World of Warcraft takes place in a 3D-representation of the Warcraft universe that players can interact with through their characters, someone sell wow gold in games. The game features two continents on the world of Azeroth. In this game world, players use their characters to explore locations, defeat creatures and complete quests.

The Death Knight is the first announced Hero class for Wrath of the Lich King.Death Knights, according to Blizzard developers, will be able to fulfill the tank and DPS roles sufficiently. Death Knights can use plate armor and new rune weapons like Runeswords and Runeaxes,but they cannot use shields.

World of Warcraft players often participate in the virtual community in creative ways, including fan artworkand comic strip style storytelling.It offers ten playable races: Dwarves, Gnomes, Humans, Night Elves, Draenei, Orcs, Tauren, Trolls, Undead and Blood Elves. The game’s races are further divided into two warring factions: the Alliance and the Horde.

The Burning Crusade was the best-selling PC game of 2007 in North America and Europe, and it is also the fastest-selling PC game of all time, selling nearly 2.4 million copies in its first 24 hours and approximately 3.5 million in its first month.Two new races are now a part of World of Warcraft. There are the Draenei, opting for the Alliance faction, and the Blood Elves opting for the Horde. The Draenei have been granted the ability to become shaman, a previously Horde-only class, whilst Blood Elves have been given the ability to become paladins, formerly an Alliance-only class.

Hex

When Hex was first announced I’m sure all shamans were very excited. Finally, shamans get a form of CC for PvP and instances! Sure, we’d have to wait for level 80 to use it, but that was at least in time for heroics and arena play.

Hex has ended up being a pretty solid form of CC in PvE content. Mobs you cast Hex on do not attack you just as the spell description says, they hop around like frogs. You can leave them hexed and run away, you can deal damage (unlike Polymorph, the effect doesn’t automatically break while you’re attacking the hexed target, meaning that if you can get lucky you can kill a hexed mob without taking any damage at all) and in an instance if you hex a mob he’ll generally flop around for the 30 seconds, making it very viable as CC.

The only real dificulty here is that nobody waits for CC anymore, but that’s not the fault of the ability. Hex would have been simply marvelous for shamans looking to run instances during The Burning Crusade, and to my mind is one of the clearest examples of an ability designed for the expansion we just left (similar to the old principle that armies are almost always prepared for the last war they fought instead of the one they’re about to fight) but since it’s a level 80 ability, you don’t really get to use it when leveling through the new content. If I had one wish it would be for Hex to be lowered in level so that shamans would get more use out of it when soloing and grinding XP to level up.

However, the pros and cons of Hex in PvE aside, it’s generally been considered somewhat of a weak spell in PvP. For starters, a hexed PC can continue to move at you, meaning that it doesn’t really help a shaman get out of range of melee who are trying to kill him or her. Frankly, Frost Shock works better for this than Hex does. Since Hex might not break on damage, you can use Hex then Frost Shock to remove your attacker’s ability to hurt you then hope you can snare him or her without breaking the hex, but it’s still clunky and inelegant. Secondly, Hex is easily trinketable, which makes it interesting.

Effectively, in PvP Hex functions as a combined disarm/silence effect. Now, a disarm and silence effect would be a very powerful PvP tool except that, unlike other disarms and silences, which cannot be removed as easily (I’m sure there’s ways to remove them that I’m forgetting at the moment) Hex can be removed with a simple trinket or racial that “Removes all movement impairing effects and all effects which cause loss of control of your character”

This would be reasonable if Hex actually impaired movement or caused you to lose control of your character. But it doesn’t. You can still move while hexed, and you can still control your character while hexed, the only thing you can’t do is attack or cast spells, so it’s a disarm/silence (admittedly, a real disarm still allows you to make unarmed attacks which Hex does not) that can be removed, unlike Dismantle or Silence. Hex is effectively neither fish nor fowl in PvP and suffers for it.

Having said that, it’s certainly not a bad spell. It’s just not as good as we all hoped it would be. It’s a solid PvE spell that doesn’t get used as much as it could due to the general lack of CC in PvE nowadays (I’ve used it as a clutch save on mobs going for a healer to give the tanks time to work) and a weak but better than nothing escape spell in PvP (if nothing else, it makes them blow that trinket or racial).

Spells:

Lava Burst

When Lava Burst first debuted on the beta for Wrath, it almost immediately caught the attention of both enhancement and elemental shamans with its ability to guarantee a critical hit combined with Flame Shock and its use as an instant cast with Maelstrom Weapon. Eventually, MW was changed so that it didn’t work with Lava Burst, making the spell primarily a way for Elemental Shamans to guarantee a crit and for any shaman out soloing to get around the ridiculous drop in offensive capacity all shamans (especially elemental and restoration, as enhancement shamans can at least still hit them) face against certain nature-immune mobs.

