RSS Official site update, Blue posts, Fan Arts

Official Website update The <a href="http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/" target="_blank">official website</a> has been updated and its layout changed slightly. The size of the right column has been slightly increased and there are now a few ads here. You can also find a handful of quicklinks here to access your account management or the realm status page without going through the menu. <div align="center"><a href="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2009/january/officialsite.jpg" target="_blank"><img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2009/january/officialsite_small.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a></div> Blue posts <div class="blizzquotewrap"><div class="blizzquoteinner"><div class="blizzquoteheader">Quote from Blizzard staff</div><div class="blizzquote">Tanking raid encounters with one specific class Sarth + 3 is probably as close as it gets to one class having an advantage, but it may be too early to even pronounce that a problem. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/26/14595069637-i-cant-be-mt.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) [US] Account-Wide Death Knight Creation Update Death Knight creation is now available on all eligible realms. Please read the FAQ for more information on death knight creation. Grizzly Hills and Borean Tundra currently are not available for death knight creation. Character creation is currently locked on Wyrmrest Accord and Winterhoof. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/1/14498530635-accountwide-death-knight-creation-update.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) [US] Realm Performance We recently identified and isolated an issue impacting the performance of realms on the Emberstorm and Whirlwind battlegroups. We want to inform players on these realms that this issue has been resolved, and you should expect to see better performance and stability in game. Antonidas, Anub'arak, Blackwater Raiders, Bladefist, Borean Tundra, Cairne, Cenarion Circle, Cenarius, Darrowmere, Drak'Tharon, Drenden, Echo Isles, Farstriders, Fenris, Garrosh, Hydraxis, Hyjal, Korialstrasz, Lightbringer, Maiev, Misha, Mok'Nathal, Moon Guard, Nazgrel, Nordrassil, Quel'dorei, Ravenholdt, Rivendare, Shandris, Shu'halo, Sisters of Elune, The Forgotten Coast, Tortheldrin, Uther, Vashj, Winterhoof, Wyrmrest Accord (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/1/14595029570-realm-performance--emberstorm-and-whirlwind.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) <img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/24x24/deathknight.jpg" alt="" border="0" /> Death Knight (<a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=650" target="_blank">Skills List</a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deathknight" target="_blank">Talent + Glyph Calc.</a>) Killing Machine We originally talked about letting the MH and OH both proc but at different rates (Windfury does something like this). Then we became convinced that dual wielding by DKs would probably sitll be good even without the OH procs from Killing Machine. Now it is just main hand procs at a frequency of 5 per minute. PPM is a statistical average, so you will see a lot of variation unless you test for a long time. But we'll keep an eye on this thread and the talent itself to make sure. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/28/14578778025-killing-machine-bugged-gc-plz-review.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) <img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/24x24/hunter.jpg" alt="" border="0" /> Hunter (<a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=620" target="_blank">Skills List</a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?hunter" target="_blank">Talent + Glyph Calc.</a>) MM and BM hunter DPS in 3.0.8 From my POV it was more like some smart theorycrafters (possibly even on EJ) came up with some numbers and then a lot of people adopted those as fact and started echoing that MM and BM would be uncompetitive. I don't feel that the community has really had enough time with the changes to figure out the nuances of specs that many people had abandoned for a long time. I still see discussions about whether raptors or wasps (or moths!?) provide the most dps. From what we can tell, SV and MM are pretty close. SV may be slightly higher, but not by hundreds of dps. Affliction and Destro aren't at the same exact number but you still see both in raids (for the time being). MM also brings a really nice group buff (Trueshot Aura) while SV provides Replenishment, and we take those into consideration. BM is an easier spec to play. We tend to reward specs that are a little tougher to play if played very well with higher dps. Affliction and Mutilate are good examples, though we went overboard with Mutilate's dominance over other specs. If BM was simpler and provided the same or higher dps, then you would see 95% BM hunters (which, no suprise, is exactly what we had). Some players will try SV or MM, decide it's not for them and go back to BM. If they couldn't make SV work, then their dps may be just fine as BM (or else the drop will be so low that they don't care). At issue is how much lower BM can be than MM and SV before it isn't worth spec'ing into. Combat for rogues is too far below Assassination so that you take too big a hit if you choose to opt out of the more demanding Mutilate play style. Make sense? Again I will offer that for 95% of players out there, your individual skill and gear are going to have more effect than your spec. Just because very good hunters (or spreadsheets) come up with the highest possible dps for Survivial, does not mean that *your* dps will improve as Survival or that you cannot improve your dps as Marks or BM. I know it's a tradition in WoW to adopt cookie-cutter specs, and to some extent we'll never get away from that. But don't absolve yourself of the responsibility for trying to maximize your dps. When the community suddenly shifts, it's because some smart player experimented with a new build and made that work. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/28/14578748409-hunter-bm-and-mm-are-broken.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) Talent spec disparities Okay, I think this is the disconnect. This is exactly what we want - 3 viable specs. We don't want BM to be the noob spec that serious players don't use. We also don't want it to be the spec that every hunter uses, which I agree is where it has been for some time. My comment was that BM can't be both easier to play and do more dps. We can debate whether or not BM is actually easier to play, but that is a slightly different discussion. Perhaps it is more fair to say that even though skilled BMs can squeeze even more dps out of their attacks, a BM player who did nothing but Steady Shot and use the pet could still do very high dps, which is not what we want. If BM becomes too unpopular with these changes, if it becomes no longer viable in PvE or PvP, then we will fix it. The problem was that for a long time BM was the only PvE spec and it had increasingly become the leveling and PvP spec too. I think some of my Ulduar comments have been taken out of context or misunderstood. We are making some changes to hunters. Some of them are pretty cool. We will have to rebalance many of the attacks at that time. For example, we are likely to add additional pet talents that increase dps so that the 4 bonus points from BM 51 will inflate player dps overall. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/28/14578748409-hunter-bm-and-mm-are-broken.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) Beast Mastery over-nerfed? As many of you pointed out, the hunter class does have a lot going on and we don't think everyone is going to be operating near their max potential with all ofthe changes after less than a week of raiding and Arenas turned off half the time. If after that time BM continues to lag behind, we’ll buff it. We just don’t want to do it in such a way that sends every hunter stampeding back to that spec. If that happens, I will have no problem admitting we over-nerfed BM. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/28/14578748409-hunter-bm-and-mm-are-broken.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) <img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/24x24/mage.jpg" alt="" border="0" /> Mage (<a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=670" target="_blank">Skills List</a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?mage" target="_blank">Talent + Glyph Calc.</a>) Mage Armor increasing DOT effects No, seriously, this is a known bug that we will be fixing soon. The irony is we think it was caused by trying to get Strangulate to obey silence-reducing effects. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/28/14595029777-mage-armor-is-bugged.html" target="_blank">Source</a>) <img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/24x24/priest.jpg" alt="" border="0" /> Priest (<a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=640" target="_blank">Skills List</a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?priest" target="_blank">Talent + Glyph Calc.</a>) Developer Q&A I just wonder, do the Blizzard devs think that Disc is turning out the way they imagined? Yes. I am very happy with it. The designers who worked on Disc did a great job. It was a good PvP spec before but now is also a viable PvE spec, yet with a different healing vibe than Holy. Are there any mechanics of the tree that might get tweaked soon? Yes. Spirit and Penance come to mind. No, they're not nerfs. I've also heard that some Disc Priests complain that it doesn't scale as well as Holy at extremely high gear levels. Is this an issue that is being looked at, or is it not considered significant? There are no extremely high gear levels in the ...</div></div></div>

Fonte