In some ways, we're fortunate that Cataclysm has simplified these for us. There are fewer must-have talents; several passive talents were rolled into the talent specialization bonuses for picking a spec; and there's room for us to choose what we want and don't want. First, we'll look at each spec's talent specializations and then the talents and abilities therein. We covered mastery bonuses for all three specs in this column, so we won't discuss them again here aside from mentioning what they are.
Arms talent specializations are Mortal Strilke for the active attack and for passives, Two-Handed Weapon Specialization and Anger Management. The mastery is Strikes of Opportunity. The fury talent specializations are Bloodthirst (an active attack) and Dual Wield Specialization and Precision for passive bonuses, with Unshackled Fury as the mastery. There's no real choice involved in any of these save for the choice that you make between each tree at level 10, so simply be aware of them and their interaction with your chosen spec.
An arms warrior will be using a priority-based system based around the Mortal Strike ability, applying bleeds with Rend and the Deep Wounds talent and using Overpower and Colossus Smash as they proc. Slam and Heroic Strike are rage dumps, with Execute becoming a powerful attack when your target is below 20 percent health. We'll take a look at arms talents of consequence now.
Tier 1 arms talents are War Academy, Field Dressing, and Blitz. Field Dressing is a talent for leveling and tanking; most arms warriors will probably use it for a while but abandon it in a pure DPS spec. It's also strong for PvP. Blitz is also a good PvP talent for an arms warrior as well as a solid tanking talent, very useful for flag defense and the like. War Academy is simply a DPS boost that all arms warriors will take.
Tier 2 and 3 arms talents include Deep Wounds, Taste for Blood, Sweeping Strikes, and Impale. These are all straightforward DPS increases either through additional damage, allowing procs, or increasing how many targets you hit. Tactical Mastery allows for rage conservation when switching stances (useful for PvP or when trying to use abilities from Defensive or Berserker stance in general); Second Wind provides a little extra survivability when stunned; Drums of War allows you to save rage when interrupting or debuffing; and Improved Hamstring gives you a chance to immobilize someone you've snared. You don't have real CC, but you can provide excellent snaring with this talent.
For the fourth and fifth tier of the arms tree, we have Improved Slam, Deadly Calm, Blood Frenzy, Lambs to the Slaughter, Juggernaut, and Sudden Death. Unless something changes drastically before we reach level 85, Improved Slam is probably the least desirable of these talents. Deadly Calm is an excellent cooldown for either situations where you're low on rage but need to put out damage now, or for when you reach execute territory and want to keep all of your rage for the next execute. Blood Frenzy is still a solid debuff; it helps with rage generation, which is always a plus for arms. Lambs to the Slaughter is a DPS increase for using arms' main attack; Juggernaut is just plain awesome and increases your damage after you use Charge; and Sudden Death makes Colossus Smash a viable part of your rotation, which is awesome due to Colossus Smash's ability to bypass armor.
Finally, we have Wrecking Crew, Bladestorm, and Throwdown. Take all three. Frankly, I'm not even going to bother going over why you should; just do it. If you don't want to take these talents as a DPS warrior, you want to be fury.
Speaking of fury, the fury "rotation" is more fluid and dependent on enrages. You'll use Bloodthirst on cooldown, with Heroic Strike taking up a big part of the rotation up now due to its being off the global cooldown (meaning that you can hit HS and BT at the same time without stepping on, say, a Raging Blow proc) and Raging Blow when it procs. You're intended to use Bloodsurge-procced Slams on cooldown, as well. But with Slam damage being lackluster for the foreseeable future and Colossus Smash, Raging Blow, and HS for the single-target rotation (and Cleave/Whirlwind for adds), Slam may end up sliding down the priority queue. I've done parses at level 80 that indicate it might still be worth using, but we'll have to wait and see. (My level 85 beta parses ended up within 100 DPS between my ignoring Slam runs and my using it on every proc runs, which has me scratching my head.)
Tier 1 fury talents are Blood Craze, Battle Trance, and Cruelty. Blood Craze was heavily nerfed in recent weeks and is now a leveling curiosity at best until/unless you combine it with Field Dressing; even then, it's lackluster. The Battle Trance/Cruelty combo will get you to Tier 2 and are both excellent talents.
Tier 2 is Executioner, Booming Voice, Rude Interruption, and Piercing Howl. These are all fairly solid talents, with Executioner being good solid DPS in that 20 percent execute phase. Booming Voice is more and better rage generation; Rude Interruption gives you a nice DPS boost for doing what you should do anyway and interrupting spell casts; and Piercing Howl is good for PvP and PvE situations. It's a fairly well-loaded tier.
Tier 3 is Flurry, Death Wish, and Enrage. Let me just say it now: You'll max all of these. Just take them and move on.
Tier 4 is Die by the Sword, Raging Blow, Rampage, and Heroic Fury. Die by the Sword is a nice concept but does not do enough for the points, in my opinion. I get that it is intended to save a fury warrior who steals some aggro from horrible death, but even so, I have a hard time imagining putting points there with Raging Blow, Rampage and Heroic Fury in the same level.
Tier 5 is Furious Attacks, Meat Cleaver, and Intensify Rage. Furious Attacks is pretty useless now for PvP since it can only reduce healing by 10 percent and it can only be applied by an autoattack; it's not reliable. Meat Cleaver and Intensify Rage are excellent talents.
Tier 6 and 7 are Bloodsurge, Skirmisher, Titan's Grip, and Single-Minded Fury. TG and SMF are what you choose if you want to dual wield two-handed or one-handed weapons, respectively. Bloodsurge will be good at 85 if Slam damage scales reasonably and not if not. Skirmisher is excellent for high-mobility fights and PvP.
In addition to all this, there are several new abilities to consider for DPS warriors. These are Inner Rage, Colossus Smash, and Heroic Leap. Inner Rage will serve you as a DPS cooldown in cases of high rage (and arms warriors, you can't use Inner Rage during Deadly Calm), while Colossus Smash will be used on cooldown by both specs (arms will get Colossus Smash reset procs from Sudden Death, getting more use out of it). Heroic Leap is both more freedom to move around (basically a targetable Charge, it could serve to evacuate an area quickly) and an added attack. One could imagine Intervening to an ally, then using Heroic Leap to get back into the fray and add some extra damage at the same time.
June 19, 2011
WoW Warriors: Talent specializations and abilities
What stats do I want as a DPS warrior?
What stats do I want as a DPS warrior?
Each DPS spec uses the same stats but has different targets for each. One of the nice changes Cataclysm has in store for you as a warrior is that the game automatically does the math for rating conversion on your character pane as you level, so you won't need to worry about exactly how much hit rating you'll need; it will tell you.
