Posts with tag ghostcrawler

Tanking hotfixes being implemented

by Matthew Rossi Feb 5th 2010 at 12:08AM

A recent hotfix has reduced the health on tanking paladins. Meanwhile, devastate is being hotfixed as well to do 20% more total damage rather than 20% more weapon damage (from 100% to 120% total weapon damage presently). There are also some scattered reports that DK tanks have gotten buffs to their Frost Presence as well, but no confirmation from Blizzard on that yet. Ghostcrawler posted that the change to Paladin health was intentional and that an announcement will be soon, and in the warrior thread said that they can't confirm when the hotfix for devastate will drop.

The culprit for the paladin health reduction seems to be the paladin talent Sacred Duty, although this has, at this time, not been confirmed by Blizzard so far as I can find. As soon as there's an announcement we at WoW.com will of course bring it to you.

Edited to include this link to the official forum post explaining the change. Thanks to ummeiko for the fast catch.

Filed under: Paladin, Warrior, Analysis / Opinion, News items, Death Knight

Daelo and Ghostcrawler discuss the Lich King

by Eliah Hecht Feb 3rd 2010 at 8:00PM

The latest edition of Blizzard Insider, Blizzard's very sporadic email newsletter (and no relation to our old name, WoW Insider) has been released. Issue 32 features a note that the Starcraft II: WIngs of Liberty site has been revamped, blurbs about the mobile Authenticator and the Armory app, and some calls to buy their merchandise.

More interesting for WoW fans, though, is an interview with Scott Mercer (Daelo), WoW's lead encounter designer, and Greg Street (Ghostcrawler), a crab who needs no introduction. They discussed the arc of Arthas and the Lich King from Warcraft II through World of Warcraft (congratulations again to Blood Legion on their 10-man world-first).

Please note that here there be spoilers for some details about the Arthas fight, so stay away if you want it all to be a surprise.

Filed under: Interviews, Wrath of the Lich King, Cataclysm

Ghostcrawler on DKs: "It is a melee class"

by Matthew Rossi Jan 29th 2010 at 6:00PM

No, it's not just a case of the obvious being stated. In a discussion of DK design in arenas, Dr. Street comments to clarify the intended role of death knights in arena and other factors. He also makes a good point about the forums in general that bears repeating for emphasis.

"We don't intend for these forums to be the primary way the team communicates our vision for the game and upcoming changes to the community. You'll get a little of that on a few select subjects through the forums and sadly that's all you're ever going to get. It's not that we don't care. It's that forums are not a great medium for that kind of mass communication. I wish sometimes you guys could be satisfied with the fact that we used to not communicate at all and now are able to communicate a little."

Moving on to the specific issue at hand in this thread, the discussion is the old shadow/frost spec that turned the death knight into a much more ranged caster, generating runic power quickly and then converting that runic power into Death Coils at range. It wasn't intended for the class. They have no problem with Death Coil itself being a popular attack, as long as the death knight has to put an effort into staying in melee with its attendant disadvantages to do so.

"The DK that runs around and does nothing but Icy Touch or Howling Blast or Death Coil feels like a rogue who forgoes combo points and openers and everything just to spam Fan of Knives and nothing else."

It's interesting to see players managing to find ways to bend the class out of the original design intent and how Blizzard responds to that: specs like shadow/frost or diseaseless blood DPS were adjusted quickly to put the class back to where Blizzard intended it.

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Blizzard, News items, PvP, Death Knight

Ghostcrawler on Cataclysm's talent tree philosophy, abilities, and Ragnaros

by Adam Holisky Jan 28th 2010 at 8:30PM

Ghostcrawler posted a bit this evening on the philosophical direction Blizzard is taking in Cataclysm in three important areas:

Talent trees
New spells and abilities
Recycled raid content

The discussion originated from a mild QQ post about what the poster felt were the flaws in Cataclysm, and Ghostcrawler took that opportunity to clarify a few things that the community has been talking about since the initial announcement at BlizzCon 2009. Chief amongst those is that they are specifically designing talent trees now with an intention for there to be 5 to 10 talent points that can be spent where the player wants -- and that talent guides like you find in WoW.com's class columns will only go so far in the selection of the idea talent tree; the rest of the talent selection will be left up to the individual user.

Of course, this information isn't exactly new per se, but it's interesting to hear some of the refinements of it all as Cataclysm's development progresses.

