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Live
Mists of Pandaria: Valor Point and Gear Acquisition Preview
This latest beta patch added some major boosts to gearing up quickly in Mists:
Valor of the Ancients
and
Elder Charm of Good Fortune
. In light of these additions, we've broken down all the changes to
Valor Points
in Mists of Pandaria and all the new ways you can acquire them.
Valor of the Ancients
and
Elder Charm of Good Fortune
Two big ways to increase your loot acquisition per week were added in recent beta patches.
Valor of the Ancients
: All characters on that realm now earn 50% more Valor Points when one character is capped. However, the maximum cap is now 3,000
Valor Points
, down from 4,000. This is great for alts or players who aren't sure what character they want to commit to more in early Mists. With account-wide achievements, it's great to have multiple characters geared enough to swap into raids to fill a needed role.
Elder Charm of Good Fortune
: Whenever you kill a raid boss, a UI window will ask if you want to spend a
Elder Charm of Good Fortune
on an extra roll. You will get another shot at the boss' loot table and win something extra--gold, gems, flasks, and possibly epic loot for your spec. 3 can be acquired each week from
Elder Charms of Good Fortune
, and
Lesser Charm of Good Fortune
can be acquired from compl
Live
News Round Up: Reduced Droprates for Heroic Mounts
Invincible's Reins
is hard to get and so is
Mimiron's Head
. Unsurprisingly, it looks like
Life-Binder's Handmaiden
and
Smoldering Egg of Millagazor
will be getting reduced drop rates too next expansion, as blue posts clarified today. It would be trivial to get guaranteed mounts from heroic encounters an expansion later.
Life-Binder's Handmaiden
and
Smoldering Egg of Millagazor
are easier to get than their Wrath counterparts were.
Smoldering Egg of Millagazor
drops on normal-mode, heroic mounts are available on 10s difficulty this expansion, and multiple
Life-Binder's Handmaiden
on 25s means everyone in the raid gets them faster.
Blizzard has already clarified upcoming achievements like
Cutting Edge: Grand Empress Shek'zeer
will only be available in their current tier, so it looks like they still want some heroic rewards to remain time-sensitive, not something to overgear and farm an expansion later.
If these mounts do become much harder to get, at least
Corrupted Egg of Millagazor
and
Reins of the Twilight Harbinger
from meta achievements have the same models.
Draztal
Will the mounts be an 1% drop ish in MoP? Or do they stay as current 100%?
I haven't seen any information on this as of yet :).
Thanks for reading.
The developers haven't decided yet how t
Live
Mists of Pandaria: 5.4 Vale of Eternal Blossoms and Golden Lotus Guide
In Patch 5.4, the
Vale of Eternal Blossoms
got some
major changes
. Parts of the Golden Lotus rep grind have changed and some quests and items have been removed.
We've broken down what's staying and going away, as well as provided a look at the Golden Lotus quests if your'e curious to read that for nostalgia's sake. In Patch 5.4, the Vale is corrupted into the Vale of Eternal Sorrows, and familiar figures from the Vale are
Siege of Orgrimmar bosses
.
Removed in 5.4
:
Eternally in the Vale
is removed, as well as the related quests and rewards. This is now a Feat of Strength.
The multi-tiered daily system is simplified. The only daily hub remaining is by Setting Sun Garrison.
The quests to kill elites are removed, and instead, the elites are rare spawns..
The
Jewel Danio
have been moved to
Timeless Isle
.
Many parts of the Vale are now Sha-infested and destroyed. Most NPCs are ting
Live
Newest Inscription Items, News Round Up
Along with today's news round up, we have a peek at some of the cool things Scribes can craft! Vanity pets, origami objects, and weapons with unique models were recently added to beta.
Some highlights from today's blue posts:
We now know where "Heroic Elite" items are from: defeating
Protector Kaolan
last on the
Protectors of the Endless
Encounter. These items are ilvl 516 (
Asani's Uncleansed Sandals
), while regular heroic items are ilvl 509 (
Asani's Uncleansed Sandals
).
Ghostcrawler confirmed that it's a deliberate move to have secondary-stat gems like
Deadly Vermilion Onyx
have beefed up stats in comparison to primary-stat gems like
Delicate Primordial Ruby
. In Cata, players stacked primary stat gems and they want socketing to be more interesting in Mists.