Hit Rating Arms has an easier time hitting its target than fury, but for either spec, hit is possibly the best DPS stat until you hit the cap. When looking at your character panel, you'll see exactly what your chance to miss an attack is with your current hit. You can adjust it via gemming, enchanting and gearing. In general, you should at least aim for the minimum amount of hit necessary to not miss special attacks, which is 8 percent. As we level to 85, boss-level mobs will go from level 83 to level 88, but the percentage of hit we'll need to hit them will remain fixed at 8 percent, unmodified by talents or racial abilities. The rating needed to get that much hit will increase with every level. As you can see in the screenshot above, hitting the 8 percent hit you'd need to be completely hit-capped on an arms warrior will be doable by the first tier of Cataclysm raiding. Fury hit capping will be much, much more difficult.
Strength With the removal of ArP, strength is your go-to red gem of choice when socketing your gear; it is the main source of raw damage output for a warrior. While you definitely want to make sure your attacks hit, you also want to make sure they do some damage.
Expertise You need exactly 26 expertise to push a raid boss' chance to dodge your attacks off of the table. The parry cap is not worth considering, since it's fairly high and you aren't supposed to be attacking your target from in front, where it does all those nasty cleaves and special horrible attacks that we let the tanks soak up. Frankly, hitting the 26 expertise cap is not going to be much of a problem by the time you're in the first raid tier of gear. You may even have to start reforging it off at that point. I suggest hit, if you're a fury warrior. Arms will most likely move it to crit.
Haste With the changes to the rage mechanic (as discussed here and in numerous other places), haste, expertise and hit rating are now the only stats that increase a DPS warrior's rage generation. Expertise and hit work by reducing dodges and misses, since an attack that doesn't connect doesn't generate rage. Haste works by increasing the speed of your white swings, thus getting more swings in to generate more rage with. Since haste doesn't work on arms warrior's DoT damage, it's still a fairly lackluster stat for arms, but in tests I've run as fury, it can provide a fairly significant DPS boost. I'd rate it below the "must cap" stats and strength, but it is surprisingly close to critical strike rating in some situations for fury.
Critical strike rating Even in raid gear, your critical strike chance is going to plummet in Cataclysm. With stats that just have to be capped and agility almost useless for us (while it generates both attack power and crit for agility classes), you're going to most likely end up with much lower crit at 85 than at 80 for a good long while. Gear has to scale somehow. I'd prioritize crit below hit and around the same as haste or expertise, depending on your spec.
Mastery We've recently discussed mastery in detail. It's the "do whatever you do better" stat added just for Cataclysm. While it's a very good stat, it will probably benefit arms faster than fury, due to arms' having less punishing hit caps to reach.
What are the WoW warrior DPS specs? And their benefits\drawbacks?
What are the warrior DPS specs?
This one's fairly easy. When you hit level 10 or selected your talent points after the Shattering, did you choose protection as your primary spec? Yes? Then you're not a DPS warrior. You're a tank. Thank you for your interest in DPS warriors; please do not show up for an instance with a sword and board and 31 points in protection and try to DPS in defensive stance. You'll give the tank fits, generate little to no DPS, and confuse everyone.
If you chose arms or fury, however, congratulations. You're a DPS warrior. That's right, two out of the three warrior specs are all about hurting things. Whether you like hitting things with a big two-hander, two smaller one-handers, or two big two-handers, it all comes back to hitting things.
Arms is, in a nutshell, the finesse spec. You're still interested in picking up a colossal sword, axe, mace or polearm and ruining someone's day, but you do so with an eye towards efficiency and precise, debilitating strikes. Arms warriors deal their enemies small wounds to cause them to bleed and crippling wounds that inhibit magical healing. They take advantage of their opponent's tendency to duck out of the way to deal strikes that overpower their defenses entirely. Arms warriors are specialists, tacticians on the battleground. They can even weave their weapon into a storm of strikes at higher levels.
At its heart, fury is about grabbing a couple of weapons and smashing everything hostile with them until everything is dead ... and then probably hitting them a few more times. In the words of Théoden, "Fell deeds awake, fire and slaughter! Spear shall be shaken, shield be splintered, a sword-day, a red day, ere the sun rises! Ride now, ride now! Ride to ruin, and the world's ending!" Or as that notable fury warrior the Incredible Hulk might put it, "Hulk smash." Leveling fury warriors will use two weapons that are designed to be used in one hand, but the talent Titan's Grip will allow a fury warrior to dual wield two-handers if desired. (If you'd rather not, Single-Minded Fury allows you to continue using one-handers while boosting damage to compensate for losing the higher damage of two-handers.)
What are their benefits?
If you prefer offense to defense, these are the specs for you. Either DPS spec can generally produce much higher damage output than a tanking warrior. If you want to dual wield, fury is required (it's one of the specialization bonuses for fury), while arms gets significant bonuses to two-handed weapon use. Most PvP (player vs. player) warriors are arms warriors, due to the talent spec's combination of debuffs, offensive power and mobility. Fury warriors are generally more popular for PvE (player vs. environment) content such as dungeons and raids, but each spec sees use in each context.
If you want to be one of the ones doing the direct killing, these are the specs for you.
What are their drawbacks?
Warriors are intended to be a hybrid class, one that can fulfill more than one role in the game. The roles are defined as tanking, DPS and healing. Since warriors can specialize their talents to either tank or DPS, they are designed to be inferior DPSers than classes that can only DPS. (Crowd control abilities, such as are possessed by most pure DPS classes, are not considered a role in this case.) Warriors do not have any significant CC (not counting the Glyph of Intimidating Shout) and so cannot fulfill that role in an instance group or raid. In essence, if a warrior is there to deal damage, that's all he's going to be able to do, save for perhaps emergency tanking for a few seconds.
WoW Warriors: How to level in Cataclysm
One of the things I get asked to do is explain not how talents and abilities work, but rather how best to level a warrior. I'm always taken aback by these kinds of questions, because I feel that leveling (whether it be a warrior or another class) in WoW has never been easier than it is in Cataclysm. But, since the question comes up a lot between emails and Twitter, I feel like I should spend some time discussing it. I expect to be doing a lot of discussion of wow patch 4.2 in the weeks ahead, so now is probably as good timing as it gets to cover the leveling game.
Let's discuss leveling. For purposes of the discussion I went and rolled a tauren warrior on Sisters of Elune. Yes, I have a problem. Still, I managed to level out of the tauren starting area without any heirlooms in one night, so it should serve as a useful tool for discussion.
Starting Out
For starters, having recently leveled a druid, a rogue, a shaman and a hunter past level 20 (the druid is level 77, the shaman max level, the rogue level 32 and the hunter level 19) I can tell you that leveling a warrior is no longer harder than leveling any other class. Between level 1 and 10, you lack the power of picking a talent specialization, but you still have all the tools you need as the 1 to 10 content is designed around your character and his slowly growing toolkit. Really, what's most important to keep in mind for a leveling warrior is how to focus on one target when questing. With Victory Rush as powerful as it is for soloing and questing, you simply need to maximize your one-at-a-time killing rate so as to pop up another Victory Rush in order to heal you while fighting more than one mob.
