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Blizzard sends a C&D to Warcraft Characters, other iPhone apps
The good news here: Blizzard may be planning to do more with the iPhone. The bad news: they're apparently trying to squelch useful iPhone apps that are out there right now. They've already sent out cease-and-desist orders to two Warcraft-related iPhone apps that were charging money (Armory Browser and the Warcraft Arena Calculator), and now we've heard from its creator that Warcraft Characters has gotten the C&D treatment as well (here's his post on the subject, though his site appears to be down at the moment). Just before he was set to announce the alpha of the 3.0 version of the app, Blizzard dropped him legal notice to stop distrbution. As of this writing, however, the app is still on the App Store, so get it while you can. Warcraft Chest and WoWTalent appear to still be available on the store as well, and WoWTalent is still charging 99 cents.For whatever reason, it appears Blizzard is going after even free programs released on the iPhone that use their information from the Armory. We're not quite sure why -- an optimist might guess that they're planning to release an Armory app of their own on the iPhone, or they're worried that people might confuse the official iPhone app with one that's unofficial. Or maybe they're just being cautious of their copyrights, though that's a pretty harsh assessment -- there are other MMOs who surivive and thrive off of unofficial iPhone and desktop apps.It would be a real shame if Blizzard legal was simply going after fans who have invested a lot of time and effort into these apps even when there's no clear reason for them to do so. Clearing the field for an official app is one thing, but closing down a useful product for your players built solely by your fans just to erase a perceived threat is entirely another.
Starting out in Vana'diel: See no evil, hear no evil, smell... no evil?
Hola mi amigos! Hoy es la dia de Vana'diel! *clears throat* Ahem, sorry about that. Hello adventurers, and welcome to another edition of Starting out in Vana'diel! Today's topic is actually one that I find quite cool about Final Fantasy XI, especially when you compare it to other MMOs. It's the mechanic that puts the fear of Promathia into every adventurer's step.Today's column is all about the different monster aggro types -- yes, there are different types. You want to find out more? Come, follow me, and let's find out more!
The Light and How to Swing It: The Tankadin for Dummies Again
Where were we? Ah, yes, tanking. Last time, we took a look at some basics of Paladin tanking, namely a few things about survivability. That's just the tip of the iceberg. When I said tanking was the most technical play style in the game, it's because tanks have to look at more factors and study more things than healers or DPS. Aside from working towards important gear requirements, a tank more than any other player must understand how a fight works. While many encounters are survivable with a few DPS not knowing too much about the fight ("get out of the void zones!"), a tank who doesn't know anything about a boss is likely to wipe the group or raid.In many ways, a tank is the most important member of a team. The cornerstone, so to speak. Because even though healers are indispensable, there's never really a 'Main Healer' position the way there is a 'Main Tank'. That's why a tank's responsibility goes above and beyond what players in other roles have. We've already examined for a bit how to build up your survivability. Today we'll look at three things: generating threat and the tank spell rotation.
SOE provides further clarification on EQ2's Fighter revamp
Whether you're fully behind them or not, the changes to EverQuest II's hate system are quite significant and will have an impact on gameplay for all classes, not just the Fighters. Testament to the enormity of the overhaul is the fact that SOE has put out yet another summary of the changes, available on the EQ2Players community site. This latest clarification does not get quite as specific as Aeralik's take last week, but it does include an explanation and pictures of the new hate meter, which will form part of the standard UI when the patch goes live.If you have aggro on a mob, your meter will show the figure '100'. For everyone else, the closer their number is to 100, the closer they are to pulling a party foul and stealing aggro. This makes it much easier for DPS and healers to see when they are in danger of drawing an NPC's attention, and they can either remove themselves from the fight for a while, or hit a de-taunt ability (which has an instant effect on the hate meter number). The EQ2Players write-up also includes a list of the changes to fighter's abilities, but for a more detailed analysis and community feedback, Aeralik's thread is where you should head.
Significant aggro changes on the way for EQII
There's a fairly hefty set of changes to EverQuest II's hate/aggro system currently being ironed out on Test, and they aren't to everyone's liking. Due to the the complexity of the changes, developer Chris "Aeralik" Kozak has offered up a summary for players to wrap their heads around. We'll attempt to boil it down even more for you, at the cost of including some of the finer details.The problem with the aggro system begins with the fact that hate has scaled linearly as the game has progressed, and damage has scaled exponentially with gear and new skills, making it hard for designated aggro-holders to keep control of mobs. One of the changes on Test has given taunts the chance to hit critically, just like damage spells, and there will be a base and normalized amount of threat from taunt abilities.
