Warriors – Weapon Masters

Warriors are a great melee class. They are capable to Tank, and even by most considered to be the best tanking class still, but can also do great damage in both PvE and PvP. Masters of the melee fight as they are, they are capable to equip all the melee weapons and even Dual Wield. Next to that they can also wear Plate armor and Shields. Their special abilities can be used with the use of Rage which is gained by taking and dealing damage, and some talents and abilities.

The Warriors have stances they can choose between. The Defensive Stance is normally only used for tanking because it reduces the damage done by 10%. However, it does increase the threat made by 10% and the damage done to the Warrior is reduced by 10% as well. Then there is the Battle Stance which is their basic stance which doesn’t give any boosts or reductions and finally there is the Berserker Stance which increases the Warrior’s critical strike rating by 3% but also increases damage done to the Warrior by 10%. Some abilities can only be used when the Warrior is in a particular stance.

Warriors are strong and can take a few punches which make them easy to level because their damage output is good as well. One should carry a shield with him while leveling so you can tank an instance when you get the chance. At level eighty 70+ however you will definitely need to have a Protection build to tank the instances though. In my opinion Warriors are fast levelers because you can kill the mobs quite fast and then Charge into the next one. Because of the plate armor you will not lose a lot of health, though one does has a few abilities that restore hitpoints and otherwise some bandages can be used which isn’t that time-taking either.

All the races, except the Blood Elves, have Warriors in their ranks.

The Warriors have the Protection talent tree if they want to become good tanks. In this talent tree there are a lot of abilities that reduce the damage done to the Warrior. You will also improve your threat done with this talent tree and will gain some new nice abilities like Spell Reflection, Shield Slam, Shock Wave and Last Stand. A Warrior can be a great tank, in my opinion, Blizzard designed Warriors to be tanks and they are the best at it.

Since WoTLK, the Arms tree is considered to be the weakest talent tree by many Warriors. This is basically because the Fury talent tree has received some great talents that make the Fury talent tree just as good or maybe even better for PvP and it stayed better in PvE. The Arms tree was good because of the Mortal Strike’s debuff left on the character that reduced healing done on him by 50%. Now the Fury Warriors have something similar in the talent tree called Furious Attacks which also gives the same debuff of 50% healing reduced on the target. If you follow this tree you will be able to Dual Wield two two-handed weapons as only class in WoW! It doesn’t only look great but boosts the damage as well and puts the Arms build even more in the shadows. Then there is Heroic Fury, another PvP talent that removes immobilizing effects and removes the cooldown from your intercept.

Warlocks - Bring Fear Upon Thee

Warlocks have always been a nice class to play. For some reason they always looked great, Blizzard always made the nicest tiers sets for them, then they have those cool class mounts. However, it isn’t only the look that counts and the Warlocks have a lot more to offer. The Warlocks are great casters and use the Schools of Fire and Shadow damage as well as a variety of different Fear spells and a Demonic Pet to bring pain upon their enemies.

You can choose a different pet for different scenarios. You can choose between an Imp, Fel Hunter, Succubus, Fel Guard, and even a Fire Golem can be summoned.

A Warlock needs Soul Shards for some abilities. These can easily be obtained though by using Drain Soul on an enemy.

A Warlock is very nice in PvP because he has a lot of damage over time (DoT) spells. If he first casts a few DoT’s and then continuously fears his opponents while also his pet is chasing them around doing additional damage, he basically can win from most opponents. The Locks also have some nice AoE spells like most other casters and have some other specific abilities. One of them is the Ritual of Souls. With this ability he makes a Soulwell which all the party and raid members can use to get a Healthstone, which instantly restores health when used. Warlocks can also create a Soulstone on themselves or on other players. Once the player dies he would be able to resurrect. Last but not least is their ability to summon other players which comes in very handy from time to time.

If you want to play a Warlock you can choose between the following races: Gnome, Human, Orc, Undead, and Blood Elves.

There are three talent trees that all enhance the Warlocks damage.

Lets start with the Affliction talent tree. Favored by many PvP Warlocks is the Affliction build simply because it focuses on the DoT spells of a Warlock and even gives him some new ones. Also the fear spells become better when this build is followed. The tactic of DoTting and then fearing like said before is great for PvP.

Then you got the Demonology build which increases the damage output of the Warlock as well as the Pets one can summon. It also gives the Warlock the ability to sacrifice his pet to make him stronger. This build is also nice for both PvE and PvP. If the Demonology build is followed till the end you will even be able to transfer into a Demon yourself. As a Demon you will get a new set of abilities and become more of a melee character with increased damage for a period of time.

The name says it all; The Destruction spec focuses on the damaging spells that do a lot of damage like Shadowbolt and the Fire based spells. This build is developed to be able to top damage meters with powerful spells.

As a Lock you can of course choose to make sort of a hybrid build between Demonology and Destruction which is also seen quite often.

Shamans - Spiritual Casters With Lots of Totems

Shamans are a nice class with a lot of different spells and abilities. You can play a Shaman in several ways. You can choose to be either a Melee or Spell casting damage dealer or become a Healer. The Shamans could only be played by the Horde races until the release of the Burning Crusade when the Draenei of the Alliance made it possible to become an Alliance Shaman. Shamans can wear all weapons except swords and are dependent on leather armor till level 40 and can then wear mail armor.

Shamans are well known for their ability to place totems that boost both themselves and party members. There is a great variety of totems that can be cast and these are divided in four schools: fire, water, earth and air totems. Only one totem of each school can be active at a time. Besides the totems, a Shaman also has another great ability called Blood Lust, or Heroism for Draeneis, which boosts all party and raid members haste rating by 30% for 40 seconds. Not to forget, the Shaman can also summon a Fire and Earth Elemental from time to time.

Then there are several abilities that the Shaman can benefit greatly from during leveling and basically in any kind of scenario. The Shamans have an ability called Reincarnation which comes with a cooldown of one hour. The Shaman will be able to resurrect the moment he gets killed if this ability isn’t on cooldown. It does require a reagent called ‘Ankh’. The Shaman can also learn Ghost Wolf at level thirty which improves his running speed which is nice for leveling, even though mounts can be used at level 30 now as well. Shamans also have Astral Recall which basically serves as another Hearthstone, this one has only 15 minutes cool down though and doesn’t cost you a spot in your bag!

As you can read above, the Shaman truly does have some great abilities. The talent trees will provide you with even more cool spells and abilities.

To begin with there is the Elemental talent build which is meant for casting damage dealers. You will use lighting and fire attacks to maximize damage. A nice AoE spell that becomes available later is Thunderstorm which does nice damage and knocks back enemies.

Then there is the Enhancement talent build. This build is created for melee damage dealing Shamans. This build will allow the Shaman to equip two one-handed weapons and will also give him some great melee attacks. If the Enchancement build is followed to the end you will be able to summon two Spirit Wolves which are extremely powerful both in PvE and PvP.

Finally there is the Restoration build which is focused on healing. Shamans can be great healers with their Earth Shield, Chain Heals, Healing Waves, Mana Totems and Riptide. The Restoration talent tree does not only give new abilities but also gives great boosts to already existing abilities.

A Shaman is easy and fun to level with all these abilities. Another nice thing a Rogue in example does not have is that you can switch between melee damage, being a caster and a healer whenever you like.

