Winter's Veil and the Light -- Part 1/2

Yes, you read that correctly. I suppose you could call this a "Christmas in July" surprise, given that I'd originally meant to have this ready for last year's actual Christmas season, but stuff happened and I got stuck finishing the story. I'll explain more in a follow-on post after this is complete.

This story is set after the events that culminated in The Deadmines and then The Stockades in Vanilla Classic WoW. When I write I tend to jump around the timeline when I find a compelling scene, which is why I have other works of fiction in the pipeline. I may eventually begin creating completely original works of fiction again, but that also assumes that Cardwyn won't kick my ass or something and demand more be written.

The full list of attributions will follow at the conclusion of the story, so I won't give anything away, but here's a standard disclaimer: 

This is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to actual events or people, living or dead, is entirely coincidental. Any characters and locations created by Blizzard for WoW Classic remain their property. This work of fiction uses WoW Classic as the primary reference point. Copyright by Redbeard of Parallel Context, 2025.

Winter’s Veil and the Light

"Apprentice, your sister is here!"

I stuffed the last wrapped present into my pack and slung it over my shoulder. "Coming!" I called, flying out of my room and to the top of the stairs.

At the bottom stood Mistress Elsharin and Kira, chatting quietly. Considering she’d just arrived from Goldshire I expected my big sister to at least appear like she’d been traveling all day, but no, she looked like her typical perfect self. She wore her formal Journeywoman's outfit, complete with the badges signifying her rank in the Goldshire Bakers Guild stitched onto her breast jacket. The only indication she’d been on the road at all was her travelling basket by her side, which she used to carry baked goods throughout central Elwynn. I bounced down the stairs and into her arms, clapping her on the back. “Kira!” I cried.

"Card!" she exclaimed, squeezing me tight and holding me at arm’s length. "Look at you! You're wearing a new robe!"

"It took me quite a while to figure out how to stitch the material,” I grinned, “but I had some help from around the Quarter." 

That was quite an understatement. When Mistress Elsharin suggested that I should mark the ending of the Defias affair by making my own robe, I was a bit hesitant. After all, she'd made it rather plain to me that despite her Queldorei house name she was not a tailor and had no interest in becoming one. After my experience with a tailor accosting me to examine my robe when I first arrived in Stormwind, I wasn't so keen on asking for help, either. However, Elsharin recommended a different tailor, and Mistress Larson took me under her wing to show me the basics of dealing with bizarre items such as spider silk thread in the creation of this new white robe.

"I love your Journeywoman's outfit!" I added as took in my sister's uniform. "Isn't it different than last year’s?"

"Yes!" Kira pulled her sleeve over, exposing some new stitching. "The gold stripe along the shoulder and down the sleeves signify Senior status."

"That's wonderful! Does that mean you're the Senior Journeywoman in the Guild?"

My sister grinned from ear to ear and nodded.

I dropped my pack and embraced her in another tight hug. "Congratulations!"

"That is wonderful news!" Elsharin exclaimed, crossing over to our kitchen. "This calls for a toast before you leave." 

"You're not coming?" Kira called after her.

My sister released me, and I shook my head and sighed.

"I shouldn't intrude, as it is a family event, and a Dawnweaver always puts family first," Mistress Elsharin replied, returning with three glasses and a bottle of wine.

"I tried to convince her that she's family now," I added, "but..."

"No buts, Apprentice." The Elf handed out the glasses and poured some wine into each. "To Kira Songshine, Senior Journeywoman!" she exclaimed, raising her glass in a toast.

"To Kira!" I saluted my sister and drank. 

"To Card and Elsharin, my Stormwind family!" Kira added.

"And now," Elsharin said, setting down her glass, "I believe you two have a date to keep back at your farm." She walked over to the foyer and raised her arms to cast. "Apprentice, you have my presents with you?"

I grabbed my pack and slung it over my shoulder. "Yes, Mistress Elsharin."

"Very well, I'll open the portal." She focused and brought the arcane to bear before us, and a portal to the farm opened. "Tell everyone Happy Winter Veil for me!"

"I will!" 

We stepped through the portal and into our barn.

