I will share with you what I have told my district representative and both senators who represent the state of Minnesota within which I reside, and what I partially posted as a comment on the petition I signed to stop the ESA from standing as spokespeople for the gaming industry while supporting the SOPA and PIPA, by banning one of their largest sources of revenue, E3.

As a former US Marine who has served this country and the freedom she represents, I view the SOPA and PIPA legislation as nothing less than a direct threat to that freedom of speech and personal expression upon which this country was founded. I expect my elected representatives to hold the interests of the citizens of this country above that of business interests, no matter how well funded or represented by lobbyists, and I will vehemently oppose any politician or organization that seeks to strip from me those freedoms which I do NOT take for granted, but instead consider part of the legacy that I have inherited as a citizen of this country, a legacy to which I have had the honor to help preserve.

I encourage each of you to contact your own state representatives and senators, and make your own feelings on this issue clear. Your individual words to them may not matter, but you can rest assured that your email will be counted on a spreadsheet list as one of X number of registered voters who have contacted that representative upon that date to state your opposition.

Politicians may ignore what you say you want as an individual, but when it is made clear that the sheer quantity of people willing to throw off their lethargy and send an email threatens their majority for the next re-election campaign, they take notice. At that point, it is in their own self-interest to pay attention.

We can only hope that their desire for re-election outweighs the ‘contributions’ large corporations and special interests are making to pay them off.

Oh wait, did I say that out loud?

Besides this being a Bearwall, that is.

I feel disconnected from what everyone else is talking about when it comes to WoW.

I read blog posts, WoW forum comments and blue responses, and I swear I don’t know what game some of these folks are talking about. What happened? Where the hell did I go, and what did I miss?

When I read blogs and forum comments, the narrative these days seems to be, “People in randoms suck and that makes them unplayable and it’s Blizzards fault, we beat LFR and thus the game, now there is nothing to do and it’s Blizzards fault, I got the best gear I can from LFR and valor so there is no point to playing anymore and it’s Blizzards fault, the game is boring to level an alt through again for the thirtieth time and it’s Blizzards fault, everyone hates pandas and thinks the lore of Pandaren is stupid so the next expansion is worthless crap and the death of WoW, Blizzard jumped the shark, game over man, game over.”

Apparently I missed the memo, spilled my cup of kool-aid, or don’t follow media reports closely enough to have been brainwashed into buying the narrative.

Silly me, I’ve been logging in and playing every night, and I have been SO busy with SO many things to do I am literally unable to do everything I’d like. There is just no time. I have to prioritize my fun to aim at the things I really want to do that I think will be MOST fun, and walk away from the game each night knowing I left some fun back there on the table. “If I’d just stayed up later, if maybe I only really needed 4 hours of sleep, maybe I could have taken home more of the fun last night.”

Why is it that so much of the discussion out there is about how dead the game is? I don’t even PvP, I haven’t done anything in the new Darkmoon Faire, and still there is just too much.

If a few people feel the game is dead, hey, I am truly sorry your game experience sucks. Paying money on a monthly basis to stare at the walls of Orgrimmar really would suck.  

But that’s not what I’m reading out there. I’m not reading a few individual people saying, “I feel like things are boring and dead”, I’m reading people making sweeping blanket statements like, “Everyone feels the game is dead, there is nothing to do, Blizzard you should…”

Here’s my take on the narrative. And when I say this, I am speaking MY opinion, and ONLY mine. YOUR EXPERIENCE MAY VARY, AND I DO NOT PRESUME TO SPEAK FOR YOU.

First, the “Pandas are Jumping the Shark” thing.

Pandas are WoW jumping the shark? Mists of Pandaria is fail, stupid, whatever?

Two words; Space Goats.

If you can really tell me with a straight face that disco-dancing space goats fleeing a demon horde across the endless dark, then crashing their spaceship city into a world was all fine and dandy, and a world breaking apart from the power of demonic forces but still retaining atmosphere and maintaining a self-sustaining ecosystem is spiffy, but martial arts pandas bringing balance to the force make you choke on your lore, I’ve got a face in a palm I’d like to show you.

What I’m saying is, that shark was jumped a long time ago. The Fonz jumped the shark while being pulled on his skies by a flying gnome-engineered helicopter.

What you have to do is get over it, and roll with it. If you didn’t quit then, why the hell would you quit now? The game is awesome anyway. Many whelps. Left Side. Handle it.

Second, the “WoW is boring, there is nothing to do” thing.

We’ve been over this ground before. Every period between content releases, we have this same discussion. And why?

Because there IS a period between content releases.

Until that far off distant day when new content is created as fast as or faster than it can be played through, there will always be times when new content was added, we played what parts of it we were interested in, and then wondered what to do until more new content.

Me, I suggest trying some other fine multiplayer game, such as Alpha Hex, when you are bored with the game you’re in.  

Would the lack of fresh monthly content even be an issue if folks didn’t pay a monthly fee, and thus felt entitled to a full months worth of fresh content every time their bank got tapped? I dunno, I don’t play any free-to-play games to have a perspective. Personally, I look at the game as being a real world that exists, floating in an alternate dimension, and I pay a monthly fee to visit, much like having to keep my passport up to date, but without the intrusive anal probes at customs.

My point is not to say that we should not get new content, or even to say that we are or are not getting new content at a satisfactory rate.

My point is that everybody is going to experience that content at a different rate based on their own available time to play the game, what parts of the game they are interested in, and how many friends they have to play with to serve as a force multiplier. it’s kinda hard to judge just how often is “often enough”.

To put this in a different perspective, I know a few folks that are upset at the quantity of new content we just got. It’s too much. They feel guilt at not doing everything that got released, but they don’t have the time. No, I’m not talking about me. :)

They feel like they SHOULD be doing all this new stuff like Darkmoon Faire and the LFR that came out, but they just don’t have time. This makes them feel bad, that they are being left behind, and I’ve heard it said they wish the content had been spread out over a few months instead of dumped all at once. 

And then there is the other side of the coin.

Just this last week someone in my guild logged in (cough, Dipro, cough) and complained about how bored they were and how there was nothing to do, and how Blizzard needs to release new raids right now, the game is boring and the new raids are boring and suck ass. 

Someone else replied that the Dragon Soul raid was almost brand new, and Dipro responded by saying “You run DS every week on LFR with four characters and tell me how fun that shit is. Blizzard needs to release a new raid.”

Really? Yes, really.

I try and give people the benefit of the doubt, but if someone runs a full 8 boss raid clear not once a week, not twice, but FOUR TIMES, and not just some weeks but every single week, then whose fault is it again if they burn out?

Blizzards, apparently, for not preventing him from being able to play too much, too fast.

Congratulations, we now have a classic example of where ideas like gating raids through quest chains and reputation grinds come from. Why? Because people either won’t or can’t take personal responsibility for living online, playing 24/7, and burning through the content in two weeks. If you want to do it, then fine by me, but where do you get off blaming Blizzard for it?

And as long as we’re talking about personal responsibility….

Finally, the biggest issue. Asshats in raids ruin the game.

I’m going to say it. This isn’t a “there are asshats in the game, Blizzard should get rid of them” issue.

This may surprise you, but the reason there are asshats in the game is that in the real world, there are a lot of people who are asshats. That is who they really are. They are asshats. They wear a hat on their ass, I can’t put it any plainer than that.

Or, as I used to say, “there are a lot of people who are alive in this world for no other reason than that it’s illegal to kill them.”

What many people don’t seem to grasp is how many asshats there are out there in the real world.

Most of the time, in the real world the asshats act like everyone else. Thank god they DO seem to be in the minority, so they hide who they really are by default in public. They do so because they get benefits out of being thought to be nice, or honest, or trustworthy, or mature, or dependable.

It all comes down to what is considered acceptable. If asshat behavior is acceptable, then asshats come out publicly. If it isn’t acceptable, then they hide, and feel other people out carefully to try and find other asshats in hiding that they can form a clique with.

In most modern companies, asshat behavior is written into employee manuals as unacceptable. Enough big companies have been sued successfully for toxic work envinronments that they have learned there is a monetary cost to allowing asshat behavior to run unchecked. If you act like an asshat you get written up, reprimanded, denied pay raises for not being a team player, lose out on promotion prospects, or get fired. Or sued for harassment or discrimination. Or get promoted to branch manager, if the culture approves of asshats and hasn’t been sued yet.

Why are there laws allowing for the sueing of a company based on a toxic work environment or for other issues dealing with respect and fair treatment? I feel, again, it’s because the asshats are in the minority. This is my own opinion, after all, you’re more than welcome to disagree. 

In most social groups, if you act like an asshat, people won’t hang out with you, you won’t get dates, at least until you find enough other asshats to form your own social group. And thus, the fraternity was born.  

