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New vanity glyphs in Mists of Pandaria beta
A giant tauren named Flaskataur, Esq. is selling glyphs for your class in Orgrimmar, Stormwind and the Valley of the Four Winds. For some classes, he offers cosmetic glyphs. If you are a monk, hunter, mage, priest, or shaman, you can now customize your character's skills in various ways. As you can see above, monks can glyph a new flight form called Zen Flight. Other examples include the Glyph of Marking that turns the Hunter's Mark into a bull's-eye, and the shaman's Chain Heal spell looks like water with the Glyph of Deluge. Check out the complete list of vanity glyphs at Wowhead News. Flaskataur, Esq. will only show you the glyphs for the class you talk to him with. Prices are 4 silver each. He's live on the latest Mists of Pandaria beta build right now, looming over everyone in a conspicuous location. So if you're in the beta, you can try the new glyphs out for yourself. It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
Mists of Pandaria: First raid testing schedule announced
Blizzard has announced the times of the first raid testing sessions for the Mists of Pandaria beta. Normal 10-man Stone Guard in Mongu'shan Vaults will be tested for two sessions this Friday, June 22. More details as to how to be ready are in the initial announcement. Daelo For Friday, June 22 we'll be testing just one encounter, the 10 player Normal difficulty version of the Stone Guard encounter in Mogu'shan Vaults. There will be further opportunities to test this encounter. Think of today as a warmup! The encounter should be available at approximately the listed times below for all Beta Test Realms, regardless of suggested geographical region. Early Session: 10:30 PDT (13:30 EDT, 19:30 CEST) Late Session: 16:00 PDT (19:00 EDT, 01:00 CEST) As always, this testing schedule is very fluid. We might have to change the time of a testing session due to various issues with bugs, builds, server hardware issues, designers being sick, class issues, etc. Keep an eye on this forum for the latest information. source Will you be joining in on the testing fun? [Via MMO-Champion] It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
Spiritual Guidance: Mists of Pandaria and the evolution of a shadow priest
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Spiritual Guidance for discipline, holy and shadow priests. On alternate Wednesdays, shadow priesting expert Fox Van Allen comes from out of the shadows to bask in your loving adoration. Ladies and gentleman, I have returned! I know the wait was absolutely excruciating, and though Dawn Moore was an apt replacement for a week, it's like getting a hit of methadone instead of your pure Fox Van Heroin. This week, I hope you'll bear with me, because I'd like to tell you a bit of a story: the story of how one Fox Van Allen found a game called World of Warcraft and of how his approach to the game changed throughout the year. There's a message buried in there somewhere, I promise. Anyway, think back to it -- your first day of WoW. Maybe you played a priest since the very beginning, but for me, it was a warrior. Priests, so far as I was concerned, were a healing class. And I wanted to break stuff. So, there me were. Me Fox. Me smash! But me no happy. Warrior make Fox sad. No like fight boomchicken close up. Want ranged attack! Control chicken mind! Make fall off cliff! Boomkin sadness fun for Fox!
Blizzard soliciting Pandaria class balance feedback
Community Manager Zarhym has posted a thread over on the official forums soliciting player class balance feedback based on their experiences and number crunching in the beta. Mind you, this is not meant to be a simple thread for pleading for buffs to your favorite ability. Blizzard's looking for serious theorycrafters slinging serious math to justify their positions. In addition, while this thread does mean the dev team feels numbers are in a solid place right now, it does not mean beta class balance is done or that further issues won't be addressed. Right now, the devs want to give player beta testers a chance to run wild, crunch numbers, and reconcile their data with Blizzard's data. Read on after the break for the full text of Zarhym's post, and if you have some serious analysis to share, go post in that thread.
The Queue: Let's do the Mario
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today. One day, I'd like to write a post-apocalyptic short story wherein the only thing that has appeared on broadcast television for 100 years is The Super Mario Bros. Super Show. Is it a terrible idea? Yes. But that's the point. john14 asked: Is there a list somewhere of the items seen on the BMAH? I'm very curious to see what all is going to be listed on it.
