Patch 3.2 PTR: first thoughts

(For the full 3.2 patch notes, check this link on MMOChampion)

Somebody set up us the bomb! ... I mean, this is quite the controversial patch so far.

PvP
* Arenas
o The newest season of Arena gear can only be purchased if you meet the requirements with your 3 or 5 player team rating. Rating requirements from 2 player teams can still be used to purchase the previous season of gear.

I suppose this is because they believe that 2v2 is too hard to really balance... but I think it's a bad idea if they wanted more participation in arenas.

PvP
* Battlegrounds
o Battleground experience has arrived!
+ Players will now be awarded experience for completing objectives and actions that yield honor in Battlegrounds (honorable kills not included).
+ Players who do not wish to gain experience through PvP can visit Behsten in Stormwind or Slahtz in Orgrimmar - both located near the Battlemasters in either city - and turn off all experience accumulation for the cost of 10 gold.
+ Disabling experience gains will prevent a player from gaining experience through any means available in the game.
+ Players with experience gains turned off who compete in Battlegrounds will face off only against other players with experience gains turned off.
+ Behsten and Slahtz can reinstate experience gains for players, for a 10 gold fee of course. Any experience that would've been accumulated if experience gains were not turned off cannot be recovered.

So, one can now level purely by PvP (but I suspect the exp gain would be roughly the same as grinding mobs, e.g. questing will still be faster.) Pretty cool though. I've had times when I wanted to hop into a BG but didn't because I would lose out on leveling.

PvP
* Battlegrounds
o When standing at a capture point that you control, you will gain a buff called Honorable Defender. This buff grants +50% honor gained from kills. This currently affects Arathi Basin, Eye of the Storm and Isle of Conquest.

This fixes the problem where defenders gained less honor than the HK farming idiots. Okay, you'll still get less honor if nobody actually comes to the node you're defending, but if that is the case, you're probably defending the wrong node :P

PvP
* Battlegrounds
o Arathi Basin
+ The time it requires to capture a base has been reduced to 8 seconds, down from 10 seconds.
+ The game now ends when one team reaches 1600 victory points, down from 2000.
o Eye of the Storm
+ The time it requires to capture the center flag has been reduced to 8 seconds, down from 10 seconds
+ The game now ends when one team reaches 1600 victory points, down from 2000.
o Strand of the Ancients
+ The faction starting on attack/defense will now be randomized at the start of each match.
o Warsong Gulch
+ There is a now a 20 minute timer on this battleground. After that time, the team with the most flag captures wins. If this would result in a tie, the team that captured the first flag wins. If neither side has captured a flag, then the game ends in a tie.

No more endless WSGs, and some sped-up ABs and EOTS. I guess it'll be a bit more bearable to farm Justicar/Conqueror now?

Items: General
#Emblem system changes
* Both the 10 and 25 player instances of the Crusaders' Coliseum drop a new Emblem of Triumph.
* Any dungeons that previously dropped Emblems of Heroism or Valor, such as Naxxramas or Heroic Halls of Stone, will now drop Emblems of Conquest instead. Emblems of Conquest can still be converted to Valor or Heroism.
* The heroic dungeon daily quest will now reward 2 Emblems of Triumph and the normal daily dungeon quest will reward 1 Emblem of Triumph.

Whine topic of the day! Anyway, I guess it's nice - if the new dungeon coming with this patch is a step up from Ulduar, this'll get people geared a lot faster (including me - I'm behind a month and a half in gear).

i'll write up some more thoughts on other stuff in a later post.

Comparing combat & mutilate

Yes, dear reader, back to the less emo posts (for now). First of all I'd like to test something I added when adding the new header, so I'll quote the Overkill nerf that is planned to hit us next patch.

Overkill: Talent redesigned. Now increases energy regeneration by 30% while stealthed, and for 20 seconds after breaking stealth.

So yeah, there you have it (that should look like a Blizzard quote). I won't say too much about this, other blogs have already done their predictions, I'd prefer to wait and see the impact on PvE. It's obviously meant as a PvP nerf mainly, and we knew it was coming.

Combat vs Mutilate
I'm still without a WoW subscription at the moment, but that doesn't mean I don't have stuff to write about! I dug up a few screens in my WoW folder. Right before I left I respecced my PvE spec back to Mutilate, and before I did that I ran some tests on the target dummies. I used the same gear except for the weapons (Greed/LPC for Combat and LPC/LPC for Mutilate). For the exact gear, glyphs etc used, check these chardev profiles: combat / mutilate.

I used the stopwatch and clicked to start it while I used a keybind for my opener. After 4 minutes (sharp :p !) I took a screenshot to record my current dmg done and average DPS on Recount. In retrospect I should probably have done both spec tests multiple times - I only did Combat once, and then did two tests for Mutilate because I thought I had to get used to the changes a bit (I hadn't played with the new HfB yet and such).

Anyway, the results:


Number one is my combat test, two is the first mutilate test, and three is the second mutilate test. As you can see, my second mutilate test had the highest average DPS, and the first had the highest overall damage done.

