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PTR Notes: No cyborz in the Deeprun Tram
What did Skazarund do to get banned from the PTR? All he did wrong was cyborz, man. Cyborz, if you didn't know, is a little bit of the digital hanky-panky. The Internet in-and-out, if you will. The networked nookie, know what I mean?All joking aside, apparently that's true-- Timbal says the test realms are for "testing new game content and functionality, not your abilities to write romance novels." Now, I'm not a huge fan of cybersex or anything (the real thing seems much more fun), but there are people out there that do it, and as long as they don't hurt anyone, I'm fine with leaving them alone. Does Blizzard really feel the need to ban anyone who gets it on on the PTR? Is it somehow more wrong there than on the live servers?Skaz may have been obscene in some way, and if so, then yeah-- he broke the terms of service, and a ban is in order. But if he's just gettin' it on, RP-style, baby, is that really being "disruptive or counterproductive to testing"?
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Beyond Patch 2.2: Schwick's compilation of verified info
Patch 2.2, currently in testing on the PTR, has some great improvements like voice chat and reporting AFK'ers in Battlegrounds. What it doesn't have is any new, big, sexy chunk of playable content. So when are we going to see the post-Karazhan 10-main raid zone, Zul'Aman? New Heroic Badge rewards? Guild banks? Oh, we already know that last one.Forum MVP Schwick on the WoW European forums has compiled a list of known updates in Patch 2.3 and beyond. He often provide reference links to his sources form many of his future patch notes, which makes him an information god in my book.He also goes on to list all the verified information about the WotLK expansion. I thought I had read all the info that was out already, but on Schwick's list I found items I didn't know, like the fact that Blizzard has a plan to deal with the fact that the Horde doesn't have a fear ward. Or that Naxxramas, the last raid zone introduced before TBC launched, will be repurposed in the new expansion. Or that new shaders will be introduced for shinier graphics. Mmm, sparkles.Check out Schwick's post if you want to get a look ahead about what's known for future patches.Screenshot of Zul'Aman boss models courtesy of MMO-Champion.com.
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Test a spec for free or try a new class on the PTR
When the Public Test Realm is up, any player who has had an active account since November 2006 can copy their character over to help test the new update. During the Patch 2.1 Public Test phase, I copied my L64 feral druid over and respecced to Balance. Fortunately, I had a decent set of Balance gear with me and was able to give the spec a good test drive. I enjoyed it enough that I eventually went Balance when I hit L70 on the live servers.With Patch 2.2 currently on the Public Test Realm, Blizzard is allowing players to copy up to 4 premade L70 characters to the Test Realm. This time, I decided to see what it was like to play some other classes I long admired, so I copied a shaman, a priest and a rogue. Each toon starts out with a full set of raid gear and PvP gear for different specs as well as plenty of trinkets, rings, weapons, drink, bandages and gems. They also get epic mounts, both land and air. They have none of their talent points assigned, so you can spec them immediately, but you will have to find a trainer to get the higher levels of any spells/abilities you pick up in your talent tree.Read on for my impressions on each class after the jump.
PTR VOIP on PPC is GTG
Just a note for you running WoW on the older Macs out there-- PowerPC Macs were the last to run WoW's built in voice chat system on the PTR, and as of build 7125 (the latest, I believe), voice chat now works.If you're running one of those fancy shmancy new MacBook Pros with the Intel processors, you don't care, and if you're running WoW in Windows, well I'm sorry (did I mention that I'm also writing for our blogosphere cousin TUAW now?). But for those of you running PowerPC Macs, feel free to load up the PTR and do some voice chatting.Was the headline too confusing? "Public Test Realm Voice-over-Internet-Protocol on PowerPC is good to go."
PTR Notes: Updates for 8/16
Me again, keeping you up to date on the latest PTR changes. A new build went live today; what exciting surprises did it have in store for us? Well, not much, I'm afraid: a few bug fixes and some nerfs to the Tempest Keep dungeons. See for yourself: Tempest Keep Arcatraz The Devastate cast by Unbound Devastators is now Physical damage. The recast time for the Defeaning Roar spell cast by Unbound Devastators has been increased on Heroic mode. Wrath-Scryer Soccothrates' Knock Away can no longer be dodged or parried. This will help prevent the catastrophic placement of multiple flames on top of each other. Harbinger Skyriss cast his Fear spell less often. Botanica The time between casting of Thorngrin the Tender's Hellfire has been increased. The time between casting of Thorngrin the Tender's Sacrifice has been increased in Heroic Mode. Thorngrin the Tender's Enrage ability now increases his melee damage by 75% instead of 110%. Mechanar The Arcane Servants summoned by Sunseeker Netherbinders are now properly classified as Arcane Elementals, deal less melee damage and have fewer hit points. The Eye Phoenix-Hawk Hatchlings now Wing Buffet less frequently. Crimson Hand Centurions now deal less damage with Arcane Flurry. Crimson Hand Battle Mages have had their Frost Attack damage reduced.
