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Category: Warcraft

The War Within Beta Development Notes & Tank Changes 17 July 2024

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello everyone.

This week’s update to the War Within Beta is now available to test. Please note that there is a possibility of some server instabilities over the next few days. If you encounter any issues with instabilities, please report them in the bug reporter.

CLASSES

  • DEATH KNIGHT
    • Death Strike can now only heal the Death Knight for a percentage of damage taken from a given damage event once. Death Strikes that heal the minimum health amount do not count as using damage events in this way.
    • Enfeeble reduces damage dealt to you by 12% (was 15%).
    • Null Magic reduces Magic damage taken by 8% (was 10%).
    • Hero Talents
      • Deathbringer (Blood/Frost)
        • Reaper’s Mark is now a 45 second cooldown (was 60 seconds).
        • Swift End now reduces the cooldown of Reaper’s Mark by 15 seconds (was 30 seconds).
        • Frost
          • Reaper’s Mark now scales with Mastery: Frozen Heart.
          • Wave of Souls now scales with Mastery: Frozen Heart.
          • Exterminate now scales with Mastery: Frozen Heart.
      • Rider of the Apocalypse (Frost/Unholy)
        • Damage of all Riders reduced by 15%
        • Hungering Thirst disease damage, Death Coil, and Frost Strike damage reduced to 10% (was 15%).
        • A Feast of Souls now Increases damage of Runic Power spenders by 20% (was 30%).
        • Trollbane’s Icy Fury damage reduced by 10%.
        • Undeath damage reduced by 10%.
    • Blood
      • Consumption’s Blood Plague damage occurs 30% more quickly (was 50%) and duration reduced to 6 seconds (was 8 seconds).
      • Rapid Decomposition’s Blood Plague and Death and Decay now deal damage 15% faster (was 18%).
      • Coagulopathy now increases Blood Plague damage by 25% per stack (was 30%).
      • Developer’s note: In The War Within, all character Stamina has been increased by 60% as part of an overall adjustment to the pace of healing gameplay. This increases the relative value of abilities that heal a percentage of a character’s maximum health. Many of these ability changes are to counteract that relative change. For instance, the percentage health that Frenzied Regeneration restores has been reduced by about a third, but the amount of health it restores has remained the same.
        Death Strike is a powerful ability that allows Blood Death Knights to mitigate a percentage of any form of damage taken in the last 5 seconds. In a way, Death Strike works like a retroactive shield block. Instead of reducing damage up front, it “mitigates” the damage you took from a hit by healing you. If used in succession, Death Strike can affect a single hit multiple times, which would be comparable to blocking a hit, then going back in time and blocking it again, in some cases restoring yourself to higher health than where you started. In The War Within, we are changing Death Strike to only heal the death knight for a percentage of damage taken from a given damage event once, to make it scale more like other tank mitigation mechanics.
        We are also reducing Runic Power generation somewhat and reducing some of the mitigation death knights get from high-uptime cooldowns like Enfeeble and Dancing Rune Weapon, but increasing armor from Bone Shield. Overall, death knights should take damage more smoothly, and they will remain one of the strongest tanks for encounters with high magic or periodic damage
      • A new aura, Coagulating Blood, shows the amount of recently taken damage that will be used to calculate the value of your next Death Strike. The aura description lists the value as a flat amount and the number of stacks shows it as a percentage of your current health.
      • Blood Shield’s cap is now 50% of the Death Knight’s maximum health (was 100%) and the cap is no longer temporarily increased by Vampiric Blood.
        • Developer’s note: This should not affect how much Blood Shield Death Knights are able to generate while actively tanking, but will reduce how large a barrier they are able to accumulate while off-tanking.
      • Bone Shield increases Armor by 100% of Strength (was 80%).
      • Leeching Strike now heals for 0.25% maximum health for each target hit (was 0.5%).
      • Dancing Rune Weapon increases Parry chance by 35% (was 40%).
      • Each active Dancing Rune Weapon generates 3 Runic Power when mirroring Heart Strike (was 5).
      • Everlasting Bond increases Dancing Rune Weapon’s duration by 6 seconds (was 8 seconds).
      • Blood Drinker reduces the damage the enemy deals to you by 15% (was 20%).
      • Bonestorm heals you for 2% of your maximum health (was 3%), up to a maximum of 10% (was 15%).
      • Bonestorm damage increased by 20%.
    • Frost
      • Glacial Advance damage reduced by 15%.
      • Icy Death Torrent damage reduced by 15%.
      • Enduring Strength now grants 15% Strength (was 20%).
      • Shattering Blade now causes the next Frost Strike when consuming 5 Razorice stacks to be increased by 115% (was 125%).
    • Unholy
      • Ebon Fever now increases damage diseases deal by 12% (was 15%).
      • Bursting Sores now increases Festering wound damage by 16% (was 20%).
      • Bursting Sores damage reduced by 8%.
      • Superstrain now applies Blood Plague and Frost Fever at 75% (was 80%).
  • DEMON HUNTER
    • Live By the Glaive now restores 2% of maximum health (was 4%).
    • Hero Talents
      • Aldrachi Reaver
        • Incisive Blade effectiveness reduced to 15%.
      • Fel-Scarred
        • Havoc
          • Demonsurge no longer increases Armor or max health while your demon form is active.
          • Demonsurge now causes Demon’s Bite to generate 15 additional Fury (and 5 for Demon Blades) while your demon form is active.
    • Vengeance
      • Developer’s note: In The War Within, all character Stamina has been increased by 60% as part of an overall adjustment to the pace of healing gameplay. This increases the relative value of abilities that heal a percentage of a character’s maximum health. Many of these ability changes are to counteract that relative change. For instance, the percentage health that Frenzied Regeneration restores has been reduced by about a third, but the amount of health it restores has remained the same.
        Like Death Strike for Death Knights, Soul Fragments give Demon Hunters strong recovery against any type of damage, as well as strong self-healing. Because Demon Hunters consume Soul Fragments steadily, we are not changing the rules for how often they can affect a damage event. We are increasing Vengeance’s overall damage taken by weakening the damage reduction of talents like Void Reaver and Illuminated Sigils, while keeping the power of core abilities like Soul Fragments and Demon Spikes. They will continue to be one of the stronger tank classes at self-healing and surviving magic damage.
      • Thick Skin increases Stamina by 60% (was 65%).
      • Demonic Wards reduces physical and magic damage taken by 8% (was 10%).
      • Soul Cleave healing reduced by 20%.
      • Frailty heals for 8% of damage done (was 10%).
      • Void Reaver reduces damage you take from targets afflicted by Frailty by 3% (was 4%).
      • Illuminated Sigils grants 12% Parry chance (was 15%).
      • Down in Flames reduces Fiery Brand cooldown by 12 seconds (was 15 seconds).
      • Metamorphosis increases maximum health by 40% (was 50%).
      • Darkglare Boon now refreshes 15-30% of Fel Devastation’s cooldown (was 20-40%) and refunds 15-30 Fury (was 20-40).
  • DRUID
    • Regrowth initial heal increased by 30%.
    • Frenzied Regeneration heals you for 20% of your maximum health (was 32%).
    • Ironfur increases Armor by 112% of Agility (was 120%).
    • Renewal heals for 20% of maximum health (was 30%).
    • Hero Talents
      • Keeper of the Grove (Balance/Restoration)
        • Dream Bloom healing increased by 20%.
        • Power of Nature increases the healing of Rejuvenation, Efflorescence, and Lifebloom by 10% (was 5%)
        • Minor Cenarion Ward cast from Durability of Nature healing increased by 100%.
        • Bounteous Bloom: Grove Guadian healing increased by 30% (was 20%).
        • Grove’s Inspiration increases Regrowth, Wild Growth, and Swiftmend healing by 9% (was 6%).
        • Potent Enchantments causes Tree of Life granted by Reforestation to last 3 seconds longer (was 2 seconds).
        • Harmony of the Grove increases your healing by 6% for each active Grove Guardian (was 3%).
      • Wildstalker (Feral/Restoration)
        • Symbiotic Blooms prefer to target injured players over pets or minions.
        • Symbiotic Blooms grow 30% more often.
        • Bond with Nature now increases healing taken by 3% (was 10%).
        • Harmonious Constitution now increases Regrowth’s healing to yourself by 35% for Restoration and 25% for Feral (was 50%).
        • Bursting Growth healing increased by 100%.
        • Implant causes Symbiotic Blooms to grow for 6 seconds (was 4 seconds).
        • Vigorous Creepers increases the healing your spells do to affected targets by 20% (was 6%).
    • Guardian
      • Developer’s Notes: In The War Within, all character Stamina has been increased by 60% as part of an overall adjustment to the pace of healing gameplay. This increases the relative value of abilities that heal a percentage of a character’s maximum health. Many of these ability changes are to counteract that relative change. For instance, the percentage health that Frenzied Regeneration restores has been reduced by about a third, but the amount of health it restores has remained the same.
        With high armor and Ironfur uptime, druids should be one of the best tanks at surviving physical damage. We’re slightly increasing the damage they take from all types of damage and balancing the power of their self-healing. We’re also reducing the durations of some of their cooldowns to make timing their use more important.
      • Reinvigoration reduces Frenzied Regeneration’s cooldown by 10/20% (was 20/40%).
      • Earthwarden reduces damage taken by 25% (was 30%).
      • Survival of the Fittest reduces cooldowns by 12/24% (was 15/30%).
      • Tooth and Claw reduces damage taken by 12% (was 15%).
      • After the Wildfire triggers after spending 300 Rage (was 200).
      • Ursoc’s Fury grants a shield equal to 25% of Thrash and Maul damage (was 45%).
      • Elune’s Favored heals you for 25% of Arcane damage dealt (was 40%).
      • Rage of the Sleeper duration reduced to 8 seconds (was 10 seconds).
      • Rage of the Sleeper damage taken reduction reduced to 20% (was 25%).
      • Rage of the Sleeper Leech decreases to 20% (was 25%).
      • Pulverize duration reduced to 8 seconds (was 10 seconds).
      • Ursoc’s Guidance reduces the cooldown of Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc by 1 second for each 25 Rage spent (was 20).
    • Restoration
      • Swiftmend healing increased by 20%.
      • Lifebloom heal over time increased by 20%.
      • Lifebloom bloom healing increased by 30%.
      • Cenarion Ward healing increased by 20%.
  • EVOKER
    • Disintegrate damage increased by 10%.
    • Fire Breath damage increased by 10%.
    • Azure Strike damage increased by 10%.
    • Deep Breath damage increased by 10%.
    • Verdant Embrace healing increased by 20%.
    • Living Flame healing increased by 30%.
    • Hero Talents
      • Chronowarden (Augmentation/Preservation)
        • Echoes cast from Resonating Sphere will no longer trigger or consume Golden Opportunity.
      • Flameshaper (Devastation/Preservation)
        • Consume Flame no longer double dips healing and damage mods.
        • Engulf can now be stored in Stasis.
        • Traveling Flame will now prefer injured allies when seeking a new target for Dream Breath.
      • Scalecommander (Devastation/Augmentation)
        • Melt Armor damage increased by 25%.
    • Augmentation
      • Black Attunement increases the maximum health of you and 4 nearby allies by 2% (was 4%).
      • Aspects’ Favor increases Black Attunement by 1% max health per talent point invested (was 2%).
    • Devastation
      • Eternity Surge damage increased by 10%.
      • Pyre damage increased by 10%.
      • Shattering Star damage increased by 10%.
      • Unravel damage increased by 10%.
      • Firestorm damage increased by 10%.
    • Preservation
      • Spiritbloom healing increased by 20%.
      • Reversion will now extend its duration by 30% when it is refreshed.
