1.6 Leaked Patch Notes

[lemekim]

Don't Shaman have a totem that helps prevent folks from running?
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Grounding totem does not work on AOE effects, and is in general useless in its current state in larger PvE. There is a tremor totem, but the time between pulses was changed in this patch to 4 seconds within 20 yards or so. 4 seconds of a boss mob running around is not a good thing by any means. Not to mention that every time the tank gets feared, he loses a bit of aggro, so not getting feared in the first place is a huge plus. So in short, no, there really isn't anything nearly as good on the horde side, at least for PvE.

[Skandranon]

One of the things that intrigues me most is what I pointed out to mjdoom earlier on TS. The Bloodthirst talent redesign creates a powerful warrior DPS addition which is utterly indifferent to your weapon speed. My baby warrior is almost certainly going to spec heavily into Fury to try this one out.

[Quark]

One of the things that intrigues me most is what I pointed out to mjdoom earlier on TS.  The Bloodthirst talent redesign creates a powerful warrior DPS addition which is utterly indifferent to your weapon speed.  My baby warrior is almost certainly going to spec heavily into Fury to try this one out.
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:o Good point! Blizzard finally created something that doesn't screw over fast weapons!

[LochnarITB]

My immediate reactions - "Ouch!" and "Why not?"

Ouch! - Lochnar, as a frost mage, is going to have to figure out how much this hurts him. He is going to be shocked the first time he tosses a snowball and the monster comes running full tilt. I couldn't even tell you what monsters will be immune to the slow effect of chill.

Why not? - No new alchemy recipes? Hmmph!

[Quark]

Why not? - No new alchemy recipes?  Hmmph!
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As far as I know, the people listed already have Alchemy recipes. That's gotta factor into it.

[Lissa]

See, it's funny. I think the dwarves racial ability is pretty f'ing powerful.  As a priest, it pisses me off that I'll get trumped very time by a dwarf that can lose a poison effect.  WotF didn't bother me as much.
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To an alliance Warlock, Will of the Forsaken is an "I Win" button, especially to a Rogue. With no escape ability and Fear being the only potential escape ability that the Alliance Warlock had, an Undead Rogue that caught an Alliance Warlock unprepared, even a Link 'Lock, would win 95% of the time.

[Skandranon]

To an alliance Warlock, Will of the Forsaken is an "I Win" button, especially to a Rogue.  With no escape ability and Fear being the only potential escape ability that the Alliance Warlock had, an Undead Rogue that caught an Alliance Warlock unprepared, even a Link 'Lock, would win 95% of the time.
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To priests, too. Will away the first Psychic Scream and there's thirty whole seconds for a rogue to slice up a soft squishy priest. All the healing in the world can't stop a dagger rogue from carving up a caster into many bloody bits.

[LochnarITB]

As far as I know, the people listed already have Alchemy recipes.  That's gotta factor into it.
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To the best of my knowledge, timbermaw and argent dawn each have one transmute recipe (singular) and lokhtos has none (although there is a limited quantity recipe for sale to anyone at the bar). Lokhtos already has multiple recipes for the other professions and they are adding recipes (plural) to him and to argent dawn and timbermaw. Alchemists are being short changed.

Of course, this complaint is based on the assumption that the recipes are worthwhile. I would certainly prefer to get no recipes (which would mean no need to grind faction) than to grind faction to get to recipes that are pointless.

[nobbie]

To an alliance Warlock, Will of the Forsaken is an "I Win" button, especially to a Rogue.  With no escape ability and Fear being the only potential escape ability that the Alliance Warlock had, an Undead Rogue that caught an Alliance Warlock unprepared, even a Link 'Lock, would win 95% of the time.
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Come on, WotF is a some seconds potection vs. minutes of cooldown. There's still lots of time for a Human or Gnome Warlock to survive and win.

