4.2 patch interview with Tom Chilton

a great insight into the mind of a game director and his team enjoy 

world of warcraft pvp mage build part 2

6. Macros

Freeze on your Frostbolt

#showtooltip Frostbolt
/cast frostbolt
/click PetActionButton4

Summon your pet if you don't have one or cast freeze

#showtooltip Summon Water Elemental
/cast [nopet] Summon Water Elemental
/cast !Freeze

Cast Ice block or cancel it, spam it for a debuff remover.

#showtooltip Ice Block
/stopcasting
/cancelaura Ice Block
/cast Ice Block

Sheep your focus if you have one, else it will cast on your target.

#showtooltip Polymorph
/cast [target=focus, exists, harm] Polymorph; Polymorph

And the same for Counterspell

#showtooltip Counterspell
/stopcasting
/cast [target=focus, exists, harm] Counterspell; Counterspell

7. Addons

Gladius - Arena unit frames -
 http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/gladius.aspx

Gnomish interrupter - Party chat info about your CC -
http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/gnomish-interrupter.aspx

Quartz - Must have castbar -
http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/quartz.aspx

OmniCC - Timers of cooldowns on your action bars -
http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/omni-cc.aspx

8. Tips

Practice alot. All good mages started with killing boars. A good way to practice is dueling.
Don't be scared outside the gates of Orgrimmar or Stormwind. Find someone of your skill
level and duel with him, get revenge if you lose so that eventually you let him bite the dust.

Another way to train your skills for arena is... arena! Find someone to play 2v2 for fun,
you will learn your own class but other classes too + you get the conquest points cap!

Watch Mage PvP videos. Vanilla WoW or not, skills are skills. You can still learn from
old movies because killing is for the most part kiting/position work.
You can find some here or choose one down: http://warcraftmovies.com/movies.php?
class=4&category=1&tab=dls

Vurtne - Probably the best mage ever. He doesn't play anymore so the movie is a bit old.
http://warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=39506

Noone - Movie captured in TBC.
http://warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=70655

Saru & Tharbad - 2v2 with double Frost Mage
http://warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=55762

Gameking - Arena in WOTLK, 2v2 and 3v3
http://warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=131789

There aren't much good Cataclysm videos because the expansion is young and it takes
loads of time to make one.

Copied from http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/1710233539 :

Always CS a lock on Hand of Gul'dan. It will lock his fire and shadow school.
The same counts for a druids Starsurge and Frostfire Bolt from a mage.

If a warrior uses Spell Reflect, cast fire blast to take it away. If you're low you can use
Polymorph to get yourself up again.

If you spellsteal Hand of Sacrifice, 30% of the damage you take will still go to the paladin.

You can cast out of a rogues smoke bomb, you can't cast into it.

Spamming pet follow will stop your images to attack someone.

Flame orb hits rogues in stealth and brings them out, despite no animation of it hitting.

Save up 2 finger of frost procs, icelance twice, then pet nova and icelance twice more,
potentially 4 gamebreaking crits.

You can use Blink to avoid fall damage, just cast it when you're almost about to hit
the ground.

When defending a base in BG, position your pet twenty yards in front of you, you
can use its freeze spell to stop horde

in their tracks which lets the defence guys get the first hit in.



Critism is welcome as long as it's constructive.

#2







These are excerpts from world of warcraft armoury forum 

world of warcraft pvp mage build part 1

1. Spec
2. Glyphs
3. Stats
4. Gear
5. Gems & Enchants



1. Spec


At the moment there are 3 different builds viable.


Frost with middle burst, and passive oriented talents.
7/3/31
http://wowtal.com/#k=kqbKKsHC.aei.mage.


Frost with middle burst but alot of stuns due Impact.
2/8/31
http://wowtal.com/#k=SHRH95L6.aei.mage.


Frost with high burst, i recommend this one.
9/0/31
http://www.wowhead.com/talent#oMhbbZZffdhsusd0o


You can change the spec if you're feeling that something is not right.


