Scott Johnson
Appearances
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
I know he had a computer with him. So I think he was probably just willing to hop on whenever he could get the connection. Anyway, this is a long way of saying that we're going to talk about our first impressions of the game. And funny, it's kind of my whole impression because I beat the MSQ of the main campaign and then did a bunch of side stuff. Still doing side stuff.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
I'll get to that in a second. But I hit level 80 on Saturday and I haven't played that much in a long time. I played a lot on Saturday. Like...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
effectively i played the whole day i didn't play solid i breaks here and there but i haven't had a day that's that was that wide open where i could just play play play and kim's like hey it's new new expansion weekend you of course you can you know of course you should play go play i've got other stuff to do you know because normally saturday is kind of our day right not this one anyway
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
All I can say about it is I'm impressed. It does definitely have the feeling, as they have warned us and Chris talked about in the one-on-one Q&A that he and I did, or not Q&A, interview, that the stories, that this was going to feel like the first of more, right? Like we're not just doing a one-and-done campaign anymore.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
And even in the past, you know, like the Dragonflight expansion and those before it, you have sort of your main story. It ends in a place where you're like, all right, now I'm just waiting for patches. And those patches will include additional story content as other stuff releases in the game. Various seasons hit, new raid hits, therefore new story quests, new this, new that, whatever.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
What we've learned very quickly in the shadow of a brand new expansion for retail is that there's a lot on our minds and there's a lot we want to say and it's kind of hard waiting. So we also promised on our first episode back that we do lots of little extras here and there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
And that's where we're at with this one. But what's different here is it left me with the impression that this was just the first act of three, which is literally what's going on here. We were told this on stage last BlizzCon that World of Warcraft, The War Within was just the beginning of the World Soul Saga and that we would have three of these episodes.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
So it makes perfect sense to me that we would get a chunk and it wouldn't be complete or it wouldn't have the same sensibility as a previous expansion where the entirety of the story is mostly contained in that MSQ. But in this case, it definitely left me wanting more, but I was also very satisfied with what we got. And in some cases, some of the best storyline stuff and beats I'd ever seen.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
in the main campaign. And so far, some of the best side quests. Now, I'm not just going to be all glowy here. I think that there is a risk. The game runs the risk of feeling a little unfinished because it does sort of cliff hang.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
in a way that that maybe we're not used to um and for some gamers that i mean that may test their patience i don't know but for me it was a nice change it just feels like i've got room to breathe here a little bit like all right just take this as it comes it's all good you know uh But here's some quick overalls, and then I'll throw it to Bobby and let him have a bit of a say as well.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
And again, I don't know what he talked about, so apologies if any of this, anything weird comes out of Bobby today. I'm sure it won't. So, overall, like tonally and sort of like the setting, I absolutely adore it. I admit, though, I got a little bias in this department. If you tell me that your video game of any kind or story, book, movie, whatever.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
is told about big subterranean concepts like we went down a mine and it opened up into this civilization we didn't know existed, or even horror movies like The Descent. I love, as claustrophobic as that can be, I love stories about what's underneath. You spend all this time on top of the world, but what's down there? And it turns out a ton is down there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
So we'd put things in your feed that maybe you weren't expecting or whether it be quick impressions or thoughts on something that's going on in the immediate moment or whatever. And so we're doing that. And today's is a first impressions kind of discussion. Now, here's the weird bit about this.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
I don't want to give anything away for those that haven't played yet, but there's something called the core way, which is not just listening to core on Thursdays. It's a... Literally a tunnel, a path, a thing that the Earthen have done where they've created a way down. And what's interesting is you get to go down more than you've ever gone before and go places that they've never even seen.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
It's pretty wild. And having just seen, like, I'll give you a cinematic example. I just saw Godzilla X Kong, and they spend a lot of time. I mean, the whole concept of where Kong came from in the first place is like that weird middle, not middle earth, whatever they called it, the in-between thing, which is like mountains on top and bottom, weird gravity in the middle, that kind of thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
Anyway, at the core of the earth, there's this thing. Well, they even go deeper in that movie, and I love that stuff. Like when they go down there, they got all the weird crystals and the funky caverns and just vast amounts of cavernous space. That's a motif I can spend big time in. I love that. Don't know why. I don't know what's up with that. I just love it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
And so that already speaks to me immediately. So your mileage may vary on that. As a concept, it's enough to carry all of it for me. Like I'm just, oh, it's going to be great. It's going to be interesting down there. There's going to be cool stuff. And it was. It was really something. One of the zones... Okay, all the zones are great. But one of the zones in this game...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
is easily, by far, the most impressive environmental design I've ever seen them do. And that's for Hallow Fall, which is roughly level 75 to 77 or 78 or something is kind of where you're running in there. Second to last zone, really, at least in the campaign content. And holy shite, I can't even describe it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
We'll talk way more on a proper show, but let's just say when I walked in there, I just went, geez, this game. How are they doing this 20 years later? Like, just from a pure awe standpoint, I was absolutely freaking boggled by this zone. It just blew my mind. So I don't want to say too much more about it because you just really ought to go there and experience it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
Howdy y'all. This is Scott. Uh, we're going to do something a little extra today. You may have noticed that the instance, you know, we said this on the last episode, the plan moving forward is monthly. That's the cadence. However,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
But we also get to meet some interesting characters there that are hinted at in the cinematic. And so finally a chance to kind of hang out in there and do some fun stuff. Beautiful, beautiful place. Oh my gosh, I could spend all day there. And some of the most powerful story hits happen in there. And, um, I don't want to give any of that away again.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
Bobby's not here with me physically, but you will hear from him today because while on his Alaskan cruise, which was planned way before this return to the instances plan.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
We'll talk about that on a show where it's appropriate to maybe get into the, not spoilers, but you know, deeper, deeper stuff about, you know, Anduin's hanging out with you mostly down there and you, there's a bunch of stuff that happens with him. We get some real progress in his, uh, in his life of difficulties. Uh, Okay, all that said, so I really like the MSQ.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
Again, I'm just giving you overalls here. This is nothing. We're not going to get into the nitty gritty so much. But side questing so far has been distinctly better, in my opinion, than the previous expansion side questing or secondary stories. I think they made a real effort to do that here. And there's some real bangers in there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
There's one that basically deals... I don't want to give anything away here. How do I say this? There's one that deals with a real-life issue. Let's say, you know, like if you have some aging grandparents or parents that they may have to deal with. Let's just say that. I'll say that. They handled it with such grace and authenticity, but still kept it in the World of Warcraft world.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
It was really something. You'll know what I mean when you get to it. And if you have anyone dealing with that sort of thing in their real life, it may even move you. It did me. It was really something. But yeah, that stuff's up their game. And I'm going for all of it because I really want to clear these zones out. And the reason I want to do that of content is because I want to...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
so he's not actually here to do it but he's got some first impressions now i've not listened to his files at all because i want to be surprised right along with you for all i know he you know it'd be really unfortunate if it was just like a i don't know nothing about wow like what if this was just him talking about the toilets on the ship or something i don't know but we're going to find out together that's the kind of risks i'm willing to take in this life um
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
I want to unlock everything. They hide so much stuff under just common quests now. And I don't mean hide, but like if you want an amazing secondary armor set that just comes from quests, a lot of that is side stuff. Some of the transmogs that I want the most are side quest drops. Yeah. I like that they've done this in the game. I have a lot to say about my first couple of delves.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
I think those were pretty neat. I think they're a little obscure. But again, we'll dig deeper into that later. Ran a couple of dungeons. Those were great. Just on the overall, I think it was real strong. And now it's out in the world. As of yesterday, it's officially in everybody's hands. Or maybe it's today. Or midnight last night. Whatever it was.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
So early access period is over, and now everyone gets to get in, and we'll see how things go. But having a great time. I'm going to turn it over to Bobby now and let him describe his experience in the world of Warcraft, the war within. And we'll see you guys on our next chunk of content, whether that be a full show or something else. We'll see you then.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: The War Within - First Impressions and Level 80!
But I think that probably means he's had some internet somewhere where he could play. On the ship, my experience on the Alaskan cruise, which I did a couple of years ago, was that I had zero good connections when I was on the boat. But when we were off in areas off the boat, we could get decent connections, certainly 5G. And so I think that's probably what he did. I don't know.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
I haven't seen him forever. Some I wish I'd have seen that were either home because of some quarantine that somebody on the Diablo team got COVID. And so some people I wanted to talk to there were all stuck at home, so I didn't get to see him. But I did get to, I saw Ian Hazikosis in the hallway, whipped right past me. He looked busy. Just...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Yeah, he's always busy. I do look forward to having him on here again because he's a great interviewer. But I didn't get to talk to him, though, which is kind of a bummer. But I got to see Bethany, who's awesome in their community outreach department, whatever you want to call it over there. I guess it's just community management, whatever the term is.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I got to see Thist, who's a podcaster in her own right. She does all their social media stuff now. She's awesome. Big thanks to Drew. Of course, Randy, as I mentioned. Steve, my old pal Steve, who sent me this. Should I even tell? I don't even know if I should. It was 2012. It was a long time ago. This guy's the one that sent me this Diablo 3 signed by the dev team skateboard deck. Oh, wow.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Look at that. That never went anywhere else. They were going to maybe make some of these and they didn't do it. And no wheels or anything because I'm never going to ride this. Are you kidding? But look at that. Isn't that awesome? Anyway, Steve, you're the man. You know it. And I got to meet Holly Longdale, which was a really nice treat because I didn't see that coming.
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She's essentially in charge of all things Warcraft now, or WoW anyway. Right. And since John Hite left, I think all those responsibilities went to her. And she is the nicest freaking person. And as passionate as anyone I've ever met there, I can't wait to interview her. She was awesome. Awesome. I know people have seen her on stage.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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She does BlizzCon stuff, worked mostly in the classic side of things before height left. And so you've seen her, but she's so great in person. Oh my gosh. I just love being around her. So that was awesome. That's my favorite thing about going was getting to see these people. Some I haven't seen forever. Some I've never met before. And knowing that we did something pretty cool.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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We were both very sweaty when we did it. Um, maybe Chris was a little sweatier than me. I'm just saying. And that handshake thing at the end where we laugh and kind of crack up, that's like, we did like 10 of those. And that's why we were losing it because it's so awkward and weird. And, and, We wanted a good ending, right?
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I'm so glad they put it in because I wanted Blizzard to have fun with this like we were having fun. That being said, there is a ton of stuff that I don't know if it'll ever make it out of there that was super funny, but maybe not good enough for primetime or whatever. Sure. I don't know if we'll ever see it. Maybe some TikToks or some Instagram reels or something.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
I don't know what they'll do with it, but... Anyway, that's that. I got a quick question about that whole thing, though. Will wrote in and says, before I ask the question, I have to say how moving it was to see you and Chris back together on a stage. After watching that, I would have brought the three-year sub if one was available. Hey, Blizzard, I hope you're listening.
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Anyway, my question is this. Was there anything cut from the interview that you can share or that you found interesting, informative, or important? And follow up any chance for director's cut of the interview. Anyway, amazing to see you guys together again, says Will.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Well, funny you should ask because there were a couple of things that came up that didn't make it, but I think it was mostly for time. These weren't like super secret-y things or anything, but... We had a big, long discussion about class fantasy and why he thinks the Protection Paladin is the coolest class in the game.
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It's also mine now. I've been playing a prop pally for a while now, mostly because he told me forever ago about this via text or something. But to hear him say it out loud was super fun. And he just loves righteous, mighty hero stuff. And freaking, you know, the Captain America tie-ins and throwing hammers around and, you know, for justice and all this. That's super his jam.
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Whoa. Um, I will actually say I didn't know this before our conversation, but I didn't know that's where you, where you came in, where you slipped in.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But he talked about other stuff, which really surprised me. He rolled a Hunter Volpaire and made him look like Robin Hood. Right. And that's weird. That's a little weird. In fact, I have it right here for those watching at home. There it is. There's a there's a scene where it fades out and he's Chris is up here and the Volpair is down here and it's actually or Volpair. I keep saying Volpair.
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Volpair. Yeah. Yeah. And yeah, things like that. There is there was a lot more of that sort of stuff and a lot more like. you know, 20 years ago, who were you then versus now? And, you know, we dug, we just dug deeper. It wasn't like it was all bombshell stuff, but they had a 20, 25 minute limit and they had to tighten it up. So mad respect for them even doing that.
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I don't know how they did it to be honest, but it was super fun. So thank you for that. Well, we'll talk more about emails and how to contact us a little bit later. A couple other quick things before we get into the big news of the month. Have we mentioned this as a monthly? Have we done that?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Good starting cadence in it at any rate, right? Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I tend to agree. Here was my thinking or reasoning, because in the past it was always weekly. Yeah. There's a little part of me that knows that a monthly show will always have content no matter what. There's always going to be stuff for us to talk about, changes that happen that we're interested in, all of that. That's going to be a thing. Weekly, it was hard even –
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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halfway through the original run of the show sometimes to produce enough content to justify a weekly podcast and uh i hated that feeling of we're having to pad this out or talk about too many other games to pad it out or that sort of thing so we figure i think bob you'll agree with this that's weird my mouth made a weird noise then i apologize to everybody at home
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Made a lot of weird noises over the years. It's fine. I think you'll agree with me when I say it's better for us to start at this cadence and give more down the road than it would be the other way, where we start cramming one weekly or however often we do it, and then we go, well, we think it needs to be bimonthly because it's not enough. Well, we're going to go back to a monthly or whatever.
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I suppose anything's possible in the future, but this feels like the right place to start up again.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. We'll do basically we, we've, this is more internal. I don't know why I'm sharing this, but we're going to do six episodes seasons. That's that for this cadence is six months. Yeah. And at the end of that six months, we look at it and go, all right, let's evaluate it. What do we like? What do we not like? What do we think about the next season? And is that next season more often?
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Is it the same? Like that's when those decisions will be made.
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Yeah. I think that's smart. Something I didn't do enough of in the first run. I didn't know what I was doing in the first run. I mean, let's look, let's think about this. The show started in 2006. It ran till 2021 to two. It was 22. Yeah. And that's a long time to do anything. Yeah. Without a major tweak.
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Yeah. Let alone that. And you could say, well, Scott, you had all kinds of tweaks. You had a different co-host at various different times. And that's true. We did. Um, And lots of ups and downs, including the Blizzard ups and downs, which were pretty massive at the time. Controversial stuff, layoffs, the buying by Microsoft, and Bobby Kotick finally getting his hand out of the cookie jar.
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All of these things represent a very... chaotic kind of run that did real well. People were real happy with it and whatever, but it wore me out. So the goal this time is to retain all the passion and love, but yes, keep the fun out front. Fun is front. Fun front.
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wait they called me that in high school fun old fun front they called me funny front yeah they were they were into it anyway so that's the plan um i have a quick thought on before we get to the news i wanted to talk about follower dungeons for a second and these were these were put in i don't know months ago as part of the tail end of dragon flight um an expansion i don't know if i've said this anywhere else i probably said it on core a few times but i think dragon flight was awesome i loved that expansion yep fantastic
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yeah i think it was a real big return to form after shadowlands i felt like not since maybe legion have i enjoyed it as much as i did and i would put it up there with my top three expansions i think go and in no particular order because that that'll get me in trouble but i think it's lich king it's legion and it's and it's dragonflight those are my three favorites oh you know what i
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You got to squeak it in there. I do love Pandaria.
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Yeah, they were great times. So anyway, but I didn't play a ton in the last six months or so of this expansion. I knew that the follower dungeons were coming and I didn't know much about it other than, oh, that sounds interesting. And then I got kind of sidetracked in Final Fantasy for a while. And they were doing a thing and they're just like it. You could run dungeon content with AI companions.
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Yep. right? All doing their job. And every single one of at least the current dungeons, there is some talk of retrofitting old dungeons. I hope they do. Um, I don't know if they will or not, but, but I, I remember hearing about that going, well, that seems cool. I will definitely try that out. And then I kind of lost track of it.
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So here recently working on alts and just getting ready for the expansion, I also have been playing that prot pally and enjoying the hell out of him. Yeah. Uh, it's kind of Chris's fault. And, um,
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man those things that shield it's really great partly because i can just round up like 50 i can round up like 10 elite mobs and 50 regular mobs all in one pile and they're done like it's op you throw your shield you consecrate maybe maybe maybe heal yourself maybe maybe if you have to i hold on to that blinker for a while you know it's like i barely ever need it and i take down world bosses that you're not supposed to solo so it's like
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That's why I'm here. Things are looking real good for that game. I'm excited in a way that I haven't been for a very long time. And I think a two year hiatus away from the show. Was the healthiest thing I could have done. In terms of putting it behind me. Thinking about it in a very different way over time. And finally got around to the last few months or so. And I went.
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It's like very, it's a power fantasy that's a little out of control if I'm honest. But see that my secret thinking is because Chris has one and because he was there at the very beginning and probably had a lot to do with that class. They're not going to change it. They're not going to nerf it because, you know, they can't do that.
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Yeah. Don't worry about it.
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Yeah. I love that about that class. And I'm just having fun with it. I rolled a Zandalari troll because I think they're cool and tall and they're not all hunched over.
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i get a little purple skin you know just looking like a badass um and i'm having and so did you use follower dungeons to teach yourself how to tank then well so here's so here's what happened i'm like i am in the world doing world quests and all this stuff with a tank spec which is usually slower for most other classes it's a it's the slower choice you're not gonna tear through them i tried that a little bit with a demon hunter years ago and
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Everything took longer, even though I kind of enjoyed the rotation of a tank. But I was always like tank tanking in this game, healing in this game, for that matter. Those two things intimidate the hell out of me, partly because I've been playing this game since early access friends and family beta in 03. All right. A long time. During that entire run, DPS only. Never tanked. Not once.
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I had some tank, you know, like a warrior, but Fury or something. So this time, finally, after all these freaking years... I thought, well, there's no harm in me going into a follower dungeon in tank spec to just, let's see what this is. Let's just try it. I'm going to have to have some of these mechanics figured out.
