The first episode of our new form of the WoW Weekly news edition is here, covering the past week in World of Warcraft. This week: Battle for Azeroth launch, Conquest points and Gamescom 2018!
Carbot from Carbot Animations has released a new video with his parody of the Battle for Azeroth opening cinematic. Check out the video below and be sure to check out his other animations in almost every Blizzard game!
The likely final round of hotfixes for this week have made their way to the live servers, including nerfs to the amount of azerite levels you need for World Quest and Mythic+0 dungeon items as well as outpost flightpaths.
Quote from: Blizzard
Here you’ll find a list of hotfixes that address various issues related to World of Warcraft: Battle For Azeroth. Some of the hotfixes below take effect the moment they were implemented, while others may require scheduled realm restarts to go into effect. Please keep in mind that some issues cannot be addressed without a client-side patch update. This list will be updated as additional hotfixes are applied.
Hotfixes
August 17, 2018
Azerite Gear
- Substantially lowered the Heart of Azeroth level required to activate the outer ring of Azerite armor obtained from World Quests and Mythic dungeons.
Classes
- Warlock
- Affliction
- Deathbolt will now correctly deal increased damage if cast immediately after casting Unstable Affliction.
- Affliction
Creatures and NPCs
- Slickspill should be much easier to loot now.
Items
- Fixed an issue where ‘Bygone Bee’ Almanac’s cooldown or duration would be affected too much when hitting multiple enemies.
Player versus Player
- Sources of Conquest such as the World PvP Call to Arms quests, PvP Island Expeditions, Skirmish, and Battleground queues will award Honor until Battle for Azeroth: Arena Season 1 starts.
- Players who currently have Conquest will have the currency converted to Honor once they log in.
- Miniaturized Plasma Shield and Personal Space Amplifier engineering belt enchants can no longer be used in Arenas and Rated Battlegrounds.
- Fierce Gladiator is once again available to players who have earned the Fierce Gladiator: Legion Season 5 achievement.
- The War Mode Air Supply Drops in Tiragarde Sound should no longer fall in unreachable locations.
- Monk
- Brewmaster
- Incendiary Brew now adheres to line of sight restrictions.
- Double Barrel will no longer stun targets multiple times per Keg Smash cast.
- Brewmaster
Professions
- Cooking
- Fixed a bug that prevented Pandaria Banquets from granting the intended skill levels to Pandaria Cooking and Way of the Grill.
Quests
- Fixed a bug that caused the miners to not respawn as intended for “A Shot at the Dark Iron”.
- Fixed a bug where missions required to unlock hubs on the other continent were expiring quickly.
- Riding Macaw is no longer unfriendly to Horde for the world quest “Swab This!”.
- Hexlord Raal is now reliably present to offer “Pa’ku, Master of Winds”.
- “The Lord Admiral’s Lament” and “Bloodied Sentinel’s Glaive” can now be turned in to Kayla Mills
World
- Flight paths unlocked through missions should now reliably appear as valid destinations on the flight map.
The Warbringers shorts brought some great music with them and Blizzard has now released the songs on Youtube, Spotify and iTunes.
Quote from: Blizzard
Next wednesday is the first day of Gamescom 2018 and Blizzard will be making an appearance as well! Judging by their tweet they’ll be releasing new information about Battle for Azeroth, and judging by the art they have released the warbringers short for Queen Azshara will be released as well! After the opening ceremony many livestream activities are planned with community streamers.
🗓 Mark your calendars!
From August 21-25 we'll be at #gamescom2018 to share the latest news about #BattleforAzeroth! pic.twitter.com/hmsMfaquCf
— World of Warcraft (@Warcraft) August 17, 2018
The opening begins at 10:30 CEST (EU server time) and the rest of the schedule can be found here. The livestream for the opening can be found here.
Hotfixes: August 16, 2018
Possibly the biggest list of hotfixes yet for Battle for Azeroth has been deployed to the live realms; a list which includes a big buff for the Arms Warrior mastery, profession recipe books and many quests.
Quote from: Blizzard
August 16, 2018
Azerite Gear
- Fixed an issue where Ruinous Bolt would sometimes damage enemies that the player was not in combat with.
Classes
- Warrior
- Arms
- 1 point of Mastery now increases Deep Wounds damage by 10% (was 1%).
- Damage of all Arms abilities decreased by 14%. This excludes Arms Azerite Traits.
Creatures and NPCs
- Da White Shark has turned a new leaf and has fully renounced the fighting tactic of beating someone with another person’s body.
- Players should now always be able to see the reward treasure chest after defeating Da White Shark in the Grand Bazaar.
