World of Warcraft 3.1 Patch Brings Dual-Specs, New Raid

On Tuesday Blizzard rolled out the first major content patch for World of Warcraft since the launch of Wrath of the Lich King last November. The 3.1 patch includes the long-awaited dual-specialization feature, which allows players to quickly and easily switch from one set of talent choices to another. Action bars and glyph choices change as well. The patch also includes a new end-game raid dungeon, Ulduar, which expands upon the variable difficulty modes Blizzard has recently experimented with. The instance contains 14 bosses, 10 of which have an optional "hard mode" that players can attempt for better rewards. In addition, the patch contains a host of class balance changes, bug fixes, and UI improvements. You can see the full patch notes at Blizzard's website, and a brief trailer is also available.

Comments

1000 gold

[gibbled]

1000 gold for dual spec. Don't need quivers or ammo pouches any more.

Exams

[DirtyCanuck]

This is certainly going to have an adverse affect on exam scores around the world.

Re:Exams

[Opportunist]

I don't know how to put this without almost certainly burning Karma.... but IMO someone who needs this patch, who respecs often enough that 1000 gold for the "right" to have two specs is actually valuable, not to mention having 1000 gold lying around, ... do you think his exam scores will be affected in any way? Can you spend less than zero time learning?

Re:Exams

[Jack9]

To start, you net about 700 gold in the level from 70 to 80. If you're careful, much more.

Fundamentally, MMORPGs that use a DIKU archetype system (classes) find an overabundance of damage dealers and few tanks; even fewer healers. It's easy enough to note that leveling up / grinding for money / pvp rank / whatever (DIKU style) you need damage, making the classes capable of tanking/healing even more sparse as they min/max toward the damage specs. This is a nightmare for developers who have to try to balance that system. I'd say dual speccing is useful for just under half the wow population and really makes the non-damage dealing classes much much more attractive as there is now true flexibility, guaranteeing more $$$. From a player perspective, it's a win. From the developer's perspective, it's a win. From the publisher's perspective, it's a win.

Re:Exams

[NewbieProgrammerMan]

1) 1000g isn't exactly a lot of money any more.
2) The dual spec addition isn't for respec freaks. It's for people that don't like sitting around waiting on a healer or tank for a group, or that want to take their healer or tank out solo to do some dailies and not have it take all damn day to kill something.
3) Some of us aren't total losers, ya know. My GPA for the last two years of grad school is 3.7. I'm not the only person in my classes that plays WoW, either.

Re:Exams

[thriemus]

I have spent over well over 3000 gold on each of my two lvl 80 chars respeccing from PvE to PvP and vice versa. 1000 gold is nothing in game now. The reason dual spec is nice is this:

PvE - 2 different specs in raid without having to hearth and get summoned back (Sunwell anyone?)

PvE & PvP - People who play both do not need to respec every day now.

This current patch not only addresses the need for new content but is also providing some much needed class balance in abilities.

The reason that we are only getting one new instance is because of the sheer amount of development that Blizzard are now putting into new content. They have to design encounters for 10 & 25 man raids, then within each of those they have to design and balance easy and sometimes multiple levels of difficulty. Think of OS 10 / 25 with 0,1,2,3 drakes alive. There are 8 different ways to killing one boss. I would rather see 1 well designed instance than 3 instances with no real thought put in. With the new hard modes all raiders can see new content, lower guilds can kill bosses but it takes very capable guilds to kill bosses on the hardest mode, giving the best loot.

Sorry, I play WoW, quite a bit, however I play in one of the top 100 guilds in Europe so at least I am a capable no lifer ;P

Re:Exams

[adunstan]

What about for a new player? Someone that would probably get a lot of use out of this. I know that it was hard for me when I joined WoW just as the 2nd expansion was released. Starting as a Priest at level 1 when there is hardly anyone around your level forcing you to solo most of the time and making it almost impossible to find a group for low level raids is not easy.

Having this dual-spec system would make it a lot easier for a low level first time player to solo, especially for the low damage classes. It would mean they could easily switch between for example a healer priest for the rare chances they did get in a group/raid and shadow priest for solo.

I quit WoW when I got to level 65, I started getting bored of having to go days waiting for a decent group for an instance. It very much felt like to me, that Blizzard didn't care about new players, they already have enough regular subscribers to keep them going.

Also, I didn't have 1000g available at the time I quit, so even now, I wouldn't be able to use this.

Re:Exams

[jo_ham]

I play casually, I am swimming in gold. Gold at 80 is like air. It's hard *not* to make a fortune really quickly.

Re:Exams

[Talderas]

1. Getting from 1-80 without instances is not hard at all.
2. Blizzard made it easier to get from 1-60 (I think), by reducing the exp required per level.
3. Instances are a boring way to level up, compared to questing.
4. There's more quests in the game than it takes to get leveled up. For example, you could easily hit level 70 in Outlands after doing Hellfire, Zangarmarsh, Terrokar Forest, Nagrand, and a little bit of Blades Edge Mountains. That leaves the rest of Blades Edge Mountains, Shadowmoon Valley, and Netherstorm to get quests where you got more gold rewards for quests. In Northrend you could hit 80 easily by the time you've done Borean Tundra, Howling Fjord, Dragonblight, Grizzly Hills, Zul'drak, Scholazar Basin, and if you're a bit unlucky a little in Storm Peaks. Either way you'll have most of Storm Peaks and all of Icecrown to get gold from quests.
5. Lv60 and Lv70 raids aren't done frequently. The people that do them frequently either do them with a small elite group of players because they're looking for specific stuff (Elementium Ore from BWL, Bindings from MC), or they do it with high level characters because they don't want to be carrying people.
6. Instances are fine to find, the problem is that some instances are quicker and have better equipment and people generally drift towards those instances. You can almost always find Scarlet Monestary groups horde side, but trying to find a group for Sunken Temple or Blackfathom Depths is near impossible.
7. If you were a low level when BC started there should have been numerous new low level characters, tons of Draenei alliance side and a tons of blood elves horde side. I smell BS there.

Re:Exams

[drinkypoo]

3) But have you ever seen a woman naked? And I don't mean by turning off Google safesearch.

Re:Exams

[Anonymous Coward]

Not being pedantic here (ok, maybe a little), but

As a verb affect means "to act on" or "to move" (His words affected the crowd so deeply that many wept); affect means "to pretend" or "to assume" (new students affecting a nonchalance they didn't feel). The verb effect means "to bring about, accomplish": Her administration effected radical changes. The noun effect means "result, consequence": the serious effects of the oil spill. The noun affect pronounced with the stress on the first syllable, is a technical term in psychology and psychiatry. Affect is not used as a noun.

from Dictionary.com

I guess you meant "effect", since there is a causation-consequence relation.

Re:Exams

[Krneki]

Shame they needed 4(?) years to understand it.

Now can they do something about FPS. Playing at 20-30FPS on modern hardware ain't fun.

Re:Exams

[Anonymous Coward]

This is certainly going to have an adverse affect on exam scores around the world.

I deleted 4 lvl 80 toons and dumped my WOW account two months ago. Nice to have my life back. The time drain that WOW puts on a person is astonishing. The pursuit of gold, gear and epics is a GIANT waste of time. Ultimately what do you get? NADA.

Re:Exams

[Ephemeriis]

What about for a new player? Someone that would probably get a lot of use out of this. I know that it was hard for me when I joined WoW just as the 2nd expansion was released. Starting as a Priest at level 1 when there is hardly anyone around your level forcing you to solo most of the time and making it almost impossible to find a group for low level raids is not easy.

Starting out new at level 1, right after an expansion is released, is difficult no matter what. Everyone's playing in the new content, nobody wants to go do any of the old stuff.

Having this dual-spec system would make it a lot easier for a low level first time player to solo, especially for the low damage classes. It would mean they could easily switch between for example a healer priest for the rare chances they did get in a group/raid and shadow priest for solo.

No it wouldn't.

The first several re-specs are dirt cheap compared to this. There's absolutely no reason you'd want to save up the 1,000 gold for dual-specs on a character before you got to the endgame content. And even then I'd argue that it doesn't make sense unless you are actually re-specing fairly often.

I quit WoW when I got to level 65, I started getting bored of having to go days waiting for a decent group for an instance. It very much felt like to me, that Blizzard didn't care about new players, they already have enough regular subscribers to keep them going.

They've dramatically decreased the time and effort it takes to get to the endgame content these days. It is amazingly quick and easy to get to 70 and start playing around out in Northrend. Especially with the whole "recruit a friend" thing. I've seen folks in guildchat get 10 levels in a matter of minutes.

Also, I didn't have 1000g available at the time I quit, so even now, I wouldn't be able to use this.

1000g is nothing. I made that and more without even trying on the way from 60-70. And I again made that and more without even trying on the way from 70-80. Throw in some heroic dungeons, a raid or two, some daily quests... You could have 1000g in less than a week.

Re:Exams

[DrgnDancer]

On the other hand "spec" is of almost negligible importance until level 45 or so and only becomes really critical as you approach end game. I have personally healed instances as far as the Scarlet Monastery with a DPS spec Shaman, and I've run with non-spec healers in even early Outland instances. Being the proper spec helps of course, but it's not nearly as big a deal as gear is until later. I remember running Ragefire Chasm (The mini-instance in Orgrimmar for 13-15th levels) once and someone asked me if I was a "speced" healer. I was level 14, I'd spent a grand total of 5 talent points... Does it matter?

(For the uninitiated, you get 1 talent point per level from 10 on in WoW. A level 80 therefore has 71 points to spend. This can make a huge difference to how you play and what you are capable of. Lower level characters have many fewer points and are therefore getting less of an advantage from them, but conversely have greater flexibility because they are less specialized.)

Re:Exams

[Schadrach]

The issue I see coming is that the classes who can only act as a damage dealer are also generally the ones with the least powerful buffs/debuffs. When you have to choose between dealing X damage with Y buffs on a character or dealing 0.95*X damage, with Y++ buffs, and the ability to also act as a healer or tank by standing out of combat for 5 seconds, how do you make the classes that lack the flexibility of having the option to tank or heal worthwhile as a choice? WoW had already seen some of that, when looking at census values and doing the math, something like 15% (beyond what would be assumed as an even split of players going to DK) of those playing damage-only classes switched *BEFORE* making switching roles as simple as being out of combat for 5 seconds.

Re:Exams

[DrgnDancer]

I dunno what GP was talking about on the "tons of low level Draenei and Blood Elves running around". I think he though you meant you started just after BC was released, not WotLK. Having said that, it seem like you were on the wrong server. if you decide to give it another shot, try Thorium Brotherhood. We're a fairly old server, but with only a moderate population. On the disadvantage side, our economy kind of sucks on the low end, and gear for low to mid levels is expensive, and we're not great raiders (only a few guild ever finished Black Temple or Sunwell Plateau). On the nice side, most guild are willing to recruit young and help you out with leveling, and lots of people have multiple alts and there's usually groups to be had for low level instances with only moderate effort. I'm leveling a druid right now and she's done a couple 20s-30s instances.

