I would love to see housing implemented in WoW.  Unfortunately, I think they're waiting till their market share starts the slide before they introduce this upgrade. 

Great new column!  I'm looking forward to reading more about the underbelly.

This just in from Blizzard, developer post from the forums:

"Kisirani
Blizzard Poster 338. Re: Bag of Candies, ACT 2! 02/13/2009 10:27:30 AM PST
The Bag of Candies had a fairly reasonable drop rate and was in no way bugged; however, due to the random aspect of the achievement, we discussed it and did hotfix an increase in last night. While I'm aware that some of you dislike the chance aspect of this achievement, it will remain in the meta.

And just to dispel all the superstition around it, no NPC has a greater chance of giving out candies. They're all equal. "

Folks have been complaining vociferously on the forums how difficult the Be Mine! achievement was.  Given the fickle nature of the RNG gods and the brevity of the event, this achievement looked to be the meta achievement killer for "What a Long Strange Trip It's Been."  My main is now sporting her Love Fool title.  WOOT!!

 

My mis-identification  of the location of the cockroach vendor has been corrected and I'd like to add an addendum or two.

A friend pointed out that I had missed an important part of the Love is in the Air event. In addition to receiving Gifts of Adoration for Love Tokens, players can give Love Tokens to npcs when they have the Adored debuff and receive Gifts of Friendship. Guards will give Gifts of Friendships that contain cards or pledges for their city. Other npcs give the gift which is appropriate for their city: a pie for Orgrimmar, flowers for Thunder Bluff and a romantic poem for the Undercity. When you have 5 of a given item, you can right click and condense it into a package. When you have a package of cards, pledges and items for your city, you can right click one of the items and it will make a gift collection for that city. When you have a Gift Collection for Orgrimmar, Thunder Bluff and the Undercity, right click on one of the collections and you will receive a Horde Gift Collection. This can be turned into Peddlefeet who is located near the leader of each Old World city. The turn-in counts as a vote for that city's leader and gives a buff. 

More importantly, you will receive a box of chocolates and can choose to get either 5 Handfuls of Rose Petals, 5 Love Rockets or 5 Silver shafted arrows. As these components are used in many of the holiday's achievements, it can make it easier to complete the achievements required to become a Love Fool, by finishing the Fool for Love achievement.  The same applys for Alliance with the cards, pledges and items for their major cities.

Argghhh!!  You're right.  The snake vendor is in Org, the cockroach vendor is in Undercity.  My bad.

The recipes I purchased from the trainer remained green until I hit 415.  Now they are gray.  While it's true you'll be cooking up a lot of fish to get a gain you can level to 415 using trained recipes.  Now the only recipes I have that are green are the ones I have purchased using the Dalaran cooking awards from  the daily cooking quest.

I'll also add that doing the daily cooking quest gives 150 Kirin tor rep.

So very sad to see a life snuffed out at such a young age.  Kudos to Blizzard for making a memorable moment in this poor child's short life.  My condolences to all who loved him and there seem to be many.

I agree.  It is indeed possible to raid and maintain a real life.  You have to be a in a guild with other responsible adults who agree to adhere to firm rules.  You also need enough raiders so that the real life issues that arise among adults don't impact the ability of the guild to raid.

Rule number one: Real life comes first.  Adults understand that when your spouse's relatives are there for a visit, you won't be raiding.  Ditto for your kid's recital night.

Rule number two: Even if the raid wiped when the boss was at 1% that last time, we are  past the official ending time for our raids and we are done.  Adults have jobs and responsibilties that have priority.  Showing up for work half asleep because the raid pushed on till midnight is not fair.  The ending time is firm.  No more pulls after the official stop time.

Additionally, there are a limited number of raid nights.  Adults can usually afford to devote two or three evenings a week to a hobby.  Additionally, raids are limited to 3 - 4  hours in length.   Weekends are for family.

With a guild that adheres to rules such as these, it is possible to both raid and maintain a real life.  You won't be raiding at the bleeding edge, but it is possible to access most of the end-game content.  My guild was working on Illidan when the update went live.  While that isn't Sunwell, I think most would certainly consider it end-game raiding.

Sorry for any inaccuracies, but these articles are written approximately a month before they are published.  My clairvoyance fails me again.

Originally posted by Abrahmm

From my experience, that program seems like a big waste of time and money. I don't know one girl in real life that actually likes video games, my gf barely has the attention span to play Pac Man(which is her favorite game btw).

Maybe your girlfriend's lack of interest reflects the fact there is there is little that in the current video game market that appeals to women.  I am a real life woman who plays video games.  I've been heavily into MMORPGs for over 10 years and frankly I am shocked at how the distaff side of the market is ignored.  There is very little in the current crop of video games which is designed to appeal to women. 

I know folks will reply to this post that there are absolutely no difference between men and women, beyond body parts.  Hey, I went to an all woman's college and I took that Women and Society course.  I am also the mother of a daughter and a son.  On the whole men and women are more similar than they are dissimilar, but to assert there are absolutely no differences between the two groups flies in the face of evidence.

Tastes overlap, but some features appeal more to women, others more to men.  The ones that appeal to women are largely ignored.  The ones that appeal to men are given time and resources.  And then guys wonder why they can't get their girlfriends interested in online gaming.

I loved Ultima Online back in the day.  Yes, I loved questing and killing dragons.  But what I enjoyed the most was role-playing.  I loved my house.  I loved crafting items and selling in my player run vendor mall.  I loved our role-playing village.  I loved growing and crossbreeding plants.  I loved being able to change the appearance of my character.