Teenager arrested for making suicide threat to Blizzard rep
In a sad bit of news to start the new year, it would appear that a teenager in Fairfield Township, Ohio, was taken into custody yesterday for falsely claiming that he would commit suicide if a Blizzard support representative did not give in to his request. The young man, who remains nameless due to being underage, was arrested for "inducing panic" which carries a first-degree misdemeanor charge according to the Middletown Journal. The young man was chatting with a Blizzard rep and made the statement that he was "suicidal and that the game was the only thing that he had to live for." Whether or not this was World of Warcraft or a Battle.net account was not disclosed, but even still, it has raised the question in a few circles if Blizzard was beyond the bounds in bringing the police into this situation - or why the police might arrest someone for it.
Judgement of Light to cause no threat in 3.0.8
It's not in the 3.0.8 patch notes, but apparently Paladins should expect removal of all threat from Judgement of Light in the next patch. This is being done to address the wonky nature of JoL threat -- since for fights in which large portions of the raid are taking damage it gives a huge threat boost via healing threat, while for fights in which only a few raid members are taking damage it only gives a small threat boost via healing threat. Or to put it concisely, as forum poster Tippocabra did, "threat from Judgement of Light is not consistent." The new "no threat" JoL should be nothing if not consistent, though it has some tanking Paladins concerned about reduced threat. (For Retribution or Holy Paladins who have ever found themselves using JoL in a group situation, however, the threat decrease can only be a good thing.) Ghostcrawler assures us, however, that this is not meant to nerf Protection Paladin threat -- and though he doesn't go into specifics, we have to assume that means the threat Protadins would previously receive from JoL will be coming from elsewhere.
Druid's Swipe now generates 50% increased threat
Ghostcrawler mentioned last night that the Druid ability Swipe was on their radar for a fix. Blizzard, and many Druids, felt that when you combined Swipe with the global cooldown it wasn't generating enough threat. There have also been extenuating issues concerning Swipe's effectiveness in picking up mobs in a uniform manner, often requiring the druid to have near perfect positioning.That's now been "fixed" today via a hotfix.Swipe's threat has been increased by 50%.Previously the limitation on the number of targets swipe could hit was removed, along with other classes AoE tanking abilities like Thunder Clap.The immediate effect of this won't be known beyond "it'll let Druids AoE tank better." There might be some backlash from the other classes that Swipe will now cause too much threat compared to their abilities (thus tipping the scale in favor of a Druid tank). There also might be some concern that people will just spam Swipe.Only time and everyone's reaction will tell.
Forum post of the day: Collateral damage
Retiribution Paladins had about three weeks to really shine. Think of it as retribution for many years of being laughed out of PUGs. Blizzard implemented promised nerfs to the Class in patch 3.0.3. Dumptruk of Frostmourne is upset about the effect that these changes have had on tanking in the Protection specialization. He opined that reduced damage in Judgments equates to reduced threat per second. He finished is post with a plea to reevaluate protection Paladins.In a response to the thread Rauss of Sentinels disagreed. He believes that a Paladin tank should not rely on Judgments to build threat. Rauss relies on Consecration, Hammer of Righteousness, and select Seals/Judgments to build aggro- depending on the situation. He thinks the original poster should expand to additional aspects of the class to realize its true potential.
Tips for new Death Knights from a fellow tank, part 2
Dear corpsified bundles of beautifully-armored joy (but more particularly those who tank Azjol Nerub while wearing Expedition Bracers of the Bandit),We had a little bit of controversy in the first installment, so I'm just going to state this as baldly as possible; if you hated what I wrote last time, there's a good chance you'll walk away from this one thinking I eat babies. Delicious, delicious babies. While I never mean to offend people, I reserve the right to tell them the truth, or at the very least a highly entertaining and plausible lie.Truth, she be at times an ugly mistress. And she ain't gettin' any prettier as we move from DPS to tanking.Tanks have significantly more responsibility, both in groups and raids, and they face the competing directives of maximizing mitigation (to keep their healers happy) and maximizing threat production (to keep their DPS happy). I've healed dozens of Death Knight tanks at this point, and while the average pugged DK tank has gotten noticeably better, there are still a few trends you'd want to be aware of as a healer. The problems in beta right now are made worse by Blizzard unintentionally overselling the ease of tanking on a Death Knight in 5-man runs. Many people seem to have interpreted the statement that they should be able to tank well with Blood, Frost, or Unholy specs as being tantamount to saying they can tank well regardless of how their talent points are spent in those trees.Any experienced tank can tell you right now that this is not true, but people believing that it is is how you wind up with 11K-life Death Knights taking 7-8K enraged hits from Keristasza in the Nexus. If you've never tanked before but you're interested in tanking on a Death Knight -- or pragmatic enough to know you'll probably wind up tanking a certain number of 5-mans on your DPS Death Knight -- I hope this article helps you avoid what I went through in May 2007 when I started tanking and sucked at it.I came to the beta to slowly lose my mind trying to heal insane tank damage and gulp Extra Strength Tylenol. And I'm all out of Extra Strength Tylenol.
