Starting at 6:00 p.m. EDT, 5:00 p.m. CDT, 3:00 p.m. PDT we’ll be liveblogging the Twitter developer chat that’s going on with WoW’s Director of Production and Game Director.

We’re seeing how this goes. We know a lot of you don’t use Twitter, and that many places of business block Twitter. If this twitter-induced liveblog goes well for us, we’ll do it again during future Twitter chats. If not, we won’t! Enjoy it now either way.

Update: Chat over!

The transcript of the liveblog after the break. We’ll do a review of this tomorrow, talking about our thoughts concerning the event overall. After you read the transcript you’ll likely come to the same conclusion we did: Save for a couple items nothing new was really presented. There was a lot of fluff and very little substance.

4:50pm CDT: They’re now taking questions, tweet to @warcraft with the hash tag #blizzchat.

500pm CDT: Lots of questions are being asked, no answers yet. Most of the questions are not too good, to be honest.

5:05pm CDT: Nothing yet over their twitter feed. Although we’re told this is today…

5:09pm CDT: Q: Will Path of the Titans be as time consuming as obtaining Sons of Hodir reputation?

A: Sons of Hodir was easy, we’re thinking more along the lines of Argent Dawn rep actually. JK! As a matter of fact, we don’t want the paths of the titans to feel grindy at all so we’re trying to make sure that each step along the way feels more like a great quest, or a key achievement (like killing all the bosses in a new raid zone). So, it should be more oriented around accomplishing something that feels important rather than grinding.

5:10pm CDT: Q: What’s Deathwing’s current relationship with the Old Gods?

A: In facebook terms, I’d list it as “It’s Complicated”. “Single” or “Married” are probably too extreme in this case.

5:11pm CDT: Q: Love the steps taken to making high-end content accessible to casual players. How committed are you to continuing this?

A: This is something we talk about on a regular basis. There isn’t a line in the sand we have made, it’s much more on a per piece of content basis. We do like the way the regular modes are shaping up to be more casual friendly, while the hardmodes are a way to reward very hardcore play.

5:13pm CDT: Q: Ulduar had one kind of hard mode(triggered).. ToC had another (ToC vs TOGC).. Ony has none. What will ICC have?”

A: ICC’s hard modes will be triggered, but via in-game UI (much like how you toggle between normal and heroic modes today) rather than triggered by game mechanics (like not killing the three drakes before you attack Sartharion).

5:16pm CDT: Q: For Cross-realm LFG if the group is composed by members of other realms do they have to go on foot or will they be teleported?

A: The current plan is for players using the LFG system to be automatically teleported into the instance, similar to how battleground queuing works today. This is active on the PTR now, and we plan to host a community event around this feature soon!

5:17pm CDT: Q: Will there be Wintergrasp-like capturable zones in Cataclysm?

A: Yes, there is an island off the coast of the Eastern Kingdoms named Tol Barad. Players will fight for control of the island and its famous prison. However, while the battle for Tol Barad is not in progress, players will find that it will remind them much more of the Isle of Quel’Danas, in that it’ll be a major daily quest hub with quite a bit of random world pvp (presumably).

5:20pm CDT: Q: Will Alliance ever get an ingame band like the Hordes L80ETC?

A: Sure, if somebody knows of an awesome Alliance band…

5:21pm CDT: Q: Any chance to have LFG menu to show classes you’re looking for I.E just showing all tanks or healers currently qued in LFG.

A: The plan right now is to allow players to register for roles they are capable of filling, then have the queue system make the best decision possible for the player. This is to give all classes an equal chance at participation. We also have plans to diversify the class makeup in a future PTR update.

5:23pm CDT: Q: Thousand Needles is getting a big change in levels; how has the Cataclysm affected it?

A: As a result of the Cataclysm, Thousand Needles has been completely flooded with water!

5:24pm CDT: Q: With T10, are we going to see tokens like in Ulduar? or like CC? CC style had every class and spec rolling on same thing.

A: With T10 we’re going to see a hybrid. The tier 10 items (the ones with item levels you’d find in the 10-player raid) will be purchased with Emblems of Frost.

The tier 10.5 items (the ones with item levels you’d find in the 25-player raid) will be obtained by getting a token (one that is specific to 3 or 4 classes, much like the ulduar tokens) and using it to upgrade the tier 10 item that was purchased with emblems of frost.

5:26pm CDT: Q: With Cataclysm revisiting the old world, any plan to make the old reputations worthwhile again?

