World of Warcraft News and Raiding Strategies RSS Feed

by Published on 2013-01-29 05:41 AM

ProzaicMuze: Wizard Sleet Storm Build, Diablo Head Statue, Wizard Fan Art, Curse Weekly Roundup

Want to talk about this news post? Use this thread! Please don't attempt to enter the contest in it, as your entry will not be counted.

TCG Pets Giveaway
WoWTCGLoot was nice enough to send us some things to give away again this year, so a big thanks to them! We are starting with some pets and one month Curse Premium codes. This time around, half of the prizes will go to people replying to this news post and half will go to people entering through WoWDB contributions.

Currently WoWDB entries have a higher chance to win, as less people are participating, so if you are really interested in winning, take a look! Making useless comments like "This is a great pet" is a great way to get disqualified from the contest!

Prizes

Rules
  • Enter once by replying to this news post!
  • You can earn additional entries by leaving a useful comment on WoWDB pages. If you try to spam to get more entries, you will be disqualified from the contest. Comments that aren't constructive and useful will be removed. Comments that repeat what is already on the page or in another comment without adding anything of value will be removed.
  • You can earn additional entries by uploading a high quality screenshot to WoWDB pages. Low quality screenshots will be removed. Please crop before uploading, as there is a ~1MB file size limit. Screenshots can take several hours to appear, as they are approved manually.
  • Keep in mind that Curse accounts and MMO-Champion accounts are not connected, so you may need to create a new account on WoWDB.
  • Winners will receive a PM on the forum / WoWDB which they have 72 hours to reply to. After that, a new winner will be selected. Don't forget to log in and check your PMs!
  • Entering more than once per contest thread is useless and will get you disqualified. There will be no 2nd chance for people posting more than one comment in this thread, you have been warned. (We will also of course check for double accounts, etc)
  • You have until Friday February 1st @ 11:59 PM EST to enter the contest. After that time this thread will be closed and winners will be selected randomly.

Addon Review: World Boss Status
Now that you have had time to level alts, you may have trouble remembering which alts have done which world bosses each week. World Boss Status is a very simple addon that will save kills per character for you. It can output the information to chat, a minimap button tooltip, or utilize one of the LibDataBroker displays, such as ChocolateBar or Bazooka.

It is a very simple addon, but will be even more handy with the new World Bosses being added in Patch 5.2. You can grab it from Curse or directly through the Curse Client.



Blue Posts
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Content Difficulty Feedback
the comparison made the console games - i completely agree. this is an MMORPG. why should it require 3 seperate difficulty levels? this is NOT a console game, it should not be adjustable to suit any 1 persons play style on principle of the genre. dont even try to twist this point. MMORPG's are Mass Multiplayer, more than a few peoples ideas are required to completely overhaul a part of the system such as raids. you even created LFR to solve this problem. just because they want to select a higher difficulty does NOT mean it should be made easier. i don't go on to call of duty and select Veteran difficulty as a noob and expect it to be easy, and anyone who does is NOT worth affecting the play styles of others.
World of Warcraft is neither the first MMO to have varying levels of difficulty, nor the only one. You can't compare it to a completely different game (Call of Duty) as it doesn't even share the same genre nor the same design philosophies or game design.

If you look at the MMO world you'll see other titles do also adjust the difficulty of their content, in fact, there's a very popular case of such a boss in another MMO, which I won't name here for obvious reasons.

You killing normal Elegon doesn't effect my HC Elegon. When you come and ask MY elegon to be nerfed, then it affects my game. Otherwise i wouldn't care less what they do with 'your' Elegon as long as I can try and kill 'my' Elegon or wipe on 'my elegon' till i learn to move from the floor in time
It's not "your" heroic Elegon though (neither "their" normal Elegon). But there's something that has been said on this thread that is true. As much as some hardcore players love to blame the casuals when 'their' content has been nerfed in the past, the fact is, you'll rarely see threads asking for heroic bosses to be nerfed. Sure, you'll find the occasional thread here and there, but it's far from common.

Let me make it clearer by an example: We were slowly but surely progressing on spine of deathwing when the nerfs started rolling in. Beat spine when it was nerfed by 10%, and Madness when it was nerfed 15%. This made us feel cheated. We did not feel that we had succeeded in killing those bosses the way they were meant to be killed, it even borderlined on a feeling of shame, as there was another top guild on the server that beat both at 0% 3 weeks earlier.
3 weeks earlier? Did they turn the debuff off? Because in fact, it took 3 months for the debuff to go from 0% to 15%:
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/blog/3599256 (5%, January 31)
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/blog/3746119 (10%, February 28)
http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/blog/3899863 (15%, March 26)

But still, it's a fair point that your accomplishment felt diminished because of a debuff tackled on the boss. That's the reason why in Mists of Pandaria there're the "Cutting Edge" achievements for the three final Heroic bosses of the current tier (in fact, on the Patch 5.2 PTR they currently read "defeated before the discovery of Throne of Thunder), so although this isn't Dragon Soul and there're no nerfs in place, you have a good reason to actually try to chase those kills and earn a reward that will, no doubt, be rare among raiders come 5.2. You'll be able to show that Feat of Strength and say "I killed it before 5.2".

Also, we didn't have the Item Upgrade system that is available right now (although it'll be going away with the arrival of 5.2, at least temporarily), so the panorama you're looking at right now is vastly different than that of Dragon Soul, even if it feels like not that much has happened since then. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Blue Tweets
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Classes
Why does Blizzard hate options so much? Talents, Upgrades, many stats went away. Do you think players are stupid?
On the contrary, players are so smart that they "solved" the simplistic talent design too quickly and never looked at it again. (Source)
So the new talent system ISN'T that good after all? What are you gonna do, then? Change it all over again in 6.0?
I didn't mean to imply the new model isn't good. We're happy with it overall, just changing some that aren't used enough. (Source)

blood (476i) solo 2 rogues (500/485i) + mage (485i). comf w/ this? tank damage is ridic, dps in raids is overboard, esp blood.
Tank damage shouldn't be ridiculous when fighting rogues, because they lack Vengeance. (Source)

Hey GC, for how long are Arcane and Affliction going to remain 8-10% above all other classes/specs on bosses overall?
Probably until 5.2. We think they are both overpowered, but not so bad that hotfixes are critical. We'll keep an eye on it. (Source)

.…based on damage alone, is there any other path to achieve that goal?
Very progression-oriented guilds appreciate the non-DPS aspects of each spec. Other players just focus on the stack rank of DPS. (Source)

GC, why do we have confusing abilities like Rapid Fire which don't trigger GCD, yet still can't be used during a GCD?
Abilities off the GCD tend to get macro'd unless they are very situational. Macros shouldn't make decisions for you. (Source)

I'd rather a glyph be effective and boring than interesting but rarely used.
What's the point in having the system at all though if you're not going to think about which glyphs you want? (Source)

*more* class distinction, yet the trend has been to homogenize classe? This sounds like an opinion rather than a direction.
No, actually a direction, but at the same time we have to keep players happy and when their character don't work, they aren't. (Source)

Any plans on fixing the Vanish bugs atm? I seem to be getting pulled out of stealth quite often after vanishing.
We haven't heard many complaints about Vanish not working since we totally rebuilt it a year or two ago. Any more details? (Source)
You could vanish a cheapshot or deathcoil, you can still do it, but you're CC'ed IN vanish which is extremely lame.
It was also really buggy BC of server lag and spells already in flight. "Fix Vanish" was probably the number one request we got. (Source)

Does WoW have too many buttons? What's the long-term thinking since you like to add new abilities every expac? Hard to keybind
Totally agree. On the other hand, leveling up and not getting new spells is pretty lame too. We don't have a great solution yet. (Source)

Death Knight (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
What is your opinion on AMS, IBF, and Death Pact not being usable while silenced? Seems comparable to deterrence and disarms.
Silence is one of the few ways to stop a DK. We don't want to make things harder to counter.... (Source)

Don't you realise how stupid it is to have 2h and DW play differently and really on different damage-types (frost/physical)?
Why is it stupid? It provides some choice to the player especially depending on what gear drops. (Source)

Druid (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Balance druids need a fix. Badly. I've died so many times that the game is more frustration than fun.
In this case, I'm not sure it's a class balance problem. Unless you're a tank, Pandaria can be deadly while leveling. (Source)
There are a lot of challenging quests leveling through MoP. We wanted to make the world feel more dangerous like it used to. (Source)

What are your plans for rdruid in 5.2 pvp. Will you be buffing hots?
We don't think so, but we do want to make sure they keep enough pressure if Cyclone stays nerfed. (Source)

Mage (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
If we are talking fun, to wit: tedious ramp-up times, rune of power feels stifling,and Arcane Blast spell effect visual hidden
Would the ramp up feel better if it was 3 stacks again but more DPS per stack? (Source)

Monk (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Touch of Karma double dips res.. Intended?
Yeah, it's really just the way the spell works. (Source)

Paladin (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
the spell power of ret pally does not benefit from SP 10% buff, is this a bug?
Not a bug. Their attack power is increased, which gives them spell power indirectly. (Source)

Hungering Cold was scapped because you thought it was a stun, while ironically giving a stun to dks and that move to paladins.
We kept buffing Blinding Light because paladins thought it was weak in beta. We were wrong. It's probably okay for Ret as instant (Source)
I had forgotten we had changed it from a stun, but that wasn't why we yanked it. It was the instant AE part. (Source)

Priest (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Shadow priests severely lack burst dmg in a form of a strong CD. Any plans on adding new cooldowns or improving current?
Surge of Darkness and Mindbender are decent burst buttons and we're trying to redesign Insanity to provide a third. (Source)

chakra cooldown needs to be removed. is there a reason to keep a 30-second cd ? it's not a choice, it's a pain.
With no cooldown, you aren't making any choices about your healing focus. You're just changing it whenever it suits you. (Source)

nerfing Disc would create 2 underpowered specs. Wouldn't it make more sense for both to meet eachother halfway?
Holy competes fine with the other healers. Disc is just so powerful that unless you're stubborn, you probably go Disc. (Source)

You sir are an idiot. Nerf a good spec to make a shitty one seem ok.... really.......Holy has way bigger issues.
That's not how we see it. Holy posts bad numbers because there are 5-10X as many priests playing Disc (and beating other healers) (Source)
Then where are all priests ? playing as a shadow ? Or you want more disc in PvP ? and more holy in PvE ?
Disc is overpowered in PvE and underpowered in PvP. We're trying to solve both. (Source)
Doesn't Disc tend to post better numbers than direct healing just because absorbs go before direct heals?
Yes. But that still means Disc is doing more for the group than the healers who are getting their heals sniped. (Source)

Rogue (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
when 5.2 drops can we have a glyph that keeps shuriken toss like 5.1??
What do you like about the 5.1 version? (We usually don't glyph specific talents.) (Source)

Interested to see if PTR feedback favors C&D or H&R... would you consider going back if H&R wins out?
If players react really positively to it, then yes, we'd consider it. Our internal feedback is good but not flawless. (Source)

Warlock (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Blood fear feels limited with changes. Only melee and pets directly hit them.
We agree the pets might be a problem. Could make pets not charge or trigger it, but that might be a nerf too. (Source)

Warrior (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Warrior Question: Do you feel that both Arms and Fury (both versions) will be enhanced in the upcoming patch 5.2 in PVE?
Depends on what you mean by "enhanced." Fury doesn't need any more DPS in PvE. Arms might need a little. (Source)

if you want to balance SW without changing the % heal per sec, why don't you just change when SW starts, like below 20% or 25%
In PvP, you might spend only seconds at that percent. (Source)

The new haste bonus for Warriors, does it double Haste just from gear or all buffs? (Heroism/Potions/Raid Gimmicks.)
Should be all haste, but you can compare it to the Enhance one which works similarly. (Source)

increasing Slam dmg might seem like a remedy to TfB/HS removal, between MS,OP, and ColSmash, warriors almost never use Slam
It's already at what 220% on PTR? But we agree more Slams makes the Arms rotation even in PvP more interesting. (Source)

In fact, Warriors in arenas almost dont use SW. The healers dont risk letting SW work. SW is ok in duels and bg
Not sure I'd agree. We see almost every PvP warrior with SW. If it never got used I think they might try another talent. (Source)

PvE
True or false: in Raid Finder, using an elder charm *might* result in a Sigil of Power.
False. (Source)

Any plans to introduce a system to help out those who are unlucky with drops? 3 coins every week on Sha of Fear, no upgrades.
We're talking about it. My sense is many of the players who complain about the loot model have been super unlucky, which sucks. (Source)

then why are you testing the next raid at an heroic ilvl? A tiny minority of casuals will have 502 at tier's end.
Because your ilevel will increase as you do the new content. Not everyone can clear normal on week one. (Source)

also, are you planning for the 5.0 raids to still give out VP in 5.2? It could hurt a lot if not, specially small guilds.
Yeah, at the moment we are. It might be less than today, but they seem like a good valor option. (Source)

Heroic Garalon 25 down - although I wasn't in for the fight. No real cleave. Sigh. you are my only hope
Typically successful groups only have 4-5 cleaving in a Garalon 25. More than that, and you may be wasting DPS. (Source)

How do you not see fewer options? IIRC WotLK had dungeons and quests, Cata had dungeons and quests, Mists has quests only...
What did you get from the quests in LK once you were max level? And why don't you run the MoP dungeons? Great source of valor. (Source)

pve dungeons for rep to get pve gear makes sense your statement about dungeons for pvp gear makes you look stupid.
The point was dungeons offer epics and valor. Why do they also need to offer additional bonuses? They are rewarding already. (Source)
Dungeons are right now a near worthless piece of content after reaching item level 463. Give us a reason to run
They have rare epics and they are an efficient source of valor (esp. first of the day). Don't you always grow out of dungeons? (Source)
how about a tabard that grants you rep in dungeons, but doesn't let you loot any gear?
That still lets you get around the daily rate of progression that the quests provide. We don't want "Finish in one week." (Source)

I fear where WoW is going if you can't see that the reason ppl return from newer MMOs is the dungeons and endgame, not quests.
We think the game works better with a mix of dungeons and questing. (Source)

The buzz seems to be that most "normal" raiders are either behind their usual pace or are resigned to LFR. On your radar?
Is this anything other than the tier being pretty big? (Source)

vs why should I log in every day and grind all week for upgrades too small to notice?
Because the alternative is it feels mandatory to cap valor every single week, no matter what else is going on in life. (Source)

but you can't spend the damn valor without daily quests. The gear doesn't need the rep requirement.
The 5.2 valor gear requires a rep, but it's not a rep you earn from dailies. (There is also a daily rep like in 5.1.) (Source)

Future
Is this rumor I'm hearing about you saying *NO* new dungeons in MoP true? They're my favorite group content!
There isn't a new dungeon in 5.2. As far as I know, that's all we've said. (Source)

Hey GS, I know Transmog is all being patched up in 5.2, but have you guys thought of allowing the enchant effect to mog?
We have thought about it. We don't have the tech to do it at the moment. (Source)

Where do you get t15 on the ptr?
You can't ATM. You could kill the bosses, but we're considering (not promising) letting you just buy the gear to try the sets out (Source)

do you think we could see the path of the titans concept return to maybe re-expand the talent system since it was rebooted?
I still love the idea. Hope to bring it back someday. (Source)
Expected this comment to be about skirmish arenas, oh well
Hope to bring those back someday too. (Source)