Tips for new Death Knights from a fellow melee, part 1
Dear reanimated angst-puppy hero corpses,Love what you've done with the smell, really. The little air freshener attached to the runeblade is a nice touch. Now that I'm in the beta, I've had the opportunity group with -- conservatively -- billions of you. I've healed a lot of Death Knight tanks, and tanked for a lot of Death Knight DPS. Most of you seem like cool people, so I say this with sincere love in my little Druid heart and a touch of worry over what will happen in November:Most of you are awful.I don't wish to be needlessly cruel here, mind you, or to overlook that the class is still new. Blizzard endlessly tinkers with you, so it's not like your rotations haven't changed, or your talents and skills are stable. And I know you're not coming to Northrend with a bank full of awesome gear from Burning Crusade. This isn't about your wearing greens or using the wrong attack or tanking rotation; I'm not even going to bother with the theorycraft surrounding the ideal DPS rotation until Wrath actually ships. But I'm seeing an awful lot of you running around playing as if...almost as if...you haven't played a tank or a melee class before. It's uncanny. But when I switched from playing a balance to a feral druid more than a year ago and knew nothing about playing a melee DPS/tank, I made all the mistakes you're making right now. Help me help you!
Stepping away from +threat
Threat is at the heart of tanking. However, it's totally hidden from the player, and many players don't understand it well or at all. A thumbnail sketch: every point of damage you do causes 1 threat. Every point of healing you do causes 0.5 threat (unless you're a paladin, in which case it's 0.25 for reasons I've never fully understood). This is base threat; many classes have threat modifiers. Rogues, for instance, have an innate 30% reduction to threat. Warriors and Druids get 30% improved threat in their tanking modes (Defensive Stance/Dire Bear Form); this will be raised to 45% in LK, I believe. Paladins get 90% extra threat for their Holy damage from Righteous Fury. Then there are various tanking skills which have special threat modifiers. Sunder Armor is one that has been around forever; it wouldn't cause much threat inherently, but it's got extra threat built in. Lacerate and Revenge are other examples. In short, the way Blizzard has traditionally made tanking work – made sure the tanks are causing more threat than everyone else, so the mobs will attack them – is by keeping their damage low, but raising their threat with threat-increasing auras and threat-boosted abilities. This is not the tack they're taking in LK, based on some trends that have been emerging in blue posts over the last month or two. For instance, Ghostcrawler: "We'd like to get away more from +threat abilities for all classes if we can."
Tips for using the new Shadowmeld wisely
One of the topics we talked about indepth on last Saturday's WoW Insider Show was the racial ability revamp that Blizzard did in the latest beta patch -- I said that I wasn't even under the impression that racial tweaks were on the table, but apparently Blizzard still doesn't think they're done, and it looks like they're using those abilities to build in a lot of baseline things like threat reduction and resilience against movement-impairing effects.After all the dust settled (there was one more revision in the works, and there may be more so far before the patch goes live), it looks like Shadowmeld is going to be getting one of the aforementioned threat reduction tweaks: Night Elves will be able to kick in Shadowmeld instantly and even while in combat every three minutes, and it will drop (though not wipe) threat, cancelled on moving. This adds, as Phaelia notes, a few new wrinkles to Night Elf gameplay -- not only will NE Priests have a new aggro "pause" (since the aggro doesn't actually disappear, all that will happen is that they'll have to wait for the tank to grab enough aggro to get focus back), but soloing Night Elves will have a new way to dodge a pull gone bad, and Druids who happen to be pulling in raids will be able to end a bad pull early, hopefully without wiping the entire group.Pretty slick for just a racial ability. As always, this may change before the beta ends (originally, this was a Human ability called The Fall of Humanity, though Blizzard wisely decided it didn't work too well as that), but this extra functionality might give NEs an extra panic button when they need to switch threat around fast.
