World of Warcraft 5.3 Patch Notes (PTR)

Another batch of patch notes goodness for WoW players. 5.3 is now on the PTR and although nothing’s finalised, there’s plenty of interesting changes afoot in a range of areas.

So if you’re stuck somewhere without WoW to play, do the next big thing and trawl through the patch notes for the next update. Enjoy!

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World of Warcraft PTR Patch 5.3

General

• Please note: During the 5.3 PTR, not all the content listed may be available for testing, or may only be available during a limited testing window. Keep an eye on our PTR Discussion forum for details.
• New Battleground: Deepwind Gorge
  • In the new Battleground situated in the Valley of the Four Winds, the Alliance and Horde continue their war for Pandaria’s precious resources. While the two factions battle for control over mines, they must also protect their own resources from being stolen and turned against them!
• New Arena: The Tiger’s Peak
  • Gladiator hopefuls have a new location to test their mettle amidst the Kun-Lai mountain tops, in the training grounds of the powerful Shado-Pan. Players must make use of the looming tiger statues and fenced platforms to gain an advantage that will bring victory and glory!
• New Scenario: Battle on the High Seas
  • Help your faction fend off enemy forces in the midst of a battle for naval supremacy on the High Seas.
• New Scenario: Blood in the Snow
  • An agent of Zandalar has infiltrated Dun Morogh and rallied the Frostmane trolls. At Varian’s request, Moira will lead her personal guard against them once the king’s champions have stopped the magical storm protecting Shimmer Ridge.
• New Scenario: Dark Heart of Pandaria
  • Goblin engineers have been excavating in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms to find a mysterious artifact, but all they’ve found is trouble; you have been personally called upon by the Warchief to aid them in their hour of need.
• New Scenario: The Secrets of Ragefire
  • Infiltrate the Emberdeep Caverns and assist the Gob Squad in investigating a recent disappearance in Durotar.
• Heroic Scenarios
  • A Heroic difficulty for Scenarios have been added and are designed to provide challenging content for small groups of well-seasoned adventurers. Completing a Heroic Scenario awards Valor points, and a chance to obtain Raid Finder quality items.
  • Heroic Scenarios require a pre-made group to join.
  • Heroic Scenarios offer bonus objectives that will reward additional valor if completed.
    • An option to run a random Heroic Scenario has been added as a drop-down in the Scenario tab in Dungeon Finder.
  • Players can complete a normal or Heroic Scenario for bonus valor each day, but not both.
  • Six Heroic Scenarios will be available in patch 5.3. Four are new and two are upgrades of existing normal Scenarios.
    • Battle of the High Seas
    • Blood in the Snow
    • Dark Heart of Pandaria
    • The Secrets of Ragefire
    • Crypt of Forgotten Kings
    • A Brewing Storm
• Quest Campaign: Escalation
  • The Darkspear Trolls are in open rebellion against the Warchief! Aid your faction in preparing to rout Garrosh Hellscream from Orgrimmar
    • Alliance heroes will scout Orgrimmar’s outskirts and engage in SI:7 espionage to weaken Garrosh’s power structure.
    • Horde heroes will help Vol’jin’s insurgency survive a Kor’kron assault and advance towards the Horde capital.
  • Visit Lorewalker Cho at the Seat of Knowledge in the Vale of Eternal Blossoms to begin questing.

