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The Queue: Sheesh
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today. Why yes, I actually do know that Travel Form isn't castable indoors, not only because I was overtired and just made a mistake when I wrote yesterday's Queue, but also because 28 of you posted the exact same comment telling me that Travel Form isn't castable indoors. I even corrected the post, and people still posted the same "Travel Form isn't castable indoors" comment like the article had never changed. What the heck, people? My own fault, though. I'm never writing The Queue at 4 a.m. again. Well, except this time. Sapphyre asked: I've been wearing my heirloom shoulders on my alt priest for her entire life. It says in the tooltip "requires 1-80" yet I dinged 81 and it didn't force them off. Am i still receiving the 10% exp bonus by having them equipped or are they not working anymore and should be replaced with better stat gear? , Heirlooms are still wearable past level 80, but their stats will no longer scale and you will not receive the experience bonus from them either.
The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Protection Warrior 101
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Care and Feeding of Warriors, the column dedicated to arms, fury and protection warriors. Despite repeated blows to the head from dragons, demons, Old Gods and whatever that thing over there was, Matthew Rossi will be your host. Tanking. The role wherein you go and let very bad things do other very bad things to you so that they don't do very bad things to the rest of your party or raid, giving said party or raid time to do very bad things to them. I wrote a protection 101 guide almost exactly a year ago. We're revisiting the subject now for several reasons. Much as when we wrote the DPS warrior 101 guide, things have definitely changed for prot warriors over the past year. The addition of the mastery stat, the removal of defense on gear, the talent revamp and Vengeance have all had a cumulative effect on tanking warriors. So we're going to cover the basics and give as broad an overview as we can.
The Queue: Boats
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today. Boats! They float! In water. What the heck. crooked.wook asked: Are there any good cloth armor options for leveling or endgame casters, aside from dresses -- I mean, "robes?" I mean, there are shirts, tunics, jerkins, whatever -- is there any way for a serious caster to not be forced to don a robe? No, and there probably won't be, because tier 8 mage gear had a tunic and pants instead of a robe, and all mages did was bitch, bitch, bitch. This is why we can't have nice things.
Lady Sinestra, Paragon, and the cutting edge
Yesterday, <Paragon> got the world first kill of Lady Sinestra, the hardmode-only encounter in Bastion of Twilight. As you might have expected for a boss that only two guilds in the world have even reached, the encounter was not as well tested as it might otherwise have been, according to <Paragon> themselves. Today, in response to a forum thread about that, Zarhym chimed in with a response discussing the issue. Zarhym - Did Paragon enjoy their journey? I do think you have to take the tone of that post in the context in which it was written. Because Sinestra is a super-hardcore boss, they were pretty much the first ones to really push her mechanics to the limits. It's easy to see from their post that they were understandably frustrated. Not only were they trying to learn the mechanics and develop strategies, but we were watching closely, hotfixing several different issues as they stumbled across them. This meant they had to adapt to the changes we were making on the spot in addition to figuring out how to kill her -- and she's definitely no pushover. We do wish it would have been a cleaner fight for them, but we really appreciate them pushing the limits of hardcore raiding, and testing us to design new and compelling challenges. :) source Basically, what this means is very interesting for guilds and players who want to push content as hard and fast as possible. It means when you step into these fights that require unlocking and are intended for the best of the best, you're effectively going to have to accept that with great selectivity comes great unknowns.
