Blizzard clarifies arena tie-break

There has been an excellent thread running in the EU forums laying out constructive criticisms of the new arena tie-break system. This system, if you hadn't heard, introduces a new buff called "The Crowd Chose You!!!" which will be applied to one team or another based on two criteria: the team with the largest number of players alive, and the team that brought an enemy player closest to death. Blizzard EU Community Manager Taepsilum posted in the thread to clarify that this is still very much in iteration, and to calm the fears of the posters, but a couple of great points were brought up.

Firstly, if one team gets an enemy player to repeatedly low health percentages, for example, they get a mage to 10% then to 5% then to 8%, but their opponents get one of them to 2%, do their opponents win? It sounds, from reading about the system, like the team that got the player to 2% would emerge victorious, but this seems a little counter-intuitive. Another great question is whether the health for the calculation is percentage based or numerical. Percent would make more sense, it seems. Hit the break for Taepsilum's post.

TaepsilumThere are some very good points being brought up in here, particularly the dispute between the "frequency in which each team gets someone from the other team close to death during the course of one game" Vs "how close to death the enemy was".

Some solutions could encourage turtling and we have to pay attention to that.
On the other hand, we also don't want to change players' behaviour too much because of this, for example, some healers might stop feeling comfortable playing at low health in order to keep the pressure on the other team during certain moments, and paladins/spriests/mages/hunters/rogues won't wait so long before they bubble/block/deterrence/vanish, etc...

Who should win between a team that nearly kills their opponent 20 times during one single match and a team that leaves their opponent at 1 HP and plays defensively during the rest of the game?
Maybe there could be a mix between both variables with some weight applied to each of them.

We'll make sure to share the potential issues you brought up with the devs, there are many solutions available to break ties and it's possible that we end up seeing some iteration on this.

Tags: arena, arena-guide, arena-strats, arena-tie-break, arena-tiebreak, arena-tips, arenas, breaking, featured, guide, how-to-play-battlegrounds, how-to-pvp, pvp-guide, tie-break, wow-arena, wow-arena-guide, wow-guide

Filed under: PvP

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Blizzard clarifies arena tie-break

There has been an excellent thread running in the EU forums laying out constructive criticisms of the new arena tie-break system. This system, if you hadn't heard, introduces a new buff called "The Crowd Chose You!!!" which will be applied to one team or another based on two criteria: the team with the largest number of players alive, and the team that brought an enemy player closest to death. Blizzard EU Community Manager Taepsilum posted in the thread to clarify that this is still very much in iteration, and to calm the fears of the posters, but a couple of great points were brought up.

Firstly, if one team gets an enemy player to repeatedly low health percentages, for example, they get a mage to 10% then to 5% then to 8%, but their opponents get one of them to 2%, do their opponents win? It sounds, from reading about the system, like the team that got the player to 2% would emerge victorious, but this seems a little counter-intuitive. Another great question is whether the health for the calculation is percentage based or numerical. Percent would make more sense, it seems. Hit the break for Taepsilum's post.

TaepsilumThere are some very good points being brought up in here, particularly the dispute between the "frequency in which each team gets someone from the other team close to death during the course of one game" Vs "how close to death the enemy was".

Some solutions could encourage turtling and we have to pay attention to that.
On the other hand, we also don't want to change players' behaviour too much because of this, for example, some healers might stop feeling comfortable playing at low health in order to keep the pressure on the other team during certain moments, and paladins/spriests/mages/hunters/rogues won't wait so long before they bubble/block/deterrence/vanish, etc...

Who should win between a team that nearly kills their opponent 20 times during one single match and a team that leaves their opponent at 1 HP and plays defensively during the rest of the game?
Maybe there could be a mix between both variables with some weight applied to each of them.

We'll make sure to share the potential issues you brought up with the devs, there are many solutions available to break ties and it's possible that we end up seeing some iteration on this.

Tags: arena, arena-guide, arena-strats, arena-tie-break, arena-tiebreak, arena-tips, arenas, breaking, featured, guide, how-to-play-battlegrounds, how-to-pvp, pvp-guide, tie-break, wow-arena, wow-arena-guide, wow-guide

Filed under: PvP

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Blizzard confirms WoW account hacks, issues warning on security

WoW Insider reported on this over the weekend, and Blizzard has now confirmed that there has been a security issue with the Mobile Auction House. Blizzard EntertainmentThere's been a recent increase in unauthorized World of Warcraft account-logins via our website and the World of Warcraft mobile armory app.