Rogue - Shadow Stalkers

Rogue’s have a clear purpose in WoW, dealing damage. Rogues are a melee class that can use several high damage abilities to make sushi out of their opponents, whether in PvE or PvP. Rogues can Dual Wield every kind of one-handed weapon there that can be found in WoW. There are able to use their special abilities with the use of Energy. With some of these special abilities, one can apply a combo point on their target. The Rogue also has some finishing moves that are more effective when more combo points are applied on the target. There can be a maximum of five combo points on a target and they disappear once a finishing move is being used.

Next to their great damage dealing capability the Rogues are also known because of their ability to stealth and their preference to attack from behind with their backstab ability. They walk around stealthed in battlegrounds and arenas, sneak up behind their enemies and have an edge over them. Being able to stealth also comes in handy in PvE scenarios because there is an ability called sap which can be used on Humanoid mobs which keeps them out of combat for up to sixty seconds. They are also able to Blind a enemy for 12 second, making him incapable to do anything.

Rogues also have some stunning and disrupting abilities which makes them great for both PvE and PvP purposes. Some good Rogues are able to stunlock enemy NPC’s or players, which basically means that they can hardly move, cast or attack.

Rogues can also use some poisons on their weapons that either boost their damage or put some other debuff on a target.

The following races have Rogues in their ranks: Dwarves, Gnomes, Humans, Trolls, Undead, Orcs, and Blood Elves.

A Rogue can choose to specialize in the Assassination, Combat, or Subtlety build, or choose to combine either one of these talent trees. All the trees are there to increase the damage output of a Rogue, since tanking or healing are definitely not his thing and can even be considered as a Rogue’s weak spots. It is for the player to decide which talent tree suits him best. All the trees got their pros and cons, the one player likes this, the other likes that, discussions go on and on but basically it comes down to preferences.

What can be said is that the Assassination tree is usually chosen for leveling and focuses on the crit rate and poison aspects of the Rogue, while the combat build offers the Rogue the chance to specialize in a particular type of weapon, which is why this build is probably better at 80 once you got some steady weapons.

The Subtlety build focuses on the Survivability, crowd control and Stealth aspects of the Rogue. This build gives the Rogue some burst damage and this is probably why a lot of PvP Rogues go for this build.

Priest - What Makes a Priest The Best Healer?

The Priest is a caster class and is considered by most to be the best all-round healer in WoW. His spells are Holy and Shadow based. A Priest can also do quite a bit of damage but is mainly known for his great healing capabilities in both PvE and PvP.

One of the downsides of playing a Priest is the leveling. Even though the Shadow talent tree is available, which greatly increases a Priest’s damage done, it can still be time taking because the spells cost a lot of Mana. Once you get to the higher levels though, you can always count on a spot in any kind of party or raid wherever they are going because a Priest is just great and everybody knows it.

All the Priests are able to cast a Stamina buff on themselves and party and raid members. If a few points in the Discipline tree are spent another buff called Divine Spirit becomes available. This buff boosts the Spirit of players. A Priest’s healing spells are based on Holy power and one has a variety of instant, small, big, HoT and AoE heals to choose from which make the priest the best overall healer. If a Priest prefers to do damage he is pretty much stuck on the Shadow spells if he wants to get the best out of his Priest.

You can choose from quite a few races if you want to play a Priest. The Human Spirit and Blood Elf’s Arcane Spirit racials make them nice choices. Other races you can choose from are Dwarves, Night Elves, Draenei, Trolls, and Undead.

A Priest can choose to go for a full Discipline build if he likes to heal and likes to play PvP. There are some great talents in the tree that make the Priest tougher, his heals more effective and the Priest will also gain some new abilities like Pain Suppression and Power Infusion. The Discipline Priests are great single target healers. This, together with abilities like the ones mentioned above make the Discipline Priests great for PvP as well.

The Holy tree is also great for healing. It’s probably a bit better when it comes to raw healing then the Discipline tree. Some other healing spells like Circle of Healing are learned which make the Priest even a better healer. The Holy build gives more bonus healing and is normally considered to be better for PvE purposes when it comes to healing.

Finally, the Shadow build. Priests make great healers but they sure can do good damage as well. His damage is based on Damage over Time (DoT), and fast spells like Mind Blast and Mind Flay. The great thing about a Shadow Priest is that he can also support his group by placing some debuffs on a target like Vampiric Embrace and Vampiric Touch which will convert some damage done to mana and hitpoints for both the Priest and his group members.

Paladins - Holy Warriors

The Paladin is a hybrid class, capable to tank, heal and do damage. The Paladin can wear plate armor, shields and most melee weapons. The Paladin uses the Holy magic school and physical attacks for most of his abilities.

One of the most well known abilities of the Paladin is Divine Shield, often called ‘Bubble’. The Divine Shield is an instantly casted spell that protects the Paladin from any damage for 12 seconds. Divine Intervention is almost as good as Divine Shield and can even be casted on party or raid members. It protects the target from all physical attacks. The Paladin also has various auras that affect the entire party and several buffs that can also be cast on different players. The Paladins abilities cost Mana, no matter what build one chooses.

The following races have Paladins in their ranks: Humans, Dwarves, Draenei, and Blood Elves.

A Paladin can be a very capable tank when the Protection talent tree is used. While using a shield and some abilities that create high amounts of threat, the Paladin can easily tank in dungeons. A Paladin tank is probably the best tank when it comes down to keeping aggro on multiple targets. This comes at a cost though meaning that he isn’t as good as a Warrior Tank in example when it comes to single target tanking. Some buffs also become available in this talent tree like Blessing of Sanctuary and Blessing of Kings, even though the last one doesn’t have to be chosen since it requires quite a few talent points.

A healing Paladin should use the Holy talent tree to maximize the effect of his healing spells and to obtain some other healing spells that will make him a great healer. A Holy Paladin is a very capable healer known for his fast heals. Known to be one of the best single target healers while his weak spot is the lack in heals that can heal an entire group. A Holy Paladin should focus on getting a lot of critical strike rating, because his heals will heal more and a lot of his heals will refund Mana this way.

Finally there is the Retribution Paladin. While wielding a 2h weapon and being able to use several abilities that deal great amounts of damage, the Retribution Paladin is a great class for both PvE and PvP. This hasn’t always been the case; before the WotLK, Retribution Paladins were almost never welcome in either raids or PvP teams. This is probably why they have received a great boost and are now one of the stronger PvP classes and builds out there.

A Paladin is a strong class, fighting one can be really annoying as it seems that they have multiple lives sometimes. Playing one is a great experience. A nice thing about a Paladin is that you can gather different types of gear and then change from a tank to a healer or DPS if you get a bit bored with your build.

#BlizzChat Developer CHat on Twitter

Quote from: Zarhym (Source)

Cataclysm - General
Q: Do you intend to have all 280% flying mounts scale to 310% when a 310% mount is earned, or will only purchased mounts do so?
A: Our current plan, is that in Cataclysm, you can learn a new rank of flying that lets all flying mounts move at 310% (even current 280% mounts). That will probably be as fast as mounts will ever get. We don’t like it that when you get a 310% mount that you stop using your old ones.

Q: If 310% speed is becoming trainable, does that mean we'll be able to fly in Azeroth from the get-go?
A: We have considered the concept of “Old Weather Flying.” Just kidding. More than likely, you’ll just be able to fly from the beginning.

Q. You mentioned at BlizzCon that all races would be getting revamped racial abilities. Care to shed some light on any of them?
A. We’re going to do something similar to what we did in Wrath of the Lich King, where we just refresh them to make sure they’re balanced and feel cool. Something you could see is dwarves getting a bonus to Archeology, or undead getting a new activated racial ability that will be more useful in PvE.

