It seems Blizzard has been taking on unofficial WoW applications in the Apple Apps Store. According to Gaming Angels, Blizzard has asked the owners of Armory Browser, Warcraft Arena Calculator, and Warcraft Characters to remove the apps. Granted, these are all paid apps, but it seems that Blizzard doesn’t plan on stopping there and will target the free apps next. No explanation for these take-down requests have been posted yet, but many speculate that Blizzard may be creating a few apps of their own.
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Tag: games
Target announced today a new reservation program that offers guests a chance to reserve the biggest and most popular video game titles. Beginning April 19, Target guests can purchase a collectible reservation card, only in stores, for $1. When they bring the reservation card back within seven days of release to purchase their game, they will receive a $5 Target GiftCard to put toward a future purchase.
“We’ve created a reservation guarantee that ensures guests will get their hands on popular games the day they are released, and a $5 GiftCard upon purchase adds even more value,” said Mark Schindele, senior vice president, Target. “We are constantly striving to make sure our guests find everything they need to work, live and play all in one convenient and simplified shopping experience.”
Blizzard can add another notch on its belt. In a recent victory in their ongoing campaign against World of Warcraft bots, a federal judge has ruled that not only did the Glider bot break the EULA, it can be classified as a circumvention device under the DMCA.
“As we’ve noted before, Blizzard’s legal arguments, which Judge David G. Campbell largely accepted, could have far-reaching and troubling implications for the software industry. Donnelly is not the most sympathetic defendant, and some users may cheer the demise of a software vendor that helps users break the rules of Blizzard’s wildly popular role playing game. But the sweeping language of Judge Campbell’s decision, combined with his equally troubling decision last summer, creates a lot of new uncertainty for software vendors seeking to enter software markets dominated by entrenched incumbents and achieve interoperability with legacy platforms.”
Read the whole story here.
GoGamer is my favorite online websites to purchase games as they’ve always been dependable, timely, and have great prices. Black Friday + GoGamer = win as you will see below:
PC Games
Ultima Online 9th Anniversary Collection $42.90
Sacred 2 Collector’s Edition $42.90
Command and Conquer: Red Alert 3 $33.90
Left 4 Dead $34.90
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning $32.90
Spore $34.90
Fallout 3 $30.00
FarCry 2 (I) $29.90
X3: Terran Conflict (I) $29.90
Guild Wars Trilogy $29.90
X-Plane 9 $27.90
FIFA Soccer 2009 $24.90
Crysis Warhead $21.90
Stalker: Clear Sky $19.90
World of Warcraft Battlechest $19.90 (Limit 10 per customer) (Friday and Saturday Only)
Mercenaries 2 $17.90
Spiderman Web of Shadows $14.90
Unreal Tournament 3 $9.90
Final Fantasy XI: Wings of the Goddess $9.90
Lineage 2: 4th Anniversary Edition $9.90
Alone in the Dark $5.90
F.E.A.R. Director’s Edition $5.00
Empire Earth III $4.90
The Sims: Pet Story $3.90
Soldier of Fortune Payback $3.90
Prey $3.90
Lord of the Rings Online Limited Edition $2.90
SpiderMan: Friend or Foe $2.90
Just Cause $2.90
Stanglehold $2.90
Battlestations: Midway $2.90
BlackSite Area 51 $1.90
Thrillville $1.00
PC Accessories
Zboard MERC Stealth Gaming Keyboard $44.90
Microsoft SideWinder Precision Racing Wheel $41.90
TekNmotion PulseWave/Pulsar PC Gaming Headphones $34.90
Razer Piranha Gaming Headset $34.90
Razer Diamondback 3G Gaming Mouse Flaming Red $29.90
Microsoft Reclusa Gaming Keyboard $29.90
Saitek Aviator Joystick $29.90
Microsoft Wireless Keyboard Optical Desktop Pro $22.90
TekNmotion 4 Piece CD/DVD Storage Case Combo $19.90
Saitek Eclipse Keyboard Red $19.90
Razer Mantis Speed Gaming Mouse Mat $12.90
Microsoft Digital l-Media Pro Keyboard $9.90
TekNmotion Yapster Headphones Black $7.90
Microsoft LifeCam VX-1000 $7.90
Saitek PP26 Cyborg Rumble Pad $7.90
TekNmotion 48 CD/DVD Wallet Black On Black $1.00
Mac
Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare $33.90
The Sims 2 $29.90
Roller Coaster Tycoon 3 $29.90
World of Warcraft Battlechest $19.90 (Limit 10 per customer) (Friday and Saturday Only)
Xbox 360
Fallout 3 $49.90
Gears of War 2 $49.90
Call of Duty: World at War (I) $45.90
GTA IV Special Edition $44.90
Guitar Hero: World Tour (I) $42.90
FarCry 2 $37.90
GTA IV $34.90
Legendary $24.90
Fracture (I) $14.90
Frontlines Fuel of War $9.90
Blazing Angels for Xbox 360 $9.90
PS3
Frag FX Controller $44.90
Fallout 3 $42.90
Wii
Nintendo Wii Super Bundle $499.95 (Limit 1 per Household, Quantities Limited)
Guitar Hero: World Tour for Wii $35.90
Alvin & The Chipmunks for Wii $9.90 (Limit 1 per customer)
DS
Guitar Hero: On Tour $34.90
PS2
Eye ToyKinetic w/Camera $19.90
Tomb Raider Anniversary $12.90
Guitar Hero: Aerosmith $14.90
Alone in the Dark $6.90
Gamecube
Nintendo GameCube Bundle $79.95
The following information from Game Director Gaute Godager is about the plans for the near future.
