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Live
PTR
10.1.0
PTR
10.1.5
News
Live
5.1 Pet Battle Improvements: Battle-Stones, UI Features
5.1 introduces many quality-of-life fixes for fans of pet battles, from battle stones that let you upgrade the quality of your favorite pet, to UI improvements showing pet rarity and levels of wild battle pets. We've covered the big ones below!
If you're looking to get started on pet battles, check out our interactive
battle pet map
and
visual database
, as well as WarcraftPets'
pet battle tools
!
Pet Battle Journal: Sort Features
Several search filters have been added to the Pet Battle Journal.
Name: Sort pets in alphabetical order.
Level: Search by highest to lowest.
Rarity: Group pets together by Rare, Uncommon, Common, and Poor quality.
Type: Group pets by family (Beast, Mechanical, etc).
Zone Maps: Levels of Wild Battle Pets
Players can now see the levels of wild battle pets per zone with the in-game map. The levels show up beneath the zone's name, colored green, yellow, or orange depending on the
Live
Mists of Pandaria Beta: New Maps, Icons, NPCs, Quests, and More
We had a huge patch
last night and there's a lot more information to cover!
First off, in the biggest news,
achievements will be account bound
. Blizzard had hinted they really wanted to do this, but didn't know if they'd have the time. They are now mostly account bound!
Secondly, we datamined more
quests
,
NPCs
, and icons. We also previewed the new features in the Pet Battle system, as well as general changes such as spellbook improvements and new female Pandaren fur markings.
Pet Battles
Pet Battles
Do you want to be the best, that no one ever was?
After learning
Battle Pet Training
from a Master Pet Tamer such as
Marcus Jensen
in Goldshire, you will be able to both capture wild pets and battle them. Both types will be tracked on your minimap. The screenshots below show a pet battle we initiated with a
Forest Spiderling
in Northern Stranglethorn.
Live
Patch 4.2: Two New Hunter Pets, Molten Cats, and Dungeon Journal Interface Changes
There are a couple exciting things still left on 4.2's PTR worth checking out, so we've rounded them up here. These topics include two new hunter pets (
following up from Blizzard's original eight they introduced last week
), some new vanity items including a staff that turns you into a molten cat, and a lot of Dungeon Journal changes for functionality and appearance (it's looking very good).
We'll start with the hunter pets first since a lot of you were unimpressed with the five spiders, two spectral cats, and the reskinned owl of last week. Blizzard apparently listened to the masses and decided to add two very cool new models with their own trick for taming them.
Remaining Hunter Pets
Karkin
Karkin spawns in Fireplume Peak--you'll reach him by jumping off Skitterflame's Ledge. He is a crab with a shiny metallic skin that casts a frontal fire attack from range. Again, you will have to jump between floating rocks to get in range to tame Karkin, but not too close or else you’ll be attacked.
Skarr[/h3
Live
Blizzard's Third Q+A Answered, Armor and Weapons Selected for Next Topic
Blizzard just posted their next set of answers to the
their third global Q+A session they held through the forums
recently. Surprisingly, the traditionally dry and technical topic of user interfaces provided the community with what we believe are the best set of questions and answers thus far; they make for the most riveting read, at least! From big to small, questions this time around address real issues that we've been wondering--like how come the default backpack hasn't gotten an upgrade in the past six years or why isn't World of Warcraft's default UI easily rearranged like in other games?
There will be more of these sessions coming up in the near future as well. The topic of
Armor and Weapons
is slated to be tackled next; starting at 4PM PDT today, Blizzard will field questions from NA players. We'll have another post when those go live.
Some of the topics of the questions they were asked include:
Combat Log Improvements
Overpowered Addons
Order of Characters on Select Screen
Milling/Prospecting Tedium[/l
Live
The Weekly Marmot - How Addons Alter Game Design
This week, we look at addons from a little bit different of a perspective than usual. Instead of looking at what addons can do to affect the way you play directly, I get into some behind-the-scenes discussion of how addons change the way the developers have to approach their design of things like class and encounter balance. Does allowing players to create addons like DBM hurt the game? Or is there actually some benefit?
Live
Cataclysm Beta (Build 12857): New Glyph UI + Eclipse Bar Redesign
You may have remembered hearing that
Glyphs
were changing from consumable items to learnable skills. Last build we saw the makings of that—now, when you use a glyph, it goes into your general tab of the spellbook, ready to be used whenever you want to place it. Well in this latest build Blizzard has taken it a step futher and given the glyphs tab of your talent frame a complete makeover!