• Battlefield: Barrens
  • Put the stranglehold on Orgrimmar by undermining the Kor’kron supply chain in Northern Barrens.
    • Collect resources by killing Kor’kron loyalists and their supporters.
    • Get a group together to kill Kor’kron leaders for bonus resources.
    • Escort your faction’s caravans across the zone for even more additional resources.
  • The Darkspear Rebellion will reward your efforts to undermine the Warchief by helping you upgrade Latent Kor’kron Armor into useable gear.
  • Participate in the Escalation Quest Campaign to learn how to engage in the Barrens conflict.
• The Legendary Quest Continues
  • Journey with Wrathion to the four corners of Pandaria to speak with the August Celestials.
  • Champions will have had to complete Wrathion’s earlier tasks (including “Heart of the Thunder King”) to continue.
• New Brawler’s Guild Bosses
  • Test your might against two new tiers of bosses in the Brawl’gar Arena in Orgrimmar or Bizmo’s Brawl Pub in Stormwind.
  • New VIP areas are now accessible for brawlers at or above rank 8.
  • Bizmo has raised the floor in his arena to hide the bodies. Or… maybe to improve the sight lines. We’ll never know for sure.
  • Special “Challenge Cards” can now drop from mobs or reward satchels, allowing you to summon and battle unique bosses.

Classes

• Healing abilities and spells which automatically pick targets now follow consistent rules for targetting logic. Targets with lower % health will be preferred, and players are weighted more heavily than pets.
• Players with full health no longer count towards the cap for area-of-effect healing abilities and spells.
• The following summoned pets/totems will now chain cast their spells with no delay between casts, allowing them to cast their spells more frequently in the same amount of time.
  • Death Knight: Gargoyle
  • Druid: Force of Nature (Balance, Restoration), Mirror Image (Symbiosis)
  • Mage: Mirror Image, Water Elemental
  • Shaman: Searing Totem
  • Warlock: Doomguard, Terrorguard, Wild Imp

Death Knight

Unholy

• Sudden Doom now requires the Death Knight to be in Unholy Presence to activate the effect that causes Death Coil to cost no Runic Power.

Druid

General

• Mark of the Wild had its mana cost reduced to 5%, down from 10%.
• Symbiosis: Intimidating Roar had its cooldown increased to 90 seconds, up from 60 seconds.

Talents

• Force of Nature is no longer on global cooldown and summons a single Treant. The Treant no longer has a control bar, immediately uses its special abilities on the Druid’s current target, and accumulates 1 charge every 20 seconds up to a maximum of 3 charges.
  • Restoration version of the Treant now casts Swiftmend on the Druid’s target when summoned. This version of Swiftmend does not require or consume a heal-over-time effect on the target.

Glyphs

• Glyph of Solar Beam have been removed and replaced with Glyph of Omens.
• New Glyph: Glyph of Omens: While the Druid is not in a Solar or Lunar Eclipse, the following abilities will generate 10 Solar or Lunar Energy: Entangling Roots, Cyclone, Faerie Fire, Solar Beam, Faerie Swarm, Mass Entanglement, Typhoon, Disorienting Roar, Ursol’s Vortex, and Mighty Bash.

Balance

• Solar Beam is now more responsive when players enter and leave the beam’s area-of-effect.

Hunter

General

• Hunters now have 50 pet stable slots, up from 20.

Item Sets

• PvP 2-piece set bonus has been redesigned. Using Arcane Shot now causes the Hunter’s PvP Power to increase by 800 for 6 seconds.

Mage

General

• Arcane Brilliance had its mana cost reduced to 1%, down from 4%.
• Dalaran Brilliance had its mana cost reduced to 1%, down from 4%.
• Teleport: Vale of Eternal Blossoms and Portal: Vale of Eternal Blossoms now have new icons.

Monk

General

• Spear Hand Strike now locks a spell school out for 4 seconds, down from 5 seconds.
• Nimble Brew now also removes horrify effects, and reduces the duration of horrify effects and fear, and is available to all Monk specializations (formerly only available for Brewmaster and Windwalker Monks).

Talents

• Ring of Peace had been redesigned. The ability forms an 8-yard sanctuary around a friendly target for 8 seconds, instantly disarming and silencing enemies within the area-of-effect for 3 seconds. Enemies that use abilities other than auto-attacks or cast spells on allies within the Ring of Peace will be disarmed and silenced for 3 seconds. Disarm and silence effects are subject to diminishing returns.