Lava Burst was the first step in moving shamans into a much more mixed damage mode of play. While nature damage is still very important with Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning and numerous talents that support them, Lava Burst means that shamans now have a reliable way to deal fire damage as well as a way to ensure that if a critical hit is needed to proc a talent such as Elemental Focus or Elemental Devastation, the shaman no longer has to wait and hope. Thanks to the cast time, enhancement is much less likely to try and work this spell into a rotation, but it can serve as an effective opening cast on a boss to get the critical hit train rolling, so to speak, and for elemental it basically means that stacking crit is no longer as important as spell power or hit rating, since any effect that requires a crit can be has with a mere FS/Lava Burst combination.

Honestly, Lava Burst is a good spell, a very efficient spell, and the addition of the Shamanism talent in patch 3.0.8 made it even better for caster DPS. If for no other reason than its lessening of our reliance on nature damage, it would be a worthy acquisition when you hit level 75. But combined with the synergy it displays with other talents and spells, it becomes very nice indeed.

Still, doesn’t seem easy to

Crap. Out of room — that’s 511 characters. Of course, they can fudge things a bit by having those “story quests” where characters can use multiple pages to build up their background, and the 511-character limit doesn’t apply to all of the dialogue — some of the later quests have pages and pages of dialogue as the quest goes on. But squeezing enough information to keep a player interested in just 511 characters is quite a feat.One of the most interesting things we heard from Jeff Kaplan last week (besides that he agrees the Green Hills quest sucks; won’t do that one again) was that quest designers are given only 511 characters (not words) to put their quest text in.

It’s surprising to think that they’ve created all the backstory, throughout Azeroth, in just 511 characters at a time. But even Kaplan said the limit is a good thing: it means Blizzard has to show story to the player rather than tell it.

This guide will focus mostly on normal dungeon drops, although where a quest reward, reputation reward, or relatively easy to craft crafted item is a good option for the slot, we’ll highlight it as well. By the end of this guide, the Hunter that didn’t quite finish their Karazhan runs during Burning Crusade should hopefully have an idea of where to get a good outlay of gear to prepare them for heroics, and eventually for Naxxramas itself.You’ve checked out the reputation gear for Hunters, and now you’re ready to grind. So you’ve picked up your tabard, and you realize that you still have a question left to answer: Which dungeon should I run? What dungeon has the gear I need to get suited up and ready to run Heroics?

Scattered Shots is here to help. We’re going to look at some of the best pre-Heroic drops for Hunters in Wrath, and hopefully give you some idea of what way to go when you look for your next dungeon, or at least what drops to cross your fingers for.

Rings

For Rings, you’ll want to head up to Ulduar. In the Halls of Lightning, General Bjarngrim will drop the Bjarngrim Family Signet, which comes with lots of agility and attack power. Even if you can’t use the haste rating on it, the agility and the AP alone blow away most other pre-heroic possibilities aside from uber-expensive crafted rings.

Speaking of expensive crafted rings, you may want to see if you can get your hands on a Ring of Scarlet Shadows. This jewelcrafted ring has a good outlay of critical strike rating, attack power, and hit rating, plus a socket, and will make a fine pair with the Bjarngrim. If Halls of Stone trash drops or the AH treat you well, you could also pick up a Palladium Ring, which sports attack power and critical strike rating that make it a very viable alternative to either of the other two rings.

Trinket

For Trinkets, I’m once again going to recommend you go after a faction reward, in particular the Oracle Talisman of Ablution from the Oracles of Sholozar Basin. The proc helps keep you out of Aspect of the Viper, and we just love that critical strike rating. Read the rest of this entry »

Season 5 will begin on December 17th for those players that have reached level 80. That’s just a few days away. For those that haven’t, the skirmish brackets of 71-75 and 76-80 are available. The time is now to start organizing your arena teams and get them in gear for the upcoming events.

With all the changes in Wrath the next arena season promises to be interesting. Here’s to bigger and better weapons!

Gnorog on the EU forums posted notice a while ago that Season 4 is over. That means that all arena teams and ratings have been cleared, and arena charter NPCs have been disabled.

Your arena points will stay with you until you reach level 71 however.

But the end of Season 4 isn’t the news.

