Class Changes For Patch 3.1 Part 1 Announced

Yesterday, I wrote about the announcement for class changes that are coming for patch 3.1. Ghostcrawler mentioned that they were working on a few things and that they would announce said changes soon. Now when Blizzard uses the word “soon” it actually usually takes a while so I’m very surprised that some of the changes are announced already. this must be the fastest “soon” ever.

According to CM Eyonix, they’ll be announcing the class changes in a three part series. This first one happens to be for priests, rogues and shamans. The changes are listed below and are subject to change as per Eyonix’s note.

PRIEST

# Divine Spirit – this spell is now a core ability available to all priests.
# Discipline has access to a new talent, Power Word: Barrier. (Think of it as Power Word: Shield for your whole group).
# Several area of effect (AOE) heal spells have been improved: Prayer of Healing can be cast on any groups in your raid party. Holy Nova’s mana cost has been reduced. Circle of Healing now heals for more.
# Shadow priest PvP survivability has been improved: Shadow Form now reduces magic as well as physical damage. Dispersion now removes snares.
# Penance – this spell can now be targeted on the priest.
# Serendipity – this talent now reduces the cast time of Greater Heal and Prayer of Healing when Binding Heal or Flash Heal are cast.
# We are also working to give Holy additional PvP utility.

ROGUE

# Hunger for Blood – instead of a self-buff, this ability can only be used when there is a bleed effect on the target. However, it has no stacks and grants a 15% damage bonus.
# Adrenaline Rush – the cooldown on this ability has been lowered.
# Lightning Reflexes – reduced to 3 ranks. In addition to 2/4/6% dodge, this talent now also grants 4/7/10% passive melee haste.
# Killing Spree – while this ability is active, the rogue does 20% additional damage.
# Savage Combat – now causes 2/4% physical damage done.
# Mace Specialization – this talent now grants haste in addition to armor penetration.

SHAMAN

# Chain Lightning – now jumps to 4 targets but does less damage. We wanted to make the distinction between Lightning Bolt and Chain Lightning more clear.
# Storm, Earth and Fire – this talent now increases all damage done by Flame Shock, not just periodic damage.
# Spirit Weapons – now reduces all threat, not just melee threat.
# Unleashed Rage – reduced to 2 ranks, now also increases your critical strike chance with melee attacks by 1/2%.
# Totem streamlining: The Mana Spring and Healing Stream Totems have been combined. The Disease Cleansing and Poison Cleansing Totems have been combined.
# We are also working on giving Enhancement and Elemental more PvP utility.

source

Originally, I thought that most of the changes will be for PvP but after seeing the changes so far, it seems like there are a lot of cool changes that aren’t just for PvP. The discipline priest talent power word: barrier looks like a very fun spell to use and the buffing of some of their AoE heals will definitely benefit raiders. There are also some changes that could be taken the wrong way by some players like the change to chain lightning for shamans and the change to hunger for blood for rogues but I think they’re seen as buffs by most people. After seeing nature of the changes in this first edition of announcements, I feel quite optimistic for the classes that I play whose changes will still be announced.