So speculate how long until MOP? June, August, October, December or ?

[chaos5061]

FEEDBACK: Scarlet Monastery (Challenge)
The Challenge mode for this dungeon is unlocked for this beta cycle.

A few relevant testing notes:
You must have completed the Heroic version of the dungeon once in order to attempt the challenge mode.
Item level will be normalized to 463.
There is no queue system for challenge modes; groups must be formed manually and you must zone in from the outside world.
The current Gold/Silver/Bronze times are not final.
While the challenge is active, the group leader may Reset the dungeon at any time via a drop-down accessible by right-clicking your unit frame.
You may want to dig up those dusty keybindings for things like crowd control and interrupts.
Enemies in Challenge mode dungeons are 1 level higher than in Heroic versions, as a rule, such that bosses are now level 93.

Please use this thread to share feedback regarding the dungeon, including information on group composition and completion times.

FEEDBACK: Gate of the Setting Sun (Challenge)
The Challenge mode for this dungeon is unlocked for this beta cycle.

A few relevant testing notes:
You must have completed the Heroic version of the dungeon once in order to attempt the challenge mode.
Item level will be normalized to 463.
There is no queue system for challenge modes; groups must be formed manually and you must zone in from the outside world.
The current Gold/Silver/Bronze times are not final.
While the challenge is active, the group leader may Reset the dungeon at any time via a drop-down accessible by right-clicking your unit frame.
You may want to dig up those dusty keybindings for things like crowd control and interrupts.
Enemies in Challenge mode dungeons are 1 level higher than in Heroic versions, as a rule, such that bosses are now level 93.

Please use this thread to share feedback regarding the dungeon, including information on group composition and completion times.

[chaos5061]

Warrior
Warriors and a Barbarians Fury
I think there's a certain amount of rage/sec that make warriors feel good, lets call it X. Too much, and the mechanic stops working as a limitation. Too little, and you feel starved and it's no fun. The problem is that X isn't different to a maxed out warrior at the end of the expansion or a beging warrior in greens, but by tying it to gear progression you force either the too much end of the scale on the endexpo warrior or the starved feel on the questing warrior.
I agree with that, but here's the thing: we don't want warriors to scale linearly. What I mean by that is that as you increase gear, you'll be hitting harder and critting more often. Both of those are fun, don't get me wrong, but after you get over the thrill of BIG NUMBERS you start to see behind the curtain a little. Fundamentally, there isn't a huge difference between hitting a bad guy for 3000 or 30,000, especially when the bad guy's health has probably increased by ten as well.

What feels cooler is if you actually feel different with great gear. Instead of just hitting harder, you are hitting different buttons. For warriors, that means having enough rage to use Heroic Strike frequently instead of rarely. But that means we need to start warriors in quest greens at the "rarely" side of the dial, so that when you're in epics in the final tier, you're now at "frequently."

Historically, what has happened is that warriors start at "never" and then grow into "always." Rage scaling with gear was too good. It needs to scale, and a little bit of exponential scaling is ideal, but the end of the curve can't rocket up towards the sun.

[chaos5061]

Terrace of Endless Spring: Lei Shi

Lei Shi is the third boss in Terrace of Endless Spring. He

drops Tier 14 shoulder tokens along with the normal armor and weapons.

[chaos5061]

Terrace of Endless Spring

Hidden high in the mountains, the Terrace of Endless Spring is the sacred center of the Vale of Eternal Blossoms. Its peaceful fountains are said to have the power to heal and rejuvenate, but when the Sha of Fear attacked, many of the complex's guardians turned on each other in fits of terror.

Achievements

• Heroic: Lei Shi - Defeat Lei Shi in Terrace of Endless Spring on Heroic difficulty.
• Face Clutchers - Defeat Lei Shi while all members of the raid are afflicted by Parasitic Clutch in Terrace of Endless Spring on Normal or Heroic difficulty.