- Slickspill in Stormsong should now be much easier to loot.
- John J. Keeshan has decided to once again wield his old bow instead of the bow of a certain warchief.
Dungeons
- Fixed a bug where a group of players below level 110, when partied with a level 110 player in a Legion dungeon, would receive heavily reduced experience.
- Fixed an issue that caused Alliance players who had completed The Pride of Kul Tiras to be unable to access Siege of Boralus.
- Fixed an issue that caused Horde players who hadn’t completed Zandalar Forever to be able to access Kings’ Rest.
- Clarified the error messages shown when attempting to zone in to Kings’ Rest or Siege of Boralus without meeting the requirements.
Items
- Salty Dog Crackers are now consumed on use.
- The Stormsteel Saber now has a level requirement of 120.
Player versus Player
- Steel Strongboxes now drop Dread Aspirant gear for all valid armor slots during the offseason.
- Factionally-aligned guards should no longer attack you for attacking members of the opposite faction.
- Call to Arms: Vol’Dun will now correctly count Horde players slain while in Vol’Dun.
Professions
- The Forgotten Techniques of Kul Tiras/Zandalar items now properly restore recipes that were learned and subsequently unlearned.
- Fixed a bug preventing some Draenor profession books from properly teaching all introductory recipes.
- Archaeology
- Digsites in the Port of Zem’lan are no longer partially obscured from view.
- Cooking
- Crafting Swamp Fish’n Chips should now give credit towards the achievements “The Zandalari Menu” and “The Kul Tiran Menu”.
- Fishing
- Akan now teaches Battle for Azeroth Fishing.
Quests
- Fixed a bug that caused a few Tortollan quests in Stormsong Valley from awarding Tortollan reputation as intended.
- Completing “All Laid Out for Us” now awards its part of the Stormsong and Dance achievement.
- Upon accepting “Back to the Lab”, Raimond Mildehnall will no longer attempt to fight every enemy he sees while returning to the basement.
- Fixed an issue where the Lightforged Warframe used during “Dawn of Justice” was weaker than intended.
- Felecia Gladstone will now offer the remainder of her quests in Warfang Hold only once all her tasks for the Saltstone Mine have been completed.
- When unlocking World Quests in Zandalar and Kul’Tiras, Halford Wyrmbane or Nathanos Blightcaller will now give you a fresh Flight Master’s Whistle if you left yours in the bank.
- Players are no longer stuck after abandoning “Into the Dunes” mid-flight.
- Scout Mckellis is now available at the turn-in location for “Powder to the People” and “One Man Against the Horde”.
- “Wanted: Anchorface” should now be available to Alliance players before they unlock World Quests.
- “Wiccaphobia” should now proceed as expected for players who group up with other players on the quest.
- Players may now complete “Spell Bound” after first completing “So Long, Sister”.
- Lucille Waycrest should no longer disappear for some players on “Of Myth and Fable”.
- Eligible party members now receive Azerite along with “Azerite Mining” quest credit when a member of the party interacts with an Azerite node.
World
- Fixed a bug preventing some Inns from granting rested experience to characters in War Mode.
- The Royal Treasury in Dazar’Alor is now flagged as a rested area.
- The second floor of the Snug Harbor Inn is now flagged as a rested area.
- The Flight Master’s Whistle can now be used on the non-dungeon island of Tol Dagor.
Unintended Conquest for PvP
The conquest points players have been able to earn in PvP were unintended, as the new PvP season has not started yet. As such, Blizzard will be converting these conquest points to honor or gold when the new PvP season starts.
Quote from: Blizzard
With the Battle for Azeroth Pre-Patch, we incurred a bug that caused some PvP activities to reward Conquest. Conquest was never intended to be accessible while the season is not active, and while Conquest did appear for some players on their Character Currency tab, it wasn’t useable. There aren’t any items that can be exchanged for it in-game right now.
We’ll be deploying a hotfix soon that will change any activities that are currently awarding Conquest to award Honor instead.
When BFA Season 1 begins, players will start earning Conquest as planned. At the same time, we’ll convert any unintended Conquest that players earned during the post-season to Honor or gold.
Additionally, new one-time PvP quests will get reset when BFA Season 1 begins. We want to make sure you can complete those quests to earn Conquest from them as intended. These quests are located in the same place where you turn in Conquest quests, so they should be easy to spot.
We apologize for any confusion this may have caused, and we’re working to make the fixes and conversions as seamless as possible.
We look forward to everyone engaging with the new Conquest System upcoming in Season 1 of Battle for Azeroth! Click here to learn more.
