Yet Another Warlock Nerf

Is it my imagination or is Blizzard just trying to come up with more reasons to grind honor?
This baby will cost us 40,000 honor points for a whooping amount of 25 resilience. Another must-have for serious PvPers, but again, that's going to be a boring grind again just like Battlemaster.
I'm guessing the trinket will be changed soon and require a personal rating of 2000.

> New Medallion

The new Season 4 items will have the below personal and team arena rating requirements:

Shoulders: 2200
Weapon: 2050
Head: 1700
Chest: 1600
Legs: 1550
Gloves: none
Off-hand: none

In addition, some of the Season 4 quality items that will be purchasable with honor will also carry a personal and team arena rating requirement:

Boots: 1700
Ring: 1650
Bracers: 1575
Belt: none
Necklace: none
Trinket: none

No more 10 games per week and getting all the gear. No more playing specs for fun (destruction warlocks, balance druids for example). No more boosting friends or selling points.

Getting to 2200 rating for the shoulders is a hard task, I'm not even sure I can get that high. I can't help to wonder, what will happen to all those stuck at 1500 rating or less. Sure, they suck at PvP, but even if they're getting 300ish points per week, they'll be able to get some decent gear with the current system. This change might completely kick the fun part of arena combat and make it elitist only. Even those at 1500 rating invested their time and good will.

Some players are very happy about this change, mostly the ones at 2000+ rating. Sure, you know how to play and you deserved your items, but you didn't get that far just because you had the gear.
You can give full S3 gear to some random scrub and he'll be stuck at 1500 rating, regardless of class (ok rogues might get 1600).

I've played a good part of this season with some close friends, most of them poorly equipped and skilled. But I helped them get some points and learn a few things, and it was fun. We usually got together after arenas and discuss about it (read: me laughing at them). But the point is, it's more fun to play with people you know then some random guys who you've never met.
One of them is a shadowpriest, and it's common knowledge they perform poorly in arenas. He'd probably do much better specced discipline, but he has no healing gear and doesn't want to healbot people.

Let's take a look at some random player who likes doing arenas from time to time. We'll call him Mr. B. Mr. B is a hunter usually found in SSC or TK. He likes killing big monsters with 24 other people, trying out new things like PvP specs, and playing battlegrounds every now and then. Mr. B doesn't have the best gear, nor a whole lotta resilience. But he's got decent ratings and always learns something new.
With his ratings, he won't be able to buy any weapons, head, shoulders, boots, and maybe even rings next season. I really hope he gets better, but if he doesn't play more, he'll be stuck at that rating forever, and won't get many season 4 items. Mr. B is very good at killing those monsters in raids, yet he understands PvP is another game and requires a different mindset. If someone magically gave him all the PvP items, I doubt he would reach 2200 rating anytime soon.

Why would you deny items to a fine lookin' hunter like Mr. B? He's doing ten times better in arenas then most other hunter (or any other class for that matter) bloggers out there and I'd say he's a very happy dwarf. Let Mr. B buy whatever item he wants.

S4 Rating Requirements

Partnered with Epic Weapons, Blizzard released a limited edition replica of Frostmourne, a sword wielded by Arthas in Warcraft III.
The sword enabled him to defeat the wicked Dreadlord Mal'Ganis, but also cursed him so he became a Death Knight. But who cares anyway. If you want to read more lore check it out on wowinsider.

The sword looks freaking awesome. It will cost you a minimum of $429 (ouch!). If you're interested, read more about the auction here.

Just like with those WoW commercials with Shatner, Mr. T and others awhile back, yet another great marketing stunt by Blizzard.

> Frostmourne Hungers

That's right, the old Life Tap is back. I'll sound like an ass now but I expected it, nobody can hate warlocks that much. LT will surely see some changes in the future, but nothing as drastic like now.
Hopefully the devs won't put this crap back.

> Life Tap Changes Reverted

Finally! The patterns were already added to Shattered Sun rep vendors, and all that was missing were gems. These gems and recipes were for months a thorn in my jewelcrafter's eye, and buying them from the auction house is painful even for my budget.

I'm sure there's a lot of guilds out there unhappy about this, since it will be a significant loss of gold, but dedicated PvPers like myself are finally one step closer to all the PvE riches.

Hopefully this trend will continue so we don't end up again with such sought after epic items only available to raiders.