The numbers are very close together though, which is nice, people can just pick whatever they want to play, or play with whatever weapon is best for them.

I'd like to try this revamped mutilate in a raid now that I've raided as combat a few times. With the changes they made to poisons etc, I will probably be able to use my Rolfen's Ripper with Berserking (originally purchased for PvP) as my OH.

Just gotta run some Heroic HoS for that dagger there and I'll be set for some mutilating.

Rogue fashion, dual specs.

Rogue Fashion
First, a bit of character progress news. We did Malygos 25 yesterday (due to the two tanks that could tank Sartharion having their PCs wrecked ... we suspect voodoo is involved) and I got Frosted Adroit Handguards (for the minimum KP bid .. gotta love no competition). I think I will keep this as my non-Tier piece, instead of the usual Chestguard of the Recluse, since I have Heroes Bonescythe Chest already and it would break my two piece Tier bonus if I rolled on that chest.

After that I went into a 10-man Naxx run that was almost full melee DPS (only one hunter). Grobbulus was interesting with this setup as one might suspect, but we did get him down. I also got a nice piece of rogue fashion (Scourge fashion?) in the Cloak of Mastery. Not that I'm complaining, but I had the Ice Striker's Cloak crafted a few days ago /sigh.

I was quite satisfied with my DPS on that run, though. Using Zaltu's macro recommendations and Dinaer's weapon switching comment I setup my Sinister Strike and FoK with Closetgnome gearset switching. On the trash I was second on damage done and DPS until late in Naxx, below the hunter and above all the death knights.
For every FoK I would automaticly switch to double Broken Stalactite for some big FoK numbers. As soon as I hit Sinister Strike, I would switch to my usual Greed/LPC combo for max single target DPS.

Dual specs
With patch 3.1 nearly upon us, what will you do with dual specs? Will you buy it at all? I will probably (when I get enough money ... I got my bronze drake so I'm balancing on the verge of poverty at the moment) go for a PvE combat and a PvP Muti/Prep spec.

I'm just happy I'm not playing my druid as my main at the moment. Trying to decide between Tanking, Moonkin DPS, Cat DPS, Resto, Resto PvP, Feral PvP, Moonkin PvP ... dual specs would almost make you depressed when you think of it that way.

Sure, I could come up with a few more rogue specs, but there is a difference between choosing combat PvE or muti PvE and cat DPS or moonkin DPS.

Rogue buffs, Forsaken professions

Short post here, but after reading Jessica's reply on my mail, I have decided to take Skinning and Herbalism on my Forsaken rogue when I revive him from the dead (I deleted him a few months ago). At 80 I will switch to Alchemy. My Death Knight bank alt will be going Inscription and Enchanting, so I can make my own enchants and glyphs.

This also means that I will have Lifeblood and Master of Anatomy at my disposal while leveling. Free crit and heal, hooray !

Also, the blue tracker of MMO-Champion had some insight in what Blizzard may have in store for us:

Hunger for Blood
We think it can be a little annoying to try to keep it up all the time. We have a plan to make it a little more usable and interesting (and buff rogues in PvE at the same time). (Source)

Do you plan to buff the Combat talent tree?
Yes. (Source)

Assassination and rogue DPS in PvE
Assassination is doing too much damage relative to other rogues. Rogues as a whole are still too low in PvE and we have plans to bring them up. (Source)

Aside from a general PvE buff for us, it will be interesting to see how they plan to change Hunger for Blood.

Also, happy lunar festival !

Picture: guildies kiting Omen to AQ and back, last years Lunar Festival.

Rogue aesthetics and patch 3.0.8

Just a note that I will be working on a layout that is more appealing when my exams are done and I can get back into WoW to have a little photoshoot with my character.
For now, you'll have to do with my lazy header, which is secretly a screenshot I just smacked some text on.

In other news, I suppose this is where I talk about the new patch and what it did for rogues. Well, honestly .. not that much. (No, Ogre, that doesn't count as complaining !)

* Cheap Shot: This ability no longer has diminishing returns against anything other than itself.
* Kidney Shot: This ability now has diminishing returns against all other stuns.
* Fan of Knives: The cooldown has been removed. In addition, now deals 150% of weapon damage when used while daggers are equipped.
* Feint: Rank 8 now reduces the damage taken from area of effect attacks by 50% for 6 seconds in addition to its existing effects.

The first two work together (they switched the diminishing returns). Not that important in PvE, but in PvP it means less stun combining with your teammates stun spells (e.g. no more full duration Deep Freeze + Kidney Shot for example)

The Fan of Knives change is nice - combat rogues can use Adrenaline Rush for some FoK spamming. Mutilate rogues won't be throwing out that much AoE hurt, but still 50% more damage !

Feint .. well I guess we have an excuse to put it on our action bar now. Finish your cycle and Feint before disengaging a target that is going to AoE you to minimize the load on your healers. In PvP, not really that useful I reckon.

There's also material changes for a lot of enchants, but I'm not going to list them all and instead refer you to the post on MMO-Champion.

Aeltyr tries to find his knives and realises he left them in his other armor. Aeltyr casts Fan of Handkerchiefs, but it fails.