Tuesday's in-game fixes
by Adam Holisky 
Jun 9th 2009 at 3:00PM
Blizzard blue poster Bornakk has announced a couple new in-game fixes. The updates are as follows:
First, the nerf to the Paladin's Vindication talent that set the Pally community on fire yesterday is now live. The nerf removed stamina and intellect from the 20% reduction that Vindication gave. All other primary statistics are still affected by Vindication.
Secondly, Maim, Bash, and Hammer of Justice will no longer cause a player's spell to be interrupted when they're immune to stun. They will still interrupt the NPC's spells however.
There have been a handful of other hot fixes that we've covered the past few days, and those are recapped after the break.
- When immune to the stun of following abilities, Maim, Bash, and Hammer of Justice will no longer cause player spells to be interrupted but they will still interrupt NPCs.
- The Retribution Paladin talent Vindication no longer reduces the targets stamina or intellect but does correctly lower agility, spirit, and strength.
- We've made some adjustments to the siege engine and demolisher in the flame leviathan encounter in order to make them more effective.
- The tower of life's adds have had their health reduced.
- The Ancient Water Spirit in the Freya encounter should now be vulnerable to interrupt effects.
- Life Sparks will no longer chain their Shock spell.
- Commanding Shout and Battle Shout are again free to use during the preparation period of battlegrounds and arenas.
- To resolve an exploit we have removed all non-boss chests from dungeons introduced in The Burning Crusade: Ramparts, Blood Furnance, Shattered Halls, Steam Vault, Underbog, Slave Pens, Arcatraz, Botanica, Mechanaar, Shadow Labyrinth, Sethekk Halls, Mana-Tombs, and Auchenai Crypts.
Filed under: Paladin, News items
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 3)
Alex Loftus Jun 11th 2009 2:04PM
Glad they didn't nerf DK's.
peagle Jun 9th 2009 3:08PM
That chest resolution feels really heavy handed. Were they entirely out of coding solutions that they simply had to eliminate the mechanic? Oh well, what with their being none in WoLK I'd almost forgotten them existing.
Nick S Jun 9th 2009 3:11PM
What was the exploit, if I can ask? I've seen a few tricks to get chests easily, but none that seemed exploit-ey.
Shiabre Jun 9th 2009 3:20PM
The chests were removed because hackers would steal accounts, run the char into the instance, loot the chest, and reset the instance. A friend of mine was hacked and spent an entire evening running in and out of the same instance just looting the chests there until we got a GM to shut him down.
dead2soon Jun 9th 2009 3:33PM
Isn't there a teleport hack that allows exploiters to zoom around WG collecting mining and herb nodes while underground? My guess is the same hack could be used to clean instances out of chests as well.
Scott Jun 9th 2009 3:39PM
Having a rogue at 70, when BC was the latest expansion, I could stealth through the entire instance, picking herbs and chests throughout any of the instances listed above. Not only did I make a killing in selling stacks of herbs, I could also sell and/or DE the blues from chests for a nice profit. Nowadays, removing them is rather moot as looting the chests no longer reap the same benefits as it did at level 70.
All-in-all, Blizz could have simply made chests despawn if just one person entered an instance, allowing full parties to still reap chest rewards, instead of removing them entirely.
tresser Jun 9th 2009 3:10PM
im still not really getting how removing the chests was something necessary or how it was an exploit. but i dont play a rogue, so maybe the money really was that great in there
Drahliana Jun 10th 2009 8:45AM
Are you on one of those servers where you get the dreaded "Additional instances can not be lauched right now" error when you're trying to run an instance? Folks soloing dungeons add to the instance count are part of the reason why.
I don't have a problem with folks soloing dungeons generally, but repititive abuse by folks who go in for gain and no risk, not even any combat is behavior worth stamping out.
Aedilhild Jun 9th 2009 3:13PM
I'd particularly love an in-game fix that solved a rare, post-3.1.3 problem with nighttime ambient sounds playing in broad daylight, realm-time. I keep reading, hoping to see it announced.
http://forums.wow-europe.com/thread.html?topicId=9416711822&pageNo=1&sid=1
So far, only a handful of EU players have reported it, and I'm unsure if any Stateside players in addition to myself are experiencing it.
Devs know about it, which means there are higher priorities, the bug is elusive, or both.
But man, is it strange to hear owls in Stormwind during the afternoon. The upside is a number of musical tracks that apparently play only during the graveyard shift.
Cort Jun 9th 2009 3:16PM
Is there a real "exploit" allowing people to get to the BC chests, or is it just the ability to not aggro mobs in the instance due to being higher level?
If that's all it is, funny that they call it an "exploit."
Djinn Jun 10th 2009 12:15PM
Yay!!! vindicaiton change.. FInally a PVP aimed change that doesnt #$%k those of us that choose not to soil ourselves with that activity... No self respecting Ret Pally specs for that in raids anyway cuz bosses are immune... big whoop... nerf warriors
outdps Jun 9th 2009 3:21PM
One of these days, feign death will work on Razorscale. One of these days.