      • Emerald Blossom and Echo casts will no longer consume Essence Burst when they are released from Stasis.
      • Lifebind will now trigger its healing from heals that are considered procs.
      • Field of Dreams procs will no longer incorrectly benefit from Titan’s Gift.
  • HUNTER
    • Hero Talents
      • Sentinel (Survival/Marksmanship)
        • Symphonic Arsenal now has a 5 target cap.
        • Sentinel now has a 2 second period (was 1 second).
        • Sentinel damage increased by 100%.
        • Overwatch now has a 15 second internal cooldown.
  • MAGE
    • Mass Barrier now has a cooldown of 3 minutes (was 2 minutes).
    • Hero Talents
      • Spellslinger (Frost/Arcane)
        • Arcane
          • Embedded Arcane Splinter damage reduced by 20%.
          • Arcane Splinter damage reduced by 20%.
          • Splinterstorm damage reduced by 20%.
          • Splintering Orbs’ Arcane Orb generates 2 Splinters per hit (was 4).
    • Arcane
      • Arcane Barrage damage reduced by 60%.
      • Arcane Barrage damage increase per Arcane Charge increased to 90%.
      • Arcane Missiles damage reduced by 10%.
      • Arcane Orb damage reduced by 10%.
  • MONK
    • Yu’lon’s Grace grants an absorb equal to 1% of your maximum health (was 2%) every 3 seconds (was 2 seconds).
    • Healing Winds restores 10% of maximum health (was 15%).
    • Hero Talents
      • Conduit of the Celestials (Mistweaver/Windwalker)
        • Celestial Conduit damage reduced by 8%.
      • Master of Harmony (Mistweaver/Brewmaster)
        • Manifestation effectiveness reduced to 50% (was 100%).
        • Balanced Stratagem effect reduced to 3% (was 5%).
        • Way of a Thousand Strikes vitality reduced to 30% (was 50%).
        • Brewmaster
          • Aspect of Harmony’s damage contribution reduced to 15% (was 20%) healing contribution reduced to 7% (was 10%).
    • Brewmaster
      • Detox now costs 10 energy (was 20).
      • Chi Wave damage reduced by 10%.
      • Chi Burst damage reduced by 10%.
      • Developer’s note: In The War Within, all character Stamina has been increased by 60% as part of an overall adjustment to the pace of healing gameplay. This increases the relative value of abilities that heal a percentage of a character’s maximum health. Many of these ability changes are to counteract that relative change. For instance, the percentage health that Frenzied Regeneration restores has been reduced by about a third, but the amount of health it restores has remained the same.
        Healers have more time to heal monks than other tanks because Stagger spreads out the damage that they take over time. Our goal is for monks to take a little more damage overall than other tanks to offset this effect. However, we feel their overall magic damage mitigation is a little low compared to other tanks and are improving it somewhat by buffing Stagger and its value against magic. To increase their physical damage taken overall, we are primarily reducing the dodge granted by Elusive Brawler and some of their other talents.
      • Mastery: Elusive Brawler chance to dodge reduced by 12%.
      • Brewmaster’s Balance increases Armor by 50% (was 25%).
      • Celestial Fortune heals you for 70% of the amount healed (was 80%).
      • Amount of damage staggered increased by 8%.
      • Percentage of magic damage staggered increased to 58% (was 45%).
      • Dance of the Wind chance to dodge reduced to 5% (was 10%).
      • Staggering Strikes healing reduced by 28%.
      • Spirit of the Ox chance to summon a Healing Sphere reduced by 40%.
      • Elixir of Determination healing reduced to 30% of recently purified damage (was 50%), or a minimum of 8% of your maximum health (was 20%).
      • Celestial Brew healing reduced by 10%.
      • Pretense of Instability grants 10% Dodge (was 15%).
      • Dance of the Wind chance to dodge reduced to 5% (was 10%).
    • Mistweaver
      • Ancient Teachings now transfers 170% of damage to healing (was 150%).
      • Tear of Morning now causes 12% of Enveloping Mist healing to transfer to allies with Renewing Mist (was 20%) and increases Vivify healing by 15% (was 20%).
      • Jade Bond now increases the Mastery healing from Chi-Ji by 60% (was 40%).
      • Yu’lon’s Grace now absorbs 1% health (was 1.5%) and may stack up to 10% max health (was 15%).
      • Vivify healing increased by 30%.
      • Gust of Mist healing increased by 10%.
    • Windwalker
      • Blackout Kick damage reduced by 8%.
      • Tiger Palm damage reduced by 8%.
      • Rising Sun Kick damage reduced by 8%.
      • Fists of Fury damage reduced by 8%.
      • Spinning Crane Kick damage reduced by 8%.
      • Rushing Jade Wind damage reduced by 8%.
      • Thunderfist damage reduced by 8%.
      • Strike of the Windlord damage reduced by 8%.
      • Whirling Dragon Punch area of effect damage reduced by 8%.
      • Dual Threat damage reduced by 8%.
      • Yu’lon’s Grace now absorbs 0.6% health (was 1%) and may stack up to 6% max health (was 10%).
      • Detox now costs 10 energy (was 20).
  • PALADIN
    • Lightforged Blessing now affects 2 additional allies (was 4).
    • Flash of Light healing increased by 20%.
    • Shield of the Righteous increases your Armor by 150% of your Strength (was 170%).
    • The Dusk buff from Of Dusk and Dawn reduces your damage taken by 4% (was 5%).
    • Word of Glory healing increased by 10%.
    • Sanctified Plates’ armor increase no longer applies to bonus armor from Shield of the Righteous.
    • Protection
      • Developer’s note: In The War Within, all character Stamina has been increased by 60% as part of an overall adjustment to the pace of healing gameplay. This increases the relative value of abilities that heal a percentage of a character’s maximum health. Many of these ability changes are to counteract that relative change. For instance, the percentage health that Frenzied Regeneration restores has been reduced by about a third, but the amount of health it restores has remained the same.
        Paladins have a balance of good defenses against both physical and magical damage. They can be in danger if they lose the defensive power of standing in Consecration or if the armor bonus from Shield of the Righteous drops, so we are not reducing any of their passive physical defenses like armor or block. Like druids, paladins have high uptime on their defensive cooldowns, so we’re pulling back some of their durations to make timing their use more important. We would like paladins to have slightly more self-healing, so we are increasing the power of Word of Glory.
      • The damage reduction effect while standing in Consecrate of Mastery: Divine Bulwark is reduced by 20%.
      • Improved Holy Shield increases your chance to block spells by 8% (was 10%).
      • Sentinel’s duration reduced to 16 seconds (was 20 seconds).
      • Eye of Tyr’s duration reduced to 6 seconds (was 9 seconds).
      • Righteous Protector: Holy Power abilities reduces cooldowns by 1.5 seconds (was 2 seconds).
    • Retribution
      • Word of Glory healing increased by 20%.
  • PRIEST
    • Flash Heal healing increased by 20%.
    • Power Word: Shield absorb amount increased by 20%.
    • Power Word: Life healing increased by 20%.
    • Hero Talents
      • Voidweaver (Discipline/Shadow)
        • Discipline
          • Entropic Rift damage reduced by 30%.
          • Void Blast damage reduced by 12%.
          • Voidheart increases Atonement healing by 20% (was 10%).
    • Discipline
      • All healing is no longer reduced by 3%.
      • Power Word: Radiance healing increased by 10%.
      • Penance healing increased by 20%.
    • Holy
      • Heal healing increased by 20%.
      • Holy Word: Serenity healing increased by 20%.
      • Divine Image’s Healing Light spell healing increased by 20%.
  • ROGUE
    • Recuperator now triggers every 3 seconds (was 2 seconds).
  • SHAMAN
    • Healing Surge healing increased by 20%.
    • Hero Talents
      • Farseer (Restoration/Elemental)
        • Restoration
          • Unleash Life now calls an Ancestor for 12 seconds (was 6 seconds).
    • Enhancement
      • Primordial Wave is now a 30 second cooldown (was 45 seconds).
      • Doom Winds is now a 60 second cooldown (was 90 seconds).
      • Casting Flame Shock, Frost Shock, and Sundering will now initiate combat with melee auto attacks.
      • Molten Assault range increased by 4 yards.
      • Molten Assault now plays an impact visual on impacted targets.
      • Crash Lightning range increased by 4 yards.
      • Crash Lightning is now on personal resource display.
      • Earthen Weapon is no longer on personal resource display.
      • Elemental Blast now correctly replaces Lava Burst in spell book.
      • The following talents are now 1 point:
        • Molten Assault
        • Improved Maelstrom Weapon
        • Witch Doctor’s Ancestry
    • Restoration
      • Riptide initial heal increased by 20%.
      • Unleash Life healing increased by 20%.
      • Healing Wave healing increased by 20%.
      • Ascendance now duplicates 70% of all healing (was 80%).
      • Ancestral Guidance now transfers 10% of all healing into healing (was 25%).
      • Undulation can now be tracked through a counter on the Healing Wave and Healing Surge spell icons.
  • WARLOCK
    • Hero Talents
      • Hellcaller (Destruction/Affliction)
        • Hatefury Rituals now increases the damage of Wither by 30% (was 50%) and reduces its duration by 15% (was 25%).
          • Developer’s note: We are reducing the damage increase of Hatefury Rituals so that it is a competitive choice against Bleakheart Tactics rather than the correct choice.
        • Affliction
          • Wither periodic damage decreased by 20%.
      • Soul Harvester (Demonology/Affliction)
        • Your Demonic Soul now benefits from the following interactions:
          • Mastery: Master Demonologist
          • Shadowtouched
        • Soul Anathema is now affected by Mastery: Potent Afflictions and Mastery: Master Demonologist.
        • Demonology
          • Succulent Soul now increases the damage of Hand of Gul’dan by 60% (was 20%).
    • Destruction
      • Shadowburn damage increased by 80%.
      • Incinerate damage increased by 5%.
      • Soul Fire damage increased by 5%.
      • Channel Demonfire damage increased by 10%.
      • Summon Infernal damage increased by 10%.
      • Developer’s note: We’re increasing the throughput of Destruction after reviewing the performance of Warlock specializations from both internal and external data. In addition, we are considerably increasing the output of Shadowburn to bring it in line with other talent choices on the Destruction tree.
  • WARRIOR
    • Pain and Gain now heals for 2% of your max health (was 3.5%).
    • Impending Victory heals you for 20% of your maximum health (was 30%).
    • Protection
      • Developer’s note: In The War Within, all character Stamina has been increased by 60% as part of an overall adjustment to the pace of healing gameplay. This increases the relative value of abilities that heal a percentage of a character’s maximum health. Many of these ability changes are to counteract that relative change. For instance, the percentage health that Frenzied Regeneration restores has been reduced by about a third, but the amount of health it restores has remained the same.
        Warriors are the strongest tank against physical damage, though they can be vulnerable to magic or periodic damage. In this round of changes, we are increasing their damage taken across the board by reducing the power of Defensive Stance. Warriors also have some strong heals that scale with their maximum health, like Indomitable and Impending Victory, so we are reducing the power of those abilities to compensate for the 60% increase to Stamina.
      • Defensive Stance reduces damage taken by 16% (was 20%).
      • Fight Through the Flames causes Defensive Stance to reduce magic damage you take by 6% (was 5%).
      • Into the Fray increases Haste up to 8% (was 10%).
      • Punish reduces damage enemies deal to you by 2% (was 3%).
      • Enduring Alacrity increases Stamina and Armor by 8% (was 10%).
      • Indomitable increases your maximum health by 6% (was 10%) and heals you for 1% of your maximum health per 20 Rage spent (was 10 Rage).
      • Defender’s Aegis reduces Shield Wall’s cooldown by 60 seconds (was 30 seconds).
      • Impenetrable Wall causes Shield Slam to generate an additional 4 Rage (was 3 rage) and reduces the remaining cooldown of Shield Wall by 6 seconds (was 5 seconds).
      • Disrupting Shout cooldown increased to 90 seconds (was 75 seconds).

