Nearly 3 months after the release of Wrath of the Lich King, Blizzard is finally putting out some new content! Forlorn Legacy will be hitting the PTR’s very hard as soon as Ulduar is activated. Our good friend Daelo (Lead Encounter Developer @ Blizzard) announced a while back that there will be set times where people will be able to test Ulduar. He also said that certain encounters won’t be tested at all, and some encounters would be tested only on the European PTR’s. This is an interesting new approach Blizzard is taking to testing new raid content. Anyway, I wanted to share some thoughts on a few of the new features coming in Patch 3.1…

Ulduar

Most guild have had Naxxramas, The Obsidian Sanctum and The Eye of Eternity on farm status for months. Personally, Naxxramas can goto hell as far as i’m concerned, I did it at Level 60, ran weekly pugs at Level 70, and I run it 4 times a week at Level 80. I’m sure there are people out there who share my sentiments, a new raid instance has been long overdue. Ulduar will feature 14 bosses, 11 of them having optional hard modes. Personally, I love the concept behind hard modes, they offer another level of difficulty and more replay value. My only qualm is when achievements like Heroic: You Don’t Have An Eternity and You Don’t Have An Eternity don’t offer any rewards beyond the achievement points. Sartharion 3 Drake is a perfect example of rewarding players for the extra level of difficulty.

Dual Talent Specialization

This is quite possibly one of the most anticipated features to date. Dual Talent Specialization allows you to pickup a second set of talents and glyphs that you can switch to at any given moment (as long as you’re not in combat). When this feature was first announced, you would need to be near a Lexicon of Power in order to switch specs, but it seems they had a last minute change of heart. When the PTR’s went live, the Lexicon of Power requirement was lifted, you can now respec anywhere. I recently setup Dual Specs on my Paladin (Holy/Ret) and Mage, (Frostfire/Arcane) the one time fee you have to pay to your class trainer is currently 1000g, but with the amount of complaining going on…the price may go down. Personally I think 1000g is adequate, but for some people that amount of gold is hard to come by. I can see both sides of the argument.

Argent Tournament

This came as a surprise, I don’t think anyone was expecting this but it seems like a pretty cool concept. The Argent Crusade has setup a new camp just north of Sindragosa’s Fall in Icecrown, they’re in the process of building a coliseum that’s supposedly getting added in a future patch. The whole purpose of this event is to introduce mounted combat, you’ll be able to get a special mount that you can use to fight players and NPC’s. The initial questline teaches you how to use the new Tournament mounts, you get 4 basic abilities - Attack, Ranged Attack, Charge & Block. There’s also bunch of dailies available from Silver Covenant/Sunreaver NPC’s in their respective camps. That’s right, they’ve finally implemented the Silver Covenant and the Sunreavers. I was unable to find a quartermaster for either faction but i’m sure it will be implemented by the time 3.1 goes live.

All in all, Patch 3.1 is looking good, long overdue…but still good! I’m anticipating a 2 month stay on the PTR before going live, so we’re looking at a late April/early May release.