Thank you!
Learn About Battle for Azeroth Class Trials
The class trials have been updated for Battle for Azeroth!
Quote from: Blizzard
With the launch of World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth, we’ve updated Class Trials for level-110 characters. Now you can try a class in the expansion before you boost!
On the character-creation screen, players who have the World of Warcraft: Battle for Azeroth expansion can now create and play a level-110 “Class Trial” character with a preset class specialization. You’ll take this character through a tutorial experience and get a chance to play through the Siege of Lordaeron event, gain your new Artifact neck piece—the Heart of Azeroth—from Speaker Magni, and experience the introductions to Kul Tiras for Alliance characters or Zandalar for Horde characters. After that, if you’d like to play the class further, just apply a level-110 character boost to continue your adventure.
Getting Started
Whether you’re Horde or Alliance, you’ll begin your new adventure on a gunship high above Seething Shore. Your new trainer will guide you along the way as you become familiar with your new class, providing you with opportunities to practice against several enemies.
Basic Training
Once the experience has been completed—or at any time during the Class Trial—simply apply a level-110 character boost* to continue your journey in Battle for Azeroth. If you’re undecided, you can also keep the character around and apply a boost later, or delete it if you want to make room to try another class. Please note that if a character completes the Class Trial experience but is not boosted, it will be locked and unavailable for play until a boost is applied.
While there is a limit on the time you’ll have to play through the Class Trial, you can log out of the character and continue the experience later with the time you had remaining. You’ll also be able to try multiple classes, and won’t be locked into only one Class Trial.
Whether you’re already one of Azeroth’s protectors, returning for the new expansion, or a new player joining friends, the Class Trial experience provides an opportunity for Battle for Azeroth players to find the character that’s right for them.
What are you waiting for? Take the plunge into the latest adventures in Azeroth!
*One level-110 boost is included with Battle for Azeroth, and additional character boosts can be purchased in the Shop.
Last night the second round of hotfixes made their way to the live servers!
Quote from: Blizzard
Here you’ll find a list of hotfixes that address various issues related to World of Warcraft: Battle For Azeroth. Some of the hotfixes below take effect the moment they were implemented, while others may require scheduled realm restarts to go into effect. Please keep in mind that some issues cannot be addressed without a client-side patch update. This list will be updated as additional hotfixes are applied.
Hotfixes
August 15, 2018
Azerite Gear
- Fixed an issue where the Azerite Trait Reckless Flurry was incorrectly increasing ability damage, in addition to auto attack damage.
- 7th Legionnaire’s Tunic and Honorbound Outrider’s Vestments now correctly have an Outlaw Rogue trait. The extra Subtlety Rogue trait has been removed.
- Fixed an issue where the Azerite Trait Wild Fleshrending was not increasing the damage of Swipe for Guardian Druids.
Dungeons
- Experience rewarded from end-of-zone dungeon quests has been greatly increased.
- Fixed an issue where players couldn’t complete “Ecological Research” in The Temple of Sethraliss on Normal difficulty.
Items
- Harlan’s Loaded Dice now scales correctly with item level for its spells.
Pet Battles
- Francois can now be properly summoned and used in Pet Battles by Alliance characters.
- Fixed a bug that prevented Peachy and Winkle from battling as intended.
Professions
- Archaeology
- Fixed a bug that caused some digsites near Vigil Hill in Tiragarde Sound from providing fragments as intended.
- Blacksmithing
- Crafting the Stormsteel Spear recipe now creates the correct item.
- Mining
- Fixed a bug that prevented ore gathered in Kul’Tiras and Zandalar from being stored in certain bags, as intended.
Quests
- Fixed a bug causing one of the Shadra Betrayers to evade during “The Ancient One”.
- Fixed a bug that caused the Ancient Gong to sometimes become unusable during “Punishment of Tal’aman”.
- Fixed a bug that made Taelia disappear under rare circumstances on “The Old Knight”.
- It should be harder to get separated from Rastakhan on “The King’s Gambit”.
- “Mine Sweeper” is now easier to locate and obtain. Goblin Mine Technicians aren’t the tidiest bunch and may have left an extra Cracked Mine Sweeper in the Saltstone Mine.
- Players who disconnect before turning in “Dress to Impress” should now be able to properly see Flynn in the Dead Man’s Tale.
- Fixed an issue where players could move during “Rest in the Depths”, breaking the channeled spell.
- The Island Expeditions quest “Notched Coin” can now be turned in to Mili Wanderbrew.
- On “Return to Gloom Hollow”, players should no longer be able to get into a state where Titan Keeper Hezrel will not move.