Dear Blizzard Devs,

RE: Beta changes to dispel mechanics

I should preface this by saying that I love using all of my abilities when I raid (well, with the exception of cycloning – not a fan), and I do enjoy dispelling IF it is meaningful and NOT just buttonmashing to remove all the purple or green from my raid frames. I WANT to be dispelling debuffs from my allies during raids.

But, in the past, there have been some absolutely horrible encounters that forced us to be dispel-bots. Decursive was created to counter these whack-a-mole fights, and we would literally sit and mash one button over and over and over. You guys broke Decursive (which was ultimately a good thing), forcing people to manually target their debuffed friends (honestly, at the time, Decursive felt necessary, but I don’t want mods doing my job for me).

With these UI changes prior to TBC, you said you would move away from the spamfest-type dispelling fights. I was relieved to hear it; I wanted to heal, not spam dispels. But when TBC rolled out, there were still bosses (and many trash pulls) that forced us to become dispel-bots instead of doing what we actually enjoy – healing.

Bosses, and particularly trash pulls, were full of quickly applied and reapplied, AOE, raid-wide debuffs. In my guild, Hyjal trash and Keeva is a bit of a running joke, because I used to rage so much about it.

Who the hell wants to spend 20 minutes of trash waves just hitting decurse? I’ll tell you. NOBODY. It’s HORRIBLE.


But this time it will be DIFFERENT. Right?

Then, prior to WotLK, you again said there would be changes to the game and how things were done. After wanting to stab myself during Hyjal, I prayed you were going to keep your word this time and do away with the multi-debuff, raid-wide AOE debuffs.

Unfortunately my hopes were dashed when we jumped into Naxx and immediately came up against trash that poisoned the entire raid at once. I really can’t stress enough how tiresome that kind of trash is – please stop doing that.

(Now, I have to say that Ulduar was mostly free of crazy dispel fights, and TOC and Icecrown have only a couple of encounters/trash pulls that involve tiresome dispelling. Perhaps we’re moving forward now, moving away from a reliance on spamming dispels. But the recent announcement regarding dispel mechanic changes does worry me a little – are you really going to do it this time?)

You guys have said you want the cost to go up, to encourage more thoughtful use of our cleansing abilities, and that you’ll make sure there aren’t any “spammy” dispel fights. I want to believe you, I really, really do. But you have to admit that historically speaking, you’ve kinda gone soft on your promises to abolish spammy dispel encounters.

So.. you might excuse me for being a little skeptical. But I really hope that this expansion is “the one”. The one where we don’t have to be dispel spammers anymore, ever again.


The good, the bad, and the ugly

With all of this in mind, I have put together a list of good and bad examples of dispelling fights, from a druid’s perspective (note: poisons and curses only – since this is looking at past encounters).

Please take them into consideration when designing encounters in Cataclysm that incorporate dispellable debuffs.


The particularly ugly

• High Priestess Mar’li (ZG spider boss) – spiders and poisons everywhere. Spammy and boring.

• Lucifron (MC) – curses all over the raid increasing spell and ability costs by 100%. Spam, spam, spam.
• Chromaggus (BWL) – my job for this fight was literally to cleanse and little else. And I had no idea what the boss even looked like in action for ages. Stand out of LOS and spam your cleansing spells. Boy was that fun.
• Hyjal trash – curses applied to most of the raid, and would be almost instantly reapplied zzzz
• Naxx trash – makes me weep.
• Grand Widow Faerlina (Naxx) – annoying AOE poison volley that would just keep poisoning people very 15 seconds. We usually ignored it and healed through because removing it was so tiresome. Case in point – trivial debuffs that are constantly reapplied and a total chore to remove (so much so that we just didn’t bother).
• Lady Deathwhisper (ICC) – only one or two people here and there, but just seems to happen all the time. Perhaps I’m being a bit hard on this one, but it feels very whack-a-mole to me – someone lights up purple, hit decurse. Someone else lights up purple, hit decurse. Zzz.
• Faction Champs (TOC): can be a spamfest depending on the NPCs you get. See Lady Deathwhisper: Not a fan of reactionary style fights.

Vanilla healers: You know what I’m talkin’ about.



The average

• Gehennas (MC) – reduced healing, so it has to come off the tank asap.

