Big News Of The Week

Money Money Money Money. Money!

In two mostly unrelated moves this week, Blizzard announced the upcoming sale of tickets for Blizzcon 2010, and they released the beta version of their long-rumored remote auction house application. The tickets are going to cost you $150 each, while the auction house application is going to cost you $150 over a period of about 4.2 years.

Rumors And Scuttlebutt

Blizzard Is Taking AVR Out!

Over on the UI And Macros forum, Blizzard Community Manager Bashiok called out his opponent for the world championship: The relatively new mod AVR. Bashiok said

“This is a notice that we’re making changes in 3.3.5 in attempts to break the ability for the AVR (Augmented Virtual Reality) mod to continue functioning. For those unaware, this mod allows players to draw in the 3D space of the game world, which can then be shared with others who are also using the mod. In some cases this manifests itself through drawing/tagging/defacing the game world, but more popularly is used to give visual guides for dungeon and raid encounters.”

Town Cryer

Cassi C. writes: I have a tight raid schedule and real life schedule and sometimes they overlap each other without warning. For example: I am a student still and things such as reports, projects, and work in general come up without warning along with a raid that i signed up for earlier. I cant decide what to do! Do i blow off the raid to do my work or do i wait till late at night to start/do my work? If i blow off the raid then i have a chance to get screamed at or kicked from guild or even uninvited from raids, however, if i delay my work i could get a bad grade and be screamed at, yet again.

Cataclysmic Drop Of The Week

Five Big Dungeons For You

It’s time to start working on something that is going to take some coordination to pull off before Cataclysm, and that is the Classic Raider achievement.

Additional show content provided by Darrell the Tipgiver, Steve “Buxley” Pietrowicz, James “Acuzod” Jefferies and the outstanding Instance Community.

Special thanks to DogHouse Systems, FigurePrints!, TypeFrag and SquareSpace for sponsoring this episode.

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Big News Of The Week

Blizzard Wants You! Well, Maybe Someone Like You.

That big game shop named for a snowstorm this week announced the imminent arrival of their closed beta test for the third expansion to World Of Warcraft: Cataclysm. The beta will be via invite only through Battle.net, and Blizzard has not yet announced an exact start date, but we have some ideas.

Rumors And Scuttlebutt

Blizzard Professes Interest In Your Chosen Jobs

There is so much to talk about on this topic that it fills our entire Rumors And Scuttlebutt segment this week. In a huge post, Blizzard admitted to finishing their analysis of professions in WoW for Cataclysm, and shared some of their notes. It arrived as a forum post by Wryxian, who said

While the Cataclysm updates to many of the professions are still deep in development, we wanted to share some of the work that’s been going on, as well as a high-level look at any lessons learned or changes to their underlying philosophies during the design process. Please be aware that not all professions have the same extent of information available right now, but each is receiving the same love and attention as the next.

Town Cryer

Michael Y. writes: I’m a level 80 shaman and my dad is a level 80 paladin. He hit 80 recently, and I’ve started to show him around the world of instances. He only has one set of gear and refuses to go dual-spec. Unfortunately, since he wants to tank, his gear is all tanking gear. I’ve tried to persuade him to get dual-specced, or at least get a set of dps gear, but he doesn’t want to. Normally, I’d just tell him to do it right, or don’t do it at all, but he’s my dad and I want to have a good time with him and for him to have fun too. What should I do?

Cataclysmic Drop Of The Week

Rare Reins

In this, our second in a limited series of suggestions for activities you can undertake this week to prepare for Cataclysm and not miss something that might be going away, we’re highlighting an activity that few have seen through, and may never be possible after 4.0. That is: Farming Baron Rivendare for the Deathcharger’s Reins.

Additional show content provided by Darrell the Tipgiver, Steve “Buxley” Pietrowicz, James “Acuzod” Jefferies and the outstanding Instance Community.

Special thanks to DogHouse Systems, FigurePrints!, TypeFrag and SquareSpace for sponsoring this episode.

Don’t forget, when you signup for Squarespace, use the code PC at checkout for 10% off the lifetime of your account!

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Big News Of The Week

That’s Right: It Could Kill Everything

This week, Blizzard unveiled the latest in their in-depth examination of content forthcoming in Cataclysm: The Halls of Origination. It is a level-85 five-player dungeon in Uldum, featuring an unparalleled journey through the timeless titan construction and seven unique boss fights. Hidden deep within its halls lies an ancient treasure that, if placed in the wrong hands, could endanger all life on Azeroth!

Rumors And Scuttlebutt

Finding Out Who Your Real Friends Are

Blizzard officially announced their long-planned Battle.net Real ID system this week, raising many more questions than were answered on their new service website. As previously stated, the new chat system will allow for cross-game chat in Blizzard games on Battle.net, the ability to see your friends on any character that they’ve created, broadcast announcements, and better see what your friends are doing in-game.

