Ask a Beta Tester: Wyrmrest Temple and the dragon shrines

Elizabeth is off having grand adventures at the airport today, so I'll be filling in for her on Ask a Beta Tester today. You may know me from such WoW Insider features as Know Your Lore, Ask a Lore Nerd, Hybrid Theory, and Bad Pop Culture References. Hm, wait, I think I imagined that last one... Anyway! I'll be fielding your questions today, and I apologize if I didn't get to yours. I had to pick and choose questions I actually knew a thing or two about, so I couldn't really answer class questions about classes I don't play or don't know very well.

If I didn't get to your question today, go ahead and ask it again today, and hopefully one of the other WoW Insider staff in the Wrath Beta will be able to answer it for you. Thanks, everyone!

juicyjuice asked: As I understand it, the Argent Dawn is making a reappearance in WotLK. Will players who spent a lot of time with the Argent Dawn pre-BC have a significant advantage over people who may not have much or any Argent Dawn rep when WotLK hits?

The Argent Dawn and parts of the Silver Hand are now operating as the Argent Crusade. I won't elaborate on that so we can avoid any spoilers on the front page here. So no, high Argent Dawn rep from WoW Classic will not give you any advantage in Wrath of the Lich King. However, it will probably play a role in an achievement or two, though it is a bit too early to say for sure whether that will be the case when Wrath hits retail.

Joene asked: I have a question regarding the dragon shrines. What's up with these and what's inside the Maw of Neltharion?

There is one shrine for each Dragonflight, not including the Netherwing, because they're not a 'real' dragonflight as far as Azeroth goes. This is because the zone they're found in, the Dragonblight, is a sacred place to the Dragons. It was where they were born, where they were given their power by the Titans, where their temple can be found, and where Dragons go to die... if they can make it there.

The Dragon Shrines are pretty much how they sound. A shrine and sacred place for each Flight, and each of them have something a little different going on. Inside of the Maw of Neltharion (the Black dragon shrine) specifically, there are Necromancers using the bones of dead Black Dragons and Drakes to bulk up their Frost Wyrms

ironblade asked: Any good news on Titan's Grip? Is the DPS good and is it a viable leveling spec?

From everything I've heard (and if any of you warriors disagree, let me know! A few more opinions would be fun) Titan's Grip has the capability of being devastating but overall it will have lower DPS than two 1Handers. Utilizing Titan's Grip grinding mobs will probably result in some incredibly fun Whirlwind crits, but you won't be very satisfied in dungeons or raids with it. The crits are nice and big, and you'll probably 2-shot quest mobs with its crazy burst but the actual DPS put out by Titan's Grip is subpar.

poPixel asked: New pets are available to tame. Screenshots are coming in of oversized Devilsaur pets. My question is, what about the more unique monsters hidden away? Is The Beast (remember UBRS?) now an option?

I'm not a Hunter guy myself, so I throttled Daniel until he coughed up the goods. Currently, Devilsaurs are the only especially unique new thing that can be tamed. The Beast Mastery talent that is supposed to allow you to tame 'exotic' creatures isn't even fully implemented yet, and my best guess is that either a) Devilsaurs slipped through the cracks and aren't supposed to be able to be tamed yet, or b) they're testing Devilsaur abilities and scaling at the same time they're polishing up that talent. I suppose it would be a bit silly to call that talent 'implemented' if there are no exotic creatures to actually tame yet, so it would make sense they'd release or test them before the talent is called good. Oh, and core hounds (The Beast is one of these) are not able to be tamed yet, but maybe we'll see that later on. Maybe.

As far as more mundane pets, they've finally added moths as a pet family that can be tamed. Beyond that it's mostly new skins, and you can check most of that out on Petopia. I can't help but notice there's a Bald Eagle skin for the bird family. Daniel and I both agree that we need to level Hunters with Engineering so we can have a Bald Eagle and a Motorcycle.

Nizari asked: Are the elf NPCs in Dalaran Blood Elves or High Elves? I couldn't tell from the tour de Dalaran video that was posted.

Both, actually. There is currently the main city of Dalaran, then a Horde specific sector and an Alliance specific sector. Blood Elf guards from Silvermoon stand watch outside of the Horde sector and stop Alliance players from entering. High Elves from a faction called the Silver Covenant stand guard at the Alliance sector, keeping Horde players out. So you saw a little of both. Keep in mind that Dalaran isn't done yet, so this might change before retail.

CJ asked: So when are we going to see some well-fed buffs from Wrath recipes?

Man, I wish I knew! I'm a huge dork and enjoy Fishing and Cooking in WoW, but it doesn't seem like much of that has been implemented yet. I've found one Cooking recipe through a quest, but it's regular ol' food right now, no buff.

Wren asked: This may seem like a stupid question, but are we going to be limited to one Death Knight per server?

As those who commented in the previous AABT post stated, currently in the Beta there is no limit to how many you can have per server (probably for testing purposes). However, from everything we've heard previously there will be a limit of one per server when Wrath hits retail, as long as you have a level 55+ character somewhere.

Lori asked: Outland seemed cramped and crowded compared to the two Azeroth continents. I think Blizz said they wanted Northrend to feel larger than Outland. Have they achieved this goal? Also, is there an overabundance of NPCs to reduce framerate?

Well... yes and no, sort of. It doesn't just 'feel' larger than Outland. It is larger. The zones are massive. I almost want to say that most of the zones are as large as two Hellfire Peninsulas, but that would probably be an overestimate. My mind boggles at their hugeness, but I don't think they're quite that big. They're pretty freaking big, regardless. The Howling Fjord has three flight paths for each faction, and then another neutral path from the Tuskarr. You really do need them, too.

As far as feeling cramped, I don't think the zones are cramped but there is a lot going on. There's plenty of beautiful scenery to look at, but there's things to do everywhere. Even if there's no quest hub nearby, the mobs themselves do entertaining little things. The shovel tusks lock horns and fight, the worgs hunt the shovel tusks, the proto-drakes hatch their eggs via raining fire down on them from the sky... the world feels very large, and very alive.

As far as framerate, I'm usually not one of those people that have their computer completely crap out when flying through Shattrath, so my word may not be the best on this. However, none of the towns have had random batallions of soldiers practicing and running around or anything. There are heavily populated places like the recruitment line in Valiance Keep, but I think they are handled better than Shattrath was. Thats just my opinion, though.