The Care and Feeding of Warriors: Cooldowns

Every week Matthew Rossi slaves in his kitchen over a hot stove, primarily because he needs something to nosh on while composing The Care and Feeding of Warriors, WoW.com's column about warriors. Also, he's chained to the stove. No no, don't ask, it's a long story.

Cooldowns. Those abilities that provide a sizable benefit to a character when used, but cannot simply be used over and over again due to a time-based limitation on their use. As far as I know, every class has a few. For warriors, being a two role hybrid, cooldowns can be further broken up into tanking and DPS related, with some overlap (the famous and oft-neglected Retaliation comes to mind as a cooldown that can be used in either role to some extent).and it's often the most basic and yet most easily overlooked aspect of warrior gameplay.

While for a DPS, cooldowns are useful and even can be said to be required for top performance, for a tanking warrior's cooldowns only grow in importance the more cutting edge the content becomes. Wrath of the Lich King stands out, a year or so into its development cycle, as having shifted tanking away from a process of gearing to either survive or completely avoid big spiky damage in the form of critical hits/crushing blows to a process of gearing to survive big spiky damage through stamina and, more often, cooldown usage. Whether it be Gormok the Impaler's Impale, Onyxia's combination of Wing Buffet, Cleave and Fire Breath, or Mimiron's Plasma Blast, you as a tank will often be called to do anything in your power to make healing you through massive amounts of damage easier. Sometimes, it won't be enough.

So let's talk about cooldowns.

The first (and some will say most obvious) rule for proper use of cooldowns is knowing that yes, you should be ready to use them. A friend of mine recently came to me with an issue he was having with a warrior tank in his raids (I was still DPS but was preparing to move back to tanking myself) - the problem as he laid it out to me was, this warrior tank was easily the most difficult to heal of any of their raid's tanks. The DK and druid tanks were fine, but the warrior was an absolute pain to keep alive. So I agreed to go over their logs of the fights and after a few minutes I noticed some irregularities. On Auriaya, a fight which has not only the boss but four adds that each hit harder if they're in proximity to each other, I saw something... or rather, I failed to see it.

On the entire fight, the warrior didn't use Shield Block once. Didn't use Last Stand once. Didn't use Shield Wall. I went and armoried his tanking gear and saw a Heart of Iron equipped: it never got used. In short, he didn't use either of the two big cooldowns, he didn't even use the mini-cooldown of Shield Block or his trinket. A cursory scan of other fights revealed the same kind of problem: rarely would he use Shield Block, almost never did he use Last Stand, and Shield Wall got use once in an entire night of raiding Ulduar. And it wasn't even on Mimiron, it was on a trash pull before him.

Whether you're tanking or DPS, the first thing you need to do as a warrior is learn what your cooldowns are, how often they're up, how long they take to be usable again once popped, and when the best time to use them is. You do not want to be popping Bladestorm when there's one mob left in a trash pull, especially when there's another trash pull coming it would provide better AoE DPS for. You don't want to hit Death Wish while you're offtanking a mob who does a lot of incoming damage. (This is even more true for Recklessness.) This also means moving past the mindset (which older warriors often feel more than ones who have just taken up the class) that you should save your big three linked cooldowns. I feel your pain, guys, but those times are gone. Recklessness, Retaliation and Shield Wall aren't linked anymore. They're not on 30 minute cooldowns that are mutually exclusive, so if you pop Shield Wall for this one boss you won't have all three for 30 minutes. Those days are gone, and we need to leave them dead and buried. Cooldowns are meant to be used.

The second (almost as obvious to some, but still bears stating) rule is, don't take what I just said to mean you should pop Shield Wall immediately as soon as it comes off cooldown. It's okay if you tank an entire heroic and never use Shield Wall once if it never once needed to be used. If the healers are already complaining that you're not taking enough damage to be worth healing, it's fine to focus your attention elsewhere and not worry about popping Last Stand as soon as you can. This is especially true if you know or suspect that harder content is coming. Furthermore, it's useful (especially in the era of tanking we find ourselves inhabiting where cooldowns are as short as every two minutes because they often need to be used that often) to learn exactly when to use a cooldown and how often to do so. On a fight like heroic Twin Val'kyr, you may end up having to use a cooldown to eat a vortex rather than switching colors depending on your overall strategy, and if this is the case, you may have to eat two vortex back to back because the RNG is a hideous gap-toothed maw that chortles and giggles as you try and escape the onrushing truck that is bearing down upon you. It drools, too. So it's okay to not use all of your possible cooldowns at once: you probably don't need Shield Wall and Last Stand at the same time. Space them out.