Fellow Hyborians!
As you may have noticed we have had frequent patches the last two weeks. We hope this will soon start to quiet down, but as long as there are major issues – and there have been – we will dedicate the Conan team to fixing them and giving you these fixes as soon as possible! We have a plan on how to move this game forward because as you know, what you have today is but the platform – the dawn of this world. I hope you enjoy the game as is, but I can ensure you, this is but the beginning!
Our focus from now on can be summarized by these points:
1. We will add content, specifically in mid-late thirties and mid-late fifties and make the leveling speed smoother in those areas, reducing the need to grind.
2. We will have an overhaul of the PvP system – adding consequence and a host of small things.
3. We are fixing bugs you reported through all channels we can get information from.
4. We will add a new large outdoor region in the 55-60 range this summer!
5. This is only a small taster! More information about the exciting summer and fall Roadmap will come the end of the next week!
6. We are staffing up Customer Service, Quality Assurance and Community departments!
I will spend some words on a bit more details now.
1. Filling “thin areas” in our content
We have seen that there are certain level ranges of these Hyborian Adventures that do not have the amount of quality we wish them to have. Most specifically these are the end of the Thirties and the end of the Fifties level ranges. We are addressing this in several ways.
* Several mid-late thirties dungeons are getting a complete overhaul (Black Castle, Pyramid of the Ancients and Treasury of the Ancients)
* Several quests are being made fuller and more entertaining. If people wish to revisit these quests, we will add a system to let them try them out again.
* we are adding first a batch of quests in Eiglophian Mountains (lvls 55+)
* We are also adding in a bunch of quests that didn’t quite make it for launch in the 30+ areas.
* Around 60 quests through the game have been flagged as “Lore Quests”. They will now be patched out with full Voice-Over. (Roughly 1 quest per level after level 20)
All this will come in June! In July the first level 80 additional Dungeon will be patched out. More on that later…
2. Overhauling the PvP System
People like our open PvP system. There are many plans on how to give this open free PvP even more meaning and Purpose. In the meantime we will be doing some smaller tweaks, and we plan to get these out sometimes in June. I will not go into 100% detail here, but that will come next week! What I can promise is:
* An update on how sneaking and perception works in PvP (nothing major, but an adjustment).
* A change in the amount of information you get when you hover over an other player.
* An added system of consequence to “ganking”. (Killing much-much lower level players).
* A system of adding consequence to losing a PvP match, and winning a PvP match + turning on PvP Leveling.
* A change in how Crowd Control (Root, Knockback etc) works in PvP.
* PvP gear.
3. New Massive Region
We will unveil this location later, but it will feature a host of quests, new monsters and places of dreams or horror. It will be styled towards the players in the late 50s and bridge the experience on the way to Atzels Approach. We have plans for releasing several of the areas that didn’t quite make it for the release.
4. Fixing bugs and increasing Customer Service
Funcom has always prided ourselves with having great customer satisfaction. The success so far for this title has left us with the need to increase the size of CS. This will go in parallel with the constant fixing of bugs and other issues that lead people to petition. Included in this is even better testing of the game by increasing the size of Quality Assurance and informing you better about changes by staffing up the Community Department. I know a blurb like this will haunt me always, but I will still venture one: We aren’t satisfied until all our customers are! You know we had a very, very difficult launch of Anarchy-Online! That was a very painful process for all of us working on it – 4 years. You might not understand how driven we are to make sure you enjoy this game, and all the support around it!
The future is very bright for Hyboria. There will be many bright mornings following this, the very first. Together we shall surge ahead and build the world even bigger, better and more detailed!
Yours truly,
Gaute Godager
Game Director
Age of Conan, Funcom
After months of financial statement teases and the initial reveal in an issue of Game Informer, Activision has officially released the first details of Guitar Hero 4, now known as Guitar Hero: World Tour. The game will be available this Fall on the PlayStation 2, PlayStation 3, Wii and Xbox 360. The same development teams that created Guitar Hero III are back on board with the PS3 and Xbox 360 versions being developed by Neversoft, while Vicarious Visions is creating the Wii version and Budcat is bringing it to the PS2.
Guitar Hero: World Tour looks to be the beginning of a completely era for the Guitar Hero series. As was revealed by Game Informer, World Tour will feature a drumkit and microphone along with the Music Studio track editor and an eight-player Battle of the Bands mode. Any song created in the Music Studio can be shared with other gamers through the game’s online database GHTunes.