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It's not that hard, I'm sure, anyway, but I can do it without the pressure is the point. I don't have to be with some randos with higher expectations than I can deliver or some DPS who thinks every time he dies, it's my fault and everyone mass leaves the group or whatever. All of these things that sometimes are just... Old stories of toxicity and it carry through the wow time, right?
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These are just, they're stereotypes of wow and they stuck. And this was one of them for me is like, you don't want to tank. You're going to be miserable in there. But here's the part. Okay, so that part, I get in there, and guess what? No problem. I can tank. I can do it. It's not a big deal. It's a video game, it turns out. You can wrap your head around it.
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But here's the big takeaway that I didn't expect. I may have mentioned this somewhere else. I hope this isn't redundant for somebody. But I came out of that first dungeon experience kind of elated because it wasn't just that, oh, I can tank. And yes, it's easier, right? The follower dungeons aren't meant to be super hard.
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You're supposed to feel like you're having a decent time in there and you're not dying all the time.
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Yeah, way lower. And that's fine. That's good. I don't think their goal here is to make that some sort of hardcore part of the game. Although I have questions about Delves, but we'll get into that in a minute.
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So I get in there and I realize for the first time in my WoW history, which is deep and distant... I actually noticed where I was and what was going on. And so I realized even before I was tanking or before I wanted to learn how to tank, I had a problem in dungeons no matter what. If I rolled in there with the hunter or the lock or anyone else, I always was like, okay, everybody doing their stuff.
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you know, it would be great right now. Like bringing that stuff back, getting back into the thick of Warcraft in a way that I haven't in years, both as a player and as someone who covers the stuff.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Okay. Oh, we're running. Are we moving this quickly? I got to hurry and get loot. Okay. Grab loot. Okay. Go to the next wing. Okay. Where's the boss? Shoot. I didn't look at it. You know, like you're always doing that and it's, and you're not on your own timetable. You're on somebody else's. These things made me slow down and literally smell the roses. Maybe not literally.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
I couldn't smell anything. But I saw things I'd never seen before. I paid attention to voiceover and story. I walk into a cave, and I'm suddenly like, oh, my gosh, look at the work they did on the stuff hanging from the ceiling. Yeah. that's amazing. Like this environmental art is incredible. And I can't believe they got these textures to work. And this boss design is crazy stuff.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I never got to do because I wasn't able to take that kind of time. either like the first time you see a dungeon and you run it, let's say back in BFA, you're just trying not to get killed and you're trying to understand what the mechanics are and you're whipping through there fast.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Maybe you saw a YouTube thing, but once you have it on farm, you're also not really paying attention because now it's just a thing you got to hurry up and get in there and do and get the F out. This was this moment of like, let's dip my feet back into the fantasy of this experience. It's a dungeon. It's as old as the fantasy trope itself. You want to go in there.
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It's mysterious and dark and weird and you don't have all the answers and you're not quite sure what to expect.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
And I also feel like Blizzard's in a much better place in particular team too, in terms of the content they're making and building and them having Chris Metzen back and having that kind of leadership enter the, you know, this phase of the game. With his own much-needed break coming back from. He did a very similar thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It's also my favorite thing about World of Warcraft. I think I may have said this in the interview with Chris and it got cut, but my favorite thing is the world. The world's the character. The world is the place. The world is the game. So when I go in there,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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i love i think the reason i leaned so much into solo play and i think a lot of players are like this is that you get the thing to yourself and you get to pay attention and really soak it in if you're constantly being forced to play a role within a group especially with strangers you don't always get that experience and so i know there are some players who look at follower dungeons and go that's for weenies who are afraid to have a group
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I don't suppose I can change their minds, but I would at least address that by saying, I understand the sentiment, but this is one more way they're letting me get in there. And it turns out that exact same dungeon that I breezed through on follower mode, saw, loved, was like blown away by. Now I'm excited to get back in there with friends. Now I want to do that. And then I want to go higher.
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I want to go normal. I want to go heroic. And then guess what? Let's get some keystones going. Let's start farming that shit. And let's freaking go mythic. I've never even gave a crap before, right? And suddenly I give a crap.
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Yeah. Where you're supposed to be having fun regardless. I mean, say what you want about Blizzard. Say what you want about WoW. They have always had... This is a toxic problem they have always had. I don't know why the player base is like this sometimes. I'm not trying to say everyone is. Obviously, they aren't. There's a ton of people who aren't. But why has it got this reputation?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It has a reputation for a reason. And I don't think it's Blizzard encouraging it. They don't do that. In fact, if anything, they're just like... what if we LFG? You guys don't have to freak out so much in there. How about you don't have to wait by some stone and hope another dude shows up? How about, you know, they try to make these things simpler.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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You can still do it all the hard way you want, but they're like, what if you had some AI followers that would help you just get this experience that we spent all this time making?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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He took off in 2016, 2017, whatever it was, and put it all behind him and then came back here recently. He had a much bigger break than I did. But in a lot of ways, I think those two stories cross. Having just spent some time with him, we talked a little bit about this. And sometimes you need some room between you and your whatever it is, your creation. Sometimes for...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Hello, everyone. Welcome to The Instance 2.0. This is technically a new episode, 667. We got to decide if we're going to keep the numbers. I don't know. I can't decide. But maybe my brand new co-host, Bobby Frankenberger, will help me decide that. Bobby, hello and welcome.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, just... That'd be really realistic. I mean, there is that button you can hit that'll say, I need directions, essentially.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. And that worked great in one particular situation. I got lost and I was like, I don't know where the next tunnel is. Like, this is just really, it's really obtuse where this is located, or at least it felt like it. So I hit that toggle and the character says something like, you want me to lead? No problem.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And this mage goes running out and then starts walking toward a hole in the wall and went, oh, that's the hole. Okay, nevermind. And then I untoggled it immediately and kept leading. So just giving me the tools. I really appreciate that. I do think there's room, though, I'll say this, for follower dungeons to also scale some difficulty. The base level is very, very simple.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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They give you some good gear in there for your first time in there. It's definitely going to be an eye-level improvement over what you walked in there with. But it's not amazing. And it'd be nice if I went through there a couple of times on regular and then went, all right, I'm ready for a heroic follower dungeon or even some sort of mythic adjacent difficulty.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I mean, I still think people should be nicer and go, oh, no worries. The first time in here, check it out. It's over here. Like, but no one does that anymore. They should. They don't.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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You know, for a visual artist, it's their sketchbook. For an actor, it's just turning down some roles and taking some time off, you know, whatever it is, or doing directing or something else. And this felt like just a thing I needed to step away from for a while. And now I'm very energized about it. I'm very excited to have Bobby with us because here are the reasons I picked Bobby.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, because they're all kind of in it together trying to figure it out.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, it's very cool. So we'll see what they end up doing with it. you know, I walked out of there going, this is cool. It's just cool that it exists. I may never use it more than the first times I go through each new dungeon and see them. I may never touch it again after that for, for that entire expansion. I don't know why I would. Right. But, but now I know them. Now I can go in there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I can properly lead a run through there. I can do it with friends and strangers. I ran some her. Oh, the one, the one thing that does throw you is immediately almost after I finished the last dungeon of this expansion, um,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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on follower mode, I immediately queued up for a heroic version of the same thing and got in right away because I was a tank and I was a little nervous, but I knew this place now, right? I was like, okay, I can do this. The bosses throw, you know, starting with heroic and moving forward, especially in a mythic, they start throwing new mechanics at you. Yeah.
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And I was like, oh, these weren't on the floor when I was here last time. Shit.
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Yeah. You're a dead hunk of paladin meat on the ground and nobody wants that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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uh speaking of which remix is ending or has ended it's done yeah um they even took down the ui that was saying how many days to count down for a while said zero which i thought was weird they finally get rid of it um i don't know if you played much of that but i thought that was really cool and i came to it late so i didn't get all the stuff i wanted to do done but a lot of people were leveling characters zero to 70 in like an hour and a half two hours oh my god like everybody's got like eight billion alts now yeah and they basically created like an arcade game oh my gosh
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And it's fun. It's really fun. And it made me realize it's not just because it's set in Pandaria. That helps because everybody loves going there. But it also just really captured the essence of what would be fun to tweak this. It's not that different than what classic players have liked about the Season of Discovery stuff.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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New ideas, new concepts, new abilities, this cloak that just gets exponentially more powerful the more you play and the faster you level and all of that. And I think that was a brilliant little test of maybe what's to come. So if they're going to do more of that, that's great. I don't know where else you'd take it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Maybe Legion would be a good backdrop for this because there's so many places to go.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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uh even just to start your journey you can pick the you know that whole continent's just got tons of content um but and then maybe even bring this one back again make a rotation but but doing this with the retail game and not just weird stuff with classic i think is very good for the health of the overall wow thing and i say more of that please i loved it
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
We may as well just lay these out. One, you have exceptional availability. Just kidding. That's not the number one one. But you have good availability. You're around, right? I can call you whenever and we do stuff. Um, that never hurts, but really the main reason is I really like Bobby's enthusiasm. I think he has a natural, um, he's, he's a natural for this sort of thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
It's a great way to have alts. We now have alts. Use them, everyone. Oh, and that is one thing that came out of the interview with Chris that I liked. They didn't do all of it, but most of it about how the allied races systems that they started putting in the game around Legion. Yeah. One of my favorite things they've done in the game because it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Instead of just waiting every other expansion for, oh, there's one, maybe two new races. Or usually it's like, I don't know, what was it? Morgans for the Alliance and goblins for the Horde. And then, you know, Death Knights, whole different thing. And like, they always try to do this.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
with either class or, or races, but to have races kind of pop and, and get, and you can get them with an expansion has made the game so much more interesting to live in just diversity of character types. Um, you know, upright, upright trolls walking around with hunched over ones. Like, yeah, just all of that vibe is so great for the game. And I hope they keep that up.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I guess with this one, we're getting, what, the earthen, the trolls that live down under the ground? Yeah, and I am excited about the earthen. I'm pretty excited about their whole story. Right now, the main earthen guy looks like his job sucks. He's just pulling that giant freaking lava hammer.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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pulls the chain over and over again yeah that would that's not a fun job i don't want that i mean does he get breaks does he have like a decent dental plan like what's it like it's like sisyphus rolling the rock up a hill except he just yanking the chain yeah it's a bad time all right we're gonna get into uh what's going on this month and i have this for you i have a bunch of look i've did some things that are reminiscent of old
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Like, you know, transitions and some stingers and stuff. And some that are new. I would call this one new. And big thanks to a very specific friend who pulled out his thrall voice to help me with this one. So here you go.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, that was Chris Metzen with his thing. Here's the thing, though. Yeah, he did it with his phone, which was a challenge because I was like, is this going to sound okay? And I think I got it to where I wanted it. So very happy with it. Thank you, Chris, for that. Let's talk about what's going on. Obviously, new expansion tomorrow for early access, folks. Yeah. My whole day is going to be shot.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Oh, right. Bobby's leaving town. I forgot.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
He's also kind of a big Warcraft nerd and we're going to hear more. I'm going to hear more about how mythics work than I ever did during my entire 16 run of the original instance. Yeah. Because I'm, I'll admit it. They, they, from day one, I was intimidated to the point that I was like, yeah, probably won't be doing a lot of that. And people are like, why?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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That's a long time. Without you playing WoW. And I can tell you as a veteran of said cruise, I didn't even think you're on the same boat we were on. Yeah. The internet is so bad. You can even pay for it. It doesn't matter. It's so bad. It's terrible. So there's no, there is no playing remote WoW while you're on that boat. I promise you that. No. But grats on the 15 years and also too bad for you.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Here's the funny thing about it, though. You ended up having to pay, what, an extra 40 bucks for this privilege and you still have to leave town early? Because that's about what the epic version is, right?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Oh, right, good point, yeah. We knew, but you knew you'd get early access. She just didn't know when that would be.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Yeah. Let's air out those panties right here, right now. Cause this is not, sorry, not panties, whatever, whatever you want to air out. Okay.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. I get it, dude. I don't like, uh, For those who are afraid that the instance reboot is nothing but shiny talk about Blizzard, I actually think this was a big mistake of theirs. And it's a mistake that is not without precedent across the industry. Sure. And in a lot of ways, they're just sort of following suit. Yeah. I still don't like it. I think it's a little predatory.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I think that giving people early access... I think giving items like a bunch of cosmetics, mounts, and maybe some currency and that sort of thing, I think those are reasonable reasons to do an upgrade. I get those. Those make perfect sense to me, especially amount on the store is 20 bucks alone or 25 or whatever it is. So this is actually a pretty good deal for everything you're getting. However...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I go, because I don't want the pressure, you know? Um, But I'm changing. That sea is changing. That sea, that boat. That boat is on the sea, and it's moving. It's changing. What I'm trying to say is I've come to some realizations that I think I might enjoy this stuff. So to have you around talking about that stuff is going to be a big deal.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Holding when you can play over your head with money, I'm not a fan of that at all. And if I had to guess, there were probably some internal naysayers on that that just were like, do we really have to do this? This is not a good idea. And who knows when this was all solidified? It was certainly before the acquisition. So who knows who's in charge then? I don't even know.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But I don't love this part of it. And I think we'll have to just obviously live with it. But I think it's important we give them heat for this, and I hope players do, so that maybe they rethink this next time. I agree. If there's one thing I know about the marketing teams, PR teams, community, and even devs over there is that they...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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They want you to have a great time in this game they work hard on. I know that for sure. And if you could really talk to those guys without a PR nightmare, I think a lot of them would say, yeah, we don't love this business decision that was made to squeeze a little more money out of players so they could have the privilege of playing the game early. Right, right. I think it's a little devious.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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That being said... Of course, I paid up and I'm going to do it because I'm going to get in there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. There goes my principled stance ends there because, I mean, maybe that's why this... What am I saying? I know this is why they do it because there will be enough people to do it. What's the harm in doing it almost? It's like, well, either everyone will be happy waiting until the day they can and they don't want to pay or they'll pay and do it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Either way, it's extra money for them, for whoever, even if it was five people who did it. Right. It was extra money that they wouldn't have had otherwise. So, of course, from a business perspective, you do stuff like this. These kinds of things aren't crazy. And for me to sit here and complain about it and still pay up to that amount is a little jarring even in my own head.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. Come on, you guys. You didn't have to do it. You guys make a lot of money over there. Anyway, the the collector's edition looks nice to get some good stuff going on with that. Oh, my gosh. Yeah. They always do. But I don't think it comes with a copy of the game anymore. We're past that now. No more copies of games, no USB drive, no DD ROMs or none of that. We're done. It's all digital.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
And for those that are like, oh, man, it would be great to have a hardcore voice on the show, yeah, Bobby, he's a hardcore player. He's not just dinking around. He's not just out there gathering beaver pelts for no reason. Right. There's got to be a reason. There needs to be a reason. Today we bring you that reason. Well, anyway, I'm glad to have you with me and it's going to be great.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Get the code, go online, download it. It's the year 2024. Get used to it. Speaking of the launch, let's look at the dates real quick. Here's what we have to expect. For early access times in LA, 3 p.m. Pacific data. Data? Daylight. That's what I meant to say. There's no Pacific data. That will be, let's see, August 22nd, so tomorrow. New York, 6 p.m. Makes sense. Three hours later, right?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Or three hours difference. Right. Sao Paulo, Brazil, 1900. London, 2300 BST. Paris, zero CEST. What does that mean? Like midnight or whatever. The turning of the tide there. I don't know what that is. Taipei, 6 CST. I don't know what the CST stands for. These foreign regions, I'm not going to be able to give you much info on. Seoul gets it at 7. Is that AM or PM? I don't know.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It just says KEST, which I assume is Korean Standard Time. And then Sydney's getting it at 8 AM or PM. Again, they don't give the PMs or AM.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, I think you're probably right. If you are living in those places and you look there... you'll know. For global launch, that is all happening on the 26th and roughly the same exact timeframe for that day. So 22nd for early access, you will have access to the game until the 26th where you'll have it to yourself and you're a little exclusive club of people who bought Epic or higher.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And then on the 26th, everybody else jumps in the pool. And that'd be good for you because you're not even going to be you're going to be out in the middle of the Atlantic doing or Pacific doing stuff. Yeah. Or the Arctic, wherever the hell you go. How high up do you go? Are you in a different ocean by then?
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But at some point, doesn't it change to something like you get high enough? It's like, you know, you know what I mean? Like at some point, it's the Northern Pacific maybe. Okay. All right. You're going to love that stuff. I'd love that. All those weird little village type places and strange fishing towns and stuff. Awesome.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Maybe I'll see some of those walrus people there. Yeah. It was all cool. But already in the game, we have the following. UI and quest changes. That's already in. All right. So that means all kinds of new icons on your map. Yeah. Some of it takes a little bit to get your head around, but for the most part, it's pretty straightforward.
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The game is in the last couple of expansions have been very heavy on if it's the exclamation point with the shield, that's your main story campaign quest. And anytime you see those run those, because that's going to be your main story. Yeah. That's still true. However, It's not so easy now to just do those and do nothing but those. They want you to do more than that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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So just know that going in that some of these other regular exclamation points from the old days might be required. You're not going to over level like you did in the previous expansions. They haven't given us too many big details on that, but it sounds like it's just a broader distribution of XP.
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There's a whole bunch of other things we could say about it. I've got some plans for some big interviews around the community. One particular very big YouTuber has agreed to come on and talk in a little side interview, that sort of thing. Uh, segments from the community. I'd love to see those make a little bit of a resurgence.
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I want to see all of it, so I'm fine with it too. That's my favorite part of open world questing. But also I hope it means improved side quests because they were so deprecated in the last couple of expansions, I don't think the side quests were awesome. They were okay. Sure. But they weren't like, whoa, I can't believe this side quest exists outside of the main story.
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It's almost better than, you know, you hear that in games all the time, like The Witcher.
