Death Knight PvP at level 80, from the beta. Siege Vehicles! ’nuff said.
I haven’t started a DK yet. Yeah, I know, I’m bad. I did play one for awhile in the beta and I’m looking forward to it, but I think I’m going to get my Rogue up to 80, first. I haven’t had much time to play recently and I’m only level 73.
So. DKs and PvP. What do you think of them as they stand, now?
Are they the overall destruction machine of choice? Or strong against casters and Ok against others? Or…? Are they the Gankers or the Gankees?
Lots of us have encountered this scene in the battlegrounds (BGs:) There’s the Pally, let’s start working on him. I’tll take awhile, but…. WTF!?! (appear at spirit healer)
About That Squishing Noise…
Yes, right now is the time of the Retribution Paladin. They’re lean, mean, squishing machines laying waste to anyone who stands in their way. I don’t play a Pally, my 40 is collecting dust right now, but I’ve been on the receiving end of a few of them in the BGs. It’s not bad if I can land a dismantle and they don’t bubble, but otherwise? I’ve never been slaughtered quite so quickly.
Not that I know what I’m doing, but sheesh.
I’m of two minds on this, especially for long time players. For ages Pallies have been underpowered in some areas and the subject of much complaining from their fans (and which class hasn’t?) so it’s kinda cool that they are now the destruction/murder machine of choice. On the other hand, since I play a Rogue…
My kid has been playing Paladins and Warriors since the original beta, claims they are his favorite classes, and has complained about their damage and abilities for as long as he’s been playing them. I tease him about being a masochist, since those are his classes of choice and their damage has traditionally been …lacking. I’ve also been kidding him about how he must hate the current situation with the Ret. Pally running roughshod over everything.
Word has it that in the Wrath of the Lich King beta test characters were balanced for level 80, but that too little testing was done at the lower levels. The call from dead and envious players, since the 3.0 patch on the 14th, has been heard and the official word is that the nerf is coming (which will make my kid happy. I think. )
Supposedly the nerf is going to clip the burst damage, but will leave longer term DPS about the same. We’ll see. Buffs and nerfs (and patches) usually have their fair share of unintended side-effects.
So What’s the Word?
This post pretty much covers what the fuss is about:
Retribution Paladins: Fair and Balanced - So I tried my hand as a Retribution Paladin this weekend. I had heard all the complaints about how overpowered Retribution was at the moment, so I thought I would get some first hand experience for myself. …
WoWinsider notes the the coming changes are aimed at PvP Paladins and will leave PvE pretty much (in theory) unchanged. It also has a Ret build for PvE types. I’m going to log into my rust covered Pally right now and play with them for a few.
Patch 3.0.2 primer for Retribution Paladins - Retribution deals so much pain that we’ve sent the rest of player base running to Ghostcrawler crying for a nerf. And we’re getting nerfed. To the ground. Don’t panic. The changes are really, mostly aimed at PvP Paladins — okay, …
Here’s a good analysis of the Ret Paladin from Blessings of Kings:
Are Retribution Paladins Overpowered? - Half the challenge of playing a Ret paladin is actually getting to melee range. It’s not like Retribution can Charge or Stealth or Death Grip. If a player lets a Ret paladin get in range, she has already lost half the battle. …
Zuggy (a hardcore PvPer) has some blue posts on Blizzard’s thoughts about the incoming nerfs:
Retribution Paladin Nerfs Incoming - There’s no denying that retribution paladins are insanely overpowered and fortunately (or unfortunately depending…) the nerf stick was officially confirmed earlier this evening. While there are some needed changes to the class to …
And SpoonCraft has details on some of the specific nerfs:
Retribution Paladin Changes Coming Soon (Oct. 17th) - As I stated yesterday, we are happy with Ret’s PvE damage and sustatined damage in PvP, but were concerned that the burst damage in PvP could be too high. We discussed this for literally hours yesterday, which was certainly not the …
So what are your thoughts on the Retribution Pallies and their current or upcoming states?