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

  • The stacking deserter debuff “No-Show” that is applied when leaving a Solo Shuffle or Battleground Blitz match is now applied account wide (was character specific).
  • CLASSES
    • MAGE
      • Arcane
        • New PvP Talent: Chrono Shift – Arcane Barrage reduces movement speed by 50% and increases your movement speed by 25%.
        • Aether Attunement damage increase to secondary targets is no longer decreased by 50% in PvP combat.
        • Prodigious Savant’s effectiveness is no longer decreased by 20% in PvP combat.
        • Arcane Blast damage is no longer increased by 13% in PvP combat.
      • Fire
        • Unleashed Inferno damage bonus to Flamestrike is no longer reduced by 100% in PvP combat.
        • Fire Blast damage is no longer reduced by 8% in PvP combat.
        • Flame Patch damage is no longer increased by 11% in PvP combat.
        • Pyroblast damage is no longer increased by 12% in PvP combat.
        • Dragon’s Breath damage is no longer increased by 16% in PvP combat.
        • Flamestrike damage is no longer increased by 24% in PvP combat.
        • Living Bomb damage is no longer increased by 100% in PvP combat.
      • Frost
        • Glacial Assault damage increase is no longer reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
        • Ice Lance damage is now increased by 95% in PvP combat (was 31%).
        • Splitting Ice now causes Ice Lance to strike a secondary target for 20% of its damage done (was 80%).
        • Glacial Spike damage is no longer decreased by 11% in PvP combat.
        • Ice Nova damage is no longer increased by 8% in PvP combat.
        • Blizzard damage is no longer increased by 9% in PvP combat.
        • Flurry damage is no longer increased by 9% in PvP combat.
    • MONK
      • Ancient Teachings is now increased by 120% in PvP combat (was 150%).
    • PRIEST
      • Discipline
        • Power Word: Radiance healing is no longer increased by 10% in PvP combat.
    • WARLOCK
      • Health Funnel’s effect is no longer increased by 20% in PvP combat.
      • Affliction
        • Infirmity is no longer reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
        • Siphon Life damage is no longer increased by 20% in PvP combat.
        • Fixed an issue that caused Haunt to deal no damage in PvP combat.
      • Demonology
        • Pact of Ered’ruin’s Doom Bolt damage is no longer reduced by 60% in PvP combat.
        • Demonic Strength is now reduced by 25% in PvP combat (was 50%).
        • Dreadbite damage is no longer increased by 10% in PvP combat.
        • Demonbolt damage is no longer increased by 20% in PvP combat.
      • Destruction
        • Conflagrate damage is no longer reduced by 15% in PvP combat.
        • Incinerate damage is no longer reduced by 10% in PvP combat.
        • Immolate damage is no longer reduced by 9% in PvP combat.
        • Shadowburn damage is no longer increased by 10% in PvP combat.
    • WARRIOR
      • Thunderous Roar damage is no longer reduced by 7% in PvP combat.
      • Shockwave damage is no longer increased by 16% in PvP combat.
      • Armored to the Teeth is no longer increased by 45% in PvP combat.
      • The War Within Warrior Class sets are now 50% effective in PvP combat (was 0%).
      • Arms
        • Arms Warrior damage is no longer decreased by 13% in PvP combat.
        • Arms Warrior auto attack damage is no longer decreased by 15% in PvP combat.
        • Fueled by Violence is no longer reduced by 17% in PvP combat.
        • Deep Wounds damage is no longer reduced by 13% in PvP combat.
        • Cleave damage is no longer reduced by 9% in PvP combat.
        • Overpower damage is no longer increased by 10% in PvP combat.
        • Execute damage is no longer increased by 15% in PvP combat.
        • Test of Might’s effectiveness is no longer decreased by 50% in PvP combat.
        • Bloodletting’s effectiveness is no longer decreased by 50% in PvP combat.
        • Dreadnaught damage is no longer increased by 30% in PvP combat.
        • Fixed an issue that caused Strength of Arms Overpowers to grant higher Mortal Strike and Cleave damage increase than intended.
      • Fury
        • Bloodbath damage is no longer reduced by 20% in PvP combat.
        • Whirlwind cleave damage is no longer reduced by 9% in PvP combat.
        • Bloodthirst damage is no longer increased by 6% in PvP combat.
        • Annihilator damage is no longer increased by 15% in PvP combat.
        • Dancing Blade’s auto-attack speed and damage increase is no longer decreased by 50% in PvP combat.
        • Raging Blow damage is no longer increased by 30% in PvP combat.
      • Protection
        • Rend damage is no longer reduced by 20% in PvP combat.
        • Shield Slam damage is no longer reduced by 20% in PvP combat.
        • Battering Ram’s effect is no longer decreased by 50% in PvP combat.
  • REWARDS
    • Fixed an issue causing Unbound Changeling’s secondary stat buff effect to use incorrect scaling.
    • Raid Rewards
      • Treacherous Transmitter cooldown increased to 1.5 minutes (was 1 minute). Primary stat buff increased accordingly.
Quote from: Blizzard

With the introduction of the Dragonflight talents system and season-over-season changes, tanks in World of Warcraft have become extremely durable relative to non-tank characters. Their active defenses can mitigate high percentages of incoming damage and they have strong self-healing. Today, in the hardest content in the game, many tanks can sustain themselves without much assistance from healers. In some cases, we’ve seen it become optimal to do group content without a healer at all.

World of Warcraft is an MMO, and its multiplayer aspects are a major strength. Group content is extremely rewarding when players performing different roles come together to overcome a challenge. We want to reinforce the importance of the healer role and work towards gameplay where tanks and healers collaborate to reduce the damage the tank is taking and to restore the tank’s lost health.

Tank durability can cause some other problems as well, especially in challenging endgame content, that we want to work toward improving.

  • Enemy damage has increased to challenge tanks, but if it’s increased too much, it gets spiky and puts tanks in significant danger if their defenses ever drop. This can lead to tanks getting killed rapidly, seemingly out of nowhere. We feel this is unsatisfying and would prefer tank damage to generally be evenly distributed, but still threatening over time.
  • If tanks are not threatened enough, then the most challenging part of endgame content can become keeping DPS and healers alive, often against high burst damage. Making tank survival a more involving element of group gameplay could give us some freedom to ease up on the threat to other group members.

To address the above, we’re making reductions to tank durability and self-healing. This will allow us to smooth out the damage tanks and parties take while retaining the challenge of keeping them alive over time. We’ll take those changes into account in encounter tuning as well.

Tanks will take more damage overall, but shouldn’t die significantly more often.

To increase the overall damage tanks take and their reliance on healers, we’re primarily increasing the percentage of damage they take, after mitigation, from steady damage sources like physical attacks. We’re making fewer reductions to each class’s defenses against burst damage or other threats that are currently most likely to be lethal to them. Encounters will be tuned with this in mind so the character of tank damage changes, but the lethality of it doesn’t significantly increase.

Tank damage intake should be steady and not too fast.

One of our goals for these changes is to smooth out the rate tanks take damage to reduce surprise, spiky deaths. Healers should have time to respond to tank health and tanks should have time to use self-heals like Word of Glory or Celestial Brew. For some classes, we’re increasing their passive defenses to compensate for decreases to more active or reactive defensive mechanics. Tankbusters will still create challenging moments that reward tanks for planning and smart use of cooldowns.

Tanks will still have strong answers to threats or periods of danger, but less sustained self-healing.

Tanks should have autonomy over their own survival and will still have cooldowns or emergency self-heals like Renewal or Impending Victory. But the healing of continuous effects like Elune’s Favored or Indomitable are reduced, so tanks must have more of a partnership with healers to restore their missing health once it’s lost.

Healer gameplay should not be dominated by tank healing.

Healers play a critical role, and keeping tanks alive is part of what they bring to the table. However, healers contribute to the success of groups in many ways, especially in dungeons. They sustain the group, dispel harmful effects, and respond to burst damage, all while doing mechanics. Tank healing should not demand so much that it interferes with their other roles. It may take some iteration to get the balance right on this, where healers feel essential to tank survival but with their attention not overly demanded by it.

Tank gameplay should not significantly change or require actions like kiting to survive.

We’re happy that more players are enjoying playing tanks with their friends and in pick-up groups. There are a lot of demands on tanks, such as learning M+ routes, leading groups, and knowing what trash abilities are particularly dangerous. The gameplay of standing toe-to-toe with groups of enemies and the tactics you’ve learned to survive should continue to be effective.

Your Feedback Please!

We’re excited for you to get ahold of these changes and share your feedback on playing with them. Because there are so many factors to tanking, the most valuable feedback will be descriptions of your experiences playing with them. What does it feel like to play with the changes, and what’s different for you and your allies? Here are some questions to give you ideas of things you could share:

  • How durable do you feel before and after the changes? What makes you feel that difference?
  • In what ways did you change how you play?
  • How did it change your builds?
  • In what scenarios were you getting into trouble?
  • For healers, how much more of your attention went to tanks compared to before?

We’d also love it if you can share what content you played and its difficulty level (M+ key level, Delve level, Heroic vs. Mythic raid, etc.), what difficulty level you and your friends normally clear, and what your experience level is with a class you tried.

Thank you!

Quote from: Blizzard

Class Updates

In The War Within, all character Stamina has been increased by 60% as part of an overall adjustment to the pace of healing gameplay. This increases the relative value of abilities that heal a percentage of a character’s maximum health. Many of these ability changes are to counteract that relative change. For instance, the percentage health that Frenzied Regeneration restores has been reduced by about a third, but the amount of health it restores has remained the same.

Blood Death Knight

Death Strike is a powerful ability that allows Blood Death Knights to mitigate a percentage of any form of damage taken in the last 5 seconds. In a way, Death Strike works like a retroactive shield block. Instead of reducing damage up front, it “mitigates” the damage you took from a hit by healing you. If used in succession, Death Strike can affect a single hit multiple times, which would be comparable to blocking a hit, then going back in time and blocking it again, in some cases restoring yourself to higher health than where you started. In The War Within, we’re changing Death Strike to only heal the death knight for a percentage of damage taken from a given damage event once, to make it scale more like other tank mitigation mechanics.

We’re also reducing Runic Power generation somewhat and reducing some of the mitigation death knights get from high-uptime cooldowns like Enfeeble and Dancing Rune Weapon, but increasing armor from Bone Shield. Overall, death knights should take damage more smoothly, and they will remain one of the strongest tanks for encounters with high magic or periodic damage.

  • Death Strike can now only heal the Death Knight for a percentage of damage taken from a given damage event once.
  • A new aura, Coagulating Blood, shows the amount of recently taken damage that will be used to calculate the value of your next Death Strike. The aura description lists the value as a flat amount and the number of stacks shows it as a percentage of your current health.
  • Blood Shield’s cap is now 50% of the Death Knight’s maximum health (was 100%) and the cap is no longer temporarily increased by Vampiric Blood.
    • Developers’ notes: This should not affect how much Blood Shield Death Knights are able to generate while actively tanking, but will reduce how large a barrier they are able to accumulate while off-tanking.
  • Rune of the Fallen Crusader now heals for 4% of your maximum health (was 6%).
  • Runic Attenuation now generates 3 Runic Power (was 5).
  • Enfeeble reduces damage dealt to you by 12% (was 15%).
  • Null Magic reduces magic damage taken by 8% (was 10%).
  • Bone Shield increases Armor by 100% of Strength (was 80%).
  • Leeching Strike now heals for 0.25% maximum health for each target hit (was 0.5%).
  • Dancing Rune Weapon increases Parry chance by 35% (was 40%).
  • Each active Dancing Rune Weapons generate 3 Runic Power when mirroring Heart Strike (was 5).
  • Everlasting Bond increases Dancing Rune Weapon’s duration by 6 seconds (was 8 seconds).
  • Blood Drinker reduces the damage the enemy deals to you by 15% (was 20%).
  • Bonestorm heals you for 2% of your maximum health (was 3%), up to a maximum of 10% (was 15%). Bonestorm damage increased by 20%.

Vengeance Demon Hunter

Like Death Strike for Death Knights, Soul Fragments give Demon Hunters strong recovery against any type of damage, as well as strong self-healing. Because Demon Hunters consume Soul Fragments steadily, we’re not changing the rules for how often they can affect a damage event. We’re increasing Vengeance’s overall damage taken by weakening the damage reduction of talents like Void Reaver and Illuminated Sigils, while keeping the power of core abilities like Soul Fragments and Demon Spikes. They will continue to be one of the stronger tank classes at self-healing and surviving magic damage.

  • Live By the Glaive now restores 2% of maximum health (was 4%).
  • Thick Skin increases Stamina by 60% (was 65%).
  • Demonic Wards reduces physical and magic damage taken by 8% (was 10%).
  • Soul Cleave healing reduced by 20%.
  • Frailty heals for 8% of damage done, down from 10%.
  • Void Reaver reduces damage you take from targets afflicted by Frailty by 3% (was 4%)
  • Illuminated Sigils grants 12% Parry chance (was 15%).
  • Down in Flames reduces Fiery Brand cooldown by 12s, down from 15s.
  • Metamorphosis increases maximum health by 40% (was 50%).
  • Darkglare Boon now refreshes 15-30% of Fel Devastation’s cooldown (was 20-40%) and refunds 15-30 Fury (was 20-40).

Guardian Druid

With high armor and Ironfur uptime, druids should be one of the best tanks at surviving physical damage. We’re slightly increasing the damage they take from all types of damage and balancing the power of their self-healing. We’re also reducing the durations of some of their cooldowns to make timing their use more important.

