Late Night Blue Posts - WotLK Class Changes and Boss Armor

Upcoming Frost Changes

We have concerns about how bursty dps has become in PvP. On the other hand, we’re pretty happy with mage dps in PvE so we want to take care not to hurt it.

For example, we discussed shifting some of Arcane’s damage between Arcane Blast and Arcane Barrage, but that actually does hurt one of Arcane’s PvE advantages over Fire — namely to be able to move around while doing some instant spells.

In the case of Frost, however, we have become concerned that it’s too easy to blow opponents up too quickly. Two of the culprits here are instant, uninterruptible Fireballs and Deep Freeze.

We are changing Brain Freeze to only proc off of Frost spells that can chill. Specifically, this limits the tactic of trying to fish for procs with Ice Lance. Ice Lance gets used a lot more in PvP, so we don’t think this will hurt Frost as much in PvE.

Secondly, Cold as Ice no longer reduces the cooldown on Deep Freeze. Deep Freeze is an (ahem) cool spell and we don’t want to nerf it too much, but you must admit that the poor frozen shmuck can endure a lot of damage while he is locked up.

Upcoming Warlock DPS Changes

We have finished a fairly comprehensive look at the dps of various classes and specs and are concerned that warlock dps isn’t quite where it should be. It’s not abysmal by any means, but we think it should be a little higher.

To give warlocks a little extra nudge in PvP, we increased Soul Link up to 20% from 15%. You may already have this change.

In PvE, overall, we just think a lot of classes benefitted from getting the warlock buffs a little more than the locks benefited from getting everyone else’s buffs. So we decided to just buff lock damage across the board (which will also help in PvP somewhat). Rather than change damage and coefficients of a lot of different ranks of spells, we just inflated talents that we were almost certain you’d already have. Shadow Mastery, Demonic Tactics and Emberstorm were all increased by 1% per rank for 5% total.

Let us know how that feels. The changes should go live before Nov 13.

Recent Fury Changes

As I posted recently in the hunter forums, we increased the armor on level 83 raid bosses by 10%. This will be a nerf to warrior dps.

In the case of Arms and Protection, we don’t think any adjustment is necessary at this time. Arms is doing very competitive dps, while Fury has fallen behind. We experimented with lowering the proc chance of Sudden Death, from where Arms gets a lot of its damage, but weren’t happy with the result and ultimately decided to buff Fury instead.

First, we increased the percentage of AP that contributes to Bloodthirst from 45% to 50%.

Second, we reduced the hit penalty on special attacks on Titan’s Grip from -12% to -5%.

As I have said before, we have been somewhat reluctant to give Titan’s Grip such a huge buff. It is now likely more powerful than several other talents in the tree and risks being the 51-point talent to which all other classes compare their 51-point talent. Nevertheless, we feel it was the right change to make.

When a Fury warrior missed a Slam or Bloodthirst on a boss, they ended up building up a lot of extra rage that couldn’t be spent fast enough. I understand some players suggested an additional attack for Fury, and that is something we may still consider when we see players hit 80 and start experimenting more with the build. But it would be a very big change that involved touching talent trees and glyphs, as well as a lot of time necessary to iterate on the right values. The Titan’s Grip change by contrast was a simple one, and judging by the number of players who have asked for it throughout beta, one that will be welcomed by the community.

Upcoming Hunter Changes

As I have suggested a few times, we are concerned that hunters of all 3 specs are doing damage that is clearly superior to other classes. While we’re trying to achieve closer parity among specs of all classes with regard to dps, and we want to particularly make sure that hunters, rogues, mages and locks are not left behind, we do think the hunters are too far ahead, particularly at 80, in good gear, when raid-buffed.

However, we have also tried to give hunters a substantial survivability boost in PvP and we don’t want to do anything that hurts them too much in PvP.

So here are changes you will most likely see soon:

1) Ranged attacks no longer benefit from the haste effects of Windfury Totem and Improved Icy Talons. This is a nerf to hunter white damage.

2) We are also improving the armor on level 83 raid bosses by 10%. This will be a nerf to the dps of any class that does physical damage. For classes that would slide behind with such a change, we’ll take steps to adjust them — though it probably isn’t as many as you think. The raid buff stacking overhaul was very beneficial to melee (and hunters). Sunder / Expose Armor alone can be a 20%+ dps increase, which is why we decided to attack the problem from this angle.

