Let me explain.

I have a nasty habit of taking on more projects than I can reasonably handle. Then, when the time comes to sit down and work on one, it becomes a question of focus. Which one should I work on? Where are my notes for it? Am I going to have to do a lot of memory-searching, or is something down on a document? Usually, by the time I figure out what I’m going to work on, the window I had to work on it is gone, and we’re back at square one the next day.

It’s a personal flaw that I recognize in myself, and I *am* working on it. I think I’m just going to need to keep a whiteboard with progress meters in my room.

To this end, I’m cutting out the D&D chronicle from the blog. I can’t stay ahead of it, and I’m so far behind I will never catch up. I can’t continue to try to post it, but I will say that you can typically follow our D&D adventures on twitter, courtesy of @PixelExecution, @FabulorWizard, @KevaraBloodbane, @Half_Lazan, and @Key_the_Thief.

In the WoW world, well…  I’ve been busy. I’ve been made recruitment officer for our guild on Rexxar, Stands in Bad (and we are recruiting!), so a lot of my time outside the game is spent thinking up ways to get our guild out there and known. Ironically, my blog is the last place I thought of in order to get the word out, but hindsight is 20/20. We’re still short a few caster cloth- and leather-wearing DPS to finish the second team, but we’ll have to make do in the meantime.

We start raiding this week. Wednesday will be the guild’s first foray into 10m normal Mogu’shan Vaults, and I think we’re prepared. As prepared as we can be, I suppose. A majority of us have run LFR, and we understand the mechanics that are missing, so I think we can make a fair go of it.

Lelissa has been 90 for quite a while, and I’ve been working hard to have a second 90 to fill a spot in a second raid to make sure everyone who wants to raid can. So, after a week of solid work (and assistance from a girlfriend who enjoys powering everyone’s alts through dungeons), I got Qiuzhi, my Pandaren Mistweaver/Windwalker, to level 90 this past Sunday morning. She was not the first alt I was expecting to get to 90, and I suspect that Malyss is very disappointed in me right now.

I’m sure she’ll deal. She hasn’t been in a spotlight position since Wrath anyway.

I’m very uncomfortable with the idea of healing for pickup tanks right now, since she’s decked out in crafted PVP healing gear. I don’t have mana issues so long as people pay attention and do what they’re supposed to, but after her first two heroics on Sunday, I’m starting to wonder how many people haven’t absorbed the fact that we’re on a new expansion, and the healers in dungeons aren’t gloriously overgeared for them.

Siege of Niuzao Temple is the best dungeon for showing you who your potential raiders are. The third boss, with the shield and the bombs is Grade-A trial material for who will cut it in your first week, I guarantee it. My experience with it was abysmal, until I finally lost it.

I won’t go into the specifics of describing the fight, as anyone who still reads my blog already knows them I’m sure, but when people are throwing bombs at the tank holding the adds, not getting out of the way of bombs that are about to blow up, and just generally not paying attention, your mana goes right out the window. Rocks fall, everybody dies.

Then it happened a second time, after a brief explanation of what not to do.

It must be my old age, but I’m actually very impressed with myself that I didn’t just put the whole bunch of idiots (except the tank, he’s my friend) on ignore and leave the dungeon. I ended up telling my buddy to wait a moment, and I proceeded to fill the chat with something more direct. I didn’t even swear once, which is something of a milestone for me. It was fairly simple.

“Do not stand next to bombs unless you’re going to throw them. If you cannot get to a bomb within 2-3 seconds, then leave it alone and GET AWAY. If a bomb has fallen near you, and you don’t know how long it has been there, then GET AWAY. I don’t care if you have to stop DPS for five seconds, I don’t care if your mother is on the phone. I am not overgeared for this content, and I CANNOT HEAL STUPID. The less damage you take, the more likely we are to get through this encounter. Now buck up and let’s do this right.”

The next attempt went without a hitch. I barely even had to heal, except for the tempest AoE and some sudden, unexplainable tank damage. I even got to throw some bombs.

This expansion is going to be serious culture shock for people who cannot adapt. Now, more than ever, in heroics and in raids, personal accountability is at the forefront. This is a good thing for people like me, those people who play to get better, for those who expect the most out of themselves in the arena they choose to play in, heroic or normal raiding. For a player with more of a sense of entitlement toward the endgame, this expansion will either forge them into something better, or it will break them. I don’t think there can be a middle ground.

There’s more to say, but my friend already has the trademark on the Bearwall. I’ll just have to save it for the next post.

I’m not going to go into too much detail – we all know that I’ve got a tendency to get wordy, and it’s best avoided here. Frankly, every Arms Warrior is going to play a little different based on choices and situations, so I’m only going to focus on single-target outputs.

Ability Changes

Mortal Strike now has a 6-second cooldown, up from 5, and generates 10 rage. With the way Overpower functions for us on Taste for Blood, I suspect that this change was put into place in order to keep the original feel of TfB and its internal 6-second CD for Overpower from the old Rend ticks.

Rend is gone, replaced by Deep Wounds which appears from use of Mortal Strike. Deep Wounds itself lasts for 15 seconds, but Mortal Strike only has a 6-second cooldown, so on single target fights, you won’t see Deep Wounds dropping off.

Taste for Blood now has an additional effect for Overpower. There is a 30% chance that Overpower will enable a followup use of Overpower, and will add a stack counter to increase the damage done by Heroic Strike. Initially, I found this change to be frustrating (you all know what a proponent I am for kicking the old Heroic Strike to the curb), but after working with it pretty extensively after the patch, I have the utmost confidence in the way the Overpower/Heroic Strike symbiosis works. Overpower also no longer costs rage.

Stat Changes

Fortunately, things have changed for slightly better here. You will need 7.5% hit and 7.5% expertise for boss fights. Right now, at 85, that works out to 768 rating for each, unless you have racial bonuses that work in your favor. Fortunately, the stat screen on your character window will show you just how much you have (including your bonuses), so it’s easy to see how much of a gap you have to cover.

Our relationships with Crit, Mastery, and Haste remain unchanged – we love the first two, and loathe the last, because it doesn’t do enough for us.

Talents

Key for single-target fights, I think, is Dragon Roar. Bladestorm still locks us down for ability usage, so that’s out unless you’re fighting a boss that summons a ton of adds regularly. Shockwave would also be purely situational. Dragon Roar ignores armor, and crits automatically – no need to worry about boosting it with something else before use.

Glyphs

I’m a little indifferent about our glyphs save for one: Unending Rage. A rage bar that fills to 120 is incredibly useful, and is the only must-have I will recommend. For the other two, I only suggest that you use what you know you will make the most use of. Me, I like Long Charge and Rude Interruption.

Priority

Things have changed a little bit since before 5.0.4, and it’s going to feel a little weird adding Heroic Strike to the mix, but you have to. Here’s your priority:

1. Dragon Roar
2. Colossus Smash
3. Overpower (TfB Proc – only one!)
4. Mortal Strike
5. Execute (below 20%)
6. Overpower
7. Heroic Strike (only with 2+ stacks of TfB)
8. Slam

So let’s break this down one piece at a time.

Dragon Roar comes first. As we said before, it already ignores armor (no need to burn Colossus Smash beforehand), and always crits. It hits all enemies within 8 yards, and also hits them with a little bit of a knockback and a knockdown. The knockback isn’t that noticeable on regular mobs, and on bosses, it’s non-existent, so there’s no need to worry about too much movement.

Colossus Smash to prep for Execute under 20% health, or Mortal Strike and Overpower above 20% is always a must. No question there.