Lei Shi

• Afraid - Lei Shi grows more afraid as players hurt her. She gains 1% casting speed for each 1 percent health of her total health lost.
• Spray - Lei Shi casts Spray instead of using melee attacks. Spray causes water to burst from the ground at a player's feet, inflicting 104,000-218,400 Frost damage to all players within 2.5 yards and increasing their Frost damage taken by 10% for 15 sec.
• Hide - Lei Shi hides from players. Players cannot target her while hiding, but area of effect attacks and spells can still hit her. Lei Shi reveals herself after the players strike her enough times.
• Get Away! - Lei Shi channels the waters of the Endless Spring, pushing players away and inflicting 60,000 periodic Frost damage. Players who fight the current take half damage. Lei Shi channels for 30 sec or until players inflict 5% of her maximum health in damage.
• Protect - Lei surrounds herself with an inpenetrable bubble and animates several elementals to protect her. She maintains the bubble until players defeat one of her Animated Protectors.
  • Animated Protector - When Lei Shi casts Protect, she animates these elementals from the bracers scattered throughout the area. The elementals turn back into water and fall to the ground when the effect ends.
• Scary Fog - Sha energy coalesces around several players, inflicting 5,000 Shadow damage every 2 sec. for 40 sec. In addition, players and enemies near an afflicted player take 5% more damage from all sources. This effect stacks.

[chaos5061]

Here is something that I think deserves a big BOO!

We just finished a pass making all pets that are caught via pet battles in the world non-tradeable. This means these pets cannot be put in cages for trading or posting on the AH. We felt that the option to buy these pets on the AH would take away from the exploration/collection gameplay of the system.

This could always change in a future patch, but this is how it will go out with MoP. You should see the change in our next build.

[chaos5061]

Beta Class Balance Analysis

Since everyone is thinking it, I'll ask...what should we read into the fact that you, and not GC, is now responding to posts in this forum?
That I’m not as busy as others are right now (which is a terrible understatement).

Back in the Black Wing Decent and Bastion of Twilight myself and a few friends of mine discovered that dots already on the target don't actually get re-evaluated when their caster receives a large haste boosts such as heroism and time-warp. This forces you to reapply your dots so that their period of ticking is shortened by the haste gain.

As you can probably tell this is quite a hassle. Especially as an Aff lock with mucho spell haste procs. Is this still the case?
Yes. The parameters of a DoT are determined at cast time. This may be a good time to explain one related topic though: Refreshing DoTs and whether that recalculates their parameters. For several classes, we have various mechanics that allow you to refresh or extend an existing DoT. In some of these cases, doing so recalculates their parameters; in other cases, it does not. Why the inconsistency, you ask? The rule we follow is that if the mechanic allows you to perpetually extend one DoT forever, it needs to recalculate. If it isn’t intended to let you maintain one DoT forever, it doesn’t need to recalculate. For example, the Demonology warlock's spell Touch of Chaos extends Corruption significantly, and it’s quite likely you’ll roll one corruption the whole fight, so it then recalculates. Alternatively, there’s a new mechanic coming for Affliction where Haunt adds 1 tick to each of your DoTs when it hits; that does not recalculate damage.

GC, just a quick clarification. The new Armor Damage Reduction formula used for 86+ characters: Armor / (Armor + 4,037.5 * Level - 31,7117.5) Does this continue on to level 93, similarly how the current Cata formula worked to 88 until this expansion? or is there another formula for level 91 and beyond?
It continues on to level 93. Just to clarify to make sure there are no misunderstandings, adding denotation for which variables are of the target and which are of the attacker: DamageReduction = TargetArmor / (TargetArmor + 4037.5*AttackerLevel – 317117.5).

Monk
Currently Rushing Jade Wind is causing 6sec shuffle for each target it hits. (given the cap on shuffle is 12sec, it basically means you get 12 sec shuffle if you cast on more than 1 mob).
This is something we're keeping an eye on for balance problems but for now, this is intended. There is a chance we may change it in the future.

Still on lvl 90 talents for monks, whats the intent on Xuen tiger?
Xuen does indeed cause Eminence for Mistweavers and is purely DPS for Windwalkers. For Brewmasters, he has a provoke, not a taunt. Provokes are what we normally give pets and they work like taunts but don’t work on most bosses. For example, Army of the Dead ghouls have a provoke. He should be decent at tanking and scales with your stats, the hope being he is useful as an off-tank. However, he won't be able to tank a raid boss (since he has a provoke, not a taunt), but he should be able to tank some adds and dungeon mobs. Please try that out and let us know how he does.

