Paladin Tales

The Unburied

2009-02-27T11:33:00.003-05:00

"Something is dreadfully wrong. Fear is in the air; I can feel it. I was but days out of Tristram when I saw a screaming ball of flame rip across the sky. Surely enough, soon after witnessing this harbinger of doom, I stumbled upon a badly mangled traveler. He was barely able to spit out the tale of the cursed monstrosity responsible for his broken body as his life drifted away. He called his killer "the unburied".

Months ago, when I wrote of the undead blight upon our land, I thought them the gravest of threats. But they are nothing compared to the new undead creature described to me by this poor fellow.

He was a law officer of sorts, a local guard out looking into the depraved handiwork of a crazed individual, the sort we seem to be seeing more and more of in these dark days. When the guard happened upon a mass grave dug by this sick fool, a massive, horned, disgusting behemoth was digging itself out. The dying traveler described this loathsome beast – or, as he termed it, the unburied – as being comprised of bloated parts from many fetid, rotting corpses, with a multitude of disfigured heads and slobbering fanged mouths. He was fortunate that day, but when he returned with several men to help him deal with the creature, they found to their horror that the undead spawn was too much for even their combined efforts. They fought valiantly to the last man, sacrificing themselves to keep the beast from rampaging across the countryside and taking who knows how many innocent lives. He was the last survivor, and before he passed on, he proudly told me that they were successful in eradicating the foul unburied creature.

Being born out of pits of human misery, these beings feed on human suffering. Wherever bodies are dumped together unceremoniously, the unburied may rise. I cannot help but wonder if this be some sort of cosmic justice for our inhumanity to our fellow man. But what is the catalyst? What animates these things? What makes them so horrendously different from the run-of-the-mill zombies or "normal" skeletal undead?

Some days I truly feel that the end of humanity must be at hand. Certainly our world is home to assorted disturbing and unsettling creatures, but every dawn seems to bring news of more wretchedness we must endure as a people. The darkness is coming, my friends: mark my words."
-From the writings of Abd al-Hazir

Bashiok: The Unburied is formed by the fusion of soil, rock, human bodies and angry souls. The spikes that jut from its body are shards of stone ripped from the earth during the development of the creature.

Looks awesome. Wouldn't want to be that guy in the middle of em':

Blizzcon 2009 Has The Green Light

2009-02-17T13:05:00.003-05:00

BLIZZCON® 2009 ANNOUNCED

Blizzard Entertainment® gaming celebration to return to Anaheim Convention Center on
August 21-22

PARIS, France -- February 17, 2009 -- Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. today announced plans for its fourth BlizzCon® gaming convention, to be held at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California on Friday, August 21 and Saturday, August 22. BlizzCon is a celebration of the global player communities surrounding Blizzard Entertainment®’s Warcraft®, StarCraft®, and Diablo® universes. In response to the festival’s increasing popularity, this year’s event has been expanded from three convention halls to four.

“We’ve been amazed by the incredible response to each of our previous BlizzCon events,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “We’re pleased to be bringing the convention back to Anaheim this year, and we look forward to this new opportunity to meet Blizzard gamers from around the world.”

BlizzCon will offer a wide variety of activities throughout the two-day event. In addition to serving as a gathering place for Blizzard Entertainment gaming communities, attendees will be able to enjoy:

• Hands-on play time with upcoming Blizzard Entertainment games
• Discussion panels with Blizzard Entertainment developers
• Competitive and casual tournaments for players to showcase their talents
• Community contests with great prizes
• Commemorative merchandise based on Blizzard Entertainment’s game universes
• A silent auction
• More exciting activities and attractions to be announced
Further details, including ticket availability and pricing, will be announced on the official BlizzCon website, http://www.blizzcon.com, as the event draws closer.

To keep pace with the continued growth of World of Warcraft as well as development on other Blizzard Entertainment games, the company is currently hiring for numerous open positions. More information on available career opportunities can be found at http://eu.blizzard.com/en/jobs/.

Pretty exciting. They're having it early so I would imagine that there will be a release date for SC2 (November / December?). Could also have new class(es) for Diablo 3. Maybe even a new WoW Xpak. Should be fun!

Blizzard's Nice Little Gift for $14.99

2009-01-22T21:38:00.003-05:00

It has taken months but Blizzard has finally given us some Diablo 3 merchandise! From Small to 3XL, you can get your own Diablo 3 T-Shirt (Mens & Womens). I know I'll be getting myself one. If only they would sign some more posters and put them up... hehehe.

A direct link to the Mens T-Shirt

Bashiok on Auction Houses

2009-01-08T22:00:00.003-05:00

"Foremost - spamming is bad. I think trade channels usually suck because of the requirement to spam. The amount of time and effort spent just to get your items noticed borders on brain-explosiony. Throw in the lack of easily gauged economy and you’re usually left out in the dark, laughed at, ripped off, etc. Your suggestion seems to mix the idea of an auction house and trade channel, in that you can use a channel in-game to spam, and then have some sort of UI to trade the item. That definitely solves one issue, which is needing to leave the game and just sit in a chat channel. What it doesn’t solve is needing to sit in a chat channel and spam. Sure, you could probably play and spam the channel every once in a while but it’s really not the cleanest approach. You’re still spamming a chat channel, you’re still limited to the people that want to see that spam (ie not many).

Since you brought it up let’s move on to the World of Warcraft’s auction house. World of Warcraft did not invent the auction house trading system. It may have certainly refined it, but an irrational hatred of the game that some of you seem to have really shouldn’t translate to game systems that aren’t original to it. There are some major advantages to an auction house similar to WoW’s. You don’t have to be present being the biggest and best. You can be playing with friends, PvPing, asleep, at school or work, and someone has the ability to see your items, and you have a greater chance to sell/trade them. You don’t have to spam a channel, you don’t have to even be online and playing. That’s HUGE, and really the main reason so many people use trading systems such as websites and forums for Diablo II. You want to focus on playing the game or not playing the game, not sitting around hoping someone wants your item.

It also helps form a visible and easily identified economy. I’m a new player, I got a sword I think it’s probably pretty nice, I can go on an auction house and search for it or similar swords and get an idea of how much it should sell for. In this case being in a trade channel is no better whether it’s in-game or out of game. What you’d probably end up with is people still going to forums and more static styles of trading found on websites, but even then any unified sense of economy is spread thin. Maybe that’s not such a bad system in itself, and an official trading site could work. Of course what you lose either way though, auction house or website, is in-game player interaction. Which is what I assume you’re striving to keep.

When it comes down to it, any change or addition or removal of any systems have to be weighed. Do the positives outweigh the negatives?

I’ll go back to what I said at the beginning and state we don’t know what if any types of trading systems will be in the final game. Maybe there won’t be, it may be that eventually we settle on leaving it Diablo II style. We have some ideas of what would be cool, but at the end of the day we’re not going to do anything that isn’t far and away a more positive change for the game."

Seems like he either likes the auction house style or just plain hates the Diablo 2 style. I hope it does enter play in D3 but they would need to make sure that gold is used more in trades than items.

Tyrael Has Moved

2008-12-13T17:21:00.004-05:00

Blizzard has updated their Diablo3.com website. Tyrael has moved closer to us and his wings have become more like silly string.

Before

After

Looks more evil, don't he? The first think you see when you enter the website is Tyrael. It's not everyday your major logo changes. But maybe this tells us something is coming.

I sawwwy...

2008-12-04T20:49:00.003-05:00

I know, it's been a month since the last update. But there is a reason. More like excuses but we'll go with that.

1. Holiday seasons are always busy. I think everyone can agree with that.

2. There has been no new. None, zip, nada. Unless you want Wrath news but I've given up on keeping up with that.

3. Any free time has been spent on the Diablo 2 realms.

So, if you wanna do some Hell Baal runs, hit me up! US-East, Non-Ladder. Whisper *neflight2 or my characters:

Aticus
Whoa_ASorceress
Whoa_ANecro
Whoa_APaladin
Whoa_AHammerdin

When more news come, I'll have it posted.

Can't Quit? Epic Fail.

2008-11-06T22:41:00.004-05:00

Here's a little tid-bit for those who want to leave WoW for other MMOs:

1. People who said that they were leaving WoW for another MMO and they left for Age Of Conan, 68% of the players re-subscribed to WoW.

2. People who said that they were leaving WoW for another MMO and they left for Warhammer, 48% of the players re-subscribed to WoW.

It just proves that WoW is like drugs: you can't stop... j/k. But it does ponder the question to those WoW leavers that if these people were tired of WoW and wanted something new or just... well, wanted something new. I knew I didn't want to play anymore but 68% of people returning to a game they left is astonishing.

But, this isn't your typical MMO. Leaving EverQuest was never really an option unless you wanted to stop playing MMOs all together. I mean, it really was the only one out there at the time. And usually, in EQ, you were replaced once you left (in the high end guilds). In WoW, there are so many players that if you were to leave, and lose your spot in a guild, you could find an equal guild doing the same raids.

All of this just proves that this isn't you grandfather's MMO... or for some of you, your older sibling and/or father's MMO.

Vote 08!

2008-11-03T10:29:00.002-05:00

Tomorrow is election day in the US. That means that it's now our time to use our right as US citizens to go out and vote for whomever you believe should be our leaders. No matter whether you are a Republican or Democrat, it's time to spend 5 minutes of your day to go and vote.

As much as I would love to spend more time playing Fable 2 for the 2nd time through, I know I'll be spending a few minutes of my day at the polls.

R.I.P. Hellgate London

2008-10-25T00:23:00.003-04:00

It only took a year (give or take a few months) but Namco Bandai has announced that as of January 31st, 2009, the game's online servers will be shut off.

It's not like we all saw this coming. The over-hype killed this game. People went into the game thinking it was going to be the best RPG since WoW, but they were only to be hit with bugs. The concept was there and the Diablo guys did a good job with the RPG elements of the game. The problem was technical.

For those who still want to play online, it's free of charge until N/B shuts off the servers. Two good things come out of this: 1.At least there's single player, and 2. You will be able to find it in the bargain bin for $10 pretty soon.

The Top Ten Dumbest Things In Diablo 2.

2008-10-22T14:02:00.006-04:00

Been busy this past week so here's a little list that HellForge created. It's the top ten dumbest features of Diablo 2. I don't believe the Great Marsh should be on the list because of the experience we get from single player games. In any case, it's a pretty accurate list.

I'd also like to add the Assassin character class to this list. It should be #3.

10. Attack and Stamina Potions
Honestly, did anyone ever use these? For anything? Ever? They had barely enough power to clear out the Stony Field, why did they even bother to include them? The most ridiculous and useless items in the entire game, without a doubt.

9. The “Thief” Monster Ability
An interesting, if disastrous feature, that lasted all of one patch. I wonder who thought that ripping items off a player’s character and dropping them onto the ground for all to see was an awesome idea? Still, it was worth it just to hear the screams of panic.

8. Nihlathak’s “Corpse Explosion”
Hmmm… oh, I know! Let’s give him the ability to cast a spell that does massive damage from two screens away! And make it kill you in one shot! Yeah, that’s a great feature! Hardcore players will LOVE the “challenge”.

7. + Light Radius
Useless little modifier that would appear on every freakin’ thing you didn’t want it to. What’s it going to do? Blind the monsters with its luminous shine? More like attract them from half a thousand miles away to figure out what this giant glowing bug catcher is.

6. Isenhart’s Set
Isenhart, I think I speak for every player when I say “F*** off, you useless w****y piece of c**k cheese”. We’re sick of your set turning up twelve times in each game; it’s as effective as a semi-defrosted mackerel. And smells about as good too.

5. The Great Marsh
Probably the least visited area in Diablo 2, most of the time we don’t need to go near the Great Marsh at all. Whether it’s a bug, or just made that way, it rarely generates as a part of the main Kurast path, instead appearing as a sort of dead end detour. Why would we want to spend twenty minutes exploring a pointless midget filled area that goes nowhere? Meh.

4. Loot Drop Glitches
This can occur at any time, but most notably in the Level 3 Durance of Hate’s Council Members. How many times have you killed those guys on the way to Mephisto and had them drop nothing? Also known to happen with Duriel, who may drop no more then a town portal. I’ve even personally solo-slain Hell Baal… only to have him drop a few yellow items. Curse you Blizzard for your buggy drops!!!

3. Druid’s “Spirit of Barbs”
A level 30 ability for the Druid, the Spirit of Barbs with 20 points in it does close to 100% damage return to attackers. Meanwhile, the Paladin’s “Thorns” aura - a level 6 ability – does 100% damage return… with one skill point in it. The Druid’s suckage doth make us ROFL.

2. Making Hell ‘Durance of Hate’ 10x Bigger
A classic example of trying to force gamers to “play the game the way it’s meant to be played”. The idea was to make running Hell Mephisto a tad harder, or perhaps abolish running him altogether. Instead, 75% of Diablo 2’s playerbase suddenly became acquainted with the time saving “map hack”. Longevity lies in being able to speed through the monotonous nowadays; remember that, developers. We’re happy to take things slow for the first few play throughs, but it very quickly becomes “been there, done that”. Trying to draw out the pain (coughcoughHellgate1.3dcoughcough) will not be appreciated.

1. Nerfing “Whirlwind”
Whirlwind was the ability of Diablo 2. It was the skill that almost single handedly marketed the game to all fans of the warrior class. And for a few patches, it was good! Then BAM! Nerfed harder then the American economy. At -50% damage right off the bat, Whirlwind needed a massive amount of points just to reach “useful” let alone “devastating”. Take a mental note people, if some skill seems insanely powerful to you: shut up about it!

All I Want For Christmas Is...

2008-10-16T19:47:00.001-04:00

This

You can buy it for me here. Thanks :-)

Seriously? WoW.

2008-10-13T16:43:00.003-04:00

I know that there's a lot of Blizzcon 08 news and stuff to critic but I have to rant on this guy.

One World of Warcraft player has a complete set up for his Warcraft needs. And those need are 36 accounts and 11 computers. And I thought cosplayers were the ultimate geek.

I used to multibox Diablo 1 and 2 because rushing and trading were easier that way. But 36!? Come on. Oh, and here's his defence:

"It costs me exactly $5711 in subscription costs per year with 36 accounts on the 6 month pay schedule. Not bad considering I’m looking at it like it’s a hobby and there are more expensive hobbies out there than World of Warcraft," claims Bradster.

Yeah, I can see some hobbies being more expensive; like buying old cars. But there are other cheaper hobbies which people can actually praise you for. Such hobbies include: Hiking, biking, reading books, model railroads [from experience, seriously. My grandfather still gets praises for his train layouts], woodworking, volunteering at you local community center, and yo-yoing. How many people do you meet swinging those yo-yos around? Next to none - we need more of them.

Look, having 1, 2, or even 3 Warcraft accounts is fine by me. Some people enjoy that. But this man needs a real hobby... one that isn't addicting but just fun to do. And one that gets you out of the house.

BlizzCon 08!

2008-10-09T22:03:00.008-04:00

Stay tuned tomorrow for more Diablo 3 information right here!

I'll be posting frequently tomorrow evening on whatever we hear.

*Update - 11:00AM EST*

It is official: There will be a PLAYABLE DEMO OF DIABLO 3! Also, you will be able to play a new class! Damn you, you lucky SOBs. :-P

"Among these brave champions stands the enigmatic witch doctor, a spiritual warrior from deep within the Torajan jungles. At BlizzCon 2008, the witch doctor is yours to command for the first tim ever. Stop by the Diablo area on the show floor for your chance to lead this fierce new hero into the catacombs beneath the Tristram Cathedral.

While you're there, revisit the raw strength of the barbarian - a Diablo series classic - or try your hand at Sanctuary's newest champion, who will be revealed at the event."

*Update - 2:00PM EST*

Blizzard has release a new class! THE WIZARD! I'm pretty excited about this class - love the name too. I find it better than Sorceress but not as cool as if they were to bring back the Mage.

It is said that the Wizard will have Charged Bolt, Magic Missle, Blizzard, Tornado, and Frost Nova.

The description follows: Youthful and headstrong, the upstart Wizard manipulates the primal forces of the universe to vanquish foes.

There is also news that the playable demo's final boss is the Skeleton King! No, not Jack. He's the Pumpkin King. Is it Leoric? I mean, we killed him when he was already dead so I guess he could still be there in Tristram's Cathedral.

*Update - 5:00PM EST*

Blizzard has updated Diablo3.com with a full page on the Wizard including some new spell trailers as well as a cinematic trailer for the class! There are also numerous screenshots updated on the website. It's a great read.

I am also VERY convinced that the Skeleton King is King Leoric himself. It's just too weird to have a 'Skeleton King' in the Tristram Cathedral when in Diablo 1, the Skeleton King was Leoric. In any case, he looks badass!

D3 Website Update

2008-10-02T19:32:00.002-04:00

I've been sick this past week with this fall cold that is going around all of Connecticut. With that said, I am getting better but I have much work to get caught up on. A good friend of mine is getting married this weekend so no more updates this week.

Here's a link to Diii.net's article about the Oct 2nd Diablo3.com update and a new monster too. Looks like a Leaper from Act2 but instead of jumping, it'll be burrowing.

Will Teleport Be A Skill In Diablo 3?

2008-09-24T22:59:00.004-04:00

There has been some crazy forum posts over the last few months about having Teleport in Diablo 3 or to not have it. There's very valid arguments on both sides.

Pros
- It makes the game faster.
- Gets you around monsters that are immune to your skills.
- The ability to rush lower players at a quicker pace than walking.
- Mana cost is cheap.

Cons
- It shortens the game.
- Boss runs become grinding.
- The ability to rush lower players at a quicker pace than walking.
- Sways PvP battles to one side (at times).

My stance: I hope they keep it out of the game. Give the Mage class (cause we all know there will be one) a skill like Levitation. An ability to fly over ground monsters; leaving casters and ranged monsters to hit you. You will also be able to go over broken bridges (see gameplay vid) but not through walls. Give it a 5-20 second duration and a decent mana cost.

The mistake they made was in 1.10 when they release Enigma. The ability to have every character in the game teleport was a cheap and, in my opinion, a half-ass way of balancing the game. In balancing though, they gave the game a quicker pace and ruined a lot of fun in exploring the levels. You can say all you want that 'we've been through it dozens of time. Why do we have to do it again?' Well, it is a RPG after all. It's supposed to be a long process to make your character the best he or she can be.

Jay Wilson has already said that they want to get away from the Boss grinds. This will be one way to help with that cause.

If they were to make it available in the game, I hope they would put a 5 second cooldown or a very high mana cost. Maybe a percentage of your total mana. Start out at 20% and move down to 10% by level whatever.

The Alt Key

2008-09-22T14:06:00.003-04:00

We've all thought about it: Why do we have to hold down the Alt key in Diablo 2? Well, Blizzard thought about this too. And Bashiok answers:

"The way it works now is that when an item drops the name shows for about 5 seconds and then they fade out and disappear. Pressing Alt shows all dropped item names for again about 5 seconds and then the names fade out and disappear. I actually didn't like it at first, I liked the on/off state of pressing or not pressing Alt, but with the names showing immediately after drop and having a sort of "grace period" after just tapping Alt, it's really grown on me and is a lot more intuitive. It's a lot easier to see what just dropped quickly and decide if you care, and it isn't necessary to constantly hold down Alt while scavenging after a large fight. I still want to see -nopickup return but I haven't really asked anyone what the possibility of that is. I don't think it would work well with the current system, so options may have to be a possibility."

This makes sense. There are plenty of occasions where if I see something drop, I stop everything I'm doing and pick it up. I don't however enjoy the idea of battling a group of monsters, checking the drops and then having 5 seconds of items being shown leading to accidentally clicking on Bolts, Arrows, Cracked Boots, etc etc, while you're trying to take down a cultist.

The pickup system should be 3 options.

1. Hold down Alt to see the items (as in Diablo 2)

2. Always show the items that drop.

3. No pickup option.

It cannot be that hard to let the user choose how he or she views the items on the ground. But, as I said above, I like the Alt key in Diablo 2. I would put Ring, Middle and Index finger on 123 keys and my thumb on alt. Very comfortable; very easy. I wonder if they'll add anything else to the pickup options.

