Blue Posts
PTR to open very soon!!!
by Olblindman on May.16, 2010, under Blue Posts
Quote from: Daelodev (Source)
US Testing Schedule:
Date to be determined
EU Testing Schedule:
Tuesday, May 18 starting at 19:30 CEST.
Now that the 3.3.5 patch is available for PTR testing, we wanted to have a round of focus testing for Ruby Sanctum. Only normal mode will be available, with Heroic testing to occur at a later date.
Everything related to this zone is implemented for this test, please note any issues with the trash creatures and sub-bosses, loot, achievements, and quests.
US Testing Schedule:
Date to be determined
EU Testing Schedule:
Tuesday, May 18 starting at 19:30 CEST.
We plan to allow testing for an extended period. However since this is the Test Realm, unforeseen issues could delay or cancel testing at any time.
[EDIT] – Issues with the PTR have delayed testing. Hopefully the issues with the servers will be resolved by May 18.
Date to be determined
EU Testing Schedule:
Tuesday, May 18 starting at 19:30 CEST.
Now that the 3.3.5 patch is available for PTR testing, we wanted to have a round of focus testing for Ruby Sanctum. Only normal mode will be available, with Heroic testing to occur at a later date.
Everything related to this zone is implemented for this test, please note any issues with the trash creatures and sub-bosses, loot, achievements, and quests.
US Testing Schedule:
Date to be determined
EU Testing Schedule:
Tuesday, May 18 starting at 19:30 CEST.
We plan to allow testing for an extended period. However since this is the Test Realm, unforeseen issues could delay or cancel testing at any time.
[EDIT] – Issues with the PTR have delayed testing. Hopefully the issues with the servers will be resolved by May 18.
Some updates from this morning server work.
by Olblindman on Apr.27, 2010, under Blue Posts
Update – Apparently, a few people missed the announcement this morning. The X-53 Touring Rocket is now available on live servers! Check the original announcement for more details.
Icecrown Citadel Buff increased to 15%
The Hellscream’s Warsong and Strength of Wrynn buffs in Icecrown Citadel have been increased to 15%. So far, only 9 guilds killed the Lich King in 25-Man Heroic mode, 8 of them with a 10% buff, and 1 with the 5% buff.
Cataclysm Class Preview Section
by Olblindman on Apr.07, 2010, under Blue Posts
There’s so much Info out there and its being updated faster then I can keep up with so I will post links to WOR site for each individual class as it becomes available for viewing from Blizzard. Olblindman~
Cataclysm Dispel Mechanics and Reaction to Death Knight tank changes!
Information, links, updated 03:19 Thursday April 9th, 2010.
Olblindman~
Cataclysm class previews coming the next few days.
by Olblindman on Apr.07, 2010, under Blue Posts
Cataclysm class previews coming soon
by Alex Ziebart 
Apr 6th 2010 at 3:04AM
In a surprising middle-of-the-night blue post, Bashiok has announced the schedule for an upcoming series of Cataclysm class change previews. The series will start this upcoming Wednesday, April 7th, and continue through to the 16th. The schedule is as follows:
- Shaman – April 7
- Priest – April 7
- Warlock – April 7
- Warrior – April 8
- Death Knight – April 8
- Rogue – April 8
- Hunter – April 9
- Druid – April 9
- Mage – April 9
- Paladin – April 16 (More details on this in the blue post)
This is just one more step in the deluge of Cataclysm info being passed on to us before the beginning of the encroaching beta phase of testing. Expect more and more of this in the next few weeks, because we’re certain to see it. Check behind the cut below for the full blue post from Bashiok. It’s a long one.
Filed under: Druid, Hunter, Mage, Paladin, Priest, Rogue, Shaman, Warlock, Warrior, News items, Death Knight, Cataclysm
WoW.com
New Mount =)
by Olblindman on Apr.07, 2010, under Blue Posts
Holy crap, that’s a lot of announcements for today.
Current Recruit-A-Friend FAQ – http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?locale=en_US&articleId=20588
Talent Trees in Cataclysm
by Olblindman on Jan.30, 2010, under Blue Posts
Quote from: Ghostcrawler (Source)
I was going to bump this to the General forum, but I think the talent tree comment is worth addressing in the role forums, since it applies to class design.
