You’ll have varying tactics for one on one combat which depend on which talent tree you have chosen. For example, the Beast Mastery Hunters will find their pets, Bestial Wrath and the Beast within talents invaluable whereas Marksmen will find the talent enhancement to their shots useful and the Volley enhancements can help rain death on many huge cluster battles that tend to occur in the battlegrounds. But Survival Hunters will get lots of use out of their traps and explosive shot attack. However, all three trees will have a need for their pets and the Volley attack. If possible, you should target cloth wearing, lighter armored enemies and stay clear of heavy armored foes like Warriors, Paladins and Death Knights. Your damage can be of more use eliminating healers and DPS than trying to break through the heavy armor classes who have healers backing them up. After all, beating up a heavily armored meat shield with a ton of hit points that are constantly being refreshed is rather counterproductive. Fight smart and take out the healers first.It can be a bit different to prep your Hunter for level 80 PvP combat than prepare for a raid. So we will tell of this mainly here to help you understand.
   You must know the first thing to obtain victory is your role in combat. As a Hunter, your role does not differ much in PvP combat as it does from fighting in groups and raids. You can stay with your group and keep your distance in combat or use your ranged attacks to take out enemies from a safe distance. Often you’ll have huge clusters of enemies that you can fire your Volley attack. Sometimes with all the chaos, this goes overlooked and you can gain several honorable kills by the distracted enemies. Some areas like the Alterac Mountains battleground, offer many places such as towers that you can climb to the top of and fire ranged attacks at the enemies below. 

   Even if you are fighting a one on one battle, just keep one thing in mind never there are no other enemies around. It’s moments like these that a sure fire win can turn into a severe ganking. It’s best to stick with your allies unless you enjoy getting blindsided by a small army.
   Generally speaking, the Strand of the Ancients is run by level 80s and works in two phases. One team defends and another attacks. The two factions switch positions after the 10 minute battle duration is up or the attacking team captures the defending team’s relic. Hunters can play a very important role in many parts of this battle. If you’re on the attacking side, you may want to get in and ride shotgun on one of the siege weapons. While this doesn’t always provide you with the best opportunities for kills, you can play a key role in keeping enemy melee off the siege engine so it reaches its target and brings down an enemies wall. Concussive Shot is useful when those pesky melees try to come up behind the engine. This and your other attacks can buy the engine to bring down an enemy gate. If you are quick and crafty enough you can aid in bringing down the enemy walls by planting Seaforium Charges which can be picked up at friendly locations. So make sure you grab one before boarding the engine or trying to bum rushes a wall.
 There are many other battlegrounds you can choose from for some fun PvP action like Alterac Valley, Warsong Gulch, Arathi Basin, Eye of Storm, and the Arena. Each battleground allows a certain number from each faction. However, you sometimes find yourself incredibly outnumbered or outnumbering the enemy yourself. While the battlegrounds are fun, which provide PvP, the numbers game can get tilted in one direction pretty quickly.
You are able to buy a number of items from PvP vendors for your faction with HP and Markfs of Honor earned from the various battlegrounds. For the Hunters, there’re a number of useful items but getting them will take plenty of Marks and Honor Points.   You can utilize the walls to your advantage if you are on the offense. There’re small ledges that have cannon placements on them you can man or stand on to fire ranged attacks at enemy below. The cannons deal splash damage to enemy units and can help bring down enemy siege weapons before they reach the walls. If you find these are already controlled by someone, use the ledge to fire down on enemies that get too close. In all other cases, stick with your group and try to take out healers and casters first.

   Inscription is definitely a new profession that high level characters are given the opportunity to learn, which along with the ability to create a powerful new Death Knight character. It’s a means by which characters can actually change and customize their spells and abilities, which means that cool-down timers, attack ratings and Area of Effect can be altered for a spell within a character’s spell book.
   While it appears that only one inscription will be allowed to be on a spell at one time, their goal is not to create one or two all-powerful inscriptions that will be used above all others, but to give players a variety of valid choices as to how to modify their spells. The example he gives is that of Frost Nova. One player might choose an inscription that gave their nova a longer range, while another might choose one that would lengthen the duration of the root associated with it.
   With the new dungeons, instances and a revolutionary Player vs. Player zone in Northrend, these additions make World of Warcraft: Wrath of the Lich King an intriguing new addition to the epic game play that has already made Blizzard world famous. With the advent of the new World of Warcraft expansion, Wrath of the Lich King come a bevy of new features, a new continent, new enemies and new factions. However, the new hero class being included Death Knight is the most interested and exciting addition to the game. This is the first hero class added to the game and also the first new class at all since the game launched in 2004. For this reason, it is one of the most exciting add-ons since the game first launched.
   In the game, the hero class is an addition that works for only the highest level players, those that have already completed the rest of the content in Wrath of the Lich King and reached level 80. Once a player has reached level 80, they are given leave to embark on a particular quest. This quest is similar to the epic mount quest Warlock’s were given when they reached level 60 back before the Burning Crusade expansion. However, this time around, players are questing for an entirely new character class. Once the quest is complete though, characters can unlock the Death Knight as a character class and start a new character with that class.
   The Death Knight is unique by reason that it starts at level 60 already, which means that most of the players do not need to grind the lower levels to build up their Death Knights. Instead, they are at once given access to high level content to show off their powerful new character. The Death Knight is solely relegated for endgame users and high level characters, which is unlike the Draenei and Blood Elf additions of the Burning Crusade expansion.
   For the most part, the Death Knight is unique in almost every way. The Death Knight has a rune sword, which is given its own special bar, instead of the usual rage, energy and mana meters that every other class utilizes. On this sword, players are given the ability to etch up to six runes from three different categories. At length, the mixture and combination of the runes decide the abilities that the sword will learn. The ability used sets off a cool-down timer that will countdown until they can be used again.

