Death Knight Racial Guide

The new death knight hero class is the only class which can be created with any race. This will lend itself to a wide range of variablity in the class, particularly based upon your unique racial abilities and traits. So what is the best knight death race? Well, it’s a very difficult question. There are many factors must go into answering this question based upon what you want to do with your death knight.

Do you want to focus on PvE and raiding? PvP and Arena? or a combination of the two? Knowing what you want to do with your DK will help you make the most informed decision for your death knight’s race. Let’s start with the horde races.

Best Race for Death Knight?

note: non-combat abilities such as +profession skills, underwater breathing, etc. were not considered for this analysis. Also, make sure you check out the alliance and horde racial abilities and traits guide for the updated list of racials.

Best Horde Death Knight Race

Orc Racials:

1. Blood Fury - Excellent ability for both PvP and PvE death knights.
2. Hardiness - A solid ability for PvP, fairly useless in PvE. Not quite as good as it once was, but still worth the mention.
3. Command - Another bonus for the class, which benefits from it’s undead summoning. Will have great value in both PvP and most PvE encounters.
4. Axe Specialization - Great if you’re using axes, so long as there are high end 2 handed axes available this will be another bonus to the class.

All in all orc receives solid bonuses which help augment the death knight’s natural abilities. A very solid choice for PvP and PvE.

Tauren Racials:

1. War Stomp - A very nice ability, personally I think this is more for healers than death knights though. That said, it’s still a solid ability and will be beneficial for both PvP and PvE.
2. Endurance - It’s yet to be determined exactly how this will be scaling, but on what I’ve seen and read it will be a nice HP boost, but not as crucial as it once was.
3. Cultivation - Fairly pointless, no real application in both PvP or PvE. Don’t choose your death knight because of cultivation.
4. Nature Resistance - Solid 2% nature resist, good for both PvP and PvE.

Overall just not that impressive. Hardcore tank death knights may opt for Tauren anyway as endurance does have the potential be significant. We won’t really know for sure until we see how it scales at level 80. The other racials are decent at best.

Troll Racials:

1. Berserking - Will be a huge benefit for PvE death knights, particularly those who are tanking. Since you’ll always have life spiking up and down you can get a full 30% attack speed increase.
2. Regeneration - Since death knight’s won’t have much health regeneration to begin with this racial is fairly useless.
3. Beast Slaying - Is amazing for dungeons that have lots of beasts, namely bosses that are beasts. Also nice for PvP vs. hunter pets and druids in animal forms. This talent is very underestimated.
4. Throwing Specialization - Pointless as death knights cannot wield throwing weapons.
5. Bow Specialization - Pointless as death knights cannot wield bows.
6. The VooDoo Shuffle - Great for PvP due to the importance of snare application and breaking, also should be beneficial to some degree in PvE. Will be dependent on the encounter.

I really like the idea of the berserking as a tank death knight, and of course it’s going to be great in PvP. Certainly in the running for best PvE tank. When you add beast slaying, berserking, voodoo shuffle on top of amazingly good hair cuts it’s not hard not to choose them!

Undead Racials:

1. Will of the Forsaken - Always crucial for PvP, not so much in PvE.
2. Cannibalize - A very solid ability, but more of a grinding / utility type of racial as opposed to an actual combat racial. Once again, more of a PvP ability.
3. Undeadwater Breathing - No real combat application, don’t choose your death knight based on this.
4. Shadow Resistance - A nice addition, but very minor, especially as it’s only 1% compared to the other resistances which are all 2%.

Overall I feel undead will be better suited to PvP players who are very concerned about being fear. Traditionally, undead racials have been the end all be all for PvP, but after the wotf nerf in addition to the other “meh” racial abilities, I don’t think undead are all that great.

Blood Elf Racials:

1. Mana Tap - Solid PvP talent, minimal PvE application.
2. Arcane Torrent - Great racial ability for both PvP and PvE.
3. Arcane Affinity - Non-combat talent, don’t choose your death knight based on +10 enchanting skill. It’s just not worth it.
4. Magic Resistance - 2% for all spells is pretty big, certainly makes up for arcane affinity.

Overall pretty solid here as well, a nice mix of PvP and PvE utility.

