Wednesday 6 August 2008

Laggramas

Big Bear Butt recently posted about how there's an awful lot of content out there in vanilla WoW that most players haven't seen before.  Every time I log on, I see people complaining about how they're bored, and that Blizzard needs to hurry up with Wrath because there's nothing to do.

To paraphrase BBB: rubbish.

A few weeks back, as I said previously, I joined OathBound.  Within 60 seconds of being invited in, I was asked if I wanted to come to ZG.  Yes, Zul'Gurub; the guild was having a fun-run.  ZG was one of the few raid instances I'd done back in vanilla WoW, so it wasn't like I hadn't done a few full clears.  And it's not like there's much of anything you can get from ZG that's still useful at 70.

But I went along, and I had a blast.  I can't describe how good it felt to not just one-shot Bloodlord Mandokir, but to completely destroy him.  Fighting Hakkar again was great fun, and I even got to kill Gahz'ranka, who I had never seen before.

The week after, the guild was in Molten Core.  We only got as far as Baron Geddon before calling it, but again it was just so enjoyable to run around tearing these once-feared bosses to ribbons.  I remember having to decurse the Lucifron fight on my druid.  On dialup.  Without Decursive.  Needless to say, it's a hell of a lot more entertaining when you're just in charge of bringing the pew-pew.

And this week, the guild headed over to the Dread Citadel itself.  Unfortunately, it didn't go so well.  The major issue seemed to be a lack of people.  With no upgrades for them, most didn't seem interested in coming.

I was absent for an entirely different reason: I'd reached my broadband quota a few days earlier, and was speed-capped.  Which means that while I can do just fine on a Kara run, I was disconnected inside Naxxramas within 10 seconds; instantly if someone entered combat.

I'd really love to see Naxx.  And BWL.  And AQ.  All the places and fights I never got to see back before BC.  I suppose I find it hard to understand how someone can invest time into this game and not want to see and do as much as they can.

Sure, there's no upgrades to be had from MC or Naxx.  But those pieces of gear that drop out of BT or Sunwell; the ones you covet so much... WotLK is going to make those obsolete.  You'll be back at the bottom of the food chain again.  If all you get out of playing WoW is better gear, then you'll have nothing to show for all that effort.

On the other hand, I'm coming away with something worth far more; something you won't find on any loot table: memories and fun.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Retro-raiding is a blast! I've completely explored every dungeon other than Temple of Ahn'Qiraj and Naxxramas, but that doesn't prevent me from being gleefully happy when people start talking about heading back to them. In particular, I find a lot of The Burning Crusade babies -- people who joined right when the expansion was released -- never got to see that content at all.

I seem to have the opposite problem that you do; I stepped foot into Molten Core recently with a bunch of friends who had gotten attuned and suddenly I was getting whispers to join the group! I've now got four of my tier pieces again and obtaining a Benediction -- long since considered my white whale -- seems suddenly conceivable!

Gauntlet said...

I got to spend about an hour in Naxx with my guild a couple of weekends ago. That was a great amount of fun, especially seeing a bad pull wipe 24 raid-geared level 70s in a few seconds.

Unfortunately, there was a lot going on that day, so I only got to see two bosses taken down. And I've missed all the other old-school raids due to timing issues.