Windwalker

• Legacy of the Emperor had its energy cost reduced to 1%, down from 6%.
• Legacy of the White Tiger had its energy cost reduced to 1%, down from 6%.

Paladin

General

• Blessing of Kings had its mana cost reduced to 5%, down from 22.3%.
• Blessing of Might had its mana cost reduced to 5%, down from 22.3%.

Priest

General

• Power Word: Fortitude had its mana cost reduced to 1%, down from 4.4%.
• Mass Dispel no longer dispels magic effects that are normally undispellable. Cast time has been decreased to 0.5 seconds, down from 1.5 seconds for Discipline and Holy Priests.
• Void Shift had its cooldown decreased to 5 minutes, down from 6 minutes for Discipline and Holy Priests. For Shadow Priests, cooldown has been increased to 10 minutes, up from 6 minutes, and the spell is no longer usable while in Arenas or Rated Battlegrounds.

Glyphs

• Glyph of Mass Dispel has been redesigned and no longer reduces cast time. The glyph now enables Mass Dispel to dispel magic effects that are normally undispellable.

Discipline

• Atonement now heals nearby friendly targets for 80% of the damage dealt, down from 100%.

Rogue

Talents

• Shuriken Toss now deals 100% more damage in the initial ranged attack, and energy cost has been increased to 40 energy, up from 20.

Shaman

General

• Lightning Bolt can now be cast while moving.

Glyphs

• New Glyph: Glyph of Lightning Shield causes Lightning Shield to reduce the amount of damage taken by 10% for 6 seconds after Lightning Shield is triggered.
• Glyph of Unleashed Lightning has been removed and replaced with Glyph of Lightning Shield.

Warlock

General

• Dark Intent had its mana cost reduced to 1%, down from 4%.
• Demonic Gateway cast time has been reduced to 4 seconds, down from 5 seconds, and can now be attacked and killed by enemy players. Each gateway has 50% of the summoning Warlock’s health, and 100% of their resilience.

Warrior

General

• Defensive Stance now decreases damage taken by 25%, up from 15%.

Talents

• Vigilance now resets the cooldown on Taunt in addition to its current effects.

Protection

• Unwavering Sentinel no longer increases the damage reduction of Defensive Stance by 10%.

Quests

• More information coming soon.

Creatures

• Creatures that are Level-90 and above now have a chance to drop Lesser Charms of Good Fortune.
• Rare spawns in Pandaria (except Zandalari Warscouts, and Zandalari Warbringers) and bosses in Battlefield: Barrens will now always drop Lesser Charms of Good Fortune.
• Oondasta
  • Shiny Pile of Refuse now has a chance to contain a Primal Egg, and a number of Dinosaur Bones.
  • Spitfire Beam no longer increases in damage with each jump, deals a flat 200,000 damage(up from 150,000 damage), and jumps to 99 targets (up from 20 targets).

Pet Battles

General

• Bonus damage has been added to many basic abilities, at the cost of slightly reduced accuracy.
  • Check out Pet Battle Accuracy Changes in Patch 5.3 for additional details about the accuracy changes.
• Pet Battle Duels are now available in all dungeons and raids. Enjoy!
• Pet Battles in the wild and duels are now viewable by other players in the world.
• Hit Chance is now displayed for all abilities.
• Abilities no longer have a base chance to miss or be dodged by opposing pets of the same level.
• Reduced the chance to miss when fighting higher-level opponents from 5% per level to 2% per level.
• A series of new achievements and rewards have been added for max-level matchmaking PvP pet battles
• Wins for max-level, matchmaking PvP pet battles can now be tracked in statistics.
• Battle pets’ recent ability loadouts will now be saved when pets are swapped in and out of battle slots.
• Species specific Flawless Battle-Stones are now Bind to Battle.net account.
• Black Claw now deals 20% less damage.
• Blistering Cold had now deals 100% more damage.
• Hunting Party now has an increased cooldown of 4 rounds, up from 3 rounds.
• Fixed an issue where pet abilities that had a chance to stun were not working correctly.