Wrath Release Date

2008-09-18T18:55:00.002-04:00

Matt Graham beat me to it so I'll just post what I was going to post in the first place. (I've been kinda dead this week so there won't be anymore posts this week).

'Nuff said.

Bad News Always Comes With Good News

2008-09-12T08:33:00.005-04:00

The Bad News:

Bashiok: "Well, health and mana leach may not come back. There's balance issues, and they may not make it into Diablo III"

The Good News:

I went into my D2 Account and when it said my characters have expired, I clicked on them and I was able to go into the game and they weren't expired anymore!

How that happens? I haven't a clue.

Diablo 3 Theory Hour

2008-09-09T14:32:00.004-04:00

I wanted to bring your attention to something I remember reading and thinking about years ago back when this article was first written in 2003. Diii.net (formally Dii.net) posted this article in the aftermath of Lord Of Destruction and back when the Diablo 3 speculation first started to arise. This is exactly what I had envisioned with D3 as well as Tyrael's deception (more on that after the article).

"We are given a lot of information throughout the game on the power and plans of the Three Brothers, Diablo, Mephisto, and Baal. We are told that if they unite they will be invincible. We are told that no one is certain of their plans, but it probably involves something really bad for Sanctuary. We are told they must be stopped. And many more besides. Even though the archangel does not speak all these dire prophecies, he would have been the source for many through the knowledge of the Three he gave the Horadrim way back when the whole soul stone fiasco began. Tyreal was also the primary drive behind finding and catching the Three before they united. Also, his prot�g�, Deckard Cain, was the main instigator for the smashing of the soul stones. In other words, the actions our heroes took in Diablo 2 were largely along the lines of Tyreal�s own thought process. And, I suspect, also exactly what Diablo and company wanted us do to. Perhaps the archangel has been used like a sock puppet for a really long time. Or, perhaps, he helped Diablo write the script. His actions do have some interesting contradictions.

Look first at the claim that if the three unite, they would be invincible. They united, all right. They opened the gate, and sent Diablo through it. Then Mephisto died. We chased down Diablo. He died too. The only hope was Baal. Who eventually died. Some invincibility. On the other hand, perhaps they intended that we kill them.

There is precedent. Diablo (back in Diablo 1) lured a nice, strong, juicy hero down through the caves so he trade in the body of the boy for stronger one. That is, he planned his own �death.� Why would the three do the same? Mephisto himself answers. �You are the harbinger of our return� he tells Diablo. As Diablo heads for hell. Return... to hell? Yes. So, the three were not plotting massive mayhem across Sanctuary? Well, I would not go that far.
But Diablo needed to go to hell, and I think Mephisto did to. Mephisto, more than the others, needed to die. It seems that the soul stones bound the three to the mortal plane. They could not leave, but nor could they regain their full hellish powers while those stones were in existence (is my guess). They had to get rid of those stones, which they controlled anyway. At the same time, they had to rally the legions of hell for a nice little invasion of mortality. The losing the soul stone thing was most important for Mephisto, and least for Baal. Why? Mephisto�s stone was fragmented. Each council member had a piece, and the largest piece was in the palm of the guy that took the form of Mephisto. He could not reach anything close to his full power, because his soul stone was scattered about. That is why the oldest brother was such a weakling. His power was also divided among the six other unique council members.

So, the plan went like this. Diablo goes to hell to get armies ready for Baal. Baal goes to find his soul stone, after which he picks up the armies from Diablo and attacks the World Stone, and Mephisto stays behind to by the other two a bit of time. Which means he is the first to lose his soul stone and thus the first to return to hell in full power. Diablo is second. So by the time the World Stone falls, there are two prime evils at the height of their strength waiting to charge back into the mortal realm. There is no reason to think that breaking the soul stones killed the three. Instead, it may have only made them stronger. Let us assume Tyreal knew all this. Then, by breaking the World Stone, he may have opened up a hole for the massive invasion that Izual warned of."

So, Tyrael would be working with Izual and the 3 brothers to help destroy the Worldstone so Hell could invade. Think about it: In the end of Act 2, the cinematic shows Tyrael telling Marius to go to Zakarum Temple. However, we do not know what happened after that. For all we know, he was fighting with Diablo. However, because Diablo was in his weaker human form, how was he able to escape? Cain said it himself that Tyrael had defied the heavens to "help" the mortal men. Also, see how he is portrayed on Diablo3.com? He's in a black silhouette. Dun dun dunnnnn.

I wish I had my PDF file of all the character conversations of Diablo 1 and 2 but I seem to have misplaced it.

The image we see of Diablo in the D3 teaser trailer could be the true form of Diablo. We've noticed that in Diablo 1, he stood tall and skinny. In Diablo 2, he was more hunched over but more muscular. Now, in Diablo 3, he looks like he's gigantic and full of fire (the fires of hell?) with a big head and a look like he's full of power. Is this what Luke has foreseen?

Another thought just came to me: In recent years, we've been able to fight an "Uber" Diablo, Mephisto and Baal. Has the light bulb gone on yet? Maybe this is foreshadowing what Luke has suggested of the brothers being more powerful now that their stones were destroyed.

Of course, this is all speculation.

New Artwork Released By Blizzard

2008-09-06T18:41:00.003-04:00

I've been waiting to see the island Skovos for a while now and I really wanted to be able to go play there in Diablo 3. However, that isn't going to happen. They release the image as a way to show how large the world of Sanctuary is and here is what Blizzard had to say:

It isn't a location that you'll visit in Diablo III, but the artwork is a good example of the work and thought going in to fleshing out the world of Sanctuary. It's already a very complex world with a lot of locations and events, but a lot of it still isn't visually or contextually realized. As we want to create the feeling of a world outside of your immediate view it's important to create or expand upon the locations and stories of that world.

As we're working to create Diablo III we're also working to create a more visually complete Sanctuary.

The second image: I can imagine is Kehijstan because we know we're heading to Caldeum. However, I've also heard that it could be the impact site of the Meteor or near the Dry Steps / Scosglen.

The other concept arts are of a sloth beast and a cultist.

And, if you want a nice wallpaper of Skovos, you can go to www.diii.net and download this wallpaper (which is now my wallpaper).

Jay Wilson Drops Some Info On Blizzcast

2008-09-04T09:20:00.005-04:00

If you haven't already listened to Blizzcast Episode 5, you might want to read on. I've taken some of my favorite explanations and info leaks from this interview for your viewing.

First, Jay Wilson confirms that there will be an Act system just like in Diablo 2. To me, this is huge. Diablo 1 was a little blah in going from Dungeon Level to Dungeon Level. The Act system used in Diablo 2 was a great way to balance out monter levels and player levels.

Bashiok: We're talking a lot about acts right now could you give any insight into the act distribution as compared to like Diablo 2? How many acts there would be?

Jay Wilson: We were originally going to go away from an act structure but we found it fell so easily into that and so we're going to a similar structure as Diablo 2. It just seemed natural, it felt right. Right now we're focusing on about the same length, about the same number of acts. I don't want to solidify because of course; you never know what'll happen. But right now we're going for about the same.

Jay also explains to us that they want to get rid of the "mule" system when storing items. Warcraft did it the best with the mail system. And it looks like there will be that in Diablo 3 or a shared stash throughout your Blizzard account.

Jay Wilson: And then, the last one is we really want to make it easier for you to be able to share and trade items with other people and other characters on the same account. We've talked about ideas like a shared stash, or a mail system like World of Warcraft has, and we haven't nailed down exactly which one of those we want to do, but we're definitely going to do something like that, that's going to make it really easy for you if you've got, a witch doctor and a barbarian character, and you find that awesome witch doctor drop and you want to share it, it'll be super-easy to do that.

Bashiok: so in other words, I won't have to worry about my game closing after...

Jay Wilson: No, no more opening up a game, dropping items on the ground, and you know, hoping that the game stays open or getting a friend to help out, no more of that. You should be able to do it on your own.

He also explains in great detail on why they chose not to bring back the Necromancer and other characters from Diablo 2. He makes outstanding points! I never thought about it before but the Necromancer and other characters were perfectly well rounded and balanced.

Bashiok: So, from my viewpoint, probably from a lot of people's viewpoint, the announcement was extremely positive. But it seems like a lot of the Diablo II players, or at least the hardcore Diablo II players want to see the necromancer come back or perhaps other classes coming back. Obviously, the barbarian's one of the ones you're bringing from Diablo II. What are your generally feelings on bringing classes back the previous games?

Jay Wilson: Well, for the core game, you know, the kind of initial release of Diablo III, we really want to establish our own identity, like we don't want to just remake Diablo II or Diablo I, we want to provide a unique game experience for people. So, on that front we're really only going to consider bringing back classes that we feel we can improve-the necromancer is an awesome class, actually my favorite class, from Diablo 2, and the class I'm currently playing the most of- its not that we just dislike him, he love the necromancer, but part of his, you know, the issue we have is, he was so well-designed, I mean, you've got your corpse explosion, you've got your skeleton sum, pets and you know, hordes of those guys running around and killing things, you've got curses, like, it's across the board a very well-designed class and there's certainly some things we could do a little differently, but do we feel like we can make him so much better, and change his core gameplay experience. If anything, we'd say we really don't want to, like he plays too well. Whereas with the barbarian, we really looked at the class and he's cool but he could be a lot cooler and he could have a lot more that he does, over the previous game. So, you know, that's why the necromancer is not being seen. A lot of people have looked at the witch doctor and said “oh, the witch doctor is so similar to the necromancer, he's not going to be there, there's no chance for the necromancer ever.” I wouldn't go that far, we are trying to make sure that the witch doctor, while he has a lot of similarities is very different overall. One of the core differences is that the witch doctor is very attack oriented- people remember back to the gameplay video, almost all the monsters that got taken out were taken out by the witch doctor, not by his pets. So that's kind of a key difference between him and the necromancer, is that the necromancer was very often, his pets were critical to his damage output, whereas the witch doctor uses his pets as a distraction and a utility. So we try to keep them different that there's the possibility down the road, but that would maybe be an expansion or something like that after we felt like we've kind of established core Diablo III game. That being said, I wouldn't expect, I would tell people not to expect any other Diablo II or Diablo I classes appear you, know, in the exact same form that they did- if we did bring back another class it would be a radical change.

He also shuts down all the "poor art direction" protesters. Guess what guys? They tried to make it darker and it didn't work.

Jay Wilson: And what we found was, again, when we made the enemies that very realistic dark, gritty look, like the environment, they all just kind of blended together, and again, it made the game not very fun. So, at that point, after we had done this twice and gone, “wow, we really don't like the results here, we started going back to Diablo II in particular and looking at it, trying to figure out what Diablo II did, that worked so well. What we found was that a lot of the ideas that made Diablo II work well, just didn't translate well to 3D. We also found a very different game than a lot of us remember, even though a lot of us played the game still, like a lot of us are still big Diablo II players, we still have kind of this idealized vision of it where we really remember, like, Durance of Hate and act I dungeons and we kind of conveniently forget, you know, the act II desert and the really bright lava hell levels and the things like that that are filled with a lot of color. And we saw that and we were kind of surprised. We were like, “wow, look at how green the fields are in act I, look at how much color there is in this world.”

Some great stuff! I can't wait until Blizzcon because maybe, just maybe, they'll release another class! Come on Bard! :D

New Titles In Wrath

2008-08-31T14:01:00.003-04:00

The following was posted by Blizzard this past week:

Achievements Titles

Arena Master - Complete the arena achievements
Salty - Complete the fishing achievements
The Diplomat - Raise your reputation level from unfriendly to exalted with Timbermaw Hold, Sporeggar and the Kurenai / The Mag'har.
The Hallowed - Complete the Hallow's End achievements
The Seeker - Complete 3000 quests.

Feats of Strength

Twilight Vanquisher - Participated in the realm first Sartharion the Onyx Guardian kill (25 player).
The Supreme - First player on the realm to achieve level 80.
Assassin - First rogue on the realm to achieve level 80.
Warbringer - First warrior on the realm to achieve level 80.
Archmage - First mage on the realm to achieve level 80.
Of The Ebon Blade - First death knight on the realm to achieve level 80.
Stalker - First hunter on the realm to achieve level 80.
The Malefic - First warlock on the realm to achieve level 80.
Prophet - First priest on the realm to achieve level 80.
Crusader - First paladin on the realm to achieve level 80.
Arch Druid - First druid on the realm to achieve level 80.
Of the Ten Storms - First shaman on the realm to achieve level 80.
The Magic Seeker - Participated in the realm first Malygos kill (25 player).
Conqueror of Naxxramas - Participated in the realm first Kel'Thuzad kill (25 player).
Of Gnomeregan - First gnome on the realm to achieve level 80.
Of Quel'thalas - First blood elf on the realm to achieve level 80.
Of Argus - First draenei on the realm to achieve level 80.
Of Khaz Modan - First dwarf on the realm to achieve level 80.
The Lion Hearted - First human on the realm to achieve level 80.
Champion of Elune - First night elf on the realm to achieve level 80.
Hero of Orgrimmar - First orc on the realm to achieve level 80.
Plainsrunner - First tauren on the realm to achieve level 80.
Of the Darkspear - First troll on the realm to achieve level 80.
The Forsaken - First forsaken on the realm to achieve level 80.
Grand Master Blacksmith - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in blacksmithing.
Grand Master Alchemist - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in alchemy.
Iron Chef - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in cooking.
Grand Master Enchanter - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in enchanting.
Grand Master Engineer - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in engineering.
Doctor - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in first aid.
Grand Master Angler - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in fishing.
Grand Master Herbalist - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in herbalism.
Grand Master Scribe - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in inscription.
Grand Master Jewelcrafter - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in jewelcrafting.
Grand Master Leatherworker - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in leatherworking.
Grand Master Miner - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in mining.
Grand Master Skinner - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in skinning.
Grand Master Tailor - First player on the realm to achieve 450 skill in tailoring.
Hero of Northrend - First player on the realm to gain exalted reputation with the Argent Crusade, Wyrmrest Accord, Kirin Tor and Knights of the Ebon Blade.

The Doctor title and Iron Chief are pretty awesome. I also like The Diplomat. Hurry and get your titles first!

The Best Power Ranger... EVER!

2008-08-28T19:38:00.002-04:00

So, I was surfing YouTube this morning and discovered this:

(Watch and enjoy - Please finish chewing anything you may have and swallow the last gulp of drink)

Off Topic

2008-08-26T09:12:00.002-04:00

Slow week in news so I figured I'd branch off of the news and opinions to talk about what's coming up in my life.

The big thing is that I'll be getting a new phone late this week / early next week. It's the Samsung i760 Smartphone/PDA. Not only is it a 3G (with a windows upgrade) but it'll hold up to 32gb of space. I'll only be getting a 4gb microSD card but it's nice to know I could upgrade. Also, I'll be getting internet on my phone! Now, if I get stuck in traffic or my internet craps out or I'm hanging out in jury duty, I'll be able to blog here. The picture above is the phone with it's keyboard out.

Now, I got this phone on eBay for 227.50. I can sell my u740 Alias phone on eBay for 150. If that happens, I would basically get this new Smartphone for only $70. Booyah!

My Goddaughter turned 2 last week. She's adorable. I got her into Winnie The Pooh and now she's bouncing her 3 1/2 foot Pooh like Tigger does.

School is starting up again next week. It's only 3 classes so I'm not too bothered by it. Part-time students for the win.

And lastly, I've decided to be The Wanderer from Diablo 2 for Halloween. I have a Kit-Rae sword which looks like the one from the Act 1 cinematic. I also have a 13th century replica monk's robe which looks like a normal cloak. Should be pretty epic. Halloween for me is when my summer community has it (Columbus Day weekend) so expect pictures or something before Halloween.

Wrath Cinematic Trailer!

2008-08-21T10:08:00.003-04:00

Blizzard has finally released the Wrath Of The Lich King Trailer! Click on that link to watch and also to download the video.

(Spoilers bellow!!!)

As always, it looks great. Blizzard really knows how to create a cinematic trailer. I'm kinda disappointed with it because I expected more of Arthas slaying Horde and Alliance characters and narrating himself; not his father (almost like the Zul' jin trailer). But, I really can't complain; it's awesome anyway. The Frost Wymn looked great and his army was exactly how I imagined it would be. Go check it out!

Adam Sessler Rants On The D3 Haters

2008-08-16T10:11:00.002-04:00

Adam Sessler is still my favorite gaming guru. In last week's Sessler's Soapbox, he flames the Diablo 3 art haters. I've been waiting for him to finally speak on the subject because I knew he would make good points. If you want to see more of Sessler's Soapbox, you can get it through iTunes video podcast, G4's website, and youtube.

PS: Madden 09, Fantasy Football, and NFL preseason games took up all of my free time last week. This week, I should have a post up ASAP.

Today's The Day!

2008-08-11T09:44:00.003-04:00

Don't forget: Today is August 11th and Blizzcon08 tickets are going on sale!

However, the site is currently down lol.

Keep checking back to the Blizzard store and get your tickets before they all sell out.

*Update*

Tickets are sold out. Hope you got yours!

Old Diablo 2 Characters May Appear In D3

2008-08-08T09:10:00.003-04:00

I was going to post yesterday but once I got home and turned on the NFL network for my daily Brett Favre update, I noticed one little small headline.... Brett Favre was traded to the J-E-T-S! JETS! JETS! JETS!! So, for the rest of the day, I was kinda glued to my TV :-D.

But onto news. Blizzard has been busy with Diablo 3 lately. MTV Multiplayer has Blizzard's take on why older classes (ie: Necromancer) are not in Diablo 3.

“Our approach for classes in ‘Diablo III’ is that we don’t have a strong desire to bring back classes from the previous game,” Wilson told me. “The goal is to try and give people new gameplay and not just re-hash old gameplay. We’re not just making a ‘Diablo II’ with updated 3D graphics.”

Well, that's dandy. If you wanted to stay away from older classes, then why do I see the Barbarian there? Not just the Barbarian but you're creating the same gameplay of the Necromancer in the Doctor with some added fireballs. Stop making excuses for something fans want. Diablo 2's characters are perfect (well, not the Assassin and Druid... they could have been improved a bit) so why change it? If nothing is wrong, don't fix it.

“There’s a lot of people on our team who aren’t happy with our class choices,” he admitted. “But after we’ve established ‘Diablo III’ as its own game with its own type of gameplay and experiences, I wouldn’t be opposed to looking at old classes. We are trying to design [the Witch Doctor] class so that if we did bring back the Necromancer, there’s room for him. We’re looking out ahead of time at what our expansions are going to be, so we’ve got to keep room open for some of those other classes down the road.” Wilson added, “It’s one of those things where, unless we put like 30 classes in the game, people are going to be unhappy. But if we put 30 classes in the game, we’d hurt the game. I think that of the classes that we’ve chosen, there will be something for everyone. I’m not worried that people won’t be able to find a class that they like to play.”

I can agree with the 30 classes argument but give us more than 5 classes. If you are going to release an expansion, and it's going to take as long as Wrath to make, make sure the characters are good and something that the fans want. It sounds like this new director is doing what HE wants to do and not what he people want in their classes. If HALF of your team wants some older classes back, I think that throws up some red flags. But if they make another assassin or rouge type class, I'm going to pull my hair out. I hate playing those classes and because it's Diablo, I'm going to have to play it.

The Shockadin In Wrath

2008-08-05T09:09:00.002-04:00

Synovia at wowpaladin.org wrote an amazing article on how great Shockadins are going to be when we go north. I'm running out the door now for a looooong day at the office so I'll post the article here for you to read but I highly recommend wowpaladin.org for a lot of raid Paladin news.

----

"With WotLK being tentatively slotted for a November release, it’s easy to get overly excited about the possibilities. However, something in particular caught my attention today as I was browsing through the Beta talent calculator over at www.wowhead.com: Are Holy Paladins to be limited to back of the raid healbotting? After some deliberation and placement of talent points, I’m inclined to state that it certainly seems as though this time around Blizzard has opened the proverbial doors for a large variety of Paladin playstyles: the Shockadin being one of them.

Now while I won’t at all claim a Shockadin now or even then to have any kind of raid viability, as of the present I am extremely confident as to their effectiveness in PvP. Let me share with you my thoughts on just why I believe what I do.

