4.0.1: Live for testing

[Lurile]

So I'm almost done downloading the PTR before church for the Cataclysm prepatch. Anyone can get in, although it shouldn't be confused for the beta. It implements a lot of class changes, and I heard you can fly everywhere. There are no new combos, races, or changes to zones I hear, unfortunately. But be sure to hop over to the official WoW website and click into the PTR.

[Chikt]

No flying in the world and no old-world changes. It's only class related changes, basically.

[Durk'atar]

Considering how much Beta is still changing from week to week, exactly what changes does this build include?

[Moknim]

From mmo-champ:


Old world changes, new quests, etc ... are NOT AVAILABLE, but will be available on live realms for people without the expansion after it's deployed.

Basically, on the test realms:

Classes changes are up, new talent builds, new glyphs (not fully implemented yet), etc ...
Revamped old zones are NOT available
New graphics (textures, water effects) are NOT available
Archaeology is NOT available
Guild leveling is NOT available
Flying in Azeroth is NOT available
New content is NOT available

[Emyi]

Anxiously waiting for Emyi to transfer

[Lurile]

I honestly don't know other than the new class changes, what the cool stuff I get to see here will be...but...

[Roth'rili]

This is just from dueling and messing around on the ptr!

All around I didn't think shaman changed much. Most dmg classes are pretty globally and can kill you in seconds, beside Ret pally, and warrior that come to mind. I mainly played around as elemental in my resto pvp gear so I wasn't enjoying two shots as much. Earthquake and the lighting shield stacking talent both have no use in 1v1 but I can see them shine in BGs still. Also Earthquake as a amazing animation I think and I had fun spamming it. I mainly switched to elemental to fool around, cause as resto I was really getting pounded into the dirt. There is no way to get stoneclaw glyph for shield (even if you already had) and insta ghost wolf is not achievable at 80 so makes me very squishy, and I can't run away beside relying on earthbind and frostshock. *cough as a warrior chain spams intercept and charge anyways* But with no way to absorb dmg till you get the nerfed stoneclaw glyph and no way to run away resto shaman is going to hurt till Cata if blizz doesn't tone down the numbers just slightly. They do have good healing in their talent passives though and I expect them to do better in PvE as it will allow them to do more things then constantly heal to stay alive.

I did take notice of some other class changes while fooling around. Ret pallies are not that OP right out of the box woot! I can still forever duel a ret pally even with their interrupt on the PTR. Warrior feels like their numbers are the same, probably cause the removal of ArP...which got converted to crit. Which I am sorry I got to be like wtfbliz! Nerf crit then convert the one gem every warrior as socket to crit, why not str? That would be to convenient!? :confused: Also BM hunters (LOL! LUST HOUND!), Destro locks, Frost mages, shadow priests and of course boom chicken can kill you in seconds or global you.

Also resil sucks hardcore, you can pretty much PvP in your PvE set and still do well or even outstanding.

This is just pure speculation of, inaccurate numbers, and a still testing phase, opinion of mine. I am enjoying my self still and I am sure once I re-keybind my spells and get off my addiction and crippling dependency of clique and grid I will do better. :D

P.S Holy priests look amazingly fun to play! Serendipity and their other talent stuff have cool animations and seems like that can rival Disc as a PvP healer in the PTR. Plus they get a neat few second stun, still probably the best 1v1 healer.

[Atlarian]

I have no idea how to do this at all.
Is it open to everyone or...

[Ryoku]

This is just from dueling and messing around on the ptr!

All around I didn't think shaman changed much. Most dmg classes are pretty globally and can kill you in seconds, beside Ret pally, and warrior that come to mind. I mainly played around as elemental in my resto pvp gear so I wasn't enjoying two shots as much. Earthquake and the lighting shield stacking talent both have no use in 1v1 but I can see them shine in BGs still. Also Earthquake as a amazing animation I think and I had fun spamming it. I mainly switched to elemental to fool around, cause as resto I was really getting pounded into the dirt. There is no way to get stoneclaw glyph for shield (even if you already had) and insta ghost wolf is not achievable at 80 so makes me very squishy, and I can't run away beside relying on earthbind and frostshock. *cough as a warrior chain spams intercept and charge anyways* But with no way to absorb dmg till you get the nerfed stoneclaw glyph and no way to run away resto shaman is going to hurt till Cata if blizz doesn't tone down the numbers just slightly. They do have good healing in their talent passives though and I expect them to do better in PvE as it will allow them to do more things then constantly heal to stay alive.

