Something interesting has popped up on the live realms, the legendary ring upgrade can now be bought for 1250 Valor Points per upgrade! This will give you another incentive to run Mythic Dungeons if you haven’t upgraded your legendary ring to ilvl 795 yet!
Players who have acquired the most powerful rewards from Khadgar's Legendary questline may now purchase Crystallized Fel from (1/2)
We released a small new tool on the website this morning for those that aren’t sure what they should do in WoW today! You can find it here at wowweekly.net/whatshouldidotoday .
The World of Warcraft: Legion alpha test is now underway! A small group of testers have already been trying their hand at the Demon Hunter, and today we’ve added some new areas for players to check out. Alpha testers can now explore the Stormheim and Highmountain zones, as well as the Halls of Valor dungeon. All classes except for Shaman are now available; character copy is currently disabled, but testers can create high-level characters using templates we’ve provided.
There’s no NDA (non-disclosure agreement) for the Legion alpha, so those invited to play are free to stream the game and take screenshots or movies. Please keep in mind that Legion is still in development—we’ll be making changes to the game as we continue to prepare for the upcoming beta test, and what you’ll see during the alpha test is not necessarily representative of the final game.
Players selected to participate in the alpha will receive an email invitation directing them to download the alpha client directly from their Battle.net account. As always, please be aware of phishing attempts—if you’re unsure whether your invitation is legitimate, please log in to your Battle.net account to verify that there is a Legion alpha license attached (under Your Game Accounts).Getting Started
If you’ve been selected to participate in the Legion alpha, your Battle.net account will already be flagged for access.
Make sure your graphics drivers are up to date.
Run the Battle.net desktop app—it may need to update itself if you haven’t run it recently. If you don’t have it installed, get started here.
Once Battle.net is installed and updated, select World of Warcraft from the list of games on the left.
In the Region/Account drop-down menu above the Play button, choose Alpha: Legion (listed under In Development), then click Install.
Allow installation to complete, and click Play.
Once you’ve launched the game, use the Legion alpha template to create a character. This is located near the Enter World button.
Providing Feedback
We’d love to hear about your experiences on the Broken Isles, so once you’ve had a chance to play, please send us your feedback.
For general feedback, use the in-game Feedback interface.
For crashes, please use the Crash Reporter feature that appears when the client crashes.
For general game bugs, use the in-game Bug Report interface.
If you’re getting a wrong version error, please uninstall and reinstall the client.
Once you’ve set up a Battle.net account and have attached at least one Blizzard game, you can choose to opt in to future beta tests from the Beta Profile page—just check the box next to which games you’re interested in testing. Once that’s complete, it’s simply a matter of waiting for an invitation.
Welcome to the WoW Weekly Design Corner! In this editorial series I (Mezzy) look at different parts of WoW and see how I would design the next new thing, or perhaps improve upon it. The following designs and mock content are NOT official content.
Last time we found ourselves in the Halls where we encountered the servants and occupants. But today, we climb the tower of Karazhan where we will find our final challenge to overcome before the rift in time and space can be closed: The Echo of Medivh.
When designing the final wing/boss I wanted to make something that was memorable. It was a final boss fight, but didn’t necessarily have to be complex. In the end it does have some more chaotic elements to it that you can’t control, but also some more fun aspects to it through the fighting of not just the Echo of Medivh, but the echoes of foes you’ve fought in the past. In normal/heroic you fight just those within TLHoK, but on mythic you’ll encounter the abilities of foes beyond the halls. Which in the end makes for a really fun (theoretical) encounter!
Due to the amount of abilities the encounter has, it’s been split into 2 tabs below. The first being the normal/heroic fight and the second tab being the mythic changes. These mythic changes replace the Echoes of normal/heroic. As usual, the encounter journal entires are at the bottom of the tabs.
Other than a video I hope to release in the future to bring the Time-Lost Halls of Karazhan further to life, this will be it for the TLHoK. I certainly hope you enjoyed it!