Paladin
Is it intended for Judgment to no longer apply/refresh Censure anymore? If so why was that change made?
Yes, Judgement has had quite the long history and has been a relatively unique ability since its inception. It's been a mix between a ‘ranged’ type attack or a ‘spell’, or for most of the past few years it’s been a ‘melee’ attack with a long range. That’s why it triggered Censure. But it also shared a bunch of properties with spells. So, for Mists, we decided to finally make it consistent with everything else and just say that it’s purely a spell, just as much as Exorcism or Holy Shock are spells.

[chaos5061]

Shaman
Is it intended for Healing Tide Totem to act as healing done by the shaman, or as a separate entity to avoid being split by Ascendance(Resto) as its currently not being duplicated and divided.
Intended. Totems' actions don't count as the shaman's. This is consistent with Searing Bolt not triggering Echo of the Elements and other similar effects.

Pets are currently not taking bonus health from Ancestral Vigor from what I can see. They're receiving the buff but not gaining any maximum health.
We plan to fix this in a future build. Currently, pet scaling from your own health is overwriting buffs. We plan to fix this. (This would also affect Glyph of Water Elemental, by the way).

Warlock
Windwalk Totem currently does not prevent warlocks from becoming snared via KJ Cunning. Is this intended or bugged?
Fixed in the next build.

Alternatively, there’s a new mechanic coming for Affliction where Haunt adds 1 tick to each of your DoTs when it hits; that does not recalculate damage.
I wanted to post a correction on this part. Our design process is very iterative and we’re constantly trying out new things. The above mentioned mechanic for Haunt extending DoTs is something we’ve been trying internally, but have decided not to go with for now, so don’t expect to see it in a future build.

[chaos5061]

Upcoming Pet Battle Changes
Many changes have been ongoing with the quests. Our next build should have significant updates.

A few highlights on what we have been working on:
Unique Tamer emotes
Unique Tamer pets
Tamer battles have been tuned up in difficulty
One Grand Master Tamer per continent. Defeating him/her will unlock all the daily's on that continent.
The flow has been consolidated to work though our two main trainers in Stormwind and Orgrimmar.
We have implemented more than 40 Tamer fights across the entire game. This does not include the boss fights!
Daily quests on Grand Master Tamers offer the Sack of Pet Supplies as a reward.
A new achievement reward for defeating all the Tamers. A "Tamer" title.
All of the quests to fight Tamers are now account-wide. This means that the one-shot quests can only be completed by one character on your account. The daily's can be completed by any character, once per day. Account wide quests are denoted in the quest log.

Warbot Fuel
There will be a way to get Warbot fuel in MoP. Still figuring out the specifics, but we are going to make it happen.

Remove 'Safe Zones' from PvP Servers
We feel it is rather necessary that the starter areas remain uncontested territory, as it gives newcomers a better chance to get a feel for the game and learn how it works... people need a chance to tie their boots before they get their faces smashed in :-)

We acknowledge that the pursuit of good world PvP can make the line between griefing and PvP quite blurry, and that is very much a part of the game which seasoned PvP players are fairly used to. But it is not fun to be new to a game, or re-rolling a new character for that matter, if you can’t even leave the starter area because some enemy faction player is corpse-camping or ganking everyone and everything in sight.

i heard you're going to try get us more involved with wpvp in mop but how will that change with the current dungeon/bg systems? wont people still just afk in sw/org in wait for their stuff to pop up?
We are indeed trying to get people more involved with world-PvP in Mists of Pandaria.

We are trying to provide a greater incitement for people to go back into the world by offering more content to do outside of the cities - this combined with cross realm zones means that you should come across more people(including enemy players) in the world overall. Additionally - the guards on PvP realms will be nerfed, so bashing in some skulls inside enemy towns and cities should be more feasible as well.

Is there any info about how much weaker the guards on PvP realms will be, compared to the ones on PvE realms?
I'm afraid I have no info available on this as of yet, but I can imagine that it will be something that may need a few adjustments over time anyway. The guards still need to matter and have some ability to protect the citizens of towns and cities, so they shouldn't be complete pushovers, but they also shouldn't be a near invincible army as they are today.