Q: Can you give us some more information on how and what Path of the Titans will reward you with? Talent points? Unlock talents?
A: The Paths unlock a new kind of glyph called an Ancient Glyph. These don’t enhance class abilities, since they are designed to work with any class. They do grant bonuses that might be useful to a wide variety of characters as well as offer some actual new abilities as well. If you think your action bar is full, then you may want to head for the passive bonuses instead of the active abilities.

Q: Will the new guild perk system kill a lot of smaller guilds?
A: Our goal is not to encourage players to have to change their existing guild. We realize some players like smaller guilds and some like larger guilds and we don’t want to ask you to change that.

Q: What improvements to the UI are being considered (particularly for raid healing)?
A: We would like to update the default Blizzard UI. It has some fatal flaws, such as not being able to show buffs and debuffs simultaneously. We probably won’t ever go as crazy as some of the mods out there just because they provide a ton of customization, which is one of the things players like about them. We do think players deserve a raid UI that is fully functional for those players who just don’t like to install a lot of mods. We hope to get this change in for Cataclysm, but we’re changing the UI for the spell book, talent pane, professions window, character stats, guild, friends and probably a dozen things I’m forgetting, so it’s just a matter of how much time we have.

Q: What kinds of UI updates are planned for Cataclysm. Eclipse and Soul Shards are two, but any others?
A: We have already moved professions from the skill tab to an awesome new page on the spell book. In fact, in the absence of weapon skills, we got rid of the skill tab entirely. We have a new talent tree UI that shows all of the talent trees without scrolling and provides the passive bonuses as well. We’re changing the glyph UI to support Paths of the Titans. We’re changing the PvP queue UI to support rated Battlegrounds. We’d like to improve the V-nameplate feature. We’d like to provide more information when you level up about what new spells or features are now available to you. We’re experimenting with better ways to organize buffs and debuffs and communicate procs and cooldowns too.

Q: What change are you most excited about?
A: We are changing the old zones probably more than most players realize. A place like Stonetalon is virtually unrecognizable. It has all new quests and item rewards and dramatic changes to the landscape. A zone like Western Plaguelands has actually been updated to reflect the fact that the Scourge are in retreat (which is not to say that the zone is without its dangers). Everywhere you’re going to see something new and surprising. I think a lot of players are excited about the level 80-85 experience (as they should be!) and the goblin and worgen zones (which if anything are better than the death knight starter zone, if you can believe that), but I think a lot of players are going to want to reroll new character of existing races and classes just to see how much everything has changed.

Masteries
Q: Can you go into more detail on Vengeance? As it stands it sounds like off tanks will be at a significant disadvantage.
A: We want Vengeance to have a long enough duration that off tanks won’t lose their damage bonus. In most situations, the off tank is doing some tanking along the way. The worst case scenario would be say a fight where the off tank needs to tank in phase 3 but not phase 1. Remember, even in that case though you have tools to generate high threat. Vengeance is there to keep DPS from pulling off you late in the fight.

Q: With armor class bringing mastery bonuses, will players never want to "downrank" from, say, leather to cloth?
A: That’s the idea, really. They still can wear the older armor, but they’ll lose some stats from doing so.

Q: Can you allow points spent in your off tree give a diminished amount of mastery bonus toward your main tree so as to not nerf hybrid specs?
A: Does the Elemental shaman really want more melee damage though? Does the Shadow priest really want to heal better? If anything it feels like it would be a nerf to hybrids, since a warlock would get more damage from any tree, while a DPS hybrid might only get more damage from their tree.

If hybrids end up coming out a little short, we’ll compensate in other ways (such as more oomph in talents) instead of doing hacky things with the mastery system.

Q: Compared to some third mastery bonuses (radiance etc) others are a little boring (+crit damage etc) Intended? Comments?
A: The mastery bonuses are obviously a really new concept. The risk on the one hand is that they’re too boring and don’t affect gameplay and on the other extreme they take specs which already have a lot going on and just make them overcomplicated. For now we wanted to implement a range and see what feels the best in beta. We expect to iterate on these a lot.

Class Mechanics
Q: How will haste affect channeled spells. Will it be similar to DoTs and HoTs?
A: They will channel faster but their duration will remain unchanged. You will get more ticks on the same cast.

Q: When does the homogenization of classes stop? Paladins are starting to look like priests. Where is the diversity?
A: We want the challenge of beating PvE encounters or enemy teams in PvP to be how awesome you are at strategizing, not how often you are at recruiting the right classes. While it is very, very important to us for classes to feel different, it’s also very important to us that friends get to play together.

Q. Is every healer supposed to be able to tank-heal efficiently, or will we still see specs excel in it more than others?
A. Each healer is intended to have a different niche, and different strengths. Such as Restoration druids with HoTs, or paladins at direct healing, Discipline priests at absorption/prevention, etc. That said, each healer should be able to keep up a tank and have some deeper “tank healing gameplay” as they do now.

Q: How will "active spell is more powerful" be handled with no more dot clipping?
A: How about we get rid of “a more powerful spell is active” altogether? If you have some bonehead overwriting your more powerful buff or debuff, we’d rather you handle that issue socially.

Cataclysm - Raids & Dungeons
Q: Can you make crowd control in raids and 5-mans an important aspect of the PvE game again?
A: An emphatic yes.

Q: With more players raiding in Wrath of the Lich King than ever before, do you plan to raise the difficulty to accommodate our new skill/experience?
A: The heroic difficulty is designed for the players looking for more of a challenge. One of the things we learned from Icecrown is that we unlocked the heroic modes so late that players had tons of practice on the encounters on normal mode, so the step up was smaller than it was in say Ulduar when players on hard mode were still learning some of the encounter basics. (In our defense though, because of the time of year we released Icecrown we made a conscious decision to not ask players to choose between holiday events and hard-mode raiding.)

Q: Will Ragnaros have a new weapon in Cataclysm, considering that we stole and reforged his? I'm sure he's not happy about that either.
A: Oh come on, it never actually dropped for you. Then again, is there really much demand for a Strength, Stamina, Fire resist, cosmetic Fireball proc weapon?

Cataclysm - Items
Q: Will relics and wands be getting any new attention in Cataclysm?
A: With relics, the plan is to make them class agnostic. In other words, there might be a +strength relic that a death knight or paladin might want to equip. We think that will let us add more of them to the game without them being so specialized. They will feel more like wands.

How to make wands and relics a bigger part of gameplay is something we’ve had many, many discussions on. Ultimately though we’d rather see warlocks, mages and priests casting their spells, not zapping someone with a wand. In Cataclysm we don’t expect to see much wanding, even at lower level.

Q: What will happen to our gems and enchants on gear that give us stats that are being removed in Cataclysm ?
A: We are going to change most gems and enchants that have obsolete stats like armor pen and defense..

Q: When you say you're going to make relics class agnostic, does it include druids' idols as well?
A: Druid, shaman, paladin and death knight. It’s possible we will still keep some that are very specific to certain classes and specs. Overall though we’re not happy with the current design where an ability procs a buff on you. If it’s an ability you don’t use often, then the item is terrible, so they end up feeling really passive already. At the same time, the fact that we have to offer so many prevents us from ever giving you the choice of which one to use. So we make the Resto druid or Enhance shaman version every new tier. It would be a more interesting decision if there was a crit + Intellect relic and a haste + Intellect relic, and you can choose which one to use.

