Review of World of Warcraft's "Mists of Pandaria," Part Two

In Part One of the review, we discussed "Mists of Pandaria's: new race, the Pandaren, and the new continent of Pandaria. Besides the Pandaren and Pandaria, the new feature getting the most talk is the Pet Battle System. Here, all those non-combat pets players have been collecting over time can be put to use besides showing them. It's gotten a lot of comparisons to "Pokemon," which even Wowpedia admits.

To gain the ability, one visits a Battle Pet trainer. Only one character needs to do so as the ability is account bound rather than on one single character. One's pets start at Level one, and by challenging wild pets or another trainer's pets in duels, winning pet battles increases' ones pets experience and over time levels them. Like items, pets can be common, uncommon, or rare in quality, rares having higher stats.

Players can heal their pets once every ten minutes. They can also pay a stable master to heal them or a special battle pet bandage. There are some achievements and quests than can be done. One can also buy and sell pets at the auction house. Naturally rares sell for the most. 

Mounts have also become account bound, although characters can still use only those of their level or lower. And those of the opposing faction will be unavailable.

Another new feature is scenarios, which are much like instances, but are shorter "with progressive objectives and a story arc." Unlike regular instances, tanks and healers are described as not truly needed. One "WoW Insider" writer described them as much more ideal for warrior class characters than instances. The first one, Theramore's Fall, was made available a couple weeks before the release of "Mists of Pandaria," which gave the sense of the Horde and Alliance, already hostile to one another, getting closer to all out war. If this was a signal for "get ready for more player vs player," there were opportunities for it in two new battleground areas.

There's some fun new things in the game. One feature isn't so much new as brought back from WoW's beta days. While the game was still under development, druids in their travel form could carry a passenger. But this feature was cut before the game's release. The reason, Blizzard was a bit wary of juvenile wisecracks of guys "riding" female druids. But with some of the more suggestive jokes and flirts for the past couple expansions, a guy going about on a lady druid's travel form was mild in comparison. So the feature was brought back for "Mists of Pandaria", with the addition of a new glyph for druids. By now though, it's more of a neat feature than a practical move since back then it took a lot longer to get to level 40.

Players in Pandaria can also do a bit of farming. Unlike games such as Runescape, there is no farming skill. Instead, one can help a farmer at Sunsong Ranch in the Valley of the Four Winds, and he'll let you grow your own veggies. Quests allow one to gain favor with the farming faction, the Tillers, and the further one goes, the more plots that are available. Naturally it isn't always so simple to just plant and forget. Your crops may need watering, weeding, defending from critters trying to make lunch out of them, and "wild" crops will need to be wrestled (see picture). "Farmvile" certainly didn't involve defending pumpkins from Level 86 Swooping Planshawks. Successful harvests yield cooking ingredients for Zen Master level Cooking and other items such as herbs, enchanting materials, and even skins, minerals, and cloth.

One fun new gadget for engineers is the "Blingtron 4000," as well as fun for everyone else around it. When summoned, it hangs around for about ten minutes and gives a gift to anyone who talks to him. WoW Insider described the gifts as a variety of items from potions to items that help raise your skills, to "a steamy romance novel."

It's a little easier for those doing the archeology profession. Instead of three digs, one is able now to dig five times at an archeology site on a map before it fades. In Pandaria, Pandaren archeological finds can be crated and stacked in one single space in your backpacks and get you better reputation with the Lorewalkers.

With five new levels come some new moves and attacks. For the Hunter, one fun move is "Stampede" in which all of your pets attack the target at once, although each having only a quarter of it's offensive strength. 

One major difference between "Mists of Pandaria" and the two previous expansions is the lack of a single villain dominating the plot. "Wrath of the Lich King" got it's name from it's big bad boy. With "Cataclysm," it was Deathwing the dragon aspect that threatened to wreck the world. Here, no one bad guy dominates the field like they do, players dealing with a few separate bigger bosses as they go about Pandaria.

However, there will be one interesting villain that players will deal with later on after a major patch several months from now: Horde Warchief Garrosh Hellscream. In the plot, Thrall's replacement as the Horde's leader as he goes off to help the elements against Deathwing isn't the careful statesman he was. Instead of bargaining, Hellscream feels the Horde should simply take what it wants, and if it means war with the Alliance, so be it. Unlike Thrall, he feels only Orcs are deserving of the most honored roles in the Horde, and woe to anyone Orc or not who openly questions him. His plans to expel the Alliance from the continent of Kalimador change to outright genocide. More and more, Horde members are increasingly dissatisfied at his rule, and eventually rebellion will break out. In the upcoming Siege of Ogrimmar, both Alliance and Horde players help the Horde rebels to defeat Hellscream, whom as it turns out has been secretly been doing some abominable activities. There is only speculation as to who replaces him. Will Thrall return, or will the Horde see a third Warchief? Time will tell.