As of present, the Shockadin arsenal requires the expenditure of talent points to retrieve all of the following:

1/1 Sanctity Aura (Retribution)
1/1 Holy Shock (Holy)
5/5 Holy Guidance (Holy)
5/5 Improved Seal of Righteousness (Holy)
5/5 Divine Intellect (Holy)
3/3 Crusade (Retribution)

Now we can all agree the list above, although comprised of “essential” Shockadin talents, is lengthy. They are required as such due to the nature of the spec. It is unarguable that each of these talents directly affects the damage output of the build but what’s more is that although WotLK is removing the first altogether (Sanctity Aura), it is providing not just one replacement to increase DPS but several.

At this time, I would like to draw your attention to the following build:

http://wotlk.wowhead.com/?talent=sEA0xhzGVzMxkZZVbhxbczh

The list above now receives the following additions:

3/3 Healing Light (Holy)
- This talent currently only increases the healing done by Flash of Light and Holy light by 4/8/12%. As of WotLK it will still do this but it will additionally increase the effectiveness of your Holy Shock spell by 4/8/12% as well.
5/5 Conviction (Retribution)
- As of today, this talent only increases your melee critical strike chance by 1/2/3/4/5%. With WotLK, it will also increase your spell critical strike chance by 1/2/3/4/5%
3/3 Sheath of Light
- This new talent increases your Spell Power by 10/20/30% of your attack power and puts a HoT on your heal targets any time your crit them with a heal.
1/1 Sanctified Retribution
- Allows for 2% flat damage increase by anyone affected by Retribution Aura. This essentially replaces Improved Sanctity Aura directly.

So we’ve lost the flat 10% damage increase to Holy spells granted by Sanctity Aura but in return we’ve gained the above four sources of extra damage on our Holy Shocks. Let’s see how this all breaks down in WotLK terms.

For this demonstration, I’m going to make a floored assumption that my statistics on my Holy Paladin, in her Holy gear, will remain unchanged at level 80. The only difference I”m assuming is the acquisition of 10 more talent points to spend within the WotLK talent trees. I makes these assumptions for simplicity in calculation and also so I can use real numbers taken directly from my Holy Paladin.

The coefficient used for instant cast damaging spells is 42.86%. Although Blizzard has noted that coefficients are being adjusted for healing spells given the removal of +healing gear and the introduction of spell power, the damage coefficients will remain in tact as no change is needed.

Holy Shock, at level 80, does a base range of damage beginning at 967 and ending at 1047. From here, we would first apply our +damage (or Spell Power) at rate consistent with the above coefficient of 42.86%. For my Holy Paladin, this is done as follows:

1047 + (740 spell damage * .4286) = 1365

However, we know that Sheath of Light will yield an addition Spell Power value of 30% of my attack power. At first consideration this many seem negligible but even someone completely naked has an attack power granted by their level alone. For example, my Holy Paladin’s level 70 attack power, while garbed in full Holy PvP gear is actually 436. Taking this into account we have the following base damage instead:

1047 + (740 + (436 * .3) * .4286) = 1421

With the base damage calculation completed, we now turn to talents for any further benefit to the spell. The order of application for these talents is irrelevant so we’ll begin arbitrarily with Healing Light which adds 12% effectiveness to Holy Shock:

1421 * 1.12 = 1592

Next, we account for Sanctified Retribution:

1592 * 1.02 = 1624

Lastly, we consider Crusade:

1624 * 1.03 = 1673

As we can see, our basetop-end damage on Holy Shock, in level 70 Holy (not even spell damage gear) PvP gear and without any additional stats (that will obviously be accumulated on our way to 80) is 1624. Now, let’s add the icing on our delicious cake by applying Avenging Wrath:

1673 * 1.20 = 2008

Now the fun begins. Spell critical strikes deal 150% damage after damage-increasing calculation has concluded. Given a top-end of 2008 damage as calculated above, let’s assume either a straight away critical strike or use of Divine Favor to yield one:

2008 * 1.50 = 3012

Please remind yourself that all these calculations were done off the statistics present for my level 70 Holy Paladin in healing(Ornamented) PvP gear. Most Shockadins presently in World of Warcraft float around 1200 spell damage and not my awe-devoid 740. Let’s make one last assumption, shall we? Let’s assume, on what I would consider to be the far low end of the potential spectrum, that a level 80 Shockadin has 500 attack power and 1600 spell damage. Using these new numbers, let’s run through the calculation one last time:

1047 + (1600 * .4286) = 1733 (base spell damage including Sheath of Light)
1733 * 1.12 = 1941 (Healing Light)
1941 * 1.02 = 1980 (Sanctified Retribution)
1980 * 1.03 = 2040 (Crusade)
2040 * 1.20 = 2448 (Avenging Wrath)
2448 * 1.50 = 3672 (Critical Strike)

As you can see, even low-balling the potential spell damage of a level 80 Shockadin immensely still leads us to near 4000+ damage Holy Shocks. I would argue that it won’t be uncommon for Shockadins, with proper buffs to be capable of putting out 5000+ damage Holy Shocks in PvP.

So what are the possibilities? You tell me. Seemingly, they are endless as already at level 70 the Shockadin has proven his worth in 2v2 arena by bursting down topped-off Warriors with 13K HP in 3 seconds. Perhaps Blizzard saw this video as well and realized the potential for a very fun aspect to the Paladin game play. We can only wait and see.

This is Synovia, taking her leave."

Arthas In Soul Calibur 4?

2008-08-01T09:12:00.005-04:00

For those who don't already know, Wrath is confirmed for October-December 2008. But onto other epic things. I came across this Joystiq post which showed a video of Soul Calibur 4 with 24 customizable characters from video games and movies. What really caught my eye though, was Paladin Arthas and Death Knight Arthas! I was freaking out from the awesomeness; seriously.

The Paladin Arthas was using Astaroth's hammer and Death Knight Arthas was using Soul Calibur. For those who have Soul Calibur 4 (AND YOU SHOULD!), you can create these guys by using the Paladin Armor (white and black), long blonde and white hair, Astaroth's fighting style and Siegfried's fighting style. I'm going to try and make my own Arthas too... in fact, right now.

Here's the link to the video! It's about 14-15 minutes until you see Arthas.

*UPDATE*

I was fooling around with the Soul Calibur editor this morning and was able to make an ok Joker and an amazing looking Harley Quinn! There's no suit for the Joker and the faces given are horrible. I had to give him normal pants (which look good) and a stupid looking jacket. Oh well.

Harley Quinn on the other hand is amazing! I unlocked the Jester Costume and changed the colors around as best as I could to fit her suit (ex: With her boots, I was not able to make one boot Red and the other Black. I had to choose one color). She came out great though. Here's some pics from my cell phone. Not the best quality but it's the best I got:

Blizzcon 08 Press Release

2008-07-29T13:58:00.003-04:00

This morning, Blizzard announced that they will start selling tickets to Blizzcon 08 on August 11th. The tickets will go for $100 (do not forget to include airfare, hotels, rental car, etc). Also, if you cannot make the event and you have DirectTV, you will be able to purchase a pay-per-view event that has 8 hours of Blizzcon 08 footage. I might just get that if the price is right. At the moment, there is no price set on the pay-per-view event. Here's the press release:

IRVINE, Calif. – July 29, 2008 – Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. today announced that tickets for its third BlizzCon^™ gaming convention will go on sale August 11 and that live coverage of the event will be available as an exclusive DIRECTV pay per view event. BlizzCon is a celebration of the global player communities surrounding Blizzard Entertainment^®'s Warcraft^®, Diablo^®, and StarCraft^® game universes. The event will take place at the Anaheim Convention Center in Anaheim, California on October 10 and 11.

"Meeting and interacting with our players at BlizzCon is always a great experience for us," stated Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. "We're also pleased to be working with DIRECTV this year to bring the show, for the first time, to those players who are unable to attend."

In addition to serving as a gathering place for the different Blizzard Entertainment gaming communities, BlizzCon will offer an array of activities, including discussion panels, hands-on playtime with upcoming games, tournaments, contests, and more. Tickets to the convention will be priced at $100 USD each, and will be available for purchase directly from the official BlizzCon website at www.blizzcon.com.

The pay per view event will deliver a minimum of eight hours of live HD coverage from the show floor on each day of the convention, including exclusive interviews, demos, and more. Beginning in August, DIRECTV will run a promotion offering the BlizzCon pay per view event free to new DIRECTV subscribers. Pricing for existing DIRECTV customers and programming details will be available in the coming weeks from Blizzard Entertainment and DIRECTV.

"BlizzCon is one of the most highly anticipated gaming conventions of the year, and we are excited to partner with Blizzard Entertainment to deliver coverage of the show to gamers nationwide," said Steven Roberts, senior vice president, new media and business development, DIRECTV. "With our BlizzCon pay per view package, members of Blizzard's gaming communities who are not attending the event can now experience it in crystal-clear HD."

More Changes

2008-07-26T09:22:00.002-04:00

You can blame the lack of updates on me. I've been busy and when I'm not busy, I'm lazy and tired. Here's some more Paladin changes on the way:

Paladin
Holy

The amount of health point healed by Holy Shock has been increased by 66%. (eg. Rank 7 now heals for 2401-2599 instead of 1431-1549)
Infusion of Light now reduces the cast time of your next Holy Light spell by 1.3/2.5 secs instead of 1.25/2.5 secs.

Protection

Holy Shield will now give you 6 charges instead of 4.
Avenger's Shield mana cost reduced by 70%, damage has been reduced. (eg. Rank 3 now deals 494-602 damage for 780 mana instead of 705-861 for 1745 mana)
Guarded by the Light now reduces the mana cost of your Consecration, Holy Wrath and Avenger's Shield by 15/30% (Old version : Whenever your parry or dodge an attack you have a 10% chance to reduce the mana cost of your next Consecration, Holy Wrath, or Avenger's Shield spell by 25%/50%)

Retribution

Improved Blessing of Might now increases the attack power bonus of your Blessing of Might by 10/20/30/40/50% instead of 4/8/12/16/20%
Vindication now has a chance to reduce the target's attributes by 10/20% for 15 seconds. (Old version : 5/10% reduction)
Pursuit of Justice is now a 2 rank talents (was 3), reducing the change to be hit by spells by 1/2% and mounted movement speed by 9/15% (Old version : 1/2/3% hit and 5/10/15% mounted speed)
Repentance now costs 395 mana instead of 9% of base mana.

I like the Holy Shock buff :-).

Crazy Paladin Changes When We Go North

2008-07-21T22:45:00.001-04:00

The Wrath Betal is here! And boy, Blizzard wasn't kidding when they said they were taking a second look at how the Paladin works. Our talents were finally put in the right places. The Holy Tree looks amazing! This will most likely be my talent build for L80. This would be my normal Spellwarrior / Healing build. Might not be for everybody but I like the solo healing stuff. You can also reset the build and make your own build too.

Due to the LARGE changes and that I really do not have time to devour it all, I'll let my favorite WoW Insider writer, Zach Yonzon, explain it all to you.

Paladin patch notes from the Wrath Beta:

All Auras now affect all party and raid members within the area of effect.
Anticipation (Protection) moved to tier 1, now increases chance to dodge by 1/2/3/4/5%.
Avenger's Shield (Protection) cast time reduced to .5 seconds, duration increased to 10 seconds.
Avenging Wrath no longer causes Forebearance, damage increase reduced to 20%, now increases healing done by 20%.
Blessing of Freedom renamed Hand of Freedom. Only one Hand spell can be on the target per paladin at any one time. Now costs 6% of base mana.
Blessing of Light and Greater Blessing of Light removed. Their effects have been folded into all relevant abilities.
Blessing of Protection renamed Hand of Protection. Only one Hand spell can be on the target per paladin at any one time. All ranks now cost 6% of base mana.
Blessing of Sacrifice renamed Hand of Sacrifice, is now only 1 rank and transfers 20% of the damage taken to the caster, duration reduced to 12 seconds, cooldown increased to 2 minutes. Only one Hand spell can be on the target per paladin at any one time. Now costs 6% of base mana.
Blessing of Salvation renamed Hand of Salvation, now reduces total threat on the target by 2% per second for 10 seconds while also reducing all damage and healing done by 10%. Only one Hand spell can be on the target per paladin at any one time. Now costs 6% of base mana.
Conviction (Retribution) now increases critical chance with all spells and melee attacks.
Divine Intellect (Holy) moved to tier 2, increases total Intellect by 3/6/9/12/15%.
Divine Intervention cooldown reduced to 20 minutes.
Divine Protection and Divine Shield now cost 3% of base mana.
Divine Purpose (Retribution) now reduces chance to be hit by spells and ranged attacks by 1/2/3%.
Divine Strength (Holy) moved to tier 1 in the Protection tree.
Greater Blessing of Salvation removed.
Hammer of Justice now costs 3% of base mana.
Hammer of Wrath is now considered a Retribution spell, moved from Holy, mana cost reduced, missile speed increased, now usable on targets below 35% health.
Healing Light (Holy) moved to tier 2.
Holy Shield (Protection) cooldown reduced to 8 seconds.
Holy Shock (Holy) range changed to 20/40 yards when used on enemies/friends respectively, cooldown reduced to 6 seconds.
Holy Wrath is now instant cast, causes a 3 second stun, cooldown reduced to 30 seconds, radius reduced to 10 yards.
Illumination (Holy) moved to tier 3.
Improved Concentration Aura (Protection) moved to the Holy tree.
Improved Concentration Aura moved from the Protection tree to tier 4 in the Holy tree.
Improved Devotion Aura (Protection) moved to tier 4, reduced to 3 ranks, now increases armor of Devotion Aura by 17/34/50% and increases all healing done to units affected by Devotion Aura by 1/2/3%.
Improved Hammer of Justice (Protection) now reduces cooldwon by 10/20/30 secs.
Improved Righteous Fury (Protection) threat bonus folded into base spell, talent still reduces all damage taken by 2/4/6%.
Improved Sanctity Aura (Retribution) renamed Sanctified Retribution, now causes all units affected by Retribution Aura to cause 2% more damage.
Improved Seal of Righteousness (Holy) moved to tier 1, renamed XXX, now affects Seal of Righteousness, Seal of Vengeance and Seal of Corruption.
Improved Seal of the Crusader (Retribution) renamed Heart of the Crusader and the effects now apply to all Judgement spells.
Judgement of Justice will no longer prevent Fear effects, only prevent NPCs from fleeing (e.g. at low health).
Lay on Hands no longer drains all mana, cooldown reduced to 20 minutes.
Pure of Heart (Holy) reduced to 2 ranks, now reduces duration of Curse and Disease effects by 25/50%.
Redoubt (Protection) moved to tier 2.
Repentance (Retribution) mana cost changed to 9% of base, duration increased to 1 minute (10 second PvP duration), now usable against Demons, Dragonkin, Giants, Humanoids and Undead.
Retribution Aura damage increased and now gains damage based on Holy spell power.
Righteous Fury now increases threat caused by Holy damage by 90%.
Sanctified Light (Holy) now also increases the critical chance of Holy Shock.
Sanctity Aura (Retribution) removed.
Seal of Justice/Judgement reduced to 1 rank with all the effects of the previous rank 2, the Judgement effect no longer prevents Fear.
Seal of the Crusader has been removed. The effects of Judgement of the Crusader have been folded into all relevant abilities.
Seal of Vengeance damage over time effect duration increased to 18 seconds.
Spiritual Focus (Holy) moved to tier 1.
Stoicism (Protection) moved to tier 2, now reduces duration of Stun effects by 10/20/30% and reduces chance your spells will be resisted by 10/20/30%.
Toughness (Protection) moved to tier 3.
Turn Undead (ranks 1 and 2) removed. Turn Evil now granted at level 24, mana cost changed to 9% of base.
Unyielding Faith (Holy) moved to tier 2.

From the WotLK Information Wiki:

Seal of Corruption - Fills the Paladin with holy power, granting each melee attack additional Holy damage over $53742d. This effect can stack up to $53742u times. Only one Seal can be active on the Paladin at any one time. Lasts $d.
Blessed Hands (Requires 20 points in Holy) - Reduces the mana cost and increases the resistance to Dispel effects of all Hand spells by 15/30%
Infusion of Light (Requires 35 points in Holy) - Your Holy Shock critical hits reduce the cast time of your next Holy Light spell by 1.25/2.5 secs.
Sacred Cleansing (Requires 40 points in Holy) - Your Cleanse spell has a 10/20/30% chance to increase the target's resistance to Disease, Magic and Poison by 30% for 10 sec.
Enlightened Judgements (Requires 40 points in Holy) - Increases the range of your Judgement spells by 10/20 yards.
Judgements of the Pure (Requires 45 points in Holy) - Your Judgement spells increase your casting and melee haste by 2/4/6/8/10% for 30 secs.
Beacon of Light (Requires 50 points in Holy) - The target becomes a Beacon of Light, healing all party or raid members within 10 yards for 2000 over 15 sec. (Rank 5, Level 80, 2330 mana, 1.5 sec Cast)
Divine Guardian (Requires 15 points in Protection) - While Divine Shield is active 15/30% of all damage taken by party or raid members within 30 yards is redirected to the Paladin.
Touched by the Light (Requires 40 points in Protection) - Increases your spell power by an amount equal to 10/20/30% of your Stamina and increases the amount healed by your critical heals by 10/20/30%.
Guarded by the Light (Requires 40 points in Protection) - Whenever you parry or dodge an attack you have a 10/20% chance to reduce the mana cost of your next Consecration, Holy Wrath or Avenger's Shield spell by 25/50%.
Shield of the Templar (Requires 45 points in Protection) - Increases the damage and reduces the mana cost of your Holy Shield, Avenger's Shield and Shield of Righteousness spells by 5/10/15%.
Judgements of the Just (Requires 45 points in Protection) - Your Judgement spells also reduce the melee attack speed of the target by 10/20%.
Hammer of the Righteous (Requires 50 points in Protection) - Hammer the current target and up to 2 additional nearby targets, causing $s1% of weapon damage as Holy damage. This ability causes high threat.
Heart of the Crusader (Requires 5 points in Retribution) - In addition to the normal effect, your Judgement spells will also increase the critical strike chance of all attacks made against that target by 1/2/3/4/5%.
Sanctified Retribution (Requires 20 points in Retribution) - Damage caused by targets affected by Retribution Aura is increased by 2%.
Sheath of Light (Requires 20 points in Retribution) - Increases your spell power by an amount equal to 10/20/30% of your attack power and your critical healing spells heal the target for 20/40/60% of the healed amount over 12 seconds.
Sanctified Wrath (Requires 35 points in Retribution) - Increases the critical strike chance of Hammer of Wrath by 25/50%, reduces the cooldown of Avenging Wrath by 30/60 secs and while affected by Avenging Wrath 25/50% of all damage caused bypasses damage reduction effects.
Swift Retribution (Requires 40 points in Retribution) - Your Retribution Aura also increases casting, ranged and melee attack speeds by 1/2/3%.
The Art of War (Requires 40 points in Retribution) - Your damaging Crusader Strikes have a 5/10/15% chance to cause your next Judgement spell to cause double damage.
Righteous Vengeance (Requires 40 points in Retribution) - Increases critical damage bonus of all attacks by 3/6/9/12/15%
Divine Storm (Requires 50 points in Retribution) - An instant weapon attack that causes Holy damage to up to ${$i-1} enemies within $a1 yards. The Divine Storm heals up to 3 party or raid members totalling $s2% of the damage caused.

Yeah... that's a lot. I'll have my opinions on Thursday (unless something else comes up more interesting before then).

Rutt-Roo Raggy: Someone Made A Boo Boo

2008-07-17T09:39:00.004-04:00

I have the internet back! I finally got some time yesterday to dig another trench through my yard and running a telephone wire to my place. Besides the new patch, I really haven't read anything that has happened in the last 2 weeks.

This popped up this morning on WoW Insider which made me chuckle and feel sorry that one poor guy at Blizzard that would be getting a rip from his boss and made the butt of all jokes by his staff-mates. I think this was one of those days where he probably thinks that he shouldn't have gotten out of bed today. A Death Knight page popped up this morning in the Classes page. Someone pushed a button they shouldn't have. It shows the Warrior character (and the Warrior title) but the description is of the Death Knight. (Click the image for a bigger version that you can read).