Any chance to see old poison proc animation for Rogues in 5.2? Would be a GREAT minor glyph, I loved the visual back then.
It's a technical issue. Weapons can only display one enchant effect at a time. A common request though so maybe there's an answer. (Source)

Ghosty we want the visual of the quiver, not the actual item! We want to pull arrows out of something when we shoot!
It's on our wish list, but we don't have an ETA. (Source)

Will plate classes ever see strength polearms, or at least polearm transmogrification, again?
It's hard to answer "ever." We would like to have them and we think players would too. We don't have an ETA though. (Source)

I saw post about quivers . I guess the players aren't expecting to have quivers slots but at least a visual quivers look .
Yeah I understand that now. It's on the list, but I can't give an ETA. We always want to do more than we can at one time. (Source)
I assume that's the same answer you'd have to give about the proving grounds concept, right?
Less code and art time required for those, so they're higher on the list. (Source)

Is MMO-Champ correct that the warlock quest rewards a 489 ring? Isn't 489 a little low for a 5.2 epic?
The quest isn't far enough along to be able to meaningfully data mine anything out of it. The plan is still for 5.2 though. (Source)

Sunsong Ranch changes sound good. Now allow some personalization and some item storage space, and we've got player housing.
Isn't an important part of player housing being able to show off your stuff? (Source)
Why can't either the party leader set which member's phase to be in (for housing) or lowest phase layer for helping others.
Yeah we'd like to do that. Would help make phasing less disruptive. (Source)

Misc
All you do is gate people's enjoyment in the game. Get 90 lesser charms, get elders, do sha/ganon profit. login next week.
Games are about overcoming obstacles. Our data suggests people quit playing when things are too easy or convenient. (Source)

can the reforge guy take a vacation as well?.. and on an unrelated note, can you get rid of feasts all together?
And durability, and travel, and maybe flasks and... wait, where did the game go? (Source)

wait are you saying if a majority of people don’t like something?
I'm saying most players aren't in a position to conduct a scientific poll. (Source)

I´m curious if the changes you make are based on more feedback than 200 players. If you ever publish any feedback that is...
Totally depends on the change. Some based on the habits of millions of players. Others because of 1 insightful post. It's not a vote (Source)

With all due respect, if you disagree with simcraft, then show us your internal one, afraid that we will find mistakes?
We are the designers. If you disagree with our design, the burden of proof is on your to convince us we're wrong. (Source)
we are the financiers the burden is on you to keep us happy and paying. prove US wrong. =D =P
Agree that it's our job to keep you happy. Disagree that proving sims right or wrong is the most effective way to do that. (Source)

Where do you base your ideas of balance on? The general vibe or actual (representation) numbers?
For things like DPS, the real numbers. You can't test how effective a CC chain is in PvP though. We rely more on feedback then. (Source)
And even in the case of DPS, we will make changes if players can't hit the expected numbers or use different rotations etc. (Source)

To be specific, Do you care if a player is happy with the game as long as they keep playing?
Yes, in life you also have to pay bills. But why spend your short years on Earth making a game that players just tolerate? (Source)
Most devs I know are in this business because they want to make games people like. It's a passion, not a means to a quick buck. (Source)

What do you mean with "sampling bias."?
Players sometimes view logs as how much DPS everyone *can* do. That's not what logs measure. That's the bias. (Source)
Say X is 2% higher DPS than Y. All the best skilled and geared players go X, further inflating X to maybe 10% higher than Y. (Source)

I left because some high rated arena players told me i didn't had what it takes, brought down my motivation.
Unfortunately, one of our community's favorite things to do is tell others that they're doing it wrong. (Source)

So basically you guys were full of shit when you promised aerial combat in WG on the WOTLK original box?
Our philosophy is to try not to ship bad designs just so we can say we shipped them. Players get angry, but angrier if it's bad. (Source)

from the sounds of it, you're already contemplating quitting twitter.what are you going to do if twitter doesn't work out?
Reddit? Pintrest? Not giving up yet. (Source)

How many people is considered a lot at that point?
It only takes a single person to make a compelling point to have us consider it. (Source)

Why do people so rude to you when they talk about game balance?
Not sure. Maybe they feel they have to be loud to get attention or else they're just frustrated and can't help themselves. (Source)

the most important thing you guys learned from Cata going into Mists?
Don't let players quickly run out of things to do! (Source

You say WoW isn't good as single player game but many quests suck/are frustrating in groups or w/others around. Thoughts?
It's a fair criticism. Seeing / playing with other players of your faction should generally be a bonus not a penalty. (Source)

Please don't ignore our valid concerns because of one player's attitude. Please read some of our suggestions.
I wouldn't punish a class because of a few bad apples. (Source)
plumbers don't refuse to fix x problem because basement too cluttered/gunky. Maybe wade into class forums once in a blue moon?
Good plumbers don't cause more leaks though. Even the simple PTR thread I started brought several "I feel ignored" posts. (Source)

I don't see there being much maintenance required for a vanilla server. You guys would get a ton of old players back for sure.
It would be a ridiculous amount of maintenance. Nearly every patch fix would have to be made twice. (Source)

Guild Wars 2 Flame and Frost: Prelude Update
The previously talked about patch is finally live! It brings new daily achievements, Living Story events, playing as a guest on another world, home world transfers for a gem fee, culling changes, and lots of bugfixes and polish. See the full notes for details.



Curse Weekly Roundup
THQ is finally granted the rights to sell, FIFA takes Black Ops 2 for a ride of it's own, and new content and announcements for big 2013 games; all in this Curse Weekly Roundup

by Published on 2013-01-27 09:04 PM

TryHard: Starting Fresh - Episode 3, Fan Creation of the Week: The Art of Deiv Calviz, Bonus Blizzard Comic Contest Entry

Patch 5.2 - PvP UI Updated
Patch 5.2 updates the PvP UI with a larger and easier to use dialogue, including a different way to blacklist battlegrounds.



Patch 5.2 Legendary Quests Updated
A recent PTR build updated the description of many of the legendary quests. Check out the quest pages to read the entire description for each quest, especially A Reckoning!

The new additions show that you need to unlock several phases of the War Effort, as well as kill the new world boss, Storm Lord Nalak.

Level Name Objective
90Meet Me UpstairsMeet Wrathion upstairs on the second floor of the Tavern in the Mists in the Veiled Stair.
90Secrets of the First EmpireCollect 20 Secrets of the Empire and 40 Trillium Bars.
90I Need a ChampionEarn Exalted Reputation with the Black Prince by defeating mogu, Zandalari, and saurok enemies on the Isle of the Thunder King.
90The Lightning ForgeProgress through the Isle of the Thunder King until you unlock the Lightning Forge. Meet Wrathion outside the Lightning Forge and complete his task.
90Spirit of the Storm LordProgress through the Isle of the Thunder King until you unlock the final courtyard. Obtain a Tempered Lightning Lance by thrusting the lance into Storm Lord Nalak and killing it.
90Echoes of the TitansCollect 12 Titan Runestones from raid bosses in the Chambers of Flesh-Shaping and the Halls of Thunder.
90Heart of the Thunder KingSlay the Thunder King in the Halls of Thunder and collect the Heart of the Thunder King.
90The Crown of HeavenMeet Wrathion atop Mason's Folly in the Veiled Stair and collect your reward.
90A ReckoningContact Wrathion once your faction is ready to make its move. [To Be Continued in Patch 5.3...]


Lunar Festival 2013
There aren't really any significant changes to Lunar Festival this year, just keep in mind that you can grab the other faction's pet by making a character on that faction or purchasing it from the AH.



Blue Tweets
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Classes
How much have you been hearing about the 400+ ilvl gear on 80's? Will this be fixed soon? Or intended to be??
A lot, yes and no. (Source)

I know Hit & Run is DOA, but are you guys at all surprised by the amount of positive reaction we saw from some PTR players?
Honestly, yes. The targeting reticule was a deal-breaker for many of our internal folks. (Source)
really, the targetting reticule was the killer? Maybe we can talk about HLeap
Heroic Leap played into the decision. We like the ability (and so do many warriors) but for some the reticule is a hard sell. (Source)

Any plans to still balance&nerf healer mana in 5.2? Pallys and Discs hardly go OOM anymore making spirit a less valuable stat.
We see paladins go OOM. Disc avoids it with Rapture games that aren't available in 5.2. (Source)
What about resto druids? Mages? They never oom
Mages aren't designed to OOM (except Arcane). Resto druids are. (Source)

What do you think is the reason(s) that vast majority of the warrior population plays arms in pvp compared to fury?
Big hits > many hits in PvP. Enrage can be dispelled. (Source)
so, rogues are many hits class, change them plz
If the damage of all melee has about the same "cadence" doesn't that hurt class diversity? Rerolling should be exciting. (Source)

Is the Vengeance hotfix permanent? Or just until you fix the recalc bugs?
The intent was for it to be permanent. Is there a reason you need Vengeance to be that high? (Source)

You've said WoW cannot support an infinite number of classes.With DK and now Monks added will we ever see a Demon Hunter class
Is there enough design space there not occupied by DK, warlock, hunter, warrior? (Source)

10/5% is indeed unacceptable. 1% delta is fine. And need to switch specs for single vs. multi-target encounters is same bs.
I suspect 1% is unachievable on actual diverse encounters so long as specs use different buttons. (Source)

Death Knight (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
DK 4 piece 25 sec addition to Army of the dead, seems odd?
We realize it's a tough sell, but we have some ideas to make the set bonus more attractive. (Source)

Druid (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
I think there are very few ferals out there who actually wanted this monotone non-shifting gameplay.
That one is really tough. Some druids like the shifting aspect of the class, other say "No, I am a cat. Period." (Source)

The wrath spell for the treeants for Force of Nature isn't scaling with solar eclipse.
That is intentional. (Source)

Resto Druids got hurt so bad with the increased Battle Fatigue. Troubling you still think them on par with RS/Pala. Explain?
If everyone's healing goes down by the same percentage, how does one healer get hurt more? Relative healing should stay the same. (Source)
When healing was higher it let the druid hot then do other things like cyclone/pounce. Now he has to hardcast more.
But if the shaman's heals are 30% smaller too, why do they not have to heal more as well? (Source)

Mage (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
If you want mages to play the spec they want. Why have the devs made fire mage so poor on single target dps? any changes inc?
All the raiding mages were Fire BC Fire was best in every situation. Now we see more Frost and Arcane, but still lots of Fire. (Source)
the Player like to play Fire, but why you dont want it, you nerfed it to the ground on singelataget?
Last I looked, Fire is 90 to 100K on a single target fight like Feng. That's to the ground these days? (Source)
try looking at the average players not the top raiders. avg player is at 40-60
And isn't Arcane around there as well? Or maybe a better question: what is not to the ground for normal players? (Source)
http://t.co/lEbr21Sy ist this not the ground?
Stack ranks are deceptive. Try this: compare just Fire and Arcane. Now compare sample size and standard deviation. (Source)

arcane is around there frost Im seeing still low overall 30 - 43 I track this to lack of FoF proc chance on bosses. look into?
Hard to say for Frost. Sample size is low, and my guess is most raiding mages are Fire/Arcane. (Source)

Fun? Not sure. Interesting? B/C scorch adds a bit more decision making to rotation.
Can you explain the decision? Aren't you just fishing for Missiles procs while sitting on 6 stacks? (Source)

Monk (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Have you ever considered that not many people roll monk because of the burdens of keeping up an alt or levelling one
Yeah that is certainly an issue. When I say monks are low in PvP, that considers their already low population overall. (Source)

How do you feel mistweaver monks are in terms of raid utility compared to other healers? There isn't a goto reason to take one
I worry about this problem at the macro level. If all 6 healers had awesome utility, you still could not take them all. (Source)

Paladin (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
why did you take repentance, an iconic ret tool, and made it bad for rets and placed it in a awkward talent tier?
We wanted less instant CC (still do) and knew cast time would be hard sell for Ret, so we'd let them opt out of it. (Source)

I feel if you removed HoTR from Ret AoE DPS and replaced it with Divine Storm our AoE Rotation would feel better.
When we had Divine Storm in the "builder" role before, its damage was puny and Rets asked for it to hit harder. (Source)

Priest (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Shadow apparitions. Pretty much the only thing they've got left and now even Healpriests with 4pc T15 get 'em.
Golden Apparitions aren't yellow Shadow Apparitions. (Source)

Are you worried about Pr. T15 being all about SA's that weird things might result? Is pathing with them still a problem? 3Max?
We fixed a lot of bugs with Apparitions in 5.2. Had to do with bosses temp going immune in encounters. (Source)
What about the 3 max apparitions>?
No cap to them in 5.2. (Source)

Why can't you just buff holy DPS to be within 5% of Shadow? Do you hate versatility that much?
Why would you be Shadow if you could heal and DPS competitively with one spec? (Source)

Could also be a case of dmg being too high, but Disc is too far behind before all that is factored in. Thanks for your time.
We would like to see more Disc priests. Just want to make the right changes and not break anything. (Source)

Rogue (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Why did you give 50 energy for rogues in tier bonus ? IMO it means OP for sub, 5+ amb. Do you think energy is a big problem ?
We were trying to give them more burst for PvP (ironically they needed it) but considering +30 instead. (Source)

On rogue "fun" levels.Imo theyfeel maintenancey.Keep up SnD,Rupture,Enven.Takes away the feel of the actual attacks you use
Maybe Slice and Dice should only be one spec? (Source)

Also, to reiterate, it's fine for Combat to be better at cleaving. We just want to tone it down so you can be e.g. Ass / Sub. (Source)
Bring them up to par with combat not nerf rogues only viable cleave into the ground. Does this not register?
Rogues are doing well on almost every fight. The problem we're trying to solve is promoting diversity not giving out more DPS. (Source)
So instead of giving rogues 3 legitimate choices when faced with a cleave heavy fight we get 3 mediocre choices. Great logic.
Why don't you tell me the DPS delta that defines legit vs. mediocre for you? (Source)

I'm talking about sub spec, the buff of sanguinary veins (16%==>20%) is not enough to be competitive. Hemorraghe need a buff
Hard to say. If you look at a fight like Feng, Sub isn't far behind even though the sample size is much smaller. (Source)
you mean subtlety?
Yes, my bad. He said Sanguinary Vein buff. I heard Vitality buff. Both were intended to close the gap. (Source)

Will you compensate the loss from Blade Flurry (Combat rogues) somehow? There are still people who prefer combat over sub
We buffed Combat single target to make them more competitive with Assassination. (Source)
since its damage is reduced so much will you be removing or reducing the energy generation penalty?
On Blade Flurry? Yes, perhaps. (Source)

Warlock (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Sorry for bringing up old question, but why is Sac in locks talent trees if we are to always use pets? I like Sac speccing
Locks are pet classes. It's fine for Sac to let you opt out of that, as long as not every lock takes Sac. (Source)
Sac brought me back to my lock. Changes to aff kept me here. Hope doesn't go away. A % dmg nerf = ok. Playstyle nerf = not.
We're not talking about redesigning the talent -- just making sure we see warlocks take the others as well. (Source)

