Patch 3.3

[SurfD]

Update to add some New Patch Notes:

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html

Quick Summary of the Big changes -
- Pet Classes are getting reamed HARDCORE in PvP (gg feeding your pet into the Bladestorm Meat Grinder)
- Small Revert to the "downranking" nerf (Welcome back rank 1 frost bolt spam for low mana cost snares)
- 1 Second immunity to Vanish breaking from damage / hostile actions after Vanishing.
- Shaman get some AoE love.
- Bunch of quality of life changes for characters level 1-15?  wtf

General

    * Icecrown Citadel
          o The Forge of Souls, the first wing of the 5-player dungeon, is currently available for testing.
          o Additional Icecrown Citadel dungeon and raid content will be made available in future test builds.
    * Dazed: Creatures attacking a player from behind can no longer cause players level 1-5 to be dazed, and have a reduced chance to cause players level 6-10 to be dazed.
    * Copied Test Realm characters will no longer be copied with their achievement history in order to better facilitate the character copy process.

Classes: General

    * Default Equipment: Starting weapons are now more uniform. Rogues now start with a pair of daggers equipped. All other classes except shamans start with a 2-handed weapon equipped and the required skill already known. Shamans start with a 1-handed weapon and a shield, as they benefit more from the shield than they would from a 2-handed weapon.
    * Glancing Blows: The mage, warlock, and priest classes no longer have an increased chance for their melee attacks to be glancing blows; and the damage penalty due to their glancing blows is the same as for other classes.
    * Health and Mana Regeneration: These regeneration rates have been increased by up to 200% for low level characters. As a player's level increases, the regeneration rates gradually reduce, returning to normal rates at level 15.
    * Spell Mana Costs: These costs have been reduced for almost all lower level spell ranks. In general, if a spell decreased in cost with a higher level rank in patch 3.2.0, that spell now has the decreased cost at all ranks. In addition, spells learned before level 20 with reduced cast times and/or durations have even further reduced mana costs, proportionate to their reduction in cast time or damage.

Races: General

    * Racial Attribute Bonuses: These bonuses have been recalibrated to even out the amount of starting health on the various races. All races start with a standardized level of stamina, except for orcs, dwarves, and tauren who now start with 1 extra point of stamina. For each class, bonuses and penalties to all attributes have been adjusted so that each race has an equal attribute total.

Death Knights

    * Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle: There is now a 1-handed version of this rune in addition to the current 2-handed rune.
    * Talents
          o Unholy
                + Night of the Dead: Now reduces the damage your pet takes from area-of-effect damage by 45/90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.

Druids

    * Pets
          o Avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pets take from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.

Hunters

    * Misdirection: Redesigned. Instead of having finite charges, it now begins a 4-second timer when the hunter using Misdirection performs a threat-generating attack, during which all threat generated by the hunter goes to the friendly target. In addition, multiple hunters can now misdirect threat to the same friendly target simultaneously.
    * Talents
          o Beast Mastery
                + Intimidation: If the hunter's pet is in melee range of its target, the stun from Intimidation will now be applied immediately instead of on the pet's next swing or attack.
    * Pets
          o Avoidance: Now reduces the damage your pet takes from area-of-effect damage by 30/60/90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.

Mages

    * Talents
          o Arcane
                + Arcane Empowerment: This talent now also grants 1/2/3% increased damage done by the mage's party or raid for 10 seconds after the mage gets a critical strike with Arcane Explosion, Arcane Missiles, Arcane Barrage, or Arcane Blast. This effect is exclusive with Ferocious Inspiration and Sanctified Retribution.
    * Pets
          o Avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pets take from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.

Priests

    * Pet
          o Avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pet takes from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.

Rogues

    * Dual Wield: Rogues now know this ability upon logging into the game at level 1.
    * Stealth: This ability no longer has multiple ranks. While active, the single rank of this ability (available at level 1) allows rogues to move at 70% movement speed.
    * Vanish: For the first second after this ability is used, neither Vanish nor Stealth can be broken by taking damage or being the victim of a hostile spell or ability.