Echo of Medivh
The Echo of Medivh prevents the Time-Lost Halls from disappearing, keeping the portal to Draenor open. Defeat the Echo to close the rift in time and space.
Encounter description and design notes:
Arcane Blast – Deals 80,000 arcane damage to the target. Medivh gains Arcane Infusion on target.
Arcane Infusion – Increases Arcane Blast damage by 15%. Increases all magic damage by 1.5%. Stacks.
Note: Just means Medivh will do increasing damage on the target with this ability.. had to change wording to fit it in the photoshopped dungeon journal entry.
Arcanic Thunder – Puts an arcanic storm in the targeted area, any player standing in it will take 120,000 arcane damage per second.
Mana implosion – Medivh expels the mana from the targeted players, causing their mana to be depleted and spawns mana orbs around the room for each player’s mana that was depleted.
Mana Orb – Restores 30,000 mana when picked up by a player.
Mana explosion – Medivh detonates the mana orbs floating around in the room, dealing 30,000 arcane damage to every player per orb.
Consume Essence – Every 20% health the Echo of Medivh will draw on the essence from enemies once defeated, resulting in one final echo from your foes. Medivh can have up to 2 essences active at the same time. Resets Arcane Infusion stacks.
Howl of the Den Mother – Echo of Medivh summons Fel Pup Echoes.
Fel Pup Echo – Deals 30,000 auto attack damage every second.
Fire Pulse – Deals 100,000 fire damage to every player every 5 seconds. Medivh gains a stack of Fired Up! Resets on Essence change.
Fired Up! – Increases fire damage dealt by 1%.
Summon Duplicate Echo of Atiesh – The duplicate Echo of Atiesh deals 50,000 arcane damage to a random player.
Sore Spot – Increases magic damage by 10% per stack. Resets on Essence change.
Arcane Beam – A beam of arcane energy travels around the room, if the player gets hit by it they will take 250,000 arcane damage.
Empowered Staff – Atiesh becomes heavy, dealing heavy physical damage to the player
Wrath of the Last Guardian – At 30% health Echo of Medivh goes into a frenzy, breaking the barrier between the magical ley lines and the Time-Lost Halls.
Mirror Image – Summons 3 Mirror Images that each cast a bolt in a different spell school.
Sargeras’ Wrath
Sargeras’ spirit deep within the echo unleashes his anger, destroying any mortal who gets hit. Find cover!
Demonified Medivh voice over: “Die you pathetic mortals!”
Development notes:
The tower room is very big and circular. Next to the Echo of Medivh there are holograms of each of the previous bosses that have all been defeated by the raid. Medivh is seen channeling a beam with which he’s drawing the essence from Celeus.
During the 2nd phase, the air color will change, showing the collapse of the dimension of the Time-Lost Halls. After the defeat of the Echo of Medivh the environment will continue to have this light, creating a sense of urgency to get out and escape the dimension, back to Draenor.
Sargeras’ Wrath gets cast at 10% health, causing an explosion of chaos damage. A bubble safe zone will appear for players to stand in to not get killed by the ability.
When Mana Implosion is cast, the more mana a player had, the more mana orbs will spawn. This means later in the fight it’ll have less effect.
Mythic Abilities
On Mythic Difficulty Medivh draws upon the powers of enemies you have faced in the past, outside of the Time-Lost Halls. This replaces the Echoes from normal/heroic.
Development/Encounter Notes:
(M) Echo of the Lich King
Infest – Deals 75,000 Shadow damage to all players. In addition, the targets will take increasing Shadow damage per second. This effect is removed when the target has more than 90% health.
(M) Echo of Garrosh Hellscream
Touch of Y’Shaarj – Corrupts the targeted players minds. The targets snap out of their corruption when they hit 20% health.
(M) Echo of Yogg-Saron
Summon Crusher Tentacles – Summons 2 Crusher Tentacles that reduce the players damage done by 20% each while it has no target to attack.
