2.1.0 Patch Notes

[Mavfin]

I did some testing. Even with a fast 1.6 offhand (Stormreaver Warblades, fairly low damage range), devastate was still adding ~75 damage to each devastate. Constant, no adjustment for sunder, as you said. +75 a pop on a spammable ability is quite a bit, really, and that makes me think it'll go up quite a bit if I get a slower/higher damage range offhand.

(it shows in combat log as two devastates each time you spam it, mh/oh pretty obvious to see)

This was in DPS gear, 1500ish ap w/o bshout. PTR was a bit laggy for me, so I didn't stay on a long time, but I did kill enough mobs to get a feel for it. Feels like a nice boost, but probably won't push prot past fury or anything.

[Concillian]

This was in DPS gear, 1500ish ap w/o bshout. PTR was a bit laggy for me, so I didn't stay on a long time, but I did kill enough mobs to get a feel for it. Feels like a nice boost, but probably won't push prot past fury or anything.

I think if you optimize your DPS gear around devastate (slow weapons in both hands) then it has the potential to be slightly better on boss fights, where there are 5 sunders, but worse with no sunders. Probably close enough that it will be a very good option for OTs who expect to be doing a fair amount of heroics or are usually in a flex role (some tanking / some DPS)

[Taelas]

I think if you optimize your DPS gear around devastate (slow weapons in both hands) then it has the potential to be slightly better on boss fights, where there are 5 sunders, but worse with no sunders. Probably close enough that it will be a very good option for OTs who expect to be doing a fair amount of heroics or are usually in a flex role (some tanking / some DPS)

Not to mention it's a great boost in grinding.

[Quark]

Little-documented change going on with meta gems - base requirements are changing all over the place. At one point most were missing requirements but weren't working. Now a bunch of requirements have changed. Here's the current list according to wowhead:

Bracing Earthstorm Diamond
+26 Healing Spells & 2% Reduced Threat
Requires more Yellow gems than Blue gems
Requires more Red gems than Blue gems

Brutal Earthstorm Diamond
+3 Melee Damage & Chance to Stun Target
Requires at least 2 Red gems
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems
Requires at least 2 Blue gems

Destructive Skyfire Diamond
+14 Spell Crit Rating and 1% Spell Reflect
Requires at least 2 Red gems
Requires at least 2 Blue gems
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems

Enigmatic Skyfire Diamond
+12 Critical Strike Rating & 5% Snare and Root Resist
Requires more Red gems than Yellow gems

Insightful Earthstorm Diamond
+12 Intellect & Chance to restore mana on spellcast
Requires at least 2 Red gems
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems
Requires at least 2 Blue gems

Mystical Skyfire Diamond
5% on spellcast - next spell cast in half time
Requires more Blue gems than Yellow gems

Powerful Earthstorm Diamond
+18 Stamina & 5% Stun Resist
Requires at least 3 Blue gems

Relentless Earthstorm Diamond
+12 Agility & 3% Increased Critical Damage
Requires at least 2 Red gems
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems
Requires at least 2 Blue gems

Swift Skyfire Diamond
+24 Attack Power and Minor Run Speed Increase
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems
Requires at least 1 Red gem

Swift Starfire Diamond
Binds when picked up
Unique
+12 Spell Damage and Minor Run Speed Increase
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems
Requires at least 1 Red gem

Swift Windfire Diamond
Binds when picked up
Unique
+20 Attack Power and Minor Run Speed Increase
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems
Requires at least 1 Red gem

Tenacious Earthstorm Diamond
+12 Defense Rating & Chance to Restore Health on hit
Requires at least 2 Red gems
Requires at least 2 Blue gems
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems

Thundering Skyfire Diamond
Chance to Increase Melee/Ranged Attack Speed
Requires at least 2 Red gems
Requires at least 2 Blue gems
Requires at least 2 Yellow gems

Basically anything that was "# <color>" has decreased.

[Legedi]

From http://www.wowinsider.com/2007/05/01/ptr...for-may-1/ the most recent PTR 2.1 note changes:

* General
o Inspect distance has been increased to 30 yards (from 10 yards).
o The amount of parry rating needed to get 1% parry has been reduced by 25%.
o Many set bonuses did not work properly when combined with an item or enchantment that had the exact same effect at the exact same magnitude. That issue has been corrected on all set bonuses.
* PvP
o The new battleground matchmaking system is now implemented and active. This system allows the battleground to select teams of similar equipment quality and organizational level to battle each other. For now, the system will be very forgiving about creating matchups in order to keep queue times low. However, the parameters will be adjusted as necessary when more organized teams become active in the battlegrounds.