Re:Exams

[Opportunist]

Umm... do Blood Elves count?

Re:Exams

[superwiz]

The biggest advantage of this is not being pigeon-holed into a specific role during a raid. The game is involved enough that even a specific purpose character can benefit from having specializations for different types of encounters (physical vs magic damage or multi-target vs single-target healing, for example). Having said, the games staff is still an obnoxious collection of sob's. So any entertainment value that the game itself provides is offset too much by the pain that Blizzard staff can cause due to their half-ass arbitrary and capricious decisions on whether certain standard game behaviors violate terms of service. If you add in the fact that the game actively hones addiction (by encouraging daily logins with daily quests and 20 hour cool downs on crafting abilities), you'll quickly realize that no matter what content they create, the game is not worth it.

Re:Exams

[UnknowingFool]

There are many classes and characters that benefit from this in raids. This patch allows the player to switch specs without having to go to a major city. There are certain bosses that need X tanks and Y healers to defeat. Many times you don't have that personnel available. Smaller guilds especially can't just swap out personnel on the fly or have people waiting on standby. Also player skill is important. You might need another tank and have one not doing anything but his gear/skill is less than adequate for the encounter. But you do have a damage dealer who makes a decent off tank and has decent tanking gear so using him is a better option. It makes raiding a lot more convenient. In our guild we have many players who can switch between roles and spent a lot of gold doing it.

Also within roles there differences. Some damage dealers have specs that are more raid support and some that are more damage. Some specs are actually required for certain fights. For example, Leotheras the Blind and Illidan required an Affliction warlock to tank the boss during different phases.

Then there's WoW outside a dungeon. While a good healer or tank are great for running dungeons, they have a hard time not in a dungeon. When they have to solo for quests or do dailies or grind, their effectiveness is severely limited. Killing a mob is easy for a damage dealer and extremely difficult for healers and sometimes tanks. Our healers used to respec every weekend when not raiding to make enough gold to support their raiding. For them it was more cost effective to spend 100 gold (to damage then back to healing) every weekend to respec so they could get gold for other aspects fo the game.

Re:Exams

[Anonymous Coward]

1. Getting from 1-80 without instances is not hard at all.

Especially if you follow a guide like this.

Re:Exams

[Hoi Polloi]

I just dual specced my enhancement (melee dps) shaman for restroration (healer). Melee dps is my preferred way to solo and quest and is how I play most of the time. I do very well in instances also. However, the need for healers is constant and is always a handicap for groups (pug or guild) trying to get a run going. With dual specs I can now offer myself as a healer and make setting up groups MUCH easier. I've even been saving a full healer gear set for this eventuality which I will always carry.

This should also increase the pool of tanks out there. One caveat, there is also going to be a wave of somewhat inexperienced tanks and healers out there for a while while they learn the ropes. *cough* *cough*

Re:Exams

[drinkypoo]

Umm... do Blood Elves count?

Were they... naked Blood Elves?

Re:Exams

[ReiDragon]

I get 60-70 FPS on my system. It's not even that modern.

Re:Exams

[NewbieProgrammerMan]

Why yes, quite frequently, in my bed. And yes, she's a real person, and no, I'm not paying for it.

Do I have to turn in my geek card now? ;)

Re:Exams

[Anonymous Coward]

Talderas, I have to disagree with with your 3rd point there, "3. Instances are a boring way to level up, compared to questing." I am/have leveled(-ing) two holy priests (53/80) simply because I genuinely enjoy the instance grind. Some people prefer the community aspect of the game, and meeting people through instances can be very enjoyable. My father, however, would be someone who would agree with #3. I would keep in mind that it isn't very fair to place opinion within a list of facts. The same statement could apply to #1, although I do personally agree with that statement.

Re:Exams

[kv9]

Why yes, quite frequently, in my bed. And yes, she's a real person, and no, I'm not paying for it.

your sister?

Re:Exams

[Anachragnome]

"3. Instances are a boring way to level up, compared to questing."

I totally disagree.

After doing the end-game raid dance, my wife, a few friends and myself made 4 Undead Warlocks and an Undead Priest, calling ourselves The Ungrateful Dead. Other then a few class quests, we spent ALL of our time doing what I had wanted to do since I was playing pencil & paper Dungeons and Dragons as a kid many years ago--Dungeon Crawls.

As soon as we met the level requirements of a dungeon (I think level 6 for Ragefire Chasm is the lowest), in we went. It was very challenging, filling specific roles with various Warlock builds combined with a Priest in either shadow or healer mode. We had to use our heads, had to spend time testing different approaches and all in all had a great time.

In regards to the leveling rate, since we were going in at very low levels, as soon as we could, we earned a relatively large amount of XP from runs. A couple levels gained for each run was normal. Did it get boring? Nope. By the time we had run the dungeon a couple of times we were leveled up for the next one. It was actually a really smooth transition from one to the next.

I can honestly say that I had more fun playing one of those Warlocks then any other gameplay style I experienced in WoW.

Re:Exams

[Anonymous Coward]

Having this dual-spec system would make it a lot easier for a low level first time player to solo, especially for the low damage classes. It would mean they could easily switch between for example a healer priest for the rare chances they did get in a group/raid and shadow priest for solo.

No it wouldn't.

The first several re-specs are dirt cheap compared to this. There's absolutely no reason you'd want to save up the 1,000 gold for dual-specs on a character before you got to the endgame content. And even then I'd argue that it doesn't make sense unless you are actually re-specing fairly often.

That, again, depends on the player... Some players love groups.

Play a prot warrior, prot/holy paladin, holy priest, resto shaman, etc... going from groups as Tank or Heals to questing as Tank or Heals is painful. I would have spent 2k to have shadow leveling and holy grouped back when 1k meant something.

Giving low players that option is a good idea imo. The gold is easy to come by if you have an 80 or a tradeskill that's marketable.

Hell... even for those that stick purely to a single role (Dps, tank, heals), dual spec can be usefull... this spec for PVE, that spec for PVP.

to say that Dual Spec ain't usefull at lower levels? Your missin the tree's for the forest... it's going to be usefull to some.

Re:Exams

[Spellvexit]

We did the same thing, but starting later with 3 death knights and 2 warlocks, killing our way through instances with no one to heal us. I found it immensely fun with greater rewards, but what both you and I have in common is that we had a reliable group of friends with whom it was fun to raid.

The poster complained that instances were boring, and that could certainly be personal preference, but if he also had to go through the tedium of forming PUGs and cutting through the drama and poor communication skills of other players, I can certainly see how it would be an irksome way to level!

Re:Exams

[Anonymous Coward]

whoa "effect" should not be used as a verb unless you're playing a dead president from the 1800's

Re:Exams

[Talderas]

You have to keep in mind, I was writing that response specifically to the author's point of view. Of course this wouldn't be /. if people paid attention to context.

When he says "I started getting bored of having to go days waiting for a decent group for an instance." that means he wasn't playing with friends, or he didn't have high level friends to help him out. With the changes Bliz made to xp to level and the amount of xp rewarded by low level quests, the only way running instances is faster experience is when you have a high level person power level you through the instance over and over. It is not fun sitting around looking for an instance group. When you're in that situation, meaning leveling without friends, the only reason to do an instance is to complete a quest for a very nice item, and get some decent loot.

Re:Exams

[centuren]

I don't know how to put this without almost certainly burning Karma.... but IMO someone who needs this patch, who respecs often enough that 1000 gold for the "right" to have two specs is actually valuable, not to mention having 1000 gold lying around, ... do you think his exam scores will be affected in any way? Can you spend less than zero time learning?

As a retired warrior, I can assure you that you don't have to be a hardcore player for this to be worth it. Arena is a really fun aspect of the game, battlegrounds are great drunken guild activities, and tanks are always in demand.

That might sound like hardcore playing, but it's just the option to do different things. My guild had PVP premades on the weekends, and if I signed on then, I'd want a PVP spec. I only played Arena casually, but still got in the minimum games every week (again a PVP spec). Pretty much everytime I'd sign on, though, someone would want me to tank a heroic, or the occasional raid.

So even if I'm just playing a couple hours in the evening, a few days a week, I was still in the position to switch between a PVP arena spec and a PVE tank spec. Even with just having the PVP spec on the weekends and the PVE spec during the week, it still adds up to a lot of gold, much more than 1000g, which as other people are pointing out, isn't really hard to collect at all after hitting the max level, which is the only time you'd need the dual spec ability anyway.

Re:Exams

[maddskillz]

1000g is nothing. I made that and more without even trying on the way from 60-70. And I again made that and more without even trying on the way from 70-80. Throw in some heroic dungeons, a raid or two, some daily quests... You could have 1000g in less than a week.

When I played I could make 1000g in a couple of hours, buying greens, and selling the materials from disenchanting. It's not hard if you have the right professions and a server with a good economy.

Re:Exams

[Anonymous Coward]

No, your mom.

Re:Exams

[PaladinAlpha]

I got 20-30 FPS on a GeForce 440 MX. Running on a Pentium 3 with 256 megs of RAM. Under WINE on Linux. I doubt there's a system still operational that couldn't run this game.

Re:Exams

[billcopc]

For some classes it's just tweaking (e.g. a mage having both arcane and ffb). For others it's a game-changer such as druids, as you can now have a DPS spec, and a healing spec... Classes that used to respec a lot, now don't need to do.

I tend to play DPS, so in my case I can have one spec for balls-to-the-wall destruction, and another with a more balanced setup for longer fights or ones with special conditions (fire vulnerability vs frost, etc).

Re:Exams

[dAzED1]

one can get 300g fast and easy via daily quests. Group up with friends, go hit dailies. Tada. Want some cheese with your whine?

Re:Exams

[Krneki]

In Goldshire at 03:00 or in Dalaran at 20:00?

Re:Exams

[Anachragnome]

Well, not to state the obvious, but it is not that hard to make 4 friends in WoW.

That aside, yes, it is not fun Pugging, for the most part.

"When you're in that situation, meaning leveling without friends, the only reason to do an instance is to complete a quest for a very nice item, and get some decent loot."

We found that the boss drops were more then sufficient to keep us all pretty well geared. Many of the instances we CLEARED on our first attempts, at low level mind you, so we had access to the good stuff right from the outset. Four Warlocks and a Priest is a way over-powered group composition, once mastered.

The only problem we had was that we all wore cloth. But speccing differently eased that somewhat.

Dungeon crawls, for the sake of being there, were more then enough to keep us busy. The loot was just a result, not the goal.

