Blizzcon 2008 - Day 1 !

[Malfuron]

Anyone have a video of the conference?

[SilverLynx]

30 specs, and 25 raid slots.

But not really.

30 TREES (31 if you count feral druids), 25 raid slots.

Now which of those trees (deeper than 31 points) are not suitable for raiding at this point in time?

Hunter: Survival
Rogue: Sub
Mage: Arcane
DK: Unholy (let's face it, it's a trick tree - lots of fun to play but no real group utility save for your bubble)
Warlock: Demonology (deep demonology is a joke for real DPS and has no raid-unique buffs, and you know it)
Druid: Feral cat (the numbers just don't impress me. they STILL don't scale properly)

So look at that. So long as you leave the idiot-specs at home, you have 25 players.

Har har.

[SilverLynx]

Wish I was there

I wanna hear more about this new MMO.. "a new Universe"? hmmm....

Me too - it's awesome that Blizzard is creating it's own WoW killer.

Now, what will make me laugh my ASS off is if WoW kills this next-gen MMO.

[memento]

Information wise its a little disappointing yet.

Nothing really new has been announced. Instead it all seems like a big summary of already known stuff with a developers commentary.
Where are the big OHHHs and AHHHs?
I know they are very close to release but I really thought they kept some last big secret like an amazingly cool dual spec feature. But even that is coming post-release and no details yet. :-\

[Cookiecutter]

They obviously won't let people respecc anywhere, or in a arena or out grinding, so i "guess" you'll be able to change between 2 prefered speccs while in a neutral or friendly town, outpost or city..

[Flashy UI screen for specc-switch] done

[Nubs]

Great photos so far of the event ;D

BTW, anyone wanna guess what class Ozzy is in the ad? My guess would be warlock (possibly death knight) since he's the "prince of darkness" afterall.

[Verolish]

* The dual-spec system will be introduced in a content patch. The goal is to let you switch specs very easily in raid, even between fights ! However it won't be possible to switch specs in the middle of an arena match.
* With dual-spec introduced in the game, there are also discussions about an Itemrack-like mod being introduced to the default UI

Blizz posts so yes you will be able to switch on the fly. Not just in combat or arena!!!

[hosehead]

Some very interesting things, i would LOVE to hear more about them putting pally power into default ui. It would make my life easier on my alt

There isn't any plan to add class-specific elements like PallyPower in the default UI. Sometimes very popular addons might be integrated to the base UI but only when they fit general needs.

Keep your paladin bloat to yourselves!

[stupid11]

Warlock (Skills List / Talent Calc. (9061))

• Warlocks pets have been made more useful.
• The warlock rotation shouldn't be restricted to a shadowbolt spam, that's why Chaos Bolt was added.
• Affliction Tree is still too complicated and developpers are working on it. Developers definitely want it back as a raiding spec
• Pets should be easier to summon/switch and use.

Chaos Bolt is the least of Destro's rotation problems. The problem is they're forcing gimmicky PVP spells that have always sucked, and still do, onto us. Sacrificing good damage for bad damage just for a boost to that good damage (Backdraft) is NOT going to work.

And we weren't "restricted" to Shadowbolt spam, it was just superior to other things.

Why do they only work on Affliction when it's currently the highest DPS tree we have? WTF? HELLO DEMO? Anyone even remember this tree is there? Destro isn't much better off in terms of DPS talents (DPS itself is respectable, but it's enormously complicated, self-defeating, and all of our high level talents just boost Immolate and Conflag. DPS TALENTS though, need a major rework. Utility/Fun/PVP talents are fine-ish.)

Also, how the fuck are pets easier to summon OR switch? ? ? ? We've had ABSOLUTELY ZERO CHANGES to pet summoning. Locks are going to be FUCKED by boss abilities that target a random person. BAM, pet gets 1 shot, lock either gimps himself for the rest of the fight or spends 10 seconds doing nothing and recasting his pet.

