World of Warcraft Dev Tracker

This is something that we can commit to do more often.

It feels like the sweet spot between not starting enough conversations about active game development and being too pushy about what council members talk about is: asking for your feedback immediately after we’ve announced something that is currently being developed.

To that end, for instance, we’re planning to start multiple new threads here on Friday...

The below hotfixes have been applied or will be applied to the Guardians of the Dream PTR as hotfixes over the course of this week and next week.

CLASSES

• DEMON HUNTER
  • Havoc
    • Demon Hide bonus to magic damage reduced to 3% (was 4%).
    • Fel Barrage damage reduced by 6%.
    • Shattered Destiny now requires 12 Fury spent per increase to demon form duration (was 10 Fury).
  • Vengeance
    • Amirdrassil, the Dream’s Hope (2) Set Bonus – Flare Up damage now benefits from talents that increase Fire damage.
• EVOKER
  • Preservation
    • Developers’ note: We have concerns about the amount of Essence Bursts Preservation is able to generate through the new 2 piece bonus, so we’re reducing the number of Living Flames it can cast. We are also tweaking the 4 piece bonus to be more c...

This year, we plan to release a World of Warcraft Q&A video soon after BlizzCon. We’ll take the questions for the Q&A from you – both at BlizzCon and via forum threads that we’ll open on Friday, November 3. We’ll ask you to submit questions on the latest WoW and WoW Classic updates, and we’ll answer as many as we can in the Q&A video.

We look forward to hearing from you. See you at BlizzCon!

The Guardians of the Dream PTR has been updated with the following changes:

ITEMS

• Developers’ note: As players prepare to delve into Amirdrassil, we are adjusting several Aberrus trinkets to account for changes to tuning targets and philosophy as well as to mitigate effects which have proven simply too synergistic with class power. As with Vault of the Incarnates, we want to avoid scenarios where item power could drive players to continue running old content that they otherwise would leave behind.
  • Rashok’s Molten Heart mana restore reduced by 70%, healing reduced by 50%, and Versatility reduced by 20%.
  • Beacon to the Beyond damage reduced by 11%.
  • Ominous Chromatic Essence secondary stat granted reduced by 5%.
  • Neltharion’s Call to Dominance duration increased to 20 seconds (was 10 seconds), but primary stat granted reduced by 50%.

October 25, 2023

Wrath of the Lich King Classic

• Adjusted the logic controlling the levels at which player-characters are allowed to queue for dungeons in the Random Dungeon Finder so that it is closer to the range displayed, which was also adjusted. Now, all classic dungeons should allow a range of roughly 8 levels: from 3 levels below the level of the final boss to 5 levels above. Burning Crusade dungeons should now allow a range of 3 levels below the end boss to 3 or 4 levels above it, and Wrath dungeons allow a range that starts at 3 levels below the end boss.
  • Developers’ notes: The most noticeable effect here is that the minimum level allowed for some dungeons has gone up slightly. This is intended to address situations that arise for players whose level was significantly lower than the rest of the group.
• Fixed a bug that could prevent Masked Orphan Matrons from starting the Headless Hor...

October 25, 2023

WoW Classic Era and Hardcore

• (With realm restarts) Added additional protections to prevent some deaths via flight-path disconnects. Now when you take a taxi, a protection aura is placed on you that prevents all damage, your hearthstone cooldown is reset, and your hearthstone spell is insta-cast.
  • Developers’ notes: We have alerts in place that will help us as we continue to monitor and investigate this issue.

October 25, 2023

Player versus Player

• Blade’s Edge Arena has been temporarily removed from the Arena rotation, for a terrain issue to be addressed.

WoW Classic Era and Hardcore

• (With realm restarts) Added additional protections to prevent some deaths via flight-path disconnects. Now when you take a taxi, a protection aura is placed on you that prevents all damage, your hearthstone cooldown is reset, and your hearthstone spell is insta-cast.
  • Developers’ notes: We have alerts in place that will help us as we continue to monitor and investigate this issue.

Wrath of the Lich King Classic

• Adjusted the logic controlling the levels at which player-characters are allowed to queue for dungeons in the Random Dungeon Finder so that it is closer to the range displayed, which was also adjusted. Now, all classic dungeons should...

Yes, we’ve deployed hotfixes to address a lot of what was happening here.

The ranges are based on the level of the last boss in each dungeon. Now, all classic dungeons should allow a range of roughly 8 levels: from 3 levels below the level of the final boss to 5 levels above. Burning Crusade dungeons should now allow a range of 3 levels below the end boss to 3 or 4 levels above it, and Wrath dungeons allow a range that starts at 3 levels below the end boss.

This is something that happens with regularity. You were perhaps joining a queue that had grown quite long because, at that time of day, damage dealers were queueing up in much greater numbers than tanks or healers.

Imagine what the queue might look like: it’s 875 damage dealers, all listed in the order they joined the queue, and zero tanks or healers. With each tank+healer that come along, up to 3 of the players in the queue get a group and enter the encounter. At prime time, imagine that a tank+healer queues up once every 5 seconds, reducing the size of the queue by up to 36 damage dealers per minute.

Now imagine that a significant percentage of the tank+healer groups that queue already have one or two damage dealers in their group. They only need a fifth player. So only the person at the front of the line is removed from the queue and put into the encounter. In the meantime, the queue has grown from 875 to 885 damage dealers.

In this simplified** hypothetical...

Earlier today, we doubled the hourly instance limit for the Headless Horseman event. You should now only hit this limit if you attempt more than 10 instances in an hour.