Do you play more than two MMORPGs at the same time? Ever wish one of them had one of the features of the other? Well, according to Blizzard poster Tigole, we might see a feature from Richard Garriott's Tabula Rasa make it to World of Warcraft (well, sort of). Details in the full article.

In a recent interview with PCzone, World of Warcraft lead designer Jeffrey "Tigole" Kaplan shared a few details about the new PvP zone in Wrath of the Lich King. In addition to that, he mentioned as well that players will be getting an "epic experience" from the moment they enter the new area.

You can find more details on this in the full article via the read more link below!

Blizzard Lead Designer Jeffrey Kaplan (Tigole) was recently interviewed by Warcry.com regarding the World of Warcraft expansion Wrath of the Lich King. He gave details about the Death Knight class, reputation, and the further development of all the racial storylines.

Kaplan gives a general overview of what players can expect to get when they pick up Wrath of the Lich King. If you want to find out more about the upcoming expansion, head on over to the full article.

Former World of Warcraft lead designer Rob Pardo (aka Enoyls) mentioned a few interesting details on the WoW forums regarding the launch of StarCraft II. The details he gave has lead some individuals to believe that the launch date is closer than what Blizzard originally hinted.

Want to find out what Rob Pardo said? Check out the full article for more details.

Blizzard's Lead Designer for World Design in World of Warcraft Jeff Kaplan (otherwise known as Tigole at the official WoW Forums), recently spoke at the Leipzig Games Convention about what's going to be in the latest expansion Wrath of the Lich King.

Judging from what he said, it looks like happy times are coming to gamers everywhere. He gave word that there are quite a few things that weren't announced in BlizzCon regarding WotLK. Among them includes the five man level 80 raid Caverns of Time which will be in Stratholm.

Kaplan also gave word that they're looking into pursuing what the Bronze Dragon Flight is up to as well as give players a chance to fight beside Arthas before he was corrupted by the power of the Lich King.

A few details on the Death Knight were also clarified by Kaplan. First up is the fact that they haven't completely finalized the level requirements for the hero class.

He hinted that it might be unlockable with a level as low as 55 and 60. However, the quest to gain it will most likely be implemented as well as being able to keep your race. Yes, that means that we might actually be seeing Gnomish Death Knights rampaging the fields.

Finally, the designer gave word that more hero classes will be introduced in the future. The Demon Hunter, Archmage, and Blademaster will probably be coming. However, it has been confirmed that the Death Knight will be the only hero class available when Wrath of the Lich King debuts.

Good times are definitely in store for WoW players with all the new content in the new expansion. We're hoping that they start working on more hero classes. After all, (insert favorite race here) does not live on one class alone.

 

This comes as a big surprise to everyone who loves to raid, but according to a post from Jeffrey Kaplan (aka Tigole), Blizzard lead designer for world design, the attunement requirements for entering the Serpentshrine Caverns and Tempest Keep have been lifted.

Here's what Tigole had to say on the matter in a post on the forums:

After a lot of thought and deliberation, we’ve decided to remove the attunement requirements to enter Serpentshrine Cavern and Tempest Keep: The Eye. While many of our attunements in the Burning Crusade have been good progression checks, a few of the attunements have turned out to cause unnecessary stress on guilds either doing the content or attempting to do the content. With Black Temple and Battle for Mount Hyjal thriving, we want to encourage (rather than prevent) new guilds and raid groups to attempt Serpentshrine and TK. We are going to leave the current attunement quests in the game so that players can still engage in the challenge and the lore of those quests should they choose to. At a later point, we are considering adding a final reward step to those quests as well (that way those who have already completed them would not miss out on a *new* reward).

We’re listening to feedback from you guys constantly and your opinions are important to us. We want this game to be the best possible MMO experience for our players.

Enjoy Serpentshrine and Tempest Keep =)

Enjoy it indeed. The removal of SSC and TK attunements as a needed process also removes one of those stressful barriers keeping guilds from progressing in the game. More importantly, it opens up the two instances to more casual players, and so long as they have the needed gear to survive, they can also experience the same joys raiders have been finding in their time there as well.

Killing World of Warcraft's High King Maulgar and the rest of his council in the Blade's Edge Mountain of Outland is quite easy provided that you know what you are doing. If you don't, you're pretty much dead meat.