* Druids
o Bestial Wrath: The immunity granted by thtis ability now lasts the full duration of the ability. Bestial Wrath now grants immunity to Cyclone. Cyclone will no longer prevent the immunities from being granted.
o Celestial Focus: The delay on the stun effect for Starfire has been reduced.
* Mages
o Impact: The delay on the stun effect has been reduced.
* Paladins
o Consecration: Corrected a tooltip typo. Low ranks of this ability being cast by high-level players are now being properly penalized.
o "Illumination": This talent now only gives 60% of the mana cost of the critical heal. It also now returns the correct amount of mana when used with ranks 4 and 5 of "Holy Shock". [up from 50%]
* Priests
o Blackout: The delay on the stun effect has been reduced.
o Mass Dispel mana cost reduced.
o "Shadow Word: Death": Cooldown increased to 12 sec and will now properly damage the casting Priest when it is reflected. [the reflection part is new]
o Spiritual Guidance: This talent now works while the Priest is in Shadowform.
* Rogues
o Blade Twisting: The delay on the daze effect has been reduced.
o Gouge: This ability will no longer trigger poisons (and thus break itself).
* Shaman
o Earth Shock: Rank 8 is now properly considered an Interrupt effect for talents and abilities that affect interrupts.
* Warlocks
o Death Coil is now is now subject to diminishing returns in the Horror category. Currently, only Death Coil is in this category.
o Felguard: This pet will periodically check to see if you know the talent which allows you to summon it, and die if you do not know the talent.
o Seed of Corruption: This spell will now interact properly with town guards when bystanders are hit by its detonation in a duel.
* Warriors
o Bloodrage: It is no longer possible to gain extra rage from this ability by using tradeskills to keep you in combat.
o Charge: This ability will now properly cause the warrior to go into combat with its target.
o Flurry: Ranks 1-4 will no longer trigger from ranged critical strikes.
o Improved Hamstring: The delay on the immobilize effect has been reduced.
o Sweeping Strikes: This ability will no longer be modified erroneously on additional targets by percent modifiers to your damage.
* Quest
o Void Crystals maximum stack size has been increased to 20 from 10.
* Dungeons and Raids
o All 25 man raid bosses who drop set tokens will now drop an additional token.
o Coilfang: Serpentshrine Cavern
+ Morogrim Tidewalker has been moved to a more central location in his room.
+ Hydross the Unstable's hit points have been slightly reduced.
Colossus Ragers have had their health reduced significantly.
o Auchindoun: Shadow Labyrinth
+ Reduced the number of creatures in Shadow Labyrinth.
o Karazhan
+ Netherspite will no longer cast Nether Burn while crazed.
o Magtheridon's Lair
+ Hellfire Warders have been significantly reduced in difficulty.
+ Hellfire Channeler's Shadow Bolt Volley has been made much more easy to interrupt.
+ The melee damage of Burning Abyssals has been significantly reduced.
o Tempest Keep
+ High Astromancer Solarian's hit points have been greatly reduced.
o Tempest Keep: The Arcatraz
+ There are fewer Protean Nightmares roaming the halls of the Arcatraz.
* Items
o Alliance Shaman PvP Sets: These sets now have set bonuses as intended.
o "Mystical Skyfire Diamond": The triggering rate on this item has been increased, but it now only reduces the cast time on spells by half; and Warlocks casting "Corruption" with maximum ranks in "Improved Corruption" will no longer consume the "Focus" buff from this gem.

[Bolty]

Basically anything that was "# <color>" has decreased.

True, but:

Bracing Earthstorm Diamond
+26 Healing Spells & 2% Reduced Threat
Requires more Yellow gems than Blue gems
Requires more Red gems than Blue gems

The best healing metagem is still out of reach for most healing Priests without sacrificing enough to make it not worth it to begin with. Meh. This is because healing gear is chock full of Blue slots, with very few red or yellows out there.

I'm currently using a Powerful Earthstorm Diamond, but with these new requirements I'll be able to get an Insightful Earthstorm Diamond. Hmm.

-Bolty

[Lissa]

True, but:

Bracing Earthstorm Diamond
+26 Healing Spells & 2% Reduced Threat
Requires more Yellow gems than Blue gems
Requires more Red gems than Blue gems

The best healing metagem is still out of reach for most healing Priests without sacrificing enough to make it not worth it to begin with. Meh. This is because healing gear is chock full of Blue slots, with very few red or yellows out there.

I'm currently using a Powerful Earthstorm Diamond, but with these new requirements I'll be able to get an Insightful Earthstorm Diamond. Hmm.

