zircon

Subtlety or "Prep" (preparation) spec rogues are generally suited for PVP and ganking. All those improved cooldowns and abilities really come in handy for making huge bursts of damage and just nailing your opponent as quickly as possible. You will, of course, be Dagger-spec so you can get Backstab and Ambush. Sword spec rogues are more PVE oriented, and better against heavily armored targets, as their Sinister Strikes will be more powerful. That's just what I know so far. I'm still levelling up my Rogue. Money has lots of purposes, too - epic mounts, materials for crafting, librams.. but it's MAINLY useful as a means of trade with other players. I always need more money to get potions, trade goods, enchants, and so forth.

Yes. It would have been ridiculous to have people play hundreds of hours of PVP (30-40+ a week) to HOLD their max rank.

No, they've addressed that. The items you can wear are based on your highest lifetime rank, not your current rank. That was the latest patch change.

I think the top rank PVP stuff is getting buffed. Currently, some dropped items (like Untamed Blade from BWL) are better than the highest rank PVP stuff - and that is next to IMPOSSIBLE to get.

Shamans are king of PVP as far as I'm concerned. They are really a PVP-oriented class, because they are capable of putting out massive burst damage with shocks (as well as status effects), they can enhance their own movement, clean debilitating effects, heal (slow OR fast), hit hard in melee, and screw up enemy casters with tremor/grounding totems as well as enemy melee with Earthbind. The reason their PVE usefulness is diminshed is that their big DPS cannot be sustained - they are very mana dependent. In PVP, it doesn't matter, since most fights are short. My PVP gear switch is entirely +Stamina based because I know that 95% of the time, when I die, it's with a lot of mana (and what good is the mana if you're dead?). But in PVE, you want to have good regeneration, aggro-reducing talents, and sustained healing or DPS - Shamans can do all that, but they're not as overpowered there as they are in PVE. Paladins, on the other hand..

You can always make two characters and see which one you like more. BTW more updates from Gorefiend, Horde - * Onyxia down for the third time (from my guild's hand anyway) * Eye of Shadow IS A BITCH TO GET. Why did they make this so hard? There are 5 guilds ahead of mine, when you consider alliance, that we never get Kazzak. So I have to farm Winterspring for 40+ hours to even have a shot. * Ragnaros hueg

This is definitely a creative mix that certainly brings some interesting ideas to the table. The overall style reminds me strongly of Vigilante's work, particularly "MayFortuneSmileUponYou, but there are plenty of things that make this mix unique as well. I thought that the arrangement was excellent. The original was very simplistic in its melody and progression, and in my opinion, somewhat boring and predictable. This track is clearly a remix of that source in that the melody and some of the fundamental rhythms are the same, but the changes to harmony and progression, as well as the addition of LOTS of new material makes it a great rearrangement. What I especially liked was the new progressions and chords added towards the middle of the song, which fit perfectly with the feel and composition of the source tune. 2:03 and beyond REALLY makes this mix, with the combination of acoustic, electric, and heavily processed material. Structurally, while it is on the minimal side, the creative guitar processing and ambient pads/electric guitar parts that are added later on make it dynamic. The mix between the washy, ambient stuff and the acoustic strumming is superb. It's very difficult to pull off that kind of thing without the song sounding muddy and completely washed out, so major props there. In fact, I had no problem with any of the production elements here. The initial wave sounds were a bit lofi (sounded like 8bit 22khz or something low like that) but otherwise, recording, playing, mixing, processing.. all great. Overall I think this is a very creative and well-executed mix that is a LOT more engaging than most guitar mixes we get. Fantastic job! YES

Hmm.. my guild tried Ragnaros for the first time today (only been beaten once to date on Horde for our server). Our MT has 300+ fire res but no one else really has all that much. We got absolutely obliterated.. brought him to 89%, didn't even get to Phase 2. He's a beast.

Err. Really, whatever you want. Race doesn't have a HUGE impact. That said, here's my recommendations. Orcs make good Warriors and Hunters because of their increased resistance to stun, improved Axe skill, improved pet handling, and the ability to give themselves a temporary attack boost. Undead can do pretty much anything. Their "Cannibalize" is great for melee classes because it reduces downtime, and Will of the Forsaken makes them much harder to kill for Priests and Warlocks (dispels Charm, Fear, and Sleep and grants immunity to those temporarily). Undead Priests get one of the best offensive spells in the game, Devouring Plague, Trolls... are one of the most gimp races in the game. They have no really useful abilities, since Berserking doesn't quite work properly. But, Berserking probably makes a lot of sense for Warriors and Rogues.

One thing that struck out at me first was the lack of overall production quality. While I'm the last person to expect spectacular mastering and engineering, I think it's nonetheless an important aspect of a song and needs to be considered with everything else. The whole mix sounds sort of dull, with all the parts sort of muddied together, the percussion being 'far back' and bland except for the hats. The drum sequencing itself isn't bad (though some of the patterns don't seem to fit the style you're going for), but the samples and production need work. I suggest reading in the remixing forum for more help on that subject, or even talk to Compyfox to try to get a brighter and more 'alive' mix than what you have now. The string samples have got to go. The marcato ones especially are just BAD. Please find something else or remove them entirely, they actually detract from the mood you were going for. The recording of the guitars seemed better in comparison to this other stuff, but a little reverb to make them less dry would have been nice. They also felt out of sync at times with the percussion, and the sometimes odd panning of the different strums and layers was disorienting. The lack of reverb/delay or any other kind of spatial processing was apparent especially in the parts with ethnic percussion, and towards the end with the sparse vocals (where everything seemed to be pretty out of sync). Arrangement-wise this isn't BAD, but it needs a lot of work. The structure doesn't seem to actually go anywhere - it's just playing the theme back, more or less, with few creative changes and not much of an unique interpretation factor. It's 5+ minute length made the entire thing feel dragged out, like only a few minutes of ideas were being stretched to fit. This also led to some sparseness throughout the mix as well at different times, although that might also have been due to the relatively minimal instrumentation. You can have a relaxing acoustic mix but still do more "stuff" with just a few instruments. I'd say this needs considerable work all over, as Larry said. NO

Veilon, I suggest you read my ReMixing Tips Part 3, which covers Synthesis. The techniques I write about apply to Subtractor.