Re:Exams

[clovis]

But it's OK if you're playing a live president from the 1800's

Eh, I already quit

[linzeal]

Maybe I am just getting too old but it was becoming more and more a chore to do anything in that game. Dual spec should of been released years ago, the RPG element needs expansion and for fuck's sake fix all the old 60's and 70's end game content so people actually want to play it. 30-40% of the game no one even plays anymore because you can get better gear questing in the 60+ or 70+ zones than doing old end game stuff. In other words heroic difficulty dungeons and raid instances need to have their loot tables redone in respect of the new expansions.

Re:Eh, I already quit

[Morlark]

I think you're just getting a bit old. You and me both, actually, I know exactly what you mean, there are some days when I can't even be bothered to log on and do stuff. But saying that, when I look at the game, intellectually I can't deny that actually pretty much everything has become less and less of a chore, quite significantly so, in fact. And they keep making things even easier. I agree with everything else you said though. MMORPGs these days have precious little actual RP of any kind. They've started to make some headway on that, with the new phasing technology and whatnot, I suppose. Hopefully they'll include lots more stuff that does that in the future. And I'd love it if they found a way to make all the old content relevant again too, but they've repeatedly said that they have no intention of doing so, and I can kinda understand why. Certainly, I think that simply bumping up the loot tables of every old instance every time they released a new expansion would be an incredibly bad thing.

Re:Eh, I already quit

[Opportunist]

There's a simple reason why "refurbishing" the old dungeons would be a really bad idea from the perspective of Blizzard: The fastpass for new players would go away, increasing the time to the top.

Most MMOs fail after a while for a simple reason: Starting anew is pointless. A game that has been around for 2+ years makes a new player uneasy. Should I start? Everyone has 2 years on me, so I'd have to play 2 years to be where they are today. And they'll yet again be 2 years ahead (or only one, if it takes another year to the expansion). Why the heck should I start?

WoW (and some others) solved this by upping the levelcap every so often. The point is that first you have, say, 60 levels. After you reach 60, you can't "level" anymore. You go grind equipment.

Then, a year later, levelcap increase. And along with it you get new equipment, common items (of level 60something) that make the ultrasuperspecialawesomerarestoftherarest raid superoverthetoppowersword you pulled out after months of grinding like your mom's cooking spoon.

Now, no new player will go into that level 60 dungeon. Why should he? The weapon he could get out of there will drop, more likely and maybe even as a better one, from any random trashmob he kicks while heading for a quest.

But it served its mission. The players that were there from the start had something to do 'til levelcap up, they grinded that superawesome...youknowit for months. And new players don't have to do that. They basically get the fastpass past this grinding, thus starting on roughly equal footing.

Starting a new character, or starting the game as a new player altogether, actually makes sense this way!

Grinding and raiding is, essentially, busywork. To keep you playing and paying.

Re:Eh, I already quit

[hesaigo999ca]

I don't agree at all, if someone goes through a dungeon a second or third time, it could change the overall experience, as a counter is kept (achievements) as to what was done....going into naxxaramas a 20th time, might mean the challenge grows to make it a little tougher each time you go, with better and better drops....or more guaranteed drops?

Re:Eh, I already quit

[Opportunist]

Then the initial drops would have to be pretty poor to start with, or else the power inflation would soon reach even more ridiculous levels than it already does. In general, you will end up at the same level that you were before the expansion (i.e. at the end of that dungeon geared for lv 60 characters you'll get the superduperawesome stuff that dropped), yet any trashloot "post expansion" would be better. Else you'd have a quite decisive "gap" between level 60 and level 61.

Another thing to take into consideration is what a "level" really is about. Basically a "level" in WoW is characterized by three things: Mana/HP pools, stats and relative level to your opponent.

Mana/HP is straightforward. You get a few points more mana/HP.
The relative level affects e.g. your (and the mobs) chance to hit, to successfully cast a hostile spell, etc.
And stats finally mean you get e.g. +2 int per level.

All of these three effects can be part of the bonus an item gives you. Items give you stats, HP/mana, critchance, and so on.

So items are, essentially, "additional levels". And while this does cause WoW some problems now, it's a completely different matter. You might have noticed it if you happened to have a fully equpped lv70, how easily you could breeze through the quests on your way to 80. You were, essentially, already past level 80 due to your equipment.

The question remains, why I should raid and grind for hours in a lv70 dungeon when I can get the same loot from trashmobs on my quest to level 80? Improving the drops from the 70s dungeons is no option, though, since it would escalate the equipment bonus problems WoW is facing already even further, because you would have to boost the post-70 equipment even more, making it increasingly harder to release expansions while still allowing new players to ever reach the top.

Re:Eh, I already quit

[hesaigo999ca]

I imagine you speak of the PvP?
I was really more suggesting for raiding scenarios, but lets go through PvP then.
Actually you could have in place a sub system for lvl 80
that allows for lvl 80.1 to not quite go up against lvl 80.9...so to speak...
yes lvl 79 vs lvl 80 is not fair at all, but a lvl 80.5 vs a lvl 80.7
would make for a close battle.

Anyhow, there is always a way to make things more interesting, and for the most part if veterans are already with too many lvl 80 alts, and have no reason to stick around and play, this hurts blizzard, so it is in their best interest to start coming out with more ideas to keep the people they already have!

Developing new ways to reuse game content already present is the cheapest "new stuff"
you can program for.

Trust me, I know what I am talking about.

"The best way to predict the future , is to invent it....... or code it!"

Re:Eh, I already quit

[brkello]

I don't see how that is better. The problem that Udular hopefully solves is having a difficult new raid. Naxx would have been fairly difficult if people didn't know all the strategies from when it had came out previously. It is more interesting to have to figure out a new area than run the same one over and over again. Tweaking the difficulty doesn't really matter.

New, difficult content is what is important. It is nice that they have added extra levels of difficulties to bosses. That gives the best guilds something to strive for while still being accessible to those who don't have as dedicated/skilled group.

Your method has many issues. Whose counter do you go by to set the difficulty? What if they fail to complete it? Is difficult reduced then? Upping difficult through boss damage and hp doesn't really give a new experience, just requires better gear. People seem to forget this game has over 12 million people. Despite the flack Slashdotters like to give it, I do think Blizzard knows a little about making games. No one is going to be entertained forever by one piece of software. And you can't please everyone. The people who talk about quitting are just more visible because everyone who plays WoW is playing it right now instead of posting to forums.

Re:Eh, I already quit

[Opportunist]

I'm speaking of pretty much everything.

As I said, items and their bonus is essentially additional levels. Again, what does another level give you? HP/Mana, a more favorable comparison against the mob's level (critchance, damage done and taken, hitchance...) and stats. The same you get from items.

So a level 60 player "naked" can be buffed to a level (don't quote me on exact levels here, ok? Just for comparison's sake) 65 equivalent with items. To level 68 with heroic equipment. But he can level to 70.

Now, items dropping from level 65 mobs have to be better than items dropping from level 60 mobs. Else, why bother going for the tougher mobs? So being level 65 with level 65 equipment would have to push you at least to level 73 (because level 60 items already gave you another 5 levels). At level 70, items would have to give you at least another 10 levels or, again, nobody would go for them. And heroic even more.

The problem we're facing here is that sooner or later your equipment "outlevels" real levels you could gain when the next expansion, and the ensuing level cap increase, comes in. Level 80 items already give you ridiculous amounts of stat/crit/HP/mana/etc buffs, pushing you way over a level 100 equivalent. We're not talking about fractions of levels, we're talking about giving you more levels than someone with "normal" gear could get even by leveling past you to levelcap.

If you now want to refurbish level 60 instances to give you meaningful gear, the gear you pull out of those instances has to push you at the very least past level 80, or else, why go there and not level up instead, which is arguably easier. This in turn would heat up the buff inflation even more, forcing you to give level 80 heroic gear stats that make future addons increasingly difficult to justify. When your level doesn't mean jack because 99% of your stats come from equipment, how do you want to ensure people have to level up first before crashing into your top level instance? He has the level 80 heroic equipment which gives him a multiple of his 80 levels in stats, and of course also a multiple of what those additional 10 levels to 90 would give him. He wouldn't need to level up first before going into the new content, thus creating a shortcut for your player, thus reduing the time he can be kept playing.

Re:Eh, I already quit

[hesaigo999ca]

Have you ever run a 25 man raid with only 15 people and survived....?
Try it sometime, this is where it is fun to get better gear, less people needed to finish
a dungeon or raid.

nerf

[sofar]

lots of nerfage, including people not being able to download the patch (look at the forum spam lol) and things like the new instance being totally hung, trade chat completely not working etc etc...

Looks like it's pretty bad. I'm not even complaining about the mana regen nerf for priests which effectively cuts off a big part of their potential.

time to play something else for a bit.

Re:nerf

[NOPerative]

As soon as the severity of the nerfs sets in, I'm predicting that millions are going to quit, and Ghostcrawler is FINALLY going to get canned! The dude might understand character balance somewhat (READ: NOT MUCH), but he sure in the hell doesn't understand human nature. Asking people to drag race with a vette, telling them "that car's too fast, so use this one," and then sticking everyone in 1300cc Volkswagen's with single-barrel carbs isn't going to sit well with most. Guess it's time to purchase some Warhammer stock or something.

Re:nerf

[Anonymous Coward]

millions

I do not think that word means what you think it means. Ghostcrawler understands human nature fine. You're just asking him for the impossible. What's more, because he understands human nature, he knows that it is in the nature of humans to ask for the impossible. So rather than killing himself trying to pull a miracle out of his ass, he merely provides the possible, knowing that people will be content with it. And make no mistake, people will be content with it. Every single patch there has been someone making absolutely absurdly overblown proclamations of the death of the game, and it's all (Ghostcrawler|Tigole|Kalgan)'s fault, and he's sooo gonna get fired, and everyone's gonna quit the game. Well guess what? Every single one of those doomsayers was wrong.

Seriously, what did you think they were going to do? Rebalance every single class at this new inflated level of power? And then rebalance every single boss encounter to take that into account? Even assuming they ignored all non-raid content, I don't even know how long that would take them. And then of course of course you'd have to test these changes and fine tune the numbers, and that alone would take months. Anyone with two brain cells to rub together will have already seen the necessity of an occasional nerf here and there. But yeah, you go run off to your Warhammers, or whatever. I look forward to the day you realise that WoW is king of MMOs for a good reason.

Re:nerf

[Anonymous Coward]

To paraphrase something I read on the official forums. If Blizzard announced they were cutting the monthly subscription from $15 to $10, the forums would be filled with posts complaining that either:

a) the new price point will lower the barrier to entry too far and bring in more n00bz; or

b) the price has not been reduced far enough, and should be maybe $8 or even $5.

A very vocal contingent have been complaining since WotLK launch that raiding is too easy. Now Blizzard make changes so that healers can actually run out of mana again, and Deathknights can't over-simplify the hardest encounters, thus increasing the difficulty, and now people are complaining about the nerfs.

Re:nerf

[Anonymous Coward]

PvE, they have done a decent job at class balance.