Of course, one of the big changes in the Wrath of the Lich King expansion is the changes to all the various talent trees. As you probably know, Blizzard isn’t just adding a few new talents or increasing the level cap to 80. No no no, there’s a little more to it than that - they’re making large changes to existing talents and shuffling around their exact position in the talent trees.
So what I’ve put together here is a collection of posts, from various places, that discuss the level 80 talents and changes. Some of these also offer build suggestions, both from raiding and PvP points of view. In addition, If you want to play around with talent builds for your own characters you’ll find the level 80 WoW talent calculator here.
Of course, the changes aren’t 100% finished, all of this is still in beta test, and Blizzard has been known to make big last minute changes. We can count on more changes along with the usual collection of nerfs and maybe some buffs. Still, it’s a place to start thinking about how you might spec your characters when you upgrade to Wrath.
Update 10/14: The 3.0 patch has arrived and here’s an update post on what’s happening with the WoW Talents and Builds.
’nuff said, here ya go!
WotLK: Build 8962 - 4 Extra Points for Frost - When the WotLK expansion hits, as I level up, I will start filling in the Arcane tree until I get Focus Magic. When I hit 80 and start raiding again, the talent build that I will most likely be using is this: 80 PvE/PvP Frost.
WotLK Paladins May Have “Shocking†Potential - All of the above said, the following, were I to PvP as a Shockadin at level 80, would be my talent build without question:. Allow me a couple caveats with the above build: …
Tanked! Revaluing Feral Combat Talents in Beta Build 8926 - The pictured talent build is essentially what I’d like to be using at 80. All PH NYI (place holder, not yet implemented) talents are now “live†on beta, and it’s pertinent to note that the talent “Mother Bear†has been renamed to the …
Want to hit level 80 fast? Looking for ways to familiarize yourself with Northrend without wasting valuable playtime running around in circles? Check out the Killer Guides’ Wrath guide and get ready to go before the expansion hits.
Shock and Awe: The Art of Dual Shockadins in WotLK - Both of these assumptions are based off of items I found in the WotLK database at WoWhead situated around an item level of 200 (the item level which seems to be the base for epics at level 80). In addition to these two assumptions, …
Why 3.0 will change Arena entirely - Much like when Blizzard imeplemented the WoW 2.0 41-point talent trees into the game shortly before TBC, and much of the dissaray it caused, the WoW 3.0 talents are almost entirely based around players being level 80 and consequently …
Truckload ‘o Changes - At level 80, this 80 spellpower. Much higher than it was before. I believe it is still weaker than Flametongue Totem and doesn’t stack with it. Twin Disciplines - The tooltip was fixed to read: Increases your spell power on instant …
8926 DK changes, Blue Posts, and Site News - They may be fun in that you get a lot for your money, but they work against the design goal of being able to build a customized talent tree for your character. They also make spec parity or class balance a lot harder when there are …
A look at our Bear Tanking future in Wrath - Clearly (I hope) a class that could do rogue-level dps and warrior-level tanking with the same talent build is the kind of thing that makes other players a little miffed. But we’re reevaluating a lot of old (and some admittedly tired) …
[Druid] The 3.0 patch - cat build edition - That’s about .66% dps per talent point, which just isn’t that good. This may not make the cut at level 80; it’s still lower per point than master shapeshifter. Rend and Tear barely makes the cut. Assuming that you’re only hitting …
WotLK Hunter Pets - Major Changes - Pets will still have to level to some degree, but it will be a lot more transparent than it is now. A level 1 beast trained by a level 80 hunter will hop to level 70 instantly. That way the pet isn’t completely useless while you try
Edit: Big Red Kitty says - Beta Talent Builds, Just Say No - “OK, see? The hunter class is going to be totally mixed up. Anything and everything people have said, including us, is kaput and moot.”
One of the many additions, for all you Arena fans out there, that’s coming to WoW with The Wrath of the Lich King expansion is the new Orgrimmar arena.
Spooncraft has a video which shows of some pretty interesting features of this particular arena.
Holy crap am I excited about Arenas!? YES I AM! This would be a first for a long time, but I think Blizzard has just made arenas fun for me. I figure if they’re going to turn the PVP game into an FPS Team Deathmatch, then at least make the maps fun to play.
