How are Events Posted?

Anyone of ‘member’ rank or higher has the ability to add guild events, and anyone may invite specific members to an event. But first, a word on the types of event one can post in-game:

There are two types of event, according to WoW‘s built-in calendar:

Ordinary or generic events appear only on your own calendar, or on those players’ to whom you send invites. Setting one up allows you to send notifications, which appear as a flashing golden question mark over the calendar icon and on the calendar itself.

A guild event does not allow notifications, but will appear on all guild members’ calendars.

To give you an example of this distinction:

Let’s say I log in as Scorpinar, and create a generic dungeon event for the Scholomance. I invite a group of three characters including Coffindodger’s warlock alt., Clarkson. All three characters will have a notification of this event waiting for them when they log in. If, however, Coffindodger logs only his main character in, he will be quite unaware of the event. It only appears on Clarkson’s calendar.

Let’s say I create a guild dungeon event instead. Players can still sign up to it, and the entire guild can see that there is a dungeon raid happening but only if they manually check the in-game calendar. The problem is that only non-guild members can be directly notified of this event; the burden is on the guild members to keep informed of changes to this calendar.

There is a solution however, which I will come to shortly.

Creating a New Event

(L) Creating a generic event; (R) Notification that you've an invitation waiting.

Creating any event is a simple matter of right-clicking on the calendar dates, accessed in the top-right of your HUD radar. The ‘create event’ panel allows you to set the following:

• Event name, almost always the same as the dungeon;
• Event type, which allows you to choose specific dungeons and raids with which to personalise the calendar;
• Time, in the server’s own time zone (Misha-US is Pacific Coast time, GMT -8);
• Notes on meeting points, appropriate character levels and quest pickups;
• Attending characters;
• Invitations, which can be made manually (by typing player names into the appropriate box) or by a ‘mass invite’ filter on guild and arena teams, seen above.

Fill in the fields, hit ‘create’ and you have an event!

As Future Tense’s raid leader, I set duplicate events; one as generic, one as a guild event. The generic event sends invitations out to all characters in range, while the guild event (labelled a ‘Call to Arms’) informs all players that something’s happening, regardless of which alt. they have logged in. This way an event named something like ‘Call to Arms: Scholomance’ will suggest that characters around the high 50s and level 60 have been invited to join. Log in your level 58 alt., and voila; an invitation.

How Can I Find Out About Events?

Our Facebook Group

You can see all the Facebook events on your news feed, so long as you don’t have the group hidden, or you can visit the group page itself to find out. I also endeavour to personally invite those players who I think have a character in range.

In-Game

In-game events are logged as both guild and generic events, to help you keep up with alts. as described above. If you log in with any Future Tense member character, you can view the in-game calendar and see what I’ve labelled ‘calls to arms’. Those of an appropriate level range can also expect notifications over the calendar HUD button.

Google Calendar

Though we no longer run a Future Tense-specific calendar, you can generate your own via the WoW Armoury.

• Log in to the Armoury and click your character name to view their profile.
• Check at the foot of the page to see if you’re viewing the Armoury in the right language for your server; this needs to be ‘English (US)’ for American servers.
• Click the ‘calendar’ tab along the top.
• Log in with your password and authenticator if you need to.

• Click the RSS icon, seen towards the top right of the calendar, below your achievement points counter.

• Customise your feed by selecting up to 5 characters (this will pull both guild and generic events in) and any repeating game events if you wish.
• Copy the calendar feed URL.
• Open Google Calendar, look to the left-hand side of the window and drop the ‘other calendars’ panel down if it is minimised.
• Click on ‘add’ at the very bottom, and choose ‘add by URL’. Paste your calendar URL in here and accept.
• You can now edit the calendar name and colour by clicking the new, jargonistically-named box.

Blacksmithing, Leatherworking & Tailoring

• Many of the items we create 5 or more of of just to level the armour-crafting trades will be tweaked to generate random statistics, similar to some jewelcrafting and engineering recipes. This should avoid gathering dozens of Steel Plate Helms, then…
• Superior-quality recipes will grant more professions points in order to reflect their higher material cost.
• Specialisations are to be removed, and the recipes made available to all. This will no doubt prove controversial given blacksmithing’s particularly high material costs for specialisation quests, but will allow non-tailoring specialists to equip sets like the Moonshroud robes.
• More PvP armour sets will be introduced at early stages in the trade.

Alchemy & Enchanting

• A new alchemists’ stone will be available, as well as a third alchemists’ potion, in a Crazy Alchemist’s Potion mould.
• All potions and elixirs will use the same flask type, however flasks will use a different type.
• A new vanity pet will be added for enchanters.

