Project Lore

This past week, for me at least, has been all about crazy, oh-no-they-didn't moments in WoW, and hopefully educating our dear readers a bit about how not to get duped by would-be bad apples. I have one more tidbit to share before shifting my concentration back to where it belongs, which certainly isn't on these griefers. This one's all about keeping track of those enemy spies, Raid ID thieves, trolls, ninja looters, serial gankers, and just general douchebags. Beyond adding them to your ignore list or just blacklisting said players from your raid invite list, you also can go beyond by listing them at wowjackass.com (Thanks to Eric, who alerted me to this site in a previous comment.) Here's how it works: When you are the subject of any of the above offenses, you go to the site, enter the name of the criminal and their server, describe the act in detail, and submit it to the site. They process submissions within 24 hours, and the roughly 50 percent who make it through the screening process then are listed on the site's front page, and Twitter and Facebook pages. After bumped from the front page, they'll remain listed on their respective server page. The site also ranks servers according to the number of listed jackasses. Currently my main server, Khaz Modan, is listed at the number 1 spot with more than double the number of  listings as the next-closest server, Skullcrusher. Is this because Khaz Modan has an unusually large number of jackasses? Possibly. But, it also could mean that more people on the server are aware of the site through trade chatter, or it could also mean that people are retaliating against getting listed by reporting others. The site doesn't collect or display names of those reporting the information, but someone accused (especially if they're a RL jackass) may take a guess at who reported it regardless. Which brings up another potential problem: False accusations. I'm a firm believer that there are always two sides (or more) to a story. Unfortunately, WoWjackasses, at least initially, only reports one side. And, just because a person can tell a tale of ass-hattery in great detail (which is part of what the team looks for to figure out which entries are authentic), the story still could be pure fiction. WoWjackasses attempts to thwart this possibility by allowing site-goers to add a comment of their own, or give each listing a "thumbs up" or "thumbs down" based on their own experiences. Finally, someone who feels they have been wrongly accused may contact site developers and give their piece. At least that's a step in the right direction. Criticism aside, the site makes for some fun reading, especially if you recognize some of the names listed on your server. And I don't mean to belittle the mission of the site; it's certainly a worthy one, and would be hard to pull off without these side-effects. You'll just have to decide whether you trust the information enough to let it guide you in your quest against getting jerked around.

Before you get your "ZOMG Cataclysm Is Coming Out In August" panties in a bunch, let's be clear, the release date of the book makes no mention of the third expansion launching side-by-side with it.  Technically the date isn't even official, no matter how accurate Amazon has been in the past, Blizzard is Blizzard, even with the extended universe stuff.  The novel, titled World of Warcraft: The Shattering: Prelude to Cataclysm (Semicolons of Destruction), is available for hardcover pre-order at the exuberant price of $26.00 and should hit your doorstep around August 31. Believe it or not, you are currently in the process of reading right now.  So stop being all high and mighty, claiming that you aren't so nerdy as to read a book about a video game, and give it a shot.  After all, Christie Golden absolutely bowled everyone over with her treatise on Arthas, his fail at horseback riding and Jaina.  She's also written other solid books and stories set in the Warcraft universe. There's currently no information available on the plot, but considering the subtitle, I expect there to be a good chunk of the novel dedicated to Deathwing's awakening.  Who, what, or why it happens will be up to Golden's creative mind - with some input from Metzen for sure - but I hope Rhonin dies. Actually, Knaak should be the one to put his own character down.  No, Rhonin deserves to die twice.  Knaak has a perfect opportunity to kill Rhonin in February as part of World of Warcraft: Stormrage, a novel that's to revolve around the Emerald Dream and Malfurion Stormrage.  Okay, enough Rhonin hating, he may cry about it. Anyways, being a prelude I expect The Shattering will come out well before Cataclysm.  The exact opposite of the release schedule for the Arthas novel. Who's going to geek out on lore with me?

