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Patch 4.3 PTR: Well of Eternity heroic dungeon available for testing
If you've been waiting for the Well of Eternity 5-man heroic dungeon to open on the patch 4.3 PTR, wait no more. It's now available from the Dungeon Finder tool, and you can zone into it successfully. The screenshot above is of Peroth'arn, the first boss in the instance, bossing around various minions (including a Highborne using a Blood Elf model, for some reason). If you've been itching to sink your teeth into some serious lore, there's no time to lose! Hop on the PTR and get to testing as fast as you can. Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Review the official patch notes, and then dig into what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Accessible content, valor points and the alt
I play a lot of alts. I don't have as many alts as my friend Kol does (in Wrath, he had a max-level alt of every class in the game and several more besides), but I have four warriors at max level, a shaman at max level, two paladins in the high 70s, a druid who just dinged 73, four or five DKs between 60 and 80 on various servers, and a mage I don't like to talk about. I also raid. My raiding is semi-casual from my perspective, three nights a week for three or four hours a night, but we're pretty exclusively doing hard mode content -- so for some people, that's fairly hardcore. I won't pretend it's easy for me to do much beyond 5-mans and BGs with any of my alts. I play about 20 hours a week, more than some, less than others, and am pretty happy with my main and what he can do. One of the problems when playing one of my alts is that they're simply not capable of even coming close to my main. Struggling through yet another Zul'Gurub slog on my Worgen becomes almost impossible when I know I could blast through it on my Tauren -- but the Tauren wouldn't benefit, whereas the Worgen needs the gear. The announcement of Raid Finder for patch 4.3 has me thinking about how many of my alts will actually get to see raid-level content. New heroics will also debut with patch 4.3, and for the first time in Cataclysm, a heroic dungeon will offer gear on par with raiding. (Up until now, even the ZA/ZG tier of heroics offers gear a step below the Tier 11 raids.) This means that we're about to enter into a new way to play your alts.
The Queue: Late '90s nostalgia trip
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today. Your regularly scheduled Mike Sacco has been postponed due to rain. Enjoy whatever this is instead. Fantastik asked: So what is the WoWInsider crew's best guess as to when they think 4.3 is coming out?
WoW Insider Live Stream: Hour of Twilight
The patch 4.3 PTR is really rolling along now! Blizzard has opened another new heroic dungeon for testing: this time, it's the Hour of Twilight, the third (chronologically) Dragon Soul heroic. We've assembled a crack 5-man team to conquer the dungeon and give you a nice in-depth preview. Join me, Mat McCurley, Matt Rossi, and Alex Ziebart in our live stream right up there! Update: The stream has ended for the night; thanks for tuning in! You can still watch the recording of our instance runs if you so desire, and it is embedded right above.
The OverAchiever: Examining patch 4.3's new achievements
Every Thursday, The Overachiever shows you how to work toward those sweet achievement points. This week, all hell breaks loose. Hey folks. The Littlest Pet Shop option was the most popular choice in last week's The OverAchiever: Wrapping up Mountain O' Mounts, but that was before all manner of patch 4.3 goodness was datamined on Tuesday night. I spent the subsequent 24 hours in a caffeine-fueled haze running three characters around the PTR investigating the new achievements for you. I bring tidings of great, albeit currently bugged, joy to you all.
Patch 4.3 PTR: New dungeon sets revealed
Stalwart dataminers over at the Scrolls of Lore forums have put together images of the new dungeon gear sets coming in patch 4.3. These sets are not true sets in that they have bonuses, but the gear from the new Hour of Twilight 5-man dungeons will each have a cohesive aesthetic look to them. Check out the images of these new dungeon sets in our gallery; thanks to poster handclaw for these awesome shots. The cloth set currently does not have shoulders showing because of a bug where the right and left shoulders are swapped on the palette. We will update the gallery with a new shot plus shoulders when we get our hands on it. Until then, enjoy. %Gallery-135137% Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Review the official patch notes, and then dig into what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Patch 4.3 PTR: Zandalari heroics no longer in own tier; all heroics award 150 VP
The new Hour of Twilight / patch 4.3 heroic dungeons will have their own category in the random Dungeon Finder, while the Zandalari heroics tier has mysteriously disappeared. Now, when queueing for a random Cataclysm heroic, the system will include the two Troll instances if your item level is satisfactory to enter. In addition, the Hour of Twilight dungeons, as well as any Cataclysm heroic, now reward 150 valor points per completion, up to seven times week. Any heroic will now grant the same amount of valor points. Moving the Zandalari heroics into the general heroic pool seemed like it would happen eventually, considering that having multiple tiers of dungeons to queue up for could get confusing over time. Now, players will be placed into dungeons based on their ilevel and not necessarily which dungeon category they queue for. This presents an interesting dilemma, though. Players who want to do a quick heroic right now can queue for a random, non-Troll heroic and be in and out with half the VP (and half the stress -- I'm looking at you, Jin'do) in half the time of a Troll heroic. In 4.3, it doesn't appear that you'll have the option. Then again, everyone at a high enough gear level to care about this stuff will just queue for the Hour of Twilight heroics anyway, right?
