2.0.6 hits PTRs: small nerfs for Priests and Hunters, nerfs and buffs for Mages
by Eliah Hecht 
Jan 21st 2007 at 2:30PM
Another week, another patch. WoW 2.0.6 PTRs are now up, and with them, patch notes. Here's the Priest, Hunter, and Mage stuff; behind the cut is the bug fixes (not much interesting there besides hopefully pet bars being fixed). Marksmanship Hunters lost a bit of damage, Priests' Shadow Word: Pain lost a bit of damage, and Mages' Fireball and Frostbolt lost a bit as well. However, Counterspell is now non-Global Cooldown, which means you can (for example) Counterspell and then immediately cast another spell. I honestly thought Mana Shield already did absorb magical damage as well as physical; shows what I know about mages.
Hunters
- "Silencing Shot" now does only 50% of weapon damage instead of 75%.
- The base damage for "Arcane Shot" has been reduced by about 9% and the bonus damage from ranged attack power reduced from 20% to 15%.
- The bonus damage for "Barrage" is now 4/8/12% for ranks 1/2/3. [used to be 5/10/15%]
- The bonus damage for "Improved Barrage" is now 4/8/12% for ranks 1/2/3. [used to be 5/10/15%]
- Each rank of "Improved Fireball" now reduces your spell damage coefficient by 2%.
- Each rank of "Improved Frostbolt" now reduces your spell damage coefficient by 2%.
- "Counterspell" no longer triggers the global cooldown.
- "Mana Shield" now absorbs magical damage as well as physical damage.
- The bonus coefficient for "Shadow Word: Pain" has been reduced by about 9%. This should result in about 5% less damage done by "Shadow Word: Pain" for the typical priest.
Bug Fixes
- The "Frozen Shadoweave Boots" will now properly increase shadow damage.
- Players will no longer lose control of their character if they tryto talk to an NPC while mobs are aggro on them.
- The /equip command will now work on pieces of gear that are not in your primary bag.
- Fixed an issue that was causing some players to disconnect in Hellfire Citadel:Blood Furnace.
- The "Corruptor" 4 piece set bonus will now be properly applied.
- The Legion Fel Cannons at Forge Camp Anger in Blades Edge will now properly spawn above ground.
- The Arena queue tooltip will now show the arena that the player is queued for.
- Fixed an error that was causing players to disconnect if they tried to socket a gem that had been gift wrapped.
- Fixed an error that was causing players to disconnect forming a party with other members in the same area.
- Pet icons will now properly update in the Stables window.Improved the robustness of the pet action bar display. It is now less likely to be accidentally blocked by addons.
- Players will no longer hear the gong sound repeated after initially joining a queue for the battlegrounds.
- Having a group invite declined while queued via "Looking for More" will no longer remove you from the queue.
- Nethershards will no longer cost honor to purchase but will cost gold instead.
- Players will no longer be given access to both quest lines following the Declaration of Allegiance to the Scryers or Aldor in Shattrath City.
Filed under: Hunter, Mage, Priest, Patches, News items
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)
Kupcakes Jan 21st 2007 2:43PM
Is there any word about Blizz doing premades on the PTR's?
Oraculum Jan 21st 2007 3:04PM
I have a 60 Holy PvP+PvE priest and a 60 mage and a 60 warrior. To hear of anything but buffs to both my mage and priest continues to remind me why I won't play this game. It's sad because I've been waiting for my server queues to return to something sensible (less than 1000), and now this happens... While minor changes, they are just another slap in the face...
Mage Notes: My mage has +598dmg and is regularly the number 1 killer/damage dealer in battle grounds.
My mage who is the absolute worst solo PvP class (well maybe except for my warrior), just got his damage reduced while getting returned to the pre-nerf state of patch 2.0 (with CounterSpell). Don't get me wrong, I understand this is a PvE nerf but taking between 60-800 damage off of my frostbolts (depending on conditions/buffs/cooldowns being used), is pretty bad for a class that relies on doing huge burst damage or risk getting 1-3 shotted.
If Blizzard plans to reduce the Burst damage dealers, only way of killing in PvP, then they need to give the mage other options. While people are happy about the return of CounterSpell to a useful state, it is actually nothing but a return to a place where Mages are still one of the worst solo PvP classes. Take our dmg away, but give us more utility. Or just let us have our reign as top damage dealers without a nerf that scales as your gear gets better...
jxl Jan 21st 2007 3:56PM
The hunter nerf is actually pretty major for PvP, which should make a lot of non-hunters happy. The RAP-based damage on arcane shot is the majority of the damage (for most if not all hunters), and this is being cut by 25%, so most hunters' arcane shots are going to be reduced by around 17-20%. Being the only damage-dealing instant, this is massive in PvP, and greatly reduces burst damage for all non-marksman hunters.