[caption id="attachment_8363" align="alignright" width="264" caption="Already Have All The Mats For Solidsamm's Upgrades"][/caption] Patch 3.3 is all over the WoW news of late.  The patch notes have been continuously updated, bosses have been tested and Heartbourne has posted more videos than I can keep up with.  Lost in the information overload may have been the reveal by MMO-Champion of some awesome craftable gear.  Raiders will be getting access to a pair (or more depending on specs) of high ilevel items come Icecrown Citadel.  Being crafted, the additions become just another opportunity to make a horde of gold. Simple economics tell us that the gear will be a hot commodity when the patch first drops.  Many players will be clambering to upgrade their main, and likely a collection of alts, to the new gear, raising the demand of the needed consumables, and thus the price. As a friendly reminder, it would behoove those gold-starved players to begin hording these items now - eternals, transmute items (Moonshroud, Titanseel, etc), skinning items - in an attempt to fill you coffers when the bull market arrives.  You have to spend gold to make gold after all. Even if you aren't in need of turning 1000g into 5000g, the leg and feet items are sure to attract you anyways.  Be smart, save some gold by purchasing the needed materials now, while they remain relatively low.  I've been doing just that, snapping up eternals, Nerubian Chitin, transmute cloth, Arctic Furs, for the rogue and priest crafted gear for over a week now, assuming the price was right.  I'm even farming what I can in an attempt to maximize my auction house income later on. Honest to god, playing the auction house around patch time has made me more goblin droppings than all of my farming tactics combined.  Grab Auctioneer, get some baselines for prices, research which items will see their prices skyrocket, and be sure to purchase and cash out at the appropriate times.  Don't wait until Patch 3.3's release is imminent.  By then it will be too late.

If you've attempted to log-in over the past few hours you've likely been stone-walled from entering the game. The culprit appears to be a small hotfix or patch intended to (ironically) update the install repair tools that either wasn't ready to go live yet or just featured plain old bad code. When it first released, people were receiving an error that said the server was "unable to validate game version." As it stands, that issue has been solved and the fix can now be downloaded properly, but it seems to be causing further issues for Windows Vista and Windows 7 users. Namely, that the patch fails to install. Some intrepid users figured out that running the game in Adminstration Mode fixed the issue, and this has been confirmed by Blizzard to work (for most people having the problem, if not all). If you aren't aware of how to make this change to the game files, here is a helpful Blue posts that can point you in the right direction:Hey all,

"The problem with the patch causing an Unable to Validate Game Version was resolved shortly after the patch was released. If you are having a problem downloading or applying the patch, here a number of things you can do: Wait. The download process may be a little slow as it is prime time and lots of people are logging on and downloading all at the same time. If the progress bar is moving, even if ever so slightly, then you are on your way to getting patched. - Keep in mind that there is a time out to the download. The Play button may appear before the download has finished. If you do this, you will still get an Unable to Validate Game Version, as the game hasn't actually patched yet. Vista/Windows 7 users should try running the game as an Administrator. - Right click the desktop shortcut and select Run as Admin If you are getting a Failed to Apply patch, try deleting the patch and download it again. The patch is named wow-patch.mpq and can be found in the root of the game folder or, for Windows Vista/7, in C:\Users\Public\Documents\Blizzard Entertainment\World of Warcraft. Then start the game again to download the a new copy of the patch."

They also recommend cycling your modem and/or router to clear the cache:

"If you're getting a Failed to Apply Patch, Windows Vista or Windows 7 may not be permitting WoW to patch itself. Right-click on the World of Warcraft shortcut, and "Run as Administrator". If you still can't connect, I would clear up any residual cache or connections, and power cycle the network: 1) Shut down your computer 2) Unplug the router and the modem 3) Wait for a minute, and then plug the modem back in, and let it fully power up until all of the lights are solid. 4) Plug in the router, and let it fully power up. 5) Boot up your computer, and try to log in. The DNS cache may need to be cleared too: http://us.blizzard.com/support/article/flushdns"

Even if it seemed fairly innocuous to do so at first, it was probably a bad idea to pump out a fix in the middle of prime time. Any time you have to go in and mess with the game files manually, you run the risk of an inexperienced user screwing something up with their install or corrupting their copy of the game altogether. It seems that things are already clearing up for the majority of players, but if you're still having trouble logging into WoW, the best advice I can give you is to hold tight. It's assumed that all issues will be solved by the end of tomorrow's maintenance period. Hopefully, you didn't have a big raid planned for tonight! It may be worth your while to keep tabs on the Tech Support forum for more tips and updates on where this thing is going.

