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Lichborne: DPS stats for tanking death knights
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. So Rossi bought this up in his last column, and I feel like it is a valid question. If haste is a valid gearing strategy for Paladins, why shouldn't it be for the other tanks? The idea of haste and critical strike as being valid, even desirable stats for a tank seems almost anathema, but as of Mists, especially, it's worth a look. Paladins even have a gearing strategy built around haste. Are they the only ones? Should death knights be considering haste and critical strike rating? Should Blizzard be looking at ways to make haste and critical strike rating more desirable for tanks? We'll consider those questions this week.
Breakfast Topic: Could free movement in combat become a baseline mechanic?
Get out of the fire! Get into the healing! Strategic movement is a key precept in today's World of Warcraft. Encounter design for even everyday zone mobs scritch-scratches at the wool of player tunnel vision, nudging players to make haste out of various sizzling, glowing, steaming puddles of bad. But if we players are to remain light on our feet, we need to be effective even while we're in motion. Over the years, WoW has given us more and more ways to do exactly that. Yet even as mobility becomes a baseline expectation, casting or using skills on the move has not become a baseline ability. In an era of gameplay exemplified by Guild Wars 2's constant dodging, half of WoW still has its feet tangled in cast times and channeling and positioning. Like WoW and its puddles of bad, GW2 expects players to avoid certain damage -- but with much greater alacrity. In GW2, you hop sideways and leap backwards to dodge blows and spells, rather than hoping your stats will help you "dodge," mitigate, or absorb some of them. Dodging becomes a compelling mechanic that's fairly simple to adjust to for a WoW player who's used to moving out of the bad. Readjusting to WoW after a session of GW2, however, is more problematic. I find myself juking my own character (yes, I think you could call interrupting yourself to the point of inaction "juking") when I return to WoW after playing GW2, strafing and jiggling and double-tapping in a vain attempt to dodge my opponent's wrath. My hyper-twitchiness is only complicated by the fact that WoW wants you to move away from some but not all attacks. It's a difficult halfway point to come back to. We've come a long way from the days of plunking our butts down at range to plow through rotation and mana micromanagement. But have we come far enough? Does WoW need to lighten up even more, freeing players to cast and act freely with a more natural flow of action, rather than juggling discrete movement and action phases? Maybe you believe that the mix of both types of abilities presents its own interesting challenges. It certainly has become the foundation of boss encounter design and strategies, and it's a pillar of PvP balance as well. Taking away the yin and yang of movement and stillness would tear apart the whole. What if we could gain the ability to move with complete freedom during combat in WoW without destroying encounter and game balance? Would we also benefit from the more dynamic dodging mechanics of games like Guild Wars 2? Or do you like WoW's blend of movement and static elements just as it is?
The Daily Grind: Do you like mobs telegraphing their moves?
WildStar brought up an interesting topic last week with the revelation that the MMO would feature mobs telegraphing their moves so as to allow players the chance to dodge out of the way or otherwise react. This isn't a new concept, of course; both The Secret World and Guild Wars 2 feature both special attack warnings and the ability to dodge. So it makes me wonder if this is a growing trend in MMO combat. For so long, we've mostly stood in place when fighting an enemy without the need to move around or be aware of mobs telegraphing their most powerful attacks. For some, this shift to a more mobile and reactive combat experience might be a breath of fresh air, but for others, I can see it as being more annoying than engaging. What say you? Is this the type of combat you'd like to see a lot more often? Do these telegraphed moves give you an additional advantage in a fight or prove to be a liability? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Garmin does new in-dash navigation tricks, steers 2013 Dodge and Chrysler models
You won't be able to leap tall structures in one of Chrysler's new cars with Garmin in-dash GPS hardware, but at least you'll be able to see them. 3D buildings and terrain are among the fresh features in the navigators, along with a new UI, trip planner, improved junction view (by a factor of 25), and enhanced routing. The nav company is one of the cogs in Chrysler's Uconnect service, which will roll out in four models next year: the Dodge Journey, Charger and Dart along with Chrysler's 300. Other players in the service are SiriusXM, which provides weather info and entertainment; and Sprint, which shoulders the in-car data workload through its cellular service. Lest you think that all this infotainment will distract you right into the ditch, worry not -- most of the controls are voice activated. If you want a beaming dealer to getcha into one of the new models, the PR is after the break.