We're in the process of notifying any account holders who were not using an authenticator and whose account showed signs of unauthorized access (e.g., logging in from an unusual IP address). If you are among this group, you will receive an email describing how to reset your account.

As a result of these activities, access to the World of Warcraft auction house via the mobile app has been taken off-line temporarily. Upon request, our customer support team will restore in-game items and gold for any accounts impacted.

While no means of account security is guaranteed, every precaution you take to secure your computer and your account-including changing your password periodically-adds another defensive barrier. We strongly encourage everyone to take a few moments to read through the security tips available on our support website and follow the suggestions posted there.

As we mentioned in the original article, a GM had recommended the addition of SMS Protect to further secure accounts, and using unique passwords for your battle.net account. Also, running virus scans, keylogger scans, and malware scans is an excellent practice.Tags: breaking, hack, hacking, mobile-armory, mobile-armory-auction-house, mobile-auction-house

Filed under: Account Security

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Blizzard will be at San Diego Comic-Con

Blizzard Entertainment announced today that they will have a presence at this year's San Diego Comic-Con. They'll have a booth on the show floor where some of their writers and artists will be signing and they'll also be showing off some of the new products being introduced this year. New to this year are exclusive SDCC items that they will be selling at their booth.

Blizzard will be releasing their schedule and the product list ahead of time -- details coming soon. It is likely that their newly released Art of Blizzard Entertainment book will be there to be purchased and signed. Though if you want to purchase it ahead of time or aren't going to the Comic-Con, Amazon has a great deal on it right now. Tags: breaking, comic-con, san-diego-comic-con, san-diego-comic-con-2013

Filed under: Blizzard, News items

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Breakfast Topic: Do you buy in-game items at the Blizzard store?

Blizzard recently released the Armored Bloodwing mount in the Blizzard store. I don't know about you, but I've seen quite a few out in the wild, with some of them just hanging around big cities, showing off. This mount is not quite to my taste -- I'm a huge sparkle pony fan -- but I like its aesthetic and I see the appeal.

Other than the Celestial Steed, I also bought the Wind Rider Cub plushy and in-game pet set. And the Spousal Unit has the Winged Guardian mount. (I think he's eyeing the Armored Bloodwing too. Hmmm. Father's Day is coming up ...) In addition, we each have the collector's editions for several years and all the pets included there.

As much as I love my purchased in-game goodies, I do have a bit of buyer's remorse about spending money over and above my subscription. These digital goodies are really only mine to rent while playing the game. Should I ever stop playing WoW, all that money will have gone to things I don't really own. Still, I've been hanging out in Azeroth since the open beta and am still loving the game, so my departure from World of Warcraft isn't likely to happen anytime soon.

Have you bought any in-game items from the Blizzard store? Do you regret the purchase after you see how popular your new mount or pet is? What are your thoughts on spending money on virtual items? Tags: armored-bloodwing, blizzard-store, featured, game-discussion, gamer-discussion, mounts, world-of-warcraft-discussion, world-of-warcraft-topics, wow-discussion, wow-hot-topics, wow-issues, wow-topics

Filed under: Breakfast Topics

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Blizzard was Hacked, Security Update

Some of Blizzards servers were broken into. Blizzard has issued a press release. Here it is, in full, links have been removed. See the source pages for Bliz links. Credit cards and other important data do not seem to have been compromised.

Players and Friends,

Even when you are in the business of fun, not every week ends up being fun. This week, our security team found an unauthorized and illegal access into our internal network here at Blizzard. We quickly took steps to close off this access and began working with law enforcement and security experts to investigate what happened.

At this time, we’ve found no evidence that financial information such as credit cards, billing addresses, or real names were compromised. Our investigation is ongoing, but so far nothing suggests that these pieces of information have been accessed.

Some data was illegally accessed, including a list of email addresses for global Battle.net users, outside of China. For players on North American servers (which generally includes players from North America, Latin America, Australia, New Zealand, and Southeast Asia) the answer to the personal security question, and information relating to Mobile and Dial-In Authenticators were also accessed. Based on what we currently know, this information alone is NOT enough for anyone to gain access to Battle.net accounts.

