Old World Dungeon Revamps, Orc Clan Armor, Warlords Theorycraft, Blue Tweets, DLC 443

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[Datamined] Patch 2.0.6 Class Changes & Strings, Josh: 'Ladders at E3... Confirmed', Blizzard Aiming For More Item-Based Builds

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Warlords of Draenor - Old World Dungeon Revamps
Warlords of Draenor brings us updated versions of some lower level dungeons. These include Blackfathom Deeps, Razorfen Downs, and Razorfen Kraul. Tonight we are taking a look at Blackfathom Deeps and Razorfen Downs.

Blackfathom Deeps

Razorfen Downs

Warlords of Draenor - Orc Clan Armor Sets
Today we are taking a look at another one of the Orc Clan armor sets, the Shadowmoon Clan. These sets are currently not available to players.

Patch 5.4.8 Hotfixes - June 9

Quests

• Borrowed Brew: Resolved an issue that could cause players to be unable to see Lorewalker Cho after consuming Mouthwatering Brew.

Bug Fix

• Resolved an issue where the Heart of the Valorous buff was not correctly persisting through death.

Warlords of Draenor Theorycraft Discussion

One of the new mechanics in Warlords of Draenor for tanks is Resolve. It is similar in design to Vengeance, except without the offensive component. Incoming damage increases the effectiveness of your self-healing, so that things like Shield Block and Shield Barrier stay competitive with each other, both in solo questing, and mythic raiding.

Resolve: Increases your healing and absorption done to yourself, based on Stamina and damage taken (before avoidance and mitigation) in the last 10 sec.

Resolve from Stamina

• You always get a baseline amount of Resolve, based on Stamina
• This uses the formula: Stamina / (250 * ItemScaling[PlayerLevel])
• ItemScaling is a table with a value for each player level, that you can find in the DBC files. Ex: ItemScaling[100]=261
• This updates dynamically with temporary stamina buffs.

Resolve from Damage Taken

• You also get some based on damage taken, as a % of Max Health , and decaying over time
• The server remembers your damage taken events for the last 10 sec.
• This portion is recalculated every 1.0 seconds and on every damage taken event.
• Each damaging event grants 0.25 * [ Damage * 2 * ( 10 - ( Now - DamageTimestamp ) ) / 10 ] / MaxHealth
• This averages to ~Damage/MaxHealth
• This calculation uses the damage before damage reduction (% damage reduction effects, and armor).
• Damage that is not mitigated by armor (Spell and Bleed damage) grants 2.5x as much Resolve.
• Auto-attack damage that is avoided counts as the average amount of damage that that auto-attack would have done.
• MaxHealth does not include increased max health from temporary multipliers like Last Stand, or Ursa Major.

Additional Notes:

• Resolve is multiplicative: A heal of size X becomes size X*(1+Resolve).
• Resolve does not affect percent-based heals (i.e. "heals you for 20% of your life" would be unaffected.
• There is no quick-ramp-up mechanism or taunt-transfer mechanism
• Resolve will persist through shapeshifts.
• Resolve only affects self-heals and self-absorbs
• It will still have diminishing returns when attacked by multiple mobs (same formula/logic as Vengeance had)

Another opaque mechanic that someone just asked me about on Twitter:
Gift of the Serpent Proc Chance

Gift of the Serpent has a proc chance based on Mastery, and then some spells have a reduced chance per heal. Here is the multiplier on that proc chance for each heal.

• Renewing Mists = 0.25
• Chi Wave = 0.25
• Zen Sphere (Periodic) = 0.25
• Zen Sphere (Detonate) = 0.15
• Chi Burst = 0.15
• Soothing Mists = 0.30
• Soothing Mists (Statue) = 0.15
• Enveloping Mist = 0.20
• Uplift = 0.25
• Eminence (Self & Xuen) = 0.20
• Eminence (Statue) = 0.10
• Chi Torpedo = 0.15
• Spinning Crane Kick Heal = 0.10
• All Others = 1.0

Clarification on leveling perks, are they consistently worded to show additive/multiplicative?

• Improved Raging Blow: Increases damage by 20% --- Multiplicative
• Improved Unwavering Sentinel: Now increases your armor by an additional 15% -- Additive
• Bonus question: Anger management, here to stay/gone? If sticking around, will it reduce the same abilities that eye of galakras reduces?

Yes, we've been consistent with the wording on the perks; those guesses are both correct. If you find any counterexamples, they'd be considered bugs, but I don't know of any offhand.

