The War Within: First Zone

This post may contain spoilers for first two zones of The War Within.

I picked up The War Within on Monday and have been slowly working through it. I decided to try to do as much of the first zone as I could before moving on. So I got to 76 before making my way to the second zone.

There was a minor kerfuffle as Blizzard nerfed levelling a day after launch, giving the people who purchased Early Access a lot more time with the quick levelling. While the optics were bad, it was really necessary. I went Templar on my Retribution Paladin, which gives you a very powerful new ability Hammer of Light, which chains off Wake of Ashes. I was having a really hard time trying out this new ability because Wake of Ashes would kill everything before I could even use Hammer of Light!

In any case, the first part in Dalaran is really well-done. There was this seamless cut from action to in-game cutscene that I don't think I've seen WoW do before. Xal'atath is a great villain so far, just toying with the good guys like a cat. Unlike the humourless Jailer, Xal'atath is having fun, and it just works. Style is everything for a villain.

The Isle of Dorn is a pretty good first zone. The earthen are interesting, though it is a bit weird that this is the second robot-ish race we've seen recently. The first being the mecha-gnomes. They are rather different, but it's still kind of weird.

It does feel like a very Alliance-centric expansion so far, though that may be mostly because of the dwarves.

Also, being called "Outlander" all the time reminds me a lot of The Old Republic.

The Infernal Hordes

The history of Diablo IV is Blizzard trying to make unique and interesting content, and the community yelling that the content needs to be more streamlined. That there's no point in making complicated dungeons, or making the players search for keys, etc. Then Blizzard gives in and smoothes out the rough edges.

And so in Season V, we come to the ultimate expression of this philosophy: The Infernal Hordes.

The Infernal Hordes is basically a large round room. Waves after waves of enemies spawn, and then you kill them and collect aether. After several waves, you go to a new room and fight a council of 3 bosses. Then you can spend your aether on rewards.

I fully expect the community to complain that you have to switch rooms for the boss fight.

On the other hand, the Infernal Hordes is pretty fun. There's also a mechanic after each wave where you can choose a boon/bane combo from a set of 3 options, which can change up how you approach future waves.

The Infernal Hordes is Diablo's combat in its rawest, purest form. Yet, Diablo's combat system is strong enough to make that compelling. But I guess the true test is staying power. Can the Infernal Hordes remain fun after a few weeks?

The War Within Early Access

Early Access for The War Within has started. This time around, Blizzard did something new. Normally, early access is tied to preorders. This time around, early access is tied to the most expensive preorder tier, and not available for the lower tiers.

I don't know if you can really fault Blizzard for this. Early access is often felt to be the most valuable perk of preordering, so they probably sold a lot more of the higher tier preorders than before. And of course, probably spread the load on the servers out.

But I think it's left a bit of sour taste in the mouths of the player base. Blizzard is coming off two big successes in Dragonflight and the Pandaria Remix. I think splitting the current player base this way has dampened the enthusiasm.

Maybe it's just a vibes thing, but it just doesn't feel like a real early access in the community. Looking at Reddit right now, three of the four top posts are about the split.[1] It's not even angry posts, it's more a sense of resignation. But it really should be a sense of excitement. Kind of honestly, I'd even take the traditional "6 hour queue" and "servers on fire" posts.

Oh well, it will probably be forgotten in a few days. I actually haven't preordered, so I'll probably get the expansion after it formally launches sometime. Still, I can't help but feel that Blizzard tripped and squandered some of the momentum from Dragonflight.

[1] The fourth post is about Warbands, and how the poster has so many alts, he should have a Warchestra instead. Honestly, it deserves its spot.

Alleria: Light and Shadow

The second short for The War Within is Alleria: Light and Shadow.

I gather this is a condensed version of a longer audiobook. The artstyle is nice.

Also, I kept thinking that Alleria should have become a Demon Hunter. She's an elf, and she has all the same lines. She even uses her bow as a glaive-style weapon. 

Heh, maybe this is hinting at a third specialization for Demon Hunters: Void. Demon Hunters that are void themed instead of Fel and fire themed.

After all, they gave Evokers a third spec, so maybe Blizzard will do the same for Demon Hunters.

Threads of Destiny

WoW is doing short trailers for the new expansion. Here's the first one, Threads of Destiny.

It's a pretty interesting introduction to one of the antagonist factions in the expansion. It also features everyone's favourite dagger, Xal'atath, doing traditional corruptive villain things.