This update's a teeny-tiny little one, honestly without a whole lot to talk about. Paladin's continue to get changes to their Lay on Hands spell, which you may or may not have seen Blizzard waffling about on the official forums. The latest version of the spell -- which once was rumored to remove the ability to cast on yourself altogether -- now merely causes Forebearance in the same case. If you cast it on any other players, including fellow Paladin (say a healer casting it on a tank), it should operate as normal. According to Blizzard, this is to keep the class from stacking it with other life-saving maneuvers in certain, troublesome situations. It looks like they putting a big fat nerf on The Oculus, as well, no doubt in response to players complaining about having to run it more often using the new Dungeon system. I can't say I've ever found the instance to be particularly hard, just weird and kind of annoying. Unfortunately, they're doing nothing to really change the way the dragons and mounted combat work. Instead, they're just plain old making it easier by cutting down on the damage output and health of both bosses and trash mobs. Not the right move, if you ask me, but I suppose it would take more effort than they're willing to put in at this stage to rectify the overarching problems with the dungeon. [caption id="attachment_8353" align="alignright" width="300" caption="3000g is a bit steep for a used hole, isn't it? She sells an expensive 24-slot bag, to boot!"][/caption] Oh, also make sure to check out Haris Pilton's new 24-slot bag, the "Portable Hole" (oh, the jokes that could be made about debutantes and their holes)! Nice throwback to role-playing's pedigree, though. Anyway, here the full notes (even if there's regrettably not much beyond what I've described above):

Dungeons & Raids Oculus

• Many bosses and creatures have had their total health reduced.
• Several bosses and creatures have had cooldowns on specific abilities increased, effect durations reduced, and damage on some of these abilities reduced.
• Ring-Lord Conjurers and Sorceresses now hang out in packs of 4 instead of packs of 5.
• Vehicle scaling on the drakes based on the rider’s item level has been increased to make them more powerful.

Paladin

• Divine Intervention: This ability now also removes Exhaustion and Sated from the target. In addition, the cooldown on this ability has been reduced from 20 minutes to 10 minutes. Cannot be used in Arenas.
• Lay on Hands: This ability will place Forbearance on the paladin if used on his or herself. It will not place Forbearance on others.

Items

• Haris Pilton now sells a new 24-slot bag! She has stubbornly decided to remain in Shattrath City, so those interested should seek her out there.

Bug Fixes

• The Bug Fixes section has been updated with tons of minor fixes, check the full patch notes for more information.

Protip is a weekly short video segment. Check back every Monday for a new guide or tip. Leave a comment to let me know what you want to see in future segments. Follow @Heartbourne for notifications of new videos!

This week, I go on a harrowing adventure through the Blizzard store to find a Pandaren Monk.

The tier armor preview for patch 3.3 and Icecrown Citadel has been finalized. We finally get a peak at Shaman armor. This is one of my favorite tier 10 set designs. The deer things coming out of the shoulders look like a random periodic effect. I love these types of effects; it adds a lot of personality to the armor. I personally don't look forward to running around with a bag on my head, and I think my priest friends will be giving me flashbacks to Molten Core days with their ripoff of Mage tier 1. I liked the armor design in Burning Crusade, and I think that it went downhill on a whole in Wrath. These tier 10 armor sets look dull in comparison to Burning Crusade armor. Then again, the whole "pew pew laser" theme to Burning Crusade didn't set well with a lot of players. With tier sets so easy to obtain combined with the questionably impressive designs for armor, I've felt rather underwhelmed by armor in Wrath of the Lich King. Then again, I still love rocking my Rogue tier 8, especially the helm. Check out the official preview page at WoW Europe. Do you think this armor is really what should be dropping in the legendary Icecrown Citadel?

