lylirra
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Diablo 3 bug sees trillions in gold duping, auction houses shutdown
Sure, we all like gold. But even the most gold hungry among us can see the problem with a bug that allowed players to accumulate trillions of in-game currency, which is exactly what happened with Diablo III's patch 1.0.8. As a result, the game's Auction House was taken down, and Blizzard is still debating what actions to take to correct the issue, but Lylirra posts on the official forums that roll backs won't be necessary. Lylirra - Auction Houses Temporarily Offline -- Update 12:00 a.m. PDT: At this time (and after careful consideration), we've decided to not move forward with rolling back the servers. We feel that this is the best course of action given the nature of the dupe, how relatively few players used it, and the fact that its effects were fairly limited within the region. We've been able to successfully identify players who duplicated gold by using this specific bug, and are focusing on these accounts to make corrections. While this is a time-consuming and very detailed process, we believe it's the most appropriate choice given the circumstances. We know that some of you may disagree, but we feel that performing a full roll back would impact the community in an even greater way, as it would require significant downtime as well as revert the progress legitimate players have made since patch 1.0.8 was released this morning. source I know it would be a pretty big blow to lose character levels or gear acquired legitimately, so if they can go after the actual accounts that used the exploit and remove just their duplicated gold, that seems like the best option to me.
Blizzard bans thousands of bots from Diablo III
Diablo III is a few thousand players lighter today, as Blizzard announced that it had culled the unfaithful (read: botters) from its fold. Community Manager Lylirra issued the grim proclamation: "We've recently issued account bans to several thousand Diablo III players who were found to be using botting programs while playing. In addition to undermining the spirit of fair play, botting, hacking, and other forms of cheating can also cause technical problems with the game as well as contribute to performance issues with the Battle.net service." Lylirra also said that the Diablo III team is working to add a feature that will allow players to directly report naughty bots through the game itself.
Blizzard fixing GAME Australia's mess, giving Diablo 3 to those who preordered
GAME Australia (a large video game retailer) is entering voluntary administration, which is the same as going into bankruptcy in the United States. Included in this fact is that GAME will not be giving Diablo III to all those who preordered it. To add salt to the wound, GAME will also not be offering refunds for Diablo III preorders -- or rather, it will, but only after practically every other person under the sun is paid back, and only then if people specifically file as an unsecured creditor, of sorts. Essentially, if you live in Australia and you bought Diablo III from GAME, you're screwed. But wait -- Blizzard to the rescue. In what has to be one of the classiest moves I've seen from a gaming company, Blizzard is offering a solution for those who have gotten the short end of the stick. Those who preordered from GAME can buy the Diablo III digital edition tonight, submit their GAME Australia receipt to Blizzard, and get refunded from Blizzard whatever money they paid for their preorder. It's rare that anyone gets to report news of a company going out of its way to do something like this, let alone a multinational as huge as Blizzard. Huge kudos to Blizzard. Check out the full post announcing this, along with key dates, after the break.
Blues explain nature of archaeology cooldowns
Several players and Community Manager Lylirra shared some discussion today on the official World of Warcraft forums about the cooldowns of novelty items crafted through the archaeology profession. In the thread, the original poster suggested that the cooldowns of certain novelty items were too long in comparison to others and that Blizzard should consider fixing the discrepancies. The poster used Pendant of the Scarab Storm and Bones of Transformation as an example, noting that both items have a vanity effect that lasts 20 seconds but a cooldown difference of 90 minutes. Lylirra responded, explaining that the cooldowns, though seemingly random, were chosen with specific issues in mind. She explains that with the Pendant of the Scarab Storm specifically, developers were concerned that the item's effect might strain certain players' computers. Archaeology Items' Cooldowns The current cooldown was chosen deliberately, but I can see why you might think otherwise (100 minutes is kind of strange for a cooldown time). Anyway, summoning a harem of scarabs can be pretty taxing on some systems, so there were some initial concerns about putting the pendant on a short cooldown. Based on the feedback we've received, though, we're looking into reducing it. We agree that the effect is pretty cool and would be nice to use it more frequently. source Personally, a little lore logic behind the items might be nice as well. How is it that my character can summon a god every 3 minutes, but it takes 10 minutes to round up some sassy dwarven ladies?
Battlegroup changes in anticipation of complete merger
Recently, players from the Emberstorm and Whirlwind groups have been noticing that they're being grouped in the dungeon finder with each other. This isn't a bug; the matchmaking system has been changed to allow those two battlegroups to be matched into dungeons and BGs with each other as part of the overall goal to eventually merge all battlegroups across a geographical area (think Europe or North America) and allow matchmaking across all of them. CM Lylirra announced these changes and addressed some bugs to the process that are making it impossible to queue for BGs, which will hopefully be straightened out. Still, bugs aside, the first step of eventually allowing an entire region to be selected from for PvP and PvE seems really exciting to me and very positive overall. Finally, I'll get to farm all the disparate old friends I have on like 20 servers! A frabjous day, all told. World of Warcraft: Cataclysm will destroy Azeroth as we know it; nothing will be the same! In WoW Insider's Guide to Cataclysm, you can find out everything you need to know about WoW's third expansion (available Dec. 7, 2010), from brand new races to revamped quests and zones. Visit our Cataclysm news category for the most recent posts having to do with the Cataclysm expansion.
Battle.net authenticators limited to one account
Blizzard is changing up the security on their authenticators a bit. This isn't a major change and shouldn't affect that many people. Starting now, if you happen to have multiple Battle.net accounts (not multiple WoW accounts under one Battle.net account), then each account must have its own authenticator. This means if you have separate Battle.net logins for zergrush@somedomain.com and taurenfever@example.com and you want to use an authenticator, you'll need to buy two. If you've just got taurenfever@example.com and all of your games are under that Battle.net login, then you're perfectly fine. This is not retroactive. If you already have two accounts linked to a single authenticator, everything will still work as it does right now until you unlink that authenticator. The full blue post detailing the changes is behind the cut below.
No Cataclysm beta invites have been sent out yet
You and about 11.5 million other people are sitting around their computers tonight wondering where their beta invitation is for Cataclysm. Well, you can go to bed. The initial wave of Cataclysm beta invites have not gone out yet, according to a new blue CM named Lylirra. She does say that it would be wise to check the email your battle.net account is under within the next 24 hours. Take that for what you will; these waves of invites have been known to get pushed back. Lylirra -- Cataclysm beta invites Quote: So is it a good rule of thumb that if I didn't recieve an invite today, then i won't today? Or are they still sending them out? We're still in the process of selecting accounts and ensuring that they're properly flagged for beta access. We've not yet sent out any invitation emails, though. So, you may want to check your registered email address periodically during the next 24 hours to see if you've been invited to the Cataclysm beta, or simply keep an eye on the "Manage My Games" section of your Battle.net Account Management page (https://us.battle.net/account). If you've been selected to participate, you'll definitely be notified in one of those two areas. Good luck! :D source