Best Death Knight Race for Horde Conclusions

• PvP Pick: Orc / Undead
• PvE Pick: Troll / Tauren (tank)
• All Around Pick: Orc
• My Preference: Troll

Perhaps I’m a little biased since I play a troll, but just based on the talent changes…well, trolls are looking pretty damn amazing. If we just compare troll / orc to the other races there’s not really much to mention. All tauren really have is the war stomp, as endurance is quite negligable after the change.

If we look at undead all we’re really considering is will of the forsaken, which is still great for PvP, but the other racials just don’t cut it for me. Blood elves are in a similar boat. Overall I feel orc is the best overall package. All 4 racials are work to directly increase damage / survivability, where as the other racials are mixed / indirrect / non-combat at best.

Personally I’d still opt for the troll, due to my natural affinity for the race in addition to their recent racial improvements and multi-faceted PvP and PvE application.

Best Alliance Death Knight Race

Dwarf Racials:

1. Stoneform - More of a PvP talent, but also very nice during raids and other PvE encounters.
2. Gun Specialization - irrelevant, death knights cannot use guns.
3. Frost Resistance - A nice 2% resistance, solid for both PvP and PvE.
4. Find Treasure - pretty pointless as it’s a non-combat talent, do not choose your death knight based on this.
5. Mace Specialization - like any specialization, it’s great if you’re using the weapons for which you have bonus expertise for. Solid for both PvP and PvE purposes.

Quite frankly not all that great. If you have a 2h mace and do nothing but PvP against frost mages you might could make a case, but I’m not impressed by the racials here.

Gnome Racials:

1. Escape Artist - amazing for PvP, especially now that it can no longer be resisted. Solid for many PvE encounters as well.
2. Expansive Mind - pointless as death knights gain nothing from intellect
3. Arcane Resistance - Like any of the resistances, this will be a solid trait for both PvP and PvE.
4. Engineering Specialist - non-combat trait, don’t choose your race based on this.

Much like dwarves, pretty bad. With the exception of escape artist every racial ability is either “meh” or not used at all.

Human Racials:

1. Perception - Some PvP application, not nearly as good as the old perception.
2. The Human Spirit - death knight’s have no real spirit application.
3. Diplomacy - non-combat, do not base your racial choice on this ability.
4. Sword Specialization - Great if you are using swords, worthless if not.
5. Mace Specialization - Great if you are using maces, worthless if not.
6. Every man for himself - Awesome for PvP as it allows you to use another trinket, also solid for many PvE encounters.

So far the best of any alliance race. Having the double weapon specialization at least gives you some leeway as to your weapon selection. Once again nothing all that stellar though.

Night Elf Racials:

1. Shadowmeld - Not crucial, very minor PvP application for death knights. Some PvE application for DPS death knights.
2. Quickness - Solid for PvP and PvE.
3. Wisp Spirit - Pointless, do not choose your race based on this.
4. Nature Resistance - Solid for PvP and PvE.

No useable racials, quite frankly pretty bad. Quickness and Nature resistance are nice additions, but considering they are really more situational uses at best…these are pretty bad.

Draenei Racials:

1. Gift of the Naaru - Excellent ability for PvP and solid for PvE as well, especially now that it scales with AP / spell power.
2. Heroic Presence - Solid 1%, nothing major but certainly a nice addition.
3. Gemcutting - non-combat, do not choose your race based on this.
4. Shadow Resistance - Of all the resistances shadow is the one to have, especially since it’s a 2% compared to the undead’s 1%.

Overall, draenie is pretty solid. The gift of the naaru is pretty huge in my opinion, you toss some nice passive resistance and +hit on top of that you’ve got a pretty solid package.

Best Death Knight Race for Alliance Conclusions

• PvP Pick: Human
• PvE Pick: Human / Draenei
• All Around Pick: Human
• My Preference: Human

Looking at the alliance racials for the death knight…well quite frankly they all just suck. Besides escape artist, stoneform, and gift of the naaru there really isn’t much worth mentioning. The other racial abilities are cenetered around passive or non-combat traits which aren’t going to really make or break your character. I strongly feel humans will make the best all around death knight.

You’ve got weapon specialization on both maces and swords, the novelty of diplomacy, perception…and to top it all off you’ve got the real clencher for me, every man for himself. This is huge, particuarlly for PvP. For PvE it’s not as big of a deal, hence why I’ve listed draenei as another option. Heroic pressence and gift are very nice, but when compared to the human’s weapon specs and free trinket I think the 2 races come up pretty even.

