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Age of Conan heralds Secrets of Dragon's Spine update series
Hyboria's about to get a lot more rowdy, as if that was possible. Funcom announced that it is planning a series of updates for Age of Conan called Secrets of Dragon's Spine, with the first update coming in the next few months. The key focus for this content will be in the titular desert region of the Dragon's Spine, located southwest of Pteion. These updates will not only introduce a new zone, but also plenty of additional quests, dungeons, challenges, and even a new mount type. Funcom says that the Dragon's Spine will be around the same size as the coast of Ardashir, and will feature a new raid and PvP area. The three dungeons to be introduced are the Coils of Ubah Kan, the Sepulchral of the Wyrm and the Slithering Chaos. Creative Director Craig Morrison hopes that this announcement gets fans pumped up: "Our version of Hyboria has grown into a vast online world since we launched back in 2008. With the Secrets of Dragon's Spine update, we are moving into an incredibly exciting part of Robert E. Howard's work, and I think both Age of Conan players and fans of Howard's work alike will find a lot to enjoy once they get to explore this new content." [Source: Funcom press release]
Star Wars: The Old Republic previews Terror From Beyond
If you can't wait for the next tier of Operations in Star Wars: The Old Republic, you'll be happy to know that the newest tier is being added in update 1.4. You may be slightly less happy to know that the new operation, Terror From Beyond, is not meant to be a cakewalk by any stretch of the imagination. A new developer diary explains the lore behind the operation and some of the threats that players will be facing on the swamp planet of Asation. Colonized and largely abandoned by the Gree, Asation is a swamp planet that houses a massive hyperspace gate. The Dread Masters, a group of Sith not known for sunny dispositions, have opened the gate and started filling the planet with all manner of horrible creatures. The operation promises to offer new encounters and mechanics beyond what's been seen in previous raids, something for dedicated endgame players to look forward to in the next major content update.
How do you make a raid?
Over at this year's Gamescom, I was lucky enough to be among a small group invited to a Blizzard round table on Raids and Dungeons, where we sat down with Blizzard's Lead Encounter Designer Ion Hazzikostas and Lead Game Producer John Lagrave. These two high-end content creators opened the round table by talking the audience through the process of how the Blizzard team goes about making a raid and the trials and tribulations they encounter along the way. This was fascinating to listen to, so I thought I'd share the insights with WoW Insider readers. This is not verbatim quoting throughout, as I simply can't write that fast, but it covers the raid-making process as they described it. How do you make a raid? You start with the lore. Ion and John talked us through the process of making the Firelands raid, so they began from a set of conditions. As Ion put it, "We consider what the idea is. What is this raid going to be about?" So they sit down with the encounter design team as well as the game producers in a meeting room and talk it out.
The Secret World's first raid debuts at Gamescom
Remember that badass CG trailer for The Secret World that featured four of the game's factional NPCs joining forces to duke it out with a big nasty in the remains of New York City? Well, that might be our first clue about TSW's next update. Funcom's new content initiative continues at next week's Gamescom event as the firm will be releasing details of The Secret World's first raid encounter. According to a report at IncGamers, the raid will "involve a giant monster crawling out of the subway system [and] attacking a partially destroyed New York." We don't know for sure whether the old trailer is related to the new raid, but there are a lot of similarities (including an errant subway car and what looks like the blasted remains of the Big Apple). See for yourself after the break.
Leaderboard: Raid vs. small group content
When it comes to partying up in MMOs, it seems like everyone has his or her own preference for what size is ideal. While I've dipped my toes into the waters of raiding, I found it far too chilly and impersonal for my temperament. Yet while I prefer small group instance runs, I'm not blind to the fact that raiding remains immensely popular among part of the population. Small group content offers a more intimate setting for you and a few friends (or strangers with potty mouths) to tackle an instance. Because there are so few of you, each player needs to pull his or her own weight and become a hero. These runs tend to be less stressful and far more accessible to the game's population. On the other hand, raids offer the most challenging content in the game. A raid requires all involved to be geared up, skilled, and knowledgeable in the ways of fight patterns. Participating in one can feel downright epic, especially when you consider that you can see content that many players will never witness. So let's put it to a vote! Which do you prefer: raid or small group content?
Do we need an intermediate raid?