Your best bet as a warrior of those levels is to quest. Do not grind unless there's a quest that rewards grinding. Pick up as many quests as you can, especially ones that can be completed in close proximity to each other. Once you get access to Victory Rush at level five, you now have an ability that counteracts the greatest of warrior leveling weaknesses from the first four years of the game -- namely that warriors couldn't survive more than one mob adding on them. VR means that you, as a low level warrior, now have even odds of surviving when more than one quest mob adds. It makes it possible to grind quest mobs with little to no downtime. I can't praise VR enough as a leveling tool. The only ability that has more of an effect is Charge at level 3 because it gives you an opening move that guarantees you'll have some rage to hit Strike with. Strike is actually a fairly lackluster ability and you'll happily replace it with whatever your talent specialization attack is at level 10.
Once you reach level 13 or so, instances open up. Running an instance or two a day while questing in zones between them is probably the fastest way to level up, especially if you have heirlooms. Even if you don't (this article is written assuming you don't need them, because frankly, you do not) you can easily clear a zone in a few hours. As it stands right now, you can successfully level in any talent specialization, can level via tanking, can level through PVP, or mix in all these types of activity. I personally prefer to run one instance and do a few battlegrounds during a play session, then focus on clearing out a zone's quests. This usually nets me between five and seven levels for a few hours of play, depending on what level I am and how abundant the zones are in quests. PVP is probably slower than either questing or instancing, but it's still quite possible to gain four or five levels in three or four hours of PVP.
Try everything
As a warrior, you can tank in instances. Dual Talent Specialization is available at level 30 for a mere 10 gold, and if you have any interest in leveling more quickly and growing to understand the tank role, I recommend getting a second spec and speccing protection. At least until level 50, however, it's not necessary to spec prot to tank in the leveling instances. Any warrior can equip a shield and use Sunder Armor (gained at level 18) and their main attacks to hold threat in most situations. I myself have tanked up to Sunken Temple (an early 50's instance) as arms with a shield and one-hander. There's no reason not to try out protection as early as possible to gain access to talents and abilities that help with both threat and survival, but keep it in mind. Tanking is probably the fastest way to level a warrior right now, as you can queue pretty much instantly from the moment instances become available all the way to level 85.
After tanking, clearing a zone's quests is probably the fastest way to level, and is quite possible in any spec for a warrior. Gone are the days where tank specs couldn't kill anything, or fury simply didn't have the oomph under max level. Arms remains one of my favorite leveling specs simply because leveling as arms helps you grow into an understanding of one of the games more complicated melee DPS priority systems. Arms also works well as a tanking spec at lower levels and is, of course, a solid PVP spec pretty much from level 20 on. Fury really comes into its own at level 69 when you gain Titan's Grip or Single-Minded Fury, but arms and protection are always good from 10 to 85, and can easily be used to level through any zone, run instances, and PVP in battlegrounds. I found that PVP is very strong for buying gear at level 60 and 70 that will surpass what you could get in same level instances. The 60 PVP set and epic weapon will last you almost through to the next expansion's content, so if you're not using heirlooms please keep PVP purchases in mind. Frankly, even though I admit I'm hardly the best PVP warrior around (not even close) I found the rewards definitely worth running a few battlegrounds a day, and I even had fun doing it.
To sum it all up, I spent a little over week working on this toon, running instances, questing, and doing PVP between them. I got in maybe two to three hours a day, more on weekends, and without heirlooms I'm well into level 64. I'm wearing a full set of level 60 PVP epics simply because I could (I gathered the honor fairly easily). It's on par with Outland gear, although I expect I'll be replacing all of it soon with Northrend instance gear. It doesn't take long at all to level with the improved questing in the 1-60 zones, tanking is easy in any spec up to level 50, and I keep a prot offspec handy for when I feel like tanking now that I'm into more complicated content. Leveling a warrior has absolutely never been easier, and if you're one of the people asking me about it, I recommend giving it a try.
June 18, 2011
the 9th PvP season would be ending as soon as June 28th rather than the 21st.
The WoW community site was recently updated to let players know that the 9th PvP season would be ending as soon as June 28th rather than the 21st. What does this mean for us? Unofficial confirmation that patch 4.2 has been moved back at least a week. The new probable release date is June 28.
Earlier this week, a new balance patch hit the PTR and made some decently sized changes to abilities and their associated numbers. No new assets were added, but a lot of numbers were moved around. After Ghostcrawler's excellent balance post and call for feedback, we guessed that this patch on the PTR could have the potential to push the patch back a week. Well, it looks like it did.
Update your calendars, folks. You've got an extra week to push tier 11 content and have a patch-free Midsummer Fire Festival, which launches on the 21st.
You can now take Mr. Robot (new mobile app) anywhere you want.
With the release of their new mobile app, you can now take Mr. Robot anywhere you want. The app is available for $1.99 on the iTunes store and the Android Marketplace.
Mr. Robot is a great tool for newer players to get a better idea and understanding of how to rearrange their augments like gems, enchants and reforges. Even for the veteran players who disagreed or wanted additional control over the stat weights, the values and weights are able to be customized.
Read on for a quick overview and my thoughts on the app.
Just to clarify, I have an iPhone 4 and an Asus Eee Pad Transformer. That means I have both versions of it: One for my phone and one for my tablet. There are a few demonstration shots you can find on their app pages. When you get it, you'll be taken to a screen where you can either load up your character from the armory or create a class of your choice and load up gear. Once your characters have been loaded, they can be saved and referenced later on.
For the players who want to fine tune the stat weightings, you can certainly customize them and adjust how you want the weights to be set and even impose a maximum cap on a particular stat.
Want to see what else is available for a slot? You can tap the list function and it shows what's available for that slot. It'll even tell you where it drops from including the boss you need to take down or whether or not it is a crafted item. If you like, you can simulate having an item equipped in order to see what effect it has on the rest of your character.
Cheap CHI hair straightener
Tapping into an item brings you full information on it including how you have it reforged, gemmed and enchanted at present. Hitting the optimized button shows you the best augments you can get on it. And yes, Ask Mr. Robot does take your set pieces under consideration.
June 16, 2011
WoW Patch 4.2 Public Test Realm Guide
The number of Valor Points awarded for killing a boss in the Firelands is 70 120 in 10-player mode, and 90 140 in 25-player mode.
The number of Valor Points awarded for killing Occu'thar in Baradin Hold is 35 120 in 10-player mode, and 45 140 in 25-player mode.
The previous, lower values caused a lot of hand wringing on the official forums. As people rightly complained, they did not allow raiders to reach the weekly cap simply by running the new tier 12 content. Players would have to choose between five-man heroics and stale tier 11 content to cap their VP, something many considered a time-consuming tedium.