First off they've vastly increased the size of the frame—it's now the same size as the talent frame. You now have
NINE
glyphs to select: 3 Prime, 3 Major, and 3 Minor. On the right side of the panel you will have a list of all learned and unlearned glyphs. Blizzard was also kind enough to add some advanced glyph searching! No need to scroll down the list forever trying to find that one pesky glyph to switch in.
Screenshots
[b
Live
Cataclysm Beta (Build 12759) UI Changes!
A new beta build has just been deployed on the beta realms and with it came some excellent changes to the UI that I think everyone will enjoy.
First off
Mounts
and
Companion Pets
have moved out of the character pane and into their own tabs in the spell book. This allows a player to easily browse through the pages looking for the right mount or pets to add to your bars instead of guessing if that's the right icon for your
Onyx Netherwing Drake
.
There was one other things that got a
much
needed overhaul was the Video Settings window. Now all the sliders have been removed and turned into drop downs, this way you no longer have to guess what each section of the sliding bar. All settings have different options ranging from the standard fare of Low, Fair, Good, High and Ultra to simple Enabled or Disabled options.
Another small addition is you're now able to
"learn"
Glyphs and they show up in your general tab of your spellbook. You will automatically learn a glyph upon purchasing and using the glyph item. Now, whenever you want to change glyphs you will no longer have to run out and buy new ones and can just apply them directly from the spellbook.
Blizzard also added a tweak for the new streaming client t
Live
Cataclysm: New Raid Frames and Reforging(?)
In a recent Cataclysm beta build Blizzard introduced
new raid frames
, to allow better testing (since there are no new raids enabled) they have enabled them as party frames. The new raid frames are vastly different from the live version. Taking some design aspects of popular addons like
Grid
I believe Blizzard has designed raid frames that I personally might not have to use an addon for!
Also added in the newest build,
Reforging
has finally made its appearance. Performed by Highborne Thaumaturges in the major cities, reforging allows you take secondary stats on your armor and convert them to another secondary stat. An example used by the in-game thaumaturges is, if you have an item that increases hit rating but you would rather it increase your haste rating you can convert the hit to haste for a price.
Unfortunately we are unable to test reforging to get more exact information, as it is currently bugged!
Live
Dolby Axon Releases Client API
So I don't know if anyone but me is following what Dolby is doing with their new
Axon
service, but it's something that I've been interested in so I thought I'd take a moment to mention it here.
For those of you who don't know, Dolby Axon is a VoIP service that Dolby has created, intended to fulfill the same needs as a Ventrilo or TeamSpeak server , but with a lot of extra functionality—for example, Axon can actually
position
your voice in 3D so you can actually hear teammates located in a particular spot in full surround.
Well Axon has just released an API for their desktop client, which has the potential to mean even
more
interesting developments.
Live
Cataclysm Beta: UI Changes
With the upcoming Cataclysm expansion finally hitting an official closed beta, there has been a torrent of new information for everyone to feast their eyes on. With that being said, as with every expansion before Cataclysm, there are always an influx of User Interface changes and we have the low down on what has changed so far in the beta.
Come check out the full preview after the break!
Live
Pawn, Now with Added Wowhead Awesome
Some of you may know about this little addon from the last time we
mentioned
it, but for those who don't here's a little explanation:
Pawn
is an addon that takes the stats from an item you are looking at and gives it a score based on a weight scale, very similar to our own stat weighting system. The higher the score the "better" the item is according to the weight scales you design.
And now, Pawn users will be happy to know that the team over there has added a little extra awesome into the addon by using our
stat-weights
by default!
To get Pawn you can find it on our sister site
WoWInterface
.
http://www.wowinterface.com/downloads/info7296-Pawn.html
Live
Quest Tracking Feature Preview
Blizzard has released a
preview
of the new quest tracking feature on the official website!
The new page gives a full rundown on what you can expect to see in the Quest Tracker that's scheduled to come out with the new patch.
We've been testing out an all-new Quest Tracking feature which we plan to include in content update 3.3. Read our preview to learn how the World of Warcraft questing experience will be vastly improved in content update 3.3 for characters of all levels here:
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/3p3/newquestui.xml
For more information on patch 3.3, check out our
extensive guide
!