A: With each expansion, we introduce new reputations with new rewards. Sometimes we introduce reputations that are obviously related, such as Argent Dawn/Argent Crusade and Cenarion Circle/Cenarion Expedition. We don’t update the rewards for existing reps, as we don’t want to put new characters at such a significant disadvantage.

5:27pm CDT: Q: With the removal of defense in Cataclysm, will plate gear still have avoidance stats or will tanks and dps be sharing?

A: Tanking gear will still have avoidance stats, they just won’t have the defense stat anymore. So to answer your question, tanking and dps gear will not be the same.

5:28pm CDT: Q: Any plans of doing anything with Grim Batol in the Wetlands?

A: Yes, we currently plan for Grim Batol to be one of the raid zones in Cataclysm. =]

5:30pm CDT: Q: Any plans on adding bonuses to certain titles your character obtains? Like “…of the alliance” gives +5 to all stats

A: We have no plans to introduce combat advantages to titles. Titles in World of Warcraft are very specifically set up as prestige rewards only.

5:30pm CDT: Q: When do hunters get to tame druids?

A: Right after druids get a hunter form.

5:32pm CDT: Q: What are the plans for the current Goblin-run towns after Cataclysm is out?

A: Most Goblin-run towns will continue to operate as normal. In general, the existing Goblin cartels tend to be self-serving, and therefore aren’t taking sides.

5:32pm CDT: Q: Will there be anymore epic storylines with cinematics like the wrathgate questline?

A: We have big plans for additional in game cinematics! We are happy with how the Wrathgate questline worked out, and want to do more lines like this.

5:32pm CDT: Q: May I create a group with 4 friends and then use the LFG interface to gain the random dungeon reward?

A: Yes. In fact, you can join it with a full group of 5 and still get the random dungeon reward. The reward is for doing a random dungeon, not necessarily for having random members.

5:34pm CDT: Q: Crowd control is all but dead in raids. Is that something you plan on bringing back?

A: Like say… with the Faction Champions encounter in ToC? ;]

5:35pm CDT: Q: Can locks have a summonable flying mount now please?

A: Now? As in right this second? No.

5:36pm CDT: Q: There’s plenty of great endgame content, what about some new early/mid content to keep new players entertained?

A: We actually have some small changes to the early game going live in 3.3.0 to help eliminate some new player confusion. This is not content specific, it is more focused around easing the new player pain.

5:37pm CDT: Q: Will leveling from 80-85 be like leveling from 70-80?

A: It’s too early to say. We base our leveling more around how much quest content we have and how good the reward pacing feels. If we have as many quests as we did from 70-80 and if it feels like your character is getting a reasonable amount of new stuff for the time invested, then it could end up being similar.

5:39pm CDT: Q: Are hardmodes going to get anything to make them feel like a different fight visually or auditory

A: I find the hard modes very different visually. Much more black and white imo.

5:40pm CDT: Q: Will players be able to do ‘old world’ quests after Cataclysm is released?

A: Only “old world” quests that we don’t change. However, once the Cataclysm happens, it happens for everyone and there’s no going back.

5:41pm CDT: Q: How will you handle beginning characters and higher level friends after Cataclysm? WIll they be out of phase?

Players will not be out of phase. The Cataclysm changes the world for everyone.

5:42pm CDT: Q: Are there any plans to open the other “sanctums” in Wyrmrest (i.e. Obsidian Sanctum, Azure Sanctum, Emerald Sanctum)?

A: Possibly. =]

5:43pm CDT: Q: Any chance the Legendary items will grow stronger as players level up as heirlooms? Its too much work, just to ditch after a patch.

A: This is something we have talked about a great deal. One of the concerns about making a weapon “best in the game” that scales up, is that players will continue to do old, outdated content in order to obtain the weapon. This ends up being not very fun for the other participants. While obtaining a legendary weapon is an incredible accomplishment, it is important cycle out weapons on a somewhat regular basis to make sure players are always playing new content.

5:45pm CDT: Q: Any chance that the hybrid system that is going to be implemented for T10, could be retro fitted to all WotLK raids?

A: I’ll take that as a good reaction to the t10 system. =] However, it unfortunately won’t be retroactively applied.

5:46pm CDT: Q: Are Worgen going to have mounts?

A: Both Worgen and Goblins will have new, racial specific mounts.