As DPS, you're less interested in using your cooldowns to keep from dying and more interested in using them to make other things die. Still, it's probably the case that you don't need to pop Recklessness and Death Wish at the exact same moment. This is less crucial depending on an overall DPS strategy: it might in fact reward you to use them both at once, especially if you'll have the rage to really take advantage of reck with a solid BT/Whirlwind/Slam combo or a nice Sweeping Strikes while Overpower and Execute are lighting up, followed by a timely Bladestorm into a lot of mobs faces.

Also, please don't forget about trinkets with on use abilities. These are effectively bonus cooldowns. By using my Heart of Iron and Satrina's Impeding Scarab at the same time, I basically have a third cooldown period I can use after Shield Wall and Last Stand. With the glyphs I have for each ability, using these two trinkets in this manner usually gives me enough leeway that one of my other two major cooldowns will have come up at the very least. Shield Block, although only really awesome if you have 4 piece T8, is still up every forty seconds as well to help act as a mini cooldown so don't forget you have it. (The problem with using Shield Block in this way however is that, frankly, it's a better threat move at this point than a damage reduction, at least on bosses who often don't even hit that hard or often physically but who do a devastating move that can't be blocked. On trash, Shield Block can help Damage Shield as well as keep you from taking a lot of damage.)

Also, if you're tanking an AoE pack, it can really be useful to throw a Retaliation up just as you charge into them. The initial counterattack provides just an added extra bit of aggro, and every little bit helps when your DPS consists of a ret pally who hits Divine Storm the second you look at a mob and a DK who thinks the Death and Decay button has an 'I win' sticker on it.

Again, these guidelines may seem simple, but like many simple things, they're often lost on us, so especially if you're new to DPS or tanking on a warrior try and keep your cooldowns in mind.

Encrypted Text: Leveling a rogue, level 1-10

So, after reading the list of pros and cons, you've committed to starting your new rogue. This is a proud day for the brotherhood of assassins, as we welcome a new member into our fold. You will learn to embrace the shadows and your adrenaline will spike after your first kill. You will learn to hide your tracks and strike fear into your enemies.

Before you're ready to slay dragons and assassinate high-profile targets, you've got a lot of learning to do. Rogues can be a complex class, with our nearly limitless bag of tricks and a playstyle that is uniquely our own. You must learn how to use your techniques effectively, and how to maximize your damage output while staying alive. The journey from a young rogue to a powerful assassin begins today.

I'll assume you've read the first article of this series, and you've chosen a great name and customized your new character to your liking. You're thrown right into combat upon logging in, with the goal of killing some variety of low level beasts. You'll be presented with two abilities: Sinister Strike, and Eviscerate. Your basic attack structure will revolve around using Sinister Strike to do damage to a mob, and using Eviscerate when you have built up a few Combo Points.

Combat will be mostly boring for the first few levels, as your attack structure and rotation will be the same for quite some time. The idea of building combo points and then releasing them via a finishing move is a core rogue mechanic, and so building combo points and then using them will be your method for killing just about everything. The only variety comes in how you build the combo points and what you choose to use for your finishing attack. This is a great time to set your key bindings for your basic moves, so that they become second nature as you begin your journey to level 80.

Combo Points & Finishers:
The combo point -> finisher cycle will be what dictates the pacing of a rogue attack sequence. If you were to stack combo points using Sinister Strike, and then finish with Eviscerate, you would have to wait around 30 seconds before your Eviscerate is ready. Knowing when your enemy will die is key to your ability use decision-making. If your enemy will die in 4 seconds, there's no point in saving your combo points: use them immediately so that you don't lose your investment. I suggest TimeToDie as one of your first addons. It's great for knowing how long your enemy will be alive so you can choose whether or not to use a finisher or continue building combo points.

