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All of the latest Mists of Pandaria newsIn-game fixes for Monday May 4th
by Adam Holisky 
May 4th 2009 at 10:40PM
There's an additional list of in-game fixes released tonight by Bornakk. The fixes have been coming less and less over the past week, and that's reflected in the fact the game's stability has vastly improved since patch 3.1 dropped (at least for most).We covered some of the Ulduar changes, which were announced separately this evening. Apparently Blizzard felt them important enough to mix them in with these other changes as well.
Chief amongst the changes is that the Tier 8 4 piece set bonus for Druids now works. I don't honestly know anyone that has ran into this yet, but I'm sure there's a few folks out there with four pieces of Tier 8 already.
The entire list of changes after the break.
- The NPCs just inside the front entrance of Ulduar (like a repair ogre) should no longer despawn.
- The Druid Tier 8 Nightsong Battlegear 4 piece bonus should now properly extend the length of Savage Roar.
- The Auriaya encounter has received the following changes: The range of Savage Pounce has been slightly reduced, the impact and periodic damage has been reduced in Heroic difficulty, the Guardian Swarm ability now summons 10 Swarming Guardians instead of 25 but their individual damage has been increased.
- The reflected damage done by Elder Stonebark with his Petrified Bark ability has been significantly reduced.
- In the Hodir encounter, the time to complete the hard mode has been increased to 3 minutes. (This will be applied during maintenance beginning with North America on Tuesday May 5.)
- The health of the Heart of the Deconstructor in the XT-002 Deconstructor encounter has been reduced.
- In the Thorim encounter, the Iron Ring Guard's Whirling Trip ability will now only hit the tank.
- In the Assembly of Iron encounter, the duration of Overwhelming Power has been increased to 30 seconds in heroic mode and the amount of healing that Steelbreaker receives from Electrical Charge has been reduced to 20% of his max health.
- The first pack of trash mobs in the Conservatory of Life has been removed, one of the trash packs in the General Vezax room has been removed, all of the humanoids in General Vezax's room are no longer immune to stuns, the Faceless Horrors will only go immune and summon Void Beasts once instead of 3 times, and the damage done when a Clockwork Sapper explodes has been significantly reduced.
Filed under: Patches, News items
Reader Comments (Page 3 of 5)
Oriflame May 5th 2009 11:09AM
And I'm still waiting for Plastic Rat to tell us why when he can't down a single hard mode encounter he still thinks they are too easy.
Vladeon May 5th 2009 12:38PM
Plastic Rat said:
How about football, or for that matter any sport? A bunch of guys who get together, set themselves a challenge and try to overcome it.
They get paid to do it. When I play football with my friends, I expect to enjoy it. But when you are getting paid to do something, such as professional sports, there is little enjoyment because you're working hard at accomplishing a goal, winning, instead accomplishing the goal of having fun. If you're playing this game purely to be competitive pve and not enjoying it, then there's something wrong. At the point that playing a game becomes work and not fun, it ceases to be a game.
turkeyspit May 4th 2009 11:34PM
I'm still waiting for there to be a chest just inside the instance portal with all the loot.
Would save so much time for all these 'casuals' who don't have time to raid. They do pay their 15$ a month like everyone else, and deserve to see and get everything in the game, right?
Oteo May 4th 2009 11:40PM
Nice straw man you got there.
Oriflame May 5th 2009 12:03AM
and your armory link with 3... no, 1, Ulduar hard mode achievement please?
Saithir May 5th 2009 3:00AM
Well we know the new 5-man is coming, right?
They should totally do this on the PTR. Just make a single room in the instance with a chest and nothing more instead of the real new instance. Even for a few days after the PTR has started. ;)
I would have so much fun reading all the silly posts then. ;)
Radd May 4th 2009 11:42PM
I'd pay a dollar to see how many of the "leet radiers"flaming WI boards were a part of 40 mans back in Vanilla.
Brian May 5th 2009 1:01AM
Probably a fair number, actually...or at least some of the old-school 40-man raiders are echoing the sentiments being expressed here.
One of my favorite feral druid blogs recently contained a post with the blogger complaining heavily (if somewhat more literately than is the standard here) about Ulduar nerfs. This post, by coincidence, I read right after he talked about various strategies for running Sarth-3d, which he had apparently done multiple times.
Now Sarth-3d isn't impossibly difficult, but still, it's not something the vast majority of the WoW population has ever successfully completed unless they paid for a run with a high-end guild. This feral blogger is apparently suggesting, as are many here, that Ulduar difficulty (no discussion of "hard modes") should be based on what the top fraction of the WoW population find difficult.