Mortal Strike, and Overpower to follow up. Obviously, at the start of the fight, you won’t have Overpower just sitting there waiting to be used, so you have to force the proc with a Mortal Strike. The key here, though, is that as long as Overpower continues to proc, use it until it isn’t anymore. If you have an Overpower proc waiting to be used, but you Mortal Strike instead, you’ve just wasted an Overpower and a chance for a TfB stack. There’s an important caveat here, though: Do not use more than one GCD to delay a Mortal Strike. It’s an important DPS ability, and if you’re just chewing through Overpowers instead of using it, your output will suffer. Fortunately, it’s rare to run into it, but if you do, keep that in mind. If you’re playing your cards right, you’ll start to see a pattern between what you can do with the Mortal Strike/Overpower/Heroic Strike chain, which we’ll cover in a moment.

I’ve seen a couple guides out there telling you not to use Heroic Strike unless TfB is at 5 stacks. Some guides even tell you to use Heroic Strike with just one stack, even over Slam. Don’t pay attention to either one. The first situation is completely unrealistic – you’ll be able to count on one hand, two at most, the number of times you’ll get to five stacks in a single RAID, let alone a single boss fight. The second situation is a waste of your resources. Slam does 215% weapon damage plus 997 at level 85; Heroic Strike with a single stack will only do 210% weapon damage, plus 499. Even if the latter portion of the equation gets doubled, it’s still only 998, which means you’re losing out.

The key here is to make sure that you’re always using Heroic Strike at 2+ stacks, but only use HS when the TfB stacks are just about to drop off – you’ll almost always be able to try to sneak in one more MS+OP combo with 3-4 seconds to spare on the stacks, so if it doesn’t add another stack, you can still burn HS without much trouble.

That’s pretty much everything. For those of you who use Weak Auras (or are interested in doing so to help you keep track of things like TfB stacks and the like), once the display bugs are worked out in the menu, I’ll be posting up my export strings for anyone to use, as well as including some screenshots.

Slay well, my friends.

I know a lot of us have had this problem in some form or another. You’re puttering around Stormwind or Orgrimmar going about your business when you happen to see something on your screen that makes you do a double take. Something someone said in General or Trade Chat made you wonder just what was going on, or maybe you spotted the name of a character or hunter pet that made you slow down and say, “Hold on a second, here. Did I just see what I thought I saw?” So you turn to check again, and sure enough, there sits a Worgen Hunter with a wolf pet named Jewbiter. Or a Dwarf Paladin named Mikehunt (if you’re confused about this one, say it out loud really fast). I’m not making these up – these are people I’ve actually reported before.

In days past, you would be able to click the trusty red question mark in your UI, open up a ticket, and file it with the GMs so that it would be looked at. You’d receive a nice little in-game message that showed that it was responded to and being investigated. In the case of Mikehunt, I added him to my friends list to make sure that the name was changed, and if not, I could report him again later (I had to report him several more times for other versions of the same name, until he finally received a final warning, I suspect, and changed his name to something more appropriate). With Jewbiter, however, you just had to make your report and hope that it would be resolved. Not the greatest option, but for me, it was enough. The in-game mail response at least indicated that it was being investigated, and in my experience, turnaround time on these issues was typically within a day or two.

The new system doesn’t work in the same way, and in some cases, it’s a little bit better and more user-friendly. The option for making a report on bad player names, bad pet names, bad guild names, or unacceptable language in chat is now reduced to a click-to-report option. Right-click the character portrait or character name in chat, choose “report player,” and the UI comes up. Now, the UI for this feature is great. You can choose one of four radio buttons: Bad Player Name, Bad Guild Name, Language, and Cheating ; add in a short description of the incident in the provided text box, and that’s that. Report finished.

On paper, it looks like the perfect way to manage these reports. No more having to remember what a character name is, or figuring out just what alt code you need to get that umlauted u. I don’t get updates from Blizzard anymore to say, “Hey, we got your report and we’re gonna look into it. In the meantime, have a Pudding Pop,” but when this feature was first released, I could live with it. They’ve done right by me in the past, so no big deal.

Then something went wrong.

Back on Azgalor-US, I was running through Stormwind one day on my hunter. I happened to run by the blacksmith’s area and ran past a Worgen Warrior rocking the DS5 instance plate armor. That armor looked pretty good! So, like any fledgling transmogger (damn you Rades and Rhuan) wanting to check it out and see what it would look like on a Draenei, I clicked his name and did a double take.

Ibitanegar.

I was shocked. That’s not even skirting the line of racism, that’s taking the running long jump right into I-dare-you-to-ban-me-ville. So I brought it up in guild chat. Encouraged everyone to report him, and filed a player name report myself. Added him to the friends list to keep an eye on the name change, and went about my day. In my heart I knew it would get handled; Blizzard would bring down the hammer.

The next day, I logged in and saw no change. No big deal, I thought, it’s probably backed up in the system, but I filed another report anyway. The day after that, no change. No big deal, I thought again, it’s probably backed up in the system. I filed another report anyway. I was away from my computer for a few days after that, working on my D&D/novel project, so I wasn’t able to check in to see if there was a change. However, I’m sure you can imagine my surprise and confusion when, a week after my initial report, I logged in to find that Ibitanegar was still on my friends list. I reported him again. I encouraged others to do the same. I mentioned it in guild chat. Standard operating procedure, right?

A week later, after reporting daily, Ibitanegar was still on my friends list. Alright, follow standard operating procedure. Report, encourage. Report. Encourage. Report. Encourage. It was then that some people in my guild mentioned that they couldn’t report him without being able to click him or his name. So, after forming a group with everyone who wanted to report him but couldn’t because they weren’t in Stormwind, I used HGWT to bring them to his position (and I’m sure if he was at his computer, he was confused as to why half a dozen people just teleported in on him, but I digress). Reports were made, and I went on about my business.

On one occasion, I decided to see what would happen if I were to use the old way of reporting. Choosing the “report a player” option simply gave instructions on the click-to-report procedure, but what about another method? I sent in a complaint through the original system, indicating that my numerous reports on the new system had gone unanswered, and that this player name was something that should be addressed. I received a wonderfully copy-pasted response detailing that all player reports must use the new click-to-report procedure, and no escalation option. Glorious. (Note at this time that I didn’t use any of the reporting options on Battle.net. Why? Because until the time of this writing and discussions with Rades, I forgot they even existed.)

More than a month after my initial report, Ibitanegar was still unchanged. I was absolutely baffled. I could not understand why a racial slur of this magnitude was allowed or just glossed over.

Some time later on Twitter, Blizzard posted this:

And I responded:

A few hours went by without a response, and I logged off for the day. I got up the next morning to see an update in my twitter feed, a response from Blizzard:

My jaw dropped. Are you KIDDING me? “The atmosphere on a realm is determined by its population.” My problem with this response is two-fold. In the first place, it doesn’t explain WHY they would allow a name such as this to persist, and second, does this mean they’re okay with a racial slur as a name so long as everyone else on the server is fine with it? I responded to this utter ridiculousness, only partially addressing the requirement of having to click to report:

Now, I’ve seen @BlizzardCS respond to tweets they’ve received about people having problems and questions on tickets and so on. Not once did I ever receive a follow-up from them on this for more clarification, and I’ve been grinding my teeth about this whole event since it happened. It’s been almost two months since my initial reporting, and Ibitanegar is still playing his happy little racist heart out on Azgalor-US, but I’m no longer there to continue reporting him.

