season seven
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'Apex Legends' Fight Night event formalizes in-game boxing with a new zone
Apex Legends is starting up a 'Fight Night' event that brings a zone where players can't use their guns, explosives or special abilities -- it's all punches and kicks.
'Apex Legends' tweaks season seven battle pass after players complain
Despite all of the changes added to Apex Legends to launch season seven — new map, new character, vehicles and some major adjustments to existing characters — it was barely out of the door yesterday when the game’s biggest supporters started to turn against it, spurring a quick response. Like many other “free” games that are popular right now, EA’s battle royale shooter features a battle pass system where players can pay for a set of collectible items that unlock as they keep playing the game. For the new season, the game’s developers rolled out their biggest battle pass change since the game debuted a year and a half ago.
Captain's Log: Our Star Trek Online year in review plus a look ahead
As I took the time to really go over the past 12 months in Star Trek Online, I began to realize just how much the game had changed between this time last year and now. While some people will never be pleased, I can't say I'm one of those people. I'm utterly delighted by most of the changes in the game and am looking forward to the expansion of the reputation system into 2013. With that said, however, there are improvements that Star Trek Online still needs if it wants to quell some of the harshest (and sometimes deserved) critiques. Join me as I finish up my year in review and then touch on some of Executive Producer Daniel Stahl's answers to player questions in this month's Ask Cryptic post.
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online year in review, part two
As 2013 gets underway and before Cryptic Studios and Perfect World Entertainment begin hinting at upcoming material due out for Star Trek Online's third anniversary next month, I'm taking the opportunity to go over the past year in the game. It's a great time to sit down and be reminded of just how much transpired in the last 12 months. Last week, I barely scratched the surface of what happened in Star Trek Online during 2012, but I was able to touch briefly on some of the minor changes that occurred with user-generated content tool, The Foundry. Join me while I continue my look back on what 2012 brought to STO!
Star Trek Online's Foundry gets a whole lot more awesome
When Star Trek Online's Foundry system fully comes back online after the next maintenance period, players will be treated to a much more robust system than ever before. In a new dev diary, Associate Producer ZeroniusRex explains what the team's been doing to make creating and using the Foundry all that much more enjoyable. Foundry users will discover that the system now includes a Foundry Spotlight in the mission journal. Foundry missions are nominated by players to be potential spotlight candidates. Players have extra incentive to run spotlight missions, as those will have daily rewards attached. Foundry creators will have a few new tools, such as being able to hide and path NPCs, and will be able to access the Mugato enemy type as well as several temporal ships.
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online tweaks Season Seven
It's been just over two weeks since Season Seven went live in Star Trek Online, and a lot of tweaks to the new reputation systems have already been implemented. Because of what seems to be low turn-out on the Tribble test servers, the team placed its focus on major performance bug squashing and decided to wait to make changes to the system mechanics until after it could get more solid data from the players on the live (Holodeck) server. Once that information was received, the changes were fast and furious. Star Trek Online's Executive Producer, Daniel Stahl, released two blog posts over the course of the last week, outlining not only the alterations to the Season Seven material but also answers players questions in the November Ask Cryptic. Join me as I go over a few of the changes!
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online's Season Seven shakedown
It's been a week since Star Trek Online launched Season Seven, and some of the mechanics revolving around the new Reputation systems are beginning to unfold. The day Season Seven was released, many players were caught off-guard by the fact that a dilithium reward was missing from the Strategic Task Force missions. These missions became affiliated with the new Task Force Omega Reputation system with the patch. The outcry was so immense and so loud that within 30 hours of the patch, Star Trek Online's Executive Producer, Daniel Stahl, updated the game's blog to reflect that a dilithium reward (albeit a reduced one) would be added back to the STF missions. Since then, quite a few players, including me, have had the opportunity to give the Romulan reputation system a try, and we've seen some highly unanticipated results. Join me past the jump as I discuss the Season Seven shakedown.
Captain's Log: More Season Seven stuff for Star Trek Online
As expected a few more dev blogs have appeared on the website for Star Trek Online. We are quickly moving towards the release of Season Seven in November and many parts of the new content are already available to play on the game's test server, Tribble. The first blog reveals more information about the back story of the budding colony on Mol'Rihan (New Romulus). Two more blogs detail the new reputation systems that will be released in Season Seven and finally, a fourth blog discloses more information about the new Embassy Outpost project that will be a part of the existing Fleet Starbase System.