The new values allow ten-man raiders to (almost) reach the new 960 980 point VP cap with a full clear of all new tier 12 content; 25-man raiders can reach the cap by beating any seven of the eight.
Here are the details of WoW Patch 4.2 Public Test Realm Guide
Patch 4.2 is now available on the Public Test Realms! With a new raid, a legendary questline, the most diverse daily quest hub to date, major story developments, user interface enhancements, and much more, patch 4.2 is certain to have something for everyone. Check out the Public Test Realm Discussion forum for information on helping us test out the new content. We’d love to have you!
Before you get testing, here are some major features coming in patch 4.2 you need to know about, followed by the latest patch notes.
Through the Fire and Flames
Feast your eyes on the adventures that await when World of Warcraft patch 4.2 takes you through the fire and flames and into the Firelands.
The Firelands
World of Warcraft patch 4.2 will offer hardy adventurers an opportunity to turn the tide in the Firelands, a huge outdoor raid of the highest difficulty, with 10-person and 25-person normal and Heroic modes. It will be a scorching opportunity to delve into this Elemental Plane, where six unique bosses stand between you and the reinvigorated Ragnaros.
A Legendary Engagement
Patch 4.2 introduces an epic quest that will challenge those daring enough to complete the legendary staff Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa's Rest. The great staff duplicates destructive magics, and also bestows upon its wielder the ability to transform into a member of the Blue Dragonflight. Those who complete the staff won’t be the only ones to receive a reward, though. As this task requires the dedication of an entire guild, upon completion of the staff all guild members will receive a unique non-combat pet to call their own.
The Regrowth and Molten Front
In patch 4.2, stalwart adventurers will have the opportunity to test their mettle at two new daily quest areas located in the fertile hillsides of Mount Hyjal and the burning depths of the Firelands. Known as the Regrowth and Molten Front, these areas will offer an unprecedented amount of daily solo content for level-85 players to enjoy -- including over 60 new quests, four "unlockable" iLevel 365 gear vendors, and a world that evolves right before your eyes.
Elemental Bonds
After the druids and their allies thwarted the invasion of Hyjal by the Twilight's Hammer and Ragnaros, an air of peace settled on the sacred mountain. As new growth bloomed across the region, members of the Earthen Ring and Cenarion Circle, along with the noble Dragon Aspects, convened at the ancient World Tree of Nordrassil. Among the gathered heroes were the legendary archdruid Malfurion Stormrage, the former Horde warchief and accomplished shaman Thrall, and his strong-willed companion, Aggra. Together, this illustrious assemblage was to unite its wondrous powers and restore the World Tree for the good of Azeroth.
Yet this auspicious event ended in tragedy. The details are still unclear, but word has spread that an incredibly powerful Twilight's Hammer agent, shrouded to hide his identity, interrupted the ceremony and struck down Thrall with dark magics... casting his spirit into the four domains of the Elemental Plane. If these terrible rumors hold true, the Earthen Ring -- indeed, all of Azeroth -- has potentially lost one of its greatest champions.
…Is this the end of the Son of Durotan?
BlizzCast 16 on Patch 4.2
We're excited to present the first-ever video BlizzCast, now in beautiful full-motion 2D! (Don't forget to wear your 2D glasses.) We've also jam-packed this episode with juicy information on World of Warcraft patch 4.2. Rob “The Voice” Simpson sits down with Game Director Tom Chilton to find out what the patch is all about, Lead Quest Designer Dave Kosak lays out info on the new Firelands quest hub, and Lead Content Designer Cory Stockton spits and flows on Ragnaros and the upcoming raid content.
Before jumping onto the PTR, you might also fancy yourself a preview of the new tier armor and nifty Dungeon Journal. If you’ll be helping us to test the latest World of Warcraft: Cataclysm content, stay tuned for the implementation of all of these 4.2 features in the weeks ahead. We’ll be frequently updating the patch notes below to let you know what’s available on the PTR, and you can keep your eye on the Public Test Realm Discussion forum, as we will surely make requests for feedback and focused testing there. Feel free to let your hands and feet drift out of the proverbial car while it’s moving. Just keep in mind this isn’t the complete list of 4.2 features or patch notes.
WoW Patch 4.2 trailer, and it's a doozy.
Hot off of the official World of Warcraft Youtube channel, we have the official patch 4.2 trailer, and it's a doozy.
And we get to see exactly what Rag has in store for not only Mount Hyjal and the World Tree but the entire world. Death, destruction, all that kind of thing. It's an elemental donnybrook.
I gotta say, that's one heck of a well executed trailer.
Hearkens back to the Gods of Zul'Aman and the Black Temple trailer for sheer awesome, and those were two of my absolutely favorite patch trailers.
I'm excited. Let's go save the world, everybody.
The MM talent tree: the hunter marksmanship tree
For reference, here is the MM talent tree as it stands now. (You can play with it in detail on Wowhead). I've tossed on here some of the talents that we typically take for a raiding build (though there is variability there), but in discussing potential talent changes, we have to take PVP into account just as much :)
MM specializations
MM hunters get the following special bonuses just for choosing the MM tree:
Bonus Ability: Aimed Shot
Specialization: Artisan Quiver
Mastery: Wild Quiver
Right off the bat, we're in a nicer place than the BM hunters. Aimed Shot is a strong part of the MM rotation -- hardcasting Aimed Shot is our ideal focus dump when we're confident that we won't have to move, and for the low level hunter, it's a nice opener when questing.
Our specialization and mastery are both useful and help secure the feel of the tree as the spec that focuses on actually shooting things and dealing ranged physical damage. Personally, I'm fine with all of these as they stand.
Talent changes
Once we get to the talent trees themselves we can pretty quickly find things that could be changed around. Like the BM tree, we have some extra talent points to spend in our tree, but unlike BM these choices are actually choices -- and we have actual DPS options for all of them. Unfortunately, some of the choices get really confusing.
The more I think about talents, the more I appreciate how difficult balancing the top tier of each tree is. When you consider it from the perspective of another tree looking to spread their excess points, there's almost always an obvious right choice. I almost wonder if the right idea wouldn't be to make sure that no first-tier talents boosted DPS at all. Then you have to spend those points on a non-DPS option, at which point you suddenly have a choice.
Once you get down to the second tier you can then have significantly more awesome abilities, because the cost to get there is much higher -- you would have to have spent 5 points on fun, quality of life, or survivability talents before you can take them.
I think that's an idea worth considering, but for the time being I'm going to set it aside and look at what I'd tweak with the talent trees as they are.
GftT and Sic' Em: Right at the top, we have to wonder a little bit why these are in the MM tree. Don't get me wrong, MM hunters love our pets too and we're happy to grab these talents to buff our DPS, but they feel like they belong to the BM hunters.
