Oct. 12, 2007

Zul'how cool is this?!

With thanks to a few of my friends over on Test server (thanks Rhaygar and Fetch, much love!), we went and did a bit of exploring around Zul’Aman today. As we slithered and feigned death around the zone (just us three, so no engaging), we found the Amani Bear, a look alike to the rare bear mount. Imagine my suprise when I gave it a shot of Beast Lore and it came back 'Tameable!’ Well, of course we had to try it, and after picking our positions, I came away with it as my very own!

Blizzard, I beg you, even if this isn’t intentional, let it stay. Bears are one of the many pets we’ve got (not unlike spiders, sporebats, hyenas, crocolisks… the list goes on) that needs a shot in the arm. A new model, like this one, could give this species a needed boost in popularity.

Our trio hasn’t completed its exploration and so we’ll be back tomorrow for a real run at the zone, but additional beasts we’ve located include Amani Elder Lynx (tan lynx, tameable), Amani Lynx Cub (mountain lion, tameable), Amani Dragonhawk (red dragonhawk, untameable), Amani Eagle (new model, cross between owl and… carrion bird maybe, untameable), Amani Crocolisk (dark green crocolisk, tameable), Tamed Amani Crocolisk (light green crocolisk, tameable) and Amani Lynx (tan lynx, tameable).

Oct. 12, 2007

XOXO

I’ll let Kalgan from Blizzard speak for himself:

We’re planning to shrink the min range on ranged attacks to reduce or eliminate the “dead zone”. The only point to the dead zone was to ensure the min range on ranged weapons was enough such that ranged weapon attacks wouldn’t be used while also being melee’d (at least by mobs… players have a bit of slush built in).

Oct. 12, 2007

Never try to save my life again

More items are coming in from the Test realm, slowly but surely. One of the most awaited changes was to see what the new PvP set bonus was going to be for us. Drum roll please… nah, never mind, skip the drum roll:

  • (4) Set: Reduces the cooldown of your Multi-Shot ability by 1 sec.

Oct. 11, 2007

Please don't attack the window treatments

2.3 is on Test realms but man, it’s getting slammed from here and back again, so if you can settle for just the notes, here they are, as they relate to hunters. Yes, Zul’Aman will be in, as will guild banks and experience required to level between 20 to 60 has been reduced:

  • Expertise: We have added a new stat and associated rating called expertise and expertise rating. Expertise rating converts to expertise at the same rate that weapon skill rating formerly converted at. Each point of expertise reduces the chance for your attacks to be dodged or parried by 0.25%.
  • Weapon Skill: All items and abilities that granted weapon skill have been changed. In most cases, they were converted to expertise or expertise rating. Ranged attacks do not benefit from expertise, so ranged weapon skill has generally been replaced by critical strike bonuses or hit bonuses. In a few cases, talents have been changed to other effects to avoid granting players excessive amounts of expertise.
  • Client spell cast requests are now sent to the server even if your player is already casting another spell. This eliminates the need for /stopcasting in macros to compensate for latency.
  • Pets will try to get behind their targets when engaging in melee combat.
  • Dwarf: Gun Specialization now increases chance to critically hit with Guns by 1% rather than increasing weapon skill.
  • Troll: Bow and Thrown Specialization now increases chance to critically hit with those weapons by 1% rather than increasing weapon skill.
  • Arcane Shot (Ranks 6 and above) now dispel 1 Magic effect in addition to their normal damage.
  • Explosive Trap: The initial damage dealt by this trap is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power.
  • Immolation Trap: The total damage dealt by this trap is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power.
  • Misdirection: This spell will now always be removed correctly if multiple Hunters overwrite each other’s Misdirection.
  • Readiness: This talent now finishes the cooldown on Kill Command.
  • Serpent Sting, Immolation Trap and Explosive Trap all gain additional damage based on ranged attack power.
  • Serpent Sting: The total damage dealt by this sting is now also increased by 10% of your ranged attack power.
  • Steady Shot: Tooltip clarified to indicate base weapon damage is used in the damage calculation.
  • Trueshot Aura (Marksmanship) no longer costs mana to cast and will last until canceled.
  • Wyvern Sting (Survival) is now instant cast and has a maximum duration of 10 seconds in PvP.
  • Daily cooking quests are now available from The Rokk in Shattrath City! In addition to gold, you can receive random cooking reagents and new recipes as a reward for completing these quests. (Some Fruit or Fungus recipes would be nice)
  • Duration of wizard and mana oils created by enchanters has been increased.
  • Players can now track fishing nodes. This ability is learned from a journal sometimes found in crates obtained through fishing.
  • New fish can now be caught in Zul’Aman and Deadwind Pass. Recipes for preparing these new fish are obtained through the daily cooking quests.
  • Fishing difficulty reduced for some areas in Nagrand.
  • New recipes are available from Grand Master leatherworking trainers to make 20 slot quivers and ammo pouches.
  • New recipes are available from the Honor Hold, Thrallmar, and Lower City quartermasters to create 24 slot quivers and ammo pouches.
  • All old world dungeons have had their loot revisited. Players will now find that all loot dropped inside instances will be of Superior quality.
  • Black Bow of the Betrayer: The triggered effect from this item will no longer use up charges of Misdirection. In addition, the triggered effect will no longer break crowd control effects.
  • Expose Weakness: The triggered effect from this talent will no longer use up charges of Misdirection.
  • Gladiator’s armor pieces of like nature from various seasons will now all meet the requirements for their shared set bonus. This means if you are using 2 pieces of Season 1 gear and 2 pieces of Season 2 gear of the same design you will now have your 4 piece set bonus.
  • Ogri’la Faction Vendor: This vendor now sells potions usable anywhere for a large number of Apexis Shards.
  • Players that complete the attunement quests for Tempest Keep and Coilfang Resevoir may now choose to display a new title, “'character name’ Champion of the Naaru.”
  • Items with Metagems in them will now display the gems required to activate the metagem and whether those requirements have been met on the item tooltip.
  • Many On Use items now display the cooldown in the item tooltip.
  • Fixed a bug in the pet sheet stamina mouseover tooltip that showed an incorrect health increase value.

If you have any additional notes that I might have missed or things that were changed but didn’t make it into the 'official’ patch notes, do feel free to mail them to me at fritti@tkasomething.com. I expect there to be further updates in the next few days as people get their characters copied over and jump into Zul’Aman (new beasts, perhaps?). Remember, all this stuff is subject to change, it’s not reality until it’s on the live servers, as Kalgan reminded us:

2.3 will be up on the PTR for quite some time. Several classes are likely to get more changes before 2.3 goes live, it’s just a question of which changes (ie: we’re still considering the mortal strike effect for aimed shot for hunters, among other possibilities). Yes, we’d be making several changes to aimed shot in the process if we decided to go with that change.

Also, MMO-Champion is reporting an undocumented new skill for Hunters called 'Disarming Shot’. No further details at this time but the name seems pretty self-explanatory. However, information coming in is saying that it is not found on any of the Hunter trainers as yet and there is speculation that it is either a NPC ability from Zul’Aman (when you mind control mobs to fight a boss there) or is potentially a Tome drop ALA old Tranquilizing Shot.

Oct. 2, 2007

If you have to ask, you can't afford it

Not really new news, since it was discussed at Blizzcon, but the legendary ranged weapon was again confirmed by Bornakk:

We were planning to implement a Legendary ranged weapon soon, while I’m not sure what class restrictions it will have, I kind of doubt many Rogues or Warriors are going to be able to say that they need it or will use it more than Hunters. Just my crazy thoughts though.

The 'were’ part scares me. Makes me think soon isn’t as soon as we hope?

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