World Of Warcraft

Man, Blizzard may have just set a new standard for being sneaky with potentially plot-relevant information.

In the Forsaken starting zone of Deathknell, there's an interesting bit of dialogue with the Pandaren monk trainer. One of the local Forsaken attempts to share the local "brew" with her. (It's really a concoction laced with their plague of body-melting horror.)

So she drinks it...and comments on the "interesting" taste. That's it. Even with her title of "strong of stomach", I don't think that's enough to resist something like that so easily. So apparently Pandaren are highly-resistant to the Forsaken plague, if not outright immune.

If I hadn't been messing around in their starting zone, I wouldn't have caught this. Let the WMGs begin...

Her name is Ting, Strong of Stomach. Of course she'd be able to resist it.

Here is the full conversation for everyone:

edited 9th Oct '12 8:42:46 PM by tclittle

Pandaren tastes in alcohol are either ultra-extreme or ultra-bizarre. Just ask Rexxar what he thought of Chen's 'experiment'. Betcha they'd be able to mix in the blood of an Old God and not be corrupted.

edited 9th Oct '12 10:43:08 PM by Recon5

How can you corrupt that which has already been so? There is more to the Pandathings than meets the eye.

There's one pandaren in the Dread Wastes that wants to make a brew with Sha essence. If you ask me, there are some things mortals were not meant to brew.

edited 10th Oct '12 5:45:11 AM by kraas

That's why I think the Pandaren are Eldritch Abominations with black and white fur.

I got an answer on the wild pets thing. Apparently Blizzard changed it so that the quality of wild pets has a much higher effect on their stats than before. It makes it really easy to tell which ones are rares, too. I still think that something is broken with their health scaling at level 17+, though.

Re: Pandarens... that's interesting that they can seemingly drink anything without being affected by it. They clearly are not immune to the Sha, as you can tell in several questing areas. I think they're just super tough.

edited 10th Oct '12 7:56:49 AM by Fighteer

I sort of promised a blog post at level 90, so here it is.

Sounds like they really hit the mark this expansion. I didn't want to rush to 90 and yet I feel like I have to because there is so much to do, which beats nothing to do.

I'll have to do some more pet battles.

Having read the blog post, you're missing some reputation dailies and the context for some more. First there's the Klaxxi dailies, but obviously you haven't gotten around to exploring the Dread Wastes yet so that's understandable.

Both Shado-pan and August Celestials have their own rep and dailies, but you can't access them at all until you get Revered with Golden Lotus. Which as you noted is the hardest rep to grind. In some ways that's actually a mercy though, since by the time you can access them hopefully you've already finished some of the easier ones. Otherwise there'd be way way to many dailies. On the other hand, there's something cruel about the fact that your reward for doing a billion dailies is even more dailies.

"On the other hand, there's something cruel about the fact that your reward for doing a billion dailies is even more dailies."

I can't argue with that. I guess I need to start hacking away at the Dread Wastes, then.

what I'm loving most about panda is all the concessions made to the fact monk players need to level from level 1 all over again. Namely all the blue level gear you can buy at the monastery, the daily exp buffs, the free gear and exp buffs every 10 levels..etc,

You know, based on some studies of DPS rankings (Theoretical Realistic), I'm starting to think that Blizzard needs a tuning pass for Balance Druids. Hunters and Rogues seem to also be sucking it a bit (across all specs).

I have yet to see a Feral Druid in dungeons, though. Do they exist?

On my MM hunter, currently at level 88, I'm holding my own in reg Mists 5-mans, pulling ahead if there's lots of AOE potential; Thrill Of The Hunt turns awful hunter AOE performance into kick-ass with its constant procs of near-free Multi-Shots. On the negative side, it makes a nonsense of the idea of "rotations", and I need to see the theory-crafting numbers of if I should ignore the procced shots in favor of pulling up focus so I can get off the next Chimera Shot on schedule.

So at least at 88, I'd say, hunters are doing OK; I haven't heard significant whining by the 90s I know, either. If we're down, I suspect at least part of it is that Blizzard gave us even more buttons to push with our new talents, in a class already suffering from a surfeit of buttons to push. It's taking people a while to start using the new stuff effectively.

Having found the first few regs pretty easy, I was a bit surprised by the fact that the Shado-Pan Monastery can totally kick a PUG's asses, especially the last boss.

Meanwhile. I notice windwalker monk goes from meh before rising sun kick, to decent with it, to holy shit I'm a wrecking ball once you get northrend level weapons.

My DPS is currently pretty dismal (enhancement shaman) but I just picked up my first ilvl 463 piece, and I should have enough JP to buy another new piece soon. I also need to get to work on the engineering head piece (which seems like it will be either a matter of luck during farming trillium, as i have encountered a grand total of three veins during my grind to 90, or paying far out the ass for it on the AH).

Just get an Alchemist to transmute it for you. 10 Ghost Iron Bar = 1 Trillium Bar. Most will gladly work for tips.

Just when I thought I was safe from the dreaded double post, along come the new 5.1 PTR patch notes.

I like the new Pet Battles features. Searching for and sorting pets will become a lot easier, as will identifying ones you want to capture.

edited 11th Oct '12 11:07:05 AM by Fighteer

Had no idea that existed, thanks.

edited 11th Oct '12 2:00:31 PM by kraas

There already exists a macro to show the quality of opposing pets you're battling; I use it. Nice to see it officially done, though.

Solo content? This brawlers guild is highly relevant to my interests, I adore that kind of content.

I do like the sound of it.

PTR has been updated with new DMF pets and activities. Also, some datamined audio clips. REALLY BIG SPOILERS WHEN WATCHING THEM.

Jaina purges the Horde from Dalaran after some one took off with a bell that can emit chaos when rung.

Anduin clashes with Garrosh over the bell, and uses a mallet designed by the Pandaren to have the bell emit order when rung with the mallet.

BIG ONE HERE: Garrosh kills Anduin, seemingly.

Aethas Sunreaver thinks Lor'themar would be a good Warchief.

Lor'themar is getting peeved at both Garrosh's actions, but also Jaina's and is becoming more and more neutral. Also, his voice is not what I have would have guessed at first.

Varian going soft? Maybe Anduin's influence. Tyrande's voiceclips say Varian is being tentative. I'm going through all of the videos.

edited 12th Oct '12 3:07:22 PM by tclittle

And all the people who wondered why Jaina did not throw the Horde out of Dalaran immediately before are now laughing.

Random fun of the day: this conversation had me chortling. Look at the context and the post that the blue reply is to.