Jan 7

This was reported by MMO Champion, and I’m reporting it here as well in hopes that it will help people recognize scammers, and inform them of this important change.

In patch 3.0.8, a new interface will be used to chat with game masters. Check out the post on MMO Champion for the details!

Related posts:

1. 2.4.3
2. Dual Specs Not Dead Yet
3. Heroic/Raid Saves in 3.1
4. Patch 3.0.8 Notes Updated – Highlights
5. Mods for 2.4 Coming Around

Jan 7

Patch 3.0.8 is bring a lot of bug fixes and balancing to the expansion. The patch notes have not officially been updated, but there is a post on the forums that list them all. Without focusing on class-specific changes (excepting Raise Dead, as it could potentially affect everyone!), here are some of the highlights (at least in my opinion):

General Changes

• Players may now create death knights on any realm once they reach level 55.
• Tapping: All player spells which cause a creature to become aggressive to you will now also immediately cause the creature to be tapped.
• The Darkmoon Faire vendors have new items now that trade routes into Northrend have been better established.

Death Knight

• Raise Dead has now been split into two spells:
  • Raise Dead now raises a ghoul or pet ghoul (if talented). Requires corpse dust if no humanoid corpse is nearby.
  • Raise Ally now raises a fallen party member as a ghoul and has no reagent. Available at level 72. This should now last for 4 minutes.

Alchemy

• All flasks no longer require an alchemy lab to create.
• The Cooldown on Transmute: Titanium has been reduced to 1 day, and the materials required have been simplified.
• Reduced the cooldown on Northrend Alchemy Research from 7 days to 3 days.

Mining

• Mining veins and deposits no longer require multiple hits to receive all the ore. Players will receive around the same amount of ore, stone, and gems they would have received from multiple hits.

Quests

• The daily quest, “Shoot ‘Em Up” now only requires 15 Jotunheim Proto-Drakes to be shot down, down from 20. As well, the harpoon now only costs 5 energy to shoot, (down from 10.)

User Interface

• Chat frames can now be made “Noninteractive”. When in this state, they will ignore all clicks.
• Various filters can now be applied to Achievements.
• A special UI for chatting with GMs has been added.

Related posts:

1. Patch 2.4
2. PTR 3.0.8 Live
3. So, You Wanna Play a Death Knight: DPS
4. Patch 3.0.2 Today
5. Patch 2.4: People are Far Too Optimistic

Dec 11

As you may have guess from the title of this post, PTR 3.0.8 is now live. All the changes that have been disucssed since Wrath launched that were to come out “in a patch before the Ulduar content patch” are in here. Some notable changes:

General

• Racial restrictions on mounts have now been lifted. Night elves on mechanostrider? Tauren on raptor? You’re not seeing things.
• Tapping: All player spells which cause a creature to become aggressive to you will now also immediately cause the creature to be tapped.

Druids

• Feral Attack Power: All weapons now have the potential to grant feral attack power based on their dps (as compared to the best superior-quality weapons available at level 60).  Players will see their existing feral weapons grant roughly the same attack power as they did before (+/- 2 or so), but many new weapons will be options for the feral druid.  Some feral weapons have had strength converted to attack power to be more appealing to other classes able to equip them.  All druids will see the amount of feral attack power granted by an item in the item tooltip, if it grants any, but other players will not see that information.

Warlock

• Ritual of Summoning: Will now create a summoning portal object which can be re-used for multiple summons for 5 minutes.

Warrior

• Fury: Titan’s Grip: The hit chance penalty has been removed.

These are just a few of a large number of enhancements, bug fixes, and other additions (including new achievements and associated rewards). MMO Champion has the full scoop.

Related posts:

1. Patch 3.0.8 Notes Updated – Highlights
2. Patch 2.4
3. Two-Hand Tanking Weapons will Not be Implemented
4. The Death of the Epic Mount Quests
5. Greetings

Dec 11

Taken from the World of Warcraft Character Re-Customization Screen:

Character Re-Customization

Welcome to the Character Re-Customization page. This service lets you customize your character’s appearance, and includes an optional name change. Please note that each customization costs $15.00 USD per character customized. If you plan on changing the character’s name during the customization, please familiarize yourself with the World of Warcraft Naming Policy.

Things to know before you start!

• This service lets you change your character’s gender, face, hair and skin color, hairstyle, name, and other cosmetic features determined by their race and gender combination. You cannot, however, change your character’s race or class.
• Each Character Re-Customization costs $15.00 USD (not including applicable taxes). This covers a single customization for a single character.
• A character may only be customized once every 30 days.
• If you change the character’s name during this process, the name you choose must be available on the character’s realm, and must be within the World of Warcraft Naming Policy.
• A Character Re-Customization cannot be reversed once completed, except by a second customization operation (subject to the above costs and limitations).
• If you change the character’s name during this process, then once the name change is completed, your character’s old name will be locked from use on the realm for 90 days. After that time, the old name becomes available again and can be claimed by anyone on its realm on a first-come, first-served basis.
• Please review the Character Re-Customization FAQ for answers to common questions about this service.

Clicking continue takes you to a screen where you can select your realm and character:

Select a character to customize by clicking “Customize.” You are then asked to enter either credit card information, or a “Character Re-Customization gift card Redemption Code,” which sounds like an interesting idea.

After you have paid up, there will be a new button when you log in that lets you customize your character. It can be done at your convenience–you don’t have to do it right away.

