Thori'dal, Blue posts, Fanarts

[Boubouille]

Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury preview
Yesterday, I talked about a small update on Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury, and here it is ! Nothing really big but according to what's available in the game files, there is a pretty cool feature to make the bow a bit more impressive : all the arrows you shoot with the bow will have a light effect ! Of course, it could be a problem if you're trying to sneak behind the enemy lines to snipe a few enemies from behind a tree, but most of the time I'm sure you'll enjoy it.

Before watching the videos keep in mind that :

• Stats are still from the old pre-PTR leak, they could have been changed. (But it didn't happen with any other item)
• As usual with this kind of preview, nothing is officialy confirmed, the bow didn't drop yet and everything could be changed.
• It's not affecting "special" shots like Steady shot or Multi-shot, this could be a bug on my side, a bug on Blizzard's side, or just working as intended.
  

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[url="http://www.vimeo.com/881840/l:embed_881840"]Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury[/url] from [url="http://www.vimeo.com/user434038/l:embed_881840"]Boubouille[/url] on [url="http://vimeo.com/l:embed_881840"]Vimeo[/url].

WotLK Beta - Player selection
Looks like completing Sunwell Plateau within 3 days won't get you in the WotLK Beta faster.
[blizzquote="Nethaera;http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=5784520563&postId=57837309180&sid=1#16]Or, for a more serious answer, it's largely random. We do our best to make sure we have a good mix of players. I've seen it before where one friend has posted on the forum about another friend who got in but they didn't and why didn't they when their friend is the one that only plays casually and they (the op) are the one that is hardcore. We're not looking to pick one demographic to help do the testing. We look for a good mixture of people with different play styles and interests. It gives a decent snapshot of what issues need fixed or tweaked prior to release.[/blizzquote"]


Retribution paladins in WotLK
So ... Retribution paladins mana issues shouldn't really be a problem anymore with WotLK ? Sadly the info comes with the usual "it's too early to confirm anything" and I doubt we'll get a real explanation anytime soon.

What was said was that the developers plan to change how the abilities of Retribution Paladins will work, which will make it easier to gear up due to the possibilities of sharing gear with Warriors. Although we have little information beyond this, this may also serve as an interpretation that Retribution Paladin mana issues should be less of a concern after WotLK.

It is still a little too soon to speculate however, but rest assured that we will keep you informed as soon as new updates become available

Arena Tournament Schedule v2
Bornakk made a post with the Arena Tournament Schedule, it's a lot more detailed than the one posted yesterday in europe and it should definitely give some answers to players.

With the first round of qualification for the 2008 World of Warcraft Arena Tournament underway, we wanted to provide a schedule for the remainder of this qualifier and details on what each of the phases entails.

Phase 1 - The Practice Phase – Currently active and completes on April 22, 2008

• There is no penalty for changing your team and you are free to move teams around.
• At the end of this phase all arena team ratings will be reset to 1500 during maintenance.
  

Phase 2 - The Competition Phase - Active from April 22, 2008 to May 6, 2008

• Every team will be reset to a 1500 rating and official rankings begin.
• There will be a 150 team rating penalty for any player added to an arena team.
• At the end of this phase all arena teams will be locked down and players will not be able to switch characters from arena teams.
• Registration will also close at the end of this phase.
  

Phase 3 – The Final Phase – Active from May 6, 2008 to May 20, 2008

• Registration is closed for this phase of qualification.
• Players are no longer allowed to switch arena teams during this phase.
• At the end of the phase, the top 4 rated teams from the Battlegroup will be invited to the regional qualifier if they meet all eligibility requirements.
• Eligible teams must have played a minimum of 200 games during Phases 2 and 3 to be able to qualify to advance to the regional qualifier.
• Each team member must have participated in 30% of their team’s games to be eligible to qualify.
  