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Yeah, I think people like a good MSQ, but I think that I think they may be maybe overcorrected a little bit. And this is a chance for them to pull it back some. So I'm actually looking forward to that. Also, Skyflight worldwide and is a toggleable thing. So even in the current content, if you're even still leveling in Dragonflight. You can turn your mounts.
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What was called dragon writing is now just called sky flight. You can turn that off or on. And what that does is it turns your flying mounts into the old school sort of hover and move style that existed prior to this expansion. And between that and sky flight, which lets you do the full dragon writing kind of mechanics, uh, I love this, that they put this in.
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But maybe some people always didn't like, you know, they just don't like change. So they'd never like dragon flight or dragon flying and they would rather just float and do their way. I think that's great because now they have their thing. Good job, guys. You got it. I think that those of us who've embraced the mechanics of dragon flight, it's so much freaking fun to get around.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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We've had, uh, you know, there was a time there where every episode we had five or six wonderful weekly segments that would show up at the end of the show. And, uh, people really liked those glommed onto those. It's how I met Patrick. He started out as a, as a segment producer or as a, as a, as a, you know, a little side extra producer.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, or click the other one is if you click on your collection, like the little horseshoe. And up top of the horseshoe, there's a little tiny dropdown up there of a few things like this, like random mount, something, something. And then the flight switching is also there. So they tried to put it in a couple of places to make it convenient.
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But once you have that, just stick it on a bar somewhere, have it off to the side. And I find myself toggling all the time. It takes a little bit of time, like you cast a spell to do it.
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Yeah, you have to be on the ground to do it. And when you do it, it immediately changes it as soon as the spell's over. And then you can mount up again and you're to the other way.
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So where I find this most useful is world quests in particular, where it would be a lot easier for me to see things from a bird's eye view where I'm not soaring all the time, where I just need to kind of helicopter hover. And so I'll toggle it on for those kind of quests. And when I'm done, I toggle it back and then soar across the continent and do it somewhere else.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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The actual freedom of choice there is excellent. And I'm really glad they're doing that. Because it's one of my favorite new features of the game for a very long time. But I also think there is some value in giving people a choice, especially if they're used to doing a certain thing. So watch for that. You also have cross-realm guilds. We've been filling ours up pretty quick.
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In fact, I think we kind of hit... Maximum already. I need Blizzard to take away, like back in 2010, the rumors at the time were that our guild was partly responsible for this, but they made guilds smaller. They put a cap of a thousand per guild. And it was because ours was like nine or 10,000. It was unwieldy and it was kind of hard to deal with for them.
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I don't know why it was for them, but, but then how we handle data has maybe changed or whatever. My guess is this isn't a problem now. So I think they should drop the limit and we should be able to make a gigantic guild again without any problems.
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And then in the case of Randy Jordan, AKA Randy deluxe, my, my old second original cohost, uh, He started out as somebody who called in with tips and stuff. So you never know what's going to come from those things. And I always liked that content a lot.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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instead of getting on it yeah all these separate guilds it's hard but cross realm guilds are happening that means that you are no longer limited to one server it also means you are no longer limited to one faction so if you've got some folks yeah on the alliance you want to bring into your guild you can do it this would have been dude this would have been like swearing in church about 10 years ago
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Did that surprise you when they changed it? Because it shocked me. I was like, whoa.
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I should mention, this is a great time to mention this, because I also agree the retail game's in the best shape it's been in a very long time. Some of you at home are going, wait, what about Classic? You guys going to talk about Classic on this show? Yes, the answer is yes. It's just that there's nothing huge happening right this second in Classic. And you know what?
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Someone's going to write in and go, are you kidding me? This thing they just did was huge. I get it. There's stuff happening in Classic. I'm not playing Classic. I'm not that interested in Classic. It doesn't mean we won't cover Classic stuff. We will.
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That's good for the show. I mean, just from the baseline, why I don't care to play classic is because I've played all of this a lot. I've played since 2003. It's a long time to play a game. And I'm more interested in what's new and less in what's old. And I love... Trust me, I'm a nostalgic guy. I have a whole other podcast about classic gaming.
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And at the end of the show today, we're going to actually play a throwback segment from a long time ago because the person who made it very sadly just passed away kind of suddenly. And I think we owe him a little honor there. So to bring all of that back, we're going to start with an old one and think about that guy a little bit. More on that later. But anyway, lots of cool stuff on the way.
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And hell, Warcraft about to hit 20 puts it in that category. Sure. But... I find it just, I find it jarring and hard to be in and I've tried. So it doesn't mean that I'm representative of some of a whole bunch of people. I'm sure some people agree with me, but we will make sure that we have, especially the big, you know, the big strokes that are happening in classic.
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We're going to definitely talk about on the show. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Let's talk about warbands for a second. That was a thing that I forgot they were doing entirely until I got back in and went, oh, right, they're doing warbands. This is a big deal.
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I think maybe what surprised me is that it was in so early. And I shouldn't be surprised because they always do feature stuff in final patches before expansions hit. So it shouldn't be that shocking to me. But when warbands happened... And I logged in and the first four or five characters in my character list were all hanging out in some sort of campfire circle.
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I just went, what the hell is going on? It's like Diablo. Am I picking the freaking barbarian to go do Diablo 2 or something? It felt very weird. And I went, oh, right. This is just them saying we also have a little bit of a visual picker. for your war band, but really everything in that whole column of characters, they're all part of your war band.
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And I already love it because here's my favorite feature. I go out into the world on an alt. I wanted to get a lock to 70 and I did yesterday. And so that makes, I think I have four seventies, maybe five going into this expansion. Not that I'll use them all, probably only use one or two. But I'm running around with this war lock and
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And I'm leveling and I'm doing my thing and I hit 70 and then I'm out to do some quests and I see under the quest, I noticed that the exclamation point above some of these people's heads is a little bit faded out. I'm like, that's weird. I hadn't seen this before. So I would walk up to it and ask the person what the quest was. And sure enough, they're ready to give me the quest.
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But down below it says your war band has already done this one.
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And the idea is, well, wait, if I was only doing it for Transmog, that's already done. If I'm doing it for rep reasons, that's done. Like, I don't need to do it. And so I won't, or I will because it's fun, or some other reason that you wanted to do it or whatever. But giving me that choice, I mean, that's a small thing, but I really like that. Like, I should be way more excited about it.
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We also started a new guild within the core guild, which is all part of my core podcast. You might say, wait, what happened to AIE? They're still there. So if you're in there, you're already good. You're with friends. You're among friends. We're just kind of spreading it around a little bit, having it sort of permeate other places.
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Yeah, that's the thing. People who don't do alts, this is a huge gesture. This is saying to you, hey, try some new stuff. And that's really what pushed me to get the lock ready to hurry up and get some of these other characters because I think I am going to be more involved that way.
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Not just in like, well, one has professions and he's making bags for everybody or this guy's cooking for everybody or whatever. Those are all still key and important and whatever, but having it feel more like these characters who I inhabit when I'm playing them are all on the same goal sheet. that's meaningful, right?
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And then we're sharing stuff like bank stuff and we're sharing rep grind doesn't feel as grindy when all your dudes have it, you know? And then Transmog alone is a massive thing for me. I love the Transmog system in this game. And now everybody gets everything.
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I mean, not necessarily, can't necessarily wear everything from everyone, but I've got, if I find a piece of mail out somewhere and I wear plate, If I get it, it gets thrown into the bucket. And anytime I have a male wearing character that wants to go out there and change and have that look that I unlocked with a whole different character, they can. It's all in there. I love that.
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Absolutely freaking love that.
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And now that guilds are cross-faction, cross-realm, way less barriers to entry. Yeah. Just seems like a perfect time to kind of kick that part of the industry or the of the community together. So we're looking forward to all of that. And who knows, Bobby might be the guy that leads like the real hardcore, you know, weekly locked out freaking mythic runs. I don't know.
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Right. Yeah, I think it's a really smart thing to do. I think it's a long time coming. A lot of these features, I just sort of go, could have really used this one about 12 years back. Yeah, no kidding. But I can't get wound up in that or else there's a million things Blizzard should do and maybe they will eventually do. Like, I wouldn't be surprised if one day...
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Stuff they've been asking for since vanilla suddenly shows up. That's just the way these projects go. If it's the right time, you do it. If it makes sense, you do it. You throw the resources behind it and you do it. And I'm excited for them to do it. What else is there to mention about that? Let's talk about the Earthen, the new race.
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There's so many things. We're just going to touch on a few of these. But this is the new playable race with the War Within, the Earthen. You unlock the Earthen characters after completing their quests in the overall level-up campaign. You enlist this Titanforged race made of living stone by aiding them in their endeavors. I mean, let's be honest.
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They're basically underground doors made out of dirt. That's pretty much it. And that's okay. I'm not saying it's bad. Yeah. But that's what they are. You can go Horde or Alliance. And they have, let's see, starting at level 10 in their capital city of Domagol or Domagol. Dornagol? Dornagol. Yeah. I always get that R-M-N mixed up as an M, especially in italics. But anyway, yeah, that's exciting.
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Why are you so excited about them? Because I see them and I go, oh, cool. Another one to add to the list. Great. I'll make an alt. This will be fun. But you seem a little more enamored than I am.
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They're just amazing. What's your current race for your paladin right now?
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They look so good, you guys. I mean, I don't know. I wasn't much of a troll guy before this, but after that expansion, which was already a controversial expansion, my favorite thing that came out of it were those Zandalari trolls. They are awesome. And it's fine, you Alliance, you got your like beer drinking humanoids. It's fine. Whatever those were.
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Yeah. They're fine. I'm not complaining. You guys got a thing, but I'm telling you, those Zandalari trolls. Woo. Such badasses. Anyway, we'll see. The Earthen look cool, though. I'm excited about it. Me too. And also anytime... We're old enough to remember a game where paladins were strictly an alliance choice, right? Yeah. And what was the equivalent on Horde? It was... The shaman. Shaman, right.
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Yeah. What do you, do you think there'll be like a line for this? I think there will be, people are going to be like, I want to, I want to do mythics with Bobby just from our conversation here. They don't even have proof that you're good at that yet. They don't even know. They're just going to show up and go, I have a keystone.
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And they're not... Really not equivalent at all. They never were, but... You know, it just never felt right.
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I saw YouTube short or on TikTok or something that was showing off some early concept work for an initial class. They were going to do something along the lines of a bard that did a lot of buffing and kind of had a guitar and, you know, this sort of thing. And they ended up scrapping the whole thing. But I always wonder what that would have been like, you know, a mostly buff class.
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There's other buff classes, but... That's a little hard. I'm not really a bard guy like in any kind of game, even D&D, even though John, for example, is always telling me that bards are the greatest characters or the greatest classes in D&D ever made. And therefore are great in everything. But I'm just not big on the whole. I played a guitar for a second and you guys all have more hit points.
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I don't know why. I don't know why. It just annoys me. So I'm not into it. But anyway.
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Oh, that's right. So wait, there's the Voker that does the direct damage caster stuff. And then what's the other one? The other one's a healer.
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Trust me. 16 years of me forgetting stuff when I needed it the most. It's just fine. This is, this wouldn't be the instance without that. Um,
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That is very bard-like. Yeah. I like that fantasy a little better than bards. Bards and the music and stuff. It's just silly to me. I'm going to get hate for this. It's just never been my favorite thing. And also, if you're going to call them the – what did you call them? What's the spec? Augmentation. Augmentation. They should give you like Botox treatments and stuff like that.
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High cheek – like cheekbone lifts and boob reductions in my case. Yeah. Let's move on to some hero talents. This is exciting.
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Yeah, because I mean, look, I'll admit this. The game is old enough, long enough in the tooth that the old days of when you get a new expansion, it meant a whole new leveling path of brand new abilities. That's gone. We don't do that anymore. If anything, it's just talent unlocks. I think the talent system is really in a good place right now, so I'm not complaining. But I do miss that.
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Like every other level, bing, I got something awesome to try out. And you don't have that with your old characters. So I feel like this is an olive leaf in that direction. It includes hero talents for all the World of Warcraft classes. Don't know why I had to say that. I could have said, wow.
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Two years ago, the final episode was 666. We did that not on purpose, but we were happy to have that happen because it was funny.
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And they are an evergreen form of character progression for each class specialization that introduces new powers and class fantasies. There are 11 nodes in a hero talent tree. First of these unlocks with the system at level 71, and you earn one talent point per level from level 71 to 80. So you get every talent in the tree by 80. So you fill it out. It's not A or B. It's everything.
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You may do it in a different order because you want to, you know, I don't know, have stuff early. Not downside of this, but I hear a lot of people arguing about which class they're going to play because some of them seem epic for some of these classes. And some seem fine. You know, like the ice spec stuff for a frost mage seems awesome compared to that of a arcane mage.
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And I guess to each their own, you're going to find something you're going to like. But I always worry about that a little like... are we going to see too many of a certain thing because they just go OP and then they'll balance it and they'll patch it and then they'll piss someone off because it got nerfed and it's fine.
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Astounding levels of leadership. That's what you bring. So I'm not worried.
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Yeah. Like Frostfire spec as opposed to Sunfury spec, it's kind of like in between those two if you're a mage. I'm talking about mages a lot because I think I'm going to use my 70 boost for a mage. I think I've decided. Mages are very fun. I mean, I got a lot of like level 50 mages and I don't want to do them manually. So I think I'm going to boost one.
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That's right. You can also expect, I've been talking a lot to PR lately, you can expect a lot of conversations with more folks at Blizzard, some familiar people, some newer people that no one's really met in this way before.
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I know, I'm an idiot. Remix. I even had like a, what's the, who's the dark elf from on the Horde side? What's the name of those elves? They're void elves.
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I had a void elf in there, in the Mist remix thing. And he's looking like just like the most magic badass you ever met in your life. And then I ran out of time. So he's going to be like level 45. And I'm like, I could just boost him, I suppose, now that he's in the pool, right? The other thing about that, real quick, I almost forgot to mention this earlier. I did forget.
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Your warband, which is like the top five characters, you swap those in and out, whatever order you want. You can take an old character and shove them way up top if you want. It doesn't matter. But what I didn't know they did, I was like, why is this list so long? Can't figure it out. And I'm like, Roy, you're not on this server. Roy, what are you doing? Because I have this character named Roy.
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Right. And I still think it's amazing I have that name. And they haven't taken it away from me. But anyway, it's because they're now giving me one single list. It's no longer a server or realm list. Character list where you jump realms and check characters. And so it's one gigantic thing. You hover over it. It'll say, oh, that character is on Suramar. That character is on whatever.
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And you can just launch it from there. And they're part of your war band. Like, yeah, it's that's nuts to me.
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That you've ever had. I got a guy named Wetblade. I talked about this on TMS today. His name is Wetblade. He's a level, I think maybe even nothing more than a 10 or 11 level warrior that I made back in 2008. Yeah. I think, or seven even. And he just sits at the auction house in Orgrimmar as a bank alt back when those mattered. And I haven't seen him in years. And suddenly he's in my list.
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like all this stuff is possible so it's all coming up speaking of which last week i went to um blizzard entertainment there in irvine california for roughly 36 hours it was very quick um but i got a message some days before from an old friend of blizzard chris metzen who said hey do you want to be the guy that does this interview that we need doing and i said 100 i would i'll come do that for you he's done so much for me why wouldn't i go that do that for him
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I'm like, what the F are you doing here, dude? And he's wearing blurry, shitty armor. He looks like a clown costume. It's awful. Yeah. But, you know, it's a good time. Anyway, back to the hero talents. Are there anything in this or anything as part of that that you're the most excited about?
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I mean, obviously it's a big box feature, but, you know, anything here that's like, whoa, I can't wait to do that.
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Yeah. I do like this. I like this crossover, though, because I can either be pack leader. I'm a beast master hunter, like, through and through. I don't want to play anything else. The whole point of that class, in my opinion, is to have tons of animals. I just love it. Give me two bears. Give me a couple of cats that come out once in a while. There's a dinosaur on a certain proc, like...
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Just dump all the animals on everything. And so I'm going to stick with that. But being able to choose between Pack Leader and Dark Ranger, you know, as paths to take, I think is really smart. So that the player doesn't feel like they're locked into one little thing or another. You know what I mean?
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I like the monk ones sound like places I'd want to eat their buffet. You got the Conduit of Celestials, Master of Harmony, and the Shadow Pan Buffet. Mm. Mm-mm-mm.
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Oh, you just keep going back, dude.
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Let me tell you something real quick. Sorry, offshoot. Again, a staple of the instance. A little tangent. That cruise to Alaska, the food, right? It's awesome. I love the food on that ship. It was really good. But I at first hated the pastries and the desserts because they seemed to have –
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just a monocle of sugar compared to what they used to have or compared to what I would get somewhere else, just really low sugar. And I realized that's the devious part of it. I'll eat five of these now because they have less sugar than one back home. And that's how the, that's how the French get you, by the way, all of their stuff's like that. It's like low sugar, but you eat more of it.
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We, we poo poo the whole thing's over. Right. You don't even know what that means.
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uh what else we got here let's talk about season one schedule schedule oh my gosh yeah as the kids call it um they've laid this out for us pretty well you've got uh early access like i mentioned on the 22nd normal difficulty dungeons will become available on that start so ericara the city of echoes level 70 through 80 well these are dungeons sorry let me get to that first yeah
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Priory of the Sacred Flame, 70 to 80. The Rookery, these are all 70 to 80, so I don't know why I'm saying it. Well, not all of them. Some are 80.
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Right. Stone Vault, another leveling dungeon. Cinderbrew Meadery is level 80 only. City of Threads. Why does that remind me of something? City of Threads. What is that? Anyway.
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Oh, in the City of Threads. I see. Let's see. Darkflame Cleft. I mean, look. That was my other wrestling name in high school back in the day. Darkflame Cleft. And Dawnbreaker, also at level 80. See, with the launch of the expansion on the 26th, heroic difficulties become available then. So these are all norms until the official launch.