A few reminders about these notes. First, they were obtained from the official patch files. Secondly, the notes are subject to change at the whim of Blizzard. If they do, you’ll be able to find the changes here. Third, not everything on the PTR makes it into the live patch – and not everything in the live patch was on the PTR.

The full notes are after the break: Part I and Part II.

For a concise listing of everything we’ve written on the patch, check out WoW Insider’s Guide to Patch 3.1. the official patch notes for the live version of patch 3.1. Features of this patch include:

• Dual Specs
• Ulduar
• Argent Tournament
• Major Class Changes
• Swimming Mounts
• New Inscriptions

  Secrets of Ulduar

• Due to significant talent tree revisions, all players will have their talent points reimbursed. Several new spells and abilities have been added for select classes. Players will need to visit their class trainer to learn new spells.
• The Argent Tournament, a permanent in-game event, has come to Icecrown. Players interested in taking part in this event should visit the Argent Pavilion located on the west side of the tournament grounds. Features include:
  • New ways of gaining reputation with capitol cities.
  • All new daily quests, achievements and titles
  • New rare and epic items, tabards, pets, banners, faction shirts and mounts
  • Mounted combat, and much more to come!
• All Ground Mounts may now swim without dismounting the rider. Flying Mounts still may NOT, and will dismount the rider upon entering water.
• Players level 40 and higher will now be able to visit their trainer to pay a one-time fee and access the dual talent specialization feature.
• The achievement Brew of the Year has been removed from the Brewmaster meta-achievement. The achievement Brew of the Month has been added in its place.
• Noblegarden has been redesigned into a week-long holiday with new items, quests, and more. Various achievements have been added, including the meta-achievement Noble Gardener, which is now required for the meta-achievement What A Long, Strange Trip It’s Been.
• Applying a glyph no longer requires a Lexicon of Power. The same rules for switching between dual talent specializations now apply to switching glyphs and cannot be performed while in combat, Battlegrounds (except when Preparation is up), or Arenas (no exceptions). Read the rest of this entry »

That’s it! The one I’m most curious about is the Equipment Manager. Did someone forget to pull the line from the live patch notes, or did they fix their bugs faster than expected and manage to get the feature in for the patch? I guess we’ll see when the realms come back up.

 I thought I’d take a look and see what changed between the last PTR notes and today. And the answer is: not much. Only eight new/changed lines, and nothing that I’d call major. But you may disagree, dear reader, and so I’ll list everything I found right here.

• [Hunter] Roar of Sacrifice can be used on the hunter only
• [Shaman] Unleashed Rage: Reduced to 3 points, down from 5. No longer increases agility, but instead increases your total expertise by 3/6/9. [was 3/6/9%, though that was probably a typo]
• [Warlock] Drain Soul: Each time Drain Soul deals damage to a target which can grant experience, it now has a chance to generate a Soul Shard

But hey, only some of us are lore nerds, and I’m sure a lot of you are here looking for some prime patch 3.1 gameplay and feature information, what with extended maintenance and said patch 3.1 going live today. Luckily, you’re in luck. You lucky person you. Expect loads of patch 3.1 information articles and roundups as the day progresses, including dual spec information and galleries showcasing the new sights and sounds of the new patch. it’s easy to see why I sometimes have a hard time convincing them of this fact, as I have spent the last few hours gushing about King Varian Wrynn to anyone who will listen and even a few people who won’t. Seriously, if you are in a place that allows the streaming of video and sound, you should watch the new Ulduar trailer. Varian is so amazing, I almost needed a change of pants after I finished watching.

In the meantime, you can start your reading with our official constantly updated Guide to Patch 3.1 and this roundup of some of the hottest news from the past week:

Dungeons, Items, Professions, and More

• Insider Trader looks at Patch 3.1.
• Ready Check is preparing for Ulduar’s Bosses.
• Speaking of Ulduar, who gets Valanyr anyway?
• Vaneras offers some clarity regarding Patch 3.1 Emblem drops. Of course, the explanation still doesn’t sit well with some.
• The Overachiever helps you go Insane in the Membrane.
• Time is Money discusses Auction House Basics.
• Allison discusses the lessons of pugging 25-man Naxxramas.
• The Blues are offering more teasing about old world phasing. Could this be hinting at new 3.2 content or an old world expansion?
  Read the rest of this entry »