Free access weekend 21st-24th March

[Catriona R]

For anyone unsubbed who wants to have a look:

https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Can't say I disagree with the comments on MMO-C suggesting sub numbers
may be a little low, but neither am I complaining, had been just
thinking I miss my druid (my 2nd account is unsubbed at present), so
cool, I'll get to play him for a few days and look around my other
alts on that account.

Might have a go at Balance of Power if my bf is up for it (he's
unsubbed too), we duoed Nighthold a while back so should be able to do
the whole chain; I'd have got to it sooner but my druid is the one I
most want to do it on, those forms are great!

[Lewis]

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/
Can't say I disagree with the comments on MMO-C suggesting sub numbers
may be a little low, but neither am I complaining, had been just
thinking I miss my druid (my 2nd account is unsubbed at present), so
cool, I'll get to play him for a few days and look around my other
alts on that account.
Might have a go at Balance of Power if my bf is up for it (he's
unsubbed too), we duoed Nighthold a while back so should be able to do
the whole chain; I'd have got to it sooner but my druid is the one I
most want to do it on, those forms are great!

I'm about to let my sub lapse for awhile. I have finished the current
content (ilvl 392, unlocked KT race, and caught up on war campaign). I
have no interest in playing any alts until I unlock flying, nor do I
want to bother trying to get them to grind on the AP hamster wheel, so
this seems like a good time to take a break for a few months.

I will probably wait until the next step in Flying is unlocked and the
first of the AP catchup mechanisms gets implemented before I resub.

Oh, and I ran into one of your favorite players types in Wintergrasp.
One guy who just kept screaming and yelling in /i. I noticed after a
while that only 3 of the 40 players were participating in /i, so I
posted "You know, it's people like you that cause people to not even
read /i in groups. You're basically yelling at yourself."

He was quiet for about 2 minutes, then started yelling again, so I just
switched tabs so I stopped seeing him.

I mean, I assume it was a he in the same way i assume he's a Trump
supporter, a lousy short-term boyfriend, and has no friends.

Anyway, I did think, "Oh, Cat would HAAAAAAAATE this." 🤣

[Catriona R]

On Tue, 19 Mar 2019 00:31:42 -0000 (UTC), Lewis

Post by Lewis

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/
Can't say I disagree with the comments on MMO-C suggesting sub numbers
may be a little low, but neither am I complaining, had been just
thinking I miss my druid (my 2nd account is unsubbed at present), so
cool, I'll get to play him for a few days and look around my other
alts on that account.
Might have a go at Balance of Power if my bf is up for it (he's
unsubbed too), we duoed Nighthold a while back so should be able to do
the whole chain; I'd have got to it sooner but my druid is the one I
most want to do it on, those forms are great!

I'm about to let my sub lapse for awhile. I have finished the current
content (ilvl 392, unlocked KT race, and caught up on war campaign). I
have no interest in playing any alts until I unlock flying, nor do I
want to bother trying to get them to grind on the AP hamster wheel, so
this seems like a good time to take a break for a few months.
I will probably wait until the next step in Flying is unlocked and the
first of the AP catchup mechanisms gets implemented before I resub.

Sounds a good plan, I'm paying my sub with gold now (made loads of it
at BFA launch while my RL income got lower so as gold token prices are
way down on their high point last year it makes sense), so I'm staying
subbed but my activity level fluctuates depending on my mood. I
finally finished the 8.1 war campaign on Tuesday so I could unlock my
Zandalari troll... haven't even started 8.1.5 as it's gated behind
Dazar'alor LFR (makes sense for story after Talanji becomes queen to
require you seeing the death of her father, to be fair!). Most of what
I do atm is emissaries and old raids for collecting stuff.

Post by Lewis
Oh, and I ran into one of your favorite players types in Wintergrasp.
One guy who just kept screaming and yelling in /i. I noticed after a
while that only 3 of the 40 players were participating in /i, so I
posted "You know, it's people like you that cause people to not even
read /i in groups. You're basically yelling at yourself."
He was quiet for about 2 minutes, then started yelling again, so I just
switched tabs so I stopped seeing him.
I mean, I assume it was a he in the same way i assume he's a Trump
supporter, a lousy short-term boyfriend, and has no friends.
Anyway, I did think, "Oh, Cat would HAAAAAAAATE this." ?

