Guide Contest - Final update and Prizes
I couldn't pick all the good guides I got during the contest and I figured I could do one last update with all the guides from people who didn't win but still did a good job. If you have some free time, I strongly suggest the Guides Submission - Rare and Guides Submission - Uncommon forums to check out all the submissions.

It was ridiculously hard to pick winners for the contest and I hated every second of it. Refusing good guides just because there was something slightly better or because it didn't match the few criteria I had is like resurrecting a gnome in a raid, it really really sucks but you know you have to do it anyway. I'll probably switch to a voting system for the next contest and hope that people won't try to cheat it too much.

Also, I will (finally) send the prizes to the winner today, the reason why I delayed them for so long is mostly to make sure that none of the guide was stolen from another player/website. I figured that waiting 10 days to make sure that nobody come and claims one of the guide was the best thing to do, it didn't happen, enjoy your prizes! (It's also too late to do it now, don't waste your time trying to steal a prize with that)

General

Technical

Classes

Professions & Gold Farming

Miscellaneous

PvP

Thanks again to everyone who took the time to submit a guide, and thanks to WoWTCGLoot.com for providing the shiny prizes.


Guild Reputation Cap
Originally Posted by Bashiok (Blue Tracker)
Well, I think this is a valid complaint being that there's an initial buy-in period where you're kind of wondering why you have to level up reputation with a guild you've been in for a year, but that's sort of the nature of implementing new features like this.

You are correct in that we do not want people to join guilds, be able to immediately buy rewards that the guild unlocked, and jet. Your idea of unlocking rewards based on time spent in the guild instead of contribution isn't quite right either.

Guild rep exists to gate rewards based on someone's actual contributions to their guild, not just being some dope on the roster. Jumping in to guild dungeon and raid runs (with 80% members, [40% for 40 person raids] until 4.0.6 which drops 5 person dungeons to variable gains based on 3/5, 4/5, and 5/5), winning rated bg's, or earning guild achievements, all help earn guild rep. And yes, so do quests, should you find yourself doing them.

The point is not to force you to do things you do not want to do, but instead be rewarded for participating in activities with your guild. And it uses criteria that ideally keep it from getting too 'gamey'. We could probably say if you make a flask, give it to a guild mate, and they drink it, you get some guild rep. And then that type of action turns into a fun farming game that has nothing to do with actually encouraging guild interaction. The criteria we've set are hopefully those that are both beneficial to the guild and its members, as well as avoiding making grindy actions the best way to get rep.

As far as making it account wide, I'm not a designer, but that definitely hinders, again, the guild participation factor. Once you have guild rep set on one character, and if that then applied account wide, your desire to contribute to guild content that isn't pushing gearing your character drops substantially. However, if you have an alt that's 80, yeah you probably will want to join in on that Blackrock Caverns run being put together. Otherwise you're a jaded 85 guildie who has variable interest in actually helping someone else out (Yes, yes, I'm sure you're the most selfless and helpful person in your guild, but that scenario is too often the rule and not the exception). It could also be gamed to some degree... but I'm not sure to much effect.

As I said initially this can be a weird start conceptually, but while contributing with guild members you're gaining rep, and you'll get access to those rewards from then on. As this is still a fairly new and fairly big and complex system we're watching it very closely, and fully intend to keep adding to it and improving upon it. Your constructive feedback is welcome.

How do random dailies or fishing quests have anything to do with guild interaction?
Maybe not a whole lot directly (although there are a ton of indirect benefits), but it is a way for the super low pop guilds or very inactive guilds, and their members, to rep up. Say your guild has 10 people and of those 10 people a couple log in maybe once a week, we want there to be some way that you'll eventually level your guild, and in addition, be able to rep up and purchase rewards. It's going to be slower, for sure, but it's there.

As for your previous comment regarding flasks etc. I think I can see who contributes to the guild on a larger scale as well via the use of the Guild Bank. Isn't helping the guild aquire the mats and items that help us all do things a valid part of contributing to a guild?
Sure, but again, that can be gamed. Making guild rep a meta game of depositing mats, to remove them, launder them, and re-deposit to exalted is not the point of the system. And while it would be cool to recognize those things, there's simply too many loopholes.

Computers - Setup of the Month (by chaud)
chaud's setup of the month is one week early this month because of the release of the new CPUs, it's a pretty good time to upgrade and I guess a lot of people will be interested in the article. (The next one might be in 2 months instead of one now that the big wave of upgrades is done)

Read if you plan to upgrade - New CPUs and GPUs are not coming anytime soon, so now is a good time to buy. New SSDs are coming later in Q1 that might be of interest if you are not ready to buy just yet.