Other gameplay options will include a four-player “full band” mode (that can be played both online and locally) and singleplayer Career mode that can be played with any instrument. ..
Activision is saying that World Tour will feature the largest number of tracks in a music game ever. As of now, four bands have been confirmed to have a place in World Tour: Van Halen, Linkin Park, The Eagles and Sublime. And all of the songs will be master tracks; there will be no covers on Guitar Hero: World Tour. The game will also offer “significantly more localized downloadable music than ever before on all of the next-generation consoles.” So while it’s vaguely worded, it sounds like downloadable tracks are coming to the Wii as well as the PS3 and Xbox 360.
Finally, Activision has announced that the guitar controller will once again be redesigned, this time becoming “slick” and “more responsive.”
In a single word, bitchin’.
We know that Wii Fit is due out in America on May 19th, but today, Nintendo of America announced that it will be selling Wii Fit with the balance board for $89.99.
The game features over 40 yoga, aerobics, strength training and balance activities. The hope is to “provides consumers with a fun, easy and affordable way to incorporate exercise into their daily routines.” While it won’t make you fit and lose lots of weight, it’s better to do this than sit on a couch.
I’m sure we’ll start seeing studies of people losing weight on Wii Fit, but don’t be hooked into buying any books about it.
If you are in New York, you’ll get a special treat if you buy it from the Nintendo World Store. From April 18-20, the first 1,000 customers who place a $5 deposit for Wii Fit will receive a limited edition Wii Fit t-shirt featuring the image and reproduced autograph of Mr. Miyamoto.
EDIT: Oops. Sorry everyone. Wife double-posted this story. Yup, we’re getting one of these for sure. Guess that means I have to exercise more now, eh?
the wife has already let me know that we’re getting one.
Wii Fit has already made waves in Japan, selling more than 1.4 million copies since December, and Nintendo of America has finally announced how much it will cost us to get in shape when the game finally hits North America on May 19. The Wii Fit package, which includes both the game and the wireless balance board, will sell for $89.99.
The title features more than 40 different games and activities, in areas such as yoga, strength training, and aerobics. Nintendo also announced that the first thousand people who pre-order the game from the Nintendo World Store in New York City will receive limited-edition t-shirts featuring everyone’s favorite tea-table up-ender, Shigeru Miyamoto.
While the game will be priced slightly higher than the $75 it was originally sold for in Japan, it is probably due to the sturdier version Nintendo had to make for bigger folks on this side of the Pacific.
After what many have seen as an eternity, Flagship Studios has finally released another patch for the single-player version of the Hellgate: London. Caution that the patch is a beta and not a final release. If you wish to install the beta patch there are a large number of fixes discovered and tested in the multiplayer version. Just be certain to back up your save games before installing beta patch.
Download Hellgate: London SP patch 1.2 beta (US)
Download Hellgate: London SP patch 1.2 beta (UE)
Also of note is that the Test Center server was updated with an early build of Hellgate: London Patch 1.3.
Hellgate: London SP patch 1.2 beta Patch Notes:
Hello Hellgaters!
We’re very pleased to bring our single-player gamers up to date with this patch. We’ve been putting a lot of focus on the online space where we get a great deal of testing done on our Test Center servers. The consistent feedback and requests to have these same improvement made available for those of you that enjoy offline, single-player gaming has not gone unheard! We’re still a small studio, so getting everything done as fast as you and we want to can be a challenge. So we greatly appreciate your patience while we got this patch into the development / test / release cycle.
You’ll find tons of bug fixes, skill changes, class balances, UI updates, graphic enhancements, and much more in this patch. We hope that it makes your enjoyment of Hellgate: London all the greater!
The Hellgate: London Team
—
General
Based on the number and depth of balance changes to skills in this update, certain characters will be provided a “respec token” that allows them to reassign their skill points. This token is automatically placed in the character’s inventory and can be used at any time.
- The timer and quest requirement have been removed from the mini-game.
- Fixed a bug where chat entry became visible in the Character Select screen after logging in and then logging out of the game.
- Fixed a crash bug associated with exiting out of the Character Creation menu.
- Players that had beaten Normal mode with a character but then were unable to access Elite mode with a new character should now have access to that game mode by logging in once with the character that completed Normal Mode.
- Fixed a bug which caused audio and sound effects to sometimes stop playing.
- Adjusted difficulty of the Nightmare endgame. Decreased the ramp of the damage penalty that players face against monsters higher than their level.
- Fields from different sources can now stack. Please note that the graphics from new fields still override those of previous fields.
- Players must now wait 5 seconds before they can re-enter a Hellrift.
- Fixed a bug which caused weapons to disappear when swapping weapon sets in the middle of performing certain skills.
- Fixed a bug which caused the /played command to display the incorrect amount of time played.
- If a player dies during (or just before) a cut-scene begins playing or the game begins loading, the re-spawn options menu will come up after the cut-scene or loading screen is completed.
- Vendor inventories in Nightmare difficulty should now be stocked with Nightmare-level items.
- The Shock effect now deals damage immediately when it’s applied.
- Several character and monster animations have been improved.
- Fixed known Blueprint exploits.