Asshats tend to pretend to be what they are not, because as I said before, I truly believe most people are not asshats, and so the asshat minority hides what they really are so they can be accepted into the larger group and get what they want from others. If there is nothing they want from the other people around them, and there is no chance in their opinion that word of their behavior will get back to whoever they DO want things from, then they just act like an asshat, and say things like “I do what I want and to hell with what other people think”.

It really is all about what is acceptable. You want your guild to grow asshats like mushrooms after the rain? Asshats always make little ‘off-color’ remarks, are looking for other asshats to bond with, and so they feel other people out looking for other asshats in disguise. If they make overtures of asshattery in the guild chat channel that are received with approval instead of disgust, it gets a little bit more accepted in your guild. Other asshats in disguise may see that guy get away with it or be joked with, and feel it’s okay for them to come out a little as well. It spreads, it grows, it becomes accepted as part of the culture.

If that is who the majority of the guild people are, well, shit happens. But if not, then those who hate asshattery better be prepared to shut down that kind of behavior before it grows. I know I don’t want to play where asshat behavior is an accepted part of the team dynamic.

If asshattery become an accepted part of the guild culture, then when a non-asshat enters the environment, boom. Welcome to a toxic environment to be in, and you’ll lose the nice people fast. 

Am I talking about the real world, or the game world? Both. This all happens in the real world as well as WoW. Every day. And every different situation and environment you enter has the same underlying social dynamics going on. It’s just more obvious in WoW, where there are more opportunities to act without repercussions or long term consequences. Get too much of a reputation, get too many people friending you to track your name changes, and you can just make a new character or server transfer. In the real world, when people burn too many bridges they pick up stakes and move to a new town or state, job hop, switch regular bars or hangout places, whatever it takes to leave the consequences of their behavior behind.

For the purpose of this discussion, I’m lumping racists, sexists, jackasses, homophobes and all the other crap into one term; asshat.

When you come into World of Warcraft, all those same asshats are in the game. The game did not create them, it did not train them, they were not nice people until the game turned them into asshats. Asshat is their true inner person, their default state of being. They are only pretending to be nice to get what they want.

If they can get what they want AND act like an asshat, it is utopia. I have no idea what a guild formed solely of asshats would be like, but then again, I’ve never been in a fraternity, either. But hey, they don’t need a guild… they have LFD and LFR!

All those asshats, hiding behind their masks in front of their guilds… you get them on a cross server random BG or raid, surrounded by strangers, and let them loose. What happens?

You get people say all sorts of trash talking, people rolling Need on everything they can. Intentionally kill the Corruption tentacles to wipe Spine of Deathwing, again and again. Intentionally start encounters before they can be kicked, or before a full group can form. Pull oozes while people are still zoning in. Go afk in the middle of a fight, so if the group wins they got carried, roll need and leave with a sneer. Run addons that spam meters and spell activations until you can’t see actual text buried in the scroll going by.

LFD and LFR do not create asshats. Blizzard does not create asshats. They were there before, and the sudden lack of peer pressure and accountability encourages them to be themselves. The anonymity of LFD and now LFR did not create asshats, it just provided an opportunity.

I applaud every effort Blizzard makes to try and isolate asshats from affecting other players. The problem is, the convenience of LFR and LFD is just too damn sweet. For all our bitching about how LFR and LFD kill off server based communities, the fact is we all love the convenience of forming groups that don’t take all night sitting in one sitting spamming trade chat. We all hate the asshats and the lack of a reputation-based community policing itself and stifling the unchecked asshat behavior in our groups, but we also want fast groups.

This is all my opinion, based on what I’ve observed in my life and what I really think about asshats in the real world and in WoW. I don’t honestly know how Blizzard can be held responsible for blocking the ability of asshats from being in the game, without accepting that part of the responsibility has to be ours to shut down asshat behavior in our own day to day lives, and make it clear that asshat behavior is never acceptable.

No matter what, though, ignore works, and the majority of people I meet in game are not asshats. With the anonymity the game provides, the very fact that the majority of players I meet are NOT asshats fills me with hope, and a good bit of joy as well.

I joke about being a grumpy old bear sitting on my lawn yelling at the kids running by, but damn, talk about living the dream.

I’ve just got a couple scattered observations from running the new 5 person instances. I’m sure they’ve been brought up before, but it’s stuff I find interesting, and after yesterdays “Omigod it’s all rainbows and unicorns” post, I thought some balance was needed around the joint.

Aren’t we all Heroic and stuff

The first thing I noticed that surprised me was what was missing, and wondering what it meant for the direction we’re going for the long term.

A few comparisons.

When Burning Crusade came out, we had 5 person instances, with both Normal (leveling ) and Heroic (max level only) modes.

Later on, a new content patch brought us a single new 5 person instance, Magister’s Terrace, in Normal and Heroic that had a story that tied into the new Sunwell raid.

When Wrath of the Lich King came out, we again had 5 person instances in both Normal and Heroic versions.

We got a middle content patch with a new raid, and a new 5 person instance with Normal and Heroic modes for the Argent Tournament.

Later on, a new content patch brought the Lich King raid in Icecrown Citadel. Instead of having one new instance, however, this time we had three, one each in both Normal and Heroic modes, to be done sequentially, and with a quest chain delving deeper into the storyline leading up to the new ICC raid.

After what had come before, the new three instance chain-quest concept was met with much approval, gushing, and raindbows coming out our butts.

Blizzard presumably took note of the gushing, and got the idea that we might have been pleased.

Now we fast forward to Cataclysm.

Again, we had an initial release of 5 person instances in Cataclysm, with both Normal and Heroic modes. Additionally, there were two 5 person instances that were Heroic only, old low level instances that were revamped into new, level 85 versions, the Shadowfang Keep and Deadmines.

We heard there would be old content brought to new life, and were overjoyed. Heroic only? Strange, but since it was very old and familiar content, it made some sense that we wouldn’t need to see it again while leveling. It would be a nice treat for hitting 85.

What has happened since then is that all the new 5 person instance content continues to be released in Heroic version only, no Normal modes.

With the Troll dungeons, Zul’Aman and Zul’Gurub, I think people were disappointed but understanding. I mean heck, they were originally 10 person raids that were retrofitted as 5 person instances.

The feeling on my part was, it’s hard enough to take content tuned for 10 people and fit it into a 5 person group of higher level. This is old content that most people are already familiar with (most, not all), so we’re getting a taste of it for nostalgia. To also make a second, slightly easier version in 5 person Normal mode as well and have players be in the old content just that much longer? A bit too much.

I figured that making those two be the only two that you had to chain run to max Valor was just a misstep, a poorly-thought out idea that wasn’t well conceived.

After all, nostalgia only goes so far, and for people that had run them a lot in Vanilla and in BC, those weren’t exactly fan favorites begging for a re-release.

Now, a 5 person Karazhan Heroic? With instanced wings to break it into bite-sized chunks? I think that would have had more legs to it than the Trolls.

Still, my point is, it was understandable to have the two Trolls released as Heroic-only. Disappointing, but understandable.

But now here we are with a new release of three more 5 person instances, again meant to be done sequentially, again with a quest chain threading through them, and again designed as an outstanding story introduction for the new Deathwing raid.

But, following the brand new tradition of Cataclysm instances, the new instances have no Normal mode.

So, is this the new design intent? To provide an initial release of Normal instances, for leveling through while questing, but release additional group content that is ONLY intended for max level raid/Justive point geared players?

On the one hand, so far I am very happy with how the new 5 person content is tuned. It is extremely fun, and if this is an example of content that doesn’t suffer from a split focus, then good.

On the other hand, all of the characters I’ve got capable of running the content are at the “raid and JP gear” level, at least iLevel 365 average. All of them have gone through all of the Firelands daily quests and obtained the iLevel 365 upgrades from the vendors, have JP tier pieces, etc. Raid drops and crafted.

Is it a fair assessment of the content if all the characters I have doing it are very well geared?

I’ve got two characters that are just now entering the final leveling curve before 80 instances. My Priest is level 80, and my Paladin tank is level 72 or so. Both are staring the Cataclysm leveling dead in the eye, and having a drought of ANYTHING new to do prior to level 85 endgame, and even then nothing new accessible until doing the entire month-long Firelands dailies (again) and chain running standard Heroics long enough to qualify by iLevel for the new stuff… crap!

Crappity crap crap.

Not looking forward to it.

There is a lot of new stuff in this patch, and it’s great. Heck, I haven’t even had the chance to spend any time at all at the Darkmoon Faire!

But again, it sure would’ve been nice if there was something added, a normal mode something on the new things, or even better, a new quest area inserted somewhere into the 80 – 85 range to break it up a bit.