[Skandranon]

Come on, WotF is a some seconds potection vs. minutes of cooldown. There's still lots of time for a Human or Gnome Warlock to survive and win.
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It was twenty seconds of protection, and an undead rogue can destroy any caster in eleven. The minutes of cooldown are rather irrelevant.

[nobbie]

It was twenty seconds of protection, and an undead rogue can destroy any caster in eleven.  The minutes of cooldown are rather irrelevant.
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Assuming the rather rare (and fair) 1 vs. 1 situation on the PvP battle field, but: Especially (Alliance) Mages are usually assisted and protected by 1 or 2 additonal players, i.e. a Tank, Healer and/or Hunter. And on PvP servers, where the number of Alliance players is often twice, or more, as high as that of Horde players, you can expect 3-4 assistants per Mage. And now tell me that crippling WotF on the HORDE side wasn't a severe blow against the Horde players! Considering the fact that the player ratio Alliance vs. Horde is overall about 2:1 on all WOW servers, WotF's spell duration should actually have been increased to 30 seconds to compensate this imbalance in PvP! What I also don't get is the fact why Blizzard crippled WotF to 5 seconds duration in both PvP and PvE. Programming-wise, it should have been easily possible - depending on the player mode - to leave the old duration for PvE, and limit it only in PvP (if that was necessary at all). No, this unfair change was obviously the result of the whining of thousands of Alliance players who saw that they can't simply trample down the Horde (and rake in "honor" points) fast enough on battlefields with a higher amount of Undead players among the opposing faction. And as far as Blizzard goes, these folks obvioulsy prefer Alliance players (the majority of the paying customers), and moreover have obviously absolutely no clue of the realities on the public WOW realms.

[Arnulf]

And as far as Blizzard goes, these folks obvioulsy prefer Alliance players (the majority of the paying customers), and moreover have obviously absolutely no clue of the realities on the public WOW realms.
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Careful! First off, I doubt that these "leaked patch notes" are the real thing. So Will of the Forsaken is not on the table. Or highly improbable.

Second, I've heard that 2:1 Alliance vs. Horde argument much too often. I do not think it's true either. And even if it were true it does not make any difference depending on how the active server population is. There may be a 2:1 ratio of registered player characters (more alts on the Alliance side for example) on a particular server. But if the Horde is much more active than the lazy Alliance bastards, then the real ratio could be very much 2:1 for the Horde.

Having said that, balancing a game of this scope is pretty much an impossible task. For the same reasons balancing D2 was pretty much impossible: Too many variables.

Let's assume just for a moment that WOW is purely balanced. You wouldn't see a difference to the current situation because people would need to figure out every counter to every advantage there was. With a purely balanced WOW you would still hear cries for nerfing/buffing certain skills because they were perceived as imbalanced.

-Arnulf

PS: You want to counter fear effectively? Mithril Insignia Become an armour blacksmith! ;)

[Darian]

Careful! First off, I doubt that these "leaked patch notes" are the real thing.
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I dunno why anyone would doubt they're real; they've been leaked the last three patches, and each time they've been completely accurate.

[Tal]

Assuming the rather rare (and fair) 1 vs. 1 situation on the PvP battle field, but: Especially (Alliance) Mages are usually assisted and protected by 1 or 2 additonal players, i.e. a Tank, Healer and/or Hunter. And on PvP servers, where the number of Alliance players is often twice, or more, as high as that of Horde players, you can expect 3-4 assistants per Mage. And now tell me that crippling WotF on the HORDE side wasn't a severe blow against the Horde players! Considering the fact that the player ratio Alliance vs. Horde is overall about 2:1 on all WOW servers, WotF's spell duration should actually have been increased to 30 seconds to compensate this imbalance in PvP! What I also don't get is the fact why Blizzard crippled WotF to 5 seconds duration in both PvP and PvE. Programming-wise, it should have been easily possible - depending on the player mode - to leave the old duration for PvE, and limit it only in PvP (if that was necessary at all). No, this unfair change was obviously the result of the whining of thousands of Alliance players who saw that they can't simply trample down the Horde (and rake in "honor" points) fast enough on battlefields with a higher amount of Undead players among the opposing faction. And as far as Blizzard goes, these folks obvioulsy prefer Alliance players (the majority of the paying customers), and moreover have obviously absolutely no clue of the realities on the public WOW realms.
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Can we can the rhetoric please? Blizzard's CMs, developers and staff all play classes and races on both sides on the public servers. This has been repeated many times on the official forums.

