Avellina

It would definitely line up with the reason that they take the drakes out in the first place (ie: gear makes the achievement easier). The coliseum itself would be expected to drop iLvl 239 gear (232 for 10-man), the same quality gear that is currently available through Uluduar's hard-modes so there wouldn't be a problem allowing people to receive a few pieces of gear from the new instance in order to get their drakes. We're really talking of a few pieces anyway of gear, given the staggered start (10 boss downings maximum before you can unlock the heroic version to be exact). Given that they also try to match high-end PvP gear to coincide with what people are wearing PvE wise, I wouldn't be surprised that the 5th week of 3.2 sees not only the drakes removed, but also the start of a new arena season.

 

Kraith

I wouldn't say it is popular. Is it highly played? Yes, but why? Well for the most part that the honor gains are by far better than any BG. You can buy PvP gear with the WG marks. You can buy items that grant you free honor with WG marks. It is quite simply a better use of a honor farmers time. It has far more benefits than a BG does.

Though, I personally love WG. The changes to a player limit kills it for me. It is simply turning it into a non instanced BG, which doesn't match what was set out for WG. The new changes will however balance it out somewhat. I know on my server at least there is usually 3 Horde raids and 2-3 Alliance raids (Alliance have Ten 95% of the time).

 

Axl_Stukov

Some of the achievements for the tournament raid are now up on MMO champ - Patch 3.2 Achievements .
What strikes me as particularly interesting is the achievement "The Traitor King", involving killing scarabs with spikes, is this Anub'arak back for a round 2 battle? The quest to kill him in Azjol'nerub referred to him as the traitor king.

 

Zurai

Cite? To my knowledge they've made no absolute statements whatsoever about when the Ulduar drakes would be removed.

 

Cranberry

That was also his title in WC3 (one of the Nerubians in A-N refers to him as such). I think the Nerubians showing up mid-tournament is very much back on the table as of now.

 

Baka

On the other Hand, Achievements like "I've had worse" (Defeat the Black Knight in 10 minutes while wearing all blue items, before 3 Volcanos erupt, while everyone in the group has at least 1 stack of Spurting Blood and there are no shamans or paladins in the party but before you spend at least 1000 gold in repairs wiping to the Black Knight) could very well mean that the developers are very aware of the data-mining going on and are trying to deliberately set us on the wrong track.

 

Copernicus

World of Warcraft - Wrath of the Lich King Achievements

Defeat every boss in the Trial of the Crusader in 10-player mode.
* Gormok the Impaler
* Acidmaw
* Dreadscale
* Icehowl
* Lord Jaraxxus
* Edyis Darkbane
* Fjola Lightbane
* Final Boss

---

Guessing, but the first three are the two wurms and the magnataur, Icehowl and Lord Jaraxxus are seperate bosses, the two Banes are the Vrykul twins, and the Final Boss is a final boss.

------------------------------------------

The 5-man has two separate boss lists. It looks like a group of faction-dependent bosses (five of them) and then three more bosses.

* Ambrose Boltspark, Colosos, Lana Stouthammer, Marshal Hacob Alerius, Jaelyne Evensong
* Deathstalker Visceri, Eressea Dawnsinger, Mokra the Skullcrusher, Runok Wildmane, Zul'tore
* Argent Confessor Paletress
* Eadric the Pure
* The Black Knight

---

Unlocking the new dailies (Silver Covenant/Sunreaver, Crusader) will require a lot of work with the current Argent Tournament dailies. The first set needs Exalted with Silver Covenant/Sunreaver and Champion of a faction, while the second set requires exalted with every racial faction and the right to represent each faction.

They also added another guy into Wintergrasp (Koralon the Flame Watcher).

 

zoombini

From looking at the achievements, there will be a thanksgiving event as well. (including an achievement for finding a rogue of each race. Oy . . . )

 

Leviathon

It's them having fun with placeholders.

 

Exemplar

I suspect it's more simply named because it's a "friendly fire" achievement like Iron Dwarf, Medium Rare. Drag small adds and let them die when the Undead Nerubian uses spike.

I do hope 12,000 is a placeholder number, though. The numbers required to be present to do it in a reasonable period (i.e. 1000 killed a run/wipe for 12 goes) could provide serious FPS issues to low-end video cards. 200 odd bugs running around simultaneously is a lot of extra crap to render.

Rock: "We're sub-standard DPS. Nerf Paper, Scissors are fine."
Paper: "OMG, WTF, Scissors!"
Scissors: "Rock is OP and Paper are QQers. We need PvP buffs."

 

Mideci

So the reality is that the statement was indeed made (they weren't mute on it), but it was the opposite of categorical (it was waffle-ish)... Here it is....

"Last I heard they would be removed when 3.2 comes out, if this changes we’ll let you know." -- That was from Bornakk around the end of May.

 

Cranberry

Looks like the Coliseum 5-man will have MgT-style trinkets:

There are also several 25-man trinkets, including an upgrade to DC:G for melee classes.

EDIT: From WOTLKWiki, we have this gem:

Looks like Master Looter mistakes can be remedied without GM intervention in the future.

