Mists of Pandaria: Beta

So, it’s been a long time since I posted on here, for any number of reasons, the best of which is that taking a break is good for the soul.  And that since WoW is a game, and I fundamentally believe all about the fun of a game (albeit with a bit of effort) I refuse to blog about something which is not fun, for long – because everyone wants to read about a tortured soul, don’t they?  Even the writer of that sort of drivel gets bored of it, ffs.

So what has brought me back is the MOP beta – for which I received an invite this week.  I know I am not in the first, second or however many waves of testing (I think I am in wave 4) and tbh, I probably shouldn’t be:  I’ve not played for 7 years, nor have I got the highest spec machine or anything, nor do I actually know anyone or contribute to theorycrafting:  I am an end-user, albeit one that has ranked up plenty of hours.

The panic on panda island leads me to think that this is a stress-test in a way:  even when the game is fully downloaded, there is endless lag – so much so that mobs can be untagged when you fire a spell, and yet grey after one hit:  there are people who appear out of nowhere – clearly they were present there before, but not visible – and looting is a mystery.  And interacting with quest targets?  I think I might do a public information post about that…

So far, I cannot copy a toon to the server:  either one of mine, or a premade.  So nothing really helpful for me to try there.  Hopefully that will calm down in the next week:  after the holiday weekend perhaps…  So, it’s off to panda island…  Along with everyone else who cannot make a top level toon.

First impressions – if it were not for the whole laggy thing, this would be more enjoyable.  There are a few really enjoyable quests, with nice twiddly bits to them.  The gear does not seem to match that available from the gnome or goblin starting areas, and wealth is significantly poorer.  I did not find trainers on the island, but perhaps on my second time round I will work out where they are:  my spels appeared on my action bar without any intervention.  And I never saw any professions trainers round about level 5, not even in dummy form.

I’m still really disliking the whole kawaii female thing:  I can cope with flowers in my hair as a style, but the whole dreamy head-on-one-side fidget on one leg thing is awful.  Awful.  With the goblin female it was endearing, because they didn’t have that soppy dreamy look, it could be imagined to be the sudden shyness behind the tough survivor exterior.  Here it is just fluff and more fluff.  I want to slap her.  Not a good feeling to have towards a toon that you’ll live with for 90 levels and beyond.  Stand up straight, girl!  stop that slouching and sighing.  Drink coffee, not lemonade from a plastic cup through a straw…

Next thing to try will be a monk – for the whole rolling along thing:  that is so much fun to see, so might be fun to try – it is not a racial trait but a class one.  Could be interesting to see on a non-panda, actually.  I like the jumping and landing animations – especially jumping from significant heights (if you get a lift to the top of the temple and you really didn’t want to be there, there are no steps down, only get onto one of the bridges and jump down as carefully as possible – the whole crouching tiger look is great.