Monday, September 29, 2014

Monday Random Thoughts

- Been thinking about what I want to do with my garrisons.

- I know a few people have posted here looking forward to hearing what I will be doing to use, or strip from, some of the ideas.

- Always glad to help.

- I just figure out what I want to do and share my opinions.

- Problem is I am having such a dreadfully hard time deciding.

- There have been a few things I decided.

- Like being we are not going to have flying I want the mage tower.

- Then after playing I think I have changed my mind on that one.

- I no longer would waste a space on the mage tower, no thank you.

- However, if you do get the mage tower as alliance then making nagrand one of your ports is the perfect idea.

- It is the furthest point from the alliance garrison so it only makes sense.

- But after playing and seeing how few reasons there are to ever actually go out in the world I noticed travel and getting around all that fast is not that important.

- There is nothing to do in the world.

- So there is no reason to have fast access to it.

- Maybe that is another tin foil hat idea for people to wonder about.

- Blizzard knew there was nothing in the world to do and if they added flying people would figure that out even faster.

- So they are not adding flying in an effort to make the content last longer.

- Have fun with that one tin foil hat conspiracy theory people.

- I am afraid to make any final decisions on what I am going to do with garrisons because it seems like they are changing things every single patch.

- I guess that is a good thing.

- It means they are still working on trying to make things better.

- So you can read it one of two ways, depending on if you are a fan boy or a hater.

- If you are a fan boy you can say it shows how great this is going to be because they keep working hard at making it better even up until the last moment.

- If you are a hater you would say how can they still be this far from finished so close to release and it shows they have no clue what they are doing.

- And then there is me.

- Right down the middle.

- I am surprised they are still this far from being done and it shows a lack of proper management but am impressed that they have a vision and are not letting up trying to get it there in time.

- So does that make me a fan boy or a hater?

- I say it makes me a realist.

- I, like most others, just want a game to play.

- But I keep track of my garrison on beta and keep trying to decide what I want to do.

- So far the only thing I have set in stone absolutely is that you will need a salvage yard if you ever want to level up the gear of your followers.

- Absolutely 100% sure of that one.

- There is really no other dependable way to get gear for your followers.

- Maybe one to three quests a week, that you need to succeed at, that might get you a piece.

- But you will get, if active, 15-20 pieces a week with a salvage yard.

- The better the gear your followers have the better the chance at a successful mission.

- The better the rewards from those mission.

- Rewards like conquest points, apexis crystals, 615, 630, 645, and higher gear.

- But all of this needs very very very geared followers.

- So you need to be getting gear at more than a 1 to 3 pieces a week rate.

- And that means you need a salvage yard.

- No ifs ands or buts about that one.

- So ladies and gentlemen, we have our first, and only at the moment, mandatory garrison building, the salvage yard.

- Did you see the most recent lords of war short?

- And some people were complaining there were no alliance characters.

- In truth there should not have been any.

- It is about the lords of war, which means orcs, sick of them or not.

- But this one about Maraad was great, it pulled at my heart strings.

- Seeing the dolly just lay on the ground knowing the little girl had died was about as sad as the darrowshire story line.

- The original darrowshire storyline that is.

- When I did that one so many years ago I actually thought I was going to cry.

- I felt something in the pit of my stomach.

- Yes, a cold hearted bastard like me was left saddened and empty by the end of that quest line.

- The new one lost some of its power.

- Oh who am I kidding, the newer shorter versions leaves no feeling like the original had.

- But this story in lords of war was sad on a level close to that one.

- The first four lords of war left me wanting me be an orc, it made them feel powerful, strong, fighting the good fight.

- The 5th one instilled the feeling that all those orcs need to die and die now.

- I would have not believed blizzard would go there, but at least we did not see it happen.

- But a child, many children, slaughtered, nothing can pull the heart strings and make one seek vengeance any more that that.

- Orcs... must... die.

- It is wrong that I would rather watch more lords of war shorts than play the game?

- They were so incredibly well done.

- Sad they are over.

- I noticed my favorite orc, one I have been writing about here for many years, that I want to be the big bad of an expansion, was not in the lords of war.

- At first I was mildly upset not to see more of him because I always loved his story and his character.

- Long before most people even knew who he was.

- But not seeing Gul'dan turns out to be a good thing, for me at least.

- You see, there is a connection with the lords of war and because of that connection I am glad Gul'dan did not have one made for him.

- I will not speak the connection, because it might be spoilerish, but I am sure most people already know it or can figure it out.

- Get ready for next expansion when Gul'dan is the big bad.

- Yes, another orc expansion, but not just any orc, the greatest evil that the world as we know it has ever seen.

- See, that is why I like Gul'dan, he doesn't need a reason to be evil, he just is.

- There is something to be said about someone that does not have any other motives.

- He does not want to rule the world, he wants the power of it.

- He does not want followers, servants, assistants, he just wants power.

- Any way and any how, it makes no difference.

- If being a good guy and petting bunnies and saving kittens from trees would bring him power he would do that.

