I shall soon be back!

[WindupAtheist]

Yeah, I've got a little ding-and-shiny itch going on right now.  I'd pacify the ding part with a Diablo 2 jag, or just ignore it, but an old UO buddy of mine wants to give it another go on our old RP server.  That, and a couple co-workers play and it'd be fun to drop in on them every now and again.

Gonna go real slow, turn as many numbers off as possible, shut off all global and zone-wide chat channels immediately, and just smell the roses.  What I want to know is, can I completely remove the XP bar?  Is there a mod or anything that'll hide it, so I can just go do stuff and be surprised when I ding?  That alone might do me a lot of good.

Anyway, I don't expect this return to last too long, but what the hell?

[Lt.Dan]

Sucker.   

[Jayce]

I believe bar mods, like bongos, can turn off the xp bar.

Also, if you're not totally sold on your old RP server, there is (believe it or not) an F13 crew on The Venture Co, which is also RP, as of the last few days.  We have a guild and everything.  People are still logging on, strangely enough....

Check the other thread and give anyone a tell if interested.

[Driakos]

If you don't want to mess with mods, you can just change the XP bar, to a Reputation bar, and it'll track that instead.  So, yeah.  You can hide it.

[Koyasha]

It doesn't change to a reputation bar until you're 70.  If you activate that option pre-70, it adds a rep bar on top of the xp bar, rather than hide exp.

Either way, just get a good addon like Bartender3 or whatever your preference and you can hide pretty much anything you want.

It's a lot quicker leveling up since 2.3, by the way, and there's a lot more actual choice in where you can go - as opposed to before when you pretty much had to do 95% of all quests at any given level range in order to level out of that level range.  I also remember you complaining about elite stuff way back...they took out most of the elite stuff in Azeroth, so all those quests that everyone used to skip about 80% of the time because it was too annoying to get a group together for are doable without all the hassle now.

[WindupAtheist]

Yeah, the faster leveling was an incentive to burn another month or two on it.  I seem to be falling into the pattern of a 3-to-1 UO/WoW ratio, which is fine.  It is nice to play something that isn't an ancient heap of sprites every now and then.

[Driakos]

It doesn't change to a reputation bar until you're 70.  If you activate that option pre-70, it adds a rep bar on top of the xp bar, rather than hide exp.

Ahh that sucks.  Didn't even think it was a 70 only thing.

[Tale]

I can't play WoW anymore. I reactivated because my ISP (Internode) has engineered a WoW proxy that gives a much lower ping from Australia. (While doing this, they also discovered the latency problem that resulted in Blizzard disabling the Nagle algorithm in the last patch.)

I had been gone 8 months, long enough to make me curious about the game again. But I tried starting a new character and found the WoW quest-and-fight pattern mind-numbingly dull. So I tried going back to my 70 druid, but the game felt retro and tired. There isn't a mountain for a guild/individual to aim at, just a huge range of molehills. The Burning Crusade zones look dated already.

It feels like I've played it to death, which is a feeling I never get with other MMOs. I can drift back into them and mess around, but WoW has come to a full stop.

[Jayce]

But I tried starting a new character and found the WoW quest-and-fight pattern mind-numbingly dull. So I tried going back to my 70 druid, but the game felt retro and tired. There isn't a mountain for a guild/individual to aim at, just a huge range of molehills. The Burning Crusade zones look dated already.

Interesting. Retro compared to what?  What else have you been playing?  I'm just curious, not looking to shoot you down or anything.  Different strokes and all.

[Tale]

Interesting. Retro compared to what?  What else have you been playing?  I'm just curious, not looking to shoot you down or anything.  Different strokes and all.

Tabula Rasa is the only other MMO I've played recently. Played through the Orange Box games and watched some full TV series I'd missed. I've gone through the Crysis demo a few times which has probably skewed my view of graphics in other games. But I wasn't meaning to compare WoW with any of those, just with how super-slick and entertaining I used to find it. Yep, different strokes.

[Trouble]

I've gone through the Crysis demo a few times which has probably skewed my view of graphics in other games.