WotLK Racial Abilities Changes

Kalgan has recently dropped the ball on some new racial changes that we can expect to see tested out in upcoming patches:

Changes that should be in the next beta push. Bear in mind that some of these may change somewhat or entirely, and there may also be other changes coming in subsequent pushes:

Orc
- Hardiness now reduces the duration of stun effects by 15%

Troll
- Racial Passive “The Voodoo Shuffle”: Reduces the duration of all movement impairing effects by 15%. Trolls be flippin’ out mon!

- Berserking: no longer has an activation cost of energy/rage/etc

Draenei
- Gift of the Naaru: now scales based on the higher of either the caster’s Attack Power or Spell Power

- Shadow Resistance: reduces the chance to be hit by Shadow spells by 2%

Dwarf
- Frost Resistance: reduces the chance to be hit by Frost spells by 2%

- Racial Passive “Mace Specialization”: Expertise with Maces and Two-Handed Maces increased by 5.

Undead
- Shadow Resistance: reduces the chance to be hit by Shadow spells by 1% (yes, this is lower than the other resistance racials)

- Will of the Forsaken: removes any fear, sleep, or charm effect (no longer has a lasting immunity).

Night Elf
- Quickness: reduces the chance to be hit by melee or ranged attacks by 2%

- Nature Resistance: reduces the chance to be hit by Nature spells by 3%

-shadowmeld: Activate to slip into the shadows, reducing the chance for enemies to detect your presence. Lasts until cancelled or upon moving. Any threat is restored versus enemies still in combat upon cancellation of this effect.

Tauren
- Endurance: now scales based on base health, to be tuned to approximately a 5% heath increase if the player were wearing green quality gear

- Nature Resistance: reduces the chance to be hit by Nature spells by 2%

Gnome
- Escape Artist: the freeing effect can no longer be resisted

- Arcane Resistance: reduces the chance to be hit by Arcane spells by 2%

Blood Elf
- Mana Tap: ability removed (partially integrated into Arcane Torrent)

- Arcane Torrent: restores 15 energy, 15 runic power, or 6% of mana to the Blood Elf (along with the current 2s silence effect)

- Magic Resistance: reduces the chance to be hit by spells by 2%

Human
- Perception: changed to a passive, now grants one character level of passive stealth detection

- Racial “The Fall of Humanity”: Feign death which may trick enemies into ignoring you. Any threat is restored versus enemies still in combat upon cancellation of this effect. 5min cooldown

- Racial Passive “Human Supremacy”: The dominance of Humanity is evidenced by having one more racial bonus than normal. Actually, make that two counting this one. (just a tooltip, no actual functionality)

-UPDATED - The fall of humanity has been removed in the most recent beta patch and replaced with “Every man for himself”, effectively works just like a PvP trinket, though it’s on the same cool down as PvP trinkets.

- The Human Spirit: spirit bonus lowered to 5%

Wrath of the Lich King Warrior Changes

It was only a matter of time before warriors finally started to get their turn along the buff table. Blizzard poster Gamnin made a massive post regarding some of these changes that are expected to be introduced in the next beta build.

Overall most of these changes are very reasonable. The very nature of the warrior class always seems to lead down the same road though…without gear it’s pretty miserable, but with proper weapons, itemization, and ideally a good healer the class becomes one of the highest pvp damage dealers in the game.

Finding a way to balance this is no easy task, but I’m hopeful Blizzard will find a happy medium. My only major concern with the class at this point is titan grip. While this talent makes fury a great substitute to traditional mortal strike builds I think it’d be difficult to find the gray area where it could be good enough to convince some warriors to change from arms without making it insanely overpowered.

But this point has been the underlying problem with WoW talent builds from the beginning. There is always going to be “the” spec you have to be if you want to participate in X, be it PvP, Raiding, etc. This type of min / max theorcrafting has certainly helped players achieve their goals much quicker, but it’s very sad to see so many talents, skills, play styles and hybrid builds go unused for the greater part of WoW existence.

Hello Warriors,

I’ve got a sneak preview of things coming up in the beta for you to discuss. We still have lots of polish and bug fixing to do and we’re still wrestling with a few elements of the warrior abilities and talents so do not consider this an exhaustive list. As always, post any concerns or suggestions you have.