> Epic Gems for Badges

It looks like those fake 2.4 patch notes weren't completely fake after all.
Here's the recent class changes from mmo-champion:

Druid

• Lifebloom healing coefficient has been reduced.
• Many shapeshift form tooltips have been updated to be consistent with each other.
• Nurturing Instinct increases your healing spells by up to 50/100% of your Agility, and increases healing done to you by 10/20% of your Attack Power while in Cat form.

Hunter

• Improved Mend Pet now has a 50/100% chance to remove one Curse, Disease, Magic, or Poison effect, up from 15/50%.

Mage

• Arcane Fortitude now increases your armor by an amount equal to 100% of your Intellect, up from 50%.
• Blink, Slow, and Spellsteal have all had their mana cost reduced.
• Icy Veins no longer stacks with Bloodlust/Heroism.
• Improved Fire Ward has become Molten Shields.
• New Talent: Molten Shields will cause your Fire Ward to have a 10/20% chance to reflect Fire spells while active. In addition, your Molten Armor has a 50/100% chance to affect ranged and spell attacks.

Paladin

• Resistance Auras: It is no longer possible for two Paladins in the same party to make it appear that players have two of the same resistance aura active.
• Righteous Defense: This spell will now always be castable on friendly npcs.
• Seal of Blood: This ability will no longer cause spell pushback for the Paladin with this seal active.
• Turn Undead(Rank 3):This spell has been reworked and has been renamed to “Turn Evil”. It will now work on Demons in addition to Undead. Turn Evil is subject to diminishing returns, and lasts 10 seconds in PvP.

Priest

• Chastise no longer disorients the target, but now is instant cast and roots the target for 2 seconds.
• Focused Will now reduces damage by 2/3/4%, down from 1/3/5%.
• Power Infusion: Infuses the target with power, increasing their spell haste by 20% for 15 seconds.

Rogue

• Improved Backstab is now called Puncturing Wounds.
• Puncturing Wounds increases your critical strike chance with Backstab by 10/20/30%, and the critical strike chance with your Mutilate ability by 5/10/15%.
• Improved Sprint: This ability will now always remove Entangling Roots.

Shaman

• Ghost Wolf: Cast time reduced to 2 seconds, down from 3.
• Nature’s Swiftness and Elemental Mastery now share a 10 second cooldown.
• Tremor Totem now pulses every 3 seconds, down from 4.

Warlock

• Blood Pact now has a tooltip.
• Demonic Sacrifice: Now works properly in sanctuary regions (such as Shattrath City and the Stair of Destiny).
• Nether Protection: The buff from this talent will no longer interrupt capturing PvP flags and bases.

It will be interesting to see how some of these changes will affect smaller arena brackets, especially 2v2. Paladins should finally be able to do something against warlocks, since their Holy Shock is buffed moderately, and Turn Evil working on pets should give them a chance to drink also.

I'm sure a lot of shaman will easily find 2 talent points to get improved Ghost Wolf in enhancement tree, which will then make it instant cast. Tremor Totem changes will mostly benefit versus warlocks, but we'll destroy them anyway.

Rogues are getting buffed again (what a surprise!), Improved Backstab talent will improve Mutilate damage, in addition to Backstab. I guess too many of them specced Shadowstep as Blizzard wanted.

As for priests, with Power Infusion's spell haste they will spam Mana Burns like mad; I would lie if I said I like it.

Feral druids are getting a nice buff, but it won't help them one bit. There's still not much utility they can bring as restoration druids, especially in 2v2. Restoration set's 4-piece bonus will be changed to a bonus to Regrowth. I was just getting used to the run speed increase, but the nerf is necesarry so I can live with it. I'm not too happy about Lifebloom nerf either; yes, druids are strong healers in 2v2, but I'm afraid this will have huge impact in PvE where I don't feel as strong as some other classes.

There's no word about warlock's pets not scaling, so the change is either delayed or indeed a bug.

Here's something non-class related.
A few new neck pieces dropped from Twin Eredar on PTR, which have resilience. Sin'Dorei Pendant of Conquest, Salvation and Triumph.
If you missed my rant about such items check it out here, but I'll say it again, get PvP items away from PvE!

> New class changes in 2.4

It doesn't look like patch 2.4 will change much about class (im)balance, but there are some interesting changes so far. Looks like we'll be doing the same thing again: farm reputation, Badges of Justice, and honor.
Here's what awaits those of us on the frontlines.

