Patch 5.2 PTR - Build 16618
New build #16618 will be deployed to the PTR realms soon. Don't miss GC's Patch Notes below!
Achievement Changes
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
Dungeons & Raids
- Glory of the Thundering Raider now rewards an Armored Skyscreamer.
Spell Changes
Originally Posted by MMO-Champion
Item Set Bonuses
- Item - Paladin PvP Set Retribution 2P Bonus Your Crusader Strike now also grants you 800 1,000 increased PvP power for 6 sec.
- Item - Priest T14 Healer 4P Bonus Reduces the cooldown of your Penance spell by 4 3 sec and reduces the cooldown of your Circle of Healing spell by 4 sec.
- Blood Plague A disease dealing [ 172 + 13.8% [ 223 + 17.9% of AP ] Shadow damage every 3 sec for 30 sec. Caused by Plague Strike and other abilities. Passive.
- Frost Fever A disease dealing [ 143 + 13.8% [ 187 + 17.9% of AP ] Frost damage every 3 sec for 30 sec. Caused by Icy Touch and other spells. Passive.
Frost
- Howling Blast Blast the target with a frigid wind, dealing [ 467 [ 575 + 68.1% of AP ] Frost damage to that foe, and [ 234 [ 288 + 34.1% of AP ] Frost damage to all other enemies within 10 yards, infecting all targets with Frost Fever. Death Knight - Frost Spec. 1 Frost. 30 yd range. Instant.
- Icy Talons Your melee attack speed is increased by 20%. Death Knight - Frost Spec. 30%. Death Knight - Frost Spec.
- Might of the Frozen Wastes When wielding a two-handed weapon, your Obliterate deals 40% more damage, and all melee attacks deal an additional 10% 20% damage. Requires Two-Handed Axes, Two-Handed Maces, Polearms, Two-Handed Swords. Death Knight - Frost Spec.
Unholy
- Scourge Strike An unholy strike that deals 130% 140% of weapon damage as Physical damage plus 764 886. In addition, for each of your diseases on your target, you deal an additional 25% of the Physical damage done as Shadow damage. Requires Melee Weapon. Death Knight - Unholy Spec. 1 Unholy. Melee range. Instant.
- Steady Shot A steady shot that causes 50% weapon damage plus 997 60% weapon damage plus 1,436. Generates 14 Focus. Useable while moving. Requires Ranged Weapon. 40 yd range. 2 sec cast.
Marksmanship
- Aimed Shot A powerful aimed shot that deals 320% ranged weapon damage plus 7,974 350% ranged weapon damage plus 9,597. Requires Ranged Weapon. Hunter - Marksmanship Spec. 50 Focus. 40 yd range. 2.5 sec cast.
- Chimera Shot An instant shot that causes 210% 315% ranged weapon Nature damage plus 2,617 5,887, refreshing the duration of your Serpent Sting and healing you for 3% 5% of your total health. Applies the Hunter's Mark effect. Requires Ranged Weapon. Hunter - Marksmanship Spec. 45 Focus. 40 yd range. 9 sec cooldown.
Survival
- Black Arrow Fires a Black Arrow at the target, dealing [ 1,430 + 11.5% [ 1,650 + 13.2% of AP ] damage over 20 sec. Black Arrow shares a cooldown with other Fire Trap spells. Requires Ranged Weapon. Hunter - Survival Spec. 35 Focus. 40 yd range. Instant. 30 sec cooldown.
- Explosive Shot You fire an explosive charge into the enemy target, dealing [ 349 + 28% [ 402 + 32.2% of RAP ] Fire damage initially and every second for 2 sec and applying the Hunter's Mark effect. Requires Ranged Weapon. Hunter - Survival Spec. 25 Focus. 40 yd range. 6 sec cooldown.
- Arcane Missiles Launches five waves of Arcane Missiles at the enemy over 2 sec, causing [ 231 + 22.2% [ 227 + 21.8% of Spell Power ] Arcane damage per wave. Generates an Arcane Charge. Arcane Missiles' damage is increased by 50% per Arcane Charge. Arcane Missiles has a chance to be activated after each of your damaging spell casts. Limit 2 charges. 60 yd range. Instant.
