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- World of Warcraft Client Patch 2.4.0
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The latest patch notes can always be found at
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/
The latest test realm patch notes can always be found at
http://www.worldofwarcraft.com/patchnotes/test-realm-patchnotes.html
Fury of the Sunwell
The glorious fount of arcane energy known as the Sunwell empowered the
high elves for millennia, until the death knight Arthas laid siege to
the elven kingdom and corrupted its sacred energies. Seeing no other
alternative, a band of survivors led by Prince Kael’thas destroyed the
ancient fount. Over time the surviving elves fell pray to a crippling
magical withdrawal.
Now, promising salvation for his people, Kael’thas has returned. Soon
the Sunwell will shine once again, but whether the sacred fount will
usher in deliverance or destruction remains to be seen.
In Memoriam: Gary Gygax
Blizzard Entertainment would like to dedicate the patch in memory of
Gary Gygax. His work on D&D was an inspiration to us in many ways and
helped spark our passion for creating games of our own. As avid D&D
players and fellow game developers, we were all saddened by the news of
his passing; we feel we’ve lost a true adventuring companion. Thanks
for everything and farewell, Gary. You will be missed.
Combat Log Improvements
The combat log has undergone improvements that allow more robust combat
text filtering including the ability to define custom colors for enemies
and friends as well as combat text filtering for self and others.
Global Arena Tournament
Players will be able to create level-70 characters with epic
equipment and compete on special tournament realms in a new global arena
tournament. For more information, details and entry requirements,
please visit the official tournament pages.
General
- The Sunwell Isle is now available for play. This area includes a new
quest hub and 5-player and 25-player instances.
- The combined forces of Shattrath have launched an attack on the Isle
of Quel’Danas, to confront Kael’thas and the Legion at the Sunwell
and surrounding areas. Players will now be able to gain reputation
with the Shattered Sun Offensive and participate in a new set of
daily quests.
- A representative of the Keepers of Time has been spotted at the
World’s End Tavern in Shattrath. Players in good standing with the
faction will be granted ease of passage to the Caverns of Time.
- Characters will now retain talented spell ranks so when they retalent
they do not have to relearn the spells from trainers.
- Spell Haste: Spell haste now reduces the global cooldown on spells,
down to a minimum of 1 second. This change does not apply to melee
and ranged abilities.
- Item Cast Spells: Many spells cast by items were being cast as if
the caster were the same level as the item. Most of those will now
be cast at the player’s level, giving them a reasonable chance to
miss,be dispelled, or be resisted.
- Resilience: Now reduces the magnitude of mana draining effects by the
same amount that it reduces critical strike damage. The Tooltip has
been revised to reflect this.
- Spirit-Based Mana Regeneration: This system has been adjusted so that
as your intellect rises, you will regenerate more mana per point of
spirit.
- Weapon Skill: Points will be gained faster in weapon skills for
levels 1 through 59.
- The Daily Quest limit has been increased to 25.
- Non-self % based haste spells will no longer stack with each other.
Racials
- Find Treasure: This ability no longer deactivates upon death.
Druids
- Cyclone range is now 20 yards, down from 30.
- Empowered Rejuvenation: This talent now properly affects the final
heal from Lifebloom.
- Gift of Nature: This talent now properly affects the healing from
Tranquility.
- Insect Swarm: Casting lower ranks of this spell is now properly
penalized like other healing and damage effects.
- Lacerate: This ability now deals additional damage based on the
attack power of the Druid.
- Lifebloom: The bonus coefficient on the final bloom effect has been
reduced by 20%. This spell will no longer cause error messages when
interacting with Spellsteal or while the Druid is under the effects
of Mind Control.
- Mangle (Bear) now properly triggers a 1.5 second global cooldown,
increased from 1.0 second.
- Many shapeshift form tooltips have been updated to be consistent with
each other.
- Natural Perfection: This ability will no longer be triggered by
taking critical strikes while sitting. In addition, it is now
affected by the Subtlety talent and now reduces damage by 2/3/4%,
down from 1/3/5%.
- Nurturing Instinct increases your healing spells by up to 50/100% of
your Agility, and increases healing done to you by 10/20% while in
Cat form.
- Regrowth: The mana cost of this spell has been reduced by
approximately 20%.