Battle Pets

• A number of new battle pets have been added to the Throne of Thunder and Isle of Thunder. Happy hunting!
• Whispers from pet tamers in the north have spread word of an elusive new battle pet that can be found in the frozen tundras of Northrend. The Unborn Val’kyr awaits.
• Battle Pet drops have been added to Burning Crusade raids. These new pets can be obtained from raid bosses in Karazhan, Tempest Keep and Serpenshrine Cavern. Obtaining all of these new pets will reward players with a new battle pet, Tito!
• Ethereal Soul-Trader has been returned to his original, larger size.
• Teldrassil Sproutling, Withers, and Ruby Sapling’s Shell Shield has been replaced with a new ability: Ironbark.

Battle Pet Quests

• Beasts of Fable daily quest has been broken into three separate chapters. Players can now choose to do any or all of the chapters each day.  Rewards have been modified to include a new consumable that will boost battle pet XP for a limited time.
• All Pet Battle daily quests on Pandaria, Beasts of Fable and Spirit Tamer quests will now award experience, valor, and Lesser Charms of Good Fortune.
• All Pet Battle quests will now award experience.
• Increased the difficulty of elite pets on the Beasts of Fable quest.
• A new weekly quest for max-level, matchmaking PvP pet battles has been added.

Raids, Dungeons, and Scenarios

Loot Specialization

• Players can now choose to receive loot for specializations other than the one that’s currently active. This feature can be accessed by right-clicking on the character portrait and selecting the option from the drop-down list. Loot specialization is available for bonus rolls, Raid Finder, and Pandarian quest rewards.

Raids

• Bonus Roll
  • Protection for bad luck streaks have been added to bonus rolls. Each bonus roll that does not provide loot has a progressively better chance to award loot to the player.
• Serpentshrine Cavern
  • For the Fathom-Lord Karathress encounter, Cataclysmic Bolt now deals 10% of the target’s maximum health plus 5000 damage, down from 50% of target’s maximum health, the stun effect can be removed by abilities that free the player from stuns, and the spell now targets any character class instead of only targeting character classes with mana.
  • Lady Vashj
    • Coilfang Strider’s Panic ability now activates every 4 seconds, up from every 2 seconds.
    • Shock Blast’s stun effect can now be removed by abilities that free the player from stuns.
    • Tainted Elementals now despawn after 20 seconds, up from 15 seconds.
• Tempest Keep
  • For the High Astromancer Solarian encounter, Nether Scryer’s Domination spell now has a 2 second cast time, up from instant cast, and can be silenced.
  • For the Void Reaver encounter, the radius for Arcane Orb has been reduced to 15 yards, down from 20 yards.
• Throne of Thunder
  • Amani’shi Beast Shaman no longer casts Chain Lightning while mounted on Amani Warbears.

Scenarios

• Lorewalker Cho will allow heroes to take part in either faction’s Scenarios, so players can see what the other side has been up to.

PvP

• A blog titled: PvP Gear in Patch 5.3 has additional information and reasoning behind the PvP changes in 5.3.
• All characters now have a base Resilience of 65%.
• Battle Fatigue now reduces the amount of healing and absorbs by 45%, up from 30%.
• PvP Power bonus to healing are now based on class and specialization.
  • Healing specializations receives a 100% bonus to healing from PvP Power.
  • Damage specializations for Druids, Monks, Paladins, and Shamans receives a 70% bonus to healing from PvP Power.
  • All other specializations and classes (including tanking) receives a 40% bonus to healing from PvP Power.
• PvP Power bonus to healing for healing specializations has been increased to 100%, up from 50% for Druids, Monks, Paladins, Priests, and Shamans.
• PvP Power bonus to healing for damage specializations has been increased to 75%, up from 25% for Druids, Monks, Paladins, Priests, and Shamans.

