[2023] WoW Classic Era 1.14.4 Development Notes

Welcome to the Classic Era 1.14.4 test environment.

Features

New PvP Ranking System in Classic Era

• Testing of the PvP ranking system update will begin with a later build of the PTR.

Hardcore Realms

Please read our robust feature overview here for a high-level rundown of the ruleset.

• The Level cap is currently set to level 30 on the WoW Classic Hardcore PTR realm.

Known Issues

• On first login to the PTR, some game settings may appear to be missing. Completely logging out and back in should resolve this.
• Dungeons in WoW Classic Hardcore are a work in progress.
  • Dungeons currently save players after a boss is killed. As a result, we’ve moved all XP in dungeons to bosses only.
  • The amount of XP granted by bosses is not final.
  • This is not yet fully implemented and should be in place in a future PTR build.
• The Soul of Iron system does not yet currently exist on Hardcore realms. We intend to port this system over Hardcore ruleset realms prior to their launch, with a few adjustments.
• Currently, when players die, their auctions and mail are not cleared. Mail and active auctions will be cleared and deleted on player death in a future update to the PTR.
• The leash range on enemies is set to a fixed distance from where the enemy is initially engaged. This range is currently set to 500 yards. We’re looking for feedback on how this impacts normal play.
• We’ve made adjustments to the time that players stay in the world after disconnecting. This function is a work in progress, and testers may find themselves remaining in-game for longer than expected after some disconnects.
  • We recommend NOT forcibly disconnecting to avoid a death, as your character will remain in the game world for a short time. While we intend this time to be short enough to potentially help prevent an accidental death (i.e. due to disconnect while traveling through the world, or engaged in a very “safe” combat), if you are in genuine danger of dying and are at very low health, a forced disconnect is unlikely to save you.
  • As always, safe and careful play, avoiding overpulling, and always having a viable escape route during combat is the best way to prevent death!

Player versus Player

• Additional iterations to the Duel to the Death feature are coming in a future build:
  • The minimum player level required to gain or grant stacks of the “String of Ears” buff is currently level 10. This will be raised to level 19 in a future PTR update.
  • There is currently no penalty for fleeing from a Duel to the Death. In an upcoming PTR update, we intend to implement a very punishing deserter-style debuff for players that flee an honorable Duel to the Death, in order to prevent exploits and non-participation in an agreed-upon duel.
• The PvP honor system will be completely disabled on Hardcore Realms and this is intended.
  • Please note that we do plan to implement a method for hardcore players to obtain the PvP trinket when patch 1.14.4 goes live, as this trinket has utility outside of the Honor System (such as in duels or PvE content).

As always, we really appreciate your time on the Public Test Realm and are eager to read feedback from you on this game mode.

• On first login to the PTR, some game settings may appear to be missing. Completely logging out and back in should resolve this.

July 6, 2023
Build 50337

Testing Focus

• We will bring the Hardcore PTR realm down on Thursday, July 13. It will then be unavailable for approximately 7 days until July 20.
• At the same time, we will open a Normal Classic Era PTR realm with level 60 character templates enabled for PvP testing.
  • We will publish a full explainer on the revamped Classic Era honor system.
  • We will also host a “Brawl with the Blues” event on Friday, July 14 at 2:00 p.m. PDT—more details coming soon!

Gameplay Adjustments

• The minimum level to earn or grant stacks of the String of Ears buff has been raised to 19 (was 10).
• Upon death, any active mail in the player’s mailbox will be deleted when a realm transfer is initiated, and any active auctions will be cancelled and deleted.
  • Developers’ notes: This was a necessary change to enable dead characters to transfer to a Normal Era realm if they are dead and are unable to retrieve mail or cancel auctions. Please note that the Free Character Move service is not currently testable on PTR. It will function just as it does on live Classic Era servers now when 1.14.4 is released later this Summer.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue where a Duel to the Death could be prematurely ended by declining a secondary duel request after the primary duel starts.
• Fixed an issue where crowd control such as Frost Nova and Fear would immediately break when the target suffered damage.
• Fixed an issue that caused the dungeon save notification to pop up every time a boss is killed within a dungeon.
• Fixed various Lua errors associated with the options menu.
• Fixed an issue that caused a Lua error to appear when abandoning a quest.
• Fixed numerous trainers that were not allowing players to train new skills.
• The following issues were also fixed over the past few days via hotfixes:
  • Being stunned, rooted, or otherwise afflicted by a CC that causes players to lose control of their character will no longer cause a Disconnect.
  • Abilities such as Cleave and Swipe no longer have infinite range.

July 13, 2023
Build 50461

Testing Focus

• The Hardcore PTR realm is now temporarily closed, and a new PvP test realm is available.
  • Only level-60 template characters may be used on this realm.
  • Please join Battlegrounds and test the new Honor system.

Details on the Honor system are here.