3) Now the armor change won’t affect PvP at all and the haste buff change will only have a marginal affect in BGs and only in Arena teams that include certain comps. However, in order to make sure we didn’t nerf hunters too much, we made two changes to Disengage. First, its cooldown dropped to 25 sec (from 30) which can be talented to 16. Second, it no longer requires a target, but does require you to be in combat. Now if someone closes to melee, you can leap back without having to select them first. We require you to be in combat though so we don’t see a lot of hunters bouncing around IF / Org or using it like Blink to goofily speed up travel.

Boss Armor Change

As I have posted a couple of times recently, we decided to raise the armor of level 83 raid bosses by 10% to correct for some dps difference between casters and melee + hunters. I wanted to address the issue head on with the rogues.

We have done a lot of testing recently, and concluded that even with this change, Assassination rogues are likely the top dps spec in the game against single bosses that don’t move around a lot (like Patchwerk). This isn’t a bad place for them to be. They pay a small price both for being melee (where more damage tends to occur) and for lacking the ability to respec into a non-damage build. We don’t think they will be as far above hybrids as they have been before — as I’ve posted before, it’s very important that hybrid classes do higher dps now that their buffs do not stack.

Combat builds, especially swords, is competitive but probably behind Assassination. This is something we’d like to address, especially if it turns out to be a major difference between the specs. Additional armor does hurt Combat, but also remember it’s just raid bosses and not other players (or trash or heroic bosses).

Subtelty, sadly, is just much harder to test since so much of their damage relies on other players. Our preliminary evidence is that they generate plenty of combo points from Honor Among Thieves, but this might mean their personal dps when not in a group suffers. This is something we’re still testing.

I will add that some players have wondered if Honor Among Thieves is bugged since the cp can occur more often than 1 sec. In this case, the tooltip is just unclear. When Jimmy the Shaman crits, he cannnot “send you” a combo point more often than 1 per sec. But if you have lots of players critting all the time, you can build them up quickly. So Honor is (here it comes) working as intended.

PTR Patch 3.0.3 Class Changes

Death Knight

Frost

• Deathchill - Buff only lasts 30 seconds.
• Improved Icy Talons - Now increases melee and ranged attack speed instead of just melee speed.
• Rune Strike - Cost increased to 20 Runic Power.
• Tundra Stalker - Now increases your expertise by 1/2/3/4/5. Down from 2/4/6/8/10. No longer affects Icy Touch.
• Improved Icy Touch - Frost Fever reduces melee and ranged attack speed by an additional 1%. Down from 2%. Last 2 ranks listed as 0% reduction.
• Frigid Dreadplate - Now just reduces the chance melee attacks will hit you by 1/2/3%.
• Black Ice - Tooltip updated to reflect only affecting Frost damage.
• Chains of Ice - Now the target regains 10% of their movement each second for 10 sec. Changed from the target regains 5% of their movement each second. Lasts for 20 sec.

Unholy

• Death Coil - Rank 2 values reduced to 208 Shadow damage to an enemy target or healing 312.0 damage from 272 Shadow damage to an enemy target or healing 408.0 damage.
• Summon Gargoyle - Cost increased to 50 Runic Power. Now persists for 10 sec plus 1 sec per 8 runic power up to 60 sec. Changed from 1 sec per 8 runic power up to 60 sec.
• Corpse Explosion - Now has a 30 yard range.
• Unholy Blight - No longer makes targets considered diseased. All ranks had a slight damage increase.
• Crypt Fever - Now increases disease damage taken by the target by 10/20/30%. Changed from increases the damage of other diseases on the target by 20/40/60%.

Druid

Balance

• Eclipse - Now on proc, increases damage done by Wrath by 20%. Up from 10%. Critical strike chance with Starfire increased by 30%. Up from 15%.
• Earth and Moon - Increases spell damage taken by 4/9/13% for 12 sec. Also increases your spell damage by 1/2/3%. Changed from Arcane, Fire, Frost, Nature and Shadow damage and 5 ranks.
• Moonfury - Changed to 3 ranks, 3/6/10%.

