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Mists of Pandaria: Druid Symbiosis updated (includes tables)
The latest beta build includes the most recent changes to the druid Symbiosis spell. Symbiosis, as you may know, is essentially a spell swap between a druid and any other class. It's not done automatically, so if the druid is in a class-run raid group -- a group where there are no duplicate classes -- the druid can choose to give it to any raid team member. In return for this generosity, the druid receives a spell back from the target, which appears on the druid's bars and is currently usable with all the usual restrictions of that spell, such as cooldown, range and similar. The spell distribution follows after the break -- first, the spells that other classes receive from their druid friends.
Lonesome George immortalized in Mists of Pandaria
Syiler from Ace Games has sent us a video of Blizzard's tribute to the last of the Pinta Island giant tortoises. Lonesome George died last month, and as a result, his subspecies is extinct. He was always an icon of the nature conservation movement, but now he's become somewhat of a martyr to rally behind. Blizzard's version of Lonesome George, Lon'li Guju, is spectral and has wings. He flies around Kun'lai summit and will follow you around if you /kiss or /hug him, as Syiler shows in the video. Given that the tortoise only died a month ago, Blizzard has worked quickly to incorporate him into the game. This just shows that there is time for more surprises for us before Sept. 25. [Thanks Syiler!] 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!
Blizzard giving away even more MoP beta keys on Facebook
With today's news of Mists of Pandaria's Sept. 25 release date, there's sure to be a surge of interest in the expansion, and Blizzard is giving you the opportunity to get into the beta before it ends with a new sweepstakes. All you have to do is follow Warcraft on Facebook and complete the entry form, and you're good to go. They'll draw 2,000 names a week, and half of those will receive another key to give to a friend, for a grand total of 15,000 keys. Check out the full Blizzard summary below, and get crackin' if you're not in the beta yet! Mists of Pandaria Beta Key Sweepstakes We've just launched a Mists of Pandaria Beta Key Sweepstakes! Starting July 31, we'll be randomly selecting 2,000 winners each week to receive a key to our exclusive World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria beta test. In addition, every other winner chosen will receive a second key to share with a friend! Drawings will occur every Tuesday for five weeks for a total of 15,000 keys. To enter participants simply need to follow Warcraft on Facebook and complete our official entry form between now and August 27 for a chance to win. For more information about how to participate, check out the sweepstakes rules and eligibility page and our sweepstakes FAQ. source 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!
Watcher explains gold normalization for Mists of Pandaria dungeon bosses
Have you ever noticed that the bosses in the oldest dungeons drop much less gold now that they can be soloed? Blizzard Game Designer Watcher says the developers felt the gold drops were too high for the difficulty of the battles, so they nerfed the amount of gold you can loot in dungeons like Magtheridon. In Mists of Pandaria, rather than retroactively nerfing legacy content, dungeon bosses will drop the same amount of gold per player, regardless of how many players defeat them. So if a boss drops 100g for 25 players, it will drop 20g for 5 players. This change is retroactive for all dungeons from previous content. The full text of Watcher's clarifications as follows. Watcher In general, enemies in raids and dungeons drop significantly more gold than outdoor foes, specifically because we are assuming that the gold is going to be split 5, 10, or 25 ways. As player power rises over time, it obviously becomes possible to complete old content with significantly fewer players, such that the gold rewards become disproportionately high. In the past, our only solution was to drastically reduce the gold dropped by legacy content across the board (e.g., Magtheridon, much of Karazhan, etc.). In Mists, we have a new system in place that normalizes gold yield based on the number of players involved in the kill. If a Black Temple enemy drops 100 gold today on live, and you kill it with a 25-player raid group in Mists, it'll also drop 100 gold and each player will get 4 gold. If you solo Black Temple, that enemy will also give you 4 gold. If you do it with 4 friends, it'll drop 20 gold and each of you will get 4. In other words, the gold obtained from killing raid or dungeon creatures no longer depends upon how many people you bring, or do not bring, with you. This system does not apply to anything in the outdoor world. source Watcher Quote: If this is the case, will the original gold values of the bosses in Gruul's Lair, Magtheridon's Lair and Karazhan be restored so groups will once again get more gold from the boss than from a single trash mob? Yes. source 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: Many pet battle changes in next build
The pet battle quests in the current MoP build are largely incomplete and due for extensive updates in the next build, according to Cory "Mumper" Stockton. One significant change is making the tamer battles account-wide and therefore only completable on one character. This does not apply to the dailies, so individual characters can still complete those quests once per day. [Edited because I originally misinterpreted Mumper's statement, though it is not entirely clear.] The same character who completes the initial battle that opens up the dailies does not have to be the one to complete them. So any other character on your account can still do those quests once per day. (You know, because they're dailies. Captain Obvious needs to stop whispering in my ear.) While Stockton says that "significant updates" will be coming in the next build, he lists highlights of what they "have been working on." This distinction may indicate that some of the updates will not necessarily make it into the next beta patch. Mumper's full post is after the break.
