Patch 4.3: Tier 13 set bonus changes announced

Not entirely happy with the upcoming set bonuses for tier 13 in patch 4.3? It's all right, they're still in the process of being tweaked. Community Manager Zarhym just posted some changes that will be going into affect for both two-piece and four-piece T13 set bonuses for the druid, hunter, mage, paladin, priest, shaman, warlock and warrior classes.
- For feral druids, Pulverize now also grants your Bear Form Mangle critical strikes a 100% chance to trigger Savage Defense.
- For shadow priests, Shadow Word: Death deals an additional 55% damage, but it also reduces the damage you take from your own SW:D when the target fails to die by 95%.
- For DPS warriors, your Raging Blow and Mortal Strike abilities have a 13% chance to apply the Colossus Smash effect on your target for 6 seconds.
Follow after the break for the full list of changes.

Druid
Mage
Paladin
Priest
Warlock
Warrior
- Balance, 4P -- Reduces the cooldown of Starsurge by 5 sec.
- Feral, 2P -- Pulverize now also grants your Mangle (Bear) critical strikes a 100% chance to trigger Savage Defense, and your Blood in the Water talent now causes Ferocious Bite to refresh the duration of your Rip on targets with 60% or less health.
- Feral, 4P -- Frenzied Regeneration also affects all raid and party members. This effect cannot be triggered if you have been in Bear Form for less than 15 sec. In addition, your Stampede talent now grants two charges after using Feral Charge (Cat).
- 4P -- Your Arcane Shot ability has a chance to grant 30% haste to you and your pet for 10 sec.
Mage
- 2P -- Your Arcane Blast has a 100% chance, and your Fireball and Frostbolt spells have a 50% chance to grant Stolen Time, increasing your haste rating by 50 for 30 sec and stacking up to 10 times. When Arcane Power, Combustion, or Icy Veins expires, all stacks of Stolen Time are lost.
- 4P -- Each stack of Stolen Time also reduces the cooldown of Arcane Power by 7 sec, Combustion by 4 sec, and Icy Veins by 6 sec.
Paladin
- Protection, 2P -- Your Judgement ability now also grants a physical absorb shield equal to 25% of the damage it dealt.
- Retribution, 2P -- Your Judgement ability now also generates 1 Holy Power.
Priest
- Healer, 2P -- After using Power Infusion or Divine Hymn, the mana cost of your healing spells is reduced by 25% for [10|23] sec. (10 sec for Discipline, 23 for non-Discipline.)
- Healer, 4P -- Your Power Word: Shield has a 10% chance to absorb 100% additional damage and increase the mana granted by Rapture by 100%, and the duration of your Holy Word abilities is increased by 20%.
- Shadow, 2P -- Shadow Word: Death deals an additional 55% damage, and reduces the damage you take from your own Shadow Word: Death when the target fails to die by 95%.
- Elemental, 2P -- Elemental Mastery also grants you 2000 mastery rating 15 sec.
- Elemental, 4P -- Each time Elemental Overload triggers, you gain 250 haste rating for 4 sec, stacking up to 3 times.
Warlock
- 2P -- The duration of your Doomguard and Infernal summons is increased by [20|30] sec and the cooldown of of those spells is reduced by 4 min. (20 for Demonology, 30 for non-Demonology.)
- 4P -- Soulburn grants a 10% increase to your spell power for 10 sec, and Soul Fire cast with Soulburn active now grants a Soul Shard.
Warrior
- DPS, 4P -- Your Raging Blow and Mortal Strike abilities have a 13% chance to apply the Colossus Smash effect on your target for 6 sec.
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Reader Comments (Page 3 of 3)
Harvoc Sep 29th 2011 6:59PM
*Restoration Druid talent Malfurion's Gift
Cricket Sep 29th 2011 7:05PM
Not if you use the new 2point talent "heavenly voice", which reduces it down to a 3 min cd as well as bump the healing done by 100%, which makes it quite competitive as a raid cd. It's definitely a much better trigger spell than lightwell.
Boobah Sep 29th 2011 7:14PM
It's non-discipline because a shadow priest wearing the healer gear still gets the tier bonus.
