World of Warcraft

There’s been quite a lot of buzz since the introduction of the arenas into Warcraft. Not only because it brings out a number of glaring balance issues with certain class combinations, but also because of the excellent gear that is now attainable through pvp alone. This post is meant to be a devil’s advocate post, and I’ll purposely not try to lean towards one side or the other. This shouldn’t be too difficult considering my love for both aspects of the game.

The animosity of the two sides of this argument stems quite a bit from those who prefer one style of play or another. On the one side you have players that never step in to the battlegrounds or arenas, and prefer to raid for their character’s equipment. They feel threatened and disappointed that a new avenue for progression has been opened that they do not prefer, and a number of players have left raiding guilds to pvp in the arenas instead. They claim that arena epics are far too easy to obtain because you can obtain an epic item within a few weeks, win or lose, while raiding is a lengthy, sometimes complicated process that involves quite a bit of managing people and taking orders. It also involves farming consumables and paying repair bills. PvP does not.

On the other hand you have players that never go into raid instances and feel the thrill of competing against other players trumps anything that a scripted computerized boss can dish out. They like the fluid, quick paced nature of player versus player combat and feel liberated now that raiding gear no longer dominates the pvp area of the game. In fact, raiding gear is now at a significant disadvantage because of the addition of a new stat, resilience. They also tend to have shorter attention spans, and prefer to spend an hour fighting in the arenas over 4 hours in a raiding dungeon.

There’s no clear answer to which side is right and which is wrong because most of the back and forth you see on the forums is simply a matter of opinion and biased passion for one side of the game or the other. Is the more easily attained pvp gear causing inflation of equipment too fast and will eventually lead for players to be bored quickly? Maybe. Does the current raiding system need to be modified to guarantee rewards and cut down on the amount of time it takes to complete? Perhaps.

In the end it all comes down to what you do for fun in game. I see a lot of interesting terms tossed around about how players “work” for X or “deserve” Y for their efforts, this isn’t really in the spirit of the game. Ideally, games like warcraft are meant as a fun distraction, an interesting use of your leisure time, not a second job for pvping or raiding.

Enjoy the weekend!

Unfortunately for most of us, gamers are often depicted stereotypically as lazy nerds that play at their computer desks loaded with cheetos and Mountain Dew. The last thing you want do for your own sake is replicate this stereotype. Even if you enjoy gaming and you will be sitting down for a raid for hours at a time there is always something you can be doing to keep yourself in shape, especially while raiding where there will invariably be downtime.

Don’t believe me? Click here!

Personally I hit the gym 3 times a week to do strength training and cardio 6 days a week, but still have plenty of time to do things like say, warcraft. You don’t have to be a gym rat to stay in shape, you just have to tailor your diet appropriately and get moderate exercise. Start out light, get into a routine you can handle, and you can always work your way up from there.

Good luck!

When it comes to the new the new daily quests which involve exploring the various Outland dungeons, it’s important to take into account a number of things. Firstly, I don’t know about you, but I don’t really have the time to do an instance run every single day, and I certainly don’t have time to do a heroic and a regular dungeon run. With this in mind, here are some things to consider:

1. Pick a dungeon you like

I never really understood the concept of “grinding” or “farming.” If I enjoy an activity within the game I’m more than happy to do it. Want to send me through Heroic Ramparts? You got it! I’m there! I like the dungeon’s layout, battles, items, etc. Don’t go to a dungeon that you detest simply because you have the quest there. Personally I hate shadow lab, I’m never going there again…ever. Don’t drag yourself through a dungeon for the sake of your daily quest. It’s just not worth it.

2. Bring Friends

Do you know how much more fun a heroic dungeon run is when you have your relatives/friends to share the experience with? Maybe the proverbial **** hit the fan and you just barely made it out alive while the healer, tank, and rogue are all dead, and then you dance while everyones face floor in the dirt. Everyone laughs and has a good time. Loot also gets distributed without any hassles, and the synergy of the group means a fast, fun run. Don’t PUG unless you have to. Trust me.

3. Non-Heroics are OK too!

I’m not sure why, but a lot of players seem to shy away from doing “regular” instances. Perhaps they are simply too l33t to step inside lesser dungeons, or there’s simply no gear in it for them so they refuse to go flat out. Me? I’ll take a dungeon I like in regular mode every day of the week and twice on Sunday over a Heroic Dungeon I hate. Regular mode dungeons are also much more PUG friendly, so if you’re going that route consider this daily instead.

Instances are just one of the many options that Warcraft has to offer, keep in mind that you’re in the game to have fun, not “grind” out shiny pixels.

Enjoy!

I think it’s always interesting reading articles about professional gamers, or at the very least opportunities to make money through gaming. While in 99% of games I don’t consider myself “hardcore” enough to stand a chance, I’m happy to present said opportunities to you! Maybe you are as good as you think you are…and that could lead to 100 thousand smackers in your pocket (before taxes, thanks Uncle Sam).

How to do it?

There’s the World Championship for the WoW trading card game due up from November 30th through December 2nd. There, you’ll compete with the best in the world for one of the larger payouts out there for gamers. I think it’d be an interesting event to go to regardless!

Good luck guys, I’m rooting for you!

If you’ve ever fought in the battlegrounds of Warcraft like Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, or most notoriously Alterac Valley, you probably understand the problem of AFK players. Rather than fight and participate in the battle, you’ll often see these players hanging out by the graveyard or starting point. Here they’ll sit, from the very beginning of the match to the end, hoping to leech a small amount of honor from your team (which probably lost because they lacked the teammates).

It’s a frowned upon tactic that I personally don’t understand. If you don’t enjoy fighting other players, why pvp at all? The gear acquired is really only good for PvP, so I’m not entirely sure what the motivation is. Regardless Blizzard has taken steps to nip this problem in the bud, so to speak. They’ve implemented a reporting system, where players can report AFKers. This gives the player a debuff which stops any honor gained until they get back into combat. Sometimes this works, other times the afker realizes what happened, runs off to get killed, and then plops back at the graveyard/entry point again.

What can you do to stop it? Currently not very much, except try your best and fight on if your team is losing rather than plop yourself at the graveyard and do nothing.

There’s also a UI addon you can use to automatically report AFKers. This can be found here.

Now that patch 2.3 is live and running, players are already itching to hear what is on the horizon. One of the newest changes to be slated for the next patch involves a key talent for mages of the frost persuasion: iceblock. Eyonix, a community monitor for blizzard, gave us some more insight into the upcoming changes and how it will affect the class:

” There are a few nice improvements we’re making to the mage class in patch 2.3.2 (a small patch that will be on the public test realms soon) and we wanted to share them with you. First, we’ll start out with two changes affecting all mages. Ice block will become a core ability, trainable by all mages at level 30. Additionally, conjure mana (rank 6) will restore 1800-3000 mana and will now have three charges, meaning you can use it three times before having to create a new one.

To be sure we’re clear here, yes, the same cooldown will still apply between usages.

Cold snap will be moved to Ice block’s position in the talent tree and its cooldown will be reduced. As a side note, it will no longer reset the cooldown on fire ward. Moving in to Cold snap’s spot will be a brand new ability called Icy Veins. This new ability will decrease casting time for all spells by 20% and increases the chance that chilling effects freeze the target by 25%. It’s an active ability, lasting 20 seconds and has a 3 minute cooldown. ”

Sounds pretty nice to me, and not just for frost mages! From what I’ve researched so far, fire mages that pick up icy veins will see a 2-3% increase in damage. Hardly gamebreaking, but a welcome change I’m sure.

-Xias

When it comes to MMOs, one of the more fascinating aspects of the game is the ability to create characters of various classes. While we tend to get attached to our first choice (aka our “main” character that we usually play), sometimes you just want to see what other choices different classes can offer. Warcraft gives you a number of distinctly different classes that usually perform one or many of the following roles: Healing, Tanking, DPSing. There are other factors to consider like crowd control, but those are the 3 main things to focus on.

So, how to decide?

