Warrior patch history

This is the patch history from the Warrior perspective.

Patch 0.6

• Characters have a new combat stat called "Attack Power." Attack Power helps determine melee damage dealt. The new Attack Power value is displayed in your character sheet as Power. This value is based on class, level and ability scores. Most classes use strength, but rogues and hunters use a combination of strength and agility. The main purpose of Attack Power is to provide a more consistent effect from buffs, regardless of weapon speed. Slow weapons will receive a larger bonus from your Attack Power than faster weapons which will ultimately balance slow and fast weapons. It is important to note that most attack bonuses in the game now add to your Attack Power.
• The amount of melee damage directly attributed from your weapon has been reduced. Damage is now more closely connected with class, strength and buffs than before. Your weapons are still very meaningful but the combat effect you get from using a higher (or lower) level weapon has been reduced.
• Block values have been added to shields. Blocking an attack no longer avoids all of the damage of an attack. Blocked attacks avoid an amount of damage based on your shield and your character's strength.
• Players will now find it more difficult to fight monsters that are a good deal higher in level than they are. Player chance to hit and damage ("glancing blows") are reduced while the monster's chance to hit and damage ("crushing blows") are increased.
• Miss, Parry, Block, Dodge, Critical Hit, and "Stun from Behind" all have new formulae for determining their percentage chance of occurrence.
• The effect Spirit has on mana and hit point regeneration has been improved. Spirit affects all characters' mana and hit point regeneration rates in and out of combat.
• Your chance to hit with each weapon when fighting with two weapons has gone down, but the total hits from both weapons has gone up. Your total damage output when fighting with two weapons should be higher than fighting with one weapon and a shield, but roughly equal to fighting with a two-handed weapon.
• Off-hand attacks deal of the weapon's designated damage.
• Punishing Blow no longer requires the Warrior to be behind the target.
• Defensive Stance and Sundering Strike (Rank 1) have been removed from the trainers. These abilities are now available through quests.
• Bloodrage has been moved to the Savage Combat skill line.
• The values for Sundering Strike have been reduced.
• The damage for Cleave has been increased.
• The damage for Slam has been increased and the cast time reduced.
• Slam and Cleave are both now Berserker Stance abilities, as originally intended.
• Charge no longer teleports you to the target, but speeds you along a path towards the target.
• The duration for Hamstring has decreased.
• The cooldown for Pummel has increased.
• The duration for Shield Bash has decreased and the cooldown has increased.
• Disarm will now only disarm weapons and will select the weapon in the off-hand if there is no weapon in the main hand slot.

Patch 0.7

• The beginnings of the new resistance system are in the game. Players and some creatures now have the ability to resist damage from offensive spells and abilities based on their total resistance, their level and the level of the person or creature causing the damage.
• The interrupt reliability has been increased for things like Pummel and Shield Bash. They can still be resisted, dodged, blocked, parried and deflected as appropriate.
• Charge: All ranks now include a short stun.
• Cleave: Damage reduced.
• Disarm: Will only work on targets that are carrying weapons. Changed to an instant ability.
• Hamstring: Changed to an instant ability. Cooldown removed.
• Inner Rage: Rage cost reduced. Replacements added.
• Intimidating Shout: Cooldown reduced to 3 minutes.
• Overpower: Only activates after dodge now (not block and parry).
• Punishing Blow: Rage cost and damage increased. Changed to an instant ability.
• Rend: Damage reduced. Changed to an instant ability.
• Revenge: Moved to level 14. Changed to flat damage with the damage reduced.
• Shield Bash: Moved to level 12. Interrupt chance raised to 100%.
• Shield Block: Moved to level 16.
• Shout: No longer locks out other Shout abilities for five seconds.
• Slam: New berserker stance added at level 30.
• Sundering Strike: Changed to an instant ability.
• Thunder Clap: Damage increased. Now deals nature damage instead of physical damage.
• Platemail is now available for Paladin and Warrior classes at level 40.

Patch 0.8

• Talents are now available for the Warrior and Mage classes!
• In PvP, control types of spells such as Charm, Fear and Stun will now be subject to diminishing returns. This means that if a second spell of the same type is used against the same player within 15 seconds of the first effect wearing off, the second spell's duration will be reduced by 50%, the third's duration will be reduced by 75% and the player will be immune to the fourth casting.
• Hamstring: Duration reduced.
• Players who are feared can no longer use items, cast spells or use abilities until fear wears off.

