Jess IMmed me a second ago telling me there was an outbreak of an emergent plague on World of Warcraft last night:
so Blizzard came out with a new dungeon in the patch
in the dungeon, there is a boss who gives you a disease which does 250 damage every second for three or four seconds
and the disease spreads to ANYONE of your own faction who is near you
so some moron fought the boss and then hearthstoned into ironforge while still infected
and there was mass death and dstruction as the disease leaped from person to person, then back again
basically no one survived!!!!
I believe this was yesterday
[have they got it under control?]
not exactly, but it's only on a couple of servers
it kills really fast so it tends to wipe everyone out, then disappear
no, no, it hasn't come to Silver Hand
evidently under level 20, it kills in the initial infection
after that it's a bounce-around-reinfect thing
And she sent me to look at Ironforge calls out for healing (Windows Media file only, sorry), a bit of documentary machinema about the phenomenon. (The title refers to the line of text your avatar will produce if you type /heal at the prompt.)
What a document of the culture of the people who live together in this space. The footage is by turns awkwardly framed and brilliantly captured, with an elf on a Sabre careening by the camera at the end, spurting out gobbets of gore like some stylized recreation of ebola. It has some of the urgency of an Indymedia protest video -- eyewitness testimony, chaotic crowd scenes, periodic explosions of light (from healers and resurrectors), panicked avatars running around gouting blood -- and some of the heavy-metal-soused overdrama of a pro-wrestling star's entrance to the ring. A moustached gnome stands on a pile of skeletons facing the camera, gesturing madly, and says "Ya man/I saw some guy run by/POW/He blew up!/Blood brains and snot..."
It closes with text from the machinemographer reading "Only a hero can save us.../Someone brave... And that Hero,/Sure as hell aint me./If you need me I'l be in Undercity."
In world, as on Earth, disasters define community, eh? And remind us how small and ineffective we are against the whims of the programmers and the emergent dangers of nature.
Posted by Gus at September 19, 2005 04:22 PM...and ebay auctions of virtual treasures for metamoney. From a forum on the Rogue class...
Auntie Doomhammer writes....
I purchased the game a month ago, and I'm quite content myself to mess around, parse things, and find a talent set that suits my needs as I go along.
However I have a 6-year old niece whom I have over a fair bit, and she's detirmined to play after watching me.
I selected a rogue also for her, but I'm looking for some help with a build.
She can probably handle simple combos - ie Sinister Strike + Evisceration after bubbles [combo move indicators], maybe even Ambush or something, but I wouldn't try to pass off anything much more complicated. I figure a sword or mace build might be best, but I'm not sure about the value of ambush (I havn't messed with a dagger build yet) pushing daggers over them if I can teach her how to use it.
So I'm looking for some build suggestions for minimum grief and optimal leveling with that in mind. My guess is that she will just likely go around killing things on her own (I'll help with quests, but I'm looking for something simple for her), so a normal game session from her will probably be just kill, kill, kill, etc with me joining her for quests. I'm not sure she will ever reach high level, but I'd like to reduce the headaches of watching her and make sure she enjoys the game.
I'm going to assume a splash of assassination, a heavy dose of combat, and a dash of subtlety - but I'd like some options and builds if anyone has suggestions.
Thanks in advance =P.
Wycca
Rogue/Doomhammer
Posted by: Cupofmud at September 21, 2005 10:55 AM
As I approach level 60 the fauna gets less and less hostile, leaving me free to enjoy the surroundings more and more. Today I went to Feralas to catch a trophy fish. There are awe-inspiring, towering waterfalls and trees, vast green vistas, and, sitting quietly next to the Verdantis River, two lovers. Rexah, level 60 female, human rogue and Arwenn, level 60 female, human mage were melded into one so that the only clue that there were two there was their intermingled halo-captions. I walked away up the river (literally, I have walking on water skills) and spent considerable time catching my fish. They were still melded when I returned but when I stood there taking notes for this comment, they separated. For a brief moment they emoted at each other:
Arwenn cries on Rexah's shoulder
Rexah sighs at Arwenn
Rexah loves Arwenn
Arwenn licks her lips
Then a magic portal To Darnassus opened and they departed in a flash of brilliant and deadly plumage.
I hearthstoned back to Thunder Bluff to cook my fish.
Posted by: Cupofmud at November 27, 2005 3:30 PM
Dude! Mud! Getcha own blog! No, for real, you have good things to say -- quit commenting and get serious! :)
Posted by: gus at December 11, 2005 1:08 PM