Update 2: Found The Problem

2008-07-11T23:17:00.002-04:00

I'm blogging from a phone! It's pretty neat. My friend has the whole iPhone online thing. As said the other day, my internet and phone line is down. Something happened here at my summer home so that the phone line connecting the two family campers died. AT&T came down and said it was the wire we put in between the campers. Because we did it, he couldn't fix it. Sometime, we will need to run another wire between the two campers to get internet back. Hopefully in the next few days.

Changin' For The Better

2008-07-08T23:52:00.003-04:00

Zach Yonzon of WoWInsider is reporting that, 'Yes. Paladin changes are coming.'

I don't need to repeat the article here so I'll be brief. We do not know much about what exactly is going to happen but we do know that change in coming. As we all know, the Paladin isn't the easiest class to balance. As with all hybrid classes, there are a lot of aspects to mold. From what the article is saying, it seems like Blizzard is looking at the Paladin class with the Death Knight mindset. What I mean is: the DK can tank and DPS with one spec. Almost like the Paladin's Spellwarrior build of 40/11/10. Hopefully, they'll give us the gear now to build on more of a DPS and a touch of healing or even DPS via tanking.

They also confirmed they wanted to make the Paladin tank for viable in 5 mans and even full raids. The reason we don't have much info yet about spells and talents is because they're still looking at how they want the future Paladins to work. We'll see what happens but expect major changes in the coming months.

Update

2008-07-07T17:33:00.001-04:00

I have no internet at my house. AT&T said it could take until Friday to fix it. I'm typing this up quickly at work. I'll have a post ready when the net comes back.

Time For A Rant

2008-07-03T12:35:00.003-04:00

Ihmhi on the Diabloiii.net (new name) forums posted an amazing analysis on the first 9 minutes of the gameplay video. He compares the game to WoW a lot which I think is unfair. Every game copies another. There wasn't a need to mention WoW 7 times...

*talking about D3's buffing system* "I can see they are making the game VERY different from WoW by having it completely on the opposite side of the screen. d:"

"WoW-style cooldown"

"the inventory seems to be more like WoW now"

"the player swap out his axes for some fancier ones. Again, some ideas taken from WoW and similar MMOs."

"Apparantly they've taken some tips from WoW's AuctioneerAdvanced addon (and similar addons)."

What really made me cross was when he was talking about the Elixers. "Will we have stat-boosting potions (like WoW's alchemy) in Diablo III?" Maybe he never played the original Diablo but they had Elixers which boosted up stats.

"Small Bag. So it looks like bags (like WoW) will serve some sort of function in Diablo III."

I'm not trying to beat on the guy. He made great points. I just do not see the need to compare it to just WoW.

http://forums.diii.net/showthread.php?p=6581118

Another controversy surrounded Diablo 3 is that the environments look too bright. Diablo is supposed to be a dark world and yet they're making it look more colorful.

First and foremost, my opinion on the matter? IT'S A LOAD OF BOLLOCKS! After all these years, you would think that the Blizzard Devs know what their doing. 10 Million Subscribers to World Of Warcraft and TWO video games (10 and 7/8 years old) being played by thousands of people daily (Diablo II and Starcraft). Video games that are being played DAILY after almost a decade. Not to mention that Diablo II is now selling at the Top of the Amazon.com carts and when Starcraft II was announced, it too jumped to the top. Now, after all these months since the Starcraft II announcement, it's at #18. Come on. Give it up already.

There's a petition going around which is against Blizzard's art direction. (I will not post a link to the petition). They are saying that it look too "cartoon'ish" (mind you, they repeated that it looked too much like WoW's cartoony style way too many times). They also want the light radius back.

Pesonally, it looks fine. If I want to walk around in a dark dungeon, I'll go lock myself in a closet or walk around my house with the blinds shut at 3AM in the morning. A game should be pleasing. It doesn't mean it has too be "cartoon'ish"; it just doesn't have to be black, dark red and grey. It's an art style and by the look of all Blizzards games (including Starcraft), they all have the "cartoon'ish" look. It's Blizzard's art style. Don't like it? Get out.

/end rant

Diablo 3 Gameplay Video / The Classes

2008-07-01T13:05:00.005-04:00

Gameplay Part 1

Gameplay Part 2

Today, I want to talk about the TWENTY MINUTE gameplay video for Diablo 3. Yes, 2 0 minutes! I thought we'd only get to see a cinematic but this just added frosting, sprinkles, roses, balloons, gummy bears, nerds, strawberries, and that cookie stuff in the middle to the ice cream cake. Yes, it's that good.

It starts off by showing a Barbarian class, wearing hardly any armor, fighting some zombies. The zombies enter the area by climbing up the walls! There were a lot of them too. Picture Dynasty Warriors meets Diablo. Not saying it's a bad thing but it sure is different.

They show off some crazy skills including a new version of Leap Attack. Finally, they implemented some good uses to that fun skill. They've added a dashing attack, a sonic wave attack, a Hammer of the Gods spell, and everyone's favorite: Whirlwind! Whirlwind looks wicked.

They rigged the game to show off some weapons and armor. The weapons are nice and detailed and now instead of turning blue for cold, yellow for lightning, they actually have the "WoW Enchantment effect" to them. Instead of slowing enemies, cold attacks freeze and a stun effect was added to lightning. The armor set on the barbarian looked demonic.

We were then met by none other than Deckard Cain. A mini dialog conversation began where the Barbarian was also talking with Cain. That would make a fun aspect to story mode.

On our way out of the dungeon, we were introduced to one of Diablo 3's new character classes: The Witch-Doctor (okay, you all can take 5 seconds to start singing that stupid witch-doctor song. Don't lie. I know you all started thinking about that song when you heard about the class :D). He showed off some summons like the mongrel who seem to work like the Skeletons and Wolves of Diablo 2. He could also make their bodies explode and do damage to nearby enemies (like a Necromancer's corpse explosion only limited to destroying your own pets). There was also a locus swarm attack which ate away at nearby enemies. If the zombie was close to another zombie, the swarm moved to that one; eating both zombies. There was also a Wall Of Zombies spell which worked like a Bone Wall only with attacking zombies.

Some may like this new class and the hate may flow my way by saying this but, I don't like the Witch-Doctor. He's too much like the Necromancer. I don't see why they couldn't have just stuck with the Necromancer and give him a boost of powers. They gave the barbarian a dash attack - why not give the Necromancer Disease instead of Bone? People cried for a Necromancer class in WoW. People loved the new Necromancer class (after patch 1.10). Why not give the people the old man we all know and love?

Any way, we are then met by 2 other characters. FEMALE VERSIONS OF THE CLASSES! I don't know why they couldn't have done this in Diablo 2. We can finally choose to make a Male Barbarian or a Female Barbarian (and with all the other classes).

The final boss fills up half the screen. Literally. It looked tough but the four fighters defeated him. The female Witch-Doctor died and the Barbarian was decapitated. Yes. Decapitated. The monster picked him up and bit his head off. And by bit, I mean tear it off. Well, both really. He bit down and then pulled it off... The Barbarian screaming makes the whole scene a bit disturbing >_>... This is never getting a Teen Rating lol.

The graphics are outstanding and the colors fit. The lighting is good and the physics are great.

Till tomorrow... ting tang walla walla bing bang.

PS: Happy Canadian Day!

Diablo 3 Story // Cain's Journal

2008-06-30T17:41:00.005-04:00

The Diablo 3 story takes place about 20 years after the Worldstone had been destroyed by the arch-angel Tyrael. In these years, the people of Sanctuary slowly start to forget the three Prime Evils and all that had happened during their reign. To most, the story is just a myth.

However, to Deckard Cain, the legendary story of the one hero still lives in his mind. Cain travels back to New Tristram to study the remains of the old Cathedral. Tristram grew to a popular town after the Worldstone was struck down. People wanted to view the Cathedral of wence Diablo first appeared. However, as the years drained on, people stopped coming, and New Tristram became a depressing place.

As Cain was researching, he noticed a comet, hitting the exact same spot where Diablo first arrived many years ago. With this, Cain called upon new heroes to protect the world against "the rising powers of the Burning Hells – and even the failing luminaries of the High Heavens itself."

-Cinematic Video-

There is a woman in the video (the narrator as well) who would seem to be Cain's assistant. In the gameplay video (which I will post during the Gameplay post), the Barbarian clearly says that Lyra (or some other name... I can't remember) is worried about him. Also, we see a mountain that is now destroyed and two people in armor looking over it. I can guess that this is Mount Arreat - after the Worldstone was destroyed and the two characters are the Barbarians of the North. Also, to further back this theory, we also see Tyrael throwing his sword into the Worldstone. I can imagine they could be showing this to lead into the explosion of Mount Arreat.

Another awesome surprise is that we see Diablo without his soulstone! There is just a firey "t" scar.

On the Diablo 3 website, there is a section dedicated to Cain's Journal. This is a flash journal, written by Deckard Cain, which shows passages from King Leoric to the destruction of the Worldstone. Deckard Cain will also narrate the journal for you! It's really cool and even though some of you may already know the story, it's still fun to listen to Cain.

I've started playing Diablo 2 again. If you have the expansion and want to play, whisper Aticus (Paladin 30 40) or Starburn (Amazon, ~~lower level~~ 17) or the account *Neflight2 on the USEAST server - LADDER. I might be making a Sorceress soon too.

PS: The background image is set to a 17 inch widescreen monitor (my laptop). The image doesn't stretch out or shrink. If anyone can get me a HTML code which will automaticly fix the background image to make it stretch out to fit the screen, can you leave a comment with the code? Thanks!

Outline For The Week // Paladin Wrath Updates

2008-06-29T00:55:00.004-04:00

What I'll do in the next week is take pieces of the Diablo 3 Website and explain what's there and (as always) add my opinions - be it good, bad, or in the middle. I'll try to get to all of these in this week (one per day).

1. Story / Deckard Cain's Journal

2. Gameplay / 20 Minute Gameplay Video

3. New Character Classes

4. Screenshots & Artwork.

5. Tyrael

The Tyrael topic should be a fun one. Best for last, you know? :-). Hopefully I'll get all that in by Thursday.

Onto other topics from today's WWI, there is very little Paladin news on the Wrath front. For you Retadins: You are going to be getting Warrior/DK gear. I could only imagine that's all +Str, +Stam, and +Attack Power. You will also be able to become more viable in groups. Yeah... they said that last time they tried to boost up Ret. Don't get your hopes up, in my opinion.

Holy Paladins will be getting a new healing spell called "Hand of Purity". This spell is supposed to work like a big Holy Crap button. I would imagine (and this is speculation now) that it'll give a player a big heal; just enough so you could get a Flash or Holy Light off. Definitely an improvement.

There was also some talk about changing Blessing of Protection and Blessing of Freedom so that they will NOT override your other Blessing (ie: Kings, Might etc).

So, stay tuned Sunday night or Monday for the next Diablo 3 update!

Christmas Has Come Early In 2008

2008-06-28T17:18:00.002-04:00

This morning, Blizzard announced that they are, in fact, in the process of creating DIABLO III!

As you can see, I've changed the layout of this blog to incorporate both Diablo and Warcraft. As of today, there is no word that there will be a Paladin class in Diablo 3. However, due to the popularity of the game (and my own personal liking of the game) this blog will now post any new information on Diablo 3.

This coming week, I'll be posting either daily or every other day, trying to inform everyone about the new game. The website is very difficult to get through due to the high traffic. I was stubborn enough to sit through and read every page - even though it took hours :-).

So, do you guys like the new layout?

Diablo 3 at the WWI?

2008-06-26T00:00:00.002-04:00

Has the time come? I think so! This weekend, at Blizzard's World Wide Invitational, there is a high chance that we will be hearing about a Diablo 3 game!

"In a question and answer session that concluded this year's GDC Paris, Pardo was asked directly if he could talk more about "the new game" that rumours have strongly suggested will be Diablo 3. "So you want me to announce the game before our announcement?" he said. "No offense, but I think there's like 300 people here, and I'll be ripped apart by 8000 people there [at the Invitational] if I pre-announce it - but it's going to be really exciting. I think everybody here will be really excited about the announcement." -GamesIndustry.biz

So, there's an announcement coming. Question is: What game? Over the last 2 months, Blizzard has taken over Diablo3.com, released a picture of many runes from Wrath, Starcraft, and Diablo 2, and also a German PC magazine saying they won't release new of the game (they have a special magazine theme for the game as well), even if "hell froze over and cows gave beer." We've already heard of Starcraft II, and it will be a new game. You don't schedule a press conference to announce a game that has already been reviled.

I'll be on the net Saturday finding out what game they will announce. If it's Diablo 3, I think I may drop my laptop in the excitement.

PS: If you haven't already figured it out, I'm a huge Diablo freak :-D.

**UPDATE: Thursday morning**

The fourth ice image was released this morning. The first 3 had runes from Wrath's Frostmourn, Diablo's Hel Rune, and a symbol from Starcraft 2. This new image shows that the ice is starting to melt and a shadowy figure is now making an appearance.

There's a few guesses I can make from this. The first one being the obvious: something in Northrend is awakening. The second though is something I've speculated this whole time since the end of Lord Of Destruction. It is said that Tyrael destroyed the Worldstone. However, what if in the process, he didn't destroy it, but opened it so he could try to hold the power within himself to keep Heaven and Hell from entering the Earthen plain. However, like Tal Rasha, he probably was corrupted by the Worldstone. Being that the Worldstone is in the Arctic barbarian lands, the stone could have frozen over. The shards in the picture look a lot like the shards that flew past Tyrael in the end cinematic. Of course, this is all rambling guesses and just a few of the many possible speculations.

Personally, what I really want is to move backwards in time. Back to The Great Conflict! The 7 evils will be there, Diablo would still be alive (how can you have a Diablo game without Diablo?), and the story is already laid out. All they have to do is paste the pieces together. With the success of World Of Warcraft, Blizzard has proven that they can still make fantastic RPGs and thus proving this Diablo game could be an outstanding one.

I'll have to make a big post one of these days about the history of Diablo and conspiracy theories... There's just too many of them!

Vote for me!

2008-06-22T12:23:00.002-04:00

Patch 2.4.3!

2008-06-19T00:00:00.001-04:00

Patch day is soon arriving and faster than I anticipated. Usually I like reading the notes weeks before hand but I have not had the time. As I am writing this, I have only skimmed some parts of the patch notes. Over the next few days, check back for updates at the end of this post as I begin the epic journey through the patch notes of Patch 2.4.3.

First, I will go through the General changes:

General

Dispel effects will no longer attempt to remove effects that have 100% dispel resistance.
Parry Rating, Defense Rating, and Block Rating: Low-level players will now convert these ratings into their corresponding defensive stats at the same rate as level 34 players.
Haris Pilton has launched a new line of bags and jewelry. Check her out in the World’s End Tavern!
Mounts at 30?! Yes, it’s true: Apprentice Riding and mounts are now available at level 30. Training costs 35 gold.
Blood Elf flightmasters outside of Silvermoon City and Tranquillien have traded in their bats for glorious fire-breathing dragonhawks.
Alcohol cooldowns have been rolled into Drinks: All 10-second cooldowns have been removed and replaced with the 1-second Drink cooldown.
Numerous flying non-combat pets have had their flight height modified to no longer skim along the ground: captured firefly, dragonhawk hatchlings, moths, owls, parrots, phoenix hatchling, spirit of summer, sprite darter, and tiny sporebat.
Nether Ray Fry (a non-combat pet) is now available from the Skyguard Quartermaster. This requires an Exalted reputation with Sha’tari Skyguard.
Equipping an item will now cancel any spell cast currently in progress.
Placing an item in your bank will now cancel any spell cast currently in progress if the spell was cast by that item.
You can no longer move backwards to stop racing rams.
When a stun wears off, the creature that was stunned will prefer the last target with the highest threat, versus the current target.

I must say, I am most pleased with the changes made. One key bother for me was when I had my Crimson Whelpling out, he could never fly next to me. Now, he can! I'm very excited to have this. They didn't mention whelplings in the notes but maybe they're part of the hatchling family. Another bother of mine was when I was playing my Blood Elf on a buddy's server, I had to ride a bat. Here's a race, who seem to look bright, colorful and neat, who have to ride bats to get from here to there. I'm really happy to see they've finally sent those bats back to Lordaeron.

I was saving the best for last: Mounts at L30! Yes, your normal 60% speed mount will now be available to purchase at L30 at a cost of only 35 gold. At first, I thought it was all a joke. This is the first time I've heard of this. I can see some of their logic in this. This will now make the trek though the horrid 30s a bit faster. This is something they should have done in the Dustwallow Marsh patch. The only flaw I see in this is why epic mounts haven't gone down too. The Death Knight is starting at L55 with a 60% speed mount. Why can't they just make epic mounts L55? But, now is not the time to be greedy. We have our L30 mounts. Rejoice!

Again, check back soon for more updates and the rest of the patch notes.

*Update*

Paladin

Greater Blessing of Light Rank 1: This spell will no longer overwrite Greater Blessing of Light Rank 2.
Summon Warhorse is now available at level 30.

Not much there but at least they fixed it. Also, "Time Management features have been implemented! These features include an alarm clock, stopwatch, and viewing your computer’s local time." That sounds cool but I think a bit late.

You can read the rest here because the rest if bug fixes and other classes.

Meet The Jormungar // Solo Dungeons?

2008-06-16T00:00:00.002-04:00

I hope this creature is scaled to size like the picture cause I would be in my glory. To stand toe to toe with this thing would be epic. This is called a Jormungar. It's a new creature we'll be facing in Northrend.

"The fiercely aggressive Jormungar are a marvel of evolution, possessing rows of chisel-like teeth capable of boring through solid rock, as well as muscular, flattened bodies well adapted to rapid underground navigation.

Legends tell of the nerubians' using the jormungar as creatures of labor, forcing them to carve massive tunnels through Northrend's subterranean ice and lay the groundwork for the nerubians' ancient civilization. With the fall of the nerubian empire, swarms of rogue jormungar ran amok, drilling through the region's permafrost, attacking surface dwellers, and devouring everything in their path."

Serves those Nerubians' right... Silly spiders, Jormungars are for Pallys :-D.

-----------------------------------

Another post which caught my eye on MMO-Champion is a thread on the WoW Forums asking for Solo Raid Content. The poster makes valid points:

"First I just want to say thank you Blizz for making such awesome games. I love to play WoW. However, I also love to solo. Unfortunately when it comes to endgame the two don’t mesh.

I understand that RAID = WORK and as such raiders should receive better rewards for working harder. I do not understand however why this reward should be seeing content. Isn’t better gear enough? How about titles? Shiny glowing auras to prove you’re better than everyone else?

I personally play for FUN not WORK. This along with the fact that I cannot schedule time to play a game (Well I could… but I would need to get a divorce first) is why I do not raid.

I think Blizzard is taking a step in the right direction with the upcoming xpac making all raids being able to be done with 10 or 25 person groups. I’d like to see this taken one step further. Make instances and raids have a solo setting and have the gear be one step lower. For example in WotLK if in 25 man mode the raid would drop Tier 9 gear then in 10 man it will drop Tier 8 gear and in Solo mode it should drop Tier 7 gear. This would serve two purposes.

1. It would give people that don’t like to group (like myself and many others) a chance to see all the content and enjoy this extremely well crafted story and game Blizzard has put together.

2. It would give new subscribers who do want to group a chance to catch up to their guilds and help raid without putting as much strain on guildmates to come back and help them with as much low content to get their new friend up to being raid capable. You do the raids on solo to get your T7 gear. You get 9 guildmates to give you a hand and do the raid again on 10 man and get your T8 gear. Then you are up to doing the 25 mans to start actually helping your guild progress.

I’m not asking to be handed anything easy. I would really like as much challenge as I can get. However I don’t want that challenge to come in the form of trying to get people together to do an instance/raid and dealing with all the crap that comes along with that (Idiots wiping the group, people having to leave in the middle of a session, loot ninjas, etc.)

I apologize for the wall of text, you may now proceed to flame."

