3.3 Public Test Realm is up up up up baby !

[Bluspacecow]

NEW BUILD 10712

As usual mmo champion has the major changes prettily well summarised :

http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/p...r-build-10712/

http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/p...s-1027-update/

Possibly the major highlight is changes to the new LFG / LFR system.

NOT SURE IF THIS IS ACTIVE ON THE CURRENT BUILD AS IT WASN'T WORKING FOR ME

Dungeon System

This feature has replaced the Looking For Group tool and provides all-new dungeon party creation functionality.

Players can join as individuals, as a full group, or a partial group to look for additional party members.

Groups using this tool will be able to teleport directly to the selected instance. Upon leaving the instance, players will be returned to their original location. If any party member needs to temporarily leave the instance for reagents or repairs, they will have the option to teleport back to the instance.

Players can choose the Random Dungeon option.

The Heroic Wrath of the Lich King Daily Random Dungeon option will award two Emblems of Frost no more than once a day.

The normal Wrath of the Lich King Daily Random Dungeon option will award two Emblems of Triumph no more than once a day.

Continuing to complete Wrath of the Lich King Heroic instances using the
Daily Random Dungeon option will award players two additional Emblems of Triumph each time.

Daily Heroic and normal dungeon quests have been removed. These quests have been replaced with weekly raid quests (see the "Quests" section for details).

Level-appropriate rewards will be offered to players who choose the Random Dungeon option for pre-Wrath of the Lich King dungeons.

Players can be placed in a group for a random dungeon no more than once every 15 minutes.

Random Dungeon rewards will be placed in each player's inventory automatically upon completion of the dungeon (final boss killed). A pop-up notification will display any rewards earned through the Dungeon System.

Instead of choosing a random dungeon, players can also choose specific dungeons appropriate for their level range. Multiple instances can be selected at one time. The feature no longer limits the choice to look for only 3 dungeon groups at one time.

Pick-Up Groups

Cross-realm instances are now available and use an improved matchmaking system to assist players in looking for additional party members. As with
Battlegrounds, the realms in each Battlegroup are connected.
As part of the matchmaking system, some of the more difficult dungeons will have a minimum gear requirement. Players also need to meet the
requirements for dungeons that require attunement, such as keys or quests.

If a player does not meet the requirements for a particular dungeon, a lock icon will be displayed next to that dungeon. Hovering over this icon will display the requirements which have not been met.

Only conjured items and loot dropped in a dungeon for which other party members are eligible can be traded between players from different realms.

A Vote Kick feature will be available in the event a member of a party is not performing to the expectations of the other members.

Players who leave the group prematurely are subject to a Deserter debuff preventing them from using the Dungeon System tool for 15 minutes.

If an existing group loses a member, the leader will be asked if he or she wants to continue the dungeon. Choosing to continue will automatically place the group back into the Dungeon System queue.

A Player will not be placed in a group with people on his or her Ignore list.

Players who take part in groups who have one or more members who have been matched with them randomly from within the Dungeon System will receive extra rewards, up to and including the coveted Perky Pug non-combat pet. The more random players with whom one groups, the faster the pet can be obtained.

The Need Before Greed loot system will be the unalterable default looting system for pick-up groups in the Dungeon System and has been updated.

Need Before Greed will now recognize gear appropriate for a class in three ways: the class must be able to equip the item, pure melee will be unable to roll on spell power items, and classes are limited to their dominant armor type (ex. paladins for plate). All items will still be available via Greed rolls as well as the new Disenchant option should no member be able to use the item.

Players will be able to roll on items with a required minimum level higher than a player's current level.

Looking For Raid

There is a new Looking For Raid option available to players that can be accessed via the Raid Information screen in the interface or by typing “/LFR.”

Players will be able to browse the system manually for any other players looking for a raid dungeon group.

While browsing LFR players may sort the list ascending or descending by left-clicking the following headers: Name, Level, Class, Tank Role, Healer Role, and Damage Role. The crown is the Leader Role (representing a raid group with 2 or more people). Players can left-click on this header to sort the list with groups at the top or at the bottom.

Hovering over players listed in LFR will display their name, class, level, roles and comments. Hovering over a raid/group will display the leader's name, the raid information (number of people the raid), comments, if there are any bosses dead (and which ones), and if there are any friends from your Friends list or ignored players from your Ignore list in the raid group.

The Looking For Group chat channel has returned and can be accessed in all major cities (similar to the Trade chat channel) without the use of the Dungeon system interface.