With the advent of battlegrounds I would say that the population imbalance is less of an issue for this change. It is only in world conflicts that the population imbalance truly comes into play.

Lets look now at how this has really changed PvE for the horde. Lemekim pointed out that WotF allowed an undead tank 20 seconds or so to build up aggro on Onxyia and other fear producing mobs. To get the same effect the Alliance has to have two dwarf priests casting fear ward on a tank. The Lurkers on Stormrage are truly fortunate to have two dwarven priests but I can tell you that they are not overly abundant throughout the rest of the population. Other encounters where sleep and charm are abundant the horde had an advantage over the Alliance population. Granted these encounters are not overwhelming in number but they do happen in the end game instances.

But the real area to look at is in PvP. In capture the flag battlegrounds fear rules supreme. Those who are quickest on the fear and have more of it available will have an easeir time than those who don't. A typical encounter on the PvE battlegrounds is a horde warrior charges into an alliance group and fears. All alliance scatter. The fear passes and the alliance starts regrouping their tactics. Horde warlock or priest fears and the alliance re-scatters. Rinse and repeat at least one more time for fun. On the other hand the alliance sends our warrior charging in and watches as only part of the horde run in fear. The other part, mostly rogues, mages and warlocks then proceed to rip apart this warrior while his party mates are scattered to the wind by fear effects. And god help the priest or warlock who attempts to do the same on the Alliance side. I've been in CTF battlegrounds where the entire make up of the other team was undead and Tauren. No fear, earthbind totems ftw!

[Treesh]

The Lurkers on Stormrage are truly fortunate to have two dwarven priests
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Now if only people would tell the n00b dwarven priestess before the fight starts what critters are ones that cast fear in the high end instances, she'd be a lot happier and much more useful. :P

[Tal]

Now if only people would tell the n00b dwarven priestess before the fight starts what critters are ones that cast fear in the high end instances, she'd be a lot happier and much more useful.  :P
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Awwww c'mon! Half the fun of playing is shooting from the hip! ;)

[Treesh]

Awwww c'mon! Half the fun of playing is shooting from the hip! ;)
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Not when I hear Darian say over teamspeak, repeatedly, "Feared again" and not being able to do a thing about it because both dwarf priests warded the gnome simultaneously. ;)

[Drasca]

I dunno why anyone would doubt they're real; they've been leaked the last three patches, and each time they've been completely accurate.
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I think they do it to stir up interest and possibly gauge the reaction every so often, without the burden of being 'official'. If its leaked you don't have to necessarily stand by it, you can just claim its fake or temporary until otherwise.

Poker trick imo.

Beyond that, there's always unmentioned changes that slip by the notes.

WotF is as close to an "I.Win" racial button as you can get. You only have a few general tactics for 1v1 pvp. Outdamage, Outlast, damage avoidance long range kiting or up close dancing, and interrupts. Against Warriors with arcanite reapers or MC epic equipment 6-7k health, you simply cannot outdamage or outlast them directly. Rogues with 4k health, they'll outdamage before you do. Mages who've practiced against locks, saber dancing upclose with fireblast and IAE, sometimes PoM Pyroblast (luckily most mages can't afford this, as they'll be oom and finished in group). Your real option is to interrupt them and try to mitigate damage to yourself through dancing behind them. Crippling poison, Hamstring, charge&intercept, frost nova & blast wave really cut down ability to kite long range. It is possible to CoEx them at range, only against rogues does this work often. Your only interrupts? Fear and charm. Pyroclasm (hellfire stun) doesn't work. Lock vs lock battles requires smart use of fear to dominate the enemy.

