A Hallow Ending (short story)

((This is a story I just posted on CC's forums about Ketlan's first days on the realm.))

“A Hallow Ending”

Her hands moved in a set rhythm, inured against both the chill and the occasional prick of the needle.  Ketlan was no master tailor, but repairing her own robes was a familiar task.  The once pristine robe was riddled with a series of mends and patches.  It was mismatched, pieced together from different sources.  Each stitch was memory, as was every faint stain, which no scrubbing could remove.  

Ketlan's First Day

I spent today giving my neglect main some much needed love.  I bought her some gear, and let her attend an RP event.

Oh, and I died surprisingly less often that I thought I would.

Welcome to Cenarion Circle

Well, I gave it a lot of thought, and last night I made a decision.

I transferred my main to Cenarion Circle.

Welcome, Ketlan Jancis, to your new home.

Monking Around

Sooo...

Monking Around

Something many people thought would never happened occurred yesterday: Blizzard announced a new class for World of Warcraft, the Monk. 

We're looking at a leather-wearing, agility based fighter who can tank, dps, and melee heal!  The last one has me very excited as a healer.  It's a brand new dynamic, and one I can't wait to try out. 

There are three specs:

• Brewmaster (Tank) 
• Mistweaver (Melee Healer)
• Windwalker (DPS)

One of the monk's distinctive features will be its lack of auto attack.  Every attack you do will be generated by a button press, giving you much more involved, "twitchy" feel.  The animations on the monks seem very expressive and fluid and are based off martial arts.  Of course, we've only seen the Pandaren animations; who knows what a gnome or night elf would look like?  (Or a Tauren!)

Monks will wear cloth and leather armor, and their resource is chi.  In the case of the Mistweaver, when you switch to a healing stance, your chi will convert to mana.  The healing model will be based on proximity: you can heal those who are standing close to you in melee, or you can heal via statues that can be strategically placed near ranged DPS.  This reminds me a bit of atonement healing in disc priests; I hope there is some way to target your heals more effectively that what my priest currently does. 

 

I haven't heard yet how the other two play styles will work out.  They will be using the same leather gear as a druid.  There is a possibility that Brewmaster will work like feral tanking- which I guess we should start calling guardian tanking- or might be a form of agility tanking.  Windwalker is likely to be similar to a rogue.

I'm already thinking about what to name my future monk, and what class she should be.  My main's a 85 disc priest, and my favorite alts are a resto shammy and resto druid, so I'm definitely trying out the mistweaver spec.  I will have to roll a pandaren - how can you not? - but I would like to see how the class feels on classic races, as well.

There hasn't been any new news on updated character models, but if all the BC-era classes are getting a whole new set of animations, there has to be some improvements made, if only in the skeletal system. 

It saddens me that it will likely be months before we get to try out the new class.  People at Blizzcon get to play a demo, but in the everyday world, the PTR is still working on Patch 4.3.  It would be nothing short of miraculous if the next PTR is for MoP. 

As soon as that Beta hits, though- I will be there!

BLIZZCON

I just finished watching the first day of Blizzcon coverage via livestream. Wow!

Or should I say WoW?

Vashj'ir still bugged

Dear Blizzard,

I am posting this here as this is not an actual “bug report” per se, as this concerns a known issue.  I would just like someplace to share my feelings on this problem, as it has left me very frustrated.

I consider myself a casual player.  I take my time playing through the game.  I like to explore, take breaks, and read every quest.   I don’t look up information on quests or zones unless I’m stumped, although I can’t help hearing some spoilers. It took me two years to reach level cap.   What keeps me playing is the community, and the story.

How I Wound Up in Cenarion Circle and My Current Guilds

It's time for another late-night post, fictional readers.  This one's a long one.

I've been thinking a lot about guilds lately.  Y'know: which ones to join, keep, what to name my future bank guild.  Stuff like that.  Up until now, I haven't really been all that picky about what guild I join, except that they must be casual.  I don't have the schedule the commit to raid times or required events. 

I think it's time I got more serious about guilds.