Game Nouveau

Taking a break from writing to write (14k)

2009-11-05T21:23:00.001-08:00

I'm reaching that wonderful place in Shadow of the Dragon (tentative title) where I am excited to write so I can find out what happens to my characters. It's both thrilling and a great bummer, because it's not like I can curl up in bed and read -- I have to write the damn thing first. But I love where I am, I love that I am bringing to life not only my story, but my husband's. Every day when I hand him my new chapters, he gets more excited to see his world flushed out. And that gets me more excited to write it for him.

The trick of it is, I sit down to write, and my undisciplined mind automatically thinks of all the things I could be doing instead. It's horrible, because when I'm not writing, all I do is think of writing.

Example: I recently signed up for culinary school, while my husband signed up for classes in game design. I felt very conflicted, because while I am very interested in food as an artistic expression, I know the game industry so well, having been a part of it for almost three years. It feels safe to me. So I debated for a couple days as to whether or not I should really take the game design classes instead. I mentioned this dilemma to one of the admission's councilors at school and she said: "What do you do because no one tells you?" I lied and said "I cook," but it isn't true. When no one tells me what to do, I write. When I told my husband about this, he said: "Yes, but you already have a degree that proves you can write. Now you need one to prove you can cook." He's right -- my undergraduate degree is in Creative Writing, albeit poetry.

That's what NaNoWriMo is all about: doing what you love even when the circumstances, the new videos games you receive in the mail, and your school schedule tell you otherwise. I won't say that I'm not getting sidetracked -- otherwise I wouldn't be blogging, now would I? All these words and I can't count a single one toward the dreaded 50k. Only...I didn't mention this to anyone but my husband...my goal isn't 50k, it's 100k, and I'm crazier than ever.

Well, I suppose it's time to find out what Arturis discovers in that great hulking cathedral he's just found in the forest. I hope it's something good.

Whole wheat bread, or at least the makings thereof

2009-10-30T12:03:00.001-07:00

Whole wheat -- mixing process 5, originally uploaded by Mandifesto.

Here's proof that I'm actually in culinary classes. What you'll find down in that churning mass are the elements that make up whole wheat bread. From basic yeast, water, honey and flour you can create something of substance, of power, something that will help sustain you. That is the beauty of cooking.

And the planning begins...again

2009-10-28T10:53:00.000-07:00

Last night was a talk night. We have this every once in a while, my husband and I, where we get on an idea and are energized by it. The resulting electricity is something that fuels my writing, my projects, gets me into trouble and gets me out of it. It might be that I'm turning back into a night person, or just that I need someone to bounce ideas off -- or it might be that this is in some ways a collaborative project, and this buzz in my head is a result of finally getting to scratch the surface on a cohesive timeline.

The trick of it is, Art and I have been building our own personal stories since we were children. Now we are weaving those stories together, and it gets tricky. Seriously tricky. Like we have to change the laws of nature tricky. SotO takes place in my world, which I've named Terra. It's like Earth but not Earth, as the clever name indicates. His story takes place on another world entirely, so you can see how connecting the two may seem unlikely. But see, there's this Well in my story, and strange things happen with that Well.

Does this mean that I won't have an outline done by Sunday? I'm not sure. But it does mean that I'm starting to get a grasp on it, and if I had to sit down and start writing today I could. That's a good feeling, because before last night I was feeling a little lost, a little out of sorts mucking around with someone else's world. Today, hopefully the discussion continues. I will, at least, attempt to sketch out the first few scenes so that I know I have somewhere to go in the first 20k regardless of how much planning happens beyond. Nanowrimo will happen, busy as I am. I promise it.

The countdown to Nano 2009

2009-10-27T23:08:00.000-07:00

Yes it's been a while since I blogged here, but now that I am no longer blogging professionally, I thought it high time to return to good ol' Game Nouveau. I am currently working the skeleton of a sequel to my 2007 novel, tentatively entitled Shadow of the Rose. This will be the first of the novels in the series to be set in a completely new world, one created by my husband. It's a massive challenge, writing inside someone else's world, but I realized something yesterday: I can make it my own, and if he doesn't like what I make of it, then this will stay unofficial fan fiction instead of canon and lore.

Tonight I am sitting down doing some world building, even though the outline is far from finished. I figured that these sorts of gems will make it easier to write the outline, as I need a bit of action in what is largely a personality drama wrapped in a fantasy setting. I'm halfway through my list of curiosities, and so far they are interesting enough to build a couple scenes from, which is ultimately the point. If I am not invested in the world, I cannot expect my characters to want to spend time there.

So I'm going back to it. Despite so much happening in my life, despite the marriage and the move and the unemployment and culinary school, it's important to me that Nano go on. That means that I have three days to formulate a road map, a plan, and a semblance of a synopsis before October 31st. Can it be done? Certainly. Will it be done? That remains to be seen.

Five rejections and a realization

2009-06-24T12:54:00.000-07:00

A couple of weeks ago I sat down in a frenzy and wrote out a synopsis of SotO and a query and sent it off to a dozen agents. I got nothing but form rejections back, which makes me immediately wonder if the query is weak. With no way to verify its strength, I decided that I needed to look deeper into the manuscript and see if there was anything unusual about this book that makes it worth publishing.

In talking over the process with friend Will Davis, I learned that his novel, already accepted by a publisher and previously in editing stages, was put on hold since the industry is suffering now. This is not only disheartening, it's shocking, because a strong literary fiction piece deserves to be put on shelves and enjoyed by readers the world over. Trouble is, his agent told him, only one genre is selling now: Horror.

