Patch 5.3 interview with Ghostcrawler
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The latest patch 5.3 news
All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsNew PTR patch notes
by Eliah Hecht 
Apr 9th 2009 at 8:30PM
Blizzard has once again updated the PTR patch notes for patch 3.1. As usual, none of the changes here will be a surprise to you if you've been following all the action, but for the sake of completeness, I'm going to list them here anyway. Many commenters requested last time if they could just see what's changed between this and the previous patch notes, so that's what I have for you tonight. These are just the new things in tonight's patch notes revision. If you want to see the latest PTR patch notes in full, head over to the Blizzard PTR forums.
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General:
- Due to significant talent tree revisions, all players will have their talent points reimbursed. Several new spells and abilities have been added for select classes. Players will need to visit their class trainer to learn new spells.
- The Argent Tournament, a permanent in-game event, has come to Icecrown. Players interested in taking part in this event should visit the Argent Pavilion located on the west side of the tournament grounds. Features include:
- New ways of gaining reputation with capital cities.
- All new daily quests, achievements and titles.
- New rare and epic items, tabards, pets, banners, faction shirts and mounts.
- Mounted combat, and much more to come!
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[Wintergrasp] Steam Rush: Removed from the Siege Engine due to pathing issues.
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Mana Regeneration: The amount of mana regeneration derived from intellect and spirit has been reduced by 40%; however, talents that allow for mana regeneration while in combat have been increased. As a result, in-combat regeneration for classes with those talents will stay the same, while out-of-combat regeneration will be lower.
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Mages' Mirror Images have gained avoidance from area-of-effect damage similar to what warlock and hunter pets already have.
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Death Knights:
- Amount of damage absorbed by Anti-Magic Shell is limited to 100% of the DK's health (was 50%).
- Clarification that Blood Boil's new radius is 10 yards.
- Death Strike now deals 75% weapon damage, up from 60%.
- Attack speed of Dancing Rune Weapon changed from 2.0 to 3.5.
- Will of the Necropolis no longer triggers from damage amounts less than 5% of the player's health.
- Rime is now triggered by Obliterate instead of Icy Touch.
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Druids:
- Moonkin Form: Mana cost reduced
- Survival Instincts: Cooldown reduced to 3 minutes, down from 5.
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Hunters:
- Clarification that Black Arrow shares a cooldown with all other traps.
- T.N.T. reworked. Now Increases damage done by Explosive Shot, Immolation Trap, and Explosive Trap by 2/4/6%.
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[Mages] Molten Armor: Chance to critically strike is now increased by a percentage of the mage's total spirit
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Priests:
- New Shadowfiend ability, Shadowcrawl, teleports the Shadowfiend to an enemy target and increases its damage done by 15% for 5 seconds
- New Holy Talent: Body and Soul: 2-point talent. When you cast Power Word: Shield, you increase the target's movement speed by 30/60% for 4 seconds, and you have a 50/100% chance when you cast Abolish Disease on yourself to also cleanse 1 poison effect in addition to diseases
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[Rogues] Sinister Calling: The damage bonus to Backstab and Hemorrhage is now 2/4/6/8/10%, up from 1/2/3/4/5%.
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[Shaman] The elemental from Earth Elemental Totem now scales up in power based on the shaman's spell power instead of attack power.
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Professions:
- Alchemy:
- Flask of Endless Rage: Now requires Goldclover instead of Fire Leaf.
- Flask of Stoneblood: Health granted has been doubled
- Engineering:
- New Reticulated Armor Webbing engineering enchant can be applied to cloth, leather, or mail in addition to plate.
- Gnomish Lightning Generator: Now has passive critical strike rating. The damage from the activated effect has been reduced. No longer has a cast time. Now invokes a 10-second DPS burst item category cooldown
- Hand-Mounted Pyro Rocket: No longer on the global cooldown. Damage increased, Cooldown reduced. Now invokes a 10-second DPS burst item category cooldown
- Hyperspeed Accelerators: Now invokes a 10-second DPS burst item category cooldown
- Alchemy:
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Equipment Manager no longer in this patch.
