Welcome back to Ask a Beta Tester, where we answer your questions about the Wrath of the Lich King beta! We had quite a few questions regarding the multi-passenger mounts coming in Wrath, so we'll mostly focus on those. That's not all we have today, but most of it. Our first question is from JPN... What does the tooltip mean for the Traveler's Tundra Mammoth where it says it carries vendors?
It means just that! It comes with two vendors. One sells reagents (including poisons) and the other sell trade supplies, like thread and parchment. The trade supplies vendor also sells some statless fashion clothing.
If you're not using the vendors and want to let your buddies hop on, there will be an Eject button to throw the vendors off and make room for your friends. And yes, only people in your party or raid can get on your vehicles. No random strangers will be jumping on your mammoth or motorcycle.
Welcome back to Ask a Beta Tester, wherein WoW Insider's stable of beta testers answer as many of your Wrath Beta questions as possible! Today we'll start off with burton888's question...
Is there a "magic number" for Enchanting, in that you can disenchant everythng in the game (currently 275 for pre-WotLK content)?
My 375 Enchanter was able to start disenchanting blues as soon as I hit Northrend shores, so I can't say for sure what the minimum level is. However, we can take some guesses based on what we saw in The Burning Crusade. As a few readers said, to disenchant epics it actually requires 300 Enchanting. 300 was the profession cap in WoW Classic. Assuming that trend continues, you will need 375 Enchanting to disenchant everything in Wrath. In the expansion after Wrath, it will probably take 450. Getting to 375 is a pretty safe bet.
Red asked...
How is spell damage affecting a Paladin's Ret Aura? Is it reduced like a standard DoT tick or even further? What are the numbers looking like with tested spell damage?
Thanks to the information slowly (we just can't get them fast enough around here...) leaking out from the Wrath of the Lich KingBeta, we already learned that the professions trend started in The Burning Crusade will continue in the new expansion. The Burning Crusade (or Patch 2.0) introduced new items or enchantments that confer bonuses exclusively the character with the profession, such as ring enchants for Enchanters or Bind-on-Pickup gems for Jewelcrafters. This was a welcome change that rewarded players with their choice of profession -- almost to the point where such profession-only bonuses compelled many to choose professions somewhat incongruous with their class.
Hardcore PvP players pursued Enchanting for the ring enchants, for example, while hardcore raiders leveled their Leatherworking for the Drums of Battle. In Wrath of the Lich King, the different professions get even more exclusive goodies designed to keep professions more or less in tune with their intended classes. Eliah reported about the passive buffs for gatherers, and they seem to be in thematically tuned to some classes. Take Master of Anatomy, for example, which seems to be a benefit given to Skinners. Traditionally, Rogues, Hunters, and Shamans were the classes who pursued Leatherworking and its complementary profession, Skinning. The passive benefit to critical strikes are certainly welcome to those classes, so players who chose to stick to their Skinning will actually receive a pleasant boost in Wrath.
Blizzard has been saying for a while that they're working on letting Enchanters ply their trade via the Auction House. When the Wrath beta launched, we didn't immediately see any way that this feature has been implemented. However, Elisalia, a beta-tester, wrote in to let us know that she'd figured it out. The link between Enchanters and the AH is going to be Inscription, and it looks like it will work as follows:
Inscriptors can create blank parchments, such as the Bleached Parchment seen in the picture. Each type of parchment works for one type of item to enchant -- armor, weapon, etc.
Enchanters can cast enchantments on those parchments, to create, for instance, that Scroll of Enchant Cloak - Greater Defense. These scrolls can be listed on the AH, mailed, or traded like any other unbound item.
The scrolls can be right-clicked by anyone to apply the enchantment to their own items.
It's a good system, and I like it. In addition to using the AH, of course, this will also allow enchanters to give enchantments to their own alts -- about time. I wonder if Inscriptors will be able to use a similar system to vend their own spell enhancements. Also, hopefully the cost of the parchment will not be too high; if it's more than a few gold, people will likely circumvent this system entirely and keep doing enchants the way we do them now. Enchanters, does this look like a good system to you? Would you rather preserve the face-to-face, personalized nature of the enchantment transaction?