Patch 4.3 PTR: New loading screens and zone maps
You can't hit a new dungeon without knowing where you're going these days, can you? MMO-Champion has datamined the new loading screens for all three new dungeons, the new Darkmoon Faire, and the Dragon Soul raid, and Wowhead News snapped up maps for all the new instances, as well as some old. The zone maps include not only the new instances and raid dungeons, but a new map for the Vault of Archavon, the Forge of Souls, and Baradin Hold. Baradin Hold seems to indicate we'll be seeing a third boss with this patch. I wonder what will happen to the wandering eyes of Occu'thar? Check out the gallery for a look at all loading screens and maps for patch 4.3. %Gallery-135016% Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Look at what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Patch 4.3: Blizzard's official preview of the Hour of Twilight heroic dungeon
The last of patch 4.3's time-traveling dungeons now has a preview available on the official website. The Hour of Twilight takes place in present-day Azeroth, where the Twilight's Hammer is putting on a full-scale invasion of Dragonblight. Why Dragonblight? Because that is where the ultimate showdown with Deathwing will begin -- and the Dragon Soul plays a key part in taking the former Aspect of Earth down. Included with the preview are some unsettling images of Wyrmrest Temple crawling with the tentacles of Old God minions, as well as some shots of the surrounding areas. There are three bosses mentioned with the preview: Arcurion, a formidable water ascendant who is tasked with killing Thrall; Asria Dawnslayer, a deadly agent of the Twilight's Hammer; and a third face who should be instantly recognizable to Alliance players. If you want to avoid spoiler content, I'd avoid the preview, but the third boss is a shock for those familiar with him in game so far. Did we mention Thrall? That's right, he's there too, and players must escort him and the Dragon Soul safely to Wyrmrest Temple. I'm having flashbacks to CoT: Durnholde Keep, but they are good flashbacks. From the looks of things, these events tie directly into Thrall: Twilight of the Aspects; those who are wanting to know more about the events in Hour of Twilight should check out that novel. All in all, it looks like the three dungeons are similar to the last three dungeons of Wrath of the Lich King. They tie into the final raid encounter in a crucial way, and the story is interlocked between all three dungeons. Check out the official website for the full preview, plenty of images, and more boss information. Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Look at what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
Patch 4.3: Rogue legendaries, Raid Finder, and more
Blizzard's patch 4.3 info drop continues tonight with interviews going up across the blogosphere. Our sister site Joystiq posted a whole bunch of new info about 4.3's dungeons earlier, and now we've learned a few really cool pieces of information from Curse's interview with Greg Street (aka Ghostcrawler) about the new rogue legendary weapon, the Raid Finder, and more. First, the rogue legendary is actually a pair of legendaries -- specifically, a pair of daggers named the Fangs of Father (which may be a mistranslation), according to Taiwanese Gamebase. GC explains across his interviews that rogues have understandably felt left out of this expansion both in terms of numbers and content, so giving them a legendary of their own was a good way to get them into the spotlight. The quest line for these daggers will revolve around the single pure black dragon egg that players helped protect in the Badlands. The dragon will hatch (it's a boy!) and lead rogues on a time- and gold-consuming quest around the world for their well-earned blades.
Tom Chilton shares info on patch 4.3 dungeons and more
When Zarhym said that patch 4.3 goodies were imminent, we didn't know he meant this soon. Our parent site, Joystiq, has the details from Tom Chilton, game director for WoW. He talks about the trio of new 5-man dungeons and the lore behind the final chapter of Cataclysm's story. The new 5-man dungeons will have us exploring a future where Deathwing wins, to show Nozdormu the endtime that would happen if Deathwing were allowed to bring his plans to fruition. After convincing the leader of the Bronze Dragonflight to aid us, we travel back in time to the Well of Eternity to allow Thrall to steal the Demon Soul. The Demon Soul is an ancient dragon artifact that will be the focal point of our attack on Deathwing. Finally, we enter the Hour of Twilight, escorting Thrall and the Demon Soul to Wyrmrest Temple, which is where the final battle begins. Chilton also talks about the Deathwing encounter itself, sharing with us details on the mobile fight that is like nothing we've ever seen before. Deathwing will be on the run, and we will be giving chase across the world. As Deathwing is trying to heal himself and regain his strength, players will be ripping away his armor plating and fighting the lava beasts that lurk within his body. There will be a new balancing mechanic that forces players to stay balanced while fighting, adding an entirely new angle to the encounter. The final showdown will occur with players fighting Deathwing from floating islands in the Maelstrom. The full article on Joystiq has more details on the encounter and what we can expect to see when facing Deathwing. From my perspective, patch 4.3 is shaping up to be one of the most exciting patches of all time! Brace yourselves for what could be some of most exciting updates to the game recently with patch 4.3. Look at what's ahead: new item storage options, cross-realm raiding, cosmetic armor skinning and your chance to battle the mighty Deathwing -- from astride his back!