General

• Enraged Assault redesigned, now Enraged Regeneration: You regenerate 30% of your total health over 10 sec. This ability consumes all Enrage effects and prevents any from affecting you for the full duration. Must be enraged to use. Cost 15 rage, 3 min cooldown.
• Slam – We’re working to change this ability to suspend the swing timer when you are using the ability. In other words, if you’re .5 sec away from swinging your weapon when you start using Slam you’ll be .5 sec from swinging your weapon after Slam goes off.

Arms

• Improved Charge now generates 5/10 rage.
• Mace Specialization now ignores 3/6/9/12/15% of target’s armor.
• Sudden Death and Trauma swapped locations.
• Bladestorm now lasts 6 seconds, causing a whirlwind every second.

Protection

• Toughness now also reduces duration of movement slowing effects by 10/20/30/40/50%.
• Improved Sunder Armor renamed Puncture, reduced to 2 ranks for 1/2 rage cost reduction.
• Improved Disarm reduced to 2 ranks, now reduces the cooldown of Disarm by 10/20 sec and increases damage taken by disarmed targets by 5/10%.
• Improved Defensive Stance reduced to 2 ranks, now reduces spell damage taken by 3/6% and any block/parry/dodge has a 50/100% chance to enrage the warrior causing 5/10% more damage for 12 sec.
• Vigilance will soon transfer the 10% threat lost to the warrior. It will also have 3 charges to curb using it on targets that are being hit constantly. We’re still polishing this element to get it to feel right.
• (NEW) Warbringer is a new one point talent on Tier 9 that allows Charge to be used in combat. Did I mention the change to Improved Charge?
• Critical Block now also increases your chance to critically hit with your Shield Slam by 5/10/15%.
• Sword and Board no longer triggers when Shield Slam is used, but the chance to trigger has increased to 3/6/9/12/15%. Note these are not final numbers.

Fury

• Intensify Rage and Precision swapped locations.
• Enrage now increases damage done by 3/6/9/12/15%, limitation on number of attacks removed.
• Improved Whirlwind now increases damage of Whirlwind by 10/20%, no longer reduces cooldown.
• Focused Attacks changed to use PPM (procs per minute) to make it trigger at the same rate regardless of weapon speed. Note that dual-wielding and haste still improve your chances.
• Titan’s Grip still needs a counterbalancing element, but what it will entail and how severe it will be is still being evaluated.

Thanks for reading!
To answer a few questions:

- Yes, I meant Furious Attacks, not Focused Attacks.
- Some notes are already in the beta, some are not updated yet on the calculator so wanted to give additional visibility to anyone else reading the forums.
- Warbringer: What we don’t want to see is Charge becoming part of a tanking rotation. At the moment it will remain usable only in Battle Stance. An experimental idea to be sure.
- Stance Dancing: The short answer here is we want just the right amount of it. :)
- Final numbers are not in yet for the various talent trees. We want all trees to be viable in PvP and PvE so expect further number tuning across all classes/specs.
- The important upcoming change to Vigilance is the threat transfer. 10% of the target’s generated threat will go to your threat total.
- Bladestorm consuming rage every second is a bug that’s been fixed.

Wrath of the Lich King Raiding

Blizzard announced some new information today regarding the way that Buffs, Debuffs, and Groups will stack in Wrath of the Lich King.

Source: Blizzard Forums

With the release of upcoming content patch players will see a change in the way we allow buffs and debuffs to stack exclusively in a raid. For the most part, what this change means is that many buffs and debuffs that were previously allowed to stack together no longer can, and that many buffs and debuffs that only a single talent specialization could bring can now be brought by multiple different specializations. The philosophy behind this change shows up in many of the changes we have made in Wrath of The Lich King, such as when we made almost all buffs raid-wide. We want players to be able to form raids and parties based on who they want to play with, rather than who has the correct talents and abilities to min-max their raid performance.

Raid composition will still matter to some extent, but without this change, it would have overwhelmed every other aspect of raid planning (as we added new capabilities to each of 30 different talent trees). You no longer need to rigidly control the melee/spellcaster balance of your raid, or make sure every group has all the critical buffing classes, etc. This change has many class balance implications.

IMPORTANT! Before we are done, we will thoroughly test the performance of every class. It should not be assumed that one class’ current performance relative to others in beta is final. Some classes (and specializations) will need to be reduced in power and some increased. Many may feel the change has more impact on class X than class Y. We will address all of those concerns via our internal testing and community feedback.

There are thirty or so different categories into which buffs and debuffs fit. Here you will find a comprehensive list of the changes made broken down by category and which spells/talents are in that category.

