WoW Releases Major Changes in Pre-Expansion Patch

Greg Tito

PR for Dungeons & Dragons
Sep 29, 2005
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WoW Releases Major Changes in Pre-Expansion Patch



With Mists of Pandaria around the corner, Blizzard changes classes and improves "quality of life" in Azeroth.

World of Warcraft debuted in November 2004. When the fourth expansion Mists of Pandaria hits, the MMO will be nearly 8 years old. Anything that ancient in videogame time has to reinvent itself to stay current, and WoW has seen quite a few alterations to its lore, code and core game mechanics over the years. Patch 5.0.4 is no different. Released on the servers yesterday, this patch introduces a new talent system for each class, alters the buff system and lets you level up in zones with players from other servers to keep the population feeling full. Perhaps the most anticipated changes are those that just fine-tune the game experience for WoW players, such as finally allowing you to loot all the stuff around you instead of just one bag at a time.

The changes to the nine classes will be some of the most discussed by the vocal player base on the official WoW forums. Blizzard Community Manager Bashiok explains just how much your rogue or paladin will change. "A number of changes have been made that can impact how you play your class," he said. "These range from minor to major, but almost all specs have altered rotations, and a few have been completely redesigned. Once the patch launches be prepared to spend a little time reacquainting yourself with each ability, and setting your action bars up."

For example, the hunter class can now attack with bows or guns from any range - there was a minimum distance required before - and the pets the class uses no longer have their roles restricted by type. Any animal - be it a gorilla, a turtle or a dinosaur - can now have the Ferocity, Tenacity, or Cunning specialization. Also, druids have a fourth talent spec, splitting up the Feral talent tree between Cat and Bear druids.

You can read the outlines the class changes here. [http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/blog/5735177/World_of_Warcraft_504_Patch_Notes-29_08_2012]

I spent about 12 hours downloading the beta for Mists of Pandaria so I could check out the changes, but most current WoW players have been downloading the patch in the background for the last week or so and 5.0.4 went live as of yesterday. How has the patch impacted your game so far?

Source: Blizzard [http://eu.battle.net/wow/en/blog/5739421/Patch_504_Survival_Guide-29_08_2012]


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alik44

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Sep 11, 2010
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To me it feels like they dumb down a few things and they rearranged a lot of the abilities. also they either got rid of the tech tree or just placed it some where else cause i can find it anymore also for some reason they just give u all the spells at certain lvl aside from buying the skills before. and they either removed imolate or made it a high lvl skill idk.
 

Loop Stricken

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Jun 17, 2009
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The optimiser wouldn't work for me. Seems someone at Blizzard had the brilliant idea to disregard the A and B drive as usable drive letters, because those are obviously always floppy drives.

Sigh.
 

Saviordd1

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Jan 2, 2011
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Combustion Kevin said:
wait, no more minimum distance for ranged weapons?
well, that won't be a balance issue at all!
Seriously, this.

In my time in WoW I played a hunttarder and I'll tell you, I felt overpowered with just a pet and ranged weapon, but giving that weapon unlimited distance and allowing you to turn that tiger into a tank?

Yeah... a shit storm is gonna be had with that.
 

Loop Stricken

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Combustion Kevin said:
wait, no more minimum distance for ranged weapons?
well, that won't be a balance issue at all!
Hunters don't use melee weapons anymore, so if they had a minimum range, it would break them.
 

Loop Stricken

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Saviordd1 said:
Combustion Kevin said:
wait, no more minimum distance for ranged weapons?
well, that won't be a balance issue at all!
Seriously, this.

In my time in WoW I played a hunttarder and I'll tell you, I felt overpowered with just a pet and ranged weapon, but giving that weapon unlimited distance and allowing you to turn that tiger into a tank?

Yeah... a shit storm is gonna be had with that.
MINIMUM distance, man.

Before, if you got up into a Hunter's face, they started hitting you with their weak-arse statstick.
But Hunters don't do that now, they just shoot you in the face from three inches away.

They still have a maximum range.
 

Fappy

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Loop Stricken said:
Saviordd1 said:
Combustion Kevin said:
wait, no more minimum distance for ranged weapons?
well, that won't be a balance issue at all!
Seriously, this.

In my time in WoW I played a hunttarder and I'll tell you, I felt overpowered with just a pet and ranged weapon, but giving that weapon unlimited distance and allowing you to turn that tiger into a tank?

Yeah... a shit storm is gonna be had with that.
MINIMUM distance, man.

Before, if you got up into a Hunter's face, they started hitting you with their weak-arse statstick.
But Hunters don't do that now, they just shoot you in the face from three inches away.

