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Much like the rogue class itself, Blizzard decided to be pretty sneaky and release the Rogue Q&A as one of the last class Q&As. Maybe they used some rouge to hide it? For the most, I enjoyed reading the interview. I like that Blizzard admitted that a few aspects are in need of a fix, and that they defended a few decisions which negatively affected rogues. My favorite part of the interview was about (Spell #1856) and its current functionalityut have a look for yourself! You can read the entire interview after the break, or read the original one linked below: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/info/underdev/rogue.html Community Team: This segment is all about the rogue; we will delve deep into this class with Greg Street and discuss the elements that make the rogue class incredibly unique. Q. Where do rogues fit into the larger scope of things currently and where do you see them going from this point forward? A: Theye a premier melee dps class — the personification of skulking and swashbuckling flair. It their primary and only role — theye not going to turn into tanks or healers. Rogues were once the best dps class hands-down, and a lot of the other classes were just there to buff rogues. Rogues were supposed to be selfish and not bring many buffs or utility of their own. Wee not really happy with that design any longer, and have pushed rogues to be a little more normal — great damage in the right conditions, but also some good utility and synergy as well. Rogues have nearly always been strong in PvP, just because their shtick of coming out of stealth to stun and then unload on an opponent translates so well to everything from Arena to random world ganking. Q. What is it that makes them unique compared to all other classes? A: Rogues have a complex resource system with the balance between energy and combo points, and rely on active abilities to respond to situations rather than passive effects. This leads to a very interesting tension between planning out what youe going to do ahead of time and reacting to proc-based resource gains (energy/combo points from things like Combat Potency, Relentless Strikes, and Ruthlessness), and rationing your active timers and abilities to survive. Community Team: Let look at rogue abilities, the combo point system, and the feedback our rogue community has provided on some of these. Q. Do we feel the current combo point system is working out fine for rogues, not just for Subtlety, but for all three trees? Are there any plans to improve how combo points are awarded later down the road? A: Yes, but there always room for improvement. Combo points are meaningful in all aspects of the game, and provide a necessary limiter on some of the rogue more powerful abilities. Too many combo points runs the risk of completely overwhelming your normal abilities and breaking the natural flow of the class, as Subtlety rogues who raid probably know all too well. I would expect that abilities that modify how combo points are acquired are something wel probably be careful with in the future. Overall, we really like the way the combo point and finishing move system works. If anything, the risk is that we could push too many other classes towards this system, which makes it less unique for the rogue. Q. Vanish, as you know, is one of the class staple abilities that sets it apart from other classes. However, there are times when Vanish doesn execute quite as the rogue intends, especially when they vanish right in the middle of some kind of enemy channeling spell or when a class sends their pet after the rogue id-vanish.Do we feel that, in its current rendition, Vanish is working properly in this respect? What variables should be considered when Rogues decide to utilize Vanish to avoid it being negated? A: No, Vanish isn working properly and breaks when you breathe on the rogue funny. There are two problems with fixing it. One is that technically it just not easy. We would need to change the ways spells are resolved on the server side. Now t

Not many Warcraft fans get to step inside the headquarters where virtually everything in the world was produced. Ezra Chatterton, a 10-year-old from Riverside, will likely live in infamy for what he got to do.
Blizzard invited him in, let him go crazy with power in the game, helped him design new characters, a quest and a weapon and then piled all sorts of goodies on him before he left. But it’s a small token considering that Ezra has metastatic brain cancer. The Make-A-Wish Foundation of America, which helped him get his wish, was told by doctors that if it would be better to fulfill the wish sooner than later.
I met Ezra. He knows Warcraft inside and out even though he’s only been playing since the fall. He wasn’t just a boy in awe of the great Blizzard (maybe a little), but he knew what he wanted when he sat down with Blizzard’s top game designers like Jeff Kaplan who helped him create characters. The characters — Ahab Wheathoof, an aging Tauren, and his dog, Kyle — will show up in the game within four weeks. How cool is that!
Ahab Wheathoof, a Tauren, is the creation of Ezra Chatterton, 10. Meet “Captain Ahab” in Outland and learn about a new quest. Click image to see Ahab hanging his quest at the entry gate.
“Ezra’s knowledge and enthusiasm really impressed us. He had obviously thought through his requests and suggestions thoroughly, and his grasp of the details of World of Warcraft was extensive. We do see requests from players regularly in various contexts, but this was a particularly gratifying case. To be in a position to grant someone’s wishes directly and immediately was truly special” – Jeff Kaplan, Blizzard’s lead game designer.
Article Source: www.ocregister.com.

