Patch 4.1: Guild Challenges
Blizzard released an official preview of the guild challenges found on test realms earlier this week.
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker)
In addition to updating Zul’Gurub and Zul’Aman for level-85 players, we're also excited about another patch 4.1 feature: Guild Challenges. Built into the Info panel of the guild user interface, Guild Challenges will be weekly tasks guild groups can tackle for additional guild experience, achievements, and gold.

This feature has been designed and implemented to be quite simple. At the top of the guild user interface Info pane, a new Guild Challenges section will be displayed and broken into three categories: Dungeons, Raids, and Rated Battlegrounds. Any guild group will qualify for Guild Challenges credit and there is a set number of times each challenge can be completed per week. There’s no need to add a quest to your Quest Log or anything of that nature. Just grab a guild group eligible for any of the challenges and go.

Completing a Guild Challenge will result in a popup to confirm credit has been awarded, similar to achievement popups (or “toasts”). The participating guild members will then earn experience for their guild. In addition, a gold reward will be deposited directly to the Guild Vault. The gold and experience rewarded varies for each challenge type, but you won’t have to worry about receiving reduced rewards if, say, you happen to be in a guild group that completes a raid or dungeon on normal difficulty. Since there is a limited number of times each challenge type can be completed per week, we want to make sure guilds don’t feel set back if a guild group of level-18 players receives credit for completing Deadmines, versus a level-85 guild group completing Heroic Deadmines. The same applies to normal and Heroic difficulty raid progression. Provided the content is level-appropriate for your guild group, you’ll earn experience and gold for your guild.

To earn Guild Dungeon Challenge credit, the 5-player party must be composed of at least 3 guild members. Raid and Rated Battleground Challenges require that 8 out of 10 players be guild members, while 20 guild members are required to earn credit for 25-player raids. To earn gold for Guild Challenge rewards, a guild must be level 5 or higher and the participating members must have earned honored reputation with the guild. For example, 3 out of 5 guild members in a 5-player party must be honored to earn gold for the guild. If those three guild members have only reached friendly reputation, they would still receive credit and earn guild experience, but the guild would not receive gold.

So, let’s say your guild has been regularly hitting the daily experience cap. You might be wondering how beneficial it’d be to do Guild Challenges. Well wonder no more, amigos: Guild Challenges award guild experience above the cap. Think of it like rested experience. The guild experience cap will extend itself relative to the guild experience earned by completing these challenges. It’s a great way to get an extra edge on your guild leveling! Not only that, if your guild reaches the level cap, continuing to partake in Guild Challenges will yield a much more substantial sum of gold deposited directly into the Guild Vault.

We’re very happy with Guild Challenges and feel that they’re a fun way to continue expanding upon all of the new guild features added in World of Warcraft: Cataclysm. Your feedback regarding this system is always appreciated, as you can be sure we’ll be looking for ways to beef it up in future patches.


Update - Patch 4.0.6 Hotfixes - March 29
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker)
March 25 - March 29
Dungeons & Raids
The Bastion of Twilight
  • A bug has been fixed that could cause Flame Strike during the Ascendant Council encounter (Heroic difficulty) to target an existing fire patch, instead of creating a new one.

Guilds
  • The guild perk “Have Group, Will Travel” no longer allows players to summon guild mates inside dungeons, raids, Battlegrounds, or Tol Barad when the battle is in progress. It will also not function while the player is on any transport.

Quests & Creatures
Uldum
  • Hostile NPCs are no longer present at the Temple of Uldum once the cutscene from picking up "Harrison Jones and the Temple of Uldum" finishes playing.

Ensidia is Awesome
Don't blame me for the title, that's what the game said! Ensidia was the first guild in the world to complete the I Can't Hear You Over the Sound of How Awesome I Am achievement! Congratulations to them!



Rogers (Canadian ISP) admits throttling World of Warcraft
ArsTechnica has a very interesting article about how Rogers has been throttling traffic from WoW for the past few weeks. According to the reply from Rogers (pasted below), the problem might not be fixed before June.

"Our tests have determined that there is a problem with our traffic management equipment that can interfere with World of Warcraft," said Rogers. "We have been in contact with the game manufacturer and we have been working with our equipment supplier to overcome this problem.

"We recently introduced a software modification to solve the problems our customers are experiencing with World of Warcraft. However, there have been recent changes to the game, which has created new problems. A second software modification to address these new issues will not be ready until June."