As far as starting gear goes, there's really not many options. Most won't have any stats on it, and if it does, you don't really have much variety or any choices. Try to pick up as much leather as possible (for the higher armor class) and anything with Agility, Strength, or Stamina (in that order). The suffixes of perfect rogue gear are "of the Monkey" or "of the Tiger". Your stat selection will matter more at later levels, but right now, be happy with whatever you can find. Do not buy any gear from the vendors, as it is not worth it.

Level 2:
After completing your first quest, you'll be asked to go visit your friendly rogue trainer. He'll have a new spell for you: Stealth! While Stealth may seem fun, you actually don't have any Stealth-only moves at this level, and so it is mostly used for sneaking around. However, you'll want to be killing almost everything you see for experience, and so you won't spend much time in Stealth at all.

Level 4:
At level 4, you'll be eligible for two brand new moves. One is a personal favorite: Pick Pocket. This is your first move you can perform in stealth, and it allows you to steal some copper or items from your enemies. While leveling up, I would suggest using Pick Pocket as often as possible to ensure you always have some gold available for training new abilities or buying reagents. The second move you acquire is Backstab, which will unfortunately not even warrant a position on your hot bar. It's a largely useless move currently, with no Backstab spec being viable anywhere.

Level 6:
Level 6 brings an update to Sinister Strike which should make it fairly more potent, and our first defensive ability: Gouge. Gouge is one of the most underused of rogue techniques. Use this if you are being attacked by two mobs, as you can effectively knock one out of the fight. Use this if you need to run away, as it will give you a fairly big head start, or if you need to use a bandage. It's a great ability that should find its way to one of your hotkeys. Try using it as often as possible to get used to its nuances.

Level 8:
Level 8 brings another update to a base ability, making Eviscerate do more damage. You also pick up Evasion, which is the first powerful rogue CD you'll acquire. At lower levels, nearly all mobs are melee attacks, and so this will make you nigh immune to their attacks for 15 seconds. This is great for taking out elite or group quest bosses, and for mistake pulls where you end up with more mobs attacking you than you'd like. It's key to remember that you can only dodge an attack if you are facing your enemy, so this does nothing for you if you are running away from a fight. Use Evasion every time it's available, as the longer that Evasion is sitting "ready", the more time it is being wasted.

Level 10:
Finally, upon reaching level 10, you receive quite a few new abilities. Blizzard tends to stagger abilities every 10 levels (for 1-60, at least) and so every 10 levels you will see a major playstyle shift. This time, you receive another Stealth-only move of Sap, which is the rogue's best form of crowd control. It can allow you to solo groups by Sapping one of the mobs and then killing the other quickly. We also receive another infamous cooldown, Sprint. This one is more for escaping fights than for staying to rumble. If you think you can win, use Evasion and tough it out. If you're sure that you'll be defeated, use Sprint to escape from combat. There's no shame in sneaking up and taking a second shot at your prey.

Finally, you'll receive Slice and Dice. This is a staple of rogue DPS, and you should bind it to a key that you can reach easily. Attacking 20% faster will have you doing a ton more damage, and will become even more useful when you gain the ability to apply poisons to your weapons. If you're in combat, you should try to keep Slice and Dice up at all times, especially when fighting multiple targets. If you finish every fight by dumping your combo points into Slice and Dice, you'll be able to keep it up between targets, and you'll hop from mob to mob with great ease. You don't always need to save up 5 combo points before using Slice and Dice, usually 2-3 combo points is enough to keep it active for an entire fight.

While you're on your way to level 10, you'll have questions like "what speed should my weapons be?" I would suggest reading up on the basics of rogue axioms. The short answer is that any gear you use will be fine while leveling, and that you shouldn't worry terribly about min/maxing while on your way to 80. The key suggestions I can provide would be to use the best equipment available to you at the time, and focus on your abilities instead of your gear. A well-played rogue can often defeat a well-geared rogue, and the lower levels are an even greater example of this.

