4.1 Prot Warrior changes, [4.0 Warlock changes]

Two things in patch 4.1 combine to make me a more competent raider. One: Improved net code gives me a stable ~230ms latency in raids. Two: My interrupts no longer miss, and have a shorter CD. The result of these changes is that the only time I'll miss an interrupt is when I personally fail at paying attention. [Or if Ignacious and Fellatius* gang up on me, but that's another rant.] You cannot imagine how much this reduces my stress levels for bosses than require an interrupt.

I love the idea of Shield Block reducing magic damage as well, but realistically you'll still use Shield Block on CD for the physical damage mitigation [assuming you are tanking], so the end result is an RNG 4% overall magic damage reduction, assuming maximum Shield Block uptime. It's a very welcome mitigation buff, but nothing revolutionary. I seem to recall it having both a higher uptime and a larger % reduction when it was first included in the PTR notes-- I'm assuming it just got "balanced" down to its current level.

Spell reflect CD has more than doubled. I'm not sure where this nerf has come from. This was a situational ability in PvE, but very useful in PvP, so I'm assuming that this is part of the PvP nerf warriors seem to have had. Another thought is that perhaps there is a boss in Firelands which casts single target spells at the tank and Warriors had too much of an advantage over other tanks at this boss.

Raid Last Stand. This came a bit out of left field. I'm not used to needing the level of raid-awareness [when playing my Warrior] that this ability would require to be useful as an OSHT button. I can think of a few situational uses, phases of high raid damage, Chimaeron comes to mind of course, and it will nicely buff any percentage-of-total-HP healing abilities, but the very short ten-second duration and the fact that the healers may not be prepared for the entire raid to lose 30k health simultaneously when it fades makes me extremely hesitant to use it. I think this ability was probably intended to be a much more meaningful effect, but like Shield Mastery was eventually "balanced" into its current form. It just seems like one of those "no real use" abilities and I have a feeling that they'll end up buffing it just to get people to use it at all.



Going through my old blog posts to remove the crappy formatting I came across a draft that I never got around to posting from late November last year [shortly after The Shattering]. Reading this makes me want to play my Warlock again.

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Well here we go. Exciting time. I actually finally got around to trying the new Destruction last night and it is sweet. It’s every bit as Shadowfury-Conflagrate-fast-cast satisfying as pre-4.0, but now it has:

- All-magic-damage ward which has the old Nether Protection effect built in.
- CD instant pyroblast
- Imp proc instant pyroblast
- Imp has lost Fire Shield. =(
- Oh but now he can dispel magic. =D
- Did I mention the instant pyroblasts? <3

They’ve also done some fantastic things with making each demon useful in a different way, to the point where each feels like a subspec in itself. Succubus can CC and has a new knockback, Imp buffs your stamina, can dispel and works with Destro DPS, Voidy is for tankz and survivability, Fel puppy is for Affliction DPS and anti-casters. [And Demonology of course has the ultra demon that trumps them all, as it should.]

What’s interesting about the new Soul Burn multipurpose CD is that they seem to have deliberately avoided any obvious "increase dps" use for it. You can use it for instant demons or instant pyro or fast movement or a temporary health increase or as a threat CD for tanking, but I was really anticipating at least one or two along the lines of "decreases cast time for your next five Shadowbolt casts" that would be an obvious DPS gain.

There are too many classes and I want to play them all. =(