<font size="3" style="line-height: 1.3em;"><b>Season 5 Arena/Honor items</b></font><br />Season 5 starts this week! Blizzard posters made a small recap of the gear available in Season 5 and for some reasons <span style="text-decoration: underline;">weapons aren&#39;t mentionned in the first two tiers of PvP gear</span>, maybe they just didn&#39;t think it was worth mentioning or it could mean that Savage and Hateful Gladiator weapons aren&#39;t going to be implemented on live servers. <br /><br />Anyway, you can still check the <a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=821" target="_blank"><b>Season 5 Armor Sets and Weapons</b></a> on our dedicated page. <br /><br /><div align="center"><a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=821" target="_blank"><img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/news/2008/december/season5gearr.jpg" alt="" border="0" /></a></div><div class="blizzquotewrap"><div class="blizzquoteinner"><span class="corners-top"><span></span></span><div class="blizzquoteheader"><span>Quote from: <b>Bornakk (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/1/13392255320-season-5-arenahonor-items.html" target="_blank" style="color: white;">Source</a>)</span></b></div><div class="blizzquote">With Arena Season 5 launching on December 16, we wanted to provide some helpful information. The method in which Arena or Honor items can be purchased will be slightly different then how it was before. For Arena items, there will be 3 tiers of purchasable set items that includes pieces for the Head, Shoulders, Chest, Gloves, and Legs as follows:<br /><br />Tier 1 - Superior (blue) quality items:<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>No rating requirements</li><li>Costs Honor and Arena points</li><li>Equivalent to heroic dungeon items</li></ul><br />Tier 2- Epic (purple) quality items:<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>Medium rating requirements</li><li>Costs Arena points</li><li>Equivalent to 10-person raid items</li></ul><br />Tier 3 - Epic (purple) quality items:<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>High rating requirements</li><li>Costs Arena points</li><li>Equivalent to 25-person raid items</li><li>This tier will also contain Arena weapons</li></ul><br />In addition, there will be two tiers of Honor items that includes pieces for the neck, ring, boots, belt, bracer, and trinket as follows:<br /><br />Tier 1 – Epic (purple) quality items:<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>Medium rating requirements</li><li>Costs Honor points</li><li>Equivalent to 10-person raid items</li></ul><br />Tier 2 – Epic (purple) quality items:<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>High rating requirements</li><li>Costs Honor points</li><li>Equivalent to 25-person raid items </li></ul></div><span class="corners-bottom"><span></span></span></div></div><br /><br /><font size="3" style="line-height: 1.3em;"><b>PTR 3.0.8 Official patch notes updated</b></font><br />Wryxian posted <a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/13/7190770922-ptr-patch-308-notes.html" target="_blank"><b>slightly updated patch notes</b></a> on the european forums. A lot of these changes have been mentionned in past blue posts, but I&#39;m pretty sure that Polearms now trainable by Druids and Mental Quickness swapped with Static Shock are new changes. <br /><div class="blizzquotewrap"><div class="blizzquoteinner"><span class="corners-top"><span></span></span><div class="blizzquoteheader"><span>Quote from <b>Blizzard staff</b></span></div><div class="blizzquote"><img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/ideathknights.gif" alt="" border="0" /> <b><span style="color: #C41E3A;">Death Knight</span></b> (<b><a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=650" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Skills List</span></a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?deathknight" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Talent + Glyph Calc.</span></a></b>)<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li><del>Death Knights have access to unique death-knight only facial textures and skin tones. These can be selected at the character creation screen. </del></li></ul><br /><img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/idruids.gif" alt="" border="0" /> <b><span style="color: #FF7D0A;">Druid</span></b> (<b><a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=700" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Skills List</span></a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?druid" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Talent + Glyph Calc.</span></a></b>)<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>Polearms: Now trainable by Druids.</li><li>Starfall: Instead of canceling shapeshifting, now cancels on shapeshifting into an animal form.</li></ul><br /><img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/ihunters.gif" alt="" border="0" /> <b><span style="color: #ABD473;">Hunter</span></b> (<b><a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=620" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Skills List</span></a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?hunter" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Talent + Glyph Calc.</span></a></b>)<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>Arcane Shot: Mana cost lowered to match the cost of Steady Shot.</li><li>Explosive Shot: Damage increased substantially, and additional scaling added to compensate Survival Hunters for the decrease in power of Steady Shot. No longer deals damage to secondary targets.</li></ul><br /><img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/ishamans.gif" alt="" border="0" /> <b><span style="color: #2459FF;">Shaman</span></b> (<b><a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=660" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Skills List</span></a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?shaman" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Talent + Glyph Calc.</span></a></b>)<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>Mental Quickness and Static Shock have switched positions in the talent tree.</li><li>Mental Quickness: The change from attack power to agility has been reverted. Reduces the mana cost of instant cast Shaman spells by 2/4/6% and increases spell power by an amount equal to 10/20/30% of your attack power.</li><li>Elemental Oath: In addition to existing effects, now increases spell damage done by the Shaman by 5/10% while Elemental Focus Clearcasting is active.