In the upcoming content patch there are many new additions and improvements. Perhaps one of the largest changes is the introduction of the new dungeon system. This new system will be available for all dungeons. A “Dungeons” button will replace the Looking For Group feature currently available in-game, and provides additional benefits to those who use it.

System Highlights:

• Join as a Group or Solo
• Cross-Realm Instances/Grouping
• Instance Teleporting
• Smarter Group Matching
• Daily Random Dungeons
• Repeat Random Dungeons
• Choose Multiple Dungeons
• Vote Kick system
• Lovin’ the PUG Bonuses
• Looking For Raid
• Need Before Greed Updated
• Group Disenchanting

Join as a Group or Solo
Much like the current Looking For Group system, players will be able to join the dungeon system and choose the role they would like to fill within groups: Healing, DPS, or Tank. In addition, once roles have been identified, they will be applied to all dungeons chosen. Players will now be able to choose multiple dungeons and will no longer be limited to three. The system has also improved group creation and matchmaking capabilities and will create more balanced groups when assessing the selected roles of players.

The LFG channel has been disconnected from the dungeon tool and can be used by anyone in a major city, much like the trade channel currently available.

Cross Realm Instances
When joining the dungeon system as a solo player or with a partial group, additional random players can be found within the same Battlegroup via cross-realm instancing.

While the new system offers the ability to group with player from other realms within your Battlegroup, you won’t be able to use this to manually invite specific players to groups.

Instance Teleporting
When you use the dungeon tool to find a dungeon, you’ll get ported to the inside of the dungeon, much like the current Battleground system. When you leave the instance, you will be returned to your previous location. If you need to leave temporarily, such as for repairs or to purchase reagents, you can teleport back to the dungeon again. This feature can be used both by groups looking for other players and by premade groups of five who use the dungeon tool.

Smarter Group Matching
The new system will now work to match at least one experienced player for the assigned dungeon with less experienced players in the group. It will more carefully match class types, and will more consistently match players of equal levels for the dungeon chosen. The interface will also allow players to see how many players are looking for groups as well as the average wait time of groups that the tool has formed.

Daily Random Dungeons
Players or groups can choose specific dungeons or they can instead take their chances with a random Heroic or random normal dungeon. Picking randomly conveys some additional benefits. If you defeat the final boss in a dungeon, you receive 2 Emblems of Frost for Heroic dungeons and 2 Emblems of Triumph for normal dungeons. In addition, after players have received 2 Emblems of Frost for the first Heroic dungeon they do in a day, they will earn 2 Emblems of Triumph for each additional random Heroic dungeons in that day. These random rewards replace the current daily dungeon and daily Heroic dungeon quests. The current NPCs who offer those quests will offer weekly repeatable raid quests instead. You can also earn level-appropriate rewards for running random pre-Wrath of the Lich King dungeons while you are leveling up.

Lovin’ the PUG
Players who take part in groups with one or more members who have been matched with them randomly from within the dungeon system will receive extra rewards, including the coveted Perky Pug non-combat pet. The more random players you group with, the faster you could get your new pet!

Vote Kick
Players who use the system to find additional random members for their party will be afforded a couple of extra conveniences to help them perform well. The loot option is fixed to the updated Need Before Greed option (and unalterable by any member) and players can vote to remove another party member from the group. It will take four votes in order to remove someone, however, so consider this newfound power carefully.

Looking for Raid
There will be a new option available to players that can be accessed via the raid information screen in the interface or by typing /lfr. Players will also be able to take part in raid-specific weekly quests and will be able to browse the system manually for any other players looking for a raid dungeon group.

Need Before Greed Updated
Need Before Greed will now recognize gear appropriate for a class in three ways: the class must be able to equip the item, pure melee will be unable to roll on spellpower items, and classes are limited to their dominant armor type (for example, plate for paladins). All items will still be available via greed rolls should no member be able to use the item as well as the new disenchant option will be available for all parties.

Group Disenchanting
Players in a group with an enchanter will now have the option to automatically disenchant any items that are not claimed by a player from within the loot window. Players will have this option available to them in both premade groups and in randomly matched groups. This option is available in any loot system, even if players don’t use the new dungeon tool.