Player vs. Player
Q. Thanks for having this chat! I have to say that I feel many changes are PvP-oriented. Is the game shifting more toward PvP?
A. What we’re trying to do at this point in the game is make abilities more niche and interesting, rather than adding Sinister Strike with a different name. A lot of talents and abilities we add initially only seem to have a PvP role at first glance, but eventually also prove useful in PvE situations too (examples are Dispersion, Body & Soul, or Typhoon).

Q. Will there be as much effort put into making tanking specs viable in PvP? Will Vengeance be useful in PvP?
A. Our goal is to make all specs as viable as we can in as many aspects of the game as possible. Currently some tank specs are not so much viable as they are overpowered (because their damage is competitive and survivability is off the charts), so that issue will have to be addressed when we start to flesh them out as more attractive and mainstream PvP spec options.

Death Knight (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q: With the change to death knight tanking, Blood being the tank spec, what AoE aggro moves (besides Death and Decay and Pestilence) will we have to use?
A: We think Death and Decay and Pestilence are pretty good. We’ll add another ability if we think it’s needed, but remember, the “round things up and AE them down” strategy isn’t going to be as effective in Cataclysm until you out-gear instances.

Q: Will Dark Simulacrum work on bosses? or at least be useful in PvE?
A: It will work on any spell you can Spell Reflect, which is actually quite a few bosses. Remember, Dark Simulacrum doesn’t cancel the incoming damage so in that sense it is easier for us to balance letting death knights use it in PvE. Also be careful considering new spells for old encounters. The encounter designers will make the new encounters with the new spells in mind.

Q: I still don't get the motivation to redo the death knight rune system. It's been a couple years and now that it seems close, why do it all over?
A: Many death knights felt like they didn’t have enough global cooldowns (GCDs) to use their abilities. In some cases, the rune system started to matter less than the GCDs to hit the right button. We want death knights to have to make choices about what abilities come next. When you see DKs play today, it looks like they’re playing the piano – hitting buttons so fast. We need to buy them some room in their rotation to be able to take advantage of say procs or runes coming back sooner than expected.

Q: Did the developers learn anything from the death knight release that they plan to keep in mind for any possible future classes?
A: Um, maybe we won’t listen to community feedback about how classes need more abilities, damage and survivability? (Just kidding.) Adding a new class is very challenging, which is one reason we don’t want to do it every expansion. It’s a really good question though, and we’d like to give a little more thought to how to answer it (when we aren’t fielding so many Twitter questions).

Druid (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q. Why are Restoration druids the only spec in the game not receiving a new spell?
A. Restoration druids are actually getting a fair bit. For one, Tree of Life is getting a whole new model (think Ancients of War) and will also “morph” some of your spells to do crazy things while in the form, such as cause Regrowth to be instant, or Lifebloom to apply two applications at once. Tranquility will be raid-wide. We’re also touching nearly every Restoration druid spell to make sure each has a niche and feels good. In general, playing a Restoration druid should feel a lot different (better!) in Cataclysm than it does today.

Q. What change are you most excited about?
A. Some of the new Balance talents for druids, like Solar Beam, which works like Freya’s spell where it instantly silences a target and they have to move out of the beam to get rid of the debuff.

Hunter (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q. Will there be any new pet families added, or will we simply see more additions to existing ones?
A. We're not sure yet whether we’re adding new pet families or not. It’s possible. Expect to see some monkeys, foxes and other new pet possibilities though!

Q: Does the Marksman mastery (Double Shot) work like the Wild Quiver talent (provide a free autoshot) or like the Lightning Overload talent (a free whatever spell you just cast)? In other words, can Double Shot fire a second Chimera Shot?
A: Double Shot is a half-strength autoshot. Wild Quiver will increase the damage of the autoshot to 60-70% (or something similar). Lightning Overload (the talent) will likewise increase the magnitude of the Elemental Overload mechanic.

Mage (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q: Why are you giving Mages more Crowd Control?
A: We like for classes and specs to have themes. Part of the mage kit is control. Part of the warrior kit is mobility. We like to reinforce those designs rather than give classes new abilities that remove their weaknesses. Weaknesses are supposed to be something you keep in mind while you’re playing. I’m sure Ret paladins would love Heroic Leap and warriors would love Polymorph, but that plugs a hole really, really well where you risk being a one person army who doesn’t need to be supported by other players in PvP or PvE. Obviously it risk homogenizing all the classes as well.

Paladin (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q: Will healing hands be a paladin-centered tranquility, or something we have to run around to keep people in range of?
A: The idea is that it matters where the paladin is, so it won’t be raid-wide like Tranquility will be in Cataclysm. We will make sure the magnitude of the heal is sufficient that it’s a button the paladin wants to use. The cooldown and duration aren’t set in stone either.

Q: Now that paladin's Holy Shock is baseline is there any plans to change the Art of War talent?
A: We like Art of War, so we don’t expect it will go away. We understand the concern that Holy Shock might compete with Art of War a little bit in terms of role (an instant damage spell) and that’s something we’re going to have to address.

Q. What information/ideas can you share on PvP utility in the Retribution tree? Mandatory gap closer/interrupt question. Not having a cleanse will hurt. :\
A. Retribution paladins will be getting an interrupt.

Priest (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q. Could the Shadow priest's Mastery bonus instead be something more distinctive from shaman shield orbs (like shadow ravens)?
A. The original “fantasy”; behind the Mastery bonus is that you’re storing shadows through combat with you, that you can unleash out using Mind Blast or Mind Spike for more burst damage. We're not sure about ravens or how that relates to a Shadow priest, but we’re definitely going to do some unique art for them.

Rogue (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q: Is Smoke Bomb going to be usable in boss fights? Because it looks like it could cheat a lot of mechanics.
A: Potentially, yes. It essentially follows the same room of line-of-sight. If standing around a pillar lets you avoid a boss ability, then Smoke Bomb would too. Lady Deathwhisper’s adds for example, would run up to melee you if you were in a Smoke Bomb.

Q. With the emphasis moving to Battlegrounds, have you looked into rogue cooldown dependency issues?
A. We definitely want to give rogues a considerable boost in the passive damage reduction department, and then tone down some of their active cooldowns in the process. We still want the rogue to feel twitchy and exciting to play, but not to the extent that you can’t deal with another class toe-to-toe without any cooldowns up. Oh, and Cloak of Shadows now provides 100% resistance.

Shaman (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q: Are there any plans to separate the mana regeneration mechanic and the damage reduction mechanic that is in Shamanistic Rage?
A: It’s a drawback we’re aware of and one we’re looking at. We don’t have a change that we’re ready to announce.

Warlock (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q. With all the new changes to Demonology warlocks, do you plan to implement any threat reduction talent unique for Demonology?
A. Threat is something that we want to be binary. You should only really ever worry about pulling threat from a tank during the first thirty seconds or so, when the tank is still establishing threat, not two minutes in because your DPS was too high. In a nutshell, we’ll make sure you don’t have to stop DPS during a fight because of your threat level (ala Hodir).

Q. Any plans for an untalented spell to help warlocks deal with stuns?
A. Possibly. It’s also possible we may take a look at stuns in general. But overall stuns will feel less impacting in an environment where players have significantly more health than they do today.

Warrior (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Q: Any plans to give Fury Warriors more hit from precision or another talent due to the removal of Heroic Strike as"next weapon" hit?
A: Part of the problem is that Fury warriors undervalue hit as it is because of the way Heroic Strike works today. We’ll make sure they do appropriate damage with the new model, but that probably won’t be with a talent that says “I don’t have to worry about getting hit for my gear.”