Meme Monday: Summer Heat Memes

Well, it took an extra month to arrive, but Summer has finally hit our corner of the Midwest with a gigantic sledgehammer. The past week we had what the meteorologists rather blandly call a "heat dome" over much of the US, so we here got kind of thwacked by the weather.

In an absolute sense, low to mid 90s (~34C) isn't really that bad, but given that we had a significantly colder Spring and early Summer so far, it was a bit of a rude awakening. So, while I'd typically put this sort of Meme Monday later in the Summer, I figured I'd post it now. After all, Cincinnati and Milwaukee were both warmer than Las Vegas for the majority of last week.

I should try this sometime. From Thunder Dungeon.

Okay, I chuckled at this. After all, I do live on
the northern edge of the Bible Belt.
From Memedroid.

My son's room is like this. It gets the afternoon
sun and not enough airflow from the HVAC system.
From 9GAG.

If it were hell, it'd be a lot closer to what
work feels like. From Thunder Dungeon.

And because I prefer winter....
From Facebook and Castillo.

A Bit Late to the Party

Mike Bell dropped a YouTube video today about his coworker and buddy Matt's experience with a new toon on a fresh Retail WoW account. 

The TL;DR is Matt found that approaching the game as a brand new player --without knowing the ins and outs of the game itself-- the leveling experience pretty quickly becomes unbearable due to the level scaling.

To which I say...

From The Ballad of Busker Skruggs and really
from all over the internet.

I know, I know, people may not internalize things if they don't experience it themselves, but this is not a new event. In fact, problems with the new Retail WoW experience have been around for quite a while. I tend to focus on the story problems, but when your gameplay starts to break down, then WoW finds itself in a precarious position. 

For all the problems with the story, WoW has always --always-- been able to lean on its gameplay as its strength.* But now, Matt found himself where he'd outleveled the content but didn't have commensurate gear to match with the content he was facing. Since your ability to kill mobs in Retail WoW is so dependent on gear**, he found himself having to pull off every trick in the book to kill mobs, something your average new player won't know. Returning players have certain advantages, with heirloom gear that automatically scales with you, and they can also have friends drop by to help them kill things in the same way that people are boosted in Classic WoW.

How to fix the problem? 

Matt eventually used his knowledge of crafting to craft some cloth gear (he played a Tauren Mage) and then he could keep playing, but again, that's something the average new player won't know. Among the suggestions he was given but rejected include the tip to simply logoff and not play for two months, then Blizz will automatically provide you with a set of catch-up gear. Given that buying the game then NOT playing it seemed nonsensical, Matt passed on that one.

I guess my reaction to this video is better late than never, but at least they did make an honest attempt at trying things out.

*I'm including raiding and other instanced content here.

**I'd argue even more so than in Classic WoW, where you can get away with being undergeared while being out in the wild for quite a while. Hell, I'm proof of that.

On a Clear Day, You Can See L40

Okay, it's not quite that bad.

Card is wearing gear really meant for someone
in the upper L20s, but those bonus Frost damage pieces
have no equal until much higher Tailoring skill is obtained.
The levels as of Tuesday, June 24, 2025.

I mean, everybody is at L34, so only 6 levels to go. I suppose that you could argue that L40 is the true midway point in the leveling process due to how difficult it is to level the higher you go up in Vanilla Classic, but paradoxically more quest areas open up once you get past the mid-30s and mid-40s doldrums. 

I've kept myself busy by fishing for Nightfin, which has come in handy as that gold I've made has now started to go into leveling Blacksmithing and keeping up with all of the toons' ability training. At least two of the toons I'm leveling will get their mounts automatically at L40, but that means I have to pay for 6 mounts in the not too distant future.

So... I'd better have something like 600 gold lying around for that, right? Probably more, given that I want to have a cushion so I'm not totally broke* and that I'll still likely have to pay for the basic riding ability for those other two toons anyway. And then there's all those nice L40 abilities you have to train for as well...

Yeah, I think I'm gonna be mount poor for a long time after L40.

Back when I was originally leveling Az in 2019/2020, it was at this point in the leveling process that her gear was getting pretty long in the tooth --most of it came from The Deadmines, so at L20 or so-- that I began purchasing some items off of the Auction House to replace the oldest pieces. I've held off from doing that for now, but when your daggers came from random drops in Westfall, trying to kill things in Desolace with them doesn't really cut it. 