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On September 10th, The War Within Season 1 begins with heroic and raiding Wingfinder 1. uh, which is the new, uh, new narrow bar, narrow bar. If I'm saying it right, palace that opens up mythic zero dungeons also become available along with heroic seasonal dungeons and the new world bosses that are going to be all over the place. Uh, so that's, that's exciting.
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And it turns out it's a good thing I did because I don't think anybody was going to do this if we didn't have some sort of mutual agreement on who was going to interview and that sort of thing. So I was honored to be asked, first of all. Second of all, it's just kind of a no-brainer. And I was like, all right, let's go. The only problem is it bumped this show a week.
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Um, and then here are the world bosses, Kordak, the dormant protector. Well, he doesn't seem scary. He's dormant. It gives, it gives a crap, you know what he's doing. Um, Aggregation of horrors. Now that sounds a little scary. That sounds a bit more scary. That's my mother-in-law's house. Sure. She doesn't listen, so everything will be fine.
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Sure. A atrocity of the undersea. And then Orta, the Broken Mountain. That's a whole mountain. Beware. All right? Watch out for that. September 17th, you get Mythic Raids, Raid Finder Wing 2, Mythic Plus Dungeons, and Story Mode will open, or Raid Story Mode will open. And then on September 24th, Raid Finder Wing 3, if I can say this right, will open as well. So that's your plan.
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That's your big initial blowout of content.
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Yeah, and it's roughly what we're used to. This isn't that crazy of a schedule. It's not that different than, say, the last expansion.
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Yeah. It's a little, honestly, it's a little bit like follower dungeons, but it is, it's the raid version of that. It feels like, yeah. And I think, I think they're being very specific about not calling it follower raids to set expectations for this. Cause this really is a chance to, This is a further effort, all right? Because you can see what goes on here.
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Raiding in the beginning, 40-man raids, 25-man raids, all that early crazy stuff in the game. Those all made sense, but it was very obvious early on that a very small percentage of the player base was actually seeing this stuff that took so much work to create. It was a huge part of the development. Right. And that was annoying. So what do they do? They bring people like Greg Street and others on.
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We were supposed to record this last Tuesday. Yeah. That's kind of sucked, right? I was like, hey, Bobby, sorry.
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uh, right around cataclysm and they start working on, uh, and releasing content that is LFG, the LFG or LFR rather stuff made it possible for you to play on a much simpler mode or, or less difficult mode. It meant more people could see the stuff, but I'll bet you that even then that's still a larger subset, but still smaller overall than what maybe Blizzard would like everyone to see.
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This is a chance for them to say, well, We made this big, complicated, multi-tiered thing that's got tons of story and all this stuff that is also tied to all your outside questing. Hey, all you filthy casuals. They don't say that, but if they did, get in here and see this. In a way that you can see it. And I think this is a great idea. Again, way long coming.
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This feels like something they should have had forever ago, but I'm excited about this. I think it'll be great.
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Yeah. You're not there for all the fat loots. I mean, there's some loot, but you're not there for all your grindy reasons, so save the grinding for a different... That's a different night. That's a different thing. That's a thing you schedule with a bunch of people, and it's almost like work, but it's fun. You like it, but now you have...
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You know what I mean? So I think it's going to be great. I'm really looking forward to that as a feature. I did skip over it. Kind of. Didn't I just ran right past that thing? Yeah. All right. Now we got to talk about some hardcore stuff.
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A gaze of a God. Do you know who that is? That's, um,
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i forgot which elder god i chose for that i forgot who it is that's a bad oh no no no no i can't remember who it is anyway i'll think of it before the show's over anyway let's talk about delves and the potential for hardcore games among the delves um it is replacing pvp in the great vault which makes me happy because i never used it in this last expansion i don't play pvp in this game
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And they went, well, I guess we can settle for it. It's fine. But, yeah, I went out there and got to sit one-on-one with Chris. We did a very – those guys are very professional about their camera equipment and their audio stuff. It's kind of awesome to see them prioritize that. They have, like, full-time people that just do that.
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I'm sorry, okay? They've made great strides over time to make a great PvP experience, but I just don't like it in MMOs of any kind. It's not just a WoW thing. I just don't like it in any of them. Your mileage may vary. I've definitely got some memories from doing some PvP things, but I just don't care about it that much.
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So for me, that Great Vault thing just ended up being a feature I never touched in this last expansion. That's all switching over to Delves and it being its, you know, connective tissue. Real quick from the Delves themselves, we have a bunch of stuff in the Isle of Dorne. We have Earthcrawl Mines, Creevel's Rest, Fungal Folly. That sounds terrible. I don't want to go in there.
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In Hollowfall, another zone, you have Skittering Breach, Nightfall Sanctum, and the Sinkhole. You also have something called Micromancer Cavern. Cavern. Micromancer.
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That's in fungus. Another fungus thing. Micromancer. Is my co-man. Oh, my co. Like mycology. Mycology. Now I get it. It's like, oh, it's mine. Look at me and my co-mancer. And then they mixed it with necromancer. The Ringing Deeps. We got the Waterworks and the Dread Pit. Both things. Also with my mother-in-law. And then we have...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Azkahet, the Spiral Weave, the Tak-Rathan Abyss, and the Underkeep, as well as Zekvir's Lair. Yeah. And Azkahet is that big bug city, cavernous bug city, which I'm stoked about in there. You watched the new cinematic for that, right?
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The mom and the daughter and all that. I don't want to spoil anything, but it was good. It was real good. It was gooey, too. I don't even like... Look, I don't like any of the Blizzard bug stuff. Don't like it. Not a fan. Don't like big bugs coming at me. Don't like beetles. I don't like carapaces.
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Fighting all that stuff's not my jam, but I really like what they're showing with the story in there, so I'll deal with it. It'll be okay. But let's talk about the Delves in general. This is an idea pulled a little bit from a lot of stuff in different MMOs. They come from neighboring MMOs, and they kind of do their own tweak on it.
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Follower dungeons are definitely a tweak on the AI-assisted dungeons in Final Fantasy. And I would say these Delves are a lot like the self-same Delves in Elder Scrolls Online. They have a very similar system in there. How excited are you for Delves, and why?
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They're at Blizzard whenever it's needed for their various games and whatnot. Of course, right now, a lot of WoW stuff happening there. But the interview happened. If you haven't seen it, go to the Warcraft YouTube channel. It's currently, I think, the most recent video.
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No, the story of Torghast was outside of Torghast. There were things I liked about Torghast. I liked the concept. I liked the augmentation of your abilities, the deeper you went in. The roguelike elements were fun, but man, you got tired of that place. Oh my
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Yeah, they basically made a part of that playlist, even though it was kind of outside of it, but it fits. I think you can hear it as well without the video on their RSS feeds, but I think it's worth listening to for a bunch of reasons. One, it was a really great look at 30 years of Warcraft, which is an insane thing to say, 20 years of World of Warcraft.
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Yeah. Big question for me is how much variety will there be with runs? I want it to be... The one thing I liked about Torghast, at least initially, it felt like things were...
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The concepts did not, it wasn't full Diablo levels of randomization. And that bummed me out. That's part of why it fell off as I just like, this is so samey and so boring. And the, and the look of it, like environmental art was kind of bad. No offense to anyone working on that, but.
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Oh, I thought it was his own separate thing.
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So one would assume once you finish the campaign, you'll have it.
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Especially for alts. I didn't realize that. I thought this was a, well, yeah, you're right. So 548 or five, yeah, excuse me. 548 will get you into tier four immediately.
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Got it. Let's see. There was another thing about this I wanted to mention, if I can find it. Similar to Torghast, recommended levels. You can do tiers. Here we go. Tier 1, 561+. If you want to do Tier 8 through 11 at your max, 603+. And it will drop, obviously, loot appropriate to that gear level.
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And what that time has yielded for both Chris personally and professionally, what the plans are moving forward, what it's like to come back after that amount of time and some of those challenges. It went places. And a lot of it got cut because we had done an hour and a half of content. They had to whittle it down to about 20 minutes or something. Yeah.
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Yeah, I'm looking forward to these. This is going to be stuff that you can very quickly in a guild situation to say, hey, is anybody around who's going to go run tier two on two of these? And three people in the group can go, yeah, I'm available. And you just go, you know.
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um real quick here is for those at home going well scott it's nothing like eso delves what i mean by that is this is blizzard is putting their own spin on it kind of like they did with dragon flight and mounts it is definitely lifting from uh what's the name of the other game guild wars 2 and their mount system is very similar like there's no way they didn't get inspiration from it but they put their own spin on it this is what blizzard does and they do it pretty well
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So the delves are going to be different. There's a whole different kind of focus with these delves. The ones in ESO are kind of random and you're just out in the middle of nowhere and you're like, I think I'll go down that hole. And there are other players in there and you have goals to do and stuff like that. And you can clear a delve, but it's not this structure.
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They've clearly tightened this up a little bit. Do you think we'll ever see quest tables again? Are we done with those forever? No more of those.
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Yeah, and they used them in BFA at the ship, and you'd talk to Vampire George, whatever his name was, and you'd...
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Yeah, it was like checking for currencies in a free-to-play mobile game a little bit. Yeah, exactly.
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Yeah. I mean, I think there's something to that in general, but I just think it's a hard fit for an MMO. It's just not that interesting, you know? Yeah, it's just, it's not.
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I liked earning gold that way. It wasn't much, but I liked just saying, oh, this guy's going to go off and I'll take this 300 gold mission. And he'll come back with a bunch of gold that I didn't have before. And then I'll exploit that and have him go every day. And then I'll definitely check it. Like if it's the right motivation, I'm in. But that just never felt like it to me.
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yeah uh all right well that's about that for that let's talk about mythics for a little bit more or raids anything about these any changes to mythics i should say this time around for somebody who loves them like you do are you excited about yeah mythic plus dungeons are my jam i really love that um i'm so crazy about mythic pluses that i actually um
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Zalatath, by the way, for those who don't know, she's your floating balls in front of her face cinematic lady. She's our big bad to this thing. And the thing that Metzen said in the interview was going to show up throughout the saga, not necessarily just like, oh, she's the raid boss and we're within the It's much more than that.
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I'm putting up an image of her right now that she originally appeared as. She looks like she'd be no trouble, you know? Look at this image. I'll put it in Discord. You see that and you just say, oh, yeah, just look at her. It's like an NPC. Big deal. She's not even wearing shoes. Lame, right?
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Oh, that's why I was thinking of Legion. Because she was actually a weapon. Oh, there it is. Yeah, the sentient blade. Yeah, her story is a weird one. But anyway, yeah, I like that. I mean, it will be like all this stuff, proof's in the playing, right? All your mythic friends are going to play it, and then they'll decide whether these new affixes are stupid or not. So watch for it.
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I think the entire community feels that way. So don't... Yeah, yeah.
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Come into a town near you. All right. Okay, I'm really excited to play this. So I'll just play it. Here you go.
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Why, it's the town crier. It's the town crier.
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All right, what you got there is a multi-generational take on the town crier. We got the OG Nicholas when he was five, then his nephew who is now five, and then Nick, or then me doing the, it's the town crier, and then you got Nick who's now 24 doing his little bit, and then you got Van again doing his thing, and then the two cries are Van and then Nick when he was five again.
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All in one glorious bumper file. Anyway, I had fun putting that together. So, uh, yeah, it's nostalgia. It is that it's in its purest form. Uh, let's get to this, uh, here message that we got here. Uh, this is sorry, tabbing around here. Uh, this is a quick message from Bay Lell in our chat room and, uh, discord and all that stuff.
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How does it feel, he says, with all the hype coming to The War Within? Do you think that any XEQ devs wonder when it went Blizzard's way or why it went Blizzard's way rather than theirs? So referring, obviously, to EverQuest 2, which launched the same time as WoW. I remember at the time, there were a lot of people, including my very into MMOs brother-in-law, who were convinced that
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All the money should be on EverQuest. They were the ones that were going to do it. And that WoW was going to be a also-ran. It wouldn't last very long. You can still play EverQuest 2, EQ2, and it's fine. It's community and everything. But why did it run away as the clear frontrunner and has been since?
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I don't have a good answer for this, except to say I think the game began as a more, even in classic days, people want to act like it was more hardcore than it was. But I remember when this game came out and everyone said, when you die, you just float around for a minute as a ghost, and then you get all your stuff back. This is a baby.
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I remember people saying stuff like that, even about WoW's initial days, which people act like now. Oh, your hardcore days, man. Those were the days. You don't remember then.
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um it was already that right they were already getting accused of care bearing but i think that their instincts were correct make this game as as as available to as many players as possible and that will carry you longer i also think choosing to do a art style that was uh significantly less at least aiming for realism and more stylization did them enormous favors
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Because it lasts the test of time. The technology and what we see today is vastly improved, but it's still consistent with what the game was in its early days. So you can keep that consistency throughout the years. They were trying for like the hottest looking mannequin level freaking quote unquote realism at the time with EQ.
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And it flopped on its face with that particular aspect because it looks like ass now. It looks terrible now. So never go for the cutting edge. I think that was a hugely smart decision for them and to go stylized and to make the game more playable by more people. I think that's really it. Do you have any thoughts on that, whether I'm insane or not?
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Yeah, I agree. What was the game I was playing right before while I was playing a lot of... Oh, geez. What was the one that introduced Realm versus Realm? My brain just went crazy. I can't think of the thing. Anyway, the one that had Merlin in it, it was... I can't remember the name. Anyway, that game I played a ton of and it had this very punishing death problem where you would die.
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First of all, they didn't have like questing, proper questing. It was just like grinding. So you'd find a place where a bunch of creatures were and just kill them until you couldn't stand it. And the name almost came to me and then it left again. Shit. Some people at home are yelling at their stuff because they know. But anyway, when you would die, you would lose some percentage.
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I want to say it was 20% of your XP. Regardless, that was gone. No matter what, that was gone. But also your stuff, your gold, your items, your equipables were all left there in a pile, kind of Diablo 2 style. And you had to run, you had to corpse run, not in some ethereal realm where you're dead and you're a ghost and nothing can hurt you, but in the real world. And so you're very vulnerable.
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And then when you get out there, I just almost had it again. Dark Age of Camelot, that's it. Hey. You ever have a thought just go, oh, shit, I didn't catch its face. And then it runs by again. It was like that. Anyway, then you'd have to run up to your thing. You'd get a little bit of your XP back. I don't think it was all of it. And you get your stuff back.
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But now you had to go grind out the XP you lost. Yeah. Now, I understand the value that some may place on that kind of punishment. I think there's a place for it, and I'm glad that there is.
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There you go. Exactly. Or something like, I don't know, Souls likes today. They're punishing on purpose. It's part of the experience. I think that's wonderful that those exist. But if you want to capture a very large part of a subscribing game model market, you've got to be more approachable than that.
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So it's a small example with the death thing, but there are a lot of things in WoW that I really appreciate that others did not do. Here is a quick email. No, this is a voicemail. This came to us at 801-471-0462. This is about when things started way back in the day.
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This is Bobby, by the way. He's the one that looks like Jesus, if you're looking at any pictures of him. Or I guess if you're watching this video right now, very Jesus-like in both look and tone. He's going to take us to task. He's going to judge us at the great judgment bar of Bobby, and it's going to be great.
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All right. So if you don't recognize the voice, that is Andrew Konietzky, the original co-host of The Instance back in 2006. And he was there for about a year. Also did a little ELR with me. And it was just great to hear from him. So I wanted to make sure I played that. Brings us full circle. That was a long-ass time ago. A long time. It seriously was. Yeah. And we started the guild together.
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I think I probably first complained about wow bugs then because we were doing the Gates of Encarage back then. It's just a wild. And then I saw Randy last week, so I got a little bit of that. And, you know... There's been a lot of people, a lot of stuff in between, but here we are now today doing a thing with this guy that looks like Jesus, and it's great. I love it.
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No, you can't. You're like Samson. Don't do it. I don't even know how that story goes, but Samson couldn't cut his hair for some reason. What was the deal?
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Oh, was that it? All right. Yeah. I thought it was something more like all his money went away or something like that.
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That shows what I know. All right. Returning player after a long time away. He has a question about writing animation. Here you go.
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and the art of storytelling and um and it just if it was it's great everybody should listen to it it's it's really really great yeah i think you should too so as far as like things that got cut um there's there were immediately in the youtube comments people who
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All right, so... I was thinking about this the other day because my, um, one of these mounts I was trying to remember what it was. Oh, I know what it is. The Diablo, the Diablo death something mount. It's the one you got for Diablo fours pre-order. It's awesome. By the way, one of the best like tie-in mounts they've ever done.
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And it's got this amazing wingspan, super demonics got like three headed dog in the front. It's very cool. But I noticed that when my orc is sitting there, he's holding like, he's supposed to be holding like a, like a, what are those called on horses? Hilt or whatever it is. Uh,
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Yeah. What's that called?
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Is it pommel? No. It's not. It's not.
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So this is like whatever that little handle is. And he's holding it with his two hands, but there's nothing there. He's just in the midair holding nothing because the reins of this thing are all in a different place. And so he's just very stiffly sort of stuck there. I mean, clearly it's not a priority.
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But you'd think for a company that really prides itself on smooth transitions and animation and all that stuff, maybe would have had a look at that. I don't know. Maybe there's some old code that just prevents this from ever looking right. But he's right. If it isn't a horse, you all look funny.
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I have followed my stuff for saying things like, Scott, how did you not say Khadgar the shit wizard when I brought up Khadgar and kind of paused awkwardly because I looked like I was maybe going to call him a shit wizard because we've been doing that for years on here. And there is a version of some footage somewhere that is cutting room floor for this where I did refer to him as the shit wizard.