We also know that cryptographically scrambled versions of Battle.net passwords (not actual passwords) for players on North American servers were taken. We use Secure Remote Password protocol (SRP) to protect these passwords, which is designed to make it extremely difficult to extract the actual password, and also means that each password would have to be deciphered individually. As a precaution, however, we recommend that players on North American servers change their password. Please click this link to change your password. Moreover, if you have used the same or similar passwords for other purposes, you may want to consider changing those passwords as well.

In the coming days, we’ll be prompting players on North American servers to change their secret questions and answers through an automated process. Additionally, we’ll prompt mobile authenticator users to update their authenticator software. As a reminder, phishing emails will ask you for password or login information. Blizzard Entertainment emails will never ask for your password. We deeply regret the inconvenience to all of you and understand you may have questions. Please find additional information here.

We take the security of your personal information very seriously, and we are truly sorry that this has happened.

Sincerely,
Mike Morhaime

Original source

MMO-Champion has the original release and an FAQ.

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Breakfast Topic: Should Blizzard brake base XP while preserving boosts for experienced players?

We recently explored how you felt about alternate characters, whether you believe they should represent true alternatives to your first character or whether they should remain secondary to a more fully developed main. Either way, there's no stuffing rapid leveling back into the bag. WoW's current leveling design pushes players forward relentlessly, whether they're experienced gamers or not. The problem is that today's leveling pace already outstrips zone content, quest lines, gearing -- you name it. Should Blizzard apply the brakes to base XP while still permitting seasoned WoW players to choose to move more rapidly?

Consider this: What if the leveling experience weren't tuned to catapult players so quickly through and past leveling zones and dungeons? What if the pace were a little looser, giving new players more time to soak up the leveling game itself -– and then at the same time, the current XP boosts were spread across tools designed for experienced players who choose to hop, skip, and jump their way to 90?

The precedents are there -- just look at the heirloom armor system. Today, you can buy Grand Commendations to boost various reputations for your characters once you've played through them once. And remember when everyone was buying the Tome of Cold Weather Flight for their alts? The tools are already in place. From leveling XP to reputation gains to player convenience, the helping hand of a level-capped main character is key.

Do you think WoW's leveling experience should remain something to be played through quickly and efficiently, even for brand new players, or do you think there's merit to allowing that part of the game to move at a more deliberate pace? Would you support more mechanics that give experienced players a way to speed up leveling for their alts, preserving a slower pace for new players and players who enjoy slower leveling? If you like a strong emphasis on mechanics like heirlooms and commendations, should those tools be simple, affordable purchases for any level 90 player, or should they take some time, effort, or money to earn? Tags: alts, featured, game-discussion, gamer-discussion, leveling, main, main-character, world-of-warcraft-discussion, world-of-warcraft-topics, wow-discussion, wow-hot-topics, wow-issues, wow-topics, xp

Filed under: Breakfast Topics

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Blizzard offers an inside look at WoW's sound design

Blizzard stands out amongst other game companies in their astounding array of musical entities. From legitimate choral and orchestral works, to the dedicated professionals that bring you the realistic sounds you hear every day in game -- their multidimensional musicality is astounding. Sound is often over looked in a game, but in reality it is just as important as the visuals and the text you read; everything is about creating an emotional response to what your character in-game is doing, what they're fearing, what their heroism is forcing them to undertake.

We talk a lot about how that heroism is impacted by mechanics and lore, but little about how it's impacted by the audible stimuli of the surrounding environment and its many creatures. Take a minute while you do your dailies and raiding tonight and see if you can tell what's going on just by the sounds. I think you'll be quite surprised.

In a new post on their blog, Blizzard goes into how some of their sound design was accomplished for patch 5.3 and MoP. There's some more interesting facts that we learn in the article: The Zandalari Battlesaur consists of three sound layers (previewed in the video above): Voice actor Jon Olson, a bear, and a tigerThere's five full time people working on WoW's sound designThe monk's "woosh" sound was made by swinging large objects around in a circle and editing them togetherThen there's also this line from Blizzard's post, which stands out as potentially the best thing ever written about Warcraft:

We also did a big vegetable destruction recording session where we tore up ears of corn, smashed walnuts, hit cabbage, and twisted celery among other things to use for sweeteners. These sounds were used in various ambiences, Monk abilities, creature exertions, farming, doodads, spells and in many different quests.

