Nethaera has been pretty visible on the forums lately, answering a lot of questions about Wrath of the Lich King. She even popped into one discussion asking about the possibility of being able to change faces in the expansion if only to say that plastic surgery isn't in the cards quite yet. However, Neth mentions that players will be able to change hairstyles, facial hair, and possibly even get tattoos.
So while some of us who've chosen wrinkled, old mugs might not get a rejuvenating facelift (and Undead who don't have jaws will continue to miss them), a lot of customization will be available in the form of new horns for tauren, jewelry, and maybe tattoos. Salthem states the same thing in another thread, saying that there's a lot of development to be done, but that this was the direction they were taking.
The April Fool's prank that Blizzard pulled this year featured the Guitar Hero-inspired Bard class, and pictures of the character had intricate tattoos on both arms. Some early speculation posited that it could be from the new profession Inscription. It could be that the tattoos were just an artist's embellishment for the prank, but it's equally probable that the barber shops in Northrend just might be tattoo parlors, as well.
You can now get your beta discussion going on with Blizzard via the Wrath of the Lich King Beta Forums, which have been made open to the public. This means you do not have to be in the beta to view the forums, but you do have to have to be in the beta to post in them.
This is great news for those of us who want to keep track of all things Wrath, with comments and discussion happening right from Blizzard. They'll surely be a treasure trove of knowledge during the upcoming testing phase.
It's turning out to be quite an exciting beta night. Stay tuned for more.
Fixing "their" bugs which in turn breaks "our" addons and mods. The suggestion is that they don't care, or could take steps to prevent this.
As you can imagine, all sorts of responses cropped up, including the usual people who get into arguments with other posters, players in agreement, joking and sarcastic responses, and of course, an awesome string of blue responses.
Nethaera was in an answering mood this weekend -- she opened up a few cans on all kinds of player questions, and clarified a few answers we weren't so thrilled with before. The biggest question, of course, was the release date for Wrath, and rather than just giving the usual "soon" answer, Neth actually made sure to say that Blizzard has definitely not finished the game yet.
She also gave a much better answer about why Blizzard is opposed to the leaking of talent data from the game. Before, all we heard was that leaking the data was "extremely offensive and inappropriate" (that comment's been deleted from the forums, actually). And this time around, Neth is much more reasonable -- the reason they don't want data leaked is because they want players to theorycraft from gameplay, not from talent data. Of course, that still doesn't mean hearing about the data earlier is a bad thing, for the players or devs, but she has a point -- reading talent data isn't the same as playing the class.
Other than that, the questions aren't too great. People ask if Blizzard is going to do anything original, and of course they are -- Blizzard's great ideas don't come out any sooner than "when they're ready," but when they do, they're almost always groundbreaking and fun. It's completely understandable that Wrath is taking their focus, and while yes, the waiting is always the hardest part, Blizzard has never shown us that the wait for their games is anything less than worth it.
Of course, the Oceanic realms still have their individual forums and this has caused some confusion among the forum posters regarding why the forums were established. And it wouldn't be forums without trolls.
I, for one, see the value of a forum for Oceanic players to discuss their specific issues and to be able to find players in similar situations without searching the U.S. forums and without being limited to specific servers.
If you are an Oceanic player, please take our poll:
I was wondering when/if things would get a little hot and heavy for the new CM Zarhym on the forums, and this thread is it -- players start out asking for a date for the expansion (we all know when Wrath will come out already: "when it's done"), and when Zarhym orders up a generic answer, players start to test his limits. One snarky answer gets him to deal out a ban, and it's downhill from there -- when players start fighting with him over the fact that they want a new battleground, he gets a little snippy, and eventually, he says that putting in a new battleground would only satisfy a "small percentage" of the playerbase. And then players really get angry.
I think Zarhym handled himself pretty well -- his little snipe at players for thinking an expansion was "too soon" last year was uncalled for, especially since Blizzard told us they were actually aiming for one every year. But he's not distraught to the point of a Tseric yet, obviously. He's just not quite as smooth as, say, Drysc or Neth yet in quelling angry players.
It's too bad that, since the CMs are anonymous, we have no idea when they start of their qualifications or past experience (though of course we'd trust Blizzard to hire people who know what they're doing). But Zarhym got his official welcome to the forums -- when players start flaming you for saying the wrong thing, you know you've made it.