You may say, “What do you think Blizzard does, make new content all day long?” My answer is, if everything released is always aimed at max level, then you’re telling us that the massive bulk of the game, the 1 -84 range, is irrelevant. In which case, eliminate it and let us make characters that are already 85. Does anyone really enjoy leveling with the exact same Northrend and Cataclysm quest content?

Does anyone look forward to playing a Pandaren from 20 to 85 when MoP comes out? In the exact same Outlands, northrend and Catalcysm content? Again?

Ugh.

The level 1 to 60 revamp for Cataclysm added a LOT of replay to the game. Hitting Outlands, Northrend and even Cataclysm zones after that is kinda like taking a crushing blow to the nuts.

I’m not saying do that same kinda massive revamp each time. I am saying, aiming to add one additional quest zone(or a half-sized zone) intended for leveling through somewhere in the game for each content patch would have a massive impact on replayability and adding choice to leveling options.

Or, maybe you think I’m insane.

Tactical Variation

The other thing I’ve been noticing is the way the encounters are being laid out such as to limit tactical choice.

For all you tanks out there, answer me this;

Can you name one boss fight in the new instances where it is possible to perform a Line of Sight pull?

Not necessary, but possible.

Even in the early stage of Well of Eternity, with it’s pillar placement, it doesn’t really lend itself to being able to Line of Sight pull, because of, you know, thousands of demons in the area.

I’m not complaining, I’m just noticing. When these new instances were designed, the requirements placed on tanks to use terrain in an innovative way were minimized. The encounters were streamlined to run in, fight, don’t stand in stuff or get out of the way of stuff or kill stuff in this order or interrupt stuff.

I think the reason is the LFD, and the ‘go go go’ mentality. I think it’s the attitude that pulling for the tank if he takes ‘too long’ is not just okay but normal.

Because the encounters are streamlined, they are easier to grasp the concept the first time or two through, and because they are designed for face pulling, there is nothing to cause you to stop and do something that takes a second of preparation first. So, you just run straight in and there is less likelihood of people pulling for you before you get your nice LOS tug off or whatever.

Has anyone else noticed other cases where the new design of encounters has seemingly taken into account things that were frustrating for you when playing with strangers, and eliminated them?

There is clearly a lot of careful thought going into this content, not just in making them interesting and fun and exciting, and full of lore and story and goosebump moments, but also in trying to anticipate and remove irritations from LFD.

I’m kinda curious what else you folks have seen along the same lines.

This is not one of my usual posts. There is no intent here to be funny, I won’t be taking my usual sideways look at the world around me, be it a game or the ‘real’ world.

No, this is a serious post. This comes from my heart, and I wish I weren’t writing it. But I am, and I fully intend to publish it, in the hopes that once it’s out and gone from my head, so will be all of the bad things that have been building up in my brain all day.

I’ve had the desire to write about this for months, and I haven’t done so, because it just wasn’t appropriate for a ‘gaming blog’.

Yes, I know, I’ve always said this blog is for me to write about whatever I want to write about, and you’re all welcome to come along for the ride, hating it or liking it as you wish.

Along the way, one thing that I’ve tried to do is  avoid anything that was confrontational.

The heart of the reason why is, I know full well that anything I say, any argument I may make or reasoning I may frame will do nothing to change someones mind. All I would be doing would be making noise, and hurting people.

Hurting people? Yes, indeed. Nobody wants to hear someone else criticize their opinions or beliefs. If I weigh in on a serious topic, someone else will feel strongly about it and feel hurt that I said things they did not agree with. Plus, hey, I am not that smart, and my position may very well be wrong. Why hurt someone else AND be wrong? Better if I stay silent and have the chance to continue to learn and grow.

So, faced with no positive result from a post, and the surety of hurting someone, why do it now?

I’m doing it now because I can’t take it anymore. I have to say something, I have to get it out of my head. I have never felt quite so helpless before, so powerless, as I have done earlier today, and as pointless and ineffectual as this forum is to actually accomplish anything, one thing it will do; it’ll get this crap out of my head and out there where I can feel that I did something.

At least I won’t have done nothing about it, nothing at all.

Gay marriage. Specifically, the fight against legalizing gay marriage.

I’m a married white straight man that attends Catholic church every Sunday morning. I declare that up front because people who believe in labeling people care about that shit. There are a lot of people who, after reading that, will undoubtedly feel confident that they know everything there is to know about my opinion on any subject worthy of discussion.

Fine, think what you want, while I get on with this.

I and my family went to church this morning.

I grabbed the bulletin of announcements on the way in, and read it a bit while sitting in the pew, waiting for the service to begin.

The section of the bulletin that the pastor uses to write his weekly message was titled “Supporting Marriage: The Responsibility of All The Faithful.”

Within this section, I read the following, which I have re-typed exactly as it was published, except where I noted to preserve anonymity;

This past Thursday Archbishop Nienstedt gathered the priests and deacons of the archdiocese for a teaching day. One thing  that the Archbishop wanted to stress  is the importance of supporting the Marriage Amendment that will be on the ballot in Minnesota in November 2012. The archbishop is asking all priests, deacons, and indeed all the faithful to work for this cause. The amendment will ensure that marriage remains defined as between one man and one woman. As your pastor I fully support the archbishop and this effort and I greatly appreciate his courage, vision and leadership on this issue of our time.

Eric (last name withheld) has volunteered to head up a committee in our parish to work on this effort. The committee will serve to first reflect on marriage and its purpose and then to inform, and coordinate our parish efforts to support marriage. I thank Eric for stepping forward to serve in this important role. (Information on volunteering for the committee withheld)

At the teaching day last Thursday, it was noted that the ultimate goal is not simply a victory at the ballot box next November, but rather a deeper understanding and appreciation for ourselves and society of the true nature and purpose of marriage. I look forward to the next twelve months as we as a parish take time to reflect on marriage and its role in society and the importance it has on all of us.

That is what I read in the bulletin this morning, written by the pastor that was about to speak to us.

When I read those words, my brain kind of froze for a bit. I was trying to get my brain moving, but it felt like I was a light truck with bald tires on an icy surface, lots of spinning and movement going on, none of it going anywhere.

I lasted like that until the pastor got to his sermon. I pretty much went on automatic pilot until he started to speak.

The sermon he gave today was about the two most important commandments that all the faithful should obey; To love god with all of our soul, heart and mind, and to love our neighbors as we love ourselves.

That was the sermon. That was the message.

And that sermon went into my brain, a brain that was still trying to digest the words this pastor had written.

We are to go out and vote to define marriage as between one man and one woman, AND we are to love our neighbors as we love ourselves.

They just kept hitting, colliding in my brain. They still are.

I wanted to shout at the pastor right there in the church, “You mean love all our neighbors, as long as they are straight? But to hell with the gays, is that it?”

But of course I didn’t. What would it accomplish? Will I change his mind? No, of course not. Either he truly believes that this is what God wants, or he will do exactly as he is ordered by his superior the archbishop regardless of what he actually believes is right or wrong.

Either way, I’m not going to change his mind, I’m just going to cause a scene and hurt a lot of people who feel that this is somehow right, or just, or Gods will.

I know, I’m not saying this well. 

Let me try and take this through how I see this.

An Amendment on Marriage that seeks to define Marriage as between a man and a woman does not actually support marriage.

Right now, are marriages between one man and one woman forbidden, denied or blocked? No.

If one man and one woman, of any faith, requests their union to be recognised as a legal marriage, it is a simple series of legal steps to make it happen.

So, is an Amendment necessary to ensure that keeps happening in the future?

No.

Such an Amendment would not give any additional benefits to one man and one woman seeking a legal marriage bond.

Is same-sex marriage legal right now, then? No. Right now, in the state of Minnesota, same-sex marriage is ALREADY denied.

So what would this new Amendment do?

It’s purpose would be to add an extra layer of legal bullshit preventing same-sex marriages from being accepted. See, right now the existing laws are being challenged, so if there is a second law on the books, then if the first law gets overturned, there will still be a second one that has to be fought.

It is an Amendment not to provide but to deny, and really, to stick the boot in, too.

It is an Amendment aimed directly towards one goal; to provide an additional layer of legal defense to continue to discriminate against same-sex marriage, both sexes still being composed of PEOPLE. American citizens. You know, people.  

If you are singled out or excluded, you feel hurt, don’t you? You feel rejected, unwanted, even hated depending on the lengths someone is willing to go to just to exclude you.

That is what this is. In my mind and heart that is how I see this. I can’t find any OTHER way to see it. And for that, I am truly grateful.

This proposed Amendment is a tool of hate, because it has no purpose other than to single out and exclude an entire group of people from enjoying the same legal benefits under our government that others take for granted.