Mists of Pandaria likely to have a Digital Deluxe version
Tipster Patrick sent us a screenshot of the above screen displaying the fact that there will be a Mists of Pandaria Digital Deluxe Edition. While this page typically is not available on the dashboard, we were able to confirm it using a provided custom link (which we are not distributing for security reasons). It is not possible to get anywhere useful after pressing the Digital Purchase button, because the game has not yet gone on sale. While Blizzard has made no official announcement, we believe this means that a digital version of the Collector's Edition will be available containing only the digital parts of the CE. The box shown looks like the Collector's Edition box, which lends credence to this hypothesis. We know nothing (unfortunately) about the release date, pricing, or if this will even exist. But if this is showing up on the Battle.net site, it seems likely. [Thanks, Patrick!] 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 best macro ever
Power Word Gold posted about this today, calling it the last macro your hunter will ever need. They're quite right. The Mists hunter glyph Glyph of Fetch teaches your pet how to fetch. Like any good dog, your pet will learn to scamper gleefully over to whatever you just killed and loot it. This is pretty awesome as far as glyphs go, but it gets even cooler with a macro. And that macro really is, quite simply, the best ever: /targetlasttarget /cast Fetch Woah, people. Like, woah. Push a button, and your pet goes to get your loot. Now all the hunter community needs is another glyph that lets their pets mine, herbalize, skin, and fish. Maybe one that gets them to disenchant all the greens, too. Or do dailies. My hunter suddenly shot up my priority list of leveling alts. Did yours? 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 Dungeon Journals and loot tables at Wowhead
Wowhead has all of the loot tables and Dungeon Journals for the raids and the 5-mans that are new to Mists of Pandaria. The journals are already in the latest patch, and Wowhead has them all up for reading if you don't have access to the beta. Some of the loot highlights include: Dreadwoven Leggings of Failure drop off of the Sha of Fear located in The Terrace of Endless Spring raid dungeon. Feng the Accursed in the Mogu'shan Vaults drops the Hood of Cursed Dreams. The Flashfrozen Rosin Globule drops in the Siege of the Niuzao Temple from Vizier Jin'bak. Does the globule attach to the ear via freezing to it, or is it sticky because of the rosin? /shrug The Dungeon Journals for two new world bosses are there to peruse as well, but they don't include the loot tables. Head on over to Wowhead for the details on the MoP dungeons and loot. Remember that all facets of the beta are subject to change without notice. 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!
48 dailies are 48 dailies too many
Matt Rossi recently posted about Vaneras' blue post regarding questing and dailies. If you didn't catch the original post, here's a rather edited version in the interest of brevity containing just the sections I'm talking about today. Do hit the source link for the full version if you want to. Of these 1300 quests, roughly 300 of them are dailies. ... The dailies are of course randomized, which means that you will never log in and find that you have 300 daily quests to do. We expect that if a player has progressed sufficiently with the neutral factions, and thus advanced to their maximum possible quest availability, you would have around 48 quests available on any given day. source I want to draw your attention to the last line: "48 daily quests available on any given day." Forty-eight daily quests. Of course, the daily cap has also disappeared in Mists, so you can do those 48 quests every day! Lucky, lucky you. And there are 300 or so in total, so they won't be the same every day; you'll get something like one in six, although hopefully it won't be quite that predictable. Why has Blizzard done this? Well, they want to increase the amount of max-level content available to the playerbase. It's an admirable goal, but I can see a few downsides with the daily quest-focused approach they've taken.