(M) Echo of Lei Shen
Thunderstruck – Echo of Medivh hurls lightning at the targeted area, dealing 400,000 nature damage damage to nearby enemies. Damage decreases the further an enemy is away from the point of impact.
(M) Echo of Illidan Stormrage
Agonizing Flames – Deals 200,000 fire damage to every player and continues to deal 75,000 fire damage every 3 seconds to every player.
So what do you think of the final encounter in the Time-Lost Halls of Karazhan? Do you like the raid instance as a whole? Let me know in the comments!
During scheduled maintenance on Tuesday, November 17, we’ll release Patch 6.2.3, bringing cross-realm Mythic raiding, new Timewalking dungeons, the return of the Valor currency, the Grove Warden mount, and more to the game.
Tuesday’s maintenance period will also mark the end of the current PvP season and the beginning of Warlords Season 3. In the new season, you’ll have a chance to earn new PvP gear, including the Warmongering Aspirant (PvP item level 715), Warmongering Combatant (ilvl 730), and Warmongering Gladiator (ilvl 740) sets.
For those interested in diving into dungeons, the very first Cataclysm Timewalking Bonus Event begins Wednesday, November 18, featuring Grim Batol, Stonecore, Lost City of Tol’vir, Vortex Pinnacle, Throne of Tides, and End Time. We’re also expanding the Northrend Timewalking Bonus Event to include Pit of Saron and The Burning Crusade Timewalking Bonus Event to include Magister’s Terrace.
Check out the links below for more, and we’ll see you on Draenor!
A new Cataclysm Timewalking Bonus Event has been added to the holiday rotation, featuring the following dungeons:
End Time
Grim Batol
Lost City of Tol’vir
Stonecore
The Vortex Pinnacle
Throne of Tides
The existing Burning Crusade and Wrath of the Lich King Timewalking events have been expanded to include an additional dungeon each:
Magister’s Terrace (Burning Crusade)
Pit of Saron (Wrath of the Lich King)
New rare mount: Infinite Timereaver, has been added as a random drop from any Timewalking boss.
Added a vendor near the Cataclysm portals in Stormwind and Orgrimmar during the Cataclysm Timewalking Bonus Event that sells modernized Cataclysm gear and cool new toys.
Cross-Realm Mythic Raiding
Cross-Realm raiding has been enabled for Hellfire Citadel on Mythic difficulty. You’ll now be able to join with friends or fill that last raid spot to take on the most difficult encounters in Warlords of Draenor.
Item Upgrades and Valor are back!
Item upgrades are back! Players will be able to earn and spend Valor to upgrade items from Hellfire Citadel, crafted profession items, items created from Baleful tokens in Tanaan Jungle, and all Draenor dungeon drops. All the items you’ve already earned are eligible for upgrades retroactively.
Characters can earn Valor in a number of ways.
Completing the first random Heroic Dungeon of the day
Completing Mythic Dungeons
Completing weekly Bonus Event quests (except for the Pet Battle Bonus Event)
Completing a Raid Finder wing for Highmaul, Blackrock Foundry, or Hellfire Citadel for the first time each week.
To upgrade, visit your friendly neighborhood ethereal in Orgrimmar and Stormwind, or Stormshield and Warspear to upgrade your gear by 5 item levels at a time for 250 Valor, up to twice per item, for a total potential boost of 10 item levels.
Improved Item Rewards
Mythic Dungeon Loot Improvements
Mythic Dungeons now have a chance to award items ranging from item level 685 to 725 in 5-item-level increments, with a progressively lower chance as item level increases.
Mythic Dungeon bosses now also have a chance to drop a new Heirloom Trinket that will scale up to level 110.
Baleful Item Level Boost
Baleful items now have a chance to create items ranging in quality from item level 655 to 695 in 5-item-level increments, with a progressively lower chance as item level increases.