Chrysler taps Sprint for new Uconnect in-car data, wants always-on internet that's hands-off (video)
Interior technology is increasingly the main battlefield for automotive giants. We shouldn't be surprised, then, that Chrysler is bringing in some bigger guns for its Uconnect service through a team-up with Sprint. The carrier will integrate its cellular data into a Uconnect Access system where the source of pride is precisely how little Chrysler drivers will need to touch it: the two want voice commands that cut down the amount of involvement needed to plot a new course, change the music input or send a text message. Smartphones also get much more of a say in the matter this time around, providing remote control to open and ready the car before owners even set a foot inside. WiFi hotspot support carries on as well. Just be aware that you'll have to go big or go home to get an early taste of the new Uconnect -- it's available only in the 2013 model years of the Ram 1500 and SRT Viper for now, neither of which is especially gentle on the pocketbook. Update: It looks like the 2013 Dodge Dart R/T will also get the Uconnect goodies, which Sprint's press release neglected to mention. [Thanks, Nathan]
A look at avoidance balancing in Mists
Theck, the paladin tank theorycrafter, has recently finished a series of posts at his blog looking at the state of avoidance in the upcoming expansion. He examined every aspect of the system with the help of a deluge of formulae to come up with some very helpful information for tanks to brush up on while waiting for Mists and all its new content to launch. In particular, in the earlier parts of the series, Theck discerned the new formula for working out each avoidance stat after diminishing returns. As a result, he was able to plot out (for plate tanks in particular) the proper ratio that dodge and parry should be balanced at. Right now, on live, we want to keep parry and dodge as absolutely close as possible. The two have the same diminishing returns curve, which means that x points of parry will be diminished exactly the same as x points of dodge. As such, if you have 3% more parry than dodge, you're losing a non-zero amount of avoidance to the gaping maw of diminishing returns that you might otherwise keep if it was reforged to dodge. However, as Theck has discovered, the DR curves were bent significantly apart in Mists, to the point that we'll want much more parry to keep an even ratio with dodge -- about three times more parry, to be exact.
Chrysler's Mopar division brings wireless charging to 2013 Dodge Dart (video)
The idea isn't new to the aftermarket crowd, but Mopar has just announced the summer arrival of the industry's first OEM wireless power mat, which is designed specifically for the 2013 Dodge Dart. It'll fit snugly within the center console tray, and will charge any properly equipped MP3 player or smartphone. The power mat will retail for $200 and will be available from Chrysler's network of dealers. As for the 2013 Dart itself, it'll set you back a mere $15,995. You'll find an inside peek at Mopar's solution, along with the full PR, right after the break.
Lichborne: The effect of the new stat changes on death knights
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. We're still a couple of weeks away from the dam burst that is the Mists of Pandaria press event, but in the meantime, Lead Systems Designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street has posted a new Dev Watercooler. He listed some stat changes coming in Mists that, while ostensibly not as complicated as those in Wrath, still hold some interesting and possibly major implications for class balance in the coming expansion. Let's dive right in and see what they mean for death knights. Blocking takes a week While it doesn't directly affect us, the blocking changes will certainly shake up the tanking hierarchy that we're a part of, so it's worth pointing out that the usual single roll combat table for dodging, parrying, or blocking a hit is gone. Instead, the chance to block will be calculated only after the dodge and parry chance is calculated. This essentially means that being unhittable is gone. You can't just stack to 102.4%. Of course, death knights and druids have never been able to do this, but they will now be joined by the shield tanks.
2013 Dodge Dart digital dash display hands-on (video)
Sure, we've seen digital instrument panels before, but the one outfitted for the upcoming Dodge Dart re-birth caught our eye. Instead of a regular ol' speedometer in the center of the driver side dash, you'll encounter a 7-inch instrument cluster that you'll be able to customize based on your specific auto info needs. This of course will be the second screen on the dash, as the vehicle will also feature Chrysler's 8.4-inch Uconnect infotainment system in the center. Just how useful is the new feature? We took it for a test drive of sorts, and hopped out with a few thoughts. First, the amount of information that can be delivered to the driver's screen was pretty comprehensive. You'll be able to check gas mileage / fuel economy, odometer details, tire pressure, burned out lights, follow the navigation system and sort out your music choices. The color and image quality were both great, something that gets overlooked from time to time with on-board vehicle screens. While some simple animations take place on the screen for things like driving directions, the folks at Dodge affirm that the monitor won't pose a distraction while you're on the road. For a look at the new display in action and a quick refresher on the Uconnect system, hit the gallery below or the video on the backside of the break.
