Project Lore

WoW players now can change the race of their level 10 and higher characters - if they don't mind dishing out $25. Blizzard unveiled its new paid race change service today, about a month after adding the service as "coming soon" on the official website. All you have to do to start the process os logon to the Account Management page, click on the Race Change option (which is being promoted pretty heavily ono the page at the moment), and follow the instructions. Here's a few items of note to take in mind when considering a race change. For full details, check out the FAQ on Blizzard Support.

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Love 'em or hate 'em, rogues have got to be sneaky. It's a good part of what defines the class, allows them, as leather-wearers, to deal melee dps without instant death, and sets them apart from other DPSers. So it's no huge surprise that Vanish, one of the key skills that rounds out that specialty, has long been debated because it's, as some players would say, "broken."

Just how is it or isn't it broken? Different players of different classes will give you varying answers. But the debate revolves around players/mobs/pets still being able to attack a rogue who has vanished, and a number of AoE/DoT effects that will immediately pull a vanished rogue back out of stealth. Personally, my main is a rogue, so I tend toward the side that vanish should allow a little bit of lenience to allow some time to get away, heal or regenerate some energy. But I certainly don't want it to be overpowered, either, because then it will inevitably get a nerf.

Enter Patch 3.3 on the PTR, and game developers announced hefty plans to unveil a Vanish fix. The hoopla began about a month ago, with blue poster Ghostcrawler announcing Blizzard's intentions on the WoW forums:

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The High Inquisitor is a new regular column at Project Lore that seeks answers to the greatest mysteries of Azeroth. Each week, the inquisitor will attack a previously unanswered question and attempt to explain the unknown. But she won’t rest until all plausible explanations are explored. The best, most probable comment(s) will be highlighted with the next edition’s inquisition.

Hello, and welcome to another inquisition! Last time, we had even more participation from readers who wanted to give input on the magical mystery of bag space. And we weren't the only ones with the topic on the brain. Earlier this week, the official Warcraft twitter account asked the same question of readers, also paying tribute to a pretty hilarious artist's depiction of Warcraft bags. They even showed Project Lore some love when I replied that we also were looking into the question!

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Have the the Hallow's End festivities been keeping you busy? Between the daily slaughtering of the Headless Horseman, trick-or-treating hourly to keep up my chances of collecting all those masks, and running around "wanding" my guildies, I've been trying to enjoy the event to its fullest. But what about Halloween IRL? You know, that on which our WoW event is based. Well, there's still time to incorporate a little Warcraft in that area, too.

You all probably have seen the host of RL WoW-themed masks and make-up in the Blizzard store in years' past. For the hordies here, there's plenty of options, each which run about $35 to $40: the standard male orc mask, a Thrall-inspired mask, a male troll mask with plenty of tusk, and my personal favorite: the male forsaken mask. There's also the ear prosthetic kits that will set you back about $12 each, in both blood elf and night elf varieties.

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Hot off of the @Warcraft Twitter feed, we have news of the next new Heirloom piece: rings! And they come from an unexpected source: the Kalu'ak fishing derby. From the patch notes:

The all-new Kalu’ak Fishing Derby, a test of fishing skill with a healthy dash of luck, has come to Northrend! Every Wednesday beginning at 8 PM players can try to catch the elusive Blacktip Shark. Elder Clearwater sits in Dalaran for one hour awaiting the return of the quickest, most experienced fisher to bring him this shark. This champion fisher will be rewarded in-kind for returning with the first catch. Those who aren’t able to return with the first catch will still receive just reward for getting the Blacktip Shark to Elder Clearwater before he takes his leave. It is said that these sharks’ favorite meal are the bite-sized Pygmy Suckerfish. Perhaps a hook in their waters will do the trick.

This seems pretty random. Unlike the Stranglethorn Vale fishing contest, which requires precise planning and a strategy, this one has more of a factor of luck involved. In addition, we have this tidbit as well:

“Master Angler of Stranglethorn” has been changed to “Master Angler of Azeroth” and can be achieved by winning either the Kalu'ak Fishing Derby or the Stranglethorn Fishing Extravaganza.