Typically you are going to want a change of pace from your main character’s role. Are you tired of laying down the up-front pain on your mage? Perhaps you should try the slow agonizing death inflicted by warlocks. Being DPS and low on the demand totem poll getting old? Time to see what it’s like being the support that keeps everyone alive and kicking as a priest. Regardless, here are some tips to help you make your choice:

Well for the first time since the patch I was able to enter the gates of Zul’Aman and see for myself what was really going on in there. So far I must say I’m impressed, especially with the starting area. Graveyard placement, flight points right near the entrance, and the meeting stone there to summon your comrades as well was a breath of fresh air. We were able to leave Karazahn, fly there, get the flight point, and summon everyone and were ready to go within 10-15 minutes.

The area leading up to ZA is interesting, and in stark contrast to the typical rigid, militaristic assault outposts setup by the various factions. Rather, we were met with a ragtag group of ruffians and criminals set to stake their claim to the city’s treasures. This reminded be quite from a historical perspective of exploration groups such as The Donner Party who left for the frontier seeking their claim to fame ill-equipped and full of hope rather than experience.

The Trolls waste no time in realizing your intrusion, and you are immediately ambushed at the gates by a number of elite and non-elite soldiers. I thought the atmosphere, music, and armored look of the trolls made for an awe-inspiring instance. The bear mounts in particular are fierce fighters and very cool to see in action (shame they aren’t tameable!). I’ve only been up to the first official boss of the place, but the experience made me eager to return the following week. More details as I progress, but be sure to check the place out if given the chance!

There’s quite a bit of buzzing on the wow forums today about changes that were made to how the server/client interaction is handled when using abilities (melee abilities especially). What does this mean for you? Read on!

Here’s an excerpt from a forum post describing the issue:

“Imagine you are a mage, you see a monster! You press your frostbolt button to attack it well… OK now first the game has to run a series of checks to make sure you can actually cast this spell. It does these checks first from the client side (that means your computer) For example…

1) are you in range able to cast this spell?

2) is the spell on any sort of cooldown (global cooldown included)?

3) meet the requirements of the spell (i.e. have enough mana, aren’t currently silenced blah blah)?”

This was changed to the following:

“Basically, Blizzard intentionally changed server-side checks in conjunction with global cooldowns in the last PTR update. The game now checks server-side if all the requirements are met to perform an ability. So, for example, to use Overpower, the server checks:

-You are in melee range
-You are facing the opponent
-You have enough rage
-They dodged

After the server verifies all of this, then it sends the message back to your client to perform the action. If however, you fail a check, you have to wait for the server to acknowledge that. But the crippling part here is that the server automatically starts your global cooldown for the ability when you hit the key before it performs the checks. Meaning, it starts the GCD, then verifies if you can do it, and if you can’t, interrupts the GCD for you.”

If you don’t feel like reading through that technical mumbojumbo, here’s the skinny. If you are out of range when attacking a monster or player, you’ll trigger your usual 1.5 second cooldown.

Until this issue is resolved or confirmed, only use abilities that you know you are in range for. Don’t mash buttons, hit them once when you get in range.

Good luck!

Well it looks like the day has finally come! I’ll be sure to change this if something goes horribly wrong and the patch doesn’t end up being released, but as it stands we are headed that way!

Here’s the list of live changes for you!

World of Warcraft Client Patch 2.3.0

The latest patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/

The Gods of Zul’Aman

The stronghold of Zul’Aman has stood for millennia as the Amani trolls’ seat of power and bastion of the fearless, cunning warlord Zul’jin.

Zul’jin has spent several years plotting behind Zul’Aman’s walls. Furious at the Horde for allowing his hated enemies, the blood elves, to join its ranks, he eagerly embraced a scheme that the witch doctor Malacrass recently proposed: to seal the power of the animal gods within the bodies of the Amani’s strongest warriors.

Now Zul’Aman’s army grows more powerful by the day, hungry to exact vengeance in the name of its fearless leader, Zul’jin.

Guild Banks Introduced

* The Guild Bank is a shared repository for an entire guild and will be accessible through Guild Vault objects near existing banks. The Guild Bank will allow players with the appropriate permissions to store items and money for use by the rest of the guild. Permissions to withdraw and deposit money and items are controlled by the guild leader through the guild controls menu. The Guild Bank is divided up into separate tabs so that the guild leader may restrict access or group items into distinct categories.

• Up to 6 purchasable tabs each containing 98 item slots
• Permissions to view/deposit/withdraw per tab
• You may use your Guild Bank withdraw limits to pay for item repairs (now enabled on all merchants)
• Transaction logs of the last 25 actions within each tab, as well as money activity.

Dustwallow Marsh

* Dustwallow Marsh has seen many improvements with the addition of over 50 new quests and a new neutral goblin town called Mudsprocket located in the southern part of the zone. There is also a small quest hub featuring a crashed goblin zeppelin, to the east of Tabetha’s hut.

Leveling Improvements

* Many leveling improvements have been made for the old world.

• The amount of experience needed to gain a level has been decreased between levels 20 and 60. In addition, the amount of experience granted by quests has been increased between levels 30 and 60.
• Level 1-60 dungeon quests have had their experience and faction rewards increased.
• Many elite creatures and quests in the level 1-60 experience have been changed to accommodate solo play.

General

* The latest patch of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade shows a benefit on today’s popular multicore processors like the Intel(r) Core(tm)2 Duo processor family. The enhanced patch has demonstrated higher frame rates by spreading the work across both processor cores.
* Zul’Aman is a 10-player, level 70 outdoor instance located in the Ghostlands. Players will be able to confront six new bosses including the Forest Troll Warlord Zul’jin.
* Guild Banks have been introduced. The Guild Bank will allow players with the appropriate permissions to store items and money for use by the rest of the guild.
* Experience: The amount of experience needed to gain a level has been decreased between levels 20 and 60. In addition, the amount of experience granted by quests has been increased between levels 30 and 60.
* All items have had their bonuses to Weapon Skill Rating converted to a new stat called Weapon Expertise Rating. Each point of Weapon Expertise reduces the chance for your attacks to be dodged or parried by .25%.
* Healing reduction effects will now affect all health drain spells and abilities (e.g. Mortal Strike will reduce health gained from Drain Life).
* Healing: Almost all items and enchantments that provide bonus healing now also provide a smaller number (approximately 1/3) of bonus spell damage. There are a few items and enchantments where this was not possible, such as random-stat items and Zul’Gurub enchantments, but this is now the case on virtually all other items.
* On Kill Effects: Items and abilities that trigger on killing an enemy will no longer trigger on using an ability that kills your pet.
* Weapon Skill: All items and abilities that granted weapon skill have been changed. In most cases, they were converted to expertise or expertise rating. Ranged attacks do not benefit from expertise, so ranged weapon skill has generally been replaced by critical strike bonuses or hit bonuses. In a few cases, talents have been changed to other effects to avoid granting players excessive amounts of expertise.
* A new flight path has been added to the Rebel Camp in northern Stranglethorn Vale.
* Flying units can see ground units and vice versa at any altitude.
* Players no longer gain the moving AOE radius bonus if they are jumping.
* Client spell cast requests are now sent to the server even if your player is already casting another spell. This eliminates the need for /stopcasting in macros to compensate for latency.
* Vendor Discounts: All vendors with an associate faction now give discounts at all levels above neutral.

• Friendly: 5% discount
• Honored: 10% discount
• Revered: 15% discount
• Exalted: 20% discount
• Quest givers who have available daily quests will have a blue exclamation point instead of a yellow one.

* Pets will try to get behind their targets when engaging in melee combat.
* You can now obtain a tiny Sporebat pet with exalted Sporeggar faction.
* An Azure Whelp pet now drops from the blue dragonkin in Azshara.
* If you are seated and try to use abilities that require you to be standing, you will stand up and use them. This can be disabled with: /console autoStand 0 .
* Racial Abilities

• Dwarf: Gun Specialization now increases chance to critically hit with Guns by 1% rather than increasing weapon skill.
• Gnome: Escape Artist cooldown increased to 1 min, 45 sec.
• Humans: Mace Skill now increases the critical strike chance with maces and two-handed maces by 1%.
• Humans: Sword Skill now increases the critical strike chance with swords and two-handed swords by 1%.
• Orcs: Axe Skill now increases the critical strike chance with axes and two-handed axes by 1%.
• Troll: Bow and Thrown Specialization now increases chance to critically hit with those weapons by 1% rather than increasing weapon skill.