I did take notice of some other class changes while fooling around. Ret pallies are not that OP right out of the box woot! I can still forever duel a ret pally even with their interrupt on the PTR. Warrior feels like their numbers are the same, probably cause the removal of ArP...which got converted to crit. Which I am sorry I got to be like wtfbliz! Nerf crit then convert the one gem every warrior as socket to crit, why not str? That would be to convenient!? :confused: Also BM hunters (LOL! LUST HOUND!), Destro locks, Frost mages, shadow priests and of course boom chicken can kill you in seconds or global you.

Also resil sucks hardcore, you can pretty much PvP in your PvE set and still do well or even outstanding.

This is just pure speculation of, inaccurate numbers, and a still testing phase, opinion of mine. I am enjoying my self still and I am sure once I re-keybind my spells and get off my addiction and crippling dependency of clique and grid I will do better. :D

P.S Holy priests look amazingly fun to play! Serendipity and their other talent stuff have cool animations and seems like that can rival Disc as a PvP healer in the PTR. Plus they get a neat few second stun, still probably the best 1v1 healer.

Sucks to hear about Resil (especially since I'm capped... Cough). I'm pretty sure Blizzard will recalibrate it for 85... Otherwise I'm not resubbing.

Also, I was looking at the Holy Priest stuff as well. They have a lot of interesting talents, but I don't see anything that can really trump the power of Pennance and Pain Supp.

[Lurile]

Sucks to hear about Resil (especially since I'm capped... Cough). I'm pretty sure Blizzard will recalibrate it for 85... Otherwise I'm not resubbing.

Also, I was looking at the Holy Priest stuff as well. They have a lot of interesting talents, but I don't see anything that can really trump the power of Pennance and Pain Supp.

The resil change is all about giving crit classes a chance to shine in PvP, and assuming Blizz has held true with their "Burst and control don't matter anymore, we all have aboot 50k hp" promise, this resil change won't kill us. I don't know though

[Raynell]

When I get the chance to, I'm giving Prot a go, both PvE/PvP, on good ol' Raynell.

[Roth'rili]

Update! (sorry only been messing around with my shaman really)

Telluric Currents as just been shown to me to be more useful maybe then I originally thought. With my Lighting Bolts hitting for about 2600, minus the cost of LB(263), and gaining 40% of that number in mana it comes to about 930+ mana back. Which is really nice considering your mana efficient heal is 200 something and riptide is about 400+ and would make casting a big heal make you lose only about 170+ mana. I can see spamming LB with fast haste filling up your mana bar pretty nicely in non intense healing situations in PvE. In PvP though I am not to sure cause the person that enlightened me to it thought it was a must for PvP. Which I replied "As Resto in PvP I am spending more time healing then being offensive and when I am offensive its rarely to cast LB. Its usually a flameshock+lava burst." I am not to sure how that setup will even change since shaman still don't have a way to shield themselves for a few seconds to go offensive. Plus the matter of risking a LB getting a interrupt causing your heals in be locked out.

Focus Insight seems nice, though you do end up paying a little bit more (about maybe 240+ mana) on a heal to boost it by 30%. Which is noticeable I think. I went from 15k GHW to a almost 20k GHW on a non crit which I will probably find more use for it in PvP. Mainly when I need to frost shock kite to be able to get away while increasing my healing potential.

Cleansing Waters is nice, I love it for PvP! Well as long as there isn't a unstable affliction dispelled, the healing will soften the dmg but the silence will still kill you. Its a nice 3k+ heal for removing a magic debuff or curse, so it acts as a cleanse and minor heal! Plus I love being able to cleanse magic debuffs again.

