Blizzard has rolled out a whole wave of unlockable goodies across Diablo III, Starcraft 2, Overwatch, Hearthstone and Heroes of the Storm to celebrate the 20th anniversary of the original Starcraft on PC. Each game has a different reward to claim ranging from small profile portraits to exclusive skins featuring Sarah Kerrigan (yay!).
Here’s a breakdown of what players of each tittle will receive should they login between today and March 31st:
Starcraftr II – A set of three user interface skins (one per race), a portrait and a decal.
World of Warcraft – /salute a Starcraft mini-pet and receive the “Salute to Starcraft” limited time achievement.
Overwatch – Sarah Kerrigan Ghost Skin for Widowmaker.
Hearthstone – Play the Starcraft themed Tavern Brawl between March 21st and 25th and receive 3 free Kobolds & Catacombs packs.
Heroes of the Storm – 20th anniversary Protoss, Terran and Zerg display pictures featuring artwork from the original game.
Diablo III – Dominion’s Revenge pet.
I’m a little disappointed in the Heroes of the Storm reward in particular. Considering the amount of Starcraft Heroes – like Raynor, Kerrigan, Tychus etc – you’d think they’d have something a little more substantial than three display pictures. Both SCII and Heroes of the Storm even share the same engine! Rumor has it the next revealed hero will be from the Starcraft Universe but the dev team could have done so muchg better here.
You might have already heard the news yesterday: Ubisoft mentioned on their Investor’s Call that “Player Recurring Investments” (read: microtransactions) have outpaced the sale of full price and discounted digital copies of their games for the first time ever. In terms of raw numbers of the 343 million euros the company made from their digital businesses 175 million Euros were the result of “Player Recurrent Investments” (which include microtransactions, add-on DLCs, Rainbow Six Siege Season Passes, subscriptions and those sorts of things). The 83% rise in microtransaction purchases over the past year for Ubisoft could signal the tipping point where small recurring payments within the AAA games we play outpaces traditional complete products for the foreseeable future.
I’m certainly not calling this the “death of the $60 game” or “the decline of games as a complete product” but there is no denying that over the past year major game studios have tried to forcefully inject smaller purchases into franchises that have not been known to use the previously mobile only lootboxes / battle crates / whatever you’d like to call them. What started with cosmetic item crates in Overwatchhas quickly morphed into Warner Bros Interactive selling Legendary Orcs for real money in Shadow of War, players being able to purchase level-ups and weapon power in Fortnite‘s PVE mode and most recently random lootbox exclusive mount skins in ArenaNet’s Guild Wars 2.
A slide outlining the “digital revenue split” between Digital Distribution and Player Recurring Investments.
Tempting players with the chance of highly coveted items, exclusive skins and other valuables for only a small amount of cash does sound an awful lot like gambling. Yes, there is no chance of getting “nothing” when you purchase an Overwatch loot box but the disappoint that comes when you open a box that contains nothing but duplicates, sprays and the occasional voice lines became such a meme within the community that the Overwatch team found it necessary to fiddle with the odds found within loot boxes so that duplicates are less prevalent.
While I’m on the topic of odds – popular public contests like Mcdonald’s Monopoly, Casino tables and slot machines in British Columbia and other games of chance have to clearly outline the odds that a player faces before they make their decision. The gaming industry has not faced threats of regulation when it comes to disclosing odds to players in North America yet but the Chinese government is well ahead of us and passed a law requiring game makers to disclose the odds of “random drops” within their titles. In the Chinese version of Overwatch you have the probability of one “legendary item” (the highest rarity) for every 13.5 loot boxes. If you try to roughly convert that to $USD or time spent depending on the calculations used you’re either spending $7.99 USD (for 14 lootboxes) or roughly 20 hours of gameplay time FOR THE CHANCE of unlocking a legendary item, not necessarily the one you want.