Cutting Edge: Will of the Emperor
and similar Feats of Strength can only be obtained in their current tier, so players can't go back later with better gear to get it.
More infomation on the staggered raid release schedule in Mists:
Heart of Fear
and
Terrace of Endless Spring
are scheduled to be released on normal difficulty four weeks after
Mogu'shan Vaults
.
Inscription Perks
Toys and Pets
In recent patches,
Live
Mists of Pandaria: Guide to The Tillers
Calling the Tillers simply a "faction" sounds misleading--gaining reputation with
The Tillers
, in Valley of the Four Winds, is much more complex than any other Pandaria faction. You'll harvest a variety of crops yielding everything from vegetables to profession materials, gain reputation through a series of quests to expand your farm, and also gain friendship with 10 Tiller NPCs who enhance your farm in Halfhill.
There's a ton of stuff to cover in this preview, so we've broken it down into three tabbed sections:
Farming
: how to plant, grow, and maintain crops, as well as how to expand a farm.
Tillers Union
: covers the main questline in which the player wins union votes from Halfhill residents, daily quests, and Tillers reputation rewards.
Friendship
: the friendship reputation system, how to increase friendship through quests and gifts, as well as Best Friend rewards.
We have a video preview by Lore up of how to get started farming too!
We've also found several great guides so far:
Tillers Farming
from our friends at El's Extreme Anglin', and [url=
http://www.wowhead.com/
Live
Mists of Pandaria: PvP Gear Preview
Friday's patch had huge additions for Season 12 PvP gear. Not only were many set bonuses changed, but models were added to all the Season 12 items, from weapons to capes. Plus, a few PvP sets had their models changed since we first previewed them--hunter, paladin, and priest!
We've listed all the PvP weapons, armor sets, and accessories with their corresponding 3D models and set bonuses below. Click the images to view them with the Flash modelviewer.
Some basic info:
There are three tiers of PvP armor: Dreadful (Honor Points), Malevolent (Conquest Points), and Malevolent Elite (Conquest Points + 2200 rating). Each of these armor sets has a distinctive tint.
All 2 piece set bonuses increase PvP Power by 300 and PvP Resilience by 600.
All 4 piece set bonuses increase PvP Power by 400 and PvP Resilience by 800.
PvP Power and PvP Resilience are new stats in Mists. PvP Power increases the damage you do to other players as well as the healing you do to other players in PvP situations. PvP Resilience continues to be a defense stat. These two stats will only work in PvP situations, helping to ensure that PvE gear will remain weaker.
Each set has class-specific 2 piece and 4 piece bonu
Live
Mists of Pandaria: Klaxxi Reputation Guide
Note: We have updated this guide for Patch 5.4 and reposted it in our
guide section
.
We'll continue looking at Mists of Pandaria reputations with
The Klaxxi
today. It's a good thing we didn't preview too many earlier, as this latest patch introduced many more rewards for each faction.
In addition, there's been a number of blue posts over the past few days:
There's a sale going on this weekend, following the recent one to transfer realms last week. This weekend, it's 25% off character race changes!
Some bad news if you haven't finished the Brewfest meta: the holiday this year will require you to be 89 to kill
Coren Direbrew
, so you'll have approximately 10 days to reach 89. There are new ilvl 470 versions of the trinket, so it would be OP if you could queue pre-Mists:
Brawler's Statue
,
Mithril Wristwatch
,
Thousand-Year Pickled Egg
,
Coren's Cold Chromium Coaster
,
Bubbliest Brightbrew Charm
,
Bitterest Balebrew Charm
.
Class feedback continues on the new level 75 Rogue talent,
Sting Like a Bee
, the Beta Class Balance Analysis thread, and a closer look at Monks.
Beta raid testing will finally inc
Live
Pandaria Transmog Preview: Capes and Dungeon Armor
Now that more models are popping up on beta, it's a good time to start thinking about transmog in Mists of Pandaria. Today we'll look at sets found in dungeons as well as quest capes--two types of items that might be thrown away while leveling, but would be hard to retrieve later on. As usual, you can click on all the images to view them in our Flash 3D Modelviewer.