- Fixed a bug which sometimes caused files to require unnecessary patching.
- Fixed a bug which caused the mini-game to become stuck if the player zoned to town or quit the game immediately after completing a round of the mini-game.
Memory Usage
- Memory manager rewritten for better performance and stability.
- Fixed a UI-related memory leak.
- Fixed a clothing and armor texture-related memory issue.
User Interface/Controls
- Reorganized the De-modificator, Augmentrex, and Nanoforge interfaces to appear in the left-hand panel area.
- Added an auto-transparency feature to the chat window.
- Players can skip all logo splash-screens with a single click.
- The Mini Map is now set to the top right of the screen with character state icons appearing below.
- The Chat Window is now scalable. To adjust the size of the chat window, hold down the ALT key. There is a small tab in the upper right hand corner of the chat interface that can be used to resize the window.
- Skill Retrainers now have a confirmation dialogue to help players from accidentally using them.
- Some UI panels have been improved.
- Fixed two bugs which caused the automap fog of war to be reset either when using a PRD or in levels with hellrifts.
- Shift-activation should now work for skills granted by items.
- The [Shift], [Ctrl], and [Alt] keys are now re-mappable, and may be set as key-modifiers.
Graphics
- Templar melee animations have been tweaked for smoother combat flow.
- Fixed an issue where backgrounds would flicker or disappear.
Graphics (DX10 Only)
- Various distortion effects have been fixed.
- Fixed a Hellrift portal graphical issue in which the image would slide inappropriately.
- Translucent models now render properly against the background.
- Particles and translucent models are no longer out of focus with the depth-of-field effect.
- Depth-of-field blur amount has been reduced and is now more subtle.
- Fixed a resource/memory leak that showed as either Page File or Commit Size growth.
Nightmare Difficulty
- The difficulty of Nightmare has been rebalanced. More overall experience is earned in Nightmare levels and the overall level progression has been adjusted.
Quests
- Fixed a bug with the Cannon Street Rails quest.
- Fixed a bug in the Helping Hands and Triage quests where Maxim and Arphaun occupy the same place.
- Fixed a bug with the Regular Customer quest where Slaughterbeast occasionally wouldn’t spawn as expected.
- Characters stuck in the Holborn station after completing the game in normal mode should be able to progress.
- Certain quests that could not be completed after defeating Sydonai because Emmera was no longer accessible can now be turned in to a new NPC named Sammy.
- Fixed a bug which sometimes caused collection side-quest counters to count down under certain conditions.
- Players can now drop the train part quest items for the “…All the Live Long Day” quest. Also players may no longer pick up these items if they do not have the quest active or if they already have the item.
- Any leftover blueprint items from the “Threshold” quest will now be removed.
- Players who have more than one of an un-droppable quest items now have the option to destroy all but one of these items.
Items
- Improved the drop rate of analyzers and various recipes.
- New blueprints have been added for Focus Items and Boots.
- Focus Items and Boots can now be made by crafters.
- Unique items that were found before Patch 0.5 that are missing special attributes may now be rerolled for free. The process is as follows:
- All mods must first be removed using a Delux De-Modificator. This is available once at no cost for qualifying items.
- Once all the mods are removed, insert the item into an Augmentrex 3000. Now click any of the three “Add Property” buttons to reroll the item attributes.
- All item attributes will be rerolled and the item balance will be up-to-date. If the item level was previously upgraded with the Nano Forge, the additional item levels will be added to the newly generated base level after the item reroll. This means that the new item level may not be the same.
- The Stun Defense granted by the Gyro Stabilizer has been increased.
- Health and Power injectors now show up in high level stations.
- Fire Extinguishers now give the appropriate Ignite Defense.
- Armors with the “minion damage bonus” affix now work for the Engineer.
- Restorative injectors are usable when either health or power is below the player’s maximum since they can help recover both health and power for the user.
- Increased the amount of Shields found on items and affixes, ramping up after level 10. Note that this change is not retroactive and will not apply to existing items; however, newly dropped items and existing items upgraded through the Nanoforge will receive the adjusted amount of shields.
- Id Pulsar weapons should now ignore friendly targets.
World Movement
- Players can now use the /stuck command when in Ghost form.
- Fixed rare instances where certain areas were impassible.
Monsters
- Monsters with the Infested ability have had their damage reduced.
- The Beast of Abbadon, Oculis, and Sydonai will now re-spawn normally, even if the player has previously completed their associated quests.
- Fixed a bug which would sometimes prevent Oculis or the Furuncle from spawning properly.
- Stalkers and Burning Fiends are now part of the Beast caste and Tortured Souls are now part of the Spectral caste. This applies to all types of Stalkers, Burning Fiends, and Tortured Souls.
- Fixed some cases where monsters would get stuck in the ground.
- Wurm no longer spawns maggots when it dies.
- Maggots summoned by Wurm will now automatically die upon Wurm’s death.
- Fixed a bug which allowed the Wurm encounter to be exploited.
- The Lightning now looks like a giant robot as intended.
Crafting
- The limit on number of times an item can be upgraded has been raised to 10.
