What would you do? (a.k.a. am I an asshole?)

Story time boys and girls, gather round gather round:

Today I was propositioned by a guild mate to help him run all three of the new Icecrown heroics back to back, his intent of course to farm up some ilvl 232 gear that he was in need of as upgrades. I always encourage behavior of people trying to upgrade their gear, especially when it is available in heroics. We managed to round up a healer in the guild as well and decided that we would pug up the last two dps when we got no replies for such in the guild. Having a tank and healer we were queued up for Heroic Forge of Souls and we're on our way.

When we arrived in the instance, we saw our two other dps were Death Knights. Both of them were swinging around Edges of Ruin, so I thought this would be at least a solid run in terms of dps and clearing things out. Some of their gear was pvp variants, but I thought that shouldn't stop a DK from pulling at least 2k dps. When they asked at the beginning if we were going to do all three heroics I told them "that was plan."

About the third trash pull I noticed that we were going a bit slower than usual but thought nothing of it. By the time we were done with the last boss of the instance, I got a tip from the guildies with me that both the DK's were actually pulling less than 2k. Thats less than the damage I do when I'm tanking. Thinking nothing of it, I said "so vote kick them," in guild. Thinking that they would go swirling into the nether of some obscure server never to be heard from again, it was only after the first vote kick that my guildies and myself noticed both were actually from our server. When asked why they were kicked as we started to enter Pit of Saron, I gave the explanation of low dps to which I was responded to with hostility, boiling down to accusations of being an asshole.

I took a moment to think about it, and then responded in the middle of the tirade "what gives you the right to decide who gets to go?" with this: "After looking over the dps charts, it's my opinion that you both need either better gear from lower levels of heroics or a better understanding of your class before attempting some of the hardest heroics in game."

Of course the DK's weren't happy about my response and went on to insult me some more. After getting out the instance one of them apparently started to trash talk the guild, of which is primarily my fault, no doubt about that.

How could I have handled it better? Probably by giving them an explanation before vote kicking them, that occurs to me now.

Am I wrong for kicking them though? Does it make me an elitist asshole? Maybe a bit.

My point of view though: It should be possible for most, if not all classes in dps specs, to be able to pull 2k dps from just questing blues and crafted purples. I know blue posts have gone on to say that they feel 1.5k is about the average low end of dps looking to do heroics and that if they are below that then there is some misplaying or misgearing going on, but I truly feel 2k is obtainable, even for a fresh 80 DK.

If you've got an opinion on the issue dear reader (and I'm sure you do) now would be the PERFECT time to respond by leaving a comment at the end of this post! I value your feedback and like to know who's reading.

So, are my standards too high or would you have done the same?

Greatest Hits of 2009

Happy Holidays to everyone! I hope your Holiday season has gone well. Been touring around a bit, so far as Vegas!

Anyway, 2009 is over, but it's been quite the year for WoW! We've been given so much over this year, dwarfing probably more than any other year in the game's five year history. I've decided to countdown what have probably been the most influential changes to the game in a general sense. Of course a blog list will vary from your own opinions, but take a gander all the same

#10 Disenchant option in Dungeons

This probably seems like a small one to some people, but not having to determine who in a group is an enchanter and speed through the rolling process, not to mention not having to pass out shards in the end, just screams as a great time saver for 5 man groups. Very subtle but very cool.

#9 Revamped starting experience

If you haven't rolled a new toon recently (which I wouldn't blame most) let me just sum up that levels 1 to 20 are now easy mode, and thats not a bad thing at all! Making the game more attractive to new players is great for retaining new players. Having spells cost less mana, more appropriate starting weapons, super reduced chance to be dazed, it's all great stuff that will really start paying off when Cataclysm hits the shelves.

'cause we're all gonna try out a Worgen, don't even deny it.

#8 Turning off Experience

This is something a lot of Twinks have been asking forever! No longer do you have to worry about walking out of a town randomly, accidently gain level 20 for some reason and make your Shadowfang worthless. At the same time though, this is a bit of a double edged sword for twinks since experience-less toons now have a much increased chance to be matched against each other. So no, twinks won't be mowing down under-geared gnomes all day long now, but not pushing yourself out of your bracket after your all twinked out is more than an even trade. Being able to turn of xp if you like to quests with others is also kind of handy for group play. Really though, this change goes hand in hand with the next item on the list.

#7 Experience in Battlegrounds

There have been reports of people trying to level purely through PvP now, which is actually kind of viable. Questing around and queuing up for a BG while you do so is a good way to stay on your toes while leveling. Go in with a group and you increase your odds even more. Those with many alts that like to pvp will love this change. Try rolling around in a fresh 58 / 59 DK for some fun times.

#6 Normalization of Profession Bonuses

This is another sort of two-sided change that some people will take issue with. Those people are the ones that took Blacksmithing and Jewelcrafting because it offered the largest stat gain of any profession combination, especially being able to gain extra socket bonuses you would normally pass up. For everyone else though, a sigh of relief washed through WoW, now knowing that the you would be gaining very similar buffs just by having 400 or so profession points in two professions. It's not quite perfect though, Master of Anatomy is still woefully under-powered, Lifeblood is great for grinding but situational at best in the endgame, and Toughness is just for Tanking, maybe PvP. Still, we're better off having some variety in crafters for the game as a whole.