Efficiency: Personally, I think Efficiency a pretty dull talent -- and it's something all specs end up having to take (BM has to take it just to get their pet talents on the second tier of the MM tree). A multi-level talent offering a passive bonus that is considered required for all specs sounds to me like the kind of thing that we want to get rid of. I say replace Efficiency with something else, or possibly change the talent into something more interesting -- like lowering the cost of one shot significantly, or making Steady Shot regen more focus -- or heck, how about giving us our range extension talent back? That should have belonged to MM anyway.
Then we come to the fourth tier of the MM talent tree, which is the place where I have the most issues with talents. This tier is just plain odd.
Resistance is Futile: While the Resistance is Futile talent can certainly give us some nice benefit, and it's great in PvP, it just doesn't feel like a MM talent. The MM rotation is sufficiently challenging without trying to toss Kill Command into the mix. I'm fine with the idea that KC is available to MM and SV to use in PvP and if we ever have another fight where we're out of LoS of the boss, but I really don't think it should be something we regularly use in boss fights -- but with Resistance is Futile, it is. In any fight where the boss is apt to move a decent amount, either on it's own or through regular tank repositioning (so most bosses at some point), this becomes a valid DPS talent choice, and really screws with the MM rotation in the process. Give it to BM, I say.
Termination: Termination looks pretty attractive on the surface, but in practice it can be difficult to actually make use of the additional focus because of how incredibly rigid the MM rotation is. Because it's only available at the very end of the fight, we're already using Kill Shots and free Kill Shots from our glyph (making us already more focus positive at the end of the fight) in our rotation, and we still want to hit our Chimera Shot every cooldown, and we have to maintain our Improved Steady Shot buff with pairs of Steady Shots. It just doesn't leave much space for an extra shot to use the extra focus. This talent would be far better if it just didn't only apply during the last 25% of a boss fight. Either move it to something that's available earlier, or change it from increasing focus regen to just flat increasing damage during that period (or increasing damage of certain shots -- comboing with Kill Shot could make sense).
June 15, 2011
Patch 4.2 PTR patch notes updated for June 10
Blizzard has once again updated the patch notes for patch 4.2, which will introduce the Firelands raid and the Molten Front and the Regrowth questing areas. The most recent versions of the patch have been marked "release," and PVP Season 9 is ending soon, which means we should see patch 4.2 drop in the next couple of weeks. Get your shoes on, kids -- we're almost at Grandpa Ragnaros' house.
The most interesting change in these notes is the effective nerfing of raiding for valor points. The maximum number of valor points one can achieve weekly has been lowered to 980, down from 1,250. The number of valor points you could earn through heroic dungeons and the new Zandalari heroics were 490 and 980 respectively, and raiders could earn an extra 270 points on top of that. Now, it is possible to get the maximum amount of valor points from just doing Zandalari heroics.
We do not yet know why this change was made. Raiders will understandably be perplexed, as one of the raid game's main draws was faster valor point gear. In addition, the prices for valor point gear have not changed, so certain pieces of gear that used to require two weeks will now require more collecting. Hit the jump for all the new changes.
General
New Daily Quests: The Regrowth and Molten Front
◦A large assortment of all-new daily quests and rewards are now available in Hyjal, where players can help the Guardians of Hyjal push back the allies of Ragnaros and establish a forward operating base in the Firelands! In order to partake in the Regrowth and Molten Front daily quests, players must have at least completed up to and including the quest Aessina's Miracle. Once this quest has been completed, players should speak with Matoclaw in the Sanctuary of Malorne to take part in the Regrowth efforts.
New Quest Chain: Elemental Bonds
◦A New quest line is now available to level-85 Horde and Alliance characters, bringing brave adventurers to Thrall's aid. The Call of the World-Shaman, the quest which will point players toward Thrall and The Nordrassil Summit, can be obtained in Stormwind or Orgrimmar. New Raid: The Firelands Located within the Elemental Plane, the Firelands is an all-new 10- and 25-player raid featuring normal and Heroic difficulties! Battle-hardened veterans of the Horde and Alliance now have an opportunity to strike at Ragnaros the Firelord and his loyal servants by venturing into their domain via Sulfuron Spire in Mount Hyjal.
New Legendary Item: Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa's Rest
◦Steadfast raiders have an opportunity to embark on a series of quests to create an all-new legendary caster staff. In order to begin the process of assembling the staff, players must first kill a Molten Lord in the Firelands. Once a Molten Lord is killed, players can accept the quest A Legendary Engagement from Ziradormi or Coridormi in Orgrimmar or Stormwind.
New User Interface Feature: Dungeon Journal
◦A host of dungeon information is now built into the user interface via the all-new Dungeon Journal. This feature can be accessed with the "M" key while in a dungeon, or via a new button in the navigation tray from anywhere in the world. Boss background story, encounter details, abilities, and loot can be viewed with the Dungeon Journal for all bosses which have been integrated into the new system. Additional dungeons are planned to be incorporated into the Dungeon Journal in future updates.
Death Knights
Unholy Might now increases Strength by 20%, up from 5%.
Druids
Starfire damage has been increased by approximately 23%.
Wrath damage has been increased by approximately 23%.
The 4-piece Balance druid tier 11 PvE set bonus, Astral Alignment, now provides a total of 15% critical strike chance with 3 charges, decreasing by 5% per charge, instead of 99% decreasing by 33% per charge. This change was made because the set bonus proved so valuable it was not possible to upgrade out of the set into tier 12. To compensate, changes have been made to Starfire and Wrath (listed at the top of the druid class section).
The 2-piece Restoration druid tier 11 PvE set bonus has been redesigned to work with the new Restoration druid mastery. Druids with this bonus now receive the bonus to Spirit while the Harmony mastery bonus to periodic healing is active.
Paladins
Illuminated Healing (Mastery) has been adjusted slightly so that if a paladin refreshes an existing copy of his or her own Illuminated Healing on a target, the new absorption amount will be added into the old absorption amount and the duration will be reset. The total absorption created can never exceed 1/3 of the casting paladin's health.
Inquiry of Faith now increases Inquisition duration by 66/133/200%, up from 50/100/150%.
Shaman
The 4-piece Elemental shaman PvP set bonus (Gladiator's Thunderfist set) has been redesigned. It now causes Lightning Shield to generate an extra charge, rather than consuming one, when it is triggered by receiving damage, up to a maximum of 3 (9 with the Rolling Thunder talent).
Dungeons and Raids
Valor Points
◦The maximum number of Valor Points which can be earned in a week from any and all applicable dungeons and raids is now 980, down from 1250.
◦The maximum number of Valor Points awarded for completing Rise of the Zandalari dungeons remains at 980.
◦The maximum number of Valor Points awarded for completing Heroic dungeons remains at 490.