Players may only be queued or listed in one of the following systems at a time: Dungeons, LFR, Battlegrounds, or Arenas.

Ignore List: The amount of characters a person can ignore has been increased to 50. In addition, players on other realms can be placed on the Ignore list.

[Bluspacecow]

NEW BUILD 10747

Patch notes have been updated @

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...Id=20126978820

As usual MMO champion has the new changes highlighted :

http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/p...s-update-1103/

Possibly the biggest Highlights I can see are listed below :

* New Pug dog non combat pet for running random dungeons through the newe Dungeon System

http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/...ctober/peg.jpg

* Meeting Stones: To use any Meeting Stone, it is only required that the character’s minimum level be 15. There is no maximum character level requirement for any Meeting Stone.

There is possibly more interesting stuff but you'll have to look up the mmo champion page yourself

[Seerah]

I wants teh doggie!!

[Bluspacecow]

Observations from 10747 :
Disclaimer : Tested this on build 10747. Some changes might of course had come on a previous build but I didn't personally test them. What follows may change on a later build.

Gave the new buff options a go. It will now group buffs. These will appear under a single icon that when you mouse over them will show the buffs underneath it. Tried it out with Horn of Winter and it had a golden icon with a "1" on it. Mousing over it showed the normal Horn of Winter icon.

The new tutorials are pretty friggin cool. They now have a Prev and Next button on them. The Icon down below has a number on it for how many tips you haven't looked at. You can also page back to previous ones in case you've forgotten something.

The timing of them seems to be a little better then previous threads but seems a little off in places. On my Testcow toon it didn't show the flash card for Spells & Abilities until I had killed my 2 Cougar. Did it expect me to melee everything until then ??

The new Quest Helper like feature appears to had a lot of work done on it.
When you track a quest it appears in the objectives tracker with a numbered button on it. Pressing this button brings up the world map with the area you need to look in on the map highlighted with the same numbered icon in the rough centre of it.

EG if you're tracking a quest and the quest appears in the objective tracker as "3" there will be a "3" button on the tracker. Clicking opens the map with the area you need for the quest highlighted in Blue and a "3" icon in the rough centre of it.

When you complete a quest you are tracking it automatically starts tracking the next one in the chain. A nice feature.

The map also has quests on the left and the text of the quest down the bottom. When not tracking any quests it appears to disappear , reverting back to the old style map.

There's also a Southwest pointing arrow icon at the top of the map that converts it into a smaller Cartographer like map window. Not moveable by default nor can it seems be able to right click it to unlock it. The small version is still using the same frame names so it should in theory be possible to move it with a frame moving addon.

Also the quest tracking feature appears to work via zone. That is if your not in the zone for the quests you are tracking then it doesn't do the whole number buttons on the OT and icons on the map. If you change the zone your map displays to the one which you are tracking quests for the map changes to bring up the quest tracker icons and stuff.

All in all the quest tracking features are coming on nicely. Would be nice to have a single preference to turn them all off tho - I had to turn all the options in the Objectives screen in Interface options before they went away.

Disclaimer : Tested this on build 10747. Some changes might of come on a previous build but I didn't personally test them. What follows may change on a later build.

Gave the new buff options a go. It will now group buffs. These will appear under a single icon that when you mouse over them will show the buffs underneath it. Tried it out with Horn of Winter and it had a golden icon with a "1" on it. Mousing over it showed the normal Horn of Winter icon.

The new tutorials are pretty friggin cool. They now have a Prev and Next button on them. The Icon down below has a number on it for how many tips you haven't looked at. You can also page back to previous ones in case you've forgotten something.

The timing of them seems to be a little better then previous threads but seems a little off in places. On my Testcow toon it didn't show the flash card for Spells & Abilities until I had killed my 2 Cougar. Did it expect me to melee everything until then ??

The new Quest Helper like feature appears to had a lot of work done on it.
When you track a quest it appears in the objectives tracker with a numbered button on it. Pressing this button brings up the world map with the area you need to look in on the map highlighted with the same numbered icon in the rough centre of it.

EG if you're tracking a quest and the quest appears in the objective tracker as "3" there will be a "3" button on the tracker. Clicking opens the map with the area you need for the quest highlighted in Blue and a "3" icon in the rough centre of it.

When you complete a quest you are tracking it automatically starts tracking the next one in the chain. A nice feature.

The map also has quests on the left and the text of the quest down the bottom. When not tracking any quests it appears to disappear , reverting back to the old style map.

