Burning Crusade Goes Beta, NDA Lifted

[Merusk]

Any of our testers care to confirm or deny the rumor I recently heard that you'll be able to have 3 professions instead of 2?

[Modern Angel]

Not a tester but it's been asked all over the place. Not true.

[Phred]

Not a tester but it's been asked all over the place. Not true.

Definately not true. They did up the quest log to 25 though.

[Modern Angel]

That's real nice. Everything I've read has said there are an absolute million quests. More than enough to fill up even a 25 in perpetuity.

[Phred]

That's real nice. Everything I've read has said there are an absolute million quests. More than enough to fill up even a 25 in perpetuity.

That's a slight exageration. I've had no trouble keeping up with quests and I didn't even delete every quest in my book when I transferred over to beta. I suppose if you initially ran all over the continent you could overfill your book but eash area has about 15-20 quests in your level range when you arrive there from my experience. I actually ran out of quests to do in L66. Every quest I could do was done except for a couple of elite quests it was next to impossible to get groups for. Amazingly even in beta for some reason it's very hard to find people willing or needing to team up to kill elite mobs in the later zones. Dispite /who saying the zone is full of appropriate leveled people using the lfg tool or just /general chat has yeilded no results for me and the one person I found to team up on one quest said they took 2 1/2 days to find a group for the quests I was looking for.

[Simond]

Blizzard 'improves' (read: ruins) the male BE model 
(Apologies in advance for linking to the Official WoW forums)

[Morfiend]

I also0 liked the old models a bit better, but honestly its being blown out of proportion (pun intended). I logged in last night after seeing all these threads, and in game you can hardly tell that they are a bit more buff. Also, I think the amimations work a bit better on the new model. The old one had a sort of boneless feel when he would swing a 1h weapon. But as stated I did like them a bit more lean.

[Morat20]

Has there been anymore changes on Hunter pet scaling? Last word I got was that after they normalized outland pets with the pre-TBC pets, even BM specced hunters were hosed. Pets couldn't hold aggro worth a flip, no chance at end-game surviveability, etc.

All things considered, I have no idea what Blizzard should do about pets. The idea is good -- lower your ranged DPS some in return for getting a small DPS pet that can keep them at range (thus beating on the pet, not you), but it's not working out in practice. When you hit raids, you're effectively taking a DPS nerf because pets can't handle elite mobs -- they die to AoE attacks and such designed to make life hard for well geared tanks.

In terms of single-target DPS, I would have thought it'd go Rogues>Hunters>Warlock>Mages>Warriors. Against multiple targets, Mages of course should reign supreme. :)

In actuality, though, it's a darn good raiding night when I'm up there with the mages -- simply because I'm sacrificing 80+ DPS from my pet, 'cause I can't use it. I take a big DPS nerf for nothing. And I'm not sure there's a solution. If you upgrade pets enough to survive against elite mobs, then you're unbalancing them for PvP -- unless you're willing to acknowledge that in PvP a Hunter's pet is not worth trying to kill, and letting the poor clothies take the pet DPS (and interrupts) as they try to burn down the Hunter.

I guess one option is to make Hunter pets immune to PvE AoE -- but I'm pretty sure that's going to cause a lot of problems too.

I just don't see a way to scale pets to make them surviveable -- and able to contribute their 10% or so of Hunter DPS -- at end-game, and not make them effectively overbearing in PvP.

[MrHat]

The solution is to seperate them into PvE pets, and PVP pets.  Different abilities for different sides.  The BM tree could reflect this, each skilll doing 1 of 2 things, letting you chose.

[Righ]

They should ping-pong between each class being overpowered and underpowered on a regular basis. Their next MMORPG should have three classes.

[Morat20]

The solution is to seperate them into PvE pets, and PVP pets.  Different abilities for different sides.  The BM tree could reflect this, each skilll doing 1 of 2 things, letting you chose.

I dunno. What's the downside of making Hunter pets immune to PvE AoE physical effects -- right there, your pets tend to live through most boss fights. Aren't Warlock imps much the same way?

