Manny and Joce take a look at some of the data mined info from the 8.2 PTR, as well as take a look at Narcissus, and answer some of your questions from the FAZ Discord!
Putting the Epic Feel back into Epic BGs
Blizzard is making some scaling changes to 3 of Epic Battlegrounds to reduce the offensive power of some elements.
Alterac Valley
We’re modifying the scaling in the zone to make creatures more difficult for players at high item-levels. Our goal here is to make gameplay feel more similar to the difficulty of Alterac Valley in early Tides of Vengeance.
Isle of Conquest
The health of destructible walls will be increased by 30%. This is intended to offset the power that the docks has given players with recent 8.1.5 improvements.
Battle for Wintergrasp
The damage done by the Catapult’s Flame Breath ability will be reduced. We still want Flame Breath to feel scary and powerful, especially against other players, but we feel that current values are too high.
PTR is Available Now!
- Now Available for Testing
- Heart of Azeroth system update: introducing Essences
- New Zone: Mechagon
- New Arena: The Robodrome
- Mount Equipment
- Crestfall and Snowblossom Island Expeditions
- Ashran Epic Battleground
- https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/rise-of-azshara-ptr-development-notes-april-16/153083
Essences and the HoA
It’s PTR data mining time!
- The first slot will not have a HoA requirement beyond completing the introductory quest.
- Magni questline has stages, unlocked by your HoA level, that rewards the higher levels of the The Crucible of Flame essence
- All HoA’s will be raised to 35 for those below that point by the intro quest.
- Essences are available from PVP, Questing, M+, Raids, and Reputation. No pet battling required
- Worth noting that anything like PVP or M+ say things like Season 3 or 4, or Season 3 or later, indicating that this is the planned system from now til the end of BfA, and that these items will be attainable for the duration of the expansion
- https://us.forums.blizzard.com/en/wow/t/heart-of-azeroth-traits-cost-of-entry-too-high/153209/21?
Mechagon Loot is bananas. B-A-N-A-N-A-S
One of the highlights shown on the 8.2 stream was the Pocket-Sized Computational Device which we talked about last week. This week Wowhead’s data mining revealed a set of rings that can be interchanged to form customizable set bonuses!
- There are Logic Loops and Bit Bands
- 4 of each type of ring
- The Logic Loops set a condition and the Bit Bands detail the effect
- Wowhead Article on the Rings
Professions
- All raid relevant professions have new recipes
- New flasks, feast, potions, gems, enchants
- New recipes to inscriptionists for vantus runes and contracts
- New herb and ore to gather, and new crafted gear for blacksmithing, leatherworking, tailoring, and engineering (as well as a new Blingtron!)
- https://www.wowhead.com/news=291234/8-2-ptr-build-30080-professions-battle-pets-upgraded-potions-flasks-enchants-gem
Community Resources/Add-ons
Narcissus
The first time I have ever installed an add on not because of functionality but because it is absolutely BEAUTIFUL.
Narcissus is a paper-doll display that replaces the character info frame. It is a minimalistic interface which shows what the player’s character looks like and the various item slots that can be equipped by your character. Beyond looking fantastic it also has a few functional benefits over the default character sheet. To access the Initial Screen you can press the icon on the minimap or type the command: /narci
Initial Screen
When activated the add on while hide all other UI; but, you still retain control of your character. Here you will see:
- Your equipped gear with the icons, names and ilvl shown. The Heart of Azeroth will also show the HoA level and progress towards the next rank.
- Each slot has a hexagonal border which is colour-coded based on the items rarity.
- Any item with a gem socket will show a color-coded icon.
- All icons will show full tooltip information on mouseover
- Items can be switched by either clicking on the icon or holding alt as you mouseover an item slot and then selecting one of the other choices that will appear.
- Items can be quickly unequipped by hold alt and left-clicking the item.
- Azerite Powers can be accessed as normal from this screen
- The Attributes and Enhancements information is also shown to the right with full combat rating information
- Equipped Item level is displayed but can be show exact ilevel (not rounded) on mouseover
- stats at 0% that are normally hidden
- Clicking on the ilvl icon shows further details
- Equipped ilvl, Max potential ilvl (of items in bags) and
- Attack Speed
- White damage
- Tank stats (even for non-tanks) such as DR, Dodge, Parry and Block %
- An infographic for secondary stats showing both your flat rating and effective percentage
- Tertiary stats
Photo mode
Clicking the camera icon in the bottom left of the screen will switch to camera mode. Camera mode is all about looking great. Four icons will appear: Transmog, Do Emote, Hide Texts, and Top Quality. The photo mode menu widget does not appear in screenshots.
Transmog
- An animated icon of your character will appear in the top left with your armor type, specialization, class and name.
- The attributes and enhancements will be moved offscreen.
- All non-visible item slots will be greyed out and the details of the each items appearances will be shown in the item slot rather than the equipped items true details.
- Name of item, the items source will be shown beside each icon.
- By default the transmog option will be set to text only layout; however you can click on that option to change over to the text and model layout. This will bring in an up close second model of your character.
- The “Copy Texts” will provide a Clipboard with a listing of the gear you have used for your transmog.
- You can change the syntax to share as plain text, BB Code to use on sites such as wowhead, or Markdown for use on Reddit.
- The export can also include the item ID
Do Emote
- A large list of emotes that your character can perform for your screen shot.
- You can select from the list and your character will perform the emote.
- If you have “Auto Capture” selected, Narci will automatically take a screenshot in the middle of the selected emote.
Hide Text
- Will temporarily hide unit names, combat text and speech bubbles while you attempt to get the perfect screenshot. (Your previous settings are restored upon leaving photo mode.)
Top Quality
- Temporarily increases your graphics settings to max so you can look your best for your close up. (Your previous settings are restored upon leaving photo mode.)
Podcast (faz-pod): Download (Duration: 1:50:38 — 101.3MB)
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