Revnah Sep 29th 2011 7:26PM
Hmhm, I thought that was just something they were thinking about (the talent to reduce the DH cooldown), that's how I had understood that Dev Watercooler thing. I'm not on the PTR so I can't say - glad to hear it's apparently been implemented already!
I'd still say it's an imbalance. DH talented is going to be holy priests' great cooldown, comparable to disc's PW:B. We're not going to use that when we need mana, but when there's a lot of damage going on. Just sayin'... these bonuses just don't feel right, whatever way I turn them.
Mugutu Oct 3rd 2011 11:21AM
Yeah, good idea. Give the best mage spec with the nuke that has the lowest cast time the 100% chance. What the hell, Blizz.
Arcane doesn't even like haste that much.
Iglet Sep 29th 2011 7:16PM
"Arcane doesn't even like haste that much" and that is why I consider the 2p to be a slight nerf for arcane, while the 4p just makes the mana meta-game a little bit more interesting
That one Joey Sep 29th 2011 7:24PM
I would have liked the ramp up to be crit instead of haste...this just means we'll be running out of mana faster.
AngrySlob Sep 29th 2011 8:32PM
It seems a little unfair on Frost. If they don't make the proc chance for Frostbolt higher they should at least include Frostfire Bolt or Ice Lance or something.
I do really like the Mage set bonuses, I just don't think they are balanced right yet.
Noah Sep 29th 2011 9:15PM
Ohhhh Blizzard I LOVE that feral set bonus! Thank you SO MUCH!
Japith Sep 29th 2011 10:37PM
There went the secret reason to bring a bear and a cat along! Now the cat can't shift to bear for an extra 4pc raid heal "Bear Tranquility" because they have to be in bear form for 15 seconds. Blizzard caught us before we even got a chance to use it.
TonyKP Sep 30th 2011 9:46AM
The cat thing somehow hadn't occurred to them, and then when eeeeeeeeeevery blogger and columnist saw it within the first .001 seconds of reading the blue post and posted about it .002 seconds later someone at Bliz noticed and slapped the developers upside the head. There was no way that was going to go live short of a collective "shhhh, everyone be very quiet so they don't notice" effort from the entire fan base.
viciouspen Sep 30th 2011 1:49AM
At the site of the Ret paladin 2p bonus...I think I may weep at the beauty of it.
Sven Sep 30th 2011 2:21AM
I like that they have made the knives edge sharper for arcane mages for mana usage
Until now it has been kind of dull *ca tji*
however If it means that I will be using my long forgotten wand for a minute after each burn it is hardly more interesting
But honestly we do not know until we see the boss fights. Could be that we will be running so much around that it will be difficult to use any mana let alone getting the 10 stacks needed to max
maddy.ninja Sep 30th 2011 5:36AM
As a Holy Priest, I can't but rejoice! \^O^/
Healer, 2P -- After using Power Infusion or Divine Hymn, the mana cost of your healing spells is reduced by 25% for [10|23] sec. (10 sec for Discipline, 23 for non-Discipline.)
This is great. Lightwell is usually cast before battles, not after. :D
Healer, 4P -- Your Power Word: Shield has a 10% chance to absorb 100% additional damage and increase the mana granted by Rapture by 100%, and the duration of your Holy Word abilities is increased by 20%.
This is also good! Seeing as most fights require a lot of movement, incresing the duration is much better than lowering the cooldown, especially for Power Word: Sanctuary.
If you reading this (and even if you're not, since I can't post on US forums as a EU customer), THANK YOU VERY MUCH BLIZZARD GUY! :D *happy*
Othor_NL Sep 30th 2011 8:57AM
"2P -- The duration of your Doomguard and Infernal summons is increased by [20|30] sec and the cooldown of of those spells is reduced by 4 min. (20 for Demonology, 30 for non-Demonology.)"
So being specialized in controlling Demons means you get a shorter duration on your Demon?
Natsumi Sep 30th 2011 9:49AM
No, if you spec Demonology you get an additional 20 seconds for your DG/Infernal through Ancient Grimoire, so this still puts their demon out for 10 more seconds than anyone else.