What's the downside there? PvP they're still open to AoE, most non-raid bosses aren't big on AoE damage, and then you could more carefully balance BM versus MM versus Survival.

[Chenghiz]

Warlock pets can gain aoe avoidance - I think hunter pets should be able to as well, definitely. As for hunter pet nerfing, I get the impression that 'can't hold aggro, not survivable' was the general outcry on the WoW-Hunter forums. On the EJ boards the response was still negative but not quite so drastically so.

[pants]

Warlock pets can gain aoe avoidance - I think hunter pets should be able to as well, definitely. As for hunter pet nerfing, I get the impression that 'can't hold aggro, not survivable' was the general outcry on the WoW-Hunter forums. On the EJ boards the response was still negative but not quite so drastically so.

From what I was reading, the original TBC hunter pets from Outland were monstrously overpowered.  Like being able to solo 3-4 elites of the same level at once, without the hunter having to do anything.  So they needed to be nerfed, sounds like the nerf bat has hit too hard tho.  Expect it to be unnerfed a bit, although it is going to be damn hard to get right.

[Zetor]

PARIS, France -- Blizzard Entertainment® today announced that the release date for World of Warcraft®: The Burning Crusade™, the highly anticipated expansion for World of Warcraft, will be in January 2007. By adding a few extra weeks to the development cycle beyond its original target date, Blizzard will be able to extend the closed beta test and further refine the new content that will ship with the game.

“We appreciate the enthusiasm surrounding World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade, and we’re excited about putting the finishing touches on all of the new content,” said Mike Morhaime, president and cofounder of Blizzard Entertainment. “We feel confident that the extra time spent polishing the game will result in the high-quality experience that our players expect and deserve.”

Blizzard began the closed-beta phase of testing on World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade earlier this month. The January 2007 release window will allow extra time for current beta testers to participate in the final stages of development and continue providing valuable feedback.

Further information on specific worldwide release dates, pricing, and other details will be announced in the near future.

Pushed back to Jan 2007... wtf is Vivendi thinking? You gotta milk that holiday season, cmon!

Source: here and here


-- Z.

[Velorath]

I'm a little disappointed, but better for them to get as much of the class balancing out of the way as possible before release.  I've got too many other games to play in the next couple months anyway.

[Shavnir]

Eh, would it really be a Blizzard game if it wasn't delayed beyond people's expectations?

[Fabricated]

I am physically incapable of being surprised by a delay of a Blizzard title.

[Trippy]

Eh, would it really be a Blizzard game if it wasn't delayed beyond people's expectations?

WoW got forced out before Christmas but this time around I'm guessing Vivendi didn't want to piss off the Blizzard employees (e.g. by making them work through Thanksgiving) given that WoW is the goose that's laying the golden eggs for Vivendi.

[Merusk]

Well, there's that and the fact that the beta hasn't even tested L70 or any of the content and abilities therin.   Damn near impossible to test balance issues and bug content when that happens.  If they don't up Beta's cap to 70 in today's downtime, I wouldn't expect them to hit a January date either.

[Numtini]

I sort of figured it was going to be delayed, if for no other reason than that it was Blizzard. I'm more amused than anything else and the teeth gnashing on the forums is as much entertainment as the game itself.

[Simond]

Arse.

...

Heigh ho, back to my corps (minor, trivail) war in EVE for a few weeks.

Edit: Trippy, I don't think this is good news for the TBC dev team - instead of shoving whatever was ready out the door at the end of November (and taking six months or so afterwards to patch in whatever was missing), they're going to be chained to their PCs until TBC goes live.

[Phred]

Doesnt surprise me in the slightest. I doubt it'll hurt sales much either. Did it hurt diablo or starcraft? I believe both released after xmas.

[lamaros]

I dont think it will hurt them much at all. WoW didn't get most of the subscribers they have now on the original release alone, so thinking that they require a christmas release now doesn't maketh sense.

And I think the Devs were going to be chained to their PCs whichever way they did it. An early release wouldn't mean any slowing of the testing and patch cycle.

