Blizzard’s latest World of Warcraft Forever patch notes are here, and it’s a big week for the beta because the level cap is going up to 30, marking the highest we’ll be able to climb until the full launch of the reimagined MMORPG on November 4. Alongside this comes three more dungeons, newcomer Excavation Site: Wetlands (for the level 26-31 range) and returners Razorfen Downs and Uldaman. There is a pretty sharp dungeon XP nerf, however, along with plenty of class tuning balance changes to dig through, so let’s take a look.
Before we get to the class changes, let’s talk about the more general adjustments in this new World of Warcraft Forever update. As it continues to hone leveling speed, Blizzard has fairly sharply cut the XP granted from dungeon quests, which now reward 50% less extra experience beyond normal quest values. Other notable tweaks include white and green wands now selling for just one copper, and creatures only being able to be skinned a single time before their body disappears. Blizzard has also boosted rain visibility for its more extreme weather, and introduced barber shops to Darnassus and Thunder Bluff.
The wording of camping features has been changed to make it clearer what benefits are mutually exclusive, and the Boosted Rest debuff that limits how much rested XP you can stack up has been made more obvious. Campfires have also been made to hurt less. The Cooldown manager now supports Rogues and racial abilities, and should no longer show duplicate entries for each spell rank. On the character sheet, you’ll be told how downranking spells now gives them a reduced chance to activate class abilities and talents.
Moving into the balance changes, possibly the saddest news of the patch notes is that Undead can no longer use Cannibalize if the caster is immune to physical damage, which means the Undead Paladin dream of Bubbling yourself while you nosh on a fallen foe is no more. Gnomes, meanwhile, no longer gain any benefits to periodic effects from Eureka (Blizzard notes that “channeled spells do not count as periodics”). I’ll go through the class tuning alphabetically – sorry, Warriors, I promise these aren’t as long as last week.
Druids lose Tiger’s Fury, which will certainly hurt, but they do gain 75% increased Rage from critical strikes in Bear Form and Dire Bear Form, along with attack-power scaling for Swipe that was previously missing. All Shapeshift forms are now immune to Disarm, bringing it more in line with original WoW, although changing form will not remove such an effect if it’s already been applied beforehand, so you can still be weakened with good timing.
Feral Druids specifically lose King of the Jungle (in line with the Tiger’s Fury change), but do gain a new fourth-row talent. Shifting Power is for Cat Form, has a 16-second cooldown, and converts 55% of your base mana instantly into 40 energy. Its cost can be reduced by effects that make Shapeshifting cheaper. There’s a connected ‘Improved’ talent in row five, which reduces its cooldown by four and then eight seconds. Lastly, the threat generated by Primal Bite is “roughly doubled.”
Hunter gets some redesigned, “more vanilla feeling” icons for Improved Stings and Predator’s Edge. Marksmanship’s Sniper Shot now has a 45-yard range, and increases the range of your next three shots by ten yards for ten seconds. Survival’s Deflection now applies just half the parry bonus per level (up to a cap of 5% instead of 10%). Finally, Blizzard has brought back ‘aggressive mode’ for pets, and fixed a bug that could cause some pets to ‘forget’ their abilities.
All Mage spells from comprehension can no longer be cast while moving. For Fire Mages, Combustion’s charges go back down from four to three, Improved Scorch’s Fire Vulnerability will not roll a second time to check for a resist, and Hot Streak is now ‘Heating Up’ to reflect that it no longer uses a streak mechanic. Frost Mages, meanwhile, no longer roll to check resists on the Winter’s Chill talent “since the original spell needed to hit.”
Protection Paladin loses one-third of its block chance on Redoubt at all levels, maxing out at 20% instead of 30%, but the block chance on Holy Shield goes up from 20% to 30% to compensate. Retribution Paladins get a nerf to Champion of the Light, lowering the Intellect conversion to spell damage from 33/66/100% to 20/40/60%. Additionally, Blizzard has removed a tooltip wrongly asserting that Champion of the Light increases healing. “It did not.”
Priest’s Devouring Plague is now able to critically strike, and Shadow Word: Death will no longer erroneously benefit from Early Demise on targets above 20% health. Discipline Priest’s Inner Focus no longer benefits the critical strike of periodic effects, while Shadow Priests’ can no longer fail to apply Shadow Weaving. Rogues no longer lose all of their combo points if Expose Armor misses, but Subtletly specs now only get combo points from Setup if your target is the one you’re dodging or resisting a spell from.
Shaman’s Ghost Wolf has been made “more visible,” and bug fixes ensure Disease Cleansing Totem lasts five minutes and Totemic Recall restores mana correctly. Warlock’s Drain Soul will now be interrupted when casting another spell, and Hellfire can critically strike. Affliction Warlock’s Soul Harvesting is now just ‘Soul Harvest,’ and its incorrect mana regen increase has been fixed. Pets get ‘aggressive mode’ much like Hunters, and the Incubus has a new, lower-res model designed to better fit the look of Forever.
Warriors are the biggest talking point. Most importantly, they now generate 100% increased Rage when landing critical strikes, solving their biggest frustration. Rend and Sunder Armor now instantly tap enemies (tagging them as your target), which will help with leveling. However, queuing Heroic Strike no longer increases your off-hand hit chance. Arms Warrior won’t require a two-handed weapon for Spearing Strike any more, but instead needs Battle Stance.
Fury Warriors get a big balance pass, with no more off-hand rage generation increase from dual-wield specs. Blizzard has moved many talents around the tree “to give Fury more access to utility and meaningful choices early,” while freeing up points later to provide more flexibility. Among these you’ll find the new talents Lingering Rage, Furious Precision, and Gore Drinker, while Improved Cleave and Boundless Rage are gone. Finally, the attack-power ratio of Bloodthirst has been raised from 35% to 45%.
Rounding us out, Protection Warriors have also had a tree reorganization, aimed at giving non-shield users “a clear path to the middle” and allowing Protection to better serve as a secondary spec for PvP. The remainder of the patch notes run down a few more bug fixes, along with some known issues. The more pressing of these is that chaining spells together doesn’t play precast effects and sounds for the second until the first finishes, and enemies are able to parry or block from behind if you stand too close.
The most entertaining is that “Anduin Wrynn – and many other children – unintentionally have hats.” Blizzard’s in the process of taking these away, although personally I think they should keep it in as a random occurrence. Another nice touch is the inclusion of the Kyle’s Gone Missing quest, a special Make-A-Wish creation which was originally introduced during Burning Crusade.
The World of Warcraft Forever beta update is live now, raising the level cap to 30. We’ve still got about three more weeks of the test period to run, before those inevitably agonizing 14 days of downtime until the full release. Expect plenty more adjustments and balance changes in the meantime as Blizzard’s experimentation continues.