WOW Obsessed » patch 3.1

Hoping for Argent Tournament’s future

Angelo Fernandez — Sat, 09 May 2009 14:08:17 +0000

When Blizzard announced that patch 3.1 would include the Argent Tournament, the concept was exciting and intriguing. The idea of a permanent in game event that would feature mounted combat and the building of a coliseum was something totally new and therefore sparked a lot of interest.

argent tournament jousting

The Argent Tournament is a nice source for all sorts of rewards – a new set of daily quests to earn some gold, reputation for your faction and a spiffy title, cool mounts and even some epic quality gear. It’s nice to have more sources for these things to beef up your character and also gives characters more potential goals to strive towards. In fact I can see the Argent Tournament as a nice source for gear upgrades for fresh 80’s, especially for alts.

I’m currently working on both my paladin and warlock alts and I’ve been drooling at some of the gear that I could possibly get for them from the Tournament. There’s really only one snag that’s keeping me from getting anything much from it except gold and rep from dailies – I totally suck at jousting. Even at the lowest level of jousting npc’s I fail so much. I only got lucky one time and that’s why I was able to reach the progression to get Valiant’s seals. I can imagine that there are more people like me who just plain suck and pretty much gave up jousting altogether.

This is the reason that I’m really really hoping that there’s more to this Tournament than just jousting. Deep inside I’m hoping that when the coliseum gets built, there will be more things to do. It’s like the Noblegarden world event where if you really hated collecting eggs then you won’t be able to get far in that event. I hate jousting and I really hope that it’s not the end for me and the Argent Tournament’s future.

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Next minor patch will bring some cool stuff

Angelo Fernandez — Wed, 29 Apr 2009 13:55:12 +0000

The more time passes by the more I see how “big” patch 3.1 was really supposed to be. We’re seeing more and more things that should have been released on that day it came out but including it would have meant postponing the release of the patch. Since we’ve been clamoring for Ulduar for so long, the patch had to be released with quite a bit of stuff that weren’t included and are only now slowly coming out.

argent tournament rewards vendor

According to CM Nethaera, the next minor patch will include two cool things – the much awaited Equipment Manager feature that was supposed to come out in patch 3.1 and a change to the Argent Tournament mount rewards.

The Equipment Manager is the missing piece to make switching specs using the dual specs feature seamless. Right now, your glyphs and action bars switch with your spec but that’s not enough. It could be that switching to another spec requires another set of gear and at this time changing your spec requires you to switch out your gear one by one unless you have an addon that does this. Equipment Manager will be the built in version of these addons and you should be able to change your gear without a problem as long as everything is in your bags or at the bank (you need to be at the bank to switch out items from the bank).

The same minor patch will also bring a change to the Argent Tournament mount rewards. If you already have one of these mounts, it will undergo a graphical improvement when the patch goes live. But then you can also get another mount for a cheaper cost that will have the looks of the ones that are currently available. So in short, after the patch you can get 2 mounts from the Argent Tournament. The cooler looking mount will cost 100 champion’s seals while the plainer ones will cost 5 champion’s seals and 500 gold.

I think these changes are pretty cool even if it’s just a minor patch!

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Noblegarden coming really soon!

Angelo Fernandez — Sat, 25 Apr 2009 13:57:32 +0000

In case you’ve been so caught up with the coolness of the new stuff patch 3.1 has to offer that you already forgot, I just want to remind you that there’s something else that’s cool coming our way really soon. I’m talking about the new and improved Noblegarden world event that’s just hours away.

noblegarden in wow calendar

Noblegarden usually comes out on Easter Sunday itself and in the past only lasted one day. This year it got postponed to April 26 but it looks like it could be well worth the wait. The event will last a whole week, ending on May 3. This year we not only get to hunt for eggs but also have several daily quests located in the many starting towns, several cool items found inside eggs, lots of chocolate (even used as currency, wonder how that will go) and cool new achievements that you need to get if you’re after the grand meta achievement to get that cool drake by doing all the world event achievements.

Hope we all have fun with this new and improved Noblegarden!

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Yogg-Saron World First Kill videos

Angelo Fernandez — Mon, 20 Apr 2009 12:54:36 +0000

Patch 3.1 is still only almost a week old but the normal mode of Ulduar has already been cleared by a few guilds around the world with the many reports of Yogg-Saron kills. But for most of us, we’re still probably working our way up through the different bosses. But I’m sure a lot of us will be joining these guilds in the Yogg-Saron kills eventually.

ulduar portal

I thought that posting videos of the world first kill done by Ensidia would inspire a lot of people and also help them learn the encounter. I may not be a serious raider like some people are but what I’ve learned over the years is that no matter how much you read up on an encounter, there’s nothing like seeing it for real. There’s nothing like actually being there and reacting to the challenges of the encounter but seeing a video of a successful kill is the next best thing to actually being there.

Enjoy watching the videos!

Part One

Part Two

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Book of Glyph Mastery drop rate increased

Angelo Fernandez — Sat, 18 Apr 2009 14:49:56 +0000

One of the things I was looking forward to with the release of patch 3.1 was the cool new glyphs that came with the patch like Glyph of Life Tap and Glyph of Nourish. As a resto druid who is also a scribe, I was looking forward to switching out my Glyph of Regrowth for the Nourish one. Of course I was hoping to learn it myself but I would have been just as happy to find it in the Auction House and buy it. To make a long story short, I’ve done neither of them and that makes me a sad panda… err Tree.

glyph interface

There’s some good news for those people who’ve been searching high and low for the new glyphs, according to CM Eyonix.

