PTR Notes: Shaman buffs, Life Tap "change," and more
Posted Feb 27th 2008 10:50PM by Eliah Hecht
Filed under: Shaman, Warlock, Patches
The PTRs just came back up about an hour ago from a new build being applied; some people were able to get on earlier, but any information they found is
liable to be buggy. Here's what's been found since the realms came back online for real:
- Shaman:
- Flametongue weapon puts a 50% healing reduction on the target for 5 seconds, refreshing with every hit.
- Toughness: each point in the talent now reduces the duration of movement-impairing effects by 10%, in addition to the previous effect of increasing armor. This means 50% reduced duration at 5/5.
- Shamanistic Rage changed; now reduces all damage taken by 30% and gives a chance to regenerate mana equal to 30% [was 15%] of your AP. Lasts 15 s [was 30 s].
- Global cooldown on dropping totems reduced from 1.5 s to 1 s.
- [Warlock] Life Tap (rank 3) converts 20% of your maximum health to 20% of your maximum mana. Still terrible, and not very much of a change from the 15% it was at before.
- Alchemy:
- There are some new epic gems: spell haste and stam, spell haste and spell damage, resilience and stam, and plain spell haste.
- New alchemist stones. They all increase the effect that healing and mana potions have on the wearer by 40% (does not stack) in addition to the following effects:
- Assassin's: +54 crit rating
- Guardian's: +54 defense rating
- Sorcerer's: +54 spell hit rating
- Redeemer's: +119 healing, +40 damage
- New cloak enchant: Stoneweave (+12 def rating)
See
World of Raids and
MMO-Champion for screenshots of the gems and all the rest of the changes. Let me know if you see anything else that has changed and I'll add it to the post. It's nice to see Shamans finally getting something good; these seem to be some solid buffs for PvP. As to the life tap thing, I really just have to shake my head at this point.
Tags: life-tap, life-tap-nerf, patch-2.4, patches, ptr, shaman, warlock
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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 6)
2-27-2008 @ 11:02PM
New01 said...
Shaman didn't need the FT buff.
Reply
2-28-2008 @ 4:56AM
vildand said...
The FT buff is what will make shamans truely viable in the smaller arenas, just like the aimed shot buff did for hunters.
2-28-2008 @ 9:47AM
Jeff said...
great, a flametongue buff no less than one level after getting windfury....useless
2-28-2008 @ 10:35AM
Lucas said...
What? Flame tongue is still useless for PvE... Its just viable as an offhand enchant now (Also, this is good for elemental shamans, when theyre running they can melee the target now and then to keep it up)
2-27-2008 @ 11:06PM
josh said...
God damnit, my warlock is still screwed. Good thing its not my only level 70 otherwise I would probably quit playing forever.
Reply
2-28-2008 @ 9:08AM
PeeWee said...
Adapt. Overcome. Or go QQ. Seriously.
2-27-2008 @ 11:07PM
jet242 said...
Life-Tap change:
whaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa?
thats, like, making it worse, right?
Reply
2-27-2008 @ 11:15PM
themann1086 said...
Blizzard really doesn't want me to play my lock.
I'm fairly casual, though I've planned on putting more time into the endgame once I got my toon to 70. 1 year later, Blizz breaks warlocks. Thanks, guys. Just.... thanks.
Reply
2-27-2008 @ 11:18PM
Eckozealot said...
Wow, this is all messed up! Enh SHammys needed a bit of a buff, but this is a bit far, too damn many MS effects, and not one for my pally! LT change is stupid, flat out, and completely breaks itemization of locks. But worst of all, why the HELL are alchemists getting the best trinkets when Jewelcrafters dont have anything on par with this! All ive wanted since I became a JC was a crit trinket, or a passive healing trinket, this is idiotic!!!
Reply
2-27-2008 @ 11:18PM
Atomsk said...
The Shaman change doesn't really seem like a buff
Reply
2-27-2008 @ 11:22PM
Ryan said...
Are you stoned?
2-27-2008 @ 11:25PM
Dahk said...
It's a buff...but probably not going to make any difference or solve their core problems.
2-27-2008 @ 11:32PM
hoviboy said...
"reduces the duration of movement-impairing effects by 50%"
you are right #6, this is not a buff
2-28-2008 @ 11:59AM
Khanmora said...
It's a buff but what talent points will you drop to pick up a talent that formerly was completely outmoded?
2-27-2008 @ 11:22PM
Zhalseran said...
gogo lifetap un-buff buff and un-needed shammy buff that doesn't solve their problems
Reply
2-27-2008 @ 11:23PM
Ryan said...
Reducing the duration of movement impairing effects doesn't help?
2-27-2008 @ 11:24PM
Zhalseran said...
I was more refering to the flametongue buff
2-28-2008 @ 3:26AM
Frostwolf said...
it doesn't help if a warrior wants to hit hamstring he can do it again before your toughness reduces his hamstring by 7.5 secs leaving another 7.5 secs for him to rehamstring you. The fact is most movement impairment effects are only subject to GCD, minus the shaman frostshock which is on a 6 secs CD, YEY Enhance buffed against resto shammies with their new FT proc. Toughness was and is still not worth the spec points.
2-27-2008 @ 11:23PM
Retron said...
Wait, Life Tap Rank *3*?
20%/20%? We had just a few hours ago heard about 5%/15%...was that for a different rank or something? I'm so damned confused. I really wish Blizzard would start clarifying this craziness beyond the flip comments from days ago...
Reply
2-27-2008 @ 11:32PM
Eliah Hecht said...
The 5/15% was a bug, I'm assuming. Currently on the PTR, LT rank 1 is 5/5, 2 is 12/12, and 3 is 20/20.