PvP Items

• Season 13 Tyrannical gear had their item levels increased to ilevel 496, up from ilevel 493. Weapons and shields/off-hand items remain unchanged at ilevel 498.
• Season 13 Tyrannical Elite gear had their item levels decreased to ilevel 496, down from ilevel 512.
• Resilience has been removed from most PvP gear.
  • Resilience gems and enchants will continue to be available and remain unchanged.
  • 4-piece PvP set bonus for all Season 12 and 13 armor sets that granted 1000 Resilience now grants 1000 PvP Power instead.
• PvP Power will remain exclusively on PvP gear.
• Glorious Tyranny weapon enchantment now grants 600 PvP Power instead of 400 PvP Power and 200 Resilience.
• New weapon enchantment: Bloody Dancing Steel is functionally equivalent to Dancing Steel, shares the same visual effect as Glorious Tyranny, costs a scroll of the base enchant, and requires a 2200 rating.
• New weapon enchantment: Spirit of Conquest is functionally equivalent to Jade Spirit, shares the same visual effect as Glorious Tyranny, costs a scroll of the base enchant, and requires a 2200 rating.
• Tyrannical Gladiator’s Tabard and Tyrannical Gladiator’s Greatcloak are available as new prestige items at 2500 rating for 1000 Conquest Points.

Battlegrounds and Arenas

• Battlegrounds, Rated Battlegrounds, and Arenas now have an ilevel cap. All gear will be scaled down to ilevel 496.
• Dalaran Arena: Masons of Dalaran have been hard at work installing steps in the two remaining corners of the arena.
• Eye of the Storm: The starting platforms have been lowered.

Professions

• Herbalists of low skill can now pick herbs in Pandaria for a small amount of usable material. The yield an herbalist will be able to harvest from each node is determined by skill level.
• Miners of low skill can now mine mineral deposits in Pandaria for a small amount of usable material. The yield a miner will be able to harvest from each node is determined by skill level.

Items

• The Voidbinders are back in capital cities and shrines.
  • PvE Item Upgrades
    • Items upgradable by Valor now require 250 Valor to upgrade per 4 item levels, for a total of 500 Valor for 8 item levels per item. This is retroactive to all items that use Valor.
    • Items upgradable by Justice now require 750 Justice to upgrade per 8 item levels, for a total of 750 Justice for 8 item levels per item. This is retroactive to all items that use Justice.
  • PvP Item Upgrades
    • Malevolent Gladiator’s Conquest (Season 12) items that have upgrades available are still upgradable at their original costs.
    • Dreadful Gladiator’s Honor (Season 12) items that have upgrades available are still upgradable at their original costs.
    • No other PvP items are upgradable.
• Reduced the amount of Justice, Honor, and Darkmoon Faire tickets needed to upgrade heirloom items by 60%.
• Players starting on Cataclysm content can purchase level-80 gear from Iris Moonweaver in Hyjal and Erunak in Vashj’ir to more easily qualify for Blackrock Caverns and Abyssal Maw: Throne of Tides.
• Two new purchasable items using Elder Charms of Good Fortune have been added for Troves of the Thunder King Scenario.
  • A box that could be placed and jumped on, opening up new paths through the Scenario.
  • Excess Elder Charms of Good Fortune can be used to purchase an Arcane Trove/Sunreaver Bounty.
• A new achievement and reward has been added for obtaining 200 mounts.
• Unclaimed Black Market Containers are now available on the Black Market Auction House. What’s inside? It’s a mystery! When opened, the container has a chance to contain any item that can be available on the BMAH.
• Courageous Primal Diamond had its clearcasting effect renamed to “Lucidity” to differentiate it from other spells with that name.

UI

• A new option to display pet tamers on the world map has been added. This should help players looking to find unlocked Pet Battle daily quests.
• When using name plates, castbars will now display for all creatures and players in the area.