Patch 4.2: Rage of the Firelands guides and patch notes now available
by Mathew McCurley 
Jun 25th 2011 at 8:00PM
Oh, and there's a whole bunch of official patch notes.
Here's your definitive link guide to patch 4.2:
- The full, definitive list of patch 4.2 patch notes.
- Patch 4.2 introduces the Dungeon Journal feature. Check out WoW Insider's coverage of this cool new tool.
- Thrall's epic quest, Elemental Bonds, will shake your perception of the former warchief and his powers. WoW Insider also pondered what this means for the greatest shaman on Azeroth.
- Raiders are anxiously awaiting the newest raid tier, The Firelands. WoW Insider columnist Matticus shared his impressions of Beth'tilac, Lord Rhyolith, and Alysrazor.
- Looking good is as important as downing bosses. Blizzard posted previews of each and every classes' tier 12 armor sets.
- Two videos previewed The Firelands early on in the announcement of the tier, putting us Through the Fires and Flames.
- Read all about the new legendary staff coming with patch 4.2, Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa's Rest. Accompanying the staff is an epic quest involving the fate of the blue dragonflight.
- Learn everything you need to know about the two new daily questing hubs, the Molten Front and the Regrowth, from Blizzard's official preview. WoW Insider previewed some of the new dailies you will be completing, as well as finding the new rare hunter pets roaming these areas.
- Your valor points are becoming justice points when the patch hits. Check out the valor to justice conversion procedure.
- Two new mounts, the Vicious War Wolf and the Vicious War Steed will be rewards for 75, 150, and 300 Rated Battlegrounds wins. They are even bind-to-account, so you can mail them off to your alts.
- Season 10's armor sets got a nice preview and are looking as ferocious as ever.
- Before a new PVP season begins, the previous one has to end. Check out how the transition happens and what players who are expecting rewards from season 9 should be cautious of while the results are being tallied.
- The War Games system got an overhaul and is back with patch 4.2.
- Ghostcrawler went all out, explaining each and every balance change, spelling out what it means to be a developer on a game this daunting. Phew. Good on you, crabs.
- Dave "Fargo" Kosak penned his first Dev Watercooler, discussing how patch 4.2 brings in a bunch of content for casual 85s and what Blizzard's philosophy relating to the casual player really is. We were excited to find out that Fargo is now the lead quest designer for World of Warcraft!
The news is already rolling out for the upcoming WoW Patch 4.2! Preview the new Firelands raid, marvel at the new legendary staff, and get the inside scoop on new quest hubs -- plus new Tier 12 armor!
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
DancePuppets Jun 25th 2011 8:45PM
Really worried about this patch now. I play a Disc/Holy priest and there is no spirit cloth available in the entire instance (except one randomly itemised head slot item), we can only gear up via VPs for those slots. So after a couple of weeks of successful raiding when all the other healers are sporting some off-set gear in their armour slots, giving them far greater throughput and increased mana regen, priests will at best be able to give more throughput with vastly reduced mana regen (so no "staying power" as it were) or the same throughput as T11 and the same level of mana regen both of which will be way behind the other healers.
dmrobertson2 Jun 25th 2011 8:52PM
Well if this isn't a shot over the bough that 4.2 is coming Tuesday, then I don't know what is.
One question though, if an Arcane MAge has Terecgosa Rest equipped and fires off an Arcane Blast does the copied blast cause an additional buff, or is the copied spell like your Mirror Images and not bound to your buffs?
Furydeath Jun 26th 2011 12:46AM
It only copies the damage nothing else so if your rank 3 AB crits for 90k it will do another 90k.
Amaxe Jun 25th 2011 8:52PM
"Glyph of Ferocious Bite has been redesigned. It now causes Ferocious Bite to heal the caster for 1% of maximum health for each 10 energy used."
vs.
"Glyph of Dark Succor has been redesigned. Rather than placing a 15% maximum health floor on Death Strike healing while in Frost or Unholy Presence, it causes the next Death Strike within 15 seconds after killing a foe that yields experience or Honor Points to heal for at least 20% of the death knight's maximum health (still requires Frost or Unholy Presence)."
Is there a smiley for a middle finger to Blizzard? Because I'd rather my DK had an effect similar to the druid rather than the Dark Suck-or one we're getting.
/sigh
dmrobertson2 Jun 25th 2011 8:55PM
Its pretty much in response to PVPing DK's. You can pretty much spam Deathstrike and not die, all while interlacing your interrupts in, there by making your victim neutered. The life gain was completely OP in most cases.
Amaxe Jun 25th 2011 9:40PM
Yes, but it really wrecked the class for us PvE players who like to go from one mob to the next without having to potion/eat.
dmrobertson2 Jun 25th 2011 10:34PM
Thats understandable. I just still have nightmares of getting "Night at The Roxbury"'d into oblivion by 2 Frost Dks in arena.
Artificial Jun 25th 2011 10:37PM
I already don't use the glyph. If this is "wrecked", I'd love to know what levels of ridiculous OP is required for the class to be playable?
Amaxe Jun 25th 2011 10:38PM
Yeah. Not being a PvPer (my latency is really bad so I die a lot), I don't really know how effective Death Strike could be if I tried it PvP with a low latency connection. So I tend to approach everything from the PvE approach.
Not trying to say that PvPers have no right to complain of course. just venting about changes I dislike
GhostWhoWalks Jun 26th 2011 1:17AM
Artificial, you apparently don't do heroics all that often, or if you do you're either lucky enough to avoid most of the AoEs mobs can throw out or you have a godly healer. Dark Succor was a godsend to PvE DPS Death Knights, since before we would have interrupt our rotations and spam 3 or 4 Death Strikes just to deal with incidental damage from enemy AoEs. 15% may have been a bit overpowered, but it could've easily been lowered to 12 or 10% and we still would've been fine. Changing Dark Succor to a weak Victory Rush is a nasty hit to our survivability during boss fights.
dumbguy Jun 27th 2011 10:09AM
Well, it's still spammable, right? We just have to deal with the 8% floor (which translates into 80 energy for that cat druid) that is baked into the baseline version of the spell.
I agree, it's still unfun for PvE.
scherbaddie Jun 27th 2011 12:40AM
And how do warriors, rogues, ret paladins and enhancement shamans deal with all this "incidental damage"? That's right, by avoiding it in the first place or interrupting their damage rotations to heal themselves! Welcome to melee dps!
Zach Jun 27th 2011 11:10AM
Recuperate, Word of Glory, and Greater Healing Wave from a maelstrom proc. Each only takes a singe GCD and heals more than a single Death Strike would.
Prissa Jun 26th 2011 12:45AM
"If a player wins a Need roll under the Need Before Greed system on a Bind on Equip item, the item will become Soulbound to that player. The item will remain unbound if won via a Greed roll."
...Did they just fix ninja rolls?
Ace Jun 26th 2011 12:50AM
Well, they made them less profitable/appealing anyway
Jack Spicer Jun 26th 2011 1:20AM
I hope that this applies to all items and not just equipment.
Prissa Jun 26th 2011 1:29AM
Well it's under the item section, and states 'item' in the bullet point, so one would assume it's not just equipment. Would have been good back when books of glyph mastery were in hot demand.
zenpunk Jun 26th 2011 10:27AM
Traps now scale with hunter stats such as.... expertise and spell penetration.