Project Lore

A Tribute to Addons is a column featuring new, cool, or useful addons. Send a tweet to @Heartbourne or @Projectlore with your suggestions, or leave a comment. On this edition of A Tribute to Addons, we are looking at the WoWHead client and its accompanying addon, "WoWHead Looter". The WoWHead client is very simple. Players can download the Windows or OSX versions from WoWHead, and it automatically puts the addon in the appropriate place. The software does not need to run while you are playing WoW for the addon to work. The addon grabs data from drops you find, quests, items, and other general data, which WoWHead's collects to calculate statistics and locations for the various items and objects in the World of Warcraft. There is no in-game interface; it merely prints a message in your chat frame on startup to let you know its work. Users need only run the software client to upload their data after creating an account on the WoWHead website. Using it helps contribute to the WoW community and provide us all with one of the best WoW database on the Internet, but there were some recent changes that make the WoWHead looter even better. WoWHead launched their Profiler a few months ago, which allowed players to query the Armory and have their Armory information stored on WoWHead, complete with multiple profiles and deep integration with the WoWHead database. Now, the WoWHead looter can gather information about your characters and sync it to the WoWHead Profiler. The new profiles are very slick. Sites that support WoWHead hotlink mouseover tooltips, like Project Lore, allow users to hotlink their characters. The addon grabs nearly all relevant data about your characters, so you can see data like your collected pets, completed quests, and known recipes. Using the vast WoWHead database, you can easily see what "completionist" items you need to obtain, like what quests you need to do, and quickly and easily find out all the information you need to find out about it. The system is all automatic, and the links are very clean and intuitive. For example, check out my non-combat pets, and how to get the ones I'm missing. In audition to the extremely powerful profiles, the same great searching and filtering abilities you know and love from the WoWHead database are present in the profile database. For example, here is a search that showed me everyone on my server who participated in the first Yogg-Saron kill, everyone with the Insane title, and all the skill level 450 engineers. WoWHead looter and profiles have replaced a lot of other services and sites that I use. Are you a fan of the WoWHead profiles?

Of the Christmas presents (a few WoW-related) that I was happy to receive over the holidays, the one that I most appreciate is a present from myself: a new desktop. You see, for the past few years I've been playing WoW and doing all of my other computer tasks (such as blogging) via laptop.

First, it was a Sony VAIO running Windows Vista with pretty measly specs and a 15.4-inch screen. I could do most of my day-to-day productive tasks on it fine, but WoW -- not so much. My graphics were turned way down, addons were kept to a minimum and tabbing out of game was really the equivalent of committing in-game suicide -- an automatic crash. Not too fun at all.

Then, a pretty major upgrade came when I started swiping my husband's "gaming laptop" (an oxymoron? yes.), a Gateway FX series, when it wasn't in use. A larger, 19-inch screen, more graphics capabilities, less worry about tabbing out. But to keep things running smoothly, it was best to close all other programs while playing. Then there was the addon confusion. Our two sets of addons aren't entirely compatible, and it took me a few times to realize that I could customize the addons per character. Not a huge deal, but it still wasn't my computer.

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The fourth installment of a film franchise that's gone on too long Spider-man is causing me some concern.  You see, Spider-man 4 and the untitled Warcraft movie share the same director, Sam Raimi.  According to Hollywood Reporter the webslingers quadrilogy has hit a wall, that snag may affect the movie I actually care about.

Apparently, Raimi and Sony cannot come to a consciousness on which villain(s) to use for the latest movie.  The obvious answer is Carnage, but four writers have tried, and failed, to get Sony and Raimi to kiss and make-up.  The collection of re-writes and re-starts has lead to a delay of Spider-man 4, knocking it out of opening 2011's summer blockbuster run on May 6.

