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: Mike Sacco and the Saccos
by Alex Ziebart 
Mar 30th 2010 at 1:00PM
Welcome back to The Queue, WoW.com's daily Q&A column where the WoW.com team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today.
What happens when you put WoW.com staffers in a room with a karaoke machine and alcohol? The video embedded above is what happens. And there were only two of them, Mike and Fox! BlizzCon is going to be... interesting.
scraggerly asked...
"I was just visiting Dominic's warlock column, mainly because I love the lock-mage feuds and comments. Is there a particular origin (maybe lore) to the feud, like the montagues and capulets, or is it mainly player generated?
Also, can we start more feuds?"
It's player generated, mostly coming from the fact that they're bother cloth caster classes filling the same pure role. The two classes have competed for the same job in raids for years, but they're two different classes. Any gain for a mage is a loss for a warlock and vice versa. They compete with one another on a level no other classes do. If a mage gets some awesome ability, it's less likely for a warlock to be welcomed to a raid. If warlocks utility gets ratcheted up with no love for mages, suddenly there are less raid spots available to the mages.
Other classes compete, no doubt about that, but none as closely as these two classes. Plus everyone that plays warlocks and mages are lame and can't handle a real man's class. Unless they're girls, and in that case, why aren't they healing me?*
Artitian asked...
"Why do you guys and gals at WoW.com not cover macros? A macros 101 post and subsequent macro spotlight articles would be an awesome addition to the site."
We do cover macros, just not in their own column. A number of class columns have covered them recently, not to mention Gold Capped and various other areas. We talk about them pretty frequently, actually!
I'll pass the idea onto the staff though, and maybe we'll put out a dedicated macro feature in the future.
vertigobliss86 asked...
"Since the Horde has a little minor quest in Dalaran taking you to Thunder Bluff to see a preview of the tauren learning to become paladins, does the Alliance have something similar with dwarves becoming shamans?"
We don't have one for dwarven shaman yet, but we do have one for night elf mages. There's a Highborne in Darnassus trying to meet with Tyrande, while a sentinel is bullying him around. The tauren paladin quest is far more interesting. Trust me.
RothKeahi asked...
"April Fools Day is coming up soon, and we all know Blizzard has been known for elaborate pranks on the day. Any thoughts or hopes on what they may do this year?"
The ultimate prank. WoW will be down all day long.
Kar asked...
"Today via LFG tool I joined a heroic in progress. When I teleported in, I didn't go to the entrance but rather right where the rest of the group was, several rooms in. It wasn't a warlock summon or anything. Is this a new feature?"
This was added in patch 3.3.3. Although in the 24 hours, I've run a number of dungeons where it didn't work and new party members started at the beginning anyway. I'm not sure if it's a bug, or if they temporarily turned it off until people stop getting teleported into the sky in Oculus and falling to their deaths.
*Please don't take this seriously. Joke, guys! You know those things! Jokes!
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, The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 4 of 12)
Dreamstorm Mar 30th 2010 1:26PM
This has been asked and answerd (also in the Queue) countless times.
NO, Outlands will not be changed, other than gear-changes.
NO, Northrend will remain unchanged by Cataclysm, other than gear-changes.
dragon_eel Mar 30th 2010 1:27PM
Northrend being hit by Cata has been covered way more times than i can remember! Read up a bit why don't ya!
jealouspirate Mar 30th 2010 1:30PM
I think that developers have said that nothing will change for Outland, and there will be very minor changes to Northrend.
It's definitely a gap in the timeline, but it's the same thing they did with Death Knights heading off to Outland.
I actually think there are going to be a huge amount of these "time paradoxes" that we'll just have to deal with in the Old World. For example, killing VanCleef and then heading off to a Cata-changed zone.
Grovinofdarkhour Mar 30th 2010 1:46PM
So far it appears Outland will be unaffected (different planet, makes sense) but with all the travelers between worlds, it would be beyond weird if they hadn't even heard anything about it. I would expect to see changes to the flavor text for many Outland NPCs making reference to current happenings on Azeroth, but probably no material changes to their functionality.
Northrend? For the most part, Northrend will be the new Outland... you'll only be questing/raiding there for the short time you're level-appropriate, as all the new zones & raids will be scattered throughout the old world. But, it won't be as thoroughly obsolescenced as Outland was, because this time there isn't a shiny new continent where everyone will be spending all their time.
