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Patch 3.3  

World of Warcraft
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World of Warcraft Patch 3.3.0

The latest test realm patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html

The latest patch notes can always be found at http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/

Icecrown Citadel: The Frozen Halls

Looming over the stark wastes of Northrend, Icecrown Citadel awaits those who would see the Lich King and his Scourge brought low and the threat they pose wiped from the face of Azeroth. The heroes who venture within will face some of the greatest horrors yet seen. But before you burst into the front gate of the citadel, an alternate means of entry beckons. Journey through three separate wings of the new five-player dungeon, Icecrown Citadel: The Frozen Halls, and follow Jaina Proudmoore or Sylvanas Windrunner into the Lich King's domain.

Icecrown Citadel: The Frozen Throne

All across Northrend, many battles have been fought against the vile Scourge. Countless lives have been lost since the Alliance and the Horde first reached these frozen wastes, but the champions of Azeroth continue to march forward -- and Icecrown Citadel, the cornerstone of the Scourge's power and the home base of the Lich King, is their final target. Tirion Fordring and the Argent Crusade have forged an accord with Darion Mograine and the Knights of the Ebon Blade to form the Ashen Verdict. This coalition's strongest combatants, along with the champions of the Alliance and the Horde, will lead the charge against the citadel. In the new Icecrown Citadel raid dungeon, Azeroth's mightiest will face terrifying challenges before ascending to the Frozen Throne, where the Lich King and his runeblade, Frostmourne, await to deliver the heroes to their deaths....

Cross-Realm Dungeon Finder

The Dungeon Finder is now available, providing players with quick and easy access to five-player parties. This feature connects all realms within a battlegroup using an advanced matchmaking system, making it easier for players of all levels to find a dungeon group. In addition, players can reap additional rewards through the Dungeon Finder by choosing the Random option, which is available to both pick-up and pre-formed groups. Check out the User Interface section for more details.

Getting Started and Quest Tracking

A number of changes have been made to World of Warcraft's introductory experience, including updated character and class information at the character-selection screen, more robust tooltips with images, improved health and mana regeneration at lower levels, and adjustments to various classes designed to make it easier for players to get started. In addition, all-new quest-tracking features have been added to assist players in finding objectives, including new interface functionality in the quest log, the map ("M" key), and the Objectives pane.

General

  • Character Creation: The descriptions for races, classes, and race/class combinations have been improved to provide new players with a better idea of the roles and advantages of each class and race.
  • Dazed: Creatures attacking a player from behind can no longer cause players level 1-5 to be dazed, and have a reduced chance to cause players level 6-10 to be dazed.
  • Knockbacks no longer dismount players. If on a flying mount, you will be knocked back a short distance before being able to resume flying.
  • The existing /welcome emote now greets/welcomes targets (character says “hello”), while the new /yw is for saying "you're welcome."
  • Many of the tail sweeps with knockback effects will no longer hit players’ pets.
  • Level 1 characters no longer start with food or water in their inventory.
  • Attack is now called Auto Attack. The tooltip has been changed to reflect that the player will continue automatically attacking a target.
  • Meeting Stones: To use any Meeting Stone, it is only required that the character’s minimum level be 15. There is no maximum character level requirement for any Meeting Stone.

Icecrown Citadel

  • Three separate 5-player dungeons – The Forge of Souls, Pit of Saron, and Halls of Reflection – containing all new challenges and missions of discovery, await players in normal and Heroic modes.
  • 10- and 25-player challenges await players in Icecrown Citadel. Only when all challenges have been overcome in the raid dungeon can players unlock hard modes for individual bosses. For more information on how the Icecrown Citadel raid content will be made available, please visit our Dungeons & Raids forum: http://forums.worldofwarcraft.com/board.html?forumId=11126&sid=1