Ghostcrawler's full statement after the break.

Filed under: News items, Cataclysm

Second Twitter developer chat on January 15th

by Alex Ziebart Jan 13th 2010 at 8:00PM

Bornakk hit the forums this evening to announce the second Twitter Developer Chat. It will take place Friday, January 15th at 5:00 PM PST. Like last time, questions will be taken via Twitter and answered on the forums. Senior game producer J. Allen Brack and lead systems designer Greg "Ghostcrawler" Street will be the ones answering your questions. Instructions on how to submit questions and all of that sort of thing can be found over in the forum thread.

The focus of this Q&A will be patch 3.3, Fall of the Lich King, so don't expect to hear any grand Cataclysm news in this chat. I'm actually very curious if we'll learn anything at all, considering the focus on current content rather than future content. It might be a good chance to get some insight into the development process, rather than trying to squeeze strategy tips out of the devs.

Filed under: Events, Blizzard, Wrath of the Lich King

Upcoming class and item balance changes

by Adam Holisky Jan 7th 2010 at 8:17PM

There has been a lot of good discussion lately concerning various aspects of the DPS status quo. Some classes are putting out too much compared to their cloth counterparts, and others have suddenly found themselves too powerful in certain areas of the game. Blizzard recognizes this, and this evening the Lead System Designer, Ghostcrawler, came out and enumerated a few things Blizzard believes are true.

Ghostcrawler has left the door open to these class and item balance issues being fixed (if Blizzard decides to pursue such fixes) in either a hotfix or through an upcoming patch. Chief among these changes are an increase in warlock DPS, a decrease in rogue DPS, a change in protection warriors to limit their utility in PvP, and refinements to Icecrown Citadel weapon procs.

When looking over this laundry list of areas to change, it's important to remember that Ghostcrawler is not promising a fix, and that he and his team are not ready to share specifics. He has not promised you the pony, so don't be mad if some of these changes don't happen.

Ghostcrawler's full statement after the break.

Filed under: Patches, News items

Are Bloodlust/Heroism drums incoming?

by Matthew Rossi Jan 6th 2010 at 2:00PM

If you're a shaman you're familiar with the "grar grar grar grar" sound of Bloodlust or the "ktang!" of Heroism, its Alliance counterpart. For a long time one of the complaints has been that you absolutely had to have a shaman along in order to gain access to this buff. Even when leatherworking drums and inscription scrolls were created for lesser versions of buffs like Blessing of Kings and Prayer of Fortitude, Bloodlust/Heroism were still a unique buff to the shaman class.

Is that going to change? A discussion on the forums leads to Ghostcrawler revealing that yes, they are considering allowing Bloodlust/Heroism be a buff one can gain through an item. Now, I'm torn. On the one hand, NO! Keep your filthy crafter fingers off of my precious! My precious! I'll kill you! I'll kill all of you! But on the other hand, it really isn't fair at this point that Bloodlust/Heroism is pretty much the only buff we can't get a lesser version of through crafted items. A 25% speed increase for 30 seconds (or even 35) would be weak enough in comparison to real Bloodlust that you wouldn't have to worry terribly about being replaced by a drum kit. I suppose. Man, I don't want you to have my Heroism. Like I said, I'm torn.

So what do you think oh why am I even asking we all know you want my precious. My precious!

Filed under: Shaman, Leatherworking, Analysis / Opinion, Classes, Inscription

Blood Pact: 2009 through the Eye of Kilrogg

by Dominic Hobbs Dec 28th 2009 at 9:00AM

Blood Pact is your weekly warlock digest brought to you by Dominic Hobbs. "The avarice never ends! 'I want golf clubs. I want diamonds. I want a pony so I can ride it twice, get bored and sell it to make glue.' Look, I don't wanna make waves, but this whole Christmas season is stupid, stupid, stupid!" ~ The Grinch

Hmmm... a look back at changes for warlocks in 2009. Well there was... no, wait, that was 2008. Well what about... nah, that's planned for Cataclysm. Wow, this is harder than I thought. Nothing particularly outstanding has happened in the warlock area this year; but so much has happened and, well things have changed. It's like waking up each morning and something is subtly different. Your blue toothbrush is now red... The sofa is now against this wall, not that one... each change is pretty unremarkable in it's own right but by the end of the year you are a stuntman living in LA married to a small, blond Portuguese skier who when she's not training does abstract painting, practices yoga and brews her own beer.

