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Tigole lists informal patch notes for the next stage of the beta
Tigole has been joking around on the forums with a vengeance today (did you know that Northrend was originally going to be called "Blizzneyland"?), but he did provide us with a quick preview of all the patch changes for the next beta build coming up. Heroics, he says, have been retuned, and Blizzard is especially looking for feedback on endgame raid instances like Icecrown. Dalaran has gotten a little more "polish" (that's the shiny kind, not that there are more people there from Poland), and there will hopefully be a glyph vendor in soon to let players try out new glyphs of all kinds. Finally, he says performance updates have started, and that's a good sign that Blizzard is working on getting towards the final stages of the expansion development -- sounds like most of the early zones and items are as done as they're going to get.He also, of course, says that there are class changes in the patch, with one of the most insightful notes we've seen yet: "You won't like the ones made to your own class but you'll think the changes made to the 9 other classes are all overpowered." It's true. If only all of the other patch notes could be so incredibly clear to players.
Key items and tabards out of the bags soon, says Tigole
Tigole has gotten over his little weekend rampage on the forums and gotten back to business: he's got two tidbits about a popular subject among most players: making more bag space available.First up is tabards -- he says that there are no plans to move tabards from the bags to the UI (as with the pet and mount changes), but that players shouldn't worry too much, because Blizzard is making it easier for players to get lost and destroyed tabards back if necessary. Since the Championing mechanic means we won't have to wait till Exalted to get tabards, there'll be a tabard vendor in Dalaran that'll have most of the tabards you need at a relatively cheap price.And "keys" that aren't keys are also mentioned -- by this, we mean things like the Scepter of Celebras or the Mallet of Zul'Farrak; attunement items, in other words. Tigole says there's a plan for these also (another "keychain" tab, maybe?), but that we won't see it in time for the expansion.Good news on both ends for people short on bag space, even if we have to wait a while. Personally my bag space is freeing itself up lately -- it's an "everything must go" sale on the AH for me as I try to convert all my soon-to-be obsolete crafting items into gold.
"Tigole Deep-Breaths more"
Interesting note from the forums, although apparently quite a few threads are being deleted or locked even as I write this; Jeff "Tigole" Kaplan appeared momentarily in this thread written by a player complaining about the 51-point Restoration Shaman talent, Riptide. The original poster notes Blizzard's guiding philosophy of never shipping a game before they're truly done with it, and contrasts that with the fact that some of Riptide's visual and audio effects are unlikely to be finished in time for Wrath (the spell itself is apparently 100% functional, just not the bells and whistles Blizzard usually programs to accompany player spells and abilities). Another player down the thread characterizes this as Blizzard caving to demands made by Activision. Tigole appears a few comments down to ban the first commenter for "trolling," adding that the game is still being worked on. The second of the two commenters mentioned is then handed a ban by Tigole as well. One of the response threads that appears to have survived is here, with a set of reactions ranging from sympathy to Tigole to a recountment of EverQuest history to concern over how the two players were banned.I'm somewhat torn, and had wondered whether the whole thing was a joke; I've not seen Tigole appear on the forums to ban people before (although it's entirely possible he has and I've just missed it). I've seen worse behavior on the forums escape official comment, but it does seem as if the number of complaints (rational or not) has hit fever pitch on the discussion boards. And -- let's be frank -- a lot of it does seem like pretty pointless carping. I've had a chance to see the beta myself now, and I don't think anyone could realistically accuse Blizzard of skipping its usual attention to detail (indeed, the only running complaint I've seen on the beta servers is that they're too popular). Still, these particular bans seem a little out of the ordinary, unless there's something going on I haven't seen.**EDIT: as of 4:12 pm EST, it looks like the above referenced response post has also been deleted, but the original source thread is still intact.**
Collector's Edition and Blizzard Events items will become "Bound to Account"
Jeff Kaplan a.k.a. "Tigole" announced today that the following items will become "Account Bound": Murky Tyrael's Hilt Murloc Costume All Collector's Edition pets This is an interesting change to say the least. Blizzard will set this change in motion on the Beta first, and if everything goes smoothly it'll go live (no word if it will happen in Wrath of the Lich King or patch 3.0.2).Kaplan notes that with this change Collector's Edition pets will no longer disappear when you put them into your pet spell book. The spell will still be added, but you will be able to send the pet item around to your other characters on your account. He does point out that if you've already put your pet into the pet spell book, you won't be able to be refunded the pet on the beta. Of course, that does not apply to the live realms – since the pet spell book isn't implemented in live.