Haha tbh I don't hate that so much as just roll my eyes, there's so
many shouty types like that in pvp I often wonder why I even have chat
turned on when I try it (which is very rarely so I guess I usually
forget to turn it off). Doesn't do much to convince me that the
average pvper isn't a 12-year-old with anger problems, that's for
sure!

[Peter T.]

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Time to reorganize my three one-man guilds! =)

Post by Catriona R
Can't say I disagree with the comments on MMO-C suggesting sub numbers
may be a little low, but neither am I complaining, had been just
thinking I miss my druid (my 2nd account is unsubbed at present), so
cool, I'll get to play him for a few days and look around my other
alts on that account.
Might have a go at Balance of Power if my bf is up for it (he's
unsubbed too), we duoed Nighthold a while back so should be able to do
the whole chain; I'd have got to it sooner but my druid is the one I
most want to do it on, those forms are great!

I spent my boost on a 67 hunter and he hit 120 a few hours ago.
Finally. I hadn't touched him for 2-3 years, and I couldn't bear the
tedious leveling to 120 anyway.
My plan is to level my shaman and spriest 110->120 the next 2-3 weeks -
6 chars at max level so I'm ready for 8.2. I have a feeling there will
be some huge changes besides those Blizzard has already mentioned. But
the player pool is declining.

[Urbin]

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Thanks. I might take the chance to log in on my characters to see who is
around in my guild and I might solo a little to get a feel for the new
content. I doubt I'll play all that much, though. I've been away so long, I
doubt I'll be able to function effectively ;-)

Cheers
Urbin

[Catriona R]

Post by Urbin

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Thanks. I might take the chance to log in on my characters to see who is
around in my guild and I might solo a little to get a feel for the new
content. I doubt I'll play all that much, though. I've been away so long, I
doubt I'll be able to function effectively ;-)

I bet, can still be fun to take a look around though :-) I'm only
particularly useful with one class these days, have had a go on a
couple of alts in the last week and eek, no idea what half my
abilities do any more... or more like, *don't* do now that they did do
in Legion :-P

[Urs Beeli]

Post by Catriona R

Post by Urbin

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Thanks. I might take the chance to log in on my characters to see who is
around in my guild and I might solo a little to get a feel for the new
content. I doubt I'll play all that much, though. I've been away so long, I
doubt I'll be able to function effectively ;-)

I bet, can still be fun to take a look around though :-) I'm only
particularly useful with one class these days, have had a go on a
couple of alts in the last week and eek, no idea what half my
abilities do any more... or more like, *don't* do now that they did do
in Legion :-P

Well, seeing the free access started last night already, I gave it a go.
Decided to try out a demon hunter first and played that through until after
getting into stormwind keep and on to dalaran. I can't say that I managed to
follow all of the story (I know some of the Illidan/Maive story from the
books but that's been years ago and I never raided black temple). Much like
the DK starting zone I just followed the script. It was ok, but I couldn't
say if there is a big difference between any of the other melee damage
dealers (didn't try tanking spec).

Today I then created a "trial account" which gave me a level 110 hunter,
that I took through the introductionary story. Again, some lore gaps (when
did they de-crystalize Magni? I even went to old IF to check but he is no
longer down there :-) Why is Jaina's mum so pissed off with her daughter? I
never quite managed to understand that. Silithus seems to have gotten a even
less inviting, as if not enough of the old zones had been destroyed in the
Cataclysm :-)

Storywise, I didn't quite grasp how that introductionary story matches the
rest of the lore. From what I gleamed, the big battle was in Lordaeron. If
my memory serves right, isn't that where Undercity was in classic and most
of the expansions? So how come that city is back intact and worth fighting
over? When did the tentatice truce between alliance and horde turn into all
out war? I guess having been away from the game for years left me a bit in
the dark :-)