• Shazzrah (MC) – increases damage taken – take it off the tank asap, and anyone else.
• Nefarian (BWL) – nasty curse on the MT.
• Yogg (Ulduar) – not too bad, can get spammy if people leave corruptors up – but that’s the raid’s fault, and can be controlled.
• High Priest Venoxis (ZG snake boss) – lots of poisons on the MT. Nothing special.
• Viscidus (AQ40) – nasty poison dot, but also very boring.
• 3 Bugs (AQ40) – Nothing special, just poisons everywhere. Boring.



The good (please revisit these!)

• Ossirian (AQ20) – AOE curse of tongues around the boss – not bad. Only on a few people, and you could prioritise MT healers then spellcasters.

• Princess Huhuran (AQ40) – Wyvern Sting on up to 10 people, but if cleansed deals 3000 damage (so it usually wasn’t cleansed). Interesting tradeoff-type debuff. We should see more of this kind of thing, but probably not in a way that the tradeoff will kill them and make dispelling completely undesirable. Adding danger or any kind of decision making to the “to cleanse or not to cleanse” question is good. Anything that means you shouldn’t just mash away at your cleansing spells is good. (I always loved the Zul’jin “heal and you hurt yourself – so choose your heals wisely” tradeoff. More please.)
• Archimonde (Hyjal) – Grip of the Legion – 2500/2sec. Nasty, nasty debuff – has to come off ASAP. Only ever put on a few people at once, but since everyone is moving around, it became dangerous if you were out of range of your dispeller. DEFINITELY an awesome dispel fight; I used to love racing to someone in travel form to save them. Thumbs up on dispels here – would love to see more of these very dire debuffs, rather than trivial, mass debuffs. This was a fight where dispelling felt important and valued, not just as though you are going through the motions.
• Kalecgos (SWP) – need to wait for the curse to get to a certain point before you dispel, then it jumps to another person. Yes, by the end we are practically only decursing, but at least you have to think – and it also made the healers work together to coordinate healing towards the end. One of the few heavy cleansing fights that didn’t feel like a chore.
• Noth (Naxx) – a curse applied to multiple people that (if not decursed) will basically wipe the raid. As long as this kind of curse isn’t applied constantly to the raid (making it so that you are constantly decursing), it’s pretty neat. Decurse or the entire raid dies, yikes.
• Sapphiron (Naxx) – affects 20% of the raid every 24 seconds, draining life from the victim and healing the boss. Another debuff that is only put on a handful of people, but could do bad things to your raid if your dispellers aren’t on the ball.



Suggestions for going forward

My wish list for dispelling in Cataclysm is quite simple:

1. No more trivial, raid-wide debuffs.
Stop making trash pulls with mobs that debuff most or all of the raid at once, with trivial debuffs, and when those debuffs are removed, the mobs instantly re-debuff the raid. This is boring, tiresome, and feels pointless.

Nothing we do should ever feel like we are just mashing a button to get rid of something that doesn’t really matter too much but we should probably do it because it’s our job, yawn. Why put a debuff on the whole raid if it doesn’t really do anything? It’s just token busy-work.

No more trifling, raid-wide, token debuffs. If you think it adds variety, to make trash more fun and interesting rather than having us “just” heal – it really doesn’t. It makes life miserable for healers. Just leave these types of trash abilities out, please.

1a. Stop using mass debuffs to make things “fun”.
Cycling cleanses through the entire raid does not make trash fun, interesting or novel. It makes it tedious and mind-numbing. Please stop thinking that it adds novelty to our day.

2. More super nasty debuffs – just not all the time
For boss encounters, use debuffs that are nasty, threaten to wipe the raid, require fast reaction time, BUT are only placed on a handful of people at a time and NOT more than once every 30 seconds. I want debuffs to be seriously bad news if I don’t do my job fast – I want my dispels to be valuable – but I don’t want to spend 80% of the fight removing debuffs. I’m here to heal.

Key point: Put dangerous/dire debuffs on few people, occasionally, rather than petty debuffs on the entire raid, frequently.

3. Make us think.
Look at the list above. Fights that made us time our dispels, or came with a tradeoff, required class or role prioritisation or required us to run into range to get our target – they’re the fun ones.

4. Don’t make me wear +hit gear.
Make it so that defensive cleansing cannot be resisted.


Please follow through.