Considering World of Warcraft's size and fanbase, any news involving it is going to get conversation, and the "Mists of Pandaria" expansion has brought about no shortage of them. A number dismissed it from the beginning as little more than a "Kung-Fu Panda" joke because of the new race. Others however welcomed them, one girl saying, "They are just so CUTE!" Some PvP players do have a preference for this kind of character, feeling others will be embarrassed to be "pawned" by a cutsie character, "You just got your a** handed to you by a panda?!" The biggest complaint about the Pandaren I've heard is of them being a neutral race, though most can see why Blizzard made them available to both sides, some citing Horde fan complaints about the Worgens' Alliance status.

Of the Pet Battle System, many have dismissed that as well as "WoW meets Pokeman." Others find it an occasional interesting break from the routine of the game. Though few if any seem to be making it a major part of the game for the long haul. The new scenarios, however, have gotten praise.

Among the comments about the expansion was of the detail of Pandaria, very picturesque with it's towns' architecture and the wilderness. Some also commented the land seemed more "normal" than previous parts of Azeroth. Here, you're more likely to see NPC people going about their lives farming, mining, fishing, and otherwise living. You'll also see a lot more kids.

WoW players interested in the role-play aspects of their characters have expressed these kind of  Pandaren players have something of an interesting challenge. Not only do they have to come up with an explanation why they sided with Horde or Alliance, but as from a race that's been isolated, war-torn Azeroth that's had to deal all kinds of threats and challenges from The Plague, Goblin technology, all kinds of demons and monsters, and of course that the Alliance and Horde are perpetually at some level of conflict. A new reality entirely foreign to these characters, it could certainly warp the mindsets of these furry adventurers. Or perhaps they somehow remain laid back and curious at heart.

A number of people feel Blizzard did a better job with "Mists of Pandaria" than "Cataclysm." Among the people I know, the Sunweavers guild in WoW is active again, with players both rolling up Pandaren characters and exploring the new land. The response doesn't seem to be as great as Cataclysm, when the guild grew with new players happy to have Worgen characters, but it has brought life back to a guild that was seeing only minimal activity for the past few months.

It's been commented on that if "Mists of Pandaria" fails to keep World of Warcraft's numbers up, it will be the expansion that sees the biggest multiplayer online game begin to lose it's dominance. While it will still be number one for at least a few more years, if it continues to decline like it has, games like Star Wars the Old Republic will begin to have comparable numbers of players. For the short term however, "Mists" has been a success, with 2.7 million units sold in its first week and the total number of players past ten million again, up from 9.1 million in August. So at least for now Blizzard is unlikely to make any major changes, such as expanding it's free-to-play version beyond level 20. It's a safe bet this game will eventually be getting players who hadn't been born when it was first launched.

My personal opinion is "Mist of Pandaria" rates a four out of five. If you're a dedicated WoW player you'll most likely love it, especially if you're a panda fan. If you're not already playing, it may not hold your interest for more than a few months. As for yours truly, I'm keeping my subscription.

And that's it for now from Azeroth.


Sources: WoWpedia, Gamespot.com, WoWInsider,

Bixyl Shuftan

Review of World of Warcraft's "Mists of Pandaria," Part One

On September 25th, Blizzard's "World of Warcraft," the most popular of massive multiplayer online games, released it's fourth expansion "Mists of Pandaria." Anticipated for several months, the update promised a number of new features, notably the new continent of Pandaria and a new player race: the Pandaren.

The Pandaren were originally created as an April Fool's joke, but to Blizzard's surprise the response was a positive one. So they were included in the Warcraft III computer game. The Pandaren are of course panda-like, with females smaller than males and sporting earrings. They also have small tails, with female reds having longer ones. They have a few special features compared to other races. They take less damage from falls. They get double the " Well Fed" stat bonuses from food. They start off with a fifteen point bonus in Cooking. Their "Quaking Palm" can stun a target for a few seconds. And their rested experience bonus lasts twice as long. The latter can be quite helpful for players leveling up a character. Most player classes are available: Warrior, Rouge, Mage, Priest, Shaman, Hunter, and the newest one: the Monk. What truly distinguishes Pandaren from other player races is that they are the first "neutral" one. They don't start out as Alliance or Horde, but choose who to side with near the end of their introductory quests.

