I’m not sure how this is connected to the opening of the Gates of of Ahn’Qiraj but there seem to be a world event with the Shade of Eranikus (also seen at the end of the Sunken Temple, one of the most underrated instances) invading Moonglade and sending some “Nightmare Phantasms”.

As seen on the FoH’s thread.

I saved the two main screenshots, the one with the dragon and the one with the invasion. In the case they go down.

I guess it must have something to do with this. (As seen on Pacifist Guild site)

(short version for the lazy)

Some more considerations and anticipations about the future of the PvP in WoW for the next year.

(For what is possible. I’m often mocked because I usually “predict” this and that but I believe that it’s also important to try to anticipate where things are going instead of just stating the obvious after they happen. I’m an observer and that’s what I find interesting.)

This is a collection of interesting comments from Caydiem (and it’s thanks to her that there’s something worth discussing from time to time):

This is a multiplayer game, and we want to encourage people to work as a team. As such, I don’t believe separating out the queues would solve the issues you’re seeking to solve without causing another batch of problems in their place. Queue times would be far longer, for instance, and that’s something that’s already a large complaint. (No, we can’t just whip up cross-realm queues, either; that will take quite some time.) So many people are asking us to stop treating symptoms and start curing the whole thing, and we’re doing everything we can in that direction — but it’s a massive undertaking and thus won’t be done anytime soon.

The separation of the queue would cause further problems and honestly wouldn’t solve a lot of the issues prevalent there. I apologize if you felt it was the answer, but there are many schools of thought on the subject.

The simplest thing you mentioned is to pair “Join as Group” with others who use the feature, and put individuals in their own. However, there are concerns with this method. The field doesn’t consist entirely of pick up groups and incredibly organized teams. There’s a middle ground. The teams had to practice together quite a bit to get to that stage. It’s much harder to learn when you’re being crushed, and thus the powerful remain powerful while the unskilled remain unskilled. There’s not nearly as much chance to “learn2play” in such a system, I’m afraid; joining as individuals will not allow you to get with the same people each time, thus seriously stunting any practice. In addition, it would cause queue problems for the people in Join As Group, as there are scant few people who would play the game that way.

Battlegrounds are about teamwork, and we don’t want to discourage group play.

Cross-realm battleground queues are in consideration already, but it requires tech that isn’t in place, so no, again, not simple. ;) Also, the game “detecting” things like how much fish they caught in a given time — and acting on it — is not something that could be implemented currently, and is in fact another quick fix you seem not to like very much.

To address the whole issue…

The Honor System and PvP is being reviewed, but the fruits of such labor will not come for some time. I appreciate your feedback, but it’s not time yet. No, the Honor System isn’t going to be scrapped, but it will be reworked, with the objective being to reward skill. That’s a long time coming, however. Just because we add these fixes to aid the worst of the symptoms doesn’t mean we’re not treating the problem at large… we are, but it’s going to take a while.

Ideally, the developers want the Honor System to reward skill more than just time investment, and to better reward those fighting more skillful players. They want matchups to be more even and less one-sided. They understand your frustrations, and they’re right there with you.

But currently the game has no real way to understand and track the nebulous thing that is “skill” in PvP. The Honor System would need considerable changes for this idea to occur, and as such, it’s a long way out there.

But it is being talked about. It is something the developers want to do with the game. It just may take us a while to get there.

My idea is that the game will try to move toward the perfect matchmaking (hell, even Koontz suggested it. So it will happen), at least in the longer term.

But to even start to consider that possibility they’ll have to support cross server BGs to have a bigger pool from where to draw the players and “match” their performance. Which is also what Caydiem explained in the comments I quoted. Considering what was hinted at the BlizzCon the cross server BGs won’t be possible till the release of the expansion, so we are talking roughly about June of the next year (just to have an idea of the timeframe).

Now I don’t like at all the direction where all this is going. For a very, very simple reason that everyone seems to forget: There’s no skill in a RPG. Exactly because, in the second we add statistics and complex rulesets where each character is different and can increase its power “artificially” (levels, skills, loot), the “skill” shifts from the one of the player to the one of the character. That’s the essence of an RPG and the “character progression” that also made WoW so successful and addicting (there’s a reason why most of the mmorpgs are RPGs, it’s not just because the producers are stupid).

Simplifying:
Skill = phat leet

Here’s a riddle:
We are in Arathi Basin.

Group 1 is about 15 players with epic mounts.

Group 2 is about 15 players with standard mounts.

Who is more skilled?

—
If this is true and if the new matchmaking system will couple “even” matches and calculate the honor values accordingly, this means that the only way to climb ranks effectively in PvP would be through the access to uber purple loot and with organized guilds supporting you. Which means, once again, that a casual player will have, guess what? NO CHANCE. Because “skill” is for a good 70% about what your character is wearing and with these premises you’ll have no way to progress in PvE (hello 40-men raids and tier 2 and 3 armor) NOR in PvP if this system is going to reward more those that already “have”. Something that Caydiem (that looks smarter than the actual designers) summarized with:
“The powerful remain powerful while the unskilled remain unskilled.”

Which is exactly what will happen in the perfect matchmaking service + ladder system.

This concept is rather important and more than how it appears. In fact it makes obvious another one that may appear silly but that is simply true: DAoC’s Realm Points mechanic is as good as it can be.

You really cannot find a better progression system for PvP and for a very simple reason (again). This is an RPG and the only mechanics that could be appropriate (fit) are RPG mechanics. In fact the hypothesized ladder system rewarding “skill” that WoW could implement in the next year can surely work and it is demonstrated to work for other games (for example Warcraft the RTS). BUT ONLY if you discard every kind of persistent character development. Simple example: in Warcraft 3 your heroes can “level up”, which is an RPG mechanic (and that, still, some consider like an intrusion), but that progression lasts only for the duration of one match. It’s self-contained and you cannot “port” any of your progression from a session to the other. In fact the only thing you are porting is your “skill”.

So let me repeat the concept: it’s absolutely impossible to create a system that can measure “skill” in a RPG. And even if you were able to create this chimera and factor absolutely everything (loot, classes perks and roles, skills, levels, ping values etc..) you would obtain a game where the progression would be simply nullificated. You would basically cross the fence and transform the RPG into something completely different. Something that would remind what SOE did recently with SWG and that I’m not sure the WoW’s players around the world would appreciate (considering how they are rabid about simplified and overstretched character progression).

My “prediction” is that Blizzard will surely burn a lot of resources and rewrite significant parts of the current game to reach that goal. I’m also sure that they’ll manage to build a matchmaking service as good as it can be. But the point is that it will remain an half-assed PvP system not better than the half-assed system we have right now. Because the goals and the solutions they are chasing are not appropriate and will continue to be problematic and rise problems till they won’t accept that “skill” is a concept that cannot fit in a RPG without erasing or dumbing down the character progression.

Which also brings to the commonplace that says that you cannot expect the PvP to work in a PvE game. Because “skill” and RPGs are antithetic. You cannot invent any fancy solution to bring them close without a fucked up outcome.

Of course I also disagree with the commonplaces. DAoC, in fact, has a very good PvP character progression done through Realm Ranks that has never been considered a big problem and that added a lot of “spice” to the game. But this is another important topic that I won’t comment here.

Caydiem:
Yes, the developers are working on bringing PvP back into the world itself rather than just Battlegrounds.

No, I don’t have any details to share… yet. ;)

COMEDY GOLD on the recent changes to the BattleGrounds and the 10-minute rule that “slipped” in the patch:

(about the 10-minute rule)
I just spoke with Kalgan, and he explained the reasoning behind this change.

As you know, there are several groups out there who are very good at their particular Battleground, and seeing such a group on the opposite team when you’re in a pick-up group can be discouraging. For some, this means they don’t even try to win; they AFK out or fish until such time as the Battleground ends, get their token, and go back into the queue.

This change is meant to encourage groups of all skill levels to put in effort towards winning. Maybe you can hold one or two bases in Arathi Basin; maybe you can keep them from grabbing three flags in ten minutes with a good defense. The idea is to give players incentive to try and fight rather than give up before the match truly gets going.

I will endeavor to clear up the controversy and confusion surrounding the “ten-minute rule.”

The idea that players would have to remain in battlegrounds for ten minutes before they’d receive a Mark of Honor for losing was one the developers were seriously considering as an effort to reduce the incentive players had to lose a battle quickly. The concept was simple: it would give players incentive to try and stay in, rather than giving up and allowing a quick loss without any effort expended. However, during further discussions, it was decided that adding a mild punishment to those who /afk out of battlegrounds, in the form of a requeue timer (Deserter debuff), would be preferable to the old “ten-minute rule” idea. In addition, since the problem was primarily found in Arathi Basin matches held during the Arathi Basin “holiday,” the developers chose to improve the way in which bonus honor was awarded during Arathi Basin holidays rather than institute the ten-minute rule.

The ten-minute rule had been implemented as part of 1.9, and was set to be removed from 1.9 as the Deserter debuff was put in place. Unfortunately, because 1.8.4 was developed simultaneously with 1.9, the ten-minute rule had actually made its way into 1.8.4 too (which was tested and signed off upon some time ago, around the time this change was being implemented). As such, the ten-minute rule mistakenly went live.

This was not intended by our development team, and we sincerely apologize for the inconvenience. The ten-minute rule does not exist on the patch 1.9 test versions that have been on the test realms for some time now (with the exception of Warsong Gulch, which is being fixed), reflecting the fact that the Deserter debuff was intended as a replacement rather than an addition to this mechanic. We intend to fix this bug in a server-side hotfix soon.

Thank you for your patience throughout this. We’re keeping a close eye on PvP, battlegrounds, and the Honor System, and will continue to make changes as warranted.

So the “intended” changes are more stupid than the 10-minute rule.

Now if you happen to join as a random group the BG camped by the farming guild in uber purple you have two wonderful, extremely fun choices:
1- Exit the BG and enjoy another fun penalty on the queue (because they weren’t long enough)
2- REALLY go fishing so that the BG is over quickly and you can cash at least the mark of honor.

Basically we start from the 10-minute workaround, which was designed so that the players were encouraged to hold the battle for at least 10 minutes and get the mark of honor.

I’m not inventing anything. Requoting:

This change is meant to encourage groups of all skill levels to put in effort towards winning. Maybe you can hold one or two bases in Arathi Basin; maybe you can keep them from grabbing three flags in ten minutes with a good defense. The idea is to give players incentive to try and fight rather than give up before the match truly gets going.

So the goal is again to encourage you to fight instead of “giving up”.

And now the smartest of all changes! Instead of the 10 minute rule, they penalize you if you leave the BG with a fancy “queue debuff”.

What’s the result? That this will encourage the players not to fight. But to give up and sit in a BG so that the farming guild will win as fast as possible, cash the mark and requeue without the penalty.

So, basically, they started to think a way to ENCOURAGE the players to fight and finished to encourage them to completely surrender and “go fishing”. Great work!

It’s not only a solution that sucks (it’s blatantly a stupid and clunky workaround) but it’s also completely illogic since it contradicts the original premises:

For some, this means they don’t even try to win; they AFK out or fish until such time as the Battleground ends, get their token, and go back into the queue.

Which is EXACTLY what is going to happen (the fishing part) if they introduce the penalty to the queue.

—
Now. I rant and point my finger with no shame because the BGs are completely retarded (surpassed only by the Honor system) but also EXTREMELY EASY to fix.

In fact all these problems that are coming up (give a look to this, and Tobold’s comments) are a fucking consequence of a model that just doesn’t work and that was blatantly broken:

The fact is that the PvP in WoW doesn’t exist. The war doesn’t exist. It’s all faked in a sort of detached arcade mode that roleplays itself, taking place somewhere else in the form of a detached, instanced zone. The PvP isn’t consistent, despite the two factions are at war from the “lore” point of view, they aren’t in the game. They don’t fight over something. They don’t conquer nor control (at least in the BGs, on the PvP servers the situation was better before they introduced the honor points). So it’s obvious how the whole and only purpose of the PvP is just the personal gain. A personal gain that can easily be exploited since the “war” exists just as a false excuse. As a pretence.

Basically the problems Tobold noted are just the consequence of a system that is not consistent. It doesn’t simulate what matters and the obvious result is about the players working around the faked war to reach the actual REAL, concrete goal: the personal reward.

Once again the players outsmart the designers and show them where their ideas are broken and pretentious.

Now my belief is that if you fix the model (which would be extremely easy) all the other multiple problems that rose as a consequence will simply vanish without the need of workarounds and workarounds to previous workarounds.

So, concretely, how to fix the model?

It’s simple: remove those fucking retarded diminishing returns on Honor Kills. In the BGs only. Give us FULL CREDIT because we are going in a BG with the purpose to kill. And that’s what the system should reward.

If we get normal credit for the direct kills, a group of PUGs will be encouraged, guess what?, to fight. Because even in the worst situation possible you can still get some kills even if the other group is in uber purple and owning your Arathi Basin session. Plus you’d actually BE ENCOURAGED to fight the bigger guys because the honor reward increases consistently if you kill a much higher rank than yours. While “giving up” will make you just lose honor points.

The logic is simple. We are joining for a fight. So give us credit for this fight.

At the same time, remove the Honor reward for direct kills OUTSIDE the BGs. Completely. As it was on the PvP servers before this horrid Honor System was introduced. And give us, instead, PvP goals to accomplish (PvP hotspots), like PvP towers and outposts to conquer, upgrade and hold.

This would discourage the annoying, disruptive ganking and will give the world some decent PvP depth that is currently totally missing.

(and it was all explained back then, with a longer rant here.)

To conclude, the most fun part. The first quote from Caydiem is dated: 12/6/2005 8:54:52 PM WEST The second quote: 12/7/2005 1:59:49 AM WEST

How can both of these be true? If she went to Kalgan today and said “The players want to know why we implemented a ten minute rule” shouldn’t he have looked at her and said “You mean the ten minute rule we scrapped and never made implemented?”

Maybe they should read Raph’s guide:

“customers see through falsehood really quickly,”

Haha.

EDIIT- Update on the cheap drama:

“How is it, then, that you received an explanation for why it was implemented from the developers when it wasn’t supposed to be implemented?”

A large amount of data runs through our hands on any given day. I asked Kalgan plainly what the reasoning was behind the ten minute rule in Battlegrounds, and he told me, which I then related to you. I’m sure he could tell me about any number of mechanics that almost made it into the game but didn’t if I asked him first thing in the morning. Shortly after I spoke to him he ran back down to me, saying it shouldn’t have been implemented at all, and explained what happened. Instead of simply announcing a hotfix later, he and I wrote up the above message with the explanations therein.

This isn’t attempting to pull the wool over your eyes. We’re human. We made a mistake. Our hotfix team is working to correct it as I type this.

Which fits with my original comment.

The fact that the change was deliberate and not a mistake makes them look even dumber.

(For simplified explanations about what happened give a look to my summary)

From Mark Asher’s hype blog.

“YAY! EPIX!”

Patch notes leaked as usual. I was actually expecting the test servers to go up on Tuesday, at least if they want this patch out before Christmas. The notes are what matters though.

I’m posting on the fly, so I’ll need to format. Maybe comment later.

EDIT- Since the test server is up and the patch notes officially out, I remove them from here.

—
Well, not much to comment, actually. lots of minor changes and fixes, all the major features were already known and changes to the classes that I don’t feel like commenting.

I noticed the huge nerf to Warrior’s Enrage, though.

The leak seems to come from here, which also has the updated stats of some Tier 2 armor sets.

EDIT- The patch notes will be available here later on.

Mannoroth just disconnected everyone. When it was back there was no lag, but also no NPCs.

Mages are selling ports at 1G. Some people reported that all mobs in MC are gone with the exception of the bosses.

Other people decided to go raid Undercity, then they remembered that they’ll have to walk till there.

On the forums Blizzard announced a lame change to the instances reset timers that will start with the next patch (probably tomorrow the test servers will go up). It was on FoH’s forums (still dead) a month ago. The reason is just to band-aid some exploits that they cannot fix.

Fun times.

The warrior Tier 2 armor wins hands down not only compared to the other similar sets, but probably even as uglier and most ridiculous set EVER (well, beside the shoulder peens):

Removing the blades on the shoulders and head would make the set look almost acceptable, but then my warrior would look exactly like a football player…

I wish armors would look, you know, like metal.

But then I’m far from hoping to get Tier 2 armor for my dwarf warrior.

Other sets in the Underdev page, along with a richer preview about the content.

Fancy title for the same thing.

I spent some time to work on one of my tiny UI addons to add more functions and keep it polished. Now it’s perfectly integrated with CTMod and by pressing on its button (on the Misc tab of CTMod panel) you can toggle between various modes that let you select the delay in seconds before it automatically joins the BattleGround.

I just spotted a comment from Darniaq on Heartless blog which simplifies in a wonderful way another core problem:

It is dominated by Hardcore because the very system requires hardcore levels of investment. If a system is designed to require such dedication, then regardless of who you say it’s for, it will be dominated by hardcore. Because it’s easier for them to do it than casuals.