As we mentioned in the recent post explaining the new Dungeon System, disenchanting will work a little differently in all 5 player and raid dungeons when patch 3.3 is released. We have seen a consistent pattern where players eventually need very few items from dungeons and they result to disenchanting as much of the loot as possible since those materials that can be obtained continue to have a lot of worth.

When the new Dungeon System is launched, the default user interface will give players the option to automatically disenchant items that they obtain in 5 player and raid dungeons. This option will avoid the hassle of having items picked up by an enchanter first to redistributed later and overall will make the process much smoother.

Also, with the inclusion of cross-realm-instancing in the dungeon system, there will be restrictions on trading items similar to the restrictions that are currently active in Battlegrounds. If the Dungeon System is used to complete a group for a dungeon then non-temporary items will not be able to be traded in the instance. This makes it so items like enchanting materials will not be able to be traded in the dungeon and using the new user interface option will be the only way to distribute disenchants. There will be some exceptions to this restriction though as Bind-on-Pickup items will continue to be trade-able to those present for the kill for a short duration and completely pre-formed groups that don’t use the Dungeon System to form the group will still allow trades.

To maintain the importance of the profession itself, the disenchanting UI option will only be available for groups that have a character with the necessary level of Enchanting to disenchant the items that are obtained.

We are very excited about the upcoming improvements in the new Dungeon System and don’t forget to check out the full preview here for all the details: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=20677771774&sid=1

We are scheduling raid tests in Icecrown Citadel for October 26-30.

The schedule is as follows:

US Servers

• Thursday, October 29 at 7PM EDT / 4PM PDT – Sindragosa
• Friday, October 30 at 7PM EDT / 4 PM PDT - Valithria Dreamwalker

EU Servers

• Thursday, October 29 at 18:30 CET – Rotface

Only normal difficulties will be tested, although 10 and 25 player raids will be available.

The Icecrown Citadel raid test schedule will be very flexible, and can change at a moment's notice due to build status, bugs, and server issues. Remember that this is the test server, so things can, do, and will break from time to time. Check this forum for the latest Icecrown Citadel raid testing schedule information in the weeks to come.

[edit] Correcting testing times for EU realms as we are now in Winter time (CET) :-)
[edit] Moved Rotface up, rescheduling Putricide for next week.

Emblems in 3.3
The Daily Random Heroic will award two Emblems of Frost upon completion (can be done once a day). The Daily Random normal dungeon will award two Emblems of Triumph upon completion (can be done once a day). If players continue to select "Random" via the Dungeon System when running Heroic dungeons after the Daily Random Heroic dungeon has been completed, they will receive two additional Emblems of Triumph for each random Heroic dungeon completed.

Emblems of Frost will drop in the 10- and 25-player Icecrown Citadel raid... and perhaps if another boss stumbles into the Vault he'll drop them as well. (Source)

[...] If you complete the Daily Random Heroic dungeon for the day to earn two Emblems of Frost in addition to the Emblems of Triumph which drop off of each Heroic boss, you can continue to select the "Random" option for Heroics in the Dungeon System. Doing so will award you with two Emblems of Triumph upon completion of each dungeon in addition to the Emblems of Triumph which drop off of each Heroic boss. (Source)

Healing
Healing has always been challenging and to some extent thankless in WoW. I don't think LK fundamentally changed that.

When I heal, I like to be challenged. Just buffing healing overall, or taking some of the challenge away from the healers, I don't think makes the game more fun for them. It might be fun for a week as everyone thanks you for doing such an amazing job all the time, but playing any game in godmode typically gets old after the initial rush.

What I mean is that one of the most boring experiences I can have in the game is to be a healer for a milk run in which a wipe is unlikely and nobody is going to take much damage. By contrast, you can still have fun in that situation as a DPS spec. You can see how fast the boss dies. You can see how much damage you can do. It can even be fun as a tank, because you can usually afford to drop some of your defenses in order to improve your dps and try and make the fight shorter. At the very least, you can try and see how much damage you can mitigate. It's possible to do some pulls and even weaker bosses with almost no incoming damage. All a healer can really do is try to heal as little or efficiently as possible, which really just means you're standing around a lot. Maybe you're tossing the occasional Wrath or SW:Pain or something, but that dps contribution is pretty trivial even compared to the trying-to-DPS-a-little tank.