First Qualification Round Schedule for North America:

• Phase 1 ends and Phase 2 begins: April 22, 2008
• Phase 2 ends and Phase 3 begins: May 6, 2008
• Phase 3 and the first Qualifier ends: May 20, 2008

Other blue posts

Arena Tournament registration fee
The fee is for each qualification stage, but if you qualify (top 4) from the first one you're not required to play the second one. You'd already be through to the regional and can sit back and watch the others battle it out in the second qualifier to meet you at the regional. Of course, if you do qualify from the first one you can still pay the entry fee from the second one to have access to the realm and keep your Arena skills honed, but you can't qualify twice. (Source)

Removal of 5v5 and 2v2 on Tournament Realm not planned
We don't have any plans currently to remove the options of playing games outside of the rated 3v3 matches. While obviously you can't win prizes for doing them, if you want to have some fun in 2v2 and 5v5 games, go for it! (Source)

Rogues removed from stealth at the beginning of Priestess Delrissa encounter
This is an intended part of the encounter, rogues should be removed from stealth when the NPCs are engaged. (Source)

Stratholme - Abominations bug
The event will not continue if it attempts to reset while abominations are in combat. We are aware of this issue and it is being worked on. (Source)

Bug - /combatlog doesn't record player's deaths.
We are aware of this issue and it will be fixed in an upcoming patch. (Source)

Europe - Free Character Migration

Due to population differences between some of the highest and lowest populated PvP realms, the following Free Character Migration will be available April 9th to 15th:

From: Frostmane, Grim Batol, Magtheridon, Twilight's Hammer
To: Bladefist, Dragonmaw, Spinebreaker

From: Molten Core
To: Stonemaul

Please note that the migration may be closed at any time should a destination realm's population rise too high.

FAQ: http://www.wow-europe.com/en/info/faq/charactermove.html

Thundgot also made a post concerning last week's migrations
[blizzquote="Thundgot;http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=3623142327&postId=36222963191&sid=1#3]We'll consider running the same migration again next round (April 16-22). Sudden and very significant population changes on the involved realms may of course prevent us from opening some specific migrations, but barring that it should be very doable.[/blizzquote"]


Official Site - 4 New Fanarts
The american and european official sites have been updated with new fanarts.

[FailedCRC]

Yeah lets buff ret paladin so they don't have a need for mana, and let them keep all their burst damage and immunity abilities, that'll definitely make them more balanced.

[overneathe]

WHY MOLTEN CORE!!!
Gief Darkspear transfer already. :<
It's the most casual realm of all times.

[fr0hzn]

nice itemcache-modelchange, boubouille.
I hope blizz bans your ass :P

naw, just kidding.

[Dessimus]

Thori'dal looks sick!

[El_Vaughn]

lol @ abo event

[Sulika]

Yeah lets buff ret paladin so they don't have a need for mana, and let them keep all their burst damage and immunity abilities, that'll definitely make them more balanced.

Or to be more realistic about what this means:

Paladin Tier10 talent will be: "Your intellect increases by 4/8/12/16/20% of your strength".

Easy 5 point filler talent, less work for future itemisation, no need to change anything else. If Blizz are feeling really generous they can alter JoC to use some other scaling mechanism. In fact, having it scale 1 damage per point of intellect with the above change would probably make it work reasonably well without breaking it for Holy palas as a direct switch to AP based scaling would.

[Jitte]

yay the legendary bow is now legendary because you get a extra bag and a new arrow effect. Make the bow legendary with it's stats instead please ;<

[Tuig]

yay the legendary bow is now legendary because you get a extra bag and a new arrow effect. Make the bow legendary with it's stats instead please ;<

"Stats are still from the old pre-PTR leak, they could have been changed. (But it didn't happen with any other item)
"

[Emi]

They had better be, since the current version is a nice gimmick, but not worth the title legendary.

[the_nell_87]

Or to be more realistic about what this means:

Paladin Tier10 talent will be: "Your intellect increases by 4/8/12/16/20% of your strength".

Easy 5 point filler talent, less work for future itemisation, no need to change anything else. If Blizz are feeling really generous they can alter JoC to use some other scaling mechanism. In fact, having it scale 1 damage per point of intellect with the above change would probably make it work reasonably well without breaking it for Holy palas as a direct switch to AP based scaling would.

