It was Troll versus Troll this week, as Gal'darah and Moorabi squared off in the Two Bosses Thunderdome. Gal'darah impaled an easy victory, sweeping to a win with 68 percent of the reader vote. (However, nearly 9 percent of voters didn't award victory to either combatant. We didn't find their rationale in the comments anywhere ... Who knows what they were thinking?)
Kar On E: Welcome to the Pachyderm playoff, everyone! This match kind of reminds me of a trip I took to the zoo recently. I saw several elephants and a couple of rhinos. Although I think in RL that an elephant might be able to take on a rhino, I believe that the rhino takes it in this case.
First of all, Moorabi won't be able to transform if he spends most of the fight impaled. Even if not impaled when he tries to transform, there's still the small matter of charging ghost rhinos (which would be a great band name). Finally, even if the elephant transformation happens, that doesn't mean that Gal can't impale him ... it just means that he might not be able to juggle him in the air quite as easily. For my money, Gal'darah will prove to be the most powerful pachyderm in the place.
Josin: One turns into a rhino, the other a mammoth, and they charge head on into each other. Azeroth is treated to a mountainous feast of Rhino Dogs and Last Week's Mammoth.
Clydtsdk-Rivendare: Additional mammalian transformations cannot be launched. Please try again later.
Aug 20, 2009
One Boss Leaves: Gal'darah impales Moorabi
WoW Rookie: Sharding etiquette
This week, we're going to help you understand a practice that varies wildly from group to group, server to server and even expansion to expansion. "In the past few months, I've run into a situation with people who are (or who I think are) new players who happen to be 80," reader Sarabande writes to WoW Rookie. "To them, the idea of DEing BoP items for shards is completely alien (and to at least one, he just rolled greed on everything 'just to see if he could get it')."
Should your group roll for unwanted or unneeded drops when an enchanter is on hand to disenchant them? What's accepted in one situation might be scorned in another. Because there's no single way to handle the situation, it's important for new players to be aware of the options. It's also important to understand the reasons why players feel so strongly one way or another about this issue. Because there's no single "correct" method, the savvy player respects the group consensus.
Disenchanting is the process of breaking down (yes, we mean "destroying") armor or weapons of uncommon (green), rare (blue) or epic (purple) quality into magical elements (crystals, shards, essences and dusts), which can then be used to enchant other gear. Also known as DEing and sharding, disenchanting is the primary means of "gathering" or "creating" materials for enchanting (an important point that explains why enchanters sometimes get touchy about their "rights" to loot drops for sharding.)
When a drop is not an upgrade ("need") for any given player, it's considered a "greed" roll. If there's an enchanter in the group, he or she may volunteer to DE the unneeded loot. The value of the enchanting component often outstrips the value of the original drop, either to a vendor or through the Auction House. This is especially true for unused BoP items, which always end up getting sold to a vendor.
At this point, we'd like to direct your attention to a recent Insider Trader column, Who keeps the shards?. Go on, click on over and read it, then come back. We'll wait right here.
Got a little better handle on the matter? Hang on, class, we have one more assigned reading for today: Are disenchanters getting robbed by rolls?
"Up until recently, all I had to do was say 'Do you want me to DE?' and it was understood and accepted that we would roll for shards at the end -- at least for those who did not get a BoP upgrade," writes Sarabande. "But lately, just asking that is not sufficient."
The WoW Rookie solution: Speak up and lock down a looting procedure before your group gets under way. "How are we handling shards, guys? Can anyone here DE?" keeps it above-board, friendly and clear.
Points to consider:
Is everyone in the group willing to let the enchanter keep any loot that's not Needed? If you have an enchanter willing to shard drops for randoming, will you roll and distribute shards at the end of the run or after every drop? Will you be sharding all un-Needed drops or only BoPs? What if someone leaves early? Is there an enchanter in the group who still need mats for leveling or buying high-end Enchanting recipes (some require shards for purchase)?
