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The Queue: Ziebart vs Sacco
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.Sometimes late at night when the sun is down and the moon is up, the writers at WoW Insider sit around the campfire and talk about things. Weird things. Like owning a pet snake and cat at the same time (Sacco), or how putting together a desk can be a pain (Alex). More and more often these days there has been a little friendly feud going on between Alex and Sacco. You can read their little quips at each other over a few posts. So today in the Queue I want to ask you: who would win in a writer cage match? Alex Ziebart or Mike Sacco? %Poll-27017% Also, I'd like to thank all of you who left questions not about the crazy delicious Hawaiian Pizza yesterday. You gave me something to work with!Blinger asked..."Will the emblems of Heroism be really useless now? If there is no more badge gear I need, have plenty of Frozen Orbs I can throw a stick at, is there going to be any point in me ever doing the current Wrath heroics again other than just to help out mates all of which are in the same boat anyway? Or will it be likely that there will be some form of Heroism to Valor exchange?"
Ulduar in-game dungeon maps
We're reported on the new in-game dungeon maps that Blizzard has implemented before, and we've got the Ulduar maps for you tonight. These are coming fresh off the latest Patch 3.1 PTR build (#9637 for those keeping track).Click below through our gallery to see them all.The map seems to indicate there are five floor to Ulduar. There is also a mini-map overview that was complied a few days ago you can also check out.Boss testing is commencing tonight, and we should have some more information and impressions up for you by tomorrow morning. We're also on the PTR now checking out other reported changes, we'll let you know what we dig up!Full gallery of Ulduar maps after the jump!
Finding unfinished quests
Alan on LJ is having a problem I've been thinking a lot about lately -- like me, he wants to go back and finish the Loremaster achievement, which asks you to clean up all of the quests in the old continents. But like me, he's wondering just how he'll find all of those old quests -- unfortunately, there's no way to know which quests have and haven't been done, and while of course, there's a "low level quest" tracking option, that still requires you to run around to all of the different quest locations to find them.A forum thread like this one is a huge help, but still, there's no way in the game to really go back and easily find which ones we've missed. Even with a list like that, you might spend twenty minutes trying for a drop before realizing you've already done that quest. Blizzard promised us a little while back that they'd be changing the "discovery" mechanic (so that we'd be able to see on the map which areas we hadn't discovered for the achivements yet), and an option like that might be helpful for cleaning up old quest -- say that low level quest tracking might work over the entire map, or there might be a magic box in Dalaran that would have whatever quest items we might need.The good news here is that Blizzard has built a fair amount of leeway into the quest achievements -- you won't need every single one to get the points, so the more obscure drop-based quests can probably go undone without worry. But just like the World Exploration achievements, a little more help finding the quests we might have missed would go a long way.
Mapping robots equipped with visual vocab filters for more accurate mapping
Mapping robots have been tooling around the earth for quite some time, but a new development in their tech seems to be leading them in the direction of far more accurate results. In general, these mapping bots scan the territory they are in, but often have trouble recognizing a location they have previously seen because of incidental changes, such as the addition of a car here and there. The research team, working in Oxford, England, has worked out a way to get the robot to "ignore" such negligible variables, by having it assign identifiers, in the form of words, as it trucks along the terrain. The robot can assign up to a thousand words every two seconds to a location as it moves, with related words linked together as a "bag of words" so that if it revisits a location and sees a bicycle seat and a bicycle wheel, it identifies this bag of word as one item, preventing the bot from attaching too much significance to several missing items. The robot is currently set to map a 1,000 km piece of land in Oxford, which would apparently be the largest stretch ever by a bot. Check the video after the break (warning: it autoplays!)
Wrath 101: Flight paths in Icecrown
Finally, we come to the end. Icecrown is the very last zone in Wrath, and a very gloomy one it is (in my opinion). This zone, as well as Storm Peaks, was designed with flying mounts in mind, but like Storm Peaks it still has flight paths for those of us who prefer to travel on autopilot. And like Zul'Drak, all the flight paths are neutral, being controlled by either the Argent Crusade or the Knights of the Ebon Blade. Unlike either of those zones, however, the FPs in Icecrown are extensively phased. Only two of them, Argent Vanguard and Death's Rise, are accessible immediately upon entering the zone, so don't go cruising around trying to pick up all the FPs. Just go through the normal quest lines and you'll unlock all four of them sooner or later.