Totem Talk: Restoration update and preparing for Mists
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Totem Talk for elemental, enhancement and restoration shaman. Want to be a sultan of swing healing? A champion of Chain Heal? Totem Talk: Restoration, brought to you by Joe Perez (otherwise known as Lodur from World of Matticus and cohost of the For the Lore podcast), shows you how. Did you miss me? I know I missed you! I know you were all super excited about the update to restoration shaman on the beta a couple of weeks ago. I was. We got some good information to mull over. Clarification on one of our new talents along with some numbers for estimated proc rate was a good starting point, and we even got our first glimpse of the tier 14 raid set bonuses. I still believe that the four-piece bonus needs to be revisited, because I think that it will wind up wasted on us for the most part. I'm holding out hope that we'll get an update sometime soonish. That said, we haven't had a whole lot in the way of updates the last few weeks for restoration shaman. Things are starting to slow down, at least for right now. I'm guessing that will change as soon as more raid data gets parsed and verified. We'll see some tweaks, whether it's to spell coefficients or mana regeneration. While it's been slow, there has been at least some news and some blue responses to the current restoration position.
Encrypted Text: Breaking down Shadow Blades
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to email me with any questions or article suggestions you'd like to see covered here. Shadow Blades is the most anticipated new rogue ability in Mists of Pandaria. We're finally learning a new technique for our combat repertoire, instead of simply picking up defensive cooldowns like Smoke Bomb or Combat Readiness. While I'm disappointed to see yet another cooldown in my spellbook, Shadow Blades actually sounds pretty cool. Who doesn't want to deal shadow damage to their enemies, piercing their precious armor in the process? The truth is that while Shadow Blades sounds cool from the tooltip, it fails to live up to these expectations in reality. The damage increase in incredibly minor at best for all three rogue specs, and the gameplay mechanics end up being negligible. While I'm fine with our rotations staying mostly stagnant, many of you were hoping for something new to spark your interest. Shadow Blades seemed to be just the thing rogues needed in Mists. Unfortunately, Shadow Blades ends up writing a check for awesomeness that it is completely unable to cash.
5 things you need to know about Mogu'shan Palace
So, the last time your friendly five things you need to know correspondent stopped by, it was to give you five pieces of useful information about the rollicking barrel of fun that is Stormstout Brewery and its emo sister dungeon Temple of the Jade Serpent. And now we're back, with the first of the level 87 dungeons: Mogu'shan Palace! Well, I say the "first"; you actually get Mogu'shan Palace at the same time as you get Shado-pan Monastery, but Mogu'shan is the easier of the two, in my book. I would argue that its also the more fun one of the pair. As ever, this is not intended as a walk-through. It's more a set of tips so that you can head on into the dungeon armed with just enough knowledge to be dangerous. My aim is to let you explore the dungeon for yourself without spoiling your fun while still alerting you to some useful bits of information. That's enough introducing -- let's get going! We've zoned in, and we're in a square room with some very fancy decoration. There are lots and lots of guys wandering around here. What do we do? 1. Look at your map! Um, yes. Most obvious advice ever? Well, sure, but the reason I'm saying it for this dungeon is that if you're there for a speed run, you can really skip a lot of trash. As long as you're careful about patrols, you really only need to take out about two packs of the seven-ish in the first room, for example. Navigation is a bit complicated in parts of this dungeon, and you can save yourself a lot of time and wiping by watching your map to see where your dungeon party are off to. Oh, and after the first boss, head to the western side of the room. There's a crescent-shaped secret staircase that appears after you've looted the chest. Run down it, and the mobs will most likely give up attacking you and go back to arguing about which clan is the greatest. You can thank me later.
