Patch 5.3 interview with Ghostcrawler
Mystery of the Unborn Val'kyr
The latest patch 5.3 news
All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsThe Queue: Tooth explosion
by Alex Ziebart 
Nov 5th 2009 at 4:00PM
Today's edition of The Queue is gifted to you by my horrifying toothache that has kept me awake at ridiculous times of the day for the past week. You can thank the toothache for this article, because otherwise I may have done something healthy instead, such as sleep.
Mordockk asked...
"Is Quel'Delar going to be a Legendary weapon? If so, does that mean there is going to be two Legendary weapons next patch?"
Just like Quel'Delar's stats, this is something we don't really know. My gut says no, it won't be a Legendary, but it's not something I can say with absolute certainty. Blizzard has surprised us before, and they'll continue to surprise us. Still, I'm going to guess Quel'Delar and its partner items will be epics, not legendaries.
Mordockk also asked...
"How many people actually made the mace from Ulduar? We started giving the shards to one healer who took an extended break, then started giving them to another and now we have 3 healers with 10+ shards."
I don't have any solid numbers to give you, but from what I've seen, most guilds that clear 25-man Ulduar regularly have at least one. If they don't have one, they're incredibly closing to having one, within a few shards. If you didn't run into that awful healer situation there, you guys would have one, too.
Guilds that have only just now started clearing Ulduar? Yeah, they have awhile to go yet.
Tim said...
"WoW.com should start the About the Bloggers segment back up."
I'll talk to the bosslady about it, but I can't make any promises. As a writer, I really enjoyed those, but historically they had so-so reception with the exception of Matt Rossi's burly chest. We're a much larger site now though, so maybe second time's the charm.
Revan asked...
"Is it safe to say that we will be seeing the new Council of Tirisfal in Cataclysm?"
I believe that at BlizzCon, it was mentioned that they would be a faction in Cataclysm, one of the big dogs trying to repair Azeroth after Deathwing screws things up.
Uncertainty asked...
"What's up with the lack of PvP knowledge/awareness on wow.com? I think about 90% of the columnists on WoW.com have said on the show that they don't participate in arenas."
This is something we've been trying to do better lately. The people on our staff who don't like to arena and probably won't be convinced otherwise, but there are a number of people on the team that do enjoy PVP, and we have a number of PVP features we're trying to produce more regularly.
We have The Colosseum, which is being covered by Michael Gray and C. Christian Moore, which interviews high ranked arena players. However, those depend somewhat on actually being able to contact the people we want to talk to, and when the only contact information you have is their character name, that can be difficult. A lot of people that get in-game mail from us think it's yet another phishing scam. Understandable, but bothersome. Lately we've been trying another approach in addition to that: If you know somebody (or are somebody) that is an exceptional player in the arena and they/you want to be interview, contact Michael Gray at the email address gray AT wow DOT com. We won't necessarily interview everyone that mails in, but we'll look at and consider them all.
On top of that, Zach Yonzon will be continuing The Art of War(craft) which is a Battleground (and world PvP) based column. C. Christian Moore, a highly rated arena play himself, was also brought on board to write Blood Sport, our arena-based column. We're pushing for these to happen more regularly, so hopefully they will!
And now I go and try to get some sleep again. Fare thee well, WoW.com. Wish me luck.
Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW.com crew is here with The Queue, our daily Q&A column! Leave your questions in the comments and we'll do our best to answer 'em!Filed under: Analysis / Opinion, Battlegrounds, Arena, The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 5)
BladedDingo Nov 5th 2009 4:29PM
Is it possible to use smaller images for the mobile version of wow.com? I don't have an iphone and when I visit the mobile version i'm given a huge image tha forces me to side scroll on my screen.
Mordockk Nov 5th 2009 4:31PM
HEY!! Thanks for the answers.
Do you think Invincible will be moderately difficult to attain or extremely difficult like Mimiron's Head?
With the new Icecrown radiance debuff in ICC I have a feeling that this is going to put Feral Druids back on top as the most sought after maintanks, considering they already have a ridiculous amount of dodge and effective health I see them as being the least effected by the radiance. Your thoughts?
Draelan Nov 5th 2009 4:55PM
Actually... I'm worried that it will be the exact opposite. Yes, Druids have a lot of dodge and high health, however, other tanks have other ways to mitigate damage which will not be affected by IC Radiance. Specifically, Block and Parry. Given that IC Radiance only affects dodge, we may see the other tanking classes putting greater focus on their other mitigation stats to compensate. Druids, however, don't have alternative mitigation stat to focus on. (No shield = no block. And bears can't parry.)
