World of Warcraft patch 7.1: Return to Karazhan

Ahead of World of Warcraft patch 7.1, Legion’s first major patch, hitting PTR “in the next two weeks” we’ve gathered every bit of information we have about it. We’ve given final judgement on the new expansion in our WoW Legion review (spoilers: it’s real good) and there’s already more content on the way. Before it hits PTR there’s a lot of scattered information out there, so we’ve got it all in one place for you.

For everything else Legion, check our dedicated post.

First up, here’s the major patch inclusions we know about, most of which are detailed in the trailer above:

• New five-man ‘mega’-dungeon, Karazhan, a reimagining of one of the game’s most popular raids.
• The Trial of Valor, a three-boss raid against Odyn, Guarm and Helya that finishes the storyline of Stormheim.
• Suramar expansion including new world quests and the continuation of the storyline in a nine-week-long chain.

Here’s Blizzard’s quick, two-minute run-down of the patch:

And now, details.

WoW Patch 7.1 release date

Most importantly, when will we get to play it? Well release is scheduled forOctober 25 in US, and October 26 in EU.The Trial of Valor raid will unlock two weeks after.

WoW Patch 7.1 Q&A

A patch 7.1-focused Q&A was ran on the official Twitch account with a bunch of information – including the release date – as well as info about other things that are changing. Here’s the archive:

WoW Patch 7.1 balance changes

All the number tweaks in Legion’s first patch.

Patch 7.1 Class Changes

Death Knight

• Blood
• Icebound Fortitude has returned, reducing damage taken by the Death Knight by 30% (remains at 20% for Frost Death Knights).
• Frost
• Frozen Pulse now triggers if you have fewer than 2 full Runes (was 1).
• Frozen Pulse damage reduced to 60% of Attack Power (was 72%).
• Glacial Advance now hits targets in melee range more reliably.
• Razorice now increases Frost damage by 3% per stack (was 2%).
• Obliterate damage increased by 20%.
• Howling Blast damage increased by 50%.
• Unholy
• Death Coil damage increased by 50%.

Demon Hunter

• Agonizing Flames damage bonus to Immolation Aura reduced to 30% (was 50%).
• Felblade is now usable against targets in melee range even if the Demon Hunter is rooted.
• Distance from which Soul Fragments can be used for Soul Cleave, Soul Barrier, and Spirit Bomb has been increased to 25 yards (was 20 yards).
• Demon Blades will now trigger while on the global cooldown (was delayed until after the GCD). This is not a gain to throughput.
• Spirit Bomb healing from damage increased to 15% (was 10%).
• Soul Barrier now lasts 12 seconds (was 8 seconds).
• Abilities learned have been spaced out:
• Sigil of Silence – Level 101
• Empower Wards – Level 103
• Sigil of Misery – Level 105

Druid

• Mastery: Harmony now includes Frenzied Regeneration.
• Ysera’s Gift will only heal party or raid members.
• Living Seed now copies 25% of the crit heal (was 50%).
• Seeds of the World Tree now increases that amount by 8%/point (was 10%).
• Owlkin Frenzy will now only affect Lunar Strike (and not Solar Wrath or Stellar Flare).
• Swiftmend healing increased to 770% of Spell Power (was 700%).
• (Balance, Guardian, Feral) Druids how have Regrowth in place of Healing Touch.
• Regrowth is castable in Moonkin Form.
• Talents, artifact traits, and legendaries have been updated to affect Regrowth where appropriate.
• (Restoration) Regrowth has 40% additional chance to crit (was 60%).
• Activating Incarnation no longer triggers a global cooldown for any spec.
• Incarnation: Chosen of Elune once again provides the armored Moonkin model.
• Galactic Guardian:
• Now causes Moonfire to generate 10 Rage (was 15).
• Now increases its direct damage by 300%.
• Now has a spell alert.
• Guardian
• ​Thick Hide now reduces damage taken by 6% (was 10%).
• Restoration
• Prosperity now reduces your Swiftmend cooldown by 3 seconds (was 5 seconds).
• Cultivation healing increased by 20%.