Dungeon Armor
These items are mostly from dungeons, but some are rewards from long quest chains or from RNG-stat scenario satchel rewards. Full list of items under the toggles.
[model item
Live
Mists of Pandaria: Shado-Pan Reputation Guide, News Round Up
Today we have a news round up on more beta class balance analysis, as well as the guild mentoring program, old raid gold nerfs, and role of beta testing. With the
release date
for Mists of Pandaria, there's been a flurry of MoP-related posts as well, including Blizzard's very own beta key sweepstakes--they will be giving away 2,000 keys each week for five weeks.
We also have a spotlight on the Shado-Pan, a new faction in Mists of Pandaria with some epics and fun vanity rewards!
The
Shado-Pan
protect Pandaria from the imprisoned Sha--no small task. They are found wearing their distinctive navy-and-red armor throughout the borders of Pandaria in Kun-Lai Summit and Townlong Steppes. Rewards include some ilvl 489 epics as well as flavor items at both Honored and Exalted, such as breakable boards and mounts.
Patch Changes
5.4 Changes
Valor Points
gear now costs
Justice Points
, existing ilvl 458 gear is now 75% cheaper, and no gear purchasable with a currency requires reputation.
5.3 Changes
Players will not need Revered with [fa
Live
Scenario Previews: Arena of Annihilation and Greenstone Village
Two more scenarios were added in beta in this recent patch:
Greenstone Village
and
Arena of Annihilation
. We've got writeups and screenshots of them, as well as videos by Lore! Sceanarios also now have quests implemented, as well as reward satchels that yield ilvl 463 blues:
Cache of Powerful Armor
.
Greenstone Village
Greenstone Village
Greenstone village has been taken over by Jade Elementals and you will have to restore peace to the village by fending off the attacks, rescuing villages, finding their kegs, and killing vengeful sprites.
Summary
Stage 1: Rescue the Villagers:
Woodcarver Liupo
and
La
Mayor Lin
Meila
Portly Shung
Scribe Rinji
Graceful Swan
The village has been invaded by Cursed Jade Elementals and Sassy Seedlings. The group will need to clear the town and speak to the frightened NPCs.
Stage 2: Rescue the Dojo
Beasts of Jade spawn inside the Dojo and you need to help the Brewmaster kill them.
Stage 3: Recover Burgled Barrels[/
Live
Mists of Pandaria: Challenge Modes
For the current Challenge Mode guide as of Patch 5.1,
click here
!
If seeing Dragon Soul nerfed every month isn't your thing, Challenge Modes in Mists of Pandaria may be more your style. Similar to
Herald of the Titans
, you'll beat bosses without overgearing them, getting special vanity prizes like unique transmog armor as rewards.
Overview
Challenge Modes are timed heroic instance runs, done in low ilvl gear. Any gear worn above ilvl 463 will be scaled down.
Gear will retain all hit and expertise, so players can remain capped. Stats that will be scaled down are secondary ones.
There are three tiers of achievements and rewards, listed below: gold, silver, and bronze.
Once players have beaten all the gold achievements, they have access to a
realm leaderboard
.
Challenge-mode leaderboards
allow players to filter by instance, time, and by guild.
Inspiration for challenge modes: timed Stratholme runs and the original Zul'Aman r
Live
News Round Up: MoP Tabard Preview, Character Transfer Sale, PTR Soon
The latest beta patch introduced all the tabards for the Mists of Pandaria factions--they blow tabard designs from past expansions out of the water. Unlike past expansions, tabards will not be the first thing players buy at Friendly for reputation gains. Instead, they will be vanity rewards only available at Exalted, just like tabards in Burning Crusade.
Click on the images to view them in our 3D Modelviewer!
Anglers Tabard
,
August Celestials Tabard
,
Golden Lotus Tabard
,
Klaxxi Tabard
Lorewalkers Tabard
,
Order of the Cloud Serpent Tabard
,
Shado-Pan Tabard
,
Tillers Tabard
[model item=115119 slot=19 img=
http://wow.zamimg.com/uploads/blog/imag
Live
Mists of Pandaria: Rare Elites and Vanity Items
Rare spawns are getting some huge changes in Mists of Pandaria--they'll drop unique vanity items like
Ai-Li's Skymirror
and
Mr. Smite's Brass Compass
! These items range from vanity pets to trinkets that summon kidnapped puppies. After Cata's rares mostly dropped generic quest-level armor, we're thrilled to see a return to quirky flavor details in Mists. We farmed up as many items as we could yesterday in between covering the latest beta patch.