PvP, well it's a mess. On top of the food chain are ret paladins, DKs, and rogues. Any non melee don't stand a chance, even with 650+ res. 3.1 only has made this more pronounced, because most ranged classes were handed PvP nerfs, while melee received DPS boosts with talent changes.

If someone is playing cloth caster, they have zero defense now (fear on warlocks and priests breaks really fast), and a ret pally in crap blues can crank out 25k of damage in less than 2 seconds (the GCD) easily in two button presses.

So, WoW PvP is simple. Play a melee class, or repeatedly click a release button due to melee classes able to kill almost anyone with a simple step macro.

The devs just don't seem to understand this, but if you look at what Kalgan, Ghostcrawler, and the other lead class balance devs play as their mains... they are all melee classes. Kalgon has his warrior, etc. Thus, they end up balancing the game in PvP around melee DPS and ensuring melee can stay in hitting range of their targets at all times.

So, as a player, you have three choices. Roll a melee just for PvP action, have something non-melee for PvE, or pull your sub and go to a MMO that actually spends time in balancing class archetypes (melee versus ranged) in PvP.

Players know this. Look at the populations of servers. 50% are melee, most DKs, then pallies, then wars, finally rogues.

Re:nerf

[ScottPhill]

"trade chat completely not working" Woot! Now there's a good reason to download the patch!

Re:nerf

[bigstrat2003]

As soon as the severity of the nerfs sets in, I'm predicting that millions are going to quit, and Ghostcrawler is FINALLY going to get canned!

Yes, because GC alone decides what happens to the game balance. Methinks you're yet another one of the players who insists on acting like just because he's visible to you, he must be the source of all your problems.

Re:nerf

[TheKidWho]

Stop BSing, Ret palladins aren't the kings of pvp, DKs/Hunters/Holy Paladins are.

And what the hell do you expect when a Paladin wielding a giant 2 hander comes to attack your cloth covered ass? You expect it to not hurt?

P.S. Mages/Locks/Hunters Hurt.

Re:nerf

[brkello]

Considering that when I logged in last night and found a queue over 10,000 on my server, I think you are 100% wrong. Interesting how you judge this Ghostcrawler guy as being out of touch when you make completely stupid predictions showing your inability to make simple, logical conclusions.

Re:nerf

[Spellvexit]

I normally play cloth classes, so I have a bit of a grumpy bias against Rogues and Hunters, but the damage really does seem to be out of control. I know cloth casters are supposed to be fragile, but when battles end in a matter of seconds via stunlock, it's a disappointment. I wish Blizzard would simply ratchet down the damage and healing while still keeping roughly the same amount of hit points. It would draw out the battles and give you a little bit of time to think and develop a strategy instead of asking yourself "what happened?" when your body crumples to the ground.

Having said that, I think such a revision represents an enormous obstacle for Blizzard. As the AC put it, PvE does seem quite balanced on the whole. If you start tweaking damage output to accommodate PvP, you've got to be meticulously careful about its implications in PvE.

Re:nerf

[GaryPatterson]

On top of the food chain are ret paladins, DKs, and rogues

You mis-spelled "Holy Paladins." It's a common mistake, caused by the failure to notice that the guy in plate has 16K mana and spends all his time healing the other guy. You're probably distracted by the scary-looking guy in plate who keeps smashing your face in though, so it's understandable.

Ret Paladins have around 3% representation across arenas, which is as close to balanced as any spec can be.

Real News vs. Advernews

[DreamsAreOkToo]

This isn't news. Real news goes like this:

"World of Warcraft introduces variable difficulties to their in game dungeons."

Advernews goes like this:

"WoW patch 3.1 released with 14 new bosses, dual spec, new GUI choices, and game balancing!"

One key difference, Advernews doesn't make sense to anyone outside of the game's target market.

Sorry for the made-up word.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Anonymous Coward]

"World of Warcraft introduces variable difficulties to their in game dungeons."

News? "You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means."

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Anonymous Coward]

You keep using that reference. I do not think it means what you think it means.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Anonymous Coward]

In Soviet Russia it means what I think it means.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[KefabiMe]

I don't think anyone who doesn't already play Warcraft (or tried it and doesn't like it) know what dual-specs or what raids are. This is just so us WoWheads can discuss the patch. "Variable dungeon difficulty" seems more likely to be a line to try to bring new players to the game.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Anonymous Coward]

Don't be sorry, that word fits perfectly because it succinctly communicates important meta-data.

Thank you!

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[fractoid]

Anybody want a peanut?

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Anonymous Coward]

This is slashdot, nothing makes sense to people outside the target market.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[whoda]

LOTRO has had variable difficulty instances for a while now.
I thought they had copied it from WoW, guess it's the other way around.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Thaelon]

It's called a slashvertisment around here.

But given that this directly affects - often the majority of - the lives of 11.5 million people, it is actually pretty newsworthy.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Opportunist]

Now, now, don't think the lingo was invented in WoW. It existed long, long before many WoWers learned to read. Or walk.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[jaraxle]

I don't think anyone who doesn't already play Warcraft (or tried it and doesn't like it) know what dual-specs or what raids are.

Replace "Warcraft" with "any other MMO" and you may be on to something, but raids and dual-specs are nothing new. EverQuest 2 has had dual-specs for a long time now, and just about every MMO has had raids right from EverQuest 1.

Unless I misunderstood your double negative...

~jaraxle

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[0xdeadbeef]

One key difference, Advernews doesn't make sense to anyone outside of the game's target market.

Because advertising is so useful to an audience that already buys your product. Quit your nonsensical whining.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Camann]

Well there has been "Heroic" option since the first expansion, but Wrath is pushing "hard modes" which aren't switched "on" and "off" like the Heroic setting, but instead driven by players' choices about how to fight a given boss.

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[Anonymous Coward]

Quit rhyming and I mean it!

Re:Real News vs. Advernews

[KefabiMe]

Yes the lingo was created way before WoW, but I stand by my comment! Everyone who played EQ, UO, or anything before WoW has either tried WoW and didn't like it, is playing WoW right now, or has refused to play WoW for the past 4 years and will probably refuse to ever play it. =p

I have an old system

[Anonymous Coward]

Does WoW 3.1 run on WfW 3.1?

Re:I have an old system

[dzfoo]

You'll need to install one of the old versions: Town of Warcraft, State of Warcraft, or Country of Warcraft. If your hardware specs are too low, however, you'll probably need to use the first version: World of Disagreementcraft, or World of Skirmishpractice.

        -dZ.

Re:I have an old system

[denzilly]

I laughed out loud.

Re:I have an old system

[dzfoo]

Yeah, my favorite is Town of Warcraft.

But that's only after completing Clubhouse of Warcraft at level 50.

I'll stop now, I promise.

      -dZ.

I already quit!

[fatboyslack]

/tar WoW /cast ResistMMORPG

You have a life turned to you.

Seriously while this cleans up some of my old bugbears why I quit I'm still not coming back.

Re:I already quit!

[Sasayaki]

Resisted! :(

Need more hit rating... it's a skull monster!

(edit: screwed up and posted as a reply to base, when it should have been a reply to this. Gah.)

Re:I already quit!

[noonc]

Same here, I could care less. :)

Re:I already quit!

[fatboyslack]

*REturned to you

sigh typo

Re:I already quit!

[digitalchinky]

While I am happy that you have some reserves left in your overall caring potential, me, I'm out, I simply could NOT care any less than what I do now.

Re:I already quit!

[denzilly]

Well my caring is running on fumes, having just passed the last caring station "for 50 miles" on the way to the Death Valley of Caring...(What's my score for that?!)

Coming next:

[Anonymous Coward]

World of Warcraft for Workgroups 3.11.

Resisted.

[Sasayaki]

Resisted. :(

Need more hit rating... it's a skull monster!

Re:Resisted.

[Sasayaki]

lolwut. :( I fail at posting.

Re:Resisted.

[Toxicpsion]

Yes. Yes you do. At least today.

Re:Resisted.

[Sasayaki]

I'm sad. :(

Ulduar

[RogueyWon]

I suspect there's quite a lot riding for Blizzard on the quality (and challenge level) of this new raid instance. A lot of people are starting to notice that Blizzard seems to have stripped WoW of development resource to focus on other projects. While the Wrath of the Lich King expansion got a lot of positive press for the "oooh, pretty" factor, the simple fact is that it is desperately short on level 80 content (and with WoW levelling being as fast as it is, most players are level 80).

When the previous expansion, The Burning Crusade, came out, it contained quite a few raid instances. These were, Karazhan (11 bosses), Gruul's Lair (2 bosses), Magtheridon's Lair (1 boss), Serpentshrine Cavern (6 bosses), The Eye (4 bosses) and Mount Hyjal (5 bosses). A few months after release, Black Temple (9 bosses) was added. All of these were brand new encounters. By contrast, with WotLK, we got a recylced instance from before the first expansion and just 3 new bosses in other mini instances. Only now, months after release, are we actually getting a sizeable new instance with a reasonable number of bosses. Instead of developing significant amounts of new content, Blizzard have just had the office temps think up some new Achievements - basically requirements to kill bosses in really silly ways - to act as timesinks.

If these new bosses in Ulduar are the kind of thing that can be breezed through in a week or two, even on easy mode, then I suspect that a lot of players, like me, will be leaving the game. The thought of spending the next 5 months farming Ulduar, as we've just spent 5 months farming the pitiful content that was in the game at release and redoing it in an attempt to get some dumb achievements is not pleasant.

Re:Ulduar

[Fluffeh]

As a wow player, I simply hate it when you make sensible well argued points like this.

Having said that, I stopped playing about 2 months prior to WOTLK. I had about a week of hard playing since then (4 days to level from 70-80) and have sort of been adhoc'ing since then. If I was indeed raiding with my guild still, I would be rather pissed about once again going through Naxx all over again and again. Last time we ran it we had 15 more peeps in there at a time but that aside, nothing much has changed. Sure, it's new to many players, but for those like me, the new expansion is very thin indeed.

This concept of dual spec? Yeah, great now I can play a Survival AND a Beast Master spec on my hunter. Woo. *cough* *crickets* Ohhhh... Thunderfury, I gotta go roll against a warrior!

- Fluffybunny of Proudmoore.

Re:Ulduar

[Riceo]

Hmm you're right... This could be the end of the world... of Warcraft. (gonna get a /kick for that.)

Re:Ulduar

[Twiztid_Madrox]

I just finished reading the patch notes, and i must say it appears that they are making this game easyier and easyier to play, Part of the fun in vanilla wow was how hard it was to level as some characters but was paid off once you got to level 60. Not its just a mass race to 80.

I still enjoy playing warcraft but i never got into the whole raiding thing i used to love pvp when it was about 8 hour AV battlegrounds. I still get the most enjoyment in warcraft from leveling characters and chatting with some guild mates but i think i might just cancel my subscription now because of the way blizzard are taking the game.