Shifting Perspectives: Raiding early Blackwing Descent as a balance druid
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Shifting Perspectives for cat , bear , restoration and balance druids. Triple moonkin! All across the sky! It can only mean one thing, that's right kiddies: It's raiding time. Strap on your big boy pants -- things are about to get serious. Seriously. OMG, OMG, OMG it's here! Yay, I actually did something that I said I would do. This is such a drastic change for me that I think I'll write a whole article on how important this momumentous event is, instead of actually writing about boss tactics and annoying things like that. No? Not feeling it? I suppose I can go ahead with the normal plan, although I think the other idea was much better. Raiding thus far has been rather hit-or-miss, in my opinion. Perhaps I'm jaded, but many of the encounters feel a tad ... simplistic, or at least far easier than they should be. Certain encounters, and especially the end encounters of all three raids this tier, are tough and fun, but the in-betweens seem a little weak at times -- but again, that's just me. For example, I spent more time wiping on the first boss of Grim Batol when it showed up as my first heroic ever than I did on Magmaw. Maybe that's just us; I don't know. Whether or not you agree, raiding is about being prepared. We've covered gearing yourself up for raids to death, so let's get on with the second part of those preparations.
The truth about datamined WoW data
Right now I'm playing World of Warcraft as more of a pinch hitter than I am used to, in part because I also do things like make the calls for our raids and help plan out raid times. In essence, I find myself a guild officer in a guild just getting off the ground, so I don't have the luxury of gearing for only one role. I have to be ready to tank or DPS based on what's needed. This isn't a problem, exactly. But it means I find myself having to really pay attention to what either role demands at a moment's notice, and so the patch 4.0.6 changes are constantly on my mind. As such, I found this forum thread interesting not for what it contains but in what it reveals about how people use datamined information. The original post is based on information that is datamined, and as such, is not always fully in line with what is intended. In this particular case, as Zarhym points out, the Heroic Strike changes aren't new but are the same HS changes we've seen in every version of 4.0.6 that have been discussed to date. Datamining can be an awesome tool, to be sure. I've salivated over weapon models and reacted with consternation to class changes over and over again in the past, just like everyone else. I still remember sitting at my computer trying to will Ulduar into existence; got a heck of a nosebleed. But please, when dealing with datamined information, you have to keep in mind that it often (purely due to the limitations of the process) comes up short or deals with information that may have no bearing on what ends up in the live game. So when you see a tooltip change or hear about an ability going up or down in power based on it, it's best to wait and see a confirmation of the change from Blizzard before you panic. Datamined changes can be a good heads up, but they're not to be considered the same as officially released information. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm has destroyed Azeroth as we know it; nothing is the same! In WoW Insider's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion, from leveling up a new goblin or worgen to breaking news and strategies on endgame play.
This World of Warcraft bathroom is strictly for the Horde
What kind of feelings do you want to inspire in people who are lucky enough to spend time in your commode? A sense of wonder? Or maybe you just want some badass World of Warcraft stuff hanging in there, proudly declaring your Horde affiliation. If you're in the latter camp, we may have found your next potential BFFs. Pictured above is the bathroom of couple Paul and Gloria, who did all of the work themselves, documented from beginning to end in this Photobucket gallery. They've got dragon heads for the light fixtures, a full potion cabinet and, of course, an assortment of themed weaponry.
Cataclysm hotfixes for Jan. 18
What with all the buzz about the PTR and the upcoming patch, it's been a while since we've seen some good old-fashioned hotfixes. Fear not, for blue poster Zarhym has posted with some new goodies for us all. Today's list of hotfixes seems to run the gamut from class tweaks to quests, but there are a few notable changes for raids and dungeons: In Blackwing Descent, Atramedes will no longer despawn when his tail passes through the area trigger in the entrance to his room. He will no longer despawn randomly during the fight. Pulling him out of his room will now cause him to reset. Also from Blackwing Descent, the damage of Chimaeron's Caustic Slime has been reduced for both raid sizes and dungeon difficulties. Over in Tol Barad, "The Leftovers," "Swamp Bait" and "A Huge Problim" can now be shared between members of the Alliance. In addition, these quests now award the correct amount of gold and faction for the Horde and Alliance as well. Follow us after the break for the full list of hotfixes.