Imagine if, when Northrend became available, there was no newly-relocated Dalaran; and Shatt was still the transit hub of the in-game universe. Since people would have still been passing through Shatt constantly, they likely would have remained at least a bit more active in Outland than they did. That's my best guess as to what we're about to see with Northrend. But since it's the same "world" that is being affected by the cataclysm, I would expect a LOT of flavor text revisions, if not at least a few of the new questlines passing through Northrend.
Methuus Mar 30th 2010 2:16PM
And Blizzard has said that, yes, they would have liked to have changed Northrend to reflect the cataclysm and would have liked to have redone Outland as well.
But, despite the dumptrucks full of money that they get each moth, Bliz says that they just don't have the resources to redo the whole world(s). So they're focusing on just Kalimdor and EK.
So Bliz knows the lack of story coherence when you level is a problem, but they don't view it as a very important problem.
jbgolsong Mar 30th 2010 5:34PM
Only the Old World will be changed by the Cataclysm and its consequences. When it comes to Northrend, I don't remember reading anything about it changing, Outland will definitely be unscathed however!
Radioted Mar 30th 2010 1:09PM
Speaking of macros, how can you be sure a macro is pulling out the right spellrank? I have a macro that switches me between Aspect of the Dragonhawk and Aspect of the Viper. Occasionally when I am in battlegrounds, I will get whispered by someone's addon, informing me that I seem to be using Dragonhawk rank 1, instead of rank 2. Off course, since I'm in a BG, I usually have Aspect of the Monkey up, but anyway, when I use the macro and check the tooltip for my Dragonhawk, it seems to be rank 2. So what the heck is going on?
Rowan Mar 30th 2010 1:21PM
If you place a '(Rank X)' after the spell, it will always use the specified rank. If you do not place a rank beside the spell, it will automatically use the highest rank you have trained. Those are the only two ways spell rank can be 'incorporated' into the macro. If your macro says Rank X, you're using Rank X, despite what someones addon is telling you.
Beatphreek Mar 30th 2010 1:24PM
You can put the rank in right after the spellname "Aspect of the Dragonhawk(rank 2)" or if you leave it without that, it should just choose the highest rank. More importantly you know aspect of the dragonhawk does the job of bowht Aspect of the Hawk and Aspect of the Monkey right?
Tooltip reads: "The hunter takes on the aspects of a dragonhawk, increasing ranged attack power by 300 and chance to dodge by 18%. Only one Aspect can be active at a time."
Netheral Mar 30th 2010 1:27PM
I don't have a clue about what's going on with your macros (perhaps posting them would be smart?), but I do know that there's no reason to use aspect of the monkey, EVER. Since, well, have you READ the description for Aspect of the Dragonhawk? It actually combines aspects of the hawk and monkey, neat huh?
Sorry if I sound harsh, but I can't help it if I'm a douchebag. :C
Julianne Mar 30th 2010 1:35PM
why would you use monkey when dragonhawk gives the same dodge benefit?
Radioted Mar 30th 2010 2:46PM
Well... I clearly am an idiot. Nothing to see here, folks, move along!
/casts Misdirect on the healer
/feigns death
Arednel Mar 30th 2010 1:09PM
thought you'd be please some women are mages, at least we cook up nommy tables of food :P
Hollow Leviathan Mar 30th 2010 2:26PM
Strudel again? Where's my conjured magebeer?
davidfairhurst63 Mar 30th 2010 1:11PM
How could a girl heal you when she's in the kitchen?
Dreamstorm Mar 30th 2010 1:30PM
I saw what you did there...
Vitos Mar 30th 2010 1:33PM
Laptop
Greykin Mar 30th 2010 1:37PM
http://xkcd.com/341/ :D
jordedo Mar 30th 2010 1:13PM
"The ultimate prank. WoW will be down all day long."
This is almost true in the EU servers as far as I know. Loading screen freezing. 47 pages post in Tech Support forum and growing. People needing to restart WoW multiple times before being able to reach their characters.
"When I teleported in, I didn't go to the entrance but rather right where the rest of the group was"
I noticed this today in a random LFG Zul Farrak run. Sweet.
Anuillae Mar 30th 2010 1:14PM
Ha! You say that it is a man's job to hide behind massive shields and plates of metal? I would like to see you go out there and face dragons and Abominations wearing nothing more than a cloth dress, and armed with a stick of wood. It requires more courage to fight with less armour and get hit few times than to wear impenetrable metal armour and get hit more.
(Don't worry about him, he's a little stupid, owing to having been hit on the head so many times)