Posts tagged Timbal at WOW Insider

Posts with tag timbal

The trinkets of Magisters' Terrace

Posted Apr 5th 2008 6:00PM by Adam Holisky
Filed under: Items, Analysis / Opinion, Instances

The release of patch 2.4 was epic by anyone's standards. New content accessible to every level 70, new items, new high end raids, and a new instance. Magisters' Terrace is the newest addition to the WoW 5 man instance family, and has a lot of great goodies in it for the intrepid traveler.

Heroic mode Magisters' Terrace can be a thing of beauty or a real pain. I find that while it's challenging and requires a lot of good social communication amongst participants, it can be a bit ridiculous at times. Especially the 9 mob pull right before you face Kael'Thas.

However with that said, one of the best rewards in any five man instance comes out of heroic Magisters' Terrace's Priestess Delrissa: the trinkets. The tanking trinket in particular makes me cry it's so great. Five hundred seventy more HP and an amazing live saving dodge increase. The DPS trinkets, casting trinkets, and healing trinkets are equally great. Let's take a closer look at them.

Continue reading The trinkets of Magisters' Terrace

Blizzard explains hunter suspension

Posted Mar 12th 2008 9:00AM by Zach Yonzon
Filed under: Hunter, Blizzard, PvP, Forums, Arena

WoW Insider recently reported that Megatf, the highest ranked Arena Hunter and hunter community personality, was banned from the forums. Initially thought to be a permanent ban from playing World of Warcraft, Drysc explained that Megatf had violated the Forum Code of Conduct and was temporarily banned from the forums, with no impact on his ability to access WoW. The violation was also not because Megatf has posted keyloggers or gold selling sites, as earlier reported, only that the ban was erroneously categorized elsewhere. An unfortunate side effect of the ban was the subsequent deletion of all threads created by Megatf, some of which also happened to be stickied guides that the hunter community held in high regard. Drysc also explained that the deletion was part of the suspension and could not be undone, so those useful hunter guides were gone forever unless they were archived.

Timbal explains Blizzard's actions in detail and in a rare display of verbosity, proceeds to rationalize the process by which Blizzard's moderators deal with errant threads and posters. He apologizes on behalf of the company for deleting the valuable threads but also cautions players against unwarranted and ill-worded protests against "perceived class balance issues" that might be in violation of the forum rules. He also explains that the scarcity of blue, or Blizzard, responses from the forums do not necessarily indicate that players are not being heard although it often feels that way for many. This only reinforces the fact that Blizzard is extremely vigilant about forum violations and spares no one from reprimand. As always, Blizzard encourages feedback as long as it is done in a constructive manner.

Manda's tales from the TTR: Stress edition

Posted Mar 9th 2008 10:45PM by Amanda Miller
Filed under: Horde, Realm News, Patches, Events, Blizzard, Bosses, Mounts, Interviews, Arena

Sunday's Tournament Test Realm stress test was, in my opinion, a huge success. Despite the lag, the occasional crash or kick, and a one-hour maintenance downtime, the server held up quite well considering just how many people were bombing around on it. After maintenance, the lag improved quite a bit, and I'm guessing that Blizzard learned a fair amount that will help them to design the arena tournament realm.

Of course, interaction with the GMs, fighting spawned bosses dropping orange epics, being polymorphed into all sorts of things, receiving rare mounts, and reading through /general, /say, and /yell, not to mention tells, were the real highlights from yesterday. While Alex has already given a fairly detailed account of our adventures, I have some stories of my own to tell.

Gallery: TTR Stress Test Gallery

Continue reading Manda's tales from the TTR: Stress edition

Blizzard's forum policy against foreign languages

Posted Aug 28th 2007 2:12PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Fan stuff, Virtual selves, Blizzard

This post on the official forums, like many others in languages that aren't English, got closed down. Why? Because it's a policy of Blizzard that they do not "offer foreign language support" on the forums (although, in looking through the Forums Guidelines, I can't see anything that officially says that). At any rate, the rule is no language but English on the official forums, and Timbal is sticking by that policy.

And it's not just Spanish-- I've seen this come up on the EU forums as well, when someone posts in French or German. Why is Blizzard so opposed to players posting in their native language? Of course, as Timbal says, not everyone can know every language, but Timbal knew enough Spanish to realize the original thread (called "server latino") was asking for new realms. And this is 2007-- is it too much to ask for one Blizzard forums employee that speaks Spanish, or in the EU, French or German? They may not know enough to actually answer the questions in that language, but they should know enough to police players who are speaking in that language, maybe in a special foreign language section of the forum.

Now, also according to forums policy (but also not listed in the "guidelines"), you're also not supposed to request new realms, so even if the thread was in English, it would have been closed anyway. And if someone speaking a foreign language is somehow being obscene, that doesn't belong on the forums either. But it's unfair for people who have legitimate questions or requests and want to posit them in their native language to be shut down by Blizzard automatically. Nine million people play this game, and it's very likely a large number of them don't speak English as their native language-- for Blizzard to completely ignore them on the forums is a poor decision.

Update: Our terrific commenters point out that there are French, Spanish, and German forums for the EU servers. But the fact remains that Blizzard closes, without second thought, any thread started in a foreign language on the US servers.

PTR Notes: No cyborz in the Deeprun Tram

Posted Aug 21st 2007 4:05PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Odds and ends, Blizzard, Humor

What did Skazarund do to get banned from the PTR? All he did wrong was cyborz, man. Cyborz, if you didn't know, is a little bit of the digital hanky-panky. The Internet in-and-out, if you will. The networked nookie, know what I mean?

