Hello, Gustava here, bringing you an important update straight from the PTR 3.3 test servers. In this patch, Blizzard is introducing their brand new Dungeon Finder System. It will revolutionize the way we PuG in World of Warcraft. Here is the breakdown of the new LFG in the coming patch.

(source)
New Dungeon Finder System In the upcoming content patch there are many new additions and improvements. Perhaps one of the largest changes is the introduction of the new dungeon finder system. This new system will be available for all dungeons. A “Dungeons” button will replace the Looking For Group feature currently available in-game, and provides additional benefits to those who use it.
Join as a Group or Solo
Much like the current Looking For Group system, players will be able to join the dungeon system and choose the role they would like to fill within groups: Healing, DPS, or Tank. In addition, once roles have been identified, they will be applied to all dungeons chosen. Players will now be able to choose multiple dungeons and will no longer be limited to three. The system has also improved group creation and matchmaking capabilities and will create more balanced groups when assessing the selected roles of players. The LFG channel has been disconnected from the dungeon tool and can be used by anyone in a major city,much like the trade channel currently available.
Cross Realm Instances
When joining the dungeon system as a solo player or with a partial group, additional random players can be found within the same Battlegroup via cross-realm instancing. While the new system offers the ability to group with player from other realms within your Battlegroup, you won’t be able to use this to manually invite specific players to groups.
Instance Teleporting
When you use the dungeon tool to find a dungeon, you’ll get ported to the inside of the dungeon, much like the current Battleground system. When you leave the instance, you will be returned to your previous location. If you need to leave temporarily, such asfor repairs or to purchase reagents, you can teleport back to the dungeon again. This feature can be used both by groups looking for other players and by premade groups of five who use the dungeon tool.
Smarter Group Matching
The new system will now work to match at least one experienced player for the assigned dungeon with less experienced players in the group. It will more carefully match class types, and will more consistently match players of equal levels for the dungeon chosen. The interface will also allow players to see how many players are looking for groups as well as the average wait time of groups that the tool has formed.
Daily Random Dungeons
Players or groups can choose specific dungeons or they can instead take their chances with a random Heroic or random normal dungeon. Picking randomly conveys some additional benefits. If you defeat the final boss in a dungeon, you receive 2 Emblems of Frost for Heroic dungeons and 2 Emblems of Triumph for normal dungeons. In addition, after players have received 2 Emblems of Frost for the first Heroic dungeon they do in a day, they will earn 2 Emblems of Triumph for each additional random Heroic
dungeons in that day. These random rewards replace the current daily dungeon and daily Heroic dungeon quests. The current NPCs who offer those quests will offer weekly repeatable raid quests instead. You can also earn level-appropriate rewards for running random pre-Wrath of the Lich King dungeons while you are leveling up.
Lovin’ the PUG
Players who take part in groups with one or more members who have been matched with them randomly from within the dungeon system will receive extra rewards, including the coveted Perky Pug non-combat pet. The more random players you group with, the faster you could get your new pet!
Vote Kick
Players who use the system to find additional random members for their party will be afforded a couple of extra conveniences to help them perform well. The loot option is fixed to the updated Need Before Greed option (and unalterable by any member) and players can vote to remove another party member from the group. It will take four votes in order to remove someone, however, so consider this newfound power carefully.
Looking for Raid
There will be a new option available to players that can be accessed via the raid information screen in the interface or by typing /lfr. Players will also be able to take part in raid-specific weekly quests and will be able to browse the system manually for any other players looking for a raid dungeon group.
Need Before Greed Updated
Need Before Greed will now recognize gear appropriate for a class in three ways: the class must be able to equip the item, pure melee will be unable to roll on spellpower items, and classes are limited to their dominant armor type (for example, plate for paladins). All items will still be available via greed rolls should no member be able to use the item as well as the new disenchant option will be available for all parties.

_________________________________________________________

This move is yet another great idea from Blizzard to update the LFG option.

To try this out, I leveled a toon to level 23 and I wanted to run Shadowfang Keep. Even today, if I wanted to find a group to do that, I would probably still be in the queue  for days. With this new system, I can queue a group for it. This system will pool all the players from your server’s whole battlegroup, much like the current BGs.This would theoretically allow you to find a group to do Occulus at 3 am … if you were so inclined for whatever reason. When your group is complete, you will be prompted to enter the instance, exactly the same way that BGs work now.

The Looking for Raid interface is just as Good as the LFG interface, only better for guilds who don’t have enough to run their  own full 10-man raid or need a few more to fill a 25 man raid. This is also good for people who run VoA, or OS, or Onyxia since most pug it anyway. It works almost the same as LFG works now but with a little more detail. And I am sure it will be a big help with many smaller guilds that don’t raid often at all.

If nothing else it will entice the newer player to actually experience end-game content. This can lead to other issues such as groups ending up with well-geared “n00bs” that don’t know the fights and cause wipes. This is inevitable and WILL occur, hopefully those who are motivated enough to get geared will also learn the fights.

Now, there will be no more daily heroic quests. I’ve seen many people forget to get the quest or loot the boss after we finsh the dungeon. When 3.3 goes live, if you kill the final boss you automatically get your two Frost Emblems and gold, no muss no fuss. I also like how the new Need Before Greed works so ninjas will not be able to loot-steal gear that’s not their armor type or spec type. Blizzard does it again taking a system no-one really uses now and making it better. I have tried it on the PTR and I am quite impressed by how well it works and I think you will too.

Bottom line: we will ALL be using this new and improved LFG/LFR a lot in the near future and we’ll all Dominate even more because of it.

12 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Anyone who’s been playing on-line games for a while will understand where I’m coming from with this and Dominate is no exception. Every guild/group/association goes through this, be it in WoW or even in real life to a certain extent.

