[2022] 9.2.5 PTR Development Notes

World of Warcraft Version 9.2.5 PTR

ACHIEVEMENTS

• All Covenant Sanctum feature achievements are now visible and count towards your character’s total achievement points, regardless of which covenant your character currently belongs to. Nonetheless, all characters must belong to a Covenant to earn that Covenant’s specific achievements.

CHARACTERS

• Blood Elves can start a quest to earn a new mount, weapon appearance, and the Blood Knight armor set for Blood Elf Paladins by speaking to Liadrin in Oribos. Requirements: Level 60 and Exalted with Silvermoon.
• Dark Iron Dwarves can start a quest to earn a new mount and weapon appearances by speaking to Anvil-Thane Thurgaden in Shadowforge City, Blackrock Depths (accessed via Mole Machine). Requirements: Level 50.

CROSS-FACTION INSTANCES

• Players are now able to directly invite members of the opposite faction to a party if you have a BattleTag or Real ID friendship, or if you are members of a cross-faction WoW Community.
• Premade Groups in the Group Finder listings for Mythic dungeons, raids, or rated arena/RBGs are now open to applicants of both factions, though the group leader may choose to restrict the listing to same-faction applicants if they so choose.
• WoW Communities now have the option to be cross-faction, while Guilds will remain single-faction.
• Random matchmade activities like Heroic dungeons, Skirmishes, or Random Battlegrounds will all remain same-faction. [LEARN MORE]
• The following instances are not cross-faction:
  • Trial of the Champion
  • Trial of the Crusader
  • Vault of Archavon
  • Icecrown Citadel
  • Baradin Hold
  • Siege of Boralus
  • Battle of Dazar’alor
  • Darkmaul Citadel (Exile’s Reach dungeon)

ITEMS AND REWARDS

• Broker Mark of Distinction now increases the Renown of your currently active Covenant to 60 (was 40).
• Renown catch-up is accelerated through Renown 60 (was 48).
• These activities will now have a 100% chance to reward 1 Renown upon completion:
  • Mythic and Mythic+ dungeons
  • Torghast Layers 9-16
  • Defeating a Shadowlands raid boss encounter
  • Winning a Rated Battleground
• Reward boxes from Callings now contain twice as many Grateful Offerings, still scaling with your covenant sanctum’s Anima Conductor level.
• The Zereth Mortis weekly quest “Patterns Within Patterns” now awards Grateful Offerings.

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

• New Arena: Enigma Arena
  • The mysterious Enigma Arena from Zereth Mortis was created by the Progenitors and serves as an ever-changing battlefield. A switch located at the center of the Arena can be used to create cover for yourself and your allies—or deny it from your opponents. Clever strategists will control and dictate the flow of battle; those who cannot adapt will surely be defeated.
  • Enigma Arena has been temporarily disabled.
• PvP Talents
  • Developers’ note: In 9.2.5 we’re planning adjustments to a few PvP talents for specs that could benefit from mechanical changes, beyond the scope of our standard balancing (which will continue separately, as needed). Since these will be limited and the changes are aimed at addressing specific concerns, feedback on your experiences with these classes and effects during 9.2.5 will be valuable for informing future development.
  • Death Knight
    • Anti-Magic Zone’s spell damage reduction increased to 50% (was 20%) in PvP combat.
    • Dome of Ancient Shadow (PvP Talent) has been removed.
  • Warlock
    • Demonic Embrace now increases your Stamina by 20% (was 10%) in PvP combat.
    • Demon Armor (PvP Talent) has been removed.
    • Affliction
      • New PvP Talent: Shadowfall – Gain the Nightfall talent with 100% increased chance to gain its effect. If you already have this talent, you may select another in the same row.

SHADOWLANDS SEASON 4

• Mythic+
  • New Seasonal Affix: Shrouded – Nathrezim infiltrators have disguised themselves among the enemies throughout the dungeon. Cartel Ta will reward you handsomely for assisting in their capture.
  • New Dungeon Rotation
    • Tazavesh: Streets of Wonder
    • Tazavesh: So’leah’s Gambit
    • Operation Mechagon: Junkyard
    • Operation Mechagon: Workshop
    • Return to Karazhan: Lower
    • Return to Karazhan: Upper
    • Iron Docks
    • Grimrail Depot

USER INTERFACE AND ACCESSIBILITY

• All search filter dropdowns now have a button that lets you easily remove all active filters.
• The default hand cursor now has new, higher resolution art for its larger sizes under Interface Options > Accessibility.
• The Report Player pane has been redesigned, with new categories added. (Available in a later PTR build)

Hello everyone! Here are this week’s 9.2.5 PTR notes:

CHARACTERS

• Blood Elves can start a quest to earn a new mount, weapon appearance, and the Blood Knight armor set for Blood Elf Paladins by speaking to Liadrin in Oribos. Requirements: Level 60 and Exalted with Silvermoon.
• Dark Iron Dwarves can start a quest to earn a new mount and weapon appearances by speaking to Anvil-Thane Thurgaden in Shadowforge City, Blackrock Depths (accessed via Mole Machine). Requirements: Level 50.

