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Category: Dragonflight

Dragonflight Alpha: Timeskip Officially 3 Years After SL, Feedback: Shamans, Hunters, Death Knights

We got quite a bit of info on Dragonflight developments last night. Steve Danuser has confirmed that there will be indeed a 3 year timeskip after Shadowlands and we got multiple blue posts on different class feedback threads about changes coming to their respective talent trees!

Timeskip Officially 3 Years After Shadowlands

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello friends,

I wanted to take a moment to address the topic of time passage between Shadowlands and Dragonflight.

There has always been some amount of time passing between expansions, though rarely has it been called out in game. We maintain an internal timeline of what year each expansion begins, and the gap between them has either been one year (as with earlier expansions) or two years (as with most of the later ones). But NPCs in the world don’t talk about how the Burning Crusade took place in the year 26 after the Dark Portal opened, or how we rediscovered Pandaria in the year 30.

When you look back at the Warcraft timeline, one of the things you’ll notice is that a lot of massive, world-changing events were tightly clustered together. This is especially true for WoW, which since launch has seen a multitude of invasions and catastrophes back-to-back in the chronology.

With Shadowlands representing the closing of one book in the Warcraft saga (as we mentioned in interviews around the release of our Eternity’s End update), it felt like an opportunity to give Azeroth and its inhabitants a bit of breathing room before Dragonflight ushers in the start of our next major storyline.

Shadowlands began in the year 35 after the opening of the Dark Portal, and Dragonflight will begin in the year 40.

Given that the events of Shadowlands took place over the course of two years, that leaves a few additional years that we are fast-forwarding through. Our purpose here is not to have a litany of events take place outside the game that you need to read about in a novel or other media to understand the state of the world. The goal of the fast-forward is to provide the people of Azeroth with a slice of “normal” life without a major threat looming over their heads.

When our heroes return from the Realms of Death, you can imagine them easing back into their lives and duties without an immediate crisis to address or enemy to fight. With the Alliance and Horde honoring the truce signed after the Fourth War, the average Azerothian citizen will be able to enjoy a time of stability and reflection.

That said, we plan to offer a digital short story on our website that details one particularly joyous occasion which has been referenced in the alpha build. It’s going to be a fun and charming read, but it won’t be necessary in order to understand the events of Dragonflight.

Besides stretching out the WoW timeline a bit, another benefit of this fast-forward is that it will let our younger characters get a little older, allowing some of them to take a larger role in future storylines. Yet not so much time will be passing that you’d expect characters who are already adults to look significantly different.

As for changes to the world that have been discussed or foreshadowed, such as the resettlement of Gilneas, those will not be happening during the fast-forward. As cool as it is to show locations and populations evolving because of story progression, we want events of this importance to be in-game questing that our players experience for themselves (as with the reclaiming of the Ruins of Lordaeron in the 9.2.5 update) rather than having it happen off-camera.

For your player characters, it has always been left to your own interpretation how much time had passed when they log in after the arrival of a major update or new expansion. Dragonflight is no exception. You are free to imagine what your characters have been doing in that time of respite as you look forward to the arrival of the Dragonflight pre-patch.

Hopefully this post helps clear up confusion about the timeline and explains our goals for having a few more years pass than we normally would.

–Steve Danuser, Narrative Lead

Feedback: Shamans

Quote from: Blizzard

Enhancement Shaman,

Several changes are coming in the next build you receive, in addition to several bug fixes. We also removed a -35% damage and healing modifier to your spells that benefit from Maelstrom Weapon in an effort to make your spells more impactful, but may have to reintroduce this as tuning goes on.

Talent Changes:

  • Primal Primer is no longer an option in the tree.
    • Primal Primer and Primal Lava Actuators were two different ways of making Lava Lash better. We opted to keep Primal Lava Actuators.
  • Hailstorm now provides your next Frost Shock a bonus for up to 10 Maelstrom Weapon charges spent to better work with Overflowing Maelstrom. The maximum bonus targets is still limited to 5.
  • Stormstrike now replaces Primal Strike.
  • Doom Winds now does some immediate damage when you activate the ability.
  • Ice Strike’s Frost Shock buff now highlights Frost Shock.
  • Alpha Wolf now works with Chain Lightning, rather than Crash Lightning so you do not have to take Crash Lightning to get the benefit.
  • Ascendance now is now a choice node vs Deeply Rooted Elements.
  • Thorim’s Invocation now remembers whether you most recently cast Lightning Bolt or Chain Lightning, and uses that spell when you use Windstrike, rather than always using Lightning Bolt.
  • Chain Lightning (rank 2) functionality baked into Crash Lightning/Chain Lightning interactions.
  • New 1-point talent: Crashing Storms: Crash Lightning damage increased by 40%, and Chain Lightning strikes 2 additional targets.
  • Gathering Storms has been consolidated down to a 1-point talent.
  • Hot Hand has been converted to a 2-point talent with the same total values.
  • Feral Spirit cooldown has been reduced to 90 seconds.
  • Elemental Spirits no longer reduces the cooldown of Feral Spirits.
  • Several talents have shifted around due to the above changes.

Thank you all for the continued feedback and testing.

Feedback: Hunters

Quote from: Blizzard

Happy Friday, Hunters.

Several changes will be in your next build and we wanted to share what to expect. There are also several bug fixes, and some things that were previously marked NYI are now working.

Class Tree:

  • Survival Hunters: corrected a missing connection between Kill Command and Improved Mend Pet on the class tree.
  • Alpha Predator’s value has been lowered from 30%, to 15%.
  • Improved Traps now also lowers the cooldown of Hi-Explosive Trap.
  • Stampede now snares targets hit by 30%, and you and your pets gain 10% increased critical strike chance against targets hit by your Stampede.
  • Hunter’s Agility is once again Avoidance.
  • Camouflage no longer links directly to Improved Traps. The choice node below Survival of the Fittest now links to Born to be Wild.
  • New 2-point passive talent, Serrated Shots: Serpent Sting and your bleed damage is increased by 10/20% damage. This value increases to 20/40% against targets below 30% HP.
  • New 2-point passive talent: Arctic Bola – Aimed Shot/Cobra Shot/Raptor Strike/Mongoose Bite have a chance to fling a bola out at your target that bounces 2/4 times and deals increased damage per point. Targets struck by the bola are snared by 20% for 3 sec.

Beast Mastery:

  • The top of the Beast Mastery tree has been shuffled around a bit, and now starts with Cobra Shot rather than Barbed Shot.
  • Barbed Shot damage has been increased by ~75% (this is unrelated to talents and just a change to the ability)
  • Loaded Quiver has been removed. Barbed Shot is now 2 charges always.
  • Barbed Wrath is now 1 point, down from 2. It no longer affects Aspect of the Wild.
  • Wild Call has been reduced to 1 rank.
  • Call of the Wild’s cooldown has been increased to 3 minutes.
  • The Bloody Frenzy that adjusted Barbed Shot Frenzy stack generation has been removed.
  • New 1-point talent: Brutal Companion. When Barbed Shot causes a 3rd stack of Frenzy, your pet automatically uses their special attack (Bite/Claw/Smack) with increased damage.
  • Aspect of the Wild has been redesigned.
    • Aspect of the Wild now fires a Cobra Shot at your target and another nearby target. While Aspect of the Wild is active, Cobra Shot’s Focus cost is reduced by 10, and each Cobra Shot fires a Second Cobra Shot at a nearby target.
      • New choice node below Aspect of the Wild:
        • Each temporary beast summoned reduces the cooldown of Aspect of the Wild by 5 sec.
        • Cobra Shot damage increased by 30% while Aspect of the Wild is active.
  • Several talents shifted around past the first gate due to the above changes, but the tree’s structure is very similar.

Marksmanship:

  • Dead Eye now also reduces the cooldown of Kill Shot.
  • Windrunner’s Guidance has been lowered to 25% critical strike damage bonus.
  • New choice node below Wailing Arrow:
    • Wailing Arrow resets the cooldown of Rapid Fire and grants a charge of Aimed Shot.
    • Wailing Arrow now fires 5 wind arrows at your primary target, and up to 10 split between any secondary targets.
  • Crack Shot lowered to a 1-point talent.
  • Calling the Shots and Eagletalon’s True Focus have swapped spots.

Survival

  • Coordinated Assault, Spearhead, and related talents should be working.
  • Explosive Expert tooltip updated, it has no interaction with Kill Shot and is just some cooldown reduction to Wildfire Bombs.
  • Birds of Prey has been redesigned. Kill Shot now strikes up to 3 extra targets while Coordinated Assault is active.
  • New choice node against Birds of Prey: Bombardier. The cooldown of Wildfire Bombs is reset when Coordinated Assault is activated, and when it fades.
  • Guerilla Tactics increases the initial damage of Wildfire Bombs by 50%, down from 100%.
  • Fury of the Eagle once again grants 50% critical strike chance against targets below 20% HP.
  • Ruthless Marauder increases the HP threshold for increases critical strikes by 5% per rank rather than increasing critical strike chance.

Thanks for the continued feedback and testing.
And yes, have a nice weekend everyone!

Feedback: Death Knights

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello Death Knights,

We’ve got an info drop for you. Here’s what we’ve been working on, and what you can expect to see in the next Alpha build for both the Class and Unholy trees.

Class Talents

In an effort to further increase choice, we’ve updated some talent positions, added two additional connections from Might of Thassarian and Merciless Strikes toward the center section of the class tree, reduced 3 rank talents to 2, and updated the lead-in talent to Abomination Limb with a throughput talent.

The following changes are not everything you’re going to see in the next build. Rather, these are highlights of the bigger changes (and a few more-subtle position changes with existing talent nodes).

Rune Mastery

  • Max ranks increased to 2, up from 1.
  • Now leads into Abomination Limb (replacing Improved Death Strike).

Icy Talons

  • Max ranks reduced to 2, down from 3.

Unholy Bond

  • Max ranks reduced to 2, down from 3.

Unholy Endurance

  • New talent: Increases Lichborne duration by 2 sec and while active damage taken is reduced by 15%.

Death Pact

  • Now has a new connection from Might of Thassarian

Asphyxiate

  • Now has a new connection from Merciless Strikes.

Clenching Grasp

  • New talent: Death Grip slows enemy movement speed by 50% for 6 sec.

Improved Death Strike

  • Max ranks reduced to 1, down from 3.
  • Now available much earlier in the tree.

Here is a look at the updated tree with the new structure:

Unholy

As we mentioned previously, we have updates to both the baseline and talent tree for Unholy. These will be available in the next Alpha update. The baseline changes focus on helping reduce the cooldown desync as well as baking in existing talents to help the flow and feel of the spec. Additionally, the Unholy tree itself experienced substantial iteration and has been mostly redesigned and restructured with 11 new talents.