Where I will agree we need to improve healing in WoW is in relationship to how much damage the tank is taking (or even a teammate in PvP). Damage to health is too high in almost all scenarios, such that only the really big, really fast, or really broad (group-based) heals count for much. Things that are fun for a healer, such as trying to be mana-efficient or matching the right heal to the right damaged character go away when you're just spamming like mad. None of this should come as news to readers of this forum, because it's the kind of thing we've said before.

What I would like to see in Cataclysm is higher health pools but also lower heals (and tank avoidance) overall. Hopefully everyone won't be on the verge of almost dying, yet the risk of overhealing will be more real such that you can't just madly spam all of the time if you want to make it to the end of the encounter.

A similar thing is true for PvP. If health pools are larger, but heals smaller, then you see folks with health in between 100% and 0% more often. (Source)

Designing Raid encounters around heals
While that sounds good on "paper," my fear is that you would see groups just swapping all their healers out for paladins on boss 1 and then for shaman on boss 2. If you look at all of the mechanics of an encounter, you'll notice that the designers spend a lot of attention on trying not to prop up any single class or role too much. For example, there are not many LK encounters that scream "replace all your casters with melee" or "drop all of our melee for three more tanks."

To be honest, I'd much rather it go the opposite direction and players stop approaching raid invites as "They'll want me because my class is so awesome," and instead "They'll want me because I'm good." (Source)

Dungeon System
Need Before Greed and caster items
We knew this change was going to be controversial, and we totally understand that e.g. cloth can be an upgrade for a Balance druid or leather can be an upgrade for a shaman.

Looting to some extent is always going to have a heavily social component. There's only so much we can do (or should do) to try and "solve" that problem for players. On the other hand, the new LFG system also removes some of the social checks and balances (not that those are huge to begin with) by potentially grouping you with folks you may never see again. On my server, perennial ninjas and jerks earn a reputation. That's going to be harder when you're talking about a battle group. Overall we expect players to just pug a lot more often, because the new system really is that good. So overall the drama over who gets the healing shoulders might arise more often.

Ultimately, our logic went like this: If a Holy paladin loses a great non-plate upgrade to another player, one out of five players might feel bad. If a Holy paladin rolls Need on every type of armor that drops, then four out of five players might have a bad experience. The jerk potential seemed worse than the lost-an-upgrade potential as far as whether or not players buy into using the new dungeon tool.

You can still Greed a potential upgrade item. You can still talk to your group and explain that X is an awesome item for you and would they mind passing on it or even trading it? (You can trade BoP items for a short period of time following the same rules that apply today.) (Source)

[...] Yes. I'm not sure if everyone realizes that. Need Before Greed is forced when you add random players to a 5-player group. You can use whatever loot system you choose when you use /invite to form the group.

To try and improve the pug experience (at least pugs formed through the tool) we wanted to try and minimize jerkish behavior, and that includes not giving the leader a whole lot of power. I'm not talking about a player who thinks it's funny to pull the entire instance and wipe you. I'm talking about players who legitimately want to run the dungeon but have very non-conventional ideas about leadership or loot distribution. We are trying to impose a little bit of convention on these groups so that everyone has a better pug experience. (Source)

[...] Need before Greed is changed everywhere. From our research, very few groups use this loot system. (I'm sure some do, and you don't need to post to tell us that it's your favorite loot system.) Most groups use some variant of Group Loot (the current default) or Master Looter. If you use Group Loot, you can still Need on anything you want. You just can't use Group Loot on a pug formed with the Dungeon tool. (Source)

LFG Channel in Patch 3.3
The Looking For Group channel will return in patch 3.3. If you wish to run dungeons with players on your realm, you can use the Looking For Group channel in any major city to create the party. [...] It works exactly like the Trade channel currently does. (Source)