 

Seratha

The proc on the caster trinket is the same proc as [Flow of Knowledge], but restricted to damaging spells. If it's not a placeholder proc, that would put the new 5-man Heroic loot on the same tier as Naxx 10. That's assuming that the trinkets follows the same pattern as the Magisters' Terrace trinkets and drop off the second to last boss on Heroic.

 

KTalisman

They said the 5-man would be 3 encounters, so considering the well-documented similarity between Paletress and Whitemane, I can't help but wonder if she and Eadric the Pure are in the same encounter, with a similar flow as the SM fight?


And regarding the Ulduar Drakes:

 

Henin

Based on the Upper Back Pain achievement mentioning Snobolds and Icehowl I would have to guess that Icehowl is the Magnataur.

 

Malleus

Unless that trinket comes packing a stat as well as the proc, it's a significant downgrade. You'd be losing a permanent 90 Str/Agi's worth of AP and crit for the sake of having 60 more Str/Agi during proc uptime.

 

• Allara

They can only datamine spells, which is how they're getting the trinket procs now without actually seeing the items. The trinket will undoubtedly include some sort of static stat in addition to the proc.

 

KTalisman

I can't help feeling we're either missing a boss from the list or the Magnataur is actually a separate encounter to the worms, despite the Sneak Peak seemingly lumping them together as the "First Challenge". Maybe it just means the Magnataur and the worms will be the first 2 encounters?

- We know there's a dude called Icehowl who has Snobolds. We know there's a Magnataur. We know Snobolds serve Magnataurs.

- We know we have to fight the "Twin Val'kyr". Edyis Darkbane and Fjola Lightbane fit with this. These would also be the Scourge Lieutenants fight Blizzard hinted at.

- There's a fight against "enemy heroes". Gormok the Impaler and Lord Jaraxxus sound like Orc and Human (or some other Alliance race) tournament champions to me.

- "Final Boss". Traitor King achievement, Frost Crypt Lord model, Blizzard intentionally hiding the name, scarabs, spikes, and the utter absurdity of Anub'Arak being a level 74 boss. Come on, we all know it, we all want it. Bring it.

 

TSplodey

Not sure if anyone noticed but the first 2 in the list of 5man bosses are all the faction leaders in the Valiant's tent at the Tournament.

 

Krixooks

I don’t think we all want it. Why on earth would Anub’Arak resurrect and make an appearance at the Argent Tournament? His manager at HQ in Ahn’Kahet rang him up and said it would be a good publicity move?
I was pretty disturbed to find that Blizzard had already removed their grand plans for the underground zone nerubian kingdom, but putting Anub’arak as a tournament boss is like putting him in a clown suit and throwing sponges at him for $2.
The Alliance and Horde champions will fit in really well though, they have colour and personality. If they make unique and fun encounters for them I will really be looking forward to the Tournament patch.

 

Razzberry

Guess what?

 

Xabora

It may be some Nerubian Beast. To my knowledge. (EDIT: It may be Lord Jaraxxus)


After some reading, it most likely is Anub’Arak just a bit frosty.
Since the achievement icon file name is listed as: achievement_boss_anubarak

 

Krixooks

So Anub'arak has a phylactery? Oh snap we should have picked that up last time we killed him and destroyed it. Maybe we gave it to someone called Zorro who is actually a Twilight Cultist.
No wonder they’ve been working so long on the Coliseum, apparently they had to bore some sort of hole down through northrend.

The Isle of conquest looks great I really can’t wait for this, glaive throwers! At last! I’ve always wanted to use that one in Warsong Gulch that is next to the graveyard.

Anyone know anything about the Venomhide Ravasaur? I assume they’re implementing a Winterspring Frostsaber equivalent (probably into Un’goro). You Horde guys have been missing out on all the fun grinding that rep!

 

Consider

Apparantly they are introducing a third version of the tier sets marked 'Heroic', with higher ilvls than their regular counterparts.

It seems as if it will go something like this:
10 man Normal - 10 man set (ilvl 232, as expected)
10 man Hard - 25 man set (ilvl 245, as expected)
25 man Normal - 25 man set ( " ", " ")
25 man Hard - 25 man heroic set (ilvl 258, the natural 13 ilvl step up)

Not a bad idea, really. It's hard to balance set bonuses with the fact that hard modes drop higher ilvl gear. This would be the solution.

 

Xabora

And it looks like T9 will further be broken up in art styles and names that fit the Alliance and Horde.
All I could gather so far.

Class	Alliance	Horde
Mage	Khadgar's Regalia	Sundtrider's Regalia
Warlock	Kel'Thuzad's Regalia	Gul'dan's Regalia
Priest	Velen's Raiment	Zabra's Raiment
Priest	Velen's Regalia	Zabra's Regalia
Druid	Stormrage's Garb	Runetotem's Garb
Druid	Stormrage's Regaila	Runetotem's Regalia
Druid	Stormrage's Battlegear	Runetotem's Battlegear
Rogue	VanCleef's Battlegear	Garona's Battlegear
Shaman	Nobundo's Garb	Thrall's Garb
Shaman	Nobundo's Regalia	Thrall's Regalia
Hunter	Windrunner's Battlegear	Windrunner's Battlegear
Hunter	Windrunner's Pursuit	Windrunner's Pursuit
Death Knight	Thassarian	Koltira
Paladin	Turalyon	Liadrin
Warrior	Wrynn	Hellscream