Warrior (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Warriors good in start of cata...then nerfed to the ground, anyone else see a pattern? GC you really need retire.
One data point is not a pattern. It's not even a line. (Source)
its the same exact thing that happened in cata, how do you not see this?
Because warriors are still very well represented in PvP on live and we don't think the modest 5.2 changes will change that. (Source)
Do you think the Warrior PvP nerfs have had long enough time to sink in and be properly reflected in PvP metrics?
Probably not. There seems to be a long lag for stuff like that. A successful team might not swap classes overnight. (Source)

Arms rotation on PTR feels good. Weak aoe though including Bladestorm. Mastery & haste still near useless, overall bad scaling
We have plans to make haste and mastery better for Arms and haste for Fury. Hopefully it works out. (Source)

Have you considered that most warriors think second wind should be standard, thats why everyone picks it/ignores all others?
Sometimes players like spells because they're fun and sometimes because they're powerful. Which do you think Second Wind is? (Source)
How is a passive ability that only works at %life fun. I don't think it is super OP but everybody takes it.
I agree. It might be convenient and even powerful, but I don't see how it makes you excited to play your warrior. (Source)

Why doesn't warbringer dr with anything do you even care for your game?
I do care, and it DRs with Charge and Dragon Roar (and a couple other things). (Source)
Y not remove the dmg from Shockwave (Arms & Fury specc only), only diff is tht shckwave has a longr stun?
We think the stun is the entire PvP balance problem. The damage is high, but it's the frequent stun that is hard to deal with. (Source)

Have u guys considered leavin shockwave as is minus damage. But restricting avatar, reck, and or banner from stackin together?
We have considered it. It takes a lot of unfun management to cycle your cooldowns though. Why not just cut 1 and recude CDs? (Source)
So cycling cooldowns isn't fun and popping them together isn't fun. Why even have multiple cooldowns like this?
Popping them together is fun. It just risks too much burst in PvP. (Source)

With the PvP healing change, is there a chance Second Wind will be reverted to 3%? Pretty please?
We've talked about doing that and nerfing Dstance instead. Might try both and see what feels better. (Source)

I think he means that outside of CS, it is better to have dead GCDs and pool rage(for HS spam in CS) than use WS.
Could make CS not affect HS, but then a lot of warriors have some relearning to do. (Source)
I think the solution is in changing WS, not in breaking something that works well (heroic strike).
But what would you change WS to? Ultimately it's a priority question of whether it beats HS, RB etc. (Source)
I thought the intent was to just beat HS (like Slam does) except in rage bleed-offs? Does it not accomplish that?
That is the intent, but it sounds like Fury just ignores the BS proc often, which is unfortunate. (Source)
It is low dmg and awkward to use. Making it proc a stronger free WS might be too similar to new Overpower though.
WS is always going to be low priority compared to all else but we can try to make Bloodsurge worth using. (Source)

Make the bloodsurge proc give WS a .5s GCD so you can get all 3 in one GCD and squeez it in there. Nerf it's damage.
The game can't handle GCDs that low very well. Lag would be a killer. (Source)

PvE
Devs have spent more time defending this poor choice and not fixing it.
Well, yeah, why wouldn't we defend a decision that we are unlikely to change? (Source)
pve dungeons for rep to get pve gear makes sense your statement about dungeons for pvp gear makes you look stupid.
The point was dungeons offer epics and valor. Why do they also need to offer additional bonuses? They are rewarding already. (Source)

if 5.2 has no new 5-mans but new PvP honor gear, won`t it be the only consistent gearing for pve players too?
You can use Honor gear. You can also run 5.0 LFR or earn valor to purchase items. (Source)

Hey are the increased T14LFR droprates in 5.2 affecting elder charms' rates? What about normal/heroic T14?
Elder charms: yes, for LFR. For normal and heroic, probably not, but that isn't set in stone. (Source)

Why are there such large ilevel gaps between tiers? Wouldn't smaller gaps make catching up easier?
Raid balance works best when skilled groups can go in with lower ilevels and the rest of us can slowly improve our gear. (Source)

Wait... Your current, throw patches at us like candy... is exactly against this mentality.
Subtle difference: ToC invalidated Ulduar very quickly. We hope the 5.2 raid doesn't do that. You can keep running 5.0. (Source)
But it will though. The desire for better loot will invalidate previous content. Has been like that since Wrath.
Why wasn't it like that before Wrath? (Source)
Because there was no catch-up system. But u said that we can catch-up LFR 5.2. in LFR 5.0. No reason for N/H
So we'll shoot for a catch up mechanism that isn't as brutal as SSC->BT but not as fast as Ulduar->ToC. (Source)

I disagree, the LFR system is trying to get the game to decide loot drops, not the players.
Yes, that's the goal. It is sad to lose the ability to be kind but worth it to avoid loot drama among strangers. (Source)

in regards to the random LFR loot, ever thought of giving a "pass" on loot so that the system chooses the next player?
As soon as we do that, players are going to start begging you to pass because of course they deserve an item more than you. (Source)

Will you stop trying to make us like dungeons/raiding with strangers, when that isn't remotely the draw, anytime soon?
I think they will ALWAYS be more fun with friends. Your friends aren't always online or willing to go with you though. (Source)

Control factor. Prev system rewarded social grps rolling as team, and solos wrnt hindered. Now it's always same loot % as solo
You mean a social LFR could feed gear to one player to gear them up faster? (Source)

PvP
friend of mine just asked me about putting back vengeance in pvp. would that be possible? not the same way but an amount?
Pretty unlikely TBH. Tanks already have good damage reduction and control in PvP. They don't need punishing DPS as well. (Source)

Do you balance the game for 1v1, 2v2, 3v3, bgs or what?
We try for everything, but place the most emphasis on 3v3 and BGs. (Source)

I told friends about Cata. MoP I preface with "you're not viable until your 4th week of PVP cuz no pvp weapon"
Did you have Honor weapons in Cataclysm? (Source)

Have you considered making all loss of control share the same DR? It may reduce comp restrictions & cc balance problems.
Talked about this some last week or so. The downside is it might take away some of the skill and knowledge PvP players like. (Source)

DKs need strang on 1 min cd, no rune cost and off gcd, 30 sec cd on gnaw and amz baseline. No positional req. Class fixed? :-)
Are more silences what PvP really needs? (Source)

If it was decided to make WoW only based around PvP balance and absolutely nothing else, would pets still be included?
Great question. I'm not sure. Would depend on if classes felt different enough without them. (Source)

Character
And wasn't it one of the main slogans of MOP - free us from being locked on mains only?
You're asking more (I assume) to be able to play main and all alts without having to play a lot more than you did in Cataclysm? (Source)
We didn't want to prevent you from switching mains because you'd lose an achievement. (Source)

That wont hurt game just because you'll still have to grind rep at least once.
Can't you make the same argument about leveling up or even earning Valor? The basic question is what % faster should an alt take? (Source)

The problem is the pace that players used to play to be able to keep up is not even close to current requirement
Used to from when? Cataclysm didn't ask players to play much... and they didn't. (Source)

Thank god for no upgradeable gear in 5.2. Hope it stays out forever.
I tried to be careful to say that was the plan at the moment. It isn't set in stone. (Source)

If you allow players to transmog outside of weapon-type, doesn't that sort of defeat the purpose of weapon-type to begin with?
What is the purpose of weapon type these days? There used to be warrior talents etc. (Source)

Sites like noxxic, EJ, IV and you'll see the benefit we TC's bring. Look at the wow forums, what benefits do the whiners bring
Humor me. How does theorycrafting make the game more fun (excluding the people who enjoy geeking out on the numbers)? (Source)
Because its otherwise not possible to determine how to properly gear up -> play at the limit.
If we thought that was extremely important, then we (the devs) could just tell you and not make you figure it out. (Source)

So upgrading items is just a waste of time and effort. What is the point of it if it doesnt help in new raid even?
I would think having higher ilevel would help a lot in the new content and will compete for a time with newer gear. (Source)
still no answer if VP will be reset/downgraded like in the past on 5.2's release?
I don't believe we have answered that yet. (Source)

What are your thoughts on balancing 25m vs 10m healing? Seems like the biggest challenge among the 3 class roles.
In brief, it's hard to overheal in 25, which makes AE spamming feasible, which means healers can use fewer buttons. (Source)

If you're spending valor on upgrading old items instead of buying new items you're probably doing it wrong.
Right and we don't want it to be a complex math / probability problem about whether upgrading or buying is better. (Source)
So we ARE getting catch-up gear via VP in 5.2 (was under the impression LFR was the only route we got to catch up)
Planning on new valor gear. Some (not all) may require reps. LFR is another avenue, but also gated. Catch up - yes. Instant - no. (Source)

You aren't happy with how it's playing out atm? Is it because players are feeling pressure to VP cap to min/max?
No, it's really that having valor for upgrade and valor for gear at the same time creates stressful decisions. (Source)

Why is every design decision in MoP designed to make alts take more and more time to play? lvling rep gearing all anti-alt.
In fact, many players made alts at the end of Cat because they were bored. Alts are cool, but shouldn't be mandatory to have fun. (Source)
That isn't actually why those decisions were made. They were made so that a player with one character doesn't get bored. (Source)

Are you content with people going from 4pc tX to 4pc tY? Rather than using tY at 2pc.
You give up a lot of stat points to use an old set bonus (waiting until 4 like you said). (Source)

At last BlizzCon someone asked about tabards and bank space consumption. Anything being done there? I realize it's a big task.
We recognize the problem and agree we made it worse by adding so many toys. We have some ideas, but nothing to announce yet. (Source)

I'm playing much less now with boring dailies and always-out-of-reach valor cap. Feels pointless, not fun.
What if you just earned as much valor as you felt like and didn't target the cap. What if the cap was 20,000? (Source)

Some of us like not spending every spare moment just to keep up. Is it really drop in subs that motivates design?
It's similar to how we offer many difficulty levels in raids now. We have diverse players and try to support as many as we can. (Source)

The only problem is that there are players who can only play 2-3 days a week - for us, catching up = impossible.
How many weeks of playing 2-3 days is reasonable to spend on catch up? (Source)

Rested Bonus applying to VP seems like a reasonable compromise. Could replace valor of ancients
We've considered that (and rep) but the game has no concept ATM of rest for anything beyond XP. (Source)

UI / Addons
As an addon dev, im not against you protecting functions, but you need to give a way to interact with it. "Req. User Input"
That's usually what we get around to doing. It just takes code time, which is time we can't spend on other features or bugs. (Source)

Dear GC, can you please make it so that Auto-loot is on by default. I have to change it every time I make a character.
Not crazy about default, but we could save the variable per account instead of character perhaps. (Source)

have you thought about adding some sort of mouseover heal setting, not just macroing everything?
Yes, we've considered it as an option, since it's a popular one. (Source)

I dont want to automate anything! MANY people cant change talents w/o freq reloading due to false addon errors!
We are going to *try* in 5.2 to isolate the protection more so that innocent mods don't stumble into it as frequently. (Source)
In addition to that, some more helpful debug info would really nice (e.g. stack traces of where the taint occurred)
Talked about this some with the UI team today and they're going to try some things. (Source)
Maybe the UI team should have dealt with UI instead of pokewow?
Add-on authors always want access to more stuff and more power. We try to help them out as we can. WoW's UI is our main focus. (Source)

Are there any plans to add some UI that allows you to track which +Rep Commendations you've already purchased?
Yes. 5.2 has such a feature. (Source)

They aren't false errors. We understand that the mods may not always realize what they did to get the taint. (Source)

Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 Pros vs Joes Contest
Our friends over at FPSGeneral are holding a contest that will give you a chance to play against some professional gamers and win a Call of Duty: Black Ops 2 Care Package Special Edition or a Black Ops 2 Season Pass. See the full post for more details.



Dark Legacy Comics #175
We are going back to 2009 to revisit this old Lunar Festival comic!

by Published on 2013-01-26 11:15 AM

"Damage Reduction Considered for Dueling, What Mob Density Options Would You Like?, Multiboxing - Legal or Not?, Poll: Are You Going to Use Dueling?

Patch 5.2 - Reputation Changes
Along with the new Work Orders, Patch 5.2 will allow you to earn 750 reputation from the first heroic and 325 reputation from the first scenario of the day!


Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
1) is the championing rep a flat rep you get at the end that's comparable to what you would get from doing all dailies that day?
Currently, the reputation for your first heroic is 750 and 325 for your first scenario.

2) does the dailies faction have reputation rewards as well? and are those intended as a sort of catchup for new players/alts?
The new dailies faction doesn't have any valor items.

3) if the valor rep is related to the raid (most likely it is), can you also get it through LFR?
The developers don't want fresh 90s to skip previous content and jump into the newest, so you'll still need 480 item level, but all the changes introduced to previous content will definitely help catch up quicker (lower prices, higher drop chance...)

Also, the valor reputation can be earned through the Raid Finder too but you need to kill bosses to get beyond a certain threshold. So we probably won't see something like the old Icecrown Citadel reputation runs.

But only for old factions (5.0, 5.1), or not?
In order to use the Work Orders in Sunsong Ranch, you need to be exalted with The Tiillers and all plots unlocked, but it's not required to own Sunsong. Work orders will be available for most 5.0/5.1 factions, but it will most likely not include Black Prince.

Patch 5.2 - No New Sha-Touched Weapons
Unfortunately it seems that some people missed that the Patch 5.2 Raid Gear Preview yesterday was not the final gear, and that much of it is placeholder items with placeholder stats. (Such as this Strength and Spirit tanking mace).
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
You're really best off sticking to information actually contained in our patch notes or other official channels of communication if you're looking to avoid confusion.

There are no more Sha-Touched weapons forthcoming. If you've been diligent about helping Wrathion and continue to do so, your reward in 5.2 is going to be a legendary meta-gem that can go in any helmet.

Patch 5.2 Raid Gear Item Levels
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Ion "Watcher" Hazzikostas saw this thread, and wanted share his thoughts on some of the issues you guys have raised:

We think it’s worth noting that many players began their Mists of Pandaria raiding experience with an average item level in the low 460s. Over the course of the past four months, Heroic raiders have seen their average item level climb by as much as 50, while normal mode raid groups that are just getting to Sha of Fear for the first time likely have an average item level that compares to what the cutting-edge guilds had when conquering Heroic Heart of Fear. Getting raid loot along the way has likely felt like a meaningful progression, and the overall damage and healing output of a raid group grows measurably from week to week with each piece of gear looted from a defeated boss. We like that, and we want Throne of Thunder to give players a similar sense of progression.

We could have taken an alternative, more conservative approach, where Throne of Thunder Raid Finder awarded ilvl 496 items and Normal awarded 509 items. A guild that has only done the current normal mode raids, but no Heroics, will then walk into Throne of Thunder with an average item level around 500 (lots of 496 items from Heart of Fear and Terrace, some of them upgraded to 504 with Valor). That doesn’t leave much room to grow – it means that players would only be a few percent stronger when facing Lei Shen at the end of the instance than they were facing Jin’rokh at the start. It also means that when raiders run into a roadblock halfway through the raid, there wouldn’t be much hope that a bit more gear from the next clear would have a significant impact.

Ultimately, we think that raid progression works better, and is more compelling, when there are meaningful increases in power from gear. The effort of downing a boss for the first time is properly rewarded with loot that is attractive to all members of the raid, and the steady increase in player power over the course of progressing through an instance allows us to scale the challenge accordingly. For example, we can now design Lei Shen around the expectation that the average raid group that reaches him will have an item level of nearly 520. The cutting-edge groups that tear through the zone in the first week or two will be comparatively undergeared when they reach him. Without any other changes on our end, item progression means that the same encounter can pose a stern test to a top guild when 5.2 comes out, while still being doable by the groups that only reach the same encounter a couple of months down the line. For example, Heroic Gara’jal was a brutal test of DPS for raiders who faced him last October, but now he feels like part of a smooth progression for groups that are just graduating from normal modes and beginning Heroics.

