draenei
Latest
Then and Now: Pretty addicts & space squids
Flash back to six months ago. There were people swearing up and down that the Blood Elves would ruin the Horde with their silly antics and their overly-pretty looks. Many on the Horde side had misgivings that we'd be dealing with a slew of switchers who were just rolling Horde to play pretty characters, but otherwise would bring little to the table. I remember seeing forum postings saying that Blood Elves would be outcast and unwelcome, and even a couple of "boycotts." Many other people were complaining about the "space shaman" that the Alliance were getting. Well, okay, most of the complaints were about the male models -- I don't think anyone on the Alliance side disliked the female Draenei models. Then of course, there were those who were just as unhappy with the changes to the Blood Elf models made towards the tail end of the open beta and swore they wouldn't roll one due to the larger chest.Flash forward to now. My guild has one Blood Elf paladin who is approaching endgame: an old guild mate who re-rolled. We also have a host of Blood Elf alts in various stages of being run up through the ranks. None of us are even batting an eyelash at any of them. There again, none of these are new players to the guild, so we aren't dealing with any potential switchers. Another of my guild mates is doing the faction grind to get her undead a chocobo... err... thunder chicken... whatever those things are. The forums are no longer ablaze with "Blood Elves suck!" or "Just say no to space squid!"I know for me, despite misgivings, the Blood Elves have largely been a blip on my personal radar. I have a Blood Elf hunter (stereotypical, had to do it) who is all of level 19, and has been collecting dust for some time now. I saw the content and experienced most of the new quests, which was pretty much what I set out to do. None of it has made me want to level a Blood Elf to endgame to take the place of my Troll/Tauren/Undead characters. And that's even including the Blood Elves having some extremely awesome racials that I'm sure will eventually make me level one. Have the Draenei or Blood Elves totally changed your gaming landscape? Have you noticed a lot of faction switching, or did you switch to the other side yourself? Did people really boycott, or were prejudices eventually left behind? For those of you who rerolled or switched, have you been treated any differently?Just curious, since there was so much fire and vitriol about the new races before Burning Crusade went live.[many thanks to Sean]
Bugs show a little emotion
Sorandra over on Livejournal has an interesting bug happening when she runs WoW in Vista-- her female draenei is showing a different skin in different situations. Out of water, she's got the face you see up on the left. But in water, a different face appears. It looks like her toon just really hates water.Of course it's just a texture error (a known one, at that), most likely fixed by updating her video drivers. But it does kind of make you wonder a little bit why Blizzard doesn't bother implementing something like this for real, and making characters actually show facial animations. Sure, the mouths move, but we can't actually frown when we /frown or smile when we /smile. If it's this easy to change the face textures, it seems like it would be just as easy to show displeasure for real.The only obstacle might be that they'd have to design different textures for each gender and race, which would take a bit of time (time probably best spent on the actual patches and expansions). Still, a little more emotion would be fun to have. If Blizzard ever gets around to doing a graphics overhaul (much like Dark Age of Camelot has done with one of their expansions), hopefully something like this will be on the list.
Around Azeroth: Bloodmyst Isle
Thirlwell of Khadgar sends in this excellent shot of the northern shore of Bloodmyst Isle, in the draenei starting zone. Of the two newbie zones included in the Burning Crusade, I can't pick a favorite. Bloodmyst, as you see it here, is an interesting red-tinged version of a night elf zone, and home to one of my favorite quests in the game: The Kessel Run. In comparison, what does Ghostlands offer? Just wandering elites which occasionally come by to say hello just as you're finishing a mob. Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! Or perhaps you'd just like to see more of your pics from Around Azeroth. %Gallery-1816%
I have portals, I know things
The other day I was helping a guildie with their mage as they reached 20. Thus began the long journey to collect teleportation training from around Azeroth. Something he said along the way stuck with me though. He mentioned that he hardly sees people asking for portals to Darnassus now. I thought about it, and would have to agree. I seem to sell as many ports to Darnassus as I sell to the Exodar. The cities are so closely linked, it's fairly easy to hop on a boat and be anywhere on Kalimdor that you need to be. Why then the great level difference in the training? The portal to Darnassus still remains a spell you can train in at level 50, while the portal to the Exodar is a level 40 spell. This goes for the teleport spells as well, since the level for Darnassus is 30, while all the others are available at level 20. So in essence, all that bouncing around the continent starts ten levels sooner. I imagine that initially the portal to Darnassus was level 50 because it represents a greater magical achievement. You are now transporting a group across the ocean. Does the Exodar require less skill to use? You are still transporting people across the Great Sea. Wouldn't it in fact require more skill, seeing as how we have had a longer history with the Night Elves than we have with the Draenei? I am thinking that the developers might want to take a look at the level requirements for the portals. The initial level requirements seemed to support the lore. The training, as it stands currently, does not. A possible explanation is that Night Elves shun arcane magic. However, they do accept the portal trainer within their city, so this argument doesn't seem to work for me. If they let that first mage in there to create the portals in the first place, why would it be more difficult for other mages to do so? Is there some sort of other explanation that I'm missing as to why there is such a level discrepancy with both the teleport and the portal spells to Darnassus?
