Molly Gets Her Gnome On!

Uber Wife and I have been trying to take a second and third set of wizards through Zafaria. It's always a bit difficult coordinating our schedules.

I got to hand it to Bailey though, she's done the "lionblood's share" of the work preparing her storm wizard and Molly (a mutually claimed life wizard -- it's a long story involving my wife swiping my life character and claiming her as her own hehe) by getting them through both Celestia and Wintertusk.

Last night though, I played Molly and Bailey played Bailey (her storm wizard named Bailey that is) in the big Z! Zafaria! By the end of the night we were finished with the Savannah. Man that's a lot of fire lion people defeating. whew.

We were both psyched when Molly earned her Gnomes spell and was treated to the Gnome visitation in MooShu.


It's too bad these new spell appearances don't stick around longer like the old ones, right? I love to hold my visitations open for as long as possible. :)


So, we now have a gnome caster in the Team Friendly family!

If we could inspire Amber to play her character more, we'd have two gnome casters! ;)

Happy Dueling!

Bailey, Thomas, Kyle, and Iridian finish Zafaria

I was actually going to bring this up on the last Check This Out post, but I forgot to mention it. WHOOPS!

Yup, mark four transcended wizards down for Team Friendly as we finished up Zafaria last Sunday.


There we all are sitting in front of the weird box thingy at the end of Zafaria. Wierd box thingy is awesome.

It took us a while to make our way through the world, simply because Bailey and I wanted to experience Zafaria together. Coordinating our schedules while juggling the three kids and their needs and own wishes to play on the computer can be a tricky thing, but we were lucky enough to get some nice stretches of game time over a few weekends, and the rest is history.

Here's the obligatory Morganthe screenshot. :)


Here's the other obligatory screenshot of team friendly in elephant illusion. :) :)


There were a lot of great moments in Zafaria (like visiting the zoo), but more than that, it was fun chatting with our friends lists while playing through Zafaria and spending some time playing together. That was fun, and thank you all for making it an easy ride for us with all the support.

Next up for us would probably be taking another team through . . . I'll let you know when we plan it all out. It'd be great to play my ice wizard again, and I think Bailey has a Myth wizard burning in her pocket. The lure of the basilisk is strong. :)

In the meantime, Thomas is busy crafting his Spiritcaller Drums. Just one more Conga Drum and a few black pearls, and I'm ready to finish that crafting quest up!

Happy Dueling

Zafaria Going Live!!

Wizard101 shutdown at midnight last night as both the live realm and the test realm were closed for a ten hour period. The reason why was given on Wizard101's Facebook page: Zafaria be comin' today!

I'm a little bummed I didn't get to see the end of the game in the test realm, but like I said in my previous post, we've had some difficulties playing this last month due to real life things, but . . . I did get pretty far last night, and I'm happy to say that I made it into the drum jungle and dinged level 68.

WOOTS! Check out my Dr. Von's!

YOU MONKEY GET SHOCKED DEAD!


YOU WIZARD GET LIGHTNING BOLT HEAL!


ME FRANK! ME KILL STUFF!


I think that's my favorite part about the Dr. Von's spell is that I GET TALK LOUD DUMB MONSTER WHEN CAST! RAWR!

I reported a few bugs. One involving the Dr. Von's spell which was, when zoning back out of the Death School (after recently zoning into the Death School just after getting the Dr. Von's spell), Dr. Von's monster's visitation spot (which is directly outside the Death School) would flash back to life for a couple seconds. You could zone back into the Death School and then back out into Nightside and BAM! There's Frank again and again and again each time you zoned out. ACK! He's the monster that won't die . . . again!! ;)

So, anyway, the fight with The Hoarder wasn't much to write home about and it was a pretty simple battle.


PRISMED WRAITH KILL DEAD! HE NO CHEATING BOSS!