Arcane
- Arcane Barrage Launches bolts of arcane energy at the enemy target, causing [ 1,072 + 103% of Spell Power 1,041;] Arcane damage. Consumes all Arcane Charges. Arcane Barrage's damage is increased by 50% per Arcane Charge, and it hits 1 additional nearby targets per Arcane Charge for 50% damage. Mage - Arcane Spec. 0.5% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. Instant. 3 sec cooldown.
- Arcane Blast Blasts the target with energy, dealing [ 808 + 77.7% [ 785 + 75.7% of Spell Power ] Arcane damage. Generates an Arcane Charge. Arcane Blast's damage is increased by 50% per Arcane Charge, and its mana cost is increased by 150% per Arcane Charge. Mage - Arcane Spec. 1.666667% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. 2 sec cast.
- Arcane Missiles Launches five waves of Arcane Missiles at the enemy over 2 sec, causing [ 231 + 22.2% [ 227 + 21.8% of Spell Power ] Arcane damage per wave. Generates an Arcane Charge. Arcane Missiles' damage is increased by 50% per Arcane Charge. Arcane Missiles has a chance to be activated after each of your damaging spell casts. Limit 2 charges. Mage - Arcane Spec. 40 yd range. 2 sec cast (Channeled).
Mistweaver
- Muscle Memory When you successfully Jab or damage at least 3 enemies with Spinning Crane Kick, you gain Muscle Memory, causing your next Tiger Palm or Blackout Kick to deal 150% increased damage and restore 2% mana. Monk - Mistweaver Spec. 4% mana. Monk - Mistweaver Spec.
- Penance Launches a volley of holy light at the target, causing [ 1,200 + 124.4% of Spell Power ] Holy damage to an enemy, or [ 7,926 + 76.2% of Spell Power ] healing to an ally instantly and every 1 sec for 2 sec. 30 yd range. Instant. 40 yd range. Instant.
Talents
- Power Infusion Infuses the Priest with power, increasing spell casting speed by 20%, all damage by 10% 5%, and reducing the mana cost of all spells by 20%. Lasts 20 sec. Priest - LvL 75 Talent. Instant. 2 min cooldown.
Discipline
- Penance Launches a volley of holy light at the target, causing [ 1,200 + 124.4% of Spell Power ] Holy damage to an enemy, or [ 7,926 + 76.2% of Spell Power ] healing to an ally instantly and every 1 sec for 2 sec. Priest - Discipline Spec. 3.1% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. Instant (Channeled). 10 sec cooldown. 9 sec cooldown.
Shadow
- Mind Blast Blasts the target for [ 3,322 + 229.1% [ 2,768 + 190.9% of Spell Power ] Shadow damage and generates 1 Shadow Orbs. Can be cast in Shadowform. Priest - Shadow Spec. 3% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. 1.5 sec cast. 8 sec cooldown.
- Shadowform Assume a Shadowform, increasing your Shadow damage by 20% 25%, reducing all damage done to you by 15%, and increasing all party and raid members spell haste by 5%. However, you may not cast Holy spells while in this form. Priest - Shadow Spec. 2.6% of Base Mana. Instant.
Assassination
- Dispatch A vicious strike that exploits the vulnerability of foes with less than 35% health remaining, causing 400% weapon damage plus 1,944 460% weapon damage plus 2,576 to the target. Requires a dagger in the main hand. Awards 1 combo points. Replaces Sinister Strike. Requires Daggers. Rogue - Assassination Spec. 30 Energy. Melee range. Instant.
- Envenom Finishing move that deals instant Nature damage proportional to the number of combo points on the target. Following the Envenom attack, your poison application chance is increased by 15%, for 1 sec plus an additional 1 sec per combo point. 1 point : [ 11.2% of AP + 400 480 ;] damage 2 points: [ 22.4% of AP + 800 960 ;] damage 3 points: [ 33.6% of AP + 1,200 1,440 ;] damage 4 points: [ 44.8% of AP + 1,600 1,920 ;] damage 5 points: [ 56% of AP + 2,000 2,400 ;] damage Replaces Eviscerate. Requires One-Handed Melee Weapon. Rogue - Assassination Spec. 35 Energy. Melee range. Instant.
Combat
- Vitality Increases your Energy regeneration rate by 20% and your Attack Power by 30%. Rogue - Combat Spec. 35%. Rogue - Combat Spec.