PvP

* Arenas

• The top ranked team of each battlegroup for each format will receive a new unique title for the end of Season 2 called “Merciless Gladiator”.

* Battlegrounds

• Daily quests have been added targeting a random battleground for that day. Look for Alliance Brigadier Generals and Horde Warbringers near your faction’s battlemasters in all major capitals.
• Dropping the Flag in a battleground will now result in a debuff that will not allow you to pick up the flag again for 3 seconds.
• Druids who are shapeshifted when they receive the Restoration buff from battlegrounds will now correctly regenerate mana.
• Players will now be able to cast spells for free in the Battleground before it begins.
• Players will now be able to cast spells for free for a few seconds after being resurrected by a Spirit Guide in the Battleground.
• Alterac Valley

+ Additional Warmasters no longer report for duty upon destroying an enemy tower. However, destroying an enemy tower still eliminates the associated opposing Warmaster.
+ All Warmasters are linked to each other and their respective Generals and can no longer be pulled individually.
+ Honor from capturing towers has been increased.
+ All Commanders and Lieutenants have left Alterac Valley in search for other battle opportunities.
+ Players will no longer be sent to their starting tunnels on death unless that team controls no graveyards in the battleground.
+ Many NPCs in Stormpike and Frostwolf holds are no longer elite
+ Bonus Honor in Alterac Valley is now only awarded during the battle for destroying enemy towers and slaying the enemy Captain. Upon conclusion of the battle, bonus honor is also awarded for intact towers, a surviving Captain, and for victory in the battle. The total bonus honor awarded should be similar to the previous total.
+ The Horde and Alliance now have a limited number of reinforcements available in the battle for Alterac Valley. The number of reinforcements available is reduced upon player death, loss of towers, and death of Captain Galvangar or Balinda Stonehearth. In addition, all available reinforcements are lost upon the death of General Drek’Thar or Vanndar Stormpike. If a team is reduced to zero reinforcements, the opposing team wins the battle.
+ Towers and Graveyards in Alterac Valley are now captured in 4 minutes (down from 5).

• Eye of the Storm

+ The points awarded from capturing the flag in Eye of the Storm is now increase based on the number of bases the capturing team owns.

• Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, Eye of the Storm

+ Additional bonus honor is now awarded upon conclusion of the battle.

Druids

* Barkskin: It is no longer possible to cast this spell while Cycloned.
* Challenging Roar: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its targets is now increased by hit rating.
* Cure Poison and Abolish Poison are now usable in Tree of Life Form.
* Cure Poison, Abolish Poison and Remove Curse range increased to 40 yards.
* Entangling Roots: It is no longer possible for multiple Druids to have Entangling Roots on the same target. In addition, it will now always be removed correctly if multiple Druids overwrite each other’s Entangling Roots.
* Entangling Roots: This ability will no longer be overwritten when the new Entangling Roots would do less damage.
* Feral Attack Power: Items that granted bonus attack power in Cat, Bear, Dire Bear, and Moonkin forms have been re-evaluated. In almost all cases, the attack power on the item has been increased. This change corrects an issue where feral weapon damage was not keeping up with other classes in its rate of increase.
* Feral Charge: It is now possible for the interrupt and root effects from this ability to be resisted separately.
* Force of Nature: This ability will no longer automatically break stealth on victims in its casting area. Nearby stealthed characters may still be attacked if they are too close to the summoned Treants.
* Growl: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its target is now increased by hit rating.
* Heart of the Wild: This talent no longer provides 4/8/12/16/20% bonus Strength in Cat Form. Instead it provides 2/4/6/8/10% bonus attack power.
* Hibernate: This spell will now always be removed correctly if multiple Druids overwrite each other’s Hibernate.
* Intensity (Restoration) increased to 10/20/30% mana regeneration.
* Natural Perfection (Restoration) - Now also grants the Natural Perfection effect after being critically hit, reducing all damage taken by 1/3/5% for 8 seconds. Stacks up to 3 times.
* Natural Perfection: This talent can now trigger while the Druid is sitting.
* Primal Fury: This talent will now be learned correctly even if purchased while the Druid is dead.
* Rebirth cooldown reduced to 20 minutes, from 30 minutes.
* Remove Curse is now usable in Moonkin Form.
* Shapeshifting Spells: Some of these spells were causing additional unintended threat. That additional unintended threat has been removed.
* Soothe Animal: This spell now properly consumes Nature’s Swiftness.
* Tranquility now gains additional benefit from spell damage and healing bonuses.
* Tree of Life: It is no longer possible to have the bonus healing aura from this ability while not actually in Tree of Life Form.
* If you are in a shapeshift form and try to use an ability that may only be used in caster form, you will leave the form and use that ability. This means that you can shift from one form to another in one action. If you don’t have mana to shift form, you will get an error message and remain in your current form. This can be disabled with /console autoUnshift 0

Hunters

* Aimed Shot (Marksmanship) now reduces healing done to that target by 50% for 10 seconds, shot time reduced by 0.5 seconds.
* Arcane Shot (Ranks 6 and above) now dispel 1 Magic effect in addition to their normal damage.
* Explosive Trap: The initial damage dealt by this trap is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power.
* Expose Weakness: The triggered effect from this talent will no longer use up charges of Misdirection.
* Immolation Trap: The total damage dealt by this trap is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power.
* Misdirection: This spell will now always be removed correctly if multiple Hunters overwrite each other’s Misdirection.
* Misdirection: If a Hunter attempts to use this ability on a target which already has an active Misdirection, the spell will fail to apply due to a more powerful spell already being in effect. This will not trigger the cooldown or cost any mana.
* Readiness: This talent now finishes the cooldown on Kill Command.
* Serpent Sting, Immolation Trap and Explosive Trap all gain additional damage based on ranged attack power.
* Serpent Sting: The total damage dealt by this sting is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power.
* Steady Shot: Tooltip clarified to indicate base weapon damage is used in the damage calculation.
* Trueshot Aura (Marksmanship) no longer costs mana to cast and will last until cancelled.
* Wyvern Sting (Survival) is now instant cast and has a maximum duration of 10 seconds in PvP.
* Wyvern Sting: This ability will no longer be overwritten by lower ranks of Wyvern Sting.

Mages

* Arcane Intellect and Arcane Brilliance mana costs reduced.
* Arcane Meditation (Arcane) increased to 10/20/30% mana regeneration.
* Arcane Missiles: Players will no longer get strange error messages when casting this spell at evading targets. The spell will simply fail.
* Detect Magic removed. All players may now see their target’s beneficial effects at all times.
* Evocation now regenerates 15% of total mana every 2 seconds rather than increase Spirit based regeneration.
* Fire Ward and Frost Ward now gain additional benefit from spell damage bonuses. Base absorb values of ranks 5 and 6 have been reduced.
* Ice Barrier now gains additional benefit from spell damage bonuses. Base absorb values of ranks 5 and 6 have been reduced.
* Ignite: This talent is no lingered triggered by damage dealt by Molten Armor.
* Improved Fireball: The reduction in damage coefficient caused by this talent has been removed.
* Improved Frostbolt: The reduction in damage coefficient caused by this talent has been removed.
* Polymorph: It is no longer possible to polymorph a player and have that player remain mounted. In addition, it will now always be removed correctly if multiple Mages overwrite each other’s Polymorph.
* Portal Spells: Portal spells to capital cities can no longer be cast in battlegrounds.
* Remove Curse range increased to 40 yards.
* (NEW SPELL) Ritual of Refreshment available on trainers at level 70.
* Spellsteal: It is no longer possible via this spell to get two Forbearance debuffs at the same time.