I played through Crysis and everything looks like crap to me now. Even new games like Call of Duty 4. Surprisingly, the Source engine seems to have aged best of all engines in recent times. Most likely because they put so much work into making people look realistic, especially faces. Funny thing is the Source engine does faces 1000x better than Crysis. Faces look like crap in Crysis, and they don't synch at all with voice.

[Morfiend]

Yeah, I've got a little ding-and-shiny itch going on right now.  I'd pacify the ding part with a Diablo 2 jag, or just ignore it, but an old UO buddy of mine wants to give it another go on our old RP server.  That, and a couple co-workers play and it'd be fun to drop in on them every now and again.

Gonna go real slow, turn as many numbers off as possible, shut off all global and zone-wide chat channels immediately, and just smell the roses.  What I want to know is, can I completely remove the XP bar?  Is there a mod or anything that'll hide it, so I can just go do stuff and be surprised when I ding?  That alone might do me a lot of good.

Anyway, I don't expect this return to last too long, but what the hell?

I would advise you to get the Ace Downloader mod. This is an out of game mod installer and updater tool. Its really good. It has a list of several thousand mods than you can install with two clicks. You want a bard mod like Bongos, or Bartender, I think you can get both through ace.

[Chimpy]

I would advise you to get the Ace Downloader mod. This is an out of game mod installer and updater tool. Its really good. It has a list of several thousand mods than you can install with two clicks. You want a bard mod like Bongos, or Bartender, I think you can get both through ace.

Bongos is a non-ace mod. (One of only 2 in my current mod list, WowAceUpdater is just too convenient for my lazy self)

But as Morfiend said, If you are starting fresh on mods and have no "old" mods you wish to continue to use, files.wowace.com has all the mods that are listed in the Ace2 SVN. If you search for a type of mod you are looking for, chances are you will find at least 2 sometimes many more mods that do what you want, each with it's own look/feel.

[Azazel]

So how are you finding WoW this time, WUA?

I'm finding it less sticky each time I go back and play it. My interest didn't even last a month this time around.


The repetitiveness of grinding daily quests and arenas and battlegrounds (as well as a new 360) just fucked it right off. I'll try questing with my wife later on today if she's up to it. That's about all that remains fun in the game. I couldn't even be bothered doing arenas with her the other day, the slow, small increments for a new shiny that still take a 2-hour block per week can just go fuck right off.

[Dren]

So how are you finding WoW this time, WUA?

I'm finding it less sticky each time I go back and play it. My interest didn't even last a month this time around.


The repetitiveness of grinding daily quests and arenas and battlegrounds (as well as a new 360) just fucked it right off. I'll try questing with my wife later on today if she's up to it. That's about all that remains fun in the game. I couldn't even be bothered doing arenas with her the other day, the slow, small increments for a new shiny that still take a 2-hour block per week can just go fuck right off.

I have to disagree with you on BG's, but certainly if you do not derive any "fun" from them anymore, the rewards will not keep you coming back.  Right now, I'm still just having fun learning and getting better.  I like the general thrill of large scale combat.  The thing that truly keeps me coming back is the chance at getting a group that just "works" and dominating the enemy.  It is like gambling.  Those few great experiences are so great, it doesn't matter how many times you lose inbetween experiences.  YMMV

[Azazel]

PUG BG groups are awfully shit as Alliance on Proudmoore. They're fun when we get a good solid premade going but they can be a pita to get into. And there's just not enough of the game overall keeping me interested right now. I just can't be bothered.

[WindupAtheist]

I'm having a decent time of it so far.  My pally is about to be 44, and I'm GM of a little guild that consists entirely of UO buddies horsing around in WoW.  There's five of us all around the same level, my ret pally, a holy pally, a prot pally, an affliction lock, and a holy priest.  We don't kill stuff terribly fast, but with that much plate and that much healing in the group, we don't die either.

With the increased leveling speed and a decent group of friends to play with, I'm not feeling any grind at all so far.  And while I miss ganking random dipshits out in the world, being able to quest in peace in places like Hillsbrad and STV is a nice change of pace.  Plus I just like my human pally better than my old cow shaman, aesthetically speaking.

So yeah, thumbs up so far.

[Fordel]

Make the Holy Priest a Shadow priest and not only will you never die, you'll never run OOM either.