Are we at a turning point? Only time will tell but here’s hoping that the discussions around microtransactions, gacha style loot boxes and random chances for real world money within gaming face some kind of regulations in the near future. I know personally I’ve spent a good chunk of spare change on loot boxes and microtransactions over the past year and I don’t feel any happier or better off since I did. It would have been nice to know that to get that Soldier 76 Grillmaster Skins during the first summer games would have cost me 20 hours of my life just for the chance…
Pictured in the header: Overwatch’s loot boxes, Fortnite’s Llamas, Shadow of War’s crates, Tess’ Eververse in Destiny 2, Heroes of the Storm’s loot boxes and Guild Wars 2’s Mount Adoption Certificate. Embedded in this post is an amazing video by Jim “Fucking” Sterling, Son!
User reports from launch day suggest that PC players of Bungie’s Destiny 2 may find themselves with a permanent ban if they are using common PC benchmarking tools like FRAPS and MSI AfterBurner or chat programs like Discord with the overlay functionality enabled.
Over on /r/DestinyTheGame several users have reported that their accounts or friends accounts have been banned without explanation for running common PC programs in the background while playing Destiny 2.
Here is a short (and at all definitive) list of programs that MAY cause interference with Destiny 2. This list is based upon user reports and has not been confirmed by the game’s publisher or developer as of press time:
Open Broadcasting Software (OBS) in “Game Capture” mode.
Windows 10 Game DVR (with background recording enabled).
MSI Afterburner’s Performance Overlay
FRAPS
Discord’s Chat Overlay
Running either the Battle.net or Destiny 2 as a “Non-Steam Game” through Steam. Doing this enables the Steam Overlay by default.
Destiny 2’s official support page lists several cases where streaming software such as XSplit or OBS is “not supported” when using “Game Capture Mode”. Similarly, performance tools with overlays such as FRAPS and MSI Afterburner are also listed as not supported.
The Game Capture mode of applications such as OBS and XSplit is not supported. The following methods are supported for capturing video of Destiny 2 on PC:
To capture while playing in Exclusive Fullscreen:
Hardware capture through methods such as Elgato, AVerMedia, or a dedicated streaming PC is supported.
NVIDIA Shadowplay and AMD ReLive are supported.
To capture while playing in Windowed Mode (including Borderless Fullscreen):
OBS and XSplitScreen Capture mode is supported.
OBS and XSplitWindow Capture mode is supported.
PLEASE NOTE: Other recording applications, such as Dxtory, Razer Cortex, Fraps have similar restrictions to those outlined above. “
In regards to Hardware Monitoring and Overlays this is what Destiny 2’s support page recommends:
“Overlays Some features from third-party applications which rely on the use of screen overlays are generally not compatible with Destiny 2. The following are examples of features which may not be compatible with Destiny 2 on PC.
Voice Communications
“Who’s talking” and visual notification features, such as those provided by Discord or Mumble, are not compatible with Destiny 2. Notification features may still be provided through the third-party application.
Hardware Monitoring
Framerate and statistics overlays, such as those provided by EVGA Precision XOC, MSi Afterburner, and Fraps, are not compatible with Destiny 2.”
I’ve reached out to Activision Publishing for an official response to this story as well as clarification on whether or not apps like Windows Game DVR which are built into the OS and enabled by default can cause an issue with Destiny 2’s anti-code injection system. I’ve also asked if Destiny 2’s anti-code injection system doesn’t play nice with apps like Discord which detect games running on your system. This whole thing could be the result of a launch day hiccup or bug in the game’s code. We won’t know for sure until we hear back.
Activision Publishing previously provided Broken Joysticks with a review code for a single copy of Destiny 2 for consideration. We have not personally experienced issues with third-party applications & Destiny 2.
Prepare to construct additional pilons and make sure your mineral harvesting skills are at peak performance as Blizzard is prepared to re-release 1998’s Starcraft and the Broodwar Expansion for the HD generation on August 14th through the Blizzard App.
StarCraft: Remastered features not only revamped visuals & widescreen support but also the ability to play this real time strategy classic in 4K for the first time. While unit balance and build orders will remain unchanged from the original versions, Blizzard has made an effort to clean up the mission briefing artwork and remaster the in-game audio as well. New features that where not possible in ’98 also include cloud saving through the Blizzard App, matchmaking and brand new leaderboards.
