With another recent hotfix behind our belts, there was a handful of interesting dev tracker posts on the forums yesterday. First off, let’s talk hotfix changes.

A pretty large chunk of the Warrior population was disappointed to find that Thunderous Leap, one of the Warrior PvP PA abilities, was disabled for use inside dungeons and raids. Ailion commented on the change:

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Thunderous Leap was disabled in instances because the use of this ability to bring the player to supposedly inaccessible locations resulted in some unintended game states within certain encounters. This causes the mechanics of the encounters to break. We have decided to disable this ability to maintain the integrity of the encounters.

There seem to be two schools of thought regarding the change among the vocal Warrior players of the community. Some players feel the change was too cutthroat and will hurt PvE Warriors who enjoyed having a baseline mobility move, and other players feel the change might have been necessary, but only if other PvP PA abilities are treated equally (Cleanse Soul, for example).

Keep reading to see the rest of the dev tracker posts.

With 36 different souls to balance these days, the Trion RIFT team definitely has their hands full. The first hints of Patch 2.2 are now hitting the Public Test Server (PTS) and the developers are asking for player assistance. Parses, to be exact. Each of the callings are experiencing their share of changes in 2.2, and Trion wants to know exactly how balance stands with these changes. Ailion recently made a post on the PTS forum announcing a brand new dummy-filled testing instance that players can utilize while on the PTS server.

The new area, coined “Dummy Foundry” (the title screenshot should give you a clue as to why), features a wide variety of DPS and tank practice dummies (single target and AoE), NPCs with gear sets, class trainers, and a way to give your character most of the important raid buffs. Trion’s hope? That players will pop on, run a few DPS parses using the controlled gear sets and buffs, and share their parses. If you’re interested in helping out the developer team, make sure to read Ailion’s post in its entirety since the team’s looking for parses that adhere to certain conditions.

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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We are adjusting all the stats of the Riftstalker’s tanking vendor-bought gear for Expert Dungeon and Raids to include Deflect. They will lose mostly Parry from this adjustment.

After including changes made to Shadow Guard, Guardian Phase, 2 piece crystal and False Blade, the Riftstalker in 1.8 compared to 1.7 will have:

1) Less avoidance.
2) Higher Deflect chance.
3) Better mitigation from a successful Deflect.
4) Slightly worse mitigation from an unsuccessful Deflect.
5) Better overall damage mitigation.
6) More Health

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Additional changes to the Sab will be coming up in tomorrow’s PTS update (if the push goes through).

High Explosives: Duration has been increased to 8s, up from 6s. Now stacks up to 3 times.

Increased Explosive Power: Damage increased by 5-25%, up from 3-15%.

Bomb Specialist: Damage increased by 5-25%, up from 3-15%.

Combat Wounds: Now increases damage of Spike Charge and Caltrop Charge by 15-30%, up from 10-20%.

Chemical Bomb: Damage has been increased.

Caltrop Charge: Damage has been increased.

Spike Charge: Damage has been increased.

Fragmentation Bomb: Reduced the cooldown from 15s to 10s.

Carpet Bombing: Reduced the cooldown from 2 min to 1 min.

Rapid Setup: Reduced the cooldown from 1 min to 30 sec.

Trench Warfare: Damage bonus from Attack Power is increased by 5% for every point spend in the Saboteur soul above 26, up from 4%.

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Some minor changes:

Splinter Charge and Embers Charge will now apply their full debuff effect from a single charge. The debuff duration will be 12 sec per Charge.

The armor debuff from Splinter Charge will be equal to a 3/3 talented Piercing Shot.

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Additional updates for 1.8. These won’t be up on the test shard until the end of the week or next week.

Marksman

• Empowered Shot: Energy cost has been reduced from 45 to 40.

Ranger

• Splinter Shot: Energy cost has been reduced from 45 to 40.
• Improved Escape Artist: Removed
• New tier 6 talent: Steady Hand: Increases the effect of Attack Power on ranged weapon abilities by 5%, plus an additional 2% per point spent in the Ranger soul above 26.
• 2 piece HK synergy crystal: Now also reduces the energy cost of Shadow Fire by 10.

Saboteur

• Chemical Bomb: Duration of the effect is increased to 10 sec, up from 8 sec. Damage has been adjusted.
• Spike Charge: Duration of the effect is increased to 10 sec, up from 9 sec. DOT interval is now every 2 sec, down from 3 sec. Damage has been adjusted.
• Caltrop Charge: Duration of the effect is reduced to 10 sec, down from 15 sec. DOT interval is now every 2 sec, down from 3 sec. Damage has been adjusted.
• Improved Spike Charge: Removed
• New tier 4 talent: Combat Wounds: Increases the damage of Spike Charge and Caltrop Charge by 10/20%.
• Bomb Specialist: Now also reduces the energy cost of Bombs by 1/2/3/4/5.
• Demolition Specialist: Number of enemies affected has been increased to 4/8 other enemies.
• Trench Warfare: Now also affects Detonate.
• Splinter Charge: The value of the armor debuff has been increased. A 5 point Splinter Charge will be slightly higher than a 3/3 Piercing Shot.

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Rogue and Warrior weapon PA bonuses have been changed.

Instead of increasing weapon DPS by 0.2 for every point invested in the weapon PA node, you will now get 2 Attack Power for every point invested with the weapon equipped in each weapon slot. The warrior’s 2H weapon mastery will give you an additional 2 AP per point invested. Whether you are dual wielding or using a 2H weapon, you will eventually get the same amount of AP bonuses.

The AP bonuses are also added to your pet.

These changes will be up in the test shard shortly.

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Saboteur changes for 1.8
Here are the preliminary changes for the Saboteur in 1.8, with the goal of making the Saboteur a competitive AOE DPS soul.

1) All Saboteur Charges can no longer be parried/dodged/blocked/deflected.

2) High Explosives: Functionality has been changed. Your Fragmentation Bomb, Time Bomb and Annihilation Bomb cause the target to bleed for 6 seconds.

3) Combat Survival: Removed

4) Combined Arms: New talent. Your Fragmentation Bomb has a 50/100% chance to detonate all Blast and Spike Charges you have applied to your enemies.

5) Charge Booster: Functionality has been changed. Increases the damage bonus from Attack Power of your Charges by 10%. The damage bonus from Attack Power is increased by 3% for every point spent in the Saboteur Soul above 21.

6) The Trapper: Removed

7) Trench Warfare: New talent. Increases the damage bonus from Attack Power of your Bombs, Traps and Land Mines by 10%. The damage bonus from Attack Power is increased by 4% for every point spent in the Saboteur Soul above 26.

8 ) Demolition Specialist: Now affects an additional 2-4 other enemies, up from 1-2 other enemies.

9) Caltrop Charge: Functionality has been changed. It now causes the target and surrounding enemies to bleed over 15 seconds when detonated.

10) Splinter Charge: Now deals damage and applies debuff to the target and surrounding enemies.

11) Embers Charge: Now deals damage and applies debuff to the target and surrounding enemies.

12) All traps, except Land Mines, now no longer have a cooldown.

13) 2 Piece HK Synergy Crystal: Functionality has been changed. It now increases the damage of Blast Charge and Spike Charge by 30%.

14) 4 Piece HK Synergy Crystal: Functionality has been changed. It now increases the damage of all Saboteur’s AOE abilities by 15%.

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Additional proposed Rogue changes to be added for 1.7. It will go into the test shard soon.

Assassin

Expose Weakness has been fixed. The additional damage from Expose Weakness will be added per stack of Serrated Blades. So you get 3 times the bonus for 3 stacks of Serrated Blades.

Bladedancer

Blade and Fury – Your Quick Strike and Precision Strike increases the damage of your next Keen Strike by 10-20%, up from 5-10%.

Deadly Dance – Can now be triggered by Compound Attack.

Nightblade

Dusk to Dawn – It is no longer a channeled ability but a straight up DOT attack. It now awards 2 Combo Points and

Originally posted by Ailion (Source)

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Just want to notify everyone about the upcoming changes. We hope to push these to the test server in a week.

Bladedancer

Blade Finesse: Functionality has been changed. It now increases the Attack Power bonus of your Finishers by 5-25%. This bonus is applied only to attacks with melee weapons.

Combat Expertise: Functionality has been changed. It now increases the Attack Power bonus of your Combo Point generating abilities by 5-25%. This bonus is applied only to attacks with melee weapons.

Combat Culmination: Functionality has been changed. Your Finishers cause Physical attacks to ignore 1-3% of your target’s armor per Combo Point for 10 seconds.

Ranger

King of the Jungle: It now increases pet damage by 20%, up from 10%. For every point in the Ranger’s soul above 21, it increases pet damage by 6%, up from 3%.

Feral Aggression: Increases Crit Hit chance and also pet damage by 100% for 15 seconds. Cooldown is reduced from 2 mins to 1 min.

Pin Down: Cooldown is reduced from 3 mins to 1 min.

Diffuse: Cooldown is reduced from 3 mins to 1 min.

Assassin’s Poisons and Nightblade Weapon Enchantments

Assassin: The Attack Power contribution to the damage from poisons has been increased.

Assassin: Leeching Poison: The Attack Power contribution to the healing from Leeching Poison has been increased.

Nightblade: The Attack Power contribution to the damage from weapon enchantments has been increased.

These changes are not yet final and will be subjected to change based on feedback and parses.