Dabura Jan 21st 2007 4:14PM
Jesus, mages are getting a huger uber nerf! IF they decease the coefficient by 2% per rank of improved frostbolt, thats 10% less dmg, since all frost mages take it. So all I can say is WHAT THE HELL ARE BLIZZARD THINKING?
Dirtyboy Jan 21st 2007 4:17PM
That's just freaking great. I use a combo of Shadow Word : Pain and wand plus the Power Word: Shield to solo and to use as little mana as possible (for when I aggro multiple mobs in BC). I'll have to actually see it in action to see how much of an effect it has, but I wish they would issue explanations when they do a class change.
Eliah Hecht Jan 21st 2007 5:14PM
Remember, decreasing the coefficient by 10% doesn't mean the spells do 10% less damage -- it means they get 10% less of +damage from your gear.
As far as reasons go, here's what I was able to scrounge from the forums:
Poster: Tseric at 2007-01-20 14:27:58
Subject: Re: The 2.0.6 Patch Notes!
Q u o t e:
I see.... Interesting dynamic. It makes the Empowered Talents essentially mandatory, then...
That's one way to look at it. You could certainly recoup those removed percentage points in that manner. Devs were just shaving off a little damage from the end-game scenario, as they felt the dps was a little out of line with where they would like it. It's fairly obvious that it's a removal of dps from primary nukes, so there isn't much more to elaborate on.
Cooldown on GDC was a philosophy decision. They decided to agree with you. ;)
Mana shield. You guys have been asking for caster defense in PvP for a while, right? Well, there is something to that effect.
http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=69810260&pageNo=1&sid=1#16
AcceptableRisk Oct 10th 2007 5:34PM
I'm interested to see how the Hunter changes balance them with respect to PvP. They were doing some pretty ridiculous damage and Arcane Shot appeared to be one of the worst offenders.
The Mage changes seem a little rough especiall because it's imbalanced towards fire. The change impacts fire mages more than frost. Both because Fireball already receives more of a damage bonus than Frostbolt and because the Improved Fireball talent affects the overall DPS of its spell less than Improved Frostbolt. Perhaps mages were doing too much damage in the end stages of the TBC beta and this brings them more in line. I'll reserve total judgement until a ways down the line.
The Shadow Word: Pain change brings its coefficient in line with the recent nerfs to Warlock DoT's. Wasn't hard to see that one coming.
Overall, I'm a little dissappointed with the way they've been handling this. In 2.0 they unified the way all DoT and HoT effects recieved +damage/healing. It seemed a really reasonable thing to do. Longer durations recieved more benefit and per second everything equaled out. Simplicity in action. Then they started monkeying around with all of it and making special cases. Things get confusing and the justification is difficult to grasp. If the old coefficient of +damage*duration/15 was too high, then make the change across the board. Doing it in bits and pieces makes players feel picked on when the changes come piecemeal and single out one class at a time.
Shat Jan 21st 2007 11:17PM
To mages blizz giveth and blizz taketh away. To locks they just giveth.
jakk on the blackrock server Jan 21st 2007 11:44PM
#1 you are a frost mage. how are people 3-shotting you? you should be able to kill people with rank1 frostbolt.
Tachyon Jan 22nd 2007 4:30AM
I consider this patch a buff for the fire mages (hey, they essentially get the ice barrier for free, with mana costs on absorb, but without cooldown), and a major nerf for frost mages (31 talent made obsolete, and frostbolt damage reduced by 5-7% overall, but contrary to fire mages which can use pyro and scorch instead, we got no alternative for sustained DPS).
Yes, frost mages can use mana shield too, and it will stack upon ice barrier, but this is nonsense, as the manashield can be applied faster (only global cooldown compared to ice barrier which has 30sec/24sec cooldown) and costs way less mana to keep up all the time. Wasted 31 talent, it is, and I dont't think this is balanced towards other classes (all the benefit from fire or arcane, and the shielding of the defence tree for free).
As a frost mage, this patch makes me sad...
Cracky Jan 22nd 2007 6:43AM
As a fire mage, it's my JOB to do the greatest damage. So this nerf sucks.
Reducing my attacking ability and increasing my defence makes me less individual and more mediocre.
I wish I'd spent my time levelling a warlock sometimes.
Tachyon Jan 22nd 2007 7:24AM
I agree with #11, and I can't really see the motivation Blizzard has to reducing the damage of fireball and frostbolt. Fire mages can be happy with it for PvP, but in PvE they're as much affected by the dmg nerf as we frost mages.