StarCraft: Remasteredwill be priced at $14.99 USD ($19.49 CDN) and includes three special building skins for those who pre-order before the games’ release.
Today a news post on the World of Warcraft home page details their plans to discontinue the Battle.Net branding.
Blizzard plans to phase out the use of Battle.Net in favor of the Blizzard moniker. Instead of “Battle.Net Voice” for example, it would be “Blizzard Voice” after the change.
They detail that the underlying technology and systems are not changing and they have no plans to discontinue any services.
When we created Battle.net, the idea of including a tailored online-gaming service together with your game was more of a novel concept, so we put a lot of focus on explaining what the service was and how it worked, including giving it a distinct name. Over time, though, we’ve seen that there’s been occasional confusion and inefficiencies related to having two separate identities under which everything falls—Blizzard and Battle.net. Given that built-in multiplayer support is a well-understood concept and more of a normal expectation these days, there isn’t as much of a need to maintain a separate identity for what is essentially our networking technology.
One can certainly understand wanting to consolidate their brand name and ease confusion for potential and current customers.
You can check out the news post here.
So a couple weeks ago I published a story outlining all to be had at the time for the Legion Pre-Launch content. Since then I’ve found a few things I’ve missed, a few things I’ve learned, and what to do with it.
Previously I talked about the scenarios involved. Well, after doing some research I’ve found there are quite a few easter eggs in game items you can pick up before doing the fist quest. So if you have an alt that hasn’t done the scenario for broken shore yet, hold off until you find a hidden vendor sitting in Stormwind Harbor. All you have to do is have the quest for the broken shore, but don’t actually do it yet. Before boarding the boat for the quest outside the dock there is an NPC named Lenny “Fingers” McCoy(Horde side is Fo’Rum the Postmaker by the Draonsh’ar Blockade and Ravika by Bladefury’s docks). This NPC is a vendor that sells a few items including a Lucky Shirt which is the only in game way to obtain the “Fine Cloth Shirt” transmog appearance. (The Horde vendor has hard to get items from patch 5.3 that were since removed from the game, so if you play Horde be sure to grab them).
Taken from screenshots @wowhead.com
The final hidden item to be found is during the 6th stage of the Broken Shore quest line for the alliance(but can also be picked up during stage 7). There is a coffin looking thing where you can find a “Charred Locket” during the scenario. If you don’t grab it now, it’s gone forever on that toon. When you’re done take the locket to Eastvale Logging Camp in Elwynn forest. There will be an NPC named Alaina Heartsong that will want the locket(at 85,67). Leave and return to the house immediately and you can find the reward item upstairs named “Alaina’s Bonnet”. The Horde cannot loot this, but if you unlock it on alliance side you can transmog it as a Hordie.
Taken from screenshots @wowhead.com
Another cool item that you can obtain is dropped from the Doomsayers around your main cities that once outed with either a Demon Hunter’s Spectral Sight or an item called “Cursed Vision of Sargeras” that drops in Black Temple, turn into a “Dread Infiltrator”.
Taken from screenshots @wowhead.com
There are usually LFG groups looking for it that are active right now, so get playing to find it. The item it drops is a neat “Toy” for your collection called a “Pocket Fel Spreader”, but it actually doesn’t do any damage. It applies a fel texture to the ground and objects in its radius and just plain looks really cool instead.
The other half of this is players that end up hearing “Dark Whispers” will eventually gain an action bar which can transform them into a dreadlord to cause all kinds of trouble for other surrounding players by turning them hostile ala mind control. If the players don’t want to do it at the time can just click off the buff. As a Dreadlord you have the abilities to CC a group with a “Hysteria” debuff, vanish to avoid combat, and disguise yourself as a normal player as you’re spreading chaos.
One last note on items which relates to the previous article, is on the Fel Bat Pup. Once bought with Nethershards and learned you can re-crate for later sale, so I suggest buying a few and saving them to sell later for a profit. Just learn the pet, open your log and right click and select “Put in Cage”. Note that you only need to do this if you’ve already right clicked and “learned” that pet and you want to get rid of the extras.
