[Cairenn]

New World of Warcraft Patch: Battlegrounds! - Eyonix on 6/7/05

We're pleased to announce that the latest patch has arrived, and included are the first two Battlegrounds. Nestled high within the Alterac Mountains of Lordaeron is Alterac Valley, where teams of 40 complete PvP quests, enlist the aid of powerful NPCs, and clash over strategic objectives in an all-out battle for domination. And in the Northern Barrens, on the highly contested border between Horde and Alliance territory, lies Warsong Gulch, a fast-paced capture-the-flag-based Battleground where teamwork and strategy are the keys to success. Simply log in to World of Warcraft to begin downloading the latest patch and start in on all the fun.

For additional information on World of Warcraft's Battlegrounds, please visit the new Battlegrounds mini section, which contains information about the rewards for both Alterac Valley and Warsong Gulch, as well as each Battleground's score screen!

More to come when I'm able to connect to the site.

Okay, full patch notes now:

- World of Warcraft Client Patch 1.5.0 (2005-06-07)

Battlegrounds arrive!
The Warsong Gulch and Alterac Valley battlegrounds are now available. The Warsong Gulch entrances may be found in the northern Barrens near the Mor'Shan Rampart (Horde) and south of Silverwing Outpost in Ashenvale (Alliance). The Alterac Valley entrances may be found east of Sofera's Naze in Alterac (Horde), and in the Headlands of Alterac (Alliance).

General
- Wands - The Shoot Wand ability is now a toggle. While active, it will continue attacking with the equipped wand until some other action is taken (movement, spellcasting, item use, etc...).
- Pet speed has been increased when out of combat and following their master.
- Berserking (Troll Racial) - Updated tooltip to clarify ability only usable following a melee critical.
- Hardiness (Orc Racial) - Fixed a bug that caused many abilities to ignore the additional resistance.
- It should no longer be possible to disarm traps created by friendly players.

PvP
- Honor system
Dishonorable kills - gained by killing a trivial Civilian NPC - now has a negative impact on a player's honor. Enough dishonorable kills will reduce a player's rank all the way to zero.
Players may now see an "estimated contribution point value" in the combat log for an honorable kill. Note that this value does not take diminishing returns against the same player into account, and is therefore "estimated".
"Team Contribution Points" has been renamed to "Honor"
Added tooltips to the different elements of the Honor System UI.
Players will see their last week's kill data in the "Last Week" section of the Honor System UI even if they did not achieve the 25 honorable kills required to gain standing or rank.
Fixed a bug where the PvP trinket rewards were not always removing the effects they were designed to remove (e.g. Polymorph, Fear, Stun).
- Sitting characters will now stand up immediately after an attack, even if stunned.
- Players can no longer swap inventory gear while dueling.
- Dueling is now allowed within Everlook.

Hunters
- The Hunter Epic quest has had some of its Demonic Corrupters retuned.
It should also be noted that Hunters that attempt to bypass the single player portion of the encounter by using another class to do their tasks will fail the quest in a most glorious fashion.
- Tranquilizing Shot - Is now properly affected by Efficiency and Hawk Eye talents.
- Unleashed Fury - Fixed a bug where the damage increase was lower than stated in the tooltip. It should now increase damage by the listed amount.
- Growl - Rank 1 effect improved.
- Volley - Damage increased.
- Pet speed has been increased when out of combat and following their master.
- Spirit Guides in Battlegrounds will now summon/resurrect your current pet when the Hunter is resurrected.
- Unstabling dead pets no longer puts players into a degenerate state where their pet only partially exists. Unstabled dead pets can now be properly revived, and players can no longer train more pets than their stable can hold.
- Fixed a bug where magic shots were missing too frequently when used on a target with Blessing of Protection active.

Mages
- Mage Armor - Now has a new, unique icon.

Paladins
- Fixed a bug where a Hunter's magic shots were missing too frequently when used on a target with Blessing of Protection active.

Priests
- Inner Fire - Now stacks with other effects that increase attack power and armor.
- Holy Nova - Cooldown decreased.
- Feedback - Casting a higher rank of the spell will now replace an existing, lower level effect.
- Unbreakable Will - Fixed a bug that caused many abilities to ignore the additional resistance.

Rogues
- Riposte - Fixed a bug where the ability was not usable against a disarmed or unarmed target.
- Vanish - Should be a lot more responsive when used to avoid incoming attacks.

Shaman
- Fixed a bug where Fire Nova, Flametongue, Stoneclaw and Windfury Totems had incorrect level caps when cast by higher level shaman. All totems should now be summoned at the level of the caster.
- Flametongue Totem - Tooltip updated to clarify that only the main-hand weapon is enchanted.
- Windfury Totem - Tooltip updated to clarify that only the main-hand weapon is enchanted.
- Fire Resistance Totem - New icon.
- Frost Resistance Totem - New icon.
- Grounding Totem - Fixed a bug that allowed some area of effect spells to be "grounded" and/or destroy the totem.

Warlocks
- Improved Drain Mana - Damage caused is now considered Shadow damage and is no longer reduced by armor.
- Improved Voidwalker - Now increases all Voidwalker spells (now also including Sacrifice) by 10/20/30%.
- Improved Succubus - Now increases Succubus spells by 10/20/30%.
- Master Summoner - In addition to decreasing casting time of summoning the Imp, Voidwalker, Succubus and Felhunter, it now reduces mana cost by 20/40%.
- Improved Enslave Demon - In addition to reducing the attack speed and casting speed penalty of enslaved demons, it now reduces the resist chance of Enslave Demon by 2/4/6/8/10%.
- Demonic Sacrifice - Is now instant cast.
- Improved Firestone - Now also improves the bonus Fire spell damage of Firestones by 15/30%.
- Inferno - The summoned Infernal will now be enslaved for 5 minutes before turning on its summoner.
- Drain Mana - Targets with no mana will no longer be valid for Drain Mana (Rank 4), making it consistent with all other ranks of the spell.
- Improved Drain Mana - Damage caused by this talent is now improved by the Shadow Mastery talent.
- Conflagrate - Range increased.
- Siphon Life - Is now instant cast, damage increased.
- Paranoia - No longer causes threat when cast.
- War Stomp (Doomguard) - Now has a maximum of 5 targets.
- Pet speed has been increased when out of combat and following their master.
- Honorable kills will now generate a Soul Shard when Drain Soul and Shadowburn are used.
- Spirit Guides in Battlegrounds will now resurrect your last Imp, Voidwalker, Succubus or Felhunter. If the Doomguard or Infernal were the last active pet or the previous pet was killed before the Warlock, an Imp will be summoned.
- Improved Curse of Agony - Fixed a bug where Curse of Agony (rank 1) was not improved by the talent. The talent will now work properly with all ranks of Curse of Agony.

Warriors
- 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.