Azeroth
Latest
The best of WoW Insider: May 5-12, 2009
Welcome back to the Wacky World of Warcraft, where the men are men, the women are usually dragons of some kind, and the average faction leader is probably being mad with some kind of ill-gotten power. Confused? Wondering why that ugly-looking orc is approaching you with sword drawn? Worry not, WoW Insider is your all-encompassing guide to Azeroth. Just please keep your arms and legs inside the tram at all times -- you don't want to hear what happened to our friend Wirt. News WoW Insider interviews Tom Chilton on Patch 3.1 and beyondWe talk to the game's lead designer on the latest updates, and what's coming up next. Star Trek references in the World of WarcraftWe've all (well, most of us -- ahem, Alex and Dan) seen Star Trek and loved it, so we compiled this little list of sightings in game. WoWMatrix responds to Curse and WoW InterfaceThere was a kerfluffle in the addon scene lately, and popular addon updater WoWMatrix finally responds. BlizzCon tickets on sale May 16thBlizzard's convention is returning to the Anaheim Convention Center, and it'll cost you $125 and some time in line to go. Flying in old world AzerothBlizzard has long said it wouldn't be possible to allow flying mounts in the original game world. And here's why. Features Disappointment the patch 3.1 game worldNot everything is hunky dory after the latest update -- at least one of our bloggers is a bit bored. Officers' Quarters: FragmentationOur column for guild officers takes a look at who should get the game's newest legendary. The OverAchiever: Glory of the Hero strikes backHow to do one of the biggest achievements in the game. WoW, Casually: Guide to the latest featuresNot every WoW player is a hardened veteran -- for the newer folks, there's WoW, Casually. Arcane Brilliance: PvPing as a Fire Mage after patch 3.1What's new in the world of Mages? Our Mage blogger Christian Belt tells you.
Flying in old-world Azeroth
One of players' most frequently asked questions since BC emerged has been when -- or if -- Blizzard plans to make flying mounts usable in classic Azeroth. It's an attractive proposition due to the sheer size of Kalimdor and the Eastern Kingdoms, and how convenient it would be to take a fast flyer to places that aren't well-served by flight paths. CM's and developers have said that the programming and time required to "retrofit" the old world to be usable by flying mounts isn't worth it, and that they'd rather spend developmental resources on new content.A player who got irritated with all the begging -- and someone who I can only assume has access to GM powers on a private server -- decided to take an aerial tour of several zones in Azeroth in December 2007 to document the territory Blizzard would have to redesign in order to make flying mounts feasible. It's a really interesting look at how Blizzard exploited perspective and line-of-sight in order to make buildings and zones appear bigger and more built-up than they actually are, and there are a few places in the video that I haven't seen even on websites dedicated to the "secret places" of Azeroth. I'm not sure why this video hasn't popped up previously but it doesn't seem to be tagged or categorized in any way, so that might be why. Check it out; flying in Azeroth would be great to see these things, but there's no denying Blizz would have a lot of work to do.
The end of vanilla WoW
We've heard about suggestions of vanilla servers before (and Blizzard has flatly stated that they have no plans for them), but here's a new twist: Nomnom on Korgath says that Blizzard should finally, once and for all, abandon the old world. He says that leveling from 1-60 is a pain, even with the changes and recruit-a-friend (and on that, I agree -- my Paladin is level 50 and staying there, because leveling is boring), and that Blizzard should just start all new characters at level 55, especially if you've already got a 70+ character. They already did it with Death Knights, and those have worked their way into the endgame just fine.That idea's definitely been batted around before, and anyone leveling an alt can definitely see the benefits. But think of what you're giving up with a new rule like that: Deadmines, Wailing Caverns, Scarlet Monastery. All of the epic quests and reputations, all of the great old-world vistas and settings. Plus, new players to the game will find the old world even emptier than it already is -- everyone who has a high level character will already be leveling through Outland or Northrend.Do we really want to abandon the old world for good? Blizzard doesn't think so -- Palehoof unofficially suggests that Blizzard is happy with the subscription fees for the two weeks it takes you to level your character, and Bornakk officially says that Blizzard is happy with the way things work now, and if they see a problem, they'll fix it. You have to think that they'll eventually allow this kind of "powerleveling" in some way -- as we move closer to level 100, it'll just be silly bothering with the lower levels considering how far ahead the new content is. But for now, you'll have to stick to leveling the old-fashioned way, because vanilla WoW isn't going anywhere.