5:47pm CDT: Q: Will there be events where ally + horde players have to work together to kill a boss?

A: Generally speaking we don’t do this because we prefer that the horde and alliance feel like enemies rather than a big happy family working together to defeat a common foe. If anything, we want tension between the sides to rise.

5:47pm CDT: Q: Will Hyjal be made for exploration in Cataclysm?

A: Yes.

5:48pm CDT: Q: Do you have plans to have acheivement points redeemable?

A: Achievement points are a prestige reward only. There are no plans to turn them into some kind of currency.

5:48pm CDT: Q: Will 10-man raiding guilds see Legendary quality weapons (items) drop in their raids anytime soon? Or in Cataclysm?

A: Our current plan is to reserve Legendary weapons for the 25 person encounters, I wouldn’t rule it out in the future though.

5:50pm CDT: Q: Any chance of being able to link more then one authenticator on one account? (in case I lose or break one)

A: We are talking about the authenticator and how to make it a better experience. Your suggestion is one we are talking about.

5:51pm CDT: Q: Any plans for a gated system in IIC like in Colliseum that prevents us from doing hardmodes from day 1?

A: We do have a system that unlocks bosses similar to how we handled TOC and Sunwell. We are restricting hard modes to raid leaders that have defeated Arthas in regular mode.

5:52pm CDT: Q: What will happen to Mankrik’s Wife? Please don’t tell me she’s gobbled up by the lava?

A: You’ll have to wait and see. =]

5:53pm CDT: Q: In the future will hard modes have greater fidelity like Sarth, Sarth+1, Sarth+2, Sarth+3 rather than the Binary Normal/Hard?

A: Generally we have learned that hard modes should be more binary, but that doesn’t mean we will never do something like Sarth 3 drakes again.

dEAr ProPhET vElEn,

i HAVe pICtureS oF You anD thE EREdaR tWInS.
SEnD mE 100000g iN cASh, oR i shOw thE aLDor whAt yOU ReAllY MeaN by “COMMunIOn wItH tHE HoLY lIGhT.”

DetaILs To FoLLow.

Velen replies:

Plus we answer your emails as usual, and that’s always a good time — you can email us anything you want (including some mp3s for intros if that’s your thing) at “theshow AT wo

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• Talent trees
• New spells and abilities
• Recycled raid content

Of course, this information isn’t exactly new per se, but it’s interesting to hear some of the refinements of it all as Cataclysm’s development progresses.

Ghostcrawler’s full statement after the break.

The talent tree comment Ghostcrawler is referring to:

No new talent points. But wait didn’t GC say they were going to go back and redo the trees? That is a misconception. All that means is that they are going to tweak stats and abilities to match cataclysm’s new stats and maybe new ones for underperforming PvP specs like subtly and moonkins. I know it’s not always good to add new abilities on top of a already fragile PvP system. However for me new abilities was something to look forward too. You could be really excited about it. Also it put a creative side to blizzard, wondering how much further the team could think ahead of us.

Ghostcrawler’s entire statement is as follows:

I was going to bump this to the General forum, but I think the talent tree comment is worth addressing in the role forums, since it applies to class design.

1) We are changing talent trees, in some cases substantially. The major focus is pruning out boring but valuable talents that passively increase say damage or healing.

2) A secondary focus is to fix the clunky areas (e.g. warlocks having two conflicting range increasing talents). We’re not going to remove old favorites or radically change the focus of the trees. You will definitely have to rethink your builds however.

3) Because you earn passive bonuses just for spending points in the tree, those fun, niche or utility talents won’t seem as expensive as they do today. We want to create a lot more choices where you are choosing utility vs. utility. We want to see far more “cookie cutter” build guides that say “Spend the last 5-10 points where you want.”

Davelea asked …

“Will the goblin and worgen mounts be available to the other classes at Exalted, and if so should I stock up on Runecloth?”

We have no idea, but it’s very likely given how racial mounts have worked in the game up until now.

Cetha asked…

“So I just completed Battle for the Undercity for the 7th time and was shocked and pleased to discover that there are now voiceovers for everyone. Thrall, Jaina, Sylvanas, etc. Is this new? When did this happen?”

I’m fairly sure that’s new as of patch 3.2. It might have happened as early as patch 3.1, but I think it was much more recent. It wasn’t a documented change, so most of us were surprised by it the first time we heard it.