Patch 0.9

• All instant-cast, non-channeled spells can now be cast while moving.
• Spell casting now has diminishing interrupt time. Each successful hit after the first will set the spell being cast back less each time to a minimum of .2 seconds. First hit 1 second, second hit .8 seconds, third hit .6 seconds, fourth hit .4 seconds, fifth and all successive hits .2 seconds.
• Interrupt spells/abilities (e.g. Shield Bash) will now interrupt channeled spells.
• You can no longer eat or drink while in combat.
• Spell Interruption spells/abilities will now interrupt the entire school of magic for the duration. For example, using Kick against a mage casting Fireball will prevent Fireball, Fireblast, Scorch, and all other fire spells from being cast for the Kick's duration.
• Strike renamed Heroic Strike.
• Punishing Blow renamed Mocking Blow.
• Sundering Strike renamed Sunder Armor.
• Sunder Armor no longer stacks with Expose Armor, but will now stack with Faerie Fire.
• Recklessness now has a percent-based armor reduction, but using it makes you immune to all fear effects for the duration.
• Dual Wield no longer requires skill points to purchase. It is available on Warrior trainers at level 20 for a monetary training cost.
• Intimidating Shout now has a chance to break when the feared target is damaged.
• Charge range changed to 8-25 yards.
• Charge minimum range reduced to 8 yards.
• Charge can now be done during combat, but the target must still be within the 8-25 yard range.
• Taunt effectiveness reduced.
• Enrage now has a max duration
• Enrage triggers when being hit with a critical hit now, damage increases with the rank of the talent.
• Removed attack speed bonus from Enrage.
• Reduced Enrage damage bonus slightly.
• Flurry speed slightly reduced.
• Moved Enrage/Flurry/Cruelty, changed pre-requisites for each.
• Reduced rage bonus for Improved Heroic Strike.
• Mortal Strike now has a cooldown, damage has also been reduced.
• Rage bonus for Improved Charge reduced.
• Tactical mastery points distributed evenly. Players will no longer experience "diminishing returns" from putting more points into the talent.
• Slightly reduced the damage bonus given by 2-handed weapon specialization.
• Improved the Anticipation talent.
• Increased the amount of ranks you can have in Improved Disarm by 3.
• Reduced strength of Combat Endurance.
• Increased duration of Improved Battle Shout.
• Reduced Deep Wounds damage.
• Improved Hamstring slightly improved. (Note: base Hamstring ability has been slightly reduced)
• Improved Pummel is no longer a pre-req for Improved Overpower.
• Reduced chance to gain rage from Unbridled Wrath
• Changed Taunt to improve the effectiveness of Taunt rather than reduce the rage cost.

Patch 0.10

• Charge is no longer usable during combat. Stun duration component has been reduced, rage generation changes with each rank.
• Demoralizing Shout effect is now reduced at higher ranks.
• Pummel has had its interrupt duration reduced.
• Shield Bash has had its interrupt duration reduced; cooldown timer has been increased.
• Hit points gained from STA has been increased, while base hit points have been decreased. Overall, hit point pools should be roughly the same.
• Mana and health regeneration gained from spirit has been improved.

Patch 0.11

• Gnome Warriors can now learn the Bows proficiency.
• Night Elf Warriors can now learn the Guns proficiency.

Patch 0.12

• Item durability is now in the game.
• Spirit no longer affects item proc percentage. Item proc percentages are now independent of stat attributes.
• Taunt and Challenging Shout are now useable against targets that are immune to physical attacks.
• Hamstring - Movement slow effect reduced.
• New Spell: Berserker Rage (Level 30)

Patch 1.1 "World of Warcraft"