• Armor Debuff (Major): Acid Spit (exotic Hunter pet), Expose Armor, Sunder Armor
• Armor Debuff (Minor): Faerie Fire, Sting (Hunter pet), Curse of Recklessness
• Physical Vulnerability Debuff: Blood Frenzy, (2nd Talent Spec TBA)
• Melee Haste Buff: Improved Icy Talons, Windfury Totem
• Melee Critical Strike Chance Buff: Leader of the Pack, Rampage
• Attack Power Buff (Flat Add): Battle Shout, Blessing of Might
• Attack Power Buff (Multiplier): Abomination’s Might, Trueshot Aura, Unleashed Rage
• Ranged Attack Power Buff: Hunter’s Mark (only Hunters benefit, so no need to exclude against other class abilities)
• Bleed Damage Increase Debuff: Mangle, Trauma
• Spell Haste Buff: Wrath of Air Totem
• Spell Critical Strike Chance Buff: Moonkin Aura, Elemental Oath
• Spell Critical Strike Chance Debuff: Improved Scorch, Winter’s Chill
• Increased Spell Damage Taken Debuff: Ebon Plaguebringer, Earth and Moon, Curse of the Elements
• Increased Spell Power Buff: Focus Magic, Improved Divine Spirit, Flametongue Totem, Totem of Wrath, Demonic Pact
• Increased Spell Hit Chance Taken Debuff: Improved Faerie Fire, Misery
• Percentage Haste Increase (All Types): Improved Moonkin Aura, Swift Retribution
• Percentage Damage Increase: Ferocious Inspiration, Sanctified Retribution
• Critical Strike Chance Taken Debuff (All types): Heart of the Crusader, Totem of Wrath
• Melee Attack Speed Slow Debuff: Icy Touch, Infected Wounds, Judgements of the Just, Thunderclap
• Melee Hit Chance Reduction Debuff: Insect Swarm, Scorpid Sting
• Healing Debuff: Wound Poison, Aimed Shot, Mortal Strike, Furious Attacks
• Attack Power Debuff: Demoralizing Roar, Curse of Weakness, Demoralizing Shout
• Stat Multiplier Buff: Blessing of Kings
• Stat Add Buff: Mark of the Wild
• Agility and Strength Buff: Strength of Earth Totem, Horn of Winter
• Stamina Buff: Power Word: Fortitude
• Health Buff: Commanding Shout, Blood Pact
• Intellect Buff: Arcane Intellect, Fel Intelligence
• Spirit Buff: Divine Spirit, Fel Intelligence
• Damage Reduction Percentage Buff: Grace, Blessing of Sanctuary
• Percentage Increase Healing Received Buff: Tree of Life, Improved Devotion Aura
• Armor Increase Percentage Buff: Inspiration, Ancestral Healing
• Cast Speed Slow: Curse of Tongues, Slow, Mind-numbing Poison.

In each category, you can only benefit from the most powerful spell granting that effect. For example, Fel Intelligence grants spirit and intellect, both weaker than Arcane Intellect and Divine Spirit. If a player has Fel Intelligence and receives a stronger Arcane Intellect buff, he will gain the intellect value from Arcane Intellect and the spirit value from Fel Intelligence.

In most cases, fully-talented players will have exactly equal power on the strength of these buffs and debuffs. Fel Intelligence is an example of where one ability is weaker than others. The buffs in the “Increased Spell Power Buff” category are also not all the same potency, as they scale and grow in radically different ways. In virtually every other case, however, the buffs are equal. This means, for example, that fully-talented Battle Shout and Blessing of Might now grant the exact same amount of attack power.

In addition to this change, we also needed to address the “mana battery” roles in a raid. The mana regeneration effect they grant is no longer limited to their own party, and it no longer depends on the amount of damage they deal. Each time they trigger the mana regeneration effect, 10 people in their raid group will receive a buff which causes them to regenerate 0.5% of their maximum mana each second. This buff, Replenishment, will be given preferentially to raid members with the lowest mana, but will re-evaluate which raid members receive it each time it is fired. Replenishment is provided by Shadow Priests, Survival Hunters, and Retribution Paladins.

Finally, we have modified Heroism and Bloodlust to affect the entire raid. However, all affected raid members will be unable to cast or benefit from Bloodlust/Heroism for 5 minutes.

