Blizzard Product Slate, Forum Titles, Blizzcast 15, Blue Posts

Update - Added November 30 hotfixes, including a massive boost to Gamon's already incredible power!

Blizzard Product Slate "Leak"
People are pretty excited about a new picture going around the web, supposedly a leak of the schedule of Blizzard's release for the next year. I don't usually comment that kind of things but ...


Source
The image appeared on MMOGamesite.com, apparently this is an english MMO site based in China and I already know a lot of people will hate me for reporting that news. The document itself is probably a slide from an internal presentation to executives and/or shareholders, and seems to be 8 months old according to the date at the top.

Battle.net 2.0
  • BNET2 - Well, that's the Battle.net we now use on WoW.
  • BNET2MapMarket - This is pretty self explanatory, but I'm a little surprised by the timeline.
  • BNET2 3rd Parties - The end-game with Battle.net is as far as I know to compete with Steam. One of the best way to do that would be to use the new platform to distribute a popular game, and if that game was an upcoming Call of Duty title the Activision/Blizzard merge would suddenly make a lot of sense, right?

Starcraft 2
Nothing really new here, but I have no idea what SC2 Phoenix is.

Diablo 3
Target release date in a year makes sense. The 2 expansions aren't really a surprise but I wouldn't take it as a confirmation, that's usually the kind of stuff you mention in company meetings with the higher-ups to make everyone happy.

World of Warcraft
  • WoWMobile - Done/in-progress with the mobile Auction House and the upcoming extra features.
  • Cataclysm - Well, we all know about that.
  • WoW Brazil - Portuguese translation of the game. I already heard a couple of rumors about that and at this point I'm 99% sure it's true, this is one of the reason why I think this document is legit. (The 2 others being the TCG Game and Titan)
  • WoW X4 - 4th expansion in a year and a half sounds very plausible.
  • WoW TCG - TCG Game, this part will probably remind you of one of my old posts ... The Future of World of Warcraft: TCG
  • WoW Movie - I'd say the timeline is off because the document is a few months old, before Sam Raimi decided to work on other projects before the Warcraft movie (but I still want to believe).
  • WoW X5 - 5th expansion a year and a half later, nothing surprising.

Titan
Yeah, that's Blizzard's new MMOFPS and I might have hinted at that in the past but I don't have a lot of extra information about it and the release date is just an estimation. Don't assume that it will be released by the end of 2013 based on that document, it would be very stupid. (Edit: Titan is a new game by the way, not an existing IP. But I'm really not sure what's the plan with it, I just know that the FPS bit is most likely here to stay)

Conclusion
The document is probably legit, even if it's already a little old it still confirms and backups a couple of information I already mentioned, and mentions the portuguese translation for the first time in public. Don't take it as a hard fact and don't bring it up too much on official forums but I think it's an interesting piece of information.


New Forum Titles are here!
The new titles are finally deployed on the forums and I'm only a few months late! Hopefully it will make the regular forum posters happier and it will be an awesome opportunity for the 40 new moderators I will promote tomorrow to ban hundreds of people trying to boost their post count. See the list below, the post count required for the last 3 titles will remain secret for the moment, it's ridiculously high anyway.

0 Keyboard Turner
10 Grunt
25 Blademaster
50 Field Marshal
100 High Overlord
200 The Patient
350 Stood in the Fire
500 Mechagnome
750 Dreadlord
1000 Bloodsail Admiral
1250 Brewmaster
1500 Epic!
1750 Pandaren Monk
2000 Warchief
2250 Pit Lord
2500 Herald of the Titans
3000 The Lightbringer
4000 Scarab Lord
5000 I am Murloc!
6000 Legendary!
7000 Immortal
8000 Elemental Lord
9000 Over 9000!
10000 Old God
11000 Titan
????? The Insane
????? The Unstoppable Force
????? Merely a Setback



Patch 4.0.3a Hotfixes - November 30
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker)
Here you will find a list of hotfixes that address various issues related to the release of patch 4.0.3a. While many have already been deployed on all realms, some may not be implemented until the next time your realm is restarted. We will continue to update this thread in the days ahead as additional hotfixes are applied.