- Upgrading an item takes 50% less resources.
- A new, rare salvaged material crafting material called Nanoshards are now required to upgrade items.
- Nanoshards can be obtained from any item, but the chance to salvage one is increased when disassembling rarer items.
- The number of Nanoshards required to upgrade an item increases each time the same item is upgraded.
Fixes
- Fixed a bug where characters would not save when they killed 65,534 monsters in one session.
- Fixed a rare bug where equipping the Cleanser and a shield can delete the shield.
- Fixed a rare bug where Templar could equip both the Cleanser and a shield.
- Fixed a bug with mods on weapons not being properly equipped when loading a character.
- Fixed rare cases where the PRD became unusable.
- Fixed a bug where numerous pets would show up in Stations.
- Fixed a bug where already activated Auras would turn on and off when swapping weapons that grant Aura skills.
Skills
PLEASE READ the changes to skills carefully as many have changed. Some skills now have new names to represent their different effects or make more sense within the context of the character class.
- Fixed skills being added to and/or removed from Shift activation when swapping weapons.
- Increased the amount of Shields granted by skills that provide Shields.
Templar
- Aura of Power, Aura of Renewal, Aura of Defense, and Aura of Salvation have been rebalanced. Additionally, their skill rank progressions have been normalized to provide a 33% increase in effectiveness per skill level. Blademasters and Guardians will now see more return on investment in these auras.
- Investing a skill point into an Aura skill will no longer automatically cause it to activate.
Aura of Power
- The power regeneration granted by Aura of Power has been decreased. At rank 10, Aura of Power grants 94% of the power it gave previously.
Blademaster
Path of Righteousness
- Path of Righteousness now applies damage from offhand melee weapons.
Call of the Chosen
- The Taunt and Fear Attack Strengths of this skill now properly scale with the Blademaster’s level.
- The range of Call Of The Chosen has been increased.
Crosscutter
- Crosscutter now requires a target in order to use the skill.
Whirlwind
- Fixed a bug which caused Whirlwind to immediately cancel itself.
Guardian
- Prayer of Retribution can now be used while poisoned.
- Prayer of Healing can no longer be used while poisoned.
Aura of Thorns
- Aura of Thorns should now properly increase Thorns damage from items.
- Aura of Thorns has been rebalanced to fit the standard Aura progression model.
Aura of Renewal
- The initial health regeneration granted by Aura of Renewal has been slightly decreased. By rank 10, this aura provides significantly more health regeneration than it did previously.
Aura of Defense
- The armor bonus granted by Aura of Defense has been decreased.
Aura of Salvation
- The initial elemental attack defense granted by Aura of Salvation has been slightly decreased. By rank 10, this aura provides significantly more elemental attack defense than it did previously.
Grand Aura
- This skill now provides an equal percentage increase to the Guardian’s Holy Aura radius at each rank, ending with the same total increase at rank 5 as it did previously.
Challenge
- The Taunt Attack Strength of this skill now properly scales with the Guardian’s level.
Denounce
- The Taunt Attack Strength of this skill now properly scales with the Guardian’s level.
Cabalist
- The Summon Ember and Summon Fire Elemental skills no longer conflict when granted through items.
Brom’s Curse
- This spell now heals a fixed amount based on the attacker’s level instead of being based on a percentage of the attacker’s health.
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted. Brom’s Curse affects up to 4 targets for 5 seconds at rank 1. The maximum number of targets is increased by 1, the duration increased by 1 second, and the amount healed is increased by 12.5% per rank.
- This spell may now be cast while moving.
- The range of Brom’s Curse has been increased to 20 meters.
- Fixed description for Brom’s Curse to match the actual health gained.
Afterlife
- The power cost of this spell has been reduced.
Elemental Drain
- The power cost of this spell has been greatly reduced.
- The casting time has been reduced by 1 second.
Word of Fear
- The Fear Attack Strength of this spell now properly scales with the caster’s level.
- The base Fear Attack Strength of this spell has been increased by 25%.
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted. Word of Fear now gains 33% more Fear Attack Strength per rank.
Evokers
- Fixed a bug that caused Drain Power to charge an upfront power cost.
- Tempest’s targeting range has been increased and properly loses targets that move out of range.
- Fixed a bug which prevented Boneshards from having any effect on every other cast.
- Fixed a bug which prevented Evokers from using any other skills for two seconds after casting Boneshards.
- Skill Rank bonus descriptions have been updated and normalized to be based on their initial rank 1 effect. For example, Spectral Bolt now displays no Phase Attack Strength bonus at rank 1, but displays a more clear bonus of 25% Phase Attack Strength per additional rank.
Spectral Curse
- Spectral Curse now also reduces targets’ movement speed by 10%.
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted. Spectral Curse now affects up to 4 targets for a 5 seconds at rank 1. The maximum number of targets is increased by 1, the duration increased by 1 second, and movement speed penalty increased by 5% per rank.
- This spell may now be cast while moving.
- The power cost of has been reduced substantially, and the range has been increased to 20 meters.