-Bolty

Put Green gems and Purple gems in those Blue slots. Green counts as both a Yellow and Blue and Purple counts as both a Red and Blue. If you have a couple extra Yellow or Red sockets, either put Orange gems in there (for Yellow and Red) or straight colored gems. It should be doable, especially given Royal and Dazzling are better than the straight Blue gems (tons of MP5 that way).

[Quark]

I'm currently using a Powerful Earthstorm Diamond, but with these new requirements I'll be able to get an Insightful Earthstorm Diamond. Hmm.

As an fyi, that's 2% chance of 300 mana per cast. In a longterm scenario that'd work out to -6 mana per spell.

[Bolty]

As an fyi, that's 2% chance of 300 mana per cast. In a longterm scenario that'd work out to -6 mana per spell.

Right right, that's why I'm "hmm"ing. It benefits Paladins more than Priests, since Paladins are more about spam healing while a Priest's healing style is to try to cast heals as little as possible to maximize spirit regen.

A 2% proc means that it will likely fire twice per raid encounter.

-Bolty

[Kevin]

Right right, that's why I'm "hmm"ing. It benefits Paladins more than Priests, since Paladins are more about spam healing while a Priest's healing style is to try to cast heals as little as possible to maximize spirit regen.

A 2% proc means that it will likely fire twice per raid encounter.

-Bolty

You'd probably be better of putting spellsurge on the weapon and trying to make up the 81 healing somewhere else I think. It's only a 3% chance so only 1% better and it's only 100 mana instead of 300, but it's for the whole party. Since the priest is likely in with other spell casters you've given the raid a lot more mana that way.

I've debated doing 2x spellsurge for a enh shammy when they are in a healing role that they will end up in at times. Getting an off hand with more than about 20 healing is not easy though and giving up the shield in healing gear is tough in some situation as well, not to mention you are usually in with melee folks anyway. But the higher proc chance on it could be fun. I know it's still great on a resto shammy as all those totem casts can proc it. Water shield and earth shield can proc it. And shammies are a bit spammier than priests for the healing, though not much.

[Bolty]

You'd probably be better of putting spellsurge on the weapon and trying to make up the 81 healing somewhere else I think.

Two things, GG:

1) Rumor has it Spellsurge might be nerfed on PTR 2.1, giving it a smaller procrate. Since such things are difficult to test, it's hard to determine truth. It's known as fact that the tooltip on the enchant that says 3% is wrong on live servers - it's more like 15% - but apparently that might be getting nerfed.

2) Spellsurge has a 30-second built-in proc cooldown. If that's a 30-second cooldown per weapon, then yeah that would be nice on a dual-wielding Shaman. The 30-second cooldown is why it's hard to figure out its actual procrate, btw.

Spellsurge is a pure raid enchant. +81 healing helps in raiding and 5-mans and PvP. In heroics, mana is almost never the issue - healing output is. So...I agree that they're about equal in quality, but I'm not going to be rushing to overwrite my +81 heal enchant with it anytime soon.

-Bolty

[Flymo]

Until the latest PTR patch you could drop Primal Mooncloth Tailoring but still benefit from the Primal Mooncloth set (provided you didn't take it off; you couldn't re-equip it). Now the set items show as red and you don't get any of their attributes.

[Artega]

You could always just put red or yellow gems in slots regardless of colors. I see most tanks doing that with stamina gems after they reach the defense softcap and their target avoidance ratings.

[Kevin]

Two things, GG:

1) Rumor has it Spellsurge might be nerfed on PTR 2.1, giving it a smaller procrate. Since such things are difficult to test, it's hard to determine truth. It's known as fact that the tooltip on the enchant that says 3% is wrong on live servers - it's more like 15% - but apparently that might be getting nerfed.

2) Spellsurge has a 30-second built-in proc cooldown. If that's a 30-second cooldown per weapon, then yeah that would be nice on a dual-wielding Shaman. The 30-second cooldown is why it's hard to figure out its actual procrate, btw.

Spellsurge is a pure raid enchant. +81 healing helps in raiding and 5-mans and PvP. In heroics, mana is almost never the issue - healing output is. So...I agree that they're about equal in quality, but I'm not going to be rushing to overwrite my +81 heal enchant with it anytime soon.

-Bolty

Right I was talking for raiding and was only considering it comparison to the meta gem.

I also agree that the options for the meta's with the socket colors and what is itemized aren't that great, at least if the socket bonus matters at all to you I don't know if they do on healer gear, on some hunter gear they are decent on some they are pointless. So I don't know how viable just putting what you want in and ignoring the color is for healers.