I think it was my old buddy Starsongsky that mentioned over Twitter how cool these class specific Bookshelves were inside The Hoarder's room in Dragonspyre. I'd have to agree!


KI Mark those down as a future crafted item, would ya? Those are great!

I love that one of the where-does-this-lead-to(?) doors of the spiral finally got used in Dragonspyre for the Hoarder fight. :)

Now it's time to do it all over again! ENGAGE LIVE REALM!

Hope to see you all transcended in the live realm soon! Can't wait to see all the buzz and excitement as people explore this new world. :) Those first few days and weeks when new stuff goes live is so much fun! Enjoy it!

Happy Dueling!

Greyhorn Mercenary Land

Well, I thought I'd just put up a quick post to let you all know where I am and what I'm doing. I'm currently Level 67 on the Test Realm and quickly approaching level 68 (only two bubbles away). Woot! Test cast of Dr. Von's monster coming up! Can't wait. :)

The road to Level 68 has been fun. There were a couple cheating bosses along the way, a trip to a zoo, magical wall paintings that recounted all of Zafaria's majestic past, and . . . a lot of greyhorn mercenaries. A lot ...






Yeah and funny enough, this morning when I logged off I got another quest to kill . . . You guessed it! Greyhorn mercenaries.

Well, that's one badge that shouldn't be too difficult to earn! :)

It's been kind of an insane week, y'all. One of our computers had a hard drive fail, and the Geek Squad at Best Buy was baffled. Needless to say, our family's gaming and computer use has been, um, restricted. I've got deadlines approaching, a death in the family, parent teacher conferences, and business crap woes . . . Not to unload on you all. I WILL PREVAIL!!

Sigh.

How's your bug finding going on the Test Realm? Good?

Happy Dueling!

Test Realm Tweaking Zafaria

You asked for it, you got it . . . Zafaria is now a little bit tougher. Of course, this made some angry (I'm not sure I buy that "we fizzle more."), but the topic is still being debated. I was online for a little bit this morning and fought a couple battles and didn't really notice the changes.

It'd be nice to see what exactly got tweaked? From Kevin's vlog, it appears that mobs have more health and critical more often. He also adds that it might simply mean you shield more often and that fights will take a bit longer, which is basically what people were asking for . . . a little bit more of a challenge.

I hope that in the future that KI will look at increasing challenge in a more creative way. "Creative" though usually means "more time consuming." To quote myself:

"And that's another question. How should KingsIsle make the fights more difficult if they do? I don't think it's as simple as adding 1,000 health to every mob. I think most of us would rather see a more interesting mechanic rather than just stacking health on the things we fight. Strange resists? Beserk on first round? More healing mobs? More but limited battle circle sizes? More difficult puzzles? What is it that could make this more interesting to the battle weary legendary wizards?"

I have a sneaking suspicion that we're entirely too late in the game for many "interesting changes." You know?

The other change seems to be Level 70 henchmen got buffed and correspondingly became more expensive. Although I'm not sure if the price was just to discourage people from using them too much on the test realm, be carefully with the pricing, KI. If you raise that cost too much, people won't use them. Raising the difficulty of the world is great and will naturally make people look to henchmen more, but raising the cost of those henchmen at the same time might actually take money from your pocketbook. My gut is telling me that the cost of a hireling for one round should not equal the price of a hoard pack.

Also, what do you all think about the changes to Sirens and Dr. Von's Monster (no longer Dr. Katzenstein's Monster)? Looks like Sirens was nerfed a touch and Frankenstein is now adding a -25% healing debuff on the target. On the surface that seems like it could be useful in PvP. What do you think?

Thanks for reading and as always, let me know what I've forgotten or missed. It's appreciated. :)

Happy Dueling!

Zafaria Too Easy?

I've been seeing a couple of threads on central proclaiming that Zafaria is too easy: like this one (where at least 61 people agree) and this one (where a call is made to add 1000 health to all mobs and add more cheating bosses).