***

That does lead into an interesting paradox with leveling: I frequently will take gear drops I find in the wild and send them to my other toons to help them out. For example, I don't think Hoots has gotten a bow for herself since Darkshore; instead she's gotten bows as hand-me-downs from other toons that found them out in the wild. The same thing goes for my Druid, Taldanifal, and his items. It's a pretty rare occasion when my three Leather wearing toons find useful gear out in the wild, especially after the embarrassment of riches in Westfall and The Deadmines. All those leather drops there led to what I kindly call "the expectation of riches"; after all, we got a lot of gear early, so why won't that continue in later levels? Well, Vanilla Classic (and life) don't work like that. 

You know the disclaimer: past results do not guarantee future performance? Well, Vanilla WoW is that saying come to life. To be honest, it's much better that it happen in a video game, as opposed to happening in real life with your finances. While you can't depend on gear drops, you can make some educated guesses. And in my case, just prepare for the worst, because that's how my luck rolls in MMOs.

Still, I can enjoy the sights...

Winging by Grom'gol on my way north from Booty Bay.

*Back when I was leveling in TBC Classic and had at least made it to Zangarmarsh (the swampy zone in Outland), one of the guys I knew on our raid team who had pushed ahead and was busy doing all the things had wiped out his entire stash of gold to pay for a fast flying mount, something like 5000 gold. The move shocked me, but he said it was totally worth it.

To be honest, I think that decision to essentially bankrupt yourself in pursuit of a fast flying mount is what turned me off from getting fast flying on any of my toons in TBC Classic and Wrath Classic. I've lived my entire life on a paycheck-to-paycheck basis, and blowing everything for what is pretty much an extravagance simply isn't in my system. 

Meme Monday: Contextual Memes

Yes, there's that classic Doctor Who parody meme where Clara Oswald asks the Twelfth Doctor about whether a particular number is a lot, and the Doctor answers "Depends on the context". I've got a few of them around, so why not have this for a Meme Monday?

Let's get the original out of the way, shall we?
From Incorrectwhoquotes, but really from all over.

Okay, I'd argue yes to both, because I'm old enough
to know I need to do more per day than just game.
From the Facebook Geeks are Sexy group.

Of course I had to go and put a Minecraft
meme in here. I can even here the nasally "huh?"
sound that character makes. From Reddit and
Know Your Meme.

Yeah, as a pencil and paper RPG player, that's
about right. From Imgflip.

Given that I own a few Wusthof knives, I found this
quite funny. From Imgflip.

Absolutely. I saw a LEGO store in the Charlotte airport,
and they told me that they ship internationally, so you
don't have to worry about trying to board a plane with
"extra baggage". From Pinatafarm.

Red Flags

When I logged into Battle.net today, I saw this graphic:

From Battle.net, although a slightly different color tone
than found on the front page.

I typically don't see this particular version of Xal'atath --I think this is from a cutscene or a trailer for the expansion-- because this is more photo realistic than the "usual" version:

It's that "I'm the smartest person in the room"
look that gets you. From Wowhead.

The look she has in the first graphic reminds me a bit of Minthara from Baldur's Gate 3:

Well, except for the white hair and the non-glowing
eyes. And the carvings. And that Minthara is obviously
pissed off. From IGN and Larian Studios.

That middle graphic looks more obviously diabolical to me, while the other two being more understated actually scare me a helluva lot more. 

I've never heard Xal's voice, but Minthara's throaty voice, like she's got a breath mint in her mouth that she needs to work around to speak properly, is properly noble yet demanding. She also carries the baggage of expectations, because the Drow in D&D and The Forgotten Realms have a long history that can't easily be ignored. 

On the flip side, Xal's photo realistic look is scarier due to the red flags I see in them. Like, oh, the carvings in her cheeks. While I've seen my share of facial tatoos over the years, I very rarely see facial carvings; the only people I've ever seen who actually put carvings on their face are those who really don't give a damn about anything.

And let's not forget those eyes. Sure, WoW has tons of races with glowing eyes, but Xal's have a certain... something about them. Maybe it's the shapes in the center that appear to be small mouths. Or that the glowing portion is mainly the irises, unlike entire eyes that glow (looking at you, Sin'dorei, Kaldorei, and Draenei). Or that it makes the eyes look like moons, and not in a "ooo, how beautiful" way either.