New PvP cloaks, this time with spell haste:


Battlemaster's Alacrity is a new BM trinket, again with spell haste:



This head enchant might be useful for those with poor PvP gear and lack of stamina and resilience:


New battleground repeatable quest (you can complete this as many times you want per day, but you'll get the gold only once):




And here's some new welfare gear for you scrubs:

Druid
Dragonhide Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Increases your movement speed by 15% while in Bear, Cat, or Travel Form. Only active outdoors.

Kodohide Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Increases your movement speed by 15% while in Bear, Cat, or Travel Form. Only active outdoors.

Wyrmhide Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Increases your movement speed by 15% while in Bear, Cat, or Travel Form. Only active outdoors.

Hunter
Stalker’s Chain Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Concussive Shot by 1 sec.

Mage
Evoker’s Silk Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Blink spell by 2 sec.

Paladin
Crusader’s Ornamented Battledgear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Hammer of Justice by 10 sec.

Crusader’s Scaled Battledgear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Hammer of Justice by 10 sec.

Priest
Mooncloth Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the duration of the Weakened Soul effect caused by your Power Word: Shield by 2 sec.

Satin Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the duration of the Weakened Soul effect caused by your Power Word: Shield by 2 sec.

Rogue
Opportunist’s Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Gouge ability by 1 sec.

Shaman
Seer’s Linked Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Stormstrike ability by 1 sec.

Seer’s Mail Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Improves your chance to get a critical strike with all Shock spells by 2%.

Seer’s Ringmail Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Nature’s Swiftness ability by 24 sec.

Warlock
Dreadweave Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the casting time of your Fear spell by 0.2 sec.

Warrior
Savage Plate Battlegear
- 2 pieces: +35 Resilience Rating.
- 4 pieces: Reduces the cooldown of your Intercept ability by 5 sec.

New enchant, Deathfrost. I'll leave the math to others but it looks interesting for PvP:

Credits to Mmo-champion and WoR.

> Patch 2.4 - PvP additions

We can all agree the afk reporting feature in 2.2 patch didn't help much - in the first few days after the patch hit everyone was eager to report people and it did help a bit. If nothing else, I felt like I could finally do something about the afkers except live with it. You can't spend half of the time checking the map and see who's inactive and who is not, and even if you did report them, they just got in combat to remove the debuff and kept on afking. There's been a lot of requests and suggestions on how to further improve it (such as kicking players out of battlegrounds), but up until now Blizzard probably didn't know what to do.
Finally, it seems they got tired themselves and announced the following:

In our continued efforts to support fair gameplay in World of Warcraft and to provide a positive experience for players, we are currently taking steps to ensure fair and enjoyable competition in the Battlegrounds. Starting immediately, we will be issuing warnings and penalties, including suspensions and the removal of Honor points and recently acquired Honor rewards, for non-participation in Battleground games.

So, issuing warnings and penalties eh? That doesn't sound so bad now - it's certainly more than I expected. I guess it will be again very forgiving, your account won't be suspended for doing it a few times, but those who constantly abuse the system will sooner or later be caught.

It's nothing special really, but I've figured this out awhile back. If I'm too lazy to do battlegrounds, I just don't do it no matter how much I need the honor. Or if I'm too lazy to fight, I just defend. Standing still on farm in Arathi Basin doesn't take much effort, and killing some random hunter or rogue from time to time who tries to take the node ain't that difficult.
That way, I can watch TV but still contribute in the game.

I'm glad Blizzard finally did something serious about this issue. I doubt this will really end the leeching in battlegrounds, but it sure will help.
But I wouldn't mind if inactive players got kicked from the BG as well. *hint*

> Thou shall be banned

The latest 2.3.2 news surprised me today. I didn't expect a rogue nerf at least till 2.4, but AR/Prep was more ez-mode than SL/SL.

* Ambush: The damage multiplier on this ability has been increased from 250% to 275%.
* Hemorrhage: This ability now correctly does additional damage when its debuff has already been applied.
* Preparation now resets the cooldown of Shadowstep and no longer resets the cooldown of Adrenaline Rush.
* Shadowstep now adds a 3 second, 70% movement speed increase.
* Sinister Calling now also increases the percentage damage bonus of Hemorrhage and Backstab by 2/4/6/8/10%.

If you're a rogue, you can pretty much choose any spec atm and you'll be fine in PvP. That's hardly the case with other classes - some don't even have one decent talent tree.