Warhammer, a game of plastic and metal miniature models and now a MMOG in development lit up the network like a holiday fireworks show over the weekend. We have about three million screenshots, concept art pieces, nudie pics and other eye-candy type goodies up for your perusal.This is all well and good, but if you were to cover yourself in stink repellent spray and walk into a Games Workshop store you would find that most of the denizens purchasing product therein were not partaking in Warhammer: Fantasy Battles, but were playing Warhammer: 40K.Warhammer: 40K is a faster paced, sci-fi table-top game that is actually a lot of fun to play if you can get past the stink and care to spend countless hours painting models that will never look as good as the ones you are playing against. It’s a dichotomy where artistic talent meets warfare; where space marines are religious zealots and Orks blow things up with heavy explosives while they careen across the ground in vehicles patched together with red duct tape to make them “go faster”.Dawn of War proved that the Warhammer 40K license was a big winner. Why or why couldn’t we have a MMOG based on that universe? I’m tired of Elves and Dwarfs and intelligent cats who walk on two legs. Please give us some sci-fi. Tabula Rasa and StarGate Worlds can’t get here quick enough for me.Are you content with the current glut of fantasy MMOGs or would you like to see some sci-fi?Post a comment at the bottom of this blog. If you are shy (or female and sending in naughty pictures) you can E-Mail me. Every good guild needs a home. A home free of gold ads, secondary market farmers. Look no further than GuildPortal.com.Exclusive new TenTonHammer.com Content! Let us entertain you or at the very least waste some of your time at work.08.28.2006 Exclusive Content
Dungeons and Dragons Online: Poll – Is Quest XP The Correct Choice?”DDO does something almost no other game does: it awards XP only after the completion of a quest. Players don’t get XP from killing random monsters–or from any other way for that matter. Tonight we take a look at that design mechanic and ask you to tell us if that’s the right way to go in a MMOG.”
Dungeons and Dragons Online: Mailbag – Looking To The Future”With the end of August, many DDO players have returned to school or gotten the children out of the house, so we expect a lot more time to play DDO for everyone! Ralsu dips into his mailbag and discusses plans for the site in the upcoming month. Oh, and he also takes some heat from a reader who challenges him to deliver on his promise of an interview.”
EverQuest 2: Dialogue With The Denmother”Known throughout Norrath for her trail mix, Niami Denmother is one of the most respected crafters in the EverQuest 2 world. While wielding the Rolling Pin of Doom, Niami takes time from her busy schedule to discuss current and upcoming tradeskills changes, and her thoughts on crafting in the MMO world. Did I mention the whole trail mix thing? Mmmmm.”
Vanguard: Saga of Heroes – Home Is Where The Community Is”Vanguard: Saga of Heroes has made the bold decision to NOT host official forums after launch, with the exception of a tech support forum. Good move? We won’t really know until Vanguard launches. Our weekly columnist, Mercurie, takes a look at official forums and Vanguard’s stance. Have a read, and then share your thoughts on our forum. Unlike the official forum, ours is sticking around!”
Vanguard: Saga of Heroes – Guild Leader Interview: Xaices Of Reverenced Ire”The Guild Leader of Reverenced Ire, believes his guild experiences in other MMOs have led him to some answers. He’s planning to lead his guild to raiding victory in Vanguard: Saga of Heroes. How will he do it? Check out our interview to get Xaices’ his take.”
Warhammer Online: 50 New Screenshots”The Warhammer Online Ten Ton Hammer community site now sports 50 new original images from the highly anticipated MMO adaptation of the popular tabletop game. “
Warhammer Online: Zone Overview: Blackfire Pass”Black Fire Pass has been the site of many battles throughout the course of history, but none were as significant as the first which was fought there. At Black Fire Pass, a great force of Dwarfs led by King Kurgan Ironbeard joined with a human army under the command of a young hero named Sigmar to confront and ultimately destroy a great horde of greenskins. Following the battle, King Ironbeard swore a great oath that for all time, the Dwarfs would safeguard the eastern mountain approaches to the lands of men. In the following year, Sigmar was made the first Emperor, uniting the scattered tribes of humans under one banner.”
Warhammer Online: Career Information – The Dwarf Hammerer”When it comes to heavy blunt objects size matters, and that thought is the driving force behind the Hammere

