Hello and welcome to the first ever MMO’s Tavern, my name is Thom and I’ll be guiding you safely through this week’s MMO news.
First things first, the NDA from last week’s press tour regarding Blizzard’s upcoming expansion pack for World of Warcraft was lifted at 12:01 AM PDT on Monday. To the surprise of many, Mists of Pandaria was further along than anticipated. Reports from the press tour indicate that the expansion content is pretty far along with all but two of the new zones implemented and mostly ready to go. Along with the continent comes a new race, the Pandaren, a newly revamped talent system, and many more changes. Many people asked when the beta would start to which Blizzard responded with their trademarked “soon.” Apparently “soon” meant Wednesday night. The first wave of beta invites went out Wednesday evening and live streams of the beta can be found across the various WoW fan and news sites. Just as a security reminder to any readers that also play WoW, the safest way to check if you have beta access is to check your account management page on the battle.net main site. Phishing scams are going to start again in earnest with the release of the beta so keep your computer and your account safe.
Star Wars: The Old Republic continues to improve its offering to the fans as news from the Guild Summit and the upcoming patch 1.2 spreads across the Internet. BioWare released a video this week further explaining the improvements to the Legacy System that are coming out with the upcoming patch. Most notable of these changes are the “Race Unlocks.” Upon reaching the level cap with a particular race, players can then roll their next new character as a member of that race. For example, if a player levelled a Sith Pureblood to the cap as a Sith Inquisitor they could then start a new character as a Sith Pureblood, regardless of faction or class restrictions. Additionally, there will be other Legacy unlocks including mailboxes and repair vendors in the player’s personal starship and much more. Personally, I’m looking forward to playing my Sith Pureblood Jedi Shadow with the release of the next patch. Real quick before I move on, The Old Republic is having another free weekend to attract new players. If you’re a fan of story in your MMO I highly recommend you give it a try. More information can be found here.
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Turbine announced a new class for the upcoming Dungeons and Dragons Online expansion Menace of the Underdark this week. The Druid class will be released with the expansion this summer providing players to shapeshift their way to victory and plunder. It will be a premium playable class and will be free to all VIPs. Menace of the Underdark is set for release on June 25, 2012.
I think that’s about enough for this week. I’ll be back with more news from MMO’s Tavern next week, so until then keep them vorpal blades swinging but not in here. I don’t like fights in my tavern.