Once the group has made a decision:
If your group decides to shard and distribute, press Pass (the "X" at the top right-hand corner of the loot roll box) on any drops you're not rolling Need for. Don't be a jerk about "outing" enchanters who prefer to take their chances with a Greed roll and DE their own wins afterwards. They've undoubtedly lived through their share of DEing controversies. Put the Armory down, boy, and give them their peace. If your group has decided to distribute shards at the end of a run, don't forget to stick around!
Remember, the only hard-and-fast rule when it comes to sharding drops in a group is to communicate and decide as a group how to handle things before the run begins. Have fun!
Patch 3.2.0a being deployed today
You've read that right, there is a new patch that is dropping today, and right now. Patch 3.2.0a. This patch is a small one, yet important one that is fixing a variety of client issues that have been present since Patch 3.2. This is the first time in quite a while that a patch has not dropped on a Tuesday, and that one has come without any prior notice.
Of particular note with this patch is fixing of the "dump macros" that were being used by numerous rogues. Ghostcrawler hinted earlier in the day that there would be a fix for this soon, but it's surprising to see it solved so quickly.
There are also some graphic fixes in the game that many people should be pleased about. In particular for Mac users.
The full announcement, including patch notes, after the break.
The full patch notes and statement reads:
We'll be releasing a minor bug fix patch to version 3.2.0a. This sort of patch is very small in size, and we use them to fix specific issues that can't be hot-fixed. Issues addressed with this patch:
Fixed an exploit players were using with / commands
Fixed a performance issue with players logging into the game
Fixed an issue with Mac clients freezing near water
Fixed a crash Mac clients were experiencing with shadows on Fixed Function cards
Fixed an art issue with Freya Hard Mode where the light beams were visually too hard to see
Fixed an issue with Loaner mounts requiring Cold Weather Flying We will be bringing all realms down very soon for this small, but urgent patch. Downtime is expected to be quite minimal, as only rolling restarts will be required. Updating your game client will take only a small download.
Tags: breaking, bugs, dump-macro, exploits, graphic, mac, macro, patch-3.2, patch-3.2.0a, rogue, wow-patch, wow-patch-3.2, wow-patch-3.2.0a
The BlizzCon schedule, EU style
And the truth is that you're going to be staying up pretty late -- the conference will finish up around six in the morning there, so if you want to see all of the costume contests and Ozzy's concert on Saturday, better make sure you've got plenty of coffee and/or Red Bull on hand. And even if you fall asleep, don't worry: we'll have you covered.
Update: Here's one done by a reader with Australian times on it.
Aug 19, 2009
NCsoft aims for Aion to be second only to WoW in US
NCsoft has big plans for their fantasy MMO Aion in the west, and they're hoping to emulate their Asian success in the North American market. Kris Graft reports for Gamasutra that Aion generated 40.6 billion won (USD 32.7 million) in Q2 2008, which he notes is a strong start. In an earnings call, NCsoft CFO Jaeho Lee said, "I believe the performance of Aion in the US and European markets will be very successful. ... We are guessing that Aion will be -- could be -- the second [most] successful MMO in the US market next to World of Warcraft."
Bold optimism, to be sure. What really caught our attention, though, was that Graft pointed out a mention of the now dead-and-buried Tabula Rasa during that earnings call, another title NCsoft once had high hopes for in western markets. In answer to a question about how many boxes of Aion will ship as opposed to Tabula Rasa, Gamasutra quotes Lee as having said, "It's very unfortunate to hear the name of Tabula Rasa at this conference call... and we all want to forget and erase that memory from our performance."
Lee stated that their poor handling of Tabula Rasa (his wording: "We did a very poor job with Tabula Rasa") could have an impact on retailers taking orders for Aion, but he said that the situation is improving as anticipation for the game builds.
Have a look at the full story over at Gamasutra and let us know -- are their expectations of trumping every other MMO running in the US, well, unrealistic? (At the very least, the phrase "WoW-killer" was never uttered.) And does World of Warcraft's subscriber base really need to be the sole standard by which the success of all other titles are measured?