You guys have said you want us to mash less and think more. You’re upping the mana cost to make us more conservative with our dispelling – but good encounter design will do a lot more towards the goal of reducing dispel “spam”.

Give us dispel fights that make us think, that come with trade-offs, that make dispelling feel like an important and valued part of the fight – not a tedious chore that gets in our way. Make debuffs a real threat to the raid, not just something to keep us GCD-locked.

Don’t just serve up raid-wide debuffs (and this includes trash) that force us to cycle through our frames and button-mash (and do it over and over, when the mobs re-apply their debuff).

I’m counting on you this time!


I remain your humble druid servant,
~ Keeva

Possibly Related Posts:

• Cataclysm talent update, armor specialisation
• Blizz dev chat on Twitter – druid question roundup
• Cataclysm: the brand spankin’ new 31pt talent trees

Reader question time!

“I’m a shameful clicker but I can see the benefit in key bindings. I want to know from someone who is well versed how to go about key binding … how to change my mindset. I currently use WSAD for directional control, mouse for camera control and click those buttons furiously. My most common used spells with are bound to keys 1,2 and 3, but I’m mostly a clicker.

Can you give me some advice on how to swap to binding more of my abilities? How should I control my character?”



The transition from clicker to keybinder

There are two basic options; you could either go “cold turkey”, bind all of your frequently used abilities, and learn them all at the same time; or, you could bind a few at a time, get to know them, then bind a few more.

I found it quite easy to do them all at the same time, because I chose bindings that made sense to me (more about this later). But if you feel it’s a bit too much to learn all at once, just bind a few, get used to them, and then bind another, and another, etc, as you become more comfortable.

As druids, some of our keybinds will overlap with our different forms. Some abilities will be the same in every form, and some will be unique, but share a keybind. Depending on how you set yourself up, this can mean a LOT of keybinds. Because of this, I recommend that you create a table to record your binding choices, so that you don’t lose track of what the bindings are for each form. I’ll explain this more later, too.


Click casting vs keybinds

If you’re used to clicking, you may prefer to use click casting, which means you simply hover over the target’s frame and click a button on your mouse. The more mouse buttons you have, the more heals and spells you can bind (you can also use alt/shift/ctrl modifiers). Some frame mods such as Healbot and Vuhdo have this feature built-in; if you are using Grid or other frame mods, you will have to install a standalone mod like Clique.

Alternatively, you can use keybinds, which is where you have to target the person you want to heal (either by clicking on them or hovering over them if you are using mouseover macros), and then striking a key on your keyboard.

These options are completely personal preference, and neither is better than the other – you just need to find the one that suits you best. You can also use a combination, if you prefer.

(Personally, I find that using my mouse exclusively causes fatigue in my right hand, and makes me stumble on my clicks. I find striking keys to be more precise for me, and less tiring on my hands.)


How to actually bind your abilities to keys

If you choose to use keyboard keys, you can set these up through the in-game key bindings menu. However, it’s a huge list, and can be a pain. You’re much better off using a bar mod to place your abilities into, or even easier, download the mod “Bindpad“. This mod allows you to simply drag your abilities, macros, equipment or items (like potions, food, etc) into a page of empty binding slots, then you simply left click on the ability you want to bind, hit the key or combination of keys that you have chosen for it, and you’re done. Bound!

Here’s an example of what it looks like:




Most of the good bar mods will also let you bind the slots on your bars, rather than single abilities. This means that when you shift to other forms, your 1-2-3-4-5 (etc) buttons will now be used for your cat abilities, bear abilities, and so on. Some bar mods are also compatible with dual specs.


Druid forms and dual specs

Some abilities will be the same in every form – for example, I want 2 to be barkskin, because I can use it in every form. Or you might want to keep Tranquility available for every spec – just in case you have to pop out of Moonkin form to save the day. So some abilities will be the same regardless of your forms. But you might like to have your 3 button do something different depending on your form. For me, it’s LB, LB, Mangle, Mangle (caster, tree, cat, bear). 4 is Rejuv, Rejuv, Rake, Maul.

Alternatively, you can build macros that will choose an action dependent on your form. For example, “if I’m in tree form, use rejuv; if I’m in cat form, use rake; if I’m in bear form, use maul”. Or, “If I”m stealthed, use Ravage; if I’m not stealthed, use Shred”. This saves on bar space and key bindings; you don’t need to have 3 different key binds for your different stances; you can just have one button and one binding, and the macro will check whether you’re a cat or a tree before performing the action.

