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 to the Public Test Realm raises the level cap to 30. It also introduces Mastery for the Cleric and Druid classes and includes a major update to the Warrior class. The PTR is a place to get an early look at what’s coming with the Combat & Progression Update rolling out later to live servers, but it is a testing server. Expect bugs, crashes, and please remember that it is much more limited in content than live servers.
Due to the extensive class ability changes in this update, all characters on the Public Test Realm will be reset when the update occurs.
Please also note that due to the holiday in the US next week, we will not be updating the Public Test Realm that week.
Cleric Mastery – Righteous and Judgement Mastery Branches
This update introduces Class Mastery for the Cleric class. The two branches are as follows:
The Righteous branch focuses on the healing aspects of Cleric. Characters who specialize in this branch can become extremely powerful healers to help support their groups.
The Judgement branch allows the Cleric to mete out divine punishment to their foes at the expense of some healing power. Judgement-focused clerics will gain abilities that allow them to contribute far more damage to fights, especially when fighting undead opponents.
As part of the introduction of mastery, many Cleric abilities have been adjusted, and some abilities that were formerly gained via leveling are now unlocked via mastery instead.
Check out the updated Cleric Page for more details.
Druid – Preserver and Storm Herald Mastery Branches
This update introduces class mastery for the Druid class. The two branches of Druid mastery are as follows:
The Preserver branch focuses on healing and support aspects of the Druid class. Characters who specialize in this branch gain potent healing abilities which allow them to function more effectively as main healers in difficult and challenging encounters.
The Storm Herald branch further empowers the druid’s magical attacks, enabling them to bring nature’s fury to bear in defeating their opponents. At high levels, Storm Heralds gain the ability to assume aspects of the storm, empowering their Call Lighting ability and allowing them to instantaneously move around the battlefield.
As part of the introduction of mastery, many Druid abilities have been adjusted, and some abilities that were formerly gained via leveling are now unlocked via mastery instead.
Check out the updated Druid Page for more details.
Warrior Class Update
Warrior was the first class we added Mastery to, and in many ways was our prototype for the system. Since enabling the Mastery system for testing, we have learned quite a bit from listening to our players and from working on the other classes. This update helps catch Warrior up with those other classes, and as a result, our Warrior players should find that they now have many more options available within their Mastery branches.
We’ve also taken the opportunity to extensively review player feedback on the class as a whole, and make adjustments to many of the Warrior’s base abilities.
Looking Ahead
While we will not be updating the Public Test Realm next week, we will still be working on fixing bugs, addressing feedback, tuning combat, and adding Mastery for our remaining classes. We expect to have numerous changes ready for testing by the time of our next update.
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. Relog to fix this.
- The center Mastery circles are not yet usable.
- Mastery bonuses will not update the existing ability tooltips.
- NPCs are slow to respond in combat.