garrison
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Breakfast Topic: Old school questing
In the WoD beta, if you choose to put a Barn on the first available medium plot in your Garrison, as I did circa level 92, you immediately receive a quest from the NPCs there to head to Nagrand and trap an animal. So off I went, west out of Shadowmoon Valley, through Taladar and toward Nagrand, seeking my quarry. This was a mistake. All roads in Taladar lead to Shattrath, and Shattrath is under siege by both level 100 Iron Horde soldiers and demons of the Shadow Council. If you try to run south around Shattrath, you'll end up in Auchindoun, also overrun by Shadow Council demons and a load of other nasties who are way above level 92. Once you've finally made it into Nagrand, you'll discover that it's a level 98-100 zone. Oops. After many deaths in Nagrand, I finally managed to successfully trap a clefthoof and returned, bruised, battered, but at least triumphant, to my Garrison, where I vowed never to set foot in Nagrand again for at least another five levels, Barn resources be damned. Upon reciting my tale of woe to sympathetic colleague Liz Harper--who went through the same thing when she too chose to put a Barn in her Garrison--I realized that I felt almost like I was picking up my swim form quest in Moonglade as a level 16 night elf druid, only to find that half of the amulet I needed was off the coast of Westfall. I had the same sense of apprehension about the unknown zones I had to head through, frustration when I found I wasn't quite up to the task, and eventual elation as I managed to finish the quest anyway. I thought, "Would I want this kind of questing experience to be a regular WoW feature again?" Is the fist-pumping moment of triumph worth the reckless blundering through two zones full of red-leveled, hostile mobs? Honestly, I'm not sure. What about you? Would you be eager to rise to the challenge, or frustrated to be handed a task so far beyond your current means? How old-school do you want to go?
Warlords of Draenor: Garrison basics
If you're venturing into Draenor for the first time, there's no avoiding the new garrison feature: it's at the heart of all of your adventuring into this new world. But before it can become a hub for questing, professions, and missions (more on that later), you'll have to build it. Fortunately, it's not very hard: as soon as you make your way through Tanaan Jungle, your first task will be establishing a garrison in Shadowmoon Valley (alliance) or Frostfire Ridge (horde). If you want to know more, we're about to cover the basics of Warlords of Draenor's garrison system. Though no story spoilers follow, if you want to head to Draenor without knowing what comes next, you'll probably want to skip this post. Now, onward, to Draenor!
Breakfast Topic: Broken things and Daleera Moonfang
Broken things are one of my guilty pleasures. Not completely broken, mind you -- something that doesn't work at all isn't much fun. But things that are just broken enough that they function incorrectly are wonderful. A household animatronic with low batteries, for example. Or when game physics go bad. This guilty pleasure means I love alpha and beta test phases of games. Sometimes the stories that result from a glitch in a game tickle me more than the actual stories. Daleera Moonfang, pictured above, is the subject of one such story. While playing the latest Warlords of Draenor alpha build, I'd just recruited Daleera as a follower in my garrison. She'd been with my crew for no more than five minutes before I noticed her over by a keg of ale, drinking away. I wandered over there just for the sake of saying hello and noticed her actions were looping a whole lot faster than they should. Only a few seconds passed between each refill of her mug and she never stopped. She'd fill, drink it down in one go, then immediately refill. While refilling, she'd comment on how much she enjoyed the drink before it. "That'll get you there, son," she said. "Just like Mom used to make. It's like a little piece of Ironforge." It doesn't matter that the NPC that loiters by the keg is randomized. It could have been any of my followers. But Daleera was the first, and now, in my heart, it will always be her. Daleera Moonfang is my hard-drinking priestess of Elune. She could drink dwarves and pandaren under the table. She's honed her boozy craft for an entire elven lifetime. It isn't canon, but it's my canon. Tell me: do you love broken things? I want your stories!
World of Warcraft starts previewing Garrisons
Garrisons are one of the big defining features for World of Warcraft's next expansion, but we haven't heard a whole lot about them. That's all changing with the start of a new four-part series explaining how the system works and how players can unlock and improve their Garrison, starting with the absolute basics. The first part is available now, outlining the overall scope of the fortifications and what players will be able to do with them. The short version is that Garrisons will be centrally located for both the Horde and Alliance, but you'll have access to satellite locations in each of the various zones through the expansion. You'll also have choices about which buildings to construct as you move through Draenor, which will affect both the central location and the satellite region -- building a Lumber Mill, for instance, will mean unlocking one back at your main Garrison as well as offering unique buffs while in the zone with the Mill. Check out all the details in the official posting.