I do like games myself, though I tend to stick to older ones because I have older game systems (and I’m kind of old.) I like to play the Diablo series, Half-Life, World of Warcraft, Age of Empires, the Thief series, Tomb Raider, Silent Hill, Resident Evil and even some text-based MUD’s.  I’ve played games for a long time, and there are times that I get so involved that it probably is unhealthy and there are other times that I personally think they help me work out some repressed irritation or anger and do me some real good. Sometimes when I’ve had a terrible day, there is nothing like a nice killing spree in a virtual world.
While some of my favorite games are kind of virtual worlds, particularly World of Warcraft and the MUD games, I haven’t personally been as involved in the Sims games or online virtual worlds like Second Life. I do sometimes feel quite inspired by the characters in my games. Some days I would truly love to be Lara Croft. On the other hand, though I liked playing Hitman 1 and 2, I can honestly say that I’ve never wished to be in that world for real. I’d be absolutely terrified to be in those situations and I truly don’t want to do those things in real life. I’m not terribly squeamish either, but I don’t fancy seeing blood splatter on a daily basis. As to the Sims-type games and virtual worlds, when I have played them I tend to create characters that I kind of want to be. I like to create characters with a look that I find attractive. I enjoy making my characters healthy and a little buffed out. I like them to be sort of spiritual looking in the games where that’s workable. I like that kind of “hippie-yogi-monk” facial expression. Even so, if I could really trade my own life for those lives, would I do it? I think I’d like the option to have some of those traits so easily. I don’t much think I want to live in those worlds, though.
Article Source: www.associatedcontent.com

Age of Conan has been consistently demonstrated as a mature MMOG with a special emphasis on barbaric combat. At an event in San Francisco last week, the Funcom team got together and really let the press dig into the game. It was the first time they showed it, not with hype and circumstance – this summer, they demoed it with beheadings set to 100 percent – but with the confidence to let the game live or die on its own merits. Over four hours, I was able to play through the first seven levels, experience a mid-level dungeon and zone and get acquainted with their instanced PvP.
Based on the famous novels by Robert E. Howard, Age of Conan provides players with all the usual MMOG trappings. It has everything any AAA MMOG needs to have -quest-driven character development, dungeons, instanced arena PvP, combat, crafting, AAA graphics and a strong story. Then, as any successful MMOG must, it throws in a few ripples. They rethought the basic combat mechanics, added a territory control endgame and introduced a fresh look at the traditionally sterile first few levels. The question is now, have they pulled it off?
A big promise Funcom made is a single-player experience through the first 20 levels that makes the player feel like a hero, not a rat-slaying peon. It sounded great on paper, but while the first few levels were a solid MMOG experience, that’s all they were. Full disclosure: I am so programmed to grind through those levels that it was not until a day after the event that I even remembered the “single-player” aspects. So to me, the experience was not altogether different than what I am used to.
Age of Conan has been in development since 2003 and it occurs to me that in this area, the genre may have passed them by. The much-hyped single-player experience does have cut scenes, tree-based dialogue and some good sequences, but from what I saw, it is not a heck of a lot different than what any MMOG has to offer. Back in 2003, these innovations were hallmarks of the RPG, not the MMOG, and really would have set it apart. Today, they’re part of the mainstream MMOG experience.
Perhaps aware of this, Funcom seems to have played the feature down both in rhetoric and action. It’s also not a pure single-player experience. Players start in an MMOG area and work through a basic tutorial mission before they come to Tortage, the first city. All the while, other players are running around. The single-player experience amounts to an instanced class quest that players can weave in and out of. Go into the bar, talk to the right person, and you shift into the evening, which is the instanced single-player experience. Every so often, it boots you back to daytime, which is a traditional MMOG shared space. Players can power through that epic quest and gain their levels, but they can also play in the MMOG world. This is not a strict single-player RPG followed by an MMOG, but a weave of the two.
It certainly felt a lot more like an MMOG than a single-player game, but that is not an indictment of the experience. The story was solid and definitely referenced the mature tone without clobbering the player over the head, and the whole experience was refreshingly polished. The best indication is that as I worked my way through the first few levels, rarely did I feel stuck, lost or an urge to check my watch. It is a solid start. It had a fair bit of typical “fetch me this, kill that,” but I can say I was genuinely entertained.
The strongest part of the first few levels – and I would suspect the game in general – is that for the first time in a long time it feels like a world and not a guided trip through Disney Land. There are challenges and creatures along the way that have nothing to do with the mission at hand, and combat doesn’t always wait for you to get ready. For example, right out of the tutorial, I started on a road that led down into the town. My goal was to gain access to that town, and had I wished I could have stuck to the path and got it done, but unlike so many games, there were not sheer clif