Not only does this save space, it will save you going mental trying to remember 3 or 4 times the number of key bindings!

Here’s a list of handy macros: Useful macros for druids

For the abilities constant through your forms (eg Barkskin), just bind the ability directly, in bind pad. For abilities that share a bind with feral form abilities, you can either put them on a bar and bind the SLOT, or put them into a conditional macro and then bind that macro in bindpad. Whichever suits you best.



Example of what my bars might look like in different stances.
Barkskin is always “2″, but 3, 4 and 5 change according to my form.


To make it much easier on yourself, I really do recommend that you draw up that table of all the different binds for your forms, so you can remember which are constant and which will change if you shapeshift. This will also make it easier to decide whether you want to bind them directly, or have them share keybinds with other abilities.


Using “logical” bindings

When making new bindings, I try to choose keys that remind me of their associated spell. For example, Alt-W is wrath, Alt-S is Starfire, Alt-R is Entangling Roots. It’s simplistic – but it helps.

I also “pair up” abilities that are similar or complement each other. For example, 3 is Lifebloom, and Shift-3 is Wild Growth, because WG to me is similar to LB but on multiple targets. Rejuv is 4, and Swiftmend (which is used with Rejuv) is Shift-4. My two direct heals, Regrowth and Nourish, are 5 and Shift-5. Abolish Poison is G, and Remove Curse is Shift-G. As you can see, I keep “pairs” of spells together because I consider them to be similar.

I use similar abilities across various characters. For every class, “1″ is my emergency button. Nature’s Swiftness+Healing Touch, Ice Block, Feign Death, Desperate Prayer, etc. “2″ is my “protect me for a few seconds” key – Barkskin, Power Word: Shield, etc. I use the same bindings for my cat finishers and my hunter pet finishers.

G and Shift-G on my druid are poisons and curses, and show up on my raid frames as green and purple respectively. On my priest, I’ve configured Grid to show diseases as green and magic as purple, and I’ve bound Remove Disease and Dispel Magic to G and Shift-G, just like my druid. When I see a green or purple frame, I don’t even have to process whether it’s a disease or poison or curse or magic – my muscle memory says “green – hit G” and “purple – hit Shift-G”.

If you keep similar abilities on the same binds across all of your characters, it will help you to commit them to memory much faster and easier.


Other tips

Other than the logical bindings, keep your most frequently used abilities on keys that are the easiest to reach, and limit the modifiers.

I have small hands, so I try to limit myself to 3, 4, 5, plus all of the left-hand letters except Q and Z (my small hands makes stretching my pinky awkward and clumsy). This is personal preference – if you can comfortably use your pinky, then you open up a few more keys to use.

3, 4 and 5 are my frequent, basic heals – Lifebloom, Rejuv, and Regrowth. The modified versions (Shift-3, Shift-4, Shift-5) are WG, Swiftmend, and Nourish. All of these are easy for me to hit without stretching, and don’t cause me any fatigue. Don’t bind your most common spells to a key that makes you stretch or strain!

Less important or infrequently used abilities can be bound on the right-hand side of the keyboard to save space on the left. For example, Innervate is Shift-I, Hurricane is Alt-H. The cooldowns mean that I can’t use them frequently, so using right-side binds frees up space on the left. It will mean that you have to take your hand off the mouse momentarily though – if you’re not comfortable doing that, if it feels clumsy, then stick with the left side of the keyboard.

Keep your emergency buttons easy to reach. Nature’s Swiftness/Healing Touch, Barkskin, Swiftmend, Tranquility, health stones and potions, bandages. You don’t want to have some crazy binding for your health stone – it has to be easy to get to!

Your mouse wheel is great for changing forms. It’s super fast. I use:



• Down: cancel all forms

• Shift Down: travel
• Ctrl Down: Tree
• Alt Down: Bear
• Up: kitty
• Shift Up: flight form


I use Down to return to caster, but using the same scroll binding twice will also return you to caster form. For example, scroll up – kitty. Scroll up again – back to caster.


WASD (keyboard turning) vs mouse turning

Finally, a note on movement.

