Druid Changes 4.0.6

Balance is mostly being left alone.  Cats and bears received (mostly) a string of nerfs (the mangle buff seems unlikely to fully offset the hit to bleeds, which form such a core component of cat damage).  Bears I guess were dealing too much damage; it doesn’t appear bears received any mitigation nerfs.  Oh, and berserk [...]

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Time to go back to WoW

With Cataclysm hitting in less than 2 months, I’m probably going to head back into Azeroth on a more consistent basis.  In addition to making sure I have a server to land on, this means making sure I understand the healing model properly.  Math will be forthcoming on this.  In the meantime, what does everyone [...]

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Cataclysm in December

Apparently, we get Cataclysm in December.  You likely know this. I wish I could say I was thrilled and excited.  For whatever reason, this time, I’m not.  The quest stuff really is cool.  The new zones are lovely and well-crafted, and the redone old zones simply sparkle from polish. But meh.  Don’t care right now. [...]

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World of Warcraft: Cataclysm System Changes Annoy Me

I haven’t said much about WoW because I’ve said all I can: the  quest changes are pure awesome.  The zone revamps really expand the story. And I just have nothing to say about the talent tree revamps.  They haven’t done anything for me.  I don’t like them.  They killed even the old illusion of choice.  [...]

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Cataclysm Beta: It’s Here and Now I can Talk About It

I’m a systems designer, so I tend to focus on the numbers and such where those crop up in games.  Planning, ability combinations, play options, the underlying conceptual form of a game: these are what I tend to focus o nthe most.  These are the things that imbue the background structure of the game, the [...]

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BRK Returns

Yay!

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World of Warcraft: New World Order Surprisingly Like the Old World Order

Blizzard has sent the blue posters out in force the past couple days, with several major posts detailing overhauls to important existing systems.  Rage is getting the promised overhaul (though you aren’t getting the promised pony), The major dispels are being more evenly distributed among healers, and Ghostcrawler is admitting defeat and creating a dedicated [...]

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World of Warcraft: 25-man Heroic Lich King Still Lives, Masteries, and Assorted Junk

I wish I had more to say on WoW.  I’ve mostly been on a holding pattern with regards to the game while we wait on more information about Cataclysm.  As far as the current game goes, my suspicion that the 25-man version of the Lich King would hold out longer than a week has proven [...]

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WoW: Cataclysm Stat Changes

Yesterday, Blizzard posted a massive summary of  upcoming stat changes. It’s worth bearing in mind that while many stats are changing suddenly, stats have been evolving over the course of the game’s life.  Wrath came in  with a number stat changes that were relatively important, including the removal of +healing and +damage/healing for casters.  Burning [...]

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Quick WoW News: Twitter Chat for 2/26

Developer chat on Twitter (h/t MMO-Champion)

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