1) We are changing talent trees, in some cases substantially. The major focus is pruning out boring but valuable talents that passively increase say damage or healing.
2) A secondary focus is to fix the clunky areas (e.g. warlocks having two conflicting range increasing talents). We’re not going to remove old favorites or radically change the focus of the trees. You will definitely have to rethink your builds however.
3) Because you earn passive bonuses just for spending points in the tree, those fun, niche or utility talents won’t seem as expensive as they do today. We want to create a lot more choices where you are choosing utility vs. utility. We want to see far more “cookie cutter” build guides that say “Spend the last 5-10 points where you want.”
4) In some cases, trees will flat out get new abilities. These are in addition to the new level 81+ abilities.
5) You will get 5 additional talent points for the new levels.
6) We are not deepening the trees. This actually unlocks some interesting opportunities. For the first time, you can reach a 51 point talent and a 21 point talent in another tree.
I’ll also add that for Lich King we just brought Naxxramas back and adjusted the bosses for 10 and 25 raid sizes. The Cataclysm raids are new content with new maps and new bosses. We’re just trying to hit the nostalgia button with mentioning old foes like Ragnaros. Ragnaros may be back, but he’s not in Molten Core.
Plate DPS Classes Using Mail/Leather
by Olblindman on Jan.28, 2010, under Blue Posts
As we have done in previous expansions, we plan to release a patch that updates the game systems shortly before the full expansion content goes live so you will still be experiencing Wrath of the Lich King content with the new stat systems for at least a short period of time. All classes will be changing a lot in Cataclysm and we will announce all of the changes in advance to try and prevent players from being taken by surprise. In the mean time, please make your item selections with both current and future content in mind.
The original post was directed at the plate wearers because a mail-based class who is wearing leather going into Cataclysm won’t be at the same disadvantage as a plate-based class who is wearing leather or mail will be.
For an enhancement shaman or hunter, the mail will lose its Intellect, but the physical dps mail and leather will both have Agility that enhancement shaman and hunters want. However, we are also going to offer a small additional incentive for characters to wear “their” armor so it will encourage shaman and hunters to wear mail over leather, balance druids to want leather over cloth, holy paladins to prefer plate, etc.
We realize everyone will have lots of questions about what will happen to their gear, and we will eventually share all of that with you. We just wanted to post this reminder for plate wearers who are currently after leather and/or mail items to let them they will really not want it when we convert to the next expansion.
Part of the Cataclysm re-itemization will be to change all of the old (pre-Wrath of the Lich King) items, which will include doing things like actually having low level balance druid leather or holy paladin plate.
Ghostcrawler
Lead Systems Designer
Q u o t e:Made WHAT clear, exactly? This is old news.
The only thing it has done is made people paranoid since this warning has been posted so many months away from Cataclysm.
I mean, is the expectation honestly that Plate DPS Classes stop bidding/rolling on Leather/Mail? That’s not going to happen as long as there’s meaningful content out.
The intention isn’t to have people change their bidding/rolling habits right now. If the item is an upgrade right now for current content you should probably go for it.
The intention is to make sure players know that the leather/mail items probably won’t be very useful when we do reach Cataclysm so having some extra plate items as backups will probably be more helpful than another abyss crystal at that point in time. Cataclysm is not right around the corner but if you are using (just tossing a number out there) 8 leather items, replacing all of them may take more than a couple weeks.
Q u o t e:
Q u o t e:
If you are focused on Icecrown progression right now, as you probably should be (…)And what is that supposed to mean ? Since when doing progression content is the “recommended by Blizzard” way of playing the game ?
Drop the elitist attitude, your message will get through without it.
No offense Crabman, I love you and think you’re a great man. But it’s your responsibility to choose your words more carefully than the average poster.
I meant if you are focused on gearing up your character for Cataclysm instead of Icecrown, then you are probably overplanning. 
If you are gearing up for Cataclysm though, I would not suggest plate wearers investing in leather and mail. If getting leather and mail help you beat the bad man with the big sword, then go for it. I posted this mostly in response to tin-foil-hat-wearers above who speculated we were trying to nerf warrior dps or change social norms or whatever by suggesting they stop rolling on leather.
This all may seem perfectly obvious to you, but I promise you we will still see plenty of “you pulled the rug out from under me” posts, which is why we are starting early with the information campaign.