The introductionary story was ok (but left lots of gaps) and while I can see
how this whole new "chapter mechanisms" interwoven with the cut scenes helps
to tell a story, it takes away much of the open world feeling of vanilla wow
I loved so much. Once I arrived in Kul Tiras and managed to free myself from
the dungeon I was very much looking forward to having a go at some of those
quests I had just picked up that sounded like they were a bit less scripted,
but right after talking to the Harbour Master I got a pop up saying "Your
character is locked and will be logged out in 10 minutes. Buy the expansion
to continue playing". Not quite how I imagined the "free weekend" :-)

So I logged back to my main who is stuck somewhere in post BC Nagrand (I
think it was somewhere in SMV, though I am not sure). All talents gone, all
spells gone, empty action bar, two dozen quests in the quest log, an
interface that was cluttered with dozens of pieces of information. I tried
re-picking my talents for a minute but just reading the description of the
first tier left me clueless, as it referenced spells that I either no longer
recognise or that only came into the game since I left, so I had absolutely
no clue which one to pick, so I logged out without even playing a minute on
him.

So now it's friday night with two more "free" days but I reckon I've seen
enough to know that this game is definitely over for me. May I need to start
back on a vanilla server just for old times sake, other than that, I think
it's changed to much for me to still enjoy.

One cool thing though: Taking my demon hunter through the initial quests
left her with about 1100 gold (I guess this is so they can buy a flying
mount when they're done). Instead I mailed that to my main, basically
doubling his funds. I clearly left before the great inflation hit :-)

Cheers
Urbin

[Catriona R]

Post by Urs Beeli
Well, seeing the free access started last night already, I gave it a go.
Decided to try out a demon hunter first and played that through until after
getting into stormwind keep and on to dalaran. I can't say that I managed to
follow all of the story (I know some of the Illidan/Maive story from the
books but that's been years ago and I never raided black temple). Much like
the DK starting zone I just followed the script. It was ok, but I couldn't
say if there is a big difference between any of the other melee damage
dealers (didn't try tanking spec).
Today I then created a "trial account" which gave me a level 110 hunter,
that I took through the introductionary story. Again, some lore gaps (when
did they de-crystalize Magni? I even went to old IF to check but he is no
longer down there :-)

Can't remember for sure, but he woke up a while back, just before
Legion I think, as his being "one with the earth" means he can
communicate properly with Azeroth now (spoiler: Azeroth isn't *just* a
planet; she's a young titan, so she can communicate quite well with
the right person), so he leads us into a fair bit of story content.
Btw he still IS crystal, just movable crystal (in some quests he
comments about how heavy he is now, and he'd better stick to walking
on solid ground lol)

Post by Urs Beeli
Why is Jaina's mum so pissed off with her daughter? I
never quite managed to understand that.

Now that one's *really* old, Warcraft 3 old ;-) I never played that
far in that game, but I gather, all the way back then, Jaina was being
relatively peaceful with the orcs, and her father wanted to wipe them
all out, and wouldn't listen to her, so she stood aside and let them
kill him, as the only way to maintain the peace. Her people fully
blame her for it and think she completely betrayed him; they don't
realise she was caught in the middle (although given later events, she
probably wishes she'd never done it!)

Post by Urs Beeli
Silithus seems to have gotten a even
less inviting, as if not enough of the old zones had been destroyed in the
Cataclysm :-)

Hehe yeah, it's a rather impressive new decoration in there now, but
not a lot of life ;-)

Post by Urs Beeli
Storywise, I didn't quite grasp how that introductionary story matches the
rest of the lore. From what I gleamed, the big battle was in Lordaeron. If
my memory serves right, isn't that where Undercity was in classic and most
of the expansions? So how come that city is back intact and worth fighting
over? When did the tentatice truce between alliance and horde turn into all
out war? I guess having been away from the game for years left me a bit in
the dark :-)

You missed the actual introduction to the expansion (there was an
event for a few weeks which set it all up): Undercity is being fought
over as revenge, because Sylvanas thought burning Darnassus down would
be a good idea... as a result the Alliance are furious and a good few
of us Horde players are rather unimpressed with our faction and
wondering why we're meant to be going along with this anyway (this
whole expansion feels like Garrosh 2.0 on the Horde story, thankfully
the Zandalari trolls are really cool, they've saved the expansion for
me).

https://wow.gamepedia.com/War_of_the_Thorns might explain a bit more,
the two stories
https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/story/short-story/a-good-war and
https://worldofwarcraft.com/en-us/story/short-story/elegy give the
best detail from both sides but are longish reads, worth it if you've
got time.