The best of WoW Insider: April 21-28, 2009
What a week in the World of Warcraft -- we've explored even further into the mysteries of Ulduar, we saw Peggle in WoW and WoW on the iPhone, and the Easter holiday of Noblegarden has arrived (even though it is a little late thanks to Blizzard's long testing periods) in Azeroth. But even though all of this is happening at once, there's no need to fear -- Joystiq's sister site WoW Insider is here every single day with news and views about what's going on in Azeroth. Whether you're a complete noob, you left the game at level 60 (boy howdy things have changed since then), or you're currently rolling through the 80 endgame, we've got news for you. News Val'anyr stats discoveredA new legendary mace has been discovered in the game's new Ulduar instance. WoW Insider exclusive: PopCap releases Peggle for WoWInsert joke here about one addictive substance inside another. Video teases iPhone WoW clientBlizzard will likely never let it happen, but a third party says they've gotten WoW running on the iPhone. Today's in-game fixesTwo weeks later, Blizzard is still fixing a few issues from patch 3.1. The OverAchiever: Guide to Noblegarden AchievementsAlbeit a little late, Blizzard is finally celebrating their version of Easter on the live realms. Features Varian Wrynn is rightThe Alliance's latest leader really, really hates the Horde. And here's why he should. The Queue: Raid goes up, boss goes downA little Queue and A about... whatever you want to know. Loot, rationality and The Sunwell EffectA great essay about what drives us to do what we do in-game, and how Blizzard can use that. Lichborne: A Patch 3.1 talent build cookie platter for Death KnightsSo you're a DK and you have no idea what talent build to choose after 3.1. If you're OK with a cookie cutter build, boy do we have a batch for you. Eggsellent Guidance: 30 Noblegarden eggs in 15 minutesThe easiest and quickest way to collect some yolks for the latest holiday achievement.
The Queue: Druidic Druids
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW Insider's daily Q&A column where the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Adam Holisky will be your host today. Today we'll look at the pressing questions of Arthas' relationship with you, Blizzard's love affair with the Druidic traditions, and Quartermaster dis/sim-ilarities.Jumper asked..."Where do players fit into the story of the WoW? For example: Eventually players will be able to kill Arthas. How will that be written in the stories?"
Video Games Live interviews Jason Hayes in Austin
This is really interesting -- our friend Tommy Tallarico of Video Games Live recently did a show in Austin, Texas, and during the performance, they actually brought former Blizzard composer Jason Hayes up on the big screen via Skype and chatted with him about the Warcraft music they had just played. Hayes worked on some of the cinematic music for Warcraft III, and though he is no longer with Blizzard, he put together some of the new music you're hearing now in Wrath of the Lich King as well.Hayes talks about how he works closely with the cinematic team to try and come up with an appropriate mood for what's happening on screen as the music plays. Even with early animatics, he says, you can get a good sense of where the scene is going and what the story is about. He also says that the Latin lyrics in his songs aren't necessarily Latin -- he uses a translator online and picks and chooses what sounds best. So not exactly historically accurate, but it's Warcraft -- as long as it sounds good, they can justify it however they like. It's definitely a fun little chat with one of the people behind some of the sweet sounds of Azeroth.[via WorldofWar]
Breakfast Topic: Exploring the World of Warcraft
One of the things which kept me in Azeroth -- at least long enough for the addictive side of the game to set in -- was the promise of exploration. I originally rolled a human mage and still remember at level five, being taken all the way from Elwynn Forest to Darnassus. Bear in mind though, this was back before The Burning Crusade when being Alliance meant traveling from the Eastern Kingdoms to Kalimdor took a good forty minutes if you didn't have the flight paths or a mount. You had to get the tram to Ironforge then run the gauntlet of death to Menethil, catch the boat to Theramore, get another to Auberdine and then fly or get another boat to Teldrassil. The whole trip really showed me how big the world was, as well as teaching me all about threat and my ability to aggro everything in a three-zone radius.So when I rolled my druid, the day before the expansion hit, I was determined to see as much as this beautifully crafted world as I could. Yes, I essentially had a death wish. I was exploring Outland with an honour guard of my guildies at level 10 (and hearthed in Shattrath), I ran through the Arathi Highlands at level thirty, swam through Un'Goro Crater in my forties and was pushing the boundaries of Shattrath by my fifties.However along the way I found some amazing places: the crystal filled cave at Marshal's Refuge, the boughs where the Dragons of Nightmare can occasionally be found, the first time you run into Azuregos in Azshara, the Twin Colossals of Feralas -- well the eastern one at any rate. Then when I got my flying mount I really started exploring properly.Nagrand alone is full of nooks and crannies and I adore the beauty of Crystalsong Forest.So come on, readers, I want to know if you've explored all the hidden places of Azeroth and Outland. Do you have any favourites? You do? Great, be sure to tell us about them in the comments box.