Right, I'm not saying its a Rewire problem, I even said "that's the problem, with FLStudio anyway". Here's how FL treats rewire. 1. You add a "Rewired" channel. 2. You select the Rewire client.. in this case Reason. 3. You hit "Show Panel". This actually loads Reason alongside FL so you can go and edit stuff. 4. To access Reason's sounds, you click on "MIDI Options" in the Rewired settings. There is a list of MIDI channels, each ONE being a Machine. So #1 is "Hardware Interface". To actually use one, you select Output from the "Map" menu, select a MIDI port, and then click "Add" (there is a "To" menu as well, but all it says is Reason 6.. no other options). So by doing that, you set an Output port to 'bus 6', and then use FLStudio's MIDI outs to actually send the MIDI data.

One thing I noticed throughout here was a lot of reverb, and an almost constantly running Malstrom preset (that is SO overused that it's not even funny). Come on.. do at least SOME editing to that! But I think more of an issue is the amount of reverb all around, particularly on the percussion. There are some cases where you want to bring that back a bit, even though I realize you're going for a certain atmospheric feel - stuff sounds 'farther back' than it should for backing percussion. In addition, I thought that the drum sequencing was largely pretty plain and bland. More layering, variation, and humanization would help it to be more engaging and less plodding in nature. On the other hand, I thought the other instruments and the synths were executed well. The arrangement seemed pretty strong to me, although overall, the structure seemed somewhat sparse, with usually only one instrument taking the foreground, and everything else just sort of setting the stage. However, none of those foreground instruments or melodies were so good that they should have been put by themselves like that - they're not PARTICULARLY expressive. I would suggest adding more material throughout the song to fill it out, by means of different pads, instruments playing harmony parts or chords, countermelodies, that sort of thing. I do like how you change stuff over the course of the song's length, but I didn't think it happened fast enough. It seemed drawn out and repetitive because of how minimal the arrangement was. The original material - the solos - weren't awful, but didn't really add much. I think you could remove some of those and not hurt the overall mix. Basically, the interpretation factor is there, but work still needs to be done on this. NO

The way Rewire works, every MACHINE will take up another MIDI channel on the list. That's the problem, at least with FLStudio. It doesn't matter how many 'audio tracks' you do or don't have.

Yes, Rogues are essential in many encounters, Ragnaros being one of them. They can do nearly as much damage as a mage and spend no mana. They're an extremely well-designed class and should not be complaining.

No, I said 100+ machines. I tend to make very complex setups very fast.

Yeah.. I posted that video on page 8. Totally sick.

Warrior. But Hunter has a pretty good variety too.

What, killing people? Isn't that the POINT of PVP?

I agree with my fellow judges here. The playing is on the sloppy side and needs a lot of tightening, as do the other song elements. Either invest in or search for a less overused drumset too - surely you can find something a bit more natural and acoustic in nature. What you are using now is very electronic in nature, and it's being sequencing in a pretty mechanical way. The overall interpretation factor is low as well, you say yourself this is basically a cover. We really look for RE-arrangements of stuff. Add your own material, add variations, mess with the harmony or rhythms, do things to make your remix your own. My main advice now would be to work on your playing and timing, as well as some of your production values to get that guitar to have a little more edge (without overriding everything else). NO

Oh man.. I just changed my opinion on rogues after watching "World of Roguecraft". It's an EXTENSIVE pvp video showing a Rogue (or at least a Rogue being played by a Warlock) using nothing but Rogue abilities/talent and bandages, and fighting other level 60s who all have max health. He starts with Shadowcraft, a Krol Blade, and a decent offhand. He then wears all Wildheart, and removes the offhand, as well as downgrades his rings/trinkets. Then, he puts some Shadowcraft on and uses 2 Worn Blades (.9dps). Next, he uses all Wildheart with the 2 Worn Blades. Afterwords, he uses ONE Worn Blade. For the grand finale? He uses NO GEAR AT ALL except ONE WORN BLADE. The whole time he is owning other 60s of different classes, even when he's being attacked by more than one person. Unbelievable. And he uses NO potions, NO engineering skills, nothing cheap - just Rogue abilities and bandages (periodically).

More people need to play on Gorefiend, Horde. It owns.

What's wrong with the current method of adding channels or routing? Also, they've had a graphical DB plugin for AWHILE.. and there are already meters.

Yes, and also wet/dry signal ratio, and probably left/right also.

Say you want reverb on 10 mixer tracks. Making 10 individual instances is kind of inefficient. A send track lets you create one reverb, and put it on the send track. Any other track can then apply 0 to 100% of the send's reverb. Or any other effect for that matter. Before, FL only had 4 sends, but now you can have up to 64, which is cool.