New PvP title and mount
Tigole announced a slight change to PvP Achievements and excited more than a few people -- myself included -- by noting that players who complete the Achievements For The Horde! and For The Alliance! will be rewarded a Black War Bear. Players who manage to reach the respectable 100,000 Honorable Kill plateau will unlock the 'of the Horde' and 'of the Alliance' titles. Currently in Beta, slaying four enemy faction leaders award the title while getting 100k HK gave no rewards.While the Amani War Bear will be unattainable when Patch 3.0 hits, but it seems like there might just be a replacement -- will guilds be organizing these new 'bear runs'? I certainly hope so. I was never a fan of the Amani War Bear, or bears as mounts in general, but a PvP mount that rewards killing all four of the opposing faction's leaders? Oh man. Where do I sign up? I certainly hope that the mount will sport a different, non-troll armor model as well as faction insignias and the requisite reds or blues. These new bear mounts might just be incentive enough to get players to raid enemy cities and, hopefully, get to 100k HK along the way.
Icecrown Citadel confirmed in post-release content patch
As if we didn't really see this coming -- just like the Black Temple with Burning Crusade, Tigole confirmed for sure that the last instance of Wrath of the Lich King will be pushed off past release to a content patch (likely 3.1 or 3.2, if we had to guess), which means we won't face Arthas for a final showdown when the expansion releases. Of course, there'll be plenty to do anyway -- besides all of the other 5man instances, there'll be Lake Wintergrasp to mess around with, and of course Naxx and Zul'Drak will be in and ready to go. But those looking for a Lich King resolution will likely have to wait -- while we'll see plenty of Arthas, we won't actually face him until the Icecrown content patch.Disappointing? Not from our perspective -- just like Black Temple, leaving the last instance out of the expansion will not only let Blizzard make sure it's released only when done, but it'll give us something to look forward to after Wrath. No one really expected to see this content in the Wrath box anyway, and not even Blizzard has left us guessing -- they've been pretty clear that Icecrown would get its own content patch from the beginning. Leaves us more time to enjoy the content that does come with the expansion.
Beta patch possible today with changes to XP, Storm Peaks, and premade characters
According to Tigole, Blizzard will "try to patch" the Wrath of the Lich King beta today. Storm Peaks will open back up and should not crash the sever. No word yet if Naxx will be introduced in this patch. The servers should be up between 4:30 p.m. PDT and 6:30 p.m. PDT.The XP required to level will also be reduced by 10% this beta patch. Things should go faster for all you playing around with leveling.Finally, there will be a new beta realm opening up named Murmur. Tigole mentioned that the premade characters should not have been made available on the existing realms. He tells us that "they are being removed." There is no indication as to whether or not current premade characters will be moved to the new realm or just outright deleted.
Should your GM be able to tax you?
This idea's been floated before, but a few people on the forums have responded pretty enthusiastically to the notion of introducing a "guild income tax." Others...not so much so. Basically, there was a proposal made in the Beta forums that Blizzard give GM's/officers the ability to levy a percentage-based tax on members' earnings. Jeff "Tigole" Kaplan responded, saying that it "was an interesting idea" and they're considering options for improving guild administration, but there was no way they could program a change like this in time for Wrath. Bear in mind that the original tax being suggested would apply to your toon both inside and out of raids (although no one was seriously suggesting that the tax should apply to non-raiding members of the guild).I have to admit that I'm not too keen on the idea of a broad-based "income tax" on players, if only because the game's current mechanics make it all but certain that the main beneficiaries will be people who either can't (due to class/spec) or won't put much gold into the guild coffers. Moreover, the taxation idea acts as an incentive for people not to guild their alts, thus avoiding taxation entirely on toons that are usually the real means of support for a raiding main (someone remind me to go reserve a hunter named Swissbank). As an herbalist/alchemist, I farm a lot for friends and have been known to chuck the guild bank a few hundred gold from time to time. Maybe I'd save time and money under a system that required me to hand over 2-3% of my income, but still. Being taxed removes an element of individual responsibility, and it certainly takes away the nice feeling you have for voluntarily helping others.If nothing else the idea's given rise to a few nice jokes (Cacora of Hellscream: "Do I get money back at the end of the year if I claim multiple alts as dependents?"), but the final word may well belong to Grig from Whisperwind: "So, Blizzard is considering taking one of the most universally loathed concepts from real life and adding it to a game. Why, they'd be silly not to do it."