I've been mulling this news around in my head, and ever the jump-the-gun kid, wondered if I shouldn't put SotO on hold and shift to ...err Shift, a book that definitely blends horror and fantasy. From the research I've been doing, genre blends seem to be much more popular with publishers than straight fantasy novels. Teen fantasy, modern fantasy, fantasy mixed with medical drama, every agent seems to be looking for these on Twilight/Harry Potter things that don't fit solidly into one box or the other. Striding the fence is all well and good, but ultimately Shift is little more than a spin-off tale, and one that doesn't have a backbone of its own as of yet.

I admit it's hard to write horror when I don't read much of it, and I learned with Molly's Fault that stepping out of your genre completely leads to nothing short of disaster. I sit on the precipice therefore, mulling over which story should get the first big push.

SotO is my original story, that "I have a novel in me" book, the story I have been writing since my childhood. Shift was the "oh hey, I think I can write something NOT SotO for once" revelation piece, and it's still amorphous and globbular the way that all unformed thoughts begin. I haven't found where this story wants to go. But maybe I need to form this unsculpted mass into something presentable, seeing as how it's a blend story with horror elements and all those things spell saleability.

Also I have gotten back into reading fantasy again, living in the genre I want to write, and I've come across some great work. Excellent work, the sort of writing I want to weave into my story. So I have also been chewing on how much tweaking is needed to deepen my world. Yes, ironically enough, it's the world building I have a problem with -- I know, shocking for a fantasy writer. I think it's because I read as a young writer that world building kills perfectly good fantasy tales, so I reverted to the opposite extreme. The notes I've gotten back from others reading my work indicate that the reader is left to fill in the blanks, which is fine for a murder mystery, but not when you're describing the sieging of a city.

I've started building bones for the SotO world, but none of them are represented in the actual novel as of yet. Essentially I built my origin stories for the races on the world, and in that received some much needed perspective, but there is no skeletal structure in the novel. It is still at its core a novel written by a twelve year old, with none of the solid description that comes from building out your universe until it's so real anyone could see what you see when they pick up the book. My bones are different from other fantasy books in that this is a fantasy based on American history and geography, not British, but you would never know that from reading it. Damn, I have a lot of work to do.

My brain is full, but nothing's getting done

2009-06-24T12:45:00.001-07:00

A week from now I will be on a plane to New York, but today I sit here with a brain swimming with ideas and a body that has no direction with which to focus them. Even as I sit down to blog, I don't know which of the sixteen topics in my head I should write about. Should I talk about the rediscovery of good fantasy fiction and how I realized my work is missing the mark? Should I stew over the wedding? Should I lay out our lovely engagement pics for the world to see, even though I ressemble something that needs to jump hoops at Sea World? Do I discuss our troubles at home, and the brewing drama that has my stomach in knots?

Yes, I'm all over the place, and flooded with emotions and thoughts to the point that I don't know where to turn next. I guess I can only take things one post at a time.

The final countdown

2009-06-08T18:46:00.000-07:00

It's officially 30 days until the wedding -- a day I am celebrating as our -1 month preemptive anniversary. Today I sent out the last of our invitations and received our first response card. It's a good thing because I was really worried that the response cards were too difficult to find behind the directions card.

At this point, we're so behind we JUST settled on bridesmaids' dresses last night, and the worst part is, it's a wedding happening across the country. It's a strange situation for a control freak, knowing I can control nothing having no cash and being in California. Perhaps I can hand make something clever for favors, but there might be nothing at all.

But I still have a month to go. I've lost ten of the 20+ pounds I need to drop to feel less than planetoid at my own wedding, and am searching for a pair of shoes that will look nice, feel comfortable, and yet still not cost $100. The family keeps saying don't stress, but life is throwing flaming curve balls of late. Not only have I been out of work since October, but Art came down ill last month, so we've been dealing with some pretty heinous complications from Diabetes. It's odd how things end up on the extreme ends of the life continuum for us. It's great things or horrible things, but very little in between. That's the way it's always been, but no matter what the heartache, I still have a faux anniversary to celebrate.

The synopsis, the query, and the insomnia

2009-05-05T04:11:00.000-07:00

It all came together this evening. Something about the smell of the rain outside, I'm not sure, but round about midnight I pulled Art's laptop into bed with me and the synopsis came pouring out of me. This after five failed attempts over the course of several weeks. After that, I was so giddy I couldn't sleep, so got up, sat down at my computer, and out came the query letter. On a roll, I figured after re-reading them both five times a couple submissions couldn't hurt.

Question 1: Is the editing done?

Yes and no. I know, should prospective agents stumble on this I'll be crucified, but honestly, I am at the point where I think I need to hand the manuscript over to a higher power, a professional power. No, it's not perfect, and I can even see where some of the weak points are, I'm just not sure about how to fix them.

Question 2: Don't you think you should wait until you have a sleep-rested brain to work with?

Definitely not. I always used to write my best work in the small wee hours, and I really feel in my bones that what I created tonight represents my work as best I can.

So now it begins. I'm making a 100 query pledge. 100 rejections before I even consider giving up. Maybe it will take 1000, but more than likely once I get 100 rejections from agents I'll just move onto the publishers directly. Making a mental note here to go buy a rejection binder for my first ever foray into novel submissions. I feel so very grown up alluva sudden.

on Word Counts

2008-11-25T15:04:00.000-08:00

This month sucks. I can say that with all affection because so much has ended up happening in November. Not only is Nanowrimo happening, but also I have had to look for an apartment, start weeding through the garbage heap that holds my personal possessions. Add to that the new World of Warcraft expansion released on the 13th, and my word count has been doomed from the get go.