So take away fear & charm, your only interrupts, for 20 seconds. The enemy can either outdamage, outlast, or outmitigate your damage because they're either faster, beefier, don't require standing still to attack, and sometimes don't require facing the enemy.

Even with major talent investment, personal skill, and foresight to win against that extreme uphill battle, without charm or fear, which are part of the skill set, you're really out of options.

Soul-link, Drain tank locks can mitigate enough damage with drain life + dancing to not need fear as much but still need fear to buy time to outlast by outhealing. Mages and Arc Reaper Warriors are readily beatable this way. Felhunter / SL warlocks give mages the worst time, while warriors don't get to their nasty Execute at 20% health fast enough. Rogues, while still a problem, its possible to survive that encounter instead of being insta-death. Blind still isn't a big problem, as its a poison (not a disorient, gouge is a disorient). However, you must keep your side rather than front or back facing rogues to disrupt their 'facing front/back' required abilities. It is possible to pull off fear this way, because only 1/4 rogues use kick, but if it is kick-interrupted (difficult to tell in laggy situations). You can only guarantee outlasting rogues if you have the interrupts available.

Also, sitting down guarantees crits. That's a nasty bug that'll supposedly be fixed.

CoEx Locks can kite much better against rogues and warriors at long range, but mages still pose a problem.

Nightfall/Shadowburn locks have a chance to outdamage the enemy if they have low health, but this is chancy with requiring facing the enemy (not guaranteed). Nightfall procs will disappear with bad attempts, and rogues/mages tend to be able to zip behind you.

If you had charm available, you could charm enemy, kite, shadowbolt/nightfall/shadowburn/searing pain spam, charm again. Or mix fear / charm. Too bad WotF negates that all together.

No interrupts = You lose. They can outdamage, outlast, better damage mitigate and interrupt you. What can you do? Sit and die? That's what they expect, and there's a good chance of it happening if you cannot slow or interupt their ability to damage and interrupt you.

In BG, wotf's 20 second ability is whitewashed a bit because battles are fast and furious, but UD almost guarantees victory over fear defense classes every 3 minutes. Sometimes it takes that just to get to the field.

While WotF is overpowering... Fear ward is overpowered too. 30 second cooldown? Can still spam that before and during battles. All other wards only apply to self, and only last the period of their cooldowns. Fear ward should apply too. If not... don't nerf UD WotF.

[kandrathe]

To the best of my knowledge, timbermaw and argent dawn each have one transmute recipe (singular) and lokhtos has none (although there is a limited quantity recipe for sale to anyone at the bar).  Lokhtos already has multiple recipes for the other professions and they are adding recipes (plural) to him and to argent dawn and timbermaw.  Alchemists are being short changed.

Of course, this complaint is based on the assumption that the recipes are worthwhile.  I would certainly prefer to get no recipes (which would mean no need to grind faction) than to grind faction to get to recipes that are pointless.
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And, considering that the Meilosh formula is Transmute Earth (rare) to Water (uncommon), gives the Alchemist very little incentive to spend hours grinding in Felwood. My only reasons are it was good experience for awhile, I need tons of Mageweave, and I believe that Meilosh or the Timbermaws will someday sell something I will want.

Same with AD faction, transmute Air(rare) into Fire(uncommon). No one sane would do this.

The useful vendored formula's of Transmute Fire to Earth from BRD, and the Transmute Water to Air from Scholomance require no faction. But, I suspect that they may make some of the formerly drop only formula's available with enough faction.

[Raelynn]

Blizzard claimed that they added epic recipes in every profession in MC a few patches back. Has anyone heard anything about any of them? Beyond that, I don't believe there has been a new alchemy recipe since the game hit retail.

When I read this a few days back, this alchemy comment was one of the things that crossed my mind, the other being "Everyone's gonna call Blizzard a hypocrit for the change to WotF". They did say they weren't going to change it.