nesingwary
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Connected Realms: Cause for caution as characters disappear
Many players have wondered, after the announcement of Connected Realms, and the slow creep of connections taking place, why it isn't all moving faster. Why isn't their low-population realm on the list? When can they start recruiting? Why is it all taking Blizzard so long? Are they just resting on their laurels? Are they just being lazy? Well, I have a cautionary tale that might help to clarify the situation. Yesterday, after maintenance in the US, inhabitants of very recently connected realms Nesingwary and Vek'nilash happened upon some highly unusual issues. Players were logging in and discovering their characters were gone. Disappeared. And players who could still see all their characters on the login screen could only access a few of them. Other players weighed in with their stories of being unable to access guild banks, guild bank logs being years out of date, and more. 14 hours later, at the time of writing, and it only seems to be getting weirder, with characters flagged for rename, and duplicates or copies of long-deleted characters starting to appear. Players are starting to panic and grabbing their names with level one alts for security. Blizzard blue Vrakthris has been doing his best to help, giving players a code to put in tickets so they could all be dealt with swiftly, but this doesn't seem like it's been resolved just yet.
Wrath 101: The Oracles and the Frenzyheart Tribe
Throughout the lifespan of Ask a Beta Tester (now The Queue), people have asked if there are any factions like the Aldor and Scryers. Are there two factions like that, you get to pick one or the other? The answer is yes, but they don't play as big of a role. They're less prime players of the expansion, and more lolcat comedy relief.I'm convinced that this situation in Sholazar Basin isn't to be determined by which faction you like more, but which faction you hate less. The two warring factions are The Oracles and the Frenzyheart Tribe. The Oracles are a group of fully sentient, 'intelligent' gorlocs (a step up in murloc evolution) that unknowingly worship the Titans. The Frenzyheart Tribe are a tribe of wolvar (little wolverine men) and they're fairly new to Sholazar Basin. They're huge jerks that do jerk things and steal gorloc land like jerks. The gorlocs do have big, annoyingly floppy tongues though, so I guess it's justified.
WoW Insider previews the zones of Northrend
We showed you what Northrend has to offer in pictoral form last night, but here's a rundown of the various zones you'll see up in the frozen north when you take that boat or zeppelin. Northrend definitely seems like some of the best work Blizzard has ever done -- there's a zone-wide city of Trolls, we're getting visits from new NPCs like the Oracles (talking Murlocs!) and the Tuskarr and Taunka, and old visits from groups like The Venture Company, the Titans, and old Hemet Nesingwary himself. And the richness of available landscapes here is amazing as well, from the chilly flats of the Borean Tundra to the sheltered heat of the rainforests of Sho'lazar to the windswept, battered Storm Peaks and the icy evil of Icecrown.Northrend is going to be amazing -- here's one final preview before we take that step into the land of the Lich King. %Gallery-36678%
Ask a Beta Tester: Of Northrend and Nesingwary
Today we're going on safari with a question from t_d, who asked.... Do we get to see Hemet Nesingwary do some big game hunting in Northrend and if so, who did he leave in charge of the Nagrand Expedition? Where there's new adventures to be had -- and new beasts to hunt -- you will find Hemet Nesingwary, struggling to rid the world of dangerous creatures everywhere. Though on the beta realms, his camp in Nagrand still contains Hemet himself, we're guessing that when Wrath goes live they'll replace him with a stand-in, similar to what they did when he came to Nagrand from Stranglethorn Vale. For more on on Hemet Nesingwary -- and other questions -- read on! But if you're the sort who wants to avoid spoilers, turn back now. We're aiming to avoid major story spoilers, but this feature is all about beta content and we can't talk about the beta without giving a few things away.
Insider Trader: Cooking, the final stretch
Cooking is a secondary tradeskill that most players should strongly consider learning, and maximizing. The buffs that many of the foods award can be quite helpful, and aside from damage buffs, there are also healing buffs, tank buffs, and food for hunter and warlock pets, among other yummy treats. If you rely on purchasing the foods from the auction house, you'll find your consumables bill soaring upward. You can also make a profit from cooking, especially regarding pet food. Because many players are stubborn and won't learn any of the secondary skills, you can sell your dishes for a hefty price. Still, if you don't fall madly in love with cooking, searching high and low for the latest recipe and farming to your favorite tunes, then you might have some trouble and confusion when trying to reach 375. This week, Insider Trader will take an in-depth look at the easiest path to cooking 375, avoiding fishing altogether. Although they go hand-in-hand, they can be done separately, and many cooks do not want to become fishermen.
Drysc weighs in on questing
Player Tychlona of Kul Tiras made a fair point in a forum post when she noted that it sometimes gets a little annoying doing "collection" quests where it seems to take hours to collect what you need, Be it Gray Bear Tongues or Helboar Meat. I'd say that most of us can likely feel her pain on that measure. Drysc answered her later in the thread with some of his own insight into the process of questing and dealing with various types of quests. His point that sometimes seeing that "5/30 Windroc" notice in your quest log can make a quest feel like a bit of grind is very understandable, but I have to counter that seeing that "8/10 Monstrous Crawler Leg" in your quest log and knowing you've already killed 30 mobs without those last 2 legs appearing can feel just as grinding. He says a few more interesting things that may shine some light on Blizzard's questing philosophy, which I'll discuss after the jump.
Hey! You've got your Azeroth in my Outland!
So earlier today I finally decided to leave the confines of Hellfire Peninsula (I haven't even come close to finishing all the quests there-- Outland is just plain packed with things to collect and kill) and check out the rest of the continent for myself. I did a quick loop around Zangarmarsh and then headed for my favorite zone so far, Nagrand, to see the PVP town of Halaa, and then, on my way back to Terokkar Forest and Shattrath, I noticed a familiar looking camp on the side of the road. I pulled up, shocked, and sure enough, it was my old friend Hemet Nesingwary! The master hunter (and quest giver) actually recognized me when I talked to him from our time together back in STV (apparently he's left his son in charge back there), and said he'd come through the portal and leveled up to 70 in the blink of an eye, just to see how the hunting is here in Outland.Likewise, while I haven't seen him yet, I hear Rexxar, the questgiver in the Horde Onyxia quest chain who used to be in Desolace, now resides at a settlement in Blade's Edge Mountains. Maybe I just don't know how much WoW has affected me, but seeing Hemet in Nagrand was like seeing an old friend, and I know when I see Rexxar I'll have to give him a /nod or even a /wave as well.And the self-referential stuff goes back even farther than WoW's Azeroth-- the Unyielding Vengeful Knights and Footmen in the Expedition Armory in Hellfire Peninsula are right out of Warcraft II, and the first time I went to Shattrath to do the little tour quest, I was too agog at the scenery to realize the questgiver I was clicking through was none other than Khadgar-- THE Khadgar! As in, the one standing with the rest of the statues in Stormwind!I love Blizzard's references to pop culture and the real world. And yes, it's nerdy, but I think that I love their self-referential lore stuff even more-- it's awesome to see the story of these characters play out before our eyes. Seen any other familiar faces in Outland yet?