Bornakk responded in a typical Blizzard. In short, 'Sorry we're not doing things that you like but, tough luck.'

"I understand your desire for this, but grouping up is an important part of the game, our goal with the 10 person raids is to making the raiding content feel a little less exclusive to players, but if you want to see everything then you would need to take on the challenges of every aspect of the game.

When the new expansions come out everybody has to level their characters up and at some point find new gear. This is a great opportunity for new players to get involved in their guilds if they are looking to take on a bigger roll in progression.

We do have a lot of solo-content available in the game as it is. You can level up to the max level, go through every zone, complete the vast majority of quests, enter battlegrounds and continually do a number of daily quests without ever grouping up with other players - but adding more variety to the game is important to a lot of people and that is where the 5 person and then 10/25 person raid dungeons come into play. These aspects are more challenging and so the story arcs they involve build up accordingly.

In short, we don't currently have any plans to add solo play to every aspect of World of Warcraft."

I feel Tremallyn's pain. I would love to go toe to toe with Illidan, but for someone who only gets to play 1-2 nights a week (for only an hour or two each time), it makes me miss out on the story. One way Blizzard can do this is to set up a Solo Instance for all dungeons. You will get to choose whether to solo it or raid it. If you choose solo, and beat the boss, you will never be able to go back in. The gates will be shut - the boss will be dead. Award honor instead of badges (because most solo players either do dailies or PVP at L70). Lets say, 25,000 honor for Grull, 50,000 honor for Illidan, etc etc. And maybe some dungeon marks which can be used as any of the battleground marks. Honor shouldn't be just for PVP. We're fighting in a war and you should get honor points for achieving a big goal in the storyline.

Vacation: All I Ever Wanted

2008-06-06T09:36:00.006-04:00

I'll be on vacation for the next week. I haven't had a week off in 11 months. I'm not taking my laptop so I won't be blogging. I need to get away from my job and computers.

Here's a follow up interview with Republican Rep from CT about her WoW characters and her views on video game legislation.

I'm sure there will be much news to talk about when I get back. Cya in a week!

Finally, Something Juicy To Talk About!

2008-06-02T23:48:00.002-04:00

Leave it to the media to blow a situation out of the water. There is an article today about a missed 14 year old girl was found in a campground with a 27 year old man. They both met over WoW, he drove to pick her up, and took her to the campground.

First and foremost, I think all child abductors are skum. With that said, I still do not believe it is right to charge this man with kidnapping when the article clearly says that, "Saddie "Elaine" Julian, 14, of Boise was believed to have run away with Morgan Douglas Jones, 27, a man she met over the Internet." The key note is "run away with", not abducted or kidnapped. Leave it to US law to try to protect everyone; no matter the circumstance.

Of course, WoW Insider was right on the case with none other than Adam Holisky (it seems like everytime I disagree with WoW Insider, it is when he posts...). Adam writes, "I am amazed at some of the creeps who play this game, and Morgon Jones definitely falls into that category. 27 years old and running off with a 14 year old girl he met through the game. It's time for him to get outside and enjoy life while he still can, since hopefully there'll be some good ol' prison time coming his way."

Innocent until proven guilty, in my opinion. Who are we to judge someone's character by a news report?

Badger, a WoW Insider reader, made a comment directed at Adam indicating the flaws in his article and the news report.

"Adam,

First off, I love how both of the other Blog posts to which you linked were your own, and the reference to "commenters" was a parenthetical side-note. If you're looking for validation, look to a third-party, not yourself.

Second: As you're not directly involved in the case, you can't tell from this article whether: (a) the girl went willingly rather than being kidnapped (despite the charges); (b) the parents gave enough of a shit to try and stop her or to try and monitor her activity in-game when she was already below the advised age for playing *and* using the Voice Chat system; or (c) the guy responsible is in need of serious psychiatric and psychological help, unable to draw the line between responsible and irresponsible behavior. Maybe *his* parents didn't give enough of a shit to raise him to see the distinction.

Personally, my gut tells me the same thing yours does - that the guy is a lecherous scumbag - but nobody outside of the affected family and the two parties involved in the "kidnapping" case knows that for sure, so please don't make snap judgments on cases like this (even if they're probably correct). Rise above the standard for typical media (like the TV station that posted this article) and wait for all the facts to come in."

This just supports my theory even more. A: It was never said she was forced to go with him and actually, the article said that she "ran away" with him. B: Some cases of runaways stem off of a fight with parents or disagreements. Maybe they should have spent more time monitoring her. And C: Yeah, the guy was an idiot to go along with it anyway. If he had half a brain, he'd known that the law indicates this a kidnapping (even though, ethically, it wasn't).

I don't believe he should get jail time. However, I do think he should be punished in some way. Maybe a hefty fine or some psychological revaluations if it comes down to that. Maybe he does have some problems up there. Then again, who am I to judge? For all I know, he's perfectly fine.

I guess the two morals are:
1) Don't go running off with underage people; no matter what.
And 2) Don't push an article that is flawed and doesn't have their facts straight.

Connecticut Finally Got In The WoW News

2008-05-29T20:37:00.002-04:00

WoW Insider is reporting that 101's District unanimous Republican nominee does, in fact, play World Of Warcraft. That district covers North Guilford and Madison (about a 25 minute drive from me). Her name is Jeanne Stevens (R) of Madison, CT. This article states that:

"The mother of four boys, she volunteers for Madison Safe Rides and co-chairs the town's Safe Homes program, as well as volunteers at the library of Island Avenue School. She is active in her parish, St. Margaret Roman Catholic Church, also in Madison. She also enjoys playing the video game World of Warcraft."

I would bet one of her sons got her into it :-D. Now, the Shore Line Times did not mention anything more about WoW in their article and I would imagine this is all we'll hear about it. I'll have to mention it in conversation with some people around the area to see if they know anything more... If I ever do find out more, I'll let you know.

Question To The Readers (2)

2008-05-26T09:16:00.006-04:00

Summer vacations! 'Tis the season of College finals ending and the working class starts to take their vacation days/weeks. The servers will soon fill up; even at 10am compared to when everyone is usually busy. 5am will be the only safe time.

So, what are you going to do with all your time off? I know I'll be working (as usual) and taking 1 or 2 weeks off for a vacation. I've already opened our summer house so WoW on the weekends will be slim to none. I'll just be popping on to check the Auction House.

Also, what will you be doing in game? I'll be playing my Mage (still 69) and doing dailies with him and Aticus.

So, leave a comment with the answers to...
What are you going to do with your time off and what will you be doing in WoW?

Paladins Kinda Cut Out of Tuesday's Wrath Leak

2008-05-22T00:00:00.001-04:00

I've read over http://wotlk.wikidot.com/ (which has all sorts of Wrath Alpha info) and I was very disappointed to find that there was only one spell leak for the Paladin. *Spoiler***Highlight the following text** The spell is called Martyr: Redirect all harmful spells directed at friendly targets to yourself for X time.***

So, where it's something, I would have liked to have seen more spells. There have been 5 classes already who have some spells and talents leaked but just the one from the Paladin. I wanna see the new changes to Protection (like Blizzard has said).

The new Mage spells and talents are really something wicked. Especially the Frost tree. Stun anyone? Mwhahaha. Warlocks will finally get Metamorphosis! I loved the spell in Warcraft 3 and now it is in WoW. They have screenshots too! And how about that picture at the top of the page? I would bet that might be the non-combat pet we'll get for the collector's edition.

On a Mage update, my Mage is currently 68. We're working really hard on to get him to 70 and at least into the battlegrounds for some epics. The time has come to settle down, save your money, and build up for the expansion.

Also, congratz to David Cook for winning the American Idol competition! And rightfully so. It wasn't even close. He won by 12 million votes! Amazing! I can't wait for his second album.

Wrath Alpha

2008-05-19T11:39:00.003-04:00

So, I don't have much to talk about and it has been a very non-eventful weekend in WoW. However, MMO-Champion has the Blizzard Wrath Alpha patch notes (SPOILERS):

-----------------------------------------------------------------------
- World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King: Friends and Family Alpha
-----------------------------------------------------------------------

Welcome to the World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King Friends and Family Alpha. The list below contains information on the current available content available for testing and general information. This information is subject to change.
General
- The continent of Northrend is now available! To travel there, visit one of four transportation masters in either Orgrimmar, Undercity, Theramore,or Menethil Harbor.
- Transportation between Howling Fjord and Borean Tundra can be found at the Tuskarr villages in those zones.
- NPC Transportation Locations
Horde:
Undercity to Vengeance Landing (Howling Fjord)
Orgrimmar to Warsong Hold (Borean Tundra)
Alliance:
Menethil Harbor to Valgarde (Holwing Fjord)
Theramore Valiance Keep (Borean Tundra)

World Environment Zones
- The following zones are available for testing: Howling Fjord, Borean Tundra, Dragonblight, and Grizzly Hills
Dungeons
- The following dungeons are available for testing:
Howling Fjord: Utgarde Keep (70-72)
Howling Fjord: Utgarde Pinnacle (80)
Borean Tundra: The Nexus (70-72)
Grizzly Hills: Drak’Tharon Keep (74-76)

Classes
- All Classes are available for play. Spells and talents will be available for testing past 70 for the following classes: Druid, Mage, Priest, Shaman, Warlock, Warrior
- The Death Knight Hero class is now available for play.
Creating a new Death Knight will start you at level 55 in Eastern Plaguelands.
No starting quests are implemented though Death Knight abilities will be available for testing.
Several Death Knight talents, although they will appear on the talent pane, are not yet implemented.

Tradeskills
- The following tradeskills are available to train up to 450: First Aid, Herbalism, Mining, and Skinning.

Vivendi's First Quarter Report

2008-05-15T19:20:00.005-04:00

Some of you might not even care but Vivendi had a press release summarizing their first quarter financial status. There is however a little something about Wrath in here (bolded so you don't have to read the whole report. You're welcome :D ).

Vivendi Games · Vivendi Games continues to make strong headway with Blizzard Entertainment, inc and World of Warcraft ®, adding 2 million incremental subscribers compared to end of March 2007; After reaching the 10-million-subscriber milestone at the end of 2007, World of Warcraft's subscriber base grew to more than 10.7 million by the end of the first quarter of 2008.

A comparison of the first quarters of 2007 and 2008 performances is not representative because the first quarter of 2007 included the hugely successful release of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade. Blizzard Entertainment's second expansion, World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King, is scheduled to be released in the second half of 2008. Consequently, Vivendi Games' revenues for the first quarter of 2008 are 24.1% lower (-18.2% on a constant currency basis) when compared to the same period last year. Vivendi Games' revenues was 221 million.

Blizzard Entertainment's revenues was 192 million. Sierra Entertainment, Sierra Online and Vivendi Games Mobile revenues were slightly higher than their performance for the same period last year; in the face of unfavorable currency exchange movements on all business segments.

· Vivendi Games' EBITA amounted to 50 million. Excluding the allocation of Group overheads, Blizzard Entertainment's EBITA was 99 million.

Sierra Entertainment's EBITA of -34 million (excluding the allocation of Group overheads) was effected by higher costs related to increased investment in Sierra product development and accelerated royalties expense for released products.

Vivendi Games' EBITA also includes continued start up expenses for the Sierra Online and Vivendi Games Mobile divisions. Comments on Vivendi's First Quarter 2008 Financial Indicators Revenues amounted to 5,280 million compared to 5,020 million for the first quarter of 2007, an increase of 260 million (+5.2%, representing +6.9% at constant currency). EBITA totaled 1,203 million compared to 1,274 million in the first quarter of 2007, a decrease of 71 million (-5.6% or -3.9% at constant currency) which was mainly driven by the favorable settlement of a tax litigation (+73 million) in the first quarter of 2007 and Vivendi Games (-57 million), with the impact of the exceptionally successful release of the first expansion pack, World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, also in the first quarter of 2007. In addition, in the first quarter of 2008, EBITA included a net reduction in the provision for stock options and other share-based compensation plans (+38 million) and Canal+'s two extra Ligue 1 soccer match days compared to the first quarter of 2007 (-32 million).

Income from equity affiliates totaled 85 million compared to 82 million for the first quarter of 2007. Our share of income from NBC Universal represented 53 million for the first quarter of 2008 compared to 65 million for the first quarter of 2007, a decrease driven by the decline of th U.S. dollar and NBC Universal's performance. SFR's share of income from Neuf Cegetel represented 33 million compared to 18 million for the first quarter of 2007.

Adjusted net income amounted to 697 million with 0.60 per share, compared to 771 million with 0.67 per share for the first quarter of 2007, a decrease of 74 million (-9.6%). Earnings attributable to equity holders of the parent amounted to 555 million with 0.48 per share, compared to 932 million with 0.81 per share for the first quarter of 2007, a decrease of 377 million (-40.5%), which was primarily due to the dilution profit on the sale of a 10.18% equit interest in Canal+ France to Lagardère (+239 million) in the first quarter of 2007.

So, it seems like Vivendi is holding up fairly well.

BTW: My Mage is now currently 66 and climbing. We hope to have him to 70 by next weekend - if not sooner!

This just in: Morgan Webb hates the Horde. You rock Morgan! :-D

1 Million Strong For Burma

2008-05-15T00:00:00.001-04:00

http://www.burmaitcantwait.org/burmaitcantwait/

I'm taking a break from Blizzard and WoW news to bring some attention to a website which started up a 30 day campaign earlier this month. The US Campaign for Burma is a group devoted to spread the word about what is happening to the people of Burma, bring Democracy to the country, and to bring human rights to the Burmese.

For those who do not know, for over 20 years, the people of Burma have been ruled over by a government with an iron fist. These people want democracy but are beaten, tortured, and killed by their government's military anytime they express themselves.

Each day, a 90 second commercial supporting Burma is presented on the website (usually by a celebrity or someone in relation to Burma). Day 6 is my favorite. Eddie Izzard takes a step back from his comedy and speaks powerfully about what is happening to the children and worshipers in Burma. Ellen Page (The Tracey Fragments, Juno) is also supposed to be presenting a short as well in the coming days.

/end plug

Diablo 3 at BlizCon 08?

2008-05-13T10:06:00.004-04:00

This is going to be a quick update cause I am so psyched to hear the news. There is going to be a BlizCon 08 this October 10th-11th. But that's not why I am excited. I'm excited about the fact that they have reserved 3 rooms instead of two. Now, what game franchises do Blizzard own? Warcraft, Starcraft, and.... DIABLO. So, three rooms, three games, and they just took over the domain name Diablo3.com.

I.Can't.Wait!

Death Knight Information Unleased!

2008-05-12T00:25:00.000-04:00

After months of waiting, information is finally here! Welcome: The Death Knight. This is the information taken from MMO-Champion (cause I'm lazy and don't feel like summarizing :P):
Death Knights

All players with a level 55 character will be able to create one Death Knight per realm, per account. (Gamespy.com)
Blizzard's designers decided to start the class with a full complement of abilities right off the bat, figuring that any player that has advanced a character to level 55 would be able to learn to handle the new class with minimal difficulty. (Gamespy.com)
Death Knights will have a summonable Skeletal Deatcharger Mount. (Gamespy.com)
Death Knights aren't using Mana or Energy, the runes are their primary source of power and are slotted into their "blade," which lies underneath their health bar as a visual indicator of what resources are available to the player at any given moment. (Gamespy.com)
Spent runes automatically refresh after a set period of time, much like a Rogue's energy bar. (Gamespy.com)
There are six slots in the blade, and the player is free to fill those slots with any given number of Blood, Unholy or Frost runes. (Gamespy.com)
Death Knights also have a secondary resource called Runic Power generated by using your rune abilities. It will use the same mechanics as rage and increase when you deal damage, or slowly decrease if you're not using it. (Gamespy.com)
Death Knights will have a lot of abilities that cost all available Runic Power with varying levels of effectiveness based on total Runic Power spent. (Same mechanics as Execute for warriors, or finishing moves for Rogues) (Gamespy.com)
Death Knights will have spells equivalent to auras called "Presence", providing them with powerful self-buffs depending on their role in the group. (One for tanking, one for damage dealing, etc ...) (Gamespy.com)
An instant lifedrain spell (described as death coil without the fear component) will be available. (Gamespy.com)
Death Knights will be the first class to use diseases as a source of damage, with abilities that become strong depending on how many diseases are already applied to the target. (Gamespy.com)
"Army of the Dead" will spawn numerous undead minions to attack nearby hostiles targets. (Gamespy.com)
Death Knights will also revive an enemy (or ally) as a ghoul to use it as a pet with its own special abilities like a disease-inflicting strike and a stun. (Gamespy.com)
When an ally is risen as a ghoul, a pop-up will appear and this ally will have the choice to control the ghoul if he wants to. (Gamespy.com)
The Death Knight's particular niche will be in tanking magic-damage-dealing bosses. They will have an ability much like a banshee's anti-magic shell, greatly diminishing the amount of incoming magic damage they'll receive in combat (Gamespy.com)

Death Knight Skills

Death Coil -- Depletes all Runic Power, dealing 600 damage to a non-Undead target, or healing 900 damage on a friendly target. (Curse.com)
Death Grip -- This is the Death Knight's "taunt" ability. It also pulls the target to the Death Knight, forcing them to attack the Death Knight for a short amount of time. Yes, I said pulls the target; Blizzard is going to allow players to move mobs in the expansion both with Death Grip, and other knockback/pull abilities. This works on players too, so PvP balance ahoy! (Curse.com)
Chains of Ice -- Roots the target in place. When the spell fades, it places a snare on the target that reduces in potency as the duration runs out. (Curse.com)
Death Pact -- Sacrifices the raised ghouls to heal the Death Knight. (Curse.com)
Death and Decay -- Targeted, AoE Damage-over-time which pulses similar to the Paladin spell Consecration. Anyone affected by Death and Decay has a chance to be feared. (Curse.com)
Frost Presence -- Increases Armor by 45% and allows the Death Knight to generate 25% more threat. Only one presence can be active at any time. (Curse.com)
Unholy Presence -- Increases Attack Speed and Movement speed by 15%. Only one presence can be active at any time. This was described by Tom Chilton as the "PvP" presence. (Curse.com)
Anti-magic Shield -- Reduces the damage of the next magical spell cast on the Death Knight by 75%. It also converts the damage reduced into Runic Power. (Curse.com)
Strangulate -- Depletes all Runic Power, dealing minor damage and silencing the target for up to 5 seconds. (Curse.com)
Summon Deathcharger -- Allows the Death Knight to summon a Deathcharger mount. This mount is acquired through quests, similar to the Paladin and Warlock land mounts. (Curse.com)
Raise Dead -- Raises a nearby corpse to fight for the Death Knight for 2 minutes. If used on a player corpse, the player has the option to play as the ghoul for the duration -- gaining access to the ghoul's abilities. (Curse.com)
The ghoul has the ability to do the following:
Leap to the target
Rend for decent damage-over-time
Stun target, and of course more

Looks epic to me! A bit of a Warrior-Rouge-Evil Pally crossover. I know I'll be playing one. I'm not sure about the Rune System though. I'm still a bit confused on how it's going to work. Then again, it seems like something you need to experience. It does look like a hard class to play. I bet this isn't going to be a walk in the park. If they do a good job in the first training missions, then they will succeed in teaching us how to play the class.

BTW, it looks like they're going to mute the Necromancer class fanatics with the spells Army Of The Dead and Raise Dead (see above). The spells do seem to the fit the demographic. I've always wanted a tanking class with the powers of the Undead. Probably the same way I wanted a Paladin because of the Spellwarrior class-aspects. Same with the DK. We Paladins should feel right at home :-D.

(I wrote this article on Friday. There have been so much Wrath information released over the last 4 days. There's just too much for me to summarize. WoWInsider and MMO-Champion have all the information that has been leaked.)

I Gotz Mah FigurePrint!

2008-05-08T23:47:00.006-04:00

As promised, here are some pictures of my FigurePrint of Aticus.

Please click them to see a full resolution picture. Due to horrible lighting, the picture quality is pretty weak... Sorry. The middle one looks the best because you can see how detailed the face can be. Problem is, it blows out the particles. It does not look that bad. Excess lighting on an object will blow out anything (ie: dust on a laptop).