Below is a list of changes previously mentioned, as well as new talents. The below list does not document each individual restructuring of existing talents, as that’s quite substantial, but we do have a screenshot of the tree below to help contextualize what can be expected.

Abilities

Death Coil

  • Runic Power cost reduced to 30, down from 40.

Epidemic

  • Damage increased by 20%

Scourge Strike/Clawing Shadows

  • Damage increased 20%

Talents

General

  • All 3 max rank talents have been reduced to max 2 rank (where applicable)

Deadly Coil

  • Cut

Unholy Command

  • No longer reduces the CD of Dark Transformation when dealing damage with Death Coil
  • Now reduces the cooldown of Dark Transformation by 8/15 seconds.

Army of the Damned

  • Now reduces the cooldown of Apocalypse by 45 seconds (No longer reduced by Death Coil)
    • Death Coil still reduces the cooldown of Army of the Dead
  • No longer summons a Magus of the Dead when Apocalypse or Army of the Dead are cast

Summon Gargoyle

  • Duration reduced to 30s, down from 35s
  • Now gains 1% damage per 1 runic power spent (down from 1% per 2 runic power)
    • At first read this can be confusing but it is a buff to the damage ramp for Gargoyle.

Improved Scourge Strike – Increases the damage of Scourge Strike by 10/20%

  • Cut

New Talent – Feasting Strikes: Festering Strike and Scourge Strike/Clawing Shadows have 15% chance to generate 1 Rune.

New Talent – Runic Mastery: Increases Maximum Runic Power by 10/20.

New Talent – Plaguebringer: Scourge Strike causes your disease damage to occur 150% more quickly for 5 sec.

New Talent – Magus of the Dead: Apocalypse and Army of the Dead also summon a Magus of the Dead who hurls Frostbolts and Shadow Bolts at your foes.

  • Magus of the Dead’s Shadow Bolt damage increased by 20%.
  • Magus of the Dead’s Frostbolt damage increased by 10%
  • Magus of the Dead’s Frostbolt slow duration increased to 6 sec and 60% slow (up from 4 seconds and 50%)

New Talent – Ruptured Viscera: When your ghouls expire, they explode in viscera dealing Shadow damage to nearby enemies.

New Talent – Commander of the Dead: Dark Transformation also empowers your Gargoyle and Army of the Dead for 30 seconds, increasing their damage by 40%.

New Talent – Eternal Agony: Death Coil increases the duration of Dark Transformation by 1 sec.

New Talent – Coil of Devastation: Death Coil causes the target to take an additional 35% of the direct damage dealt over 4 sec.

New Talent – Rotten Touch: Sudden Doom causes your next Death Coil to also increase your Scourge Strike damage against the target by 30% for 6 sec.

[NYI] New Talent – Plaguebearer: Inflict disease upon your enemies spreading Festering Wounds equal to the amount currently active on your target to 8 nearby enemies (45s cooldown, 30 Runic Power).

  • This ability may not make it into the next Alpha build.

New Talent – Superstrain: Your Virulent Plague also applies Frost Fever and Blood Plague.

  • Currently grants full effectiveness for the other diseases. Tuning is always likely to change in future builds.
  • Please note: Morbidity will now also scale damage from FF and BP because of this the damage per rank has been reduced.

The new and updated Unholy tree looks like this:

Thank you very much for all of your discussion and feedback.

We look forward to hearing more from you about the updated trees.

Dragonflight Alpha Phase 6 Starts, Hotfixes – 17 August 2022

The Dragonflight Alpha has been updated for phase 6 testing! All leveling zones are now enabled, monks have had their talent trees added, the reputation/renown faction tracks are now testable and much more!

On the retail side of things we had two small hotfixes.

Dragonflight Alpha Development Notes Update

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello everyone! Take a look at this week’s Dragonflight Alpha updates:

DISCOVER THE DRAGON ISLES

  • All Dragonflight zones are available

NEW FEATURES

  • FOUR MAJOR FACTIONS
    • Major Factions are a new way of experiencing outdoor progression – an iteration on previous reputation-based gameplay. Participating in content throughout the Dragon Isles grants reputation toward these Major Factions. Earning reputation unlocks renown ranks. Each Major Faction’s progression is different, with content fitting a variety of playstyles. Importantly, major factions are not exclusive – you can be a member of all four factions at once.
    • VALDRAKKEN ACCORD – The faction of the unified dragon flights working together in harmony for the protection of the Dragon Isles.
      • Professions: A variety of activities, Work Orders, and exploration catered towards professions and progression within the system.
      • Dragon Racing: Complete races on your dragon for glory and renown
      • Outdoor Elite locations: Cobalt Assembly, Obsidian Citadel, Tyrhold
      • Lay siege to the Djaradin of Dragonbane Keep within the Waking Shores
    • DRAGONSCALE EXPEDITION – The Explorers’ League and Reliquary have come together and formed this expedition to explore the Dragon Isles.
      • Discover treasure maps scattered throughout the Dragon Isles
      • Lots of Treasures, unique minigame-style World Quests (Climbing, Cataloging)
      • Progression
        • Expedition Supply Kit: Unlock bonuses for climbing and cataloging. Unlock tools to help find treasure and mark your discovery of areas in the world.
    • ISKAARA TUSKARR – Become a member of the Iskaara Tuskarr, a tribe renowned for their skills in fishing and feasting.
      • Fishing: New ways to fish. Unlock fishing holes. Fish in 3 difficult and unique biomes. Fish up lunkers with friends using harpoons. Collect fish offline with a net.
      • Contribute to a Tuskarr Feast at the village in Iskaara. Complete the event to reward hungry adventurers!
      • Outdoor Elite locations: Imbu, Brackenhide Hollow
      • Progression
        • Fishing Work Bench: Gather reagents for tuskarr craftsmen to improve the capability of harpoons, nets, and biome fishing.
    • MARUUK CENTAUR – The faction for the unified centaur clans across the Ohn’ahran Plains.
      • Join a hunt among the Maruuk centaur and your closest allies as you traverse the zones within the Dragon Isles
      • Explore the nomadic lifestyle of Clan Aylaag as their caravan makes its way across the Ohn’ahran Plains. With each stop comes a new adventure, quests, rewards, and more!
      • Progression
        • Train with the Shikaar clan to prepare yourself for the hunt!
    • Known Issues
      • You will most likely encounter placeholder rewards, especially for treasures and rare creatures.
      • Not every permutation of every type of content is available yet.
      • Some areas of the world may have temporary enemy population.
    • Developers’ note: We appreciate any and all feedback. For this release, we’ve reduced some of our barriers to entry for a number of pieces of content. We’d love to hear how these experiences feel and how you spend your time in the Dragon Isles. Alpha is an environment for testing and change. Though some of these barriers and values may be temporary, we will be monitoring feedback and making adjustments as needed to ensure your experience in these new lands is enjoyable and rewarding.
      Please let us know your thoughts. We’ll be adjusting content throughout the days and weeks to come.

NEW DUNGEONS
Developers’ note: Throughout the testing period, character levels will be scaled when entering Dragonflight dungeons. When this happens, the amount of talent points that your character will have available will reflect the original level, not the scaled level.

  • The Nokhud Offensive

CHARACTER LEVEL
Developers’ note: With each phase, we encourage players to make a new template character and avoid using their previous characters as they could potentially be in a broken state. After making a new template character, make sure to talk to Questzertauren and he will prepare you for any available content.