Speaking of douchebaggery on the Khaz Modan server, apparently Alliance aren't the only ones acting up. While on the same Ventrilo server where an enemy player listened in to my raid group's precious Wintergrasp tactics, another interesting topic came up: the stealing of raid IDs. It's been a while since I've heard anyone mention stealing raid IDs. I assumed the practice had at least waned a bit ever since a blue post announced last year that the practice is now considered a reportable offense. For anyone unfamiliar, the stealing of a raid ID is basically when another player (and whoever else he invites along) is able to gain access to the hard work that someone else already has put into a raid. Let's use Naxxramas as an example. Say Guild A already has run through the Arachnid, Plague and Military quarters of the instance, leaving only the Construct quarter to finish later in the week before they can unlock the Frostwyrm Lair. (The new Patch 3.3 PTR patch notes state that players will no longer have to unlock the other quarters to get to the lair, but as an example let's keep this rolling.) Then, there's Guild B, who also wants to run Naxx -- as quickly as possible. Somehow, through trade chat, whispers or possibly even a planted mole, they find out that Guild A is already 3/4 of the way through the raid. They form a group for a 5-man instance and invite along a member of Guild A. But actually, the other four members are waiting outside of Naxx. The actual "steal" happens very quickly. Guild A member accepts the group invite, then immediately Guild B changes the group to a Raid and promotes the Guild A member to leader. The other four Guild B members run into Naxx and are asked whether they want to be saved to the group leader's instance. They all click "yes." The group is disbanded, and Guild B invites their friends to partake in the last quarter of Naxx. Guild A, on the other hand, loses its progression in the instance and has to start from scratch after the raid lockout period ends. I explain the practice not so that you can go and use it (please don't be a douchebag - I'd put this behavior several notches worse than spying on the other side for your own advantage.) Instead, use the information to be smart about who you group with or, in this case, don't group with, especially when you're saved to a partially-completed instance. And also don't go announcing that you're half-way through an instance when someone may try to take advantage of that. And if, for some reason, you find yourself leader of a raid group that you thought was a 5-man PUG, GTFO. Fast. Unfortunately, it looks like the practice is alive and kicking, at least on my server. The good news is that everyone who was in on that vent discussion now knows which guild is guilty of the practice. You can't be a douchebag for long before people spread the word and exclude you from groups. But all this got me a little worried about the new cross-realm LFG system getting ready to roll out in Patch 3.3. So far, it looks like the cross-realm LFG will only be for 5-man dungeons, and not 10- or 25-man raids. Things could get really sticky if the cross-realm system also is available for raids, introducing a whole host of potential challenges, not in the least being the systematic stealing of raid IDs. Beware! Has anyone else come across this trickery as of late? Who else things the Raid ID system needs some kind of overhaul to prevent the systematic stealing of others' progression? With the changes already coming to LFG, perhaps now is the perfect time for Blizz to tackle the issue.

There was a post over on Elitist Jerks that outlined a loot distribution system called GDKP, or "gold DKP". I really like the concept and plan to try it out soon. It has been popular in Korea for some time year, and it is getting some traction on US and EU realms. GDKP is a relatively simple system. Here is how it works:

1. Whenever a desirable item drops, bidding starts. There is a minimum bid for items, usually around 50g. If the item is disenchantable, its always higher than the market price of the shard in principle.
2. Bidding can be done in a variety of ways. The most common way is publicly in raid chat, with no limit on the number of bids any one person can make. Bids have a required increment above the previous bid.
3. If no bids are made for 10 seconds, the highest bidder receives the item and pays his money into the "pool". It is usually held by the raid leader/loot master. If no bids are made, the item is disenchanted and bid off, starting low.
4. At the end of the raid, the "pool" is divided among the raiders.

