World Of Warcraft

We finally know what the pirate flag was in the roadmap.

It's called Plunderstorm, a pirate themed 60 person battle royale that's so different from the WoW we're used to they're going to have designated servers specifically for people to take part in it. You have a custom character just for the mode/servers and it sounds like the gameplay is different enough from what we're used to to be a borderline a spin-off (says we need no previous knowledge of any classes or races from Live).

Edited by NaraNumas on Mar 19th 2024 at 9:27:56 AM

So, a event which is very different from the usual gameplay, to the point it resembles Fortnite more than WoW. It's PvP oriented, which is something most players don't care that much. And, it's time-limited and has attached some rewards such as pets and mounts.

Yeah, this isn't going to turn well. I predict the next days are going to be full of complaints from FOMO-addicted players who will complain that Blizzard is "forcing" them to play this event that they actually hate, only so they can earn the rewards before they disappear.

Edited by morenohijazo on Mar 19th 2024 at 3:45:41 PM

More PVP crap. I'm glad I tempered my expectations for this update.

Blizzard in 2015: Releases the "flavor of the year" from 6 years ago.

Blizzard in 2024: "I will fucking do it again"

I've wanted a battle royal in wow for ages, just disappointed that it's not going to be evergreen content.

If they want to make a pvp spinoff game they should just make a damn pvp spinoff game.

Why not just make it a battleground.

I have a running theory, though one with no real evidence to back it up, that Plunderstorm might have originally been a concept for one of those new, standalone IPs that we know they were working on, but got shelved because of the merger. But since they had a fair chunk of the idea set they decided to just retrofit it to WoW.

I mostly think that because, well, Blizzard is absolutely a trend-chasing company who likes to copy what else is popular, I feel like they would have 100% wanted to make a standalone battle royale instead of just a game mode in their existing games if not for extenuating circumstances preventing it.

Edited by NaraNumas on Mar 19th 2024 at 1:32:42 PM

How long were the Chinese servers down?

NetEase shut down the Chinese servers some time last year. I don't remember exactly when.

Edit: Google is your friend. It was on January 23, 2023. So it's been over a year. Users were encouraged to download their account data so it could be restored in the event that service came back.

Edited by Fighteer on Mar 20th 2024 at 11:15:12 AM

World of Warcraft Patch Notes Version 10.6.2 April 1, 2024

All us pansies who can't handle PvP get our own little version of Plunderstorm... called Noblegarden. Very cute, Blizzard.

Class balance is perfect, a new underwater raid, a new Groundhog Day style dungeon, healing Warriors, guru Paladins, and a new mode in which all game elements are completely random.

Another piece of Warcraft I've made into a physical miniature: A Mountain Giant. This is the biggest custom miniature I've made so far.

Awesome.

So it's been a bit and we have a lot of info about most* hero talents now, what are folks thinking about them?

My main is a Dev Evoker, I'm absolutely happy with both of mine, Scalecommander and Flameshaper both sound awesome and seem pretty practical.

I'm looking forward to trying out Elune's Chosen with my Balance Druid. In the end, it's all glitter painted on top of class balance, and we haven't exactly been riding high this expansion.

Edited by Fighteer on Apr 8th 2024 at 10:30:32 AM

Of those classes I've read about:

Restro Druid:

• Keeper of the Grove
  • We went from Heal druids having an off-GCD way to spawn heal pets, to there being a set bonus heavily promoting this build, to there being an entire sub-class centered around this in just 3 patches. I don't trust NP Cs with deciding whom to heal and I don't want to be remade into a dingy ass heal pet summoner.
• Wildstalker
  • Boring and creatively bankrupt. Wow my Hots apply another Hot and my bleeds apply another bleed, then 5 talents which improve these, golly. It will probably be the go to tree though due to Kot G being pet jank.

Guardian Druid:

• Elune's Chosen:
  • I like the arcane build for bears and this double's down on it and turns bears into Ao E life-steal tanks which sounds fun.

• Druid of the Claw:
  • The cat-weaving tree which lets us keep most of our armor when going cat form which means we can finally use Dash without gambling our life and improve our DPS by weaving in some Cat bleeds. Ok but some nodes are boring +10% dmg filler.

Holy Paladin:

( I haven't played Hpala this expansion but I've kept in touch due to talking with a guild mate about it a lot)

I know I have been critical about my heal druid trees but *WHEEEEZE* boy would I hate having to choose between these two.

• Lightsmith:
  • Hey remember the light well? Remember Monk heal spheres? Remember how group members are notoriously incompetent at taking action even if it is highly beneficial for them? Here is an entire tree centered around spawning shit on the ground which might benefit your mates but realistically will be only accidentally be picked up by the same two melee's fidgeting around you.

