Shamus Plays WoW #9: No Murlock, No Wedlock

By Shamus Posted Sunday Nov 13, 2016

Filed under: WoW 19 comments

This job is getting a bit strange. We just wanted to help (ewww) a group of simple farmers with whatever dangers or trials they were facing. But instead, Maybell MacLure asked us to deliver a note to her boyfriend. Who sent us to see his grandmother.

Oh. THESE idiots again.
Oh. THESE idiots again.

“So this is the place?”, I ask suspiciously. “It looks… small.”

Ma Stonefield and one of her kin are out front. Pa Stonefield is no doubt off somewhere engaged in some sort of agricultural endeavor. Tommy is still standing by the river where we left him. And there is an old lady just inside. This is obviously Grandma Stonefield, who we’ve been looking for.

“I guess so?”, Norman says with a shrug. “I mean, it’s the only house around here.”

So let me get this straight,” I say slowly. “Tommy and Maybell can’t get together and make the beast with two butts because their families are feuding. So Tommy sent us here to talk to his grandmum?”

“I don’t know that Tommy is planning on doing… that. I mean, neither of them said anything about fooling around.”

“The note didn’t say anything about involving anyone’s grandma, either. Yet here we are.”

“Yes,” agrees Norman. “Here we are.”

Dayum Granny, you've got the exact same physique as your teenage granddaughter. What's your secret? Jazzercise? Pilates?
Dayum Granny, you've got the exact same physique as your teenage granddaughter. What's your secret? Jazzercise? Pilates?

We go inside and Norman introduces himself. Then he explains the problem.

Granny sighs, “Poor Tommy and Maybell. While our families are feuding, those two don’t have much of a future.”

I look around the doorless, nearly unfurnished shack, “I don’t think the feud is the biggest problem regarding their future.”

Granny smiles, “I’ll bet William Pestle has a potion that can help them!”

“A… potion?” Norman asks. “They’re already in love and everything. I don’t think they have any problems that can’t be solved by shoving Tommy Joe in the direction of Maybell.”

“No, a potion will fix everything!” Granny insists.

So we trudge back to town and visit Dr. Crazy Candles again. Norman gives him the whole story.

Look buddy, please don't ask us to find, give, or make any candles.
Look buddy, please don't ask us to find, give, or make any candles.

Pestle shakes his head, “My heart goes out to those two. You know, I was young and in love once.”

“Ew. No more details, thank you,” Norman says.

“But maybe I have a potion that can help them. If I make an invisibility liquor for Maybell, she can slip away and meet with Tommy Joe.”

“What good will that do them?” Norman asks.

“Boss!” I scold him.

“Oh,” he realizes, “That. Fine. How much for the potion?”

“Well, I’ll need some crystal kelp fronds,” Pestle says.

“I don’t want to know what goes in it. I have a weak stomach. Just make it up and I’ll run it back to her,” Norman says.

“No, I’m saying I need you to go and get crystal kelp fronds for me.”

“Oh right,” Norman says bitterly, “I wouldn’t expect an apothecary to have exotic things like ingredients. Let me guess, I have to run to Stormwind and buy it, only that guy won’t have a bag to put it in, so I’ll have to run to Ironforge to get a Dwarven paper sack. But they’re out of paper, so I’ll have to sail to Darnassus, where I’ll find out that the paper-maker is out of wood pulp, so I’ll have to venture through the Dark Portal and find the special tree of-“

“Crystal Kelp grows in the ocean,” Pestle says, more than a little annoyed.

“Okay, we’re off to Stormwind harbor, then. Thanks for nothing,” Norman snorts.

Most of Pestle's dialog here is from the game.
Most of Pestle's dialog here is from the game.

“Except…” Pestle adds.

“Here it comes,” Norman says under his breath.

“You won’t actually find it in the ocean if you go looking for it.”

“So where would I find it?”

“Murlocs sometimes carry it. See if you can get some from them. There’s a Murloc village in the lake just east of us.”

Yeah, the only place in the universe you can get crystal kelp is from Murlocs, and only when you’re doing this quest. There are a lot of spots like this in the game where you have to go and gather resources that only exist while you’re looking for them.

I’ve often thought it would be interesting if you made an online game where everything was available all the time. If crystal kelp really did appear along the coast and Murlocs really did drop it, whether you needed it or not. It would be interesting to see how many players would naturally revert to adventure game behavior, scarfing up everything needlessly and hauling around armloads of random crap.