My wife and both kids have got their Wrath of the Lich King beta keys, but not me. Sob. Guess I’ll just mooch off their accounts. Mwahahaha!
So as you may know, especially if you read my other post WoW PvP, Blizzard is letting you copy premade templates of level 80 PvP characters into your Wrath beta account. (They’re also letting you move your regular PvE characters to PvP servers, but that’s another post. )
If you have your beta key, you log into the WoW Beta page, pick the copy template option, and go from there. You’ll land on a page which gives you two choices, one ally, one Horde, for each class in the game. You can pick any three and it takes about a day for them to copy over.
Once it’s copied you’ll have a nicely PvP geared 80, in Dalaran, to play with. My Rogue, for example, has 747 resilience. Not bad.
There’s an interesting glitch, though. Apparently, and I assume this will be quickly fixed, some classes have invisible gear. The female Blood Elf Pally, for one. There are others.
The gear is a mix of blue and purple, so this isn’t a maxed out character. PvE geared characters are not available. I assume this means they want to test the PvP system, right? Well the instances are open (and Rogues don’t need a key,) but the battlegrounds and arenas are not, at least as I write this. Being beta things will change and then change again.
If you’re wondering… I went with a Shadowstep build on this one. The world server is down at the moment, so I don’t have exact numbers, but it’s a pretty basic build. You can hit the level 80 WoW Talent Calculator here and play around with builds.
You do start with some stuff and some nice bags. Haris Pilton, in Shattrath, sells the Gigantic bags at a Gigantique price.
Here’s a screenie of the Orc Rogue with bags. Note the bandages (heal 5800) and the poisons, which are now (will be) bought from vendors. No more flash powder for your Vanish, either.
Naturally, when Wrath goes live all beta characters will be deleted. Still, this gives us a good chance to play around with talents and see what gear will be coming.
I’ll probably use Zygor’s Guide and blast my Rogue to 80 ASAP, then work for some of that gear in the BGs and Arenas (with my 1200 Arena rating.)
Deathknights are a lot of fun so far, so that one will be next. After that, we’ll see.
I expect all the new talents and everything DeathKnight will be significantly tweaked between now and release, so take all beta info with a hefty lump of soothing spices.
Looking around my blog list I came across a couple of interesting PvP posts that I thought you might like to see.
This first one is arena based, but I think it could be easily used elsewhere, in the unlikely event that you can find cooperative players in the BGs. Since my main is a Rogue i particularly liked this one.
Rogue / Rogue vs. Druid / Rogue is no easy match, typically any team with a druid is going to be a tough match for a double rogue team. That said, using systemic decision making and quick reflexes we can learn how to effectively counter these 2v2 teams. Rogue / Rogue Vs. Druid / Rogue 2v2 Arena Strategy
Gnomes. There’s just something disturbing about them. Must be the remnants of the radiation poisoning. It is rather interesting how those Tauren mallets are just the right size…Â Anyway, here’s a fun story of the Hunter and the Gnome Rogue.
The Tauren Hunter was merrily bounding into the Silverwing base in Warsong Gulch; she had been enjoying these player-verses-player excursions lately and was rather fond of her 25,000 honor that she had stockpiled for when she would hit 70 in a couple more levels and would need a nice set of war gear to go with her set of standard adventuring gear. She made it to the roof of the enemy building when suddenly she was jumped upon! By a very persistent gnome rogue. The Fable of the Gnome Rogue
Rogue’s Eye View has something which some of you know about already, but maybe a few don’t. Hope into your very own premade level 80, then go kill the other 80s!
To those that don’t know, earlier this week it was announced that level 80 premades are available to players in the beta test.
In order to copy over a premade character, you’ll need to log into your account at beta.worldofwarcraft.com and make your way to the character copy section. Level 80 Premades Available for Beta Servers
Nyhm is a character best know for making a series of well loved videos on YouTube. Most of these videos have hundreds, or thousands, of 5 star ratings from his fans, so check them out sometime. I’ve posted a few of Nyhm’s videos here, but just search his name on YouTube and you’ll find the others.
