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The Queue: Time warp
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. In my personal canon, every time a mage uses Time Warp, it creates a new timeline. We aren't even on our Azeroth anymore. Who knows where we are? Mages ruin everything. CRtheMighty asked: Who all from our Azeroth is going to this alt-Draenor? I know Garrosh, because it's his fault, and somewhere Thrall pops over. Anyone else?
The Queue: Wood doesn't burn, right?
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. Yeah, I'm sure that bridge is safe. Kidneph asked: First time asker here, but here goes. Do you reckon we will see a pre-xpac event like BC to Wrath and so on? If so, what do you think it may be?
The Queue: Spikes
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. We have a number of quickie questions today. Some longer ones, but a lot of quickies, too. BoltzmannHatchling asked: Talking about Gorgrond, where all the spikes in Blade's Edge Mountains? I thought it was a remarkable and unique orogeny of that place, but Draenor lacks the "spikes" and can't seem to pin point them on the alphabeta maps. But if they are gone like my pools and volcanoes of green lava, then I understand...
Warlords of Draenor: Solo scenario and quest improvements
Leveling content and design has been an ongoing process since day one of WoW. In vanilla, quest chains would literally send you from one end of Azeroth to the other and back again in search of some relic or document or other item that was vitally important to the NPC who happened to be on the wrong continent to retrieve it. As time went on, quest flow was re-designed again and again, with more of an eye for keeping things bite-size and compact, less lengthy and drawn out. In Cataclysm, that envelope was arguably pushed too far, featuring story-heavy leveling zones that felt like they were on rails, leading players from one hub to the next with little exploration encouraged. Thankfully, Mists relaxed the rigid structure and went a little more free-form with quest flow. It's hard to describe the differences in quest progression and flow on the beta for Warlords. Although the test servers are currently riddled with players, which means they are also riddled with extreme amounts of lag here and there, it's still possible to get an overall idea of how the quest design and flow has changed from Mists ... and there are some major changes afoot.
Warlords of Draenor Alpha: Transmog changes
On live servers you can't transmog polearms over swords, axes or maces (and vice versa), but on the Alpha it's a totally different story, as you can see in the header image above. No idea if this is an intended change or not (I hope it is) but it's certainly a welcome one for those of us who happen to carry a Hellreaver in our bags.
New human male model revealed
Blizzard has just revealed the revamped human male model, coming in Warlords of Draenor. Like previous reveals, the new model's increased fidelity is immediately obvious. The work done on his facial structure will be appreciated, too -- though he does bear a striking resemblance to Tarzan. In the reveal, Art Director Chris Robinson also mentions that select work-in-progress models will be hitting the Warlords of Draenor alpha in the near future. The final versions of those models will be revealed on the website.
Warlords of Draenor: Big changes to Monks
The latest Warlords of Draenor alpha patch notes have been released, and they come with some pretty hefty changes to monks--Mistweavers in particular. Blizzard has been experimenting with the monk class, and that comes as no real surprise. They were the new kids of Mists of Pandaria, so it's expected that they'll be getting relatively large changes in the expansion immediately following their introduction. Death Knights went through the same thing in Cataclysm, so this seems to be just part of the new class cycle. Keep that in mind as we go over the changes; this is still alpha, after all, and if there were any time for Blizzard to play around and see what happens, it's now. The biggest changes in the current build involve haste, the global cooldown, and the separation of the traditional healing style of Mistweavers versus the Eminence dps-while-healing style. Like Warriors, a number of the monk changes show a great emphasis on the importance of stances, and how different stances affect gameplay. The monk change notes are after the break, with the strikeouts left intact so as to illustrate the dynamic changes from the last alpha build. Red text in the original that is not struck out has been bolded below.