Below you will find a list of the changes to abilities which exhibit new behavior regardless of the exclusive categories. The changes usually mean the old behavior was removed and replaced by the new behavior. Numbers listed are for maximally-talented versions. Here is that list of changes:

• Improved Scorch: Increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
• Winter’s Chill: Also increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
• Elemental Oath: Grants 5% spell crital strike to raid members.
• Improved Moonkin Aura: Grants 3% haste of all types.
• Earth and Moon: Increases spell damage taken from all schools by 13% on the target.
• Misery: Causes spells cast at the target to have +3% spell hit.
• Shadow Weaving: Buffs only self.
• Improved Shadow Bolt: Buffs only self.
• Expose Weakness: Buffs only self.
• Shadow Embrace: Buffs only self.
• Blood Pact: Grants health instead of Stamina.
• Fel Intelligence: Has replacement ranks that grant flat values of Intellect and Spirit.
• Frost Aura: Excludes properly against all other resistance buffs.
• Grace: Reduces damage taken by target by 3%.
• Rampage: Increases melee and ranged critical strike chance by 5% for the raid.
• Improved Faerie Fire: No longer benefits melee and ranged hit chance, only spell hit.
• Hunter’s Mark: No longer increases attack power bonus from attacks against the target.
• Improved Hunter’s Mark: No longer grants melee attack power.
• Sting (Hunter exotic pet - Wasp): Now acts as a minor armor debuff.
• Waylay: Attack speed reduction changed to 20%.
• Icy Touch: Only slows melee attack speed (not ranged or spell).
• Tree of Life: No longer grants healing based on spirit, grants 3% increased healing received to raid.
• Demonic Pact: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
• Focus Magic: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
• Totem of Wrath: Now grants a flat amount of spell damage, and all enemies in its radius have an increased chance of being struck by criticals.
• Heroism: Cannot be recast while caster has Exhausted debuff, and those with Exhausted debuff cannot be affected by it.
• Bloodlust: Cannot be recast while caster has Sated debuff, and those with Sated debuff cannot be affected by it.
• Vampiric Touch: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on dealing damage.
• Hunting Party: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on specified shots.
• Judgements of the Wise: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on Judging.

Wrath of the Lich King Class Information

Over the weekend at the World Wide Invitationals Blizzard sat down for a bit of Q and A with the fans that went out to see the event. As a result, additional information was added to the growing archive of Wrath of the Lich King archive and even more was verified.

Death Knight

• People playing a Death Knights will see the original voice of their race slightly modified to make it sound more … Death Knight-ish.
• Tanks will be interchangeable in 5-man dungeons but tanks will have a speciality in 25-man raids. Death Knights will be best against casters and shouldn’t be too far behind on other encounters.

Rogue

• Dagger specialization will be improved for rogues in Wrath of the Lich King.
• Rogues will get a talent called “Fan of Knives”, an AoE ability allowing them to attack all enemies within a short range. It will be some kind of “emergency” ability and you won’t be able to spam it.
• Sap will now work on more targets, humanoids, beasts, dragonkins, demons. “Anything with a skull and a brain inside of it”.

Warlock

• There isn’t any plan to change the soul shard farming as it’s part of the class, but an “emergency soul shard” ability might be added.
• Demonic Circle will allow warlocks to scribe a circle in the ground to teleport to it later with another spell.
• The 51-Point demonogy talent is a Demon-Form, this will allow you cast AOE Shadowbolts

Druid

• There will be a new model for the Druid’s Dire Bear form and the Dire Cat form will be introduced.
• Nourish will be a new healing spell, healing for more hit points for each HoT effect on the target.
• There isn’t any plan to change cyclone

Paladin

• Retribution paladins will share their itemization with Death Knights and Warriors. Their group utility will be increased by making them more efficient DPS-wise.
• Retribution paladins itemization will be moved to the same item as Warriors/Death Knights
• A new reactive healing spell will be added - Hand of Purity.
• Paladin’s short-term-blessings no longer overwrite long-term-blessings.

Warrior

• The plan is to improve the warrior specs to make sure that DPS warriors would be able to tank a little, while protection warriors would be able to DPS slightly more with new abilities like Shockwave.
• Titan’s Grip is a new Fury talent and allows warriors to wear 2 hand weapons with a single hand.
• Protection Warriors are getting a spell called “Shockwave” allowing them to damage and stun all the monsters in front of them.
• Bladestorm will be a new Arms talent whirlwinding all enemies in range every x seconds for a few seconds.