Being the only non-gathering primary profession that has, thus far, been implemented in the Wrath beta, enchanters should feel special. No word yet on the long-rumored ability to sell enchants on the AH, but we do at least have some interesting new enchants to look forward to. Here are some of my favorites:
Eyonix made a lot of players happy the other day by announcing the start of Season 4. It's something that a lot of players have been waiting for, even planning for. Some players will be making the mad rush to accumulate Arena and Honor points. Within the first week of the new season, players who have stashed away the maximum 5,000 Arena points will be able to purchase anywhere from two to three pieces of Brutal Gladiator gear, provided they achieve the required personal ratings.
For other players such as those who have only recently dinged 70 or those new to the PvP scene, the 75,000 maximum Honor -- or whatever Honor they have stashed away -- will likely be used to purchase Merciless Gladiator gear when it goes on sale. More seasoned players will use the Honor to purchase Guardian gear to round out their equipment slots. When Season 4 starts, players will be strutting around Azeroth in brand spanking new gear. For a select few, these players will look like walking piles of Gold. New Arena seasons flood the community with enchant-worthy, gem-hungry gear like no other event.
In my last Light and How to Swing It, I covered some good enchants for the upper part of an endgame healing paladin -- the head, shoulders, cloak, chest and bracers. Now it's time to head below the belt (har) and take care of hand, ring, leg, foot, weapon and shield enhancements. Okay, hands and rings aren't technically below the blt, but I ran out of room for them last time.
Gloves
Major Healing: As a holy paladin, you're all about healing. Whether you focus on PVE or PVP, more raw plus healing is always an excellent choice. The only drawback here is that the mats are pretty pricey. 9/10 PVE, 9/10 PVP.
Blasting: It doesn't sound like a paladin enchant, but Blasting is an inexpensive alternative to Major Healing for healadins. Spell crit isn't quite as good as it used to be, due to the Illumination nerf, but it's still useful -- particularly if your gear lacks crit.
Everyone needs a good rod. This runed copper variation is the ideal candidate for the apprentice enchanter. Just be mindful of where you whip out your magic stick because everyone will want to get their hands on it. Here is what you will need:
Wood Dowel (1/2" x 12")
Wood Dowel Cap (1 1/2" x 3/8" Hole)
Metallic Craft Paint (I actually used a deep bronze)
Each week Arcane Brilliance offers a place for Mages everywhere to take a short break from opening portals to Shattrath and just relax and enjoy a thousand words or two about their class. That's right, my robed brethren, nobody's going to ask you to "sheep square" or demand "table plz" around here. Yep, 'round here, all the Fireballs crit, the tank never breaks your Polymorph, and aggro is just a five letter made-up word that doesn't mean anything. So set aside your threat meters and your spell damage trinkets, sit back, and enjoy this brief respite. You can always get back to pulling aggro off the tank later.
Much like life, playing World of Warcraft is a series of choices. Some of these choices (should I jump that flagged Gnome while he's already in combat, or wait till he's done and engage him honorably?) are smaller than others (should I roll Mage, or some other, crappier class?). You choose a class, a race, a hairstyle, a guild, a spec, and whether or not to accept a party invite from that Hunter who has no pet and has decided melee suits him better than attacking from range (psst...always choose "not" on that last one, trust me). One of the most important choices you will make, and one that will effect your entire WoW experience from start to finish, is your choice of professions.
Your choice of a crafting profession will offer you benefits as you level your Mage to 70 and then determine many of your opportunities at end-game. Thankfully, this choice is one you can always undo, although doing so can be costly and wasteful. Join us after the jump for part one of our look at the seven primary crafting professions and what each one has to offer us as Mages throughout our WoW careers.
I wrote about dropping Mining to take up Enchanting, and I'd like everyone to know it's going fine. I'm now at 357, being patient with the last few points to 360, opting to sell enchantments and save what little money I have after blowing quite a bit on all the materials up to 300+. Of course, now I feel somewhat compelled to acquire Enchanting formulas just so I have more options to use as I level up. The tips are a nice bonus.