I can see in the near future blizzard offering a service where if you have 1 level 80 you can pay x to get another level 80 on the same server without having to level him. Just to make it all that much more easyier for the players.

Re:Ulduar

[dcjester]

The problem is, when you have 10 million plus players, you have to develop content to please the majority who usually happen to be people who want near instant gratification on completing something. Blizzard has realized this, and so make the game easier with every patch so that those who whine the loudest can get their (insert class name here) leveled out faster so they can "rayd and g3tz teh ub4r geer to pwn" AI mobs that much faster. I quit the game close to one year ago, and the only reason I would go back would be because there is nothing else to play on the market. Thankfully, the MMO market being as it is, I can usually find something else to take my attention away from games like this where FOTM classes run the game. Those who enjoy WoW, by all means, continue doing so. I think though you will get bored eventually with the ease at which you succeed at things. It is comparable to someone starting in AP English, then watching as it gets turned into remedial just because everyone is given the thought that they should be there too.

Re:Ulduar

[Canazza]

honestly, the moment I get bored with Ulduar, I'm calling it a day for WoW.
We won't see Icecrown Citadel until Winter and we'll have Ulduar farmed by June, and if Ulduar turns out to be crap, then I'm holding no hope out for Icecrown.

If I want to find out the storyline developments I'll go watch the boss kill on Youtube

Re:Ulduar

[RogueyWon]

The huge reduction in difficulty level in WotLK has indeed been pretty annoying. Now, I understand that these tier 7 instances are designed to be accessible to new players who've never touched the level 60 or 70 content, and that's fine. Their difficulty as an introductory tier would have been spot on, IF there had been harder tier 8 content in WotLK on the day it shipped. I was never expecting (nor wanting) the retuned Naxxramas to be pitched at Sunwell Plateau level difficulty.

I understand that back in Burning Crusade, they possibly pitched some of the early raid encounters a little bit too hard. Karazhan was quite a steep curve for new level 70s (to say nothing of the fact that it was the only introductory level instance and could only be done 10 man) and Gruul and Magtheridon, before they got nerfed, were completely out of the sights of most players for quite some time. But even had Burning Crusade's Tier 4 content been easier than it was at launch, there would still have been plenty for the more advanced players to do.

I really hate the philosophy which says that every raid player in the game should be able to blitz through any instance, with a few "hard modes" for the same fights thrown in for advanced players. Back when we were working through Black Temple and Sunwell Plateau, just getting to see the next boss was often the biggest reward from defeating the previous one. That's gone now. I'm not sure I want to be playing a game where, once Icecrown Citadel has been released, even the casual guilds have downed Arthas within a fortnight, meaning we then spend the next 9 months trying to kill him while standing on one leg and drinking only the purple fruit juice.

Re:Ulduar

[Anonymous Coward]

I'd just like to point out that the original Naxxramas was released a few months before the BC expansion, hence most players never had the chance to try it out. I was in a semi-hardcore guild at the time but we were busy wiping in Ahn'Quiraj and didn't have the time to try out Nax. There were only a few guilds on my server that made any progress at all in Naxxramas.

Re:Ulduar

[Anonymous Coward]

The Burning Crusade did not ship with SSC, The Eye, or Hyjal. These were all added in later content patches.

Re:Ulduar

[Anonymous Coward]

Time will tell. I think that guilds that have can cap Kel in 10 or 25 man Naxx will be able to do 10 man Ulduar or 25 man Ulduar without issue after people learn the basic boss strats. However, there is a difference between doing OS with one drake up to doing OS with all three up. Same with Ulduar. The guilds that can nail the bosses on hard mode will be actually doing something extraordinary.

Not to say that variable difficulty is new with WoW. Everquest 1 has had this since the Lost Dungeons of Norrath expansion where groups (and raids) could choose between normal or high difficulty missions. Everquest 2 has had some expansions (Splitpaw being the most notable) offering multiple levels as well.

Raiding in WoW has changed over the years. First, they assumed people were going to do large raids with many people, thus the 40 man Molten Core runs. Then, as time progressed and the population base was made out of fewer and fewer hardcore (raid six days a week) players, the best bang for buck was 25 and 10 man raids. Then, in WotLK, the same raid can be done with 25 people or 10. This seems like the best way to go overall. My only wish in WoW is that they allowed all T7 and T7.5 pieces to be purchased with the appropriate emblems, rather than just the pants.

Gearing up in WotLK is admittedly harder than BC. In BC, especially after season 3 of arena fighting, one could gear up a new 70 by running BGs, then purchasing S1 arena gear. This would allow someone to get caught up to guildies who were in Kara, Black Temple, and other places without having to spend a long time running heroics, or being a drag on a raids being undergeared. I do wish this was a viable way to gear up for raiding in WoTLK. Instead, once someone gets 80, they need to run heroics repeatedly in order to get blues, then either be very good at arenas, or find a guild with the capability to run Naxx to be able to obtain epic gear.

Re:Ulduar

[ildon]

For 99% of raiders, Naxxramas *was* new content.

Re:Ulduar

[destroyer661]

As someone who played in beta and then on to quit just before release of The Burning Crusade, I have to say how much I hate the fact that nigh 4 years after the game was launched the blizz dev's are finally implementing changes that all of us hardcore raiders proposed in beta and the first months of molten core's launch.

The Burning Crusade made the game terribly easy, and it's gone wayyyy downhill since then. This game has literally become a seething addiction for it's player base since around the time Blackwing Lair came out and blizz has turned to being in the business of trying to give everyone everything they want. Which is a great business model by any means, it keeps the money flow increasing or at very least stagnant. It's grown into such a shitty game. Don't get me wrong, I loved every minute I played from 0-60, and then my time raiding at 60 was awesome as well, but the game has turned into complete shite.

Re:Ulduar

[Anonymous Coward]

Wrong. TBC did indeed ship with SSC and The Eye, but the keying requirements were so obnoxious that it took several rounds of nerfs to the entry level raid bosses before people got to actually see them in large numbers.

Mount Hyjal was released in the same patch as Black Temple.

Re:Ulduar

[bigstrat2003]

No, all of those were in the game with the expansion launch. It just so happened that people didn't get around to them until later patches.

Re:Ulduar

[Zixia]

That's true, but I don't think his point was that Naxxramas wasn't new content to most people and more that it was old content that was tweaked, showing that there was little 80th level content created specifically for the Wrath of the Lich King expansion.

From that point of view, it may well be that the creative energies have been diverted away from World of Warcraft to different projects and the life of the game may now be quite limited.

Re:Ulduar

[D Ninja]

I just finished reading the patch notes, and i must say it appears that they are making this game easyier and easyier to play, Part of the fun in vanilla wow was how hard it was to level as some characters but was paid off once you got to level 60. Not its just a mass race to 80.

This is *exactly* why I stopped playing. So many people were QQ'ing about things being too hard or too easy or they didn't have enough choices or etc etc etc.

And Blizzard did everything they could to make the game so stinkin' easy that it became boring. I never had to worry that I couldn't complete a quest. I never had to worry that I wouldn't EVENTUALLY get some piece of gear because I just needed to run an instance enough times.

Easy = Boring. Too hard is bad too, but I'd prefer too hard over being so simple, every single character is running around with every single thing accomplished.

Re:Ulduar

[Vohar]

That's a hell of an opinion on the game's current state for a guy who hasn't even played the game in years.

A lot of people confuse 'ease' with 'less time-consuming.' I like the changes that have been made to the game(in the past few years since you played). It takes less time to get around to actually playing instead of travel time, farming, etc. I work at work. I play games for fun.

Re:Ulduar

[Anonymous Coward]

Effectively being the same thing then, no?

Re:Ulduar

[Opportunist]

Who said that you have to be able to raid just because you hit levelcap? Hell, I remember games like DAoC where it was anything but a given that someone you signed up could perform. But at least these people didn't even get to levelcap. You found out usually around level 30ish whether someone is an asset or a tool. By then, rep was still affordable. Someone level 40+ must've been doing something right. Else he wouldn't have reached this level.

I played WoW 'til shortly after BC came out, when I was just fed up, mostly because I could not tell whether the people I was about to join for a raid could play or not. I'm not really a guild person who wants to "hang out" with "friends" in a game. If I wanna hang out with friends, there's a bar around the corner and I do have friends that I can meet in RL. When I'm playing MMOs, I want to play.

In a nutshell, the lack of sensible PUGs pretty much killed WoW for me. It worked well in older games. If you were a tool, you didn't get to the top. Since everything up to the top level raids is basically handed to you in WoW (invest time and whatever you want is yours, no matter how you play), it's not my game. I want to feel like I "earned" what I have, and not by sitting my butt flat enough and spend enough time.

Re:Ulduar

[Twiztid_Madrox]

The day they made every class do the same thing ruined the game. It made the game feel watered down. Healers should heal and not deal damage on par with other dps classes. The only exception should be the 3 Hybreds. leaving the others to concentrate on one roll. having 4 classes that can all tank to the same ability or 4 healers that can all heal to the same ability waters down the game

Re:Ulduar

[imunfair]

I don't really have an issue with instances being hard - the thing I find annoying is that they make lots of encounters based on your gear rather than your skill. "Hardcore" raiders aren't better than many casual raiders, they just had more time to grind that gear up.

I realize gear is the whole philosophy behind WoW so I don't see a real problem with it - but I get tired of people acting like they're so much better at the game when they might actually be worse players when put in equivalent gear.

Re:Ulduar

[Sancho]

No.

Re:Ulduar

[UnknowingFool]

I don't really have an issue with instances being hard - the thing I find annoying is that they make lots of encounters based on your gear rather than your skill. "Hardcore" raiders aren't better than many casual raiders, they just had more time to grind that gear up.

The one thing that made BC challenging was that some of the bosses were gear checks and some actually required group coordination. For example, in SSC Hydross and Lurker required some coordination but could be done by PUGs. Lady Vashj was damned near impossible if everyone didn't know and do their jobs. One person screwing up (not moving when they had a static charge, pulling aggro off a strider, not turning a naga away from the raid, etc) meant a wipe. After months of wiping on Vashj, the GM finally told the guild before the raid that if anyone screwed up, they would be replaced. That night two people got booted and we finally killed her.

Re:Ulduar

[0xdeadbeef]

The thought of spending the next 5 months farming Ulduar, as we've just spent 5 months farming the pitiful content that was in the game at release and redoing it in an attempt to get some dumb achievements is not pleasant.

Perhaps you should reevaluate the value of "farming" anything.

Re:Ulduar

[Hoi Polloi]

I don't really care how so-and-so got their gear or mount, etc. I've played enough pugs to start to recognize a core of good players who also pug regularly. I know their names. I've frequently been messaged by players asking me to join who turn out to have been very good players I've run instances with before and they know me. If you are frustrated by poor skills in pugs I suggest keeping your friends list up to date with the good ones and keeping an eye out for them.

