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Breakfast Topic: What do you hope to see in Shadowmoon Valley?
Blizzard's alpha testing of Warlords of Draenor alliance zone Shadowmoon Valley came to an abrupt halt on Friday when the alpha realms were brought offline to address an issue. With only a brief glimpse of Shadowmoon and a short zone preview to whet our appetites, today let's talk about what we want to see happening in the alliance zone. I'm eager to finally get some hands-on time with alliance garrisons -- though we've seen a preview, I'm eager to see how they play out in-game -- and finally meet up with the Draenei of not-yet-Outland. These early glimpses of new content are always exciting and filled with possibility -- so tell us, readers, what do you most want to see in Shadowmoon Valley?
EU battlegroups experiencing language problems after mergers
Tipster Nimm writes in to let us know that several EU battlegroups have been having serious issues after mergers that occurred post-patch 3.02. The mergers have seen a number of battlegroups acquiring servers with other language-dominant populations, which has resulted in a number of French, German, Portuguese, Spanish, and Russian-dominant servers (among others) all in the same battlegroups. While this is probably necessary to a certain degree to guarantee equal Alliance/Horde populations for quick queue times, it's become something of a communication nightmare in battleground matches, particularly those with lots of players using Cyrillic characters. As the player Thoughtless from the Karazhan realm asks, "Can you imagine how hard it is to organise any sort of teamplay in AB with player ???????? from <????????> guild cha(t)ting "?????? ??? ??????? ??????? ?????" in BG chat?" Nimm also notes that differentiating between ??????? enemy players is a nightmare.We knew that Blizzard was closing four EU realms (Stonemaul, Molten Core, Shadowmoon, and Warsong) and transferring remaining players to other realms in response to Russian player migration to Russian realms opened late summer 2008, and the problem's partially the result of that (which has already resulted in the inevitable "In Soviet Russia, battlegroups merge you" joke). A few amused people are rising to the occasion by translating such phrases as inc 5 schmiede (inc 5 blacksmith in German) or proposing a revival of Esperanto, but the Russian language pack would be the only possible solution for the ???? problem. There's been mention made that this is only a temporary fix on Blizzard's part to faction imbalances on battlegroups, but if you're on an EU realm that's seen a recent battlegroup merge, just be aware that Babelfish might be a useful tool in the near future.
Free EU character transfer destinations revealed
Toward the end of August, European CM Vaneras had announced the closure of a few English-speaking EU servers due to the great success of their Russian localization, with a note that destination realms for free character transfers would be announced later on. Later on is, apparently, last night. Thundgot has posted the destination realms, and each set includes one that is part of the same battlegroup as the realm of origin. From Molten Core you can transfer to Burning Steppes*, Deathwing, Dentarg From Shadowmoon you can transfer to Boulderfist, Spinebreaker*, Xavius From Stonemaul you can transfer to Ahn'Qiraj, Burning Blade, Jaedenar* From Warsong you can transfer to Auchindoun, Bladefist*, Haomarush If you call one of the four closing realms home, I strongly recommend you go research your options and choose your destination while you still can. If you haven't moved yourself somewhere by the time their nebulous deadline (post-patch 3.0.2) hits, you'll have your destination chosen for you when the realms are ultimately brought down. Make sure you end up somewhere you'll like.
Vaneras announces closure of four European servers
European CM Vaneras made an interesting announcement just the other day: Four EU realms will be closing entirely with Patch 3.0. The EU realms Molten Core, Shadowmoon, Stonemaul, and Warsong will be closing up shop, and free character transfers will be offered to other, currently unannounced EU realms. The destination options will be announced within the next week.Don't worry, though. These realm closures have nothing to do with any dips in WoW's popularity. It's actually due to the launch of WoW's Russian localization. A vast majority of the players on those particular realms were Russian players, and they migrated to the new Russian servers when they opened up, leaving most everyone else high and dry. The equipment these four servers run off of will likely just be used elsewhere, since Vaneras stated they'll be prepped for Wrath of the Lich King's launch after being taken down. Most likely they'll need to launch a few more realms when Wrath rolls around, but it was just far easier to fold these four into larger communities at this point.[ Thanks, Swarfy! ]
This is the arena that never ends
It just goes on and on my friend. Jbangalanga, Weaslelawd, Spiked and Deunan started playing it, not knowing what it was, and they continued playing it for ten hours and twenty minutes just because ... Yes, you heard right: there was a 2v2 arena match that lasted for over ten hours. According to Weaslelawd, the DPSers of the teams -- the warrior and the warlock -- got killed in the first few minutes. This left Weaslelawd, an orc resto shaman, and Spiked, a night elf resto druid, to battle it out. Neither healer could out-DPS the other's heals, and both were too stubborn to give up. The druid was unable to rez his own partner due to cooldown restrictions, but stayed alert enough to interrupt any attempts from the shaman to rez the warrior. Jbangalanga created a character on Spiked's server to try to negotiate a settlement, but talks fell through as neither Weaslelawd or Spiked was willing to throw the match or /roll for it. Weaslelawd actually talked to a GM halfway through, but unfortunately chose to host the picture on imageshack, where they can't be seen due to excessive bandwidth usage. Eventually, it hit 5 AM in Spiked's area and he began to zone out. Also, he said, eight pieces of his gear were broken. He emoted to Weaslelawd that he was ready and let the shaman kill him. Weaslelawd walked away from his ten-hour match with ... 15 added to his arena rating. Wow. Spectators on both Burning Legion and Shadowmoon have suggested that both teams deserve a couple thousand arena points and a Manly Man award for a ten-hour fight. I would probably have given up around the twenty minute mark. What would you have done in the same situation -- fight it out or give up?
Around Azeroth: A wrong turn somewhere...
In this single screenshot we see a sad tale unfolding as Pruflas of Blood Reign on Blackwater Raiders takes a wrong turn on his flying mount. In all honesty, this Kraator fellow -- a rare spawn in Shadowmoon Valley -- looks extremely unfriendly. It's a sad wrong turn indeed to send you flying directly into his face... Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! Or perhaps you'd just like to see more of your pics from Around Azeroth. %Gallery-1816%
Server Downtime Thursday
Blizzard is rolling out new hardware for several US realms this Thursday, and the process of transferring the realms means - you guessed it, extensive downtime. The migration will begin on Thursday at 12:01 AM PST and may last as long as 24 hours. Those of you on effected realms will receive an extra day's credit to your account, which is, I suppose, better than nothing. Following the migration, Blizzard plans to open character transfers from existing realms to new realms (yet to be opened) to further help with performance and overcrowding issues. Realms transferring to new hardware are Archimonde, Dalaran, Khadgar, and Mal'Ganis. Other affected realms include Aggramar, Andorhal, Anetheron, Burning Blade, Burning Legion, Dentarg, Duskwood, Earthen Ring, Eonar, Eredar, Executus, Gilneas, Gorefiend, Haomarush, Kargath, Laughing Skull, Lightning's Blade, Llane, Malygos, Scilla, Shadow Moon, Steamwheedle Cartel, Thunderhorn, Thunderlord, Turalyon, Ysera, Ysondre, and Zuluhed. While these realms are not receiving a hardware upgrade, Tseric explains that current equipment configuration requires this.Update: The schedule has been pushed back to Thursday.