"More DoTs" cameo in F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin
ihatemostthings' friend found something fun in the new(ish) game F.E.A.R. 2: Project Origin. Apparently, wandering around in the game, you can come across a little terminal that has some familiar code to anyone who's ever raided with a more-than-enthusiastic raid leader (NSFW). You can click the picture above to see a closeup view of what the screen says.Pretty cute. Blizzard has seen fit to make nods to other games in Azeroth, so it's fun to see other game companies return the favor.
WoW zones in real life
Aurdon over at I Sheep Things spotted this great collection of comparisons between real-life environs and the in-game places that they inspired. Not all of the comparisons are pitch-perfect, obviously (there are no Nagrand-esque floating islands in the real world, and the Crystalsong Forest picture shows trees covered in ice rather than the mystical wood that grows in-game), but lots of the pictures are really dead-on, and they show you really well how Blizzard uses a kind of hyper-realized version of Earth to create what seems like a very real Azeroth.We've posted before how the architecture of WoW mirrors real-world places and culture, but even the natural world of Azeroth uses lots of Earth's real-life elements. And it would be cool to know where these pictures actually come from -- some of them are recognizable (obviously, Stranglethorn Vale is based on parts of the Amazon, and The Barrens represents Africa's savannahs), but even Icecrown and Zangarmarsh are represented (in slightly less mythical form) on Earth. It would be interesting to know exactly where.
More teasing from the Blues, this time about phasing
Oh Blizzard why do you torture us so? Last time it was all about Gilneas, and this time, Wyrxian winks at a player suggestion that phasing gets used more in the old world. Take this all as you will -- Blizzard is just pulling our chain on this stuff, and whatever they have in mind, they're not giving away quite yet.But, let's speculate a little, shall we? We already know that there's one more Lich King mystery content patch: Ulduar is coming first in patch 3.1, and Icecrown will likely be the final raid of the expansion, but there's one more raid that they haven't told us about yet. So we could guess that we'll finally see what's been going on in Gilneas all these years, and that it'll be a phased experience, much like what we saw in the Sunwell patch before the expansion. Plus, the announcement for that patch could be right around now -- with 3.1 set to go live any day now, Blizzard could release that patch and then throw out a preview for the next release right away.That's all guessing, of course. And we have no idea whether the phasing reference and Gilneas are even in the same patch -- I speculated long ago that the Emerald Dream expansion could be an entirely phased version of old Azeroth, which could completely revamp the 1-60 experience. So who knows? But Blizzard, as they always do, know something, and while they might let on soon, they're not telling right now.
Are we being teased about the next expansion?
