Filed under: Virtual selves, News items, Wrath of the Lich King

Okay, so we’ve been hearing this for a while now. The Dance Studio is coming at some point during Wrath, it’s just been delayed. There’s been no word about that beyond it though. We’re not even sure if they have a rough target patch for it. It’s just sort of out there, that unanswered question: Dude, where’s my feature?

Zarhym spoke out on it again the other day, and while on one level it’s more of the same “it’s coming when it comes” type of talk we’ve heard before, he does say that the art team is “hacking away” at it when they aren’t faced with more looming deadlines like Ulduar. This is probably the first time that I can recall that we have had someone from the Blizzard team saying that yes, it is being actively worked on.

Now admittedly, this still isn’t a release date, and I’m still not expecting it until at least 3.3, but it’s out there, which is the good thing. Here’s looking forward to the day when I can have my Human Death Knight start dancing the Matt Dance.

Zarhym: Artists are “hacking away at” new dances originally appeared on WoW Insider on Sat, 31 Jan 2009 20:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Priest, Bugs, Quests, Death Knight, Wrath of the Lich King

We got an interesting email tip from Matthew Madinger that the quest The Air Stands Still is bugged in a really odd and unique way. Namely, it kills Shadow Priests who do it. Intrigued, I checked the WoWhead link and sure enough, several other shadow priests have reported the same bug. Without going into too much detail, our face melting priest friends are reporting that the death knight mobss who are supposed to help with the quest are instead coming over and killing them. In one case this means you get the honor of being killed by a very important Death Knight, if that’s any consolation.

If you’re a shadow priest, please be careful when taking this quest, and if you could report back on whether or not it bugged for you we’d appreciate it. I don’t have a shadow priest myself, so I was unable to try and see if I got killed.

The Air Stands Still bugged for Shadow Priests? originally appeared on WoW Insider on Sat, 31 Jan 2009 19:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Mage, Analysis / Opinion, Tips, PvP, Features, Raiding, Guides, Classes, (Mage) Arcane Brilliance, Wrath of the Lich King, Inscription

Each week Arcane Brilliance writes a column about the ins and outs of Magehood. Mostly, what’s in a Mage’s hood is the Mage’s face (which may or may not have a lower jaw), and what’s out of a Mage’s hood is fiery death. Did you see what I did there? It’s clever word-play, you see…ins and outs…Magehood…in a Mage’s hood…out…get it? Oh, fine. You try to come up with something witty every week! It’s hard! Stupid italicized introductory paragraphs…I should have just gone with some more Warlock-bashing.

I don’t know about you, but when I was a kid, discretionary funds were rare and precious. There were so many toys to buy, and so little money with which to purchase them. If Grandma were to send me a card with five bucks in it for my birthday, that was a windfall of epic proportions. Each purchase had to be carefully planned, each dollar wrung for as much value as it could provide. Use the money now on a Storm Shadow action figure (with combat grip!), or save it to someday replace the NES controller that had died a premature death in the wake of a last second Tecmo Super Bowl loss to my little brother? Yes, my childhood was in many ways resource management training for later years spent playing games like Starcraft.

And games like World of Warcraft.

Do I spend my Stone Keeper’s Shards on a meta gem now, or save them for that sweet Mammoth? Use my honor to upgrade my cloak now, or save it and get the trinket? Use that socket for spellpower or hit rating? Kill the Warlock, or kill the Warlock? So many choices.

All of which brings us to this week’s topic: what to do with our precious and very limited Glyph slots? Follow me through the jump, and we’ll discuss.

Continue reading Arcane Brilliance: Grading the glyphs

Arcane Brilliance: Grading the glyphs originally appeared on WoW Insider on Sat, 31 Jan 2009 18:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Patches, Analysis / Opinion, News items, Wrath of the Lich King, Rumors

So a few minutes ago, a reader by the name of Mike — if that is his real name — sent us, without links or other proof, a copy of what he says are the official patch notes for 3.1 from an early internal build. So we’ve now been having a pretty robust discussion here at WoW Insider HQ over whether they’re legit or not.