Anyone who raided back in late Wrath remembers the year we all spent in ICC. By the end of that time, it got pretty hairy. However, in the lead up to Cataclysm, we got a surprise raid, The Ruby Sanctum. It wasn't meant to replace ICC as the end raid of Wrath or the Lich King as the end boss of the expansion. No, the Ruby Sanctum and its boss, Halion the Twilight Destroyer, was intended to serve as an introduction of sorts to the Cataclysm that was coming. At the time, I was fairly derisive of Halion. What was the point of another small raid when we already had ICC? I remember doing heroic Halion attempts in July and feeling like the whole thing was a complete waste of time and a sidetrack from ICC. But now that we've had the same experience in Cataclysm of a long time in our end raid, and this time no intermediate raiding to tide us over until Mists of Pandaria, I'm rethinking my position. Halion served two purposes. First, he introduced us to new mechanics we'd bee seeing again in Cataclysm. Both Valiona and Theralion and later Ultraxion used elements of the Halion encounter's mechanics. But second and more importantly, he served as a bridge between the ICC fights, with their Scourge, undeath and plague motifs and the coming expansion's introduction of Deathwing and his Twilight's Hammer cult minions. A third but related purpose was to give us something to do that wasn't ICC after six months in the place. So now I wonder: Did Mists of Pandaria need an intermediate raid? Was it a missed opportunity that we didn't get one? And would it have made sense if we had?
Mists of Pandaria raids will have staggered release, none available at launch
There will be no raids available to players when Mists of Pandaria is released on Sept.25, 2012. Blizzard announced today that the first tier of raids in Mists of Pandaria will have a staggered release. A single raid will be released one week after the launch of the expansion, Mogu'shan Vaults, and the raid finder version of that raid won't be available for another week after that. Nothing will change regarding the release of heroic modes, which will be available for the following lockout after players complete the raid on normal mode. Tier 14's other two raids, Heart of Fear and Terrace of Endless Spring, will be released four weeks after the release of Mogu'shan Vaults. The full details of this announcement are outlined in the blue post below.
Mists of Pandaria Beta: 25-man raid testing starts tomorrow
10-man raid testing on the Mists of Pandaria beta has been under way for quite some time now, but if you've been wanting to give 25-man testing a try, it starts tomorrow. Watcher made the following scheduling post late last weekend. Raid Testing Schedule - July 30-31 After the weekend, we will be testing a number of raid encounters, including 25-player encounters. The testing schedule for remaining Normal modes will be somewhat accelerated, since the encounters are already familiar to many testers and we are just verifying functionality and tuning. Each encounter should be available at approximately the listed times below for all Beta Test Realms, regardless of suggested geographical region. Monday, July 30th Blade Lord Ta'yak (Heart of Fear) - 10 Player Heroic 10:30 PDT (13:30 EDT, 19:30 CEST) Gara'jal the Spiritbinder (Mogu'shan Vaults) - 10 Player Normal 16:00 PDT (19:00 EDT, 01:00 CEST) Tuesday, July 31st Stone Guard (Mogu'shan Vaults) - 25 Player Normal 10:30 PDT (13:30 EDT, 19:30 CEST) Imperial Vizier Zor'lok (Heart of Fear) - 25 Player Normal 12:00 PDT (15:00 EDT, 21:00 CEST) Protectors of the Endless (Terrace of Endless Spring) - 25 Player Normal 13:30 PDT (16:30 EDT, 22:30 CEST) Feng the Accursed (Mogu'shan Vaults) - 25 Player Normal 15:00 PDT (18:00 EDT, 24:00 CEST) Blade Lord Ta'yak (Heart of Fear) - 25 Player Normal 16:30 PDT (19:30 EDT, 01:30 CEST) Tsulong (Terrace of Endless Spring) - 25 Player Normal 18:00 PDT (21:00 EDT, 03:00 CEST) As always, this testing schedule is very fluid and subject to the realities of a beta environment. We might have to change the time of a testing session or cancel it entirely, due to bugs, builds, server hardware issues, etc. Keep an eye on this forum for the latest information, and thank you in advance for testing and providing feedback. source As you can see, there is still some 10-man testing left, but it's going on right now, so log onto beta servers quickly if you want to participate. If you're wondering how on earth you'll be able to get a group together on beta tomorrow to do a 25-man raid, I can assure you there have been plenty of trade chat groups thus far that you can join. Many of the groups are guilds who don't have their entire roster on beta, so they have to pug additional players to fill their raid groups. 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: How would you design an MMO's endgame?
Earlier this week we asked if you were sick of raiding progression. A lot of you said yes, and that got us to thinking that there must be some other endgame activity that tickles your fancy. Let's pretend for a moment that budgetary concerns are off the table. You're the creative director on your very own MMORPG, and you need to come up with some sort of engaging endgame that will keep your max-level players entertained and/or paying (preferably both). If raiding is off the table, how would you design your MMO's endgame? 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!