Conclusion:
Once you've reached level 10, you've started to get some of the meaty rogue abilities that you'll be using all the way until level 80. Next week I will be covering a larger range of leveling, complete with a few choice rogue quests and some of our great new abilities and tricks to try out while experimenting with the rogue class. Please post any tips you have for a rogue between the levels of 1-10, or any tricks that you have to share for those just starting a new rogue.

Blizzard explains delay in Race Change service

Zarhym responded to a thread on the official forums started by, of all things, a troll. The poster wrote accusing Blizzard of lying about paid race changes being still in development, pointing out that faction change enabled racial changes, as well. Zarhym calmly explained that "the conversion tables for changing races within one's own faction are completely different from the faction change service." This means that there's a separate development time for it.

He also reminds everyone that "the only thing better than offering a service people want is making sure that service works when people want it." It's pretty much standard operating procedure for Blizzard, a company notorious for pushing back releases in favor of getting things right. It's interesting to note that Blizzard introduced faction changes ahead of race changes, perhaps because the former addresses more player concerns while the latter is merely a customization preference.

There's also a chance that Blizzard will allow the new race-class combos leading up to the Cataclysm, which would be perfect timing for the paid race change service, anyway. I was looking forward to swapping my Blood Elf Death Knight into an Orc, but since the announcement, I've been drooling over the prospect of an Undead Hunter -- a race-class combo I've wanted to play since I first launched the game. I've waited this long, I guess a little more of Soon won't hurt.

Patch 3.3 PTR: More diabolical Warlock changes

On the WoW Insider Show a few weeks back I made a comment about a lack of patch 3.3 warlock changes. Now I'm not saying that it had anything to do with it, but we have seen an awful lot of changes since then. I've posted three previous articles covering some fairly significant changes to our spells, talents and pets (as well as our clothes) and here we are with a fourth.

The balancing of the different trees continues with one change to each. I'll start with destruction as it's one that a lot of people were anxious about.

Conflagrate: Redesigned. This talent now consumes an Immolate or Shadowflame effect on the enemy target to instantly deal damage equal to 9 seconds of Immolate or 8 seconds of Shadowflame, and causes additional damage over 3 seconds equal to 3 seconds of Immolate or 2 seconds of Shadowflame. In addition, the periodic damage of Conflagrate is capable of critically striking the afflicted target.

This ability had previously changed to move a portion of its damage from the initial hit to a subsequent DoT (in the case of Immolate). The concern raised was that this is a damage reduction as the DoT couldn't crit. Now that they have added a crit mechanic to this DoT, the damage imbalance has been somewhat redressed, though a few questions are outstanding.

1. Does the amount of increased damage from criticals increase for this DoT with points in Ruin?

If not then this means the damage drop from the mechanic currently in live is only half compensated for by this change.

2. Will the DoTs have the same crit chance as the direct damage portion of Conflagrate
Fire and Brimstone increases the crit chance of the direct damage portion by 25%, if this is not shared by the DoT portion then this means the DoT is still not making up for the loss to the direct damage.

3. If the Conflagrate DoTs do crit, will they trigger Pyroclasm?

If so then you have four chances to proc the effect for each cast of Conflag.
More testing will undoubtedly be done over the coming week to answer these questions and fine tune the numbers. Whatever the result this is a damage increase for destruction, albeit one that is redressing a prior nerf.

Next we see a change for affliction:

Shadow Mastery: This talent now also increases the damage done by the felhunter's Shadow Bite ability by 3/6/9/12/15%. This is a pure buff to affliction damage, though nothing major. Five points in Shadow Mastery is a standard part of affliction, and so is the felhunter under patch 3.3. This means you will always have the 15% damage increase on Shadow Bite. That's about an 8.5% buff to felhunter damage and just under 1% to your total damage.

