Lake Wintergrasp: Lets Make It Better

Lake Wintergrasp: Lets Make It Better   Hello,   I’m here today to talk about my experience with Lake Wintergrasp and how I believe the zone can benefit from a few changes and improvements. A lot of folks don’t quite understand how Wintergrasp works, so I’ll provide a brief overview of the game rules. As of the most recent build, during each round either the alliance or horde control the main fortress, located at the northernmost point in the centre of the map. They are the defenders, from within their base they make use of two siege factories to produce vehicles. The attackers can capture two siege factories located at the east and west points of the map in order to produce siege vehicles to break into the defender’s keep and ultimately break down their inner keep door for the win.   I’d like to propose some tweaks to this system in order to see a more dynamic, enjoyable and balanced large-scale pvp experience in Wintergrasp. Firstly, I like the idea of siege equipment, adds a new feel to pvp.. for about 15 mins. After that, you’re stuck wondering why you’re forced to use a catapult or somesuch with a total of 2 different

Armor Class Loot Ratios

Armor Class Loot Ratios   (I posted this on the items forum, but i’m not sure if it gets any traffic, or if it’s the correct forum to post this topic.)   Also, sorry if this has been brought up before.   Just curious, but what exactly is the plan for armor class loot ratios. If you look at the three types of loot function for each class it seems the numbers look like this. Not sure to separate healing/caster for each armor class. For the sake of this I won’t separate it, even though I realize they look for different stats. (Also note: I have no idea if tanking Deathknights use “prot” gear or “dps” gear. I’ll assume they use dps gear.)   Armor Class: Number of specs use for particular function   Tank Plate: 2 (Prot Paladin, Prot Warrior) DPS Plate: 6 (Arms, Fury, Retribution, Blood, Unholy, Frost) Healing Plate: 1 Holy Paladin   Phys DPS Mail: 4 (Beast, Marcks, Surv – Enhancement) Healing/caster Mail: 2 (Elemental, Resto)   Phys DPS Leather: 4 (Sub, Assissination, Combat, Feral) Healing/caster Leather: 2 (moonkin, Resto)   Healing/Caster Cloth: 9 (holy, disc, shadow – fire, frost, arcane –

Very unhappy about downranking change

Very unhappy about downranking change   After doing some instance runs this weekend I am having a very diffcult time finding a constructive way to say this – I hate the removal of downranking for healers.   If the devs hate downranking so much, how about if they just suck it up and deal with it? Maybe they could get some therapy for it. Maybe they could go cry in the corner for a while and then leave it the hell alone. Pooping on players is not the solution.   There is no “topping off” any more for shaman. And it’s annoyingly common for a heal to either leave the target at about 90% or wildly over heal them. This isn’t a huge disaster, but it’s extremely annoying to have efficiency totally removed from the game. Healing is now less fun. The lack of anything subtle, half my healing keybindings gone, and a healthy chunk of the choices I make when healing removed…….. It just sucks.   Pre-buffing with ancestral fortitude – Gone. That sucks.   Topping off warlocks and shadow priests who turn health in to dps – Gone.   In fact a good deal of the cool resto shaman stuff is worthless now. Healing way, fortitude,

Howling Fjord vs. Borean Tundra

Howling Fjord vs. Borean Tundra   It pleases me that so many people like Howling Fjord, because I intend to start every 70 I have in Borean Tundra and it will be nice to have the population spread around.   Things I like about Borean Tundra: 1. Monster variety. There’s a ton of variety on the things you fight. Howling Fjord is Vrykul, Vrykul, Vrykul, Vrykul, wolves, Vrykul, Vrykul, pirate quests, Vrykul, Vrykul, Vrykul.   2. Terrain variety. Lots of visual differentiation in Borean Tundra. But thanks to the strategic placement of sight barriers, the use of valleys and hills to control your perceptions, it doesn’t look like a patchwork quilt, even though it is. It flows very naturally to me when riding around in it. I felt like the zone was a lot bigger than it was. Not because it’s uninhabited, but because it was very cleverly designed.   3. Multiple quest hubs. After your first couple quests at Warsong Hold you can immediately shoot off to Bor’gorok Outpost, Amber Ledge, or Taunka’le Village and start up new quests. I plan to jet immediately for one of these and hopefully avoid the crowds that will be camping the same identical quests in

Divine Providence buffed, still worthless

Divine Providence buffed, still worthless Many classes have interesting five-point talents immediately preceding their 51-point talents. Heck, two out of the three Priest ones are pretty good. Discipline has Borrowed Time, which brilliantly capitalizes on the new Power Word: Shield-centric healing method of that tree. Shadow has Twisted Faith which, alright, is not the most exciting, but at least it improves Shadow’s main damage spells considerably, as well as letting them get a bit more out of spirit. In Holy, we’re stuck with something called Divine Providence. Basically, every heal that can hit more than one target is up by +2/4/6/8/10%. Not only is this boring as heck, but it’s not even good. For it to meet the benchmark of 1% improvement per talent point, fully half of your healing would have to come from these heals. I can’t speak for everyone, but I’m willing to bet that at least 70% of my healing will come from Greater Heal, Flash Heal, and Renew, gimmick fights aside. These are heals that this talent does absolutely nothing for. The devs “are sympathetic to the notion that Divine Providence feels like a second Spritual Healing but

