so much on my to-do list that when am I going to get around to playing a Warrior?

As to classes my colleagues should play… I’m going to leave that one to you guys, because I’m just not sure.

This is really simple but it took me a ridiculously long time to figure it out (during which time I was very upset, because I like my artifact). At the transmog vendor, click on your weapon and then go to the drop-down in the upper right and select “Legion Artifacts” where you would choose weapon types. You’ll see the Artifact for your current spec and you can transmog any type of weapon into it.

Victory! Victory over weapon transmog restrictions!

I think it’s possible that Chromie could become cross with certain Gnomish factions who were curious about time travel. And when I say “curious” I definitely mean “building crazy time travel gadgets that are messing up the timeways.” They would probably do this innocently. wanting to learn, but that isn’t to say it couldn’t deal damage. Or possibly explode. It’s the cost of innovation, y’know?

This is the sort of thing the Bronze Dragonflight would want to stop, and Chromie may well be sent to make sure it does stop.

Except, really, the actual conversation is just Chromie explaining time travel physics to a room full of Gnomish engineers (including Geblin, of course) who are all frantically taking notes and nerding out. Chromie really only means it as a warning of what not to do, but they keep asking questions and soon enough it’s a proper lecture.

They part on good terms, and then the Gnomes go back to their workshops with all of this new information and make new time travel devices that don’t ruin things in quite the same way as the previous versions, and then they have to have this talk with Chromie again.

Repeat.

And ta ta for now, my friends. Someone (I am not presently sure who) will be here to answer your questions tomorrow, and I will see you again next week. Until then, good night and good luck.

Yes, yes, it’s probably not night when you’re reading this. Just work with me, will ya?