PTR 3.3.3 Hunter Changes [Updated 3/10]

[Mania]

The patch notes from the first build of the 3.3.3 PTR are up, and include one hunter change:

Ferocious Inspiration: This ability is now an aura and provides 1/2/3% damage to all party or raid members within 100 yards.

Other notable changes include major new mechanics for Battlegrounds and Honor, and a bunch of Auction House changes that are probably related to accessing the Auction House from outside the game proper.

Edit: Oh, and apparently Wintergrasp changes also.

[Update: 2/24 - Build 11599]

The patch notes have been updated to:

Ferocious Inspiration: This ability is now an aura and provides 1/2/3% damage to all party or raid members within 100 yards and boosts the damage of Steady Shot by 3/6/9%.

[Update: 3/1]

Ghostcrawler clarified on the Damage Dealing forum that Ferocious Inspiration will buff Steady Shot in addition to Arcane Shot.

[Update: 3/10]

The patch notes have been updated to include the following:

Heart of the Phoenix: Cooldown reduced to 8 minutes, down from 10 minutes.

[Zangor]

dont know if you think its as important but i made a news post about the upcoming 3.3.5 patch that will be adding a new raid
http://forums.wow-petopia.com/viewtopic.php?f=15&t=813

also the new aura will be the second "buff" hunters will give to other classes and since its a damage booster we might be seeing more tolerance for BM raiding

[Rhyela]

Do you know if it will still increase the damage to Arcane Shot? Or perhaps that will go elsewhere.....

[Zangor]

it states its a 1/2/3% increase to damage

this means all forms of damage except items are increased so in short yes arcane shot damage will be affected

[Kalliope]

The patch notes from the first build of the 3.3 PTR are up, and include one hunter change:

Ferocious Inspiration: This ability is now an aura and provides 1/2/3% damage to all party or raid members within 100 yards.

Oh wow, so hunters are actually going to have a second aura? Well, one for BM and one for marks, but still. That's pretty cool. Now they just have to fix it so our auras visually override all the equivalent buffs. >_< What? IT'S ANNOYING.

I wonder what the aura icon will look like, or if it'll just be the little rawring beastie still.

Classes: General

Several raid buffs have had their ranges increased to 100 yards, up from 45 yards, to prevent select buffs from repeatedly getting applied and removed during highly mobile encounters. Some buffs, such as paladin auras, totems, shouts and Blood Pact are intentionally meant to have shorter ranges and remain unchanged.

I'm going to guess that FI is just one of these and that others, like TSA, are going to fall under this blanket as well.

Blood Death Knights:

Abomination's Might: This effect is now passive instead of being a proc on certain strikes. Rank 1 is 5% attack power and Rank 2 is 10% attack power. The self strength buff remains unchanged.

This is going to impact hunters in that it's the same buff as TSA and was one of the worst offenders in making our icon disappear, which meant massive spam of losing/gaining the aura.

Arcane Mages:

Arcane Empowerment: This effect is now passive instead of being a proc off of critical strikes. The self damage buff remains unchanged.

This is the same buff as Ferocious Inspiration, which is also interesting. I think hunters' auras may be getting the right-of-way here. I'm hoping, anyway.

Enhancement Shamans:

Unleashed Rage: This ability is now always on as a passive aura.

Same deal with TSA. Although the word "aura" actually appears here...are all of our auras going to jockey for position now or what? >_<

Non-hunter stuff of note:

Culling of Stratholme

Players may now skip the initial introduction dialog to this dungeon once they have completed it at least once.

OMGYES. THANK YOU. FINALLY! *dies*

Frozo the Renowned has moved into the Dalaran Magus Commerce Exchange and will be trading your Frozen Orbs for various other trade goods.

I'm very curious to see how this is going to work. this is also generally worth noting, since if frozen orbs are actually going to be worth something again, expect to see a lot more ninjas. *sigh*

Fishing

The "Monsterbelly Appetite" daily fishing quest has changed so it now takes place outside the Violet Hold in Dalaran. The quest still requires a Severed Arm and has been renamed to "Disarmed!"

All I can say is lol. Another fishing daily moved to Dalaran!

Be sure to check out the crafting stuff too - very nice!