I'm not giving up, not by any stretch of the imagination. I still want to win, but I sit here blogging instead of writing, so I obviously have an issue with focus. This morning I posted on my other blog, cleaned out the refridgerator, answered emails, updated the wiki, started adding songs to my computer playlist...and did a SMALL bit of writing. What is it about novelling that gets me to do other things?

So yes, I have words down. I don't much like this novel, I have to say, but I have almost 29k of it down, and five days to go. Why am I not daunted? Because I know that if I stopped procrastinating I could technically have it done tonight. I write quickly, the words flow, but I have this problem with getting myself to let them flow. Not sure how to fix that.

I tried to make cupcakes with numbers to motivate me like I did last year. Trouble was, I ended up eating those without numbers and leaving the numbered ones to rot because I couldn't get myself to right.

Right now I work in 2oo word increments. At the moment I am working up the gumption to get to 29, and then to 30. After 30 comes the hard part. The hard part meaning 31-50.

Hell, I'm not even witty in my blog anymore. This month really has sucked.

Not Sure about Nano

2008-10-07T08:00:00.000-07:00

It's been months since I've blogged here...exactly five months I believe, but I have a good reason. I started blogging professionally (http://www.omgrpg.com/), and it wasn't until just recently that I started getting back to my personal writing. Now that so much time has passed, what have we learned?

Well, I finished SotO, and am almost done with the second draft. It's got good bones, as they say in genetics, but the words don't really flow like the poetry I wanted to make them. Still, it's a novel, and it's completed, with a beginning, a middle, and an end that jumps out of nowhere (with a purpose). I am happy with it, even if Chapter 4 is largely blank and there are whole scenes missing.

Shift on the other hand is a trial for me. I am still working around how to rewrite it, how to make straight, meandering fantasy into tight, brooding horror. It might end up as dark fantasy, but I really am not a ghoul and vampire kind of girl. Still, the story needs to be told, and as I see it, Shift will tie in a lot more with SotO, in content if not in style. I just need to figure out what that content is.

This year's book is much more of a puzzle. Even more of a puzzle is the idea that I might not get to Nano at all because as of October 25th I will be jobless. This means that I will be tasked with job hunting, which means I won't be allowed to write a novel. But if I manage to get work (anyone need a personal assistant/trainer/corporate writer/customer service rep who can work hard and start immediately?) I will still face the challenge of picking a topic. In the previous years it was a no brainer, write a new book based on a previous world then rewrite the previous world. Now I sit at a crossroads with four possible paths to take, and I can't really say I am sure about any of them.

Here are my possibilities:

1. Molly's Fault: This is a story wrapped around Molly Bates, a little character that popped into my head this year. Essentially, Molly is living in a Los Angeles being ripped apart by natural disasters, and her only desire is to pick her dog up from the kennel.

2. SotO Prequel #2: Yes, I am getting into a Star Wars thing, but honestly, I find it intriguing to start with the traditional fantasy tale and then tell how people got there. This Prequel tells a Pocohontas-esque story set in a fantasy world. (The Native Americans will tonight be played by the Elves). It's a good idea, and one that will get written, I'm just not sure it will get written now.

3. SotO Sequel #1: There is also a tougher story out there, one without form or inspiration. At the end of SotO a young boy is crowned king in the absence of his sister, and he vows that his people will return to their nomadic lifestyle. His dearest friend, the crazy Joppa, transforms out of her madness to become the High Priestess of a new religion. I'm eager to know what their stories are, and if they end up romantically connected. I don't see this as being stronger than SotO, but I could always be pleasantly surprised.

4. SotO Sequel #2: This is the story of the absent sister. She's stepped into a portal, leaving her world behind. This tale is actually better formed, but takes a completely different turn, with new characters and a very strange backstory relying on another author's world. I want to tell Mylena's story, show where she goes and what happens to her, I'm just not certain that this sequel should be written first.

So what do you think? Yes, four completely different stories, each with their own challenges. I intend should I have the time to plan all four of them and then pick, but October is incredibly busy for me. I get on a plane tomorrow bound for Southern California, and that will make planning....nonexistent while I'm away, let's be honest.

I've got to say I am so very very unhappy about the idea of NOT Nanoing this year. It's become a ritual, a rhythm, a goal and a focus for me. Knowing that there are 4 books out there waiting to be written (mainly so I can find out what happens) is a thrilling notion, but I also understand Boyfriend's concern. I get too focused on the writing, it's true. But isn't that the definition of an all-consuming passion?

[image courtesy of Nanowrimo.org]

Frostsabers, Zandalar Tigers, and Polar Bears, oh my!

2008-05-16T08:21:00.000-07:00

This morning I came across a post on the WoW forums that made me a happy Mandifesto. A while back we heard the dev team was going to phase out the Amani War Bear Mounts from Zul'Aman when Wrath is released this fall. Initially I was extremely disappointed, although I understand. Exactly how epic can the mount be if you go in and farm it at level 80?

So now Bornakk gives me hope. They are not dropping the bear mount entirely, they are simply replacing it. There will be a new Polar Bear mount attainable somewhere in the next expansion. Obviously we have no word on which instance will have the Great White Teddy, but I expect it will be another of the 10-man raid encounters. Maybe you didn't hear it here first, but you did hear it. Amani War Bear? So last expansion. The Dharma Polar Bear is for me! Complete with fish biscuits and a Hydra logo!