November 30
  • Gamon is now immune to all forms of crowd control, uses the abilities Charge and Battle Shout, and wrecks adversaries with his new two-handed axe.
  • Players should no longer be prevented from entering a Battleground for no reason.
  • Many loot tables for NPCs have been adjusted to provide the correct items and scaling.
  • The Alchemy bonus from Flask of Stoneskin now grants 120 stamina, up from 80 stamina, to keep it in-line with similar bonuses from other professions.
  • Many creatures in Uldaman were not awarding reputation upon death. This has been corrected.
  • Wrathbone Reavers, Wrathbone Sorcerers, and Fallen Warriors no longer grant reputation in Pit of Saron.
  • Players can again start the Thrall escape event in Caverns of Time: Old Hillsbrad regardless of quest status.
  • The temporary guardian Basalt Rockling no longer drops from Balboa in Azshara.
  • Magma-Lord Kolob in Burning Steppes no longer awards dungeon tabard reputation.
  • The rest area for Tarren Mill is now correctly located in the inn.
  • Golden Skeleton Key can no longer open lockboxes that requires a higher Lockpicking skill than 125.
  • Bronjahm should once again drop Heroic-quality loot in Heroic Forge of Souls.
  • Random, mean level 15 deer appeared in Teldrassil to the shock and awe of low-level players. They have been replaced with level 1 fawn.
  • Gunships in Isle of Conquest should now work properly when a member of the opposite faction is on the gunship.
  • It is no longer possible to bypass Fatigue beyond the borders of Dun Morogh (looking at you here, death knights).

Druid (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
  • All ranks of Lifeblood are correctly granting the amount of Haste listed in their tooltips and are no longer affected by max health.
  • Ravage! is no longer consuming Clearcasting when it is used, and is only benefiting from Stampede.

Hunter (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
  • Trueshot Aura now functions correctly for level 39 hunters.
  • Hunter pets that were immortal can now be killed, flying pets no longer fly, and pets that were immobile after tamed properly move.
  • Beetle and turtle pet armor is now consistent with other Tenacity pet armor.
  • Qiraji Scarabs from the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj are no longer able to be effected by the Mutate Bug buff after being tamed.

Mage (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
  • When Freeze misses or resists on the first target, but is successful on another target, the mage will correctly get the Fingers of Frost procs from the target successfully hit.
  • Applying a damage-over-time Fire spell to a target that is being tanked no longer causes that target to face the mage.
  • The effect of the talent Firestarter will no longer stop functioning when Molten Armor has only 30 minutes remaining when cast with Glyph of Armors active.

Paladin (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
  • Hammer of the Righteous now consistently hits all nearby targets, including those behind the paladin.
  • Hammer of the Righteous should now function correctly if used right as an auto-attack begins.

Priest (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
  • Holy Word: Sanctuary was healing for too much when used with Glyph of Prayer of Healing. This has been corrected.

Warlock (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
  • Demon pets should not be receiving the appropriate contribution of the warlock's armor.
  • Blood Pact is now properly scaling with the level of party members.

Quests
  • Dungeon quests for level 1-60 dungeons on Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor now reward significantly less experience. Read more about this change here.
  • The event for "The Battle for Darrowshire" properly resets after a failed attempt and the Relic Bundle will correctly trigger the event again after a failed attempt.
  • Soldiers in Northwatch Foothold, Durotar now spawn more frequently.
  • Players should no longer get disconnected if they attempt to share a quest that isn't supposed to be sharable.
  • Players should still be able to interact with Orgus after offering a drink for the quest "Let's See What You've Got, Zanzil".
  • Ranger Glynda Nal'shea no longer has a duplicate personality appearing in Lor'danel, Darkshore.
  • Satchel of Helpful Goods should be rewarded when players complete Shadowfang Keep via the Looking For Dungeon system.
  • "The Secrets of Uldum" can be completed.
  • Margol the Rager in Searing Gorge now respawns in a much more reasonable timeframe.
  • Plainstriders in Northern Barrens now respawn considerably faster to meet the demand of their demise.
  • "One Draenei's Junk..." and "Kum'isha's Endeavors" can no longer be shared.
  • The quest item Enohar's Explosive Arrows for the quest "Curtail the Darktail" can now only be used on Darktail Bonepickers within Blasted Lands.
  • Mounted characters can now proceed through "Rise of the Brotherhood" in Westfall without any complications.
  • Buttonwillow's Hand Grenade from the quest "Remove Their Arms" can no longer be used outside of Blasted Lands.
  • Golems at the Grimesilt Dig Site in Searing Gorge should now respawn at a more reasonable rate.
  • Players should no longer experience a client crash when accepting the quest "A Destiny of Flame and Sorrow".