Paladins

* Blessing of Light: Lower ranks of Flash of Light and Holy Light are now properly penalized when used with this Blessing.
* Cleanse and Purify range increased to 40 yards.
* Crusader Strike (Retribution) cooldown reduced from 10 to 6 seconds.
* Divine Favor: When this ability is cast immediately after a critical heal, it will no longer be removed incorrectly.
* Exorcism mana cost reduced.
* Fanaticism (Retribution) now also reduces threat caused by all actions by 6/12/18/24/30%.
* Hammer of Wrath mana cost reduced.
* Holy Wrath mana cost reduced.
* Improved Seal of the Crusader (Retribution) benefits folded into the base spell. This talent now gives the benefits of the Sanctified Crusader talent instead.
* Judgement of Light: The combat log will now show the health gained from rank 5 of this ability as Judgement of Light instead of Seal of Light.
* Judgement of Wisdom: It is no longer possible for the mana energize effect to trigger off of reapplication of the Judgement of Wisdom.
* Paladin seals no longer have a low chance to be dispelled if you have 3 points in Sanctified Seals.
* Precision (Protection) now increases spell hit chance as well.
* Pursuit of Justice (Retribution) is now 3 ranks and increases movement speed by 5/10/15% and also reduces the chance you’ll be hit by spells by 1/2/3%.
* Righteous Defense: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its targets is now increased by hit rating.
* Sanctified Crusader (Retribution) renamed Sanctified Seals, which now increases your chance to critically hit with all spells and melee attacks by 1/2/3% and reduces the chance your Seals will be dispelled by 33/66/100%.
* Seal of Vengeance: The bonus damage this ability dealt when the debuff is fully stacked on the target was incorrectly too low. It is now increased.
* Spiritual Attunement: This ability will now gain mana properly from Vampiric Embrace heals.
* Vengeance (Retribution) duration increased from 15 to 30 seconds.
* Vindication (Retribution) frequency and duration increased and now reduces all attributes by 5/10/15%, not just Strength and Agility.
* Weapon Expertise (Protection) renamed Combat Expertise, now increases expertise by 1/2/3/4/5 and total Stamina by 2/4/6/8/10%.

Priests

* Blessed Recovery: This talent can now trigger while the Priest is sitting.
* Blessed Resilience: This talent can now trigger while the Priest is sitting.
* Chastise (NEW) is now available to Dwarf and Draenei priests at level 20. Chastise causes Holy damage and incapacitates the target for 2 seconds.
* Circle of Healing: The base amount of healing from this spell has been reduced along with increasing the bonus it receives from bonus healing effects. Characters with more than 1338 healing will see their Circle of Healing heal for more than previous patches. Characters with less than 1338 healing will see their Circle of Healing heal for less.
* Cure Disease and Abolish Disease range increased to 40 yards.
* Divine Spirit: It is no longer possible for a target to simultaneously have Divine Spirit rank 5 and Prayer of Spirit Rank 1 icons showing at the same time.
* Elune’s Grace (Night Elf) effect changed to reduce chance to be hit by melee and ranged attacks by 20% for 15 seconds. There is now only 1 rank of the spell.
* Fear Ward is now available to all priests at level 20. Duration reduced to 3 minutes, cooldown increased to 3 minutes.
* Fixed a bug where the global cooldown was triggered when shifting out of Shadowform.
* Focused Will (NEW Discipline Talent) - After taking a critical hit you gain the Focused Will effect, reducing all damage taken by 1/3/5% and increasing healing effects on you by 4/7/10% for 8 seconds. Stacks up to 3 times.
* Holy Fire: The tooltip on rank 4 has been adjusted.
* Inner Focus will now properly affect Lightwell Rank 4
* Inner Focus: This effect is now properly consumed by casting Mind Soothe.
* Meditation (Discipline) increased to 10/20/30% mana regeneration.
* Mind Soothe: This spell will now consume Inner Focus.
* Mind Vision: Now consumes the Inner Focus buff when cast.
* Pain Suppression (Discipline Talent) is now usable on friendly targets, instantly reduces the target’s threat by 5%, reduces damage taken by 40% and its cooldown has been reduced to 2 minutes.
* Prayer of Healing, Circle of Healing and Holy Nova (healing effect) now gain additional benefit from spell damage and healing bonuses.
* Prayer of Mending: This ability will no longer be overwritten when the new Prayer of Mending would do less healing.
* Power Word: Fortitude, Divine Spirit, Prayer of Fortitude and Prayer of Spirit mana costs reduced.
* Power Word: Shield now gains additional benefit from spell damage and healing bonuses. Base absorb values of ranks 10, 11 and 12 have been reduced.
* Shackle Undead: This spell will now always be removed correctly if multiple Priests overwrite each other’s Shackle Undead.
* Shadow Word: Death: Resilience no longer reduces the backlash damage from this spell.
* Starshards (Night Elf) is no longer channeled, costs 0 mana, is now a Magic effect, lasts 15 seconds, causes damage every 3 seconds and has a 30 second cooldown.
* Starshards: The damage per tick of this ability no longer changes during the duration of the effect.
* If you are in Shadowform and try to use an ability that my not be used in Shadowform, you will leave Shadowform and use that ability. This can be disabled with /console autoUnshift 0
* Silent resolve: This talent now benefits the triggered buffs from Blessed Resilience, Blessed Recovery, and Martyrdom.

Rogues

* All poisons will now enchant the weapon for 1 hour, increased from 30 minutes.
* Blade Flurry: This ability now works correctly in all cases with shielded targets.
* Blind is now a physical (no longer a poison) attack. Reagent requirement removed. Now shares the same diminish category as Cyclone and is now diminished in PvE as well as PvP.
* Cheat Death (Subtlety) chance to trigger increased to 33/66/100% and now also causes the rogue to take 90% less damage for 3 seconds when the effect triggers. This effect cannot occur more than once per minute.
* Cold Blood: Fixed an issue where this buff was sometimes getting removed when an attack missed.
* Dirty Deeds now also increases special ability damage against enemies below 35% health.
* Dirty Deeds: This talent will no longer interfere with getting the bonus damage from the Druid ability Mangle on Rupture and Garrote.
* Fleet Footed (Assassination) now increases movement speed by 8/15%.
* Hemorrhage: This ability now does 125% of weapon damage.
* Kick: Interrupting a channeled spell with this ability will now always properly prevent casting spells from the same spell school for 5 sec.
* Precision: This talent now also applies to ranged weapons.
* Remorseless Attacks: This talent can no longer be triggered by the death of a rogue’s target dummy or other pet.
* Riposte is now subject to diminishing returns in PvP.
* Rogue’s Deadly Throw missile speed increased significantly and snare duration increased slightly.
* Ruthlessness now only affects melee finishing moves. It no longer works with Deadly Throw.
* Sap: Multiple Saps placed by multiple Rogues will now be handled correctly in all cases.
* Shadowstep (Subtlety) can now be used at any time, not only while stealthed. Now increases the damage and reduces the threat caused by the next damaging ability. Cooldown increased to 30 seconds. Range changed to 25 yards.
* If you are in Stealth and try to use an ability that may not be used while stealthed, you will leave stealth and use that ability. This can be disabled with /console autoUnshift 0

Shaman

* Chain Heal: The tooltips on ranks 1-3 have been adjusted.
* Chain Lightning cast time reduced to 2.0 (from 2.5), mana costs reduced, benefit from spell damage reduced appropriately.
* Cure Poison and Cure Disease range increased to 40 yards.
* Earth Shield: This spell will now always be removed correctly if multiple Shaman overwrite each other’s Earth Shield.
* Earth Shield: This ability will no longer be overwritten when the new Earth Shield would do less healing.
* Earth Shock: Interrupting a channeled spell with this spell will now always properly prevent casting spells from the same spell school for 2 sec.
* Elemental Focus (Elemental) now reduces the mana cost of the next 2 damage spells by 40%.
* Elemental Mastery: It is no longer possible to get two consecutive guaranteed critical strikes from using this ability.
* Eye of the Storm: This talent can now trigger while the Shaman is sitting.
* Frost Shock is no longer subject to diminishing returns.
* Grounding Totem: This totem is now destroyed upon redirecting any spell to itself.
* Lightning Bolt cast time reduced to 2.5 (from 3.0 where applicable), mana costs reduced, benefit from spell damage reduced appropriately.
* Lightning Mastery (Elemental) cast time reduction reduced to .1/.2/.3/.4/.5 seconds.
* Lightning Overload (Elemental) now has a 4/8/12/16/20% chance to occur and the additional spell causes half damage and no additional threat.
* Mana Spring Totem effect increased.
* Mental Quickness (Enhancement) now also increases spell damage and healing equal to 10/20/30% of your attack power.
* Two-Handed Axes and Two-Handed Maces are now trainable by all Shaman at the appropriate weapon masters. The Enhancement talent has been replaced by Shamanistic Focus.
* Shamanistic Focus (New Enhancement Talent): After landing a melee critical strike, you enter a Focused state. The Focused state reduces the mana cost of your next Shock spell by 60%.
* Shamanistic Rage (Enhancement) now also reduces all damage taken by 30% for the duration.
* Spirit Weapons (Enhancement) threat reduction increased to 30% from 15%.
* Rockbiter Weapon: For ranks 4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 the increased damage resulting from this enchantment has been reduced slightly to match the intended numbers given in the tooltip. Ranks 1, 2, 3, and 9 are unchanged.
* Water Shield: This spell no longer costs any mana to cast and its duration has been shortened. At the end of its duration, it now grants mana for any remaining globes. In addition, the mana granted per globe has been substantially increased.
* Windfury Weapon: This enchantment can no longer be triggered while you are disarmed.

