Ulduar is up, Servers are not ...

... not up to the task.

Yes, it's been a long time you didn't have a rant post on this blog. Today will be one ...
Yesterday was patch day in EU. Ok, I know, we all know too well the catchy "Patch Day, No Play !" But don't tell me you were not eager for Ulduar and didn't want to try it right away, from the number of people having answered the poll (to the right of this very site), and even if few have, a large majority of raiders want to raid Ulduar.

Patch time was extended in EU, it is usually until 11am, it was announced to last until 3pm. As said on WoW Insider, we all expected it was to include in the EU patch release the maintenance that already was added to the US real during the night ...

So my guild had a small team-speak meeting in the evening and we made two 10-Man groups and went to Ulduar. Our idea was to keep it to 10-Man at first, have fun with that size, and then go to 25-Man hoping for new challenges. Why do we do that ? Because we hope to keep the content interesting a little longer like that. Ulduar is big, but it's only one instance, and once we'll have finished it we all already dear the long wait for the next raid instance.
Anyway.

Both groups entered Ulduar around 9:30pm (GMT+1). Both groups downed the Flame Leviathan pretty quickly, with the "mandatory" achievement to not have used the trick to stun it ... when you don't know the switch is destroyed by the air missiles, there is no chance you activate it :P
The fight is fun, really easy, but we did it in normal, 10-Man, without any tower destroyed, so in its most easy incarnation. Let's hope it'll be a little more interesting in the other modes. But all in all I4m not that interested into a vehicle fight, so I don't care.

Now, we arrived at the crossing and the choice for Ignis/Razorscale/Deconstructor. It's strange how little trash there is in this part of the instance ... not that I'm fond of trash, but there is 0 trash to Razorscale or XT-002 ... it feels empty. I hope there will be more inside Ulduar itself.
We went for Ignis, because it was looking like there could be some fun trash, and we pulled the flame giants at the entrance. Ok, let say these babies hit hard, and have a bad aoe stun/silence. We were surprised, we wiped. And then things got ugly ...

Two of our members were out of the instance. One had to go visit the angel, his corpse being too close to the giants, one had a dc and relogged in ... Dalaran. And in front of the instance were ... 200 people waiting to go in, because the raid instance server was full (I'll post a picture tomorrow of the crowd at the raid entrance, but it looks like the picture on this WoW Insider article) ... yes the raid instance server was full ! We didn't have any message, as when you can't go into an instance since Blizzard patch about that. But the behavior was exactly the same, loading screen, waiting for 2mn without the loading bar moving, returning in front of the raid instance entrance.
Nice ! Happy !

We made two tries on Razorscale with only 8 people, one dps warrior respecing to tank on the fly, and only 2 healers ... first one wasn't too bad, we nearly got him to 50%, second one wasn't as good, I got flame bombed 3 times in a row (for more than 7K each) and died after 30s of fight.
Half an hour later, still impossible to enter Ulduar ... we stopped there.

So not even 2 hours of raid, simply because the servers were not up to the task. There were no lag, oh no ... simply because Blizzard decided to limit the number of raid instances on their servers ... and so limit the number of people who could play the game, as simple as that.
Add to that the instability and numerous people crashing out of Ulduar (we were lucky we only had that happen 4 times and the 3 first were able to come back). Looks like this is a problem everywhere, as reported here.

I'm saying servers stability and size is going to be what I'll rant about for the next weeks ... and lag has already been an issue in WotLK for months, thank you Blizzard but limiting the number of players to solve lag is not going to make happy customers.

Paladins & the Dreadful Patch 3.1

Ok, rant post again, for all Holy and Retribution paladins sake (not that I don't like prot paladins but they look fine in this patch).

I'm just going to list all the wonderful changes that I do really fear in patch 3.1. Don't tell me I'm not posting the "good" ones, I won't cover protection here, and this is the only branch receiving buffs in patch 3.1.