Or, as Governor Mark Dayton is quoted as saying, “I’m here to support those Minnesotans and Americans who want the same rights, freedoms, opportunity, respect, dignity and legal protections and legal opportunities as every other one of their fellow citizens… which is the founding principle of this country!”

Notice please that I vote Republican and Mark Dayton is a Democrat. I mention this to point out that this isn’t a political discussion, it’s discrimination against people. Discrimination is discrimination. Period.

And yet, the message of the pastor in our church this morning is that we are to love our neighbors as we do ourselves.

Is it that gay people are evil? Is that the message I’m supposed to be getting here? Would the very existence of same-sex marriage sunder the bonds that hold families together? 

But are we not supposed to turn our cheek, to give no offense, to embrace others and show them love and compassion?

Are we not all people, regardless of our race, our religion, our philosophy or our chosen nation? Are we not all people regardless of whether we are atrtracted to the same sex, the opposite sex, both or none of the above? 

How can someone that truly believes that ‘God is love’ be capable of showing so much determined hate towards other people?

How does denying same sex partners the right to legally marry in any way affect the quality of the marriage between one man and one woman?

That is a rhetorical question. I can tell you right now, the entire rest of the world can be engaged in same-sex marriages, and it will not affect my personal marriage with my wife one bit. However, if I don’t stop spending so much time playing WoW and more time fixing the house, I am going to be in trouble. 

If one man and one woman engage in a marriage and it falls apart, the blame cannot be laid to rest at the feet of same-sex marriages. It can be blamed on the couple.  

This is how I feel. I look at this… this bullshit going on, and what I see is our generations’ future shame.

Right now, we, our generation, can look back on the civil rights wars of the 1960s, and we can wonder, “How the hell could anyone be so racist and so hateful that they would try to make it a law that black people and white people could not drink from the same water fountain, or go to the same school, or eat in the same diners. How fucked up did those people have to be to have that much hate, to want to exclude an entire people, and who the hell would stand up in any meeting hall and have the guts to try and pass laws like that.”

We can say that now, but guess what? Those people, many of them, are still alive. They are still around. And when we wonder this aloud, they keep their mouths shut, but inside, they are still the people who were there back then. Those folks didn’t just vanish into the mists of time. They hear their grandchildren wonder about racism, and who could be so stupid and wrong, and they keep their mouths shut.

I feel that is where we are right now.

Right now, all across America, all this hate, this same stupid hate and fear is all out in the open, and people are actually standing up and proud of their efforts to exclude the gays, and to block them from the legal rights straight people enjoy.

But someday soon, gay people will see the justice they deserve. They have to. It is inevitable. There are too many of us in this country that are continuing to grow with an open mind and an open heart, and are raising our children the same way. We grew up with a lifetime of accepting and understanding that discriminating against a people based on the color of their skin is wrong, and discriminating against a people based on the religion they practise is wrong…

Is it any wonder that with the lessons of the past to show us the evil of such discrimination, the civil rights movement and the Holocaust just to name TWO in the last century, that we find it ever harder to understand how those types of discrimination were evil, but discriminating against someone on the basis of gender or sexual orientation is just fine and dandy? 

The hate is still alive now, but within 40 years there will be teens wondering aloud how fucking stupid and evil and hateful people had to be to try and prevent people from being legally acknowledged as married just because they were bith the same sex, instead of understanding that it’s what a person has in their heart that counts.

And these people now, these people we see right in front of us, they will be the ones that hold their past in their hearts and keep their mouths shut, because they don’t want to look like a hate filled bigot in front of the grandkids.

But why do we have to wait 40 years? Why? Why do we have to be able to see this so damn clearly right now, how FUCKED UP this is, without being able to speed it up?

I said to Cassie, I don’t know how I can even argue this with someone. I start with, “I hold this truth to be self-evident. That people are people, and intentionally hurting people is wrong.”

I don’t know where to go from there. If you don’t get that intentionally hurting other people is wrong when they are doing nothing to hurt you, when their actions have no affect on your life, if you just can’t get that key point, then where do I go in convincing you? 

I don’t know. I’ve never felt so powerless. I know, nothing I say can change even one mind. Sure, I can live my own life, and I can raise my children to keep an open mind and see people as people, but that does nothing to change how other people are raising their kids… and how long this whole struggle to stop the hatred will continue.

I’m sorry, as I said. I don’t want to hurt your feelings, and I don’t want to be controversial. I don’t even see this as controversial, that it is is just… stupid. I’m not very articulate about speaking my heart, it’s not like writing some cool story. But this shit… this stuff going on in my mind, it’s really bothering me. I just don’t get how people can’t see what it is they’re doing. I can’t get it through my head how anyone can be that full of hate, or worse yet, so uncaring of the affects of what they do if they just blindly go along with it.

Cassie tells me it’s not just the Catholic Church, it’s a lot of Churches, and I understand that. I also understand a lot of the arguments are made that it’s in the Bible and is the will of God.

Well, there is a lot that is in the Bible that isn’t acted on because we understand the Bible was written by men, not God directly. Or has anyone noticed all the banks being forbidden to charge interest on loans all of a sudden? Anyone? I know my mortgage has interest payments, I don’t know about anyone else.

Just saying.

If the basis for an argument is that God said so in the Bible, then every single thing God decreed in the Bible better be in place, or fought for equally hard. You don’t get to pick just the bits to enforce as Gods will that let you be a hate-filled bigot. If you do that, then you are acknowledging that you don’t agree with God on everything, just the bits you think he was right on. Now you’re picking and choosing… and we’re back to this bullshit being about what people do to other people, looking for a justification, and has nothing to do with Gods will.

I don’t know. Hopefully when I push publish, I’ll get that cathartic cleansing that means all this is now dumped on someone elses id.

Tomorrow will be a new day. Every day is a gift, and I don’t want to be walking around tomorrow still pissed off at the hate of a bunch of stupid people. 

I do know one thing. Singling people out and hurting them because they are different than you is wrong. It doesn’t matter what the ‘different’ is. Gay, black, jewish, space alien, I don’t care, it’s wrong.

I don’t know much else in this life, but that I know, and I WILL stand by it.

I say, it’s not enough to block this stupid Marriage Amendment. No, we need to go further, and pull back the Minnesota Defense of Marriage Act AND the federal level Defense of Marriage Act.

Huh. How about that. I really do feel better now. And yet, I’ve accomplished absolutely nothing. Go figure.

No, nothing on my store, although I do hope to one day have enough energy to put Tish Tosh Teshs brilliant tanking pet design up there, like I said I would back when I went to NADWCON.

No, what I want to point you to is one of the most brilliant sites on the internet, one of the most wonderful stores, and a good way to blow an afternoon.

Do you have a friend you’d like to find that perfect, unique gift for?

Do you also lack the craft skills necessary to pull off something neat yourself, like knitting a scarf in the colors of the Horde?

Well, then may I suggest you pay a visit to Shapeways.

You probably already heard of or visited Shapeways before, but have you been by lately?

Shapeways is a site that allows you to either submit your own custom 3D CAD designs to be made by their cutting-edge processes out of the material you choose, from plastics to stainless steel, or to pick from existing designs that other people have already created and uploaded. Or in some cases, customize some of those designs to suit your own purposes.

You could find replica Green Lantern rings on Shapeways long before DC Comics realized it might be a money maker for them, and come on, who didn’t want their own Ring of Ultimate Power™ as a kid?

I had planned on taking the Blizzard WoW Bear Claw design that signifies shapeshifting into Bear form and having it designed into a signet ring.

Unfortunately, I truly have zero time these days. I’m working twelve hour days at the foundry, five days a week, and that just doesn’t leave me much time to do squat. So, I fail.

BUT!

Shapeways has grown to the point where creative folks have carved out their own stores on the site, populated with their own unique designs.

These are things you truly will NOT find in brick and mortar stores… so you can be assured that your significant other will not open this present and say, “Oh cool, I saw that on Amazon and was thinking of getting one, thanks!” Or, worse yet, “Oh damn, I already got one, I forgot to tell you.”

First, for the true dice collectors among us.

I, myself, am a collector of dice. I’m clearly not in Wil Wheaton’s league, but I can console myself with knowing that my collection filled tackle boxes years before he considered picking up his first d20.

As an initiate to the inner mysteries of the die, I find these beautiful designs to be worthy of applause;

The Large Dice Set, designed and sold by Made by Wombat. This is just one of Made By Womats designs, to whet your appetite for more. :)

Or how about this, for the Girl Genius fans out there?

The Steampunk Die Set, created and sold by Masterworks?

As cool as that is, I love the stylings of her Deathly Hallows inspired dice set a little better, but that’s just me.

You starting to see what I mean about cool and unique?

Before I leave the world of innovative die, how could I not mention Dizingof’s Steampunk D4?