Breakfast Topic: Achievement envy

Breakfast Topic: Achievement envy I’ve just about had it with all you Achievement whores! Yep, I mean you, that guy who just has to open up his map in places he’s never bothered to go before. And I mean you, too, that dude who keeps on learning pets and mounts just to get that stinky pet and an overgrown pigmentally-challenged lizard. You put too much pressure on me. No, really. My guild has gone on a Dora rampage and guild chat is keeps lighting up with silly messages about this guy exploring Azshara or this girl exploring Ghostlands. I don’t care! I tried not to take Mike’s poll on Achievements because I didn’t want my epeen to shrink any further. I cry uncle on all you explorers and pet collectors and mount enthusiasts. Okay, the truth is, all those Achievements just make me want to stop my Battleground grind — ok, I confess I’m pursuing Achievements myself, but it just isn’t as fast as all that exploration. My guildies are racking up Achievement points paying visits to VC or Balny and the Baron while I toil away not getting any ’shwing’ sounds for hours on end. The time I got Wrecking Ball, nobody else was online!

D.H.E.T.A druids…

D.H.E.T.A druids…   Yeeeeaaaaah, there are a few things wrong with DHETA imo.   I don’t mind villanizing Nesingwary, he did have people out there mass-killing non hostile animals… Poor things… BUT… Turning this group of Cenarion druids into freakin’ animal rights activists is too much.   I suppose all of the DHETA folks must be wearing cloth (or pleather, hah) armor, so I won’t even go into the hypocrisy of them being leather-wearers. But, like people have been mentioning, they seem to have no problems killing animals pulled to their camp… yet, omg, you kill something that’s hostile towards you (in self defense!) and SHAME ON YOU!   (Of course, maybe the “ethical treatment” thing is a farce and DHETA really stands for Druid Hypocrites Eating Tasty Animals.)   Seriously though of all the pop culture references to include, PETA? Really? Do you have to? (Don’t get me wrong, I love SUBTLE pop culture references, but this is a bit much imo…)   (I’m fine with the quests, btw… yay, rescue animals! …I just really, really don’t like the whole

Alpha Testers: Please Read

Alpha Testers: Please Read    We want to thank each of you once again for your participation in the alpha testing phase for Wrath of the Lich King. We’re pleased to inform you that we will not be wiping current transferred characters, and you will be able to continue playing them in the beta. Although we attempted to salvage death knights created during the alpha, they were broken in many ways; because of the significant changes and improvements made to the class, the existing characters were missing key abilities and would not be able to function properly. Your time testing the death knight was not in vain, though, as it directly contributed to many of the changes that were implemented. While we will not be deleting transferred alpha characters, we will be locking them for a very short period of time, allowing new players entering the beta some time to catch up. You will all be receiving a new set of character transfers, and if you’d like to begin testing immediately, you are welcome to copy the characters over again. The death knight starting area is also available for testing, and we encourage everyone to play through it.

Encrypted Text: Trunks of the Trees, Assassination and Combat

Encrypted Text: Trunks of the Trees, Assassination and Combat Every Wednesday, Chase Christian of Encrypted Text invites you to enter the world of shadows, as we explore the secrets and mechanics of the Rogue class. This week, we explore two of the new 51 point talents coming soon. If you ask 75% of the top Rogues worldwide what the premier PvP spec is, they’ll tell you Subtlety. If you ask an even greater margin of raiders what Rogue spec pumps out the most DPS, you’ll get a solid shout of “Combat, duh!” And if you should ever feel the urge to pick up a pair of daggers, every brother of the shadows will direct you towards Assassination. These three trees have been neatly defined by Blizzard, and it’s fairly obvious what each is designed for. What separates Rogues from every other class is our nearly unilateral use of 41 point talents. A dagger Rogue without Mutilate is gimped while a Sub PvP Rogue without Shadowstep is the laughing stock of the arena. And don’t bother stepping into Sunwell without Surprise Attacks, unless getting trashed on the damage meters is your idea of fun. We’ve gotten so used to the comfort in knowing that

WoW Arena Tournament down to top three teams

WoW Arena Tournament down to top three teams After three straight heartbreaking losses against American team Selective Queuers, Worldwide Invitational champions Council of Mages bowed out from the tournament today leaving only three teams to battle it out for the prestigious — and kingly — prize of $75,000. The Korean team of Hyoga, Snowstorm, and Student, considered by many to be the best RMP in the world, was the last Asian team in the tournament. They were also the last non-WLD (Warrior, Warlock, Druid) team to be eliminated, as the top three — Europe’s Nihilum Plasma, and the United States’ Selective Queuers and Fnatic Orz all predominantly ran WLD throughout the competition. Selective Queuers ran a soft counter comp to Council of Mages’ RMP by swapping in Rogue for Warrior, but otherwise performed as expected as RMP do not handle WLDs (or RLDs in this case) very well. Although the matches that managed to get streamed were fine examples of professional Arena play, the dominance of WLD teams showed just how strong the comp is in the 3v3 format. Despite brilliant play from Council of Mages, they simply couldn’t get over the hump of a