Official Garrison preview lays down the foundation
We've been waiting very impatiently, almost salivating really, for more details on Grrisons and how they're going to work. Well, at last, our wait is over. Blizzard has finally dropped some of that sweet, sweet structure-creating science on us. In this post, part one of a four series, we get the basics for how Garrisons will work -- how your Garrison is part of the leveling process, how followers will work and how you can recruit them, the missions you can send them on and how that will benefit the Garrison, how we'll expand the Garrison with new building and use each zone to expand their role in the expansion. As the story unfolds, you'll find that Garrisons are intimately integrated into every zone-whether you choose to follow the main quest path or just head off into the hills to explore, you will meet allies (and enemies) in every corner of the world. While your main fortress will always be in Shadowmoon Valley (Alliance) or Frostfire Ridge (Horde), you will establish Garrison outposts in Gorgrond, Talador, Nagrand, and Spires of Arak, all customized based on your building choices. Eventually, your forces will span the continent, and you will have an army capable of assaulting the fortified Iron Horde Foundry. Will your troops succeed? That's entirely up to you, commander. This in particular is of interest - you apparently won't just have the one Garrison, but a linked series of fortifications throughout Draenor to serve as your means of recruiting and defending your followers for the push against the Iron Horde. Head over to the official site for more details.
Garrisons and their role in Warlords of Draenor
We're all talking about garrisons these days. Whether it's how they're going to work, where they're going to be, or what we're going to do with them they're the big new feature for Warlords of Draenor and we're all constantly worrying at the bone to try and squeeze more information out of them. It's understandable. Players have wanted something akin to player housing for years, and the garrison goes beyond that - it's effectively your own fortified town. It brings back memories for players of old school pen and paper RPG's like me of hitting the end of the expert levels in D&D and getting a dominion. We've recently found out that the garrison will be heavily integrated into the leveling experience, requiring it to have a stable location (Frostfire Ridge for Horde, Shadowmoon Valley for Alliance) and that there will be specific racial-themed buildings for the professions section of your garrison. There's even going to be group content for garrisons. Mumper has even assured us that the garrison will not be required to level. Meanwhile, Muffinus has asked players who, out of the entire World of Warcraft, would they want as a follower - I'm personally pulling for Rexxar and Marhsall Windsor. Yes, I know. What this all means is in flux, of course, as Mumper himself acknowledges - design is iterative, and changes happen. We're still waiting for more details, but what I wanted to talk about now is how the garrison is shaping up to become one of those rare things, a feature that can completely transform your playing experience in fundamental ways, yet not directly.
PAX East 2014: Can World of Warcraft's garrisons live up to the hype?
Like many players, I have very mixed feelings about the garrisons being added to World of Warcraft's latest expansion, Warlords of Draenor. At this year's PAX East, I sat down with Blizzard Entertainment to discuss the feature, and the studio reps explained garrisons as a way for Blizzard to bring a bit of Warcraft into the WoW universe. As a fan of WarCraft 3, I left the interview feeling hopeful and excited. But the more I thought about it, the more I began to worry that garrisons will boil down to one of three things: an expanded version of Mists of Pandaria's farms, a new daily quest hub, or just another time-sink that will keep players isolated from one another.
Warlords of Draenor: Wowhead digs up Garrison models and more
As a new alpha build hit servers last night, the datamining began again. Wowhead has already turned up a plethora of new models, weapons and more, and has now turned to one of the most hotly anticipated features of Warlords of Draenor, Garrisons. They've put together a detailed list of 70 buildings, along with what exactly all of them do, and what size plot they go on. There's a lot of interesting information one can glean from this data, such as how follower gearing might work and what mission rewards might be, as well as how you get various vendors into your Garrison. Of course, this is datamining, so shouldn't be taken as 100% fact, but it's still really interesting stuff. There's also information showing off small images of the Garrison buildings, and a map. It seems like these may be UI elements that allow you to design your Garrison and set up its layout, but of course, this is just inference from the data that's presented. There is, however, even more information on each building type, that ties in with the aforementioned list. We're slowly getting an idea of what the Garrison progression might look like.
