Challenge Rift - Week 86

Celebrate a Wild Valentine's Day - Find and Build Themed Decks!

Patch 8.1 Hotfixes - February 14, 2019
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Dungeons and Raids
  • Battle of Dazar’alor
    • High Tinker Mekkatorque
      • Wind Up now grants 10% Haste and Movement Speed in Heroic difficulty (was 20%).
      • Boss health lowered by 5% in Heroic difficulty.
    • King Rastakhan
      • Seal of Purification, Scorching Detonation, and Withering Burst should no longer hit pets.

  • Uldir
    • Taloc
      • Orbs of Harmony will now respawn when the Taloc encounter resets.

Player versus Player
  • Restoration Druid mana regeneration is now reduced by 55% in PvP.
  • Holy Priest, Holy Paladin, Restoration Shaman, and Mistweaver Monk mana regeneration is now reduced by 50% in PvP.
  • Discipline Priest mana regeneration is now reduced by 45% in PvP.
  • Balance Druid, Feral Druid, and Elemental Shaman mana regeneration is reduced by 35% in PvP.
    • Developers’ notes: We’ve taken a careful look at healer mana during longer PvP engagements in both Arenas and battlegrounds, and the changes above are intended to address several concerns. In PvP, we want mana to feel like a more critical resource, and we want mana efficiency to be an important part of PvP healing. At the beginning of Battle for Azeroth, mana regeneration from all healer specs was reduced by 15-30% (depending on the class), and after reviewing the current state of the game, we feel like further reductions are necessary to both healer specs and a few hybrid specs.

  • Druid (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
    • Restoration
      • Nourish mana cost increased by 30%.

  • Rogue (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
    • Assassination
      • Neurotoxin now increases the cooldown of affected spells by 1 second (was 3 seconds).
      • Neurotoxin now has a 45 second cooldown (was 25 seconds).
      • Neurotoxin now has a 3 second duration (was 10 seconds).
        • Developers note: Unfortunately, we are unable to fix several technical issues with this spell at this time. We’re working on a fix for it that we hope to include in 8.1.5.

Patch 8.1.5 PTR - Portal Room Portal Model Updates
The portals in the portal rooms of Stormwind and Orgrimmar have received updates from the old mage portals on the PTR.



Blue Posts
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Whirling Dragon Punch Bug
are you guys aware about the whirling dragon punch bug for windwalkers? I haven’t read anything acknowledging it and its pretty game influencing
With Whirling Dragon Punch, there seems to be a bug causing a cooldown discrepancy. We’re testing it in 8.1.5, where it appears to be fixed, and appreciate the heads-up. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Chris Metzen Tweets
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
While I don’t represent Blizzard anymore, I want to say that despite how hard this week was - the folks still there are some of the most dedicated and passionate developers in the world. They give their ALL daily...... for YOU guys.

Yes, the business end of things can be tough sometimes - but that’s every company. Blizzard’s not done. Or over. Or on fire. Rough patch, maybe? But the people there are brilliant and working hard every day. Support them. Encourage them where you can.

Flailing about the apocalypse doesn’t help. Positivity and faith in the long run actually DO help. A community that doesn’t support each other won’t last. Be positive for each other. Be constructive. Anger just breeds anger. I think Yoda said that once...

...the vast majority of people there that build and support products can’t/don’t control the top end of the business. Claiming that it all on fire and dead does a huge disservice to the people that are there doing their best. (Source)
This article was originally published in forum thread: Patch 8.1 Hotfixes - Feb 14, 2019, Patch 8.1.5 PTR - Portal Room Updates, Blue Posts started by chaud View original post
Comments 63 Comments
  1. Dr Assbandit's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by dhru2 View Post
    I hate this Chris kid... who asked his opinion? Does he even have a job? Unemployed trailer trash...
    I bet Blizzard paid him to shill and calm the real working people down. Pathetic!
    Someone should tell him opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one.
    Nice b8 m8
  1. FelPlague's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by RangerDaz View Post
    Hey Chris, can you please come back and put the Lore team back on track?

