Catching up with the old Blog

Hey all. First and foremost, I wanted to re-up my last post on the old blog for those who missed it.

I've put more time into the the Public Test Realm, and I've got a few more opinions on it. For one, I'm a fan of the new Stormwind harbor, but it has some issues. For one, there's nothing to stop the Horde from sailing right in to Stormwind from Northrend. That seems like a design flaw, to me. Secondly, when you first arrive at the harbor from the city, you're faced with what looks like the way down, but no - it's a sheer drop to your death! Seriously, there needs to be a sign or something there, telling you to go around the small, almost hidden ramps to the sides. Sheesh.

Secondly, I've re-specced to retribution from holy on my paladin main on my main server, so I did the same on the PTR, to great success. I rolled through Stranglethorn Vale at level 42 (2 levels behind my real avatar), slaying anything that got in my way with no fear. I took on lvl 44-45 mobs with impunity, and only stopped when my bags filled up with loot. Myself and another lvl. 42 retribution-specced paladin tore up a whole mess of lvl 44+ mobs in an old ruin without breaking a sweat. Does this mean that retadins are overpowered? Not in my eyes. It just means that we've finally caught up to the rest of the pack. I can't handle mobs at my own level very well on my main server, but here I was able to solo higher level mobs. Not bad.

Lastly, I'm a huge fan of the graphical improvements they've made, particularly with the lighting, or more specifically, the shadows. The dappled light effect coming through the trees down in Stranglethorn is beautiful, and reminds me allot of Fable, in a good way. I'm seeing shadows of birds flying overhead, too. It's gorgeous.  I hope to see further improvements made along these lines someday in the future.

On a related note, I'm working on a webcomic in the vein of Gamespy's Flintlocke comics, called Gavelier's  World of Warcraft. Gavelier is the paladin I was talking about above, and here he goes on adventures with a couple of low-level characters. I hope everyone enjoys it. Later, all.

Anyway, as for new stuff, I've been enjoying - of all things - PopCap's addition of a Bejewled add-on for WoW. I like  how it can pop up during a flight and give you a game timed to your individual flight. For example, I flew from Stormwind to Booty Bay, and the add-on gave me a game once the flight started, and gave me until we landed to rack up as many points as possible. Very nice. It will also track your scores compared to your friends and guildmates. I'm beside myself that there's something to do during those long, boring flights besides going AFK for awhile.

In other news, I again want to point you to Beta's Blog, in case you somehow missed it. Later, all.