What patches means to you.

hey guys and welcome back.

So lots to talk about this week including some Blizzcon related stuff which has everyone in a buzz so lets just drive straight into those murky waters of the well of eternity and see what stuff we can pull up.

So as everyone knows by now patch 4.0 dropped this week with a wealth of changes to talk about. First off we have the new water mechanics which personally i think have been long long overdue. The reflection system is inch perfect and for such a minor aesthetic change it does add that sweet little kiss back into the game especially in Northrend or the harbour in Stormwind.

We also had some class changes. Well i say some there was a major upheaval in classes in patch 4.0. not to go into too much detail as all the information can be found at mmo champion anyways but to pick out a couple that i have noticed so far being the warrior and warlock changes. Firstly warlock now don’t need to use bag spaces to carry soul shards. Yahoo we all say and again it’s a change that took too long coming. There is also no cost now for summoning voidwalkers or demons of the like as you now have a talent called Master Summoner which if maxed out costs no mana to summon them. Blizz FTW on the warlocks so far. Of course my undead warlock is only level 25 at the moment so will have to wait a long time to see what they like at max level and hoping they are just as cool.

Warriors also have some changes in the way of rage normalization and so far i have not played much around with my max level warrior tank as my internet has decided to give me extremely high latency in instances which i am looking into but when i get the change to i will write-up a nice post on how this has effected warriors for all you guys.

We have seen parts of cataclysm starting to appear in the UI as well this patch with new look interfaces for not just professions but also talents and your spell book. Must say i really like these changes as it makes it much easier for you to find what you want and also gives you more options in the professions section along with a button to link to a specific chat section E.G if you wanted to link your blacksmithing Eternal Belt Buckle.

We also all knew that the stats changes were coming this patch along with the new mastery system and so we can say a big good-bye to MP5, defense, spell ranks (auto updated per level now) and weapon skill. Again this is another welcome change to a system that was desperately to complicated and didn’t explain clearly enough why you needed these stats.

See we just half way now. told ya there was lots to talk about 🙂

The new patch has also introduced the new flexible raid lock out system. A more concise post on this can be found here by Blizzard on the forums but in essence starting with ICC and Ruby Sanctum you can not complete for example Lord marrowgar on 25 man normal and then go and do up to as far as you want on 10 man content. For sake of argument we will say to Sindragosa and then hit the Lich King on 25 if you so wish. Any explanation i will give on this will not explain this perfectly but in essence it is a cool change and one many many players will find extremely helpful in see all the content in the game that they would have otherwise missed out on due to being in a bad pug or just not having the time to raid or missing a scheduled raid night.

Introduced into the game for the first time also in the reforging vendors. Which these do is they allow you to swap 40% of any of the secondary stats of an item (mostly ratings) for another secondary stat. Reforging is done by NPCs in Capital Cities, ask a guard if you want to know where they are! This is a nice feature and one i can see Blizzard opening up possibly even further for item customization. How about changing the colors on items or even changing the item itself to look like previous tier gear if you had a favorite. The possibilities for this are amazing and something we all hope Blizzard expands on in game soon.

We also have the emblems going the way of the doo doo this patch and the intro of justice points. basically your Justice Points total will be equal to (Emblems of Triumph + Emblems of Frost ) * 2.75.  There was a great post on the forums explaining this new system and how it works for raids and dungeons going forward and I for one am so happy that they have gotten rid of the emblem system and gone just a much more simple and easy to understand points system. It is not a huge revamp but is one that will definitely be of benefit to the game moving forward in the years to come. Read the post on justice points here.

and finally on patch 4.0 we have got glyphs. Glyphs will now be separated into three different tiers: minor, major, and prime.  This system rocks rocks. Now glyphs are permanent spells and once you buy them from the auction house or scribe then they are available to you to mix and match when ever you so desire. Again another great post on this new system in the forums here. Being a warrior tank i know how much it could cost me on buying glyphs for situational encounters. especially in ICC but this new system has made that task so much easier and one i know tanks are going to love .

Now that all the patch 4.0 news is covered lets look at some more news. Blizzcon baby is a week away and this week we found out the headline act. Yes none other than the writers of the greatest song in the world and it’s tribute song as they forgot the greatest song in the worlds lyrics. The one and only Tenacious D. Yes you heard Jack Black (Year One, Kung Foo Panda etc ) and Kyle Gass (the other guy from Tenacious D and the pick of Destiny) are coming to rock Blizzcon like Ozzy did before them. What a perfect choice for a band for such a great event. Seriously who else could top these guys except maybe a 2 hour (TBFKA level 80 Tauren Cheiftans). With the Direct TV package this is going to be an awesome event and thank god i still have holidays to take in work as they are now booked for this amazing event.

This sunday the first cataclysm TV spot shall be going live in America during the Dallas Cowboys versus Minnesota Vikings NFL game on Fox. Game starts at 4:15 PM EDT, 1:15 PM PDT . I am sure within a few minutes of the TV spot going live it will be all over Youtube so all you EU and Ozzie gamers keep and eye out and lets see what a peak at the cataclysm cinematic is going to look like. We know it will be epic but i want it now as Veruca Salt would say.

Well that’s it from me for this week. Hope you enjoyed this especially long post today. Chat next week.

Earthquake?! = Cataclysm ????

Well we have seen it for a couple of days now but finally get a blue post on it. We have all noticed all realms and regions have experienced a shaking / earthquake screen effect every once and a while for the last few days.

Finally on the official forums someone asks “There was a shake in Dalaran…. Is this the beginning of the Cata Pre event?…Or was it just me?”

Wryxian replied not just once to this “It was just you. Seriously, earthquakes leading up to some kind of cataclysm? I lol’d.
*the earth shakes a bit* o.O” then continued with “The Kirin Tor want to ensure that even though their city is no longer actually in the ground anymore, it still receives the same treatment as the rest of Azeroth… or something. 😉“.

See what he said there “still receives the same treatment as the rest of Azeroth” which simply confirms that there are currently earthquakes in Azeroth and are leading up to a world event in the some time hopefully not to distant future. There have also been reports on Wow.com of invisible NPC’s called Shakers who may be the in game mechanic for this effect.

More as and when we get it.