The ONLY SPEC in pve that will get any pet summoning improving talents is deep Demo, our worst tree. Honestly, it's going to be worse than in TBC because all Destro raiders could get the 6 second default summon and Fel Dom for a .5 second summon. 80% AOE only avoidance does NOT FIX having a 10 second resummon.

[Groal]

http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/.../390956251.jpg

What's with the cool-looking interface on the character to the left?

[hosehead]

http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/.../390956251.jpg

What's with the cool-looking interface on the character to the left?

http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/.../390904175.jpg

probably related to this.. just one of the iterations along the way.. dated photos.. test/debug realms..

notice the achievement inspection - http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/.../390902755.jpg - they both share the same name..

things are going to look weird =)

[Puffy]

Chaos Bolt is the least of Destro's rotation problems. The problem is they're forcing gimmicky PVP spells that have always sucked, and still do, onto us. Sacrificing good damage for bad damage just for a boost to that good damage (Backdraft) is NOT going to work.

And we weren't "restricted" to Shadowbolt spam, it was just superior to other things.

Why do they only work on Affliction when it's currently the highest DPS tree we have? WTF? HELLO DEMO? Anyone even remember this tree is there? Destro isn't much better off in terms of DPS talents (DPS itself is respectable, but it's enormously complicated, self-defeating, and all of our high level talents just boost Immolate and Conflag. DPS TALENTS though, need a major rework. Utility/Fun/PVP talents are fine-ish.)

Also, how the fuck are pets easier to summon OR switch? ? ? ? We've had ABSOLUTELY ZERO CHANGES to pet summoning. Locks are going to be FUCKED by boss abilities that target a random person. BAM, pet gets 1 shot, lock either gimps himself for the rest of the fight or spends 10 seconds doing nothing and recasting his pet.

The ONLY SPEC in pve that will get any pet summoning improving talents is deep Demo, our worst tree. Honestly, it's going to be worse than in TBC because all Destro raiders could get the 6 second default summon and Fel Dom for a .5 second summon. 80% AOE only avoidance does NOT FIX having a 10 second resummon.

Typical flavor of the month reroller.

Take a look at the new skills, the new playstyles and the beta forums and your questions will be answered regarding better switching between pets, how Destro works.

You were quite fond of just pressing 2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2 right?

[Fmr]

I don't like the idea to swich specs between fights. The Spec switching is a good idea but not between fights. kinda weird

[Sarevokcz]

"totems have more life and are ahrder to dispell"

umm, whaaat? did i miss something? sure, stunclaw increase their health, but thats hardly all the time. and they are destroyed still easily, no matter what.
and Lava burst comment aint true, either, if it werent there, LB wouldnt be nerfed like hell :/

[aikouka]

Linecon was fun today! :P

Oh and the Starcraft thing is that Starcraft II will be a trilogy (for the single player campaigns only, the multiplayer will be full at release) with the Terran campaign coming first, then Zerg then Protoss. Also, Blizzcon 2008 beta keys will be used for Starcraft II (time not yet announced, Mike just said it wasn't ready yet). They showed the newer campaign interface and it was interesting, but to be honest, I'd have to try it as it's a lot different than the fairly linear mission mode that Starcraft has right now (there were very few branches that you could take by completing a mission differently in the original). But it looks like the trilogy idea was good, as from what they showed of the single player terran campaign... all of the in-game cinematics and stuff being done for all three races would've kept the game from coming out for awhile. Although, personally I would've wanted Protoss first myself :P.

Oh and as to the comment on Lightning Bolt, if I remember correctly, GC said they actually wanted to tone down LB a bit, but decided against it, because it'd hurt Elemental too much at this current point (as you don't get Lava Burst until 75).

DK: Unholy (let's face it, it's a trick tree - lots of fun to play but no real group utility save for your bubble)

Absolutely not true. Unholy is actually a fantastic tree overall for either tanking, PVE or PVP. Unholy excels a bit when it comes to AoE tanking and it has a few good tanking talents. The real tree that could use some work is Blood. It's good for DPS, but when it comes down to it, Blood's lower-in-the-tree tanking talent is supposedly Vampiric Blood, which simply raises the amount of healing you receive by 50%... not exactly great for mitigation compared to Bone Armor (Unholy) and Unbreakable Armor (Frost). Unholy's DPS is also pretty darned good.