Around Azeroth: Flying draenei!
Draenei don't naturally fly, as best I can tell. They don't, after all, have wings or any other obvious mechanisms of flight. However, reader Genso of Hyjal sends in this shot of what can only be described as a flying draenei. He claims it's some sort of quest, but I'm not so sure -- who knows what kind of technology those crafty draenei brought with them to Azeroth... Watch out, draenei, I'm on to your secrets!Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! Or perhaps you'd just like to see more of your pics from Around Azeroth. %Gallery-1816%
Around Azeroth: One giant leap for draenei-kind
Reader Stolie sent in a series of shots from the airfield above Ironforge and the highest peak in Dun Morogh, taken from a draenei's perspective. Does this make Stolie the first draenei to climb this peak? It's impossible to say for certain (I received this shot on February 7th, in case you were wondering), but you can find more pictures of Stolie's journey on Flickr.Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! You can attach a picture file or send us a link to one -- and don't worry about formatting, we'll take care of that part. See more of your pics from Around Azeroth. %Gallery-1816%
Flash heals for everyone
Mystic Worlds (who just changed the color scheme on her blog) has an interesting idea: give every single class in the game the chance to have a flash heal all for themselves.To a certain extent, things already seem to be going in that direction-- the Gift of the Naaru is pretty much exactly what she's talking about, except that it's only for Draenei. And Blood Elves, with Mana Tap and Arcane Torrent, have what you might call a "flash mana heal." Additionally, lots of high end gear is showing up with a chance to heal on it-- there's even an enchant now that periodically heals the whole party. Mobs are hitting harder than ever, but there's also more ways to recover from it.But MW wants a "heal yourself, nub" heal-- for rogues or casters who don't manage aggro, or warriors who don't wait for mana. That idea I'm not thrilled about-- one way to "train" a caster not to pull aggro is to simply let them die. If we gave casters all kinds of outs, there's lowered incentive for them to do their job right in the first place. Of course, MW does say that each class would be required to spec a certain way for the heal, so it wouldn't exactly be free-- players who could play their class right could spec a different way and take the bonuses that came along with it, and players who wanted things to be a little easier could spec for the flash heal.Then again, by the end of MW's piece, you can tell she's just ranting about being told to heal. That I can identify with-- if I'm main healing an instance, you don't have to tell me to heal you. If I'm supposed to heal you, and I can heal you, I'm healing you. Whether every class has a flash heal or not, if you're not the warrior and we're all doing things right, you probably shouldn't be getting hit in the first place.
A Shaman Primer for new players
The following document was created to help Shaman, specifically Draenei Shaman, as they find themselves as the new class in the Alliance. It's also useful for those who are about to group with a Shaman (or two or three), to understand what role a shammy will play in your group or raid. Finally, it's definitely a good read for anyone who's just picking up the Shaman class, to give you a bit of a jump on your fellow players in knowing your place in groups and raids. As with most of my shaman info, the credit here definitely goes to Skew, my leveling buddy who is now on his 3rd level 60 Shaman. He swore that if Shaman were ever given to the Alliance, he'd play one, and he has. His knowledge and support and love of the class have been instrumental in encouraging the same in me. The bulk of the primer is posted after the break, so be sure to read and chime in with your thoughts on the role of a shaman.