The buff on the mana shield doesn't compensate for the reduced damage, absorbing a little over 700 damage isn't really needed either with regard to the huge amount of HP we gain in TBC anyway...
Yes, we mages WANT to be squishy, but get the most damage instead, that's what our role as a 'glass cannon' is all about. Damage is the keystone to our survivability, the 'kill it before it kills you' aspect of our class.
Maybe they just wanted to make the arcane spells (missiles and blast) more of an alternative, or force mages into speccing improved fireball/frostbolt if they use them for sustained damage (so speccing in the tier 8 talents to compensate for a nerf in the tier 1 talents)...
As for the other changes in the patch, I do see the reason behind cutting the damage of silencing shot and arcane shot (they were way too strong in PvP against clothies), but the damage reduction of SW:P wasn't necessary...
All in all the changes in the patch are wasted, don't fix if it ain't broken...
Khamikazi Jan 22nd 2007 7:41AM
I find it funny when mages/priests/hunters and even warriors talk about their dmg being reduced even the slightest. Myself, being a rogue, have nothing other than dmg and those classes are all about "wth, give us survivability and utility" and all that. Give a rogue a reason to be invited to a group, seriously. Only ways I get a group in WoW is if I start a group or my friends start a group. You never see "need a rogue" but always "need DPS". The moment it comes out I /tell about it and the usual result "sorry, we need hunter/lock/mage".
This is one of those moments that truly deserve a QQ for those that cry foul. I have good gear and yet hear my mage friend going around "heck yes, 4k crit". Tell me how doing a tad bit less damage is going to be world ending.
Cracky Jan 22nd 2007 8:14AM
In reply to #13: Rogues' advantage is stealthing. - BIG advantage. Mages are a glass cannons with knowhere to hide and often run unsuccessfully. We NEED to take the enemy down fast - or we are screwed.
This nerf is awful, and the increase in defence is a red herring.
Zequel Jan 22nd 2007 9:17AM
wtf? That's a major nerf for fire mages. As stated above, that's our function - to nuke. And EVERY fire mage has improved fireball, its the foundation for a fire mage. Why give us new DPS talents and then nerf existing ones to bring us back down. With all the stamina gear, we need MORE DPS, not less. A lock I was partying with had 8k of health (buffed) @ 64th level. HELLO! I don't have much chance in PVP against him now, what happens when he has 10K @ 70th and my fireball is nerfed? Stupid decision. Better planning on the game design would have been a better way to go. This seems very arbitrary.
NedKelly Jan 22nd 2007 9:14AM
What on earth would make them think a holy / disc priest (if they wanted to nerf shaow priest they could have picked a number of other spells) need nerfing?
Seriously, when was the last time you got taken out by a holy priest?
/dumb
Tachyon Jan 22nd 2007 9:28AM
#14: erm, Mages also get invisibility at lvl 68, hence easy escaping. But you're right, stealthing is *the* advantage of the rougues, being able to choose when and what to fight and having the first strike most of the time in PvP is priceless. Sadly this ability isn't really needed in instances, I feel for the rogues here...
Cracky Jan 22nd 2007 9:57AM
#17: Mages have invisibility at level 68 you say? Didn't know that! Sounds quite cool actually! Well, I'll reserve judgement for now then.
Mind you, the 5 minute cool down is a bit harsh. It's not as if you could rely on it as a standard proceedure.
Any higher level mages want to comment?
Nfar Jan 22nd 2007 11:44AM
When they nerfed Warlocks last week, everyone was singing Hallelujah! Now that it's happening to them, all I can say is "enjoy your balance". Rogues and Feral Druids are next. Cloak of Shadows must either cost 100 energy and be on a similar cooldown to Sprint or it must be returned to a 41 point talent so that if a rogue wants to be king of PvP, he pays the PvE price for it. Feral Druids do way too much damage along with the ability to break almost every CC and heal themselves instantly. Their damage coefficients need to be nerfed as well as their threat generation.
After that we can work on the Paladins and Shaman (I'm looking at you, Chain Lightning coeffecient).
Vapor Jan 22nd 2007 12:46PM
According to the nerf that listed above, it's a big nerf for hunter damage. It affect not just arcane but almost all hunter shots that use regularly. With that nerf, I can see alot of MM hunters will reconsider to go BM. All I see blizzard doing is nerf a spell/skill that we have and give us something else then come back later and nerf that new buff spell/skill cause it's overpower.
For those of you that hate the BIG RED PET that stuck on you. You will see alot more of it after this patch.