Read the full article on ArsTechnica.com


Blue Posts
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Paladin (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Skills/Talents)
Word of Glory 20sec cooldown in Patch 4.1
I recently spoke to the devs about this, and their direction on it has not changed. We want Ret to be able to heal. However, if a Ret paladin is healing so often that a 20 second cooldown is a constraint, then that Ret paladin is spending too many GCDs healing. Spending a lot of GCDs on heals isn’t what we want a DPS spec to be doing.

We’d rather it be a big heal that is used infrequently, than a small heal that is only makes a difference to you if you give a lot of your GCDs to it. (Source)

Priest (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Skills/Talents)
Holy Word: Sanctuary
I had a talk with the devs about this very issue yesterday, and they are well aware of this subject, and tend to agree with those of us (one of my mains is a holy priest) who have noticed that Sanctuary could do with a buff.

There are two things that have to be dealt with here: 1) Holy priest AE healing is pretty decent as-is, and 2) we don’t want Sanctuary to be so similar to Healing Rain.

Again, the devs agree that a modest buff is a fair solution, although it is hard to know when or by what magnitude such a buff might come along. (Source)

Warlock (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Skills/Talents)
Unstable Affliction Dispell Penalty
We think the silence from dispelling Unstable Affliction is sufficiently punitive, but the damage may be too low currently - - that it isn’t scary enough to make it a decision to dispel or not.

In general, it’s not our goal to offer dispel protection for every dot or hot out there, but Unstable Affliction is a spell and mechanic we like and we want to make sure it’s doing its job. Maybe a damage bump would be enough, but in any case it's an ability we're looking at. (Source)
This article was originally published in forum thread: Ensidia is Awesome, Rogers throttling WoW, Guild Challenges Preview, Blue Posts started by Boubouille View original post
Comments 172 Comments
  1. good diu bro's Avatar
    Paladin (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Skills/Talents)
    Word of Glory 20sec cooldown in Patch 4.1
    I recently spoke to the devs about this, and their direction on it has not changed. We want Ret to be able to heal. However, if a Ret paladin is healing so often that a 20 second cooldown is a constraint, then that Ret paladin is spending too many GCDs healing. Spending a lot of GCDs on heals isn’t what we want a DPS spec to be doing.

    We’d rather it be a big heal that is used infrequently, than a small heal that is only makes a difference to you if you give a lot of your GCDs to it. (Source)
    They should give death strike a 20cd as well, with maybe a talent on blood to reduce its cd.
  1. ComputerNerd's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by drake741 View Post
    What is throttling? Is it an active sabotage of those connecting to WoW?
    Judging from previous issues with ISP's it appears that a previous WoW patch made changes to the data transmitted between your client and the servers.
    This change resulted in some ISP's recognising that as Peer to Peer or file sharing traffic, which due to automated systems is often on a lower priority or throttled in terms of its potential bandwidth use.
    Seperating that out manually from something otherwise very similar which the ISPs feel they have a good reason to throttle has proven problematic.
  1. Kuja's Avatar
    Wasn't the Rogers announcement different last time? Or did Blizz threaten them with a lawsuit?

    They said something about making wow players lag on purpose if they use the p2p launcher thingy. Now they are saying it was an accident and are going to repair it? lol
  1. namelessone's Avatar
    Hahaha, I switched to their biggest competitor Bell a few months ago. Just in time it seems =)
  1. Neganova's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by invictusordead View Post
    Where is the fire mage pve buffs???????
    What buffs do we need?
  1. Lynix's Avatar
    Meh to the achieve.
    Meh to Challenges
    Meh to something in canada that doesn't effect me
    Meh to class changes, I don't really play anymore and wont till they make the game more exciting outside of raiding.

    All in all meh.

    Think I'm finally getting over wow.
  1. FireryRage's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by namelessone View Post
    Hahaha, I switched to their biggest competitor Bell a few months ago. Just in time it seems =)
    Bell's not much better in the big picture, really. They also have limited bandwidth, and probably throttle some connections. Just so happens their throttling doesn't affect WoW specifically.
    To all the fellow Canadians who use Rogers/Bell, I recommend you look at the smaller internet companies cropping up. They offer better service (some with unlimited bandwidth, either right out of the box, or for a minuscule increase in price), and the more switching to them, the more the big ones will have to reconsider their practices as they lose more and more customers due to their terrible methods.