Hunter

• Track Mechanicals granted to all gnome and goblin hunters, as well as any hunter who uses the Mecha-Bond Imprint Matrix.
• Posthaste now lasts 5 seconds (was 8 seconds).
• Vulnerable now increases damage by 50% (was 25%), stacking up to 2 times (was 3 times).
• New Hunter talent (replacing Dash):
• Trailblazer: Your movement speed is increased by 25% anytime you have not attacked for 3 seconds.
• Survival
• Raptor Strike damage increased by 100%.
• Carve damage increased by 150%.
• Butchery damage increased by 35%.
• Throwing Axes damage increased by 25%.
• Animal Instincts has been redesigned: Flanking Strike now also reduces the remaining cooldown of a random one of the following abilities:
• Flanking Strike
• Mongoose Bite
• Aspect of the Eagle
• Harpoon

Mage

• Arcane
• Arcane Blast damage increased by 17%.
• Arcane Missles damage increased by 17%.
• Arcane Orb damage increased by 17%.
• Arcane Charges now increase mana costs by 125% (was 100%).
• Fire
• Pyroblast damage reduced by 6%.
• Flamestrike damage increased by 15%.
• Aftershocks damage increased by 15%.
• Frost
• Brain Freeze now also increases the damage of your next Flurry by 50%.
• Waterbolt damage increased by 25%.
• Water Jet damage increased by 100%.
• Lonely Winter now increases the damage of affected spells by 25% (was 20%).
• Flurry damage increased by 5%.
• Ice Lance damage increased by 5%.
• Frostbolt damage increased by 5%.
• Ray of Frost damage increased by 5%.
• Frost Bomb damage increased by 5%.
• Comet Storm damage increased by 5%.
• Ebonbolt damage increased by 5%.
• Frozen Orb damage increased by 5%.
• Blizzard damage increased by 10%.

Monk

• Effuse now heals for 250% of attack power (was 200%).
• (Windwalker, Brewmaster) Crackling Jade Lightning now costs 20 Energy, plus 20 Energy per second.
• Brewmaster
• Brewmaster Monks now gain 15% additional Armor from gear.
• Brew-Stache now lasts 4.5 seconds (was 1.5 seconds).
• Mistweaver
• Sheilun’s Gift now activates Soothing Mist.
• Chi-Ji Crane Heal now heals for 135% of spell power (was 150%).
• Soothing Mist now heals for 64% of spell power per tick (was 55%).

Paladin

• Retribution Aura no longer ignores tanks (including self).
• Flash of Light now heals 450% of spell power (was 425%) and costs 18% of base mana (was 16%).
• Holy
• The Rule of Law talent now increases the radius of Tyr’s Deliverance by 50%.
• Light’s Hammer now costs 35% of base mana (was 40%).
• Sanctified Wrath now extends Avenging Wrath by 5 seconds (was 10 seconds).
• Retribution
• Holy Wrath now deals 200% of your missing health in damage to 4 nearby enemies, up to 120% of your maximum health.
• Blade of Wrath has been redesigned: (Passive) Your auto attacks have a chance to reset the cooldown of Blade of Justice.
• Protection
• First Avenger: Avenger’s Shield now add +50% damage to the first target, and +10% Grand Crusader proc chance.
• Bastion of Light now has a 2-minute cooldown (was 3 minutes).
• Crusader’s Judgment now has 2 charges, and Grand Crusader now also grants a charge of Judgment.

Priest

• Mindbender now returns 0.5% of your mana per tick (was 0.75%).
• Discipline
• Power Word: Solace now returns 1% of your mana per tick (was 0.75%).
• Clarity of Will’s cast time is now 2.0 seconds (was 2.5 seconds).
• Contrition now increases Atonement by 3 seconds (was 2 seconds).
• Holy
• Renew healing increased to 62% of spell power (was 55%).
• Desperate Prayer now heals and increases health by 30% (was 20%).
• Divinity now lasts 6 seconds (was 8 seconds).
• Heal now heals for 500% of spell power (was 475%).
• Prayer of Mending now heals for 175% of spell power (was 150%).
• Prayer of Mending now avoids jumping to targets that already have Prayer of Mending, if possible.
• Binding Heal now costs 2.5% of mana (was 3.0%).
• Holy Fire damage increased to 200% of spell power (was 150%).
• Shadow
• Arcane Torrent now generates 15 Insanity.
• Power Word: Shield cost increased by 51%.
• Shadowform has returned as a new spell for Shadow Priests:
• Assume a Shadowform, increasing your Shadow damage dealt by 10%, and reducing your Physical damage taken by 10%.
• You may not cast any Holy spells while in this form.
• The shadowy visual is now tied to Shadowform.
• Voidform now acts to intensify Shadowform. It automatically triggers Shadowform if not already active, and you gain the effects of both.
• When Voidform ends, you return to Shadowform.
• The damage of all Shadow Priest abilities has been reduced to compensate for this, resulting in no net gain or loss of damage.