#5 Gems for Honor, Badges for PvP

A nice little cross-game action with this one, Being able to redeem PvE currency for PvP rewards and vice versa has helped broaden the game on all fronts. Hardcore raiders now find themselves doing more Wintergrasp and Battlegrounds so they can get some Honor for gems, and now badges from heroics can go towards PvP gear for everyone. Another subtle but nice change.

#4 Earlier, Faster Mounts

Remember how big a milestone level 40 was? Getting your first mount and being able to move across the globe at something other than run speed was revolutionary for many and a matter of pride, if not a right of passage back in Vanilla and BC!

I don't miss those days though when I look at the system now. Being able to get your first mount at level 20 is just a much better idea! 20 is when you start having to get out of your predefined zones and start looking for adventure elsewhere, and being able to trot along the countryside makes such a difference when leveling. Epic at 40 and flying at 60 go right in line with the progression, but the increase to regular flight speed is probably what takes the cake for a lot of people. Not everyone has the time and devotion for epic flying (a real real shame) But 150% flying speed over the old 60% is a much better feeling so that you don't feel like your gibbing your land speed for the ability to go over obstacles.

#3 Revamped Badge System

We caught a gleaning of this on release with a two-tiered badge system that rewarded better gear for those that could find the people for 25's. Since then we've seen more tiers of badges added and heroics updated in order to provide gear for this behind the cutting edge raid curve or just getting alts leveled up. Many players cried fowl when this plan was released, claiming that it made the game easy mode and took away from the reward and stature of the "Hardcore Raider." In truth, it has redefined what can be considered a hardcore raider. Blizzard has said they want more people to see the endgame of content, and with this change everyone will get the option, even if they just have to keep plugging away at heroics. The difference now comes at the speed of which you finally get to take down that last antagonist at the end of his nefarious lair. If your hardcore, it may be a week or two with the release of the content. If your casual, it may be further down but it is possible!

Really though, if you define yourself into this "Hardcore" classification, you should be worrying less and less about people running dungeon for their Tier 10 and more concerned with how Heroic Deathbringer Saurfang is going to punch your face in.

Nice little rant there. These next two choices were tied in my mind, but I had to put one before the other, so here goes:

#2 Dual Specialization

It finally happened this year, something we've all been requesting for a very very long time got implemented and now we no longer have to click a little box 71 times for new talents, go through the additional trouble of re-glyphing, then reset your action bars and macros! So much time saved, its amazing really. Before being able to change with the click of a single button seems like the dark ages. Dual spec's are what caused me to switch my main role in raids from a DPS to a Tank. Being able to be a tank for heroics all the time has quickly allowed me to build up skills vital to be learned as a tank and take it on full-time. I'll admit though as soon as I got it for the first time, I almost instantly wanted triple-specialization. My healing as a Paladin is rusty, and the spell power plate just keeps dropping in excess for my raids =P

Well, if you've seen my second pick, you can probably guess my first pick.

I mean, I only talk about it all the time.

It's a revolutionary change to the game thats added so much value.

Well, without further ado, the greatest change to WoW this year was easily:

#1 Jousting

I think everyone can agree with me when I say that it was a fantastic idea by Blizzard to add a psuedo PvP option to PvE when they added the Jousting feature with Call of the Crusade in 3.2! And boy did they implement it into a lot of stuff for that patch! Lots of new dailies and a Boss in the 5 man EVERY SINGLE TIME! So you can enjoy the not-boring, not-tedious, and not-hated fighting craze thats sweeping the nation. And boy, do I see people using the Jousting-duel option all the time, for bragging rights or for settling tenuous socio-economic disputes in Great Britan. I can only hope we end up Jousting the Lich King himself!

. . .

. . .

. . .

Nah, I'm just yanking your chain =D

The Real #1: Revamped Looking for Group system

What can I say that hasn't been said already? It's a revolutionary change to the game thats made running dungeons more popular. And truly, dungeons are where WoW shines in terms of design. Being able to queue up without having to dig through various chat tells takes away so many headaches as the games pairing system is more than competent to build you a group. Rarely will you get an unworkable group or instance. More-so is that the function works so well while your leveling up a character. Being able to work on quests and have a dialog box pop up and port you straight end is so amazingly wonderful, and the teleport out option is also incredibly handy. While I do value Dual Spec's, how great this addition was caught so many off guard it just had to take my top spot!

Well, thats all I've got for tonight. I hope 2010 goes great for everyone and I hope to be writing well into Cataclysm. So I'll see you all in a random dungeon!

In-depth dungeon finder impressions

By far the biggest hit of the patch so far has been the new Random LFG system. It seems everybody has tried it at least once, and reactions to it have been mostly positive, especially in the speed that it takes to get a full group together. So kudo's to Blizzard to getting this system up and running.