This ties in neatly with the post made by Stubborn  where their letter to Blizzard about votekicking says:

“I understand your secretive punitive measures that are to “protect customer’s privacy.”  Fine.  Those of us who are actually trying to maintain some semblance of civil community are constantly frustrated by it because one job of a justice system is deterrence, which can’t happen if justice takes place in secret, but fine.  Okay.  However, when the one tool we’re given where we can see swift and cold justice happen is gimped in such a way as to make it unusable, it calls into question your own stand on bad player behavior.”

My problem with the reporting feature is the SAME THING, but on a much more potentially damaging scale. Blizzard has given us a tool in order to help “police the community,” as Stubborn indicates, but barring one tweet from @BlizzardCS which is removed from the original issue, I’ve seen no results. On top of that, it feels to me as though that the customer service department is suggesting that if I’m the only person who has reported it (I know that I’m not), then it’s not important enough for them to investigate. Maybe I’m reading too much into that, but I’m not sure what else I’m supposed to take away from “The atmosphere on a realm is determined by its population” other than a casual dismissal.

Clearly, this isn’t working. So how do we fix the system? Honestly, click-to-report is a great feature. What’s not great is that it is the ONLY way to report. You might be able to get around distance restrictions by doing some fancy target-of-target work, but if you’re reporting in Stormwind and your guildmates are in Felwood, that’s just not possible. This requires the person in Felwood to come all the way back to Stormwind to report cases like this, and why in the HELL are the ones who are following the rules the ones who have to be inconvenienced in order to police their own community? I know that Blizzard doesn’t make public how many people they have in their GM system, so I know that some of the issue has to be with the sheer ratio of reports to personnel, but there HAS to be a better way.

Changes that I think would make this system run a little better:

• More options than click-to-report, OR make it so that you can /who [name] and click to report from the /who window. Being half a world away unable to report something your friend or guildmate mentions automatically forces you into a silent majority. I know Blizzard wants us all to use their shiny system, but if part of the system is broken, responding to “it doesn’t work” with “use it anyway” is flawed.
• Reports about bad character/guild names must be treated with the same level of concern as you would over someone reporting a hate crime. It might be something that severe, anyway.
• Reports about language must be treated with a high level of concern, though honestly, I’m less worried about someone saying “fuck” where a kid might see it than I am about them being exposed to racist views. I’ve personally witnessed other players talking about the “gook delivery driver” that just brought them take-out in general chat, or that some “goddamned Jew” ripped them off in trade. Put the four-letter words (or others like them) on the back burner, and address the racism first. I’m not saying the language is any less valid a complaint, but as a personal opinion, I think racism is much more damaging to the community than a rampant swear word.
• Implement and maintain a zero tolerance policy for racism. I’m sorry, but if I were on Blizzard’s GM squad, I’d be pushing for automatic perma-bans on anyone spouting off racist remarks or offensive names. I know there’s a bottom line to consider here, but what would you prefer? Banning one racist and scaring another ten into line, or letting one racist run rampant and losing ten paying player accounts because you’re not heading this behavior off at the pass?
• More escalation options in-game. It’s too easy to forget that there are other reporting options outside of the game world (I have a pretty good memory, and *I* forgot). Also, getting an automated response from a filter-based servicebot with no way to actually talk to a human being doesn’t contribute to the betterment of the community.

In closing, I’d like to point out that I’m not some raving censor out to quell every little thing that people do wrong. If someone swears in a public channel, I’ll let it go. I swear to express frustration or disbelief, and I’m not about to tell someone they can’t get a word in for emphasis if they really need to. However, if they’re on a major rant-bender where every other word requires an eye-covering of any nearby child, then I warrant it necessary to report it.

But this isn’t the 1800s anymore. It’s not even the 1900s. Any racism, even casual racism, confuses and upsets me a great deal. I just can’t wrap my brain around a blanket hatred of a group of people because of the color of their skin or a stereotype. Beyond that, though, I think what I’m shocked at most was how this whole situation was handled. Not once was I contacted for further information; not from in-game chat, not from in-game mail, not from @BlizzardCS after a half-hearted “show some server solidarity – power to the people” response. After two months, it makes me feel like my concerns for keeping up a good community were just swept under the rug.

Sweeeeeeeeeeet.

I’ll get some numbers in here as soon as I can.

Heroic Strike: Now does 100% (was 160%) weapon damage plus 498 (was 796.8) (140% (was 224%) plus 697 (was 1116) if a one-handed weapon is equipped).

Okay, so it’s still a 30 rage ability, and back down to being an ability that’s more or less useless without Incite. But here’s the part that really bakes my noodle.

Slam: Now does 225% weapon damage plus 2101.5, up from 150% weapon damage plus 1401.

Then why in the HELL would I EVER use Heroic Strike again? Not even as a rage bleed! Even with critical strikes doing 200% damage, Heroic Strike STILL puts out less damage. Sure, if your Heroic Strike crits, Incite guarantees the next one to be a crit, but why would I even bother? A standard Slam already does more damage for the same rage!

Essentially, we’re back to where we are now in Cataclysm. Heroic Strike will be even more of a waste of space on your ability bar if this particular change makes it to the final release. Not that I’m complaining (I really hate Heroic Strike anyway – always have), but why have all of these special talents and abilities tied to a spec that won’t ever use it?

It’s just like the current T13 2-piece bonus. Not only is it NOT a passive ability like most other classes, but in order to be effective, it requires Incite and a boatload of rage you’re usually better off using for something else. Don’t get me wrong, there are a couple fights in Dragon Soul right now where the amount of damage you take keeps your rage pretty high, and for that it’s Heroic Strike heaven. But the majority of the time, you’re burning more rage than you should if you use it, and you get a better return out of Slam, even with the .5 sec cast time.

It’s haphazard changes like this that make me fear for the future of Warriors, not just Arms. If Blizzard returns us to the state we were in back in Wrath, I don’t know what I’m going to do.

