Posts with tag patch-6.0

With patch 5.4.8 we're seeing a new way to achieve an old goal - allow players to get further in established content while it remains the most recent content available. In essence, with this patch, we will be able to buy slightly increased ability to progress with valor points. This isn't new - it's what the item upgrade system has always been.

I've been thinking about the new item upgrades and the Deeds of Valor since they were announced. I haven't been able to play WoW as I'd like lately (health reasons) but one of the things that immediately came to mind when they announced Deeds of Valor was that this was an entirely new way to nerf raid content at the end of an expansion. Instead of a progressive buff to the players, or a progressive nerf to the bosses, we're seeing a mechanical way to spend valor points to gain the same ultimate aim. Making it possible to trade in your Timeless Coins for valor points is a good way for players who are flush from constant Timeless Isle grinding to convert them to something useful, and allowing players to upgrade items an additional 2 times (for a total of four upgrades) serves to nerf content without nerfing it. Everyone will be stronger, will hit harder, will have more mana for heals.

I have some opinions about this, of course. Others have already expressed theirs - and to be fair I accept the basic premise that these are quality of life changes that will cease to matter in patch 6.0. And I'm okay with that, because again, I see this primarily as a way to nerf Siege of Orgrimmar without actually doing so. It gives us another valor dump, of course. But with changes like Heart of the Valorous (which won't be live when 5.4.8 drops) it feels as if valor itself is being made into a progression mechanic.

Sometimes, it's best to let things speak for themselves.

@DaikatsuCTR @IamDunlock @DopaStatic @Celestalon In 6.0, Cloud Serpents no longer require Cloud Serpent Riding.

- Watcher (@WatcherDev) May 2, 2014

So there we have it -- in patch 6.0, you will be able to ride a Cloud Serpent without Cloud Serpent Riding, meaning that at last your alts will be able to mount up. This seems to contradict an earlier post, but it's not anything I'll be complaining about. Going back to Pandaria to get this seemed kind of odd considering Warlords is all about getting people to the new content as fast as they want, so I'm glad for this change.

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• Haste % and Crit % bonuses have been streamlined -- no more spell/melee/ranged, it's a universal Haste and Crit % bonus for all.
• Druids, rejoice -- Ravage no longer requires you to be behind the target.
• Many glyphs have been removed, and a lot of new glyphs have been added, with some glyphs now being exclusive to a specialization.
• Movement speed enchants now increase Movement Speed by 10% -- up from 8%.
• Hunters, there has been a comprehensive sweep over pet abilities -- it's a major list!
• Paladins, there have been some major tweaks to both Holy and Protection specs.

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We already knew that Warlords of Draenor would be revamping the game in a big way, but the first look at the 6.0 patch notes gives us a real sense of the scale of the changes that will be hitting us when the patch -- and the expansion -- goes live. It's no surprise that in 15,000 words of patch notes that there's a lot changes in the works. But even knowing that changes were coming, it was still a shock -- especially the skills removed.

But while there are skills I'll miss, what I won't miss is having bars packed with buttons. My screen is full of them, bars upon bars of skills, macros, and consumables I might need at any given time -- not to mention raid bars and other addons that take up screen space. So I'm all for any pruning that lets me stare at buttons less and focus on the game more. The real question is whether this pruning will really be the end of button bloat or if by the end of Warlords -- or the next expansion -- we'll be back to the same button problems we have today.

So, readers, what do you think? Are you for the removal of button bloat -- and do you think this will really fix it?

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If you have items you haven't upgraded yet, you should know that item upgrading is going away as of patch 6.0 - any items you have already upgraded will remain so, but you won't be able to upgrade any new items once the patch drops. So if you've been lax, like I have lately, it's time to get serious about your valor points and get everything upgraded before that time.

Honestly, I'm not really all that sad about losing valor upgrading - it lately felt like that was all you could do with the points anyway. So I won't miss it that much. It would be nice if they added something to do with valor points once 6.0 drops - I'm always a sucker for cosmetic items, hint hint.

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From the looks of the strings, the service will work similarly to the item restoration service -- in other words, it will likely have a cooldown period to prevent abuse. Keep in mind however that this is datamined information, and is in no way official -- we may never actually see it implemented when the expansion goes live. But hey, for now I'm going to look forward to the possibility that the paladin I viciously decided to cut might just make another appearance on my character list, some day.

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The Warlords of Draenor 6.0 patch notes brought many surprises, but one of the biggest is that professions will no longer provide bonuses that affect combat.