Personally I am sitting right below level 62. I kind of wanted to sit out for a bit and let the test realm die down from the madhouse that it was on day one. It's been really nice being able to find a battle circle and still group with people.

I can identify a little bit with the sentiment that the world is too easy, but then I also remember what Krokotopia was like. Do you remember playing through Krokotopia and encountering those 150 health manders after you had just been downing some rather difficult scarecrows (for your level) in the haunted cave? Eventually the difficulty of Krokotopia ramped up, but it never was horribly difficult.

Have I died in Zafaria? yeah, I took a defeat against Queen Tanei Ghostmane's 3 vs. 1 battle this morning in the Savannah right before posting this.


Will it stop me in my tracks over and over? Oh, not at all. I'll simply adjust my strategy a bit or bring an extra character with me. We have four accounts after all and people on our friends lists . . . the easiest way to beat something difficult is add another wizard, and perhaps that is why the difficulty seems meaningless to many?

Every fight in the test realm on the opening day (and day after) was most likely faced with 2-3 other wizards by your side. Then again, even with the Necromancer, who is designed to solo, I was feeling those first few mobs could have been a little tougher. Too be honest, you'd think KingsIsle would make things a little harder to upsell their hireling sales in the crownshop. ;)

I did keep thinking to myself, how in the world would Angus ever get through a world like this where mobs start with 3 power pips and cast right out of the gate . . . not giving many rounds to shield at all. I have no idea.

So, what do you all think after playing through Zafaria a bit . . . is it too easy? Should KingsIsle give us more of a challenge, even outside the boss fights?

And that's another question. How should KingsIsle make the fights more difficult if they do? I don't think it's as simple as adding 1,000 health to every mob. I think most of us would rather see a more interesting mechanic rather than just stacking health on the things we fight. Strange resists? Beserk on first round? More healing mobs? More but limited battle circle sizes? More difficult puzzles? What is it that could make this more interesting to the battle weary legendary wizards?

OR, does it not matter the difficulty? does it only matter that I play here with my friends and enjoy an "easy" (gotta put that in quotes because Angus is pooping his pants over how he'd survive without gear) challenge?

Let me know what you think!

Happy Dueling!

Zafaria Info from Test Realm EXPLODES! BOOM!

This is how Wizard101 fans operate . . . Less than 24 hours later after Zafaria has been released.

- All level 68 spells have been revealed (A couple Astrals too) (oh yeah, gardening spells too). (oh yeah even MORE astral spells)

- Leopard pet drop location confirmed and skink too. (as well as a confirmation that there is a lack of new school pets.)(also, petnomes for leopard and skink)(also, trying to discover all rewards for feeding pets your gear.)

- Level 70's title is not heroic, but "Transcended."

- There's an elephant transformation potion quest.

- How to beat Belloq's cheat.

- A video of all the new mounts in Zafaria.

- New wand with no level requirement in the crowns shop.

- There are a couple guides at work for Monkees locations: here's one.

WHEW. You all work very fast and furious.

Me? Well, there's no way I can keep up with all that. I'm content with watching from a distance and trying to throw out a joke or two. I did get some time playing with Uber Wife on the test realm last night though! We're finally on the same quest, but I'm pretty sure she's going to play some more today on the test realm without me while I'm at work. I'll catch up. :) Too be honest, it was extremely difficult to find an open slot in the battle circles on the test realm last night. Hopefully that will calm down over the next few days. I think we'll start to see even more information and hopefully more meaningful discussion about how our gameplay will change. Nathan Shadowblood is off to a good start.

Oh yeah, and all this talk this fast is aging me quickly:


I'm a lost student . . . with grey hair! :( KI! My hair is blue not grey! ;)

It's good to see everyone having fun with Zafaria. Remember though, it's not a race (well, anymore at least). We'll all be Transcended soon enough. :) How does it feel to you? Do you like the feel of the new world? Done any good bug reports?

Happy Dueling!