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Rating issues for Arena and RBG wins
There is a strange issue taking place at the moment with rating. Rating itself is a tricky thing to wrap your head around, especially as it's recently gone thorough something of a shift. Right now, your character has two ratings for every bracket of arena, and for RBGs. One is the MMR, the matchmaking rating. This is the rating the system uses to match you up against similar level players. It's shown at the bottom right of the scoreboard after every match, as an average of your group's character MMRs. The other type of rating is CR, Current Rating. This is the rating that your character earns by winning and losing matches, the one that's shown in green and red letters in the main part of the scoreboard. It's also the rating that gets you titles and mounts. Every season CR is reset to 0, while MMR remains what it was last season. So, if you ended season 14 on an MMR of 1800 and a CR of 1880, you'd have begun season 15 with an MMR of 1800 and a CR of 0. What happens next is that as you win games, your CR increases towards your MMR. You should expect it to stabilize as you reach a CR that's near your MMR. As you win and lose games, your MMR will also shift. Your MMR aims to give you a 50/50 win-loss rate, as when that's achieved you're being pretty evenly matched.
Encrypted Text: A rogue's guide to patch 4.2
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to email me with any questions or article topics you'd like to see covered! Rogues have a lot to look forward to when patch 4.2 is released. If you spend most of your time in dungeons or raiding, you'll be happy to hear about the sizable buffs to all three of our talent trees. Unfortunately for rogues that favor PVP, there are some cooldown changes to Cloak of Shadows and Combat Readiness that won't be well-received. While I'm not completely satisfied with the size of our buff when compared to our relative position in the DPS pack, our potency in Firelands still remains to be seen. In addition to the slew of balance changes, we can start salivating over the new gear that will be available. Our tier 12 set has some very fun bonuses, and also some great crafted gear coming up. Our caster rivals will get access to their first legendary weapon since Atiesh, so we'll have to do our best to keep up. The duration of Blind in PVE is going up to a full minute, giving us two forms of long-term CC in Sap and Blind. As proof that rogues are designed to be the best at what they do, most other CC effects in the game are going to start mirroring Sap. Polymorph and the rest won't aggro mobs that they're used on, which should make it far easier to coordinate CC in a PUG. Plus, even if the group manages to somehow mess up CC and starts combat early, we can just use Blind as a stand-in for Sap anyway.
Sony intros VAIO CR / SR bundles in support of breast cancer research
It's crazy to think, but October is merely days away. That also means that Breast Cancer Awareness month is just around the bend, and Sony's being ultra proactive by announcing two new pink laptop bundles to support breast cancer research. First up is the Cosmopolitan Pink VAIO CR pack, which features a 14.1-inch LCD, 1.3-megapixel camera, Core 2 Duo CPU, Bluetooth, a built-in DVD burner and a matching case / mouse. If that's a tad large and / or underpowered for your tastes, you can check the Glossy Pink VAIO SR, a 4-pound rig with a 13.3-inch LED backlit display, up to 320GB of HDD space and a "Switch" mode that gives users the ability to toggle between high performance and power saving modes on the fly. The two bundles start at $870 and $1,399, respectively, though you can CTO them both 'til your wallet cries uncle. %Gallery-32744%
Sony's Vaio CR series finally gets official
No real surprises at this point, but here's skinny on Sony's "worst kept secret" Santa Rosa-based Vaio CR series of 14.1-inch laptops. Sony is going the multi-color route with these, hoping to attract the fashionistas in the room with sangria, cosmopolitan, dove, indigo and black color options. Sony also packed in some fun keyboard-bordering LED action and even an option for a color-coordinated bag and mouse. Prices start at $1,350 and Sony will start shipments at the end of this month. Processors are all Core 2 Duo T7100, graphics do the Intel GMA X3100 thing, the display manages a 1280 x 800 resolution, and 2GB of RAM comes standard. Hit up the gallery for more pics.%Gallery-3848%
New pics, specs for Sony's Vaio CR laptops
Sony never really got official with us on this Vaio CR series of laptops, that would just make things too easy, but that doesn't mean the info has to stop flowing. Notebook Italy scrounged up so more dirt on the things, and apparently these units are due to hit in the middle of June, and naturally will be bringing Santa Rosa with them. The look seems in line with Sony's other all-new laptops this season, if perhaps a tad frumpier, and the specs are fairly familiar as well, with Core 2 Duo 1.8GHz T7100 processors, GMA X1300 integrated graphics, Vista Home Premium, 2GB of RAM, a 160GB HDD and dual-layer DVD burner. The 14.1-inch 1280 x 800 screen includes a webcam, and Sony has tossed in an SD card slot along with its usual complement of Memory Stick, FireWire and ExpressCard inputs. Notebook Italy is betting on a 1,350 Euro tag ($1,815 US) for most of the configurations, with a 1,550 Euro ($2,084 US) option coming alongside with beefed up Radeon HD 2300+ graphics.
Sony's summer laptop lineup leaked, including Santa Rosa FZ series
There isn't quite an abundance of info about these up-and-comers from Sony, but it's better than nothing. Sony is prepping the 15.4-inch FZ series, 13.3-inch SZ5, 11.1-inch TZ11, 13.3-inch CZ and 14-inch CR for a summer launch, and is apparently having a hard time keeping the info under wraps. We've got a few shady specs on screen resolution and whatnot for a few models, but the fact that the 11-inchers on up to the 15-incher are sporting WXGA resolutions seems to cast a bit of doubt on the proceedings. Luckily, we've got the skinny on the FZ19 (pictured above), which includes the new Santa Rosa chipset from Intel, along with integrated X3100 graphics, 2GB of RAM and a 120GB HDD. Most of the laptops, including the FZ series, include built-in webcams and heaping helpings of RAM. The TZ series is a refresh to the TX line of ultraportables, and seems to be making some good strides, including a purported business-friendly redesign and an SSD option due for a later revision. Not too many specifics on launch dates, but July seems to be the general word, at least for the CZ and CR series. Hit up the read link for more detailed specs.