One thing I particularly liked about the cinematic is that Xal'atath set things up so she wins both ways. The queen accepts, the princess supports the queen, Xal wins. The queen declines, the princess dethrones the queen, Xal wins.

If The War Within is just one crazy Xanatos Gambit from Xal'atath, I'll be pretty happy.

Dragonflight Catch-Up: Patch 10.1

I've been going through the Dragonflight story quests for each patch. Since WoW throws all the quests at you once you hit max level, it's very easy to do them out of order. I've been following this guide on Reddit.

So far, I've done the 10.1 quests, which focused mainly on the Black and Blue dragonflights. I quite liked both of them. For the Black dragonflight, I liked the triad of Ebyssian, Sabellian, and Wrathion. I thought their story was well done. It's pretty rare for WoW to focus on the flaws of the heroes in this fashion, and it was a nice change of pace. Compare it to the Blue dragons, where all the dragons had quirks, but no real flaws as such (well, maybe Azuregos).

The Blue dragonflight were also good, but very different in tone. I liked that Blizzard used the old world and history, taking players back to previously-visited locations.

All in all, the 10.1 quests were quite good and interesting. I'm looking forward to the next set of quests, which look to be focused on the Bronze and Green flights.

Radiant Echos

The WoW pre-patch event, Radiant Echos, is currently active. I caved during the free weekend and downloaded WoW again. I haven't played since launch.

First thing I noticed is that the UI feels slightly off. They didn't do a full overall, but Blizzard changed enough icons such that it's a bit unfamiliar. I still haven't figured out what the hourglass next to people's names in guild chat means.

The event itself is pretty fun. You go to three zones, do events based on quests and bosses from previous expansions, and then kill the memory of a major boss like Arthas. Then the cycle repeats, though the bulk of the reward comes from killing the boss once. It's a pretty good rhythm, and the quests are fun callbacks. There's also a nice variety of quest types. Sometimes it's killing a named character, sometimes it's collecting pages from Stranglethorn, and sometimes it's trying to get the perfect boar liver to drop.

I gather the original incarnation was much stricter. The event didn't repeat and only did one cycle, so it was easy to miss the boss kill. Also, I think the time between events was longer. Blizzard has tweaked it so that you can keep going consistently, and also have several chances to get the boss kill.

There's also a quest line, though I don't think it is complete. I imagine the second half will activate closer to the expansion launch.

Heuristics for Building a Diablo IV Character

Diablo IV's next season is coming up, so I thought I'd lay out some heuristics and strategies for getting a semi-decent build. Now, none of these will compare to a true pre-made build from the various websites, but I think they're a good skeleton for a player to experiment with.

1. Diablo IV is built around builder-spender gameplay. Generally only take 1 builder and 1 spender.
2. One of your abilities (usually the spender) will be your main source of damage. Only put multiple ranks into this ability. Just take 1 rank of the other abilities you want to use. Other than your main ability, focus on passives.
3. The legendary aspects you put on your gear are your "set". The priority for the early game is figuring what your "set" looks like and assembling the necessary aspects. After that, just keep imprinting your set on new gear.
4. Put your best aspect on a 2H weapon (2x effective) if you are using one, otherwise on your amulet (1.5x effect). 
5. While levelling, temper your gear with the basic stats. The more exotic stats generally need a full build to take advantage of.
6. As for gear, just upgrade whenever you can. You can worry about specific stats once you hit Ancestral gear.
7. Unique items are powerful, but don't use too many. Much of your power comes from your "set" of legendary aspects, and each unique you use causes you to lose one of your set pieces.
8. What sort of abilities and special effects you focus on depend mostly on your build (i.e. crowd control, burning, overpower, etc.). But you need an easy, regular source of Vulnerable, be it ability, aspect, paragon glyph, etc. You should have it by the time you hit Tier IV.
9. For the paragon board, your first priority is glyph sockets, and enough ability points to activate the secondary power of the glyph. Then paragon nodes if they are good for your build. You should aim for at least 5 sockets. Pick up rare and magic nodes if they are close by, but focus on the path between sockets and paragon nodes.
10. Personally, I think D4 works best when you do a wide variety of content. Mix things up.

Obviously, these tips will only take you so far. The meta-builds on the various websites will most likely be stronger. But these heuristics will give you some direction if you want to try a home-brew on your own.