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online's smartphone app and Season Seven content
The news keeps rolling in! Dev blogs over at Star Trek Online continue to give the playerbase more information on the new content expected with the release of Season Seven this November. We're hearing more about the new adventure zone in the New Romulus system. We've been able to read the beginning of the story behind the fractious break-up of the Romulan Star Empire and the reasons a large group now seeks assistance from both the Federation and the Klingon Empire. Yet another blog covers some of the basics of the new Azure Nebula Rescue space mission in the upcoming Tau Dewa sector block. Finally, and somewhat surprisingly to many of us, Star Trek Online announced the beta of the STO Gateway, a new web-based application with some pretty awesome potential! So jump past the break as I go into more detail about the continuing wave of new information.
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online's Season Seven sneak peeks
It's starting! The Season Seven sneak peeks are beginning over at the Star Trek Online website, and I have to say that I'm rather intrigued. The updates began with news about the long-awaited Borg strategic task force mission, Into the Hive, and continued with the news that the game will see the release of not just a new ground battle zone but an entirely new sector block! Due to be released in November, Star Trek Online's Season Seven suddenly holds more promise, especially since it appears that one of the franchise's key enemies, the Borg, may finally have their story-line tied up and put to rest. Hit the break and we'll talk about what's coming our way in November!
Captain's Log: Star Trek Online in Las Vegas
This weekend, Massively, along with Trek Radio, hosted the formal Star Trek Online Discussion with the Devs panel at the official Star Trek convention in Las Vegas, Nevada. And if I judge by the personal feedback received and the unanticipated (yet much appreciated) turn-out from players who attended the panel, all seems to have been very well received. Join me past the jump to learn more about what the STO developers said in response to questions posed by Massively and those in attendance at the convention and on the game's forums.
Captain's Log: STO's loaded for bear
In continued preparation for the coming release of Season Six, this week Star Trek Online players saw the reemergence of the State of Game letters from STO Executive Producer Daniel Stahl as well as the launch of the new tier five ship, the Armitage class. We still await the official release date for Season Six; it hasn't been released to the Tribble test server, but Stahl's letter gives additional insight into what players can expect from the new season and gives a few hints at what can be anticipated in Season Seven, due out later this year. So join me as I go over both the letter and the specs for the new ship!
Blood Sport: Patch 3.3, part III
Want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women? Blood Sport investigates the entirety of all-things arena for gladiators and challengers alike. C. Christian Moore, multiple rank 1 gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more in WoW.com's arena column. We've come to a fork in our musical journey, where I'm going to start branching into genres and/or artists you might not have heard of (if you have, great, feel free to tell me what a giant douche I am for underestimating you). Today we'll be listening to one of my all-time favorite indie-folk tracks, Cold Cold Water, by Mirah. The Star Wars tribute video is a nice touch, if you're into that kind of thing (I am). Last time, we went over hunters, mages, and paladins. This week, we're going to round out the classes with the exception of rogues and warriors (they're not getting any high-impact PvP changes at all). We'll also talk about some cool glyphs and enchanting changes. Next week, we'll start doing stuff other than patch notes. I'd like us to throw around more opinion and less analysis. Read on to find out what's up in arena for priests, shamans, warlocks, enchanting and inscription in Patch 3.3!
Blood Sport: Patch 3.3, part II
Want to crush your enemies, see them driven before you, and hear the lamentation of their women? Blood Sport investigates the entirety of all-things arena for gladiators and challengers alike. C. Christian Moore, multiple rank 1 gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more in WoW.com's arena column. David Byrne and The Talking Heads are a personal favorite. Miles Fisher seems to love them as well. His cover of This Must Be The Place (Naive Melody) is homage to one of the most beautiful, striking melodies I've ever heard, and as such, it will be your listening music for the day. (NSFW Warning: The video is a parody/reenactment of American Psycho, so view carefully.) Last time, we went over the Will of the Forsaken nerf, 100% pet resilience, death knights, and druids. The patch looks to be a very interesting bag of surprises for arena enthusiasts, we're getting major changes to the way some races work, as well as nearly every class is getting a pretty substantial change or two which will probably help them in PvP. We don't normally see patches where most classes are buffed, but this could be one of them. Read on to find out what's up with hunters, mages, and paladins in Patch 3.3!
Blood Sport: Patch 3.3, part I
Ahh, lovely Radiohead. The entirety of Scotch Mist (which is In Rainbows played live) will be our listening music, as I expect today's article to be somewhat...lengthy. Starting out with "Weird Fishes" is a nice touch -- you gotta love Radiohead's set order diversity. By the way, I'm going to continue supporting the Blood Sport column with listening music, due to overwhelming positive response. If you have any suggestions for songs, please let me know in the comments below! Instead of talking about minor changes, I'm going to try to only hit the major ones here, as this is a giant patch. If you think I skipped something important, please let me know via the comments below and I'll reply. Today, we'll be covering pet resilience, the Will of the Forsaken nerf, death knight, and druid changes, and what they hold for arena combatants. Expect the other classes and item/glyph changes soon! You can find all about Patch 3.3 here. Check out what the last major patch of WotLK has for gladiators and challengers alike after the break!