• Battle Shout: Now grants 10% increased attack power, not Strength and Agility. Now also generates 20 rage.  Not altogether a surprising change. I’d expected Battle Shout to go to a raw attack power number for Cataclysm, and it didn’t.
• Battle Stance: Now increases damage done by 10%.  So we’re gaining an overall buff here, essentially getting the Berserker Stance values, since Berserker is getting something else entirely. I like this one – a 5% damage reduction was a very disappointing “bonus” for losing 5% damage output.
• Berserker Rage: Duration reduced to 6 sec, down from 10 sec. No longer grants extra rage generation from taking damage.  Also not a surprising change. I’ve never used Berserker Rage outside of a fear break, so I have no complaints here.
• Berserker Stance: Increases damage done by Whirlwind and Cleave by 20%. Doesn’t affect us at all. Fury Warriors might cry havoc a bit with this one, but maybe not. It seems like one of their major abilities is getting a massive boost.
• Bladestorm: Renamed from Whirlwind. You become a whirling storm of destructive force, striking all nearby targets with your main hand weapon for 75% weapon damage. Also does 75% weapon damage for off-hand. This one I’m not too clear on. Has Bladestorm, then, been removed from our talent list? According to the WoW site it’s still a level 60 talent option, but maybe they’re just behind on an update.
• Charge: No longer requires Battle Stance. Cooldown increased to 20 sec, up from 15. Now can be used in combat and generates 20 rage, up from 15. Also an expected change, with the complete restructuring of talents. A lot of the old Arms talents are getting rolled in here, and the increased rage generation will be very helpful. Not too sure how happy I am about the increase in cooldown time, but I suspect I’ll be picking up the 12-second cooldown talent anyway, as it’s the best PVE option, unless they decide to make it so that we can charge at very close range. Time will tell.
• Cleave: Now has a 1.5 sec cooldown, down from 3 sec. Now does 75% weapon damage. This isn’t a big contender for Arms damage, so I’m not terribly disappointed by this. Sweeping Strikes and Cleave is always handy for AoE fights you don’t have a Bladestorm ready for, but it’s still low damage by comparison. This makes me wonder how baseline rage generation will function, because a lot of our abilities are getting rage cost increases.
• Commanding Shout: Now increases Stamina by 10%. Percentages seem to be the flavor of the expansion. Works for me.
• Deep Wounds: New. Your Mortal Strike, Bloodthirst and Devastate cause the target to bleed for 1090 over 15 sec. The loss of Rend as an ability forced this one a bit. It’s good that every spec is getting something out of it, and for Arms, the cooldown on Mortal Strike will keep this rolling pretty constantly. I’m pretty sure the damage values given here will scale with level… otherwise this might be a bit disappointing.
• Demoralizing Banner: New. Throw down a war banner that decreases the damage dealt by all enemies within 30 yards of the banner by 10%. You can Intervene to your war banner. Lasts 15 sec. 30 yd range, 3 min cooldown, Instant cast. The banner seems like an interesting mechanic. Healers need some help keeping melee alive during a close blast? Throw this baby down. Being able to intervene to it… I guess it’s a handy way to be able to leapfrog into battle faster? Heroic Leap -> Banner -> Intervene -> Charge or some variation thereof? Hmm.
• Disarm: No longer requires Defensive Stance. No longer costs rage. No longer disarms the ranged weapon. My god, it’s about time. Not being able to disarm ranged weapons kiiiiiiiinda tilts a PVP battle in favor of hunters, but every hunter I talk to tells me that Arms Warriors are their bane, so I dunno. I haven’t done a lot of serious PVP lately.
• Enrage: Critical strikes with special abilities and critical blocks Enrage you, increasing the rage you generate from normal melee attacks by 25% for 6 sec. I have a sneaking suspicion that this is where a lot of our rage generation is going to come from, but let’s face it, 6 seconds is NOT a lot of time! At best, you’ll get two normal swings during the duration unless you’ve got some serious crit value and can chain a few of these in a row. I’ll have to reserve judgment for testing.
• Execute: Now costs 30 rage. No longer has a stance requirement. No longer consumes additional rage to do more damage. Probably a wise move. They’re looking to streamline rotations/priorities for all classes, and waiting until you’ve got lots of bonus rage for an Execute was always a little iffy. 30 rage baseline puts this on the same level as many of our other standard abilities, and it makes me concerned about whether Execute will remain the beneficial attack at the Execute phase. I’m sure that it will be, of course, otherwise this would be a really stupid change.
  
• Hamstring: No longer has a stance requirement. Keen.
• Heroic Strike: Now has a 1.5 sec cooldown, down from 3 sec. Now deals 160% weapon damage plus 796.8 (224% plus 1116 if a one-handed weapon is equipped). This is part of an effort to get us to use Heroic Strike more often, I think. It really was a poor ability for Arms even through Cataclysm (Slam did more base damage despite the meager critical chance boost, and the only real value from Heroic Strike came from Incite), and it’s never been a popular attack for bleeding off extra rage in my book. You’ll see what I mean a little later.
• Heroic Throw: Now has a 30 sec cooldown, down from 1 min. Now does 50% weapon damage and no longer causes high threat. Didn’t really find myself using this in combat either, except as a lead-in to a Charge most times.
• Incite: Reworked: Your Heroic Strike criticals cause the next Heroic Strike to also be a critical. These guaranteed criticals cannot re-trigger the Incite effect. This is now a passive baseline ability, once again an effort to make Heroic Strike more “regular.”
• Intervene: No longer has a stance requirement or rage cost. Now only takes the next hit while the target remains within 10 yards. So now Arms Warriors can try to save a healer in a pinch. Where am I going to find a place to put the damn ability?
• Intimidating Shout: No longer has a rage cost. Now has a 1 min cooldown, down from 2 min. This has some very interesting PVP implications.
• Mocking Banner: New. Throw down a war banner that forces all enemies within 15 yards of the banner to focus attacks on the warrior for 6 sec. Lasts 30 sec. You can Intervene to your war banner. 30 yd range, 3 min cooldown, Instant cast. More of a Protection ability, obviously, but could be handy for kiting. Heroic Leap and some rocket boots, perhaps?
• Pummel: Now has a 15 sec cooldown, up from 10 sec. No longer has a rage cost. We’ve traditionally had one of the longest cooldowns on any of our interrupt abilities, and this has always bothered me a little. Now we’re increasing a cooldown on a rarely-used PVE ability, and a crucial PVP ability? We’ve gone from being good to have around in an Arena to the red-headed stepchild of PVP. Interestingly enough, we’re now actually really useful in PVE, where up through Wrath, you could get more DPS by swinging a dead cat in the direction of your monitor.
• Shattering Throw: No longer has a stance requirement and no longer does damage based on attack power. Um..  okay.
• Skull Banner: New. Throw down a war banner that increases the critical chance of party or raid members within 30 yards of the banner by 30%. Lasts 10 sec. You can Intervene to your war banner. 30 yd range, 3 min cooldown, Instant cast. I like this one, obviously. 10 seconds of 30% bonus crit? Really good for heavy healing needs or a point where you need more burst on a boss. I’m still reserving judgment on how I feel about these banners, though. I need to use them a while. Where’s my beta access, Blizzard?  /shakefist
• Spell Reflection: No longer has a stance requirement or rage cost. …Huh. Guess I’ll have more reason to carry a shield around, unless they remove that requirement from the ability. I’d have less of a problem using something like this consistently if it didn’t turn my spec into such a gimmick. “Oh, hey, I can spell reflect, but I’ve got to trigger three whole global cooldowns to make the switch, use the ability, and then make the switch back to a weapon that actually does damage!” Call me selfish if you want, but it seems like this is just lazy design.
• Sunder Armor: No longer causes a large amount of threat. Yeah, didn’t really use this a lot anyway. I raid with Rogues and Druids.
• Taunt: No longer has a stance requirement. Hmm. This will be nice, actually. No more stance changes for fights with mechanics like Beth’tilac.
• Thunder Clap: No longer has a stance requirement. Now reduces target’s physical damage done by 10%, down from 20%. Damage no longer increased by attack power. This one becomes our AoE bread and butter, I think. You’ll see why a little bit further down.

So overall, we’ve got some really good changes, I think. Some things are a little confusing (the cooldown extension on Pummel, for instance), and a lot of things look like they’ve really got some potential. So let’s look at the stuff that’s going to be just for us Arms types.