Misdirection gets a shorter cooldown in Wrath
Since the addiiton of Tricks of the Trade to the Rogue repertoire in the Wrath of the Lich King Beta, Hunters have felt a little slighted. Not only did Rogues get Misdirection, a somewhat defining Hunter ability in PvE, they got Misdirection on a much shorter cooldown that also augmented the tank's damage for even more threat. Koraa brought good news late last night, mentioning that Misdirection's cooldown will be lowered to 30 seconds (down from 2 minutes) to match the cooldown of Tricks of the Trade. While Misdirection still doesn't have any secondary effects like Tricks does, you have to consider the fact that it can be used at range which is a pretty big deal. While the abilities have similar effects, they'll be used for wholly different things. It's a threat management tool for Rogues, whereas it's a pulling ability for Hunters. The two abilities fill different roles despite their similarities. Hunter threat tends to have some pretty wild spikes sometimes, but I think they have all the threat management they need. Feign Death is on a 30 second cooldown, and the Rogue threat wipe is at 3 minutes.
Insider Trader: Faction recipes for enchanters
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.Last week we took a look at some of the more popular and requested enchants and how to get them for yourself. I also promised that I'd continue the faction recipe series by taking a look at enchanting for this week. So far, I've talked about the following professions and which factions hold appropriate recipes: Designs for jewelcrafters part one, and part two. Plans for blacksmiths. Recipes for alchemists. Patterns for leatherworkers. Patterns for tailors. Here is a complete list of the factions to which any enchanter should "suck up" and how far you'll need to take it: Shattered Sun Offensive, honored. Consortium, revered. Cenarion Expedition, exalted. Thrallmar/Honor Hold, exalted. Keepers of Time, exalted. Lower City, exalted. Sha'tar, exalted. Violet Eye, exalted.
Tank Talk: All about aggro
Tank Talk is WoW Insider's tanking column, promising you an exciting and educational look at the world of getting the stuffing thrashed out of you in a 10- or 25-man raid. The column is rotated amongst Matthew Rossi (Warrior/Paladin), Adam Holisky (Warrior), Michael Gray (Paladin), and Allison Robert (Druid). Our aim is to use this column to debate and discuss class differences, raid-tanking strategies, tips, tricks, and news concerning all things meatshieldish. This week's Tank Talk is a little bit of a public service. Recently huddled around the ticker-tapes of WoW Insider, we came to realize that your intrepid Insider lacked a particular resource: a basic guide to aggro. Certainly, this most important of subjects is old hat to us meatshields ... but maybe not quite so much to everyone around us. And gosh, who better to talk about this subject than your devoted Tank Talk tanks! And, really. If your team doesn't know aggro, then you're going to have a hell of a time as a tank. So, let's Tank Talk about aggro. What it is, where it comes from, why you want it, and why they don't want it.
Built-in threat meters implemented in Beta
The built-in threat meter that Bornakk hinted at yesterday has made its way to the latest build of the Wrath Beta. Tipsters John and Hugimbory point out that the Beta now shows the percentage of threat on the target, updating as it changes relative to other attackers. MMO Champion also reports that the % of threat is shown on the scrolling combat text based on the party or raid member with the highest threat. Mob tooltips also show threat percentage, all indicating simple data forwarded to the client. WoW Insider reported Nethaera saying that built-in threat meters were coming "in a future patch" back in February. It now appears that the 'future patch' she referred to will probably be Patch 3.0. It remains to be seen whether this implementation of threat monitoring will stay in the game as is, although it's more than likely that the system will still receive some polish.
Bornakk hints at upcoming threat meter
This isn't the first time we've heard about putting a built-in threat meter in the standard World of Warcraft interface. The idea came up back at Blizzcon 07, and Neth confirmed plans to include such a meter in February '08. But there's not been much discussion about the idea since then. Today, Bornakk confirmed they're still working on it, but there's obviously no details to be shared yet. ("Soon," and all that.) So, while we don't know that we'll be seeing the threat meter with the release of Wrath of the Lich King, at least we know it's probably still coming eventually. Threat meters are almost entirely a mandatory requirement for most raids. The two big ones are KTM and Omen, of course. It lets your DPS know when to let off the gas a bit, before they pull aggro off the tank. Or, maybe, tells the tanks they need to push the pedal harder and build up more of their own threat instead of limiting the DPS. I can't imagine raiding without one, and if that's the state of things for enough players, I expect Blizzard will take it over themselves soon enough.
