Which, come to think of it, we haven’t seen that many of lately. Guess the whole “flying mounts” thing has made Slow Falling for long distances not so interesting.And while we’re at it, before you say that you need Slow Fall to get the Going Down? achievement, you don’t. First of all, it won’t work, and secondly, there’s a better way to do it: as you’ve probably heard by now, you can do it just by jumping off of the platform on the Scryers Tier in Shattrath onto the little canopy hanging over from the Lower City below. Everybody has their own place for that, of course, but that’s the easiest.

Still, it’ll be nice to have Slow Fall for everyone — we can throw it on the list with Levitate as a class ability that’s been spread around a bit. Is it still too limited to include in game mechanics?

Christian caught this one in his last Arcane Brilliance column, but I figured the rest of us non-Mages might like to know as well: Slow Fall will be castable on others in patch 3.0.8. Very exciting — while there are a few other Slow Fall buffs in the game (and lots of parachutes, from all the vehicles in Northrend), now all you need to jump down from a high point in the game is a friendly Mage. We expect to see a nice jump up in the number of Slow Fall videos.

What you won’t see here is Dual Specs. They are scheduled for Patch 3.1. Patch 3.0.8 is on the horizon and there are a lot of interesting changes coming our way. Although this info is currently on the PTR (or Public Test Realm for those of you not into acronyms), this does not mean that it is final.

A lot of things could change before this patch goes live, but as things stand, here is a list of changes to be ready for.Leveling will become even more convenient, some fundamental gameplay changes are being made and classes are being adjusted… again. While these changes affect everyone, I’ll be going over the ones that will particularly matter to those of us with limited playtime.

More graveyards, faster death travel

Hardcore players are already decking out their level 80 in purples, but many more casual players are still leveling up mains and alts in the old world. (I certainly am.) With 60 new graveyards being added to both of the old continents, dying will become much less inconvenient. And as if that weren’t enough, everyone’s runspeed while dead has been increased. So gank away griefers! I’ll just run back and blink away before your emote macro has completed. Read the rest of this entry »

Shoveltusk Soup and Succulent Orca Stew were the two that didn’t make it back into the game, which makes one of 3.0.8’s patch notes make a lot more sense. You know, the one about Shoveltusk Meat being converted to quest items? And orcas are just Chilled Meat fodder now, it seems.The Northrend Gourmet has been a hot topic achievement since Northrend hit live realms, because it simply wasn’t possible. Four of the required recipes were completely missing. As of the current PTR build, that’s no longer true. Two of the recipes have been re-added to the game, and two recipes have been wiped out of existence. Not added to the game, but no longer an achievement requirement either.

Are there any major ramifications from removing the soup and stew? No, not really, unless you were sitting on a mountain of shoveltusk flesh. The buffs they supplied were redundant, offered by other meat as well as other fish. Sort of pointless recipes, really. This streamlines how many recipes you need more than anything else.

Kungaloosh is now taught by a drunkard in the sewers of Dalaran, who apparently has the recipes etched into his arm. And Fish Feast? I hope you like doing the Cooking daily, because it now requires 5 Dalaran Cooking Awards.