Speaking of which, here's another graphic of a Big Bad with similar red flags:

Oh yeah, Ahmanet works. Better than the movie
itself, to be honest.
From 2017's The Mummy (and Reddit).

Ahmanet gives a whole new meaning to the term "four eyes", and those raised tattoos don't endear her to people, either. 

I guess the biggest red flag among them is the malice that to a greater or lesser extent they all inhabit. It doesn't exactly give me warm fuzzies if one of them were to strike up a conversation with me at a bar. Since they all wear their intentions on their collective sleeves, it's kind of hard to look beyond that. Unlike some baddies...

Yes, I pulled this gif from Bedazzled. So sue me.

What is Best in Life?

I'm not exactly sure how Age of Conan is still kicking around, but it still is.

Yes, there it is.

I hadn't installed it in 2021 when I broke down and bought my current PC, and I suppose that my old toon there is still hanging out wherever I'd left it way back when. 

Still, Funcom continues to keep the Conan license alive with AoC, Conan Exiles, Conan Chop Chop, and Conan Unconquered. How do they do it? And while most people know of Conan from the Arnold Schwarzenegger movies the original Robert E. Howard short stories are still around.* I can find at least one Conan book at my local bookstore, which is one more than from David Eddings (and until recently Michael Moorcock). What is the appeal of Conan?

Maybe it's because the Sun travels east to west
and the Moon travels west to east. Yeah, I thought
something was weird the first couple of days I played,
but I couldn't put my finger on it until I realized that
the Sun rose in the same area that the Moon set.

The Sword and Sorcery subgenre has its adherents, particularly those in the RPG community who enjoy the "old school" style of 1e AD&D and modern interpretations such as Shadowdark. It's just that for some reason the brutal and brooding style of the Hyborean Age, created by a bookish Texan, has an enduring appeal to this Norwegian game company. 

When I used to play Age of Conan I got the impression that it was far more popular over in Europe than in the US, and my tinkering around with Conan Exiles has only reinforced that perception. 

Taking a rest in a bed I'd built with crude tools.

Both Conan Exiles and Age of Conan have a casual attitude toward nudity that would shock certain sensibilities in the US. Yes, you can play Conan Exiles on a server --your own or created by others-- without turning nudity on, but I'm sure that was put in place to allow the game to be put on Steam. I'm not here to moralize about that, because nudity or near nudity is a staple of Sword and Sorcery along with magic and civilization itself being evil and corrupting, but it is worth noting that Funcom went all in on the aesthetic. Before you ask, no, they didn't add sex to the game, but apparently people created mods to "fix" that.

Why am I not surprised?

A more problematic part of Conan Exiles is that Funcom did not shy away from another aspect of Sword and Sorcery: slavery and thralldom. Here in the US, any discussion of slavery centers, first and foremost, on the slavery of Africans that culminated in the American Civil War. Slavery in Conan Exiles is more akin to that found in the Ancient World, where those defeated in war were enslaved by the victors.** In Conan Exiles, you "recruit" people to your side by knocking them out using a truncheon, putting them on the Wheel of Pain, and having them "work" the wheel until their spirit is broken. 

And despite the "splitting hairs" aspect to the whole thing, holy crap is this something incredibly problematic. 

Yes, it follows with the spirit of Conan's world, but I also think this is something that the devs could have read the room and said "You know, slavery isn't exactly a popular thing right now, maybe we ought to come up with another mechanic other than thralls." I mean, there's plenty of other things that were popular in the Ancient World (and Sword and Sorcery) that didn't make the cut in the game. 

If you are thinking about Conan Exiles as a survival game to play and you find the thrall mechanic a hard line, that's on Funcom. They could have easily changed the game to something less problematic, but by sticking to their guns they limited their game's appeal. 

*Not to mention stories written by other authors, such as L. Sprague de Camp, Lin Carter, Poul Anderson, and even Robert Jordan.

**For those familiar with Roman and Greek history may have heard of Epictetus, the Stoic Philosopher, who was born a slave. And there's Spartacus, who led a slave revolt.