I've used the tool to run my fair share of heroics since the patch release. I'm usually tanking at least once a day on my Paladin for Emblems of Frost, and then hopping around to my alt tanks and healer to build some Emblems of Frost for Primordial Saronite later. My experiences have been mostly positive on the whole, especially on my Paladin. I have a sneaking suspicion that this is due to the higher item-level of gear and getting matched up with other players of similar stature. Likewise, my Death Knight and Warrior tanks seem to get into groups with other players on the lower sides of gear scores, as they only adequately meet the requirements (at least in my eyes) to tank heroics. Many other players are also reporting these discrepancies in their pugs, citing super well-geared squads or dismal bands of destitutes. The system works well enough now, and while I suspect some players would cry fowl at the prospects of carrying lower-geared players, a better cross section of player gear would be better on the whole for the system.

Here's a bit of etiquette and tips when using the random-lfg:

-If you have friends or guildies that are willing to lend a helping hand, You may want to ask to bring them along before randoming the rest of your group. Especially if your gear is sub-par, having people sympathetic to your situation is better than invoking the ire of random people.

-Speaking of Ire, expect to hear some "colorful constructive criticism" when random'd up with people. Even if you know your doing your job right, some people can't resist ribbing others.

-If you haven't run at least all of the Lich King dungeons once (preferably on heroic) please do the rest of the game a favor and do not check yourself off as leader material. You do a great disservice to yourself and others by posting false claims of your knowledge.

-If you have no idea what is going on in an instance (shame on you for not even doing a little bit of reading), don't be afraid to ask! It's better to live humbly than to die ignorant.

-If your a hybrid class and are checked off as healing or tanking along with dps, expect to not be dpsing. You will however be rewarded with a quicker queue time.

-Remember to take any reagents or consumables you need into the instance with you. Players across servers can only trade items found inside the instance, so the studious Shadow Priest won't be able to trade water to the impromptu Resto Shaman.

-If you do forget to repair or bring liquids, don't forget that you can use the "eye" icon on your minimap to port back to town, and then again to get back to the dungeon. It will inconvenience your party, but not as much as your gear going red in the middle of Halls of Lightning.

-Achievements, especially those that don't make the fights easier, are better left to be achieved with a premade group if that is your prerogative. Ask if you'd like, but don't expect everyone to be happy to go out of their way and not take a red drake through Oculus.

-If you think the dungeon or a group isn't the best use of your time, don't be afraid to desert. While you do get a debuff keeping you out for 15 minutes, if you've got something better to do, the group will survive and find another person to fill your role.

These tips should hopefully help smooth out your pugging experience. Good luck in all your instanced endeavors!

If you got bug problems I feel bad for you son, I got 3.3 problems but a Lich ain't one

Alas, I can't take full credit for the awesome title of this post, that honor goes to Radioted, a reader and commenter over at WoW.com

So after much downtime of getting all the servers gussied up, 3.3 hit us, and in this bloggers opinion, it's actually been pretty smooth.

Far from perfect mind you, but still, most of the features are working as intended (or some semblance there-of) and that's saying a lot for patch day. I'll break down review of what I've tinkered with so far.

The most interesting part of the patch, in my humble opinion, is the new random LFG, which looks to be an invaluable tool in the future of the game. The instance server load for the night of a patch release was, of course, staggering, making our favorite "Additional instances cannot be launched at this time" message make it's triumphant return to the game. Hello loading screen that refuses to load, bane of my existence, unbeatable boss forever and ever. And hark, there was a multitude of forum goes, and their QQ's drowned the Blizzard page, salty words in a torrential downpour...

...ahem...

It's patch day, lots of people want to do the new stuff, and it looks like as the game goes on that you'll have an easier time getting groups. Anyways, the Random LFG seems to be working like a charm. After queueing yourself up for a random group, you get matched up EXTREMELY quickly, I'm talking like a couple seconds. Now, this may be because non-dps rolls are in high demand (healers and tanks) and that there are many hungry dps nipping at the heels of these rolls, so your milage may vary. Any of my toons marked up for a tank or healing roll along with dps checked off was always delegated to the non-dps roll.

Warping into dungeons is pretty darn cool once everybody is ready to go, and it really is super handy for those people who always forget to repair their gear or forgot their tanking belt (you know who you are). Of course, some of these pugs may be like the horror stories we've all heard before, alts coming out of the woodwork with sub-optimal gear. Blizz has stated so far that low gear scores will restrict you from accessing tougher heroics, and so far I haven't set foot in an instance yet where players were at least a majority of blues and epics, so it's been quite acceptable.

Of course, with pulling people from different servers that you may only communicate with with in just one dungeon, you increase anonymity, which on the internet translates into a greater likelihood that your group members will be dicks. If your fiddling around on alts, prepare for some colorful constructive criticism.

The new disenchant option on loot is a godsend. Does the DE for you and rolls out the shard if nobody has needed or greeded. Pretty fantastic.

