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2012 Arena Pass Ranked Ladder Phase 1 has begun!
The 2012 Arena Pass Ranked Ladder Phase 1 has begun! This incredibly well-titled section of the Arena Pass realm has kicked off in the United States and Europe, signaling the start of the ranked phases. EU players need to remember that all the dates in this article should be adjusted to one day later for EU realms. What does it all mean? Well, if you've been in the practice phase, your rating will be reset to 0, and if you add new people to your team after this point, you'll be penalized by 150 points of rating. So if you had a rating of 300 and added a player to your roster, your rating would be adjusted to 150. Sense made? Good! It's not wholly clear whether a team with a rating of 0 would be moved to a rating of -150, but I sincerely doubt it -- and to be honest, it shouldn't be too hard to gain 150 rating points. If a player leaves your team, you won't be penalized, to the misery of PvPing trolls everywhere. This phase will run until May 22, at which point Ranked Ladder Phase 2 will begin and team roster changes will not be permitted, so get your teams sorted out as soon as you can. Registration is open until the end of May 22, so if you want to get involved in the Arena Pass, it's not too late to sign up. If you want your Murkimus, then now's the time to get in the 50 3v3 games required to get him on your live realm characters. Any games you played prior to the Ranked Phase won't count toward earning him, so get involved! Also, don't forget that if you are in the top 1,000 teams at the end of the Ranked Ladder Phase 2, you'll be getting a Vanquisher title on the live realm. By signing up for this Arena Pass, you're also getting access to an exclusive Level 90 Arena Pass Realm once you've upgraded your account to Mists of Pandaria. To the victors, the spoils -- and also to the participants in more than 50 ranked games!
World of Warcraft Arena Tournament 2010 registration open
It's official: registration for the 2010 World of Warcraft Arena Tournament is now open! Like last year's arena tournament, players will participate on regional tournament realms -- separate from live realms -- for a spot to play at the live events. The arena tournament will use the 3v3 arena format for teams, and the regular arena season on live servers will not be interrupted by this event. The cost of registration is one payment of $20 per eligible World of Warcraft account. For more information on eligibility and restrictions, check out the Arena Tournament rules page. This year's cash prizes, including prizes awarded at both the regional finals and world championship, amount to over $200,000. But even if you don't win the big prizes, there's still something out there for participants -- players who have participated in at least 50 rated tournament games on one character with the same team will be eligible for Murkimus, the gladiator murloc pet that players may remember from last year's tournament. Please note that as of patch 3.3.3, Murkimus is an account-wide pet that will apply to all WoW characters on your Battle.net account. Players who have a character in one of the top 1,000 teams and have participated in at least 100 rated tournament games during the last four weeks will also receive the Vanquisher title for their live characters level 71 and over. While the news may be good for players that missed out on last year's games, some have expressed disappointment that there was no new pet and title for this year. Zarhym addressed this in a post on the Arena Tournament forums: Zarhym While it would be cool to provide a new pet, we're not necessarily trying to encourage as many people as possible to pay $20 and sign up for this tournament ultimately because they want a new pet. It's a nice perk to encourage people, but we don't want the Arena Tournament to be a more complicated version of the Pet Store. We want players who are serious about competing to sign up for the tournament, not just a reason to take in more money through offering a new vanity pet with each new tournament. source So for those of you looking for a new pet -- sorry, looks like that's not in the cards this year. But for players who missed out on the pet last year and players who would like a chance at the cash that Blizzard is paying out, you can sign up for the fun and games on Blizzard's website.
Arena Tournament Phase 3 ends tonight
We hope you got those 200 games, because the Arena Tournament is ending this phase of the tournament by 9pm PDT tonight. This means that only the Top 1,000 teams will qualify for the next round, and the rest of the entrants can take the season off. The Top 1,000 teams will move on to Phase 4, or the invitational ladder, for a shot at winning up to $75,000 in a prize pool worth over $200,000. In order to qualify, players must have played a minimum of 200 games with the same character on the same team.Players on the Top 1,000 teams will receive the title of "Vanquisher" for all their characters Level 71 or higher. As an awesome consolation prize, any player who managed to get 200 games regardless of how well (or how badly) they performed will receive Murkimus the Gladiator on one of their characters. When Phase 3 ends tonight, the Tournament Realms will be shut down for one week, after which Phase 4 will begin anew on April 14. Good luck! We know it might be a little late for that, so... uh, congrats?
