Battle.net Parental Control Changes, Feedback on Density is Needed, MannerCookie's Torment 6 Freeze Barb

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Armory Stats - Proving Grounds
Today we are looking at data from proving grounds achievements, with a sample of 6.3 million characters and 2.3 million players that were active after November 19th. The sample is slightly biased, as players who are not in a guild are much less likely to appear in our sample. You can leave suggestions for future stat posts in the comments!

Our first chart shows the percentage of players that earned proving grounds achievements, for at least one role, at least two roles, or at least three roles. The second chart shows the same data, but scales the percentages so that they consider only the participating players. A participating player is a player that earned at least Bronze in one role.

Unfortunately we are unable to look at achievements by class, as achievements are earned account wide, and there is no way to know which character they were earned on.

There are three data points for every difficulty level, but you may need to click the names in the legend to hide taller bars and mouse over close to the X axis in order to see them.

A total of ~20,000 players have completed the You're Doing it Wrong, or ~3% of the players that earned at least one Silver role achievement.

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Upcoming Battle.net Parental Control Changes
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker)
On January 7, 2014 or shortly afterwards, we’re making a change to Battle.net® Parental Controls: a new default setting will prevent in-game purchases for accounts that have Parental Controls turned on. The account will not be able to:

  • Make purchases in the World of Warcraft® in-game Shop
  • Make real-money purchases in Hearthstone™: Heroes of Warcraft™
  • Make purchases in the Diablo® III real-money auction house (note: the auction house will be permanently closed on March 18, 2014)

We’re making this change to ensure that Parental Controls users will have more control over real-money purchases in Blizzard games. No action is needed to keep this default setting and prevent in-game purchases.
To enable in-game purchases for this account:
1. Log in to Battle.net and visit the Retrieve Parental Controls page.
2. Enter your Parental Controls email address.
3. Click the Send Parental Controls Email button.
4. Check your Parental Controls email for a message from Blizzard Entertainment.
5. Click the link under the account user’s name. This will take you to the Parental Controls setup page.
6. Under the Purchase Settings section, check Allow in-game purchases, and click the Save Settings button.

If you’d like to remove Parental Controls from this Battle.net account, visit our Adding and Removing Battle.net Parental Controls support article for detailed instructions.

Blue Tweets
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Art
What overall feel are you guys going for for armor in WoD? Something light/nomadic/less bulky?
overall theme is primal/barbarian . We're also tapping into iron horde theme strategically. (Source)

Any chance of allowing white/statless items as transmog models? Some very nice models among those going to waste!
Doubtful as it's currently the #1 lock-out mechanism. More likely that we'll try to (re)include such assets as future rewards! (Source)
Consider their models for re-inclusion I mean!
Oh yes, that's what I meant! Just a matter of the item/reward peeps finding the right time & place for all that stuff. (Source)

I mean, they don't start holding the bow like a gun suddenly. I just wonder why it's such a problem with fist/1Hand weapons.
Bow/gun was hard-coded in from the very beginning, built into the system. And again, for *both* philosophical & technical reasons. (Source)

Character / Items
Probably too much for twitter, but what plans for trinkets in WoD? RPPM/ICD/On-use/
Variety. All of the above, along with some more ideas. (Source)

Just FYI, Tauren could need an offensive racial (wow that sounds weird) So many of my druid pal racechanged to Troll...
Yes, adding a throughput benefit to races that had don't have one currently is part of balancing the racials. (Source)

Warlords of Draenor Stats
Will low level gear only have haste and crit or will amplify, readiness and multi-strike(lol) be low level too?
Unsure. Since most low level gear only has 1 secondary stat on it, it could be OK. Still deciding. (Source)

Will Multistrike interact with some class mechanics like, say, crit for fire mages & how is it meaningfully different from crit?
Just there are some class abilities that trigger from crits, there may be some that trigger from Multistrikes. (Source)
"Just as there are...", rather. Yes, Flameglow would work better against Multistrikes (and still worse against crits). (Source)