Q: Will Protection Warriors have improved AoE tanking in Cataclysm?
A: We will make sure they don’t feel gimp compared to the other 3 tanks. We’re not going to give them an ability that they can just spam endlessly to maintain AE threat. We think Thunder Clap and Shockwave already work well for that. We want you to have to manage threat, but we don’t want it to be insanely hard to manage. (You also might be doing less AE tanking in Cataclysm overall.)

Miscellaneous
Q: Where is my moose?
A: Well, we’re looking for a zone where moose would really fit. Unfortunately we did the perfect zone for them, Grizzly Hills, already. On the other hand, let’s just say we have a large, Egyptian-themed desert zone in Cataclysm.

Q: What are your plans to eliminate the pollution problem in Azeroth? Motorcycles, planes, methane from Kodo gas, venture company?
A: Well on the one hand, there will be more druids with trolls and worgen joining the ranks. On the other hand, there will be more goblins, and you know, goblins just don’t care. They have this section in Orgrimmar where they have their little beach chairs set up to look out on a view of oil drums floating in the lake. On the third (?) hand, you’ll be cleaning up the toxic waste in Gnomeregan if you can retake it!

Q: I've been playing since vanilla. The consciousness you've applied to make this game grow is praiseworthy. Thank you.
A: You’re welcome! One of the challenges of Cataclysm is to change enough to be exciting but not so much that the game feels unrecognizable to long-term fans. A lot is changing, but it’s still World of Warcraft.

Blue Post: Celestial Steed, Mastery & Multiple Trees, Combatlog and raids

Quote from Blizzard staff

Celestial Steed (not) limited quantity
The store itself does not act as a generator for loot codes, so a set number of codes had to be added to the store. That number is very high. If it's ever reached, we can add more. The item offer isn't intended to be of a limited quantity. (Source)

Mastery and multiple trees
If you are a 5/20/51 Ret paladin, you get mastery bonuses for spending 51 points in Retribution, and nothing else.

If a rogue is 55/21/0, they get mastery bonuses for spending 51-55 points in Assassination and nothing else.
We went back and forth on this for a bit, but Emogenheap's examples are correct. Basically it came down to two things:

We could do cooler bonuses (like Balance and Shadow) if we knew it would be restricted to those guys only and not all members of that class.

Several hybrids would have trouble finding enough attractive in other trees. Why does the Elemental shaman want better melee damage or healing? Meanwhile the Fury warrior happily dips into Arms to pick up their bonuses too. (It's fine to sub-spec into other trees is there are sexy talents there, even if they are different roles. We just didn't want someone to potentially get 9 different passive bonuses from doing so.) (Source)

Passive Mastery Benefits
On the broader topic of whether more creative or more passive mastery benefits are more fun, we just need to get players in there in beta and trying them out. The risk of more passive bonuses (like the current Enhancement one) is that it's just a little dry. Since your spell damage tends to scale roughly (roughly) with your gear, it risks just feeling like more damage. On the other hand, bonuses like Shadow and Balance affect gameplay an awful lot and may end up being just one too many things to monitor. We wanted to split the difference for now and see what feels the best. It could be that we spice up some of the passive ones or it could be we tone down some of the crazier ones, or we continue to offer a mix and let players gravitate towards what they like. I can see how the more creative ones might just sound more exciting, but then again getting 12 new abilities might sound exciting too until you're struggling with how to learn the nuance of when to use each one (if that lousy analogy makes sense). (Source)

Showing absorbs in combat log
We're still working on showing absorbs. It's technically very challenging. It's not information we currently pass down to the client, and while passing that information down isn't too tricky itself, making sure we can share it without affecting your performance is less trivial. (Source)

Vengeance Mastery Bonus
If you've spent much time on this forum in the last several months, you'd have noticed a common theme is that tanks start to have threat problems again at extreme levels of gear. The problem really isn't that surprising. Say that tanks start out doing half the damage of DPS specs. All is well. But the DPS specs continue to improve their DPS stats while tanks continue to improve their survival stats. Even if tanks spend a little effort on threat stats (some of which they get naturally on their gear), they still can't keep up with the DPS specs. It's a gear scaling problem.

We considered, and rejected, many other solutions to the problem, such as increasing threat modifier or choosing to no longer make tanking gear. Ultimately we decided that there were good things about the way rage works on warriors and bears (translating incoming damage into threat) and the way the mage talent, Incanter's Absorption turned damage taken into damage done. It just provides the damage increase in a way that's controllable.

Vengeance is NOT there so that you no longer have to ever worry about threat. It's fine with us if you have to consider threat a little bit at the start of a fight. Again, if we wanted to make threat not a factor in WoW, we'd just remove it and have mobs always stick to you rather than just cranking the threat numbers up so high that you don't have to take it very seriously.

Vengeance is also not designed to keep tank dps high no matter what in any circumstances. It's designed so that when you're being hit, your damage stays elevated. The damage done scales with your health, essentially allowing tank DPS to increase as DPS specs DPS increases. It scales a little bit with damage being taken too so that you don't turn into a juggernaut if a rogue sticks you with a dagger in PvP. (Source)

Encounter design and raid composition
Encounter design will always favor someone over someone else. It's probably impossible to make things absolutely even across every class (or even every tank class) on encounters that are tuned this tightly. And really, we wouldn't put that kind of constraint on the encounter designers. It's tough enough coming up with mechanics that you guys aren't totally sick of seeing while still giving you enough flexibility to bring whoever you want.

If we thought it was impossible or even really, really difficulty for some classes to tank some encounters, then that would cross the line for us. Death knights coming off of Sarth and going into Ulduar crossed the line because the advantages they had seemed like they were giving them an advantage on every fight. Blocking made too much of a difference on Anub, and we probably won't use that mechanic again. The Lich King hits so freaking hard on 25 heroic mode that a giant health pool is pretty useful. But the three guilds that have killed him now have used pretty different comps and even different tanks, so that seems pretty successful. So few guilds have anything approaching a reasonable shot of being able to handle that fight until the buff stack gets much higher that it seems a little silly to worry about it too much. (Props if you guys think you're close.) Meanwhile, you can do every other encounter in the game with the tank of your choice without being at a major disadvantage. Doesn't sound that bad overall. (Source)

Downranking
Yes. Actual downranking had two problems though. One, it was a pretty obtuse concept for new players. If you're super elite you might dismiss that concern, but it was something players had to figure out (typically be reading forums or something) and worked nothing else like anything in the game.

Even more of a concern, a lot of players downranked not only to conserve mana when they didn't need to heal much but because at some point in gear the coefficient starts to matter a lot more than the base points. They could essentially get a fairly powerful heal off at a lower cost.

We think the decision of when to use a big heal and when to use a small heal is a fun one -- it was fun for players for vanilla and BC. Healing might be too bland if you literally only had those spells, but nobody will. (Source)

Paladin (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Paladin Healing model
We talked a lot about keeping the paladin model inverted, where the small heal is super efficient. There is probably a way it could still work. In the end we were just concerned that it would end up biting us in the rear. Somewhere along the way we'd have to make special rules to handle the paladin, who would risk being too mana efficient or too incapable of healing when forced to heal outside of their mana-efficient comfort zone. Could we have designed it? Probably. But frankly I'd rather spend our time on more interesting mechanics and spells. I'd rather the new AE heal really make paladins feel like they can AE heal rather than really making sure FoL felt small, cheap and fast. I agree it erodes a little bit of distinction among the classes, but only a little bit. There are far more interesting ways to make healers feel unique than in the relative mana efficiency of their small spell. (Source)

Divine Storm
Divine Storm will get the Whirlwind treatment (less damage per target but unlimited targets).