Yes, that is a single D4 die. Just, omigod. If you WERE planning on handing Wil Wheaton a single die at Gencon or something, what better way to leave an impression than with that?

That is as far as I’m willing to go on a blog post. Hopefully, this will tease you into leaping in and seeing what kind of awesomeness you can find to wow that special someone.

I’ll also be honest, I have an ulterior motive. I know a lot of you are brilliantly creative, and if even one of you visits Shapeways, sees the possibilities, and opens your own store to share and sell your imaginative designs, I’ll consider it a victory.

Okay, I have to leave you with one more.

This one is the Horde Medallion by leslie of the store Satori.

Does that not kick ass?

I think it does.

Happy shopping!

You ever hear this old joke?

A manager is speaking to a gathering of employees. He tells them that because of the costs of restructuring, the downturn of the economy, and the need to stay competitive in the marketplace, there will be no raises or profit matching bonuses this year. Then he tells the employees that sales have continued to grow at record levels, making this the most profitable quarter in company history. Then he stops, looks over at his secretary, and says, “I told you to put the United Way employee donation drive announcement between those two.”

Sometimes, that’s the way it seems with Blizzard, isn’t it? All these announcements and press releases and interviews and revelations come out, and individually they all make perfect sense and are clearly meant to generate excitement and buzz, but when I put them together without the filler, the message gets kinda… mixed. Or misleading. Or, and I’ll be blunt, self-serving corporate bullshit.

Make no mistake. Content does not come out for the sake of content to please the player. Blizzard does not have a crew of men and women creating and changing code for World of Warcraft in the backroom or in their basement for fun, rogue coders ranging wild and free adding whatever they feel like at their own pace.

No. Everything that gets added or changed in game comes out after planning meetings, time to market discussions, and cost/benefit analysis is done.

If you see content announced, be it new raids, hot gear, rules changes or a new Legendary, you should know that there was a meeting or series of meetings behind it.

In those meetings, there were overall objectives to meet. ”What can we do to improve retention of existing customers? What can we do to attract new customers? What can we do to encourage existing customers to not drop payment for the few months before new content comes out? How do we get old, tired, bored customers to come back again? How do we handle the cynical and bitter?” 

I’m sure there are additional concerns in planning meetings, but you get the idea. Committing programmer and quality testing resources costs money, and before that money and time are committed, there will be an expected return on investment.

So, back to the mixed messages. The bullshit messages. The upswing of excitement tempered with the “but why can’t we do x?”

Or, to put it another way, Why So Serious?

Transmogrification, or ‘mogging’ as it’s now called, was announced to great excitement on my part. In almost all ways I’ve been delighted with the very idea. It has succeeded in one assumed goal; I am revitilized in playing World of Warcraft, because this has challenged my ‘collector’ instincts to go out there into old content and gather pieces of gear together for that ‘neato’ set. It’s also brought renewed attachment to my characters, fulfilling my desire to customise and personalize my avatar so that I’m not just Huntard #4590786. Sure, I’ll still be generic Big Brown Bear Butt #75876, but the non-shifty among us will finally get to look cool while we kill stuffs.

We’ll even get to dispense with clown suits in Outlands, and for once in our lives, if we don’t WANT bare belly buttons in our plate armor, we won’t have to put up with it.

Unless you’re into that kind of thing.

The mogging announcements and the questions that came out of the community (and the Blue responses) give us some food for thought. 

Let’s take a look at some of these discussions, shall we?

From this article;

We have an obligation to players and to our hard working artists to keep the game from looking too silly. I know looking ridiculous is fun for some players, but World of Warcraft was established with a design that the game overall kept its silliness in check. That’s one of the reasons we resisted adding a feature like Transmogrification for so long.

So weapons that look like fish, for example, probably won’t be available as source items for Transmogrification, even if one is technically a dagger and has stats. There are a handful other weapons with “silly” models (such as frying pans, brooms, etc.) that may or may not be allowed — it’s still under discussion.

From this article;

Fishing Poles cannot be transmogrified.
Fishing Poles cannot be used to transmogrify.
There may be individual items that are excluded from being transmogrified on the basis that they were originally added to the game as absurdities. (examples: a weapon that looks like a fish, or a chest piece that is invisible)

Going off of what has been said, mogging will allow players to wear armor and weapons that are effective in combat while at the same time present a player-chosen appearance.

But Blizzard is also saying that they do not want players to have total freedom in the choices available to them. Things that Blizzard deems ‘silly’ are not permitted. The reason, the sole reason, is out of a self-imposed obligation to the players and to the artists to keep the game from getting too silly.

Err. Wut?

We as players are being given the freedom to take the disparate ‘clown suit’ clashing appearance of items, items that are individually best in performance but look like shit visually when all mixed together, and pay gold to have them all look like matching or themed sets we choose.

Many players will certainly take advantage of this.

But we are NOT being given the chance to truly let our own attitudes or humor or sense of satire shine through. We do not have freedom of personal expression in how we do this, unless someone chooses to mog their gear to intentionally pick items that clash as horribly as possible, going for a circus clown look.

And the reason given is to keep things serious.  

Let’s put ourself in that hypothetical Blizzard meeting. The one where the suits are looking for the cost/profit analysis before giving the green light to coders to even begin implementing a new feature like mogging.

When mogging comes up, what does Blizzard get out of it? We can see the cost in coding time, and we can see the fun aspect as players, but where does Blizzard see a profit?

In terms of retention, perhaps a little. Mogging will provide an opportunity for customization, and the act of customizing will bring us to invest more of ourselves into our characters, leading at least some of us to feel a closer investment into WoW. 

But is that all?

What about attracting new players amidst all the competition out there in the MMO world, with all these shiny new games?

If you have not played an MMO before, and were comparing screenshots or looking at in-game videos on Youtube, wouldn’t Blizzard come out looking a little better if their characters wore more cohesive and attractive gear with amazing looking weapons?

Wouldn’t screenshots of boss kills look a bit better if everyone stood out more and looked… planned?

The impression that potential new customers would have is that you can look cool in WoW, something that mismatched armor appearances and clown suits worn for the stat benefits don’t provide.

As an aside, why don’t they currently provide them? Because whoever the design team is for gear sets, as talented as they are and as kick-ass as the work they’ve done over the years is, the people putting stats on those gear items have forced players to choose between style and substance instead of having both in one package. And talking about why that has been the way it has would make for another fun discussion.

Back on point, when you consider screenshots and the new player attraction point of view from a Public Relations / Sales (corporate suit with no sense of humor)perspective, the decision to ban silly looking items from mogging becomes self-explanatory.

I’m a blogger, so I’ll say it anyway; if Blizzard is trying to entice new customers with images of epic battles and high fantasy, competing against games with more cohesive high fantasy art styles (and more realistic looks with higher polygon counts) they don’t want to have videos floating around out there of top flight raid teams killing Ragnaros while wielding fishing poles, frying pans, baseball bats and pitchforks, with a main tank beating Rag with a fish.

It would happen. Why would it happen? Because we are, the most of us, gamers playing a game, and we gamers as a class have this annoying tendency to enjoy the silly, the absurb, the satirical and the loony. We often like Fawlty Towers, Red Dwarf, Monty Python, Rosencrantz and Guildenstern are Dead and other things that poke fun at the too self-important or deadly serious.

We are Not So Serious. We ARE the people who think tanking Ragnaros and beating on him with a dead floppy fish would be hilarious. 

Blizzard knows this. And at least one aspect of policy makers has chosen to pre-emptively block it before it can become a problem.

Who in Blizzard would worry about this? After all, I know that part of what brought me into the game was the light-hearted nature of the art, the stylistic sense of the game, and yes, pop culture references and more tender moments.

In game non-combat pets are an example of the heart of the game that drew me in. Things that spoke to me of people making a game that loved what they did, and knew what fun was. People who knew how to have a good time. I felt I could trust people like that to continue to support a fun game to play.

Would tanking Ragnaros with a fish main hand hurt Blizzard? Would it detract from our enjoyment of the game? I submit to you the argument that if it would, it would do so to the same extent that the entire quest series in Westfall parodying Horatio from CSI: Miami does already.

I know there are some players that do not like having that type of pop culture involvement or sillyness in the game. But it’s in the game already. Clearly, there is a faction within Blizzard that DOES have a sense of humor, DOES know how to have fun, and also knows how not to take themselves too seriously. And who have tried to explore that sense of humor while staying within the boundaries of a very smart and intelligent world setting with amazingly rich lore.

This isn’t War and Peace, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, or On War.

This is a video game, and as such, we the players get in there and mess around.

Who plays World of Warcraft?

People who have so much fun that we take the serious aspects of the game like dying in the Ring of Fire and make Johnny Cash parody songs, or look at the insane farming requirements to open the Gates of Ahn’Qiraj and make parody videos of it, or just take the brilliance of Avenue Q and set one of their songs to a video about what those nice people in your guild are really like.

