Sep 4, 2008

And so it goes...

As mentioned earlier today, I wasn't a fan of the "Race to 80" achievements. And apparently Blizzard figured out it wasn't a good idea as well.
We've decided to remove the titles for the Realm First Feats of Strength that are associated with reaching level 80. We've also removed the titles associated with the Realm First Feats of Strength associated with gaining 450 skill in the professions and secondary skill. Lastly, we've removed the title associated with Realm First to accomplish the Northrend Vanguard achievement.

Realm First boss kill achievements will still grant a title.

As a side note, Beta characters will retain their titles or end up displaying a broken title. This won't carry over to the live realms but it is merely a symptom of removing these titles from the game. If we were to do another wipe of the achievement system, the Beta titles would go away.

Hex Lord Vanquished!

Last night, in a triumphant return to Zul'Aman, the Gold Team was able to obtain the third timed chest for the first time ever (with 2 minutes to spare) and we then went on to kill the dreaded Hex Lord Malacrass! Congratulations to my good friend Dylana who won the Tiny Voodoo Mask and Mercreus who got his Trollbane. I also obtained these Footpads of Madness which I'm still unsure about. I love my Boots of Blasting, but another 25 haste could get my Fireball down to 2.7 seconds potentially.

I also just discovered that last night I was running the whole night with the wrong pair of gloves on. My Spellfire Gloves were sitting in my bank the whole night, basically gimping my damage by 7% and also putting me under the hit cap, resulting in another damage loss. I did enjoy running last night with my two pieces of Tier 4. Sporting the Collar of the Aldor and Pauldrons of the Aldor allowed me to cast straight through any bird interruptions on Akil'zon and also during the spirit bolts on Malacrass. And while the tooltip mentions just uninterruptable fireballs, it seemed like my scorches were going off without interruptions as well. So next time in (a.k.a. tonight), I'll be going in with the correct gloves and my two pieces of Tier 4.


So we've finally got another boss off of our Gold Team list and Zul'jin is the last left. On our very first attempt, we got to the lynx stage - which I thought was quite good since 7 of us were seeing him for the first time. Our best attempt was our last (of probably 4 or 5) where we once again made it to the lynx stage with 7 or so people up, but we lost our priest early in the stage and without the group heals, we were done. But it was a great learning experience and I hope we can get him down soon.

I still a bit skeptical that we can get the bear mounts, but we are now able to get three timed chests which is a great advancement. We also are doing much better on Akil'zon which is great progress for us. We are able to hatch one whole side each time eggs are hatched which greatly cuts down on time required to kill him.

On a side note, I have added another pet to my collection, however, I think my screenshots were not properly kept over the past few sessions, so until I can get screenshots, I am not announcing him here.

Achievements, Part II

Rohan shared his thoughts on the subject already, but I thought I'd chime in as well. I absolutely hate the "World First" feats. At least they're not achievements, but I don't think anyone should be rewarded for these feats.

First gnome to 80? Who cares. First tailor to 425? Whoop-de-do. First player on the server to 80? Way to prove you can either a) take a week off work or b) take a week off school or even worse, c) share your account with others and power level.

If I see anyone running around sporting one of the "server first" titles, I'll just laugh a little on the inside. All the other achievements I have no problem with. Exalted with the Timbermaw? Sure, it takes time (a lot of time), but you can do a little here, a little there, but it doesn't take a week of straight playing.

Also, what does happen if someone gets seriously injured from sleep deprivation or too many energy drinks? I have an energy drink here or there, and when seeing the latest Batman film, I drank too many in a short period of time and I swear I thought my heart was going to explode (why I still continue to drink even a single one is a mystery...). So what does happen if someone drinks too many, goes into cardiac arrest, and dies - while trying to accomplish a feat that Blizzard set up in game? Could they be sued? Maybe. They are officially sanctioning the race to 80. They are saying - go for it - we know you'll play 24x7, but we don't care. You want to be the server first, congrats.

I doubt they'll change their mind about this, but in my opinion, it's probably one of the stupidest things they've done in a while. Let's hope they do go back and realize the mistake they've made.