They still have a maximum range.
I miss the old days where they would whip out dual swords on my ass :(
 

Imperioratorex Caprae

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May 15, 2010
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Ranged minimum distance only affected hunters, leaving them to use absolutely useless abilities like "raptor strike" if they're snared. Now even up close hunters have a fighting chance against other classes (yes I know about disengage). Something that shoulda been done a while back, it also helps when classes stack against bosses.
Now I don't have to stand a few yards back from the rest of the group and die because the healer couldn't AoE heal that far.
Other than that, the new talent system is genius to me, since most of it is utility and really lets you choose how you play your class without having to look up "Best spec for Patch X". I can now play any spec I want to without fear of being dropped from a raid or instance because "wrong spec n00b".
And elitists who think overcomplicating the talent tree makes the game better, seriously?
I'd rather have this choice of utility abilities and really having to look at what glyphs I want as opposed to what sites like Noxxic.com tell me is the best.
In otherwords, Blizz has allowed players to really make toons more than cookie cutter versions of x class.
Still it takes a bit of getting used to, I also like the idea that anyone can make any race (even pandas once MoP is released) without having to own the xpacs, just have to buy the xpacs to get the rest of the content (level cap, dk class, monk class, and all the xpac zones).
No daily limit? Thank you Blizz, now I can run around and do all the dailies I couldn't find time to do cuz I was working too hard on the ones for the current patch.
Pet/Achieve/Mount Sharing? Thank you again blizz, now I don't have to get the Headless Horseman's mount on all my toons this halloween.
So, in essence, I like the new patch and can't wait to participate in defending Theramore's downfall... or perhaps be the instigator...
Only thing now that bothers me is I'm unsure of what to equip on my casters, do I keep my staff or do I use my wand... that hasn't been sufficiently explained.
 

Loop Stricken

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Fappy said:
Loop Stricken said:
MINIMUM distance, man.

Before, if you got up into a Hunter's face, they started hitting you with their weak-arse statstick.
But Hunters don't do that now, they just shoot you in the face from three inches away.

They still have a maximum range.
I miss the old days where they would whip out dual swords on my ass :(
Oh yeah, that Raptor Strike was a killer.
Oh, the pain of it all. :|
 

sneakypenguin

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Heals are so OP right now its awesome in pvp my shamans greater healing wave hits for 100k+ its like having permanent lay on hands, and healing tide is the most insane aoe heal i've ever seen. Just played a wsg no deaths and 9 million heals, a druid had 11 million and no deaths. PvP is chaos since its now scaled for 90 lol. Only thing i fear now is warlocks.
 

RobfromtheGulag

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May 18, 2010
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Heals are so OP right now its awesome in pvp my shamans greater healing wave hits for 100k+ its like having permanent lay on hands, and healing tide is the most insane aoe heal i've ever seen. Just played a wsg no deaths and 9 million heals, a druid had 11 million and no deaths. PvP is chaos since its now scaled for 90 lol. Only thing i fear now is warlocks.

-Oh really... This almost makes me want to come back. After the Cata 'Yea heals cost real mana now' change I wasn't haveing much fun as a healer.
--Is it back to the point where a geared shaman/druid/priest can just run and Hot/Shield without dying? Because last I tried in my welfare pve epics I got burned down even before I could run myself out of mana (which would have taken <30 seconds).

The Talent swap is what really has me loathing the idea of purchasing MoP. I'll wait for some reviews to hear if it's as bad as I imagine.
 

Combustion Kevin

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Loop Stricken said:
I miss the old days where they would whip out dual swords on my ass :(
Oh yeah, that Raptor Strike was a killer.
Oh, the pain of it all. :|[/quote]

wait, wait, wait, what happened to raptor strike, or dual wielding hunters?

what did I miss in my absense, has the world gone mad in the meantime?!
 

Loop Stricken

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Combustion Kevin said:
wait, wait, wait, what happened to raptor strike, or dual wielding hunters?

what did I miss in my absense, has the world gone mad in the meantime?!
Well, how long have you been gone?

Blizzard finally decided to make it abundantly clear that Hunters should not be meleeing, by removing their ability to use melee weapons.
 

Combustion Kevin

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Nov 17, 2011
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Loop Stricken said:
Combustion Kevin said:
wait, wait, wait, what happened to raptor strike, or dual wielding hunters?

what did I miss in my absense, has the world gone mad in the meantime?!
Well, how long have you been gone?

Blizzard finally decided to make it abundantly clear that Hunters should not be meleeing, by removing their ability to use melee weapons.
I always thought hunters were supposed to be able to defend themselves up close, but with the powerful shots and the pet they were supposed to be at a disadvantage up close, still.

now they're no longer at a disadvantage up close, range is no longer an issue except for being too far away.

oh, and as for your question, I played the first two months of WotL before finally leaving the game, been playing since two months after vanilla's release. >.<
 

tehweave

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Apr 5, 2009
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And once again, Hunters will be overpowered.

It's times like these that make me want to go back. But like a recovering alcoholic/smoker I know that going back wouldn't be worth it.
 

Cowabungaa

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I don't know much about WoW's balance and all that any more, I've been out for ages, but the fact that servers are getting even more cross-over stuff really saddens me.

Sure it makes it feel more full perhaps but the feeling of having a true community on your server even less. Looking back at how much they wrecked that in WotLK already... Damn shame.
 

DugMachine

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Man this game is just straight crack I tell ya. I canceled my sub for the 7th time last month but now i'm tempted... NO MUST FIGHT THE URGE. Agh was thinking of getting Panderia buuuut I think i'm going to give this one a pass and finally end my WoW days. Twas a good game though and I don't regret all the hours I put into it.