Blizzard's detailed look under the hood of sound design is available on their blog. Tags: blizzard-sound, breaking, wow-sound, wow-sound-effects

Filed under: Blizzard

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Blizzard announces HearthStone at PAX East 2013 live blog

We don't have any idea what it's going to be (besides something new), but Blizzard is going to be announcing it at PAX East today. We'll keep run a live blog of the announcement right here! Expect more throughout the day.

The live blog will begin in your timezone at:
10:00 a.m. EDT9:00 a.m. CDT8:00 a.m. MDT7:00 a.m. PDT2:00 p.m. London
9:38AM That's it for the presentation! Thanks for joining us. We'll get screenshots and everything else up soon.
9:36AM They just showed the iPad interface. Go play Duels of the Plainswalker if you want a feel for it. Looked *a lot* like it.
9:35AM There are normal and expert AIs to play again.
9:33AM You'll play as one of nine heroes in the Warcraft universe.
9:33AM They're now showing a little making of video with lots of Blizzard personalities talking about it. Neat to see them, but nothing major.
9:30AM Pardo jokes: "Big experiment for Blizzard, to see if they can announce a game and release it in the same year"
9:30AM Windows version and iPad version playable today.
9:30AM Playable on the PAX show floor today.
9:30AM Beta this summer, release this year.
9:30AM "Released not Blizzard soon, but IRL soon"
9:29AM HearthStone is already playable internally on the iPad.
9:29AM Pardo says "iPad shortly thereafter."
9:29AM HearthStone will launch on Windows and Mac.
9:28AM The druid keeps healing himself in the demo game they're showing. "Typical."
9:26AM Found the answer -- iPad version is coming soon (tm).
9:25AM We've pinged Blizzard to see if they have any comment.
9:25AM Lots of questions about HearthStone being on the iPad. We don't know yet... it sure would fit perfectly though.
9:23AM The animation is a bit better than what's on Duels of the Plainswalker. More Warcraft-style. Look and feel is miles ahead of MTG: Online (not that it's hard to do that).
9:22AM Anyone who plays MT:G will immediately get this.
9:22AM "Demon has taunt right now, so he (the druid) can't attack anybody but that demon right now."
9:21AM Card just played has AoE damage.
9:20AM Looks like a pretty standard play field, discard pile, health (30), mana.
9:18AM Looks like 4 cards in your hand to start off with...
9:18AM They're now giving a demonstration of the game being shoutcasted, a warlock vs. a druid. Very much SC2 style. Very much.

9:17AM "Game built as fun, casual but deeply strategic game."
9:16AM Duel online to boost your medal ranking. Each week you earn medals in the game, and as you get medals, that's how you get booster packs.
9:16AM Uses Battle.net match making

9:16AM You start deck building by picking your character (rogue), then picking rogue cards. As you go through the class specific cards, the game will pop up and give you suggestions. You can have the game fill out the rest of the cards at any time.
9:14AM You can also just let the game itself create the deck for you.
9:13AM Tutorial mode will help you build the right deck, suggest cards.
9:13AM There is a full featured deck builder, easy to create your own decks.
9:12AM With crafting you can disenchant the cards you're not interested in. You get arcane dust in return. Take that arcane dust and craft the exact card you want.
9:11AM You play the game as a hero (like a mage).
9:11AM Card Crafting is going to be something.
9:11AM You will be able to make use of duplicate cards.
9:11AM Blizz wants to capture the exciting of opening a physical pack. They have some great 3D animation when opening up a pack, much more interesting than just seeing cards displayed in order on a screen like in current digital CCGs.
9:09AM There will be different rarities of cards. Common, rare, epics, and legendary cards.
9:09AM Blizz hasn't decided the exact amount of money per pack. They're thinking around $1 right now, but haven't fined tune it. Will be doing so in the alpha and beta.
9:08AM Over 300 cards in the game, 5 per pack, can earn and buy packs, many types of cards.
9:08AM If you're already used to playing a mage, then in this game you'll intuitively understand how to play HearthStone as a mage.
9:07AM Board will be animated. 3D, no flat board.
9:07AM They want to make it more fun than existing card games online, more specialfxs, more exciting gameplay.
9:06AM They want to do with HearthStone as they did with WoW -- make it accessible and make it fun.
9:06AM They want to make it fast to jump in, manage rule complexity, make pack opening awesome, and keep it exciting to watch.
9:05AM Blizz is doing this because of their love of CCG games like Magic: The Gathering. They're making it accessible, and not just for the hard core CCG players.
9:04AM Online CCG. It's free to play.
9:04AM HearthStone. Heroes of Warcraft. A Collectable strategy game set in the Warcraft universe.
9:03AM Looks like... could it be...
9:03AM There are Warcraft characters in the game's new presentation.
9:03AM Cards have just flashed on the screen.
9:02AM New team is 15 developers, experiment more, faster development cycle.
9:01AM This is an entirely new team at Blizzard for this game.
9:01AM WoW has 135 developers now, up from an original 60.
9:00AM Pardo is up giving the announcement now.
8:48AM People are filling in. We should get started here in about 15 minutes. Thanks for joining us! The stream above should work, but if it doesn't (as these popular stream are often wont to do), we've got people on the ground as well.
8:20 AM Zarhym tweets that the line to the announcement was filled by 9 a.m. Sorry to all those that are trying to get in!Tags: breaking, pax, pax-east, pax-east-2013