• Blood and Thunder: Your Thunder Clap now also applies Deep Wounds. This is why Thunder Clap becomes our bread and butter ability. Stomp, make everything bleed, then go to town.
• Colossus Smash: No longer has a stance requirement. Now costs 30 rage, up from 20. Smashes a target for 175% weapon damage plus 221 and weakens their defenses, allowing your attacks to entirely bypass 100% of their armor for 6 sec, and causes the Physical Vulnerability effect on the target. Bypasses less armor on players. Weakens the constitution of an enemy target, increasing their physical damage taken by 4% for 30 sec.  The rage cost increase is something we’re going to see a lot of, and I hope that the changes to rage generation are really going to be able to balance it out. There are a couple things that will help – one that we’ve already seen (Enrage), and one that’s coming up a little further down the list.
• Die by the Sword: New. Increases your parry chance by 100% and reduces damage taken by 20% for 5 sec. 2 min cooldown.  I suspect this is what Retaliation is becoming, if it hasn’t already. Good potential in both PVP and PVE, I think.
• Mortal Strike: Now generates 10 rage. Now has a 6 sec cooldown, up from 4.5 sec. A vicious strike that deals 125% weapon damage plus 1282 and causes Mortal Wounds on the target.  The idea of Mortal Strike being a rage generator is just WEIRD to me. Don’t get me wrong – I like it. I have a feeling we’ll need the generation. The extended cooldown sucks a little bit, though, and it feels like they’re trying to give us more GCDs in between abilities (probably to use more Heroic Strike).
• Overpower: No longer has a stance requirement or rage cost. Now does 140% weapon damage, up from 125%.  These rage-free abilities are very interesting, especially something as explosive as Overpower, and especially for its synergy with Taste for Blood coming up a little further down.
• Seasoned Soldier: While wielding a two-handed melee weapon, your Physical damage dealt is increased by 20%, up from 12%.  This has been long overdue in returning. This actually gives us a respectable chance to keep up with most other DPS classes. Right now, we’re HEAVILY outdistanced by Rogues and Hunters and most casters who make more use of huge haste benefits from buffs like Heroism/Bloodlust.
• Slam: Now costs 30 rage, up from 15. Now is instant cast, down from 1.5 sec. Now does 150% weapon damage, up from 145%.  Hallelujah. No more “cast time” on an ability that should never have had it in the first place. The increase in rage cost makes this automatically inferior to Heroic Strike going forward, however, and if they’re both at 30 rage each, unless our rage generation is HUGE, I just don’t see using Slam all that often anymore. Again, this is one of those things that I need to be able to TEST.
• Sudden Death: No longer allows you to keep 10 rage after using Execute.  I’ll miss that part of the ability, but at least it still allows Mortal Strike to reset the cooldown on Colossus Smash.
• Sweeping Strikes: No longer has a stance requirement. Erm…  yay?
• Taste for Blood: You have a 100% chance for Mortal Strike to enable the use of Overpower, and a 30% chance for Overpower to enable the use of an additional Overpower.  If this is actually operating as it reads, this could provide some interesting burst, and also explains why the rage cost was removed from Overpower. I like the fact that they’ve finally tied these two spec-defining abilities together, and I think it’s got some good potential for some serious damage output. I can’t wait.

As you can see, there’s a lot of neat stuff going on here! The changes to Mortal Strike, Slam, Heroic Strike, and Overpower are absolutely key to making Arms work going forward. Now that Rend is gone and Mortal Strike and Overpower are synergistic, the original Cataclysm priority makes a few changes based on exceptions. The current priority is as follows:

(Rend->)Colossus Smash->Overpower->Mortal Strike->Slam(Heroic Strike>70 rage)

The changes to the abilities, however, make for some interesting possibilities between Overpower and Mortal Strike:

Colossus Smash->Mortal Strike(Overpower)->
Overpower(Mortal Strike)->?(Slam/Heroic Strike>70 rage)

This, of course, means that so long as you have Overpower continuing to activate new Overpowers, you’d utilize it over any other ability.  Zero rage cost for big damage? You betcha. When it stops triggering new Overpower usages, you go back to Mortal Strike. What I’m not so sure about is the last part of that priority. Heroic Strike and Slam will both have the same rage cost in Mists, and a 1.5 second cooldown is just a GCD. Why would we even use Slam anymore? Does this mean Slam becomes the rage bleeder when you’re above 70 rage, or is Heroic Strike still off the GCD and would it allow you to use both at once?

I sorely need to test this. Blizzard, where is my beta invite?

First I tried the purple Judgment recolor. A little out of place for a Warrior, and skirts never were really Lelissa’s thing, but what the hell. Destiny is purple, the purple Judgment recolor is purple, it seemed like a good idea.

It was alright, but not really good enough. Not only that, every other plate wearer, from Death Knights to Paladins to other Warriors had a set of this stuff and was running around with it. Then I remembered something from the early days before Burning Crusade.

Soulforge.

Soulforge was perfect! It matched the colors all but exactly, and is a great looking set to boot. Fortunately, with the reintroduction of Darkmoon Faire, it’s also really easy to get if you’re willing to burn a few tickets on some armor pieces. Fortunately, you only need the chest, shoulders, gloves, legs, boots, and belt for a really good look. The helm is good if you’re going for that “warrior nun” sort of vibe, but Lelissa is anything but pure, so that’s not happening.

Finally, the poster.

I’ve been seeing variations of the original poster here and there on the internet, and I figured it was high time I made my own.

Finally, the announcements started trickling in for new abilities and talent changes. Abilities were nerfed in unusual ways to make room for damage buffs (Mortal Strike comes to mind). Talent trees were changed entirely (looking at you, Blood). Arms got the Million Dollar Man treatment, providing a major boost to utility and damage output.

In short, Cataclysm is a good time to be an Arms Warrior.

But how do you decide what race will work best for you? If you’re like me, it comes down to an aesthetic decision and whether or not the race fits the character (insert LOLRP joke here). However, if you’re more analytical about your approach, and you want to eke out every last available bit of potential based on your race, here’s a list of races (in alphabetical order), their abilities, and what my grade is for Arms PVE (group content, like raids or dungeons), PVP, and RP potential in terms of these abilities.

Blood Elf

Blood Elves are new to the Warrior scene in Cataclysm now that they’re no longer dependent on fel energies to survive. Like a recovering crack addict begins to regain strength and health, so too did the Blood Elves regain much of their physical strength by kicking their habit. Good for them. Blood Elves have three racial abilities:

• Arcane Torrent: Silence all enemies within 8 yards for 2 seconds. Gain 15 Energy, 15 Runic Power, 15 Rage, 15 Focus, or 6% Mana. Two minute cooldown.
• Arcane Affinity: 10 point skill bonus to Enchanting.
• Arcane Resistance: Gain 1 point of Arcane Resistance per level (85 at level 85 – isn’t math fun?)

Honestly, these abilities are pretty terrible. Arcane Affinity is only great if you’re an enchanter, Arcane Resistance is situational, and Arcane Torrent functions as a lesser Battle/Commanding Shout to an extent. They’re far more PVP focused than anything, but even then, not by much.

• PVE Grade:   D
• PVP Grade:  C+
• RP Grade: F

Draenei

Draenei are the largest Alliance race, and interestingly versatile through their abilities. Some of them aren’t as great as they could be, though in one particular case, all we’re waiting for is the 4.0.6 patch in order to make it better. Lelissa, my Warrior, is 100% pure Draenei, and I couldn’t imagine myself playing another race for a Warrior. That’s a personal opinion, though. Draenei have four racial abilities:

• Gift of the Naaru: A heal-over-time effect that lasts 15 seconds. The amount of healing is adjusted by the Draenei’s attack power or spell power, whichever is higher. Three minute cooldown. (Expected to get a buff in 4.0.6 to be more useful at 85.)
• Heroic Presence: Increases the Draenei’s chance to hit with spells and attacks by 1%.
• Gemcutting: 5 point skill bonus to Jewelcrafting.
• Shadow Resistance: Gain 1 point of Shadow Resistance per level (85 at level 85).

Heroic Presence makes for a fantastic PVE and PVP ability, because any hit you don’t have to account for in your gear can easily be converted to something else you need, like crit, mastery, or expertise. Gift of the Naaru is pretty terrible right now, but as mentioned above, will be receiving a significant boost in the upcoming patch in order to make it very worthwhile. Still, it remains a heal-over-time, which, while every heal counts, makes it not so effective in PVP. In PVE, the ability is more effective, but finds its niche during downtime between pulls. Gemcutting is nice if you’re a Jewelcrafter (and I was, for a while), but the gems you can get through gemcutting aren’t going to be that much better than epic gems, so the rewards are awfully ‘meh.’ Lots of enemies, both PC and NPC, seem to be using shadow damage/abilities this time around, so Shadow Resistance is worth a little more than you might expect.

