Garrison Shipyards, Spec Specific Trinkets, Blue Posts, Eventbrite, Blizzcon Party

[chaud]

Blood Shard Exploit Repercussions, Kridershot UE DH, Crusader Fanart

Top Decks of the Week, Gfinity Spring Masters II Decklists, Theorycraft Spotlight: Midrange Dragon Rogue

Heroes Announcement this Monday

Patch 6.2 - Garrison Shipyards
Patch 6.2 adds Naval Missions to your garrison. You can't have Naval missions without ships, so there is also a new Shipyard being added to your garrison. The Shipyard is not a building and doesn't take up any existing slots or space in the garrison.

Both the Alliance and Horde shipyards are placed near your initial arrival point to the zone. The Alliance can get to the shipyard by taking the new exit that was added to their garrison. The Horde can take the existing back exit down to where the crashed ship was to get to their shipyard.

The Shipyard is unlocked by completing a short quest chain at the Iron Docks, accessible to anyone with a Level 3 Garrison. Vol'jin / Varian send you to the Iron Docks to recruit a Shipwright. You collect supplies and break Roark out of a prison train. After Roark is free, you reclaim his blueprints and return to your garrison to construct a shipyard. Currently it costs 5,000 garrison resource, but that is a placeholder value.

After unlocking your shipyard, you meet Solog at the dry docks and build a Transport ship. Currently the ship costs 1,000 resources to build, but this may be another placeholder value. Once you have a ship, the Assault on Tanaan Jungle can begin!

Alliance Shipyard

Horde Shipyard

Ship Models
Some new ship models have been added and some are reused from previous expansions.

Missions
Ships have abilities that counter other abilities and traits, just like followers. Almost all of the missions are currently placeholders, but we can still get a look at the UI. A new NPC is added in your Town Hall that allows you to access Naval Missions, which require Oil to complete.

Ship Equipment
Ships have two equipment slots, one of which is unlocked when the ship becomes epic quality.

Level	Type	Name	Cost
1	Consumable	Ship Equipment: Stabilizer Fins	2000 ×
1	Consumable	Ship Equipment: Navigational Charts	2000 ×
1	Consumable	Ship Equipment: Trained Shark Tank	2000 ×

Achievements
Completing Naval Missions will unlock higher levels of the Shipyard. The benefits from the upgrades aren't currently listed, but an upgraded Shipyard may allow you to have more ships, better ships, different types of ships.

Name	Points	Reward
Sailor Complete 25 Naval Training Missions.	5	Reward: Unlocks Shipyard, Level 2 Upgrade
Captain Complete 50 Naval Training Missions.	5	Reward: Unlocks Shipyard, Level 3 Upgrade

Patch 6.2 - Spec Specific Trinkets
Along with the other trinkets being added in Patch 6.2, Archimonde drops some trinkets that change effects based on your spec. Keep in mind that the procs aren't final.

Level	Type	Name	Zone	Dropped By
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Death Knight Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Druid Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Hunter Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Mage Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Monk Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Paladin Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Priest Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Rogue Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Shaman Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Warlock Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde
695	Trinket	Boss 13 - Warrior Trinket	Hellfire Citadel	Archimonde

Blue Posts

Timewalker Dungeons
1: When tuning these timewalker dungeons, are you also taking into account that they're already faceroll when you're doing them while leveling even right now? Seriously, have you tried running Arcatraz at its intended level? Bosses usually die in 10 seconds or less. I don't want that to be the kind of experience you get with timewalking.
The item squish and other class changes over the years certainly have had an adverse effect on old dungeons.

Our QA team is in the process of playing through the Timewalking versions and we look forward to PTR feedback as well. What we'll likely do is continue to adjust the item leveling scaling until we feel that the dungeons are appropriately tuned. We'll also be looking out for any strange outliers in mechanics and such.

2: Is there any chance this feature could be expanded to raids? Most of the raids before WotLK saw very little of the player population doing them because of the number of geared players required was too high for normal people. I'm personally hoping for Ahn'qiraj and Sunwell Plateau to be brought back somehow, even if only briefly.
This is still to be determined, but there are no plans for Timewalking raids in Patch 6.2. 5-player dungeons serve a significantly different purpose than do raids, and so we'd want to make sure we're not interfering with, or otherwise negatively affecting, Normal/Heroic/Mythic raid progression by adding an extra layer of "legacy" tiers.

We definitely want to focus on getting this introduction of Timewalking with TBC/Wrath dungeons in 6.2 right first, before we consider expanding it to include additional dungeons, or especially raids.

fair enough, but what happened to making new content? in the past, we would get a set of dungeons along with a new patch or raid tier: like ICC or DS. cant new dungeons be made, rather than recycling old ones? I like doing old content but it's still not bringing anything new to the table.
One of my points in my original post is that this isn't an either/or scenario. Creating a Timewalking system is entirely different from creating new 5-player dungeons, particularly in terms of artist resources.