Oblivion did this, but that was a single-player game and it tracked inventory by weight instead of item slots. It becomes more of a trade-off if every new weed, animal part, or knickknack you find takes up one of your precious inventory slots. Sure, doing so might let you instantly fulfill a quest at some point, but it’s more likely you’ll just lug it around for the next 20 levels for no benefit. This would be especially true if the designers placed a lot of extra useless items in the game.

I don’t actually know if that would make the game better, but it would be an interesting experiment to see how people behave.

Uh. What is this guy guarding? The Murlocks? The lake? I think he's too overdressed to be a lifeguard.
Uh. What is this guy guarding? The Murlocks? The lake? I think he's too overdressed to be a lifeguard.

The lake. Filled with filthy Murlocs. There’s even a guard standing by the lake, looking right at the little buggers.

“Okay, let’s get this over with,” Norman grumbles.

“Not so fast, squire,” I say. “You need to hold up your end of the bargain.”

“Bargain?” Norman asks.

“I gave you some inside info on the demons, now you have to tell me what the deal is with your mom.”

“Oh,” Norman says sheepishly, “That.”

“Pay up.”

“Okay,” Norman sighs, “My mother is Lady Agatha Lightgiver, Exalted Paladin of some order or other.”

“Your mother is a paladin?”

“Lady Lightgiver is somewhat famous around here. She’s about as anti-demon as they come. And she’s… strict.”

“Which explains why you don’t want her to know about this whole Warlock business you’re into.”

“I lied about taking a cookie when I was a kid and she chased me around the house with a magic hammer. A cookie! I can’t even imagine what she’d do if she found out about this.”

“Sure you can,” I point out.

“Yes, I can,” he admits, “But I’d rather not.”

“Well your secret is safe with me,” I assure him. “Nobody needs to know about this except you, me, and these Murlocs we’re about to murder.”

To be honest, you don't make many friends in this game.
To be honest, you don't make many friends in this game.

A few minutes later we have a nice pile of corpses at our feet.

“Whew! Smells like old fish,” Norman says.

“So… how many villages have you wiped out now?”

“Those were mines, not villages. And this doesn’t count. Kobolds are vermin, but Murlocs are evil.”

“Really? What makes them evil?”

“Well,” says Norman as he pats down the corpses, looking for kelp, “They’re aggressive and mean. They do evil things.”

“Really evil things?”

“Yes. They’re murderers and thieves.”

“Wow. So you’re saying that these little guys are so evil they might charge into a human village and kill everything that moves just to acquire a few leaves of seaweed from you?”

“Well, they would never do anything that bad, but I think-” His voice trails off and he looks down at the kelp in his hands. “Curse you demon, stop trying to confuse me.”

“I’m not confusing you. You’re doing that to yourself. I’m just pointing it out.”

We head back and speak to Candlejerk again. He takes the kelp from us and whips up a potion for Maybell.

This animation apparently represents someone brewing a potion in the palm of their hand.
This animation apparently represents someone brewing a potion in the palm of their hand.

Then we have to make the trip from Goldshire to the MacLure farm, which means a ten-minute running battle against thieves, bears, cutthroats, and giant spiders, who are apparently somehow all in league with each other and want to kill us on sight.

“What does it say when thieves live in more harmony with nature than you?”

“Just stop it!” Norman snaps. “You’re always trying to make it sound like I’m evil. I’m not.”

“I’m not saying that. I’m just showing you that good is just evil with better P.R. Why is it okay to kill that robber? Because he’s evil. Why is it wrong to kill that lazy town guard? Because he’s good. What makes the robbers evil? They attack good people and take their stuff. What makes you good? You attack evil things and take their stuff. These are your rules, not mine.”

“There’s no comparison! You said so yourself that you demons want to wipe out the mortal realms!”

“True, true. But what about your mom?”

Norman turns red with fury, “Be very careful what you say about my mother, demon!”

“Fine. I’ll let you say it yourself. What if she suddenly got the power to wipe out the demon realms?”

Norman begins chewing on his mustache furiously.

“Anyway. I’ll let you sort that one out for yourself. Let’s get this potion delivered.”

The rest of the walk to the farm is very quiet. (Aside from the screaming robbers, bears, spiders, etc.)

Dayum Maybell, you've got the exact same physique as granny. What's your secret?
Dayum Maybell, you've got the exact same physique as granny. What's your secret?

Norman marches in the door, hands over the potion, and walks back out. Maybell mews some thanks before she chugs it and disappears.

“Was she under house arrest? Was that really the only way she could escape her own farm?” I ask.

“I don’t care,” Norman says.