CONventional Speculation

2008-05-16T07:34:00.000-07:00

Mutfak has a silly name. I'm not exactly sure how he came up with that beauty, but it's almost dumb enough to fall into my Theory on Character Naming and Player Ability(tm). But Mutfak for all his nomenclature frivolity brought up an interesting point this morning: What will the BlizzCon 2008 announcement be?

BlizzCon is not an annual event, as Blizzard has already stated they will only have the convention when they feel they have meat enough to fill the plate, as it were. No reason to simply celebrate their nearly 11 million players. No, there has to be some big reveal. Mut believes Blizzard will announce a second Hero class, a healing class, since on his server there is a terrible shortage of healers. This isn't the case, obviously, since the Hero class is an experiment all on its own. I really don't expect a second class announcement at the convention. It could happen, true, but it's not likely.

But that still leaves the question of what announcement will be made. I have a theory, recently formed on only one cup of coffee, but it's a good one. Or, at least as good as one cup of coffee on a Friday morning will get you. I maintain that there will be only one Hero class put into the game in Wrath. The next expansion is all about Fordring versus Arthas, Paladin versus Death Knight. The themes of the expansion revolve around the Death Knight. The only other class featured in Wrath to such an extent is the mage class. I simply can't believe there will be an Archmage added to the game. While cool, it's too similar to the class currently in the game.

So my theory goes that yes we will have an announcement regarding the Warcraft universe at BlizzCon (not to be confused with my belief they will also announce another MMO project on October 10th), but it will be the announcement of the next expansion. Think of it. We were told that Blizzard intended to release a boxed expansion every year. In 2005 we learned about TBC. In 2007 we had the Waht-lu-kuh announcement. I expect 2008 to bring us the Maelstrom announcement. Why Maelstrom? Azshara and Malfurion are the last of the Warcraft Celebs not to make an appearance in WoW. While we have seen videos of people travelling through the Emerald Dream landscape already put in the game files, I don't see the story jumping that completely. Yes, I can expect ED to be an expansion of its own, but I don't think it's next. Remember my favorite map? The map of the Maelstrom that we saw on the behind the scenes DVD? It included amongst other things Kul-Tiras and Undermine. And everyone loves pirates. There have been two other MMOs to come out with pirate games.

I expect that Maelstrom will have with it two new races and most likely a Hero class. Finally we will see a faction of playable goblins, as well as naga. I am still pondering what the Hero class will be, but I expect to see one every expansion as we go forward. With the Maelstrom would also come the opening up of Zandalar, meaning that trolls would finally have a homeland. Anyway, the initial coffee-created burst of energy is gone. Now that I have had my say, I will slink back into the shadows and let my prophecies go forth and bring me unsung glory.

Help me oh Great Reader!

2008-05-15T07:26:00.000-07:00

Hitting the editing slump as I have been, I realized a couple of days ago that I am missing a key piece of information as a result of my city-girl upbringing. Chapter 4 in SotO features a harvest festival, a holiday built from the cultures of the people of Shadowhaven, a mixture of the religious and the magical. However, I don't have a frame of reference for a small town fair. I grew up in Los Angeles, where such a thing just doesn't exist.

So, in the interest of getting back on track, I am appealing you friends. Do you know of any movies or episodes of television shows out there that have a small town country festival or fair or some such celebration that I might be able to glean inspiration from? So far the only thing I can think of is the fair in Steel Magnolias but I'm sure there is better out there.

Also, I am still looking for sets of eyes to read the manuscript. Boyfriend is giving great feedback from his reading, but he's just one person, and a biased one at that. I figure that if you're interested enough to read the blog (even if it is for gaming articles) then you might also enjoy fantasy literature. Wow, did I just call this tripe "literature?"

Patch Day Today

2008-05-13T08:09:00.001-07:00

So in other news not so con-filled, Patch 2.4.2 is being released today. For those of us planning on heading into TK tonight, it's awesome news, since part of the patch also includes a fix to the Void Reaver fight. Additionally, there are sound fixes in 2.4.2, but more interesting are the class fixes:

Paladins can rejoice that Crusader Strike will actually be hurting things now instead of just tickling them a little.

Mages will cry a bit as they realize that you can no longer turtle someone on their ram mount and have a turtle riding a sheep. Knowing that NPC polymorph no longer heals targets make me sad, and very fearful for the Shade of Aran fight.

Hunters will now get a boost to MP5 with Aspect of the Viper. I'm still trying to figure out how a snake bite increases mana efficiency. 'Tis a puzzlement.

Cooldowns have been reduced on all profession crafting abilities, so I will now be able to make Primal Mights 4 hours earlier than normal. Silly me for not being all that excited about that one. But it is good to know that once I get to Void Shatter (5 points away currently) there won't be a cooldown on it. Once I am able to log in, remind me to check my Goblin Jumper cables, since they're not a trinket anymore, I assume they just take up a bag slot on my already overburdened hunter. Mail boxes are now trackable on your minimap, and although this isn't a faboo feature, it certainly will be useful.

I didn't see any reference to fixing of the chat filters. I would love that to be part of this patch's content, and if it is, please let me know. Obviously these are highlights from the patch notes as I see them. I find little interest in Mac fixes or exactly when Illidan despawns because frankly, those don't affect me. See the complete list of patch notes here.