While it may or may not hint to the release date of the next expansion, a listing on Amazon has pegged the release of a hardcover novel by award-winning author Christie Golden entitled World of Warcraft: The Shattering: Prelude to Cataclysm. While that might seem like one colon too many (insert snickering here), the self-explanatory title actually sounds pretty cool. What sounds uncool, however, is that it’s a prelude. Meaning before.

If you’re reading into this as much as I am (generally not a good idea), that could mean that the Cataclysm expansion will ship after August 31. After all, you’d think that Blizzard’s marketing team would want a book that reveals what happens before the Cataclysm to actually launch before the expansion hits, right?

Eastern Kingdoms – Light overhaul:

• Tirisfal Glades
• Western Plaguelands
• Silverpine Forest
• Arathi Highlands
• Alterac Mountains
• The Hinterlands
• Hillsbrad Foothills
• Duskwood
• Elwynn Forest
• Dun Morogh

Loch Modan questing today, it stands apart. It’s a very long journey for a young character, and when you finally arrive at the Sepulcher and find the husband’s grave, you realize you’ve come all this way to deliver a worthless trinket to someone who threw his life away on a hopeless cause. You turn it in and…that’s it. There is no follow-up. There is no happy ending. There is, however, the feeling that there’s more to the savagery of the Forsaken than meets the eye.

IgroMir is Russia’s largest gaming convention — sort of an Eastern European Electronic Entertainment Expo (E5?) — and Blizzard made an appearance there this week, showing off World of Warcraft: Cataclysm and Starcraft II. Besides the demo booths, visitors could look forward to panels with J. Allen Brack (the current WoW head honcho) and Chris Sigaty (SC2 grand poobah), trivia contests with the Russian Blizzard CMs, and goblin/worgen leveling contests.

But, of course, here at WoW.com we’re mostly interested in Cataclysm news, so let’s get right to it, shall we?

In his Cataclysm panel, Brack touched on two subjects — Tol Barad, the new outdoor PVP zone/quest hub, and the new guild leveling system. The Tol Barad talk was apparently nothing new, but the guild leveling talk had some good information in it. Not everything discussed here is new, but some of it is, so I’ll just reiterate what he said.

After the jump, of course.

Your guild will get experience for players earning rep, killing bosses, doing dailies, getting achievements, Arena and BG wins, crafting, leveling up, and more. The top 20 earners in the guild each week will have their contributions turned into XP. Previous contributions won’t factor into a particular week’s XP, so every member of the guild has the chance to be a top earner each week.

Guild experience, once accrued at the end of each week, will be converted into guild currency, which can be used to buy a myriad of items, including reagents, tabards, pets, profession recipes, heirlooms, and Guild Talent points.

Guild Talents will be things like a Mass Resurrection spell on a 30-minute cooldown, removal of reagents for buff spells, and increased gold drops in the world and instances. Guild leaders can respec guild talents, though the method and cost (if any) is currently unknown.

As your guild levels up, the amount of ingredients necessary for your guild recipes will get cheaper. An example would be lowering the number of Frozen Orbs (or the equivalent) necessary to craft a weapon by your guild blacksmith. The guild interface will also allow you to browse through any and all recipes available in your guild.

Guild-crafted heirlooms will cover every gear slot, according to Brack, and, like any guild-crafted item, will remain bound to the guild. If you leave the guild, your Guild-Bound items will automatically deposit themselves back into the guild bank.

Guild achievements are also in the works, such as an achievement for crafting a legendary, or for getting a certain number of players to the maximum profession level. A guild can also get an achievement automatically if a certain percentage of players in the guild have it too. It’s unknown if guild achievements will provide XP or currency.

The WoW movie is mentioned by a few players, and certainly that’s a possibility — though the movie isn’t due out for a comparatively long time in terms of patches. Starcraft II may also bring a number of new players in or back to the game, as the new Battle.net system will definitely spread the word about people playing World of Warcraft. But even then, all of those new draws combined don’t really seem like they’re capable of generating the flood of new players that completely revamping the starting experience would deserve.

From what we’ve seen, WoW: Cataclysm is pretty far along in development. Blizzard had a lot to say — and show — of the game’s third expansion at BlizzCon, and every new bit of info we’ve been able to wrangle since then tells us that the game is chugging towards the fabled Friends & Family Alpha, full steam ahead. We don’t have a solid date, and likely won’t until it happens, but it’s coming.