Shifting Perspectives: Lifebloom is like broccoli, and other lies my mother told me
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Shifting Perspectives for cat, bear, restoration and balance druids. This Tuesday, Lifebloom prevents vitamin deficiencies. When I was a small child growing up on the mean streets of a rural farming community, my mother used to hector me into eating my vegetables. "You'll get rickets if you don't eat your broccoli," she said. "Children in some parts of the world would kill to have string beans," she said. "You'll flunk your SATs if you don't eat zucchini," she said. So I'd choke the stuff down in resentful silence, assuming that dessert would be forthcoming in the typical quid pro quo of the childhood dinner table. (My lawyer father lived to regret teaching that phrase to small children.) It took me until freshman biology to realize that my mother was exaggerating the odds of developing scurvy if we didn't eat a sufficient quantity of vegetables at every meal. And you know what? Playing a resto druid on the beta is kind of like being a small child getting Lifebloom and Harmony endlessly stuffed into your face. In the meantime, there's a bowl of deep-fried, bacon-crusted, chocolate-dipped Wild Mushrooms just ... out ... of ... your ... reach on the table. I ate the green stuff, Blizz. Now where's my dessert?
Mists of Pandaria Beta: Valley of the Four Winds
Valley of the Four Winds is the second zone players will find themselves in when leveling through Mists of Pandaria. The quests in the Valley start at level 86, but the valley is a little different than most leveling zones we're used to. Instead of being restricted to the Valley of the Four Winds, the zone is tied into Krasarang Wilds to the south, and the two zones act like sister sub-zones, each with its own storyline that eventually unites at the end. If this sounds a little confusing, it isn't as you're playing through it. At the beginning of the zone, players will encounter four characters all looking for the elusive Hidden Master. In an effort to find him more quickly, the four characters split and follow the paths of the four winds to the north, south, east and west. Players can choose to continue in the valley to find the two characters tucked away in the farmlands, or they can head south to Krasarang and find the other two characters. Each character has their own sub-story arc, and each arc weaves together into a seamless story. Head whichever way you want -- the leveling is fun any way you go! In the meantime, take a look at our gallery for a selection of screenshots from the verdant farmlands, hills and forests of the Valley of the Four Winds. %Gallery-158568% It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
Ghostcrawler on holy paladins in Mists of Pandaria
Holy paladins have some questions as to where their healing is going in Mists of Pandaria -- and Ghostcrawler, like the last son of Krypton, has burst onto the scene to answer them. Yes, that's what Superman does: He bursts through stone walls and answers questions about holy paladins. Dr. Street (that's his secret identity -- shh, don't tell anyone) offers details on paladin healing and mana cost, why certain abilities like Holy Radiance were nerfed, and the critical chance of Holy Shock. It seems that paladin healing is intended to be balanced around its many mana-discounted or outright free effects. While if a paladin and another healer both just stood there and cast their cheapest heal, the paladin would indeed run out of mana sooner, the design of the class is intended so that they won't do that, so design has to be balanced around those free heals. I won't pretend to be an expert, but the premise seems logical enough. Ghostcrawler also mentions specifically that the Holy Radiance and Holy Shock spells are being looked at and could be adjusted if they're underperforming. You'll find the entire post reproduced here after the break, so you paladin healers (or any healers who are interested) can take a look and see what you think.
Arcane Brilliance: 4 things I'm going to miss the most in Mists of Pandaria
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Arcane Brilliance for arcane, fire and frost mages. This week, we're discussing a sad topic: loss. Not that this is a new feeling for mages. We've loved and lost before; everyone pour one out for Wand Specialization. You were too beautiful to die. Every time there's a new expansion, we get some new toys to play with. We tend to focus on these shiny new abilities or revamped mechanic -- and rightly so, as they are often pretty spiffy. But I fear we sometimes forget the casualties. For when Blizzard giveth, it also tends to taketh away. Spells are replaced, redundant talents vanish, and mechanics change, and as a mage, I always feel somehow diminished when I see a blank page in my spellbook -- even if it's a page that used to be occupied by something as useless as Arcane Fortitude or Amplify Magic, those ancient relics of fail. Mists of Pandaria will be no exception. We're gaining some awesomeness but losing a few things too. And some of those things, I'm really, truly going to miss.