    Because this war campaign in terms of Lore and character consistency has been a train wreck since the beginning.

    By the way, we miss the old Thrall (the pre cataclysm one, i must add), and we need you to bring him back
    Remember when people were begging for him to be fired?
  1. Nurasu's Avatar
    Yikes, is he allowed to say 'rough patch'? I'm sure he signed something somewhere when he left...
  1. Paulosio's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Ohnonononotempemail View Post
    "They give their ALL daily...... for YOU guys."

    You must be gullible to believe this. Last i checked they were developing games because they are paid to do so. Stop trying to make people feel sorry for a company. They are not your friends, they just want our money.
    He is mostly talking about the people working for the company. There are lots of ways to get paid. It took these people a lot of effort over the course of their lives to get where they are in the industry and i'm sure like most creative people, they care about what people think about the fruits of their labour. I would expect many of them could find better paid employment where they don't have to deal with the darker aspects of an online "community" judging and criticising every single thing they do or say.

    But ye carry on with your toxic negative views.
  1. Eggroll's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by dhru2 View Post
    I hate this Chris kid... who asked his opinion? Does he even have a job? Unemployed trailer trash...
    I bet Blizzard paid him to shill and calm the real working people down. Pathetic!
    Someone should tell him opinions are like assholes. Everyone has one.
    Hate is a bit of a strong word here, but I agree. His comments are out of place and patronizing.

    He somehow seems to have a rich-old-overpriviliged-oversaturated-white-dude-artist-victim-complex or something.

    Let's send him a hanky.
  1. Theoris's Avatar
    The new portal effect looks pretty cool. Hope player portals get them too.
  1. Rogalicus's Avatar
    Gotta admit new portals look pretty cool.
  1. RangerDaz's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by FelPlague View Post
    Remember when people were begging for him to be fired?
    Those people forgot that he is probably the person most responsible for the warcraft lore on which was built the entire world of warcraft MMO.
  1. nicode's Avatar
    I always think it's weird that they have people standing next to portals 24/7, I guess keeping them open. What a crappy job :P

    Actually seems like it would be more immersive if they had some kind of device or platform keeping the portal open instead of NPCs. Or even better would be mini-instance portals so you can take it without clicking.
  1. Gadzooks's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Nurasu View Post
    Yikes, is he allowed to say 'rough patch'? I'm sure he signed something somewhere when he left...
    NDAs don't disallow opinions, you just can't reveal specific information.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Nurasu View Post
    Yikes, is he allowed to say 'rough patch'? I'm sure he signed something somewhere when he left...
    Hit send before I was done -

    Also, look at his comment, in context. He's talking about the company as a whole going through a rough patch, not patch 8.1 being rough.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Kyphael View Post
    Chris Metzen: Warlords of Draenor was his baby. Now he's retired. Let that sink in.
    Nah, he was neck deep in Titan during WOD - WOD was the rise of Ion, Afrasiabi and Kosak, more than Metzen. He might have done big brush type stuff, but the last expansion with his fingerprints and spirit all over it was Pandaria. That was the last expansion he was creative director for, Afrasiabi took over that job in WOD.
  1. Trumpcat's Avatar
    Chris Metzen begging to support Activision?

    No.

    If they wanted the support and love of the community they would act like it. Like Blizzard did in years past.

    No, they don't care, time and again they prove it and reconfirm it. They care about revenue graphs on the inside meetings weekly presentations.

    Go to hell.
  1. starkey's Avatar
    Waiting on Ghostcrawler to blog about something now.
  1. Triggered Fridgekin's Avatar
    While I don’t represent Blizzard anymore, I want to say that despite how hard this week was - the folks still there are some of the most dedicated and passionate developers in the world. They give their ALL daily...... for YOU guys.
    Something about this kind of rubs me the wrong way. Were those who were let go any less dedicated and passionate than those who were kept? Were they giving less? Weren't developers left untouched?