Finally, for demonology, Molten Core has changed once again:

Molten Core: Redesigned. This talent now increases the duration of Immolate by 3/6/9 seconds and provides a 4/8/12% chance to gain the Molten Core effect when Corruption deals damage. The Molten Core effect empowers the next 3 Incinerate or Soul Fire spells cast within 15 seconds (Incinerate: increases damage done by 6/12/18% and reduces cast time by 10/20/30%; Soul Fire: increases damage done by 6/12/18% and increases critical strike chance by 5/10/15%). Molten Core now has a new spell effect. So what's new? First off there's a change to Immolate, adding 3/6/9 seconds to the DoT. This is a buff to the damage-per-cast-time of the spell but reduces the total damage done by the spell (assuming you don't refresh/clip it). This is interesting for hybrid builds from a 'rotation' point of view as it will require less casts of Immolate to maintain the ability to cast Conflagrate.

Another change is that the effect will now only trigger from Corruption; so no more procs from Shadow Bolt or CoA. This is likely to cause a reduction in MC uptime, especially during the execute phase. Also, interestingly, the Glyph of Quick Decay might become more viable for builds using Molten Core.

The third change is to the duration of the Molten Core effect. Previously this was a flat 12 seconds, which could be refreshed. Now it's for the next three casts of either Incinerate or Soul Fire within 15 seconds. This is a reduction in the number of casts one proc will empower but it will depend on the proc-rate as to whether this is a reduction in the number of empowered casts in a fight. Since that proc-rate is going down it does look like there will be less casts under the effect of MC.

That's not all though, the effect that Molten Core has upon your casts has changed dramatically. Incinerate used to have up to 15% extra damage but now has 18% extra damage and 30% reduced cast time. Soul Fire used to have 10% extra damage but now also has 18% damage increase as well as a 15% extra critical strike chance. This is a huge buff to these abilities, though is offset by the reduction in the number of times they will be buffed.

The changes to Molten Core make it a very complicated but interesting talent. It's likely to mean a change to the standard builds that use it -- to have all three talent points invested in it, probably at the cost of Demonic Empowerment. It is also likely to change the demonology build rotations so that when Molten Core is active Incinerate is cast instead of the normal Shadow Bolt (except where the boss is below 35%, in which case Soul Fire).

One final thing; I forgot to mention previously:

Glyph of Life Tap: The effect of this glyph now has a chance of activating when Dark Pact is used. With the felhunter back in the affliction game Dark Pact is more attractive but I still don't think it's as good as Life Tap when you have a healer on hand (and very often a lot of AoE healing). Also, why it only has a chance of triggering the effect I do not know. This seems like an attempt to get affliction locks to use the ability more but it doesn't seem to go far enough. Maybe we'll see more changes in this area before the patch goes live.

Patch 3.3 PTR: New LFG interface

In the latest build of the PTR, Blizzard has included the new Looking for Group interface they've got in the works. As they had announced in at BlizzCon, the recent fix for the "Additional Instances" errors that were plaguing us a few months ago also adds the ability for them to allow cross-realm LFG. A new feature usually means a new interface and the trend proves true. It incorporates a lot of the long asked for features as well as removes several older features from the panel.

They've taken the current system that allows you to select your available roles (healer, tank, or dps) as well as select if you're willing to lead the instance. One thing that should help out is the ability to earn emblems as well as gold for doing just a completely random pug each day. While some of you might be groaning at this thought, they are willing to reimburse you for the inconvenience with 68G for completing a random level 80 heroic. This money scales based on how much of your party is random and how much is premade. The less random your party is the lower the cash return.

It's still early in the PTR and several features, like the ability to use the LFG panel to look for a raid, don't appear to be completely finished yet. I've included a gallery of what the new interface looks like thus far.

Icecrown and Hallow's End edition

Happy Tuesday morning and happy Hallow's End, everyone. That's right, WoW's coolest holiday's in full swing. Or is when the servers are up. If you're going after the Hallowed title, we have a Hallow's End achievement guide for you. If you're thinking of going after everyone's favorite cackling headless holiday boss, we have a guide to the new Headless Horseman loot. Of course, maybe you just want to do some good old fashioned trick or treating. We have something for that too.


Of course, while the revelry continues on live servers, the testing continues on the test servers, and there's been quite a bit of activity.

The icecrown raid has now seen some testing, and we have a list of abilities and achievements for the first boss, Lord Marrowgar. On the raid lore front -- don't click these next couple links unless you want to be spoiled -- we have animation for the Lich King himself and news of Bolvar Fordragon.