Arcane Brilliance: Weighing the level 90 mage talents
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Arcane Brilliance for arcane, fire and frost mages. This week, we're looking once again at the mage of the future. And just like the mage of the right now, the mage of the future needs two things in abundance: mana and spellpower. Fortunately, the mage of soon™ only has to get to level 90 to get a new way to gain both. You've traversed the wilds of Pandaria. Your mage has decked himself out in shiny new quest reward greens that are better than the purples he farmed Deathwing for months to collect. You've killed X number of mobs, collected X number of inexplicably difficult-to-locate vital organs from those mobs and returned them to people with increasingly tough-to-reconcile reasons to want said organs, killing a potentially genocidal percentage of the warlock population along the way. Now, you're level 90. Your reward is two new abilities. One is Alter Time, which we've already discussed at length. The other is entirely up to you. There are three new choices in your talent ladder to select from. They range from a fresh and infinitely more useful version of Mana Shield to a crazily improved buff for Evocation to a rune of wizardly sparklesauce that you place on the ground and then set up shop there, serving up magical deathfire to all customers forevermore, amen. They sound quite different, but have one thing in common: You press a button, and you get mana and spellpower. I think we can all agree this is a button we want. The question is, which of those three buttons do we want the most? And the next question is, do we want any of them as our capstone talent?
Blizzard clarifies Challenge Mode gear scaling
U.S. blue Watcher has recently been online answering questions about Challenge Mode gear scaling. Blizzard first responded to discussion about the upscaling of old items, confirming that as many suspected, this has been purely for beta testing purposes. Gear above ilevel 463 will be scaled down, but gear below ilevel 463 will be left alone. This certainly means that challenge modes will not be available to those who have only recently started working their way through the dungeon gearing system, and I definitely think that is working as intended. After all, players who aren't experienced at the dungeons they're attempting will likely not do well in challenge mode scenarios. One commenter mentioned that it meant they could choose their favorite tier set bonus. I rather sympathize with that perspective; it would be really cool to have the opportunity to go back and reuse those old set bonuses. In a later post, Watcher went on to clarify how the scaling would work on in the live game. Check it out after the break!
Jaina Proudmoore: Tides of War excerpt
Simon and Schuster has posted an excerpt from Christie Golden's upcoming World of Warcraft novel: Jaina Proudmoore: Tides of War. Like The Shattering did for Cataclysm, Tides of War is expected to be the story that sets the foundation for the Mists of Pandaria lore. As we've reported before, Blizzard announced the book will be released at the end of August, which coincides with Simon and Schuster's release date of "on or around August 28th." You can preorder Tides of War now. We've reprinted the entire excerpt and description after the break.
Mists of Pandaria: Wowhead previews Vale of Eternal Blossoms
The Vale of Eternal Blossoms is the zone for max-level players to hang out and get their endgame faction work done. The Alliance and Horde each have their own settlements, which have every thing you would look for in a major city while also including many level 90 faction hubs. The catch is that the only way to get into the vale is to complete a quest chain for the August Celestials, A Celestial Experience. At the Kun-Lai Summit, you must complete the trials of Xuen the White Tiger in order to gain access. Other points of interest: Mogu'shan Palace, a 5-man dungeon and home to the Lorewalkers Golden Lotus, the faction that continues the quest chain begun with A Celestial experience, while helping to protect the pandaren from the mogu Gate of the Setting Sun (located at The Great Wall), another 5-man dungeon Wowhead News has screenshots and more details in their preview. 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!
Newest World of Warcraft novel gets a release date and cover preview
Jaina Proudmoore is one of the biggest lore figures in World of Warcraft despite the fact that her character history largely consists of trying to make reasonable compromises and being completely ignored. It's no surprise that she's the star of the newest novel based on World of Warcraft considering her prominence in the lore and her relationship to the war between the game's factions. Tides of War is written by Christie Golden and will be released in late August, setting the stage for Mists of Pandaria later this year. While Jaina has always tried to broker a peace between the Alliance and the Horde, the novel's plot revolves around Warchief Garrosh Hellscream launching an attack against Jaina's home in Theramore, demonstrating the same legendary thinking that's alienated several of the Horde's allies. Whether or not the erstwhile diplomat will be able to retain any hopes of a peaceful resolution remains to be seen, but with Mists of Pandaria promising to focus on the conflict between the two factions, it seems likely that players will be looking at silencing the last and loudest voice for peace.