2. Glyphs


Prime:


Glyph of Frostbolt - Increases the critical strike chance of your Frostbolt spell by 5%.
Glyph of Frostfire - Increases the damage done by your Frostfire Bolt by 15% and your Frostfire Bolt now 
deals 3% additional damage over 12 sec, stacking up to 3 times, but no longer reduces the victim's movement speed.
Glyph of Ice Lance - Increases the damage of your Ice Lance spell by 5%.


Major:


Glyph of Evocation - Your Evocation ability also causes you to regain 40% of your health over its duration.
Glyph of Polymorph - Your Polymorph spell also removes all damage over time effects from the target.


The third one depends on your playstyle as there are 3 options available. 
Alot of mages switched from Ice Barrier to Icy Veins or Blink because Ice Barrier is in a really bad state now.
Glyph of Ice Barrier - Increases the amount of damage absorbed by your Ice Barrier by 30%.
Glyph of Icy Veins - Your Icy Veins ability also removes all movement slowing and cast time slowing effects.
Glyph of Blink - Increases the distance you travel with the Blink spell by 5 yards.


Minor:


Here again it depends on your style, choose what you like.
Glyph of Conjuring - Reduces the mana cost of your Conjuring spells by 50%.
Glyph of Armors - Increases the duration of your Armor spells by 30 min.
Glyph of Slow Fall - Your Slow Fall spell no longer requires a reagent.
Glyph of Arcane Brilliance - Reduces the mana cost of your Arcane Brilliance spell by 50%.


3. Stats


First of all, get the hitcap. You don't want to lose an arena because you're Polymorph missed. The hitcap 
for mages is 4% and it isn't really hard to get it, if you're full PvP Gear you'll need probably 1 hit gem.
The Spell Penetration cap is 240, you have two options to get the cap:


Bloodthirsty cloak with 70 Spell Penetration enchant = 248
Vicious cloak with a hit gem = 251


Also, you need about 17% crit, otherwise youre shatters will never come off.


If you have these 3 stats it's: Int > Crit > Haste/Mastery.


4. Gear


PvE gear isn't viable in PvP anymore so i suggest to go full PvP gear. With Ice Barrier in this state you 
really need loads of resilience to stay alive. Most Mages are running with 3000-3400 resilience these days. 
NEVER gem for resilience because it isn't worth it. When you reached ~3300 you can choose to use Crit 
trinkets instead of resilience, but that's your choice.


If you have Engineering, make sure that you get Lightweight Bio-Optic Killshades with a +Crit and 
a +Resi cogwheel.


5. Gems & Enchants


Head - 60 Intellect and 35 Resilience rating
Shoulder - 50 Intellect and 25 Resilience rating
Cloak - 70 Spell Peneration/50 Critical Strike rating
Chest - 40 Resilience rating
Wrists - 50 Critical Strike rating
Hands - 50 Haste rating
Belt - Belt buckle
Legs - 95 Intellect and 80 Stamina
Feet - 30 Stamina and Minor Movement Speed
Main Hand - Power torrent or if you don't have the money Hurricane
Off Hand - 40 Intellect


Meta gem - Chaotic Shadowspirit Diamond
Red gem - 40 Intellect
Yellow gem - 40 Critical Strike rating or 67 Critical Strike rating if you have Jewelcrafting
Blue gem - 20 Critical Strike rating and 20 Hit rating or 50 Spell penetration
#1


so in the next post  I will cover:
6. Macros
7. Addons








These are excerpts from world of warcraft armoury forum 

Near miss in Adelaide for quantas

THE Victorian cricket team and Australian band the John Butler Trio were involved in a tense near-miss in Adelaide when the landing gear of their plane appeared to fail

Cricket Victoria spokeswoman Jessica Cook said the entire squad of 17 - including Australian team members Cameron White and Peter Siddle - and sports staff were on the plane from Darwin to Adelaide last night.