Warlock

* Banish can no longer be cast on targets tapped by other players or groups.
* Conflagrate: The Immolate debuff will now always be removed correctly when this spell is cast.
* Drain Life and Siphon Life now reduce the amount healed when the warlock is affected by healing reducing effects (e.g. Mortal Strike, Wounding Poison).
* Hellfire: This spell will no longer cause enemy spells to increase casting time or reduce channel time. It will also no longer prevent flag captures in Battlegrounds.
* Nether Protection (Destruction) now has a new, more distinct visual effect.
* Ritual of Souls now takes significantly less time to cast and complete.
* Seed of Corruption detonation will now obey line of sight.
* Shadow Embrace: This talent’s effect can no longer trigger other effects.
* Shadow Ward: This spell now gains additional benefit from spell damage bonuses. Base absorb value of rank 4 has been reduced.
* Soul Siphon (Affliction) now increases damage by 2/4% and no longer affects Drain Mana.
* Soul Siphon (Affliction): If a Warlock already has a particular spell cast on a target, reapplying before its duration ends will no longer grant an additional bonus.
* Unstable Affliction: The silence from this ability is now subject to diminishing returns.

Warrior

* Blood Craze: This talent can now trigger while the Warrior is sitting.
* Challenging Shout: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its targets is now increased by hit rating.
* Charge will work more often when targets are up against unpathable areas like walls and poles.
* Defiance (Protection) now also grants 2/4/6 weapon expertise.
* Devastate (Protection) now combines the effects of Sunder Armor into its effect. It is also now affected by all talents and items that affect Sunder Armor.
* Disarm is now subject to diminishing returns in PvP.
* Enrage: This talent can now trigger while the Warrior is sitting.
* Improved Berserker Stance (Fury) now also reduces all threat caused while in Berserker Stance by 2/4/6/8/10%
* Improved Intercept and Weapon Mastery have swapped locations in the talent trees.
* Intervene will no longer place you in combat.
* Hamstring now has a 10 second duration when used on PvP targets.
* Mace Specialization (Arms) now has a reduced chance to occur but generates 7 rage instead of 6.
* Pummel: Interrupting a channeled spell with this ability will now always properly prevent casting spells from the same spell school for 4 sec.
* Shield Bash: Interrupting a channeled spell with this ability will now always properly prevent casting spells from the same spell school for 6 sec.
* Shield Slam (Protection) now always tries to dispel one Magic effect on the target.
* Sweeping Strikes and Deathwish have swapped locations in the talent trees.
* Sweeping Strikes (Fury) now lasts 10 seconds and affects your next 10 swings.
* Sweeping Strikes: This ability now works correctly in all cases with shielded targets.
* Tactical Mastery: This talent also now grants greatly increased threat from Mortal Strike and Bloodthirst when in Defensive Stance.
* Taunt: The chance for this ability to land successfully on its target is now increased by hit rating.
* Weapon Mastery (Arms) now reduces duration of Disarm effects against you by 25/50% rather than giving you a 50% chance to avoid or full immunity to Disarm effects.
* Whirlwind: This ability now strikes with both weapons when a Warrior is dual-wielding.

Professions

* All primary profession trainers outside of capitals (Alchemy, Blacksmithing, Enchanting, Engineering, Leatherworking, Tailoring) have been changed to train up to Artisan level (skill level 300) in their respective professions.
* The capital cities now possess Artisan level trainers for the primary professions they support, and are surrounded by their newly-dubbed Apprentices where applicable. Please visit your local Master trainer when you wish to train.
* Alchemy

• Added a sound for when a cauldron is created.
• Added a new potion to alchemy trainers: Mad Alchemist’s Potion. This new potion requires Alchemy to consume.

* Blacksmithing

• A new world drop recipe for an Adamantite Weapon Chain has been added. This new weapon chain both reduces disarm duration and increases parry rating.
• Sharpening Stones and Weightstones now last 1 hour.

* Cooking

• Daily cooking quests are now available from The Rokk in Shattrath City! In addition to gold, you can receive random cooking reagents and new recipes as a reward for completing these quests.
• Reduced the maximum skill obtainable from recipes between 200 and 300. This does not include Outland recipes.

* Enchanting:

• Duration of wizard and mana oils created by enchanters has been increased.
• The Surefooted enchantment now requires Fel Iron Rod (was Runed Eternium Rod).
• Added a new enchant shield recipe to trainers that increases resilience.

* Engineering:

• Cogspinner Gearcutter in Ironforge and Sovik in Orgrimmar now sell the schematic for the Steam Tonk Controller in a limited supply.
• Engineers can now create incredible new flying machines! Find Niobe Whizzlespark in Shadowmoon Valley to learn these fantastic new plans.
• Engineering potion injectors no longer require engineering skill to use.
• Jumper Cables XL is no longer a trinket.
• Materials required to create the Steam Tonk Controller have been reduced. To reflect the reduced requirements, the maximum skill gain has also been reduced somewhat.
• Plans for a new Field Repair Bot are rumored to belong to a select few Gan’arg Analyzers in Blade’s Edge Mountains.
• Plans for a new arrow making device can be found from Sunfury Archers.
• The plans for adamantite shells now create an Adamantite Shell Machine. The machine creates 200 high quality bullets at a time, with 5 charges per item.
• The Crashin’ Thrashin’ Robot is now Bind on Use rather than Bind on Acquire so non-engineers can use them as well.
• The materials required for the Field Repair Bot 74A have been simplified.

* Fishing:

• Players can now track fishing nodes. This ability is learned from a journal sometimes found in crates obtained through fishing.
• New fish can now be caught in Zul’Aman and Deadwind Pass. Recipes for preparing these new fish are obtained through the daily cooking quests.
• Fishing difficulty reduced for some areas in Nagrand.
• You can now fish in Ironforge again.

* Herbalism

• Picking herbs will no longer cause effects on items to trigger.
• Fel Blossoms are now unbound, but have an additional requirement of 275 herbalism to use.

* Jewelcrafting:

• A new skyfire meta gem recipe can be obtained from the Coilskar Siren of Shadowmoon Valley. This new meta gem increases critical strike rating and critical strike damage with spells.

* Leatherworking:

• Stylin’ hats no longer require Zhevra leather.
• Greatly increased the radius of the Drums of Battle, Drums of Restoration, Drums of Speed, and Drums of War.
• Increased the range at which you can gain leatherworking skill from crafting drums.
• Removed the casting time from the Drums of Battle, Drums of Restoration, Drums of Speed, and Drums of War.
• Slightly increased the radius of Drums of Panic.
• Reduced the casting time of Drums of Panic and added a global cooldown equal to the casting time.
• Reduced the faction required to obtain Drums of Battle and Drums of Panic.
• Drums of Speed and Drums of Restoration are no longer world drop recipes, and can now be obtained from the Mag’har and Kurenai faction vendors with revered standing.
• Drums can now be used while shapeshifted.
• A new recipe is available from Grand Master leatherworking trainers to create glove reinforcements, providing a substantial armor bonus. Reinforcements are a permanent enchantment and cannot be placed with other permanent enchantments.
• New recipes are available from Grand Master leatherworking trainers to make 20 slot quivers and ammo pouches.
• New recipes are available from the Honor Hold, Thrallmar, and Lower City quartermasters to create 24 slot quivers and ammo pouches.
• A new recipe is available from Grand Master leatherworking trainers to make a 20 slot bag to hold leatherworking supplies.
• The ogres in the barrier hills are rumored to have a pattern for a 24 slot bag to hold leatherworking supplies.