Saying the Pandaren background have a Chinese influence is stating the obvious, though this is nothing new with World of Warcraft races such as American Indians with Taruen and Victorian English with Worgen. The plot background describes their last emperor shrouding their lands with an "impenetrable mists" thousands of years ago to protect it from the calamities at the time other lands were facing. Some generations ago, some Pandaren explorers founded a colony on the back of an island-sized sea turtle and their descendants have wandered the ocean since. This is where new Pandaren characters begin. Pandaren and turtles go together in other ways, with Pandaren hunters starting off with a turtle as a combat pet, and their racial mount being the speedy Dragon Turtle.

Beginning Pandaren characters start off as training in a small village, then are sent on quests to help out the island, occasionally fighting hostile monkeys and rabbit-like denziens. A few quests are an obvious take on one popular Japanese anime. Around Level 10, one's character and his/her friends come across the source of the island's distress: an airship having crashed into the giant turtle's side. There, they meet up with members of the Alliance and Horde, fighting against naga which have been stirred up by the crash. Once the island has been saved, it's decided to send Pandaren out into "the broken world" to help out it's other peoples. One of the character's friends decides on going over to the Alliance, while another will head to the Horde. The player then decides which path lies before his/her character: Alliance or Horde. After meeting up with the new leader, the player is free on how to progress while his/her friend begins teaching those interested on the ways of the monk.

Blizzard advertises monks as being experts in unarmed combat that "draw their weapons for devastating finishing moves." This doesn't mean going in without a weapon in your slot. Monk characters should be armed as normal. Monks have both an energy bar, and another bar for "Chi" energy. Some energy attacks will build up Chi energy,  while other special attacks use it up. Besides staves (which mine started out with), these characters can use fist weapons, one handed axes, maces, and swords, and polearms. Monks can be of most races, Humans, elves, dwarves, gnomes, and Draenei for the Alliance, Orcs, Tauren, Trolls, Forsaken, and Bloodelves for the Horde, and of course the Pandaren. Monks are limited to cloth and leather armor. Monks have three specializations: Windwalkers who concentrate on melee attacks, Mistweavers whom can heal, and Brewmasters whom can tank with their special moves like the "drunken masters" in some martial arts flicks.

Besides new races and new characters, players have some new territory to cover with their current ones. Level 85 characters upon entering their capital are given a mission. A ship carrying the Prince of Stormwind has run aground on a strange new land. Alliance characters are sent with a force to recover him and secure the land before the Horde does. Horde characters are sent with a force to get him and likewise secure the land before the Alliance. Once getting to Pandaria, both sides come to blows, and besides fighting one another are trying to win over the local Pandarens, as well as fighting the locals old foes whose attention has been aroused, as well as some dark spirits which have also been stirred up.

Characters will be unable to fly on personal mounts, until reaching level 90, the new top level in the game. Until then, there's the Pandaria kite transportation. There's also no mailboxes in the first few places you come across in the Jade Forest Zone, the entrance to Pandara. So saving loot such as player gear for the Auction House and skins & ores may be a problem at first. But if you look around the region, eventually you'll find a village with one. Deeper into the continent are some auction houses, including the Black Market Auction House with some items unavailable anywhere else. In the Black Market, items will be generated and listed by NPCs. There is no buyout price, only bidding.

Part Two of the "Mists of Pandaria" review will cover the Pet Battle System, and what some have been saying about the expansion. 

To read the second part, Click Here.

Bixyl Shuftan

Meanwhie, Back in Azeroth: "The Mists of Pandaria"

World of Warcraft, the most popular of the Massive Multiplayer Online Roleplaying Games, has been in the news recently. A few days ago, it was for it’s Chuck Norris TV commercial. But before that, in October Blizzard announced their plans for the next expansion for their bestselling game: "The Mists of Pandaria.”

To begin with, a new PC race is introduced, the panda-like Pandaren. No this isn’t some “Kung Fu Panda” joke. Longtime players are probably familiar with the Pandaren Monk companions (most often seen in capital cities). As it turns out, they were originally created years ago as an April Fool’s gag. But the response was so popular, they were included in the Warcraft III game. Rumors of them soon to be introduced in World of Warcraft persisted for years, as well as rumors of complaints from China. But at Blizcon 2011 in October, the word was official.