We love 5-player dungeons too. But they're also difficult to introduce in patches, as they take quite a lot of time to develop relative to their lifespan as relevant content, even when compared to new raid dungeons, which require weeks or months of progression for the average guild. Most players run through 5-player dungeons a small handful of times to get whatever upgrades are available and then move on.

This is, in part, why we're introducing Mythic difficulty for 5-player dungeons in Patch 6.2. Most players feel a content gap between world content and raid content once they've run through the Heroic 5-player dungeons, and we feel that a Mythic difficulty (in addition to the introduction of Timewalking dungeons) will give players more progression options in small group content further into the lifespan of an expansion.

At the same time, this frees up our artists more to create the creatures and environments needed for future content, which aids us in our efforts to reduce the gaps in between content updates.

Are the time walker dungeons being designed just for level 100 characters, or is the intent for the level 100 people to group with people leveling up through the content now? So e.g. Level 100s would join groups with characters level 70 for BC dungeons, etc?
The intent is to group together anyone queuing for Timewalking when available. So, level-70 characters will be matched with level-100 characters for TBC Timewalking dungeons, for instance. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Blizzcon 2015 - Eventbrite Issues

Message from Eventbrite
On Wednesday evening, we had incredible demand for BlizzCon tickets but unfortunately, our waiting room did not work as we had expected. While thousands of people were successful in securing a Blizzcon ticket, sadly, we let others down. Our team spent the rest of the week working on a fix that we thought would remedy the issue that some encountered on Wednesday so Blizzcon’s second onsale would be seamless.

Unfortunately, on Saturday morning we experienced significant site slowness during BlizzCon’s second onsale. We understand what a frustrating experience this was for those purchasing tickets.

At Eventbrite, we are completely committed to offering a smooth, pain-free ticketing experience for event attendees and organizers alike. This week, we were not successful in providing that experience and on behalf of all of us at Eventbrite, we’d like to apologize to the entire Blizzard community. We take issues like this very seriously, and in the coming days, our team will be looking into what caused these situations so we can remedy for future onsales. (Official Forums)

Message from Blizzard
Just want to say to everyone who ran into issues when purchasing or trying to purchase tickets: we share your frustration and are sorry that the experience did not live up to expectations. Thank you for taking the time to provide your feedback. We are evaluating options for future online ticket sales to help ensure a smoother overall process. (Official Forums)

Blue Tweets

PvP
There's great momentum going in the WoW PvP tournament scene right now and it's only going to get better! (holinka)

Blizzcon 2015 World of Podcasts Party
World of Podcasts had a "little" party at Blizzcon 2014 and over 3,500 people showed up! This year they are doing it even bigger and better. You can meet podcasters and community members (such as the team from AskMrRobot), take pictures in the photo booth, play games, see and win fan art, listen to talks, and enjoy the bar! Entry is free and the team behind it is raising money to pay for the party on Kickstarter.

[cptaylor38]

Here's to hoping "You are not prepared for the con before the storm" is a subtle hint to an Illidan return announcement in the next expansion announced at Blizzcon.

[Deleted]

nope its a direct link to it being the Blizzcon before Heroes of the Storm is released.

Survival trinket is beyond a joke. Unless they change the BA mechanic to stack which I doubt.

[Somarlane]

Oooo, I want the Alliance submarine. I love that look. Shame I won't be able to have it since I play Horde.

[Arbs]

Yet it is the same night as the WoW Head party.

[Teebone]

Once again it looks like my followers are going to have more to do than I will.

[Super Kami Dende]

6.2 looks like it may be the patch that brings me back.

Naval Ops remind me of Kenway's Fleet from AC:Black Flag, Timewalking Dungeons is awesome since I loved those dungeons. Mythic Dungeons is even better since I love 5 player content.

Also those Trinkets are amazing.

[Pogoball]

Most of these pre-con events are packed butt to gut and have 1-3 hour long lines. By the time you get in, whichever community member or dev you went to meet has already left. Your best bet to meet anyone halfway interesting is just to loiter in the Hilton lobby bar after the show closes (but get there by 7-ish). The party is usually rolling until 3-4am or until the management shuts it down.

[Kaneiac]

Why do my followers get to go on sweet naval adventures, but I get to sit in my garrison and do nothing?

[Mask]

Oooo, I want the Alliance submarine. I love that look. Shame I won't be able to have it since I play Horde.

