Why would a mage turn to the right?

November 29, 2006 11:21 AM

WoWFilter: Help me win a friendly bet involving World of Warcraft macintosh bugs, screen layout, and character positioning. Yep, lots

A friend of mine in my World of Warcraft guild posted this screenshot of his new modded UI:

http://www.paucielecti.com/uploads/img456d2a186b701.jpg

And challenged us to the following mystery:

Notice everything that covers my screen is on the right? That's because when I fight I turn my left side slightly toward my target.
25g to the first person that can correctly post why I do this. And yes, there IS a reason.

Hints:

1) It's not about how my toon looks/animates from that angle.
2) It's not because of anything related to UI visuals.
3) It's something related to WoW, not anything personal/RL.
4) It's because of a bug that used to be in the game, but has been fixed.
5) It's because of what type of computer I used when I started playing.

I know oodles and oodles about the game, but this has me totally perplexed. My google-fu has failed me.

It could be due to some client/server bug that misread the orientation of the character. I also knew that mages suffered from bugs involving their Blink spell when facing certain directions or certain landscape features (like uphill and downhill). But I'm unsure as to any specifics beyond this.

Help me win repair money!

posted by cowbellemoo to computers & internet (4 comments total)

Spent a while with my buddy Google and this is all I could find.

Possibility?
posted by jon4009 at 12:26 PM on November 29, 2006

Worth a shot. Seems to fit all the criteria. I'll let you know how it goes!
posted by cowbellemoo at 12:56 PM on November 29, 2006

This is pulled from the depths of my memory, and I'm having a hard time googling it, but: there used to be a tab-targetting bug in that it would only work reliably on one side of the screen. It's possible that your friend was using his setup as a workaround. It's mentioned in passing in this forum post (search for "targetting").

(Although I don't think the bug was limited to Macs.)
posted by flipper at 3:00 PM on November 29, 2006

I played a mage in WoW for about a year and a half, and for a while there was a bug with the spell Cone of Cold, where the animation would indicate that the spell was affecting the area directly in front of the character (as it's supposed to), but the actual effect of the spell was being directed 90 degrees to one side or the other.

I don't know if it was always the left side or not. I also don't know how long the bug was around, or if it has since been fixed.
posted by good in a vacuum at 3:30 PM on November 29, 2006