Posts with tag honor

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.

Why yes, that is the most disgusting whale you've ever seen. Unless, of course, you've witnessed local authorities taking dynamite to a beached whale to get it out of the way since they couldn't move it just by pushing the thing. That is disgusting. Whale guts landing on cars a mile away? No thanks. I'll take the guy pictured above over that.

Moonkinmaniac asked...

"On the WoW calendar there's an undead whale picture. What the heck is it? Is it a rejected project for the current expansion or possibly one for Cataclysm?"

What happens when Harvest Festival and Brewfest collide? The It came from the Blog Epic Harvest Brewfestival Ride! On Saturday, those of us who are level 40 and above are going to dress up our Epic Mounts as Brewfest Kodos and ride to Honor a Hero in Ashenvale.

• When: 4:30pm EDT (1:30pm PDT, 2:30pm Server Time) Saturday, October 3rd
• Where: Meet in front of Orgrimmar on Zangarmarsh (U.S.)
• Who: Any Horde character with an Epic Mount
  
• How: Send a tell to Robinella or any It came from the Blog Lurker to join the guild

We will be earning enough tokens in Brewfest to obtain the ability to transform our mounts and then riding to honor Grom Hellscream. We will then return to Javnir Nashak and complete the one Harvest Festival quest (there is no Achievement). If you do not have a high enough level character on Zangarmarsh to participate, there is still plenty of time to make a Death Knight and complete the starter quests.

If you have any questions about It came from the Blog, please read our FAQ.

We hope you'll join us for the Epic Harvest Brewfestival Ride!

We've gotten a bunch of tips recently that claim some very e-famous PvPers are botting in BGs. If you aren't familiar with the term "botting," Dictionary.com provides us with the following definitions of bot:

1. Bot:
   –noun
   the larva of a botfly.
2. Bot:
   –noun (Australian Slang)
   a person who cadges; scrounger.
3. Bot:
   –noun
   a device or piece of software that can execute commands, reply to messages, or perform routine tasks, as online searches, either automatically or with minimal human intervention (often used in combination): intelligent infobots; shopping bots that help consumers find the best prices.

One of the most widely-cheered announcements during the Game Systems panel was the introduction of rated battlegrounds and the reappearance of old PvP titles from the now-defunct ranking system. It's a question we've seen asked a lot -- plenty of people out there aren't fond of arena but love battlegrounds, and many of them chafed under the inability to get up-to-date PvP gear. It looks like Blizzard will be trying to reward better battleground play without punishing people who have the bad luck to land on an indifferent PuG. Here's what we know so far:

• Whichever battleground is currently on its holiday weekend will also be a rated battleground for that week.
• Battleground wins will award both rating and arena points. Battleground losses won't punish you with a ratings loss, but also won't award any points. I would assume that you can continue to accrue honor and a single BG token per loss. Points earned will be capped at a certain number (not yet known) per week to keep rated battlegrounds from feeling too "grindy."
  
• Your battleground ratings will, like the current arena system, encompass two ratings: a personal and a match-making rating.
• Old PvP rankings will make their reappearance as end-of-season titles (e.g., "Scout," "Commander," "Centurion"). No word yet on whether these are permanent or if, like the non-Gladiator arena titles, you have to earn them each season to continue displaying them.
• "Special epic ground mounts" will be made available to people playing the rated battlegrounds.
• Rated battleground wins will also contribute to the new guild talent system.

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BlizzCon 2009 is here! WoW.com has continuing coverage, bringing you the latest in Cataclysm news, live blogs, galleries, and reports right from the convention floor. Check out WoW.com's Guide to BlizzCon for the latest!

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So patch 3.2 will be bringing some pretty significant changes to PvP Battlegrounds to say the least. Not only will Wintergrasp be morphing into a weird quasi-battleground with queue, but Warsong Gulch is getting a time limit, Eye of the Storm and Arathi's resource goal is being slashed, and we're getting a whole new battleground in the Isle of Conquest. In short, we're going to have some soul searching to do while we decide where to get our non-arena organized PvP fix on.

We're running late on this one (the beginning of the month was quite busy), but it's not any less exciting: congratulations go out to our latest Guild of the Month for May: the Dragon Knights on Area 52. They sent us a nomination along with many other guilds in the game, and were selected for their originality, community, and raiding performance. Among other interesting things about the guild (which you can read in the second half of this post), they run a guild podcast, an email newsletter, and even a lotto, all along with raiding competitively and leveling up as a guild.