Rogue

• Kingsbane now generates 1 combo point.
• Hemorrhage, Marked for Death, and Ghostly Strike show up on the caster’s nameplates.
• The cast time for all Assassination poisons has been reduced to 1.5 seconds (was 3 seconds).
• Outlaw
• ​Saber Slash damage increased by 10%.
• Pistol Shot damage increased by 10%.
• Ghostly Strike damage increased by 10%.
• Blunderbuss damage increased by 10%.

Shaman

• Fire Elemental, Earth Elemental, and Feral Spirits now all have totem timers.
• Earthquake Totem has been renamed to Earthquake and no longer summons a totem.
• Torrent now provides a 30% bonus to Riptide’s initial heal (was 40%).
• Elemental
• Earth Shock damage increased by 15%.
• Frost Shock damage increased by 15%.
• Stormkeeper now also makes the affected Lightning Bolts and Chain Lightning instant.
• Stormkeeper now has a 1.5 second cast time.

Warlock

• Demon Skin and Demonic Circle have swapped talent locations.
• Devour Magic has returned for Felhunters.
• Doomguard’s Doom Bolts damage increased by 13%.
• Affliction
• Unstable Affliction now afflicts a target with up to 5 Unstable Afflictions at once.
• Compounding Horror trait redesigned: its buff causes your next Unstable Affliction to deal (32% Spell Power) Shadow damage instantly, stacking up to 5 times.
• Soul Effigy is now immune to AOE damage.
• Agony damage increased by 5%.
• Unstable Affliction damage increased by 5%.
• Siphon Life damage increased by 5%.
• Drain Life damage increased by 5%.
• Drain Soul damage increased.
• Phantom Singularity damage increased by 5%.
• Corruption damage increased by 10%.
• Demonology
• Demonwrath now generates Soul Shards more consistently.
• Demonic Empowerment now increases health by 20% (was 50%).
• Thal’kiel’s consumption deals damage equal to 8% of pet health (from 6%).

Warrior

• Inspiring Presence now affects party and raid members only.
• Hamstring is now on the global cooldown, and can once again trigger Tactician.
• Bladestorm damage increased by 8% for all specs.
• Fury
• Raging Blow damage increased by 8%.
• Rampage damage increased by 8%.
• Execute damage increased by 8%.
• Bloodthirst damage increased by 8%.
• Odyn’s Fury damage increased by 8%.
• Furious Slash damage increased by 8%.
• Dragon Roar damage increased by 8%.
• Ravager damage increased by 8%.
• Enrage now increases damage taken by 20% (was 30%).
• Warpaint now modifies the Enrage damage taken increase to 15%.

Patch 7.1 Item Changes

• The following items now disable their effects rather than cancel the entire buff when leaving the Broken Isles (most notably when entering some class halls):
• Bloodtotem Saddle Blanket
• Leystone Hoofplates
• Demonsteel Stirrups
• The damage effects from the following trinkets should no longer hit targets that are crowd-controlled:
• Six-Feather Fan
• Terrorbound Nexus
• Caged Horror
• Twisting Wind
• Emerald Nightmare trinkets:
• Ravaged Seed Pod’s damage increased by 20%.
• Nature’s Call cone attack damage increased by 40%.
• Unstable Horrorslime’s damage increased by 20%.
• Bough of Corruption’s damage increased by 10%.
• Horn of Cenrius’s healing increased by 10%.
• Unbridled Fury’s duration increased by 5 seconds, and its armor and health bonuses increased by 10%.
• Swarming Plaguehive can now also drop for Shaman whose loot specialization is set to Enhancement.

WoW Patch 7.1 Karazhan dungeon

Karazhan is returning in patch 7.1 and it’s getting a bit of a revamp.

• Now a five-player dungeon, still with nine bosses and a massive, sprawling layout.
• It’s designed to be a little harder than the mythic difficulty currently in the game and has a weekly lockout – it’s basically a five-man raid with equivelently “generous” gear rewards.
• To get in you’ll need to complete an attunement questline with Khadgar that operates as a sequel to the pre-quests we undertook before Legion launched.
• Doesn’t replace old Karazhan, with a new entrance seen above.

Karazhan attunement quest

Before you make your way inside, you’ll need to open up the dungeon for access. This is done via a quest chain that sends you round four Mythic dungeons:

• Halls of Valor
• Vault of the Wardens
• Blackrook Hold
• Violet Hold

Once you’ve done that, Khadgar will open up Karazhan for you.