Even with that for a priest I wasn't sure if spellsurge is better than +81 healing for raiding either.

And even with the 30s lock out (which isn't as bad as it might sound since it's 100 over 10s so without the lockout you could overwrite a current proc like warriors do with deep wounds all the time). 2 weapons would still up the chance of proc just not as much as it seems.

Battlemaster is another one that looks like it would be nice on a DW shaman, though they have aggro issues as is. Since that shaman is generally just an unleashed rage and totem buffer for a melee DPS group and they won't be putting out as much DPS as anyone they are grouped with, sacrificing a little more DPS for a bit more group healing can help. Battlemaster has the proc limit as well from what I understand but you still get benefit from a double enchant.

[VinnieJones]

Ruh roh, no real shaman changes. Doesn't bode well.

[Mirajj]

Ruh roh, no real shaman changes. Doesn't bode well.

And no hunter additions/issue addresses either. =/

[Tuftears]

EJ rumor has it that the proc cooldown on Spellsurge is being increased to 60 seconds as well.

[NiteFox]

And no hunter additions/issue addresses either. =/

Closest thing we get is the Mend Pet change, which, frankly, should've been a HoT practically from the start.

[Kevin]

Closest thing we get is the Mend Pet change, which, frankly, should've been a HoT practically from the start.

And hunters mark will add 440 more ranged AP after about 15 seconds with 3 hunters around. Even if I'm the only hunter I'll get that 440 bonus (11 per ranged hit) in That's only about 30 DPS right there. Pets will only take 50% damage from AoE effects + all the 360 degree cleaves are gone, so pet longevity goes way up. Kill command not being on the global cooldown doesn't really matter in a mana limited fight, but on fights (like everything before the Curator in Kara and every 5 man) that is another DPS boost for all hunters since you can fire it off without messing with a steady, arcane, or multi. For a beast hunter it already better damage per mana than other skills. My last Kara run I was getting 5.21 damage per mana on steady, 3.03 on multi shot, 2.56 on arcane, and 2.21 on serpent sting (small sample size on that on 64 ticks the whole night as I was mostly keeping up scorpid) . Kill Command was 5.564. Again I'm a beast hunter so Kill Command will hit hard and have a higher crit rate I also don't have efficiency (went 12 deep in survival for EZ-mode trapping, 26s traps, 26s cooldown with 2 pc beast lord set for heroics and all the trapping I do in Kara as well) which ups the damage per mana of all the other shots. That talent would have pushed steady (should have pushed it to 5.73) ahead of kill command for me but not the other shots. Of course I was in a group with all casters to give them the ferocious buff. Had the pet had a battle shout or strength of earth totem, Kill Command would have been pushed up to around 6-7 damage per mana (depends on if I had both SoE and BS or just one of them).

I'm not sure what the mana efficiency for it on marks or survival hunter will be, my guess is that kill command will still be better mana to damage than arcane on most mobs, depending on talents, multi for a Marks should be much more efficient than it is for me as mortal shots, barrage, ranged spec, and master marksman will up the damage to mana ratio of those skills. But when mana management is a concern paying attention to the mana efficiency of all your skills is something that hunters should do.

The change to expose weakness being a 100% chance for 3 points I don't really count as a hunter buff since that is a raid buff. Same with the kill command being able to proc ferocious inspiration (which is about a 15% uptime increase for that skill if the hunter has 20% and Focused Fire to up the crit rate on kill command for me it should go from about 65% uptime to about an 80% uptime) that is a bigger buff to the party than the beast hunter is in, than it is a buff to the hunter themselves.

I still think most of the hunter issues are still in itemization and I would like to see more done with that. But I'm still pretty excited about the other changes that were announced and implemented before.

[Lissa]

For a Survival Hunter that goes down to Tier 7, ToTH helps a lot when it comes to mana longevity as most Survival Hunters are going to have 650+ Agi with just the end game blues and a smattering of purples from Kara. Throw in the chain to EW and if you look at a 25 man raid, that's some significant DPS increase for all physical damage as the loss of the 360 cleaves means more Rogues, DPS Warriors, and Cats in there mixing it up. Figure if you have 9 total physical DPS combined (tank, Rogues, Hunters, Cats) and 650+ Agi with near continuous EW from a single Hunter now (you should be able to put 6 or 7 shots down range every 7 seconds easily enough) means 150+ AP which is almost 10 DPS per physical DPSer.

To me I'm happy with the changes I've seen in Survival, I'm more than willing to give up long trap times in order to have a couple talents that increases my overall raid synergy. While I may not top the damage meters, I will certainly help the physical DPSers do so.