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Matthew Rossi

Matthew Rossi @MatthewWRossi — Matthew Rossi is a synapsid, perhaps descended from Cynognathus. He was born in Providence, Rhode Island, and grew up there before leaving to see the world and be mistaken for a sasquatch and/or minor singing celebrity in various locales. He currently lives and writes in Edmonton alongside his amazing and beautiful wife and their cats. He’s written three collections of speculative fiction, Things That Never Were, Bottled Demon and At Last, Atlantis. He loves playing warriors in World of Warcraft, barbarians in Diablo III, and he’s beginning to notice a pattern here.


The Queue: The coming of Red Thursday

Okay, so I have been inundated with ads hyping Red Thursday all week up here in Ice Station Canada. Since I am an aspiring Canadian citizen, I felt like I should at least try and figure out what Red Thursday actually is, and so far I can report that I have absolutely no idea. Is it a marketing scam created by legendary Canadian retail chain Canadian Tire? Possibly! Is it a ghoulish play on when doctors finally decide to perform life saving surgeries in a capitalist hellscape? Also possibly!


Titan Rune Dungeons will add a “Heroic Plus” difficulty to Wrath Classic dungeons — now live on the PTR

Wrath Classic is adding a new difficulty to dungeons in Phase 2 with Titan Rune Dungeons, which allow players to gear up with 10-man raid level loot from Phase 1 — helping to keep Wrath dungeons relevant throughout the game. Blizzard has talked about increasing dungeon difficulty and improving loot before, originally calling it "Heroic Plus," but now the feature is live on the PTR for testing.

What content do you most enjoy in an MMO?

I'll be up front -- I thought the Mission Table was the best innovation in Warlords of Draenor. Now, many years later, the news that it won't be in Dragonflight fills me with a kind of joy I wasn't aware I was capable of feeling -- a boisterous, almost terrifyingly primal exultation, like unto that you would expect to feel just before you started singing and a musical number just sort of happens.

How should Blizzard handle Allied Race restrictions in Dragonflight?

The first Allied Races we got were unlockable by doing Legion content, and the others all required Battle for Azeroth unlocks, which means as of Dragonflight we're talking two or three expansions ago. World of Warcraft certainly seems to be trying to make leveling easier and more streamlined, but that also makes those older expansion unlocks for Allied Races more and more extraneous, in my opinion.

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