There's also speedier reputation grinds coming, as well as bind on account status for the Sons of Hodir shoulder enchantments. We may also be able to transfer bind on account items between factions. Also, leatherworkers will be glad to know that Arctic Fur is now purchasable, and aspiring Loremasters will finally get a list of their completed quests to help their search.

Of course, what with the 5 AM to 11 AM Pacific downtime, you'll have time to read all of the above and more, I'm sure. With that in mind, here's a few more choice tidbits from the past week for your approval:

Hot News and Features

If you've already signed up for Battle.net, be sure to grab Mr. Chilly!
You still have time to get in on our latest Creative WoW headset giveaway.
The Patch 3.3 PTR soldiers on with new builds and new information. Here's some of the latest stuff from the newest build. Have you followed the official Warcraft twitter yet? If not, you may be missing out. Take a sneak peek at the Death Knight manga. Congratulations to Armed Forces, September's Guild of the Month. The WoW devs will be taking questions live on twitter.
Class News and Guides

Shadow priests got some sweet buffs in Patch 3.3. Warlocks got some changes in the latest Patch 3.3 PTR build as well, and a look at their tier 10 gear.
Totem Talk rounds up the shaman Patch 3.3 PTR changes..
Mages got a simplified Scorch and a buffed Elemental in the latest PTR build, among other things. Arcane Brilliance also has a more in-depth look at the Patch 3.3 changes for Mages thus far.
The Light And How to Swing It looks at the latest news from the Patch 3.3 PTR on paladin Tier 10. Encrypted Text starts from scratch with rogue character creation. Rossi's Warrior is getting back to where he once belonged. Rossi also thinks Whirlwind may need to go.
Items, Professions, PvP, and More

Here's some raiding UI news: Lowbie Raids are gone, everyone gets to place marks, and in general, chaos chaos and anarachy reign in Patch 3.3.
WoW Rookie discusses making time for raiding. Ready Check takes on the Twin Val'kyr. Ghostcrawler has some clarification on the removal of armor penetration.=
Odds and Ends

15 Minutes of Fame sits down with WoW, Eh? Cartoonist Cadistra. Deathwing comes to life in this fan's sculpture. Episode 7 of Season 3 of The Guild is up.

Raid Rx: Healing heroic Lord Jaraxxus

This is the second boss in Trial of the Crusader. After you healed through the gate bosses that comprise the Northrend Beasts, Lord Jaraxxus is the next step.


My raid group managed to get this demon lord down this past week. We got the 10-man version down several weeks ago but the 25-man version eluded us for some time. Compared to Northrend Beasts, this boss should feel relatively easier. Your raid will spend less time learning Lord Jaraxxus than the previous boss.

Let's check out the healing side of things, shall we?




Setting up

Your healing group should consist of 6 players. 2 tank healers will suffice. Big plus if you have 2 holy priests or other AoE type healers.

When you're getting into position, direct your healers to cover the room as much as possible. Ideally your healers should be spaced out evenly from each other in a circle around the center. If each player can be covered by at least 2 or more healers, your raid will be in excellent shape.

Things to watch for

Incinerate Flesh: You thought this debuff was a pain on normal mode for healing. It becomes even more dangerous. If it goes off during normal mode, it's easily healable. Healers can cover the damage. On heroic, it's just about a guaranteed wipe when Burning Inferno lands. On normal, 60000 damage has to be healed up. On heroic, that amount increases to 85000. Priests, if their health was already low to begin with when they get this debuff, drop a shield on them to prevent any instant gibs while they get healed up to full.

Legion Flame: This green trail of heat can surprise even the most seasoned of healers. I confess I was exhibited signs of tunnel vision while healing. In one of the earlier attempts, I was roasted alive. Don't let this happen to you!

No one likes barbequed dwarves, right?

Space yourselves out to avoid Fel Lightning. You can eat a 2nd or 3rd jump from a Fel Lightning and still live. In other words, you should be safe standing next to 1 other person if there's no room around you due to fires on the ground.

