Polestar 0.2.4

Polestar 0.2.4 is our biggest update yet. The arrow now walks real paths: round cliffs, walls and water, through town gates, into caves and down the Undercity's lifts, where our first version pointed in a straight line. Real paths are still a work in progress: now and then one may lead up a mountain or over an obstacle you can't climb, and we're improving them with every update. Around it, every trip is planned door to door, with flights, boats, zeppelins, the tram, lifts, portals, your Hearthstone and class teleports, and every leg timed in the guide window.

Also new: a Class category with 62 guides, party sync, Polestar in German and Latin American Spanish, group warnings on elite and dungeon goals, dungeon attunements you can be guided through, and dozens of guide fixes from your reports.

Polestar is still a beta. If something's off, tell us on Discord or GitHub Issues.

Updating

Quit the game completely and start it again after updating: 0.2.4 adds a new folder, Polestar_Nav, and a /reload doesn't load new addon folders.

The arrow walks real paths

• Real paths. The arrow follows the path Shortest Path Forever's routing engine finds from wherever you stand, and finds a new one when you stray. It never searches in combat, and if anything is missing you get the straight arrow as before.
• Polestar's own walking maps of Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor: out of an inn by its door instead of through the wall, down into the Undercity by its lifts, and never swimming across open sea (the water the game tires you in).
• The right floor. A walk to an NPC or object ends on its floor: Andron Gant is reached down in the Undercity's Rogues' Quarter, not on the street above it.
• Caves first. The arrow leads to a cave's mouth before anyone inside it: Goldtooth in the Fargodeep Mine, Grik'nir in the Coldridge troll cave, the Den behind Gornek, the Burning Blade Coven, Skull Rock and the Jasperlode Mine among them.
• Told step by step. "Walk to The Great Lift, Bottom", then "Take The Great Lift"; through a zone's gate or into a cave, each leg with its own time.
• Route lines on the world map and the minimap: dots along the real path where you walk, flights along the way the flight master actually flies, and boats, zeppelins and the tram as solid lines, each in its own colour.
• Go anywhere. Shift-click empty space on the world map or the minimap and the arrow takes you there; Alt-click works over map icons too. /polestar near repair (or trainer, vendor, innkeeper, bank, flight, stable and more) finds the quickest one to reach by route, not just the nearest as the crow flies.
• Spawn regions. Where a step's mobs and objects spawn is now a shaded region on the map, not a dot, and the goal the arrow follows wears the arrow's colour.
• Still a work in progress. Real paths are a big step up from the straight arrow, but they can still lead up a mountain or over an obstacle you can't climb. The worst slopes are already avoided (the Raptor Horns hillside in the Barrens now goes round), and we're refining the rest update by update. Found a bad route? Press F6 with it on screen and send us the report on Discord or GitHub (issue #98).
• The arrow no longer vanishes on the Deeprun Tram.
• Rather have the straight arrow? Options → Arrow & routes → "Walk real paths".

Developers' notes: The routing engine is Cillian Berragan's, from his addon Shortest Path Forever, and Polestar carries it with his kind permission. The walking maps of Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor are our own, built from the game's terrain, water and buildings in his map format; Zephras Isle uses his. They take about 26 MB of memory and load only while "Walk real paths" is on.

