Raiding With Lisia
Wednesday, September 14, 2016
New Site
The podcast is now up to ten episodes, so I'm really happy about it. See you there!
Monday, July 11, 2016
Jumping Into the Podcasting Pool
The big thing that has prevented me from making my own podcast is wondering if I really have anything new or interesting to say, and also a desire to have someone else to say it with. I like to have interaction, not just me talking to an empty room. All the people I know who would be interested in doing a WoW podcast are already doing one, and there are quite a lot of them. In fact, many of the current WoW podcasters have either quit podcasting about WoW specifically, or quit altogether, or have been getting super desperate for things to talk about. So who am I to start up yet another one?
And yet, since I mentioned toying with it on my blog, some guy has done that, i.e. started up a new WoW podcast, about PvP. Some other people who already had at least one other podcast have started up a new one. Clearly I was right when I said to Mick Montgomery that there was still stuff to talk about (I was the only non-podcaster on that show). In the meantime, I was on Battlechat again, and the lovely Sil told me that she thought I should definitely go for it.
I'd tried to dip my toe in the water by recording a half hour bit with my husband, and posting it here, but as far as I know not one single person listened to it, except for Sil, whom I had to ask a couple of times (not her fault, she's busy). I assume part of this is because you had to actually click on the media player as opposed to just subscribing in your podcast app of choice, but it did frustrate me a bit. On the other hand, now I have absolutely no expectations that anybody is going to listen to the subscribable podcast either, so if anybody does, that will just be gravy. And since the only money I have actually spent specifically on this project is the $12 or whatever for the domain, I really can't complain if nobody but me cares. That said, I'd love it if people did in fact care and listen.
As of right now, I have three episodes up, which consist entirely of my husband and I discussing a given topic - no "news" or anything like that. We intend to go on with this format to the tune of about once a week, probably adding guests from time to time (I have promised Sil she's the first). I'd still love it if I could find a cohost, but for now, my husband, who also plays WoW, is doing the show with me, and we have a pretty good rapport (although he'd probably rather be doing something else). But we'll see how it goes. It's not listed on iTunes yet, since I need to redo the cover art to their specifications, but you can get it manually from Feedburner.
I hope that you'll join me in Raiding With Lisia! Please subscribe through the podcast app of your choice, and feel free to send the show email or participate on the Facebook page. See you there!
Sunday, June 12, 2016
Warcraft: The Beginning - Review (here there be spoilers)
Hi all. Sorry I haven't posted recently. I switched jobs in May, and because of ill health, it's been hard for me to adjust to the new commute. However, I'm hoping to be able to publish more often now that things have settled a bit.
Yesterday I went to see the Warcraft movie, twice in fact. I will say right off that I loved it, and I will certainly be buying the DVD as soon as it comes out. That said, it wasn't as good in some ways as I had hoped it would be. My issues follow:
The relationship among Medivh, Anduin, and Llane is core to the story - and yet, that relationship received almost no exposition in the movie. If you know the game lore, you know they grew up together and were best friends. If you read the supporting literature (graphic novel, novelization) you receive a lot of exposition. But there's almost none in the movie. They refer to each other as "friends" but that's not enough, and frankly, most of the viewing public isn't going to understand why a king, a wizard, and a soldier (yes, Lothar is so much more, but that's not explained either) would be close, never mind VERY close, friends. Likewise, if you haven't read the supporting literature, the fact that Taria is Anduin's sister comes out of left field. Again, the non-WoW-playing viewing public is going to be a bit staggered by the fact that a white-skinned, blue-eyed man has a dark-skinned, dark-eyed sister, even though that's one of the things that's so great about the game (i.e. the mix of what we think of as different races into one big whole). Giving some sort of support or exposition of everyone's relationship to each other would have made the whole plot stronger. I think this is really my biggest complaint.
My second biggest issue is with Medivh himself, and again it's a problem of lack of exposition. In the game lore, Medivh's actions are explained by his "possession" by Sargeras, but in the movie, there's no (apparent) concept of this possession; instead, the reason given is that his corruption began because he had previously begun studying fel magic so that he could combat Trolls who were also using it. However, this fact is not explained in the movie itself, but only in the supporting literature. In fact, you get the idea in the movie that fel magic is COMPLETELY UNKNOWN in Azeroth until Gul'Dan brings it in, except that oh wait, Medivh's using it? Again, this just comes completely out of left field, and even if you've read the literature, you're wondering where the Trolls got it. Now, I haven't read the movie novelization yet (nor have I finished the Durotan novel), so maybe some of this is explained elsewhere, but even if so that doesn't matter: a movie should be able to stand on its own, and this plot point does not.
I'm not even sure how I feel about the new Medivh explanation anyway. If there is no Sargeras, then is there a Burning Legion, or just random demons? If there is no Burning Legion, then how (why?) did Gul'Dan get his demonic power? Who is the demon that Medivh becomes, or is it just Medivh-as-demon? How did he "invite" the Orcs to Azeroth? Was all this going to be explained in a sequel? If so I really hope there IS a sequel, but with plot holes like this I'm a bit worried. The in-game lore was always a bit weird and convoluted, but I was used to it. Now I have no idea what's going on, and apparently neither did Ben Foster, because his acting was uneven and just not really believable.
