MoP and Beyond

Its funny that my last posts were about the potential of Cataclysm as the next mmo or expansion. We all know now that Cataclysm was indeed the expansion after WotLK. With Mists of Pandaria waiting in the wings, not more than a month away, I thought it a great time to revisit this blog and get back into the nitty gritty of it all.

That being said, I’ve transitioned to a Paladin now and can give insight into all 3 roles of DPS, Tanking and Healing. In the coming weeks, I’ll be posting gearing guides, professions, and most importantly, an all inclusive guide spanning my entire playing experience. Should be a long read and work-in-progress, but (hopefully) interesting none the less.

Cheers.

~Q

Time Away

Unfortunately, wasn’t able to keep this as alive as I might have wanted. I got pretty busy getting ready for my time in the military. On that note, it will probably be some time till I post here again. I’ll be training from July till December.  Best of luck to all.

~Q

New MMO or Next Expansion?

Blizzard trademarks “Cataclysm”
A few days ago Blizzard filed a trademark for “Cataclysm” on the United States Patent and Trademark Office website. Cataclysm was registered for :

• Entertainment services, namely, providing on-line computer games; providing computer games that may be accessed via a global computer network; and providing on-line information in the field of computer gaming entertainment
• Comic books, computer game strategy guides, trading cards, coloring books, adhesive stickers, rub-on transfers, notebooks, stationery-type portfolios, posters, greeting cards, calendars, instructional leaflets in the field of computer games, computer game instruction manuals, catalogs in the field of computer games, advertisement boards of paper or cardboard, photographs, art prints
• Computer game software and related instruction manuals and guides sold together as a unit; downloadable computer game software; interactive multimedia computer game program; mousepads

Below is a small extract of the Latest Status Info on the Trademark Applications and Registrations Retrieval (TARR) Website

———————————————

LAST APPLICANT(S)/OWNER(S) OF RECORD
Blizzard Entertainment, Inc.
16215 Alton Parkway
Irvine, CA 92618
United States

GOODS AND/OR SERVICES
Class Status: Active
Computer game software and related instruction manuals and guides sold together as a unit; downloadable computer game software; interactive multimedia computer game program; mousepads

2009-06-30 – New Application Office Supplied Data Entered In Tram

2009-06-30 – New Application Entered In Tram

———————————————

So … What does it mean? Well, Wrath of the Lich King was trademarked a few weeks before the Blizzcon, we’re not going to jump to conclusions here but WoWWiki will most likely give you a few things to think about on their Great Sundering article.

The Great Sundering, also known as simply the Sundering or the Cataclysm was a world event which reshaped Azeroth approximately 10,000 years ago at the end of the War of the Ancients. This event was triggered due to the Well of Eternity being destroyed.

Prior to the Sundering, there was only one continent on Azeroth, referred to as Kalimdor. In the catastrophic explosion, eighty percent of the land mass was destroyed leaving behind the major continents and scattered islands that are known today: Northrend, Kezan, the Eastern Kingdoms, and the remnant still referred to as Kalimdor.

The site of the Well of Eternity became a swirling vortex of power known as the Maelstrom.

A few days ago, one of our user also spotted a test server named “Maelstrom 3 Test” in the US server list (it only showed up for a few seconds, see This post). If the expansion is indeed The Maelstrom/Cataclysm, we can expect to see a few things here:

• Sargeras and/or Deathwing
• Azshara
• Goblins!

Ulduar Podcast

An interesting podcast featuring Ciderhelm and Lore regarding Ulduar on the whole and the hard-mode progression.

http://www.tankspot.com/forums/f189/51723-ulduar-hard-modes.html

Select Patch Notes

Shaman

• A customizable totem bar will now be available for shaman allowing the storing of 4 different totems. These totems can be placed on the ground at once in one global cooldown for the combined mana cost of all 4 totems.
• All Shocks now have a default range of 25 yards, up from 20 yards.
• Base health increased by approximately 7% to correct for shamans having lower health than other classes.
• Chain Heal: Jump distance increased to 10 yards. In addition, the amount of healing now decreases by 40% as it jumps to each new target, instead of 50%.
• Ghost Wolf: Can now be learned at level 16. While in this form, snaring effects may not bring the shaman below base normal run speed.
• Talents
  • Enhancement
    • Shamanistic Rage: Cooldown is now 1 minute, down from 2 minutes. Successful melee attacks now have a chance to generate mana equal to 15% of the shaman’s attack power, down from 30%.
  • Restoration
    • Ancestral Healing: The buff from this ability now reduces the physical damage taken by the target by 3/7/10% instead of increasing the target’s armor.
    • Cure Poison and Cure Disease: Combined into a single spell, Cure Toxins.
    • Earth Shield: Dispel effects will now remove charges of Earth Shield rather than the entire aura.
    • Healing Way: Redesigned. Rather than providing a chance of increasing Healing Wave spells on a friendly target, this talent now innately increases the effectiveness of the shaman’s Healing Wave by 8/16/25%.
    • Mana Tide Totem: Totem health now equal to 10% of the shaman’s health.
    • Nature’s Guardian: Redesigned. Now has a fixed 100% proc rate, has a 30 second internal cooldown, and increases the shaman’s maximum health by 3/6/9/12/15% for 10 seconds.
    • Nature’s Swiftness: Cooldown is now 2 minutes, down from 3 minutes.
    • Tidal Waves: No longer reduces the cast time of Lesser Healing Wave by 30%. It instead now provides +25% critical strike chance to Lesser Healing Wave, along with the previous 30% cast time benefit to Healing Wave.
    • Improved Water Shield: This talent now has a 10/20/30% chance to be triggered by Chain Heal, and the charges of Water Shield are no longer consumed by this talent.