So there's been a feeling in the air lately that some of the blues have been in a bit of a teasing mood. Sure, that's not neccessarily new, but what is interesting is what exactly they may be teasing us about. For example, here's a recent post in which one Sulmus of Aerie Peak asks for the Greymane Wall to be opened. Zarhym soon jumps in to say that they would be "out of their mind" to open the wall... then follows up with random ellipses. To top it all off, Bornakk and Crygil jump in with silly punctuation of their own. Now when Alex and I were discussing this the other day, Alex insisted that they were basically admitting that the Greymane wall would be opened, likely in conjunction with the next expansion. He says it's already in the planning stages, and the blues are just waving the knowledge tantalizingly out of sight because they're not allowed to officially announce it yet. Now, at first I wasn't really on board with it, but then I noticed another post Zarhym commented in.
GDC09: Spending time with the cruise director of Azeroth
At GDC09, we got to talk with many people and listened to a variety of panels on all aspects of game design. But there was little doubt as to which panel attracted loads of attention -- the Jeff Kaplan panel on quest design in World of Warcraft.Warcraft has come extremely far in terms of their UI design and quest implementation since the game launched back in 2004. Just between 2007 and 2009, Kaplan revealed that over 8,570,222,436 quests have been completed, while the daily average was 16,641,409. With those numbers in place, it's safe to say that World of Warcraft players are driven by their questing.Kaplan's panel revealed a few tricks of the trade, as well as his beliefs regarding questing, so without further adieu let's get into the meat of his panel.%Gallery-49071%
GDC09: Spending time with the cruise director of Azeroth pt. 2
Mistakes of World of Warcraft Kaplan was quick to note that Warcraft was far from perfect, and he wanted to highlight some of his own mistakes inside of the design. The first mistake was the idea of the "Christmas tree effect," otherwise known as having so many quests in a quest hub that the minimap lights up with exclamation points like a Christmas tree. While players enjoy this, Kaplan wanted to say that the developer loses call control over the player at these points, as the player will not read any quest text in their clicking frenzy. There's no control over what quest leads into what or which order the player will do the quests in. The second was the internet adage of "too long, didn't read." Quest designers don't need to write a book to get their point across with the quests. He brought up that video games had a type of "medium envy," where sometimes they get too preachy with their topics. Games should be fun first, story second. Mystery also falls in this category. The story can provide mystery, but the quest log should never have any mystery to it. The quest log should always point where to go and what to do, but the overall story of those quests may provide some solution to some mystery. Also avoid poorly placed quest chains, like the Chains of Myzrael questline in Arathi Highlands. The Myzrael line was hard to find, ended up spanning 14 levels, and ended with killing an elite mob that was level 44. This quest line was a "brick wall" according to Kaplan, because most players never stuck with it. It's good to have quest chains that span content, but quest chains like this break down trust the player has with the developer. When the player runs into a chain that he can't finish with a monster he can't kill, the player loses trust in the developer's sense of guiding them to fun. He also emphasized to avoid inserting "gimmick quests." His example here was part of the Oculus dungeon where players ride on dragons. These types of quests center around doing something the client may not be able to properly handle. Warcraft was not designed to accommodate vehicles. When developers resort to putting in parts of the game that center around a gimmick, it can detract from the fun of the rest of the game. The horror of collection quests Kaplan's speech ended with an analysis of why people hate collection quests so much, and a few tips on how to make collection quests into a better experience. His problems with the quests stemmed from three areas -- dense creature population, too few of a creature to kill, and having a wide variety of items required for the quest. Having a dense creature population can put off people, especially when there's a lack of the monster required for the quest. If someone has to kill four lions for every one raptor required for the quest, then there's a problem. His other point was that collection quests shouldn't require an insane amount of items. To everyone's amusement, he brought up the Green Hills of Stranglethorn quest chain (a chain he wrote) as the exact thing a designer should never do. Collection quests should be an easily obtainable number of items, and not such a long grind fest with the hope that your required item might drop. Lastly, never have the player question why they're collecting the item required -- it should be clear from the onset. Kaplan brought up the infamous gnoll paw collecting quests, in which gnolls may or may not drop paws upon death, where obviously a gnoll has four paws and not a number between 0 and 1 (which everyone applauded at loudly). Quests should make sense and not become a gimmick in their own right. This causes the player to once again, lose trust. Most of these points that Kaplan has brought up pertain to Warcraft, but can easily be applied to any game on the market. With all of this in mind, perhaps we'll get to see some better design in our MMOs from other developers, now that we're all on the same page... of the Green Hills of Stranglethorn.