Blizzard maps out BlizzCon
There she is, the BlizzCon map for 2009. As you can see, there's an extra hall than last year (and two more halls than a few years ago) -- Blizzard has rented out the flnal hall of the convention center, so there are four whole halls filled with Blizzard activity. This also means that they don't have to go into the conference rooms on the second floor -- the panels will be held either on the mainstage or in the new panel discussion stage area. We're not sure where Ozzy will be held; in the past, concerts have been over in the arena attached to the convention center, but with one big room dedicated to a main stage, Blizzard may just set things up in there this year.
Everything else is pretty expected -- there'll be a Retro Arcade and an Art Gallery again, and statues of Kerrigan, Illidan, and the Orc and Wolf model to check out. One interesting note is that there are playable areas for both Diablo III and Starcraft II (we'll probably see the singleplayer mode of that game playable for the first time) as well as World of Warcraft, so if a new expansion is announced, we might get to see some of it playable already. And of course, all of Blizzard's partners will be in attendance as well. Excited yet?
WOW Leeroy 7 - The Hunter's Mark
It's only a few short days until BlizzCon, and I can't think of a better way to celebrate than a new release from Herculean Productions. Those fun loving folks have released Episode 7 of The Chronicles of Leeroy. This episode is specifically titled The Hunter's Mark.
Our noble Horde adventurers continue to get farmed by the evil Alliance rogue from last episode. Just when we think Leeroy and company will never reclaim their bodies, a heroic hunter arrives to save the day. The real punchline for that moment is, of course, the soundtrack. And I assure you -- I've not laughed so hard for some time. (Maybe it's the old fogey in me.) The new mage also makes an appearance, which gets me curious about where her subplot is going to go.
I continue to really love the Leeroy series. I can't express how much I love being reminded of the fun and community we should all share, and Herculean Productions does an outstanding job of doing just that.
Click here to check it out yourself.
Shifting Perspectives: Leveling 21-30
Every week, Shifting Perspectives examines issues affecting Druids and those who group with them. This week, we slog through levels 21-30. Also, werewolves.
Once the news broke on Troll Druids (and, I would guess, Worgen Druids as well, assuming that Blizzard isn't in the middle of a giant hoax), I sat back in my chair and held the following conversation with my subconscious, as I am so often wont to do:
ME: Troll Druids make no sense. Neither do Worgen Druids.
SUBCONSCIOUS: This is not about sense. This is about expanding your readership. Trolls + Worgen = MOAR DURIDS = more people reading Shifting Perspectives.
ME: That's not a valid statistical assertion.
SUBCONSCIOUS: Cool story, bro. Everyone will be rolling a werewolf Worgen when the expansion hits. You know you will be.
ME: (silence)
SUBCONSCIOUS: Werewolves! How badass is that, is all I'm saying.
ME: But the Trolls hate the Elves! They wouldn't be caught dead in Moonglade! And how the hell did the Worgen learn Druidic magic that took thousands of years to develop while some nutcase locked them behind the Greymane wall for 10 some-odd years?
SUBCONSCIOUS: Who cares?
ME (faltering): But...lore...wibba...wubba...
SUBCONSCIOUS: F%@k the lore! Now's the time to make a mad bid for power! Grind the rest of the class columnists under your questionably-itemized i-level 239 boot!
ME: Screw you, I need to go write the column for this week.
SUBCONSCIOUS (shouts after me): WEREWOLVES WEREWOLVES WEREWOLVES!
All right, my newly-expanding readership, let's get our collective nose back to the grindstone. Levels 21-30 are going to be significantly easier than levels 10-20 if for no other reason than a growing set of offensive abilities, but overall they're still not likely to be among your easiest.
If you're leveling Balance, your DPS rotation should be making heavy use of an early Moonfire and then Wrath spam in conjunction with Rooting mobs to keep yourself undamaged. Starfire can also be used, but until you get some +haste on your gear it's a very long cast (although it's more mana efficient than Wrath). I would advise investing in a Glyph of Entangling Roots for leveling purposes.
