The Clue: J’aqueues
Look, I may be stretching the Queue puns to their limit here, but I’m pretty proud of that one (or I guess, those two). What will tomorrow’s title hold? Will Liz cap off the week with another pun?
I don’t have any of those answer. But I do have… A [Queue Variant].
I like the ‘NEW’ ‘Q’ branding. TY for including my question in today’s ‘Q.’
So here’s a new one.
Q4tQ: 9.1.5 seems to be aimed at fixing every concern of the community. If they succeed then where from there? I would like to see more work done on the leveling experience for levels 10 to 50 and less focus on systems as game content in end game play. As a super wish I’d like player housing that’s along the lines of the MoP farm.
Where next? Hoo boy, there are so many places the WoW team could go next for QOL changes. If it still doesn’t manage to make it into the 9.1.5 notes, please, for the love of Yogg, expand the quest log limit. Give us checkboxes so we can mass-abandon quests. Make it so that dropping one quest to make room for a new one actually makes room for the new one. Please, Blizz, make the quest log experience better.
On top of that, player housing (as you mentioned), guild housing, a way to level all classes on one character a la FFXIV, fewer factional barriers to gameplay, gear dying, fewer transmog restrictions, an in-game “mouseover and click F6 to report bug” feature like we get in beta tests… so much more.
And some of those aren’t even pie-in-the-sky wants! 9.1.5 is great, and the game has plenty of good things about it… but there’s still a lot Blizz could do with WoW to bring goodwill within the community.
Q4tQ: Do you think Blizz is going to remember that Shadow Priests exist this time when attempting to tune the “Thwarting the Twins” encounter in the Mage Tower? It sucked that they designed an entire phase around the assumption we had an interrupt with a 24 second cooldown, but was extremely fun being able to pop Surrender to Madness and force the boss to jump right into the final phase in a race against the clock before Madness killed us.
Follow up Q: How many classes do you see yourself earning the transmog reward on from this new Mage Tower?
Goodness, don’t get me started on that. I sure hope Blizz tunes each encounter a bit more closely to the specs that will be playing them. The Shadow one always felt designed around Boomkin or Frost Mages, with Shadow as a retrofit. I’m not getting my hopes up, but I do have some hope.
As far as how many classes I’ll do it on, Priest for sure, and maybe my Rogue and Warlock. But I’ve been super behind alt leveling in Shadowlands, so very likely this will just be a Priest thing for the foreseeable future.
Q4tQ: Are they including the Mage Tower artifact skins in the revised Mage Tower challenge?
Nope! And I’m perfectly okay with that.
Q4tQ: if you’d never played WoW, what do you think you would have done with all that gaming time?
I’d like to think I would have played a lot more games, and a larger variety of them. As much as I liked playing WoW, playing it for so long sort of made it the game I compared everything to, and I got way too used to having one UI and one control system that made everything else seem strange and awkward. Always having WoW to go back to might have kept me from getting into a lot of the other games that I tried to play and didn’t stick with.
It’s also possible I could have kept playing City of Heroes or fallen into another MMO, so who knows.
There’s no real way for me to answer that. I know you specified “gaming time” but I started playing WoW in 7th grade, and here I am almost 30 still playing it. Asking me what I would’ve done in that time is like asking me what life would’ve been like if I’d grown up somewhere else or gone to a different college. My knowledge of WoW literally got me my first out-of-college job (yes, this one here).
What I will say is that I’ve thought about this a lot, and there are some smaller things I can pinpoint as “more likely.” For instance, I probably wouldn’t spent more money over time, since WoW was $15 per month and basically the only thing I played for a long time, whereas most console games were $50-60 — and without WoW, I definitely would’ve been buying more than one game every 3-4 months.
I also wouldn’t have the friends, the personality, or the experiences (including traveling to California multiple times) without WoW. It’s a weird thought, and from the outside it might be hard to understand or empathize with one video game having such large ripples throughout my life… but hey, that’s the reality of it, and I like that reality.
Q4tQ Can you learn cosmetic weapons on classes that can’t use the weapon type?
Nope. Cosmetics are labeled as such, but they’re still given a slot designation. For instance, your coveted Replica Haggis of Aggramar is still technically a shield. Can’t use shields? Can’t use the ‘mog.
That’s not necessarily something I think needs to be changed, BUT… I would love it if cosmetic items dropped for anyone, regardless of class. Even if my Priest can’t use some of the super cool Antorus weapons, I’d love if he could farm them for my other characters. But solo, they’re not even part of my Priest’s loot table :(
Q4tQ: At some point do you think we’ll see Allied races based on the Shadowlands Covenants? If so do you think it would be a positive? I could see a plus being that they would be available to both factions.
I don’t think we will, purely because Allied Races felt like a (largely) BFA thing, and Blizz has indicated before that they’re taking a break on Allied Races. Not to mention, Blizz has never felt like the type to just add a new race — they seem to like to give them at least some intro or backstory. It makes sense, but I think they’re over-estimating the importance of just letting people pick a race and play the game.
That said, we’re seeing more and more community-requested changes, so maybe. I think it also depends on where 10.0 takes us, since there are a whole lot of logical questions of bringing back someone from the Shadowlands who may or may not have once also existed as a different person on a different world.
Q4tQ: How do I gear my alt, preferably without doing any actual game content?
xD
Nah, I’m just a tad tired of current content, but I do like my priesty alt. Guess I’ll do the world bosses and run her through lfr, I can manage that without breaking out in hives. Any other lazy-cat suggestions?
The lazy answer is to just do the Mission Table (or whatever it’s called) on your phone. Alternatively, do what I do and wait until 9.2 introduces BOA items to easily gear alts >.>
I will also say, it’s definitely not everyone’s cup of tea, but battlegrounds (especially the larger and/or holiday ones) are a stupidly easy way to gear. Grab a bottle of your favorite beverage, put on some Netflix, and see how many enemies you can kill before they kill you. It’s frustrating for some, but if you’re able to get into the right mindset, I promise it can be mindless gearing and a very different play experience than you may be used to. (Not necessarily Sibylle “you” but anyone-reading-this “you.”)
My wife scored a free year of Hulu+, any show recommendations?
Devs! It’s an easy binge, but I absolutely love Alex Garland and Rob Hardy’s directorial style/cinematography. They’re the pair behind one of my favorite films, Annihilation, and that style comes through in Devs a lot.
(I know you got a lot of other solid recommendations, but I had to make a point of mentions Devs. I liked it a whole lot.)
That’s our [Queue Variant] for today! Please leave lots of questions for tomorrow’s writer, and pray to the Old Gods for a full run of puns.
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