Hearthstone Live Stream
May 9, 2013 in Hearthstone
This afternoon, two game designers from the Hearthstone team hosted a Live Stream where they played the game and answered questions. You can view the video below.
Blizzplanet.com back online!
Back in 2005/2006 back in the days of Classic World of Warcraft, I became a fan of a website known as Blizzplanet. Their reviews of books and the owner’s knowledge of WoW lore helped mold me into the WoW fanatic that I am today. A few days ago, some news broke of his website going
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Blizzplanet.com back online!
May 8, 2013 in Friends
Back in 2005/2006 back in the days of Classic World of Warcraft, I became a fan of a website known as Blizzplanet. Their reviews of books and the owner’s knowledge of WoW lore helped mold me into the WoW fanatic that I am today. A few days ago, some news broke of his website going down due to a dispute between staff members, the details of which I am going to withhold here out of respect for all parties involved. I got in contact with Medievaldragon, the owner of Blizzplanet and volunteered my time, support, and expertise with web development to help bring his website back online. Over the past three days, I have been working nonstop to help this website of which I have been a fan for a long time, and I am proud to announce that as of this moment, the website is back online. Medievaldragon is an excellent person and extremely knowledgeable about Warcraft lore. I highly recommend giving his website a visit, without him and his passion for Blizzard games, I would not be the person I am today.
Thank you Medievaldragon, for everything.
You may visit his site here.
Social Media Networking
May 8, 2013 in Website
Activision-Blizzard 2013 Conference Call Recap
May 8, 2013 in Activision-Blizzard
I came into the conference call 20 minutes late, but it seems that there was not very much extra mentioned in this conference call that wasn’t already in the press release, but I did catch a few things related to WoW that were not in the press release.
- 5.3 was announced to be coming out “later this month”
- Blizzard is projecting more subscriber loss by the end of the year.
- When talking about the loss of subscribers, mention was made of older players coming back to the game after some time experiencing a “disorienting effect” with all of the changes to the game, which discourages them from playing. Blizzard will be working to ease this transition in the future.
- Also noted was the fact that the majority of WoW’s subscriptions were from China, which also coincides with the most loss of subscriptions coming from the same area. There is increased competition with F2P MMOs in the area that may be contributing to the loss as well.
- Players seem to be blowing through content and unsubscribing, just to resubscribe when new content comes out.
- Titan and Blizzard All-Stars will not be released in 2013.
WoW subscribers down to 8.3 Million from 9.6 Million in Febuary
May 8, 2013 in Activision-Blizzard
Today’s Activision-Blizzard press release revealed a few interesting things, mainly that World of Warcraft, as of March 31st 2013 is down to 8.3 million active subscribers, this is down from the 9.6 million subscribers from around Febuary. However, don’t let this loss of subscribers fool you, WoW is still the #1 subscription-based MMO.
The press release stated that overall, the first quarter of 2013 had “Better-than-expected” financial results. These results are attributed to several of Blizzard’s products, namely the first Starcraft 2 expansion, Heart of the Swarm, and Diablo 3 remaining in the Top 10 PC Games in both the American and European regions.
The press release continues with a recap of the announcements of Diablo 3 for the PS3 and PS4 systems, as well as the announcement of Hearthstone: Heroes of Warcraft for Windows, Mac, and iPad.
The press release also reveals that in it’s first two days, Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm sold 1.1 million copies worldwide, including physical and digital sales.
At 4:30PM EST Activision-Blizzard will be hosting a conference call for Investors and the Media.
You may view the press release Here.
Blizzard Blog: Preparing for Patch 5.3 Escalation
May 8, 2013 in Blizzard Blog
Daxxarri made a post today containing the highlights of the 5.3 patch. There are several changes that are coming in patch 5.3 that are not mentioned in this post, these are listed below.
- All bosses in Mogu’shan Vaults, Heart of Fear, and Terrace of the Endless Spring now have a chance to drop either a Sigil of Power or Sigil of Wisdom.
- Two new Heirloom Shields: Weathered Observer’s Shield and Flamescarred Draconian Deflector
- Reduced cost on the heirloom upgrades
- Several dungeons had their level requirements tweaked.
- Gate of the Setting Sun is now available in Normal difficulty, and accessible to level 89 characters.
- Grim Batol is now accessible at level 84, down from level 85.
- Lost City of the Tol’vir is now accessible at level 84, down from level 85.
- Magisters’ Terrace is now accessible at level 68, down from level 70.
- The Mechanar is now accessible at level 68, down from level 70.
- Low level herbalists and miners can now mine in Pandaria
- The in-game support tool now loads the Battle.net Support Site in game
Originally Posted by Daxxarri (Official Forums)
Now that the patch is on the horizon, we’ve narrowed down some of the key things you might want to know before the big day. If you want to find out more about everything that’s coming, you can check out the latest Public Test Realm patch notes, or even download and play on the PTR itself.
Be Prepared
Hold on to some of those currencies you’ve been earning over the course of patch 5.2. The gear-upgrading Void Binders are returning in patch 5.3, but it will be cheaper to upgrade items using Valor and Justice Points. Upgradeable PvP items from Season 12 will be eligible for upgrade once again at their original costs. In addition, Heirloom items will be cheaper to upgrade, whether you’re using Justice Points, Honor Points, or Darkmoon Faire tickets. We’re also speeding up the leveling process from 85 to 90. Here are the details:
The experience required to level from 85 to 90 will be reduced by 33%. Time to dust off those alts!