As we surfaced, bleary-eyed into January our memories of sacrificing succubus and SL/SL were fading faster than those of December 31st. Those heady days of power that also led to FotM wannabes flooding our ranks. Skill and complexity had been leaking out of the class for a while and Naxx wasn't really providing any of us with much of a worthwhile proving ground. Affliction spell rotations were causing carpal-tunnel injuries on those who were determined to take the cold-turkey approach to dropping their addiction to Shadow Bolt spam. Fans of demonology were taking felguards like some sort of methadone for simplistic raiding, meanwhile retaining the use of their fingers.

Filed under: Warlock, Analysis / Opinion, Classes, (Warlock) Blood Pact, Cataclysm

Healing's evolution in Cataclysm

by Allison Robert Dec 23rd 2009 at 2:00PM

Ghostcrawler, when not directly occupied with the pack of idiots harassing him on the Damage Dealing forums, stopped by the Healing forums this past month to share some information on how healing is likely to change in Cataclysm. Of particular interest is Blizzard's changing design philosophy with respect to what makes healing challenging. Right now tank avoidance is so high that, as GC's previously observed, bosses have to hit like a freight train in order to pose any threat to tank survivability at all. Between that and what's universally acknowledged as the "never running OOM" ethos of Wrath, the unfortunate effect has been healers spamming their largest heals on anyone within range.

The model that Blizzard's looking to move towards is getting a test run of sorts in Icecrown Citadel -- lower tank avoidance, bosses hitting for more reasonable amounts, and -- in Cataclysm -- higher health overall. In other words, we'll be healing for roughly the same amount we're healing now through less damage that nonetheless occurs more frequently. This will lead to a greater risk of running OOM as the encounter progresses if you dump a ton of mana on damage that should have been healed more efficiently. Even now, there are encounters like hard-mode Vezax where you do have to do this, which I thought made for a pretty interesting fight.

Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Priest, Shaman, Analysis / Opinion, Raiding, Forums

The Queue: Wherein we are aghast

by Alex Ziebart Dec 22nd 2009 at 5:00PM

Welcome back to The Queue, WoW.com's daily Q&A column where the WoW.com team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today.

Oh ho, what is this? Another edition of The Queue, approximately one day after the one before it? How unexpected! Who knew that daily features could be so... daily? I, for one, am shocked. And perhaps a little appalled.

Tori asked...

"What do you think will happen with the Undead after the Lich King is defeated? I realize for gameplay purposes they won't suddenly disappear from the Horde, but from a lore view Sylvanas' entire grudge against Arthas was most of the reason for using the Horde as a means to her end.

Plus after all the Wrath Gate drama... it just seems as though the Forsaken should almost be their own faction or something."

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Add-Ons, Wrath of the Lich King, The Queue

Why you don't have freedom of speech in WoW

by Adam Holisky Dec 14th 2009 at 8:00PM

Freedom of speech is one of the most often quoted rights by gamers and people online, yet it is sadly one of the most misunderstood. This right comes about regularly when people are discussing forum bans, moderation, and people like Ghostcrawler telling folks they need to behave. People think that just because they live in a democracy or free society that they have an innate right to do and say whatever they want wherever they want.

Nothing could be further from the truth.

In a private forum, such as the official World of Warcraft forums, or on a site like WoW.com, you don't have any inherent right to do anything. The people running the site or designing the game sets the rules, and that's that. If Blizzard says all communication must end with "Ni!" or you're banned from their forums, then that's the rule you must follow. It's their property and their choice to do that.

If we say every comment must make fun of gnomes or the commenter will be banned, then that's the rule you must follow. It's our website.

Freedom of speech has absolutely no bearing within a private organization. When you accept WoW's Terms of Service or use a website like WoW.com, you agree to abide by the organization's rules. If you don't follow those rules, or if someone in the organization just wakes up on the wrong side of the bed that day, you can be prohibited from returning to the forums or playing the game.

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Forums

[1.Local]: Do it for the e-peen Sunday

by Lisa Poisso Dec 13th 2009 at 2:00PM

Reader comments -- ahh, yes, the juicy goodness following a meaty post. [1.Local] ducks past the swinging doors to see what readers have been chatting about in the back room over the past week.