Lead Systems Designer
More Tank stuffs
by Olblindman on Jan.26, 2010, under Blue Posts
Quote from: Ghostcrawler (Source)
1) We’re much more concerned about tank single target dps than we are tank AE dps. Especially in Icecrown, there are virtually no fights where the tank’s dps contribution on an AE fight is really going to amount to much. You can make an argument that the single target dps can be relevant on e.g. Festergut (though again, I still don’t think there are that many cases where the difference between success and fail are the tank’s dps).
2) You may find Devastate boring, but Devastate is a very easy ability to buff because even small tweaks have large effects given how often it is used. Buffing say Shield Slam (or even Def Stance) would make the PvP balance we’re trying to solve even worse. You’d have to buff Revenge enormously to see a difference. Any buff to Heroic Strike affects dps warriors in PvE as well who aren’t hurting at all. Some of the ideas about e.g. Rend are interesting, but we’re pretty sure the last thing the warrior needs is yet another ability to manage while tanking. Long term that might be the kind of thing we consider, but given that we’re looking for a safe and easy buff, that’s not the kind of thing we want to mess with now. (Consider that even if we did a PTR, who is going to be on there when the competition is new bosses in Icecrown?)
3) There are differences in how tanks generate AE threat, and therefore damage. Warriors are jealous of the DK and especially paladin persistent area-based damage, and the others are jealous of the warrior’s burst AE threat on incoming adds. Druids are jealous of anyone with more than one button.
So, yes, one way of handling this is to give every tank a burst AE attack like Thunderclap, a sustained AE attack like Consecrate, and a mass taunt like Challenging Shout just for good measure. That’s the kind of thing we are really reluctant to do though because it just works against the justification for having 4 tanking classes when they all perform the same way including using the same kind of tools. Now, on the other hand no tank should be horribly gimped in any of those situations, and except for rare exceptions they really aren’t. We’re mostly talking quality of life issues here. (One such exception: DK offtanks on Yogg had trouble picking up adds and the dps couldn’t afford to wait. As long as there aren’t a ton of fights like this though, we don’t think it’s a systemic flaw.)
4) Long-term, the paladin manner of generating AE damage and threat is probably too good, especially given how simple it is. To be honest, we have very mixed feelings on the whole AE tanking game. We brought the druid and warrior more in line with the paladin for fear of recreating the Shattered Halls / Mount Hyjal experience, where other tanks just weren’t competitive. What that has led to of course is the AE tank + AE style of damage for almost every pull. You need the tools to be able to tank legitimate adds fights (imagine lots of incoming mobs), but does that mean every pull needs to devolve into that? We’d like to see less AE overall, so buffing everyone’s AE tools isn’t going to be tops on our agenda. That does however mean that we really can’t afford to have a “best AE tank”, and while things are more fair there than they were in BC, they aren’t fair enough.
Sorry for going off topic here, but these kinds of questions have come up a lot lately, so I figured I’d just share some of our discussions publicly.
3.2.2 Patch Notes Quote from Blizzard staff
by Olblindman on Jan.26, 2010, under Blue Posts
Important - Patch 3.3.2 is not this week MMO Champion
After checking with a few people, I can confirm that Patch 3.3.2 will not be deployed this week. It also means that Season 8 will not start this week either, as the season cannot start without the patch.
At this point I’m not sure if it means that we will also have to wait one more week to fight the Lich King. It all depends on whether Blizzard wants to release the encounter and the new season on the same day.
Dungeon and Raid
Icecrown Citadel
- The Scourge and the Lich King’s last hold, Frostwing Hall will be added to the game. However, in order to enter the wing, the Ashen Verdict must shatter the barrier first.
Halls of Stone
- Since Brann Bronzebeard exercised constantly, he will walk faster during the escort.
Forge of Souls
- Devourer of Souls will cast Mirrored Soul less frequently.
- Trash mobs Spell Reflect abilities have been changed. It now has a cast time, 2 charges, and chance to reflect reduced to 75% from 100%
Nexus
- Anomalus casts Create Rift only once now. (Down from 3)
Ahn’Kahet: Old Kingdom
- Elder Nadox’s now spawns only one Ahn’kahar Guardian.
- Jedoga Shadowseeker air phase now only happens once.