We’re confident that our planned item levels are not going to skew class balance or degenerate gameplay, and we’re monitoring the performance of all classes and specs in the new gear that will be available in 5.2 and going forward. Stat “inflation” was probably most out of control during the Wrath of the Lich King, but that was an issue with how powerful the gear was that was available as the expansion began perhaps more than any other factor. As a point of comparison, the item level 213 warrior set breastplate that was available in Naxxramas gave a level 80 player 2% critical strike chance; the item level 496 warrior set breastplate available in Heart of Fear gives 1.32% critical strike chance. We’ve learned from the past and carefully left ourselves a lot more room to grow this time around.

Normal raiders now, would have normal Throne gear, not lfr, I don't see why you're comparing Normal Ilevel -> LFR Ilevel.
If I'm not missing something, I don't think he was. He's comparing 5.0/5.1 normal mode gear to 5.2 normal mode gear.

This, really can't believe Blizz still force raiders into LFR to stay competitive, WE DON'T LIKE IT.
It's our expectation that Heroic raiders should have no interest in 5.2 Raid Finder gear. If you have item level 509+ gear from 5.0/5.1 Heroics, then the question is, why would you want item level 502 gear from the Raid Finder? Players wearing normal mode gear might find some slight upgrades in the Raid Finder in the first few weeks, but it's a safe bet that any gear that was upgraded with Valor Points will probably beat anything found in the Throne of Thunder Raid Finder.

PTR Class and Set Bonus Issues
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
We use PTR as a time of iteration to try out a lot of changes and see which ones work out or not. We think the time has come to revert some of the PvP nerfs that we made for noble reasons, but which aren't working out. Specifically, we wanted to remove blanket Silence and shift the game back more towards casting and interrupts. We think the continual arms race between instant spells, Silence and Silence immunity isn't good for the long term health of PvP. It is a shift we still plan to make, but we don't think patch 5.2 is the right time to make it. There are a great deal of instant spells and we don't think it is fair or reasonable to remove them all and force so many players (many of whom might not even participate in PvP) to re-learn their class mid-expansion.

Warlock (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
- We are reverting the removal of Spell Lock.

Mage (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
- We are reverting the removal of Improved Counterspell.

Druid (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
- We are reverting Cyclone having shared diminishing returns with other forms of crowd control. While we are keeping the cooldown of Cyclone cast by Feral druids in order to make Predatory Swiftness CC less dominant, we are lowering the cooldown to 20 sec from 30 sec.

Monk (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
Ring of Peace has been adjusted. It now forms a sanctuary around the friendly target, causing enemies within 8 yards to be disarmed and causes enemies who cast a harmful spell to be silenced for 3 sec. Moving out of the ring does not remove the silence, but it won't trigger again. The duration of Ring of Peace is 8 sec.

I also want to reiterate that we see very little PvP participation during the PTR. This isn't really too surprising since it takes a sizable time commitment and a Critical Mass of skilled players to really generate good Arena or BG testing. (By contrast, guilds trying out the new raid encounters gives us a lot of PvE testing.) We're not blaming anyone - PvP is just hard to measure until it gets into the "real world," so we are even more dependent on player feedback. Unfortunately, PvP feedback is even more subjective than PvE feedback for a number of reasons, including the lack of meaningful meters, the challenge of keeping in mind the evolving tapestry of changes to all classes, and of course the very human tendency that makes it easy for some players to be quick to take credit for their victories and quick to blame their class for their defeats.

This just means PvP balance is always going to take a lot of iteration. We appreciate your patience and all of the good feedback that we get.

We can't test PVP on the PTR because you disabled queueing for battlegrounds and didn't give premades PVP gear.
There are currently some bugs preventing BG queuing from working on the PTR, but I've been through enough of these PTRs to predict that even once those bugs are fixed, we'll see very few players participating. We have occasionally tried "BGs with the blues" and similar tactics, and maybe there are some other ways to encourage or even reward participation that we could consider.

If you do participate and share your feedback with us, then you are our hero. On the other hand, we still do get a lot of good feedback based on patch notes / upcoming changes posts. That is part of the patch development process as well.

We still plan on making it easy to try out the PvP and PvE gear on PTR once those items are built and relatively bug free.

GC gives in again to the demands of bad players. Relearn their class... lol!!!! How is waiting until you see a cast then pressing a button relearning your class. WEAK EXCUSE!
If you played a Holy paladin and found your Holy Shock had a longer cooldown, and found Word of Glory had been replaced with (making this up) "Phrase of Glory" with a 2.5 sec cast time, and found that Devotion Aura no longer prevented player Silence, you might find yourself a little disoriented. Those are the kinds of changes we think would be necessary to allow interrupts to sufficiently serve as a counter to healing at this point in time.

While it might seem impossible to the forum-posting contingent of our player base, we lose more players to frustration at constant class design changes than we do to perceived balance problems. We have to keep that in mind when considering any changes, even those that are ultimately better for the game in the long run.

Paladin (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
We knew haste would be attractive to Protection when we gave them Sanctity of Battle, which only Retribution had previously. That's why we gave them Sanctity of Battle. Even if you have a tanking set with no haste, there are haste buffs in the game. We wanted all the tanks to benefit somewhat from what were traditionally DPS stats, since part of the active mitigation design was to make tanks care more about hitting things with sword (and claws). It only gets to be a problem, as I said previously, if dodge and parry (which are going to be on some gear) are perceived as pointless. (They aren't pointless, but that's really beside the point at this stage.) We aren't going to reitemize every plate piece in the game to remove dodge and parry. We also don't want to nerf haste for paladins, because it is fun, and for the most part working as intended. We don't have a solution yet that we're willing to share, but that's the intent. I state all this, because I feel like this already long thread has become a bit too dominated by this one topic in the past few pages.

I have to agree with an earlier post about how this game should be about bringing out a good product and making it a good game. It seems more and more the justification for changes (or not making changes in this case) is the number of subs that will be lost.
This is pretty off-topic, but I'll address it anyway. Making good games is about keeping players engaged, about their having fun, their being happy.

Any game designer worth their salt wants players to love their game. That's why you choose this business. Yes, we all need to put bread on the table at the end of the day, but there are hundreds of careers that can deliver on that. We chose this one because we like games.

Now WoW is blessed with a whole lot of players. Unsurprisingly, those players like different things. The forum community is very self-selecting and generally a lot more hardcore than it realizes. You guys are really important to us. You care about the game deeply. You help us improve it just because you want it to be better. There's even a business angle - you evangelize the game to others. Everyone wins.

But making a change to the game - any kind of change, even a great change - carries with it a certain amount of risk. I can almost guarantee that someone out there will hate any change we make. If enough players dislike a change, then there is a chunk of the community that is unhappy. Sometimes we make tough decisions that are unpopular at the time, usually because we think the long term benefits are worth it and players may just not fully appreciate those in the short term. But overall, we want players to be happy. It's not a vote or a poll or anything and we're not about to turn over steering the ship to the community. But keeping players happy matters.

Consider the opposite: what kind of responses do you think we'd be seeing if I posted things like "We don't care if you like it or not, we're making this change," or "We don't care how many players we alienate - this is the way it's going to be." That would be a terrible way to keep players happy. So all I'm asking is don't beat us up for caring about the impact that our decisions make on the whole player base, not just the minority who post.

Are you on some sort of cheap drug when you make choices. Tanks care about these things dodge parry block armor HP. Thats all that should matter. It has always been this way in every game ever made. It is the D & D way and the correct way. When you take this focus away you lose your ability to be a lead developer and deserve to be removed from the team.
The answer to your first question is yes. My answer to the rest is: have you seen all of the paladins begging us not to change the way haste works for them because it is both useful and fun? Are they all wrong too? Nah, never mind, don't answer that.

Either you need find a way to better weed out the bad feedback or your team needs better personal understanding of PvP. Patch 5.0 warriors were IMO worse than S5 DK's.
But do you see all of the warriors claiming that they are just fine now and have been over-nerfed for 5.2? Sure, it's easy just to dismiss them as wrong, but how do we know? How should we know during MoP development when warriors were coming off a bad Cataclysm season and begging for buffs? With 20/20 hindsight, I'll totally agree that we overdid it. How to ensure that we don't get it wrong next time? We'll keep listening to players and discussing their feedback. For PvP particularly, that's really the only way I know of to get things feeling right.

If anyone out there can provide the definitive list of players who are nearly always right, please let me know.

Some of us feel that making PvP better should be an extremely high priority even at the expense of some players feeling a bit confused when logging in after a patch.
Totally reasonable. Some players feel like more pet battle content is an extremely high priority. It's even possible there are more of them than there are PvP players. (I have no idea off the top of my head.) I would hope by the sheer number of PvP-oriented changes we've pushed and the number of conversations we've had that it's a priority, but I get that these things are subjective.

So you have no problems making warriors or shaman relearn their class mechanics mid-expansion?
No, we have a huge problem with it. It sucks and it's ultimately our fault. On the other hand, it doesn't seem fair to make other players live with overpowered specs because of our mistake. (This applies to PvE too by the way, where it's not okay for someone to be overpowered even if you aren't trying to kill each other.)

And this reasoning right here is why my account is canceled as of the 28th.
I'm sorry that you cancelled your account. I am even sorrier that you cancelled for a change we didn't make and stated we didn't want to make (removing haste gameplay from paladins). There may be a lesson in there about making decisions in the heat of the moment.

In 5.2, no healer will be able to live through the opener of a Mage/Rogue/X comp, blanket silence, instant CC and stuns will just make those 2 classes very strong together for another combination of classes to combat.
That's a healer point of view, and I get that, but from the warlock or mage point of view, it was going to be impossible to ever kill anyone because the healer can't be interrupted with all of those instant heals and a Silence-prevention cooldown on top of that. I'm just pointing out there are two sides to the argument, and it's not fair to just claim that you're right and they're wrong.

The reality is that moving more towards the 'interrupt heals, don't prevent them' paradigm would be wonderful. But a huge amount of changes to a great many classes need to be made to make that possible. 5.2 just isn't the time for that. I don't even think it's realistic this expansion, but I'll be they'll try.
Yeah, exactly, and we could even make the time, but we'd be scared of the huge number of changes it would take to get there. We're also concerned that some players might not even like the PvP style that we ended up with. We get requests constantly for dispel protection, impossible to counter abilities, stuff that works while CC'd and immunities to various mechanics. Those are all in the opposite direction of where we think PvP needs to go, so we have to factor in player response to all of that and leave even more design time and space for iteration.

Posts like this really bother me. Scared to even read this thread.
Yeah, that's one of the reasons I don't post much on forums anymore. Some players aren't here for a discussion. They just like to lob grenades. (The other reasons are that I don't have the bandwidth to address really long posts, even if they are well-reasoned, and that I can't communicate with anyone outside of the US here.)

If you somehow feel the energy cost is fair, what if we could Maim any target? Rather than only our combo target? Kinda of like having Redirect built into Maim? Or convert Maim into a bleed, so it ignores armor and scales with Mastery? Or make it so does extra damage if the target is immune to stuns?
The Redirect is part of what we're trying to get away from with the PS + Cyclone. It just feels like you can't counter or even predict it. We like trying to boost Maim as well because it gives druids another type of CC, but one that does take some build up and has a real cost. That's the same kind of gameplay I'm trying to advocate above: full of counters.

The problem with Feral movement speed is that they could get up to 215% speed or something like that. Yet there is no good way in the game to explain what stacks with what, so you'd have to try out mixing and matching boot enchants with Dash or whatever and figure out what worked. It was recreating the whole crazy CC DR matrix problem, which is hardly a design worthy of emulation.

I saw Bashiok post about Balance and I thought about posting something in there, but no, I'm going to continue harrasking here: Are you folks playing balance on the dev team? Do you have enough people playing on PTR? Do I need to find some time to help folks like Owlcapwn test so our cries can still be ignored?
If I could ask one thing of you guys as a community, try and tone back the "ignored and neglected" talk. None of the classes are specs are neglected by the design team. I just don't have the bandwidth (as I said above) to address each concern, even the very eloquent ones, even the ones that may be totally reasonable and accurate. When we want to comment on something, we'll comment. There isn't really a reasonable way to force us to comment on something, so just try and be at peace.

Folks, it's another long weekend, so don't expect updates before Tuesday.

On topic: Blood DK 4 piece design being off is not player perception at this point. Some of my and others posts previous on the matter show math that this bonus on raw numbers is not as good as the previous bonus.
It isn't a goal that every set bonus is exactly the same DPS / healing / survivability every time. We have a goal that we shoot for. Sometimes we overshoot. That doesn't mean every set bonus for the rest of the expansion has to also be over-inflated. Fortunately, the generous primary stats on every item solve the problem where players cling to earlier set bonuses and don't feel like they can upgrade again.

We do reconsider set bonuses that are annoying, too situational or awkward to use, or dramatically underpowered or overpowered. We haven't decided yet if Blood 4pc falls into that category.

- Glorious Tyranny weapon enchant was modified to 400 PvP Power, 200 Resilience, and 50% disarm Duration.

(No melee classes would have used it without the disarm duration.)

Blue Posts
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Patch 5.2 PvP Gear Item Levels
Yes, very much. Your current mal will be a bit better than s13 mal
I don't think it's that cut and dry. If I'm understanding the numbers, 5.1 Malevolent will only be better than 5.2 Malevolent if it's carrying 2/2 item level upgrades (though it will have more stamina).

Currently, the PvP Power and stats on each tier of gear are tuned to ensure that they're the best choice for PvP compared with a PvE equivalent:

Malevolent > LFR gear for PVP.
Tyrannical > normal mode raid gear for PvP.
Elite Tyrannical > Heroic mode raid gear for PvP. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Marked for Death and Rogues
As it stands right now it is the easiest way to set up a 5 point KS and Shadow Dance with full energy.
In 5.2, Marked for Death will be the easiest way to do that. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Removal of LFR Boss Count
If you enter and complete a partial clear you will be given priority for a fresh run the next time you enter the queue, letting you pick up any missed bosses. The 45 Valor for completing that run too isn't a bad deal, either.

Oh boy 45 valor. For wasting probably an hour of our time? Not including the time wasted for the second queue and raid.
I generally find I'm in a 2/3 partial, and when I re-queue to pick up those first two bosses it does not take an hour to down the final boss. Is it taking you an hour to kill a boss?

45 valor for about 15 minutes more of my time is pretty efficient.

he was referring to the hour long queue - he had to queue TWICE for an hour each time to kill all bosses once instead of queue ONCE for an hour to kill all bosses once
Sure, and if we just let people pick and choose raids to join there could be 24 other people dropping group to wait in queue again. There are a few things you can do in the game all by yourself that don't involve other players, and we can try to make sure those really work as a single player experience. Raiding just can't be one of them.

And, taking a step back, LFR continues to offer an exceptional experience and reward for time invested value versus it not existing.

If he saw 2/3 bosses then what would he do? cancel the queue? Well then he has to wait again either way.
Oh, and that.

