The Queue: Isn't Christmas over?
by Alex Ziebart 
Jan 5th 2011 at 11:00AM
Welcome back to The Queue, the daily Q&A column in which the WoW Insider team answers your questions about the World of Warcraft. Alex Ziebart will be your host today.
Wow, guys. A whole lot of you thought we were baiting the older folks in our audience with that Bing Crosby video yesterday. Since when do you need to be old to enjoy Bing Crosby? There is no "you must be this old to ride" sign on that man's music. It is an undisputed fact that Bing Crosby's music is the best Christmas music ever made and the man himself is one of the best American singers of all time.
Undisputed fact, people. Undisputed.
Wellsee asked:
Getting the jewelcrafting recipes one every three to five days is very tedious. Wrath had Titanium Powder to speed up the process, but there isn't an equivalent in Cataclysm. Was the powder an option from the beginning in Wrath?
No, Titanium Powder was not an option at Wrath of the Lich King's launch. You couldn't prospect Titanium to acquire Titanium Powder until patch 3.2, when the epic gems and gem cuts were implemented. My personal prediction is that Cataclysm will go the same way. Around patch 4.2, Blizzard will implement epic gems; you will be able to get them (rarely) from Pyrite Ore, and you will also be able to get Pyrite Dust.
Do note: That's only my personal theory. Don't be disappointed if it doesn't happen. Blizzard has never said that's what it'll do.
SomnambullistArygos asked:
Where's Thrall? If you do all of the quests in Deepholm, you see the Earthen Ring leave the Temple of Earth. Wouldn't Thrall be able to leave, too?
I think the situation at the Maelstrom is a two-way street, but we've only been able to close one lane. We rebuilt the World Pillar and kept Azeroth from collapsing into the Plane of Earth, but the Maelstrom was a pretty screwed-up place to begin with, and Deathwing did even more damage to it. Azeroth won't collapse in on itself anymore, but there's still a great big rift in the planet.
Daedram asked:
I've seen you guys mention patch 4.1 recently, but do we even know anything about it? Has Blizzard talked about it yet? What's in it?
Blizzard has talked a little about patch 4.1, but nothing too in depth. I'm going to be a jerk and not answer your question here, but rather advise you to keep an eye on the site. A post outlining what we know about patch 4.1 will be popping into existence in the very near future.
Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW Insider 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: The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 10)
Josin Jan 5th 2011 11:04AM
I just wish the Jewelcrafting dailies gave a skillup, like the cooking and fishing ones do. Considering the cost in gems of some of them, it's really frustrating to get just a token from it.
Rapskallion Jan 5th 2011 11:19AM
I don't totally disagree with you considering purchasing the raw uncommon gems for the daily can be up to 450g on my server (Hyjal-US). However, if JC got skill ups from a daily then every one that wasn't a JC would want a daily that gave their professions skill ups.
It's one thing when the secondary professions like Fishing do it... but to only give one primary profession a skill-up daily would be unfair.
Josin Jan 5th 2011 11:26AM
I don't think it's a bad idea to implement skillup-via-quest scenarios for the other professions, either.
Personally, I'd just have been happy for some way to get some steady skillups on First Aid. I wasted a LOT of cloth trying to eke out those last points for 525.
dcisko Jan 5th 2011 11:42AM
Also, Inscription sort-of has a daily skillup recipe via Forged Documents, though it's only orange to 510 and yellow to 522.
Darthregis Jan 5th 2011 11:48AM
@ Josin
You used all that cloth for leveling First Aid?!
Please don't take this personally; my tailor would be punching your first aider in the face right now, if he could. IN. THE. FACE.
Josin Jan 5th 2011 11:55AM
Actually, I used half for leveling first aid, and half for helping out a tailor friend (who also had 4-5 other people feeding her cloth as well). We take care of our people. No reason we can't take care of ourselves in the process.
Dee Eff See Jan 5th 2011 12:00PM
Skillups are awarded to Fishing/Cooking because they are secondary professions available to everyone in the game should they decide to level it.
If Jewelcrafting were given skillups for doing a daily quest then every other profession would be at a disadvantage. The market should balance itself to a point where you are recovering the money spent on gems to create a token which can in turn be used to obtain a Chimera's Eye.
Now, if you decide to turn in the token for recipes that is similar to the method used by Blacksmiths, Leatherworkers, etc already where they have to trade a valuable resource to receive their recipes. So really, Jewelcrafters are in a similar situation as everyone else.
Lloren Jan 5th 2011 12:02PM
Everyone in our 25 man raid team was required to have 525 skill in first aid and 2 stacks of dense embersilk bandages in their possession by the first official raid (yesterday) or they didn't get a raid spot. My tailor alt REALLY wanted to punch myself and the officers in the face.