Ms Cook, who was travelling with the team, said after circling the airport several times, the Qantas crew advised passengers a cockpit light indicated a problem with the landing gear, particularly the front wheel.

After a tense 45 minutes, passengers were advised to prepare for a crash landing and get into a brace position.

"Every big name that we have was on the plane," she told AAP.

"There was certainly a bit of angst and we were very happy to get off the plane."



Ms Cook said the John Butler Trio was at the front of the plane and, like everyone else on board, was shaken by the ordeal.

Despite a "bumpy" touchdown, the plane landed safely, she said.

Apple can take your photo and shut down your jailbroken iPhone, iPad

APPLE has been accused of creating "traitorware" for trying to patent security software that tracks down people who jailbreak their iPhones and iPads and locks them out of their devices.
Jailbreaking allows users to access software and features for their devices that have not been sanctioned by Apple.
The process was declared legitimate by a US court earlier this month, but Apple said any such interference in their device will void its warranty.
Apple's patent, which went before the US Patent and Trademark Office earlier this week, is for "systems and methods for identifying unauthorised users of an electronic device".
Using the software, Apple can remotely access your sensitive information and data, ostensibly to determine if you are an “authorised user”.

Among the information they can access, the system can take a flashless, undetectable photo of the users' face (with the iPhone 4's front-facing camera) and multiple photos of the surrounding location.
It can also record the users' voice regardless of whether they are making a phone call, monitor their internet usage and record the heartbeat and “vibration signature” of the user.
According to the patent application, if these identifiers do not match the "authorised" user, the system then determines if there is "suspicious behaviour".
Suspicious behaviour, says the application "comprises one or more of hacking the electronic device, jailbreaking the electronic device, unlocking the electronic device, removing a SIM card from the electronic device, and moving at least a predetermined distance away from a synced device".
If Apple decides that all this adds up to unauthorised use they will remotely lock or shut down the offending iPhone or iPad, making it unusable.
It's been labelled by watchdog organisations as dangerous spyware. They even invented a new word for it – “traitorware”.
US civil liberties group, Electronic Frontier Foundation, has called the patent "downright creepy and invasive" and overkill for technology that is to track down a lost or stolen phone - something already possible with the "Mobile Me" app.
"This patented process could be used to retaliate against you if you jailbreak or tinker with your device in ways that Apple views as 'unauthorised' even if it is perfectly legal," it said.
There are obvious financial incentives for Apple putting an end to the legal process and the Electronic Frontier Foundation believe this could be the greater motive behind the software.
“This patent application does nothing short of providing a roadmap for how Apple can - and presumably will - spy on its customers and control the way its customers use Apple products.”
Electronic Frontiers Australia shares their concerns.

“There are huge privacy implications.” Colin Jacobs, chair of EFA told news.com.au
“It raises the risk of what happens if someone gains unauthorised access to the information… if this information is stored then it's pretty clear that someone will come looking for it.”

US military's top secret X-37B shuttle 'disappears' for two weeks, changes orbit

AMATEUR astronomers are enjoying a cat-and-mouse game with the US military in keeping track of its secret space plane, the X-37B.
The X-37B was launched in April amid much publicity, but scant detail about its true use.
Built by Boeing's Phantom Works division, the X-37B program was originally headed by NASA.
It was later turned over to the Pentagon's research and development arm and then to a secretive Air Force unit.