- The explosion damage caused by Spectral Curse has been increased.
Drain Power
- The damage of this spell has been increased significantly.
- Increasing ranks of Drain Power now work properly at all power ranges.
Drain Life
- The damage of this spell has been doubled.
Arcane Shield
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted, providing slightly less shields at lower ranks.
- Arcane Shield is unaffected by the Evoker’s movement.
- This spell now lasts for 10 seconds with a 25 second recast time.
Concentrate Damage
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted. Concentrate Damage now provides a lower initial damage bonus, but grants a greater bonus per rank. Concentrate Damage’s new damage bonus progression surpasses its previous curve damage bonus progression at rank 4.
Summon Ember
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted. Additional ranks of this skill now provide 15% more damage instead of 20%, but the base damage of the Ember pet is significantly higher across all ranks.
- The Ember’s Health, Damage, Ignite Attack Strength, Critical Chance, Interrupt Strength, Interrupt Defense, and Armor have been increased.
Firestorm
- The rank progression of this spell has been re-designed. Additional ranks of Firestorm now provide a 5% increase in damage rather than an increase in Ignite Attack Strength. Firestorm surpasses its previous damage at rank 3.
- The Ignite Attack Strength of this spell has been reduced.
- The range of this spell has been increased to 10 meters.
Flameshards
- The Flameshards spell has been re-worked. The number of shards fired is now fixed at 7, but multiple shards stack with each other. Individual shard damage has been decreased slightly to take damage stacking into account.
- Increased ranks in Flameshards now increases each shard’s Ignite Attack Strength by 25%.
- The spells now has a cool-down time of 2 seconds.
- This spell’s power cost has been decreased.
- The base Ignite Attack Strength of this spell has been increased by 25%.
- The range of this spell has been increased to 25 meters.
- The explosion delay of Flameshards has been decreased to 1 second.
Hellfire
- This spell’s casting time and initial power cost have been reduced significantly. Additional ranks now provide a slightly smaller decrease in power cost.
- This spell now has a cool-down time of 2 seconds.
- The damage and Ignite Attack Strength of this spell have been increased substantially.
- The range of Hellfire has been decreased to 25 meters.
- The targeting of this spell has been fixed.
- Hellfire can now be aimed as long as the skill trigger is held down, and fires once the trigger is released.
Spectral Bolt
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted. Spectral Bolt now provides an additional 25% Phase Attack Strength per rank. The initial Phase Attack Strength of Spectral Bolt has been slightly increased.
- The power cost of this spell has been decreased, and the Phase duration has been increased by 1 second.
- The cooldown of Spectral Bolt has been decreased to 1 second.
- The base Phase Attack Strength of this spell has been increased by 25%.
Spectral Lash
- The damage of this spell has been increased by 35%.
Spectral Lash Mastery
- The damage of the explosion caused by this spell has been doubled.
- The rank bonus of this spell is now applied to the explosion effect properly.
Lightning Field
- The damage of the Lightning Field has been increased substantially.
- The power cost of this skill has been decreased.
- This spell now has a cool-down time of 2 seconds.
- The splash damage of the initial effect has been increased by an additional 17%.
- The skill description has been corrected to match the actual increase in radius per rank.
Tempest
- The casting time, power cost, and cool-down of Tempest have been decreased.
- The base damage of Tempest has been decreased.
- The strike frequency bonus per rank of Tempest has been decreased to 10% per rank.
- Each Tempest cloud now lasts for 15 seconds and has a range of 15 meters.
- The rank bonus of this spell now properly increases the frequency of lightning strikes.
Arc Legion
- The rank progression bonus of this spell has been changed. Additional ranks now increase the Shock Attack Strength and Shock Effect Damage of Arc Legion by 25%.
- The range of this spell has been fixed at 18 meters.
- The damage of this spell has been increased.
Demonspine
- The rank bonus of this spell has been slightly adjusted to a 25% increase in Stun Attack Strength per rank.
- The power cost of this spell has been decreased.
- The damage of this skill has been increased.
- The base Stun Attack Strength of Demonspine has been increased by 20%.
Boneshards
- The rank bonus of this spell has been slightly adjusted to a 50% increase in Stun Attack Strength per rank.
- The damage of this spell has been increased by 60%.
- The cooldown of this skill has been decreased to 6 seconds.
- The base Stun Attack Strength of Boneshards has been increased by 25%.
- The power cost of this skill has been increased.
Skullsplitter
- The rank progression of this spell has been adjusted. Skullsplitter now begins with 12 fragments and gains 2 additional fragments per rank.
- Skullsplitter now explodes into a significantly more predictable nova pattern.
- The power cost and cool-down of this spell have been slightly decreased.
Venomous Spirit
- The damage of this spell has been increased and the power cost has been decreased.
- The Fear Attack Strength of this spell now scales properly with the caster’s level and has been increased significantly. Additional ranks of Venomous Spirit no longer provide an increase in Fear Duration.
- The travel speed of the Venomous Spirit has been increased significantly.
Venom Armor
- Several bugs with which allowed the swarms created by Venom Armor to bypass its intended cool-down time have been fixed.