Every rare mob in Pandaria, known as "Pandaren champions," will drop a satchel and a medium-level piece of armor in addition to a special item. Most rares drop vanity items, which we've listed below, but a few mobs in lower-level zones drop things like
Big Bag of Linens
instead. Tracking down all the rare mobs will grant the achievement
Glorious!
.
Several of our intrepid beta users have been
farming these mobs
--be sure to check out
Glorious: Rare Elites of Pandaria
that compiles much of the found info. It's got maps of all the new rares, tabs for all the new loot and NPCs, and tips for dealing with their abilities.
Kun-Lai Summit
[ite
Live
News Round Up: New Recruit-a-Friend Mount
There's a new mount players can get this week, via Recruit-a-Friend:
Heart of the Nightwing
. This mount replaces the
X-53 Touring Rocket
as the reward you get when the recruited player pays for the second full month of game time. It transforms you into a flying panther that can carry the recruit on your back! Check out the 3D model below:
There are also two 10-player heroic encounters open for testing on beta today. Check out our past coverage of these bosses featuring the Encounter Journal and screenshots!
Will of the Emperor
Spirit Kings
In today's news round up, there's also more class balance analysis posts and the ongoing debate on challenging content in Cataclysm continues. And as a reminder,
Power of the Aspects
is now 30% in Dragon Soul this week.
Click the cut to see all the blue posts!
Live
Mists of Pandaria: New Mounts
There are many new mounts in store in Mists of Pandaria, from cloud serpents to water striders that walk on water. Since we've been datamining a few new mounts and models every patch, we thought it would be good to list them all in one place. Remember to click on the images to view them on our 3D modelviewer!
Cloud Serpent
The following three mounts require
Order of the Cloud Serpent
Exalted, which will be a month-long reputation grind in the style of the Winterspring Frostsaber.
Reins of the Azure Cloud Serpent
Reins of the Golden Cloud Serpent
Reins of the Jade Cloud Serpent
Reins of the Thundering August Cloud Serpent
requires Exalted with
The August Celestials
and costs .
Reins of the Thundering Jade Cloud Serpent
is purchasable from guild vendors upon clearing all Tier 14 content.
Reins of the Crimson Cloud Serpent
is a reward for completing
Glory of the Pandaria Hero
.
Reins of the Heavenly Crimson Cloud Serpent
is the reward from
Glory of the Pandaria Raider
Reins of the Astral Cloud Serpent
will probably be celestial, in the style of Algalon/Elegon.
Reins of the Heavenly Onyx Cloud Serpent
: Small chance to be inside the loot satchel upon killing the world boss
Sha of Anger
.
Reins of the Onyx Cloud Serpent
: Reward from the quest
Surprise Attack!
.
Reins of the Thundering Ruby Cloud Serpent
is the new rare spawn mount for Pandaria. I
Live
Gathering Professions Preview and News Round Up: Dragon Soul 30%
Rounding out our profession previews for Mists of Pandaria, we'll look at the remaining gathering ones:
Herbalism
,
Mining
,
Skinning
,
. We've gone over all the items for each profession and their drop locations, as well as the new buffs each profession offers.
Today's news round up covers a variety of topics: Dragon Soul difficulty change to 30% next week, the announcement of the new Guild Mentoring Program, more Beta Class Balance Analysis, LFR roll explanations, and Blizzard at Comic-Con.
Herbalism
Herbalists get a new rank of
: Uses your skill in Herbalism to absorb energy and nutrients from the earth, instantly healing minor wounds and granting 2880 haste for 20 sec. Can be used while stealthed or invisible.
Herbalist's Spade
is sold by Trade Supply vendors. It increases your herbalism by +10 and does not need to be equipped.
Fool's Cap
: high-level areas with water nearby: Windward Isle, Briny Muck in Dread Wastes, etc. Requires 600 skill.
