wow Dragonflight Patch 10.2 PTR Notes: October 17th

[Staff 1,488]

This week's PTR notes bring improvements to very rare item drops from Amirdrassil. They will now drop in addition to all the other loot, and no longer "take up a slot" of regular loot when they drop. We also have the usual large amount of class tuning, with some PvP item changes this time around as well, and UI tweaks foused on macros.

PTR (Source)

Hello testers! Here are this week’s notes for Guardians of the Dream PTR:

CLASSES

• DEMON HUNTER
  • Any Means Necessary now correctly shows the same percent value before and after talenting into it.
  • Cycle of Binding now works with Precise Sigils.
  • Inertia now triggers correctly after using Immolation Aura twice before using Fel Rush.
  • Vengeance
    • Retaliation damage increased by 50%.
    • Sigil of Flame with Ascending Flame now reapplies Frailty when hit with another Sigil of Flame.
    • Chains of Anger now correctly increases cast reticle size of Sigils.
    • Developer’s note: The below changes will be applied to PTR over the course of this week.
    • Fiery Brand duration increased by 2 seconds.
    • Shear damage increased by 10%.
    • Fracture damage increased by 10%.
    • Soul Cleave damage increased by 15%.
    • Spirit Bomb damage increased by 8%.
    • Soul Barrier absorb values increased by 25%.
    • Fel Devastation damage increased by 30%.
    • Stoke the Flames damage bonus for Fel Devastation reduced to 35% (was 40%).
    • Fel Flame Fortification and Revel in Pain talents have swapped locations.
    • Deflecting Spikes is no longer connected to Calcified Spikes and Retaliation in the talent tree.
    • Fixed an issue causing the Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope Set Bonus to fail to reduce the cooldown of Sigil of Flame.
• DRUID
  • Balance
    • Fixed a few issues with Balance’s Mastery. Mastery’s default damage bonuses now correctly increase the damage of Wild Mushroom, Power of Goldrinn, and Orbital Strike.
  • Guardian
    • Blood Frenzy now grants 3 Rage each time Thrash deals damage (was 2).
• MONK
  • Escape from Reality is now a 1-rank talent (was 2).
  • Brewmaster
    • Fixed an issue with targeting on damage dealt by the Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus.
    • Fixed issues preventing Charred Passions, Invoke Niuzao the Black Ox, Dragonfire Brew, and White Tiger Statue from triggering the Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus.
    • Fixed an issue causing Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus to deal less damage than intended.
  • Mistweaver
    • Clouded Focus now stacks up to 2 times (was 3) and no longer increases the healing of Vivify and Enveloping Mist before its first application.
    • Vivify and Invigorating Mist healing increased by 12%.
    • Expel Harm’s healing is now reduced by 40% in PvP combat.
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus: Chi Harmony now stores 20% of all healing done (was 15%).
    • Faeline Stomp’s initial heal and damage increased by 100%.
      • Developers’ note: We felt Faeline Stomp was not impactful enough on its own for how often it is pressed to activate other effects.
    • Bounce Back now triggers after receiving 12% of your health in damage (was 15%) and lasts an additional 2 seconds.
    • Unison now heals for 50% of Soothing Mist’s healing done (was 75%).
    • Life Cocoon can no longer be canceled.
      • Developers’ note: Canceling Life Cocoon early was sometimes optimal in order to trigger Nourishing Chi.
• PALADIN
  • Holy
    • Reclamation now refunds up to 10% of Crusader Strike or Holy Shock’s mana cost (was 12%).
    • Holy Shock now costs 2.8% base mana (was 2.4%).
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus: Holy Reverberation healing decreased by 10%.
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus: Holy Reverberation may stack up to 6 times (was 3).
• ROGUE
  • Vigor now increases energy regeneration by 5/10%. (Was 8/15%).
  • Subterfuge refreshes duration correctly when broken out of Vanish while another Subterfuge is active.
  • Lethality now interacts with Blade Flurry when talented into Deft Maneuvers.
  • Grand Melee now increases damage dealt correctly.
  • Heavy Hitter now interacts with Blade Flurry if talented into Deft Maneuvers.
  • Assassination
    • Indiscriminate Carnage distance to nearby targets is now calculated from the caster player rather than the affected target.
    • Poison Bomb now works with Caustic Spatter.
    • Kingsbane initial damage now critically strikes when used with Cold Blood.
    • Internal Bleeding applies to mouseover target if used from a mouseover macro.
    • Dragon Tempered Blades now correctly applies to Numbing Poison.
  • Outlaw
    • Killing Spree self damage is now reduced during Cheat Death.
    • Crackshot now works with Sepsis.
    • Crackshot now correctly triggers Dispatch from Between the Eyes for all Stealth conditions.
    • Take 'em by Surprise duration adjusts correctly with different stealth interactions.
  • Subtlety
    • Ephemeral Bond now correctly increases the healing done by Crimson Vile ability and Soothing Darkness.
    • Replicating Shadows distance to nearby targets is now calculated from the player, rather than the target.
    • Shadowed Finishers procs no longer incorrectly consume Goremaw’s Bite stacks.
    • Shadow Techniques takes Premeditation into account when used 2 extra combo points are generated from having Slice and Dice active.
    • Dark Brew now correctly increases damage of Instant and Wound poison.
    • Sepsis now grants full combo points with Shadow Blades.
• SHAMAN
  • Elemental
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (2) Set Bonus – Now grants an Elemental Blast at 70% damage (was 100%) and now grants 10 seconds of all 3 Elemental Blast buffs (was 15 seconds).
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus – Bonus Lava Bursts now deal 65% of normal damage (was 100%) and Lava Burst’s burn damage is now 10% (was 15%).
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus – Fixed an issue causing some damage modifiers to apply multiple times to Lava Burst’s burn effect.
    • Further Beyond can now extend the duration of Ascendance by up to 100% (was 150%).
  • Restoration
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (4) Set Bonus – Increases the healing of Riptide by 20% (was 15%).
    • Chain Heal now costs 5.6% of base mana (was 6%).
• WARRIOR
  • Fury
    • Storm of Swords now gives Slam a 9 second cooldown (was 12 seconds).