There's also a Southwest pointing arrow icon at the top of the map that converts it into a smaller Cartographer like map window. Not moveable by default nor can it seems be able to right click it to unlock it. The small version is still using the same frame names so it should in theory be possible to move it with a frame moving addon.

Also the quest tracking feature appears to work via zone. That is if your not in the zone for the quests you are tracking then it doesn't do the whole number buttons on the OT and icons on the map. If you change the zone your map displays to the one which you are tracking quests for the map changes to bring up the quest tracker icons and stuff.

All in all the quest tracking features are coming on nicely. Would be nice to have a single preference to turn them all off tho - I had to turn all the options in the Objectives screen in Interface options before they went away.

[Bluspacecow]

Observations from 10747 :
Disclaimer : Tested this on build 10747. Some changes might of course had come on a previous build but I didn't personally test them. What follows may change on a later build.

Gave the new buff options a go. It will now group buffs. These will appear under a single icon that when you mouse over them will show the buffs underneath it. Tried it out with Horn of Winter and it had a golden icon with a "1" on it. Mousing over it showed the normal Horn of Winter icon.

The new tutorials are pretty friggin cool. They now have a Prev and Next button on them. The Icon down below has a number on it for how many tips you haven't looked at. You can also page back to previous ones in case you've forgotten something.

The timing of them seems to be a little better then previous builds but seems a little off in places. On my Testcow toon it didn't show the flash card for Spells & Abilities until I had killed my 2 Cougar. Did it expect me to melee everything until then ??

The new Quest Helper like feature appears to had a lot of work done on it.
When you track a quest it appears in the objectives tracker with a numbered button on it. Pressing this button brings up the world map with the area you need to look in on the map highlighted with the same numbered icon in the rough centre of it.

EG if you're tracking a quest and the quest appears in the objective tracker as "3" there will be a "3" button on the tracker. Clicking opens the map with the area you need for the quest highlighted in Blue and a "3" icon in the rough centre of it.

When you complete a quest you are tracking it automatically starts tracking the next one in the chain. A nice feature.

The map also has quests on the left and the text of the quest down the bottom. When not tracking any quests it appears to disappear , reverting back to the old style map.

There's also a Southwest pointing arrow icon at the top of the map that converts it into a smaller Cartographer like map window. Not moveable by default nor can it seems be able to right click it to unlock it. The small version is still using the same frame names so it should in theory be possible to move it with a frame moving addon.

Also the quest tracking feature appears to work via zone. That is if your not in the zone for the quests you are tracking then it doesn't do the whole number buttons on the OT and icons on the map. If you change the zone your map displays to the one which you are tracking quests for the map changes to bring up the quest tracker icons and stuff.

All in all the quest tracking features are coming on nicely. Would be nice to have a single preference to turn them all off tho - I had to turn all the options in the Objectives screen in Interface options before they went away.

[Bluspacecow]

NEW BUILD 10772

As per usual I get up from a long sleep and a new build has been pushed out to the PTR. Seems only yesterday we got the last build.

Patch notes have been updated @

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...Id=20126978820

MMO champion has the new changes highlighted :

http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/p...s-update-1105/

Highlights of build 10772

* Arenas : All abilities that have base cooldowns of 10 minutes or longer cannot be used in Arenas, down from 15 minutes.

* Players no longer need to kill the final bosses in all four wings of this dungeon in order to teleport to Sapphiron. Teleportation orbs have been added to allow players access back and forth from Sapphiron's lair.

* The new quest tracking features have formally been added to the patch notes :