Sorry for my little update posts and mostly being about shamans. If any shamans like hearing the changes without wanting to head to the PTR themselves then my job is done. I also wanted to test out my warrior but since the removal of my keybindings and macros my laziness as deterred me from actually testing him out. Mainly cause I don't want to go back and forth copy and pasting my macros dang it.

[Lurile]

I'm entertained by focus thusfar, I started a hunter before the PTR bugged up completely and was spamming arcane shot, I have to wait sometimes between fights because it's slow, but two in a row can two shot starting mobs, sure beats auto shooting the fuck out of things until they were in melee range and playing with raptor strike.

[Roth'rili]

Premades are now available and now I am just messing around with prospective classes I want to be in Cata. What is a good feral cat pvp build so far cause I am unsure at the moment. Should I be getting everything thats not the three bear talents on the right? I tried to go to elitist jerks and SK gaming to look at specs and line up the right choices, but they really changed a lot in the tree it seems. I can not cleary see whats pure PvE talent might be since my experience with druids isn't that much. Right now the build I just settled with at 80 is this (http://wowtal.com/#k=-b-DWtPT.9zi.druid) (no hurts me if its horrible).

Then I'll try out priest before actually testing out classes I know heh.

[Catilyn]

Lawl, Kennith, you found me on the PTR.
Interestingly, you can play on the PTR even if your Account is frozen.

I'm on the Broxigan (US, PvP) Realm, if anyone wants to duel Catilyn with the new talent changes.

[Roth'rili]

Lawl, Kennith, you found me on the PTR.
Interestingly, you can play on the PTR even if your Account is frozen.

I'm on the Broxigan (US, PvP) Realm, if anyone wants to duel Catilyn with the new talent changes.

Psh no one wants to duel Cat even with the old talent trees =P

[Ryoku]

Premades are now available and now I am just messing around with prospective classes I want to be in Cata. What is a good feral cat pvp build so far cause I am unsure at the moment. Should I be getting everything thats not the three bear talents on the right? I tried to go to elitist jerks and SK gaming to look at specs and line up the right choices, but they really changed a lot in the tree it seems. I can not cleary see whats pure PvE talent might be since my experience with druids isn't that much. Right now the build I just settled with at 80 is this (http://wowtal.com/#k=-b-DWtPT.9zi.druid) (no hurts me if its horrible).

Then I'll try out priest before actually testing out classes I know heh.

As a general rule talents that are based on "if target has X amount of health or less" aren't good for PvP for any class because it's only useful for that small amount of time (that is unless we're talking about adding good damage to a specific ability, which can be good in WotLK as it makes an execute mechanic for good burst). It works for raiding because bosses can spend several minutes around 25% health, but it PvP (yes even with increassed health pools) unless you're purely dueling there's going to be health bars fluctuating all around with heals and burst and stuff. Fuck in WotLK you're not even going to barely touch a most people at 25% health or less before they're dead. Plus, the ability only refreshes rip. At 25% adding a DoT can be very marginal. I just wouldn't go there, and would personally rather have the Stampede talent.

http://wowtal.com/#k=-YovMF3j1.9zi.druid This is what I'd go with at 80. Endless Carnage is okay, but it's only really useful for Savage Roar in PvP, so I marginalize it. Pulverize on the other hand gives you the opportunity to do some decent burst when in bear form, and the potential to set yourself up for added burst in cat (pop bear gain lacerate while being beat on, pulverize, swap cat with 10% extra crit chance).

Oh, and fury swipes. It's a bear form thing. In cat form your auto attack hits fast and weak, meaning the proccs are significantly less useful. In bear form you hit like a warrior, so the talent is akin to the old sword specc talent in that regard. However, you use bear form mainly for when you're getting focus fired, so having RNG damage addition feels a bit subpar.

[Anthek]

http://wowtal.com/#k=-YovMF3j1.9zi.druid This is what I'd go with at 80. Endless Carnage is okay, but it's only really useful for Savage Roar in PvP, so I marginalize it. Pulverize on the other hand gives you the opportunity to do some decent burst when in bear form, and the potential to set yourself up for added burst in cat (pop bear gain lacerate while being beat on, pulverize, swap cat with 10% extra crit chance).

