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The Queue: I'm back. It's me, DP.
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW.com's daily Q&A column where the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today.Today I am pleased to announce something even bigger than a new WoW expansion. In fact, it has nothing to do with WoW at all, but it's still something every single person reading this blog will want to know about. It's something that will bring excitement to all of our lives. Our inner children will burst forth in joy at this announcement. This is something that's 17 years in the making, folks. That's probably longer than some of you have been alive.Yes, that's right. Don't Copy That Floppy is getting a sequel. Naix asked..."Will we ever see each faction get their own special class again like the Paladin and Shaman?"
WoW Insider Show with Medros of All Things Azeroth live tonight
We're doing the podcast at a special time this week, so if you can't usually tune in to us on Saturdays at 3:30 Eastern, now's your chance to catch a live show. Tonight at 6pm Eastern, we'll be live over on the Ustream page, and our special guest will be none other than Medros, of the All Things Azeroth podcast. He's the second in our ongoing series of guests from around the community -- Michelle Madison of Warcraft Outsiders, you'll remember, was on a few weeks ago, and we're planning on having more podcasters and bloggers on with us in the coming weeks as well. Medros will join Lesley Smith, Turpster, and I in discussing the biggest news of the past week, including those Worgen pets you may have seen around the game, what Tom Chilton said about the future of World of Warcraft, the upcoming changes to Northrend flying. And if things work out as planned, we might even be able to get a live report straight from the PTR about how testing of the Crusaders' Coliseum is going.Should be a great time for sure. Tune in tonight on our Ustream page. It all starts off at July 9, 2009 6:00 PM EDTvar date_span = document.getElementById("date"); var date = new Date(date_span.innerHTML); var monthname=new Array("Jan","Feb","Mar","Apr","May","Jun","Jul","Aug", "Sep","Oct","Nov","Dec"); var weekday=new Array("Sunday","Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday", "Friday","Saturday"); var year = date.getFullYear(); var day_of_month = date.getDate(); var month = monthname[date.getMonth()]; var day = weekday[date.getDay()]; var hour = date.getHours(); if (hour > 11) { if (hour > 12) {hour -= 12} am_pm = "PM"; } else { am_pm = "AM"; } var minute = date.getMinutes(); if (minute < 10) { minute = "0"+minute; } date_string = day + ", " + month + " " + day_of_month; date_string += " at " + hour + ":" + minute + " " + am_pm; offset = -date.getTimezoneOffset()/60; if (offset >= 0) { offset = "+"+offset; } date_string += " in your time zone (GMT"+offset+")"; date_span.innerHTML = (date_string); , so you can head there or just hit the link below to find an embedded version of the stream after the break. And while we'll be chatting live as usual during the show, you can always send us a note about something you hear or something you'd like us to talk about at theshow@wow.com. We'll see you tonight!
Tom Chilton talks about 3.2 and the future of World of Warcraft
Videogamer.com has a nice long interview with World of Warcraft Producer Tom Chilton about everything from patch 3.2 and the Argent Tournament to the future of the game at large. They caught up with him at the Warcraft Regional Finals 2009 tournament in Germany this past week, and in part one, he talks about the upcoming patch and what Blizzard is expecting to get out of it. He says the Isle of Conquest battleground is their most "epic-feeling" instanced PvP setting since Alterac Valley, and that they want it to feel nuts, with players fighting each other via air and land. He also mentions Arena, and says that it was originally designed to be "a fun side PvP activity" that they went a little overboard with during Burning Crusade. Finally, he talks about twinks, and says that neither Blizzard nor twinks, apparently, want to see other players crushed by those who have the time or money to max out their low level characters. Even twinks, says Chilton, want to see competition against each other, and the option to turn XP off will let them do that. I'm not sure I agree with that last one -- many twinks seem to beef their characters up just for the chance to lay waste to "normal" players, but Chilton says Blizzard believes otherwise.The second part of the interview is more general -- he talks a little bit about the next expansion (with the same speculation we've already heard: Gilneas, the Maelstrom, the Emerald Dream), and says that designing a race is tougher on artists, but designing a class is tougher on designers. He admits that because we had a new class in Wrath, it's unlikely we'll see another class so soon in the next expansion, but "not impossible" of course. And he does note that Blizzard tries to "pre-seed" the races before they use them as playable races, so if they are adding in races, chances are we've already seen them (which, you may note, wasn't strictly true with the Draenei in BC). Finally, he talks about the future of Blizzard's MMO in general, and says it's still wide open to them: they plan for the game to last for years, and what they do between now and then, whether that be more expansions, microtransactions, or even a free-to-play model, will have to depend on what they want to do at the time.Very interesting interview. Chilton doesn't really reveal anything, but you do get the sense that save for a very skeleton plan of one or two years in the future, Blizzard is really playing it fast and loose with World of Warcraft. Even he admits that the game may look very different, depending on how things go, in another four years from now.
