So today the pre x-pac patch hits. Am I speaking in another language, if you don't play World of Warcraft, then it probably seems like it. The Shattering is a start to a new in game world. World of Warcraft, or WoW as it's known to most, has been around in it's base stage, known by many as classic, or vanilla WoW, for some 5 years, more if you were lucky to get into the beta. Now we prepare for the third expansion and by far the most anticipated, imo.
The other two expansion left us with a few new zones in Azeroth, 2 new races, and 2 new non-Azeroth zones. In short very little changed in the vanilla world that the oldest players (by length of playtime, not age) remember. This time that world is gone forever. When the servers come back up today and I log onto my own characters the world I logged out in will no longer exist. So I'm going to take this moment to remember all the things I loved about Azeroth, all the things that I've missed for a long time, and all the things I will start to miss from now on.
When I first started playing WoW I was a sucker for a new server. The competition of a starting area filled with players who raced to kill or collect first and fastest. Eventually the servers lost balance and population and new servers stopped being released, people had gone back to their original server after the race to 60 was won or lost. However I really hope when I get to log in tonight or tomorrow that I see packed starting zones. It will be a nice start to the new world, to see it as populated and not empty.
Lately when you leveled a new character, ignoring the quest text you've read a million times before, the world is empty, no one fights for this quest boss, or that quest item, the only people you see are NPCs or level 80s completing some achievement or another, if you're really lucky that 80 will invite you to a group and fast track you to the next map. Heck once you get your newest Alt to 80 you're really just spending your days doing the exact same thing, every day. If you're lucky you already have some friends to make this less daunting then it sounds. And if you're really lucky those friends Raid or PvP in a group and you still have fun while doing it.
One thing I miss that I doubt I'll ever see again is world pvp, I'm not talking about ganking that guy who stole your ore node, or getting your guild together to take Haala or even winning a Wintergrasp. I'm talking about the first few months of WoW when you'd be wondering along doing some quests and there's a group of level 20ish horde attacking your alliance city, and people are fighting back. No, not a few level 80's one shotting the offenders but equal level players defending their city. Does anyone remember Hilsbrad battles that lasted all day and by the time it was over Southshore guards were in Tarren Mill fighting the Tarren Mill guards and vice versa. Those were the short lived days. At least I might see some pvp over quest mobs and farming spots again, even if it isn't really the same.
Gone are the days of Desolate Desolace and the Tanaris desert, the Barrens are no longer Barren and Azshara is no longer going to be an empty zone you only visit if you want to do you level 50 something class quest. Shimmering Flats will shimmer for a different reason. I'll miss the Azeroth that made me the player I am today, even if that player is somewhat cynical at times, but I look forward to discovering a whole new world that makes leveling new and exciting again. A world that gives new players a glimpse of what made me love this game.
I will bitch, I will complain, I will be unhappy at times with other players, or confusing quest instructions. I'll miss how simple plotting talents was, but above all that I will be interested, I'll be paying attention and learning a whole new way to play. I won't be alt tabbing and reading facebook while I auto attack that monster. I will be enjoying myself no matter how miserable I sound.
Tuesday, November 23, 2010
Monday, November 8, 2010
on writing about vampires
I think what a lot of popular vampire stories have in common are unhealthy relationships. Whether it's between two vampires, or a vampire and a human the relationships that develop, especially on the romantic level are often emotionally abusive on some level if not physically. As I work on editing my own stories involving vampires I can only hope that I break out of the trend. I admit a lack of respect for Stephanie Myers keeps my from reading the twilight series but I've noticed the same with Anne Rice, Charlene Harris, Michael Romkey and many others.
However it's a difficult task to tackle. In most authors own lore there is a hierarchy amongst vampires, the older the individual the more powerful they are is pretty standard. Even in my own lore there are varying factions of vampires, with different strengths and weaknesses. When you're putting these creatures together it becomes difficult to verbalize equality however amongst rivals or platonic character interaction this isn't a huge focus.
When you come to writing relationships there's a lot to consider. Especially between vampires and humans. You're dealing with a creature who is physically superior and generally incredibly older. A lot of authors like to let their vampires personalities be dated by when they were human. In my opinion this is were a lot of the issues of healthy relationships come into play. While I agree that the period in which a person became a vampire would influence the vampires values I think it's too much of a stretch that they would be that attached to the time itself. However this also varies depending on the lore an author works with and how reclusive the vampire in question is.
Suffice to say some vampires may hang on to their past, my own villain is a vampire like this. In fact while doing edits on my own novel I noticed that I was hopefully breaking this trend. A lot of my book center's around my main vampire realizing that she is in an emotionally abusive relationship with her maker. While not my original intent when I started writing this book many years ago, it was a present realization.
What happens in a lot of stories is you have a vampire protecting a human, when you throw a relationship into a situation it's hard not to have an overbearing white knight. Two things can happen, either this vampire is so protective that they refuse to change the human, thus leaving themselves as the literal superior life-form in the relationship (we're talking physically here) often times using their human lover as a walking vending machine. The other option is that the vampire fails in some way and is faced with the death of his/her human love or having to change them.
Ultimately when you write about humanized vampires you're going to get compared with the popular authors I mentioned above. For a long time I was afraid to keep writing, as I wanted to stand out and not be compared but I've realized that it's unavoidable, and not necessarily a bad thing. If I get compared to a popular author, especially a popular author who no longer writes vampire themed novels that can open up my reader base, and hopefully it will be these people who see the difference.
However it's a difficult task to tackle. In most authors own lore there is a hierarchy amongst vampires, the older the individual the more powerful they are is pretty standard. Even in my own lore there are varying factions of vampires, with different strengths and weaknesses. When you're putting these creatures together it becomes difficult to verbalize equality however amongst rivals or platonic character interaction this isn't a huge focus.
When you come to writing relationships there's a lot to consider. Especially between vampires and humans. You're dealing with a creature who is physically superior and generally incredibly older. A lot of authors like to let their vampires personalities be dated by when they were human. In my opinion this is were a lot of the issues of healthy relationships come into play. While I agree that the period in which a person became a vampire would influence the vampires values I think it's too much of a stretch that they would be that attached to the time itself. However this also varies depending on the lore an author works with and how reclusive the vampire in question is.
Suffice to say some vampires may hang on to their past, my own villain is a vampire like this. In fact while doing edits on my own novel I noticed that I was hopefully breaking this trend. A lot of my book center's around my main vampire realizing that she is in an emotionally abusive relationship with her maker. While not my original intent when I started writing this book many years ago, it was a present realization.
What happens in a lot of stories is you have a vampire protecting a human, when you throw a relationship into a situation it's hard not to have an overbearing white knight. Two things can happen, either this vampire is so protective that they refuse to change the human, thus leaving themselves as the literal superior life-form in the relationship (we're talking physically here) often times using their human lover as a walking vending machine. The other option is that the vampire fails in some way and is faced with the death of his/her human love or having to change them.
Ultimately when you write about humanized vampires you're going to get compared with the popular authors I mentioned above. For a long time I was afraid to keep writing, as I wanted to stand out and not be compared but I've realized that it's unavoidable, and not necessarily a bad thing. If I get compared to a popular author, especially a popular author who no longer writes vampire themed novels that can open up my reader base, and hopefully it will be these people who see the difference.
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