Capture Caption

Even among the handful of WoW players with whom I exchange screenshots, there are plenty that are funny, awkward, or interesting. I thought it might be fun to do a weekly write-your-own caption post. I’ll provide the screenshot (or you can send me a screenshot by email) and you provide the caption, either through a Twitter mention (@battlechicken) with the tag #capcaption or by commenting below. I’ll post all of the captions I receive!

Don’t worry, if no one’s interested I’ll phase it out quickly and replace it with a fancy dancing bear!

Speaking of bears, the first screenshot is courtesy my husband and his worgen druid, Lycanthropy:

Can someone please tell me what the heck is going on here?!

Behind the Chicken: IRL & the Battlechicken

Have you missed me so far this month while I’ve been pounding out my novel for National Novel Writing Month? (The only correct answer here is “of course!”) I’ve missed you too, if it makes you feel better.

I don’t often bring my personal life to WoW-related stuff (Twitter being a mild exception…), but in this case my personal life is likely to change the frequency and consistency of Tastes Like Battle Chicken, so I think it’s relevant.

Some of you know that I have two children: a girl in kindergarten and a 2 1/2-year-old son. Corny or not, they’re my little blessings; big things in small packages and all that.

Back in February of this year, our life changed dramatically when we stopped making excuses for our son’s developmental delays, talked to our family doctor, and hit up books and websites for information. It didn’t take us long to realize that our son identified with many of the characteristics of autism.

Things I Would Do For a Beta Invite

There are things I like: Pandora, potato chips, dill pickles, Mythbusters.

There are things I crave: Diet Pepsi, Cheez-It Hot & Spicy, 5 minutes of QUIET.

And then there are things I’m desperate for: my husband (rawr!), and a Cataclysm beta invite.

I know there are a lot of good reasons to NOT be in the beta, but for me, I dig the secret. Being in the beta is like being in a secret club. I want to know the things they’re talking about. I want to experiment. I want to poke and prod and explore the new content. I especially want to make it impossible for a certain warrior I know to rub his invite in my face.

So I asked Twitter (and my guild): If you had a secret, WoW-related club and I wanted to join, what embarrassing/challenging/ scandalous initiation would you put me through? Some of these people are so devious, they should probably work for Blizzard.

Twitterkin

Most people who read blogs are pretty well-informed in their area of interest, so I’m guessing a lot of you already know about the developer chat with Blizzard through Twitter last night (the second of its kind).  If you haven’t read it, you probably want to check out the entire thread.

For the purposes of my blog, though, we’re going to jump right to the druid/moonkin-related items.

Q. Any plans on looking at balance druids, in particular to Eclipse procs? RNG sometimes is detrimental to our dps.

A: We don’t mind the RNG aspect that much per se, but losing an important proc because it happened at the wrong time (say just before you moved) is a problem. We have a pretty cool solution for Cataclysm if we can make it work. It makes Eclipse cooler but also gives Balance more of a kit in general.

We already knew that we weren’t going to see a drastic change before Cataclysm, but we still don’t really know how.  However, I’m pleased that they realize that seeing Starfire Eclipse hit three seconds before Unstable Ooze Explosion makes us groan, and I’m really excited that they’ve got a “pretty cool solution.”  I think all of us have theorized ways to help us out, so I’m hoping this goes above and beyond all of that.

Q. Both balance druids (moonkin) and elemental shaman feel like their dps is falling behind in Icecrown Citadel. Any damage boosts for these hybrid casters currently planned?

A. We have small buffs coming in the next patch. We’ll see where they are after that when more encounters are open (including the hard modes) and once more players have tier sets and higher gear in general. We have no problem buffing them more if we need to.

My favorite sentence there is “We have no problem buffing them more if we need to.”  While buffs don’t necessarily correct the underlying issue of haste (and soon, crit) becoming increasingly less valuable to us as we accumulate new gear, I think the intent is to help us over the hump as we wrap up WotLK. That they’re willing to continually evaluate our performance and try to give us a hand now and then is something to appreciate, at least.

The developer chat as a whole was much more successful this time, in my opinion.  Last time it felt like the devs coming along to give us a pat on the head and a sucker and tell us to keep being good little players.  This time the questions they answered were mostly thoughtful, specific questions which they answered in kind.

P.S. I’ll be watching my mailbox for that pony, GC.

A Little Birdy Told Me

Game director Tom Chilton and Director of Production J. Allen Brack logged onto Twitter and answered questions for about 45 minutes (for a total of 39 questions).  I have to be honest, I expected more.  A lot of the questions they answered are things that are either common sense or things that anyone who follows WoWInsider or WoW’s own news info enough already knows.  Neither one of my questions were answered, sadly.  If you’re at all interested, I encourage to you read the full post here, but if you want a brief synopsis of some of the more interesting things, read on:

Did Someone Say Druid?

