Tipme

I noticed that they were changing some "Heavy" Agility items that are kind of geared toward Hunters.
Some noticeable ones are:

Band of Reanimation http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=10

Ring of the Godslayer http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=11

Cryptstalker Ring http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=1020

Prestor's Talisman http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=637

The Agility AQ40 ring http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=215

Band of Accuria http://www.thottbot.com/beta?i=660

I believe these item changes were to accompany the change about how Agility affects hunters now.

Well, Reanimation and Godslayer and Prestor's don't have Class: Hunter on them.
and, IMO, as a rogue, Reanimation is amazing. It beats Band of Unnatural Forces in my book. I will have to pick one up before expansion, you can call me an Agility whore. I might also have to go to MC that my guild pugs for a band of accuria.

All this being a setup for this question.
Why wasn't Bonescythe Ring changed? Because it's rogue only? I'd like to see it get an Attack power upgrade too!
Ring of the Unliving also remained unchanged, not meant for hunters?
The ring of reckoning from Nef remained unchanged, although more Stamina Heavy, it's still got agility! Some hunters out there use it.
Is blizzard deciding what "Hunter" items are? or were these last 3 items just not significant enough to be changed cause they aren't for hunters?

 

Pontiac

The mistake you're making is in thinking that Blizzard would go back and change all the items that a hunter might be using. There's no reason for that. What they ARE doing is changing the items that had high dps value to a hunter before the agility change, and low dps value afterwards. Archimonde's and the Ring of the Unliving were already low dps value rings by comparison, that a hunter would only take if stamina concerns were more important than dps. For that matter, reitemizing Archimonde's ring off Nef would make it LESS useful to warriors who like it as a stam-heavy tanking ring. They don't want AP, they want mitigation from parry and dodge.

What really blows my mind is the question regarding Bonescythe. Why on earth would Blizzard change a rogue ring when rogues didn't get their stats from itemization changed? If Blizz wanted the Bonescythe ring to have mixed Agility and AP on it, they'd have made it that way to begin with. They didn't want to then, and nothing has changed for rogues in the meantime. so why would they do it now?

 

Groglox

There are still other items that are clearly "hunter" but have not been changed. See: Ossirian's Binding, Vek'lor's gloves of devastation.

 

Impervious

Cryptstalker Ring's overall contributing attack power wasn't changed, so there's no reason for Bonescythe to be changed. 30 agi = 60 RAP before, now it's 20 agi + 40 AP
Any rogues or warriors that had the agi heavy items (Band of Accuria and Prestor's for the +hit, for example) got free upgrades

 

Maynard

I'd be a bit annoyed if a rogue took reanimation over me at this stage in the game. It'd just rot in their bank for three months whereas a hunter could help the guild progress with it. Definetly be worth picking up after the hunters have got one, mind you.

Probably because gear is, currently, Agi or AP, not both. I have no idea why they decided to make the two mutually exclusive, but currently they are. Cape of the Black Baron is the only exception that comes to mind.

 

ildon

Because they realized that the benefit to rogues and hunters was identical whether it was AP or AGI due to the cost of the points on the items, so rather than intentionally create weak items, they just only put AGI on them.

 

Silentness

Especially seeing how powerful Band of Accuria is already for rogues. +2 hit is no joke in regards to scaling with gear.

 

Haldane

...I think you meant "clearly Enhancement Shaman". Which might explain why they wouldn't have been changed.

 

Zagzil

Because now that they put AP/Agility on items again, it makes a drop off Kel'thuzad an extremely weak ring compared to other possibilities. It's about as good as the AQ Exalted Ring with those changes.

 

Andrise

If you think any item without +str or +AP is "clearly Enhancement Shaman," well, I don't know what to tell you...

 

Haldane

 

Lodfish

Exactly, the AQ40 exalted ring is now better. It has 2 more AP, 3 more Stam for only 2 less Agil. That will make a better pairing with the loatheb ring

 

Mist

I honestly believe they should go back and reitemize the rogue sets, if they're fixing all the hunter sets to work with their new mechanics. We didn't get new mechanics, but our armors were always shit compared to hunter tier 2 and 3 which are now mathematically perfect for their ilvl.