Now let's look at World of Warcraft, the behemoth of MMORPGs.  Role-playing is an aspect of online gaming that attracts a high percentage of women.  Does WoW support role-playing?  Yes, they have role-playing servers, but if a game doesn't have attractive locations for weddings....it's not RP friendly.  No such place (private, attractive, not subject to random attacks by mobs) exists in the entire game.  Role-playing is difficult in public spaces, which brings me to the next issue.

WoW does not have housing.  I loved having a house to decorate in UO and SWG.  Many of my guy friends enjoyed their houses too and got especially creative in making items for their houses, like making a grand piano out of black dyed shirts and chess boards.  Many of the guys I knew, however, had their houses decorated with storage packs.  This is something that tends to appeal a bit more to the fair sex.  WoW has no housing.  It has no villages where one can role-play in private.  Many of the guys I knew used housing to attract their significant other to play UO.  What hook can they use to entice them into WoW?  Most women who become active in MMORPGs are initially introduced to online gaming by a significant other.

Women tend to care a bit more about how their character looks.  WoW has very little leeway in character customization.  Until Blood Elves there were no attractive female choices on the Horde side.  Armor, while leveling up, makes one look like an explosion in the Crayola factory.  Guys care about how their character looks.   Gals tend to care a bit more.  Again, WoW is full of fail here.

Women are likely to be interested in the creative aspect of online gaming.  In SWG one of my characters was a dancer.  She was part of a guild that put on shows in the various towns around the galaxy.  That game allowed you to coordinate dance routines with a troupe.  Nothing like that in WoW.

Women tend to be more into the social aspect of online gaming.  Men are more likely to prefer PvP.  Yes, I've known some women that were awesome in PvP.  Yes, 50% of those how played SIMS online were guys.  But to pretend there are no differences between what is likely to appeal to the two sexes is naive.  There is a lot that could be added to WoW that would make it a more female friendly place to be, but Blizzard has put those on the back burner.

I've played WoW since open beta and obviously I find enough appeal to keep renewing my subscription.  I'm more into working with my guild to take down a tough boss than I am into hanging out in the SIMs disco.  Still, there is a lot that could be added to this game which would enhance its appeal for me.  Maybe having some female designers on the team might make the universe of MMORPGs a more female friendly place.  And guys usually like having the ladies around, so it'd be a win/win, plus tap into a huge potential market that is currently being largely ignored.

This is a welcome change.  With the rep and faction grinds that came with Outlands, rolling an alt from 0-60 got you only half way there.  Once you get the alt to 70 you still face a gruuling grind to get the rep and faction needed to raid.  Add another 10 levels and the task becomes overwhelming, not only for new players, but for existing players who want to try out an alternative  playstyle.

Now if they would add a little side game that isn't quest or instance driven.  How about instanced villages to support roleplaying?  House decoration?  Creative outlets combining ordinary objects to create items like fish tanks or grand pianos?  World of Warcraft has a seamless introduction to the game that other games now strive to copy and they managed to make the leveling process feel like much less of a grind.  Now they need to look at Ultima Online and ask themselves why with clunky graphics and a dated game engine is this game still going after 10 years. 

Not everyone is into the social aspect of MMORPGs.  For some it is all about the pixels, getting the phat loots, and parading around the bank  in those awesome shoulders.  For that kind of player Nilhem or Death and Taxes is the ideal: a guild that is first through content.  If that is your definition of legendary when it comes to gaming guilds, no, The Syndicate is not on the leading edge of content.

What makes The Syndicate legendary is its longevity.  What other guild has been around for 12 years and is still a significant presence in one game, needless to say two?  I first became aware of The Syndicate when I was playing UO.  They played on a different shard (they are on Atlantic, I played on Cats), but I had still heard of them.  I guess I read a great deal of Stratics back in the day and they were always sponsoring an event: a fair, a crafting day, or other activity.  Still, unless you're one to read outside of the narrow field that defines your guild , your server, or even your game, it is not surprising many have not heard of them.

As it happened, I starting playing World of Warcraft on the same server as The Syndicate.   I became aware of their presence there from the server forums.  Everything I read said this was a sympatico guild for me, but they were Horde and my toons were Alliance.  So I just filed information about The Syndicate away.....till my long-standing guild fell on hard times.

I'm a mature, female player.  Not every teeny bop guild is going to be a good fit for me.  I wanted to raid end-game.  I wanted a mature, stable community.  Ultimately I decided to level up a horde toon and apply to The Syndicate.  A friend from my old guild was now a TS member and he urged me to apply.  I did.  I was accepted (not many make it over that hump) and today I am proud to be a member of one of the premier guilds in online gaming.

The Syndicate is not premier because they are on the cutting edge of end-game content.  They are premier because they comprise a mature, caring community, which enables people to form lasting friendships within the context of gaming.  Our guild master, Dragons, pours time and effort into this guild and it shows in a hundred ways.  He, along with our Squad Leaders and Raid Leaders, works hard to create a fun, fair and caring community in which to enjoy the virtual parts of our lives.  A core guild creed is Real Life Comes First.  How many hard-core raiding guilds have that as their keystone?  Maybe that's why they won't be here in a year or two, but The Syndicate will still be around.

I've been the guild master of a couple of guilds: The Village of Edinburgh in UO and in many ways defacto GM of The Defenders of Justice in World of Warcraft.  I am always amused when some young pup decides having their own guild will be fun.  Running a guild, or at least running it well, is work.  It is a lot of work and it is at its core often a thankless job.  Sean's book will give any nascent guild master insights into what it takes to run a successful guild, one that will live past the changes in the next expansion.  Besides that, as a long time gamer, it was a fun read: a real walk down memory lane.