Feral

• Predatory Instincts - No longer affects Bear Form or Dire Bear Form.
• Growl - Cooldown reduced to 8 seconds. Down from 10.

Restoration

• Improved Tree of Life - Now increases your armor contribution from items while in Tree of Life Form by 33%. Changed from overall armor increase.

Hunters

Marksmanship

• Improved Barrage - Now affects Aimed Shot.
• Barrage - Now affects Aimed Shot.

Beast Mastery

• Ferocious Inspiration - Now raid wide.
• Aspect of the Viper - Melee attacks now also generate mana. In addition, you gain 4% of maximum mana every 3 sec added to the description.
• Animal Handler - Increases your pet’s expertise by 5/10. Changed from 2% chance to hit.

Survival

• Disengage - Down to 5% base mana from 14%.

Pets

• Fire Breath - Now has a 20 yard range.
• Stampede - Damage ranges increased, max rank is 182 to 246 damage up from 91 to 123.
• Thunderstomp - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Spore Cloud - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Lightning Breath - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Monstrous Bite - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Poison Spit - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Tendon Rip - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Savage Rend - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Sting - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Snatch - Focus cost reduced to 20 from 40.
• Ravage - Damage ranges increased, max rank is 106 to 150 damage up from 89 to 125.
• Lava Breath - Damage ranges increased, max rank is 128 to 172 damage up from 64 to 86. Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25
• Rake - Damage ranges decreased, max rank is 24 to 34 damage down from 59 to 83. Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25
• Acid Spit - Damage ranges increased, max rank is 124 to 176 damage up from 62 to 88. Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Froststorm Breath - Damage ranges increased, max rank is 128 to 172 damage up from 64 to 86. Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Swipe - Damage ranges increased, max rank is 90 to 126 damage up from 60 to 84. Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Gore - Damage ranges added, max rank is 122 to 164 damage. Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.
• Scorpid Poison - Rank 6 damage reduced to 18 to 40 from 34 to 80. Focus cost reduced to 20 from 25.

Mage

Arcane

• Arcane Blast - Down to 8% base mana from 9%.
• Arcane Missiles - Higher ranks down to 31% base mana from 34%. Lowest ranks down to 37% base mana from 41%.
• Arcane Explosion - Higher ranks down to 22% base mana from 25%. Lowest ranks down to 27% base mana from 30%.

Fire

• Frostfire Bolt - Down to 14% base mana from 16%.
• Living Bomb - Down to 25% base mana from 31%.
• Fireball - Higher ranks down to 19% base mana from 21%. Lowest ranks down to 23% mana from 25%.

Frost

• Frostbolt - Higher ranks down to 13% base mana from 15%. Lowest ranks down to 16% mana from 8%.

Paladin

Holy

• Enlightened Judgements - Now increases the range of your Judgement spells by 15/30 yards. Up from 10/25.
• Infusion of Light - Now reduces the cast time of your next Flash of Light by .75/1.5 sec.
• Judgement of Light - Wording changed to “attacks and spells” from “attacks”.
• Judgements of the Pure - Now increases your casting and melee haste by 3/6/9/12/15%. Up from 2/4/6/8/10%.
• Judgement of Wisdom - Now has a chance to restore 2% of the attacker’s maximum mana.

Protection

• Shield of Righteousness - Rank 2, level 80 added. Slam the target with your shield, causing Holy damage equal to your block value plus 400. This spell causes a high amount of threat.
• Hammer of the Righteous - Now causes 4 times your main hand damage. Up from 3.
• Shield of the Templar - Now also reduces all damage taken by 1/2/3%.

Retribution

• Sanctified Retribution - Damage caused by targets affected by Retribution Aura is increased by 3%. Up from 2%.

Priest

Holy

• Divine Providence - Now also reduces the cooldown of your Prayer of Mending by 6/12/18/24/30%.

Shadow

• Devouring Plague - Max rank does 1088 damage, down from 1216.
• Improved Vampiric Embrace - Now increases the healing received from Vampiric Embrace by 33/67%. Up from 5/10%.
• Vampiric Embrace - Changed to allow you to be healed for 15% and other party members to be healed for 3% of any Shadow spell damage you deal.
• Shadowform - Now also allows for your Shadow Word: Pain, Devouring Plague, and Vampiric Touch abilities deal increased percentage damage equal to your spell critical strike chance.

