World of Warcraft has been causing low-level players some difficulties since the pre-patch – especially in dungeons. It has become too hard. Is the item squish to blame, or are the players just not handling it well?
Yesterday, Wednesday, the pre-patch 6.02 was also introduced here in Europe, and players logging in now are experiencing a sort of culture shock. Although it was known that the stats would be lower; a gem that only gives 10 strength still looks strange at first. The item squish is as hard as expected.
World of Warcraft with 6.02 suddenly harder than before
Sure, acclimatization difficulties were to be expected, but complaints arose that World of Warcraft has now become much harder. Players are wiping through 70 dungeons, having no chance to get through. While questing, players are dropping like flies, somehow lacking the firepower. Is it just a placebo effect? No, it is not.
Somewhere in the complicated balance of the game, mistakes have crept in that make World of Warcraft significantly harder, especially at low levels. Where two casts were enough for an enemy the day before yesterday, now it takes significantly more. “It’s great,” some say, “finally you need skill again! Blizzard must have thought this through!” No, they didn’t.
Especially low-level dungeons become death traps in World of Warcraft
Late on Wednesday night, a hotfix was announced in the official forum. Shortly thereafter, the lead designer of the expansion, Ion “Watcher” Hazzikostas, also explained the problems. It is not only the item squish that is to blame for the difficulties. With 6.02, three changes were implemented:
- The aforementioned item squish from level 60 into the Mists of Pandaria dungeons has flattened the item curve.
- The doubling of player HP to compensate for the removal of resilience from the game.
- Changes in base spell damage to improve scaling in the future.
In combination, these three effects are causing balancing difficulties that were not planned.
Players who found difficulties in the leveling area, especially in dungeons, are therefore not suffering from any kind of illusion or acute noobism, but from a bug. At the moment, Blizzard is already working on a hotfix that is expected to be deployed within a day and will require a server restart.
