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The Dangers of Datamining: A cautionary tale of a not-so-evil Magister
Some time last month, I was chatting with a friend about various story bits in WoW when we wandered onto the subject of the blood elves and what they're up to in the story. I pointed out the short story In the Shadow of the Sun for more recent sin'dorei lore, adding that of course the story took place prior to Wrath in the time line, so it really wasn't the most up-to-date bit of lore, although it was a wonderful read. My friend asked if I thought we'd see anything with the blood elves in Mists, and I replied that I didn't think so, but then we didn't really know that much about storylines in Pandaria yet. "Well, yeah," they replied. "But what about Rommath? I mean, he's part of the Twilight Cult and all." I paused for a moment, confused, and then realized what they were referring to. "That was a set of datamined voice files that never made it to game," I clarified. "Well yeah, but he's evil," they insisted. "No, he's not -- as far as the game and the lore is concerned, that conversation never happened, and Rommath is still the same old Rommath. A little cranky and snooty, but definitely not evil. Until proven otherwise." They pondered this, and the conversation moved on from there. I've had this conversation again and again -- in game, on Twitter. And this, my friends, is just one example of the many dangers of datamining.
Ask a Beta Tester: It's all about the money
We have a lot of profession questions today, but also a few about Achievements, the Beast Mastery 51-point talent, and what happens when you push Death Knights off a cliff:Riley asks...How is the Shaman Hex ability working? Does the target still have control of movement and does the PvP trinket work against it?Hex is a the crowd-control spell for Shamans referenced by the devs at the class panel here, and it's been tinkered with a lot since we first heard about it. It was originally meant to be more of an emergency-only, short-duration CC. In its present form, Hex's duration has been increased to 30 seconds and it doesn't necessarily break on damage. However, in PvP the target can control where they go, the PvP trinket does work (you can also shapeshift out of it as a Druid), and it's considered a curse and can be dispelled by Mages, Druids, and restoration Shamans (who will have the ability do dispel curses with a 31-point talent Cleanse Spirit). Think of it as a somewhat odd combination of Counterspell, Fear, and Polymorph.
More beta keys sent out
Several people, including many WoW Insider authors, have received Beta Opt-In keys for Wrath of the Lich King in the last 24 hours. This latest wave seems to be quite large. In previous waves I've known 1 or 2 people that have gotten in, where as this wave I know at least 16.There is some speculation that this might be an attempt by Blizzard to thwart the release of Warhammer Online, which is set to come online next Thursday. Warhammer has received some mixed reviews, with many comparisons to World of Warcraft, including one by Michael Zenke of our sister site Massively.Nonetheless, those that have received keys are enjoying the thrills of the beta. New levels, the Death Knight, and servers crashing a few times an hour. Good times had by all!
Age of Conan's old beta test servers shut down
It is time for beta testers milking the beta gravy train to pay-up and subscribe if they want to continue playing on an official Age of Conan test server. According to Scott over at Pumping Irony, upon firing-up the old test launcher players were met with the somber news and much kudos for their hard diligent bug reporting and feedback during the whole testing operation. Funcom kept their old beta servers online for a month after Age of Conan launched before pulling them offline yesterday and the plan is to convert them over into a "Testlive" server. A common practice after an MMOG launches. To keep a healthy test playerbase busy swatting bugs and pillaging bleeding-edge content the following standard measure is planned: "We will be doing several things to encourage people to play on Testlive. We are looking at being able to copy characters from Live, having "buffing" NPCs that will level and gear your character up."Doesn't seem like much incentive to play on the official test live server, but what else can they do aside from handing out bags of money to all your non-test characters? You tell us.