DDO opens a window to Menace of the Underdark raid
While Dungeons and Dragons Online: Menace of the Underdark has been out almost a month now, there's still a lot of the new expansion that remains to be seen by the public. One of these views is that of the final boss of the capstone 12-person raid, Lolth. Turbine's sent in a few pictures showing this intense battle between level 25 players and her royal spiderness in the Demonweb. Check them out! That's not a suggestion; it's an order. [Source: Turbine press release] %Gallery-148679%
GuildOx data shows 50% decline in raiding guild activity
This news probably shouldn't come as a huge shock to anyone who understands the ebb and flow of WoW expansions, but GuildOx, a site that collects all kinds of data from the WoW Armory, has discovered that raiding guild activity has fallen 50% since the beginning of 2012. GuildOx site runner Polar tells us that a raiding guild is defined as "a guild that has gained a boss kill or raid achievement within the past month or those guilds that have completed heroic Madness of Deathwing." Activity in this case is defined, obviously, as killing a boss that week. Again, not a huge shock; we're officially in Cataclysm's twilight (heh) years, and drop-off like this before an expansion is to be expected. It's worth noting in this case that the numbers for active raiders might be a little better than what's reflected here -- after all, plenty of guildless people have been able to raid thanks to Raid Finder, and that sort of activity wouldn't be tracked by this metric. One thing's definitely for sure, though -- the game needs a jump start in the form of Mists of Pandaria if Blizzard wants people to stick around. Thankfully, it's right around the corner, but one wonders just how long this cycle can perpetuate. The end of Wrath and the lifetime of Cataclysm showed us that diminishing returns are already in effect, Annual Pass or no, but MoP's endgame is decidedly different than what we've seen in the past. Perhaps things will be different this time.
G-Technology kicks out USB 3.0 G-Drives for Macs, keeps your Retina MacBook Pro well-fed
If you've just picked up a MacBook Pro with Retina display or a 2012-era MacBook Air, you may be jonesing for a matching external hard drive to take advantage of that much-awaited USB 3.0 support. G-Technology has you covered -- and how. Updated versions of the laptop-oriented G-Drive Mini, Mobile and Slim (you're looking at the Mobile up top) all roll in the higher peak speeds and progressively trade raw speed as well as 1TB capacities for sleekness, while the twin-drive, 1.5TB G-RAID Mini will tax that 5Gbps bandwidth without becoming too ungainly. Not taking your external storage on the road? The single-disk G-Drive now climbs to 4TB in addition to jumping on the USB 3.0 bandwagon, and the dual-drive G-RAID will serve up as much as 8TB at the newly brisk speeds. All but the G-Drive Slim support FireWire to ease those jitters over transitioning from old to new, although they won't all arrive at the same time. Most of the G-Drive and G-RAID gear will be showing up in August at prices between $110 and $810, but the two Mini-labelled drives could be a bit late to the party with a less defined summer target. You can get the full scoop after the break.
Boss fights and perspective
I love heroic Spine of Deathwing because I am a prot warrior. Is the fight hectic? Absolutely it is. If I were a healer, I would probably hate it with a passion, having to heal that stupid debuff off of people and deal with some ridiculously high damage spikes. If I were a DPSer, I'd probably loathe having to throttle my damage for 90% of the fight then go for broke for the tendons, being sure to line up my cooldowns and consumables and trinkets. And dealing with the Fiery Grip is an exercise in doing exactly what you have never learned how to do as a damage dealer, not killing things. But as a tank? Especially one kiting bloods up and down the spine? It's glorious. It's hard, really really hard. As the fight progresses, the difficulty of tanking the bloods goes from Meh, I can do this while I eat this giant hoagie to There are 50 bloods chasing me help help. You will use every cooldown, big and small, as well as every movement increase you have. You will shift from tanking one or two bloods to tanking 10 or 20, and finally you will find yourself drowning in the things, hopping around the back of the spine and desperately hoping for a cooldown to come up. And it's awesome. It is the most fun I've had in Cataclysm, bar none.
Netstor rolls out Thunderbolt-powered PCIe and storage expansion options for Macs
We can sympathize -- your task-master Mac is hurting for PCIe expansion and more storage. Fortunately, Netstor has just announced several new products to boost your computer's ego and add either item via those newly christened Thunderbolt ports. The TurboBox NA211TB will lend three extra PCIe slots to any Mac that has the 10Gb/s port, while the NS780TB Desktop Storage will use it to bolt on 16 bays of disk storage. The company's rackmounted NA333TB Mac Mini Server, meanwhile, gives you 16 removable storage bays along with most RAID array options, and the aforementioned PCIe upgrade integrated to boot. Shipping dates and pricing weren't announced, but if you're looking to transform that Macbook Air into a video-editing behemoth, you may want to check all three options at the source.
