Hotfixes: August 22, 2022, Alpha Feedback: Warlocks and Mages, Return to WoW and Get Shadowlands Free!

August 22, 2022

Auction House

• Addressed multiple issues causing degraded Auction House performance.
• Fixed a bug causing Incoming Amount to display the incorrect value for sales of commodities in full stacks.

Dungeons

• All Mythic+ dungeon tuning will occur during scheduled weekly maintenance in each region.
• Iron Docks
  • Sanguine Sphere’s absorb now scales with keystone level.
• Lower Karazhan
  • Galindre and Elfyra’s health reduced by 35%.
  • Winged Assistant’s Throw “Stuff” damage reduced by 40%.
  • Winged Assistant’s health reduced by 35%.
  • Galindre’s Flashy Bolt damage reduced by 30%.
  • Elfyra’s Defy Gravity damage reduced by 50%.
  • Atumen the Huntsman will no longer cast Intangible Presence.

Player versus Player

• The minimum item level players are scaled up to in Solo Shuffle has been increased to 278, as intended.
• [EU realms only] Fixed a bug that unintentionally decreased all players’ matchmaking ratings.

Greetings Warlocks,

Our Eye of Kilrogg has been watching the community discussions unfold over the past two weeks and we have several changes that we’re summoning into this week’s Alpha update, based on the feedback we’ve observed. There’s a lot to cover with Core and each Specialization tree receiving significant changes, so grab your Healthstones and let’s dive into our grimoire of updates:

Core Tree

We took another look at the Core tree and came to the same consensus that a lot of the community shared: while it was cool to get access to buttons previously unavailable or completely new, it created a lot of button bloat and added some additional mechanical complexity to each rotation. In lieu of this, we’ve cut out a lot of the throughput centric talents (Devastating Bolt, each of the Pacts, etc.) and introduced (or re-introduced) some utility talents in their place. Here are some examples of spells you can expect to see:

• Soul Armor – When your health drops below 35%, the percentage of damage shared via your Soul Link is increased by an additional 5%.
• Demonic Resilience – Reduces the chance you will be critically struck by 4%. All damage your primary demon takes is reduced by 15%.
• Abyss Walker – Using Demonic Circle: Teleport or your Demonic Gateway reduces all damage you take by 4% for 10 sec.
• Fel Synergy – Soul Leech also heals you for 25% and your pet for 50% of the absorption it grants.
  • Soul Link has been divided into two parts: Fel Synergy and itself (the damage reduction portion). The reason for this change is Soul Link offers too much value for a single talent node. That said, Fel Synergy and Soul Link are very close to one another, and neither are multi-rank.

Additionally, the following abilities are now implemented and testable:

• Summon Soulkeeper (was Summon Jailer) – You gain Tormented Souls periodically and as you slay enemies. Consume all Tormented Souls to summon a Soulkeeper that periodically blasts nearby enemies. The Soulkeeper’s lasts 2 seconds per Tormented Soul consumed.
• Inquisitor’s Gaze – Summons an Inquisitor’s Eye that periodically blasts your enemies.

We’ve also rearranged some talents, such as moving Accrued Vitality and making Demonic Circle much more accessible.

By removing excess throughput from the Core tree, we have more freedom to funnel it into the specialization trees and focus on amplifying each specialization’s rotation.

Affliction Tree

Our primary goals with this pass of Affliction are to remove a lot of the button bloat introduced during the first pass, remove excess rotational maintenance, and focus on Affliction’s single target toolkit. With these goals in mind, we’ve removed: Deathbolt, Death Dealer, Pact of the Nathrezim, and Malefic Wrath.