Screenshot taken by Kaylan Heineman, Broken Joysticks
The final thing I want to revisit and discuss is invasions. With a little clever use of the LFG interface, you can level a character from 1 to 100 in well under a day of constant playing. Once you are in Stage 1 of the invasion at Dun Morogh specifically in Kharanos(though it works elsewhere if people join), make or join an LFG group under custom with Dun in the title (either your own, or a hosted one) including killing the commander. Once it rolls over to stage 3, leave the group and join another by just typing “Dun” in the search bar (or if you’re reset back to stage 1, host your own with Dun in the title for others to find). These stages offer the maximum XP with minimal deaths, as the third stage bosses can be kind of brutal and can easily ruin your nice streak of XP gain. Just keep redoing stages 1 and 2 of the invasion until you are at the desired level. You can do this on toons of any level to boot so if you want to switch mains and level a toon quickly before the expansion this is the time to do it.
Screenshot taken by Kaylan Heineman, Broken Joysticks
I won’t go into the last quests and scenarios until my third part as there’s been little content thus far (but good content nonetheless), which is coming up hopefully right before or right at the date of the launch of Legion. Don’t quote me on that.
I hope you can take what I shared and maximise your fun before the expansion officially launches on August 30th.
During Gamescom earlier today Blizzard launched their Legion Cafe which is styled after the Demon Hunter class hall, the Fel Hammer. You can check out tons of photos on the Official World of Warcraft Facebook page. During the events they announced their first content patch for Legion as captured by user Slootbag on Twitch during his live stream. Just click the link for the replay.
Patch 7.1 is titled “Return to Karazhan”. It will feature a 5 man epic dungeon and a mini-raid that will be central to the story of Legion and will contain at LEAST 9 different instances. Additionally there will be new Suramar content in the mix as well as some world content, and there is a new small raid between Nightmare and Nighthold which finishes the Stormheim quest chain. It will be in the PTR by the time Legion hits the public. You can check out the trailer from Wowhead below!
Alright, before we get to my analysis let me make something super clear—I went into playing the new World of Warcraft Hero class, the Demon Hunter, with the expectations and excitement of a girl who grew up playing the game since Vanilla (The years of the game between its debut in 2004 to the advent of its first expansion, The Burning Crusade, for those not necessarily super WoW-savvy) and its prior games, Warcraft: Orcs and Humans, Warcraft II: Beyond the Dark Portal, Warcraft III: Reign of Chaos/Frozen Throne, rendering me something of a Lore Queen, if you will.
In simpler terms, I had VERY high expectations from Blizzard Entertainment’s development team to treat the perspective and lore of the Illidari, Illidan Stormrage’s clan of Demon Hunters who have harnessed the fel energies of the Twisting Nether with delicate, respectful care. These are heroes who sacrificed everything they hold dear to harness the power of the Fallen Titan Sargeras’ army – the Burning Legion – with the express intent to destroy their forces. As such, Demon Hunters deserve to be treated with the grace, fire, determination, and noble sense of sacrifice for the greater good that they have demonstrated countless times.
Exposition aside, I have decided to outline the tone I got from WoW’s upcoming expansion, Legion, seen from the eyes (well, not really—look up Demon Hunters. You’ll see what I mean) with the noble attempt of preventing as many spoilers as conceivably possible. That said, I am going to put a mild spoiler warning for this article. If you want to preserve the many surprises and shocks this content contains, thank you for your time, but this article is not for you.
For those of you big on the nitty gritty of its functionality, you are in for a treat. The Demon Hunter is a fantastic class—it is a robust tank/melee-DPS hybrid class with oodles of health but a fast-paced, frenetic style of gameplay. It is very much a class that demands quick reaction and prioritization skills as the rotation itself can be demanding and with little “wiggle room”.
