Blizzard has stopped holding WoW: Forever to Classic’s power budgets. In the final beta development notes, posted Monday night by community manager Kaivax two days ahead of the November 4 launch, the team says it has “raised damage on classes across the game” over the last two weeks and increased the health of higher-level creatures to compensate.
Classic power budgets meant every addition cost something else
The developers explain the change in their own notes:
Over the course of Beta, we came to the realization that trying to hold ourselves roughly to Classic power budgets for each class meant that every new element we added needed to come at the expense of something else. Those reductions left some iconic abilities feeling lackluster, and closed the door to other potentially exciting design options.
The team calls the result “headroom.” It also admits some earlier changes were “likely hasty in turning to Burning Crusade- or Wrath-era solutions” instead of ideas built for Forever’s combat. The stated goal is not “perfect numerical equality,” but classes that feel valuable by “doubling down on the strengths and differences that make each class unique.”
No big tuning changes are planned before raids open next month
Blizzard says it has tuned the game “to a reasonable place,” but that “the only true test of that tuning is the game itself.” Apart from bugs and serious outliers, it does not plan “big tuning changes” before raids open next month, and we reported the first raids for December 9.
A “large tuning pass” is expected once there is enough data from players leveling past 30. The notes do not give it a date.
Shaman loses Lava Burst while top-rank Lightning Bolt gains 80 percent
Elemental Shaman is one of the most visible changes. Lava Burst is removed and replaced by Call of Thunder, which adds 5 percent critical strike chance to Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning. Lightning Bolt’s base damage rises on all ranks, with the top rank up 80 percent, and Lightning Overload now has a 10/20/30 percent chance to trigger a duplicate spell, up from 3/7/10 percent.
Enhancement gets a boost too: Stormstrike now deals 150 percent normalized weapon damage, up from 100, on a 6-second cooldown instead of 8. Early reaction on r/wowforever is split, in a thread that is still small. One commenter says the changes “made elemental hit like a truck,” while another calls Elemental PvP “dead on arrival.”
Salvation is gone, so bears and Warriors generate far more threat
Paladins lose Salvation, Mass Salvation and Revoke. Bear Form and Dire Bear Form threat jumps from 50 to 115 percent, which Blizzard says is “to compensate for Blessing of Salvation being removed.” Warrior Defensive Stance threat goes from 30 to 80 percent, and Righteous Fury is now trained at level 10 instead of 16, matching when other tanks get their stance.
Rogues get Shank, and their poison scaling doubles
Rogues pick up a new ability at level 24. Shank costs 5 Energy, has a 10-second cooldown, cannot miss, deals 50 percent off-hand weapon damage and generates 15 Energy. Deadly Poison’s Attack Power coefficient doubles to 0.009, and Instant Poison’s doubles to 0.01.
Other large swings in the notes:
- Hunter: Aimed Shot bonus damage up about 110 percent, Arcane Shot base damage up about 30 percent.
- Druid: Shred goes from 155 to 200 percent weapon damage, Ravage from 350 to 435 percent, and Starfire base damage rises about 40 percent.
- Warlock: pets drop to 2 Health per point of the master’s Stamina, down from 7.5.
- Priest: a failed Shadow Word: Death now costs the Priest 30 percent of maximum Health, up from 10.
Starting zones get the fastest respawns until the launch rush settles
Respawn rates are adjusted across the world so players aren’t “hitting hard bottlenecks” on launch day. Starting zones respawn fastest, and rates gradually slow as you level. Blizzard says it will bring lower-level zones “down to more typical rates” once the initial surge settles, and that it isn’t trying to remove competition entirely: “Some contention for spawns is expected and part of the experience.”
Bags stop auto-equipping, and new spells stay off your action bars
A few changes are ones you will notice in your first hour. Bags must now be equipped by hand, and new spells are no longer added to your action bars automatically. Training all class abilities from 1 to 60 now costs between 206 and 207 gold for every class, and the notes say gamepad support has “entered a complete functional state.”
The notes also find room for one joke. Dalaran Summoners in Alterac Mountains, Blizzard writes, “were really amazingly good at summoning and would summon until their little hearts couldn’t summon anymore. And then they’d summon some more anyway.” That is now fixed.