The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Level 90 in the Mists of Pandaria Beta
Every week, WoW Insider brings you The Care and Feeding of Warriors, the column dedicated to arms, fury and protection warriors. Despite repeated blows to the head from dragons, demons, Old Gods and whatever that thing over there was, Matthew Rossi will be your host. I'm taking the week off from my Cataclysm postmortem to go back to Mists of Pandaria's beta and talk about what level 90 is like so far. So far, I definitely prefer protection. It's far better for rage generation whether tanking or soloing, and once you get used to using Shield Block and Shield Barrier actively to lower incoming damage, it feels fairly strong for tanking. I definitely wouldn't call it overpowered, but it works, it holds aggro, and you can stay alive decently against most trash and bosses. Shado-Pan Monastery on heroic seemed doable, although I'm not sure how much of that was the instance compensating for my leveling gear. Arms works better than fury because arms ends up with more rage than fury does. Even with Bloodthirst generating 10 rage again, I spent a lot of time simply unable to do anything but hit Bloodthirst on cooldown and wait for it to come off cooldown so I could use it again. Having to get two or even three Bloodthirsts off before I could hit another ability made the spec feel absolutely neutered. Yes, I'm in a mix of leveling greens and blues, but the whole point of the rage redesign was to make rage less streaky. As it stands, fury will not be viable for someone newly 90.
Mists of Pandaria Beta: Captain Placeholder gets a promotion
As you may already know, Jade Forest is disabled in the current Mists of Pandaria beta build. If you, like me, left several level 85s standing around the place while you leveled to 90 on one, you'll be teleported out (in my case, I was ported to the nearby Valley of the Four Winds), and you'll need to find a way back to Orgrimmar or Stormwind. Once there, you'll need to find Adm'rl Placeholder, the Most Interesting Questgiver in the World. He doesn't often give quests, but when he does, they're memorable. Some of you may remember him from his days as a Captain. The Adm'rl offers a quest which, when accepted, teleports you back to the Valley of the Four Winds, this time to speak to Private Tim P. O'Rary, who will upon completion of the conversation quest (you may have to wait a few minutes for him to recognize you) will immediately boost you to level 86. Enjoy questing in the Valley, the Krasarang Wilds and of course the new leveling dungeons. I'm so glad that Placeholder got a promotion, I cannot even tell you. He's found in the trade district next to the AH in Stormwind and just outside Garrosh's playhouse for the Horde. It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
Mists of Pandaria Beta: The new endgame
Mists of Pandaria has a whole new story on a brand new continent with inhabitants that we've never really been able to interact with before. We've mentioned the leveling experience, we've mentioned the shift away from the linear nature of quests in Cataclysm, and we've mentioned some of the cool moments you'll see as you level. And let's face it -- there are a lot of cool moments. Leveling in Pandaria feels completely different from leveling in Cataclysm. Jade Forest serves as the starting zone and the literal impetus, in terms of story, for what drives you to the rest of Pandaria. Without the events of Jade Forest, the rest of the zones simply would not happen. In fact, without the events in Jade Forest, I suspect the rest of Pandaria would have been largely uneventful. The key lies in our arrival, which is a shift in the direction of the storytelling. We aren't reacting to traumatic events anymore; we're the cause of them. But it's the endgame that has changed so significantly that it's unlike anything we've ever seen before -- and it's changed for the better.