* Mining

• Mining will no longer cause effects on items to trigger.

Items

* All old world dungeon bosses have had their loot revisited. Players will now find that the loot dropped inside instances will be of Superior (blue) quality.
* Arena Relics: New relics have been added to support all talent trees for relic users. In addition, most of the arena-system relics have been renamed so there is a more consistent naming convention.
* Arakkoa Feather: This item can now be sold to a vendor.
* Ashtongue Talisman of Lethality: This item will no longer trigger when the victim of your finishing move is immune to that attack.
* Ashtongue Talisman of Vision: The mana granted by this trinket has been increased.
* Ashtongue Talisman of Vision: This item will no longer receive multiple chances to trigger per cast of Stormstrike.
* Ashtongue Talisman of Zeal: The damage over time affect from judgments has been adjusted so that it will work properly. It now has a shorter duration, and is not refreshed by melee attacks.
* Ashtongue Talisman of Zeal: The damage over time effect from this trinket is no longer refreshed by autoattacks and does not charge mana.
* Atiesh: This item can no longer open portals in battlegrounds.
* Band of the Eternal Restorer: As this item now provides some bonus spell damage, spell damage effects can trigger it. In addition, healing over time effects can now trigger it when they could not before.
* Band of Eternity will now make the correct sound when moved in a player’s inventory.
* Black Bow of the Betrayer: The triggered effect from this item will no longer use up charges of Misdirection. In addition, the triggered effect will no longer break crowd control effects.
* Bloodsea Brigand’s Vest will now make the correct sound when moved in a player’s inventory.
* Boundless Agony can now be disenchanted.
* Cataclysm Raiment: The bonuses on this set have been adjusted.
* Cooldown removed from Noggenfogger Elixirs. The shrink effect will no longer stack with other shrink effects.
* Cowl of Benevolence will now make the correct sound when moved in a player’s inventory.
* Crystalforge Raiment: The bonuses on this set have been adjusted.
* Darkmoon Card: Vengeance: This item will no longer trigger from environmental damage.
* Dropped items that were rings/trinkets/one handed weapons that were previously unique are now unique-equipped. That means that you can have more than one of those items, but you can only have a single one of them equipped.
* Enriched Terocone Juice: This item now properly provides mana regeneration no matter how it is used.
* Essence of Death now drops from level 57-60 non-elite undead in the Eastern Plaguelands.
* Eye of the Dead: As this item now provides some bonus spell damage, spell damage effects can now consume its charges.
* Felsteel Chests: The loot from these chests has been improved.
* The Felsworn Gas Mask will now work when you put it on while mounted.
* Free Action Potion: The buff from this potion can no longer be dispelled or taken via Spellsteal.
* Gladiator’s armor pieces of like nature from various seasons will now all meet the requirements for their shared set bonus. This means if you are using 2 pieces of Season 1 gear and 2 pieces of Season 2 gear of the same design you will now have your 4 piece set bonus.
* Gladiator’s Chain Gauntlets: The bonus damage on these gloves has been increased from 4% to 5%.
* Grand Marshal’s Dragonhide Helm: The intellect on this item was increased slightly to match the equivalent Horde-only item.
* Hallowed Wands: These items no longer work on Druids who are shapeshifted.
* Hallowed Wands: These wands no longer function in the Old Hillsbrad Caverns of Time event.
* Hallow’s End Pumpkin Treats: The larger and oranger buff no longer causes Battle Elixirs to be removed and can stack with them.
* Hand of Antu’sul: The effect that triggers from this item will no longer cause a cooldown on Warrior’s Thunderclap ability.
* Libram of Saints Departed: This relic now functions properly again.
* Lightfathom Scepter will now make the correct sound when moved in a player’s inventory.
* Lightning Capacitor: This item now has a 2.5 second cooldown on acquiring Electrical Charges.
* Lockboxes will now display the numerical lockpicking skill required to open them.
* Low Level Cloth Items: All agility and strength on low-level cloth items has been replaced with other stats, usually bonus spell damage, but also sometimes other stats beneficial to mana users.
* Merciless Gladiator’s Chain Gauntlets: The bonus damage on these gloves has been increased from 4% to 5%.
* Mr. Pinchy: This item no longer destroys itself when its charges run out. This resolves some bugs that occurred when its final charge was used.
* Mystical Skyfire Diamond: A cooldown has been added to this item’s effect, but the chance for it to trigger has been increased.
* Noggenfogger Elixir: Consuming this potion now has a shared 3 second cooldown with other types of non-combat potions.
* Ogri’la Faction Vendor: This vendor now sells potions useable anywhere for a large number of Apexis Shards.
* Ogri’la Reputation Rewards: All epic and superior quality items are now disenchantable.
* Overseer Disguise: It is no longer possible via use of this item to be on a mount while in Moonkin Form or Tree of Life Form.
* Pendant of the Violet Eye: This trinket will no longer fire multiple times from a single casting of some Paladin spells.
* PvP Trinkets: Insignia of the Alliance, Insignia of the Horde, Medallion of the Alliance, and Medallion of the Horde now clear the debuff from Judgement of Justice.
* Shadowmoon Grunts will no longer drop Black Temple quality loot.
* Shiffar’s Nexus Horn: Many spells and abilities can now trigger this item that were unable to before.
* Skyshatter Raiment: The four piece bonus is now being applied correctly and the two piece bonus will affect the correct spells.
* Tidefury Raiment: The additional mana granted to Water Shield by this set has been increased.
* Tome of Fiery Redemption: This item no longer can be triggered by casting blessings.
* Totem of the Thunderhead: The additional mana granted to Water Shield by this totem has been increased.
* Unstable Flask of the Sorcerer: This flask will now provide the bonus to healing specified in its tooltip.
* Vambraces of Ending will now make the correct sound when moved in a player’s inventory.

Dungeons and Raids

* Players that complete the attunement quests for Tempest Keep and Coilfang Resevoir may now choose to display a new title, “‘character name’ Champion of the Naaru.”
* The Requirement for Heroic Keys has been lowered to Honored.
* Elite mobs outside of pre-Burning Crusade dungeons have been changed to non-elite.
* The level ranges of pre-Burning Crusade dungeons have been adjusted to a narrower range.
* Meeting stone level requirements, the Looking for Group system, and quests have been adjusted to match the new dungeon level ranges.
* Auchenai Crypts
o Wandering Ghosts are now neutral to players
o Summoned Ghosts now take longer to summon in.
* Auchindoun: Sethekk Halls
o Mobs inside Sethekk Halls will now continue to award Lower City reputation into Exalted.
o The Shadow Labyrinth Key can now be looted from the Talon King’s Coffer next to Talon King Ikiss in the Sethekk Halls.
* Auchindoun: Shadow Labyrinth
o Blackheart the Inciter: This stun associated with this creature’s charge ability will now properly be considered a stun for talents, abilities, and items that interact with stuns.
* Black Temple
o High Nethermancer Zerevor’s Blizzard and Flamestrike will now last their full duration.
* Caverns of Time: Battle of Mount Hyjal
o Increased the reputation awarded for killing Archimonde in Hyjal Summit.
* Hellfire Citadel: Hellfire Ramparts
o The Reinforced Fel Iron Chest can now only be looted by players who are present during some portion of a successful attempt of the Vazruden and Nazan encounter. In addition, on Heroic difficulty the chest now contains a Badge of Justice for each player present.
* Hellfire Citadel: Magtheridon’s Lair
o Mind Exhaustion is not applied until Magtheridon is successfully banished.
* Karazhan
o The number of creatures that must be killed in the Karazhan Servants Quarters area before a miniboss spawns has been reduced.
o Phase hounds in Karazhan will now phase out less frequently.
o Coldmist Widows no longer wipe threat when casting Poison Bolt volley.
o Karazhan Chess Event: The Dust Covered Chest can now only be looted by players who are nearby when the event is completed successfully. In addition, the chest now contains 2 Badges of Justice for each player present.
o Wrath of the Titans will no longer cause Shackle Undead to break.
* Tempest Keep
o The Blood Elves that patrol the Tempest Bridge no longer patrol directly into Prince Kael’thas Sunstrider’s chamber.
o The use of Ice Block, Divine Shield, Cloak of Shadows, and other similar spells and abilities will no longer prematurely detonate High Astromancer Solarian’s Wrath of the Astromancer spell.
o Kael’thas
+ All four advisors have had their health reduced by 10%.
+ All of the summoned weapons have had their health reduced by 10%.
o Al’ar
+ The ability “Meteor” has been renamed to “Dive Bomb”.
o Mechanar
+ Nethermancer Sepethrea’s Frost Attack now reduces movement speed by 25% rather than 50%.
+ The Mechanar: The Cache of the Legion can now only be looted by players who are present during some portion of a successful attempt of the Gatewatcher Gyro-Kill and Gatewatcher Iron-Hand encounters. In addition, on Heroic difficulty Gatewatcher Gyro-Kill and Gatewatcher Iron-Hand no longer drop Badges of Justice. Instead, the Cache of the Legion contains a Badge of Justice for each player present.