ITEMS

• The Revival Catalyst will be available during the first week of Season 3. However, players will only gain a charge every two weeks instead of every week.
• AMIRDRASSIL, THE DREAMS HOPE RAID REWARDS
  • In conjunction with the earlier opening of the Revival Catalyst, tier armor tokens will continue to drop at the current 1:3 rate relative to non-tier loot.
    • Developers’ note: By shifting more of tier acquisition to the Revival Catalyst and away from tier token drops, we expect that players will complete their set bonuses at the same rate or faster than Season 2. While raiders will still enjoy an edge as the season begins, players who prefer not to raid will be far closer behind them than previously.
  • Very Rare item drop rates have been further adjusted, and these now have a chance to drop in addition to a boss’s typical quantity of loot; for example, a 20-player group could receive one tier token, three non-tier items, and Dreambinder, Loom of the Great Cycle.
    • Developers’ note: As we continue to iterate on Very Rare items, we hope that elevating them to drop independently as bonus loot will feel less frustrating than knowing that Icewrath’s Channeling Conduit could have been a Whispering Incarnate Icon. This also ensures that drop rates are consistent across all Very Rare items.

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

• ITEMS
  • Fang Adornments (Embellishment) damage reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
  • Leaf of the Ancient Protectors absorption reduced by 60% in PvP combat.
  • Ember of Nullification silence duration reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
  • Caged Horror damage reduced by 60% in PvP combat.
  • Corrupted Starlight damage reduced by 75% in PvP combat.
  • Oakheart’s Gnarled Root damage and slow reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
  • My’das Talisman damage reduced by 55% in PvP combat.
  • Revitalizing Voodoo Totem heal reduced by 55% in PvP combat.
  • Vessel of Skittering Shadows damage reduced by 50% in PvP combat.
  • Balefire Branch intelligence gain reduced by 70% in PvP combat.
  • Prophetic Stonescales health restored, haste gained, and damage reduction reduced by 75% in PvP combat.
  • Iridal, the Earth’s Master damage (on use effect) reduced by 75% in PvP combat.

USER INTERFACE AND ACCESSIBILITY

• The Premade Group Finder now shows the applicant’s specialization in the tooltip.
• The “Remove Recruit” option has been removed from the right click menu in the Recruit a Friend pane.
• MACROS
  • Macros can no longer conditionally execute commands based on your party state.
  • Macros can no longer change equipment using /script, /run, or the Lua API. Equipment can still be changed using regular macro commands such as /equip.
  • Technical notes:
    • UI Macros have been restricted in a few ways. The general issue was there were several exploits to conditionally execute macro commands. These exploits tended to use un-restricted Lua API functions that happened to mutate states that various macro options/conditionals queried, or selectively register the globally available MacroEditBox for the event that would run commands
    • To address the state mutation, two methods were employed:
      • Converting APIs like PickupInventoryItem to be restricted when trying to change gear during combat.
      • Caching the state queried by the macro conditional when combat starts so that the state remains invariant while combat is in progress. Macro options that check party membership and composition uses the cached state approach.
    • To address selective event registration the MacroEditBox was removed from the global namespace and the event was replaced with a callback.