Engineering & Jewelcrafting

• Engineering will remain largely the same, however new designs will allow engineers to craft gadgets for other players to use.
• Schemata will be added for crafting bows and crossbows as well as guns.
• New jewelcrafting dailies will be introduced, however it’s not clear if these will replace or supplement the existing shipping quests for Undermine.
• New cuts will be added to compliment the new mastery system.
• Jewellers will be allowed to craft new fist weapons, eyewear and some vanity consumables.

Gathering Trades

• All Cataclysm herbs have the chance to drop Volatile Life, in an Eternal Life mould.
• Savage Leather carries on in a Borean Leather/Knothide Leather style as the Cataclysm staple. Pristine Hide carries on from where Arctic Fur left off.
• Obsidian becomes the new staple ore in a Fel Iron style, offering the chance to mine gems, Volatile Fire and Volatile Shadow. Elementium continues in an Adamantite Ore style, also offering Volatile Water and Earth. Pyrite becomes the new Khorium.

Secondary Professions

• New fishing dailies will feature.
• First Aid bandages will change to offer a heal-over-time rather than channelling health, and Cataclysm will open three new bandage types.

The process starts with an application to the guild. You’ll be asked for an email address and password, and then to verify this address; all standard stuff.

If you could use the name we know you by within the guild, that’d be useful too! Your username identifies you on the blogs and forum, and it bundles your alts. under one banner. The username can be changed later.

Once signed in, you can then visit the character roster and start adding your alts. These characters form a WoW Armoury style roster for the guild, and allow you to apply directly to upcoming raids! The ‘Add Char’ button is found in the top right of that frame.

Once your characters have been added to the roster, you will then find options to add them to instances. Every calendar event which allows sign-ups comes with a ‘participation’ section, to which you can submit any of your alts.!

There is also an option to form groups, and drag and drop your characters into them; we’ll likely only use this option when we begin raids, but it will allow us to see, at a glance, if we have enough healers, tanks and damage players on hand. Very useful.

Remember that you can view the 7-day ‘raid forecast’ right from the website homepage! Click any event to view its participants, leave comments, and hopefully, to register your alts. for the party!

futuretense.mmoguildsites.com

How to Roll for Loot

There are four actions available when ‘rolling’ for items (i.e., generating a virtual die roll in order to win an item):

• Need
• Greed
• Disenchant
• Pass

Your choice of which option to use comes down to a few simple questions:

• Is this item an upgrade to the gear I currently possess?
• Do I require the disenchanting reagents this item would ‘drop’?
• Can one of my alt. characters use this (‘bind on equip’ only)?

If the answer is “no” to any of those, you’re really only rolling on gear in order to sell it, which may not suit the group best.

Generic Rules

Rolls are generally conducted in the hierarchy below, but the party’s leader holds ultimate authority over rolling on the loot. They may wish for a cloth piece to benefit their healer more than a damage caster, for example, and can mediate in the case of disputes.

If you are:

1. A player who requires the item as an upgrade to the spec. you’re in now, or as a recipe for your profession…
   You roll ‘need’.
2. An enchanter who requires the item for disenchanting…
   You roll ‘disenchant’.
3. A player who requires the bind-on-equip item for an alt….
   You roll ‘greed’, announcing that it’s for an alt.
4. A player who wishes to sell the item for cash or disenchant it on an alt.…
   You wait until last, in order to ensure that no-one needs it for an alt. (they will announce this) or is rolling on it as part of their profession. Then you may roll ‘greed’.

Bind-on-Pickup Rules

Some of these rules don’t apply to bind-on-pickup gear, which can only be transferred within that party. In this case, if you are:

1. A player who requires the item as an upgrade to the spec. you’re in now, or as a recipe for your profession…
   You roll ‘need’.
2. An enchanter who requires the item for disenchanting…
   You roll ‘disenchant’.
3. A player who requires the bind-on-equip item for your off-spec….
   You roll ‘greed’, announcing that it’s for an off-spec.
4. A player who wishes to sell the item for cash…
   You wait until last, in order to ensure that no-one needs it for an off-spec. (they will announce this) or is rolling on it as part of their profession. Then you may roll ‘greed’.

Treasure Chests (/roll)

With the exception of boss chests, opened by the tank as in Blackrock Depths and The Oculus, treasure chests are opened to group rolling, which is done by the command “/roll”. There are two types: locked and open.

