Latest World of Warcraft News
January 5th, 2010
While you are enjoying the new wonderful LFG system and content of patch 3.3, take a break and read about the latest news in World of Warcraft:
Shard Droprates in 3.3 – Players who were worried about the shard droprates of the Shawfrost Shards needed to create the legendary two handed axe, Shadowmourne, can rest a little easier now. Blizzard has confirmed that the droprates are not only bearable, but actually pretty darn good. The WoW Armory site states that the Shards will be dropped at a rate of 25-50% off of all bosses except Arthas in Icecrown Citadel 25 man on normal mode. This droprate increases 100% to 50-100% when playing on heroic mode. It will still be quite a process for players to craft the axe, but not as bad as some may have thought!
New Corehound Pups a Good Watchdog? – Now, obviously with their super cute animations and two-headed adorableness, the Corehounds are just around for looks and laughs right? Nope! I came across a post this week on a blog site I read all time that had me saying, “wow! what a good idea!” See, the pups are awarded to those players who have an authenticator (mobile or physical) attached to their account and they are removed from the account if the added security of the authenticator is ever removed. That being the case Guild Leaders could use the pups as a means of knowing if a guild officer with full bank permissions has the added security on his/her account. Frequent and random checks could be performed to make sure the officers and other members with bank access keep the authenticators on their accounts. This would prevent most account hacking/guild bank clearing situations.
All New Interview With Frank Pearce – Kevin Kelly at Joystiq had a rare chance to sit down and talk with Frank Pearce recently and ask him some questions about the future of World of Warcraft and to reflect on the good and bad of the past five years. The interview gives some insight into the founding and development of Blizzard Entertainment as a company as well as the growth of the game’s popularuty and Blizzard as a worldwide corporation. Kevin asks great questions and the answers are direct and concise. This interview is a great read for any WoW fan! Check it out here.
Facebook and World of Warcraft - What do the two have in common? More than you might think. In a recent write-up Gamasutra has compared the functionality of two seemingly very different social networking outlets. The article points out the obvious differences between the two franchises like one (WoW) is a game with an entirely engulfing virtual world surrounding it whereas the other is a site for socializing and networking with peers. The things I was more interested in were the not quite so obvious similarities between the two like creating and using an identity and the necessity of virtual interaction with others prevelant in both cases. The article is an interesting take on contrast and comparisson. Read it here.
Blizz Devs. to Speak at 2010 GDC – As in previous years, some of Blizzard’s leading developers will be speaking at the Game Developer’s Conference in March 2010 in San Fancisco, CA. Scheduled to speak this time are Senior AI/Gameplay Engineer, Brian Schwab and Pricipal Software Engineer, Erin Catto. Now, granted these will basically be total nerd talk and it is highly unlikely that any new revelations will be included in either one of their speaches, but anything is possible! We will update you on times and ticket information closer to the event.
Updated Armory App Has Some Cool New Features – Blizzard recently pushed an updated version of the Mobile Armory App for the iPhone which includes dome pretty sweet new features like a streamlined character selection screen, the ability to load and save custom talent builds and in-game reputations on character profiles. However, I think the absolute coolest thing to happen here is the “Find an Upgrade” feature which now works with the mobile app. So now while you’re riding the bus to work or sitting on your luch break, you will be able to search for a gear uprade for any equipment slot on your character! Nice, now we just need a little more game integration with the iPhone App and we’ll be all set! If you don’t already have the Mobile Armory App on your phone, now is a great time to get it…and it’s FREE!
New Features From Wowhead – The folks over at Wowhead have bestowed some gifts upon us for the holidays in the form of brand new features! The site now features a Completion Tracker which works with their profiler and client to track your character’s journey. Areas tracked by this feature include quests, mounts, pets and recipes. This is still in beta but seems to be working fine. Then we have the “share” feature which allows players to post profiles, blog posts, etc. to their Facebook pages, Digg and other social networking outlets. If this isn’t enough for you though, you might want to check out the super cute new Wowhead Wallpaper by Noxychu…
No Story Skipping in Instances – Now, we all know the story in the Culling of Stratholme is cool…the first few times you do it, but after about the 75th time it gets to be a bit much! Now, thanks to the random heroic dungeon finder, I think I have every word Arthas speaks during the run completely memorized. So my question was…will Blizzard ever go back and edit the “older” dungeons to include the ability to skip the drawn out storylines like the newer dungeons have? Eyonix answered exactly this question in his forum post this week and to my disappointment there is no plan to allow this in the immediate future, however he does leave it open-ended by saying, “It’s always a possibility in the future”.
New Anniversary Interviews and Minisite – Over on the Warcraft Anniversary Mini-Site there is a fairly new Blizzcast posted in which some of the top names in Blizzard development speak with members of the community about the past, present and future of the Warcraft Franchise. There is really no new information devulged, but it is great to hear all these guys in a room together joking around and reminicing about old times! Check it out here and then if you want you can read through some of the other recently posted interviews here.
Icecrown’s Delayed Gating – Well, as upset as some players may be, it would appear the gates to the second portion of Icecrown Citadel are not opening anytime soon. Players who have cleared out the first bosses in the lower areas of the Citadel were met with a message from their friendly faction leader that further content would not become available for 28 days. Now, this counter hasn’t changed so it leads us to believe that it’s something more like “when Blizzard flips a switch”. Many players aren’t happy about this, but Blizzard poster Daelo hit the forums to assure all of us that the time between the subsequent wings will not be so long and this delay was implemented due to the holidays. No one wants major content being deployed when most of the staff that could deal with problems is on vacation, right?! Right.
Blizzard Fan Art Contest – The World of Warcraft fan base has always had some amazingly talented members, I mean look through the Fan Art Gallery if you need proof of that. Blizzard is once again calling upon those of you out there who are talented and imaginative to enter their Holiday Fan Art Calendar Contest. The idea for this one is to create a piece of WoW-inspired art with a holiday theme that sets the tone for a particular month. The art can center around any one of the many in-game holidays and must be submitted by February 8th 2010. Artists whose works are chosen will also receive some pretty cool prizes. To read the official rules and to submit an entry, click here.
WoW Magazine Preview Now Online – The World of Warcraft Magazine is showing of a full 40-Page Preview from its first edition to give fans and a glimpse of the publication which is scheduled to arrive to subscribers before the end of the week. The magazine’s maiden issue is a full 148-page advertisement free, eye-candy filled piece of art. The stories in the first issue include lore visitations, class columns and interviews with members of the WoW community. The magazine, which is only available by subscription only, will not be placed on store shelves but is still available to new subscribers. So, if you haven’t already, you can subscribe today by clicking here.
The Red Rider Air Rifle – This year players were treated to a bit of nostalgia in the form of the Red Rider Air Rifle (an in-game BB Gun) which was placed in the game as a salute to the holiday classic, A Christmas Story. But, wait before you get too excited and start pelting other players with your 200 rounds, be sure and do the achievement it’s needed for first! The BB King achievement (Ally, Horde) requires players to go around and plink the opposing faction leaders with a BB from the gun. Just FYI, it is possible to miss so make sure you do your achievement first so you’re sure you have enough ammo!
Naxx Raid Deck Now Available – Upper Deck has released the latest in their series of raid sets for the WoW Trading Card Game. The Naxxramas Raid Deck and Treasure Pack can now be purchased through their online store for $29.99 and $9.99 respectively. Each deck and treasure pack contains collectable foil cards, game cards and UDE Points.
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