Not so long ago, I asked this very question in a poll, so it was nice to see this excellent forum post attempting to answer the query "which class should I roll to tank?" Jakalope of US Wildhammer-H goes over the strengths and weaknesses of each of our three current tanking classes (Warrior, Druid, and Paladin), and gives some reasons why you might want or not want to play them.
It's a great post and you should really read it if you're at all interested in the tanking classes and comparisons of them, but here's a summary (note, this is what he seems to be saying, not my opinions):
Warrior: takes a lot of concentration, needs many skills, gear-dependent, has several "oh !@#%" buttons; most difficult to play well. Crucial MT for progression raids.
Druid: easier to gear, fewer skills used while tanking and thus easiest for straightforward fights, less versatile while tanking, but can switch roles mid-fight. Not a great MT for 25-mans, but the best OT anywhere, and a strong MT for 5- and 10-mans
Paladin: Best AoE tank, hands-down. Need to be able to watch cooldowns; need multiple sets of gear for tanking; best 5-man tank; hard to level.
Unfortunately, this hardly makes my decision any easier, since nothing really calls out to me directly. I like all the strengths, and none of the weaknesses bother me overly much. I'll probably just keep leveling the druid, because it's fun, and the paladin, because I've got a leveling buddy for that one. The warrior will probably stay un-leveled for now, because Warriors are a pain to level in my (limited) experience. Warrior was also the least popular response to my poll (just behind Druid).
Yogi suggested in the forums that the Account Create Date should be added to the Armory. He would like that info so that he can tell the difference between people telling tall tales and actual veterans. Nethaera pointed out that there are many ways to assess people's abilities without this often inaccurate information. After all, some players are currently playing mains on what began as alternate accounts purchased months or years after first playing the game.
I think it would be fun to know the real veterans from the professed veterans, but I don't think exact account creation dates are the best or most fun way to do it. Actual in-game veteran rewards and titles would be much more fun, in my opinion, and could be listed in the Armory.
What information would you like to see added to the Armory? Do you think that account creation dates would be useful? And is it really necessary to call my poor neglected druid "untalented" for all the world to see -- in capital letters no less? Yes, I haven't logged on to her in years and her talent points are now reset and unspent but that hardly means that the poor thing is not gifted. Wouldn't "unknown" or "undecided" convey the same information without being so pejorative?
Branch raised an observation today -- it can be difficult getting groups for instances which aren't the daily Heroic. Of course, in the same post, he claims he gets offers from characters who aren't quite heroic enough for Heroics. The problem seems to really be that he can't get groups that meet his standards for the Heroics he wants to do.
Bornakk first offers that he thinks experience plays a role here. Until you've experienced the content, you're probably going to be intimidated by it. In my opinion, you may have to enjoy some time with PUGs to get that experience.
The thread winds up with what I'd expected in the first place -- the issue is more about which instance offers the most badges for your time. The fate and future of badges has been a hot topic. Bornakk definitely acknowledges that we run Heroics for badges instead of loot. Since Blizzcast indicated changes to badge loot in Wrath of the Lich King, it'll be interesting to see what happens to Heroic badges come expansion time.
We're all understandably hyped for Wrath of the Lich King, and a lot of us are watching the leaked alpha testing information closely. Forum-goer Zaggaroth is looking a little more forward. He's asking the question: How do you get into the closed beta testing?
Nethaera steps in to answer his question, and shed some candlelight. Blizzard pulls its beta testers from "many places." Some folks win a contest, others are random, while still others are the result of specific targeting -- they want that particular demographic of player represented in the testing. They don't pick only the most experienced players, which makes sense when you consider the game's for everyone and not just the elitest of the elite.
Neth wraps up her posting by saying Blizzard's not yet determined if there'll be some kind of application for the beta, and that it'll all depend on what the developers want when that time comes around. I'd guess they've done some thinking on this subject. But in some vocabularies, alpha testing just means "a development phase." We're probably still a little ways off from the closed beta. Edit: Added a link to the thread in question, in addition to the Source link below.
Forum regulars were treated to a new Community Manager over the weekend in the form of Zarhym. We don't always cover every appearance of a new blue, but when we do, it's usually interesting. What's noteworthy about Zarhym's appearance is that he has an unusually cool avatar, and a few folks have already begun speculating about it.
Zarhym hasn't posted a lot yet, but he's starting to show some personality. He's passed out some Kool Aid toasts, but is sticking to the not-quite-canned language about class balancing and ongoing development that we've come to expect from CMs. We also know his first levelling experience to level 40 was a Gnome.