Daily Random Heroic Dungeon with people from your realm
That's not true by the way. You can form a group of five players, have the party leader open the Dungeon System and select the Random Heroic option. The pre-made group will be able to port to the selected instance, not be bound by any of the cross-realm restrictions (such as mandatory Need Before Greed, trade restrictions, Vote Kick, etc.), and will receive the daily reward for completing the dungeon. Your pre-made group could continue to select the Random Heroic option again and again to continue running any Heroic that pops up each time -- even if a Heroic dungeon pops up that you've already done -- and you will continue to get loot and Emblems of Triumph from each boss, plus two additional Emblems of Triumph for completing the random Heroic instance. (Source)

Dungeon System and Ignore List
And hey, the Ignore list is being expanded! You can also ignore players on other realms if you have a bad group experience with them. The Dungeon System will not place you in a group with any character on your Ignore list. (Source)

Random Dungeon Group creation speed
If you jump into the new Dungeon System tool, you likely won't have time to do much before finding a group. Groups will be created quite rapidly in most cases, particularly if the Random Dungeon option is chosen. If you don't want to use this system because you might have to play with people not on your realm, you're only restricting yourself. (Source)

Ninjas in random groups
As far as ninjas go, the default loot system will be Need Before Greed and cannot be changed if the group is cross-realm. The Need Before Greed system will be more intuitive as well so a player can't just roll Need on everything to try and ninja items by luck.

Ultimately, if someone's being a huge jerk in the party, Vote Kick them. Ignore them. You won't play with them again. (Source)

Looking for Raid System
The Looking For Raid system is entirely separate from the Dungeon System and is only for your realm. Players are not automatically grouped with this tool and it can be accessed from anywhere. (Source)

Cross-Realms Raid
It's something that has been discussed and is not out of the question, however we have no plans for allowing cross-realm raids in patch 3.3. (Source)

Dungeon System Q&A (Source)
What happens when your group falls apart before the completion of the random heroic? (assume you are saved as a result now)
As it works on the test realms right now, it's no different than if a group were to fall apart mid-run on the live realms today. If anyone leaves the group or gets kicked though, the leader will be asked if he or she wants to continue the instance. If the leader chooses to continue, the group will automatically be put back into the Dungeon System to find more members.

Will the new members be warned, say, that they've been chosen to join a dungeon already in progress with X bosses dead and be given an option to join or wait for a fresh run?
Yes.

Will a dungeon leader be given the option to continue the raid without adding more members? I've been in more than one pug where a problem child QQs and leaves, and the run goes a lot faster with the 4 than it did with the full 5.
Yes, the leader can choose not to have the Dungeon System fill vacancies.

How exactly do you know what the random heroic is? Or you just get awarded for the first random heroic you run as if it was the daily, no matter what random instance it is?
Yes, you get rewarded for completing the first Daily Random Heroic dungeon you do on any given day. It doesn't work like a quest anymore, so the choice will be random for each group formed through the selection of this option.

Do you get rewards for using the tool within your realm only or must you use the battlegroup search to be rewarded?
You can form a group of five players on your realm and then select the Daily Random Heroic dungeon through the Dungeon System tool. You will be rewarded just the same except for the fact that you will not get credit toward the pick-up group Achievement reward.

On the ptr, there was a gold reward for doing the random the first time along with the frost emblems? Is this still the case? If so, will there be a gold reward for additional random dungeon runs after the first one completed?
We're still discussing this.

Can you decide if you want to look for people in your realm alone or the tool will just mix and match?
If you're looking for party members via the Dungeon System, it will always look for eligible characters queued within your Battlegroup. You will need to use the Looking For Group chat channel in a major city or form a group on your own terms if you want to keep the group confined to players on your own realm. This doesn't make you ineligible for the Daily Random dungeon rewards though.

How is the gear requirement determined? is Blizzard implementing their own Gearscore?
The Dungeon System will make sure players are of the appropriate level, have the appropriate attunements for a dungeon (if applicable), and look at the average item level of each player. The system will put together a group according to the roles (tanking, healing, DPS) players have selected to fill and attempt to match characters as best as possible according to the items they have equipped.