Warlords of Draenor: Shadowmoon Valley preview
I love draenei. I've made this clear time and again. So you can imagine the throaty, masculine squeal of delight that I let loose when I saw the new zone preview for Shadowmoon Valley up on the official site. I'm very hopeful that we'll get to explore it soon on the alpha (a hope fed by specific tweets) and getting to read about what's going on in the zone made me very, very excited. Okay, so it made me giddy with delight. Exarch Akama! The Temple of Karabor! Gul'dan up to no good! If I were any more excited this entire paragraph would be in italics. So head over to the official site and read what Senior Designer Helen Cheng has to say about Shadowmoon Valley, the Alliance's first stop on Draenor. I am so freaking excited right now. We're going to get to see intact draenei architecture and their greatest heroes and... I gotta go lie down now, guys. Discuss among yourselves.
The Queue: Leveling in Warlords, QQ, and more
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. Let's all agree to lay off of Wildstar today, eh? @crusaderesper asked: Is the leveling in WoD filled with rares and events like the Timeless Isle?
Warlords of Draenor: New plushie Battle Pet
Wowhead discovered a new Battle Pet in Warlords of Draenor, and this one is guaranteed to be the cutest Battle Pet in your stable. The Elekk Plushie is exactly what it sounds like -- a plush version of an elekk, stitched together with love, if not any particular skill. The pet is tagged with a Profession: Tailoring label, suggesting that perhaps this little bundle of fluff will be crafted by tailors. The attacks, however, are the real treat here: Fluff Barrage, Take It, Plushie Rush, Cute As A Button, Who's the Best Elekk In The Whole World?, and Itchin' for a Stitchin'. They may sound cute, but here's the catch -- they're all imaginary attacks. Obviously a stuffed toy can't actually battle...but hey, we can pretend that it can, right? @perculia Well, it's a *regular* stuffed animal. Which means it just sits there and stares at you when you summon it.- Jonathan LeCraft (@TheCrafticus) June 11, 2014 The only working ability for the pet is Itchin' for a Stitchin', which will perform a pet swap. Other than that, the plushie just sits there. It's a plushie, what did you expect? However, Jonathan LeCraft later clarified on Twitter that while the plush is a joke, some might not find it funny, which means the squeezably soft little toy might not actually make it into the game. As a kid, I had countless stuffed animals, each of which was just as beloved as any pet I owned -- so I kind of hope the little guy makes it to release. I'd like to name him and summon him just like any other pet, regardless of whether or not he can actually fight. I'd love to see an achievement for actually getting the plush to level 25, while we're at it. What do you guys think? Do you want an Elekk Plushie of your very own?
Warlords of Draenor: Secondary Stat Attunements
The latest round of patch notes has introduced several new sections of content pertaining to the next expansion and just how classes are going to function. One of these new items is Secondary Stat Attunements -- passive abilities that grant a 5% bonus to specific secondary stat bonuses for every class and spec in the game. This bonus is in addition to the secondary stat bonuses you'll find on gear in Draenor. So what does that mean to you, the player? It's a little boost for your character, but in addition to that, it's also a little nudge in the right direction as far as choosing secondary stats that are appropriate for the spec you want to play. For instance, balance-spec druids have a Secondary Stat Attunement for mastery -- meaning they've automatically got a 5% bonus applied to their mastery, and indicating that hey, mastery is a pretty good thing, and perhaps you'll want to pick up more of that over other secondary stats. Read on for the full list of Secondary Stat Attunements.
Warlords of Draenor Alpha: Updated patch notes for June 13th
Well, it's another update to the Warlords of Draenor Alpha and its patch notes. What's new, what's changed, what's going on with the Alpha? Here's a few highlights: There's a new section called Secondary Stat Attunement that basically comes right out and tells you what stat you're expected to want for each specialization. Fury warriors, you'll notice it's still crit. Fire mages? Same thing. We're still angry and hot. We both still love crit. We should totally form a band. Other new sections include the Self-Sustainability section (which explains how your ability to not die has been changed) and the Tooltip Clarity section, which explains why they've made changes to various tooltips. Of extra import is the mention that, just because the tooltip has changed, that doesn't mean the ability has, unless the patch notes say it has. So keep that in mind. There have been several changes to the Ability Pruning section - Death Knights lose Blood Strike and Necrotic Strike, druids see a mountain of changes (seriously, if you're a druid, go check that out, it's crazy) - paladins, priests, rogues and especially shamans have gotten some significant pruning as well (I'd put shamans just behind druids). Head on over to the official patch notes and take a look for yourselves. If you're playing a class like a shaman or druid that just saw a lot of change it's especially a good idea to read up on the current state of affairs.