Filed under: News items, Hearthstone Insider

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Zarhym on why Blizzard didn't do an April Fools joke

The observant among the WoW community will have noticed that, on the Warcraft side at least, Blizzard didn't put out an April Fool's joke this year. There was a little confusion surrounding this, as Crabby made a reappearance on the official forums, back for another year, and a really excellent piece of fan-created art depicting a Dark Ranger was doing the rounds. The Starcraft team documented the apparent return of the Warhound, and even implemented it in-game, re-skinning all your workers as Warhounds.

And while some of the WoW community were happy to amuse themselves with ElvUI's Harlem Shake, or Wowhead's PTR patch notes, others grew increasingly angry that the WoW team hadn't put together a prank for this most foolish of days. Blizzard Senior Community Rep Jonathan "Zarhym" Brown took to Twitter, and to the official forums, to attempt to explain the absence of any seasonal folly.

All his posts are after the break, but the long and short of it is that, firstly, while some ideas had been bandied about, nothing had really stuck, and secondly, the team who usually work on the April Fool's jokes had been rather busy with other things. What other things could possibly have taken priority? Maybe Hearthstone itself, the Hearthstone website, or the recent revamp of the shop page, given how Zarhym explains the teams' roles.

It seems like Blizzard can't win: last year there were complaints that they wasted Developer time on April foolishness, this year, complaints that they didn't. What's your take on it? Did you wish they had done something? Or would you rather they spent time designing real content? Hit the break for Zarhym's posts.

ZarhymBased on all the interesting replies I've been receiving on Twitter, I just want to specify here that I was primarily referring to website content and the priorities of our Web and Community teams. These are the teams that tend to put the most focus on April Fools jokes on our websites. People are extrapolating a lot of strange conclusions out of what I said... or, I guess more accurately, what I didn't even say.

And, as I said in the first of those tweets listed on MMO-C, we DID work on ideas for this year's April 1, but they didn't really pan out. We decided we couldn't justify spending MORE time on it this year with everything else going on. This doesn't mean we had more time to kill in previous years, or that we'll never do gags on our website again. It was a matter of priorities and time investment.

It's awesome that people enjoy when we do fun stuff. We like fun too. I'm sure we can all continue to have fun together, even if we didn't fool people on the day everyone not only expects it, but apparently demands it. :p

ZarhymQuote:

yah... that would be awesome, if last year they didn't say "the team that works on april fool's jokes, aren't part of the development team" nice try, nice try.

...

This thing on? Check Z. Check. Check!

ZarhymQuote:

Zarhym, I hope you remember that tweet the next time you're inclined to give the canned "Doing X doesn't take away resources from Y, we have independent teams" response we've been treated to for years. I'm glad you guys are finally admitting something we all knew and decried for many, many years now.

This is the problem with pulling things we say out of context and using them as blanket statements to justify why we didn't meet your expectations.

Here's an example:

Very rarely does website development interfere with game development. There's communication between the teams so that we have a shared vision, obviously, but each team has its own resources specific to their respective design focuses.