EQ dev: WoW wouldn't exist without EQ
Videogamer.com has an interview up with Ryan Barker, the lead designer for seminal MMORPG EverQuest. When asked if he thought WoW would exist without EQ having been around, he replied that he didn't think so, and that Blizzard designers would likely agree with that statement. I think he's right, too. The success of EQ allowed for countless imitators and innovators to follow in its footsteps, and WoW is certainly both of those things. What made WoW successful in the first place, beyond brand recognition, was the fact that the developers -- whose team consisted of a number of former EQ devs and prominent community members! -- refined and added on so many features cribbed from EQ. They made the formerly hardcore-only genre accessible to a wide variety of players and age groups, and in doing so broke subscriber and sales records -- thus continuing to make new MMOs financially plausible. And with WoW's improvements to the diku formula, the genre is now filled with WoW imitators as well. History repeats itself. Sure, it's entirely possible that WoW could have existed without the advent of EQ, but it would have been a very different game if it existed at all. And I doubt it would have been anywhere near as good without having been able to learn from EQ's myriad mistakes or study its successes. We owe a lot to Old Man EQ. Now get off his lawn.
The best of WoW Insider: May 5-12, 2009
Welcome back to the Wacky World of Warcraft, where the men are men, the women are usually dragons of some kind, and the average faction leader is probably being mad with some kind of ill-gotten power. Confused? Wondering why that ugly-looking orc is approaching you with sword drawn? Worry not, WoW Insider is your all-encompassing guide to Azeroth. Just please keep your arms and legs inside the tram at all times -- you don't want to hear what happened to our friend Wirt. News WoW Insider interviews Tom Chilton on Patch 3.1 and beyondWe talk to the game's lead designer on the latest updates, and what's coming up next. Star Trek references in the World of WarcraftWe've all (well, most of us -- ahem, Alex and Dan) seen Star Trek and loved it, so we compiled this little list of sightings in game. WoWMatrix responds to Curse and WoW InterfaceThere was a kerfluffle in the addon scene lately, and popular addon updater WoWMatrix finally responds. BlizzCon tickets on sale May 16thBlizzard's convention is returning to the Anaheim Convention Center, and it'll cost you $125 and some time in line to go. Flying in old world AzerothBlizzard has long said it wouldn't be possible to allow flying mounts in the original game world. And here's why. Features Disappointment the patch 3.1 game worldNot everything is hunky dory after the latest update -- at least one of our bloggers is a bit bored. Officers' Quarters: FragmentationOur column for guild officers takes a look at who should get the game's newest legendary. The OverAchiever: Glory of the Hero strikes backHow to do one of the biggest achievements in the game. WoW, Casually: Guide to the latest featuresNot every WoW player is a hardened veteran -- for the newer folks, there's WoW, Casually. Arcane Brilliance: PvPing as a Fire Mage after patch 3.1What's new in the world of Mages? Our Mage blogger Christian Belt tells you.
[1.Local]: To agree, to disagree, or to agree to disagree
Reader comments – ahh, yes, the juicy goodness following a meaty post. [1.Local] ducks past the swinging doors to see what readers have been chatting about in the back room over the past week.Flamers and trolls aside, WoW Insider readers are generally a contentious lot. Their viewpoints are as divergent as the player demographics the site attracts – all types of players, from the casual to the hardcore. With this many angles to consider, WoW Insider becomes a melting pot of ideas and opinions, from the sublime to the ridiculous. (And let's face it – some of the so-called ridiculous ideas are the most entertaining to read.) Yet this week, readers seemed to be more often of one mind than not – whether that agreement was ultimately to agree over the topic at hand or to agree to disagree. [1.Local] highlights several reader conversations that made the radar this week.