I love it. You can see some residue / dust / particles... whatever you wanna call it. But it's still 32 man days worth of my life finally memorialized as a statue instead of a piece of data.

I spent 7 years playing Diablo 2 and now all but one of my characters are gone; never to be seen again. And you can take screenshots and say, "Hey, it's good enough." Fine by me - go ahead. But screenshots will be gone someday too. This is only $115. Anyone who is over 16 can go out, get a job, work for 3 days and pay it off.

I'm just saying, to all the nay sayers out there (in a tone that Yahtzee said it in his Portal Review around 4:00 minutes), "Fuck You. FigurePrints are great and if you don't think so, you must be stupid."

:-D

New Blizzard Store

2008-05-05T17:18:00.003-04:00

(This post is in memory of Ryan J. Buckley)

Not much news to talk about for the WoW casual player. However, for those hardcore Blizzard fans (such as myself), Blizzard has finally updated their online store! It's all cool looking, organized, and cleaned up. I remember seeing so many things out of stock but that's gone.

http://www.blizzard.com/store/

In other Blizzard news, Blizzard has officially taken over Diablo3.com (now linked to Diablofans.com). This is not a sign for a release date but it does raise an eyebrow that they are planning something. I hope we hear something soon! Just to clarify, the owner gave the website to Blizzard. Now, Blizzard should give the guy some money for it. They're sitting on so much cash that it'll be a nice write-off.

And we have just about 11,000 hits to this blog. It might not seem like much but it makes me feel proud.

No Post Today

2008-05-01T13:26:00.002-04:00

You do the math :-P

Cya Monday!

Macrotransactions

2008-04-28T09:18:00.006-04:00

Massively had a post yesterday which really caught my eye. It's a well written article about paying for Power Leveling but through Blizzard. You can read it here. I truly think everyone should look it over.

In summary, it gives an example that Blizzard could use to help people get to the new content and also not have to grind out 1-60 anymore. These next few exerts explain his points very clearly and are well thought out.

"Some of the best experiences WoW can give you are the ones where you and three or four friends play together in a static group. However, all of my friends (myself included) have played out the original content. We would only be interested in coming back to Azeroth in the event that we could start with a level 60 character and jump straight into the Burning Crusade content.

So why not offer separate servers for players interested in spending 20 or 30 bucks on a new level 60 character, as Mr. Zenke suggested?"
------
"I can hear all the people who've spent tons of time playing World of Warcraft complaining about this. "What about all the players who've invested all this time in getting to max level?" are the kind of arguments I expect. Well, what about them? It's not as if potential players were going to grind up so they could come and raid or PvP with those characters. You're not losing out on us having our own sever to play on.

Sooner or later most people are going to stop playing WoW, so it's not as if time spent playing is any less meaningless in relative terms. What matters most is experiencing something fun with friends. Nobody is forcing anyone to pay 20 or 30 bucks to get a level 60 on a special server. Everyone can still grind up to level 60. There are just some who would prefer not to, which isn't all that different from how things are now."

And I could imagine that all the people he's talking about are the teenagers who pay their monthly fee via lunch money, chores, or pleading their parents (yeah, I said it - go ahead a rip me a new one). However, I still think that most of the complainers of paying real money for virtual goods are these teenagers. I don't see a 30 year old complaining that someone would want to throw down $20 or $30 to skip content on a server dedicated to that service. It would be the people who can't afford that (i.e. teenagers) who will come out in numbers against it.

It happens in real life too with another demographic: Senior citizens who cannot afford tax increases will go to the polls against a town budget which raises their taxes. And they come out in numbers! That one gets turned down. Then, once the Education / School Sports side of the budget is threated to be cut if the second budget is turned down, the mothers and fathers of school children go out and vote.

Getting back to the article, I believe Blizzard should throw up a few servers, one for PVP, PVE, RP and RP-PVP, that have payable resources. Not only will it be more money for Blizzard but also for those players who want to experience the new content. My father is still at L50 and really wants to get to Outland. However, whenever I call him up and ask if he wants to level his Hunter a bit, he tells me he started a new character. My father would be the perfect candidate to use the payable servers. He, such as myself, don't mind throwing money into something which we enjoy. Golfers pay $1000+ for a yearly course membership and another $700 for clubs, balls, and other accessories. Movie buffs spend $30+ a week on DVDs. People will spend their money on what they enjoy doing. And, if they enjoy trying out new classes at a high level, then so be it and let them do it.

--

I just wanted to clarify that I'm not picking on teenage age group here. I'm sure there are adults who also feel that way (and vise versa). I just went for the majority of players in my example.

New Mount Enchants Confirmed

2008-04-23T20:36:00.006-04:00

MMO-Champion is giving hour by hour updates about the new patch 2.4.2. And, they have confirmed that there are Mount enchants! At least, in the code. Your usual trinkets are now going to turn into specific mount enchants to one mount in your inventory.

They have said that the old trinkets have not yet disappeared. This will probably change in a PTR patch. In my opinion, I don't like it. I'm a mount-a-holic. Aticus has a horse, a ram, tiger, talbuk, and a normal flying mount. To enchant just one would be a waste of money. However, I can see that it would be much more helpful to have a trinket spot open.

This is a small post so I will be updating from time to time over the next few days.

Update - Thursday, 8:29AM

Portals and Teleports to Thereamore and Stonard are in fact on the PTRs. Could this be our way to Northrend? I think so!

Wrath Alpha Screenshots Leaked

2008-04-21T00:00:00.003-04:00

Matt from World Of Blogcraft posted some leaked pictures of the Wrath Alpha. These are not screenshots because Blizzard is smart and disabled the button. However, this guy took these pictures from his digital camera. The quality isn't that good but you can make it out.

Now, could these be fake? Of course. The maps seem real - not the dwarf hairstyles.

The one that makes me ponder is the picture of the Undead Death Knight. If it is fake, kudos to the person who made it. However, if it is real, I looks like there will be more Hero Classes. Personally, I believe there's more to the Hero Classes than Blizzard is letting us know. I think they will make a whole set of Hero Classes and not just the one DK.

The picture shows the Death Knight slot under a Hero Class tab. There are also 5 other boxes with grey keys in them. This could mean that there are more classes on release or it could mean they are locked out until a later date. I know we need to do a quest to unlock the Death Knight. I'm guessing that at the completion of this quest, we will get a key that matches the grey keys in the picture.

This is all speculation of course but it's fun to throw ideas out there.

**EDIT** - 12:34AM

After a closer look at the DK picture, it seems like a fake. The Axe is overlapping the character select frame and the left foot of the Undead male is overlapping the name box. Plus, it might be my eyes but it seems like the name box is smaller than normal. Also, the DK info box looks fishy... it's all blocky.

**EDIT 2** - 11:12am Monday

The website has taken down the Undead Death Knight picture.

Blogbraft has a flicker of the original here.

Gear Reset Not As Bad As Burning Crusade

2008-04-17T16:53:00.008-04:00

**UPDATE**
Aticus hit Exalted with the Shattered Sun Offensive. (Click the picture to get a very nice detailed screenshot)

Yesterday, Bornakk, a Community Manager on the Warcraft forums confirmed that the gear reset which took place in the Burning Crusade will be different when Wrath comes out. He stated...

"Players and items will have an increase in their stats/items that goes along with leveling to 80, it will just be a little more consistent when compared to The Burning Crusade. What I mean by this is the way items are working right now will be closer to the new items you get in Wrath of the Lich King and it isn't like you will see an item with double the usual amount of stamina from your first quest."

In other words, if you have a chest piece with 50 stamina and 25 intellect, it won't double to 100 stamina and 50 intellect right at 71. It will progress slower all the way to 80. This is also nice because now your epic gear from BC arenas, battlegrounds, and raids will still be viable. Now, I had the level 60 GM PVP set from old world and that lasted me until level 68-70 (in which Season 1 replaced it). Hopefully, everyone with Season 1 now will be able to keep that gear until level 78-80. If I had to guess, it should stay like that.

Also, going back to Bornakk's statement, if this is true then your new raid gear won't necessarily be instantly replaced. A suggestion: If you have full season 1, don't bother setting season 2 gear once it drops to the battlegrounds. It'll just be a waste of marks and honor. Save it up for level 80 gear.

A Mage Update: Because both of our servers are really close to Phase 4, we've decided to put off the Mage leveling until next week or the week after. I know I want my title... like... really bad! And he wants just to hit Exalted (I'm only 2 rounds of dailies to go before Exalted). Lore-wise, I think the Shattered Sun is perfect for Aticus to join because he doesn't feel the need for the faction wars anymore. The Shattered Sun broke down the lines of factions between the Aldor and Scryers. So, I really want to be "Aticus Of The Shattered Sun."

Let The Powerleveling Begin!

2008-04-14T11:08:00.002-04:00

After BC came out, I leveled Aticus to 70. However, my level 60 Mage was just sitting there at the top of my character list, twiddling his thumbs, and looking from side to side as if he was up to something. I've decided to take him out of retirement. My buddy and I now have a set schedule, day by day, to take turns playing him through Outland. Ideally, I want to make him a great Frost Crit / Shatter build using Mind Mastery and Spell Power talents.

Now, let me try to explain how it works. In layman's terms: Freeze them to the ground and hurt them bad with ice spells. Now, how do I do that? Well, the 40/00/21 helps. Mind Mastery increases spell damage by 25% of your Int. Spell Power increases crit damage by 50%. Now, add that with the frost talent Ice Shards for another +100% crit damage. That's 150%. Wow. With the Shatter talent, the crit chance of spells is increased by 50% against frozen targets. What does Ice Lance do? If it crits, it does 3 time the damage. A good crit with Frostbolt will also give out about 3,500 damage with about 1000 spell damage.

PVP anyone? :-P

We'll see what happens but I'll be playing 6 hours a day while my friend will do another 6. He has full rested so it should be going fast. I'd guess 2 weeks.

An Update on Aticus

2008-04-10T22:33:00.003-04:00

Two big news topics: Wrath is in Alpha testing. Rejoice! Secondly, Curt Schilling was on The Instance. I just happened to turn on ustream and I heard his voice and just freaked out! The episode isn't for download yet but once it is up, download it. He's one of the greatest.

Now, Aticus has been very busy over the last week and a half. Things have slowed down (work wise) and I've been able to play in the world of Azeroth for many more hours than I'm used to. I've purchased The Blade Of Wizardry for Aticus because it is a sword made up of pure fire. Was it an upgrade? Not really. My healing went down but my spell damage rose. For solo play, spell damage is a major key to the puzzle. 1200 gold for it on the AH and that did set me back. But, I had the extra cash and I couldn't pass it up. The good news is, after doing dailies for The Shattered Sun, I've gained it all back and more.

I've leveled up my professions up a lot more than they used to. 375 Cooking, 300 Fishing, 290 Skinning, and 246 Mining. I've been talking about doing this for a while and it's a good way to spend my free time after I've done my share of dailies.

Earthen Ring is around 50% done with Phase 3. Pretty sweet. This means, that by the time we hit Phase 4, I will be exalted with The Shattered Sun Offensive! I really want that title "Aticus Of The Shattered Sun" and the tabard. Yeah, I'm a Shattered Sun fanboy. You know, breaking down factions and all that stuff. I'm about 3500-3700 into Revered. Getting about 2500-3000 per day.

By the by, get the food from the vendor there on Quel'Danas. Somewhere around 7500 health and mana in the same food item. Just like the mage's food table but in your backpack. Only 50 silver for 5.

I've also given up on the Naga killing daily on Quel'Danas. The drop rate is too low, the spawn rate is slow, and the siren frostbolting wenches are just annoying. It's not worth my time for just 12 gold.

Oh well. Have a good weekend folks! Be back Monday.

Earthen Ring Wikia

2008-04-07T20:13:00.004-04:00

Not sure if there are any other servers on Wikia but I stumbled across an Earthen Ring server wikia. There's a few players on there who are creating pages for their characters and stories. There's also a list of guilds which will help anyone new to the server or switching factions.

You can check out Aticus' page here. Have fun enjoying his character page. [I must say that there is no relation to my own personal personality. It is fully Role Played]. There will be a bigger update Thursday.

PS: I came across a video game reviewer who is just hilarious. You can watch some video reviews here.

Sunwell Phases Server List

2008-04-03T14:52:00.003-04:00

I hope everyone is enjoying the new Sunwell content. I should have posted about this before, but it slipped my mind. All servers, of course, are trying to unlock the new phases for the island. There is a website, http://us.gorgonnash.info/, which is taking info from each server and making a list of who completed what and where they're at now. It's a great way to see where your server stands.

As figured, most PVP servers are near the bottom. I could only imagine the carnage which is taking place. My server, Earthen Ring, is currently 20th. That's pretty awesome. Proudmoore and Cenarius are in the top 2 and have already hit phase three! I'm sure that by Saturday, my server will be on its way into phase 3. Still no mailbox :-/...

You can help out Gorgonnash by adding their add-on. This will upload the Sunwell info to their website. If you do not see your server up there, install the add-on! Only servers with people who have the add-on will update onto the website. Happy hunting and for a lot of you, enjoy the end of phase 2!

PS: At least 125 servers now have a portal to Sunwell from Shatt. Now, you do not need to go to the flight master.

Brief Description Of A Few Phase 1 & 2 Daily Quests

2008-03-31T00:00:00.004-04:00

After spending a few days playing around in Quel Danas, I have found a new liking to Daily Quests. These quests are easy, simple, and not very time consuming. You can get 8 of them done in less than 2 hours. I'll just go through a few now (excuse me for not remembering the quest names or monster names).

The first two are located by a building near the docks. You need to kill 5 of the big neutral electric things. You can't miss them. After you kill one, press the little item in your bag and that's it. 5 and you're done. The second is killing those power deprived blood elves. Collect 4 blue things from them and zap a red crystal near the docks with the 4. Done and done.

There's a third non-repeatable which will bring you to a big green portal. Tape the teleport scroll and you end up in Hellfire Peninsula. Two quests here. First, you get a non-combat pet. Kill the fire mobs until it becomes big, green, and unstable. You do not need to be in a group. All you need to do is be near someone killing one and you will get credit. Bring it back to the gate near the quest giver to explode it. The second is killing 4 demons, collecting their blood and then using that special stone to suck the power of the elite blood elves around the area. Then kill them without their power. Only 4 kills.

Back to the Sunwell, there's two new quests if you have entered into Phase 2. You will need to kill 6 of either the infernos, demon dread lords, or the 4 armed female demons. Then, next to a big green portal, kill the really big blue guy (described in the quest log) and stick a flag in him. The second quest should be done in a group of 5. It's a bombing quest but the monsters have a lot of HP. The best way is to all fly off at the same time. Bone the hell out of the place. A good group can complete it in one sweep.

There's other quests in Shatt which you can do as well. With all of these quests (and more), I can now see why we now have 25 daily quest slots available. So, get going! Your server needs you help to retake the Sunwell!

More info can be found on WoW Wiki.

Hello 2.4

2008-03-28T11:59:00.001-04:00

First of all, I pity every business man who has to wear a suit everyday of the week to work. I hated it! Sure, I got a lot of complements on looking good but I was so uncomfortable. God, how do you do it? lol. Sorry about yesterday. I had meetings at the CT state capital (which only happens once every couple years).

On Tuesday, March 25th, patch 2.4 went live. On my server, I could not move without disconnecting. Not just on Aticus, but other characters in Outland as well. It wasn't just my server either. My Wednesday morning, everything was fixed. From Shatt, I took the portal to Ironforge where the fightmaster knows a direct route to the island. You can pick up some quests, do a few dailies and run the new 5man and 25man content. I only did 2 dailies and entered into MT.

Now, I thought I was an idiot or rusty because our PUG wiped 3 times. However, after what everyone has said, it seems like this 5man is really hard. So, I fell better :D. There's a lot of mages and they hit hard. CC is very important. We had a mage and a trapping hunter which helped a lot. A 1 minute freezing trap is great.

Now, I think everyone needs to go and get those dailies done because I want next phase and a mailbox! :D

Introducing Iron Dwarves!

2008-03-24T11:16:00.004-04:00

Last week, Blizzard updated the Bestiary for Wrath. They added the Iron Dwarves to the icy mix. Here's the direct quote from the website:

"The Explorers' League has scoured the far corners of the world, seeking to uncover the truth behind the origins of the dwarves. Now it seems they may be one step closer to unlocking the secrets of the past.

The latest clues come from ancient dig sites within the Howling Fjord, where the iron dwarves were first encountered. Etched with runes of power - and with lightning pulsing beneath their thick, metallic skin - they may represent the missing link between the dwarves and the legendary titans of myth. Unfortunately the malevolent iron dwarves have openly defied the Explorers' League and seem intent on destroying any and all artifacts connecting them to the shadowed recesses of history."

Pretty cool in my opinion. I've always liked the dark iron dwarves but now we'll be dealing with 70+ dwarves. I bet all you Horde lovers out there are chomping at the bits to get your hands on some of these little pests ;-). As for me, even as an Alliance player, I still have fun slaying them. The legendary titans kinda gives me an uneasy feeling because now I don't know if they'll be really buffed or not. They are part of Howling Fjord though so maybe they're not as strong as I thought... Oh well. I'm still waiting for more news on the Wendigo and Darkfallen!

Vial Of The Sunwell

2008-03-20T20:42:00.002-04:00

Reading WoW Insider yesterday, I came across a trinket which should help a lot of healers. It's call the "Vial of the Sunwell". This little toy collects 100 points from any holy spell you cast. It will build up to 2000. If you use the trinket's ability, it instantly heals your target for the total collected points. It also has 15mp5 which is pretty good. Because this trinket can crit, I would have liked to have seen +crit instead of the mp5. However, there are Paladins who are having problems with mana.

Here are some extra notes which Heavenfall mentioned on WoWHead:

- The amount of energy you have can be ascertained by the number of stacks the buff has. If you have 10 stacks, you have 1000 energy.
- The buff on yourself that stores the energy lasts 10 seconds
- Using the trinket does not produce a Global Cooldown effect
- The trinket has approximately 10 yards range
- The trinket can be used with 0 energy, and then it heals for 0
- It is not affected by +healing gear
- It can crit

So, with this and the boost to Holy Shock, we Holy Paladins will have some viable instant heals. Every 10 Flash of Lights will make for a 1000 instant heal. The 2 minute cooldown is a real drag... It's just too long and this will make a lot of people cringe at the item. The 10 yard range isn't too hot either. You'll have to run up to the tank to use it.

So, does the instant cast heal out weigh the negatives mentioned above? In my opinion, I would pick it up for Aticus. What about you?

An Alternative MMO: LOTRO

2008-03-17T10:52:00.004-04:00

(actual in-game screenshot)

Happy Saint Patrick's Day to all!

This weekend, I went into the world of J.R.R. Tolkien and the Lord Of The Rings Online. At first, the game seems like it was going to fail. There are only 4 races to choose from: Human, Dwarf, Elf and our beloved Hobbit. Each has its own racial abilities and certain classes to choose from.

Champion - Dual wielding fighter.
Guardian - Tank
Captain - Buffer / Support
Burglar - Rouge / Stealthy Trickster
Hunter - Ranged DSP (no pets)
Minstrel - Singing Healing Class
Lore-Master - A hybrid spell caster and animal tamer.

The character creation is good but not great. It's just your typical creation screens. Entering the world will start a tutorial. You could skip it but it gives you some experience so it's worth it. It really helps newcomers and starts the story. In LOTRO, there are normal quests and story quests. The story quest is one long quest chain that (I believe) goes until you are at least level 50 (max level). In this game, grinding is just not worth it. You get little experience from it compared to just doing the quests. LOTRO gives you a nice supply of quests and you will rarely run out of them. Only once have I completely emptied my normal quest tab. There is one thing that shocked me was bag space. You start with 5 bags with 15 slots each!

One thing that LOTRO has is a fantastic title system. Right from the beginning of the game, you get a title. This is chosen in the character select screen in that you get to pick where you are from. I was Neflight of Gondor cause Gondor is epicly awesome :D. If you don't die before level 5 you get the title The Wary. If you kill enough Black-somethings human gang members, you get Watcher Of Roads.