Unfortunately, I have to say that Dominic Cooper, possibly for similar reasons of not understanding his character's motivation, did not do a great job with Llane (forevermore to be known to me as King Lame). The issue is most obvious just before Llane's death, because nowhere in the movie has he shown himself to be a person capable of sacrificing himself for his kingdom. His command to Garona to kill him just comes out of nowhere, and the only thing that saves that scene is Paula Patton's acting. As someone who cries at the drop of a hat, I should have been sobbing at that point, but I shed exactly one tear: movie fail.
Most of the special effects were great, but the wolves were awful and I'm very happy that they weren't utilized very often. Most of the time, how bad they were wasn't distracting, but the one scene where the wolf tries to attack Lothar was pretty awful; the wolf looked comical rather than frightening, which was very distracting.
The lack of blood, gore, and hacked limbs in the battle scenes made those scenes unbelievable. For instance, just before his death, Llane points out to Garona that they are surrounded, and there is a quick "air view" to illustrate that fact. The battle from that view looked like toy soldiers being blown around (which maybe is what it was?). We've come to expect much better from movie battle scenes. In addition, Draka's agonized delivery of her son was rendered completely ridiculous by the fact that the baby comes out completely clean. I get that perhaps we don't want to gross out the audience too much, but perhaps he could have at least been MOIST?
Garona was puzzling. In the original game lore she is represented as being half Orc and half Human, with this later being retconned to, or explained by, her actually being half Orc and half Draenei, the Dranei half being her mother, Maraad's sister. In the movie, however, she indicates that she wears her mother's tusk to remember her by, which would imply that her mother was an Orc (she also says her mother was burned for giving birth to her, which implies an Orc having done something unspeakable, such as willingly mate with a lesser creature rather than the forced mating of Orc male and Draenei female in the game lore). Yet she knows the Draenei language, which is notable, because Gul'Dan does not. She explains her knowledge of the Human language (which starts out as stilted and broken and then suddenly and for no apparent reason becomes utterly fluent) as being something that she learned from a Human prisoner brought through the portal, which makes pretty much no sense whatsoever, but no explanation is ever given for her knowledge of the Draenei language, unless it's in parts of the supporting literature that I haven't finished reading yet. Given that even the more recent lore explanation of her past had to be explained by "magical aging", this new confusion just adds to the plot issues I've already mentioned.
Orgrim's betrayal of his BFF Durotan is another important plot point that, once more, for lack of exposition, is a failure in terms of believability. While a plausible reason is eventually given, there is almost no leadup (one doubtful look is all we get) to his decision, so yet again I was caught off guard by something important to the plot. Kudos, though, for the agonized look that Durotan throws Llane in the same scene just before he turns to engage in the battle (and an unsurprising but unfortunate lack of apparent reaction on Llane's part - the camera cuts to him but his reaction shot is completely inscrutable).
I think those are all my negative comments. Now for what I really loved:
Anduin Lothar was fantastic. Travis Fimmel acted the HELL out of that part; I would say it was the best performance in the movie, rivalled only by Toby Kebbell's Durotan. (Since those are the two on the poster, I'd say it's fitting that they were the best characters in the movie.) When Lothar pushes Garona away slightly to tell her he's never been in so much pain, I shivered. That was just amazing.
You know what else was amazing? Khadgar. His character in general, and the interaction with Lothar were completely spot on. I could have watched an entire 2 hour movie filled with just Khadgar and Lothar, seriously. It's kind of ironic because I was never all that crazy about either character in the game lore - well, until Warlords of Draenor, when Khadgar becomes amazing and snappy. In fact, it seems to me that the Khadgar we're seeing in game right now is based on a man who learned some of his best sarcastic moves from his old friend Anduin Lothar, as portrayed in the movie.
Despite my saying that I could have watched a whole movie with just Khadgar and Lothar, I wish I'd seen more of Garona and Taria. I loved that they were both, in their own way, badass and yet vulnerable, and I would have loved to have seen more of that.
The "Orc CGI" was spot on. I kept forgetting that the Orcs weren't real, which means the effect succeeded. Other than the issue mentioned above - which could have been something that was cut - I also felt that the Orc characters were very well acted. In addition, I was delighted to be able to recognize Kargath and Grommash, who looked recognizably like their Warlords of Draenor portrayals. In fact, other than the skin color, Grommash looked exactly like he does in the expansion cinematic.
I loved all the little Easter Eggs in the film, such as the murloc. MRGHGALLALLAGHAG! <3 But seriously, those little moments of humor really added to the film, and I'm glad they were there.
The spell effects were also spot on, I felt, with one possible exception: Medivh's barrier during the "betrayal battle" was more reminiscent of elemental than arcane magic. However, I'm willing to believe that the Guardian would be capable of that kind of effect, so it didn't upset me too much. The rest of the effects were great. And bonus points for the "ding animation" as Khadgar defeated the fel magic.
In summation, I loved the movie, even though it wasn't perfect, and I hope that it did well enough that there can be a sequel. I'm eagerly anticipating the DVD release, and I hope that it's a Director's cut or that the deleted scenes, of which I suspect there are many, are included.
