(WoW) Mists of Pandaria, Day 1
I've been keeping relatively low on general spoilers for the expansion. Oh, I knew about the talent revamp and the pet battles in a general sense, but I've not studied any of the zones or dungeons. So it was actually a surprise to me to see King Varian ordering a mission to find his son.
Of course, first thing's first. Before the actual release, Monday marked the start of this year's Harvest Festival, so I had to take my paladin on her yearly pilgrimage to Uther's tomb. When the expansion went live, I made the rounds to train skills to the next level before reporting to the king.
The opening quests involved a vehicle assault on a Horde fort on the shores of Pandaria. Technically... there were some issues. The sheer number of players doing it at the same time and the forced camera angle made it nearly impossible to see the targets in the latter half of the quest, much less actually hit them before someone else did. That's not a bug, exactly, and I did eventually get through it, but I think it counts as problemtatic design at least. After that was an assault on foot, which worked more normally and immediately drove home one of the things I love about GW2: kill-sharing (which, unfortunately, would take work to adapt without GW2's level-scaling). But I was able to get my required kills without too much additional time and the area looting feature is a nice quality of life improvement. I was also taunted by rich ghost iron veins in the area - the normal ones were surely mined out by people like me until they spawned as rich versions, which require a higher mining skill than most people would have at that point. I finished out the night on a note of victory by running around a bit to get my skill up and came back to mine the rich veins on the shore. Take that, game!
The scenery in the Jade Forest is lush and lovely, though still in Warcraft style. The music that I've noticed is nice. The story so far is reasonably good, though it meanders a little. My semi-IC gut instinct is to find Anduin, but after the conflict at the landing the Alliance has been put into making-friends mode with the locals. Now, that's good for long-term support, but as a veteran of Outland, Icecrown, the Firelands, and the fight with Deathwing, I feel like that should be a little beneath me and I should be able to go looking. But the Alliance-Horde conflict has also roused spirits in Pandaria, with dark sha possessing people unwittingly - it appears that is a theme that may carry on through the expansion. That's all the more reason in my mind to find Anduin and back off. I also have to say that the airship's return to the fleet is a little mystifying when the mission is not yet completed, but if SI:7 is taking over on the ground, so be it.
We'll see where this goes. So far, it's probably the smoothest WoW launch I've seen, with one quest causing issues, but we weren't even forced to relogin at launch time. That's a good sign.
Of course, first thing's first. Before the actual release, Monday marked the start of this year's Harvest Festival, so I had to take my paladin on her yearly pilgrimage to Uther's tomb. When the expansion went live, I made the rounds to train skills to the next level before reporting to the king.
The opening quests involved a vehicle assault on a Horde fort on the shores of Pandaria. Technically... there were some issues. The sheer number of players doing it at the same time and the forced camera angle made it nearly impossible to see the targets in the latter half of the quest, much less actually hit them before someone else did. That's not a bug, exactly, and I did eventually get through it, but I think it counts as problemtatic design at least. After that was an assault on foot, which worked more normally and immediately drove home one of the things I love about GW2: kill-sharing (which, unfortunately, would take work to adapt without GW2's level-scaling). But I was able to get my required kills without too much additional time and the area looting feature is a nice quality of life improvement. I was also taunted by rich ghost iron veins in the area - the normal ones were surely mined out by people like me until they spawned as rich versions, which require a higher mining skill than most people would have at that point. I finished out the night on a note of victory by running around a bit to get my skill up and came back to mine the rich veins on the shore. Take that, game!
The scenery in the Jade Forest is lush and lovely, though still in Warcraft style. The music that I've noticed is nice. The story so far is reasonably good, though it meanders a little. My semi-IC gut instinct is to find Anduin, but after the conflict at the landing the Alliance has been put into making-friends mode with the locals. Now, that's good for long-term support, but as a veteran of Outland, Icecrown, the Firelands, and the fight with Deathwing, I feel like that should be a little beneath me and I should be able to go looking. But the Alliance-Horde conflict has also roused spirits in Pandaria, with dark sha possessing people unwittingly - it appears that is a theme that may carry on through the expansion. That's all the more reason in my mind to find Anduin and back off. I also have to say that the airship's return to the fleet is a little mystifying when the mission is not yet completed, but if SI:7 is taking over on the ground, so be it.
We'll see where this goes. So far, it's probably the smoothest WoW launch I've seen, with one quest causing issues, but we weren't even forced to relogin at launch time. That's a good sign.
Awaiting Day 2 ~ 3: Where the F to quest!
ReplyDelete*smirks* Just for you, I'll start on that...
ReplyDelete