Blood Pact: Warlocks in Blackwing Descent, part 1
Every week (when the regular warlock writer hasn't been eaten by a prince of hell or something, that is), WoW Insider brings you Blood Pact for affliction, demonology and destruction warlocks. For those who disdain the watered-down arts that other cling to like a safety blanket, for those willing to test their wills against the nether and claim the power that is their right, Blood Pact welcomes you and invites you to take a seat. There will be no silly wand-waving or worthless incantations in my class. The curse of the warlock writers on WoW Insider strikes once more. Your normal master of darkness, Adam, is still lost in the Nether, presumably off hunting some new, rare, malformed demon-spawn. The last fill-in, the dark conjurer Zach, has also become lost to the void. I assure you that both situations are merely a setback. For the moment, that leaves you with me -- a minor power in the demonic struggle, but hopefully with enough tricks hiding up my proverbial sleeves to share a trick or two. Warlocking (or is it warlockery?) is rough stuff. People expect a lot of you! You have to kill things, summon people, provide glowing hell-health fragments, command a vast array of demonic forces. Then there are the fight mechanics to worry about as well. You've gotten the first part of all that down, but each new raid brings new encounters with new mechanics to learn. It's a daunting task, but that's what I'm here to help with. Well, hopefully. It could also be that I'll just wind up getting you killed a horrible, gruesome, if not glorious, death. Either way, I'd say your prospects look good!
The Queue: That's "Famous Titles"
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today. Don't ask me why I was looking for pictures of Alex Trebek, but it was a fruitful search. Look at this picture of him and Zsa Zsa Gabor! What a weird combination. Smart dudes get all the ladies. Haha, well, no, that's not true at all. But dudes with rockin' 'staches definitely do. Crispn asked: Question, I remember reading about a feature that lets you view a boss abilities, loot, etc. Is this in game? If so, how do you use it, and if not, is it coming? That's the Enhanced Dungeon Map, and it's coming in patch 4.1, according to the devs at BlizzCon.
The Queue: All aboard the knuckle train to Fist Planet
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today. I really hope the rest of you guys caught the Adventure Time marathon on Cartoon Network yesterday, too. There is no better time than Adventure Time. Darasen asked: Do items like Mithril Spurs and Carrot on a Stick make a worgen's running wild ability move faster (where level-appropriate, of course)? If so, am I the only one that finds the idea of kicking yourself to go faster or dangling a carrot in front of yourself humorous? I'm not sure mount speed enchantments or items even exist anymore, especially the Carrot; but if they do, yes, they would affect Running Wild. Crusader Aura does.
The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Arms and the 4.0.6 patch notes
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Care and Feeding of Warriors, the column dedicated to arms, fury and protection warriors. Despite repeated blows to the head from dragons, demons, Old Gods and whatever that thing over there was, Matthew Rossi will be your host. Last week, we saw patch notes for the PTR and patch 4.0.6. Since then, we've seen updates to these notes. These updates mean that some of the things we talked about no longer apply. And then they went and updated them again. It would be fair to say I kind of groaned when I saw Blizzard do this, knowing I'd most likely have to basically spend another week talking about the notes. I was especially annoyed because I finally have my tank set to the point where I can tank in a raid or a heroic without feeling painfully undergeared, and I've gotten my DPS up to where I think it should be at the current gear level and talent spec design. In general, I think warriors are almost where they should be right now. We may be slightly weaker than I'd like as tanks, and arms is frankly pretty bad as a DPS spec right now. It's still good for PvP, although that's mostly due to its ability to chain stuns, which it will be losing somewhat in 4.0.6. With Slam still not scaling at all with haste, arms is going to need flat-out DPS increases to go along with the nerfs it's taking. Fury will probably be all right -- not the absolute top DPS, even among hybrids, but it will deliver in fights where melee is unduly punished for being melee. So let's go take a look at the cards we're going to be dealt in patch 4.0.6 as of the most recent update. If I had to sum up the entirety of the remainder of this post, it would be, "Okay, but why not buff arms for PvE?"
