19/02 Instance Performance Balancing
This only appears to be in effect on EU realms at the moment. As soon as Blizzard announces it for the US as well I'll post something.
Quote from: Wryxian (Source)
To ensure stable and positive performance in raid and dungeon instances, an instance performance balancing feature was implemented which limits the total number of instances that can be created on a realm. Prior to this change, we were seeing serious issues in instances which greatly degraded instance performance, and in some cases, caused them to crash entirely.
This update instituted a load check that limited opening of additional instances. This will result in throttling of some instance creation where users receive the following message: "Additional instances could not be launched. Please, try again later." Ultimately, we felt that some wait time for players attempting to create a new instance was better than causing bad performance for all players in instances.
We are continually monitoring the realms affected by this, and use the data we gather to implement further optimisations. Our ultimate goal is to work toward the removal of the limit.
More on Mana Regen Changes
Yesterday Ghostcrawler posted more information on the mana regen changes coming in 3.1. While this would normally fall under the blue post recap since it's not an announcement, this is a fairly important piece of info to a large majority of players.
Quote from: Ghostcrawler (Source)
The goal is to have mana last about the same for all healers. We don't think many players would be that interested in a style where you heal crazy good for a short period and then run OOM. How classes manage their mana varies a lot, and we are making tweaks to it for 3.1 to try and keep them in line. For example, the shadow fiend needs to be more reliable.
I am still not following the logic that Int now trumps Spirit by even more. It may have been a better stat already, but these changes shouldn't affect it that much unless you A) skip Meditation and Intensity, or B) relied a whole lot more on OOFSR regen than the average raid healer of reasonable skill.
I will break from our normal practice and go ahead and provide the numbers, just to make sure nobody is guessing about the details when doing their estimates:
-- The amount of base mana regen granted has been reduced 40%. We called this "Spirit" in the notes, since most players associate OOFSR regen with Spirit, but in reality Int factors into the equation as well and we only lowered the constant, not the relative contributions of Int or Spirit. In retrospect, this probably caused more confusion than it alleviated, but mana regeneration is a fairly technical concept.
-- The effects of talents that provide mana regen while casting have been increased by 67%. This includes: Arcane Meditation, Improved Spirit Tap, Intensity, Mage Armor, Meditation, Pyromaniac, and Spirit Tap. For example, Intensity and Meditation are now 17/33/50% mana regen while casting (up from 10/20/30%). For most dps classes who never got much mana from OOFSR in the first place, the results should not be noticeable. Boomkin may be a possible exception because of Innervate, and we'll take a look at that.
-- This should leave mana regeneration while casting (even the contribution of Spirit) relatively unchanged, but reduce mana regeneration while not casting by 40%. (If you don't understand our logic, I suggest you re-read the excellent post I quoted above.)
-- Since paladins don't rely on any of those abilities for mana regeneration, we lowered the healing penalty of Divine Plea to -50%. We are also likely to make Spiritual Attunement provide less mana for non-tanking paladins. We are not touching Illumination for the moment. Nor are we lowering the effects of Replenishment (though as I have suggested, it would be our likely next target if we aren't happy with the results of these changes).
Blue Posts
New Glyphs Coming Soon (Source)
Yes, we'll be adding new glyphs soon.
Brewfest Mount Acquisition (Source)
Currently there are no changes planned to the mount drops. Have your friends level up your alts and be ready to beat him up for the mount you deserve!
Be Mine! Achievement: Was it actually fun? (Source)
I enjoyed myself... to a degree, I wouldn't say the event or specifically this achievement went as smoothly as I/we would like it to.
Raids & Dungeons
Flame Leviathan will not be optional (Source)
The challenge of this boss is not planned to be optional. Are you prepared for it?
5 Hardest Raid Bosses (Source)
In no specific order some that come to my mind are C'Thun, C'Thun's trash, M'uru pre-nerf, Sartharion 3drake, and old school 4 Horsemen.
Ulduar Attunement (Source)
I don't believe there is any attunement currently planned for Ulduar. Instead you can head straight into the dungeon and enjoy it instead of running around somewhere and getting ready only to find that two of your main healers didn't do the attunement yet.
Why AQ40 mounts can't be used elsewhere (Source)
They were never intended to be mounts used in the outside world aside from the Black Scarab Lord one and so far we don't see a reason to change this. They do count toward the mount achievement so enjoy some free mounts as you pile them up to 100, or 101 really.
2009 Arena Tournament
Character cap on tournament realm is 3 (Source)
You may only have 3 characters at any given time. This means that if you have 3 characters and want to change, you have to delete one before creating a new one.
No crab pet choice on Arena Tournament Realm (Source)
Seriously, we'll get this fixed. With the new design, you should be able to pick any pet for the tournament. We might not be able to change this right away though.
