I wanted to reach across party lines in this monumental election and say one thing. We need to rebuild America to its former glory. The America with a 14K stock market, with a budget surplus, the America with a favorable stance in foreign policy. Let’s hope the change america wants, is the change of a better country.

A patch to Warhammer Online! This first patch is going to fix most of the major gripes: “Our maintenance patch 1.01 contains enhancements and fixes that you have rightly identified and brought to the forefront of our attention. Target Nearest has been revamped, the pesky “Target Out of Range” bug has been squashed, we’ve fixed bugs with /ignore and your friends list, resolved an issue with disappearing pet windows on zoning - and more!”

• Players no longer need to scroll down through the EUALA when logging into the game. The window now defaults to the bottom, and players need only check the Agreement box and click accept.
• The war against the gold sellers continues! We have made improvements to the Appeal system to allow players to report spam messages from gold sellers more quickly.
• TAB-targeting should now more consistently select the nearest enemy in the player’s field of view.
• Corrected an issue that was preventing players from adding new friends to their friend list even while the number of existing friends was below the list’s size limit.
• Fixed the issue that was causing players to sometimes get stuck in a particular animation state.
• Monsters which change velocity while moving in combat should no longer return “Target is Out of Range” sometimes when attacked by players.
• The /ignore command will now work more consistently.
• In response to player feedback, we have made improvements to player pet movement and behaviors.
• The Pet window should no longer disappear when its master is zoning or entering the game.
• We made many UI fixes including a new “autoloot” feature requested by many players.
• Guild cloaks will now display their heraldry properly.
• We have made several improvements to the chat window, and it should now be more intuitive to use and set up.  A number of chat window issues were resolved in the process. We are continuing to work on your requests about chat, with more improvements to come in the future.

Combat and Careers

Shaman

• The debuff from “Hurts, Don’t It” will no longer stack with itself

Content

• We have identified a couple of serious bugs that trivialize the content in the Lost Vale dungeon. We have disabled the dungeon entrance while we investigate these issues. Thank you for your understanding as we work to improve your in game experience!

• The Public Quest “Wagon Defense” will no longer get stuck because of objectives spawning in trees.

• Fixed a bug in the “Wagon Defense” quest

• The quest “Killing Time” should now allow players to gain credit when killing enemy characters in the Stone Troll Crossing scenario.

• Lorcar Perrithan no longer offers the quest “Phoenix Gate”. Players can now obtain this quest from the Uthorin Warscout.

• The Gunbad instance lockouts will now be 30 minutes instead of 24 hours.

• Fixed an issue that was preventing Erikwuf Wrathbound from offering the “Good Will” quest.

• Some monsters have been identified that were dropping Destruction items for Order players. These monsters will now drop Order items for Order players.

• Fixed an issue with the spawning of burning bushes in the “Rewards for the Faitfhful” quest.

• Player pets have learned to behave themselves. They should now listen to their masters and stay focused while in combat with monsters, rather than dancing erratically. In addition, they should follow obediently at their masters’ side rather than spinning around.
• Monsters that are rooted in place will no longer appear to chase you if you flee from them, even though they are still rooted.
• Continued improvements have been made to client stability and performance.
• We have fixed an issue that was awarding an overly large experience bonus to players who killed many monsters in rapid succession (IE, several killing blows within a second or two of each other). This will largely only affect small groups that use AE abilities to kill off a very large number of monsters with a single ability activation.
• Fixed an issue that would sometimes cause roots to last longer than they should.
• The delay between sending multiple mails has been reduced from 20 seconds to 5 seconds.

White Lion

• Fixed an issue that was allowing players to use the “Pounce” ability without an enemy target. The ability now requires an enemy target to jump towards.

• A feature has been added to User Settings which allows players to auto loot corpses by default. Players can enable this feature by selecting the “always auto loot” option, under the game play section. Please note that holding shift while looting with the option enabled will cause you to loot normally. When the option is disabled, shift-loot will still auto loot all.