Using your mouse to turn, reposition, and move your character is faster and smoother than using your keyboard. Keyboard turning gives you that “shuffling” look as your character slowly turns to the direction you want to face. In situations where you have to run out of fire (etc), it can mean the difference between taking a tick or two of damage, or none at all.

Personally, I use a hybrid mix of keyboard and mouse turning, and so do many druids. The reason for this is because many of us use mouseover macros or click-casting (clicking on your target with your mouse button to heal them). This ties up the mouse for periods of time, meaning that you have to fall back on your W key to move forward. It’s not necessarily a bad thing to use your W key to move forward, but I definitely recommend that you get used to using your mouse to do quick turns if you need to run. Shuffling will slow you down. It only takes a moment to move your mouse out into the open, turn, and then go back to healing while you run with W.

Backpedalling (”S”) is okay as long as it’s not used to get out of fire, etc – it’s too slow. I will often backpedal here and there to reposition, if my mouse hand is tied up; otherwise, I simply mouse-turn quickly.

Different people use different methods, but that is mine, and it serves me well.



As always – this is just an insight into how I do things, and what works and is comfortable for me. Explore for yourself, see what works. Click casting, binds, mouseovers – there’s a style for everyone, it’s just a case of finding what’s comfortable for you, and then training yourself to use it – either all in one hit, or gradually.

It’s not difficult – just write down what you want to do, bind a few spells, and start practicing until it’s second nature.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Talent trees in Cataclysm – scrapped and redone
• Resto Druid calculator!
• Cataclysm: druid forms and other models

Here’s the final list of 3.3 changes that are relevant to druids.


Latest patch notes can always be found at
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html.

Implemented/current patch notes can be found at
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/.




Restoration



• Rebirth: The cooldown on this spell has been lowered from 20 minutes down to 10 minutes. Cannot be used in Arenas.

• Rejuvenation: The base duration on all ranks of this spell is now 15 seconds.
• Tranquility: The cooldown on this spell has been reduced to 8 minutes, down from 10 minutes.
• Gift of the Earthmother: Redesigned. This talent now increases spell haste by 2/4/6/8/10% and reduces the base global cooldown of Lifebloom by 2/4/6/8/10% instead of its previous effects.
• Glyph of Rapid Rejuvenation: This glyph allows for the druid’s haste to reduce the time between the periodic healing effects of Rejuvenation.
• Idol of Flaring Growth: Now has a detailed combat log tooltip.
• Nightsong Regalia Set: The bonus to Rejuvenation from this set will now work properly with the Idol of Rejuvenation equipped. In addition, the instant heal provided now has a correct combat log tooltip.
• Rejuvenation: Druids will no longer get a more powerful spell error message when attempting to overwrite a Rejuvenation they cast.


Balance



• Nature’s Grace: The tooltip now correctly indicates that it will not be activated from periodic spell critical strikes.

• Force of Nature: Health on the treants has been increased.
• Pet avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pets take from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.
• Idol of Lunar Fury: Now has a detailed Combat log tooltip.
• Glyph of Hurricane: Now modifies the spell tooltip on Hurricane to indicate the spell also applies a movement slowing effect.
• Hurricane: When cast from Bear Form, Cat Form, or Dire Bear Form, this spell will now channel properly instead of stopping the channel as soon as the shapeshift is cancelled.


Feral



• Prowl: This ability no longer has multiple ranks and penalizes movement speed by 30%.

• Predatory Strikes: The Predatory Swiftness buff from this talent now has an 8-second duration.
• Idol of The Corruptor: Now has a detailed Combat log tooltip.
• Warmth of Forgiveness: Now grants mana properly to druids in Bear Form, Cat Form, and Dire Bear Form.
• Infected Wounds: This ability is no longer considered to be in the magical defense category; therefore spell hit no longer applies to its activation. Tooltip error corrected.
• Swipe (Bear): Tooltip corrected to display 8 yard range.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Cataclysm talent update, armor specialisation
• Blizz dev chat on Twitter – druid question roundup
• Cataclysm: the brand spankin’ new 31pt talent trees

You guys know that I don’t dip into the math side of things, so I won’t… but I wanted to discuss my actual thoughts on the 4pc Tier10 bonus, and why I think it’s pretty crappy.



Blanketing and T10 4pc value

Blanketing was big in Ulduar, to the point where it was labelled OP and perhaps triggered the upcoming “bug fix” of removing the last tick of R15 Rejuv, and most certainly the nerf to our Tier 8 set bonus. Too much Rejuv healing.