In addition to being profiled here on the site, the Dragon Knights will also win a raid pack from Swagdog.com, where they (and you) can pick up customized shirts and hats with their guild name and logo printed on them. Our Guild of the Month contest is ongoing, so stay tuned to the site for the next chance to nominate your guild to be recognized here on WoW.com. Read on to learn more about the Dragon Knights and why they're our winners for May.

One thread over at the forums sparked quite a discussion when it asked what the problem was with World of Warcraft PvP. It's a pretty good question and definitely not something with a simple answer, but Ghostcrawler took up the task and addressed several issues in his usual forthcoming fashion. In a nutshell, Blizzard views the following issues as the primary problems of PvP:

• Too much emphasis on Arenas and not enough on Battlegrounds.
• Too much emphasis on 2s and not enough on 3s and 5s.
• Not enough class / spec representation in Arena. Warlock, hunter and shaman numbers in particular are too low, but they're not the only ones.
• Too fast-paced.
  

Ghostcrawler proceeded to explain the last point in detail, talking once again about burst damage and reiterating their intent that PvP should be a balance between damage, healing, and crowd control. He says that Blizzard plans to "add an extra GCD or two" in the small window where a player can either be healed to full or fall to enemy fire, allowing players to better use their full toolbox. Anyone who has ever played Arenas should know that that's a pretty tall order.

Vaneras has just released the details for the Isle of Conquest, the new battleground that will be appearing in Patch 3.2, Call of the Crusade.

You can read the complete details over on the official forums or check 'em out after the break. There are some key things that everyone should be aware of:

• IoC will be a 40-man battleground. Yes, you read that right. This is the first 40-man content released since Naxx 1.0. That is going to make some old school players very, very happy. I know I'm already giddy with excitement.
• There will be significant use of siege and vehicle combat. This includes going on The Airship Hanger and using parachutes to drop teams onto the enemy keep from above.
• You will need to kill a general held up in the enemy keep, much like Alterac Valley.
• Reinforcements will be used. Capture resources to boost your strength.

This looks like an amazing new battleground, and one that I'm sure many of us cannot wait to try out on the PTR. There has been a ton of new information about Patch 3.2 released in the last few days, so it looks like PTR might be soonish. Keep your fingers crossed.

The complete statement on the new Isle of Conquest after the break!

Lots of good questions this week, and like yesterday's Queue, we have a full set of them today as well.

Boreddruid asked...

"Is there any particular time that my guild should start 10-man Ulduar hard modes?"

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

Good afternoon, WoW Insider! I'm feeling pretty good today, how about you? Why am I feeling so good? The idea of the PTR potentially going up in the next couple of days is giving me a bit of a rush. Seeing all of the new stuff is one of the big things that excites me about MMOs, and of course passing that info on to you guys. Let's hope it goes up sometime soon, because it will rule.

Firestride asked...

What should I do if I get into an AV raid that is intent on zerging, and going up against an opponent who is also zerging, only better at it?

It's the Arathi Basin Call to Arms holiday once again, and The OverAchiever is here to help guide you through the Master of Arathi Basin Achievement, which is required for the Battlemaster meta-Achievement. You should be playing quite a bit of Arathi Basin this weekend considering it's one of the most fun and balanced Battlegrounds, so why not grab some Achievements while you're at it? Speaking of Achievements, one of the requirements for I Pitied the Fool is to hop into Arathi Basin and visit the Blacksmith, so head over to a Battlemaster and queue up!

Arathi Basin Veteran
Win 100 games. Like all the Veteran Achievements, this is just a matter of time. The hardest part is slogging through all the losing games.
Difficulty: Moderate

Arathi Basin Perfection
Win 2000 to 0. In the one hundred games you're supposed to win with the previous Achievement, you're quite certain to have one of these. However, if you want a little strategy thrown in, the best tactic would be to send teams of five to the Lumber Mill, Blacksmith, and Mine, with one to tag the node nearest your spawn point and any team that finds no resistance to head straight to the Farm or Stables. Essentially, the idea is to prevent any flag from being captured, as all it takes is ten seconds for it to tick for 10. Because it takes ten seconds to tag a flag, that's ten seconds too late.
Difficulty: Moderate

Me and the Cappin' Makin' it Happen
Take 50 flags. This is easy, and again just a matter of time. It's quite possible to have a lot of flag tags in one game -- you're not required to capture the flag you've tagged for it to count for the Achievement. In a worst case scenario, simply be the first to take the nearest node (Farm or Stables) in fifty games.
Difficulty: Easy

Blizzard poster Slorkuz gave a lot of effort in a post made the other day discussing Warsong Gulch, one of the game's first Battlegrounds. In a long post, he details his experiences with common tactics such as flag room defense, 10-man offense, half and half (5 on offense and 5 on defense), and the most common tactic that all players are familiar with -- the "kill anything on sight" strategy.