Arcane Brilliance: News and notes for mages from PTR patch 4.0.6
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Arcane Brilliance for arcane, fire and frost mages. This week, a magical journey awaits ... a fantastic voyage through a mystical realm. I speak, of course, of the Public Test Realm, and the wondrous patch notes that dwell therein. Now before we begin, I should make it clear that mages aren't getting anything even remotely earth-shattering in patch 4.0.6. It's not like Blizzard is letting us autofire while moving or anything. But a patch is still a patch. Things are going to change, and though mages have been left largely un-fiddled-around-with (at least in comparison to many other classes), we do have some incoming alterations to be aware of. So with our expectations in an appropriately subdued state, let's peek beyond the jump for an annotated look at what be happening, yo.
Patch 4.0.6 PTR: New restoration shaman spell animations
With all the changes up on the latest build of the PTR, something that wasn't documented is happening, and it is pretty awesome. Restoration shaman spells are now getting a different animation. Until now, our casting animation was very similar to that of druids. Green energy would glow around our hands and small leaves would form within that power. While it was nature-related, it wasn't very shaman-esque. A healing shaman's element has always been water, and now our spells are accompanied by that very element. Gone are the leaves and green; instead, our hands our now encapsulated in glowing blue orbs of water as we bargain with the element to heal our allies wounds. When Greater Healing Wave lands on a target, it has a water splash animation very similar to Riptide, and for now, Healing Surge and Healing Wave have had their leaves replaced with sprite-like things that fly up in a circle around the target. I wouldn't be surprised, though, if Healing Surge and Healing Wave get similar animations on target to Greater Healing Wave. I don't think anyone quite expected an update like this, but it certainly a welcome one. It gives us just a little bit more of a unique flair and really fits our style of healing. It also shows that even now, Blizzard is looking at all of those little things that make the game so awesome, like cool casting animations. What do you think? World of Warcraft: Cataclysm has destroyed Azeroth as we know it; nothing is the same! In WoW Insider's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion, from leveling up a new goblin or worgen to breaking news and strategies on endgame play.
The Queue: Nothing
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today. You people. I link you one of the year's best screenplays, and you spend four pages of comments talking about how Facebook is evil. All I did was link you a cool thing! So today I'm not even doing that. Today you get ... Nothing. Aerowannabe asked: Does anyone remember the devs talking about updating the professions at low level in order to make them more viable? I'm not expecting crafting gear to be better than dungeon stuff or anything, but it would be nice if there at least some things they could craft that help leveling. I'm not really sure what you mean -- craftable stuff at low level is still pretty good, from the blacksmithing armor with +hit on it to jewelcrafting pieces that have no real competition for several early level brackets.
Shifting Perspectives: PTR 4.0.6, balance and you
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Shifting Perspectives for cat , bear , restoration and balance druids.This week, I'm going picture hunting. If you happened to send any in last week, chances are I didn't get them. Our emails over here recently changed, and I can now be reached at tyler@wowinsider.com. So send your pics! Okay, okay, so I know that I had originally promised to start doing the raiding guide this week, and I was so totally going to do that, but the information that's currently up on the latest PTR is just too juicy to pass up. Like the mythical GC pony, the raid guide will come next week, I promise. The PTR doesn't hold a lot of information for balance druids overall, but what it does hold is amazingly amazing. (Props to those who know where that one comes from.) There are a few nerfs, and they come in areas where we really needed buffs instead, but there are quite a number of buffs out there as well that can certainly whet the palate. There are also some important profession and general changes that will help everyone, including balance druids. I'm normally not a fan of huge balancing patches such as these that come out so soon after an expansion is released -- rage, what good was beta, and all that -- but at least we are finally getting these changes now. And what changes are those? Oh, why, I'm so glad that you asked.
