Retribution benefits much more from STR (and other AP increases) than Spell Damage. This is why they're removing Spell Damage from the Ret s3 set on the PTR. Now instead of these pieces not being worn by anyone (except Shockadins maybe), they are great for both DPS warriors and Ret paladins.

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The warmaster leggings change makes sense. Honestly, the only way anyone leveling up will see Rend is with at least one person from vanilla Wow who has an UBRS key. The leveling character will generally want DPS gear for the leveling grind over tanking gear. If an UBRS drop will help a player level up, a guildie will be more inclined to them run through it. Of course I'm excluding the 1% of players who will still farm for an UBRS key (or Ony, BWL, Naxx, etc) when leveling.

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i actually chuckle at people thinking that removing all the INT off of plate will actually help ret paladins. losing the spelldamage just makes it less useful for other pally specs as well. that said, if they do in fact tweak ret a little to allow them to get more bang out of generic DPS plate, that can only be a positive.

but i think theres a pretty simple reason why they are streamlining all the plate in lower instances: death knight leveling.

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They were there before as taking equipment because you needed to gear up to... tank.

Since you're not running UBRS as a precursor to doing ZG/MC/etc, I'm not sure why they'd need to be tanking gear anymore. I can't say for pally loot, I have no idea how to level one of those beasts, but as for warrior stuff, i'd say if I got tanking gear before the mid-60's it would be surprising.

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I'm angry I'm losing holy paladin gear that I've worked hard for. I'm level 52 on my paladin and now I lose it all due to "Ret Paladin" possibility changes. I levelled holy for a reason- to be a healer on my server who knew his role and did it well. Now I'm forced to go back to clothie gear to do my job properly.

Bravo Blizzard for being ignorant to the holy spec.

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I think it probably has to do with the fact that players who are still leveling and slaving their way to 70 are usually in a DPS spec like retribution or enhancement for Shamans or whatever, so this helps players in that stage of the game more

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I was actually personally suprised by some of the upgrades in lower instancess. For example: the shoulders that drop off of the wolf guy in SFK went from white to blue with rather nice stats. Rahk'zor's Hammer from Stockades, same thing...white to blue with decent stats. Of course its good, but it seemed a tad bit overdone. Now that gear will last WAAAY longer then it used to or even should IMO.

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Characters who are not done leveling are likely to be DPS Spec to aid in leveling. So these changes make sense to me.

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Thank god my prot aoe-ing ass is already 62. I have the foreman's helm and I'd be pissed as hell if they changed it on me back while I was using it. The new stats are crap as far as prot aoe/holy paladins are concerned.

So basically no reason to go to BRD except maybe the tanking trinket for Prot spec pallys. My 28 pally definitely won't waste any time in there if I continue level her.

Blame it on the death knights, blame it on the retardins - but who cares, it just sucks for the rest of us.

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My guess for why the changed it...
Since end-game (not the guild on Laughing Skull) is at 70 and not 60, people running the former end-game instance would be looking for leveling gear over tanking/healing gear. Just a guess.

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@7: Rahk'zor's Hammer was a common drop from Rahk'zor in Deadmines - it's good that it will no longer bite. Especially since I have several of them on a bank alt - they haven't sold because, well, they suck. And being white, they can't disenchant. And I hate vendoring. So I just held onto them - well now they'll be worth something.

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@8:
Let me spell this out. This gear drops in instances. The instance group is likely to have a tank and a healer. In virtually every instance past Gnomer, a tank and healer are far more effective if they are at least GEARED as tanks or healers. If they are in an instance where this changed gear drops, you have positive evidence that they run instances, and that the tank and healer run instances AS tanks and healers.

In many cases, tank and healer gear is being replaced with generic DPS gear. The one that's killing me on my PTR lowbie priest is the near-removal of the Spirit stat. A healing priest now has VERY little incentive to run these instances, and if you aren't running instances there's very little incentive to spec holy.

They might as well disable the non-solo trees until 60, if this is the route they're taking.

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@5 Go to outlands duh

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To copy my post from the other topic, that fits more here:

On that matter, where's all the +spell damage leather for Balance Druids? Zul'Farrak has 2 leather pieces with high +spirit that Druids really don't need. Could they drop the +spirit and replace it with +spell damage like all the cloth?

These 2 items in ZF, by the way:
Jinxed Hoodoo Skin: http://www.wowhead.com/?item=9473
Jinxed Hoodoo Kilt: http://www.wowhead.com/?item=9474

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I'm concerned that they're removing mass amounts of spirit in favor of spell damage. As a mid-level priest, I'm going to lose nearly half of my spirit when 2.3 goes live.

I agree, spirit is the least useful stat for most classes, but many priests live and breathe by it. Anyone have a list of spirit gear that isn't being changed?

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You may have also seen the FR disappear off of every item from these instances that possessed them. Since no one does MC anymore (why retool and reduce the number of people needed to run when you can just obsolete huge expanses of content, I always say), let alone BWL. I also noticed the same happening to NR, effectively doing the same to AQ.

I guess it makes sense though, since they already obsoleted so much of the gear by almost any level 60 green dropped in the outland, and are now just getting around to emphasizing how much they don't care about that content...

Oh well.

And I know obsoleted isn't a word.

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Actually... Obsoleted is a word...

http://www.m-w.com/dictionary/obsoleted

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