It's a rather hefty post and should help a lot of players decide on what tactic to employ when running WSG premades (as you can't obviously expect PUG groups to follow any real strategy with coordination). Slorkuz explains that Warsong Gulch is a Battleground where team composition is critical, something that holds true here more than other Battlegrounds (or as in the case of Alterac Valley, not true at all). With such a small team, having no form of crowd control or healing can and usually ends in a loss.

Honor is currently capped at 75,000, a legacy from The Burning Crusade when the most expensive Honor item was a little over half that number. There's a sensible rationale behind the Honor cap, which is in place to curb stockpiling of the currency for future, unreleased rewards. Honor as a currency, unlike badges or emblems, is the same across the board. Players can start accumulating Honor starting at Level 1, while players must be Level 70 to obtain Badges of Justice or Level 80 to collect Emblems of Heroism, Valor, and in Patch 3.1, Conquest.

This works to prevent players from purchasing on-level epics as soon as or even before they ding 80. At most a player can purchase one or two pieces before using up his or her Honor. Emblems work in reverse. It's impossible to obtain emblems below the appropriate level, but there is no upper limit to the number of emblems you can store. Unlike badge gear from The Burning Crusade, where higher tier items for more badges were made available later in the expansion, Blizzard has created different tiers of gear for different emblems. This means it's unlikely that there will be new items available for Emblems of Heroism or Valor.

This means you won't progress gearwise just doing the same thing over and over. In order to get better gear, players will need to raid. In contrast, because Honor is the single currency a singular currency across all levels for PvP gear, Blizzard is constrained as to how to limit accessibility to better gear. They do this by putting a ratings requirement on the best PvP items, requiring successful participation in Arena play. Arenas are to PvP are what raids are to PvE. It's not a perfect system, but it will do for now. But what happens when players reach the Honor cap and have every item they need or want?

This is long overdue, but with the Strand of the Ancients weekend upon us, it's a fine time to take a look at the Battleground introduced to us in Wrath of the Lich King. Strand of the Ancients is presumably located off the Southern coast of Dragonblight, and works differently than any other Battleground before it. It is the first timed Battleground and guarantees that the game will end in about twenty minutes or less.

The 15-player Battleground has an attack and defend scenario, where the objective is to capture the Titan Relic housed inside a keep at the southern end of the map. It is very similar to Wintergrasp, and is a fast-paced Battleground where players literally race against time. Attackers, split into two groups, arrive on two boats on the Northeast and Northwest portions of the map. When they land on the beach, four siege vehicles are initially available to attackers, who must break down gates to get to their goal.

These siege vehicles are identical to the demolishers found in Wintergrasp, with about 80,000 hp and the same offensive capabilites. Players on foot can pick up Massive Seaforium Charges in Seaforium Barrels throughout the map. These explosives can be placed near gates to deal damage to them. Players on defense, meanwhile, can man cannons that flank each gate. These cannons have 60,000 hp and have very long range.

Kalgan hopped on over to the forums to make a significant post that previews what can happen in Arena Season 6, the tiers of gear available, and what will happen to the Vault of Archavon. One of my fears going into the next Arena Season was that Archavon the Stone Watcher would lose his relevance, as he drops significantly lower tier gear a full season behind the current one. This would have greatly devalued control of Wintergrasp.

However, Kalgan reveals that a new boss in another wing of the Vault of Archavon will drop the Furious Gladiator pieces. He makes no mention of past season's gear, and says that the new boss' loot table will be structured slightly differently drom Archavon's. This could mean that the 10-man version can drop the Honor-bought non-set pieces rather than a lower tier of Arena gear and notes that the boss will not drop the chest piece. In the same post, he pegs the chest piece at a 1750 rating requirement, which should probably indicate that the boss will not drop items with a higher requirement (head, shoulder, weapon, etc.). This is an important announcement that ensures the relevance of Wintergrasp. The boss is also expected to drop Tier 8 pieces, making it equally appealing to PvE players.