Karazhan dungeon bosses

While only eight bosses are listed here – with the Opera being one of the three encounters each time you try it – Blizzard did say there would be more. The chess event, Kara’s most famous ‘boss’, is missing and is likely to make a return, as are other, possibly optional or secret bosses. The leading theory for this is Nightbane, the original secret boss of Kara, though no method for summoning him has yet been discovered and is likely disabled on PTR. Blizzard’s official preview is herealong with their teaser video below.

Maiden of Virtue

Karazhan’s first boss is a Titan Watcher that’s none too pleased about all the partying that’s been going on here. She’s going to uncorrupt you with cleansing light and holy force.

• Will stun the whole group at one point, broken by damage, meaning you actually have to standin the fire.
• This leads into a heavy DPS phase to get through her shield so you can stop her before she, y’know, kills you all.
• Requires interrupting throughout to stop the tank dying.

Opera Hall

There’s three options here, which will be randomly selected each week.

Wikket

A story of the Hozen and whether evil is born or bred.

• Two opponenets with shared damage, both of which must be defeated.
• Lots of stuff to not stand in, with avoidance not always involving simple movement.
• Also adds. So many adds. Kill them, obv.

Westfall Story

Definitely-not-Westside-Story returns as a three-stage fight against those who would pull apart two star-struck lovers. One of them is a Murloc. Yeah.

• Loads of adds to stop at the start and narrow it down to just the pair of bosses.
• Chaotic, as allies should be avoided when certain debuffs are placed.
• Moves between areas, making things even more hectic.

Beautiful Beast

Try to win love for the transformed monster that is Brute by fighting off his paramour’s guards.

• A whole batch of powerful enemies all at once. As they’re defeated, the others are healed and buffed. Take them down one at a time, and kill the most dangerous first.
• They’re all pieces of furniture, by the way. One is a broom. Yeah.
• Fight will get less chaotic but more hardcore as it continues and servants are taken out.

Attumen The Huntsman

Mounted rider and all-around deadly force. Oh, he’s got a mount drop too.

• Switches between mounted and un-mounted forms as the fight progresses.
• Midnight, his mighty steed, will go solo when her health gets low, letting you damage Attumen directly.
• Each phase has its own mechanics, and is particularly deadly to tanks not on their game.

Moroes

The steward of Karazhan is hosting a dinner party and you’re rudely interrupting.

• Starts with a number of high-power adds that must be crowd controlled and killed before Moroes makes them immune.
• These guests all have their own set of powers, but there are long crowd control affects available in the room to separate them.
• Will pick random targets to garrotte, giving them a stacking debuff that constantly sucks health.

The Curator

The buggy, erratic protector of Karazhan’s menagerie of magical animals.

• Will cast spells on the party rapidly to begin with, burning through mana.
• After this enters a stunned state while regenerating, taking 100% increased damage. Probably hit him then, eh?
• Will do steadily more damage as the fight continues, meaning timing cooldowns for the damage phase is important.

Shade of Medivh

Magical echoes of the last Guardian of Azeroth, this one in particular from a time when he was not himself.

• Casts spells togainmana, finishing with a very powerful ability that requires coordination to overcome.
• Move on Blizzard, don’t move on Flame Wreath, kill adds if they appear – there’s a lot of stuff to keep in mind.
• WIll move through this cycle until he’s taken out. Not a lot to tank, plenty to kill.

Mana Devourer

A simple, harmless mana wyrm. Obviously not, given it’s here.

• Constantly releases mana that must be collected, used and then disposed of in sequence before it kills you.
• If the Mana Devourer grabs mana itself that is Bad.
• Will just kill you if it grabs too much mana. Don’t let that happen.

Viz’aduum the Watcher

The final boss and agent of the Legion sent to capture Karazhan.

• Three stages set across various Legion command ships. He’ll use them to attack you.
• Has plenty of his own abilities to throw at you too.
• Generally, there’s a lot of fire being rained down to not stand in.

Karazhan loot

Karazhan gear drops are 855 ilevel, with the usual titanforge, socketing and tertiary stat possibilities. There is also a set of chest pieces that enhance the trinkets the drop from the raid. The chest pieces are ilevel 875, but the exact bonuses they give to the trinkets isn’t yet known. Also at ilevel 875 are a series of drops without a current loot assignment – these are believed to come from the optional, secret boss Nightbane.

WoW Patch 7.1 Trial of Valor raid

New patch, new raid. Trial of Valor is on the smaller side, with just three bosses, and is meant to sit between the Emerald Nightmare and Nighthold raids as far as progression is concerned.

Trial of Valor release date

Trial of Valor is planned to release two weeks after the patch itself, on November 8 in the US, November 9 in the EU. Presumably, this will be followed by the Mythic and LFR versions of the raid the following week. This is so Blizzard can be all-hands incase there are critical bugs during progression attempts from the world’s largest guilds, BlizzCon long-over by that point.