Me, I’m not so sure. The Hunter and Death Knight changes are a little overpowered (Don’t et me wrong, I’d love the changes, I just recognize they’re probably a bit on the overpowered side), and the whole Ruby Sanctum thing seems out of left field when the dungeon focus is supposed to be Ulduar.

On the other side, Adam is pretty insistent that these changes could just be an earlier test build that will get nerfed down, and the class changes are no worse than, say, patch 2.1 anyway. Alex and Matt Rossi are leaning toward fake too. So in the end, we just decided we better post these and let you judge for yourself. I’d recommend taking them with a big grain of salt myself, but read up after the break and let us know what you think.

Continue reading Believe it or Don’t: Patch 3.1 notes leaked?

Believe it or Don’t: Patch 3.1 notes leaked? originally appeared on WoW Insider on Sat, 31 Jan 2009 17:05:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, News items, Instances, Raiding, Bosses, Classes, Buffs, Wrath of the Lich King

One of the major overhauls heading from Burning Crusade into Wrath of the Lich King was the consolidation of buffs and debuffs. In an attempt to keep raid groups from thinking they had to bring one specific class to get one specific buff or debuff, Blizzard switched some spells up, gave buffs to more classes, and made them unstackable, the result being that one can take one of a certain handful of class and specs to get the buff or debuff they desire, in theory giving a raid more choice about who they bring.

Still, the buffs and debuffs remain, and Ghostcrawler has been having some pretty interesting discussions about them in the past few days. To start with, he came out and said it pretty plainly: Replenishment is Mandatory. Blizzard will balance fights under the assumption you have Replenishment much as they do under the assumption you have a tank. In the short term, this means your raid is probably going to want to find a Shadow Priest, Retribution Paladin, or Survival Hunter if they haven’t already.

Continue reading Replenishment is mandatory and other buff discussion from Ghostcrawler

Replenishment is mandatory and other buff discussion from Ghostcrawler originally appeared on WoW Insider on Sat, 31 Jan 2009 16:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Breakfast topics, Wrath of the Lich King

Wow. It’s already the end of January. Time flies by so fast that one twelfth of 2009 is already finished. Now would probably a good time as any to ask how you’ve done so far in Wrath of the Lich King. I’m rather proud that our little guild has downed 25-man Malygos — I should probably tell Mike to give us a shoutout on Guildwatch — and that the only thing left for us to do right now is Sartharion with three drakes. Sure, we didn’t finish it all in a retarded three days, but I’m very happy nonetheless. On a personal note, my wife gave me a Nobles Deck, so I’m looking forward to turning that in for my Darkmoon Card: Greatness this week. It should go rather well with a pretty little hacking thing I got last week.

On the other hand, I’ve neglected my Shaman, who’s sitting lonely at Level 70 in Warsong Hold. The only nice thing is that his Engineering is almost maxed out, so I should have no problem learning that Schematic: Mechano-hog when the time comes. I just need to force my lazy butt to level him. My Hunter has yet to step foot in Northrend, and I don’t think I’ve ever logged my Death Knight past the initial leveling experience. My Warlock finally got four pieces of Plagueheart, so I’ll try out how that 4-piece bonus works out. Maybe on Loken later, since I’ve still got some backlogged quests with those happy little giants.

Overall, I guess it’s been a pretty good start of the year. I’ve gotten a bit of gear on some characters, decent progression in the endgame, and even enjoyed some success in my favorite thing to do, PvP. How about you? It’s the end of January, how’s your game coming along so far? Have you leveled more than one character to 80? Ventured into Naxxramas? Any Achievement is notable, even for seasonal things like getting the Elder title. In a game that rewards all our varied playstyles, I’m curious to know how everyone’s doing so far.

