Okay, I got bored after finishing my Prometheus 2 script so I’m back to playing World of Warcraft slightly ahead of schedule. Patch 5.3 has a bunch of goodies mostly along the lines of loot and nerfed XP so I didn’t really want to miss out too much. So far as a casual player, I’ve mostly taken advantage of the unlucky streak on rolls and loot specialization.
Loot specialization is really cool and possibly the thing I was looking forward to the most in this patch. The idea is that you right click on your portrait and can choose a spec that you want the loot to roll on. For instance, you can choose blood, frost or unholy or your current spec. This can occur for scenarios, LFR and quests and you can switch at anytime. What makes this great is LFR in particular. This should solve a lot of problems for people who queue with the wrong spec for loot. Although you’ll never get away with bad tanks and healers, it should reduce the problem that seemed out of control before. Also, this feature makes questing a lot more convenient since you no longer have to switch specs and lose any built up resources (especially as a spellcaster).
The unlucky rolls bonus is another feature that compelled me to play. The way it works is that every time you use a coin on a reroll for loot, you can get a bonus on the next roll if you just got gold. If you win loot, I think the percentages are reset (meaning, even if you didn’t use a coin on a reroll). I don’t know how much the percentage is increased but I heard that Throne of Thunder’s base change is somewhere around 14-17%. Usually, after 1-2 rerolls I’ll get a piece of loot so my guess is that the bonus is increased around a similar amount.
Something I’m uncertain about with regards to the unlucky bonus streak is if it gets reset between instances and raid resets. The problem is that there’s no visual cue to alert the player if the bonus is being applied. It would be a nice feature just to demonstrate that they’re in line for something and to show just how long this bonus exists.
Something else that I’ve noticed when it comes to loot is the lower percentages of dropping loot as my guys gear up. For instance, my druid ran through all old content this week and didn’t see a single piece of gear. I had set the loot mostly to her offspec but her main spec is ilvl 481/483 thereabouts. Without using any elder charms, she got nothing. So my theory is that once you hit ilvl 480, the game might lower your percentage to win loot. Compare that to before where both she, my Shaman and Death Knight geared up really quickly when the increase in drop rates occurred for pre-patch 5.2 LFRs. I suppose then that this will just motivate players to try running the treasure scenario to get their coins if they want to get offspec loot in the situations where their gear is pretty good already.
Lastly, I started working on my warrior. Already, I’m at the second little village in the Jade Forest and I managed to hit level 86. I feel that by the time she completes the area she’ll either be 87 or very close to hitting 87. Short form: 33% experience reduction is pretty gnarly.
Another thing I want to check out is the upgrade system. Since I’m pretty focused on getting the new loot, I don’t really want to spare any valor points for the upgrades. But they are cheaper. The only upgrade I’m considering is the BoA inscription staff for my spellcasters. That actually might be a really good investment since the damage will be huge once my priest and mage hit 90.
I haven’t tried the new scenarios as of late but have wandered around the Barrens and Durotar just to check out the zones. I believe you pretty much have to complete those scenarios before really partaking in the following quests leading to the siege on Ogrimmar raid coming up. But it was interesting to say the least seeing some changes around the zone. They did remove the CRZ aspects to both areas at least for level 90’s that I can see. I haven’t stepped outside on my lower level toons to see if that’s changed. But overall not as many visual changes as I had anticipated.
I did try LFR Throne of Thunder again. Part 1 is becoming pretty fun now that I have a better idea of what to expect. I managed to finish up to Part 3 so I just need the final wing before completing it on my hunter. It’s been a real mixed bag so I think the more practice I get in, the better I’ll get on it overall. But it’s nice just being able to push these spots a little more.
With regards to PVP, I’ve heard a lot of people complaining but I suspect that it’s mostly the assholes who go around ganking people in the world. I might get into it eventually but I want to focus on leveling my toons and gearing my 90s up.