Among the discussions that goes into World of Warcraft, one topic that's gotten the attention of the devs is the matter of User Interface (UI). With that said, we'll be making mention of Cogwheel's post from months back, which detailed a comprehensive list of UI-related suggestions for the game by the players.

The post has recently gotten the attention of Slouken - Blizzard's resident UI guru - who replied with a series of comments on what UIs the Blizz devs would indeed be implementing in the upcoming patches.

Given that the list was scattered through various posts at the WoW Forums thread, we've got WoWInsider to thank for summarizing the list into one cohesive form. We'll start off with which UIs Blizzard has decided not to use:

• Declined:
• Generic /sequence command
• Spell Queuing
• Vendor value without being at a vendor
• API to retrieve DND or AFK status message from another player
• Finer-grained action button enable/disable events with some logic moved C-side
• /stopcasting
• /swapgroup
• Some way to iterate over the pet spell lists of pets you're not currently using (client doesn't have this information)
  
• In Patch 2.3
• Eliminate the need for /stopcasting in macros that have multiple instant, non-GCD spells
• /petautocasttoggle
• /targetlastenemy, /targetlastfriend
• There is a new Frame member function: registered = Frame:IsEventRegistered("event")
• There will be a function to query which frames are registered for an event: frame1, frame2, ... = GetFramesRegisteredForEvent("event")

View the full list plus a few notes right at the full article!

 

This news just in from Big Blue Blizzard, who have accepted that latency between client and server is too varied and has yet to be fully addressed: the casting latency trick that some expert mages have been using for some time now is confirmed acceptable by administrative standards.

Or so says macro community manager Slouken, who comments, "FYI, we're working on something for [patch] 2.3 to help make /stopcasting lag workarounds unnecessary." Adding another possible fix - and hopefully an effective one - to patch version 2.3's possible change list makes this significant news indeed.

The exploit was reportedly addressed to a game master before, who assured that such an exploit was completely fine in their books - as long as it doesn't utilize automation techniques. The trick required the use of instinctive estimation, a casting latency addon known as Quartz, and a small macro script. It allegedly increased mage's DPS directly by as much as 20%.

While looking over the World of Warcraft forums, we noticed that Blizzard MVP Iriel had posted a list of upcoming changes to macros and user interface APIs for the future 2.2.0 release of the game.

It's currently a five-page thread that details the myriad changes that'll be happening once 2.2 comes about, with Slouken, Blizzard's interface expert, chiming in on the matter by offering clarifications and adding to the already impressive body of knowledge amassed there.

If you're a Blizzard interface fan, or spend your time coding nifty UIs for people to use, then you may want to take your look. It'll definitely be worth your while.

 

Some people have complained about a problem with fonts in World of Warcraft. The problem doesn't occur when viewing it at 100% scale; however, as the scales change the text itself becomes truncated.

This problem was brought up by CKKnight on the WoW Forums. In addition, the poster submitted a photograph of the said error along with the settings that were used. While this might not be a big issue to those who don't use scaled frame units, it is a major one for those who do. Sure it can be argued that experienced players know how high their hit points are but it's always good to have a visible reminder.

So far Blizzard Poster Slouken has responded and said that they will look into it. No resolution has yet been found. Keep checking back here for more updates on World of Warcraft.

Just a quick update for another patch 2.1 game bug, courtesy of World of Warcraft's ever-vigilant Public Test Realms (PTR) players. Cthon over at the WoW official forums reports that a bug was found while using the  IsUsableSpell ("Power Word: Shield") command:

IsUsableSpell("Power Word: Shield") now only returns "true" if you have a target. It did not do this before 2.1. Other spells that require a target still return "true" if you have them, whether or not anything is targeted.

Shortly after this report was posted, Blizzard spokesman Slouken came in to state that the bug was expected to be fixed by patch 2.1.2. Given that we're currently focused on Patch 2.1 for the moment, it remains to be seen as to when patch 2.1.2 will kick in. Stick around in case more news pops up or if you fancy reading up more on WoW's Death and Taxes guild interview.

A WoW Forum member named Shirly noted that a certain code (viewable using our "read" link below) which is designed to bind the MultiBarBottomLeft buttons such that they change their actions whenever the main action bar's page is changed worked fine with Blizzard's World of Warcraft. But that was until the 2.1 update.