- Some monsters between Jedoga Shadowseeker and Herad Volazj have been removed.
Pit of Saron
- Dead players are now able to enter the dungeon during Krick and Ick or Forgemaster Garfrost encounter.
Utgarde Pinnacle
- Players only need 3 harpoons to bring down Skadi’s drake during the encounter. (Down from 5)
- Svala Sorrowgrave now casts Rituals of Sword only once. (Down from 3)
Vault of Archavon
- Toravon the Icewatcher has been added to the Vault of Archavon. He awaits your challenge in both 10 and 25 man difficulty
Violet Hold
- New portals will open faster after players defeat bosses
Arena
- With brand new rewards, Season 8 is officially starting!
Druid (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Balance
- Earth and Moon: This talent now increases your spell damage by 2/4/6% (Up from 1/2/3%)
Shaman (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Elemental
- Shamanism: This talent now increases your Lightning Bolt or Chain Lightning spell damage by 4/8/12/16/20% (Up from 3/6/9/12/15%) and Lava Burst spell damage by 5/10/15/20/25% (Up from 4/8/12/16/20%)
Warlock (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Affliction
- Shadow Embrace: Now stacks 3 times (Up from 2) Healing reduction effect reduced to 2/4/8/10% (Down from 3/6/9/12/15%)
Demonology
- Demonic Pact: This talent now increases your spell damage by 2/4/6/8/10% (Up from 1/2/3/4/5%). The buff effect to the party or raid members is unchanged.
Destruction
- Conflagrate: Periodic Spell damage increased to 40% (Up from 20%)
- Empowered Imp: Damage done by imp increased to 10/20/30% (Up from 5/10/15%)
- Improved Shadow Bolt: Now increases Shadow Bolt damage 2/4/6/8/10% (Up from 1/2/3/4/5%)
Warrior (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Protection
- Concussion Blow : Damage is decreased by 50%, but threat generated by this ability remains still.
- Devastate: Damage is increased to 120% (Up from 100%)
- Shield Slam: Damage increment from block value decreased, and starts to decrease from lower block value. If your gear is almost High-end, players won’t really recognize the change. In addition, threat generated by Shield Slam is increased by 30%
- Warbringer: This talent no longer allows Charge and Intercept to break roots or snares. Intervene remains unaffected.
Player Interface
- Party leader created by Dungeon finder is now called “Guide”
- Promoted players in raid now able to do Ready Check
Item
- Ashen Verdict Faction Ring now offers new ring to Strength dominant classes.
- Tier 10 Elemental Shaman set 4-pieces effect (redesigned): Whenever Lava burst successfully casted on the target, it increases Flame Shock duration by 6 sec
One of many concerns regarding tank’s.
by Olblindman on Jan.26, 2010, under Blue Posts
http://blue.mmo-champion.com/26/22748817764-blizzard-design-team-is-going-to-kill-wow.html
Blizzard design team is going to kill wow.
— if they continue with the direction they are going. Making block nothing more than glorified rng armor, gutting and crippling AoE tanking (not just paladins, although that is what concerns me personally the most), just sweeping away key, central stats that have existed as long as the game itself just to appease idiots too stupid to figure out how good ArPen is or isn’t, or how to attain uncrittability.
Eliminating AoE tanking, closely interwoven with absolutely ruining block for non-raid bosses by making it another slathering of rng armor, will reduce every pull to a CC-infested crawl. Instances will take hours once again. No one wants to see a boss every 45 minutes because they have to single-target kill mobs and coordinate CC; LoS pulling single packs of mobs because accidentally pulling another group or a pat will mean a wipe will be a requirement once again.
How many people will spend 2 hours in a 3-boss heroic? Even 1 hour? How many new players who can’t master the intricacies of “kill skull first” will be able to effectively CC and not break other’s CC’s?
And now the game is being reduced to— what? 2 stats? “Makes good stuff happen” and “Stops bad stuff (sometimes)”?
I am NOT looking forward to Cata if this is where the design team is (mis)leading us. This plan, still in its infancy, sounds horrid and abominable.
Feanorion
2010-01-26 01:02:28
Re: Blizzard design team is going to KILL WoW
Legit topic. Terrible thread title. I suspect if you tried again, you’d still get interested players posting.
Ghostcrawler
Lead Systems Designer
Ghostcrawler
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