July 20, 2023
Build: 50547

Testing Focus

With our build update today, we’ve brought the WoW Classic Hardcore PTR realm back online. We encourage testers to resume their adventures on this realm. Please don’t forget to report any issues you see using the in-game Bug Reporter!

Bug Fixes and Adjustments

• Hardcore Realms – General
  • Fixed a bug that allowed players to resurrect dead hardcore characters that were logged out for a certain amount of time in rested XP areas.
  • Fixed an issue that sometimes allowed players to die in a normal Duel.
  • A new art unique art Duel to the Death flag asset has been added to WoW Classic Hardcore.
• PvP Honor System
  • Fixed a bug that prevented HKs and PvP objectives from appropriately granting Honor.
  • Fixed an issue where the Honor conversion algorithm was not granting the appropriate ranking progress.
    • Please note that this bug will not be fully resolved before the weekly reset on Tuesday, July 25. Testers will not receive the correct ranking progress for this week.
  • Fixed a bug that sometimes caused honor gains from certain Battleground PvP objectives to be subject to diminishing returns.
  • Fixed a bug that allowed players to go into negative ranks if they de-ranked due to Dishonorable Kills.
• User Interface
  • Fixed an issue that was causing the target of target frame to not update target of target health bar in real time.
  • Fixed an issue where players could cancel an in-progress Duel to the Death by cancelling a second Duel to the Death contract after the Duel has begun.
  • Fixed an issue where an instance save notification frame would pop up every time a boss was killed in a dungeon in WoW Classic Hardcore.
• Classes
  • Fixed an issue where Summon Incubus costs less mana to use than Summon Succubus.
  • Fixed an issue that caused Eyes of the Beast to immediately cancel when the player attempted to move the pet that is being controlled.
• Quests
  • Fixed an issue where certain escort quests NPCs that path across zone boundaries to become stuck when hitting the zone boundary.
• Dungeons
  • Additional adjustments were made to XP gain in Dungeons on WoW Classic Hardcore realms:
  • Non-boss enemies will now grant 50% of their base XP value.
    • Developers’ notes: After playing on the PTR ourselves and evaluating feedback from testers, we agree that getting zero XP from non-boss enemies doesn’t feel great, and has practical implications, in that many player abilities that require killing enemies that grant experience or honor don’t function for most of the dungeon. As a result, we’ve toned down the amount of XP that bosses give slightly, and also restored partial XP gain to all the other enemies in the dungeon. We feel that this should be sufficient to prevent dungeon spam groups that avoid boss kills from being an optimal way to level, but not be as punishing to legitimate dungeon groups in hardcore.
• Mac
  • Fixed an issue that prevented WoW Classic Era clients from launching properly on MacOS 14.0 Sonoma.

PvP Honor System Testing

July 27, 2023

Build: 50643

Bug Fixes

PvP/Battlegrounds

• Added a Preparation phase to the beginning of battleground matches in Arathi Basin, Warsong Gulch, and Alterac Valley. During this Preparation phase and before the gates open to begin the battleground, the mana cost of all abilities is reduced by 100%.
  • Developers’ notes: We’d like to encourage teams to buff each other during preparation and this should help with that. Additionally, we’ve disabled the Blink spell in Preparation. Blink is notorious for being able to allow mages to get into tricky places, and this sometimes includes tricky places such as “outside the base before the match starts”.
• Made additional adjustments to terrain in Warsong Gulch to prevent players from reaching unintended areas.
• The effective Honor cap for the week has been adjusted to 500,000 Honor. Please note that this is a PTR-only value right now, and we may make additional adjustments to this value before the live launch of 1.14.4.

User Interface

• The reset button on the Auction House UI is now in the appropriate location.
• Fixed an issue that caused changes to Floating Combat Text settings to not update until you reload your UI.
• Fixed an issue that allowed addons to bypass the Duel to the Death contract.
• Fixed additional miscellaneous issues with the Target of Target frame.

August 3, 2023

Build: 50753

Please Join us on the Normal WoW Classic Era PTR realm tomorrow, Friday, August 4 at 2:00 p.m. PDT for another Brawl with the Blues event! We’re looking for one big final scrap to help us confirm all of our adjustments to the new PvP system are behaving as expected.

Hardcore

Multiple improvements have been made to Guild Death Announcements on Hardcore realms:

• Death announcements can be disabled in the chat window configuration options menu under “Other”.
• Guild deaths will display the creature that killed the player-character and the zone or area they died in.
• A “Coward!” debuff will be inflicted on players that flee from a duel to the death. This debuff is incredibly punishing and will persist for 3 in-game days.
• The total in-bounds area for Duel to the Death has also been greatly increased.

Bug Fixes

• Fixed an issue causing diminishing returns to not function correctly on the second and third applications of the same type of crowd control.
• Fixed an additional issue that caused scrolling combat text settings changes to not take effect until a UI reload.
• Restored a missing animation effect to the Hunter ability Flare.