If you haven’t guessed it yet this is going to be one of those thought-provoking-life-changing-deep-seeded-realization articles (or some reasonable facsimile )

As we speak Dominate on Fenris is going through it’s 4th iteration (cycle). Some of the players are new some have been here since the beginning and yet others are returning after a hiatus but all share a common goal. Any guild that is to survive this cycle  must have one if nothing else to truly rise from the ashes: a purpose.

The Birth:

Dominate (for those who don’t know yet) is a loose association of like minded individuals that stems from a web site (www.DominateYourServer.com). It all started on the web with Gavin putting up tips from time to time to help anybody get better at WoW. Over time this eventually lead to the creation of guides: Horde Leveling guide, AH Mastery guide. Popular demand is the real reason there is a Dominate guild on Fenris in the first place. When the guild was started everyone had a common goal: Dominate, Raid and Progress through content as a group. And we did through every cycle to varying degrees.

The First steps:

After everyone signed the charter and we had 150 members in the first 2 weeks it was time to see what we can do with all the toons. We all started running heroics and doing the special events in anticipation of the next expansion (Wrath). When the expansion hit it was a good ‘ol fashioned leveling race to 80 through new content with almost no outside help. Wowhead was incomplete, no web site had any real information on anything even the Horde leveling guide had us running to Alliance quest givers on occasion. 14 days after the launch of Wrath we had enough to form our own 5-mans on a consistent basis with new 80s popping up every day and the true spirit of this guild shining bright. Everyone was there helping everyone else out with advice, materials, professions and anything else we needed. There was a real sense that we were going to do something great.

Growing up:

It wasn’t long we had 5-man dungeon runs every night and anyone that came online would find a group really easily, we were getting all the gear we could in anticipation of our first real challenge: Naxxramas, a zone that would make or break us. A month after the expansion had launched we had enough “geared” 80s to head into Naxx … And wipe the whole night without killing a single boss. We took it in stride after a great motivational speech from our Guild Leader we went back to the drawing board and got more gear from heroics, OS and VoA. By the next raid lock out period we were ready for our next crack at taming the beast. That night we cleared spider wing and one more boss, everyone had gotten some piece of loot and we felt great, so great we spent as much time talking about that raid in vent afterward as we did actually in the instance. We were on fire and the world of Azeroth was our oyster.

The glory “years”:

After that week we started on the road to conquer the rest of that place we had most bosses on Farm in no time. We were attracting more and more people every week and it didn’t take long to build up 2 complete 10-man raid teams. After that 25 Man Naxx was ours for the taking. Our players were gaining experience and everyone was getting more gear every day. We were updating our guild ranking every day in whichever web site was most used at the time and we managed to crack the top 10 server after only 2 weeks of raiding Naxx 25. That spurred the troops onward and KT was ours to pwn.

The beginning of the End:

Just when things were rocking and we were doing good that’s when we started seeing the problems. Like all guilds we had our share of problems, from Key Officers going AWOL for personal matters,  to squabbles over spoils and even the occasional public rivalries between the Tanks. We also had people leave the guild for a more “hard core” raiding guild after they got geared up with us and learned all the fights and the ones who left because we “didn’t raid enough” or at the “right times”. There was also a member who got his account hacked and even though Blizzard did eventually restore all it, he’s never really come back. Others just got tired of the game and simply needed a break be it because of real life constraints on their time or simply a genuine need for a break. I don’t know if it was any of these alone that did it but I am certain that the confluence of events led to our eventual collapse. I got to tell you the higher you climb, the longer the fall seems. One particular week we missed a raid because there simply wasn’t any Tank on-line, the next raid night we were short 3 healers. Then we said let’s resume raiding in 10 days or whenever the next patch comes out, but some people have a very short attention span and needed their raid fix then and there. Ultimately when patch day hit the guild just wasn’t the same and we had to start over again.

From the ashes:

Dominate was started from a web site that had one single goal in mind: to help the average player become better. We have, from the beginning, been brought together by an ideal and a common sense of “dominating and having fun doing it”. Because of that Dominate can never really die, those who believe in what we stand for will be there through thick and thin, the hard times and the good. Those who believe that helping people level (through hints and tips and knowledge and possibly a phenomenal leveling guide)  is just as important as gearing the new 80s and Raiding Ulduar or any new raid out there ( ToC, Onyxia, Icecrown etc.)  This, the true Spirit that holds us together, can weather any storm.

Copy and paste this back to back a couple times with different people and it could very well be the story of any guild on any server.

Starting over … Again:

Gavinn and Lawbringer have both stepped down from the day-to-day leadership of Dominate and some of the more experienced players and some newer ones that have believed in what we stand for since the beginning have stepped up to the plate to rebuild in the Spirit of Dominate. With the help of others we are rebuilding from the ground up the guild was formed over a year ago with one purpose: a Casual Raiding/Training Guild. We have really high hopes and even higher expectations. Whether  you are in the middle of leveling your first toon or if you’re at your 5th 80, we have need of every class to rebuild the Dominate guild on Fenris Horde side.