This is great news for anyone aiming for the Salty meta-achievement. The Stranglethorn contest is very competitive and really encourages subversive behavior to win. As far as the ring, I'd kind of like to see it be a reward for the fishing contest to make it rare, but having it as a consolation prize as well could be great for gearing up my alts. There was recently a new buff data-mined that showed a +5% XP bonus from an heirloom, and as no current heirlooms provide 5%, I think its a safe assumption that it will be on these rings. This is a great incentive to work on fishing!

There are some pretty big things changed or added in the new patch 3.3 build that didn't make it to the patch notes, some of which discovered on the PTR, others announced by blue posters.

• Kalu'ak Fishing Derby (held on Wednesdays): "The Kalu'ak hold a fishing derby every few days in Northrend. Be the first to catch a Blacktip Shark and win respect with the Kalu'ak, and an amazing prize!"
• Master Angler of Azeroth: "Win the Booty Bay fishing contest or the Kalu'ak Fishing Derby." Hopefully this will replace Master Angler of Stranglethorn in the meta-achievement.
• Titles for killing Arthas: 10 player heroic: "the Frost Ender"; 25 player: "the Kingslayer"; 25 player heroic: "the Light of Dawn".
• Transmute: Titanium no longer has a cooldown.
• New enchant: "Enchant Gloves: Angler: Permanently enchant gloves to increase fishing skill by 5."

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Before we had any confirmation at Blizzcon that Goblins and Worgens would be introduced as playable races in WoW Cataclysm, we had a plethora of speculation that that might be the case. If you recall, it all started with the discovery of four new textures for Hallow's End masks datamined from within the depths of Patch 3.2. Of course, later, new textures also were added (perhaps to throw us off the path, a successful tactic) for murlocs, Vrykul, ogres and naga.

But now, of course, information on the expansion has been confirmed, and I know I'm not the only one itching to play the new races for more than just a few-minute demo. So, what could be better than to pretend to play the new races as part of the fun of Hallow's End?

One of the things I was most looking forward to for the holiday this year was getting a chance to don one of those new masks while riding around on my Magic Broom. The original file names of the four masks found by Scrolls of Lore specifically include "Halloween" in them - for example "Helm_Mask_Halloween_WoF.blp" - so it's a reasonable conclusion that they're the same as the other masks for Hallow's End. But at least so far, the masks are nowhere to be found.

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WoWFlix is a column featuring videos from around the web related to World of Warcraft. If you find something you’d like to be featured, leave a comment or send a tweet to @Heartbourne. Today, WoWFlix is featuring a trailer for an upcoming machinima by TheDtbf called "Forgotten". Most people groan when they see another machinima with Blood Elves killing Alliance. I smile. This machinima seems pretty gritty. TheDtbf did a good job with the WoW graphics engine to take a relatively bright, cartoony game and turn it into a dark, dank movie. Its not clear what the story will be, but I like how they are fighting in Wintergrasp - it really reminds me of stealthing in and ganking Alliance all along the watchtowers. I'm kind of curious what class the main huge-eyebrowed Blood Elf is, if he even falls into a stand class category. He seems like a Rogue, but he is wielding a two-handed sword. Blood Elves can't be warriors and he doesn't seem like a Death Knight or Paladin. Do you dig it, or do you think this is an old and tired archetype for WoW machinima?

I had been putting off starting on the Hodir quests for several weeks in favor of working toward becoming an exalted champion with all my Horde factions, but soon realized that was a mistake. To up my raiding game, I really need those shoulder enchants that come with exalted status with the Sons of Hodir! So, I've switched up my daily routine mid-tournament and opted to follow what I've found to be a somewhat... dirtier path.

In the past I've lamented over the goopy, gooey, poopy (literally) quests that seem to plague Azeroth. On the surface, the Sons of Hodir quests are nothing like that. The initial quest chain actually is a ton of fun, all the way up to jumping from dragon to dragon, killing riders along the way as you fly the long way up to Thorim, atop the Temple of Storms.

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Wow, these things are coming so quickly now that I better start labeling them more clearly. Build 10596 represents the second one that we've gotten this week! What's the hurry? With any luck, it means that we'll be seeing both Icecrown Citadel and the expansion sooner than we initially thought. If I had to make an educated guess, I'd say that Blizzard tries to release the final version of 3.3 in mid-to-late November, so that they can get it out before the holidays hit and people start finding other ways to spend their time. Following that, I expect some world events to occur either in a 3.4 patch or 4.0 in January or February. But enough of my pontification, on with the list of new changes:

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