Enough background, let's get to the topic at hand, the Warcraft movie.  With rumors swirling around Spider-man 4's delay, many industry insiders expect Warcraft's debut to be delayed in return, if by only a few months.  Others maintain that Raimi will just change his focus to Warcraft as the dispute rages on, allowing Blizzard's pictorial debut to remain on schedule.  That's a bit optimistic though.  At the moment, there's almost no concrete information on the movie besides Raimi directing and Legendary Pictures producing.  So what the heck is Raimi going to do, direct a series of DC Unlimited action figures?

That could be really entertaining...

In my opinion, the handling of Blizzard's licensed products has been absolutely stellar.  From the novels, to the books, manga and the trading card game, every bit of the extended universe is near gold.  I expect the movie to have the same loving treatment, a fact that Raimi's hiring only promoted.  Following that logic, delay the movie as much as needed.  Just make sure it's up to the quality and polish that we expect.

Like patches and expansions, don't hold your breath waiting for the movie film.



Finally, this week saw a return to somewhat normalcy in-game, after about two weeks of haphazard scheduling around the holidays. Starting the week of Christmas and stretching through New Years, my own guild and many others I know of saw a startling halt to raiding, despite all that new content and drool-worthy loot within Icecrown Citadel. I was able to sneak in a couple hours here and there for the weekly raids and a few daily randoms. Then toward the end of my extended vacation, I had a couple of entirely empty days that I chose to fill with WoW. With few others in my guild on, I decided to catch up on some questing that I've pretty much abandoned (other than dailies) since hitting 80. I finished up quests in Zul'Drak, remembering the days when that content was incredibly difficult, spent a little time in Storm Peaks, and continued on to Icecrown. And something struck me: Arthas really has left his mark all over Azeroth. Of course, with hordes of undead minions roaming the planet, you can see Arthas' imprint everywhere. But through questing, you see more the larger essence of his influence. Such is the case with a quest chain starting at Sindragosa's fall that leads the adventurer through some key moments in Arthas' life. It begins with meeting a ghostly childish figure, Matthias Lehner, who gives you the quest Where Dragons Fell and you witness the Raising of Sindragosa. In subsequent quests, you play as Arthas and see him kill his own soldiers then raise them as undead, then battle Illidan Stormrage. I don't want to give anything away to others of you who may not have seen the line, so I'll simply say that the questline concludes with a heart-pounding confrontation between the Lich King and the heroes who are fighting against him. I've heard others reference this questline before (mainly through comments on my post asking whether Arthas can be redeemed, a question which I still think is valid despite the conclusion of the questline). But since it's something that easily can be overlooked on the grind to 80, I hadn't actually seen it for myself. So if you, too, find some time leading up to the battle with the Lich King, I recommend seeking out this ghostly little boy (whose name, by the way, is an anagram of Arthas Menethil) and playing through it for yourself. Now that the battle is nearing, has anyone else found themselves thinking through some of these older quest lines involving Arthas? Do you think we can draw any clues about the final encounter from them?

[caption id="attachment_9612" align="alignright" width="222" caption="Never has a Random Number Generator been so friendly to players."][/caption] We all know somebody that has been hacked, but who realized it would get this bad? I sort of take it for granted that this sort of thing is going to happen in an online environment. Even if account security is normally iron-clad, all it takes is a few people unwittingly supplying their vital information to an untrustworthy source to break the system, but without being made aware of the official statistics, it's always been hard to get a grasp of the true scope of the problem. Well, it must be bad enough if Blizzard is considering making their Authenticators mandatory for all accounts. WoW.com claims to have learned from unnamed "inside sources" that this may soon be the case:

WoW.com has learned through trusted sources close to the situation that Blizzard is giving serious consideration to making authenticators mandatory on all accounts. According to our sources, while this policy has not been implemented yet and the details are not finalized, it is a virtually forgone conclusion that it will happen. This response is a direct effort to stop the massive number of compromised accounts by gold sellers and keyloggers.