TOC has been almost entirely the opposite; the Twins fight makes our priest cry foul at me, but other than that, the healing is a lot more bursty and rarely requires Rejuv blanketing. This is particularly true of 10 man size raids, since we are forced to do more direct healing, and there are less people to take damage and require blanketing anyway. Perhaps there’s more Rejuving going on in 25s, but in 10s TOC, not much.


So at the moment, I’m not doing much blanketing.


The 4pc Tier10 bonus pretty much requires you to blanket the raid with Rejuvs to get the most benefit from procs. Obviously, being percentage based, the fewer Rejuvs you’re throwing around, the less benefit you’re going to get. So logically, it will be most useful on 25man blanketing fights. How odd that they would encourage us to go back to this, after nerfing us.



On fights without blanketing


On 10 man fights without a blanketing requirement, the 4pc is going to be near worthless. Why would I need a Rejuv thrown on someone – if they need a Rejuv, they probably already have one already. So the bonus will either give me:


- a Rejuv on someone who doesn’t need it, or
- a Rejuv refresh on someone who already has my Rejuv on them


On fights with blanketing


As a 10 man raider, I can keep Rejuv up on the entire raid with a few seconds to spare (say, to refresh Regrowth on a tank, or throw a spot heal). If I am blanketing, what use is another Rejuv going out? I suppose it’s a free refresh.. but the problem with that is that if I am already cycling through every person to Rejuv them, a refreshed Rejuv in the middle of the raid is going to throw my rotation out.


I will then either keep going with my cycle and overwrite the free Rejuv (to keep everyone nicely in my rotation), or I will skip that person (since they already have Rejuv) for a cycle and come back to them later. The possibility then is that their freebie Rejuv drops off while I’m coming back around to them – so they miss a tick or so until I reapply. See where I’m going with this?


So, I either overwrite the free Rejuv and waste it, or I skip that person and they possibly end up with no Rejuv for a few seconds because the free one is out of sync and dropped off.


TLDR: It will mess with my SYSTEM.



Summary


4pc bonuses are meant to be relatively impressive due to the fact that you need to collect and coordinate 4 pieces of gear.


This bonus is weak at best. Without even going into the math of what it *could* contribute to your HPS and whatnot – I see it messing with my rotation at the best of times, and hardly showing up at the worst. The value drops considerably, in my mind, for 10 man raiders, who will either be covering all 10 people with ease and have little use for an extra Rejuv, or won’t need extra Rejuvs because they have things covered anyway.


Why would we strive to collect a 4pc set if it’s going to be mediocre at best, and at worst (particularly for 10 man raiders) almost useless?


Perhaps Icecrown will be full of heavy aura damage fights, and we’ll go back to blanketing. Even so, this bonus will contribute little for me. It will either throw Rejuvs when they’re not needed, or refresh them when I would prefer that they didn’t. A resounding “meh” on this set bonus.



Post script: On the possibility of “jump” actually meaning “jump”


I’m still 99% certain that Blizzard couldn’t possibly be stupid enough to create a 4pc bonus that is not just seen as perhaps a little lacking, but something that the majority of people would actually avoid picking up at all costs.


Surely.


I have to admit though, while we (as players/bloggers) all know it is the most stupid idea ever conceived.. I have to concede that maybe, just maybe, Blizzard haven’t spotted the problem. Maybe.


It’s so blatantly obvious though – surely they realise how bad it would be for our Rejuvs to randomly drop from our intended target and pop up on someone else? Particularly if you are keeping a Rejuv on your tank, for example – it would be horrible if your Rejuv randomly moved to someone else, just as you were about to Swiftmend the tank. Or to be keeping Rejuvs on the melee, and for one of those melee to suddenly drop their Rejuv, in favour of it landing on someone’s pet cat.


That’d be really, really bad.


Yes, the wording says “jump”. If we take it literally, it would jump. Off.


But they MUST realise that would be awful. You’d have to be utterly BLIND not to realise how terrible it would be.


So surely they don’t intend it to work that way. It must be yet another ambiguous tooltip.


Surely.



I don’t think I’m being overly optimistic, just reasonable. LOGICAL. Which is why I posted to say, “Everyone calm down, it can’t POSSIBLY mean what you guys are reading it as!” To me, it was a simple case of misunderstanding the tooltip and overreacting.

