Posts with tag Weapons

With great betas come great datamining, and we've got some splendid new weapon and shield models from the Mists of Pandaria beta courtesy of Disenchanting Azeroth. A lot of these models are potentially NPC only or lower level items, according to the site, and they are very detailed as we've come to expect from Blizzard's texture artists. Hit the link for more staves, axes, maces, and more from Mists of Pandaria.

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It's open warfare between Alliance and Horde in Mists of Pandaria, World of Warcraft's next expansion. Jump into five new levels with new talents and class mechanics, try the new monk class, and create a pandaren character to ally with either Horde or Alliance. Look for expansion basics in our Mists FAQ, or dig into our spring press event coverage for more details!

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Every week, WoW Insider brings you Spiritual Guidance for discipline, holy and shadow priests. On Wednesdays, shadow priesting expert Fox Van Allen comes from out of the shadows to bask in your loving adoration. All jokes removed to achieve SOPA compliance.

When we met here last, I spent a great deal of time calculating the power of trinkets, partially because it's an important subject and one that's not easy for a shadow priest to unravel without performing their own research (or reading someone else's). The real reason: WoW Insider data shows you guys absolutely love reading about trinkets. And why wouldn't you? Trinkets are the most compelling gear slot to fill. Instead of relying on boring, flat stats, they offer compelling procs.

But trinkets aren't the only pieces of gear that offer compelling procs -- not anymore. Game designers at Blizzard are finally living up to a promise they made way back in February 2010 to "make more proc weapons in the future."

The future is now, but that presents a new challenge to shadow priest. What exactly are those neat new procs worth? And what's our best-in-slot weapon?

This Breakfast Topic has been brought to you by Seed, the AOL guest writer program that brings your words to WoW Insider's pages.

As an enhancement shaman, my main character has lost many a roll over the years to players rolling on weapons for which their class probably shouldn't even have been rolling in the first place. We enhancement folk are pretty picky about which weapons we'll use; slow one-handers with agility are the only ones that pique our interest (blasphemers who use spellpower weapons are dead to me), and only those of the mace, axe, or fist families. Back in Naxx, I lost out on Calamity's Grasp to a rogue who wasn't even specced into a fist weapon build. Hunters rolled on one-handed axes like Touch of Madness -- as if they couldn't use nearly every other kind of weapon! Even dual-wielding DKs tried to get their cold, dead hands on one-handers like the Lion's Maw.

If it were up to me, I would remedy this problem by creating a whole new weapon class: flails. Flails would only be usable by shaman (and maybe druids, because kitties are cute). Variations could include the medieval-esque spiked ball(s) chained to a short pole handle, or even the nunchaku style of two sticks chained together. The swiftly spinning ball and chain of death would fit well with the enhancement shaman's Windfury Weapon imbue as well.

If you could, what new type of weapon would you add to WoW? Which classes would be able to use the new weapon, and why?

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The folks at Wowhead News have found a very interesting new vendor outside of patch 4.2's Firelands raid. Lurah Wrathvine, who is also riding on a Flameward Hippogryph for maximum pizzazz, will upgrade various normal tier 12 raid and valor point gear for the low, low price of a Crystallized Firestone. This is an item that drops off of the bosses therein when they are killed on heroic difficulty.

What's interesting about this system is that it affects items that don't even drop in the Firelands, especially the difficult-to-upgrade relics like the Hardheart Relic that makes my shaman scream "Me want!" like a caveman. Since relics are usually a valor point purchase, this makes them difficult (if not impossible) to upgrade, in comparison to other items. In general, this whole system is currently only in place to upgrade 21 items, but with some of those items being weapons or armor pieces, we may see more soon. It makes me remember Sunmotes and the Sunwell Plateau's exchange system. Crystallized Firestone definitely seems like the next iteration.

Also new on the test realms: The Avengers of Hyjal have a new strength DPS trinket. Looks like new itemization is being implemented as we speak.

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The news is already rolling out for the upcoming WoW Patch 4.2! Preview the new Firelands raid, marvel at the new legendary staff, and get the inside scoop on new quest hubs -- plus new Tier 12 armor!

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Blizzard and Epic Weapons' weaponsmithing fan art contest tasked talented WoW enthusiasts with crafting and building life-size replicas of their favorite World of Warcraft weapons. Categories included Best Dagger, Best Mace, Best Sword, Best Ranged, and Best of the Rest. The entries are phenomenal, but that's a given for how talented the WoW playerbase is.

Each week, WoW Insider brings you a fresh look at reader-submitted UIs as well as Addon Spotlight, which focuses on the backbone of the WoW gameplay experience: the user interface. Everything from bags to bars, buttons to DPS meters and beyond -- your addons folder will never be the same. This week: Shackleford.