Blizzard Entertainment?todayannounced that its eagerly awaited massively multiplayer onlinerole-playing game (MMORPG) World of Warcraft?will be in stores in NorthAmerica on November 23, 2004. World of Warcraft will launchsimultaneously in Australia and New Zealand, and is planned for releasein Korea, Europe, and other countries throughout Asia shortly following.With a monthly subscription, players in these regions will soon be ableto experience the epic adventure of the Warcraft?series in an immersiveand continually evolving online environment.
In World of Warcraft, players assume the roles of legendary heroes andinteract with thousands of other players online as they explore andadventure across a vast world. Whether journeying together or questingon their own, players will engage in heroic battles, developfriendships, forge alliances, and compete with enemies for power andglory. The game features customizable character classes with thousandsof weapons, spells, and abilities. With an innovative, easy-to-useinterface, an action-packed combat system, and thousands of quests thatbuild an immersive storyline, World of Warcraft offers a MMORPG thatwill appeal to both veteran and casual players alike.
“World of Warcraft has been our largest undertaking to date,” said MikeMorhaime, president and co-founder of Blizzard Entertainment. “When weset out to create a massively multiplayer online game, our goal was toexpand the scope of the Warcraft universe by offering an incrediblydynamic game experience. We’re extremely proud of the game we’vecreated, and we believe players will be very pleased when they see whatwe have in store for them.”
World of Warcraft will be available for Windows?98/ME/2000/XP andMacintosh?formats at a suggested retail price of $49.99 in the U.S.,and will include a free one-month subscription to the game. The specialcollector’s edition of World of Warcraft will also be available atrelease for a suggested retail price of $79.99 and will include theWorld of Warcraft game on both CD-ROM and DVD, a free one-monthsubscription, a World of Warcraft behind-the-scenes DVD, an exclusivein-game pet, a cloth map of the game world, a soundtrack CD, an Art ofthe World of Warcraft coffee table book, and a commemorative game manualsigned by the development team.
After the initial free one-month subscription ends, players of World ofWarcraft will be able to continue playing under one of three differentsubscription plans. The month-to-month subscription plan costs $14.99per month, the three-month plan costs $13.99 per month, and thesix-month plan costs $12.99 per month. World of Warcraft subscriptionfees can be paid by major credit card, PayPal, and pre-paid game cards,which will be available in stores where World of Warcraft is sold. Worldof Warcraft has received a Teen rating from the ESRB.

Article Source: www.ign.com.

Swedish developer Fatshark is preparing to show off its new third-person shooter — Lead and Gold: Gands of the Wild West — for the first time at gamescom next week in Cologne.According to the press release issued today, Lead and Gold will be a downloadable game for both console and PC, and is a third-person team-based affair.Lead and Gold – Gangs of the Wild West catapults the player straight into the dramatic crescendo of the Western myth. Relive the high-noon duel on the main street of a frontier town or the intense firefight during a bank heist. Immerse yourself in gameplay drawing from a perfect mix of cool-headed player skill and the brutal close quarter brawl of the classic Western shoot out.Lead and Gold – Gangs of the Wild West is built with the GRIN Diesel Engine, previously used for Bionic Commando, Bionic Commando Rearmed and Tom Clancy’s Ghost Recon Advanced Warfighter.Check out the first media by clicking on the image below.Eat lead and, umm, steal gold?

Bryn says: There’s more than a hint of Team Fortress 2 about this one. Check out the screenshots. While Fatshark is a relatively unknown outfit at this time, there’s a decent chance that if Lead and Gold is done well, we’ll be hearing more about the team in the future.This first batch of images looks pretty cool. It’s not likely that it’ll steal away from hardcore TF2 players, but perhaps it’ll offer some new and different?
Article Source: www.gamespy.com.

Meh, been busy/lazy/website apathetic lately, thus the lack of postings.I have been healing a little more lately, so I am (err was) thinking about doing a temporary respec to put a bare minimum amount of points into Holy. I would essentially be sacrificing 5% parry (and one of the prot talents likely) to gain 10% int and the healing bonus.Not convinced that would be a worthwhile return. I don't have the gear to make up for the 5% avoidance drop anyways (Crushing Blows bad).Been reading some interesting articles and musings on avoidance vs block. Tanks with really high levels of avoidance seem to succumb to spike damage whereas tanks with really high levels of block seem to succumb to the priests going OOM Even though the healing is smoother with higher mitigation (over avoidance), the tank is still receiving more overall damage. It seems to me that finding a balance between the two would be more appropriate (and possibly adjusting the avoidance/mitigation balance on a per fight basis).”The big announcement” from Blizzard is tonight. Starcraft 2 anyone?
Article Source: www.hokage.org.