As per the article, the volume of complaints has apparently gotten so massive, that it has backed up Blizzard's support system. Wonder why it's been three days since you opened your GM Ticket and still haven't received a response? Blame the hackers. Playing internet sleuth to figure out what's happened to thousands of accounts (and how to keep the vitcims happy) has dealt a huge blow to the company's internal resources. So let's say that Authenticators do go mandatory: how do you implement a plan like this on such a grand scale? There are still some 11+ million people playing the game and if you don't get a device into every one of their hands, you're going to lose subscribers anyway (simply because they won't be able to play the game). The obvious answer seems to be to include an Authenticator with every copy of Cataclysm. Blizzard has had some trouble manufacturing enough of the keychain-sized devices to match demand, and waiting until the expansion is ready to ship would give them enough time to create the required amount. Plus, it would presumably eliminate extra cost to the consumer. Sure, Authenticators are cheap, but tell that to the person who already pays you fifteen dollars a month! The only downside I could see is that a lot of people not in the United States likely play the game at internet cafes and don't actually buy boxed copies themselves. In the meantime, it might be best to bolster the Mobile Authenticator program. The application is already available for iPhones (and, for that matter, the iPod Touch if you don't have service with AT&T), but getting versions out there for Android and Blackberry devices as soon as possible would be a quick way to swell the numbers. What do you think of this potential change in policy? Overreaction or necessary precaution? It's clear that account hacking is happening, and it's happening a lot. Blizzard has to do something, right?

As many of you have suspected, we think rogue damage is too high. We will be making hotfixes to lower the maximum damage output of Assassination and Combat rogues. The Combat nerf will be slight. Both specs should still do just fine on damage meters (assuming skill, gear etc.) but shouldn't be beating out other specs to such a large degree. Other things on our radar that you might see soon -- none of these are promises and we have no specific changes to announce yet: Warlock damage in PvE is a little low.

• Protection warriors have too much utility and damage for PvP. (We don't want to hurt their tanking in PvE of course.)
• We are considering adjusting (not replacing) the Elemental 4 piece Tier 10 set bonus.
• We'll continue to refine and look at the Icecrown weapon procs.
• Other stuff (yes, we've heard your concerns), but these are the big things we are focusing on at this time.

Some of these changes, should we decide to pursue them, can be handled via hotfix and others will be made in an upcoming patch. We usually don't make such general announcements before we're ready to share the specifics, so we'll see how this works out.

Listed below are recent fixes we have applied to the game. Keep in mind that some of these changes may not be active until after the realm has been restarted. To review previous in-game fixes, please visit: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=21723843880&sid=1 01/07/10

• Rotface’s hit points have been reduced in the 10 person encounter.
• Stealthed rogues should no longer trigger traps in Ice Crown Citadel from long range.
• The base damage bonus from Hunger for Blood has been reduced from 10% to 5%.
• The bonus damage rogues gain from attack power for poisons has been decreased. This applies to Instant Poison, Deadly Poison, and Wound Poison.

So, readers, is this Rogue nerf something you can get behind, or would their high level of damage have been worth stringing along in Icecrown Citadel until gear started to even things out a little bit? Do you think Blizzard knows what they're doing with the class, or have they painted it into a corner over the course of the expansion? If the latter, can it be saved with a Warlock-style revamp in the expansion?

[caption id="attachment_9596" align="alignright" width="300" caption="Valkyrie Profile's Lenneth, clearly #1 on my list of Hawt Battle Maidens I'd Totally Do."][/caption] No doubt the addition to provide more weapons with procs on them in Icecrown Citadel was something of a controversial decision. I think everyone likes the idea of them. Especially when they have neat visual effects like Nibelung does. Who wouldn't want the chance to summon a small army of sexy battle maidens every time they cast a spell?! But until people can get a handle on the proc rate, they all seem like nebulous upgrades. You don't have the same kind of raw stats to deal with, and that makes people nervous and uneasy. I imagine it also makes these sorts of weapons harder to balance, especially when bosses still drop their more traditionally-itemized kin. That's why we've been seeing so many tweaks to said equipment as of late and today is no different. Several items (two weapons and a trinket to be exact) have had their procs modified in the changes below. And for those of you working on your Shadowmourne quest, some good news, as well:

Listed below are recent fixes we have applied to the game. Keep in mind that some of these changes may not be active until after the realm has been restarted. To review previous in-game fixes, please visit: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=21723843880&sid=1 1/6/10

• Deathbringer’s Will trinket will now proc haste as a replacement for armor penetration.
• The val’kyrs spawned by the Nibelung staff will now always hit with their smite attack and their damage has been increased for both normal and heroic versions of the staff.
• The chance for the proc to activate on the Black Bruise weapon has been increased.
• In the Rotface encounter, big oozes should now properly combine.
• Rotface’s acidic blood and Festergut's acidic blood now function appropriately through the use of the group looting and master looting systems.

[caption id="attachment_9589" align="alignnone" width="640" caption="Auctioneer makes the AH 100x more usable."][/caption] Wishful Thinking is a column for the theorycrafting behind World of Warcraft.  No, not the number crunching madness perfected by the folks at ElitistJerks, but the features, abilities, and design ideas that the Project Lore writers conjure from their squishy pink stuff. I believe it's safe to say that there are two things in World of Warcraft that everyone uses at some point in their heroic career, their inventory, and an auction house.  Whether it be the one in a capital city or Dalaran, you've likely perused the magical storage system for deals.  Materials for your professions, enchanting mats, gems (cut and uncut), gear and hawking your own wares are the reasons most players know the fastest way to their local auctioneer.  Even the most AH adverse player has likely spent hours scanning for this or that, with heavy users spending days of (often semi-afk) playtime.  Yet like our inventory system, the auction house, for all intents and purposes, hasn't changed a lick since vanilla WoW. How are we letting these basic things slide?  How can we, as paying customers, sit by and allow the system's we use the most to completely suck.  Unlike fleeting raid dungeons or jousting, this content will never go out of style because it's a necessity.  Just like Peeps at Easter.  I hated the system when I first started playing the game.  It just seemed obvious to me that it could have been so much more, possibly rising into an economic game in and of itself. At the time I shrugged off the oversight, chalking it up to developers being too busy perfecting the meat and potatoes of the game.  I assumed that the system would get attention after bigger fish were fried.  Here we are, five years and two full course meals later, and little has changed. Thank god for Auctioneer.  At least that appetizer makes the current incarnation palatable. Things the Auction House severally needs:

• First and foremost, steal from Auctioneer.  Blizzard makes no qualms about lifting ideas from the AddOn community, from the CT Mod crew to Quest Helper ideas have been "borrowed."  Take everything from Auctioneer that isn't automated.  This includes price matching and being able to do multiple postings of the same item (not an automation I'd avoid, it's simply logical).  And don't worry about this killing theAddOn.  The creators are far to inventive to let that happen.
• Add a standing buy option.  This would enable players to post the quantity and amount they are willing to pay for an item.  If another player comes along and adds an item at the correct (or lower) price, then the system would automatically purchase the item for me.  Instant gratification for the seller, and a time saver for the buyer.
• Put a price tracking measure into the standard interface.  Blizzard has tried to stop players from scanning the Auction House for average pricing a few times.  The best way to stop it would be to just display the information to us.  Rather than dozens to hundreds of players scanning the AH a few times a day, Blizzard servers can take care of it, scanning every six hours and displaying the median prices of items.  It'd make the players better informed, save our time, and the AH database would have millions of less calls.  Win, win.
• Expanded "Usable" filter.  I need a gem, a Cardinal Ruby gem for a rogue.  Stop showing me caster/tank items. They are usable in theory, but come on.  Sortable by class-based items would be a nice start (allowing you to buy things for an alt on your main).
• Combat Auction House flooding.  One technique that you can use to make sure your items sell is to make them appear on the first page.  Players rarely flip to the second page so by selling stacks of one, your items can push other lower priced items off the first page.  I'm not sure what can be done to combat the spam of a user posting 100 single item auctions of Infinite Dust without breaking the reason for splitting existing, but it's annoying and adds to the slowness of the Auction House.