Combat is simple with spell cool-downs and auto attacks. Death Penalty in this game is loss of health, attack power, and other things. This adds up if you keep dying. You don't run back to your body because you don't really "die" in LOTRO. You just get defeated and taken back to a nearby town.

Lastly, the best this game has to offer is the graphics and sounds. I can't stress this enough: the game is BEAUTIFUL! I have the graphics close to max and I'm in awe 100% of the time. The detail in the grass, the sky, fire, the bags under your enemy's eyes, and the most outstandingly done water effects are truly breath taking. The sounds cut out sometimes which is a major disturbance. If I'm fighting a wolf and the person next to me does a fire spell, the wolf's howl will cut out and all I'll hear is fire burning. That aside, the sounds, when they're full, are fantastic. Fire sounds like fires. When you're running through town, you will hear horses and donkeys walking around, cats meowing, and the town's folk chatting.

Now, if you going to transfer over, please be advised that people do not tolerate immaturity in LOTRO. This game is a Role Playing game. It is also advised that you are familiar with the J.R.R. Tolkien books and lore. I have yet to have seen anyone act out of character. There are advice and out of character channels which are friendly and helpful. If you have a question, just ask and someone will usually respond. There is no need to spam it nor type in all caps. This is really what makes LOTRO amazing. $15 a month fee to play.

As far as I can tell, I'll be suspending my WoW account for the next few months to play this game. However, I will still support the WoW community and report on any game/Paladin news.

Opps... My Bad

2008-03-14T09:07:00.002-04:00

Yeah, I forgot I changed the updates to Monday and Thursday.

Two short things to talk about today. The first is that Blizzard has released 2.4 under the Blizzard download this past week. I recommend downloading the 200+mb file now so you save time on patch day. Expect to see even more downloads coming over the next few weeks because there will still be changes to 2.4.

The other subject is a new video podcast I discovered a few days ago. It's called The MMO Report. Now, some of you do not play other MMOs but for those who do, or even want to learn more about other MMOs, this short video podcast is just for you. It's produced through G4TV and thus, can be assured its production is good. The graphics are decent. They're plain but at least they have depth. The host is very clear in his speech but the humor will make you do many facepalms unless you're a teenager... Then maybe you will laugh. Download it through iTunes.

Over the weekend, I'll be expecting to play Lord Of The Rings Online. That should be monday's update.

An Alternative MMO: City Of Heroes

2008-03-10T23:12:00.002-04:00

So, my adventures this weekend took me to places I have never been before. First, Nova Scotia (which, I have to say, was amazing! I love the oceanfront property and it is one of the places I would like to live someday) and second, City Of Heroes. Being very tired of WoW these last few weeks (burnout), I decided to try out the other MMO that I had in my hand (at my local GameStop) the day I decided to get into WoW. Every-so-often, usually between content patches, I'll take a few weeks off from WoW. I just get bored with doing the same dailies and alts don't help as much as people would think.

The first thing I've noticed with CoH is the character customization. You can make your hero look like your dream super hero. Some examples are: zombies, pirates, android, tights, Matrix-type, and ninja. There are even more choices than this! This is the BEST character creator I have ever seen! And, you can also have over hundreds of color customizations. It is just insane.

After 45 minutes of the character creation screen, you finally have your hero and enter the world. This is where things can go... blah. The movement is very stiff and your UI is big. Now, I'm guessing that there are ways to change this, but to someone who just entered the game, it is very distracting, confusing, and cluttered. Another function is that there's no auto-attack. I have to wait every 1.5 seconds to hit my "brawl" or attack button. Your other skills are used like WoW's skills with cooldowns and are easy to notice.

As you level up, you can put "Enchantments" on your spells. These can vary from more damage, less cooldown, more range, etc. It's like the new profession in Wrath: inscription. There are two ways to gain experience. You can wander around town beating up on gang members who are harassing citizens or you can complete quests that take you into an instance. For example: Go into the office building, arrest (kill) all Thugs and collect the stolen documents.

As for character classes, they are pretty basic.

Blaster = Mage / Ranged DPS
Controller = Crowd Control
Defender = Cleric / Paladin
Scrapper = Rouge with good survivability
Tanker = Your typical tank.

I made two characters so far: A Scrapper and a Tanker. I loved my Scrapper (named Aticus) but he wasn't a super hero. He looked like something from the Matrix. However... my Tanker... SO FUN! This is where the facepalm comes into play. Get ready... my super hero is... The Canadian Brawler! Hey, if the USA can have Captain America, Canada can have The Canadian Brawler :-D

The picture at the top of the post is what he looks like. A giant Maple Leaf on his chest with a red and white suit show his true Canadian pride. He also has a cigar in his mouth cause I like cigars and it makes him look cooler. Hehehe, I like to have fun with my characters. I almost fell out of my chair when my hero lifted his mighty battle axe over his head and yelled "Ohhh Canada!" before slaying the thug. You can choose your battle cry in the character creation screen but I never thought it would as hilarious as it was.

So, in conclusion, it is not the best MMO out there. Lord Of The Rings is better. WoW, LOTR, then CoH would be my top three. And just to let everyone know, I've only played a handful of hours. There could be many more adventures out there. I only took both characters to level 5 (the picture was from yesterday).

Legends May Fall But They'll Never Die If We Remember Them

2008-03-05T19:14:00.006-05:00

Two legends fell yesterday, March 4th. One harder than the other. First, Brett Favre of the Green Bay Packers (National Football League) retired after 255 consecutive games and 17 years in the NFL. He is the definition of a man who loved his job, had fun, and gave inspiration to many quarterbacks and football players alike. All across America and Canada, fans knew how much Brett Favre meant to the game of football. One fan said,

"I've been a Cowboys fan since time began, but this is one sad day in NFL history. Brett Favre was one of the few players in the game that made it worth watching. Though I cringed when you played my 'Boys, you will be greatly missed for the competitive fervor you brought to this sport. Even here in the Lone Star state, we love ya Brett and the game won't be the same without you."

However, the real loss yesterday was of Gary Gygax. He past away yesterday morning. Not only was he one of the creators of Dungeons & Dragons, but he was one of the fathers of the Role Playing / RPG universe we know today. From leveling systems (experience gains for killing monsters) to grinding out better gear, it wouldn't be here if it wasn't for him and his friends.

It seems like God needed a Dungeon Master. Who could ever be better than Gary Gygax?

Rest in peace Gary and thank you.

Question To The Readers (1)

2008-03-03T11:05:00.004-05:00

We all know that there's a little pleasure we get from playing WoW. But, if an MMO came around which was about your favorite thing, would you migrate? My question to the readers today is: What MMO, if they made one, would you quit WoW for?

I know that there are a few which would make me quit. I would quit for a Diablo MMO. Hands.Down. I think if they were to go back to EverQuest graphics and game mechanics, I would still play it.

Another guilty pleasure of mine is Pokemon. After replaying a newly made version of Red, I came to realize how great of an RPG it really is. You just don't get that feeling when you're 12 years old playing it. You are on an epic journey to catch, train, and raise YOUR Pokemon. It just feels like an MMO because you do have the freedom to go anywhere you please and train whatever you want to. There would be no gear to grind for, but the grind would be for money to purchase potions, pokeballs and other trinkets for your Pokemon.

So, what MMO would you quit WoW for?

Crawling Back For My Life

2008-03-01T18:18:00.003-05:00

I'm finally feeling better and getting back to my old routines. Being away from WoW for the last week has been surprisingly fun. I've discovered the Nintendo DS. I've played it before but after actually buying one and playing it on the couch all week, I'm addicted. Mario Party, Animal Crossing and my all time favorite, Uno Skip-Bo & Uno Freefall are all amazing games. Being away also brightened my eyes about how much time and effort goes into this game. 15 hours a week may not seem like much but you really don't realize how long that is once you stop doing it.

But this is a WoW Blog. To be honest, there hasn't be any Holy Paladin news within the last week or so. The only interesting change was to Turn Undead. It is now called Turn Evil which will now effect both Undead and Demons. One rumor is that Alliance Paladins will now be able to get Seal Of Blood and Horde will get Seal Of Vengeance. However, this is just a rumor.

My newest task I set for myself is making a new hunter. I have a level 35 hunter but she has gotten old and I feel like Role Playing a old dwarven hunter named Neflight. I started him a week ago with the idea that he will travel into Wailing Caverns to tame one of the Serpent Pets. That should be fun. They look really cool too!

Unless something major pops up, Monday's post will be a question to the readers.

Blahhhh....

2008-02-26T00:16:00.004-05:00

So... I'm a bit sick. I haven't been playing WoW nor been on the computer the last few days. I don't know when I'll feel better enough to keep updating. Hopefully I'll be better by Thursday or Friday. Sorry guys.

PS: Kudos to Diablo Cody for winning the Oscar for her work on Juno. I'm pretty angry at the Academy for not giving Ellen Page (who played Juno) an award for Best Actress. She really did deserve it.

Paladin: The Jack-Of-All-Trades

2008-02-20T02:07:00.004-05:00

I've been experimenting on different Holy Paladin variations since 2.3 hit. Not just because I was bored, but because I want to be able to make an effective jack-of-all-trades Paladin. Ever since the original Diablo, Blizzard has set the caster-warrior class as a hybrid and I believe a lot of World of Warcraft players do not realize that hybrids are supposed to be able to a little of everything and not be too great at one feat.

Let me explain why I think this:

Back in Diablo, you could have three classes: Warrior, Sorcerer, and Rouge. Most people thought inside the box and played them as they should be... A tank, a mage, and a ranged fighter. However, I took a different route that not many people took and that is a hybrid of the Warrior and Sorcerer. I named him a Spellwarrior. In Diablo, everyone can learn every spell in the game by finding spell books. If you put the right points (str, vit, energy, etc), you could make any class a hybrid. In this case, I put points into Vitality and Energy. I was able to off-tank, heal, do a bit of with crowd control, and damage with this character.

Once Diablo 2 was released, I noticed that they had made a Paladin class which acted a lot like my Spellwarrior. He could give auras which my guy couldn't, but he could do damage, tank, and heal (well, somewhat... not really helpful in this game). I was ecstatic that I finally have a pure character that fit my playstyle.

The same mindset I had with the Diablo series is the same I had when I came into World of Warcraft: Find and play the jack-of-all-trades class. Now, there are a lot of classes in the game which can do this (Druid, Shaman, and Paladin) but Shamans were part of the Horde and I didn't feel like looking at a bear's butt (:P) so I choose the Paladin. Having played the class for over 7 years, it was the right choice and fit into my comfort zone.

Back to the real point of this post:

Time and time again, I see Paladin running around with 61 points into the Ret tree, 61 in Prot, or 50/11/0. These are all fine and great. I will be the last one to tell you how to play your character. However, in the true aspect of the character, I do not believe this was how Blizzard wanted the character played. All three trees were made to support each other: Holy-Prot, Prot-Ret, and Holy-Ret. There are a view out there who even go across the board into all three trees.

I always laughed when I heard a Paladin complain that Ret was weak and they wanted Blizzard to buff Ret Paladins. The bottom of the Ret tree was weak and will always be weak (in my opinion). Under Sanctity Aura, there is only one good talent and that is Repentance. The others are OK but not something that stands out to me.

Having said that, I've tried three different builds that can be deemed jack-of-all-trades. The 40/00/21, the 41/20/00 and the 40/11/10. I'll start in order.

40/00/21: The pure Shockadin build. Most people believe (as I did) that Sanctity Aura was the key for adding DPS. Well, I was wrong and I think a lot of people are still decieved by it (I'll explain why in the next build). What I liked about this build is that you can heal and do grat burst damage. Vindication is now my new favorite Paladin talent. -15% to the target's stats. That's 15% of their base HP and MP gone. The key for a Shockadin is to get your opponent's health down and then burst Hammer Of Justice for the stun, Judged Seal Of Righteousness, Holy Shock and Hammer Of Wrath for a good 2,200-2,700 damage within a matter of seconds. You also get a nice talent called Pursuit Of Justice which can be very helpful while chasing down an opponent or just to be lighter on your feet. This is a good build but it doesn't work as well as I would have liked it.

41/20/00: Another good build. Not as mana efficient as the 40/00/21 though. That is a huge drawback! After 3-4 fights, you will be drinking. I never thought that Benediction (from the Ret tree) was as helpful as I thought. You really do miss something once it's gone. You also lose Vindication. /cry but we can manage without it. There are 3 bonuses with the 20 in Prot though. First is Blessing Of Kings. 10% to all stats! That's an extra 600 HP and MP (for me). Remember Sanctity Aura? Throw it out the window because Kings is the reason why it's not that great. I had found that my spell damage dropped only 30 points! I went 21 points down in Ret for something I could get with 11 in the Prot tree (also the HP and MP boost). The second is the ability to block more damage with Sheild Spec and Redoubt. Third is Improved Concentration Aura. Your cast bar will never be interrupted by damage and an your party's resistance to silence can help in PVP and PVE. Again, the problem was the loss of mana. I did not like all the downtime the build had.

40/11/10: Can this be the jack-of-all-trades build? In my eyes, the answer is YES! You get your normal 40 points of Holy, you get Blessing Of Kings and you get Benediction for Mana with a 8 second cooldown on your Judges. I can main heal, do decent DPS, and off-tank (badly but survivable). Love to solo? This is your build. You can help in many situations. Just make sure you have Stam, Int and spell damage / healing on your gear. It is important to have a high spell damage and balanced HP and MP. I believe mine is around 9,200 health and 9,500 mana, as well as 600 spell damage, 1,100 healing.

The main important thing here is to learn that Paladins can be more than just pure Ret, pure Prot, or pure Holy. You can play as you want but I would try out some of these builds for the fun of it. I would love to try the new Ret Paladin builds but my gear is not set for it and I feel like I would not be successful without proper gear.

After months of research, the 40/11/10 build, in my opinion, is the best Paladin build if you want to heal, do damage and more importantly, solo. If you plan on getting to 80 soloing, I would highly recommend this build.

(This will be my last post until Monday. I have a very busy end of the week ahead of me.)

Rave: Figure Prints

2008-02-18T19:02:00.004-05:00

I always check my email every mid-morning before heading into work. I knew that the Figure Prints drawing was Friday and I figured it would be the same result as always: Sorry but you weren't selected in this month's drawing. However, this was not the case. It just turns out that I was chosen as one of the lucky view to have a Figure Print made of my character!

I was ecstatic. I usually don't get excited over these sorts of things but after my Diablo 2 Hardcore L99 Paladin expired, I realized then that online games do not last. They don't stand the test of time. Eventually, World of Warcraft, as we know it, will cease to exist. This is the perfect opportunity to show my legacy in this game.

Creating a Figure Print is a very simple task. They did a wonderful job on being able to pick your stances and base. All you need to do is type in your character's name and choose a server from the drop down menu. After a minute, Figure Prints will pull up your character from the armory. They give you a few options like 'no cloak', 'no helm', having your weapon out or not, and displaying your tabard (if I remember correctly).

Next, I had to choose a stance. This was time consuming because there are 35+ to choose from. I wanted the Paladin casting stance but my face was buried in my shoulders :D. From bows, to guns, stealth, and blocks. They have everything. I ending up choosing the attack stance because it was centered with the name and it would look better on my coffee table.

Finally, there are three bases you can have your Figure Print stand on. There is a marble stone base, a tiered base and a pile of gold base. I chose the marble base because it looks more Alliance-like.

He is a picture of what it is going to look like...

It's going to cost $99.99 for the figure and $14.99 for the shipping. It will take 30-60 days to receive Aticus in his glass dome. I really can't wait!

What Holy Paladins Have Been Waiting For...

2008-02-15T01:46:00.008-05:00

A buff to Holy Shock! Here's the quote from WoWInsider:

Paladins' Holy Shock damage buffed by about 35%, healing buffed by about 75%. Top rank now deals 721-779 damage or heals for 931-987 (was 530-574 damage or 530-574 healing).

Very nice. As a Shockadin, I am very pleased for this. I know Paladins have been waiting months and months for this buff. With spell damage and healing added, most endgame Paladins should be doing around 1,400-1,500 damage and ~~2,300-2,400~~ 1,800-2,000 healing (un-crit). These are just my guesses. ~~In my opinion, I think this is more getting us ready for Wrath than just setting out a fire.~~ Taking it away from the global cooldown would be surreal and I'm sure it will silence a lot of Paladins out there.

Now, concerning Heal Over Time spells for the Paladin: I've accepted my roll as a one target healer. We're probably never going to get a HOT because that's a Druid's job. Our Flash Of Light is wonderful where it is and Holy Light can have it's drawbacks but it's okay. I would like to see it's mana cost reduced a bit though...

All across the board, patch 2.4 is turning out to be one awesome patch. Once it hits, I'll be switching from my 40/21/0 spec back to 40/11/10. I'm going for that instead of the 40/0/21 because I'm enjoying Blessing Of Kings way too much. That extra 600 health and mana is more helpful than Sanctity Aura. Plus, Kings increases INT which increases crit. I'll sack some damage for HP, MP and crit chance. The only loss would be Vindication. I LOVED this talent while I had it. Because we're made of burst DPS, the less HP an NPC has, the better.

So, I hope you all had a wonderful Valentines Day. I know I did. Now I think I will try to go back to sleep :D

**EDIT, Friday, 2/15, 08, 11:50am**

WoWInsider just reported this morning that there has been a change to the Paladin Arena Season 1 and 2 gear bonus.

[Paladin] Healing arena sets 4-piece bonus changed to "Increases the healing from your Holy Shock spell by 30%" (was "Reduces the cooldown of your Hammer of Justice by 10 sec")

Now, Holy Shock will have a 105% healing buff in 2.4! Amazing! I take back what I said about not putting out the fire.

Kaliri Will Now Properly Attack Us

2008-02-13T22:50:00.003-05:00

It's a sad day for those of us who are still grinding out our Sha'tari Skyguard rep. A little portion of the 2.4 patch notes gained my attention today. Under the section "World Environment": Monstrous Kaliri have learned how to chase players going straight up. Where I am glad the Monstrous Kaliri went to flight school, it is disappointing to know that we will no longer be able to fly straight up and evade their attacks.

I was playing today doing the Skettis' bombing eggs daily when I had to evade one. The Kaliri followed me up pretty high. I looked down as The Postal Services' song "Such Great Heights" started playing. I laughed as the chorus played...

They will see us waving from such great heights /
"Come down now" they'll say /
But everything looks perfect from far away /
"Come down now" but we'll stay.

With all the Kaliri circling below, it was just the perfect situation.

Anyways, enjoy flying high for now but be sure to remember to stay away from them after 2.4. They can daze you and knock you off your mount; leading to either death or a nice swim in the lake below.

I'm Making A Note Here: HUGE SUCCESS!

2008-02-11T18:47:00.000-05:00

Not only is it a huge success that the PTR for 2.4 hit over the weekend but also this: WoW has implemented our Weighted Companion Cube into the Lunar Festival! I was walking around Stormwind when I noticed it yesterday morning and so did some other people who have screen shots of this all over the internet (WoW Insider picked out the best one IMO).

For those who do not know what this Weighted Companion Cube is, it is part of a video game called Portal (part of the Orange Box). On level 17 of this game, you get a Weighted Companion Cube to help you along through the level. If you haven't played it, I highly recommend it. Pick it up on Steam or purchase the Orange Box. Also, the title of today's post is from the ending credits song called "Still Alive." You can search for the song on YouTube.

Now, in WoW, you can't touch it, pick it up, or throw it into an incinerator (some people want to throw it into the Great Forge in Ironforge). It kind of makes me sad. I want it as a friend. Imagine having one as a non-combat pet? They already says "So-and-So's Companion". It would be cool to have it say "Weighted Companion Cube // Aticus' Companion." Hey, I can dream.

In any case, I had a long post about the Lunar Festival planned out but I saw this and HAD to post about it. Thank you Blizzard!

Upper Deck Announces The World Of Warcraft Miniatures Game!

2008-02-08T21:20:00.000-05:00

This past week, Upper Deck Entertainment released its newest game: Warcraft Minis! "World Of Warcraft Miniatures Game" features little figures, much like Warhammer, but already painted. It looks like you and your friends will be able to play one character, an entire group of characters against each other, or fight againstraid bosses (they've already announced Onyxia).