◦The number of Valor Points awarded for killing a boss in the Firelands is 70 in 10-player mode, and 90 in 25-player mode.
◦The number of Valor Points awarded for killing Occu'thar in Baradin Hold is 35 in 10-player mode, and 45 in 25-player mode.
◦The number of Valor Points awarded for killing a boss on Heroic difficulty in The Bastion of Twilight, Blackwing Descent, and Throne of the Four winds is 35 in 10-player mode, and 45 in 25-player mode.
Baradin Hold
◦Occu'thar has broken free from his cage and presents an all-new boss challenge to players in 10- and 25-player arrangements who control Tol Barad.
Blizzard has updated the community site tier 12 armor preview with the final 2 armor sets -- warrior and druid.
Blizzard has updated the community site tier 12 armor preview with the final 2 armor sets -- warrior and druid. Patch 4.2 is coming soon, as players prepare for the invasion into the Firelands to confront Ragnaros for the (potentially) last time. Each armor set for this raid tier has its looks originating from something in the Firelands, going for the instance motif over the class motif.
Warriors will dress themselves in the Molten Giant Battleplate, made in the image of the new molten giant model. You may remember molten giants and molten destroyers from the Molten Core. They also wander fields of lava in the Firelands, ready to lumber over to unsuspecting players.
Druids will be donning the Obsidian Arborweave sets, based on what appears to be the tree that Malfurion and the Avengers of Hyjal are growing in the Firelands as the foward base against Ragnaros. Maybe, as a restoration druid, you were upset that Tree of Life was not a permanent form anymore. Well, now you get to dress up like a tree. Compromise. Hit the jump for a pic of the druid set.
By the way, Obsidian Arborweave is the most "Blizzard" name for anything I have ever seen. I hope that guy got a raise.
WoW Gear: Can you still tank?
World of Warcraft: WoW The great tank gear drought of the 60s
The problem is gear. Upon exiting the starting zone, you are thrust out into the world with a minimum of tank gear. Both your trinkets do have tank stats or procs, as does your chest, but it's still a mishmash, and you may find yourself wanting solid tank gear. If you're an alt, as you probably are, you may be lucky enough to have a main that can throw you a few of the new tanking heirlooms, including the cape, shoulders, helm, and chest. That said, the level 58 to 70 field is generally a wasteland of decent tanking upgrades.
Whether from smithing or quest gear, Outland really isn't that big on gear specifically for tanks, especially for questing. Your best bet is to spend a little time outside of dungeons questing in order to grab what high-stamina quest rewards you can, such as the Underworld Helm. You can also grab the Fearless Girdle and the Circle's Stalwart Helmet in Zangarmarsh, which you can gem with Wrath-era gems to give yourself a nice head start on your HP pool or tank stats.
Can you still tank? The answer, essentially, is yes. It isn't always pretty, but low level dungeons are a lot simpler than high level heroics. Your gear doesn't have to be so severely tanked focused, either. That said, there are at least a few things you should do to make sure you're the best tank you can be.
March 5, 2011
WoW PTR Patch 4.1
World of Warcraft Patch 4.1 is coming to the Public Test Realm, and it's bringing all sorts of new content to the game. Most notably, Zul'Gurub and Zul'Aman are both being reintroduced as 5-player Cataclysm Heroics! Our friends at Wowhead are keeping track of all the changes in an informative blog post, and here are the highlights:
The return of Zul'Gurub and Zul'Aman (that's worth mentioning again)
New Molten Front zone and epic trinkets - Firelands raid coming- New class skills and spell changes
New mounts and companion pets
New guild reputation tabards
New achievements and statistics
Wowhead has brought back their PTR site so you can keep track of the latest 4.1 additions, including spell changes and new and updated icons. Keep checking back for more information as it is released.
You can also discuss the return of Zul'Gurub an Zul'Aman in this thread in our WoW general forum, or make some new topics to discuss other aspects of the patch. What are your thoughts?
Patch 4.1 Public Test Realms Coming Soon
That's right, folks. Development on the first major content patch for World of Warcraft: Cataclysm is well underway! We're currently making preparations to bring some of the initial content and updates we've been working on for this patch to the Public Test Realms. So you ask, "what will we find in the first 4.1 test client?" (You did ask that, right?) Well, let me tell you!
The Gurubashi Tribe Persists
Originally a 20-player dungeon released in patch 1.7, Zul'Gurub will once again open its gates, featuring updated lore, all-new encounters, achievements, and improved loot! Zul'Gurub is now a level-85 five-player Heroic difficulty dungeon. To provide a new tier above the current Cataclysm dungeons, players can expect to find epic-quality item level 353 loot. The minimum average item level to enter this Heroic dungeon is 346.
The Return of Zul'Aman
Ever a player favorite, the level-70 ten-player dungeon of Zul'Aman is being reintroduced as a level-85 Heroic five-player dungeon. Zul'Aman will join Zul'Gurub in a new Dungeon Finder tier of Heroic dungeons, providing epic-quality item level 353 loot. The minimum average item level to enter this Heroic dungeon is also 346. While Zul'Aman will be more of a throwback to the original dungeon featuring many of the same encounters, players can expect to find some updated gameplay mechanics, as well as new environment textures and lighting.
With the Zuls returning, you may be wondering about the unique mounts that were once contained therein. We're pleased to announce that new versions of the rare raptor, tiger, and bear mounts will be available, while the old versions of these mounts will remain unique to those who already have them. We'll reveal more about how these updated mounts can be obtained in the future.
Class Design
While we do intend to make fewer balance changes in patch 4.1, you can still expect to find a fair number of updates. Below are just a few we'd like to share with you right now. Keep in mind these changes don't encompass the entirety of the 4.1 changes, nor do the initial Public Test Realm patch notes.
To start, we want to do a better job of balancing the AoE power of the different damage-dealing specs. You can expect to see some changes to this end made throughout the testing process.
Inner Rage is now available at level 56. It was intended to solve an excess rage problem that largely isn’t affecting warriors anymore. We’ve added a replacement ability for warriors at level 83: Rallying Cry.
Colossus Smash now ignores 70% of an opponent's armor, down from 100%. We are compensating Fury and Arms warriors by increasing the damage of other attacks.
Word of Glory: We want Retribution and Protection paladins to have reasonable healing on themselves or others, but we know paladins sometimes feel like they can’t use their Holy Power on anything but their heals in some situations. We’d rather these two specs spend most of their Holy Power on damage-dealing abilities, with occasional healing.
More To Come
We're still hard at work on additional features, balance updates, and bug fixes for patch 4.1. We look forward to sharing more information with you in the days and weeks ahead as we release new content on the Public Test Realms. Until then, have a look at the patch notes we've prepared thus far. As always, these notes are not final and will continue to change as we go through the iterative development and testing processes.
