Ah, Blizzard. Just when I think that they’ve hit the cusp of their sick sense of creativity, they surprise me with another devious raid encounter that has the potential to make guild leaders blow a gasket and guild members to sheepishly release and offer their penitent excuses. Ulduar has come, and with it, the most guild-challenging instance since Karazhan’s timing specific boss fights kicked our collective rears a couple years ago.

But don’t worry, I’m not going to expound on the whole raid instance,  just the first part. You may have heard it called by many names, such as “the tank part”, “the flipping awesome tank part!”, or “that string of expletives tank part!”, but regardless, your first encounter in Ulduar is extremely unique. Not just because its an epic start to the raid, but because it changes so many set roles in the guild raid makeup. Let me lay the stage for you:

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In World of Warcraft’s latest patch players are treated to the latest raid zone called Ulduar. The last boss, known as Algalon, has been opened up. There has been some rumbling from the hardcore crowd about the limitations on this fight and how that will affect the game play of the more dedicated. Will this cause frustration? How many people will this affect?

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The latest patch has been released. People have problems, the patchers are down, queues are up. Etc Etc. Can you stand the wait?

Happy Patch day, enjoy a video.

Read on for the patch notes.

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The highly anticipated dual talent spec option for World of Warcraft is almost here! Today, Blizzard has posted a Q&A explaining various details about what you can expect to see when the dual talent spec option goes live.

Talent Dual Spec Q&A with Ghostcrawler
With the next content patch, we will be introducing a number of additions and changes to the game. One new feature in the works is the ability to set up two separate sets of talents, or “dual spec”. While the complete feature may not be immediately available in the Public Test Realms (PTR) and specifics are still liable to change, we wanted to go over some questions with Senior Game Designer Greg “Ghostcrawler” Street to find out more.

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Recently, Blizzard has been releasing  information about the upcoming class changes to take place with the 3.1.0 patch. Here are all 3 of the installments combined for your reading pleasure.

PRIEST

• Divine Spirit – this spell is now a core ability available to all priests.
• Discipline has access to a new talent, Power Word: Barrier. (Think of it as Power Word: Shield for your whole group).
• Several area of effect (AOE) heal spells have been improved: Prayer of Healing can be cast on any groups in your raid party. Holy Nova’s mana cost has been reduced. Circle of Healing now heals for more.
• Shadow priest PvP survivability has been improved: Shadow Form now reduces magic as well as physical damage. Dispersion now removes snares.
• Penance – this spell can now be targeted on the priest.
• Serendipity – this talent now reduces the cast time of Greater Heal and Prayer of Healing when Binding Heal or Flash Heal are cast.
• We are also working to give Holy additional PvP utility.

ROGUE

• Hunger for Blood – instead of a self-buff, this ability can only be used when there is a bleed effect on the target. However, it has no stacks and grants a 15% damage bonus.
• Adrenaline Rush – the cooldown on this ability has been lowered.
• Lightning Reflexes – reduced to 3 ranks. In addition to 2/4/6% dodge, this talent now also grants 4/7/10% passive melee haste.
• Killing Spree – while this ability is active, the rogue does 20% additional damage.
• Savage Combat – now causes 2/4% physical damage done.
• Mace Specialization – this talent now grants haste in addition to armor penetration.

SHAMAN

• Chain Lightning – now jumps to 4 targets but does less damage. We wanted to make the distinction between Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning more clear.
• Storm, Earth and Fire – this talent now increases all damage done by Flame Shock, not just periodic damage.
• Spirit Weapons – now reduces all threat, not just melee threat.
• Unleashed Rage – reduced to 2 ranks, now also increases your critical strike chance with melee attacks by 1/2%.
• Totem streamlining: The Mana Spring and Healing Stream Totems have been combined. The Disease Cleansing and Poison Cleansing Totems have been combined.
• We are also working on giving Enhancement and Elemental more PvP utility.

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