This presupposes that I have the extra time to actually run two LFRs per week of the same instance... I don't (2+ hours of queue = no). If I decide to queue for LFR (which I no longer do), I want to do a fresh run, period.
And I believe you presuppose you're the only person playing.

Bashiok, you know how much I love watching you work and running LFR, but I've got Azeroth's 500th anniversary to plan, my wedding to arrange, my wife to murder, and Guilder to frame for it; I'm swamped.
Well I appreciate the quote, at least. But, and don't take this the wrong way, think back to a time not-that-long-ago before LFR existed. How much raid content were you seeing then, how far had you progressed, and what was the time investment? I'm not saying we don't want LFR to be a smooth and pleasant experience, or be accessible, but it's putting 25 people together to let them see, experience, and even get awesome items from end-game content. That is pretty amazing. Automated game systems can only do so much to ensure it's a pleasant experience on the personal terms and whims for every single person.

The point I was shooting for is this: if I choose to take part in PvE content via LFR I don't want to have to run multiple instances (of the same instance) just to see each and every boss, most importantly by sitting in at least two very long DPS queues.
Absolutely. We don't want for you to run the same instance multiple times either. We'd be happy to entertain ideas for how we can put a group of 25 strangers together, who all have different goals, expectations, and time constraints, and see each of them remain until the end regardless of anything else that happens in the raid or in their life (drops, wipes, wife came home, cat peed on foot, etc.). (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Feedback: Jin'rokh the Breaker (10N)
Is this another fight where the debuff isn't going to transfer to pets? Not getting that damage buff for BM pets is unfortunate.
In our next build the benefits from standing in the pool will also apply to your pets. This is based on the player's location, not the pet's location.

I honestly can not fathom how you break the game so hard. How can a Paladins channel spells make everyone in the raid lagg?
Simple: There's a bug in this build that causes some cast-time paladin spells to have bad (negative) heal prediction values, which the UI that displays predicted healing isn't expecting, causing a ton of client lag for everyone that is trying to display those values. This is fixed in the next build. Turning off predictive healing in the UI may help, in the meantime.

Every new patch involves a tremendous number of changes to the game -- both obvious new content like adding new dungeons or outdoor areas and countless behind-the-scenes changes to code, client/server interactions, and so forth. With thousands of such changes, there are unfortunately going to be some bugs, and often some very unexpected ones. Part of the purpose of PTR is to catch as many issues like these as possible, so that they don't make it to the live servers and impact players' experience there.

Thank you, as always, for your patience and for helping test the 5.2 patch. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

New Talent Tree Simplicity
They gave us "variety" by making the choices irrelevant to the game. You have freedom to choose, because your choice is meaningless. How is this an improvement?

I'm not sure you've actually looked at the new talents.

The are doing the same thing with glyphs. The top tier was removed completely. Many of the best or "mathematically superior choices" have been removed and added to your rotation as baseline skills. Minor glyphs are now almost nothing but cosmetic changes.
You're upset that you got some glyphs as baseline skills? o.O

With all due respect... have you? As previously stated, only two of my six choices have any meaningful effect at all on my character. And those two choices don't really alter my experience much. Its mostly the choice between a cooldown and a passive ability to improve my DPS. It certainly isn't much of a fun or exciting choice now, is it? Well, I guess that's subjective, but its certainly not fun or exciting for me.

And it is even worse on leveling characters. I honestly am not sure I even have my talents set on some of my lower levels. They are so trivial and unimportant, I completely forget about them. Gone are the days that reaching a new level meant something.

Ah, so if it doesn't flat increase your DPS it's worthless? I think you may want to talk to some other druids on what is useful or not in various situations. Not sure I can argue against that kind of mentality except to say what you're looking for are item stats. If all you want is flat DPS increases, keep gearing up! The rest of us will enjoy employing various talents, and respeccing, to great effect.

I think he meant that he wishes all skill tiers were relevant to both PVE and PVP and not only PVP or PVE
Not all trees are going to be amazing for every situation. We're happy to hear ideas on how we can change a given tree to keep it unique and make it useful in raiding, questing, and pvp.

But did you get excited about that extra 2 percent damage to moonfire? Maybe for a few seconds, but it wasn't that talent point that enabled you to keep going and further your toon, it was the level itself. Sure, every 10-15 levels you got a talent that was really a game changer, but what does that sound like?
To be fair the old trees were successful in making themselves seem meaningful and fun, but yes most of the time they were either meaningless or required. Speccing down a tree by following a guide to maximize DPS wasn't a choice, and if you didn't follow a guide you were spending your talents wrong. Period. With the new trees you have six trees, and on each tree all three options are a variations on a theme, and the choice generally comes down to personal preference or style. That's at least an option that means something to you, to your character, and your identity in the game.

the only time ive used the T1 priest talent is on the last boss in msv. everything else in raiding is immune to thoes talents. so....
What about while you were leveling to 90? Or doing dailies? Or PvPing? Those talents are actually amazing in different ways, and for many different situations. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Content Difficulty Feedback
Do you personally consider that true progress? It baffles me.
Picture a group that is stuck on a boss at 30% hp constantly for, I don't know, two months. They'll definitely consider it progress when they finally move past him, and it's fine. For you that's not true progress because they didn't kill the boss on its hardest version, and it's a valid point of view as well, but that can't be a reason to block people from moving on, particularly if we keep in mind what the developers have seen when this happens: while there are guilds out there that have the will to keep on trying for as long as it's required, it's a rare treat in most other guilds, and they eventually give up.

While many people think they would easily make it into any of the Top 10 world guilds, the truth is most of them aren't.

How would I be able to tell the guys from Paragon (or any other top guilds) that I have accomplished the same thing they did, albeit a bit further down the line, when Blizzard has made that accomplishment 30% easier?
Would you really think you had? The fact you have killed a boss 30% easier doesn't mean you have become Paragon, far from it.

I wish my personal experience was of any use in this case, because from what I've seen, most people in those guilds did feel they had accomplished their personal goal (killing an end boss) but definitely didn't feel they were in the same league as the best guilds in the world. But my sample is terribly limited, so I'm not going to generalize and say that's the case for most guilds in that situation, because it'd be an outright lie.

By your logic, all my opponents in PvP should be nerfed by 30% by the end of each season, because I paid for the game and I want to have a free Gladiator title if LFR players are getting a free "Savior of Azeroth" equivalent of a title.
The Gladiator title is specifically tied to the 0.5% best players on a PVP season, so it's not the same thing. There's nothing that specifies "the Heroic end boss of a raid tier is meant to be killed only by the 0.5% best raiders of the tier", and we're talking, in any case, about something that happened on a different moment and on a different environment. WoWProgress shows Heroic Madness was defeated by around 14k+ guilds worldwide, sure, it looks like a lot, but the raid was available for almost a whole year. Fast forward to today, and this same website indicates that 260 guilds have killed Sha of Fear in Heroic (and they are getting as well the "Cutting Edge" achievement. So, if at any point the boss is nerfed, and the criteria is no longer met, they would be able to show that achievement to prove they did it without any nerfs.

Times have definitely changed in that regard (in my opinion, of course).

I am self mainly motivated by new boss kills and I do not mind really what other raiders kill or do. I have my own speed, pace and so on. I do not mind if 10 other DK's wear gear as I do, when they do content I do. Makes sense, yes ? However I roll eyes, when see that AFK guy in LFR run around with almost identical gear as I do. Without transmog feature you barely would make difference between me and the AFK-Hero, who does most cases 25k dps if not less.
The diference is that your AFK hero is wearing gear that is 26 item levels lower than yours and doesn't have stuff you do, such as vanity rewards (Glory of the Pandaria Raider and Guild Glory of the Pandaria Raider come to mind as an example).

Also, if you fancy doing challenge modes, it's very likely your AFK hero won't have the transmoggable set of gear you can get access to either.

Do not be too upset on me. You are talking to the player, who did not quit after 5 weeks of Kael'thas wipes on bench, nor 6 weeks of mu'rus wipes. And I lived trough 15-20 minute Nefarian respawn timer on vanilla, as well the complete hilarious wipe fest of Firefighter, Shadowtraps on Lich King and I sm sure am not scared of tsulong or Sha of Fear (which I believe might be block my team for a while). I am not a top raider even. I am just one of those 'raiding masses' - average Joe's of HC raiding, if you will.
You may not be a top raider in some community world ranking. Your dedication is certainly rare among players though. If you track back to M'uru, you'll probably remember that guilds were falling apart before reaching 6 weeks of wipes on him and Kael'thas was seen by many as a massive hurdle. So even if your progress spells "average Joe's of HC raiding" the fact is, when it comes to dedication, you have plenty of it, and hopefully your guild does too.

nice way to put majority of the wow population these days are spoiled little brats with no brain, its true tho. Sad part is that this CM here wanna turn this game into a console game. Im just curious if this is how blizzard as a company sees it or just this guy? if so what future we can expect from wow? will we be able to play it on x-box soon with pause buttom and cheat codes?
Oh, please, don't try to hyperbole my posts. Toning something down eventually so more people can complete it doesn't mean turning the game into a "console game", which, in the other hand, is a weird comparison, since there're plenty of challenging console games out there. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Guild Wars 2 Biggest Fan Contest
Guild Wars 2 Guru is holding a contest for three signed collector's editions of Guild Wars 2 and gem cards. Enter by creating something GW2 related and the staff will vote on some winners.



TCG Art Update
Blizzard has updated the Trading Card Game art gallery to feature ten new pieces.

by Published on 2013-01-25 05:30 AM

"The Complete Diablo Fix", On Gameplay and The Auction House, TryHard: Witch Doctor Legendary Guide

Patch 5.2 - Work Orders
One of the recent PTR builds added a new feature to the Sunsong Ranch, work orders! These quests will use eight plots of dirt each, allowing you to do two per day, and reward you with 300 rep each.

Level Name Rep Objective
90Work Order: Dominance Offensive IPlant 8 Red Blossom Leak Seeds on Sunsong Ranch.
90Work Order: Dominance Offensive II
Daily
300 Harvest 8 Ripe Red Blossom Leak plants and provide 40 Red Blossom Leaks for Domination Offensive.
90Work Order: Operation: Shieldwall IPlant 8 Witchberry Seeds on Sunsong Ranch.
90Work Order: Operation: Shieldwall II
Daily
300 Harvest 8 Ripe Witchberry plants and provide 40 Witchberries for Operation: Shieldwall.
90Work Order: Golden Lotus IPlant 8 White Turnip Seeds on Sunsong Ranch.
90Work Order: Golden Lotus II
Daily
300 Harvest 8 Ripe White Turnip plants and provide 40 White Turnips for the Golden Lotus.
90Work Order: Shado-Pan IPlant 8 Green Cabbage Seeds on Sunsong Ranch.
90Work Order: Shado-Pan II
Daily
300 Harvest 8 Ripe Green Cabbage plants and provide 40 Green Cabbages for the Shado-Pan
90Work Order: The August Celestials IPlant 8 Striped Melon Seeds on Sunsong Ranch.
90Work Order: The Klaxxi IPlant 8 Mogu Pumpkin Seeds on Sunsong Ranch.
90Work Order: The August Celestials II
Daily
300 Harvest 8 Ripe Striped Melon plants and provide 40 Stripped Melons for the August Celestials.
90Work Order: The Klaxxi II
Daily
300 Harvest 8 Ripe Mogu Pumpkin plants and provide 40 Mogu Pumpkins for the Klaxxi.


Patch 5.2 Raid Gear Preview
The latest PTR build added some of the new raid gear from the Throne of Thunder. Keep in mind that this is not all of the gear, just an early preview. You can see the changes being made to 10 and 25 player raid gear drops in this blue post.

Level Type Slot Name
522FingerFinger 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 9 Loot 1 - Agi DPS Ring
522ClothWaist 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 10 Loot 1 - Cloth Int Spirit Belt
522ClothLegs 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 2 - Cloth Int Spirit Legs
522ClothLegs 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 10 Loot 1 - Cloth Int Spirit Legs
522ClothHands 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 2 - Cloth Int Spirit Glove
522ClothHands 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 12 Loot 2 - Cloth Int Spirit Glove
522ClothHead 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 9 Loot 1 - Cloth Int Versatile Helm
522ClothShoulders 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 7 Loot 2 - Cloth Int Versatile Shoulders
522ClothShoulders 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Grab Bag - Cloth Int Versatile Shoulders
522ClothLegs 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 7 Loot 2 - Cloth Int Versatile Legs
522ClothFeet 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 10 Loot 1 - Cloth Int Versatile Feet
522LeatherWaist 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 11 Loot 1 - Leather Int Spirit Belt
522LeatherFeet 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 7 Loot 2 - Leather Int Spirit Boot
522LeatherFeet 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 10 Loot 1 - Leather Agi Feet
522LeatherHands 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 9 Loot 1 - Leather Int Spirit Glove
522LeatherHands 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 12 Loot 2 - Leather Int Spirit Glove
522MailHead 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 2 - Mail Int Spirit Helm
522MailLegs 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 11 Loot 1 - Mail Int Spirit Legs
522MailLegs 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 12 Loot 2 - Mail Int Spirit Legs
522PlateShoulders 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 1 - Plate Str Tank Shoulder
522PlateShoulders 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Grab Bag - Plate Str Tank Shoulder
522PlateHead 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 9 Loot 1 - Plate Str Melee Helm
522PlateHead 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 12 Loot 1 - Plate Str Melee Helm - xx
522PlateFeet 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 11 Loot 1 - Plate Str Melee Boot
522PlateHands 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 1 - Plate Str Melee Glove
522PlateHands 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 10 Loot 1 - Plate Str Melee Glove
522PlateShoulders 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 2 - Plate Int Spirit Shoulders
522PlateShoulders 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Grab Bag - Plate Int Spirit Shoulders
522PlateLegs 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 7 Loot 2 - Plate Int Spirit Legs
522PlateLegs 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 9 Loot 1 - Plate Int Spirit Legs
522ShieldOff Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 2 - Str Tank Shield
522Two-handed AxeTwo Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 12 Loot 1 - Str Melee Axe2H
522GunRanged 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 10 Loot 1 - Agi Ranged Gun
522One-handed MaceOne Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 8 Loot 1 - Str Tank Mace1H
522One-handed MaceOne Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 9 Loot 1 - Agi Melee Mace1H
522One-handed MaceOne Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 12 Loot 2 - Int Spi Mace1H
522PolearmTwo Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 12 Loot 1 - Agi Polearm
522One-handed SwordOne Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 10 Loot 1 - Str Hybrid Sword1H
522Fist WeaponOne Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 11 Loot 1 - Agi Fist Weapon
522DaggerOne Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 7 Loot 2 - Int Sprit Dagger
522DaggerOne Hand 5.2 Raid - Normal - Throne of Thunder - Boss 9 Loot 1 - Int Versatile Dagger
Level Type Slot Name
541FingerFinger 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Alani's Inflexible Ring
541FingerFinger 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Ring of the Golden Stair
541FingerFinger 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Leven's Circle of Hope
541FingerFinger 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Anji's Keepsake
541FingerFinger 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Simple Harmonius Ring
541BackBack 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Yi's Cloak of Courage
541BackBack 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Cloak of the Dark Disciple
541ClothChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Robe of the Five Sisters
541ClothWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Seeker
541ClothLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Poisoncrafter's Kilt
541ClothFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Storm-Sing Sandals
541BackBack 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Sagewhisper's Wrap
541BackBack 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Blackguard Cape
541ClothChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Vestments of Thundering Skies
541ClothWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Orator
541ClothLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Leggings of the Poisoned Soul
541ClothFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Void Flame Slippers
541BackBack 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Cloak of Snow Blossoms
541LeatherWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Harbinger
541LeatherLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Wind-Reaver Greaves
541LeatherChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Softfoot Silentwrap
541LeatherWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Borrower
541LeatherLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Dreadsworn Slayer Legs
541LeatherFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Tukka-Tuk's Hairy Boots
541LeatherChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Mistfall Robes
541LeatherFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Boots of the High Adept
541MailLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Swarmkeeper's Leggings
541MailFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Sandals of the Elder Sage
541MailChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Breastplate of the Golden Pagoda
541MailWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Winnower
541MailLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Locust Swarm Legguards
541MailFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Steps of the War Serpent
541MailChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Robes of the Setting Sun
541MailWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Precursor
541PlateChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Cuirass of the Twin Monoliths
541PlateWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Consumer
541PlateLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Kovok's Riven Legguards
541PlateFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Yu'lon Guardian Boots
541PlateChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Dawnblade's Chestguard
541PlateWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Rescinder
541PlateLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Legguards of the Unscathed
541PlateFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Tankiss Warstompers
541PlateChest 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Battleguard of Guo-Lai
541PlateLegs 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Ambersmith Legplates
541PlateFeet 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Bramblestaff Boots
541PlateWaist 5.2 Raid - Heroic - Throne of Thunder - Boss 13 Loot # - Doubter


Patch 5.1 Hotfixes - January 22
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Raids, Dungeons, and Scenarios
  • Sigils of Power now only drop in Mogu’shan Vaults, and Sigils of Wisdom will only drop in Heart of Fear and Terrace of Endless Spring, with a very small chance to drop in LFR Mogu’shan Vaults. This should ensure that players who had access to Mogu’shan Vaults for a longer period of time are now seeing more Sigils of Wisdom.
  • Heart of Fear
    • Amber-Shaper Un'sok
  • Temple of Ahn'Qiraj

Bug Fixes

Patch 5.2 Raid Testing Schedule - January 25
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
On Friday, January 25, we will be testing two more raid encounters in the Throne of Thunder.