As for the new 5 mans. I've managed to do two so far. Getting pulled in mid instance for the second one restricted my access to the third, though I've heard that I'm not missing much from an unfortunate server bug near the end of the Halls. From what I have done on heroic, these places are tough. Granted, they still don't quite hit the level of difficulty that Heroic Magister's Terrace had when it came out in BC (CC was an absolute MUST!), but they're a step up from Heroic ToC 5, which is all fine in my book. The bosses are epic with lots of abilities, the music is cool and moody, and the atmosphere feels just right.

Cross-faction mailing for heirloom items is also in effect. Haven't tried bags or gold yet, but it'll be next on the list. Rolling around in super high-damage gear at low levels never gets old to me. More-so, lower level characters are now much more resilient than they used to be. Chopping down the mana costs at low levels was a fantastic idea and makes the starting and learning experience much more smooth for new players. It also makes the game look more appealing as you'll rarely have to eat and drink before level 20. This could end up being a sort of double-edged sword though, as not conveying this information to new players early on may lead to neglect later in the game. The new tutorial system in game hopes to counteract this.

Well, thats all I got for my first round of 3.3. Hopefully some raid reflections will be coming up soon!

3.3 To-do list

Well, 3.3 is supposed to hit tomorrow (today?), so while your chilling out waiting for server's to get off maintenance, patching to go through, or servers to reset again, here's a quick list of things every player should do once we have the world stabilized and ready to enjoy:

-Respec! Before anything happens, make sure that your spec is up to date! Lots of changes to classes everywhere, so you may need to respec or get some exciting new glyphs. There's a lot of potential out there at the moment, Frost Mages getting perm Elementals, Affliction Locks returning to the top of the DPS charts, Unholy DK's supposedly having a workable scourge strike, things like that. Pallies, we more or less got some minor nerfs when it comes to pve (more survivability stuff for pvp apparently) so you might want to check your respecs as well.

-Conquer the new ICC 5-mans! Get an elite squadron of people you trust and clear out all three of the new instances. If you haven't seen the quests involved inside the triple-winged trial, let me just say that they're oozing with lore and dripping with epic loots! 219's for the regulars and 232's for the heroics, so if you aren't already geared to the 9's, there's something in there for you! Also, with the new random LFG system, you'll have these 3 open up as potential locations to get set into. Remember, the new Cross realm LFG doesn't take heroic lockouts for dungeons in account, so there's a chance that if you've already cleared it out with a group regularly, you can get again if the server-god's are looking kindly on you.

(Edit: It looks like some of the quests inside the new ICC 5's will be netting you some Emblem's of Frost! Huzzah!)

Speaking so much of the Random LFG

-Try the random LFG! This is going to serve as your new daily heroic, so you might as well get a feel for it early. Theoretically, in a perfect world, you should be able to log in, queue yourself up for a random dungeon, marking up whatever rolls you can fill, and in about the time it takes to get queued up for a BG, you should be knocking out whatever instance you've lucked into. If your wary your first time through, you can pick 3 people you trust on your server and let the service random up the last person. This will count to the daily reward of two Emblems of Frost! Doing more will also get you closer to a new pet if that's your collection addiction.

-Check out what the weekly raid is! This new system is going to be throwing you a random raid boss every week for a shot at getting 5 more Emblems of Frost along with 5 Emblems of Triumph. These bosses range to thinks like KT (who you can skip to directly now!) and XT-002, to some of the early ICC bosses. Plan and coordinate with people you trust, these bosses can be taken down on 10 or 25, whatever is most works best!

-Check out the new VOA boss! More badges and an early chance at Tier 10! Suggest you spread out the group as evenly as you can (or stack it so your the only one getting tier >_>)

-Finish your Rep grinds! If you've got any factions in Northrend that aren't revered or exalted yet, you can now buy rep tokens for the price of a single Emblem of Triumph! Better yet, shoulder enchants and head enchants are now BoA, meaning you can mail em off to alts!

speaking of BoA

-Roll an Alliance (or Horde)! If you haven't tried rolling around as an opposite faction yet, now is actually a great time to give it a shot! Bind on Account Heirloom items are now mailable cross-faction, so if you've saved up a ton of gear or badges, why not roll around and be op for a bit? I'll be messing around with an Alliance Shaman from time to time ^_^

-Get Quel'Delar! As quick as you can! Unless you were a top tiered raider and got yourself a weapon from ToGC 25, this quest has an upgrade for you (except for you tanks =P). Seriously, go get it, be pro and walk into ICC with an ilvl 251 weapon.

I mean it, do it, people will love you and it will rain money.

-Get a new Heirloom item! Don't forget about the new fishing derby on weekends! A chance at an heirloom ring being able to bring up your experience on alts to 25% with shoulders and chest is just nuts. If you managed to have recruit-a-friend going, it's going to be 375% extra experience. Jumpin'-Jehovah!

And of course, you've got the biggest baddest raid yet, with the expansions penultimate villain waiting for you...

Ain't no rest for the wicked

Happy post-thanksgiving to everyone, hope your turkey-day was good, let's get down to it.

MMO-Champion has graced us with even more information on the legendary Shadowmourne, check out this video on the weapon and it's effects:

Pretty spiffy effect, nice to let everybody know what your toting around, as if the BIG BLUE GLOWING AXE OF DOOM wasn't enough of a tip-off.