Re:Ulduar

[Hoi Polloi]

I have an issue with the time required for many raids. They just start to take too long and some players such as myself only have a few hours a night at best to play. I know you can pick up with a saved instance but then you get the usual scheduling misery. I'm not looking forward to Uld. being a marathon run. I don't want to only see the first few bosses all the time because I can't stay around for a full or even half clear.

As for gear it is pretty hard to get high-end gear without having put in a significant amount of time. You'd have to be thick as a brick not to learn how to play your char even if you are farming emblems for your gear. I usually see a pretty good connection between gear quality and play skills. Usually the problem is they have the skills and gear but have awful personalities.

Re:Ulduar

[changedx]

The Blizzard developers disagree with you. Your attitude is basically: "Only the top X% of players should be able to encounter the end boss in the game." Which was the case for all pre-WotLK WoW. But Blizzard has decided to increase X and make the game more accessible to casual players.

Of course, it's all about the specific numbers for X. In the original WoW, much less than 1% of the players had downed any boss in Naxx. In TBC, less than 3% had downed the final boss in Sunwell. In WotLK so far, roughly half of the players have finished Naxx (easy by former WoW standards). As for the end boss, only time will tell, and X will be somewhere between 3% and 50%. Most likely closer to the 3% end.

You can get your own statistics here: http://www.wowprogress.com/

Re:Ulduar

[Anonymous Coward]

Last boss of Serpentshrine Cavern was bugged to death, unkillable. And you had to kill her 25 times (at least) to get in Hyjal. The guild Nihilum killed her using what has been considered exploits, that is, having many lvl 18 warlocks outside the instance so that EVERY player has a soulstone.

Until they changed it so that every player could loot the vial.
From the 2.1 patch notes:
The drops for The Vials of Eternity have been modified. Vashj's and Kael's Vial Remnants are now multi-drop quest items. This means they'll be lootable by each raid member who is on the quest, as opposed to the four vials that drop at the moment.

So technically, you could not get in Hyjal.

Many evidences pop'd up showing that Hyjal wasnt even complete, before the 2.1 patch.

So yeah, BC shipped with :
Karazhan
Overtuned Grull and Magtheridon
Bugged SSC
Bugged The Eye

Re:Ulduar

[bigstrat2003]

Don't get me wrong, I loved every minute I played from 0-60, and then my time raiding at 60 was awesome as well, but the game has turned into complete shite.

You've changed, maybe. The game has not. It's still the same damn game it was then, just with new content.

This whole "the game has gone downhill since the old days" rant is so laughable, yet I see it all over. The game hasn't changed one damn bit. If you don't like it now, but did before, it's you that has changed.

Re:Ulduar

[Whorhay]

That's not actually true. The game has changed a lot since it was originally released. The difficulty of the end game has come down by a lot. The exp and hence time required to level has been reduced by a ton, meaning even fewer of the quests in any given area get finished now. Many classes have changed in their overall ability and utility. That said, the changes aren't all negative depending on your perspective. If you liked being among the hardcore elite that finished Naxx when it was a 40 man I can understand the feeling that the game has gone down hilll since then. If you were more casual than that you probably appreciate the better access to the end game content your gaming dollars have paid for. In the end it will always be a matter of opinion whether or not a game is better or worse than it used to be.

Re:Ulduar

[bigstrat2003]

I meant in terms of how the game plays and feels, not specific things. Yes, some specific things have changed, but the overall game is the same. If you liked raiding before, you're going to like raiding now. If you liked PvP before, you're going to like PvP now (well, maybe not arenas, but the BGs and world PvP haven't changed).

The difficulty of the end game has come down by a lot.

This really isn't true. You have to remember, pre-3.1 content is equivalent to MC in the old days. MC was easy as fuck, even easier than Naxx. If we compare Naxx (the current one) to AQ40 or Sunwell (or even the old Naxx), yes, the difficulty has come down a lot... but those aren't meant to be on the same tier. We have to compare present-day Naxx with MC, and Naxx is actually more challenging than MC was.

Re:Ulduar

[garylian]

This is at the core of why I get frustrated with WoW so much.

Blizzard has decided to blur the lines between classes, and keeps changing rolls with each expansion.

I'm on my second stint in WoW. I played for the first 9 months after release, and quit when I hit 60 and got bored with the gear grind. I went and played EQ2 for 3 years, and stopped playing after my kids were born. Recently the wife and I decided to give WoW another try.

After hitting 80 with my solo main, I can say that the game is definitely weak on class roles. The talent trees are cool and all, but I hate not knowing if a shaman is a healer or a dps class, and what kind of dps they are. I hate not knowing if a druid is going to boomkin, heal, or tank/melee. I could go on, but people that play the game get it.

When I join a pug for instance/raid runs, I'd like to not have to ask who is doing what. I like knowing that the druid is primarily going to heal, and maybe toss a few DoTs in.

I've grown to prefer EQ2's way of having 24 classes, and many of those classes are simple variations of a theme. I greatly preferred having someone ask my necro "you have lifeburn specced?" than asking my shaman "you enhancement, elemental, or resto?"

The dual specs are a nice touch, but I think WoW is hurting by its lack of timely expansions, and its problems nerfing PvE when it tries to fix PvP issues.

Now I'm going to go play some "I Win" mode, and get my DK on.

Re:Ulduar

[garylian]

They got away from the 40-man raids and got down to 25-man raids, but now they are upping the time it takes to complete places. I feel like I'm back in EQ in some cases, where you would pick an instance to tackle, and spend all day Saturday trying to beat it.

Sure, you can log out and come back in and the zone won't have reset (though trash mobs may be back). But instead of making 1 instance so big, I'd have preferred to have wings that were treated as seperate instances. Each wing of Naxx takes a long time to get through unless you are in an uber guild with a really tight-knit group of raiders.

I'm at the point where all my gear upgrades are either through Arena (hack-ptui!) or 25 man instances. And my guild doesn't even have 25 active players. I do a few PUGs, but I haven't seen a single piece drop that my class can use on any of them. And PUGs on stuff like 25-Naxx don't look for the same folks the next day. They just grab whomever and keep going.

Re:Ulduar

[ArsonSmith]

But wait, now I can farm easy mode until I'm good enough to farm medium mode, until I'm good enough to farm hard mode, until I'm good enough to farm the level 4 hard mode. (It seems that each boss will have up to 4 levels of difficulty depending on what trash you kill before hand.)

Icecrown Citidale is going to have to promise a hand job with every raid to keep me playing. And I don't mean a self serviced one as it is now.

Re:Ulduar

[garylian]

I think a lot of rogues not playing on PvP servers would contend that a lot has changed in how the game plays and feels.

DKs have radically changed the landscape of the game.

Re:Ulduar

[ArsonSmith]

Guilds, at least raiding guilds, are not there for you to hang out with friends. A raiding guild is there for only one reason. To insure that the other raid members are not morons. In fact most of the people I like to play casually with and/or call friends are not in my raiding guild.

Re:Ulduar

[Anonymous Coward]

Dual spec makes more sense for hybrid classes than DPS, sure, but it's still nice to have. And for someone who is just "adhoc'ing" you sure have a lot of nice gear...

I would mod you -1 Troll, but I see you're a Tauren.

Re:Ulduar

[Hoi Polloi]

I like the wing structure of Naxx and I'd take it one step further. Make each of the wings seperate instances (so being saved to one wing doesn't save you to all of them). If you try to enter the last section for the final two bosses then it can do a check to see if you cleared the previous 4 wings just as if you had done a single clearing run. This would make it easier for puggers who may have only had time to run the first wing or two to get in on a run on the other wings with a different group. The way it is now you get saved to all of Naxx so you usually end up running the first two wings over and over since pugs tend to do the wings in order.

If Blizzard thinks I'm going to spend all weekend doing a run, like you said, then I'm going to have to hang up my toon.

Re:Ulduar

[Fluffeh]

My version of Adhoc'ing means still getting things done. At the moment it's pretty balanced between game and RL. When I was leading raids with my guild in Burning Crusade content, my time online in RAIDS (not counting just farming/playing) was around 25-35 hours per week. Compared to that, I am just Adhoc'ing :)

So?

[klokop]

So?
I guess technically it's news... but it probably doesn't matter.

Thanks but no thanks

[quisxt]

Don't get me wrong, it's a fun game, but I'm not an undergraduate in college anymore, and after spending 8+ hours at work sitting on my butt in front of a computer, coming home and sitting on my butt for 4 more hours for a Nax raid or whatever doesn't sound like fun. It just seems like such a waste of time. Gah, I must have grown up a little when I wasn't looking :)

Re:Thanks but no thanks

[supermank17]

Isn't it odd how that works? When I was an undergrad (which wasn't all that long ago), I loved video/computer games and would spend as much free time as possible playing them. Now that I'm working on a computer all day, I would much rather go do something outside when I get off work. I actually have more free time now than when I was in school, but I do almost no gaming anymore...

Re:Thanks but no thanks

[cthulu_mt]

That's why I play EVE Online; my character gets better while I'm sitting on my ass at work.

Re:Thanks but no thanks

[brkello]

Yes, work is also more fun than Eve so that works out as well.

Re:It still looks like a Hanna-Barbera cartoon.

[Anonymous Coward]

Bad troll is bad, but I just have to say I like the look. Tried Oblivion (not MMO, I know) and LotRO and find the graphic style of these games to be very off-putting. Maybe it's the uncanny valley, I'm not sure, but they feel more artificial and less immersive.

WoW looks like a cartoon, and when I fly about on my dragon and shoot fire out of my fingers, and when I'm fully buffed and everything procs and my power level goes over 9000, I feel like I'm in a cartoon too. Good stuff. Everybody loves cartoons.

Dual-Specs and new RAID?

[macraig]

So now WoW supports dual core specs, but what RAID modes, 0, 1, or 5? Can I buy this new WoW mobo at newegg.com?

Re:Dual-Specs and new RAID?

[dcjester]

I wonder if it can handle SLI finally. I mean, if it can run under RAID, why cant it take use of full video enhancements?

Re:Dual-Specs and new RAID?

[macraig]

I'm still wondering when my microwave can handle SLI....

Re:Dual-Specs and new RAID?

[tygerstripes]

If you're using SLI, you don't need a microwave. Or central heating.

Re:Dual-Specs and new RAID?

[Anonymous Coward]

I'm still wondering when my microwave can handle SLI....

It will 'ding' when it's ready

Re:Dual-Specs and new RAID?

[grimflick]

imagine a Beowolf cluster of those ....

One puff was enough for me

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

Finally, I got sick of wondering that World of Warcraft was all about. I downloaded the free trial. It actually ran in Linux under Wine. I was impressed.

That was about all I was impressed with.

The updates took about 10 hours to fully complete, with each new patch leading to yet another. When the game finally started, I was required to "roll" my character. Having absolutely no idea what I was doing, I selected a Bull, and made it a druid, to get in tune with nature.