New set of LotRO videos show more of Moria
Even after the launch of Lord of the Rings Online's Mines of Moria expansion this last Tuesday, Turbine is still pumping out the video previews for each of their new areas of the mines themselves.A few days ago, they released a video for the Redhorn Lodes in the central Moria region, and The Great Delving, which is the first section you encounter when entering the mines. Then today, they've released yet another video depicting Zelm-melek, which is smack dab in the middle of the mines, above Redhorn Lodes. If you've reached any of these areas in game yet, you know that these videos don't quite do them justice, yet they're still worth a look. Check them out embedded just after the cut.
MapWoW maps Northrend
MapWoW is one of my favorite WoW resources online. I have to admit, I don't use it as much as some other helpers, but it's really well done -- someone put the Azeroth map inside the Google Maps interface, and added herbs, ores, flight paths and everything else you need to find on the map. If you've ever asked "where can I find..." in a chat channel, odds are that MapWoW had the answer already.And now they've got Northrend in the mix, ready to go for your exploring needs. It's a little spoilery, actually -- a pretty detailed bird's-eye view of all the new content in the expansion. They do have flight paths included, but they don't quite have herbs and ores uploaded yet -- we're told they'll be in soon.Don't get me wrong -- there's definitely something to be said for exploring: pretty soon, we'll have tagged and catalogued every single mob up there, so it is fun to just run around now while it's all still a new world. Don't depend on maps right away, because you never know what might be just around the corner in the land of the Lich King. But if you need it, there's your map.
Mystery continent spotted
Sharp-eyed tipster Fontane sent us this very interesting screenshot today. This is a picture of a book open on the table by the Argent Dawn emmisaries currently set up in Shattrath. What does that look like in the circled area? To me, it looks like a map of Azeroth: Northrend at the top, Kalimdor at left, Eastern Kingdoms at right, and the Maelstrom in the middle. But what's that at the bottom? Could it be a new continent? Sure, it might be a bit early to speculate about the third expansion, given that the second isn't even out yet (five days!). But I'm going to do it anyway; we do know they've got more planned.
EverQuest II slated to get a map upgrade
Game Update 50 will coincide with the release of EverQuest 2's next expansion, The Shadow Odyssey. We've already show you how fantastic the new content drop will look from the dungeon-crawling perspective, but there are a handful of other features that will be added into the game at the same time. The official site is showing off one such feature, an all new mapping system that will be coming to the game in GU50. The new maps will be a significant improvement over the current static and not-all-that-helpful option.The new maps will list POIs inside a given zone, allows for custom setting of waypoints in an intuitive manner, and even offers a search feature. Players can search for NPCs right there on the screen and have them appear as waypoints on the map. The developers have also added a mini-map to the game for the first time, an innovation that will come as a big relief for players used to running around with the full-sized map open and resized. Full details of the new maps are available on the official site, and be sure to follow up with our full coverage of SOE's The Shadow Odyssey expansion.
BlizzCon schedule and interactive map
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/BlizzCon_schedule_and_interactive_map'; BlizzCon 2008 begins this Friday October 10th and it looks like it's going to be a great time. Blizzard has posted the schedule for the two day event, as well as an interactive map of the convention. On Friday there will be WoW relevant panels about the UI, classes, and artwork. On Saturday there will be panels about WoW PvP, raids & dungeons, a general Q&A session, and more class panels. The opening keynote is set to being at 11:00 a.m. PDT on Friday morning.There are a lot of interesting attractions and events that'll be going on in addition to the slew of vendors that'll be there. There will be several large hands on gaming areas, a charity auction (hopefully some cool things will be presented – we'll be sure to let you know what's there when we find out), a developer signing, some archery, and Blizzard trivia.WoW Insider will be covering the event in force. We'll be covering everything we can with live blogging, images and video from the floor, and several other great features. Lots more to come this week!Read on after the break for a quick look at when all the WoW related events will be happening.
