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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsHearthstones down to 30 minute cooldown in patch 3.1
by Zach Yonzon 
Feb 26th 2009 at 9:20PM
Eyonix was quick to shut down these arguments in a long thread but eventually capitulated to the will of the masses, announcing that Hearthstones would be usable every 30 minutes when Patch 3.1 goes live. Eyonix still doesn't quite understand what the fuss is all about, though, and points to mage portals, Dalaran portals, and good old mount riding as acceptable means of getting from point A to point B. He even dismisses the complaints as QQ at one point. That said, it looks like some QQ has won the day for now. Enjoy your 30 minute hearthstones, everyone.
Patch 3.1 brings us Ulduar, dual specs, significant changes to all the classes, and more! We've got you covered from top to bottom with our Guide to Patch 3.1.Filed under: Blizzard, News items, Forums
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 9)
Tizzy Feb 26th 2009 10:12PM
I don't get it, they shorten the hearthstone to half an hour, you'd think people would be happy to save a little time here and there but NO! It's all "QQ the game is too easy nao! waa waa" come on people, it's just a shortened cooldown, not game breaking stuff.
It's not like they made it that you could hire NPCs to fill out the ranks on a raid missing a few or something, lol.
Jamesisgreat Feb 26th 2009 10:21PM
I know - reducing it to 30 mins is nice and will make traveling around the increasingly large world that much easier.
Why is everyone acting like it's some game breaking change and there will no longer be any raiding or PvP - just players HSing back and forth?!
Jeez - melodramatic much?
MisterMoose Feb 26th 2009 10:47PM
Oh yes, the game difficulty is balanced around hearthstone times. You just have to listen to the people QQing about the change to believe that.
Zarfay Feb 26th 2009 10:13PM
What's a hearth stone?
/end shaman
Amaxe Feb 26th 2009 11:04PM
You need them some times...
[Guildmember]: Hey Amaxe, head out to CoT to run an instance
[Amaxe]: OK let me hearth back and I'll head out through Dalaran
(5 minutes later)
[Guildmember]: We changed our minds. head out to HOL
[Amaxe]: You could have said... never mind. I'll burn my hearthstone
(5 minutes later. Amaxe is muttering as she flies up to HoL)
[Guildmember]: Change in plans. Now it's UP.
[Amaxe]: /cry
Kalabus Feb 26th 2009 10:14PM
I think its just dumb that people qq for an issue that shouldnt have been an exploit and for blizzard to give in and make HS only on a thirty minute cooldown. as an inscriber I thought yay I make some money with my recall3 scrolls now for people trying to get back to dalaran,or werever there Hearth point is.... yay for me. then bam blizzard decides hey you bunch of complaining crying little babies.... have your HS on a shorter cooldown.... in fact if you bunch of cry babies keep qq'ing maybe we will give everyone portals. and they can teleport themselves to any instance... wait still not good enough... ok we know, how about you can warp just to bosses to skip trash that will speed it up even more..... what still not good enough....
I can go on but im sick of typing.
RogueJedi86 Feb 26th 2009 10:18PM
Don't scrolls of recall require you to be a Scribe to use? That might be a big reason them scrolls don't sell. If non-scribes could use, I'd have bought 10 of them immediately just to see where I'd backfire to.
Tizzy Feb 26th 2009 10:19PM
The thing about recall scrolls is that anyone who can use them can make them easily themselves, since they're inscriber only.
Just like the engineering trap, it'd be great if the stuff you can make could actually be used by people.
Chris Anthony Feb 26th 2009 10:30PM
Tizzy, with Inscription, your regret about Scrolls of Recall not being usable by anyone else should probably be tempered with the knowledge that everything else you can make is usable by others. ;)
Tizzy Feb 26th 2009 10:54PM
@Chris
Yeah, Inscription is quite handy, all in all, just saying that someone griping that this change will ruin their plan to make money via scrolls of recall is quite pathetic really, as they are either just looking for something, anything, to complain about, or don't know their own profession well enough to realize that it wouldn't work anyway.
Gessilea Feb 26th 2009 10:14PM
I'm super happy about this. For me, I never needed anything other than my hearth stone until achievements went in (and faster instances). Now there are a lot more reasons to hang out in the older zones, and a lot more reasons to want to cut down on horribly long flights (Hinterlands to anywhere, BARF). As nice as it is to have the time to work on my tan during the flight across Kalimdor, I am 100% happy with this change.
Beatphreek Feb 26th 2009 10:18PM
I agree about the flights... I've been saying for years that they need to BUFF BIRDS!!! There is no good reason for a 15m flight path from Darnassus to Silithus... that's dumb... same thing on the Eastern Kingdoms. I understand a time sink and needing travel time to some extent, but I think then should definitely make the flights faster.
RogueJedi86 Feb 26th 2009 10:20PM
To be fair, Silithus and Teldrassil are at opposite ends of the continent. A 5 minute flight would ruin the sense of scale. Plus I think many people's computers would die at having to load and deload so many zones so fast.
