This week Manny and Joce talk about what’s been going on in their world, give some overall BfA impressions, talk WoW news, and then take your emails. All this and more on this week’s For Azeroth!

Shadowlands Prequel Novel Coming July 14th

Shadows Rising will serve as the prologue to the upcoming Shadowlands expansion.

  • Written by Madeleine Roux who previously wrote World of Warcraft: Traveler / The Shining Blade
  • The synopsis speaks of multiple threads:
    • Alleria and Turalyon are sent on a quest to track Sylvanas
    • Zekhan and Talanji working to save Bwomsandi against Sira Moonwarden and Nathanos Blightcaller.
  • Excerpt follows the point of view of Zekhan and details a failed assassination attempt on Princess Talanji.

RTWF Interview with Ion

  • Because RTWF is streamed, issues are magnified. It’s embarrassing to have bugs with so many people watching. Historically Mythic bosses haven’t been tested and polished, it just hasn’t had a spotlight on it.
  • RTWF is an organic community event, not structured to be a perfect equal race with time zones and patches being a factor. They want to support it but Esports is a tricky label to apply because it lacks the structure, template and rules that are standardized.
  • The Carapace of N’Zoth bug 
    • a sub 1/1000 chance to happen
    • When a sanity draining event applies to a player, there was a chance based on a fraction of a second timing, that it could double count.
    • In the past, they’ve never communicated publicly about these kinds of hotfixes because it only affected these 20 or 40 people in the entire World. Now, with the streams, this changes things.
  • Corruption is an 8.3 system, but they’re happy with how the experiment has played out and it’s letting them explore a world without Warforging and Titanforging
    • Babylon Redeemer asks: what do you think of corruption gear now that it’s been out a while?  Scale just right? too much corruption per gear? too little? power levels?
  • A common suggestion in the past was a spectator mode for raids and when thinking about it, they had to wonder if the right way to play the game was to have someone who didn’t even participate in the encounter. There’s no question that your performance in some area suffers when you raid lead.
  • Regarding the N’Zoth payoff, they’re satisfied with how it turned out. They’ve definitely heard feedback from the community – there’s some element of “that was it”.
  • A regret is how the cinematic was viewed by most people. It was designed for you the player being the hero — they’re thinking back to criticism they’ve gotten in the past such as with Thrall and the Deathwing cinematic.
  • https://www.wowhead.com/news=311136/warcraft-radios-interview-with-ion-hazzikostas-on-the-nyalotha-world-first-race-

Keystone Master’s WinterSpring Fling

The WinterSpring Fling is a LIVE event giving exclusive tournament realm access to all participants! This tournament will have an MDI style format including sign-ups and time trials, followed by a live two-day tournament with a chance at winning some awesome prizes.

  • It’s a community tournament
  • Signups are open now until February 22nd
  • Time trials are March 3-7
  • Streamed live on Twitch on March 14th and 15th
  • The option to have a 6th player. This allows flexibility in teammates as a backup or to use as a strategic advantage
  • Limit of one spec per dungeon. Essentially this rule has been implemented to prevent the triple Rogue or double Deathknight comps we’ve been seeing abused in previous MDIs..
  • Dungeons and affixes will be known ahead of time to reduce the amount of “work” players have to go through.
  • Prizes include Blizzard game time, a 3 month subscription to Raidbots and more