Category Archives: game

Gold Capped: How to reach the gold cap

Posted on by
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Basil "Euripides" Berntsen aims to show you how to make money on the auction house. Email Basil with your questions, comments, or hate mail!

Don't mind the intrusion, folks. It's me, Fox Van Allen. I'm filling in for Basil this week while he deals with the parasite that recently burst from his wife's stomach. (That's what those baby things are, right? Am I recalling seventh grade health class correctly?)

If any of you have been following me on Twitter (and if you haven't, for shame), you may already know that back in March, Heartbourne of Lore Hound challenged me to a race to the 999,999g 99s 99c gold cap. I immediately accepted. After coming up with some basic rules (no gold buying, no server transfers, no "borrowing," no interfering with each other's auctions), the race to a million was on.

During the contest, I was quiet about my gold-making activities -- I didn't want to tip off the competition. But now that the contest officially ended this past week, I'm free to talk about what happened. And so, my friends, what follows is the tale of how someone with virtually no gold-making knowledge went from next to nothing at the start of Cataclysm to, as of June 10, over one million gold.

Continue reading Gold Capped: How to reach the gold cap

Filed under: ,

Gold Capped: How to reach the gold cap originally appeared on WoW Insider on Thu, 16 Jun 2011 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Breakfast Topic: Guild achievements and you

Posted on by
This Breakfast Topic has been brought to you by Seed, the AOL guest writer program that brings your words to WoW Insider's pages.

We are now a good 6 months into guild achievements. As a guild leader, I think the concept, as executed, is great. Although we're casual and we run all content, trying to get certain achievements has provided us with incentives to level toons, level professions and to work together.

Every week, I post to the guild web site, a tally of what we're working on and how far along we are in finishing an achievement. Doing all the Burning Crusade heroic 5-mans made people run the regulars to get enough honor to get their keys. People went into instances they didn't know existed. Attendance at our retro raid nights spiked when we announced that we needed this run for the guild achievement. We're small so the 25-man achievements will probably elude us, but people take a look at what still needs to be done and they help make it happen.

Continue reading Breakfast Topic: Guild achievements and you

Filed under: ,

Breakfast Topic: Guild achievements and you originally appeared on WoW Insider on Wed, 15 Jun 2011 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Breakfast Topic: Who would be playable in Blizzard vs. Capcom?

Posted on by
As I pointed out in The Queue on Sunday, I'm super excited for Marvel vs. Capcom 3. Getting hyped up over the slow trickle of character reveals is almost as fun as getting the game itself, and the latest set of reveals got me thinking -- what if Capcom teamed up with Blizzard to make a Blizzard vs. Capcom fighting game?

Most Blizzard characters are ripe for a fighting game setting, either from being part of a martial universe already or just looking the part. From the StarCraft universe, we could probably expect to see Raynor and Tychus repping the Terran side of things, Tychus with his marine armor and Jim walking around unarmored (because he looks cooler that way). Kerrigan is the best (and possibly only) choice for a Zerg representative, and Zeratul is the obvious Protoss challenger. Diablo is full of perfect fits, too -- Diablo 3's monk, for example, is already based off of fighting game characters. Going back even further into Blizzard's history, Blackthorne and the Lost Vikings could make an appearance too.

But what about Warcraft? There's limited roster space and a whole lot of playable character possibilities. Would you want faction leaders? Big bads? Classic heroes? What races would make the cut? Who would best represent the expansive Warcraft universe? And most importantly, what kind of awesome special moves would they have?

Filed under:

Breakfast Topic: Who would be playable in Blizzard vs. Capcom? originally appeared on WoW Insider on Wed, 02 Feb 2011 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Permalink | Email this | Comments

Facebook vs. World of Warcraft

Posted on by
They both have millions of users across the world. They both have made and broken friendships and relationships, and they both have raised millions if not billions of dollars for their respective companies. And chances are that they're both so popular even your grandma knows about them. Gamasutra has written an interesting post comparing both World of Warcraft and Facebook of all things, and they say that the two are more alike than you might think: both enable you to create an identity, and use that identity to interact with others, and both give you a wide variety of options to do so (in WoW, you can slay dragons together, and on Facebook, you can tag pictures or post on walls). Gamasutra wants to get to the center of where exactly the interactivity lies, and in doing so, figure out what makes Warcraft a game, and Facebook a network.