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and like so you step forward a little bit so the mount like tilts you forward but like really fast yeah and so it's like you're waving around like like a stick like yeah like paper you really you should launch off the front of that thing nobody's asking for like hyper realistic physics here but i do think they i think they could go right like revisit this you know yeah tweak it a
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If you want to have your voicemail played on the show, 801-471-0462. You can also email us theinstance at gmail.com. And if you prefer to use the website, there's a link on there as well over at frogpants.com slash instance. Sign for the drop of the month. Now, this is exciting because we're about to give away some stuff. This week's drop is a contest.
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And I want everybody to go right now to frogpants.com slash contest. I'm going to bring it up here for folks to view it. As you can see in the video version anyway, there's a picture of Thrall and Anduin checking out the sword. And it's a contest that will give you a bunch of possibilities. So here's what you're entering to win. One of you will win a copy of the War Within Epic Edition. Okay. Wow.
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Just one of you. We only have one. By the way, thanks to Eric for that. Dude in our community. Very generous to offer that up. Six people, and these will never be the same. There will only be one per thing. So there won't be one guy gets six months of free WoW time or something.
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Yeah, just in case. Six people will win free 60-day WoW cards. This is thanks to our friends at Doghouse Systems who have been with us since 2008. One of my favorite people I've ever partnered with. John and crew over there are amazing human beings. You should buy your systems from them. They're amazing people. And, uh, he sent these over to me and says, Hey, let's give these away.
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Why wouldn't you want it? Six of you will win that, and then six people will win 2008 BlizzCon mount cards that are very rare. You can't get these anymore. It was the mount cards you had to scratch off and then enter into your account in 2008, and they've never made them since. Wow. And I can't even tell you who gave me these, but somebody at Blizzard, I'll say that. They were very nice to do it.
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So a little piece of history there, six of these unscratched. I already have them. They're like literally in my possession. I have to admit I've been, you know, I had a couple of eBay temptations, but I didn't do it there for you guys. Uh, all of that is possible. If you just go to frog pants.com slash contest, that's frog pants.com slash contest. All it asks for is your name, your email.
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And if you want to leave a message, you can, it's not required, but we just need to be able to get in contact with you. If you win, um, All of the winners will be announced sometime early next week. What is today? Wednesday? Maybe even this weekend. I just want to give people a few days.
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So let's say Saturday we'll make an announcement across the channels and stuff and let everybody know who has won what. And we hope to do more contests on the show as well. But right now this is a big one.
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So again, hop in there now for your chance to win 60-day WoW cards, BlizzCon mount cards, or the War Within Epic Edition of the game, all courtesy of wonderful people like Eric, Doghouse Systems, and a secret friend in Irvine. I think that's it on that. Oh, and I mentioned earlier, just as a little memorial of sorts, it's not much of one, but it feels right to do this.
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And I can't remember exactly what the content was or why. It wasn't part of when I was talking about him in that context that did make it. But there was some other Khadgar comment that got yanked. Um, there are a few other things. Like he said something, everybody wants to know when he said, um, we're not prepared for something to do with the sword being extracted from Azeroth.
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For an old friend of the program, way, way, way back in the day, if you guys remember, one of our post-show segments was created almost every single week by James. He went by the name Akuzod. He has been a very active player in our guild and was
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always showing up with these awesome files every week i loved playing them and he would play this overly dramatic news segment and i decided to go find one to play at the end of the show today which i will do in post uh so if you're listening to the audio version of the podcast you'll hear it uh you won't hear it on the video one but the audio version will have it
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And, uh, we just want to wish him and his family the best. Um, he passed away suddenly. I feel so bad for his wife, just awful stuff. We lose people in this community sometimes and it's never easy. Um, so shout out to Accusat and his family for, uh, you know, for being such a rad dude. He was awesome. Yeah. I think it's going to do it. That is going to do it.
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Oh, we got a Patreon should mention that. Oh, do I have Patriot? Let's see if I have a bumper for that. What do you mean there's lore in this game? Oh, that's an old Thrall thing. That's not going to work. Uh, but anyway, we got to this Patreon, patreon.com slash the instance. And, uh, we got some people who signed up already.
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I mean, I didn't even really get the word out that much, but we already have a bunch of new signups. Lee Adams, Quag Spire, Will Porta, Carrie, Ram Volter, Spaghetti Syntax. Love that guy. Leveled up, sorry, leveled up noob. Uh, Andy Tashita, Shatterproof, know him. Jesse Raposa, Gabe Geisendorfer, amazing name. I want to know him. Michael Hennessy and Tanner Goodman. We know Tanner.
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You guys are awesome. Thank you so much for your early support of The Instance. You're going to get commercial-free versions of the show. You're going to get other benefits. Just go read about them. And we'll be adding more as time goes on. We just wanted to get something up for launch, and so it's ready to roll.
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You can sign up today at frogpants.com slash instance, or go straight to patreon.com slash the instance. Okay? Super easy. Piece of cake. No problem. I think that's it. Frogpants.com slash instance for everything else. You can find all our links and stuff over there. And of course, the instance at gmail.com if you'd like to send us your feedback. And don't forget, we also do voicemails.
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We also do texts at 801-471-0462. Bobby, super fun having you on for the first one, man. Wow, and this was a beefy one.
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There was a lot of catching up with what's going on. I suspect our monthly visits will be slightly less lengthy, but no less tasty. You know? Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I'm getting Thai food later, so I'm kind of hungry. You can tell. Anyway, that's all happening next month right here on The Instance. Thank you guys for being here. Thanks for letting us relaunch this directly into your face.
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And we hope you enjoyed it. That'll do it for me and for Bobby. We'll see you next time.
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And I said something in the aftermath of that, that got cut. Um, And so I don't actually know the answer to this. I just know that my, the word, you might call it a proper name, a proper noun that I said got cut. I'm not saying that means it's anything or doesn't mean anything, but they left in the comment about you and are prepared. And if they're willing to do that.
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I'm just saying put together your own thousand-piece puzzle, okay?
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Okay. No getting around it. It was so much fun, though. And it really only represented about two hours of time for the trip. The rest of it, I got to go tour a bunch of stuff. We got to have lunch with Chris and hang out for a bit. Their curated internal museum, the Blizzard Museum, very cool. Like, you would love this thing. It's like literally a museum. Yeah. And they curate it like one.
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So things come in and out. They rotate in and out. Sometimes these things end up at cons or other events. And then they come back. They go under glass again. They have all their awards in a special place. Ancient concept art from like the late 90s, mid 90s, this kind of stuff. Really, really cool stuff. And I love that part of the tour. We also got to see the bikes.
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Remember the motorcycles they made? Do you remember that whole thing?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Back in like 2013, 14. I think it was a Warlords thing. Speaking of which, the Warlord's gigantic axe, the Gorehowl. Yeah. That is the one that was in a taxi cab in New York for promoting that expansion.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
Yeah. That thing's sitting in their main lobby now. And it is, I can't even, a photo doesn't know justice. You could hang 12 gorillas off this thing. It's so big. I don't know why I chose gorillas. Yeah. I like to compare things to how many gorillas could hang off of it. And in this case, a whole hell of a lot of gorillas could fit up there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
but it was really cool to just see all that stuff some things i'd only ever seen from afar and people are probably like well scott you've been going to blizzcon forever did you never do a tour during any of that no i mean i would fly into that santa ana airport that's near wow so this is your first time going to blizzard first time on the blizzard campus
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
No. Turn your cheek or however it goes. How's that go?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
What a treat, man. Oh, it was amazing. I can tell you why I never did though, because everybody was always in Anaheim. And so every time that I could have gone, everything important happening was happening in Anaheim and nobody was there. So it's kind of pointless to go up there on your own if you don't have somebody who can walk you through it or whatever.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
So props to my old co-host and pal Randy Jordan, a.k.a. Randy Deluxe. He was my tour, my personal tour guide. And he showed me all kinds of stuff, knew a lot of inside stuff. Went and looked at... like every building has a lobby in this campus, but, but only one has like someone there. And then you got a NDA and sign and get a tag and all that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance: Welcome back, Champion
That's just the one main one that you're, that you would think of behind the org statue over there. But all the other buildings have space for another one of those if they wanted it. So that was just weird, but it's just a big business park. Right. And so in theory, this is a hundred businesses, not just one taking over the entire, the entire thing. But, um, Anyway, I got to see a few people.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 670: Dino-Sour?
Why it's the town crier. It's the town crier.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 670: Dino-Sour?
This show is part of the Frog Pants Network. Yes. Get more at frogpants.com. What do you mean there's lore in this game?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 670: Dino-Sour?
the world of warcraft podcast so you don't have to this is the instance
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And then as soon as the new, new thing got there and I got to level 80, it was like, all right, we're back to it. So I tanked a ton of normal and heroic content and it turns out that's good practice for even the big show, which when you've got your 25 friends there or whatever. And, uh, and it, and it just kind of clicked with me. It's weird.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Cause I've, this has been the most intimidating, uh, job in the game. Healer's not far behind it. I still don't know how those people can not lose their minds. I don't know how they do it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
So big, big ups to everybody out here. Their heels, their, their team. Well, but, um, I just thought, well, there's no better way to do this than to just go for it. Well, the good news is if you just play the tank, and I also mainlined the protection spec through most of the PBE content that I led to 80. And while you might say, well, you're going to kill stuff slower.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Sure, but I'll kill 20 mobs slower than the single target that some of you DPSers are doing. So that's how I would play. I'd gather a million mobs around me and kill them all at once. And often I'd rip through quests very quickly as a result. This is not new to people who maybe main spec tank. But for me, it was like this temptation of, should I just move over to Ret Pally for a little while?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And should I grind that way and then worry about this? But instead, I was like, nope, you're going to learn... what it means to taunt at the right time and pull this that way and kite this guy the way you need to. So when the time comes, there'll be in these innate instincts and you'll have to adjust. And there's some things you still don't know, but you'll get it. And it turned out really well.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I think a huge part of it is we have an excellent team overall. Like everybody was kicking butt for sure. For sure. But we one shot, what one through four, uh,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
that's a crazy fight those two can eat a turd i freaking hate them they're really it's really crazy it's fun but it's crazy in there and that's where we ended the night about a three-hour run but to get eight of you know two eight of nine in the first night albeit on normal is a is bodes really well for all of us because i think as soon as we hit you know we gear up to heroic we're gonna have a great time in there
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
chit-chatting while we're doing it and and then i love focusing and and repeatedly dying and trying to figure out what we're doing wrong like that's just that's i love that yeah i love it it's fun and um i had fun and and by the time we'd at least taken down maybe two of those bosses i felt like i could relax and not be so uptight about whether i was going to blow it or not
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I don't know what happened there. That was still janky, but I also reassigned it and it worked every time after that. So I don't know if I had that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, it went fine. But I can't wait for our regular nights. We're going to
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
you know be doing these on the weekly um for those wondering if we are going to stream this stuff maybe not right away but that may happen we'll see um but grats to that whole team we had such such a good time in this week i guess very fun i guess friday what we reset and go again right start from the top every week it'll be different if if you can extend the lockout you can decide you want to start on the same boss again but that's a choice that you make and usually people don't make that until they're
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
That's the thing. I got no gear, no meaningful gear from any of those encounters. Um, but lots of us did. So I'm really hoping Friday will be my, uh, happy gear day. We'll find out. Um, anyway, it went really well. Uh, and again, huge thanks to that team. We are called the core within.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
It's pretty stupid, but I love it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Oh, it's not stupid at all. It's wonderful and inspired.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I do have, okay, so let's get into the overall on the month in bits and pieces. One thing I wanted to say early on is that the early access thing happened before, or excuse me, after the show had aired, I think a day later. I can't remember.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, and it was a bummer for you because you had to leave and couldn't really even take advantage of it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, that sucked. But I have an opinion about it now, and it may surprise people what... I have to say, because I thought I was going to be really glad they offered the option to play early access. Sure. I think that... I think it could be way better next time, but I think it was kind of bad this time. And the reason I think it was bad...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
The full story, as would be presented campaign-wise to players on day one normal, not early access, was not fully in the game yet. So we all hit a bunch of artificial walls and went, oh, that's not here yet. Or I guess I'm done with Thrall for now. And you weren't even really sure of this.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
unless you were really paying attention to news and stuff, but you didn't know what was even going to launch on the day one and how much, what's missing here and why is it missing? Is Blizzard like cramming? You know? I don't know. I couldn't, I couldn't really get my head around what the deal was there, but I don't, I think it was a vastly better experience than,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
The day everyone played the game and the fullness of that campaign was ready to play. Yeah. And it felt less empty. It felt less. What's the word? I felt like I was in a PTR servers, how it felt for a few days. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, I think that's who gained advantage from it. I mean, I guess I suppose I got some of that because it got me there. I got to 80 pretty quick. And then, of course, they nerfed it. They didn't nerf it. They buffed it, buffed the game for launch day because they wanted to slow down progression. People are getting there too fast.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
to be honest with the alts i've been playing i haven't really noticed that big a difference you know people were kind of freaking out about that i don't it wasn't that noticeable to me whatever they did it didn't seem to make a big deal but but then again i leveled this tank in a tank spec and then brought in dps alts and killed things quicker so maybe it was just my perception but
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Anyway, I don't think they should do that. If they do it again, I think this game needs to be ready to go in all of its finished features for a normal day one launch for most people. That should be your early access state of the game. If not, then what am I paying? What? Forty bucks for whatever it was.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
additional yeah to get it early i mean some of this some of the extras are nice the the sky rook mount thing what are they called whatever rooks the white the blue birds with the electrical business you have all the oh yeah whatever they're called Electro Birds. Electro Birds. That's an awesome mountain. I use it a ton.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But all that being said, I just think that the game felt... I felt like I was still beta testing and it didn't feel great. And there were just some broken stuff. Like I would talk to a...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
you know no take candle kobold somewhere and he'd say yes treasure or whatever and do a thing and then i would accept its quest and the quest just straight up to never show up and i would reset it and it still wouldn't show up so there's a lot of that going on um also i had a bug where If I mounted, oh, I know what it was. The Diablo 4 mount, it's like the three-headed dog bonus mount.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I love that mount, especially on my Warlock. He's just awesome. But the problem is that when you mount him and then you start moving before he's fully done animating or before the bar fills, you fall off of it and now you're invisible. And it won't fix unless you re-log into the game. You can't do a reload slash reload. You have to re-log into the game or you have to zone in somewhere.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
So I got to go find a load screen, which actually is harder and wow than you think, you know?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I tried that. Slash reload did not work. And I tried it over and over. And that never worked. And I tried disabling mods, re-enabling them, reloading the UI again. Nothing did it. And it was my shield and a hammer just floating out there. I don't know what other people... I'm guessing other people see the full model. It's not a problem. It's something on the client. Sure.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But now that seems to be gone. It seems to be worked fine. So there's just all this stuff was happening during early time where I just was like, I just spent 40 bucks to do what exactly? I guess get ahead on leveling. But then people like you who were even gone a week had no problem catching up. I don't think that was even an issue.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I think next time, unless they're explicit about fixing some of this, I don't think I'd do it again. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It's more revenue stream for a game that hasn't changed their monthly price since launch.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, I think early access on something like, you know, just pick any other game. The Elden Ring makes sense to me. It's primarily a single player experience and, you know, the game is just the game and there it is and it's done. There might be a patch, but it's not, you know, the functionally the game is there. MMOs are just too far, wide, deep and tall, like so much there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
There's no way that you're going to get in. You're going to get the core thing and you're going to be able to get started, which I did. And that felt fine. But it also just felt like all the gates were in place. No gates had been lifted. No time gates, no progression gates. All the gates are down. So you're in a mall with like three stores that are open. That's how it felt.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, you're like, I really need to go down to Hobby Lobby. No, it's not even close to Hobby Lobby. What's the one where they get all the goth shirts? Oh, yeah, Hot Topic. Hot Topic. I got to go into Hot Topic. Nope, the fence is down. I'll wait until I roll. But I paid $40 to go to Hot Topic and it wasn't open. That's how it felt.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I don't know why I'm using Hot Topic or why Hobby Lobby even came up. I don't even like that place. Well, anyway, so that's my only thought on that. I otherwise have had nothing but positive experiences, and I have loved this expansion so far. I've loved the story. I've loved everything about it. I do think there is a missed opportunity I want to bring out on top here.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I haven't talked about this anywhere else. They missed an opportunity with the earthen. Every expansion, it's either like new race, new class, sometimes a combination of the two, pandarens and monks, for example. Most of the time, though, it's like, well, here's your demon hunter and good news, bad news, only night elves and blood elves can be that thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
In the case of the last expansion, you got your dragon folks and they got to be a new class. That was a lot like pandaria. But it's usually every other, right? It's like new races, new class, new race, new class. But with sub races and everything else, I feel like they've gotten a little more fluid with it. Here's the missed opportunity. This game introduced the earthen.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
So the horde finally have a version of dwarves. And for the most part, I think they're well received. I think Alliance people are just kind of like, oh, more dwarves, huh? Big deal. But for us, it's like, oh, no, man, freaking dwarf. This is great. We don't have these. But they missed an opportunity. The lore goes so deep and so awesome on how these are like, literally, they're called earthen.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
They live mostly underground and they dig and mine and are constantly... Doing things that evoke earth and mud and stone and all that. Yeah, yeah. And you don't release this expansion with a Thurgis class, some kind of earth magic class. Now, I know all you shaman out there going... What about us? We have Earth things. I'm not saying you're one little aspect.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I'm saying something that is a focused Thurgist. It's like the earthquakes. And again, I know there's some of that with Shaman. But everything has to do with rock and stone. Yeah. What were they thinking? I mean, I know that you can only do so much for expansion. You got a lot of new systems this time. But I am literally bummed. that that wasn't a thing because I would be leveling one right now.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, even just a secondary, like two classes. Do like you did with Demon Hunters. We don't need maybe three. So give me a tank spec, which makes sense for a big earthy dude.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
yeah or uh that or maybe dps but maybe even some kind of healing thing maybe it's more utilitarian like providing instead of heels or providing stone shields that well like i said the rune carving right you're like you put you plop runes on the ground that people can stand in and and do stuff and great idea it's a great idea what would they think you know what i bet if we could ask the right people they'd say oh well this was on the whiteboard we just didn't get to it or something