Elemental
- Elemental Focus When you land a non-periodic critical strike with a Fire, Frost, or Nature damage spell, you enter a Clearcasting state. The Clearcasting state reduces the mana cost of your next 2 damage or healing spells by 25%, increases spell damage done by 10% 15%, and increases single-target healing done by 50%. Shaman - Elemental Spec.
- Shamanism Increases the damage of Lightning Bolt by 50% 70% and Chain Lightning by 70%, reduces the casting time of both spells by 0.5 sec, and removes the cooldown from Chain Lightning. Shaman - Elemental Spec.
- Shadow Bolt (Affliction, Destruction) Sends a shadowy bolt at the enemy, causing [ 1,282 + 120% [ 1,474 + 138% of Spell Power ] Shadow damage.
- Shadow Bolt (Demonology) Sends a shadowy bolt at the enemy, causing [ 1,282 + 120% [ 1,474 + 138% of Spell Power ] Shadow damage.
Demonology
- Hand of Gul'dan Summons a falling meteor to strike the target and all enemies within 6 yards for [ 534 + 50% [ 614 + 57.5% of Spell Power ] Shadow damage and inflicting them with Shadowflame. Shadowflame Reduces movement speed by 30% and deals [ 876 + 13.7% of Spell Power ] Shadowflame damage over 6 sec. Generates 2 Demonic Fury every time it deals damage. Warlock - Demonology Spec. 5% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. Instant.
- Metamorphosis: Touch of Chaos While using Metamorphosis, your Shadow Bolt spell transforms into Touch of Chaos. Unleashes energy at the enemy, causing [ 712 + 66.6% [ 819 + 76.7% of Spell Power ] Chaos damage and extending the duration of Corruption. Warlock - Demonology Spec.
- Soul Fire (Affliction, Destruction) Burn the enemy's soul, causing [ 748 + 70% [ 912 + 85.4% of Spell Power ] Fire damage.
- Soul Fire (Demonology) Burn the enemy's soul, causing [ 748 + 70% [ 912 + 85.4% of Spell Power ] Fire damage.
Destruction
- Conflagrate Target enemy instantly explodes, dealing [ 1,602 + 150% [ 1,923 + 180% of Spell Power ] Fire damage. If the target is afflicted by Immolate, their movement speed is reduced by 50% for 5 sec. Generates Burning Embers. Critical strikes double this effect. Warlock - Destruction Spec. 1% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. Instant.
- Immolate (Affliction, Demonology) Burns the enemy for [ 396 + 37.1% [ 475 + 44.5% of Spell Power ] Fire damage and then an additional [ 1,980 + 37.1% [ 2,375 + 44.5% of Spell Power ] Fire damage over 15 sec.
- Immolate (Destruction) Burns the enemy for [ 396 + 37.1% [ 475 + 44.5% of Spell Power ] Fire damage and then an additional [ 1,980 + 37.1% [ 2,375 + 44.5% of Spell Power ] Fire damage over 15 sec.
- Incinerate (Affliction, Demonology) Deals [ 1,496 + 140% Deals [ 1,645 + 154% of Spell Power ] Fire damage to an enemy.
- Incinerate (Destruction) Deals [ 1,496 + 140% Deals [ 1,645 + 154% of Spell Power ] Fire damage to an enemy.
Arms & Fury
- Colossus Smash Smashes a target for 175% weapon damage plus 388 3,882 and weakens their defenses, allowing your attacks to bypass 100% of their armor for 6 sec, and causes the Physical Vulnerability effect on the target. Bypasses less armor on players. Physical Vulnerability Weakens the constitution of an enemy target, increasing their physical damage taken by 4% for 30 sec. Requires Melee Weapon. Warrior - Arms & Fury Spec. Melee range. Instant. 20 sec cooldown.
Raid & Dungeon Abilities
- Cosmic Strike Strikes an enemy, dealing 200,000 150,000 Arcane damage to alll enemies within 8 yards, knocking them back. 300 yd range. Instant.
- Disorienting Roar Horridon emits a powerful roar, inflicting 250,000 Physical damage and disorienting all enemies for 2 sec. 2 sec cast. to all enemies and empowering allies, increasing melee attack speed by 50%. 2 sec cast.
