Blackrock Foundry Stats, Blue Tweets, Setup of the Month, Symmetra Gameplay

[chaud]

Solo vs. Group Play, PYWT: “Stone Age” Barbarian

Popular Decks of the Week, Viagame House Cup Finals + Decklists

Dustin Browder Tweets Round-Up, Madeon at the Launch Event, Plays of the Week Wombo Combo

Armory Stats - Blackrock Foundry Progression
Today we are taking a look at the Blackrock Foundry progression of players in each difficulty. Now that achievements are account wide, we can group characters by account and get an idea of what percentage of players (not characters) have defeated a boss on each difficulty at least once, based on progression data.

The data used today is a sample made up of 2.1 million accounts, with at least one character active after April 1. The sample is slightly biased, as players who are not in a guild are much less likely to appear in our sample.

The second chart uses the number of players that killed Gruul in each difficulty (except Mythic, which uses Beastlord) as the base of participating players for that difficulty. Each difficulty can be toggled on and off by clicking the name in the legend.

We looked at Siege of Orgrimmar stats in January 2014 and May 2014. You can leave suggestions for future stat posts in the comments!

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Blue Tweets

Flying
Not posting on your site, and only having one response to a player made thread about it was a bad move
Yeah, it's obviously caused a lot of friction that we hadn't anticipated. Clearly a mistake on our part. (CM_Lore)

Q&A
By "legitimate" you mean the ones you are willing to field, probably not the onese most find important.
We will definitely be talking about flight in the Q&A. (CM_Zarhym)

Will you please confirm that flight IS something that will be addressed in this Q and A? Thanks.
We will definitely be talking about flight in the Q&A. (CM_Lore)

Classes
Are there any considerations to lower passive Parry and Dodge again in 6.2?
Certainly if needed. Will look into it. (holinka)

Art
Indeed Zarhym. Wouldn't want those poor underpaid artist to actually do a good job I guess? Really miss the old Blizzard Quality.
It's not at all realistic to design ALL armor to fit ALL char models just in case. But look for any reason to take issue w/ us. (CM_Zarhym)

Misc
Apparently selfie cams were an appropriate use of dev time. Not farahlon though.
So you admit you only count additions to the game YOU care about. This is helpful. (CM_Zarhym)

Ghostcrawler Tweets
While the developers have been pretty quiet since @WarcraftDevs appeared, Ghostcrawler still occasionally talks about WoW. Remember that he no longer works for or speaks for Blizzard.

Developer Communication
What's your view on how silent the WoW devs have been on classes changes since you left?
I'm obviously not privy to their thought process. Do remember there is a difference between individual intent and company policy. (OccupyGStreet)

Yeah Just seems like a lot of "we want feedback" *gets feedback* "lol jk we wont do that"
That is something I have worked on articulating my whole career. We want your feedback but we still design the game. (OccupyGStreet)

Understand and respect your customers/players should be important to devs.
I think it almost always is. Players sometime mistake disagreement for neglect. (OccupyGStreet)

Greg, always wandered if Activision and Cata where the breaking points when the Buddy GC had to stop to chat in the boards.
It became Blizzard policy, but it wasn't from Activision. Not sure what the policy is now of course. (OccupyGStreet)

Reputations
Hey greg what do you think about reputations in wow being as dumbed down as it is now with little to no useful rewards
I'm afraid I'm not familiar enough with the content. Reps were always challenging to strike a balance between fun & mandatory (OccupyGStreet)
As I like to say, it's really hard to make fun and rewarding content feel optional. (OccupyGStreet)

Computers - Setup of the Month
Each month or so we will post a couple of hardware setups for those of you who are thinking of upgrading their computer!

This month
The current SSD prices are trending slightly downward again over the past few months, with most SSDs under $0.50 per gigabyte when on sale.

New GPUs from AMD may be coming in the second half of this year, but no official announcements have been made.

Depending on how much you want to overclock, you may need to spend a bit more for a better CPU cooler like the NH-D14.

Unless you are doing a lot of video rendering or streaming, you do not need the 4790K and should spend that money elsewhere.

Make sure to keep your AMD and Nvidia drivers up to date.