So someone put sillyness in the game, someone I would wager is a gamer at heart and knows how to have fun.

But here is a new feature, and we’re told that there is now an obligation to prevent sillyness. Apparently, we wouldn’t be showing the proper respect for the material and the artists hard work if we killed Ragnaros by beating him to death with floppy dead fishies. 

I call bullshit on that one. 

So why? Why risk a downside of player irritation at being restricted? There has to be some benefit that outweighs the negative.

Maybe someone can suggest another in the comments, but the only one I see is the possible PR benefit from having movies with Oh So Serious players beating raids and doing PvP in badass looking matching gear sets, sans fish. 

It’s an idea only a suit would have; to assume potential players of a fantasy game with Orcs and Elves (and Gnomes), seeing characters fighting with fish, would be TURNED OFF and walk away saying “Hell no, that shit is too damn silly for me. I’d prefer a nice game of SimAccountant”.

It is, to bring this back to my earlier corporate joke, the equivalent of a proposed picture of all the company employees for the company website or newsletter. Human Resources or Public Relations people come out to hand out t-shirts with the company logo on them for everyone to wear, arrange everyone so the ‘pretty’ office people and managers are standing prominently out in front or on the sides to kind of mute the grubbiness of the production staff, and generally manage the situation so the picture taken presents the image they want to show, and if it happens to resemble reality, well, that was an accident.

It’s one step up from doing what my last company did, and just hire professional models to portray the company employees on the company website, leading employees to ask each other, “Who the hell is that, and when did we hire them?”

Seriously Blizz, Why So Serious?

World of Warcraft is almost alive, isn’t it?

The older it gets, the more it changes and grows, just like us.

Tanking is going to change. Oh noes! Worgen are going to get horsies. Oh noes!

Is it the end of the World as we know it?

No, it’s just another sign that as time passes, things change.

Perspectives change. Attitudes change. New information is obtained that, when added to existing knowledge and acquired experience, causes us to re-evaluate our beliefs and modify our assumptions, then act accordingly.

Or, we just assume we know everything there is to know, assume we peaked in the eleventh grade, can’t improve on perfection, lock our minds rigidly into stagnation and judge everyone and everything around us based on our own limited worldview. 

Of course I don’t mean you. No, I’m talking about those other close-minded people, and aren’t they fun to look at.

World of Warcraft changes all the time. Sometimes we don’t like the changes, sometimes we do.

You can accept things and adapt, try to make the most of it, open your mind to the possibility that things might be okay after all, or you can get the hell out.

There really is no option three.

The one thing I’m not sure gets across to some people is that no matter how loudly you bitch, piss and moan, the changes Will. Not. Stop.

There is no special freeze-frame timestop mode just because you like things just the way they are.

Improvise, adapt and overcome, or GTFO.

One way or another, be advised, if your way of dealing with every change you don’t like is to bitch about it, complain about it, whine and piss and moan and harp on and on about how great it was in the good old days, how much better everything was, how bad everything now sucks, how much you hate everything they’ve done or will ever do unless they wipe the servers and re-install Vanilla….

Then screw you, I’m turning you off.

While the game changed, you stayed exactly the same. Locked into a single-minded worldview that was not open to the possibility of change or growth. You had one thing, you learned it, you liked it, and now you’re rushing out there into the surf, hands outstretched to stop the tide. Nooo! Noooo! No dissassemble Number Five!

Here comes the hurricane, and no, it’s not stopping for you. Number Five is being scrapped for parts, Steve Jobs made a phone that’s smarter. Them’s the breaks, kid. Liked the articulation on those eyebrows, though.

The wise people may not like the changes, but instead of barking like walruses they go on the official forums and post intelligent, coherent and mostly POLITE statements concerning the state of proposed changes and how they either don’t work as advertised, don’t address the stated problem, or could stand to be improved. These people perform analysis, make recommendations, and then when that wave comes rolling in, they’re out there holding their surfboards saying, “Bring it on, bitch. Let’s shoot the curl.”

I am sick and tired of hearing about how badly the game sucks now, how terrible it is, how broken, how corrupt, how venal or self-serving. How it totally lacks fun.

hmmm. That’s all news to me.

Here’s a clue for you.

I have never, in all the years I have played WoW, ever had more fun in the game than I am RIGHT NOW.

Broken? Broken my ass.

I am playing with great people, simply GREAT people. I am leveling alts in different areas and in different ways.

Are you not having fun? Well, that’s your experience, and that’s certainly valid. But what you people continuously seem to do is forget that YOUR experience is only true for YOU, and you do NOT speak for ME!

Why can you not get it through your heads? Just because YOU’RE not happy doesn’t mean EVERYONE ain’t happy, it just means the only person that is really real to you ain’t happy.

I’m having lots of fun, and not just on my mains, and not just because I raid every once in a while with great folks. I’m having TONS of fun with alts, too!

Wait, what? Why yes, didnt you know? Back in Vanilla WoW you had to quest to level.

That was it.

But now, why look! You can quest in a streamlined system that doesn’t have any dead level zones at all that force you to grind mobs to get through levels 48-54, OR you can PvP through the levels getting XP, OR you can LFG through the levels doing nothing but cooperative grouping meeting completely new people in dungeons and getting bags of loot, just wow!

Wait, what if I’ve got a max level character already and I’m not interested in questing for the third (or thirtieth) time, I just want to get to max level fast so I can tank for my friends? Why, look at this shit, we’ve got Heirlooms all UP in your grill you can get to speed up XP gains, plus we’ve got Guild Advancement that increases XP gains PLUS lets you buy even more Heirlooms to speed that shit up if you don’t have the time or Justice Points to get them, and you’re also too lazy to do the Argent Tournament dailies to earn tokens to buy them. Oh yeah, that;’s right, three different ways to get Heirlooms, not counting doing PvP and then converting Honor to JP to buy your Heirlooms, OR competing in the fishing tournament for the Pirate Ring.

But wait, what if you never played before at all, AND you don’t care about seeing any of that awesome questing, you want to blow off the storylines and completely ignore the lore, that stuff is for geeks and freaks (like me), all you want to do is leap right in and rush as fast as possible to max level so you can go play with your friends with these raids and stuff fo’shizzle? 

Well hell, we’ve even got Recruit a Friend to give you and your buddy that you’re going to be playing with some SERIOUS XP gains fast!

Err, you DO have a friend that will play with you and be part of your Recruit a Friend, righty-O? I mean, that’s your argument here, right?

Oh, they just want you to get yourself, all alone, to max level as fast as you can so you can join them?

Errr.

Cluebot: If they’re not willing to group with you and help you take advantage of Recruit a Friend to get you to max level so you can play with them… well, they’re not really a fgood riend, understand? They’re just people you know that said, “Hey, why not pick up the game and join us, it’ll be cool dude.” No, this is more about you wanting to get yourself to max level so you will be worthy of joining them in what they’re doing. Friends are usually at least a teensy bit interested in spending time with you, no matter the level, especially if it’ll help you get to play with them and their max level characters faster. 

The game changes, grows, adapts to the demands that we, the players, make. Marketing types sit around and try to come up with things to add or change that will entice new players, and delight old ones.

Transmogrification? I’ve actually seen people pissed that this will be added. “OMG, another gold sink” they say. “Why would I do that, what’s the point. Well, at least I can farm BoE items to sell to the idiots that want it.”

Spoken like a true “My character is just a bunch of numbers that I have no emotional attachment to whatsoever and I never came up with any kind of backstory at all for” player.

Oh, and a gold sink?

Yeah, like Reforging.

Oh, wait. Maybe they added other tools and content in game that made getting tons and tons of gold easy at max level, the only level in which you’d want to use Reforging in the first place. Or would be able to gather all those interesting old items to build a neat set.

Damnit, I don’t have time to Reforge anyway, I have to grind Hellfire rep so I can get the key to unlock Heroics in that zone. Oh wait, that was removed. Now I can just join a heroic, as soon as I find more in Trade chat to join my group, then fly out to the instance with enough to use the summoning stone.

Oh, wait.

But I can’t play tonight guys, I have to go farm all the mats for the Flasks that I’ll need for the raids, just like the other 24 members of the raid team, all grinding those mats all the time we’re in game that we’re not actually raiding…

Oh, wait. Cauldrons and Fish Feasts kinda cut way down on the farming needed, didn’t it? Just a few Flasks and stuff, and the whole raid is hooked up.

Huh. It’s almost as though the things that were massive time sinks that you simply HAD to do were streamlined or removed outright to allow you the freedom to leap right into the meat of PLAYING as fast and as much as possible…

And time sinks and daily quests were added that were fun, and helpful, but purely optional.