Trial of Valor bosses

Odyn

• Much like the Halls of Valor dungeon, Odyn challenges us to see if we’re worthy of taking on his tasks. This time, he doesn’t give up until 10%. He also has Hymdall and Hyrja with him that must be beaten first, simultaneously.
• Phase one is buffed up versions of two Halls of Valor bosses, while the rest of the fight is a massively powerful version of Odyn.
• Odyn has two phases of his own, and can get real nasty. Lots of group damage and tank-switching.

Guarm

• Helya’s three-headed hell-hound who beat us up in the Helheim storyline quests. We’re back to finish him off and while he’s just one hydra-dog, he has three breath attacks alone.
• Requires multiple tanks at all times to handle the heads. His breath attacks each apply different debuffs, and getting two different ones is, you guessed it, the end of your life.
• There’s no second phase, but healers are going to run out of mana from the massive amount of area damage eventually.

Helya

• A final showdown with the lord of the underworld after her brief appearance on a boat in Maw of Souls. Starts the fight just off shore, eventually retreats and orders her army to attack you.
• This fight is add central. From tentacles to the entire army of hell, Helya herself is barely the main threat from 65% onwards.
• There’s going to come a point where just getting her dead is more important than trying to control the flurry of enemies. Have someone ready to make that call.

Trial of Valor loot

Ilevels for Trial of Valor are as follows:

• Raid Finder: 840+
• Normal: 855+
• Heroic: 870+
• Mythic: 885+

These are a 5 ilevel increase on the rewards from Emerald Nightmare’s various difficulties. They won’t Titanforge beyond the current ilevel cap of 895 until after The Nighthold releases in early 2017, when things will start scaling to the new as-yet-unannounced cap.

You won’t be getting a tier set in this raid, with Legion’s first coming from the Nighthold a little further down the line. However, there is a stat-less transmog set acquired through a quest that requires doing the raid multiple times. Unlike previous cosmetic rewards, this can be done in LFR as well as the three main difficulties, but each has its own colour associated. One of Wowhead’s datamined screengrabs can be seen below.

Each type of armour has four variations.

Trial of Valor quests

There won’t be an attunement for Trial of Valor. However, there is a small chain added in the patch that unlocks more world quests as part of Helya’s invasion. This is a four quest mini-series starting with Havi in Valdisdall and ending with Odyn within the raid itself. This unlocks Helarjar Landing World Quests across the Broken Isles.

WoW Patch 7.1 world quests

There’s a batch of new world quests coming in 7.1, in three main areas.

Patch 7.1 Suramar quests

Suramar’s getting its own mini-expansion in patch 7.1, including new storylines and world quests, carrying on the plotline that finished with the formation of the Arcan’dor. Here’s what we know so far:

• There will be a weekly campaign, currently estimated at nine weeks, with new quests each go round. They culminate with the opening of the Nighthold raid.
• In these we go after the Nightborne who are feeding power to Gul’dan, taking the offensive to Suramar city.
• According to the official post on the matter, completing the new storyline gets you “much closer” to the Arcanist’s Manasaber mount.
• It begins with the quest ‘Lockdown.’

In the run-up, make sure you’ve got as much Nightfallen reputation as possible. This speeds up significantly once you’ve completed the Suramar storyline to unlock further world quests, which then give you rep to unlock more quests, starting the loop.

The push to honoured and then the push from there to the next quest unlock at around 7,000 rep are the stopping points. Doing all your Suramar world quests every day, plus mastering the withered mini-game and using the Darkmoon Faire reputation buffs is highly recommended. Chances are, there will be some form of catch-up in 7.1 for those with less time, that fell behind or new level 110s.

Patch 7.1 Helya invasion world quests

As part of the patch, Helya’s armies are coming out of, er, Hel to invade the mainland of the Broken Shore. A quest in Dalaran called A Call To Action begins this chain, discovering the threat just a couple of moments too late to stop it. This then unlocks a whole bunch more world quests in the Broken Isles against the invasion.

Patch 7.1 Falcosaur world quests

Cooking and First Aid focused quests on the shores of the Broken Isles, which are under attack from Falcosaurs. You stop them, then take care of one of your own, eventually giving you a mount and raising some battle pets along the way. Perks N Peeves, a WoW pet-focused blog has some more infoon exactly how it all goes, while Wowhead has videos and the like.The quests also drop eggs which can be traded in with The Wardens to receive new patterns for those professions.