Bug leaves Draenei out of the Alliance
It kind of boggles my mind that there are Draenei out there going through the Onyxia quest (not just because they're not supposed to be that level yet, but also because who still cares about Ony?), but apparently there are, and they're having issues. It seems the Draenei aren't yet considered to be in the Alliance for a few quests-- the note in A Crumpled Up Note isn't dropping for them at all. Also, the Flute of Xavaric, another Alliance item isn't appearing for them either. Drysc confirms it's a bug, and they're working on it.Which is a little strange, when you think about the mechanics of the game. One player mentions the Horde's experience with the necklace in Uldaman-- when Horde try to pick up that necklace, they get an error message (but at least it drops for them). Likewise, Blizzard was able to easily make Pally gear drop on all those Horde runs before the expansion, but they can't flag the Draenei as Alliance? Bit of an oversight, that.But here's hoping it'll be fixed soon, and the Draenei can be folded back under the wing of the Alliance forces for good.
Breakfast Topic: Azuremyst or Eversong?
By this point, even inveterate Alliance players like me have gotten a chance to check out the Blood Elf areas, and presumably Horde players have looked at Draenei too. There's no question that both Azuremyst Isle and Eversong Woods, as well as their associated next zones, are very well designed. In fact, they may be a little too good: the quests and quest rewards make the old-world starting zones look a little shoddy. I'll be highly tempted to roll Draenei whenever possible for my new characters in the future. (The excellent racials don't hurt, of course.) How do you think the starting zones stack up, both with respect to each other and as compared to the old-world zones? I have to say, I like Azuremyst a little better than Eversong, but then again, I did play it first, and I do have a bit of an Alliance bias.
Blue Notes: Draenei plural, more European migrations, Remorseless hotfix
I think I absorbed this from the race intro voice-over or something, but just like Shaman, the word for more than one draenei is "draenei" (Neth): It should be the same whether singular or plural. Yet more European migrations to delight us all, including one that was scheduled to be closed kept through over the weekend (Thundy): The below migrations will be activated today (Friday). They're scheduled to close on Monday January 29th, at 12:00 (noon) CET. However, again, please note that this may change at any time. Grim Batol to Jaedenar / Boulderfist / Vek'nilash (same as was running during the week) Shadowsong to Bronze Dragonflight / Anachronos Dragonblight to Bronze Dragonflight / Anachronos Quel'Thalas to Bronze Dragonflight / Anachronos Nordrassil to Bronze Dragonflight / Anachronos And finally, it appears that the crit bonus for the Rogue talent Remorseless Attacks was not being applied to Hemorrhage. This was a bug, and has been hotfixed (Ommra): Hello again, I am happy to inform you that a hot fix has been deployed for this :) Critical strike bonus for rogue talent Remorseless Attacks is now correctly applied to Hemorrhage.
The Azeroth Blues
Unlike some other draenei and blood elves, I'm not 60 yet. I hit 40 last night on my Draenei Shaman, and immediately picked up the mount and converted to mail gear. Then, a feeling of emptiness came over me. I was puzzled. I've leveled up before through Azeroth, this Shaman will be my 7th trip to 60 (and now beyond), and I really do enjoy leveling. What's hit me though is a feeling that I'm stuck in the same old content. It's not that I don't love Azeroth, I really do. It's been my home away from home for almost 3 years now. It's just that while I'm grinding away through levels in the "old country", all my guildies are out in the Outlands having fun and getting drool-worthy gear from mobs I've never heard of. Yes, I have some awesome company in the leveling grind (frequent commenter Skew is a good friend and guildie) as we both get our shamans raid-ready, but really, there's no sense of awe and exploration in Azeroth anymore. Would Blizzard have done better to implement a bit more mid-level content in the expansion? Levels 1 through 20 were fantastic on Azuremyst and Bloodmyst isles, and I've heard the Blood Elf content is just as fantastic. There's something particularly cool at the end of the Bloodmyst quest series that leaves a player feeling good about the world and their place in it. And then you head into the rest of Azeroth.