WoW Insider Show live today on Ustream
Today on the show, it's an all-star cast of WoW Insider folks: we'll welcome Alex Ziebart and Adam Holisky both on the show to talk about the latest news from the World of Warcraft. And as usual, Turpster will join us with his own brand of silliness (don't miss our newest feature, Turpster's Tips, in which he tells you something that may or may not help you play the game better). And what is the latest news, you ask? Why, it's our interview with Tom Chilton (featuring mentions of dance moves, new Druid forms, and player housing), that legendary mace and who it's for, whether the Bloodlust love should have some spreading around, and Alex's general disappointment with the game world lately. The show starts up at May 9, 2009 3:30 PM EDT var date_span = document.getElementById("date"); var date = new Date(date_span.innerHTML); var monthname=new Array("Jan","Feb","Mar","Apr","May","Jun","Jul","Aug", "Sep","Oct","Nov","Dec"); var weekday=new Array("Sunday","Monday","Tuesday","Wednesday","Thursday", "Friday","Saturday"); var year = date.getFullYear(); var day_of_month = date.getDate(); var month = monthname[date.getMonth()]; var day = weekday[date.getDay()]; var hour = date.getHours(); if (hour > 11) { if (hour > 12) {hour -= 12} am_pm = "PM"; } else { am_pm = "AM"; } var minute = date.getMinutes(); if (minute < 10) { minute = "0"+minute; } date_string = day + ", " + month + " " + day_of_month; date_string += " at " + hour + ":" + minute + " " + am_pm; offset = -date.getTimezoneOffset()/60; if (offset >= 0) { offset = "+"+offset; } date_string += " in your time zone (GMT"+offset+")"; date_span.innerHTML = (date_string); over on our Ustream page.And we've got a full schedule in the coming weeks as well: next week, we'll be recording the show live on Wednesday, May 13th at 6pm Eastern, so those of you who aren't usually available on Saturday will have a chance to listen in. And then on the 23rd, we'll be back live at the usual Saturday time, not only with audio but with video, as we present our video show, to thank you all for boosting our Twitter page up to over 9.000 followers. We've got a lot of fun stuff planned -- trust me when I say it'll be a cavalcade of guests and jokes and good times.And then after that, we'll be welcoming on a special guest host. Brigwyn's charity auction raised a whopping $2,500 for Child's Play this past week, and some awesome, caring fan paid almost $480 to join Turpster and I on the podcast for a week. So stay tuned for that. We'll have them on soon, and they can disagree with me or argue with Turpster or do whatever they want for the whole show. Should be a lot of fun.
WoW Insider interviews Tom Chilton on Patch 3.1 and beyond
Now this is by no means the first time we've interviewed World of Warcraft's Lead Developer Tom Chilton (aka Kalgan) but we though with the recent release of Patch 3.1, this would be the perfect time to sit down with him and get the 411 on Blizzard's plans for their latest patch.WoW Insider: Blizzard seem to be treating each major patch as more of a mini expansion, what are the reasons for this?Tom Chilton: I would say the biggest reason is because we're always pushing ourselves to do as much as we can in every patch. We're never really satisfied with what we have in the patch versus what we didn't have. Maybe the developers get a little out of control - but in a good way as that's good for players. More than anything else we want to make sure that in a patch we have content for everyone. We feel like one of the things we didn't do so well in the past was to deliver content for everyone, we would deliver content for different parts of the player base at any given time like a 25-person raid or a 10-person raid or here's a new battleground, back in the day of Arathi Basin. However we didn't really hit everyone at the same time so we're trying harder to do that while at the same time maintain our pace of Expansions ... our blindingly rapid pace of Expansions.
Tom Chilton on what's coming in patch 3.1
Our old friend Jessica Citizen has an interview up with Blizzard's Lead Game Designer on World of Warcraft, Mr. Tom Chilton. When Jeff Kaplan shipped off to other pastures in Blizzard to work on the new MMO, Chilton says he took over Kaplan's meetings, so right now, he is the flag leading the big ship of WoW. In the interview, he talks a bit about dual specs -- the system was originally planned to go in with the Lich King expansion, but it had to be pushed back to 3.1. And Chilton says he's already expecting to answer questions about triple specs at this year's BlizzCon, but of course, there's a balance there, as there has to be some choice on the part of the player as to what they decide to specialize in.He also talks about the Argent Tournament and Ulduar -- the Tournament, he says, will be a boon to solo players and players who enjoy daily questing, with the jousting minigame mixing things up a bit. And Ulduar's hard modes, as we've heard before, will bring raiding back to the difficulty that players expect. Chilton fesses up to an error that GC hinted at yesterday -- Blizzard nerfed PvP items at the same time that they made raiding more accessible, and the result is that people flocked to PvE while ignoring most of the PvP options. "We kind of over-solved the problem," he says.In the end, he calls 3.1 "the most ambitious content patch we've ever done for World of Warcraft." We'll have to see -- given that Noblegarden should show up with the new patch, it ought to be implemented by at least April 26th.