Shamans

    * Fire Nova Totem: This totem has been replaced with a new spell, Fire Nova, which is available at the same ranks as the old Fire Nova Totem. Existing characters will automatically learn this new spell in place of the totem. With a Fire Totem active, shamans will be able to use Fire Nova (fire magic) to emit the same area-of-effect damage as the old Fire Nova Totem from the active Fire Totem, not consuming the totem in the process. Fire Nova will activate a 1.5-second global cooldown when used and has a 10-second spell cooldown. The caster must be within 30 yards of the totem to use this ability, but does not need to be within line of sight of the totem.
    * Talents
          o Elemental Combat
                + Improved Fire Nova Totem: Renamed Improved Fire Nova. This talent now provides an additional 10/20% damage to the spell and reduces the cooldown by 2/4 seconds.

Warlocks

    * Pets
          o Avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pets take from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.
          o Summon Imp: This ability is now available from the trainer for level 1 warlocks and no longer requires a quest to learn.

Warriors

    * Victory Rush: This ability is now trainable at level 6.
    * Talents
          o Protection
                + Damage Shield: This ability will no longer trigger any chance-on-hit effects from the warrior or the opponent it damages.

User Interface

    * Quest Tracking Feature
          o This system is currently under development and is not fully functional.
    * Looking For Group System
          o This feature is undergoing several improvements and is not available for testing at this time.
    * For additional notes on Lua and XML changes please visit the UI & Macros forum.

Graphics

    * A new feature has been added to the D3D graphics engine to improve texture management (particularly for Windows XP users). This is currently enabled by default on the public test realms. For more information please visit our Test Realm forum.

Professions

    * Enchanting
          o Black Magic: This enchantment now sometimes increases haste rating for the caster rather than inflicting the caster's target with a damage-over-time effect. It is also now triggered by landing any harmful spell rather than inflicting damage with a spell.

Items

    * Glyphs
          o Death Knights
                + Glyph of Icy Touch: Instead of granting additional runic power, this glyph now causes Frost Fever to deal 20% additional damage.
          o Shamans
                + Glyph of Fire Nova Totem: Renamed Glyph of Fire Nova. This glyph now reduces the cooldown of Fire Nova by 3 seconds.

Bug Fixes

    * Druids
          o Rejuvenation: Rank 15 of this spell was providing a 15-second duration. It has been correctly reduced to 12 seconds.
    * Mages
          o Flame Strike: Some ranks of this spell had an incorrect cast time of 3 seconds. All ranks now share a 2-second cast time.

[kildorn]

I know they were unhappy with pets/avoidance and pvp, but this pretty much moves pets back into the "will not be alive 5 seconds into any encounter" range with no other forms of defense against the rather large amount of AE damage found in some forms of PVP.

[Delmania]

Warlocks

    * Pets
          o Avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pets take from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.
          o Summon Imp: This ability is now available from the trainer for level 1 warlocks and no longer requires a quest to learn.

Is honestly too much to just ask for better scaling for the damn pet?  Seriously, as a warlock, my defense relies on having my pet out.  Several key abilities are located on the pet.  Without it, I've got Demonic Circle!

[Sjofn]

I lol at that fire nova change. LOL YOU HEAR?

[SurfD]

I know they were unhappy with pets/avoidance and pvp, but this pretty much moves pets back into the "will not be alive 5 seconds into any encounter" range with no other forms of defense against the rather large amount of AE damage found in some forms of PVP.

I think they need to give it a conditional scaling based on the type of pet.  Having 90% avoidance to AoE in PvP is pretty broken for a permanent pet, like Hunter pets or Warlock Combat pets (like a Doomguard or Felguard), since they do considerable damage, and fighting against them is almost like fighting against 2 people.    However, for temporary pets, like Treants, Mage elementals, Shaman wolves, and such, completly removing the AoE avoidance basicly makes them worthless.  Nothing like popping your Trees on someone only to have their 7k hp get instantly melted by 2 quick AoE's.

I think maybe having something like

- Warlock / Hunter pets get 40 or 50% avoidance
- Temporary pet get 70 or 80% avoidance

Either that, or temporary pets need a BIG increase in Hitpoint pools to compensate.

[Nevermore]

    * Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle: There is now a 1-handed version of this rune in addition to the current 2-handed rune.

Looks like I might be going back to DW Tanking after all.  It would be really interesting if the 1H version of the rune slows down the attack speed of the weapon so DKs can get better use out of the current 1H tank weapons.