Patch 7.1 Illidan quests

As mentioned in the preview video, more quests for the Illidan storyline will be deployed with 7.1. These haven’t been officially detailed, but according to datamining will involve killing a large number of dungeon bosses and collecting their souls. Harder bosses give more rewards, though a weekly cap means nobody will be seeing the end for another couple of months, likely to tie-in with the release of the Nighthold and the end of the first phase of Legion’s storyline with the death of Gul’dan. Full spoilers and details over on Wowhead.

WoW Patch 7.1 PvP changes

As it always seems to, PvP is getting another minor overhaul in patch 7.1. Blizzard have their own entire post about it, but it boils down to more predictable and scaling rewards for PvP activities. First wins of the day give big bonuses to honor and artifact power, while rating each week will reward a piece of loot in a similar way Mythic+ dungeons. Higher rating, better loot. While they’re not de-minimising the impact of loot on PvP, they do want to give rewards that allow PvP-focused players to be relevant elsewhere.

There is also a new PvP faction, Talon’s Vengeance, who has been datamined. On PTR they have no quests and their vendor doesn’t seem to sell anything. They are believed to be tied to the Falcosaur world quests as well. As you’d expect, they have a mount at Exalted and various bits of gear and cosmetic loot on the way up, some of which is useful for questing.

Official notes:

• Nagrand Arena has received a significant visual update.

Honor System

• Honor talents will no longer be lost when a player chooses to Prestige.
• Players will receive gold or artifact power in lieu of honor talents at higher prestige levels.

Rewards

• The Item Levels of PvP gear rewards now scale as World Quest gear rewards scale, and PvP gear rewards can be Titanforged, Warforged, socketed, or include tertiary stats.
• Players will no longer receive a bonus piece of gear based on their rating for the first two wins in each rated bracket (2v2, 3v3, 10v10).
• Players will now receive a bonus piece of gear based on their best rating from the previous week for each rated bracket (2v2, 3v3, 10v10).
• Bonus gear will be of the “Gladiator” type at PvP ratings below 2000, and of the “Elite” type at PvP ratings above 2000.
• The first victory of the day bonus now includes a large Artifact Power reward.
• The reward increase for your first victory of the day has been extended to all brackets: Skirmishes, 2v2 Arenas, 3v3 Arenas, and Rated Battlegrounds.
• Artifact Power rewards have been increased.

Honor Talents

• Death Knight
• Frost
• The two bottom rows of Death Knight Honor Talents have been significantly redesigned:
• Choose one of: Deathchill, Frozen Center, or Delirium
• Choose one of: Tundra Stalker, Overpowered Rune Weapon, Chill Streak
• Chill Streak Damage increased, cooldown reduced to 45 seconds (was 60 seconds).
• Remorseless Winter’s snare now cannot be dispelled.
• Unholy
• Unholy Mutation duration reduced to 8 seconds (was 12 seconds).
• Druid
• Many talents have changed positions in the Druid Honor Talent tree.
• Pouncing Strikes now affects Maim and Rip, but no longer affects Rake.
• Pouncing Strikes no longer causes you to leap towards the target.
• Tranquility now heals for double the amount in PvP.
• Disentanglement now causes Efflorescence to remove all snare effects from friendly targets when it heals.
• Thorns now deals 5% of the attacker’s total health in Nature damage.
• Nourish has been re-designed:
• Reduces the cast time of Healing Touch by 0.5 seconds and automatically applies one of your missing healing-over-time spells to the target. If all of them are present, Healing Touch critically heals.
• Monk
• Fast Feet now also reduces the duration of snares by 20%.
• Brewmaster
• Yulon’s Gift has been replaced with Niuzao’s Essence.
• Casting Purifying Brew now dispels all snare effects.
• Mighty Ox Kick cooldown reduced to 30 seconds (was 60 seconds).
• Mistweaver
• Refreshing Breeze now refreshes the duration of Essence Font on targets rather than Renewing Mist.
• The Soothing Mist from Ancient Mistweaver Arts mana cost reduced, and healing increased slightly.
• Dome of Mist duration increased to 8 seconds (was 6 seconds).
• Fortune Turned healing bonus increased to 50% per stack for 2 stacks (was 15% per stack for 3 stacks).
• Healing Sphere healing increased by about 40%, and its cooldown reduced from to 45 seconds (was 60 seconds).
• Windwalker
• Grapple Weapon is a sixth tier Honor Talent.
• Disarms the enemy for 6 seconds, with a 60 second cooldown.
• Spinning Fire Blossom generates 1 Chi, costs 50 Energy.
• Spinning Fire Blossom is now affected by Mastery: Combo Strikes.
• Heavy-Handed Strikes now causes Fists of Fury to reduce the movement speed of targets by 70% for 2 seconds each time it deals damage.
• Heavy-handed Strikes has been moved to the sixth tier.
• The first tick of Fists of Fury will knock down and stun targets.
• Zen Meditation has been replaced by Zen Moment:
• Costs 5 Chi. Has a 45 second cooldown and a 10 second duration.
• Reduces damage taken by 20%, increases healing taken by 20%.
• Each attack that triggers Combo Strikes (in non-consecutive ability use) reduces the effect by 5%. Zen Moment fades if it reaches 0%.
• Whirling Kicks has been replaced by Control of Mists:
• Every 20 seconds, Effuse is instant-cast. You gain a Control of Mists debuff with a 20 second duration after casting Effuse instantly. Each Chi spent while Control of Mists debuff is active will reduce its remaining duration by 1 second.
• Yulon’s Gift now only affects Flying Serpent Kick.
• Rushing Tiger Palm has been replaced with Disabling Reach:
• Disabling Reach now increases the range of Disable by 7 yards.
• Paladin
• Retribution
• Vengeance Aura now only affects targets who have your Greater Blessings.
• Shaman
• Restoration
• The Honor Talent version of Spirit Link cooldown reduced to 30 seconds (was 60 seconds).
• Earth Shield’s protection now activates when the target takes an attack equal to 6% of their total health (was 10%).
• Warlock
• Destruction
• Multiple Honor Talents have changed positions in the Honor Talent tree.
• Cremation has been redesigned:
• Cremation now makes Immolate an instant cast, and Conflagrate deals an additional 4% of the target’s total health in Fire damage.
• New Honor Talent: Focused Chaos
• Focused Chaos increases the damage of your Chaos Bolt by 150%, but it no longer is also cast on your targets afflicted by your Havoc.
• New Honor Talent: Entrenched in Flame
• Conflagrate roots targets until cancelled. This effect is not broken by damage.
• Bane of Havoc no longer replaces Havoc, and both can be used.