Each encounter should be available at approximately the listed times below for all Public Test Realms.

Jin'rokh the Breaker - 10 Player Normal
10:30 PST (13:30 EST, 19:30 CET)

Lei Shen - 10 Player Normal
16:00 PST (19:00 EST, 01:00 CET)

PTR Class and Set Bonus Issues
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
Warrior (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • For Arms, we are going to try Overpower proc'ing Sudden Death instead of autoattacks. This will make haste slightly worse (which we can fix) but we hope will help make the rotation slightly more compelling, since autoattack procs can feel really random. With Overpower you can anticipate it a little more.
  • Likewise, Overpower will cost no rage in Execute range. We agree that saving rage for Overpower and spending it all on Execute don't play well together.
  • We haven't made a tuning pass on Arms (or any spec) yet. Don't fret about DPS numbers at this stage.

Mage (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • For Arcane, we are going to try going down to 4 stacks (down from 6) that increase damage by 50% (up from 25%) and mana cost by 150% (up from 75%). Our goal for Arcane, which hasn't changed in some time, is for the spec to focus on mana management with the ability to go up to high DPS for a high mana cost when needed. We don't want Arcane to sit at max stacks all the time. As a player who is focused on maximizing DPS, you're going to want to maximize stacks, but it's not always going to be easy to do - that's the challenge of mastering the spec. The reason we lowered the stack size is we felt that having to build up to 6 made dropping stacks feel too punitive.
  • Also for Arcane, Scorch deals 40% less damage for Arcane only, but its damage and mana are now increased by Arcane Charge. We agreed that previous iterations were too punitive for Fire and Frost. For Arcane, using Scorch as part of the base rotation won't be as powerful as it is today on live (which we feel violates the stack management I mentioned above), but it will increase with stacks.
  • We are still iterating on Blazing Speed.

Monk (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • We have made several Mistweaver changes to make Fistweaving more viable. As with Discipline, our goal isn't to make a hybrid healer / damage-dealer (at the same time), but to have a different healing style that can contribute some additional DPS. There are several changes here, but overall we increased damage and decreased Eminence healing to compensate for the damage increase. Overall, both damage and healing should go up relative to live. By linking the damage boost of Tiger Palm and Blackout Kick to Jab, we're asking for some short-term commitment to Fistweaving and not just mixing in parts of Fistweaving with more traditional Mistweaving.

Hunter (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • We still plan on rebuilding Power Shot. We have not done so yet.
  • We're not sure 5.2 is the right time to convert any of the active buttons to passive procs. While we would like to slim down the number of buttons hunters need to manage overall, changes like this are controversial and I'm sure it would feel like a nerf (even a nerf to fun) to many hunters.

Paladin (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • For Protection, we do have plans to try and lower the value of haste relative to dodge and parry. We don't want to make haste terrible for paladins, but we agree that it's odd for it to be better than more traditional tank stats. It might require a nerf to Shield of the Righteous to do this, but our goal is not to nerf survivability overall. We just wanted to provide you some context if you see odd changes to tanking abilities.

I have one concern about the Eminence change. With the nerf to Eminence, it results in a nerf to our 90 talents (Xuen especially). Were the 90 talents considered with the Eminence change?
Xuen was not nerfed and is still 50%.

I too would like to hear anything about Blood DKs at this point. Even if it's just a "we think Blood DK set bonuses are in a fine spot"
We think the 4 pc (more runic power) is useful. Yes you get it during a cooldown when you may not need it at that instance, but you will still benefit from eventually converting the runic power to Death Strike.

However, player perception does play into these decisions. We have occasionally designed set bonuses that we still believe were very good that players never really figured out in the way that we hoped. Alternatively, we have seen cases where bad math or someone's opinion just gets accepted as fact and takes on a life of it's own. It also occurs sometimes that we just miss something that players catch that cause our numbers to be wrong. With all of that in mind, we may yet change the Blood 4pc but haven't come to a conclusion yet.

Minor point: would a 10-rage discount on the next Execute make more sense for Overpower?
That is the actual implementation of the change I was hinting at. (Technically, it's a duration on all Overpower not a single charge.) We are also going to try a slightly cheaper Slam. We agree that will help make it clear whether you should prioritize Slam or Overpower. We further agree that the problem wasn't really Arms having too much rage. The problem was Arms not having an engaging resource model since nearly every attack was free. A 20 Slam and 10 Overpower might work fine. Let us know.

Appreciate the update Ghostcrawler, but still waiting on news of a buff for Destro single target damage.
As I said above, it makes more sense for us to implement mechanics changes before we tune all the numbers. Otherwise, you throw out all the tuning work every time you make another mechanics change. I will post when we've finished our 5.2 tuning pass so you guys have a chance to offer feedback.

We think Destro may be a little behind, but it's not much. Affliction PvE damage is too high, which causes many warlocks to go Affliction on every fight rather than considering options. That creates a big sampling bias effect on sites like World of Logs and Raidbots. The lower performing DPS specs appear even lower than they actually are because the only players generating those logs are uninformed (which also tends to mean undergeared) or just messing around. To get a more accurate test, you need to see a player try every spec under similar circumstances (gear, skill, etc.), and those data are much more rare.

Is there a reasoning behind this? It honestly feels like you're taking the opinions of a mysterious part of the playerbase (like the same portion who you quoted as "not liking DivPurP because it was too RNG") and changing the entire spec paradigm around it. Why push for MORE class homogenization when the game already has WAY too much?
The game just isn't currently designed to support it. It creates potential problems such as:

  • A Prot paladin competing with a Frost DK or Ret paladin over gear, meaning there isn't enough DPS plate to go around.
  • A Prot paladin considering a tier set with dodge and parry on it to be "garbage" because it doesn't stack all haste.
  • A Prot paladin looking at a Ret 2pc set bonus that she normally wouldn't touch because now the stats aren't that bad either.

In a world where tanking plate didn't exist or every loot system used the personal LFR one or 100% efficient reforging then it might work.

We understand that having a lot of haste feels fun and visceral and is more dependable than dodge and parry. We'll try to come up with a solution that keeps that in mind.

So let me get this straigt, TFB will reduce the cost of Execute as well? Or does using OP reduce the cost of Execute by 10 for X seconds? Sounds like the second one which is not bad tbh. Means Execute replaces Slam in the rotation (Unless with excess rage in Zerker Stance with CS up) which it should,
Sudden Death - Your Overpower hits have a 25% chance of resetting the cooldown on your Colossus Smash. Your Execute hits have a 100% chance of making any Overpower free for 10 sec.

Blue Posts
Originally Posted by Blizzard Entertainment
Patch 5.2 Raid Loot Changes Feedback
Crithto, will using the 5.2 equivalent of Elder Charms grant a chance at Thunderforged Loot or will it be exclusively limited to drops?
Yes, bonus rolls in 10- and 25-player raids will also afford you a chance to receive a Thunderforged item.

Hypothetically speaking, say a boss had 13 items that can drop from him. He doesn't drop any tier. How many of those 13 items would be marked that they can be thunderforged? All 13? only 4 of those 13? etc.
Hypothetically, yes, all 13 of those non-tier items would have a chance to be Thunderforged.

Why must you introduce an artificial incentive that promotes a less favorable format for the majority of players? And by less favorable, I mean by simply looking at how many guilds raid 10 vs 25.
Getting better loot has always been a part of this game and in Patch 5.2 the variety is being increased. We think this is a good thing. However, calling 25-player raids less favorable in unfounded and an unfair assessment. Tons of players would love to do 25s, but the coordination and effort to do so is more difficult with very little additional reward. 10s aren't more popular because the entire community agreed they're more fun, it's just a simple case of effort versus reward.

There are two main points we're trying to address with this change:
  • Raiding in 10- and 25-player dungeons already provides the same item level rewards for everyone. Engaging in the logistics of the larger raid format, however, we feel should be rewarded and the slight increase in chances to receive a Thunderforged item in 25-player is our effort to strike a better balance between both raid sizes.
  • The addition of Thunderforged items also have benefits for both 10- and 25-player raids. For instance, if a raid group is stuck on boss #5 and their members have all the viable upgrades from previous bosses, going through those bosses again to work on #5 can now bring added bonuses. We think this makes these efforts much more fun and rewarding.

Will there be a visual to indicate you're wearing Thunderforged gear or just the iLvl difference?
There won't be any visual effects, Thunderforged is a tag much like "Heroic" and indicates that the item is slightly better than its Normal/Heroic counterpart.

We're still going through your feedback and really do appreciate the things you've shared. Please keep it coming. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Patch 5.2 Rogue Feedback
Due to a miscommunication, I included some incorrect information in my opening post in this thread, Shuriken Toss shouldn't be proccing non-lethal poisons like Crippling or Paralytic. It will continue to activate damaging poisons.

Can you clarify if you mean Shuriken Toss the actual ability or are you just talking about the auto-attack?
The active ability and its auto-attack component will behave the same way.

Is the auto attack portion really set in stone? I rather keep Shuriken toss the way it is, and still allowing those poisons to proc without giving them some ridiculous ranged attack with nearly full uptime.
Nothing is set in stone, per se, but Shuriken Toss hasn't proven to be very popular in its current live incarnation. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Content Difficulty Feedback
Skill has nothing to do with it imo. It's the mentality of most players.

People who are terrible at something think they deserve to see all the content, because they pay as much as us. Blizzard gives in to these players, by giving them epics for doing dailies or LFR, or the 'Heroic' dungeon, or nerfing content down,... so why should they bother to try and get better in the game?

Well, those "terrible players" do pay as much as you do, so that much is true and can not really be used as an argument. But you seem to correlate the presence of epic rewards on certain areas of the game with mentality of these players, which is not necessarily the case. A player can be incredibly hardcore in mentality and just not have the time to devote on his life to get into the content tailored to the hardcore audience. It's not mutually exclusive.

It's also these kind of people that don't achieve as much in life, cause life doesn't get 'nerfed' for them. those people think they should earn as much pay as a guy who works 10 times as hard as them because they wear the same uniform. Lazy people are lazy
By this definition, we can assume that Warren Buffet and Carlos Slim are very skilled hardcore raiders with all content on farm since day 1...

It doesn't make much sense, does it? That's the issue with these kind of arguments, it's just demeaning for the sake of it. One could argue the exact opposite and it'd be just as bad (successful in a game = failure in real life), so, please, please, store this arguments somewhere safe, cast them into the depths of the sea, and never use them again.

As stated wow has something for all: farmville and heroic raids, to put it bluntly. But why nerf hc raids when there is farmville for those that don't want to have a hardcore gaming experience? That's what bothering me. As I said before, some nerfs are justified, but having the last raid of an expansion nerfed through the bottom so that 'everyone can see it' while LFR was invented for that is what's beating me.
Perhaps you're looking at it from the wrong perspective? I mean, it sounds like you believe it's the players that are interested on doing just The Tillers and taking care of Sunsong Ranch the ones that want to do heroic raiding and have issues with it. Why not think about those players that are progressing through heroic raids and just can't overcome a particular boss? Would you prefer they'd rather quit altogether if they become blocked somewhere? What benefit do you get of it in that case? (assuming you have progressed through that boss, of course).

Most people in today's WoW don't care about the epic challenges, don't care about becoming better at the game, they just want to hop in and play and smack some enemies.
Do you think most of the players back in vanilla wanted to become better at the game?

example of flawed logic: player B fails in certain challenge. player B cares not to improve. player B says content is too hard and requests nerf. blizzard checks. player A has completed it. blame is laid to player A to being selfish.
First, you assume "player B cares not to improve". You just can't know. You assume it's not the case because in your opinion, if he cared, he'd take down the boss. The fact is, it's much more complex than that. Even if player B wants to improve, he may not be able to devote the amount of time he'd need to improve.

Then you mention "blame is laid to player A to being selfish", which is not the case, at all. Why would player A be blamed at all in the first place? What's been said, though, is that, more often than not, player A will go and say "No! Don't nerf it! Make them climb the same rope I had to!", despite player B indicating that he just can't.

But lets step away from myself and see the bigger picture of nerfing content. From what I understand from the blogpost Draztal posted, Blizzard consider "nerfing" content when they see dips in the rate of how guilds progress. I can understand the reasoning behind this, but I cant see why it would be a good thing in the long run. Because what you essentially do then is killing motivation. There is no need to nerf heroics. Eventually people will outgear it so much that the "fail threshold" is so high that most people will kill it. It might take a content patch or two, but just wait!
Let's imagine you have 50 raid groups, and you are designing 10 bosses per raid, 1 raid per tier, for 5 consecutive tiers. On your first raid, 47 groups clear all bosses, 3 quit because they got stuck in boss 7 and after weeks of trying, they've got the memo: with the current gear, they don't have the skill for this game, and they'd rather spend their time elsewhere doing something fun than wait weeks to be behind others anyways.

On your second raid, since it went so well (47 out of 50) you decide to tune content a bit tighter, and 39 out of those 47 clear all bosses. On your third ray, again, you tune content a bit tighter than before, 26 out of 39 clear it all. On your fourth raid, one notch more in difficulty, and 12 out of 26 clear everything. By your fifth raid, your original audience (50 groups) has been reduced to 12, and the time invested in each raid, has been increasingly wasted.