I haven't seen any of the existing CMs disappear, though. My guess is this staffing expansion is related to the upcoming game expansion you might have heard about. Not only are there more players coming around to WoW, but those players are going to be busy posting questions, analysis, and complaints. Zarhym will probably help the team address all that, without lessening their existing service. Good luck, mate!
We've mentioned solo instances before -- just like more midlevel content, Heroic versions of old world instances, and player housing, they seem to be the kind of content that players seem really interested in, but Blizzard isn't all that excited about implementing. And now they've come up again on the forums, and once again Bornakk has given a few good reasons why it just wouldn't work for the game Blizzard is making.
Tremallyn of Shu'halo is actually asking for scalable instances -- he says that if 10 and 25man groups are going to be playing the same instances in Northrend, why not scale those down to five man and even solo versions, so all players can get a chance to see the content? Bornakk replies that the rest of the game already is solo content, and that they want the endgame dungeons to be more exclusive. We've heard other good reasons before -- to tune an instance for every class, with all of their varied strengths and weaknesses, would require Blizzard to water down the instance so much that it wouldn't be nearly as dynamic an experience as you can have with a minimum 10 people in the party.
Not that it's impossible -- other games (I know of one in particular) have scalable instances, some of which are even tuned for one player. But at the same time, we play MMO games for a reason -- if you really just wanted to play a great single player experience, there are a wealth of single player games to choose from out there. And if you really want to do an instance solo, you could always just wait 10 levels and do it solo anyway.
He says that yes, the flying mount is definitely worth it (it makes playing the game much faster, since most of the time spent in the game is actually travel anyway), but also that actually obtaining an epic flyer was always meant to be optional -- only for players who want to "go the extra mile." Not sure how he can say both of those things at the same time, but there you go. He also says the main consideration in the cost wasn't any effect on the economy, but rather simply making sure that it took a certain amount of time for players to obtain all that gold -- they averaged how quickly players could pick up gold versus how long they wanted players to work for the mount, and arrived at 5000g.
There is some (kind of) good news on the horizon for players who don't want to spend all that money, however. If and/or when Blizzard releases a higher riding skill, Drysc says they'll probably drop the price on this one. Of course, that doesn't really tell us anything concrete -- with the onset of siege vehicles, there may be all kinds of changes to how riding and driving works in the game. Until then, keep grinding, because apparently the only thing that will get you flying fast is a whole lot of gold.
Drysc gave a little insight into how the Arena seasons are scheduled over on the forums -- I had always thought that the Arenas were running on their own schedule (with the spaces in between augmented by when patches got released). But apparently the timing of Arena seasons has more to do with PvE content than anything else.
Strange, no? But true -- Drysc said that they want Sunwell Plateau gear to "circulate" a bit more before introducing a new Arena season. That means that the players running PvE content are actually calling the shots for when the Arena season ends -- if guilds take their time getting through the Sunwell raid, it may be a long time before we see any signs of Arena season 4.
That's interesting -- obviously a lot of players consider PvE and PvP to be completely different parts of the game, but not so with Blizzard. Apparently they consider them very much two sides of the same player base, so much so that even something as arbitrary as PvE gear distribution determines timing of the Arena seasons.
I know that image above is tiny, sorry about that -- click it to see the whole convo. Basically Mimszee got what he thinks is a bum deal out of a jewelcrafter (who he calls a "jellyfish" -- because he's too spineless to talk to Mimszee maybe?), and keeps telling one of the jewelcrafter's guildies to "open your face!" Your guess is as good as ours as to what that's all about. But that's not even the end of it -- there's more in this week's GW about Mimszee. A lot more.
For other downed, recruiting or drama news from around the realms, click the link below. And to put your own guild's news here (or a particularly tasty morsel of drama about another guild), just drop us a note to wowguildwatch@gmail.com, and you could see it here next week. Open your face!
Nethaera has been pretty visible on the forums lately, answering a lot of questions about Wrath of the Lich King. She even popped into one discussion asking about the possibility of being able to change faces in the expansion if only to say that plastic surgery isn't in the cards quite yet. However, Neth mentions that players will be able to change hairstyles, facial hair, and possibly even get tattoos.
Nethaera was in an answering mood this weekend -- she opened up a few cans on 
I was wondering when/if things would get a little hot and heavy for the new CM Zarhym on the forums, and 
Not so long ago, I asked this very question 
We're all understandably hyped for 
We've 
Drysc has 
Drysc gave a little insight into 
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