LotRO: Riders of Rohan instance cluster coming after expansion launch
Even with all of the information flying around about Lord of the Rings Online: Riders of Rohan expansion this week, players were left wondering about the question of the expansion containing any new instances, skirmishes, or raids. In a forum post, CM Sapience addressed the instance issue directly by saying that it's being worked on, it probably won't arrive in time for the expansion's launch, and the team is waiting until the content is fleshed out some more before giving solid details. "We are working on an instance cluster," Sapience confirms. "Currently it is planned to be part of an update due to release after the Riders of Rohan expansion has shipped." He also mentions that Riders of Rohan will contain "a new type of repeatable content" that Turbine has yet to disclose. Sapience promised that further information on these two topics will arrive later this summer.
Exclusive City of Heroes dev diary: Design insights from the Magisterium trial
Today the war ends in City of Heroes. Today players are taking up arms (and mutated plant spores) in the final battle of the Praetorian War, and it will be a glorious eruption of particle effects and superheroic feats. The Magesterium incarnate trial is arguably the centerpiece of Issue 23, and Associate Designer Jeff Hamilton flew in to give us the skinny on this chaotic fight. You can get all the details on the Magisterium as well as an exclusive sneak peek at images from the fight, all after the jump!
South Korea's FTC reportedly raids Google again over lack of cooperation
Google might be in trouble for how it handled an earlier raid by South Korean officials over antitrust concerns. Insiders claimed to AllThingsD that the country's Fair Trade Commission stormed Google's Seoul offices again on May 28th after the company allegedly stonewalled the investigation in suspicious ways. Among the accusations, Google supposedly deleted files and asked staff to work from home rather than face inquiries. The FTC's goal was still to answer complaints from local search firms Daum and NHN that Google was unfairly making it difficult to use a non-Google search engine in Android. Google still says it's cooperating with regulators, but the assertions if they're accurate would paint a different picture. They certainly don't alleviate pressure in the US over similar subjects.
Reader UI of the Week: Enter the box with Oakdusa's raiding UI
Each week, WoW Insider and Mathew McCurley bring you a fresh look at reader-submitted UIs as well as Addon Spotlight, which spotlights the latest user interface addons. Have a screenshot of your own UI that you'd like to submit? Send your screenshots along with info on what mods you're using to readerui@wowinsider.com, and follow Mathew on Twitter. Functional isn't always beautiful. All of you should go out to your vehicles in your driveways or parking structures and look at the floor mats. I guarantee that your car is a wreck. If you've got kids, don't even get up from the seat; we've all been in your car. Functional, but not going to win any beauty contests. I'm featuring Oakdusa's UI because it made me incredibly nostalgic for the days of the original World of Warcraft and its eternal predecessor, EverQuest. The EQ user interface was this odd creation, living in the realm of "this sounds like a great idea on paper because people enjoy the comforts of realism in a fantasy world." What an MMO's UI fundamentally had to have was not defined yet, not in the modern setting, until World of Warcraft came along.
Vindictus EU update features two new raid bosses
This must be the day for sexy MMO news. On the heels of one risque announcement, we have a trailer for the latest Vindictus EU update that features a scantily clad lass named Succubus and a demonic colossal called Glas Ghaibheleann. Succubus is, well, a succubus, and she's also a raid boss who will challenge players like no other. Except for maybe Glas Ghaibheleann. He's also a raid boss. While he's not quite as attractive as his partner-in-crime, he's equally deadly. Nexon says that the pair will awe players with their appearance and unique abilities. Get a load of the latest Vindictus EU update in the video after the cut. [Source: Nexon Europe press release]
Skill Mastery: Astral Shift
One of the early shaman survival cooldowns that you can get at level 15 is called Astral Shift. It isn't flashy or super awesome or anything. But an emergency damage reducer on a 2-minute cooldown could be just what you need to stay alive and continue DPSing (or healing). It doesn't reduce only magic damage. Nor does it reduce only physical damage. It reduces any damage! In case you feel two minutes is too long, you have some alternatives. Nature's Guardian is an effect that can kick in once every 30 seconds, which might potentially save you (although the next hit you take could be lethal). Stone Bulwark totem is another alternative that places a shield on you which refreshes and adds additional absorb amounts every five seconds after. The theme of the level 15 shaman talents revolves around survival and damage mitigation. Raiders may lean more toward Astral Shift, but I'm using the Stone Bulwark totem for the purposes of questing and leveling. 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!
