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The Queue: Release the Kraken!

Matthew Rossi
Updated ·4 min read
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Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Matthew Rossi will be your host today.

Surprise! It's me! Writing the Queue the way I do sometimes. I decided to release a kraken today, I haven't done that in a while and I got to missing it. Besides, all these krakens piling up around the house, it's crazy, I can't get anything done.

Snitch76 asks:
Is there likely to be any more beta patches before 6.0, or any changes between the last patch and 6.0? I'm really hoping for a few last minute changes to my class(es) of choice!

They did one last night. They'll keep doing beta patches until they're satisfied with balance, so you really can't be sure they're done until they outright say they're done.



SebastianVota asks:
When paying for a subscription game like WoW, does the allocation of resources to the removal of content feel like a good use of Blizzard time to the WoW Insider team?

Would you prefer to see those same resources put on adding things to the game instead of removing them?

Well, let us be honest - it takes almost no resources to remove content. Sure, some coding has to be done, and that's not negligible, but it's not the same thing as having to design content. So I'm not sure your question is a really apt one - it's like criticizing someone for boarding up a door as a waste of time when they could be building a new room.

Now, that being said, I'm not all that excited by all the stuff being temporarily or permanently removed in 6.0 - it seems weird to me. The fact that they're removing the treasure room scenario, for instance - I get that it apparently dropped way too much gold when a level 100 ran in and powerbombed the thing, but the solution to my mind is simply to nerf the crap out of the gold that drops there and let people who want to get the nerd points for doing the scenario do it. We let people blow up old raids nowadays and get those achievements, why not old scenarios?

Eliza asks:
We've known about the Reforger on the yak mount going bye-bye for awhile now, but I hadn't realized the NPC himself was leaving...

"Grand Expedition Yak's reforge vendor (Mystic Birdhat) has been replaced with a vendor that offers transmogrification services."

What's happening to poor Mystic Birdhat? =(

Let me show you.

Spread the word, people. Tell your friends. Tell everyone. Birdhat lives.

Bugboy asks:
Q4tQ: Why is there a statue of Varian outside Stormwind Keep? Isn't it generally custom in fantasy kingdoms to construct giant statues of past leaders and legends, like the Argonath? Or, heck, the statues in the Valley of Heroes?

I have no idea, but if I were to speculate, any one of the following reasons might be on the mark:

  • The people of Stormwind were so relieved that their King had returned after finding out that a giant dragon had infiltrated and nearly destroyed the entire kingdom that they insisted that Varian get a statue.

  • People had completely forgotten what Varian looked like (some even thought he wore cloth armor and had a mustache for some strange reason) so they needed a statue to identify him.

  • He's very vain.


Krastanof asks:
Grandpa Matthew, what was raiding like back in Vanilla?

(inside jokes FTW)

Joke answer - we had to raid uphill both ways in molten lava and we liked it! (Actually, Molten Core has a weird topography and you do end up going uphill a lot.)

Real answer - it was all we knew, so we ignored how awful a lot of it was. Like the enormous pain in the butt of getting 40 people together and then listening to them rant about how much harder EverQuest was and how spoiled we were to only need 40 people. Needing six tanks for one fight, and then never needing that many again. Entire raids built around a specific resist mechanic. Whole classes that were prized primarily for standing out of combat and resurrecting/buffing the dead. People getting drunk and singing on TeamSpeak. That last one might just have been our raid. My point is, it was a lot of fun at the time, but I don't want WoW to go back and be that game again - it was definitely an artifact of the MMO genre that had come before it.

And there's the Queue for today. See you all tomorrow.

Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW Insider crew is here with The Queue, our daily Q&A column. Leave your questions in the comments, and we'll do our best to answer 'em!