ConMan(die)

2008-05-13T07:29:00.001-07:00

In 2005 I was living in Oregon, trying my darnedest to make a living where I simply wasn't wanted. I had a teaching degree, 2 years of experience in a Middle School classroom, and yet I wasn't allowed to substitute in Oregon school's because my credential didn't have Oregon written at the top. Instead I waitressed, ironically at the California Pizza Kitchen in Tigard, until it was very clear that I simply couldn't survive in such a hostile anti-Californian climate.

During a summer which topped the record books for Oregon heat waves, Boyfriend and I learned that there would be a convention held in Anaheim that August specifically centered around the celebration of Blizzard's games. Tickets sold out too quickly for me to grab a pair, and I had resigned myself to watching yet another once-in-a-lifetime opportunity from the sidelines. Along about July we were in dire straights: no jobs, running out of the savings I was living off of, unsure what would happen to us. It was then that we decided hell, if we're going down, we might as well have one last hurrah. So I bought a pair of tickets for more than I care to admit on eBay (one of my few purchases from the site), and we planned a trip down to Southern California for BlizzCon 2005.

The experience was unforgettable. I have rarely been someplace where the very air crackled with energy. Every street corner in Anaheim had WoW players on it. You could walk into the Red Robin down the street from the convention center and see the table's filled with group after group of convention attendees. The new blood elf race was announced, StarCraft Ghost was playable on the floor, as was Ahn'Qiraj and the new races' starting area. Only the truly devout were at the convention, and it was the truly devout that got to listen as the development team spilled juicy secrets into our waiting minds.

Two year's later, I was in San Francisco, having crossed the country twice in search of a place to call home. Once again living a life replete with turmoil, we heard the announcement that a second BlizzCon was going to be held that October. At the time, I was formally blogging about World of Warcraft, and offered to be one of the writers to cover the event. Once again I made the pilgrimage down to Anaheim, only this time to visit a con filled not with the devout, but with the apathetic. Suddenly the crowd was screaming Chuck Norris comments at Jay Mohr, and I realized the WoW player base had completely shifted in the 2 years since the last convention. It was still an awesome experience, particularly going as press, but it wasn't the same joyous celebration it was the first time. The developers were limited in what they were allowed to say to the faithful, and indeed the amount of time they sat in panels was greatly reduced.

Yesterday it was announced that there will be another BlizzCon in October of 2008, and the announcement makes me look back at my experiences and realize I've been in a very rare position over the years. Not many can say they were there when Metzen announced that the heroes of old were "alive and kickin' ass" beyond the Dark Portal. Not many squealed in embarrassing glee at the announcement of the new Blood Elf race, or raced back to their hotel room to upload photos of the community manager's Wrath of the Lich King t-shirt. I was there, and I will be there again, but in a different capacity. I will be there as a veteran.

The Editing Monster

2008-05-11T13:51:00.000-07:00

I have read through the first 4 chapters of SotO, making my notes in the margins, correcting spelling errors (surprisingly few considering who I am), and now it's gotten to the point where I have to input those edits. Starting is incredibly daunting to me, and I'm not exactly sure why. The largest piece missing from the novel is description. Saying that Warrek "loomed in the doorway" is nice, I suppose, but it doesn't give the full impression of a man so broad he has to shoulder his way into the room, of a man so imposing that his just standing there intimidates everyone around him. Much of the novel is seen from his point of view, so it's essential that we see how others are affected by him before we spend all that time seeing things from his eyes. But really, I have this hangup. I resist opening the document and adding that description.

I am going to force myself to do so this afternoon, once I get somethings out of the way. I need to get the ball rolling, or this novel will never see the light of day, and I get the sense that it's a good enough story that others should get the chance to experience it. But how to start the fixing?

Adventures in Inappropriate Orphan Mentoring, Part II

2008-05-11T12:47:00.000-07:00

I've been remembering my time with Dornaa of late. That precocious little Draenei really wormed her way into my heart. Flipping through the photo album I created of our Children's Week escapades, I came across a few more gems I thought you might like to enjoy.

After Dornaa's field trip to Caverns of Time and with her Dragon Toy tucked firmly under her arm, we set off to visit Medivh. He seemed to be entertaining all manner of guests, so I didn't think he would mind 2 more people stopping by.

And seeing as how I think all children should learn to respect their elders, we made sure to give our respects to Medivh's father before we left Karazhan.

Ah yes, I had almost forgotten this one. Dornaa seemed to very interested in the various cultures of Outland, and we had a little extra time before she had to get back to the orphanage, so I took her out to Hellfire Peninsula to witness the grandeur that is Magtheridon's Lair. She seemed completely awestruck.

When at last returned to Lower City, it was with eyes welling with tears that I handed off my charge to the Orphan Matron. Admittedly she did run rather quickly back into the orphanage, no doubt eager to tell her friends about all the marvelous experiences she had. Ah yes, good times.

A lover of lists

2008-05-06T14:11:00.000-07:00

So, I am currently taking a break from bashing my enfeebled brain against Adobe InDesign CS3, and decided to focus on something that isn't draining my life out of my fingertips. It's a challenge to find something that fits the bill really, even in WoW, since I had such a tremendously suck-filled night in ZA yesterday and spent a frustration-filled lunch attempting to race people on epic flying mounts for daily questing nodes and failing miserably. So frustration is now choking my arteries, and when that happens, it's hard to focus on the good things in life.