I've covered already several points in earlier posts :
Patch 3.1 Patch Notes updated (13th), yet more sad paladin changes
More on Paladin state in 3.1
Enlightened Judgements Nerf, why so much druid love ?

I'll try to sum-up all the changes for Holy Paladins here.

Official Patch Notes: (see post below)
Divine Plea can once again be dispelled.
Spiritual Attunement: Removed from trainers. It is now available deep in the Protection tree for 2 ranks at 5/10%.
Blessed Hands: Now reduces mana cost of Hand of Freedom, Sacrifice and Salvation by 15/30%, and improves the effectiveness of Hand of Salvation by 50/100% and Hand of Sacrifice by an additional 5/10%. Moved to tier-4.
Additional Undocumented changes: (World of Raids)
Enlightened Judgements: No longer increases the range of Judgement of Justice. Moved to tier-10.
Infusion of Light: Now increases the critical chance of your next Holy Light by 10/20% instead of reducing cast time. Moved to tier-10.
Blessing of Sanctuary: Now only grants mana on dodge/parry/block. In addition, will only grant mana if that is the active power type of the friendly target (Bears and Cats won’t gain mana).
Mana Spring Totem & Blessing of Wisdom: (World of Raids)
We are making a change to these spells so that their benefits are exclusive in patch 3.1.0.
earlier Builds: (MMO Champion, MMO Champion)
don't let forget the earlier changes, even if they are not included into the latest patch notes
Sacred Shield now cannot be on more than one target at any one time.
Hand of Sacrifice now lasts 12 sec or until the caster has transfered 100% of their maximum health.
Glyph of Holy Light can no longer crit.
Righteous Vengeance (Tier 10) is now a 3 point talent. When your Judgement and Divine Storm spells deal a critical strike, your target will take 10/20/30% (down from 40%) additional damage over 8 sec. (Previously a 5 point talent)
Fanaticism (Tier 8 ) is now a 3 point talent and now increases the critical strike chance of all Judgements capable of a critical hit by 6/12/18% (down from 25%) and reduces threat caused by all actions by 10/20/30% except when under the effects of Righteous Fury. (Previously a 5 point talent)

Ok this is it, not exactly all the changes, but all I want to discuss, and seriously way enough to stop playing a paladin if all of these go live for patch 3.1.

I'll discuss these changes in two parts, first retribution nerfs and then holy bad design choices.


Retribution pitiful state

I honestly feel sad for our dps branch. The thing, as always recently with Blizzard, is that they are overdoing changes. Paladins were given big boosts in 3.0, they decided to nerf retribution "To the ground !" and got it very low, it seems it's not even finished sadly my dps brothers and sisters.

The problem with retribution is PvP, and more precisely the Arena. The tree was build around crits, big crits, and to crit often. This was a relatively bad design from a PvE point of view, and before the huge buff of tank aggro with 3.0, retribution was often too uncontrolably bursty for it's own sake (and survival). But let's say it gives retribution dps something unique as a close combat dpser.

Now read these ptach notes over here:
Righteous Vengeance. When your Judgement and Divine Storm spells deal a critical strike, your target will take 10/20/30% (down from 40%) additional damage over 8 sec. (Previously a 5 point talent, now 3 points)
Fanaticism now increases the critical strike chance of all Judgements capable of a critical hit by 6/12/18% (down from 25%). (Previously a 5 point talent, now 3 points)
Clearly these changes are done to reduce the burst damage of retribution paladins in the Arena, were they are still considered as too high. But this also directly nerfs their PvE damage without any sort of compensation.

I advise you to read a very good post from Andarin on the wow PTR forums that MMO Champion copied on its Blue Tracker here.

Current parses from the PTR are confirming what Ret Paladins have feared will happen regarding 3.1 changes. With our consistent damage being nerfed in addition to the large DPS loss from mob changes, Ret Paladins have gone from second lowest PvE DPS to rock bottom DPS. Our DPS has taken a whopping 10%+ drop in PvE damage, and frankly, Exorcism is not compensation at all in this regard.

