Beta patch notes, digested

All classes

• Respec costs 1 silver for the rest of the beta if you have not reset talents in the last hour. The first reset after a change costs more, then it drops back to 1 silver after an hour.

Druid

• Rejuvenation, Tranquility and Wild Growth can now land critical hits.
• Wrath base damage up about 50%.
• Thorns now scales with the caster's spell power and falls back to base values when the caster is gone or far away.
• Mangle is now Primal Bite; its debuff is gone, and every talent that named Mangle names Primal Bite. Primal Fury is Blood Frenzy again, with the old icon.
• Feral Charge (Cat) can no longer be cast on allies.

Hunter

• Furious Howl's attack power bonus is down 40%. Bats now get Sonic Blast. Tame Beast fails on beasts above your level.
• Untalenting Lone Wolf no longer leaves a 4% damage penalty while a pet is out.
• Lacerating Strikes can crit. Strider Kick now gives 30% movement speed for 3 sec.

Mage

• Arcane Missiles checks line of sight once, when the channel starts, so a target stepping out of sight no longer stops the missiles.
• Wake of Fire lasts 30 sec (was 20). Hot Streak lasts 20 sec (was 15). Ignite no longer double-dips on percentage damage modifiers.

Paladin

• Retribution Aura scales with spell power. Consecration fixes: its damage bonus applies to every target and it no longer reaches or pulls targets above or below the caster.
• Holy Strike does 25/29/32/36/39/43/46/50% weapon damage by rank (was 25/25/30/30/35/35/40/40%), so every new rank is an upgrade. Echo of Justice proc chance corrected. Righteous Fury adds 60% Holy threat (was 90%).
• Holy: Holy Strike's cooldown is 10 sec for everyone (was 12), Improved Holy Strike leaves the tree, Holy Power adds 15% crit chance to Holy Strike on top of its old effects, and Light's Vigil's tooltip is clearer about which version refunds mana.
• Retribution: Vengeance triggers on non-periodic crits and caps at 3 stacks (was 5). Two-Handed Weapon Specialization is 2/4/6% (was 3/6/9%). Sacred Arbiter raises Holy Strike damage 20% (was 10%). Twist of Light also cuts Seal mana costs by 20%.

Priest

• Renew can crit. Power Word: Shield overwrites an existing shield on a target without Weakened Soul.
• Gnome: Contingency Plan can crit; Confounding Flash has a Holy cast visual and new sounds. Night Elf: Starshards gains pushback resistance from Twilight Focus. Undead: Dark Sacrifice no longer breaks crowd control and its tooltip says the mana scales with Spirit.

Rogue

• Sap on a PvP-flagged target now flags the Rogue.

Shaman

• Lightning Bolt ranks 3 and 4 do more damage, so they are upgrades despite their longer cast times.
• Totems: Windfury and Flametongue Totem buffs carry the totem's name. Flametongue Totem has no duration, is replaced by the next totem, no longer stacks with itself, with Flametongue Weapon or with Windfury Totem. Tranquil Air, Windfury and Grace of Air totems no longer stack across Shamans.
• Elemental: Elemental Fury (row 3) and Elemental Alacrity (row 6) trade places, so the cast-speed talent comes early. Lava Burst ranks 1 and 2 do about 10% more base damage than the Lightning Bolt learned at the same level.
• Enhancement: Rage of the Far Seer no longer speeds up spell casting. Restoration: Riptide can crit.

Warlock

• Life Tap's tooltip shows the real amount converted and says it scales with Spirit. Voidwalker Sacrifice scales with 10% of the Warlock's spell healing.

Warrior

• Sunder Armor threat corrected on every rank, with a small increase from attack power.
• Protection: Bastion (row 5) and Focused Rage (row 6) swap places so Focused Rage comes before Shield Slam.
• Arms: Bloodthrill procs 4/8/12/16/20% (was 2/4/6/8/10%) and only from main-hand attacks, Cleave and Heroic Strike included. Slam's cooldown is 18 sec (was 15); Improved Slam cuts it by 1.5/3 sec.

Races

• Gnome: Eureka! is a 10% discount on Mana, Rage or Energy abilities for every class.
• Human: Will to Survive's visual now matches Dispel Magic. Tauren: Cultivation needs a character level of each herb's Herbalism requirement divided by 5; herbs above 300 skill grow at 60.
• Undead: Touch of the Grave only fires from effects with a damage part and no longer breaks crowd control: Shadow Word: Pain triggers it on cast but not per tick; Distract, Pick Pocket and Polymorph never trigger it.

Cooldown Manager and gamepad

• The Cooldown Manager lifts important cooldowns and buffs into a movable frame. Off by default (Options, Gameplay Enhancement); Druid, Mage, Priest, Warrior and Warlock can test it, more classes later. It does not track spell ranks yet. Blizzard wants to hear which spells should be tracked by default.
• Gamepad: shapeshift, pet, aura and stance flyouts on the action bar; the pet bar no longer replaces the bottom bar; new options for a compact action bar, fixed party targeting and swapping the targeting sides.

Items and quests

• Some guns and bows were not using ammunition; they do now. Quest reward item levels corrected, a few early caster rewards adjusted. Minor, Lesser and plain Wizard Oil are back at Classic's 8, 16 and 24 spell power; Brilliant is unchanged. Wands no longer gain damage from spell power.
• Twenty-odd quest fixes across Dun Morogh, Durotar, Elwynn Forest, Mulgore, Silverpine, Teldrassil, Westfall, Undercity and Zephras Isle, mostly respawn times and drop rates. Khonsu's arrival in Silithus is out of the beta and returns later.

Known issues new to this build

• Cooldown Manager gaps: banes and curses lose tracking on retarget, Healthstone, Arcane Blast, pet cooldowns and weapon enchants cannot be tracked, Priest tracks everything by default, the mana gem needs another cast first. Changing party composition can move you to another world instance. The Stormwind minimap misdraws. The Personal Resource Display shows no combo points.

Read against the site on 28 Sep 2026. The post is the source; this is the digest.

Still open on 24 September

• Barber chairs throw a Lua error; character friends are disabled in the beta; the minimap can sit partly off screen; the character pane hides level, class and titles.
• Pets: mana, health-from-Stamina, hit and expertise on the pet sheet do not show the master's scaling; movement speed shows wrong base values.
• Glancing blows: caster chance and penalty wrong at every level; melee penalty wrong against higher-level targets, so the sheet's glancing numbers are off.
• Opening the Legacy window with Y before level 25 throws Lua errors on two tabs. Guild charters can be handed in unsigned as a workaround. Bear Form multiplies consumable and buff armor. Queueing Heroic Strike, Cleave or Raptor Strike disables the spell queue window. Arcane Missiles fires a full-damage bolt when you take damage while channeling. Resurrection sickness lasts the wrong time at low levels. The Cooldown Manager is unfinished and varies by class.

Read against the site on 28 Sep 2026. The post is the source; this is the digest.