 

Pono

 

Xard

The exceptions are there, but mostly -very- rare, and of fairly low item level. However, because of the power of agi + Ap together, for both hunters and rogues before TBC, these items were universally wanted because of how good the stats were (see Bracers of the Eclipse, Cape of the Black Baron, etc. all comparing very well vs epics for their item level)

What doesn't make sense is to change it for one class but not for the other, retroactively, but then change it for both classes in the future. As it stands, hunters get ALL their gear reitemized to be very close to the rogue ideal, but rogues are still left with a huge number of items with either AGI and STR, or just pure AP. Obviously it doesn't take a genius to realize that +str for rogues is worth half as much as +ap, and yet we get a ton of strength, or in the case of pure AP we lose out due to non-linear ramping of stat costs. But in TBC, rogues and hunters will compete directly head to head on most accessories, and I'm sure a lot of hunters will find pieces of leather that they would like to wear because all the stats will be agi, ap, and stam.

While I do look forward to the changes in TBC, the complete worthlessness of my old gear due to the itemization changes (for pure dps even, not even talking about stamina) is a big downer.

 

Groglox

The difference being, with the mechanic changes, the fact our gear was reitemized means nothing, since our overall stats stay roughly the same (about 100 less ap on average from base agi loss), factor in new talents in marks and we are about where we were. If rogue sets were reitemized, it would be an across the board buff, for no real cost, and put rogues too far ahead of where they should be in regards to other classes.

 

Mist

I think you're underestimating the changes to hunter gear. You SHOULD come out way ahead, considering the fact that agility + AP on an item comes out to give you about 50% more benefit than just agility on said item. At the very least, hunters are getting a very huge buff to their melee ability for free. Literally HUNDREDS of points of melee AP for free.

 

Brunswick

While you are right that hunter's received a free melee buff, I doubt such an obvious product of these mechanics changes escaped Blizzard's notice. Beyond that your logic is unsound, because if rogues get retro-active reitemization, then why shouldn't [insert your favourite class here] get their gear changed.

Edit: Deleted my misinformed comment.

 

Elendril

eh? rogues and hunters will now want the exact same items since they have they value the same stats and have the same formulas. previously hunters JUST wanted agi, and AP wasn't optimal, so stuff like ring of the godslayer and band of reanimation went to us while qiraji fury rings and such go to rogues - similarly with prestor's talisman/barbed choker. the change will make hunters and rogues compete MORE for gear.

 

Tel

In all fairness, i see there being no real need for rogue items to be changed, ok hunters will get a minor buff at the expansion release, but realistically, how much difference is it going to make after a few weeks when you've replaced most of your T3 anyhow?

That being said, it does seem a little off that rogues like myself that have picked up 'hunter rings/necks' will receive a indirect buff at exp release.

(On another note, i cant seem to access new stats for band of accuria - a ring i currently use simply due to the fantastic scaling of +hit with gear, could someone possibly paste them here?)

 

◊ Lactose

Band of Accuria
Unique
Finger
+12 Agility
+10 Stamina
Requires Level 60
Equip: Increases your hit rating by 20.
Equip: Increases attack power by 16.

Look, Lactose, we'd rather you didn't eradicate the whole human race.
- Sam & Max

 

Brunswick

Yeah, I put that comment in the wrong context AND I was remembering stat values incorrectly.

Went back to read the other thread that touches on this by Eej on how hunter set gear was changed. After looking at that again, I can see why a rogue would like to see the same kind of TLC for their set gear.

 

Moridin

Um, no... are you purposfully ignoring all the facts and answers in order to make this fit your world view? If an item gave 0.5% crit and 50ap before the change, guess what, it'll give 0.5% crit and 50ap after the change, the benefit has _not_ been changed in any way shape or form (bar melee AP which is slightly up, but if that makes you all flustered I'm sure we can make them change rogue gear to be exactly like now, only with a slight ranged ap addition). Well, except it's not exactly the same of coruse, on the unchanged items (like agi melee weapons, agi enchants etc) we get slitghly more crit and lose 50% of our AP from them, same with base stats. The benefit from +agi totem and blessing of kings has also been reduced.

My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings,
Look on my Works ye Mighty, and despair!

 

Mem

True, but on the other hand, as a rogue/hunter you will enjoy a choice regarding class shared items. What I don't like about the agi change is the fact that my already rather low crit rate will suffer further. At the current point of itemization I tend to pick agi gear in order to set off my lack of crit since most rogue loot (except for T3) is relying heavily on to hit.

 

Astmathic

I think that the most simple answer is the correct one. I am a bit surprised that noone has thought of it.

Hunter stats has been changed so that 33 agi = 1 crit and 1 agi = 1 ap instead of the ~53 agi = 1 crit and 1 agi = 2 ap.

I think that they added the ap on the items just to make sure that hunters didn't get tons of crit suddenly for being highly agi itemized. I could be wrong though, but this seems to me as the most logical.