Ghostcrawler's answer about that is (on the same page):

Retribution dps, especially in PvE, is lower in 3.1 than we want.

Cool ... they know retribution dps is too low (in PvE note that). What did they do since ? Nothing ... it's even going worse with the Spiritual Attunement nerf (see below).
I do cry for you retribution paladins, the sure thing is now I know I won't go retribution for my second spec, it's going to be hard for any retribution paladin to find a spot for an Ulduar raid.


Should Holy paladins cower in fear ?

This is probably a bit strong, but future for Holy Paladin does look grim.

First of, the Arena nerf bat:

Divine Plea can once again be dispelled.
Blessed Hands: Now reduces mana cost of Hand of Freedom, Sacrifice and Salvation by 15/30%, and improves the effectiveness of Hand of Salvation by 50/100% and Hand of Sacrifice by an additional 5/10%.
Enlightened Judgements: No longer increases the range of Judgement of Justice.
Infusion of Light: Now increases the critical chance of your next Holy Light by 10/20% instead of reducing cast time.
Sacred Shield now cannot be on more than one target at any one time.
Divine Purpose moved to tier-6.

For Arena play, the loss of judgement of Justice hurts, it was a very good tool against several classes, helping your dpsers to catch opponents. It was said by the blues to be something that "hurt the druids too much", ok let's save the druids ... as if they were needing it with the other 3.1 changes.
Divine Plea was made undispellable when it was nerfed to 50% healing reduction, well, let's make it dispellable again.
The Hands nerf is that their cd is not reduced anymore, I think we won't see any paladin taking this talent anymore.
Infusion of Light Holy Light 0.8s healing bombs no more, ok that one was perhaps needed for Arena play, these ones were really overpowered.
Sacred Shield nerf ... it won't have such an impact on the arena, but it was a nice prevention tool, active even when you were stunned.
Divine Purpose move is made to force Holy Paladins to go deeper into ret, and they will probably do, because it is such a necessary tool in the Arena. But they will lose healing potency, yet another "hidden" nerf for us.

Now the PvE nerf bat:

Spiritual Attunement: Removed from trainers.
Enlightened Judgements: No longer increases the range of Judgement of Justice.
Infusion of Light: Now increases the critical chance of your next Holy Light by 10/20% instead of reducing cast time.
Mana Spring Totem & Blessing of Wisdom are exclusive in patch 3.1.0.
Sacred Shield now cannot be on more than one target at any one time.
Glyph of Holy Light can no longer crit.

Very strong nerfs here too, you could consider my words are strong themselves, but the Sacred Shield nerf is a huge nerf for Holy Paladins in PvE. Try to think about fights such as Loatheb, and the soon to be Hodir, and think about the amound of raid damage in these fights. The only effective tool of Holy Paladins has just been removed to them.

Now read what Ghostcrawler has to say on the Sacred Shield nerf:
(source)

However, you shouldn't need to do a ton of group healing in raids, and in PvP or heroic dungeons, you should still have enough tools to manage: fast heals, the HL glyph, Beacon, etc.

Let say that Holy Paladins are only good for tank healing, let just take only one of them in a raid from now. Anyway, two blessings is way enough with the Blessing of Protection (only usefull for paladin tanks) and Blessing of Wisdom nerfs (exclusive from Mana Spring totems). And Holy Paladins are bad for raid damage/healing even more with this nerf, overhealing too much (even more with the change to Infusion of Light), and just low on the healing meters (I know I should not look at that, but think a lot of raid leaders use them to judge healer efficiency).

I won't go as much details for the other nerfs, but they all affect holy utility/efficiency a little.
Spiritual Attunement is a clear mana nerf.
Enlightened Judgements removes the possibility for a Holy Paladin in a raid to Judge Justice if there are already a protection and retribution paladin in a raid (who should judge Light and Wisdom).
Blessing of Wisdom nerf is a utility nerf.
Glyph of Holy Light nerf, even if small, and even if it was a bug, is a healing power nerf in aoe healing our worst point.
Infursion of Light nerf will result in more overhealing and less predictable utility, I just see it as dumb as it is now.
Small details add and this patch ends being the strongest nerf to Holy Paladins since a long time.