Quest Log A Show Map button has been added to the Quest Log. Selecting a quest and pressing this button will open the map for the zone in which the quest objective is located displaying the associated area of interest. Any other active quests in a player’s Quest Log for that zone will also be displayed. Map The map interface has been separated into four separate panes: a map pane (left), a pane listing active quest names for the zone being viewed (right), a pane listing the full quest text for any highlighted quest (bottom left), and a pane listing the quest rewards for any highlighted quest (bottom right). All active quests listed in the right pane for the zone being viewed on the map will be assigned a number. These numbers will be displayed on the map according to the areas of interest for each quest. Highlighting a quest name in the right pane will highlight the corresponding area of interest on the map in the left pane, show its quest text in the lower left pane, and list the quest rewards in the lower right pane. Given that some quest objectives can be achieved in multiple locations within a given zone, highlighting such a quest will highlight an area of interest closest in proximity to the character’s current location. This feature can be disabled by un-checking the Show Quest Objectives box in the bottom right corner of the new map interface, restoring the map to its standard full-screen display. Clicking on the arrow in the top right corner of the new map interface will hide all but the map pane, bringing the map out of full-screen mode and allowing players to leave it open while navigating a zone or engaging in combat. Objectives Tracking This frame has been improved to offer new functionality and can be used with the new shrunken map option. The Objectives frame is now docked below the mini-map next to the right 2 action bars and will track up to 12 quests for a zone. Numbers have been added next to each quest name and objective corresponding with those areas of interest displayed on the map. If a quest objective has been completed, the number will be replaced with a yellow question mark symbol. The arrow button in the top right corner of the Objectives frame can be used to toggle between minimizing and maximizing the quest objective display. Quest Difficulty Tracking This feature is off by default and can be enabled in the Objectives window from the Interface Options menu. Turning this feature on will color-code all quest names displayed in the map interface according to difficulty (grey, green, yellow, orange, and red).

What's different for me for the quest tracking features from last build

* Show objectives button on map : To turn the quest panes off and on. Very Niiiiiiice.

* Up to 12 quests a zone on the objective tracker ? I thought you could currently do more by making the box large enough. But then again who really needs to track more than 12 quests per zone ? With it currently parented to the minimap you wouldn't want to be tracking many quests anyway. I don't like how they've made so you can' unlock the objective track anymore You can shrink it but that's about it

* Area highlighted will be the closest to you. Kinda missed this change.

* Shows where to turn in a quest to (yay )

* The new objectives tracker remembers what quests you are tracking ...even after log out. Finally !!!!

Also the disconnection problems people were having appears to be gone

[Bluspacecow]

NEW BUILD 10805

http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/p...r-build-10805/

The Halls of Reflection (Last wing of the 5-man dungeon) are now available for testing

[Bluspacecow]

About to head to bed but here's 2 updates for us :

http://www.wowhead.com/?guide=3.3

^^ Rather excellent 3.3 Guide , including some stuff I've not seen elsewhere. Will need to confirm their facts from the patch notes tho...

I've been missing out on a lot of the loot stuff mmo champion posts

http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/i...-citadel-loot/
http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/i...dungeons-loot/
http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/e...frost-rewards/

[Bluspacecow]

Ohhhh undocumented chansges I loves these :

http://www.wowwiki.com/Patch_3.3.0_(...mented_changes)

Including info on this :

http://www.wowwiki.com/Luck_of_the_Draw

It's a buff you get for Pugging

[Bluspacecow]

NEW BUILD 10835


WoW-0.3.0.10805-to-0.3.0.10835-enUS-ptr-patch.app == 85.8 MB
WoW-0.3.0.10805-to-0.3.0.10835-enUS-ptr-patch.exe == possibly similar

Patch notes updated at http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...26978820&sid=1

Paladins: Divine Intervention Priests: Shadowform Rogues: Deadly Poison, Improved Poisons Shamans: Elemental Mastery Warlocks: Improved Drain Soul, Destructive Reach User Interface: Dungeon System now called Dungeon Finder Graphics: Enabling D3D Items: Shaman Tier-9 4-Piece Set Bonus (Elemental) Bug Fixes section updated

MMO champion post : http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/p...r-build-10835/

Just in case the MMOC post doesn't get updated here's the stuff Boubouille missed :

PRIESTS


Shadowform:

This talent also now causes Devouring Plague and Vampiric Touch to benefit from haste. Both the period length and the duration of these spells will be reduced by haste. In addition, the mana cost has been reduced from 32% to 13% of base mana.

SHAMAN

Elemental Mastery:

This talent now increases spell haste by 15% instead of critical strike chance while active.

New LFG Tool now called Dungeon Finder

NEW D3D GRAPHICS BACKEND :

A new feature has been added to the D3D graphics engine to improve texture management (particularly for Windows XP users). If you are experiencing random crashes related to file read errors or out of memory, this new backend may help. To enable the new backend, add the following line to your Config.WTF file: SET gxApi "d3d9ex". For more information please visit our Test Realm forum:

[Bluspacecow]

Good news everyone !

You can now move that reduced World Map frame by turning on an option and right clicking the title

This is the smaller version of the world map you get via clicking the Southwest arrow at the top of the world map. The new option is in Interface options->Objectives

New change for build 10835

[Bluspacecow]

NEW BUILD 10894

http://www.mmo-champion.com/news-2/p...ard-dreamhack/

lolz at mmo champion putting the wrong build number there !