Warlords of Draenor: Shadowmoon Valley in next alpha build
World of Warcraft's Creative Director Alex Afrasiabi has confirmed via Twitter that the next alpha build will shut down the Horde lines in Frostfire Ridge and open up Shadowmoon Valley in its place. Shadowmoon Valley available next alpha build with the new intro tier garrison. Horde will be turned off for this phase. Soon (tm). - Alex Afrasiabi (@Abrosiabi) June 11, 2014 Considering Shadowmoon Valley is the expansion's introductory zone for the Alliance, I think it's safe to assume that the "new intro tier garrison" mentioned is, in fact, the Alliance-side garrison. Even though it's never safe to predict these things, it's still nice to know that the addition of Alliance garrison Followers discovered in yesterday's alpha update was, in fact, an indication that Alliance-side testing was nearly upon us. Having played through a bit of the Alliance quests at the Temple of Karabor during BlizzCon, I'm particularly interested to hear what the alpha-testers have to say about the rest of the zone, as well as how the blue garrison quests are both different and similar to the red ones.
Warlords of Draenor: New alpha build
A new build has been released onto the Warlords of Draenor alpha servers. The servers are not yet available for play by testers, so any changes in available content are currently unknown. However, dataminers are already hard at work. The current build includes numerous class changes, glyph changes, and myriad similar updates. The build also appears to include numerous scenarios relating to old dungeons. For example, an Utgarde Pinnacle scenario with a straightforward objective: defeat the bosses of Utgarde Pinnacle. As we're unable to playtest at the moment, the implementation of these scenarios is unknown. It's possible content from previous expansions will scale up with us as scenarios. Followers for the Alliance garrison appear in the latest build, too. Follower: Vindicator Onaala, among others, indicate progress on the Alliance side of things, if not necessarily an imminent testing of Alliance content.
Warlords of Draenor: New UI introduced for keybinds
I've been messing around in the Warlords alpha, but I'm afraid I haven't gotten very far in actual gameplay, largely because I keep getting sucked into the UI and the subtle changes that have been made. The latest change is a small one, but incredibly welcome -- the keybinding interface has gotten a small revamp. Instead of scrolling through one very long list, keybinds have been broken up into sections, and players can simply choose which section they want to work with. Once you've chosen the appropriate section, functions are clearly labelled to choose from. Just click on the keybinding you want to change, and press the appropriate keys you want the function bound to -- the same as it functions right now. There aren't really any major changes in regards to the keys you can bind, it's the same list. The layout has simply been refined and rearranged into something that is much easier to look at, and easier to use. Given the customization capabilities of so many addons out there, this new layout may not be of use to everyone. But if you, like me, are sick of scrolling through a seemingly endless list of options in one small panel in order to keybind one function, your days of being irritated are almost over.
The Queue: Garrisons, cloud serpents, and the Alliance
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. After playing through Frostfire Ridge, I'm pretty stoked to see how the Alliance side of the story goes. If the draenei story delves even half as deeply into the essence of their culture as Frostfire does with the orcs, I'll be quite happy. @TheWiseHoboking asked: when will blizzard will start talking about alliance related warlord story/content?
Warlords of Draenor: New quest and map interface
The quest UI has received some tweaks and changes in Warlords of Draenor -- no longer simply a quest log, it has been renamed to the more appropriate Map & Quest Log instead. Hitting L for your quest log will now bring up a new pane which combines both map and quest log into one handy place. You can still hit M for a full sized map, but it almost isn't necessary with this new feature -- the drop down menus at the top of the pane will let you switch between continents, and then sub-zones within those continents. It honestly reminds me of the current Dungeon Journal UI, which lets you choose between expansions, dungeon or raid content, and then individual dungeons or raids for boss strategies and loot lists. And frankly, this is one of those quality of life changes I didn't really realize I needed until I saw it in action.