Here's a counter example:

The Web & Mobile team, unlike the WoW development team, is a shared-resource team. Not only does the scope of the projects they work on extend far beyond what most people are assuming in this thread, they support all Blizzard websites.

The point:

Context matters. We can say that developing April 1 jokes doesn't require pulling resources from game design, while it CAN ALSO be true that Blizzard's continued expansion in the web, mobile and social media spaces to support increasingly more games DOES put more strain on our Web & Mobile and Communications departments.

I've experienced it first-hand during my six years with Blizzard Community Development. The way I work with WoW's game designers hasn't changed all that much over the years (although we've evolved our relationship with them and try to be as efficient as possible when we ask for their time). That said, the scope of my job, as well as the functions of the Blizzard Communications department as a whole, have grown and changed quite dramatically.

Sometimes I'm still surprised by how difficult it is to maintain a rational public dialog about anything we're doing or saying. April 1 is what it is, and perhaps we'll have cool things to share on future occasions. But, the fact that this is even a part of the WoW discussion beyond 12:00 am April 2 seems like folly to me. I don't intend to spend anymore time on it. :)

ZarhymQuote:

I love how he said "yeah that's the web site team" and people are like "well it's be awesome if he'd tell us it's not the dev team or something."

NOBODY READS BLUE POSTS

Yea, people don't deserve to be able to reply to this thread anymore. If it's a waste of anything, it's a waste of everything. Tags: april-fool-2013, april-fools, breaking, count-to-ten, take-a-deep-breath, zarhym, zarhym-community-manager-of-the-year

Filed under: News items

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Blizzard <3s Bad Robot

One of the core values we live by here at Blizzard is “Embrace Your Inner Geek.” We play countless games, we collect comics and card games, we love cutting-edge technology and computer hardware, we’re fascinated by science and discovery, and many of us are movie buffs. Movies represent the combined imaginations of talented writers and visionaries, artists and operators, editors and producers, that can culminate in an awesome cinematic experience.

It’s with this motivation that we express our respect for JJ Abrams' Bad Robot Productions.

Coming in a future patch, characters with the Engineering profession will be able to produce this mechanical homage to the company that brought us award-winning television shows like Lost and Fringe, and are continuing the epic Star Trek and forthcoming Star Wars film sagas. Everyone has a chance to get their hands on this pet, allowing them to show off their mutual appreciation for Bad Robot, and the stories they’ve brought to our TVs and movie screens.

We hope everyone enjoys this new pet!

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Blizzard Comic Contest Winner

Sorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.

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Blizzard Invades PAX East March 22-24

PAX East kicks off this week! Are you ready?

What: Hosted annually in Boston, PAX East is a celebration of gaming culture and community
Where: Boston Convention & Exhibition Center booth #1036 of the Expo Hall
When: March 22–24

Head on over to east.paxsite.com for panel schedules, hotel and travel information, forums, and more. If you have an iPhone, Android, BlackBerry, or Windows 7 smart phone, you can also download the super sexy (and super official) PAX East 2013 app from Guidebook for free.

We've got something new to share, and we're bringing it to PAX East! If you're attending, be sure to arrive at the Naga theater early in order to secure a seat for our presentation. If you're not going to PAX East this year (or you just went a little too crazy the night before), we've got you covered -- the whole thing is being streamed live on the official PAX Twitch channel at 10:00 a.m. EDT Friday, March 22.

Gather your gear, heroes, and get ready to face down the Burning Hells on the PlayStation 3!

Our action-packed single-player hands-on demo will showcase several key elements that make Diablo III on the PS3 so much fun, including a reimagined interface and inventory system, direct character control, updated camera, and bosses and monsters specifically tuned for console. Players will also get to experience gameplay from Act III of the campaign where they’ll get to test their mettle as either the cunning Demon Hunter or mighty Barbarian.

We'll have demo stations available from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. EDT in booth #1036 of the Expo Hall, so if you’re in the area (and in the mood for some ritual demon slaughter), be sure to stop by and check it out!

In addition to showcasing the PS3 version of Diablo III and chatting you up about the game as you saunter by, we'll also be giving away enough swag and prizes to make a Treasure Goblin jealous.