[Venkman]

I seriously doubt this'll be a problem for them. Either they're avoiding the gluttony (good for MMORPGs), have so many pre-orders they don't need retail presence in December anyway (so sorry for that lack of foot-traffic aid there buddy retailers), or figure the rise in Gift Card gift-giving for the holidays will translated into January sales of boxes anyway (back atcha retail partners).

[Paelos]

Hmmm, this gives me more time to get to Naxx before it becomes completely obselete.

[Jayce]

I for one am glad to see at least one development house that doesn't have "SHIP IT BY XMAS" engraved on a millstone and hanging around every developer's necks as a condition of employment.

[Modern Angel]

I'm surprised only from the standpoint that they'll miss the Xmas release and that all the reports I'd read from beta said that things were shaping up quite nicely. It's Blizzard, though... no skin off my nose. The release of the full new talent trees is a nice halfway point. I'll be really curious how the 41 point talents scale with current content.

[Righ]

I'm not surprised that there are a lot of fans who think this is a good thing largely because its what Blizzard are doing.

[Morat20]

Warlock pets can gain aoe avoidance - I think hunter pets should be able to as well, definitely. As for hunter pet nerfing, I get the impression that 'can't hold aggro, not survivable' was the general outcry on the WoW-Hunter forums. On the EJ boards the response was still negative but not quite so drastically so.

From what I was reading, the original TBC hunter pets from Outland were monstrously overpowered.  Like being able to solo 3-4 elites of the same level at once, without the hunter having to do anything.  So they needed to be nerfed, sounds like the nerf bat has hit too hard tho.  Expect it to be unnerfed a bit, although it is going to be damn hard to get right.

As best I understand it, outland pets were overpowered. When you took the overpowered pets, added in the pet scaling they added (pets scaling to hunter gear), they were monsterous. So they nerfed the outland pets so they followed the old pet pattern -- if you tame a level 2 cat and work it up to level 60, he's the same as if you tamed that cat at 60.

Problem is that now the pet scaling is too small -- pets have all the surviveability of a wet napkin and even BM pets have to spam intimidate and kill to keep aggro. On the one hand, they've now got a constant baseline as all pets scale the same. On the other hand, they need to actually adjust it so that pets scale properly and remain useful.

As it is, you wouldn't spec BM even for levelling 60 to 70 -- much less raid.

[Signe]

Yay!  Blizzard stuck a big pointy stick up me arse!  Yay!  Blizzard did something!  Yay! 

[Nija]

Pushed back to Jan 2007... wtf is Vivendi thinking? You gotta milk that holiday season, cmon!

-- Z.

What were they thinking? I bet they were thinking they'd have lines of 200 people at midnight at every eletronics retailer in the country. No matter what date they choose.

Monthly subscriptions aren't good christmas presents. 'Hey honey, I got you this neat PDA phone for christmas! Yeah, only trouble is that in order to use any of the cool features you'll have to pay $50/mo on top of what you already pay... LOVE YOU!'

The gift that keeps on giving!

[Dren]

Pushed back to Jan 2007... wtf is Vivendi thinking? You gotta milk that holiday season, cmon!

-- Z.

What were they thinking? I bet they were thinking they'd have lines of 200 people at midnight at every eletronics retailer in the country. No matter what date they choose.

Monthly subscriptions aren't good christmas presents. 'Hey honey, I got you this neat PDA phone for christmas! Yeah, only trouble is that in order to use any of the cool features you'll have to pay $50/mo on top of what you already pay... LOVE YOU!'

The gift that keeps on giving!

The difference is this is an expansion, so the suck... gift receiver will already have the subscription.

I agree they sell just as many either way though.

[Dren]

Yay!  Blizzard stuck a big pointy stick up me arse!  Yay!  Blizzard did something!  Yay! 

Finally, Signe posts her RL picture!

*Edit:  You look funny without a nose.*

[Signe]

I smell funny, too.

[Furiously]

I smell funny, too.

That could just be NJ.