If the chest is locked, only those blacksmiths, engineers and rogues with a high enough lockpicking skill or item should roll first. All those eligible take their pick of the items within, in descending order from whoever had the highest roll. Then the chest is treated as open:

If the chest is open, all players type /roll and take turns looting their fill, starting at the highest roll.

Mining, Herbalism, Skinning and Engineering

If a party contains more than one of skinners, miners, herbalists or engineers, those players will usually come to their own personal arrangements regarding the looting on fallen enemies. It should generally be assumed, however, that gatherers bow to craftsmen: a player with only herbalism and skinning skills should refrain from depriving alchemists and leatherworkers of their source materials.

Veins and herbs should be treated as locked chests: only those capable of tapping into the node should roll, and the highest roll wins the loot. Players who don’t require the item or the gathering skill points from tapping that node should come to an arrangement with those who do: they may be happy to roll on a par with you.

Scorpinar keeps an eye out for patrolling Scourge.

We took in the first half of the instance: largely its Scarlet-occupied quarter, with some detours to Alonsus’ Chapel in order that Kalonike might initiate herself as a paladin of the Blood Knights. The trail is a diverse one, exposing parties to both the 10-strong mobs of Scourge and some tricky human foes in the Scarlet Crusade. It calls for some fine-grained tanking, as evidenced by some unfortunate traps by rambling abominations and ghouls, and a lot of AoE damage; my thorium helm is tipped to Kalonike and Clarkson for some explosive light- and fire-based explosions!

Future Tense face Cannon Master Willey.

There are some truly exhilarating fights to be had in this zone, many of which throw in mechanics unseen in previous dungeons. Bosses may summon swathes of additional fighters, take possession of your melee damage-dealer or even transform themselves mid-fight, but there are rewards to match this commitment. Not all of our rewards came in the form of loot, either:

Clarkson breaks loose into demon form.

Clarkson levelled up to 59 and then 60 within this single run, breaking out into the impressive demonologists’ Metamorphosis spell to sweep the respawning Scourge from our exits. Knowing that we now have a melee/caster hybrid on top of our retribution paladin, Kalonike, should make further challenges very interesting indeed!

The battle takes on a different tone inside Utgarde Pinnacle, however. The Lich King is seen directly interfering with the vrykul’s resurrections, this time creating val’kyr servants. Svala Sorrowgrave was a surprising foe, having chosen Gemenar for a sacrifice to Arthas. Her ritual was eventually seen as folly however, and as we moved on to harpoon fights and a showdown with King Ymiron, Future tense managed to put matters right inside the vrykul throne chambers.

We tied the day off with two attempts at the Trial of Champions, racking up.. quite a repair bill. It became clear that the Black Knight is a force to be reckoned with, and that being dismounted and trampled during the jousting matches is not a good move. Still, two epic pieces ensured that Antianara and Kaseido gain a little more health, and the benefit of some epic jewellery.

We’re a way off tackling Icecrown, but it’s now clear we’re worthy of training at the Argent Crusade’s tournament grounds!

Kaseido, Coffindodger, Gemenar and Antianara hear from Ulduar's archives.

It started in Ulduar’s Halls of Stone, after we fought through the ranks in the vrykul village of Brunnhildar, sowed peace between the ice giants and storm-lord Thorim and confronted a new threat in Loken. King Jokkum commanded us to enter Ulduar’s halls of stone and lightning, and so we did.

Brann Bronzebeard, intrepid but not too bright, was on hand to guide us around in exchange for us protecting him during his research. The whole encounter wrote a fascinating new chapter in our discovery of Azeroth’s past; a couple of groups have ventured into Uldaman and seen what the titans have wrought there and outside Uldum, but it’s in Northrend that clues begin to bond. As the guild has yet to step inside Ahn’Qiraj this forms our first encounter with the threat of the Old Gods, however it’s clear from Silithus that these beings are adept at corrupting whom they will.

The Halls of Lightning was our first level 80 guild run, fought with reputation-gleaning tabards for the first time, too. Loken himself put up far less of a fight than some of the constructs he has guarding him; lessons are being learned in the taunting of whole mobs, and in taming noisy damage-dealers since we managed a wipe or two.

Still, we pick ourselves up, dust ourselves off and look to the next challenge. Though sadly the main body of Ulduar is too tough a challenge for our 4-man group, we have a chance to visit various level 80 dungeons, uncover the intentions of Northrend’s various dark forces, and work our way up to trying heroics once more.

• Tank: Kaseido
• Healer: Coffindodger
• Damage: Gemenar & Antianara