Also, the dungeon finder changes seem to be aimed at stopping griefing. Excellent.

[Tahlian]

If that Frozen Orb change means what it sounds like it means, you might be able to trade in an orb for, say a Frost Lotus or two instead of having to go out and spend an hour gathering herbs and maybe get two lotuses. Which would be nice.

I'm also interested to see how the FI change manifests. We'll be taking yet another damage nerf if we lose the 9% flat damage to Arcane Shot the talent itself gives us. This may be one of the few things that encourages me to copy over to the PTR to test.

[Kalliope]

I doubt the functionality of FI is going to change; just the manner in which it stays up.

[Rhyela]

I'm also interested to see how the FI change manifests. We'll be taking yet another damage nerf if we lose the 9% flat damage to Arcane Shot the talent itself gives us. This may be one of the few things that encourages me to copy over to the PTR to test.

Hi Zangor, this is what I meant. Right now FI specifically increases the damage of Arcane Shot. I realize all other damage will be affected but Arcane Shot got an even further damage increase through this talent. I'm curious if we'll still get it.

[Kalliope]

I'm also interested to see how the FI change manifests. We'll be taking yet another damage nerf if we lose the 9% flat damage to Arcane Shot the talent itself gives us. This may be one of the few things that encourages me to copy over to the PTR to test.

Hi Zangor, this is what I meant. Right now FI specifically increases the damage of Arcane Shot. I realize all other damage will be affected but Arcane Shot got an even further damage increase through this talent. I'm curious if we'll still get it.

Here's the new tooltip for Ferocious Inspiration:

Ferocious Inspiration
All party and raid members have all damage increased by 2 to 3% within 0 yards of your pet. In addition, increases the damage dealt by Arcane Shot by 8 to 9%.

Source.

[Sharilar]

The damage boost to Arcane from FI has always been passive, not a part of the proc, so there should be no worries there. It's like all those talents that state "You gain X. Also, You gain +3% to all stats."

[sargeaw]

So you think these changes will help with us that want to use BM spec more in raids?

[Saturo]

Definately. Giving us a damage aura is sure to give quite a discussion on elitistjerks.com .
After this goes live, I'm sure most of the info about it is found there.

[Tahlian]

If the FI aura is still overwritten by the ret paladin and arcane mage auras, then we're at zero-sum. Nothing will change. If it overwrites those two auras (which would be nice, since by our very natures a BM hunter will be a rarity in a raid), then perhaps a BM hunter would become something "nice to have, but not required." Which may be about the best we can hope for if Blizzard flat-out refuses to bump up our dps before Cataclysm.

[Rhyela]

If the FI aura is still overwritten by the ret paladin and arcane mage auras, then we're at zero-sum. Nothing will change. If it overwrites those two auras (which would be nice, since by our very natures a BM hunter will be a rarity in a raid), then perhaps a BM hunter would become something "nice to have, but not required." Which may be about the best we can hope for if Blizzard flat-out refuses to bump up our dps before Cataclysm.

As much as I'd like our aura to not be overwritten, I just have this gnawing feeling of dread that it will be. Hmm...I don't raid right now so I'm not sure, but is our current FI overwritten? What I'm wondering is that if the future FI aura is overwritten, will anything really change if it already is now? Did that even make any sense? (Having some sleep deprivation issues lately so I'm in a sort of fog)

[Kalliope]

Can't speak for FI, but TSA, which is already up constantly for us, gets overwritten by the shorter duration buffs.

However.

In my big wall of text above, I noted that a lot of those similar talents are being changed to ALSO be passive auras.

How that's going to work out for everyone remains to be seen.

[Mania]

I've updated the original post to include the patch note change from today.

[Dragonpuff]

*whistles
FI just keeps getting better and better!

[Tahlian]

Well, we're getting damage to Steady Shot, but losing the damage to Arcane Shot. I wonder if that will work out to a damage increase in the long run.

[Kalliope]

Considering that arcane's dropped out of the other two specs' rotations....this may be a step in the right direction.

I consider this a VERY positive sign.

[Ryno]

Ha! They called me a fool for collecting that +Arcane Spell Damage mail gear! Who's laughing now?!