Of course, that's just a bit of speculation on my part. Only time will tell.
thebitterfig Nov 5th 2009 5:28PM
Chill of the Throne will likely have no actual effect on tank balance between classes. Sure, dodge is reduced, but block does not provide major benefit on bosses making that unattractive to stack, and the very steep diminishing returns on parry will make it an bad stat to stack excessively. Because of the interaction between Chill of the Throne and dodge's own diminishing returns, dodge will still be the best way for a warrior, dk, or paladin to gain avoidance.
However, this is likely to effect player psychology more than mechanics, as demonstrated by everyone saying "druids will suck in Icecrown" when they take the exact same nerf to avoidance that every other tank receives. At the end of the day, 20% avoidance is 20% avoidance no matter which class you are dealing with.
tatsumasa Nov 5th 2009 5:48PM
@20%=20%
except bears don't stack up as much mitigation overall, that is why they have more health. 20% from a tank who has 25% dodge, 25% parry, and 25% block doesn't hurt as bad as 20% from a bear who only has 45% dodge.
Lokasenna Nov 5th 2009 8:22PM
1. Current bosses (Ulduar and ToC) hit really hard to deal with how much avoidance everyone has, leading to spiky damage and not-uncommon two-shotting of the tank.
A. As spiky is it is, all the tanking classes are still able to handle this damage.
2. Blizzard's solution to spiky damage: 20% dodge debuff across the board for Icecrown, along with smaller hits from the bosses. The end result is less damage hitting more often, thus giving the healers more breathing space.
B. To my knowledge, no properly geared tanking class at the moment has less than 20%, so all tanks are losing the same amount of avoidance.
Conclusion: All tanks that can handle the current levels of damage will be able to handle the changes in Icecrown.
Shrike Nov 5th 2009 9:23PM
Block is not an avoidance stat, and the mitigation it provides is not worth considering against bosses.
20% dodge from someone with 25% dodge and 25% parry is the same as 20% dodge from someone with 45% dodge. The second person ALREADY had 5% less avoidance, they'll still have 5% less avoidance.
With boss damage reduced due to the dodge reduction, druids will again be out front because of the sheer size of their health pools.
lidstrom Nov 5th 2009 4:40PM
question for the queue:
any chance bliz will get rid of the rest bar? it seems to be an outdated idea, and since many of their recent changes have been to speed the leveling process, it'd be nice to be leveling an alt and not have the rest bar go from blue to purple and slow down the process.
Tori Nov 5th 2009 5:01PM
I wouldn't want the rested bar removed, but I would be happy to see it expanded past the 2 bar cap it currently has.
You can have an alt sitting around in an inn for a while and when you decide to play them again 2 levels blow by in no time at all. I'd rather have an accumulated rest period that would be worth the time of not being on that character.
Emophia Nov 5th 2009 4:42PM
The Art of War(craft) was a battleground column?
I always blanked it because I thought it was about WoW's art or something, dayum I feel dumb now.
Tim Nov 5th 2009 5:21PM
Ha ha, me too. There is that craft section about actual crafts. I thought it was weird that they only did the art of battleground stuff. Then I L2R article texts...
Condor Nov 5th 2009 4:43PM
"does that mean there is going to be two Legendary weapons next patch?"
What's the other one?
Draelan Nov 5th 2009 4:59PM
Shadowmorne. A legendary quality axe.
lawters Nov 5th 2009 5:02PM
Shadowmourne.
JLocke Nov 5th 2009 4:45PM
I believe that at BlizzCon, it was mentioned that they would be a faction in Cataclysm, one of the big dogs trying to repair Azeroth after Deathwing screws things up.
*hurries off to get a new change of clothes*
I must have missed this, cause this is news for me! This totally made my day 100% better!
pochi Nov 5th 2009 4:46PM
question: what travels faster falling from the sky or a 280/310 mount flying straight down?
Kurash Nov 5th 2009 5:09PM
@pochi
The 310% mount travels faster no matter what direction you're going. Gravity doesn't affect your flight speed, since WoW physics =/= actual physics.
Kurash Nov 5th 2009 5:12PM
Oops. I misread your comment. Feel free to vote me down.
Bosco89 Nov 5th 2009 5:20PM
I tried to measure the fall time and the flight time from the floating "island" near Krasus' Landing (with 1 second tolerance):
280%: 15 seconds
Falling: 10 seconds
And i think the 310% still can't beat the fall time.
...That's 16g for repairs :D
JKWood Nov 5th 2009 5:36PM
Falling has an acceleration component. The question of how much damage you take from falling depends not on how FAR you fall, but how FAST you are falling. Thus, why Slow Fall will prevent a mage from taking any damage from a fall.
That makes me wonder... as a speed-limiting debuff, would Judgement of Justice prevent fall damage? Must test.