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

• New Arena: Enigma Arena
  • The mysterious Enigma Arena from Zereth Mortis was created by the Progenitors and serves as an ever-changing battlefield. A switch located at the center of the Arena can be used to create cover for yourself and your allies—or deny it from your opponents. Clever strategists will control and dictate the flow of battle; those who cannot adapt will surely be defeated.
• PvP Talents
  • In 9.2.5 we’re planning adjustments to a few PvP talents for specs that could benefit from mechanical changes, beyond the scope of our standard balancing (which will continue separately, as needed). Since these will be limited and the changes are aimed at addressing specific concerns, feedback on your experiences with these classes and effects during 9.2.5 will be valuable for informing future development.
  • Warlock
    • Demonic Embrace now increases your Stamina by 20% (was 10%) in PvP Combat.
    • Demon Armor (PvP Talent) has been removed.
    • Affliction
      • New PvP Talent: Shadowfall – Gain the Nightfall talent with 100% increased chance to cause your next Shadow Bolt to be instant. If you already have this talent, you may select another in the same row.

SHADOWLANDS SEASON 4

• Mythic+ Season 4 is currently mid-development and Mythic Keystones may behave strangely or not function at all until this work is complete. We’ll provide more details once Mythic+ Season 4 is ready for testing.

Hello everyone! Here are this week’s PTR notes:

ITEMS AND REWARDS

• Broker Mark of Distinction now increases the Renown of your currently active Covenant to 60 (was 40).
• Renown catch-up is accelerated through Renown 60 (was 48).
• These activities will now have a 100% chance to reward 1 Renown upon completion:
  • Mythic and Mythic+ dungeons
  • Torghast Layers 9-16
  • Defeating a Shadowlands raid boss encounter
  • Winning a Rated Battleground

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

• Enigma Arena has been temporarily disabled.
• Death Knight
  • Anti-Magic Zone’s spell damage reduction increased to 50% (was 20%) in PvP Combat.
  • Dome of Ancient Shadow (PvP Talent) has been removed.
• Warlock
  • Affliction
    • New PvP Talent: Shadowfall – Gain the Nightfall talent with 100% increased chance to gain its effect. If you already have this talent, you may select another in the same row.

PROFESSIONS

• Increased the experience points earned when crafting Specialized Armor and Jewelry for creating Runecarving items by 400%.
  • Developers’ note: In order to allow more players to engage with the crafting system late in the expansion, as well as finish their legendary leveling for a reasonable cost, we are increasing the XP gained by rank so it only takes three crafts per rank to reach the next rank.

Hello everyone! Here are the notes for this week’s PTR update:

ACHIEVEMENTS

• All Covenant Sanctum feature achievements are now visible and count towards your character’s total achievement points, regardless of which covenant your character currently belongs to. Nonetheless, all characters must belong to a Covenant to earn that Covenant’s specific achievements.

ITEMS AND REWARDS

• Reward boxes from Callings now contain twice as many Grateful Offerings, still scaling with your covenant sanctum’s Anima Conductor level.
• The Zereth Mortis weekly quest “Patterns Within Patterns” now awards Grateful Offerings.

The 9.2.5 PTR has been updated with following:

PLAYER VERSUS PLAYER

• The Enigma Arena has returned to the PTR with a new name: Enigma Crucible.
  • Developers’ note: Our intention was to release this map with a unique mechanic, a central button that allowed players to manipulate the pillar configuration throughout the match. Unfortunately, we encountered challenges during implementation that would have resulted in a poor quality experience. While we continue to work on this arena’s unique mechanic and evaluate it for a future release, we’ve decided to go forward with a version of the Arena that has a single pillar configuration that remains locked throughout the match.

The Season 4 Mythic+ Affix is now available for testing on the PTR.

SHADOWLANDS SEASON 4

• Mythic+
  • New Seasonal Affix: Shrouded – Nathrezim infiltrators have disguised themselves among the enemies throughout the dungeon. Cartel Ta will reward you handsomely for assisting in their capture.
  • New Dungeon Rotation
    • Tazavesh: Streets of Wonder
    • Tazavesh: So’leah’s Gambit
    • Operation Mechagon: Junkyard
    • Operation Mechagon: Workshop
    • Return to Karazhan: Lower
    • Return to Karazhan: Upper
    • Iron Docks
    • Grimrail Depot