So did you survive the latest patch? Surprisingly, my patch day went relatively smoothly, thanks primarily to the Blizzard background downloader doing it’s job over the past few weeks and carefully managing my library of addons. Once the new launcher had downloaded I was up and ready to go. Well almost. Here’s my spin on some of the new features.

Managing Addons with Patch 5.04

It’s usual for addons to cause the biggest headaches when a new patch arrives. They’re flagged as ‘out-of-date’ by the interface or simply break when loaded until developers can update them. I was on a Hangout recently with Sapu, the lead developer of the addon Trade Skill Master (TSM), and I asked him if TSM would work with the new patch. He assured me it would if I was running with the latest code for 4.3 – which I was. Of course, all addons for 4.3 are ‘flagged’ as out-of-date by the interface and won’t load unless you explicitly click the option to do so. This normally doesn’t cause a problem for most addons, but you may get a few non-fatal errors with a few.

I try not to run with too many addons – just enough to manage my auctions and crafting:

Auctioneer – my main auction house addon

TSM – all modules, but mainly for crafting.

Postal – mail management

Gathermate – for gathering.

On patch day I went ahead and loaded my addons. Most worked fine, except Auctioneer which threw the occasional error. Fortunately, there is a 5.04 patch compatible beta version available for download (version 5.14) at Curse Gaming. Patch 5.04 compatible versions of TSM and Gathermate are also now available at the same location. Unfortunately, Postal is still limping along, but not too badly. I’ll keep loading it until the new version arrives.

AOE Looting

With addons out of the way I was keen to try AOE looting. This feature allows a player to aggro a mob, kill them all – either one by one or with an AOE (Area of Effect) spell – and then loot them all by simply looting only one of the corpses.

I rushed off to Stratholme to try this out. And what a difference it now makes to clearing an instance. My Mage cut a swath through the undead like a Grim Reaper. It also allowed me to try some of the new spells using my Frost Spec Mage.

I first created a Ring of Frost and stood in the middle. I then planted my newly acquired Frost Bomb on one of the mob, causing the rest of the mob to rush over and get trapped in my Ring of Frost. I then simply rained down death in the form of Blizzard. I then looted the whole mob in one go. Rinse and repeat until all bags full.

Pet Battle System

Unfortunately, the new pet battle system is not operational for this patch, despite the new training manual being present in my player’s Spell Book. This probably inspired many players to rush off to the Auction House to pick up a few pets, as all my crafted pets flew off the shelves at well above market price. Here’s my list of sales on patch day:

4 x Magic Lamp (Enchanting) – listed 1000g each

4 x Pet Bombling (Engineering) – listed 450g each

4 x Mechanical Yeti (Engineering) listed at 500g each

2 x Lil’ Smokey (Engineering) – listed at 350g each

Unfortunately, I had sold out of all my De-Weaponized Mechanical Companions so had none ready for the day. The few listed on my server were selling at around ten times the price and still holding steady!

Where Did All My Glyphs Go?

Scribes probably had the busiest day as most change occurred with Glyphs. All major glyphs were removed and I found a few quirky minor glyphs in their place. One such glyph changed my Polymorph Sheep into Polymorph Porcupine! Another let me understand the Arcane Racial Language of my allies? Beats me what it does!

The Auction House Laid Bare

Fortunately, I had stocked up with herbs, including many Wraith herbs which proved to be very profitable as the Auction House soon was bare of many mats as players ransacked the place looking to buy at any price (usually, my very high price)! My Alchemist sold out of batches of Potion of Treasure Finding and Flasks of Steel Skin but otherwise had a quite day.

The cooldown for Truegold is now removed, but the choke point on my server is still volatile air which kept prices at their market level. I expect the prices to gradually fall over time and peak when Mists of Pandaria goes live.

One Volatile I hadn’t expected to be in short supply was Volatile Life which was nowhere to be found on my server. The reason is probably the new inscription recipes that seem to use this mat in great quantities. So I spent a little time farming Whiptail in Uldum to maintain my own personal supply.

I hope your patch day was as successful.

Marcus Ty