    It's not like you can even point to a chart which says Activision Blizzard is tanking financially so steps had to be made in order to meet expectations especially when they exceeded expectations. Their CEO Bobby Kotick makes something like 29 million dollars a year and sits on nearly 7 billion dollars but sure they have to restructure from the bottom in order to... make more than they've ever made before.

    It's kind of perplexing but I guess it isn't due to shareholders and the idea that a rough patch is taken as some kind of death knell where the higher ups will have to downgrade their private jets and own 13 mansions instead of 15.
  1. Morbys's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Nurasu View Post
    Yikes, is he allowed to say 'rough patch'? I'm sure he signed something somewhere when he left...
    Anyone who wanted him to get fired were complete morons then, I think you are thinking of Ghostcrawler. Christ Metzen is the one reason there is a story behind any of Blizzards game, he is the creative genius behind starcraft and warcraft story, not too sure about diablo, that may have been someone else.

    And I'll support the team when they grow a backbone and say no we can't do it that way. What are they going to do, fire the entire wow department, ya good luck with that.
  1. Declaron's Avatar
    “I loved my job at Blizzard, I loved who I worked with and I loved the worlds we created, the games we created, the people in general, when I saw that the business model was going to be changed I got out, I got out before I got fucked over, none of you can blame me. I won’t be nasty about what’s going on now because I saw it coming, I saw what it would become, I saw what you guys would have to deal with both my old colleagues at Blizzard and the people who payed and played this awesome thing we created that’s now gone to a terrible existence. I don’t say anything nasty because we all know, especially you guys, you need Kap, and once Kaps back I’m back and we can sort all this nonsense out.” ~ Chris Metzen 2019. (Paraphrased)
  1. MrLoque's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by Declaron View Post
    “I loved my job at Blizzard, I loved who I worked with and I loved the worlds we created, the games we created, the people in general, when I saw that the business model was going to be changed I got out, I got out before I got fucked over, none of you can blame me. I won’t be nasty about what’s going on now because I saw it coming, I saw what it would become, I saw what you guys would have to deal with both my old colleagues at Blizzard and the people who payed and played this awesome thing we created that’s now gone to a terrible existence. I don’t say anything nasty because we all know, especially you guys, you need Kap, and once Kaps back I’m back and we can sort all this nonsense out.” ~ Chris Metzen 2019. (Paraphrased)
    Please someone give this man a golden trophy
  1. Daraven's Avatar
    Please for the love of god fix the AMD bug already...
  1. tripleh's Avatar
    Hey Chris its the devs and narrative teams own fault. That those workers lost there jobs. If the devs/narrative team actually did stuff that players enjoyed. Maybe those people would still have there jobs. But watch the devs repeat the same thing over again. They never learn.
  1. korijenkins's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by roboscorcher View Post
    What if I told you that companies were made out of human beings?

    What if I told you that most gamedevs are the opposite of cash-grabbing opportunists, often taking pay cuts to work on the project they love?

    Would that change your mind? Probably not, as most gamers have no idea how hard it is to maintain a profit in this industry.
    Do you really consider Brack and Kotick to be human beings?

    The Reptilians have taken over Blizzard!
  1. Eggroll's Avatar
    Quote Originally Posted by grexly75 View Post
    What Chris says is correct, just a shame that the community here if there even is one is a total cesspool.. As there are those who would rather take a dump on others in the "community" than help them, and a couple of posts in this very thread pretty much show it..
    No, it is not. It is patronizing, it is arrogant. And it is not his place to tell anyone what to think, say or let alone feel. If Blizzard had a proper PR department they would reassure the players that their favorite worlds are not in peril. But nooo. Instead, we have a player hating, entitled corpse whispering to us from the grave.

    Thanks, but no thanks. As much as I appreciate Metzen's past contributions to WoW, his recent comments are completeley out of place. They reek of self pity, self righteousness and arrogance.

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