- Death Knight Tier 7 DPS Sets: Death Strike has been added to both the 2-piece and 4-piece bonuses.
- Glyph of Heart Strike: Duration of snare increased to 10 seconds.
- Howling Blast: Each rank now properly shares a cooldown with the other ranks.
- Hunter traps will no longer be able to be set off by totems.
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Filed under: Patches
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 3)
Rob Apr 10th 2009 10:42AM
Well, it depends on what is fun for you. I am sure you know the rogue is extremely good at PVP, but lately they've been overshadowed by rets and DKs. I really hate those guys, btw.
If you feel that your side is terrible at PVP, you should look at the stats for your battlegroup. Not sure where they are, but one website does have stats as for which group wins/loses the most. There is definately some skewing, on both sides, depending on the BG. Also it strongly depends on time of day. For example, alliance always wins WG around 7pm at night every night, without fail. However, there are usually 2-3 fold more alliance than horde, it really makes a difference despite tenacity. WHereas, during the day, horde usually does a better job at WG (you could argue that the kids are at school and I certainly will not disagree).
Anyway, don't let this stop you from re-rolling if you want. Above all, do what you want, not what the commentators or your guild wants.
Dreadskull Apr 9th 2009 9:51PM
Oh the AT is going to be permanent? Yay. That puts a ton of pressure off of me getting my Warlock up 5 more levels before 3.1 0.0
Plastic Rat Apr 9th 2009 10:03PM
The mana regen thing... I don't get it.
I thought the idea was to reduce the amount of mana that, healers especially, regenerated during combat, trivializing many encounters.
If talents that regen mana during combat are still working as normal, but only out of combat mana regen has been nerfed, then won't that leave the situation exactly as it was, except for making for more downtime between combat?
Am I misreading this and 'out of combat' is referring to the 5 second rule?
Plastic Rat Apr 9th 2009 10:21PM
A quick glance at your previous comments leads me to believe that you may be lost.
forums.worldofwarcraft.com is apparently the site you are looking for.
Please enjoy frolicking madly with the other screen lickers over on the official forums.
Amak Apr 9th 2009 10:33PM
The 5 second rule is not "out of combat". It means that you get full mana regeneration after not casting for 5 seconds, even during combat. Spirit reliant classes such as priests used this to "take a break" from casting as a way to regen their mana pool - the 5sr dance.
AyaJulia Apr 9th 2009 10:33PM
The thing they're trying to nerf is the way a lucky clearcast proc can shoot your mana through the roof. We've all been there as healers. Even at your spammiest, you'll have those moments when you get a clearcast proc of whatever form your class has and hold off for just a few extra seconds to get yourself a couple thousand mana back.
As a priest, if I got a Surge of Light and followed it with Inner Focus, I could manage 5-10k mana back depending on how the fight was going.
Plastic Rat Apr 9th 2009 10:55PM
@Amak
I understand what the 5 second rule is, I'm just not sure what they're trying to do here with their reduction in 'out of combat mana regen'. The reason I mentioned the 5SR is because I thought maybe it was a typo or it had been phrased incorrectly.
@AyaJulia
Ok, so how does 'out of combat mana regen' being reduced by 40% affect the mana you're going to regen with clearcasting in your example? I assume the mana you're going to regen from your Surge of light/inner focus comes from the 5SR because you're effectively not spending mana for a few more seconds?
Daniel Apr 9th 2009 11:27PM
While "out of combat" and "outside the 5sr" are not precisely the same thing, in terms of regeneration of mana from spirit they are. You get full mana regen anytime you are outside of the 5sr, regardless of whether you are still in combat or not. Your combat status really is a red herring; it's whether you are casting that's important. But people interchange the phrases because it makes no difference for the topic under discussion..
I wasn't aware that the Priests where getting such huge mana surges by going outside the 5sr. I don't get surges like that on my Druid. Having said that, my own opinion is that the change will actually have little impact on the game for most players. But we'll see.
Plastic Rat Apr 9th 2009 11:35PM
Thanks for the explanation Daniel. That makes sense now. So the whole thing is actually about the 5SR and doesn't have anything to do with 'in combat' or 'out of combat' mana regen.