Getting it Right:

If you like helping out other people and don’t mind answering the occasional noob questions or if you’d always wanted to ask some noob question but have always been scared of the backlash in trade chat, then Dominate is for you. If you are sick of the drama and would like to play the game in a friendly, cuss-free atmosphere where respect and a positive attitude are the primary criteria of entry, you’re more then welcome to join us : Horde side on Fenris server(/who Dominate)

As of this writing:

1. Dominate GM: Anibow (DK)
2. Second in command/Raid Leader: Dindrane (Prot/Holy Paladin … aka Agorg)

These are some of the things that we have learned along the way and have decided to incorporate into the current cycle in order to grow:

• Better communication between the guild leadership, its members and officers.
• Using the Spirit of DominateYourServer.com as the unwritten rule of the guild.
• Actually helping players of all levels (including 1-79) learn to play their class and play as a team.
• Organize runs for lower levels .
• Help the newer 80s get gear as well as experience raiding.
• Getting every 80 their free Bronze drake … I like free.
• Restructuring the guild staff so that all jobs get done by those who enjoy them.
• Restructuring ranks in a visually meaningful manner.
• Getting some PvP in there as well (Premade BGs, daily PvP, Holiday PvP etc)

That’s not to say that we’re perfect but we do try to make a difference wherever we can.  We are once again on the look out for like minded people that believe in what we stand for. Wherever you are in the world of Azeroth: always DOMINATE!

29 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Blizzard has finally revealed how Icecrown raid will act at launch.They are going  a ToC-type route. Content will be released over several weeks, below is how the raid will work.

__________________________________________________________

Quote from: Daelo – Blizzard Lead Encounter Designer (Source)

Icecrown Citadel testing has been progressing very well over the last few weeks, and this has been a huge help to the encounter design team. We want to thank everyone who has logged onto the PTR and tried the encounters there.

As we’re now getting closer to the release of 3.3.0, we wanted to talk about our plans for access progression within Icecrown Citadel. Icecrown Citadel is going to be broken up into four distinct sections: The Lower Spire, Plagueworks, Crimson Hall, and Frostwing Halls. We plan on releasing these four sections of Icecrown Citadel over time and not all immediately when patch 3.3.0 goes live. At this point we can’t give precise dates for these release dates as they are determined by when patch 3.3.0 goes live. Once dates are known with more certainty, I’ll update the community so they can plan appropriately.

The first section that opens will include the Lord Marrowgar, Lady Deathwhisper, Icecrown Gunship Battle, and Deathbringer Saurfang encounters. Progress beyond that point will be prevented for several weeks. Then the Plagueworks will open with Rotface, Festergut, and Professor Putricide becoming available. After another period of time, the Crimson Hall will open and you can then fight the Blood Princes and Blood-Queen Lana’thel. The final Frostwing Halls unlock then occurs after that, making Valithria Dreamwalker, Sindragosa, and the Lich King available. We believe a staggered release of the content will allow players to experience Icecrown Citadel at a sustainable, measured, and ultimately more enjoyable pace.

There are other elements that gate access along the way. Players may not attempt any Heroic versions of 10 player encounters until they have defeated the Lich King in a 10 player raid. Similarly, players must defeat the Lich King in a 25 player raid before they can attempt a Heroic 25 player encounter. So players must master every normal difficulty encounter in Icecrown Citadel before attempting Heroic difficulty.

The Lich King may not be attempted until Professor Putricide, Blood-Queen Lana’thel, and Sindragosa are defeated. Furthermore, the Heroic difficulty of The Lich King encounter may not be attempted in any week unless the three aforementioned encounters have been defeated in Heroic difficulty that week.

The Ashen Verdict provides reinforcements and material for players to assault Icecrown Citadel, but this support is not endless. Raids will have a limited number of attempts total each week to defeat the four most difficult encounters in Icecrown Citadel: Professor Putricide, Blood-Queen Lana’thel, Sindragosa, and the Lich King. As these boss encounters are unlocked, the number of attempts available per week will increase. The initial number of attempts provided for defeating Professor Putricide is only five. When Blood-Queen Lana’thel unlocks, the amount of total attempts remaining will increase to 10. Then when Sindragosa and the Lich King unlock, 15 total attempts will be available to defeat all four bosses. After a raid has exhausted their attempts for the week, the Ashen Verdict must withdraw their support and the four most difficult bosses all despawn and become unavailable for the week. The limited attempt system is a feature of both Normal and Heroic difficulty.

There will be no explicit rewards for defeating the Lich King with a specific number of attempts remaining as there was with Trial of the Grand Crusader. There will also not be an achievement to complete Icecrown Citadel without being defeated by a boss encounter, or letting a raid member die. (i.e. A Tribute to Insanity).

In the weeks and months after all twelve encounters are unlocked, additional attempts against the final four boss encounters become available. This represents the Ashen Verdict growing more powerful and gaining a stronger foothold in Icecrown Citadel. To further help raids, Varian Wrynn and Garrosh Hellscream will begin to provide assistance by inspiring the armies attacking Icecrown Citadel. This is represented as an additional zone wide spell effect applied to all players that will increase their hit points, damage dealt, and healing done. This effect will also increase in effectiveness over time. Players may opt out of the spell’s effect if they so wish.

__________________________________________________________

This move by Blizz is a smart one, to keep content from being cleared to fast. This way even the most top end guilds will have to wait before they can knock the Lich King off his throne. As was the case with the Release of ToC, it gave every guild a chance to build up to the later encounters at the same pace as the Hard-Core Raiders. Leveling out the playing field as it were.

The max counter on the Big-Four and having to beat Arthas on regular to start Hard Modes will make it more fun and offer a new take on raiding. Blizzard is essentially applying their ToC formula to an actual 10-25 man raid, as opposed to ”encounters”. In retrospect it seems that ToC reveals itself to be a test for a new format of end-game encounter.

Another fringe benefit of this type of growth is that it will allow all players the necessary time to pick up the rather rare Emblem of Frost necessary for the Tier-10 gear. I also suspect that this latest tier won’t really be an option if you want to stand a chance against Arthas.

The format used in Icecrown will allow Blizzard more time to develop the next expansion by stretching out this patch over several weeks as well as allowing them the necessary time to fix the bugs they inevitably create when tweaking existing content.

