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5 stupid-awesome uses for the Glyph of Disguise
Last year, we examined the curious possibilities of the remarkable Potion of Illusion, introduced in Cataclysm and hailed for its potential as a tool for amusement and mayhem. Potions of Illusion were my guild's go-to ingredient in what were otherwise boring waits for raiding to start, and my guild thoroughly enjoyed playing around and seeing what different kinds of effects we could mimic. Although the days of Cataclysm are over, the Potion of Illusion still has its uses. And in Mists of Pandaria, the possibilities have opened just a little wider due to the introduction of a glyph that works hand-in-hand with the Potion of Illusion. In Mists, rogues were given the Glyph of Disguise. This minor glyph allows rogues to copy the appearance of an enemy, simply by pickpocketing it. Sadly, the Glyph does have its limits -- rogues can no longer pickpocket Durn the Hungerer, a source of endless hours of amusement in beta -- but that doesn't mean the glyph is devoid of all fun. In fact, there are plenty of cool mobs out there in the world, waiting to be mimicked.
Welcome to the World of Treecraft
Science Daily reports that a Stanford computer scientist named Vladlen Koltun has produced a program that allows both amateur and professional creators of virtual worlds to select from countless possible types of trees (all modeled based on scientific research) and to customize those trees based on their own needs.The program is cleverly called Dryad, and Koltun and his associates hope that it will be one of the first steps towards making the development of believable 3D online spaces an achievable goal for creative types without enormous budgets. Koltun said that there is a very small community of 3D modelers skilled in creating objects like trees, and that the rarity of the skill is partly responsible for a lull in the progression of user-generated virtual worlds.So, if you are planning on making a 3D MMO, you can use the program for free at the Stanford website. Maybe then your army of expensive employees can be smaller! It's also just fun to play with.
New WotLK screenshots on the official site
Two new screenshots have landed on the official Wrath of the Lich King page, and they look pretty different from anything we've seen about the next expansion so far. You can click on the pic above to see the first one full, and here's the second.Now clearly both show a forested, lush area, and there is only one forest that we know of is Northrend so far: Grizzly Hills, supposedly a redwood type of forest home to the Northern Furbolgs. This forest, however, looks a little greener than that-- it may be the Sholazar Basin, which we haven't seen screenshots of yet. Obviously the creature above is some new kind of Dryad, so that means we may see traces of Cenarius in Northrend, and when you mention Cenarius, you have to mention the Emerald Dream. So we may find out more about that line of lore in Northrend as well. Very interesting.
