MMORPGDot Feature: World of Warcraft Beta Journal #7
Dialogue, 2004-04-22

Rest System

I'll go ahead and get the most talked about portion of the new push out of the way. The Rest system, as it exists in the current push, gives players incentives for not playing overly long and for using multiple characters. Characters that are in play for an extended period of time (5+ hours) killing monsters and gaining experience begin to tire. This is expressed through a series of states. They are (from highest to lowest) Well Rested, Rested, Normal, Fatigued, and Exhausted. The highest state, "Well Rested", can be achieved through 8 hours of "sleep". Sleep amounts to time offline, when the character is logged out at an inn. The time to reach Well Rested is identical no matter how weary your character is. An Exhausted character takes 8 hours to reach Well Rested, as does a Rested character. Characters who are not logged out at an inn do not gain back levels of the rest tier. These states of rest govern how much experience you gain from killing monsters. Well Rested Characters receive a 100% experience bonus. Rested, 50%, Normal, None, Fatigued, 1/2 normal, and Exhausted, 1/4 normal. Through this xp incentive, Blizzard is encouraging a casual gamer behavior and apparently penalizing "hardcore" players.

In my week or so of playing with the rest system in place, I've only ever run myself down to Rested once, and that was on a Saturday. I am the epitome of the casual gamer, though. I have a full-time job and a fiancée; My average time in-world during a week is about 25 hours or so. To be honest I think even those people who have the time to play for 8 hours straight are overstating things quite a bit. As long as you give your character 8 hours of downtime every day, you'll always be in the Well Rested state. Playing even one other character ensures that your primary will never drop below the highest rest tier. Be at peace, my hardcore brethren.

Aside from design issues, the Rest system has resulted in some excellent gameworld results. Inns are now interesting, vibrant places. They are chok full of trainers, merchants, and players at all times of the day and night. Inns are natural centers of trade and opportunities to gang up with players for quests. WoW Inns now remind me fondly of the places where so many youthful D&D adventures began. Players who have been whining endlessly for a teleport of some point can now rejoice in the acquisition of hearthstones. A hearthstone is handed out the first time you "check in" at an inn. The hearthstone is bound to the last inn you check in at. Hearthstones, when activated, teleport you instantly back to your "home" inn. These small stones are now the best means of ending your evening or making a merchant run quickly and conveniently.

Combat Changes

Combat has been changed significantly. Damage is now controlled more directly by your class, level, and attributes than by what weapon you wield. This seems to have resulted in longer fights with creatures at or above your level, and quicker fights with creatures below your level. Shields have been given a chance to block, making them useful even beyond the armor increase. When a creature is above your current level, fights have been made significantly tougher. Even creatures two levels beyond your own are a tough battle and may well result in your death. Chances to hit creatures above your level, as well as spell resists, have been significantly increased. If a creature is enough levels away from your character, you will simply never be able to hit it.

"Tapping" is another oft-mentioned subject added into the game by this push. The first character who attacks a creature claims it for himself and his group. All other players see the creature's portrait turn grey. Anyone can attack the target, but only those who have the creature tapped will gain xp and loot from the creature when it is slain. This is intended to assist players who have complained of kill stealing issues. Except for spell-punking casters, this seems to have largely eliminated the problem.

Skill System & Level Advancement

You recall everything I mentioned to you before about level advancement, talents, and skill? Forget about it. The new level advancement schema is...different. At each level, you gain hit points, mana, and talent points (as before). However at the moment talents are disabled. These crucial benefits are going to be reopened to us at some point in the future, completely reworked. Character improvement of attributes is instead handed through "skill points". Skill points are gained by killing creatures. Every 600 points of experience received from killing monsters (unaided by rest bonuses) results in the acquisition of one skill point. Skills are used at level gain to increase attributes and to purchase tradeskills from trainers. We are ostensibly supposed to be able to increase our weapon, magical, and trade skills using our points but at the moment that functionality seems to be disabled. At the moment, the only thing that skill points are useful for is increasing attributes after level gains. Overall level advancement is in a half-completed state that is very hard to comment on because so many elements are missing. It's made for some confusing and frustrating gameplay this past week. I'm looking forward to the patching in of additional elements.

Misc.

Beyond these major changes, a score of minor bugs and annoyances have been taken care of. Cloaks are now visible, and look really cool. Some memory leaks have been plugged and areas optimized, improving performances in some of the more traditionally laggy areas of the game. Collision detection has been greatly improved, meaning that my personally least favorite bug, the "falling through the world problem" has been largely taken care of. Nearly every class has been retuned and some people are very unhappy about it. The Rogue's "Sap" ability has been greatly reduced in effectiveness as a crowd-control device. Clerics have lost the ability to cast "Sleep" (another crowd controller) to Mages. To be honest, this change doesn't make a whole lot of sense to me. The whole concept behind WoW clerics was to include a crowd control element. I guess they're rethinking that angle. Paladins and Mages have been made slightly less uber through some mana cost tweaks to spells and some cooldown increases. Warriors have actually improved through some cooldown and rage cost reductions. The warrior ability "Charge" has been changed so that the warrior appears to move quickly across the ground, as opposed to teleporting. The level cap has been moved up to 35, allowing slightly more high end content and requiring the opening of some new dungeons.

Overall the changes are very interesting and lay the groundwork for some major changes to come. I'll do my best to keep you informed as they are incorporated. Next week I'll give you my look at the grimmest of the player races, the Undead. Until we meet in Tirisfal Glades...