Isnt multistrike just crit with the chance of hitting somthing you dont want to plus only 1/3 the power? (I am guessing: No )
No... Multistrike doesn't hit a different target. Can trigger 1 or 2 times per attack. (Source)
Which means if it strikes twice and both crits it's +120% otherwise it's +90% or less. How will this ever be better than crit?
It has an appropriate coefficient so that it's competitive. Is that what you mean? (Source)
Does that mean Multistrike is affected by our Crit rating?
No... Multistrike and Crit are separate mechanics. (Source)

Double multistrike, all three hits crit! <- This is the only thing will hear about in WoD PvP.
We recognize that problem and are preemptively working on potential solutions. (Source)

Right, what's wrong with that? Also I imagine some specs getting procs off multistrike hits
Yeah, 1% Multistrike will be way cheaper than 1% crit. That's fine, happens all the time. (Source)
critrat is near 100% right now. Multistrike capped around 6.1 then? Or lower critchances in general?
And half that crit is from Agi, not crit rating. (Source)
wait, I missed something... no more agi->crit? Same for int-crit? Agi-dodge and str-parry?
I'm saying that you can't say that "I capped crit in X tiers, so I'll cap multistrike in X/2 tiers". Crit came from Agi too. (Source)

is the only way to get multi strike through gear? Toons have base mastery and crit...
We may have the occasional buff, or class ability, or consumable. Characters don't have base haste, yet you get it from all over. (Source)

Lot of tick mechanics were changed to less frequent but more powerful to decrease server load. Any worry for multistrike?
We learned a lot from those changes. We're designing Multistrike and handling some similar challenges with that in mind. So, I see where the concern is coming from and we're making sure that it won't cause problems like that again. (Source)

PvE
Keep that crap out of my visual clusterfuck melee pile.
We 110% recognize the problem that is visual clutter, especially in raids, and want to make it better, not worse. (Source)
We've started toning up your own visuals, and toning down others' visuals. Much more of that to come in WoD. (Source)

I want to always have something to work for (in WoD gear), but I don't want to rely on it for damage + competitive raid spot.
Those desires are competing with each other though, you see? (Source)

PvP
Is ONE DR (or something like it) a system you'd consider for WoW PvP? It would dramatically cut down on CC and make it strategic
Prefer to reduce the number of CC spells. Players seeing "Immune" more isn't going to be fun. (Source)
Is that actually going to happen though? You guys say that an awful lot yet Hunters have been the only ones to lose any.
It's the plan for WoD. (Source)
Simpler solution is removing so much CC that DR isn't needed to such a large extent anyway.
DR categories help prevent class stacking, which is good, but the number of categories has grown too high. (Source)

Since 72% resil makes healing very efficent atm im interested to see how healers will will be adjusted for low resil PVP.
We're exploring 150% crits for PvP damage/healing which makes a big difference for both base resil and battle fatigue. (Source)
Bringing back resi providing crit % reduction is something people (I) have been suggesting for over a year...
Sure but that's not what we're talking about here (Source)

I hope it can be reduced, and I would love to see it removed as a stat and just be a background effect like battle fatigue.
Base resil will be reduced as low as possible. Like PvP dmg reduction as set bonus (trinkets). Don't like resil gems. (Source)

What about making base resilience only active in instanced pvp? Pve players still stand a chance but pvp gear good in world pvp.
This would just mean the game is way more bursty out in the world. Not something we want. (Source)
I didn't think of that. I just hope you guys find a way to make world pvp work. I'm stoked about Ashran #WoD
I think we have good plans here to make ilevels much closer in WoD than MoP. (Source)

a lot of problems with battle fatigue in duel...not applied .Is Battle fatigue removed in wod?
A goal for WoD is for Battle Fatigue & Base Resilience to be as low as possible. This has broad implications. (Source)

One quick question as someone asked. RBG was TotG too, yes? I'm sure I heard H. say so.
Yes, RBGs will have TotG too. (Source)

Horde towers are much easier to defend; gives a large advantage to the Alliance UNLESS can wipe on Galv.
We're looking at what we can do on the map, but it will take a long time to change community opinion (Source)

will there be LoS objects around the central fighting points in Ashran?
Yes we're designing the contested areas with LoS in mind (Source)
Will hunters still have quad damage stampede, and various other things that only apply in arena fixed to be v. player?
Our design for the area is a PvP playground with an emphasis on atmosphere, exploration & participation. (Source)
A lot of things are going to feel "crazy" and OP out there. Be forewarned. (Source)