Radiophonic Jun 9th 2009 3:23PM
Don't pull threat from your tank. Problem solved.
Jason Jun 9th 2009 3:34PM
Indeed...stop winning Omen and things will work out fine.
AJ Jun 9th 2009 4:14PM
@Radiophonic
Obviously you dont understand how to play a hunter well. Dont demean someone when you are saying something wrong. You shouldnt demean someone anyway even if you are right. The reason you are wrong: If a hunter (or any threat dropping class) can't drop threat, they are forced to throttle their dps to the tanks tps, which is determined by skill,gear, fight mechanics. Being able to drop threat means you dont have to throttle down dps to an undergeared/underskilled tank, and actually do your job of putting out the best damage you can while not pulling off the tank. My hunter is better geared than 90% of the tanks in out guild and it only hurts the entire raid if you have to do less dps and drag the fights out longer than they need to be.
Think b4 you post
Nick S Jun 9th 2009 4:22PM
Blizzard gave Hunters Feign Death to keep them from pulling aggro off the tank. Wouldn't you be mad if one of your abilities simply didn't work on a few select boss fights where threat is sensitive?
Sparcrypt Jun 9th 2009 8:36PM
@AJ
Actually you're completely wrong...
I can't remember the last time I pulled aggro from the tank, and I'm a rogue who tops the metres pretty much every time.
I use vanish to get myself a bonus overkill a lot more often then I have to use it to drop aggro regardless of the tank.
Can't use FD and your aggros getting up there? Use MD on the tank mid-fight.. that's what its there for.
This is *nothing* to do with 'not knowing how to play a hunter well hurhur'. This is knowing how to play a DPS class well. Here is how you do it:
1) Do as much damage as you can to the required target(s) at the right time without pulling aggro from the tank.
2) See #1.
Tank has to move in a fight? He loses some threat generation. Adjust. Tank has to pick up multiple mobs? He loses some threat generation on the main mob. Adjust. You have to change targets to do something else? ADJUST.
There is much more to playing a DPS class then looking up the optimal rotaion and then mindlesss spamming it from 30 yards away while staring at recount. What do you think happens to me if I go all out on say, Ignis? The boss would turn around and one shot me within about 10 seconds and my damage would be a great big ZERO. The undergeared scrub who lived would now be worth more to the raid then I was because they are still doing damage.
You have a 30 second CD complete aggro wipe and a 30 second aggro dump onto the tank. Use them, they are in the game for that reason.
AJ Jun 9th 2009 9:23PM
@Sparcrypt
Did you completely miss the point of the comment that Radiophonic was commenting on?
outdps:
One of these days, feign death will work on Razorscale
You:
You have a 30 second CD complete aggro wipe and a 30 second aggro dump onto the tank. Use them, they are in the game for that reason.
The whole point of this mini thread is the MD ISNT WORKING. So we do not have a 30 sec CD aggro wipe. You were making some very good comments on dps class gameplay until you made yourself sound like an idiot with the last line.
Secondly, I roll MD's on the tank when needed, but I can do a lot more threat in the 25 secs MD is on cd than I can in the 3 shots I get with it up. Rogues have 3 agro reducers - Vanish( agro drop), Feint (agro reduce), Tricks ( agro transfer). Hunters get only 2. Also, your Tricks increase the dps of the tank which also increases his tps by higher damage output. Hunters dont increase the tanks dps output with an MD, just transfer threat only. Take away your Vanish and Feint from a fight, only use Tricks, take away 10% of the extra threat he gets while tricks is on him, and see how much you have to slow your dps so you dont pull agro.
Its not a question of pulling agro, a very poorly played dps class will pull and die. Its about not being able to do the dps you are capable of doing because the skills blizzard gave you to do that dps dont work.
Microtonal Jun 9th 2009 9:36PM
@ Sparcrypt:
"You have a 30 second CD complete aggro wipe and a 30 second aggro dump onto the tank. Use them, they are in the game for that reason."
Congratulations on completely missing the point. The problem isn't that hunters *aren't using* FD on Razorscale. It's that FD apparently *doesn't work* on Razorscale. A 30-second CD complete aggro wipe is useless if it doesn't actually wipe your aggro.
And misdirect doesn't work that way. MD is for pulling, not for mid-fight aggro management. Like I said elsewhere in this terribad comment system, I stopped pulling threat on Razorscale the minute I started running with tanks that don't suck. Stop spamming your taunts.
jpwkeeper Jun 10th 2009 7:34AM
@ Microtonal
You are incorrect, sir. MD can and should most certainly be used mid-fight to push the tank's threat higher faster. This allows everyone to go all out without having to either throttle or threat-dump, especially on a fight where the tank is moving. Heigan is a good example of that.
And I love how the idiots jump into the fray right off the bat. Yes, we know you can throttle your DPS to not pull aggro off of the tank, but the idea is that if your threat dump actually dumps threat, you can maintain your DPS. I'll bet the same people, when asked for help on Razorscale, probably responded "LOL L2DPS".