• Herald of the Sun
  • Hey remember pre-rework Karma from Lo L and how nobody managed to utilize her tether? Here is a similar mechanic where you have to span a net between two notes which spawn where you Holy Shock. Have fun constantly having to double check your mates positioning so you actually get any value from this. Great for the top 0,5% of players disciplined enough to coordinate this, everyone else better get your vocal cords oiled, you will have to shout at a lot of people for moving in the wrong spot just as you pulled your CD.

Edited by Kiefen on Apr 8th 2024 at 4:26:55 PM

Probably going to go Templar Paladin for my main. It's a good thematic fit for a Dwarf and mostly modifies abilities I'm familiar with.

The intricacies of the mechanics or how the theoretical numbers compare with Hearld of the Sun are things I couldn't care less about. I don't raid outside of LFR and if anyone doesn't want me in their group because of my spec is "wrong" I sure as heck don't want to spend time with them.

So we know what the "Timewalking Pandamonium" on the roadmap was.

It's called "Remix: Mists of Pandaria". Effectively, we roll a new character on dedicated servers similar to Plunderstorm, and starting at level 10 we go on an accelerated leveling path from 10-70 through the Pandaria questing experience, but with all the Dragonflight systems. Once the event wraps up, if you're attached to the character and have slots they'll be moved over to Retail.

There's new loot and a ton of cosmetics, there's gems that sound similar to the runestones in Season of Discovery, there's a disenchanting system for unwanted items to create coins to spend on said cosmetics, and completion rewards for 100% completion of the zones (meaning map completion, treasure, rares, quests, and scenarios/dungeons/raids (LFR or above) if the zone has them).

So far from what we've seen of the cosmetics I'm tentative but hopeful, it'll be awesome if things like the challenge mode armor and phoenix mounts are no longer unobtainable, even if they are recolors to keep the original's prestige.

Edited by NaraNumas on Apr 11th 2024 at 8:08:00 AM

https://www.wowhead.com/news/blizzard-answers-timerunning-pandamonium-questions-no-challenge-mode-sets-338674

It seems removed rewards aren't coming back. Not even as recolors.

It's stupid. I agree that skill-based rewards should never be handed for free, but new players should always have the chance to prove themselves worthy and earn them. This isn't skill-based prestige, it's just "I was playing this before you" prestige. Which, in my opinion, it's a bad idea if Wo W wants to attract new players.

Anyway... What's the point of this? What's the difference with Chromie Time, other than encouraging FOMO with time-limited rewards? New players who want to earn removed rewards, too bad, they can't. Old players who want to relive the expansion, well, Mo P Classic is coming next year (obvious from the timetable for Cata Classic), more faithful to the original experience.

Edited by morenohijazo on Apr 11th 2024 at 9:34:11 PM

I think they might at least be experimenting with the idea of remixes as an alternative to classic expansions beyond Cataclysm.

While this is just my perception, I do feel that Season of Discovery and Classic Hardcore attracted far more interest in the community then WotLK Classic did or Cata Classic currently is.

And if that's the case it begs the question of if it's actually worth it to make later and later classic expansions as their own thing.

The MoP Remix on the other hand is much more integrated into retail, and seems to mostly pitch itself as a fun way to level up a new character all the way to max while earning some unique cosmetics. It doesn't demand nearly as much of a commitment as playing the classic version of the game and everything you earn also gets applied to live. And while the raids will be available at the higher difficulties, the focus seems to be much more on just experiencing Pandaria once again.

I just wish for a Northrend experience with Dragonflight's modern leveling system and mechanics (hence why I tried and failed at Wrath Classic), or at least change Wrath's TW raid to Icecrown Citadel over Ulduar.

Edited by RainingMetal on Apr 11th 2024 at 6:31:16 AM

Man I've seen like no hype at all for the next expansion. Like literally pretty much crickets on that front. What's up with that?

Lack of talk, pretty much. The alpha might be starting soon, but besides the stuff learned at Blizzcon and the slow-drip previews of Hero Talents, we actually haven't heard anything new about it since the announcements.

Edit: At this point though since WoW and FFXIV are full on dueling games fighting for release-date audiences, we'll probably hear news soon, since XIV just had one of their live letters showing off the features for their next expansion, Blizzard will want to keep up.

Edited by NaraNumas on Apr 17th 2024 at 4:51:45 AM

I find myself most interested in the new Nerubians and Kobolds, especially. The big ones remind me of Rat Ogres, so naturally I'm hopeful that the Kobolds might become a more credible threat and take a few pages from Skaven and other insidious ratmen in fiction.

I'm sad that it seems like the Nerubians are the main big bad of this expansion. I always liked the Nerubians, and the idea that they were void creatures on the road to redemption was really appealing. Now it seems like with the Undead threat extinguished they're returning to their Lawful Evil roots. Real sad. Maybe the Humanoid Nerubians are the end result of this endeavor and they join the Horde?