The Diablo III team will be sharing updates, photos, and more live from the convention floor, so be sure to "Like" us on Facebook and follow our official Twitter feed so you don't miss out.

For those who are Boston-bound, we salute you . . . and hope to see you there!

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Blizzard Comic Contest Winner

Sorry, I could not read the content fromt this page.

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Blizzard Comic Contest Winner

@Dazanin: Don't get so butthurt, I'm just joking, and I'm actually 23, just having some fun.

And it's the fact that I am first that counts.

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Does Blizzard Even WANT You To Raid?

Wrath of The Lich King was an astonishing expansion for WoW in many ways, but one of them was the way it opened up raiding. For the first time ever, the ultimate endgame was accessible to all players – and I know a lot of people, including me, got their first real start in raiding then.

But has MoP gone back to the old model of raiding only being for the elite? Saxsy thinks so, and she makes a persuasive case – although I’m sure there will be counter-arguments – in her latest post:

“The upshot? If you wanted to raid, in practice you have to do dailies. Raiding without dailies meant somehow, through purchased items and a lot of heroics, scraping together a 460 ilvl set to get into LFR. And then in LFR, gearing would be slower than other people because you wouldn’t have those extra charms to get good loot. If a 460 ilvl is required for normal LFR, which rewards ilvl 476 items, one could reasonably extrapolate that you should have a 473 item level to enter normal MSV. Good luck hitting that without valor gear.

In short, a person not running dailies is at such a competitive disadvantage to someone running dailies that it’s unlikely they would find a raid spot on a raid team that had the aim of clearing current content in normal mode.

This is what people mean when they technically inaccurately claim that dailies are compulsory. They’re not strictly compulsory. But good luck raiding without them.

Read the article (note – the meat of the post starts about a page down): How Blizzard Convinces People Not To Raid

Tagged as: mop, raiding

If you enjoyed this article, check out our other posts from these categories: World of Warcraft

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Blizzard introduces live Web Chat support

Blizzard Customer Support has rolled out a new feature to better assist customers with issues. The new live Web Chat feature allows players to chat directly with a Customer Service Representative, bypassing the long wait times sometimes associated with phone calls. But don't think that this is a replacement for the ticket and phone system altogether. The live Web Chat is only available for issues that can be resolved in that format -- specific issues may require a ticket or a phone call to address.

Using the new system is easy enough; simply visit the Contact Blizzard Support page, select the game you need assistance with, and then choose from a variety of dropdown menus to pick the selections that best address your particular issue. You'll see three buttons at the bottom of the screen, one for submitting a ticket, one for contacting by phone, and one for live Web Chat. Please note that web chat and phone support availability still varies based on hours of operation, as well as the type of issue you need addressed.

Honestly, I'm wondering why this type of support system wasn't put into place years ago. With the Web Chat feature, players can bypass sitting on the phone and listening to hold music, and just chat with a representative to get their issues addressed. And with the new filtering system for issues, it makes it a lot easier to figure out what I should be doing if I have a problem. Hey, don't get me wrong, I do love Blizzard, but if I don't have to sit in a phone queue, I'm generally all the happier for it.

You can read more about the new live Web Chat feature on the official site.

Tags: blizzard-customer-service, blizzard-customer-support, blizzard-entertainment, blizzard-live-web-chat, blizzard-support, blizzard-support-website, customer-support, live-web-chat

Filed under: Blizzard, News items

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Blizzard clarifies patch 5.2 item upgrade changes, upgrade NPC gone

To help alleviate the confusion about the absence of gear upgrades come patch 5.2, Lead Systems designed Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street recently tweeted the following:

@panterpe No gear. The NPC is gone.

- Greg Street (@Ghostcrawler) January 11, 2013

Naturally, this response prompted a flurry of tweets from players concerned about various aspects of the proposed changes. Ghostcrawler responded to several, with further explanation, and Blizzard Community Manager Bashiok subsequently posted a longer explanation on the US forums.

Players concerns related, understandably, to gear which had already been upgraded. Would it keep its upgrades? The response, reassuringly, from Ghostcrawler, was yes, it would. This fact itself brings other issues with it, particularly for PvP gearing. Upgraded Conquest gear is already so much higher than honor gear, with a maximum item level of 491 compared to honor's maximum of 466. The new honor gear arriving in 5.2 would have brought the two levels closer together, but it was then downgraded from 483 to 476.