If you look at it that way, it might be easier to see what the negative effect would be in the long run if people get left behind; which is kind of what happened in The Burning Crusade with Sunwell Plateau or Naxxramas in Classic, as raid groups were encountering walls on a given boss, they were unable to progress at all or for extended periods of time, so, by the time the 4 Horsemen first kill was achieved, most of the raiding groups hadn't even stepped into the instance.

What I don't agree with here is that you seem to indicate that every guild that can not clear a said instance on heroic mode while it's the main active content vanishes. That's most definitly not true. As a semi-hardcore raider with 10-12h raiding a week, I would never expect to clear an entire raid instance on heroic, especially not with optional heroic bosses at the end. Ulduar and the first tier in Cataclysm are perfect examples. There was always a boss to progress on that was only a little bit more difficult than the previous one, yet nothing was completely dumbed down while it was still active content. They were my two absolute favourite tiers and I didn't end up clearing them completely on Heroic mode until the tier after.
Perhaps it was an example a bit too simple, you're definitely right, not every guild that can't clear an instance in heroic while it's current content vanishes. It wasn't an example related to WoW though, but rather on why one could have an interest in revisiting fights and lowering the difficulty of some of its aspects.

Well, I surely felt like more people were up for exploring, and stuff like that than nowadays. It feels like it's much more about "must cap this, must do this, must blabla must blabla". The overall feeling of some kind of rush, that's what I feel is much more dominant in the playerbase nowadays.
When we play a new game (which WoW was to all of us in vanilla) there is a sense of discovery, of confusion/lack of familiarity and so on, that slowly fades over time as we get familiar with the game. It's certainly a feeling that I miss myself from time to time.

That is something people seem not to understand including the blue here. They have given us the content - and regardless how much everyone pays they do not need/deserve same reward just because they pay the monthly fee.
The "they do not need" part might be easier to discuss. Some players just don't need PVP content at all (in fact they wouldn't mind if it was entirely removed from the game, the same aplies to PVE content from the perspective of some PVP players).

But... they do not deserve? That's a really tall claim. By what order? What gaming principle does make a player worthy of completing something?

Monthly fee means access to servers and content, and it should be players OWN Actions that reward you not just getting rewarded for logging in and existing as entity.
But this hyperbole, as much as it gets thrown around when these topics come out, is just not true. Noone is rewarded just for logging in. The only thing a nerf does is set a lower bar, you still have to overcome a certain level of challenge and perhaps diminish the sense of achievement of players that defeated a boss on its harder incarnation. But that's quite far away from "being rewarded just for existing as an entity".

So basically what this teaches them is that you dont have to work for things in life.
So when they actually get sick of sitting at home infront of their computer all day and want to enjoy life instead they are so very brainwashed by the "OMG HARD!! Nerf!" mentallity that they cant grasp the fact that you have to work for what you want to acomplish in life.

How about we let the parenting of kids to... their parents? No, seriously, World of Warcraft is a videogame. Gaming it's supposed to be a fun activity (if you have that fun through challenges, social interactions, etc is completely up to you). Not some kind of "School of Hard Knocks about the Real World".

while you might have a point, you totally disregard the fact that guilds keep forming, disbanding, merging, splitting, re-forming etc. there's a constant stream of players between guilds. so in your example, some players of guilds that stopped raiding might have left for another, still raiding guild, or founded a new one.
Yeah, you're totally right. As I said, it's a simplistic example that didn't take into consideration many things to avoid making it overly (and unnecessarily) complex.

If a guild has full (100%) gear from NHC and can't beat every boss in HC, then so be it. It means the guild either hits that brick wall and can't continue and has to accept this as fact, or the guild will push past its limits and eventually break that wall.
Not every guild has the will to keep hitting that wall, neither accepting as a fact that "here's how far you can go" is a very appealing reason to play.

"Hey, we've got to this boss, and we can't progress any further. It's all good!" In most cases, those players will just stop playing to have their fun somewhere else.

What was the point again of normal modes or LFR?
Normal modes and LFR don't exist so nothing has to be tweaked ever again.

LFR is tailored towards players that can't participate in organized raiding, and therefore, it's tuned accordingly (25 complete strangers, with little to no team play in most cases, and wildly different skill levels and gear). Of course, if you regularly play in organized raiding, LFR does not present a challenge. at. all. If you consistently raid Heroic bosses, then probably LFR looks just hilariously easy to you. Because you're not the target player.

Normal modes are for players that participate in organized raiding, and Heroic for those guilds that want to put their skill to test, but, this doesn't mean that even on its own scale, a particular boss might need tweaking in the opinion of the developers, or simply, they just feel it's time to tone something down so players that have been stuck on him for some time can progress.

In reality, what seperates most players is the amount of time available to play. Levelling up to max, farming mats (or farming something to pay for mats), running dailies for valor points and rep, learning new encounters and gearing up in either 5man or LFR takes time.
It's not just time. Interest and investment into the game is also important. Take a theorycrafter for example. That kind of player will devote a big amount of time trying to understand how the mechanics of a class work so they can get the maximum DPS/Survivability/Healing out of his character. In turn, this becomes a guide that helps players with less time to dedicate to better play with their characters.

So, it's not about just dismissing those with more time either. If I had to guess, I'd say that what separates players is how important to them is what they do in the game. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

Incentive for 25 Player Raids
It is still a chance. There will be cases where a 10-player raid will have more Thunderforged items than a 25-player raid.

Bashiok its not so much a slap in the face as OP says, but this is something that is going to be HIGHLY annoying to both 10 and 25 man. Its going to cause the mind set of if I upgrade my heroic (insert slot here) and then next week the Heroic Thunderforged weapon drops I will have wasted 1500 valor upgrading that item possibly.
Making a choice to spend currency and then receiving an upgrade soon afterward that makes that choice sub-optimal was not created with Thunderforged items, and will continue long after they're no longer viable.

I think the types of conversations taking place, if nothing else, show that it's at least an engaging change that could mean... something. We'll have to see how it works out, and maybe some day we look back and all laugh at that stupid Thunderforged idea, or maybe we all forget about the forums posts we're making right now because it becomes a solid and accepted part of the game's itemization. In the meantime, your feedback, and back-and-forths, and thoughts, are helpful. (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

The Daily Blink - Nobody Knows the Drama I’ve Seen
The Daily Blink has summed up some of the reactions to the Patch 5.2 raid loot changes.

by Published on 2013-01-23 07:28 PM

Patch 5.2 - 10 and 25 Player Raid Loot Changes

Patch 5.2 PTR - Build 16486
A new build of patch 5.2 is being deployed on test realms, stay tuned for all the changes!


Warlock Green Fire Spell Icons
The spell icons for the new green fire spells have been added to the game.




New Models
A new epic bat mount has been added to the game files! We also found new toad models, a baby thunder crocodile, a baby thunder isle bird, and Pierre received a couple of minor improvements.









Warrior Tier 15 Armor Set
The Tier 15 for warriors is finally in the game files!





Tier 15 Armor Sets Recap
Class Male Image Female Image Video
Death Knight Male Female Video
Druid Male Female Video
Hunter Male Female Video
Mage Male Female Video
Monk Male Female Video
Paladin Male Female Video
Priest Male Female Video
Rogue Male Female Video
Shaman Male Female Video
Warlock Male Female Video


Tier Armor Set Bonuses Changes
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
Death Knight (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • Item - Death Knight T14 DPS 2P Bonus Your Obliterate, Frost Strike, and Scourge Strike deal 4% increased damage, down from 10%.
  • Item - Death Knight T15 DPS 4P Bonus Increases the duration of Army of the Dead by 15 sec. Your Soul Reaper ability now deals additional Shadow Damage to targets below 45% instead of below 35%. Additionally, Killing Machine now also increases the critical strike chance of Soul Reaper.

Druid (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • Item - Druid PvP Set Feral 4P Bonus Once every 30 sec, your next Ravage is free and has no positional or stealth requirement.Additionally, when you successfully interrupt with Skull Bash, the cooldown of your Enrage is reset.
  • Item - Druid T15 Feral 2P Bonus Predatory Swiftness grants you an additional combo point on your current combo target when consumed. Gives your finishing moves a 0% chance per combo point to add a combo point to your target.
  • Item - Druid T15 Feral 4P Bonus After using Tiger's Fury, you gain 40% increased critical strike chance on the next 3 uses of Mangle, Shred, or Ferocious Bite. Ferocious Bite, Ravage, and Swipe.

Hunter (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • Item - Hunter T15 4P Bonus Your Arcane Shot and Multi Multi-shot, and Aimed-shot have a chance to trigger a Lightning Arrow at the target, dealing 100% weapon damage as nature.

Shaman (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • Item - Shaman T15 Elemental 2P Bonus Your Lightning Bolt and Chain Lighting Chain Lighting, and Lava Beam hits have a 10% chance to cause a Lightning Strike at the target’s location, dealing 70,000 Nature damage divided among all non-crowd controlled targets within 0 yards.
  • Item - Shaman T15 Enhancement 2P Bonus Unleash Elements also grants you 3 Your Stormstrike also grants you 2 additional charges of Maelstrom Weapon.
  • Item - Shaman T15 Restoration 2P Bonus Your Healing Stream Totem now heals an additional target for 50% of its normal amount. 25% of its normal amount.

Warlock (Forums / Skills / Talent Calculator)
  • Item - Warlock T15 DPS 2P Bonus While Dark Soul is active, your chance to trigger Nightfall is increased by 30% Haunt's duration is increased by 2 sec, Chaos Bolt and Shadowburn consume 20% less Embers, and abilities cost 30% less Demonic Fury.
  • Item - Warlock T15 DPS 4P Bonus Your Malefic Grasp and Drain Soul deal 5% more periodic damage, your Incinerate has a 8% chance to generate twice the normal Embers, and your Shadow Bolt and Soul Fire grant 5% more Demonic Fury. spells generate 10% more Demonic Fury.



New Items

Level Type Slot Name
526Other Heart of the Thunder King
526Item Enhancement Crown of Heaven
90Meta Gem Indomitable Primal Diamond
90Meta Gem Courageous Primal Diamond
90Meta Gem Capacitive Primal Diamond
90Meta Gem Sinister Primal Diamond
90Meta Gem Tyrannical Primal Diamond
476FingerFinger The Brassiest Knuckle
476FingerFinger The Brassiest Knuckle
90Mount Reins of the Thundering Cobolt Cloud Serpent
90Mount Clutch of Ji-Kun
20Mount Armored Bloodwing
85Mount Sky Claw
1Companion Pets Pierre
1Companion Pets Tiny Red Carp
1Companion Pets Tiny Blue Carp
1Companion Pets Tiny Green Carp
1Companion Pets Tiny White Carp
90Item Enhancement Enchant Weapon - Glorious Tyranny
1Junk Treasures of the Thunder King
1Other Banner of the Mantid Empire
1Other Ancient Sap Feeder
1Other The Praying Mantid
1Other Inert Sound Beacon
1Other Remains of a Paragon
1Other Mantid Lamp
1Other Pollen Collector
1Other Kypari Sap Container
1Key Hoard-Keeper's Key
1Quest Sunreaver Mana Crystal
1Quest Kirin Tor Mana Crystal
1Quest Pristine Banner of the Mantid Empire
1Quest Pristine Ancient Sap Feeder
1Quest Pristine Praying Mantid
1Quest Pristine Sound Beacon
1Quest Pristine Remains of a Paragon
1Quest Pristine Mantid Lamp
1Quest Pristine Pollen Collector
1Quest Pristine Kypari Sap Container
85Other Mantid Amber Fragment
1Consumable Waterlogged Zandalari Journal
1Consumable Iron-Bound Zandalari Journal
1Consumable Blood-Spattered Zandalari Journal
1Consumable Torn Zandalari Journal
1Consumable Frayed Zandalari Journal


Achievement Changes
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
Brewfest
World Events

Children's Week
World Events

Collect
Pet Battles

Dungeons & Raids

Guild Feats of Strength
Guild

Hallow's End
World Events

Pandaria
Exploration
  • Champions of Lei Shen (New) Defeat all of the Isle of Thunder rare mobs listed below. 10 points. Criteria: Haywire Sunreaver Construct, Mumta, Ku'lai the Skyclaw, Progenitus, Goda, God-Hulk Ramuk, Al'tabim the All-Seeing, Backbreaker Uru, Lu-Ban, Molthor.

Quests

Reputation

Pandaria Raid
Dungeons & Raids



Spell Changes
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
Mounts
Flying
  • Armored Bloodwing (New) Summons and dismisses a Swift Windsteed. This mount changes depending on your Riding skill and location. Account wide. 1.5 sec cast.
  • Armored Riding Skyscreamer Summons and dismisses a rideable Armored Riding Pteradactyl Skyscreamer. The capabilities of this mount depend on your Riding skill and location. Account wide. 1.5 sec cast.
  • Clutch of Ji-Kun (New) Summons and dismisses a rideable Clutch of Ji-Kun. This is a flying mount. Requires Cloud Serpent Riding from the Order of the Cloud Serpent. Account wide. 1.5 sec cast.
  • Malevolent Gladiator's Cloud Serpent (New) Summons and dismisses a rideable Malevolent Gladiator's Cloud Serpent. This is a flying mount. 1.5 sec cast.
  • Thundering Cobolt Cloud Serpent (New) Summons and dismisses a rideable Thundering Coblot Cloud Serpent. This is a flying mount. Requires Cloud Serpent Riding from the Order of the Cloud Serpent. Account wide. 1.5 sec cast.

Ground

Companions

Death Knight (Forums)

Druid (Forums)
  • Cyclone now has a 25 yd range, down from 30.
  • Growl no longer activates Bear Form, now requires it.
  • Maim damage was doubled.

Guardian

Major Glyphs

Monk (Forums)

Brewmaster

Mistweaver
  • Muscle Memory (New) When you successfully Jab or damage at least 3 enemies with Spinning Crane Kick, you gain Muscle Memory, increasing the damage of your next Tiger Palm or Blackout Kick by 200%. Monk - Mistweaver Spec.
  • Teachings of the Monastery now works with two additional spells, Crackling Jade Lightning - Damage increased by 100% and Tiger Palm - Damage increased by 100%. Blackout Kick also hits 4 additional nearby targets for 50% damage.

Paladin (Forums)
Talents
  • Selfless Healer now also works with Holy Shock. Now improves your next Flash of Light's effectiveness by 20% per stack when used to heal others, down from 35%.

Retribution
  • Sword of Light now increases healing done by Flash of Light by 100%, up from 35%.

Priest (Forums)

Discipline
  • Inner Focus now also makes you immune to Silence, Interrupt, and Dispel effects for 5 sec.
  • Pain Suppression is now castable while stunned.
  • Rapture now reduces Power Word: Shield mana cost by 25%, down from 50%. Proc now grants mana equal to 150% of your Spirit.

Holy

Holy & Discipline
  • Spiritual Healing (New) Increases the healing done by your Flash Heal and Binding Heal by 43%. Priest - Holy & Discipline Spec.

Shadow

Major Glyphs
  • Glyph of Desperation was replaced with Glyph of Binding Heal - Your Binding Heal spell now heals a third nearby friendly target, but costs 35% more mana.
  • Glyph of Inner Focus was replaced with Glyph of Weakened Soul - Reduces the duration of the Weakened Soul effect caused by Power Word: Shield by 2 sec.

