Thanks to my guild needing a healer and two level 80 characters from Wrath, I haven’t had the opportunity to create my tanking worgen warrior yet. This means that I’ve so far missed out on the Victorian starting area of the wolf-men, which is something I desperately want to experience to see how Blizzard has grown and matured at story telling during the opening minutes of an avatar’s life.
When I was compiling that little list of Blizzard’s extensive Expanded Universe, the company so timely released a new short story to the world, Genn Greymane: Lord of his Pack (PDF sans some art). It’s certainly no novel, but at a healthy 25 printed pages, it’s enough content and lore to fall under The Novel Post’s umbrella. Continue Reading
One seemingly small change coming soon in Patch 4.0.6 has been stirring up a lot of debate.
The removal of the requirement that a player must discover a dungeon’s entrance before they may queue for it from the dungeon finder has a lot of people flustered.
And I can see why. Back in May when WoW developers announced that this requirement would be coming in Cataclysm, most players seemed pleased. There were a lot of positives to consider.
The requirement would encourage exploration of new zones and therefore the questing and lore that encompass the areas around them; players would be more likely to know the way from the spirit healer back to the dungeon entrance, in the case of an untimely wipe; and the dungeon finder would potentially have fewer players joining randoms for dungeons that they had never before encountered.
But along with those positives also came scheming for how the new system could be used to a player’s benefit.
All around the WoW community, as the news spread, one other potential benefit of the system became obvious — players could use the system to opt out of the dungeons that weren’t as quick or easy as they would like; that didn’t have the rewards they were looking for; or that, for whatever reason, they didn’t want to encounter. By simply not discovering those locations, a player would never have to worry about entering a less than ideal dungeon again. They could eliminate the potential of an Oculus 2.0. — or, in this case, The Stonecore.
Sure, why not? Why not optimize fun levels while playing? I’ll tell you why. Continue Reading
Update: As of Patch 4.0.6, players will no longer be required to find a dungeon’s location in order to queue for it. Why? Take a look at our analysis of the subject for more. Until then, scroll on for our handy dandy dungeon location guide.
In the latest expansion of World of Warcraft, Blizzard changed how queuing up for dungeons work. You have to discover the entrance to be able to queue up from anywhere using the Looking For Dungeon tool. This threw many people for a loop, not knowing where an instance entrance is. That’s where Lore Hound plays their helping hand. Below is a compiled list of the new Cataclysm 5-mans with screen-shots of the location, the level range, and a short description of the instance.
Location: Blackrock Mountain, Searing Gorge/Burning Steppes. Head towards the Blackrock Spire entrance portal, and take a right. Follow the hallway and take the first left. Follow this path until there’s a fork going left down a walkway, and straight upwards. Take a right down the path (or jump, for those daredevils out there) and take another right. Voila. Alternatively, take the Mole Machine from Finkle.
Description: It is a series of tunnels created by Twilight’s Hammer clan in order to gather the remaining Ragnaros’ minions and transport them back and forth to Mount Hyjal, as well as to perform horrific experiments conducted by the nihilistic cult in order to use the essence of the dragon in order to transform the worthy into dragonspawn.
Some transitions happen faster than you realize. It was only a couple of weeks ago that the first Goblins and Worgen appeared as playable characters in World of Warcraft.Those first couple of days, when not soaking up questing goodness, I was oohing and ahhing at the new additions to the WoW family.
I was still caught by surprise at seeing their little toons running around Azeroth, even though I had known for more than a year that they soon would be arriving as playable characters. I marveled at their cute green features and furry snarls as they sought to complete questing of their own. Between logins on my main, I made a few versions of the new guys, although never logging in with them, simply to get more of the character creation process. And you know I couldn’t get enough when I saw the first in-game versions of their /dances.
And almost as suddenly, the novelty wore off. After running PUGs with cutesy goblins who don’t know crap about how to play — I suppose it dawned on me that they are just as fallible as everyone else who’s playing. If not, even moreso at this point.
I don’t know why, exactly I didn’t realize it to begin with. Continue Reading
Just because I know a good portion of our audience followed us from our previous digs, I know a lot of you also probably watch or would watch the Totally Rad Show. Some of you may even be members of the Totally Rad Guild along with our own Mr. Juggynaut. Personally, I’m an occasional watcher, and was totally pulled in by today’s episode.