• Guild cloaks will now retain heraldry settings through zoning.
• Corrected an issue that was preventing players from adding new friends to their friend list even while below the list’s size limit.
• Improvements to the behavior of TAB-targeting. This should now more accurately target the nearest enemy in the player’s field of view.
• The /ignore command will now work more consistently.
• The Pet window should no longer disappear when zoning or entering the game.
• In some cases, the chat window would reset to default position upon logout. This should no longer occur.
• Resizing the chat window should no longer cause the chat window to reposition itself.
• The text entry button is now colored to match the color of the channel the player is currently defaulting to for text entry.
• Hitting enter no longer fades in the entire chat window, instead it just fades the text entry box.
• Changing resolutions should no longer cause the chat tab labels to disappear.
• If more chat tabs are created than the width of the chat window is able to display, then buttons allowing the player to scroll forward and backwards through the chat tabs will appear.
• When resizing the chat window, players will now get a resizing cursor.
• Left-clicking on the chat window now causes it to fade immediately.
• When dragging a chat tab off of the chat window players will now get a “phantom chat tab” until they release the mouse button, instead of creating and dragging the new tab immediately.
• When docking one chat window to another, an arrow indicator is now displayed on the chat tab listing which indicates where in the order of chat tabs the tab will now be placed.
• When creating a new tab, the properties of the new tab are cloned from the original tab chosen.  For example, using New Tab on the Combat tab menu creates a Combat(1) tab with all the same filters and font settings of the original Combat tab.
• Players will no longer be able to use the /petname command unless they have a White Lion out.
• New Cycle Enemy Target action added as a handier version of Target Next Enemy. This action is bound to Tab by default; existing characters will not have their keybindings changed, so if you would like to use this action instead of Target Next Enemy with your current character, you will need to change this keybind.
• Fixed an issue that was causing the health bar fade option to work incorrectly.
• We have re-skinned the Guild Registrar interaction window.
• Fixed an issue that was causing the health bar fade option to work incorrectly.

• Many parts of the UI have been modified to fit localized text properly:

- Quest Titles in the Quest Dialog window

- Zone Names in the Zone Loading screen

- The Title Bar in the Open Parties and Warband’s window

- Tactic Names in the Guild Tactics store window

- Zone Names in the Guild Roster tab of the Guild window

- Permission Text in the Admin tab of the Guild window

- Alliance Information in the Alliance tab of the Guild window

- Requirement (Blue) Ability Tooltip text

• Fixed an issue with chat text in localized versions of the game.

I have been playing WarHammer Online lately, so far is a pretty great MMO. I am playing on the Dark Crag server as a Dwarf Ironbreaker. As some of you might know, I was a huge World of Warcraft junkie, logging in hundreds of hours since getting early access in the beta stages. I no longer play, but I do dabble in some MMO’s when they look intresting.

Warhammer so far is the best MMO since WoW. The RvR (Realm vs. Realm), called PvP in other games is amazing. There are places to conquer and instant battlegrounds on all sections of the maps.

My friends rolled on the good guys side, Order, so I choose IronBreaker which is the purest tank class available. The build I am currently going for is heavily based on damage and support in RvR combat. It allows for weilding a massive 2-handed axe and AoE snares.

Look me up on Dark Crag, Order side, a sexy dwarf named Moskrilla.

UPDATE: I have also completed my renown build.

Wrath of the Lich King CE is now available! If your interested in the collectors edition, here is what you get:

• The game on DVD-ROM
• A 208-page LK art book
• Frosty, the baby frost wyrm
• A DVD with developer interviews, commentary on the cinematic, etc.
• Soundtrack CD
• Mouse pad with a map of Northrend
• Two starter decks for the CCG, and two exclusive cards

The pricing will be $70 for the CE, as opposed to $40 for the regular edition.

Wrath of the Lich King is being released on November 13. You can pre-order both versions here:

Collectors Edition (coming soon)

Standard Edition

Testing out some new typography themes for the blog.

This is a post using the new wordpress application for the iPhone. It’s pretty amazing, however the touch typing of the iphone and lack of copy and paste make writing long posts nearly impossible.

World of Warcraft PTR Patch 2.4.3

The latest patch notes can always be found at WoW -> Patch Notes -> Current Patch Notes

The latest test realm patch notes can always be found at WoW -> Test Realm Patch Notes