LotRO: Mines of Moria screens released for Foundations of Stone
LotRO fans can rejoice in yet another collection of screenshots from the upcoming Lord of the Rings Online: Mines of Moria expansion. These five new screenshots -- linked in a gallery below -- show creatures and environments from the Foundations of Stone area of the expansion. As depicted in a previous map of Moria we saw at PAX 2008, the Foundations of Stone area is in the southeastern-most corner of the mines themselves.Be sure to keep your eyes on Massively as we expect to release much more information on Mines of Moria as the expected release time quickly approaches.%Gallery-18340%
Mac 101: Get a Google Map from Address Book contact
How many times have you looked at an Address Book contact address, only to realize that you don't know where they're located? What do you do? Most would copy and paste the address into Google Maps, but there is a better way! In a contact's Address Book card, right-clicking on an address and clicking on "Map Of" will launch your default browser and map out the address in Google Maps. If you are using Tiger, you will need to install a plug-in, however, this tip works beautifully in Mac OS X Leopard. Want more tips and tricks like this? Visit TUAW's Mac 101 section.
Official interactive Northrend map
In case you'd like to get a sneak peek at what you'll be rampaging all over in Wrath, Blizzard has just put up an interactive map of the new continent of Northrend on its site. It's pretty, of course, but also information-packed. For each zone, if you click on it, it lists the following information: Level range of the zone; the two starting zones are listed as 68–72, as we expected. Flight points, Alliance, Horde, and neutral. All the zones seem to have plenty of flight points, which will make it less painful not to have flying mounts until 77. Instances, with levels for those. Raids. Interestingly, both the raids currently in beta (Naxxramas and Chamber of Aspects) are in Dragonblight; I hadn't realized that. Zone map Obviously, if you're averse to these kinds of spoilers, don't click over. Otherwise, enjoy the pretty pictures. 55 days until LK; I can't wait.
Google Maps for mobile gets Street View and walking directions
Google Maps for mobile just stepped up in the feature department with Google's inclusion of Street View in its newest version. In case you've been hiding under a rock -- or live in almost any other country aside from the US -- Street View offers up a storefront take on your world rather than the traditional top down look you see with common maps. The new version also includes walking directions which will ignore pesky one-way streets and the like. While the list of supported handsets is missing, we do see BlackBerry listed and Java-enabled phones, too, so do us a kindness, grab it and let us know if it works on yours.
Keeping yourself alive in EVE with safespots
Learning how to create safespots in EVE Online is an essential survival skill, but it's one that takes some time to get the hang of. The Goonfleet video tutorial to safespotting is an excellent start, but other player resources are popping up and explain how important it is to have and properly use different types of safespots.EVE blogger Manasi has written an excellent guide to safespotting called "Getting your A$$ out of the fire" that covers the different types of safespots a player in EVE can make use of. Namely, "gate" safespots (useful for watching a gate at range while cloaked), "deep" safespots (used most often, numerous such bookmarks are needed), and "station" safespots (within docking range of a given station, allowing you to evade attackers by docking up). Manasi goes into detail about how to create each type of safespot, and -- most importantly -- how to use them. Manasi's "Getting your A$$ out of the fire" paired with the aforementioned Goonfleet Safespotting 101 are all you need to get a handle on safespotting in EVE Online. Be sure to check them both out if you're a new pilot. Goonfleet's Safespotting 101 video tutorial is embedded below the cut.
EVE Online's answer to GPS
EVE Online is a vast setting where all players interact in one galaxy. While other MMOs are sharded across different servers, some with different locales, EVE places all of its players together. Its implementation ensures that many servers seem to be just one from the perspective of any pilot flying in New Eden. However, given the daunting size of EVE's explorable environment, there have been some players who took it upon themselves to map the known universe and release their findings as a resource for other pilots. Shayne Smart, aka Serenity Steele, is one such player. He's been getting some media attention in recent months as Vice-Chairman of the Council of Stellar Management (CSM). Beyond his duties on the CSM, Smart is also well-known to many players as the creator of EVE Strategic Maps, a spiral bound collection of star charts which some fans of the game find indispensable. You would think Smart would find mapping out 5000 solar systems (each with its own myriad planets, moons, stations, and other resources) a feat hard to top. But what Smart's done is found a way to use the in-game browser in the EVE client to act as a sort of GPS, tracking your position as you jump from one solar system to the next, and allowing you to better see your relative position in the galaxy as part of your overview. The cartographer's latest 'minimap' effort is presently 2-D only and in beta, though is well worth a look and quite simple to use. Click the gallery below for Shayne Smart's instructions on how to use the free 2D minimap within your in-game browser. Add GPS to your overview >> %Gallery-31177%
WotLKWiki offers interactive Northrend map
The folks at WotLK Wiki sent us a note that they've got an interactive Northrend map up and running. It's nothing too surprising (they basically just put all of the map screen maps from the beta together), but it is in a nifty Google maps interface, so you can drag, click, and zoom around the new landscape at will. And of course, the pictures don't mean too much at this point -- of course big landmarks like The Nexus and Ulduar stand out, but it's assured that actually seeing these places will be much more amazing than just seeing their flat representations on the map.What's really interesting, though, is going way back to the beginning and comparing this map to all the different versions from Blizzard's planning stages. Though a lot of things have been added in to fill in all the space, they've really been faithful to the overall design since the beginning. Even the Warcraft III maps match up pretty well. Blizzard really sticks to their mythology, and that's probably at least one reason why fans enjoy exploring it so much.