Those of you used to playing Rogues and Warriors will feel right at home with the Demon Hunter with the up-front-and-personal style of attacks and some devastating AoE damage as the grand finale. The class is a surprisingly good introduction to melee DPS and tanking, for those of us who prefer the “squishier” classes, namely the spellcasters who are often referred to as “glass cannons” that require a more composed, distant strategy of combat. Personally, I have always played a Warlock as my main, so it was definitely a culture shock, so to speak. At first, I felt it was fresh and new but it seemed eerily familiar. After a little raid into my memory banks, if you would pardon the awful in-joke, I realized that the Demon Hunter, with a few tweaks, is just like the Fury spec Warrior from times long past with a certain Rogue-ish flair that leads to a relentless kind of agility (fitting as it is the DH’s primary stat) which will bring a smile to the faces of gamers who want a more League of Legends-styled pace in their rotation.
Perhaps the hallmark of the Demon Hunter is the mobility—the DH is officially THE most mobile class in the game, outstripping the vaunted Warriors by a fair margin on all fronts. It introduces an age-old game mechanic those of us raised in the 90’s fondly remember: the double jump. Because of the demon wings, this class is able to make an easily-controlled second jump and even glide without any external assistance for quite some time. This alone fundamentally alters how you play a character in World of Warcraft; where you once had to frustratedly attack your space bar to inch your way up Azeroth’s many slopes, you are now easily able to scale virtually any surface. It felt to me much like the first time using a flying mount during The Burning Crusade in that the world truly opens up. Side-note—take care where you decide to glide, lest you float lazily and inexorably toward a World Boss or an instant-kill off the map. Many embarrassing treks to my corpse came from comprehensively exploring the new mobility.
Furthermore, part of your rotation involves rushing in and dashing away in a hit-and-run style, never sticking to one enemy for very long. This makes Demon Hunters invaluable to add-heavy situations within the dungeons and raids for crowd-control and damage mitigation to the tank and the casters. I often referred to Demon Hunters as the guardian angels of the squishy classes because of the wealth of interrupts and counters you wield and the ability to save them at the last second. Many healers have praised me quite vocally for saving their hides with a quick intervention. Veterans, take note—The Shrine of the Fallen Warrior is now easy as pie to get to should you wish to make a pilgrimage to this hidden gem in the Barrens.
Owing to my limited experience with melee DPS classes, I had a tiny learning curve which was soon resolved by the excellent pacing of the starter zone; a miserable, shattered world called Mardum, which holds a certain artifact essential to Illidan’s greater plans. You are one of his most trusted lieutenants charged with the recovery of this artifact while Illidan himself dealt with the “pests” storming his stronghold, the Black Temple. Without revealing too much, you will rethink the noble stand against Illidan heroes made back in 2007 and question its repercussions. The mood alone of the area is bleak, desperate and full of adrenaline, mixed with slack-jawed wonder at the gorgeous vistas of this broken world. Once again, it is definitely a throwback to The Burning Crusade in giving players expansive, alien worlds to just observe and get lost in. With the exception of the first hour of breaking in the character, there will be very few unnecessary trips to the Spirit Healer as the difficulty scaling is spot-on in the entire starting zone. You will feel pulled along with the plot and will feel like you just blinked and you were already thrust into the Broken Isles while simultaneously feeling confident in your abilities for the more difficult content ahead. Bravo, Blizzard—you finally made a “just right” intro zone for a class and race.
Screenshot by Tamsin Skye Heineman on Legion Beta Server 1
In this vein, I feel that the Demon Hunter is a symbol for the overall theme of the expansion—relentlessness in the face of an infinite enemy and impossible odds—with an additional, far subtler message to its legion (pardon the pun) of roughly 11 million subscribers worldwide. That message is this—Blizzard has heard the cries from its veteran, hardcore players for a return to the more complex, nuanced gameplay that had a much stiffer difficulty curve. At the same time, however, they also acknowledge the many newcomers to the world of Azeroth in the wake of Lionsgate Entertainment’s feature film, Warcraft, based on the events of the First War in Azeroth’s past (telling the events of Blizzard’s first installment, Warcraft: Orcs and Humans).
