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: Fus Ro Dah
by Alex Ziebart 
Nov 14th 2011 at 11:00AM
Oh jeez. Oh gosh. It's 6:30 a.m. and I haven't written The Queue yet. This is your fault, Skyrim. This is all your fault. I hate you so much. Get out of my life, Skyrim. I never want to see you again.
Wait, baby, no! I didn't mean it! Come back, please! I need you. I need you so bad.
AGuyOnTheInternet asked:
Any idea what Blizzard's plan is to get people missing expansions to be set and ready for MoP? Like a battle chest or something?
Blizzard has already bundled The Burning Crusade with the base game; The Burning Crusade effectively doesn't exist anymore. All of that content is in the bottom-level box, not branded with the Burning Crusade title at all. A couple of the Blizzard developers have mentioned in passing that they want to roll Wrath of the Lich King into the basic box as well. That will almost certainly happen at some point in the future, but when? We don't know. It could be a few months from now. It could be a couple years from now.
Personally, I'd like to see Blizzard go the route a couple of other games in the industry have gone with expansions: If you buy an expansion, you're given everything else that's been released before it. So if you were a new player who wanted to start World of Warcraft, you would just buy the Cataclysm box. With it, you'd get Wrath of the Lich King, The Burning Crusade, and vanilla WoW. When Mists of Pandaria comes out, a new player would buy the MoP box and get Cataclysm, Wrath, Burning Crusade, and vanilla all in one package.
Wrox asked:
Has there been any word of a Pilgrim's Bounty boss? I'd love to fight an epic turkey of doom. This holiday could be so much more than the week when everybody levels cooking on their alts.
No word on that, no.
I think I like Pilgrim's Bounty being low-key. This season is stacked with so many darn stress-inducing holidays in-game and out that I appreciate having a little break to just run around the world, have a little fun, skill up cooking and not give a damn about the latest mount drop or whatever.
@eicenhour asked:
Do you think Blizzard will bring back the Battle for Undercity in the future?
Definitely not. Cataclysm killed that quest dead.
@ladiciuswarrior asked:
with the removal of relics and the such do you think we will get vanity items like the book hanging from my pally figure?
I haven't heard anything about this, but it would be very awesome if Blizzard did it. Trophies is one of the things Warhammer Online did extremely well. You earned trophies by completing in-game tasks and achievements. Every character model had a set of attachment points on the hips, shoulders, and so on. You chose which trophies you wanted to display on which parts of your body. I absolutely loved it, and I'd love if Blizzard brought that to WoW.
@malytwotails asked:
Should I bake gingerbread cookies or mint chocolate chip cookies tomorrow? I promise to actually send some to Alex.
While I love gingerbread and it is the season for such things, I'm not sure any cookie could top mint chocolate chip. Go with that.
I wonder if USPS lets you send cookies to a P.O. box?
@Sabiba asked:
any suggestions to beat the prepatch boredom? Other than rolling an alt. Can't seem to get excited for anything other than raiding.
Build your transmogrification set! That's what I did. Also, don't force yourself to play if you're bored. It's alright to step away from the game and do something else to let your batteries recharge. You'll be more excited to play when patch 4.3 rolls around that way. World of Warcraft won't get mad at you for being a two-timing cheater if you play another game for a couple of weeks. Taking a break is OK.
Playing other games doesn't need to be a huge expense, either. A lot of players get nervous about playing other games because they don't want to drop $50 to $60 at a time on a brand new game they may or may not like, because that's a steep price tag when you're used to only paying $15 per month. You don't need to drop $60 on a new game. You really don't. Grab Steam and look at recent top indie games. You can get some really solid titles for around $15, sometimes as low as $5. I highly recommend Bastion for $15. It's one of the best gaming experiences I've had all year.
Have questions about the World of Warcraft? The WoW Insider crew is here with The Queue, our daily Q&A column. Leave your questions in the comments, and we'll do our best to answer 'em!
Filed under: The Queue
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 14)
omedon666 Nov 14th 2011 3:46PM
Three words that changed my Skyrim experience forever (for the better):
"Silence, my brother"
I could explain it further, but I'd have to kill you. ;)
rapsam2003 Nov 14th 2011 3:55PM
Ah, Skyrim. I love you, baby!