Don't hesitate to post any feedback in the comments of that news post, and don't forget to visit the Computer Forum for any extra questions!

Peripherals/Monitors

Component Puppy Dolphin
MonitorASUS VW224U 22-Inch Widescreen - $150ASUS VW246H 24-Inch Widescreen - $221
KeyboardMicrosoft Digital Media Keyboard 3000 - $25Cyborg V.5 - $37
MouseLogitech MX518 - $35Logitech G500 - $50
SpeakersLogitech S220 2.1 Speaker System - $23Logitech Z313 Speaker System - $40
Component Narwhal Unicorn
MonitorDell E2311H 23-inch LED-backlit Widescreen - $332Dell UltraSharp U2410 24-inch (IPS Panel) - $556
KeyboardLogitech G110 - $66Razer BlackWidow (Backlit)- $70
MouseRazer Deathadder - $47Razer Naga (Buttons on the Side) - $71
SpeakersCreative Inspire T3130 2.1 Speaker System - $50Logitech Speaker System Z523 - $84


Puppy and Dolphin

Component Puppy Dolphin
CaseNZXT GAMMA Classic - $40NZXT GAMMA Classic - $40
Power SupplyOCZ ModXStream Pro 500W - $65Corsair 650TX - $80
CPUAMD Athlon II X4 635 AM3 - $99AMD Phenom II X4 955 Black Edition - $150
HeatsinkCooler Master Hyper 212 Plus - $28Cooler Master Hyper 212 Plus - $28
MotherboardGIGABYTE GA-770T-USB3 AM3 - $93GIGABYTE GA-890GPA-UD3H AM3 - $135
Memory4GB PNY Optima DDR3 10600 - $354GB G.Skill Ripjaws F3 4GB 12800 DDR3 - $75
Graphics CardXFX 5770 - $145XFX 6850 or EVGA GTX 460 - $190 / $229
Hard DriveWestern Digital Caviar Blue 500 GB - $44SAMSUNG Spinpoint F3 1TB - $60
DVDLite-On LightScribe 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $22Lite-On LightScribe 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $22
Total$571$780 / $819


Narwhal and Unicorn

Component Narwhal Unicorn
CaseCooler Master Centurion 5 II - $54Cooler Master HAF932 - $137
Power SupplyCorsair 650TX - $80Corsair 750HX (7 Year Warranty) - $130
CPUIntel i5-2500k - $233Intel i7-2600k - $330
HeatsinkTuniq Tower 120 Extreme - $59Noctua 6 NH-D14 - $85
MotherboardASUS 1155 P67 P8P67 Pro - $201ASUS 1155 P67 P8P67 Deluxe - $248
Memory4GB G.Skill Ripjaws F3 4GB 12800 DDR3 - $754GB G.Skill Ripjaws F3 4GB 12800 DDR3 - $75
Graphics CardXFX 6870 OR EVGA GTX 470- $240XFX 6970 - $380 OR EVGA GTX 570 - $370
Hard DriveWestern Digital 1TB Caviar Black - $98Western Digital 1TB Caviar Black - $98
SSDNoneOCZ Vertex 2 120 GB (Review) - $223
OR
Corsair Force 120GB (Review) - $230
DVDLite-On LightScribe 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $22Lite-On LightScribe 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $22
Total$1062$1723



Reminder - Curse is still recruiting!
Curse is still recruiting and you should definitely apply if you think you have the skills required to join the company! A few positions are now filled but we're still looking for skilled people for the jobs below.






Comics
Nerfnow.com has an interesting (or depressing?) comic on MMORPGs last week!

This article was originally published in forum thread: Guides Contest, Guild Reputation, Setup of the Month, Recruitment, Comics started by Boubouille View original post
Comments 71 Comments
  1. Switchshot's Avatar
    True comic.... It's about the goal now, not about the experience
  1. Toejhomas's Avatar
    That computer guide is all sorts of jacked, if you want a better one check out tinyurl.com/falconguide - it's updated every month.
  1. Titan's Avatar
    There is no point in suggesting the P8P67 PRO to anyone who isn't going to be using it for crossfire/sli as 80 percent of the features are the same as the non pro. Anyone who doesn't know how to pick components themselves won't be doing serious, 5ghz overclocks. So the non-pro board will not only do everything they want, but cost $30 less.