Classes: General

  • Area-of-Effect Damage Caps: We’ve redesigned the way area damage is capped when hitting many targets. Instead of a hard cap on total damage done, the game now caps the total damage done at a value equal to the damage the spell would do if it hit 10 targets. In other words, if a spell does 1000 damage to each target, it would hit up to 10 targets for 1000 each, but with more than 10 targets, each target would take 1000 damage divided by the number of targets. 20 targets would be hit for 500 damage each in that example.
  • Attack: Level 1 druids, mages, priests, and warlocks will no longer start with the Attack button placed on their action bars by default.
  • Default Equipment: Starting weapons are now more uniform. Rogues now start with a pair of daggers equipped. All other classes except shamans start with a 2-handed weapon equipped and the required skill already known. Shamans start with a 1-handed weapon and a shield, as they benefit more from the shield than they would from a 2-handed weapon.
  • Glancing Blows: The mage, warlock, and priest classes no longer have an increased chance for their melee attacks to be glancing blows; and the damage penalty due to their glancing blows is the same as for other classes.
  • Health and Mana Regeneration: These regeneration rates have been increased by up to 200% for low level characters. As a player’s level increases, the regeneration rates gradually reduce, returning to normal rates at level 15.
  • Pet Resilience: All player pets now get 100% of their master’s resilience.
  • Spell Mana Costs: These costs have been reduced for almost all lower level spell ranks. In general, if a spell decreased in cost with a higher level rank in patch 3.2.0, that spell now has the decreased cost at all ranks. In addition, spells learned before level 20 with reduced cast times and/or durations have even further reduced mana costs, proportionate to their reduction in cast time or damage.
  • Taunt Diminishing Returns: We’ve revised the system for diminishing returns on Taunt so that creatures do not become immune to Taunt until after 5 Taunts have landed. The duration of the Taunt effect will be reduced by 35% instead of 50% for each taunt landed. In addition, most creatures in the world will not be affected by Taunt diminishing returns at all. Creatures will only have Taunt diminishing returns if they have been specifically flagged for that behavior based on the design of a given encounter.

Races: General

  • Orc and troll shamans now have their own unique totem art.
  • Racial Attribute Bonuses: These bonuses have been recalibrated to even out the amount of starting health on the various races. All races start with a standardized level of stamina, except for orcs, dwarves, and tauren who now start with 1 extra point of stamina. For each class, bonuses and penalties to all attributes have been adjusted so that each race has an equal attribute total.
  • Will of the Forsaken now shares a 45-second cooldown with similar effects, including the Medallion of the Horde, Titan-Forged runes, Insignia of the Horde, etc.

PvP

Arenas

All abilities that have base cooldowns of 10 minutes or longer cannot be used in Arenas, down from 15 minutes.

Battlegrounds

  • Battleground Experience: Battleground experience gained is now based on the level of the player gaining experience, rather than the highest possible player level in that Battleground.
  • All level 71-80 Battleground daily quests will now award 25 Arena points in addition to their current rewards.

Wintergrasp

  • You must now have the following ranks to build or pilot siege vehicles:
    • Rank 2: Build/pilot Catapults.
    • Rank 3: Build/pilot Demolishers.
    • Rank 3: Build/pilot Siege Engines.

Dungeons & Raids

Naxxramas

  • Players no longer need to kill the final bosses in all four wings of this dungeon in order to teleport to Sapphiron. Teleportation orbs have been added to allow players access back and forth from Sapphiron's lair.

Oculus

  • Azure Ring Guardians agro distance changed from 50 to 40 yards.
  • Many bosses and creatures have had their total health reduced.
  • Several bosses and creatures have had cooldowns on specific abilities increased, effect durations reduced, and damage on some of these abilities reduced.
  • Ring-Lord Conjurers and Sorceresses now hang out in packs of 4 instead of packs of 5.
  • Vehicle scaling on the drakes based on the rider’s item level has been increased to make them more powerful.

Class Change

Death Knights

  • Army of the Dead: The cooldown on this ability has been reduced from 20 minutes to 10 minutes. Army Ghoul damage dropped by 50%. Cannot be used in Arenas.
  • Raise Ally: The cooldown on this ability has been reduced from 15 minutes to 10 minutes. Cannot be used in Arenas.
  • Rune of the Stoneskin Gargoyle: There is now a 1-handed version of this rune in addition to the current 2-handed rune.
  • Rune Strike: Threat generated by this ability increased by approximately 17%.
  • Talents:
    • Unholy
      • Night of the Dead: Now reduces the damage your pet takes from area-of-effect damage by 45/90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players. In addition, this talent now reduces the cooldown of Army of the Dead by 2/4 minutes, down from 5/10 minutes.
      • Scourge Strike: Redesigned. The base ability now deals 50% weapon damage plus an additional amount as physical damage. However, for each disease the death knight has on the target, the target will take additional shadow damage equal to 25% of the physical damage done.
      • Unholy Blight: This talent now deals only 10% of Death Coil damage as a damage-over-time effect on the target.