Only a very select few in the US military know what it's for, but observers on Earth believe they're putting together the puzzle piece by piece.
Several sources claim quote arms control advocates who say it's clearly the beginning of the "weaponisation of space".
In May, avid skywatcher Ted Molczan studied the X-37B's orbit from his home in Toronto and said its behaviour suggested it was testing sensors for a range of new spy satellites.
Since then, the X-37B been arguably the least-secret secret project on the planet, as fellow backyard astronomers joined in the scrutiny, aided by how-to video guides and apps such as the Simple Satellite Tracker.
That is, they did until July 29, when the shuttle disappeared, causing all kinds of consternation and conspiracy theories about its fate.
It took amateur skywatcher Greg Roberts of Cape Town, South Africa, who noticed that it failed to appear as scheduled above his base on August 14, another five days to find it.
When he did, he noticed it was some 30km higher and on a different trajectory, according to calculations from other colleagues in Rome and Oklahoma.
The X-37B's new track means it takes six days to pass the same spot on Earth, as opposed to its original four-day track.
Mr Molczan believes this may be another small piece to the puzzle about what role the shuttle may play in US military operations.
"This small change of orbit may have been a test of OTV-1's manoeuvring system, or a requirement of whatever payload may be aboard, or both," he said in a release paper about Roberts' X-37B find.
The shuttle has been in orbit now for 124 days. It uses a solar array once in space for power, which theoretically will allow it to stay airborne for up to 270 days.
But the additional presence of large fuel tanks and a rocket motor allows it to change orbit, as evidenced by the latest sudden change of course.
According to the The Register, this is a key component of its surveillance-related capabilities, along with the fact it can land in a much more versatile fashion than other shuttles.
Using its "cross-range" wings, it can duck off elsewhere once its entered the Earth's atmosphere rather than follow its oribital track to a pre-specified landing pad.
This means the X-37B can get up and down from space in one orbit, as its wings allow it to compensate for the slight turn in the Earth and bend it back to its original launch pad.
The Register says that capability would make it difficult to track, as it would only pass over a region once.
Theoretically, it could drop a spy satellite on one run, then pick it up on the next without the satellite having ever been detected.
Other observers claim the X-37B can carry a payload roughly the size of a medium-sized truck bed, or enough to hold a spy satellite.
According to the Pentagon, a second X-37B is under construction, so expect the guessing game to continue for some time about what the US military is really up to in space.
Until now, all that remains known about the X-37B is that is it has at least one trick - the ability to hide from skywatchers for two weeks

New Kindle 3 'everything the iPad isn't'

EARLY reviews for the new Kindle 3 are calling the e-reader "everything the iPad will never be".
Amazon's new device was this week shipped out to North American and UK customers who had been among the first to order the device.
Amazon has been offering its Kindle devices since 2007 and has managed to hold onto a large portion of the e-reader market despite increasing competition.
On the day it began shipping the newest devices, Amazon announced that the Kindle 3 was its fastest-selling device yet - a feat likely due in part to a rise in digital reading driven mainly by the Kindle itself.
The third-generation Kindle is smaller, lighter, and available in both Wi-Fi/3G and Wi-Fi-only versions.
Among reviews, PC World calls it "the first e-reader in months that's left me wanting to read more" and "a winner that shoots to the head of the pack", while PC Advisor says its set of upgrades "vaults it to the top of the e-book reader category".

While the Kindle is competing with a variety of other readers, including major contenders such as the Nook, Kobo, and Sony e-readers, the device's stiffest competition may come in the form of the iPad, Apple's tablet computer.
Wired, however, remarked that Kindle's "continued popularity bodes well for the future of single-purpose long-form reading devices," while The New York Times says "(The Kindle 3) is ingeniously designed to be everything the iPad will never be: small, light and inexpensive."
Among negative points, CNET notes the device's lack of support for ePub files.
All books in the Kindle Store are available exclusively in Amazon's proprietary format, a feature that is frequently cited by reviewers as one of its biggest drawbacks.
The Kindle 3 has a 6-inch-size reading area, measures 7.5 by 4.8 by 0.3 inches and weighs about 245g.
Other small, lightweight e-reading devices include dedicated readers such as the Sony Reader Pocket Edition and the COOL-ER e-reader, as well multi-fictional devices such as the Blackberry, Android phones, iPhone, and iPod Touch.