- It is not about doing something evil, it is about doing whatever it is that would end up with giving him power.

- If doing good deeds gave him power he would put on purple tights with a big red G on his chest and run around leaping small building in a single bound.

- It is about power for no reason other than to have it and get more.

- So simple, so basic, so awesome.

- And I still hope we will get to see him as a big baddie.

- Just hope they do not make him a stepping stone in some raid leading up to the real bad guy.

- He deserves real bad guy status.

- Oh, back on task, the lords of war shorts were so good I would love to see more of them.

- I would offer up a raid tier if we could get a new one each week.

- Oh wait, we already are losing a raid tier next expansion.

- So can we have more lords of war blizzard?

- It would take off a little of the sting of feeling screwed over by the company for this long drought and seemingly lackluster new expansion.

- Lately you have been doing a better job with the lords of war shorts than you have the game itself anyway.

- They hit the ball out of the park on them.

- Sad when they created these for buzz and they ended up being better than the expansion they are trying to buzz.

- But that is not unheard of.

- How many coming attractions for movies have you seen that were awesome and then the movie sucked?

- These shorts are the coming attraction and warlords is the movie.

- Having played all the beta has to offer I can tell you the coming attraction is better than the movie.

- I can't believe how much effort we will be putting into garrisons just to leave them behind.

- It was okay with the farm, sort of, because you can say it was just like a quest line, being you opened it up as you quested.

- It was something that had usefulness afterwards of course, but otherwise it was no big deal.

- This is the other way around, the garrison the not opened with a quest line (so to speak because it starts that way) but is a vehicle to lead you on quests.

- One which you need to work to build.

- One which you need to spend a fair deal of gold to build.

- One where you need to spend a lot of time to build.

- One where planning matters.

- I don't want to do all that and leave it behind, and we will be leaving it behind.

- If there is one thing I must say I am going to hate about next expansion it is that.

- It would be like asking me to leave the pets I leveled in mists behind.

- To forget all that work leveling them, collecting them, making teams.

- Just like you will be doing with your followers.

- You will spend all that work leveling them, gearing them, collecting them, making teams and then when the next expansion comes out you leave them all behind feeling like you did all that for nothing.

- I want them to be like my pets.

- I want them to continue along with me, even more so with all the effort it takes to build them up.

- So warlords is all about garrisons and thus far it is all warlords has to offer.

- I am afraid in the end it will also be the thing I hate those most.

- All because I will have to leave that work behind.

- How do you think all the pet battlers would feel if you suddenly told them after they leveled all those pets they could not be used in new content?

- Yeah, that is what I will feel about all that work I put into leveling and gearing my followers.

- Sure hope blizzard moves forward with the garrison idea and we get to keep the followers we collect.

- Because I already hate leaving them behind.

- And I do not even have them yet.

- How bad is that?

- Oh well.

- Have a great day.

20 comments:

  1. The war mill not sure its name on alliance actually is much better at producing follower items than the salvage yard in my experience. so now you have two mandatory buildings :P

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    1. I saw that, but with my little testing they did not seem to as often as with the salvage yard. But in a recent patch they seem to have lowered the amount you get from the salvage yard so maybe they are closer now.

      I really dislike this "required" idea to something that was supposed to be optional.

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    2. I was mostly joking it's required if you want to level up your followers Ilevels as fast as possible of course if you pick that you are going to have to give up something in return. like being able to mill or the barracks really its up to you and what your must haves are. I can tell you already they aren't going to be the same for everyone.

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    3. I will most likely go this route with alts so they can win some gear via follower missions. Thus leveling my followers faster means more to them in the grand scheme of things. On my main (or 3 mains if you will, one for DPS, one for healing and one for tanking) I will be raiding so they will not need follower gear but all others will and this would make it the best option.

      As far as building go, the only good option at that level is the inn and once you do the quests and get all the items that really isn't all that great to have either.

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    4. na there's lots of good things the stables make you not get dismounted, the lumber mill is good especially if you need Garrison resorcess. It's really what you want to prioritize do you want more people at 100 faster? get barracks do you want more follower Ilevel faster? get salvage yard and the work shop, do you not play alts you may need that lumber then to change out your buildings. I can see lots of valid picks for lots of different play styles and people in the play styles too.

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    5. eh.. I am not impressed with stables other than to get the mounts or lumber mill at all.

      All of the choices seem like blah ones. I'll do them all to get all the achievements but that is about it. Get this until that, get this until the other, none of them seem like buildings you would want to get and want to keep, except maybe end up with the stable for speed, mage tower of ports or keep the barracks for the special follower ability that comes with it and even at that, it would be the last choice.

      All the small building seem like much better options in my opinion. I want them all and am upset I can not have them all.

      The medium builds, in my opinion offer the hardest choices. (I think we are both mixing up the medium and large ones)

      I should have all the buildings anyway. I mean, after all I am the savior of azeroth, I am a war hero, I have saved the planet over and over, I am the commander of all the forces here, even heroes call me a hero to look up to, I am the general, the one and only ruler of all things military on this planet. If I say I want all buildings, I get all buildings. ;)

      In case you did not notice, was just having a little fun with it there. Not meant to be serious.