WoW Insider's PTR voice chat hands on
Voice chat is now available on the 2.2 PTR, so I downloaded the test realms, rolled up a gnome Warlock, and put on my Logitech headset to try it out. What I found was a pretty intuitive voice chat system that does most everything Blizzard promised to do, and will likely replace Teamspeak or Ventrilo for a lot of smaller guilds.Unfortunately, it's complicated enough that it probably won't be extremely widespread-- players who haven't found the need to join up on voice chat yet probably still won't feel a need to do so. But for guilds who don't want to pay for a separate server and friends who group together often, the ingame voice chat should work just fine.The rest of my impressions, including a complete walkthrough on how the chat system works, are after the jump.
PTR Notes: Changes for 8/10
More PTR changes! Hooray! This time it's the US forums that have the newest notes, which appear to have been changed from the last version only in the Professions and Quests sections. Here are the modifications: [Jewelcrafting] A new recipe for Steady Talasite is now available from the Halaa vendors, at the cost of research tokens. This superior green gem grants resilience and stamina. [Blacksmithing] Added a new recipe for Ragesteel Shoulders that drops from an unknown creature in Shadowmoon Valley. [Blacksmithing] Reduced the number of pieces required to get the benefits of the Ragesteel set bonus. [Engineering] Reduced the cooldown on the engineer-made Parachute Cloak. Quests: Banish the Demons now rewards either a Darkrune or a Fragmented Darkrune. Five fragmented Darkrunes can be combined to create a Darkrune. In the Bomb Them Again quest, the cooldown of the Skyguard bombs was decreased to 5 seconds (was 10). In the Relic's Emanation quest, the money reward was decreased while the Ogri'la faction reward was increased. No major changes, then. Go forth and test the voice chat!
Voice chat FAQ
We all have questions about the new voice chat features that's coming in patch 2.2. Helpfully, Blizzard has posted a FAQ, answering many of these very questions. Some of them are fairly obvious ("What is the new voice chat feature in World of Warcraft?"), but several answer things I was genuinely curious about: Q: Can I speak in more than one channel at a time? A: While you can join multiple chat channels, you can only have voice chat enabled in one channel at a time. You can switch voice chat between channels by using the new chat interface found in the social window, or by clicking on the voice chat options button located near the mini-map. Q: As a parent or guardian, how can I control my children's access to the voice chat feature? A: Parents and guardians have the ability to manage voice chat via the parental control system found on the official World of Warcraft website. You can turn voice chat off entirely or allow your children to listen but not speak in voice chat. The voice chat feature defaults to "off." If parental controls are enabled on an account, you will need to turn on voice chat via the parental control system (found in the account-management section of WorldofWarcraft.com) before it can be used in the game. Q: Does voice chat work in guild chat or when using the "/say" command to talk to characters in your immediate vicinity? A: At this time, the integrated voice chat feature does not work in guild chat, "/say," global defense, trade, or any public chat channel. However, we may look into offering voice chat functionality for the guild chat channel in the future. Q: Do raid leaders have moderator rights? A: Yes, raid leaders have moderator rights and can mute players in the raid voice chat channel for all other players in that channel. Q: Can I mask my voice? A: Voice masking is not currently available. This is a feature we are looking into and may consider for the future. The entire FAQ is posted after the cut. Are you excited about voice chat?
PTR Notes: New 2.2 features, including anti-AFK
The test realms for patch 2.2 grind on, and it looks like a new build is being pushed, since the patch notes on the European forums got updated. Here are the changes I found in the new notes; some we knew were around, like voice chat, and some we had been promised, like anti-AFK measures for battlegrounds. Voice Chat - The new Voice Chat feature is now available in game. Players will need to go into the options menu under Sound & Voice to activate it. Volume sliders are available for the microphone, speakers, and game-audio fade (which automatically lowers the game audio when a voice communication is received), as is a "push-to-talk" setting. Right-clicking on a player's name now includes the option to mute or unmute that player. Muting another player blocks all voice chat from him or her; the ignore feature now blocks both voice chat and text chat from that player. Chat Channels- New Chat Channel controls and functionality are now available under the chat tab in the Social Window of the interface. The interface will now show the channels players are in or are available, depending on the area of the world they are in, along with new private channel controls. A new feature for reporting players as being AFK in battlegrounds by right clicking has been added. When enough reports are registered, a 30 second debuff will begin to count down. Once the timer is up a new debuff will appear that will prevent the player from gaining any honor while it is on. This debuff can be negated as soon as the player engages in combat.