BlizzCast episode 8 released
The 8th episode of BlizzCast, the Blizzard Podcast, rolled out just a short while ago. If the only Blizzard game you're interested in is WoW, you'll probably be disappointed this time around, there's not much World of Warcraft discussion. The information is very, very heavily slanted toward Starcraft II and Diablo III.The podcast kicks off with their usual Q&A portion. The World of Warcraft questions, answered by Tom Chilton, were aimed at Wintergrasp and the vehicle system (specifically the lack of aerial combat). That's the full extent of the WoW content here. That's all, folks. If WoW is all you care about, that's the end. For those of you that are Blizzard fans in general? Jay Wilson (Diablo III Game Director) and Dustin Browser (Starcraft II Lead Designer) cover the Q&A for their respective games.The remainder of the podcast is a Diablo III interview with a pair of the game's developers, Julian Love (Lead Technical Artist) and Mike Nicholson (Senior Artist). If you intend to play Diablo III, it's worth a listen. It gives some insight into the developmental process of the game, and that's probably the most interesting part of these podcasts.
The Queue: How do you make that weird U thing?
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW Insider's daily Q&A column where the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today.Adam called yesterday's edition of The Queue 'the Extreme edition,' but I'm of the opinion he didn't quite follow through. So I'm posting something extreme to make up for it, which you can see in the video above. Extreme. If you don't feel it's extreme enough, feel free to post your extreme links in the comments below with your usual questions, as long as the links are safe for work (and sanity.)Eternauta asked... I have a question, too. I know it's pretty stupid and obvious, but here I go: Why is everybody DPS and why is it so hard to find healers or tanks?
Jeff Kaplan leaving World of Warcraft
var digg_url = 'http://digg.com/pc_games/WoW_s_Game_Director_leaves_for_unannounced_Blizzard_MMO'; In a surprise announcement this afternoon, World of Warcraft's Game Director Jeff Kaplan (whom you may know from the forums as "Tigole," and whom those of you with a longer memory may remember as the guild leader of Legacy of Steel back in the EverQuest days) is leaving the WoW team to work on a their unannounced MMO. (What this means for how far along that project is it's hard to say -- are they perhaps bringing in a solid game designer because they're just now getting things started? Or to polish off the finishing touches?) Says Kaplan of his time with the World of Warcraft team:I wanted to take a moment to let the community know that I've switched roles here at Blizzard to work on our upcoming, unannounced MMO. World of Warcraft has been such a central part of my life these past six and a half years, and it's success would not have been possible without the tremendous community around it, so I wanted to say thank you to all our players who've shared this amazing experience with us so far. World of Warcraft isn't going anywhere, however, as the rest of the team is remaining in place, including Kaplan's "partners in crime" Tom Chilton and J. Allen Brack.Mr. Kaplan, while we haven't always agreed with you, we'll certainly miss having you around. And, since you're going, we have to ask... can we have your stuff?
WoW Insider Show live tomorrow at 3:30pm Eastern
It's that time of the week again, and even though Wrath is out and we're all playing up a storm, we'll be taking some time out of our schedule to put out our weekly podcast, the WoW Insider Show, and you should come join us. We'll be live on Ustream tomorrow afternoon at 3:30pm Eastern (time zone calculator), and this week, we'll welcome the site's other co-lead blogger, Dan O'Halloran on with us -- he was live on the scene in Anaheim with Blizzard and about a thousand fans during the launch, and he got to talk to Tom Chilton, so we'll get him to tell us all about that. And Chase Christian, who writes the Encrypted Text rogue column, will be joining us as well to talk about his experiences from 70-72 so far. Additionally, we'll be chatting about Blizzard issues with server downtime and how they've fared post-launch so far (very well, I think, queues notwithstanding), and we'll talk about that first to 80 player and all of our other experiences in Northrend over the past few days.Should be a terrific show, definitely tune in on Ustream, or just come right back to this post, as we've embedded the stream after the break. If you've got a question for the show or something you'd like us to talk about, just drop a note: our email address is the show AT wowinsider dot com. And of course we'll be on for our usual aftershow -- after the show ends, we turn off the recording and chat directly with the people in the channel, so if you haven't listened live before, there's a great reason to tune in tomorrow. See you there!