  • Any Level Character Template
  • Maximum Level: 70

CLASSES

  • NEW TALENT SYSTEM
    • HUNTER
      • Class Tree
        • Improved Traps now also reduces cooldown of Steel Trap.
        • Removed connection between Rejuvenating Winds and Improved Tranquilizing Shot.
        • Added a connection between Tranquilizing Shot and the Intimidation/Explosive Trap choice node.
        • Lone Survivor’s cooldown reduction has been lowered 30 seconds (was 60 seconds).
        • Death Chakram now increases all damage taken instead of just physical damage taken.
      • Marksmanship
        • The talent locations of Lone Wolf and Killing Blow have been swapped.
        • The talent locations of Black Arrow and Legacy of the Windrunners have been swapped.
        • Legacy of the Windrunners changed from 1 rank to 2 ranks. Each rank adds 3 potential arrows. Bonuses to Aimed Shot now also apply to these bonus Wind Arrows.
        • Windrunner’s Guidance changed from 2 ranks to 1 rank. It now also guarantees a critical strike for the Wind Arrows, and increases their critical strike damage up by 50%.
        • Salvo now works with Volley or Multi-Shot.
        • Bombardment changed to a 1 rank talent and is now right below Multi-Shot.
        • New Talent: Bulletstorm – Extra ricochet targets from Trick Shots grants a stacking buff to Multi-Shot damage.
        • Calling the Shots has had its design adjusted to grant cooldown reduction for Trueshot from Focus Spent, rather than require specific shots.
        • Improved Arcane Shot has been to renamed Crack Shot.
    • MONK
      • Developers’ note: In today’s build, you’ll see an early-access version of the Monk talent trees. Our goal with the class tree is to allow a player to construct different visions of their character and play with the hybrid nature and cheerful mobility that exemplifies a Monk. For Brewmaster, our primary goal was to allow players the flexibility to lean into different flavors – to emphasize a brew-heavy playstyle, or go the way of the wily martial arts master – while also providing situationally-interesting decisions for survivability. For Mistweaver, we want to offer support for both the caster and melee playstyles while maintaining a variety of choices for both builds. We also wanted to take a look at Mistweaver’s multi-target damage profile through returning and new talents such as Zen Pulse and Ancient Concordance. And for Windwalkers, we wanted to allow players the flexibility to focus on different styles of damage dealing, as well as offering opportunities to customize their ability loadout in ways that bring back old friends or lean into focus on specific abilities. We’re excited for Monks to be joining the Dragonflight Alpha and we look forward to hearing your feedback!
      • Known Issues
        • There are several talents that are not fully implemented yet. These are tagged with NYI (Not Yet Implemented) in their Talent name.
        • The Talent Frame background for Mistweaver is incorrectly using Windwalker art. This will be corrected in a later build.
    • PALADIN
      • Retribution
        • Divine Protection has been added as a choice node with Shield of Vengeance. Cooldown increased to 2 minutes.
        • Justicar’s Vengeance now costs 3 Holy Power and deals 7% less damage.
        • The talent locations of Ashes to Ashes and Divine Toll have been swapped.
    • WARLOCK
      • Soul Conduit refund chance reduced to 10% at max rank (was 15%).
      • Destruction
        • Backdraft now affects Soul Fire.
    • WARRIOR
      • Class Developer Notes
        • We’re feeling pretty satisfied with the class tree structure but are still experimenting with placements and the content of specific talent nodes while taking onboard internal and community feedback.
        • We’ve seen a new iteration of the class tree each week during the three weeks since the first release of the Warrior tree. In the version going live today there’s the most options due to more pathways and interconnectivity. We’d love to hear from you if you prefer this, or the more streamlined simple tree with obvious pathways that released initially.
        • We want to spend a little more time with stances to try to achieve a version where each feel useful and desirable for different reasons, but we have had a fallback plan since embarking down this path of having an offensive and defensive stance. Fury and Arms would both start at the offensive node and Protection would start at the Defensive node.
        • Thunderous Roar – We are working on this and the subsequent talent node, which will be a choice node internally and we hope to update on this soon.
        • Signet of Tormented Kings – As above, we’re working internally on this, and we hope to have an update soon. We have ideas but haven’t implemented them yet.
        • Shockwave – There has been some feedback about wanting Shockwave to be lower down the tree and easier to obtain. We’re quite confident that if we put it before the 20 points requirement that every Warrior both DPS and Protection would have it. That isn’t our intention, an AOE stun on fairly short cooldown is a powerful ability and we feel there needs to be some opportunity cost to obtain this. We’d like Shockwave’s subsequent node to be a choice so expect a new modifier here in the future.
        • Rend – Our intention with the introduction of Rend to the class talent tree was that Arms and Protection would likely often choose it and that Fury would very rarely. We’ve seen higher uptake and reliance on Rend than we’d like so for this week we’ve moved it to the Arms and Protection trees as a test. We’d like to hear your feedback on this change.
        • There are several very simple nodes on various talent trees, including those of other classes. These serve multiple functions, and we’ll briefly detail some of the reasoning behind their existence.
        • When looking at the talent trees for a class there’s a huge amount of information to absorb and learn. Beyond that, there’s also many choices for players to make. Having some talents that are simple and obvious in their effect helps to lower the overall complexity and functions as a guide for what abilities and stats are important for each specialization.
        • However, we’ve heard your feedback about the secondary stat nodes and have been working to make them more interesting. There are some examples of this in the Fury tree this week.
      • Class Updates
        • Changed some pathing and node positions to encourage more flexible build choices.
        • Spear of Bastion – Should now work correctly outside of the Shadowlands.
        • Elysian Might – Should now work correctly outside of the Shadowlands.
        • Honed Reflexes – Now reduces cooldowns by 1.0 second (was 1.5 seconds) and reduces the cooldown of Raging Blow (was Bloodthirst).
        • New Talent: Menace – Intimidating Shout will knock back all nearby enemies except your primary target and cause them all to cower in fear for 15 seconds (was flee).
        • Crushing Force has been redesigned – Slam deals an additional 30% damage and it has a 10% increased critical strike chance.
        • Concussive Blows – Now reduces the cooldown of Pummel by 1.0 second (was 1.5 seconds).
        • Titanic Throw – Correctly applies deep wounds to all targets when combined with Improved Heroic Throw.
        • Impending Victory – Heals for 30% (was 40%).
        • Thunder Clap – Costs 30 Rage for Arms or Fury (still costs 0 Rage for Protection).
        • Rend – Removed from the class tree.
      • Arms Developer Notes
        • We’re feeling confident in the general structure, but we will likely add some extra talents to the middle of the tree where it feels a little bit sparse.
        • Sharpened Blade and Blunt Instruments – As with the simple talents mentioned earlier in this update, having some guidance from talents rather than everything being wide open can be helpful for some of our less knowledgeable players. We’re aware of the polarizing feedback here, but we want to get this in front of more players throughout the Alpha and Beta before we decide if it needs to be removed. If it doesn’t work out as we hope, we’re happy to change it.
        • We’re looking at changing the Bladestorm subsequent talents into choice nodes to give some more options for players to experiment with.
        • Colossus Smash and Warbreaker – We’ve seen some feedback regarding why these are separate talents and require an investment of two talent points. 30% increased damage with the option to apply to multiple targets on a fairly short cooldown is a massive effect. It is worth far more than the average talent, especially for those located before the level 20 gate and we feel it is fair to be split into separate components as it currently is in the live game.
        • There are quite a lot of survivability options and improvements for Warriors in the class tree, but each DPS spec has historically had a major cooldown. For Arms it is Die by the Sword, so you are now purposely forced into pathing through it and one of its subsequent nodes in order to ensure you have a minimum of some survivability.
      • Arms Updates
        • Changed some pathing and the position of some nodes so that players are much more likely to take some healing/utility nodes.
        • Warbreaker – No longer incorrectly replaces Execute and does not require 20 talent points to unlock.
        • Storm of Swords – No longer incorrectly requires 20 talent points to unlock.
        • Fracture – Now causes Rend, Deep Wounds and Thunderous Roar’s Bleed effects to instantly expire and deal all remaining damage over time.
        • Skullsplitter – Cooldown increased to 30 seconds (was 21 seconds).
        • Bloodletting – Also increases the critical strike chance of bleed effects by 10%.
        • Die by the Sword – Should now correctly cost a talent point.
        • Bloodborne – Now 2 ranks and each rank increases the damage of Deep Wounds, Rend and Thunderous Roar’s Bleed effects by 10%.
        • Barbaric Training – Removed from the talent tree.
        • Skull Banner – Should now correctly cost a talent point.
        • Deadly Calm – Removed from the tree for now, iterating on a better version that will be more desired by players.
        • Fueled by Violence – Increased heal amount to 50% (was 30%).
        • Reaping Swings – Lowers the cooldown of Cleave by 3 seconds (was 2 seconds).
        • New Talent: Storm Wall – Whenever you Parry, you heal for 10% of your maximum health.
        • Rend – Added to the Arms tree.
        • Exploit the Weakness now increases Tacticians’ chance to trigger by 1.6% (was 2.6%).
      • Fury Developer Notes
        • We’re doing something fairly experimental with Single-Minded Fury. We’re unsure if it will work out as intended, but we feel it there’s an important issue to try and address here. For a good deal of time there has been a consistent complaint that some players cannot continue to play Fury due to the intense nature of it. Our goal with Annihilator and the related talents is to create a sub spec that would provide a lower APM build that would still allow players to have fun, be competitive and feel like a Fury Warrior.
        • We’ve made Titan’s Grip baseline for various reasons, but primarily because it makes many things much simpler. It will be something players gain as they level up.
        • As with the Arms tree, you are now forced to take Enraged Regeneration to ensure you have a minimum amount of survivability. A dead Warrior deals no DPS.
        • Annihilator is intended to work with most of the Raging Blow modifiers (except those related to cooldown and charges), it is currently working with some, and we hope to have this fully functioning and detailed in tooltips by the next Alpha build.
        • We’re working on the subsequent nodes for Odyn’s Fury and Ravager, these will be choice nodes and we’ll have more to share here in the future.
      • Fury Updates
        • Rearranged various talents and created new pathways and choices.
        • Titan’s Grip – Now baseline for all Fury Warriors.
        • Hack and Slash – No longer incorrectly requires 20 talent points.
        • Onslaught – Removed the Enrage requirement to use, cooldown reduced to 14 seconds (was 16 seconds) and Rage generated reduced to 20 (was 25).
        • Pulverize – Now increases Enrage by 1 second and causes Onslaught to Enrage you.
        • Odyn’s Fury – Now generates 20 Rage temporarily. We plan for this this to generate Rage based on the targets hit in a future update.
        • Crushing Blow – Removed the auto charge component.
        • Swift Strikes – Now also causes Raging Blow and Annihilator to generate 1 additional Rage per rank.
        • Critical Thinking – Now also increases the critical strike damage of Raging Blow by 5% per rank.
        • Depths of Insanity – Ranks reduced from 2 to 1 and changed to, Recklessness lasts 5 seconds longer.
        • Ravager – Cooldown increased to 90.0 seconds (was 45.0 seconds) but damage increased to 84% (was 42%) and now correctly awards 10 Rage when dealing damage.
        • Siegebreaker – Duration increased to 12 seconds (was 10 seconds), now generates 15 Rage (was 10) and damage increased to 120% (was 110%).
        • Deafening Crash – Now also increases the critical strike chance of Raging Blow and Annihilator during Siegebreaker by 10%.
        • Slaughtering Strikes – Now correctly costs a talent point and correctly improves all Rampage Strikes when caused by both Raging Blow and Annihilator.
        • Slaughtering Strikes damage bonus reduced to 8% per strike (was 10%).
        • Frenzied Flurry – Reduced to 25% (was 50%) chance to trigger Enrage per rank and auto attack damage bonus reduced to 5% per rank (was 10%).
        • Annihilator – Correctly no longer works with the chain effect of Whirlwind.
        • Raging Armaments – Now correctly costs a talent point.
        • Skull Banner – Now correctly costs a talent point.
        • Vicious Contempt – Now 2 ranks at 20% per rank.
        • Storm of Swords – Whirlwind and Slam have a 6.0 seconds cooldown but deal 100% increased damage and Slam generates 5 Rage.
        • Annihilator – Damage reduced by 15%.
        • Unbridled Ferocity – Now correctly cost a talent point.
        • Deft Experience – Partial implementation and not labeled on the tooltip is that each node is intended to also reduce the cooldown of Bloodthirst by 0.5 seconds.
      • Protection Developer Notes
        • Shield Charge – The intention for this ability is that it would be used to charge into packs in dungeons or raids as an opener. Shield Charge isn’t competitive enough currently and we’ll be looking into this. We are toying with the idea of no minimum range so that it can be used at any time and would function more as a shield smash when you’re within a certain distance.
        • There are some technical complications with Devastator and Devastate that stopped us from merging them as a node for this week, we are likely to either make them a choice node or have Devastate be baseline.
        • We’re working on subsequent nodes for Ravager and hope to have updates here soon.
        • Battle Scared Veteran – We want this to remain powerful so in terms of changes we’re hopefully going to be able to balance this ability around the lockout period. Protection Warriors are performing well in the game currently but more so than some other tanks there’s a low margin for error. Battle Scared Veteran is intended to be a fall back in case you make a mistake.
      • Protection
        • Moved the position of a few nodes around to create some different options and added some new pathways.
        • Improved Heroic Throw – Now also increases the damage of Heroic Throw and Titanic throw by 100%.
        • Bloodborne – Now 2 ranks and each rank increases the damage of Deep Wounds, Rend and Thunderous Roar’s Bleed effects by 15%.
        • Spiked Shield – Damage increased by 10%.
        • Rend – Added to the Protection tree.