Rogue

Combat

• Combat Potency - Changed to autoattacks from attacks.

Subtlety

• Shadow Dance - Removed from description, Those abilities each gain a cooldown of 2.0 sec. Lasts 10 sec.

Shaman

Elemental

• Lava Burst - Max rank now does 1192 to 1518 Fire damage, up from 1082 to 1378 Fire damage.
• Thunderstorm - Now returns 8% mana, up from 5%.
• Storm Reach - Now increases the range of Lava Burst as well.
• Improved Fire Nova Totem - Now increases the damage done by your Fire Nova Totem by 10/20%, and your Fire Nova totem has a 50/100% chance to stun all targets damaged by your Fire Nova Totem for 2 sec.
• Totem of Wrath - Now increases spell power by X instead of damage done by spells and effects by X.

Enhancement

• Static Shock - Now procs off any damage, instead of melee attacks and abilities.

Restoration

• Tidal Waves - Now affects Riptide.
• Riptide - Max rank healing increased to 1604 to 1736 and another 1002 over 15 sec from 1015 to 1099 and another 477 over 15 sec.

Warlock

Affliction

• Everlasting Affliction - Changed to gain an additional 5% of your bonus spell damage. Down from gaining 1/2/3/4/5% of your bonus spell damage effects each time they inflict damage.
• Haunt - Cooldown lowered to 8 seconds from 10.

Demonology

• Inferno - The following removed from description. Once control is lost, the Infernal must be Enslaved to maintain control. Can only be used outdoors.

Destruction

• Shadowflame - Rank 2 went to 615 to 671 Shadow damage and an additional 644 Fire damage from 363 to 397 Shadow damage and an additional 212 Fire damage. Rank 1 buffed as well.
• Improved Shadow Bolt - Now increases overall damage. Changed from damage against the target.

Warrior

Arms

• Improved Rend - Now increases the bleed damage done by your Rend ability by 10/20%. Down from 25/50%.
• Sudden Death - Proc chance reduced to 3/6/9%. Down from 10/20/30%.
• Rend - All ranks saw a slight damage reduction. If used while your target is above 75% health, Rend does 35% more damage. Additional damage now scales better [1.0 * MWB + mwb / 2.0 + AP / 14.0 * MWS] up from [0.29999998 * MWB + mwb / 2.0 + AP / 14.0 * MWS].

Fury

• Bloodthirst - Cooldown reduced to 5 seconds, down from 6.
• Titan’s Grip - Chance to miss decreased to 12% from 15%.

Protection

• Shield Bash - Now dazes the target.

Blizzcon Day 1 Wrap Up - Classes, Groups, UI and More!

General Blizzcon Announcements

• Blizzcon “Secret Project” Announcement Confirmed - Next Generation MMO, outside of WoW / SC / D3 universe
• Info on next 5 patches - patches 3.0.2, 3.0.3, 3.1, 3.2, and 3.3

Blizzcon Class Panels

Death Knight

• The original idea behind the rune system was a totally customizable rune pool (like, 6 Unholy runes) but “it sucked”. They changed it to what is it today (2 Runes of each type)
• Death Knights shouldn’t be played like a metronome and is intended to be an interactive and reactive class.
• As a death knight, your talent trees are a good way to define “your style, but not your role”. Devs want to bring this philosophy to other classes.

Druid

• Balance druids have been greatly improved and you shouldn’t see a lot of boomkins anymore. Their DPS is now on par with other DPS classes.
• Balance DPS looks pretty good now but developers are keeping an eye on the survivability
• Entangling roots was allowed indoor to give druids more crowd control ability in instances.
• Restoration were stuck in the HoT niche and were very limited in 5-mans or raids. Nourish is new flash heal-like spell added to solve this problem on single targets and Wild Growth was added to give them an AOE Heal.
• Druids were also given an OOC resurrection spell.
• Feral druids were decent at tanking and DPSing, but couldn’t master any of these fields. In WotLK you can take all the bear talents to become a very good main tank, or all the cat talents to have a very high DPS.
• Feral mana is a known issue, and developpers don’t want intellect on feral gear. This is being looked at

Hunter

• The hunter pet system was overhauled because it was “clumsy for new players”.
• The shot rataion has been cleaned to make things easier for hunters and make them less reliant on mods or macros.
• Freezing shot was introduced to make pulls faster without having to deploy your traps on the ground each time.

