World of Warcraft News and Raiding Strategies

Cho'gall in Bastion of Twilight. Go! Go! Go!

10 Player: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...75115&sid=2000
25 Player: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/th...75117&sid=2000

Azeroth is on the eve of a dramatic transformation, and as World of Warcraft changes, sometimes the old must go to make way for the new. Since the world elements that support them will be gone, many aging quests will exist only in the mists of the past.

In particular, there's been some confusion regarding lower-level class specific quests that can no longer be completed. Never fear: class mounts and abilities remain available via class trainers, even though the quests associated with them are no longer available. Also, there are several low and mid-level weapons, trinkets and robes that were once awarded via class specific quests which are no longer available and their associated quests have been removed.

We are looking forward to offering new quests, quest lines and rewards as players level through World of Warcraft: Cataclysm instead. For example, we plan a level 20 dungeon based quest which will offer weapon rewards appropriate to all classes. There will also be a similar level 50 dungeon quest which has a headpiece reward.

Finally, if your Blood Elf paladin missed out on the Blood Knight Tabard, then you should still be able to acquire one via a race specific version of the level 50 dungeon quest. Those of you hoping to pick up a Rhok’delar, Longbow of the Ancient Keepers might be happy to know that the issues which were preventing the completion of this quest should now be resolved. It’s a good idea to keep in mind that even though this item is related to a level 60 quest line, that only level 80 characters will be eligible to acquire the necessary materials from the Onyxia’s Lair encounter. The good news for level 60 characters is that Nefarian has finally decided to grow some Mature Black Dragon Sinew, so interested players can complete the quest by picking that item up from him in Blackwing Lair.

For the past few years, you may have noticed Community Team members moderating the various BlizzCon panels. This year, things are a little bit different. Instead of moderating panels, we’ll be providing BlizzCon updates on the forums, Facebook, and Twitter as well as mingling with attendees around the convention center. That’s right, this year we will be among you and look forward to getting meet and talk with you during the convention. If you see one of us, feel free to stop us and say, “Hi”.

AQ Scepter Quest Line Feat of Strength
We don't feel just completing this quest line should give you something permanently unique. The feat of strength is a nod to this epic quest line and for those who worked all the way through it. It isn't as awesome as a title or a legendary and it isn't meant to be.

Also, I guess I'm just a little weird as I often compare feats of strength as I feel those matter more than achievements. (Source)

Talent trees too easy?
I'm not convinced these posts aren't exaggerations popping out in the wake of major change. I've tried choosing specializations for several different classes and had tough, but fun choices to make in every case. There are at least a few talents in each tree which will provide extra flavor or utility according to your play style.

Will people determine the best min/max builds and spread them to the masses? Sure. That happened before patch 4.0.1 anyway. Prior to 4.0.1 you sure did have more talents and more points to spend, but the illusion of choice isn't the same thing as true choice. So many of the choices you had were between rather boring passive talents, and the choice was usually very clear. You usually chose the obvious power-increasing talents to improve your performance. Now your choices are a little more flavorful, and the best route to take is a little more subjective. You also have a greater choice of utility and power in your glyphs, and on your gear via Reforging.

Try taking another look at your old talent trees and let me know if there were truly a lot of very compelling talents that made choosing really hard, or if there were just a bunch more branches to throw points in. Look at the trees today and let me know if there are truly no choices for you to make that might enhance the enjoyment of playing your class. (Source)

Low Level Class Balance
We are going to spend some effort adjusting numbers for 1-80. It's not as big a priority as 85 because frankly, more players care about balance at 85 than they do lower level balance. As some folks have pointed out, inexperienced players almost by definition, don't place a premium on balance, and experienced players tend to not worry about balance much until they're at max level since things are changing so quickly.

Rather than adjusting everything independently, we tend to focus on max level and then work backwards from there. It doesn't help to nerf say rogue damage by 5% from level 1-60 if we then find we also need to nerf it at level 85 and then buff the 1-60 numbers to compensate.

There is some goofy stuff going on at lower level, but we'll get it all straightened out. After spending so much effort revamping the old zones and quests, we don't want the leveling experience to be an odd one. (Source)

More raid testing!

I'm going to turn on the following encounters in Bastion of Twilight, and leave the encounters from yesterday for Blackwing Descent open for a bit longer.

The following encounters will be available:

Halfus Wyrmbreaker
Theralion and Valiona
Ascendant Council

The Bastion of Twilight's entrance is located within Twilight Highlands.