General

* Dispel effects will no longer attempt to remove effects that have 100% dispel resistance.
* Parry Rating, Defense Rating, and Block Rating: Low-level players will now convert these ratings into their corresponding defensive stats at the same rate as level 34 players.
* Haris Pilton has launched a new line of bags and jewelry. Check her out in the World’s End Tavern!
* Mounts at 30?! Yes, it’s true: Apprentice Riding and mounts are now available at level 30. Training costs 35 gold.
* Blood Elf flightmasters outside of Silvermoon City and Tranquillien have traded in their bats for glorious fire-breathing dragonhawks.
* Alcohol cooldowns have been rolled into Drinks: All 10-second cooldowns have been removed and replaced with the 1-second Drink cooldown.
* Numerous flying non-combat pets have had their flight height modified to no longer skim along the ground: captured firefly, dragonhawk hatchlings, moths, owls, parrots, phoenix hatchling, spirit of summer, sprite darter, and tiny sporebat.
* Nether Ray Fry (a non-combat pet) is now available from the Skyguard Quartermaster. This requires an Exalted reputation with Sha’tari Skyguard.
* Equipping an item will now cancel any spell cast currently in progress.
* Placing an item in your bank will now cancel any spell cast currently in progress if the spell was cast by that item.
* You can no longer move backwards to stop racing rams.
* When a stun wears off, the creature that was stunned will prefer the last target with the highest threat, versus the current target.

Druids

* Barkskin: The cost of this spell is now reduced by Tree of Life Form.

Hunters

* Growl: Pets will no longer generate additional threat from this ability based on attack power buffs cast on them. Attack power buffs on their master will still indirectly increase the threat generated by the pet’s Growl.
* Pet Aggro: Pets will no longer generate threat immediately from being summoned.
* Scare Beast: This spell will now be limited correctly to one target.

Paladins

* Greater Blessing of Light Rank 1: This spell will no longer overwrite Greater Blessing of Light Rank 2.
* Summon Warhorse is now available at level 30.

Priests

* Mind Vision: This effect will now be cancelled immediately on targets who use an Invisibility Potion or Gnomish Cloaking Device.
* Spiritual Healing: Ranks 2-5 of this talent will no longer prevent refreshing Prayer of Mending.

Rogues

* Cheat Death: This talent has been rebalanced significantly. Killing blows are no longer 100% absorbed. If the Rogue is below 10% health, the killing blow is still completely absorbed; if the Rogue is over 10% health, enough damage will be absorbed to reduce the Rogue’s health down to 10%. For the following 3 seconds, damage is not always reduced by 90%; it is now reduced by a maximum of 90%, depending on how much resilience the Rogue has. The damage reduction will be four times the damage reduction resilience causes against critical strikes.

Shaman

* Earth Elemental: This pet will now leash back to its totem when pulled beyond 50 yards away.
* Lightning Overload: This talent will no longer do excessive damage when used with Lightning Bolt Ranks 2-10.

Warlocks

* Curse of Shadows: This spell has been removed.
* Curse of Elements: This spell now applies to Arcane and Shadow damage, as well as Frost and Fire.
* Demonic Sacrifice: This ability will now interact correctly with the Spirit Guide resurrection system in battlegrounds. A sacrificed pet will not be resummoned on death, and will not prevent keeping a record of the most recently created pet.
* Health Funnel: This ability will now cancel channeling when the target pet is Banished.
* Ritual of Summoning: The mana cost of this spell will now be properly deducted when cast.
* Summon Felsteed is now available at level 30.

Warrior

* Revenge: Ranks 1-5 of this ability now have damage ranges instead of fixed damage values (like ranks 6-8.)

PvP

* The Warsong Gulch flag can no longer be picked up at the same time as a flag is capped.

Professions

* Alchemy
o Philosopher’s Stone now requires 200 Alchemy.
* Cooking
o Juicy Bear Burgers now correctly increase healing as well as spell damage.
* Jewelcrafting
o Activated beneficial effects from jewelcrafting trinkets can no longer be dispelled.
* Mining
o Green quality gems can be found in mining nodes again. The drop rate of blue gems from mining nodes remains unchanged.
* Tailoring
o Removed the cooldown from regular Mooncloth.
o Herb bags can now hold Un’goro Soil and Evergreen Pouches.
o Mycah of Sporeggar has discovered how to create 28 slot herb bags.
o New Tailoring patterns are available from Haughty Modiste in Steamwheedle Port, Tanaris: Haliscan Jacket and Haliscan Pantaloons.

Quests

* Bhag’thera now spawns at a normal quest spawn rate.
* For the quests, Intercepting the Mana Cells and Maintaining the Sunwell Portal, phased characters will not be able to see non-phased character AoE effects and vice-versa.
* For the quests, Intercepting the Mana Cells and Maintaining the Sunwell Portal, pets gaining/losing phase status will now properly break off combat from unphased/phased opponents.

Dungeons and Raids