The racial traits of Pandaren, at least according to current plans, include twice the stat benefits from foods, in addition to starting out with 15 points in the Cooking skill. Their rested experience will be twice as long as other players, and take 50% less damage when falling. The Pandaren’s background describes their homeland, Pandaria, as being secluded from the rest of Azeroth and its fighting. Beginning Pandaren PCs start out as among a group of explorers on the back of a giant turtle. The Pandaren are neither Horde or Alliance, but unaligned. After some time progressing, new Pandaren characters will need to choose which faction to support.

Pandaren were provided by Blizzard with an interesting background. Naturally, much of their in-game cultural background is based on that of China, with elements of Daoism and Tai-Chi used as inspiration. Much like the Tauren, they have a respect of Shamanism. Similar to the dwarves, they have a love of alcoholic beverages, brewmaking considered a revered tradition among them.

A new class of character is introduced as well: the Monk. They are available to all races except for the Worgen and Goblins. Monks have three specilizations: Brewmasters, which can take more damage, Mistweavers, which are healers, and Windwalkers, whom deal more melee damage. They can use staves and fist weapons, in addition to one handed maces, with Mistweavers being able to use off-hand items. They wear leather armor. They use a new resource bar, a Chi-bar, which is described as being similar to the Energy bar for Rogues.

The Talent system is being described as “entirely redone.” Talent trees are being replaced by being granted another specialization ability every few levels. Plus, every fifteen levels a talent point that can be spent on one of three talents. There will also be Challenge-Mode dungeons, requiring players to complete them in a certain time. There are also plans for Scenario battles, where players team up to accomplish a goal such as capturing or defending an area. Then there’s the “Pet Battle System,” which will do doubt get the attention of “Pokemon” fans. All those companion pets which are currently just for show will be able to fight and level, as well as able to be traded on the Auction House. As of now, Mists of Pandaria is planned to have nine new dungeons, and three new Raids. And players will be able to level up to Lvl 90, with adjustments to profession skills.

There is one change that will be a bit upsetting to some players. All classes are losing their secondary weapons, which means hunters lose their melee items (though will be able to shoot point-blank), and other clases lose their raged weapon slots, though warriors and rouges can throw their weapons, and casters can use wands in their main hand.

Blizzard got an enthusiastic response to news of the expansion at Blizcon. Since then, reactions have varied, as one can tell from the WoW forums. Joystik called the expansion an interesting move in new directions. They quoted game lead designer Dave Kosak, "What we're trying to do is find other ways to incorporate other playstyles into the game and give everybody something to do. ... We have this big, giant, incredible world -- what else can you do in it?"

But “Pandaren” and all its changes are about a year away most likely. Until then, WoWers still have some new content coming up, which we’ll be covering in our next article about World of Warcraft.

Images from Blizzard.
Other articles at PC World, Joystik, WoWWiki, ING

Bixyl Shuftan

The “Cataclysm” Continues in Azeroth

This should be my last “Warcraft” article for a while. It’s not every day they make a major update. Though there have been a lot of changes here.

Besides the wolflike Worgen for the Alliance, Goblins are now available as player characters for the Horde side. Small and quick, they are higher in agility and intelligence, have a bonus in attack and casting speed, and those choosing alchemy as a profession start out at 15. From their gadgets, they’re able to do a Rocket Jump and Rocket Barage. And reflecting their background as moneymakers, are able to receive the best discount regardless of faction standing and able to call up access to their banks wherever they are.

The beginning quest chain for the Goblins explains how his/her cartel, the Bildgewater Cartel, got into the Horde. Instead of am unknown, the player starts out as an up and coming businessman/businesswoman on the cartel’s island city of Kazan. As you go about your business, including a ride on a hot rod, Deathwing, the main villain of the game expansion, shows up, and sets off the volcano. You gather your life savings (and then some), in order to get a seat on the Trade Prince’s yacht, but he double crosses you and makes you his slave. However, the ship gets caught in a storm and wrecked. So you get a chance to prove to your fellow Goblins you can be the hero who can get them out of their mess.