• PVE Grade: A+
• PVP Grade:  B-
• RP Grade: D (Gift of the Naaru is about the only thing with a visible RP effect.)

Dwarf

Dwarves are an interesting anomaly. They have some of the best Alliance PVP and PVE racial abilities, but seem to be the rarest race. In all my dealings, Dwarves are few and far between, almost the red-headed stepchild of all races. Admittedly, they’re not terribly attractive (which is often a sticking point for many players), and they’re short (which is the reason why I just can’t play one – it gives me vertigo). Dwarves have five racial abilities:

• Stoneform: Removes poison, disease, and bleed effects. Also grants +10% additional armor. Lasts 8 seconds, with a 2 minute cooldown.
• Gun Specialization: Increases crit chance with guns by 1%.
• Mace Specialization: Increases expertise with all maces by 3.
• Frost Resistance: Gain 1 point of Frost Resistance per level (85 at level 85).
• Explorer: 15 point skill bonus to Archaeology, and faster surveying.

Stoneform is a phenomenal PVP ability against Rogues, Death Knights, Shadow Priests, Druids, and other Warriors. It also tends to hold its own in PVE, since many boss fights in the past had diseases and poisons flying in every direction, and one less person to cleanse makes the healers’ jobs easier. Gun Specialization is especially useless here, but Mace Specialization is very good, at least lowering the limit for Dwarves using maces to 23 rather than 26. On the other hand, it does pigeonhole you into a specific weapon type if you’re going to do it that way, although for PVP, a mace makes a good choice. Frost Resistance is another good one for PVP, countering Frost Mages and Death Knights. Explorer is good for the potential of finding that damned Zin’Rokh (no, I still don’t have mine either…  /rude Troll Artifacts), but other than faster surveying meaning you can get out of dig sites quicker, it’s pretty much fluff otherwise.

• PVE Grade: B+
• PVP Grade: A-
• RP Grade: A- (is for Archaeology!)

Forsaken

Every game always has at least one race that fell from grace, and the Forsaken are the original bad boys. The Forsaken are former humans of Lordaeron, now cursed to undeath and eager to spread that curse to everyone else. Why the Horde hasn’t slaughtered them all en masse is beyond me, but hey, maybe now that Thrall isn’t running the show, Garrosh will wise up and wipe them out. Our Forsaken friends have four racial abilities:

• Will of the Forsaken: Remove any charm, fear, and sleep effect.
• Cannibalize: Regenerates 7% of total health and mana every 2 seconds for 10 seconds.
• Underwater Breathing: Underwater breath lasts 233% longer than normal.
• Shadow Resistance: Gain 1 point of Shadow Resistance per level (85 at level 85).

Will of the Forsaken has great use in PVP, though PVE uses are fairly limited. Granted, as a Warrior, having a second way to break fear on a boss fight is handy, but you’ll find that you won’t need to use one that often anyway. Cannibalize has no use unless it’s following a fight, and Underwater Breathing would only work if you’re fighting a boss underwater… but I’d bet there would be some kind of mechanic that allowed you to breathe normally anyway. Like Draenei, Forsaken have Shadow Resistance, and it’s more valuable than you might otherwise expect.

• PVE Grade: C
• PVP Grade: B+
• RP Grade: C

Gnome

Gnomes are the butt of just about every joke that exists on the Alliance faction, and probably 90% of every Horde joke, too. They’re often given short shrift, thought little of, overlooked, underpaid, mistaken for footballs, furniture and/or children, underfoot, snack-sized, miniaturized, low on the totem pole, teeny, tiny, and short fused.

However, that also makes them underestimated; they’re not taken very seriously, and that opens up some fun windows for RP purposes.

Gnomes have five racial abilities:

• Escape Artist: Escapes the effect of any immobilization or movement speed reduction. Instant cast, 105 second cooldown.
• Expansive Mind: Increased Mana Pool.
• Arcane Resistance: Same as the Blood Elves.
• Engineering Specialist: 15 point skill bonus to Engineering.
• Shortblade (ha-ha) Specialization: Expertise with daggers and one-handed swords increased by 3.

Escape Artist is moderately good for PVP, because it’s kind of a one-off, and it doesn’t provide immunity for a short duration afterward like Hand of Freedom would. Expansive Mind is utterly useless, Arcane Resistance only slightly less so, though Engineering Specialization is pretty keen (hats are good things!). Shortblade Specialization, while a hilarious stealth pun, is crap. And if I find any of you up-and-coming Arms Warriors dual-wielding one-handed weapons, we’re gonna have a chat before I take your Arms Card away.

• PVE Grade: C
• PVP Grade:  B-
• RP Grade:  C (Escape Artist could be used as an excuse for escaping ropes or cuffs.)

Goblin

Great monkey Jesus, did Goblins ever get the pick of racial abilities for all of the categories. These green-skinned dynamos have been blessed with some of the most useful abilities for PVE, PVP, and RP that I’ve ever seen. Goblins have six racial abilities:

• Rocket Jump: Activate your rocket belt to jump forward. Two minute cooldown, shared with…
• Rocket Barrage: Launches belt rockets into your enemy, dealing an amount of fire damage equal to a very convoluted equation. I’m not a math professor, so it’s a little beyond me. Two minute cooldown, shared with Rocket Jump.
• Time is Money: 1% faster attacking speed.
• Best Deals Anywhere: Get the best discount regardless of faction (that’s 20%, folks).
• Pack Hobgoblin: Bank access from anywhere for 1 minute. 30 minute cooldown.
• Better Living Through Chemistry: 15 point skill bonus to Alchemy, and your potions (healing and mana) are granted a 25% bonus to their effect.

Man, where do I start? Rocket Barrage is a great PVE and PVP ability, where you’ll find that you could use a quick boost to your damage output. Now that Slam is affected by haste, Time is Money is a nice boost to lowering Slam’s cast time, and Better Living Through Chemistry just increases your survivability. Best Deals Anywhere means you can buy raw materials at a discount no matter where you go or who you deal with, so that’s a boost for PVE, PVP, and RP all around. The Pack Hobgoblin is a handy bit of RP flavor, but has its own uses for PVE as well (when would you have time to use it in PVP?).

• PVE Grade: A+
• PVP Grade: A
• RP Grade: A+ (Seriously, a personal banker that isn’t Jeeves?  Win.)

Human

Ah, the old standby. Humans are jacks of all trades, masters of none. In comparison to other races, they are brash and hotheaded, quick to fight, forgive, and forget. They can aspire to greatness and power beyond their wildest dreams, or they can live in anonymity, content to be unknown to the powers that roam the world. They represent the best and worst that any race has to offer. Why? In an RP sense, they’re the easiest to roleplay, because they are what we are. We cannot possibly know what it is like to see the turning of millennia. We’ll never know what it’s like to have the wisdom of eons like the Night Elves, Blood Elves, or Draenei. We’ll never know what it is to be in tune with nature such as a Druid or Shaman. We can guess, sure, and that’s part of the fun. But when it comes down to knowing your role? Humans are where it’s at. Unfortunately, while they do get some useful PVE and PVP racials, their roleplay racials are few. Humans have five abilities:

• Every Man for Himself: Removes all movement impairing effects and all effects which cause the loss of control of your character. Two minute cooldown, shared with other similar effects.
• Diplomacy: Reputation gains increased by 10%.
• The Human Spirit: Spirit increased by 3%.
• Mace Specialization: Expertise increased by 3 when using maces.
• Sword Specialization: Expertise increased by 3 when using swords.