Sometimes when I am out looking for new addons for the Spotlight, I find an author rather than any one addon. Many addon authors are not one-timers -- they've got a few addons under their belts because they either love the work or just can't get enough out of punishing themselves. Suffice to say, we are very appreciative of their work, and really, where would we be without them?

Today's Addon Spotlight focuses on two cool utilities from Shackleford, addon author to the stars (maybe). I am a big fan of little utilities, since most of these little wonders sit idly by, performing their functions with nary a whisper or whimper. Things just happen. If you don't already know them, may I introduce CalendarHUD and WeaponUP.

Axes, maces, lightning, Windfury and wolves. It can mean only one thing: enhancement. Rich Maloy lives it and loves it. His main spec is enhance. His off spec is enhance. He blogs about the life and times of enhance at Big Hit Box, pens the enhance side of Totem Talk and leads the guild Big Crits (Week 3 now out!) as the enhancement shaman Stoneybaby.

As a melee class, weapons are our most important items. Not surprisingly, good weapons (emphasis on "good") can't be bought with emblems and only drop off a select few bosses, with the best weapons dropping off the hardest bosses. While trinkets can be hard to acquire (Death's Choice/Verdict is a lie!), you can fill in the gaps with emblems or even some subpar trinket choices and not have as big an impact on overall damage as a good weapon. Nothing beats a big stick.

Today we're looking at enhancement weapon options in dungeons, plus Trial of the Crusader and Icecrown Citadel in 10s and 25s, regular and heroic. I am skipping over Naxx, OS, EoE, Ulduar, and Ony because it seems to me that it's far easier to get in and gear up in a ToC/ToGC PuG these days than any other raid. There are some good weapon choice in those older raids, but even starting out as a fresh 80 you should find ToC-10 PuGs doable.

Let's dive in to our weapon options.

Want to get Gold Capped? This column will show you how, and is written by Basil "Euripides" Berntsen, also of outdps.com, the Hunting Party podcast, and the Call to Auction podcast.

Enchanting mats are a strange business. They are in constant massive demand, and can be made in a variety of ways. Every Tuesday, thousands of guilds get thousands of upgrades that need to be enchanted, every day, hundreds of thousands of players run PUG and PvP content that gives them upgrades they want to enchant, and every day, thousands of players buy things like Bolts of Imbued Frostweave, which require enchanting mats to make.

Axes, maces, lightning, fire, frost, and wolves, and best of all, Windfury. It can mean only one thing: enhancement. Rich Maloy (aka Stoneybaby) loves it and lives it. His main spec is enhance. His off-spec is enhance. And he will be penning the enhance side of Totem Talk.

It seems 101 guides are all the rage these days, which makes enhancement shaman 101 a convenient place to start with my inaugural WoW.com post. Playing an enhancement shaman, and playing it well, means dealing with the most extensive spell rotation in the game, having two caps to hit in gearing, and a dozen cooldowns to track. Not to mention the need to run out of fires, avoid whirlwinds, and generally dodge all that hate on melee. It's safe to say enhance is one of the most complex specs to play. It's also one of the most fun.

My favorite part is that we're right up front making a mess of things with both physical and magical damage–to deadly effect. You want to play enhancement? Let's dive right in to get you started!

This is surprising: the entire loot table for the Arthas fight, on both 10 and 25-man (normal and hard, judging by the item levels) has just been posted to the Armory. Edit: the loot is also on Wowhead now, complete with 3D models. As tipster Micah noted, if this is really the whole loot table, it consists entirely of armor tokens, weapons, and Invincible's Reins (which is listed as a guaranteed drop on 25-man heroic). The focus on weapons isn't exactly new for raid end bosses, but it's interesting nonetheless.

I haven't had a chance to go through the whole list yet, but as far as I can tell, there aren't any of the nifty proc-based items we've been seeing elsewhere in Icecrown. It's pure stats on Arthas drops (though Alex points out that they all the 25-man heroic items have flavor text). Still, I wouldn't say no to a nice Tainted Twig of Nordrassil for my druid.

Which one's your favorite?

Melee combat? Barbaric. Healing? How pedestrian. Let the elements do the talking. Totem Talk: Elemental. Brought to you by Mike Sacco.

Last week I took you through Elemental 101, a crash course in playing your elemental shaman. Now that we've got the basics out of the way and you understand your talents and rotation, it seems as good a time as any to talk about gear.

