Should I Stay or Should I Go?

Hello internet,

It may come as a shock to some of you, but I have played on the same server since WoW vanilla. Every level of every character was earned on Andorhal server. I’ve had some great times on this server – from my first experience with a member of the Horde (a level 10 Dwarf Paladin melee swinging a Tauren in Kharanos because I didn’t know that a skull next to his name meant he could rofl-stomp me in a second) to getting my TLPD, this server has been good to me.

Sadly, Andorhal’s population has been in a steady decline since The Burning Crusade. At this point, trade channel is dead, Stormwind’s population has been reduced to a handful of people AFK at the auction house, and since my guild transferred last night, the Alliance is left without a single viable raiding guild.

People throw around the idea of transferring pretty often on a server as dead as mine. As evidenced by the server population dropping faster than the stock market, many people have decided that transferring was the only solution. The issue is that server transfers are part of a self-fulfilling prophecy on a low population server. When an entire guild full of players leaves a low-pop server it takes with it such a large segment of the population that the playing experience of those left behind is so drastically changed that they have no choice but to transfer, creating a vicious cycle.

As I was saying earlier, I’ve been on the same server for my entire WoW life – which is actually an embarrassingly long stretch of time. As such, I’ve always felt a special connection to my server; after all, it is MY server. People know me here; they greet me warmly (or coldly) when I stand at a mailbox, they laugh at my jokes when I troll in trade chat, and they complain about me on the opposing faction when I alt-hop to check the Horde AH. The point is: Andorhal is my home.

Sentimentality aside, I know that I’m not getting the full playing experience on my server, and with my guild leaving, I stand to lose a lot of friends. So, despite my hatred of Blizzard’s money-grab-transfers, I want to get some answers to some questions and share them with the rest of you so that we can make an informed decision about transferring.

New Territory-

The first thing I did was scout out the new high-pop server on an alt. Bleeding Hollow was my guild’s new server, so I ran a level 1 Human into Stormwind to take a look for myself. The first thing I noticed was a very active trade chat. People were not only selling things, but recruiting for ICC 25 runs (you may or may not know this, but I’m a sucker for running old content). Next, I made my way through throngs of players to the auction house (yes, throngs of players). The prices seemed fairly comparable, but the quantity was insane. On Andorhal’s auction house there was 1 epic blacksmithing pattern; on Bleeding Hollow there were about 20.

Round 1 goes to Bleeding Hollow. While the seething mass of players doesn’t have the same appeal as our close-knit server, the possibilities on a server with an active population are undeniable. And if I’m being honest, it made me nostalgic for the good old days on Andorhal.

FAQs-

My next plan was to scout out Blizzard’s website for some answers to common FAQs. I wanted to make sure I wouldn’t be losing items and stuff. Here are the answers to my biggest questions:

What if my character's name is already taken on the destination realm?

If your character’s name is already taken, you will be prompted to rename your character. Remember that your character name should follow our Naming Policy.

What is the gold limit to transfer?

The following gold limits apply to all characters. Characters above the limits on the following table are not eligible to transfer.

 

Can I transfer back?

A completed transfer cannot be reversed. If you want to move your character again, you may complete another character transfer three days after the last one completed.

What will transfer with my character?

• The contents of your character’s bags, bank, and void storage
• Your character’s currencies including gold, honor, justice, valor, and conquest
• Your character’s achievements and achievement points (including account-wide achievements)
• Your character’s hidden ratings (MMR, BG Rating, etc)

 What will not transfer with my character?

• Your character’s quest log will be cleared completely.
• Account-wide pets and mounts remain with the original Battle.net account.
• Character friends and ignore lists will be reset.
• User interface settings (macros, character-specific key bindings, etc...) will be reset.
• Guild affiliation does not transfer (unless you perform a Guild Master Realm Transfer).

Conclusion-

So, I haven’t finalized my decision yet… but I’d like to say that Andorhal has been one hell of a good place to hang out for the last several years. It will always hold a special place in my heart.

Server First Paladin?

Hello internet, how are you today?

Several months ago, shortly before the MoP expansion was released, I decided I wanted to be the first Paladin to reach level 90 on my server. Being an achievement-wh… err, enthusiast… the idea of getting an achievement that no other person on my server could get sounded like an awesome idea. The prestige, the fame, the night elf women… all would be mine if I could just be the first Paladin to reach level 90.

In preparation for my feat, I recruited a friend to level with me and scheduled a full week off of work. When MoP hit I was totally ready to hit the ground running and power through to level 90.

As soon as the server rolled over to 12:00am I dove right in, taking the hot air balloon from Stormwind all the way to the newly discover Pandaria. In the starting zone there was fierce competition for quest objectives, and the first few hours trudged on, waiting for respawns and getting annoyed with people.

Then, we started to pull away from the pack and we discovered new areas in the Jade Forest. I was excited by our questing pace, but when I looked at our XP progress I was wholly discouraged… we had only done about half a level in almost 6 hours… Feeling defeated (and exhausted), I made an executive decision that we should go to sleep and resume the next day.

