Post Patch Arena/Future of Arena

[Kazaganthi]

This patch changed a ton of things with regard to arena. I haven't stepped in one since last weekend, but I will be in there all night tonight. Here are a few quick notes you may have missed.

1. Arena points changes.
A. Overall, 5v5 received a 6.89% increase, 3v3 received a 17.58% increase and 2v2 got a 16.07% increase
B. 5v5 1755 to 2500 (buffed gain)
C. 5v5 525 to 1754 (nerfed gain)
The strong get stronger in 5s and the weak, weaker. However the increase in 2s and 3s should help out a lot of people. I think this is a step in the right direction for Blizzard. It should let new 70s catch up a bit faster, established teams become stronger, and even out the playing field a bit more.

2. Next season gears
A rating of 1850 will be required for the purchase of weapons next season, and a rating of 2000 will be required for shoulders. The idea for shoulders being so high is that it is a highly visible sign of arena skill. Not sure if I agree with that, but I do approve of limiting some items with respect to rating. I was unable to find out if that applies to last season's ratings or the current season.

3. Gear swapping
Well those of you that were rocking the shadow priest/lock combos are going to be a bit disappointed. Gear swapping is out. Players can no longer switch into a full shadow resist set once they see the opposing team. This will make those shadow priest/lock teams a lot harder to handle, but at least warlocks have to suffer from resilience like every one else.

4. Resilience affects dots!
This is a long awaited change. As things stood prepatch, warlocks were the only class that didn't suffer from resilience. They do most of their damage through high spell power and damage over time. This meant that as resilience increased, warlocks slowly became stronger and stronger. Now they have been put back on an even playing field. All of a sudden the almighty warlock has a whole new issue to deal with. I'm very excited to see what kind of effect this will have on the 4 dps shadow priest/lock teams.

5. Various CCs reduced
Spells like polymorph, fear, and ice trap have had their duration nerfed down to ten seconds. Small buff for those of us who spend our arena life calling out "I'm a sheep!"

6. Paladin Nerf to BOF/BOS
Most of us run with Paladins so this is a big one. This means that you must jump start combat if you suspect a rogue is in the arena, or have your paladin blow his trinket right off the bat. BOS now has a one minute cool down. It will also make things rough vs mages and their sheep. BOF has been increased to a 25 second cool down. This isn't the end of the world, but it will have an effect on how the game is played. You will not have unlimited movement in arena anymore.

7. No more sword bombs
Sword spec cannot proc off of itself anymore. A bit disappointing, but not game changing.

8. Rage exploit
They finally removed the rage exploit from arenas. This is a good thing because warriors were not supposed to start combat with a full rage bar. It makes the game a bit fairer.

In theory, this patch should have a huge effect on arena play. It shows that Blizzard in on the right track to balancing things out a bit more. This is the kind of thing arena has been missing for a long time. Now I'll be really impressed when they make prot/fury warriors viable in arena(one can dream!)I can’t wait to step in there tonight and find out just how much things have changed. I'll let ya know what I find out tomorrow..:)

Kaz

[Coriel]

Just a heads up. The Sacrifice nerf got muted. It's now on a 30s cooldown (matches the duration).

[Kazaganthi]

Nice, thanks for the correction..:)

[Kazaganthi]

Due to a personnel issue,our priest went clubbin out of town all weekend, we have been unable to do arena this week. Hopefully that will change tonight. I'll let you know how it goes.

Kaz

[Kazeyonoma]

Although I'm glad to see resilience affecting warlocks finally, i feel that its not nearly as bad still.

While the rest of us suffer a 2% deficit per gain on resilience to our crit damage, and 1% deficit to our chance to crit.

since dots can't crit, they only get effected by the 1% chance to crit in terms of spell damage.

that means in a fully decked out warrior with 300+ resilience.

you will remove only 5-6% of dot damage per tick.

on a 500 tick this reduces the tick to 475. Hardly fair grounds, but its a step in some sort of warlock negation.

I still feel when a warlock dies, that his dots should stop ticking. It's ridiculous that they can toss up so many dots that it's basically impossible to dispel them all, have them die, and STILL take me out despite me doing everything in my power to kill them.

[Kazaganthi]

Kaz,

I agree completely. The thing is, I really want to get in there and see the effect of these changes. There have been many times that a change seems small, and yet it has a huge impact. I have the feeling/hope that this change will have a large effect on the sp/lock combo based teams. It would have to be because they took out the use of shadow resist gear. Anyway I'm still straining at the bit to get in there...counting the hours till I get home tonight...:) I also agree that the dots should fall off when you kill them. It's not much fun to beat a lock only to die 8 seconds later to his dots. Somehow that just seems unfair.

Kaz

[Kazeyonoma]

yeh, i didn't really notice a huge difference to warlocks damage this past week, but i did notice i went 7-3 with a 36/25/0 spec =x and i had the s2 helm fresh this week, so it may have made the difference.

almost every person who runs up against warlocks hates that even after they die, they are technically as effective dps as when they were alive, for at least 8 seconds still. That is lame.