WoWFlix: Ulduar: Defiance

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. This week on WoWFlix, we are featuring the recently completed Ulduar: Defiance (also known as Ulduar: The Movie). The third and final part was just released. If you haven't been watching, check out the completed series: If you've experienced Ulduar, I think you'll agree that this series captures a lot of the frenzy and epic scale quite well. The boss dialogue is overlayed quite well, and the production on the video is way above average for a WoW video. If you have yet to completely clear Ulduar, be sure to check out the videos for a sample of the experience. Its great to have this cataloged to remember this great raid instance as we move forward into patch 3.3 and Cataclysm. Check out parts two and three after the break.

Click to read more ...

Trial Of The Crusader Is Making Me Poor!

I'll tell you right off the bat that I'm not much of an economist. I don't play the Auction House, I don't farm for things to sell, and I only do dailies on occasion (usually if I'm determined to raise my reputation with a certain faction). With the guild vault taking care of most of my raiding bills, I don't usually have a whole lot else to spend money on aside from sending gold to an alt every once in awhile, and that's almost always repaid by the time they hit Level 80, themselves.

I've sat, more or less comfortably, around 4000 gold since Wrath of the Lich King launched. That is, until now. Trial of the Crusader, in all of its incarnations, has made me dirt poor!

Just two nights ago, I finally got the main-hand dagger I'd been looking for, Gouge of the Frigid Heart, off of Twin Val'kyr in 25-man. My guild's core group also likes to run 10-man Heroic on their own time, and wouldn't you know it? Nemesis Blade drops off the very same boss. Now, Nemesis Blade is ever-so-slightly better than Gouge of the Frigid Heart, but I'd already gone and spent 7-800 gold on enchanting it with Berserkering and I honestly didn't have the money left to do it again. So, for now, the superior dagger sits in my bank, completely unused.

Click to read more ...

Ashen Verdict Vendor Patterns

With the first part of Icecrown Citadel open today, not only did we get to preview and test the first boss (Lord Marrowgar), we also had access to a new vendor inside the palace, itself. Mott Sercer is a Quartermaster for the new faction, "The Ashen Verdict," and he stands just to the right of the entrance when you zone in. It's not entirely clear if he'll be the person to go to for things like Tier or badge gear, but he currently offers a drool-worthy collection of crafting patterns. While the gear you can create doesn't have stats yet (aside from armor and item level), it's almost assured they'll be things people want as soon as possible.

Please note that to purchase a recipe, you'll need to have a certain level of reputation with Ashen Verdict and an item called Primordial Saronite, which likely drops off of bosses or trash inside the instance (perhaps ICC's equivalent of Crusader/Runed Orbs?) . Below, I've listed each pattern and its material requirements:

Click to read more ...

Quest History in Patch 3.3

There is a major API call available in patch 3.3 that has gone under the radar of major WoW blogs. From the PTR patch notes:

You can now query for a list of completed quests with "QueryQuestsCompleted()" then wait for the "QUEST_QUERY_COMPLETE" event, and call "getQuestsCompleted(<luatable>)".


Currently there is no way to tell what quests you have completed unless you use an addon to track that data for you, and if you ever reinstall or move computers that data is lost. Addons like QuestHelper contain a huge database of quests and quest data, but without a way to tell which quests you have completed, they can only use your quest log to recommend paths for completing quests. With this data, addons can suggest quests to pick up, direct players to quest hubs, and more. Imagine opening your world map and seeing where all the quest-givers are and what they can offer. With the new built-in quest tracker in patch 3.3, this could be the saving grace of quest tracking addons.

In addition, this is an awesome addition for players like myself who are trying to complete The Seeker and  The Loremaster. Tracking down quests that start from dropped items or trying to figure out where you left off in a long chain is a pain. Addons utilizing this API call will be a huge boon to players.

How do you hope addons will use this function?

Click to read more ...

A Beginner's Guide To Macros

After yesterday's post went live I received a few correspondences about macros.  Some players wanted to know how I created (or stole) this or that macro, others wanted to learn more about writing their own, and some didn't even know what macros are.  What better way to follow that list of rogue (and other) macros than by explaining the basics of macro crafting.


First things first, what is a macro and why would you use them?  At the most basic level macros are a simple way to extend the functionality of the game, which is why players use them.  Because we are lazy.  To access the macro area type /m in the chat box.

One of the most basic macros that is often used is the ventrilo macro.

/g Server = my.ventriloserver.com
/g Port = 1337
/g Password = qwerty

By saving the information to a macro you'll never have to type it out again!  Proof that the system is useful already.  Many of the macros I showed yesterday followed this design, simple yet useful commands to save time and enable my brain to focus on other things.  The DPS increase is also nice.

Clicking your spell buttons on your hotbar is actually the same as using a macro.  You can replace every single button with a macro that does the same thing, if you wanted.

Click to read more ...

Collecting Vanity Gear with Equipment Manager

Oh, one of the joys of being a girl. I know it's a stereotype, but I can't help it. I love pretty clothes. And shoes. Bring that to the World of Warcraft, and I am quickly becoming a whore to collecting gear that serves little purpose other than looking good. Combine that with Equipment Manager, and you've got your own little closet of premade WoW outfits at your disposal.

I just recently discovered the joys of Equipment Manager. It's been out for a while now, since Patch 3.1.2. But since I was not duel specced, I thought I had no use for managing different gear sets. Oh man, was I wrong.

As bloggers have lamented in the past, gear in WoW isn't always the most fashion-forward. So if you're concerned about looking cool while hanging around Dalaran, why not change that? As long as you're not in a situation that you need your stats, I'd say vanity gear is the way to go.

Click to read more ...

Icecrown Citadel Testing To Start 10/15

Players on the test realms will get to take their first steps into the Lich King's domain tomorrow, assuming that excessive lag and crashing servers don't put put a damper on the event. No doubt many guilds (and PuGs) will be trying their damnedest to get their foot in the front door, so you can expect the outside of Icecrown Citadel to look like something like an Azerothian Woodstock (can we get The Artist Formerly known as Level 80 Elite Tauren Chieftain to play the event?).

That big bad skeleton in the background might just be Marrowgar. That big bad skeleton in the background might just be Marrowgar.

Testing itself kicks off with (obviously enough) the first boss in the instance, Lord Marrowgar. As yet, we don't know a whole lot about the specifics of each boss, but the achievement associated with him does tell us that he has a spell called Bone Cyclone which, ideally, people should be staying out of to avoid damage. Though we've yet to see his ugly mug, I'm also going to go ahead and guess that Marrowgar shares his model with those big old Bone Sentinels running around in Icecrown Glacier.

Here's the downlow from Daelo on the testing phase:

"We are scheduling a raid test for Icecrown Citadel tomorrow at 7pm EDT/4pm PDT for the two US PTR Servers. Lord Marrowgar, the first boss of the raid zone, will be available for testing. The trash leading up to him will also be ready for testing.



The Icecrown Citadel raid test schedule will be very flexible, and can change at a moment's notice due to build status, bugs, and server issues. Remember that this is the test server, so things can, do, and will break from time to time. Check this forum for the latest US Icecrown Citadel raid testing schedule information in the weeks to come.

The EU region will have a different raid testing schedule, which I will announce on their forums in the near future as I have further information and more bosses are ready for testing."

 

As you can see, European players will have to wait just a bit longer and, like past raids on the PTR, they'll likely be testing bosses on a different rotation from those in the US. It's assumed that both 10 and 25-man versions of Marrowgar will be open, though he may not have his loot table implemented yet.

Click to read more ...

iTZKooPA's Rogue (And Common) Macros For 3.2.2

Yea, I Don't Have Many Mounts...Pets FTW!


The war over the framerate issue brought on by Onyxia has been won.  But the dragon with cranial lizard properties did manage to score a victory, destroying my macros.  Again, I'm not sure how my macros disappeared into the digital abyss, they are supposed to be saved on server, but they did.  Since then I have spent a considerable amount of time trying to remember all of my macros, and additional time looking for new tricks.

I'll start off the list with my multi-class macros.

Random Pet
:
/run CallCompanion("CRITTER", random(GetNumCompanions("CRITTER")))

It doesn't seem perfectly random, but it does the trick.  Saved my sidebar from being full of vanity pet icons. :p

Random Flying or Ground Mount From List:
/run local g,f={a,b,c},{x,y,z};local z={["Dalaran"]=g,["Wintergrasp"]=g,["Krasus' Landing"]=f};f=z[GetSubZoneText()] or z[GetZoneText()] or (IsFlyableArea() and f) or g;z=(IsMounted() or CallCompanion("MOUNT", f[random(#f)])) and Dismount()

This is straight from WoWWiki.  I wasn't able to create a good one myself, and actually had a heck of a time trying to even find a solid random casting macro.  This is as close as I came.  It's limited by the macro character limit (255).  The mount collectors out there will have to narrow down their list substantially.  Replace a,b,c with a list of your ground mounts, and x,y,z with your flying mounts.  No spaces to save characters.

The mount in the top left of the first page of the mount list is 1, the bottom right of the first page is 12.  And so on.

Fishing:
#showtooltip
/equip [noequipped:Fishing Poles, mod] Mastercraft Kalu'ak Fishing Pole
/equip [equipped:Fishing Poles, mod] Weather-Beaten Fishing Hat
/cast [nomod] Fishing

A simple fishing macro that gets you ready to do some anglin'.  To use the macro be sure to replace the gear I have listed with any gear you have.  Hold a button down, a modifier in macro lingo, and click it twice to equip your gear.  Click it a third time with no modifier to begin casting.  Don't come to me with stories about the one that got away.

Oh Shit! Button:
/s Fox! Get this guy off me!
/yell Fox! Get this guy off me!
/p Fox! Get this guy off me!
/raid Fox! Get this guy off me!

I think the name, and spam, gets the point across.  The macro is hardly ever used, it would get annoying, but it's fun to pull out here and there.  Although it effectively does nothing, it's the most enjoyable macro I've ever created.

Especially when someone gets it.  Had one DPSer scream "Do a barrel roll!" We wiped because I was laughing too hard to heal.

Here are my rogue macros.  Many of these are just time-saving, but they've helped my DPS by remembering crap for me.

Auto Attack:
#showtooltip Fan of Knives
/startattack
/cast Fan of Knives

I actually use a version of this macro for some of my openers and some basic attacks (Mutilate), but its use with Fan of Knives is often overlooked.  Since you won't start auto attacking when casting FoK, having a command bound to your FoK key is a good idea.  Personally, I know I often overlook right-clicking a mob or fear hitting 'T' to start attacking because I may turn it off.  Here's the no fail solution to guaranteeing that your still getting white damage while AoEing.

Trinket:
/use Name of Trinket
/cast Slice and Dice

I currently don't have any on use trinkets on Solidsamm, so this is currently unused.  During my leveling days I had tons, and that's where the basic macro came from.  Depending on the on use bonus you may want to fire off a trinket before Slice and Dice (additional attack speed) or before a finisher (more Attack Power for bigger numbers).  Easily merged into the Cold Blood Kill Shot macro (see below).

Throw/Deadly Throw Merge:
#show Deadly Throw
/cast deadly throw
/cast throw

Save an action bar button.

PvE Opener:
#showtooltip Pick Pocket
/cast Pick Pocket
/stopcasting
/cast Garrote
/cast Cheap Shot
/stopcasting
/startattack

I changed my standard Pick Pocket button to this because I got sick of the mobs seeing me as I danced around or waited for looting to finish.  With auto loot enabled I can now run up to any mob with pockets, rob them blind and perform my opener.  If you're behind them you will squish them with a Garrote, the Cheap Shot covers you if you're in their face.

Spammable Stealth:
#showtooltip Stealth
/dismount
/cast [modifier: shift] Stealth; !Stealth

Don't worry about un-stealthing with this applied to your Stealth button.  Smash that key all day long!

Vanish:
/stopattack
/cleartarget
/cast Vanish

No accidental extra hits after vanishing with this.  Unless you right-click the target.  Dummy.

Cold Blood Kill Shot:
#showtooltip Envenom
/cast Cold Blood
/cast Envenom

This is another macro that I use with multiple abilities, my direct damage closers.  I've noticed my overall DD go up because the macro uses Cold Blood as often as possible, fitting more guaranteed crits in per raid run.  You may lose some DPS on a per-boss-fight basis, but if you don't blow CB on finishers with low combo points you should see an increase in overall destruction.

Tricks of the Trade:
#showtooltip
/cast [target=mouseover] Tricks of the Trade
/script m=UnitName("mouseover"); if m then SendChatMessage("You've been boosted by Solidsamm's gnomish destructive properties for 6s. Make the best of it.", "WHISPER", nil, m); end

I blatantly stole this one from a forum (ElitistJerks I think), just adding a little flavor to the text.  My previous TotT macro was very basic, launching off my focus.  It often became useless when my focused ally died.  It's not a common occurrence but manually resetting the focus mid-fight is a pain.  The new macro simply applies TotT to whoever I mouseover, something I ended up doing anyways.  It also whispers them, but you can remove the second line if you please.

That's all I have right now.  I'll likely think of more in the future.  When I do I will drop them in the comments section.  Now that Solidsagart is level 80 and working her way to raiding I'll follow this informative post with a priest orientated in the future.  Feel free to share your tips and tricks in macro creation, any macro friendly sites you frequent, and any modifications you would recommend to the above content.  Especially on the mount macro.

Click to read more ...

A Tribute to Addons: TooltipWealth

A Tribute to Addons is a column featuring new, cool, or useful addons. Send a tweet to @Projectlore with your suggestions, or leave a comment.







money
Gevlon's little experiment


Today, I'd like to share a questionably moral addon. Its called TooltipWealth, and it might reveal more information about your fellow players than they are willing to share.

One of the features of the Achievements system is that it tracks various statistics about your gameplay. For example, it remembers the greatest amount of gold that you have ever held and how much gold you have acquired over the lifetime of your character. This is interesting data, but not just for the player. Pretty soon after the achievements system hit live realms with patch 3.0, gold spammers started using the achievements interface on the Armory to target wealthy players to buy gold or to find poor players to sell gold. It was promptly removed from the web interface of the Armory. Players can still view this data in their statistics tabs of the achievement pane in-game.

Well, TooltipWealth comes and blows the top off of all of this. Using the achievement API, the addon queries the server for wealth data from the server for any player that you mouse-over and displays it in their tooltip! You can choose to display the most gold they have ever held, or how much gold they have handled. These numbers can be significantly different; a player who spends a lot of time buying and selling on the auction house may have only held 20,000 gold at one time but traded hundreds of thousands. It can be configured to show only players from your faction, and only in capitol cities. It is very prying, as you can see level 80s who have only held around 1,000 gold, and it also reveals the super-rich who have at some point held several dozen thousand gold.

I don't know how useful it is, but it definitely raises some questions and provides some entertainment. Do you think the addon has gone too far, or is there no right to privacy about wealth in WoW? It could be useful; for example, a suspicious person who is identified as very wealthy could be attempting to scam you. I will continue to use it, and chuckle at passersby in Dalaran

.

Click to read more ...

3.3: Icecrown Citadel Boss List, (Some) Achievements Revealed

Some of the first unofficial information coming out of the new build of Patch 3.3 includes a preliminary list of achievements associated with the Icecrown Citadel raid and 5-man dungeons. The breakdown and running analysis follows:

Icecrown Citadel 10-man Stand-Alone Achievements

These are the achievements associated with individual events and/or bosses. This is most certainly a cursory list, as they do not cover every encounter in the raid as past achievements have. The early inclusion of these, specifically, may indicate that these bosses will be available for testing soon, as they are all included in the first section of the dungeon.


  • It's a Trap! - Survive the Ice Jets in Icecrown Citadel.

  • Unboned - Defeat Lord Marrowgar without anyone taking damage from Bone Cyclone.

  • Thirty One - Defeat X (-this is a placeholder variable-) of Lady Deathwhisper's adds with her bombs and the defeat Lady Deathwhisper.

  • I'm on a Boat - Claim victory in the Gunship Battle in which every raid member visits the enemy gunship only once.