The difference is that paladins fit their rotations around cooldowns while warriors do so around a limited resource. So it's entirely possible a paladin will still use DS when other attacks are on cooldown. (It will depend on what exactly the Ret rotation looks like, which we're still developing.) Divine Storm also provides a little healing too, so it's not exactly the same as Whirlwind. We probably wouldn't want to get to the point where Rets feel the need to have their single target spec without DS and the cleave spec with DS. (And without knowing the numbers, it's going to be difficult for any of you to insist that this will or will not happen.)

In general, we don't want buttons that are good against single targets to just be better against groups of targets. It makes rotations too static and makes numbers hard to balance since "cleavey" specs can do so much more damage against tight packs of enemies. Some higher damage is fine. It just too extreme right now.

These are previews, not patch notes. Just because we didn't mention anything doesn't mean there is no chance of it changing. (Source)

Blessings / Blessing of Sanctuary
Kings and Might can just be raid wide. There should be no need to target individuals. We're trying to make sure there isn't a circumstance where one dude would prefer the opposite buff to everyone else.

Bo Sanc could just be Kings with an extra mana component (for the paladin). We're also considering making it a passive that gives the paladin mana and provides the 3% damage reduction buff raid-wide which is currently brought by Renewed Hope (the Disc talent). (Source)

Scaling back AoE Tanking Capabilities of Paladins
That's still the goal. I guess I'm unclear of what part of the paladin preview you took to mean that we're keeping the same or even enhancing the ability for paladins to AE tank.

We tried to stay away from numbers as much as possible in the previews, except to give you a vague sense of the intent for some of the new abilities in terms of whether something has a short cooldown or a long cooldown.

[...] No, it's not really that. We just have a couple of different avenues we're exploring and we didn't want to have say models A, B and C in different large paragraphs. The ideas just need a little more time to bake.

And I'm not entirely sure how you're using "niches" but I am talking about wanting Prot paladins to use slightly different rotations against single targets than against groups. The addition of Crusader Strike (and maybe Holy Shock?) alone start to provide that. (Source)

Critical Healing Effect
There also seems to be some confusion about Critical Healing Effect which simply means a critical heal can do more than 150%. (Think of talents like Ruin for warlocks.) We wanted to keep some of the feel of Holy paladins getting big critical heals and caring about crit in general. This mechanic wouldn’t really have worked in Wrath of the Lich King because big crits just translated into overhealing. In Cataclysm that shouldn’t be the case. (Source)

Shaman (Forums / Talent Calculator)
Enhancement Concerns
The previews have only been out a short while, and we're not ready to go from there yet to going into a lot of detail on every talent tree. There are some Enhancement mechanics you haven't seen yet.

To deal with two specific concerns....

We agree that Enhancement benefits too much from just auto attacking. This isn't a "nerf shaman" issue. We just think having more yellow damage makes the spec more interesting, a little harder to master (in the sense of letting really good players eek out a little more dps) and ultimately easier to balance.

On the mastery talent tree bonus, it might very well end up as all Elemental damage. We're not really trying to get Enhance to shift from Fire damage to more Lightning Bolts or anything at higher tiers of gear. We didn't go that way initially because it looked odd for Enhancement's bonus to be "Elemental damage" and also because Survival's bonus was also Elemental damage, and we want all 30 to be unique. But there are ways around that, including doing a different one for Survival. (Source)

Vashj'ir: Surviving the Depths – World of Warcraft

Quote from: Blizzard (Source)

Once a great Highborne city housing some of the most revered night elves of Kalimdor, Vashj'ir was swallowed by the Great Sea in the Sundering and thought to be lost forever. Queen Azshara, formerly a beloved leader of the Highborne, escaped death in the depths of the sea when the Well of Eternity imploded. Such salvation came at a great cost, as the queen and many of her fellow Highborne were forever transformed into the monstrous naga, doomed to wander the seas for thousands of years. Their existence mostly remains a mystery to the peoples of modern Azeroth, though the Earthen Ring has learned of Azshara's naga seizing Vashj'ir for an unknown purpose as the cries of the elements echo across Azeroth from the Abyss.

The Sunken City
Vashj'ir is a level 78-82 zone in World of Warcraft: Cataclysm where players will be called to explore the depths of the Great Sea and stop the naga from seizing immeasurable power from the realm of Neptulon the Tidehunter. This expansive underwater zone will feature an unprecedented fight for survival against the naga overwhelming the area, several new quest hubs -- including Alliance and Horde naval ships and submarines -- all-new underwater travel and combat mechanics, several pocketed undersea caves free from water's grip, two new five-player dungeons (Throne of the Tides and Abyssal Maw), and the first-ever opportunity to explore the remains of the once-majestic city of Vashj'ir!

Bottled Distress Message Found Adrift at Sea
Need your help. Time is short. I'm held captive in what I hope to be a nightmare.

Enjoying the ocean air just days ago. We were determined to control key trade routes through victory at sea over the Horde. Their fleet came into our scopes. Our world became the deafening sound of battle, the smell of gunpowder, and the feeling of fear. Looking back now, though, that wasn't real fear.

We weren't alone in those waters. Our naval warfare attracted attention and rendered us prey. With our vessel already torn apart and taking on water, we saw a tremendous creature rise from the depths and shatter the hull, sucking us down to the sea floor. It all happened so fast. I was quick to tread the waters, hoping to regroup with any survivors I could find through a dense garden of kelp, constantly gasping for a chance breath. That's when the onslaught began. From all directions swarms of brutal naga swept through and captured a great many of us. Beaten near to death, I awoke in agony, bound in chains.

And here I still sit. I can only describe our prison as very big and somehow very much alive. We're in the hands of the naga now. Surviving crewmates in better condition than me are driven into slave labor.

One escaped. Thomas. He didn't make it far before I saw him dragged back. Before being forced into labor, he spoke in a panic about some large shell protecting this living prison, expansive night elf ruins in the distance, strange naga rituals underway, and sea vrykul battling our captors. He made little sense. Could be mad. Or I could be mad to hope vrykul are fighting to free us.

Prison patrols out again. Send word to Stormwind. Sunken city far from extinct. Naga plotting something horrific. Please help.

Aion: Cleric Changes and Patchnotes [26-08-2009]

• Grace of Emprean Lord had its cooldown reduces from 5 minutes to 3 minutes - Spells do no cost mana for 12 seconds.
• Wrath of Earth had its damage increased - Inflicts 233 Earth damage and causes 259 damage every 3 seconds for 9 seconds
• Summon - "Divine Energy" had its damage increased from 900 to 1,620 - Summons a holy spirit. The spirit uses 900 fire damage spell. It loses life every time it casts the spell.
• Mass Party Cleanse had range radius increases from 10 meters to 20 meters - Cleanses up to 3 effects from up to 6 party members and recovers 3,700 hp.
• Word - "Pain" now includes a 400 magic resistance debuff - Inflicts 456 earth damage, and 507 damage every 12 seconds for 2 minutes.

Aion Guides: Spiritmaster PvP Guide

This guide explains how to fight against other classes using tips for General situations composed of suggestions from many high level and experienced Korean players.

Foreword

Some of the terms will be explained before the actual guide, so remember them as they will be referred quite often in the guide.

• Greater CC Pots are these: Greater Healing Potion - Items – Aion

Important Note: AionArmory's Database is from 1.0 so skills from it has lower damage/heal values on skills than the 1.2's actual values (Korean Powerbook values are much higher)

PvP Chat Tab Radar

Make sure you drag it out to an easily visible location.
This radar will let you know if any opposing faction members are within just outside of your visible range.