Arrohon Nov 14th 2011 4:26PM
I've been playing it whenever I can (speaking of which, why am I here instead of playing?) and haven't seen a single bug. It's crashed on me twice, but no bugs.
Also, it's my first Elder Scrolls game and I'm impressed. I was frightened and laughing my ass off when I killed a chicken and ALL of Riverwood came at me with knives. Last night I was heading over a tree trunk/bridge and there was a bandit on it shooting at me. I started to wail on him and then BAM, dragon picked him up and tossed the poor fellow. I then fought the dragon and died... then loaded and killed the %^$#@!
Butts Nov 14th 2011 4:38PM
I was very excited about Skyrim and having a break from wow in between patches... So far I have just not been able to get into it. I'm assuming many of you are on PC since this is a WoW page... so maybe you can tell me how I can get past the:
1. Clunky and super-tedious consolized UI for PC.
2. Lack of keybind control. (I am aware of the "Favorites" bind-able to 1-8.)
3. Lack of character identity... i.e. no "character" page. How do I see how sexy I am??
4. No character profile/selection... i.e. when the game starts, it is simply a saved game, rather than a character with his/her own saved points. How does one start and maintain a clear and separate alt?
Butts Nov 14th 2011 4:40PM
I was very excited about Skyrim and having a break from wow in between patches... So far I have just not been able to get into it. I'm assuming many of you are on PC since this is a WoW page... so maybe you can tell me how I can get past the:
1. Clunky and super-tedious consolized UI for PC.
2. Lack of keybind control. (I am aware of the "Favorites" bind-able to 1-8.)
3. Lack of character identity... i.e. no "character" page. How do I see how sexy I am??
4. No character profile/selection... i.e. when the game starts, it is simply a saved game, rather than a character with his/her own saved points. How does one start and maintain a clear and separate alt?
Hurbster Nov 14th 2011 5:33PM
You could just press 'F' or roll back the mousewheel to go into 3rd person mode.
Kook Nov 14th 2011 5:56PM
@ Mr Crow:
Oh. My. God. That was AWESOME! Thank you for linking it...
...brb gotta go play it again.
lancelott Nov 14th 2011 9:27PM
@ B Nuts and @ Pyromelter... That's how I play too! Outside of dungeons, caves, etc, I play in 3rd person and it's sweet! Definitely an improvement over Oblivion.
Now back to being a bad ass dragonborn-shouting-archmage-werewolf...
Guapa Nov 15th 2011 7:26AM
sooo... I'm bored of leveling my 3rd Alt to 85 so I'm interested in Skyrim - but I'm not sure if I wouldn't regret shelling out the money for it.
From this thread alone, the cons seem to overweigh the pros:
cons:
- annoying bugs in the PC version
- bad interface (if you're used to the flexibility of WoW)
- only one character/savegame possible (!?)
- getting married
pros:
- a dragon fighting a mammoth
- a dragon attacking in a city
- getting married
Is there something to be said about the game? What about gameplay? How can you specialize your char (like in classes, talents, etc). Is the story any good?
Dragoniel Nov 16th 2011 5:46AM
@Guapa
Let me just tell you this - I hate Elder scrolls. I hate Oblivion. I didn't liked Fallout. Skyrim just went on and blew my mind right off. I haven't logged in to WoW since its release. Not once.
As a matter of fact, only RPG that I ever considered to be good, was Gothic II and Gothic II: Night of the Raven. Skyrim... it is something amazing. Get it. Buy it. Download it. Freaking break in and steal it, but you have to have it. It's the best offline game released in this decade or so, have my word on it.
Pro:
+ Controls are very good
+ Interface is well done and rather intuitive
+ Graphics are very good
+ Weather effects will blow your mind every time you decide to climb a mountain
+ Combat system is quite good:
a) stealth is a very powerful strategy (no longer a gimmick)
b) magic concept is very unique (dualwielding magic, anyone?) and works well
+ More talents and specialization trees than you could shake a stick at
+ Very immersive game world
+ Challenging. There are different difficulty levels, but playing on default there is always a sense of danger. While there are plenty of enemies to oneshot (especially if going assassin stealth style), there are more than plenty to destroy you utterly if approached unprepared.