Anyway, back to the point. I've read Ming's post today and it kinda makes me sick the more I look at it.

Also, a lot of people probably didn't notice this, as a hero of the rogue community, as soon as I saw the 110% hemo nerf, I posted two bug threads on PTR and bug forum

Self-proclaimed hero of the rogue community my ass... It's not the first time he said something like that either. Seriously, it was funny when Athene did it but in Ming's case it's just pathetic. But that's just me. I bet half of Ming's visitors would spec 0/0/61 if he said so.

Rogue needs damage more than anything else and even with AR/prep there are plenty of classes that can eat two AR's and still wreck us 1v1. Rogue's overall success (class as a whole, there will always be special players with special teammates like XOM) is still not top tier in anything other than 3v3.

*cough* roflcraptastic *cough*
Not even warriors can beat you, and they're your counter class (as much as I hate using this term).

We do have the best balanced talent trees with this change, unfortunately the best balanced class tends to be the weakest class as well.

Are you fuckin' kidding me? I thought you said rogues were finally the strongest class? No golden age?

Your Ambush is buffed (hello, anyone noticed?), Shadowstep's tooltip will soon cover half of your screen, and still rogues complain. Not to mention the class got quite a few buffs in 2.3.
To all those 'ima gonna reroll' rogue whiners out there - AR/Prep needed a nerf, face it. Rogues are fine, its a l2p issue.

Hate me, flame me, nerf me, unsubscribe me, /ignore me... I can't help it. I'm probably the only guy in the known universe who hates Ming, but I do. There, I said it.

> Ming sucks!

Well not really, there's nothing wrong with Wowhead. It's me gone berserk, because finally I can use item tooltips (example) without breaking my site's layout, or having to link to Thottbot.

The new Powered by Wowhead feature enables you to show item tooltips on mouseover on your site. Someone got more details on it, but it works really simple - just add a line of code to your site's source, and voila, if you ever linked to some item on Wowhead, the tooltips will be there. No need to change any previous posts or links, simple as that.

Bigbearbutt posted another method some time ago, but it refused to work well with my site, and frankly it was too much trouble for me to try and fix it. If you prefer Thottbot over Wowhead, you can check Mania's Arcania - it works pretty much the same way.

> Wowhead goes berserk!

I finally had some time to check out the new patch myself, so here's some things I noticed.

New cooking daily quest ain't that bad - I can finally get some Golden Fish Sticks without actually having fishing. You wouldn't believe but I actually had a hard time finding Monstrous Kaliri; usually they are the ones trying to find me.


Still didn't get my Tattered Hexcloth Sack nor have I seen Zul'Aman, but I'm getting close.


It seems Primal Nether can no longer be looted unless you have a profession that can use it.


I played a bit with the guild bank, and claimed the first slot for myself. It's great not having to relog now to get bandages or potions.


Battleground preparation time is great. Also, there's always a kind mage now who casts Ritual of Refreshment before the battle begins, so I can easily stack food for the whole day.


I don't think this was in the patch notes either - trinkets now show cooldown in spell description. A+


The number of Marks of Honor we get in mailbox is now also displayed without opening the mail first. Small change but hey, I noticed!


Daily quests for heroic instances have nice money rewards, but I'd rather get a bonus Badge of Justice instead of Ethereum Prison Key, especially since Mechanar is nerfed. My days of farming consortium reputation are long gone. Actually the quest in this image is for non-heroic instance, that's why you dont' get Badge of Justice.
Be careful with the chests in Hellfire Ramparts and Mechanar - supposedly you have to loot them first or you won't get Badge of Justice. Or something like that. Don't worry, it will be fixed in 2.4.


I hate it. I hate it I hate it I hate it I hate it I hate it I hate it I hate it I hate it .....


Unfortunately, we don't get 4000 honor points, but 419 ain't such a bad bonus either, plus a bit of cash. Too bad it took me 2 and a half hours to win Arathi Basin. I guess alliance started winning more since noob classes like hunters and rogues got buffed (yes, flame me), and oh boy they got plenty of those.

Hehe's some other posts from the blogosphere which weren't published in time for my yesterday's 2.3 impressions.

• Wowinsider reports about Chaotic Skyfire Diamond dropping only for jewelcrafters. I can semi-confirm that: I had a non-jc friend farm it for several hours without a drop, and it dropped for some other guy who was a jewelcrafter within minutes. Also check WI's Zul'Aman preview.

