Speaking of Nerfs...

Over the weekend this happened to Paladins on the Beta Server:

Holy

* Seal of Wisdom now deal [ 16% of AP + 25% of Spell Power + 1 ] holy damage when unleashed. (Down from [ 20% of AP + 32% of Spell Power + 1 ] Holy damage)
* Seal of Light now has a chance to heal for [ 15% of AP + 15% of Spell Power ]. (Down from [ 28% of AP + 28% of Spell Power ])
* Seal of Light now deals [ 16% of AP + 25% of Spell Power + 1 ] (down from [ 20% of AP + 32% of Spell Power + 1 ]) holy damage when unleashed.
* Seal of Righteousness now grants each melee attack [ 2.2% of Melee Weapon Speed * AP + 4.4% of Melee Weapon Speed * Spell Power ] additional Holy damage. (Down from [ 2.8% of Melee Weapon Speed * AP + 5.5% of Melee Weapon Speed * Spell Power ])


Protection

* Seal of Justice now deals [ 16% of AP + 25% of Spell Power + 1 ] holy damage when unleashed. (Down from [ 20% of AP + 32% of Spell Power + 1 ])


Retribution

* Judgement of Command Holy damage reduced from 56% to 45%.
* Blessing of Might (Rank 8 ) and Greater Blessing of Might (Rank 3) now increase AP by 306. (Up from 305)
* Seal of Corruption now deals [ 15% of AP + 8.8% of Spell Power ] additional holy damage over 15 seconds. (Down from [ 19.2% of AP + 9.6% of Spell Power ])
* Seal of Corruption now deals [ 14% of AP + 22% of Spell Power + 1 ] Holy damage. (Down from [ 17.5% of AP + 28% of Spell Power + 1 ])
* Seal of the Martyr now make all your melee attacks deal [ 22% of mw ] to [ 22% of MW ]. (Down from [ 28% of mw ] to [ 28% of MW ])
* Seal of the Martyr now deals [ 16% of AP + 25% of Spell Power + 36% of mw ] to [ 16% of AP + 25% of Spell Power + 36% of MW ] Holy Damage when unleashed. (Old - [ 20% of AP + 32% of Spell Power + 25% of mw ] to [ 20% of AP + 32% of Spell Power + 25% of MW ] Holy damage)
* Seal of Blood now make all your melee attacks deal [ 22% of mw ] to [ 22% of MW ]. (Down from [ 28% of mw ] to [ 28% of MW ])
* Seal of Blood now deals [ 16% of AP + 25% of Spell Power + 36% of mw ] to [ 16% of AP + 25% of Spell Power + 36% of MW ] Holy Damage when unleashed. (Old - [ 20% of AP + 32% of Spell Power + 25% of mw ] to [ 20% of AP + 32% of Spell Power + 25% of MW ] Holy damage)
* Seal of Vengeance now deals [ 15% of AP + 8.8% of Spell Power ] additional Holy damage over 15 sec. (Down from [ 19.2% of AP + 9.6% of Spell Power ])
* Seal of Vengeance now deals [ 14% of AP + 22% of Spell Power + 1 ] Holy damage. (Down from [ 17.5% of AP + 28% of Spell Power + 1 ])
* Judgement of Wisdom now restores 1% of the attacker's maximum mana. (Down from 2%)
* Judgement of Light now has a chance to heal the attacker for [ 10% of AP + 10% of Spell Power ]. (Down from [ 18% of AP + 18% of Spell Power ])

Basically we got a blanket reduction in our damage output. Why? Because the new Retribution Spec was doing too much damage.

On the one hand I agree, yes Retribution was doing way too much. However the reductions here don't just affect Ret, they affect the relatively meager damage output of Holy and Protection as well.

Holy's already one of the lowest-DPS healer classes out there, and Protection was just about holding it's own. With the changes, it's going to be even less attractive to level either of these spec. Looks like it's going to be an uphill struggle levelling Ulu as Protection in WotLK.

They're promising band-aids for Prot and Holy in the future, but with about two weeks until release, I'm not holding my breath.

More fun in Nerfsville!

So last night, after a week of crashing instance servers, I finally got to see the inside of the post-nerf Zul'Aman...