And it makes me even more excited about Legion!
Monday, April 18, 2016
elitist jerks
Monday, April 11, 2016
Adding On
But since this is my blog and I do have the ability to do so, I will go into addons a bit more. First of all, I've used a replacement for Blizzard's raid frames since, I think, 2009, long before I started to actually raid. My current favorite raid frame replacement is actually a full UI replacement, ElvUI. I cannot recommend it enough. In addition to the base UI mod, I use the following addons, which I install through the TukUI client rather than Curse (which I use for all my other addons besides ElvUI and its mods):
- Cecile Meter Overlay
- Dragon Overlay
- ElvUI Autolog
- ElvUI Channel Alerts
- ElvUI Color Tags
- ElvUI Extra Action Bars
- ElvUI Priest AoE
- Location Plus
- New Openables
- Raid Buffs Checker
- Deadly Boss Mods/DBM (all modules) - unless you really, really, really know the fight cold, including knowing when to tell OTHER people to do things, you should have DBM installed, and in fact many raid leaders require it. DBM tells you when when something is happening that you have to pay attention to, both with voice warnings and text on your screen, and it's highly configurable. If you're the tank and/or raid leader, you get even more options, such as pull countdowns, countable interrupts, and so on. It's useful in situations out of raid too, but for raids I consider it imperative.
- GTFO - Stands for Get the F Out, and what it does is play a (configurable) annoying sound when you're standing in stuff, or close to stuff, or taking damage from stuff. Not absolutely necessary, but very helpful.
- Omen Threat Meter - Gives you a graphic and/or plays a sound if your threat is getting high. Mostly useful if you're always grabbing aggro, or think you might, or want to make sure you DO have it.
- Weak Auras 2 - highly configurable interface for letting you know when you have to do something. It's not all that easy to use, but there are tutorials, plus it's easy to find scripts to import. So for instance you can have a set of icons on your screen to show you how long you've got till a certain buff/spell wears off, or a bar showing you cast time for a spell on your target, or whatever. For the latter, it's true that DBM has a lot of the same functionality, but sometimes more warnings are better than not.
- Bitten's Spellflash (all modules) - flashes the next spell or spells you should cast for optimal performance, based on SimC theorycrafting. Hitting the flashing buttons has certainly improved my deeps on my hunter, plus on classes that I don't know as well, has helped me learn them.
- OmniCC - This is probably duplicated in something in ElvUI, actually, but I've had it installed for a long time, and if you don't use ElvUI it's definitely useful. Puts the cooldown for your spells on your action buttons so you know how long you've got till CD.
- MikScrollingBattleText - Cool looking and configurable, easy to see, scrolling text for buffs and debuffs and such. As a bonus, comes with configurable sounds for when cooldowns pop. Can sound quite hilarious but the point is to alert you to something you might have missed. As I said above, the more of that the better.
- Pet Attack - for classes with pets, lets you know if your pet is not attacking.
- Pet Selector - for hunters, tells you what pet will provide the most useful buffs for your party.
- Recount (and/or) Skada - I have both installed but use only Skada currently as it's less of a resource hog. Gives you a report on how much damage or healing party members are doing, with various configurable types of reporting and so on. I've put it lower on the list simply because it doesn't provide any utility itself; it's mainly useful so you know how well or badly you (or others) are doing. If you're the raid leader you definitely want to have it up. As a healer, I use the DPS meter so that I know who to rez if several DPS have died.
- Who Pulled? - Mainly useful so you know who to blame.
- Decursive - I actually use this a LOT, because my healing class doesn't have a mass dispel so I can only dispel one at at time anyway. Allows you to remove curses, poison, diseases, and so on if your class is able to do so, with a click (or you can macro-ize it). Saves action bar use. I put it low on the list because it's only really important to have if you're a healing class.
- BonusRollPreview - In the last two expansions, there have been "bonus tokens" that you can spend on an extra roll for gear (or gold). This addon gives you a drop-down menu to show you what all the possible gear is, if you don't happen to know.
- Afterlife Crowd Control - Warns you when crowd control is about to break.
- AskMrRobot - Allows you to import your current gear profile into the AskMrRobot site so that you can maximize your gear (according to their theorycrafting method).
- Pawn - if you're not sure whether the drop you just got is better than what you're wearing, Pawn can help you decide.
Monday, March 28, 2016
The Lore of Yore
So yes, I loved this book, and I will continue to buy the Chronicle series as they come out. I do have one complaint about this book, though: the writing style. It's so very overwrought, with "untold" this and "towering" that. There's so much of this in fantasy writing, and it's really not necessary, even when you're writing about "ancient" subjects. Tolkien got away with it in The Silmarillion, but most writers simply can't pull it off, and the authors of Chronicle are no exception. However, to find out the answers to my lore questions, I'm willing to put up with it.
And here's my guilty secret: I might even (gasp) commit fanfiction, based on some of what I've learned. I haven't done that in years (and I'll admit to only one attempt, complete with overwrought language), but I'm feeling rather inspired. Stay tuned!