Mage

• Frostfire Bolt is a way to achieve an elemental tree with mages, they should be able to deal both fire and frost damage
• Mage DPS looks pretty good now, there are still a few mana issues getting fixed very soon
• Living Bomb base damage will most likely be increased and the spell mechanics might be modified slightly. Overall, the 51-points talent weren’t meant to be spammed and developers want them to be situational
• Frost and Fire looks pretty balanced now, but Arcane needs a few more tweaks. Arcane needs to be more “mobile”

Paladin

• Paladins were decent off-tanks but not great main tanks, this is fixed in WotLK. Paladins should focus on protection gear instead of spell power.
• Holy Paladins were good healers but couldn’t do much in encounters where players are required to move a lot, however they definitely don’t want them as a HoT class.
• Retribution paladins are supposed to deal a decent amount of DPS without running out of mana.
• Retributions paladins have to be in control of their damage and shouldn’t have to rely on lucky critical strikes to deal most of their damage

Priest

• The goal with Shadowpriest is to make them a DPS class, not just a mana battery.
• Discipline priests should be viable raid healer.
• Mind sear was introduced to give priests another viable DPS ability.
• Class-specific racial abilities were cool, but the idea became got “old” with time. That’s why racials have been revamped

Rogue

• AoE DPS was really needed and Fan of Knives was added to the game.
• Purchasable poisons and the buff of the dagger spec should help “reintroducing” them to the game.
• The goal is to have end-boss less immune to poisons and rogues less dependent of Windfury

Shaman

• Totems are now physical and harder to dispell, have more life and last longer.
• Hex was added to give Shamans more crowd control ability, Riptide to improve their healing, and Lava Burst their spell DPS.

Warlock

• Warlocks pets have been made more useful.
• The warlock rotation shouldn’t be restricted to a shadowbolt spam, that’s why Chaos Bolt was added.
• Affliction Tree is still too complicated and developpers are working on it. Developers definitely want it back as a raiding spec
• Pets should be easier to summon/switch and use.

Warrior

• Protection spec has been revamped to make it cooler to play, mitigation talents now take a lot less points and will let you invest in a few other nice tools.
• In TBC, Arms was PvP and Fury the PvE spec, this will change in WotLK : Battle Stance, Overpower, and Rend have been improved. New fun abilities have been introduced like Bladestorm and Sudden Death, Fury obviously have Titan’s Grip.

Group Discussions

• 30 specs but 25 raid slots
  • More viable specs and death knights, but no room
• Buffs felt out of control
  • Complex, inconsistent, stacking problems
  • Curse of Shadows – gg mages
  • Bloodlust rotations
  • Jimmy can’t come ? No WF ? Cancel the raid

• Buff and debuff overhaul
  • Most buffs affect the whole raid
  • Multiple ways to get the same benefit
  • But no stacking
  • Plenty of room to bring who you want
  • Bring the player, not the class

  • Everyone buffs, everyone does dps!

• Downplay consumables

  • Potion cooldown

• Gear and Skill >> Buffs and Pots

• Just bring good players

• More shared gear

  • e.g. Spell Power – healers might not need second gear sets

• Four main tank classes

  • Overlap niches

  • Healing and coordination >> threat

• Dual Specs are coming – more flexibility!

User Inteface Panel

WotLK Beta Build 9014 Class Changes

Death Knight WotLK Changes

Blood

• Bloody Vengeance - No longer increases frost and shadow damage.
• Blood Tap - Tooltip Fix : Duration changed to 20 seconds. (Old 47802d.)
• Bladed Armor - Now increases attack power by 1/2/3/4/5 for every 180 armor value. (Old 1/2/3/4/5 strength for every 400 armor)
• Bloody Vengeance - Now gives you a 1/2/3% bonus to physical damage (no longer effects frost and shadow) you deal for 30 sec after dealing a critical strike from a weapon swing, spell, or ability. Now stacks up to 1 times (down from 49).
• Abomination’s Might - Range of attack power increase now 45 yds (Old 20 yds)