The Void Binders are coming back!
Items upgraded with Valor will now cost 250 Valor Points to upgrade per 4 Item Levels, for a total of 500 Valor for 8 Item Levels per item. This applies retroactively to all items that can be upgraded using Valor.
Items upgraded with Justice will now cost 750 Justice Points to upgrade for 8 Item Levels. They can only be upgraded once, for a total of 750 Justice and 8 Item Levels per item. This applies retroactively to all items that can be upgraded using Justice.
Malevolent Gladiator’s Conquest (Season 12) items that have upgrades available will still be upgradable at their original Conquest Point costs (750 Conquest Points per 4 Item Levels, with two upgrades possible).
Dreadful Gladiator’s Honor (Season 12) items that have upgrades available will still be upgradable at their original costs (one upgrade at a cost of 750 Honor Points for 8 Item Levels).
No other PvP items will be able to be upgraded.
The amount of Justice, Honor, and Darkmoon Faire tickets needed to upgrade Heirloom items will be reduced by 60%.
Item Level Requirements
Are you ready to face the Raid Finder, Heroic dungeons, and new Heroic Scenarios? Make sure that you’re geared up to dive right in:
Heroic Scenarios require an average Item Level of 480; unlike normal Scenarios, you’ll need a pre-made party to enter.
An average Item Level of 440 is required for Heroic dungeons.
An average Item Level of 460 is required for the Raid Finder version of Mogu’shan Vaults.
An average item level of 470 is required for Raid Finder versions of Heart of Fear and Terrace of Endless Spring.
An average Item Level of 480 is required for the Raid Finder version of Throne of Thunder.
Lesser Charms of Good Fortune
We’re adding more ways to acquire Lesser Charms of Good Fortune in patch 5.3. In addition to the changes that took effect in patch 5.2, which reduced the number of Lesser Charms of Good Fortune required to purchase three Mogu Runes of Fate from 90 to 50 and allowed players to earn Lesser Charms from Pet Battles, these new sources of Lesser Charms will be available in patch 5.3:
Outdoor world creatures level 90 and above now have a chance to drop Lesser Charms of Good Fortune.
Rare spawns in Pandaria (except Zandalari Warscouts and Zandalari Warbringers) and bosses encountered as part of the Battlefield: Barrens quest event in Kalimdor will drop Lesser Charms of Good Fortune.
PvP Season Update
PvP Season 13 is still in full swing. We discussed many of the changes coming to PvP gear in our PvP Gear in 5.2 and Preparing for PvP in Patch 5.3 blogs, and the changes below are explained in greater detail there. As a reminder, the 7,250 Conquest Point requirement to purchase non-elite Conquest Point weapons is being removed with patch 5.3.
A number of significant changes are coming to PvP and PvP gear:
All characters now have a base Resilience of 65%.
Battle Fatigue now reduces the effectiveness of healing and absorb spells and abilities by 45% (was 30%).
PvP Power bonus to healing is now based on class and specialization.
Healing specializations receive a 100% bonus to healing from PvP Power.
Damage specializations for Druids, Monks, Paladins, Priests, and Shaman receive a 70% bonus to healing from PvP Power.
All other specializations and classes (including tanking) receive a 40% bonus to healing from PvP Power.
Patching Smoothly
It’s easy to make sure that you’re ready to play when the realms become available on patch day. If you haven’t played in a while, one of the simplest things you can do is open the World of Warcraft launcher and allow the updater to download the latest available game files. If you use user interface add-ons, make sure you have the latest versions and that they’re updated and ready to go for the new patch. This is also a good time to update your video card’s drivers.
If you experience any patching issues, there’s a technical support forum thread all about patching that could help. You can also follow @BlizzardCS on Twitter for the latest support-related news.
Getting Additional Account Help
If you’re having an issue with your account, a number of resources are available to you. If other players are experiencing a similar issue, they may have already posted about it on the Customer Support forum located here, so that can sometimes be a good first stop. If you need more information or direct assistance, the Battle.net Support site will allow you to search through available solutions, submit a support ticket, or contact customer support directly.
A compilation of resources and information can also be found on the Customer Support forum, including information on in-game support, reporting bugs and cheats, submitting suggestions, reporting forum violations, and sharing forum feedback.
Good luck, and we’ll see you in Azeroth!
Adding some cool features to the site.
May 8, 2013 in Website
Part of my goal with this website is to make this a one stop for any fans of Warcraft looking for information, to achieve this goal, I will be adding inter-connectivity with other websites, such as Wowhead and the official Warcraft forums. To your right, you can see the latest five blue posts from Blizzard employees on their forums. Another neat feature is Wowhead implementation. When I place a link to an item or quest from Wowhead on my site, it will show the tooltip to the item.
Here are two examples
[Thunderfury, Blessed Blade of the Windseeker]
Call of Command
There will be a lot more nifty features added to the website in the coming days and hours. Stay tuned!
Welcome
May 8, 2013 in Website
Welcome to Raevyn.net, I am Raevyn, in some communities, I am known as HybridPunk. I have been playing World of Warcraft since shortly after launch. I currently have a level 85+ of every class, including a 90 Monk, Death Knight, and Hunter. I started off as Alliance and switched to Horde midway through Wrath of the Lich King.
Enough about me. My goal with this website is to post pretty much anything I see concerning Warcraft, be it news, products, lore, or even hardware and peripheral reviews.
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