• Warlock Therapy needs some therapy. Seems two Azure Whelpings aren't enough so he had to farm more.

• Kat got fish tracking! My fishing is still stuck on 229 for months now, maybe it's time to level it up.

• For Amava Knows Aggro the patch went pretty smooth, and also likes the hunter deadzone removed, but also raises a good point: the deadzone was part of the challenge of being a hunter. I have to agree on that - whenever I fought a good hunter, it was nearly impossible to get in his deadzone.

• White Whisker has some tips for Zul'Aman Bear, Eagle and Lynx bosses.

• Someone is worried mostly about double-freezing. I'm not much of an expert when it comes to hunters, but I'd like to point out that you can't fear two targets at the same time, nor sap, nor polymorph them.

• Mystic Chicanery ... well, just read it!

• Kaestrel's Aerie has the same problems with Auctioneer as me.

• Is Kaliope ever doing anything but farming?

Now post a comment on this post or I swear my next 10 posts will be rants and whining about hunters!

> 2.3 second impressions

• World of Raids reports about undocumented changes. I especially like the one about T6 Resto Shaman gear not having token cost.
  

• You can read about 2.3 from a warrior's perspective on Warriorpwns and The Positive Warrior.
  

• Jagoex from Warlock Therapy got Azure Whelping. Grats!

• Karthis talks about addon issues and Karazhan.

• Frostbolt.com has some Zul'Aman screenshots. Among other things.
  

• Laser Chickens have a right to speak also!

• Here's some random thoughts about the patch from Liquid Silver.

> 2.3 impressions

There are some new categories added to the auction house interface, consumables and trade goods.

You will be able to search consumables for food & drink, flasks, potions, bandages, scrolls, elixirs, and other misc items like various drums made by leatherworkers.

For trade goods, the categories are elemental (essences, primals), cloth, leather, metal and stone (ore, bars and stones like Heavy Stone), enchanting reagents and rods, herbs, engineering reagents & devices, explosives, and meat.

It's an interesting and a welcome change, apart from all those nerfs&buffs we're hearing about all the time.

> 2.3 Auction House changes

Additional Aimed Shot changes

In patch 2.3, aimed shot will not only reduces healing done to the target by 50% for a ten seconds, but we're also reducing the shot time by 0.5 seconds.

I predicted changes to Aimed Shot in one of my previous posts - it's not yet instant but 0.5 sec cast time reduction is a good start. And it will most likely be further reduced, judging by what Eyonix said.

Hypothermia back to 30 seconds, Ice Block trainable

It's a deliberate change. We initially felt like it was too quick at 30s and decided to test it out at 45s, but after playing with it for a while we felt like it opened mages to focus fire a little too much so we decided to keep it at 30s. It's worth pointing out that making changes like this and later un-doing them is not at all uncommon, it's just most of you generally don't see that process in action since it often happens before the patch even gets to the PTR.

Since I'm here, I'll also make a small pre-emptive strike against the incoming "what about other mage concerns!" replies I'm about to get and say the following.

Two things we'll be making improvements to in the near future (although these aren't likely to make it in on time for 2.3) are having iceblock be trainable (to make sure all mages have it as a tool for pve encounters and to open up other trees as being more viable options for pvp), and to-be-finalized improvements to mana issues in longer fights.

All the mage whiners out there can finally stop now! But seriously, Ice Block is one of the most important abilities that makes a mage what it is in PvP, so I guess the fire talent tree will be a bit more popular now. I rather not speculate what talent will replace Ice Block, but it will probably be nuke-the-hell-out-of-this-warlock type spell.
Can I now get Soul Siphon or Soul Link trainable? Or at least instant Corruption - I have yet to see a warlock without spending 5 talent points there.

> PTR changes: mage & hunter

Okoloth always fascinated me with his dedication of pulling interesting info from the WoW Armory.
This time, he analyzed 4.5 million characters, which is half of WoW's population a lot. You can check his site for more detailed statistics, but I was really surprised to see the class breakdown.

It seems the myth about druids being the least played class is finally over - only 7% of players choose shaman as their preferred class. If I had to guess, I'd say hunters are the most played class, but I would be wrong - warriors lead by 14% of total player base. Nerf mortal strike! Nah, just kidding. There's a lot of mages also, 2% more than there are rogues, warlocks and priests. Surprisingly, there aren't many paladins either.