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah. I agree. All right, well, let's get down into the dirt where these guys would go if there was such a class, and that is the newest system in the game, the Delves. Overall, I think Delves are really great, but I did not have that impression at first. My first impression was, oh, well, these are going to get boring quick because I don't see a lot of variation in here.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, I also think it's less even if you consider yourself a casual player. It's still it still means, you know, you've got to play the game. And you've got to play various systems in the game. And of course, Delves are now part of it. So that automatically makes it easier if you're running Delves as a solo player to have your vault filled out.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But here's where I was wrong. The variation, maybe if you ran only at Tier 3 for the rest of your life, you're going to limit your variations. But when you go up in the tiers... And by the time I got to 6, 7, and 8, it was like wildly different what you were doing in these same Dells, which may share similar layouts.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But they would throw new mechanics, new reasons to be there, new quests to do while you're in there. And also, it's very generous with giving you gear commensurate with the tier level you choose. And I have very quickly shifted from these are okay to this might be my favorite thing in years that the game has done.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And I've been curious the whole time, cause you and I haven't really talked about it in depth. What do you think of delves and how they've been executed?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. Even more so now because they've nerfed it for solo and buffed it for multiplayer in there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I think these should be focused on single player, but anyway.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But I think I just like the motif of there's a building. And in there, we've got banking dudes. We've got giant guild vaults. And then on this far wall, there's this huge dwarven forged gigantic freaking bank vault looking thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I feel like it was about a week there of chaos in the month that just felt like they weren't sure what was going on. But I feel it feels pretty solid right now. I was also around for one of these runs where I did two people, and it took us longer to take that boss down together than it did with me on my own. And I think that's how it should be, right?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I don't want to go in there and just chip away, even if it's not really hurting me that much. I don't want to chip away in an eternal freaking damage sponge. That's not fun. I can think of plenty of other things I'd rather be doing than that. And I feel like they've balanced that out pretty well since.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And to my luck, most of these problems were happening when I was maybe running up to tier three and only doing it here and there. I was doing other stuff. So really, it's been post all those fixes that I've enjoyed it the most. Yeah. I don't know. I think it's really strong. I would like to see more, even more variety, maybe less spider shit. You know, there's things about it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
There's a lot of spider shit, Bobby. A lot in there. Spider webs, spiders themselves, big old orb weavers that are a pain in the ass. Like, I get it. This is an expansion where we're doing a lot of spider things. And for the most part, I'm happy with it. But I think the Delves, I wish the Delves were just a little less on theme for that. I wish they were maybe... Here's just a delve.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
It's like a dungeon. You know, it's not meant to tie into Zalatath or any of her bull crap. This is just a room full of shit I got to do. So your experience may vary out there, everybody. But I think overall, though, I think Delves is a strong addition to this game, and I hope they keep tweaking it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Encourage me to go in there more often and also make it easier for me to grind coffer keys because I don't like the current way of doing that. It's not my favorite thing in the world. You get them from various activities, but the one you get them from the most is those memory deals. What are they called? They've been calling it since pre-patch. What the hell is the stupid blue memory
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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You find those bubbles on the overworld. You go out, you click it, you go in there, you kill a bunch of stuff. Those always drop a ton of those fragments, but you need a hundred fragments to get a single key. It's a little grindy. And I don't like doing delves unless there are, uh, the bigger coffers in there. Like I want to, I want the big ones and nothing feels worse.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
By the way, I did this the other day. I hovered over some stuff on the map and it said, Oh, you've got like three keys. You're good. Then I forgot logged in as my hunter and I hover over the same things. I'm like, I'm gonna go do those as the hunter. And I forgot, I don't have the keys.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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yeah my paladin has the keys so i so i go down there i do an entire run because i'm just being stupid tier eight the whole thing get to the end i'm like sweet gonna find that big fat chest in there sure enough there was i'm like all right here's my thing i run around pick up gold with my feet that's first thing i'm very methodical about this and then i go open the two stupid little candle boxes and they're fine i get some rep whatever and then i'm like all right
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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the big box. And I right click on it says, you don't have any coffer keys. And I'm like, shit. And there was nothing I could do.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Well, well, well. What a difference a month makes, people. Oh my gosh. I know, right? It's the instance. It's me, Scott Johnson, and Bobby Frankenberger. Bobby, welcome back. It's another month, man. How are you doing?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And I think when you're choosing your tier, there is some language there in red that says you'll do better if you have keys or something. Just so you know. But it's not... If you're used to just getting in, getting out, getting in, you're just not paying attention. And I felt like an idiot. But whatever. I got, you know... I cleared it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I got a, what do you call it, a bump on the vault, you know, just for doing it. So there's other ways to get those rewards. And that's the other thing I really like about the expansion so far is everything seems to be contributing to a greater whole. And the war bands stuff is awesome. I want to play alts way more than I usually do, like way more.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I do think it's weird that if they haven't done the story quests, they're gated from a lot of things that come out of the story quests or unlock because of them. So, for example, they just launched, was it yesterday or the day before, the story mode raid thing, which is really just the last thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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In this case, yes. In this expansion, yes. Less so in Dragonflight, but part of that was... I mean, I think you mentioned it, but Dragonflight, didn't they require some PvP content or you had to play some PvP to get in?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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some lead up quests and then the last encounter of the raid the current raid yeah yeah but done in a kind of a story way almost like follow a dungeon way it's not hard it's just cool to see it mechanically and everything and there's some story there but um my my beef with all of that was well a i would like to see more of this and see the entire raid that way would be fun um
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I think I understand why not, though. That's a massive ton of content. It will take people a long time. They'd probably rather have you LFR in there anyway for that. But what was my point? I had a point that I was heading to there. Boy, what a great point it was I had going. It must have been really important. I think I was making the point that I'm going through all that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Oh, I can't do that on alts until they have also maxed out the main campaign story. Yeah. Yep. That's a little lame, especially it only feels lame because you're giving me all this other shared stuff through war bands.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And then this one thing you're like, no, I'm sorry. You got to go do, you know, got to go hang out with thrall and Anduin and everybody and do their crap.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. But I mean, honestly, I have to say I'm impressed with how much, how many of the systems do jive now because wow, for its entire history has always felt disjointed in that way. It's just like, oh, I don't have enough rep on this character. So I got to go redo all these things. The fact that they're sharing so much of what they do share, I should really be grateful.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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So trying to be more thoughtful about that stuff. Speaking of story, let's talk about it. A lot of stuff missing in early access. Again, not my favorite thing about it, but once things kicked off, I really like where everything went. One real strength at this time versus previous efforts.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Although I shouldn't say this has always been true, but it feels like when somebody's got a text bubble above their head and you talk to them and they do the stay a while and listen thing. It's usually fine, but it uses an ad much for me in the past. This expansion has so many amazing dialogue moments between characters. You just have to click them and listen.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I am telling you out there, do not skip those. Even like the final one with Anduin and Thrall up on the hill. Maybe the best one. It's great. And what they do leading to that is pretty great. But when it's done and you do the optional thing, that it actually really gets great.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I'm torn as to whether that's good or not, that people aren't, not forced, but they're not going to get that unless they make a choice to do that. And some people choose not to do it based on previous experience. Like, no, these aren't ever that good. I don't want to sit and listen to them talk. Or often it's not voiced in the past, right? It's usually just text bubbles.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
but these are voiced and they're incredibly well done. And they add so much context to the story. Like that's how I did the story this time. I listened to everything, read everything like super, super into it. And I think they're killing it. I think this is the best it's been in a long while. You know, you still have a lot of questions and loose ends.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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You know, there's still some, I got questions about why everyone's feeder bare feet in this movie. There's constant movie, this game and this game, everyone's got bare feet. What's that about?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah. Oh, and I'm sorry. I mentioned earlier the spider queen lady is Zalatath. I mix their names up all the time. That's not what I meant. I meant the other one. What is it?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yes. And that just bummed me out because I'm kind of a completionist and I would rather see that whole grid done. So now that they've sort of excised that from there, I'm sure someone out there is mad about this. It has zero effect on me. It's only positive for me. I don't want to speak for everybody. But and I've even run a battleground since this. Since this expansion. Yeah, just one. Just one.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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answer x she's the one that killed her mom and the one uh yeah thing she's kind of she's pretty rude um but anyway yeah zalatath uh big time foot stuff i'm watching this going does is tarantino like a wow fan and like what's going on here new new wow cinematic director yeah yeah you never know um you're overall on the on the story as a whole
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Oh yeah. Can we talk about that for a second? What do you, what you, I did it last night. So I'm curious what you think before I say anything, cause I'll bet we're on the same page.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It's not that the culmination of the story and the faction leaders in the Spider-Town coming together and talking after... All that stuff's great. You'll get that same shit at the end of when we beat it for real. When we do our normal completion, we're going to see the same story. So it's not like that changes because of the way you watched it. It's also just that encounter.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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There's some lead up like... Outside, you're like, oh, we hear rumors of an uprising. Go do all these things. You do like these four or five quests. And by the way, finding about this is something you either read online or your friend told you because the starting of the quest at a spider on the whole other side of Dornagal.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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who's just hanging out over there, and it's not even like the shielded quest symbol. It's just a little good old-fashioned thing. And so I walked right past him at first going, I don't want to take another spider quest. What are you doing here? Get out of here. And then I realized, oh, no, that's where this thing starts. So I'm with you. It's a little bit of a letdown.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I did really poorly. One more than me. I was reminded, oh, yeah, I'm not very good at that in here. And I know it has its place, clearly. There's very, very hardcore players who love nothing but PvP in the game. I am the flip side of that. I don't care about it. I don't want it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It basically felt like an experiment to say, the follower dungeon system, I wonder if we could do that with raids. Here's our first stab at that. It's the final encounter. And it plays out fine in that regard. If they want the entire raid to... have a follower version of the raid at some point, even if it's time delayed so that, you know, all the hardcores get to do what they want first. Yeah.
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Thumbs up. Go that. Do it. Give people a chance.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. There was no, and there was never a chance, no matter what role you were playing. D DBM is still yelling at me during this fight.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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So I'm like, you know, getting up close and I'll say, run away or get away or the, you know, uh, D uh, debuff this or whatever. He was yelling stuff at me.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. And I realized, and I'm reacting to it. I'm going, well, yeah, let's get the hell out of that. That looks bad. Whatever it is. And then I started to realize it's not doing anything to me. I'm not dying. I'm not even coming close to like losing health. I don't think. So I just stayed and ignored DBM and took her down. And the stuff she does in that fight is pretty epic and cool.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I've seen the video of Heroic. It's insane. Like, awesome encounter.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I don't put war mode on ever unless there's a really compelling reason to do it, like some kind of achievement or an amount I can only get because I had it on or something. but the, the concept as it is currently constituted of the vault, I think is a really strong addition to the game. I hope, you know, they'll probably still iterate on it, but I hope this is kind of the model moving forward.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. Sell it to me that way. It was sold in a very different way. Instead, just tell me. I think you're exactly right. If you are somebody who's either comes just for the story and the PV aspect of the games and you just don't care about the farming and the getting there and the beating the challenge doesn't matter to you.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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The game's always been pretty nice to you that way, but you never get really good closure or it hamstrings the writers. So the writers are like, all right, well, we got to finish this quest line for those who don't see this raid. And but for people to see the raid. OK, how are we going to write that?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Because that is the same story, you know, different conclusion or it has to be lighter here or whatever. Now they're basically finding ways to say. No, we want the impact across the board. You're in here running some sort of Mythic World first attempt. We want that for you, and we want you to get out of those things also. But also, hey, Larry, you only have an hour to play once a week.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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You should get to see this too because you worked pretty hard on the rest of these quests, and now you're at the end and you have no closure. So from that viewpoint, that's a really cool way to do this. But you're right. It's not that I don't think they were. It's not like conniving, but they weren't like the way this was presented to us was not what I ended up getting. You know what I mean?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, beef it up. It shouldn't be just a little side thing. And also, it's a spider who can't even really talk to me. Like, what are we doing? That was just a weird way to do the whole thing. And I kept questioning myself. Am I doing the right thing? Because then it would split off into... Go into the middle of town and disrupt it and destroy all these things.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And then do this other thing in the middle of town. All right, well done. Now go talk to the vizier. And I'm like, am I just on a quest chain I missed the first time through here? That's how it felt.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And then when he finally says, all right, we've got movement in the castle. Get up there. And I went and talked to the dude in the front who... Literally, his prompt is, let me in the thing on story mode, and then you go do it. And I was like, oh, okay, I see what's going on. So it's a little bit unbaked, underbaked, this entire thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But I think that, like Torgas before it, like Island Expeditions, like other ideas that are a little half-baked, maybe this one, a little more time in the oven, we might get something special out of either future patches for this expansion or whatever 12.0 brings. Maybe this will be more fleshed out. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And the fact that Delves are a part of it now and Delves appear to be by all accounts, uh,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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to knock stuff out at a faster cadence now so I hope it's not a consequence of that and then that gets worse so yeah those are all questions that have to be answered with time but on the one hand everybody's like ooh an expansion almost every year you know right around That's amazing. They've been trying to do that forever. Well, why do you think it's been hard for them in the past 18 years?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Because it's hard. If you want to hit quality levels, standards, and provide tons of content quickly, they're kind of at odds with each other. Stuff doesn't just happen. But they've also streamlined a lot of pipeline technically and otherwise over there. So maybe now is the time where all this can happen. But yeah, I worry about that a little.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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um a permanent fixture now or this is intended to be one it's not you know like island expeditions or even torgast even though there's all there's bits and pieces of those things in this it still feels like this is the this is what the long road is meant to look like for delves and i like that because it gives some permanence to the way things like the vault work and other ways of unlocking stuff and when they're what do they call when they're when they're glowy but
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, we'll have to see. What else? Oh, you mentioned something here about the Arathi. I love everything that's happening with the Arathi, with that zone. With the crystal sun that turns on and off every three hours. Everything about that place. Everything about Hallowfall is amazing. It is number one zone in the history of the game for me.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And that says a lot because I put up a video in the last couple of weeks or something describing my favorites. But this thing leapfrogged over my previous favorites. And it's not just how it looks, although it is amazing how it looks.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But the way that zone is constructed, the things you can do in there, the diversity of content available in that zone alone, and then add on top of that the music, the stoic people with some really great cultural stuff being sprinkled in with different quests and stuff. There's the quest with the girl who's an orphan. Yeah. I don't remember the name of the quest.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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She runs around with a helmet with you to get some stuff done. One of the most meaningful quests I've ever played in my life. It was fantastic.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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and you know like heartfelt genuine yeah didn't feel like just a throwaway story idea in fact the side questing which we haven't really talked about a huge leap up in my opinion in terms of what you do how long they are some of them are longer main quest stuff and in particular the one with the the old earthen who's i forgot what his job was even but basically he's got alzheimer's
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. And they handled it so well. You could tell they're people on team that are dealing with some of this with their families. And you could just tell they were doing it with care. And I just really appreciated that. And I don't feel that way about most WoW questing, period. Yeah. I've been doing this for a long time. It's all fine. And I don't want to be – I'm not trying to be –
