Jebraltar

If that person dies, the tag can be taken by someone else, so it's worth mentioning that hitting any Shadows of Doom that happen to be up is a good idea. I can't verify whether or not they can be tagged by someone else, because I use consecrate to make sure I get the tag either way.

 

Ja7us

What's the deal with the Argent Mana Potions? They cost 20 necrotic runes each. Are they reusable or something? That seems awfully steep for a single use potion.

 

footloop

That may be the case, but I'm fairly certain that a vanity 'guitar' that some people don't really want is still far more popular than any loot they could have put on him (see the headless horseman's rings, for example).

 

Skellum

Anyone noticed the plague rats in org? They seem to be actively spreading the infection to the guards, and then to the NPCs. The guards aggro them, killing them and gaining the infection.

They seem to spawn for about 5 mins and roam eastwards, spawned at 10:45 PM and stopped spawning at 10:50.

My Name Is Skellum, And I wear a Silly Hat.

 

Blutelf

I can verfiy that the Shadows of Doom can be tagged, which happened to me twice. As a paladin, just cast Consecration immediately after triggering the spawn.

The Necropolis usually returns within 3-4 hours.

Just received a Kara ID, supposedly clear, door was locked - I assume someone must have had downed the boss before.

 

Beliandra

What on earth does whether or not you care for it have to do with whether or not it is vanity loot?

A non-combat pet is vanity loot.

A weapon which will be outclassed by level 72 quest greens in a few weeks, but has a humourous /use effect, is vanity loot.

 

Ellyh

Although the general forums are always something of a cesspool it does seem as though Blizzard may have irritated a very large number of people with this zombie plague event. Since they removed most of the argent healers from the major cities it's a toss up as to whether you can achieve anything in game right now. Personally I feel they should have left certain features such as Auctioneers and bankers immune to the plague as you really can't do much for extended periods of time. No one in my guild seems taken with the event and the blizzard responses on the forums don't help. They have gone for maximum disruption and seem to have overachieved. If they don't end the event soon I have to wonder how many people will stop logging in for the duration of the event.

You can already see the effect, normally IF and orgrimar are hopping, 50+ people around the AH. Just passed through IF and the place feels almost totally deserted this can't be "working as intended" in the big picture.

 

Morlark

The thing is, Blizzard has a rather unique oppurtunity here, and they've quite demonstrably made good use of it. These events are themselves supposed to be unique. And yet here we are experiencing the Scourge invasion for the second time.

If you recall, the major criticism of the Naxx event was that it was entirely underwhelming. A few level 10 zombies milling about aimlessly outside the major cities? There's no way you can call that an invasion and keep a straight face. So Blizzard have taken that criticism to heart, and they've given us what we asked for: a real invasion. If the event caused no disruption at all, it would be equally as self-defeating as it was the first time around. As you say, the event is designed to cause disruption, but it's done in such a way as to maximise the fun for the player by allowing them to become a part of the disruption.

I think it's rather nifty the way they've pulled that off. As far as people complaining about the disruption, it's worth remembering that people with complaints are often the most vocal. And yet in spite of that extra tendency towards negative vocalism, I've seen a lot of people say how much they're enjoying it. More so than you'd normally see, in any case.

 

Brute

Exactly. The event is a drastic improvement over the last scourge invasion. Hell I hope they ramp things up even more for a few days befoer it ends/winds down...

 

Skellum

This. It is nice to see people taking advantage of the oppertunity they have to log off for a few days if they are malcontent. You may see a good number of posts on the General Forums, but do not take that as a barometer of public opinion, if you look closer most of them are Vocal Complainer as the opining poster followed by limitless trolls/otherposters telling them they're having a blast.

TBH, theres nothing quite like watching a gnome mage get chased down by a horde of zombies in shatt and converted in seconds.

My Name Is Skellum, And I wear a Silly Hat.

 

Nethris

It's certainly giving us plenty of reason to invade Northrend, in a way a repeat of the Naxx invasion wouldn't really have - the Necropolises are a large show of force, but when the entire set of attacks on both continents is driven off within an hour of them starting to respawn, it just doesn't have the impact the plague does - now, this would probably be a good time for Blizzard to realize that auctioneers, bankers, and battlemasters really should have at most a 1 min spawn timer, but at least this is interesting.

I do have to wonder how many of the people whining about the disruption were some of the ones whining about everything being pointless a month before the expansion with all the nerfs to everything in 3.0.2 :P

 

Monocle

They are back. I was farming Scholo for rep stuff and the Skelly was boss there. I was so surprise I mentioned it in Guild chat and got a few people over to see him before we blew him away. The Strat boss is back too.

Both are at their original levels. The Scholo boss dropped a caster off hand I wish I had at 60, it's very nice for a blue.

 

Monocle

I fully agree here. Back during the Naxx event, the good old general Forums screamed that there wasn't enough interaction. Well Blizzard just gave people what they asked for. Why bother coming up with a giant Zombie behavior program when the players can do it for you, and act even more psychotic then anything they could cook up?

I have had a blast trying to protect the lower level infected areas, it's been great running around with a few friends trying to counter the Scourge threat in just the nearby areas to Stormwind. Westfall alone is just a nightmare at times to defend, but it has been a completely awesome experience to do so.

You don't know how cool just seeing an inn explode with Zombies would be till you actually see it in person!

I can't wait to see what happens next. Here's hoping the Lich king gets so annoyed that he starts sending the really heavy troops (Abominations, Wights and Flesh Titans) to cause complete chaos in the cities.

Great event so far, and throwing the old Naxx stuff in it is even better.