The game began. My first mission was to fetch a few feathers "the tribe". A fairly standard tutorial. But it proved tedious. You needed 7 feathers which had to be harvested from these bird creatures which you "fought" by clicking on them and waiting for your characters continuous and slow attacks to finally bring them down(Did I mention that it plays like an RTS). The trouble was that when you killed one of these birds it wouldn't necessarily drop one of these feathers, and even when it did, it could have been a ruined feather. The whole process took around a quarter of a hour. Still I assumed, it was just a tutorial. Things must get better later on.

I was wrong.

Mission after mission ensued. Collect 8 hides. Kill five cats. Harvest 8 tooths. Eventually moved on to the second town where new mission could be had. Now I had to collect 9 hides and 8 claws. etc, etc. But I was a patient man. Surely, I thought, after this drudgery is over, I will do something exciting, something that will explain the allure of the title. In the meantime, I competed with other players for the privilege of slaying a few anti-climactic "bosses", again by clicking once on them and waiting, who respawned at lengthy intervals. There were also "skills" to learn, but each needed items to be of use. Items which were only dropped, on occasion, by slow spawing monsters other players were also trying to kill.

Finally after 6 boring hours of pointless mission after pointless mission, I was approaching my goal. I proceeded towards the "capital", ascending slowly up a large basket elevator to a city on a mountain. My expectation peaked. Finally I thought, finally I will get to see what WoW is all about.

I went into the city, and up to the quest giver. The outlook was good. "We need you to fight for the Horde", they said. Finally! But then he went on. "But first we need supplies. We need you to collect 6 of this and 7 of that and..."

But it was too late. I had logged off World of Warcraft, never to return, and the Horde would never get their supplies, at least until the next poor sap came along, willing to waste another 6 hours of their life on pointless and demeaning chores. I went back to other games, and had some fun. To the end of my days I will never understand how people can pay 15 euros a month for the privilege of playing a handyman sim.

On the plus side this comic makes so much sense to me now.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[StoatBringer]

It's a shame that in the ten hours you were waiting for it to patch you didn't spend two minutes discovering that there's a lot more to combat than "click once and wait", which is the almost useless whack-it-with-your-crappy-weapon autoattack.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[Anonymous Coward]

Not to defend the game's legitimate drawbacks (I gave it up a while back as well), but the fact that you wrote that lengthy and smug criticism without even progressing past auto-attack says less about the game's limitations than it does about your predisposition. It's akin to someone judging and dismissing a windowed interface, happily saying they will never understand how someone can use it when there are single-frame CLIs available, when that person never realized that you can click the mouse, not just wiggle the pointer around on the screen for show and use tab to switch fields.

Warcaft has major shortcomings, but you not only didn't approach them, you didn't even step onto the threshold.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[Zixia]

Rather than fighting other players for spawns you could have teamed-up with them to complete the goal cooperatively, an essential part of what makes the game appealing.

You also make it sound like combat never changes, which suggests you didn't train new abilities as you gained levels. Combat is quite simplistic at lower levels because, as you say, the game is training you. When you progress you get stronger and more diverse abilities that lead to more subtle combinations of attacks.

But, really, don't look at other players as the enemy, but allies to be made for now and for the future.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[Opportunist]

The quests don't really get any more interesting. It's still mostly something that makes you wonder whether the NPCs didn't discover the post boxes yet that fill the various towns. A lot of the quests make you feel like you're in some sort of recruitment program for FedEx.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[Vohar]

Not to mention that druids start with an attack spell (Nature's Wrath, I think). That's pretty much what you're intended to use at early levels, not bopping things with your staff.

He didn't think to try that spell? Not even once? I didn't think the tutorial needed to say HEY PUSH THIS BUTTON DOWN HERE AND SEE WHAT IT DOES but hey, guess I was wrong.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[pwfffff]

What you just described is the reason you never roll a Tauren, ever. Ever ever ever. Try a blood elf, that starting area's pretty easy/awesome.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[BrookHarty]

The quests don't really get any more interesting.

WHAT? What about the daily Hodir quests, Thrusting the Spear, Polishing the Helm and Blowing the Horn? I dont know what they are hinting at, but the quests are super.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[ObsessiveMathsFreak]

It's a shame that in the ten hours you were waiting for it to patch you didn't spend two minutes discovering that there's a lot more to combat than "click once and wait", which is the almost useless whack-it-with-your-crappy-weapon autoattack.

On the contrary. I noticed and used all the abilities and spells in my arsenal. But this did not change the fact that the game is essentially a single character RTS, with "click once and wait" comprimising 90% of your time in combat.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[FuckTheModerators]

You've got the Blizzard standard opinion down pat:
"could have teamed-up with them to complete the goal cooperatively, an essential part of what makes the game appealing."
"don't look at other players as the enemy, but allies to be made for now and for the future."

I, and more than a few others, don't really have any interest in grouping in WoW. My time to play is such that I can't really schedule it, and a dedicated Thursday-night raid just ain't gonna happen. Pick-up raids? No thank you. Way too messy with lots of folks who know even less about the dungeons than I do.

Blizzard very much angles the endgame, and even 60+, at groupers. The gear difference alone is staggering. I'm at 63 and my subscription's about to run out. I'll let it. Were the next patch to come with soloable versions of instances I might come back. Don't see that happening though.

I do enjoy the game, I think what Blizzard's built is pretty damn cool. But I just want to solo and I'm near the end of the curve of where that's enjoyable.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[StatusWoe]

"I, and more than a few others, don't really have any interest in grouping in WoW"

Then you aren't actually interested in WoW. I left almost 2 years ago, but unless things have really changed Blizzard has never said the game was intended to be for people who want to play alone.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[CorSci81]

Blizzard very much angles the endgame, and even 60+, at groupers. The gear difference alone is staggering. I'm at 63 and my subscription's about to run out. I'll let it. Were the next patch to come with soloable versions of instances I might come back. Don't see that happening though.

Well, isn't the point of an MMORPG to go online and play with other people? If you made everything in the game able to be done solo you might as well be playing Oblivion with a tacked on chat room. From my own personal experience, WoW isn't really a game meant to be played solo. It's quite a bit more fun if you have other friends playing, and even better if you can find a good guild of people you enjoy playing with (and I don't necessarily mean an end-game raiding guild). I hate pick up groups and refuse to do them, which makes me appreciate my guild much more. It's nice to be able to log on and put together a group relatively easily from a pool of people I can generally trust to be likeable and competent.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[Cederic]

Hey, I chose Hunter for a reason!

Self-feeding pets mean I don't even need to click to feed it now either.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[brkello]

Um, it is extremely easy to solo to 80. I have no idea what you are talking about. The 70-80 levels have some of the best/most interesting quests in the game. The guy was saying if you are on a quest, and you are all competing, you can group up to do the quest. This doesn't require scheduling or raiding, it requires you to /say hi, want to group up for this quest?

The instances (5 man) are very easy to find groups for and most take 30-60 minutes. No need to schedule times. Even raids can be done in pick ups. One takes about 20 minutes. Another less than an hour. Yeah, you probably aren't going to do the longer raids, but you really don't have to to enjoy it. It's fine to quit because you are tired of the game, but you are criticizing it based on false assumptions or some other strange issues that you have.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[Opportunist]

Glad it ain't polishing the spear, thrusting the horn and blowing Hodir...

Re:One puff was enough for me

[Anonymous Coward]

Blood elf on the horde side, or Draeni on the alliance. For those who don't know, these were the races introduced in the first expansion and you can see that Blizzard learned A LOT between the original release and the expansion. It's much more fun to start as a BE or Draeni, IMO, than any of the "vanilla" classes.

WoW does have some issues, and the game is definitely not for everyone, but at least give it a fair shot.

Re:One puff was enough for me

[PastaLover]

But this did not change the fact that the game is essentially a single character RTS, with "click once and wait" comprimising 90% of your time in combat

To be fair, it starts like this because that's easier. If they gave you all the abilities you have at lvl 80 you'd just be dumbstruck and not know how to do much of anything in combat, spending more time reading the tooltips than the actual killing takes.

But it seems to me from your account you just don't have the addictive personality that so many people have that make us not mind one bit about all those grinding quests. At least not in the beginning.

Either way, if you don't find it fun to start with, you'll probably not find it fun after turning in your 12 rabbit ears for gazillionth time (especially since for some reason many rabbits would not seem to posses any ears, necessating the slaughter of many multiples of the amount of ears you need).

Re:One puff was enough for me

[PastaLover]

Rather than fighting other players for spawns you could have teamed-up with them to complete the goal cooperatively, an essential part of what makes the game appealing.

Er, have you played the game? Okay, maybe when instancing at lvl 70-80. But before then? Better hope the other person is not a complete cunt and will accept your invite before killing that special mob you need. And steer clear of them when doing anything else, you'll be happier that way.

Re:It still looks like a Hanna-Barbera cartoon.

[theeddie55]

When I want things to look like actual things, I'll go outside. That may sound strange to you, but people do go outside you know.

Not news either way

[CarpetShark]

News about patches to a game belong on the game's RSS feed, not a tech news site.

If the latest version comes with new AI so that NPCs happen to tell you about their dreams last night, and how they plan to put them into action today by building putting wheels on a board, adding an engine, and calling this new invention of theirs a "car", then it's worth seeing here.

Re:Not news either way

[Killjoy_NL]

With the enormous amount of players of this game and the overlap with Slashdot readers, this is a good way to keep those readers here for the news and the discussion, also for the ad views.
So yes, this does belong here.

Re:Not news either way

[CarpetShark]

If the overlap was 70%+, then perhaps. If it was 90%+, then definitely. But I doubt it's approaching either of those.

Re:Not news either way

[0xdeadbeef]

News about patches to a game belong on the game's RSS feed, not a tech news site.

Holy sweet jeebus frak! This "tech news site" lets your link your account name to your character in the game! They mimic the game's achievement system as a ha-ha, only serious joke! Would you please do us all a favor and take your whining to someone who cares? There's a whole Internet out there for you to explore, get to it!

Re:Not news either way

[brkello]

Considering that there are 25 Second Life articles to every WoW article, I really don't see what the big deal is. Barely anyone even "plays" that game yet it is on here all the time. One WoW article when a major content patch is dropped is news worthy and I would think any site that has a games section to at least mention it or it really is out of touch with gaming. The article makes sense to be here, what I can't understand is why people who say they don't care actually bother clicking in her to comment on it.

Re:Not news either way

[CarpetShark]

Would you please do us all a favor and take your whining to someone who cares?

Sure. You first.

Re:Not news either way

[Anonymous Coward]

What about the consistent server crashes they are experiencing because of the patch? Should that show up on a tech site?

Re:Not news either way

[CarpetShark]

I don't see what the big deal is either. I simply stated my opinion. You're the one taking the time to argue against that opinion instead of simply accepting it and moving on.