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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you know, what's the word? I'm not trying to minimize the fact that it's not, you know, we like to joke and say, well, it's go get five beaver pelts and kill 10 rats. And that's the extent of it. Well, that's not exactly true.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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There's sometimes those are in there, but most of the time they, they try to make some meaning out of it, but it's usually a little surface level, this stuff a few times in this game and even some things in spider town, which I didn't expect. Um, are a little gut-wrenching. Like, whoa, are we going here? Really improved on that end, in my opinion. Agreed. I enjoy that stuff a lot.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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So we'll see what happens with the Arathi. The Arathi are very interesting and untapped in some ways.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Plentiful Delves? What are they called? Bountiful. Bountiful.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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What happened to Kael'thas? Whatever happened to him? I can't remember.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, but that's what I was thinking is didn't the last time we kill him, I thought he, I thought there was another one of those where he kind of broke out or got free or changed his mind or some shit like that happened. I do not remember what ended up happening with him. Part of the problem is he became one of my favorite characters to play in Heroes of the Storm back in its heyday.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Why don't I remember that? There's a city north of me called Bountiful. I should remember that. Anyway, they have roller coasters there. The important thing is, though, to remember, folks, get your stuff done so you, on Tuesday, tomorrow, you can hop in there and get some pretty sweet gear.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I remember thinking, oh, he's fine. And it just stuck with me. And I just like, for all I know, oh, wait, no, we killed him in a raid.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, he's doing good work out there. Let's see. The other thing I wanted to bring up is a thing that we probably disagree on a little bit still. Oh, okay. I went in really dis... I don't like this spider stuff. And not because I'm afraid of spiders. That's not it. I'm not afraid of spiders. I don't want one crawling on my toast in the morning or anything.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But I'm not freaked out by spiders the way some people are. It's not that. It's... And it's just, I don't know. I just wasn't in the mood for kind of Halloween spider town. And at first I was like, let's go take me back to hollow fall. I can go to ringing deeps, anything but this. But now something's something switched for me.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I don't know if it's because I'm also leveling an undead warlock and he just fits there. but I have grown to really, really like that entire place and everything going on there, the politics of it, wearing pheromones to sneak around and do shit. I can't explain it, but I don't think you're with me on this one.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I know. Well, I mean, the reason I like the Vizier is because I remember that he's called the Vizier. You know what I mean? Right. So if I had to call him by his real name, I'd be like, okay, this is going to be trouble. But you're right. There's some fiddly stuff like that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I also think always having, well, it depends on where, how far you are in that city or what you've done and unlocked what, but, you know, sneaking around, trying not to get caught by guards. It's, it's a very Suramar memory. And I didn't like Suramar for the same reasons early on. It was just like, oh my gosh, even working, just walking around.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I also really like the upgrade system throughout the week where even if you fill out all your slots or whatever you fill out, it'll tell you what you can expect. at the stage you're at, but you can see also that if you go do say a higher tier delve, that will bump your item level guarantee up to whatever six, 10 or whatever it is.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, there's something about that place that goes against, especially the Paladin vibe. Yeah. Right? Right. Whereas, you know, when you're in Halifal, they're all Paladins. Everybody in that whole town. Like, I don't even see Paladins wearing gear that isn't dropped from quest gear in that zone.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I just, I wish they were less involved in Delves. I said it earlier, but if Bran tells me one more time that don't step on the webs, the Nerubians will come out of them. Like I know, dude. I know. Give me the torch thing and I'll burn them. But all that being said, I think that that place surprisingly grew on me and I'm not even really sure why. It might mostly be – you know what I really like?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I like shutting down all the propaganda stuff. That's fun. That is – yeah. Because they're basically – it's like – I don't know what to compare it to. Hey, depending on who's listening, it's like Fox TV or like Fox News and CNN. There I did it. So everybody got there. Everyone got insulted.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But it's like that. They're just telling you what you want to hear in this place. And you getting to help shut that down for some reason resonated with me. And I was like, all right, I'm cool with that. Otherwise, the subterfuge stuff, yeah, I could maybe take or leave. But you're right. I think they're done. Not done. But the Nerubian angle on this is important and very much part of 11.0.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And the next expansion, or even maybe subsequent patches for this one, you'll see way more Earthen slash way more Arathi involved in it all. So... Right. There you have it. The only other problem I have with the spider people is they're kind of everywhere. So you don't see an Arathi campground in the middle of Ajkahet, right?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But you see lots of spider shit in Hallowfall just because you went down the weird corner. It's like, oh, this is all webby and weird. And, oh, there's some spiders in here. They've infiltrated. Like, they've really tried hard to make them the kind of consistent thing throughout. And I could see if you don't like that stuff, it would get old. Right. Right now, I like it. I'm okay with it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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As far as other basic stuff about the zones, I really like, as we mentioned, Hallowfall is amazing. I could live there. If they ever put housing in this game, that's where I'm putting it, if that's even an option. I would love that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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yeah um the uh what's the other one oh uh bringing deeps is i also like it had to grow on me and me helping a bunch of freaking kobolds do anything had to grow on me because this game set them up to be the most irritating meme worthy little pieces of shit with candles on their heads all these years right and now suddenly they have meaningful lives they have needs and wants just like anyone else.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I'm, I'm kind of invested in them. So I really, I quite like going around there and doing stuff. Um, and it enjoyed my time in that zone. The only other one that I wouldn't call it boring, but the, the most standard of the zones is, is, uh, outside. Isle of Dorne. Isle of Dorne. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. Like their plate there, you know, I can't even compare it favorably to like, What was Dragonflight's main city? Draken Vale. Draken Vine. Valdraken. Valdraken. Jeez. Dracula Town. Valdraken puts this new outdoor zone to shame. I just don't think it's that interesting. What I'm doing there is fine. Everything's great. I like the city. Everything's popping there. It's great.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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delve and you'll get this much of an item level option in the in the vault it works really well so i i guess the best way to to dive into this episode today is we're gonna have to tackle a month's worth of content we're not here to you know fill you in on all the little nooks and crannies or what patch did this or that during that time or whatever but i can tell you right off the bat like as a big overall take here i have not played this much wow since 2008
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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riding around in the outskirts doing stuff i've spent a lot of time farming bees right now because i want that beam out pretty bad um and i'm only i think i'm 50 of the little uh honey currency that i need to to buy it and i need like 999 or something like that i don't know holy cow it's a lot i'm gonna be doing that the whole expansion i think and i only go in there for like 20 minutes at a time kill a bunch of stuff leave all my dps characters get wrecked in there
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Because it's all elites and it's like big globs of honey and there's no telling who's going to aggro who. So forget it. I'll just keep taking the paladin in there and do it that way. Let's talk about... We talked a little bit about the raid. I still have kind of an issue. Let's talk about dungeons for a second. My biggest issue with dungeons is that they feel a little deprecated because of delves.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Just the kind of static nature of a dungeon. Yeah. Which we've always had. And they're cool dungeons. I'm not going to be wrong. These aren't bad dungeons or anything. It's just they're static. They're always going to be the same. And that dynamic change of things in Delves has made me wish dungeons had some of that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, I agree. I think if they'd have kept Delves purely solo, that would have solved it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But now that that genie's out, how do you shove that back in? You know, players will lose their mind.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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You really can't, can you? Unless you completely redesign it next. You got to wait a whole expansion and and say we've redone Dell or something. You know, you can't just do it in the middle of season two of this expansion or something.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I just think it's such a great alternative way for me to be off raid schedule and do something meaningful toward gear progression in between when I saw you last. You know what I mean? It used to be more like, well, get your dungeons in and do your things and get your dailies. There's all those things and they still exist.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But I have a meaningful chance at a really good piece of replacement gear if I just go do that tier nine delve. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It wasn't. It's just for bragging rights. Ah, shit. Well, I did it. I can brag. I did nine. There you go. See, you have the right to brag now. It took forever. It was the one with the... Actually, I think it's up in the aisles. It's up out in the open air. It's the one where the final boss is the bug lady... who's shoots webs to pull a train through as part of her rotation or part of her phase.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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and uh everything since around that time i played but i wasn't like hardcore like checking in all the time um doing my dailies the way i should this sort of stuff this this particular expansion drives me in those ways in uh well and above what it has in the past i'm not sure what the magic sauce is part of it might just be my renewed excitement and that's all it takes that's possible but
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And she's very, she does the same stuff. So it's not like she's hard in terms of pattern or anything, but she's she never, she just took forever to die. So I will not being doing, I will not be doing tier nine again until there's a reason to do tier nine. Forget it. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I would love new locations. That'd be great.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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What's the thing with the Illidan raid where you can walk out with a heroic dungeon level piece? Do you know what that's about? I didn't check into it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Okay. I was thinking about maybe... I don't know. Let's do it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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If we co-queued as grouped up tanks, we'd get in like... Yeah. It would take no time to get in there.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Let's do it. By the way, if you want to join our core guild, it's super easy to do. And it's part of the core podcast, but it extends over here to the instance. If you're like, man, I can really use a new fresh, get into a new guild experience. Now would be your time. Head on over to frogpants.com slash discord. And it's our discord. Hop in there. Apply. And you may just get in.
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We really don't turn anyone away unless you're a dick. So don't be a dick.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Just don't be a dick. Let's talk about professions real quick before we get to some of the news we're talking about for the month. Yeah. Professions. Here's my professions for the thing. If you see my video, you already know the answer to this. But I fly to a mining node. Chop, chop, chop. Put up my pants. Fly over to the... Oh, look. It's some kind of weird weed. Chop, chop, chop. Put up my pants.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Chop, chop, chop. Go to the auction house, which is now in Dornigal, and stick all that stuff in the auction house at whatever defaults they are. And then tomorrow, I'll check my mail, and I made 1,000, 2,000 gold.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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That's professions right now. Now, I know it's early, and this is what happens with gathering early on. Is everybody, nobody wants to go gather themselves. They just want to do their mail. They want to make their leather. They want to do whatever they're doing. Engineers, whoever. So I'm feeding their rush and this will even out over time. I understand that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But for right now, that is professions for me. What are you doing in there? Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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But I also think the way the game's structured from overall world level stuff all the way down to very specific things you need to do in the game, they're all so wired well together now that they feel like a cohesive whole instead of these disparate things scattered around.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Oh, yeah, for sure. I think I've got like, I don't know, the paladin, which I started in Dragonflight toward the end. is up to about 250,000 gold, which doesn't seem like a lot, but you can do it. You can earn gold. Inflation's real in this game. Inflation is a thing. And they don't have enough play. Most of my gold throwaway comes from Transmog. It's very few other places I just toss gold.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And I'll have way better, I'll have a way better look at how gathering is working then versus now too, as, as a sole thing to do. So yeah, for sure. I think maybe next month we have a little bit of focus on that and maybe also a better, for some people who just don't understand the changes that happened in dragon flight. There are, I mean, it was fundamentally changed, uh,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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uh the way that all that were including gathering it's all weird now and if you don't have your head around it it seems kind of impenetrable impenetrable i don't think it's the most that's a good idea it's not the easiest thing to talk about professions next month for sure if you got thoughts on it keep those coming into us to the instance at gmail.com we'd love to hear from you uh all right it's time for us to talk about a couple of big news items and we'll start with this one
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Thank you, Chris. So just a quick check in. We're not like hardcore race to world first watchers here. Or maybe you are more than me. Are you keeping track of that much?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, Team Liquid has like eight casters they've hired. They partnered with Wowhead. It feels a little cheaty. Not cheaty. I don't want to throw that word around. I'm just saying this seems a little... Well, whatever. Liquid's huge, right? Big, successful gaming conglomerate now. They're no longer just a raid team.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But Team Liquid still looks like the North American favorite as of day six, which I think was yesterday, day seven today, I think.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
so in other words i think i may have even said this during early access in another video or something it wasn't here because we didn't have the game yet when you and i did this it was right before your cruise which by the way i hope is a good time do you have a good time on your cruise we should it was i did have a good time i got sick on the cruise but uh oh no that's not good but but i made it through and and did have a good time you get uh like motion like a choppy day on the on the seas or something is that what happened
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, I'm sure that's all it is. That's all it'll take. No, I'm with you. My attention span is limited when it comes to that kind of stuff, but I do think it's interesting. It just takes a long time, so I'm more interested toward the end.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Okay, good. Mine is almost full. I'm missing two dungeons. Two dungeon runs to fill it out. And then what? Monday's our... That's our next Vault Day, right?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Even the normals are having trouble with, yeah. That's a tough one.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Wow, they're professional players for a reason, I suppose. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
i like i like it i like learning that they have a coach basically it's not like a raid leader like we would get where yeah a tank or somebody is sort of calling all the shots or whatever it's like a dude who's untethered from the fight he's just out walking around telling everybody what to do that'd be nice you know yeah he's he's just watching everybody and it's it really is like you're you're at like your kid's soccer game and the coach is on the side and they're like hey oh
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah. You just have some angry parents yelling at him, I suppose. The only difference. But I guess some people are going to say, well, Scott, they've been doing that for years. No, I know. I just didn't know it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I didn't know they had a second guy or that's how they would. It makes perfect sense to me, especially when there's, you know, they got big money on the line. They make those are those are companies now. Like liquid's not 20 guys in a basement. Like they're a big deal. Not that the rest of us are in basements. You guys know what I mean? Right. Anyway, so there's that. I watch it like baseball.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I could care less about the 75% of the season before I start to care. And that's what will happen here. I'll start to get really interested as they get down to the wire and how close it is.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
For sure. Let's talk about the 20th anniversary stuff real quick. Yeah. Just a quick breakdown. We're not going to go into everything in super big detail, but they did announce this a couple of weeks or a week or two into the expansion, what their plans are for the November 20th anniversary of World of Warcraft.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And according to Blizzard, there are a few things coming that you're going to want to know about. This is all going to happen through November and December. So a big swath of time to earn things, get things, unlock things, all that sort of stuff. You can earn and spend a new currency called Bronze Celebration Tokens. Everyone loves a new currency to keep track of.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
It's currencies, right? And a bigger... Actually, there should be a better way of displaying them because right now it's just a tab on your character and it's not great.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Take them everywhere you go. It's just required to do it. Let's see. So these will be able to, you'll spend this on new items for your collection. Engage in the Blackrock Deaths Raid Dungeon. So another, basically another time, what do they call them? Time shit.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Um, yeah. Well, then you're, you're, uh, well, you're, you're, you were, what's, what's the word? Patient zero on a ship. If this was 2019 or 2020, they would have parked the boat and never let you off. So.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Time walking. You know what? COVID brain's real. I'm telling you right now. I had COVID last week and I can't remember names. I mean, I always, I always kind of struggle with names, but in this case, it's really, it's really bad. Anyway, you can also collect iconic tier two transmog appearance sets and Now, this is the one everyone's talking about because some very famous, very all-time banger.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Transmog, these sets, these tier two sets from back in the day are renowned in the game. And in particular, yeah, you and I are going to be wearing that. And here's the problem. So is everyone else. There's going to be a million of these guys, these paladins running around with that stuff on.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
You're going to, it's more a realistic little scripture crap on your arm and the little knives that slot in. I mean, it's going to look better than ever, but we are all going to be twins and it's going to be annoying for a hot minute.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
That is basically Paladin Town. Pal-a-town. They should call it that. Yeah. Anyway, so what is that one called? It is called... It doesn't have a name, does it?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Do you like that? I think it's so bad. It's all right. I mean, it's fine. Woof. I don't know why. Maybe it's the feet. It's those clawed feet. Not a fan. Maybe. Or maybe it's because they always put them in humans. Humans are always wearing this stuff for the previews. That's what ruins it. Give me a big old orc or something. I don't want these stupid humans. Anyway, sorry. Go ahead.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
What I like is, for example, so what I had said early on is how it seemed like chaos in that upper, I forgot the name now, lights, not lights reach, whatever it is, maybe it is lights reach.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I think, yeah, the Death Knight in particular is maybe my favorite of the new imaginings. Right. The Demon Hunter would also be in that category. He looks pretty cool. As far as the old ones go, it's hard not to see the Judgment set and not get stoked, right? It's just hard. You have to. Yeah. But the Druid, little hats off to the Druid because that's pretty badass. Druid looks good. Yeah.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Anyway, that's coming with the 20 years, of course. You're also going to get the... Did I mention Blackrock Depths? I did. Yes. That's awesome. Very excited about that. We're going to go time walking through classic World of Warcraft dungeons. We are going to get a new mount. It's a Blizzard Employee Service Awards cosmetic. Or no, that's not what that is. That's a separate thing.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But I don't know what the mount is. Do we know what the mount is? They show us?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
but it's in Hallowfall and it's that zone with all of the farms and the light things you got to toss your bits into and, you know, put three and everybody's little thing and it pops out a dude and he gives you a daily and all that. At first I thought that was chaos incarnate and I never wanted to go there again. And now I love it there. I love it with alts. I love it with my main.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
This bird is called Cold Flame Tempest Mount.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
yeah i mean it does look cool it's just kind of a chicken but it's fine yeah yeah i don't hate it all right it's also a 20-year balloon toy it's like basically a treasure chest that pops out bunch of balloons and one of them is those metallic balloons that make letters or numbers and it says 20 yeah so that's pretty cool and uh little kaz and little doomy are your uh your your pets uh that are coming
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Some new world bosses to fight, including stuff in really old zones. Let's see. I'm trying to find one of these here. Caverns of Time expanded event, they say. Chromie. She's got a new time-bending adventure with the Codex of Chromie. So that'll be fun. I guess. Discover new secrets and solve them with guest relations. Okay. I don't know what that means.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Probably earn some currency while you're in there, so that's good. You can defeat party-crashing world bosses, including the Shaw of Anger and Archavon of Stonewatcher. Am I saying that right? Archavon? Archavon. Archavon. It's been a long time since I've seen that name. Shaw of Anger, though, I think is our pal Liam O'Brien does the voice of the Shaw of Anger, I think.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Illidan and that, I believe. Anyway, let's see what else. Oh, we go back for some PvP revenge during Korax Revenge in Alterac Valley. No thanks, but I'm glad it's there for those who want it. And also they are celebrating 30 years of Warcraft with Warcraft 3 themed back appearances in the Trading Post. It's another thing I wanted to mention.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Trading Post is one of my favorite new additions to the game. Because I love transmog, like collecting everything. I feel like I never have enough currency. And I'm not asking Blizzard to sell me currency. I'm not saying that. But I might do it if they did. That's all I'm saying. Like that's terrible to say.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And I would complain that I have to do it, but I'd never have enough of it. So I want to buy this crocodile. It's on there now and I'm just shy like a hundred and I don't want to wait. Also, I think it's about to refresh soon, right? Is it monthly? How often does it refresh?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
So we got to wait a few more days. We'll see what happens. Um, all right. One other thing I wanted to mention before we move on to, I want to talk to talk mythics with Bobby and kind of what he's doing right now, because, you know, we promised you guys a little more of a hardcore look at some of that stuff and boy, howdy, are you into that?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But before we do a small change that has big effects at 11.0.5 as currently constituted on the, uh, beta or the, um, what do you call it? The test server. Yeah. The PTR. Jeez. Uh, uh, Content now, time walking content in particular, will now scale up to you instead of you scaling down to it, which is how it's been since the inception of time walking.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
This is the most right and good thing I've heard all week. This is how it always should have been. I hate that feeling of... Well, you're level 70, like previous expansion. You're level 70, but now basically you're effectively a level 10. That just feels stupid. I don't like it. So it's the other way around now. This content, which I love that they do this. Give me the old stuff.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Let's not have that just waste on the vine. Give us a reason to play it. Scales up to me. And I say, good job, guys. I like that. Bobby, let's get into some hardcore talk.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I love it as a place to grind out some sweet faction rep. It's a great place to just go and knock things out. And I like the vibe of it. And so for me, that stuff's more organic to the world than it's ever been. And while I'm out there, I'm running into other opportunities on the way. These disturbed earth things that appear like little purple rocks from the sky.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
goodness yog saran or whoever that was i don't even know bobby uh let's talk about mythics you are in the middle of your usual like go crazy on mythics and i i just think people should know what that means and whether that's whether or not they should feel more comfortable this expansion or even this season poking their head in there as opposed to previous attempts