No threat for Lifebloom
Lume the Mad has done the math (very thoroughly), and he's got the answer for Druids: the end healing burst of Lifebloom doesn't cause any threat at all, either for the caster or the recipient. He first pared the entire situation of casting Lifebloom down to its basic elements -- you've got a player who body pulls a mob, and a Druid healing them. He took out all possible reactive abilities that might cause threat, and then set up a situation where the Druid obtained threat, and cast LIfebloom on another player, with an opposing faction Shaman purging the spell early (so it could jump straight to the end heal), and the mob stayed on the Druid -- the big heal didn't cause threat for the recipient at all. Finally, Lum tested if the Druid was recieving aggro, and as you can see above, neither the Druid caster or the Warlock is affected by the end heal of Lifebloom -- just one point of damage can still pull the mob around.There's been a lot of discussion about this already -- the HoT aspect of Lifebloom still does cause threat (for the Druid), and so you combine that with the fact that lots of people were testing under "unsecure" situations, and the whole thing got very confusing. But Lum's tests seem very clear: Druids can cast away knowing that they won't pull aggro with that burst of healing at the end of the spell.[Thanks, Matticus!]
WWI '08 Death Knight Demo: Frost spells and talents
The Frost tree was originally designated the tanking tree, and the Frost Presence will likely still be the presence of choice for tanking Death Knights. Interestingly enough, very few of the other spells and talents in the Frost tree -- with the exception of Icebound Fortitude -- really scream "tanking." However, some of them do scream "crowd control," which may amount to the same thing in the end -- just freeze, slow, or silence extra mobs until you have a chance to focus on tanking them. The "frozen" bonuses in some of the talents also suggest that Frost Death Knights may have a lot of good synergy with Frost Mages as well, assuming their frozen status afflictions are identical to each other. Below is a listing of some of the Frost spells and talents shown in the WWI Death Knight demo: Frost Spells: Icy Touch:Requires level 55Costs 1 Frost Rune Instant cast, 6 second cooldown20 yard rangeDescription: Deals 217 to 235 Frost damage modified by attack power and reduces the target's ranged, melee attack, and casting speed by 15% for 20 seconds.Chains of IceRequires level 56Costs 2 Frost RunesInstant cast, 16 second cooldown20 yard rangeDescription: Freezes the target in place for 3 seconds. the target regains 10% of their movement speed each second after breaking free of the chainFrost Presence Requires level 57Instant castDescription: The death knight takes on the presence of frost, increasing armor by 45% and threat generated by 25%.Mind FreezeRequires level 57 Requires Runic Power10 second cooldownDescription: Strike the target's mind with cold, dealing 100 frost damage modified by attack power and interrupting spellcasting while also preventing any spell in that school from being cast up to a maximum of 4 seconds. Obliterate Requires Level 61 Costs 1 Blood Rune, 1 Frost RuneDescription: A brutal instant attack that deals 100% of weapon damage plus 330 and 122 additional damage for each of your diseases on the target, but consumes the diseasesEmpower Rune WeaponRequires level 68 3 Minute cooldownInstant castDescription: Empower your rune weapon, immediately activating one of each rune typeIcebound Fortitude Requires level 72Requires Runic Power1 minute coooldownDescription: Consumes all available runic power, causing the Death Knight to become immune to stun effects and increasing armor by 50% for up to 12 seconds. Does not remove existing stun effects.Frost Talents:Frozen Rune WeaponRequires 10 talent pointsCosts 1 Frost RuneRequires melee weaponInstant castDescription: Imbue your rune weapon with frost, causing 29.9 to 92 additional frost damage, based on the speed of your weapon. Also has a chance to cause your target to be vulnerable to frost damage. Lasts 10 minutes.DeathchillRequires 20 talent points2 minute cooldownInstant castDescription: When activated, increases your critical strike chance with frost spells and abilities by 100% for the next 6 seconds. Howling BlastRequires 30 talent pointsCosts 1 Frost Rune30 second cooldownInstant cast20 yard rangeDescription: Blast the target with a frigid wind, dealing 278 to 302 frost damage to all enemies within 10 yards. Deals triple damage to frozen targetsMerciless CombatRequires 35 talent pointsCosts up to 3 talent pointsDescription: Your frost spells and abilities do an additional 20% damage per talent point when striking targets with less than 20% health.Frost StrikeRequires 40 talent points, Merciless CombatCosts 1 Frost RuneRequires melee weaponNext MeleeDescription: A strong attack that deals weapon damage as frost damage. Has a 10% chance to freeze the target.Hungering ColdRequires 50 talent pointsRequires runic power1 minute cooldownInstant castDescription: Unleashes all available runic power to eradicate all heat from around the Death Knight, freezing enemies within 10 yards and preventing them from performing any action for 2s per 10 runic power. Enemies are considered frozen, but any damage will break the ice.
