It seems worse than ah first thought.  It’s no just some madness, some remnant come back tae get us.. it’s an organised bloody invasion!  Ah’m doin’ mah but but it just seems that sometimes ye cut one doon only tae huv three come back at ye…

The Good

Change

For a ’static world’, wow manages to be pretty dynamic and this event is a great example of this.  People are really feeling the ‘pain’ of the event - it’s not just a simple event which happens ‘outside’ of the normal stream of things, but is actively getting in the way of doing the usual day-to-day things people do in WoW.  The fact it’s changing day-to-day quite rapidly, too, is pretty nice.  You’re not waiting an interminable time for the ‘next step’.

Memories

This is a personal one but this event brings a lot back for me.  I first started WoW around the time Naxxramas was released and when I hit around level 15-20 I was outside the towns killing scourge invadors!  I thought this must be normal for wow, at the time, and was a really nice introduction to the lore and feel of the game.

Level Range

As I mentioned above, I took part in a previous incarnation at a very low level and this event allows for everyone to participate - low level invasions near cities, new bosses in instances from Scarlet Monastery to Stratholme and scourge events for the level-capped.

Paladin Madness

“For the Light!“  “You will die, undead scum!” and “By the Light be cleansed!“. The paladin madness has taken over many on my server - it’s limited solely to Paladins and involves running around with a big sword, waving it about, making shiny lights around people and shouting various things like the examples above.  Still, I file it under ‘good’ as it’s not doing anybody harm except zombies and, well, they want to eat my brains…

Tabard

I was always a little sad that I managed to miss The Burning Crusade starting event - especially the cool tabard.  I had always just liked how the AD tabard looked and wanted to snag one, though I had given up hope of it but now I’ve taken the opportunity to get one on most of my characters!

Reputation

I had, oddly enough, just started to grind Argent Dawn rep when the event began.  Now I’m halfway through revered without trying too hard.  I’ve grabbed some shiny new faction recipes and once exalted I’ll be halfway through [The Argent Champion].  Remember to equip your [Argent Dawn Commission] whilst fighting the scourge invasions as most will drop [Invaders Scourge Stones].  The Shadow’s of Doom even drop [Corruptor's Scourgestones].

Trinket

The [Argent War Horn] just deserves a spot all to itself for how awesome it is.  For those not yet in the know, this trinket summons an Argent Dawn paladin to help you.  When the trinket effect runs out the paladin does not fade but… bubblehearths! The laughter on teamspeak when we found this out was somewhat earshattering.

The Bad

Recycling is Bad?

Recycled content - the scourge invasion event is a repeat from both the Naxx opening event.  I’m not sure if this is a terribly bad thing, especially as the ‘details’ and rewards have been updated as well as the surrounding flavour quests but some people have been complaining, on my server, that it’s ‘all just that stuff again’.  Can’t please everyone, I guess.

Dead NPC’s

Doing ‘the usual’ isn’t always possible.  Flight masters, auctioneers, bankers - all can fall prey to the scourge and hat’s certainly pissing people off at the moment.  Having to wait for a respawn to be able to access the bank can be irritating, especially since just about everyone who gets zombified runs in to try and give it to the bankers and those standing nearby - knowing they’ll likely not notice whilst sorting things in the bank.

Dead Players

People are being ganked by zombies.  With the plague lasting only 50 seconds near the end before transformation it was very hard to get to  a healer before you succumbed.  Most found the whole “camp the portal spawns in Stormwind” funny for a few hours but those same people are complaining now when it happens to them.  Personally I’ve managed to avoid being munched on more than a few times but others are not so lucky.

Durability

One of the main reason people are being irked at the above is that it causes durability damage to die as a ghoul. They really should remove it - it’s pvp in a basic sense and should not cause gear damage - especially when you can even be ganked in Shattrath, which is supposed to be a sanctuary.  Personally, if I portal, I switch out my gear for my [Brewfest Regalia] if  I have the bag space - meaning that the only inconvenience I have is a walk back from the graveyard if I get zombified.

The Ugly

Scourge Invasion Spawn Points

Limited mobs + limited time event + spawned rares = ? Yeah, chaos and ninja-tagging etc.  I’m quite sickened by the number of players who’ve been standing in the centre of the spawn points, AoEing and trying to take the Shadow’s of Doom - without using their own scourge stones.   I’ve even had people kite a mob away which I had ‘paid for’ and pulled it so far that it reset… and then they tagged it.  That really irked me as I could do nothing against it (resto shaman cannot out aggro a t6 hunter…) and wasted some of my shards so that someone else could reap the reward.

I’ve been running with some guildies, though, (on my druid) and we managed to grab two to three per spawn point most times (using our own stones) and blasted them down despite whole groups of paladins, warlocks and mages trying to AoE tag them.

Complaints

The never-ending stream of wailing which is happening slightly irritates me, to be honest. Particularly the ones who claim that Blizzard is ripping off all of its customers? (I for one do not wish said people speaking in my name, tyvm)  I can understand being a bit upset at being ganked whilst levelling or being irked at the fact you can’t get to the raid on time because the flight master is looking a bit thin and gristley but going on and on for hours that you hate Blizz and how dare they make a world event?

Sorry, not listening, out having fun at said event!

It was only for a few days and, in my opinion it’s too much fun to worry about overly much.  A world event which will only happen once? Count me in!

Nagaluiz in this thread on the mmo-champion forums put it nicely:

It’s a wonderful transition to the events of the opening of the next expansion, and should be enjoyed. It seems that the only people who are whining are those who are still taking the next two weeks seriously and don’t realize the futility of most of what they do at the present time. Have fun with it, and think of the bigger picture. Would you rather a huge, once in your WoW career experience leading up to the invasion of the major cities by Arthas’ minions, or just one day randomly being able to enter Northrend?

I think most would agree that this, like the previous world event for TBC (which wasn’t nearly as thought out/good), adds quite some flavor to the wait for Wrath. The zombies are supposed to be annoying. They’re supposed to decimate the cities. They are supposed to serve as a juxtaposition to what you would actually be feeling if you were a resident of Azeroth, the frustration of the endless battle against the undead Scourge who just keep coming back up after you kill them, not unlike that of Arthas during the time of his descent… As Lionne said, it’s probably the best event they’ve ever done, because they’re forcing people to get involved, to want to kill the undead.

I know there are a lot of you who do not agree with this post who aren’t just whinging, for instance, BigBearButt has written an interesting tirade against the zombie event that I couldn’t help but link (though I still, respectfully, disagree) as has Lume but I do rather wish that more people would be open to the fact that one could like this event and not be a ganking asshat.

I personally spent my time as a zombie for one evening killing any player who came nearby and since then have neither looked for infection nor avoided it.  Oddly, though, I was only infected once and corpse exploded myself so as not to take durability damage (I was on my way to a raid or I mght have gone to eat some tasty Shattered Sun elfses.  I spent most of my gametime these last few days out purging the scourge and didn’t really have any issues with people griefing me.  If I was worried I might get killed at an Auction House or Bank I’d just go to a quieter city (Exodar or Darnassus).

5 days of madness, with, as Cynra points out, an insane amount of emotional involvement.  Love of loathe it, anyone who was around will not forget this event.

This was meant to be a short roundup of my thoughts. Bugger!