Warlords of Draenor: New mount tab and favorites function
The Warlords of Draenor alpha has plenty of content, but it's the little things that are standing out at the moment -- subtle UI tweaks and additions that are marked improvements to existing features. One of these in-progress changes is the mounts tab, a feature that has been pretty bare-bones since it was introduced. Although it isn't complete just yet, there are some nice changes -- mounts that you cannot use are clearly outlined in red, and mousing over their icons will tell you what riding skill you need in order to ride them. Mounts from both factions are now shown on the tab. However, Horde and Alliance icons clearly note which mounts are faction-specific, and which faction you need to be in order to ride them. In addition, some mounts now have flavor text in the mount window that includes a little information about the mount, and where it is obtained -- whether it be via quest or vendor.
Warlords of Draenor inventory UI updates
In addition to the toy box, Warlords of Draenor introduces a number of other updates to World of Warcraft's inventory UI, some of which can be seen in the image above. Each bag, minus your backpack, can now be assigned to a specific type of item. If you want all of your looted equipment to go in your last bag, for example, you can assign that bag to equipment. The above image also displays the ignore option for the new Cleanup system. On your primary backpack, there's a new Cleanup icon that will automatically organize your bags, quickly sorting all similar items together. Ignoring a bag ensures that if there's a particular mess you particularly enjoy, it will not be automatically sorted. The Cleanup option is also available in your bank. Junk items -- items with no purpose but to be sold to a vendor for gold -- are now marked with a small gold piece. When it's time to shed your vendor trash, you can now see at-a-glance what you should be selling. In addition, everyone's bank now has a dedicated 98-slot reagents tab for crafting materials and other miscellany. Certainly, that's a better solution than using numerous profession-specific bags such as herbalism's Hyjal Expedition Bag. The reagent tab comes with a Deposit All Reagents button, allowing you to deposit your array of herbs, ores, or whatever else you may have with a single button press. The button is also useful if you're not sure what does or does not qualify as a reagent. If the button takes it, you're golden. If it doesn't, it isn't a reagent. A screenshot of the reagent tab is included below if you want to see it for yourself, but let's be honest -- it's a grid of empty inventory squares. I think we can all visualize that pretty well.
Warlords of Draenor introduces vignette encounters
Playing through the Warlords of Draenor alpha, it quickly becomes apparent that the Timeless Isle was a preview of the upcoming expansion's world design. While quests and quest hubs are still present in spades, the game world is littered with bonuses -- hidden caches of materials for your garrison, rare spawns, and little stories in out-of-the-way places. While questing through Frostfire Ridge, I saw a skull on my minimap in the region known as the Boneslag. Assuming it was another rare spawn of many, I rushed down and encountered Cindermaw. I didn't know it at the time, but Cindermaw isn't a standard rare spawn at all. He's something Blizzard is calling a vignette. I was able to solo Cindermaw, and quite easily at that, but the encounter was more involved than I'd expected. After beating on him for awhile, he burrowed underground and I was given a warning that he'd moved to the southeast. A few moments later, he reappeared far out of the standard combat range, where a normal mob would leash and reset. Instead, I remained in combat with the worm, needing to pursue him through the Boneslag, fighting through (or attempting to avoid) all of the orcs that stood between us. I reached him and managed to do only a little more damage before he burrowed again, causing me to pursue once more. On the third engagement, I used my cooldowns to kill him before he could flee any further. My efforts were rewarded with Cindermaw's Blazing Talon. Vignettes appear to bring a more dynamic type of encounter to the game world, something more akin to a dungeon boss than the typical overworld monster. Cindermaw was my first kill towards the achievement The Frostwind Slayer, which lists eight different vignettes in Frostwind Desert -- what I assume to be a deprecated name for Frostfire Ridge. If that's correct, it's safe to assume every zone in Draenor will have its own set of vignettes.