Behind the Mask: Practical indestructibility
It's not very commonplace to showcase a single build on Behind the Mask. In fact, aside from the Archetypes, I've never directly addressed any of the millions of build options in Champions Online. However, one build in particular has garnered a lot of attention lately. It's infamous for its incredible survivability, and many people consider it the benchmark of all builds. The main permutation of the build is Invul/dodge, but the core idea is using layered defenses to ramp up survivability to ridiculous levels. This week, we'll cover what Invul/dodge is, how it works, and some popular variants. We'll also discuss its limitations and counters. While Invul/dodge is probably the most situationally durable build in the game, it has its weaknesses. Some players might delude you into thinking that Invul/dodge is good at everything, but that couldn't be further from the truth.
Encrypted Text: Dissecting rogue stats
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to email me with any article suggestions! Do you remember when armor penetration was all the rage? While combat rogues lusted after all the ArP as they could get their hands on, the other physical DPS classes shared the same desire. I forgave all of the feral druids who asked for the leather gear with armor penetration on it; I know we have to share the agility-based leather gear with our furry friends. I didn't put my foot down until hunters, warriors, and even death knights started rolling on our stuff. While having such a powerful stat allowed us to scale competitively, it also created a massive amount of gear competition. Blizzard's developers decided to end armor penetration's reign as the top stat and actually named a successor to the throne -- agility. Agility is now a rogue's best stat, and since it's always on our gear, we never have to worry about whether we'll see it or not. The plate DPS classes now only want strength, and so our precious leather is safe from their clutches. The stat redesign also shifted the balance of power between the other secondary stats, and we saw several stat functions changed as well.
Lichborne: Blood Death Knight Tanking 101
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. A lot has changed since the last we did a Blood Tanking 101 article. There's only one tanking tree for death knights now; you don't need to worry about defense rating; and parry haste is a thing of the past. While we have talked about various aspects of Cataclysm blood tanking in past columns, this column is meant to be your one-stop shop for all things blood tanking, to give you a general idea of what you'll need to do to start seriously tanking at the heroic dungeon and raid level as a death knight.
Behind the Mask: The numbers are coming
Last week threw a bit of a wrench in my plans. I intended to interview a very prominent member of the Champions Online community for this column, but I was sidelined by the flu and some dental work. This delay means that things must be pushed back and shuffled around while some old ideas will come to the fore. This week, I decided to cover a controversial topic: Inertial Dampening Field. However, IDF affects player survivability in a very particular way, and in my 40-plus weeks of writing about Champions, I've neglected to cover one basic thing: how defense actually works. If you don't know how defense, dodge, and linear damage reduction work in tandem, it's hard to understand just how powerful IDF can be. I think this week's column would be very valuable to a lot of players, but it is pretty complicated, and the math involved will throw a lot of people off. I'll cover the nitty-gritty math and the rules of thumb, but if you're casual, this is going to be hard to swallow. Like my guide on gear (and the more recent forum post), this is one of those things most people will have to read a few times. As a side advantage, much of this information can be transferred to Star Trek Online, since it uses similar defense mechanics. If you don't want to worry too much about the specifics, hit the jump and scroll to the bottom, where I'll sum up all the essentials.
Chrysler shows off Ram plug-in hybrid electric truck, won't sell it to you
There's already a few hybrid trucks on the market (most notably from GM), but true plug-in hybrid electric trucks are another matter altogether. Chrysler now looks set to change that, however -- at least in a small way -- with its new Ram plug-in hybrid that's set to roll out to fleet operators this summer. It was just unveiled at the Washington D.C. Auto Show, and it pairs a 12 kWh battery pack from Canadian battery-maker Electrovaya with Chrysler's own 5.7-liter HEMI V-8 engine, which Electrovaya says will allow for up to 20 miles of driving on electricity only. Unfortunately, there's no word on any plans to actually make the truck available to individual consumers, but Chrysler does seem to at least be optimistic about hybrid trucks in general, with a company spokesman noting that half-ton pickups are naturally much better at carrying a battery pack than a car, and that trucks work better as hybrid vehicle platforms.