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

  • RATED ARENA SOLO QUEUE
    • Observant Alpha testers will notice that there is now a Solo Rated PvP option in the Player vs. Player UI. Players will not be able to queue for this mode yet as its still being worked on, but we will have more information to share in a later build.

PROFESSIONS

  • USER INTERFACE
    • Art and animations added for the Professions Specialization frame.

USER INTERFACE AND ACCESSIBILITY

  • NEW HUD UI
    • Edit Mode
      • Added Extra Action Ability
    • Tracking drop down list added back to the minimap area.
      • Developer Note: Class based and professions tracking will rejoin the list soon.
  • Player interactions with NPC and game objects that open UI windows has received an update, changing the way these interactions are handled on the back end.
    • Developers’ note: There is no player facing design change, but we’d like alpha testers to help report bugs if there are any issues with UI dialogues from NPC and game objects.

Hotfixes – 17 August 2022

Quote from: Blizzard

AUGUST 17, 2022

Dungeons and Raids

  • Timewalking
    • Valt of the Wardens
      • Glazer
        • Temporarily disabled the Focus ability.

Quests

  • The objective text for the raid quest “Turning the Wheel” now correctly states that 15 boss kills are required.

Hotfixes – 16 August, 2022, Dragonflight Alpha Extended Maintenance August 16-17

Patch 9.2.7 has launched on both NA and EU realms and although Blizzard had to close the AH due to a bug they are now opening it again. They’ve released the first hotfixes that include visual improvements in Grimrail Depot and the removal of the Conquest Cap.
The Auction House wasn’t the only thing causing Blizzard trouble though, as they’ve had to extend the maintenance for the next Alpha build by a whole day because of issues they have had to get the next Alpha build launched!

Hotfixes – 16 August, 2022

Quote from: Blizzard

AUGUST 16, 2022

Dungeons and Raids

  • Mythic+
    • Grimrail Depot
      • Skylord Tovra
        • Rakun’s Diffused Energy zone positions have been adjusted, but also now show a warning visual at their location prior to becoming dangerous.
        • Spinning Spear is now correctly assigned the Stun mechanic, allowing the loss of control UI to function correctly.

Items and Rewards

  • Increased the vendor cost of Penumbra Thread to 11 gold (was 9 gold).
    • Developers’ note: This price change is to balance the decreased cost of reagents with the change to a regional commodity Auction House.

Player versus Player

  • The Conquest cap has been removed.
  • Spoils of War 25% Conquest and 40% Honor increased buff is now available until Shadowlands Season 4 ends.

Burning Crusade Classic

  • Fixed an issue that prevented the PvP leaderboards from updating as expected.

Dragonflight Alpha Extended Maintenance August 16-17

Quote from: Blizzard

We encountered an issue during today’s Alpha update that will require an extended maintenance to resolve.

We hope to reopen the Alpha for further testing on the new build tomorrow, Wednesday, August 17.

Hotfixes: August 12, 2022, Auction House Listings Next Reset, Alpha Feedback: Paladins & Hunters

After a lull in hotfixes we have a few fixes and improvements on the Shrouded M+ affix. Blizzard also announced that with the release of patch 9.2.7, which brings region wide auction houses for commodities, all auctions will be delisted.

On the Alpha side of things the devs responded to a couple of Paladin concerns and posted a total of 5 posts detailing changes and responding to feedback from Hunters! Check it all out below:

Hotfixes: August 12, 2022

Quote from: Blizzard

August 12, 2022

Dungeons and Raids

  • Fated Sanctum of Domination
    • Guardian of the First Ones
      • Resolved an issue where additional Fated Powers could fail to appear after the first power appeared.
  • Mythic+
    • Affixes
      • Shrouded
        • Improved visual clarity for Nightmare Cloud.
        • Nightmare Cloud should no longer remove players from Stealth.
        • Improved visual clarity for Carrion Swarm.
        • Carrion Swarm range reduced to 15 yards (was 20).
      • Sanguine
        • No longer heals Invigorating Fish Sticks in Tazavesh: Soleah’s Gambit.

Auction House Listings Next Reset

Quote from: Blizzard
To prepare for the upcoming region-wide commodities Auction House update, all auctions that are still listed when next week’s maintenance begins will be cancelled and returned to players’ mailboxes. There will be a notice that appears in the Auction House 48 hours before the maintenance begins informing players of the update, so be sure to set your listings to end before the servers go down.

Alpha Feedback: Paladins

Quote from: Blizzard

While this ability is relatively new to WoW as a whole, it does exist as a thing Paladin are familiar with, changing its name for the sake of change likely causes more confusion than a slightly off-themed ability does. Also, Shadowlands and its story doesn’t stop existing after Dragonflight launches.

This is a topic of discussion, but nothing final to announce either way.

Bringing back a way to get some quick Holy Light casts off is something we are discussing, whether through Infusion of Light changes, or some other method.

Alpha Feedback: Hunters

Quote from: Blizzard
Hello again Hunters,

This won’t be a specific list of everything that has changed, but some notes on changes coming to the next build.

Class Tree:

  • Some minor changes have been made to some node connections.
  • Lone Survivor’s cooldown reduction has been lowered from 60 to 30 seconds.
  • Death Chakram should work in non-Shadowlands zones, and should increase all damage taken rather than just Physical damage taken
  • Master Marksman should work with melee abilities as well.

Marksmanship

  • Lots of bug fixes.
  • Legacy of the Windrunners has changed into a 2-point node again, each point will add 3 wind arrows. Also any buffs to Aimed Shot now applies to these Wind Arrows.
    • To clarify the point about Legacy of the Windrunners gaining bonuses from Aimed Shot, this is any buffs to crit chance or damage to Aimed Shot. Trick Shots will not be sending Wind Arrows all over the place.
  • New talent in the bottom left area: Bulletstorm. Extra targets your Aimed Shot or Rapid Fires ricochet to from Trick Shots grants a stacking buff to your Multi-Shot damage.
  • Bombardment has changed to a 1 point node and is located right below Multi-Shot
    • There has been some discussion about how Bombardment should work, or perhaps that it should just work like the current 4-piece set bonus with alternate numbers. Tracking resources spent is difficult in the default UI, and most people feel it is necessary to get an addon to track how much more Focus they have to spend to get a Trick Shots effect.
    • With the current design of X Arcane/Chimaera shots required as opposed to Focus Spent, why require a Multi-Shot instead of just granting Trick Shots? Most of the purpose of this talent is to provide some limited options for Trick Shots when you don’t have 3+ targets to consistently gain Trick Shots. If the fight has one target most of the time, and occasionally some adds spawn, getting a buff that guarantees your next Multi-Shot to grant you a Trick Shots regardless of targets hit should grant you increased control over when you want to use the effect. The Bombardment buff currently lasts 2 minutes, so there is no rush to try to jam in some extra shots right as some adds spawn, you have time to prepare and use this.
  • Calling the Shots has had its design adjusted to grant cooldown reduction for Trueshot from Focus Spent, rather than require specific shots.

Beast Mastery and Survival have also had some bug fixes, but no notable design changes this week. That doesn’t mean things are final.

edit: To clarify the point about Legacy of the Windrunners gaining bonuses from Aimed Shot, this is any buffs to crit chance or damage to Aimed Shot. Trick Shots will not be sending Wind Arrows all over the place.

Quote from: Blizzard

This is the goal. It may not be there with current numbers, but these 3 points (yes, they are still 3 total points, Windrunner’s Guidance is 1-point again), is that this should be competitive. Maybe it needs to be from Aimed Shot and Rapid Fire. Maybe Arcane Shot/Chimaera shot can also cause it. There’s danger in lumping too much extra damage to Aimed Shot for PvP reasons – hypothetical numbers, if Aimed Shot normally does 1000 damage, but via procs can sometimes do 2500 damage, the damage swing is super high. A lot of bonuses were pulled out of Aimed Shot in BFA/Shadowlands and just lumped into Aimed Shot damage to try to keep its damage consistently strong.

Bulletstorm’s design is currently a buff that stacks up to 10, but doesn’t refresh duration as you gain stacks. It lets you get some big Multi-Shots in, but in a cyclical fashion.

There’s some potential tree restructure that has to happen if this is the case, because Rapid Fire is technically optional, and having a line of things coming off of rapid fire and not connecting anywhere else limits how you can move your points around the tree. That isn’t to say this isn’t possible, just that it’s more involved than just putting a node somewhere that buffs only Rapid Fire.

There are no plans to redesign any of the Mastery effects for Hunters.

Quote from: Blizzard

I should clarify my post above a bit more.

PvP is a concern for abilities that sometimes deal big damage or heal lot. This is true for the game as a whole. We have tools available to change things in PvP compared to PvE. While these tools obviously work, it’s not intuitive that Aimed Shot does 1000 damage against a kobold, and 500 damage against a player because of a hidden multiplier.

There are also PvE concerns of your abilities swinging in damage a lot. Partly for tuning reasons, but also for how the game feels. Again using hypothetical numbers, if Aimed Shot does 1000 damage, but sometimes 2500, your damage variance from each boss attempt, or on that difficult M+ pack, or in the Mage Tower challenges, or wherever, is very unstable. Sometimes it’s OK for your damage to be very swingy, some specs inherently have a lot of randomness in how they play and that’s by design. Critical strikes are already a thing that exist that changes your damage a lot, but you don’t often pull a boss and think “oh, my aimed shot didn’t crit, lets reset and try again”. That’s obviously an extreme example, but if there’s so much randomness tied to one ability’s damage, and that ability is a significant part of your total throughput, maybe it’s a problem we should try to address.

Quote from: Blizzard

If they only buff Aimed Shot, does that make Rapid Fire less desirable because it has fewer modifiers than Aimed Shot?

Quote from: Blizzard

I did not intend my question to be combative if it came off that way, it was just a question of how things look at a glance. For players who don’t rely on 3rd party sites or high end theorycrafting, if they look at the tree and see 5 things that only buff Aimed Shot, and Rapid Fire off to the side, Rapid Fire probably looks like a much less desirable button. When these 5 things buff both Aimed Shot and Rapid Fire, maybe it’s a good push in the right direction that Rapid Fire is an important button you should get, and these bonuses also work on that ability so you feel like you’re getting full value from them.

Neither direction is objectively correct or incorrect.

Dragonflight Zone Preview: Ohn’ahran Plains & Dungeon Preview: A Bounty of Adventure Ahead, Feedback: Paladins & Warriors

Blizzard has released 2 new previews. This time for the Ohn’ahran Plains and for the 8 new dungeons. They have also responded to Paladin and Warrior feedback.

Dragonflight Zone Preview: Ohn’ahran Plains

Quote from: Blizzard

Explore the Ohn’ahran Plains, a verdant region filled with sweeping plateaus, mesas, groves, and valleys abundant with life.