+ Huge world. 150 dungeons. Random encounters. Quests. 10 races to chose from. Archers, assassins, knights, warriors, mages, healers, summoners and any combination thereof.
Cons
+ Can only keybind up to 8 abilities at a time
(but you can add unlimited number of abilities to quick access menu, and you don't really need more abilities than that in combat. I generally use only 2-4 buttons for spells and selection between weapons)
+ There are a few bugs in PC version
(but so far I'm yet to find a gamebreaking bug. It's usually keybinds getting unbound due to multiple identical copies of the keybound item in inventory or camera controls locking up, which quicksaving and loading solves in 3 seconds)
+ Can't run in fullscreen-windowed mode without mods and game sometimes crashes when alt-tabing.
I never expected such a quality product from this company. They outdone themselves good. People are going to talk about Skyrim as one of the best RPG's ever produced for decades. Mark my words.
KrazyKorean728 Nov 14th 2011 11:04AM
Question (Sorry if this has been answered already):
With the simplification of Talents in Mists of Pandaria, are dual spec's going away?
loop_not_defined Nov 14th 2011 11:07AM
The spec system is staying, so no, I highly doubt it. In fact Blizzard referred to dual speccing in MoP off-handedly during BlizzCon, so again, highly doubt it.
Levi Nov 14th 2011 11:10AM
the question was asked here http://wow.joystiq.com/2011/10/25/the-queue-lets-talk-mists-of-pandaria-release-date/
but i don't think it was ever answered by either WoW Insider staff or a Blue. but as the first few posts of that Queue said, it really wouldn't make any sense to take it away, since there will still be clearly defined roles that need different builds - kinda hard to use one spec to tank AND heal, and do both as effectively as someone specced specifically for one or the other
(cutaia) Nov 14th 2011 11:28AM
No. Your spec and specific talents are different things.
As an example, a single-spec prot pally will be able to change from [stun talent x] to [cc talent y] before a boss fight without having to "respec." But if that same prot pally wants to change to a ret pally before the fight, they'll still need that second spec.
The Dewd Nov 14th 2011 11:39AM
@(cutaia) - Presumably, though, if you have a prot pally with two prot specs, you could talent them for different types of fights and switch back and forth as needed. The same could go for any class - so mages could talent into, for example, the dual-CC talent (if that stays around) for fights that require it and then have another spec for AoE or nuking or whatever.
I think, though, it's a bit early to worry too much about it since the current "trees" are just sort dev wishlists/pipedreams for now and we have no idea what it'll look like come beta much less release.
loop_not_defined Nov 14th 2011 11:50AM
The Dewd, Blizzard has said that changing the new talents will be similar to changing glyphs (done out in the world), so you could customize your talents for each individual boss fight if you wanted.
I really do love the new system. It means I don't have to decide on spending a spec slot on PVE utility or PVP effectiveness.
(cutaia) Nov 14th 2011 11:50AM
"Presumably, though, if you have a prot pally with two prot specs, you could talent them for different types of fights and switch back and forth as needed."
There won't be a point to having two of the same spec. All of the core prot abilities will be automatically given just by being prot in the first place. So, the only things that would change if you switched from a theoretical [Prot Spec 1] to [Prot Spec 2] would be the 6 "talents", which can be switched on the fly anyway.
Noyou Nov 14th 2011 12:10PM
It would be like having 2 specs so you don't have to swap glyphs. You could do it, but it would be kind of a waste, unless you only play one spec and have no other need for it.
Puntable Nov 14th 2011 12:20PM
If you want to have a PVP prot spec and a PVE prot spec, for example, you could still do that. I'm sure there will be mods to save various talent and glyph profiles, and let you switch between them with one button, which would have the same effect.
Abbadon Nov 14th 2011 1:00PM
Thanks cutaia and others... This is the first time I fully realized what it all meant!!
I can use my shadow spec for both pve and pvp, and go back to a healing offspec. And my lock can have a shared affliction pve/pvp spec and finally setup a solo, demo spec. Yay!