They heavily streamlined the once-clunky and cluttered interface and simplified the skills, talents, and general gameplay to improve its accessibility. Hardcore players seeking a challenge, fret not. In the vein of the classic board game, Stratego, it is easy to learn, but difficult to master. You will find surprisingly nuanced rotations and stat work that will keep you experimenting to maximize your effectiveness against Azeroth’s many challenging enemies. In that same topic, the many dungeons and raids in this expansion WILL test your mettle. Veterans will find the return of crowd control, interrupts, area denial, and many more classic elements that we all missed a welcome addition. Newcomers, worry not—it is a very accessible, easy to pick up the game now. You will be sucked in and challenged at every turn, but believe me, you’ll be too busy having a blast to care.
Returning to the Demon Hunters, you will find many nods to the rich history in game and out of the gold standard for Massively Multiplayer Online Role Playing Games (MMORPGs or MMO’s for short) rewarding and a distinct sense of nostalgia and they will still be surprised at the many twists that will revisit some old assumptions that may not necessarily be all correct. The Demon Hunters, much like the previous Hero Class, the Death Knight, are treated at arm’s length at first, but their perspective and skills quickly prove the Illidari’s worth in surplus as hidden threats are revealed and dealt with. Looking to the past for lessons becomes the Illidari’s first mission as they seek to gain the good will of the rest of Azeroth during the Burning Legion’s massive assault on the Broken Isles. From there, unlike with the Death Knights, these fel-infused warriors are granted a surprisingly warm reception by the general Azerothian populace. This means fewer nasty stares and emotes over the course of the expansion and an altogether better integration into the overarching plot. This was something that was only made just right in the last patch of Wrath of the Lich King as far as making the DK’s key players in the plot.
Keeping with the continued theme of revisiting the past to secure the future, the entire path of the core plots (Yes, multiple major plots go down simultaneously in this expansion.) is a constant revisit to areas of the past with keys to saving Azeroth. The Broken Isles—the last remnants of the vast Highborne civilization after the Sundering, which broke Azeroth from a Pangaea-like continent named Kalimdor into the familiar continents of today—offer keys to the true destruction of the infinite Legion and a lasting security of the peoples of Azeroth. As a Demon Hunter, you become intimately immersed in the rich lore of the starkly different regions of the Isles and serve as the lynchpin and the silent protectors of the other forces seeking Azeroth’s deliverance. While helping all the different people suffering under the thumb of the Legion, your true aim never wavers—the destruction of the Legion and the rescue of the Illidari’s leader and namesake, Illidan Stormrage. I will not spoil any of the details but I will leave it at this: the Illidari’s quest against the Legion will expand your view of Blizzard’s Warcraft universe beyond anything you imagined.
Many of the characters long left behind will get new life (and death) as they return with their unique talents and experiences. Iconic characters such as Thrall, Malfurion Stormrage, the Demigod Cenarius, and indeed the remnants of the legendary Highborne will demonstrate just how insidious their enemy is and how their experience is our only real hope. As they clung to life after the Sundering, the Highborne now serve the Legion under the new name the Nightborne. Whether or not their service to the Legion is authentic or not remains to be seen, but their society bears the last of the mysterious Titan artifacts the Shards of Creation which we are told bear the key to victory against the Legion. We will delve into the bloody history of Azeroth and face the lessons learned as we stand valiantly before an unending, sickly green inferno.
Perhaps my single favorite part of my investigation into the beta of Legion is the music. For the longest time, players have agreed that the gold standard for the expansion score has been its most successful expansion, The Wrath of the Lich King, for its soulful, dark, emotional score that near-perfectly captured the diverse continent of Northrend. That said, Lich King just got outdone—Legion has far and away the best soundtrack Blizzard Entertainment has EVER made. Better than Starcraft and Diablo and virtually all of the prior scores. I will admit, tears flowed at some of the pieces (in particular “Anduin” part 1 and 2) and I could not find a piece I didn’t adore and put on replay at least a few times. Back in Lich King, I would often fly up to the top of a peak in Dragonblight and sit there listening to the score because I loved it so much and the same thing has happened in several of the areas, particularly Suramar (once again, resisting the temptation to spoil things) and it reinforces the overall theme of the expansion. Going back to my original argument, it recycles some general themes from the previous several expansions (not to mention a healthy dose of Vanilla) and makes them brand new and engaging. To paraphrase one Jeff Lebowski, it ties the whole expansion together.
