Hello folks! This is a great website! Thanks to all who created and contributed!

I am a foreigner that lives in Shanghai at the moment and I have lived in China for more than 4 years.

I am writing this in a hurry, so I hope you can be forgiving if I am asking some things that were asked already before or the questions are too stupid:

1) I am a guy that cannot invest that much of time to the game at all times. I can play pretty much on weekends and maybe sometimes in the week. pretty busy work. But I did play this way some other games (wow unofficial or order & chaos) and still enjoyed them. Is there "still" something to enjoy in WoW for a guy like me? Is the game fun? Is it worth it at the moment?
(Because I hear some people telling me that "no you really need a lot of time to enjoy" or "no the game is dead")

2) As a foreigner, is it fun to play in Chinese servers? How are they like? I enjoyed playing o&c on chinese servers, even though there were no foreigners (people were still sometimes speaking english tho)
Also, that much foreigners at the moment?

3) I don't want to use a credit card at any level when I'm playing this game. I see family marts sell game cards. I also think I can buy the game from some shop or something.
How does it work? What should I buy?

4) Are the Taiwanese and Chinese servers the same things? I have a Taiwanese account that I used D3 from (I got it with the help of a friend). Can I use it to play from both Chinese and Taiwanese servers?

5) I've seen that family marts sell these 30 yuan cards. But they have the dragon picture on it. So that means you cannot use it on the pandaren?
Also, does these cards work both on taiwanese and chinese servers?

Thanks you in advance people. Hope we can play together sometime!

Cheers

1. Of course you can enjoy it! WoW has been changed to suit different play styles afterall. I suggest you try it first and explore the world a bit. If you're new to this, then discard others' opinions on the game and make your own. WoW has a lot, and it's up to you to enjoy in whatever you want.
Looking at your schedule rapidly, you can definitely enjoy it. Levelling is definitely enjoyable and for the better part of the game, the most fun.
When you get to max level, more activities will open up.

2. I find that the Chinese servers are much more enjoyable to play on than the US/EU ones. It might be an over-generalization but a lot of chinese players are helpful and if some start to insult you, it doesn't matter - you won't understand anyway.
I'm happy to say that we've got the most active foreigner guild on chinese servers at the moment, with numerous people logging in to play the game. Check the Crazy Waiguorens' part of the forum.

3. You can buy a WoW game card to recharge the amount of play time left on your WoW account. Those cards can be used to purchase pets, mounts or transfers/race changes, etc.

4. Unfortunately, they aren't. You won't be able to play on Chinese mainland servers with a taiwanese account. Chinese/Taiwanese accounts are limited to their respective regions.

5. Buy the 30 yuan card that has the WoW logo on it. The picture on it doesn't mean that it'll only work on a certain expansion at all. These cards will only work on Chinese servers, or as mentioned previously, you can use them for other battlenet services.

We've got great guides on this forum that'll make everything clearer.

Welcome to the forum, bobbaa.

Urubaen, thank you so much for the reply!

May I ask a few more after your answers?

1) So, should I understand that I will be ONLY paying these cards that I will buy around.
I don't need to buy the game, expansions and all that.
Just the cards.

2) How are the regulations over ID's? I know a friend of mine got a generated Taiwanese account on internet before and never had a problem since.
I also know Chinese people who plays this game with fake ID's.
What is the risk involved in this? (other than, if you have any issues like hack or something, noone will be helping you)

Do they often check the validity of ID's?
Do they often give you trouble with account where you have to prove you are the real owner of an ID?

Thanks in advance bud, and also thanks for the warm welcome!

P.S. I also just checked to make sure and I got validated with a generated id no and name

1. Yes. No expansion purchase required at all.

2. I suggest you ask a chinese friend. ID's found on the chinese web are often used by bots, and when they get banned, you will be too.
The ID's are checked at the very beginning of account creation, and also used to reclaim your account if you've been hacked, for example.

Refer to the ID thread if you're still troubled over this.

Cheers.

Hello Urubaen, thank you for the continuous support. The information you gave me is very valuable for me atm.

I have checked the old topics but unless my search-fu is really bad, they were either 2 years old or it wasn't really what I was looking for.

I have already tested the "generated" id method and it got validated. (It's not a copy paste from a website. It was a generator that generates a name, number, cellphone and birthday for you etc.)
I may be wrong but getting to identical numbers seems pretty hard this way to me.

What I wanted to know is, other than having a problem and contacting blizzard etc. is it possible for them to have random checks on ID's and such and suddenly ban you out of nowhere?

I have a serious relationship but my gf was very hesitant to let me have her id to play. She couldn't get why I would get such precious information just to "play a game" on a company that "she doesn't even know".
After a long hassle though I have managed to get in

So, anyways, I'm in now. I am in CN1 in pvp server.
I have a panda monk 12 lvl atm enjoying the game pretty much.

i have joined "english" channel but couldn't find anyone.

Anything I can do to reach to the english speaking community at the moment?

Thanks!

aaaand it seems i made a mistake because my realm has nobody...

-_-

gotta make a new char now? dang...

EDIT: Now I have created a new char in the right server, name is: Tosun

Hope you can add me to the guild guys!

I am not expecting any support because I am a casual player and won't be a key player so soon, but I hope I can have some new friends in the guild and have some fun moments in the game, joking around

EDIT2: The population of the server seems high tho...Do you get queued often?

Hopefully you got into the right server, 奥特兰克. Anyhow, they don't often do ID checks and if they do, it's only if you're trying to reclaim your account. I suggest you set up a strong password.

When you get online, type /join english in your chat, and you'll end up on an english chat channel where you can ask for an invite. Alternatively, type /who The Crazy Waiguorens , and whisper one of the members.

As for the server, I'm pretty sure it had an average population last time I checked. Don't get queued often however.

I just add about ID.
I once entered my battlenet account through proxy and they temporarily closed my account because of unusual activities, i unlocked it with ID scan, so be aware and good luck ^)
https://wow-in-chinese.forum2jeux.com/t2571-my-account-got-locked

Sleepwholelife, thank you for awesome feedback. That's good to know!

My gf is already not very comfortable with this whole id thing so now this is a good thing to back me up (don't get me wrong of course though! of course it sucks to have such an experience, no pun intended there)

Anyways, I'm already in the guild guys. Thanks for the add!

I was expecting more "English" inside but it seems like the Chinese are more than the laowai

But still, great guild. Happy to be in : )))

Not sure why she would be paranoid about the ID.
Everything in life here asks for your ID number. If I didnt have a Chinese drivers licence to prove my passport number vouches for my National ID number I wouldnt be able to do much of anything officially.

Its like a drivers licence number here. Sure you dont want to give it to everyone, and its only a game, but its no different than signing up for email or QQ.

Good luck and enjoy your weekends playing and leveling. To be honest there isnt anything worth doing the rest of the week. Now that I'm 90 and looking at a long vacation my only options in game is to either start a new character or do dailies until my eyes bleed. Wheeee

Stay under the level cap as long as possible. Heck you might even want to level up through PvP.

Mists of Disneyland was a huge let down if you ask me.

Cheese wrote:

Not sure why she would be paranoid about the ID.
Everything in life here asks for your ID number. If I didnt have a Chinese drivers licence to prove my passport number vouches for my National ID number I wouldnt be able to do much of anything officially.

Its like a drivers licence number here. Sure you dont want to give it to everyone, and its only a game, but its no different than signing up for email or QQ.

Good luck and enjoy your weekends playing and leveling. To be honest there isnt anything worth doing the rest of the week. Now that I'm 90 and looking at a long vacation my only options in game is to either start a new character or do dailies until my eyes bleed. Wheeee

Stay under the level cap as long as possible. Heck you might even want to level up through PvP.

Mists of Disneyland was a huge let down if you ask me.

Hey bud!

You are definitely right about ID but she's just not used to these kinds of stuff.
She is also worried that this kind of information can be used to fake an id and try to get credit from banks later etc.

For now, I enjoy the game...but it has a lot to do with "I'm playing wow at last!" of course

As for panda's and all, I have been following the warcraft universe since W2 (as in games...I can't say I follow the story SO good) so I don't find pandarens so odd in concept.
But still, I cannot get rid of the "disneylandish" idea of them myself as well.

However I enjoyed it anyways. The entrance of pandarens was fun imho : )) Did you find it fun?

By the way, noob question : ))

Since we are charging our account with playing time, is staying on character screen considered as "playing?

I think so. As long as you're logged into your account it's counted as 'play time'.

It is, after you hit enter on the WoW #1,2,3 etc. screen and see the character selection you are burning time.
I learned it the hard way as I had often left it open while doing other junk, but one day I noticed my time points had changed.

The pandarian lore is all right by me. Brewmaster Stormstout always poked his way into lore from time to time and the idea of exploring Pandaria was cool. (ALthough not nearly as cool as the emerald dream or other things, but hey.)
The execution of the game and enviroment is the problem for me. Its just bland and overly simple. Not even runner quest simple, its "go talk to the guy next to me" simple.
So many quests are just poke someones chat bubble then wait for the zone phase and all your freinds to dissapear.

My big attraction was the expansive atmosphere of the game, not the phasing zones that make it impossible to stay connected to freinds or help new players.

Anyway its just an opinion, good luck leveling. I'd pitch in a hand but I'm over on guiwufeng CN3