This should keep players busy for a while, at least until a certain Black Dragon performs a global, elemental jail-break. I’m still curious to see just how long this patch will last based on how fast guild are progressing through content.

All in all however it’s always nice to see Blizzard respond to user feedback and continue to cater to their clients.

4 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

We’ve told you before to level cooking alongside of Fishing. You’ve heard us say over and over that cooking can get you some gold and how every class in the game can benefit something from cooking. You’ve also heard us tell you how big of a pain in the @$$ it is. Then THIS IS YOUR CHANCE. We’ll show you how to get cooking to 350 in an hour.  There are complete guides to the actual festival itself out there but this article will focus exclusively on the cooking aspect of it.

It all has to do with Pilgrim Festival. This will require you to run from Undercity(Stormwind) to Orgrimar(IronForge) and ThunderBluff(Darnassus) but will net you a bit of gold and those precious cooking levels that are such a pain to get. Assuming you’ve got no skill in cooking you’ll want to get to Undercity and train up cooking at the Pilgrim Festival Cooking trainer.  Buy the Bountiful cookbook from the vendor and open it up to pick up the 5 Festival recipes and learn the first one right away: Spice Bread Stuffing

Undercity/Stormwind

Buy:

• 60x Simple Flour
• 60x Mild Spices
• Create 60x Spice Bread

The recipe will go gray on you at 40 but you’ll get to use the extra you buy to make the last few points.  Once you’ve got 60x Spice Bread, combine it with 60xAutomnal Herbs (from Pilgrim Vendor) to make 60xSpice Bread Stuffing and get to 100 cooking (or a little more).  Don’t forget to train up cooking before you get to 75 cooking skill or you’ll have to re-cook the bread. Learn Pumpkin pie recipe (at 100)

Buy

• 70x Ripe Tirisfal(Elwynn Pumpkin)
• 70x Honey
• Create 70x Pumpkin Pie

Again remember to train up cooking when you get to 125 (but before 150).  Once you hit 160 cooking, learn the Cranberry Chutney recipe and travel to your next destination (Orgrimar/Ironforge).

Orgrimar/Ironforge

Buy:

• 70x Tangy Southfury Cranberries(TangyWetland Cranberries)
• 70x Honey
• Create 70x Cranberry Chutney

Again remember to train up cooking when your skill reaches 200 and before it hits 225. Learn the Candied Sweet Potato recipe at 220 cooking and move on to your next destination: ThunderBluff/Darnassus

Thunder Bluff/Darnasuss

Buy:

• 70x Mulgore Sweet Potato (Teldrasil Sweet Potato)
• 70x Honey
• Create 70x Candied Sweet Potato

Train cooking between 275 and 300 and return to Undercity/ Stormwind for the last part of this adventure.  This part will require you run around like a turkey after … well … Wild Turkeys

Go outside Undercity/Darnassus and kill Wild Turkeys and remember to loot them, you’ll need quite a few so don’t be shy they are scattered all over the start area and spawn rather quickly.

Back to Undercity/Stormwind

Buy:

• 140x Honey
• 70x Automnal Herbs
• kill 70x Wild Turkeys
• Create 70x SlowRoasted Turkeys

Voila! Your cooking skill should be at 350 or a little above (355?) In the process you’ve managed to accomplish all the seasonal cooking quests and have enough for 3 days’ worth of dailies. All of which should buy you more then enough Turkey Shooters to turn all the rogues you need for the achievement (assuming you don’t miss too often)

This is BY FAR the cheapest and most effective way to level cooking you’ll ever get. The recipes don’t go yellow until you’re 10 pts away from the next one (which is whyI make you buy 70 instead of the minimum 60 you really need). To be honest I didn’t do the math on this and it’s so cheap that I’m not even going to bother. 5-10 gold ? … the amount is infinitesimal, ridiculous even.

Regardless whether you do the seasonal events or not this is a DOMINATING way to level cooking and it only comes around once/year so better take advantage of it now or you’ll regret it come Christmas when you need to get your MerryMaker title. Don’t say we didn’t warn you.

16 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Just because we publish cutting edge articles about new content, doesn’t mean we can forget about the basics. There is something within World of Warcraft that is more important to you than even the Sword of a Thousand Truths. That thing is your User Name and Password and more recently your email address and password. All of your weapons, armor and loot and all of your gold mean nothing if someone can steal it from you. That is why your account security should be the most absolutely important thing to you. I would like to stop seeing “I’ve been hacked” forever and I am sure you would like to stay safe as well.

The basic principle of account security is this:  the ne’er do well individuals want what is inside of your account and they don’t want to go through all the trouble of getting it. Often times their plans are extremely transparent and its up to you to stop them in their tracks. With a few various added practices you can prevent most every form of account security problems. You can’t prevent them all though and this guide can’t act as a complete shield for them all but you can make the chance so small you cant see it.

Account security comes in three phases. Your primary line of defense is your Email and Password. Second is your security question and making sure your Email account and your WoW account passwords are not the same really helps.  Third is your CD key and any other information that can be used to verify its your account.

If you do get hacked though Blizzard’s top notch customer service is there to help out. They can restore your account and give you a new password. They can even restore any goods stolen. ( see more on this later). Although, its best never to let someone up to no good get that far in the first place.

A secure email/password combo starts with having a unique email address and password.

The following is from Microsoft and can greatly benefit your password security.

6 steps to build a strong password

The strongest passwords look like a random string of characters to attackers. But random strings of characters are hard to remember.

Make a random string of characters based on a sentence that is memorable to you but is difficult for others to guess.

