drakonid
Latest
Breakfast Topic: Roto-scoping is not animation
For those who don't know, I'm an animator in my IRL career. I've studied it, I've gone to school for it, I do it myself. I scrutinize it, critique it and think about it every moment I get. It should go without saying that I am fairly picky when it comes to animations. Enter the drakonid. What's a drakonid? See the header image. They're the bipedal draconic warriors that are native to each main Dragonflight. Now, if you aggro them, you'll notice that they run at you, lances swirling away. I. Hate. That. Animation. It drives me crazy. My guild leader affectionately calls it my Kryptonite, as I freak out whenever I see them do it. It's just so terrible! It looks like some horrific motion capture session gone wrong; then a blind chimpanzee with a tablet in its mouth added some keyframes. Yes, I realize that it's supposed to spoof the 'Star Wars Kid' animation, but I don't care. Now, I'm not so critical that I can't like things. I love the animation that was added for ToC, where we saw poor Jarod Sunsworn get choked to death by the Black Knight. The animation for Anzu is great to watch, as they take care of the physics for his feathers. I could think of many others, but those are just a few that stand out. What animations tickle your fancy? What do you love or hate, and why? What could they improve? Discuss amongst yourselves!
Breakfast Topic: The other kind of hybrids
In conversations about WoW, the word "hybrid" brings forth images of paladins, druids and so forth. But interestingly enough, WoW has another kind of hybrid. I am referring, of course, to characters with inter-species ancestry. For those who care about the lore of Warcraft, feelings on hybrids range from "I don't really care" to "They're awesome!" to "They ruin the lore!" An example of a character who elicits the first opinion is Lantresor of the Blade. Is he a hybrid? Yes. Do people make a big deal out of it? Not really. His ancestry simply adds a nice bit of backstory to (at the time Burning Crusade was released) a new character. Two examples of well-received hybrids are Garona Halforcen and Rexxar. Garona, originally created as a half-human, half-orc hybrid, has in recent times been retconned into a half-orc, half-draenei -- still a popular character among those that know of her. Rexxar, the half-ogre, half-orc Champion of the Horde, has been a popular character since his creation in Warcraft III: The Frozen Throne's orc bonus campaign. However, hybrids can also be targets of immense hatred from the fan base. Rhonin, while not a hybrid himself, is often accused of being a "Mary Sue" by fans, with one of the most popular reasons being that he is married to a high elf, Veressa Windrunner. His twin sons, by extension, have been poorly received. There was some anger when it was revealed that the first Guardian of Tirisfal was Alodi, a half-elf. But among all the disputed hybrids, none is more controversial than Med'an. The son of the aforementioned Garona Halforcen and Medivh, last Guardian of the original Council of Tirisfal, Med'an is quarter-orc, quarter-draenei and half-human. This apparently gives him the natural aptitude to not only be a mage, but a shaman and paladin as well. Not only this, but he becomes a new Guardian of Tirisfal, which drives some to say that he "ruins the point" of Warcraft III. Regardless of your opinions on the character, the controversy created by Med'an has few rivals within Warcraft's history. In addition to hybrid characters, some races are alleged by some to be hybrids. The drakonid, humanoid dragons, are said in some places to be half-dragon. The same goes for harpies and other races. What are your feelings about hybrids? Should drakonid be the next playable race, or should Deathwing just eliminate them all in Cataclysm? Or are you somewhere in between? This article has been brought to you by Seed, Aol's guest writer program that brings your words to WoW.com. Watch for the next call for submissions and a chance to submit your own article. The next new byline you see here may be yours!
