neth
Latest
Race changes confirmed
The possibility of changing your character's race was indicated at BlizzCon 2009, during one of the panels. But then the news about it really got hot when Faction changes were officially announced, because eagle-eyed players noticed the following damning question in the new program's FAQs: Can I use this service to change race on my existing faction? The answer was confirmation enough for most folks: No. We will be releasing a Race change service in the near future for this purpose.But, this wouldn't be the first time a bit of miscommunication or other confusion has occurred. The final confirmation of upcoming race changes came today, confirmed by Neth again in an official forum thread. All she was actually doing there was referencing the original thread about Faction changes, which had already said Race changes were coming. The announcement even showed up on the official Warcraft Twitter account. So this isn't exactly a brand new thing. Still, it's nice to have it confirmed all over again.Race changes, of course, subtly differ from Faction changes because you'll still stay Alliance if you're Alliance, or Horde if you're Horde. Race changes might be performed for aesthetic reasons -- you might just prefer the look of a sexy little gnome. Still, I bet most Race changes will be to get access to "better" racials. Especially if racials do get revamped in Cataclysm, a lot of players will see the grass a little greener on the other side. Every Man For Himself, anyone?
Insider Trader: Woodworking in the expansion?
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.Ideas for a woodworking profession have been bounced around for years, but have previously been dodged by Blizzard. Although they assured us that they have plenty of ideas, they've always been working on too many others.Woodworking was not to be for Burning Crusade or Wrath of the Lich King, but what about the upcoming expansion? Considering that Goblins and Worgen could become playable, it might be a real possibility. In late summer 2007, Nethaera posted a list of some of the things that need to be considered before they can even begin to implement a new profession. While it became clear that it wasn't going to work for Wrath, it seems a little more plausible now. Today's column will be dedicated to presenting the crafting community's Woodworking ideas, discussing their implementation using the (incomplete) criteria set forth by Nethaera, and speculating about its possible presence in the next expansion.
Blizzard warns against Three Wolf Moon at BlizzCon
Grainne was posting over on the BlizzCon forums today, and brought up a very good point. We all need to be very careful about wearing our Three Wolf Moon shirts to BlizzCon.My first experience with this shirt of legend, like many of you, came through the largest digg in the known universe. It became so popular that the digg counters are even screwed up. It's just that awesome. When my shirt finally arrived I immediately found that all the Blood Elves were attracted to me, even the dudes. But that's okay, because such a powerful shirt demands respect. I was attracted to me too.I think Nethaera must have had such a similar experience. Perhaps she was posing in game as one those Blood Elves? Because that would explain her warning:"Whoa... no need to dress up that much! Not to mention, it may cause a disturbance you know."
Official 3.0.8.9506 patch notes
Nethaera has posted the official "patch notes" for patch 3.0.8.9506/3.0.8a today. They are listed in their entirety after the break.These notes mirror what Ghostcrawler said in a series of posts last night. I imagine that these patch notes could be updated at some future time, listing more bug fixes if they're present. So you'll probably want to check back later and see if that's the case.If you're looking for a download mirror for the patch files, check out our listing.
Lake Wintergrasp Hotfix
Nethaera announced today a hotfix that was applied over the holidays last week. There were issues in Lake Wintergrasp, the level 80 realm PvP zone, that prevented "objects" changing factions. This has now been fixed.This included things like the teleport pads outside the base and several NPCs. Because of this bug people were often times only able to attempt the raid boss once. When the group wiped they went to the teleport pat to zone back in. It didn't work. However now it does, and people can be happy.This comes from a post entitled "November / December Hotfixes," so we're assuming that there'll be more of them on their way. We'll keep you updated.
Blizzard says to log out and then back in to ensure an upgrade
I have to admit, this is an odd news bulletin. But Nethaera posted this on the general forums tonight without any promoting from the users."To ensure a smooth transition to Wrath of the Lich King, we recommend that players who have newly upgraded their accounts, log into the game and log out completely for a short period of time in order for their account to fully update."So what does that mean? Does it mean I have to be logged out for the game to update? I would think that would be a "duh" kind of thing. But what I'm taking from it is the following steps: Upgrade Account to Wrath Log in /dance Log out ??? Log in and go to Northend My guess is that some internal variables in the game need to be reset upon logging in, and those variables might affect other login processes, so you have to "restart" more or less. Either way, it's good information that should go out to the masses.
