Below are some highlights of today’s patch. For the full list of all of today’s additions and fixes with more details, check out the patch notes here.
This week’s update includes several fixes for server memory allocation problems that were leading to zone crashes during Week Six testing. We appreciate the patience of our testers as we worked to track down the root cause of these issues.
This update also includes changes for Dire Lords and the introduction of Mastery for the Shaman class. In addition, the update includes several bug fixes, class ability tuning adjustments, and itemization adjustments.
Dire Lord – Blood Debt Adjustments and the Reintroduction of Essence
The Blood Debt mechanic for Dire Lords is being refined based on data and feedback gathered over the past several weeks. As a mechanic, Blood Debt was intended to allow Dire Lords to be competitive as tanks when compared to Paladins and Warriors, both of whom can use shields. However, the previous version of Blood Debt was too effective at smoothing incoming damage, effectively allowing Dire Lords to survive in situations where other tank classes would not have been able to do so.
We also heard feedback from many Dire Lord players who felt that the change from Essence to Blood Debt had removed some of the challenge and fun of using their class abilities. Players told us that they missed the resource management aspect of the class and felt that gameplay had become too simplistic with its removal.
With these things in mind:
We will be reintroducing the Essence mechanic for Dire Lords, but with some adjustments.
You will see the return of the Essence Bar in the next patch, and will see Essence accumulating, but the resource will not interact with your abilities yet. Essence and Blood Debt are two separate mechanics – the amount of Essence you have at any given time will affect several criteria: how much damage you take and how much damage you deal, among other things, and many of the Dire Lord’s abilities will increase or decrease the amount of Essence you have. However, Essence is still being fully implemented and will not be ready for testing or feedback until a future update.
In addition to Essence changes, Blood Debt is being adjusted so that 10% of damage taken by the Dire Lord (rather than 50%) will be allocated to Blood Debt and then applied back to the Dire Lord over a period of 10 seconds. This damage smoothing will not occur unless the Dire Lord is taking more than 10 points of damage from an attack, which means that the mechanic will happen more frequently in later levels where the Dire Lord is more likely to find themselves in challenging tanking situations. This is intended to help compensate for the benefits that Paladins and Warriors can receive from their shields in terms of managing incoming damage.
Shaman – Oracle and Fateweaver Mastery Branches
This update introduces class mastery for the Shaman class. The two branches are as follows:
The Oracle branch focuses on the healing aspects of the class. A shaman who pursues this path will gain immense power to heal and protect their allies.
The Fateweaver branch focuses on the support aspects of the class. A shaman who pursues this path will gain additional abilities to enhance the power of their allies and weaken their opponents.
Several new abilities will be introduced at higher levels as part of class Mastery for the Shaman. In addition, as part of the introduction of Mastery, many existing Shaman abilities have been adjusted or reassigned to the two mastery branches.
Looking Ahead
We are continuing to forge ahead with class Mastery updates for Combat and Progression, as well as ongoing tuning efforts. We appreciate the patience and support that our community has shown, as well as the feedback and bug reports that are helping us refine these systems and make sure that they are fun enhancements to our game. We are currently working on implementing Mastery for our remaining classes and are committed to continuing frequent updates to the Public Test Realm until we have everything there for players to provide feedback on.
As always, we want to send a big thank you out to all our players who are logging onto the Public Test Realm. Your bug reports and feedback are helping us refine the changes we are making so that when we are ready to push the Combat and Progression update out to all our servers, our game can deliver a compelling and fun combat experience at all levels.
Known Issues
- Shrink doesn’t shrink just yet.
- Standing under the elevator in Wild’s End will push players under the world (Don’t do that).
- Nocturnal Eyes is not functional.
- Sent mail may not immediately show up in the sent tab.
- The Wind Strider spell is missing from the Shaman trainers in starting areas (this will be fixed in next update).