BlizzCast 15 Now Available
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker)
BlizzCast 15 is now live! In this episode, we bring you in-depth coverage of the upcoming Cataclysm expansion and discuss everything from world creation to class changes to sound design.

In our first segment, we discuss world-building with World of Warcraft Lead World Designer Alex Afrasiabi and Lead Content Designer Cory Stockton. For our second segment, we delve into music and sound design with Composer and Director of Audio Russell Brower and Senior Composer of Music and Sound Derek Duke. Our third segment focuses on the voice acting in Cataclysm with Producer of Casting and Talent Relations Andrea Toyias. Last, but certainly not least, we sit down with World of Warcraft Lead Systems Designer Greg Street to discuss the class and systems changes in Cataclysm.

Head over to the BlizzCast page to listen now, or download it from iTunes.

Dungeon Quest Experience Reduction
Originally Posted by Zarhym (Blue Tracker)
We are applying a hotfix today to all level 1-60 dungeon quests for Kalimdor and Eastern Kingdoms dungeons which will significantly reduce the amount of experience they award.

While dungeons should remain integral to our evolving storylines, and great places to collect gear in cooperative environments, we need to make sure each player’s questing progress remains relevant as dungeon quests are completed. In many cases we’re seeing players enter dungeons to complete quests, only to come out ahead of the leveling curve for the zones they’re in.

This change should allow players the opportunity to reap the benefits of running dungeons, while not outpacing the leveling flow from levels 1-60. At this time there are no plans for making any adjustments to dungeon quest experience for Outland, Northrend, and level 80+ Cataclysm dungeons.

You can find a list of all of the latest hotfixes here: http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/1232869

Dungeon Level Changes
Originally Posted by Daxxarri (Blue Tracker)
The Cataclysm has wrought changes to many facets of Azeroth and the dungeons found across the world are no exception. As many of the zones throughout the world now have new level ranges, the dungeons within their borders have been adjusted to match, and the items that drop within those dungeons have had their stats changed accordingly.

Here's a list of all 1-60 dungeons and the level range at which each should be explored, followed by the minimum level required for entry in parentheses.

In order by minimum level to enter.

  • The Deadmines - Level Range: 15-21 (10)
  • Ragefire Chasm - Level Range: 15-21 (10)
  • Wailing Caverns - Level Range: 15-25 (10)
  • Shadowfang Keep - Level Range: 16-26 (11)
  • Stormwind Stockade - Level Range: 20-30 (15)
  • Blackfathom Deeps - Level Range: 20-30 (15)
  • Gnomeregan - Level Range: 24-34 (19)
  • The Scarlet Monastery - Graveyard - Level Range: 26-36 (21)
  • The Scarlet Monastery - Library - Level Range: 29-39 (21)
  • The Scarlet Monastery - Armory - Level Range: 32-42 (21)
  • The Scarlet Monastery - Cathedral - Level Range: 35-45 (21)
  • Razorfen Kraul - Level Range: 30-40 (25)
  • Maraudon - Purple Crystals - Level Range: 30-40 (25)
  • Maraudon - Orange Crystals - Level Range: 32-42 (25)
  • Maraudon - Pristine Waters - Level Range: 34-44 (25)
  • Uldaman - Level Range: 35-45 (30)
  • Dire Maul - East - Level Range: 36-46 (31)
  • Scholomance - Level Range: 38-48 (33)
  • Dire Maul - West - Level Range: 39-49 (34)
  • Razorfen Downs - Level Range: 40-50 (35)
  • Dire Maul - North - Level Range: 42-52 (37)
  • Stratholme - Main Gate - Level Range: 42-52 (37)
  • Zul'farrak - Level Range: 44-54 (39)
  • Stratholme - Service Entrance - Level Range: 46-56 (41)
  • Blackrock Depths - Prison - Level Range: 47-57 (42)
  • The Sunken Temple - Level Range: 50-60 (45)
  • Blackrock Depths - Upper City - Level Range: 51-61 (46)
  • Lower Blackrock Spire - Level Range: 55-65 (48)
  • Upper Blackrock Spire - Level Range: 55-65 (48)