Realm first level 80 titles removed
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/First_to_level_80_titles_removed_from_WotLK'; The Feats of Strength for realm-firsts have been raising some controversy for a little while now. Briefly, the worry is that it only rewards people who are willing and able to either play 24 hours a day from when Wrath is released to when they reach their goal, or share their account with friends and play in shifts. Either way, it's not really a measure of skill or accomplishment so much as a measure of who's got a lot of uninterrupted time on their hands. There is additional worry that playing for 24+ hours straight is just not healthy, and Blizzard probably doesn't want people rushing through the content either. So it is with some pleasure that I report that the titles for the feats of strength for realm-first level 80 with each class, for first 80 on each realm, and for first to 450 in the various professions are being removed. The title for realm-first Northrend Vanguard (achieve exalted with various factions) is also getting removed. Note that the Feats of Strength themselves are still in – the game still keeps track of who got to 80 first, and will tell you if it's you – but there's no longer a title to show off for other players. This is an interesting compromise; the feat is still noted, but there's much less incentive to do it now. Finally, Tigole notes that the realm-first boss kills will still give titles, which is as it should be in my book. Given raid lockouts, you couldn't raid 24/7 even if you wanted to, so this is more of an indication of skill. One interesting alternative, for those who still want titles like this to be in the game, is presented on Blessing of Kings. Basically, the suggestion is that the titles should be given to those who take the least time /played to get from 70 to 80. This would mean you'd have to optimize your playing in a different way, and it would also mean you could lose the title if someone outdoes you in the future, which I see as a plus (though some here at WoW Insider vigorously disagree with me). Edit: on second thought, I agree that this is probably not a great idea. Hopefully they'll come up with some kind of very long questline for each class or something.
60-70 XP changes coming in 3.0.2
Patch 3.0.2 is going to bring us much of Wrath, without the new content. Specifically, we'll be getting the new spells and talents, which come out to a total class revamp for many classes. We'll also be getting a couple other fixes, like learnable mounts and mini-pets. And Tigole just confirmed today that among these will be a reduction in the amount of experience required to level between 60 and 70. Levels 20–60 were sped up dramatically a little while ago, which I have been very much enjoying on my various alts. But the Outland levels have remained at the same rate as always. This isn't so much of an issue now, when 70 is the endgame, but of course we're getting another ten levels in LK, and trudging through Outland then will feel a lot like dragging yet another toon through Plaguelands now. (I know some of you like Plaguelands, but I just don't understand it.) So I'm glad this is coming a little sooner, so that hopefully I can have at least three 70s poised to go into Northrend instead of the two I have now. What kind of a speed increase are we looking at? Well, the only hard numbers I've seen so far are 30% less XP required per level, and possibly 20% more XP given per mob, with no changes on quests. This is fairly substantial; I would be pleased.
Ambassador title was added per player request
We asked for more titles, and darned if Blizzard didn't give them to us. Just in case you missed it over the weekend, there are tons of new titles in the latest beta build that all revolve around Achievements and Feats of Strength, from titles for the first people to level to 80 (and 450 in professions) to titles for obscure reputations and even holidays and fishing. Blizzard really delivered on the title front -- no matter what you do in game, odds are there is a title for you to aim for.And here's the best part: this is a direct result of reader requests. Zach linked to this the other day, but he forgot to point out that when Tigole posted that the Ambassador title (for earning Exalted with all five core city factions for Alliance or Horde) was coming to the game, it was in direct response to a player asking for it.Kudos to Blizzard not only for fulfilling their promise to have lots and lots of titles for players to choose from, but for doing it in a way that came straight from players themselves. These seem so simple to implement, we're glad Blizzard is being generous with them.