Breakfast Topic: So far, so good? originally appeared on WoW Insider on Sat, 31 Jan 2009 08:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Warrior, Analysis / Opinion, Bosses, (Warrior) The Care and Feeding of Warriors, Wrath of the Lich King

There are the aspects of playing the warrior class that are flashy, obvious and fun… 7k shield slam crits, dual wielding huge, berserking enchanted weapons, bladestorming… and it is right and proper that we should gush about those aspects of the class to the high heavens. However, sometimes you have to get down to the nuts and bolts of things, as it were.

We got an email this week from Sean which stated that he wanted us to talk about the importance of hit and expertise on tanking gear. Now, we’ve talked about those stats before, but it’s a whole expansion later and as such, we should re-familiarize ourselves with hit rating and expertise for tanks and DPS warriors, because both specs need both stats but weight them differently. This week, we’ll talk about tanking gear. Why does tanking gear have hit and expertise and why is it good that it should have those stats?

Continue reading The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Expertise and hit in WoTLK

The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Expertise and hit in WoTLK originally appeared on WoW Insider on Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Warrior, Analysis / Opinion, Bosses, (Warrior) The Care and Feeding of Warriors, Wrath of the Lich King

There are the aspects of playing the warrior class that are flashy, obvious and fun… 7k shield slam crits, dual wielding huge, berserking enchanted weapons, bladestorming… and it is right and proper that we should gush about those aspects of the class to the high heavens. However, sometimes you have to get down to the nuts and bolts of things, as it were.

We got an email this week from Sean which stated that he wanted us to talk about the importance of hit and expertise on tanking gear. Now, we’ve talked about those stats before, but it’s a whole expansion later and as such, we should re-familiarize ourselves with hit rating and expertise for tanks and DPS warriors, because both specs need both stats but weight them differently. This week, we’ll talk about tanking gear. Why does tanking gear have hit and expertise and why is it good that it should have those stats?

Continue reading The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Expertise and hit in WoTLK

The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Expertise and hit in WoTLK originally appeared on WoW Insider on Thu, 29 Jan 2009 17:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Priest, Shaman, Analysis / Opinion, Tips, How-tos, Raiding, Wrath of the Lich King, (Raid Healing) Raid Rx

Raid Rx has returned from retirement! Every Thursday (usually), Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of PlusHeal, a new healing community for all restorative classes. Today, it is all about the healing leader and what you need to know if want to do it.

Organizing healers is often difficult (and sometimes) a thankless job. Having a healing leader to quarterback and direct the efforts of the other healers in your raid increases the overall survivability of the raid instead of just having healers on free for all healing. I’ve handled healing assignments in no less than 4 different guilds and it becomes a new experience every time.

Continue reading Raid Rx: Are you ready to be the healer leader?

Raid Rx: Are you ready to be the healer leader? originally appeared on WoW Insider on Thu, 29 Jan 2009 14:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: Features, Two Bosses Enter, Wrath of the Lich King

Two Bosses Enter … but only One Boss Leaves, in WoW Insider’s series of fantasy death matches. This season’s bosses come from the five-man instances of Wrath of the Lich King.

Last week, we launched a new series of Two Bosses Enter, One Boss Leaves, pitting the five-man instance bosses of the Wrath of the Lich King against one another. Our first death match turned dragon against dragon, cone effect against cone effect: Keristrasza of The Nexus vs. Cyanigosa of The Violet Hold.

Keristrasza emerges the easy victor from this battle, defeating Cyanigosa with three-quarters of the popular vote. Readers feel that not only is Keristrasza the more capable opponent, but her bondage lends her a deadly edge of passion and desperation. “Flying, porting, jumping or not, it’s all irrelevant,” comments Omegan01. “Really. Cyanigosa may be a stone cold killer, but Keristrasza is a f@@@ing psychopath. Five minutes flat and Keri’s going to be back in her basement, wearing Cyanigosa’s face and eating what’s left of her. With some fava beans and a nice Chianti.”

Stick around for the next installment of Two Bosses Enter, coming up later today with a fresh pair of opponents for your consideration.

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One Boss Leaves: Keristrasza claws Cyanigosa originally appeared on WoW Insider on Thu, 29 Jan 2009 11:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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