...And an hour later I was done. Even with a wipe on the Eagle (totally my fault, I pulled whilst some folks were still on the stairs, and they were trapped outside) we beat every timer and one-shotted every other boss.

Seriously, if you're in a group who could complete Kara pre-patch, go have your funsies in Zul'Aman now. Even Zul'jin was a piece of cake.

Apart from that, Ulu's been slowly working on achievements and killing time until the release of Wrath. Three weeks to go now! There also appears to be a Zombie Invasion that needs quelling.

Old School Weekend

People shouldn't mistake my last post for annoyance, it was more like amusement at a trivial instance being further trivialised. I thought it was funny.

However, TyphoonAndrew had this to say on the matter:

Given that there were Kara/Gruul's guilds in BT who were able to drop bosses, I am expecting this new found power we have to be smashed by the Wrath content. It might be easy now, but it will get equalised. And we'll never do Kara again after this, because how many people bother with MC now?

That comment will be ironic in light of what I did this weekend.

On Friday night I did four Heroics in quick succession: Blood Furnace, Slave Pens, Underbog and Shadow Labyrinth. Achievements was the name of the game, and we played it well. I didn't bother to time most of the runs, but I did notice in Slave Pens that the greater blessings I applied at the start had seven minutes left when Quagmirrian died. We cleared the instance in 23 minutes.

On Saturday, I worked on my achievements with Ulushnar. The Hallows Eve event arrived, which meant another event boss to farm a certain number of times per day, this time in the Scarlet Monastery graveyard. Headless Horseman isn't an especially hard boss to a group with decent gear, and there's some pleasure to be had in pummelling his Tim Burton-Fanboy ryhme-spouting face.

After farming that, I took a break and came back in the evening to join a conglomeration of Earthen Ring raiders for some oldschool fun. We preceeded to clear both Blackwing Lair and Molten Core in a bit over 2 hours. It was kind of nice to see the old bosses again, although 40 raid-geared level 70s kinda made mincemeat out of both zones (Ragnaros in particular died in 18 seconds).

Sunday involved more random achievement filling and Horseman-killing, as well as another spot of sitting offline for an hour and a half when Blizzard shut down the server in the middle of the afternoon. In the evening, Ulu hooked up with the oldschool raiders again for a zerg through the Temple of Ahn'Qiraj. Unlike Blackwing Lair and Molten Core, it was content I hadn't seen with Wulfsblood pre-TBC, so I got the chance to experience it, albeit at breakneck speed. (somewhat akin to taking a tour in a Formula One car)

Well it was a fun way to spend a weekend, but I'm still finding myself counting the weeks until the release of WotLK...

Kara after 3.0

It's a joke, a sad joke.

Five people in ZA/Badge gear could probably farm it. As it was, with 4 DPS, 2 Tanks and 3 Healers:

*Moroes died after his first Vanish.
*Maiden managed one Repentance.
*Big Bad Wolf got one Red Riding Hood.
*Nightbane never got a fear off.
*Illhoof died during his first Weakened.
*Netherspite died during his first banish.
*The Prince got off two infernals.

It feels more like Upper Blackrock Spire than ever before.

3.0: The Crashening

Well the pile of gigantic ass that forms the fetid core of Earthen Ring raised it's ugly head last night and refused me access for most of the night. When I did get on, it was to a bunch of failing mods and epic lag.

However, on the forums over the last few days there have been some misconceptions about the Tankadin in 3.0 I feel the need to correct.

1. Stop spamming Consecrate on one-to-three-mob pulls! It used to be a good, solid reliable form of Holy Damage. These days we have Hammer of the Righteous and the newly-instant Avenger's Shield in the place of it. In bigger pulls however, use it freely since your mana income from Blessing of Sanctuary should take care of it. Our mana income is better, but it's by no means inexhaustable.

2. On the subject of Hammer of the Righteous, if you don't like the sound of this ability then you have no joy in your heart! What could be better than beating your enemies in the face with a Frying Pan made of your faith?

3. The need for 490 Defense didn't go away just because Anticipation changed and we lost some +Defense from items. Since it's the only hard gear requirement we have for tanking raids these days, just accept it and do what you need to get it.

4. I kinda like being able to gear like a tank rather than a caster in Plate. Ulu's Attack power went up from a wimpy 444 to a somewhat respectable 1128. His Expertise also shot up to 26 in his threat gear (hello Shard of Contempt!)