Ghostcrawler explains Mists of Pandaria dungeon changes
In Mists of Pandaria, there are no level 90 normal mode dungeons. There are normal dungeons, but those are leveling content. Once you hit level 90, you're expected to be geared enough to start in on heroics, because those are tuned for players to be able to step in and run them. In order to explain how this all works, Ghostcrawler took to the forums to answer some questions. Ghostcrawler - Why take away regular queues at 90? There are no level 90 regular dungeons. The Mists of Pandaria heroic dungeons are easier than the Cataclysm heroic dungeons.* Once we made that decision, we thought that having two versions of the level 90 dungeons (normal and heroic) didn't make sense because they would be very similar in difficulty and offer similar loot. We thought about calling them something besides "heroic," since heroic tends to mean hard to a lot of players, but we also needed to call them something, because some dungeons like Temple of the Jade Serpent have a lower-level and a level 90 version. We thought about calling them "level 90 versions" but figured "heroic" required less explanation. (We also could have dispensed with lower level dungeons, or made lower level versions of the level 90 dungeons, but we felt like both solutions were just to make the nomenclature of "heroic" more clear, which seemed like bad reasons.) TLDR: Some Mists of Pandaria dungeons have lower level and level 90 versions. Others just have level 90 versions. In both cases, the level 90 versions are called "heroic." * - If you like very difficult dungeons, Challenge Modes are targeted at you. source And in case you're wondering, he also explains challenge modes in more detail as well as explaining why Blizzard has decided to tweak what you can queue for at 90. As always, even if you can't queue for something, you can always walk or ride up to the door and zone in that way. I remember when that was the only way you could run a dungeon. I also remember when all my gear was "of the Bear." I'm old, is what I'm saying. It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
The Queue: We've got nothing better to do
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Elizabeth Wachowski will be your host today. A point to ponder today: How come the quality of television has improved so dramatically in the past 10 to 15 years? Television in the 1970s and 1980s was widely considered trashy, and being a movie star was so much more sophisticated than being a TV star. Sure, there were a few groundbreaking comedies like All in the Family and M*A*S*H, but the concept of television as an art form didn't really take off until near the turn of the millennium, around the time of The Sopranos and HBO really putting effort into its original programming. When was the last time you saw a movie more riveting than Breaking Bad or funnier than Arrested Development? Just something to think about next time you're complaining about Teen Mom. sergel92 asked: What could Blizzard do to make the other faction cities more appealing for players and force them to actually visit them?
Mists of Pandaria Beta: New collector's edition pet and mount uncovered
The latest beta build for Mists of Pandaria has uncovered the name of the potential Collector's Edition pet and possible mount as well. The enterprising folks over at Wowhead dug up the latest info from the build, including a change to the placeholder MoP CE pet and MoP CE mount spells. The pet has been updated to a Lucky Quilen Cub, and the mount has been updated to an Imperial Quilen, which changes depending on your riding skill. Please note, these are still labeled as placeholders, so they may not be in the final product. Although we haven't seen any potential models for either of these creatures, the quilen are the lion-like companions of the mogu, one of the villainous races of the new expansion. You can see what the quilen look like in the screencap above. As with just about every new creature I run into in Pandaria, I pretty much wanted to throw a saddle on this thing from the first moment I laid eyes on it, so needless to say, I'm happy with the choice. I didn't really need any more convincing to get the Collector's Edition of Mists of Pandaria. Frankly, the soundtrack pieces I've heard plus the potential of a new art book were more than enough to snag my interest. But the possibility of both a pet and a mount have sealed the deal, so to speak. Edit: Wowhead has now updated their post with a 3D rendition of the model for the mount. Please note, there are no textures for the mount as of yet, but you can get an idea of how the armor sits on it, anyway! It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
A First Look at Mists of Pandaria Professions: Inscription
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Gold Capped, in which Fox Van Allen and Basil "Euripides" Berntsen aim to show you how to make money on the Auction House. Feed Fox's ego by emailing him, tweeting him at @foxvanallen, or sacrificing your first-born to him. I know there's some disagreement between myself and Basil over this, but inscription is hands down my favorite profession. That's not really because I like the process of finding or buying herbs, and I absolutely detest the whole milling procedure. It's because I like money. Inscription made me stupid rich. So, it would only follow then that I have great interest in what scribes will be up to come Mists of Pandaria. After all, Cataclysm brought the advent of the ultra-profitable and high-demand Mysterious Fortune Cards, so Blizzard must have something cool up its sleeves for this next expansion, too, right? Well ... sort of! I mean, let's face it, Mysterious Fortune Cards are a pretty big bar to set. That being said, there's some serious love coming scribes way in terms of new things to sell, new items to equip, and new, fun things to have fun with. But don't take my word for it. See for yourself.