Blue Posts
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
City Tabards and reputation in dungeons
If you are wearing one of the new faction tabards (e.g. Thunder Bluff, Stormwind, Orgrimmar, Ironforge, etc.), you will only receive reputation gains for that city/faction when in Classic (1-60), Northrend (70-80), and Cataclysm (80-85) dungeons. Outland dungeons will not currently provide reputation gains for the "home city" faction you are championing; this is intended.

Also, just as a heads up, if dungeon mobs and bosses are trivial to you, you will receive less reputation than if they are within your level range. This is just to ensure that players who exceed the dungeon's intended level range can still benefit from championing a specific faction, but aren't given a distinct advantage over those who are of the appropriate level and are unable to solo the content. This should also help encourage players to improve their reputation in dungeons more appropriate for their level, rather than running lower level content solely for the reputation (which isn't a bad thing by any means; we just want you to enjoy the content designed for your level range, too). :) (Source)

Aesthetic minor glyphs
We've enjoyed the few that have been made and really hope to continue on with them. A big issue is always time constraints, but the biggest hurdle is probably that we don't have the capability to alter spell effects directly with a glyph yet. The tech doesn't exist for us. Swapping out models, like the two you mentioned, are somewhat easy as long as we like the actual effect and want it in the game. Changing fire to be colored green though, while awesome, isn't as easy.

Some of the things you mentioned are certainly possible, some are quite like never going to happen, and some we just need the tech to pull it off. :)

We do indeed though hope to keep adding aesthetic minor glyphs. (Source)

Upcoming realm status page
The page itself has undergone some key improvements. Realms will now be sortable by status, name, type (Normal, PvP, RP, RP-PvP), population, locale (i.e. time zones: Pacific, Mountain, Central, and Eastern), and current queue. Also, when you're logged in, there will be a separate tab that will display the most relevant realms based on where your characters are, allowing you to quickly reference the status of the realms on which you play. :) (Source)
This article was originally published in forum thread: Blizzard Product Slate, Forum Titles, Blizzcast 15, Blue Posts started by Boubouille View original post
Published on 2010-12-01 03:10 AM
280 Comments
Comments 277 Comments
  1. mmocc0da7240b2's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Moleculor View Post
    My prediction is that SC2 Phoenix is SC1 reborn in the SC2 engine, with SC2 voice actors, etc. Possibly even SC2 design philosophies (so it won't be a redo of the missions themselves, as those were all "build base, kill base", but will do different types of missions while retaining the storyline).
    If that's the case it'll be a campaign / mission pack to add to SC2. They won't release SC1's multiplayer with the new system... Then you'd have two prime multiplayers competing for the competitive spotlight. That makes no sense.

    As for 'Titan', +1 for GENERIC FPS NAME
  1. Conbot's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Tharaldriel View Post
    As for 'Titan', +1 for GENERIC FPS NAME
    +1 for generic working title.
  1. Kainan's Avatar
    Nice titles and interesting graph that was leaked because this is a pretty major leak.
  1. crsh1976's Avatar
    Wait, forum titles reflecting your post count? What the hell, the forums will turn into a festival of players spamming every thread with mindless dribble - oh wait, they already do that.
  1. MeierLink's Avatar
    WOW BRAZIL OMG best notice ever for me since the end of the cold war =~~
  1. Seejay's Avatar
    That graph/list is pretty interesting. It's just a shame that all the stuff I'm exctied about seems to be years away :P

    If it is an MMOFPS based on the Halo universe, I think that would be amazing.