Shirly said that after the 2.1 update, the code only worked out of combat. While in combat, the actions in the MultiBarBottomLeft buttons don't change. Shirly speculated that a bug could have caused this apparent malfunction.

Within the same day of the post, Blizzard Community Manager Slouken said that the errors with the code will be looked into.

Other Forum members like Iriel, confirmed that based on their testing, this was definitely a WoW bug. "There appears to be a problem with objects being created during AddOn load being tainted, regardless of where they're loaded."

Around 12 hours later (wow, that's sort of fast), Slouken said that this bug with the secure action buttons has been fixed. He says: "This is fixed for 2.1.2, thanks!"

All we have to do now is wait for 2.1.2.

 

Since the World of Warcraft Patch 2.1 has just gone live, it seems that some players need some getting used to some of the changes. Just like the unofficial swimming change, players have noticed the change on the dismounting macros (specifically the /dismount command).

Demar from the World of Warcraft Forums noted that the old macro he was using was not working anymore. Reportedly, the /stopmacro command somehow gets overlooked. His macro is for dismounting from a flying mount and then summoning his land mount. According to Blizzard blue poster Slouken (the User Interface pirate), there is a bug with /dismount but after patch 2.1, "/dismount and auto-dismounting via spell cast is effective immediately".

For those of you who are curious as to what UI dismounting macros currently work, you might want to check out the thread by clicking the Read link below.

Over at the bug-laden unpredictable World of Warcraft's Public Test Realms (PTR), another game glitch has been detected. A report over at the WoW forums UI and Macros threads indicates that certain in-game spell icons were unusually darkened, which rendered them inoperable.

According to the following discussions at the thread, what made this incident peculiar is that, as Lealla noted, "spell icons only darken when they are unavailable due to cooldowns, lack of mana, form/stance restrictions, etc. Besides, Avenging Wrath (AW) and Divine Strike (DS) are automatically self-targeted."

Shortly after the report, Blizzard spokesman Slouken replied that the bug will be gone come 2.1.0's release. That's all to report for now, as we keep abreast of what goes on with WoW's intrepid testing crew.

 

With the Public Test Realm (PTR) up and running with the World of Warcraft patch 2.1.0, players are reporting bugs with the system.

Maldivia for the EU servers (via Cogwheel from the WoW forums) reported the some bugs on the new Profession Links. Apparently, tooltips for items don't auto update (when the item in question has "to be fetched from the server and cached") but it does update reagent tooltips. Also, items that haven't been loaded on the server can be sent over public chat but players will be disconnected if they click on that particular professional link. Professional links are also sent over public chat in the wrong text and colors.

With those issues posted, Blizzard poster Slouken noted the PTR issues and said that they will be sent to the Quality Assurance department. PTRs are bound to have little bugs (and big ones, too) and it does help when players report them. Anybody else notice any problems?

Another bug has reportedly been fixed for World of Warcraft patch 2.1. The bug in question concerns the PLAYER_REGEN_ENABLED event which, as pointed out by WoW forums member Trevion in the official WoW forums, does not fire when a player is in combat and leaves an instance. Here are a few observations posted by Trevion regarding the bug:

Enter an instance such as Stockade and enter combat with a mob, then exit the instance .. or simply /afk out of a BG while in combat. You will notice for a moment that InCombatLockdown() is true then it will switch to false but PLAYER_REGEN_ENABLED never fires. This could simply be a semantic problem, but if so is there an event for when the lockdown is about to begin and after it ends?

I have seen the following documented:

• PLAYER_REGEN_DISABLED is sent before protected frames are locked down
• PLAYER_REGEN_ENABLED is sent after protected frames are unlocked

and

• PLAYER_REGEN_DISABLED : Fired whenever you get aggro, as normal regen rates are disabled during combat.
• PLAYER_REGEN_ENABLED : Fired after ending combat, as regen rates return to normal. Useful for determining when a player has lost aggro.

Anyway, as we have said, the bug is now fixed for WoW 2.1. According to Blizzard poster Slouken, players will get PLAYER_REGEN_ENABLED before PLAYER_LEAVING_WORLD fires.