Bornakk hints at upcoming threat meter
This isn't the first time we've heard about putting a built-in threat meter in the standard World of Warcraft interface. The idea came up back at Blizzcon 07, and Neth confirmed plans to include such a meter in February '08. But there's not been much discussion about the idea since then. Today, Bornakk confirmed they're still working on it, but there's obviously no details to be shared yet. ("Soon," and all that.) So, while we don't know that we'll be seeing the threat meter with the release of Wrath of the Lich King, at least we know it's probably still coming eventually. Threat meters are almost entirely a mandatory requirement for most raids. The two big ones are KTM and Omen, of course. It lets your DPS know when to let off the gas a bit, before they pull aggro off the tank. Or, maybe, tells the tanks they need to push the pedal harder and build up more of their own threat instead of limiting the DPS. I can't imagine raiding without one, and if that's the state of things for enough players, I expect Blizzard will take it over themselves soon enough.
WotLK Alpha NDA lifted
Nethaera posted in the beta forums that the NDA for the Wrath of the Lich King Alpha has been lifted. In response to a question asking if people could share things from the Alpha, Neth says "Feel free to discuss at will." This is great news for everyone that wants to talk about the alpha material legally. Those who've been part of the Alpha will get to post troves of information and stories that they've collected. I'm sure some of them will be going up on WoW Insider soon enough, and these will only expand as beta invites become more active.The Alpha NDA was a source of tension for a lot of people, especially those in the Alpha. Several set up or contributed to sites like DeathKnight.info and WotlkWiki.com. It was very difficult, if not impossible, for Blizzard to enforce the NDA. However they were successful in forcing WotLKWiki.com to relocate.It will be interesting to see what the repercussions of the lifted NDA end up to be. One thing is for sure though, and that's that we're starting to see new and exciting information about WotLK come out minute by minute. Stay tuned!
Beta selection is random, no emails yet
Nethaera has just come out and said that the beta selection process will be random. This is important for all of us to know: there will be no precedence or order associated with the opt-in. What does this mean? It means even if you sign up tomorrow you have a chance to get in, and that all of us who rushed to sign up when it just opened get no real benefit.Neth also lets us know that there are no beta emails going out just yet - and that they will "try" to let us know when they start sending out legitimate emails.We want to reiterate again: be careful with the email scams. They will be flying around today like wildfire. Don't get caught up in one. Read our handy guide on how to keep yourself safe for more information.
Neth expounds on beta criteria to test WotLK
We're all understandably hyped for Wrath of the Lich King, and a lot of us are watching the leaked alpha testing information closely. Forum-goer Zaggaroth is looking a little more forward. He's asking the question: How do you get into the closed beta testing?Nethaera steps in to answer his question, and shed some candlelight. Blizzard pulls its beta testers from "many places." Some folks win a contest, others are random, while still others are the result of specific targeting -- they want that particular demographic of player represented in the testing. They don't pick only the most experienced players, which makes sense when you consider the game's for everyone and not just the elitest of the elite.Neth wraps up her posting by saying Blizzard's not yet determined if there'll be some kind of application for the beta, and that it'll all depend on what the developers want when that time comes around. I'd guess they've done some thinking on this subject. But in some vocabularies, alpha testing just means "a development phase." We're probably still a little ways off from the closed beta.Edit: Added a link to the thread in question, in addition to the Source link below.
WotLK: The rain is coming
While we've gotten tid bits of information here and there from Blizzard posts over the past few months, the news has been relatively dry with regards to any official announcements about Wrath of the Lich King. We know that it's in alpha testing, and we've had a bit of fun with some screenshots. But that's about it.Nethaera tells us that the development is coming along really well, which we've all heard before. However in her typical witty fashion she also gives us this gem of a line, in response to people calling WotLK vapor-ware:"The great thing about vapor is that at some point it condenses and becomes rain. The rain then falls and nourishes that which it falls on. It takes time for it to happen, but it does happen. Signs point to clouds forming in the sky, but you never can tell when they will let loose the rain..."Take that for what you will, but I read it pretty squarely as "Some major WotLK news is on its way." And that is news in and of itself.
Stress test live blog
We've been preparing for the stress test, are mostly gemmed and enchanted up, and are looking to fight! I'll be updating this post as things happen, hopefully with riveting tales of victory and triumph over Alliance Care Bears. (Kidding of course, my main is an Human warrior.)Read on after the break for the updates! We'll keep this front page only for things that are affecting everyone.Updated 5:23 p.m. PST: Live blogging wrapped up for the day. Many many thanks to all the fans and GMs out there! It was a great day with lots of cool stuff happening. More analysis over the next couple days!%Gallery-18020%
Nethaera announces progressive testing, and an update on shared test servers
Everyone's favorite candle has some news for us about the PTR. She reveals that the development team is changing the way they test by adding content progressively to this patch, and changing the patch notes to match. As the testing goes on, they may add or remove test notes or various functions they wish to test. At this least, this could make monitoring the PTR process exciting as we try to figure out what Blizzard may add and take away. In addition, although Blizzard has said that they don't plan any major classes changes, this might mean that we can still hope for the tweaking of some abilities. Nethaera's already made it known that she's watching a few well constructed shaman threads about the changes to the class or lack thereof, at least. In other news, Bornakk has updated his post on International PTRs with the news that Blizzard now plans to make the servers accessible over multiple regions for 2.4.0 only. So unfortunately, if you were planning any raiding or PvP tourneys to see which region reigns supreme, all bets may be off. With this new progressive testing announcement, we'll be sure to keep an eye on the notes for you and tell you as soon as we see any changes, so keep us in mind here at WoW Insider for your patch news needs.