But – and I don’t want to bite the hand that feeds me here – it’s Blizzard, and they have been known to make some kind dumb changes… hmm.



Hat plated and at the ready, just in case..



Possibly Related Posts:

• Cataclysm talent update, armor specialisation
• Blizz dev chat on Twitter – druid question roundup
• Cataclysm: the brand spankin’ new 31pt talent trees

I need to update the upcoming and past changes pages of the site soon – but for now, here are the previews for the Druid Tier 10 set bonuses:



• Druid T10 Restoration 2P Bonus – The healing granted by your Wild Growth spell reduces 0% less over time.

• Druid T10 Restoration 4P Bonus – Each time your Rejuvenation spell heals a target, it has a 2% chance to jump to a new target at full duration.
  


• Druid T10 Balance 2P Bonus – When you gain Clearcasting from your Omen of Clarity talent, you deal 10% additional Nature and Arcane damage for 6 sec.

• Druid T10 Balance 4P Bonus – Reduces the cooldown on your Eclipse talent by 6000.
  


• Druid T10 Feral 2P Bonus – Your Swipe (Bear) and Lacerate abilities deal 20% additional damage and the cost of your Rip ability is reduced by 10 energy.

• Druid T10 Feral 4P Bonus – Your Enrage ability no longer decreases your armor and instead decreases all damage taken by 12%, and the periodic damage done by your Rake ability can now be a critical strike.


Remember though that these are preliminary bonuses and may change before 3.3 is released.



Zarhym has also provided a sneak peek of the armor sets in Icecrown. Enjoy.

Possibly Related Posts:

• Cataclysm talent update, armor specialisation
• Blizz dev chat on Twitter – druid question roundup
• Cataclysm: the brand spankin’ new 31pt talent trees

Faction changes are now live!

If you’ve ever dreamt of being part of the Horde (and we know you have, I mean.. c’mon..) – now’s your chance.




The new World of Warcraft Faction Change service is now live. As we mentioned previously, [http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/thread.html?topicId=18031079410&sid=1] we’ve been in the process of developing a new service for World of Warcraft that will allow players to change their faction from Alliance to Horde or Horde to Alliance for a fee. After purchasing a Faction Change for a character, a player can choose any race of the opposite faction that is compatible with the character’s class. For more information on the Faction Change service, please read the FAQ, [http://us.blizzard.com/support/article.xml?locale=en_US&tag=FCFAQ] or visit the Faction Change page [https://www.worldofwarcraft.com/account/faction-change-intro.html] to get started.

Posted by Nethaera on 3 Sep 09   [Source]


But even more interesting (and I totally called it):




The current faction change costs US$30. I’m not sure whether the race change will be the same cost.


Full FAQ are available through the official site, but read on for some of the questions that I was particularly curious about, and have now been answered: (more…)

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MMO-Champion has done what they do best and served up some datamined info about the next expansion.


None of the information below has been officialy announced by Blizzard, this is only a compilation of information gathered from reliable sources. Just keep in mind that it takes a LOT to make me post something on the front page and I’m definitely not speculating here.


Here’s the exciting part, if it’s true:

The expansion doesn’t have any new class. Instead, Blizzard will offer more race and classes combinations to players, some of them have been datamined on the 3.2.2 Test Realms.

* Human Hunter
* Orc Mage
* Night Elf Mage
* Dwarf Mage
* Blood Elf Warrior
* Dwarf Shaman
* Undead Hunter
* Tauren Paladin
* Tauren Priest
* Gnome Priest
* Troll Druid



Troll druids? Or Blizzard trolling us?

I don’t think I would swap to a troll, I like my Tauren, but it would be great for us to get a couple more races as druids.




Then again, if this was our Dire form, I think I would be tempted..


I think I’ll be taking this with a grain of salt – MMO say they have reliable sources, but here’s the part that made me a little doubtful:



Flying in Azeroth
Part of the redesign of the Eastern Kingdoms and Kalimdor is the introduction of flying to the two continents, allowing access to many new areas and quicker travelling across the large continents.


I could be wrong, but I find this very hard to believe. Blizzard have always said this would be a mammoth effort, with a lot of recoding to do, and they didn’t want to put that much effort into revamping old content (they prefer to spend time and money on new and exciting content). Edit: If the follow-up info that MMO posted is true (about a lot of 80-85 stuff happening in the old world), then it would make sense to allow flying, I suppose..