Friends of mine who are buying the mastery books are making a great deal of profit from the glyphs they are selling. Eventually, the price for the books will go down. It should also be noted for those who aren’t aware, last night we applied a hotfix that increased the drop rate for the books, so that should help as well. source

This won’t change how we get them and as a scribe I still don’t like it. But at least this change will help us get it. The faster we can get the glyphs learned, the faster we can make them available to the market to help everyone.

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Normal Mode Ulduar cleared too soon?

Angelo Fernandez — Fri, 17 Apr 2009 12:32:35 +0000

The Ulduar raid dungeon was probably the most anticipated feature of the recently released patch 3.1, which also released the dual specs feature and the permanent in game event Argent Tournament. When a lot of people were complaining about the tier 7 content like Naxxramas and Obsidian Sanctum, Blizzard has always pointed out that they were really supposed to be easy and that Ulduar is way harder.

ulduar portal

Since the patch came out I still have yet to step foot inside Ulduar so I don’t really know first hand how hard it really is. The past few days was about fixing up my main character and getting the right addons. That and a lack of raid time the past few days prevented me from joining my guild on our runs. As I complain about not being able to step inside Ulduar just yet, we already have a world first kill for Yogg-Saron in normal Ulduar 25 done by the guild Ensidia from Magtheridon-EU. We also have reports of a US first kill done by the guild Vodka from the Alterac Mountains realm. Yogg-Saron is the last boss in Ulduar, not counting Algalon who is only available in hard mode.

Sure we’re not talking about hard modes just yet so Ulduar still has a lot to offer even the most hardcore raiders. But how do you feel about Ulduar being cleared (as far as normal mode is concerned) so soon after the release of the patch? Do you think this happened too soon?

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Cenarius won’t be pleased…

Angelo Fernandez — Thu, 16 Apr 2009 13:13:36 +0000

Patch 3.1 has brought us a spiffy new permanent event in the Argent Tournament and with it a bunch of cool new daily quests. Some of the daily quests involve the construction of the Colosseum, a project outsourced to the profit centered goblins.

druid cuts down a tree

Players are tasked with the acquisition of stone and wood to be used in the construction but the goblins profit centered approach is quite disturbing. For them they don’t care that the wood is obtained by cutting down trees in the beautiful Crystalsong Forest and obtaining stone from the artifacts near Ulduar.

As seen in the screen shot above, it certainly feels strange especially to the role players that a druid like myself would consent to working for these goblins especially in the matter of cutting down trees and angering the nature spirits. Cenarius won’t be pleased! I’m supposed to be a guardian of nature! Well that’s what I get for working for these goblins to fill my coffers!

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Alternate currency buy back

Angelo Fernandez — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 13:57:05 +0000

Blizzard has given us several ways to rectify some mistakes that we might do in the game that we would otherwise pay dearly for. Sold that item in your inventory by mistake? You can buy it back. In patch 3.1, we have also been given a way to play around with our talent specs before finally saving the spec we want. So if you made a mistake in allocating your points, as long as you haven’t finalized and saved it you’re still good.

With the arrival of patch 3.1 this kind of “idiot proofing” has been extended to purchases made with alternate currencies such as Marks of Honor, Emblems of Heroism, Arena points and other such things. When you make an accidental purchase with these items, you no longer need to contact a GM to solve the problem for you. You’ll be able to get it refunded on your own.

alternate currency

According to the FAQ posted by CM Vaneras from WoW EU, you can get a refund for these accidental purchses with alternate currencies within 2 hours of game time. After the 2 hours are up, you could still get a refund if you contact a GM in time but Blizzard warns that this is a last resort. Stackable items such as emblems, items that grant achievements when purchased and items that have been enchanted are not eligible for this refund.

If you want to see the Alternate Currency Vendor Buy Back FAQ posted by Vaneras, you can check it out here.

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Date set to enforce new Addon Dev Policy

Angelo Fernandez — Wed, 15 Apr 2009 11:45:42 +0000

Last month Blizzard released a new addon development policy to prevent the use of addons that charge money for players to use them. In fact the new policy also discourages the use of addons that ask for donations and if so must only be in a website and not in the game itself. With the release of patch 3.1 where all our addons went poof and are slowly rebuilding and getting updated versions, this new policy has probably taken some effect already with some addons not available for use any longer.

addons

Blizzard has already set a date for the enforcement of this new policy. They provided the addon development community with a 60 day grace period starting from the day they released the policy. This means that after May 19, 2009 the development community is expected to abide by the said policy, I expect Blizzard to shut down anyone who doesn’t abide by these rules.

Post from: WOW Obsessed

Patch 3.1 confirmed for today

Angelo Fernandez — Tue, 14 Apr 2009 16:36:36 +0000

My guild conducted a meeting earlier in Vent about getting everyone on the same page about the patch and Ulduar raiding. Basically it was about expectations – getting everyone ready for what’s to come since Blizzard said over and over that it’s going to be much harder than Naxx and the other T7 content was. We were working on the assumption that we had a week to get ready and iron out the little things, expecting that it’s coming out next week at the earliest. Our guild leader pointed out that the PTR was still up last Friday and that patches don’t come out when the PTR is still up the Friday before.

patch 3.1 downloader

Apparently he was wrong and that sort of screws up our schedule. Blizzard poster Zarhym confirmed that it is indeed the plan to release patch 3.1 today . The extended maintenance was indeed a clue. Now that the patch is confirmed for today, it’s time to finalize your specs if you haven’t yet and also work on recovering your addons. WoW Insider has a nice list of all the things that are coming with the patch, including the class changes. As usual, the PTR patch notes can be found here .

Happy Patch Day!

update: the patch is out! I’m downloading it now. It seems like the patch came out a bit later in the day. than they normally release them. Well the important thing is that it’s out!

Post from: WOW Obsessed