Anyway, Blizzard poster Ommra dropped by WoW's official community site in Europe and mentioned that a slight change has been implemented to the Ogre Lord. Ommra's complete post reads:

Tigole has notified us about a small change to High King Maulgar: Maulgar got a slight nerf. He now attacks faster but hits for less, but his overall damage is still the same. This should result in less spiky deaths. It's a pretty subtle change and will be mostly noticed by under geared raids.

By "attacks faster," does this mean Maulgar can now stomp the hell out of every player faster than before? Oh well. I guess me and my mates should go to Gruul's Lair one of these days and find out for ourselves. Anyone who has picked up the Hammer of the Naaru yet?

 

Outside of the new locations that World of Warcraft's upcoming patch 2.1.0 will carry, another item players can look forward to will be more game hotfixes. Such is the topic of a recent announcement by Blizzard's spokesman Tigole, which details some of the upcoming fixes planned for Serpentshrine and Tempest Keep:

Because 2.1.0 is not yet on the PTR's (we're hoping by tomorrow or early next week), we're going to hotfix the base creature respawn in Serpentshrine and TK Raid to be 2 hours. We're also going to fix the bug that's causing the creatures to respawn after the boss for the corresponding section has been killed.

These aren't all of the changes that we have for 2.1.0, just two of the ones that we will be able to hotfix. There are more changes coming in 2.1.0 that include creature tuning, better loot etc...

Some examples:

Lots of the creatures have fewer hitpoints
Lots of the creatures are no longer immune to CC (The female naga in SSC can be poly'd, Skeletal Ushers in KZ can be shackled)
Lots of bug fixes

As a backgrounder, Serpentshrine is the final part of the Coilfang Reservoir instance, and is also the residence of game boss Lady Vashj. Tempest Keep, on the other hand, is located in Netherstorm, Outland, and is the residence of Kael'thas Sunstrider, lord of the Blood Elves. Both areas have also received recent fixes for their trash mobs. Getting back to the matter of the hotfixes, Tigole is further reminding everybody that these hotfixes have not yet been implemented - just wait for announcements when they do kick in.

Skimming down last night's latest batch of World of Warcraft hotfixes via the WoW Forums, we saw poor Gruul up there getting two. (We can almost hear him screaming, "When will it end?") According to WoW Insider, Gruul received an extra hotfix because of a mistake in an earlier hotfix.

Confused? The first fix (wee hours of the morning) was for nerfing Gruul's HP and lowering Shatter's damage. Shatter is Gruul's area of effect (AoE) attack that does 9000 damage depending on the players' proximity with each other (read: if you got another guy next to you, expect some major pain). Blizzard guy Eyonix announced that fix, along with the info that Magtheridon's also being inspected by the devs.

Then around mid morning, Tigole announced that another hotfix was in place: "We just fixed a bug that was causing Gruul to not perform his Hurtful Strike ability. Gruul should once again be using this ability." If all boss encounters are going to be fixed this way, we wonder if Magtheridon's shaking in his booties.

The good news for warlocks. Eurynomous from the World of Warcraft forums asked why warlocks have inefficient crowd control in instances (where the mobs are mostly humanoids) citing the Succubus' Seduction as an example.

Crowd control is something that everybody (every class) has, in varying strengths. Warlocks have Seduction via the Succubus, Banish, Enslave Demon, Fear, Death Coil and Howl of Terror. Banish and Enslave Demon are specialized for demons (and elemental form for Banish), while Seduction works for humanoids. The thing is, some humanoids are immune to Seduction and you can't cast Fear more than three times on the same mob since it follows the diminishing returns rule.

The forum thread went on with players discussing other techniques to make it work. Blizzard poster Tigole was the bearer of good news as he said that on the new patch 2.1.0, the succubus' Seduction will work on most of the Humanoids that "are currently immune to charm effects". He added (since players were starting to do the old "Blizzard loves this class more"):

To clarify, the creatures do too much damage to allow them to be charmed (whether it be by a priest or by an engineer). Seducing them does not threaten the balance of the dungeon... This will mostly effect heroics. And it only makes things able to be seduced -- it doesn't make anything immune to mind control that was previously charmable. It's not a nerf for priests. It's a bonus for Warlocks.

There you have it folks. It looks like the changes are going to be ongoing in the World of Warcraft. So on to Patches To Come we go.