“Well, you didn’t save anyone, you didn’t protect the lands, and you didn’t defeat the forces of evil. But you did help a couple of clueless unwed teens get it on, so that’s something.”

“Shut up,” Norman suggests.

We head back to town. (Which results in the deaths of additional people and woodland creatures.)

As we enter town, our old friend Remy stops Norman and begins to ask for help.

Remember this guy? I wonder what he bought with all that gold dust.
Remember this guy? I wonder what he bought with all that gold dust.

“Not interested!” Norman snaps. “I’m here to help save people from evil and I don’t care about feuds or lovebirds or gold dust or any of the other nonsense you people have been yattering about.”

But Remy persists, “There’s a new threat in Elwynn Forest! Murlocs are swimming up the streams of eastern Elwynn, scaring away fish and attacking gentle folk! I warned Marshal Dughan, but he’s more worried about the gnolls and the bandits. He’s not convinced that the murlocs are a danger. Please, speak to Dughan and persuade him to send more troops to the east!”

“Murlocs attacking gentle folk?” Norman nods. “Now that’s a job!”

Norman strides over to Marshal Dughan and gives him the skinny on the Murloc problem.

Friendly reminder: Dughan's dialog is from the game.
Friendly reminder: Dughan's dialog is from the game.

Dughan stares off into space while Norman talks. A little yawn escapes him. Finally he replies with a well-rehearsed answer, “Yes, I spoke with Remy. I respect him as a merchant, though all reports of Murlocs to the east have been sketchy at best.”

“Sketchy? Have you tried talking to the candle guy at the inn? He never leaves the building, and even he knows about the Murlocs! I fought a dozen of them just an hour ago! ” Norman protests.

“Your concerns are noted, but unless I receive a military report of a murloc threat, we can’t afford to send more troops east. If you are concerned that the rumors of murlocs are true, then do thisâ€"travel to the eastern Elwynn bridge and speak with Guard Thomas.”

“Are you offering to hire me to talk to your own men for you?” Norman says slowly.

Next week: Go east, young man. Go east.

 


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19 thoughts on “Shamus Plays WoW #9: No Murlock, No Wedlock

  1. The Rockoteer says:

    Mispelled the title ther, Shamis.

    1. Inwoods says:

      Should be Morlock, amirite?

    2. Matt Downie says:

      Also, I think “that would never do anything that bad” should be “they would never…”

  2. Zak McKracken says:

    good is just evil with better P.R. Why is it okay to kill that robber? Because he's evil. Why is it wrong to kill that lazy town guard? Because he's good. What makes the robbers evil? They attack good people and take their stuff. What makes you good? You attack evil things and take their stuff.

    That’s one worth pointing out, and it’s more appliccable to real life than it has any business being, although I’d argue that the actually good people IRL don’t fall into either category described above.

    1. silver Harloe says:

      In a CRPG, your only tool is violence, so everything has to be made to look like a nail. In real life, the guards are “good” because they try to protect innocent people, but you can’t protect the plot-immune farmer from the murlocs that never target him even if they’re standing within eyesight – you can only go murder the murlocs.

      1. Ofermod says:

        I think Guild Wars 2 did a decent job of having you protect people from aggression, and also showing town guards being useful at times.

  3. Steve C says:

    There are a few quests in WoW that require one off items that drop all the time, regardless if you are on the quest or not. Basically it doesn’t work. It gets listed on the AH and doesn’t sell. Nobody thinks to look for it. Nobody thinks to list it. Those that do sell it find it is a waste of time and effort. Nobody thinks to have those items on hand immediately before it is needed and it’s too much effort to go buy them.

    Personally I always liked those quests. I kept an alt to hold all those non-bound quest items. I’d even buy them off the AH. That only worked because I was knowledgeable and done the quests. I knew what items were worth keeping for leveling an alt. Going through for the first time you are blind. It’s rather frustrating figuring out what to keep.

    1. evilmrhenry says:

      I think Rift has a couple quests like that as well. Basically, your choices are
      1) Kill 10 enemies, (who are right over there) or
      2) Run to the capital city’s auction house, buy 10 widgets, then run back
      Killing enemies is faster and more interesting.

      I think in order for this to work right, the quest needs to be repeatable, and give you something useful. Rep grinding comes to mind immediately.

      1. You mean like that one quest where you need to get 50 whatsits for the Dragonwhatevers?

    2. Joshua says:

      LOTRO has/had a few variants of this. At the beginning of the game, almost ten years ago, there were unique creature items used for specific recipes. Some of these creatures were rare spawns. Like the example above, there was little point in searching for the ingredient because it was rarely sold, and rarely sold on the AH because there were rarely people looking to purchase.