The plans are to adjust the guards on PvP realms so they are less strong than those found on PvE realms, and they will also take longer to respawn than those on PvE realms.

Importance of Beta Testing
May I field you a quick question? When Cata & D3 came out the servers were heavily fluxed with players, down time and angry mobs of people in a certain nation we will not mention... my question is have the errors of the past been noted and improved on ?
We have been rather overwhelmed in the past with more players than anticipated logging in upon release, but have taken note of past launch experiences indeed, and we will of course do everything we can to improve ourselves. More than anyone, we would like a smooth launch, and we want people to be happy and have fun when they log in after release.

I'm just wondering if the stuff reported in the beta really gets noticed...:-/. I've been reporting bugs like a woman crazed, but I guess those bugs are not "important" enough for recognition since they still are left unfixed. Namely visual bugs and such.
All reported bugs (that can be verified and reproduced of course), do get noticed and put on a list of things to fix. However it can take some time before they get fixed, as some bugs are more difficult to handle than others, and the less severe bugs do not have as high a priority as the really critical ones... I hope this makes sense to you.

[chaos5061]

NOTE THAT THE FOLLOWING HAS BEEN DISABLED FOR NOW TO FIX IT.

But I posted it here so people do know about it. I will also post this in the Diablo 3 thread.

This is an update for all Annual Pass holders who upgraded to a Collector's Edition of Diablo III. As noted in the Annual Pass FAQ, players who have subscribed to an Annual Pass and did the upgrade also receive 4 free months of World of Warcraft subscription time. This time is not automatically applied to your World of Warcraft subscription and needs to be applied manually. If you're an Annual Pass holder and purchased a Diablo III Collector's Edition upgrade, you merely need to log into your Battle.net account and at the top you should see a blue notification banner that says:

Claim Free Game Time
Because you have a World of Warcraft Annual Pass, and have upgraded Diablo III to a Collector's Edition, you are eligible for 4 months of free game time. Claim your free game time on this account.


Just click the link provided and you should be all set.

We have received a few reports from players who received an error message after clicking the link. Please know we are aware of this issue and are working to get it resolved as quickly as possible for those affected.

[chaos5061]

MOP RELEASE DATE!!!!!!

Release date for MoP is 9-25-2012
http://us.battle.net/en/int

[chaos5061]

Collectors Edition Info: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/services...ctors-edition/

[chaos5061]

Press Release:

WORLD OF WARCRAFT®: MISTS OF PANDARIA™ ARRIVES SEPTEMBER 25

Fourth expansion brings tides of war to the shores of a long-lost continent
Digital Deluxe and Retail Collector’s Editions revealed
Presales NOW LIVE

IRVINE, Calif. – July 25, 2012 – Land, ho! Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. today announced that World of Warcraft®: Mists of Pandaria™, the fourth expansion set for the world’s most popular subscription-based massively multiplayer online role-playing game, will be available in stores and online starting from September 25, 2012. Upon the expansion’s release, intrepid explorers of the Alliance and the Horde will be able to set foot upon the shores of the long-lost continent of Pandaria and embark on a perilous journey to uncover its ancient mysteries.

Mists of Pandaria will be available on DVD-ROM for Windows® XP/Windows Vista®/Windows® 7 and Macintosh® at a suggested retail price of $39.99 USD. The expansion will also be available digitally directly from Blizzard’s World of Warcraft website (www.WorldofWarcraft.com), also priced at $39.99 USD.

A special Collector’s Edition packed with bonus items will be available exclusively in retail stores for a suggested retail price of $79.99 USD. In addition, for the first time, World of Warcraft players have the option to purchase a special Digital Deluxe version of the expansion containing the in-game bonus items from the Collector’s Edition. The Digital Deluxe version is available to download directly from Blizzard via www.WorldofWarcraft.com for $59.99 USD. Players who purchase the standard edition digitally or at retail will have the option to upgrade to the Digital Deluxe version at any time (for as long as the standalone Digital Deluxe version remains available) for an additional $20 USD.