  • Frenzied Regeneration heals you for 20% of your maximum health (was 32%).
  • Ironfur increases Armor by 112% of Agility (was 120%).
  • Renewal heals for 20% of maximum health (was 30%).
  • Reinvigoration reduces Frenzied Regeneration’s cooldown by 10/20% (was 20/40%).
  • Earthwarden reduces damage taken by 25% (was 30%).
  • Survival of the Fittest reduces cooldowns by 12/24% (was 15/30%)
  • Tooth and Claw reduces damage taken by 12% (was 15%).
  • After the Wildfire triggers after spending 300 Rage (was 200).
  • Ursoc’s Fury grants a shield equal to 25% of Thrash and Maul damage (was 45%).
  • Elune’s Favored heals you for 25% of Arcane damage dealt (was 40%).
  • Rage of the Sleeper duration reduced to 8 seconds (was 10 seconds).
  • Rage of the Sleeper damage taken reduction reduced to 20% (was 25%).
  • Rage of the Sleeper Leech decreases to 20% (was 25%).
  • Pulverize duration reduced to 8 seconds (was 10 seconds).
  • Ursoc’s Guidance reduces the cooldown of Incarnation: Guardian of Ursoc by 1 second for each 25 Rage spent (was 20).

Brewmaster Monk

Healers have more time to heal monks than other tanks because Stagger spreads out the damage that they take over time. Our goal is for monks to take a little more damage overall than other tanks to offset this effect. However, we feel their overall magic damage mitigation is a little low compared to other tanks and are improving it somewhat by buffing Stagger and its value against magic. To increase their physical damage taken overall, we’re primarily reducing the dodge granted by Elusive Brawler and some of their other talents.

  • Brewmaster’s Balance increases Monks’ Armor by 50% (was 25%).
  • Elusive Brawler chance to dodge reduced by 12%.
  • Celestial Fortune heals you for 70% of the amount healed (was 80%).
  • Amount of damage staggered increased by 8%.
  • Percentage of magic damage staggered increased to 58% (was 45%).
  • Dance of the Wind chance to dodge reduced to 5% (was 10%) for Brewmaster only.
  • Yu’lon’s Grace grants an absorb equal to 1% of your maximum health (was 2%) every 3 seconds (was 2 seconds).
  • Healing Winds restores 10% of maximum health (was 15%).
  • Staggering Strikes healing reduced by 28%.
  • Spirit of the Ox chance to summon a Healing Sphere reduced by 40%.
  • Elixir of Determination healing reduced to 30% of recently purified damage (was 50%), or a minimum of 8% of your maximum health (was 20%).
  • Celestial Brew healing reduced by 10%.
  • Pretense of Instability grants 10% Dodge (was 15%).

Protection Paladin

Paladins have a balance of good defenses against both physical and magical damage. They can be in danger if they lose the defensive power of standing in Consecration or if the armor bonus from Shield of the Righteous drops, so we are not reducing any of their passive physical defenses like armor or block. Like druids, paladins have high uptime on their defensive cooldowns, so we’re pulling back some of their durations to make timing their use more important. We would like paladins to have slightly more self-healing, so we are increasing the power of Word of Glory.

  • Shield of the Righteous increases your Armor by 150% of your Strength (was 170%).
  • The damage reduction effect while standing in Consecrate of Mastery: Divine Bulwark is reduced by 20%.
  • Sanctified Plates’ armor increase no longer applies to bonus armor from Shield of the Righteous.
  • Improved Holy Shield increases your chance to block spells by 8% (was 10%).
  • The Dusk buff from Of Dusk and Dawn reduces your damage taken by 4% (was 5%).
  • Word of Glory healing increased by 10%.
  • Sentinel’s duration reduced to 16 seconds (was 20 seconds).
  • Eye of Tyr’s duration reduced to 6 seconds (was 9 seconds).
  • Righteous Protector: Holy Power abilities reduces cooldowns by 1.5 seconds (was 2 seconds).

Protection Warrior

Warriors are the strongest tank against physical damage, though they can be vulnerable to magic or periodic damage. In this round of changes, we’re increasing their damage taken across the board by reducing the power of Defensive Stance. Warriors also have some strong heals that scale with their maximum health, like Indomitable and Impending Victory, so we are reducing the power of those abilities to compensate for the 60% increase to Stamina.

  • Pain and Gain now heals for 2% of your max health (was 3.5%).
  • Impending Victory heals you for 20% of your maximum health (was 30%).
  • Defensive Stance reduces damage taken by 16% (was 20%).
  • Fight Through the Flames causes Defensive Stance to reduce magic damage you take by 6% (was 5%).
  • Into the Fray increases haste up to 8% (was 10%).
  • Punish reduces damage enemies deal to you by 2% (was 3%).
  • Enduring Alacrity increases Stamina and Armor by 8% (was 10%).
  • Indomitable increases your maximum health by 6% (was 10%) and heals you for 1% of your maximum health per 20 Rage spent (was 10 rage).
  • Defender’s Aegis reduces Shield Wall’s cooldown by 60 seconds (was 30 seconds).
  • Impenetrable Wall causes Shield Slam to generate an additional 4 Rage (was 3) and reduces the remaining cooldown of Shield Wall by 6 seconds (was 5 seconds).
  • Disrupting Shout cooldown increased to 90 seconds (was 75 seconds).

The War Within: Radiant Echoes Event Overview

Quote from: Blizzard

Confront the memories of Azeroth during the new pre-expansion event and collect Residual Memories to purchase new items to add to your Warband collection.

When: July 30 – August 26
Where: Dalaran (hub), Dragonblight, Dustwallow Marsh, and Searing Gorge
Currency: Residual Memories – Half forgotten memories can be glimpsed in the light playing across this iridescent powder.
Levels: 10-70

Players with and without The War Within™ will be able to take part in this event for its duration.


Confronting Memories

Players who have reached level 70 will receive an introductory quest and then will be directed to visit Dalaran to start. Players under level 70 will be immediately directed to Dalaran.

The event occurs in four stages and cycles between three zones. Portals in Dalaran will be available to take you directly to the event staging area and a return portal is available in each of the event zones so that players can quickly return to Dalaran and head into the next occurrence of the event. When the event is active in a zone, the portal will have an additional golden glow to indicate that it is active.

  • During the first week of the event, zones will cycle every 90 minutes.
  • During the second week of the event, zones will cycle every 60 minutes.
  • During the third and fourth weeks of the event, zones will cycle every 30 minutes.
Stage 1

During the first stage of the event, players will need to defeat the Congealed Memories that will appear in the zone and the memories around it.

Stage 2

Defeat the radiant echoes causing havoc in the zone. There are six random events that are active within the zone that can be seen on the map (M). Event locations throughout the stages are marked by a multicolor globe.

Stage 3

You’ll be able to undertake a quest in each zone during the event that will ask for you to defeat one of the event bosses as follows:

  • Only Darkness: Remembered Lich King Slain (Dragonblight)
  • Broken Masquerade: Remembered Onyxia Slain (Dustwallow Marsh)
  • Champion of the Waterlords: Remembered Firelord Slain (Searing Gorge)

Please note that once the boss is defeated by players, Stage 4 will begin and the boss will no longer be available to kill for the quest completion until the event begins in the zone again. Bosses can also rarely drop additional pieces of gear.

Stage 4

In stage four, the Radiant Echoes have subsided. Players can choose to return to Dalaran or stay within the zone to slay lingering memories to continue to accrue Residual Memories. A timer within the zone the Residual Memories are still active in will count down to the next zone event. Players can return to Dalaran and take the portal to the next zone that goes active.


Rewards

Players will be able to accumulate Residual Memories to use to purchase items from various vendors in each of the zones. You can keep track of how much Residual Memories you’ve collected by opening Character Info (Hotkey- C) and the currency tab under the War Within dropdown.

  • Dalaran: Remembrancer Amuul in Chamber of the Guardian
  • Dragonblight: Echo of the Silver Hand at Wyrmrest Temple
  • Dustwallow Marsh: Forgotten Hero at Tabetha’s Farm
  • Searing Gorge: Memory of a Duke in the Iron Summit

Players who purchase the Lifeless Stone Ring will be able to collect memories throughout the three event zones to combine into essences and infuse it with power creating the Band of Radiant Echoes (item level 227) heirloom ring.

  • Essence of the Eastern Kingdoms
  • Essence of Kalimdor
  • Essence of Northrend

Gear will begin at item level 480 with some room for upgrades. Here’s what you can look forward to:

Item Name Cost Item Type/Tooltip
Lifeless Stone Ring 25 Residual Memories Use: Infuse with the Essences of Azeroth to restore its power. “An ancient titan ring that has faded with time. Perhaps it can be restored.” Heirloom Ring
Defender’s Hefty Satchel 2000 Residual Memories 32 Slot Bag
Remembered Golden Gryphon 20000 Residual Memories Use: Teaches you how to summon this mount. The capabilities of this mount depend on your Riding skill and location (Alliance only- Skyriding)
Remembered Wind Rider 20,000 Residual Memories Use: Teaches you how to summon this mount. The capabilities of this mount depend on your Riding skill and location (Horde only- Skyriding)
Recruit’s Reagent Bag 2000 Residual Memories 30 Slot Reagent Bag
Remembered Spawn 10,000 Residual Memories Use: Teaches you how to summon this companion.
Remembered Construct 10,000 Residual Memories Use: Teaches you how to summon this companion.
Remembered Riverpaw 10,000 Residual Memories Use: Teaches you how to summon this companion.

Get the Band Together for Warbands

Quote from: Blizzard

Expand the potential of all your World of Warcraft® characters with account-wide progression across your Battle.net® account, regardless of faction—including shared Renown, a Warband bank, Achievements, Collections, and more!


Getting The Band Together

With the arrival of The War Within, upon first logging into World of Warcraft, the Warband conversion process automatically enables many of the game’s progression systems to be account-wide. Players will not need to log into each character individually for all progression, items, etc., to convert; however, there may be a short wait for the system to completely process your Warband the first time you log in. The Warband conversion process can take up to 20 minutes or longer, and depending on the amount of data being processed, there could be a login queue.

The new Warbands system is effective for all characters on a player’s Battle.net account and the items, Collections, and progression they share. It’s important to note that your Warband is limited to characters within a single region (for example, the Americas or Europe) but spans every realm, faction, and even subscription you may have within that region.


Just Hangin’ Out

When you log in to the game, you’ll see a selection of your characters on the login screen, waiting for you to choose who you will go on your next adventure with.

You can assign four characters to one scene, with more scenes planned for you to collect in the future. In addition, to make it a little easier to see who’s who in your Warband at any given moment, there’s additional information about each character during character selection.

Once in a Warband, you will no longer need to swap between realms to see characters on those realms. The one exception is if you have multiple World of Warcraft subscriptions within one Battle.net account. In this case, you will only see the characters on the account you’re logged in to, even though all your characters across subscriptions are included as a part of your Warband.


Carting Around Your Band Equipment

Share Items between your characters on a single Battle.net account in one convenient place—your Warband Bank.

The Warband Bank can be accessed by bankers throughout the game, and all characters in your Warband can access the bank to deposit and withdraw items freely. It will provide up to five tabs with ninety-eight available inventory slots each. Each tab can be purchased for an increasing amount of gold, customized with an icon, and organized like a Guild Vault. This bank is in addition to your individual character bank vault.

Any non-soulbound item can be stored in the Warband Bank. The bank will also behave like the reagent bank, allowing you to craft using reagents from it without having to withdraw them. In addition, the bank will allow you to deposit and manually withdraw gold across characters in your Warband.

Also, similar to pet battles, players who play multiple characters simultaneously on multiple World of Warcraft accounts will find that only the character that logs into the realm first will have access to the Warband Bank.

The UI and functionality of the character-level bank will be adjusted in the future, and tabs like the Warband bank will also be adjusted. Bags will no longer be needed in the character bank when this change occurs. This change won’t alter the number of slots currently available in your bank but will shift them from bags to tabs.

Warbanding Together for Better Banking

Completing the“Warbanding Together” storyline quests in and around Gadgetzan will get you access to heaps of storage for your Warband. You will be rewarded the Warband Bank Distance Inhibitor spell after finishing up. This spell allows you to summon a personal portal directly to your Warband Bank, where you can make withdrawals and deposits for 10 minutes (4hr Cooldown).

“Now that we’ve got all the transpositional data we could ever for, all we need to do is set up a wormhole in a suitable banking establishment, and we’ll be dropping gear into each other’s pockets from the field in no time!”


Sharing is Caring. Friend!

While gear is one of the primary forms of character-specific progression in World of Warcraft, Warbands makes managing and collecting them more convenient and alternate character-friendly.

Warbound until Equipped

Warbound until Equipped (WuE) is a new type of gear. Gear that is WuE can be freely traded across your Warband but becomes Soulbound once it’s equipped by a character.