      There was a fairly robust economy for the creature items used for the level 45 class quests, because these were fairly well known, and pretty important for all characters. However, since they added the option to purchase these items in the Skirmish Camps (for cheap), there’s little incentive to try to sell them anymore.

      Currently, there are Task items that are common drops for given level ranges, and anyone can use them to complete quests if they’re the right level range. This is especially valuable for F2P players. However, the drops are common enough it’s really not worth going to the AH.

      1. Nimrandir says:

        I actually held onto piles of task items when I started LotRO (thanks in large part to Shamus’ last text play reposts), waiting for the moment someone would want them.

        Does that answer his question?

      2. Considering the main worth of those items is faction rep from turning them in as opposed to just selling them for piles of money, there’s not much chance anyone would actually buy them since there’s a hard cap to how many Tasks you can do per day, while the actual “use this item for faction rep” items are unlimited and generally yield more rep than the tasks…or at least from what I’ve seen below level 30.

    3. WJS says:

      I’d suspect that the reason trading quest items instead of collecting them yourself “doesn’t work” simply because most quests aren’t like that, so people don’t think of it. If the default pattern of quests was for items that drop to anyone, it would probably be different. Likewise if the droprate is low. You need ten doodads. Sure, you could kill a few hundred bad guys to try to farm them. Or you could just go buy them. From people who have done that quest, but who still get those drops because Murlocs don’t decide whether to wear earrings or not based on if someone is paying adventurers for them.

  4. Tvtim says:

    I already carry enough crap around in my WoW bags: maps, a totem, a few types of ore, lots of fish and meat, food and some old item you cant get anymore way back from AQ. In wrath of the lich king I carried around a full second set of armor on top of everything else; all the extra crap would drive me nuts. At least now it’s separate in that quest items now go to this invisible and not accessable quest inventory.

  5. ChrisANG says:

    I’ve never played WoW, but the impression that I get is that there’s pretty much a unique quest-item for every item-fetch-quest. If you were going to make quest items drop all the time, it might be better to tie them in with the crafting system. Like, not only is crystal kelp really findable in all the places you’d expect it, but it also really can be used to brew invisibility potions. That way, you might have some on you already, or you might even have an invisibility potion or three on hand for your own use, and you could just hand one over and complete the quest without needing to go anywhere.

    ….which would defeat the whole purpose of this kind of quest.

    1. Viktor says:

      That’s how I would do it. Not “I need 10 bear gallbladders, which are dropped by bears only in a certain cave and only useful for this quest”, but “I need 10 bear gallbladders, which are dropped by all bears in this region of the map and are used for crafting and also as the quest item for 3 other bear-killing quests in this level range”. If the player wants to farm bears they can, if they want to run off to the auction house they can. The only person they’re hurting if they end up underleveled is themselves.

      Fundamentally, MMO quests come down to either:
      A: I want the player to get into X fights of Y difficulty against enemies of Z fighting style
      B: I want the player to travel to area Q
      C: I want the player to fight specific boss-monster M
      B and C should involve specific quest flags and unique items, since those are about specific experiences or moving the player to the next portion of the game. Letting the player skip them could be problematic. A, though, is about wanting them to go through the gameplay. That should be flexible, since forcing the player to experience the gameplay at the rate and places you choose is a good way to make the gameplay into a punishment, which is never a good idea.

      1. This game was referenced earlier, but Rift has a few quests like that, although iirc they’re crafting-related once you can actually start doing that…or the daily quests for all of the professions, including and most heavily in Fishing, which either require you to craft items using materials you could otherwise save for crafting actual equipment or turning in a bunch of raw items which, same deal.

        You can head to the AH and buy them at fairly inflated prices or go farm them. I managed to pull a really rare drop from one of the minor world events and that funded me buying a 150% speed mount (the highest at the time) and about 2 weeks worth of not needing to farm ore.

  6. Drlemaster says:

    In the WoW expansion before this one, you had a base to which you could add various buildings. If you were Alliance, and added the Barn, the building was staffed by the Stonefield family, including Maybell Maclure-Stonefield.

  7. natureguy85 says:

    I love Gobstab prodding Norman that he’s doing exactly what the Kobolds or Murlocks are supposedly evil for doing. It reminds me of the Goblins comic. It’s another example of something that started silly and turned into a serious series with a real plot and dark moments.

    This one.

    The context starts in the one before and ends in the next one though.

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