[Nevermore]

I lol at that fire nova change. LOL YOU HEAR?

For a second I thought that the Improved FN talent with that stun would suddenly be useful, then I saw they removed the stun from the talent.  Still, talented and glyphed that thing will have a 3 second cooldown.  I have no idea if it would be worth it, though.

[Lakov_Sanite]

It gives shamans a more reliable aoe which is a good thing. Drop a magma toem and then start some fire nova spam, good times.

[Ingmar]

    * Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle: There is now a 1-handed version of this rune in addition to the current 2-handed rune.

Looks like I might be going back to DW Tanking after all.  It would be really interesting if the 1H version of the rune slows down the attack speed of the weapon so DKs can get better use out of the current 1H tank weapons.

You better not roll on my Quel'Serrar. 

Anyway, re: the "downranking" change, remember they're getting rid of spell ranks entirely in 4.0. This is just a temporary patch to fix the "my level 7 shaman casts 4 lightning bolts and is OOM and the mob still has 60% of its health left" problem.

[K9]

It gives shamans a more reliable aoe which is a good thing. Drop a magma toem and then start some fire nova spam, good times.

Yeah, it looks fun.

[Fordel]

My Treants have 4220 HP. That's like one divine storm.

[Ingmar]

It gives shamans a more reliable aoe which is a good thing. Drop a magma toem and then start some fire nova spam, good times.

It doesn't solve the fundamental problem of shaman AE, which is that you have to run up and drop your totem in the middle of the mobs. Its vaguely useful in that you can still give your totem of wrath buff while doing it - although then you're again still making the choice to not maximize your AE potetial - but otherwise meh.

[Merusk]

    * Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle: There is now a 1-handed version of this rune in addition to the current 2-handed rune.

Looks like I might be going back to DW Tanking after all.  It would be really interesting if the 1H version of the rune slows down the attack speed of the weapon so DKs can get better use out of the current 1H tank weapons.

Yeah I was just thinking the same thing. *sigh* I hate dual wielding as a DK.

    * Misdirection: Redesigned. Instead of having finite charges, it now begins a 4-second timer when the hunter using Misdirection performs a threat-generating attack, during which all threat generated by the hunter goes to the friendly target. In addition, multiple hunters can now misdirect threat to the same friendly target simultaneously.

Nice change, with a revert back to the original Misdirection that was deemed to be way too over the top lo these many years ago.  I like it, but I bet they're going to be nerfing the aggro on Volley.

[Montague]

So... was anyone really complaining that level 1-15 was too hard? I'm kinda dumbfounded by that change.

[Rasix]

On casters you tend to run out of mana a lot.  Which is tiresome.  Not that you couldn't just buy cheap water, but no one really wants to sit down after killing a few mobs.

This would make me play my ally mage alt a bit more. 

[Fordel]

So... was anyone really complaining that level 1-15 was too hard? I'm kinda dumbfounded by that change.

Yes, as a casting class it sucks giant donkey balls.


-edit-

is, it, all the same!

[Ingmar]

So... was anyone really complaining that level 1-15 was too hard? I'm kinda dumbfounded by that change.

Before they change it, go level an orc or troll shaman from 1-8. Ever since they made the change where spells cost a % of base mana instead of a flat amount by rank, levels 6-7 have gotten excruciatingly painful, because spell damage only goes up when you get a new rank, but mana cost goes up every level. At level 7 as a shaman you can empty your entire mana bar into a single mob and it gets to you with over half its health bar left - and because there's no gear with stats on it you're stuck with your base mana pool with no real way to improve it so you can get more casts.

It isn't as obvious as a draenei because their quests (and quest rewards) are better, but as a horde shaman it is really awful for the last couple levels before you get rank 2 of lightning bolt at level 8.

[Sjofn]

    * Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle: There is now a 1-handed version of this rune in addition to the current 2-handed rune.

Looks like I might be going back to DW Tanking after all.  It would be really interesting if the 1H version of the rune slows down the attack speed of the weapon so DKs can get better use out of the current 1H tank weapons.

You could just use a slow-ass DPS weapon instead, since you'd be getting an ass ton of defense with that rune.

[Rasix]

Quick, go exploit someone looking to offload a tankard.  Beer tanking!