Anyway, one of the formulas I wanted to go after was the Formula: Enchant Bracer - Spellpower, which drop off the Bloodmaul Geomancers in Blade's Edge Mountains. So off I go to kill these ogres, I figure it'll take maybe an hour of so of farming. Easy, right? Well, what I didn't expect was that these ogres still paid fealty to me after I completed the chain of quests to unlock the quests in Ogri'la. I didn't make much of all the yelling those fatties did when they made me king, but since I didn't bother going around Blade's Edge much after that, I didn't notice that the Bloodmaul had turned yellow, or neutral, towards me. So it took me by surprise that upon killing these ogres, they say mortifying things like, "Me honored, King kill me," or "King <name>, me die now."
Thanks a lot, Blizzard. Now I feel like a total jerk. These ogres consider me (and I'm sure millions of other players... but anyway...) their king and now I'm cutting them down like some maniacal despot. They also reference Ogri'la, which is kind of like paradise to them and a Blizzard reference to the Utopian haven of Shangri-La. It's heart-wrenching when they keel over saying, "King really think... there is... an Ogri'la?" or "Me go to... Ogri'la." It's like having some distant friend with Down Syndrome die in your arms with dreams of shiny, happy places. It's tragic. I know, it's a silly video game, and I'm not even on an RP server. But still, you have to wonder how you can keep killing those who consider you their king. After a while of killing and not getting the formula to drop, I called it a night and took a break. I probably shouldn't feel so bad. After all, if I'm truly their king, why don't they just hand over the stupid formula?
I recently posted about how I dropped Mining in order to take up Enchanting to better contribute to my PvP efforts. As of this writing, I've got my Enchanting at an unexciting 245 (update: now at 350). All our banked low-level mats have been used up and I'm hitting a barrier with lacking more than a few Nether Essences. I do have the option of buying them from the Auction House, which will certainly help me skill up faster, but it will also end up breaking my already quite broke(n) back. On the other hand, my wife leveled her Enchanting rather patiently, refusing to rewrite enchantments on gear except for the most inexpensive ones. She would diligently inspect people and their gear in major cities and offer free enchantments. Over time, she acquired enough raw materials and enchanted enough people to hit 375 -- all without spending a single Copper coin.
I'm not quite as patient. Actually, I'm impatient as heck. My wife refuses to Buyout anything from the Auction Houses, instead waiting patiently for Auctions to end, getting things for the lowest possible price. The only time she uses Buyout is when it's an incredibly good deal (thanks to Auctioneer). I, on the other hand, Buyout pretty much everything, more interested in getting the item/s right away than saving Gold. I guess that's why I don't have much and my wife, well, has more than quite a bit. So, here's my question. Are you the kind of player who would rather save your time or your money? Are you patient enough to wait for auctions to end, or the kind who clicks the Buy Now option on eBay? Would you rather farm your raw materials or buy them off the Auction House -- Buyout style?
I wrote up about Leatherworking as the hardcore raider's profession of choice. This is due to one particular item -- the Drums of Battle -- which greatly increases raid efficiency, particularly if the buff can be kept up indefinitely throughout a boss encounter. The item is so raid-beneficial that even cloth-wearers, who cannot equip any leather items, drop more aligned professions such as Tailoring. For Arena PvP, where each stat point counts towards survivability and lethality, there is no better profession than Enchanting and to a lesser degree, Jewelcrafting. Arena players competing at the highest levels have taken up Enchanting purely for the exclusive ring enchantments. A quick inspection of all players rated 2k and above will reveal that most have taken up at least Enchanting and enchanted their rings with the appropriate enchantments.
Today I dropped Mining to take up Enchanting after months of internal debate. I know the cost involved and it would break my back to level all the way to 375 for the Enchant Ring - Stats and the Enchant Ring - Healing Power along the way, but if I felt that if I were truly dedicated to Arena play, there simply was no other way. In fact, I'm rather disappointed in myself for having taken this long to take up Enchanting. Embarrassingly, I wasn't hardcore enough. Fortunately, I had informed my wife of this decision weeks ago and she's been generous enough to amass a bunch of Enchanting materials for me to use in skilling up. She even made me a Spellfire Bag. Now the trek begins.
