More Crafting Woes.

Holy cow!

So, there I am in the Dwarven District next to the trainer at the forge. I've purchased all of the training he has for me, all of my crafts are grayed out, and I'm sitting at 515 Blacksmithing.

What the...?

After the shock passes, I ask my guild what I'm missing here since I should either have more stuff to buy or more training to do...and I'm told I have to go to Twilight Highlands and buy additional plans there...and the currency is ore.

I think about the ore for only a moment before the idea passes by and I give out a sigh and head out.

I find the vendor and sure enough, Elementium is the currency for the rest of my blacksmithing plans. Plus, I still need to use more ore to craft them. But Elementium is not the only ore, I also need to buy plans with Hardened Elementium and Pyrium bars. *sigh*

So, I do the deed, max out my Blacksmithing, done my blue "bloodied" gear, see the gear achievement pop up, and promptly que for my first heroic Cataclysm dungeon.

Why does crafting have to be so awful?

After 85

Well, last night while I was in the middle of the mildly humorous Uldum questlines, I dinged 85.

So, now what?

In Lich King, I didn't cap out until most players were good and done with all of the low-level content. So this time around I am much more punctual and can take advantage of people still running the first of the Cataclysm 5-mans.

Also, crafting is still in its infancy, though the market is leveling off, and I can make some profit there.

Blacksmithing is going to be a pain, again, of course, but at least I'm not too far behind the curve this time. And with over 10k in gold now, I can afford some of the more expensive mats if I need to buy anything off the auction house.

More and more I think I would like to raid a little.

I also have a few alts to finish leveling.

Still, I'm looking forward to the next content patch. Not sure what it'll bring to the table for solo players like myself, but I'm sure there will be something...maybe the revamped Darkmoon Fair?

Crafting Woes in Cataclysm.

So, apparently Blizzard decided to "improve" the crafting experience in World of Warcraft. I read about it while the beta was live and remember being sort of excited. But today I had to look it up because whatever this "improvement" was, I wasn't seeing it in the crafting that I did yesterday.

I smelted over 700 ore, then folded over 120 Obsidium Bars, crafted up to 480 skill level (maybe more), then ran out of resources. At this point the only "special" material I needed was a handful of Volatile Earth, which I seem to have a lot of. So, I was thinking afterward, what was this "improvement" that I was supposed to experience?

So today I googled it up and read that items would be crafted with random stats.

Say what?

I don't know what I was thinking when I first heard about these "improvements", but I remember being excited. Is this what I was excited about? Was I so thirsty for something new that this was all I needed? Random stats on greens?

Maybe this works out better in the blue and purple range, makes it easier to profit a little on the auction house. But on the other hand, doesn't this potentially make things worse?

First, no one cares about the green stuff. Maybe you can use some of it, but it's only going to last a few hours, a couple of days max, before you replace your crafted green item with a leveling reward. The blues might last a little longer. But really, the only people who care about greens and most blues, are enchanters who need to destroy special items for their own materials. Stats don't mean anything to them.

So, then we get to the epics, the mighty purples. Have you ever crafted an epic item? It's tedious. You need a LOT of materials that you have to grind out or buy from the auction house. If you are only in need of one of those epic, crafted items for yourself, it will still be costly. Especially if you need items that are soulbound and only found in dungeons. A few five mans might be ok, but what if your item only drops in raids?

"If you aren't raiding, then you don't need the it!", whatever.

So, let's pretend you finally get all the mats you need. You are a warrior. You want an epic crafted shield or sword or whatever. You find a forge, double check that you have everything you need for your one item, watch the bar...and your item comes out with int on it.

*sigh*

So, I'm not really looking forward to living out my own nightmare, but that's what I see coming down the line.

And what is up with this extra crafting material? Folded Obsidium? Are you kidding me? Blizzard actually wants me to work harder (waste more time) on my crafting by making me add an extra step to the process and force me to gather more low-level ores than I ever have before? Sure, it appears that we no longer need to put ten elemetal items together to form a super element, but by adding this other extra step, they haven't improved anything at all.

And by making it possible for me to waste my high-level mats on an item with random stats that I don't actually want just seems sadistic.

I don't know, maybe the random stats are just numbers and not individual things like def vs. spirit. I didn't look at any of the items that I sold yesterday, so I'll have to try and remember to look next time I blow a load of ore.

I've never really liked crafting Warcraft. Only it's promise. I wish I could quit it.

Level 84+

I took most of a day off from leveling and played around with a worgen warlock for a couple of hours. Really fun environment for the starting zone. The gloomy mood is great. The music is mostly appropriate, but some of it seems a little too "upbeat" and takes me out of the experience just a little. The little bite "debuff" that changed messages a few times was funny, "...you don't feel so good".

The next day I mostly did mining. I have some woes for another post.

I went back to Twilight Highlands so I could get the portal open. Next I need to get the Uldum portal in working condition then I'll be set for Cataclysm travel. By then I should be half way or more into 84. I might just hang out in Uldum until I'm 85, complete the zone, and gather some pyrite while I'm there.

Once again, I don't think I'm going to be raiding. I have young children and raiding just takes up too much time. Not that my guild would want me in a raid, but if I could get a spot, would I do it?

It's only once or twice a week.

I've done it before.

But I don't do much grouping at all anymore. I like the freedom of being able to leave my computer at a moment's notice to read to my daughter, or put my youngest son down for a nap. Or stare at my beautiful wife for a few minutes. Or make an emergency run to the store for supper.

I don't know, I might give it a shot. Only a couple times a week, right?

Level 83+

I've cleared Vash'ir and am moving along nicely in Deepholm. Got the "Explore Cataclysm" achievement along with the lore-related achievements for Vash'ir. Maxed out mining and only ever came across one mineral node that I couldn't get in the process. Have over two hundred Osidium Ore and gathering Elementium quickly. Gonna need a lot more of both though.

Ran across Teckton the sheep outside of Stormwind, in the mountains. Fun. The Gnome that comes running out of the house is great. I actually feel bad for killing his sheep, but it hasn't stopped me from going back.

Cataclysm Hits Home!

Cataclysm is now live at the house. That's all I have to say about that.

Merry Cataclysm!

I don't have the expansion yet. I decided to wait a little while and make sure my kids had the best Christmas I can manage. However, I am leveling a new mage. I already had one, but she's been through some of the old leveling content, also, she's decked out a little in stuff supplied by my main, and she's holding down a guild bank.

So I decided to start fresh. I thought I would at least have to send the new mage some gold for a mount...not so. She has no professions, yet from quest rewards and vendoring absolutely anything that wasn't a gear upgrade, she was able to get a mount as soon as it was unlocked. At level 37, she has about 60 gold now. She has done no auction house selling, my main has given her no gold.

The new questing zones are nice enough, but it feels like something is missing from the experience. There are regions within the zones that I used to visit while leveling in the old content that has gone totally without a glance now. There are other things are being left unexplained. For instance, the whirlwinds in Westfall. None of the NPCs seem to have noticed them suddenly appear out of nowhere and that they aren't going away.

The Rambo experience in Redridge was interesting, but I think they laid it on a little thick. And what was up with the bow reward? Throughout the questline Keeshan "Rambo" is seen with a really awesome-looking bow, but the reward wasn't that remarkable at all. Yet they called it Keeshan's Bow. Meh. I suppose it's possible that it really was the bow and the hand thing that I thought I saw attached to it was really just a separate gauntlet.

Darkshire was nice, as usual, but the change to the music took a little of mood away from the experience. The general tune is still there, but they've added some stuff to it. In the case of a place like that, less is more. By adding the extra musical tones, they've placed too much into the sound.

Stranglethorn. Wow. It always was a huge zone and it still is. But it is much easier to level in now. I used die there a lot, but not so much now. I made a couple of dumb mistakes and could have died less, but still, my record was the lowest yet. I almost feel bad for anyone supplying their new alts with heirlooms and other stuff from their mains. This new mage is way overpowered with no help whatsoever.

The ease of leveling though is a good for the game, I think. I came into online gaming from the Balder's Gate and Icewind Dale era, and I came to those straight from pen and paper gaming. So I used to expect games to be punishingly difficult. But that was a long time ago, and younger players generally don't come with those experiences.

Still, I think there might be a few too many flight paths these days. But don't think for a moment that I haven't taken advantage of them.

Looking forward to getting the expansion, but I actually hope I don't get around to it till this mage is much further along.