</li><li>Elemental Mastery: Redesigned. Now increases the Shaman’s critical strike chance by 20% for 30 seconds. Cooldown remains at 3 minutes.</li></ul><br /><img src="http://static.mmo-champion.com/mmoc/images/icons/iwarlocks.gif" alt="" border="0" /> <b><span style="color: #9482CA;">Warlock</span></b> (<b><a href="http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?page=680" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Skills List</span></a> / <a href="http://talent.mmo-champion.com/?warlock" target="_blank"><span style="color: orange;">Talent + Glyph Calc.</span></a></b>)<br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>Demonic Knowledge: Patch note changes rolled back. Talent reverted to its 3.0.3 state.</li><li>Demonic Tactics: Patch note changes rolled back. Talent reverted to its 3.0.3 state.</li></ul><br /><span style="color: white;"><b>Professions</b></span><br /><b>Inscription</b><br /><ul style="margin-top: 0; margin-bottom: 0;"><li>Deterrence Glyph: Now -10 seconds instead of -20.</li></ul></div><span class="corners-bottom"><span></span></span></div></div><br /><br /><font size="3" style="line-height: 1.3em;"><b>Character Re-Customization Now Available in Europe!</b></font><br /><div class="blizzquotewrap"><div class="blizzquoteinner"><span class="corners-top"><span></span></span><div class="blizzquoteheader"><span>Quote from: <b>Blizzard (<a href="http://www.wow-europe.com/en/index.xml" target="_blank" style="color: white;">Source</a>)</span></b></div><div class="blizzquote">Ready for a new look in World of Warcraft, but the barbershop&#39;s just not cutting it? You can now change a character’s gender, face, skin color, and other cosmetic features (such as tauren horn styles or a night elf&#39;s facial markings) using the brand-new Character Re-Customization service.<br />Available at the <a href="http://www.wow-europe.com/account/" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: white;">Account Management</span></b></a> page for a flat fee of 15€/£12, Character Re-Customization covers all available cosmetic options for a single character and includes an optional name change to go with your new look.<br /><br />For more information, see the <a href="http://eu.blizzard.com/support/article/CRCFAQ" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: white;">FAQ</span></b></a> -- or log in to the <a href="http://www.wow-europe.com/character/character-customization-intro.html" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: white;">Character Re-Customization</span></b></a> page now to begin the process of reinventing the new you! </div><span class="corners-bottom"><span></span></span></div></div><br /><br /><font size="3" style="line-height: 1.3em;"><b>Blue posts</b></font><br /><div class="blizzquotewrap"><div class="blizzquoteinner"><span class="corners-top"><span></span></span><div class="blizzquoteheader"><span>Quote from <b>Blizzard staff</b></span></div><div class="blizzquote"><span style="color: white;"><b>Healing and mana management "too easy" for the moment</b></span><br />Mana management for healers in particular, and in large raids in particular, does seem to be really easy. This is interesting because so many players in beta had the feedback that they were having mana difficulties.<br /><br />You can point at several mechanics that might make mana regen too easy: replenishment, int benefiting spirit regen, spirit offering so many other benefits, the content being relatively easy right now....<br /><br />We aren&#39;t making any changes to how things work for the moment, but it is something we&#39;re keeping an eye on. Just keep in mind that when encounters can&#39;t challenge healer mana pools, they end up having complex mechanics to learn, or dump huge damage spikes on the tanks in order to be of sufficient difficulty.<br /><br />Ulduar will also be harder than Naxx. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/27/13393405264-have-blizzard-failed-the-mana-regen-game.html" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: white;">Source</span></b></a>)<br /><br /><span style="color: white;"><b>Arena balancing and Season 5 launch</b></span><br />Look, this is the first major change WoW has seen since Arenas launched. At the beginning of BC nobody was quite sure what to expect. Classes and gear and even the Arena rules evolved since that time, but we still have seen nothing on the scale of the class and gear changes that occured when Lich King went live. We&#39;ve done our estimates and players have made many predictions and we are all going to know a lot more about the true state of things in a few weeks here. Sure, I&#39;m nervous. The forums and perhaps even the actual game are going to be pretty crazy for a few days. If the past is any indication, there will be at least one or two huge issues that nobody predicted while some of the things we were all worried about will end up being not that big a deal. But you have my word that we will keep making adjustments until things feel fair. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/27/13587298894-gc-what-is-plan-b.html" target="_blank"><b><span style="color: white;">Source</span></b></a>)<br /><br /><span style="color: white;"><b>Healing and resilience effect on game balancing</b></span><br />Dynamics shift dramatically as players acquire more resilience gear. Specs and comps that aren&#39;t viable in straight PvE gear become much more viable when burst damage decreases. We have seen this happen for four seasons now.<br /><br />We haven&#39;t made an effort to keep the dynamic from shifting, nor do we think it&#39;s a problem that the dynamic shifts. On the contrary, if you didn&#39;t notice any effect from all that gladiator gear you were acquiring, it would be much less motivational as a reward.<br /><br />Likewise, if you could heal through tons of damage even without a lot of PvP gear, then what would happen with lots of PvP gear? It&#39;s likely the game would devolve into silencing or CC&#39;ing the healer and specs that rely on doing a lot of damage would be shut out as gear improved.<br /><br />As I have said in a few threads, most players agree that the strength of healing increases as the burst damage endemic to crits decreases. The only question is to what degree. (<a href="http://blue.mmo-champion.com/27/13587719113-ive-never-seen-something-move-obvious-since.html" target="_blank">[...</a></div><span class="corners-bottom"><span></span></span></div></div>


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