Don't hesitate to post any feedback in the comments of that news post, and don't forget to visit the Computer Forum for any extra questions!

Peripherals/Monitors

Component	Puppy	Dolphin
Monitor	ASUS VS228H-P 22-Inch Monitor - $117	ASUS VS248H-P 24-Inch Monitor - $155
Keyboard	Kensington Pro Fit Media Keyboard - $22	Cyborg V.5 - $45
Mouse	Logitech G402 - $41	Razer DeathAdder - $55
Speakers	Creative A250 2.1 Speaker System - $27	Logitech Z313 Speaker System - $35
Component	Narwhal	Unicorn
Monitor	Dell P2414H Monitor - $235	Dell U2412M - $250
Keyboard	Logitech G510s - $85	Corsair Vengeance K70 - $120
Mouse	Logitech G502 - $61	Razer Naga 2014 - $62
Speakers	Logitech Z323 2.1 Speaker System - $55	Logitech Speaker System Z523 - $85

Puppy and Dolphin
All of these parts can be mixed and matched to create a build between Puppy and Dolphin.

Component	Puppy	Dolphin
Case	NZXT Source 210 - $48	NZXT Source 210 - $48
Power Supply	EVGA 600B - $60	EVGA 600B - $60
CPU	AMD FX-6300 - $97	AMD FX-8320 - $136
Heatsink	Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - $31	Cooler Master Hyper 212 EVO - $31
Motherboard	ASUS M5A97 R2.0 - $68	ASUS M5A99FX PRO - $103
Memory	Kingston HyperX Blue 4GB 1600 - $31	8GB G.Skill DDR3 1600 - $66
Graphics Card	MSI R7 260X - $110	ASUS R9 270X / GTX 960 - $160 / $190
Hard Drive	Western Digital Caviar Blue 500GB - $57	Western Digital Caviar Black 1TB - $70
DVD	Asus 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $21	Asus 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $21
Total	$523	$695 - 725

Narwhal and Unicorn
All of these parts can be mixed and matched to create a build between Narwhal and Unicorn.

Component	Narwhal	Unicorn
Case	Cooler Master HAF 912 - $70	Corsair Air 540 - $120
Power Supply	XFX PRO 750W - $114	XFX PRO 750W - $114
CPU	Intel 4690K - $236	Intel 4690K - $236
Heatsink	Scythe Mugen 4 - $52	Noctua 6 NH-D14 - $78
Motherboard	ASUS Z97-A - $153	ASUS Z97-A - $153
Memory	8GB G.Skill DDR3 1600 - $66	16GB G.Skill DDR3 1600 - $110
Graphics Card	XFX R9 280X - $260	XFX R9 290X OR ASUS GTX 970 - $330
Hard Drive	Western Digital 1TB Caviar Black - $70	Western Digital 2TB Caviar Black - $125
SSD	Crucial BX100 250GB (Review) - $97 OR SAMSUNG 850 EVO 250GB (Review) - $100	SanDisk Extreme PRO 240GB (Review) - $140 OR SAMSUNG 850 Pro 256GB (Review) - $143
DVD	Asus 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $21	Asus 24X SATA DVD+/-RW - $21
Total	$1139 - 1185	$1384 - 1430

Overwatch - Symmetra Gameplay
We got another look at Overwatch gameplay with the release of some Symmetra footage.

[moveth]

Symmetra seems pretty great. Im excited as hot damn for Overwatch.

#FreeMoveth2015

[A Chozo]

Damn they really threw ol' Zarhym on the defense line this time :X and he's doing.... poorly. I mean, "So you admit you only count additions to the game YOU care about. This is helpful.", Faharlon > Selfies, because this is a MMO-RPG, not a community chat to exibit your latest photo -_- Both are welcome, but Fahralon would've been better. And I'm aware they'r not done by the same crew of developers, but still-

[Marais]

Is funny how Ghostcrawler , who doesn't work for Blizzard anymore, is more communicative about WoW than current devs.

[Krazzorx]

Completion % near identical over same period of time in SoO vs BRF

[Karadros]

Is funny how Ghostcrawler , who doesn't work for Blizzard anymore, is more communicative about WoW than current devs.

Probably because Blizzard can't tell him to be quiet.