Frost

• Obliterate Damage lowered. (Now Rank 3 - 100% weapon damage plus 238.5, and an additional 119.25 bonus damage per disease) (Old Rank 3 - 100% weapon damage plus 252, 126 bonus damage per disease.)
• Tundra Stalker - Now gives a passive bonus increase to your Icy Touch. (20/40/60/80/100%)
• Guile of Gorefiend - No longer gives bonus to Rune Strike critical damage.
• Howling Blast - Damage increased on all ranks. (Now Rank 5 - 259 to 281) (Old Rank 5 - 192 to 208)
• Runic Focus - Description changed to : “Unlike most casters, a Death Knight’s spells cause double damage on critical hits.”

Unholy

• Death and Decay - Damage Increased (Now Rank 4 - 62 Damage) (Old Rank 4 - 52 Damage)
• Blood-Caked Blade - Damage increased to 25% of weapon damage. (Old 20% of weapon damage.)
• Blood Plague - Chance to remove a Heal over Time effect reduced to 25% (Old 50%)
• Reaping - Pestilence removed, Blood Strike added.

Druid WotLK Changes

Balance

• Starfall - Now has a 30 yard range. Instant cast.
• Nature’s Splendor - Now increases the duration of your Insect Swarm by 2.0 sec (down from 3.0)
• Typhoon - Rank 4 now does 1010 Nature damage (formerly bugged at 1 damage).

Feral

• Rake - DoT damage increased for all ranks.
• Swipe - No longer has a target limit. Now: (Rank 1) Swipe nearby enemies, inflicting 9 damage. Damage increased by attack power.
• Mangle (Cat) - Now does 200% normal damage (up from 160%). Additional damage increased for all ranks.
• Protector of the Pack - Now reduced damage per party member by 1/2/3% instead of a flat 3% for all ranks.

Hunter WotLK Changes

Beast Mastery

• Aspect of the Viper reworded - Now: The hunter takes on the aspect of the viper, causing ranged attacks to regenerate mana but reducing your total damage done by 50%. Mana gained is based on the speed of your ranged weapon. Only one Aspect can be active at a time.
• Aspect of the Wild - Rank 4 now increases Nature resistance by 130 (up from 70).
• Kindred Spirits - Description now includes “This does not stack with other movement speed increasing effects.”

Marksmanship

• Aimed Shot - Mana cost reduced from 16% to 12% of base mana. Now instant cast. Cooldown increased from 6 seconds to 10 seconds. Ranged damage increase reduced for all ranks.
• Concussive Shot - Now has a 12 sec cooldown.
• Kill Shot - Now deals 200% weapon damage (down from 205%). Base damage reduced by approx 50% on all ranks.
• Multi-Shot - Mana cost increased for 12% to 13% of base mana.
• Focused Aim - No longer effects Aimed Shot. Now also increases your chance to hit by 1/2/3%.
• Marked for Death - Now increases your damage done by your shots and the damage done by your pet’s special abilities by 1/2/3/4/5% (down from 2/4/6/8/10%) on marked targets.
• Scatter Shot - Moved from Tier 5 to Tier 3, changed trees to Survival.

Survival

• Freezing Arrow - The trap placed by the arrow now breaks on any damage (instead of having a chance to break).
• Freezing Trap - Trap now breaks on any damage once again, instead of having a chance to break. (”Any damage caused will break the ice.”)
• Lock and Load - Now has a 2/4/6% proc chance on periodic damage (down from 5/10/15%).
• Point of No Escape - Changes from 3 to 2 points. Now also effects Freezing Arrow. Critical strike chance increase on affected targets is now 3/6% instead of 2/4/6%.
• Readiness - Moved from Tier 9 to Tier 5, changed trees to Marksmanship.
• Surefooted - Moved from Tier 4 to Tier 2. No longer increases hit chance.
• T.N.T. - Moved from Tier 2 to Tier 4
• Trap Mastery - Moved from Tier 3 to Tier 9. Now effects Freezing Trap in the same way as Frost Trap (duration increase, instead of root effect on dispell).