One major difference is in the interface -- obviously, WoW is wrapped in a fantasy world, so that in between all of the socializing, you're also fighting the Scourge or the Burning Crusade. Facebook has games, but it doesn't have that overarching narrative. WoW also rewards group teamwork and coordination, while Facebook leaves collaboration to its own rewards. And of course the cost is another big difference: WoW is still a subscription game, while Facebook pays in other ways. But the amount of similarities between the two are pretty fascinating. And comparing the two, as Gamasutra does, really makes you think about just what interactivity means, and how two apparently very different types of interactive media aren't that far apart after all.

Filed under: , , ,

Facebook vs. World of Warcraft originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 18 Dec 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

How reputation governs the game

Posted on by
Ravius over at Kill Ten Rats ruminates on the importance of reputation in these very social games that we're playing with each other, and it resonated with me in terms of a few different things going on in World of Warcraft right now. We've talked lots before about ninjas and how that back-and-forth works -- in that case, karma is directly driven by what other people think of you, and of course that's seen more weakly in lots of other places around the game, including guild recruitment, your friends list, and just the general server at large.

Ravius talks mostly about the negative reputations we earn, and certainly that's a powerful motivator for a lot of people. But positive reputation is also a strong force in this game -- I'm interested to see how we deal with earning and keeping positive reputation in the new Dungeon Finder and eventually the Battle.net system. Gone may be the days when you build up a good reputation by saying "remember me if you need a good DPS" at the end of a run. It'll be interesting to see what methods we replace that one with.

Filed under: , , , ,

How reputation governs the game originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 11 Dec 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

How reputation governs the game

Posted on by

Ravius over at Kill Ten Rats ruminates on the importance of reputation in these very social games that we’re playing with each other, and it resonated with me in terms of a few different things going on in World of Warcraft right now. We’ve talked lots before about ninjas and how that back-and-forth works — in that case, karma is directly driven by what other people think of you, and of course that’s seen more weakly in lots of other places around the game, including guild recruitment, your friends list, and just the general server at large.

Ravius talks mostly about the negative reputations we earn, and certainly that’s a powerful motivator for a lot of people. But positive reputation is also a strong force in this game — I’m interested to see how we deal with earning and keeping positive reputation in the new Dungeon Finder and eventually the Battle.net system. Gone may be the days when you build up a good reputation by saying “remember me if you need a good DPS” at the end of a run. It’ll be interesting to see what methods we replace that one with.

Filed under: , , , ,

How reputation governs the game originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 11 Dec 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

How reputation governs the game

Posted on by
Ravius over at Kill Ten Rats ruminates on the importance of reputation in these very social games that we're playing with each other, and it resonated with me in terms of a few different things going on in World of Warcraft right now. We've talked lots before about ninjas and how that back-and-forth works -- in that case, karma is directly driven by what other people think of you, and of course that's seen more weakly in lots of other places around the game, including guild recruitment, your friends list, and just the general server at large.

Ravius talks mostly about the negative reputations we earn, and certainly that's a powerful motivator for a lot of people. But positive reputation is also a strong force in this game -- I'm interested to see how we deal with earning and keeping positive reputation in the new Dungeon Finder and eventually the Battle.net system. Gone may be the days when you build up a good reputation by saying "remember me if you need a good DPS" at the end of a run. It'll be interesting to see what methods we replace that one with.

