Are you prepared for Wrath of the Lich King? WoW Insider has you covered!
Posts with tag discovery

Insider Trader: Alchemy, the final stretch

Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.

While alchemy is certainly not the most flashy or popular profession out there, alchemists are an integral part of the game, and any guild worth its salt has at least one, preferably several, working to supply guildmates and fill the guild bank with stacks of consumables and transmuted items.

This week's leveling guide will feature the usual cheapest route, and the most useful, to 375 for solos and casuals.

For those of you who will be working for your guild (and hopefully are also being financed, or supported by herbalists), we'll show you how to reach 375 by making the most useful items. They might cost more, but your guild will be requiring them anyway, so you might as well get your skill points that way, rather than making stacks of items you won't be using.

Continue reading Insider Trader: Alchemy, the final stretch

Pleasant patch surprises

Like many WoW players, I was really looking forward to this patch, and by "really", I mean that I was scouring the 'net every day looking for new tidbits of information regarding the upcoming content. Disregarding the new holiday content, we haven't had a decent content update in several months. It seems like ages ago that I was eagerly delving into the, at that time, new Netherwing repuation grind. Now that I've had my drake for nearly six months, it was high time for some new content.

Even with all the pre-patch research I did, I need to learn to read the patch notes more carefully, because there were a few things that nonetheless caught me off guard. First of all, I was pleased to discover that my little mistake the other day was reversed, since the cooldown on Nexus transformations has been removed. I was also surprised by other little things, like the new log in the guild pane that records promotions/demotions and players joining/leaving the guild. And, of course, as always on patch day, people see things that they never noticed before and wonder if they were added in the update. I saw what I thought were some new planets in the sky above Nagrand this evening (pictured above), but my guildies assure me that they were always there. There were lots of other little interesting things that took me by surprise, and that's one of the things that I love best about new content -- the simple joy of discovery in a game I've been playing non-stop for three years.

How about you? Anything catch you by surprise today?

Insider Trader: Discovery zone

Insider Trader is your weekly inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.

If you're an alchemist, you either love the discovery system – or you despise it and wish to blast it back to the depths of Developers' Hell (that's one of those rock-and-lava zones, right?). Implemented with The Burning Crusade expansion, the discovery system gives alchemists a small (err, very small ... ok, very, very small ... ok, infinitesimally small) chance of discovering a new recipe every time they make a potion, elixir or flask. Players seem split between considering it a creative new mechanic or an annoying contrivance and roadblock, but after several patches and adjustments, the system seems here to stay.

Let's jump right in with your most burning question: Just how small (err, very small ... ok, very, very small ... ok, infinitesimally small) actually are your chances for making a discovery? Pretty darn small. Prior to patch 2.1, the most commonly cited figure floating around was 0.01%. (Discoveries were disabled via hot-fix for a short time just before patch 2.1, reportedly to prevent an exploit in which alchemists who repeatedly tried to create potions with no bag space could make discoveries without actually creating a potion or using potion ingredients.)

In patch 2.1, Blizzard noted that discovery rates were increased "significantly," but nobody seems to have performed (or published) an extensive enough analysis to pinpoint an honest number. One popular guesstimate puts the current discovery rate at 0.1% -- but really, your guess is as good as any. (Cauldron discovery rates are on a different table and run much higher than the general rate. Players report making cauldron discoveries, estimated at about 30%, as frequently as every one to five batches.)


Continue reading Insider Trader: Discovery zone

Alchemy hotfix: No more discoveries for now

Last night, Alchemists everywhere lost a wonderful ability. One which many (including my Druid) have not been able to savor the sweet success of. According to Tseric, there was a bug causing an exploitable situation in regard to potion/transmute discoveries. So, as was done with rogue poisons staying on when entering an instance, Blizzard has opted to temporarily remove the ability altogether for all alchemists to learn new potions, flasks and transmutes through discovery.

Per Tseric on the Profession forums:

We have been working on the resolution of a serious exploit in game which has led to certain consequences that we wanted everyone to be aware of. A hot fix has been recently applied to the alchemy profession, with regards to discoveries. For the time being, we have disabled all chance of a discovery, until we can implement the proper fix through a patch , as we can not resolve this matter solely with hot fixes. We apologize for the necessary but temporary removal of discoveries, and are working to have them re-implemented with an upcoming content patch.

While disheartening for the moment, at least it is only a temporary removal and not a permanent one. I'm sad to hear that my Druid will have to wait for some discoveries (she was so close, too!) but I'm certain Blizzard will get this remedied. It's just a question of if we'll see the alchemy discovery fix patch prior to, with, or after the 2.1 patch. That is, considering the focus on everything going on in the PTRs at the moment...