Around Azeroth: Let the bodies hit the floor
Reader Chris was just logging on to the public test realms to check out the arena vendors when he stumbled into this scene. So take this word of advice -- if you're simply interested in examining new vendor items, perhaps copying your characters over to the PvP test realm isn't the best idea. Otherwise you'll never manage to find the vendors for the corpses! Do you have a unique shot of Azeroth or Outland that you'd like to show off to the rest of the world? Tell us about it by e-mailing aroundazeroth@gmail.com! Or perhaps you'd just like to see more of your pics from Around Azeroth. %Gallery-1816%
PTR Notes: Kill command bugged
This is a weird, weird bug. Over on the PTRs, Tig has found that every time he tells his pet to drop the Kill Command, the mob attacked also executes the spell on its target. For example, if Tig is shooting a murloc, and his pet Ganjii is in melee with that murloc, Ganjii's Kill Command will attack the murloc, and then the murloc will somehow also drop a Kill Command attack on its target (in this case Ganjii).That's a big bug, because if you move it to, say, a boss, a Hunter could drop the Kill Command on the boss while the main tank's health is low, which would cause the boss to instantly attack the main tank, in effect wiping the raid. Not cool.Hortus wonders if it's just against specific mobs, but that's the last we hear of Blue-- there's no confirmation that it's a known bug and that they're planning a fix. Of course, it is the test realm, so let's not get too excited-- chances are that by the time this big patch reaches the live servers, this won't still be happening. But if you happen to be hitting the Kill Command with your pet on the test realms, watch out for that extra attack.Thanks, Colin!
PTR Update: Hortus confirms and denies
Hortus has posted a sticky about the current PTR issues which addresses a lot of problems in and questions about 2.2. Most notably, he has confirmed that Zul'Aman and Guild Banks will not be in patch 2.2. He also has confirmed that Voice Chat will still be in 2.2, but it is not yet available for testing on the test server.In addition, Hortus addressed some of the problems people are having with premade character copies. Hortus says that if you get an error when trying to copy a premade, the queue is full and to try again later. He does not address why the error message doesn't just say that...Also, it seems that even though some premade characters are missing abilities or have abilities they are not supposed to have, they do not intend to fix them at this time.Side note not mentioned by Horus: Copying characters that are not premade to the test realms is also on a several day wait.Hortus denies that the Orc Shoulders are now bigger than before the bug: Orc shoulders are now the correct size, they are not any larger than they were before, it's your imagination. He also addresses Athlon errors, authentication issues and how not to get your post deleted.It seems that with all of these issues and Voice Chat not even being tested yet, Patch 2.2 is a long way off. What are you most looking forward to or dreading in 2.2? Have you successfully copied a premade? If so, any problems and how long did it take?
Voice chat coming soon to the PTRs
We missed it on Friday afternoon, but apparently voice chat is coming in 2.2. Previously, we'd heard that Zul'Aman and guild banks weren't showing up until 2.3, but there wasn't official word on when voice chat was arriving. PTR players have reported seeing a voicechat interface, but of course it hasn't been hooked up to any code yet.But Hortus now says we'll be seeing voice chat ingame sooner than we thought-- it will be coming soon to a PTR near you, and pending testing, should go live with 2.2. Wow. Blizzard must have done a lot of work on that behind the scenes, assuming that it is what they promise: a fully featured builtin voice chat client. Think it's coincidence that there have been a few sound bugs on the test realms lately?Which means that at some point we'll have to ask this question: What will happen to Teamspeak and Ventrilo? There's a nice bit of industry there-- players pay for servers all over the place, and while each server is pretty cheap, altogether they add up to a nice chunk of change, I'm sure. My guess is that TS and Vent aren't going anywhere (because players are so used to them, and not just in WoW), but until we see what kind of interface Blizzard has created, we won't know if they're worth leaving or not. Seeing as it's the PTRs, we should get a chance to play with it soon. [ via WorldofWar.net ]
Current issues on the 2.2 PTRs
On the Test Realm Forums, Hortus has compiled a list of all known issues on the PTRs. While bugs are never fun, the good news here is that they're all being investigated by Blizzard QA, and we can hope they'll be fixed well before patch 2.2 hits the live realms. Items of note include: Many items have pink textures. Orc Shoulders are too small -- yes, it is a bug! Resilience is reducing dot damage by more than indicated Druid Cat form range is inconsistent. Rogue Seal Fate is not working. Hunter Feign Death is not immediately dropping aggro. But for a full list, you'll want to see Hortus' post!