Holiday Events
More world events please. More server wide events. More quests like "Only one may rise"!
I'd love to do more stuff like that, totally. (Source)

Dave, if you work on holiday events in WoW, could you guys raise ilevel of the holiday drops? To Timeless Isle at least.
The item peeps generally bump the player power drops once per expansion, in tune w/ the level/ability bump the encounter peeps do. (Source)
but by adding Timeless Isle you've allowed people to skip catch-up content, making holiday drops sort of useless. It's a shame.
I understand what you're saying! Still, if people are killing Ahune only for his cloaks, I have failed horribly. T_T (Source)
no, for his scythe! Lol. Wow is a "loot-porn" game. Heard the term before? We want lootz. No worthy lootz? We don't run content.
That's what I was saying: I'm more about snowing scythes and funky gas masks and flying hell-horses than magical ring item levels. (Source)
fair enough, you're my kind of guy then! More snowing scythes and glowing horses please! Increase drop rate on Love Rocket!
OG Love Rocket was like Broom (i.e. everyone during LiitA) but so funky and loved by team I had to make it a VERY rare permanent. (Source)

Fan Art
Another nice piece of Hearthstone art today from breathing2004.

This article was originally published in forum thread: Armory Stats - Proving Grounds, Parental Control Changes, Blue Tweets, Fan Art started by chaud View original post
Comments 52 Comments
  1. mmoc3d5e9cedde's Avatar
    @felade - as one of the first players in the world to achieve endless wave 30 in all roles, I agree compltely. But my healing and tank achievement where both removed (for no reason at all, and they can't re-reward it to me either, cuz having 30+ waves in pg tanking in statistics isn't proof enough). The tanking one was by far the hardest one, I went in and 1shot the healing one to get it back but have yet to managed the tanking one again (only did like 3-4 tries after having ot removed).
  1. nekobaka's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by BlahBlahFrigginBlah View Post
    The 45% thing though.... you are sent to do it by a yellow quest from the shrine. the steep dropoff of how many continued to do it after completing the initial quest with the bronze run shows how unpopular it in fact is.

    see what i mean?
    wasnt knocking the feature, i just dont see how these numbers translate to how eager the devs are to make it an integrated part in future content
    Well thats the thing with developers along with what is casual. The developers wont clearly define ether publicly and even vary it based on internal expectations. Players do get after Blizzard when developers use such terms though and use such words at times to dodge the question such as when asked how many players like LFR vs do it because there is no alternative. I didnt mean you bash you as well rather than help high light other factors including WoWs varied population wants and needs. Proving grounds are among the most optional features out there and at least based on the last numbers surpasses LFR completion rates which used to be in the majority.

    @Chaud this brings a question to mind of if you have sufficient data to show how many players participate in holiday events including the ones that could be viewed as a bit more optional.
  1. Mefistophelis's Avatar
    So for this data they used a 2,300,000 player pool and only about 20,000 have the "You're Doing it Wrong!" achievement ? Is it really that hard ?
    I did it on my monk (happening to be my main) as a healer clearing the silver dps pg.
  1. MakeMeLaugh's Avatar
    Man, proving grounds is so boooring, can't stand it. I did it when it launched, I was always almost falling asleep...

    Wish they improved brawler's guild instead of implementing this, now it's just another feature that gets overgeared that will be forgotten once the next expansion arrives... sigh.
  1. Eternal Ice's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Arian21 View Post
    So for this data they used a 2,300,000 player pool and only about 20,000 have the "You're Doing it Wrong!" achievement ? Is it really that hard ?
    I did it on my monk (happening to be my main) as a healer clearing the silver dps pg.
    As a rogue I find the healing challenge pretty hard, my hunter didn't have better luck.
  1. marq1983's Avatar
    I just wish it would get more difficult much faster, other then that i loved Proving Grounds.
  1. Flowsion's Avatar
    Proving grounds is tedious, but its certainly not 'boring'. Wave 20+ on especially heals and dps can get intense at times, and I was expecting to see more complaints about the bugs in healing endless, especially since NPC's will sometimes 'die' while still at 10% health.
  1. mmocdd602b3b80's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by DarkLoki View Post
    As a rogue I find the healing challenge pretty hard, my hunter didn't have better luck.
    Yeah but as a Rogue or Hunter, you should find the tanking challenge a breeze.
  1. ashamel's Avatar
    I'd be interested how many people were trying for the Bigger Bag achievement, and how far they were through it. A lot will presumably have a few of the items randomly, but higher numbers, let alone completion, will be a bit rarer.
  1. Siri's Avatar
    How many players completed endless 30 on all three roles? The representation is apparently not big enough to show on the graph!