Live
MMOUI - Minion in Beta
A few weeks ago
WoWInterface
announced a project called MMOUI Minion. The Minion was to be a small and light program that keeps track on your addons, updates them, allows you to download new ones, and pretty much makes your life easier. For more details, check
this blog
.
Now the beta version of the Minion is out! Continue reading to see what
Cairenn
and the team have to say.
Live
Introducing MMOUI Minion!
So our friends at
WoWInterface
are rolling out a
very
exciting new project.
It's called
MMOUI Minion
, and it's exactly what we've always wanted from an AddOn site—a simple, easy to use client that lets you manage your addons, update them all with a single click (or update them automatically when new versions come out), and does it all with the full permission of the authors and the sites involved—without gimping your features
or
your download speeds.
Cairenn
(who I'm a big fan of) and the team over there are just about to enter open beta, and they're looking for input from the Wowhead community. I'm looking forward to collecting a lot of feedback over here to give them—don't you guys let me down. ;)
We’ve got an FAQ for you guys here after the break (in addition to the more complete FAQ at WoWInterface
here
), as well as a couple of juicy screenshots after the break!
Live
WoWInterface Exclusive: The WoW Addon Store
Our sister site,
WoWInterface
, has got some breaking news on the latest major change to Blizzard's Addon system: The Blizzard Addon Store.
This is a gutsy decision on Blizzard's part—especially because adopting this business plan will make sites like WoWInterface, Curse, and UI.Worldofwar.net entirely obsolete—WoWI has already announced plans to shut down.
I encourage everyone to read the
announcement
, and to post their thoughts and opinions.
Live
ZAM Interviews MDY Lawyer on Addon Policy
So our friends over at the ZAM.com news site have posted a very interesting interview—this time with a lady named Connie Mableson.
Connie is the lawyer who represented MDY (known to most of you as the company that created the infamous "Glider" program) in the legal action that took place between Blizzard and MDY. She also represented the very first business to try and make money off of the Internet, was the first lawyer to open a law office in a virtual world—in this case, Second Life. She's
also
an avid WoW player, and she has some very interesting theories about the motivating factors behind Blizzard's recent UI policy change.
Having read the article, I don't agree with the conclusions she's come to. But either way, it's interesting to see her opinion on a highly controversial topic.
Head on over to ZAM.com to
check it out!
Live
Raider Apprentice - Addons
You ever found desktop so full of icons that you almost need to use a search engine to find the folder you need? Or your desk/working place literally hidden by mountains of papers, hole-punchers, sticky notes, staplers, folders, binders, pens and other office tools? Well, things like that can happen in WoW too, and I am an unfortunate victim of Addon addiction.
Live
It's Flat! Using Wowhead Maps
"Ka-kaw!"
The parrot spoke in a language I could not understand. Had I a cracker, I might try to coax the rainbow-colored Polly into guiding me to the nearest encampment...but empty-handed, I was forced to go it alone – all alone in the deep, damp jungle. The night was quickly approaching as the sun sat midway on the horizon. Unlike some of my unfortunate companions, I was smart enough to have brought my own set of charts and maps...but I suddenly realized that without proper knowledge I may as well not even possess them.
Insert Wowhead. We have a wonderful tool here aptly named
Wowhead Maps
. In this blog entry I will introduce the mapping system and show how to use it to explore, pinpoint, and share destinations with others. Stick around, it's definitely going to be a mappy New Year!
Live
WoWInterface's Pick of the Week
Our Pick of the Week today is a new addon to arrange your buffs with, called
BuffHUD
.
Keep reading to learn more about BuffHUD and to see a screenshot of it in action.
Live
Five Handy Macros (Yes, I use them!)
Ever wanted more bag space? How about more slots on the toolbar? Here's a list of five practical macros which I enjoy myself and would like to share with other players embarking on their epic journey to Northrend. These work even if one doesn't have the expansion. Simply copy and paste the code into the new macro text area (type /macro to start) and
voila!
A Micro-Macro Philosophy
A macro should be something that helps a player out, not burden them or make their play experience unwieldy. So that said, a macro should meet at least two of the following three stipulations to make it on the list:
A macro should not play the game for you, but help you play the game,
A macro must save space on the hotbar,
A macro must provide functionality which, by default, was difficult to achieve.
Check out the 5 macros, after the jump!
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