Wayfaring through New Eden with EveMap
EVE Online has an active community of 3rd party developers who release free tools for the benefit of other players. While tools like EVEmon, used to plan skill training, and EVE Fitting Tool, used to experiment with ship fittings, are widely used by players, there are a number of other great programs out there that have gotten less attention. One of those out-of-game tools is EveMap, created by Paul van Santen -- otherwise known as "AcriQuo." The galaxy of New Eden has over 5000 solar systems, and plotting safe routes or simply some optimal wayfaring can be a bit involved. When in-game, you can pull up an interactive map to help navigate, but it takes up the entire client window while active. Some players prefer to view their maps off-screen, and there are some 2D options available to help in this regard, but until recently, going 2D was the only option players had. That's all changed with EveMap, which is a fully-functional 3D map of the EVE universe, with myriad display options and filters. The beauty of the program is that it literally displays all of EVE's systems without being confined to the client. The system requirements to run it are minimal: Java Runtime Environment version 1.5 or higher, and an OpenGL-capable graphics card. EveMap has been well-received on the official EVE Online forums. If having another way to navigate in EVE sounds good to you, why not fire up EveMap and see how useful it can be?
Wrath of the Lich King maps
Wrath of the Lich King information is really flooding in. For the latest bit, let's take a look at some of the new maps in the game. These were obtained through a variety of sources and are 100% real, all right from the beta. Click through our gallery to see them all – including nice high res versions. You'll notice three maps missing - The Storm Peaks, Icecrown Glacier, and Dalaran. Those maps are not done yet. There are some composites that other sites have put together via the mini-map from the data files, but they're neither finished nor "normal" maps.I like the Stormwind Harbor one the best, if only because the Stormwind map hasn't changed in all these years and it's odd to suddenly see it different. The one I enjoy the least is the Borean Tundra, the color scheme doesn't sit well with me. It looks like...well...I'll let you all draw your own conclusions.Enjoy the maps! And stay tuned to WoW Insider all weekend, we've got some great content lined up for you. %Gallery-28087%
Empyrean Age factional warfare map included with newest E-ON issue
EVE Online's latest dev blog comes from Zapatero, one of the staff at E-ON, the quarterly magazine all about EVE. Our own Massively columnist Brendan Drain, aka Nyphur, has been a past contributor to E-ON, which should give you an idea of how in-depth some of the articles are. The magazine is a useful resource for any serious player of the game and the fiction is pretty solid as well, it's just a shame that there's a few-month gap between each issue's release. Maybe it was that wait that pushed him over the edge, but rumor has it one of the Massively writers snapped and bought every back issue of E-ON, but we think that he's unhealthily obsessed anyway. Zapatero writes that E-ON is about to celebrate its third year in operation with the release of issue 12, which will ship on July 4th. As a bonus to readers, it will include a free poster of the Empyrean Age New Eden star cluster, to aid players who have enlisted in factional warfare. The map was created by Council of Stellar Management (CSM) delegate Serenity Steele, who also brought EVE Strategic Maps (a book of star charts) to fans of the game. The free poster map will include region names and outposts. Faction warfare-enabled regions will be highlighted and the security status of each system will be color-coded. For those who actually have EVE Strategic Maps, the poster is cross-referenced with the book, although Zapatero states that the map will be useful on its own. He outlines what will be in issue 12 in his dev blog; if the content matches up to what the E-ON staff has put out in past issues, it should be worth checking out.