Dodge sucks at Photoshop: the Verizon Droid with AT&T 3G
Ever wish you could get a Verizon-labeled phone running on AT&T, and do it with full bars and a 3G no less? Get yourself one of the Dodge's new and free virtual product manuals, available now for iPhone and soon coming to BlackBerry and Android. They're a continuation of the sort of thing Chrysler announced back at CES, just letting you view information about your vehicle and maybe some aftermarket parts too. They're available now for the Durango and Charger, with coverage for the Avenger, Journey, and Grand Caravan coming before the end of the month. Full details about the apps in the PR below, but sadly no information on exactly where we should stick the SIM card in our Droid. [Thanks, Joe]
Lichborne: The great death knight Cataclysm tanking stat weight debate
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. Join World of Warcraft's first hero class as we head into a new expansion and shed the new kid on the block label. So here's the thing about figuring out your tank stat weights as you go into raiding: They're all subjective and likely to stay that way for a while. Between Blizzard's redesign of the way stats work, the way boss fights work and the newness of expansion, we're still trying to get the data we need to figure out the best exact way to min-max our gear. Right now, there are a few specific schools of thought on how to gear yourself for raid tanking, and right now, they all seem to be working for specific raid groups. Today, we'll take a look at the major tank survival stats and discuss the new quirks, benefits, and drawbacks of each of them as you start gearing up in earnest for the raid game.
Wasteland Diaries: New direction
The state of the game announcement for Fallen Earth was a bit vague, but it did contain some good news. It seems the game, now under new management, is headed in a new direction. Does new mean good? All outward indications say yes. I have never been accused of being overly optimistic, but I like where Fallen Earth is headed. Most of the big news is still over the horizon, and the combat changes are the first order of business. With new management comes new direction. It's nice to know what that direction might be. Of the three who were let go, I have nothing negative to say about any of them. Marie Croall has taken the reins at Fallen Earth, LLC and seems to have a clear plan. That's not to say there wasn't a clear plan before, but we are finally getting definitive answers on huge questions that we have been demanding responses on for quite a while. More details await you after the cut.
Wasteland Diaries: What's next?
There isn't yet a known release date for the next Fallen Earth patch. The 1.7.1 patch will make some fundamental changes to the combat system. These changes will be far-reaching, but they will not alter gameplay drastically. Mainly, we will see an increase in damage dealt across the board. This will make combat in Fallen Earth seem a bit more dangerous than it is now. PvE just doesn't quicken my pulse like it did when I was a new player in Sector 1. The patch will also address this. It will also add the faction control points. The main focus of the patch is the combat re-vamp and the control points. The Armor Use skill and the Dodge skill have been redesigned, and the way that damage mitigation works is a bit different in version 1.7.1. The faction control points will give the clones a reason to fight, and the victorious faction will reap far-reaching rewards. I'll go into more detail about these tidbits and more after the break, so without any further ado, let's move on.
The Light and How to Swing It: Bad habits in dungeons
With the Light as his strength, Gregg Reece of The Light and How to Swing It faces down the demons of the Burning Legion, the undead of the Scourge, and soon, an entire flight of black dragons. If you've never seen the "How to Paladin" series by stoker2 ... don't. If you have seen it, my apologies and I will continue to attempt to stop Michael Gray from linking them in Moviewatch. However, I thought it would be a perfect example of things paladins shouldn't do for a lead into my article. We're going to talk a bit about bad habits. Some of these bad habits come from learning your class while soloing and the differences you have to make in your playstyle when questing versus when dungeon running. Some of these bad habits are born out of running mostly PvP content and then moving from there into PvE, where the same tricks are more harmful than helpful. Still other bad habits come from having extremely powerful gear. When you overgear content, you start to lose sight of what it's like to have to work at things. You forget that you used to do 1,800 DPS on a good day in your quest greens and what tricks you used to work through each pull. You also start to do stunts that would have wiped your party without question three tiers of content ago. After the break, we'll take a look at a variety of these bad habits and talk about why you might want to break those habits before the Cataclysm.
DoD eases ban on thumb drive use for US military, our enemies rejoice
Betcha didn't know that USB flash drives weren't allowed in the US military. Or maybe you did -- you know, considering that one with Japan-US troop deployment maps went missing in mid-2008. Oops. At any rate, the Department of Defense has reportedly lifted said ban, but as with anything related to The Man, gobs of red tape will be involved. For starters, they won't be reintroduced "wholesale," instead being reserved for "mission essential applications." We're also told that the drives themselves must contain specific security features, and administrators will be able to track the use of 'em from the outset. For those unaware, the ban was originally put into place just over a year ago after virus-laden USB keys disrupted military networks, presumably flashing Blingee'd faces of Kim Jong-il onto CIA surveillance screens. Or not, but that'd be pretty hilarious.