Amidst the endless sea of notes, it's easy to miss these two sentences that will forever change the role of professions in WoW:

Warlords of Draenor: Alpha Patch Notes

Some of our goals with Professions in Warlords of Draenor are to make them more of a personal choice, and less of a mandatory "min/max" selection. To that end, we're removing the direct combat benefits of Professions.

source

For many years, theorycrafters and min/max'ers have baked profession bonuses into their calculations. The crit from skinning, the Synapse Springs of engineers, the eye gems of jewelcrafters, the warmer wrists of leatherworkers, etc. -- all of them have affected which professions are "best" for certain specs.

In recent expansions we've seen Blizzard try to make the bonuses more or less even across specs, with mixed success. Now, all of these bonuses are headed to the chopping block in patch 6.0, at least in their current incarnations.

Maxed-out professions will no longer be essential for high-end PvE or PvP activities. We will no longer need to weigh our personal preference against possible combat advantages. In fact, players will be able to skip leveling professions at all, if they choose, without penalty to their character's performance. This strikes me as a good change.

Will professions only provide an economic advantage from 6.0 on? Or will they give us other bonuses, such as extra lesser charms, bonus pet battle XP, or faster garrison construction? Will Blizzard tweak the existing combat-related recipes to provide different bonuses? Or will the developers remove them entirely? Many questions remain to be answered as the alpha progresses!

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The first release of the Warlords of Draenor patch notes revealed that certain glyphs will be learned automatically during the leveling process. These glyphs, as stated by developer Celeston, are chosen largely based on their usefulness during the leveling process. They will also serve as a reminder that you even have the ability to use another glyph -- often, leveling characters aren't aware when they're able to use a glyph, or what a glyph is at all.

Currently, as mentioned in the patch notes, glyphs are usually acquired on the auction house. Since every player needs these glyphs, the glyph market is a cutthroat place where a player leveling fresh can run themselves broke even if they only buy the ones they need. This change isn't one that's friendly to scribes making a killing on the auction house, but it certainly is friendly to new characters. Keep in mind that not all glyphs will be learned automatically -- only the leveling essentials. You can refer to the patch notes to see which ones will be learned and when or follow along below.

• A new row of talents has been added for level 100, and Draenor Perks from levels 91-99.
• Racial traits have been rebalanced.
• All characters now learn a few important Major Glyphs as they level up.
• Garrisons, garrisons, garrisons!

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This past week the hosts of EU-based podcast Ready Check were lucky enough to go visit Blizzard's offices in Versailles, where they met up with Brian Holinka and Ion Hazzikostas for a lively round of Q&A. The podcast--with attendant full transcript, don't you worry, folks who can't play the podcast--covers a very broad range of topics, and PvPers should be particularly interested in the broad discussion about arenas. Gothiques and Athene bring up some wonderful points about arena queuing, and matching, and the little ways in which the system often results in unexpectedly wasted time, as well as the ways in which not-entirely-honest players can manipulate that system in their favor. Both Holinka and Hazzikostas have insights to offer on these problems, and there's some good back-and-forth about potential solutions and improvements to the existing arena systems.

In addition to the excellent PvP discussions, the interview features some talk of Warlords of Draenor and the future--some of which we've already heard about, but I am so excited for garrisons and a toys tab that I could listen to this stuff all day long. Do you know how many bag spaces I'm going to get back once that toys tab goes live? In the words of the Diablo Templar companion, it will be glorious! There's also some really fun discussion on the philosophy and practice of encounter and mechanics design, and how the WoW team goes about building raids and bosses. This was perhaps my favorite part of the interview, because I am a hopeless PvPer and am much more at home among WoW's raid bosses. In any case, no matter what part of the game you enjoy, there's something in this interview for you. You can check out the full transcript and podcast episode at Ready Check's own website, so make sure to click on over to the whole thing!

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Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done.

Last week, we covered the basic class changes of Warlords of Draenor. This week, we're taking a few common questions about those changes and combining them with new information. We'll be discussing the new secondary stats and how they affect tanks, examine the possible return of dual wield tanking, and consider death knight lore in the new expansion. Without further ado, let's get started.

Q: Could dual wield tanking come back with Warlords of Draenor? After all, your weapons hit more now that hit and expertise are gone.

No. Ghostcrawler clarified recently that the miss chance for dual wield weapons isn't going away. You will still miss with "white" hits, it's just that your special hits will never miss (at least, not because of your gear). This will be exacerbated by the fact that blood death knight special attacks will not hit with the off-hand. The reason dual wielding works for frost is that Threat of Thassarian exists. It does not exist for blood death knights, therefore blood death knight dual wielding is still inferior and likely will stay inferior in Warlords of Draenor. The only real advantage dual wield tanking has is that you might get more Bloodworms, but that is not enough to offset the losses.