More interesting to those though who are waiting for their appetites to be sated by 3.3's release is the consolidation of information on the illustrious quest line to accompany chopper. As with any pre-release information on a site, it's subject to change, but we can go over it a bit. Those that were wondering what the price of entry on legendary piece of loot was, we've got answer of friendly reputation with the Ashen Verdict, 25 Primordial Saronite, and what they're reporting as quest items from Festergut and Rotface, the first two abomination bosses in the plague / unholy / construct / green wing of Icecrown. Of course it goes on to require more boss items from each of the end bosses of each wing, which limits the first possible siting of this beauty to the 3rd gate unlock. We also still don't have an exact spot of when we take up Shadow's Edge in our crusade to create this monster, which is a very formidable piece on it's own.

Might as well take a step back to mention that Icecrown is one of the greatest culminations of epic weapons to occur in the game. Public enemy number one holds Frostmourne, while the valiant verdict has employed the purified Ashbringer, and amongst the raiders we'll have Quel'Delar (a sister blade to Onyxia's Quel'Serrar) and soon Shadowmourne in the ranks as well. It's a lot for lore nerds to geek out about, and if your invested at all in the story, check out some of the links.

For those looking to get a head start on what's going to be the hardest raid this expansion, take a hop on over to TankSpot some time. Spiritus has been compiling guides for bosses tested on the PTR's and has some rough strategies for bosses that are worth taking a look at.

P.S. Good song

Ashen Verdict has plans for you!

Browsing around some WoW sites and forum, I've come across a handy link on Wowhead showing what the Ashen Verdict has to offer to crafters once 3.3 hits.

The Ashen Verdict's Reputation Rewards

For those of you who don't know, the Ashen Verdict is a new faction of master crafters from the Knights of the Ebon Blade and the Argent Crusade. It looks like they'll also be heavily involved with Shadowmourne quest line.

You can see the first iterations of the rings offered with reputations. These are looking to be quite good for most classes and should serve frugal players well. If you've got some bank though, you can pair them up with the new Kirin Tor Signets that are also being reported to be ilvl 251 on release.

Take note of materials on these material list and expect to see them go up in price on the first few weeks of release. With the introduction of the new lfg system, I suspect that some of the hardcore raiding sects will be bringing out their alts and running randoms every day for badges to convert into Primordial Saronite, the new crafting orb for 3.3 (this is assuming of course that these orbs will be buyable with the highest badge when 3.3 hits). At least, thats my plan >_>

The axe, the myth, the legend:

So they've datamined Shadowmourne's legendary version off the PTR, here is what we have in all it's glory:

Shadowmourne

Binds when picked up

Unique

Axe

Two-Hand

Speed 3.70

954 - 1592 Damage

(344.1 damage per second)

+198 Stamina

+223 Strength

Red Socket

Red Socket

Red Socket

Socket Bonus: +8 Strength

Classes: Warrior, Paladin, Death Knight

Durability 145 / 145

Requires Level 80

Item Level 284

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 114.

Equip: Increases your armor penetration rating by 114.

Your weapon swings have a chance to drain a Soul Fragment granting you 40 strength. When you have acquired 10 Soul Fragments you will unleash Chaos Bane, dealing 1900 to 2100 shadow damage split between all enemies within 8 yards.

Pretty much speaks for itself. This is the endgame of all endgame's for Plate DPS. The 3.7 Swing Speed ensures some beefy hits on all your instant attacks. The red slots scream "socket me with dps gems" And the unique proc is now better than ever. The undead clause is gone, and a straight strength gain for each shard is just godly good. You don't even have to ask who gets the weapon as it's slapped right on there for reminder. It's not a hunter stat-stick, it's not the rebirth of Enhancement 2h, this is strictly a plate 2 hander. That of course brings up the question of it'll work as a tanking axe for the Death Knight community.

You can look at the stats and see that yes, everything you need to tank with is on there: Strength for parry, a great chunk of stam, slow swing speed to avoid parry gibbing, gem slots for what have you. So yes, it'll work as a tank weapon. It is a supreme waste to use it as such though. Raid members who dps at the top of their game and have the talents to maximize the effectiveness of the weapon is what this thing is for. The armor pen on the weapon speaks more usefulness to Warriors more than Death Knights and Paladins, but armor pen is still a dps increase for all the classes listed above.

In short, give it to your highest plate dps, where it's going to have the most usage.

Of course, we're still not entirely sure how you "give" this weapon, as starting details of the quest have yet to be unveiled. We know that you you'll end up turning Arthas' old hammer into the progenitor of the legend, but what starts the quest has yet to be determined.

Another interesting note with the quest for the legendary axe is that parts of the quest line, at least on the ptr, have noted acquiring certain elements from ending bosses of each wing of Icecrown. Coupled with the delayed lockout that was recently announced, don't expect to see this baby in the hands of hardcore raiders until after quite some time.

P.S. I ever see anybody socket this thing with an AP gem, I will hunt you down!

