World of Warcraft News and Raiding Strategies RSS Feed

Blizzard on Hotfixing Mythic Halondrus Visual Bugs 

by
Lumy
Published on 2022-06-28 09:41 AM

Blizzard on Hotfixing Mythic Halondrus Visual Bugs
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
After weeks of this being a top priority for our encounter and QA teams, we’ve solved this and fixed it.

Some background

Starting on June 10, in a portion of the Halondrus encounter, multiple abilities began disappearing or rendering inconsistently. While we rolled out some partial fixes a few days later, a number of issues have lingered for the past two weeks, understandably frustrating players attempting the Halondrus encounter.

It’s unusual for a bug like this to take so long to overcome. The first step we take when any bug is reported is to have our QA team investigate and reproduce the bug. Figuring out steps to reproduce a bug is essential, both for understanding what’s causing it and to make it so that we can correctly test the eventual fix. With the Halondrus issues, we ran into an immediate challenge: none of our QA testers or engineers were able to reproduce the bug following the same steps that were causing visuals to misbehave on live realms. That’s extremely unusual, and we spent some time trying to gather more information and test different theories, while applying some quick partial fixes.

Over the last week, guided by the curious case of a single engineer who was able to reliably reproduce the issue (when no one else could), we tracked down the underlying cause as a very niche and previously undiscovered bug in our hotfix system itself. This bug made an unrelated hotfix unintentionally cause player clients to read an erroneous visual “occluder” (an invisible volume usually used to tell the engine that it doesn’t need to render whatever is on the other side of it, to optimize performance) in the Halondrus playspace. The reason internal tests didn’t easily reproduce the issue was-- the actual game data was correct.

The Current Situation

We have now developed a process to both clean up the bad hotfix data and fix the issue that made this possible in the first place. That fix was deployed earlier today.

We sincerely apologize for how long this took to fix. It was a top priority for the team the entire time, but turned out to be almost unique in coming from an underlying cause that took far longer to track down than we ever expected.
22 Comments

Upcoming Class Tuning Update - Destruction Warlock Nerfs Delayed to Season 4 

by
Lumy
Published on 2022-06-27 08:38 PM

Upcoming Class Tuning Update - Destruction Warlock Nerfs Delayed to Season 4
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
With our next scheduled weekly maintenance (June 28 in this region), we intend to make some tuning adjustments to several classes.

Classes

  • Druid
    • Guardian
      • Mangle and auto attack damage increased by 10%.
        • Developers’ note: Vengeance Demon Hunter and Guardian Druid have fallen behind in damage, particularly in single target. Our intent with these changes is to improve their performance in single-target without unduly impacting AOE environments.
  • Demon Hunter
    • Vengeance
      • All damage and healing abilities increased by 3%.
      • Fracture and Shear damage increased by 20%.
      • Auto attack damage increased by 10%.
        • Developers’ note: Vengeance Demon Hunter and Guardian Druid have fallen behind in damage, particularly in single target. Our intent with these changes is to improve their performance in single-target without unduly impacting AOE environments.
  • Warlock
    • Affliction
      • All ability damage increased by 5%.
        • Developers’ note: We’re seeing Affliction falling behind a bit in various content and feel a straight increase to their damage is warranted.
    • Destruction