• Durability loss through fighting has been decreased (mainly to accommodate the new penalty for dying)
• All spears are now polearms.
• Polearm proficiency can now be learned by Hunters, Paladins, Warriors.
• Spear proficiency has been removed.
• Inner Rage: Removed.
• Pummel: Removed.
• Heroic Strike: Now available in all Stances, damage increased on some ranks, decreased on others.
• Sunder Armor: Now available in all Stances.
• Shield Bash: Now available in all Stances.
• Hamstring: Now available in Battle and Berserker Stance.
• Rend: Now available in Battle and Defensive Stance, damage slightly increased on some ranks.
• Recklessness: Moved to level 50, moved to Berserker Stance, can becancelled early, now causes the Warrior to take extra damage instead of decreasing armor.
• Bloodrage: Available in all Stances, cooldown increased.
• Cleave: Moved to level 20, available in all Stances, damage reduced.
• Mocking Blow: Moved to level 16, damage increased, replaced more frequently.
• Shield Wall: Moved to level 28.
• Slam: Available in all Stances, damage reduced, casting is pushed back when hit.
• Thunder Clap: Damage increased.
• Defensive Stance: Now reduces damage taken and damage caused instead of increasing Defense skill.
• Intimidating Shout: Moved to level 22, no longer causes the targeted enemy to run in fear, but will cower in fear. The cowering effect is broken by damage.
• Warrior abilities that target one or more enemies now generate additional threat.
• Taunt: Now gives the target just enough threat to attack you. Cooldown added.
• Berserker Rage: Moved to level 32.
• New Ability: Retaliation (Level 20).
• New Ability: Execute (Level 24).
• New Ability: Intercept (Level 30).
• New Ability: Whirlwind (Level 40).

Patch 1.1.1

• The Daze effect has been reworked to have a smaller chance of occurring against players level one to 29. The chance of a successful Daze effect against players 30 and above remains the same.
• Defensive Stance has been improved to hold aggro more effectively.
• Taunt: removed rage cost and global cooldown.

Patch 1.2 "Mysteries of Maraudon"

• Daze chance has been reduced in degrees depending on the level of the monster versus the level of the player. Thus, a monster will have a better chance to Daze a player equal in level than it would Dazing a player five levels higher.
• Damage bonus for the Warrior's One-Handed Weapon Specialization (Protection tab) increased to 2% per rank.
• Amount of threat generated by Shield Bash when Shield Discipline is active has been increased.
• Mortal Strike changed to deal weapon damage + a flat amount (85, 110, 135, 160) instead of percentage-based damage. Additional ranks available on Warrior trainers.
• Warriors will now resume attacking after performing a Slam attack.
• New Ability: Pummel (Berserker Stance) (Level 38) - Instant attack that causes damage and interrupts spellcasting for a short duration.
• Shield Bash: No longer usable in Berserker Stance.
• Intercept: Cost reduced from 15 rage to 10 rage, damage reduced accordingly.
• Bloodrage: Now generates 10 rage immediately and 10 rage across the duration.
• Improved Bloodrage: Now reduces the health cost of Bloodrage by 25% (rank 1) and 50% (rank 2).
• Berserker Stance: Now increases critical strike chance by 3% instead of granting 10% melee haste. Extra damage taken reduced from 20% to 10%.

Patch 1.3 "Ruins of the Dire Maul"

• Previously, in many cases, a Block, Parry, or Dodge was translated into a "Miss," thus causing confusion over actual miss rates. We've made the following changes in an attempt to be more clear as to what is actually happening in combat:
• Block: All creatures will now report a Block on attacks from the front, reducing damage caused instead of converting the attack into a "Miss." Creatures will no longer be able to Block attacks from behind.
• Dodge: Every time a creature Dodges, it will report a Dodge. We will no longer translate a creature's Dodge of a rear attack to a "Miss."
• Parry: All creatures will now report a Parry on attacks from the front instead of translating them into a "Miss." Creatures will no longer be able to Parry attacks from behind.
• Blocking an ability that takes place on the next swing now blocks the normal amount of damage instead of all of it.
• Increased stun resistance will now also help resist some non-melee based stun spells from creatures.
• Training costs adjusted. Total training cost was slightly increased.
• Battle Shout - Rage cost reduced.
• Bloodrage - Health cost reduced.
• Heroic Strike - Damage increased.
• Parry - Moved to level 6.
• Thunder Clap - Now causes Physical damage instead of Nature damage; damage increased; duration increased with each new rank.
• Improved Sunder Armor - Now decreases rage cost by 1/1/1.
• Improved Thunder Clap - Now decreases rage cost by 1/1/2.
• Execute - Full rage is no longer consumed when the ability does not hit.
• Overpower - Should now be usable when a special attack is dodged.
• Fixed a bug where rage was not being generated when normal melee attacks were parried, dodged, and blocked.
• Charge has been improved so it will work through doorways and won't path you through an entire dungeon.
• Sweeping Strikes bug fixed. It will hit more reliably and show up in combat log correctly.
• Added a visual to Sword Specialization "proc" that will now show up in the combat log as well.