[Ingmar]

http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47508

Has a socket to cram a 30 stamina gem into, its a mace so you get your expertise bonus as a human DK, has some hit rating which you can't really get enough of as a dual wielding tank who has some stuff that goes off the spellhit cap, and the agility even turns into a little dodge.

Two of them would be 120 stamina out of your weapons with epic gems, that's solidly competitive with the available 2hs at the same gear level (219).

The model is even nice.

EDIT: NOT THAT I HAVE ANY REASON TO TALK YOU INTO IT 

[Nevermore]

http://www.wowhead.com/?item=47508

Has a socket to cram a 30 stamina gem into, its a mace so you get your expertise bonus as a human DK, has some hit rating which you can't really get enough of as a dual wielding tank who has some stuff that goes off the spellhit cap, and the agility even turns into a little dodge.

Two of them would be 120 stamina out of your weapons with epic gems, that's solidly competitive with the available 2hs at the same gear level (219).

The model is even nice.

EDIT: NOT THAT I HAVE ANY REASON TO TALK YOU INTO IT 

Yes, because it's not like I haven't been using that mace as one of my two DPS weapons for over a month now, Captain Perceptive. 

The reason I brought up attack speed is because I'm wondering how they'll balance that rune for 1H weapons.  If it adds straight defense like the the 2H rune, then you'll either have a rune that doesn't add enough defense to a slow 1H DPS weapon so as not to overpower a DK using an actual tank weapon or it'll add a metric asston of defense to a faster 1H tank weapon if it adds enough defense to make it worthwhile to use the slower DPS weapon for tanking.

[Ingmar]

At some point DW frost wanted fast weapons right? I have this vague memory that they changed something to nerf fast weapons for DKs - I thought it was rune strike but I went to look up what it did today and it seems like it should favor fast weapons, much like heroic strike, which would make the normal 1.5-1.7 type tank weapons good.

[Sjofn]

I assume the two weapons being enchanted with that rune will equal the 2h rune. That's how the parry ones work. Nothing weird needed.

Basically, if you need the gargoyle one to hit the defense cap when using a 2h weapon, putting it on both weapons you're DWing with would have the same effect. There's not really a reason to worry about someone putting it on a tank weapon and being "overpowered," because you'd still prefer tank plate over dps plate for the stamina/avoidance stats.

[Delmania]

I know they were unhappy with pets/avoidance and pvp, but this pretty much moves pets back into the "will not be alive 5 seconds into any encounter" range with no other forms of defense against the rather large amount of AE damage found in some forms of PVP.

I think they need to give it a conditional scaling based on the type of pet.  Having 90% avoidance to AoE in PvP is pretty broken for a permanent pet, like Hunter pets or Warlock Combat pets (like a Doomguard or Felguard), since they do considerable damage, and fighting against them is almost like fighting against 2 people.    However, for temporary pets, like Treants, Mage elementals, Shaman wolves, and such, completly removing the AoE avoidance basicly makes them worthless.  Nothing like popping your Trees on someone only to have their 7k hp get instantly melted by 2 quick AoE's.

I think maybe having something like

- Warlock / Hunter pets get 40 or 50% avoidance
- Temporary pet get 70 or 80% avoidance

Either that, or temporary pets need a BIG increase in Hitpoint pools to compensate.

Using a felguard is a bad example.  At that point, the player has invested enough points into demonology that the pet is the warlock's greatest strength and greatest weakness.  While the pet is out, the warlock is very powerful, once that pet is dead, the warlock is a weak mage with no real escape mechanism.  For some classes, killing the pet is hard, but for others (warlocks, priests, and paladins), the pet is a minor roadblock.   That being said, warlocks stand out in the pet crowd, even from hunters, in that our we rely on having our pet out for basic defense (Soul Link) and our pets provide many of our basic abilities.

[Nevermore]

At some point DW frost wanted fast weapons right? I have this vague memory that they changed something to nerf fast weapons for DKs - I thought it was rune strike but I went to look up what it did today and it seems like it should favor fast weapons, much like heroic strike, which would make the normal 1.5-1.7 type tank weapons good.

DK strikes work off straight weapon damage.  It's not normalized for the speed of the weapon.  That means you want the weapons with the highest actual damage, which are almost always going to be the slowest weapons given similar dps.