BRK taking a break from World of Warcraft
Our good friend and colleague Daniel "BigRedKitty" Howell has announced on his blog that he is taking a break from World of Warcraft. He's taking time off of the game and his blog to, as he says, "rededicate myself to my family." He thanks readers for their attention and kind words, and hopes that everyone will understand his decision, as well as examine their own lives to make sure that they focus on what's most important to them.We of course wish him well -- BRK was an excellent contributor to our site and podcast, and we commend him on making the decision to do what's right for him and his family. We hope that everything turns out OK. And as many of his commenters have said, we wish him the best of luck in everything, WoW-related and otherwise.Phaelia of Resto4Life, you'll remember, also closed her blog down recently, also choosing to focus on her family (and the sapling about to grow into it). Trying to figure out a good balance between your free time and your work and family life is a tough thing -- our Azeroth Interrupted column has covered exactly that battle. And as even Blizzard says, if any other part of your life is suffering because you're choosing to play this game or be a part of this community, it's time to make a break. Raiding the wilds of Azeroth is a lot of fun, and it's possible to do it while leading a healthy life. But if that balance ever gets thrown off, it's time to take a step back and do what's right for you and those closest to you.
Ask a Lore Nerd: Speculative speculation
Welcome to Ask a Lore Nerd, where each week blogger and columnist Alex Ziebart answers your questions about the lore and history of the World of Warcraft. Ask your questions in the comments section below, and we'll try to answer it in a future edition.Today's edition of Ask a Lore Nerd is a bit heavy on the speculation side, so be warned before you start reading. We've had a lot of questions recently that we don't yet have answers to, but are asked frequently enough that I suppose I should see what I can say!vyx asked..."Okay, so speaking of life and death, this has bugged me for a while -- how do we explain the fact that some characters (Horde and Alliance legends for example) have died, but yet every Priest, Pally, Shammy and Druid can rez people anytime they want?I realize it's a game and it wouldn't be so much fun if you died and then had to reroll a level 1, but there needs to be some type of lore explanation as to why people can be rezzed, but also can 'really die.' Are we supposed to just not worry about this or is there an explanation?"
Breakfast Topic: Six word stories about World of Warcraft
The idea of a six word story has been around for a while -- Ernest Hemingway famously wrote one that went: "For sale: baby shoes, never worn." But Pink Pigtail had the idea to bring the format into the World of Warcraft, and challenges her readers to write some six word stories about Azeroth and/or its inhabitants. Larisa's "Last mage quits. Working as intended." is probably my favorite of hers, but you WI readers are pretty creative, too. Here's a few of mine:"Fandral Staghelm is angry. Nobody cares.""Lich King laughs, teleports away. Again.""For sale: Gnomish capital. Slightly used."Ok, that last one is pretty bad. Surely you can come up with some better ones, right?
AT&T will continue Blizzard hosting
We haven't gotten much of a look at Blizzard's server architecture, but here's a tiny one: AT&T has announced in a press release that they're re-signing to a two year agreement to provide Blizzard with hosting for World of Warcraft and Battle.net. We'll get the joke out of the way first: that explains why Blizzard's sites go down so often! Ba-dump ching!But seriously, the press release says AT&T has been working with Blizzard on providing bandwidth and network monitoring for nine years already, and that they have multiple "Internet Data Centers" that provide global support of the network infrastructure that lets your character wander around Azeroth. AT&T isn't the only company Blizzard works with -- while their network provides the connections and bandwidth, the actual coding and the databases behind all of the action in WoW are another story, and Blizzard likely works with multiple big companies to make sure that all runs smoothly. AT&T provides the cables, but someone's got to help provide the servers and the code they're hooked up to.Still, despite the jokes about the downtime, it's quite a feat. We're still interested in hearing more about the mechanics behind the World of Warcraft. Unfortunately, lots of this information is probably a trade secret at this point -- even if no other MMOs are coming close to WoW's numbers, Blizzard has probably come up with a lot of techniques they don't exactly want known to the public. But a look inside one of these "IDCs" or an idea of just what machines they're using to run a realm of WoW would be intriguing.