    EDIT: Actually, am I wrong or do Microsoft look after the Halo franchise now? if so doesn't that make a Halo themed MMO by anyone but Microsoft unlikely?
  1. mmoceda8158f5e's Avatar
    IN THE MOUNTAINS - the game?
  1. Kobs's Avatar
    Titan - mmoFPS, i think i just came in my pants. This was EXACTLY the kind of mmo i was hoping from them. God i hope it's true !
  1. Black Mage's Avatar
    Seems unlikely they would leak such a thing...
  1. DrgnDancer's Avatar
    Several people have postulated that because there is no WoWx6 on the chart that it's is slated to or expected to die after WoWx5. Personally I think this is unlikely. The chart lists nothing after Q4 2015. Should we take that as a sign that Blizzard is planning to close up shop and go home? Most likely this chart is projections for the next 5 years. If the schedule here is accurate, then WoWx6 would be in roughly 5.5 years. It's just not on the schedule yet.

    I agree with Boub that it's probably legit, but would caution anyone taking anything too seriously past Q4 2011. Any kind of serious planning beyond a couple years or so out is basically fantasy. Those release time frames are goals, and likely highly subject to change. Stuff like WoWx5, SC2x3, and Diablo 3x3 aren't even in development yet. There's no way they can accurately predict a release schedule.

    So basically it's interesting, but largely irrelevant info. They confirm some already announced dates and provide some very rough estimates for later releases. The Titan stuff is interesting. It confirms a likely release date at some point in the reasonable future. My guess (if the chart is real) is official announcement next BlizzCon. Roughly two years out from release seems to be Blizzard's preferred announcement window for new stuff (less so for WoW expansions, because they're on a shorter schedule).
  1. twinkleblur's Avatar
    being a shaman the title elemental lord...just fits i gotta have it..just hope i dont get banned on the way there. also about time they fixed gamon. its gonna be funny to see all the bones in org.
  1. mmoce86c0896ae's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Tang View Post
    They just stated recently that they want a faster pace of development from the two year window that they had with Wrath -> Cata. If you think about Wrath, almost half of it was spent with ICC being the highest level content, which is about six months longer than most people actually had interest in it. The only reason it took so long from ICC til Cata is because of the massive task of creating Cataclysm. Since they're presumably not going to completely revamp the existing world every time a new expansion is released, 18 months seems pretty achievable. Previously their goal had been to pump on out every year (at least, that was an Activision goal).

    ---------- Post added 2010-12-01 at 11:34 AM ----------



    It's already been in development for 3+ years. By the time it comes out, they won't be trying to switch WoW players to the new MMO, they're be trying to switch players of some one else's MMO back to their new one. SW:TOR is already going to take a large chunk out of their bottom line, and once the bleeding starts and people see their friends leaving in droves, it will be much easier for them to leave as well.

    From a business perspective, it's actually coming out much later than it ought to, but these things do take time, especially when it's Blizzard that's involved.
    As i remember they didnt talk about expacs, they talked about a shorter time span between content patches
  1. mmoc6427d98424's Avatar
    WoW Brazil??? For god sakes... Why not WoW Portugal? I'm not playing that stupid translation for sure...
  1. ronokle's Avatar
    • WoW Movie - I'd say the timeline is off because the document is a few months old, before Sam Raimi decided to work on other projects before the Warcraft movie (but I still want to believe).


    You misspelled U-W-E B-O-L-L.
  1. DrgnDancer's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by wiIdi View Post
    yes very hard.

    You don't have to invent a new tech to do this and you know that. When someone has the Glyph of the Penguin, the Penguin model with completely different model and color will be shown for everyone. Duplicate redfire.tga change it to greenfire.tga and make sure greenfire.tga will be shown when someone has the Glyph of Green Fire.
    How do yo know that? How do you know that it's the same bits of code that tell fire what color to be as tell polymorph what model to use? You have a lot more inside knowledge of Blizzards engines and tools than most of us it seems. Seriously, these guys develop one of the more complex pieces of software on the market. If it was easy and they could make a little bit of QQ stop by doing it, don't you think they would? It seem to me that it's a relatively trivial bit of code to check for a glyph and if it's there have Polymorph: Sheep be a completely different spell (Polymorph: Monkey), than to have a glyph tell a spell to be exactly the same as normal, but with a different model. I don't know any better than you do though.