Post by Urs Beeli
The introductionary story was ok (but left lots of gaps) and while I can see
how this whole new "chapter mechanisms" interwoven with the cut scenes helps
to tell a story, it takes away much of the open world feeling of vanilla wow
I loved so much. Once I arrived in Kul Tiras and managed to free myself from
the dungeon I was very much looking forward to having a go at some of those
quests I had just picked up that sounded like they were a bit less scripted,
but right after talking to the Harbour Master I got a pop up saying "Your
character is locked and will be logged out in 10 minutes. Buy the expansion
to continue playing". Not quite how I imagined the "free weekend" :-)

Yeah that's the class trial experience, have to buy BFA to explore the
world lol. On the plus side you can still play old characters in
Legion content for the rest of the weekend :-) The rest of the
expansion is *not* scripted like that, it's just the intro experience,
like Tanaan in WoD etc. There are some other things at max lvl which
are pretty scripted, but levelling is the usual exploring and
questhubs deal, they've actually made it a bit less on rails than
usual, which is nice for a change.

Post by Urs Beeli
So I logged back to my main who is stuck somewhere in post BC Nagrand (I
think it was somewhere in SMV, though I am not sure). All talents gone, all
spells gone, empty action bar, two dozen quests in the quest log, an
interface that was cluttered with dozens of pieces of information. I tried
re-picking my talents for a minute but just reading the description of the
first tier left me clueless, as it referenced spells that I either no longer
recognise or that only came into the game since I left, so I had absolutely
no clue which one to pick, so I logged out without even playing a minute on
him.
So now it's friday night with two more "free" days but I reckon I've seen
enough to know that this game is definitely over for me. May I need to start
back on a vanilla server just for old times sake, other than that, I think
it's changed to much for me to still enjoy.

A shame but yeah, if you don't have much time to play, relearning
everything will take some time. They change a bit too much between
expansions, although I must say my problem is more that there's so few
spells now... I'll have about as many at lvl 20 in Classic as I do at
120 now,gets a bit boring, especially levelling alts when you have to
wait an eternity to get useful abilities.

Post by Urs Beeli
One cool thing though: Taking my demon hunter through the initial quests
left her with about 1100 gold (I guess this is so they can buy a flying
mount when they're done). Instead I mailed that to my main, basically
doubling his funds. I clearly left before the great inflation hit :-)

Haha nice bonus for you anyway :-) And yeah, inflation has very much
happened; they pulled it back a bit with BFA over the insane
moneymaking of Legion but it'sstill pretty profitable, been a long
while since 1k gold was the max I had.

[Urbin]

Post by Catriona R

Again, some lore gaps (when did they de-crystalize Magni? I even went to
old IF to check but he is no longer down there :-)

Can't remember for sure, but he woke up a while back, just before
Legion I think, as his being "one with the earth" means he can
communicate properly with Azeroth now (spoiler: Azeroth isn't *just* a
planet; she's a young titan, so she can communicate quite well with
the right person), so he leads us into a fair bit of story content.
Btw he still IS crystal, just movable crystal (in some quests he
comments about how heavy he is now, and he'd better stick to walking
on solid ground lol)

I see, thanks.

Post by Catriona R

Why is Jaina's mum so pissed off with her daughter? I
never quite managed to understand that.