WuE gear will be available within Raids, Dungeons, and Delves. Whenever you earn loot, you will have a slight bonus chance to gain an additional piece of WuE gear as personal loot. This gear will be at least one lower tier than other loot from that source (currently a whole upgrade track lower (e.g., Hero-> Champion), and it could be gear usable by any class.

Also, simply playing the game can occasionally earn you a single-tier gear lower than your current gear. Consider sending it to help an alternate character or take a chance and try a new class you’ve been meaning to try.


Enhancing Your Transmog Collection

To help players continue expanding their collections and style their alternate characters how they want, any character can collect any item appearance, regardless of whether they can equip the item. Class-specific appearances are an exception and will still be collectible only by that specific class.

It’s important to note that these changes only affect your ability to collect appearances. Existing rules on which characters can use any given appearance are not changing (e.g., a Priest getting a plate helm drop will unlock the appearance for your plate-wearing characters, even though they cannot use plate appearances themselves). You can view appearances on any character of any class or race within the appearances UI.

It’s also easier to collect appearances from unbound items. You will no longer need to equip the item to add it to your collection. Any time an item is destroyed via disenchanting, deleting, selling, etc., you will automatically collect the appearance. You can also collect the appearance from Bind on Equip (BoE) gear by converting it to “Warbound until Equipped” instead.

Existing gear in your character-level bank or bag inventory will be automatically added to your Transmog collection when you first log into that character.

Any gear that drops with a transmog appearance you haven’t collected yet will have the Transmog option to roll for it rather than the Greed option (Transmog has higher priority). This system will expand to allow players on one character to add class-specific items they can’t equip to their Transmog collection. It will allow a player on a mage character to collect a warrior item and add it to the Transmog collection for use on a warrior character instead.

When rolling for Transmog, any gear that drops that can be equipped by your current character will get a higher rolling priority than those rolling with characters who cannot equip the item (e.g., a priest will always beat a warrior when both roll Transmog on a piece of cloth gear).


Warband-Wide Reputation

When you have a Warband reputation, any progress made on one character will be shared with all your characters. Rewards will also be unlocked for all characters, although the form this takes will vary per reward. Warband-wide rewards will be granted only once, while some rewards will remain character-specific and need to be collected on each character.

Once a reputation is converted to Warband-wide, reputation progress will display as the furthest any character in your account has achieved. For example, if you were at Renown 5 for Valdrakken Accord on one character and Renown 10 on another, your new Warband Valdrakken Accord Renown will be 10.

Several reputations will not be converted for various reasons. Like the Winterpelt Furbolg and Glimmerogg Racer, due to not fitting within the fantasy for those reputations—Winterpelt Furbolg has a language learning component that doesn’t make sense to be shared across characters, and the Glimmerrogg Racer reputation is more of a personal standing in the snail races. These are also minor reputations that are not as impactful Warband-wide.

Additionally, converting reputations in previous expansions will take some time to implement, so it will happen over time. A limited number won’t be converted; for example, Aldor and Scryer in the Burning Crusade and the Covenants in Shadowlands won’t be converted because they represent per-character choices.

First-Time Quest Rewards

Players can earn a bonus quest reward for any quest completed for the first time on their Warband. An additional, unique bonus will be granted for completing a quest additional times.

Quests will only deliver Reputation as a first-time completion bonus. On additional completions of the same quest on alts, players will earn a bonus reward currency similar to Dragon Isles Supplies instead of Reputation. This currency will be freely transferable across the Warband and can be used to purchase various Warband-level rewards such as cosmetics, mounts, and pets.

This allows you to complete quests for any character you want without impacting your Reputation or progress. Whichever character completes them first will earn the Reputation for your Warband.


Achieving Greatness

With Warbands, all achievements are considered “Warband”. A total Warband achievement score will be tracked and displayed, and this score will be the sum of all account-wide achievement points plus the points from any character-specific achievements completed on any character.

Many achievements have become account-wide—approximately 2000 across all expansions, with a few rare exceptions. Specifically for achievements, doing the activity on one character is part of what makes it hard or interesting, such as Insane in the Membrane, since the hard part of this achievement is maxing out diametrically opposed reputations.

In addition, any achievements that would not benefit from shared progression across characters, such as Memories of Teldrassil, will be left character-specific so you can see what cool things you have done on specific characters. This will not impact your achievement score, rewards, or ability to complete achievements.

Most of the rewards granted by achievements are Warband-wide. In many cases, the reward will span across the entire Warband, such as for most titles. In other cases, the whole achievement will be converted, and its reward will be account-wide. For example, dungeon teleports earned by Keystone Hero achievements will become account-wide, both in the achievement and the reward.

The primary exception to Warband-wide rewards is those intrinsically per character, such as Dreaming of Wyrms.

Another exception is achievements celebrating highly prestigious accomplishments on a specific character, like the Gladiator: Dragonflight Season 3 achievement, whose title and progress will remain character-specific.

For most achievements, we are adding your progress across all your characters. For example, if you have done 200 personal crafting orders on each of three different characters, the Personal Crafter achievement will immediately be completed upon login.

There are a few achievements where it only makes sense to take the highest value across your characters, such as the Reach Level 70 achievement. In most cases, these are not converted as there is no benefit. We will use the highest value you have reached on any character for the exceptions where there are.


Map Exploration

For those who may not be as interested in re-exploring every map on all your characters, we are adding The Warband Map to Everywhere All At Once toy that will reveal all maps of regions fully explored by a member of your Warband. Have two max-level characters and this map can be yours!


Share the Wealth

To help avoid confusion over spending the wrong currency on the wrong character, the currency is not fully Warband-wide; instead, it can be transferred between individual characters in your Warband. So, instead of relying on buying a unique item and mailing it to an alt, you can directly transfer any shareable currency from other characters to the one you are currently playing within the currency User Interface (UI).

Currencies intended to purchase Warband-wide items such as cosmetics, pets, and mounts will usually be completely free to transfer between members of your Warband.

In cases where a currency is earned on a character with the intent that the character will be the primary user of the currency, but an excess needs to be moved to an alternate character, there will be a slight loss in the transfer of that currency, specifically for older currencies where this value loss was accomplished via an item purchase, such as Cosmic Flux from Shadowlands.

Adjustments will be made to older currencies, and Warband transfer will be enabled on many where appropriate.

Note that there will still be many currencies that will remain non-transferable because they represent important character-based progression. Two examples of these are the Crest and Flightstone equivalents in The War Within.

Shared Flight Points for Your Warband

Flight points will also be account-wide. For standard flight points you have yet to learn, you will only have to collect these on one character, and they will be unlocked across your Warband. Flight points that have already been collected on any character across your account will be unlocked for your Warband.


Get out there and expand your troupe of brave defenders of Azeroth. Happy alting!

The War Within Beta Updates 10 July 2024: Notes, Mythic+ Affixes, Delves & Healing

Quote from: Blizzard

Heya! Here are this week’s updates to the War Within Beta:

CLASSES

  • DEATH KNIGHT
    • Unholy Strength (Rune of the Fallen Crusader) now heals for 4% maximum health (was 6%).
    • An issue causing Raise Abomination to deal less damage than it should has been fixed.
    • Hero Talents
      • Deathbringer (Blood/Frost)
        • Frost
          • Exterminate first scythe damage increased by 25%.
          • Exterminate second scythe damage increased by 20%.
          • Soul Rupture now deals 30% of the damage dealt to nearby enemies.
          • Reaper’s Mark melee ability damage (not the stacked debuff) increased by 88%.
          • Wave of Souls damage increased by 15%.
      • Rider of the Apocalypse (Frost/Unholy)
        • Whitemane Death Coil cast frequency increased.
        • Whitemane Undeath cast frequency increased.
        • Trollbane’s Icy Fury now correctly deals Shadowfrost damage (was dealing Frost damage).
        • Trollbane’s Icy Fury deals reduced damage beyond 8 targets.
        • Unholy
          • Undeath damage now scales with Unholy Death Knight’s Mastery.
          • Trollbane’s Icy Fury now scales correctly with Unholy Death Knight’s Mastery.
          • Vampiric Strike now functions with Reaping.
      • San’layn (Unholy/Blood)
        • Infliction of Sorrow now extends the duration of Virulent Plague/Blood Plague by 3 seconds while Gift of the San’layn is active (was 2 seconds).
  • DEMON HUNTER
    • Hero Talents
      • Aldrachi Reaver
        • Thrill of the Fight damage increase reduced to 20% (was 30%).
        • Reaver’s Mark damage increase reduced to 12/24% (was 15/30%).
        • Reaver’s Mark converted to stacks – Now grants 1 stack if cast first, 2 if cast second.
        • Havoc
          • Warblade’s Hunger Felblade now consumes up to 5 nearby Soul Fragments.
    • Havoc
      • Consuming Lesser Soul Fragments now heals for 6% of maximum health (was 10%).
  • DRUID
    • Swiftmend healing increased by 15%.
    • Restoration
      • Wild Growth healing increased by 15%.
      • Rejuvenation healing increased by 15%.
      • Regrowth healing increased by 15%.
  • EVOKER
    • Hero Talents
      • Scalecommander (Devastation/Augmentation)
        • Bombardments damage increased by 30%.
    • Devastation
      • Eternity Surge damage increased by 15%.
      • Imminent Destruction is no longer the capstone, and has swapped positions with Feed the Flames.
    • Preservation
      • Nerub-ar Palace Class Set
        • (2) Set Bonus has been redesigned – Reversion’s healing is increased by 10%, and it has a 50% chance to grant 1 additional stack of Temporal Compression.
        • (4) Set Bonus has been redesigned – Temporal Compression increases the healing of your next empower spell by 10% per stack.
  • HUNTER
    • Rejuvenating Wind now heals 12% maximum health over its duration (was 20%).
    • Survival
      • Grenade Juggler has been updated – Casting Explosive Shot reduces the cooldown of Wildfire Bomb by 2 seconds.
      • Grenade Juggler and Sulfur-Lined Pockets procs will no longer grant the cooldown reduction effect. Tooltip will be updated in 11.0.2.
      • Bombardier is no longer consumed by Sulfur-Lined Pockets or Grenade Juggler procs.
  • MAGE
    • Reabsorption now heals for 3% maximum health (was 5%).
    • Cryo-Freeze now causes Ice Block to heal for 25/50% of maximum health over its duration (was 40/80%).
    • Hero Talents
      • Spellslinger (Frost/Arcane)
        • Splinterstorm no longer has a chance to grant Clearcasting.
        • Splintering Orbs now generates 2 Splinters per target hit (was 4).
        • Spellfrost Teachings now summons an Arcane Orb at 50% effectiveness and no longer increases Arcane Orb damage dealt for 10 seconds.
        • Frost
          • Controlled Instincts now has a 4 second grace period.
    • Arcane
      • High Voltage base chance decreased to 10% (was 20%).
      • High Voltage proc chance increase per failure increased to 10% (was 5%).
      • Aether Attunement damage bonus decreased to 100% on primary target and 50% on secondary targets (was 150% and 100% respectively).
      • Arcane Blast damage reduced by 5%.
      • Arcane Missiles damage reduced by 5%.
      • Arcane Barrage damage reduced by 10%.
      • Fixed an issue that was allowing procs such as Orb Barrage and Energy Reconstitution to generate Clearcasting.
    • Frost
      • Death’s Chill now stacks up to 12 times.
      • Time Anomaly now grants a temporary Water Elemental when it procs Icy Veins.
      • Refreshing Icy Veins no longer breaks Fractured Frost, Slick Ice, Death’s Chill, or Thermal Void for the duration of the refreshed Icy Veins.
      • Glacial Spike damage increased by 10%.
      • Cryopathy and Splintering Ray are no longer a choice node.
      • The location of nodes in Gate 3 have been adjusted.
  • MONK
    • Healing Elixir now heals for 10% of maximum health (was 15%).
    • Mistweaver
      • Overflowing Mist now heals for 0.6%/1.2% maximum health (was 1%/2%).
      • Life Cocoon absorb amount reduced by 40%.
  • PALADIN
    • Hero Talents
      • Herald of the Sun (Holy/Retribution)
        • Sun’s Avatar now contributes 50% of its healing to Beacon of Light (was 100%).
        • Sun’s Avatar healing decreased by 20%.
        • Eternal Flame periodic healing decreased by 20%.
        • Dawnlight now contributes 50% of its healing to Beacon of Light (was 100%).
        • Luminosity now increases the critical strike rate of Holy Shock and Light of Dawn by 5% (was 10%).
        • Gleaming Rays now increases the healing of your Holy Power spenders by 6% (was 10%).
      • Templar (Retribution/Protection)
        • Undisputed Ruling now grants 12% Haste for 6 seconds after casting Hammer of Light (was 15% Haste).
        • Empyrean Hammer damage reduced by 5%.
        • Cries of Redemption now deals 80% of the damage to nearby enemies on Empyrean Hammer critical strikes (was 60%).
        • Retribution
          • Sacrosanct Crusade effectiveness reduced by 25%.
    • Holy
      • Holy Light’s healing decreased by 20%.
      • Imbued Infusions now reduces the cooldown of Holy Shock by 1 second (was 2 seconds).
    • Retribution
      • Crusader Aura talent is no longer granted by default in the Class tree for Retribution.
      • Greater Judgment talent is now granted by default in the Class tree for Retribution.
      • Consecrated Blade is no longer a talent and now learned at level 11.
      • New Talent: Holy Flames – Divine Storm deals 10% increased damage and when it hits an enemy affected by your Expurgation, it spreads the effect to up to 4 targets hit. You deal 3% increased Holy damage to targets burning from your Expurgation.
      • Justicar’s Vengeance now heals for 3% of maximum health (was 5%).
      • Blessed Champion is now a 1-point talent (was 2).
      • The following talents are now 2 points (was 1):
        • Heart of the Crusader
        • Zealot’s Fervor
      • Holy Flames is now in a choice node with Blade of Vengeance.
      • Empyrean Legacy moved to where Vanguard of Justice was on the talent tree.
      • Vanguard of Justice has been removed.
  • PRIEST
    • Hero Talents
      • Voidweaver (Discipline/Shadow)
        • Shadow
          • Collapsing Void damage reduced by 20%.
    • Discipline
      • Pain Transformation now heals for 15% of maximum health (was 25%).
  • ROGUE
    • Cloaked in Shadows now creates an absorb for 18% of maximum health (was 30%).
    • Soothing Darkness now heals for 15% maximum health over its duration (was 24%).
  • SHAMAN
    • Hero Talents
      • Stormbringer (Elemental/Enhancement)
        • Tempest damage increased by 50%.
    • Elemental
      • Echo of the Elemental’s Lesser Elementals now deal 65% of the main Elemental’s damage.
    • Enhancement
      • Elemental Blast damage reduced by 25%.
        • This change has been reverted.
      • Nerub-ar Palace Class Set
        • (4) Set Bonus has been redesigned – Now grants +1 Feral Spirit when activating Feral Spirits.
    • Restoration
      • Earthen Wall Totem’s health reduced by 40%.
      • Torrent now increases Riptide’s initial healing by 20% and its critical strike rate by 10%.
  • WARLOCK
    • Demon Skin now creates an absorb for 0.12/0.24% maximum health (was 0.2/0.4%) and may stack up to 5/10% of your maximum health (was 8/15%).
    • Hero Talents
      • Hellcaller (Destruction/Affliction)
        • Seeds of Their Demise has been redesigned – After Wither reaches 8 stacks or when its host reaches 20% health, Wither deals Shadowflame damage to its host every 1 second until 1 stack remains. When Blackened Soul deals damage, you have a chance to gain Tormented Crescendo/2 stacks of Flashpoint.
        • Blackened Soul damage increased by 30%.
        • Blackened Soul has been redesigned – Spending Soul Shards on damaging spells will further corrupt enemies affected by your Wither, increasing its stack count by 1. Each time Wither gains a stack it has a chance to deal Shadowflame to its host every 1 second until 1 stack remains.
        • Malevolence has been redesigned – Dark magic erupts from you and corrupts your soul for 20 seconds, causing enemies suffering from your Wither to take Shadowflame damage and increase its stack count by 6. While corrupted your Haste is increased by 8% and spending Soul Shards on damaging spells grants 1 additional stack of Wither.
      • Soul Harvester (Demonology/Affliction)
        • Succulent Soul has been redesigned – A Succulent Soul empowers your next Malefic Rapture/Hand of Gul’dan, increasing its damage by 20%, and unleashing your demonic soul to deal Shadow damage.
        • Shadow of Death has been redesigned – Your Soul Rot/Summon Demonic Tyrant is empowered by the demonic entity within you, causing it to grant 3 Soul Shards that each contain a Succulent Soul.
    • Affliction
      • Soul Conduit now has a 10% chance to refund a Soul Shard (was 5%).
        • Developer’s note: We are increasing the effect of Soul Conduit for Affliction and Destruction due to the lower Soul Shard generation and spending rates these two specializations share compared to Demonology.
    • Destruction
      • Soul Conduit now has a 10% chance to refund a Soul Shard (was 5%).
        • Developer’s note: We are increasing the effect of Soul Conduit for Affliction and Destruction due to the lower Soul Shard generation and spending rates these two specializations share compared to Demonology.
  • WARRIOR
    • Arms
      • Storm Wall now heals for 5% of maximum health (was 8%).
      • Pain and Gain now heals for 2.1% maximum health (was 3.5%).
    • Fury
      • Invigorating Fury now heals for 10% of maximum health (was 15%).
      • Pain and Gain now heals for 2.1% maximum health (was 3.5%).