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    6. They probably figure you're the hero of azeroth you are used to hard choices. :P now do you want the enchanter hut or the jewel hut lol

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    7. And I shall make the hard choice of dig another plot over there so we can have both. :P

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  2. I am still confused about garrison buildings, especially the profession-oriented ones: Is it better to build ones that are the same as your professions, or ones that fill in profession holes? If you have every profession maxed on your alt set, does that make a difference in how you should choose your garrison build?

    I am fine with making decisions on this stuff, but I feel like -- even after lots of writing about garrisons on lots of blogs -- I have no grasp of the factors involved in making any kind of rational decisions here. It's frustrating to feel like I am going in blind to something absolutely integral to play style. Yes, I know we can change our minds about buildings, but I understand it will be expensive to do so. I think Blizz owes us a clearer set of info on garrisons before the xpac goes live -- for example, it is not enough imo to say there will be "some advantage" to have buildings that match your professions, we should by this time know exactly what those advantages will be for each profession, so as to decide if it is worth it in a given profession. If Blizz has written about this somewhere, it must be pretty obscure, because I can't find it anywhere.

    Frustrating.

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    1. I am still deciding and will make a post giving my opinion on what I believe will be best. With that said and knowing things can still change, at the moment if asked I would say build to add to the professions you already have. More so if you have an alt army. If you have an alt army you will have everything anyway so it is best to go with what you have so you have extra of them.

      If you do not have everything, like lets say on one server I have a hunter that is a leatherworker and an enchanter, being there is no skinning building and I have those two professions I would most likely go another way and build two different things.

      However, I would make sure to have a trading post in that case so I could trade extra garrison resources for the materials I need for whatever other things I decide to make.

      So far it seems like that will be the way to go. If you have everything, go with what you have. If you don't, go with what fills the holes with a trading post. But I might still change my mind if they make more changes.

      As far as advantages go, the advantages do not seem great thus far that I have noticed. I could be missing something but the only advantages I see to my alchemy lab on my alchemist is that I can buy the new patterns there instead of going to ashran. Whoop-de-do. And if I have a follower with alchemy I can put them to work there and they will give me an alchemy daily. Not a big deal. Maybe I get more materials than if I did not have alchemy but from the two characters I have it on, one with and one without, it seems I get the same from each.

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    2. Thanks, Grumpy, that was hands down the best summary on garrison-profession relationships I've seen so far. Like I said, I get that we will have to make some hard decisions on this stuff, but factors like you just laid out really help in that process. Keep the info coming, please!

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    3. You're welcome. I'll gladly share any other observations as I have them. But remember, all this can still be changed. They only recently went from allowing 5 work orders to something like 20.

      Oh, that is another profession perk now that I mention it. I believe you get 3 additional work orders for the profession building if you happen to be that profession. It is really only useful at the start of the expansion however. Even on beta I already stopped wasting time on work orders so having an extra three is not really huge. But at the start those extra three will allow you to craft things just a tiny bit faster.

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    4. As it currently is now on Beta, having a crafting profession without the corresponding Garrison building is worthless. You can't craft any of the top level items. I honestly don't know why Blizz even puts in mid level jewels, flasks, enchants, etc... they're just a waste.

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    5. You can craft them, you just need to get the patterns for them. You can buy them in ashran, you do not need to have the corresponding building to buy them from there. All the building does is save you a trip to ashran.

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    6. OK, I hope that's true, because that's not how it's described in any of the guides or datamined info.

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    7. I can not say for absolute, but from what I saw from the building in game and from the vendors that sell patterns are the building, and the patterns, are the same. So I don't think you must have the building being you can always take a short trip to ashran to buy the patterns.

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  3. The one minor problem is that they are changing things A LOT on the beta in concern to garrison buildings.

    He/She seems to be keeping it very updated but it is easy to miss changes when they are not documented by blizzard and there are so many coming out of the wood work. But it is a fantastic starting point to try and get a handle on it for those that have not been lucky enough to try it in beta.

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  4. Garrisons Garrisons Garrisons. I am going to talk about something else in this post which is your reaction to the Lords of War Maraad episode. Watching the first 4 I was thinking about how exciting it is to be an orc with this legacy of strength and determination and ambition, and totally forgot about the Alliance aspect. Watching Maraad suddenly made me feel as you did - OMG these orcs MUST DIE, especially when you see the dead children and defenseless refugees slaughtered. And it's just nice to read about someone else thinking the same thing.

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    1. They spent the first four building up the orcs, making them look like heroes fighting the good fight for their freedom. The story needed to show that is not what they were. I am glad they did it but saddened by the portrayal of it. But I guess if they really wanted to get the point across there really is no stronger punctuation you can put on it than seeing a dead child at their hands. It was just... disturbing.

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  5. new topic... discuss...

    What if Maraad had a thermo nuclear device?

    -roo

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