The hot topic at [1.Local]'s press time was an opinion piece from Adam Holisky mulling over the unfortunate high profile of inappropriate posts from disgruntled players on the Blizzard forums. "While it's obvious that trollish parts of the community value and participating in internet yelling matches, the majority of the community does not care to hear it," writes Adam. "We bring this issue up and to the forefront on popular WoW media because it's imperative for the health of the community that this vocal minority does not control or continue to influence the quiet majority."

Urnias: Adam H. is exactly right. Forum posts like the one referenced are why I stopped trying to garner any useful information from that source. I got tired and angry of having to wade through 1) e-peen, 2) flame wars, 3) players who do zero research and 4) those who feel their drop in the bucket to Blizzard's coffers entitles them to dictate game direction and others' play styles.

Please shut up and just play the game. If you're that pissed off, quit. When Blizzard sees the thousands upon thousands of accounts leaving to play Star Trek or Warhammer, they will make the changes you need to feel better and they will beg you to come back.

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Fan stuff, Features, Humor, [1.Local]

How the WoW community is about to push the self-destruct button

by Adam Holisky Dec 12th 2009 at 10:50PM

This post is going to be very meta in some regards, and it's going to touch on a few things that deal with the WoW community's very existence. We've written this article in hopes that it might help calm the waters, or at least bring some will on the part of the multitudes of individuals not to jump on the wrong bandwagon.

If you've been paying attention to the role forums and the "Ghostcrawler drama" this past week, you know what I'm talking about. If not, we'll begin with a brief rundown.

The Inherency of the Status Quo

WoW is designed and run by a team of people, with a handful of "leads" in position to direct the design of the game. These people, such as Ghostcrawler, are at the top of the ladder in terms of game development. They are the conglomerate of the entire design and development teams underneath them.

Ghostcrawler, and in the past a few people like him, post on the role forums daily in an effort to establish a dialogue with the community over some, but not all, game design principals.

The community, as expected, is more than happy to talk with Ghostcrawler and the rest of Blizzard.

The Harm of the Vocal Minority

Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Virtual selves, Blizzard

Hotfixes incoming for some DPS and tanks, not hunters or priests

by Mike Schramm Dec 11th 2009 at 5:00PM

Ghostcrawler has dropped information on the forums about a few incoming hotfixes to patch 3.3. The first three changes are posted over on the DPS role forum:

Hunger for Blood will increase damage by 10% instead of 15%. Assassination rogues needed damage, but they got too much, and this will bring them back. Sorry rogues -- the tooltip, we're also told, might not change right away.
Scourge Strike will crit only once, not on the shadow portion of the damage. "This change just proved to be too bursty in PvP and provide too much sustained damage in raids." He also gives lots more explanation of the change on the forums -- this one will be discussed quite a bit.
Rolling Corruptions will no longer use the initial haste value indefinitely. More of a bugfix than a change, says GC -- the haste value should drop out to normal after a few ticks of the spell.

Elsewhere, GC says that there are no changes planned for the new hunter epic ammo, so find a friendly engineer and stick to them like glue. There is a hotfix incoming for the bug that causes tanked mobs to move around randomly -- thank goodness on that. And SW: Pain's immunity from the haste change for shadow priests will probably stay right where it is.

Filed under: Priest, Rogue, Warlock, Death Knight, Wrath of the Lich King

Ghostcrawler on big heals and health in Cataclysm

by Mike Schramm Dec 4th 2009 at 9:00AM

Ghostcrawler has spoken up in this thread a little bit about the balance of PvE and PvP play that we'll be seeing in the next expansion. Specifically, he says that they're slowing the pace of PvP play down a little bit: "Health pools will be much larger in Cataclysm and healing will be lower." We'll have more health overall, and healing spells will heal less. That will make a difference in PvE as well -- it'll take more hits for the boss to finish off the tank, so heal size is expected not to matter as much as healing coordination. It won't matter if your tank is up to full health as much as it matters whether or not you can help them survive the next hit.

Obviously, this is very early theory for an expansion that's still in development. But what GC is saying is that Blizzard wants healers to strategize a little bit more about which heals they're using rather than depend on big healing to get the job done. Avoidance will matter, he says, because it'll help conserve healer mana. Fights will be more about strategy than overpowering with big heals.

Cataclysm's endgame is a long time away, but that's Blizzard's idea for it right now.

Filed under: Druid, Paladin, Priest, Shaman, Fan stuff, Odds and ends, Raiding, Battlegrounds, Cataclysm

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