Anger Management will include a list of affected abilities on its tooltip, instead of the reference to Readiness. Undecided which abilities exactly that'll be, yet.

Balance Druids: Mastery procs interacting with Eclipse (+ CA).

Currently, Balance druids have a small issue with Mastery procs. Due to the Eclipse Bonus buff being tied to Mastery, trinket procs may greatly increase the strength of our DOTs (with DOTs making up ~30% of our damage, in the sims I've run, using T17N profile.) My concern comes with Balance of Power, where you get maximum Eclipse Bonus on your first set of DOTs. It's very easy to maintain your original DOTs too. Given a trinket procs Mastery, this will definitely inflate Balance of Power's strength.

But BOP isn't my concern, it's our DOTs snapshotting Mastery procs. I know I've brought it up in the past via twitter, but have you given it more thought on possible solutions? Or are you okay with Mastery procs existing as they currently are (allow the snapshot)?

(Given a Mastery proc trinket exists, I will need to include it in the action list for simcraft, as it does change a few things -- given it does snapshot)

Currently, Eclipse (including Mastery) is effectively snapshotted for Balance. We're considering making it snapshot your Balance Energy, and then dynamically translating that to an Eclipse multiplier on the fly, so that Mastery isn't snapshotted. However, we don't think that that has a particularly large impact in the general case. It very well may with Balance of Power, however. Let me know if you have any calculations on how much that will matter.

Blue Tweets

Classes
for bonus armor: will it be like spirit where tanks will want only some or will we stack it heavily?
You'll likely want it wherever you can get it, but it'll only be found on accessory slots (jewelry, etc.). (WatcherDev)

Druid (Forums / Skills / WoD Talent Calculator)
Does the partial tick of a Moonfire/Sunfire DoT have the same chance to trigger Shooting Stars like a "full" tick?
If it comes an issue, we'll make it have a partial proc chance as well. (Celestalon)

Mage (Forums / Skills / WoD Talent Calculator)
Please explain why devs are so adamant on keeping flameglow. No mage ever uses it now, how will it be any different in wod? cont
Flameglow's unpopularity is a result of it being undertuned. We think an increase to its effectiveness will solve it. (Celestalon)

Shaman (Forums / Skills / WoD Talent Calculator)
wondering why ElementalShields (besides ES) and WeaponEnchantmentSpells are not becoming passive for Shaman in WoD. Pruning?
Weapon Imbues are becoming passives. (Celestalon)

Character / Items
One question. The Dev Article doesn't mention gems and sockets and "Warforged" gear. Is all of that staying bonus?
Yes, bonus sockets and Warforged are unchanged from their prior announced status. (WatcherDev)

There once was a time (most of Classic, some TBC) when no one worried about BiS and just went after upgrades.
To be fair, they were often one and the same. You might only have a single item in the game for your class in a slot. (WatcherDev)

This will not support the World First race in anyway, it's actually destroying it. RNG with loot and you win.
It averages out. The more subtle variation, the more even it ends up. Weapon/trinket drop RNG is a much bigger deal. (WatcherDev)

Is BiS still reasonably achievable in a raid tier with the new system?
Every item with your preferred stats, Warforged and socketed with the tertiary of your choice? Zero people will have that. (WatcherDev)

Warlords stat changes are going to require a pretty big mentality shift as far as BiS gear. The question is whether or not it'll be fun.
IMO the concept of BiS mostly means every other piece that ISN'T BiS feels worse. It's not a net positive effect. (WatcherDev)
People focus a lot on BiS also because it's achievable. When it's not achievable (i.e. D3), each upgrade is more rewarding.
Not just more rewarding, but more frequent. Players will more commonly have the experience of looting and equipping new items. (WatcherDev)

You say that as if BiS is going away. It's just a lot harder to attain now.
There is a spectrum of better and worse. And you'll chase upgrades. (WatcherDev)

true, all the work that has to go into temp upgrades makes them seem not worth the trouble
Right. Most pieces will now be pick-up-and-wear, on the spot. No trip to town, no gold sink. (WatcherDev)

So then the fun question is: how many CQP gear options will we get? Ringmail/Linked/Mail still
Well set bonuses change per spec (even on pure dps classes). Variety will be secondary stats (holinka)
So with that, hunters will have different set bonuses for BM, Marks, and Surv?
Where it makes sense yes (holinka)
it isn't a goal to ensure every spec has a different set bonuses. (holinka)
just that a design constraint is gone now that we can change it per spec. (holinka)

Dark Legacy Comics - #443
DLC #443 has been released!