Filed under: , , , ,

How reputation governs the game originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 11 Dec 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Author of World of Warcraft and Philosophy interviewed

Posted on by
World of Warcraft and Philosophy got released a little while back -- it's a book by Luke Cuddy and John Nordlinger that examines WoW-related topics like roleplaying and the Corrupted Blood plague, and ties them into philsophical ideas and thinking. TechFlash has now posted an interview with Nordlinger, and it's a good read as well. Nordlinger says that one reason they chose to talk about World of Warcraft in this way is that it's so incredibly big -- when you have 12 million (give or take a few at this point) people playing a game with a GDP larger than some smaller nations, you're going to touch on all sorts of interesting ethical, moral, and other philosophical ideas. He says the book has been pretty popular, and a few universities are currently considering teaching courses based on the material, not only because it's interesting, but thinking about the game in this way helps improve abstract thinking in general.

And perhaps most interesting, he says that reading the book could help players better make ethical and moral decisions in the game. Just ninja-ing the mount from an Onyxia raid might not mean much to you, but when you look at the bigger picture, and what those actions mean for ethics in general, Nordlinger says the book might help players "make more aware decisions, if not different decisions." Of course, in practice, trying to explain higher philosophy to ninjas might not have the desired effect, but it does seem true that exploring the higher meanings of this game and the intents of the people playing it might put a little more meaning into the pixels as well.

Filed under: , , ,

Author of World of Warcraft and Philosophy interviewed originally appeared on WoW.com on Sun, 29 Nov 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Author of World of Warcraft and Philosophy interviewed

Posted on by
World of Warcraft and Philosophy got released a little while back -- it's a book by Luke Cuddy and John Nordlinger that examines WoW-related topics like roleplaying and the Corrupted Blood plague, and ties them into philsophical ideas and thinking. TechFlash has now posted an interview with Nordlinger, and it's a good read as well. Nordlinger says that one reason they chose to talk about World of Warcraft in this way is that it's so incredibly big -- when you have 12 million (give or take a few at this point) people playing a game with a GDP larger than some smaller nations, you're going to touch on all sorts of interesting ethical, moral, and other philosophical ideas. He says the book has been pretty popular, and a few universities are currently considering teaching courses based on the material, not only because it's interesting, but thinking about the game in this way helps improve abstract thinking in general.

And perhaps most interesting, he says that reading the book could help players better make ethical and moral decisions in the game. Just ninja-ing the mount from an Onyxia raid might not mean much to you, but when you look at the bigger picture, and what those actions mean for ethics in general, Nordlinger says the book might help players "make more aware decisions, if not different decisions." Of course, in practice, trying to explain higher philosophy to ninjas might not have the desired effect, but it does seem true that exploring the higher meanings of this game and the intents of the people playing it might put a little more meaning into the pixels as well.

Filed under: , , ,

Author of World of Warcraft and Philosophy interviewed originally appeared on WoW.com on Sun, 29 Nov 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments

Author of World of Warcraft and Philosophy interviewed

Posted on by
World of Warcraft and Philosophy got released a little while back -- it's a book by Luke Cuddy and John Nordlinger that examines WoW-related topics like roleplaying and the Corrupted Blood plague, and ties them into philsophical ideas and thinking. TechFlash has now posted an interview with Nordlinger, and it's a good read as well. Nordlinger says that one reason they chose to talk about World of Warcraft in this way is that it's so incredibly big -- when you have 12 million (give or take a few at this point) people playing a game with a GDP larger than some smaller nations, you're going to touch on all sorts of interesting ethical, moral, and other philosophical ideas. He says the book has been pretty popular, and a few universities are currently considering teaching courses based on the material, not only because it's interesting, but thinking about the game in this way helps improve abstract thinking in general.

And perhaps most interesting, he says that reading the book could help players better make ethical and moral decisions in the game. Just ninja-ing the mount from an Onyxia raid might not mean much to you, but when you look at the bigger picture, and what those actions mean for ethics in general, Nordlinger says the book might help players "make more aware decisions, if not different decisions." Of course, in practice, trying to explain higher philosophy to ninjas might not have the desired effect, but it does seem true that exploring the higher meanings of this game and the intents of the people playing it might put a little more meaning into the pixels as well.

Filed under: , , ,

Author of World of Warcraft and Philosophy interviewed originally appeared on WoW.com on Sun, 29 Nov 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Read | Permalink | Email this | Comments