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
They could use some tweaking, maybe.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
If you're using handy notes or something, they're even more specific than that. But those things... are often just full of like globs of wax. You can sell the, what's his name? Uh, you got, you know, sometimes it's just rep. Sometimes it's gold. Sometimes it's other stuff. That's how I ended up with, uh, with that mount. I got the, um, I forgot the name of the thing, the link, something links, uh,
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Oh, yeah. That was... How do we put this? I'm trying to think like the biggest trash era in dungeons and in raids even. It's probably that expansion.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
content i like challenging content that requires me to try harder do better and think more and just and get stuff done your attitude about that stuff has changed the way i think about farming or repetitive content and mmos before talking to you about that and kind of getting that take that you just now re-expressed on the show yeah um i just always thought well
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I wish these games relied less on giving me the same things over and over and over, just making it a little harder or whatever. It's a very myopic view of the whole thing, right? But that's kind of where my head was at. The way you describe it, That's the point of these, right? That's the whole idea. It isn't that, oh, I've seen this boss 15 times. That's not the point. Yep. That's exactly right.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
The point is, the 14th time I was here, we did this. This 15th time, we're going to up our game. You know, whatever. Like, you're looking at it as a whole different enterprise than just, hey, I'm fighting a dude. Right.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Anyway, I love just finding those. And sometimes they're challenging because you've got to fight a thing. And sometimes you've got to catch wax as it flies out of the air. And then sometimes it's worse than wax. It's some kind of horrible, toxic thing, and you've got to avoid it. And there's really no reward at all. It was just a trap.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Sorry, Tuesday. What am I saying? Today is Monday. We're recording this on a Monday, everybody. And Tuesday, you get your vaults. You know, that's a thing that's relatively new in the game. And I feel like doesn't get enough praise as a fun system. It works differently in Dragonflight, though.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Uh, just get, is it just more confusing after knowing where to go after the ship part or is it, how do they make it work? Cause that freaking, I'm, I'm not gonna, okay, how do I put this? This is my favorite dungeon in the new, in the new expansion. I love it conceptually. I love the way it mechanically works. All that stuff is awesome.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
It is super weird how to find where the hell you're supposed to be in the map is not much help. So I've a couple of times now, just either get lost or, and I've like seen this thing multiple times. I should know what the hell's going on. And I get lost every time half the team gets lost. Most of them die on the ship because it wasn't great about indicating when you had to fly.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Now it does, but you know, knowing where to go after, it seems like that's a difficulty tier of its own. Right. And I kind of get, I get mad.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And something about those, I know it's a small thing, but scattering those around like that in the world as you're just getting things done, Add something to this experience. Adds a kind of random treasure thing that I haven't felt since maybe Pandaria and the patch that added that island. What was that called?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
You're also moving. You're on a ship that's moving. So when you do go land, you're not, it's not like some stationary thing where it's like, all right, I go up into the left now. It's like, well, no, you could be on the opposite side of things and now you got to go all the way across the freaking battlefield again. It's really, I'm not saying it's bad.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
In fact, like I said, it's my favorite dungeon, but it's complicated.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Oh, that's why he saw it, because he did follower. Okay.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Right. But that's what makes that a much more interesting thing, even though we don't know what we're doing. Players just don't like change. So when you're not handheld to the next area you know you all everyone panics and people were yelling like Where the hell is everybody? I'm like, I'm coming. If I just knew where you guys are at, freaking somebody mark yourselves or something.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Here, Wayne, let's tell people right now where you're going to stream it. YouTube, Twitch, or where? Where are you putting it?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
If you would have asked me this six years ago, I might have said Twitch without even hesitation. But I actually think YouTube might be better. These days, it's the aces for me monetization-wise. But actual tech reasons... I have a better experience on YouTube. I have better looking video when things are done with the same bit rates than I do when I – or that I would use on Twitch.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I just overall have a better experience and also less ads. And I just think it's a better – If I had one beef, it's the chat rooms, aka basically comment rooms in live YouTube channels don't even hold a candle to live Twitch streams because they don't have all the functionality in there. There's so much crazy stuff you can do in your chat that you can't do on YouTube necessarily.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
That would be my only beef. But the actual like... how's the stream going out? How good does it look? Is it more consistent and not dropping a lot? Is it a better bit rate later and not all artifacty, all those sorts of things way better over on YouTube.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And the other advantage is if you're also putting other supplementary content up like followups, short versions of this, a chunk of your stream moved out and put into a smaller thing, you're already doing that on YouTube anyway. So it kind of keeps it all under one roof. And I also like scheduling the way the scheduling system works in YouTube.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
So I'm kind of all over the place there, but I, my overall has been over the last couple of years trying to really test things out, including multi-streaming, which I've now dropped because it just wasn't doing it. It was, if anything, it was splitting people up even more. And that's really not the point with a community.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I ended up coming back to YouTube as kind of the mainstay for those reasons I just gave you. I don't know if that'll help or not, but.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
That is one of the downsides, right? Or potential downsides.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah. I can see that. I mean, that's the balance I've got to figure out is how much to reward people for just whipping through a Dell versus making them work with pugs or do all the other jump through hoops you have to do for a mythic. Plus that's going to be a weird balance as they move along. Um, but I like when you have beef, so bring the beef anytime you want.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Always bring beef. Lots of beef. All right. Uh, let's get into some town criers, uh, this week.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Why, it's the town crier. It's the town crier.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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i swear that gets longer every time i play it um hey everybody welcome to the part of the show where we read your feedback and we got it in the form of a couple of calls to start with and i'm going to start with this one uh it's just a nice call and i just thought it'd be nice to play it so here it is hey senor johnson this is uh for the instance just wanted to say watch
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Well, that was very nice of you to say. I have to say, so we haven't really had a chance to talk because I don't think the interview even landed before you left or before our last episode. Maybe it did.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, it may have been the day before. That was really a great experience for me. And I just wanted to say how thankful I am to everybody and their nice feedback about it. Obviously, a two-hour conversation got chopped down to about 25 minutes. There's a ton of stuff that we probably never hear from that thing. But huge thanks to Chris for even thinking of me in the first place.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And what's nice about Metzen is when we were rating the other night, Or whenever I do anything big and wow, he and I have been friends forever. So I'll send him a quick text and go, hey, we're about to raid. First night raiding. I'm going to tank. And he'll write back weird things like, you go, girl. Or, you know, stuff like that. Anyway, he has expressed also to everybody's kind words.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Because he was really nervous about that. That was like a big target. Like...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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big expectations things about to launch all the everybody's sweating bullets over here and he was you know he just wanted all everything to go well and i think it went really well so big thanks to to him the team of blizzard that helped to make that happen and all that stuff and you guys have been very nice in your comments very much appreciate it here's another one about early access hey this is jay calling from minnesota listening to the instance glad it's back uh i like bobby was
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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It's a very interesting idea. It's never going to happen, but imagine this, like, I don't know how they'd even do the math. Let's say Early Access bought you an early, what was it, a week? I guess you got seven days or six days, whatever it was. Four days, I don't know. But let's say you figure out what the math on that is. That's 40 bucks. Let's say four days.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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40 bucks for four days, that's 10 bucks a day. If you expect Blizzard for 10 days of coming to the game late to deduct $10 a day for 10 days, they're not going to do it. Literally, the game is free at that point.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, they might actually die laughing, and then the game ends and no one gets to play it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah. Yeah. And it's easy to, well, I've said this a thousand times, so apologies to everybody who's hearing me say it again, but the strength of the game for me has always been the world's the most important bit.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Sure. He's also playing with the logic of why you would charge for early access anyway and why we just accept that. It does seem weird. It's not them doing some altruistic thing of saying, we really want those who want in early. I mean, it's going to cost you a little something, but we're here for you to get in.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Yeah, no, that's exactly it. They're not thinking logically about it so that when you propose the idea, well, I'm not coming early. I'm coming late. What are you going to pay me? That was never in the cards. But I appreciate the concept. And also, of course, the phone call 801-471-0462 is where those voicemails came. That's 801-471-0462.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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You can also use it as a text line if you prefer, like this person did. Although I think this person used the web. Yeah, they did. This is about Patreon rewards. It's from Gary Yelland, I think is how you say it. The subject was wallpaper Patreon. I am thinking of joining the basic tier of the instance Patreon and would love some of your artwork for my phone and laptop wallpaper.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Warcraft or TWW related, meaning the war within, is something that is in the basic package. I have listened for years. Yeah, I think that that may end up coming to fruition. Digital, certainly at first, right? Like adding another tier of, well, we got to print a whole bunch of things and ship them out the door.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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And everything else from that feeds into other stuff, whether it's very specific things like I want to achieve this with mythics or I want to get real specific and down and dirty with these achievements or whatever. Like there's a vast amount of things to do, but really everything hinges on the world being as compelling as it can be. And this expansion in particular, there've been others.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Like we may not do that right away, but the whole point of this particular Patreon and also this iteration of the show was not to say, bam, here it is as exactly as it will always be. That is not what we're doing here. And that includes what the show might evolve into. The reason we started monthly instead of weekly, because we felt like, well, that gives us some wiggle room.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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If we introduce more content, that's better than taking away. So it fits there too, right? With what we do on the Patreon. So I would keep my eyes on that though, because I would like to do some digital rewards of various kinds.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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uh some might be audio some might be strictly artwork uh you know wallpapers is a great idea or avatars that kind of thing um we'll keep you informed is basically what i can say there uh all right now i have something very special to share with everybody and i can't wait to do this so i'm just gonna do it here we go
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Put on your nostalgic instance glasses that an engineer in the game made for you and charged you too much gold for, okay? Put those glasses on, look back in the past, and let's listen to what Patrick has to say for his mod of the month. This would be episode 107 of the mod of what used to be of the week. 107 of these now.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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Again, I present Patrick Beja, everyone's favorite Frenchman, really, really, with his edition of this month's Mod of the Week.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
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I did, Patrick. Thank you, Patrick, by the way. That was amazing. He's right. It 100% works the way you would want it to work. It feels like Blizzard made it. That's how good it is. It's an incredibly good way to interface with a controller. Here's my only beef, and truly my only and one beef with this. I want it to be Blizzard officially sanctioned controller support. Let them copy this.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Pandaria was one for me that really stuck out early Lich King. And I also think that, yeah, Legion sticks around. So does Dragonfly for that matter. I love the zones. But when the world is at its best and it's funneling me toward fun activities to do within said world, then World of Warcraft is at its best. That's when I am most engaged. And right now I'm feeling that engagement more than ever.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
That's fine. Work with these guys. Pay the money. I don't care how. But integrate it into the game directly and put WoW, a client version of WoW, in Steam so that I can more easily, natively, run WoW on my Steam Deck. Then I'll never not be playing World of Warcraft. I'll have it with me all the time. I would love this. I did that with Final Fantasy XIV for a long time.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Beautiful use case for the Steam Deck. Worked wonderfully. And... This is a lot like that control scheme. A lot of this stuff is kind of lifted from it, to be honest, how the triggers work and all that. They're basically like shift keys in a lot of ways. But the experience is very good. Patrick is right. I tried it after he first mentioned it. You guys should give it a shot as well.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
See what you think. I know I can hack my Steam Deck to do this, hack it by putting Windows on there. I know there's ways to do this. I don't want to do all that. I just want to fire it up and play it.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I keep hoping WoW's the next big Steam. I mean, what do we have on there? We have Overwatch was first, we're Overwatch 2, and Diablo 4 are all on Steam. There's a lot of questions about what will be next. I hope it's WoW. You know they want to. They're just trying to figure it out. Yeah, and if they do that... Then I'll just use the mod in the Steam version.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Oh, I wonder if I have to rebuy everything again. That would suck all hell and back, wouldn't it? They wouldn't do that to me. They didn't do it. You know what? They didn't do it with me with Diablo, and I re-bought the game, the base game. I'm happy to do that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
But I don't want to, like, Final Fantasy, they don't even let Mac and PC users share the same account. To them, those are two different platforms, even though, wow, I can play on my Mac or PC anytime. Yeah. Uh, shout out by the way, to my Mac players who, uh, just a quick note here. If you have the, one of the Mac studios, even the M the early M one Mac studios. Wow. Is glorious on that device.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
It's so good. They made it native and it's really good. So don't feel like your PC friends are, you know, have some huge advantage over you. It runs at a, you know, beautiful full 60 frame plus depending on what your monitor supports clip and looks amazing. Thank you, Patrick. Can't wait to hear from him again. He's awesome. We love him. That is going to do it for today's show. However.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
We got a lot of new patrons and I got to read them. All right. So a couple of things for that. A guild reminder. If you want to be a part of our guild, hop into patreon.com slash frog pants. Look for the core guild. You'll find it pretty easily. There's a ton of stuff on the frog pants discord, but that whole area is popping right now. And you'd be welcome. Tanner's who you're looking for.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Straving in there. If you're looking for an invite, don't overwhelm the poor guy. He's already doing a lot and I'll feel bad if you overwhelm him. Anyway, now to our Patreon at patreon.com slash the instance. I don't even know where to start, so I'll just start at the top. Mick Smith, Muhammad Sharif, Sheriff, Spencer Cole, William Warnicke, too hip for hair. There's probably a bald guy, right?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I'd love that one. Michael Marin. Let's see. Joseph Champagne. Kyle Velote. I mean, if you got a weird name, you're running the risk of me having to say it. This is what people are paying for, Scott, is to hear you say their name. I swear, sometimes people use fake hard-to-say last names so that I'll screw it up. Fuzzy Pockets. Thomas Chambers. Zach. Abdullah. Justin Salisbury.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
I knew a guy named Scott Salisbury. Anyway, Daniel Dupree, David Hearthstone Power Helms. I'll bet he's got a show called Hearthstone Power. And if he does, then you should go listen to it. Bradley Wills, Ian Makes, Bill Capella, Robbie Hill, Jay Steen, E. Johnson 7973. E. Johnson. There's something there. Anyway, Chippalip is a great name. Swordfish, McMilton, Fowey, Dingus, Texas.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And it comes down to so many factors. It's music in the game is some of the best ever in this game. Incredible stuff. And that's all under the tutelage of a brand new music director who just moved up for this expansion and I think absolutely killed it on overall direction and specific tracks.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
That is not a real town. That's just this guy's name. The man with the plan. Rogue Pogue, Wahooga.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
uh jeffrey chris peretti uh james pierce kyle holder dave schultz uh what's this one uh macroholic oh he likes the macros yeah yeah actually do you use any you got any good pally macros you can tell me about because i don't of course i do i'll hook you up because i got stuff i may go to you know some website and look it up but i i need i bet macroholic has some too he that'd be a great site macroholic.com oh man
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Anyway, Kristen, William Aiken, Alex Mader, Jerry Tolbert. Oh, we already knew about him. I mean, no, he didn't. That was a different show. Anyway, Jerry supports everything. He's the best. Wayne Raylene and old Peter Storbaten. I'm pretty sure I got it all right.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Thank you all. You'll be getting all kinds of great benefits, especially the no ads thing. Just no commercials anytime. You're basically just in there for good. And it's only a monthly. So it's a pretty inexpensive way to support your favorite show about WoW. Go check it out. That again is patreon.com slash the instance.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah, we're going to put, that's the other thing to expect during the month. So one of the things that we kind of learned through the first month, lots of supplemental content on YouTube, on the podcast feed, wherever it fits, but also Patreon exclusive stuff that you're just going to get. No one else will ever see it. Your lore video that you put up is a good example of that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
No one else even knows it exists except these patrons. And if you're a brand new patron and you join today, you get that stuff already. It's just there for you on the feed. So anyway, all of that hopefully makes sense. And we will have more of that kind of content in the next month as well. And we'll let you know when our next episode is toward the end of October for this full chat.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Bobby, is there anything I've forgotten? I feel like this was a lot today. It was a lot.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
And that's what we're here to do. And I'll leave you with one story. If you're like me and you enjoy going out and finding mining nodes and you like going out and finding herbs to farm and whatever, just be careful of that one herb that explodes and then flings you 400 feet from your position. Now, sometimes you hit a wall and it's no problem. You take a little damage.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Sometimes you take a little fall damage. Not a big deal usually. But if you're doing this in Hallowfall where there's lots of cliffs and waterfalls, Just be careful where you're aiming yourself, because if that thing knocks you off, you will go halfway across that damn map, and if you don't hit a body of water, you're dead. All right? First death I had as a paladin in this game came from that.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Ouch. Yeah. In the entirety of World of Warcraft, first death as a paladin. How embarrassing. Anyway, that's your advice. Go do what you will with it. Get ready for raid night, everybody, and we'll see you next time. Have a great month.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
The music in Hallowfall alone is some of the best stuff ever, some of the best tavern music in the history of the game. All of that stuff, I just don't like to minimize them because those things make my cohesive world work. It's not discordant. I don't feel like I'm being taken out of the world like I have in maybe past expansions. I never felt that cohesion, for example, in Shadow.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
What's it called? Shadowlands. Shadowlands. Yeah. And Shadowlands was a bummer in lots of ways, but the world wasn't... I didn't feel grounded to this place the way I do in this. And ironically, we're flying from the get-go and I still feel that way. Part of that is because these zones are massive and that helps, but...
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Um, that's just kind of my big overall, we'll get into some of the specifics here in a second. Um, and I'd like to hear your overall as well. Uh, but real quick, I want to get this out before I forget about it. We gave away a bunch of stuff last, uh, uh, during the month, started a contest on the show last month. And we were able to give away a ton of cards, a whole bunch of codes for game time.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Big thanks to Doghouse Systems again for that. And we gave away a copy of the game, heroic edition of the game. Happy people all around. Everybody's gotten their stuff now, both physical and digital. And I just wanted to say thanks everybody for participating. We'll have more of that in the future. So keep an eye out for that. And... we tanked together the other night and a raid team.
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
That was fun, man. A brand new raid team. What did you think about that experience? Especially cause you were being saddled with a pretty newbie tank and in the form of me, because I've never tanked 20 years of this game, never tanked before. Suddenly I'm like, all right, I'm going to do it. And we did it. So how do you feel?
The Instance: World of Warcraft Podcast
The Instance 669: Bug Hunters
Yeah. Here's what I think the magic is in this or the reason it worked out. I didn't go in as blind as I felt like I might be because I spent weeks even prior to the expansion launch getting my head around this paladin for the first time and then doing a ton of heroic dungeons. And that means tail end heroics for dragon flight.