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Wowhead interviews Lead Encounter Designer Ion "Watcher" Hazzikostas
The slew of developer interviews continues! Wowhead guru Perculia interviewed Lead Encounter Designer Ion "Watcher" Hazzikostas earlier this week, quizzing him about all things patch 5.2. Included in the discussion was the Ra'den encounter, which is not only hidden behind a heroic kill of the final boss of the raid, but also features limited attempts. Also included were plenty of questions about Tier 14 content and how the developers felt it worked out, as well as the question of just what kinds of progression paths are in store for raiders that have yet to complete Tier 14 content. Perhaps most interesting to me, however, was a discussion regarding Challenge Modes and the lack of new 5-man content. So far we're at the second patch for Mists of Pandaria, and while we've gotten plenty of scenarios, we have yet to see any new dungeons added to the game. While Hazzikostas stated that no details were set in stone as of yet, there were plenty of dungeons that Blizzard has done in the past that would be fun to revisit. The idea of suddenly making old dungeons relevant to players is honestly something I think could be really fun. There have been plenty of dungeons over the years that I've completely fallen in love with -- but as the game wends on and new expansions are launched, there's little reason to visit any of those prior dungeons. And while transmogrification usually leads me back, the dungeons themselves are easily soloed at this point in the game. What would it look like if the dungeons of old were suddenly a challenge all over again? Check out Wowhead for more from Hazzikostas, including discussion on Feats of Strength, legendary weapons, those intriguing new Thunderforged items and much more.
Patch 3.3 PTR: Icecrown testing starts tomorrow
Lead Encounter Designer Daelo has posted over on the forums that the testing of Icecrown for patch 3.3 will begin tomorrow, October 15th, with the Lord Marrowgar encounter. Blizzard will also have the trash before him up and working as well -- the Icecrown raid preview describes the fight as an army of undead guards, commanded by Marrowgar, "a monstrosity fused together from the bones of the undead." Sounds like good times to us.Stay tuned -- we'll definitely have a few players available to test the encounter and give you some impressions from the PTR tomorrow, and if we can get enough folks together, we might even stream it again. As Daelo points out, the testing schedule will be extremely flexible, so Blizzard will likely pull bosses up and down at a moment's notice -- they've got a lot to test and probably less time to do it than they'd want. Note also that this is for US PTR servers only -- the EU will have a seperate testing schedule that will be available on their forums when it's ready. To Icecrown! Patch 3.3 is the last major patch of Wrath of the Lich King. With the new Icecrown Citadel 5-man dungeons and 10/25-man raid arriving soon, patch 3.3 will deal the final blow to the Arthas. WoW.com's Guide to Patch 3.3 will keep you updated with all the latest patch news.