Now that one's *really* old, Warcraft 3 old ;-) I never played that
far in that game, but I gather, all the way back then, Jaina was being
relatively peaceful with the orcs, and her father wanted to wipe them
all out, and wouldn't listen to her, so she stood aside and let them
kill him, as the only way to maintain the peace. Her people fully
blame her for it and think she completely betrayed him; they don't
realise she was caught in the middle (although given later events, she
probably wishes she'd never done it!)

I can see how that didn't go down well with her mum and people back home ;-)

Post by Catriona R

Storywise, I didn't quite grasp how that introductionary story matches the
rest of the lore. From what I gleamed, the big battle was in Lordaeron. If
my memory serves right, isn't that where Undercity was in classic and most
of the expansions? So how come that city is back intact and worth fighting
over? When did the tentatice truce between alliance and horde turn into all
out war? I guess having been away from the game for years left me a bit in
the dark :-)

You missed the actual introduction to the expansion (there was an
event for a few weeks which set it all up): Undercity is being fought
over as revenge, because Sylvanas thought burning Darnassus down would
be a good idea...

Ah, I missed that bit. So what is the new night elf starting zone?

However, back in the days when I still played, I was always alliance and
therefore my visits to Undercity usually a bit hectic :) and I never paid
much attention, but my impression was that most parst above ground were
ruins. Am I misremembering? Or did the undead rebuild it just for the
expansion so it could be torn down again? ;-)

Post by Catriona R
as a result the Alliance are furious and a good few of us Horde players
are rather unimpressed with our faction and wondering why we're meant to
be going along with this anyway (this whole expansion feels like Garrosh
2.0 on the Horde story)

Yeah, I had been wondering what the storyline would look like from a horde
perspective...

Post by Catriona R

So now it's friday night with two more "free" days but I reckon I've seen
enough to know that this game is definitely over for me. May I need to start
back on a vanilla server just for old times sake, other than that, I think
it's changed to much for me to still enjoy.

A shame but yeah, if you don't have much time to play, relearning
everything will take some time. They change a bit too much between
expansions, although I must say my problem is more that there's so few
spells now... I'll have about as many at lvl 20 in Classic as I do at
120 now,gets a bit boring, especially levelling alts when you have to
wait an eternity to get useful abilities.

Yeah, I noticed that both my demon hunter after the introductory part and my
trial character (a hunter because that's the class I know best, so i picked
it to compare best) ended up with having about 5 abilities (of which 3 or 4
are on cooldowns). I got the impression that the only trick to finding an
optimal rotation was cooldown management... Not sure how much fun that would
be. My high days of rotation tweaking was during Karazan raids where I'd
have to keep track of 8 or 9 abilities and use them to best effect. Fond
memories.

Anyway, thanks for pointing this weekend out to me, it was cool being back,
even if only to see that I have definitely come off the addiction ;-)

Cheers
Urbin

[Catriona R]

Post by Urbin

Post by Catriona R

Post by Urs Beeli
Storywise, I didn't quite grasp how that introductionary story matches the
rest of the lore. From what I gleamed, the big battle was in Lordaeron. If
my memory serves right, isn't that where Undercity was in classic and most
of the expansions? So how come that city is back intact and worth fighting
over? When did the tentatice truce between alliance and horde turn into all
out war? I guess having been away from the game for years left me a bit in
the dark :-)

You missed the actual introduction to the expansion (there was an
event for a few weeks which set it all up): Undercity is being fought
over as revenge, because Sylvanas thought burning Darnassus down would
be a good idea...

Ah, I missed that bit. So what is the new night elf starting zone?

Still Teldrassil, it just phases for high lvls (and even if you're max
lvl, there's an NPC you can talk to to put Darkshore/Teldrassil back
how they were before). Same deal with UC/Tirisfal, both can be phased
back and will have old versions for lowbies.

Post by Urbin
However, back in the days when I still played, I was always alliance and
therefore my visits to Undercity usually a bit hectic :) and I never paid
much attention, but my impression was that most parst above ground were
ruins. Am I misremembering? Or did the undead rebuild it just for the
expansion so it could be torn down again? ;-)

Ah yeah, the above ground bits still are ruins but were made into
bigger and more impressive ruins when flying was added in Catclysm.
Not sure there'd ever been anything *in* the ruins before this, but I
think the general idea of the place had been already there, just
decorated up a bit for the intro scenario. Maybe if this war ever ends
we can clean it up and de-blight it to reuse lol.

