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Warlords of Draenor: Combo points no longer on target for rogues, druids
Rogues and feral druids have had one very important change that wasn't announced in the recent patch notes for the 6.0 alpha build. Combo points, the bread and butter of every rogue and feral druid attack since the game began, are now on the rogue or druid, instead of on the target being attacked. This was confirmed in a tweet by Celestalon -- who was quick to point out that the change might not see live, but is being tested for now. @Vigilate_MW Oh, hah, that's a big oversight, my bad. Yes, Combo Points are 'on the Rogue' now. Could revert based on feedback, but trying. - Celestalon (@Celestalon) April 4, 2014 This is honestly a really big change for both classes. One of the unique frustrations of playing the class was spending the time and energy to build up enough points for a big finisher, only to see the target die before that finisher could land. Don't get me wrong, having a target die is always the name of the game, whether you're stabbing with daggers or skulking around as a cat. But once that target was dead, all combo points you carefully built up would simply vanish when the next target was acquired.
Warlords of Draenor: Attack and Spell power changes
One of the changes the Warlords of Draenor alpha patch notes mentions is a pretty large change to how our primary stats work and interact with critical strike and attack or spell power (depending on which you care about). It can be broken down as follows - first, agility and intellect no longer increase physical and spell critical strike chances respectively. In addition, there no longer is any such thing as spell critical strike chance, ranged chance, or melee chance, merely critical strike chance that applies to all three. Since this is no longer affected by primary stats, it's set at a base 5% chance before gear. (Among other things this removes the last tiny vestiges of any use for agility for strength classes.) Next, agility based class gain a new passive ability called Critical Strikes which increases base critical strike chance by 10%, likely to compensate for all the crit they lose from agility. Those of us who never got crit from our primary stat (strength DPS) are left wondering where our free 10% crit is. Next, how primary stats react with attack or spell power has also been changed. Attack power from Agility or Strength has been halved - each point of Agi or Str only gives 1 AP, down from the 2 it gains currently. In addition, weapon damage has been reduced by 20% across the board. This is because Attack Power now contributes more significantly to weapon damage - 1 DPS per 3.5 AP, which is a pretty significant increase from the current 1 DPS per 14 AP. Finally, weapon damage and attack and/or spell power now contributes to the entire throughput of player spells - if you're a healer, your weapon damage and spell power will much more directly contribute to the strength of your heals, and casters will see a similar benefit from their weapons. Weapons have just become far more important for many players, if not all. To read this section of the patch notes in their entirety, just click on through to the other side.
That Warlords of Draenor alpha key is fake, but your hurt will be real
Consider this the friendly reminder that all those alpha keys you're getting in your gmail inbox for Warlords of Draenor are 100% fake. Blizzard will only enable accounts and there is no external access yet to the alpha. No wait, let's not have this be a friendly reminder. Friendly is too easy. This is a mean, rotten, no good reminder! This is the most evil reminder known to mankind! Want to know what will happen if you open up one of those fake Warlords of Draenor emails? I'll enumerate it for you so even the daftest of trolls can understand: All of your original tier 3 will be sharded Your Unborn Val'kyr will be released to the wild Zarhym's head will reattach to his body The set pieces you're farming for in Diablo 3 will never drop Titan will be sent back to the drawing board and delayed for even longer Thus concludes the meanest reminder ever.
Professions divorced from combat in 6.0
The Warlords of Draenor 6.0 patch notes brought many surprises, but one of the biggest is that professions will no longer provide bonuses that affect combat. Amidst the endless sea of notes, it's easy to miss these two sentences that will forever change the role of professions in WoW: Warlords of Draenor: Alpha Patch Notes Some of our goals with Professions in Warlords of Draenor are to make them more of a personal choice, and less of a mandatory "min/max" selection. To that end, we're removing the direct combat benefits of Professions. source For many years, theorycrafters and min/max'ers have baked profession bonuses into their calculations. The crit from skinning, the Synapse Springs of engineers, the eye gems of jewelcrafters, the warmer wrists of leatherworkers, etc. -- all of them have affected which professions are "best" for certain specs. In recent expansions we've seen Blizzard try to make the bonuses more or less even across specs, with mixed success. Now, all of these bonuses are headed to the chopping block in patch 6.0, at least in their current incarnations. Maxed-out professions will no longer be essential for high-end PvE or PvP activities. We will no longer need to weigh our personal preference against possible combat advantages. In fact, players will be able to skip leveling professions at all, if they choose, without penalty to their character's performance. This strikes me as a good change. Will professions only provide an economic advantage from 6.0 on? Or will they give us other bonuses, such as extra lesser charms, bonus pet battle XP, or faster garrison construction? Will Blizzard tweak the existing combat-related recipes to provide different bonuses? Or will the developers remove them entirely? Many questions remain to be answered as the alpha progresses!
Warlords of Draenor: Automatically learned glyphs
The first release of the Warlords of Draenor patch notes revealed that certain glyphs will be learned automatically during the leveling process. These glyphs, as stated by developer Celeston, are chosen largely based on their usefulness during the leveling process. They will also serve as a reminder that you even have the ability to use another glyph -- often, leveling characters aren't aware when they're able to use a glyph, or what a glyph is at all. Currently, as mentioned in the patch notes, glyphs are usually acquired on the auction house. Since every player needs these glyphs, the glyph market is a cutthroat place where a player leveling fresh can run themselves broke even if they only buy the ones they need. This change isn't one that's friendly to scribes making a killing on the auction house, but it certainly is friendly to new characters. Keep in mind that not all glyphs will be learned automatically -- only the leveling essentials. You can refer to the patch notes to see which ones will be learned and when or follow along below.
Warlords of Draenor: Patch 6.0 patch notes
The patch notes for patch 6.0 have been released! Patch 6.0 is the pre-patch for Warlords of Draenor, featuring many of the changes and adjustments we'll be seeing in preparation for the next expansion's launch. Please note that patch notes can and often will change over time -- these should by no means be considered a finalized version. Highlights from the patch notes include: A new row of talents has been added for level 100, and Draenor Perks from levels 91-99. Racial traits have been rebalanced. All characters now learn a few important Major Glyphs as they level up. Garrisons, garrisons, garrisons! Read on for the full list of patch notes after the break.
Warlords of Draenor Alpha testing begins
Warlords of Draenor Alpha has officially begun! While at this stage testing is limited, players may feel free to opt-in to future beta testing by going to the Beta Profile Settings on your Battle.net account. Interestingly enough, along with this announcement comes the announcement of a new file format to compress and store game files. The new file format, CASC, replaces the MPQ file formatting Blizzard has been using for the past 20 years. Keep in mind that this is an alpha announcement -- beta has not officially begun. No beta keys have been emailed out. If you receive an email offering a beta key, ignore it for now -- as more information about the new expansion releases, phishing attempts are like to rise as well. Check out Blizzard's full announcement regarding the Alpha, and keep your eyes peeled -- with a client available, datamining will likely begin soon. Update: Ion "Watcher" Hazzikostas had the following to say about the Alpha: Don't read too much into the word "Alpha." We have a LOT of content that's ready for testing. http://t.co/c93xZhSOt1- Watcher (@WatcherDev) April 3, 2014