Mandatory Glyphs And Talents Are A Drag

Our good friend the Blizzard Lead Developer Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street invaded a thread in the forums on talent frustrations with a quote that buttoned up a really long jacket. Ghostcrawler said:

“We’re stuck in this trap sometimes where players want glyphs and talents to be meaningful but optional. That’s a pretty narrow design space. If we make a talent that affects Shield Wall, then it feels mandatory. If we make no talent that affects Shield Wall, then it feels like the talents aren’t affecting things you actually care about and can become this potentially marginalized aspect of the game. The argument seems to be that if you didn’t have to get Improved Disciplines, that you could get some other potentially juicy talent. True. The same would be true if you didn’t have to get Shockwave or if paladins didn’t have to get Ardent Defender. You need Improved Disciplines, but they need Vindication.

My point is that classes are balanced as part of their entire package. You aren’t balanced at the core level with talents and glyphs thrown on as gravy on top of that. Now we are making an attempt with Cataclysm to give players more options in how they talent. But still if you imagine a talent tree in which every single talent is optional, it’s also hard to imagine how every single talent is interesting or powerful enough.”

Town Cryer

Garrond writes: I’ve been given an invite to the Cataclysm alpha by someone I know who works at Blizzard. You might think this is great for any wow fan, but normally I’m the kind of person who stears well clear of spoilers for any game that I think I’ll play. I try and avoid any intimate details of new content – things like screenshots/videos or leaks about lore. Should I let my normal reluctance to ‘spoil’ new content stop me from jumping in the alpha? Or do you think that as I’ll actually be playing the game, rather than seeing videos or hearing about it, I wont actually be spoiling anything – i’ll be experienceing it first hand months before anyone else?

Joshua H. writes: I haven’t played WoW for a good six months so far, and I know that I’m missing it. But I’m no good at the level 80 content and find myself with nothing to do when I have gone back for a week or so at a time. So my question to you is this: do I go back to WoW before Cataclysm, or after? Is there content that will keep my leveling enjoying self happy, or should I just wait until I can start new characters in a new world?

Cataclysmic Drop Of The Week

We’re Running Out Of Time

This week on The Instance, we’re taking Drop Of The Week in a unique direction for a while – The Cataclysmic drop for the next few episodes is going to answer the question that we’ve gotten the most for the last few months – “what do I do before the Cataclysm?” Specifically, we’re going to use this series of segments to highlight something that you could do that you may never get to do again. And we’re kicking it off this week with some dungeons.

Additional show content provided by Darrell the Tipgiver, Steve “Buxley” Pietrowicz, James “Acuzod” Jefferies and the outstanding Instance Community.

Special thanks to DogHouse Systems, FigurePrints!, TypeFrag and SquareSpace for sponsoring this episode.

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Big News Of The Week

Cataclysm Details Are In Full Effect

In what can only be perceived as a sign that the beta is imminent, Blizzard dropped a veritable ton of information on us this week regarding the forthcoming third expansion to World Of Warcraft: Cataclysm. We got raiding news, PvP news, new art to look at, and all sorts of new controversies to traverse.

Rumors And Scuttlebutt

Simplifying The Badges System Is Complicated

Blizzard Community Manager Bashiok broke the ice on possible changes coming to the game in Cataclysm with regard to those bits of currency you earn when you defeat dungeon bosses or win battlegrounds. In the first part of his post on the forums, Bashiok said:

Our primary goal when approaching badges in Cataclysm is to address a lot of the confusion that comes with these currency systems. To that end we’re changing badges to a more straightforward point system, similar to the ones we’ve used for a while for Arenas and Battlegrounds.

Bashiok noted that your path to obtaining PvP gear may change pretty dramatically in Cataclysm, saying:

The Rated Battlegrounds and Arenas will be sharing this same point type. Because of that, it will in fact be possible to get the best PvP items without setting foot in Arena; however, more powerful armor and weapons will of course require more Conquest points, so players who win their matches more often will still gear up faster. We’re removing personal rating requirements on almost all items; they’re definitely removed for weapons.

This wasn’t enough, and Blizzard Community Manager Bornakk followed up with another post clarifying the situation about weapons:

There will be two tiers of PvP weapons in Cataclysm. The lower tier weapons will correspond in quality to items found in the latest raid tier on normal difficulty and cost only Conquest Points. The higher tier weapons will correspond in quality to items found in the latest raid tier on Heroic difficulty and will have a minimum personal rating requirement in addition to costing Conquest Points. All of the highest-stat PvP armor, including shoulder and head pieces, will cost only Conquest Points and have no rating requirements.

Town Cryer

Jeff H. writes: Besides the barrens and thousands needles, where will be the best places to take pictures before Cataclysm?

Drop Of The Week

Making Pets Easier

This one starts with an e-mail from Russell E., who wrote:

Is there an addon out there that will randomly select a Non Combat Pet for me? How about the same for my mounts?

Why yes there are, Russell, and we’ve got just the suggestion for you and every player in the game.

MiniPet is our favorite mod for summoning a random pet with one key click. It does more than that. But you don’t need a mod. You just need this macro:

/run CallCompanion(“CRITTER”,random(GetNumCompanions(“CRITTER”)))

GoGoMount is our favorite mod for mounting on one key click. It picks the best mount for the situation you’re in, every time.

Additional show content provided by Darrell the Tipgiver, Steve “Buxley” Pietrowicz, James “Acuzod” Jefferies and the outstanding Instance Community.

Special thanks to DogHouse Systems, FigurePrints!, TypeFrag and SquareSpace for sponsoring this episode.

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