** Note: feel free to 'heap this if it's not seen as valuable or pertinent. **

As I've read EJ forums in the last few days, something that has struck me as a potential shift in encounter mechanics and strat-crafting is the issues of quickly shifting aggro. Boss design has already changed drastically in vanilla WoW from the early days of MC and Ony all the way through Naxx. We've seen endless variations on tank n' spank, with a few exceptional (and typically very fun) fights that flip this on its head. Grand Widow, Twin Emps, and other fights come to mind. The bottom line is, however, that maintaining aggro for a tank has always been a fairly simple numbers contest that involved using threat-building skills in some fashion that outpaced the rapidly building aggro of the dps and healers.

Rogues, Hunters, and Priests have cooldown skills that affect this. I know I'm preaching to the choir at the moment and we all know this information, but there's a point here.

As I've reviewed TBC items and skills, I'm being struck by the potential massive shifts in aggro that can be possible and the ways that min-maxers can use these things to their advantage. Correct me if I'm wrong, but thus far, I've seen multiple trinkets, a cloak or two, new spells, and even a POTION that 'reduces threat to enemies within 30 yards, making them less likely to attack you.'

Maybe I'm a crap theorycrafter, but is the underlying spell behind all of these items and skills the same? If so, are stacks of it multiplicative? Does it work like fade and not actually change the user's status on the hate list but rather temporarily decrease it in a fashion not unlike a mirror of taunt? Would it be viable to work potential builds around a more all-out DPS mentality while expecting that chain-use of these multiple 'threat reduction' items will see through any gaps?

Perhaps a derail, but I'd also like input on threat generation in TBC and how it's potentially changed. I already know from the previous threads on building aggression that we've moved far beyond pull -> 5x sunder -> shieldslamspam -> taunt/MBlow in emergencies as a viable method to keep nasties whacking on the MT. What changes about hate generation techniques in the expansion? Any information available from skilled tanks on anything (if anything) that they do differently in beta, would be pertinent.

I suppose this is nearly a dual-topic thread. What I'm aiming at is to find out how we'll change our thinking on the high end of aggro (the tanks) and how they will keep things focused on them in expansion, and the low end of aggro (everyone else) and how they will keep things -off- them in expansion. We have a set way of doing all of this in vanilla WoW. How will itemization specifically focused (it seems) on threat reduction affect this? Or am I making the molehill a mountain and need to realize that Blizzard won't change encounter design dramatically dependent on these threat reduction skills/spells/items?

These types of abilities (such as the Grace of Earth trinket, and all of the new ones that I've been able to coax from thott) are just a flat -threat modifier on all nearby targets when you use them, for example:

http://www.thottbot.com/beta?sp=33486

This obviously means there is nothing to multiply, so we're stucky with a lowly additive effect, although it is permanent.

Its usefulness would highly depend on the type of fights in TBC, but I can't see much coming of it - most of these effects are on the order of 1k or less, which a rogue can presently do in a couple of seconds without even trying particularly hard, and have a long cooldown.

Bottom line = I've overestimated the impact of these changes, and they're more gimmicky than useful?

Oh well, back to the drawing board and hoping that Blizzard changes other aspects of encounter design rather than what could have been cool, an elegant tweaking of threat modification techniques that players use to change the dynamics of otherwise boring fights. QQ.

Well, you can see that mages got a harsh nerf to their subtelty, warlocks and hunters gained a subtelty, and every pure dps class now has an aggro wipe. Combined with every faction having access to BoS, I'd imagine we can see pre-nerf BWL type mechanics again such as a boss with constant tank switches (pre-nerf drakes/chromag/broodlord) with pseudo-timers via aggro threshold (only so much time before the healers get on top of the hate list).

The down side to this, however, is that enhancement shaman still suffer horrible aggro problems and dps warriors will be forever aggro capped. Things like the Fankriss/Thaddius trinket, however, scale and are multiplicative in regards to BoS/Subtelty talents. I wonder if these trinkets will be still used at level 70.

Mmmm.

Yes and no.

Bear in mind (as had been said a number of times now) that both Horde and alliance will have BoS plus Tranquil Air totems in TBC. Both factions are equal in threat reduction and the encounter designers are no longer tied to balancing threat for the Horde (who had the worst threat-reduction abilities).

I agree that a snap-change in threat from all these new items seems unlikely. But do not denigrate them, because we may now see encounters with strange threat-mechanics.

For instance, an encounter where certain mobs self-buff to take increased threat from ranged atacks. Or from healing.

How about a mob that turns dead people into minions (like Emeriss) but tries to do the same to people who Feign Death and gets really,really mad when it turns out they are faking. or one that has an irrational dislike of stealth manoevres.

Just pulling concepts out of the air here, but the *point* is that all these new anti-threat things may be more useful in TBC than experience so far may suggest.

There is also the little thing to consider which is Paladin and druid tanking.

If there's a really threat intensive encounter the best solution may likely be to get a feral druid and load him up with attack power and crit boost buffs. This isn't done now due to mitigation differences (though a guild has used a druid to tank Thaddius and he held aggro through repeated five digit ignites thanks to druid abilities getting threat boosts from damage boosts)

I admit to having no clue about the threat generation of an expansion paladin.

I don't know of any testing for threat values on devastate. It's certainly possible.

Edit: It doesn't sound like it currently, though of course it could change

http://beta.worldofwarcraft.com/thre...d=370105&sid=1

I was told in Alpha that the potion you are referring to (the recipe is purchaseable with Exalted with the Sporregar) is not "Fade in a Bottle" but "Blessing of Salvation in a Bottle" that lasts a full hour and stacks with BoS and Tranquil Air.

The problem is, that these effects are very, very small - popping the hypnotist watch trinket, for example, gives a rogue not even a single special worth of threat reduction, once every 5 minutes. Unless these trinkets scale up a lot by you get to the high-end ones, a fight where a handful of specials over 5 or 10 minutes make a difference would need some extremely contrived aggro mechanics - to the extent where these trinkets would probably end up being an outright requirement, rather than a bonus, which I think would be something Blizzard wouldn't like.

Edit:

Assuming this is the only potion like it: http://www.thottbot.com/beta?sp=28548 then it is a fixed amount aggro reduction, similar to the other abilities. Perhaps it got nerfed?

I thought swipe was being improved in the expansion - hit me if you've heard it before, but is the AP modifier terrible and/or is the threat mod from it purely additive?

With about 900-1000 Bear AP, it was doing about 2-2.5 damage swipe does for me currently. All testing of current swipe puts it at damage *1.75*bear*feral instinct for threat. I'm not certain whether this has changed in beta.

The interesting one for bears will be lacerate. I haven't seen any testing done on this yet, but hopefully within the next week I'll be able to coerce someone into testing this with me.