[moveth]

I love that Blizzard is really helpful towards theorycrafters.

[Ikkarus]

I said once and gonna saying it again...

It would be a shame if the Orc Clan Armor Sets end up not being available in the game, they are better and more iconic compared to our Carnival Costum..err..I mean, Raid Tier Sets..

[Mormolyce]

Interesting, not sure how much they're revamping in BFD and RF. Unlike the Cata revamp it doesn't appear to change the basic story of the dungeon.

[Lessthanzer0]

So there are 6 or 7 new dungeons and 4 revamped ones? Seems like a little much on the revamped side in my opinion. Would've reacher had a 1 or 2 more new ones instead but I guess it's better than nothing. We'll have to see how they turn out.

[Deleted]

Ooooooh yeah so thats the reason this expansion release is taking so long?

[Jamie081]

The revamps were done 'during a bit of downtime.'

[Deleted]

Maybe lvl 100 challenge modes:-)

[Ikkarus]

What's wrong with revamps? Some old dungeons are more fun than a lot of new ones, if revamped properly it could end up being really interesting, it was the case of Zul'gurub back in Cataclysm, I only hope they don't change the map too much, I used to love the map os Scholomance, now it's just linear and boring..And yes, I prefer thousands revamped dungeons than another Stormstout Brewary...

[Phaidrae]

Wow, the new BFD looks really fun!!!

[Notos]

What's wrong with revamps? Some old dungeons are more fun than a lot of new ones, if revamped properly it could end up being really interesting, it was the case of Zul'gurub back in Cataclysm, I only hope they don't change the map too much, I used to love the map os Scholomance, now it's just linear and boring..And yes, I prefer thousands revamped dungeons than another Stormstout Brewary...

Yeah I missed just skipping Jandice and pretending she didn't exist (except on my warlock and then gl trying to get a group to do her if you wanted your dreadmist). Oh yeah, and I loved it when they reduced the number of bosses you needed to kill in ZA/ZG, every group seemed to always skip the ones I wanted. Yes, I'm a little bit bitter.

[Mormolyce]

The revamps were done 'during a bit of downtime.'

Someone whisper "Stocks and WC" to them at their next coffee break!

- - - Updated - - -

What's wrong with revamps? Some old dungeons are more fun than a lot of new ones, if revamped properly it could end up being really interesting, it was the case of Zul'gurub back in Cataclysm, I only hope they don't change the map too much, I used to love the map os Scholomance, now it's just linear and boring..And yes, I prefer thousands revamped dungeons than another Stormstout Brewary...

I like SSB, endboss can be a PITA though :P

I do sort of miss the old sprawling Scholo, but I can see how that was too long and spread out for a modern dungeon. Wish they'd kept the old one in the game somehow.

Also I notice nobody has ever complained about how they chopped off like half of Sunken Temple! I guess nobody liked getting lost on those stupid stairs.

[Blur4stuff]

i like revamps

they have got to make heroic versions for lvl 100

[Mukki]

So has anyone else noticed that the feet on the new orc models look terrible? Like as in toenail on the side of his feet terrible.

[Halanad]

I feel a small bit sad when I see Alpha people saying how the murlocs in BFD are "brand new". Those murlocs debuted in Vashj'ir and Throne of the Tides in Cataclysm. They are deep sea murlocs hence the angler fish look.

Poor Vashj'ir, forever avoided, forever forgotten.

[Mormolyce]

Hmm, just noticed: if you want to tame a Ghamoo-Ra with his current skin better get in now, looks like he uses the Pandarian turtle model in WoD instead of the Ancient Turtle model from Cata.

[Deleted]

After the butchering of DM I personally really wish they spent their time on other things than old dungeon revamps.

[Mormolyce]

After the butchering of DM I personally really wish they spent their time on other things than old dungeon revamps.

Deadmines?

The new Deadmines is great, if any dungeon suffered from the revamp it's SFK. Mostly because it isn't full of Worgen anymore. Though the new bosses were great.

[Deleted]

After the butchering of DM I personally really wish they spent their time on other things than old dungeon revamps.

New Deadmines was one of the best things done in Cata.

[Spotnick]

Someone whisper "Stocks and WC" to them at their next coffee break!

They already did Stocks.