[image via Mario Caruso]


RESOURCES

Blizzard Events
BlizzCon (190)
Worldwide Invitational (102)
Class Columns
(Druid) Shifting Perspectives (46)
(Hunter) Big Red Kitty (36)
(Hunter) Scattered Shots (21)
(Mage) Arcane Brilliance (42)
(Paladin) The Light and How to Swing It (51)
(Priest) Spiritual Guidance (25)
(Rogue) Encrypted Text (33)
(Shaman) Totem Talk (51)
(Warlock) Blood Pact (31)
(Warrior) The Care and Feeding of Warriors (55)
Gameplay
(Arena PvP) Blood Sport (26)
(BG PvP) The Art of War(craft) (25)
(Casual) WoW, Casually (20)
(Guild Leadership) Officers' Quarters (63)
(Professions) Insider Trader (63)
(Raid Healing) Raid Rx (20)
(Raiding) Raiding 101 (2)
(Raiding) Ready Check (25)
(Roleplaying) All the World's a Stage (43)
Hybrid Theory (19)
New Players' Guide (3)
Tank Talk (6)
AddOns and UI
AddOn Spotlight (88)
Macro Anatomy (14)
Reader UI of the Week (27)
Reader WoWspace of the week (31)
The Creamy GUI Center (13)
Lore and Stories
Around Azeroth (522)
Ask A Lore Nerd (8)
Barrens Chat (9)
Know your Lore (58)
Tales from the Lion's Pride Inn (14)
WoW Moviewatch (513)
Features
15 Minutes of Fame (25)
About the Bloggers (28)
Ask WoW Insider (62)
Azeroth Security Advisor (4)
Breakfast topics (723)
Build Shop (35)
Forum Post of the Day (20)
Gamers on the Street (24)
Guildwatch (81)
He Said She Said (4)
Illusionary Tactics (2)
It came from the Blog (29)
Phat Loot Phriday (92)
The Colosseum (0)
Two Bosses Enter (61)
Well Fed Buff (26)
World of WarCrafts (26)
WoW Insider Show (67)
WoW Rookie (40)
[1.Local] (13)
Classes
Death Knight (96)
Druid (316)
Hunter (287)
Mage (179)
Paladin (302)
Priest (254)
Rogue (180)
Shaman (284)
Warlock (196)
Warrior (217)
News
Account Security (23)
AddOns (254)
Analysis / Opinion (3142)
Blizzard (1660)
Bugs (219)
Burning Crusade (378)
Contests (232)
Economy (197)
Events (463)
Expansions (636)
Fan stuff (916)
Features (671)
Forums (282)
Guilds (504)
Hardware (41)
Humor (801)
Interviews (164)
Lore (313)
Mounts (140)
News items (1601)
NPCs (212)
Odds and ends (1712)
Patches (1153)
Podcasting (78)
Ranking (55)
Realm News (295)
Realm Status (244)
RP (176)
Rumors (67)
Virtual selves (673)
WoW Insider Business (304)
WoW Social Conventions (155)
WoW TCG (57)
Wrath of the Lich King (415)
Strategy
Alts (115)
Arena (256)
Battlegrounds (156)
Bosses (358)
Buffs (127)
Cheats (73)
Classes (324)
Enchants (36)
Factions (166)
Guides (405)
How-tos (411)
Instances (678)
Items (881)
Leveling (302)
Making money (193)
PvP (776)
Quests (381)
Raiding (768)
Talents (153)
Tips (583)
Tricks (231)
Walkthroughs (91)
Media
Comics (80)
Fan art (48)
Galleries (192)
Machinima (599)
Podcasts (52)
Polls (67)
Screenshots (672)
Races
Alliance (117)
Draenei (65)
Dwarves (21)
Gnomes (45)
Human (21)
Night Elves (48)
Horde (118)
Blood Elves (72)
Orcs (29)
Tauren (51)
Trolls (27)
Undead (26)
Professions
Alchemy (79)
Blacksmithing (63)
Cooking (75)
Enchanting (77)
Engineering (112)
First Aid (19)
Fishing (63)
Herbalism (50)
Inscription (14)
Jewelcrafting (87)
Leatherworking (66)
Mining (49)
Skinning (31)
Tailoring (71)
Retired
Pimp My Profile (1)
(Engineering) Hoof and Horn Research and Development (17)
Azeroth Interrupted (24)
Back In The Day (3)
World Wide WoW (8)
/silly (14)

RSS NEWSFEEDS

Powered by Blogsmith

    Featured Galleries

    Scarlet Crusade Tabard T-shirt
    Reader UI of the Week 6/29/08
    Worldwide Invitational goodie bag
    WWI08 Costume and Dance Contest
    Worldwide Invitational 2008
    World of WarCrafts: Midsummer magnet
    June 2008 splash screen speculation
    Blizzard splash screen speculation
    Midsummer Fire Festival

     

    Most Commented On (30 days)

    Recent Comments

    Weblogs, Inc. Network

    Other Weblogs Inc. Network blogs you might be interested in: