◊ zeidrich

For history's sake. This wasn't always the case. It used to be that every mob had a particular set of avoidance abilities. A cat, for instance, could dodge, but not parry or block. Only mobs with shields could block. Etc. But every mob was given a 20% base avoidance rate. So a cat, who could only dodge for instance, would have a 5% chance to dodge, and then to fill in the rest of the avoidance, they would have a 15% chance to be missed. As well, I don't believe that this could be countered by +hit gear, but I'm not sure on that. Meanwhile, a humanoid with a shield would have the typical 5% chance to dodge, 5% chance to parry, 5% chance to block and 5% chance to be missed.

Because of the disconnect in abilities, and questions about why the miss rate was incorrect, and probably other concerns about balance, they decided to just flatly give all mobs the ability do dodge, block and parry.

This happened in 1.3:

WoW -> Patch Notes -> 1.3

 

Veneda

On the "important stats" note...

Since DK's won't have mana bar, INT won't have any use for them. It's first thing that will make their itemization different from prot paladins. Additionally, it limits overlapping with spell casters gear (rings, necks), as they usually spend good part of the itemization budget on INT (which would be a wasted stat for DK).

I wonder how it's going to be resolved. It seems like the solution might be either complete detaching DK casting abilities mechanics from caster stats (and making them scale with melee stats), or giving them some class ability that will turn intellect into useful stat.

 

Gj

More pure speculation! A DK could have a number of weapon enchants similar to the shaman that essentially can increase aggro with each attack (a bit like rockbiter perhaps) and which can be effected with +damage gear. Maybe a selection of cleave/swipe style attacks that can allow multitarget aggro. Their +damage could also then scale some kind of magic buff allowing for mitigation of various types of attacks.

What I'm really interested in is how the talent trees will be structured. A lot of people are speculating a tree similar to the warriors where you have two different DPS style trees and a protection tree. I think it would be a lot more interesting to not have a simple tanking tree, instead a variety of playstyles for their tanking. Think arms/fury but for tanking instead of DPS. This would also give some variety to the tanking role, making it more fun to try out different tank specs.

Anyway that's my speculative ranting for the week.

 

Lysara

A page on the Dragonblight zone has been added to the official site:
World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King


Things of note:
- The Scarlet Crusade is indeed present in Northrend, though under the name Scarlet Onslaught.
- The Icecrown Glacier entrance, Angrathar the Wrath Gate, is located in the Dragonblight.
- Blizzard continues to portray Malygos more and more insane and power-hungry.


That last one in particular kind of bugs me. Malygos wanting to put a stop to the uncontrolled use of magic, to avoid another disaster like the Legion invasion during the War of the Ancients, still made some sense. But they're slowly changing Malygos from a wise Aspect concerned about Azeroth into what is essentially a Blue Deathwing.

 

Veneda

Considering that in TBC representatives of newly introduced race can slay their very own king, savior and guide (twice - in raid instance, then again in 5 men group), I would say this path is well trodden already.

Come to think about it, putting down those insane characters is getting boring. Insane Kael, insane Illidan, now Malygos... I wonder when Thall goes nuts and 25 heroes will have to "cure" him.

 

Grungo

Do we know for sure that Death Knights won't have a mana bar? I know it's been said that they're using a rune-based energy system, but has there been official word that the runes are all that power their spells/abilities? I had pictured runes being something along the lines of rogue combo points in reverse - they regen naturally, and your special abilities consume them. But that they might also have a mana/rage/energy system in place (most likely mana, I would think).

Or has this been officially refuted, and I'm just flat-out wrong?

 

Smurrf

Int already has a chance to increase spell crit by a small percentage & based on class & spec...I could very easily see Blizz increasing this % for DK's to minimize specific itemization. This could likely be varied...a nice bonus crit chance from int for a caster DPS based tree, no bonus given from int for a melee DPS tree, and somewhere in the middle for tanking.

Edit: And yes, the rune system *is* the energy system for DK's. Pics from Blizzcon showed the health bar, with the runesword underneath in place of any other energy bar.

 

Douglas

As I understand it, yes. We know that the runes serve as mana/rage/energy for them.