The Auction House is the backbone of Azeroth's economy.  It deserves some love. Anyone have any other things they'd like to see the Auction House add to its repertoire?  As a side question, does anyone ever use the cross-faction auction house anymore?

WoWFlix is a column featuring videos from around the web related to World of Warcraft. For this edition, regular columnist Heartbourne is handing the reins to Pixiestixy after she found her own video she wanted to share. If you find something you’d like to be featured, leave a comment or send a tweet to @Heartbourne. I went and saw Avatar over the holidays with my in-laws, and got thoroughly sucked in to the stunning visuals of the film and the fantasy storyline. I didn't think much about it during the movie, but afterward my father-in-law, who had seen me playing WoW while visiting, commented that it could have been taken straight from the game. Chinese player WenYe Shang attempts to prove just that with his video that echoes an extended Avatar trailer, but with visuals from WoW. If you've seen the movie, you'll get a kick out of the video here. If you haven't, you've probably at least heard enough about it to enjoy the movie regardless.From aircraft to floating cities to flying mounts to other roaming creatures, Shang found a WoW visual for just about everything in Avatar. I just wish the video didn't have that weird haze to it -- that would make it just perfect in my book. Also, interesting choice for music in the ending credits. As a side note, since I saw the movie I've heard it be compared to many, many other stories because of its somewhat recycled, simplistic storyline. It's been compared to Star Wars, Disney's Pocahontas and, of course, The Smurfs. Perhaps there are more of these gems floating around for each of the other stories, too. I still prefer the WoW version!

It's one of those signature Shammy abilities that sets them apart from all other classes and makes them, for some, an essential party member of any raid group: Bloodlust / Heroism. But a lesser version of the ability could soon become available through leatherworking drums, according to Blizz posters Eyonix and the fabled Ghostcrawler. Earlier this week, Eyonix replied to a thread inquiring  on the topic with this response:

We’re considering it. There are two big considerations at play here. One is we’re unsure the buff is as mandatory as some players think it is. It certainly feels like a big boost when it happens, but part of that is because so many groups use the Bloodlust / Heroism moment as the time to blow all their cooldowns and go all out. While it is unarguably a buff (though for some specs more than others), it’s role as “blow everything!” is significant too. Secondly, while we ultimately wouldn’t mind having a weaker consumable available (like Kings and Fortitude) for groups, we’re not crazy about the idea of every character running around leveling, using Bloodlust for every kill quest. At that point, it just feels like a mandatory consumable and anything designed to make it feel less mandatory (like an expensive cost) feels bad.

Even the slight possibility of this happening set of a rage of hundreds of responses, to which Ghostcrawler also contributed his own two cents. Check the forum post for his full diatribe on why "Shaman aren't a support class," but the gist of his point was summarized by his final paragraph:

We're not sure we'll make Bloodlust drums for the reasons we stated above. But we're not worried about the concern that shaman will never get invited again. You shouldn't be getting invited because of your buff today. You should get invited because you're not annoying and because you contribute to progress.

So the drums definitely aren't a for-sure thing, which isn't surprising. It's hard for Blizzard to commit to anything because if it later gets pulled from the table of consideration, there's bound to be upset fans. But as a skinner and leatherworker who only recently hit 450 and gained access to using Drums of Forgotten Kings and Drums of the Wild, (both of which are greatly useful in 5-man groups), I can say that the mere thought of a Bloodlust drum is quite exciting. I definitely can see the viewpoint that Shammies don't want that taken from them, but then my own greed sinks in and I want it for myself! What do you guys think of the prospect? And what do you make of the whole debate this has set off about whether Shaman are essential to every raid group (and whether a bloodlust drum would nullify that)?