The Daily Show vs World of Warcraft

It has recently come to public attention that the NSA has been monitoring online video games such as World of Warcraft and SecondLife since 2009. This is a little shocking to me, and not for obvious reasons. The only way you could legitimately hide any kind of terrorist discussion within Warcraft would be speak personally with one another (e.g. through whispers, guild chat or party chat) or to create an elaborate code comprised of consistent themes/terms that crop up in most discussions. To me, that just seems like more hassle than it’s worth. There have to be more efficient platforms for this that don’t include coming up with a code made up of hypothetical bestiality questions/jokes about your mom/calling each other fat virgin boys.

On the flip side of this, was the NSA seriously trying to decipher the discussions within general/trade chat? Imagine being the guy who got stuck monitoring and deciphering the party chat or whispers on, say… Moonguard? It all seems so… redundant. It’s a brazen move on the government’s part, to monitor video games under the veiled excuse that it is to “fight terrorism”.

Jon Stewart and the fine folks at the Daily Show thought this would be the perfect moment to attempt to make fun of Warcraft and the people that love playing it. To be fair I think Jon Stewart is humorous, especially his joke about the 72 virgins. This skit, however, was disappointing to say the least. The lack of accurate research makes it seem like the audience they were going for were non-Warcraft players (I can appreciate that) but that raises another question; why research at all? The whole thing came across as a quick opportunity to get a few cheap laughs off a universal, tried-and-true joke about uber-nerds done very poorly.

I made it a bit of a game to try and pick up on all the inaccuracies, and yes… there is a list.

1. Why does a Dwarf Paladin have a skill bar full of Priest spells? I see Shadow Word: Pain, Renew, Greater Heal, Holy Nova, etc etc.
2. Why does a Dwarf have Elf ears? (Not to mention there isn’t a single braid in sight….)
3. The Panda behind him is Merchant Lorvo, a vendor found only in the Wandering Isle that is NOT ACCESSIBLE to anybody other than a level 1 Pandaren, and once you leave as a Panda (at level 10) you don’t come back. So WTF is a Dwarf dude doing there?
4. He mentions he has been playing “8 hours a day for 12 years” but then mentions he is casting a level 9 spell, which you can’t do unless you ARE level 9 (they removed the ability to cast a spell with a rank that doesn’t coincide with your characters level a while ago). I know it’s a slow grind dude, but you can get to level 30 in a night.
5. I couldn’t understand if he was saying “exchanging Rings of Forged Power at the Temple of the Moon” or “Rings of Forged Power of the Temple of the Moon”, but for this instance I’m going to go with the former. There is no such thing as a “Ring of Forged Power” in the game… however there is a “Ring of Power” (but kudos for getting the Temple of the Moon reference correct with Night Elf lore).
6. He doesn’t seem to have any weapons at all.
7. There is no “Endurance” stat in the game, and the OVER USED joke I think he was going for was the joke about stamina…
8. The Holy Wrath spell Greychalk casts on Jon is a level 20 Paladin spell, not available at level 9.
9. The Retribution Aura spell Greychalk asks Jon if he has active is actually an NPC only spell… I’m unsure if they were making a clever joke about Jon being the “boss” in this instance but considering this list I’m going to go with it being a mistake.

This list could have been avoided by a few searches among Wowhead.com, Wowwiki.com, or any of the other reputable Warcraft-centric sites out there.

I am disappointed in you, Jon Stewart.  This skit would not have lost its impact to the non-WoW players, but would be funny for everyone watching, if only this list of blaring inaccuracies didn’t exist. (WoW players WILL find every minute mistake, and relentlessly remind you of it… everybody knows that.

If there are any other mistakes I missed in my little list of horrors, let me know in the comments!