The Queue: And you need a jacket

I was really good about writing The Queue early last week. This week, not so much. I mean, I’ve been later… but I’m definitely more tired than I’d like to be right now.

So, hey, why not just go ahead and Queue?

So in their original blog, Blizzard defines “commodities” as any item that can stack (which is a lot of what you’ll be regularly buying on the Auction House). I’m assuming that’s how they choose what can or cannot have a bid option.

I did a quick test and a piece of armor was something I could disable Buyout Mode for, but some cloth didn’t have that same option — it was Buyout only. Given the way the new system works (allowing you to purchase as many of whatever stackable item you want in one single buy), I’m betting actual bidding on stackable items just wouldn’t work… or it would be a lot more of a nightmare to implement.

Instead of picking, can I just get a bit of both of them and get Lorewalker Stormstout, the drunken Pandaren who tries to explain things to me while downing a ton of beer and losing his train of thought partway through? Basically, I want a drunk panda to tell me stories in Winnie the Pooh’s voice. I don’t think that’s too much to ask for.

Okay, at first, I wasn’t feeling any of those new models. But as I kept going, I started seeing a lot more I liked. If I had to pick just one? I think I’d have to go with the white Tauralus.

Gorms, Moths, and the Shadow Beast all caught my attention quite a bit as well, but I love the “pallid death” look the Tauralus has.

So — shocker — I’ve thought about this a lot before.

I’m a little conflicted because I REALLY love Drustvar but I’m also a die-hard Forsaken/non-Alliance and that’s primarily an Alliance zone. But good Yogg, is it completely and utterly my entire aesthetic! So I’d probably still want my NPC to hang out there, even if it’s Alliance-controlled.

I’d want to be hanging out in one of those locations that doesn’t really serve a purpose and that you have to go out of the way to get — something like the islands south of Tanaris, the painters above Coldarra, or that one cave south of Silithus.

My NPC would have a bunch of weird/creepy stuff for the keen-eyed, and talking to him would give you different options. I’d ask if you wanted to learn about the good word of Yogg, if you wanted to hear my thoughts on Sylvanas, or if you just wanted a joke. And I’d have a lot of jokes to tell. Oh, and I might have, like, a Holy Priest’s arm or something sticking out from a grave in my yard, just so people know I won’t tolerate that sort of nonsense on my property.

I’ll admit, I included this because I thought you were asking a question and it wasn’t until just now (going to write my answer) that I see that wasn’t the case. Oh well, I’m committed now, so I’ll just pretend you asked me what random musings I’d be most likely to include. Okay?

Okay.

I’d probably include “One comment thread took up half The Queue,” “SPencer Morgan said something weird (but good-weird),” “Mitch made an innuendo,” “Jovan quipped,” “SPencer Morgan said something weird (like, weird-weird),” or as a super bonus one, “a non-regular asked a comment.”

I’m not suuuuper far into Bastion yet, but so far, no. I don’t want to spoil anything too much, but things feel somewhat “The oblivious Good Place council” so far.

Again, though, I’m not really far into the questing experience.

Well, as I said above, I haven’t done a toooon of testing yet, but Shadow feels… about the same, I guess? The biggest adjustment for me is always feeling so much slower due to loss of max-level Haste coefficients, but that’s less about Shadow and more about a new expansion.

Right now, the thing I notice most is that Shadow Word: Death feels like it could use some work. It does moderate damage but nothing amazing, and “you don’t take backlash damage” feels like a real “meh” side effect of getting a killing blow with it when it doesn’t have that thing where it does like 4x more damage below 25%. Sims might say otherwise, but I would love to see it modified slightly so it felt more like an Execute spell and less like a slightly punishing, not-too-strong instant cast.

I’ll admit, I kind of was hoping for a bigger shakeup going into Shadowlands. I know major changes don’t always feel great, and small tweaks in their place mean Blizzard is happier overall with how the class plays but… I dunno, I kind of miss seeing an entirely different set of talents or spells when alpha/beta builds first go up. I’d be okay if Blizz went back and redesigned a lot of our talents right now.

That’s all for today! I hope your Thursday goes by quickly and you all have a subsequently amazing weekend! I’ll see you all next week :)