Since these are the beta realms, this schedule is subject to change at a moment's notice due to bugs and server issues. More raid tests will be occurring over the next few weeks.

We have pushed a hotfix to improve hunter damage.

Specifically, we increased the damage of the signature abilities (Chimera Shot, Explosive Shot and Kill Command) by 15-25%. This will both improve overall damage-dealing and make sure that these abilities are prioritized higher than other shots. We think this will bring hunters to a good enough state until they hit 85. Aspect of the Fox and Cobra Shot solve some specific issues at higher levels. Marksman hunters may still trump Survival and Beastmaster hunters until they’re 85, since their rotations rely a little on Cobra Shot.

Don't worry, EU can test these bosses tomorrow! I'm not going to turn them off right at 10am our time, I'll keep them up through most all of the day tomorrow.

On a seperate note, 25 player Maloriak currently has a significant bug in place. We're working on a hotfix, but until that goes live it's not functioning properly. 10 player seems to be much better behaved, but we're looking at a despawn issue with it.

Atramedes is testable.

We are currently in the process of resending all BlizzCon 2010 registration bar codes. Now, don't panic—this is simply for your convenience. These bar codes are identical to those included in previous emails and the printable versions from your Battle.net order history.

Please be sure to bring a copy of your bar code along with a photo ID to pick up your ticket(s) at BlizzCon registration. We'll see you there!

Armor changes in 4.0.1
We looked into your findings, and the armor numbers reflect an intentional change meant to cover the armor increases players would get between levels 81 and 85. We should have been more explicit with the rest of the announced Cataclysm changes that physical damage would go up. (It only affects creatures higher than level 80 -- bosses in this case -- so this change has no current PvP ramifications.)

Now that our live class balance changes are slowing down* and players are starting to learn their class changes, we can get a better idea of whether players are struggling more on content that they used to be able to clear. We've made some Icecrown and Halion changes already and we may need to make more.

Nice job on the analysis.

* -- We are continuing to make Cataclysm changes for classes. We will extend these to level 80 and / or hotfix when we think it's relevant. (Source)

Resilience Hotfix
My resilience post above was confusing.

We had buffed resilience by 50% and then lowered it by 25%. This is a 12.5% buff from before the patch. To use clean numbers, if you had 40% damage reduction, we buffed it to 60% (a 50% increase) and then lowered it to 45% (a 25% decrease). (Source)

Balance in low-level BGs
So can a blue state whether or not the very, very high damage outputs in low level pvp will be addressed or not? Rogues able to one-shot most enemies in sub-80 pvp: working as intended, or not?
Nobody should be one-shotting at any battleground level, so yes that (and many other class abilities) will be addressed. (Source)

Mage (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Weak mages on Beta
This is a case of having to balance differently between 80 and 85. The original mage numbers were targeted at 85, which made them overpowered at 80. We nerfed them at 80, which then made them weak at 85. We now have two sets of numbers in place so that they should be relatively balanced at both levels.

Mages are not the only class with this problem, sometimes in the opposite direction. (Source)

Paladin (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Holy Paladin Hotfix
Yes, we buffed the 5 paladin direct heals (FoL, HL, DL, HS, WoG). This is a change for both level 80 and 85. We are going to tone down Holy Radiance as I described in the other thread. It can be powerful without being 75% of paladin healing.

I know it's customary for players to classify everything as either overpowered or garbage, but we believe there are actual numbers in between say 1 and 100, so give the changes a chance before you dismiss them.

It is possible we will nerf Word of Glory for Prot and Ret at 85 to compensate for this buff since they probably don't need stronger Words. (Source)

Beta update happened and instance servers seem to be up again. I'm opening Blackwing Descent to test Maloriak and Atramedes. I'll leave these two encounters up for an extrended period overnight, including in the morning tomorrow so our non-US regions can try the encounters out.

As always, these plans can change at a moment's notice based on bugs or other issues.

Guild Achievements

• Profit Sharing now requires 100,000 gold, up from 50,000 gold. Now rewards the Guild Herald companion pet.
• Saving For A Rainy Day now requires 200,000 gold, up from 100,000 gold. No longer rewards the Guild Herald companion pet.