Re:Not news either way

[Anonymous Coward]

News about patches to a game belong on the game's RSS feed, not a tech news site.

If the latest version comes with new AI so that NPCs happen to tell you about their dreams last night, and how they plan to put them into action today by building putting wheels on a board, adding an engine, and calling this new invention of theirs a "car", then it's worth seeing here.

News about patches to a game belong on the game's RSS feed, not a tech news site.

If the latest version comes with new AI so that NPCs happen to tell you about their dreams last night, and how they plan to put them into action today by building putting wheels on a board, adding an engine, and calling this new invention of theirs a "car", then it's worth seeing here.

News about patches to a game belong on the game's RSS feed, not a tech news site.

If the latest version comes with new AI so that NPCs happen to tell you about their dreams last night, and how they plan to put them into action today by building putting wheels on a board, adding an engine, and calling this new invention of theirs a "car", then it's worth seeing here.

If you don't play wow you are the minority..

Don't click on wow related articles if you do not want to read wow related news.. DUH RETARDS

What happened to my cat?

[EreIamJH]

I logged in after the update to find that me pet had wandered outside (I was at an inn). I whistled and it came back saying that it had lost a bunch of skills.

Is that a bug, or do I just need to get a life?

Re:What happened to my cat?

[drinkypoo]

Is that a bug, or do I just need to get a life?

You definitely need to get a life; in the real world, if you don't secure your pet it might wander away and get run over by a bus, never mind forgetting how to roll over or play dead, it will be dead. You got off easy (although it's kind of hard to scratch your epic mount behind the ears.)

Re:What happened to my cat?

[Symbolis]

Talent points(including those for pets, I imagine) were re-funded due to changes in the talent trees.

Re:What happened to my cat?

[Stormy Dragon]

They may so many changes to the talent trees that all of your character and pet talents have been undone and the points returned to you. Any abilities you or your pet had been granted by talents are thus gone until you go back in and select a new talen spec again.

Re:What happened to my cat?

[WillAffleckUW]

Most people don't talk to their cats.

So, yes, you do need to get a life.

3.1 Patch Notes

[Symbolis]

As compiled by WoWWiki.

I also find WoWHead to be useful, as a newb.

How I longed to dual-spec....

[sampson7]

Honestly, I might still be in thrall to Blizzard if dual-speccing had been available. Why on earth did it take so many years to include this feature?

My holy priest was just painful to play outside of a dungeon. Respeccing cost too much time and the fun quotient diminished. I remember posting long rants on the boards back in the day and getting some BS from the Blizzard reps about how "choices have consequences." I also remember having one point in some worthless first tier disc talent for over a year because I had hit the wrong button and wasn't willing to spend the 100g to respec. Ah, good times. I miss it, on some level. But overall, I think it was probably good for me to quit after 2+ years.

Re:How I longed to dual-spec....

[jgtg32a]

I read the first line of your comment and said to my self this man plays a priest. I was too I feel your pain, I quit playing about 2 months ago myself.

Re:How I longed to dual-spec....

[KingMotley]

I think you meant 10g. The cost goes down after a while if you don't respec. Also, it never costs more than 50g.

Re:How I longed to dual-spec....

[xutopia]

I was a druid and many of the things I complained about made it to the game after I quit (reduction of aggro in feral cat, strength to healing ability conversion, etc...).

The one thing I cannot ask from the game is that it takes so damn fucking long to do the things I wanted to do and *most* end-game guilds are full of dysfunctional sociopaths I care not to associate with.

Now I play volleyball, go out with real friends and do contract work on my free time. Life is so much better!

Re:How I longed to dual-spec....

[xutopia]

Druids and paladins had the same disadvantage. In PVE they were both expected to be healbots but that build was useless while grinding or PVP.

Free time

[AlpineR]

The explanation that I've heard for this phenomenon goes like this:

For all the years that you're in school, you're always waiting for something to happen. Waiting for the next exam, waiting to finish the school year, waiting to get a driver's license, waiting to graduate. In that situation it makes sense to have an activity to consume time and get to the next goal sooner.

Once you're out in the real world, time gets much more valuable. You're not waiting for the clock to turn, you're fighting against the clock to get things done as quickly as possible. The main limit to what you can accomplish is how efficiently you spend your time. So you'd probably rather relax and recharge during your free time rather than engage in an activity to make the next work day come as soon as possible.

Re:Free time

[virg_mattes]

Of course, it could also be that some people stop liking computer games as they get older. I personally find WoW to be entertaining, and I'd rather spend a few hours playing than watching television. I don't play video games like I did when I was a kid, but that's just because I have less free time and (much more importantly to this discussion) more diverse hobbies. That's a side effect of having access to my own income and transportation more than any idea that "time [got] much more valuable".

Virg

Re:Free time

[Whorhay]

I still love video games, just hit 30. My problem now is finding time and money to afford playing them. Between church commitments, honey do lists, hobby activities with the wife, soon time with children, and of course the ever present job that pays for everything I can get in maybe an average of two hours a day.

Re:Free time

[Anonymous Coward]

This. MOD UP PARENT PLEASE.

Re:Free time

[bigstrat2003]

All of those are worthy enough activities, but they're all just as optional as video games, when you get right down to it (except your job). It's not like you have less free time, it's that you're choosing to fill your free time with different things.

Really, there's nothing special about getting older that means you have more commitments. You may have things to do, but you chose to take them on. It's not like they're necessary. You basically replace "school" with "job", and you have the same amount of free time as ever... most people just choose to fill it differently.

Re:Free time

[Whorhay]

Well actually I spend way more time in a year at work than I ever did at school.

And amusingly enough I take far less sick days from work than I did from school, probably has something to do with getting a more immediate reward in the form of a paycheck.

Re:Free time

[bigstrat2003]

In a year, perhaps, but are you accounting for summer? When school is in session, kids generally spend 7 or 8 hours of their day in school, which is pretty comparable to the 8+ we spend at work.

And amusingly enough I take far less sick days from work than I did from school, probably has something to do with getting a more immediate reward in the form of a paycheck.

L2 paid sick time! ;)

Re:Free time

[PastaLover]

I think you're on to something. In the final years of school I really tired of video games. At a certain point the only game I was playing was WoW and more as a glorified IRC chat than anything else. Something to pass the time I guess.

But now I have a job, disposable income and I don't live near campus anymore where I used to go out at least 2 nights a week (and a third in the weekends) anyway. Suddenly I've rediscovered my love of gaming and I'm trying out all sorts of interesting games.

But then I'm not in a relationship and have little in the way of obligations outside of my job. The thing is, I'm not the sort of person who's likely to take up many hobbies instead of reading work related literature and/or vegetating on the couch. At least gaming is entertaining and engages my brain.

Re:Free time

[Whorhay]

I school we were allowed up to 20 days in a year as sick time. I always took as many as I was allowed. While I was in the military I only ever had one week of sick leave, when they stole my damn wisdom teeth. And in all my civilian jobs I have taken less than one week total in four years as sick time. Although my company just took away our week of sick leave and gave us two extra vacation days :(

And of course I count in Summer Vacation. What I wouldn't give to take a three month vacation every year from work.

Way to catch up!

[GreyDuck]

So, you can have a second build for your character now? Way to catch up with City of Heroes, Blizzard!

Re:Way to catch up!

[Icegryphon]

Yeah, Blizzard now always imitates and never innovates.
The only time I ever really like it was Warcraft 1.
Warcraft 2 was ok but really boring on replay value after a few rounds of multiplayer.

Re:Way to catch up!

[brkello]

Yes, I am sure Blizzard is relieved that this is behind them. I mean, with the subscription numbers of CoH being so high, they were running a serious risk of losing the #1 spot. How will CoH responds? Maybe they will steal some of WoW's ideas...like making a game that is fun. I can't wait to see what they do! (I kid, I kid!)

As WoW gets older, so do its players

[saintory]

Perhaps some of the things Blizzard are considering are how to maintain existing players while bringing in new ones.

I think there is an obvious advantage to experienced players because there are nuances they can take advantage of the newer players might not yet know. What happens when an experienced player grows up, gets a 9-5 job, starts a family? They evolve from hard-core gamer to casual gamer.

Adding variable difficulty dungeons raises the competitive player vs. game challenge value. Adding achievements raises the competitive passive player vs. player challenge value. Adding the ability to dual-spec allows users to become more versatile within the game with a single character instead of making multiple characters for different uses. Adding more quests creates a longer story. Adding more races allows new story perspectives.

I have never raided a dungeon before so there's still content that I've never experienced. Being a casual gamer I can't commit more than a couple of hours per gaming session, maybe once or twice a week. When I have kids this will become less but as long as the stories are interesting and entertaining I'll continue playing. I believe this same technique is used in TV shows?

One question to those people who state "If Blizzard continues with this crap I'll be leaving WoW:" Where will you go?

Re:As WoW gets older, so do its players

[garylian]

Probably EQ2. It sounds funny, but in many ways, it is more casual player friendly than WoW. It really grew up from its not-so-great launch.

Plus, you buy the latest expansion, and you have the complete game, all previous expansions included. It makes it much cheaper than most established games.

Throw in the nostalgia a good portion of WoW players have for seeing the various lands of EQ again, and it's a fairly logical choice.

Re:As WoW gets older, so do its players

[Whorhay]

I quit WoW probably close to a year ago. I didn't quit because the game was horrible or anything but rather because I got tired of it and I didn't have the large time chunks to dedicate to it that I once did.

Since I stopped playing WoW I played through Portal, Halflife 2 and all it's sequels, Warhammer Online for a few months, Diablo 2 for a few months with some old friends, and now I'm enjoying Atlantica Online. There may not be another game out there that is exactly like WoW, but there are plenty of games that are just as good in their own right. If someone wants a WoW that's awesomer for them they should run an emulation server and cater to their own interests. It's not any game companies responsibility to make a game just exactly to a specific players taste.

So where do you spend that time now?

[iceperson]

I have a hard time believing people who spent their high school and college years gaming are suddenly socialite outdoorsy types after they get out of school.

I guess I'm living my life in reverse. In high school/college I spent my nights out pretty much without exception, you couldn't have paid me to stay home and play video games then. Now that I'm married with kids old enough to think hangin out with dad is lame I game, as does my wife.

Instances CAN be a boring way to level up

[Benfea]

It really depends on what you're playing. With most of my characters, I don't spend any more time in instances than I have to, but leveling up in instances is the only thing that made it possible for me to level up my heal-spec priest before 3.1. Trying to do solo PvE with that kind of character is like trying to dent a brick wall with ping pong balls.

This is not news. Get it off the site.

[Anonymous Coward]

This is not news. Get it off of the site.

1000 gold is not that much

[WillAffleckUW]

I pulled in maybe 300 gold just from selling glyphs I had on me before the patch once the patch rolled in.

Just think of it as the Diablo version of WoW.