The beginning Goblin quest chain is longer than that of the Worgen's, the 100 Quests achievement reached along the way. But it’s packed full of chuckles as you face down funny-looking pygmies, “Oomie goomie goomie!”, who want to sacrifice your friends to their turtle god. Fortunately, you have your Goblin gadgets to get you through, from rocket boots to weed-wackers, but with little to no safety features, there’s always that chance something can go wrong. Along the way, you meet up with a group of Orcs, and everyone decides it’s best to cooperate in order to get off the island. You also run into the most well-known Orc, Warchief Thrall. Players who take up Goblin characters hear from him that he’s placing another Orc in charge of the Horde. This explains why Thrall’s nowhere to be seen in Orgrimmar these days.

But “Cataclysm” is much more than two new races available for play. Flight is now available in the “classic” continents of Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms, at least for those Level 60 and over. I’ve heard some wonder if this takes away from some of the experience, but most seem happy with it, the popular gathering places at Ogrimmar and Stormwind filled with flapping mounts as players happily show them off.

You’re going to need your flying license. New areas are now open in these two continents that would otherwise be inaccessible. New quests, monsters, and enemies await. These are more dangerous than previous areas, and your level cap has been raised to 85 to keep up. And with these new levels, new weapons and armor are available. Profession levels have also been raised from 450 to 525, the new rank of proficiency called “Illustrious Grand Master.” And with them, new materials to make high level armor, weapons, potions, etc.

And there’s a new Secondary Profession available, Archeology. Players go around Azeroth digging up artifacts at dig sites recently unearthed by the Cataclysm. After getting the skill from a trainer (the one in Stormwind named Harrison Jones, an obvious take on Indiana Jones), players go to dig sites, and survey them for archeology fragments. A survey site with a red light means you’re far away from your find. A yellow light a fair distance, and a green light means you’re close. One can gather fragments from a site three times, and then it closes while somewhere else on the continent another opens. Four dig sites are open at any one time, and contain artifacts from one of the races, such as Elven or Troll, or fossils.

Once enough fragments are gathered, then can be combined to make artifacts. Your first ones will be common and not worth much, such as common vases and trilobite fossils, . But as you continue to come across artifacts, more valuable ones will appear. Finding fragments will level your Archeology skill for a while, but eventually you level just by combining them into artifacts. But finding the fragments will still get you experience points, which can help out characters that haven’t quite reached Level 80 yet.

While a way to enjoy WoW between questing, some players have their doubts on how valuable this profession is. One guide I came across suggested truly epic items were few and far between. But as a Worgen I saw one Alliance character on a fossilized skeleton mount. A prize from archeology? Maybe.

Another new feature is guild advancement. Guilds can advance with 25 levels of progression, done through the accomplishments of it’s individual players through quests, battleground victories, etc. Each new level brings perks, such as bonus experience from quests and clobbering monsters, faster mount speeds, etc. There are two new Player vs Player battlegrounds, Twin Peaks and Gilneas.

And of course there are the jokes. The Worgen and Goblins have their own special jokes, such as “Since the change, I prefer my meat rare,” and, “When in doubt, blow it up.” Perhaps it’s the perception of this player, but the game designers seem to be getting a little brave on occasion with the humor. One of the female Goblin jokes is a vieled bondage crack, and in one of the lady Worgen jokes, a supposed listener confuses what she actually means by a “bone.” The slightly riskee humor continues to the new quests, in one the player delivering a shipment of crab meat to a lady sailor and being told a subtle STD joke. And it's not just the jokes where the off-color remarks appear. In one of the new low-level quests, the new Orc Warchief insults the Undead queen by calling her a rhymes-with-witch. Blizzard must think their audience is getting older.

Some are probably asking “why just raise the new top level to 85 instead of 90?” Despite being around for several years, World of Warcraft is still successfully at keeping a large audience, and will probably remain so for some time as long as Blizzard continues to be good at giving the players a great game. Someone thought they would keep their lead for at least 20 years. Most likely it won't be that long (in my opinion), but although some people still talk about a potential “WoW killer,” more game developers admit Warcraft will not be going away anytime soon. Instead of being knocked off it’s number one spot by a new hot game, most likely it’s position will be chipped away over time as players’ tastes change and new technical developments allow for stunning new games.

And of course some players would prefer to be in a smaller game where they can meet up with the administrators and content developers, and maybe even contribute to developing in the tools of the game, such as the roleplays and combat RPs in Second Life.

World of Warcraft may be the McDonalds of online games, to paraphrase Eurogamer writer Robert Purchase, but most would prefer to dine elsewhere on occasion as well, and some never get a taste for it to begin with.

Sources: WoWwiki, Eurogamer,net, Massively

Bixyl Shuftan