- The damage of each swarm created by this spell has been increased, and each swarm now lasts for a fixed amount of time on their target.
- The initial armor provided by this spell has been decreased, but the absolute bonus to armor per rank has been increased, reaching the previous maximum armor bonus at rank 10.
Swarm
- The rank progression of this spell has changed. Additional ranks in Swarm now increase the Poison Attack Strength and Poison Duration of Swarm by 20%.
- The cool-down of this spell is now fixed at 6 seconds.
- The power cost of this spell has been decreased significantly.
Summoners
- Fixed a bug which sometimes caused the Warper minion icon to not display.
- Master of the Flame skill effects now display properly in the skill description tooltip.
Hand of Nostrum
- Hand of Nostrum should now properly increase the number of healing beams used by the Witch Doctor.
Hunters
- Fixed a bug that sometimes caused grenades to not fire properly when the skill is being repeated.
Phase Grenade
- Fixed a bug which caused the Phase Grenade to not receive the proper Attack Rating from the user. This caused the Phase Grenade to do less damage than intended against armored targets (but did not affect damage done to Shields).
Tactical Stance
- Now also gives a base Firing Accuracy bonus of 50.
- Changed the Critical Chance bonus effect (3% at rank 1 and 1% per additional rank) to a damage bonus of 15% at rank 1 and 5% per additional rank.
Escape
- Escape now provides 1 second of invulnerability when it is activated.
- Escape should now prevent enemy players in PVP from seeing the user.
- The cool-down for this skill now starts when the skill is used, not when it is cleared.
- The cool-down for this skill has been increased to 30 seconds.
- The duration for this skill has been decreased from 6 seconds to 3 seconds at rank 1, increasing by 1 second per additional rank.
- The rank cap on this skill has been increased from 5 to 7.
- Escape now clears all other speed boost effects while it is active, including Adrenaline Pills and Sprint. Using any skill or item that boosts speed will clear Escape, including Sprint.
Precision Strikes
- Precision Strikes now have direct synergies with all other Precision Strikes.
- Precision Strikes no longer have skill prerequisites
- Decreased the shared cool-down of all Precision Strikes from 20 seconds to 12 seconds.
Napalm Strike
- Increased base Damage by roughly 300%.
- Ranks in Napalm Strike now increase the Duration of all Precision Strikes by 50%.
- Decreased base radius by 50%.
Smackdown
- Ranks in Smackdown now increase the Elemental Attack Strengths of all Precision Strikes by 25%.
- Increased base damage by roughly 300%.
- Decreased base radius by 50%.
Shock and Awe
- Decreased base Damage by roughly 25%.
- Ranks in Shock and Awe now increase the Radius of all Precision Strikes by 15%.
- Decreased base radius by 75%.
Engineers
- Engineer Drone behavior improved.
- Fixed a bug that allowed Repair Drone to be used at no cost.
- Drones will now level properly along with their owner. Existing Drones that are below your character’s level will automatically be raised to the correct level.
- Drones now receive correct health bonuses with skill level after they are re-summoned.
- Engineer Drones now come with a base armor rating.
- Engineer Drones now properly receive Armor bonuses from Armor affixes.
- Fixed bugs that caused Engineer Drones to receive more than twice as much Armor than intended.
- Fixed a bug that prevented the effects of Medpak Retrofit and Shield Generator Retrofit to properly scale up with additional levels.
- Engineers should no longer erroneously receive bonuses from items which grant the Overshield skill.
- Summoned pets should no longer fail to spawn when summoned.
Beacon
- Decreased the base effect to 15% from 25%.
Marksmen
Rebounder Rounds (formerly Ricochet)
“The Marksman uses modified ammunition that has a chance to ricochet off enemies and walls.”
- This skill is now an Active skill. You must use this skill in order to gain the effect and functions similarly to how “fire both weapons” works.
- There is no power cost for using this skill.
- This skill has a chance to proc its effect (based on the skill and increasing based on the rank of the skill) for each individual firing of the skill. Since its effect is no longer dependent upon landing a critical hit, the effect of this skills will be seen much more commonly at all skill ranks and character levels.
- This skill has indirect synergies with the other skills in the “Ballistics” line. Each rank in Rebounder Rounds has a chance (albeit smaller) to proc when either Ravager Rounds or Concussion Rounds are used.
- EXAMPLE: The first rank of Rebounder Rounds gives a 10% chance for shots to ricochet while using Rebounder Rounds. Due to skill synergy, Ravager Rounds and Concussion Rounds have a 7% chance for this effect to occur while using either of those skills.
Ravager Rounds (formerly Reflected Shot)
“The Marksman uses modified ammunition that has a chance to blow through and subsequently retarget additional enemies.”
- This skill is now an Active skill. You must use this skill in order to gain the effect and functions similarly to how “fire both weapons” works.
- There is no power cost for using this skill.
- This skill has a chance to proc its effect (based on the skill and increasing based on the rank of the skill) for each individual firing of the skill. Since its effect is no longer dependent upon landing a critical hit, the effect of this skills will be seen much more commonly at all skill ranks and character levels.