Muffinus serves up Garrison details
Senior Game Designer Jeremy Feasel (he has an NPC named after him, the ultimate honor) has been answering questions on twitter about garrisons. Quite a few, in fact. Under his twitter handle of @Muffinus he dished out some pretty interesting details on what the current design for the feature is. Garrisons are going to give you perks outside of them (we already knew about the faster mount speed perk, but others are being worked on). Some perks, like a free resurrection, will not carry over into raids so as to keep them from becoming mandatory perks everyone has to get for their garrison. They want to keep customization as a draw and let players pick the perks they want. You aren't hard gated by the initial quest that establishes the garrison - you can pursue the benefits and perks of the feature even if you decide to bypass it when leveling. You will not have to stop doing something to run back and defend your garrison if/when it comes under attack. It's not a time-limited mechanic. I'm pretty excited about garrisons, as they combine elements of player housing, RTS elements from the old Warcraft games, and new kinds of minigames. Should be interesting to get to see them in action.
The Daily Grind: Should WoW's garrisons count as 'housing'?
Every time we cover World of Warcraft's upcoming garrison feature -- the one that will grant an upgradeable town to every WoW player -- someone scoffs that it's not housing and shouldn't be considered such. And to the extent that it isn't a house or a zone that you can customize tile by tile or object by object like some of the more epic housing systems in MMOland, I'd agree. Even WoW Insider's Matt Rossi wrote that the garrison system seemed more like "bringing the RTS [genre's] whole 'construct a base, generate resources, use them for battle' gameplay into the MMO" than like the game's farms, let alone like traditional houses where you can stash your loot. Still, I have to wonder how that's so different from a housing system like WildStar's, which also attempts to create a private and mechanically useful space for players rather than offer a purely creative, mercantile, or social space. What do you think: Should WoW's garrisons count as MMO housing, or are they just upjumped farms? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Breakfast Topic: I did not farm, but I will garrison
Look, farming isn't Warcraft, okay? It just doesn't fit the fantasy of a grim conflict, of a war between ideologies, of a setting divided and defined by conflict for me. I just couldn't make that mental leap - I felt stupid running around killing weeds once, much less doing it over and over again so someone I didn't even particularly like would like me. Not even the dog could motivate me to do it. But somehow dress up much of the same kind of gameplay behind stone walls and describe it as me constructing a fortified base on an alien planet and suddenly I am there. It all comes down to trappings - the garrison concept works with what I think of as Warcraft. It seems like bringing the RTS's whole 'construct a base, generate resources, use them for battle' gameplay into the MMO, and it works for me in a way the farm never could. So I'm down for it, ludicrously so. How about you? Did you farm? Are you looking forward to garrisons?
Breakfast Topic: Garrisons throughout the world
We know that in Warlords of Draenor, we'll only be able to establish our garrisons on Draenor itself. However, let's play pretend on this fine morning. If your character was given command of a defensive garrison in any zone in WoW to maintain the peace, where would you set up shop? Azeroth proper? Somewhere over in Kalimdor? The Outland we know and love? Remain in Pandaria, maybe? Personally, I think I would look toward Northrend. Northrend isn't central to anything, so it wouldn't be the most convenient location ever, but I can't think of a cooler place than Dragonblight, Grizzly Hills, or the Howling Fjord to have a command post. They aren't my favorite zones in the game, Zagarmarsh claims that title, but they have exactly the right vibe for that kind of thing. A dangerous, imposing frontier? A possible location for future, civilized settlement by the Horde and the Alliance? It would give a sense of having a purpose in the overall scheme of things beyond the current war effort on the latest front, which is pretty cool. What about you?
Making a Garrison feel like home
Warcraft tweeted a great question today, and we thought we'd throw it out to the WoW Insider readership, to see what you wonderful people thought would work for you: If you could add any one thing to your Garrison that would make it truly feel like "home" to your character, what would it be? - World of Warcraft (@Warcraft) February 5, 2014 Something I would absolutely adore is a way to display tabards. So I could hang those hard-won tabards, and some of the easily acquired but pretty ones, on my wall to look at them. Maybe a similar display for other armor items -- I think a display of helms would look pretty cool -- or what about an armory where dummies similar to the ones that display Challenge Mode gear in the shrines show off your raid tier or PvP sets? What if you could set them up to build transmog sets?! I'm getting a little excited at these ideas.
Warlords of Draenor: Breed battle pets in your garrison
In the player garrisons coming in Warlords of Draenor, one of the medium-size construction options is the Pet Stable. While we were all initially uncertain as to its purpose, more has since been revealed. Below is an explanation from Cory Stockton's Twitter account. .@perksnpeeves @gloriaboboria current plan is you can merge two pets of the same family and pick the breed. Doing this gives chance at epic. - Cory Stockton (@mumper) November 10, 2013 Do note that he specified current plan. The expansion has just been announced. Many things will change before any beta phase. Even more will change before launch.