Lichborne: 3 quick fixes death knights need for Mists of Pandaria
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done. We still don't have an official release date for Mists of Pandaria, but conventional wisdom says it's going to be out before the summer's over. I tend to agree with that, so it's getting the point where we have to assume we have two to three months to see our class really where we want it to be before the game goes live. I have to say, I'm not as optimistic as I could be. The players and developers seem to be at loggerheads to what the real issues of the death knight class are or even if it has any major ones at all. Still, the blues have also shown that they may be coming around to at least some of our points of view, so in the interests of figuring out our major problems (and realizing we're running out of time to do any major revamps), I offer three quick fixes that might hold the class over for a few content patches in lieu of any major class mechanics changes.
Mists of Pandaria Beta: The Jade Forest
Beta testers have been getting a peek at what Mists of Pandaria has to offer for a few months now. The quest chains, storylines, new features and individual rewards in Mists of Pandaria are amazing enough, but what really sets this expansion apart is the scenery. Pandaria is nothing like anything we've seen in Azeroth to date. While it doesn't have the stark, alien landscapes of Outland, Pandaria's got the kind of lush green scenery I love to see, offering a much more relaxing quest backdrop than Cataclysm's shattered landscapes. The first zone both Horde and Alliance players will encounter is the Jade Forest. Unlike the prior two expansions, players of both factions will start in the same zone, albeit at opposite ends. Don't worry about being cramped, however; as you can see from our gallery, the Jade Forest is huge. Featuring dozens of new quest areas that stretch the length of the zone, the expansion presents players with little problem being drawn into the first arc of Pandaria's story -- nor, as evidenced by the small smattering of images in our gallery, will players have a lack of incredibly beautiful things to look at. %Gallery-157916% I don't know about you guys, but there is something so foreign yet so familiar to Pandaria that I can't help but fall in love. I haven't gotten to level in a lush green area since Sholazar Basin, so I'm terribly happy with what I've seen so far, and I can't wait to play through it once it's released. It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!
Bucket list preparation for Mists of Pandaria
We may not have a release date just yet, but Mists of Pandaria is progressing quite nicely on the beta servers. I have one level 90 character already, and I'm leveling another one through just to see the changes, note any bugs I happen to still see hanging around (of which there are very few so far!) and get another look at the story behind the expansion as it plays out. It's fun, it's keeping me very busy, and sometimes I tend to forget that there's another Azeroth that I really ought to be addressing: the live one, where all my junk is at. I hate organizing things in game, which is really kind of odd because my life out here in the real world is pretty organized. I keep the house very clean and tidy. My library is organized in tidy sections by author, and my kitchen is immaculate. In fact, I get kind of annoyed when things aren't terribly organized or tidy at home. But in-game, I just can't seem to bring myself to addressing what is becoming an ever-increasing issue, and I'm really dragging my feet on getting ready for Mists. Getting ready? Yes, you heard me right -- I've found that if I want a seamless experience when I pick up an expansion and start to play, preparing beforehand is key. Plus, it gives me something to do while I'm waiting for the expansion to come out.
Arcane Brilliance: Bombs and tempests on the Mists beta
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Arcane Brilliance for arcane, fire and frost mages. This week, we're discussing my favorite kinds of mage spells: the ones that blow things up real good. Namely, warlocks. I like the spells that blow up warlocks. This should not come as any sort of surprise to anyone, ever. I don't know about you, but I didn't roll a mage for the free strudel. I'm not going to lie; the prospect of magical baked goods didn't hurt. Unlimited pie is something of a draw for me. But when I chose mage for my first character lo those many dead warlocks ago, I did so because I wanted to make pixels explode in spectacular fashion. And my mage certainly didn't disappoint. Over the years, I've thrown my share of Pyroblasts, Frostfire Bolts, and Arcane Explosions, and the resulting pixel explosions have been quite satisfactory. Still, I'm nothing if not greedy. In my opinion, when it comes to exploding pixels, more is always better. And so, when I learned of the new talents, the ones I was secretly most excited by were the three bomb talents we were choosing between at level 75. The worst part? I had to choose just one.
