Blue Notes: Wind serpents and frost Mages
by Eliah Hecht 
Mar 5th 2007 at 6:03PM
Hunters with wind serpents that have a lot of +spell damage gear (??), this is for you. Ommra declares:A hot fix has been applied. This fix reduces the amount of bonus damage that the Hunter pet ability Lightning Breath receives from the Hunter's +damage gear.
Well, OK then. Do Hunters really wear a lot of +spell damage? I hear the Wind Serpent is a great DPS pet, and I doubt this is going to affect it very much.
And here's a development in some news that's had the Mage forums in a bit of a tizzy:
Mages
- Increased the chance Frozen effects are broken when the target is critically struck by a spell.
I'm actually a bit confused about this -- other blue sources state that all crits will break Frozen. Hopefully we'll get this totally clarified soon; if this note here is correct, and not what Tseric wrote earlier, the Mage nerf is significantly reduced.
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Serenity Mar 5th 2007 6:30PM
They had to do that. They're nerfing every class this patch. It may be completely unnoticed, but they had to. They've nerfed hunters already last patch, but they had to share the love this patch too.
Toman Mar 5th 2007 6:52PM
That's good news for us mages. I mean, frost nova breaking on a molten armor crit was just a silly idea. However, experiments on the PTR have shown that this nerf shouldn't make any difference what-so-ever to the majority of players - you can still frost nova, fire off a frostbolt then icelance, both for crits. The only thing you can no longer do is spam icelance, and I don't mind that too much (the relevant thread is up on the EU mage forums but the whole forum is down for maintenance atm so I can't link it).
It does seem like a slight overall nerf to shatter as a 5-point talent. If you can only get one crit off every 24 seconds (not counting frostbite procs) then it's fairly worthless.
Then again, I'm a 40/0/21 arc/frost mage so I didn't have shatter anyway. Ho-hum, you win some you lose some.
Ignignokt Mar 5th 2007 6:59PM
It was poorly worded by the person that posted it but a hunters ranged attack power also increased our pets spell damage and the amount the wind serpent actually gets has been reduced.
I noticed my wind serpent go from 300-350 damage with lightning breath to 170-190.
Pritchard Mar 5th 2007 7:02PM
Multiple ice lance crits were rare to begin with; it was not something you counted on. It was more like, oh, what a nice surprise! What you do want to remain is the frostbolt/ice lance combo crit on a frost nova'd target, which it looks like is still viable. That's all I care about. I was always surprised when I hit a target and the nova would remain. It's like when you're out of mana and Arcane Concentration would proc. Sweet!
It doesn't say that the nova WILL break, just increased the chances that it would. This is not gameplay changing.
As nerfs go, it is not significant. Still nice of them to include it in the patch notes.
Martel Mar 5th 2007 7:46PM
Yeah this was actually a pretty major nerf to hunters as the Wind Serpent could put out some respectable dps and scaled reasonable well. Its not just a +spell damage nerf, they've drastically reduced the amount a hunter's RAP adds to the pets lightning breath. And this change is live as of a hot fix that went in on Friday.
I can see why it was done, the wind serpent was clearly the best dps pet and bliz doesn't want all hunters using the same pet. But it hurts all the same when hunters are struggling to compete against other dps classes.
Plat Mar 5th 2007 9:12PM
When was the hotfix applied? I haven't had a chance to test my wind serpent since it applied probably.
Agreed with the above, I can see why they did it, wish they hadn't :P. I don't think it will be that much of a difference in the overall usefulness as a wind serpent as a pet, they still have pretty good damage and look cool.
I've a 70 hunter on Terenas, US.
~Plat
Quaddw Mar 5th 2007 9:12PM
Wheres the warlock nerf, blizzards prized evilness of stuff!
Zuuler Mar 5th 2007 10:10PM
@7
Locks got plenty of nerfs in the past few patches, almost all undocumented. Even our imp got a hotfix that nerfed its spell damage just like the windserpent.
How about instead of crying "nerf locks", you roll a lock and quit your crying.
Heymish Mar 6th 2007 10:10AM
@8 Get em Zuuler.
@7 All the QQers need to be reminded AGAIN that no one forces you to play. What do you do in real life when you think something is unfair? How often does whining about it do you any good? Think about it.