Arena Tournament moves to second phase
It's time to get Murkimus the Gladiator! The Arena Tournament has officially moved on to the second phase of the tournament, where all matches played will count towards the season rankings. The bloodshed began last February, kicking off a two-week testing phase where players could create fully geared Level 80 characters, test out comps and strategies, and generally get warmed up for the real deal. Players interested in participating simply have to pony up $20 or €15 for a shot at winning prizes totalling $200,000. All ranked matches now count towards the qualifiers, and the players belonging to the Top 1000 teams will receive the title of 'Vanquisher' on all their characters Level 71 and above on the live realms. Players who don't crack the upper echelons of Arena rankings can still get the lovable armored murloc pet by playing 200 matches. The matches must be played on the same character and with the same team charter.Blizzard has also opened up Arena Tournament forums for US realms and EU realms, which players can use to recruit for teams, discuss strategies or ask for advice, and generally keep up-to-date on the latest goings-on in the Tournament Realms. Of course, if you want a good shot at winning, it might help to take some pointers from Korea's H O N, who played RMP to a completely different level, taking home $30,000 at the recently concluded ESL Arena Tournament.
[UPDATED] Arena Tournament has begun!
The 2009 Arena Tournament officially begun yesterday, kicking of a six-week qualifying period to find the best Arena players who will earn the chance to win prizes totaling over $200,000. Registration was opened a little over a week ago, with Blizzard enticing aspiring Gladiators with the Vanquisher title and a Murloc vanity pet that will translate over to the live realms. The tournament will consist of one round of regional qualifiers, followed by the regional finals, and winners of those finals will compete against each other for the top prize.Registering for the tournament, which costs $20 or €15, will grant players access to the tournament realms where they can create Level 80 characters of any race and class. These characters will be outfitted with the best Arena gear available -- Deadly Gladiator items from Season 5 -- and will have access to other epic items as well as enchants, gems, and glyphs allowing them to customize their character as they see fit.Players whose teams finish in the Top 1000 at the end of the qualifiers will receive the Vanquisher title for all their characters over Level 70. Casual players who don't play Arenas seriously still have some incentive as the only requirement to obtain the Murloc pet -- Murkimus the Gladiator, according to the Patch 3.1 files -- is to play 200 games over the six-week qualifying period with one team regardless of record. [UPDATE: According to this post, the first two weeks are considered a practice period and thus do not count towards the 200 ranked games required to qualify for the pet.] Players must have an active subscription in order to register.
Raid Rx: Are tier token drops fair?
Raid Rx is designed to encapsulate and cure the shock and horror that is 25-man raid healing. Ok, so it's mostly horror... Anyways, if you're a big fan of X-TREME Whack-A-Mole (or are being forced into it against your will) this is the column for you. People sure can be pushy when it comes to drops. Hands off, ladies. That Netherweave is mine! Today I share with you one of my deepest secrets. There isn't a week that goes by that I don't lay awake at night, seething about the unfairness of raiding drops. Oh, sure, there's always that elusive piece that has a 0.0002% drop rate that every healer wants. Those are pie in the sky dreams of healing uberness. No, that's not what I mean. I'm talking about the regular gear that's supposed to be dropping at semi-predictable intervals every week. Most bosses have a fairly limited loot table, and in the raiding world, most of that centers around the tier token system. You are supposed to have a 1 in 3 chance of seeing your token on any given kill. But what if that goes horribly wrong? And worse, what if it starts hurting progression? Join me after the jump for a tale of woe and angst, plus what Blizzard has been doing to unintentionally fix the situation (sorta).