If you're leveling Feral, the Cat's DPS rotation will be mostly Claw spam for the moment. A 2 to 3 combo-point Rip on your target will force it to die a little faster, though. Pull with Feral Faerie Fire, pop out of Cat to heal, then keep grinding. You can open from Stealth if you want, but in the absence of Ravage and Pounce, there's really not much point to doing so from a combat perspective.
LEVEL 22
Two new skills and three updates:
Shred: At 80 this will be a major contribution to your DPS and your main "spammy" damage skill, but while leveling it's of significantly less use due to its positional requirement. "Positional requirement?", you ask. Namely, you have to be behind a mob. Without access to Maim, your only real opportunity to use Shred at this level (unless you're DPSing a dungeon) is while opening from Prowl, so while it's a great damage move, you'll probably only get one off before the outraged mob in question is facing you. Hence, if you're leveling Feral, whether you invest 2 points in Shredding Attacks or not is entirely up to you.
Soothe Animal: In my opinion, this is one of the Druid's most underrated abilities. It's a version of the Priest ability Mind Soothe, and as of Wrath, it applies to Dragonkin in addition to Beasts. It's instant-cast, doesn't place you in combat, and is basically a version of stealth without being in stealth; it greatly reduces the distance at which a hostile Beast or Dragon will "see" you. Even at 80 I still find it enormously useful while herbing or running around doing anything without wanting to spend time in a fight. A trick you may want to use while trying to stealth past a higher-level Beast or Dragon is casting Soothe Animal on them first, and then attempting to stealth past; it's a poor-man's version of Distract.
Moonfire, rank 4: standard upgrade. Rejuvenation, rank 4: standard upgrade. Wrath, rank 4: standard upgrade.
LEVEL 24
Two key Cat damage abilities (immensely improved from their initial form) and the ability to decurse!
Rake: In the absence of the ability to use Shred on most targets while soloing, Rake was always a go-to Cat skill for face-to-face combat. However, it wasn't worth keeping on your bars for dedicated DPS situations in classic or BC, in which it wasn't really worth using over the old "Shred to 4/5 combo points, then Rip" rotation. Nowadays, Rake is worth your respect, and worth using early on an enemy to get a potent bleed going in addition to a valuable combo point. At this level, it should be the first damage ability you slap on a mob. At 80 you'll still be using a lot of it for dedicated DPS, but while soloing, a mob may not live long enough to see much damage from the bleed. Remove Curse: At one time in the not too distant past, Druids were the only healing class with the ability to remove curses, so three guesses as to what we were doing for the most part in raids. At any rate, Remove Curse is a fairly straightforward ability, but I would highly recommend downloading Decursive or a similar mod if you plan on healing (possibly even if you don't). It should make debuff removal (for both curses and poisons) both faster and easier. Tiger's Fury: Until Wrath, TF cost energy and really wasn't worth using for the most part; the damage return was almost canceled out by the energy cost, and it was only useful opening from stealth where you could pop it about 4 seconds before making your first attack (which allowed enough time for your energy to tick back to full). These days, the ability has a 30-second cooldown but is significantly more useful, particularly if talented with King of the Jungle. Train (or macro) yourself into popping it on cooldown. Regrowth, rank 3: standard upgrade. Revive, rank 2: standard upgrade. Sad as this sounds, I still get excited to resurrect people. Swipe, rank 2: standard upgrade. Thorns, rank 3: standard upgrade.
LEVEL 26
Two new abilities and a few upgrades:
Abolish Poison: Installed Decursive yet? You'll probably want to after getting this. Abolish Poison replaces Cure Poison, the quest-only ability from level 14, so if you never bothered to do the poison questline, it becomes a moot point at level 26 (although I'd still recommend doing it for the sake of some class lore). Because Abolish Poison ticks every 3 seconds for 12 seconds (it used to be 2 for 8, if I recall correctly), you can use it preemptively on a tank or PvP partner when a mob or enemy player is going to try to get a poison up (e.g. Titanium Vanguards in Halls of Lightning, or versus a Rogue or Hunter in PvP). Dash, rank 1: This Cat ability (a clone of the Rogue's Sprint) is a great emergency skill and significantly faster than Travel Form for getting out of trouble quickly. It's also great for closing the distance between yourself and a PvP opponent, or for getting to a runner in a dungeon, although Feral Charge (the Feral 21-point talent; the earliest you can get it will be in 4 levels) will accomplish the latter two without having to blow Dash's more serious cooldown. Healing Touch, rank 5: standard upgrade. Maul, rank 3: standard upgrade. Starfire, rank 2: standard upgrade.
WoW 3.2.2 and the Great FoK Nerf
Fan of Knives, how I loved thee. If you haven't read the patch notes yet, you can find them in Alex's writeup. Rogues actually received a few changes this time (a deviation from the norm), and all 3 are nerfs across the board. One is a fairly innocuous change to Honor Among Thieves, which has actually be functioning incorrectly for the past few months. The other two are sweeping nerfs to Fan of Knives: directly by reducing the damage done by 30%, and indirectly by removing the Interruption effect from Throwing Specialization.
While I am sure we will be feeling the loss on trash pulls in late-night Ulduar runs, the fact is that there's no trash in Trial of the Crusader anyway. Rogues do bring some pretty potent AoE to the table, but I believe that as long as our single target DPS remains intact, we'll still find ourselves with dedicated raid slots. The loss of FoK interruptions will really only be a hit on fights like Yogg-Saron hard mode, and other niche cases. Ghostcrawler even acknowledged the nerf, admitting that if a fight became too hard without Throwing Specialization and Fan of Knives' intricate synergy, they'd nerf it to accommodate.
AoE DPS is a perk, not a feature. I have felt like our AoE DPS has been insanely good, especially when used properly (two instant-damage poisons, two slow weapons). I'm honestly not surprised to see it being curtailed a little bit. We're still going to be potent when using FoK, but we'll have to wait until it's a true AoE situation, with 3-4 mobs that need to be taken out. Right now, FoK is so strong that there's not much pushing it all the time. After the patch, we'll have to actually make the decision of whether the AoE is worth using FoK, or whether or not to just continue single-target DPS.
I've been talking about the dominance (and sillyness) of the 'FoK spec', in which a Rogue specs into Throwing Specialization and rules the 5v5 arena by spamming FoK at every available opportunity. Between the FoK interrupts and the illegal interruption macro floating around, Rogues had become pretty powerful at locking down casters completely. The removal of Throwing Spec's interruption was necessary, though I will be sad to see it go. It was really a great ability that gave us a really unique niche in the PvE world, but I can agree there's no way to balance it in PvP.
The HaT change, on the other hand, was simply an adjustment to force the spell to work as intended. Limiting it to a single Combo Point per second makes its DPS far more reliable and easier to model, and as our party members' crit rate skyrockets with better and better gear, HaT is now incapable of exploding into new DPS territory overnight. It's a nerf to Subtlety PvE, though Blizzard has already expressed that they have no immediate interest in making Subtlety viable. As long as Mutilate and Combat both remain viable, I don't think that Sub is going to see any sweeping changes.
Ghostcrawler recently talked about Mages having two viable PvE specs after patch 3.2.2: fire and arcane. He mentions that frost is not going to be revamped any time soon. I look at this as writing on the wall, Rogues have two viable PvE specs (and pretty different ones at that), and so asking for a third is really reaching for the stars. I will be attending BlizzCon (and I'll be at the reader meetup) and I'll be sure to ask GC and the crew what their plans for Rogues are in the future.
All-in-all, I am okay with the changes we're seeing in wow 3.2.2. If I really, really want my trash DPS to scream, I have the option of swapping in the Fan of Knives glyph real quick. And if I really, really wanted to play Subtlety PvE, I'd have to accept that I was making poor PvE talent choices. Our bread and butter role, single target DPS, was completely untouched. We can let the Mages and Warlocks take care of Arthas' waves and waves of undead drones. We've got a higher calling, to stab our daggers and smash our maces so far into the Lich King's face that he cries for his mommy.
New BlizzCon 2009 schedule available
Mere minutes after we posted the fact that Blizzard had retracted their previous schedule, they released a new one. The layout of the new schedule is less pleasing to the eyes and a bit harder to read, but there's certainly some interesting stuff there.
For example, the first panel after the opening ceremonies is a "World of Warcraft Preview Panel." Previewing... what? Personally, I'm going to throw money down on Cataclysm. Also, it appears the PvP panel is gone. Folded into the two 1-hour long "class, item and profession" panels, perhaps? Then again, the PvP panel was really about the arena and battleground maps last year, wasn't it? If there's a Cataclysm preview, it very well might be a part of that. The Guild is also no longer competing with a WoW panel, and there's a new panel first thing on Saturday about breaking into the gaming industry. Plus, a 'live raid' panel probably similar to what they had at the last Worldwide Invitational: Watch one of the top guilds in the world tackle a high-end raid boss. Algalon, perhaps? Cool stuff.
Aug 16, 2009
WoW Patch 3.2.2: New Onyxia loot revealed
WoW Patch 3.2.2: Onyxia's loot is coming into focus on the test server, and we here at WoW.com's secret headquarters are pretty much sitting here drooling and gabbling incoherently over it. As promised, we're seeing the promised buffed up Onyxia loot, but it looks like Onyxia's been doing some raiding of her own, coming back with upgraded versions of some other classic raid loot as well. Also, the Quel'serrar is back.
The promised helms are in, and so far, it looks like they're the same color and model as the old T2 exactly, and they are still class restricted. Luckily, they have stuck with the improved itemization and stat outlays that have come into play since vanilla. In fact, you'll exactly see multiple versions of many helms dropping, one for each basic playstyle of the class. For example, there's tanking, healing, and DPS versions of Judgment. If there's one downside for this, it seems like it means it may take a lot of runs until you see the helm for your exact spec drop.
As far as other loots, some old favorites are definitely back. Dual wielders of all classes will be rejoicing at the inclusion of the upgraded Deathbringer, and Vis'kag the Bloodletter makes a return as well. Tanks will like the old classic Ring of Binding. In addition, the Obsidian-Edged Blade makes a return and looks very delicious. Even the much maligned Thunderstrike and Shadowstrike are up for grabs, apparently itemized for the Feral Druids who couldn't even equip them the first time around.
If there's one question that I have a personal stake in here, it's the Death Knight question. Will we be getting some loot love on Onyxia despite our lack of existence during the first go around? Apparently, there are reports of Frostforged Helms dropping, which are marked as Warrior class on MMO Champion's database and have the requisite graphics, but there does seem to be a good chance that these are meant to be Death Knight Helms. In addition, we're left off the class spread on the new Quel'Serrar. Now, I know dual wield tanking is sort of a niche for us and only possible if you are insane or stack large amounts of expertise, but man, I need it for my awesome standing around Dalaran set, at least!
But yeah, both in stats and in nostalgia value, the Onyxia's loot is looking tops. Even the backpack makes a return! Something tells me we'll all be looking forward to many a run with bated breath, and I know I'll be wielding my old school gear with pride.
WoW: Which boss would revamp for level 80?
WoW: Which boss would revamp for level 80?
With news that the Broodmother herself is returning for WoW's fifth anniversary and wow patch 3.2.2, it got me thinking about other old world bosses which could be revamped. Now don't get me wrong, I totally get that Onyxia is a one-time thing this expansion. All fun and no lore, to paraphrase one of our commentators, Maxim. But the concept is ripe for a Breakfast Topic, after all Onyxia is a classic raid but she wasn't the only one. Granted, she remains the most popular and the most legendary, the raid itself was almost a reward for completing what has to be the game's most epic quest chain. And then there was the loot, the lovely legendary (if not in colour) loot. Excuse me while I drool.
So lets say, hypothetically, you could bring back any lower level boss for a short time period aimed at level 80s. Which would you choose? Personally I'd love to see the Dragons of Nightmare, simply because they were so epic. Indeed, they are still a challenge to down today, especially with that annoying debuff. I also live in hope of seeing something of the Emerald Dream soon but that's for another day. So, constant readers, if you could have one boss return revamped for a hardcore level 80 raid, which would it be?