Mace and Sword Specialization are pretty much the high point of PVE, when it comes to encounters, and certainly doesn’t hurt the PVP arena. Humans are more flexible than Dwarves for their weapon choices, so there are great opportunities there. Outside of encounters, Diplomacy allows you to obtain reputation rewards faster, which is eminently useful for PVE. Spirit does nothing for us, so that’s a wasted ability for Warriors. Every Man for Himself, however, is incredible – it’s a PVP trinket without having to take up a trinket slot, allowing for other trinkets to be used in its place.

• PVE Grade: B-
• PVP Grade: A-
• RP Grade: F

Night Elf

Night Elves. Purple, pointy-eared, and probably perpetually prosaic (isn’t alliteration fun?). At least I’ve always thought so. When World of Warcraft was initially released, Night Elves were a dime a dozen. You couldn’t turn a corner anywhere without running into at least five milling around. Nowadays, the races are split a little better, and you don’t find a Night Elf Convention every time you land in Ironforge. Night Elves have five racial abilities:

• Shadowmeld: Slip into the shadows, reducing your enemies’ chance to detect you. Lasts until cancelled or until you move. 2 minute cooldown.
• Quickness: Reduces the chance that melee and ranged attackers will hit you by 2%.
• Wisp Spirit: Transform into a wisp upon death, increasing your speed by 75%.
• Elusiveness: Reduces the chance enemies have to detect you while Shadowmelded.
• Nature Resistance: Gain 1 point of Nature Resistance per level (85 at level 85).

Given the number of Nature-damage bosses out there right now, that Nature Resistance is going to come in handy. Shadowmeld isn’t as useful in raids as it sounds, since you don’t want to be the survivor who can’t rez anyone, and that renders Elusiveness pretty useless. On the PVP side, though, it could work, maybe, and I’m sure it has its RP uses. Quickness is good in PVP, but not as great in PVE unless you’re a tank. Wisp Spirit is the most pointless racial I can even imagine. You can get to your corpse faster. Isn’t that great?

• PVE Grade: C
• PVP Grade: B-
• RP Grade: B-

Orc

I’ll probably get roasted alive for saying this, but Orcs are essentially green-skinned Humans for the Horde. They represent the potential of the Horde much as the Humans do for the Alliance, and in many ways are a mirror of the race they’ve been at war with since the original Warcraft RTS game. Like Humans, Orcs also have four racial abilities:

• Blood Fury: Activate to increase Attack Power for 15 seconds. 2 minute cooldown.
• Hardiness: Reduce duration of stun effects by 15%.
• Command: Damage done by pets increased by 5%.
• Axe Specialization: Expertise with Fist Weapons, One and Two Handed Axes increased by 3.

Blood Fury makes PVE pretty easy, essentially being a free DPS trinket. Axe Specialization functions well for both PVE and PVP, and Hardiness contributes greatly to both areas as well – not being stunned for as much time means you can get back in to the fight quicker. Command… well, we’re not a pet class, so that goes in the circular file.

• PVE Grade: B+
• PVP Grade: A-
• RP Grade: C (Blood Fury makes angry orcs look angry.)

Tauren

Ah, Tauren. Noble. In tune with nature. Immovable (ha ha, I kill myself). Known among Alliance players as Steaks on Legs or Meals on Wheels, thanks to motorcycles and goblin mounts, Tauren are the largest race to roam Azeroth in terms of bulk (Trolls are actually taller, go figure). Tauren have four racial abilities, plus one (sort of) hidden one:

• War Stomp: Stun five opponents within 8 yards for 2 seconds. Two minute cooldown.
• Endurance: Base health increased by 5%.
• Cultivation: 15 point skill bonus to herbalism, and you can pick flowers faster.
• Nature Resistance: Same as Night Elves.
• Really Long Arms (special!): Extended reach (1yd) with melee weapons.

War Stomp is pretty handy in both PVE and PVP, given the amount of crowd control that’s necessary, and any healer wouldn’t mind a bit of a breather at times. Endurance sounds great at first glance, but the reality is that you’re looking at a boost to base health, and not overall health. At level 85, and I’m guessing here, I’d say it’s maybe 4 or 5k health, tops. Nature Resistance goes back into the “good” category, with Cultivation being more aesthetic than anything. The last one is the “hidden” ability I was talking about above – since Vanilla, and I haven’t seen anything that changed it, Tauren have always had extended reach with melee weapons. It made Tauren Warriors in PVP pretty fearsome, since a really good one could stay at maximum melee range (for them) and kill you while you couldn’t do anything.

• PVE Grade: A
• PVP Grade: A
• RP Grade: C

Troll

Trolls are the most widespread race in Azeroth, and if all the lore and theories are true, they’re the ancestors of the Night Elves, Blood Elves, Naga, and Satyr. You can find them on multiple continents, in nearly every location, and in more dungeons than you’d care to count. They’d probably be even more widespread, but an old practice of cannibalism kept the population down. Trolls have six racial abilities:

• Berserking: Activate to increase attack and casting speed by 20% for 10 seconds.
• Regeneration: Increase health regeneration bonus by 10%; also allows 10% of normal health regeneration during combat.
• Beast Slaying: 5% damage bonus when fighting beasts.
• Throwing Specialization: 1% increased crit chance with throwing weapons.
• Bow Specialization: 1% increased crit chance with bows.
• Da Voodoo Shuffle: Reduces duration of movement impairing effects by 15%.

Unfortunately, the majority of Troll racials aren’t great for PVE. Berserking is okay for solo play, though not necessarily raids. That burst of haste isn’t really that appreciable in terms of DPS, especially with a long cooldown and that short duration time. Regeneration is another ability which has higher value in solo play. Beast slaying could be great if enough raid bosses are actually beasts, but unless I miss my guess, they’re classified as “Boss” to prevent anything like this from happening. Throwing and Bow Specializations are useless for Arms, and Da Voodoo Shuffle could be useful in PVE if more bosses had more movement impairing effects, but we’ll slot that as a PVP ability.

• PVE Grade: D-
• PVP Grade: C+
• RP Grade: D

Worgen

Those funny, furry Gilneans. Shut themselves behind a wall, then found themselves cursed with the Worgen form, and a madness that was difficult to control. The moral of the story? Isolationism is never a good policy. Anyway, the Worgen have six racial abilities:

• Darkflight: Increase movement speed by 40% for 10 seconds.
• Viciousness: Increase critical strike chance by 1%.
• Aberration: Increase Shadow and Nature Resistance by .75 per level (64 at level 85).
• Flayer: Skinning skill increased by 15 and increases skinning speed.
• Two Forms: Switch to your currently inactive form.
• Running Wild: Drop to all fours and run. Serves as the Worgen racial mount.

Worgen get a nice little hodgepodge of abilities. Darkflight is handy for getting out of a sticky situation, though the long cooldown means you might not get that much use out of it in boss fights. Viciousness is good, though critical strike isn’t as valuable in Cataclysm as it has been in previous expansions. Aberration gives a nice mix of resistances, and while I haven’t seen anything dealing Nature damage yet, rumor has it that we’ll probably end up fighting Fandral Staghelm, and Druids are all about Nature damage. Finally, Flayer, Two Forms, and Running Wild are more valuable tools for RP than anything else, and have no effect on your damage output or survival.

• PVE Grade: B+
• PVP Grade: B+
• RP Grade: A

The Wrap-Up

So which races are the best for Arms? Depending on the arena you choose to play in the most, it varies, so I’ll choose the best two for each faction and for each area.