Related posts:

1. Arena PTR Open
2. Greetings
3. New Life Tap Getting Another Look?
4. WotLK Information Released
5. Patch 2.4

Oct 25

The plague is down to two minutes. Necropolis’ fly above the cities of Azeroth. Undead gather in different zones preparing for invasion.

It won’t be long now…

Related posts:

1. World Event for WotLK
2. Standing Room Only
3. Letter from War: A New Threat
4. Patch 3.0.2 Today
5. Can I Make It?

Oct 21

Patch 3.0.3 is coming soon, and several big changes are coming our way. A few of those caught my eye in particular:

Druid

The Swift Flight Form is now available on the trainer at level 71, requiring 300 riding skill, and Flight Form learned.

Paladin and Warlock

The epic ground mount is now available on the trainer at level 61, requiring 150 riding skill, and the non-epic mount learned.

So, I guess this is the end of those epic mount quests. I feel a bit mixed on the topic; I’ve done both the Warlock and Druid quests, and they were a lot of fun; however, I can see how getting folks to go back and run Dire Maul and Heroic Sethekk Halls could be annoying and bothersome.

For better or worse, though, there it is.

Related posts:

1. Travel Speed: Travel Form vs. Mount
2. New Mount and Vanity Pet Storage
3. Welcome to Outland! Again.
4. WotLK Beta: Wrath Gate and the Quality of Quests
5. …And Two More Make 70

Oct 14

As you are probably aware, patch 3.0.2 shows up today. Don’t forget to run your launcher so you get the last few hundred megabytes of the file and it installs! See you in Azeroth.

Related posts:

1. Patch 2.4
2. Patch 3.0.8 Notes Updated – Highlights
3. Patch 2.4: People are Far Too Optimistic
4. Patch 2.3 and the Experience Curve
5. Things Grow Worse

Oct 11

I got footage for the new StarCraft 2 cinematic that was shown the first time ever yesterday at BlizzCon. The announcer at the panel said it was just a portion, but it looks pretty complete to me. I apologize in advance for the blurriness during hard-to-focus dark shots, and the shakiness, but it was kinda spur-of-the-moment.

Here’s the link! Clicky clicky!

Related posts:

1. BlizzCon: Day 1
2. BlizzCon, Here We Come!
3. BlizzCon: Day 0
4. Blizzcon, Cataclysm, and Stuff
5. Blizzcon 2009 Tickets Available Soon

Oct 11

BlizzCon has been awesome so far. We’ve gotten just a few bits of "news":

• WotLK will eventually (in a patch) allow players to respec on the fly, ie "in a raid"
• Diablo 3 will have a new class called Sorceror Wizard [sorry!]
• Starcraft 2 will be released as a trilogy, with each campaign its own title and release

After all the panels, etc., there was the costume/slash-silly/dance contests. All of the contestants did a very good job, and I was amazed at the quality of some of the costumes and dances. My camera battery about halfway through the costume contest, so I didn’t get them all, and I didn’t get any from the remainder of the show. There was this girl in a mage costume complete with mage table that was my favorite costume all day, but she wasn’t in the competition and I didn’t get a picture.

At any rate, here are most of my pictures from day 1. I apologize for the blurriness of some of them, there’s not much that can be done in a place as dark as the convention center!

The Line
It was long! There was a couple in an awesome warlock/priest costume, and a paladin with engineering goggles.

The Opening Ceremony
Of course, there was a big opening ceremony. They showed the WotLK cinematic for those who hadn’t seen it. It was quite impressive on the huge screen/speakers!

And, of course, later in the Starcraft 2 panel, we got the big announcement.

The Show Floor
There was a lot to see on the floor itself. Lots of vendors set up, as well as three demo areas: one for WotLK, one for SC2, and one for Diablo 3. There were also places set up to have your picture taken with Frostmourne, etc.

There were also WoW arena and SC2 tournaments here, so there were "pro gamer" areas set up.

I wanted to take a picture of the video equipment, but I think the lady saw the little red lights the camera puts out right before a shot!

Artwork
There was a lot of great art in the Blizzard gallery, and some cool statues from FigurePrints and others.

People and Costumes
There were a bunch of people dressed up in costumes, even ones that weren’t in the contest.

One of my favorites, second to last, is Maiev Shadowsong "with Illidan" (the little trap she’s pulling on a string!)

And this year’s winner was a Draenei riding Speedy! It actually moved, and it’s mouth opened and closed!

Related posts:

1. Blizzcon 2009: Day 1
2. BlizzCon: Day 0
3. Blizzcon 2009 Tickets Available Soon
4. Patch 2.4: People are Far Too Optimistic
5. Blizzcon 2009: Day 0

Oct 11

BlizzCon 2008.

World of Warcraft Class Panel.

Question and Answer session.

Last question.

"Did I hear you right? We can switch specs in raids?"

"Yes."

Big fan. The long and the short of it is they want you to be able to switch your spec on the fly without going back to a city and getting a summon back. They don’t want you to be able to do it right in the middle of a pull, or in arena, but they do want you to be able to go, "Oh, here’s Shade, let me switch to my DPS spec." Very awesome!

Related posts:

1. Dual Specs Not Dead Yet
2. Double-Specs Not Dead Yet
3. Problems with Dual Specs and Action Bars
4. World Event for WotLK
5. Blizzcon, Cataclysm, and Stuff