I don’t like PvP…
I’m bad at it — embarrassingly so — and I never got into the competitive culture. Plus, it has no lore.
But there’s an exception to every rule. Last night, two guilds, representing both factions, hosted a world PvP event on Wyrmrest Accord. The two factions were to gather around the Seradane Emerald Dream portal in Hinterlands and duke it out. No rules, no prizes, no point. Just some random violence, all in good fun.
And this just seemed too entertaining for me to pass up. Stuff like this never happens on Antonidas. It’s lovely that Wyrmrest has such a vibrant and active community.
So I hopped on my mage, put on all four pieces of my outdated, ungemmed PvP gear, and joined the gathering hosts of the Horde.
Needless to say, I spent most of the battle as a ghost.
The fight was… interesting. I won’t mince words: the Alliance handed us our asses on a platter. I blame Garrosh Hellscream.
But the fascinating thing was that my group faced defeat like, well, adults. Never before have I seen a group in a PvP situation not react to failure like a spoiled child, raging at, insulting, and bickering with fellow team members. Nor did our opponents participate in the usual /spitting and body desecration. That made the experience enjoyable even as the Alliance facestomped as time and again.
My favourite part was what happened after the battle was over. By unspoken agreement, both factions walked (not ran — it’s an RP server) across the body-strewn field and intermingled, still flagged for PvP all the while, /saluting and /bowing to each other. It was… awesome.
Stuff like this convinces me the server transfer was worth it.
I don’t like hunting for achievements…
…In WoW. The vast majority of them are measures of time and commitment, not skill. Most anyone can get a hundred mounts or loot 5,000 gold with enough grinding. And those few that do require skill usually require groups, which rather devalues the whole concept, in my view. How much of that raid boss kill was because of my contributions? Probably not much.
StarCraft II achievements, though, are another story.
Unlike WoW’s, most of SCII’s achievements require significant skill, and since most of them are achieved solo, I know no one carried me. Back when I played SCII regularly, I worked hard at getting many of the campaign achievements, though there were some that were too much trouble for me.
My proudest achievement was completing every campaign mission on brutal, the highest difficulty setting.
But there was a problem. My old computer tended to randomly DC from Battle.Net, so I didn’t receive credit for a number of missions. It was a crushing discovery.
I was too discouraged to start over immediately, but since I got my new computer, I’ve been slowly picking away at the missions I still needed credit for. And yesterday — with much sweat, struggle, compulsive game-saving, and spamming of the stimpack button — I at last plowed my way through the final three missions that I needed.
*Punches the air.*
BOW DOWN BEFORE MY KERRIGAN PORTRAIT, MORTALS!
After that, I immediately jumped into the new “Starcraft Master” official mod, which turned out to be much more brutal than brutal.
I’ve got two of its five achievements so far; I might shoot for the rest today, or I might go hide under my bed and try to recover from that marine versus zealot scenario…
One other thing:
Blizzard recently announced the laying off of 600 employees. Most of these were not developers, so while I felt bad for the people who lost their jobs, I didn’t let it worry me too much.
Until I found out that one of those let go is the man known as Nyorloth. Nyorloth was the first ever community manager devoted entirely to the story forums and lore communities of Blizzard’s three main franchises.
He was appointed to this position only a few weeks ago, though he had been working behind the scenes for many years. He is credited with the creation of the story forums, the Global Writing Contest (a subject near to my heart), and Ask CDev.
Nyorloth’s appointment as the lore CM was met with much fanfare and seen as a sign of a new era of communication with lore fans. It was a great sign of Blizzard’s commitment to story-telling. And now, less than a month afterward, he is gone.
You will not be forgotten, Nyorloth. Ywaq maq oou.
If you’ve played World of Warcraft recently, you no doubt recognize this quote from the new dungeon, End Time. Now, this is not a good piece of dialogue by any stretch of the imagination. It is, in fact, almost embarrassingly cheesy.
Now, you might say this is a crutch to conceal bad writing. And sometimes, such as in the Murozond example, it is. But when the writing is good and combined with interesting and immersive gameplay, you get something truly special.
In Utter Darkness is a mission in Starcraft II: Wings of Liberty. It is supposed to be a vision of the future in which the last survivors of the alien Protoss make their final stand against the Zerg Swarm and their Hybrid masters.
But the enemy attacks will grow progressively stronger, the light progressively dimmer, the longer the mission lasts. Inevitably, you will be defeated. No matter how hard you fight, no matter how brilliant a player you are, no matter what, you will be forced to watch as your best-laid plans fail and your mighty fortress is ripped apart before your very eyes.
It’s a perfect synthesis of gameplay and story-telling that makes for a unique and powerful experience.
Superior Realities 