WoW-0.3.0.10835-to-0.3.0.10894-enUS-ptr-patch.app
^^ See ?

Only new thing I can see for this build is :

Druid

Eclipse: This effect will not activate again within 15 seconds of either type of Eclipse effect firing, in addition to the existing 30-second cooldown for each type of Eclipse.

[Bluspacecow]

Elaboration on the Druid's Eclipse change in build 10894

http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...33744481&sid=1

Credit : Dubbed of MMO champion

[Bluspacecow]

NEW BUILD 10952

Yet another build. Nothing really new in this build, only changes from the official notes going live and a few tweaks.

It's looking better and better for a next week release - this build has the version string down the bottom left has been changed to "Version 0.3.0 (10952) (PTR - Release) Nov 30 2009"

Note the "Release" part

[ricks322]

Still seams a little early for a release. The pre-downloaded patches are only 656MB (as of Dec 1). I would still give it 2 weeks at best, unless there is a flurry of updater activity in the next few days.

[Bluspacecow]

Originally Posted by archaica on the european realms, windows XP users are experiencing problems with the prepatch download. blizzard has known about this issue for weeks and has not addressed or resolved it. i certainly hope this is not an indicator of what is to come with the "release" of the full patch, because if it is, they are going to have a lot of very unhappy paying customers when they cannot log in because the patch will not download... knowing that blizzard has known about this issue for weeks, done nothing about it and still releases the full patch regardless.

The issues with the pre patch download didn't have anything to do with the patch data itself but the mechanism used to distribute the patch.

The patch data itself is in the MPQ files inside the data folder.

The Blizzard tools are programs that are independent of that patch data ie the Client , Updater, Launcher and Background downloader.

The client does facilitate the loading of data in and out of the Data folder but the problems people were having were not with the client but with the Launcher, Updater and Background downloader.

On the PTR I haven't seen any problems patching what so ever - there has been 12 builds pushed out and every one of them got installed on my computer painlessly (*). Neither have I seen many posts in the O forums about a particular build updater bugging out.

The upshot is if people have their problems with the Blizzard tools (other then the client) they should not have any problems come Patch Day.

(*) I won't say they were installed quickly as I'm on a slow computer

[Torhal]

I've had an issue with the Launcher since the previous two live patches which also exists with the PTR Launcher - all of the directory permissions are wiped out and have to be re-set each time the Launcher is run. Then again, I'm running Linux so YMMV.

[zero-kill]

Originally Posted by archaica my point is that the tools are not working for XP users. the tools are required to download the patch. once the patch goes live, users cannot log in without updating their game. if the tools are not working properly and they cannot download the patch material, they will not be able to log in. blizzard has known about this for weeks and has not bothered to address or resolve the issue beyond the fact that we were told not to worry as it was only the prepatch data and the actual release was still quite some time away. considering that with every live release something has gone wrong with their thoroughly tested patch, this reassurance is not at all comforting.

That's why manual download options exist

[Bluspacecow]

Originally Posted by archaica my point is that the tools are not working for XP users. the tools are required to download the patch. once the patch goes live, users cannot log in without updating their game.

You can bypass the Background downloader by opening the Background.torrent torrent file in the cache folder in the wow folder in a torrent client. That's one solution off the top of my head.

There's a few other solutions but they are pretty much all player supplied IE Unofficial and not sanctioned by Blizzard

How many Blizzard players use the XP operating system ? I would expect to see a lot more threads in the Official forums if it really wasn't working for all XP users like you state.

Regardless this still means the blizzard tools not downloading the pre patch data is a separate issue and not one relevant to this thread. There is a thread about the pre patch download that I have written btw.

They can fix the tools independently of the 3.3 patch.

blizzard has known about this for weeks and has not bothered to address or resolve the issue beyond the fact that we were told not to worry as it was only the prepatch data and the actual release was still quite some time away.

I've seen a few posts on the Tech support forums for the US realms with resolutions. I also see a few blizzard reps assisting those that are having trouble. I've so only found 2 thread about it in the first 5 pages - all chock full of player supplied solutions.

If the issue really was as bad as you think there would be way more threads about it then there already is. I don't believe that Blizzard is ignoring this problem or that none of the reps are helping people. Just that they probably have way too many threads to answer that relate to the Live realms so they choose their battle carefully.