Choice. Freedom of, one each. Hmm, I like this concept. Please, give me more!

Would I like a lot more raids to do, tons more content, boss after zone after boss all waiting to be explored, five or six raids all waiting to be tamed, but each one having to be done before the next could be tried, like we had when Burning Crusade was released?

Well, sure. And more five person dungeons. More and more content. Absolutely. All the time. Keep it coming.

You see, with all of the barriers to getting stuck into the good stuff removed, all the attunements and gear grinds and rep grinds that weren’t helpful but were required all gone… the good stuff, the content, it just doesn’t last very long.

Boy, that sure is a problem. It really is. The easier you make it to get into raiding, the faster it gets eaten up.

Of course, they could always add a ton more attunements and rep grinds and such that have to be completed before you can unlock content. That’ll slow us back down.

Or maybe we can stick with what they’re doing instead, rolling out optional daily quest areas that will distract us temporarily while they work on the next content patch. Oh wait, that came with a new raid, didn’t it?

Huh. You don’t say.

Look, if you don’t like WoW, if all you can see are the things that have changed for what you consider to be the worst, if all you can remember of the old days were the things you thought were just great, if your rose colored glasses are just setting the past to glow all pretty and warm, if all you dwell on now are the things you cannot adapt to or that have ‘ruined’ the game for you…

Then stop playing. Leave. Put the damn game down, cancel your subscription, and go play Rift. Or pre-order SWTOR! Or try Guild Wars 2, or LOTRO, or Warhammer 40K, or World of Tanks, or any of seemingly hundreds of other options.

If WoW sucks that bad, then why in the name of Elune are you still playing it, and bitching about it endlessly?

I’m sick of hearing about it.

It’s not the game. It’s you. Grow up and look around you with fresh eyes, open your mind, no really open it this time, and maybe actually make an effort on YOUR part to find some friends and play with them.

Friends make a huge difference. Purging your head of the sick poison and bitterness you’ve got choking you will help, too.

Oh, it’ll help in seeing the game clearly for what it is, sure, but I was thinking more in terms of actually making friends.

I shall leave you with the inspiration for this post, and then I’m off to play WoW, and have a DAMN FINE TIME DOING IT.

And you run and you run to catch up with the sun, but its sinking
And racing around to come up behind you again
The sun is the same in a relative way, but you’re older
Shorter of breath and one day closer to death

The next time someone wants to write a story, do me a favor… don’t include zombies.

If you have the urge to type that “z” word, stop yourself. Think long and hard about what you’re about to do… and then don’t.

It’s been done. It’s been done to death, raised, killed again, and then had a dozen boring variations on the theme brought out to try and make it seem cute, much like these “done to death” cliché lines.

Now, I understand your fascination with zombies. You can do SO MUCH with your story, using zombies as a metaphor for something else.

Zombies are symbolic of the human condition, and very tempting to use to make your point.

If you want to talk about how a person can feel alone in a crowd, few things represent it quite so well as having that someone running around surrounded by mindless, unresponsive, hostile zombies that just don’t ‘get’ you, no matter how hard they try. A sea of faces, blank or hostile, that are all around you, but no matter how loudly you scream for help, you are still all alone in a cold, threatening world that sometimes seems to hate you.

But here’s the thing. It’s been done. It’s been done, the point has been made, it wasn’t even a point, it was a massive sledgehammer of brutal obviousness ramming the entire concept down your throat.

Zombies do NOT equal subtlety.

So why is it people will not leave zombies alone? Why do we keep getting zombie movies, books, comic books, video games all in seemingly endless derivations?

Does someone out there think that there is still some untapped reserve of zombie goodness, some secret well that, once found, will gush forth with a fresh perspective that adds something new?

Here’s a secret for you. Shhh. Don’t tell anyone.

IT’S BEEN DONE!

I don’t have to be more specific. Whatever the hell it was, if you were thinking about it plus zombies, it’s been done.

If your idea was, just pulling something out of my butt, literary fictional classics and zombies, I bet it’s been done somewhere.

I’m sure if you looked, and I’m not even going to bother, but I’ll bet you could find a version of Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland, The Wizard of Oz, and even Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea, all done with added zombie.

Zombies in Space? Oh, please. There’s even been Jason Voorhees in space, for the love of memes!

Oh, are your zombies from a plague, the main characters are isolated and alone and fearing infection, and you’re making a witty statement by having the healthy be the minority, hurting and alone, and the sick be the uncaring, unfeeling masses? No, we missed that you inverted things to make your point. We are completely incapable of grasping your intended statement about aids or other communicable diseases, and how terrible the isolation feels, without the addition of zombies.

Oh yeah. You’re a freaking genius. Our silence stems from stunned admiration. Or a cowlike obliviousness. You pick. You will anyway.

Does your special zombie breed come from some alien cause, and part of the horror is being alone in a world that is not just hostile, but is unknown and unknowable, something you will never understand or be able to deal with, where all you can do is try and survive and keep ahold of your sanity, and find hope amongst the hopeless even when it seems there is no possible future to be found?

Well, just so long as it’s done with zombies.

Just, yes. We get it.

Funny zombies, scary zombies, adventure zombies, mercenary zombies going into war torn regions of the world to rescue political prisoners, a world of the living dead where humans are long gone and all that is left are zombies versus vampires, I DON’T CARE!

Just stop it.

Just… stop it.

We keep seeing the same cycles. New zombie story is very, very serious business. Next zombie story  is a variation on the theme, playing on some popular small bit the fans of the serious movie liked, like special forces vs zombies. Then the humorous take on zombies comes out, poking fun at the ‘serious zombie’ story. Then the self-conscious ironic take on the zombie story comes out, lampooning the whole thing, tongue sticking out of rotted cheek.

Then, a new serious zombie story comes out to remind people what a serious zombie story is, and is acclaimed as revolutionary, revitalizing the genre.

And it starts all over again!

Please.

Zombies.

Just say no.

If you still feel the urge, that primal drive to write or direct something that has zombies in it, if you feel that your message, whatever the hell it may be, can only be said through the use of the shambling undead, then prove it to yourself.

Take a moment of private time to contemplate Edward Hoppers’ painting, Nighthawks. Don’t think about it, don’t try to analyze it or break it down, just contemplate it. Let it seep in.

Now, while you’re contemplating Nighthawks, in the back of your mind, just let this thought seep into view…

Could I improve this by adding a zombie?

Think about it. Then go write a screenplay featuring cartoon characters from the ’80s in our modern world. You’ll display the same creative integrity, but aren’t they so cute.

If you’re a bitter nihilist, you’ll make the cartoon characters be zombies, just to spite us.

Zombie Smurf has a nice ring to it, doesn’t it?

At this point, straight up, I’d rather see just about any other damn thing than a new zombie story.

I won’t specifically name which zombie ‘thing’ was the inspiration for this post, I’ll leave it to your imagination to come up with the possible culprits. I’m sure you won’t be lacking possibilities. If someone somehow does guess right, I’ll say so, but I won’t confirm what type of media it was. Well, I’ll narrow it down for you. It was either a movie, book, comic book or video game.

Yeah, that narrowed it down. At least you won’t be wondering which music video set me off.

I will say, for the record, that it wasn’t “They Live“, only because, well, it was hilarious, I love Rowdy Roddy Piper, the alley brawl is legendary, and I feel like giving it a pass, even though you could use it as a freaking textbook case of what I’m talking about. 

Oh… and psych! If you made it this far, smile. I’ve been having some fun with you. What’s the point of doing Aprils Fools posts on Aprils Fools Day when everybody expects it?

You’ve been Bearwalled!

I won’t quote various sources, but there seems to be a bunch of folks that are pretty hot that normal raiding, BWD/BoT raiding, no longer yields Valor. Instead, it’s all about the Troll dungeons and the Firelands. Well, and Baradin Hold.

I’ve even heard that some folks are in guilds that require raiding members to ‘cap’ their weekly potential Valor points by running Troll dungeons, and other folks resent the heck out of feeling they have to run Trolls if they are going to stay competitive.

I’d like to take this opportunity to point out that World of Warcraft represents a wide open landscape for you to pursue your goals, and the freedom to make your own choices. Nobody is forcing you to do anything, including pay a monthly subscription.

Aside from the break between European and US/Oceana servers, WoW has no borders or passports. If you want to move to a different server, do it. There are no locks to bar your way. Nobody holds up a sign sayin,g “Must have 359+ gear level to ride this server.”

If you choose to raid at a pace that competes for first kills with other guilds, then that’s your choice. If the guild you choose to be in to meet that goal sets expectations for what you have to do, including meeting a weekly Valor Point cap, then again, your choice; stay or go.

