Feb. 16, 2008

Progressive testing

Just added to the 2.4 patch notes, some of this we knew, now it’s just official:

• Hunters will no longer spin around if they cast Aimed Shot or Steady Shot while facing away from their target.
• Resilience: Now reduces the magnitude of mana draining effects by the same amount that it reduces critical strike damage. The Tooltip has been revised to reflect this.
• The benefits of drinking out of combat have been delayed. It will now take five seconds before the full benefit of the mana regeneration will come into effect.
• Vengeful Gladiator’s Waraxe: The weapon delay has been reduced.
• Archimonde’s Grip of the Legion will no longer target pets.
• The proc from Black Bow of the Betrayer will no longer break crowd control effects such as Scatter Shot.

Feb. 15, 2008

Don't what me. You know what

New test build, new information filtering in. The big (undocumented) news is that resilience now reduces the effects of mana-drain spells. Documented, but file it under the 'I’ll believe it when it stays fixed’ category is the assertion that the Black Bow of the Betrayer proc won’t break crowd control effects. Since this has been reportedly fixed before (back in November of last year, no less), like I said, I’ll wait and see. The Gronnstalker bracer has had its haste bonus removed, replaced by critical strike.

Feb. 8, 2008

Thori'dal, the Stars' Fury

MMO-Champion has the skinny on the legendary bow of Sunwell, which is called Thori’dal, the Stars’ Fury.

353-540 Damage Speed: 3.00
(148.7 damage per second)
+17 Agility
Durability 110/110
Requires Level 70
Equip: Improves your critical strike rating by 16.
Equip: Increases your attack power by 34.
Equip: Your attacks ignore 112 of your opponent’s armor.
Equip: Increases ranged attack speed by 15%. Does not stack with quiver or ammo pouch haste effects.
“The energy of the Sunwell courses through Thori’dal.”

It is also being reported that it comes with the following spell ID which is not mentioned in the item description:

46699 : Requires No Ammo – Thori’dal generates magical arrows when the bow string is drawn. Does not use ammo.

No ammo costs AND anyone lucky enough to get this bow gets a bag slot back!

Feb. 8, 2008

Was the wait worth it?

PTR everything is jammed but my download is finished so I get to peek at the notes, but man, they’re a lot smaller for hunters than I honestly expected (no mention of feeding pets in combat). I’ll list some of the general ones that apply to hunters as well, sort of:

• Spell Haste: Spell Haste now reduces the global cooldown on spells, down to a minimum of 1 second. This change does not apply to melee and ranged abilities.
• Spirit-Based Mana Regen: This system has been adjusted so that as your intellect rises, you will regenerate more mana per point of spirit.
• Equiping a thrown weapon while in the middle of an Auto-Shot will no longer cause animation issues.
• Casting flare while in any way not visible, will no longer cause your flare to be invisible to other players.
• Hunter’s Mark: Hunters with Improved Hunter’s Mark will now properly overwrite Hunter’s Mark cast by Hunters without the talent.
• The stamina tooltip for hunter pets will now display the proper health increase.
• Moongraze Stag Tenderloin can now be consumed by hunter pets that eat meat.
• Winterfall Firewater: The tooltip no longer specifies only melee attack power.
• Spell Haste and Armor Penetration will now display on the character sheet (Armor Penetration displays in the hit rating section).
• Pets are now able to properly attack mobs near the walls on the ramps in Zul’Aman, Bear Wing.

Some interesting raid changes as well, the attunement requirement for Hyjal and Black Temple has been removed AND you can just head straight to Kael’Thas or Lady Vashj without killing the other bosses before them. This is the Sunwell patch too, just a heck of a lot going on. More hunter changes on the horizon? Your guess is as good as mine, guess we’ll find out as 2.4 progresses on the Test realm.

Feb. 6, 2008

Je ne parle pas francais!

Or do I? From one of the WOW-EU posters, Thyvene, about the legendary bow that’s been rumored/discussed for patch 2.4:

A few more details on this legendary weapon : it will be a loot like the Warglaives of Azzinoth, not a reward from a quest like Thunderfury.

No gathering 500 bars of Eternium. That makes me so glad. Also, don’t expect sweeping class changes immediately upon the PTR release, since Nethaera said:

I’m going to be a bit cautious in what I say in this regard. Will there be some changes to classes? Yes, there will be some. We’re not rushing into a bunch of class changes for this patch at this point. Consider the patch to be a bit more progressive in nature. As we go along, the developers are going to be keeping a close eye on the results of any changes and additions and then making changes as they feel they are necessary. How many changes occur are going to be based on testing over time. This is why it’s important for players to get in and test it as much as possible.

We want to make sure that the changes we are making are viable and practical for continued balance of the classes and don’t want to put in too many changes at once and essentially skew the results too much one way or another.

Supposedly, we may be only hours away from 2.4 being on the PTR, so I guess we’ll know when we know.