Icecrown Loot 2: Electric Boogaloo

More PTR testing with bosses and loot tables shows us some more cool gear, so lets hop into the interesting stuff:

Trauma

Binds when picked up

Mace

Main Hand

Speed 1.80

113 - 359 Damage

(130.9 damage per second)

+53 Stamina

+53 Intellect

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 264

Equip: Increases spell power by 741.

Each time your spells heal a target you have a chance to cause the target of your heal to heal themselves and friends within 10 yards for 217 each sec for 6 sec.

So for all the healers that didn't manage to assemble a Val'anyr to call their own, we have the alternative end game. Starting off with a huge chunk of spell power is always great as well as a moderate amount of Int and Stam to go with it as well. After that though, we trade out other stats that we'd find on a typical healer mace for a unique proc (somebody has to come up with a name for these things). This proc favors raid healers who hit lots of different targets in order to spread the the aoe hot around, though I'm sure this will look attractive to MT healers like disc priests and paladins. This will probably end up being another tool for healers to use in order to customize particular sets. Cross your fingers for this one off Rotface 25 healers.

Deathbringer's Will

Binds when picked up

Unique: Deathbringer's Will (1)

Unique

Trinket

Requires Level 80

Item Level 264

Equip: Increases your armor penetration rating by 155.

Your attacks have a chance to awaken the powers of the races of Northrend, temporarily transforming you and increasing your combat capabilities for 30 sec.

So here we have a new unique trinket for our dps classes that favor armor pen. I'm starting to suspect that this trinket is probably one of the defining reasons for the new unique classification line. The procs from these trinkets have been cached and show a bunch of different forms that increase your stats based on the form (Northrend beasts like Magnataurs and Tuskarr). Keeping track of these forms is probably easier when you only have one proccing. Very cool trinket indeed. (here's the heroic version)

Icecrown has loot!

Update 1: MMO-Champion has some T10 stats up, along with ICC 10-man stuff

Well, if you haven't seen it yet, hop over to MMO-Champion when you get the chance to take a look at the loot posted on the PTR for patch 3.3. Decided I'd go over some of the notable pieces that strike my fancy:

Bryntroll, the Bone Arbiter

Binds when picked up

Axe

Two-Hand

Speed 3.40

801 - 1203 Damage

(294.7 damage per second)

+107 Strength

+99 Stamina

Red Socket

Blue Socket

Socket Bonus: +6 Strength

Durability 120 / 120

Requires Level 80

Item Level 264

Chance on hit: Steals 2138 to 2362 life from target enemy.

As having my fair expertise with a 2-handed melee class, I've got to say that I'm getting really tired of seeing a 3.4 swing speed attached to neigh every weapon 2-handed piece in the game. Few and far are the exceptions to this rule, and it probably helps balance out bursty aspects of 2h (plate really) dps classes.

I digress...

This is a very curious weapon as when we compare it to top-end stuff from ToC, (i.e. the Dual-blade Butcher, Regular or Heroic) we see less strength and less stam on this weapon. This begs the question as to who this axe is the most value. A higher low and top end damage from the reg DbB (but not heroic) is going to give dps classes a boost, no way around that. But the lack of stats really begs the question as to who gets the most value from a life drain proc.

Answer is simpe: Death Knight Tanks. Having a constantly dipping health pool through fights where tanks will be dodging less and taking more consistent damage gives this axe a place to shine. Judging from the icon, expect to yank this sucker off of Lord Marrowgar.

Black Bruise

Binds when picked up

Fist Weapon

Main Hand

Speed 2.60

471 - 707 Damage

(226.5 damage per second)

+69 Stamina

Durability 75 / 75

Requires Level 80

Item Level 264

Equip: Increases attack power by 93.

Your weapon swings have a chance to grant you Necrotic Touch for 10 sec, causing all your melee attacks to deal an additional 9% damage as shadow damage.

Now THAT is a cool looking fist weapon. Once again, the only stats we get off this set knuckles is stam and ap along with a unique proc. I'm sure it'll be theory-crafted the hell out of and found that this'll be pretty damn good for CQC rogues. The real question comes is how well this is going to work for Enhancement Shaman.

Band of the Bone Colossus

Binds when picked up

Unique: Band of the Bone Colossus (1)

Finger

+90 Agility

+90 Stamina

Requires Level 80

Item Level 264

Equip: Improves hit rating by 62.

Equip: Improves haste rating by 57.

Equip: Increases attack power by 121.

A pretty standard dps ring for mail and leather wearers, the real interesting piece comes from the unique line. My thought is that this will make it so you cannot have a regular and heroic version of the same ring on, which is a little bit odd. Three other ilvl 264 rings have this bit on them as well.

Those are the most interesting ICC pieces I see up at the moment, but there is plenty more from the dungeons.

We've finally got the quest rewards up for the Quel'delar quest line:

Quel'Delar, Might of the Faithful

Heroic

Binds when picked up

Sword

Two-Hand

Speed 3.60

769 - 1155 Damage

(267.2 damage per second)

+164 Strength

+164 Stamina

Durability 120 / 120

Requires Level 80

Item Level 251

Equip: Improves haste rating by 91.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 99.

