More 3.1 thoughts – brought to you by broken authentication servers.

So Blizz has been slowly adding more info. We’re going to get dual specs? Sweet (and hopefully in time for my slaughterfest in pvp for Children’s Week?) There’s also been some confusing changes which lead me to think Blizzard is smoking something.

1. They’re getting rid of Hymn of Hope for priests. Now I’ll grant that it’s not a very useful spell and I mostly used it for the “lulz” value of having a macro that proclaimed “Change is Here!” every so often. Priests don’t have too many toys to play around with and I’m not exactly keen on having some of my toys taken away without replacement. Can I have a Spirit of Redemption where I can opt to turn into a cat instead of ghostly blue lady? Heck, why not turn my shadowfiend into a cat , he’s just as tempermental as one.

2. “Glyph of Hymn of Hope: Your Hymn of hope provides 2 times the normal amount of mana per time, but its duration is 50% shorter.” Someone at the patch notes department needs to get a facts checker. Are you getting rid of Hymn of Hope or not? Even Blue seems to be a tad irresolute on the subject.

3. Ghetto-hearthers lament! While we are getting our hearthstones reduced to a 30 minute cooldown, it is at the cost of the lovely ability to ‘ghetto-hearth’. Now I’m not too surprised but I am lazy. Where is the love for the lazy people? I’m not sure how the Kirin Tor rings will work with the new changes, but I’m curious (and lazy, above all).

4. Why do the authentication servers fail to work when I want to log on? Seriously. On my day off too…

3.1 get here nowww

So as I’m sure most of you have heard, Blue announced a few of the exciting changes coming our way for the next big patch. There’s a lot of priest love in this patch!

“Divine Spirit – this spell is now a core ability available to all priests.” Yes, yes, a million times yes! I’d long been a DS priest while raiding in Burning Crusade content and I bemoaned the loss of Divine Spirit when I went to grab circle of healing. Now that  I went for a spec that had guardian spirit, I continue to miss divine spirit. It made no sense to always have one priest be the “assigned DS priest” for the sake of a raid. I had been wishing that this talent would be made trainable for ages and it looks like I got my wish.

“Discipline has access to a new talent, Power Word: Barrier. (Think of it as Power Word: Shield for your whole group).” I really like this, there have been times when I wished to shield every AOE caster before a pull and had to wait on the cooldown for shield while another shield I had applied earlier would slowly fizzle out. And now with Wrath, it seems like everyone’s taking damage all the time. Applying prayer of healing before an anticipated burst of AOE damage helps, but I’d rather keep most of my casting time directed to my tank.

“Several area of effect (AOE) heal spells have been improved: Prayer of Healing can be cast on any groups in your raid party. Holy Nova’s mana cost has been reduced. Circle of Healing now heals for more.” Yessss, I like this change as well. I had been slowly weaning myself off using Circle of Healing since it was less mana efficient and thanks to the nerf, could no longer be spammed. Holy nova still doesn’t present much use to me aside from quick dispatching of rogue undead that stalk me in CoT : Stratholme but it’s nice to know it’ll be getting cheaper to use. I really like that I can use prayer of healing on any group now, this was something that was sorely needed.

“Shadow priest PvP survivability has been improved: Shadowform now reduces magic as well as physical damage. Dispersion now removes snares.” No comment, I don’t play shadow much but it sounds like a decent change.

“Penance – this spell can now be targeted on the priest.” Don’t have this but it sounds nifty.

“Serendipity – this talent now reduces the cast time of Greater Heal and Prayer of Healing when Binding Heal or Flash Heal are cast.” I like this. A lot.

“We are also working to give Holy additional PvP utility.” As I said to someone earlier, maybe now maybe holy priests won’t be the ones that are in the graveyard sighing in BGs. Not that all holy priests die a lot..just…well, we just tend to not stay alive very well. =D

Also if this change is real and for the 3.0.9 patch as indicated by MMO-champion, then it’s really sweet: “Inner Fire duration has been increased to 30 minutes and can no longer dispelled.”

Finally, priests get some much belated love!

Source: World of Raids

Wrath Recap

So I haven’t written here in a while. That’s totally my fault, and of course, WoW’s fault.  In the land of Yasura, I finally got to 80. With a boomkin leveling partner, we managed to mostly AOE and blaze through most of the zones. I have to say, Blizz really outdid themselves on this expansion. Every time I’d finish a quest line and say, “Oh my geez, that’s the most awesome chain ever”, I’d stumble across another chain that’d have me saying the same thing and squeal unabashedly.

Quick notes:

- A Disc/Holy build is great for leveling. I never ran out of mana and I was a decent healer.

- Holy Nova is a great way to mitigate the health losses of an AOE-hungry boomkin while still dishing out some dps.

- The Levitate glyph is very handy for leveling especially in quest zones with a lot of water to get across. Also, you get the added bonus of looking like a special diety with your own special water walk. (It’s too bad this goes away next patch, now everyone can be special. Boo! )

Speaking of the next patch, I can’t say I’m entirely surprised that priests got COH nerfed and otherwise lackluster updates (in the holy department, anyhow).  I really wish they would give Holy just a slight boost in mana regeneration and a few more tricks to make Holy stand out more as a raiding build. Guardian Spirit is nice but it’s been situational for me so far. Divine Hymn is really poorly scaled and I mostly use it for my gimmicky “Change is here!” macro. I’ve heard a lot from priests regarding the COH change from praising it to bemoaning it. I’m actually a bit lukewarm, as I’ve been consciously trying to wean myself off using it as much as I used to. Prayer of Healing has had a bit more bang for my buck with scaling. I haven’t tried to raid with my spec yet so I can’t say anything regarding that, but I’m hopeful that holy priests are still pretty viable in raids.

My current project is mostly trying to finish questing in the zones I haven’t finished for the tailoring stuff I need (as well as instances). I am also attempting to finish leveling my professions. I am really awed at the people that got realm first achievements with their professions. That is some insanity.

Speaking of insanity, I’m currently also powerleveling cooking and fishing to get the Merrymaker achievement. >.> …Yea. I’m not all there, I suppose.