Dungeons & Raids

• 1000 Valor Points - Earn 1000 Valor Points
• 5000 Valor Points - Earn 5000 Valor Points
• 25,000 Valor Points - Earn 25,000 Valor Points
• 50,000 Valor Points - Earn 50,000 Valor Points

Player vs. Player

• 1000 Conquest Points - Earn 1000 Conquest Points
• 5000 Conquest Points - Earn 5000 Conquest Points
• 25,000 Conquest Points - Earn 25,000 Conquest Points
• 50,000 Conquest Points - Earn 50,000 Conquest Points

Guild Perks

• Bartering now reduces the price of items from all vendors by 10%, up from 5%.

Companion Pets

• Moonkin Hatchling - Right Click to summon or dismiss a Moonkin Hatchling. / Instant

Enchanting

• Enchant Weapon - Landslide no longer works with ranged weapons.
• Enchant Weapon - Power Torrent now increases Intellect by 500 instead of spell power.
• Enchant Weapon - Hurricane no longer works with ranged weapons.
• Enchant Weapon - Elemental Slayer no longer works with ranged weapons.
• Enchant Weapon - Avalanche no longer works with ranged weapons.
• Enchant 2H Weapon - Mighty Agility *New* - Permanently enchant a two-handed weapon to increase Agility by 130. Requires a level 300 or higher item.
  Creates Greater Celestial Essence. / Reagents: Hypnotic Dust x 3, Greater Celestial Essence x 3, Heavenly Shard x 3

Engineering

• Spinal Healing Injector is now applied to the gloves instead of belt.
• Z50 Mana Gulper is now applied to the gloves instead of belt.

Druid (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Feral

• Rip now scales from 18/37/55/74/92% of Attack Power depending on combo points, up from 8/16/24/32/40%.
• Ferocious Bite now scales from 10.9/21.8/32.7/43.6/54.5% of Attack Power depending on combo points, up from 7/14/21/28/35%.
• Rake now causes scales from 2% of Attack Power for bleed damage, up from 1%. Now scales from 42% of AP for additional bleed damage over 9 sec, up from 18% of AP.
• Mangle additional damage has been increased from 726 to 1136.
• Vengeance - Entering Cat Form will cancel this effect.

Mage (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Arcane

• Arcane Specialization now increases damage of your Arcane spells by 25%, up from 15%.

Fire

• Fire Specialization now increases damage of your Fire spells by 25%, up from 10%.

Frost

• Frost Specialization now increases damage of your Frost spells by 25%, up from 15%.

Paladin (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Holy

• Seal of Insight - Unleashing this Seal's energy now also restores 15% of the Paladin's base mana.
• Mastery: Illuminated Healing now only affects your direct healing spells, instead of all healing spells.

Protection

• Touched by the Light now increases spell hit by 8%, up from 6%.

Retribution

• Guardian of Ancient Kings now causes 1750 damage plus 1750 per Application, down from 5250 plus 5250.
• Sheath of Light now increases spell hit by 8%, up from 6%.

Priest (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Holy

• Holy Nova now heals up to 5 targets.

Shadow

• Mind Soothe now also affects Dragonkin. Does not cause threat.
• Shadow Word: Death now deals three times as much damage to targets below 25% health.

Warlock (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Affliction

• Seed of Corruption now deals 567 to 660 to all enemies within 15 yards, down from 1186 to 1379.

Demonology

• Summon Infernal now deals 438 to 494 fire damage when it lands, up from 29.

Destruction

• Incinerate now deals 579 to 673 Fire Damage and an additional 96 to 112 Fire damage if the target is affected by Immolate. Changed from 540 to 627 with an additional 135 to 156.
• Rain of Fire now deals 2455 Fire damage over 8 sec, up from 1890.

Warrior (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Arms

• Taste for Blood will not occur more than once every 5 sec, down from 6 sec.

We are going to take the resilience buff down a little.

It should end up as a 25% buff from where it stood originally, not a 50% buff. For point of comparison, maxing out resilience before our first hotfix reduced damage by ~50%. After out hotfix, the damage reduction with max resilience was 80%. With this most recent change, damage reduction with max resilience will go down to 60%.

Part of what is going on here is that we don't want newly leveled characters to explode in PvP, while still making sure that well-geared characters aren't invulnerable. The current resilience curve makes that a tricky thing to balance. Perhaps in the future resilience needs diminishing returns so that it doesn't keep getting better and better the more you have.

While we don't have any additional announcements to make at this time, there are some additional balance tweaks we're working on. Some of our adjustments at level 80 ended up causing certain classes to be overpowered or underpowered at level 85.