I'm not as sold on Jewelcrafting for PvP, however, so I'm keeping my Blacksmithing. I also have an emotional attachment to my Stormherald, even though I know the Season 3 mace is arguably better. But as more and more players run around wielding one of the coolest-looking weapons in the game, thanks to the easy availability of Nether Vortexes, I'm pretty sure my love affair will soon end. Jewelcrafting only has unique-equipped gems with minor stat point benefits so I think I'll pass on it for now. I'm also willing to wager that Wrath of the Lich King holds nice BoP surprises for crafting professions. It feels good to have finally made the jump. At the very least, I can put this silly little racial skill to good use. Enchant Bracer - Minor Health, anyone?
Drysc, in response to a fledgling prophet, just made an interesting announcement regarding Enchanting, and certainly one that most people will love.
Every 24 hours, an Enchanter will be able to split a Void Crystal into two Large Prismatic Shards. Good stuff! At least, for most people. I'll admit, my main is an enchanter and I'll miss tossing a handful of Large Prismatics on the auction house for 30 gold a pop every day or two just to line my pockets. In all honesty, though, that was a bit ridiculous and while I usually tried to give my guildmates a hand with shards, I always felt bad when they had to hit the auction house for their materials.
The price of Void Crystals will receive a nice boost from this as well, which is a good thing. With the abundance of epics in the Burning Crusade, the price of Void Crystals just tanked more and more every day. It seems the devs are working on a few others things to help out crystal prices, too. Right now, there's very little to take Void Crystals out of the market, so that will definitely be welcome, all depending on their methods. Like I said before, my inner enchanter weeps at the impending dive of shard prices, but its a possibility the rebalancing of Void Crystals will even that out. One can hope!
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.
Back in the early days of the Azerothian economy, enchanters performed enchants with their own mats. You didn't sell anything you didn't have all the mats for, with the exception of special items such as Righteous Orbs for exclusive, high-end enchants like Crusader. When you were out of mats, you closed up shop for the day. Players laughed in your face if you asked them to provide their own mats, and anything for sale on the Auction House was overpriced to the nth degree. Enchanters developed relationships with crafters in other professions to create items that disenchanted into useful components. Players who leveled enchanting purely to disenchant items and sell the resulting reagents were frowned upon and hid their identities behind banker alts and mules.
Today, it's a disenchanter's market. Disenchanting has become a profitable "gathering" profession in and of itself. Groups expect enchanters to "shard" items on the spot during instance runs so that members can choose a more valuable shard instead of an undesirable BoP drop. Disenchanting is a whole new "profession"! Read on for Insider Trader's look at disenchanting as a money-making venture in its own right.
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.
I'm a details girl – and I think that's why I enjoy crafting. I actually enjoy the process of researching where to find recipes, making shopping lists and traveling to collect ingredients. I'm intrigued by the idea of crafting failures and more complex crafting systems seen in some other games, and I definitely believe that player-made products should be a vital part of a vibrant game economy.
That said, sometimes I get so caught up in minutiae that I lose track of the flow of time. (My husband can tell you the month and year any remarkable event took place, while I can't even remember how many years we've been married. /blush) What I can say for sure is that crafting has changed over the past year, morphing from the everyman's tool for making money and filling holes in gear to a means to an end for end-game players to gain access to BoP crafted items. Oh, there's a bustling market out there for certain enchantments and potions, odd and ends, to be sure ... But the face of professions across most servers looks radically different at the dawn of 2008 than it did one year ago.
This week, Insider Trader looks not at a timeline of changes during 2007 -- but rather, a review of trends and notable changes that are turning the tide of where crafting is headed in today's World of Warcraft.
Thanks to the information slowly (we just can't get them fast enough around here...) leaking out from the 
Blizzard has been saying for a while that they're working on letting Enchanters ply their trade via the Auction House. When the Wrath beta launched, we didn't immediately see any way that this feature has been implemented. However, Elisalia, a beta-tester, wrote in to let us know that she'd 
I recently posted about how 
Insider Trader is your inside line on making, selling, buying and using player-made products.
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