Hi Jenn.
It sounds like you had a similar question to me. I too play WoW for sometimes extended periods of time.
I bought the Barracuda... After about 3-4 hours my ear do start to get sore.
The microphone is very good and people say that they can always hear me clearly.
The 5.1 is very good but I must say I had problems setting it up correctly with my Creative X-Fi card and I have ended up plugging it into my onboard audio card - this seems to do with setting up of the volumes (as you have control of rear, bass, centre and front independantly - as a hint turn them all down and increase the front and bass first, then the rear and centre till comfortable. Remmeber if you play with the card driver setting and listening to music you need to quit your music app and restart it to hear your new settings). But the biggest thing was that halps is to have bass redirection control on your sound card (which on Vista my X-Fi doesnt but my onboard did). It would be worth checking this in your sound card settings.
The barracuda does have a built in amp/volume control with on/off switch and pretty blue lights... the cable is also VERY long.
I like them, there are mixed reviews online for them, some people critisising build quality but I think they were just careless in looking after them. They seem pretty good to me!
Again though, sound quality is good when set up correctly, positional audio is also not bad (for headphones) the mic is excellent BUT they do make my ears sore after a while (then again I think anyone would be hard pushed to find a pair of headphones that DONT do this after 3 or 4 hours...). If you ears sit very close to your head then you should be ok as I think if they touch the inside of the headphone cups it will make them sore.
Hope this helps! I have used the creative ones so cant pass judgement on them. Would I say the barracuda's are worth the money... it is touch and go to be honest...
Good luck!
Simon
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