Travel, planned door to door

• Lands where the walk is short. The route measures the real walks from the flight masters, docks, portals, inn and teleports near your target, so it no longer lands on the far side of a ridge: a marker near Astranaar no longer sends you from Sun Rock Retreat straight over the mountains. The walks later on the route follow their real paths too, each with its own time.
• Zone crossings. Walks between zones go through the real tunnels, passes, bridges and gates, from Carbonite's zone crossings: from the Barrens to Astranaar the route now walks the Talondeep Path.
• Real timetables. Boats, zeppelins, the Deeprun Tram and lifts run to their real schedules, from the transport model the servers use, so a route weighs the actual wait and ride. Ride a boat, a zeppelin or the tram and Polestar times it: for the next six hours the arrow says "Next boat in 1:20" or "Boat docked, leaves in 0:40", and the route takes the boat you can actually catch. Untimed, it says "Next boat in about 2:55".
• Share boat times with your guild and group on your realm: Options → Arrow & routes → "Share boat times" (off by default).
• The journey in the guide window: under the step, every leg numbered with its own countdown ("1. Walk to The Great Lift, Top 11:10", "2. Take The Great Lift, leaves in about 0:15 · ride 0:10"), with the total time and distance on top. Click the header to fold it.
• Travel button. When the route says to hearth or teleport, a button under the arrow casts it, and you can bind it to a key ("Use the route's Hearthstone or teleport"). Right-click the arrow or use /polestar skipleg to skip a leg.
• Class teleports and portals. Routes can start with a mage's Teleport (with a Rune of Teleportation), a druid's Teleport: Moonglade or a shaman's Astral Recall when it's off cooldown and faster, and they use the Darnassus and Rut'theran Village portals.
• Transport alerts. 30 seconds before your boat, zeppelin or tram comes in, and 20 before your stop on board: a countdown banner, the ship's bell or the zeppelin's horn, and a flashing taskbar icon. Never in combat.
• The flight map highlights the route's flight and its hops.
• A point you set before dying (a map click, /way) comes back once you're alive again.

Works with Shortest Path Forever

Run Shortest Path Forever too? Polestar now hands it the route, so the two never guide at once. Each guide goal goes to it as a stop with the game's own mark (a quest's "!" or "?", a trainer, a flight master, a dungeon, a boat), and a kill or collect area guides you there, then stays quiet while you work it. Polestar's own arrow, route lines and journey step aside, and its walking maps aren't loaded.

Prefer Polestar's arrow? Turn off Options → Arrow & routes → "Guide with Shortest Path Forever when it's installed".

Guides

• A new Class category with 62 guides for the class quest chains of every class, one guide per goal: Druid forms and Cure Poison, Rhok'delar and Lok'delar, the Mage robes and Polymorph: Pig, the Paladin's Tyr's Watch, Benediction and Anathema, Ravenholdt and the Rogue's poisons, the Shaman totems, the Warlock's felhunter, incubus and Orb of Orahil, the Warrior's armour and weapon chains, and more. Each one shows what it gives and why it's worth doing. The class mounts moved here too, and the Charger and Dreadsteed guides now walk their whole chains.
• Class quests on the leveling route. Every start takes its class letter to the trainer, and class quests come along the way: Cure Poison for Druids, Mirror Lake for Mages, the Hunters' taming quests and more.
• Refreshed leveling routes that take Forever's new quests: Shipment to Stormwind, Crown of the Earth, a Wetlands loop out of Menethil, Gloomrise, Stop the Screeching and more. The Tauren start no longer walks to Durotar.
• Group warnings. A goal that needs a group says so under it ("Elite: group advised", "Dungeon: Dire Maul", "Raid: Molten Core"), and guides with group content are tagged "Group" in the menu.
• Clearer goals. "Complete" goals show their progress (The Hunt Begins 8/14), and item goals say where the item comes from ("Kill Grellkin or Grell for Fel Moss").
• A class guide opened before your level says "Available from level 20" instead of sending you to a trainer with nothing for you.
• Quests Forever renamed carry their Forever names (Chastise, Dark Sacrifice and others).
• The published leveling times count only what a guide requires: about 130-132 hours to 60 for the Horde and 132-134 for the Alliance, as the simulator estimates them.

Dungeons and Lookup

• Attunements. Molten Core, Onyxia's Lair, Blackwing Lair, Naxxramas, Scholomance, Blackrock Depths, Stratholme, Dire Maul and more have an Attunement tab: what each key opens, whether you hold it, every step with your progress, and "Guide me through it".
• Hand in the quests. After a run, a dungeon's page builds a guide to every turn-in for its quests in your log, on the shortest path from where you stand.
• Dungeon quests list their whole chains, and their rewards show reputation, money and item counts (108 quests showed no rewards before).
• Dungeons list event and rare bosses and boss chests with their loot, and a boss's own drops come first.
• Lookup knows the reputation about 180 vendor rewards need, and 286 more NPCs show their level.