- This skill has indirect synergies with the other skills in the “Ballistics” line. Each rank in Ravager Rounds has a chance (albeit smaller) to proc when either Rebounder Rounds or Concussion Rounds are used.
- EXAMPLE: The first rank of Ravager Rounds gives a 3% chance for shots to blow through and re-target a new enemy while using Ravager Rounds. Due to skill synergy, Rebounder Rounds and Concussion Rounds have a 2% chance for this effect to occur while using either of those skills.
Concussion Rounds (replaces Homing Shot)
“The Marksman uses modified ammunition designed for maximum impact.”
- This skill is now an Active skill. You must use this skill in order to gain the effect and functions similarly to how “fire both weapons” works.
- There is no power cost for using this skill.
- This skill increases the Interrupt Strength (indirect chance to proc) of the Marksman’s weapons (based on the skill and increasing based on the rank of the skill) while the skill is used.
- This skill has indirect synergies with the other skills in the “Ballistics” line. Each rank in Concussion Rounds increases Interrupt Strength (albeit by lesser amount) when either Ravager Rounds or Rebounder Rounds are used.
- EXAMPLE: The first rank of Concussion Rounds gives a 12% increased Interrupt Strength for shots fired while using Concussion Rounds. Due to skill synergy, Ravager Rounds and Rebounder Rounds have a 8% increased Interrupt Strength when using either of those skills.
Weapon Master (formerly Hollow Points)
- Increased the Critical Damage bonus of this skill from 20% at rank 1 and 10% per additional rank, to a flat 30% bonus per rank.
Beacon
- Decreased the power cost by 33%.
- Increased the per-rank bonus to 7% from 5%.
- Decreased the base effect to 21% from 45%.
- Duration is now fixed at 6 seconds.
- Beacon may now be used on targets who already have the Beacon effect to refresh the timer.
- The Multi Beacon and Beacon effects no longer stack.
Elemental Beacon
- Now also decreases the target’s Elemental Attack Strengths.
- Gives increasing Elemental Attack and Defense penalties per rank that scales with the character’s level.
Multi Beacon
- Fixed a bug which caused increasing ranks in Multi Beacon to not provide any bonuses.
- Increased the cooldown to 12 seconds from 2 seconds.
- Duration is now fixed at 6 seconds.
- The Multi Beacon and Beacon effects no longer stack.
Sniper
- Is now available at level 5.
- No longer forces the Marksman to crouch and stop moving when used. The character now moves at 50% speed while the skill is active (in addition to the Armor and Weapon Energy Consumption penalties).
- Weapon Accuracy, Range, and Missile Velocity bonuses are now fixed at 60%, 60%, and 25%, respectively.
- Damage bonus has been decreased from 200% to 150%.
- Rank progression now decreases its rate of use and rate of fire penalties by 3% per rank, beginning at a 50% penalty at rank 1 and ending at a 23% penalty at rank 10.
Master Sniper
- Now provides a 1% Critical Chance bonus per rank, in addition to its previous 20% Critical Damage bonus.
Rapid Fire
- Now clears Multishot when used.
Multishot
- This skill has been moved under Weapon Master in the skill tree. It required two points in Weapon Master to unlock, thus requiring fewer total points to unlock than before.
Overshield
- Overshield now gives the correct amount of shields.
- Increased the Shields bonus per additional rank from 33% to 100%.
- Overshield now grants Shields in a fixed ratio: the Marksman’s current Shields Percentage will not change when the skill is activated or deactivated.
Escape Artist
- The Movement Speed bonus has been increased to 25% per rank.
- The rank cap on this skill has been increased from 5 to 7.
Grenades
- Grenades now have direct synergies with all other Grenades.
- Increased the damage of all Grenade skills by roughly 70% in addition to individual Grenade skill damage changes.
- Increased the cool-down of all Grenade skills from 5 to 6 seconds.
Explosive Grenade
- Explosive Grenades now explode on impact with monsters (but not objects) and have a 2 second fuse.
- Decreased base Damage by 23%.
- Decreased base Ignite Attack Strength by 33%.
- Ranks in Explosive Grenade now increase the Damage of all grenades by 12%.
Phase Grenade
- Increased base Damage by 6%.
- Ranks in Phase Grenade now increase the Elemental Attack Strengths of all grenades by 30%.
Toxic Grenade
- Toxic Grenades now bounce off of objects (ignoring monsters) before exploding after 1.5 seconds.
- Toxic Grenades now create a field that lasts for 4 seconds, dealing field damage.
- Decreased base Poison Attack Strength by 50%.
- Ranks in Toxic Grenade now increase the splash or field radius of all grenades by 10%.
Flashcrasher Grenade
- Increased base Damage by 12%.
- Decreased base Stun Attack Strength by 50%.
- Ranks in Flashcracker Grenade now grant and increase the Shield Penetration of all grenades by 10%.
Patch Notes Disclaimer: While we make every effort to include all upcoming changes in our patch notes, please be aware that occasionally some changes are unintentionally omitted.