I don't like the idea to swich specs between fights. The Spec switching is a good idea but not between fights. kinda weird

It's a great idea for some classes. Take Karazhan for example... you only need two tanks on a couple encounters and some trash... but the rest of the time, they're literally a wasted spot (except for some niche things like a Paladin assisting on Maiden or whatever). This way, the Paladin could change to Ret or Holy and not have to incur a possibly steep price for it to possibly have to switch back for say... certain Opera encounters.

For some classes, it might not be a big deal between fights or whatever, but it does help the fact that for some... the 50g amount might add up over time for those that like to do PVE on some days and PVP on others.

[stupid11]

Typical flavor of the month reroller.

Take a look at the new skills, the new playstyles and the beta forums and your questions will be answered regarding better switching between pets, how Destro works.

You were quite fond of just pressing 2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2-2 right?

Uh, no. I'm in beta, I already skim the forums regularly. I've done real testing of this stuff at 80.

NOTE: I SAID CHAOS BOLT WAS FINE. That's the exact opposite of 2-2-2-2-2 (you're a moron if you bind shadowbolt to 2, imo). I'm FINE with keeping dots up and using Chaos Bolt on cooldown. (If you want to play a class that spammed 2-2-2-2-2-2 in BC and will STILL spam 2-2-2-2-2-2 in Wrath, roll a mage.)

The PROBLEM is Conflag, Backdraft, and the second effect of Fire & Brimstone. They're all awful mechanics and talents.

And no, there haven't been any pet changing improvements. O wise one, please point out these amazing changes. A new interface =/= easier pet changing. You're a moron if you didn't know what each pet did/had a hotkey for the important ones. Oh, you can't? Too bad.

And buffs to the pets themselves ARE NOT THE SAME AS EASIER SWITCHING. Just because you're using one pet instead of saccing doesn't mean it's easier to resummon or go to a different one now.

[Jiai]

Also, how the fuck are pets easier to summon OR switch? ? ? ? We've had ABSOLUTELY ZERO CHANGES to pet summoning. Locks are going to be FUCKED by boss abilities that target a random person. BAM, pet gets 1 shot, lock either gimps himself for the rest of the fight or spends 10 seconds doing nothing and recasting his pet.

Change boss to not target pets.
Done.

[saggo]

Well thought everything was great until they stated that there will be player limitations on Diablo 3 - like only 4 players on a server... that sucks!

[Malathar]

Uh, no. I'm in beta, I already skim the forums regularly. I've done real testing of this stuff at 80.

NOTE: I SAID CHAOS BOLT WAS FINE. That's the exact opposite of 2-2-2-2-2 (you're a moron if you bind shadowbolt to 2, imo). I'm FINE with keeping dots up and using Chaos Bolt on cooldown. (If you want to play a class that spammed 2-2-2-2-2-2 in BC and will STILL spam 2-2-2-2-2-2 in Wrath, roll a mage.)

The PROBLEM is Conflag, Backdraft, and the second effect of Fire & Brimstone. They're all awful mechanics and talents.

And no, there haven't been any pet changing improvements. O wise one, please point out these amazing changes. A new interface =/= easier pet changing. You're a moron if you didn't know what each pet did/had a hotkey for the important ones. Oh, you can't? Too bad.

And buffs to the pets themselves ARE NOT THE SAME AS EASIER SWITCHING. Just because you're using one pet instead of saccing doesn't mean it's easier to resummon or go to a different one now.

So what button do you bind shadowbolt to? Or are you one of those loser clickers? I prefer the 3 button for mine.

[Laotzu]

So what button do you bind shadowbolt to? Or are you one of those loser clickers? I prefer the 3 button for mine.

Probably binds it to "Q" ;-)