Presales for the standard digital and Digital Deluxe versions of Mists of Pandaria are now live. Players who would like to purchase either version and be ready to play the moment the expansion launches can do so now by visiting www.WorldofWarcraft.com. The expansion content will automatically be digitally delivered to pre-purchasers via World of Warcraft’s streaming launcher prior to the release of Mists of Pandaria. Players who would like to preorder the standard box or the retail-exclusive Collector’s Edition can do so by visiting their local retailer.

“Mists of Pandaria contains the biggest variety of new content we’ve ever created for a World of Warcraft expansion, with features that will appeal to new players, veterans, and everyone in between,” said Mike Morhaime, CEO and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “We’ve received a lot of great feedback from players during our most extensive beta test yet, and we hope they enjoy exploring everything Pandaria has to offer when the expansion comes out in September.”

The Digital Deluxe version of Mists of Pandaria includes a full digital copy of the expansion along with the following exclusive in-game bonus items:

World of Warcraft In-Game Mount: Take to the skies of Azeroth astride the mystical Imperial Quilen flying mount.
World of Warcraft In-Game Pet: Journey across Pandaria with the Lucky Quilen Cub at your side.
StarCraft® II Battle.net® Portraits: Bring the Horde and Alliance rivalry to the far reaches of the Koprulu sector with exclusive Infested Orc and Night Elf Templar Battle.net portraits.
Diablo® III Banner Sigil and Accent: Display your status as a hero of Pandaria with the iconic markings of World of Warcraft’s newest playable race, the pandaren.
The Collector’s Edition of Mists of Pandaria includes the full version of the game on DVD-ROM and contains the following exclusive bonus items, in addition to the in-game content from the Digital Deluxe version:

Behind-the-Scenes DVD and Blu-Ray: Learn about the creation of Pandaria with this two-disc set featuring over an hour of commentary, insider interviews, and developer roundtables.
Collector’s Edition Soundtrack CD: Experience 20 orchestral pieces from Mists of Pandaria.
The Art of Mists of Pandaria Book: Explore this 208-page hardcover tome featuring never-before-seen pieces from the expansion, from early concepts to final 3D renderings.
Chen Stormstout Mouse Pad: Equip your desk with this special-edition mouse pad featuring the legendary pandaren brewmaster.
In World of Warcraft: Mists of Pandaria, warships of the Alliance and Horde clash off the coast of a long-lost continent, signaling the start of a new era of discovery and conquest in the history of Azeroth. As players storm the shores of this exotic new frontier and begin to explore its mysteries, they’ll encounter brave new allies, unearth ancient secrets, and play their part in reigniting the long-brewing conflict between the Horde and Alliance on a strange battlefield far from home.

Mists of Pandaria offers a wide variety of content for new and returning World of Warcraft players. Features include a new playable race (the pandaren) with its own starting zone and quests, a new character class (the monk), and an expansive new continent for players to explore as they adventure to the new level cap of 90. The expansion also includes a host of new gameplay elements designed to give players even more ways to enjoy the game, including scenarios -- a flexible new kind of cooperative PvE trial; challenge modes, which offer high-prestige rewards for mastering Mists of Pandaria’s 5-player dungeons; and an all-new pet battle system.

Mists of Pandaria has received a Teen rating from the ESRB. In addition to the English version, Mists of Pandaria will be fully localized into Latin American Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, French, German, European Spanish, Russian, Korean, Traditional Chinese, and for the first time with a World of Warcraft expansion launch, Italian. Availability of Mists of Pandaria in mainland China will be announced at a later date.

To learn more about World of Warcraft and Mists of Pandaria, please visit the official website at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com. To set up a Battle.net account and to opt-in to Blizzard Entertainment beta tests, please visit the official Battle.net website at http://www.battle.net. With multiple games in development, Blizzard Entertainment has numerous positions currently available -- visit http://jobs.blizzard.com for more information and to learn how to apply.

[cabby]

Thanks for letting us know Chaos. Just pre-ordered my copy.

[chaos5061]

Thanks for letting us know Chaos. Just pre-ordered my copy.

Welcome. Now I have to wait until the CE is on Amazon to get mine. Hope they put it up soon.

[wowvern]

Too bad, Chaos. I'll have to wait another 10 days to pre-order mine digitally. It sucks living on a fixed income. BTW, SLI and Crossfire will officially not work with MoP. Check the FAQ at the Blizzard site for more info.