    Also, you should point out the aftermarket HSF is OPTIONAL. Only buy it if you are overclocking. the I5 2500k can run up to a maximum of 80C before fail. With the stock cooler on a chip that isn't overclocked it runs in the high 30's under load and in the high 20's while idle. Which, in Intel chip standards is freezing. So if someone does not plan to SLI and overclock to 4.5ghz they could save $90 by switching to the non-pro bored and going with the stock HSF. They could then put that $90 into a higher end GPU and have a machine that would outperform the one listed with all the same features.
  1. F-Minus's Avatar
    When in comes to PSUs, Enermax is where it's at.
  1. Meugly's Avatar
    I don't understand why so many of these ultimate system kind of things recommend inferior SSDs. I always check benchmarks, like this one:
    http://www.harddrivebenchmark.net/high_end_drives.html

    Probably the most interesting thing in consumer SSD right now is the Revo Drive X2. Gotta be the X2, not the first version. This baby has 4 Sandforce controllers on it, and maybe best of all, is on a PCI card.
  1. keLston's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Meugly View Post
    I don't understand why so many of these ultimate system kind of things recommend inferior SSDs. I always check benchmarks, like this one:
    http://www.harddrivebenchmark.net/high_end_drives.html

    Probably the most interesting thing in consumer SSD right now is the Revo Drive X2. Gotta be the X2, not the first version. This baby has 4 Sandforce controllers on it, and maybe best of all, is on a PCI card.
    Because cost is still a consideration. The revodrive x2 is also not a standard drive, PCI express drives have been around for a couple of years, not sure why they are suddenly more "interesting" now. They just happen to cost, oh I don't know, 4 times the price and the reliability of their data storage has been called into question.

    Everyone knows the Crucial C300 series is the fastest on the market. Only caveat is that you're required to make sure you can support it (SATA3) and it costs nearly double other SSD drives but you're not getting double the performance. That priceerformance ratio is at the level of absurdity. It's beyond the point of reason. Are you really going to notice the 0.6 seconds?
  1. Lemons's Avatar
    I hate the idea of guild rep. It just overcomplicates things. Really guilds should be something people either do or don't do at their own discretion, and putting a bunch of little rewards in is stupid. I mean, aren't there already enough rewards for being in a guild vs. solo play? Access to timely and reliable groups? Access to the professions of the guild? Maybe guild repairs? Epic loot? Etc? Being in a guild is its own fucking reward without having extra rewards piled onto that.

    Right now, if you're not in a guild, or not in a high level guild, I bet you feel left out big time. I know I would.
  1. Scythen's Avatar
    That comic resonated with me on a different level, mainly because I feel it's as much the games fault as it is the players for coming to the state it is in now.

    Using the "Curious piece of landscape, I will explore it later" one as an example. I used to be that guy too... and now I'm not. Not just because WoWhead or any other wiki site says there is nothing there, but because there really is nothing there. Even back in the old Asheron's Call days if people remember that game, there were "Point of Interests" on the map you would go to and there would be Stonehenge type ruins or an abandoned castle. Problem was, they were interesting to look at, or as decorations, but you couldn't interact with them at all. They had virtually no purpose other than eye candy. WoW suffers heavily from the same thing.

    Newmans Landing being a prime example of this problem. You can't interact with the little house there. You can't find any lore or anything related to it in game, who built it, why are goblins there. You can't read any of the books on the shelves. You can't do nothing there. You can't make a note about it on your map. You can't ask any NPC about it. When the artist created that house, he wasn't creating it with a backstory and lore. He wasn't thinking about who built it or why. He modeled it in Maya or whatever 3d program he uses, plopped it down in the world 3d space somewhere, added some non-interactive doodads to it. And submitted it for approval to his boss. His boss said "looks good" and it got put into the game. The most exciting thing about it now is it can be mentioned in the dozens of threads that have popped up over the years "Weird places in WoW", "Secret places in WoW".

    It all comes back to human psychology. If you consider people who live in cities with landmarks... the landmarks are not exciting to them. If you live in Toronto, and see the CN Tower everyday on your way to work, you don't go "Ooooh ahhh look at that" everytime you see it. You don't even look at it most of the time. Tourists however, will take their picture with it in the background, show it to their family and friends when they get home... say "look I was there". You show that same picture to someone in Toronto however, and they shrug because if they turn their head, the tower is right there. The WoW world is like you live in a city with a landmark, but so does everyone else. So there is nobody to show the picture to who will care because they all see the same landmarks everyday on their way to work.