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

  • CLASSES
    • HUNTER
      • Survival of the Fittest no longer reduces damage taken by an additional 10% in PvP combat.
      • Exhilaration no longer heals for an additional 10% of max health in in PvP combat.
      • Kill Shot damage is no longer increased by 10% in PvP combat.
      • Beast Mastery
        • Cobra Shot damage is no longer reduced by 33% in PvP combat.
        • Bestial Wrath damage bonus is no longer reduced by 20% in PvP combat.
        • Barbed Shot is no longer reduced by 7% in PvP combat.
      • Marksmanship
        • Razor Fragments damage bonus to Kill Shot is longer reduced by 20% in PvP combat.
        • Explosive Shot damage is no longer increased by 10% in PvP combat.
      • Survival
        • Serpent Sting is no longer reduced by 17% in PvP combat.
        • Raptor Strike is no longer reduced by 5% in PvP combat.
        • Mongoose Bite is no longer increased by 3% in PvP combat.
    • PRIEST
      • Greater Heal (PvP Talent) now heals for 40% of maximum health (was 65%).
  • REWARDS
    • Raid Rewards
      • Treacherous Transmitter cooldown increased to 1.5 minutes (was 1 minute). Primary stat buff increased accordingly.

USER INTERFACE AND ACCESSIBILITY

  • On the world map, zooming in on Hub icons will allow you to see available quests in the area in more detail.

Mythic+ Affix Updates

Quote from: Blizzard

Greetings, dungeoneers!

Thank you all for your feedback on our new Mythic+ affix system. As we continue to review community responses for future adjustments, we’ve made updates in this week’s Beta.

New Affix

Continuing with the theme of Xal’atath’s Bargain, where players can harness powerful boons granted to dungeon enemies by the Harbinger, we’re adding a new affix to our Beta testing this week.

Xal’atath’s Bargain: Voidbound

  • While in combat, Xal’atath summons Void Emissary to empower nearby enemies, gradually increasing their damage. Upon defeating the Void Emissary, players harness the void energy for themselves, increasing their critical chance by 20% for 20 seconds.

Affix Adjustments

Xal’atath’s Bargain: Ascendant

  • We’ve seen a lot of feedback regarding the visual noise caused by the number of orbs being created. To address this issue, we’re reducing the total number of Orb of Ascendance from 20 to 10.

Xal’atath’s Bargain: Frenzied

  • We’ve heard feedback that this affix feels less visible compared to Ascendant, and is more punishing due to its passive nature without too much counterplay. It’s also less thematic compared to Ascendant where Xal’atath is present throughout the dungeon. With these considerations, we’re removing this affix from Beta testing.

With the Xal’atath’s Bargain affixes, we want to create varied challenges that highlight different class skills and utilities in ways that do not feel exclusionary. We look forward to your feedback and discussions on these changes.

We’ll see you in dungeons!

Delves Updates

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello everyone! We’d like to share some updates for you on Delves.

Tuning and Experience

Across the board we’ve increased the XP rewards from delves during level up as they felt a bit too low.

We’ve also done a general tuning pass across all tiers and will continue to monitor difficulty for all specs and classes. From your feedback and from our testing we saw that delves became particularly punishing throughout level up, and that many specs felt like they had to be several item levels higher than the recommended item level to survive.

We’re continuing to review the tuning for classes that are struggling in delves. We’ve seen your feedback on which classes are having a hard time. We also have our own data that shows performance in each delve by class and spec. We’ll be using your feedback and our data points to help improve the experience for players that are struggling. Keep it coming and we’ll keep you updated!

Bountiful Delves

We are in the middle of reviewing how we want bountiful delves to work at max level. Here’s what we’ll be rolling out:

  • Bountiful Delves will be consumed upon completion.
  • Bountiful Delves base chests are upgraded in quality.
  • Locked chests are still there, but will go away if you lose all of your lives.

Our goal with Bountiful Delves being consumed is to encourage players to see more delves and their variants. We’re modifying how many keys players can get per week while also increasing the base rewards from Bountiful Delves so they’re still worth running even without any keys.

We’re still working on balancing these numbers so please give us feedback as these new systems come online!

Brann Bronzebeard

We’re continuing to do work to tweak Brann and improve the experience with him and understanding what he’s doing from the moment to moment gameplay. These will be rolled out throughout upcoming patches.

  • Moved several of Brann’s “big” abilities to be unlocked at earlier levels.
  • Modified the number of abilities Brann has to be more readable
  • Brann’s “ultimate” abilities will now go on a rotation with each other to ensure he consistently uses them throughout combat. This means Brann’s use of his bigger abilities will be more focused and spread out to avoid a situation where it feels like Brann isn’t doing anything.
  • Dwarven Medicine will now heal player pets.
  • We’re aware of an issue of curios and Brann’s levels being reset and are looking into the root cause of this.

General

  • Player class cooldowns will now reset after wiping to a boss encounter.

Tak-Rethan Abyss and The Sinkhole

  • The Aquatic Hex will no longer apply slowfall.

The Dread Pit

  • The Skardyn Lure for one of the variants will now pull skardyn even if they’re in combat. Other parts of this mechanic have also been tweaked.
  • Removed the nerubian web spreaders from the skardyn variant.

Skittering Breach

  • Moved the web spreaders to be within the cave system of the delve to give our other mechanics some breathing room.

Healing Updates in The War Within

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello, healers of Azeroth.

In today’s new Beta build, we’re making some significant changes to healing that we’ve outlined in the development notes. Health pools are increasing (relative to their Dragonflight values), which has changed how it feels to heal other players in a variety of content.

Most notably, we’re reducing the strength of percentage-based healing spells to keep them in-line with their intended power, and we’re increasing the effectiveness of hybrid healing and single target heals to ensure they remain an effective means of defensive power.

We hope with these adjustments that healing doesn’t become any easier or harder. We intend to shift some of the challenging moments from overwhelming bursty damage to a more sustained healing profile.

Dragonflight Season 4 Ending Soon

Quote from: Blizzard

Hello Champions of the Alliance and Horde!

Let it be known that Dragonflight Season 4 will close soon. Players who make a big push to end the season will want to get started on their final weeks of efforts.

  • When Season 4 ends, it will no longer be possible to earn PvP seasonal rewards, titles, or Dragonflight Season 4 rankings.
  • For a time after the end of Season 4, most Mythic+ achievements and rewards will remain earnable.

We will let you know exact dates and times for the end of Season 4 and the beginning of The War Within Season 1 as soon as possible. Please keep an eye on our official news site for that and all other news about WoW.

Wishing you the best of luck battling to a glorious finish!

Weekly Cache Rewards in The War Within

Quote from: Blizzard

Hey folks!

In this week’s new beta build, you’ll see that weekly caches like the Pinnacle Cache have text indicating that they give Adventurer gear when previously they rewarded Veteran gear. We want to let you know how these caches are going to work.

The first two caches you earn each week from any source (Earthen Theater, Awakening the Machine, Spreading the Light, Azj-Kahet Pacts, Special Assignment World Quests, and the major weekly quests in Dornogal) will give you a piece of random gear. Caches that work this way have text telling you that they work this way. If it’s one of those first two caches earned that week, and The War Within Season 1 hasn’t yet begun, the cache will contain Adventurer gear. Once Season 1 begins, that gear will be Veteran gear, and the text will be updated to reflect that. We don’t want anyone to worry that outdoor players aren’t going to have regular sources of Veteran gear, but we also don’t want anyone to feel a need to play content they don’t want to play just to start the season with as many Veteran pieces as possible.