Darthregis Jan 5th 2011 12:04PM
Even with two toons to 85 and a couple of alts on their way feeing me cloth, I'm still nowehre near closed to max'ed out with tailoring. I'm just taking out my frustrations on your first aid toon.
Fret not, he'll be able to patch himself up after the beating. ;)
Darthregis Jan 5th 2011 12:08PM
Holy Typo Frenzy, Batman! WTB edit button.
*feeing -> feeding
*nowehre -> nowhere
*closed -> close
Eyhk Jan 5th 2011 12:34PM
The thing is though, that Jewelcrafting is also the ONLY profession where you need to grind dailies for each and every recipe that creates a blue or higher item. I think a skill-up would be nice.
Cyrus Jan 5th 2011 12:45PM
Jewelcrafting, Tailoring, every production profession seems rough to level. Making the items themselves don't seem any more expensive than ones in previous expansions (allowing for inflation, item level creep, etc., I just mean the ease of farming most of the materials), and getting multiple skill points from crafting one item has been great, but getting the recipes is ridiculous. In Wrath, leveling Leatherworking (just the one I'm familiar with, I'm pretty sure most other professions also have it worse than in previous expansions, although I think LW is particularly bad right now) from 430 points or so required buying patterns for 3 Heavy Borean Leather, which means six Borean Leather each, which means someone had to skin about 18 mobs. In Cataclysm, leveling LW from 510 points or so requires buying patterns for 10 Heavy Savage Leather, which means five Savage Leather each, which means someone skinned FIFTY mobs. This means it's going to take me a while to get to 525.
Foxfyr Jan 5th 2011 12:53PM
I very much dislike Blizzard's decision to use daily quests to purchase recipes. In TBC I was the first person on my server to have every available cut. In Wrath, I finally purchased the last design available 2 weeks before Cataclysm was released.
I realize that my collecting is completely OCD but I know I'm not the only person out there that tries to get every available recipe.
Noyou Jan 5th 2011 1:05PM
A skill up would be halfway decent. As it is JC is at a huge disadvantage over all other crafting professions. At least Black-smithing and Leather-working you can turn mats in for your designs. If you happen to have lots of mats you can get lots of designs. With JC you have to wait 3 days for a blue gem cut, 4 days for a meta gem cut, and 5 days for a crafted item design that you will need at least 4 special gems that would take another 4 days (unless you purchase them at super inflated prices). The thing that really irked me is when we made our JC only trinkets we got no skill ups or JC tokens. To my knowledge they were one time only designs, so what gives?
RetPallyJil Jan 5th 2011 1:58PM
Oh yeah? Well I wish my profession had a daily quest. Quit yer whinin'.
The Dewd Jan 5th 2011 2:09PM
Try maxing out Jewelcrafting on a Draenei. If you want the achievement for hitting 525 you have to get to (wait for it) 535 - because of the +10 racial. Metas go green well before then so the only guaranteed skillup is, I believe, the Fire Prism recipe. (At least out of the recipes I have right now.)
I haven't TOUCHED First Aid yet. I've sent all my cloth and greens to a tailor in my guild. Unfortunately, everyone was split and some folks were sending mats to folks and some were keeping them and some were doing First Aid. (I didn't mind the First Aid as much since we wanted the working together achievement and the one person I know who did First Aid also spent hours maxing out her fishing for us.) Now that we have at least one person maxxed I'm going to get my First Aid up and then share cloth again.
Link Jan 5th 2011 3:21PM
@The Dewd
I think you're misunderstanding how the JC bonus works. If an item turns green at skill level 500, it will turn green for a draenei at 510. Therefore, it is no different for a draenei to get to 535 skill than it is for any other player to get to 525. The real benefit comes from the fact that you can use "max-rank" JC abilities at effectively 515 skill. The end result of this bonus is making the profession substantially easier to level given the wider range of available skill-ups.
For example:
Subtle Amberjewel is learned at 465. For a draenei, they can pick it up at effectively 455 skill. Normally, it turns green at 507, but at 517 for a draenei. So, for a draenei, it took them 10 less skill-ups to get to and lasted 10 more skill-ups than it does for everyone else.
Schadenfreude Jan 5th 2011 4:26PM
I'd love to see skillup dailies for every profession, especially since the initial race is over. Those last few points to max skill are always a huge pain and being able to do it slowly and inexpensively would be boss.
Rai Jan 5th 2011 5:18PM
@The Dewd
My Gnome Engineer has little sympathy.
Carson Jan 5th 2011 8:05PM
@Noyou: the fact that JC recipes are gated by daily quests isn't a "huge disadvantage", it's a huge ADVANTAGE. Combined with the large number of cuts, it guarantees that there is not excessive competition selling cut gems. I've made 20,000g since Cataclysm launched, with minimal effort, and the other JCs in my guild have had similar results. That would never have happened if there wasn't gating on the recipe acquisition.