Premade characters now available on the PTR
Premade level 70 characters with "high level raid dungeon equipment" are now available to be copied to the US Public Test Realms.There are two catches:1) You have to have The Burning Crusade in order to copy and test these characters because they are level 70.2) There seems to be a 3 day wait time.Do you want to play with Patch 2.2 sporting some free epics? Go here and start the copy process. Blizzard asks that you allow the copy process to finish before logging into the Test Realm. There is a Copy Status page where you can check your progress.This is an excellent opportunity to not only play with the new features (and bugs) in 2.2, but also to try out a class/race combo you may be considering rolling -- all tricked out in purples.Have fun! ... in 3 days...
PTR Notes: Rogue's Blind change changed back
From the "some-of-the-people-happy-all-of-the-time file," you may have noticed a fun little change under the Rogue notes in patch 2.2: "Blind duration reduced to 8 seconds, cooldown reduced to 1 minute, Blinding Powder is no longer required to use." Blind with only a minute cooldown? With no reagent cost? Sounds good to my PvP Undead Rogue.But most people didn't like the sound of spending all that time disoriented, so this weekend, the forums opened up with the QQ rain. Even some Rogues agreed that they didn't use Blind that often, and that the reagent costs didn't bother them that much (I know I always have tons of it from pickpocketing-- it's the Flash Powder that I never have enough of). And yet when Neth announced that the change that was in the patch notes hadn't actually been implemented on the PTR (here are the new official patch notes, sans Blind changes), the whole situation flipped-- Rogues decided that they did want the Blind change, and other classes cheered that a change they weren't sure would affect them negatively had ever existed in the first place.Should Blind be changed? I tend to agree with most people's opinions-- it works right now, so why bother with it? But all the outrage and the flip-flopping on the PTR (a place that is supposed to be full of experimentation) just brings up the point I made on the last PTR: have a little patience, people. The PTRs are a place to test ideas on a massive scale, and since this change never actually appeared on the PTRs, all the commentary on it actually came from people who'd never actually played with it in the first place.
Griftah being evicted from the Lower City
Anyone who has spent any time tradeskilling in Shattrath has probably run across the Troll merchant, Griftah. Since Burning Crusade came out, Griftah has called a spot near the mana loom in Lower City his home. He has hawked many fun and dubious items like [Soap on a Rope] and [Infallible Tikbalang Ward]. (I must say, my banking alt has been blessedly Tikbalang free!) Griftah loved to talk to anyone and everyone who came anywhere near him and suggest various of his charms that he thought you should purchase -- for a price. However, some people took Griftah seriously, and thought that the white items he was selling were indeed able to do special things like give you free Rezzes much like the old Darkmoon Faire Twisting Nether card would as opposed to reading the lines carefully. (like, how it would Resurrect you if you were already next to your corpse in ghost form.) This led to angry forum threads, and people who were screaming about being grifted by Griftah because, surprise -- the white items didn't actually do anything mystical...
BigRedKitty: From the bowels of the patch notes
Using our top secret, highly illegal, and mildly toxic BRK Patch Notes Discombobulator, the highly-trained yet massively underpaid engineers at the BRK Information Warfare Center and Crunchy Cheetos Research Facility have been able to root out the hidden agenda in the latest patch notes distribution. Hold onto your Stylin' Purple Hats, folks; this isn't gonna be pretty. For The Top Ten Totally Provocative Changes Coming in the Next Patch, read on!
WoW 2.2 Mac client in-game video capture
It really seems like Blizzard is taking leaps and strides in their efforts to support some of the fun things we've been doing outside of the game and putting them actually *in* the game.When I read the patch notes and saw that the Mac client was getting in-game video recording, I immediately started my PTR client download. I was not to be disappointed. With the new "Mac Options", I can choose the resolution to record at (600x400 in this case), the framerate, and the compression. I left these as defaults, but chose to turn off the UI, cursor, and sound.Click through for a little more about the process for making the video, or just watch the video above to get an impression of what in-game recording is like.
Patch 2.2 on the PTRs
The next patch, 2.2, has just gone live on the public test realms. So for your reading pleasure, I present you with the terribly exciting patch 2.2 notes. Primarily, this patch seems to be a number of bug fixes and minor tweaks, but it also includes the infamous DoT change and a number PvP-related tweaks (reduction in CC times in PvP is what stands out to me). The patch notes are extremely long, so I won't try to summarize the rest -- check the whole things out after the break.[Thanks, Boubouille!]