Seriously, with all these gifts for Holy Paladins, I would not take more than one in a raid from now, even in heroic 25 men. As a raid leader myself, if I ever have a choice between a Holy Paladin and any other healer, I will not take the paladin ... sad isn't it ?


Now For the joy of everyone, the Spiritual Attunement nerf !

Spiritual Attunement: Removed from trainers. It is now available deep in the Protection tree for 2 ranks at 5/10%.

Wow Insider has published a detailed article on that and I'm encouraging you to read it.
Rohan on Blessing of Kings also has an interesting article on that nerf. Though he's not ranting on a pure raid efficiency side as I am, he's seeing in this nerf the end of the hybrid tanking for paladins.

As I said in an earlier post, the problem with Spiritual Attunement is that from fight to fight, the amount of mana given to a retribution or holy paladin changes a lot, depending on the quantity of raid aoe damage. And I can understand it makes fights hard to tune for Blizzard regarding paladin mana gain.

But this is a core skills for paladins, for several reasons. As Rohan says, without it retribution and holy paladins just can't tank anything, so it will be the end of "hybrid tanking" forcing everyone to dual-spec prot if they want to ever thank anything. The reason is simple : a paladin without mana can't tank anything, as a warrior without rage, and for any paladin tanking, Spiritual Attunement is mandatory to have enough mana (unless we talk tanking instances ridiculously under your level).

Now, from a raiding point of view, this will lower the mana of Holy and Retribution paladins. For Holy that will only really affect them during strong aoe damage fights (read Hodir changes below !). I'll say that we can probably manage, even if it's yet another arrow into an already strongly nerfed spec in patch 3.1.
But Retribution paladins were always using Seal of Blood in raids, to get more healing on them, and hence more mana to dps more. The mana consumed in Ulduar will be the same, as exorcism is going to affect all mobs, but Retribution paladins will have less mana, and I already often see them going oom in the longest fights. If Seal of Blood / Spiritual Attunement is not here to help them with mana regen ... I do feel even more sorry for them.

That is a sad change. Perhaps it is necessary, but it really needs some sort of compensation, especially for Retribution paladins.

WotLK and raid difficulty

That comment is linked to the small poll to the side of the page. This is a very controversial topic at the moment in World of Warcraft since the last expension (Wrath of the Lich King) is out in mid-november of 2008.

The "problem" is relatively simple. If in previous WoW raid content was often too hard at first and tuned down afterwards, WotLK raid content is really easy. The most of the content is a rebuild of Naxxramas (an old raid 40 instance from original WoW), I won't even talk about the "single boss" raids that are so short (even if in the end Malygos and Sartharion + drakes are the only providing a bit of challenge).

So, aside from not providing much novelty, Naxramass is a really easy raid dungeon. It can be done with 10 (normal) or 25 (heroic) people. The best guilds cleared it in a few days, most of the good guilds before december. And now every guild with some people and motivation has finished all of it, in both versions, after at most 3 months, taking into account the levelling time.

Not even talking of casual vs. hardcore players, nearly everyone has finished the content now, and is just waiting for more ...
From my points of view, the worse was that the "heroic" (25 men) version of Naxramass was even easier than the normal (10 men) version ... beside from two bosses (The 4 Horsemen, and Patchwerk) everything is easier in 25 men, and only Kel'Thuzad himself is slightly different.
Having struggled a little and downed Grobbulus 10 men before the fix of the move/spit bug, I've really been sad when my guild moved to the 25 men version of Nax. As a healer, Nax25 is a nearly zero challenge compared to Nax10 with 2 healers.

So well, these are only my thoughts, but I fear a lot of people are thinking the same. Feel free to comment ^^