Player versus Player

  • Developers’ note: We have been monitoring PvP balance over Season 3 and are making the following adjustments. We look forward to continue to watch how the rest of the PvP season progresses.
  • Hunter
    • Craven Strategem (Runecarving Power) now reduces the cooldown of Feign Death by 5 seconds in PvP combat (was 15 seconds).
      • Developers’ note: The short cooldown of Feign Death from Craven Strategem can be frustrating to play against, especially for classes whose primary damage comes from damage over time effects. We are changing the cooldown reduction from Craven Strategem to address this.
  • Mage
    • Flow of Time (Conduit) effectiveness reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
    • Netherwind Armor (PvP Talent) now reduces the chance of suffering a critical strike by 10% (was 15%).
      • Developers’ note: Mage survivability has continued to be higher than we would like, so we are targeting some of their defensive tools to address that while keeping the overall feel of Mage gameplay intact.
  • Monk
    • Mistweaver
      • Renewing Mist now heals for an additional 25% in PvP combat (was 10%).
      • Enveloping Mist now heals for an additional 10% in PvP combat.
      • Chrysalis (PvP Talent) now reduces the cooldown of Life Cocoon by 45 seconds (was 30 seconds).
        • Developers’ note: Mistweavers are continuing to have a difficult time responding to burst damage reliably, as they regularly have to open their primary school in order to catch up. Increasing healing over time effects and having Cocoon available more frequently is intended to provide them with better tools to respond to burst damage more reliably.
  • Paladin
    • Retribution
      • Templar’s Vindication (Conduit) now causes Templar’s Verdict to deal an additional 15% damage (was 30%) in PvP combat.
      • Shield of Vengeance damage reduced by 40% in PvP combat. Absorption amount unchanged.
        • Developers’ note: Retribution Paladin burst damage has scaled higher than we’d like, outpacing survivability and counterplay. We are looking to address some of those bigger swing moments without affecting their overall toolkit.
  • Priest
    • Holy
      • Mana regeneration reduced by 60% in PvP combat (was 55%).
      • Holy Word: Chastise now incapacitates enemy players for 3 seconds (was 4 seconds).
      • Censure (Talent) now causes Holy Word: Chastise to stun enemy players for 3 seconds (was 4 seconds).
      • Ray of Hope (PvP Talent) cooldown is now 90 seconds (was 60 seconds).
        • Developers’ note: Holy Priests have been outperforming other healers, and we are looking to reduce the power of commonly picked talents and mana efficiency to better fit within other spec representation and performance.
    • Shadow
      • Shadow Word: Pain damage increased by 15% in PvP combat.
      • Vampiric Touch damage increased by 10% in PvP combat.
        • Developers’ note: Shadow Priest has not received as much benefit from its set bonus as other specializations in PvP, so we are increasing parts of their consistent damage to help their overall performance.
  • Rogue
    • Outlaw
      • Float like a Butterfly (PvP Talent) now reduces the cooldown of Evasion and Feint by 0.5 seconds per combo point spent (was 1 second).
        • Developers’ note: The uptime of defensive abilities for Outlaw has been a point of frustration due to less opportunity for enemies to capitalize on gaps of defensive cooldowns. This is intended to address that, while keeping the feel of Outlaw intact.
  • Warlock
    • Dark Pact (Talent) now provides an absorb shield based on 300% of health sacrificed in PvP combat (was 250%).
    • Essence Drain (PvP Talent) now causes the target to deal 9% less damage to the Warlock per stack.
    • Essence Drain (PvP Talent) now stacks up to 4 times (was 5).
    • Gateway Mastery (PvP Talent) now reduces the time between how often players can take your Demonic Gateway by 30 seconds (was 15 seconds).
    • Affliction
      • Soul Leech grants an absorb shield based on 12% of damage dealt in PvP combat (was 8%).
        • Developers’ note: In 9.2.5 we removed the PvP talent Demon Armor and changed Gladiator’s Echoing Resolve to no longer interact with interrupt effects, which impacted Affliction Warlocks with their spell casts being a single school. With the combination of these changes, Affliction Warlocks’ defensives have been lower than we’d like even after our stamina increase to their base kit, so we are targeting to equip them with better survival tools in PvP.
  • Warrior
    • The amount of Mastery granted by Conqueror’s Banner (Necrolord Ability) reduced by 33% in PvP combat.
    • Fury
      • Crushing Blow (Raging Blow from Reckless Abandon (Talent)) now deals 20% reduced damage in PvP combat.
        • Developers’ note: Overall Fury damage has scaled higher than we’d like in Season 3 especially with their set bonus. We are intending to bring down some of the moments of volatility while still maintaining the high consistent damage that fulfills the fantasy of a Fury Warrior.


In response to player feedback, we have elected to not make changes to Destruction Warlock this week. We expect to adjust Destruction as well as Survival Hunter with the beginning of Season 4.

Previously in our April 20 tuning, we made adjustments to Destruction Warlock and Survival Hunter to reign in their performance in M+. Those changes did not turn out to do enough, and we need to make further adjustments, but we realize this will have a significant impact on players who have committed time and effort into those specs for the conclusion of the M+ season.

Please prepare for reductions to Destruction Warlock and Survival Hunter damage in high target situations at the start of Season 4.
18 Comments

World of Warcraft - The Tavern 

by
Lumy
Published on 2022-06-27 06:19 PM

Diablo II: Resurrected Patch 2.4.3 Coming Soon

World of Warcraft - The Tavern
Blizzard has released "The Tavern", a new video aimed at bringing new players to World of Warcraft. The website playworldofwarcraft.com has also been updated recently, and now features resources for new and returning players.
75 Comments

Patch 9.2.5 Hotfixes - June 24 

by
chaud
Published on 2022-06-25 01:33 AM

Patch 9.2.5 Hotfixes - June 24
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Classes

Druid
  • Guardian
    • [With realm restarts] Mangle and auto attack damage increased by 10%.
      • Developers’ note: Vengeance Demon Hunter and Guardian Druid have fallen behind in damage, particularly in single target. Our intent with these changes is to improve their performance in single-target without unduly impacting AOE environments.