    And of course that's not the only issue. What about casting animation? When you cast a fire spell you have a casting animation. That animation has fire dancing around your hands. Maybe it's easy to make the fire you shoot out change color based on a gylph, just like it's easy to make you turn things into monkeys instead of a sheep, but it's hard to make the cast animation change based on a glyph. It'll look stupid if you have orange fire dancing around your hands while you cast, but shoot out green fire. I don't the answer myself, and I really doubt you do either. You want it to work in a certain way, so you've decided that what you want must be easy and Blizzard is deliberately not doing it. I'm not sure why... people seem to have this idea that Blizzard hates them personally and doesn't do some things just to make them sad or angry.

    It always amuses me how people with little or no software development experience (or for that matter 3-D modeling experience) love to sit in forums and tell Blizzard how easy it is to do things. Hell I *have* software development experience and I have no idea how hard or easy it would be to most of this stuff. It all depends on how their tools and engines are setup. Never having worked on *this* piece of software I can only guess.

    Edit to add:
    Quote Originally Posted by DatBunnii View Post
    Probably sound like an idiot but-
    I'm confused about the WOWx4/x5 is.. #5 being the 5th xpansion? What's #4? :|
    Um.. the fourth expansion? There's only been three... The number system they're using here considers the base game as x0 so:
    WoW: vanilla
    WoWX1: was the first expansion (BC)
    WoWX2: WOLK
    WoWX3: Cataclysm
    WoWX4: Unknown 4th expansion
    WoWX5: Unknown 5th expansion
    Look at how Starcraft and Diablo are numbered.
  1. Alfador's Avatar
    This "slide" could be made by anyone, and even if blizzard came out and said, right now, "yeah that's an internal slide we had." it would still be damn near worthless. Blizzard doesn't give two rat turds about its own internal release dates, and that's why we never get external ones. It Things will be ready when they are ready.
  1. warptwist's Avatar
    My Protection warrior could solo pretty much every single instance he got into. I of course had he's gear enchanted, and tryed to upgrade it as much as possible, and used Self Healing and Victory rush as much as possible, but i could solo all thrash with same ease as i could solo 2 mobs outside an instance back in vanilla, and solo bosses as if i was fighting two elites at a time. Most instances i dont need a healer for, and if i got one,(a lot of them leave cause i pull too fast, and they can't keep up, and feel useless apparantly, and im a bit arrogant i guess <.<) then i can pull 2-5 groups at a time, or atleast chain pull with with also 1-2 groups on me, so my dps can AoE dps their asses off (and possible reach 400-600 dps, while i rock at 1000+)

    what im trying to say is.. Blizzard, nerfed nearly all classes dps(if not all) so we couldn't just ZERG through all instances from Deadmines to.. well..Ulduar.. but.. mainly 1-60.. and YET i can do 1500+ dps as a lvl 60 Protection warrior in just heirloom items and blues??...

    Blizzard clearly made instances 1-60 too easy, i could proberly almost tank Heroics on my lvl 60 prot warrior, in lvl 70 Heroics already >.<
  1. skottie's Avatar
    aha, leak you call this.

    thats nothing more than an intelligent placed information from activision-blizzard. /discuss
  1. ManiaCCC's Avatar
    Boubouille, are you sure with MMOFPS? Year ago (or 2? I am not sure) there were big "leak" when blue on official forum said Titan is RPG game..(they "announced" that with "Titan is new IP" fact)..

    Of course..it still could be MMOFPS with RPG aspects or even MMORPG playing from first person perspective...who knows.
  1. mmoc56c829a066's Avatar
    Well, if it's MMOFPS, I'm happy, 'cause then I won't quit WoW for that. I have enough good FPS games.
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