Today the patch notes for the upcoming 3.2 patch, The Call of the Crusade, were released. These are the first round of notes, and will likely change a fair bit before this goes live. I’ll be going over a few highlights from the list here, particularly things that pertain to raiding, and raid tanking, as those are my primary focus.

Emblem System Changes:

• Both the 10 and 25 player instances of the Crusaders’ Coliseum drop a new Emblem of Triumph.
• Any dungeons that previously dropped Emblems of Heroism or Valor, such as Naxxramas or Heroic Halls of Stone, will now drop Emblems of Conquest instead. Emblems of Conquest can still be converted to Valor or Heroism.
• The Heroic dungeon daily quest will now reward 2 Emblems of Triumph and the normal daily dungeon quest will reward 1 Emblem of Triumph.
• The existing achievements to collect 1, 25, 50, etc. Emblems of Heroism, Valor, and Conquest have been converted to Feats of Strength since Heroism and Valor Emblems are no longer attainable.

I hate that this is first on the list of discussion, but I don’t really feel like rearranging it. This is by far my biggest issue with this patch. Blizzard’s whole implementation of the tiered Emblem system was to prevent players from falling back into The Burning Crusade’s issue of getting high-tier end-game quality gear, from farming tokens out of low-tier dungeons. Extending on my earlier post, this is just going to turn some guilds into farm guilds that gear people up for the next tier, but aren’t actually running that tier of content. Now while there isn’t a TON of gear to be had from EoC, you can still purchase T8 pieces from the vendor, and in my opinion getting T8 from heroics is a poor move on Blizzard’s part. Additionally the Emblem of Triumph rewards from the two daily dungeon quests is a further watering down of the system. You’ll be able to purchase Tier NINE gear from a Tier SEVEN level instance.

Mana Regen Changes:

• Mana Regeneration: All items that provide “X mana per five seconds” have had the amount of mana they regenerate increased by approximately 25%.
• Replenishment: This buff now grants 1% of the target’s maximum mana over 5 seconds instead of 0.25% per second. This applies to all 5 sources of Replenishment (Vampiric Touch, Judgements of the Wise, Hunting Party, Enduring Winter Frostbolts and Soul Leech).

I agree with this, in the current state, Intellect is a very nice stat for a healer (particularly Paladins), this coupled with the Divine Intellect nerf (15% to 10%) and Illumination (60% to 30%) should make paladins appreciate the mp5 a little more, and not be Holy Light spam bots.

DK Tanking Changes:

• Frost Presence: 10% bonus health reduced to 6% bonus stamina.
• Icebound Fortitude: Cooldown increased to 2 minutes.
• Veteran of the Third War: Stamina bonus reduced to 1/2/3%.
• Toughness: This talent now grants 2/4/6/8/10% armor instead of 3/6/9/12/15%, placing it in line with similar abilities of other classes.
• Unholy Blight: This talent has been redesigned. It no longer deals damage to nearby targets. Instead, when you deal damage with Death Coil, the target will take periodic damage for 10 seconds equal to 30% of the damage done by Death Coil. This damage accumulates in the same way as Ignite and Deep Wounds.

About time, DK’s are so completely overpowered at the moment. Stamina nerfs and armor nerfs are well deserved. Although I feel the nerf to IBF isnt enough, combined with AMS and AMZ (if specced) a DK still pulls WAY ahead on magic bosses (things like Mimiron’s Plasma Blast).

Now for the good stuff :)

Paladin Tanking Changes:

• Blessing of Sanctuary: This blessing now also increases stamina by 10%. This effect is not cumulative with Blessing of Kings.
• Exorcism: Now has a 1.5 second cast time, but can once again be used on players.
• Judgement of Light: Now heals for 2% of the attacker’s maximum health instead of a variable amount based on the spell power and attack power of the judging paladin.
• Righteous Fury: No longer has a duration or mana cost, remaining until canceled or death. Also canceled when a Paladin activates a different talent specialization.
• Ardent Defender: Redesigned. Currently, any damage taken by the paladin while at 35% health or below is reduced. Instead, any attack that would reduce the paladin to 35% health or below has its damage reduced. In addition, once every 2 minutes an attack that would have killed the paladin will fail to kill, and instead set the paladin’s health to 10/20/30% of maximum.

Now I know I’m a little biased here, but I love these changes. Threat being where it is, I feel the Exorcism change is a great one (to keep me in my 9696 rotation against undead). Changing BoSanc into a Improved Blessing of Kings is a great way to consolidate the blessings and make Protection Paladins not feel so turn between the two when running overgeared content. Judgement of Light, finally, no more arguing with our holy/ret Paladins who gets to judge what. I’ll never be caught letting my RF run out in the midddle of a boss fight again either. Saving the best for last, An AD that cannot be leapfrogged and also a mini Divine Gaurdian. Awesome, just awesome.

All healer mechanics that increased the targets armor by a percentage have been modified to give a 10% damage reduction. Good mechanic change, I’m guessing eventually this would have pushed Feral’s to the armor cap, and also helps non-DK’s out a little on magic damage bosses.

All in all, I like the changes to the patch, but I’m still very disappointed in Blizzard for not keeping with the tiered emblem system. I hated having to farm kara week after week to get certain badge items. I wanted to be pushed to new content and rewarded for going above and beyond the first tier of raids. Hopefully this is something that will change in the time between PTR and live.