Also, the Wing Restraint Combo: Instant Cast Fear Skill > Restraint > Fear > Wing Root > Disenchantment Burst, Dispel Magic > Fear Shriek > Various DOT > If they come out of the Fear state and attack, use Body Root I - Skills - Aion
Yup, an instant kill combo, you will get The Joker laugh from this.

Fifth, The Spiritmaster

They possess various conditions and Damage-Over-Time skills, as well as pets that guard them.

But they still have low health and armor, considering they have to wear robe. Its a basic for them to use their skills at distance and survive until their opponent gives in.

On a side note, at ground battles you can use your Spirit to fight in different ways, but at flight, it is hard to use them properly. But they can fight Aerial Battles with skills like Wing Root I - Skills – Aion

Useful Skills in PvP

The basic and foremost strategy for Spiritmasters is keeping distance. Since they have many DOT skills that inflict conditions, its best to keep running away until their opponent dies.

• Chain of Earth I - Skills – Aion
• Erosion II - Skills – Aion
• Stone Skin II - Skills – Aion

Tornado of Wrath (Level 45 Stigma) 2s Cast 12s Recharge: Inflicts 357 Wind magical damage to a target within 25m, and inflicts 311 for 8 seconds in 2 second intervals.
Command: Substitution (Level 48) 0s cast 10m Recharge: Your spirit receives all damage you receive.

PS: I'd say its not just that, there's these two that are very useful in PvP (only useful in PvP really)

• Disenchantment Burst I - Skills – Aion
• Wing Root I - Skills – Aion

Tips from Player ? 상실, Server Jikel, Level 50, Asmodian

I wont tell you the order of skills to use in battle. Every SM has a different style, and the situations vary as well, so the list would be endless. Though the most important skills are as follows:

• Chain of Earth
  This skill slows enemys movement, and is recharged when the chain is released.
• Erosion
  A Must skill. For 15 seconds it does continuous damage, pressuring the enemy.
• Tornado of Warth
  Another must have skill. Even though I think the cast time is a bit too long, the effect is great. It is a DOT skill exclusive to SMs. Depending on the situation, use it after you've used Restraint I - Skills - Aion on the enemy.
• Restraint
  Putting this on the enemy will earn you time. They can ofc use a CC pot and come back right away, but you force them to use it and earns you 1-2 seconds, which can be very precious.
  From here, it will depend on how you use this time. I for one use Restraint > Disenchantment Burst > Chain of Earth > Erosion > and after getting some distance, Tornado of Wrath. But if he doesn't use CC pot and keeps himself chained, then I turn him/her into a Spirit. (Fear I - Skills - Aion is the first of these transformation skills, its actually 8-15 duration with 2.5s cast)
  If he uses a CC pot when you are casting this, I quickly cancel it and go with the chain above. Since he used the CC Pot, he cannot defend against the incoming debuffs.
• Command: Substitution
  Must have at ground battles. This skill puts all the damage you receive onto your summon, and this effect really makes the fight against melee classes a whole lot easier. But note that if you go farther than 10m from your spirit this buff will disappear, and lasts for 2 minutes.
  The recharge might seem long since it is 10minutes, but its that good.
• Stone Skin
  Sorcerers and Spiritmasters have this skill. It blocks out damage (upto a certain point) for 4m minutes, but when you meet a class like the Assassin this skill melts away. This is why keeping distance is important regardless. It lasts for 4 minutes, and has a recharge of 2 minutes.
  It is important to keep this up, but minus the recharge this can last for 2 minute more, so dont use it on recharge and keep it on until it has 10-20s of duration left. Or else you will not be able to use it again once it breaks.

Tips from Player ? 류드, Server Kidorun, Level 50, Elyos

Here are the stigmas that SMs use frequently:

• Fear Shriek I - Skills - Aion (13-18 seconds on K-Aion)
• Command: Substitution
• Tornado of Wrath
• Magic Blocking I - Skills - Aion (it is actually 6-8 seconds)
• Disenchantment Burst I - Skills – Aion
• Weaken Spirit I - Skills – Aion

But of course, depending on your setting Badge of Stealth and Command: Wall of Protection I - Skills - Aion are useful as well.
You will need to change stigmas depending on where you are going to fight.

If you are going to be in the Abyss for a while, take out the Command: Substitution. You'll need to fly, and dragging around a spirit that cant fly while using this skill which has a 10m range limit will see very limited uses. So you would end up with Disenchantment Burst, Magic Block, Fear Shriek, Weaken Spirit, and Tornado of Wrath.
Many people look down on the stigma Weaken Spirit, but it is one of the few skills that shoot a single high-damage packet in our skill line.

At Rift PvP, use Command: Substitution, Fear Shriek, Tornado of Wrath, Magic Block, and Disenchantment Burst. Command: Substitution is what makes SM stand out among other classes at ground battles IMO.

PS: Not in AA yet, Badge of Stealth (LvL 40 Stigma) .5s Cast 10m Recharge: Puts you and your party members within 20m range into basic Hide mode. You cannot move or use this in combat.
Also, I'd throw in this skill in the available Stigmas: Body Root I - Skills – Aion.

He listed some weirdo skill that I havent not even seen before most likely a typo to the Wall of Prot, but Im interested in this skill . No comment or description of what class or level can use this skill, most likely an all class usable skill like the Abyss Skills.

Tactics against Gladiators

They charge then unload high damaging attacks. Therefore, it is best to snare and keep distance while putting DOT on them. They do not have as much HP and defense as a Templar, but they are still high.

In the Abyss where they cant use the spirits properly while flying, it is best to keep them on the ground or just pop them out of the sky with Wing Root.

Tips from Player ? 기노모토사쿠라, Server 우르툼, Level 50, Elyos

If you fight them at ground, using these 3 skills well will make it easy

• Fear I - Skills – Aion
• Fear Shriek I - Skills – Aion
• Curse: Fire Spirit I - Skills – Aion

Erase their buffs using Disenchantment Burst and Dispel Magic, use Chain of Earth and Erosion too. If you use a spirit and the Command: Substitution skill, there is a very high chance of winning.
In aerial battles, it will be harder due to the fact that you cant use your spirit there, even with the 3 transformation curses. Use Wing Root to force them on ground or make them crash land, and keep removing their buffs to keep a faster flight speed. Without your spirit, it is not easy to fight a class with high damage and health.

PS: For those of you not familiar with high level Gladiator skills, they have a buff skill called Strengthen Wings that increases flight speed by 50%. He means erase this skill with your buff dispelling magic to keep a distance.
Also note that they can quickly run up to you and instantly inflict Aerial Thrust (only if you are on ground), so watch out for that.

Tactics against Templers

Many suggest how you deal with their Stunning Strike and armor skills will decide the victor.

If you solve this problem, you can just use Chain of Earth and various DOT to slowly pressure them down. The most important thing is how you deal with their Armor of Balance and Iron Skin.

Tips from Player ? 히밤, Server 파시메데스, Level 48, Elyos

They possess various Armor spells and nowadays the magical resistance buff skill, so they resist magic (for the duration of Armor of Interception).
First off, use your Stone Skin and a Shock Scroll (Resists that Stunning Strike). Using Disenchantment Burst and Dispel Magic will most likely leave just Armor of Balance and Iron Skin intact.
If any other buffs are remaining, check if the Armor of Interception is on him, and if it is, then run around while removing his buffs. If not, just use Chain of Earth and various DOT skills.
If you get dragged in by Stunning Strike, use Fear Shriek immediately to get away from the danger. From my experience, if you can take off their buffs, you won't have to use Fear and just deal with them with Chain and DOT.