Plate DPS sword, extremely attractive swing speed with stats that every class can use (haste being given a funny look by all)

Quel'Delar, Ferocity of the Scorned

Heroic

Binds when picked up

Sword

Two-Hand

Speed 3.40

727 - 1091 Damage

(267.4 damage per second)

+144 Agility

+136 Stamina

Durability 120 / 120

Requires Level 80

Item Level 251

Equip: Increases attack power by 197.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 99.

Equip: Increases your armor penetration rating by 91.

Hunter Weapon, straight-up (unless you really like armor pen that much). Solid stats all around, it's just a shame that pretty model will be sitting on your back instead of getting swung around.

Quel'Delar, Cunning of the Shadows

Heroic

Binds when picked up

Sword

One-Hand

Speed 2.70

388 - 722 Damage

(205.6 damage per second)

+62 Agility

+54 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 251

Equip: Increases attack power by 88.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 42.

Equip: Increases your armor penetration rating by 39.

Rogue Main-Hand, and what a main hand that is. That 2.7 swing speed is to die for as a combat hack-n-slash rogue. Hunters can also pick this up if they're going to get more stats with a comparable off-hand to go with it. If your a Death Knight thats dead set on dual wielding, this will also work quite well.

Quel'Delar, Lens of the Mind

Heroic

Binds when picked up

Unique

Sword

Main Hand

Speed 2.10

120 - 379 Damage

(118.6 damage per second)

+59 Stamina

+59 Intellect

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 251

Equip: Improves haste rating by 49.

Equip: Increases spell power by 657.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 54.

Caster sword for the other half of the game. These are stats that are generally every-man for casters, and even works as a healing sword for the Holy Paladin. Warlocks and Mages though, 657 spell power. SIX-HUNDRED-AND-FIFTY-SEVEN-FRIGGAN-SPELL-POWER.

Thats a lot of spell power.

But of course, Blizz hasn't forgotten about Priests, Druids and Shaman:

Cudgel of Furious Justice

Heroic

Binds when picked up

Mace

One-Hand

Speed 2.60

374 - 695 Damage

(205.6 damage per second)

+62 Agility

+60 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 251

Equip: Improves haste rating by 40.

Equip: Increases attack power by 83.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 42.

So this is for Enhancement Shaman to have something to swing around, but will also work Death Knights and Mace spec'd Rogues (ironically, no armor pen on this for your talents). The swing speed is a solid 2.6 and the stats are once again solid. The only thing that bites about this weapon right now is that it's sharing a model with one of the TK temp legendary weapons, the Cosmic Infuser, which honestly, just doesn't hold a candle to any of the Quel'Delar models.

Hammer of Purified Flame

Heroic

Binds when picked up

Mace

Main Hand

Speed 1.80

103 - 325 Damage

(118.7 damage per second)

+59 Intellect

+59 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 251

Equip: Restores 25 mana per 5 sec.

Equip: Increases spell power by 657.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 54.

Mainly for the rest of the healers first, but it'll work great for an Elemental Shaman, Shadow Priest or Boomkin. MP5 over spirit sorta makes this scream shammy even more, and once again has a kinda funky model, looks like an offhand.

Lightborn Spire

Binds when picked up

Mace

Two-Hand

Speed 3.20

684 - 1026 Damage

(267.2 damage per second)

+144 Agility

+144 Stamina

Durability 120 / 120

Requires Level 80

Item Level 251

Equip: Increases attack power by 191.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 103.

Equip: Increases your expertise rating by 84.

So here we have the mace to quell all the feral druids. It's a great bear mace and a pretty good kitty one too at that. It's model is actually pretty bad-ass to boot! Doesn't have a heroic tag though, hmmmmm...

251 ilvl weapons for DPS classes is just damn crazy! This is really good on Blizz tho imo as weapons are often one of the things that hold back a lot of dps classes, and having something baseline that will be obtainable by those who don't raid is solid. Bitch all you want about catering to the casuals but I think this is a good thing.

(plus I'm happy that I don't have to decide between a tank sword and a dps sword ^_^)

And finally, we've got posted the 219 and 232 loot from the Regular and Heroic 5 mans coming with 3.3. And there are a staggering ton of items to look over.

Out of the 219, we've got a pretty standard offering, but with a lot of cool models. For the sake of brevity, I'll just post links to some of the cooler looking items:

Hate-Forged Cleaver - Very Horde-looking axe

Crypt Fiend Slayer - Looks like a model they never used for EoE

Ghoulslicer - Roll a DK, Dual-Wield these

Mourning Malice - Another EoE model, looks smaller than the Ghoulslicer

So the 232's for the serious guys here:

Nighttime

Binds when picked up

Axe

One-Hand

Speed 2.60

325 - 605 Damage

(178.8 damage per second)

+52 Agility

+39 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Improves haste rating by 34.

Equip: Increases attack power by 78.

Equip: Increases your armor penetration rating by 34.

Cool looking model and great stats, I'll probably be saying this a lot.

Falric's Wrist-Chopper

Binds when picked up

Axe

One-Hand

Speed 1.60

200 - 372 Damage

(178.8 damage per second)

+52 Strength

+77 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Increases defense rating by 27.