Named after the Wild God of the Wind, Ohn’ahra, the Ohn’ahran Plains are a viridescent grassland that rise gently upward from the Waking Shores, with mellow hills and steppes worn smooth by wind and river. This region boasts prominent and dramatic elevations that become more mountainous, and geysers are alive with erupting columns of boiling steam.

Once home to the green dragonflight, nature thrives in the Ohn’ahran Plains. Magnificent, lush greenery abounds, and calm waters flow through the Emerald Gardens, an area alive with natural wonder drawn from the magic of the Emerald Dream.

The endlessly open plains are abundant with life, and the landscape is dotted with singing stones.

Ohn’ahran’s Denizens and Wildlife

Vast plateaus and mesas are home to the growing clans of centaurs, each a unique culture unto itself and masters of different specialties. The centaur clans are deeply connected to the land, maintaining their traditions, and those seeking to assist can earn their trust.

This region is teeming with life. High grasses surround watering holes that draw in large wildlife that provide ample prey for the hungry proto-dragons soaring through the skies. Here are some of the creatures you’ll happen upon in your travels.

Rockfang
Rockfang
Mammoth
Mammoth
Blue Hornstrider
Blue Hornstrider

The Ohn’ahran Plains are waiting for you to continue your adventure in Dragonflight. We look forward to sharing more details as development continues.

Dragonflight Dungeon Preview: A Bounty of Adventure Ahead

Quote from: Blizzard

Face new challenges and adventures in the Dragon Isles with four new level-up dungeons and four maximum-level dungeons. Danger, malice, and perhaps a bit of loot are yours to discover. Here’s a brief look at each of the dungeons.

Level-up dungeons:

  • Ruby Life Pools
  • Brackenhide Hollow
  • The Nokhud Offensive
  • Uldaman: Legacy of Tyr

Max-level dungeons:

  • Neltharus
  • The Azure Vault
  • Halls of Infusion
  • Algeth’ar Academy

Some descriptions and information are still in progress or may change as development progresses.

Zone: The Waking Shores

Ruby Life Pools

  • Melidrussa Chillworn: Melidrussa was chosen to lead the Flashfrost infusion efforts in the Ruby Life Pools. Her mastery of primal energy manipulation includes exceptional control over elemental frost. She wields this power to carry out her fervent belief in protecting dragonkin from the influence of titans.
  • Kokia Blazehoof: As Primalist forces assault the Ruby Life Pools from all sides, it falls to Kokia and her Blazebound lieutenants to capture precious eggs from overwhelmed defenders, spreading flame and havoc as they go.
  • Kyrakka and Erkhart Stormvein

Neltharus

Beneath the Obsidian Citadel lies Neltharus, home of the black dragonflight’s hoard and the secrets behind their legendary forging. When the djaradin woke from their slumber, they chose Neltharus as the point of entry for their attack. Surprised to find it deserted, they quickly laid claim to its secrets for themselves… as well as the rest of the Obsidian Citadel.

  • Chargath, Bane of Scales: This veteran dragon hunter’s title was given eons ago as a mark of legend. While the Qalashi hunters under his command train, he plans their next offensive and awaits with eager anticipation the opportunity to display his expertise.
  • Forgemaster Gorek: As one of the djaradin’s most distinguished craftsmen, the Forgemaster Gorek now resides in his sweltering chamber of the black dragon barracks. There, he harnesses the igneous power of the massive forge to construct deadly weaponry.
  • Magmatusk: The djaradin discovered many of Neltharion’s secrets while plundering Neltharus. An experimental potion gone awry created Magmatusk, a behemoth of a mammoth bent on sheer destruction.
  • Warlord Sargha: Leader of the Qalash djaradin, Warlord Sargha has been in search of anything that would increase the power of her clan and help take down their draconic enemies. In the hoard at the heart of Neltharus, she may have found exactly what the djaradin need.

Zone: The Azure Span

Brackenhide Hollow

Brackenhide Hollow is the largest gnoll home in the Dragon Isles, yet the wild gnoll settlement holds unspeakable danger. Decay seeps from the Hollow, spreading among the gnoll tribes of the Azure Span and threatening to rot away all life. In the heart of the Hollow lies the leader of the Brackenhide, and the knowledge she gleefully shares with her withered kin.

  • Hackclaw’s War-Band: Rira Hackclaw and her compatriots, Gashtooth and Tricktotem have risen up as a deadly warband among the Brackenhide. Their tactics are the reason tuskarr never travel alone, and their strength is the reason Wratheye has them guarding the gate to the Hollow.
  • Treemouth: Withered by decay, this once proud ancient has been dubbed Treemouth by the gnolls. As the rot settled into its branches, so too did it settle in the poor creature’s mind, leaving a creature bent on nothing more than the need to feed and spread decay.
  • Gutshot: This sharpshooting gnoll has mastered the art of hunting, trapping, and killing her prey. Impressed by her abilities and cunning, the Decatriarch has assigned Gutshot to oversee and train the other hunters…and take out any interlopers that might venture too far into Brackenhide.
  • Decatriarch Wratheye: Wratheye discovered decay magic in her thirst for power, and declared herself the Decatriarch after mastering it. She now builds the strength of the Brackenhide by spreading her dark magic among her tribe so the tuskarr, and all of the Azure Span, will rot in its wake.

The Azure Vault

Long ago, Malygos created the Azure Vault as a place for Sindragosa to catalogue and store away curious magical artifacts he found. Locked away and deserted millenia ago, the Vault has since fallen into disrepair, leaving it vulnerable to attacks from without… and within.

  • Leymor: Leymor was born of a humble seedling that Malygos found in a pool of ley energy. Once but a small sprout in Sindragosa’s garden, over millenia Leymor has shot up like a weed. Left to its own devices, the looming giant would surely overrun the entirety of the Azure Vault.
  • Azureblade: As security for the Vault, Azureblade refused to leave when it was sealed, choosing duty over safety. When the blue dragons failed to return, her bitter resignation drove her to eventual madness. Extending her own life with the magics she was sworn to protect, Azureblade now claims ownership over all the blue dragonflight left behind.
  • Telash Greywing: Furious at the blue dragonflight, Telash Greywing is determined to find the secrets that Sindragosa has been hiding in the Arcane Vault. Together with the Sundered Flame, he is certain he will discover more about the origins of the dracthyr… and incriminating evidence against the blue dragonflight.
  • Umbrelskul: Millenia ago, Umbrelskul unwittingly meddled with raw arcane power. Riddled with crystalline growths, he was taken to the Azure Vault until a cure could be found. Sadly, the Vault was sealed away before the research was completed, leaving Umbrelskul sleeping in stasis… until now.

Zone: Ohn’ahran Plains

The Nokhud Offensive

Civil war has erupted in the wake of Clan Nokhud’s capture of the ancient eagle spirit, Ohn’ahra. To the other clans, Ohn’ahra is more than a mere spirit: she is their goddess. Primalists summon elemental forces, and necromancers command the spirits of legendary centaur. Beset by enemies from all sides, other Marruk clans must rally for a final assault against the Nokhud and their khan, Balakar.

  • Granyth: The shadow of Granyth is known across the plains of Ohn’ahra as an omen of death and destruction. As battles between centaur clans rage across the plains, he knows it is time to destroy his ancient enemies once and for all. Soon he will land on the battlefield. Teams of centaur have armed their ballistae with bolts enchanted by Clan Shikaar. They stand ready to focus the fire of their artillery against the Primalist proto-dragon, but someone must be brave enough to stand on the front lines.
  • The Raging Tempest: Violent storm winds that ravage the plains of Ohn’ahra have coalesced into an avatar of the storm. The Raging Tempest continues to gather power to devastate not only the plains of Ohn’ahra, but eventually the entirety of the Dragon Isles. Unless champions can defeat the stormcasters and dispel their relentless elemental, Primalist chaos will reign on the plains.
  • Teera and Marruk: Blasphemous Ukhel necromancers are resurrecting legendary centaur. The spirits of Teera, the matriarch of the Ohn’ahran clans, and Maruuk, the centaur’s greatest warrior, have been raised from their graves. Blinded by painful and traumatic memories of their past, the two legends now answer the commands of Balakar and the Nokhud centaur! Only the tumult of battle can rouse them from necromantic manipulation. Once their fury has abated, perhaps they can find rest again… and eternal peace.
  • Balakar Khan: Balakar Khan is the ruthless and mighty leader of the Nokhud clan. With the great eagle spirit Ohn’ahra captured by his stormcasters, he plans to grant himself the power of the wind. Hatred unites his clan against all “outsiders,” as he calls for a return to the brutal and barbaric practices of the past. The relentless Nokud offensive continues. Someone must stand up to its tyrannical commander.

Zone: Eastern Kingdoms: Badlands

Uldaman: Legacy of Tyr

Zone: Thaldraszus

Halls of Infusion (In Development)

  • Watcher Irideus: Tasked by Tyr to protect the Halls of Infusion from outsiders, Watcher Irideus has waited to perform his duties for centuries. When finally confronted by outsiders, however, Irideus fell short. He does not intend to fail again.
  • Gulping Goliath: Deep within the natural caverns linking together the functional parts of the Halls of Infusion lurks the Gulping Goliath.  Father to generations of Hornswogs in this underground lair, the Goliath and his brood are quick to devour any creatures that stray too close.
  • Khajin the Unyielding: Khajin honed her power over the elements with anger, directed at those forces which saddled Azeroth with their intent. Unleashed upon the Halls of Infusion, Khajin vowed to stop at nothing to upend the Titans’ order.
  • Primal Tsunami: Summoned by all of the will that Infuser Sariya could muster, the Primal Tsunami was given life to break apart the Halls of Infusion.

Algeth’ar Academy (In Development)

  • Vexamus
  • Accidental Amalgamation
  • Crawth
  • Echo of Headteacher Doragosa

Feedback: Warriors

Quote from: Blizzard

We feel that all three Warrior specializations have excellent foundations for both their class fantasies and with regard to how fun their rotations are to play. So, our goal for the class in Dragonflight has been to evolve and enhance each specialization rather than to revolutionize or rebuild them.

We’re trying to strike a balance between existing things you know and love, exciting new talents and greatest hits from that past such as Blood and Thunder, Odyn’s Fury and Cold Steel, Hot Blood.

With this in mind, players should expect core rotations to feel comfortable and familiar but with a much wider variety of choice in terms of which elements they can enhance. In addition to this we’re also attempting to build in support to enable players to experiment with more varied playstyles if they desire, such as the Arms being able to heavily investing in damage over time abilities and Fury being able to double down on auto attacks.

