Timewalking Reward Costs, Accolade Trinkets and PvP Gearing,

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Timewalking Reward Costs

Originally Posted by Blizzard
(Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

They already tweeted a pretty stand-pat stance about this. Their claim is it's "meant to take dedication". I'm not expecting any type of change until after BlizzCon at the earliest.

One of the problems with Twitter as a medium is the lack of space for nuance. There are hundreds of mounts in WoW, and they are obtainable by a wide variety of different means. Some are simple to get, and cheaply bought off vendors; some require great feats of skill like Gladiator and current Mythic raid mounts; some require tremendous luck (e.g. the Elegon mount); and some require long-term effort (e.g. the Violet Proto-Drake from A Long Strange Trip, or Darkmoon Faire prizes).



Ultimately they are all cosmetic rewards, and Timewalking is designed to be an evergreen system that we will be expanding over the years. Unlike, say, a Tanaan rep mount that clearly was designed to be earned within the scope of this patch, there will be people doing Timewalking (especially as more dungeons, and more expansions' content get added) throughout the future of WoW, and this represents a long-term goal within that framework.



If you want to rush through dozens of Timewalking dungeons in a short timeframe to be one of the first to get the mount, and you'd find that experience satisfying, then by all means do so. But I certainly wouldn't say that's the intended approach here. The 500-Badge quest turn-in is a once-per-event thing (which we definitely could have made clearer), so if you want to take a more measured pace and just do the Timewalking quest each time the event comes around while you happen to otherwise actively be playing, you can get the mount with just a few total hours spent (though over a longer period of real time). It's up to you. In the meantime, there are other items (notably some great alt catch-up gear) available through the system, and those are much more attainably priced.

Accolade Trinkets and PvP Gearing

Originally Posted by Blizzard
(Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

We do not plan to put the random-stat Accolade trinkets on the vendors.



However, we did uncover a bug that was causing them to provide twice the secondary stat bonus than was intended. That bug was corrected in patch 6.2.2.



Frankly (speaking for myself as a player, and not for the development team), I'm not convinced that the Accolade trinkets are all they're cracked up to be.



The Wild Gladiator's Accolade of Dominance provides 403 Intellect and 403 Versatility in PvP combat. The Insignia provides 469 Versatility and a 20-second 1330 Intellect proc. In sustained combat, it tends to proc around every 60 seconds, giving it roughly a 33% uptime for an average benefit of ~440 Intellect.



Combine that with the fact that you have to actually be damaging someone for it to proc (which increases the effective uptime by cutting out sections where you're not hitting anyone) and the increased burst potential by allowing you to use your hardest-hitting abilities while it's active... and I'd argue that for the vast majority of players the proc trinket is easily better.



Granted, you might want a different secondary stat which isn't available on the Insignia. In that case I would argue that the difference between 469 Versatility and, lets say, 403 Mastery would be EXTREMELY minor at best.



I could also see an argument for those who are playing Humans, in which case you'd likely be comparing the Accolades to the Badges (the on-use trinkets) instead of the Insignias. As you can probably imagine, buffing Humans isn't exactly high on our priority list at the moment.



All that said, I won't pretend for a second that I'm the best Arena player, and these are obviously just my personal opinions. I'm just not seeing what makes the Accolade trinkets so incredibly attractive that they're absolutely mandatory to the point that it's worth doing content you don't enjoy for a chance to get hold of one.



I'm not really defending RNG PvP gearing, and I think the actions the development team has taken since 6.2 released speak pretty well to say that the devs aren't happy with the way it worked initially either. And I totally understand why it's frustrating that those actions aren't extending to the Accolade trinkets. All I'm saying is that, if you really don't like Ashran, just don't do it. There are other trinket options, and they're -- at worst -- still pretty good.



EDIT: I should also mention again that I'm really only speaking on behalf of myself and the way I enjoy the game. Just trying to have a conversation here.

Blue Tweets

Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment

If you talk about "bad people on the internet", what kind of people do you refer to? Those who are critical? Those who threaten?

Those who cross a line. No one minds critique. (holinka)

Ghostcrawler Tweets

Ghostcrawler still occasionally talks about WoW. Remember that he no longer works for or speaks for Blizzard.

Originally Posted by MMO-Champion

Hey GC, got any thoughts on Health of the Game vs Player enjoyment? I always feel bad about Cata heroic difficulty caving.

I could write volumes on this. Players respect sticking by your guns to an extent, but at some point it becomes out of touch. (OccupyGStreet)



Developer Communication

Is there substantial data to suggest that dev/player communication results in higher sales and retention?

No, I don't believe so, which is why it is so controversial inside studios, e.g. Valve doesn't seem to value it much. (OccupyGStreet)



miss the dev watercooler that blizz did to keep peeps informed. was concise and it came from one source. was that your idea?

I can't recall. I worked on it a lot with Bashiok and Zarhym. (OccupyGStreet)

Do you remember how many hours of discussion, drafting, revision and review went into each one, on average?

I tend to write very fast, which is why I can do all of this. (OccupyGStreet)

A blog might take 2 hours depending on topic. No idea on editing. (OccupyGStreet)

WildStar Free to Play Launches September 29

The new Free to Play version of the game, WildStar: Reloaded, is coming later this month!

http://www.mmo-champion.com/content/512 ... ldstar-F2P