With space being a bit freed up, we have some new talents and changes that we’re excited to get feedback on:

• Creeping Death no longer decreases the duration of your damage over time effects.
• Malefic Affliction – Malefic Rapture causes your active Unstable Affliction to deal 5/10% additional damage, up to 15/30%, for the rest of its duration.
• Doom Blossom (a choice against Dread Touch) – If Corruption damages a target affected by your Unstable Affliction, it has a 10% chance per stack of Malefic Affliction to deal Shadow damage to nearby enemies.
• Dread Touch (a choice against Doom Blossom) – If Malefic Affliction exceeds 3 stacks, the target instead takes 20% additional damage from your damage over time effects for 6 seconds.
• Soul-Eater’s Gluttony – Whenever Unstable Affliction deals damage, the cooldown of Soul Rot is reduced by 0.5/1.0 second.
• Grim Reach (a choice against Wilfred’s Sigil of Superior Summoning) – When Darkglare deals damage, it deals 50% of that damage to all enemies affected by your damage over time effects.

We’ve also rearranged several talents on the left side of the tree. We will continue to watch for feedback and will be tuning as we continue to test.

Demonology Tree

Overall, we’re happy with the community’s reception of the Demonology tree but have some changes and iterations we’d like to make.

• Demonic Consumption has been removed and replaced with Reign of Tyranny.
• Reign of Tyranny – Active Wild Imps grant 1 stack of Demonic Servitude. Active greater demons grant 2 stacks of Demonic Servitude. Demonic Tyrant deals 3% additional damage for each stack of Demonic Servitude active at the time of his summon.
  • Demonic Consumption was largely invisible in terms of how much power your Tyrant was getting and encouraged utilizing defensive cooldowns offensively for maximum throughput. With Reign of Tyranny, we’re trying something that is more visible to players and with better, controllable scaling.
• Guillotine (was Hold This For Me) is now playable and available for testing.
  • Your Felguard hurls his axe towards the target location, erupting when it lands and dealing Shadowflame damage every 1 second for 8 seconds to nearby enemies. While unarmed, your Felguard’s basic attacks deal damage to all nearby enemies and attacks 50% faster.
• Ner’zhul’s Volition has been updated.
  • When Nether Portal summons a demon, it has a 2/4% chance per Soul Shard spent to summon an additional demon.

Destruction Tree

Like Demonology, we’re happy with how the Destruction tree has been received. We’ve implemented many tuning changes for Destruction, and a few changes to spells based on feedback:

• Backdraft now affects Soul Fire.
• Dimensional Rift is now in the Destruction tree as a choice against Chaos Incarnate.
• Combusting Engine has been removed and replaced with Explosive Potential.
• Explosive Potential – Reduces the cooldown of Conflagrate by 2 seconds.
• Chaos Shards has been removed and replaced with Scalding Flames.
• Scalding Flames – Increases the damage of Immolate by 13/25%.
  • We’re removing Chaos Shards to ensure that Destruction’s Soul Shard generation is at a healthy cadence rather than overflowing.

That’s it for now! Thank you for all the feedback and discussions. We’ll Demonic Circle: Teleport back here when we have further updates to share.

Hello Mages!

In this week’s Alpha update, there will be a number of updates to both the Core and Spec trees for the Mage Class. We’d like to talk a bit about our design directions for this iteration and the improvements we’re looking to make.

Core Tree

The Core tree is seeing the heaviest redesign. Our goal has been to increase options by adding new spells, reducing overall multi-point nodes, cutting all existing 3-point nodes, and improve pathing. Several choice nodes have been split into standalone nodes to increase utility options. We’ve also been looking to reduce the number of nodes that may feel required. Cone of Cold will be moving baseline to improve the base kit and remove dependency issues.

Here are some examples of spells you can expect to see:

• Reflection – Teleports you back to where you last Blinked. Only usable within 8 seconds of Blinking, 45 second cooldown.
• Volatile Detonation – Greatly increases the effect of Blast Wave’s knockback. Blast Wave’s cooldown is reduced by 5 seconds.
• Time Manipulation – Casting Fire Blast/Ice Lance on Frozen targets/Arcane Missiles reduces the cooldown of your loss of control abilities by 1/2 seconds.
• Energized Barriers – When your barrier receives melee attacks, you have a 10% chance to be granted 1 Fire Blast/1 Fingers of Frost/1 Clearcasting charge. Casting your barrier removes all snare effects.

Some of this work is ongoing, and you can expect to see a couple of nodes marked NYI (Not Yet Implemented) for now.

