dave-maldonado
Latest
NPC pathing and the living virtual world
In the early days of vanilla WoW, I played Alliance. It wasn't until after hitting 60 that I began playing Horde in earnest. Although I appreciated the bare, rough-and-tumble primitive nature of Orgrimmar, I always felt there was something missing -- namely, the NPCs that happily wandered Stormwind all day long. Orgrimmar didn't really have much of that sort of thing, back then. And of all the NPCs that wandered the human capital, none captured my attention so much as Ol' Emma. Emma was at the time part of a quest chain that took place in the Western Plaguelands -- a ghost in the upper level of a house in Felstone Field asked players to deliver a package to her. But Emma's charms weren't just wrapped into that quest. Ol' Emma spent her days -- and still spends her days -- walking the streets of Stormwind. I first found her walking to the well near the flight path in Stormwind, griping about how nobody respects their elders. Laughing, I moved on, but months later on a whim I decided to follow Ol' Emma to see exactly where she takes all that water she's been supposedly hauling. To my surprise, Emma walking into a building near Cathedral Square, went up the stairs, and ... stopped, facing a wall, still talking to nobody in particular. Unfortunately, this was kind of par for the course for NPCs back then.
Patch 5.1: Transmogrify your cloak with your guild reputation cloaks
Many people think their cloaks are ugly. Blizzard acknowledges this by allowing players to turn the display of their cloaks off. Now in patch 5.1, cloaks can be mogged to look like the cloaks awarded via guild reputation. This change is not included in the patch notes, but game designer Dave Maldonado tweeted the news. Do you have a cloak you're going to mog into your guild tabard? If so, which cloak? Editor's Note: Post contents updated for accuracy. This new feature uses guild reputation rewards in transmogrification.
BlizzCast episode 10 released
Zarhym has announced on the forums that BlizzCast episode 10 is out right now for your listening pleasure. In the official podcast, he talks with Lead Encounter Designer Scott Mercer and Senior Game Designer Dave Maldonado about patch 3.2 and the Argent Tournament instances released with it. Strangely, it sounds like the podcast was actually recorded before the release, but of course now everyone knows that we fight the Black Knight in the 5-man and what the dailies are all about. Especially if you've been paying close attention to the testing on the PTR, lots of the "news" about patch 3.2 won't be all that surprising.They also look forward to BlizzCon: all of the developer panels and meetings that go on there, both from the perspective of fans (hey, we actually can be literate and reasonable instead of QQing all the time!) and from developers (turns out they are "not just blue text" -- who knew?!). It's not a super groundbreaking podcast, but as a wrapup to the release of 3.2 and a short preview to BlizzCon, it works just fine. And there's a bonus: Zarhym is offering up a contest -- answer some questions about the podcast after you listen to it, and you could win a "fabulous prize." The rules give away what the prize is: a Draenei vs. Blood Elf diorama or some action figures.And remember, if you've missed any of the BlizzCast episodes so far, you can find them both in iTunes or over on Blizzard's site, or just read our wrapups here on WoW.com.