Of course, this data does in no way tell us if a particular class is well balanced or not - the overpowerness (wut?) changes from patch to patch - I rather check www.geekboys.org/arena to see who dominates the endgame, which I plan to write about soon also.

> WoW population demographics

Mad Alchemist's Potion
It seems this new potion has a 95% chance to proc an additional elixir effect, and it's class dependant - meaning you will get buffs depending on your class, so casters should get Elixir of Draenic Wisdom or similar, and melee classes should get Elixir of Mastery or Major Agility. Good news. But I wonder how will it work with different specs or roles - what exactly will my feral druid get?


Druid

• Growl: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its target is now increased by hit rating.
• Challenging Roar: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its targets is now increased by hit rating.

I believe spell hit rating was previously increasing the chance for these spells not to be resisted so this is good news. Tanking druids still lack serious hit rating though.


Warlock

• Unstable Affliction: The silence from this ability is now subject to diminishing returns.

What can I say... nerf to dual lock teams.

Warrior

• Challenging Shout: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its targets is now increased by hit rating.
• Taunt: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its target is now increased by hit rating.

Same as for druids, a welcome and needed change. Intimidating Shout, Demoralizing Shout and Piercing Howl are not getting changed though.


Raids & Dungeons

• The Mechanar: The Cache of the Legion can now only be looted by players who are present during some portion of a successful attempt of the Gatewatcher Gyro-Kill and Gatewatcher Iron-Hand encounters. In addition, on Heroic difficulty Gatewatcher Gyro-Kill and Gatewatcher Iron-Hand no longer drop Badges of Justice. Instead, the Cache of the Legion contains a Badge of Justice for each player present.

My favorite Badge of Justice farming instance is getting nerfed :((

You can read the full patch notes on worldofraids.com.

Also, I'd like to point out that Ming, considered a very good rogue (and a very nice blogger) thinks Rogues are finally the strongest class in TBC.

I got no idea how I missed this, but Wowinsider is here to point it out. Druids will be able to shift forms without exposing themselves to vulnerable human form, which is in my opinion overpowered (I got a druid, remember). While the change looks very cool and somewhat logical, I believe it is hard enough for any class to catch a druid as it is.
Also from latest patch notes:

• PvP Trinkets: Insignia of the Alliance, Insignia of the Horde, Medallion of the Alliance, and Medallion of the Horde now clear the debuff from Judgement of Justice.

So long paladin, you shall not catch my druid anymore! Can this please be nerfed?

> New PTR build: Ain't getting better

Mmo-champion (again) reports about a chinese guild TheSeven, who managed to clean The Burning Crusade content in 52 days. It might not seem as much of an achievement at first, but it is. TBC was released in China on September 6th, which is almost 8 months (I think) after the rest of the world got it.

It pretty impressive if you take a look at their items: warrior in T4 and Karazhan shield, and a bunch of other guys equipped with T3 (yes, Tier 3!).
While I don't mean to undermine their achievement, there are a few things to note. First of all, guilds like Nihilum didn't know the strategy behind a boss most of the time - I can only imagine how it's like for 25 people to not know what they're supposed to do, much less learn to do it correctly. Also, a lot of boss encounters were nerfed in patches since BC launched.

Still, I'd congratulate any guild that put an end to Illidan. PvE is really not my domain, so I'll probably kill him when Wrath of the Lich King comes out.

> The Chinese Are Prepared

Who do you think will be more overpowered in next patch, rogues or hunters?
Hunter's ranged attacks min range is now 1 yard . Mmo-champion calls it mega major über change. I'm completely and utterly dissapointed - Mortal Strike, Dispel Magic, and now reduced minimum range... Wait - it's not instant? Oh, no worries hunters, wait a day or two it will be.
I can't wait to see what BRK has so say about this!


Update:

It seems hunters won't be able to shoot from 1 yard afterall - supposedly it's a tooltip error.
But I can't help to wonder, why were hunters able to shoot from 1 yard on PTR? Imo, it's easier to say it's a bug then explain to the community why they did such drastic changes and then reverted it. Drain Life didn't get nerfed also - it's just a bugfix after 2.5 years.

Drysc:

There's a tooltip error, it should be "5-35 yards". We want melee and ranged to be kept separate, so that when in melee attack range you should not be able to use a ranged attack. There's some amount of 'give' there, especially in fast paced PvP which can produce some temporary gray area but that's fully known with this change.

