the-undying
Latest
The OverAchiever: The game's 13 vanished titles
Every Thursday, The Overachiever shows you how to work toward those sweet achievement points. This week, we rue the lack of High Poobah among the game's honorifics. An interesting question in the Tanking forum about a month back spurred an article for readers here about which title they find most reassuring on a fellow player. The discussion that ensued was a reminder that you can't get some of the more popular picks anymore, and just why they meant -- and continue to mean -- something in the first place. Sad to say, these titles are no longer accessible, unless you manage to find some far-flung server at the end of the universe where no one's bothered to kill Sartharion at all.
The most reassuring title to see on a player
Whether we like to admit it or not, we tend to give other players the once-over whenever we zone into a Raid Finder or dungeon PUG, particularly if you've had a run of bad experiences while getting valor-capped for the week. A recent thread on the Tanking forums about the best title for a tank to sport is both a sideways acknowledgment of this and a question as to which title best suits your role in the game. For healers, one could argue that Undying or Immortal means you probably had job security for the length of Wrath, but that kind of ignores everyone else's responsibility to not screw up in Naxx. Possibly Herald of the Titans/Conqueror of Ulduar would have been the equivalent for DPS players, although a raid had to fire on all cylinders for those achievements too. Before achievements were account-wide, and leaving aside obvious ringers like Light of Dawn/Bane of the Fallen King before Mists, I would have nominated Loremaster or Seeker as the most reassuring titles to see on a player regardless of gear quality. I can't say exactly what link exists between the persistence needed to get these titles and overall competence, but I have yet to see a Loremaster or Seeker player do something screw-the-pooch crazy in a PUG. These days, it's tougher to guarantee that a player sporting a title is doing so on the character that originally got it, so maybe The Undaunted is probably the single best outward indicator of competence. Having written all this, I've also had the pleasure of knowing a world-class hunter who never bothered using titles, and we have to acknowledge that a generic, funny (e.g., "Chef Boyardee"), or absent title means nothing at all. But if you had to pick one that said, "I will not get you killed in this PUG," which would it be?
The Road to Mordor: Entitled
A few days ago I asked the Massively community members what in-game titles they loved the most. Titles have been on my brain for the past week, as I've started to realize just how many -- how bogglingly, terrifyingly many -- exist in Lord of the Rings Online. I hadn't really given them a lot of thought before, because who really stops to read every small paragraph that magically floats above people's heads? "Frodo, Ring-bearer of the One Ring of Power, Fellowship of the Ring, Formerly of Bag End, The Shire." Yeah, we get it. You're Mr. Fancy Pants. But really, titles are kind of neat, if only for the player who puts one on like a fine three-piece suit before an evening on the town. A title tells the world not only of your great (or not-so-great) accomplishments, but also a little about your personality -- after all, you chose that particular title to wear above all the others. A title can tell me if a player is really proud of his crafting achievements, or if he's a raider, or if he has a decent sense of humor. While I'd say that -- like LotRO's hats -- a good bulk of the titles in the game are cosmetically useless, there exists quite a few that are worth procuring if you're into titular collection. Today we're going to look at some of my favorite titles in the game, as well as how to nab them. Please don't pee your pants in excitement.
The OverAchiever: Do them now!
Every Thursday, The Overachiever shows you how to work toward those sweet achievement points. This week, it's time to get a move on. We've had some recent news concerning achievements in categories we've already covered, and my original intent this week was to play catch-up with that in addition to finishing off the new reputation, world event, and feat of strength achievements in Cataclysm. However, given equally recent news concerning achievements that are set to become feats (and may do so as early as patch 4.0.1), I thought it would be more sensible to cover the stuff that you'd want to do as soon as possible before it disappears. I've cross-checked the list of known Cataclysm feats of strength against the feats already present in game, and as far as I know, this should be a comprehensive set of current Wrath of the Lich King achievements that will become inaccessible as of patch 4.0.1, patch 4.0.3, or Cataclysm's release (or at least, a comprehensive list as of the current beta and PTR builds). I've written this list assuming the following: Although it hasn't been officially confirmed that all of these will disappear in patch 4.0.1 or 4.0.3 rather than the expansion itself, for the time being, I'm guessing it's one of the two patches you need to worry about. With the recent announcement of arena Season 8 ending on Oct. 12, 4.0.1 may hit in less than two weeks. Zarhym's post just made it clear that the season could end as early as the 12th, not that it definitely would, and there's still a lot of stuff to fix on the PTR and beta -- but every Tuesday from hereon is a potential patch day. Accepting Oct. 5 or 12 as possible patch dates, I've included an opinion on the feasibility of getting the following achievements done as quickly as possible.
The OverAchiever: Dungeon and raid titles, Part 2
After taking a two-week detour into guides covering the Love Is In the Air and Lunar Festival holidays, we're going to return to the list of titles available from dungeon and raid achievements. You can find part one here, covering everything from Argent Defender to Grand Crusader. This week, we'll pick up where we left off. Herald of the Titans (requires an Algalon-10 kill under special circumstances) or Starcaller (requires Observed -- 10 player) Herald of the Titans, much like its ToGC-10 counterpart Argent Defender, requires you to kill Algalon in Ulduar-10 without padding the difficulty with gear from higher-level raids. The result is arguably the coolest Algalon-related title apart from Celestial Defender, but it won't come without a ton of planning and a lot of skill. Starcaller is the same deal, minus the gear requirement.