    Also, you can see which characters, specifically, completed the endless 30 achievement. The maximum score achieved is saved in statistics and statistics are character specific even if the achievements aren't.
  1. mmoc5b53551f34's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by MakeMeLaugh View Post
    Man, proving grounds is so boooring, can't stand it. I did it when it launched, I was always almost falling asleep...

    Wish they improved brawler's guild instead of implementing this, now it's just another feature that gets overgeared that will be forgotten once the next expansion arrives... sigh.
    Dude you can't overgear it since your ilvl goes down to 463...
  1. Darmalus's Avatar
    Huh, I completely forgot about proving grounds.
  1. mmocced9c7d33d's Avatar
    Proving grounds, isn't that something for new players? Haven't bothered with it, there's no rewards right??
  1. mmoc37d54b0df8's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Arian21 View Post
    So for this data they used a 2,300,000 player pool and only about 20,000 have the "You're Doing it Wrong!" achievement ? Is it really that hard ?
    I did it on my monk (happening to be my main) as a healer clearing the silver dps pg.
    no idea if its hard or not. I suspect not.

    But I've never set foot in proving grounds, and dont intend to.
  1. Raiju's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Flowsion View Post
    Proving grounds is tedious, but its certainly not 'boring'. Wave 20+ on especially heals and dps can get intense at times, and I was expecting to see more complaints about the bugs in healing endless, especially since NPC's will sometimes 'die' while still at 10% health.
    It is certainly boring to me as a dps. I've barely done it but furthest I got was about 17 or so. Was it lack of dps? No. Was it the intense challenge? No.

    It's how boring the fights are, falling asleep after 15 mins of such a mindnumbing encounter and getting hit by an orb.
  1. Toiran's Avatar
    I'd say Proving Grounds is a success, most players don't know about it, or hardly care because it just offers an achievement and title, if it offered a set of transmog gear like say,challenge modes,for Endless 30, you'd see a big increase. It's also basically mentioned nowhere, and I don't think it took that long to create, the time invested was worth it for Blizzard, hopefully they expand on it in WoD.

    I have gold on two chars, and I seriously didn't think I'd be in the 1% for that, as for endless, I just haven't got round to trying, think I will tonight though.

    I think time is a factor as well, you've got to dedicate a few hours to getting endless, and reforge/regem etc, you can't just pause it in the middle of waves, so I'd imagine people are put off wiping on wave 28 and having to do it all over again, which is a good thing also, it SHOULD be hard/require attention etc, just saying people ragequit etc.

    Wondered what happened to the model update, also, does anyone know when the watercooler should be out?
  1. kelgo's Avatar
    The reason the numbers are so low because of how unbalanced it is for classes doing it. Some classes you can blow through endless 30 without much trouble while others it is insanely difficult just to get past silver. Also most people don't even know it exists which compounds the problem.

    Personally I think its a waste of time at least with brawlers guild there is some thought to it, in PG you pretty much breeze through it or struggle extremely hard due to the poor scaling of many classes at that ilvl.
  1. Kourvith's Avatar
    Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
    A lot of things are going to feel "crazy" and OP out there. Be forewarned.
    Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
    Be forewarned.


    Now Blizzard is having some balls again. I like that.
  1. Yag's Avatar
    I simply don't see a reason to do the proving grounds. So I have never bothered doing them.

    Now, if there was exclusive mog gear or something as a prize for achieving stuff there, i would do them. Otherwise I just ignore it like always.
  1. Bad Ashe's Avatar
    recently started healing on my pally, and now i've been in there most of last nite and this morning to see how far i can get in endless...

    maybe i was completely wrong, because once you DO start its pretty addictive. i guess its just getting the people TO start it.

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