1. Think of a sentence that you will remember
   Example: “My son Aiden is three years old.”
2. Turn your sentence into a password
   Use the first letter of each word of your memorable sentence to create a string, in this case: “msaityo”.
3. Add complexity to your password or pass phrase
   Mix uppercase and lowercase letters and numbers. Introduce intentional misspellings.
   For example, in the sentence above, you might substitute the number 3 for the word “three”, so a password might be “MsAi3yo”.
4. Substitute some special characters
   Use symbols that look like letters, combine words, or replace letters with numbers to make the password complex.
   Using these strategies, you might end up with the password “M$8ni3y0.”
5. Test your new password with Password Checker
   Microsoft Password Checker evaluates your password’s strength as you type.
6. Keep your password a secret
   Treat your passwords with as much care as the information that they protect.

Blizzard to the rescue: Blizzard Authenticator.

The Battle.net Authenticator is (but shouldn’t be) an optional tool that offers Battle.net account users an additional layer of security to help prevent unauthorized account access. This includes World of Warcraft players who log in to the game using a Battle.net account.  The Authenticator application itself is a small program that you install and access on your cell phone or mobile device. For the complete Q&A go to the  Official Blizzard Q&A.

Speaking from personal experience here, having this little thing on my accounts (yes, plural) I can certainly vouch for the security. As a matter of fact it’s a pain in the glutius maximus (anatomical body part) to have to re-type the randomly changing numbers whenever you get disconnected from the server. But if it’s that big of a pain for you, think of how much of a pain it’s going to be for the “hacker”

The concept is really sound, most companies actually force their users to go through some similar hoops, RSA security cards etc. The Blizzard (Mobile) Authenticator uses much the same technology.

Blizzard Authenticator

The Mobile Authenticator can be downloaded Here for your iPhone or other hand held device follow the link for the list of supported units. and is free (I am certain it’s free for iPhone and iPod touch, not sure about other versions)

The Key-chain Authenticator can be purchased from these Official Blizzard web sites:

• Here (US only)
• Here (Canada, Australia, NZ and Latin America)
• Here (Europe)
• Here (Korea)

Certainly a worth while investment if you’re still willing to pay a monthly fee to play the game, paying a fraction of that montly fee one-time to protect all you’ve acomplished sounds like a no-brainer to me

Another problem these days are the people who go to websites spammed in trade chat. These include gold buying sites and “your a winner of a new mount from Blizzard.” Don’t fall for these things as you can be hacked very easily by doing so. So if you want to protect your toons, like your 10k DPS specialist or the Tank that can’t be killed follow simple common sense practices and enjoy your new found security.

23 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Blizzard has decided to give us something most players use to help them level, only, Better! I have tested it and find it easy to use for new and returning players alike and a welcome addition to the existing features of the current interface. Below, I’ve put togehter a list of the some options Blizz has stated in various blue posts since patch 3.3 was announced:

Quest Log

We added a new “Show Map” button on the Quest Log. The “Show Map” feature highlights any quest in the log and will pull up the map for the zone in which the corresponding quest objectives are located.

Map

When viewing the large zone map (’M’ key), players will notice that all quests they have for that zone will be automatically tracked. In addition, this large map is now separated into four separate interface panes.To the right of the map, all active quests for that zone will be listed by name and be represented with a number. These numbers will be placed on the map highlighting areas of interest for each quest.A third panel below the zone map will give players the full quest text for any highlighted quest, while the fourth pane will display the quest reward. The quest map tracking feature is enabled by default. Players can disable this feature and restore the map to its original state by un-checking the “Show Quest Objectives” box in the lower right corner.

Areas of Interest

All areas of interest in a zone will be represented with a number corresponding to the number assigned to each active quest in that particular zone. When highlighting a specific quest, the corresponding number on the zone map will be highlighted as well.If the area of interest is large, for example, and a player needs to kill a number of quest creatures or collect quest items found within a large area on the map, the entire questing area of interest around the number on the map will be shaded blue.If quest objectives can be accomplished in multiple areas of the zone; for example, certain creatures need to be killed for a quest and have several different locations, the map will automatically display the nearest area of interest in proximity to the player.

Shrunken Map and Objectives Tracking

When viewing the large zone map (’M’ key), players can click the arrow in the top right corner to bring the zone map out of full-screen mode.The map will show all areas of interest for the zone; however the other three interface panes will be removed so players can still view their character, spells, and abilities with the map open. The standard quest objectives window has been improved and will now show numbers next to each quest displayed, or a gold question mark if the quest has been completed.The objectives window is now docked below the mini-map, next to the right two action bars and can display up to ten active quests in the zone. Players can toggle between minimizing and maximizing this quest objectives window at any time by clicking on the red arrow in the top right corner of the objectives frame.

Quest Difficulty Tracking: no more being lost now

This feature is turned off by default and players can choose “Color Quest Difficulty” under Objectives in the Interface Options menu to enable it. Enabling this option will color-code all quest names in the new map interface according to the player’s level (grey, green, yellow, orange, and red).This new feature has been built to work with nearly every quest in World of Warcraft with only a few exceptions. For example, if a quest requires that a player turns in some sort of cloth or other trade goods that can be purchased from other players, the map will not display an area of interest for where these items can be found.
All other quests, whether they require players to slay groups of creatures, gather some type of quest object, or hunt down a single specific target, will be tracked on the map, provided that the player is viewing the map of the zone in which these objectives can be completed.

Quote from: Blizzard (Source)

””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””””’

The conclusion

After quite a bit of field testing on the Public Test Realm, I have to say that I really like this interface. It’s everything Blizz is making it out to be. I won’t even be sorry to see my quest and map mods go, this does most of what they do just as well if not better and won’t cause nearly as many bugs. It’s about time Blizz made this part of the game.

