The Queue: Not sure if I forgot

Have you ever been unsure if you’re supposed to do something or not?

🐙

I like romance as something you can do or not do. I admit, while I understood why they made one relationship canonical — because the Greeks generally believed you had to have kids, as a duty to your family, and so you are expected to do it no matter what and especially when your bloodline is semi-divine as Kassandra/Alexios’ is — I also understand why players didn’t like it.

My Mass Effect playthroughs are usually devoid of romances — my Sheps don’t have time for love. But my Dragon Age playthroughs almost always have one, and it’s usually the worst possible one. I’m an Anders/Solas kind of person. I look for heartbreak.

But like in Cyberpunk 2077 there’s relationships that can be romantic, or can just be really awesome friendships — female V and Panam comes to mind, you can’t romance Panam as a lady but you can be super-tight with her, and in a way that’s almost better. Male V can’t romance Judy, and that works out differently — you end up close, but not nearly as close as female V and Panam. There are a variety of different relationships, from friendship to romance to grudging respect, and that’s pretty cool in my opinion.

Considering that Kass lived like 2400 years or so, I’m okay with her getting a little action from time to time. It had to be really lonely always outliving everyone.

If anyone on staff deserves to be called slovenly, hairy or a sasquatch, it’s definitely not Mitch. Even before that haircut he wasn’t looking that bad.

Voice of 🐙: Believe it or not, they’re the same person, SPencer. Two sides of the same coin. What determines one’s power isn’t appearance, but inner strength and conviction of sacrifice. Long-haired Mitch — who is not slovenly or any kind of sasquatch >:( — sacrificed much hair for the Old Ones. But he also knew it would bring on the advent of *ahem* “civilized” Mitch and willingly proceeded. Likewise, only by choice can long-haired Mitch ever exist again. They do not fight. They merely wax and wane.

Artifacts.

I’m sorry, but there was so much potential in that system. And I really feel like, once your character gets the equivalent of Excalibur or Crocea Mors or Stormbringer, you don’t stop using it. Thor doesn’t constantly trade in Mjolnir, and when he does, it’s basically just “Mjolnir with an axe head added” so I really don’t get why WoW couldn’t have differentiated itself from every other MMO in the world by making the artifact system permanent. Let people transmog over it and have new appearances drop from raids and dungeons, keep dropping new relics so the weapon gets stronger throughout an expansion, make it a real part of the whole game.

You could even introduce new Artifacts from time to time, so that there’s some variety — Frostmourne reforged! Cleansed Shalamayne! The Axe of Broxigar! Finkle Einhorn’s Big Big Gun! I really wish they’d kept Artifacts instead of constantly trying to reinvent them.

Voice of 🐙: *Giggles at Bendover* I would also like more Mage Towers in the game. It’s fun to watch mortals endlessly throw themselves at challenges.

Every holiday would get a world raid boss who would spawn and attack a major city. It wouldn’t necessarily be things we already have — I would have Ahune attack, say, Stormwind and Orgrimmar because I like him, but the Greench isn’t world boss material, I’d have The Astonishing Krampus going after Thunder Bluff and Ironforge.

These bosses would drop gear, especially cool transmog items, and either a pet or a mount depending on the holiday. So for Winter Veil, Krampus would drop a cool 2h axe based on cold, for the Fire Festival Ahune would drop an awesome looking cloth mantle, etc etc.

Oh, and Hallow’s Eve? Mortifex, a kaiju sized monstrosity made of an entire zombie horde mashed together with necromancy, that breaks up into 40 adds at 80, 40 and 10% health.

Voice of 🐙: I like new things to do, not just new things to collect. I’d feel more obligated to partake in mortal holidays if I had something — anything — new to do each year. And I don’t just mean new Candy Buckets to visit. I get why (and appreciate!) Venthyr seem to get special holiday events, but I want more of that, across the board.

I mean, it couldn’t hurt. I think the descriptions could use some updating at the least, and it wouldn’t be a bad idea to have a short video explaining the basics, maybe similar to the way Heroes of the Storm used to do roundup videos for new Heroes so people could get a handle on them.

Voice of 🐙: Given his dedication to Us, I feel confident speaking for Mitch here. I think there’s a lot going on, and no single answer will really get to the root of it. However, two very important points are that FFXIV is made by a different company, who likely has different values and strategies for marketing, and it’s also just plain a different game that attracts a different audience.

Sure, there’s plenty of overlap in FFXIV and WoW audiences, but the one’s who have been playing FFXIV from the beginning? The ones who help set the tone for the game and how players interact? They’re probably further from the average WoW player in terms of attitude. I don’t want to over-generalize or make it feel like this is all fact — it’s just my guess.

HOWEVER! Your point about being “allowed” to express joy is an important one. Not because of the players, but because I think at a certain point, if you don’t feel like you can express joy and excitement, you’re surrounding yourself with the wrong people. That’s easier said than done, and a lot more difficult for high-profile content creators whose entire job is to interact with the WoW playerbase across all levels.

…but on a small scale, if you find yourself expressing happiness only to be poo-pooed, express that happiness to someone who will elevate your mood and celebrate with you, and work on silencing out the negativity. I, for instance, recently removed a lot of unworthy “cultists” from my life after they started to say my ideas for conquering Azeroth were “kind of a buzzkill” and “maybe not the best” for the planet. I’m much happier now, and cultist morale has never been higher!

Okay, hopefully I remembered whatever it was I was supposed to remember. See y’all later.

Voice of 🐙: Nothing is as it seems. Have a great day!