It's not too late to defect! A race change is just $25 away.

[Draculla]

The actual problem with a ships is, that Horde cannot build anything. You don´t have any quests there.

[Ghost1987]

Affliction locks trinket perk is to have it's dots and period reduced? How is that beneficial lol

[Breccia]

The Arms spec trinket is both
a) intentionally insulting, and
b) horribly designed.

I'll explain: as any Arms warrior knows, the big game-changer for Arms 5.0 was Sudden Death. This passive ability gave your auto-attacks a chance to reset the cooldown of Colossus Smash. This was kind of a big deal, as your remaining rotation changed pretty dramatically during the CS window, with special difference in priority between Slam and Overpower. It was removed with the new expansion, and with it, any variability of the rotation. Your CS would always be up every 20 seconds, no exceptions. This, combined with the loss of Overpower and baseline Slam, left Arms an incredibly boring spec. Because the Ability Prune was applied to every spec, even those that did not call for it. Apparently, Arms with Sudden Death was really really confusing and bad and evil and had to go.

Aaaaaand look, it's back. Blizz decided that, while other spec were getting new, never-before-seen abilities or ability modifiers, Arms would get an ability we had stripped from us because of questionable game design choices. This trinket is not new. This trinket is something we had, and now we have to burn a trinket slot to get it back. That's just provocative. That's trollling.

Also, it's a stupid idea. See, the reset of Colossus Smash was great in 5.4 because you were always happy to see it. Soon as the old CS wore off, BAM, you drop the new one and fill it with Hateful Death. But our spec was intentionally built to allow this.
-- Rage was plentiful, and consistent. Melee auto-attacks generated the same Rage all the time.
-- CS cost no rage.
-- Mortal Strike generated Rage.
-- If you were short on Rage, you could manually generate some before using the CS proc.
-- CS added bonus damage to Slam. Since your Rage use was minimal outside CS, it was completely possible to have back-to-back CS's filled with Slams and Mortal Strikes.
-- You never had to halt your rotation to apply Deep Wounds.

NONE of this is true anymore.
-- Rage at low ilvls is painfully slow. It is also unreliable due to Rage from auto-attacks balanced on double Rage from crits, allowing RNG to put you in a flood or a drought at any time..
-- CS costs 10 Rage.
-- Mortal Strike costs 20 Rage.
-- There are no ways to gain Rage other than auto-attacks. And one potion per encounter, I guess.
-- the CS window Arms has requires you to pool Rage, to dump as many attacks in the 6-second window as possible. If you did it correctly in the previous window, a back-to-back window is useless.
-- Using Rend during CS is a DPS loss. Back-to-back CS windows are actually counter-synergistic, especially with the current tier bonuses, with Rend.

The only thing that this Sudden Death Trinket gives Arms that is any way useful, is the ability to pop CS a bit faster than the 14-second downtime if you happen to get enough crits to make this a good idea. So it is, technically, an advantage. It's just a very poorly thought out one, which only fits in with the rest of Arms' design the entire expansion.

[Chickat]

Here's to hoping "You are not prepared for the con before the storm" is a subtle hint to an Illidan return announcement in the next expansion announced at Blizzcon.

Or its a hint towards Naga and the ocean.

- - - Updated - - -

Affliction locks trinket perk is to have it's dots and period reduced? How is that beneficial lol

Haste lowers the dot time, but the ticks stay constant, so a 10 tick dot over 20 seconds with 50% haste would be 10 equally powerful ticks over 10 seconds. Not sure if haste works exactly like that, but you get what i mean.

[Fabled]

More follower missions..of course, why would I think Blizz would make something cool for us to do.

[rcshaggy]

Wish they updated the ship models honestly, and add more Horde and Alliance feel to them.
Would be awesome if the Horde ship used the same textures used in Warspear, Frostwall Garrison, and so forth.
Same with Ally ship...

Also 6.2 patch doesn't disappoint, wish though they could add the Quest Chapters sometime soon, and add some Bonus Quests to the zone.

[xxgunstraxx]

does anyone know when is 6.2 dropping?

[Hellravager]

Pretty sure this is a typo because no way in hell is this fair
http://ptr.wowdb.com/items/124518-bo...aladin-trinket

[Mellrod]

Oooo, I want the Alliance submarine. I love that look. Shame I won't be able to have it since I play Horde.

The cool thing about those two submarines is that you got to walk around in their interior as you swam through the ocean on one of the last quests in Vashj'ir.

[arcaneshot]

Here's to hoping "You are not prepared for the con before the storm" is a subtle hint to an Illidan return announcement in the next expansion announced at Blizzcon.

It's just a pre-con party, not that big of a deal.