Post by Urbin

Post by Catriona R
as a result the Alliance are furious and a good few of us Horde players
are rather unimpressed with our faction and wondering why we're meant to
be going along with this anyway (this whole expansion feels like Garrosh
2.0 on the Horde story)

Yeah, I had been wondering what the storyline would look like from a horde
perspective...

Depends on how much a fan of Sylvanas the player is, some seem to love
this, I'm just rather fed up. The direction of the Horde was supposed
to have been determined when we ousted Garrosh and Vol'jin took over,
but it seems we're being the bad guys, again. I'd hoped when this
expansion was announced, that at least there'd be some way of making
it not all Horde's fault, either our Teldrassil attack was revenge for
Alliance hitting UC first, or even we'd intended to capture Teldrassil
but an accident had happened leading to the fire (goblins and azerite
= lethal combination lol). But it was made explicitly clear that
Sylvanas and only Sylvanas was to blame. Sigh.

Add to that many prominent NPCs just happily going along with it all
in the 8.0 story and it didn't feel a good place to be. Now it's
changing a bit, but still, 6 months in I only have 1 character in BFA
content, none of the rest of my characters want to touch the Horde war
campaign lol (and my main hates it, but I've got to perform some
mental gymnastics to get him into there or I'm not playing lol). Next
character I level will be Alliance (and although I like Alliance, I
usually only get there after 4-5 Horde alts), their story appeals a
LOT more!

Post by Urbin

Post by Catriona R

Post by Urs Beeli
So now it's friday night with two more "free" days but I reckon I've seen
enough to know that this game is definitely over for me. May I need to start
back on a vanilla server just for old times sake, other than that, I think
it's changed to much for me to still enjoy.

A shame but yeah, if you don't have much time to play, relearning
everything will take some time. They change a bit too much between
expansions, although I must say my problem is more that there's so few
spells now... I'll have about as many at lvl 20 in Classic as I do at
120 now,gets a bit boring, especially levelling alts when you have to
wait an eternity to get useful abilities.

Yeah, I noticed that both my demon hunter after the introductory part and my
trial character (a hunter because that's the class I know best, so i picked
it to compare best) ended up with having about 5 abilities (of which 3 or 4
are on cooldowns). I got the impression that the only trick to finding an
optimal rotation was cooldown management... Not sure how much fun that would
be. My high days of rotation tweaking was during Karazan raids where I'd
have to keep track of 8 or 9 abilities and use them to best effect. Fond
memories.

Hehe yeah, I miss having lots of useful buttons, even if half of them
rarely got used, it was nice to have choices. I think they slightly
overdid the spec identity stuff, removing a lot of things that were
fun to use, at least my priest didn't suffer too badly, and he's the
one I use most.

Post by Urbin
Anyway, thanks for pointing this weekend out to me, it was cool being back,
even if only to see that I have definitely come off the addiction ;-)

Hehe, nice to have the opportunity to look around, anyway! My own
addiction has been rather cured by this expansion; I still play, but
not everyday, and not for all that long - I'm not having too much
problem making time for my second MMO, which in past years would've
been much harder to juggle two timeconsuming games! Might have more
time issues when Classic comes out though, I *know* I'll enjoy that,
although I have to hope to find a decent group of people there, hoping
for my old Nost guild to get together but it's a little quiet; there's
3 of us talking on the guild forum at present lol, and 3 people is not
a guild, hopefully whenever launch is announced that'll wake a few
more up ;-)

[Urbin]

Post by Catriona R

Post by Urbin
Ah, I missed that bit. So what is the new night elf starting zone?

Still Teldrassil, it just phases for high lvls (and even if you're max
lvl, there's an NPC you can talk to to put Darkshore/Teldrassil back
how they were before). Same deal with UC/Tirisfal, both can be phased
back and will have old versions for lowbies.

Ah, that makes sense, I guess.

