Legion is Coming

Disclaimer: I am not going to talk about specifics. The only thing I’m going to say about the trailer is: Amazing! What I am going to talk about is my feel for what we learned at Blizzcon.  If you don’t want this kind of spoilers, then move on to the next post or blog, this one is not for you.

Spoiler Free Version: Lots of things look amazing. There are several significant quality of life improvements. There are several good ways to feel social again. It really looks like the devs took a lot of time and thought through the mistakes of past expansions, trying to take the good of these things and center the game on the character again.  I even think this expansion will be more alt-friendly than WoD.

On to the Juicy Details

A Boost and a Pet

A while ago, Rho of Realm Maintenance did a little contest. To enter, you had to write an email and send it in. The subject was what you liked about Blizzcon.  My submission follows (note, there are “technical spoilers” in my replies. Nothing story related, just some of the expected game mechanics coming):

“Rho,
I watched Blizzcon via the Virtual Ticket, and because I had other things going on (like taking new kittens to get their booster shots), I had to pick my live panels carefully. On Friday night, I watched the Opening Ceremonies and Legion panel after the fact; and I have to say that listening to that first overview panel was a bit underwhelming. It felt like a slightly more indepth version of what we learned at Gamescom.  On the other hand, I loved looking at the art concepts because my Mom is an artist. I can only imagine artists who aspire to working at Blizzard taking that information and trying to create their art with those templates and concept pieces.
On Saturday, I watched the Legion dev panel live, and that’s where I really got excited. I’m not sure I can even list all the things that were on my list of “I love this”.  I’m an alt player, and I had already planned to try and get multiple toons all of their artifact weapons, so I was pretty stoked to learn later that they are giving all of our specs to us. That’s pretty awesome.
Then there was Transmog Closet! Not only will we get all that space back, but we’ll even get all that retro quest gear back! I’m excited to see how many things I have, since I have two toons with Lorewalking (one with pre-cataclysm Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms version, and the other with post-cataclysm achievements). I do wonder if the “everything from all quests completed” means everything or everything that class would use.
Tabards! I never started collecting tabards because I had no space, so I’m excited to get that new collection going.
New content! I always love the first time I quest through new content, and sometimes also the 2nd through 10th times. I’m excited that I can pick where I want to start, and how I want to progress through the content.
Artifact Weapons, So PRETTY! My favorite is the Prot paladin shield. It’s so gorgeous. Love the customizations across the board. I also loved the little snippets of lore about the weapons, making me start to think about how those quest lines are going to play out.”

Well, as it turns out, that was the winning submission. The prize was a digital deluxe version of Legion.

Then there was a small snafu. Legion isn’t giftable yet. But Rho, being the generous sort, bought Battle.net codes to provide me with the correct sum to be able to do my upgrade myself. These, however, are only available in $20 increments, so I ended up with an extra $10. While it was a suggestion from him that I use the remainder to buy myself a Brightpaw; I thought about it, and decided that it was excellent. I hadn’t anticipated winning the extra for a pet, but it makes sense to me to pay that boon forward in some way. Since Brightpaw is the Make-A-Wish charity pet, that fit the theme quite nicely. I get a little something adorable, Make-a-Wish gets the extra donation.

Of course, with the Legion pre-purchase came a 100 boost. I’d already decided to boost Eirid, so up she went to 100, giving me 8 of my 10 girls finished up (Grianna is at 79, and Kemodhne is 35). And with the new level 100 comes the unveiling of her mog. You can come back tomorrow to see that post.

My Week In WoW (November 4-11)

Gurdrid

I’ve decided to stop raiding for what may be the rest of the expansion.  I need to get some things in my home life in order, and two nights a week staying up an hour or (usually) more past my bedtime is not working for that.  That wasn’t the only factor, but the other reasons aren’t something I’m comfortable discussing at large. I’ve spoken with a few people about it, and that’s really enough.

Breige

Timeless Isle rep is trucking right along. Not as fast as I would “like” but certainly better than not at all.

Saoire

No dwarves this week.

Grianna

Grianna broke 60 and headed into Outland. She’s rolled into 64 now, and is just about to embark into Nagrand.  Since she’s out of rested XP, leveling moves to Kemodne for at least a few days.

Kemodhne

Kemodhne rolled around to 30, and headed over to Kalimdor to finish her run to 60. I didn’t burn through all of her rested XP, but decided to go run the Circuit of Disappointment instead.

Blizzcon

I got the Blizzcon virtual ticket, and really enjoyed the WoW panels, costume contest (though I tuned in just in time to see the announcement of the winners), and watched a few Hearthstone games, both exhibition and championship play.  Murkidan is so adorable!   I have lots of thoughts about what we saw regarding Legion, but I’m going to hang onto those for another post.