Last week's announcement about the upcoming changes to the character stat system was a welcome surprise, but it left many players with more questions than they originally had.
Another new Cataclysm mechanic that players are asking about is Reforging, which allows players to "convert one stat to 50 percent of another stat". Not every conversion will be allowed (like Stamina to Strength), but it's meant to add another layer of customization to gear. In response to several questions about mechanics of Reforging items for more-appealing stats, Ghostcrawler finally revealed some important details.
"Think of reforging like enchants," he said. "It's not that you take a piece of gear and turn it into whatever you want. You pick up specific scrolls with specific conversions." He continued to explain that not every type of stat conversion will be available. "Rest assured that we're not going to promote a system where Prot paladins want dps plate for tanking more than tanking plate," he said. "Part of all of these changes is to discourage behavior like that. We don't want to recreate it immediately in a different form."
In last week's announcement, we also learned that it will be tougher to max-out combat ratings—like Crit and Hit—in Cataclysm. Players are still trying to figure out how the new system will affect a player's ability to hit higher-level enemies—and apparently, Blizzard isn't sure yet. "We’re not sure yet how bosses will 'level up' in subsequent tiers," Eyonix said in this post. "The general idea is that currently you need a specific amount of hit and after that hit becomes worthless even though more hit goes onto higher level gear. Furthermore it creates odd balance problems when you are critting and avoiding the most powerful bosses by more than you did the earliest bosses (because your gear keeps getting better while they just get more health and damage)."
Blizzard fielded several other "one-off" questions regarding specific classes, abilities or game mechanics. On the European forums, Blizzard poster Wryxian replied to "What happens to the weapon skill achievements?" by saying that achievements like Did Somebody Order a Knuckle Sandwich? "may well become candidates for Feats of Strength," but we won't know for sure until later. Mages are wondering if they'll still be able to create food and water for their lowbie friends when their spell ranks are removed, but Eyonix still doesn’t know how buffing and handing out food/water to lower-level players will work.
Warlocks are a little curious about Spirit changing to a pure-healer stat; what happens to the damage increase that Spirit provided via Fel Armor and other benefits, such as Life Tap? Eyonix confirms that Warlocks won't rely on it in Cataclysm because of the stat redesign. In another post, he tries to clear up similar questions by summarizing the issue; "I would remind players who are focusing on individual talents and abilities to remember that we're going to be doing a major redesign on all talent trees," he said. "So fear not, these changes are meant to work in conjunction with the design of each class come Cataclysm."
There are big plans for World of Warcraft just over the horizon, so it's no surprise that players are anxious to learn the details. When the developers announce fundamental changes to a game that many fans have played for half a decade, apprehension is only natural. About halfway through a couple thousand replies, Eyonix tried to put things into perspective.
"We're announcing these changes now to pave the way for other information to come," he said. "It's important that people don't freak out. We're not going to break your class—though there will be many changes to the game—ones we believe are positive changes. For now we ask that you just digest the information, try and absorb it, and wait for more specific class information to release before you scream that the sky is falling."