UI addons will be enabled in the next Mists beta patch
Lovers of addons, rejoice! Blizzard blue Vaeflare has confirmed that UI addons will be enabled in the next beta build. Finally, you can reincorporate your favorite addons into your Mists gameplay. Starting with the next Mists of Pandaria beta build, we plan to enable the use of UI addons. So whether you're a savvy addon author or the most discriminating player, there's no time like the present to start planning out your perfect UI. Addon authors should also make sure to check out prominent addon sites such as WoWInterface and Curse for a chance to apply for a Mist of Pandaria beta key. These sites have recently been given a lot of beta keys to distribute specifically to active addon authors. We likewise strongly encourage authors who have access to the beta to start testing out and fine-tuning their addon updates in the beta as soon as possible. If you use an addon and start seeing errors, try downloading the most recent version of it. If you are still having errors, you may need to turn off the addon until it has been updated. source As Vaeflare hints in this blue post, do bear in mind that addons that work beautifully on live servers will likely not work in beta. Mists reworks a great number of game mechanics, so the addon creators are working almost as hard as Blizzard themselves at getting their programs up to scratch. If you're trying out an addon and it's not working, first make sure that you have downloaded the Mists beta version, not the live version. Second, make sure that you have downloaded the latest beta version from the developer's site, or check Wowinterface or Curse for the latest versions. Remember that these addons are in beta themselves and that any bugs you find should be reported to the addon developers via the appropriate channels, not to Blizzard. 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 Daily Grind: Are black market auction houses a good idea?
With World of Warcraft's upcoming Mists of Pandaria comes an interesting addition to the game: a black market auction house. This new type of auction house will allow Blizzard to post rare items from the game for bidding only (no buyouts), and is obviously intended to be a massive gold sink for those who have more money than sense on their hands. While the intent of the black market auction house is understandable, what it's selling has players hotly debating over whether this is a good idea or the spawn of Evil and Mrs. Evil. Raid gear, ultra-rare pets, and other hard-to-attain goods could become easily available for those with large pocketbooks. So let's put it to the bright minds at Massively Labs (that's you): Are black market auction houses a good idea? Is Blizzard setting a trend here or cutting its own feet out from under it? Every morning, the Massively bloggers probe the minds of their readers with deep, thought-provoking questions about that most serious of topics: massively online gaming. We crave your opinions, so grab your caffeinated beverage of choice and chime in on today's Daily Grind!
Arcane Brilliance: Which spec will be best in Mists of Pandaria?
Every week, WoW Insider brings you Arcane Brilliance for arcane, fire and frost mages. This week, we endeavor to answer that age old question: Which spec will other people insist my mage needs to be? We will try not to resort to that age old response to that question, which tended to involve punching those other people in the mouth. One constant, no matter how hard I've tried to ignore it, that has always existed in WoW is that one spec is always "best." The class designers are constantly tweaking the numbers and trying to keep things balanced, but once we all sit down with our collective calculator and spreadsheet, one spec always emerges to rule them all. It has been a sad reality that while we have always had freedom to choose a spec and personalize it to fit our preferences, when it comes time to raid at high levels or take part in PvP at high levels, that freedom essentially vanishes. You can make arguments for utility over damage or for certain specs in certain fights, but in most cases, under most circumstances, you're going with whatever cookie-cutter spec the internet has agreed upon that week, or you're not getting an invite. Well, now we have a fresh expansion to leverage our calculators and spreadsheets upon. It's still early in the beta process, and hard numbers are in short supply. Still, the overall design of the specs seems to be fairly well-defined, even if the actual percentage points are still in flux. What conclusions can we draw at this stage? Which spec looks to put out the best damage? And most importantly, which spec will let us kill warlocks most efficiently?