World of Warcraft PTR Patch 4.1
Last updated February 28, 7:30 PM PST.
Table of Contents
- General
- Classes
- Dungeons & Raids
- Guilds
- Items
- Professions
- PvP
- Quests & Creatures
- Races
- User Interface
Important: These patch notes are not final. Additional updates will be made, and all existing changes are subject to revision during the course of the testing process. More information regarding patch 4.1 can be found here. Visit our Public Test Realm forum for more information about the testing process.
General
- Flying mounts can now be used in Ghostlands.
- Resilience scaling has been modified for linear returns, as opposed to increasing returns. Under the new formula, going from 30 resilience to 40 resilience gives players the same increase to survivability as going from 0 to 10. Resilience now scales in the same way armor and magic resistances do. A player with 32.5% damage reduction from resilience in 4.0.6 should see their damage reduction unchanged in 4.1. Those with less than 32.5% will gain slightly. Those with more will lose some damage reduction, increasingly so as their resilience climbs.
- All non-damaging interrupts off the global cooldown will now always hit the target. This includes Pummel, Shield Bash, Kick, Mind Freeze, Rebuke, Skull Bash, Counterspell, Wind Shear, Solar Beam, Silencing Shot, and related player pet abilities.
- Dark Simulacrum now works on numerous additional spells in dungeon encounters.
- Raise Ally has been redesigned to be a battle resurrection, analogous to Rebirth. It is instant cast, but costs 50 Runic Power to use, and has a 10-minute cooldown. It shares the same global battle resurrection cap with Rebirth and Soulstone.
- Talent Specializations
- Blood
- Blood Shield now only works while in Blood Presence.
- Death Strike self-healing no longer generates threat.
- Frost
- Blood of the North (passive) now permanently converts both Blood Runes into Death Runes. There is no longer any proc interaction with Blood Strike required to activate Death Runes.
- Frost Strike now deals 130% of weapon damage, up from 110%.
- Howling Blast damage has been increased by 20%. To compensate, the area-of-effect splash now does 50% of the single-target damage, down from 60%. The net result of this change leaves the area-of-effect damage roughly the same as 4.0.6 numbers.
- Glyphs
- Glyph of Raise Ally is now Glyph of Death Gate, and makes Death Gate cast 60% faster.
- Cyclone duration has been reduced to 5 seconds, down from 6.
- Efflorescence has a new spell effect.
- Lifebloom's bloom effect has been reduced by 20%.
- Stampeding Roar's duration has been increased to 8 seconds, up from 6. The movement speed effect has been increased to 60%, up from 40%.
- Swipe (Bear) cooldown has been reduced to 3 seconds, down from 6.
- Talent Specializations
- Balance
- Starsurge damage has been reduced by 20%.
- Solar Beam is now more responsive when enemies move into or out of it.
- Restoration
- Gift of Nature (passive) also reduces Tranquility’s cooldown by 2.5/5 minutes.
- Deterrence no longer requires a melee weapon to be equipped.
- Explosive Trap now has a new spell effect.
- Master's Call now has a new spell effect.
- Tame Beast now tames pets to match the hunter's level, rather than 3 levels below.
- Talent Specializations
- Fire
- Ignite is no longer triggered from periodic critical effects.
- Fire
- Word of Glory now has a 20-second cooldown.
- Talent Specializations
- Holy
- Aura Mastery: This ability no longer increases the benefit granted by Crusader Aura.
- Walk in the Light (passive) removes the cooldown of Word of Glory.
- Protection
- Divine Guardian cooldown is now 3 minutes, up from 2.
- Retribution
- Divine Storm now generates 1 point of Holy Power if it hits (i.e. successfully lands on) 4 or more targets.
- Sacred Shield's internal cooldown has been increased to 60 seconds, up from 30.
- Holy
- Divine Aegis duration has been increased to 15 seconds, up from 12.
- Dispel Magic can only be used on the casting priest as a baseline effect.
- Holy Word: Sanctuary has a new spell effect.
- Inner Will and Inner Fire now last until canceled.
- Power Word: Shield duration has been reduced to 15 seconds, down from 30.
- Talent Specializations
- Discipline
- Absolution (new passive) enables priests to use Dispel Magic on up to 2 harmful effects on friendly targets.
- Power Word: Barrier's cooldown has been increased to 3 minutes, up from 2, and its effect has been reduced to 25%, down from 30%.
- It is now possible to remove Weakened Soul effects that were a result of another priest's Power Word: Shield through Strength of Soul.
- Holy
- Absolution (new passive) enables priests to use Dispel Magic on up to 2 harmful effects on friendly targets.
- Discipline
- Recuperate base effect now heals 3% per tick, up from 2%.
- Stealth base cooldown has been reduced to 4 seconds, down from 10, and the movement penalty from being in Stealth has been removed.
- Tricks of the Trade now has a 100-yard range, up from 20.
- Talent Specializations
- Combat
- Improved Recuperate now adds 0.5%/1% to the health restoration effect of Recuperate, down from 1%/2%.
- Subtlety
- Nightstalker now reduces the cooldown of Stealth by 2/4 seconds, and instead of negating the movement penalty from Stealth, it adds a 5/10% movement speed bonus (stacking with other effects) while Stealthed.
- Fire Nova has been redesigned and decoupled from shaman Fire totems. Instead, it now pulses the Fire Nova effect from each target that is afflicted by the shaman's own Flame Shock debuff. It now damages all enemies except the target hit by Flame Shock. The ability's cooldown has been reduced to 4 seconds, down from 10.
- Magma Totem now lasts for 60 seconds, up from 21.
- Stoneclaw Totem's area-of-effect threat pulse no longer affects critters.
- Talent Specializations
- Elemental Combat
- Earthquake is no longer a channeled spell. It now has a 2-second cast time, lasts for 10 seconds, and has a 10-second cooldown. Its damage has been reduced by 40% from its channeled version.
- Enhancement
- Improved Fire Nova has been redesigned and replaced by a talent called Seasoned Winds. When an enemy spell cast is successfully prevented with Wind Shear or Grounding Totem, the shaman gains magical resistance (in an amount equal to what a protection totem/aura would grant, stacking with such buffs) to the spell school(s) of the interrupted spell (except for Holy spells), lasting 10 seconds.
- Elemental Combat
- Talent Specializations
- Affliction
- Haunt damage has been increased by 30%.
- Shadow Mastery (passive) has been increased to 30%, up from 25%.
- Demonology
- Mana Feed now restores more mana (four times as much) when the warlock is using a Felguard or Felhunter.
- Affliction
- Pets
- Doomguard's damage has been increased by 50%. The Doomguard is intended to be the best guardian for single-target damage, and the Infernal the best when there are multiple targets.
- Shadow Bite (Felhunter) damage and effect has doubled.
- Charge and Intercept no longer have diminishing returns on their stun effects.