Guildwatch: A kinder, gentler GW
Something really amazing happened the other day -- Jalabharxo, as you can see in the chat above, asked for some help in the Trade chat. But unlike what usually happens (someone insults his mother or people make fun of his lack of knowledge by calling him a noob), the unthinkable took place: someone respectfully answered his question. He couldn't believe it, and even though he sent us the screenshot, neither could we.Because of this crazy change to the way the game is played (People helping each other? Who'da thunk it?), we've decided to change up the format of Guildwatch. Usually we cover downed and recruiting news from guilds around the realms, as well as all of the crazy guild drama. But the drama is always so vicious, and no one ever seems to like it too much, so from now on, we're going to be covering a different side of the game: guild goodness. We're sure you'll love this change -- the new GW starts right after the break. And as always, you can send us news of your guild or anyone elses at wowguildwatch@gmail.com.
Breakfast Topic: The titles of Patch 3.1
Patch 3.1 is a hefty content patch that will introduce a massive new raid zone, the Argent Tournament, as well as Arena Season 6. Of course, along with all those are new Achievements and consequently, titles. Some of the titles have been around since the Beta, where the realm's first Level 80 of a particular race was awarded an 'of the <major city>' title. This was widely criticized and Blizzard pulled the titles long before Wrath went live, but are now set to return with the Argent Tournament. Soon, dedicated players can append an affiliation with their favorite racial cities for all to see.Of course, there are more titles that are coming with the next content patch, and yesterday it was revealed that the titles for the Ulduar versions of Undying and Immortal were going to be Champion of Ulduar and Conqueror of Ulduar respectively. Is it just me or does Champion/Conqueror of Ulduar not have the same 'oomph' as being Immortal or Undying? First of all, Champion and Conqueror are both existing Horde PvP titles, which lessens the impact. Secondly, the cool factor of 'the Immortal' and 'the Undying' are just off the chain as well as being perfectly appropriate for the Achievement. There are also the Celestial Defender and Death's Demise titles for realm first Algalon and Yogg-Saron kills in their hardest modes. I think those are much cooler, but are about on par with, uh, Magic Seeker. Sometimes, titles just don't roll of the tongue very nicely. We usually ask for your opinion on these, and we're doing the same today for Patch 3.1's batch of titles. In fact, we're putting up a poll to get your take on all the titles of Patch 3.1. Click on a radio button to kick off your day! %Poll-28431%
AFKing your way to greatness
One of the most irritating things about raiding would have to be ninja AFK's. You wait for the results of a ready check only to see that -- oh, crap -- someone hasn't returned a verdict. Now, AFK's can happen for good reasons (children, explosions, children with explosives), but just as often they don't. On farm content, it's an irritating wait. On progression content, you check your watch and realize you're inching that much closer to a respawn timer and a raid leader who'll need a prescription for that skyrocketing blood pressure of his. As time passes, the clamor to just pull the boss rises, but that's not really possible on an achievement-oriented run like The Undying or something like a 3-drake Sartharion.There are still a few fights where you can AFK entirely and no one would be the wiser (here's looking at you, Patchwerk), but they're a dying breed. Too Many Annas, much to our surprise, managed a successful Heigan kill with an AFK player, and Heigan's notoriously unforgiving even to the inattentive. The tactic involves a Paladin and what I assume to be a supremely annoyed heal team, but apparently it worked -- and I am mightily tempted to suggest it for our next Naxx clear.
Breakfast Topic: Titillating titles
We're so close to getting Twilight Vanquisher, I can almost taste it. A lot of my guild mates would love to have the title, and I'm sure when we down Sartharion with three drakes this week -- fingers crossed... -- a lot of them will be sporting it in Dalaran. I'm not too keen on it myself. I couldn't actually care less. It's cool and all, but what I really want is Battlemaster. I'm just one or two Achievements short on every Battleground to get Master in each one. Even if I had the skill to obtain Arena Master (and I admittedly don't, seeing as how I've never broken 2200 on any bracket in any Season), it's not a title I'd display, either. I just like the sound of Battlemaster. That, for me, is the title I want the most. I know our Guild Master is five Exalted reputations away from being The Exalted. I personally think that's awesome and we're going to help him in any way we can. All my wife wanted for her leveling Priest was to be a Chef, only to meet a roadblock when she found out she couldn't do the Kungaloosh quest yet (she's only Level 74). We came close several times to getting The Undying, even getting past Heigan, so I'm sure that's in the cards pretty soon. There are so many awesome titles now it's interesting to find out what people like. David asked in his Livejournal what people thought the most prestigious title was. Readers chimed in to say what they thought were the tough titles to get. Salty got a few mentions, as well as the obviously insane Immortal. Today, though, I'm not interested in finding out what the most prestigious title is. I'm more curious to know what titles you've already obtained and what you choose to display. Some of you guys probably have a lot of titles to choose from. What makes you choose the title you display? Maybe you chose the incredibly simple Explorer for your character named Dora? Or keeping the old world PvP title of General for a toon named Anaesthesia? Some choose humor, some choose prestige, and others... well, some just like how a title sounds. How about you?
Guildwatch: Get on your main and come duel me you !%#*
Now we're getting some where -- this is the first real week where we've seen lots of achievements reported in terms of what guilds are doing, rather than actual boss progression. I think this is the future of raiding in the endgame -- you'll walk through content pretty easily, but the achievements will be what really taxes your guild. We've seen our first Sartharion with three drakes achievement in Guildwatch this week (above), and our first "The Undying" mention, too. Here's to many more.Lots more drama, downed and recruiting news after the break. Enjoy.