No more alt-tabing out of the game to find information on a quest giver or the exact location (coordinates) of a quest items. No more wondering if you’re in the right zone. No more downloading super complex mods that take up the whole screen and are so hard to configure that you just rather use the default UI than mess with the countless pages of options.

This is an Orientation Revolution! The only thing better than this little wonder would be someone doing the quest for you … and that would take all the fun out of it.

This new interface should make it significantly easier for the newer players to find what they are looking for in-game and the old timers will welcome the change as well. Regardless if this is your first run through Azeroth or your 22nd DK, the new Quest Helper User Interface will help you Dominate and level faster then ever before.

Thanks Blizz!

14 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Now on to a part I know you will all want to know….THE GEAR. Most gear is simple and straight forward. Most of us know what gear we “think” would be the best, but for those of you who maybe aren’t sure, we are dedicating an article just for it.  Keep in mind all that we have gone through in stats,   gems and enchants and you will have a better idea of what your really wanting  for gear.

The Death Knight starts with some pretty decent gear for all intents and purposes and it can get you far into the game towards level 80. Some quests give you some gear that may provide a boost in stats and that’s fine and dandy. But when do you need a major overhaul in gear? Your fist and most important gear set will be when you are level 78 when you will want a full set of

Savage Saronite Battlegear

• Savage Saronite Bracers
• Savage Saronite Gauntlets
• Savage Saronite Hauberk
• Savage Saronite Legplates
• Savage Saronite Pauldrons
• Savage Saronite Skullshield
• Savage Saronite Waistguard
• Savage Saronite Walkers

If you notice there is a repeating theme in these items. Firstly, Strength and Stamina and Secondly Critical Strike Rating and Resilience. These are really good stats for your Death Knight at this time and can get you running regular Dungeons and once you get to Level 80, running Heroics.  Even if this set is more for PvP, it can certainly boost your gear beyond the Quest greens you picked up alongside the BoE blues. There are a few items you can get to compliment your build even better.

Lvl 80 Crafted gear:

Icebane gear is a nice choice but you may ask why. They have uses down the line that can benefit you more than you might know. The best feature about these 3 pieces of gear is that they are highly customizable since you don’t really care about the socket bonus. You could for example fill all 7 available sockets with 20 str gems for a total of 140str.

• Icebane Girdle
• Icebane Treads
• Icebane Chestguard

Couple the Icebane set with these 2 crafted items (possibly replacing the boots):

• Spiked Titansteel Helm
• Spiked Titansteel Treads

Regular and Heroic Trial of the Champion

In Regular ToC, you can enter the dungeon as of level 75. You won’t be able to equip the loot in there until level 80 but the XP is good and if you can get carried (Yes, carried!) through it often enough you can certainly have a decent set of gear when you hit 80 (enchanted and gemmed).

• Banner of Victory
• Breastplate of Imperial Joust
• Drape of the Undefeated
• Gauntlets of the Stouthearted Crusader
• Girdle of Arrogant Downfall
• Helm of the Violent Fray
• Uruka’s Band of Zeal

Conversly as soon as you hit 80 you can start doing the Heroic version of the dungeon once every day to obtain the following gear:

• Ancient Pendant of Arathor
• Legplates of Relentless Onslaught
• Majestic Silversmith Shoulderplates
• Plated Greaves of Providence
• Vambraces of Unholy Command

Weapons:

Two hand weapons or our thing and anything that adds Strength and Stamina are great such as your first weapon once you hit level 80,  the Titansteel Destroyer. This weapon is a weapon of choice because of its stats. You cant get much better until you run some heroics and get a nice drop. Keep in mind the stats you have learned to look for and you should do just fine.

A weapon to look for that is far superior is Edge of Ruin and can be found only in Heroic ToC.

Next thing your working toward on gear of course is Raid gear. You know that gear that is all pretty with the purple name tags and lots of gem slots and stats that make you drool that the other person is wearing and you think must be hacked because you have never ever seen anything like that before so it just cant be real…Oh its real…and you can get it. Even if you only play one hour a day you can get the gear for raiding.

Emblem Gear

Gear can also be attained by using Emblem of Conquest and Emblem of Triumph. This is the gear of champions. This is the gear that gets you invited to raids. Keep in mind you must know your role and how to play your character but the gear helps.

Emblem of  Conquest gear:

2-piece T8.5

• Conqueror’s Darkruned Helmet
• Conqueror’s Darkruned Battleplate

5 other pieces of gear that are of interest to DKs:

• Belt of the Singing Blade
• Bladebreaker Gauntlets
• Sigil of the Vengeful Heart (The Emblem of Triumph one is FAR better)
• Legplates of the Violet Champion
• Spiked Battleguard Choker

Emblem Of Triumph Gear:

When it come to Emblems of Triumph, Blizzard changed the rules for Tier 9. There are 3 versions of every one of the tier 9 pieces of gear that share a common set bonus. Let’s refer to them as 9.1, 9.2 and 9.3 for simplicity. the last set (9.3) can only be obtained from Heroic Trial of the Grand Crusader (25-H. ToC) token drop. and a single token can purchase any of the 5 pieces available. Gone are the days of running an instance 10 times to get the one piece of Tier gear you actually want.

The two other tiers 9.1 and 9.2 can be purchased with Emblems of Triumph: 9.1 requires only the emblems themselves where as the 9.2 set requires 1.5x more emblems as well as a Trophy of the crusade. On a side note the 2 and 4-piece bonuses of T9.x are way better then the T8.x equivalent.

