6301

About the only thing that roused my interest from Blizzcon was the Monk class. Using a Pandaren to demonstrate it was a disappointing move but understandable I suppose, given that it’s the new race.

Pandas though, jeez. Next they’ll come up with something stupid like space octopi.

6302

They really tried to avoid talking about the North America and Europe subscriber numbers in the last quarterly report & conference call. I think I posted in more detail about this before, but a very large percentage of the subscriber base is now in areas that pay very little in subscriber fees. China is ~6 million of the worldwide subscribers, but subscriber revenue is locked at about $100 million per year by the licensing contract (which also covers Diablo & Starcraft II, so I don’t know how they attribute that revenue). If those six million subs were in NA/Europe averaging $13/month, that would be $78 million per month. But, WoW had more revenue in Q2 2011 than in Q2 2010 because of the opening of the cash mount/pet store in China, so there are lots of revenue streams for the moneyhat factory.

6303

The next quarterly report should be soon or (end of October)?
I want to see their new data.

6304

Gah, I recently tried returning to wow just for kicks, and I’ve always loved the early battlegrounds but man…I don’t have any lvl 85’s or anything, so none of those weapons passed down - That means, Im now totally irellevant on the pvp battlefield. I played a lvl 19 rogue, backstabbing a priest - I couldnt even see his hitpoints bar move.

I guess one has to be there from the beginning, to be relevant in at least pvp.

6305

I wasn’t a big battleground player but if I had to guess, I’d say the chance of you hitting a twinked out level 19s in those battlegrounds is probably 80-90%. It’s so fast to level a character to 19, and as you said, most people can pass either weapons, items, enchants, etc down so it’s an easy thing for a semi-bored level 85 player to do.

Your choices, then are: decide you don’t care if you die a lot, try to twink your own character out by buying or having friends make items, or level your character so you’re in a different bracket.

You’ll probably find this issue in all the battlegrounds, but I think you’re much more likely to find “normal” characters in higher level battlegrounds, as people won’t tend to level characters to 29, 39, etc, just to twink them out (that said, I’m sure SOME people do it but I would guess twinked players in those battlegrounds are more rare).

6306

It’s not so much old school twinking as heirloom gear. You’re not going to do well against a priest with a full heirloom set.

6307

Yah, twinking doesn’t really work anymore, given how quickly you gain XP in BGs. There are still twinks, of course, but they have their own BGs.

6308

Ah, if you turn off xp you’re not in the same BG? I either forgot or didn’t know that.

6309

Do we know China is 6 million of the current subs? Actual source for that?

If that is the case, then it leaves 4 million in NA/EU plus other smaller areas like Brazil and Australia.

6310

To other players it doesn’t really matter how many subs are gone since there will still be more subs than any other fee-based MMO. It matters to Blizzard but the servers will still be busy regardless.

6311

The 19-24 bracket is probably one of the biggest twink brackets now due to the free level 20s running around.

My level 20 twink hunter can beat ?? mobs that are in the high 30’s. It’s kind of crazy how powerful a level 20 is when decked out in all blues with some enchants. And, just so you know, the free accounts can’t trade or use AH, so every one is self-enchanted and enchanting is capped at 100.

6312

So, you are saying I just suck? ;-)

Anyways - I tried again at lvl 29, but man .- got owned still. I guess I’ll stick to the pve’ing.

I recently levelled my 20’s undead hunter, and took him through Arathi Highlands last night. Thats where it struck me what the big pull has always been for me in this game. The sense of history and belonging everything has. The awesome great wall the dwarves build, Stromgaard the fallen city, Hammerfall - everything just ties so damn well together with the rest of the world. Thats the kind of stuff I enjoy in games like this.

6313

Just got this in an email from Blizzard (noreply@blizzard.com). It appears to be 100% legit, but…

Due to suspicious activity, the Battle.net account [/email] has been locked. To restore access to this account, please follow these steps:

Step 1: Secure Your Computer

In the event that your computer has been infected with malicious software such as a keylogger or trojan, simply changing your password may not deter future attacks without first ensuring that your computer is free from these programs. Please visit our Account Security website to learn how to secure your computer from unauthorized access.

Step 2: Secure Your E-mail Account

After you have secured your computer, please create a new password for your e-mail account since it may also be compromised. Be sure to check your e-mail filters and rules and look for any e-mail forwarding rules that you did not create. For more information on securing your e-mail account, visit this Support page.

Step 3: Choose a New Password

You must change your password in order to resume using this Battle.net account. Please click this link to choose a new password:

https://us.battle.net/account/support/password-reset.html

*Note that your former password no longer grants access to Battle.net account management, World of Warcraft, or any other login-protected Battle.net account service.

If you still have questions or concerns after following the steps above, feel free to contact Customer Support at http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?locale=en_US&articleId=20606.

Sincerely,
The Battle.net Account Team
Online Privacy Policy

Okay, seriously, I have an authenticator, there’s practically speaking no way my account could reasonably have been compromised other than a just-in-time active attack via keylogger.

But more importantly, doesn’t everyone ever tell you to never click on links in an email? And here is Blizzard being all “We expect you to click on these links, because your normal account-management page won’t even log in, derp herp.”

Thoughts? This is legitimate, right? I can’t see how going to a us.battle.net subpage would end up with my account hacked, especially when it’s HTTPS. But I’m still fucking paranoid.

6314

What email client are you using? One which displays the real destination of the link?

6315

Um just log into your account at worldofwarcraft.com.

6316

If your account really is locked, my assumption is that someone had your ID/PW and tried to log in several times without your authenticator. Trying to log into your account but failing to plug in a valid authenticator key could have triggered your account locking.

Is the email legit? IIRC, Blizzard actually recommends NOT clicking on links in support mails and instead going to the Battle.net website and trying to log in there. If your account is indeed locked, I assume they have mechanisms on the site that allow you to reset your password or talk to a support person to clear it up.

6317

Dawn: Yes, and besides which, I don’t click on links, I manually copy them over into the address bar of a new tab.

Lorini: That’s the funny bit. It wouldn’t let me! I had to go to the special account password reset page, at which point it emailed me a long gibberish link to click on so that I could actually reset my password.

6318

But that’s still safer than clicking on a link in the email.

6319

This is legit. I just got one from Blizz too this week. I tried logging into Bnet independently and confirmed it. I just had to change my password. I was also logging in and out of a free account (linked to my own Bnet account) to make raids for my paid account to solo raid instances which may have been a trigger.

BTW, I learned that you can level a free toon to 10 and use it to make your own raids.

6320

Yep, it’s legit. I got one of those emails last week when I went to visit friends in Chicago. I guess Chicago sort of looks like China so they locked my account down just to be sure.

BTW, I learned that you can level a free toon to 10 and use it to make your own raids.

Now see, that’s the kind of thing they should put in the loading screen tips. Thanks.