Re: World of Warcraft: Cataclysm Thread
General Information:
General
* More character slots might be added but maybe not for Cataclysm.
* You might be able to reorder the characters on your character selection screen at some point.
* There are some ideas for "mentoring" to let people of varied levels play together without powerleveling. Things like downleveling yourself to play with them is a possibility but it might not be for Cataclysm.
* Character visual customization is something they would like to adress, but they don't really know what the right solution is. They have a few ideas in mind and might do something about it soon.
* Oceanic servers will get their own maintenance time at some point.
* Dancing is still in the work and the animation is working on them, there is still some work to do to make it a real feature.
Races
* Race changes will be available shortly after Faction changes. There is no point in not allowing that since you can't really prevent people with multiple accounts to play both side on PvP servers anyway.
* All races will have updated racials with Cataclysm, they should be similar to what the Goblins have. (Increased health/mana potion effects, etc ...)
Guild Leveling System
* The idea behind the guild leveling system is to make people want to be in guilds and make people feel better about being in a guild. The goal is to take that feature and make it the best they can. (Guild Talent Trees, etc ...)
* You will be able to create guild heirlooms with the new guild leveling system, you can buy profession plans and anyone in your guild can wear that item, it will scale with level.
Professions
* Armorsmith and Weaponsmith specialization really felt like the Blacksmith was limited by his choice, that's why it was ignored in Wrath of the Lich King. Ultimately it's better if the player can craft more stuff instead of just being able to craft 2H swords or whatever.
* Herbs and Ore Nodes will be reitemized with the revamp.
Player vs. Player
* XP in Battlegrounds need to be fixed because there is a lot of XP leeching in the 71-80 Brackets. Once it's fixed, it will be improved across the board.
Raids & Dungeons
* You can't get Frostmourne because it would take control of your soul. Frostmourne would be playing your character, not you. The weapon has an unique fate and the encounter is going to be mega.
* There won't be any option to do Onyxia at level 60 anymore after the revamp in 3.2.2.
Cataclysm
* There isn't any plan to prevent ganking in the contested zones of Azeroth, even with flying mounts available here. This is just part of being on a PvP server.
* They can't spoil the Thrall / Garrosh storyline, but with the cataclysm raging everywhere, what do you think the world's mightiest shaman would need to do?
* Northrend and Outland won't really be affected by the Cataclysm but some of the areas will be updated for the expansion. For example, you will be able to level up Archeology in Outland.
Itemization
* The 5 second rule might be removed with the changes made to spirit but there isn't any final decision about that.
* There is no plans to prevent Paladins and Shamans from using cloth, but there were some discussions to limit it somehow.
* Armor Penetration is removed from the gear but not from the game. There are plans to reintroduce it in another way to allow players to kill plate wearers. (Armor Penetration talents, etc ...)
* Spirit is going to be a healer stat only, it won't exist on DPS Gear. Healers need it to regen and other casters don't use it at all. (Other casters will use Intellect for Spell Power)
Classes
* They won't add a new class in Cataclysm, they have to be very careful about adding more classes and do not want tons of them.
* The philosophy about pure DPS classes is still the same, they don't want hybrid to do everything they can do. The elevated hybrid DPS in Wrath of the Lich King is in a "good place" now.
Classes - Pets
* In Patch 3.3, pets will scale of all of your stats and allow buffs from raid encounters to affect them.
* In Patch 3.3, there will be changes to make sure that pets can't be hit by AOEs from bosses but others (PvP) will be able to affect them.
* Pets classes might get a "move to this location" command for their pet, long cooldown abilities that let your pet teleport to you to get out of trouble. This would be good feature since developers can't make pet AI as smart as a player.
Druid
* There isn't any immediate plan to give feral druids a legendary, casters are next on the list.
* Trolls and Worgens Druids will get their own bear, cat, travel, and aquatic forms.
Hunter
* Hunters might be able to choose the talent tree of their pet to let them pick the pet that looks best to them. Zhevra is a possibility for Cataclysm.
* Hunter's mana is GONE!!!
* Hunters now use focus, no longer care about intellect or mana regen.
* Focus regenerates contunously, Steady shot improves the rate of getting focus bag.
* Rogue energy comes back at a 10 / sec rate, Hunter focus comes back at 6/sec (12/sec with steady shot)
* A shot costs 30 to 60 focus.
* Hunters will have fewer cooldowns on abilities
* Ammos will become an item, not a consumable.
Mage
* Night Elves Mages have been added because it sounded pretty cool to have Elves using arcane when they shouldn't be anymore.
* Mage abilities like Molten Armor will be changed to use other stats since mages won't have Spirit anymore.
Rogue
* They want to see rogues use more daggers, they're THE rogue weapon and we don't see enough of them. In Patch 3.2.2 they might add an assassination talent to make daggers more attractive.
* One of the plans for cataclysm is to take a lot of the early subtlety tree and make it passive for the class. The unattractive stuff will be taken out to let you get the cool talents.
Shaman
* Sacrificying the group utility of mana tide totem to give it a much better regen is a possibility.
* Enhancement Shamans do not use INT anymore and will be given talents to not need it just like Retribution Paladins.
* Enhancement Shamans having to run in and out of melee ranges to redrop totem and sacrifice DPS is a legitimate problem, they don't want enhancement to have to run out like that.
Warlock
* Warlock's survavibility wasn't really good at the start of Wrath of the Lich King, but they're in a pretty good place right now.
* Soul Shards are no longer in your bags. The goal is to make them fun, not a hassle.
* Soul Shards will be integrated to the user interface. (Just like Death Knight runes)
* You get three shards per fight, they will regen very quickly out of combat.
* It will be possible to get more for long fights or mistakes through Drain Soul.
* Soul Burn (New Spell) : Cost 1 Shard, 30 sec cooldown, off the GCD. Empowers your next spell, many (not all spells) behave differently when empowered.
* Empowered Searing Pain : Next 3 Searing Pains crit
* Empowered Summon Demon : Instant Cast
* Empowered Soulfire : Instant Cast
* Empowered Fear : Instant Cast
* Empowered Death Coil : Longer Horror, more healing received.
* They are only used in combat, summons or demons won't use your shards.
Warrior
* Arms lost their iconic ability when Mortal Strike was given to more classes. They need to find a new ability to fill that niche or make Arms' MS the "ultimate" mortal strike.
There's more, but that's all I feel like posting atm. Go here to see concept art and such for the new zones. http://www.mmo-champion.com/index.php?;tpstart=10