- Colossus Smash now ignores 70% of an opponent's armor, down from 100%.
- Heroic Throw is now available from trainers at level 20.
- Inner Rage is now available at level 56.
- Intercept now has a 1.5-second stun, down from 3 seconds.
- Overpower damage has been increased to 140% weapon damage, up from 125%.
- Pummel is now usable in all stances.
- Rallying Cry (new ability) is available from trainers at level 83. It temporarily grants the warrior and all party or raid members within 30 yards 20% of maximum health for 10 seconds. After the effect expires, the health is lost. It has no cost, no stance requirements, and is not on the global cooldown. It has a 3-minute cooldown, but also shares a cooldown with Last Stand.
- Shield Bash has been removed from the game.
- Spell Reflection cooldown has been increased to 25 seconds, up from 10.
- Whirlwind now has its cooldown reduced by 6 seconds when it deals damage to 4 or more targets. The Whirlwind effect caused by Bladestorm remains unchanged.
- Talent Specializations
- Arms
- Improved Hamstring now reduces the global cooldown on Hamstring by 0.5/1 seconds in addition to its current effects.
- Improved Slam increases Slam damage by 20/40%, up from 10/20%.
- Juggernaut no longer adds 2 seconds to the Charge stun, but instead lowers the cooldown of Charge by 2 seconds (to 13 seconds total without the glyph).
- Lambs to the Slaughter now causes Mortal Strike to refresh Rend in addition to its current effects.
- Mortal Strike damage has been increased to 175% weapon damage, up from 150%.
- Fury
- Flurry haste bonus has been doubled to 16/32/50%.
- Raging Blow damage has been increased back to 120% weapon damage, up from 100%.
- Protection
- Shield Mastery no longer affects the cooldown of Spell Reflection, however, it now allows Shield Block to reduce magic damage as well.
- Gag Order now only affects Heroic Throw.
Glyphs - Arms
- Glyph of Spell Reflection reduces the cooldown of Spell Reflection by 5 seconds, up from 1 second
- New dungeons available for partial testing.
- Zul'Aman has returned as a level-85 5-player Heroic dungeon featuring a revamp of the original dungeon and improved loot!
- Zul'Gurub has returned as a level-85 5-player Heroic dungeon featuring all-new encounters, achievements, and improved loot!
- Both dungeons will be in a new Dungeon Finder difficulty tier above the current level-85 Heroic dungeons and offer epic-quality item level 353 loot.
- These dungeons may only partially be available for testing at this time. Stay tuned for additional updates.
- Blackwing Descent
- Flash Bomb (Golem Sentry ability) now has a more clear warning visual.
- Magmaw now triggers a raid emote when summoning Lava Parasites.
- Further improvements have been made in the Maloriak encounter to avoid Flash Freeze targeting the tanks.
- The gold amounts on the following encounters have been substantially reduced: Flame Leviathan, Magtheridon, Gruul the Dragonkiller, Doom Lord Kazzak, and all encounters in Karazhan.
- The Guild Perk, Cash Flow, no longer prints out text to the Chat Log. Instead, the daily amount deposited is shown in the Guild Vault Money Log. In addition, players can view the weekly contribution in a new window at the bottom of the Money Log.
- We have added two new custom guild tabards as Guild Rewards. The tabards are account bound and offer a bonus to gaining guild reputation.
- The PvP Horde and Alliance trinkets have a new spell effect.
- Item Sets
- The current damage-dealing death knight 4-piece raid set bonus now also grants increased attack power when Killing Machine triggers, as well as when the death knight gains Death Runes).
- The current Holy paladin 4-piece raid set bonus now grants 540 Spirit for 6 seconds after casting Holy Shock.
- All major cities will now have every type of profession trainer and their associated trade supply vendors.
- Battlegrounds
- The Focused Assault and Brutal Assault buffs have changed.
- After 3 minutes of both teams having the flag, both flag carriers will get Focused Assault, which increases damage taken by 10%.
- Every minute afterward, an additional stack will be applied to increase damage taken by an additional 10%.
- After 7 minutes, Brutal Assault will be applied in place of Focused Assault. In additional to the damage debuff, this debuff also caps the player's movement speed at 100%. The damage taken debuff works the same and will add 10% to the debuff up to a maximum of 100% damage taken.
- The Battle for Gilneas
- Graveyard Changes
- Players who die at a control point that they own will now be teleported to the next closest graveyard, instead of the one at which they died.
- If a player's team owns the Mine and Waterworks, and dies at Waterworks, they will be teleported to the Mine.
- If an Alliance player's team only owns Lighthouse, and dies at Lighthouse, they will respawn at their base.
- If a Horde player's team owns Waterworks and Mine, and dies at Lighthouse, they will respawn at Waterworks.
- Graveyard Changes
- Twin Peaks
- Graveyard Changes
- Players will now only spawn at their base graveyard when they die in the enemy base.
- Defending players will respawn at the middle graveyard.
- Midfield players will respawn at the middle graveyard.
- Attacking players will respawn at their base graveyard.
- Graveyard Changes
- The Focused Assault and Brutal Assault buffs have changed.
- A handful of quests have been added to Northern Barrens to provide more level 18-20 content. Look for new quests at Nozzlepot's Outpost and Darsok's Outpost.
- The gnomish racial ability, Escape Artist, is no longer affected by the global cooldowns triggered by other abilities.
- The human racial ability, Every Man for Himself, has a new spell effect.
User Interface - Work has begun on a new Looking for Guild system. Further details will be provided when we are ready for feedback.
- Like the Focus Frame, the character Unit and Target Frames can now be unlocked and moved to one's content.
- Spells bound to a key now start to be cast when the button is pressed down by default, instead of waiting for the key to go up. This is an option that can be turned off in the Interface menu under Combat. Mouse clicking has not changed and operates on mouse click up.
World of Warcraft patch 4.0.6
UPDATE: The official patch notes have already been updated to include a new Achievements section, a paladin bug fix concerning Holy Power, a number of changes to current raid boss encounters, and a note about Inscription Ink Traders. Check out the complete notes after the jump.
It's official: World of Warcraft patch 4.0.6 is going live today. And check it out for more details.
World of Warcraft Client Patch 4.0.6
World of Warcraft: Cataclysm patch 4.0.6 is now available on all realms! Below you'll find the official patch notes, last updated 1:45 PM PST, February 9.
The latest client patch notes can be found here.
Visit our Bug Report forum for a list of patch 4.0.6 known issues.
Hotfixes made after patch 4.0.6 can be found here.
Table of Contents
Achievements
Death Knights
Druids
Hunters
Mages
Paladins
Priests
Rogues
Shaman
Warlocks
Warriors
Dungeons & Raids
Guilds
Items
Professions
PvP
Quests & Creatures
Races
User Interface
General Bug Fixes