If you look at the description of Heroic Strike it just says 'increases melee damage by X' while DK strikes always specify 'X% weapon damage + Y'.  Don't ask me why it's different, but it is.

[Sheepherder]

DK strikes work off straight weapon damage.  It's not normalized for the speed of the weapon.  That means you want the weapons with the highest actual damage, which are almost always going to be the slowest weapons given similar dps.

If you look at the description of Heroic Strike it just says 'increases melee damage by X' while DK strikes always specify 'X% weapon damage + Y'.  Don't ask me why it's different, but it is.

Your concept of normalization is wrong.  No "Next Melee" attacks are ever normalized, because they in fact tend to be so naturally (being limited by weapon speed).  The formulae for weapon damage per auto-attack is as follow:

Code:

Result = Weapon Damage + (Attack Power / 14) x Weapon Speed

The obvious problem is instant attacks, which are independent of weapon speed, receive massive damage increases when using a slow weapon due to both the higher base weapon damage and the slower speed which acts as a multiplier for attack power.  Thus the formula for most instant attacks now employs a fixed weapon speed dependent upon the weapon type rather than the actual weapon speed, weapon damage as used in this formula remains unaffected.

Weapon Type	Normalized Speed
Two-Hander	3.3
One-Hander	2.4
Dagger	1.7
Ranged Weapon	2.8

Normalizing any "next melee" attack would be redundant and it is simply not done.  A few instant attacks exist which also creatively evade the rule, being either based on weapon DPS or pure attack power, both of which are speed agnostic and therefore don't scale wildly with weapon speed.  The current fate of Slam I am not aware of, but it evaded the initial round of normalization and may remain one of the sole weapon damage based attack that is not normalized whatsoever.

The difference between Rune Strike and Heroic Strike is the coefficients on weapon damage and attack power versus a flat damage increase per attack.  What Blizzard was trying to do is make Rune Strike scale better, with obvious success.

[SurfD]

It gives shamans a more reliable aoe which is a good thing. Drop a magma toem and then start some fire nova spam, good times.

It doesn't solve the fundamental problem of shaman AE, which is that you have to run up and drop your totem in the middle of the mobs. Its vaguely useful in that you can still give your totem of wrath buff while doing it - although then you're again still making the choice to not maximize your AE potetial - but otherwise meh.

Shaman do have a distinct advantage over EVERY other AoE capable class in the game however.  100% threatless AoE.  Fire Totem AoE generates absolutely no threat, so you can drop it in the middle of a giant swarm of spawning adds and never need to worry that the tank not landing a hit or two on ALL of them is going to end up getting you killed.

[Gobbeldygook]

IF THIS WERE THE DRUDGE REPORT, THE SIRENS WOULD BE HERE

On the PTR, COI is on DR!  CHRISTMAS HAS COME EARLY!

[Ingmar]

Not a big deal to me, as in pvp I am probably the single least affected-by-COI spec (I can charge/intercept/intervene out of it, and duration is reduced 30% besides) but I bet Fordel will be pleased.

[Fordel]

Chains is (was?) such total bullshit. No damage Cap, No DR, No cooldown, ranged, instant root.

"But it's just a snaaaaaare"  


-edit- Don't even start that bullshit argument that is uses precious runes and costs DPS. Those are runes that weren't being used for DPS regardless because you were still 20-30 yards out from whatever potential DPS target you had in mind, and BEHOLD, each DK spec has a second melee range snare that is part of their normal DPS rotation.

[Simond]

Oh hey, yet another DK nerf because Blizzard is balancing around PvP. That makes a fucking change. 

[Gobbeldygook]

Oh hey, yet another DK nerf because Blizzard is balancing around PvP. That makes a fucking change. 

The only fight where this nerf would affect you would be Faction Champs, which is explicitly supposed to be like a PVP fight.

[Merusk]

Yeah, of all the DK nerfs over the last year, this one bothers me not at all.  All the other snares/ roots are on DR I never understood why COI wasn't.   

[Jayce]

Oh hai, COI is not on DR until 3.3 drops?   

[Lantyssa]

Being the skill a flagged level 80 used to harrass me with after I tagged him, good.  (Bastard started bouncing around me when I had like six mobs on me.  No way I couldn't miss him and not die to the mobs.)  I ragequit so hard after that BS.