Archives for the "Patches" category
Dec 8
No related posts.
Dec 1
It is my understanding (from a few different sources) that the current plan is that 3.3 will be live next Tuesday, December 8th. Here’s just a little to-do list I’ve put together to make sure I get everything done I want to get done.
To Do Before Patch 3.3
To Do After Patch 3.3
What do you have planned for 3.3?
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Oct 29
Before I say anything else, I will say this: this is not a QQ post. In fact, I think Chill of the Throne is, in the end, a good idea (at least now that we’ve dug into the itemization hole, as it were).
What Is It
Chill of the Throne is a buff, similar to Sunwell Radiance in BC, that allows all enemy mobs in Icecrown Citadel (coming in 3.3, currently on the PTR) ignore 20% of their targets dodge. Essentially, if you are tanking IC, you can subtract 20% from your total avoidance; however, boss hits will be adjusted to compensate. Let’s continue the disussion.
Why Is It Here?
A couple people from WoW’s development team explain why they are implementing this spell, and Ghostcrawler discusses it a bit more. To summarize, tank avoidance is too high. This is primary because the team that planned out Wrath’s gear did not count on having hardmodes with higher item level gear–in the end, the gear people have is better than the gear the development team thought it would be. This means that, in order to offer any chance of a challenge to a raid, the hits that do actually hit the tank (ie, the ones that are not avoided) have to hit really hard in order to have any chance of killing the tank. What you end up with is healers having to time their big heals to land right after a bit hit (or else spam their biggest heals) and tanks that are unable to reactively use cooldowns.
Ideally (and Ghostcrawler has stated multiple times that this is the aim for Cataclysm), damage from a raid boss should be lower but more consistant (”smoother”), and the challenge in keeping tanks alive should be healers having to worry about running out of mana (i.e., not overhealing) and tanks having to use cooldowns more retroactively.
So, to try to push things that direction for the last raid of this expansion, Blizzard is nerfing avoidance artificially and also nerfing the amount of damage the bosses do (resulting, basically, in lower avoidance but higher mitigation, albeit mitigation via less damage), hoping to smooth out all these giant spikey hits while still creating a risk that the tank will die.
What It Is Not
This is not a worse nerf for druids than other tanks. Let me repeat myself: druids will not suffer worse from this nerf than other tanks. “But druids can only dodge!” you might say. Well, let’s take a look here.
Theoretical (i.e. made up) Avoidance Outside Icecrown
| Class | Dodge | Parry | Total Avoidance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Warrior | 30% | 20% | 50% |
| Druid | 50% | 0% | 50% |
Adjusted with 20% Less Dodge
| Class | Dodge | Parry | Total Avoidance |
|---|---|---|---|
| Warrior | 10% | 20% | 30% |
| Druid | 30% | 0% | 30% |
It’s easy to see that both tanks end up with the same amount of total avoidance. Now, you could go and make arguments about dodge being better than parry for certain tanks, etc. etc. but the main point is that other tanks are being hit just as hard as druids.
Another Note on Gear and Item Level
Guys, just because new gear has a higher item level does not always mean it is better. Ghostcrawler has said time and time again that it’s not designed that way–gear should be a choice, you shouldn’t be able to train a monkey to buy all the newer, higher item level gear and be a better tank/healer/DPS than you were. (This is part of my issue with gear scores in general.)
This public service announcement provided to you by The Altoholic.
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Feb 27
There are plenty of folks talking about the bosses on the PTR, the change to the hearthstone (link to blue post here ’cause it’s funny), dual-talent specs, and so forth, but today BRK posted a picture that piqued my interest, and not because of the numbers in the center of the screen, but rather the little box at the top:
Now that’s what I’m talking about! A way to know that you’re going to be saved to a raid or heroic before it actually happens–and you even get a “Leave Instance” button so you don’t have to make a mad dash for the exit! This is quite possibly my favorite 3.1 change so far.
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Jan 7
This was reported by MMO Champion, and I’m reporting it here as well in hopes that it will help people recognize scammers, and inform them of this important change.
In patch 3.0.8, a new interface will be used to chat with game masters. Check out the post on MMO Champion for the details!
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Jan 7
Patch 3.0.8 is bring a lot of bug fixes and balancing to the expansion. The patch notes have not officially been updated, but there is a post on the forums that list them all. Without focusing on class-specific changes (excepting Raise Dead, as it could potentially affect everyone!), here are some of the highlights (at least in my opinion):
General Changes
Death Knight
Alchemy
Mining
Quests
User Interface
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Dec 11
As you may have guess from the title of this post, PTR 3.0.8 is now live. All the changes that have been disucssed since Wrath launched that were to come out “in a patch before the Ulduar content patch” are in here. Some notable changes:
General
Druids
Warlock
Warrior
These are just a few of a large number of enhancements, bug fixes, and other additions (including new achievements and associated rewards). MMO Champion has the full scoop.
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