Patch 1.4 "The Call to War"

• Thunder Clap - Visual and animation changed.

Patch 1.5 "Battlegrounds"

• Overpower - Fixed a bug where the ability was sometimes blocked.
• Improved Cleave - Now increases damage bonus by 40/80/120%.
• Blood Craze - Talent design changed. It now regenerates 1/2/3% of the warrior's total health over 6 seconds after being the victim of a critical strike.
• New Fury Talent: Dual Wield Specialization - Increases damage with the off-hand weapon by 5/10/15/20/25%. Note: the additional damage also increases rage generation significantly.
• Iron Will - Fixed a bug that caused many abilities to ignore the additional resistance.
• Enrage - Increased the number of charges to 12. Decreased the duration to 12 seconds. The new duration is the limiting factor for slower weapons (e.g. Arcanite Reaper will typically get one less swing), while dual wielding and faster weapons will make better use of all of the charges over the duration of the ability.
• Concussion Blow - Changed to an instant, stunning attack and removed the damage portion.
• Shield Specialization - In addition to increasing % chance to block, it now gives the warrior a 20/40/60/80/100% chance to generate 1 rage on a successful block.

Patch 1.6 "Assault on Blackwing Lair"

• Due to significant talent changes, Warriors will have all talent points refunded and can be respent.
• Hamstring - Will now cause damage to targets immune to movement slowing effects. Movement slowing effect improved.
• Improved Hamstring - Design changed. No longer improves the movement slowing effect. It is now a 3 point talent that gives a 5/10/15% chance to immobilize the target for 5 seconds.
• Booming Voice - In addition to increasing duration, this talent will now increase the area of effect of Battle Shout and Demoralizing Shout by 10/20/30/40/50%.
• Battle Shout - Tooltip updated to display area of effect (in yards).
• Demoralizing Shout - Tooltip updated to display area of effect (in yards).
• Improved Berserker Rage - No longer increases the duration of the effect. The talent will now generate 5/10 rage when Berserker Rage is used.
• Improved Demoralizing Shout - Effectiveness increase from talent increased to 8/16/24/32/40%.
• Piercing Howl - No longer has a prerequisite (Improved Demoralizing Shout).
• Deathwish - Is now usable while under a Fear effect, which will also remove the Fear effect.
• Bloodthirst - Design changed. Bloodthirst is now an instant melee attack that causes damage equal to 30% of the warrior's attack power. In addition, the next 5 successful melee attacks will restore health.
• Concussion Blow - No longer requires purchase of the Improved Revenge talent.
• Shield Discipline - Removed and replaced by the new talent Shield Slam.
• New Talent: Shield Slam - Slam the target with your shield, causing damage and has a 50% chance to dispel 1 magic effect on the target. Also causes a moderate amount of threat. Requires the purchase of the Concussion Blow talent.
• Heroic Strike/Sunder Armor/Revenge/Mocking Blow - Tooltips updated to indicate the additional threat caused by these abilities. There have been no changes to the amount of threat caused.

Patch 1.6.1

• Improved Shield Block - Fixed a bug where Rank 3 of the talent was not granting the extra block.
• Bloodthirst - Damage bonus increased to 40% of attack power.

Patch 1.7 "Rise of the Blood God"

• You can no longer unequip weapons while they are disarmed.
• Deflection - Will now increase parry chance when using Fist Weapons.
• Retaliation - Will now cause a maximum of 30 retaliatory strikes in 15 seconds. In addition, retaliatory strikes will not be possible while stunned.
• Improved Revenge - The stun effect can now be resisted.
• Mace Specialization - The stun effect can now be resisted.
• Retaliation, Recklessness and Shield Wall will no longer be cancelled if you switch stances while the effect is active.
• Shield Slam - Threat caused increased.
• Shoot Bow/Gun/Crossbow - Should no longer cause a global cooldown on all other abilities.
• Sweeping Strikes will now ignore dead targets, and will ignore PvP enabled targets if you are not PvP enabled.