However, I don't think that means we know int is useless for them. We don't know what their core abilities look like, we don't know what their talents look like, and we don't know how int and spi interact with the rune recharge times.

As far as I can tell, Arthas was actually somewhat smart. Not as smart as Jaina, no, but significantly smarter than, say, Grom. If they tune the class so itemization doesn't value int whatsoever, that will feel off to me.

 

Veneda

World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King

"For example, the death knight’s spells and abilities will be fueled by a new type of resource mechanic – the rune system – which will be different from mana, energy, and rage."

There is also official screenshot somewhere of lev. 80 DK in play, with HP bar, no mana bar and 6 runes in place of it.

 

Duodecimal

Int may have other functions for Death Knights, just as they made noises about having Spirit affect different aspects for each class. I'm not sure what the point of all this speculation is, we really can't make assumptions based on current gameplay.

 

Vaccine

Agreed, it is sad that they are making him out to be more and more crazy when previous lore indicated he had regained his sanity and was renewing his fight against the black.

 

• alcaras

I see dual wielding death knights as not going to happen... Death Knights use 2h weapons exclusively.

Also, I understand their three schools are Blood, Death and Frost.

 

Yenadar

I agree with you, but is there anything to back up the DW vs 2handed yet?

 

• alcaras

The complete lack of precedent for DW DKs vs. every DK in War3 and WoW wielding a 2h?

 

Nezralix

This is definitely awesome. Scarlet Crusade were a very compelling group, and it was somewhat unfortunate for them to meet their end in a fairly easy 5-man instance. And if we see the Scarlet Crusade, then there's a good chance we'll see more of the Argent Dawn!

Again, very cool. This suggests to me that they're working on a better sense of "zone progression" than we saw in the Burning Crusade, where the player feels like they're getting deeper into "enemy territory" as they level up. This was obviously the case in WoW 1.0, where players start hitting zones like WPL/EPL, Felwood, Burning Steppes, and Silithis as they get into higher levels; areas where stuff is definitely going down. I think players felt that a little bit in Shadowmoon Valley, and probably *should* have felt it in Netherstorm, except that Tempest Keep was oddly removed from the rest of the zone (connected via a generic tube to the mainland, with a low-key goblin outpost sitting next to it). Could just be me; maybe other players felt it was a fine culmination.

Pretty much feel the same way. Hopefully he's at least under the influence of other WoW baddies, because all these dragons spontaneously choosing to start murdering everyone is making the whole bunch look pretty volatile and dangerous.

 

bv728

I think that Shadowmoon got it pretty right, but that Netherstorm didn't; the elves in Netherstorm are too static to feel like there's actually something going down, but Shadowmoon has the feeling of siege, which helps a lot.


My guess is that they'll play up his lingering madness (the man did just spend an awful long time insane) in the Mad Genius fashion; 'My plan is flawless! It will save us all! Only lesser beings fail to see my wisdom!', and the plotarc will involve smacking some sense into him and disabling his devices and plans, rather than 'We must slay the evil dragon!'.

I'm not sure I'd qualify Illidan and Kael'Thas as insane. They're driven, and they're clearly evil, but they don't seem to be ignoring realities; in fact, Kael is clearly making pragmatic decisions based on the situation. He's just not a good guy; he values Survival and Magic over everything else, and that includes other worlds, innocent lives, and so on (by MT he may be insane, but as of TK he's just a pragmatist).

 

Nezralix

Which is kind of odd, because there really is a lot going on there; the Blood Elves are very frequently engaged in battle with mana monsters of various sorts. There's probably more NPC combat going on there than in any other zone.

I think the problem is that mana monsters don't seem very threatening (mindless monsters FTL), the whole "the world might blow up!" angle doesn't have a lot of weight because it looks like the world *already* blew up, and Blood Elves end up coming off as a little slack and incompetent.

It seems like they tried, but it just doesn't have the same gravitas of WPL/EPL or SMV.

 

Vaccine

Source? Since at Blizzcon they said it was 2h/dw axe/sword.