But before the day completely tanked I had planned to post about something that I do enjoy. So I figure, why the heck not? Maybe blogging will lighten the black mood I'm in. It's worth a try. So I have been raiding a bit ( a bit meaning just about every night of the week), which keeps me focused on eternally on what shiny new bauble I might acquire next. Now, here is where I confess to you, friendly reader, one of my darkest secrets: I love lists. I know, it's shameful, it's shocking, but it's the truth. I have a 3-subject notebook at home, the third actually, and in it I make lists, more specifically gear lists. I enjoy writing out the items I hope to get for each of my level 70 characters. But it takes time, and obviously takes paper.

So a couple weeks ago I decided to graduate my list mania to digital format and built myself a spreadsheet. It's snazzy, tabbed, and informative, and it saves trees. The high school kids can have their notebooks back. The advantages with a spreadsheet are many. I can use all the pretty fonts I love, I can add links to the WoWHead pages for each piece of loot, and I can list when I last saw the object drop. This is to presumably give me an idea of when I might next see the item drop, and hopefully into my own possession.

There are obvious deep-seated psychological issues at work here. Exactly how can someone with so little in the way of organizational skill be drawn to such an "account-esque" activity? Well I know I crave order and control of my life (David St. John said so, and I always believe what my poetry professors say). As you saw from the beginning of the post, I live in a sea of bitterness tossed on waves of frustration. A list is devoid of all the elements of chaos that tear at me so. A list is replete only with those items I fill it with, and I fill my list with happy things, like pretty robes and wands. What's not to like?

Adventures in Inappropriate Orphan Mentoring

2008-05-03T16:58:00.000-07:00

It's Children's Week, and any self-respecting citizen of Azeroth will no doubt tow around their own little orphan, showing them the sites of the realms. When I first met Dornaa, I was enchanted by her keen interest in the world around her and her overwhelming desire to summon random people into Auchindoun. I then thought to myself, why simply take her where she asks to go? Should the education be limited by one child's obviously stunted desires? Oh no! I shall show her the world of a raider, and open her eyes to what life will be like once she too levels to 70.

The first place we visited was The Eye, a beautiful example of Draenei architecture. What better place to experience the culture of her own people?

Dornaa seemed rather nonplussed by The Phoenix God A'lar, and so I thought it might be best to introduce her to someone a little more terrestrial, High Astromancer Solarian.

After researching governmental styles within the various peoples of Outland, it was time to illustrate the innovative industries we are known for. Void Reaver is a classic example of what Blood Elves can create when they put their minds to it. I thought Dornaa might be inspired to take up engineering when she got older. The little Draenei seemed less than overwhelmed.

Fine, I thought to myself, if she wanted to see something *alive* I guess I could humor her naiveté. Children always seem impressed when they meet someone of authority, so I thought it might be a treat to visit Mr. Sunstrider himself.

It was an eventful day, and one I am positive Dornaa is not likely to forget. However, now that I think on it, I didn't really give her any experiences in Azeroth itself. I wonder what places I might visit that she would enjoy. Karazhan perhaps?

Things that Cloud up my Game

2008-04-30T07:25:00.000-07:00

The more I play MMOs, the more I am convinced they are a microcosm of the larger mass of humanity. It's the sort of thing that keeps me from flipping out and going postal on people when I am playing, but also the sort of thing that saddens me. We play games to escape from the real world, but more and more real life is shaping my games. Okay, I may be ranting here, and even worse I have two rants on two related but different subjects.

First, some background. Last night was the first entry into Mt. Hyjal for L8Raid. Being new content, there were upwards of 45 people interested in running an instance that only allows 25 people. So yeah, lots of people were put on the wait list. I was one of them, and for the most part I was happy to be on the "WL" as they say. If you are going to be successful, you need to bring your best and brightest. So I sat around on the WL for a little bit, then some of those waiting thought we should run another instance while we waited rather than sitting outside the instance counting each other's toes (something I've done when raiding with Inner Focus, and that is less than fun).

So, in the spirit of my previous post, I formed a ZA raid with the 6 people that were interested...all DPS. That's not all that surprising, because blasting and ripping things is always more fun than standing there and getting your face pounded in or standing back and keeping everyone alive (not my opinion, but the general consensus). Now, I know that any 10 man raid will need a couple tanks and a couple healers, and as there were none of either of these, I let the group know that Zul'Aman wouldn't happen. They were fine with this, because really it was a group of people in gear that would be way too expensive to repair. So we went to Heroic Magister's Terrace.

Went being the appropriate word. We visited, pulled one group, and then the rest of the group got angry at me for insisting that we crowd control. Granted I yelled, but the phrase "Let me friggin' sheep," is not exactly the most offensive thing to say to a group. I ranted to Staulk who was in the group with me, but kept most of my insulting comments said allowed without hitting "Push to Talk." I was frustrated. These are people that are raiding 25-man instances, that are supposed to be mature enough to know how to reset a 5-man instance and how to mark pulls and crowd control them. Evidently there is a reason they were put on the wait list. Now once the affronted members of the group pushed me to leave the group (not something I do unless there is a good reason), I went to help Boyfriend with his crusade against the Ogres of Nagrand (AKA grinding Kurenai rep).

But while I was listening to the raid group on vent cheering as they downed two bosses and proceeded to the third, my "what is best for the group" rally cry faded. I suppose my original reason for raiding (the desire to experience everything in the game) has morphed into something different. I love raiding. I love playing the game with mature people who not only know how to play their classes and work as a cohesive unit, I love the feeling you get when that group had tackled something new. You can stand back and say "I was part of that, I helped." But I wasn't there last night, I was only listening in. Instead of was killing ogres in a dimly lit cave, hearing others as they rejoiced at that feeling of accomplishment.