Blood Sport: Patch 3.2.2, the times they are a-changin, Part II and a half
I don't care for a lot of music that was made in the last decade. The Killers are something of a breather for me. They're one of those bands I'm glad exist. When I'm forced to listen to a terrible radio station, and hear change your mind sandwiched in between auto-tuned, unoriginal dross -- I'm satisfied there is still music being made that can intrigue. (Brandon Flowers has some epic bard tier 10 shoulders there too)This is part two of part two of a three part article. Confusing? Join the fun! Surprising Patch 3.3 timing, i.e. wrenches in cogs, is a blast!In our first installment, we covered pillars changing shape in great detail, and also mentioned a few other tweaks. Our second article dealt with five classes -- paladin, priest, rogue, shaman, and warrior. Warlocks were left out of the 3.2.2 patch notes. This article is going to talk about the other four classes - death knight, druid, hunter, and mage.Being "TheArenaGuy" here at WoW.com lends to forcing myself to a very balanced perspective on classes. It makes me feel guilty if I understand armor penetration less than spell penetration. Well, actually, it doesn't because ArP is confusing. The main thing I'm trying to say here is that I don't want to write anything that is opinionated without being grounded in something. I don't want to make any mistakes when it comes to reporting to our viewers what changes will impact arena games (and how).I'm satisfied to critique changes instead of having the responsibility to make them. The developers have very difficult decisions to make with regard to arena balance and we should applaud them for making decisions in the name of equity, even if some of them might be unpopular.With that, let's get into the juicy, juicy 3.2.2 patch notes.
Blood Sport: Patch 3.2.2, the times they are a-changin, Part II
In keeping with our musical theme, here's David Bowie's Changes. Most of you have probably heard it, but most of us have not really listened to it. Take some time to enjoy one of Bowie's most renowned pieces with the article today.Last time, I went over a few significant arena modifications that 3.2.2 brought us. Square pillars for line-of-sight, the armor penetration nerf, focus frames, flying in battlegrounds, and the Onyxia loot table can be found here.This article is going to talk about five of the nine classes discussed in the 3.2.2 patch notes (warlocks were left out). The reason we won't be talking about the other four is sheer article size. I'm not getting blamed for breaking anyone's scroll wheel today! We'll go over death knights, hunters, druids, and mages in the second part of this part II (which should be in a day or two).I'm giving analysis on class changes; I hope we will agree on most things, but if you disagree or decide I don't understand a mechanic properly, please let me know in the comments below. I read all your comments and am often stunned with how gracious our readers have been towards me. Thank you for all the kind words, those of you who took the time to write them!Please don't assume that I don't care if I don't write a large amount about the horrors of nerfing or the glories of buffing your main character's class (triple negative hooray). I probably don't know enough about the intricacies of the change to make an educated prediction, and would say little rather than proclaim "this will gimp class X vs. class Y" and have it fail to come to fruition.I'm going to be ignoring all non-pvp related notes. If you think I left something out, please post a comment below and I will (most likely) edit the post accordingly.Also, 3.3 patch notes are out already! Next week, part III will be merged with the 3.3 patch notes that are coming; there's a lot to talk about!So, without further ado, here's what 3.2.2 is cha-cha-cha-cha-changing in the arena world.
Blood Sport: Patch 3.2.2, the times they are a-changin, Part I
Blood Sport investigates the entirety of all-things arena for gladiators and challengers alike. C. Christian Moore, multiple Rank 1 gladiator, examines the latest arena strategy, trends, compositions and more in WoW.com's arena column.Okay, I'm a bit of a music buff. I love Bob Dylan, one of the most influential American singer/songwriters of our time. Here's some listening music while reading -- you can probably guess what it is. I selected it primarily because the song title goes well with our discussion -- and I love Dylan's brilliant live performance in Budokan. It's a bit much if you're not a Dylan fan, I'll freely admit.Patch 3.2.2 has a myriad of PvP changes in it; I am stunned to see so little conversation on the interwebz about it. In fact, I've written so much about these changes that I was advised to split the article into parts. A lengthy article here on WoW.com is approximately 1000 words -- this article was over 3,000. (No, not over 9,000.)I'm going to split up this article into three parts. Overall changes Class changes Bug fixes and Glyph Changes Check out what's a-changin' after the break.