Yet more raid testing!

There will be two sessions, an EU session starting at 11AM server time (PDT), and a US timed session at 4PM server time (PDT). We'll open the zones on all Beta realms (including KR!) for both sessions, and possibly longer.

The following encounters will be tested:

Maloriak in Blackwing Descent
Atramedes in Blackwing Descent

Blackwing Descent is a raid zone with an entrance located along the side of Blackrock Mountain.

Since these are the beta realms, this schedule is subject to change at a moment's notice due to bugs and server issues. More raid tests will be occurring over the next few weeks.

Are you ready for BlizzCon 2010? Blizzard Entertainment's two-day gaming festival begins this Friday, October 22, at the Anaheim Convention Center. The sold-out show features developer discussion panels, top-tier tournament competition, the popular costume and dance contests hosted by Jay Mohr, an epic closing concert starring Tenacious D, and much more.

You can still join us from home by purchasing a BlizzCon Virtual Ticket (http://blizzcon.rayv.com), featuring more than 50 hours of live HD coverage as well as the exclusive BlizzCon 2010 World of Warcraft pet and StarCraft II in-game items. The Virtual Ticket is available globally via Internet stream and also through DIRECTV in the U.S. For more information, read our recent press release (http://us.blizzard.com/en-us/news/?d=2010-10#180800) or visit BlizzCon.com (http://blizzcon.com).

In preparation for the launch of World of Warcraft: Cataclysm, we have updated our recommended minimum system requirements. These new requirements correspond with patch 4.0.1. We suggest players check out our related support article for all of the details to ensure your gameplay experience is as ideal as possible.

http://us.blizzard.com/support/artic...rticleId=21054

What mysteries await within the Temple of Earth? Journey to the heart of Deepholm in our latest dungeon preview featuring the Stonecore. Considered sacred by the Twilight’s Hammer followers and acting as a haven to the elements of earth, this level 82-84 dungeon will not relinquish its secrets easily.

Learn more on our new preview page: http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/catac...stonecore.html

What A Long, Strange Trip It's Been 310% Hotfix
The hotfix is scheduled to go live tonight. (Source)

Missing Glyphs in 4.0.1
The missing glyphs we know of are Mage Armor, Long Word and possibly Vanish. The others have been found through discovery as far as we know. (Source)

Druid (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Unshifting clears Vengeance
We could make shifting to Cat clear Vengeance but let it stay on in caster form. We're only paranoid about Cat AP for obvious reasons. (Source)


Paladin (Forums / Cataclysm Talent Calculator / Beta Skills/Talents)
Holy Paladins on Beta
After looking at more of the raid attempts on beta, we are worried that Holy paladins are doing too much area healing and not enough single target healing.

While we definitely want to scoot paladins away from their Lich King monopoly on tank healing and towards raid healing, we don't want to go too far. We're thinking about nerfing Holy Radiance and buffing single target healing. Again, the goal is not that Holy paladins only ever heal the tank, but we want them to actually be able to heal the tank as well.

On Holy Radiance, we think the 20 yard range shifted the spell from one where position was relevant to just blowing it on cooldown. We'll probably keep the 20 yard radius, but have a falloff to where the healing is highest within 8-10 yards of the paladin. This will also help the spell stay relevant in 5-player dungeons without being overpowered in larger raids. The cap for Holy Radiance (and Healing Rain for that matter) also aren't working correctly at the moment.

If we decide to buff single target healing, it would probably just be points on the 5 direct heals. We think Beacon is in a good place and aren't looking to overhaul the overall Holy mechanics. It's just a numbers issue.

Judging Seal of Insight (a change I alluded to earlier) will help with mana problems, especially when Divine Plea is on cooldown or you're nervous about using it. (Source)

Beacon of Light Nerf
We thought Beacon was overpowered when the paladin could literally heal two targets to 100% at once. In that era, there was never a reason to heal the Beaconed target. Not only was it powerful, it was really easy and required little action or decision on the part of the paladin. Having the Beacon splash some healing onto a target who may or may not need it feels balance-able to us. It means the paladin still needs to decide when to heal the Beaconed target indirectly (i.e. use Beacon) or when to heal them directly. It means there is the risk of doing the wrong thing, which could mean switching Beacon when you shouldn't have or healing the Beacon when you should have healed someone else. (Source)