Mage WotLK Changes

Arcane

• Sound Effect Spell - Polymorph Penguin and Polymorph Sheep added
• Missile Barrage - Now affects Arcane Barrage. Now has a 3/6/9/12/20% chance to reduce the channeled duration of the next Arcane Missiles spell by 2.5 secs and missiles will fire every .5 secs.

Fire

• Empowered Fireball - Renamed Empowered Fire. Now affects Frostfire Bolt.
• Living Bomb - Now has no knockup.

Frost

• Deep Freeze - Now does no damage.
• Frost Warding - Moved from Tier 1 to Tier 2
• Frostbite - Moved from Tier 2 to Tier 1

Paladin WotLK Changes

Holy

• Divine Plea - Now you gain 25% of your total mana over 15 sec (up from 10 sec), but the amount healed by your spells is reduced by 100% (up from 50%).
• Infusion of Light - Now your Holy Shock critical hits reduce the cast time of your next Holy Light spell by -0.50/-1 secs (down from -1.25/-2.5 sec).
• Judgements of the Pure - Now lasts 60 sec (up from 30 sec).

Retribution

• Judgements of the Wise - Now immediately grants you 33% of your base mana (instead of 20% of your maximum mana).

Priest WotLK Changes

Discipline

• Improved Inner Fire - Moved from Tier 3 to Tier 2.
• Improved Power Word: Fortitude - Moved from Tier 2 to Tier 3.
• Silent Resolve - Ranks 4 and 5 removed.
• Twin Disciplines - Now increases “damage and healing” instead of “spellpower”.

Holy

• Guardian Spirit - This sacrifice terminates the effect but heals the target of 50% of their maximum health. Up from 10%.
• Holy Nova - Mana cost reduced to 25% of base mana from 33% of base mana for higher ranks. Lower ranks also had a mana cost reduction.

Shadow

• Devouring Plague - Amount of damage that heals you now specified, 15% of damage caused by the Devouring Plague heals the caster.
• Twisted Faith - Now works if your target is afflicted by your Shadow Word: Pain instead of Mind Flay.

Rogue WotLK Changes

Assassination

• Focused Attacks - Your melee critical strikes have a 33/66/100% chance to give you 2 energy (up from 1).

Combat

• Gouge - Damage now scales with attack power.
• Aggression - Moved from Tier 5 to Tier 4. Now increases the damage of your Sinister Strike, Backstab, and Eviscerate abilities by 3/6/9/12/15% (up from 2/4/6/8/10%).
• Blade Twisting - Now also increases the damage dealt by Sinister Strike and Backstab by 5/10%.
• Vitality - Now regens 8/16/25% energy (up from 3/7/10%).

Shaman WotLK Changes

Elemental

• Fire Nova Totem - Mana cost now 33% of base mana. (Old 26%)
• Fire Nova Totem - New ranks added. (Level 75 rank 8 - 755 to 843 damage) (Level 80 Rank 9 - 893 to 997 damage)

Enhancement

• Unleashed Rage - Now increases all attack power and has a 45 yard range.
• Dual Wield Specialization - Now increases your chance to hit while dual wielding by an additional 1/2/3% (down from 2/4/6%).
• Flurry - Attack speed increase lowered by 5% (Now 5/10/15/20/25) (Old 10/15/20/25/30).
• Stormstrike - 20% damage increase now only effects Nature spells.
• Maelstrom Weapon - Chance for buff to apply lowered, now can proc on any melee weapon hit (noncrit or crit). Duration increased to 30 seconds. (New 3/6/9/12/15) (Old 20/40/60/80/100)
• Spirit Wolves - Spirit Hunt - Duration removed.

Restoration

• Improved Water Shield - Now works on Riptide Critical Hits.
• Ancestral Awakening - Now works on Riptide Critical Hits.

Totems

• Frost Resistance Totem - Duration fixed to be 5 minutes.
• Totem of Wrath - Duration fixed to be 5 minutes.
• Fire Resistance Totem - Duration fixed to be 5 minutes.