We addressed the main stats you're looking for on elemental gear last week, but here's a quick rundown again for those who missed it: Hit rating, spell power, haste, and crit. These are the only four stats we'll be looking for on elemental gear, besides the obvious intellect and stamina boosts that'll be on nearly every piece of caster gear anyway.

If the above sounds like a pretty reasonable set of stats to look for, well, you're not wrong. So I've got good news and bad news for you. The good news? There's definitely elemental gear out there. The bad news? Good luck finding it. Elemental gearing has a lot of issues unique to both the shaman and this specific spec. And you're not gonna like them.

Fox Van Allen steps out of the shadows every Wednesday to take control of Spiritual Guidance, telling you all you need to know to melt faces with expert precision.

The era of patch 3.2 held some dark days for a shadow priest. The fights in Trial of the Crusader were definitely not built for shadow priests, especially in heroic mode. We scaled terribly with new gear. Our tier 9 gear was questionably designed. Every class has their own problems, but the problems that besieged shadow priests were bad enough to negatively effect raid performance. It wasn't hard for shadow priests to get left behind.

Patch 3.3, though -- this is our time. The changes to the spec have already been detailed: buffs to our glyphs, talents, and haste-affected DoTs gave us a ten-to-twenty percent boost to our damage right off the bat. Our tier 10 gear gives powerful two- and four-piece bonuses. And best yet, the fights in the new Icecrown Citadel five-man dungeons and raids seem as if they were built for us. We add tremendous value to an ICC raid in almost every fight.

Actually seeing those fights, though -- that can be a challenge. Patch 3.2 did a lot of damage to the shadow priest class's reputation. An increased emphasis on "gear score" in the game can (unfairly) get an average-geared shadow priest written off. We can't just take playing for granted -- past problems with the spec means there's a higher bar for us.

If you got left behind in the last patch or even if you're a newly minted level 80, don't worry -- you can catch up quick. Here's how.

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. Adam Holisky be your host today.

Hopefully you all had a nice Christmas, and are as glad it's over as I am.

Time for a handful of WoW questions and answers!

Stella asked...

"Why do Scourge necromancers (including Kel'Thuzad and death knights) get access to frost-abilities? The Scourge's power derives from Kil'Jaeden and he's a member of the Burning Legion. Demonic power is mostly fire and shadow based (for obvious reasons). So where does the Scourge's power over frost come from?"

If you thought your Epic Weapons Frostmourne replica just wasn't quite enough of a display of conspicuous consumerism, you can now display more conspicuous consumerism by buying a display for your other display of conspicuous consumerism.

That's right, Epic Weapons is now offering a special display for your Frostmourne, a light-up chunk of the Frozen Throne. It's a floor-mount stand made of clear poly-resin, built with two spotlights to illuminate the blade and hilt of your sword in a chilling blue glow. Weighing in at 26 pounds, it's also not likely to fall over and cause your cat's soul to become a thrall of the Lich King. The only thing it doesn't have, apparently, is a picture larger than 150 pixels across for me to show you. Blame Epic Weapons, not I.

It certainly looks cool, mind you, but the price -- $200 -- is a little steep, in my opinion. Then again, I suppose if you can afford the sword, you can afford the stone. Let it never be said that replica swordmakers don't know their audience. Dispose of that income, all ye nerds!

It seems like every Wrath patch brings with it more items than the last by an order of magnitude. It was eight hundred of 'em for 3.1, between the Argent Tournament and Ulduar, and now Ghostcrawler says that 1400 more PvE items will be packed in every box of Patch 3.3, including our big orange buddy up there.

Given the recent interview with Cory Stockton and our man GC, it seems like there's a lot of attention going into itemization for all of the Icecrown gear, and thus it's actually a little surprising that there's so darn much of it. And there's a ton of new kinds of procs, set bonuses, et cetera, building on the "Epic. Cool things. Proc'y stuff." mentality that GC says Icecrown items are all based on.

Then again, with what's going down with items in Cataclysm, fourteen hundred new items seem downright mundane in comparison. It must seem that way to Ghostcrawler, too, given that this whole comment off-handedly came out in a post where someone was loudly complaining about an itemization bug on a piece of Icecrown gear. That's casual conversation for ol' Greg. "Yeah, put the finishing touches on 1400 new items today. Figure later I'll get the number of that waitress at Applebee's. Tomorrow I personally reitemize all of the old-world quests for Cataclysm. I'll get up around noon, probably leave work at 3:30 or so."

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Patch 3.3 is the last major patch of Wrath of the Lich King. With the new Icecrown Citadel 5-man dungeons and 10/25-man raid arriving soon, patch 3.3 will deal the final blow to Arthas. WoW.com's Guide to Patch 3.3 will keep you updated with all the latest patch news.

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