So.. I’m not sure. As Matticus said recently, these news sites don’t post “news” flippantly, they have reputations (and therefore, revenue) to preserve. But Blizzard have always been adamant that flying in Azeroth would be time and effort better spent on developing new content.

As usual, I’m taking the stance of, “I’ll believe it when I see it.”

Besides, we all know that Undead cannot play hunters.

Some new druid races would be really great (without mangling the lore, if possible). If the above is true, I can only assume they haven’t “found” the second Alliance druid race yet – otherwise it might be a bit unfair. Although I love my Tauren and doubt I would reroll (other than for fun – hey, a 6th druid might be good for a laugh), it would be nice to have a choice.





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Patch 3.2 is upon us.

Never again will we glance upon the twisted visage of a Tauren “cat”.

No longer will our bears’ jaws sag and droop like so much saggy, droopy stuff.

Our feral forms are finally being replaced with shiny new models, after years of complaints (mostly about rampant, chronic lockjaw). It’s not just a reskin, either – this is a full revamp. We’re getting more polys.

I have to say, I’m slightly sad. Don’t get me wrong – I’m very excited for the new forms, I think they look great; but I can’t help feeling a little sad about losing the look that we have had for such a long time. Definitely want them gone – but still sad to see them go!

So, I decided to give our old forms a bit of a send off. I shipped all of my Caelestrasz druids (yes, all four of them!) to the Barrens for a bit of a photo opportunity. All of my Cael girls in the one spot, together, to say goodbye to the forms we have lived in and loved (or perhaps endured, loathed, switched to first person mode..) for the past few years.

And, through the magic that is Photoshop, I can share the moment with you all.









From left to right:
Keeva, my beloved Tauren; Drucie, my baby feral; Caoimhe, the Elf who started this whole crazy thing; and Kiiva, the newcomer.



Farewell, you fugly forms (except you, purplecat). In a strange way, I’ll miss you.

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Just as a quick follow-up to the feral form picture spam, here’s a quote fresh from Blizzard:



Based on the current looks of tauren, I believe there are a total of 19 different skin choices for male tauren, and 11 skin choices for tauren females. Many similar tones will share the same bear and cat forms though. We’re looking to release a break down of the tauren skin tones and night elf hair colors, as they correspond with the different cat and bear form color options, shortly after the new night elf cat form art is released.

So don’t worry guys, you won’t have to jump on the PTR to fiddle with the barber shop to pull together a list of the different colour combos. Blizzard should be providing one soon.




Edit: here they are (created by MMO Champion, based on a text list released by Blizzard):











Thanks Beru – I’m in Australia so updates always happen while I’m asleep



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The Night Elf cat model has been released, to mixed reviews:





Personally, I think they look great – I especially love the noses on the new cats (both Tauren and Elf).

Meanwhile, a friend is spamming me in IMs about how much he hates them because they look like My Little Pony cats. I’m giggling.

I love the white kitty, and I already loved the white elf bear. So Kiiva will be “safe”, she won’t have to change her identity to get the feral forms that I like. Unlike Keeva. While I do understand the “logic” that we should have similar colouring in all of our forms (because it “makes sense”), I still hope they don’t force us to have to change our character’s appearance to get feral forms that we find appealing.

Broken record mode on: Keeva has been Keeva for 2 years. Some people might see it as no big deal to head to the barber shop and ask politely for an entirely different skin colour – but I don’t want to do that. I want to keep Keeva’s identity. But the feral forms that correspond to her white skin tone are the ones I particularly dislike. A lot.

Here’s hoping they rethink it. Allowing us to choose would not hurt anyone – if you want a white bear and a matching white cat to go with your white hair, you could choose that – but if I hate the white bear and just want to be brown, with a black cat, then I could choose that too.

I’m getting tired of the “but it makes SENSE, durrr!” argument – does it make sense that a hairdresser could change my skin?

Having 3 forms that match in some way is good, I definitely agree. But being forced to have two forms that you hate, OR change the fundamental appearance of your character (which I and many other people have become attached to and consider part of that character’s identity) …. that’s pretty disappointing.

You’ve done an AWESOME job so far – but let us choose, Blizzard!



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