Gessilea Feb 26th 2009 10:23PM
@beetphreek: Totally. How many people never quested in certain zones because it was so inconvenient getting in and out of them? There were actually some fun quests in Desolace, but it was such a hassle to get there who would want to bother with them?
@RogueJedi86: True - but even some of the in-zone flights are so long and STUPID. Even if the birds didn't speed up, couldn't they at least fly in a straight line? Even in Wrath this is still really annoying, especially with the gnome flightpaths.
RogueJedi86 Feb 26th 2009 10:27PM
I think we can excuse Old World flightpaths being long for the same reason there's no flying mounts allowed there. So many areas just aren't made to be seen from above. Large swaths of area just below the IF Airport are brown repeating tiles, just out of player visibility range. I'm still surprised there's a little canyon connecting between Feralas and Silithus. But I could see them adding a few extra canyons here and there for flight path improvements as gradual escalation towards flying mounts.
Gnome flight paths though........well Gnomes are just weird. Chalk it up to their being creative. They'd make a flightpath takes 5 times longer if it meant they could shrink your plane while it flies(plus a cup holder). :P
Gessilea Feb 26th 2009 10:35PM
@RogueJedi86: That makes sense for them not changing FPs, but it doesn't make sense from the initial design standpoint. I would guess that they decided where the FP would go, and then designed the view underneath, not vice versa.
Anyhoo, I'm really surprised that you earlier called the people who are happy about this lazy. There really are a lot more reasons to be moving around now. It's not laziness, it's time usage. I don't think that the designers gave in to QQ, I think they looked at the way the game has changed and agreed that it makes sense that if they are removing one way people have been getting around, they would put in a different way to get around.
Jamesisgreat Feb 26th 2009 10:36PM
WTB flight path from Dalaran to Sholazar Basin that doesn't take 10 mins flying around Wintergrasp.... Couldn't the Dwarves dig a series of tunnels under it or something, like an underpass??!
danawhitaker Feb 27th 2009 12:57PM
"I think we can excuse Old World flightpaths being long for the same reason there's no flying mounts allowed there. So many areas just aren't made to be seen from above."
What, are you kidding me? You mean you actually sit and watch the screen when you fly? I do anything BUT sit and watch the screen. Maybe I've just taken the paths way too many times, but I alt-tab out of the game and play on Pogo or chat with friends, or I go get food, or in the case of Teldarassil to Tanaris and anything in the southern realms of Kalimdor, I can usually squeeze in a nice relaxing shower. I don't care about the scenery as I fly. I simply would like nice direct flight paths instead of the wandering whims of the bird that's flying me. There are some really REALLY ridiculous flight paths on Kalimdor, anyone who's quested there long and hard will know what I'm referring to, in some places you completely backtrack or swing out over the ocean for no reason, and the path across Ashenvale is absolutely insane.
Having never played a Horde character, I may be wrong, but I think Alliance has it worse in Kalimdor because there are no centrally-located capital cities on that continent. Questing in the southern part of Kalimdor is excruciating (I should know, I'm just a few quests shy now of Loremaster of Kalimdor and have done every quest on that continent up through at least level 54). At least in Eastern Kingdoms you have Stormwind and Ironforge smack in the middle of the continent so that, in most cases, it's a fairly short flight to anywhere. I've been working Western Plaguelands recently and Dalaran to Ironforge to WPL or EPL is fairly painless. When I was doing quests in Tanaris, the flight from Darnassus was painful. The alternative was hearthing in Tanaris and never having enough inventory space because I couldn't get to an AH quickly.
The reason I'm rejoicing at a 30 minute hearthstone is because, unlike you, I don't have six hours to sit around in trade and shoot the breeze uninterrupted. I have a wild three year old who has a tendency to take off randomly from whatever room I'm in and it's nice to be able to simply hearth and walk away. That way I can maximize my rest and make sure I'm in a safe area next time I log in. One full hour for hearth makes that happen a lot less often than I'd like. When I don't have to worry about chasing her, it's not so bad. I can usually at least make it back to a flight point and just park in a capital city or inn (don't get me started on the lack of inns in certain zones from level 50-70).
Of course a LOT of these problems would be cleared up if Blizzard would just add a damn AH in Shatt and Dalaran and be done with it already. Then people wouldn't be burning their hearthstones unnecessarily by going back to the Old World cities when they have no other business there other than auctions.
Gessilea Feb 27th 2009 1:54PM
@danawhitaker: While you make some good points, I would highly recommend you invest a character slot in an AH mule, or at least park one of your alts in a capital. Then the only thing you need to do is get to a mailbox.
Kolo Feb 26th 2009 10:34PM
Anyone remember last year when mounts were set to level 30?
"OMG ITS THE END OF THE WORLD" QQ started.
A week later no one mentioned it again. Some people need to stop getting hysterical over this. WoW will always be casual friendly, it's been 4 years, deal with it.