Warlords Season 3
Around the release of Patch 6.2.3, a transition to Warlords Season 3 will take place. More information and details on the close of Warlords Season 2 and transition to the new season will be available in the future.
With the new season comes new gear. New Warmongering Aspirant gear scales up to PvP item level 715, Warmongering Combatant gear scales to 730, and Warmongering Gladiator gear scales to 740.
Class Tuning Changes
Death Knight
General
Blood Boil, Blood Plague, Death Coil, Death and Decay, Frost Fever, and Soul Reaper damage has been increased by 10%.
Frost
Frost Strike, Howling Blast, and Obliterate damage has been increased by 10%.
Unholy
Festering Strike, Necrosis, and Scourge Strike damage has been increased by 10%.
Talents
Defile and Necrotic Plague damage has been increased by 10%.
Druid
General
Moonfire and Wrath damage has been increased by 6%.
Balance
Starfall, Starfire, Starsurge, and Sunfire damage has been increased by 6%.
Paladin
General
Crusader Strike, Hammer of Wrath, and Judgmentdamage has been increased by 8%.
Retribution
Divine Storm, Seal of Truth, and Templar’s Verdict damage has been increased by 8%.
Shaman
General
Chain Lightning, Flame Shock, Lava Burst, Lightning Bolt, and Lightning Shield damage has been increased by 4%.
Elemental
Mastery: Molten Earth, Earth Shock, and Earthquake damage has been increased by 4%.
Enhancement
Lava Lash, Stormstrike, and Windfury damage has been increased by 4%.
Warriors
General
Enrage now increases all damage dealt by 15% (up from 10%).
Arms
Seasoned Soldier now increases all damage dealt by 15% (up from 10%).
Raids and Dungeons
Hellfire Citadel
Defeating Archimonde on Heroic difficulty or higher will reward players with a mysterious fragment of dark power that begins a quest which will lead to the Grove Warden mount.
Timewalking
Pepe should now remain with players that enter into a Timewalking dungeon.
Items
Increased the drop rates of Felblight from Skinning, Mining, Herbalism, and Fishing by about 20%.
Mirror of the Blademaster now summon magical blades as guardians, instead of mirror images of the caster.
The Q3 2015 numbers are out and WoW’s subscriber numbers have dropped by 100k subscribers! This is also the last time Blizzard will be publishing subscriber numbers.
Warcraft Movie Trailer Teaser
The actual trailer will be shown at Blizzcon on friday, but a teaser was released today.
After an in intense season of conflict in Arenas and Battlegrounds, the time is coming soon to see who has climbed to the top of the PvP ranks. Prepare to fight your last battles of this season, and remember—there is no substitute for victory!
Warlords Season 2 will be ending as soon as a few weeks from now. Once the season ends, we’ll begin a roughly two-week process to determine end-of-season reward eligibility.
All players who believe that they may have qualified for Warlords Season 2 awards should note the following:
In order to ensure you receive your award(s), please refrain from transferring your character(s) to another realm or faction until after Warlords Season 3 has begun.
Warlords Season 2 titles and mounts will be awarded a couple of weeks after Season 3 begins.
Conquest Points will be converted to Honor Points at the end of the season, and any Honor above 4,000 will be converted to in-game currency at a rate of 35 silver per point. A few other things to keep in mind once the season has ended:
The Honor cap will remain at 4,000.
Warlords Season 2 items with rating requirements will no longer be available for purchase.
The Season 2 vendors will move over from where they are now and convert to selling last season’s gear for honor. The Season 3 vendors will appear in the newly vacated vendor location.
Rated Battleground and Arena matches will not be available during the break between seasons.
We will confirm the start date of the forthcoming Warlords Season 3 in a post here in the weeks to come.
In war, you win or lose, live or die—and the difference is but an eyelash. To the battlefield!
The podcast is back this week, we cover the upcoming changes in patch 6.2.3: Cataclysm Timewalkers and Valor points. We also speculate about what we could expect from Blizzcon next week.