Vaneras goes on to point out an important tidbit – don’t assume just because all your friends are 80 that everyone else is as well. People that play all the time tend to gravitate towards other people that play all the time, and folks that only log on once or twice a week gravitate towards each other as well.

But then I’m reminded of my brother, who just dinged 77 a couple days ago.Vaneras on the EU forums this morning responded to some criticism that everyone is already 80, etc… He makes a few interesting points.

First, he notes that they have internal numbers that the majority of players don’t yet have a level 80 character. This might be a known or assumed fact by some, but for many of us it’s interesting to hear Blizzard extrapolate on the issue.

This is also good to know as it means battlegrounds and Wintergrasp will be filling up more as a greater number of folks ding. That’s only going to lead to more fun for everyone.This means that just because everyone on your friends list is 80 doesn’t mean the whole server is yet. I know that for myself nearly everyone’s main is either 80 or high 70s now, and most have alts quickly getting up there in level too.

Let us talk about the mechanics of fishing. It is very simple. Now that you are trained in apprentice fishing and have picked up the basic fishing pole, just equip your pole in your weapon slot. It ensures that it is two-handed weapon, so it takes two both hand slots when equipped.
 After you’ve made your first successful cast, you’ll see your bobber appear to be floating on the surface of the water, and the fishing ability will be a channeled casting bar at the bottom of your screen. Keep your eye on your bobber. Place your cursor over the bobber and note that it turns into a golden cog wheel. Wait patiently for the bobber to bob up in the water, indicating that you have a fish on the line, and when you see the bobber splash up, right click the cog wheel to loot your fish. If you get the message that your fist got away, don’t get discouraged, just try again! This is a common message when you first start fishing, and later as you level, is a good indication that you are fishing in an area a little above your fishing skill level. Once you gain a few skill ups, you’ll see that message less and less in that area.
Blizzard added these swirling pools of fish to bodies of water in a patch so that fishermen would come across the schools while fishing and have a few guaranteed casts to catch that particular kind of fish when they fished directly into them. The schools of fish are just a way for you to stumble upon a more guaranteed way to fish for more of a specific fish you’re looking for. But remember — you can actually fish anywhere in the body of water, though, and do not have to fish in designated schools to catch fish. Also be on the lookout for floating wreckage pools. Fishing into these designated and random spawns usually gleans interesting items rather than fish, although you always have a rare chance of “catching” crates or other goodies when you fish anyway. You never know what you’ll pull out of the watery depths when you fish!

When it comes to fishing, there are always somethings in mind. The technique is simple, making fishing the perfect getaway from monotonous grinding or the same ol’ PvP action. To fish, you will need a fishing pole, sold by any trades supply or fishing supply vendor in your home city. Ask a guard in one of your faction’s main cities for the fishing trainer closest to you. Read the rest of this entry »

Medievaldragon: Do you actually have plans to develop new Battlegrounds and Arenas for upcoming content patches after the launch of Wrath of the Lich King?

Frank Pearce: We are still talking about what the upcoming content patches are going to include.  We have got some great ideas. Definitely its at the top of the list: new raid dungeons, new Battlegrounds and Arenas; but we don’t have specific plans to talk about at this time.

Medievaldragon: What challenges has the Blizzard Team faced to launch of Wrath of the Lich King around the world?

Frank Pearce: Yea, it’s actually a huge challenge to coordinate a worldwide launch, because we have to deal with different requirements in terms of the ratings for the game, the approvals for the game in the different countries. And then we have to coordinate the localization of the game; because we are launching World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King simultaneously in six countries. Except in Mainland China.

We are sending representatives around the world to support the launch. So that’s a challenge upon itself, because we have got people important to the organization of the game out of the office traveling to support this multiple expansion launch around the world. So there are many numbers of challenges associated with this launch.

Medievaldragon: With the Burning Crusade you had a challenge when launching the expansion in Mainland China. They have new regulations to promote a healthy and harmonious online environment, and skeletons were censored in the game. In Wrath of the Lich King, the main theme is the Undead Scourge; and Arthas the Lich King is surrounded of by skeletons everywhere in his armor (shoulders, belt, knees). What are you going to do for the launch of Wrath of the Lich King in Mainland China?

Frank Pearce: We are still going through the process of iterating on that, working with the different government authorities responsible for that, so we don’t actually know specifically what we are gonna change, if anything. We want to make the experience as identical as possible around the world, but we also have to accommodate the local requirements, so we’ll see what happens.

Medievaldragon: What do you personally recommend fans to do once they start reaching the Borean Tundra and Howling Fjord to better improve their initial gaming experience, especially those who engage in power leveling by killing mobs rather than doing the quests?