Quests

* New random Daily Dungeon quests have been added for both the heroic and non-heroic five-person Outland dungeons, as well as for the 5-person Caverns of Time instances. Each day both a single heroic and a single non-heroic dungeon are randomly targeted by these quests. The Consortium quest givers can be located in Shattrath’s Lower City
* Quest givers who have available daily quests will have a blue exclamation point instead of a yellow one.
* Aether rays can now be wrangled earlier.
* Dustwallow Marsh
o Many new quests have been added to the zone.
o The Steamwheedle Cartel have just completed building the new town of Mudsprocket in south west Dustwallow Marsh.
* Level 1-60 dungeon quests have had their experience and faction rewards increased.
* Many elite creatures and quests in the level 1-60 experience have been changed to accommodate solo play.
* Nutral, the flight master in Shattrath City, now has a quest for characters who are level 70 and do not yet have a riding skill of 225. The quest will direct a character to visit the appropriate riding instructor in Shadowmoon Valley so that the player will know where they can purchase the skill necessary to use a flying mount.
* The icon for the Charged Crystal Focus has been changed.
* The range of the Battery Recharging Blaster used in the quest, “Recharging the Batteries” has been increased.
* The Repolarized Magneto Sphere now only functions within the Blade’s Edge Mountains.
* Upon completion of the Ghostlands quest, “A Little Dash of Seasoning”, if a character still has the Apothecary’s Poison; it will be removed from their inventory.

User Interface

* The Auction House UI has been much improved. The useless categories have been removed (Plate-Cloak for instance) and a number of additional sub categories have been added. In addition, many items have had their category changed so that they make more sense.
* The Auction house time periods have been changed. Now items can be put up for sale for 12, 24, or 48 hours. The option to put up items for 8 hours has been removed.
* Sorting of auction house searches has been simplified so you can only sort by one column, and automatic sub-sorts have been created for those columns to be as useful as possible. In addition, sorting is now done on the server so as you page thru results, items will appear to be sorted across the entire results instead of just the page you’re looking at.
* The Battle Map has been renamed to the Zone Map and can be turned on for any zone rather than just PvP objective zones. There is now a drop down in the world map screen that allows you to choose when the zone map should display.
* Items that have cooldowns will now display the base cooldown time in the item tooltip.
* All players now have a tracking bubble on their minimap. From that menu you can select a specific type of vendor or npc to look for or you can select a specific tracking type if your character has tracking. Yes this means that hunters can take all of those tracking buttons off of their action bars.
* Game objects that you can interact with will now sparkle and display their name over the object to make them more obvious.
* Questgiving objects will now display an exclamation point above them when they have a quest for you. Quest completion objects will display a question mark.
* Items with Metagems in them will now display the gems required to activate the metagem and whether those requirements have been met on the item tooltip.
* When you take damage and have a full screen UI up, the edges of the screen will flash red so you know you are under attack.
* Inspect distance has been increased to 30 yards.
* When you inspect another player, you can now see their talent choices as well as their equipment.
* There are now options for displaying health and mana values on your health/mana bars for you/your party/your target and to display that information either as percentages or as numbers.
* When you are possessing a target (Priest Mind Control, Eyes of the Beast, using a Steam Tonk, etc), you now get their action bar as your primary action bar rather than having a mini action bar above your normal action bar.
* The Mind Control and Possession action bar has been revamped.
* You can now send up to 12 items in a single mail message.
* When you have an outgoing mail open, you can right-click on items to attach them to that outgoing mail.
* When you have a trade window open, you can right-click an item to move it to the trade window.
* When you have unopened mail, you can mouse over the recent mail icon and get the name of the people who most recently sent you the mail.
* When you speak with an NPC with a single function (Banker, Flight Master, Etc) and who has no other gossip options or quests you will go straight to their functional pane rather than to the gossip pane. Most importantly this means that clicking on a flight master will bring up the flight path map directly rather than the gossip pane with the option to bring up the flight path map.
* Quests that are much below your level will now have the tag (Low Level) in the gossip pane attached to the quest. This will make it easier to tell which quest to accept when a quest giver has both low and high level quests.
* You can now set the loot threshold (/threshold) with a word as well as the loot threshold number for an instance-
/threshold Epic- also sets the party loot threshold to Epic items or better quality
/threshold Rare-sets the party loot threshold to Rare items or better quality
* Corpses that belong to someone in your party, but that you cannot loot will say in the corpse mouseover who has loot rights on that corpse. This will help skinners who want to know who to talk to in order to skin their corpse, as well as master looters when special loot drops on a normal monster. Everyone will then see that there is a monster that the master looter has loot rights on.
* When an item drops that you cannot loot due to uniqueness or other factor, you will get a chat message letting you know what the item was that you passed rolling on.
* If a player is looting a corpse and there are one or more items on it that player cannot loot, the player will still be able to see those items (although not able to loot them). This only is for green or better quality items. The cases this should affect are for the profession recipes that only a player of that profession can loot or when master looter is on and there is a threshold or better item on the corpse.
* The raid panes that have been pulled out into the gamefield should save their option settings between sessions now.
* When raid bosses send an important message to the center of your screen it will be larger and have an effect that makes it more noticeable.
* The raid warning command now appears in a larger font in the center screen and grows and shrinks slightly when it appears to make it more noticeable.
* NPC’s with level appropriate quests will now always appear on your minimap as yellow exclamation points. NPC’s that have quests that you have completed will now display as yellow question marks instead of yellow dots. In addition flight masters that you have not yet gotten the flight point for will display on the minimap as a green exclamation point.
* Npc’s will display an icon on mouseover that gives a more specific indicator of their function rather than just a gossip bubble. Questgivers will now show an exclamation mark as their in game mouseover. Innkeepers will show a hearthstone as their in game mouseover and so on.
* When an Addon attempts to perform an action that is prohibited in combat, you will get a chat message “Interface action failed because of an AddOn”. This only occurs once per login.
* Many interface elements now display players in their class color so you can easily recognize what class a player is. Interface elements affected by this are LFG, Guild, and Who.
* You can now pull the list of players in a channel out of the Chat Channel windows and into the gamefield by clicking and dragging the channel name onto the gamefield. This list will show all the players in the channel sorted by voice chat status.
* Voice chat will now display the nameplate for who is talking when you are in a custom channel. Currently it only displays the nameplate when you are in a party/raid.
* Added a Use Hardware option. This should only be used by advanced users with specific hardware configurations, as it may significantly alter your sound performance.
* When multiple people are talking in a voice chat session, it will show the names of up to four people who are talking at the same time.
* The value of the TargetNearestDistance setting is validated at load time.
* If a non-standard refresh rate is selected in the video options, it will now be saved.
* The Spell Detail slider setting has been reset to the default setting. Prior to 2.3 the default for all systems was the maximum setting which was not appropriate for all hardware.
* Many On Use items now display the cooldown in the item tooltip.
* The tooltip for Block on the character sheet now displays the amount of damage reduced by a successful block.
* New macro commands: /targetlastenemy, /targetlastfriend
* New macro command to target by entire name: /targetexact
* If you get a message “Interface action failed because of an AddOn”, this means that an AddOn interfered with the Blizzard UI in some way. To diagnose this, enter the following into chat “/console taintLog 1″ and restart the game and try to reproduce it. If you reproduce it, you can quit the game and search through the file Logstaint.log for the word “blocked” and mail the log to the author of the AddOn listed there. Once you have done this you can turn off logging by entering the following into chat “/console taintLog 0”
* For more details on UI macro and scripting changes, see the UI & Macro forum.