Lord of His Pack live at Blizzard's community site
Do you like worgen? Sure, we all do! Well, I do, anyway. And if you liked the Gilneas starting zone and wanted to get to know more about the origins of the place and its independent-minded king, Genn Greymane, Blizzard has you covered. James Waugh's Lord of His Pack is all about the king himself, his relationships with allies and adversaries like Darius Crowley, and how they made the trip across the ocean to Darnassus following their flight from their homeland. The past and the present are both explored, and a fuller picture of the Gilneas that was and the Greymane that is come to light. Go check it out now.
The Queue: Know what's better than a million dollars?
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Mike Sacco will be your host today. That's right: the entire screenplay for The Social Network for free. A perfect companion to the DVD or Blu-ray that I hope you're planning on buying/watching. BlindWorg asked: So, when the next tier of raiding is launched, how it affects what gear we can by with justice/valor points? Will it be like Wrath that we can buy the the items that cost valor points now with justice points when it happens or how does it happen? In 4.1: JP items from 4.0 will still cost JP. VP items from 4.0 will cost JP instead. Items new to 4.1 will cost VP.
Should level-capped players be put into content they outgear?
I do not like The Stonecore. On a recent guild-sponsored alt run, four not-ready-for-heroics players and my level 85 shammy queued up for a random Cataclysm dungeon. We wound up with The Stonecore. We immediately decided that we didn't want to run The Stonecore, but we also didn't want to just wait the 15 minutes to requeue. So, we cleared our way to the first boss and defeated it, successfully eating up the 15 minutes. Not wanting to actually finish an instance that didn't offer us any level-appropriate gear, we re-entered the random dungeon finder. The result: The Stonecore. Again. We gave up, ran the instance for the lousy 70 justice point payoff, and died a little inside. A huge part of my distaste for The Stonecore is related to how often it comes up in the random dungeon finder on both heroic and normal versions. It's a wipe-filled nightmare on heroic, especially with a group that doesn't know what it's doing. (And let's be honest, text-based communication on the fly can only get you so far.) I have no complaint about getting regular Stonecore at levels 82 and 83. The problem is that I get it all the damn time when I'm level 85, and Blizzard gives me almost no incentive to finish it.
Guild experience changes in patch 4.0.6
The latest round of patch notes from the PTR have some interesting new information in the form of guild improvements. While running 5-mans with guild groups has always given guild experience, these changes seem to be focused on improving the rewards from doing so. Zarhym We have redefined the definition of a Guild Group for 5-player dungeons. If 3 out of 5 players in a group are members of the same guild, they will now be able to complete guild achievements and earn guild experience at 50% of the normal rate. If 4 out of 5 players in a group are members of the same guild, they will now be able to complete guild achievements and earn guild experience at 100% of the normal rate. If 5 out of 5 players in a group are members of the same guild, they will now be able to complete guild achievements and earn guild experience at 125% of the normal rate. Also note that Heroic dungeons offer a 1.5x multiplier on all guild experience earned. source Right now, in order to count as a guild group, four out of the five party members of that team must be from your guild. With these changes, a guild will be able to take three members along and still qualify for guild experience, albeit at a slower rate. What does this mean? Mainly that smaller guilds have more of a chance to reach that experience cap that larger guilds have been hitting without fail every day. The experience gain is only 50% of the normal rate, but at least doing dungeons with your guild members in smaller numbers will actually mean something. On the other end of the spectrum, if all five players in a dungeon run are from the same guild, that group now earns a staggering 125% guild experience. Why the change? It seems as though Blizzard is trying to encourage people to group with their guild members, by offering more incentives for doing so. This is all well and good, but if more guilds are running dungeon groups, this means less people using the dungeon finder and longer queue times for those who have to wait. We'll have to wait and see what the results from these changes look like once the patch hits live. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm has destroyed Azeroth as we know it; nothing is the same! In WoW Insider's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion, from leveling up a new goblin or worgen to breaking news and strategies on endgame play.