–August 11–

The arrangement of Warrior talents in the Alpha at this time is a partial implementation towards opening up more options for each specialization. We expect to have the full version of this in the next Alpha build, and once it’s live, we’d love to hear whether you prefer the wider choices or a more streamlined tree like we had in the initial version of the revamped Warrior class tree.

Arms

  • We’re happily getting close to the finish with the Arms talent tree. There’s still work to do on individual talents (including a few additions) rather than the tree structure as a whole.

Fury

  • Currently the Fury tree is undergoing some iteration and what you’re seeing in the Alpha today, unfortunately, has some key missing placements, connections, and a number of requirements that are not working correctly.
  • We’ll also likely make Titan’s grip baseline, as there’s no specific benefits (outside of weapon stats) for picking up this talent in comparison to others in the tree.

Protection

  • We’ve been recently focused on the overall class, as we’ve been pleased with Protection and feedback that this talent tree is mostly in a good place. We’ll be looking more at Protection once the other trees are up to the same standard.

Feedback: Paladins

Quote from: Blizzard

This was an intentional change. Rule of Law provides unique utility to increase the range of your heals. The reality is, people used it as a throughput cooldown. Not every situation needs a range increase, but having the option to do so is nice and not something we wanted to remove.

This is something we’re working on, we don’t intend on removing the ability to dispel magic effects from Holy Paladin.

Hotfixes – 9 August 2022, Phase 5 Dragonflight Alpha Development Notes, Feedback: Dragonriding & Hunters

Last night we got a new set of hotfixes for the live servers which include buffed drops for Cosmic Flux! The Alpha went into phase 5 with a ton of new changes such as Warlocks, 2 new dungeons, Tailoring and Engineering being enabled. Check out the full notes below!

Hotfixes – 9 August 2022

Quote from: Blizzard

AUGUST 9, 2022

Dungeons and Raids

  • Fated Castle Nathria
    • Sludgefist
      • Adjusted the Fated Power cooldowns to better align with their ability cadence.
  • Fated Sanctum of Domination
    • Guardian of the First Ones
      • Adjusted the Fated Power cooldowns to better align with their ability cadence.
    • Kel’Thuzad
      • Fixed an interaction where Protoform Barrier (Fated Power) could erroneously trigger after Kel’Thuzad’s health is depleted.
    • Sylvanas Windrunner
      • Adjusted the Fated Power cooldowns to better align with their ability cadence in Phase 2.
  • Mythic+
    • Shrouded Affix
      • Fixed an issue that could cause Zul’gamux to not cast Blood Siphon if she was moving.

Items and Rewards

  • Increased all Cosmic Flux rewards from PvP, Mythic+, and Raids by 100%.
  • Cosmic Flux will now be mailed to players when left un-looted.
  • Trashmaster’s Mantle received from Mythic+ or the Great Vault can no longer be used to complete the “I Am the Trashmaster” quest.
    • Developers’ note: Players hoping to become the Trashmaster may do so by finding a Trashmaster’s Mantle in Operation: Mechagon on standard Mythic difficulty. Players who have received a Trashmaster’s Mantle from Mythic+ since the start of Season 4 may still use it to complete the quest, but should be aware that the Richly Appointed Drape quest reward will be awarded at item level 78.

Quests

  • Fixed an issue that prevented “Tempting Fate” world quests from appearing.

Season of Mastery

  • Naxxramas
    • Fixed an issue where bonus loot could not be rewarded when defeating a boss using Runes of Fortune.
      • Developers’ note: Raid groups should always receive an extra Set Piece Token, piece of Gear the boss normally drops, or Splinter of Atiesh per stack of Rune of Fortune the raid has active.

Phase 5 Dragonflight Alpha Development Notes

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello everyone! Here are this week’s Dragonflight Alpha development notes:

DISCOVER THE DRAGON ISLES

  • Ohn’ahran Plains
  • Removed: Thaldraszus

NEW DUNGEONS

Developers’ note: Throughout the testing period, character levels will be scaled when entering Dragonflight dungeons. When this happens, the amount of talent points that your character will have available will reflect the original level, not the scaled level.

  • The Azure Vault
  • Brackenhide Hollow

CHARACTER LEVEL

Developers’ note: With each phase, we encourage players to make a new template character and avoid using their previous characters as they could potentially be in a broken state. After making a new template character, make sure to talk to Questzertauren and he will prepare you for any available content.

  • Level 62 Character Template
  • Maximum Level: 65
  • Mechagnomes have been re-enabled.