Legion is demonstrating just how rich, diverse and organic the lore of the Warcraft universe really is and telling the 11-million strong citizens of Azeroth that only by going back to the future can we secure a future for our world and indeed many more. My final judgment on the expansion from my experiences in the beta? Whether you are a newcomer or a hardcore veteran, you NEED to buy Legion and immediately roll a Demon Hunter. Trust me, you won’t regret it for a moment.
Earlier this week Blizzard Entertainment released a Pre-Launch patch to prepare its players for the imminent launch of their newest expansion World of Warcraft: Legion. Since then I’ve had a bit of time to check out the content they’ve rolled out.
The first bit I’d love to talk about are invasions. Since the theme of the expansion is The Burning Legion invading Azeroth, they’ve gone full force and brought some of the Legion’s toughest demons to familiar zones back in the main lands; Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor. The Kirin Tor have even brought Dalaran from the icy peaks of Northrend to float above Kharazan as they prepare for the coming invasion (though there’s nothing but inconsequential NPCs to be found there). The only zones that are being invaded at this time (and are the ones included in the Defender of Azeroth: Legion Invasions Achievement) are Westfall, The Northern Barrens, Hillsbrad Foothills, Tanaris, Azshara and Dun Morogh.
While the invasions themselves boil down to “gather up and ‘Zerg Rush’ their bases in those zones”, it does offer a bit of a challenge in that the mechanics are unforgiving and if you’re not paying a good amount of attention you’ll wind up crispy and dead. If any of you have played games like Rift or Elder Scrolls Online in the past the invasions are almost identical to Rifts and Dark Anchors respectively.
The biggest difference between this and others games is that tons of them spawn all at once. It’s up to the players of the Alliance and the Horde to help defend each other side by side to take them down and repel the invaders. Siege engines are also available for whichever faction the zone belongs. Completing the first two stages rewards you with a uncommon chest of items and Nethershards. The fourth and final stage of these invasions is a Burning Legion commander in the largest settlement of the zone which awards a rare quality chest of items and Nethershards.
The benefit to hitting these invasions would the current event currency, Nethershards, as well as the iLevel 700 gear that drops from completing stages of the invasions. The weapons are upgradable with Coalesced Fel which you can buy for 150 Nethershards. It is of note that there are a few rings, cloaks and other items available from the same vendor. For those that love pets be sure to grab the Felbat Pup available for another 150 Nethershards. One last thing to mention before moving on is that lower level toons may struggle to attend these so bringing your level 100 is highly recommended.
Moving onto the Demon Hunters about which I won’t go into a ton of detail. The starting zone that I got to experience for the Demon Hunters was a lot of fun and steadily paced. The storyline was engaging and even hooked to some of the previous content back in World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade expansion that some of us remember fondly. I won’t spoil it for you here but it was super satisfying to see history from another angle.
You first start in Mardum as one of your factions’ elves and later progress to the inside of the Vault of the Wardens in one of the expansion zone Azsuna. The new mobility options introduced with the Demon Hunters, namely the double jump and glide were a much welcomed addition which brought a fresh and fun way to traverse the zones.
The last thing worth mentioning is the scenario of your first trip to the Broken Shore. For spoiler reasons I won’t go into detail but before it’s over you’ll be hitting a heavy dose of feels. What follows sets the tone for the expansion and gives you a good idea just why you should be very afraid of the Burning Legion. Once again as it seems to be the theme this expansion, you will team up with the opposite faction to take down a common enemy and no one ends up coming out on top.
