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World first of "Alone in the Darkness" a possible exploit
We reported last week that a guild named Exodus on the US realm of Ysondre had come out of nowhere to topple the world first of the Heroic: Alone in the Darkness achievement, which requires that you bring down the biggest bad currently in the game, Yogg-Saron, with no help from any of the Keepers in Ulduar. But not so fast, says Serennia over at WoWRiot -- over on their forums Ensidia is claiming that Exodus used an exploit, and that their kill doesn't count at all. Apparently, having Thorim help on the fight keeps the "Immortal Guardians" in the last phase of the fight from being a problem, and without Thorim, you have to not only do the fight without his extra 10% damage bonus (each Keeper ups your DPS that much), but you have to deal with the Guardians messing up your melee classes, and oh yeah: they both heal and get healed by Yogg. Not that it's impossible to do it, but it's definitely not easy, and Ensidia claims that Exodus found a known exploit that allows you to evade the Guardians out completely, thus turning the last phase into a straight tank-and-spank, obviously much easier.After that, it gets into some guild back and forth (Ensidia apparently did something that might have been an exploit on Hodir, and when people call them out on that, they say that the exploits were different -- Ensidia's tactic was just an interesting use of game mechanics, while the exploit Exodus is suspected of using is more of a cheat), but the fact remains that Exodus is clearly not a guild that anyone expected to clear what might be the toughest raiding achievement in the game before anyone else, and yet that's exactly what they did. Ensidia says they won't be killing Yogg for the achievement using the exploit, and that they've reported the Exodus kill to the devs, so we'll have to see if the devs decide that Exodus did cheat, or if they let Exodus keep their achievements and mounts. We're not sure how much it all matters, with world first kills not being all that important any more (and that's exactly what the devs might say as well), but Ensidia is claiming that an exploit took place -- we'll have to see if that turns out to be true.Thanks, Nimrod!
Ming tackles Patch 3.2's resilience change
Despite his sometimes-crass way of getting his point across, Ming is one of the best PvP bloggers around these days. When the Patch 3.2 patch notes revealed the upcoming change to resilience, I was hoping to hear his take on it. He delivered! If you haven't seen the patch notes, Resilience in Patch 3.2 will lower incoming damage across the board in addition to its protection against critical strikes. By Ming's estimates, after all other factors have been taken into consideration, the change will bring a net difference of an added 10% damage reduction in the upcoming Season 7.That number probably doesn't seem like a lot to people who don't set foot into the arena at all, but for people who arena seriously and competitively, it will be a game changer. The developers' stated goal is to slow down the pace of the arena, and this change will do exactly that. An extra 10% buffer on survivability has the potential to absolutely be the difference between a one minute game and a five minute game. It has the potential to be the difference between a gib and a last second defensive save. As has been stated, it's possible to die in the span of one GCD, and that's not fun. If this change can extend one GCD to two or three GCDs to allow for reaction time, the arena just might end up more balanced than it has ever previously been, unless you pretend Mace Stun didn't exist in the middle seasons of The Burning Crusade.You really shouldn't take my word for it, though. I PvP, but I'd never claim to be a highly rated anything. There's a reason I was waiting for Ming's take on it. Go read what he has to say, and be bolstered by it. The arena might actually be truly fun again.
The Daily Quest: A podcast, eh?
We here at WoW Insider are on a Daily Quest to bring you interesting, informative and entertaining WoW-related links from around the blogosphere. Serennia discusses the 2v2 arena bracket. Would we be better off if they replaced it with a 4v4 bracket? Too Many Annas answers reader mail regarding a fairly widespread (in my experience) phenomenon: RPers griefing RPers that raid simply because they raid. Are you a Hunter? Are you a Hunter that hates Naxxramas as much as I do? The Hunter's Rhok shows you how to gear up for Ulduar without it! Episode #115 of All Things Azeroth has been released. This week it features an interview with Cadistra of WoW, Eh? along with a whole load of other topics. Those of you using our WoW.com profile system... we want your blogs! Have you written something that you think is worth being featured on The Daily Quest? Have you discovered another good blog here on WoW.com? Send them in using the link below! No, this doesn't mean we're going to stop linking to other sites, so don't worry! We have enough love to go around. Click here to submit a link to TDQ
Replenishment hotfixed, changed for arena play
The developers are continuing their hotfix spree, this time targeting Replenishment in the arena. While in an arena, any class that procs Replenishment will only proc it for themselves. It does not apply to the entire party while in an arena. This is something that a lot of people have expected would happen eventually, and it's good to see that they didn't wait for another major content patch for something like this. It had to be done, so they did it. I'd love to see that trend continue.The arena community has been asking for this for awhile, and if you want to know their reasoning, Serennia discussed it just the other day. I strongly suggest giving it a read. Replenishment is a game changer in the arena, and in a format with teams so small, you can't really expect every team to find a Replenishment to slot like you can in 10 and 25 man raids. Replenishment essentially being a requirement in the 3v3 format would be a disaster, and it's been made pretty clear that teams with a Replenishment have a severe advantage over those that don't. A post-Patch 3.1 world seems to be one where broken things get fixed quickly, rather than just sit there broken for months until the next content patch. As long as that holds up for more than these few weeks immediately after the patch, I'm a fan of it.
Class balance in a post-WotLK World of Warcraft
Class balance is always a touchy subject, depending on the class a person plays. But WoWRIOT has put together an impressive look a class balance in a post-WotLK World of Warcraft. After looking through much of the post, we're pretty impressed with its accuracy and overall take on current class balance, especially as it pertains to arena and PvP.Normally, those who actually play the game are much more interested in these kinds of balance overviews. However, the article contains an extensive look at Death Knights and everything about where their place in the game is right now. So for anybody who's been curious as to what's going on with the first new class in World of Warcraft, we'd say the article is definitely worth a look. For everyone who does play the game, it's probably a good idea to at least check out your class (or classes) if only to see why you should or shouldn't be upset with Blizzard. One of Azeroth's millions of citizens? Check out our ongoing coverage of the World of Warcraft, and be sure to touch base with our sister site WoW Insider for all your Lich King needs!