Raids & Dungeons

• Sunwell Plateau is the last content patch before the expansion release.
• There isn’t any plan to nerf Kil’jaeden right now, he’s intended to be the last boss before the expansion and is meant to be hard.
• Raiding armor sets and PvP rewards sets will look different and won’t share the same model anymore in Wrath of the Lich King.
• Uldum was on the original list of dungeons to be added to Wrath of the Lich King but right now it’s still unsure if we’ll see it or not.

PvP

• Raiding armor sets and PvP rewards sets will look different and won’t share the same model anymore in Wrath of the Lich King.

Professions

• Inscription trading skill is intended to be for both casters and melees, inscriptions benefits every class. The current plan is to use herbalism as the primary gathering profession.

Source: Blizzard Staff at Worldwide Invitationals Class and and Q & A Panels.

Arena Talent Builds

Moonkin druid… protection paladin…destruction warlock…fun? Yes, viable for arena, not a chance in hell. World of Warcraft arena is quite linear to a degree, especially when talking about talent specializations. Each class has anywhere from 1-3 truly viable talent spec’s for arena. If you plan on having any success at high level arena you’ll be pigeon holed into one of these spec’s whether you like it or not.

Class / Spec / Reasoning
Warrior / 35/23/3 / Mortal strike is quite simply too overpowered. Obviously you aren’t going to take your PvE prot spec into arena, and fury, regardless of 2h or dual wield, isn’t a viable option either. Embrace the arms tree, it’s the only option for arena.

Paladin / 41/20/0 / The paladin is probably the most linear class out there, though even though the paladin is only truly good at one thing in the game he’s the best in the game at it. The stand up healing power of the paladin is next to none and is the centerpiece for most traditional 5v5 teams.

Rogue / 41/20/0, 20/41/0 /, or 20/0/41 Unlike many other classes rogues have quite a bit of flexibility as all 3 of their main trees are quite good now.

Mage / 17/0/44 or 0/5/56 / The biggest difference between the two specs is quite simply, do you want a full frost build or not? The points in the fire tree are more or less filler for the 0/5/56, but by the same token the points down to improved counter spell are weak also. If you feel you can survive well enough to pick up imp. CS, go for it, else try the full frost spec for greater survivability.

Hunter / 0/43/18 / What can I say here, silencing shot is just too good. Beast mastery spec provides a bit of extra burst early on, but without the cool down you simply get destroyed. The full marksmanship specialization allows you to fill a variety of roles on your arena teams.

Warlock / 6/44/11 or 43/7/11 or 27/34/0 / The first, fel guard demonology provides great utility with the pet if you are skilled enough to use it correctly. The second, full affliction, is a bit lacking as far as survivability goes, though the extra damage you put out, in addition to the utility provided by unstable affliction, may make it an option for your team (especially if there is a shadow priest on it). The final spec, soul link + drain, offers a three DoT setup with great survivability and exceptional drains. It’s best for 2v2 and 3v3, though it can function equally as well on a 5v5 team if used properly.

Shaman / 40/0/21, 0/5/56 /, 0/9/52 Elemental or restoration, take your pick, though it’ll likely be swayed a good deal by 1) what your team needs and 2) what your gear allows for. To function as either well in PvP requires a full set of either +damage or +healing resilience gear, so simply changing specs over night isn’t an option.

Priest / 18/0/43, 28/33/0 /, 41/20/0, Much like the shaman, do you want to do damage or heal, in essence shadow vs. holy / disc.. Also like the shamans dilemma, you cannot simply change spec’s over night, it requires a great deal of time to get the proper gear needed to be successful in arena. Both are the preferred spec’s for top rated arena players around on the world and will serve you well.

Druid / 8/11/42 / My apologies to all those feral or mookin fans out there, but you won’t find any love here. A restoration druid can put his entire team on his back and carry them to the top of the ladder, assuming he’s skilled and geared enough to do so, a moonkin or feral cannot. The ability to simply abuse cyclone while HoT’ing and kiting is simply too powerful and a great centerpiece of any team, be it 2v2, 3v3, or 5v5.

Arena Talent Specs - Conclusions
Any spec will have several limiting factors, 1) your gear, 2) your ability to play it, 3) the need for it on your team, etc. These should all be considered when deciding on the correct spec for you and your team. The specs I have listed above are the tried and true preferred talent break downs for the world’s best players, trust me, these are what you want to be doing.