WoW Patch 7.1 mounts

New mounts are being added from various sources. Here’s pictures of each:

Karazhan Midnight Mount

Nighthold Mana Sabre Mount

Aviana’s Ivory Hawkstrider Mount

Karazhan Smoldering Ember Wyrm Mount

Darkwater Skate Mount

Prestigiuous War Steed/Wolf

Rockspine Basilisk

WoW patch 7.1 Battle Pets

There’s a whole heap of new Battle Pet quests in 7.1 which send you back to Wrath of the Lich King raids for new pets with new abilities and an achievement, Raiding with Leashes IV. Once that’s unlocked, it gives you a quest to challenge Algalon, the secret final boss of Ulduar, to pet battles. Beat him, you get a celestial bunny.

Alcaz Isle is also further expanded and upgraded, with a bunch of pet consumables to acquire and giant mechanical spiders to tame, if you’re of the persuasion. Much more on that in the official preview post.

WoW patch 7.1 Diablo Anniversary

It’s the 20th anniversary of Diablo this year, which is being celebrated in-game with some new items. They are:

• Scrolls and Tomes of Town Portal – replacements for Hearthstones. Ten of the former can be combined with a Blank Diabolic Tome to create a toy that does the same job.
• Twelve-String Guitar – a toy that plays the New Tristram theme.
• Horadric Stachel – a 28-slot bag.
• Stone of Jordan – use currently unknown. Possibly a currency for the other items.

WoW patch 7.1 Blood of Sargaras vendor

A new vendor has been added that sells various crafting materials and other generic items for Blood of Sargeras. This includes all of Legion’s common mats, plus order hall resources, cooking items and fish. Her name is Illnea Bloodthorn and she is in Dalaran. Here’s a full list of what she sells, each for one Blood of Sargaras:

The Order Resources come in the form of a cache that is bound to account, allowing it to be passed to alts if they’re lacking in resources.

On a similarly profession-focused front, various professions are also receiving new items. Leatherworkers get a Bloodlust-style item that can be sold, Alchemists are getting a new one-size-fits-all potion that costs Blood of Sargeras to make, there’s new Vantus Runes for Trial of Valor plus some general new inscription goodies, a new bag for Tailors and more. Details on Wowhead.