CLASSES

  • NEW TALENT SYSTEM
    • Switching Talents and Talent Loadouts no longer requires being in a rested area.
      • Developers’ note: In this Alpha build, we’ve removed the rested area requirement for changing Talents and Loadouts. Players are now be able to change their talents anywhere out in the world, as long as they’re not in combat. Additionally, previous restrictions such as not being in an Active Mythic+ instance or in a Rated PVP match still apply. In tandem with loosening this requirement, we’re adding a 5 second cast time when players change their existing talents/loadouts to prevent players from immediately swapping between different builds. This cast time does not apply to any new Talent points gained, those can be spent and activated immediately. Please let us know your thoughts on this change.
    • Evoker
      • Racial Abilities
        • Soar – Cooldown reduced to 4 minutes (was 5 minutes).
        • Familiar Skies now reduces Soar’s cooldown by 1 minute on continents that you have fully explored.
      • Class Tree
        • Developers’ notes: We want to add additional utility-focused talent choices to the Evoker class tree to diversify talent builds. With that in mind, some additional control and self-healing options are now available:
        • New Talent – Grovetender’s Gift: Emerald Blossom instantly heals you for 125% spell power when cast.
        • New Talent – Walloping Blow – Wing Buffet and Tail Swipe knock enemies further and daze them, reducing movement speed by 70% for 4 sec.
        • New Talent – Regenerative Magic: – Source of Magic forms a bond with your ally, causing 20% of their healing to also heal you while you are below 50% health.
        • Ancient Flame moved to a new location in the tree, next to Attuned to the Dream.
      • Preservation
        • Developers’ notes: These latest talent changes for Preservation are aimed at improving Temporal Anomaly’s synergy with the rest of the kit, and balancing Bronze-based builds against Green-based ones. We were also unhappy with some talent nodes (Essence Strike and Grove Tender) and replaced them with talents that should encourage a wider variety of spell usage.
        • Life-Giver’s Flame is now a 2 point node, and moved down one slot in the tree.
        • Essence Strike has been removed and replaced by Essence Attunement.
        • New Talent: Essence Attunement – Causes Essence Burst to stack twice.
        • Temporal Anomaly now heals every 2 seconds (was 1 second). Healing doubled to compensate.
        • Convergence has been removed and replaced by Resonating Sphere.
        • New Talent: Resonating Sphere – Causes Temporal Anomaly to apply Echo at 15%/30% Effectiveness (2 point node). Does not apply Echo’s direct heal. Affected by Time Lord to become up to 60% Echo effectiveness.
        • Temporal Disruption now causes Temporal Anomaly to tick twice as fast (was healing for more).
        • Grove Tender has been removed and replaced by Ouroboros.
        • New Talent: Ouroboros – Each person healed by Emerald Blossom increases healing of next Echo by 15%, stacking 15 times.
        • Time Keeper has swapped positions with Time of Need in the talent tree.
    • Hunter
      • Class Changes
        • Survival of the Fittest removed from Tenacity pets.
        • New Tenacity active button – Fortitude of the Bear: Increase the maximum health of you and your pet by 20% for 10 seconds.
      • Class Tree
        • Hunter’s Agility changed from Avoidance to 4/8% Dodge per rank.
        • Thick Hides removed.
        • Fogged Crystal removed.
        • Born to be Wild now works with Survival of the Fittest and is now a 2-rank talent, reducing cooldowns of affected abilities by 10% per rank.
        • Improved Tranquilizing Shot changed to a 1-point node.
        • Survival of the Fittest added to the tree.
        • New Choice node for Survival of the fittest:
          • Reduce the cooldown of Survival of the Fittest by 60 seconds, and increase the duration by 2 seconds.
          • Increase the amount of damage reduction from Survival of the Fittest by 20%.
        • Several talents on the class tree have had their positions adjusted due to Thick Hides and Fogged Crystal being removed, as well as Survival of the Fittest being added.
        • New (NYI) Talent – Sentinel Owl: Call forth a Sentinel Owl to the target location, granting you unhindered vision. Your attacks ignore line of sight against any target in this area. Every 200 Focus spent grants you 1 second of the Sentinel Owl when cast, up to a maximum of 12 seconds.
          • New Choice node for Sentinel Owl:
            • Sentinel’s Perception: Sentinel Owl now also grants unhindered vision to party members when active.
            • Sentinel’s Wisdom: While Sentinel Owl is active, your party gains 5% Leech and 3% Avoidance.
      • Marksmanship
        • Serpenstalker’s Trickery is now a 1 point talent.
        • A large amount of talents in the bottom left of the tree were adjusted to fix dependency problems.
      • Survival
        • Explosive Expert changed to 2/4 second reduction per point.
        • Kill Command for Survival only now has an innate 10% chance to have its cooldown reset.
        • Predator’s Kill Command chance reduced to 15% (was 25%).
        • Fury of the Eagle lowered to 30% crit chance bonus against targets below 20% health.
        • Fury of the Eagle now deals reduced damage beyond 5 targets.
        • Tactical advantage had its tooltip split to a separate number for Wildfire Bomb and Flanking Strike. Wildfire Bomb’s values reduced to 4/8% per point, Flanking Strike values unchanged.
    • Paladin
      • Holy
        • Developers’ note: The Holy Paladin Talent tree is now enabled in this Alpha build. For Dragonflight, we want to give Holy Paladins more options for caster-focused playstyles by bringing back the Power of the Silver Hand passive effect from the Legion Artifact, in addition to the active button Tyr’s Deliverance.
      • Class Talents
        • Afterimage now correctly only triggers on a Word of Glory cast.
        • Incandescence damage increased by 300%.
          • Developers’ note: This talent was extremely under tuned and did not feel rewarding as a point investment in the talent tree.
      • Protection
        • Changed positions of Strength of Conviction, Resolute Defender, Faith’s Armor, and Guardian of Ancient Kings.
        • Added several additional node connections in center section of tree.
        • Faith’s Armor increased to 10% (was 5%).
        • Blessed Hammer now correctly overrides Crusader Strike.
      • Retribution
        • Removed Talents
          • Last Rites
          • Deemed Unworthy
          • Swift Crusader
          • Long Arm of the Law
            • Developer’s note: We recognize that movement is fun and feels good when attached to short cooldown buttons. That said, our goal for Retribution Paladin is to keep their strengths in removing things that hinder their mobility, or to charge into battle on their Divine Steed, not to give them a short duration burst of movement on a very short cooldown.
          • Liadrin’s Fury
        • New Talents
          • Holy Crusader – Increases mastery by 2%.
          • Seal of Wrath – Judgment has a 25% chance to cast again and deal extra Holy damage to its target.
          • Empyrean Endowment – Judgment empowers your next Templar’s Verdict to automatically trigger Divine Storm with 25% more effectiveness. This effect can only occur every 30 seconds.
          • Executioner’s Wrath – Execution Sentence now instead deals 15% of the damage taken from your abilities to the target and nearby enemies within 8 yards.
          • Sanctified Ground – Your Consecration is 15% larger, and you cannot be slowed below 80% of normal movement speed within Consecration. This effect lasts for 2 seconds after leaving Consecration.
          • Sealed Verdict – Your Holy Power spending abilities increase the damage of your next Blade of Justice by 8/16%.
        • Modified Talents
          • Highlord’s Judgment now has 2 ranks and increases Judgment damage by 8/16% per rank.
          • Calm Before the Storm now causes enemies hit by your Divine Storm to take 100% more damage from your Consecration for 8 seconds (was 50%).
          • Inner Power now grants Holy Power every 12 seconds while you are in combat (was 10 seconds).
            • Developers’ note: This is aimed to tune the Holy Power generation overall and to balance against Sanctification.
        • Developer Notes
          • The area before the 1st gate has been restructured in a way that allows players to bypass the talents that they do not want and save a talent point while trying to go down all 3 sides of the tree. Also, the importance of the new talents such as Timely Judgment and Condemned Blade has been heightened so that players consider them more often when creating a build.
          • Zeal and Blade of Wrath have been moved up and put before the 1st gate.
            • Zeal and Blade of Wrath positional changes are aimed to solidify the foundation of Retribution Paladin. The new positioning will allow the players to get these talents in a simpler and more satisfying way for both leveling and end game content.
          • Crusade and Avenging Wrath: Might choice node has been moved up and put before the 2nd gate. This choice node is now located where Execution Sentence was in the previous build.
          • Execution Sentence and its improvement node has been moved down and put after the 2nd gate.
            • The positional changes to Crusade/AW: Might and Execution Sentence are aimed to provide gameplay defining options after the 2nd gate. The change to Execution Sentence will allow new gameplay options and is now heightened with its improvement nodes aimed at both single target and AOE situations.
          • The area after the 2nd gate has been reconstructed in a way that aims to increase build diversity and choice.
      • Known Issues
        • Not all rank upgrades are implemented.
    • Shaman
      • Elemental
        • New Talent – Heat Wave: Casting Primordial Wave triggers Lava Surge immediately and every 3 seconds for 12 seconds.
        • Primal Storm Elemental no longer moves slower than other Elementals after engaging in combat.
        • Earthquake damage reduced by 40%.
          • Developers’ note: This is not intended to be a nerf, but a damage profile adjustment. Earthquake dominates Elemental’s AoE damage profile in Shadowlands. We’ve also added talents in Dragonflight that improve Earthquake’s output such as Unrelenting Calamity, Eye of the Storm, and Mountains Will Fall which would have continued this trend. The goal is to allow for abilities like Chain Lightning, Lightning Rod, Frost Shock (with Electrified Shocks), Flame Shock, and Lava Burst to contribute more towards Elemental’s AoE.
        • Rolling Magma’s Lava Burst and Lava Burst Overload damage now reduces the cooldown of Primordial Wave by 0.2 seconds/0.5 seconds (was from 0.5 seconds/1 second).
          • Developers’ note: The interactions are with Primordial Wave and Ascendance are intentional, but the cooldown reduction was initially tuned too high.
      • Restoration
        • Cloudburst Totem now converts 30% of stored healing (was 20%) and cooldown increased to 45 seconds (was 30 seconds).
          • Developers’ note: With some new talents that interact with Cloudburst Totem like Call of the Elements, Totemic Surge, and Totemic Focus, we feel its effectiveness needs to be decreased. We started with its healing effectiveness initially but after some feedback believe it’s more important for each totem cast to feel meaningful rather than having more uses of the totem.
    • Warlock
      • Developers’ note: In this Alpha build, we are unveiling the talent trees of our favorite curse slinging, shadow bolt hurling, demon summoning class: the Warlock. These trees were built to emphasize the strong thematic and rotational gameplay that is already present with each specialization.
      • That said, we are making a few changes to address the pain points we’ve experienced while playing and concerns that have been brought up by the community. You can read more about these changes down below and our thoughts regarding why the change was made.
        • Core Changes
          • Spell Lock in the talent tree
            • With Dragonflight, we’ve removed Spell Lock from Felhunters and Spell Lock is now available for Warlocks to learn themselves. With this change, we are aiming to allow for more pet diversity in content where Felhunters feel required like dungeons and PvP.
          • Dark Soul is not in the talent tree for Dragonflight intentionally. There are a few reasons for this:
            • All Warlock specs have access to a powerful summon cooldown that interacts with the rest of their spells where Dark Soul increases a stat by a large amount. We prefer to keep the interactive spell.
            • With cooldown stacking, a high percentage of overall damage is boiled down to the cooldown window. While this can be useful for bursting, but damage output outside of this window tends to be lackluster.
            • Across the classes there are new active spells which we are both excited about and equally cautious of causing keybinding issues by adding. Finding times to pull back on active spells is something we’re on the lookout for.
          • Shadow Bolt and Incinerate base damage has been increased
            • We’ve increased the damage of Shadow Bolt and Incinerate significantly and lowered modifiers from various talents. Our goal is for these spells to feel more powerful without having to ramp to see benefits from casting it.
          • Shadowflame
            • Shadowflame is returning; however, we don’t want a short-ranged cone spell to be a rotational for a caster, so we’ve removed the damage from the ability.
        • Affliction
          • Vile Taint revamp
            • Vile Taint has been reworked – Unleashes a vile explosion at the target location, dealing X Shadow damage over 10 seconds to 8 enemies within 10 yards and applies Agony and Curse of Exhaustion to them.
            • With this change, we aim to allow Affliction to ramp up faster in dungeon gameplay especially in combination with talents like Agonizing Corruption and Sow the Seeds.
          • Deathbolt is now a base talent
            • Through Deathbolt and its modifying talents we aim to give Affliction an interesting alternative to Malefic Rapture when the situation calls for single target damage.
        • Destruction
          • An Alternative to Havoc
            • We are exploring an alternative to Havoc called Mayhem. It’s a passive that gives your single target spells a chance to deal 60% of its damage to a random nearby target. The goal with this talent is to give a more passive two-target option for players who would like to opt out of Havoc gameplay. For tuning, we intend for active Havoc gameplay to be rewarded over playing with Mayhem.
      • Along with these changes you’ll see both new spells and some old friends returning. Soul Rot and Decimating Bolt will be coming with us from the Shadowlands, Dimensional Rift returns from Legion, and many more.
      • While the core rotations of each specialization will remain familiar, these talents offer new options that will allow you to modify your gameplay and choose what’s important to you.
      • Welcome back to Azeroth, Warlocks. We look forward to hearing tales of the chaos you’ll rain down across the Dragon Isles. Be sure to let us know your thoughts, our Eye of Kilrogg will be actively watching your discussions.
    • Warrior
      • Developers’ note: As the Warrior trees were just recently put on Alpha, we’re still processing the large amount of great feedback being provided, so please keep giving us your thoughts as we’re collecting feedback from a wide variety of sources and it all helps!
      • Even though we’re still processing the feedback we’ve received, we did want to take some time to respond to a few points of feedback:
        • Multi-level stat nodes in the Warrior tree serve as gates that you need to spend into in order to access the classes ultimate abilities. The intention of the Talent system is that there are choices and not that you can obtain every point. Using multipoint nodes is a way to control that, but also to direct the flow of certain specializations towards groups of talents that are likely better for them. However, we’ve been reading your feedback and are endeavoring to make them more interesting and varied where we can.
        • Players have expressed some negativity around buying back components of old abilities. We’re trying to keep this to a minimum where we can in the warrior class, for example Rampage’s full functionality now comes from one talent. However, in some cases these talents are used for teaching new players during the leveling up process to play their class correctly.
        • We also wanted to clarify some concerns Fury players have regarding needing to obtain 4 weapons to perform optimally in the game. Current tuning aside, our expectation and plan is for Titan’s Grip to be the most competitive specialization for those that engage with progression related content of all forms at the highest levels. However, for those looking for a more relaxed playstyle that is less stressful and skill dependent but still competitive then they have that option also.
      • Class Talents
        • New Talent: Concussive Blows – Reduce the cooldown of Pummel by 1.5 seconds and successfully interrupting an enemy increases the damage you deal against them by 5% for 10 seconds. This may only occur once every 30 seconds.
        • Rearranged some talent nodes and created more interweaving paths to try and create more build variety.
        • Removed Die by the Sword from the Class tree and returned it to the Arms tree.
        • Improved Heroic Throw should correctly override Heroic Throw.
        • Reduced ranks of Two-Handed and Dual-Wield Specializations to 1.
      • Arms
        • New Talent: Skull Banner – You throw down a Skull Banner at your feet, empowering your allies. Increases critical strike damage by 20% for party members within 20 yards of the war banner. Lasts 10 seconds. Removed Concussive Blows from the Arms tree.
        • New Talent: Die by the Sword – Increases your parry chance by 100% and reduces all damage you take by 30% for 8 seconds.
        • Changed some pathing to try and make synergy groups clearer.
        • The Aura applied to enemies by Fatality is now named Fatal Mark and now lasts 60 seconds, refreshing by new stacks.
        • Fatal Mark caused by the Fatality talent can no longer critically strike.
        • Cleaned up the tooltip for Exploit the Weakness.
        • Built old ranks of Colossus Smash into Colossus Smash correctly.
        • Built old ranks of Sweeping Strikes into Sweeping Strikes correctly.
        • Reduced ranks of Improved Mortal Strike and Improved Overpower to 1.
        • Updated Icon for Martial Prowess.
      • Fury
        • New Talent: Unbridled Ferocity – Rampage has a 10% chance to grant you Recklessness for 4 seconds.
        • New Talent: Slaughtering Strikes – Raging Blow causes every strike of your next Rampage to deal and additional 10% damage. Stacks up to 5 times.
        • New Talent: Raging Armaments – Raging Blow gains and extra charge.
        • New Talent: Skull Banner – You throw down a Skull Banner at your feet, empowering your allies. Increases critical strike damage by 20% for party members within 20 yards of the war banner. Lasts 10 seconds.
        • Removed Concussive Blows from the Fury tree and moved to the Class tree.
        • Changed some pathing and node positions to try and make synergy groups clearer and add build diversity.
        • Titan’s Grip and Single-Minded Fury is now a choice talent.
        • Moved Rampage closer to the top of the tree.
        • Fixed a dependency issue with Meat Cleaver.
        • Cold Steel, Hot Blood should now generate 4 rage and references this in the tooltip correctly.
        • Bloodcraze’s Aura tooltip should now display the correct values.
        • Improved Rampage is now built into Rampage.
        • Reduced ranks of Improved Bloodthirst and Improved Raging Blow to 1.

