talent-spec
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Patch 1.12: Rogue Talent Calculator Live
A new talent calculator showcasing the rogue changes went online today. With it, of course, comes plenty of speculation about possible new talent combinations and viable builds. I don't think the combat build I've been putting together with my own rogue has changed much, there are more viable options in the assassination and subtlety trees to pair with it. Decisions, decisions....
Life as a Shadow Priest: Day One
When I first rolled my priest, I planned to do more PvP with it than I had with my other characters. And as I leveled up, I'd usually spend an evening or two a week running through Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, and eventually Alterac Valley. But after hitting 60, I found myself wanting to PvP less and less. I've talked a bit about struggling with healing in PvP, and while it's certainly possible, I can always tend to think up more entertaining things to do than venture into the battlegrounds these days.Yesterday, when a friend asked me if I wanted to go to Alterac Valley with him, I replied immediately: "No - all I do there is die over and over. I'm no shadow priest!" My friend had a quick comeback: "Why not respec?" I didn't have any response to that. I'd leveled up with a holy/discipline build that had served me well, but in the past few days respeced several times in an attempt to make solo and PvP a little more fun, without gimping my healing abilities. I hadn't been entirely happy with any of the results, so perhaps this was the time to consider more serious measures. I headed straight for the priest trainer and, after some hesitation, paid the fee to unlearn my talents.I put 20 points in discipline and remaining 31 in shadow. I was now, officially, a shadow priest.
New Talent Calculators Online
Everyone seemed to complain that the talent calculators on the official web site were slow and difficult to use. The talent calculators on Wowhead seemed to be favored by nearly everyone I encountered, with their slick design and layout. Blizzard has taken note of this when redesigning their own talent calculators, which are now online. I find Blizzard's borrowing from community projects interesting (note also there are several features that are awfully similar to CTRaid Assist coming in patch 1.11) - any other opinions?
Mage Talents Updated
...and in a very good way. Changes include the following:Arcane TreeArcane Subtlety: Now a 2-point talent that reduces your target's resistances to all your spells by 5/10 and threat caused by your arcane spells by 20/40%.Wand Specialization: Now only a 2-point talent.Magic Absorption: New 5-point, tier 2 ability. When you resist a spell, you regain 1/2/3/4/5% of your maximum mana and increases your resistances by 2/4/6/8/10.Improved Arcane Explosion: Now a 3-point ability that increases the critical chance of Arcane Explosion by 2/4/6%.Fire TreeBurning Soul: Now adds threat reduction as well as prevents you from loosing casting time by taking damage. Threat reduced by 15/30%.Improved Scorch: The fire vulnerability DoT has been improved to 3% each, and still stacks 5 times (for a total of 15% increased fire vulnerability).Frost TreeFrost Warding: Moved to tier 1.Elemental Focus: New 3-point tier 1 talent that increases your chance to hit with fire and frost spells by 2/4/6%.Improved Frost Nova: Moved to tier 2.Permafrost: Moved to tier 2.Frost Channeling: In addition to the mana cost reduction, this talent now also reduces threat caused by frost spells by 10/20/30%.Shatter: The pre-requisite for this talent is now Improved Frost Nova rather than Frostbite.Winter's Chill: Changed functionality. Now causes a debuff that increases frost crit chance by 2%. 20/40/60/80/100% chance to apply the debuff.Ice Barrier: Now receives 10% of the benefit of +frost damage gear and can stack with a priest's Power Word: Shield.
Mage & Shaman Talent Calculators
Official talent calculators have been released for the recently reviewed mage and shaman talent trees. These provide a clearer picture of the mage and shaman revisions than the already available text-based descriptions for the classes. To those dissatisfied with these changes, I can only encourage you to wait until we see how they play out on the test realms.
What Would You Do with 61 Talent Points?
You may have heard that the upcoming Burning Crusade expansion will raise the level cap of the game from 60 to 70. But what doesn't seem to be such common knowledge is the fact that you will receive ten additional talent points to spend, and that all of the talent trees will be expanded to accommodate these extra points (likely providing each talent tree with a 41-point talent). So, the question remains - what do you plan to do when you have ten extra talent points to throw around?
Priest Talent Builds?
Have all of the priests in the audience decided how they want to respec when the servers come back up? Despite having spent some time considering available options, during the my play-time on the test server I've been unable to reach a conclusion. Fortunately, Azrathil of EU server Kel'Thuzad has put together a fairly comprehensive list of possible talent builds for 1.10. For those of us still indecisive, there are a few pages of commentary in the thread, as well as additional build suggestions.
Patch 1.10 News: Priest Updates Considered
Now that everyone's had some time to read and think about the announced priest changes, it's time to talk about what the changes mean. What talent builds will be best for raiding or PVPing under these changes? Are these new talents really as good as they sound? Theoretical builds and commentary after the jump.