This system has many benefits, as well as a few weaknesses. The biggest advantage I see to this is a modularity of raid members and of loot "karma". Loot systems like karma and DKP based ones make it difficult for new members to get loot. With this system, everyone comes in with as much "karma" as they carry in their wallet. Whenever someone gets usable loot, its of direct (monetary) benefit to all other raiders, so other people receiving usable loot is a good thing. If you are raiding with someone who wants the same item as you and you both bid vigorously, one of you receives it and the other gets a large sum of money. In this way, there is less drama about who to bring to raids. Undergeared people will get lots of gear, and geared people will receive compensation for not directly receiving loot. Another benefit is the removal of any RNG elements. There is absolutely no randomness in who receives gear; its a completely deterministic way to distribute loot. It also removes any "weight" the raid leaders have on who they think should receive loot. Do you think its unfair that you are being forced to heal and cannot roll on DPS gear? There is no main spec/off spec distinction, so if you desire it as much as someone who wants it for main spec, you can still choose to receive that gear. Feel like its unfair someone is receiving all the gear? You receive compensation, and if you want gear next time, go grind out some gold. Additionally, if you "kind of" want some gear that noone else wants, you don't get penalized for taking it with a major karma/DKP loss, its only a small payment that shows that you value it more than a shard. The negatives of this system really lie in people being dishonest. There is always the possibility of the raid leader stealing the gold pool. This is why it is highly suggested that the entire system is explained before the raid in game; GMs will intervene and take disciplinary action if a raid leader does not honor loot agreements. Always make sure this conversation takes place in game to refer to later for your own security. There is also the possibility of raiders bidding more gold than they have. This is usually fixed quickly since they need to pay on the spot, but artificially inflating prices without the risk of actually having to pay is usually a good reason to immediately remove someone from the raid without compensation. Additionally, all raid members are usually bound til the end in order to receive their cut of the pool. This is a double-edged sword; it keeps people going, but it can be inconvenient when the raid leader holds all the bargaining chips to push the raid further, which is ripe for possible abuse. This system really requires a lot of trust from all participants. There are all sorts of variations. While this (in theory) could even be useful for PUGs, it can be a great way for guilds to raise money. You can decide to take 10% of the pool for your guild bank, and if the guild needs money, open up runs to other people to get some funds. You can also reward skill by giving less of the pool to raiders who underperform, such as giving the top DPS, healers, and tank (to compensate for repair costs) slightly more gold, and dock percentage points for raiders who "fail", such as dying while fighting Heigan or standing in some flavor of fire. Its a very goblinist way of raiding. Gevlon would be proud. Would you try this system if given the chance?

As you may have read in the latest patch notes, Blizzard has gone ahead and given players the option to integrate the Quest Log and World Map into one big, conglomerated objective-tracking monstrosity! People will wail and people will moan that they're, once again, making the game too easy, but then those same people will turn around and log-in to their characters with add-ons like Quest Helper long-since loaded up. And that's pretty much what this is, minus some of the more esoteric functionality. Whether that's a good thing or a bad thing is up to you. Personally, I couldn't stand using Quest Helper, and one reason was that damned "GPS arrow" that wouldn't permanently go away no matter how many times I told it to. Likewise, I never really cared for the associated "quickest route" feature because it would nag me every time I went somewhere it didn't want me to go. I'm game for something a little more coherent, a little more simplified. Blizzard's stab at this sort of functionality places your tracked quests into a numbered list. When moused-over (or clicked), the map lights up with the area in which their objectives can be found. Easy and clean! At this point in the game, I'm pretty excited to have something like this. It'll no doubt come in handy when I'm leveling an alt or simply can't remember where precisely a quest mob is located even though I've done it a dozen times in the past. But moving forward? I think I'm going to leave it off, as something like this can quickly ruin the journey of exploration and discovery associated with brand new content. I don't want the solutions to all of the new quests (in old zones and new) handed to me the second I boot up Cataclysm for the first time. That said, on with the video, which will show you the finer details of the new map/quest interface:

So what did you think? As it didn't track all of the quests I gave it, I'll venture to guess that this system isn't entirely finished yet, but it's sure a lot more functional than when we say it in its infancy (the first build of 3.3 on the PTR over a month ago). As I've already said, I like it for what it is, but undoubtedly some people are going to continue using their more robust add-ons, just as they have with the inclusion of the Equipment Manager and Voice Chat (oh god, the in-game voice chat). On which end of the spectrum do you exist, readers?