Death Knight tidbits from Neth
In a silly thread in the Druid forums asking whether the druids would get a "dark form" to go along with the Death Knight being a dark version of the Paladin (which it...sort of is, I guess), US CM Nethaera dropped a few interesting pieces of DK information.[when asked if DKs will start at level 55, instead of 60 or 70] That is the current thinking. It could still be subject to change though and is not concrete. We're still toying with ideas of how we want to make it all work. We want people to feel like they are learning not only the how's of becoming a Death Knight from the lore perspective, but also how to play one.[More character slots?] Undetermined as of yet. We'll let people know when we know more.[...the current feeling is that a player with any class over 55 (or whatever the level ends up being) will be able to unlock Death Knight? ] yes. That is our current thinking.[asked about balance] It is going to be balanced against other classes and will not be able to stomp everyone else just because it's a Death Knight. Yes, they will be powerful but in their own unique way. What makes it a Hero class is that it is from Warcraft lore as a Hero class and also you will get access to it at a higher level. Any race can be a Death Knight in our current thinking as well since the path to corruption can be founded with good intentions much like what happened to Arthas.[How many abilities will DKs start with?] Undetermined as of yet. We're still fleshing a lot of things out. This is another reason we caution people about the perception that the expansion is coming out 'too soon'. We have only shown people the tip of the iceberg and have a lot more that we are still working out and planning for. Once we have more details, we'll be sharing them so people can discuss it more and plan for the future.So there's a lot of "not sure yet" in that post, but there's also some good information, notably that they currently think DKs will start at level 55. That's a bit lower than I would have expected. 58 or 60 would make more sense, in my opinion, in order to be able to start out in Outland (but then again, does that make sense lore-wise?). So how excited are you about Death Knights? Are they your main reason to buy Wrath? The change that will kill WoW?[thanks, Natulcien]
The CMs ain't so bad after all
Eona from Durotan saw a picture of Drysc (perhaps via that very helpful faces of BlizzCon guide yesterday), and determined something that might surprise you: the CMs are people after all. Who knew?But seriously, I've always kind of felt for the CMs-- they're given the responsibility of transmitting messages to the community without actually being given all the information. There might be all kinds of good reasons that your class buff didn't show up in the patch, and yet while they may even know some of them, the CMs can't just say it was because the devs wanted to wait until the Northrend expansion, or because they clashed with something you'll find when the actual patch is released in a few days, or because this really amazing item that hasn't dropped yet makes it irrelevant anyway. At times, Drysc, Neth, Eyonix, and all the rest can seem like the Iraqi Information Minister, but more often than not, I'd guess they're just not allowed to tell us the whole story.So if you do see the CMs at Blizzcon, suppress that urge to run up and ask them why Shaman clearcasting got nerfed. Instead, give them a hug show them your support in a completely nonphysical and nonthreatening way. Because while the CMs may play as NPCs, apparently they really are people too.
Guardian pets need a mind of their own
This forums thread points out something interesting about player "guardians." Not pets-- guardians like Shadowfiend (which a priest I know called his shadowfriend), the druids' treants, and my shaman's totem elementals. After players wonder why shadowfiends keep breaking shackles, Neth says something that made me do a double-take: shadowfiends, as guardians, have an actual AI that is supposed to go after non crowd-controlled targets first.That's news to me. I haven't spent a ton of time around shadowfiends, but in my experience, shaman and mage elementals and other "uncontrollable" pets (that's why they're called guardians) tend to go after anything that happens to be close to them. That's why they don't get popped when there's sheep or shackles around-- my guild could have used that fire elemental DPS on Moroes, but because it was so important to keep those shackles up, I've been saving the elemental for later. If there really is an AI (and if it works-- even Neth agrees that may not be the case at this point, though she says the shadowfiends on the PTR are supposed to be doing things right), then maybe we can start trusting summoned guardians not to touch CC'd targets until it's OK to do so.Of course, there's other ways around it-- normally, I just don't pop my pets out until I'm sure there's no more CC left to break, but my pets are leashed to my totem, so with careful positioning, I can still avoid CC. And I believe both mage and druid guardians are targeted-- they open fire on whatever you've got targeted at the time, right? But I'd love a little AI, or at least a little control, in something like my Searing Totem. If there's a CC'd target out there, it's not worth the trouble to drop it even for the extra DPS.
