YOU’RE NOT HELPING.

Pet peeve? Oh most definitely.

Update: I don’t know what happened, but around 3PM my time everything started working again.

Maybe my bitching worked.

Going to name a new priest, Wuhdafuq, because seriously BLIZZARD: what the hell did you do?! Shadow form gone on mounts? WHY FOR THE LOVE OF VELEN WHY? Did some junior designer get bored one day and decide to make this change? And no, shadowy friends does not work. What the hell happened to all my pet slots? WHY AM I A GROWN ASS WOMAN GETTING SO INFURIATED WITH THIS #$!$$!!!!! GAME? i will put in tickets. i will go find what I did. I will try to fix my mounts. But sh*t, Blizzard. knock it off

Yeo, man.

Oh joy! I have free time, homemade egg salad, and a sunny day, and I can get right in there and start the new 6.2 adventure.

As soon as I stop trying to decide if Yanas Seastrike has on pants or not.

Is that a masthead in your pocket, or just happy to see me?

“I call it No Pants Wonder Day, but the police just call it Tuesday.”

Moonwell, we have a problem.

Sometimes the real bosses in the game aren’t bosses at all, but menial chores, or death by a thousand paper cuts kind of thing. I admit: had a teeny, tiny hangover this morning, just a little one, and just wanted to goof around and make a pretty mooncloth robe for Pessah. Little gnome priests look darling in mooncloth, don’t you know? (Maybe it was moonshine from the moonwell?)

Zep went hither and yon to collect a few items, and remembered there is a moonwell in the Caverns. Well, apparently that moonwell is just for show, and not actually a functioning one. Since her hearthstone is all used up, she’ll have to wait until she can find a working well, working well. (The one in Shadowmoon Valley doesn’t work either apparently, and has a big stinky rock in it.) Someone needs to call Bob the Super to come over and fix it. One thing she refuses to do is plunk down 2500 gold for a mooncloth robe someone else made.

So guildmates: if you have some extra felcloth lying around, would you send it her way? She’ll eventually find a working moonwell and make that robe for Pessah. Or sell it for some gold. And don’t mention moonwell moonshine to her this morning: her stomach can’t take it.

Not what it looks like.

Momokawa drank the gender Kool-Aid…

A few weeks ago, during all the hullaballoo over flying, I had the repressed sense that there was something else going on. And it dawned on me:

Mataoka still, and never will, look the same.

The subtle shading of her Mona Lisa-esque smile is gone forever. Unless I toggle between old and new models, I am learning to let her old self go. Blizzard disconnected us from our characters, and in doing so, disconnected many of us from Azeroth.

Business Insider recently featured a video of what World of Warcraft might look like if designed with the current game rendering engines, by a man name Daniel Luchau. It is pretty amazing:

So just who are we in Azeroth, and how much sway do we have? We can’t be gnome hunters, nor gnome druids, or forsaken paladins, but there is some wiggle room. And you know, if there are 7 million of us who role play and dabble in alter-egos on a daily basis, who are we to judge one woman’s role?

http://media.mtvnservices.com/embed/mgid:arc:video:thedailyshow.com:4a41b66b-8103-4b91-a880-08f4886a4ee3The Daily Show
Daily Show Full Episodes,  More Daily Show Videos,  Comedy Central Full Episodes

But maybe that disconnection to our old character models isn’t such a bad thing. It’s an opportunity to get away from the computer, to look in a mirror instead of a screen. As much as I would like to see Azeroth in more detail, at the same time I wonder if it’ll fall into Lego-syndrome, where every detail is prefabricated so no imagination necessary.

I’ve decided today I’m going to be 24 and thin again. If you don’t see it, that’s your problem. 🙂

Arkanon Poros, ya’ll

Ack! Cough! Cough! Gasp! Sniff…man, it’s dusty around here! So much clutter and dust! The pets haven’t been leveled, the alts are floundering, even the mains are bored out of their pixels…the NPCS have that thousand-yard stare from lack of purpose…praying for a garrison invasion just to break up the monotony, the poor dears. Well, Mataoka ain’t no Halaa-back girl, and it’s time to start swinging again.*

Is it?

This editorial in GeekMom got me to thinking about our choices of time. Of late, my focus has been boxed in squarely on real life, but no complaints. I have found in my brief and fleeting time on this blue rock that where energy is spent is where energy pays off. The Matty-shack is in a transitional phase, one of those moments in history where clutter, old, worn, worn down and out, simply must go clutter up the planet somewhere else. Man, do we human gather a lot of stuff. CD Rogue is still on the hunt for a new gig, young leet druid and cub are doing their things, and I’ve been saying my Kronokai Khrystor’s to just about everyone I know. The outcomes have been wonderful, with the collateral damage being this blog is neglected. I can’t make any promises: I’m not remotely ready for 6.2,* have had to leave my sweet raid team for a bit, and just chip away at my garrisons’ mines and pick flowers, take some Claritin, and pick some more in the herb gardens. Well, I’m up in the middle of the night once more, so perhaps I’ll go back to sleep for a bit, then who knows what the day will bring? Weeding through clothes, books, and mines. Guess I have too much time on my hands.