[Eliandal]

Probably because Blizzard can't tell him to be quiet.

...And yet, he never rises to the bait, and still answers as he always did - although now he prefaces with he has no current knowedge. I really love how people try almost desperately to get him to badmouth the game and the company !

[Osmeric]

Notice the dropoff in % from N to H is much smaller than from H to M. Either H is too easy or N (or M) is too difficult.

[Buu]

Misc
Apparently selfie cams were an appropriate use of dev time. Not farahlon though.
So you admit you only count additions to the game YOU care about. This is helpful. (CM_Zarhym)

Wait, WHAT!!??? Blizzard finally admit they want us to compromise to THEIR VISION? We should care and want for the game what THEY define we should?
Are we DRONES?
NOOOO.... The costumer is right in caring and wanting whatever they feel. And it's the role of the company to attend to or lose the customer.

[Kazuchika]

"It's not at all realistic to design ALL armor to fit ALL char models just in case. But look for any reason to take issue w/ us."

Yeah because you guys have done such a bang up job with this entire expansion that everyone should just sing your praises right? Give me a fucking break.

[Krazzorx]

Notice the dropoff in % from N to H is much smaller than from H to M. Either H is too easy or N (or M) is too difficult.

Its not normal being too hard as the completion % line up with SoO January.

Mythic completion % is extremely hard to measure because of the large variety of order people do those bosses in.

[MrExcelion]

Glory of the Draenor Raider - the true final boss

[Bubblykiss]

It's interesting to see that blizz is still awake.

[Buu]

Is funny how Ghostcrawler , who doesn't work for Blizzard anymore, is more communicative about WoW than current devs.

He ALWAYS was. Blizzard decided to put a gag in their developers starting Cata. I remember how they could come to the boards in WotLK, and talk as an equal to Theorycrafters.
In MoP, Greg TRIED to push the communication line with the developer watercooler. Didn't work, and since he was the most visible developer, everything was blamed on him.
He is more communicative now, because he is that way, and is not being silenced.

[Krazzorx]

Glory of the Draenor Raider - the true final boss

Lol, ashes, ashes is an awful achieve. (Albeit extremely few do these achieves anyways. Which is why they changed it up in SoO so you didn't have to drag unwilling guildies around)

[Bathory]

Can't wait to see people lose their collective shit with this QnA. They can shit on a dev in the worst way but if there's even a hint of snark directed at them they'll start crying.

[Cthulhu 2020]

Damn they really threw ol' Zarhym on the defense line this time :X and he's doing.... poorly. I mean, "So you admit you only count additions to the game YOU care about. This is helpful.", Faharlon > Selfies, because this is a MMO-RPG, not a community chat to exibit your latest photo -_- Both are welcome, but Fahralon would've been better. And I'm aware they'r not done by the same crew of developers, but still-

His sarcasm is backed up by the fact that the selfie cam took an incredibly small amount of developer resources where farahlon, a whole zone, would pretty much be the entire team and a lot of work.

This is v2.0 of "Oh my god I can't believe we sacrificed a raid tier for this mount".

[Shudder]

LOL down to 2.1 million western accounts. Nice.

[Bogrim]

This expansion is becoming a signature of poor communication and subscriber drops. At this rate, it won't be remembered as "the expansion that brought WoW back" but as "the expansion where WoW lost tons of subs and also decided to kill flying in an interview." Blizzard needs to be much more forthcoming and stop leaning back on their arrogance, such as "the subs will come back for new content" and "only we know what's best for the game." Wasting development on the "selfie cam" is a completely valid criticism when your players are starved for content, and the attitude to simply not care for keeping subscribers but just wait until you release the next expansion is the attitude of a defeatist.

It was never hard to win back their players. All they have to do is make content at a more regular phase. For some reason they seem to imply that's not possible. How is not possible? Have they even explored the possibility of releasing patches more frequently? People wouldn't be complaining in the first place if they weren't stuck in their garrison whenever there's nothing to raid.

[ChaosWolf]

LOL down to 2.1 million western accounts. Nice.

That's not what that number means at all. Blizzard is not down to 2.1 million, you dolt. 2.1 million was the sample-size used.