Golden Lotus
: requires 550 skill, any zone, rare spawn node. Picking one gives you
Luck of the Lotus
. Also chance to be inside [it
Live
Mists of Pandaria: Leatherworking Overview (Updated for 5.4)
This guide provides an overview of the additions and changes to Leatherworking in Mists of Pandaria.
Leatherworkers in Mists of Pandaria get powerful bracer enchants, as well as new types of BoP leg kits. They can make new PvP and PvE armor for both leather and mail users, as well as sell leg kits for all melee dps.
Patch Updates
New to Patch 5.4, Leatherworkers can craft ilvl 476 PvP and ilvl 553 epic recipes. These recipes are learned when crafting
Hardened Magnificent Hide
, which is used for the new reagent
Hardened Magnificent Hide
.
Pattern: Magnificence of Leather
and
Pattern: Magnificence of Scales
are new world drops in 5.2. When crafting them, you have a chance to learn the recipe for a new
ilvl 458 PvP gear or ilvl 522 epic
item. There is also a new Leatherworking bag.
Profession Perks
There are three types of leg armor kits Leatherworkers can put on their own gear for only
Eternium Thread
. These kits have more useful stat combinations than in the past. There are no more attack power kits for dps--instead there is one with agility and one with strength. These kits all require 575 skill and level 80:
[s
Live
Mists of Pandaria: Cooking Preview, Part 2
Since we last did a
cooking preview
a few months ago, there's been some new additions we wanted to share with you! We've leveled up cooking to show you the new feast models, found locations for all the cooking materials, and previewed some of the cooking vanity rewards and the story behind
Cooking School Bell
.
To recap the basics: cooking will be split up into six specializations in Mists of Pandaria. Leveling one will level your overall cooking, and you will learn dishes that give a specific stat buff. It is possible to level multiple specializations for achievements, and there are also new easy ways to go from 1-525 cooking in Pandaria. Our
earlier preview
covers the recipes for each specialization and the new low-level recipes.
New Feasts
The new Pandaren feasts are a departure from the serving platters of previous expansions. Instead, they are large tables with detailed tasty meals! These feasts give +250 of a primary stat normally and +275 if it matches up with your cooking specialization, except if it's
Banquet of the Brew
. You wil
Live
News Round Up: Pandaren Phoenix Mount, Beta Raid Video Preview
In today's news round up, we've got video and screenshot previews of four new raid encounters: Tsu'long, Sha of Fear, Lei Shi, and Blade Lord Ta'yak. We also discovered beta players now learn
Reins of the Crimson Pandaren Phoenix
!
It's been quieter than usual for blue posters, but there's some feedback about Challenge Modes as well as a few more Beta Class Analysis posts.
New Mount:
Reins of the Crimson Pandaren Phoenix
Reins of the Crimson Pandaren Phoenix
is the model used for the "Pandaren Phoenix" Challenge Mode mount reward, and it's now automatically learned by all players on beta. The animations seem a bit rushed so far, but it's always nice to see a new model instead of a reskinned mount. We recently datamined four colors of this mount model, which we've included below too: click on the images to view them in our 3D Model Viewer!
Pandaren phoenix mount (green)[/mo
Live
Scenario Previews: Crypt of Forgotten Kings and Unga Ingoo
Lore and I have teamed up again to bring you previews of the latest scenarios on beta! We'll be looking at two very different scenarios today:
Crypt of Forgotten Kings
, which takes place in a corrupted tomb with the Sha, and
Unga Ingoo
, which takes place on the beach with drunken Hozen.
They're both fairly short, and like the
earlier scenarios
, require you to be level 90 but have no spec/group requirements. You can learn more about scenarios from NPCs at your level 90 faction hubs, or queue from them via the Dungeon Finder.
Unga Ingoo
Rescue Jungle Brew from the clutches of the evil hozen pirates of Unga Ingoo.
Summary
Stage 1
Escort Brewmaster Bo to the tropical brewing pot.
Stage 2
Players run around the island collecting brew. Instead of looting brew bottles, it instead shows up as a stacking buff, with a chance to "spill" over 30, which could lower the buff. Meanwhile, the hozen are arriving in ships and running up the shore to atta
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