You can get a prebuilt starter set for two players, a Deluxe Starter Set, or booster packs. In these sets, you can play as three factions: Alliance, Horde, or Monsters. Come on... you all know you want to play as the Murlocs (which I HOPE they will create). There will also be figures for each race and class! I am guessing, for example, that there will be 9 warriors for each of their respected races. How cool is that?

My one major question is: Can this be playable by picking up your starter, reading a few pages of rules and jumping right in or will we be having our heads spinning at the difficulty? I hope they make the game easy to play so those non-WoW players can just sit down, read a few pages of rules and jump right into the experience. Many friends of mine do not play WoW but we've been looking for a Warcraft related thing outside of the video game to play. We thought about the RPG board game but it seemed too complicated for the average Joe and the trading cards can get expensive.

I really wish this is a game where you have 5 people over the house and 4 know the game, you can teach that fifth player in a matter of a few minutes. What they should have is a little card board cheat sheet with spells and stats (with descriptions! Ex: Flash Of Light / Costs 150 Mana / Heals a player for 500 Health). Maybe something where each player can buy a starter set, have a 5 man instance or something. This way, each player can learn their class (much like the game). Time will tell because the full website will be released on April 20, 2008 with an expected release in the Fall.

You can view their website at WoWMinis.com or the fansite WarcraftMinis.com

Cool Quests: Take Down Tethyr! [Alliance]

2008-02-06T22:16:00.000-05:00

I was running around Dustwallow Marsh today with my Priest when I stumbled upon a little, very fun, quest chain with a very satisfying ending. It took me to the lighthouse right next to Theramore Isle. After collecting 4 oils for the lighthouse, I received a book which took me to the Artisan Fishing Trainer. I then had to coat myself with fish guts so I can attract a shark to me. Finally, after doing that, I found myself back in Theramore. This time though, once I accepted the quest, the skies got black and this massive black sea creature entered the docks.

It's name is Tethyr and it looks like a Dinosaur Naga-Murlock thing. You cannot kill it at your level. It is ?? at level 35. However, you have cannons to help you. It takes 10 shots to kill him while he tries to cast Water Gun on you; leaving a knock-back effect on you. The catch: The 12 Archers which are helping you can be killed and you need to defeat Tethyr before all 12 die.

It's a very easy quest chain but it gives you that "Whoa!" feeling. Go check it out if you haven't experienced the new 2.3 Dustwallow Marsh content.

Burnout

2008-02-01T15:27:00.000-05:00

Have you ever experienced a time when you just woke out of bed one morning and decided that you did not want to play a video game anymore? It happens to a lot of casual gamers who are on the threshold of hardcore. Sometimes they just want to go and push themselves towards a goal (ie: Beating an FPS, getting level 40 and a mount, etc) only to find that when they reach that goal, the game is no longer fun to play. This has been labeled "Burnout". That usually subsides after a few days or a week and the person goes back to their normal gaming routine.

There's a few ways to deal with burnout. I find the most handy technique is to get together with some friends or family for dinner. It brings you away from the game and lets your mind rest by not thinking about it for a day. If you were grinding out those levels to get to 40 (or even 1-70), then a good long break will suit you. In this case, then find a TV show you enjoy and buy the DVD Boxset/s. Pick up a good book; one that suits your liking. You'll be amazed how far you can get by reading one good book. Another option is to spend some time volunteering at a local organization or church. Businesses are always looking for an extra hand. Pay a visit to your Park & Rec and ask if they have a list of places you can go volunteer. You can really fill in your normal gaming hours with volunteering hours.

One last solution is to take a break before the burnout happens. This can be done by devoting a few days a week to any of the suggestions listed above. Slowly cutting down your hours is the most effective way to stop the burnout before it hits.

Have you ever experienced a burnout? Share you story in the comments and if you have any other tips, please feel free to leave them as well.

Reins of the Riding Talbuk

2008-01-30T12:03:00.000-05:00

Here's another tip post but this one is for my second favorite mount in the game (besides the Spectral Tiger): The Talbuk! First, you need to be exalted with Kurenai (Alliance) and Mag'har (Horde). You also need to be at least level 60. However, doing this at level 60 is almost impossible without some help. Ideally, you should wait until level 65.

There's three ways to gain rep with your faction. The first is to complete all the quests with that faction. Secondly, you need to grind out ogres... lots of ogres. My choice is the Warmaul clan's ogres. They have a 35% chance to drop Netherweave Cloth and a 33% chance to drop Obsidian Warbeads. These beads will be your life-saver! If you turn in 10 of these beads, you will get 500 rep.

There's four different colors to choose from: Cobalt, Tan, White and Silver. I picked the Cobalt one. There's also a black one you can get by doing the Halaa PVP. There's the normal 60% mount and the epic 100%. There is no difference in speed from your normal mounts back in Azeroth.

To be honest, it is the easiest faction grind in Outland and the reward is pretty cool. Just buy some food, some water, and spend a few days over in the beautiful zone, Nagrand.

Hunter Pets: Gotta Catch 'Em All?

2008-01-28T00:52:00.001-05:00

[Many people have already beaten the topic of the Ghost Wolf Hotfix to death but when Hunters interrupt my Trade channel while I'm trying to post my enchanting job, then I have a problem.]

The recent Ghost Wolf hotfix has stirred up the WoW community for the last few weeks. Mostly, the Hunters have been complaining that now they've waisted their time leveling up, gearing up, etc, to get this one pet. I understand the bragging rights to show this pet off in towns is/was great but there's really no value other than that.

The Ghost Wolf is part of the Wolf family of pets. My understanding is that there's no difference other than appearance with that one particular wolf. Therefore, you don't gain anything other than bragging rights. With me, I'm very content with my polar bear pet [RP reasons] and soon to get a kitty.

When I see a Ghost Wolf in the world, I say to myself "Oh, that's nice" and move on with my day. If you hunters want me to spend 1 second of the day thinking about you and your "uberness", then I suggest you seek help. If you want people to awe over your uberness, then go pick up some other rare items: Bear Mount out of Zul'Aman, full Season 3 gear, or that beeping beep beep beep Azure Whelpling non-combat pet!

(Yeah, I'm still grinding that one out...)

Blizzard can do what they wish. Just because a Blue stated that it wasn't going to change, doesn't mean anything. If his/her boss says take away, they're going to save their job and take it away. What probably happened was, the Blue's boss said it's okay to tell them that they're not going to take it away. Then, the Blue's boss' boss might have a different opinion and tell them to take it away.

Look, I'm sorry that you've wasted your money on gear that you might not ever use anymore. However, to those people who have said that they've wasted their time leveling a hunter or to go as far as canceling their account, I have no remorse. In fact, go ahead and cancel your account because the other 9.99 million people who play the game will enjoy one less player flooding the forums and Trade Chat with complaints.

Rant: Quest Object Ninjas

2008-01-25T20:06:00.000-05:00

I'm going to blow off some steam now from the last few days. I've played Alliance for the last 2 years and rarely do I ever experience ninjas stealing quest items. However, over the last few days, I've experienced at least 8 quest ninjas!

For those who do not know who quest ninjas are, they are players who run in and take your glowing piece of paper or plant while you're fighting right next to it or are eating by it.

Maybe it is a Horde thing. Maybe it's the people who play on the Blood Furnace server. I have no idea. I've rarely had this experience on Earthen Ring (a handful of times over the years) but I /spit on anyone who does this. It is just not fair (or ethical for that matter) to see someone fighting mob/mobs next to a quest object and you just run in and steal the item. I had this happen to me today in Ghostlands: I'm fighting the Night Elves trying to get three pieces of paper. This low level pulls 4-6 elves towards me (trying to run away maybe?) and dies. I now somehow gain aggro while trying to pick up the paper. Now, I die, and some other person watches me die then takes the quest item. I understand that if I'm dead then you can take the item but he could have helped and both of us wouldn't have died.

I've counted it up. 8 times in two days playing my Blood Elf Mage. All of them are different people. As I stated: It could just be the Blood Furnace server. It could just be PVP servers in general. I guess I'm just asking people to be more courteous to other players and stop being so selfish!

"Do onto others as you would yourself."

Hi. I'm Aticus and I'm a Switcher

2008-01-23T22:24:00.000-05:00

Some friends of mine have decided to roll one Horde character on another server. Talk about being random. I was somehow dragged into this. I would rather be leveling my Priest but I figured that it can't hurt to try it out. We all rolled Blood Elves.

Wait wait wait. Hold on a moment. What?!

For those who don't know... I LOATH Blood Elves. To my core. For some reason, ever since they implemented BE's into the game, I've always been ghanked by them in Battlegrounds. Not just one but two or three at a time. I have all BE's on "Kill On Sight".

But in any case, I sucked it up and rolled a BE Mage cause I did not want to miss out on any of the new quests from BC. And so a Mage, Paladin, Priest and Rouge all set out on an adventure to a complete opposite world. I have to admit, it was different and a real shock. It is like I just purchased a new game. The quests are great, simple, and self-explanatory.

The true awe is the landscape. It is some of the most beautiful buildings and lands I have seen in the game. It doesn't beat Nagrand's beauty but it sure it special. Everything is very bright which sort of misdirects the true scenario concerning the BE's situation about their addiction to Magic. Murder's Row is more of the scene I thought Silvermoon would be like.

The true test will come once we experience contested zones (we rolled on a PVP server instead of our normal RP server Earthen Ring). I don't know how I will react to fighting the Alliance. Even General Chat is pretty rough about how everyone hates the Alliance. It's just weird to me. I have always been bipartison concerning the Horde. I will /wave as I run by them (Not BE's though ;-) ), and will only fight if attacked. Whenever an Alliance player is corpse camping a Horde, I will always ask that player to stop. Usually I get called a Horde lover and laughed at but a thanks for them Horde player always eases me.

It should be a fun experiment but I will still play Alliance at my home on Earthen Ring.

The Hunt for an Azure Whelpling

2008-01-21T19:28:00.001-05:00

Of all the non-combat pets I decided to get, I had to pick the rarest one... /epic fail. Last week, I took my Paladin out to go and farm the Azure Whelpling (cause Earthen Ring's AH price is around 350-550g). Little did I know that it is a 1:1500 ratio (give or take a few hundred). Most have said that you are 99% guaranteed to get one if you kill 2000.

In any case, the mobs are level 50-54 elites. For you Paladin's out there, put on Cold Resistance aura! At level 70, you will rarely get hit with any frost attack. I never have to heal myself and if I do, it's a Flash. Next, make sure you have a good mana pool or bring a lot of water. I've run through over 100 purified dren drinks and that is trying to preserve mana. I can kill about 7-10 in between drinks. What I've done is set up a guy in any Outland inn to buy and mail out water if you run out.

If anyone wants to start enchanting from 150-300, this is the place to farm for greens. I've gained at least 70g in disenchanting materials. I am now set up from 225-275 (minimum). Also, each mob drops about 5-25s which adds up. I've farmed about 150g in just cash drops.

Without a real counter, I would guess I've killed over 1,000. Numerous greens, one blue, 150g but still no Azure Whelpling. I'm not giving up yet though! Once I get it, you'll know ;-)

Rave: Blizzard Downloads and Copytrans

2008-01-20T00:04:00.000-05:00

As my previous post said, my laptop died on me. I did an overnight defrag, rebooted and a piece of my raid was deleted. In other words, I had to do a system recovery. I lost everything (band songs, videos, pictures, notes, etc) but I was able to get my music off my iPod thanks to the third party program Copytrans. Well worth the $20 price tag! I was able to one click my music back on my computer without losing a single file.

Now, back to World of Warcraft. I dug out my WoW CDs and ran the install. The problem I had though was that I downloaded the Burning Crusade from Blizzard instead of buying it. The worst part was the CD key was on the laptop [when it crashed] as a HTML file. My luck turned when I went onto Blizzard's site. I was able to download the client and install the Burning Crusade without any problems!

Props to you Blizzard for aiding your customers with an easy install.

I should return with more posts within the next few days. Once this all settles down and I start playing again.

Error Laptop Failure

2008-01-18T23:36:00.000-05:00

My laptop died on me yesterday and thus, I will not be able to post until it is fixed. Hopefully I will get windows installed tomorrow. I'll post by the end of the weekend.

Fallen Gamers.

2008-01-15T20:04:00.000-05:00

Usually, I'll post every 2-3 days, but WoW Insider had a post today which caught my attention. You can view it here first before reading on.

Whenever we know someone who has past away, it's very difficult to understand how we feel or what we should do. I too have lost a fellow gamer a very long time ago. She was killed by a drunk driver. The close group of us all came to Connecticut to the wake. It was bitter-sweet because she brought us all together for the first time even though it was somber event...

A suggestion I had was to place a memorial in Stormwind City and Orgrimmar. Make it a book, a stone slab, or a special room devoted to our fallen gamers. Put their character name, real name (if given permission), favorite zone, DoB/DoD, and maybe a little phrase they used to say or quote.

This may sound harsh but I don't think they should be putting in NPCs for our fallen gamers. There's 9 million players out there, maybe 50 of them pass away each year. It may not sound like much but that is a lot of NPCs to create...

This is why I believe that a memorial is a better idea. We don't make statues for every fallen soldier. We put their name on a wall and that, in my eyes, is honorable. Please Blizzard, I really want to see this memorial.

So You're Thinking About Getting A Flying Mount?

2008-01-14T18:23:00.001-05:00

After a year of the Burning Crusade, I have finally gathered enough gold to get my Flying Mount! I was a little sceptical at first. 1,000 gold just to be able to fly around in Outland? And that is for the slow mount... My friends told me not to get it. Their argument was that gold could be used better for professions. To give them props, they are right; it could have been used on my Tailoring/Enchanting Priest. However, after my last Nagrand farm run... the Flying Mount was worth it!

First of all, with Crusader Aura, it makes it fly faster and I never realized it until I threw it on. The 20% helps. Also, I never realized how much easier it is running through the zone. You have so many obstacles (such as lakes, rivers, and mountains) that get in your way which takes time to get around. One more great thing which I never thought of before getting the mount was all the trash mobs which I just fly right over! I wanted to go to Warmaul hill to summon Gurok. Having already had enough skulls, I just flew right over the mountain and found the summoning circle; bypassing all the ogres.

Another way Flying Mounts help is when you're trying to get your Mining and Herbalism up from 300-375. You can just put on your track, drop down to the node/flower, remount and move on. The last thing I have experienced is PVPing with the Flying Mount. It's very fun to fly around, see someone flagged and ghank them. What can I say? I need to have a little fun :-).

Now, this is going to cost you. Around 800 gold for the riding skill and 200 for the mount. For the casual gamer, that is a lot of money. Some people farm for Primals and others farm for Netherweave Cloth (my personal choice) to be able to afford the mount. Good news is, it is looking like we'll be able to use Flying Mounts in the later portions of Northrend. We've heard stories of blue dragon mounts. My guess would be that once you hit 80, you can automatically use your mount.

Podcasts: A Way To Increase Your Knowledge Of The Game

2008-01-11T19:54:00.000-05:00

I've been home sick with a cold for the last few days and I started getting caught up with my Podcasts. Podcasting is one of the ways where I get my information on World Of Warcraft. After a few months of playing World Of Warcraft, I started to listen to Podcasts (WoW, Football, Gaming, etc). However, most of the Podcasts I listened to were about World Of Warcraft. I found it great that I can play a game and listen to people talk about the game at the same time. After I started listening, my views and overall look about the game increase greatly. I knew nothing about the game beside my Paladin and the zones I have already leveled in.

I have a few websites listed on this blog to my favorite Podcasts. But, I will give you a little review about my top 3 favorites.

3. WoW Insider Show

This Podcast is hosted by numerous people from WoWInsider.com. This Podcast is going to be the most informative Podcast about World Of Warcraft. They cover all topics about the game. The only problem with this Podcast that there is too much variety. I never really know what I am going to listen to. However, what they do produced is great and it will surely keep you informed about the game; every aspect of the game. Check them out over at www.WCRadio.com.

2. World Of Warcast

World Of Warcast is hosted by Starman and Renata. This Podcasts covers endgame raiding, news, mods of the cast and more. This was my first Podcast. As a newbie, it was difficult to follow along at first but I quickly gained some knowledge of what they were talking about. They go in depth about news and their experiences. Well worth it if you know a bit about endgame WoW. They update about once every 2 weeks. Check them out at www.worldofwarcast.com

1. The Instance

The Instance is hosted by Scott Johnson and Randy Deluxe. This Podcast gives you a sense of two regular guys just talking about WoW. Personally, this is my all time favorite Podcast. They talk about all sorts of topics about WoW including mid-level content, new content, classes, news, PVP tips, mods, and much more! My favorite part is when they answer questions from the public. They are very precise in their answers. Their segments include: News Of The Week, Rumors & Skuttlebutt, Drop Of The Week, and Town Cryer. Also included are Mean Gene's PVP Tip and Patrick's Mod Of The Week. They have a new Podcast up just about every week (about every 8 days according to Scott). Go check them out at www.theinstance.net.

One last thing... WoWRadio host many shows about World Of Warcraft. If you have the time, check them out too.

Here is a short list of other WoW Podcasts I listen/listened to:

Taverncast (retired from WoW)
Titan (Returning soon. WC Radio)
Casually Hardcore
Analog Hole Gaming (Mature Audiences)

I use iTunes for my Podcasts and I recommend it for everyone!

(I am not doing this for these podcasters. I do this on my own accord.)

Battleground Gear & Tips To Get Season 1 Gear For Your 70

2008-01-09T22:12:00.001-05:00

Since before the Burning Crusade, I have played countless numbers of Battlegrounds (BGs). Grinding out my Grand Marshal (GM) gear was a pain and took many weeks of endless grinding. However, that gear helped me all the way through level 67 and even at 70, I still had a handful of GM gear that I was still using. I heard that Blizzard was making Season 1 (S1) Arena Gear available for honor in the BGs. I then started to grind out more honor for that gear.

Remember: I never group. No raids, no instances, no group quests (unless I can solo it).

When Patch 2.3 hit the live realms, I already had enough marks and honor to get 4 out of 5 pieces of S1. Instantly, I noticed a huge difference! It almost doubled my health and mana, my healing skyrocketed and my spell damage increased slightly. I never knew how grand Resilience can help you in PVP. I played some more to finish the S1 set and also the Vindicator's Boots.

After all of that, I have three words to say: Well worth it!

Now, how should you go about grinding out your S1 gear? First and foremost, you should get some background of the BGs themselves. You're going to need to play all of the BGs to gain the marks cost. Here are some websites if you never entered into a BG before:

Alterac Valley
Warsong Gulch
Arathi Basin
Eye of the Storm

On a side note, WOWWiki is my number 1 resource for WOW Info. If I have any questions about an item, a mod, or zone, WOWWiki is where I go. Highly recommended!

So, now you know what you need to do to play these BGs. Figuring you're 70 (or late 60s), you should head over to your Champions' Hall (Alliance) or Hall Of Legends (Horde) and write down how much honor and marks you will need in total to purchase your gear. You might get shocked by the total but that's the fun of the PVP grind... Well, not really but try to stay happy about it.

The best way to get honor is to grind out in Alterac Valley (AV). You can gain an easy 300 honor per 20 minutes. If you win, it is about 450 honor. Also, a little trick I learned is to stay on defense when you play AV. You can easily get honor kills. As a Holy Paladin, my healing kept many other defenders alive. Sure, I died a lot but it is worth it.

Playing the other BGs, to me, is a horrible grind. AB can take 30 minutes a match for little honor. Playing for 30 minutes and getting 1 mark of honor is a knife in my heart. My way of handling this grind was to play 1 AV right when I log on, 2 BGs of your choice, then go back to AV for the rest of your playing session (I would say 1 session would be 2-4 hours for the average player). It spaced out the grind and helped not only gain marks but also a good 1200+ honor.

S1 gear is just like having Tier 4 gear (GM gear is equal to Tier 2). It has helped me a lot and should help all of you. If Wrath comes out next Christmas, those with S1 gear will be all set to get out there and quest to your heart's desire!

(To look at S1 gear for your class, visit WOW's website Here)