Feeding the issue of the tooltip error is a bug currently where you can indeed range attack someone while being meleed, but that's in the process of being resolved as well.

---

Yes I know, I'm complaining a lot. I love my warlock and I'd hate to abandon it - every class got some love this patch, except locks and shaman. Oh wait, shaman got free spell damage from healing. I won't get the Merciless Gladiator mount, and it will be twice as hard in Season 3 with the newly nerfed lock.

But hey, seems my druid will have something to look forward to.

The Mad Alchemist's Potions "side effect" is actually a random buff from other elixirs. However it won't replace existing elixir buffs if you have one on.

It would be wrong to make an entirely new making gold post about this, because there ain't much to say.
When I first found out about Mad Alchemist's Potion, I thought the side effects would be negative, like on Fel Mana (hunter pot!) or Fel Rejuvenation Potion. It seems I was wrong. Although the buffs you get will be random, so it might not be exactly what you need at the moment, it's still a pretty solid chance to get a useful stat boost which does stack with other elixirs! Gosh I can't wait to try it.
There's not many potions you can make from Ragveil, so people usually don't even bother picking them up, but since this new pot is so cheap to make, expect Ragveil prices to increase. It won't make you a fortune, but you won't regret it either.

> Hunters, rejoice!

Mmo-champion brings us the news of the latest changes on public test realms. These are not as bad as last ones, but (surprise!) rogues got a huge buff again!

• Cheat Death (Subtlety) chance to trigger increased to 33/66/100% and now also causes the rogue to take 90% less damage for 3 seconds when the effect triggers. This effect cannot occur more than once per minute.
• Dirty Deeds now also increases damage against enemies below 35% health (previously, reduced energy cost of Cheap Shot and Garrote by 20 for 2 points).
  

Cheat Death requires 30 points in Subtlety tree (33 for 3/3 CD). Previously, it had a 10/20/30% chance to proc. Shadowstep got buffed, Dirty Deeds got buffed, Deadly Throw got buffed, Blind got buffed, Hemmorhage got buffed... Geez, why the hell didn't I roll a rogue?
The 90% less damage for 3 seconds part sounds like yet another warlock nerf, no? We wouldn't want a DoT (or anything for that matter) to finish up the precious rogue, would we.


But of course, this site is more about warlocks then rogues, I must not miss this huge buff we got again:

• Soul Siphon (Affliction): If a Warlock already has a particular spell cast on a target, reapplying before its duration ends will no longer grant an additional bonus.

Oh wait, it's not a buff... It's a nerf! You can call it a bugfix just like Drain Life/Siphon Life being affected by Mortal Strike and similar effects - but it's still a nerf.

But why, why buff rogues again? After reading some posts on World of Ming lately, I'm sure those guys would disagree with me, but come on. Blizz killed lock+healer combo; when top teams will consist of rogue+healer, I wonder if Rogues will get nerfed. This is what I want Rogue talent trees to look like!

There's more changes, mostly about professions and interface, you can read full notes at mmo-champion.

> 2.3 - More rogue buffs

Ysira from Kargath posted these new item screenshots on Test Realm forums. They can be obtained with Badge of Justice, currently a drop from heroic instances. In patch 2.3, badges will drop also from Karazhan bosses, as well as Zul'Aman, and you will even be able to get some from the new daily quests for instances.

Trinkets, neck, off hand and wand - screenshot
I especially like the wand - it will be much better then my Wand of the Netherwing. Spell damage+stamina gem , or just stamina will fit perfectly in the blue socket.

Cloth items & Back - screenshot
Excellent tanking cloak; other cloaks will probably be used widely for PvP, since they have resilience. Melee cloak has armor penetration on it - more rogue/warrior buffs, just what my warlocks needs.

Leather items - screenshot
All I can say is OMG - I know my druid will love some of this stuff!

Mail items - screenshot
Enhancement shamans will be particularly happy about these.

Plate items - screenshot
Cool, tankadins and retnubs finally get some nice items.

Librams, idols, totems - screenshot
Oh boy... 20 badges for this babies is nothing! Feral druids (like me :p) will be pleased - there's a new idol which has a proc on mangle to increase your agility by 65 for 10 second.

So this is it - I don't believe any class or spec left behind, there's a bit for everyone. I'm a bit tired of farming heroic instances for badges, but with the addition of daily quests it might be faster.

> 2.3 - Farming Badges of Justice, again