Tonight, if the server behaves, I'm going to "test" out Ulu's new tanking toys in Karazhan.

Incoming 3.0

Well I finished downloading patch 3.0.2 this morning and installed it. I also updated my add-ons. In theory, I should be good to go when I get home in 2 hours time.

I also took the precautionary measure of parking myself in front of the Paladin Trainer in Stormwind to avoid the lagfest that will be Shattrath on Patch Day.

Tonight's agenda involves logging in, respeccing and setting up my new gearsets. After that, Smart Casual's going on an experimental raid in Karazhan to test out our new talents and spells.

I've altered my intended spec slightly. Given that it seems the +3% mitigation won't be added to Shield of the Templar until closer to WotLK's full release, then I'll leave it out of my spec in favor of maxing out One-Handed Weapon Specialization and Ardent Defender. All-in-all this will be Ulu's initial spec.

Talents and 3.0

Well because I happen to live in the cradle of civilisation as opposed to one of the god-forsaken colonies, I will have to wait until tomorrow evening to try out the myriad delights of Patch 3.0.2.

I suppose the only thing to do is list the probable talent spec for 3.0.

After some thought, I'm going to start with a 4/51/6 spread.

My original plan was a slightly more conventional 5/51/5 but recent news has led me to change my mind.

I switched one point from Seals of the Pure to Improved Judgement so I can better fit in the 6 and 9 second skill rotations. I also got Shield of the Templar since Ghostcrawler has said it will soon include a 3% damage reudction. Those points would have otherwise rounded out One-Handed Weapon Spec and Ardent Defender.

By level 80, I intend Ulu's tanking spec to be 5/56/10.

For Posterity.

Ulushnar's stats, unbuffed at the close of 2.4.

We'll see what the story is in 3.0 on Wednesday.

Dual Talent Specs & the cusp of 3.0

So it was Blizzcon over the weekend and they confirmed that they'd be be doing Dual Talent Specs at some point in Wrath of the Lich King:

The Dual-Talent spec feature will let you switch between your two specs without having to go back to town. You can perfectly do it between fights in a raid, however it won't be possible to switch specs in the middle of an Arena Match. Your keybinds and glyphs will be saved and automatically switched as you change your spec. An itemrack-like mod might also be added to the game to make switching even easier.

This is certainly more than I expected from the idea. I figured they'd put a massive cooldown on it, but they definately seem keen to let folks play with being hybrids. As someone who's focussing on 10-man raiding in Wrath, knowing that spare tanks/healers can switch to full DPS specs on fights where they aren't needed is massively welcome. I really cannot wait until this feature goes live.

In other news, I've slowly been vendoring/destroying unneeded junk/items in my bank in preparation for 3.0/Wrath of the Lich King. I've also altered my gear slightly, swapping Ulu's Illidari Runeshield for his Bulwark of the Amani Empire and his Wristguards of Determination for his Bracers of the Ancient Phalanx. I've also set up an altered outfit for after the patch on Wednesday which switches a few more items around. I'm actually considering using the Shard of Contempt in Ulu's tanking gear.

I really can't wait for this patch!

Update 07Oct08

Well as the witty title may give away, I'm at something of a loss about what to write. I haven't felt the need to play WoW in a while now, although I've been following the Beta changes from the sidelines. The lack of friends and the ever present latency at peak times (ie. the only times I can get on) keep me from actively participating in Beta much.

Since the reorganization of the Prot tree a few pushes ago, things have been looking relatively stable for Tankadins as we head towards the release of 3.0 (next week if the rumors are to be believed). Numbers have been tweaked, but there haven't been any massive changes.

We still don't have an 11-point talent as of this writing, and I imagine we won't see one this side of release. It's kinda sad, but I prefer it to them throwing in some half-assed placeholder to buff/nerf at a later date.

Early data by theorycrafters and raiders seems to indicate that we were sufferring in terms of health and mitigation compared to our eternal "nemeses": Warriors. This seems to have been mollified by the news that in a forthcoming Beta push, the Shield of the Templar talent will be modified to reduce incoming damage by 1/2/3%. This should bring us closer to parity with our fellow shield-bearers.

So sorry readers, nothing exciting to mention here.