    I'm personally using Yak internet, which costs the same baseline as Rogers for 10Mbps, yet with unlimited bandwidth. No longer are my bills changing from 50$ to 120$ due to passing the bandwidth limit with exorbitant pricing for going over the cap. Not even any throttling on P2P that I'm aware of.
    Instead of complaining about your ISPs and how it's not fair, take 5 minutes to research alternatives, and then do something about it that will have an actual effect. Rogers/Bell won't change their practices if people keep paying for their ridiculous services. If they start losing a lot of customers to proper competition (and no, Rogers/Bell do not count as competition), they will have to shape up their act.

    For anyone interested, in Ontario, there's Yak ( http://www.yak.ca/high-speed-internet ) and Teksavvy ( http://teksavvy.com/en/res-internet.asp ) that I know of that offer decent services. There's probably more too if you look for them.
  1. gHouLwiNg's Avatar
    Why should we blame you lol? It's ensidia, not an unknown guild. Keep it up Ensidia, i really hope you take the spotlights in firelands, time to return where you belong, and that's 1st place in pve rankings.
  1. Narit's Avatar
    what an amazing achievement hahahaha thats friggin hilarious
  1. mmoce607a0de86's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Tnep View Post
    Lol? We would have had it a few weeks ago, but our OT died RIGHT before she did.
    proof or it didnt happen
  1. Radux's Avatar
    Seriously awesome props to Ensidia. That's an insanely difficult achievement.
  1. Typhron's Avatar
    How'd they cheat for this one this time?
  1. CaptainArlong's Avatar
    Man that is the best achievement name ever.
  1. Rossi4646's Avatar
    grats ensidia
  1. Makronette's Avatar
    The title (and achievement) is a lie... they aren't awesome =/

    And wow does it suck to be a Rogers customer, and I thought using mobile internet was bad but at least I don't get restricted... unless I've used up my download limit, and even then I don't get cut off or charged more to keep using it, only restriction I get is not being able to play between 4pm and midnight, which kinda sucks when I want to raid.
    Well I hope they get it sorted asap for those of you who are with them.
  1. Chaynes's Avatar
    Grats Ensidia ::]
  1. jamlol's Avatar
    I don't get why they're calling these things 'Challenges'. To me a challenge sounds like doing something extra/more difficult - timed runs, zero deaths, some extra mechanic, etc.These are just extra bonuses for doing the same shit everyone has been doing already. I guess some extra gold never hurts anything, just the name is wierd if you ask me.
  1. Jurwi's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by c4tuna View Post
    I guess I didn't get the memo about posting every world first achievement these days... oh, just for Ensidia? Gotcha.
    Jealous cause your guild is useless?
  1. Pewpewarrows's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by TaylorGang View Post
    Betcha they used saraonite grenades.......in all seriousness, congrats, hard ass achieve, very good. Guess we know what all top end guilds are gonna be obsessed with getting now...
    You act like we in the top 10 haven't been going for it already. It's been well established for a few months that it is the only goal left in this tier of raid content.
  1. Zokten's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by FireryRage View Post
    Bell's not much better in the big picture, really. They also have limited bandwidth, and probably throttle some connections. Just so happens their throttling doesn't affect WoW specifically.
    To all the fellow Canadians who use Rogers/Bell, I recommend you look at the smaller internet companies cropping up. They offer better service (some with unlimited bandwidth, either right out of the box, or for a minuscule increase in price), and the more switching to them, the more the big ones will have to reconsider their practices as they lose more and more customers due to their terrible methods.

    I'm personally using Yak internet, which costs the same baseline as Rogers for 10Mbps, yet with unlimited bandwidth. No longer are my bills changing from 50$ to 120$ due to passing the bandwidth limit with exorbitant pricing for going over the cap. Not even any throttling on P2P that I'm aware of.
    Instead of complaining about your ISPs and how it's not fair, take 5 minutes to research alternatives, and then do something about it that will have an actual effect. Rogers/Bell won't change their practices if people keep paying for their ridiculous services. If they start losing a lot of customers to proper competition (and no, Rogers/Bell do not count as competition), they will have to shape up their act.

    For anyone interested, in Ontario, there's Yak ( http://www.yak.ca/high-speed-internet ) and Teksavvy ( http://teksavvy.com/en/res-internet.asp ) that I know of that offer decent services. There's probably more too if you look for them.
    Thats good and all but a lot people don't have any other option in internet choice where they are located.....and just wait till "Yak" gets absorbed.

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