I managed to catch Nyhm in-between battles against the evil Gnome hordes and asked him a few questions:
How long have you been playing WoW?
(Since) November of 2004
What kind of raiding and PvPing do you do?
I don’t do much raiding anymore, but I pvp all the time on alts, friends’ characters, and my arena team.
What keeps you playing after all this time?
PvP just never seems to get boring, and I have a lot of friends that play.
Is Nyhm your main character? Or mostly just the face for your productions? (And I did find him on the WoWarmory.)
Nyhm is my main but I don’t play on him anymore
What got you into making videos?
Nothing really, I just decided one day that I wanted to make WoW Videos.
Who’s on your production team? Or do they prefer to remain in the shadows?
My friends help me out a lot.
What equipment and software do you use to make the videos?
What’s the first character you’ll be working on when Wrath of the Lich King is officially released?
Deathknight, of course
Are your guides written from your own efforts and experiences or do you have a team behind them?
They are mostly written by me but I have a lot of help from friends
What made you decide to write leveling and gold guides when there is quite a bit of competition already?
One way to keep the game interesting is doing things out of the game like making videos or guides so it was just another WoW related project that I wanted to complete.
So there you have it, the (really short) Nyhm Interview.
And now, Nyhm will explain, in great detail, why Mages pwn.
And if you want Nyhm’s best advice on leveling (fast), gold (lots of it), Professions and PvP then you’ll click here.
WoW Insider has a fun post on the Great Dwarf Hunter Nesingwary, seen in Stranglethorn Vale and Nagrand. Nesie, of course, is all about hunting the various beasts in the area.
Now one could argue that he’s just thinning herds that grow impossibly fast or maybe he’s just a minion of evil with his wanton slaughter of innocent raptors, er… critters.
The Wrath expansion seems to be bringing in some competition for Nesie:
But that, of course, doesn’t keep the hippie animal lovers from fighting back — as you might know by now, in the expansion Nesingwary is going to face some opposition in the form of D.E.H.T.A., or Druids for the Ethical and Humane Treatment of Animals.
Now let’s say that Nesie gets tired of these guys. Imagine one part of the quest chain being to harass (ie: kill) DEHTA members: “Ok dude, it’s a Druid. Get 15 of your closest friends…”
Or that the DEHTA crowd gets a quest to harass (ie: kill) Nesie’s hunters.
I’m not saying that this will happen, or is even likely, but it’s fun to think about. Especially on an RP (Role Playing) PvP server.
Anyone have any other suggestions to spice this up a bit?
The mighty Nyhm brings forth his wisdom regarding Pick Up Groups (PUGs) and raiding, specifically Karazhan. All of us who’ve been in big PUGs, raiding or not, will nod our heads in agreement.
Nyhm also has the info on how to level faster than anyone else, make tons of gold, level your professions the easy way, and pwn in PvP. Get your dose of Nyhm’s Wisdom here.
Twinking is the fine art of taking your character to levels far beyond what he/she should be able to do at any given level. For example, a Rogue twink, at 19, with 2,000 HP? It’s been done.
The Warsong Gulch Battleground (Capture the Flag) has a level 10-19 bracket. Naturally one wants to be level 19, otherwise rapid doom will happen. Then one needs that little edge over the other 19s…
AzerothNow.com has a killer twinking guide for those level 19 Rogues bent on mayhem and slaughter in Warrsong Gulch (and maybe a duel or three.)
So you’ve done your dailies - everyday, you’ve cleared Heroics and Karazhan for Badges until your eyes bleed, maybe you’re even utterly tired of farming Illidan every week or wiping on Kil’Jaeden. But what now? Level another character? Cancel your subscription until Wrath?
Well, I have your solution: why not create a lvl 19 Twink Rogue? But what is a lvl 19 twink Rogue, you may ask. The simple explanation is that they are characters with the best possible gear for their level (including enchants), whose purpose is PvP, and their playground is the 10-19 bracket of Warsong Gulch Battlegrounds.
edit: A commenter points us to his twinking guides and I may just make use of his level 39 Warlock guide. Very cool. WoW Twink Guide: 39 Affliction Warlock
Leveling