The Pre-Launch patch has me at the edge of my seat and absolutely excited about the upcoming playable content from Legion. Seeing the kind of care and quality that has gone into keeping and bringing this game up to date with modern standards, in both terms of gameplay and visuals has me extremely optimistic for the future of this game. At this point only time will tell of its success or failure as the fans sink their teeth into the meat of the game.
‘Twas the night before Overwatch, when all ‘cross the globe,
Every gamer was waiting, donned in their soft robes,
Their headphones were hung by their PCs with care,
In hopes that Overwatch soon would be there.
The gamers were nestled all snug in each chair,
While visions of Tracer blinked ’round without care.
The beta was returning, just ‘few hours away
To bring joy and fast battles back to their day.
If you’re staying in this holiday weekend perhaps you might want to look into playing a few rounds of Blizzard’s addicting MOBA Heroes of the Storm. This weekend all of the mounts, skins and heroes in the Nexus are reduced by 50% (off of their cash purchase price, in game gold prices remain unaffected).
Blizzard has also released a limited time Second Chance bundle which allows you to gain access to some of the timed exclusive mounts from the game’s past. These mounts include the Lunar Tiger, Red Carpet mount and the Reindeer mount!
If you’re a really dedicated player within the Nexus then this is your only chance to grab the 365 day stim pack which grants you additional gold & experience for an entire year. Normally the stim packs are sold in 7 and 30 day allotments for $3.99 and $9.99 respectively. The 365 day stim pack is currently priced at $59.99 USD and will not be available after this weekend’s sale.
Personally I picked up the Ranger-General Sylvanas Skin for $3.99 – I just couldn’t resist the idea of having a living elf Sylvanas now that I’ve got her to a high level!
All Heroes, Mounts, and Skins will be on sale at a 50% real money discount
A new 360 Day Stimpack will be available at a deeply discounted price.
Please note: The 360 Day Stimpack is a limited-time item that will ONLY be available during the Black Friday Sale.
A new Second Chance Bundle will be available with the following items:
Starcraft II’s popular blonde ghost Nova will be the focus of the next story set in the Starcraft II universe Blizzard announced this morning at Blizzcon. Originally scooped by IGN before the official reveal – Starcraft II: Nova expansion will be the first in a series of mission packs for the long running Starcraft 2 platform. The first 3 missions of Nova Ops will be released before June 19th of this year Blizzard has announced.
Blizzards Chris Sigalty had this to say about the game:
“focusing on a story that’s a little more intimate, a little darker in tone. We’ve been so focused on the galactic conflict [in StarCraft] and the galactic story. We’d like to explore something a little bit closer to home.”
Due to a recent breach on Blizzard’s internal network the company is recommending users change their Battle.net account passwords. The actual password info accessed was scrambled, and this recommendation is just a precaution. It seems no personal information was accessed says Blizzard.
Blizzard also notes that secret question answers may have been accessed as well as mobile authenticators. Automated propts are planned to inform users of change their secret questions and update their authenticator software.
After the break you can find the full securty update from Blizzard.
Blizzard’s last patch to Diablo III introduced some restrictions for players who decided to buy the game digitally. As it stands right now, players who purchased the game through Battle.net are only able to access the games first Act and are capped at level 13, they are also not able to play launch public games, gain access to the auction house and cannot make use of the public chat channel available to other players.
The auction house limitations, chat restrictions and other communication barriers were intentional but blizzard says that new digital purchases to be able to access more of the games content. Restricting players to level 13 and Act I ( namely the Skeleton King) was an unintended bug and will be fixed with the next patch.
Click the jump for a full list of restrictions that will be remain in place for up to 72 hours for those who purchased D3 digitally.
The benefit to hitting these invasions would the current event currency, Nethershards, as well as the iLevel 700 gear that drops from completing stages of the invasions. The weapons are upgradable with Coalesced Fel which you can buy for 150 Nethershards. It is of note that there are a few rings, cloaks and other items available from the same vendor. For those that love pets be sure to grab the Felbat Pup available for another 150 Nethershards. One last thing to mention before moving on is that lower level toons may struggle to attend these so bringing your level 100 is highly recommended.