Warlock WotLK Changes

Affliction

• Everlasting Affliction - Now Drain Life and Haunt will reset Corruption instead of Drain Life and Shadow Bolt.
• Drain Soul - Drains the soul of the target, causing 426 Shadow damage over 15 sec. If the target is at or below 25% health, Drain Soul causes four times the normal damage. If the target dies while being drained, and yields experience or honor, the caster gains a Soul Shard. Soul Shards are required for other spells.
• Curse of Doom - If the target yields experience or honor when it dies from this damage, a Doomguard will be summoned. Cannot be cast on players.
• Haunt - Now heals for 100% of damage done. Down from 200%.

Demonology

• Enslave Demon - Lasts up to 60 sec. Down from 300 sec.
• Demonic Pact - Does not work on Enslaved demons.

Destruction

• Chaos Bolt - Now does fire damage instead of chaos damage.
• Conflagrate - Now works with Shadowflame as well as Immolate.

Warrior WotLK Changes

Arms

• Sword Specialization - This effect cannot occur more than once every 6 seconds.

Fury

• Armored to the Teeth - Attack Power instead of Strength armor value require lowered. (Now 1/2/3 AP for every 180 armor.) (Old 1/2/3 strength for every 400 armor)

Protection

• Thunder Clap - Maximum targets removed.
• Revenge - Damage increased (Now Rank 9 - [1454.0 + AP * 0.207] to [1776.0 + AP * 0.207]) (Old Rank 9 - [652.0 + AP * 0.093] to [796.0 + AP * 0.093])
• Sword and Board - Now effects Revenge.
• Shield Slam - Damage increased (Now Rank 8 - 990 to 1040 damage) (Old Rank 8 - 756 to 794 Damage)

WotLK Shaman Talent Changes - Build 8970

Mostly generic talent adjustments and fixes, certainly the most interesting change is the addition of the new restoration talent, riptide. Riptide - Heals a friendly target for 764 to 826 and another 477 over 15 sec sec. Your next Chain Heal cast on that primary target within 15 sec sec will consume the healing over time effect and increase the amount of the Chain Heal by 25%. 18% of base mana, 40 yd range, Instant Cast, 6 sec cooldown.

Not much PvP utility, but certainly a nice bonus for PvE shamans. Chain heal is already the primary healing spell for most shamans anyway, this just adds extra unneeded incentive to spam chain heal.

The big change, and one I’m most excited for is the new 5 minute timer on all totems. Pretty awesome change for shamans’ as a whole, I’m not sure how much this change will factor into arena play as totems are easy targets…but for PvE shamans this will make a huge improvement to overall mana efficiency in long duration fights.

A welcome and long overdue change…now all we need is a new ability called “High Powered Rotary Fan” - your totems now float on a cushion of air and are programmed to follow you around via GPS. =D

Elemental

• Lava Flows - Now increases the range of your Flame Shock by 5/10/15 yards instead of increasing the amount of bonus spell damage on your Flametongue Weapon by an additional 15/30/45%.
• Eye of the Storm - Now reduces the pushback suffered from damaging attacks while casting Lightning Bolt, Chain Lightning, Lava Burst and Hex spells by 23/46/70% instead of giving you a 23/46/70% chance to avoid interruption caused by damage.
  

Enhancement

• Static Shock - Now increases the number of charges of your Lightning Shield by 2/4/6 up from 1/2/3.
• Elemental Weapons - Now increases the spell damage on your Flametongue Weapon by 10/20/30% and increases the bonus healing on your Earthliving Weapon by 10/20/30% instead of increasing the damage caused by your Flametongue Weapon and Frostbrand Weapon by 5/10/15%.
  

Restoration

• Healing Focus - Reduces the pushback suffered by 23/46/70% instead of giving you a 23/46/70% chance to avoid interruption.
• Blessing of the Eternals - Now increases the chance to apply the Earthliving heal over time effect on the target by 40/80% when they are at or under 35% total health instead of increasing the bonus healing from your Earthliving weapon by 5/10%.
  
• Earthliving Weapon - All ranks saw a healing increase, max rank now 70 up from 26.
  
• Spirit Link - Removed, replaced with Riptide.
  
• Riptide - Heals a friendly target for 764 to 826 and another 477 over 15 sec sec. Your next Chain Heal cast on that primary target within 15 sec sec will consume the healing over time effect and increase the amount of the Chain Heal by 25%. 18% of base mana, 40 yd range, Instant Cast, 6 sec cooldown
  

Totems

• All totems now last 5 min.