Patch 1.8 "Dragons of Nightmare"

• Instant Attacks:

The mechanics of most instant melee attacks have been modified to improve item balance. Previously, instant melee attacks did damage based on the damage range of the weapon, plus a bonus for the player's attack power. This bonus was then multiplied by the speed of the weapon. As a result, slow weapons did more damage than was intended, and fast weapons were considered inferior by most players. We have changed the way the attack power bonus is calculated for instant attacks. This change does NOT affect attack power calculations for normal melee attacks. Instead of multiplying by the speed of the weapon, the attack power bonus is now multiplied by a fixed number pulled from the following table:

• Two-handed weapons: 3.3
• Daggers: 1.7
• All other one-handed weapons: 2.4

As a direct result of this, many weapons have shifted position in their relative power. In particular, many Epic (purple) quality items are now more powerful than slower Superior (blue) weapons.

This change was not made to reduce the power of instant attacks, but to correct the relative imbalance of weapon itemization. At a given level requirement, epic quality weapons should always be more powerful than superior quality weapons.

Please also note that all normal weapon swings will be completely unaffected by this change. The following abilities are affected by the design change: Whirlwind, Mortal Strike, and Overpower.

• The cost per point of durability to repair plate, chain, and leather items has been reduced to be equal to the cost of repairing cloth items of the same quality.
• Concussion Blow - Will now initiate combat when used.
• Shoot Bow/Crossbow/Gun - Fixed a bug where these abilities could be used faster than intended.
• Throw - Use of this ability will now only cause a cooldown with Shoot abilities.
• Mortal Strike - Now uses normalized attack power.
• Overpower - Now uses normalized attack power.
• Whirlwind - Now uses normalized attack power.
• Warriors can immediately Intercept after using trinkets to remove immobilizing effects.
• Camera angles when using Charge should be improved.
• Items which provide +hit chance will now be allowed to counteract the increased miss chance penalty of dual-wielding.

Patch 1.9 "The Gates of Ahn'Qiraj"

• On-next-swing abilities will no longer cause multiple weapon procs on a single swing.
• Execute - Improved Execute and other discounts to the Execute ability will now correctly convert the resulting extra rage into damage.
• Retaliation - This ability will no longer lose charges when the attacker is behind the warrior.
• Sword Specialization - Special attacks such as Sinister Strike, and Mortal Strike now properly trigger the chance to gain an extra attack.
• Sweeping Strikes - Whirlwind and Retaliation will now correctly consume the charges from Sweeping Strikes.
• Bloodthirst - The damage component has been increased to 45% of attack power.
• Enrage - The talent will now grant 5/10/15/20/25% extra damage when enraged, instead of 8/16/24/33/40%.
• Mace Specialization - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
• Improved Revenge - The stun effect's duration no longer diminishes or is diminished by controlled stun abilities and spells (e.g. Cheap Shot, Hammer of Justice, Charge etc...).
• Unbridled Wrath - Only normal melee swings will trigger the rage generation from this ability.

Patch 1.9.1

• Charge – Should no longer desync characters from the server when charging from land to water.

Patch 1.9.3

• Shield Block - This aura will now correctly be removed when the charges are all consumed. However, it is still possible when fighting multiple opponents to get extra blocks due to technical restrictions.

Patch 1.10 "Storm of Azeroth"

• Execute - This ability will now work with Sweeping Strikes again. If the second victim is below 20% health, they will be hit with the full Execute amount. If the second victim is not below 20% health, they will be hit with normal melee swing damage.
• Whirlwind - When this ability is used with Sweeping Strikes, it will burn only one charge of Sweeping Strikes and will generate only one additional attack.
• Flurry - Ranks 1 through 4 of this talent will now activate correctly again.
• Retaliation - This ability will now function correctly at full melee range.
• Intimidating Shout - The cowering in fear effect will no longer be applied when the target resists this shout. In addition, this shout will now affect a maximum of 5 targets.
• Flurry - Your haste will now last only the intended next 3 swings.
• Sweeping Strikes - The additional attacks generated by this ability will now properly take into account the armor of the second target.

See also

• Patches