Fire Tree

We felt the pathing in this tree has not allowed for enough exploration due to nodes that feel required. We’re looking to reduce the number of “mandatory” points by moving a few spells baseline, such as Hot Streak and Fire Blast Rank 2, and providing more options below gate 1 and 2. Phoenix Flames will also be moving up to above gate 1.

Frost Tree

A good amount of feedback for this tree has been related to the Icy Veins nodes and how required they feel, which is leading to little choice in the bottom third of the tree. We’re looking to allow for backtracking and additional choice. To help accomplish this, we’re making all 3 point nodes into 2 point nodes and reducing the point count of the Icy Veins related nodes below gate 2. Additionally, Winter’s Chill functionality will now be baseline when Flurry is learned to allow for more point flexibility.

Arcane Tree

The Arcane tree has been updated and will have quite a bit of re-organization of talents to better open up options as you navigate through the tree as well as make a few talents that felt previously inaccessible a little easier to access. Cooldowns on some abilities have also been adjusted to better flow with Arcane’s 45/90-second windows. Below is a highlight of some of the changes you can expect in the next alpha build.

• Arcane Bombardment – Reduced to max 1 rank, down from 2.
• Arcane Echo – Reduced to max 1 rank, down from 2.
• Arcane Surge – Now grants a burst of mana on cast so that the player can immediately start casting Arcane Blast
• Arcane Orb – Moved up the tree. It’s now available before the first gate and directly after Arcane Missiles.
• Rules of Threes – Now a choice node with Arcane Familiar. This choice node has swapped places with Arcane Tempo
• Evocation – Cooldown reduced to 90 seconds, down from 120 seconds.
• Improved Evocation – Cut
• Siphon Storm – Converted to a single node (was previously a choice node with Improved Evocation).
• Charged Orb – Now available after unlocking the first gate (Charged Orb grants Arcane Orb 1 additional Charge).
• Orb Barrage – Converted to a single node (was previously a choice node with Orb Barrage).
  • Now also reduces the cooldown of Arcane Orb by 2 seconds when Clearcasting is consumed.
• Nether Tempest – Position on the tree has moved toward the center of the talent tree as a choice node with Reverberate connecting from Mana Adept and Improved Arcane Barrage.
• Conjure Mana Gem – Now restores 25% Mana, up from 10% Mana.
  • Now grants 5% increased spell power for 10 seconds baseline.
• Cascading Power – Now grants up to 2 stacks of Clearcasting when consuming a Mana Gem (previously granted Spell Power).
• Enlightened – Moved lower into the tree (from Row 6 to Row 8).
• Resonance – Moved to Enlightened’s previous position.
• Presence of Mind – Cooldown reduced to 45 seconds, down from 60 seconds.

Thank you for all of your testing and feedback so far. We’ll address some of the remaining tweaks and NYI spots in a future build soon after the next.

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Eligibility

All Battle.net accounts that do not currently have the Shadowlands expansion attached and that had any expansion license attached to the account in the past will receive the Shadowlands Base Edition and a Level 50 Character Boost FREE (no purchase necessary).

Battle.net accounts without a previous expansion license attached on any of their WoW game accounts, or which already have Shadowlands on any of their game accounts, are NOT eligible to receive a free copy of Shadowlands.

How do I Claim My Gift?

To claim your gift, follow these steps:

1. Open the Battle.net Desktop App and log in.
   • If you don’t have the App installed, download it here.
2. Click the gift icon* on the top right side of the app, next to the notification bell icon.
3. In the confirmation window, look for your gifts and click the CLAIM button.
4. Launch World of Warcraft® and enjoy your FREE copy of the Shadowlands Base Edition and Level 50 Character Boost.

We hope you enjoy these gifts, and may your journey through the afterlives be filled with adventure and excitement. Keep an eye on https://worldofwarcraft.com/news for all the latest on World of Warcraft, Shadowlands, and beyond, including the upcoming release of Wrath of the Lich King Classic on September 26 and Dragonflight later in 2022. See you in Azeroth!