Well, well. Blizzard has really gone and done it this time. To make such a bold claim (in both intent and typeface), then to absolutely ignore it outright. To offer your players a slight glimmer of hope, then to wave it aside like bad breath. To say you're going to do one thing and instead do exactly the opposite - there's a word for that, I'm sure you know. Since there has yet to be an official response to the matter, we players can only presume your attitude towards us, and I gotta tell you, it ain't pretty. Honestly, it's not a surprise, either.

No, I'm not talking about the 3.0.8 patch fiasco, though that is certainly worth mention. About the only attention I normally pay the patches is to make sure I get them downloaded. However, with the lag and queue times and lag and even more lag, I have seen more than my share of the problems the new patch has caused. No, I am directing my attention and this column to the RP realm debacle that arose over Wyrmrest Accord.

For the sake of my fellow roleplayers who may have missed it, a new RP realm, Wyrmrest Accord, opened up on January 16th. Blizzard announced free moves to it, and I quickly moved three avatars over. This was the first time I've made use of free moves, and I must say they all transferred without a hitch. I went through the process with all three in about fifteen minutes, and when I checked almost exactly an hour later, all three were moved in complete fashion. I see on the forums that many many others are not having so fluid an experience. Wish I could help with that.

That's not the problem I'm here to address. When the announcement was made, it seemed business as usual, just another free move offering like so many before, at least as far as I could tell. However, two items quickly came into sight, one being the source realms that were open to allowing characters to freely leave and move to Wyrmrest. As I undertand it, twenty-six realms were open to the free move to Wyrmrest (and Winterhoof). Of those, only nine were RP realms, with a total of sixteen non-RP realms accounting for much of the remaining number. Now, as I said, this was my first time taking Blizzard up on their free move offer, so maybe allowing characters from non-RP realms to move to an RP realm is standard operating procedure. In any case, it stank of being at best a faulty procedure, knowing that this fresh brand new RP realm was going to very quickly become simply another realm overrun with smacktard RP griefers and the like.

That was my initial thought, until I read further down the announcement and saw a sentence boldly standing out from the rest of the page that nearly caused me to jump out of my chair with glee. To paraphrase (I should've taken a screenshot!), it stated that players should be aware that Wrymrest Accord is an RP server, and that the RP rule set will be enforced there.

Whoa! Did Blizzard just say they are going to finally enforce one of their own WoW rules that was written when the game launched over four years ago? For a brief yet ecstatic moment, I thought Blizzard had surely implemented at least one of many ways to abide by their own rules to insure Wyrmrest Accord was the RP mecca that roleplayers desire.