No Trial, I Don’t Like You.
Okay, so don’t get me wrong, the new ten man/twenty five man instance is SORT OF fun. The first boss is ridiculous, the second is easy, though I guess having flaming boots is entertaining. The third boss . . . makes me angry because I don’t want my PvP in my PvE thank you very much. (Less so because I can’t PvP, more so because people see a PvP encounter and panic. This style of game play is not for everyone). The fourth boss ain’t too hard either, but at least it’s an interesting concept – WEE I HAVE WHITE FEET, NO WAIT, BLACK!
Here’s my problem with Trial. Ulduar, Naxxramas, Seprentshrine, Tempest Keep, Black Temple, Karazhan . . . all have some semblance of a story to them. This? Is lacking. There’s no roleplay reason for my characters to care that they’re investing their time in this tournament. Mind you, I think the quests outside are workable – a lot of my rp friends have been talking about “tilting” and whatnot, but I don’t feel like the dungeon itself has a story outside of PEOPLE GET IN RING AND BEAT UP MONSTERS. K THNX. There’s a scourge army, a war between horde and alliance, and our faction leaders have time to sit around and stare at us as we take shiny purple items off of animal corpses? C’moooooon, Bliz. I’m not buying it.
In my opinion, this entire dungeon lacks anything interesting beyond the item level of its loot. The experience feels phoned in and lazy – there ain’t no soul. I guess producing content quickly has its ups, but I’d rather wait another month or two for a dungeon if it means that there will be a story I can latch on to later on.
So, that’s it. BLAH @ Trial, I say I say.
Ta!
Filed in World of Warcraft 10 Comments so far
Bricu on 31 Aug 2009 at 4:48 pm #
The whole theme of the Tourney seems to be, “lets work out our problems so we can fight Arthas together.” The 5-man instance seems to have a better story. “We present the challengers to you” hinting that they would make a great addition to the fight against Arthas.
All i think this does is suggest that Varian and Garrosh hate each other, that Thrall lost his mojo and can’t deal with Garrosh and that Blizz has no idea what to do with Jania Proudmoore anymore.
Itanya Blade on 31 Aug 2009 at 5:09 pm #
What Bricu says is the story that the PoL has taken and run with. They’re all working hard in the tourney so they can be on the front lines when it comes time to take the war to Icecrown.
So, while it may be a stalling tactic, it’s a flexible enough diversion for now.
shieldbreakr on 31 Aug 2009 at 8:55 pm #
I have to disagree with ya, Yva, and agree with Bricu. This feels like a force cohesion festival warcraft-style. Got horde and alliance hammering each other to get stronger, craftier, and prepared for the attack on Arthas.
My major problem is Arthas seems to be doing nothing about it? No attacks of scourge on the tournament. No sending the dragons to burn us down. If you look at the map in Warsong Hold (which you probably can’t, but I imagine the alliance have a similar prop) the LK is all over the place with his forces. Why isn’t he attacking the tournament built to train his murderers?
Mel on 01 Sep 2009 at 12:18 am #
Quote: Why isn’t he attacking the tournament built to train his murderers?
a) He is arrogant
b) He is busy making popcorn
Yeah, PVP in my PVE? *blergh*
I feel kind of meh about the whole tournament thing (might be, because I seem to be too stupid to joust…). It is fun to fool around for a little time, but nothing more.
el ranchero on 01 Sep 2009 at 4:52 pm #
My impression was that there is a lore reason for the tournament, though its logic is perhaps debatable. The idea is that the Argent Crusade isn’t so much afraid of Arthas’ personal badassery as they are of his ability to raise dead soldiers mid-battle, which must be incredibly frustrating from a general’s point of view. Their answer is to have this massive tourney now, before storming the citadel, and weeding out all the inferior talent so that Arthas doesn’t overwhelm them with zombie n00bs partway through the battle.
And for what it’s worth, Arthas apparently does try to foil the event on two separate occasions: once by sending in the Black Knight in the middle of your 5-man, and again by dispatching Anub’arak during the 10/25 raids.
Bricu on 02 Sep 2009 at 11:59 pm #
El Ranchero, that is a particularly brilliant insight. It is a little bit cold for the Argent Dawn, but, I like it.
Corise on 03 Sep 2009 at 2:49 am #
I tend to agree with el ranchero as far as the reasoning behind the tournament — this is one war that cannot be won by superior numbers alone. All over Icecrown, we’ve seen how our losses are the Lich King’s gain. (Which to me really drives home just how stupid it is for the Alliance and the Horde to be attacking each other right now. Hey, let’s make some more corpses of our enemies for the Lich King to raise! But I digress.) The tournament seems to be intended as a non-lethal way of testing soldiers’ battle prowess, thereby allowing the Argent Crusade to select the very strongest and best warriors and then hone their skills even further through the coliseum so that the forces we send in to attack Arthas are skilled, cohesive units that won’t end up dying and getting raised to attack us right back.
So the tournament itself makes sense to me. The attitudes of certain faction leaders and members while all of this is going on is more of an irritant, personally — it seems like all of the Alliance/Horde conflict in Icecrown is just playing right into the Lich King’s hands (see above re: making more corpses for the Lich King to raise). But meh. I’m not a big fan of PvP or factional hatred in general.
Yva on 03 Sep 2009 at 8:51 am #
Okay, so . . . not to throw another poker in the fire here, but you go into Trial under the supposition that you just killed /An Old God/ in Ulduar. The god that you know, corrupted flights.
How is killing a yeti showing any more prowess than dismantling an old god one zone over?
SADFACE.
Bricu on 03 Sep 2009 at 3:07 pm #
Gear wise, yes, you’re supposed to go Naxx > Ulduar > ToC. Story wise, the Tourney is calling heroes from all over Azeroth to prepare to fight the Lich King. Gear requirements do not equal story line progression.
Yva on 03 Sep 2009 at 3:09 pm #
Eh, more release time was what I followed than any sort of itemization. I guess you could say people were doing the tournament before Ulduar? I just sort of stick to Bliz’s timeline, which was “calling people after they’ve beaten the crap out of Ulduar.”