World Environment

* Creature AI has been changed to no longer prioritize attacking unfeared targets over feared targets.
* Gas clouds in Nagrand now produce motes of air.
* Gas clouds in Zangarmarsh now produce motes of water instead of motes of life.
* The gas clouds in Netherstorm are now always visible. Abilities on goggles that previously allowed the player to detect these invisible gas clouds will now show all gas clouds on their minimap instead. This will stack with other tracking types.
* Stranglethorn Vale
o Saltscale Tide-Lords no longer have frost nova
o The fear on Mosh’ogg Lords is reduced
* Lowered the fireball damage of Defias Pillagers
* Increased the cooldowns on the heals of Kurzen Medicine Men
* The standard Disarm ability that many creatures use now has a duration of 5 seconds instead of 6 seconds.
* Sonic Burst now silences for 6 seconds instead of 10.

Bug Fixes

* An issue with spawn rates in Forge Camp: Terror and Forge Camp: Wrath has been fixed.
* Fixed the position of one of the Box of Mushrooms objects at Ango’rosh Stronghold for the quest, “Stealing Back the Mushrooms”.
* Fixed the position of a mineral node in the Blade’s Edge Mountains so that it is no longer floating in the air.
* Fixed a problem with the directions in the quest, “The Ultimate Bloodsport”.
* Fixed a bug in the pet sheet stamina mouseover tooltip that showed an incorrect health increase value.
* Fixed an issue with aura stacking and debuff cooldowns when reapplying a debuff after being charmed.
* Reverse cooldowns are correctly refreshed when a buff is reapplied by another player.

Wow that’s a lot..

Enjoy!

Much like in real life, everyone wants to have the currency of choice. In Warcraft’s case, this form of money is gold, and you use it for a vast variety of things. You might need consumables for armor, maybe you want to learn how to fly that netherdrake mount, or maybe you’ve tired of your class’s spec and want to shake up your talents a bit. All of these things cost money, you’ll need gold.

But suppose you don’t have the time or inclination to “grind” or “farm” gold on a consistent basis? Sure you have your daily quests, but sometimes it isn’t enough, you need a bit more kick. If you want to make with little or no time invested, there are a few options available to you.

1. Auction House Arbitrage: We’ll get the riskiest strategies out of the way first. Find a particular product that sells well and corner the market. Buy up your competitors and sell them at a slightly higher price, then net the profit. You have to be very careful here though. You don’t want to buy too high, and you don’t want to pick an item that is easily replenished. Watch things like primals, don’t go for easily obtained items like netherweave cloth, there will always be someone there to under cut you. This can be done with about 10 minutes per day, if you have the gold to start with.

2. Tailoring, Cloth Specialties: Tailors of varying specializations have the ability to produce specialty types of cloth. These sell particularly well. If you’re not a tailor, consider levelling up the profession, you’ll be bringing in extra gold every time your cooldown is up.

3. Alchemy Transmutes: Specifically transmuting primal earths to water. These are on a one day cooldown and can net you up to 10 gold per day with about 3 minutes of buying the primal, transmuting it, and putting the new primal up on the AH. Don’t miss a money making opportunity! If you want to go all out, specialize your alchemists with transmutes, increasing your chance that you’ll transmute more than one primal.

Good luck, you money makers out there!

There’s been widespread speculation on how tough the new 10-man dungeon, Zul’aman, is really going to get. Seeing it as a progression past Karazahn for those who shy away from the larger, more intensely administrative raids like Gruul’s Lair, Serpentshrine Cavens, and so forth. That appears to be the case, according to one of Blizzard’s community monitors and news from the Public Test Realm. Here’s what Bornakk (A Blizzard CM) had to say:

“Assuming you are doing well in Karazhan, you should be able to go right into Zul’Aman. It shouldn’t be easy, but progress always takes time.”

As it stands, it appears that the first boss in Zul’Aman will be on par with the Prince from Karazahn. There is also no attunement process for the instance, allowing those with less-forgiving play schedules to see some new content. If you’re a player that leans towards the casual style, this should be great news.

All in all it appears that ZA will appeal to a wide-variety of players, and the bosses will continually become more difficult and complicated as you progress, along with the rewards. So grab your friends, bring your gear, and have fun! (Once 2.3 hits, of course)

Let’s face it, no 2 factions are created equal when it comes to PvP. For many Battlegroups, there’s an obvious imbalance both in population and in player skill. The low-queue times for a particular faction often attracts those that like to pvp the most, with the result in the other faction having more people with longer wait times but losing most of the games they play. If you’re on the unfortunate side of this phenomenon, be it horde or alliance, you have a few options. Here are some strategies I employ while fighting for the losing side.

1. Fight hard, but don’t try to recruit everyone to your cause: Try to get those who seem to be trying together, or at the very least follow them. You have strength in numbers, and even a group of bad players have a better chance as long as they stick together. If you try to be Rambo, you’re only going to get killed faster. By the same token, don’t bother yelling in BG chat about how terrible everyone is but you. It doesn’t help anyone and it won’t change the outcome of the battle.

2. Go with Friends Even having 1 or 2 guildmates makes you a force to be reckoned with, especially in node-oriented games like Eye of the Storm and Arathi Basin. Having a well-knit group of friends makes the fight more intense and enjoyable, even if you lose.

3. Bring everything you can to the table Are you an Engineer? Load up on bombs. Alchemists? Bring those potions and flasks. Use whatever professions you have to gain the upper hand on your opponents. I can’t tell you how many times my poultryizer has saved me from a 2v1 death. Face the fact that you are often going to be outnumbered, so bring everything you have to bear on the enemy.

I can’t promise that these ideas will win you games. Battlegrounds are a team-oriented environment and no matter how good you think you are, you aren’t going to win it all by yourself. Do your best, have fun, and kill all that stand in your way. Win or lose, keep a smile on your face.

Good luck!

So the more I travel through Outlands, the more I seem to have a nagging problem: flying. Whenever I head over to tempest keep, or decide to settle down for some questing in Skettis, I have to fly. This in and of itself is no problem, but my mount seems to be slow.. too slow. No problem right? I’ll just pick up an epic flying mount at a price tag of…five thousand gold?! This is going to take some doing, but I’ve decided to share my money making experiences thus far.

It should be noted that unlike my RL persona, I’m not very frugal in-game. If I need flasks or wizard oil for a run, I’ll buy it. I don’t have an army of alts and I don’t like to “farm” for mats, so I typically do my daily quests (explained below) and head to the auction house. This is going to have to change if I expect to get my epic flying mount sometime before the next expansion. Here’s what I’ve done so far:

1. Daily quests: These have to be one of the easiest ways to make gold in the history of the game. You can do these series of quests once a day and pull in 40-70 gold on an average run. Want to cut your completion time in half? Bring a friend! The girlfriend and I always do these quests together, and almost all of them can be done much more quickly with a friend to help you out. This will be your bread and butter in gold-raising efforts. No idea where to get started? You can find great summaries and quest-guides from start to finish here and here.

2. Gathering Professions: A great secondary source of income is using your gathering professions to your advantage. Apparently the efficient market theory has no place in the World of Warcraft Auction House, because materials that make things often sell for more than the item they are used to make. Exploit this. Get all the herbs, ore, bars, etc. that you can and put it up for sale. You’ll be surprised at what you can pull in.

3. Primals: Like I said, I hate farming, but if you want to get the absolute best bang for your buck, farming primal elements are the way to go. Here you’ll be hunting mobs in various areas for motes, which are combined into primals, which are sent to the auction house for gold. What I like to do is do my dailies in the south end of Ogri’la, where there are plenty of fire elementals wandering about. Kill any you come across and collecting the motes while you’re doing your dailies, 2 birds with one stone! If you’d like to get some primals elsewhere in Outland, here’s a good starting guide.

I’ll keep you posted on my progress as we go along. Good luck on getting your oh-so-fast flyer!