Just seems to be a weird way of saying it in the patch notes.
Xavs Apr 9th 2009 10:15PM
"New ways of gaining reputation with capital cities."
Somebody please explain?
I don't think they are talking about the Argent Tournament, you can only champion a faction once you are exalted with them, unless they are your home city.
Balius Apr 9th 2009 10:31PM
No. You're wrong. You do not need to be exalted to champion a faction, and the Tournament is what they're talking about.
Arcticwolf Apr 10th 2009 2:26AM
To add to what has been said, you can Champion your factions cities and gain rep with them by doing so. As far as I have read, you have to be Champion of your own Capital first, then you can choose to champion the others. Then again, I have not been on the PTR so I can't be 100% certain, but that is what I have read.
Phaelan Apr 9th 2009 10:56PM
get the addon talented http://wow.curse.com/downloads/wow-addons/details/talented.aspx, even with the addition of ingame confirmation to the talents, it lets you do a template before you actually put up your talents. I've used it for a while and it's great.
Plastic Rat Apr 9th 2009 11:34PM
Thanks for the explanation Daniel. That makes sense now. So the whole thing is actually about the 5SR and doesn't have anything to do with 'in combat' or 'out of combat' mana regen.
Just seems to be a weird way of saying it in the patch notes.
gilren Apr 9th 2009 11:46PM
As far as it goes for me, the Mana Regen nerf shows me that while Mages can still cast water and 'Locks can tap health to get mana back, once again I need to carry more drinks on my priest to as effectively solo as I am right now, or wait much longer between fights.
So thanks for nothing, Blizzard.
I hope the little Shadowfiend buff for damage helps make up for the mana loss, but I'm going to doubt it.
Xenoiaos Apr 10th 2009 1:21AM
"Rime is now triggered by Obliterate instead of Icy Touch."
Wow thanks Blizzard. I was looking for some Talent Points to put into Frigid Dreadplate, thanks for giving me the answer.
I simply have no desire to ever use Obliterate. It requires the same Runes to use as Howling Blast, yet HB's damage has always been the same as if not better then Obliterate for me ( I just checked it before writing this) and HB hits multiple targets.
Scalin Apr 10th 2009 2:09AM
I think this "nerf" to mana regen is somewhat redundant. It doesn't solve the problem with giving classes ways to massively regen mana during combat. Annoying example? Divine Plea. 25% mana over 15 seconds (with a 1 minute cooldown), but cuts your healing (via healing spells) in half. Paladins have always been the "never run out of mana" healing class. Even better, this is a level 71 CLASS skill. What do shamans get? Mana Tide Totem, a 31pt resto talent that gives us back 24% (or 28% with glyph) mana every five minutes. It's crap like this that make me glad I don't have to heal anymore.
@Xenoiaos:
Are you just sitting there playing with yourself while HB is on cooldown? And no, my Oblit crits do more damage than HB does. Multiple mobs, sure. Single target? Playing Blood Strikes right, I can Oblit 2x and get a nice chunk of damage while you're still waiting for HB to get off cool.
Xenoiaos Apr 10th 2009 2:42AM
I'm a Frost Tank/DPS so I'm constantly blowing the cooldowns on my runes. 90% of the time HB is only used when it proc's as it otherwise knocks my Rotation out of sequence. If the proc rate had been increased during the move to Obliterate I'd consider wasting the runes on. My Icy Touch does 100 less damage for half the rune requirement allowing me to use Plague Strike after it. While not putting out as much damage as IT, The combined damage from both outdoes Obliterate in both normal hits and crits. Sure there is the GC to consider but I'll glady wait (and already do) to pump out the extra damage. Of course then there is the 3.1 changes to consider and the 15% less damage from Imp. Icy Touch but unless the buff to Plague Strike is a trivial one at best I sincerely doubt that I'd end up doing less damage with the two combined then Obliterate.
Nobody Apr 10th 2009 3:45AM
I guess this probably means 3.1 isn't going up next week, am I right?
Balius Apr 10th 2009 4:40AM
Why would updated patch notes mean anything of the sort?