"Your skill in All - Glyphs has increased to 415."

So my Warlock is now lvl83. Go go, Zeptuk!

This pass through Deepholm had the benefit of another few builds of polish, which has tidied up some quests (or actually implemented them) as well as shown off a lot of the new voice work that's been added to many npcs during quest events.

My one big question is what does the following chatlog message mean:

My Warlock is, and has always been, a Tailor/Enchanter. I can only assume this is something hinting at the new Glyph revamp, but there's nothing more I can guess about it.


My new lvl83 spell is Dark Intent.

I came to the sudden realisation that Zeptuk and I can do wonders with this due to Burning Embers, assuming everything is coded to work so. Edit: It appears that Burning Embers is not currently working, though I swear it recently was. Also, the buff drops off when mounting due to Zeptuk despawning and so Dark Intent must be recast upon landing. Hopefully this is something that is overlooked atm and pairing up a Dark Intent with one's own Imp will be designed for in the future.

As for what gear I have, I've yet to finish all of Deepholm due using a lot of rest while leveling, but I've replaced everything from ICC10 bar my T10 chest, Ashen Band of Endless Destruction (Exalted), and Muradin's Spyglass. I've reforged 52 crit on the Spyglass into Mastery and like that.

Time to take it easy, methinks. (I said that when my Druid hit lvl83 :S )

Additional Character Slots?

I managed to get a screenshot of the arrows at the bottom of the Character Select screen.

A few builds ago it was commented on by a Blue that these arrows were part of something used internally to test anything and that it wasn't an indication of gaining additional slots. Those arrows eventually disappeared, but now they're back briefly when loading up a realm. I thought I'd add this screenshot anyway, whatever the true truth.

Worgen Creation and Future Slot Increase

Worgen creation now shows one's human appearance, however, only skin colour is adjustable at the moment. Female creation is still unavailable.

Also, I noticed that there was a brief display of up and down arrows on the character select screen. I've been unable to reproduce it and I can only assume I wasn't hallucinating, but they appeared as the screen loaded during my first login of the patch. These arrows appeared in the bottom right corner above the "Delete Character" and "Back" options, and I'm assuming it's the foundations of eventually increasing character limits. While additional character slots may only be available by purchase, I look forward to hopefully being able to keep all my characters on the one realm.

Build 12803 - Thorns

Thorns has received an overhaul in this latest build.

With 4058 Spellpower and in Moonkin Form (which now gives +10% Arcane/Nature dmg) it hits for 794 damage.

This is a massive change and will be interesting to see whether it will be nerfed in much the same way that it was in early WotLK. Fast hitting enemies (namely Rogues) really take a beating from this.

Tol Barad Peninsula

The Peninsula is captured by the whoever controls Tol Barad and acts as a lvl85 daily quest hub.

Tol Barad

Tol Barad, the new PvP zone, appears as though it has benefited from the failures of Wintergrasp in many ways. The battle centers around three destructible towers and three capturable areas. We won after destroying all three towers and then capping all three nodes; however, I'm unsure whether all of that was necessary for the win, but it's awesome that there is not one single focus.

Random Observations of 12759

As per the recent blue post, mob damage has gone up significantly. There's now actually a very real danger of dying if you get overwhelmed. EDIT: I'm really really liking that mobs now actually pose a threat to the player.
To give an idea of what things are hitting for, my 83 Druid is getting smacked in Deepholm with ~3k melee hits, 10k Fireballs, 16k Fireblasts, etc. I currently have 48k HP, but that disappears very quickly when pulling multiple mobs.


The new version of the Mage talent Impact is crazy good.

I'm surprised there still haven't been any solid Druid changes in the last several builds. I'm not panicking that we're going to go live the way we are, but I definitely am jealous of the Warlock and Mage incredibleness in the last few builds, especially Fire Mages.

I do think that bringing up the issues of Balance identity is paying off, though. Wrath now has a new sound, which is a sparky zap :D
The only change I see for Druids at the moment is that Soothe Animal is now called Sooth, and reads "Soothes the target, dispelling all enrage effects". Pretty cool, imo.


Archimonde's Vengeance, one of the first sub-zones of Hyjal, has been completely redone.

^^ New

^^ Old



The Paladin talent Art of War leaves a rather large WoW icon in the middle of your screen, which makes me wonder if they're implementing a PowerAuras-esque UI.

Build 12759

I'm going to spam this post with screenshots from the latest build.

I'

Note the new icons on the menu bar. They greyed-out on currently has no tooltip, but it is where Social used to be. The Quest Log is now also an !

There is a new ability for Warlock, Summon Demon. Clicking it opens a dropdown/dropup/dropsideways menu listing all of your minions. EDIT: The same has been done for Mage portals.

Demonology's Hellfire-on-the-move is now implemented.

Portals to take you to each of the new zones are now part of the city stone circles, including a 'You need to be level 85 to use this portal" for Tol Barad.
.

Streaming Gnomes

A brief moment of limbo as Hyjal loads up.

And Stormwind in stages.

The (Partial) Throne of Tides

Note that these have been taken across a few builds over multiple runs.

New Client and Launcher - Streaming Game Content

So today brings with it a spanky new client to download, which has its pluses and minuses.

On the plus side, WoW is now able to be streamed in that you are able to play with only a small portion of the data actually downloaded. The downloading will continue as you play, giving preference to content you are encountering.

Given the state of the internet in Aus, I'm expecting the data rate threshold required to play WoW streamed will have it so that this feature isn't available anyway and that one will simply have to download the entire client as usual. Either way, it's an interesting feature.

The other downside is that I now have a rather large client download sitting ahead of me that will most definitely put a dent in my monthly quota, which will very likely see me purchasing some extra data blocks shortly. The price of Cataclysm.