I'm not entirely sure what part of making raiding more accessible these guys failed to understand, but really, why are they surprised that raiding is no longer the domain of the top few percent of WoW players?
Tempes Magus May 4th 2009 11:51PM
Anyone arguing against the nerfs should remember that Blizzard is not catering to you elitist "this is MY raid" crazies.
The game is supposed to be fun with everyone being able to experience everything with soem work, like getting to 80 and getting some half decent gear to get into Ulduar.
Try this article and the linked post from Zarhym: http://www.wowinsider.com/2009/05/02/ulduar-nerfs-and-blizzards-new-raid-philosophy/
That spells it out really well. Get used to it. The normal mode is supposed to be PUGable and the hard mode is for a challenge.
A good way to put the attitude of you elitist who want "normal mode" to be hard is "the only thing one person will have that another won't be able to have is fun". You only care about having exclusive content and being challenged on every difficulty level, but, in the end, you'll still get Ulduar on farm and be bored while others can have fun.
Oni Stardust May 4th 2009 11:57PM
Not to change the subject or anything, but that picture is awesome. Any chance someone could direct me to where I can see the just the art on the thing the guy is holding up?
Letharginator May 5th 2009 12:05AM
http://entertainment.upperdeck.com/includes/viewcard.aspx?cid=523066
Oni Stardust May 5th 2009 12:10AM
Thanks
richx May 5th 2009 12:20AM
every week i get more an more closer to quiting wow ulduar has been out what 3 weeks now an all you casuals who cant even clear naxx25 man are crying about the difficulty. all i have to say is lrn you class an lrn how to play it is sad to see the nerf bomb every week for an instance that isnt hard well wasnt hard but now a pug can run it
Oriflame May 5th 2009 12:23AM
I keep asking you guys for a link. One hard mode. That's all. If the hard modes are too easy for you - I think you really have a case. But even the best guild in the world isn't blowing through those. You apparently have done *any* and you think they are too easy?
Give me a break. Put you epeens away. No one believes you.
Brian May 5th 2009 12:53AM
@Oriflame
The thing is, for all the lack of data these allegedly hardcore raiders are providing, it's easy to overlook the fact that there is a LOT of data available about just how easy people are finding Ulduar. Except it's not available to us, it's available to Blizzard. They have all the data about every attempt of every boss by everyone in the game.
For some reason people, like the poster you were replying to, think that the Ulduar nerfs are based on whining from "casuals". Something tells me Blizzard is basing the changes on something more than that, if they are smart as their success in this market suggests they are. If Ulduar was anywhere close to being PUGable by looking in LFG, every even semi-organized raiding guild in WoW should be blowing through it. But if they were, would Blizzard really be tuning the encounters more? From their point of view that would seem to be a dumb move, since it would no longer be just the hardcore raiders they'd be alienating.
Of course Blizzard basing encounters of complaints would require there to BE a lot of complaints calling for a nerf to Ulduar. So far, the vast majority of the complaints about Ulduar difficulty are from people whining that it's too EASY. The general opinion from the rest of the people playing WoW is that it's definitely hard, but not TOO hard. If Blizzard responded to whining, Ulduar would be getting harder, not easier.
Emma May 5th 2009 1:08AM
I say hurray for the Ulduar tuning changes.
I don't buy it when people say that 'all the fun is being taken out of the game' because they're making it easier - this implies that wiping is the best part of the game and really just makes you look like you're full of shit. It's exasperating in the same way that a child carrying on about how easy he finds his grade 3 homework is.
I agree with Dave. When you're fighting RNG, disconnects and your own guild, how hard a boss is doesn't even factor in. Perfect execution should be expected for hard mode, but for normal mode I think it's unrealistic for their new raiding philosophy.
Noctiluca May 5th 2009 7:25AM
^ This.
Monion May 5th 2009 1:57AM
Acutally, if you think about it, reducing XT's heart's health is actually a buff for most fights, not a nerf. You have to do less damage to activate hard mode, but if you've got the DPS, you actually can't do as much damage to XT while the heart is out if you don't want to activate hard mode.
Houston May 5th 2009 9:27AM
That's the way I read it. Let time DPS on heart and more time DPS the adds.
Coldforge May 5th 2009 2:10AM
Dave I am so glad someone with some sense posted that have a grasp on reality and real life facts and experience about Ulduar and not the same old violin......I'm a elite don't Nerf my raid bit!
Thanks Dave!