Wrath, Your Honest Opinion.Follow

But that's why I made the master chief comment. Just because the character class barely changed from one to the other, doesn't mean it can't be its own game. The game interface from 1 to 3 hasn't really changed. The weapons haven't changed. Pre-existence doesn't mean exclusive ownership to the original game. Just because Vanilla had a warlock, and BC had a warlock, doesn't mean Wrath can't also have a Warlock. And it doesn't have to be random. It can be completely based on the previous two incarnations of it, and remain a part of the new game rather than the old.

The thing is, to me, if Blizz let you create toons at 70 and added an AH to NR, I could completely see WotLK being its own game. And that isn't a huge change to make it happen. There's enough to it, alone, that it can exist itself. It may be BETTER with BC and vanilla included, but that doesn't mean it couldn't exist as a stand-alone game.

That said, it's fine to not want to rate an expansion. But I think your reasoning has an issue. The fact of the matter is that it would be impossible to rate WoW, if you won't rate expansions separately. Why? Because you are forgetting that not everyone has the expansions. They are, in essence, playing a game that's completely different as a result. You can do the things they can, but they can't do the things you can.

That makes trying to rate "WoW" a problem, which is easily solved by rating Vanilla, Wrath, and BC on top of an overall rating.

I can rate vanilla WoW, and WoW plus it's expansions (the game as we currently see it before us). I just don't want to rate the expansions alone.


That's the point, it couldn't be a stand-alone game. You would have warlocks with only WOTLK spells - the spells they had pre-WOTLK technically aren't WOTLk content. Of course there is stuff in WOTLK that can 'work' stand-alone (I could, say, rate the Howling Fjords zone by judging it on a couple of points), but I don't feel like the expansion is too 'disconnected' from WoW to rate it as a whole. Like I said, I see it as an upgrade: I can rate WoW as it was on release day. I can rate WoW as it was after 1.1. I can rate WoW as it was after 1.2. I can't rate "Update 1.1" for WoW - not with the same standards as the game, anyway - best I could do was compare it to other upgrades and say "this upgrade had more of an impact than the others".

2/10, needs more polka dots.

But that doesn't make any sense. There's no reason to assume that a wrath that's a stand-alone game couldn't have the spells from earlier incarnations of WoW. That's why I've been giving you examples. I'm going to repeat the same one again, because there's no point in creating a new one.

Halo 1-- You have master chief with his machine gun, pistol and a variety of other weapons (the Needler being a favorite).

Halo 2-- You have master chief with his machine gun, pistol and a variety of other weapons (the Needler being a favorite). You also have additional weapons and vehicles unique to Halo 2. You have content that was not available in Halo 1.

Halo 3-- You have master chief with his machine gun, pistol and a variety of other weapons (the Needler STILL being a favorite). You also have additional weapons on vehicles on top of those carried over from Halo 1 and 2. You have content not available in Halo 1 or 2.

Just because something existed first in one game, doesn't mean it doesn't "belong" to the second.

Now let's compare that to WoW:

Vanilla-- You have 1-60 content, and a variety of spells (which includes professions).

BC-- You have 60-70 content, Vanilla spells plus new ones and new content unique to BC.

Wrath-- You have 70-80 content, Vanilla and BC spells plus new ones and new content unique to Wrath.

Please, explain to me how this differs. Sure, you can go back and do the 60 content with your level 80. But that content is not designed or tuned to it in any way. It's merely something you can do. Like if Bungie released a patch in Halo 2 one that let you use Halo 3 weapons. That doesn't make them connected. Furthermore, since most spells have at least one upgrade specific to Wrath (post level 70), that really easily places them within the scope of the "new" game.

Wrath acts VERY similar to a stand-alone game. The very fact that developers refer to old content as old is testament to that. It is technically an expansion, yes. But 99% of what you do in game easily belongs to Wrath, not to BC or Vanilla.

The way Blizz does expansions is VERY different from the way I have experienced other MMOs doing them. In FFXI, expansions added content at cap and below, but the old stuff still remained relevant, generally, to some degree. Players might get BORED of it, but the bonus of doing it wasn't diminished. Any rewards you got from it were basically as good as they were 2 expansions prior, as long as you hadn't managed to get something better in the mean time. So, when you look at the level cap content now, there's a lot to do within the scope of many different expansions, but none of them act to replace old content.

Blizzard, on the other hand, intentionally tries to cut the tie between the old content and the new. They increase level caps, make old gear useless. They don't bring old factions to the new expansion, even if that means creating a nearly identical one for the lore (Argent Crusade vs Dawn, Cenarian Expedition vs. Circle). They don't re-tune the old dungeons with regards to new talent options. Once you hit 71, your time with BC is over if you don't want to grind for mounts and non-combat pets. It won't do anything for you anymore. Something better is just around the corner. Most of what you will be doing with your main for the next few months is solely within the new expansion. This is not the case for most other games I've seen.