Touch of Jaraxxus is a DoT that will be applied on random players. It's also going to hit nearby players around them with Curse of the Nether (which is also a DoT). The damage that both abilities do are negligible. That being said, druids should dispel them when they have an opportunity.

Strong communication will play a large role in dealing with the above debuffs. Your healers should be talking to teach other. it keeps everyone focused and on task. It alerts healers as to which raid healer is healing which player.

Optionally, you can designate a player to call out debuffs on your raiders. Unfortunately, the problem with this is that by the time the other player hears the command, it may already be too late for them. it all depends on latency and reaction time.

Handling the Mistress

When the first portal appears, throw a DoT or an instant damage spell on it. If you can, do some DPS until the raid starts taking damage. You might be able to squeeze in a few seconds of DPS time before you're called back to healing.

Raid DPS has to be high enough so that the raid gets no more than 1 mistress. If you get more than 1 early on, I'd suggest wiping it and trying again.

Mistress Kiss: Something new that healers may not be accustomed to is this debuff. If a healer gets it, the next spell they case gets interrupted. Not only that, the school of magic the interrupted spell belongs to gets locked out for several seconds.

For example, if I cast Greater Heal while having Mistress Kiss, the heal gets interrupted and my Holy spells are locked out.

Ways to combat this:

Priests: Cast Mind Control to trigger the interrupt into locking out the shadow school. Shamans: Lava Burst can do the same thing. Paladins: Nothing. Druids: Stick to instants. I believe Starfire is a different school than most druid healing spells. Using instant spells will not trigger a school lock out. Feel free to cast spells like Renew or Holy Shock if you've been kissed.

In the event mages are busy shooting up volcanoes or portals, resto shamans should be prepared to Purge Jaraxxus of Nether Power.

It's also possible to fake out the kiss by casting a spell and then immediately stopcasting it. It takes a bit of practice, but it's possible. What ends up happening is your spell gets cancelled and the debuff wears off, but you have free access to the spell school.

Dealing with Infernals

Infernals aren't a big deal individually. It's when they happen to come together and start pulsing where players can drop. I've seen my entire melee team fall over in seconds when multiple infernals converged. Try to add what DPS you can to the volcano when it spawns.

Holy Paladins will be a big asset when dealing with infernals. Their Aura Mastery and Divine Sacrifice should help mitigate enough damage to keep the raid alive long enough while the infernals are doing their blasting AoE. Make sure one of the Paladins have Fire Resistance aura active!

Consider setting up Divine Sacrifice and Aura Mastery rotations among the Holy Paladins. Priests can help on subsequent infernal phases with Divine Hymn.

If you're interested in some benchmarks, the norm for first time guilds is surviving through 4 portal phases and 4 infernal volcano phases.

Congratulations! Your reward for getting heroic Jaraxxus down is heroic Faction Champions! My guild is currently working on that. Once we get these guys down, I'll post some extra pointers and tips in a future column.

Patch 3.3 PTR: A little extra XP bonus

The sneaky database over at MMO-Champion has uncovered a little spell/aura/attribute hidden in the patch 3.3 PTR files that hints at some extra XP from future versions of heirloom gear. Currently, with two pieces of heirloom gear, you can get up to a 20% bonus (the chest and shoulders each give a stackable 10%, while heirloom weapons give nothing). But this Heirloom Experience Bonus +5% "spell" grants an extra 5% experience, so it could be that in the future, we'll see pieces of heirloom gear that have an extra bit of bonus on them -- maybe gloves, cloak, or a belt -- that will bring the total bonus XP up to 25%.

There's no base level or other identifying information on this attribute (we call it a "spell," but really, given its information in the game, it seems like a gear-specific ability), so we can assume that it'll be a full 1-80 bonus, just like the current heirloom gear in the game. Unfortunately, we haven't actually uncovered any new heirloom items yet, so we have no idea if this stuff will show up in patch 3.3 or the expansion. And of course, just because the bonus applies from 1-80 doesn't mean the gear can be worn that whole time -- it sure seems like Blizzard wouldn't necessarily want Worgen and Goblin alts speeding past Cataclysm lowbie content. But we'll see -- in the meantime, look for a little extra heirloom power, coming soon.

Thanks, Gene!