First 60 Draenei Shaman, Blood Elf Paladins seen ingame
Curse Gaming is reporting that Slops of Disposable Heroes on Aggramar-A has hit 60 with an Alliance Shaman. As far as they know (and I know), that's not only the first 60 Draenei seen in the game, it's also the first 60 Alliance Shammy in the game (see Update). Congrats! Now you'll know, Alliance, just how useful we Shammies are (yep, I play an Orc resto Shammy as my main).Slops did it with an amazing time of 3 days and 9 hours, which is doubly amazing, because as far as I know, the fastest time to 60 for any class I know of was just over 4 days (that was a few patches ago, though, and Shaman do rock). If someone hasn't already hit 60 (or even 70) with a Blood Elf Paladin yet, we'll probably see it here in a few days. In fact, if you know of one, drop us a note in the comments or over at "Contact Us" in the sidebar.Meanwhile, congrats to Slops for being one of the first Shaman to benefit from the crack cocaine that is a Pally's Judgement of Wisdom-- I won't lie, we spend mana like it's going out of style, and we can't wait to get a refill. Sure, I might not like them much, but I can't wait to share spells with the enemy in raids.Update: Well that didn't take long-- commenter Stephen says Yoshie of Relentless on Maelstrom EU hit 60 on Tuesday afternoon. Technically we don't know when Slops hit, but there's also been reports of a 60 Blood Elf Paladin sighting as well. There's no question Slops' time was fast, but unless Blizzard wants to let us know for sure, we might never know exactly who the first endgame Alliance Shaman was.
.jpg.cf.jpg)
Are the Draenei too good?
Sure, anything that looks vaguely like Dr. Zoidberg probably can't be TOO good, but you have to admit that the draenei are almost preternaturally nice. They're all about healing the environment, and helping the needy, and preserving the light. The undead Kendoch of Blackrock says that their goodness has really turned him off from playing one, since it ruins his suspension of disbelief. Other posters add that the Tauren are also pretty much perfectly good, except for the Grimtotem tribe, and that the Draenei might be very nice, but the Eredar -- who are about the same thing, genetically -- have messed up the entire universe. Another thing to keep in mind is that the Draenei are fairly extreme in their pursuit of goodness, and in the Warcraft universe, any kind of extremism leads to bad things. Humans who got too extreme in their pursuit of the Scourge became the Scarlet Crusade. Going to "any lengths" to stop the Burning Legion led Tyrande to free Illidan, and we all know how that turned out. And the Draenei HATE the blood elves -- one of their early quests leads a Draenei chief to exclaim, "They must be wiped from the face of the earth!" More than a little creepy. I know many members of the Horde refer to Draenei as filthy hippies or goody-two-shoes, but what do you think about the Draenei? Is their goody-goody exterior true to form, or is any race that makes sexual jokes about gnomes and the Staff of Dominance hiding some naughty secrets?
Starting zone questions answered: Azuremyst Isle
So, want to take a break from the phat lewts in Outlands and try out one of the new races? How about Draenei? Here's the information you need to know so you can avoid asking ridiculously common questions in chat. The nearest mailbox is at Azure Watch, the first Draenei town. To learn Jewelcrafting, go to the Exodar. To get to the rest of Azeroth, take a boat from the docks just south of the Exodar to Auberdine. Your Heroic/Inpsiring Presence aura is working, it just doesn't display on yourself. Draenei Priests get for their racials Fear Ward and Symbol of Hope (mana over time (MoT?) spell for party). The low level character on an elekk has it as party of a quest; it's only temporary. You may need to kill a few furbolgs to get the Bristlelimb chief to spawn. You can only use the tree disguise by the flag. Anything I'm missing? Let me know. And remember the lessons of the past.
Blizzard devs are able to go outside again, give interviews
I guess since the expansion is finally done, all the Blizzard devs have time to talk. While reviews on the Burning Crusade are still forthcoming for the most part, there's been a couple dev interviews pop up post-launch.There's not much you won't hear on the Collector's Edition DVD, but over on Firing Squad they have a short one-on-one with Jeff "Tigole" Kaplan. Most interesting is probably how the dev team is justifying adding the sci-fi stuff to Warcraft, via the Draenei and their spaceships-- Tigole suggests there's been an "otherworldly leaning" from the beginning, with the Titans and their worldmaking, and the alien origins of the Orcs. Also, he talks about his favorite creatures in Outland, and while I've only seen Fel Reavers so far, I was definitely impressed.And at Gamespot UK's site, they catch Blizzard's Jon LeCraft. He says that the expansion's delay turned out to be time well spent and that the devs had a lot of fun making starter areas again (since their philosophies have changed so much-- that means we need more midgame content now, guys!). Finally, he acknowledges that the new 25-man cap on instances will mean breakups for some guilds, but that making everyone in the raid necessary was more important to Blizzard than simply allowing 15 people to stand around waiting for loot while the other 25 actually did the work.Nothing super new, and unfortunately, no news about what's next, either in terms of an expansion or a patch direction. But we're definitely glad the devs are getting a chance to catch their breath, and learn some lessons from this week's release.[ via Curse ]
Draenei have left the Exodar!
