Here come the full patch notes for the Firelands patch coming this Thursday, November 7th!
We have the new raid, the new Protocol Inferno dungeon difficulty, a new Baradin Hold boss, new questlines, high res textures and a lot more!
Version 4.4.1
October 29, 2024
New Raid: Firelands
The Firelands raid will become available on Thursday, November 7 at 3:00 p.m. PST. Firelands is a 10- or 25-player, 7 boss raid, and has two difficulty modes – Normal and Heroic – rewarding items for iLvl 378 and 391 gear, respectively.
- Developers’ notes: Firelands is an iconic raid, but it went through several rounds of changes by the end of original Cataclysm, which significantly impacted its challenge. We have done a top-to-bottom pass and reverted many of these adjustments, to restore the “feel” of the original state of the raid and allow it to live up to its iconic status. Still, we will monitor player performance and progression in the raid and, if needed, may make additional adjustments if necessary.
PvP Season 10 Has Begun
Engage in an all new PvP season. Gather your team to take on the challenge of Rated Arenas and Rated Battlegrounds and earn Conquest points to spend on new and more powerful PvP gear.
Elemental Rune Dungeons: Protocol Inferno
Elemental Rune Dungeons are a new optional game mode, which can be activated in most Cataclysm Classic heroic dungeons by interacting with the Mysterious Elemental Device near each dungeon’s entrance and selecting “Activate Protocol Inferno”. This mode is not available in Zul’Aman or Zul’Gurub.
- Upon activating Protocol Inferno, a floating element will appear and all 5 players in the group will need to channel it.
- Elemental Rune Protocol Inferno dungeons can also be queued for by using the automated Group Finder tool, and require a minimum item level of 346 to queue for.
- Activating Protocol Inferno will grant creatures in the dungeon the “Fury of the Firelord” buff, increasing their health and damage.
- Each boss in Protocol Inferno dungeons will drop 2x of a new currency, Fissure Stone Fragments, per player. If players have defeated all of the other bosses in the dungeon, the final boss of each dungeon will drop an extra 3 Fissure Stone Fragments.
- This currency can be used to purchase many items, such as tokens for Tier 11 gear, trinkets, and mounts, from the new NPC, Kyanite Stonetender, in Stormwind and Orgrimmar.
- The Protocol Inferno difficulty also brings with it new Achievements to earn.
- Currency updates:
- Fissure Stones will now be able to purchase Valor at a conversion rate of 1:10.
- Fissure Stones will now cap at 160, allowing players to bank up to a week’s worth of Valor, if desired.
New Baradin Hold Boss: Occu’thar
A second boss, Occu’thar, will be available in Baradin Hold with each region’s weekly content reset starting November 12.
Occu’thar has the chance to drop iLvl 378 and 384 gear.
As with the first boss, Argaloth, players can raid both the 10-player and 25-player version of Occu’thar on separate lockouts, allowing both versions to be run in the same week.
High-Resolution Textures
The Rage of the Firelands update includes a way for players to turn on High-Resolution Textures as an option, providing enhanced visual fidelity to many textures in the game. This allows for a revitalized world while preserving its classic aesthetics.
- To enable High-Resolution Textures, select the “Get HD Textures” button on the character select screen. That will send you to the Battle.net App, and open the installation window with a new “High-Resolution Assets” checkbox.
- To disable High-Resolution Textures, open the Options Menu, select “Graphics” and set “High Definition Textures” to “Disabled”.
Elemental Bonds Questline
This questline begins in Nordrassil Summit in Mount Hyjal, and will earn players an iLvl 365 back item.
Legendary Item: Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa’s Rest
Dragonwrath, Tarecgosa’s Rest is an iLvl 397 Legendary Item thatcan be earned by completing the acquisition questline. Players begin by slaying a Molten Lord in the Firelands Raid or completing all of the bosses in the previous raid tier. Druids, Mages, Monks, Priests, Shaman, and Warlocks are all eligible for this questline.
- Developers’ notes: To account for Cataclysm Classic’s increased content cadence, we have sped up the average rate of acquisition of this Legendary Item. Players will be able to craft their first, and subsequent, Dragonwraths faster than in the original Cataclysm.
Bosses
- Hexlord Malacrass will no longer cast Leap of Faith if there’s a priest in the group.
Guilds
- Guild Events and Guild Finder have been added to the Guilds UI.
Transmogrification Outfit System
- The option to save preselected transmog configurations has been added to the Transmogrify Window.