The best of WoW Insider: February 17-24, 2009
It's a crazy day over on WoW Insider -- the next content patch, 3.1, has hit the Public Test Realm, and there's a dragon-sized amount of information coming out: new raids, new instances, new world events, new mounts, new pets, new armor, new mechanics, and much more. Stay tuned to Joystiq's Azeroth-addicted sister site to hear about what's new in the World of Warcraft. News WoW Insider's guide to patch 3.1This is it -- everything you need to know about the new patch, updated with all of the brand new info from the PTR release. World of Warcraft 3.1 PTR patch notesHot patch notes coming through, directly from the Public Test Realm. Patch 3.1 undocumented changesEverything on the new patch that isn't covered in the official notes. The Argent Tournament in patch 3.1A brand new world event that no one saw coming -- we're going to be fighting in vehicles soon, thanks to patch 3.1. Dual specs currently cost 1000gOh, did you think you were getting a second spec for free? Think again. Features Guildwatch: Leave Tankserious alone!Not everything is about patch 3.1 lately -- sometimes it's just about good old drama. The Queue: I have no regrets. Well, maybe one...Our Q&A column keeps things interesting, even on maintenance day. Ready Check: Sartharion plus three drakesAn in-depth guide from our raiding column on the hardest encounter currently in the game. 15 Minutes of Fame: WoW Botter tells allWe get the inside scoop from a bot user himself. Lichborne: Top Death Knight DPS builds and patch 3.1Our Death Knight columnist lays out a few good talent builds for DKs in the new patch.
Steelseries partnering with Best Buy, credits WoW for growth
We've heard before about World of Warcraft strutting up the PC gaming market before, but could this game also be holding up the PC game accessories market? Seems that way for Steelseries -- they're the makers of the WoW mouse that we've mentioned (the one that might not be quite kosher with Blizzard's Terms of Service, use with caution). They've just recently inked a deal with Best Buy to carry some of their products (including the WoW mouse), and World of Warcraft played so much of a part in the deal that CEO Bruce Hawver credited Blizzard's MMO with creating his "high-quality gamers": "The way I used to pick up the phone after school, now, kids log into World of Warcraft and chat... Online gaming might cost $14 to $18 a month – less than a single movie visit for two people."It does follow -- if WoW is one of the only reasons left for people to spend money on PC games, it does seem that it would be one of the only reasons for them to spend money on gaming accessories. High-end mice and keyboards use to be the domain of the FPS player -- guys like Fata1ity pimped their own lines and all the mice bragged about their resolution and ease of use. But the PC market has changed, and MMOs are the game of the day now -- everything is about squeezing function into as many buttons as possible and reaching this 11 million player group roaming around Azeroth. If Steelseries and other accessory manufacturers want to sell their products, they've got to try and sell them to us.
The best of WoW Insider: February 3-10, 2009
Busy week over at WoW Insider -- we've got another patch on the horizon and a whole new set of changes to digest. If it's in the World of Warcraft, we've got news and views about it. News WoW Insider's guide to Patch 3.1Everything you need to know about the new patch -- and even some things you don't. Patch 3.0.9 to go live this weekBlizzard puts another set of hotfixes in the mix. Best. Bug. Ever.A Death Knight's Death Grip can send you on a trip around the world. Big changes for Hunters in patch 3.1Something we never thought would happen has: Ammunition is out of the game. Mana regeneration changing dramatically in 3.1Blizzard is flipping the script on regenerating mana in the next patch. Features The Queue: Legendaries are for suckersForget purple -- orange is the new awesome. Wrath 101: Darkmoon cardsA look at the new decks in Wrath. The OverAchiever: 100 Mounts AchievementsOur brand new achievements column will help you get all the mounts you can handle, including the Albino Drake above. Ready Check: Preparing for UlduarWhat to do when you're expecting... a new raid. Totem Talk: 3.1 shocks and awes Shamans