    Same principle applies to the "Abyssals killing fisherman for sport" quest. You stop caring about the story behind the quest because you really have no effect on it. With phasing now, you have some effect on some things to a limited extent... but after not having that for so long... and making it limited to only some facets of the world, it doesn't resonate enough to make a difference. If you kill those 15 Abyssal creatures and finish the quest, then go back to the beach, chances are they are still there killing fisherman. So what was the point of even bothering? Oh right, the gold or experience you got for turning in the quest. Which goes back to why it doesn't matter what the story is behind it. It could've been a white untextured box banging up against a blue box and psychologically it would be exactly the same. The only reward was the gold or exp or item, there was no reward in the form of closure to the original problem which was the fisherman being killed for sport. So psychologically, when you later get asked to help a village that is being attacked by rabid grizzly bears, in your mind you know that even if you killed every grizzly in the forest, they will keep coming, so your mind dismisses the information about the bears and the village altogether and focuses only on the information that is relevant to you... the reward.

    Anyway, this is already too long... and there really isn't any way to "fix" the problem. These are businesses that make these games to make a profit... and none of them have unlimited manpower, time and resources to create a fully interactive, fully immersive, fully living virtual world without the issues that result in the mindset illustrated in that comic. There's nothing we can do about it, so just like the quests in the game, our human minds dismiss that information and focus on what's relevant to us.... EPIC LOOTS!!!

    It is what it is...
  1. mmoc88be108a0f's Avatar
    how well will wow run on dolphin?
  1. Scythen's Avatar
    That comic resonated with me on a different level, mainly because I feel it's as much the games fault as it is the players for coming to the state it is in now.

    Using the "Curious piece of landscape, I will explore it later" one as an example. I used to be that guy too... and now I'm not. Not just because WoWhead or any other wiki site says there is nothing there, but because there really is nothing there. Even back in the old Asheron's Call days if people remember that game, there were "Point of Interests" on the map you would go to and there would be Stonehenge type ruins or an abandoned castle. Problem was, they were interesting to look at, or as decorations, but you couldn't interact with them at all. They had virtually no purpose other than eye candy. WoW suffers heavily from the same thing.

    Newmans Landing being a prime example of this problem. You can't interact with the little house there. You can't find any lore or anything related to it in game, who built it, why are goblins there. You can't read any of the books on the shelves. You can't do nothing there. You can't make a note about it on your map. You can't ask any NPC about it. When the artist created that house, he wasn't creating it with a backstory and lore. He wasn't thinking about who built it or why. He modeled it in Maya or whatever 3d program he uses, plopped it down in the world 3d space somewhere, added some non-interactive doodads to it. And submitted it for approval to his boss. His boss said "looks good" and it got put into the game. The most exciting thing about it now is it can be mentioned in the dozens of threads that have popped up over the years "Weird places in WoW", "Secret places in WoW".

    It all comes back to human psychology. If you consider people who live in cities with landmarks... the landmarks are not exciting to them. If you live in Toronto, and see the CN Tower everyday on your way to work, you don't go "Ooooh ahhh look at that" everytime you see it. You don't even look at it most of the time. Tourists however, will take their picture with it in the background, show it to their family and friends when they get home... say "look I was there". You show that same picture to someone in Toronto however, and they shrug because if they turn their head, the tower is right there. The WoW world is like you live in a city with a landmark, but so does everyone else. So there is nobody to show the picture to who will care because they all see the same landmarks everyday on their way to work.

    Same principle applies to the "Abyssals killing fisherman for sport" quest. You stop caring about the story behind the quest because you really have no effect on it. With phasing now, you have some effect on some things to a limited extent... but after not having that for so long... and making it limited to only some facets of the world, it doesn't resonate enough to make a difference. If you kill those 15 Abyssal creatures and finish the quest, then go back to the beach, chances are they are still there killing fisherman. So what was the point of even bothering? Oh right, the gold or experience you got for turning in the quest. Which goes back to why it doesn't matter what the story is behind it. It could've been a white untextured box banging up against a blue box and psychologically it would be exactly the same. The only reward was the gold or exp or item, there was no reward in the form of closure to the original problem which was the fisherman being killed for sport. So psychologically, when you later get asked to help a village that is being attacked by rabid grizzly bears, in your mind you know that even if you killed every grizzly in the forest, they will keep coming, so your mind dismisses the information about the bears and the village altogether and focuses only on the information that is relevant to you... the reward.

    Anyway, this is already too long... and there really isn't any way to "fix" the problem. These are businesses that make these games to make a profit... and none of them have unlimited manpower, time and resources to create a fully interactive, fully immersive, fully living virtual world without the issues that result in the mindset illustrated in that comic. There's nothing we can do about it, so just like the quests in the game, our human minds dismiss that information and focus on what's relevant to us.... EPIC LOOTS!!!

    It is what it is...
  1. Pexxle's Avatar
    The comic is pure LOL and Truthpaste.

Site Navigation