EVERYBODY PANIC! Actually, it seems as though everyone else wanting to quickly level a Draenei did just what I did. They got off of Azuremyst Isle as quickly as possible, and headed back to comfortable and familiar hunting grounds. In my case, that was Goldshire. I can only imagine how those poor humans felt as they saw a half-dozen squid-faced monsters earth-shocking their way through the Fargodeep Mine. Sure, the puny humans fled, but that's because they understood the might of the Draenei when we had a raid of 2 to take down Hogger. The wide-open spaces of your Goldshire amused us, and soon we were taking over logging duties in Eastvale, also slaying those silly little murloc things by the dozen. GLURGLURGLELURGLE indeed. Running back into Stormwind, I was constantly accosted by people saying things such as, "How's the weather up there?" and "Nice face, blue face." Do they not realize that we're only barely taller than night elves, WHO ARE ALSO BLUE TINGED? Words hurt, people, words hurt. However, one funny soul decided to follow me around asking "Can you make trinkcits?" Yes, "trinkcits." No, I cannot make your "trinckits" yet. I can make a little golem who spits healing love at me. I can even make copper rings if you ask nicely, and give me some money for this weekend party the Naga are having. I think the point I'd like to make is that yes, we're Draenei, yes we're new to you, but we're not new to us. We've been traveling around in our spacesh...interdimensional vessel.. for quite some time, and if it weren't for those accursed elves (blood not night, we love you, really we do) we'd have continued past your Scourge-infested world and on to happier times with the Naaru and the warmth of the light. So please, ask your children not to tug on our tentacles, do not call us "squidbillies" behind our backs, and do not assume we all know jewelcrafting (even if we do). We're regular folk, just like you and that gnome over there, and we're here to help you fight the Burning Legion. Now, can I get a summon?
Breakfast Topic: What did you do once you got your hands on the expansion?
Yesterday, we asked you what you were going to do after you installed BC. Since many of you have gotten a chance to buy and install BC by now, I'd like to see if you lived up to your predictions. What's the first think you did do when you installed BC? Personally, I did what I thought I would: rolled a male Draenei warrior named Giles. So let's have it -- new toon or Outland adventures? Feel free to come back and post here whenever you get the expansion.
Secrets of the Burning Crusade minisite
Blizzard has posted a brand new Burning Crusade mini site, and it's pretty spiffy. After a quick intro (how can I have missed that the Blood Elf mount is now called the "Hawkstrider"? What was wrong with the other name, Co-- ohhh, I see.), the music starts and you can enter the lush world of... a flash website.There's not much news in it, if you've been paying attention to BC previews at all. It runs you quickly through all the new content-- flying mounts, the new jewelcrafting profession, the new races, Arena PVP, and the new world of Outland, and even has a few good writeups of the different dungeons and factions you'll see in Outland. Overall, nothing really new, but there's good music throughout, and it's easy to check out. If you're already excited for BC (and how could you not be?), this will only add to the trembling in expectation.Oh, almost forgot-- there's a secret minigame hidden among all the content. Poke around, if you like-- Blizzard has hidden some secret clicks in there that allow you to eventually access top secret content. It's not hard to figure out, but if you really don't want to bother with it, we'll even provide you with a walkthrough after the jump.
The Burning Crusade: Preparing for the Expansion
With exactly two weeks to go, I'm left feeling a little blah about what to do in the World of Warcraft. Not quite enough time to get another character to 60 (well, maybe my shammy), not really in the mood for raiding when my gear is soon to be replaced anyway, and the PvP grind is wearing me out a bit. Fortunately for me (and for you!), I came across a posting on TenTonHammer from about a month ago. So while it may be "old news" to you, I think that it's well worth the read, given that we're so close to launch. The article covers the following topics with some good hints and tips:
