Archive for February, 2010
February 24th, 2010
There’s a new notice up on Warcraft’s Facebook site with some intriguing new information:
Official Warcraft FacebookWhat does this mean? No idea, but it appears as though the various class changes and tweaks that were announced for patch 3.3.3 aren’t set in stone just yet, which is what Ghostcrawler said late last week. This fluidity should be expected, after all, as it is a public test realm. Players on the PTR may want to keep an eye out for the changes, and possibly expect some sort of minor patch this week. When an announcement is made about the changes, we’ll let you know!
Filed under: News items
Patch 3.3.3 PTR: New info on Facebook originally appeared on WoW.com on Wed, 24 Feb 2010 01:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
February 24th, 2010
Before all dragons, there was Galakrond. From him came all the dragon aspects, and his size was greater than that of the five aspects combined. Dragonkind is descended from this massive beast. This includes the red dragons. Each dragonflight dates back to the departure of the Titans from Azeroth, following the completion of their work to reorder it to their liking.
The Titans are, if you strip all the cosmic power and grandeur away, meddlers. They go from world to world and change those worlds to their liking, whether or not the current inhabitants want them to, and Azeroth is no exception. When the Titans arrived, they found the world a seething battleground for raging elementals who fought for the amusement of ancient unfathomable entities called today by the sobriquet ‘The Old Gods’. Entities like C’thun and Yogg-Saron are an example of the true lords of Azeroth. The quoted text at the bottom of this page gives you an idea of how the Titans wrested control of Azeroth away from them and sealed them in prisons beneath the planet’s surface. With the elementals banished to other planes and the Old Gods trapped, the Titans then rearranged Azeroth to their liking.
However, since the Titans re-ordering of the world is imposed, they require shepherds to maintain it. While the Titanic Watchers of Ulduar were set to maintain Yogg-Saron’s prison, they were not entrusted with the maintenance of the world itself, possibly because they were not of it. From Galakrond’s offspring, known today as proto-dragons, the Titans shaped flights of dragons to the vital (to them, at least) task of preserving their hard-fought order. Black, Blue, Green, and Bronze were each given dominion over a key aspect of the Titan’s new world. And to Alexstrasza, the Red Dragonqueen, was given control over Life itself. This was the birth of the Red Dragonflight, perhaps the most beneficent grounp of enormous fire breathing reptiles one could hope to encounter. They are dragons, however, so don’t take them for granted.
Continue reading Know Your Lore: The Red Dragonflight
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Know your Lore
Know Your Lore: The Red Dragonflight originally appeared on WoW.com on Tue, 23 Feb 2010 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
February 23rd, 2010
If you haven’t had a chance to dive into all the Patch 3.3.3 news, now is as good a time as any, since the servers will be down from 3 AM to 11 AM Pacific. Before you ask, we have not heard that the patch is going live as of this writing, and I’d sincerely doubt it myself. It’s a bit buggy as it is, and the devs have hinted there’s more to be implemented and tested. So feel free to sit back, relax, and peruse the best news from the past week, both from Patch 3.3.3 and beyond, just below.
Continue reading Tuesday Morning Post: It’s raining again edition
Filed under: News items
Tuesday Morning Post: It’s raining again edition originally appeared on WoW.com on Tue, 23 Feb 2010 05:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
February 23rd, 2010
There’s a mini-controversy about pricing for Allod’s Online. Keen has details. Allod’s Online is a Free-To-Play game that started out in Russia. Apparently prices in the North American game are 10-20x times higher. (Keen says 20x, but all his examples are only 10x.) A bag that costs $2 in Russia costs $20 in the NA version.
So all the vocal gamers, parsimonious creatures that they are, are up in arms over this.
I don’t know if the price is too high or too low. But consider this: Russia is a poorer country than the United States. Its GDP-Per-Capita is roughly a fifth of that of the States. Is it really so unreasonable to believe that if people in Russia are willing to pay $2, people in the States would be willing to pay much more? Heck, this is the land of $5 coffees!
I think a lot of times gamers take it as an article of faith that there is a large segment of people who are willing to pay small amounts of money to a micro-transaction shop. But maybe that group doesn’t actually exist. Maybe the two major groups are people who will pay nothing, and people who will pay a lot. In that case, it’s the best strategy to get as much money out of that second group as possible.
Edit: Also, the other thing that struck me was that there is a “level 10 rune that was $689 is now $6,890.” Now, I have a hard time believing someone will pay $7000 for an item, but then again, I have a hard time believing someone paid $700. If the $700 item sold, then it is entirely possible the $7000 one will too.
February 23rd, 2010
I’m not sure whether I’d consider it a very fair reputation, but it definitely seems like roleplay servers have a reputation for not excelling at PvP. Aethros of Cenarion Circle defies that stereotype, with his team of 3v3 scoring 33rd ranked on Whirlwind battlegroup. Only a few weeks into the newest season, Aethros is already toting a personal rating of 2401.
Aethros is the death knight member of prism plz go resto. This 3v3 team is a TSG composition. Named after the team who won the 2009 Blizzard Arena Tournament at BlizzCon, TSG teams are made up of a holy paladin, a warrior, and a death knight.
Take a look behind the jump and see what Aethros had to say.
Continue reading The Colosseum: Aethros of Cenarion Circle
Filed under: The Colosseum
The Colosseum: Aethros of Cenarion Circle originally appeared on WoW.com on Mon, 22 Feb 2010 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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February 22nd, 2010
There will be realm maintenance this Tuesday from 3:00 a.m. PDT / 6:00 a.m. EDT until 11:00 a.m. PDT / 2:00 p.m. EDT. The maintenance should not be any indication that patch 3.3.3 is going to drop, as it just went on the PTR — so don’t expect anything.
The full blue announcement is as follows:
RalvorinnThank you for your patience.
If the maintenance becomes extended, you’ll hear it here.
Oh wait, is that some new fancy blue quoting CSS stuff on WoW.com? Why yes, yes it is.
Filed under: Realm Status, News items
Realm maintenance for Tuesday February 23rd originally appeared on WoW.com on Sun, 21 Feb 2010 22:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
February 22nd, 2010
One of the more common subjects in World of Warcraft writing is “How to form a raid group.” Alternatives include, “How to find a raid group,” “Does your raid group steal the covers at night?” and “Raid Leaders and the Ghouls that Love Them.” Heck, there’s so much hullabaloo about how to find a compatible guild that I’m waiting for Match.com: the WoW edition. But you don’t see a lot getting written about getting together with roleplay troupes.
I think part of the reason for that is that most folks consider roleplay to be either spontaneous events or the province of individual expression. They don’t tend to consider roleplay as something that’s organized as a group or guided by a general plan. However, as many folks with pen-and-paper tabletop games will tell you, roleplay often works best when you have a theme and a group of people who all buy into that theme.
You don’t necessarily need to get a brand new guild together in order to form a troupe. It could be something as simple as a small group of five people who want to play out a particular story. Also, a pre-scheduled “bar night” in your faction’s capital can be considered part of a troupe, especially if you set up certain ground rules about how things “work” in that tavern.
We’ve talked before about how to find your own roleplay, but that’s not entirely the same thing as starting a new group. Let’s jump behind the cut and talk about how to form a roleplay troupe.
Continue reading All the World’s a Stage: Forming a roleplay troupe
Filed under: All the World’s a Stage (Roleplaying)
All the World’s a Stage: Forming a roleplay troupe originally appeared on WoW.com on Sun, 21 Feb 2010 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
February 21st, 2010
There are a number of profession changes being introduced in patch 3.3.3. Most of these changes revolve around the speeding up process of crafting. For example, the cooldown and location requirements for Tailoring items like Moonshroud, Spellweave and Ebonweave? Gone!
Some craftable items have had their costs reduced.
More changes after the break!
Continue reading Patch 3.3.3 PTR: Upcoming profession changes
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, News items
Patch 3.3.3 PTR: Upcoming profession changes originally appeared on WoW.com on Sun, 21 Feb 2010 01:30:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
February 21st, 2010
Rich Maloy is currently working on a real life augmented reality app that will dynamically generate and display his most important priority to accomplish at that moment, as well as cooldowns remaining on important events such as birthdays and anniversaries. Friends and family invited to the private alpha test said the software, known as RichAndAwe, kept getting stuck at “buy more Guinness.” Rich reports this is working as intended.
Of all the add-ons in all the mod sites in all the world there’s one that stands out among the best for playing enhancement: ShockAndAwe. This mod developed by Pericles has a slew of features to keep enhancers on top of their game. While there are other ways to track information and max out damage output, ShockAndAwe is one mod that makes a big difference for beginners and experienced alike.
We’ll cover most of the features here, two of which stand out among the rest: Timer bars and Priority frame. But first we’ll start with the options.
Continue reading Totem Talk: Shock and Awe
Filed under: Shaman, (Shaman) Totem Talk
Totem Talk: Shock and Awe originally appeared on WoW.com on Sat, 20 Feb 2010 22:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
February 20th, 2010
It’s been a wild day for WoW news, and what better place to hear about it than on the WoW Insider Show podcast? We return to the airwaves today at 3:30 PM Eastern time, with your host Michael Sacco, cohost Matthew Rossi, and special guest hosts Kelly Aarons and Basil “Euripides” Berntsen (our new auction house columnist). We’ll be answering reader emails, shootin’ the breeze, and discussing the week’s top stories on WoW.com and around the web.
And, of course, we’ll talk live with the folks in the chat channel. You can email the podcast any time of night or day at theshow@wow.com, and you’ll be able to listen in to the show on the feed on our Ustream site, or after the jump.
Continue reading WoW Insider Show live today at 3:30 PM Eastern
Filed under: WoW Insider Show
WoW Insider Show live today at 3:30 PM Eastern originally appeared on WoW.com on Sat, 20 Feb 2010 12:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.