Don't be daft. The post was specifically about mana issues. Holy paladins are fine for mana, since they get less mana cost of spells on crits, and itemise for +mp5. Prot paladins are fine for mana, since they get mana back as they are healed. But with ret paladins, as things are now, they run out of mana fairly quickly, because they have no way to get any back. Since they won't take much damage in a raid situation, the only solution seems to be to give them a way to get mana back as they deal damage, similar to the way warriors get rage as they deal damage. This could either be a constant thing, something triggered by crits for example, or a triggered ability similar to enhancement shamans' shamanistic rage.

[Aerion]

yay the legendary bow is now legendary because you get a extra bag and a new arrow effect. Make the bow legendary with it's stats instead please ;<

Have you seriously even compared that to any other bow in game currently?
...and if you haven't, let me do that for you now.

Currently the best ranged weapon (disincluding [item=30318] from Kael'Thas event) drops from the Eredar twins in the Sunwell Plateau:

[item=34196]
or as some might prefer, the badge bow
[item=34892]

Now if you compare these to the legendary Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury you might not see that huge change in general Equip bonuses, but when you look the DPS part of the bow (if it will stay the same) you'll propably see my point...

Fastly calculated it is approximately 150% more DPS than in any ranged weapon currently in game. So if I was a Hunter raiding endgame instances, I'd definately like to have that bow in my backpocket.

I was under the impression that most of that DPS increase is negated by the fact that it creates it's own ammo

i.e. you won't be getting the 53dps bonus of timeless arrows

Yeah came to my mind just after I pressed the post button.

So if the situation is really like you said the correct DPS upgrade would be:

Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury
vs
[item=34196] ||| 148.7 - 97.3 - 53 = - 1.6 |||(with the Timeless Arrows)

Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury
vs
[item=34892] ||| 148.7 - 93.0 - 53 = 2.7 ||| (with the Timeless Arrows)

So if blizzard does not do something about the DPS boost gotten from arrows, then I think we might have an EPIC failure inc.

[ajezz]

Fastly calculated it is approximately 150% more DPS than in any ranged weapon currently in game. So if I was a Hunter raiding endgame instances, I'd definately like to have that bow in my backpocket.

I was under the impression that most of that DPS increase is negated by the fact that it creates it's own ammo

i.e. you won't be getting the 53dps bonus of timeless arrows

[overneathe]

I was under the impression that most of that DPS increase is negated by the fact that it creates it's own ammo

i.e. you won't be getting the 53dps bonus of timeless arrows

Correct.


It's still a very good improvement over any other BM weapon according to Cheeky's Spreadsheet.
No one knows why... It's just so.

[Aerion]

Yeah I corrected that few posts up. :-[

[Annatartb]

Correct.


It's still a very good improvement over any other BM weapon according to Cheeky's Spreadsheet.
No one knows why... It's just so.

Oh I know why. Steadyshots aren't affected by ammo but they are affected by weapon damage which basically means Thori'Dal adds ammo dps to steadyshots.

[overneathe]

Oh I know why. Steadyshots aren't affected by ammo but they are affected by weapon damage which basically means Thori'Dal adds ammo dps to steadyshots.

Brilliant :O !!!!!
This will actually make a HUGE difference!!!

[Brodaty]

If somebody would own this legendary weapon, would not need to hide behind the tree to kill the oponent. Instead, if someone targeted by legendary hunter, will see the lighting arrows, can say a prayer and just die :P
Unless legendary hunter is a tard, and targeted player is skilled pvper, of course, obviously.

[Xendrie]

If somebody would own this legendary weapon, would not need to hide behind the tree to kill the oponent. Instead, if someone targeted by legendary hunter, will see the lighting arrows, can say a prayer and just die :P
Unless legendary hunter is a tard, and targeted player is skilled pvper, of course, obviously.

i have a hard time to think you will ever find a retarded hunter with this bow

[pIRAteninjadragonzombie]

i have a hard time to think you will ever find a retarded hunter with this bow

made me lol since there are many tard rogues with dual glaives.
pvp wise, of course