Fixing battlemaster blocking
by Mike Schramm 
Jan 21st 2008 at 7:30PM
I haven't had this happen to me specifically, but I know it's happening out there-- players are blocking battlemasters by flooding around them, and hiding them inside other models, leaving them unclickable. We've heard about this before, and apparently it's a growing problem.So Blizzard has come up with a fix-- in 2.4, says Tigole, all the battlemasters will be standing on platforms, which will be coded with collision, so player models can't invade them. It's not that big a change (imagine the auctioneers in Ironforge and Silvermoon), but it should make for a little different visual-- it'll be a crowded little pavilion where the battlemasters are in Shattrath.
Of course, that doesn't solve the problem of blocking NPCs, only of blocking battlemasters. But there are probably enough repairers and questgivers around at this point that there's no reason to put all the NPCs on pedestals just to keep them away from the maddening crowd.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Jellodyne Jan 23rd 2008 1:47PM
Infection, you can right-click the nameplate sure as you can right-click the NPC, and do whatever you need to do. Means, yeah, you can queue up from using that.
I heal so I have healthbars up all the time, never could figure out why people were too stupid to use the nameplate if they couldn't get at the NPC.
Gurei Jan 21st 2008 7:49PM
Control/Shift + V usualy brings the names of the NPC and everyone else up.
/Target name.
Most people cant seem to do these to target katra bloodsnarld of whatever the AV in Orgr is called,lol.
Again,QQing about something you can fix yourself is easier than doing it.
Bloodchills Jan 21st 2008 7:56PM
I'm amazed that nobody knows about SHIFT+V. This is a great targeting system for enemies in raid and friendly players/NPCs in town.
In raid, you can see the health your targeted mob is at, which can help for split decision making.
In town, you can't be shut down by bad game mechanics.
Zeplar Jan 21st 2008 7:38PM
A lot of articles today are from topics last week... what's going on?
johnthorpe Jan 21st 2008 7:56PM
Next week, we'll get 5 stories about that damn ghost wolf.
Amanda Jan 22nd 2008 6:14AM
If you have such a problem with the articles, either stop reading them, or sign up to be a blogger yourself.
Zeplar Jan 21st 2008 7:58PM
/target doesn't work on NPC's.
Tereth Jan 21st 2008 8:04PM
I don't have any idea what WoW you've been playing, but yes, yes you can. Try it out for yourself.
Kiros Jan 21st 2008 8:07PM
Yaaaay I finally que without a big ol' Tauren standing on my Battlemaster.
DaleMox Jan 21st 2008 8:36PM
Btw you can easily jump to stand next to the auctioneers in Silvermoon, I always just up to them before I check the AH :) I also remember a friend trying to show me how to be on top of the collision screen of the auctioneers in IF (using the un-stuck feature, can't remember).
Anyways, this was a problem a while back in the PTRs when you could copy full GM/HW characters, and it was basically everyone rerolling (i was no better :P), and the battlemasters in Org were untargetable without the nameplates
MartinC Jan 21st 2008 8:43PM
Always get a laugh when people complain about this. Learn to /target.
Calybos Jan 22nd 2008 7:58AM
Or, players could stop being deliberately annoying little twerps. But then, how likely is that?
Zach Jan 21st 2008 9:47PM
I prefer to queue from less populated cities myself. If I'm PvPing, I don't care what city I'm queueing from, so to save myself the trouble, I queue from Silvermoon City. It's quiet, loads faster, and the people are all beautiful. =p
Chris Mutchler Jan 21st 2008 9:50PM
thank you thank you thank you
Michael Jan 21st 2008 9:57PM
I welcome this change. Any change that makes it easier to play the game and make it more enjoyable is good in my books.
As for the people who complain with the typical "QQ" and "L2whatever" the issue here is not that it is impossible to target a battlemaster, It is that players are going out of their way to inconvienience other players. It is sad that a player needs to hope on their Netherdrake and plop themselves on a battlemaster knowing people will have a hard time targeting the battlemaster.
We are all on the same team here.
Balgair Jan 21st 2008 10:19PM
Sure it's easy to /target an NPC but last I heard you can only interact with them by directly right-clicking on them... if it's now possible to interact another way can someone say what that way is, instead of just posting smartass comments? ;-)
Solidstate Jan 22nd 2008 3:05AM
I have to agree with Balgair here, as far as I know the *only* way to interact with an NPC is to directly right-click him/her. You can't /target him and then do something to interact with the targeted NPC - there is simply no way to do this.
Seriously, people posting comments like "people should QQ less about things they can fix for themselves" should double-check what they write first, before making double-fools of themselves - first for putting down other people and then for posting wrong information...
Malachi154 Jan 22nd 2008 1:52PM
shift+V brings up nameplates that you can click on to interact with the NPC, just as if you clicked on the actual NPC. The nameplates cannot be blocked by the inconsiderate...
Balgair Jan 22nd 2008 9:26PM
Aha, thanks, I hadn't realised the nameplates could be right-clicked on. Not quite the same as the "l2target" solution some suggested, but good to know it can be done, thanks!
bulgur Jan 21st 2008 11:11PM
Maybe smaller orc shoulders wasn't such a bad idea after all.