  • I've Gone and Made a Mess - Defeat the Deathbringer with fewer than X (-this is a placeholder variable-) raid members suffering from Garrote.


Icecrown Citadel 10-man Completion Achievements

These are the achievements awarded for completing different wings of the raid. By looking at each individual feat, we can see the full list of boss encounters for Icecrown Citadel.


  • Storming the Citadel - Defeat the first four bosses in Icecrown Citadel: Lord Marrowgar, The Deathbringer (could it be Saurfang or Bolvar?), Lady Deathwhisper, Claim victory in the Gunship Battle.

  • The Frostwing Halls - Defeat the bosses of The Frostwing Halls in Icecrown Citadel: Rescue Valithiria Dreamwalker (sounds like a friendly member of the Green dragonflight being turned), Sindragosa (you'll finally get to go toe-to-toe with that Frost Wyrm you see every time you log into the game).

  • The Plagueworks - Defeat the bosses of The Plagueworks in Icecrown Citadel: Festergut, Rotface, Professor Putricide.

  • The Crimson Hall - Defeat the bosses of The Crimson Hall in Icecrown Citadel: Defeat the Blood Prince Council, Queen Lana'Thel.

  • The Frozen Throne - Defeat the Lich King in Icecrown Citadel: The Lich King.

  • Fall of the Lich King - Defeat every boss in Icecrown Citadel.


.

Icecrown Citadel, from the bottom. Icecrown Citadel, from the bottom, up.

For those of you keeping score, that brings the list of boss or primary encounters in Icecrown Citadel to 12. To reiterate:

Lord Marrowgar

The Deathbringer

Lady Deathwhisper

Gunship Battle

Valithiria Dreamwalker

Sindragosa

Festergut

Rotface

Professor Putricide

Blood Prince Council

Queen Lana'Thel

The Lich King


Icecrown Citadel 5-man Dungeon Achievements:

These achievements are associated with the three 5-man dungeons that lead up to the raid: Forge of Souls, Pit of Saron, and Halls of Reflection. Unlike the raid achievements, this is probably a comprehensive list.


  • Icecrown: The Forge of Souls - Defeat the bosses in The Forge of Souls: Bronjahm, Devourer of Souls.

  • Icecrown: The Pit of Saron - Defeat the bosses in The Pit of Saron: Forgemaster Garfrost, Ick and Krick, Scourgelord Tyrannus and Rimefang.

  • Icecrown: The Halls of Reflection - Defeat the bosses in The Halls of Reflection: Falric and Marwyn (Arthas' closest confidants in the Third War), Survive the encounter with the Lich King (could this be a Metroid-style escape sequence?).

  • I Feel Good - Defeat Bronjahm in The Forge of Souls on Heroic Difficulty without letting him cast his big spell.

  • The Faced - Defeat the Devourer of Souls in The Forge of Souls on Heroic Difficulty after having interrupted his big nuke.

  • Don't Let It Go to Eleven - Defeat Forgemaster Garfrost in The Pit of Saron on Heroic Difficulty before he gets 11 stacks.

  • Don't Look Up - Clear the hallway before Scourgelord Tyrannus in The Forge of Souls on Heroic Difficulty without anyone taking icicle damage.

  • We're Not Retreating; We're Advancing in a Different Direction. - Escape from the Lich King in under two hours and eleven seconds.


Don't be alarmed by that last one. It's undoubtedly one of Ghostcrawler's "let's give the our players a heart attack" placeholder numbers. The encounter will not take two hours and eleven seconds!

Feats of Strength

There's only a single new Feat of Strength listed, but boy is it a doozy!


  • It's Over Nine Thousand! - Earn more than 9000 achievement points.


I'm only at 5130 myself, and I don't see that number increasing significantly anytime soon. It may not seem impossible, but the closer you get to the maximum, the thinner the margin, since you'll have done most of the achievements you knew you were capable of.

What say you of these achievements, friends? Cool? Uncool? Hard? Easy? The boss-related ones give us some hints about how those encounters might work. What do you think of their potential capabilities?

Keep in mind that the 10-man stuff isn't complete and the text is not final. Not to mention that there are likely 25-man versions of each one, as well.

Click to read more ...