Priest

• Prayer of Healing: The percentage of spell power this spell gains in healing (per target) has been reduced from 80.7% to 52.6%.
• Talents
  • Discipline
    • Penance: Cooldown increased to 12 seconds, up from 10 seconds.
  • Holy
    • Inspiration: The buff from this ability now reduces the physical damage taken by the target by 3/7/10% instead of increasing the target’s armor.

Paladin

• Blessing of Sanctuary: This blessing now also increases stamina by 10%. This effect is not cumulative with Blessing of Kings.
• Charger: Can now be learned at level 40.
• Exorcism: Now has a 1.5 second cast time, but can once again be used on players.
• Hand of Reckoning: Redesigned. Now does damage only when target does not currently have the caster targeted, but damage done increased to 50% of attack power, occurring after the taunt effect is applied.
• Judgement of Light: Now heals for 2% of the attacker’s maximum health instead of a variable amount based on the spell power and attack power of the judging paladin.
• Lay on Hands: The buff from this ability now reduces the physical damage taken by the target by 10/20% instead of increasing the target’s armor.
• Righteous Fury: No longer has a duration or mana cost, remaining until cancelled or death. Also cancelled when a Paladin activates a different talent specialization.
• Sacred Shield: When a paladin casts Flash of Light on a target with this buff, they also now place a heal over time effect on the target, healing that target for 100% of the Flash of Light amount over 12 seconds.
• Seal of Blood: This ability has been removed.
• Seal of the Martyr: This ability has been removed.
• Seal of Vengeance and Seal of Corruption: These seals have been redesigned to deal substantially more damage. Now, once a paladin has 5 copies of the debuff from these seals on his or her target, on each swing the paladin will deal 33% weapon damage as Holy, with critical strikes dealing double damage.
• Shield of Righteousness: Now deals 100% of shield block value as damage instead of 130%.
• Warhorse: Can now be learned at level 20.
• Talents
  • Holy
    • Beacon of Light: The healing amount on the Beacon of Light target is now based on the total healing done (including over-healing) instead of the effective healing done. Radius increased to 60 yards. Multiple Paladins can now have this active on the same target. Buff indicating a player is within range of the Beacon target is no longer displayed.
    • Divine Intellect: This talent now gives 2/4/6/8/10% increased intellect instead of 3/6/9/12/15%.
    • Illumination: This talent now returns 30% of the mana cost of the spell instead of 60%.
  • Protection
    • Ardent Defender: Redesigned. Currently, any damage taken by the paladin while at 35% health or below is reduced. Instead, any attack that would reduce the paladin to 35% health or below has its damage reduced. In addition, once every 2 minutes an attack that would have killed the paladin will fail to kill, and instead set the paladin’s health to 10/20/30% of maximum.
  • Retribution
    • Art of War: Now only applies to melee critical hits, but will make your next Flash of Light or Exorcism instant.
    • Crusader Strike: Damage reduced to 75% weapon damage to match the new 4 second cooldown.
    • Seal of Command: Redesigned. This seal now deals 36% weapon damage on every swing, and deals substantially less judgement damage.
    • Vindication: Redesigned. Now lowers target attack power, is consistent and does not stack with Demoralizing Shout.

There wasn’t much as far as druid healing was concerned, just a few small Feral Cat nerfs.

~Q

Playing army ftl

Sorry I haven’t posted the next guide! I had drill this past weekend and actually had to do stuff! How absurd, I know. Anyway, look for a Razorscale and XT guides coming within the next day or so. I’ll also be going over XT hard mode. Best.

~Q

A Quick Note

Most of the posts here will be guides centered around the 25man encounters. They can very easily be adapted for use with the 10man encounters. Just halve the amount of healers required for each task and that should pretty easily translate to a 10man running 3 healers. If you’re only running 2 healers in your 10man, huzzah! Dividing up tasks is even easier then. I’ll address Razorscale in my next post. Should be fairly brief, there isn’t a terrible amount of information for healers/ranged in that encounter. All the best.

~Q

Introduction and Greeting

Hello and salutations! If you’re reading this, you’ve found my blog. I welcome you to browse the limited nature of it currently. It will be a work-in-progress over the coming weeks as I get it up and running. Lets clear a few things up at the start. I’m not a professional by any means. Any opinions found herein are 100% my own and don’t reflect on anyone or anything outside of this blog. Any references I might link are property of those who wrote them. That all out of the way, let me welcome you once more to my blog.

The purpose here will be to explore some of the aspects of World of Warcraft (here-after referred to as WoW) from a healing-based perspective. My friend Ciderhelm, the administrator of tankspot.com, does phenomenal work crafting videos explaining encounter mechanics and strategies to successfully conquer said encounters.  However, he is a tank and his comments rarely touch on the healing aspect of boss fights. That is something I would like to do here. I’m unsure at the moment if I’ll be able to produce videos, but certainly will do my best to explain encounters from a healing perspective (through various classes as well, but starting with a druid and a shaman).

Once more, please read and enjoy. I’d love to see comments and suggestions as no one is 100% right and all strategies and ideas can be bettered by creative players and theorycrafters. All the best.

~Q