All joking aside, apparently that's true-- Timbal says the test realms are for "testing new game content and functionality, not your abilities to write romance novels." Now, I'm not a huge fan of cybersex or anything (the real thing seems much more fun), but there are people out there that do it, and as long as they don't hurt anyone, I'm fine with leaving them alone. Does Blizzard really feel the need to ban anyone who gets it on on the PTR? Is it somehow more wrong there than on the live servers?

Skaz may have been obscene in some way, and if so, then yeah-- he broke the terms of service, and a ban is in order. But if he's just gettin' it on, RP-style, baby, is that really being "disruptive or counterproductive to testing"?

New Blue poster Timbal (not Tseric's replacement)

Posted Jul 23rd 2007 3:30PM by Mike Schramm
Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Blizzard

Visitors to the official forums this weekend may have noticed a new name in blue: Timbal is a brand new Blizzard poster (and he's already closing threads with the best of them). But while players are guessing that Timbal is Tseric's replacement, and all the baggage that comes with that, Drysc points out that Timbal is a forum moderator, not actually a community manager. Timbal obviously doesn't have an avatar yet, either, but I'm not sure if that's because he's a mod, or because he's new.

What's the difference? In short, Timbal and the other mods oversee the forums, while the CMs (like Drysc and Nethaera) oversee the community. As you can see from that last link, Blizzard still has the CM help wanted ad up, and so it seems to be a pretty good guess that Tseric hasn't been replaced yet.

Or maybe he won't be. According to what I've heard from players, the forums need more moderation than management-- while Blizzard's CMs have been focused on the forums, I'd suggest WoW's community isn't really there anymore (if it ever was, really). It's either in game, or on sites like WoW Insider. Lots of players have asked for a change in the forums, either a crackdown on the shenanigans that seem to take place there, or just a way to make them more relevant to the game. Hiring Timbal as a moderator might be a step towards moderation, and a step away from relying on CM activity in the forums as Blizzard's way of managing their connection with the WoW community.

Story	More like this
All things Wrath	Wrath of the Lich King
Leaked: Wrath to be released in second half of '08	Wrath of the Lich King
The Guild season finale: Boss Fight	The Guild
An illustrated guide to Kil'jaeden's hats	Sunwell Plateau
Biggest sale on the Auctuion House	Breakfast Topics
It Came From the Blog: Revenge of the Orc-moms	ICFtB
The WoW Insider Library
Put WoW Insider headlines on your site

Event	Date
WoW Insider Arena Tournament	FRI nights
WSG weekend	5/16 - 5/19
Stranglethorn Fishing Extravaganza	SUN 2p - 4p
Midsummer Fire Festival	6/21 - 7/5
Worldwide Invitational in Paris	6/28 - 6/29
BlizzCon 2008 in Anaheim, CA	10/11 - 10/12

#	Blogger	Posts	Cmts
1	Mike Schramm	103	9
2	Adam Holisky	59	42
3	Daniel Whitcomb	52	48
4	Amanda Dean	39	0
5	Moo Money	33	27
6	Elizabeth Wachowski	31	3
7	Eliah Hecht	31	21
8	Zach Yonzon	30	0
9	Robin Torres	22	21
10	Alex Ziebart	22	2
11	Matthew Rossi	18	85
12	Sean Forsgren	13	0
13	Lisa Poisso	12	4
14	Amanda Miller	9	0
15	David Bowers	7	12
16	Jennie Lees	7	8
17	Shelbi Roach	5	1
18	Scott Andrews	4	0
19	Krystalle Voecks	4	3
20	Christian Belt	4	0

Fill your tanks with these new Resistance shots SCEA announces US releases for PS3/PSP games The Agency trailer introduces all the major players	WoW Moviewatch: Chronicle of the Annoying Quest, Episode 24 Well Fed Buff: Essence Mango Around Azeroth: The writing on the wall
New Fallout 3 conceptual concept art Last Chance: Win McFarlane Halo 3 Warthog Konami announces revolutionary Rock Band competitor, Rock Revolution	NPD: April sees Wii on top (yet again) Family Game Night is fun for the family VC Friday: More Hanabi Festival shooting goodness
WRUP: Tactical insects edition Metallic Rose DS Lite a reality So you love Advance Wars: Days of Ruin?	SCEA announces US releases for PS3/PSP games Fading Shadows coming to US, courtesy of Agetec SCE Worldwide Studios gets new president

The trinkets of Magisters' Terrace

Blizzard explains hunter suspension

Manda's tales from the TTR: Stress edition

Blizzard's forum policy against foreign languages

PTR Notes: No cyborz in the Deeprun Tram

New Blue poster Timbal (not Tseric's replacement)

WOW Insider Features

Featured Stories

Upcoming events

RESOURCES

RSS NEWSFEEDS

WoW Insider on Twitter

Twitter Updates

Featured Galleries

Most Commented On (30 days)

Recent Comments

WOW Insider bloggers (30 days)

Weblogs, Inc. Network

The trinkets of Magisters' Terrace

Blizzard explains hunter suspension

Manda's tales from the TTR: Stress edition

Blizzard's forum policy against foreign languages

PTR Notes: No cyborz in the Deeprun Tram

New Blue poster Timbal (not Tseric's replacement)

WOW Insider Features

Featured Stories

Upcoming events

RESOURCES

RSS NEWSFEEDS

WoW Insider on Twitter

Twitter Updates

WOW Insider Tags

Featured Galleries

Most Commented On (30 days)

Recent Comments

WOW Insider bloggers (30 days)

Weblogs, Inc. Network