Below, you can watch for yourself as hosts Alex Albrecht, Jeff Cannata and Dan Trachtenberg take on WoW: Cataclysm and talk through their experiences with the new content. It may not be anything super new or unexpected for those of us here who also play, but nevertheless I find it interesting to see their takes on coming back to the game after a break from playing. And if you’re not a WoW player, take a look and see what you think!
Topics covered include: questing, starting zones, the grind to level 80, the dungeon finder, dungeon difficulty and the clarity of the game’s overall direction. Includes a couple of spoilers, so beware if you haven’t gotten through the new zones yet.
The Shattering is upon us. In the coming weeks, thousands of alts will be made as members of the dirty Horde and heroic Alliance to experience all the changes. Quest design, zone design, progression, flow, old-world dungeons — there’s an obtuse amount of adjustments coming thanks to Deathwing. With the influx of characters, players may want a refresher on exactly what the hell is going on for different races at the very early stages of WoW.
Due to the very nature of the early levels – how speedily we get out of them – it makes sense that Blizzard didn’t spend an obscene amount of time creating memorable stories. Why invest money into something that players will complete in a few hours? To leave a good impression on new characters of course! Blizzard has given starting areas more depth since vanilla WoW, but even the untouched zones still contain a sense of cohesion in the opening territories of the game. Continue Reading
The holidays are upon us already, and it’s that time of year that we all sit back and reflect upon that for which we are thankful. And then drink in merriment.
This week, as Americans (even those of us on the other side of the globe) roast turkeys then run the gauntlet of Black Friday crazyness, and as in another part of the world, the Christmas markets open to the masses, I’m starting to feel warm and fuzzy inside already.
Which is why in this post, I’ve decided to reflect upon only the good things that are coming our way inWorld of Warcraft, and some which have arrived already. Luckily, with Cataclysmjust around the corner, there’s a lot to be thankful for at this particular moment in-game.
And although we may not be thankful that maintenance has been extended (currently set to end at 5 p.m. PST ie past my bedtime), we can still have some fun anticipating what’s to come. In fact, what BETTER time than now to let the lovefest begin!
I am thankful for:
Holiday deals — If you want to grab a spare copy of WoW (or 5), are looking into recruiting a friend or even are looking for gift ideas, the World of Warcraft, The Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Lich King each are now on sale both in the U.S. and in the EU. Pick up all three for a cool $20, €20 or £16.00.
The Shattering – We’ll see if my good vibes on this one wear off after post-patch mayhem, but as of now I am ridiculously excited to cruise around and get to know the new Azeroth, even in the places that it is “shattered” beyond recognition.
The guild perks system — from mount speed bonuses to auctioneering awesomeness to mobile banking to the all powerful mass resurrection, Cataclysm‘s guild perks system is looking quite tasty. You can bet Mordil isn’t the only one with high expectations for the system.
New playable races — Worgen and Goblin goodness is just around the corner. Whether you’re planning to roll one from the start or focus on your beloved main, we’ll have plenty of fun stuff to keep us entertained, and that’s also thanks to the… Continue Reading
Less than three weeks remain until the release of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, and now’s the time that I’ve been starting to think about what my play priorities will be once the expansion hits. Certainly, rolling a goblin or worgen, maybe both, will be on my immediate to-do list, and I’m sure it’s something most players will look into at one point or another.
So what do you need to know before getting started? Well, there have been a few announcements in the past couple of weeks that definitely may change your options and play experience. Let’s take a look.
First off, there’s the recruit-a-friend bonus. You bring a friend on-board to play (or create a second account and dual-box it up), and score a 300% XP bonus along with grantable levels. This method will be availableto worgen and goblin.
Lylirra on Recruit-a-Friend in Cataclysm
New goblin and worgen characters will indeed be eligible for Recruit-A-Friend benefits including increased experience gain and grantable levels. As we’ve no current plans to modify the Recruit-A-Friend program at this time or increase the level range for which the benefits apply, goblin and worgen characters (as with all other characters) will only be able to receive the in-game bonuses up to level 60.
…Please keep in mind, as well, that there will be no Realm First achievements associated with leveling characters of a specific race, so this will not place goblin or worgen characters at any sort of unique advantage.
That’ll speed up your questing experience considerably. But if you want to skip ahead to begin with, there’s also the paid race change, which also will be available from the start.
Click through for the detailed announcement and analysis. Continue Reading