3.0.2 PTR imminent
We haven't seen much PTR action in a little while (although I guess the beta realms are really a PTR for Wrath). That may change soon, though: the European PTR forums were just wiped, and Tigole recently said "3.0 will be on the PTR's soon." Disregarding his apostrophe abuse, and Blizzard's colorful history with the word "soon," this does conspire with the forum wipe to indicate that the PTRs will probably be up with this pre-Wrath patch within, I'd say, a week or so. What does this say about the Wrath release date? Well, I'd say nothing, really. In the same post, Tigole mentions that some patches were on the PTR for over two months (which is good because a lot of the new talents are really half-baked right now). Additionally, 3.0.2 could come any amount of time before LK. 2.0.1, the pre-Burning Crusade patch, came a bit over a month before BC was released. There is one notable advantage to bringing 3.0.2 to the PTR as soon as possible: more testing. While a fair number of people are in the LK beta by now, everyone who wants to (and had an active account the last time the PTR authentication server was updated) can access the PTR. As I mentioned above (and as Tigole agreed in his post) none of the classes is done yet, and the more people we get play-testing them, the better.
Level 80 and other major new highlights from the Beta [Updated]
Jeff "Tigole" Kaplan posted several new changes that are appearing in the Wrath of the Lich King Beta tonight. The highlights include: Level cap raised to 80. Less XP required for 70 to 80* Storm Peaks zone available, Icecrown unavailable. Follow dungeons available: Halls of Lightning Halls of Stone Caverns of Time: Stratholme The Occulus Utgarde Pinnacle Heroic Nexus Tigole also notes that premade characters will be made available at a later date on a different server. It looks like they'll actually be doing this now. More changes and analysis of the latest Beta patch to come throughout the evening. Stay tuned.*We did some rough calculations. Daniel's Hunter was approximately 50% of the way through level 70. His hunter is now 60% of the way through level 70. Thus, the XP required to level was reduced by approximately 20%. These are just rough estimates, and no official word on the percentage has came out yet.Update 11:49 p.m. EDT: Zarhym has said that patch notes are still being compiled. We'll have them up as soon as Blizzard releases them.
New Blizzcast: Professions, progression and patches, oh my
Blizzcast episode 4 is out, and it's chock full of the interesting discussion you've come to enjoy from the Blizzard crew. This episode includes some fantastic interviews on a variety of wide-ranging topics from the music of World of Warcraft's Sunwell Plateau to designing the various in-game professions, and caps off with a bunch of reader-submitted dev-answered questions -- and some tasty Starcraft II information! If you're curious about the things going on behind the scenes at Blizzard (you know, beyond frantically trying to fix the online store so people can pick up Blizzcon tickets) then be sure to check out Blizzcast #4! Or for those of you who aren't into podcasts (or who just don't have the ability to listen in right now) be sure to check out their handy transcription of the podcast, available now for your lunch-hour reading pleasure. 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!
Kaplan on Achievements and how Blizzard is doing them differently
Jeff "Tigole" Kaplan must have finished his work on the expansion because he's talking a lot lately -- first he's all over the forums giving us tidbits about what's up with Wrath, and now he's had a chat with MTV Multiplayer about what Blizzard's planning to do the same and differently with their achievements system.He openly acknowledges the impact of the Xbox 360 and Steam platform's achievements systems, and says that Blizzard even found themselves calling the rewards "achievements," just because the idea was so well established. But they're trying to do things differently as well: whenever they can they'll offer a progress bar, and give players access to many of the stats they have, so it'll be easy to track just where you're at in the process of earning the points.Kaplan also says that the UI team is working on completely opening up the system to mods as well, so expect to see some wild achievement addons when the mod community gets their hands on it. We do still have one more question, though: just what kinds of rewards will all these achievement points be used for? Kaplan, if you're still up for talking, feel free to chat with us.[via WorldofWar.net]
Blizzard confirms retroactive achievements, when possible
Ever since achievements were announced, the question I've heard the most from players has been about whether what they've already done will count. I attemped to answer this with a little bit of speculation last week, and today Tigole has basically confirmed what we'd already said: that where possible, Blizzard will award achievements retroactively.As we said last week, things like reputations and quests are easy to track -- other than dailies, you can't do the same quest twice, so it's easy for Blizzard to know, since day one, which quests you've done. And if a quest takes you to kill, say Onyxia, and you've completed it, then obviously you've got the achievement. Where it gets a little fuzzier is if you haven't done that quest, but you have killed Onyxia -- Blizzard probably doesn't even know yet if they'll do things like look for specific loot from certain bosses in a character's history, or if they'll extrapolate things even farther -- if you're Exalted with Hydraxian Waterlords, does that mean you've cleared MC?But Tigole does say that Blizzard is making a conscious decision to be as inclusive as possible on these old achievements -- whenever they can, they'll reward credit rather than making you go back to redo old content. That's a good choice -- it does mean that a few people will get angry for not getting the achievement because they killed the boss but didn't do the quest, but the alternative, awarding no retroactive achievements at all, would be even more frustrating.