- When a Druid in cat form casts Pounce it will now properly animate.
Hunters
- Equipping a thrown weapon while in the middle of an Auto-Shot will
no longer cause animation issues.
- Casting Flare while in any way not visible, will no longer cause your
flare to be invisible to other players.
- Hunter’s Mark: Hunters with Improved Hunter’s Mark will now properly
overwrite Hunter’s Mark cast by Hunters without the talent.
- Improved Mend Pet now has a 25/50% chance to remove one Curse,
Disease, Magic, or Poison effect, up from 15/50%.
- The stamina tooltip for hunter pets will now display the proper
health increase.
- Track spells will now persist after death.
- Hunters will no longer spin around if they cast Aimed Shot or Steady
Shot while facing away from their target.
Mages
- Arcane Explosion: The damage cap for area of effect damage on this
spell has been increased by approximately 50%.
- Arcane Fortitude now increases your armor by an amount equal to 100%
of your Intellect, up from 50%.
- Blink, Slow, and Spellsteal have all had their mana cost reduced.
- Improved Blink: This talent no longer reduces the mana cost of Blink.
Instead, it increases the chance for all attacks to miss the Mage by
25% for 2/4 sec after Blink is cast.
- Using low ranks of Fire Ward and Frost Ward spell will now be
penalized the same way healing spells are penalized.
- Frostbite: When a frost spell is reflected back at a Mage, it is
now possible for the Mage to suffer from the Frostibte effect.
- Ice Barrier: Using low ranks of this spell will now be penalized
the same way healing spells are penalized.
- Icy Veins no longer increases the chance your chilling effects will
Freeze the target, but now increases the chance to avoid interruption
caused by damage while casting any spell by 100% while active.
- Improved FireWard has become Molten Shields.
- Mana Shield: This spell will now get a percentage of the Mage’s bonus
to spell damage as an additional effect.
- New Talent: Molten Shields will cause your Fire Ward to have a 10/20%
chance to reflect Fire spells while active. In addition, your Molten
Armor has a 50/100% chance to affect ranged and spell attacks.
- Permafrost: This talent will now correctly increase the movement
slowing effect of frost Armor instead of the attack speed slowing
effect.
- Spellsteal will no longer overwrite a longer duration buff.
Paladins
- Avenger’s Shield, Holy Shield and Holy Shock: Casting lower ranks of
these spells is now properly penalized like other healing and damage
effects.
- Avenger’s Shield: This ability will no longer jump to secondary
targets which are under the effect of crowd-control spells that break
on taking damage. I.e. Polymorph, Sap, etc.
- Crusader Strike: This ability will no longer refresh the Healing Way
buff from the Shaman talent.
- Illumination: The mana energize from this talent no longer has
a chance to set off other triggered effects.
- Holy Shock: The healing, damage, and mana cost of this spell have all
been increased.
- Judgment of the Crusader: It is no longer possible to have icons for
two different ranks of Judgment of the Crusader appear at the same
time when judged by multiple Paladins.
- Judgment of Wisdom: Some abilities (such as Frostbolt) were not
triggering the mana energize effect from this spell. This has now
been fixed.
- Resistance Auras: It is no longer possible for two Paladins in the
same party to make it appear that players have two of the same
resistance aura active.
- Righteous Defense: This spell will now always be castable on friendly
npcs.
- Seal of Blood: This ability will no longer cause spell pushback for
the Paladin with this seal active.
- Sense Undead- Now persists after death.
- Turn Undead(Rank 3):This spell has been reworked and has been renamed
to “Turn Evil”. It will now work on Demons in addition to Undead.
Turn Evil is subject to diminishing returns, and lasts 10 seconds in
PvP.
Priests
- Chastise no longer disorients the target, but now is instant cast and
roots the target for 2 seconds.
- Fear Ward is now usable while in Shadow form.
- Focused Will now reduces damage by 2/3/4%, up from 1/3/5%.
- Inner Focus: Chastise now benefits from Inner Focus. In addition,
Starshards no longer consumes Inner Focus.
- Mass Dispel now affects a maximum of 10 targets, increased from 5.
- Power Infusion: Infuses the target with power, increasing their spell
haste by 20% and reducing the mana cost