The first four caches you earn each week from any source (same list as above) will give you 100 Coffer Key Fragments, which can be immediately combined to get a Coffer Key for use in Bountiful Delves. For the sake of brevity, there isn’t text explaining this on the cache items, but if the text mentions the first two having gear, this rule will apply as well. This “first four” rule isn’t in this week’s build, but you should see it in the next one.

Please note that the contents of each cache are determined when you get the cache awarded to you, not when you open the cache. There’s no reason to hold onto them and open them later. That’s no fun anyway. Open your prize!

Philosophically, this is a shift from Dragonflight. In Dragonflight, the game asked you to complete specific quests (earn 1500 reputation, plant 5 seeds, complete a Superbloom, etc.) to get Veteran gear from outdoor content. That was good—making sure outdoor players have access to that level of gear is definitely a positive—but we think The War Within can do better by not requiring specific activities. Instead, you’ll be able to complete your choice of two of six activities to maximize the Veteran gear earned. To maximize your Coffer Keys as well, you’ll need to complete two more, but again, you get to choose which ones you like. If there’s a zone you don’t like or an activity you don’t enjoy, we don’t want you to feel like you’re going to be left behind for not doing it. Outdoor activities in The War Within are meant to be approached on your own terms based on your own preferences.

We’re excited for y’all get to enjoy what we’re cooking. So soon now!

The War Within Beta Development Notes 2 July 2024

Quote from: Blizzard

Greetings! Here are this week’s updates to the War Within Beta:

CLASSES

  • DEATH KNIGHT
    • Hero Talents
      • Rider of the Apocalypse (Frost/Unholy)
        • A Feast of Souls no longer has a chance to refund a rune.
        • Damage from Runic Power abilities is increased by 30% while 2 or more Horsemen are active (was 20%).
      • San’layn (Unholy/Blood)
        • The Blood is Life accumulator deals reduced damage beyond 8 targets.
        • The Blood is Life accumulator can no longer critically strike.
        • Corrupted Blood ability of the Blood Beast deals reduced damage beyond 8 targets.
        • Essence of the Blood Queen’s Haste granted per stack reduced to 1% (was 1.5%).
        • Vampiric Strike now heals for 1%/2% of your maximum health for Blood/Unholy (was 3%/5%).
        • Vampiric Strike damage reduced by 15%.
        • Infliction of Sorrow now extends the duration of your disease by 2 seconds (was 3 seconds).
        • Infliction of Sorrow now deals 10% of the remaining damage (was 20%).
    • Frost
      • Icy Death Torrent has had the following changes:
        • Damage now scales with Mastery.
        • Damage increased by 100%.
        • Now has a 50% chance to trigger on auto-attack critical strikes while dual wielding and 100% while wielding a two-handed weapon.
        • Now deals reduced damage beyond 8 targets.
      • Pillar of Frost’s Strength increased to 30% (was 25%).
      • Enduring Strength’s Strength increased to 20% (was 15%).
      • Long Winter now extends Pillar of Frost by 2 seconds, up to a maximum of 6 seconds.
      • Shattering Blade now increases Frost Strike damage by 125% (was 100%).
      • Shattered Frost now causes Frost strike to deal 65% of its damage to nearby enemies (was 50%).
      • Hyperpyrexia’s chance to trigger has been increased to 35 and deals 45% additional damage (was 30%).
      • Rage of the Frozen Champion’s Runic Power generated from Howling Blast reduced to 6 (was 8).
      • Smothering Offense now increases auto attack damage by 10% (was 6%).
    • Unholy
      • Clawing Shadows damage reduced by 15%.
      • Raise Dead ghoul damage reduced by 10%.
      • Scourge Strike damage reduced by 15%.
      • Death Coil damage reduced by 15%.
      • Magus of the Dead damage reduced by 15%.
      • Apocalypse ghoul damage reduced by 15%.
      • Epidemic damage reduced by 15%.
      • Festering Wound damage reduced by 15%.
  • DRUID
    • Hero Talents
      • Elune’s Chosen (Balance/Guardian)
        • Boundless Moonlight damage increased by 25%.
        • Minor Moon damage increased by 110%.
        • Lunar Calling increases Starfire damage by 65% (was 40%).
        • Lunar Insight increases Moonfire damage by 20% (was 10%).
        • Atmospheric Exposure increases damage taken by 6% (was 4%).
      • Keeper of the Grove (Balance/Restoration)
        • Bounteous Bloom causes your treants to generate 7 Astral Power every 2 seconds (was 6 Astral Power).
      • Wildstalker (Feral/Restoration)
        • Thriving Growth causes Bloodseeker Vines to grow 15% less frequently.
        • Vigorous Creepers increases damage done to targets afflicted by Bloodseeker Vines by 5% (was 6%).
        • Bursting Growth damage reduced by 15%.
        • Developer’s note: Please note that the entirety of this change will be applied with next week’s Beta deploy but will be present in this week’s PTR build.
    • Balance
      • Astral Smolder has a 40% chance to trigger (was 45%) and deals 50% of Wrath or Starfire damage over time (was 40%). Now a 1- point talent.
        • Developer’s note: Please note that the entirety of this change will be applied with next week’s 11.0.2 Beta deploy but will be present in this week’s 11.0.0 PTR build.
      • Stellar Flare damage increased by 10%.
      • Wild Surges increases Wrath and Starfire critical strike by 10% (was 12%).
      • Stellar Amplification damage bonus increased to 20% (was 12%).
      • Umbral Intensity increases the damage bonuses to Wrath and Starfire by 25/50% (was 20/40%).
      • Umbral Embrace’s damage bonus reduced to 75% (was 100%).
      • Umbral Inspiration’s duration increased to 6 seconds (was 5 seconds) and damage bonus increased to 30% (was 20%).
      • Touch the Cosmos’ chance to trigger from Wrath increased to 12% (was 8%) and chance to trigger from Starfire increased to 15% (was 10%).
      • Astral Communion now grants 20 Astral Power on entering eclipse (was 12).
      • Elune’s Guidance reduces the Astral Power cost of Starsurge by 10 (was 8) and Starfall by 12 (was 10).
      • Power of Goldrinn damage reduced by 10%.
      • Orbit Breaker calls downs a Full Moon every 25 Shooting Stars (was 30).
      • Sundered Firmament calls down a Fury of Elune at 25% power (was 20%).
      • Convoke the Spirits is more likely to cast Starsurge.
      • Convoke the Spirits will now prefer to cast Starsurge or Full Moon on your current target, if valid.
      • All ability damage reduced by 5%.
    • Feral
      • Convoke the Spirits will now prefer to cast Ferocious Bite or Feral Frenzy on your current target, if valid.
  • HUNTER
    • Implosive Trap cooldown reduced to 60 seconds (was 90 seconds).
    • Steady Shot cast time reduced to 1.65 seconds (was 1.75 seconds).
    • Marksmanship
      • Arcane Shot damage increased by 10%.
      • Penetrating Shots critical strike damage bonus increased to 40% of your critical strike chance (was 20%).
      • Aimed Shot damage increased by 10%.
      • Rapid Fire damage increased by 10%.
      • Trick Shots effectiveness reduced to 65% (was 70%).
    • Survival
      • Mongoose Fury reverted to previous functionality.
      • Flanking Strike range reduced to 15 yards.
      • Flanking Strike is no longer a passive override for Kill Command.
      • Flanking Strike once again gains twice the damage bonus from Tip of the Spear.
      • Bloody Claws has been updated – Now also causes Kill Command to extend the duration of Mongoose Fury by 1.5 seconds.
      • Flanking Strike now costs 15 Focus.
  • MAGE
    • Hero Talents
      • Spellslinger (Frost/Arcane)
        • Spellfrost Teachings damage bonus reduced to 10% (was 20%).
        • Spellfrost Teachings chance to trigger reduced.
        • Arcane Splinter damage reduced by 3%.
        • Frost Splinter damage increased by 3%.
    • Arcane
      • Evocation has been updated – Increases your mana regeneration by 1500% for 2.8 seconds and grants Clearcasting. While channeling Evocation, your Intellect is increased by 2% every 0.5 seconds. Lasts 20 seconds.
      • Mana Adept is now learned automatically when specializing in Arcane.
      • Arcane Missiles damage increased by 20%.
      • Arcane Barrage damage reduced by 10%.
      • Arcane Orb damage reduced by 15%.
      • Aether Attunement damage bonus increased to 150% on primary target and 100% on nearby enemies (was 100% and 50% respectively).
      • Arcane Blast damage reduced by 10%.
      • The position of talents in Gates 2 and 3 have been changed.
      • The following talents have been removed:
        • Chrono Shift
        • Crackling Energy
        • Siphon Storm
        • Improved Arcane Missiles
    • Fire
      • Pyroblast damage increased by 5%.
    • Frost
      • Flurry damage increased by 10%.
      • Frostbolt damage increased by 10%.
      • Ice Lance damage increased by 10%.
  • MONK
    • Brewmaster
      • Elixir of Determination reduced to 50% of recently Purified damage.
  • PALADIN
    • Retribution Aura has been removed.
      • Developer’s note: As part of our process of examining raid buffs, we’ve come to the decision to remove Retribution Aura in order to reduce restrictions on group compositions. We believe that the utility options additional Paladins are able to bring is sufficiently valuable without becoming oppressive.
    • Auras of Swift Vengeance talent node replaced with Crusader Aura.
    • Retribution
      • Expurgation now lasts 9 seconds (was 6 seconds).
      • Templar Strikes now only has 1 charge (was 2 charges).
      • Templar Strike damage increased by 50%.
      • Templar Slash damage increased by 125%
      • An issue with Art of War (Blade of Justice reset) triggering more than it should has been fixed.
  • PRIEST
    • Hero Talents
      • Voidweaver (Discipline/Shadow)
        • Entropic Rift now properly scales its damage up when it grows from casting Penance or Devouring Plague.
        • Entropic Rift damage reduced by 25%.
  • SHAMAN
    • Many talents have moved locations or have had their pathing updated in all trees.
    • New Ability: Skyfury – Harness the fury of the Windlord to grant a target ally 2% Mastery and empower their auto attacks to have a 20% chance to instantly strike again for 1 hour. If the target is in your party or raid, all affected party and raid members will be affected. Learned at level 17.
      • Developer’s note: We’re aware of issues with the new Skyfury raid buff, and we expect to address it with hotfixes to the Beta tomorrow.
    • New Talent: Elemental Resistance – Healing from Healing Stream Totem reduces Fire, Frost, and Nature damage received by 6% for 3 seconds. Healing from Cloudburst Totem reduces Fire, Frost, and Nature damage taken by 3% for 3 seconds.
    • New Talent: Refreshing Waters – Your Healing Surge is 25% more effective on yourself.
    • New Talent: Traveling Storms – Thunderstorm now can be cast on allies within 40 yards, reduces enemies movement speed by 60%, and knocks enemies 25% further.
    • New Talent: Seasoned Winds – Interrupting a spell with Wind Shear decreases your damage taken from that spell school by 15% for 18 seconds. Stacks up to 2 times.
    • New Talent: Encasing Cold – Frost Shock snares its targets by an additional 10% and its duration is increased by 2 seconds.
    • New Talent: Arctic Snowstorm – Enemies within 10 yards of your Frost Shock are snared by 30%.
    • New Talent: Ascending Air – The cooldown of Wind Rush Totem is reduced by 30 seconds and its movement speed effect lasts an additional 2 seconds.
    • New Talent: Enhanced Imbues – The effects of your weapon imbues are increased by 20%.
    • New Talent: Stone Bulwark Totem – Summons an Earth Totem at the feet of the caster for 30 seconds, granting the caster a shield absorbing damage for 10 seconds, and an additional absorb every 5 seconds. 2 minute cooldown.
    • New Talent: Jet Stream – Wind Rush Totem’s movement speed bonus is increased by 10% and now removes snares.
    • New Talent: Primordial Bond – While you have an elemental active, your damage taken is reduced by 5%.
    • Voodoo Mastery has been redesigned – Your Hex target is slowed by 70% during Hex and for 6 seconds after it ends. Reduces the cooldown of Hex by 15 seconds.
    • Flurry moved from Class tree to the Enhancement tree.
    • The cooldown of Gust of Wind has been reduced to 20 seconds (was 30 seconds).
    • Earthgrab Totem and Windrush Totem no longer share a choice node.
    • Lightning Lasso and Thundershock no longer share a choice node.
    • The following talents are now 1 point:
      • Totemic Focus
      • Elemental Warding
      • Nature’s Guardian
      • Winds of Al’Akir
      • Nature’s Fury
      • Totemic Surge
    • The following talents have been removed:
      • Go With The Flow
      • Flurry
      • Maelstrom Weapon
      • Enfeeblement
      • Stoneskin Totem
      • Tranquil Air Totem
      • Ancestral Defense
      • Surging Shields
      • Swirling Currents
    • Hero Talents
      • Farseer (Restoration/Elemental)
        • Restoration
          • Undulation can now trigger Call of the Ancestors.
      • Totemic (Enhancement/Restoration)
        • Restoration
          • Healing from Chain Heal from Totemic Rebound increased by 400%.
    • Elemental
      • New Talent: Fusion of Elements – After casting Icefury, the next time you cast a Nature and a Fire spell, you additionally cast an Elemental Blast at your target at 60% effectiveness.
      • New Talent: Storm Frenzy – Your next Chain Lightning or Lightning Bolt has 40% reduced cast time after casting Earth Shock, Elemental Blast, or Earthquake. Can accumulate up to 2 charges.
      • New Talent: Elemental Unity – While a Storm Elemental is active, your Nature damage dealt is increased by 10%. While a Fire Elemental is active, your Fire damage dealt is increased by 10%.
      • New Talent: Lightning Conduit – While Lightning Shield is active, your Nature damage dealt is increased by 8%.
      • New Talent: Everlasting Elements – Increases the duration of your Elementals by 20%.
      • New Talen: Thunderstrike Ward – Imbue your shield with the element of Lightning for 1 hour, giving Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning a chance to call down 2 Thunderstrikes on your target for Nature damage.
      • New Talent: Earthen Rage – Your damage spells incite the earth around you to come to your aid for 6 seconds, repeatedly dealing Nature damage to your most recently attacked target.
      • New Talent: Echo of the Elementals – When your Storm Elemental or Fire Elemental expires, it leaves behind a lesser Elemental to continue attacking your enemies for 15 seconds.
      • New Talent: First Ascendant – The cooldown of Ascendance is reduced by 60 seconds.
      • New Talent: Preeminence – Your Haste is increased by 25% while Ascendance is active and its duration is increased by 3 seconds.
      • New Talent: Fury of the Storms – Activating Stormkeeper summons a powerful Lightning Elemental to fight by your side for 8 seconds.
      • Primordial Fury has been redesigned – Now increases the critical damage bonus of Elemental Fury by 25%.
      • Icefury has been redesigned – Casting Lava Burst has a chance to replace your next Frost Shock with Icefury, stacking up to 2 times.
      • Icefury now empowers the next 2 Frost Shocks (was 4).
      • Mastery: Elemental Overload has been redesigned – Now increases all Physical and Elemental damage dealt. The damage of Elemental Overloads is now 25% of normal damage (was 85%).
      • Lava Surge is now learned at level 12 and has been removed from the Class tree.
      • Inundate is now learned at level 14 and has been removed from the Elemental tree.
      • The trigger rate of Lava Surge and Searing Flames now scale based on the number of targets Flame Shock is on. In single target, it should trigger slightly more often, and in AoE, it should trigger less often.
      • Flash of Lightning now also increases the critical strike chance of Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning by 10%.
      • Swelling Maelstrom now also increases the damage of Earth Shock, Elemental Blast, and Earthquake by 5%.
      • Master of the Elements now increases the damage of the next spell by 15% (was 10%/20%).
      • Echo Chamber now increases the damage of Elemental Overloads by 10% (was 8%/15%).
      • Power of the Maelstrom now causes the next Lightning Bolt or Chain Lightning to trigger an additional Elemental Overload (was 2). Can now stack up to 2 times.
      • Magma Chamber now stacks up to 10 times (was 20).
      • Elemental Equilibrium is now a 10% damage bonus (was 8%/15%).
      • Elemental Equilibrium no longer has a tracking debuff.
      • Eye of the Storm now reduces the Maelstrom cost of Earth Shock and Earthquake by 5, and Elemental Blast by 10.
      • Maelstrom generation has been updated for the following abilities:
        • Lightning Bolt is now 6 (was 8).
        • Lightning Bolt Overload is now 2 (was 3).
        • Chain Lightning is now 2 per target hit (was 4).
        • Chain Lightning Overload is now 1 per target hit (was 3).
        • Lava Burst is now 8 (was 10).
        • Lava Burst Overload is now 3 (was 4).
        • Icefury is now 12 (was 25).
        • Icefury Overload is now 4 (was 12).
        • Frost Shocks empowered by Icefury is now 10 (was 14).
      • Flow of Power no longer increases Maelstrom generation from overloads.
      • Stormkeeper has been removed from its choice node with Lightning Rod.
      • Earth Shock is now a choice against Elemental Blast.
      • Earthquake is now a choice node with an option to have it be cast on your target.
      • All nodes are now 1 point.
      • The following talents have been removed:
        • Tumultuous Fissures
        • Focused Insight
        • Refreshing Waters
        • Primordial Bond
        • Call of Thunder
        • Call of Fire
        • Electrified Shocks
        • Windspeaker’s Lava Resurgence
        • Oath of the Farseer
        • Further Beyond
        • Rolling Magma
        • Primordial Surge
        • Maelstrom Weapon
    • Enhancement
      • Maelstrom Weapon is now learned at level 10 and has been removed from the Class tree.
      • Feral Lunge is now learned at level 14 and has been removed from the Enhancement tree.
      • Flurry moved from Class tree to the Enhancement tree.
      • Elemental Blast damage reduced by 25%.
      • The following talents have been removed:
        • Windfury Totem
        • Focused Insight
        • Refreshing Waters
    • Restoration
      • New Talent: Tidewaters – When you cast Healing Rain, each ally with your Riptide on them is healed.
      • New Talent: First Ascendant – The cooldown of Ascendance is reduced by 60 seconds.
      • New Talent: Preeminence – Your Haste is increased by 25% while Ascendance is active and its duration is increased by 3 seconds.
      • New Talent: Reactive Warding – When refreshing Earth Shield, your target is healed for each stack of Earth Shield they are missing. When refreshing Water Shield, you are refunded mana for each stack of Water Shield missing.
      • New Talent: White Water – Your critical heals have 215% effectiveness instead of the usual 200%.
      • New Talent: Spouting Spirits – Spirit Link reduces damage taken by an additional 5%, and it restores health to all nearby allies 1 second after it is dropped. Spouting Spirit’s healing is decreased beyond 5 targets.
      • Spiritwalker’s Tidal Totem has been redesigned – After using Mana Tide Totem, the cast time of your next 3 Healing Surges is reduced by 100% and their mana cost is reduced by 50%.
      • Master of the Elements has been redesigned – Casting Lava Burst increases the healing of your next Healing Surge by 30%, stacking up to 2 times. Healing Surge applies Flame Shock to a nearby enemy when empowered by Master of the Elements.
      • Improved Earthliving Weapon has been redesigned – Earthliving receives 150% additional benefit from Mastery: Deep Healing. Healing Surge always triggers Earthliving on its target.
      • Earthen Harmony has been redesigned – Earth Shield reduces damage taken by 5% and its healing is increased by up to 150% as its target’s health decreases. Maximum benefit is reached below 50% health.
      • Downpour has been redesigned – Casting Healing Rain activates Downpour, allowing you to cast Downpour within 6 seconds. Downpour: A burst of water at the target location heals up to 5 injured allies with 12 yards and increases their maximum health by 10% for 6 seconds.
        • Downpour is twice as effective for Totemic Restoration Shamans.
      • Living Stream has been redesigned – Now increases Healing Stream Totem’s healing by 100%, decaying over its duration.
      • Lava Surge is now learned at level 12 and has been removed from the class tree.
      • Current Control now reduces the cooldown of Healing Tide Totem by 45 seconds (was 30 seconds).
      • Mana Tide Totem’s radius is now 40 yards.
      • Ancestral Awakening now triggers at a 20% base chance and increases to a 40% chance when activated by a Critical Strike.
      • Torrent now additionally increases the chance for Riptide’s initial heal to critically strike by 8/15%.
      • Water Totem Mastery now activates on a chance, but its effect has been increased to 3 seconds of reduction.
      • Water Shield now has 9 charges.
      • Primordial Wave’s cooldown has been reduce to 30 seconds (was 45 seconds).
      • Healing Rain now heals 5 targets (was 6) and healing increased by 17%.
      • Acid Rain now damages 5 enemies (was 6) and damage increased by 16%.
      • Overflowing Shores now heals 5 targets (was 6) and healing increased by 14%.
      • Wavespeaker’s Blessing is now a 2-point talent.
      • The following talents are now 1 point:
        • Tidebringer
        • Deluge
        • Improved Earthliving Weapon
      • The following talents have been removed:
        • Improved Primordial Wave
        • Tumbling Waves
        • Continuous Waves
        • Resonant Waters
        • Flash Flood
        • Stormkeeper
        • Refreshing Waters
  • WARLOCK
    • Hero Talents
      • Hellcaller (Destruction/Affliction)
        • Xalan’s Cruelty has been redesigned – Shadow damage dealt by your spells and abilities is increased by 2% and your Shadow spells gain 10% more critical strike chance from all sources.
        • Xalan’s Ferocity has been redesigned – Fire damage dealt by your spells and abilities is increased by 2% and your Fire spells gain 10% more critical strike chance from all sources.
        • The icons of Xalan’s Cruelty and Ferocity have been updated.
        • Developer’s note: We’ve redesigned Xalan’s Cruelty and Ferocity for clarity purposes as it was unclear that Shadowflame effects should benefit from both damage increases and both critical strike chance increases.
    • Demonology
      • Your Felguard now charges its target when using Soul Strike.
      • The Houndmaster’s Gambit has been moved to row 9.
      • Flametouched has been moved to row 10.
      • Shadowtouched has been moved to row 10.
      • Sacrificed Souls has been moved to row 5.
      • Developer’s note: We’ve adjusted the pathing of several talents in the bottom section of the Demonology tree to resolve issues where a talent could be chosen and have no functionality if another talent wasn’t taken. In addition, your Felguard now charges when using Soul Strike. This is restored functionality that Soul Strike lost after becoming a pet ability rather than a player ability.
  • WARRIOR
    • Hero Talents
      • Slayer (Fury/Arms)
        • Fierce Followthrough now grants 10% additional damage to your next Mortal Strike/Bloodthirst (was 15%).
          • Developer’s note: Please note that the entirety of this change will be applied with next week’s Beta deploy but will be present in this week’s PTR build.
    • Arms
      • Blademaster’s Torment now grants 8 seconds of Sweeping Strikes instead of the full duration, however this 8 seconds will be added to any existing Sweeping Strikes (and vice-versa) similar to the other Warrior Torment talents.
        • The tooltip will not reflect this change until a later patch.
    • Fury
      • Rampage damage increased by 15%.
      • Raging Blow damage increased by 10%.
      • Improved Raging Blow’s chance for Raging Blow to reset its own cooldown increased to 25% (was 20%).
      • Bloodthirst damage reduced by 10%.
      • Odyn’s Fury damage reduced by 15%.
      • Crushing Force now gives 2/4% Bloodthirst critical strike chance (was 5/10%).
      • Fixed an issue that caused Crushing Force to increase Bloodthirst’s damage by 10/20% instead of the listed 5/10%.
      • Reckless Abandon’s Bloodbath damage reduced by 26% and Crushing Blow damage reduced by 3%.
      • Developer’s note: Please note that the entirety of these changes will be applied with next week’s Beta deploy but will be present in this week’s PTR build.

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

  • CLASSES
    • SHAMAN
      • The following PvP talents have been removed:
        • Traveling Storms
        • Seasoned Winds
      • Elemental
        • New PvP Talent: Electrocute – When you successfully Purge a beneficial effect, the enemy suffers Nature damage over 3 seconds.
        • New PvP Talent: Shamanism – Your Bloodlust and Heroism spell now has a 60 second cooldown, but increases Haste by 20%, and only affects you and your friendly target when cast for 10 seconds. In addition, Bloodlust and Heroism is no longer affected by Sated or Exhaustion.
      • Enhancement
        • New PvP Talent: Electrocute – When you successfully Purge a beneficial effect, the enemy suffers Nature damage over 3 seconds.
      • Restoration
        • Living Tide now reduces the cooldown of Healing Tide Totem by 45 seconds (was 60 seconds).
        • Lightning Bolt damage increased by 44% in PvP combat.