Demon Hunter
  • Vengeance
    • [With realm restarts] All damage and healing abilities increased by 3%.
    • [With realm restarts] Fracture and Shear damage increased by 20%.
    • [With realm restarts] Auto attack damage increased by 10%.
      • Developers’ note: Vengeance Demon Hunter and Guardian Druid have fallen behind in damage, particularly in single target. Our intent with these changes is to improve their performance in single-target without unduly impacting AOE environments.

Warlock
  • Affliction
    • [With realm restarts] All ability damage increased by 5%.
      • Developers’ note: We’re seeing Affliction falling behind a bit in various content and feel a straight increase to their damage is warranted.
  • Destruction
    • [With realm restarts] (4) Set Bonus: Blasphemy no longer grants Rain of Chaos.
    • [With realm restarts] Chaos Bolt damage increased by 5% in PvE combat.
    • [With realm restarts] Incinerate damage increased by 20%.
    • [With realm restarts] Immolate damage increased by 20%.
    • [With realm restarts] Conflagrate damage increased by 10% in PvE combat.
      • Developers’ note: In order to address Destruction’s excess soul shard generation issues, we’re removing the ability for the Blasphemy to grant Rain of Chaos. This will prevent their shard generation from getting out of control and rein in their AOE output. However, this will have some effect on Destruction’s single-target damage and to help counter the impact we’re increasing the damage of several single-target spells in the Destruction toolkit. This is a big shift so we’ll be monitoring feedback closely and will adjust in the future if needed.

Dungeons and Raids
  • Sepulcher of the First Ones
    • Halondrus
      • Fixed an issue causing players to be unable to pick up Earthbreaker Charge immediately after recovering from the effects of Podtender (Dreamweaver Soulbind).
  • The Necrotic Wake
    • Fixed an issue causing Destruction Warlock’s Rain of Fire to not proc Rain of Chaos or trigger Blasphemy while fighting on the necropolis.

Player versus Player
  • Developers’ note: We have been monitoring PvP balance over Season 3 and are making the following adjustments. We look forward to continue to watch how the rest of the PvP season progresses.

Druid
  • Balance
    • (2) Set Bonus: Fixed an issue where Celestial Pillar would break players from stealth.

Hunter
  • [With realm restarts] Craven Strategem (Runecarving Power) now reduces the cooldown of Feign Death by 5 seconds in PvP combat (was 15 seconds).
    • Developers’ note: The short cooldown of Feign Death from Craven Strategem can be frustrating to play against, especially for classes whose primary damage comes from damage over time effects. We are changing the cooldown reduction from Craven Strategem to address this.

Mage
  • [With realm restarts] Flow of Time (Conduit) effectiveness reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
  • [With realm restarts] Netherwind Armor (PvP Talent) now reduces the chance of suffering a critical strike by 10% (was 15%).
    • Developers’ note: Mage survivability has continued to be higher than we would like, so we are targeting some of their defensive tools to address that while keeping the overall feel of Mage gameplay intact.

Monk
  • Mistweaver
    • [With realm restarts] Renewing Mist now heals for an additional 25% in PvP combat (was 10%).
    • [With realm restarts] Enveloping Mist now heals for an additional 10% in PvP combat.
    • [With realm restarts] Chrysalis (PvP Talent) now reduces the cooldown of Life Cocoon by 45 seconds (was 30 seconds).
      • Developers’ note: Mistweavers are continuing to have a difficult time responding to burst damage reliably, as they regularly have to open their primary school in order to catch up. Increasing healing over time effects and having Cocoon available more frequently is intended to provide them with better tools to respond to burst damage more reliably.

Paladin
  • Retribution
    • [With realm restarts] Templar’s Vindication (Conduit) now causes Templar’s Verdict to deal an additional 15% damage (was 30%) in PvP combat.
    • [With realm restarts] Shield of Vengeance damage reduced by 40% in PvP combat. Absorption amount unchanged.
      • Developers’ note: Retribution Paladin burst damage has scaled higher than we’d like, outpacing survivability and counterplay. We are looking to address some of those bigger swing moments without affecting their overall toolkit.