Now, when the Alpha starts, Blizzard tends to keep a tight lid on information coming out of it — even the testing period’s very existence — by judicious use of NDAs and cease-and-desist orders. It’s possible that we won’t even be able to give you information that comes out of the alpha. But all of that goes away when the closed beta starts and everybody can’t talk about it enough.

So, what happens if you happen to come upon an alpha or beta invite? Well, there’s a few things you should know. The first — is that you’re a lucky duck. The rest — we’ve assembled in this handy guide, readable in its entirety after the jump.

How the heck did I get an alpha invite?

There are only two ways you’ll get an alpha invite. Either you know someone from Blizzard, or you know someone who knows someone from Blizzard. No public keys are given out for the F&F Alpha.

How the heck did I get a beta invite?

Either the above, or you opted in to the beta lottery on your Account Management page or won it via a giveaway.

What is being in the alpha/beta like?

The alpha is a fairly small community, with a dedicated forum hidden to any player not in the testing phase. You’ll have direct contact with the developers via the forums. In return for being given access to the expansion so early, you’re expected to pull your weight by reporting bugs and testing all facets of the available content.

You should have no issues finding groups or questing partners. The alpha population tends to be very knowledgeable and friendly due to their Blizzard connections. And beyond that, there’s a zero-tolerance policy for asshattery — you might even have the privilege of being banned by Tom Chilton!

What’s usually available when the Alpha starts?

In the case of Cataclysm it’s likely to be the starting zones for the two new races and an assortment of finished Azeroth zones. This will be expanded over the course of the testing period until almost all content is available, at Blizzard’s discretion.

How often is new content added?

All the time. Patches are quick and content is added in chunks. Talents, spells, quests, and other content is changed sometimes in direct reaction to player feedback on the forums.

What’s the uptime like?

Equivalent to PTR uptime. Days of activity followed by a quick patch, usually.

Who can I talk about the alpha/beta with?

If you’re in the alpha, then you can talk to other people in the alpha about it. Don’t talk about it in the live game or publicly online. Entering into the alpha puts you under an NDA which has legal ramifications if broken.

If you’re in the beta, everybody!

Do I have to start over on the alpha/beta, or do I get to copy characters?

Generally, you have the option of starting a character at level one and/or copying one or more of your live characters over onto the alpha/beta server. You do have a limited number of copies per testing period — usually a few for the alpha and then a few more for the beta.

What can I do to prepare my character for the alpha/beta?

The first thing you should do before copying your main is to load him or her up with a ton of gold. Ask some friends to borrow all the gold they have for half an hour while your copy goes through, ensuring that you have all the capital you need to pay for whatever gold sink Blizzard has in store. And training, of course.

And don’t forget that you can transfer the same character more than once to multiply your fortune.

As for the comment spammers, such is the price we pay for being a pretty large site with an open comment system. We deal with them as quickly as we see them, and yes, reporting the posts does help. We ban who we can, we block what we can, but determined individuals will keep knocking their heads at it. If you see a spam post that’s been sitting around for a particularly long time, let us know via our tipline and we’ll deal with it ASAP.

For Cataclysm, there’s so much fantastic backstory behind Deathwing and the Cataclysm itself that it’d be a true shame to have a huge driving force behind it stuck in comic book land. Let’s hope that Blizzard feels the same way.

In a forum thread discussing the recent prot warrior block changes and Warbringer nerf and the state of prot warrior DPS (it’s basically acknowledged as the lowest DPS among the tanks) Ghostcrawler chimes in that they intend to buff sustained prot DPS while reducing burst in PvP. However, he quickly comes back to point that at this stage in the expansion they don’t want to make any sustained mechanical changes and so, don’t expect one. The sustained DPS increase will come from buffs to existing abilities.

That said, I’m a hybrid player at heart. I played a druid when I first started playing, and I play a death knight as my main now, and in both cases, I always keep a set of gear upgraded and ready for all their respective roles. Those sets include relics. I have my tanking relics and my DPS relics already. If ammo become a similar “relic” system, it might not be so bad. Being able to spice up your shooting with some procs from an ammo relic would be a great way to add a little bit of fun to the system without making it overwhelmingly unmanageable.

So my question to you, dear readers, the first in a series, is this: What are your favorite and least favorite hairstyles in the game? When you see a human male with the Goku haircut or the foxtail, do you want to kill a man? For female troll players, you don’t even need to answer. I mean, you have what, two hairstyles anyway? Neither of them any good? Maybe next expansion.