There have been several posts from various Blizzard sources saying that PvP gearing would be totally revamped for 5.2, the outcome of which PvP players await with trepidation. And for PvE, the issue is pretty similar -- the pressure is now on to get gear upgraded before patch 5.2 arrives, when, currently, the ability to do so will be removed. From Ghostcrawler's follow-up tweets, it will return in patch 5.3, if it returns at all.

Ghostcrawler makes the not unreasonable point that the demand on valor points was high, with the choice players had to make between choosing to buy a new item and choosing to upgrace an existing item might have been stressful for some. But for others, like me, the choice to spend valor on something that required no rep grind was very welcome.

It is a surprise to some that the Voidbinders are not left in just for patch 5.2 gear, rather than removed altogether, particularly given how helpful this would be for players trying to level alts, who were able to grind out justice points to upgrade low level gear and get over the bar into heroics, allowing them to continue with progression without having to spend gold at the auction house. And much the same applies for the next progression bars into the Mogu'shan Vaults and Heart of Fear/Terrace of Endless Spring raid finders -- the item upgrade possibility is another option for characters to get over that hurdle.

BashiokEven Ethereals need a vacation, and the item upgraders (Voidbinders), are no exception. They're saying they need to go home to take care of business arrangements, but ... I'm not convinced. I think they're just homesick for their 'space mummy' families.

Ok ok, fourth wall broken, we're actually just temporarily removing them from the game for 5.2 due to the new raid tier. The idea with the item upgrade system is that it's a way to spend currency on upgrading items when buying new items isn't the clear path. Either you've bought everything, or at least most of them, and then spend currency to get that extra *oomph*. With a new raid tier coming, we don't want to create a trap where people are wondering what's more lucrative: spend currency on new items, or on the new gear appearing on vendors? (Hint: It's the new gear on vendors.) To help ensure we're not indirectly encouraging anyone to spend their currency somewhere they probably shouldn't, the item upgraders will be taking a break.

Right now we're planning for them to return in 5.3, which will not have a raid tier, and offer upgrades again as people will have likely have some currency to burn. We're not sure yet if we'll continue this cycle of having them take a break for raid patches and then come back in non-raid patches, but we'll continue evaluating as we go, absorb feedback, and let you know how these plans evolve.

I, for one, will miss the upgrade system, but Bashiok's post implies, not unexpectedly that there will also be new rewards to spend valor on. Hopefully the reputation grind will be less arduous than the current ones!
Mists of Pandaria is here! The level cap has been raised to 90, many players have returned to Azeroth, and pet battles are taking the world by storm. Keep an eye out for all of the latest news, and check out our comprehensive guide to Mists of Pandaria for everything you'll ever need to know.
Tags: breaking, featured, gear-upgrades, gear-upgrades-gone, item-upgrade-system, item-upgrades, item-upgrades-gone, mists, mists-of-pandaria, patch-5.2, patch-5.2-ptr, voidbinder

Filed under: News items, PvP, Mists of Pandaria

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Blizzard Comic Contest Winner

And the comic contest winner for December, 2012, is ... Joshua Mueller (Arakn).

The talented winner will receive a Diablo® III Poker Set. Congratulations! In January, we’ll be giving away a SteelSeries World of Warcraft Wireless® MMO Mouse to the winner of the next Blizzard Comic Contest.

Keep those comics coming, and you might be the next artist to take home a prize! Also, be sure to set aside some time to check out our Warcraft and StarCraft comic sections. 

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Swift Windsteed now available in the Blizzard Store

Back in October, Blizzard teased the Swift Windsteed mount on their Facebook page. Further information on the mount trickled out via datamining patch 5.1 -- and as of this morning, it's available for purchase on the Blizzard Store for $25, though there is only one color available as opposed to the many that were datamined. Swift Windsteed – Exclusive Mount Now AvailableTake the reins of one of Pandaria's most majestic and rare beasts, the Swift Windsteed, and it is said that good fortune will follow. Dart across the heavens on a silver cloud as fast as your riding skill allows. Once purchased from the Blizzard Store, the mount will be available to all present and future characters for a single Battle.net® account. Tags: blizzard-store, breaking, mount, swift-windsteed

Filed under: News items

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