• Alliance PVE: Draenei, Worgen
• Alliance PVP: Dwarf, Human
• Alliance RP: Worgen, Dwarf

• Horde PVE: Goblin, Tauren
• Horde PVP: Goblin, Tauren
• Horde RP: Goblin, 3-way tie between Forsaken, Tauren, and Orc.

The Alliance is fairly well balanced, with 4 of 6 races represented across all categories. On the Horde side, Goblin hax take the cake (that’s why it’s a lie – thieving Goblins…) for all three categories, with Tauren coming up roses as a backup.

Now, before anyone turns on the burners to start flaming, I’d like to reiterate that these grades are all based upon my perception of each race’s abilities and their uses in each area. Your values might be entirely different, but if you weren’t sure before, at the very least you have a baseline to go by.

The bottom line, really? Play what you want. Unless you’re the kind of player who is playing the game to exploit every advantage, no matter how miniscule, then forcing yourself to play a race that you can’t associate with somehow will only make you miserable.

So pick a race, and get ready! New leveling guides coming up!

Our ventures into Outland were no different. There, the flavor of the day was crowd control, and lots of it. Without a mage or hunter in most groups, many early heroics were daunting, if not outright impossible. The sheer amount of incoming damage, coupled with large numbers of enemies with ranged or magic attacks made for a high-risk situation.

Believe it or not, it was fun.

The Game Changed

Wrath changed all that. The developers felt (and rightly so, I should add) that all players should have access to content, that creating all of these dungeons and raids and fantastic fights that only a small percentage of the player base might ever see was a silly idea. In an effort to correct this, they made things a little easier to make it more accessible. Unfortunately, “a little easier” in this case meant “too easy,” and groups and guilds were steamrolling through heroics at an alarming rate, and entering the fabled Naxxramas within weeks of Wrath’s release, picking up full sets of tier gear and other toys that made those heroics even easier. Trash fights became AOE-fests, and the only time anyone ever fell to their opponents would be if the tank wasn’t buff enough, or the healer wasn’t up to snuff. Damage meters were king, and A’dal help you if you were below the tank (blasphemy!) or just too low according to someone else’s standards. Arms fell off greatly in value and output, overshadowed by other plate DPS classes.

The World Shattered

Today, the Cataclysm has reached Azeroth, and the dungeon models are returning to the old ways. Gone are the days of the early AOE-fests of Wrath, and returned to us once again are pulls where careful crowd control, steady pacing, and communication are the flavors of the day. Mages, Warlocks, Hunters, Paladins and Druids are more valuable than ever for DPS slots for the crowd control potential that they bring to the table. But where does that leave Warriors? The tank slot?

Hardly. Those of you who know me best know that I will never pick up a shield unless the situation warrants that I have no other option. (That said, yes, I have had to tank in an emergency several times already this expansion. It’s not as bad as it sounds, but I’m still a mite squishy.) However, Arms is not without its abilities to help keep damage to a minimum.

The Warrior’s Arsenal

Pummel

Need to interrupt a spell? In close range, Pummel is your friend.

Throwdown

A talented ability that I think no Arms Warrior should ever be without, Throwdown is exactly what it sounds like – knock your opponent on their ass, and they’re stunned for X seconds while they recover. I’ve used this particular ability to great effect when shadow priests use mind control in instances – once it breaks, the target typically rushes straight for the priest to deliver a major beatdown. Throwdown keeps it in place long enough for a tank to generate some threat.

Heroic Leap/Charge

I pair these two because they make an excellent combo. Enemy casting a spell while Pummel/Throwdown is on cooldown? Need more rage in the middle of an intense fight? Use Heroic Leap to hurl yourself away from the group, mouse-turn in mid-air, and use Charge to rush right back in. Leaping away from the group does sound counter-intuitive, after all, the ability itself DOES do damage. However, two things make it more valuable as a defensive tool in PVE, in my opinion. The first is that it’s rage-free, so you’re not spending vital damage-dealing resources on something that’s arguably trivial. The second is that Heroic Leap no longer has its stun/interrupt component. On the one hand, it sucks that Heroic Leap has lost some of its oomph, but honestly, Arms (and Fury) needed an escape ability that didn’t require a stance switch anyway.

Mortal Strike

Though it doesn’t reduce healing as much as it used to, Mortal Strike is the defining ability for Arms. The real benefit is no longer the healing debuff, but when talented appropriately, the additional damage granted to Mortal Strike, Overpower, Slam, and Execute makes this ability a gold mine for damage output.

So What? What Does Arms Need to Do?

Get used to playing defensively. Get used to switching targets on the fly, or using focus macros. Communicate with your team, especially if you’re in a PUG for those heroics. Perfect your priority until your fingers bleed, then keep working at it. Arms Warriors are in a very good place right now; better than we ever have been.

Make an impact. Arms is “in.”

Her view was obscured slightly as Siegadormi angled away from the city for a few moments, turning toward the massive floating city’s landing space. Lelissa curled her lip distastefully at the required delay – the Violet Eye greatly disliked having large, winged mounts in the city streets – but counted it far less important than her other obstacles. At the very least, Siegadormi would be able to speak with others of her kind at the landing zone. Then she would be free to do what she wished.

“Siegadormi, I wanted to thank you,” Lelissa called out over the rushing wind. “You have been a wonderful friend and ally over these months.”

“It is the least I could do, Lelissa, for one who has served the cause of the Bronze Dragonflight. But what brought on this sudden gratitude?”

The bronze drake glided toward Krasus’ Landing, passing over the stone wall at the edge of the platform. Leaning her entire body back, Siegadormi angled her wings and flapped hard twice, slowing enough to land in the center of the platform.

Lelissa dismounted with a sigh, patting the drake’s front flank as she walked to the archway between the landing pad and the city. “It’s time for me to face my sister, and there is a chance that I will not return. Here we must part ways.”

Lelissa began to tuck the signal whistle into the saddle pouch, but Siegadormi stopped the Draenei with a shake of her scaled head. “Keep it. Another can be made, and none but you would be able to signal it properly to call me. You may have need of me another time.” Lelissa nodded, returning the whistle to her pack.

“I have greatly enjoyed our journeys, Siega. May the light always protect you.”

“May it protect you as well, Lelissa. I will pray that your sister can still be returned to you.”

Lelissa nodded her thanks, and turned away toward the archway, disappearing behind the stone as she took the stairs down. Siegadormi watched her leave, then with a great beat of her wings, took to the skies once more and angled southward to Wyrmrest Temple.

The sudden exhalation woke Kelarr from his sleep. Opening his eyes slowly against the light coming in through the window, he stretched and straightened in his chair, finally resting his gaze on the exhausted warlock across from him. Valyra was rubbing her eyes, visibly drained, and seemed on the verge of collapse.

“Good morning. You look like hell,” Kelarr quipped, a rueful smile on his face.

Valyra frowned in his direction, obviously irritated by the remark. Catching herself, she sighed and nodded. “I look like I feel, then.”

“Then you need sleep.”

“I can’t, I have to find the proper reagents for the ritual, and hire another warlock to assist in the process. It’s a two-person show.”

“Make a list. I’ll take care of it. But you need to take care of yourself. The last thing we need to happen is for you to fall apart in the middle of casting this thing. It could mean the difference between life and death.”

Valyra smiled then, nodding her agreement as she found a blank scrap of paper and her quill. “Very well. I will defer to your wisdom in this, old friend. I’ll make a list and send Fierevere with you.”

“No, keep her wherever you need to keep her. I’ll take Myrlia with me. You know I don’t do well with demons hanging about.”

“I had forgotten. Here’s the list.” Valyra handed over the paper, then headed to her bedroom for some much needed rest.