Patch 7.1 Profession changes

• Cooking
• Nomi now has a chance to drop Slightly Burned Food instead of Badly Burned Food.
• Nomi will now always return 1 of the meat you gave him.
• Nomi can now teach tier 3 recipes such as Nightborne Delicacy Platter, even if you don’t know a required precedent tier 2 recipe, such as Barracuda Mrglgagh.
• Fishing
• Extended the base duration of the following bait buffs to 5 minutes:
• Blessing of the Thistleleaf (Val’sharah)
• Salmon Lure (Highmountain)
• Ravenous Flyfishing (Oceanic)
• A bait duration extension has been added to the Confused Seerspine Murloc (Suramar).

WoW patch 7.1 Auction House improvements

As spoken about in a recent developer interview, the auction house is getting some improvements to make it a little more usable. In 7.1, this means changes to how items are sorted, now going by the cheapest unit price rather than cheapest stack price. The hope is this will remove incentives to spam up the auction house with endless one-stacks that sell due to front-page prominence.

WoW patch 7.1 reputation alt changes

There’s been some complaints about how grindy Legion can get, especially for players who like to play a variety of characters at max level. Reputation particularly gates content, and while unlocking it the first time isn’t so bad, going through it all again to get to the dungeon-running or raiding you want to do on a new class can be frustrating. Therefore, Blizzard are making these changes:

• Court of Stars and The Arcway will now unlock account-wide once each individual dungeon is completed once on an account.
• World Quests will no longer have the “friendly” reputation unlock requirement for secondary/alt characters. Once you hit 110 on an alt, you will immediately receive a quest to speak with Khadgar to receive your Flight Master’s Whistle and unlock World Quests, as long as you’ve already unlocked World Quests on your main.

WoW patch 7.1 levelling changes

Levelling between 1 and 60 is being redesigned in 7.1. Important abilities are being moved up to levels 20, 40 and 50, while ranks are being added to upgrade abilities as you go. This is essentially to increase complexity and discovery during the levelling period, rather than frontloading it all. For max level players it has no impact, but new alts or players who’ve just started will find it quite different. Here’s the official notes on it:

• In many cases, the level 1-10 abilities that introduce the class have changed.
• Many special bonuses and features for class abilities are now granted by upgrades that are learned at a later level.
• This applies to every spec for every class other than Death Knights and Demon Hunters.
• Examples:
• Druids below level 10 now use Wrath and Moonfire as their primary damage abilities, rather than Shred and Ferocious Bite.
• While Smite will still be the first spell given to Priests at level 1, the added absorb shield effect will be an upgrade learned by Discipline at level 36, as the purpose of that effect is to add to healing in group content.
• Rogues will start leveling with an ability that attacks with one weapon and generates one combo point. Rogues who choose Assassination specialization will replace that ability with Mutilate at level 40.

WoW patch 7.1 UI changes

There’s a whole batch of UI fixes coming in 7.1, but most significant for most players is a change to what information is available to mods. Things like Deadly Boss Mods will no longer be able to access the position of your party members. This will disable all sorts of functionality currently used for trivialising position-based encounters, for example Xavius’ blades or Archimonde’s wrought chaos. It should mean harder encounters for most players, plus something Blizzard don’t have to worry about during the design phase. Beyond that, here’s the highlights from the length full patch notes:

• Flight map now shows party and raid members as well as all turn-in quests and your mini-map yellow arrow quest.
• Clicking on the dungeon/raid icon on the world map will open the Dungeon Journal.
• When you click on an emissary button on the world map, the map now moves to a zone with an uncompleted World Quest for that emissary.
• Added support for new Quick Join system, allowing players to join friends parties that are in queues.
• Added new “For the Horde” and “For the Alliance” emotes.

WoW Patch 7.1 undocumented changes

As with every WoW patch, there’s a few undocumented changes. Some are bugs that will be quickly quashed, but others are minor quality of life improvements that just didn’t get a patch note all of their own. Here’s some highlights from the very lengthy Reddit thread:

• Possible increase in Legendary drop rate (hard to test for obvious reasons)
• Mount drops announced to guild chat in same way as legendaries
• Ancient Mana drops reworked to mostly be usable items rather than raw mana, don’t count as loot on a corpse if you can’t pick them up and show up on mini-map with a different icon than mining/herbing nodes.
• Action cam re-enabled.
• Dungeon journal loot has some changes, plus can now be opened directly from the map or the bonus loot choice window.
• Channeled artifact power items can be used while moving.
• Crafted equipment can be Obliterum upgraded to rank 8.
• Reputation gains in Suramar for feeding ancient mana increased to 75 from 50.
• The class hall upgrade that allows instant World Quest completion doesn’t count towards Emissary Quests any more.

That’s all for patch 7.1 so far – check back soon for more information as it develops, or join us for further patch notes in the very near future.