Priest
  • Holy
    • [With realm restarts] Mana regeneration reduced by 65% in PvP combat (was 60%).
    • [With realm restarts] Holy Word: Chastise now incapacitates enemy players for 3 seconds (was 4 seconds).
    • [With realm restarts] Censure (Talent) now causes Holy Word: Chastise to stun enemy players for 3 seconds (was 4 seconds).
    • [With realm restarts] Ray of Hope (PvP Talent) cooldown is now 90 seconds (was 60 seconds).
      • Developers’ note: Holy Priests have been outperforming other healers, and we are looking to reduce the power of commonly picked talents and mana efficiency to better fit within other spec representation and performance.
  • Shadow
    • [With realm restarts] Shadow Word: Pain damage increased by 15% in PvP combat.
    • [With realm restarts] Vampiric Touch damage increased by 10% in PvP combat.
      • Developers’ note: Shadow Priest has not received as much benefit from its set bonus as other specializations in PvP, so we are increasing parts of their consistent damage to help their overall performance.

Rogue
  • Outlaw
    • [With realm restarts] Float like a Butterfly (PvP Talent) now reduces the cooldown of Evasion and Feint by 0.5 seconds per combo point spent (was 1 second).
      • Developers’ note: The uptime of defensive abilities for Outlaw has been a point of frustration due to less opportunity for enemies to capitalize on gaps of defensive cooldowns. This is intended to address that, while keeping the feel of Outlaw intact.

Warlock
  • [With realm restarts] Dark Pact (Talent) now provides an absorb shield based on 300% of health sacrificed in PvP combat (was 250%).
  • [With realm restarts] Essence Drain (PvP Talent) now causes the target to deal 9% less damage to the Warlock per stack.
  • [With realm restarts] Essence Drain (PvP Talent) now stacks up to 4 times (was 5).
  • [With realm restarts] Gateway Mastery (PvP Talent) now reduces the time between how often players can take your Demonic Gateway by 30 seconds (was 15 seconds).
  • Affliction
    • [With realm restarts] Soul Leech grants an absorb shield based on 12% of damage dealt in PvP combat (was 8%).
      • Developers’ note: In 9.2.5 we removed the PvP talent Demon Armor and changed Gladiator’s Echoing Resolve to no longer interact with interrupt effects, which impacted Affliction Warlocks with their spell casts being a single school. With the combination of these changes, Affliction Warlocks’ defensives have been lower than we’d like even after our stamina increase to their base kit, so we are targeting to equip them with better survival tools in PvP.

Warrior
  • [With realm restarts] The amount of Mastery granted by Conqueror’s Banner (Necrolord Ability) reduced by 33% in PvP combat.
  • Fury
    • [With realm restarts] Crushing Blow (Raging Blow from Reckless Abandon (Talent)) now deals 20% reduced damage in PvP combat.
      • Developers’ note: Overall Fury damage has scaled higher than we’d like in Season 3 especially with their set bonus. We are intending to bring down some of the moments of volatility while still maintaining the high consistent damage that fulfills the fantasy of a Fury Warrior.
39 Comments

WoW Hotfixes - June 22, 2022 

by
Lumy
Published on 2022-06-23 06:58 AM

Overwatch 2 Reddit AMA - Q&A Compilation

WoW Hotfixes - June 22, 2022
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
User Interface and Accessibility

  • Fixed an issue where the camera’s field of view could be increased past 90.
    • Developers’ note: The ability to restrict the field of view was added in 9.2.5 as an accessibility measure to help alleviate motion sickness. All of World of Warcraft -- the art, combat mechanics, and player interactions -- are built within the parameters of the user interface experience and scale. Increasing the field of view beyond the limit that has been in place since WoW launched was not intended.

Burning Crusade Classic

  • [With realm restarts] To address a bug that prevented Midsummer Fire Festival bonfire quests from resetting for players who previously completed them, all Midsummer bonfire quests will be reset. This includes any yearly quests that players might have completed for the first time since the event began at 12:01 a.m. on June 21.
    • Developers' note: This fix requires that we restart all realms, so to get the fix applied as soon as possible, we're preforming realm restarts soon during off-peak hours in each region.
30 Comments

Site Navigation

Social Media

Services

My Account

Support

Advertise

Resources

Terms of Service

Privacy Policy

Our Communities

© 2023 Magic Find, Inc. All rights reserved.