Frank Pearce: I recommend they get started doing quests, because there are some cool quests associated with the storyline for Wrath of the Lich King; and immediate opportunities to interact and immerse oneself with the Arthas’ storyline.

Is there an area in Northrend like the Dead Mire, with lots of beasties to be killed, and most importantly, herbalized afterwards?

There are areas of Northrend with a lot of herbable (that’s not a word, is it?) mobs, but not as concentrated as the Dead Mire, I think. Have you run The Nexus yet? There’s a big area of the dungeon full of things you can pick apart. Of course, you can’t farm there solo, but it’s something.

I know that mages now make refreshments past level 70 instead of separate food and water, but do vendors sell refreshments as well, or do we still have to buy food and water separately?

I don’t think I’ve run into any vendor-bought food that does that, but if you have Cooking and make your own food, all of the new recipes that regenerate health also regenerate mana.

One comment about the size of Northrend… Finally, please, an answer: Is Northrend bigger than Outland? How much bigger/smaller?

It’s definitely bigger, but I can’t say for sure just how much bigger. The starter zones almost feel twice as large as Hellfire Peninsula was, but I can’t say 100% confidently that Howling Fjord is twice as large as Hellfire Peninsula. It’s just bigger, and it feels much, much bigger. Northrend feels absolutely massive.

Since a lot of classes seem to have gotten AoE capabilities (Rogues have Blade Flurry, Fan of Knives, Killing Spree to do a crapton of damage, all tanks can AoE, and so on), is there any class that can’t AoE attack? Is really weak in that department?

Well, while a lot of classes got new AOE spells/abilities in Wrath of the Lich King, that doesn’t necessarily make them strong in AOE. Rogues of a certain spec can burn some cooldowns, but I wouldn’t call them an AOE class. Shaman are generally regarded as having some of the worst AOE, but they can do it in a pinch too, just like Rogues can. They do have Fire Nova Totem, Chain Lightning, and Elemental Shaman have Thunderstorm. So… it’s situational, I guess. Rogue AOE wouldn’t cut it in some situations, but it’s just fine in others. So, easy answer? Shaman probably are bottom rung on the AOE chart. Hard answer? It depends on what’s going on.

In the WoTLK beta Resto Shaman’s got the talent “Spirit Link”. Whatever happened to it?

It was replaced with Riptide. It wasn’t working out like it was supposed to, was kind of awkward to use with its random elements, and opened up some really cheesy possibilities like using three tanks to tank a raid boss instead of one. Riptide turned out much cooler, I think. I’m loving it on my Resto Shaman.

And mixing that with established ideas, like the Scourge Invasion or the AQ War Effort, makes for an activity that can get everyone involved no matter who you are. But for a future world event, Blizzard needs to mix that in with the lore that they’ve already established — use questing or even phasing, as they’ve done in Wrath already, to bring a bigger story into the picture effectively, and put some real meaning behind the chaos that naturally ensues from pitting player against player.

At last, they need to change the world, permanently, and not in a way we would expect. World events are usually accompanied with new content, obviously, and we all knew that at the end of this event, we’d be headed off to Northrend. But if they’d mixed that in with a real razing of Orgrimmar, or part of Stormwind permanently taken over by the Scourge, or Darnassus falling to the Nerubians, we’d all get a much better souvenir than even the Arcanite Ripper: we’d walk by the fighting in Stormwind or the rubble in Orgrimmar and say, “I remember when those streets were full of innocent citizens, before the Scourge made their terrible mark on this land. Arthas has to pay.”

This was the biggest world event Blizzard has ever tried, and it seems like a player favorite already. But they did stumble a bit — hopefully, the next time our World comes crashing down, Blizzard will make the experience even more epic.

This was certainly the most ambitious world event Blizzard has attempted yet, both reusing some of their old techniques (the Scourge invasion), some newer tricks (a special boss with extra loot, which they learned from the Horseman last year), and even some tricks they picked up from players. But there were certain issues — the timing was just plain bad, and the event really fizzled out rather than finished with a bang.

Despite the issues and the stop-and-start feel of the world event, I had a great time, and a lot of players did, too. Blizzard really is going above and beyond with MMO gameplay lately, both in the world event and in the expansion — no other MMO company is playing with the kinds of mechanics and ideas that Blizzard is tossing around, and that’s awesome. But a future world event will pick up where this one left off, and go beyond. The mechanic of having players affect players is brilliant, and the idea of a temporary third faction worked very well, so that’s definitely an idea that could be reused, in a different form than disease.