Equip: Increases your parry rating by 21.

Equip: Increases your shield block rating by 31.

Ok, now this is supremely interesting to me. First off, this thing is huge, how the hell is this a one-handed weapon? It's going to look awesome with a shield, which it will always be used with because...

...gasp...

IT HAS BLOCK RATING, not value, RATING! This is amazing to me! This squares this weapon away as a Paladin / Warrior tanking weapon. I mean, if you ignore the block rating, I guess prot DK's could use it as an offhand I guess. Swing speed is kinda fast, but we haven't seen a slow prot weapon since Naxx. The final thing wroth noting is that there isn't a single point of dodge on this prot weapon. This is kind of perplexing to me. If your below 20% dodge for ICC, then dodge does nothing. There are a few more pieces in the 5 man heroic that have this same "parry and def but no dodge" situation.

Tyrannical Beheader

Binds when picked up

Axe

Two-Hand

Speed 3.50

651 - 977 Damage

(232.6 damage per second)

+129 Strength

+137 Stamina

Yellow Socket

Socket Bonus: +4 Strength

Durability 120 / 120

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Improves haste rating by 92.

Equip: Increases your armor penetration rating by 53.

Once again, great model, good stats, very Warrior / Death Knight thing. It will serve you well ...while you look for your Quel Delar.

Black Icicle

Binds when picked up

Mace

One-Hand

Speed 2.60

325 - 605 Damage

(178.8 damage per second)

+39 Agility

+39 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Improves hit rating by 29.

Equip: Increases attack power by 103.

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 38.

Damn good looking mace.

Seethe

Binds when picked up

Sword

Main Hand

Speed 2.20

109 - 346 Damage

(103.3 damage per second)

+52 Intellect

+39 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Improves hit rating by 39.

Equip: Improves haste rating by 52.

Equip: Increases spell power by 550.

Reskinned Broken Promise likes AMAZING!

Rimefang's Claw

Binds when picked up

Sword

One-Hand

Speed 1.70

213 - 396 Damage

(179.1 damage per second)

+52 Strength

+77 Stamina

Durability 105 / 105

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Increases defense rating by 27.

Equip: Increases your dodge rating by 31.

Equip: Increases your parry rating by 21.

Spectacular looking tanking sword @_@. Seems to be a very twisted looking Kirin Tor design. This also has a tad bit slower swing speed than most tanking weapons as well, so if you want an extra bit of threat, this might be what your looking for (I'd probably consider swinging a 2.6 speed dps weapon though if your having threat problems)

Second Helm of the Executioner

Binds when picked up

Plate

Head

1925 Armor

+157 Stamina

+84 Strength

Meta Socket

Blue Socket

Socket Bonus: +8 Defense Rating

Durability 100 / 100

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Increases defense rating by 82.

Equip: Increases your shield block rating by 55.

Equip: Increases your expertise rating by 53.

If you've got a custom block-cap set (or uncrushable set, or whatever you want to call it) This is a very attractive helm that you'll want to pick up. (P.S. I love block rating)

To round out the final bit, we've got three unique trinkets to take a look at:

Needle-Encrusted Scorpion

Binds when picked up

Unique

Trinket

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Improves critical strike rating by 114.

Chance on melee or ranged critical strike to increase your armor penetration rating by 452 for 10 sec.

This is going to jump out a Feral Druids mostly but other classes that look at the soft cap of Armor Pen should take note as well. While this trinket is going to provide you less armor pen than the procs from a Grim Toll or a Mjolnir Runestone, it'll give you a little more crit over the latter. If your in the position of getting some more gear to stack some more armor pen, you'll end up having a little more passive damage and less reliance on your proc. It's a step up if you have the other pieces of gear to support it.

Ick's Rotting Thumb

Binds when picked up

Unique

Trinket

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Equip: Increases your dodge rating by 113.

Increases maximum health by 4104 for 15 sec. Shares cooldown with other Battlemaster's trinkets.

Damn solid tanking trinket. It's a ton of dodge that'll help you jump over that 20% dodge limit if you need it (you really really really shouldn't though) and the battlemaster use will be handy in Icecrown, a place thats going to test how well you use your cooldowns. If your carrying a mitigation set, this trinket is for you!

(wonder how close we are to a dodge capped rogue set...)

Ephemeral Snowflake

Binds when picked up

Unique

Trinket

Requires Level 80

Item Level 232

Grants 464 haste rating for 20 sec.

You gain 11 mana each time you heal a target with one of your spells.

Now this seems really really really interesting to me on first glance. Obviously a healer trinket, the on use haste function will probably work well as oh shit button we you gotta lay on heals, but it's the second part that needs answering quick. At worst, this is going to make healers spells all cost 11 less mana, which would probably make a lot of healers shrug. Now if it gives a healer 11 mana off of every tick of a hot, then we're looking at something that could potentially be a best in slot kinda thing in terms of longevity.

Well, thats everything I'd define as super interesting. Hop over to MMO-Champion if you want to take a look at the armor and other stuff, because there's a ton of it.

Expect more posts as we get more info!