PROFESSIONS

  • User Interface
    • The recipe panel has been updated for better ease of use and clarity:
      • Unlearned & pre-Dragonflight recipes are now found via filters.
        • Favorite recipes are unchanged and are expansion agnostic, so you’ll always see them even if the expansion is not filtered.
      • Recipe skill up chance is now represented through icons instead of recipe name text color. This change is more in-line with the new Recipe frame design while being more accessible to individuals with color vision deficiency.
      • Unlearned recipe names now show a gray color instead of a white color.
      • Recrafting Equipment has its own dedicated section in the recipe panel.
        • Please note that for this Alpha build, Recrafting is not yet implemented.
  • Gathering Nodes
    • In this Alpha build, players might notice that there are a large amount of mining & herbalism nodes spawned in the Ohn’ahran Plains. While we’re eager for feedback on how these feel, we’re still in the process of setting up the Mining & Herbalism professions and players will not be able to gather these nodes until the Professions have been enabled. In the meantime, please let us know if there are any nodes in unusual positions and are not easily accessed!
  • Engineering
    • In this Alpha build, Engineering has been enabled and can be trained by the Associate Professor Instructaur in Orgrimmar and Stormwind. There are a few new concepts that we’re exploring for Engineering in Dragonflight:
      • Engineers are able to craft Wrists for each Armor type, which can be socketed with different Tinkers that have a variety of on-use effects (such as temporary invisibility or summoning an Alarm-O-Turret).
      • We’ve added a combat resurrection consumable for non-engineers: the Convincingly Realistic Jumper Cables. These are weaker versions of the engineering variant, the Reusable Jumper Cables, and we’re very interested in hearing feedback on how they play out over the course of Alpha.
      • Various Safety Components can be used as Optional Reagents for crafting Engineering items – these Safety Components can reduce the chance of tinker malfunctions or outright prevent catastrophic malfunctions.
      • Speaking of malfunctions, the chance for engineering items to blow up in the users’ face now scale their success chance with Engineering specialization traits and Engineering Skill level. There will be a meaningful difference in success rate between new engineers that have lower skill and specialization traits and engineers that have maximized their knowledge of the profession.
    • In addition to the above, there’s a plethora of new bombs, tinkers and consumables that the Engineering profession can make. Please send us your feedback!
  • Tailoring
    • In this Alpha build, Tailoring has been enabled and can be trained by the Associate Professor Instructaur in Orgrimmar and Stormwind. Tailoring, much like the other armor-crafting Professions, has a plethora of new set & item equip effects and we’re particularly interested in hearing feedback about how these new effects feel. Spellthreads are also making a comeback as leg enchants for Intellect users.
  • Specializations
    • Unlocking Specializations requires 25 skill in that Profession. Once unlocked, players can spend Specialization points to unlock various bonuses for their Profession.
    • Developers’ note: For the purposes of Alpha we’ve added a consumable, Professor Instructataur’s Top Secret Guide, on the Associate Professor Instructaur vendor that gives players 50 Specialization points. Below are a few Specialization paths.
    • Engineering
      • Explosives – Improve in the production of bombs of all types, gaining +1 Skill when crafting bombs per point in this specialization.
        • Short Fuse – Specialize in the creation and use of bombs without safety fuses. Gain +1 Skill when crafting bombs in this specialization.
      • Optimized Efficiency – Specialize in the general precautions and techniques that are invaluable skills for all Engineers. Gain +1 Skill to all engineering crafts per point in this specialization.
        • Scrapper – Specialize in making the most of seemingly useless junk. Gain +5 Multicraft for all Engineering crafts per point in this specialization.
    • Tailoring
      • Draconic Needlework – Source the magic of the Dragon Isles to craft exceptional clothwear with reagents such as Azureweave and Chronocloth, gaining +1 Skill per point in this specialization.
        • Azureweave Tailoring – Focus on the Arcane nature of the Blue Dragonflight in your tailoring, gaining +1 Skill per point in this specialization when making and using Azureweave.
      • Garmentcrafting – Improve at tailoring Cloth Armor to take on the most powerful foes in the Dragon Isles, gaining +1 Skill per point in this specialization.
        • Outerwear – Improve at tailoring the major aspects of an outfit, such as Chest and Leg pieces of armor, gaining +1 Skill per point in this specializations.
  • Known Issues
    • Inscription: Draconic Treatises are infinitely consumable, this will be fixed in a future build. They will be single-use items that refresh each weekly reset for a small boost to your Profession Knowledge.

USER INTERFACE AND ACCESSIBILITY

  • New HUD UI
    • Unit frame art updated
      • Party frame
    • Edit Mode
      • Added Cast Bar
      • Added Minimap
      • Added Encounter Bar

Feedback: Dragonriding

Quote from: Blizzard

Here again with a few updates that went live with this build:

When we introduced turn rate tech, we wanted to make sure the when of a turn mattered. However, we might have been too heavy-handed with those values. Now that we’ve found the outer limits, we’ve re-tuned turn rate to lessen its impact. We continue to iterate on the balance here and welcome your feedback. Please give it a try, in questing, time trials, or both, and share your experience with us.

In addition, we’ve improved the hotbars for dragonriding, allowing players to customize their hotbars through drag-and-drop as normal, much like a druid’s bar when in bear form (or other cool forms). This also resolves some issues like not being able to use abilities to dismount and not being able to interact with quest items while mounted. (If you lose your dragonriding abilities, check your spellbook. Characters from previous alpha builds may not have these skills, but new characters in this build should see them there.)

  • Fixed issues include:
    • Rostrum settings now won’t reset when switching dragons, and “Accept” purchases all selections made.
    • Dragonriding visual effects should no longer persist when getting kicked off a mount.
    • Dragonriding visual effects should no longer display on other players in unexpected situations.
    • Players that aren’t Dracthyr or Demon Hunters can no longer double jump after dismounting a dragonriding mount.
  • New known issues include:
    • Occasionally, a character attempting to progress down the skill track will be unable to take new traits, even though they have enough currency. A relog should solve this in most cases.

Feedback: Hunters

Quote from: Blizzard

Sentinel’s Wisdom is very likely being redesigned.
Hunter’s Agility changing from Avoidance to Dodge was mostly so there wasn’t a doubled-up Avoidance node on the tree.

Hotfixes – 5 August, Alpha Feedback: Hunters

We get a relatively large set of hotfixes today with bug fixes and tuning changes! The blues returned to the Alpha forums to give a new round of Hunter Talent Tree changes that are for the most part making their way to the next Alpha build.

Hotfixes – 5 August

Quote from: Blizzard

AUGUST 5, 2022

Dungeons and Raids

  • Fated Raids
    • Fixed an issue that could cause client and server latency after bosses are defeated.
    • Fated Castle Nathria
      • Sire Denathrius
        • Improved the client and server performance caused by Echo of Sin’s Painful Memories.
  • Mythic+
    • Grimrail Depot
      • Grom’kar Captain’s Reckless Slash will now be cast less frequently.
      • Skylord Tovra
        • Improved the visual effect on Spinning Spear.
    • Iron Docks
      • Fixed an issue where Siegemaster Olugar’s Gatecrasher could become stuck on players.
      • Fleshrender Nok’gar
        • Burning Arrows now have a visual effect indicating where they will impact.
    • Return to Karazhan: Lower
      • Improved the visual effect on Ghostly Philanthropist’s Pennies From Heaven.
      • Lord Crispin Ference’s Will Breaker is now more visible.
      • Attumen the Huntsman
        • Spectral Charge no longer damages pets.
    • Return to Karazhan: Upper
      • The Curator
        • Fixed an issue causing Volatile Energy to fixate on pets.
      • Mana Devourer
        • Mana Devourer will once again cast Decimating Essence upon reaching full mana.
        • Energy Void damage reduced by 65%.
        • Resolved an issue that caused Coalesce Power to drain more mana than intended.

Alpha Feedback: Hunters

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello Hunters,

There are some notable changes coming to your next alpha build we wanted to share. This won’t be an exhaustive list of changes, but will hit some of the big points.

As far as bugs, we know there are bugs and things that aren’t working right. Things are being worked on.

Baseline Class Changes:

  • Tenacity Pets no longer have Survival of the Fittest.
  • Tenacity Pets have a new ability, Fortitude of the Bear. This grants you and your pet +20% maximum HP for a duration.
    • Command Pet interactions will probably be a bit broken in the next build, as well as Lone Wolf giving access to Survival of the Fittest as opposed to Fortitude of the Bear. These will be resolved in a future build.

Class Tree:

  • Thick Hides removed.
  • Survival of the Fittest is now in the class tree.
  • There is a choice node to modify Survival of the Fittest to have a shorter cooldown, or have higher damage reduction value.
  • Fogged Crystal removed.
  • Improved Tranquilizing Shot lowered to a 1 point node.
  • Born to be Wild now also modifies Survival of the Fittest, and lowered to a 2-point node.
  • There is a new, potentially placeholder, not implemented, not final, not a promise talent added in the core tree. Sentinel Owl.
    • Sentinel Owl grants you unhindered vision of a targeted area, allowing your attacks to ignore line of sight to the area.
  • There is a new, potentially placeholder, not implemented, not final, not a promise choice node attached to the Sentinel Owl node.
    • Choice A: The unhindered vision of your owl now also applies to your party members, allowing them to also ignore line of sight to the target area.
    • Choice B: While the Sentinel Owl is active, your party gains some Leech and Avoidance.

Some thoughts on Sentinel Owl:
Resonating Arrow from the Kyrian covenant is a neat, unique effect Hunters have to break the line of sight rules. It is very powerful in PvP situations, and situationally useful in PvE. We want to keep the ignore line of sight effect, but do not want to keep the personal or group damage amplification from Resonating Arrow. Keeping utility as utility, and not utility as damage, allows it to be a useful tool when the situation calls for it, rather than something you feel compelled to stack with other effects, or use on cooldown.

Marksmanship:

  • A bunch of nodes in the bottom left area have been shuffled around the tree.

Survival:

  • Kill Command (the Survival variant) now has an innate +10% chance to reset its cooldown. Predator’s value has been lowered from 25% to 15%.

Have a nice weekend, everyone.