 

Douglas

He's still potentially tainted by the whole "Dragon Soul" thing that Deathwing dragged him into though, no? I mean, sure, it was destroyed, but for millennia a portion of his essence was trapped within a corrupt, evil artifact.

Sure, Alexstrasza is on our side for now, but it won't shock me if over the next few expansions, the various dragon aspects that were involved with that all go mad and become enemies. This time it's Blue, with corruption surrounding magic. Next time it could be Green, with corruption surrounding The Emerald Dream. And some day even Alexstrasza could turn on us. Only Nozdormu is truly safe from that particular type of corruption.

 

PSGarak

There used to only be one female DK as well, and that concern was directly addressed in some Q&A session as "at the time yes, but times change." DKs have already been officially listed as a DW class. Blizzard is cherry-picking precedent for better game effect: edge weapons only yes, 2H only no.

It's 99% certain that DKs will have a relic as their ranged slot. Druids, shamans, and pallies all had the relic slot added far after their class design which meant it couldn't anything other than a stat stick, ableit a unique one. DKs are being designed with the relic slot already here as part of gameplay and itemization. There's an opportunity here for DKs to interact with their relic slot in a more important fashion, up to being as important as the weapon slot. Or perhaps the shield slot >.>. There's also a non-zero chance they could create their own relics, similar to warlock conjured stones.

http://sig.gamerdna.com/quizzes/INFL...erks/Garak.png

 

Moogul

Although they won't wield shields, it's not impossible for DKs to have some kind of 'block'-like mechanic as a talent or spell - there's a precedent for this, the holy paladin talent 'blessed life' that gives them a chance to take half damage from each attack on them.

They could quite easily make some spell like:

'Unholy Armour' - duration 30 mins - Gives all attacks on you a 20% chance to cause half damage, but you cause 10% less damage with spells and attacks.

 

Douglas

It's also theoretically possible that some of this kind of thing will happen passively depending on how you "junction" your runes. (Yeah, I may have FF7/FF8 on the brain, but the whole way Runes work really does remind me of the materia system or the junction system.)

The whole idea that you've got three distinct energy/resource pools that you can reconfigure on the fly is really interesting.

Edit: to elaborate, imagine having something in your Relic slot that had the power "increases defense rating by 25 per frost rune you have set, increases attack power by 50 per blood rune you have set, and increases spell penetration by 10 per shadow rune you have set".

 

• alcaras

Ah, I was unaware until now that they had said they would DW at Blizzcon. Everything else I've seen of DKs (even Blizzcon screenshots) portrayed them as wielding one 2h.

Thanks for letting me know and apologies for my ignorance

 

Shadout

He seems to be one of the more safe bets of doing something "evil". In lore its stated in various places that he knows his destiny (obviously) and its certainly not going to end well.
Quote from "War of the ancients":
"Know that I now ask for forgiveness for the wrongs I will cause you in the future, but I must be what I am destined to be... as Malygos is".

For Malygos, I think too, its a shame they are turning him into yet another character that turned evil/insane. Especially after he was supposedly healed. (twice that is, the fact that his Flight survived due to the War of the Ancients timeline should have helped somewhat, and then the Outland Netherwings - unless those was really created by Deathwing as a new device to enslave Malygos, but nothing really points toward that.)

 

bv728

Enemies fighting their own enemies, who would also kill you, does not add much gravitas to the zone; the blood elves kinda feel like they're gonna fall on their own eventually. There's no sense that the Alliance or Horde there are threatened; yeah, netherstorm is pretty badly beat up, but the Legion isn't actually doing anything active there.

Shadowmoon feels like it's under Seige; many of your quests relate to killing/destroying/investigating the seige, you have friendly NPCs engaged in combat constantly, and the Cipher of Damnation is beautifully illustrated cause to the ruin of the land.

I'd love to see more Plaguelands or SMVs; not as big a fan of Silithus, because of how many elites there were, but if they can capture what made the early ventures into the Plaguelands special again, I will be a happy player.

On a completely unrelated note: I, personally, think that Death Knight tanking has a strong chance of winding up on Blood, and revolve around Life Drains, Damage Shields, and physical debuffs. Just to add something almost different to the pile.