- Harsh Light The caster's light beam burns so intensely that it inflicts Fire damage to all victims caught in its path. This damage is shared amongst the targets with targets further away recieving more damage unless enough targets closer to the caster obscure the light from hitting them 100 yd range. Instant. receiving more damage. 100 yd range. Instant.
- Putrify Inflicts 10,000 Inflicts 8,000 k damage every 1 second. This effect stacks. 100 yd range. Instant.
- Quills (New) Inflicts 100,000 Physical damage to all enemies within 500 yards. 500 yd range. Instant.
- Thundering Throw Jin'rokh the Breaker throws his current target at a distant Mogu statue, breaking the statue and inflicting 0 Physical damage. Additionally inflicts 200,000 Nature damage to other players within 14 yards of the point of impact, stunning them for 6 sec. Unlimited range. Instant. 5 sec. Unlimited range. Instant.
- Thundering Throw Jin'rokh the Breaker throws his current target at a distant Mogu statue, breaking the statue and inflicting 0 Physical damage. Additionally inflicts 200,000 Nature damage to other players within 14 yards of the point of impact, stunning them for 6 sec. Unlimited range. Instant. 5 sec. Unlimited range. Instant.
PTR Class and Set Bonus Issues
Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)
- Spirit Walk – cooldown reduced from 2 min to 1 min.
- Penance – cooldown reduced from 10 sec to 9 sec.
Tier 14 4pc – cooldown on Penance reduced from by 3 sec instead of 4 sec. (In essence, this nerfs T14 and buffs Penance while keeping the same end result.) - Power Infusion – we are lowering the +10% damage buff to +5%. Our goal here was noble to make Power Infusion more attractive to Shadow, but we’re worried about making the talent too powerful in PvP. Many PvP players had concerns about the buffed version of Power Infusion.
- Recklessness – We are going to lower Recklessness to 3 min cooldown, 30% crit (down from 5 min, 50%). We will have to adjust the Glyph of Recklessness and T14 4pc (and probably other mechanics I forgot) to keep them at the same relative power. We’re trying to move away from very long cooldowns, especially those without a lot of visual noise (e.g. a 1 min Army of the Dead would be pretty annoying to see, but Recklessness is pretty chill). It would let Recklessness line up better with Skull Banner (and maybe we would eventually just merge the two buttons), and have the added bonus of reducing warrior burst in PvP while still giving them more frequent use of the CD to avoid that all eggs in one basket feeling.
- We are going to go ahead and grandfather in the bug of Shadowburn granting 2 embers on a kill. It is technically a bug, which is why we fixed it, but it's been that way since MoP launched and we don't think it's causing huge balance problems, so in cases like this, we think the right thing to do is just make it official.
- While we like mages hard casting spells more often in PvP, we agree with the consensus that we overdid the buff to Frostbolt. We are going to revert one of the earlier changes and have it once again increase its damage by its own debuff. Base damage has been reduced to compensate, but should not change for the fully stacked case.
Old patch note: Frostbolt deals 52% more damage, but its debuff no longer increases subsequent Frostbolt damage.
New patch note: Frostbolt now deals 32% more damage.
DPS Tuning
- Warrior – we reverted the nerfs to Bloodthirst, Colossus Smash and Raging Blow. We planned on taking the damage out of Execute instead, but before we do that, we’re concerned that the actual problem is the legendary meta-gem being too good for warriors, and we don’t think it’s fair to nerf all warriors because of an item that nobody will have for some time. We may nerf the metagem for warriors instead.
- Priest – we also reverted the 20% buff to Mind Blast. This buff had also become a big PvP damage burst concern. It has a pretty small effect on PvE damage overall, but we will buff something if needed. The buff to Shadowform remains.
- Monk – In efforts to further discourage Jab, Jab, Uplift, we increased the mana cost of Jab from 6% to 8%, increased the mana restore on Muscle Memory from 2% to 4%, and increased the mana cost of glyphed Uplift to 16% mana. So that monks feel like they can be less reliant on Jab, Jab, Uplift, we also changed Soothing Mist to generate chi more consistently (to avoid long stretches of bad luck) and increased its generation rate overall.
- Death Knight – We reduced the health of Bloodworms to 15% (from 18%) and reduced the health healed to 25% from 30%. Our earlier buffs were too generous (and they are still significantly buffed from 5.1).