I’m in a guild that has three raid teams. One of those teams is destroying Firelands and having a great time. Maybe one of the expectations among the members of that team is that they cap Valor Points each week. I wouldn’t know, nobody has said anything that I’ve heard, and it’s sure as hell not an expectation for the team I’m in. Because that’s not one of my goals, so I’m not even trying to be in that team, so I don’t have to meet that expectation.

If I wanted to be at that level of play? Then I’d expect to have to pay… with my time and energy and determination.

Is the raid team I’m a part of doing Firelands? Not yet. Cleared trash, sure, killed the new BH boss. Mostly, they’ve focused on clearing the last of the original raids and getting the Defender of a Shattered World closure first. 

Goal met. Bigbearbutt, Defender of a Shattered World says hello.  

Are they full up on hard modes? No, no they’re not.

But that’s the point, isn’t it? If they wanted to make the commitment in terms of time, if they wanted to set hard modes and race to server first kills as team goals… then the rules for the team would be different.

Look, it’s all about what you want to set as a goal for yourself, finding other like-minded people to play with to pursue that goal, and then doing what you feel is necessary and beyond to achieve success.

If you want to get all the Valor Points that you can in a given week, then you’ll use whatever method that you’re given. If you don’t, you won’t.

If your team feels that it is necessary to cap Valor Points each week, and you resent it, then your goals might match the rest of your raid team, but your level of personal commitment does not. Might be time to find a different raid team that has your same level of commitment, or lack thereof.

If you feel that the method Blizzard put in place isn’t fair, that’s your opinion and you’re welcome to it, but don’t expect me to share it. I clearly don’t have the same goals that you do.

From the outside, this is how the whole discussion sounds.

A player wants to raid, and be one of the first to see and do the new content. At the same time as the new content is released to challenge raid teams, wonderful, powerful new gear upgrades are made available through Valor Points.

These Valor Point gear upgrades would clearly make completing the existing content a little easier, but they’re not absolutely necessary to complete normal mode Firelands, as shown by other top notch raid teams that have already done it with existing gear from the old raiding Hard modes. The Valor Point gear makes it easier, but are not strictly required, and do not block progression.

With that being the case, Valor Point gear seems to occupy a place as an optional luxury to help raid teams that have not been doing Hard modes narrow the gap.

If the Valor Point gear is an optional luxury meant to help raid teams that have not been doing Hard modes get caught up, then yes, it would make sense to have Valor Points drop from old raids like BWD and BoT.

What Blizzard did makes sense to me, though, as it allows players to get those optional luxury points on their own time, outside of scheduled Firelands raids, without having to deal with a weekly lockout or by dividing their raid time between Firelands and BWD/BoT/Tot4W.

Their move also has one further benefit from Blizzards’ point of view; it encourages raid geared players to re-enter the LFD random mix in Troll dungeons, potentially shortening the queue times and increasing the possibility that at least one or two players in an LFD troll dungeon has been there before and is truly geared and capable of leading a team to victory.

So, what is the down side?

Well, I see a whole lot of QQing that people who aren’t raiding are able to get the Valor Point gear just as fast as raiders.

Err. Umm.

Yeah, not really feeling your pain, there.

If you don’t want to do Troll dungeons, don’t do them. If your guild is telling you that you have to, then guess what, sparky? You’ve got one of them whatchamacallems… dilemmas. Only you can decide if you want it bad enough. 

You know that determination and sacrifice and hard work you hear Michelle Kwan talk about? How she worked her ass off to do what she had to do to succeed and win, but she stayed the course and pushed herself, because she had a personal desire and drive to be the best, and she refused to give in or give up?

Yeah, about your desire for those server first kills and speed of progression? Turns out, you might have to work for it a little bit. I know that comes as somewhat of a surprise, but there you have it.

Anything worth having doesn’t come cheap. If you want it, earn it. If you don’t want it, then stop bitching about it, and do your normal raids and take your time. It’ll still be there a year from now, waiting for you.

Is it worth the price you’re expected to pay?

Your call.

I just know I’m tired of hearing about it.

Reactions to the news have been interesting to watch.

The reactions of people shown in the media here in the USA were initially joyous, images of cheering crowds, delighted citizens of all ages in the papers and on TV.

As the week goes on, I’m seeing more people stand forward to respond not to the death of Osama itself, but instead to those joyous reactions. Responses from those sad to see anyone celebrating the death of anyone, no matter what they may have done. 

I’m going to raise the issue briefly, just to touch on some of these points.

I’d like to go directly at the heart of this concern; the celebration of the death of a human being.

It sounds like a very laudable thing, wonderfully sensitive and compassionate, to so love your fellow man that you are pained to see anyone celebrate death rather than life. To feel sadness that others would find joy in the misery or ending of another human life.

The death of Osama bin Laden can’t be broken down that easily, as the simple death of a man like any other.

This was more than that for many people. This was not just the death of a man, but of a symbol.

I’m going to make a comparison that I hope will show more clearly what I mean. Please bear with me for a moment.

In the movie The Wizard of Oz, when Glinda the Good Witch of the North tells Dorothy that her falling house has crushed and killed the Wicked Witch of the East, we have never been shown the wicked witch or heard of her deeds, so her death holds little meaning for us. 

Upon hearing this news, the Munchkins come out of hiding. They spontaneously burst into song, singing “Ding dong! The witch is dead” and dance in celebration.

Is this fiction? Of course it is. But it’s also a scene that I think many of us can understand when watching from the outside. The munchkins lived in fear under the shadow of the Wicked Witch of the East. They cowered in their homes, afraid of what evil she might do to them next. They feared standing out, for it might bring them to her notice, attract her attention to them.

When they knew that she was dead, their celebration spoke to me not of joy at the death of a person, but instead of a joyous reaction to the passing of fear, a fear they had lived under for a very long time, a fear they were powerless to do anything about.

The munchkins were not evil. They did not glory in the death of another human being, assuming the witches were human. But they had been afraid, and had been unable to strike back or even to defend themselves against the power of the Wicked Witch of the East. Once the Witch was dead, they looked around, and slowly came to the realization that they were free of that which they feared the most. Their hearts were gladdened and full of joy, so full they had to sing and dance to let it all out.

Analogies are always flawed things, but I see a lot of reasons for comparing the two situations.

From the moment the Twin Towers fell, America passed under the shadow of Osama bin Laden. For good or ill he was turned into a living symbol of terror. We lived our lives knowing that there was a man out there in the world bent on the death and destruction of American innocents, what the government calls non-combatants.

Here in America, we structured our lives around terror alerts and color codes and protective measures. In those first few months, we were told to seal our homes in pastic wrap, to watch our mail for anthrax dust, to watch our neighbors and the strangers on the street for anyone at any time could be seeking to kill us. We went to war to strike at the source, we took actions to hunt him down, we were told that at any moment the next attack may come.

We watched the media talk about how any large gathering, any event where Americans would gather together was now a potential target, a preferred target. The Super Bowl, the Democratic National Convention, a Barbara Streisand concert, all of these became ‘ideal targets for terrorism’.

We went about our lives anyway, because that’s who we are. We’re Americans, and while the normal stereotype of the American is of a loud, arrogant, violent cowboy, one thing is certainly true; we don’t cower in our holes or go into hiding. We take action. It may be the wrong action, but we do something, or we want to see that our government is doing something about it.

On September 11th 2001, a tension entered the lives of all Americans, whether we are willing to admit it or not. Osama bin Laden was turned into a symbol for terrorism, the face of those that want to kill our families, our children. The face of an enemy that did not want to face soldiers on the battlefield, but instead place bombs in schools and churches, to strike at the innocent and the defenseless.

For almost ten years, all Americans that choose to enlist in the armed forces know exactly who Osama bin Laden is, and what role he has had to play in our awareness of terrorism. 

The symbol of terrorism is dead, killed by an American warrior in an intentionally planned strike. That’s a very powerful symbol, too.

Do I think people cheering and celebrating are ghouls, delighting in the death of a human being? Do I feel sadness for them?

No. I think we are seeing people who are celebrating that the symbol of terror we have known for almost ten years is dead. The bogeyman is gone. The Wicked Witch of the East got a house dropped on her, and for the moment, we can dance in the streets and cheer Dorothy and pretend that all is well.

We know in our hearts that the Wicked Witch of the West is still out there intending to get us, and our little dog too. A symbol of terrorism is dead, but terrorism itself is not. We all know this, we’re not idiots.

This was a victory, and it is right and just to celebrate a victory, to acknowledge what we have suffered, to remember those that we loved that have been lost along the way, and to show our gratitude and appreciation to the warriors that volunteered to seek out the source of our fears and destroy them, and who remain pledged to destroy all others that would continue to serve him and his cause.

God bless all those who continue to fight on behalf of the American people, and who place themselves in harms way to protect the innocent. God bless you from the bottom of my heart.