PS: Armor of Balance: +1000 resistance to Spin, Stumble, Stun, and Knockback for 1 min 30 seconds
Armor of Interception: +800 Magical Resistance for 30 seconds
Iron Skin: Remove all debuff and 50% less damage received for 30 seconds
Stunning Strike: Pulls target 15m in range and slows movement for 10 seconds, recharge 30s.

Tactics against Rangers

The hardest class to deal with is the Ranger. Since they have ranged attacks, it would be meaningless to keep distance. They can also kill you in an explosive burst damage chain, so to a low HP and defense class, they are very hard to defeat.

But really, it will depend on who finds and attacks whom first (lulz grammar winner wtb cookie please Cynic). It is important to keep an eye on your surroundings.

Tips from Player ? Nobel, Server Triniel, Level 50,

They can use the Spiritmasters weakness to its max potential. Keeping distance is useless, and if you get hit by their Stun chain, you will die without even being able to resist. They are the arch nemesis of Spiritmasters.
If you found them first, then you can take them. Using Disenchantment Burst on their Eye skills will severely weaken their burst ability, and therefore you will be able to resist their burst.
After that, you can use various DOTs and the Chain of Earth chain to put pressure. Of course, if you use the instant cast Fear skill (Curse: Fire Spirit I assume), you can win the fight easier, but save that incase you are stuck in a 2 to 1 battle.

But if they found you first, and you've survived their burst chain, then there's many ways you can deal with them. (if you didn't survive their burst chain, then GG)
You can use the instant cast fear skill to get away, or you can use the Wing Restraint Combo to instant kill them.

PS: Even if you've erased their Eye skills, more experienced rangers will still have one eye skill left: Eye of Swiftness, which will let them spike if they can get close. The reason why you use that precious instant cast transformation is because they can silence/sleep you, then come back or just kill you.

Tactics against Assassins

Using Hide ability, Assassins hitting your back has been dangerous to every class in existence.

Especially to SMs with Robe Armors, they can be dangerous enough that you can die without being able to do anything. But if you survive, you can counterattack.

Just live! If you survive, you can win.

Tips from Player ? INRI, Server 프레기온, Level 50, Elyos

This class is all about ambushing the enemy. To withstand it, you need good gears (or you can raise your Magical Resistance to resist their Ambush) If you do get ambushed, its good to look in your RvR Radar Tab, because of the Contract of Evasion.
This skill blocks magic attacks twice, so restraint or instant fear all goes off without taking effect. If you have a good gear and survived or resisted the Ambush, you will get a chance to use one or two instant cast spells. From here, there are 3 ways.

• If you have a Spirit, use Substitution (but note that the damage transfer effect does not occur immediately on use, it has some delay before it takes effect)
• Use instant cast spells (Erosion, Chain of Earth) to erase the Contract, then Instant Cast Transformation.
• If you are about to die, the instant cast transformation (only if you don't see the Contract)

If he was transformed, use Restraint, then Fear, Summon, Weaken Spirit, Fear Shriek, Tornado of Wrath. That will take care of most of them.
If you met each other head-on, the second method is best. But if you were ambushed, you'd go with the third? but the second method can avoid the Contract of Evasion. The best thing about a head-on fight is that you use Substitution before entering range. After you've dealt some damage with Chain of Earth and Erosion, turn him into a spirit, restraint then damage.

Tactics against Sorcerers

Clash with the same Mage School. Here, it is obviously important who disrupts who first.

If you found the Sorcerer first, you can use Magic Blocking and Fear, etc to deal with them easily, but if they found you first, you will 100% receive Soul Freeze, so its best to run.

Tips from Player ? 류드, Server Kidorun, Level 50, Elyos

Though you can catch the caster types Sorcerers with Magic Blocking and Fear, if you get hit by their skill Soul Freeze, you will get silenced for a longer duration (of course, if you packed a CC Pot then it goes away, but if DOTs are stacked on top of it, many times it will not go away even if you use CC Pot. If this happens, don't even look back and run).

If the Sorcerer has his Stone Skin on (After you remove buffs), even if you use the Chain of Earth stun chain, it will be hard to damage them through their protection (if they have it on, they do not get pushed back). Therefore using your buff dispelling magic to erase Stone Skin and other buffs is something you must do.

Tactics against Spiritmasters

The victor will go to whoever attacks first and/or has better gear.

The side that finds the other first can use fear skills then use various damage skills, but if the opponent has high magical resistance, he can avoid getting caught and return fire with the same attack pattern.

Tips from Player ? Nobel, Server Triniel, Level 50, Elyos

In a fight against the same class, finding out the other first and equipment will contribute a lot to winning. You can say the side with high magical resistance will definitely win, and if its regarding skill, whoever hits who with the Wing Restraint Combo has the advantage.
My tip a head-on fight, is that first fill your flight time gauge with consumables, and use Disenchantment Burst. Take their incoming Wing Restraint Combo. Since you've filled your flight time gauge to the max, you wont drop dead. Use your own Wing Restraint Combo then, many times they'll not pay attention to their own flight gauge and would get instant killed from this combo, and since you used your Disenchantment burst earlier, you can damage them directly.

Tactics against Clerics

There isn't an annoying opponent like the Cleric who can keep him/herself clean of our damage DOTs. Even if you send your summon, he can heal and be done with it. Therefore, just ignore them and pass by, or drag the battle and hope you meet a friend of yours. The only way is to use control disruption with fear skills, then dealing damage as fast as possible. But if they resist this, it becomes real hard.

Tips from Player ? Nobel, Server Triniel, Level 50, Elyos

Their anti-condition skill Dispel will keep themselves clean of most of our ability to damage, so there aren't a lot of things to do.
Lets unload a few magical attacks. If it is not resisted, then there is hope!
Keep them on as much DOT as possible, and they would counter with their Dispel skill. Keep this up, and drag their flight time down. And by checking your own flight gauge, you'd know if you use your Wing Restraint Combo, they'd fall and die.
On the other hand, if they resist your first few magical attacks, then their setting is Magical Resistance, and it will be hard to get the instant kill combo started.
Since many Clerics are flocking to the Magical Resistance manastone setting, if you met one like this then immediately flee or meet up with someone from your faction and fight him.
However, the Disenchantment burst does not take the Magical Resistance factor into count, so it will be useful against fleeing M-Resistance Clerics.
If you are highly Magical Resistant yourself, then there is a very little chance you will die against Clerics, so drag the fight on and hope that your faction comes to your aid first.

Tactics against Chanters

Chanters are hard to beat as well, since they possess powerful heals and damage.

When they get in range, they run their ranged missile-skill Penetrating Lock I - Skills - Aion on recharge and stun you. Do whatever to get some distance. Its best to keep dispelling their buffs here and there.

Tips from Player ? Nobel, Server Triniel, Lvl 50, Elyos

They can keep their health up against your DOT damage with their own DOT heals and disrupt your ability to keep a distance using Penetrating Lock.
Against these guys, instead of trying to DOT them down you must try to drop them dead using the Wing Restraint Combo.
Keep your distance, use Disenchantment Burst and Body Root on recharge, and use Magic Blocking to pressure them, and using Wing Restraint Combo will drop their flight gauge rapidly.
Since they do not have the Dispel skill that their Priest counterpart has, they have no choice but to receive debuffs from our spells. Maintain a 25m distance and dry their flight gauge flat.

Spiritmaster PvP Video