Is there going to be some information released about minimum gear item level requirements, and how to calculate them? I doubt it will be an issue for most characters, but from observation on the PTR it looks like brand new level 80s and some very undergeared alts are going to be unable to queue for both ToC/Icecrown normal instances and all Wrath heroic instances through the new system. More feedback than "get better gear" would be helpful in that case.
We'll look into this.

When is the particular dungeon determined and is it fixed if you degroup? Say you find yourself assigned Oculus and you have no desire to do that. If you degroup (taking the deserter debuff) and jump back into LFG 15 minutes later, are you locked into having Oculus once it has been assigned once even though you haven't completed it?
The dungeon is determined once the group is filled. If the group does not like the instance that's been selected, they can leave, get the Deserter debuff, and try again to get a different random dungeon once the 15-minute debuff dissipates.

Are the random dungeon emblem rewards independent based? By this I mean, say I join a group where a few members already did their first random dungeon for the day, but I have yet to do a reward. Will I still get my 2 Emblem of Frost or will I get 2 Emblem of Triumphs.
As long as you select to do a random Heroic dungeon and it's your first for the day, you will be given the daily reward for completing that dungeon.

Is a character still limited to doing each dungeon in heroic mode once per day? That is, if one continues to use the "Random" option, is it possible to get the same heroic dungeon more than once in a day? I'd assume not; that is, the list of available heroic dungeons would be reduced each time you complete one, until (if you were really keen and fast!) the list would be empty until the daily reset.
If the Random option is repeatedly selected, players can run the same Heroic dungeon more than once a day. If a specific dungeon is chosen through the Dungeon System, that specific dungeon cannot be chosen more than once a day.

You could technically be given, say, Heroic Culling of Stratholme repeatedly when choosing the Random option and be eligible to repeatedly run that Heroic dungeon in one day. You cannot, however, repeatedly choose Culling of Stratholme in the Dungeon System.

If you run Heroic Culling of Stratholme through the Random option, you cannot select that Heroic instance specifically again in the Dungeon System. If you choose to run Heroic Culling of Stratholme rather than pick the Random option, there is a chance you will be selected to run Heroic Culling of Stratholme again if you pick the Random option later that same day.

What should be the medium for deciding if someone is competent for a PuG raid anymore?
Performance, Achievements, gear, etc. I don't see how the Dungeon System changes this. The LFR system will afford players who want to raid additional options for finding the best group and raid leader. Nothing is fundamentally changing with regards to expected performance in a pick-up raid. We're just giving players more tools to find a raid (realm-only) or dungeon (cross-realm) group. Each player is still accountable for his or her performance.

When you say that the random group system matches item levels with other players, does this mean that it tries to group people with a similar item level, or of an average item level?
It's going to try to group people with similar gear together, similar to the Arena system attempting to match teams with relatively equivalent ratings against each other.

You sort of answers this before, but if I got put in a dungeon that I -really- didn't want to do as my first random heroic of the day, and I drop group, wait the 15 minutes and join a new one, do I still get the 2 Frost Emblems? Or do I -have- to take the first random heroic that is presented to me to earn my Frost?
No, you will still be eligible for the daily loot even if you don't complete the first random Heroic dungeon you enter.

Paladin
Paladin healing
We think paladins would feel fine too if they really used their full arsenal. But since cost is almost irrelevant (you can afford the mana and can't afford to not have the big heal) and since Holy Light can be hasted so much and crits all the time, everything looks like a job for Holy Light. I think Beacon and Sacred Shield have done a lot for paladins and maybe there is room for one or two more heals, but I don't think the size of the toolbox is really the problem here. Druids have a big toolbox, yet some druids can go through a whole raid with almost nothing but Rejuv and Wild Growth. If we nerfed Holy Light -- hard -- then other paladin spells would look more attractive. But that would be a big change with a lot of ramifications, and not one we're going to make for 3.3. (Source)

Rogue
Dual Wield at LVL 1 in Patch 3.3
This is pretty much the answer. While other classes can viably dual wield, it's a core part of the rogue class. As one aspect of the many changes we're making in patch 3.3 to improve the learning curve for brand new players, we're making it so that rogues, by default, know how to dual wield. (Source)