New features and options

• Party sync. In a party, the guide shows party members' progress under shared quest goals (Ana 5/8, Ben done) and who lacks a quest you took. Quest IDs and counts only, nothing in chat, and off until you turn it on: Questing → Quests → Party.
• German and Latin American Spanish. On a deDE or esMX client, Polestar's interface is in German or Spanish, in the game's own terms.
• One key for the step (Key Bindings → AddOns → Polestar → "Step action"): targets the NPC, uses the quest item or the Hearthstone, or targets the step's mobs, in guide order.
• Paladin talent plans (/pole talents): Holy, Protection and Retribution leveling plans, with the next pick ringed on your talent frame. It never spends a point for you.
• New helpers, all off by default:
  • Buy for the guide (Quality of Life → Vendors): buys what the step needs at a merchant, after selling greys and repairing.
  • Learn new spells (Quality of Life → Vendors): learns every new class spell you can afford when you open your trainer.
  • Wear reward upgrades (Questing → Rewards & gear): puts on quest rewards that are upgrades.
  • Warn about missable quests (Guide → Automation): warns before you take a quest that closes another for good.
• Grow upward: the guide window keeps its bottom edge in place as steps grow.
• Step tips now start fully open, and the guide window stays visible in combat by default.
• The instance counter ("1/5 this hour") stays off the screen unless you turn it on (Quality of Life → Trackers → Instances → "Compact display"); instances are still counted, and /pole instances lists your runs.
• A rare alert's "Set waypoint" goes to the rare itself, not a spawn point across the zone.
• At login, Polestar tells you if your install is incomplete and how to fix it.
• Bugs posted in our Discord's #bugs forum are now tracked on GitHub: you'll hear back in your thread when the bug is fixed, and again when the fix is out.

Fixes

• The Barrens: Her Name Is Olgra comes after Lost in Battle is handed in; Walton and Vrang's quests come in the order the game offers them; Kolkar Leaders no longer jumps to the turn-in before Barak Kodobane.
• Dun Morogh: Grik'nir is inside the troll cave, not on the hill above it, and Beer Basted Boar Ribs is offered without Cooking.
• Starting zones: Dolanaar Delivery and Supplies to Tannok are taken on the way out instead of a detour back, and Durotar's Cutting Teeth goes back to Gornek right away.
• Vendors and trainers the guide picks put towns in zones far above your level last: a level 18 in Darkshore was sent to Mount Hyjal.
• Class training ticks itself off when your trainer has nothing new for you, and Darnassus hunters go to the right trainer.
• Quest items that expire reach their turn-in in time (the Scalding Mornbrew, the Arcane Quickeners).
• Skip grey quests now really skips them.
• The quest item button offers only an item from the step's own quests: Bethor's Potion no longer sits on it through the Barrens.
• Ticking an accept off without taking the quest no longer sends you to farm for it; its goals leave the guide, and come back if you take the quest after all.
• Also fixed: Hides for the Forsaken's counts in Tirisfal Glades, the Hunters' taming rods on Zephras Isle, the Sapphires of Aku'Mai underground in Ashenvale, and Goldtooth inside the Fargodeep Mine in Elwynn Forest.
• The Target button and the step key pass over names hiding a line break, so a guide pack can't slip a command into their macro.

Thank you

Code in this release from CDVolvik, thecodingcortex, jnickles85-bit, meellm, petllama and thmastin. Reports and fixes from Arachnit, joelwurtz, AndarKerran, c0nsy, Feverish, kp, Miguel Antunes, Mightie, Mike_, Pynte, Roxton, SavageHands, Sevenleafclover, Shockp, Tom, Turesh, Verium, Wogi and everyone posting in #bugs.

A special thank you to Cillian Berragan. Polestar's routing engine, its timetables, its route lines and many of its travel features come from his addon Shortest Path Forever, used with his kind permission under the GPL. It's a superb addon: go and give it a look. The zone crossings come from Carbonite (Carbonite Classic, originally by Carbon Based Creations, released under the GPL): thank you to its authors. And thank you to Nivek_Gaming, whose idea started the route planner and the walking grid our maps are built from.

Every change is in the full changelog.