Showing all questgivers on the minimap
Players have been asking for a way to track even their gray quests for a long time (in order to go back and do them for lore or reputation value), and now it looks like Blizzard is finally listening. Tigole says that in the next Wrath beta build, even gray quests will be trackable on the minimap, like normal quests are now. While a few players argued when the minimap first got updated that it would make the game way too easy, I've found (as I've been leveling my alt again lately) that it actually lets you focus on the important part of the game -- the quest text. Not poking around looking for those exclamation points keeps your mind on what's actually going on as you go back to a quest giver, and makes it more fun as you turn in the overdeveloped gizzard or whatever you're giving away.So good news on this one for completists -- if you've been thinking about going back and hunting down all of the old quests, for reputation, for the new achievements, or just for the heck of it, you might as well wait until you can see them on the minimap.
Certain old keys, pets, and tabards to be retrievable in Wrath
One of the nice things about Wrath is the consolidation of bag space. With mounts and pets becoming skills instead of items, it'll free up a lot of bag space for us pack rats. Unfortunately, for now, we still need that bag space, and to get enough of it, some of us have been forced to delete pets, tabards, and keys that we've otherwise outgrown. But if you're lamenting the loss of your Miniwing, or if you're having second thoughts about deleting that Battle Tabard of the Defilers, take heart. Tigole's announced that Wrath of the Lich King will include a way to recover deleted unique tabards, keys, and vanity pets. For keys, you'll talk to a locksmith, for pets, a stable master, and for tabards, a tabard vendor (likely the ones in the capital town halls). This only works on unique, one-per-character items, of course, so if you deleted a rare drop, you'll still have to go farm it again. It also doesn't appear to be currently implemented on Beta, but hopefully it is soon so we can test it and make sure all the right unique stuff can be recovered again -- I'm hoping they include non-key keys like the Scepter of Celebras. In the meantime, it's nice to see that Blizzard's continuing to allow us just a little bit more leeway in character customization and giving us pack rats more options to keep the stuff we love. Next stop: Player housing with item display cases! Hey, I can dream.
Personal Tabards may be a possibility in Wrath
A lot of us have probably had this problem before: We join a guild, and we like it. It has the right combination of people we like (or can tolerate), interests we share, and or what have you, and we're doing fine. Unfortunately, there is the problem. The tabard sucks. That whole green crying bear on pink background thing is just so tacky, and does not go well with any of our stuff. Sure, you can replace it with one of the factional tabards, in theory, but not until 70, and not until you grind exalted, and most of those tabards don't look much better anyway. Wouldn't it be nice if you could just go design your own personal tabard at your local town hall instead? That may be coming. In a thread by Beta tester Talid, Tigole said that the idea of personal tabards was actually pretty cool, and that he'd look into it. Yeah, admittedly, that means personal tabards could be in before Wrath goes live, or it means they could be a year off, or they could still discard the whole thing. Still, it often seems to this WoW Insider staff member that getting Blizzard to agree to any major type of personal character customization is like pulling teeth, so seeing Tigole act favorably toward this is pretty exciting. It'd be a great gold sink or achievement reward for Wrath.
Wrath storage solutions
By now you have surely heard of the new Achievements system set up for Wrath of the Lich King. While this will finally give collectors an extra incentive and reward, players are a bit worried about their bag space. It was announced recently that non-combat pets and mounts would take up no bag space in Wrath, and instead, the item that currently houses the pet will serve to teach you a spell for summoning the pet, and then disappear. While this is a huge weight off of the shoulders of many players, when reading through the current list of Achievements, one begins to wonder where all of their tabards, battleground tokens, badges, holiday items, epics, trinkets, and the like are going to go. Although we don't have information regarding the storage of every item we'll soon be collecting, Tigole made the following statement:Your bags will be ok. I promise. Pets, Mounts, Heroic Badges, BG Tokens are all getting storage space.I wonder how badges and tokens are getting storage space. Surely, they cannot be turned into spells, and I don't have room for bags specifically dedicated to only one or the other, so I'm definitely interested to know what they have up their sleeves, and if any other collectible items will get similar treatment.