Wow, talk about disappointment.  I know I couldn’t have been the only druid asking questions, and yet there’s only one druid mention in the whole post.  If our questions needed to be geared towards Chilton and Brack’s collective pool of knowledge, they should’ve been more specific.

Q: When do hunters get to tame druids?

A: Right after druids get a hunter form.

They really answered this question?  All of the questions they must be receiving, and this is the one they choose?  /facepalm

Patch 3.3 Related

Q: Ulduar had one kind of hard mode(triggered).. ToC had another (ToC vs TOGC).. Ony has none. What will ICC have?”

A: ICC’s hard modes will be triggered, but via in-game UI (much like how you toggle between normal and heroic modes today) rather than triggered by game mechanics (like not killing the three drakes before you attack Sartharion).

I kind of liked the immersion of the game-mechanic triggered events.  Did anyone really struggle with how that worked?  I hope the hard modes are interesting.

Q: Any plans for a gated system in IIC like in Colliseum that prevents us from doing hardmodes from day 1?

A: We do have a system that unlocks bosses similar to how we handled TOC and Sunwell. We are restricting hard modes to raid leaders that have defeated Arthas in regular mode.

THANK YOU.  Are we going to moan and groan all the way to Arthas?  You bet.  Is it going to be super rewarding to make our way through normal mode and be “qualified” to do hard modes?  Oh my goodness YES.

Q: With T10, are we going to see tokens like in Ulduar? or like CC? CC style had every class and spec rolling on same thing.

A: With t10 we’re going to see a hybrid. The tier 10 items (the ones with item levels you’d find in the 10-player raid) will be purchased with Emblems of Frost.

The tier 10.5 items (the ones with item levels you’d find in the 25-player raid) will be obtained by getting a token (one that is specific to 3 or 4 classes, much like the ulduar tokens) and using it to upgrade the tier 10 item that was purchased with emblems of frost.

I like this.  I liked class-specific gear tokens.  It streamlined gearing without being complicated or messy.  The ToC any-class trophy method is way too messy in my opinion.  If this works seamlessly, as I hope it will, it’ll be the perfect blend.

Q: Crowd control is all but dead in raids. Is that something you plan on bringing back?

A: Like say… with the Faction Champions encounter in ToC? ;]

I have to disagree with ya here, dev.  Our group doesn’t use any traditional type CC for that fight.  We have melee keeping certain targets stunlocked, but that’s about it.  The rest is self-preservation and burn-the-heck out of them.  This fight for me looks like this:  Target Skull > FF > MF > IS > Wrath > Wrath > Eclipse > SF > SF > SF > SF > OH CRAP THE DK IS CHASING ME > Nature’s Grasp > Strafe > Strafe > Phew > Target X > Rinse & Repeat.  The druid healers sometimes cyclone things that are chasing them, and there’s a lot of slowing going on.  But traditional sheep this, sleep that, keep this and this tanked?  No way.

It’s the End of the World

Q: Thousand Needles is getting a big change in levels; how has the Cataclysm affected it?

A: As a result of the Cataclysm, Thousand Needles has been completely flooded with water!

I’m sure I knew this, but it apparently escaped my consciousness.  I can’t wait to see Lake of a Thousand Needles!

Q: Will there be anymore epic storylines with cinematics like the wrathgate questline?

A: We have big plans for additional in game cinematics! We are happy with how the Wrathgate questline worked out, and want to do more lines like this.

I loved Wrathgate.  I still save it as my very last quest for my alts on the way out of Dragonblight, and I still get all shivery as the dragons come flying in over the horizon.  I hope they duplicate this two or three times.

Q: Will 10-man raiding guilds see Legendary quality weapons (items) drop in there raids anytime soon? Or in Cataclysm?

A: Our current plan is to reserve Legendary weapons for the 25 person encounters, I wouldn’t rule it out in the future though.

I’m sorry, 10-man raiders, but this makes me sad in the pants.  Do you know why there are still warriors who equip Thunderfury when they’re running around farming?  Or why my guild master sat in Yogg-Saron’s room until our little Val’anyr issue was resolved?  These weapons are special, they’re unique.  They’re supposed to be a challenge to obtain, and a badge of honor for your character and your guild.  10-man raids, in my opinion, are too easy to merit legendaries.  Please stick with your plan, Blizz.

So there you have it.  Again, read the whole post if you’re not a WoW newshog like me and want to know what else was mentioned.  I think there will be more chats coming, and hopefully they’ve taken a few ideas away from this one to make the next one better.  I think they need to narrow the focus of these chats based on who’s answering the questions, but I guess only they know what’s really going on over there.