Post by Catriona R

Post by Urbin
However, back in the days when I still played, I was always alliance and
therefore my visits to Undercity usually a bit hectic :) and I never paid
much attention, but my impression was that most parst above ground were
ruins. Am I misremembering? Or did the undead rebuild it just for the
expansion so it could be torn down again? ;-)

Ah yeah, the above ground bits still are ruins but were made into
bigger and more impressive ruins when flying was added in Catclysm.
Not sure there'd ever been anything *in* the ruins before this, but I
think the general idea of the place had been already there, just
decorated up a bit for the intro scenario. Maybe if this war ever ends
we can clean it up and de-blight it to reuse lol.

Good to know I didn't misremember. The few cut scenes and the
introductionary video where we see the alliance storming Lordearon I got the
impression that it looked pretty intact, so that confused me. I guess they
just had really pretty ruins :-)

Cheers
Urbin

[Tim Merrigan]

Post by Urbin

Post by Catriona R

Again, some lore gaps (when did they de-crystalize Magni? I even went to
old IF to check but he is no longer down there :-)

Can't remember for sure, but he woke up a while back, just before
Legion I think, as his being "one with the earth" means he can
communicate properly with Azeroth now (spoiler: Azeroth isn't *just* a
planet; she's a young titan, so she can communicate quite well with
the right person), so he leads us into a fair bit of story content.
Btw he still IS crystal, just movable crystal (in some quests he
comments about how heavy he is now, and he'd better stick to walking
on solid ground lol)

I see, thanks.

Post by Catriona R

Why is Jaina's mum so pissed off with her daughter? I
never quite managed to understand that.

Now that one's *really* old, Warcraft 3 old ;-) I never played that
far in that game, but I gather, all the way back then, Jaina was being
relatively peaceful with the orcs, and her father wanted to wipe them
all out, and wouldn't listen to her, so she stood aside and let them
kill him, as the only way to maintain the peace. Her people fully
blame her for it and think she completely betrayed him; they don't
realise she was caught in the middle (although given later events, she
probably wishes she'd never done it!)

I can see how that didn't go down well with her mum and people back home ;-)

Post by Catriona R

Storywise, I didn't quite grasp how that introductionary story matches the
rest of the lore. From what I gleamed, the big battle was in Lordaeron. If
my memory serves right, isn't that where Undercity was in classic and most
of the expansions? So how come that city is back intact and worth fighting
over? When did the tentatice truce between alliance and horde turn into all
out war? I guess having been away from the game for years left me a bit in
the dark :-)

You missed the actual introduction to the expansion (there was an
event for a few weeks which set it all up): Undercity is being fought
over as revenge, because Sylvanas thought burning Darnassus down would
be a good idea...

Ah, I missed that bit. So what is the new night elf starting zone?

Still Darnassus, but time traveled back, like the starting zone for
death knights. Also there's a NPC, Zidormi, in Darkshore who con take
you back to before the events from the beginning of BFA (which don't
happen till your alt reaches level 110 anyway) in Darkshore, as there
is in Trisfel Glade, Silthis, and the Blasted Lands (to get to the
Blasted Lands before WoD).

Post by Urbin
However, back in the days when I still played, I was always alliance and
therefore my visits to Undercity usually a bit hectic :) and I never paid
much attention, but my impression was that most parst above ground were
ruins. Am I misremembering? Or did the undead rebuild it just for the
expansion so it could be torn down again? ;-)

Lordoron is still runes, it's defenders are coming from Undercity,
until they lose the battle and Silvanis (the new Warchief)
contaminates all of central Trisfal Glade with the zomby plague (if I
can't have no one can).

Post by Urbin

Post by Catriona R
as a result the Alliance are furious and a good few of us Horde players
are rather unimpressed with our faction and wondering why we're meant to
be going along with this anyway (this whole expansion feels like Garrosh
2.0 on the Horde story)

Yeah, I had been wondering what the storyline would look like from a horde
perspective...