GC said it's a bug. I noticed that it also has not been fixed (um, GC, can you guys pls fix??).
We thought we did fix it. Any more information? It costs 1 ember, but if it kills the target or the target dies within 5 sec, it restores 1 ember, for a net costs of 0. If it ever restored 2 embers on a kill, that was a bug and probably got fixed.
Quick follow-up though: Is the ICD [on Rune of Re-Origination] still 22 seconds with the "new" version?
Yes. We considered lowering that to match, but held off on that for now.
It has been shown quite conclusively that a Monk using 2 one handers will out dps an equal skilled, equal geared 2h monk by about 2-3%.
It's much more helpful to show us that evidence (or link it) than to state that it exists, unless it's just up in the thread somewhere and we missed it. In any case, we're not seeing it at all. DW has an additional enchant and gem, but 2H has slightly more stats and more procs.
Capactive Meta-gem
Proc now uses ranged crit/hit chances for Hunters.
I feel like fury could use some nerfs (especially SMF).
We're not seeing this in 5.2. Any more information?
Either way, the point remains that Supremacy is highly inferior in most situations. This is because your mastery (extremely powerful for affliction and destruction) does your pet no benefit. Additionally, your haste does not scale the fel energy gain of the minion. This leaves your pets scaling tied directly to critical strike and spell power, unless using a pet with melee attacks (which then gets marginal haste benefit).
We think this is a legitimate criticism. We think it's only a problem at very high gear levels, but once players see the highest DPS players choosing Sacrifice, it's going to be conventional wisdom that you just have to take that talent... which we really don't want. If anything, this talent should be rare. As I've said before, the common warlock should be one with a demon. Short of having Supremacy and Service somehow give Affliction and Destruction Demo's mastery or just nerfing Sacrifice to the point where it's really only for players who hate pet bars (even at a DPS loss), we don't have a great solution yet.
If this is even remotely true then blizzard has done a horrible job. This is the first time I've read or heard the sentence "middle of the pack" regarding mages and warlocks.
I think you might be misinterpreting my comment. Perhaps it was vague. What I meant was that if you are a player wondering if your DPS is low, compare it to someone in the middle. Players almost always compare themselves to the guy at very top of the stack rank, but that dude is often overpowered and it's rarely our goal to buff everyone else up to that line. More than likely, he'll be getting a nerf.
Is removal of the T11 Protection tier gimmic going to be addressed before 5.2 hits so don't have to keep it for a 45 sec guardian prepull as retribution?
We addressed it in 5.2. When you remove the set bonuses, the buff is also cancelled.
Mage frostbolts are doing crazy damage on the PTR on full resilience targets. Something along the lines of 200k damage crits with CDs.
We did shift some damage to Frostbolt, but overall it's a good thing for the game for mages to hard cast. They have to stand still and you can cause a Frost lock.
I'm still confused. In 5.1 I never felt my DPS, or rather DK frost DPS in general was bad, or even close to bad. Where are all these buffs coming from, is there going to be some kind of counterweight in 5.2 yet to be announced?
It's a lot of things. Overall, we are balancing for 5.2. That's a different environment. Nearly everyone will quickly get better gear with more secondary stats. While everyone scales to some extent with those stats (and as much as I like to tweak the community about its seeming obsession with scaling) the fact still remains that those numbers do affect damage. Set bonuses will change. There are new trinkets and meta-gems. Not everyone will get all of those items, but we still have to take into consideration with our tuning that many will. We have to look at the new bosses. While we like there to be some variation from boss to boss depending on encounter mechanics, we also understand human nature well enough to expect that players will quickly start worrying only about their performance in the new raid and stop worrying about how well they did on the previous one. For DKs specifically, also recall that we also nerfed the current T14 2pc because it ended up so good that there was a risk DKs wouldn't feel like they could upgrade to the T15 gear.
im not saying revert the dk buffs, they are fine...but by that same logic, where are the ret sustained buffs to keep us competitive? we are already pretty far behind frost as it is.
Unless you can demonstrate to us that Ret is behind Frost in 5.2, we can't do much with comments like this.
We think Ret and Frost are where they should be in 5.1 with the exception that Frost pulls ahead too much in certain cleave and AE situations.
More...