That's when the bitterness started. I'm not proud, but at least I'm self-aware, and that ought to count for something. I hate being excluded, being left behind. It's the sort of situation I am more sensitive to as a result of my childhood, and something that I know I have a problem with, and I do my best to cope. It wasn't really until I started selfishly resenting the core raiders for their accomplishments that I realized I enjoy raiding for a whole new set of reasons that I explained above. Now, I was bitter, and started in a lovely spiral of negativity, but such a spiral brought up an interesting idea that I've considered before. I figured it was blog-worthy and thus enjoy rant #2:

In society today, it takes money to make money. The people who are rich can invest their wealth and generate more. The same is true within WoW. I can't raise as much gold as others because I don't have an epic flying mount. I've ranted about this before because I have learned to use my bitterness to fuel my writing. I realized last night that this also extends to raiding. Those with the best gear will be invited to raids, where they will get better gear and become more valuable to the raid. It's a cycle, and an unavoidable one even within an extremely inclusive raiding group like L8Raid. I feel fortunate that there are a couple ways to break this cycle, or at least step into the cycle yourself. The first way, obviously, is finding a group like L8Raid that does its best to include as many players as possible in their raids. Show up, try hard, get to raid more. The second way is the badge loot from Patch 2.4. Suddenly there is a way for a non-raider or a second-tier raider (like me) to get gear on par with Zul'Aman and beyond. Sure it's a lot of work, but it's 5-man heroic work, and not beyond anyone willing to run the instances a LOT. Now if you're lazy and hate grinding, then you only have one choice: bitter ranting.

The Problem with PUGs

2008-04-28T09:11:00.001-07:00

So, anyone who's followed my on-again-off-again love affair with raiding will understand my joy when I tell you I've found the perfect solution to my problem. My problem being a guild with no motivation to raid conflicting with my desire to see all the content in the game. I have attempted to join raiding guilds on Elune, only to find that my West Coast time zone and my need to work to earn a living previously came into direct conflict with the raiding schedule of most guilds (well those guilds that didn't implode upon my arrival that is).

I had heard about the L8Raid back in November when I was getting back into the normal workforce, but I didn't brave joining the channel until a few weeks ago. Well, in reality I did PM the raid leader/organizer several months ago, and was discouraged not to receive a reply. These sorts of things frighten me, stepping into new territories without guidance or (more importantly) an invitation. To explain the concept, L8Raid is a group of people that want to raid, but have West Coast schedules for some reason or another. Instead of leaving their guilds, they have allied together to raid, and as a result are progressing nicely through the content.

Enter Nitnoid. Noid was a WoW Insider reader who contacted me in game to harass me for not posting on the site anymore. I had the lovely opportunity of explaining that it wasn't by my choice, and lo and behold a friendship was born. I credit Noid with much. It was he that revitalized my love of blogging, that reminded me that I don't need a paycheck to write about the game I love. It was also Noid that suggested I hook into L8Raid, and now with the group being brought up twice, I wasn't one to ignore a sign. Therefore I typed /join l8raid and have been happier ever since.

The most interesting thing is I am raiding with an alt, the priest, and enjoying the challenge. I expected to have her rejected on account of her sad gear and +healing, but that wasn't the case. The first night I ran with them to Tempest Keep and had an epic boots pattern drop, and that was the beginning of the DKP guilt cycle. Within a week of that I had improved my gear exponentially with a combo of amazing luck in Karazhan and making my new boots. In essence, I went from having a character barely ready for Kara to a character almost ready for TK, and all with gear I received while with L8Raid.

But Mandifesto, you ask as a clever reader of titles, what the heck is the problem with PUGs? Where this concept of the organized pug breaks down is Sundays. The group runs ZA on Sundays. This in and of itself is not a bad thing, at least for the 10 core raiders. They have a set group and organize their group outside the L8Raid channel. What ends up happening is that the rest of us log in at the regular time waiting for the raid organizers to pull together ZA groups, we here nothing, and end up logging out in frustration as the core group happily runs their instance.

Last night I suggested that perhaps next week in the name of inclusiveness and the greater group that one large group be formed and then smaller raids be filled from those interested and available. What ended up happening is that they asked me to work on that, which I guess is fine, except that I am not one of the leaders of the group. Sure I can organize things, but it is not my intent to take over someone else's concept. I didn't join L8Raid to lead, but then again it seems, neither did anyone else.

And that is the problem with PUGs, and to a larger extent groups in general in WoW and in life. Sure there may be a shortage of tanks and healers, but there is a greater shortage of leaders. There are very few of us that are willing to step up and make something happen rather than simply waiting until someone does it for us. Personally, I can be one of those people, but the problem with leading PUGs is that I usually get told to sod off when I take charge. This has happened to me since grade school, and more recently with the last guild I tried to raid with. Therefore I am a little hesitant in stepping up lest I am asked to step out.

Fun with /console

2008-04-24T15:01:00.002-07:00

Tuesday night Boyfriend pointed me to a post on World of Raids regarding the command /console. For the less technical among us, this command allows a player to adjust the visual settings in their game, for instance controlling the amount of ambient vegetation generated by the game engine or glow effects on a player's weapons. There is a massive opportunity here with this command for allowing personalization of the visuals in the game. I also would love to see how our Machinima artists will use this sort of control to develop new film content. I am wondering if anyone out there has completed a comprehensive list of the /console options available. A druid in Tuesday night's TK run was my source for the /console options on player glow effects. If you hear of someone with a nice beefy list of /console commands, let me know and I will update my post here.