*The best part of that video is when Guldan rolls his red eyes at garrisons…hilarious. Even he wants to redecorate in shades of toxic green.

*This may be one of the best written definitions in Urban Dictionary.

Deus ex flying machina

You didn’t have to give me flying in Draenor: I just met Jesse Long and we were going to be private and stuff…those glasses! That tabard! *swoon*

What was that, handsome? Someone at Blizzard listened the THE IRONISALLY and got their heads on right, and decided flying would come to Draenor after all? Um, yeah, duh! I was surreptitiously looking at my cell phone at work and saw a Dev Water-cooler talk before Tome’s post, and smirked, but yeah, seriously. Someone at Blizzard MUST read her blog, and if Tome ain’t happy, it’s like, well, it’s like — you better take a LONG HARD LOOK at your game development, because Tome is happy with just hanging out, and if there was ever a time to right the expletive FOR F*CKS SAKE now is the time. FFS.

Okay – good thinking Blizzard.

PS “Spirited discussion” my ass. You made Tome sad, but you fixed it. We can be friends again.

Orcs go home…

This expansion was supposed to be full of fear and testosterone, blood vengeance and second chances to wreak havoc. And I will say, the opening scene of battle where Draenei are being thrown into a vat of boiling something, I believed I would once again be on the edge of my seat, immersed in the story, caring whether or not the denizens of Draenor lived or died. But like a great movie trailer that uses up all the exciting parts of the film, it didn’t deliver.

CD Rogue found these images of a notorious New Zealand gang called the Mighty Mongrel Mob. They, from all appearances, (and appearances are all I have) seem quite intimidating. I mean, their faces alone tell a thousand stories. I’m not sure how who they are, what bonded them together, and what forces they stand against and for, but the images are stunning. They are the real deal. Not that I need to invite them to tea or anything…I’m sure they’re lovely gentlemen, and um…*cough* —don’t Hobbits live in New Zealand, too?

If there is one criticism about World of Warcraft is it’s sanitized aggression. When the green fire quest came out for warlocks, it was difficult not because of the lore or story, but the technical fussiness of the interaction. Most of it called upon precise and capricious technique: the moments when it actually used skills that are peculiar to warlocks was when it was challenging and fun, as opposed to challenging and ITHINKTHISISSOF*CKEDUP. The Gara quest was fun, too, because it gave my hunter purpose.

I have had fun leveling my Horde hunter Selkaa in Navimie’s guild on the Oceanic servers. The storylines are slightly different, and I am discovering new pathways. The time zone difference is nice, too. Because I’m on the other side of the world, when the guild is hopping I’m probably sawing logs. Not that I’m anti-social, mind you, just kind of nice to feel I’m alone with the stars and world.

So- in any case, get your writers back to the front of the line, Blizzard. People still want good stories, no matter what.

Beautiful again…

Let’s see what these can do…OH MY VELEN!

“It lasted for a long time, I believe.”

“A very long time. It was a great success, but even great successes come to a natural end.”
― Isaac Asimov, Robots and Empire

Well, I’m not sure if the Azerothian Empire is truly coming to an end. Heck, even Ancient Rome had a shelf life of ‘only’ 500-600 years (trying to do my Before Common Era and Common Era math: give me some good ol’ Anno Domini any day). No, I’m not leaving Azeroth. Not yet anyway. It’s too easy for me to have accounts and alts. But I do hope they pay attention, and quick being such dicks. Such little Caesars about the whole matter. If someone like Tome is canceling her subscription, gentlemen (and it is mostly “gentlemen”) take heed. You’ve exceeded our goodwill limit, and we’ll get all Visigoth and Gaulish on your asses and topple your civilization.

Asterix, Dogmatix, and Obelix…my heroes!

But just when I think there are no new worlds to conquer, I looked in Zep’s bags and found an old pair of Belbi’s Eyesight Enhancing Romance Goggles. I seriously have no idea why I have never tried them on before. Everyone knew this but me, but it turned everyone, and I mean EVERYONE, into a gnome:

Okay, Chris, I hope that leather strap isn’t chafing your…or your…oh my. 

Et tu, Oscar?

What I don’t understand, and maybe I never will, is why the really fun things in Azeroth are temporary, and the shitty grinds, no flying, and falling apart raid teams and mean pick-up groups seem to rule the day? I’m just gonna sit over here with my goggles on and look at all the sexy gnomes.

PS I am a bit concerned about Ceniza. She drank some potion not too long ago and, well, frankly she thinks she looks better as a male;

Kimzee, shush! If Blizzard hears you they’ll take something else away that’s fun!