WoW Insider interviews Tom Chilton
A couple of days ago at the midnight release of Wrath of the Lich King in Anaheim, CA, our very own Dan O'Halloran had an opportunity speak with Tom Chilton (also known as Kalgan), Lead Game Designer of World of Warcraft. They spoke on a wide variety of topics, from raid philosophy to the growth of the game in North America and many things in between. Read on to see what Kalgan had to say!WoW Insider: What did Blizzard think was the most surprising class development of The Burning Crusade? Did you think Paladin tanks would be as popular as they were, did you anticipate the Druid supremacy in the arena?
BlizzCon 2008: WoW Q&A Panel Liveblog
Hello Everyone! The Panel is about to start, and we have a front row seat. Check out the latest updates behind the break.
BlizzCon 2008: WoW PvP Panel
We're liveblogging the PvP panel from the floor of BlizzCon. Updates start after the break.
Ghostcrawler introduced to BlizzCon
One of everyone's favorite people in the beta is Ghostcrawler. He's out there all the time interacting with fans, talking to developers, bringing back good information and discussion. Today Tom Chilton introduced him at the class panel. He got the largest applause of the day. Everyone was very excited to get to see him and hear what he had to say.Ghostcrawler, a.k.a Greg Street, is the lead game systems designer for WoW. Basically that's designing the classes and other systems in the game.He handled the crowed very well. He probably could do some stand up with his wit. When people booed about something they didn't like he'd make a joke and have them laughing the very next second. Perhaps the best moment is when he jokingly said to a question about retribution paladins: "Don't nerf me, bro!"
Who's who at BlizzCon: WoW Insider's guide to the staff of Blizzard
Everyone going to BlizzCon this year will get to roam around the convention hall with some of the very people who bring you World of Warcraft and other Blizzard games. While many World of Warcraft fans might be familiar with the online pseudonyms such as "Drysc" and "Tigole," very few probably know what they actually look like.We've searched the internet high and low for pictures of these folks and have compiled them into a nice and handy gallery complete with some biographical information. The pictures are small and mobile enough that they can be saved to an iPhone or other mobile device that can be brought into the convention hall.If you happen to be going to BlizzCon be sure to stop and say hello to these Blizzard people. And if you aren't going, check out WoW Insider during the convention for the latest and greatest reporting right from the floor.%Gallery-33827%
Chilton: We want "to outdo ourselves in every respect"
Gametrailers hit up Tom Chilton for an interview at Leipzig and here's the video. His main point is that Wrath is bigger and better than before -- more, better, cooler content. Intercut with lots of cool video from the beta (though some of it was seen as far back as BlizzCon last year), he lays down what's up with the next expansion.He says that Wrath is meant for high-end players, but that there's lots for lowbies as well: recruit-a-friend was actually designed as part of the Wrath feature set, and Blizzard thought it was better to release it earlier. Inscription is also seen as a "whole-game" feature, since you can pick it up right at level one, and Achievements will work for everyone as well.He also talks about how the new gameplay features Blizzard is building in let them do all kinds of things with quests and instances -- he specifically mentions one encounter in the Oculus where you'll get to choose a ride with different abilities, so it'll be a different experience than your normal class play. There's some great footage of air combat in there as well, and even a little tidbit about the official threatmeter. Nice interview, and it sounds like Blizzard is rolling right along with their progress in the beta.[via WorldofWar]
Blizzard doesn't hate consoles, it's just a square peg and a round hole
We love diversity when it comes to controlling our WoW time. There's a seemingly infinite sea of AddOns and custom UI options. You can even hook up a treadmill, and simulate your character running in live action. However, except for a few custom hacks, like rigging your Wii up to control your character's direction, WoW is not playable on your console gaming device. There's always been quite a few folks who'd like to be able to play WoW on their Xbox or Playstation. But, according to J. Allen Brack in an interview with VideoGamer.com, that's not going to happen any time soon. "World of Warcraft is designed as a PC game," Brack said. "It's designed to have a keyboard and a mouse. So the controls and the control scheme that you have are very PC centric. If you think about mapping those controls and all those different type of buttons that you have to a console without a keyboard for chatting, it's a very challenging proposition." I think that makes a lot of sense. When you talk about keybinds, control combinations using the Shift and Alt keys, mouse buttons, Addons, customization -- it just seems like an awful lot to try and cram onto a Xbox controller. To even make it feasible, it seems like you'd have to add some kind of keyboard to the device. And even then, AddOn customization wouldn't be the same. Tom Chilton summed it up by saying "It's just more like a square peg round hole thing for our game. "