Druids

  • Prowl: This ability no longer has multiple ranks and penalizes movement speed by 30%.
  • Rebirth: The cooldown on this spell has been lowered from 20 minutes down to 10 minutes. Cannot be used in Arenas.
  • Rejuvenation: The base duration on all ranks of this spell is now 15 seconds.
  • Tranquility: The cooldown on this spell has been reduced to 8 minutes, down from 10 minutes.
  • Talents:
    • Balance
      • Eclipse: This effect will not activate again within 15 seconds of either type of Eclipse effect firing, in addition to the existing 30-second cooldown for each type of Eclipse. In addition, Eclipse now grants a 40% critical strike chance to Starfire and 40% increased damage to Wrath, up from 30%.
      • Force of Nature: Health on the treants has been increased.
    • Feral Combat
      • Predatory Strikes: The Predatory Swiftness buff from this talent now has an 8-second duration.
    • Restoration
      • Gift of the Earthmother: Redesigned. This talent now increases spell haste by 2/4/6/8/10% and reduces the base global cooldown of Lifebloom by 2/4/6/8/10% instead of its previous effects.
    • Pets
      • Avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pets take from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.

Hunters

  • Call Stabled Pet: Cooldown reduced from 30 minutes to 5 minutes. Cannot be used in Arenas.
  • Deterrence: Now also increases the chance for ranged attacks to miss the hunter by 100% while under its effect.
  • Misdirection: Redesigned. Instead of having finite charges, it now begins a 4-second timer when the hunter using Misdirection performs a threat-generating attack, during which all threat generated by the hunter goes to the friendly target. In addition, multiple hunters can now misdirect threat to the same friendly target simultaneously.
  • Talents:
    • Beast Mastery
      • Intimidation: If the hunter’s pet is in melee range of its target, the stun from Intimidation will now be applied immediately instead of on the pet’s next swing or attack.
    • Pets
      • Avoidance: This talent has been replaced by Culling the Herd. Hunter pets now innately take 90% less damage from area-of-effect abilities like all other class pets. This does not apply to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.
      • Cower: Redesigned. This ability no longer affects threat, and instead reduces damage taken by the pet by 40% for 6 seconds with a 45-second cooldown. While cowering, the pet’s movement speed is 50% of normal speed. Cower now only has a single rank and is available at pet level 20.
      • Culling the Herd: This pet talent has replaced the Avoidance talent in the pet trees (Hunter pets now gain that benefit automatically without expenditure of talent points). Culling the Herd increases pet and hunter damage by 1/2/3% for 10 seconds each time the pet deals a critical strike with Claw, Bite, or Smack.
      • Demoralizing Screech: The attack power reduction from this ability has been increased by 40%, equaling the maximum possible attack power reduction from the abilities of other classes.
      • Improved Cower: Redesigned. This ability now reduces the movement penalty of Cower by 50%/100%.
      • Pet Leveling: Hunter pets now need only 5% of the experience a player needs to level, down from 10%.
      • Venom Web Spray: Range increased from 20 yards to 30 yards.
      • Web: Range increased from 20 yards to 30 yards.
      • Wolverine Bite: This talent is now enabled when the pet lands a critical strike rather than from the target dodging the pet’s attacks. In addition, this talent no longer has a prerequisite.

Mages

  • Talents
    • Arcane
      • Arcane Empowerment: This talent now also grants 1/2/3% increased damage done by the mage’s party or raid for 10 seconds after the mage gets a critical strike with Arcane Explosion, Arcane Missiles, Arcane Barrage, or Arcane Blast. This effect is exclusive with Ferocious Inspiration and Sanctified Retribution.
    • Fire
      • Blast Wave: The mana cost of this talent has been significantly reduced.
      • Burning Determination: The duration of interrupt immunity granted by this talent is now 20 seconds.
      • Dragon's Breath: The mana cost of this talent has been significantly reduced.
      • Firestarter: When this talent is triggered, it makes the next Flamestrike cost no mana in addition to being instant.
      • Improved Scorch: The debuff from this talent no longer stacks, and instead can apply the full effect from a single cast of Scorch.
    • Frost
      • Deep Freeze: This spell now deals a large amount of damage to targets permanently immune to stuns. In addition, when this ability deals damage it will no longer consume two charges of Fingers of Frost for those mages with the Shatter talent.
      • Fingers of Frost: This talent now triggers immediately on casting a spell rather than being delayed until the spell strikes the target.
    • Pets
      • Avoidance (passive): Now reduces the damage your pets take from area-of-effect damage by 90%, but no longer applies to area-of-effect damage caused by other players.
      • Mirror Image: Health on the mirror images has been increased.
      • Water Elemental: Waterbolt mana cost reduced by 80%.

This page last modified 2009-12-08 10:52:35.