Oh, and fury swipes. It's a bear form thing. In cat form your auto attack hits fast and weak, meaning the proccs are significantly less useful. In bear form you hit like a warrior, so the talent is akin to the old sword specc talent in that regard. However, you use bear form mainly for when you're getting focus fired, so having RNG damage addition feels a bit subpar.

Blessing of the Grove and Primal Madness aren't effective talents in PvP (in general, really), and points better placed in Feral Aggression and Thick Hide.

[Ryoku]

It's a matter of personal preference. Druids use shred all the time, therefore a solid damage bonus on it is beneficial across the board, so I don't know where you can really say that it's generally not good, but more FB could be a good substitute for good burst so I'll let you to that opinion.

Thick hide is eh.. Bear Druids already mitigate an asston of damage from physical. I'd rather have an extra point and more energy for burst, at least in WotLK.

[Anthek]

It's a matter of personal preference. Druids use shred all the time, therefore a solid damage bonus on it is beneficial across the board, so I don't know where you can really say that it's generally not good, but more FB could be a good substitute for good burst so I'll let you to that opinion.

Thick hide is eh.. Bear Druids already mitigate an asston of damage from physical. I'd rather have an extra point and more energy for burst, at least in WotLK.

It's a very small bonus to one ability that's not exactly reliable to use in PvP since it has a positional requirement, even though it also boosts Rejuv, but that has such a higher mana cost and less healing that it's better to use Predator's Swiftness on Healing Touch or just Regrowth or Nourish. They brought up Mangle's damage somewhat to compensate for this, and some players put points into Imp. Mangle for PvP even now because of this. As for Thick Hide, the 10% increase in armor and critical strike reduction applies to all forms, not just bear, much better for going toe to toe with other melee, during a melee stun lock (with the loss of Primal Tenacity, much more important), or being caught in anything that would prevent a shift. Bear form in general probably isn't going to be used as much, besides for turtling and Bash, since Feral Charge no longer interrupts and the benefit of Stampede for Cat Form.

EDIT: Another thing I forgot to mention, Pulverize is purely a tanking tool. The buff doesn't work in Cat form, just like most buffs don't between forms, and staying in Bear form long enough just to apply the stacks of Lacerate needed is much, much less damage than just sticking to Cat.

[Roth'rili]

I am also assuming builds can wildly change depending on gear. Cause say I got this build from a none premade character on the PTR here (http://wowtal.com/#k=-bqP-BuV.9zi.druid). This was a feral druid out infront of stormwind dueling and she was doing ridiculously well. She was mostly in wrathful though and of course probably had some glyphs and most importantly that one tank trinket Corroded key. With the 200+ stam from the key and the key's effect of placing a shield on you, she effectively had like 6-7k hp on me in human form. I am guessing thats why she went a little bit more offensive in her build and passed up thick hide and stuff? Cause I couldn't really get the build to work myself really.

There is obviously a lot of self learning while leveling up as a druid on how to do things. Like getting the timing to switch forms, CC to run, heal, and renter the fight while kiting. Good druids that do that stuff get major props from me since thats harder then hell to do properly.

[Moknim]

Well, I can't see any of the specs that have been linked (they go nowhere - I'm assuming its due to changes in the builds).

There are multiple ways to spec/glyph as a kitty - and a lot of it depends on exactly what you are doing. Someone who is doing a lot of dueling will spec differently from someone who is in arenas with a healer. Typically, though, you want to spec as offensively as possible - think of yourself as a kitty who happens to be able to shift out of roots.

I would likely spec like this at 80: http://wowtal.com/#k=-bK2BvLzY.a0o.druid

(assuming we won't get that last point until 81)

The points in endless carnage and thick hide are the four that can/should be shifted around for your preference. I see no reason not to take endless carnage (since Savage Roar is the hardest thing to keep up and the thing you want to keep up the most). I could definitely see picking up Feral Aggression though - 10% damage on FB is nothing to laugh at.

And yes - feral PvP is HIGHLY gear dependent. More so than any other class I played.