Post by Catriona R

So now it's friday night with two more "free" days but I reckon I've seen
enough to know that this game is definitely over for me. May I need to start
back on a vanilla server just for old times sake, other than that, I think
it's changed to much for me to still enjoy.

A shame but yeah, if you don't have much time to play, relearning
everything will take some time. They change a bit too much between
expansions, although I must say my problem is more that there's so few
spells now... I'll have about as many at lvl 20 in Classic as I do at
120 now,gets a bit boring, especially levelling alts when you have to
wait an eternity to get useful abilities.

Yeah, I noticed that both my demon hunter after the introductory part and my
trial character (a hunter because that's the class I know best, so i picked
it to compare best) ended up with having about 5 abilities (of which 3 or 4
are on cooldowns). I got the impression that the only trick to finding an
optimal rotation was cooldown management... Not sure how much fun that would
be. My high days of rotation tweaking was during Karazan raids where I'd
have to keep track of 8 or 9 abilities and use them to best effect. Fond
memories.
Anyway, thanks for pointing this weekend out to me, it was cool being back,
even if only to see that I have definitely come off the addiction ;-)
Cheers
Urbin

[Lewis]

Post by Urbin
Ah, I missed that bit. So what is the new night elf starting zone?

Phased Tedrasil. You don't see the burning until you hit level 110 and
unlock Broth.

Post by Urbin
However, back in the days when I still played, I was always alliance and
therefore my visits to Undercity usually a bit hectic :) and I never paid
much attention, but my impression was that most parst above ground were
ruins. Am I misremembering? Or did the undead rebuild it just for the
expansion so it could be torn down again? ;-)

The fight is in the ruins; as the alliance is attacking Undercity, they
have to get through the ruins first.

Post by Urbin
Yeah, I noticed that both my demon hunter after the introductory part and my
trial character (a hunter because that's the class I know best, so i picked
it to compare best) ended up with having about 5 abilities (of which 3 or 4
are on cooldowns). I got the impression that the only trick to finding an
optimal rotation was cooldown management... Not sure how much fun that would
be. My high days of rotation tweaking was during Karazan raids where I'd
have to keep track of 8 or 9 abilities and use them to best effect. Fond
memories.

The developers have taken a lot of time to eliminate rotations from all
classes. Everyone is on a priority system now.

I have switched recently to using my 10pad for attacks. On my hunter I
have cobrashot, barbed shot and kill command on 4 5 6, murder of crows
on 9, bestial wrath on 8 and the one that summons a second pet (Beast
something Something beast) on 7 with Chimera shot on 3. That's 99%. Then
I have stampede and instaheal pet on 1-2.

On the regular keyboard which I use for movement, I have 1-2-3 set to
Aspect of the Wild, mend pet, and Multishot.

My biggest problem with the hunter is remembering that I need to
prioritize Chimera shot over Kill command when in multi-target fights.

The basic priority for single target is Aspect/Bestial wrath whenever
they are up UNLESS Aspect of the wild is coming in <20 seconds, then
wait on Bestial a wrath and cast it after Aspect. Your main damage
attack is kill command, as close to when it comes off cooldown as
possible (don't spam cobra shot).

Of course, all of this is for *real* hunters. I have no idea how you
play stick hunters or plink-plink hunters.

[Catriona R]

On Mon, 18 Mar 2019 22:34:08 +0000, Catriona R

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Looks like they switched it on early (in Europe, at least); seems to
work right now for both my bf and my 2nd account anyway!

[Lewis]

Post by Catriona R
On Mon, 18 Mar 2019 22:34:08 +0000, Catriona R

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Looks like they switched it on early (in Europe, at least); seems to
work right now for both my bf and my 2nd account anyway!

Logged in a few hours ago, finished the invasion event (only 20
minutes to go when I started!) and did the brawl. 45 minutes total for
over 200 conquest.

[Mike S.]

On Mon, 18 Mar 2019 22:34:08 +0000, Catriona R

Post by Catriona R
https://blue.mmo-champion.com/topic/1105188-join-the-welcome-back-weekend-march-2124/

Thank you for mentioning this. I would have missed this without your
post.