 

◊ Turik

It will always appear that there's an overwhelming negative response because the people enjoying it are busy... enjoying it. I've been spending my time with the ZP event versus posting on the forums like I normally do. It's just too fun.

turik(at)elitistjerks.com

 

ZulazeeluIcecrown

I noticed something odd this evening. The plate and leather "Undead Slayer" shoulders from the Necrotic Rune vendor are iLevel 109 blues, while the cloth and mail ones are iLevel 115 epics (like the rest of the set). Is there any legitimate reason for that, or should I file some kind of bug report?

 

Nethris

Noticed that as well, and can't think of a reason that would be the case - not sure there are great odds of it being changed, but it hardly looks intended - unless Blizzard figures rogues and warriors will benefit more from the haste-centric gear? Really doesn't seem likely.

 

Tizzlewump

I saw the same thing in SW tonight, a huge parade of Plagued Vermin (or were they Infected Vermin?) pouring out of the Stockades down the path towards the SW bank/AH where they were promptly slaughtered by guards. I'm assuming the Org infestation came out of RFC.

I have not been paying attention to Death Knight beta info but I think they're supposed to be able to turn players into zombies, no? This event may also be a way of letting the players meet (and test!) another xpac mechanic. The devs also like to look for new uses for new mechanics -- "Why are we making you all shapeshift on player death? Because now we can."

 

Randyll

They can turn the corpses of friendly players into ghouls, not any alive players. The functionality of the raised ghoul is roughly similar to that of a Plague Zombie, only that it has a 45 second time limit, before you die automatically.

Are there any other uses of the possession / vehicle technology in place yet? Or is this the only one?

 

Paprikka

If you are a person that isn't enjoying the event and waiting for it to end there isn't too much longer.
World of Warcraft - English (NA) Forums -> Annoyed by the Zombie

And that was two days ago, so it would seem there isn't more than a week left on the plague.

Although I'm loving the event and I hope there is a massive outbreak before it's finally completely purified, and it will be interesting to see if the plague just dissipates or is cleansed in some massive effort by the Argent Dawn.

 

Dirkzor

A blue also posted that the event would be over in time so you could complete your hollow end's quests qithout disruption. So it will end soon.

 

hiryuu1115

Out of an idle curiosity, I would love to know how much of this event was for the benefit of the CDC. I seem to remember that they studied the brief period that Hakkar's Plagued Blood infected pets as an example of how the public might react to a real plague situation.

In this situation, we have obvious disease vectors based on real life like the boxes and disease carrying animals. The disease is spread through contact and can rapidly infect a whole populace. In response to this, I know some people have definitely taken to avoiding Shattrah and quickly running to an Ardent Dawn healer as soon as they are infected, which may mirror how they would behave in case of a biological attack.

Okay, not the deepest thought but interesting enough to me at this time of night.

Cast in the name of God, Ye not guilty ...

 

footloop

I really don't see why this is such a huge deal. Yeah, it makes it hard to go about your routine as usual, and I can see how it's annoying if you want to level. However it's a few days out of a year+ of expansion, and your normal programming will return before you know it. This isn't a single player game, it's a multiplayer world, and if a couple days of disruption to your soloing is going to ruin the game for you then maybe it wasn't the right game for you in the first place.

One thing I think they should have done is make all player-zombies level 70 by default. I can see how it would be frustrating to be turned into a zombie, only to find yourself still being level 30 or whatever and thus mostly useless. If you could actually contribute to the zombie cause as a lowbie, I think they would find it somewhat more interesting.

Using my server as an example, that is most likely a result of the necropolis invasion. Most of the level 70s who spent their time sitting around doing nothing are now out zerging down undead. I really don't think it's because of the zombies.

 

Paprikka

While a really interesting event in that regards, it would hardly be useful as there are people trying to get infected and then others forming large raids to infect as many as possible. Although it would be a handy study in case of a zombie apocalypse by a crazed cult.

 

Nethris

On a related note, Tigole has said that the event's Karazhan boss will be around for about 10 days. Which sounds like the remainder of this raid reset, and all of the next.

Now, the plague may well pass before then, and based on the Blue comments on being able to have a little time to do Hallow's End quests without disruption, almost certainly will, which is interesting in and of itself - here's to hoping the necropolises (necropolii? that doesn't look right either) last as long as the Karazhan boss, though they may not, as the end of the plague seems likely to be around the time of whatever culminating attack Arthas hits us with, and continuing to throw necropolises at us after leaving or being beaten back would be a bit odd, especially with them being zerged down for loot as is.

Intentional infection was a part of the ZG plague as well though, and player driven infections and the responses might very well be a potentially useful model for unexpected outbreaks or forms of transmission during an outbreak - almost a form of worst case model, as a disease that managed to mutate to defeat efforts to eliminate it, and caused more damage in high population areas (infecting the AFK zone between the bank and the AH in IF) and treatment centers (groups specifically forming to take down the argent healers) would certainly be among the worst diseases to deal with.

Now, I don't think Blizz would be likely to do anything to their game design that they felt negatively impacted their goals for a CDC study, but I wouldn't put it past them to have contacted the CDC about the fact that they were going to be doing this, and used the CDC as a source of ideas if any came up from such a conversation.

 

Kegsta

We just had an awsome zombie raid on stormwind, 2 mates and I were camping the portal room and converting everyone who came through until we had about 30 people and we headed to the trade district.
We converted the entire thing within about a minute, It was great fun. Unfortunatly taking screenshots with the 300 sprew clouds on the ground caused my wow to crash. Then the server pretty much died and we couldnt move and got d/cd. By the time we came back in order was restored, we tried again but an army of boomkin aoed us down once we got to the trade district the second time.
Making Zombies
Heading to town
Trade district 1
Trade district 2