I woke up refreshed about 12 hours later and we resumed our quest. At this point, a lot of players had already hit level 86, and some had even reached 87. Knowing how far behind we were, we forged ahead trying to make up ground. Unfortunately, MoP turned out to be the “grindiest of grinds” as my friend described it, and neither of us could stomach the questing experience much more. So, with much regret and annoyance, we gave up.

It was right around this time that I started to see server first profession achievements for some of the more annoying professions (alchemy, tailoring). But to my surprise, there were two or three achievements still lingering… including, server first blacksmith!

 

Newly invigorated, I smelted all of the ore I had collected while leveling and quickly churned out some green quality items. Unfortunately, my half-hearted ore collecting left me well short of my goal… so I turned to general chat for assistance.

10-15 thousand gold later, I had a few dozen stacks of ore and I started working the forge like a man possessed. But the stress and pressure proved to be worth it, when I became the server first zen master blacksmith.

So, while I wasn’t able to cement myself as the best Paladin on the server, I was able to claim my title as the best blacksmith on the server.

Patch 5.1 Invades Pandaria - the Good, the Bad, and the Ugly

Hello friends,

Patch 5.1 splashed onto the shores of Pandaria yesterday afternoon, and with it came a few big changes to the game. Some of the changes were great, while others fall short (by a lot). Here's my take on 5.1.

The Good: 

Reputation Improvements! 

With patch 5.1 Blizzard has heard the player feedback about rep grinds and implemented a way to increase your reputation leveling speed. Upon reaching revered with a Pandaria faction players will be able to purchase commendations for that faction, unlocking a 100% bonus to reputation gains for that faction for all characters on the account.

While this change is only a bandage that doesn't address the real issue with the repetitive faction grinds, it's a welcome change for players needing relief from a never-ending daily quest grinds. This change comes just in time, since patch 5.1 adds even more faction dailies for the Horde and the Alliance.

Brawler's Guild

Probably the most anticipated change in the patch will be the additional of a secretive fight club that players can join (if they can manage to get an elusive invitation). Players can purchase an invite from the Black Market Auction House or get one as a drop from one of the rare faction NPCs in Krasarang. If you aren't able to purchase an invite, someone else who is already in the Brawler's Guild can also invite you.

Personally, I don't see the appeal of the Brawler's Guild - it seems to me like a developer just thought of it on a whim as a reference to a good movie. But, this fight club reference has garnered a lot of hype since it's announcement, and I know that on my server the rare spawns that drop the invitation are hotly contested.

The Bad: 

More Daily Quests


Yes, with 5.1 comes a host of additional daily quests for the players that have been craving additional daily quests to distract them from the lack of actual content in the game.

With the Horde and the Alliance forces landing on the shores of Krasarang, we will be asked to fight for the honor and glory of our factions by completing daily quests... boy, where do I sign up.

Pet Battle Updates

5.1 brings a few much needed changes to the pet battle UI. Pets will now be denoted by the color of their rarity in the battle UI frame (good). Additionally, the pet journal allows more sorting functionality (also good). My issue with the update is that they didn't go far enough! Some really great mods had been created for showing pet battle quality inside of battle. The greatest thing about the mod I was using is that not only did it show the quality, but it showed if you already owned the pet AND if it was an upgrade for you. The updated Blizzard UI doesn't show whether a pet is an upgrade, meaning you need to open up your pet journal and manually search for every individual pet to check if it's an upgrade. Same thing on mouse-over of wild pets - the tooltip will show you own the pet, but not what quality is in your journal.


The Ugly: 

New Item Tooltips

In a study from the school of fixing things that aren't broken, Blizzard decided to update the layout of item tooltips for the first time in 7 years. The old layout grouped primary stats at the top of the item, sockets in the middle, and secondary stats at the bottom of the item. For some reason it was decided that a better approach would be to smash the primary stats and the secondary stats together - so instead of having something that's easy to read and functional, we get a tooltip with a jumble of information that isn't easy to read at a glance.

Compare for yourself - do you hate the new tooltips as much as I do?

Item Upgrades

The patch also adds item upgrades - personally, I'm indifferent to this feature, but I think it may turn off some casual players. At most I think it adds an unnecessary level of complexity to gearing your character. A player now needs to know what gear is BiS, what to gem it with, what to enchant it with, what to transmogrify it to, what stats to reforge, and now, whether or not to upgrade it... sometimes, less is more.

- - - - - - -

Those are my reflections on 5.1. So, what did everyone else think of the patch?

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Paladin-Bias

I'm Back

Hello internet!

It’s been a few months since my last post, and I feel truly horrible about my absence! After taking summer (and most of autumn) off, I’m back with a vengeance.

I have a lot of catching up to do; here’s a preview of the next few posts on Paladin-Bias.

• The triumphant return of Graphically-Challenged
• A review of MoP
• A recap of my efforts to be server first Paladin
• Pet battle musings
• And more!

Check back in a few days for a more substantial post.

Thanks!

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Paladin-Bias

DING Level 2

I can't believe it's been two years since I started this blog.