Here is the complete list of items that are of interest to you:

• Bloodshed Band
• Faceplate of Thunderous Rampage
• Shoulderplates of Trembling Rage
• Mark of Supremacy
• Sigil of Virulence (This should be your FIRST PRIORITY)

Tier 9.1

• Koltira’s Battleplate of Conquest
• Koltira’s Gauntlets of Conquest
• Koltira’s Helmet of Conquest
• Koltira’s Legplates of Conquest
• Koltira’s Shoulderplates of Conquest

Tier 9.2

• Koltira’s Battleplate of Triumph
• Koltira’s Gauntlets of Triumph
• Koltira’s Helmet of Triumph
• Koltira’s Legplates of Triumph
• Koltira’s Shoulderplates of Triumph

You should note that if you are inclined to PvP there are complete sets available for purchase with both Conquest and Triumph emblems. For more information about gearing up to Raid, check out  Agorg’s Quick Gearing Guide for the Want to be Raider

Follow that guide and you’ll be raiding in no time flat, and Dominating the DPS meter in the process.

I hope you have enjoyed yourself on our DK tour of The Best DPS build for Blood Spec Death Knight in patch 3.2 and may your DPS meters hit the roof.

On a personal note. I don’t claim to have all the answers to all the questions about the Death Knight but it is my favorite class. I play the DPS DK exclusively and study and test it all the time. I have several lvl 80 DKs on different realms for testing and one I play on. I will get you up to speed on the upcoming changes as best I can for patch 3.3 and thank you for all your input.

4 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Special Abilities And Pet Management

In this installment we’ll cover the little things that are important to know while playing your DK, some are common sense and some you might already know, but a quick recap never hurt anyone.

Keep in mind: your DK is a 2-Hand weapon specialist. Gearing up will be our next part of the series so I won’t go into details here.

What other skills will I need to use?  

Pestilence:

Is very useful for multi-mob as it puts your PS and IT on all causing damage to every mob. If you’re soloing, it works out just fine but in a group it can cause problems. In a group (5-10-25 man), the tank gets aggro on the first mob and you hit the main target right after. The tank in the meantime is making sure he has aggro on all the mobs in the group. If you hit Pestilence before he does get aggro on the group you could pull threat off the tank … and that is not good. Timing is very important. While you heal yourself for the most part, if you get aggro you will not be able to heal yourself fast enough causing your healer to start healing you as well as the tank. FYI If the healer has to make a choice between healing a Silly DK who pulled threat and the Tank that will keep the rest of the group alive, do you want to guess who’s getting the heal?

For the most part you should be able to keep yourself healed up without any help and sometimes….you get a healer that refuses to heal DK’s and up-time is critical for the success of any group.

Death and Decay:

D&D is not one of your very useful skills for a Blood build but it does have its uses.

Trash mobs! Now in Culling of Strath there are a few times to use it on the little turned humans being sure to get all your runes back up and ready for the next fight. Again this takes practice and there are a few dungeons you can use it but not many. It works alright when soloing a bit but again it’s not a skill used much for this build.

Chains of Ice:

Chains of Ice is mostly used as Crowd Control in PVP and does have its uses while soloing but rarely will you ever use it in a dungeon. All bosses are immune to CC and you want the tanks to keep the trash mobs busy. While soloing, you could be questing along just fine and fighting solo mobs that tend to run away when one gets away and brings back his friends en mass. OOPS!! This is about the only time it’s a very useful thing to use. It’s nice to have be be aware of it’s limitations: CC

The Pet:

Your Pet Ghoul (summoned from Raise Dead ability) and your Dancing Rune Weapon. These guys can boost your DPS quite a bit to the point of amazement. There are a few tricks however to using them that will help you get the most out of them you can:

• Make sure your Ghoul is ready for every boss. Summoning him is on a 3 minute cool-down and your Dancing Rune Weapon has a 1- ½ minutes. So this also takes practice and timing. Make sure both are off CD for every boss, (ie. Don’t click “Ready” on the ready check if you’re not ready!)

• Whatever you do, make sure you have your pet out on every fight and Keep control of your pet at all times. It should be attacking the same target you are. It won’t change target unless the target it’s attacking is dead. If it isn’t, command it to do so using the Gnaw ability or  Ctrl-1 to force your pet to attack a new target.

• If you control your pet in this way there is absolutely no reason to ever take your pet off of Passive mode, that way it can attack the Boss while you’re kiting some trash (Gluth fight).
• Keeping your pet on passive will allow him to attack a target that you death grip much faster. Otherwise your pet jumps 20 yds. to your target and is stuck running back to you at a leisurely pace, by which time your target is most likely dead anyway.

• If the pet is low on health, you can ask your healers to throw a little love(Heals) it’s way. Certainly not at the expense of the tanks, of course, but you can remind your healers that pets need health too.

• When all else fails and your health is really low, remember that you can sack your pet for the health benefit of Death Pact. Yet another “Oh, $H1T!” button at your disposal.

• Unless you’re Tanking yourself, don’t use the Dark Command ability (Taunt), every tank will be grateful, and so will you. The days of Crowd Control seem to have gone the way of the dinosaur with Wrath but thankfully, Blizzard has specifically stated they were bring it back “in the near future”, whatever that means.

Maybe by then the DKs will have to learn to use their pets again and so will Hunters. CC some mobs, protect the healer, even back-up tank (Yes, Hunter Pets used to be quasi-acceptable tanks back in the day). Until that day, focus on what you do best: DPS.

So there it is, mass destruction is a Death Knights purpose and it is key that when you’re playing one in DPS that you should do just that. Enjoy your Death Knight and remember practice and timing are your best friends.

The next, final, installment of the DK series will cover Gear.

… To be continued.