And there is my point. I don't think you can compare this situation to master chief returning for Halo 2. Master chief is just a character. WoW is the basis of an entire game. There's only so much content you can "use again" in a new stand-alone game on the subject. Where that line lies is a matter of opinion, and that's where yours differs from mine. I don't feel "a stand-alone game" could 'recycle' more than half a game and still be called "stand-alone". Any game that uses WoW's engine+graphics, interface, item system, quest system, bag system, grouping system, classes, pizza timer and whatnot can't be "stand-alone" for me just "because there's new content". There's a reason you need vanilla and TBC to play WOTLK.

Or to keep it simple, really; I don't have the same definition as 'expansion pack' and 'stand-alone game' as you do.

Though you should PM me if you want to keep going on about it.

They don't bug me, but to each his own I guess.

The craft produces, glyphs, books, shoulder chants, scrolls, and Darkmoon cards

1) Not profitable as far as glyphs are concerned. Nobody after the first couple of weeks will buy
your skillups and they can't be DE'd. At the top the cost of acquiring new recipes either by
research or purchase of books is immense. Again unless you are there first there is little profit
to be had. Also character advancement is so fast that people do not buy a lot as they level. And
with the level restrictions on slots they could not even if they wanted to. That was not a good
idea at all.

2) The Books are useful to three (3) clases; Priest, Mage, Warlock, out of ten (10). They are
useless to any class which either dual wields, uses a 2h weapon, or uses a shield.

3) The shoulder chants rock. They should have had recipes for lower levels.

4) Darkmoon Cards. The only real moneymaker is Nobles. The others are worth less than the mat
values. And Nobles occurs rarely ime.

5) Scrolls. I have no idea what attribute scrolls sell for. I don't think its much but I just don't
know. As far as vellums go I have not explored this since I stopped buying vellums and started to
make them. So I could be off base on this point.

In the end it is the glyphs that sink this profession imo.

They're are certain fights that make certain glyphs extremely viable, that just aren't normally. I have met a decent number of people that will glyph switch accordingly (but, to be fair, I know a few of them were scribes).

But, no, people don't generally change their glyphs. Some players do, and for a few classes/specs it is a large bonus to, but it isn't a common practice yet.

Either way, respecs happen frequently enough that glyphs sell well. Especially as people level alts, buy Dual spec, etc. If they decide to make a PvP spec or turn one into a PvE spec, they'll likely change some glyphs as well. Certain classes will change all their major glyphs with a respec where others may not, though. A DK generally does all his major with a respec. A Mage on the other hand, will probably only change 1 or 2 from what I understand, keeping the Glyph of Molten Armor for all their specs, once they have the mana capacity to use it.

A Paladin that's respeccing ret may even go ahead and change a minor glyph to include the one that increases damage to undead by 1% (Hello, ICC). And a Warrior may grab the minor thunderclap glyh. Hell, since they only use certain abilities in certain specs, they may even change more.

Glyphs sell very well, in general. I know that I often see the main ones disappear from the AH within an hour of my last check.

I can see the value in it, I guess I just don't play classes that do it, or hear about people doing it.



If you're respeccing to ret btw, you best be changing all your glyphs! :P I mean more people changing a glyph or so in the middle of a dungeon or whatever to start using a different ability for the same spec.

Edited, Nov 19th 2009 7:22pm by digitalcraft

We do agree about one thing. This profession succeeds or fails on the Glyphs.

1) Glyphs

You seem to be describing a different game than mine. But then I do not raid. Do you know how many do that ? Its not very high, perhaps 4%-5% afaik. To design a craft that gets a great deal more
useful only if you raid is Monty Python territory.

A craft should either 1)help you level or 2) help get you ready for endgame or 3) make you money.

As far as Glyphs go I can see 1) minor assistance with leveling, especially relative to the cost.
2) minor help getting to and doing Endgame for PvP'ers, people who only do 5 mans, and those who
only like to level a character to 80. I have seen no evidence of the Glyph shuffling you describe
other than on each major patch when folks talents get changed. Not that often. That leaves raiders.
If you are one, and you do change out Glyphs as you suggest then what you are saying does make a
great deal more sense, but you are still out of the norm. 3) Not much help on making money. I
checked my server on prices. About half of all glyphs offered are priced below 10g. The top price
was 78g and only 75 out of 3,500 were offered for more than 50g. The only way you are going to make
any money at all will require a lot of time monitoring the market. Way too much time.

2) Books

The point was the books that were designed for the melee classes are totally useless. Your
response was a straw man.

3) Shoulder Chants

As far as the lower level chant is concerned I was not thinking of a craft bonus type like the current one. I was thinking of something to replace the Aldor/Scryer chants from BC (i.e. chant(s)
of that quality) since no one has time for that anymore.

4) Darkmoon Cards.

Not sure we really disagree all that much on this. The cards are useful. Given that you have no
idea what you are going to get I would be willing to bet that most Inscribers have passed/equaled
all but the Nobles Trink by the time they finish a deck, given normal play. Otoh really nice for
twinking your alts.

5) Scrolls.

Yeah I was only thinking of sales. My bad. The utility here maybe not huge, but its not all that small either and the cost is nothing.

Sorry this dog still don't hunt.