Rogue (Forums)
  • Kick no longer has an energy cost.

Shaman (Forums)
Enhancement
  • Mental Quickness now has the additional bonus of making your shock spells cost 90% less mana.

Warrior (Forums)

Talents
  • Bladestorm no longer requires you to have a melee weapon and no longer allows you to be disarmed.

Arms
  • Mastery: Strikes of Opportunity cleave now does 55% normal damage, down from 75%.
  • Taste for Blood was reworked: Your Mortal Strike hits grant 2 uses of Overpower. When your target dodges any of your attacks you gain 1 use of Overpower.

Major Glyphs
  • Glyph of Incite was reworked: Using Demoralizing Shout makes your next 3 Heroic Strike or Cleave abilities free.
  • Glyph of Overpower was replaced by Glyph of Die by the Sword - While Die by the Sword is active, using Overpower increases its duration by $1 sec and using Wild Strike increases its duration by 0 sec per use.

Professions
Archaeology
  • Ancient Sap Feeder (New) The mantid prefer to age Kypari sap before consumption, and they use devices such as these for the process. You can see from this ancient example that the design has not changed very much over time. 2 sec cast.
  • Banner of the Mantid Empire (New) While the mantid do use windwool and imperial silk, their preferred material is a type of "fabric" fashioned from the wings of various insectoid creatures - including themselves. This banner is an example. 2 sec cast.
  • Inert Sound Beacon (New) The technology behind mantid sound beacons is incomprehensible for non-mantid races. They seem to rely on mantid physiology. This ancient beacon, while intact, is completely inert without mantid to interact with it. 2 sec cast.
  • Kypari Sap Container (New) This container, though amber in color, is actually made from kunchong secretions. This is true of many of the more mundane pieces of mantid furniture. 2 sec cast.
  • Mantid Lamp (New) The glow from this lamp is neither from fire nor magic. Inside, you can see many glowing insects preserved in amber. 2 sec cast.
  • Mantid Sky Reaver (New) This ancient “sky reaver” sword is intended for use by airborne mantid: it is extremely light and well-balanced, meant to be swung in wide circular arcs by an attacker dive-bombing from the sky. Most mantid shed their wings as a rite of passage once they grow strong enough to wield heavy armor and weapons – it is rare to find such worksmanship in a mantid light blade. This was likely once wielded by a paragon. 2 sec cast.
  • Pollen Collector (New) It is difficult to discern the purpose of this object, but it seems to be a pollen collector of some sort. 2 sec cast.
  • Remains of a Paragon (New) Apparently the amber preservation process is not without risk. Only the head of this paragon remains. It appears to predate the pandaren revolution, although pinning down the precise era is impossible. 2 sec cast.
  • Sonic Pulse Generator (New) Mantid can generate and hear sounds from a much broader spectrum than those available to the other mortal races. Their innate understanding of extremely high and low frequencies allows mantid to create weapons such as this. The sonic pulses delivered from this apparatus can actually tear muscle and organs apart at the cellular level; direct hits can liquefy one’s innards. 2 sec cast.
  • The Praying Mantid (New) This Klaxxi'va statue dates back almost to the arrival of the Titans. Inscribed around the base of this statue is a prayer to "the seven headed one". The word "klaxxi" meant "priest" in the old tongue. 2 sec cast.

Blacksmithing
  • Black Planar Edge, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Wicked Edge of the Planes, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (10), Living Steel (4), Spirit of Harmony (6), (Unknown Item).
  • Blazeguard, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Blazefury, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (10), Living Steel (4), Spirit of Harmony (6), (Unknown Item).
  • Deep Thunder, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Stormherald, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (10), Living Steel (4), Spirit of Harmony (6), (Unknown Item).
  • Dragonmaw, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Dragonstrike, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (10), Living Steel (6), Spirit of Harmony (6), (Unknown Item).
  • Drakefist Hammer, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Dragonmaw, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (5), Living Steel (2), Spirit of Harmony (3).
  • Fireguard, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Blazeguard, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (5), Living Steel (2), Spirit of Harmony (3).
  • Lionheart Blade, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Lionheart Champion, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (5), Living Steel (3), Spirit of Harmony (3).
  • Lionheart Champion, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Lionheart Executioner, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (10), Living Steel (6), Spirit of Harmony (6), (Unknown Item).
  • Lunar Crescent, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Mooncleaver, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (5), Living Steel (3), Spirit of Harmony (3).
  • Mooncleaver, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Bloodmoon, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (10), Living Steel (6), Spirit of Harmony (6), (Unknown Item).
  • The Planar Edge, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Black Planar Edge, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (5), Living Steel (2), Spirit of Harmony (3).
  • Thunder, Reborn By making this weapon, you will learn how to create Deep Thunder, Reborn. Weapons. 10 sec cast. Reagents: Lightning Steel Ingot (5), Living Steel (3), Spirit of Harmony (3).

Raid & Dungeon Abilities
  • Animus Font Further corrupts a target already afflicted by Touch of the Animus, causing them to spew Animus Anima bolts at nearby locations every 1 sec. Enemies struck by the bolts suffer 0 Fire damage. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Animus Ring Forms several spheres in a circle around the target. The spheres move toward the center of the circle. Enemy targets that touch a sphere will consume it, increasing the damage they take from melee attacks by 100% 50%. This effect stacks. In normal and heroic difficulties, touching a sphere also inflicts 0 Fire damage over 15 sec. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Berserking Increases your melee, ranged, and spell haste by 150% for 4 sec. Instant. 175% for 4 sec. Instant.
  • Bouncing Bolt Inflicts 75,000 Inflicts 110,000 Nature damage split among enemies within 6 yards. If the Bouncing Bolt does not impact with an enemy, an Unharnessed Power is formed, and the Bouncing Bolt will bounce again! 1,000 yd range. Instant.
  • Burning Cinders Inflicts 50,000 Fire damage initially and then stacks 10,000 Fire damage every 1 second while standing in the area of effect. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Chain Lightning Inflicts 80,000 Inflicts 120,000 Nature damage, chaining to nearby enemies. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Chain Lightning Inflicts 40,000 Inflicts 60,000 Nature damage, chaining to nearby enemies. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Chain Lightning Inflicts 60,000 Inflicts 90,000 Nature damage, chaining to nearby enemies. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Chain Lightning (New) Strikes an enemy with a lightning bolt that arcs to another nearby enemy. The spell affects up to 10 targets. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Cocoon (New) Wraps the target in web, 100 yd range. Instant.
  • Conductivity (New) Increases Nature damage taken by 5%. This effect stacks. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Cosmic Barrage Channeling a Cosmic Barrage. 4 3.5 sec cast (Channeled). 10 sec cooldown.
  • Crashing Thunder Inflicts 100,000 Inflicts 150,000 Nature damage to enemies within 6 yards and an additional Lei 75,000 110,000 Nature damage every 1 sec for 45 sec. 15 yd range. 0.5 sec cast.
  • Crashing Thunder Inflicts 75,000 Inflicts 110,000 Nature damage every 1 sec for 45 sec. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Crimson Wake Animus Anima repeatedly explodes upward from the ground in a line that accelerates toward a random target. Crimson Wake will pursue the target for up to 30 seconds. Enemy targets hit by the explosions suffer 200,000 Fire damage. Instant.
  • Decapitate Lei Shen throws his axe with supernatural force, inflicting 3,000,000 4,500,000 Physical damage and increasing Physical damage taken by 50%. The damage inflicted decreases the farther away the target is from Lei Shen. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Deluge Summons a fierce void of water, dealing Frost damage to nearby enemies. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Diffusion Chain Inflicts 75,000 Inflicts 100,000 Nature damage, chaining to nearby enemies. When an enemy is hit by Diffusion Chain a Diffused Lightning spawns at the location. 1,000 yd range. Instant.
  • Explosive Slam The golem slams the ground, inflicting 300,000 315,000 Fire damage to enemies within 12 yds. of his target. Enemies struck are seared, increasing the damage of subsequent Explosive Slams for 25 sec. Melee range. 2.5 sec cast. 15 yd range. 2.5 sec cast.
  • Focused Lightning (New) Pulses 33,000 Nature damage every 0 sec. to other players within 5 yards. Melee range. Instant.
  • Focused Lightning Detonation (New) The Focused Lightning detonates, inflicting 225,000 Nature damage to all players within 5 yards. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Frost Spike (New) A frost spike erupts fom the ground, dealing 150,000 Frost damage and knocking enemy targets within 4 yards into the air. 300 yd range. Instant.
  • Frostbolt Hurls a watery bolt Frostbolt at an enemy, inflicting Frost damage and slowing them for 5 sec. 45 yd range. 2.5 sec cast.
  • FULL POWER Unleashes a torrent of Animus Anima bolts that strike at random targets. Each bolt inflicts 500,000 Fire damage to enemies within 5 yds. of the impact point. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Light of Day Inflicts 200,000 Fire damage to all enemies 10 8 yards. 300 yd range. Instant.
  • Light of Day Inflicts 200,000 Fire damage to all enemies within 10 8 yards. 300 yd range. Instant.
  • Light of Day Inflicts 200,000 Fire damage to all enemies 10 8 yards. 300 yd range. Instant.
  • Lightning Fissure (New) This field of unstable energy inflicts 50,000 Nature damage every second to players within 3 yards. 3 yd range. Instant.
  • Shatter Shattering mana Shattering inflicts 60,000 Frost damage to all enemies. 150 yd range. Instant.
  • Shockwave (New) Sends a wave of force in front of the warrior, causing damage and briefly stunning all enemy targets within 30 yards. Instant.
  • Storm Energy (New) Charges the player, causing them to inflict Nature damage to nearby players. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Storm Weapon (New) The caster enhances his weapon, giving successful melee attacks a chance to inflict Nature damage. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Storm Weapon (New) The caster enhances his weapon, giving successful melee attacks a chance to inflict Nature damage. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Summon Ball Lightning Inflicts 150,000 Inflicts 250,000 Nature damage to enemies within 6 yards and creates a Ball Lightning at the location. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Throw Spear The Zandalari Spear-Shaper throws his spear at a distant enemy, periodically inflicting 75,000 damage to nearby players. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Thunderstruck Lei Shen winds up to hurl his axe at target location, inflicting 1,500,000 Nature. The damage inflicted decreases the farther away the target is from the Thunderous Throw. Unlimited range. Instant. Thunderstruck location. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Water Bolt (New) Hurls a watery bolt at an enemy, inflicting 112,500 Frost damage. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Waves of Fury (New) The Zandalari Berserker slams his hammer into the ground, inflicting Stormstrike damage and interrupting casts. Unlimited range. Instant.
  • Wind Storm Deals 18,000 Nature damage every 1 second. Damage, healing, and absorption reduced by 80%. 100 yd range. Instant.



Strings Changes
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
  • BONUS_REPUTATION_TITLE - Bonus Reputation
  • BONUS_REPUTATION_TOOLTIP - Your account has unlocked bonus reputation gain with this faction.
  • CONFIRM_JOIN_SOLO - You are in a group. Are you sure you want to queue as solo?
  • DUNGEON_BONUS_VALOR - Some dungeons reward bonus valor.
  • DUNGEON_FLOOR_THUNDERKINGRAID8 - Hidden Cell
  • ERR_BN_FRIEND_LIST_FULL - You don't have room for any more Battle.net friends.
  • GMSS_CHAT_DEFAULT_RESPONSE - This GM is unavailable for chat. If the Open Ticket icon is present, please do not close or edit your petition. If the icon is not present and you require additional assistance, please open a new ticket. Thank you.
  • ITEM_CHARGEUP_TOTAL - (Requires %s)
  • ITEM_CHARGEUP_TOTAL_DAYS - (Requires %d |4Dayays
  • ITEM_CHARGEUP_TOTAL_HOURS - (Requires %d |4Hour:Hours
  • ITEM_CHARGEUP_TOTAL_MIN - (Requires %d Min)
  • ITEM_CHARGEUP_TOTAL_SEC - (Requires %d Sec)
  • LFG_BONUS_REPUTATION - Bonus Reputation:
  • LFG_BONUS_REPUTATION_FACTION - %s (+%d)
  • LFG_CHOOSE_BONUS_REPUTATION - Choose Reputation
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_ALLIANCE_TOOLTIP1 - Further contributions to the Kirin Tor war effort are needed before the assault on Shaol'mara can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_ALLIANCE_TOOLTIP2 - Further contributions to the Kirin Tor war effort are needed before the assault on the Zandalari fortifications begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_ALLIANCE_TOOLTIP3 - Further contributions to the Kirin Tor war effort are needed before the assault on the Thunder Forges can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_ALLIANCE_TOOLTIP4 - Further contributions to the Kirin Tor war effort are needed before the assault on Stormsea Landing can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_ALLIANCE_TOOLTIP5 - Further contributions to the Kirin Tor war effort are needed before the assault on the Foot of Lei Shen can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_DESCRIPTION1 - Securing a Beachhead
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_DESCRIPTION2 - Assaulting the Zandalari fortifications
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_DESCRIPTION3 - Breaking into the Thunder Forges
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_DESCRIPTION4 - Breaking into Stormsea Landing
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_DESCRIPTION5 - The Final Gate
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_LOCKED1 - Stage 2
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_LOCKED2 - Stage 3
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_LOCKED3 - Stage 4
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_LOCKED4 - Stage 5
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_LOCKED5 - Stage 6
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TITLE1 - Stage 1
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TITLE2 - Stage 2
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TITLE3 - Stage 3
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TITLE4 - Stage 4
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TITLE5 - Stage 5
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TOOLTIP1 - Further contributions to the Sunreaver war effort are needed before the assault on Zeb'tula can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TOOLTIP2 - Further contributions to the Sunreaver war effort are needed before the assault on the Zandalari fortifications begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TOOLTIP3 - Further contributions to the Sunreaver war effort are needed before the assault on the Thunder Forges can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TOOLTIP4 - Further contributions to the Sunreaver war effort are needed before the assault on Stormsea Landing can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_THUNDER_ISLE_TOOLTIP5 - Further contributions to the Sunreaver war effort are needed before the assault on the Foot of Lei Shen can begin.
  • MAP_BAR_TOOLTIP_TITLE - %s - %d%% Complete
  • POWER_TYPE_FEL_FURY - Fel Fury
  • SCENARIO_BONUS_VALOR - Some scenarios reward bonus valor.
  • SPELL_CHARGEUP_TIME - Current progress: %s
  • SPELL_CHARGEUP_TIME_DAYS - Current progress: %d |4day:days;
  • SPELL_CHARGEUP_TIME_HOURS - Current progress: %d |4hour:hours;
  • SPELL_CHARGEUP_TIME_MIN - Current progress: %d min
  • SPELL_CHARGEUP_TIME_SEC - Current progress: %d sec
  • SPELL_FAILED_CUSTOM_ERROR_189 - You must be near the Bloodied Court gate.
  • SPELL_RECAST_TIME_CHARGEUP_DAYS - %.3g |4day:days; required
  • SPELL_RECAST_TIME_CHARGEUP_HOURS - %.3g |4hour:hours; required
  • SPELL_RECAST_TIME_CHARGEUP_INSTANT - Instant
  • SPELL_RECAST_TIME_CHARGEUP_MIN - %.3g min required
  • SPELL_RECAST_TIME_CHARGEUP_SEC - %.3g sec required


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