Here are some examples of /console commands given on WoR. This particular macro increases the draw distance and amount of vegetation generated by the game engine. When Boyfriend enabled this on his system Arathi Highlands alluva sudden was more lush than Stanglethorn Vale:

/console farclip 777
/console horizonfarclip 6226
/console groundeffectdensity 256
/console groundeffectdist 140
/console smallcull 0
/console skycloudlod 3
/console characterambient 0

And here's the macro to revert your settings:
/console groundEffectDensity 16
/console groundEffectDist 1
/console horizonfarclip 1305
/console farclip 177
/console characterAmbient 1
/console smallcull 1
/console skycloudlod 1
/console detailDoodadAlpha 1

Now I imagine you can play around with the values in the first macro, as long as you use the second to revert to the original settings. I do not have enough processing power to try this myself (my FPS is already sadly lacking), but I did see the results on Boyfriend's system, and they were impressive. It really makes the game resemble some of the beautiful rendering I saw in LotRO.

I do not, however have Mr. Druid's macro for reducing glow effects on players. I was too busy healing main tanks during the A'lar fight to write it down.

[World of Raids]

Politics, WoW Style

2008-04-23T07:35:00.000-07:00

I'm not what you call political, but I am fascinated with the circus that politics becomes in a presidential election year. Train-wreck, rubber-necking to see car accidents kind of fascinated. I just can't look away, despite how ludicrous things become, or perhaps because of exactly how ludicrous things are.

I am what you would call a gamer, and my current preferred game is World of Warcraft. So when I visited the Indecision 2008 website this morning and found an article about campaigning within WoW, I smiled on the inside. I might have smiled on the outside as well, but I'm frankly too tired from raiding Tempest Keep last night to notice much of anything beyond the flatscreen monitor before me and the cup of coffee inches away from my fingertips.

The article makes a couple of references to game mechanics that completely fail (interrupting Feral Combat spells? And the Death Knights aren't even in the game yet, my naive political satirists.), but all in all the satire is fairly sound. We look at things from a class perspective in game, and I still maintain that Boyfriend isn't simply playing a paladin he *is* one. I often consider things from a DPS perspective in real life, in attacking the weakest problems first, burning them down, then moving on to the next. Sure I can AoE several adds at once with my IRL version of Blizzard (manic multitasking) but that will wear me out faster, and will cause me running for the snack machine to regenerate mana and health several times a day.

I wonder though, are the candidates missing the boat by ignoring cyberspace? There are 10 million WoW players, 2 million in the US alone. Those are a lot of potential votes. Although, to be honest, with Clinton's anti-gaming stance the Internet itself might reject her login as viral and erase her virtual existence on contact. Still, I think the gamer as a demographic is growing, and soon it will be one that cannot be ignored when planning out a walk down the Yellow Brick Road we know as the campaign trail.

[Indecision 2008 Blog]

I wanna go

2008-03-21T07:17:00.000-07:00

With the Blizzard World Wide Invitational tickets now going on sale, I'm getting rather whiny. Why might you ask? Well, Paris is one of those cities that I would love nothing more than to live in, and so an excuse to connect my love of French culture with my love of WoW is one I doubt will come again. But it's a chance I will have to pass up. Yes, I still work in the gaming industry (albeit for "The Man," in gaming form) but I simply don't have a valid reason for going. I also don't have the cash.

It's sad because I know the city so well. I spent 6 months there during college, "studying" the language and the culture. If I were still working for WoW Insider, I might be able to justify a trip out to the City of Lights to cover the event, although I anticipate the higher-level bloggers will be sent to stay at a poshe little place on the Rive Gauche. If you do go, make sure you visit Marie Antoinette's fountain at Le Jardin de Louxembourg for me, and eat at least one Nutella and banana crepe purchased from a street vendor in the 6th. You'll thank me later.

If any of you are going to the Invitational and need some dining and not-so-touristy things to see while you're there, lemme know. I bet my favorite fondue place still serves their wine in baby bottles.

Renigging on the Sunwell

2008-03-20T08:23:00.000-07:00

It's a very good thing I am no longer working at WoW Insider, because I would most definitely have to answer to Mike Schramm for my complete botching of my guess at the release date of Patch 2.4. It wasn't until this week that Blizzard gave us the trailer for the last content patch coming to WoW before the next expansion. So when I said February or March, I guess I was wrong. There, I admitted it. Happy?

I have to revise my estimate now in face of the fact that the raid instance is not even available for players to test on the PTR. Until guilds like Death and Taxes and Nihilum get into the instance and provide that all-too-important balancing feedback to the devs, I can't reasonably tell you when I expect the patch to drop. Sad really, because I was on a streak this year, predicting the last 3 patches with a reasonable amount of accuracy. Oh well, we are all human, n'est-ce pas? I honestly think that this is a sign that we will not have that huge gap between patch and expansion that we experienced with TBC, as long as the expansion is released sometime during the early part of next year. I tend to think that the development process is speeding up (relatively of course) over there at Blizzard, and that they have learned that an 8th month gap between patch and expansion means losing beaucoup players, and a certain amount of interest in those players that hang on.

What does this mean for the timing of Patch 2.4? Nothing really, only that the longer it takes to push this up the shorter a time we will have with the new content and the expansion. Is this a good thing? Mebbe not. Perhaps Sunwell Plateau will become another Naxxramas, but I doubt it. I think this content will be meaningful for a while yet, and should take Nihilum at least a month to conquer it. At least we won't have to look at completely restructuring guilds with the coming expansion as we had to do in the past.