8 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Welcome to our next installment in the DK series. Today we cover Professions, Gemming, Enchanting and a few stats.

Professions:

JewelCrafting and Blacksmithing are you two top choices when it comes to professions for a DK. They combine the most Raid-Benefits to your character than any other professions. They are also the most expensive.
If you choose Jewelcrafting as one of your trade skills then you’re in for a treat. Jewelers’ Gems will be your best friends. You can have 3 of these unique Gems on your equipment with stats like 34 to Hit Rating or 34 to Strength and even 34 to Expertise that can produce results.
As a Blacksmith you’ll get two extra sockets to put those bad boys into.
One way to mitigate that expense, is to level Mining first while picking up twice as much ore as you really need. Get JC up and then drop Mining to pick up BS and use the remainder of your mats for that one.
If gold has always been an issue for you, feel free to pick up Gavin’s AH Mastery Guide

Your gemming priority is as follows:

1. Hit Rating
2. Strength,
3. Expertise / Armor Pen
4. Critical Strike

Enchants:

1. Strength
2. Attack Power
3. Critical Strike
4. Haste

Some Stats to make the above make sense

Hit Rating:

DKs and all melee classes share the same 8% cap on that, until you get 8% hit rating (263 Hit rating) this stat is your top priority. As long as your are not Hit capped you should be trying to get there. This is especially important when using a 2-H weapon, after all, every swing you miss is damage that you’re NOT doing.
Once you are Hit capped, Strength: you can never have enough Strength. For a DK 1 Strenght = 2 Attack power. Attack power directly translates into DPS …

Now the following comes from the guys at ElitistJerks.com. These guys really know the math.

Expertise vs. Armor Pen

Expertise
•1 Expertise Skill reduces the chance your attacks will be dodged/parried by 0.25%
•32.79 Rating is equal to 1% less chance your attacks will be dodged/parried.
•8.20 Rating is equal to 0.25% less chance your attacks will be dodged and parried (each) and thus is equal to 1 Expertise Skill.

Armor Penetration Rating
It doesn’t affect our damage from Diseases, Icy Touch, Howling Blast, Scourge Strike or Death Coil. This makes Armor Penetration have a reduced value for Unholy and Frost Specs. Blood however does have quite a lot of benefit from ArP Rating, due to the majority of its damage being Physical.
We need 15.39 Rating to ignore 1% armor on our target.

So although ArPen is cheaper to get (15.39 = 1% armor ignore) the Expertise affects both Dodged hits and parries which redure your DPS significantly. Bottom line, for a DK they are relatively equivalent because we use a slow 2-H weapon and Strength is always more valueable anyway, so gemming and enchanting for those stats may not be so wise. Don’t forget that most of your gear will naturally come with some of those stats

“What  do I need to upgrade first?”

Just remember, you will never be taken seriously as a player, for end-game content, if you don’t enchant and socket your gear.

WoW-Heroes.com

WoWHead.com/profiles

Both have a fantastic tool to look at yourself in the mirror so to speak. Using those web sites you can see, at a glance, what your character has equipped, what he is missing, what upgrades are available and where to find them.

That’s it for this installment of the DK series, tomorrow we’ll cover the finer points and before we’re done we’ll have gone over the gear as well .

6 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post

Welcome back to the second installment of the DK series.  Today, we’ll cover Glyphs and Rotation.

Glyphs are pretty straight forwards; you saw them in the link to the build on Yesterday’s article. The only argument I see is for Glyph of Icy Touch instead of Glyph of Disease. And after field testing it in multiple scenarios, based on my play style and rotation I just prefer the Glyph of Disease because of the instant refresh of all diseases. After all the less time I spend refreshing a DoT, the more time I can spend DPSing.

Glyph of Death Strike- Major
Glyph of Dancing Rune Weapon-Major
Glyph of Disease- Major
Glyph of Horn of Winter-Minor
Glyph of Pestilence-Minor
Glyph of Raise Dead- Minor

When it comes to rotation, some classes have a fixed rotation (Prot Paladins) while other classes have a priority-based rotation (Feral Druids). Death Knights can, ironically put out more damage with the simplest of rotations. It’s probably why we’re accused of “Face Rolling”, but every DK knows that’s just plain Jealousy, even if no other class will admit it!

Step1: Put up your Diseases

Plague Strike(Puts: Blood Plague) and  Icy Touch (to put Frost Fever on your target)

Once those are up you can forget about them for the rest of the fight and as long as you remember to keep them up with Pestilence, you’re golden. Remember, Pestilence is a top priority before your diseases run out, It’s far less “expensive” to keep them up than it is to renew them if they fall off.

Step 2: Do your thing!

Death Strike, Heart Strike (x2), Death Coil (Runic Power Dump),

Death Strike, Heart Strike (x3), Dancing Rune Weapon

Rince and repeat.

It’s preferable to wait for the second time through your rotation to ensure that you have all 4 Blood Worms up before you call your DRW, but if you already have 4 Blood Worms, you can go ahead and pop DRW on that first pass. With the glyph, your DRW is up for 17 seconds and will spend the next 73 seconds on cool down. During that time Death Strike and Heart Strike are pretty much all you need, as long as you remember to keep up Pestilence before your diseases run out.

Now this may sound a little simplistic and too good to be true, but on the PTR I’ve personally done 8.4K DPS and after enchanting and gemming up the gear, I brought that up to a staggering 10,200 DPS. (Ok, it’s in full T9 and 245 Epics, but still …)
This just proves that a rotation doesn’t have to be complicated to generate results and that some times, the simplest way is the best way.

Next time we’ll cover Gemming and Enchanting as well as some base stats and their importance to a DK.

… To Be Continued

6 Comments » ~ ~ Random Post