10:15pm EST: Patch is now downloading. It is 667MB file size bringing build 8788 up to 3.0.1.8820. Level cap increased to 80.

Jeff “Kaplan” Tigole: The level cap will be 80. Storm Peaks will be available. Icecrown is still unavailable.

We’ll also make the following dungeons available:

  • Halls of Lightning
  • Halls of Stone
  • Caverns of Time: Stratholme
  • The Occulus
  • Utgarde Pinnacle
  • Heroic: The Nexus (No attunement necessary—just get level 80)

Gundrak and Ahn’kahet: The Old Kingdom almost made this patch but there were a few issues which held them back. Also, we sped up the leveling curve from 70-80. We’re still dialing in the leveling speed so feedback is appreciated.

Premades will be available at a later date and on a different server.

UNDOCUMENTED CHANGES (Source)

Mage
– Mage frostbolt is now back to normal size

Warrior
– Unbreakable Armor cooldown reduced from 2 min to 1, now increases str by 10%.
– Shield Break removed, new ability appears to be NYI
– Titan’s Grip hass been bumped down one tier and is only 1 point now. And no speed penalty it appears. So it’s been buffed.

Paladin
– Paladin Concentration Aura: All party or raid members within 30yrds lose 35% less casting or channeling time when damaged.
– Judgements no longer do any damage (bugged)

Druid
– Rampage heavily reworked – now causes you to give a 5% crit buff to nearby party members on crit.
– Ferocious Bite damage slightly increased.
– Swipe now hits 4 targets.
– Savage Roar now increases attack power 40% and lasts 14/19/24/29/34 sec depending on how many combo points you have up. (Previously 35% attack power and 9/12/15/18/21 sec)
– Feral Charge (Cat) now makes you jump through the air towards your target much faster than before.

Death Knight Changes: (will add as I find more)

– Some or all death knights now have a green diseased “glow”
– Death Knight: Death Grip removed
– Blood Aura changed – All affected party/raid members are healed for 1% of the damage they deal.
– Anti-Magic Zone has a new icon.
– Death Strike buffed, now heals even without diseases if it is a killing blow.
– Frost Strike RP cost reduced to 40.
– Runic Power Mastery now increases max RP by 10 per rank
– Wandering Plague (DK Unholy talent) now gives a chance equal to your crit chance to cause aoe damage and cause double damage from the disease.
– Icy Touch damage buffed by ~15%, Frost Fever duration reduced.
– Frost Aura back to magic resistance
– Heart Strike has a new icon.
– Summon Gargoyle’s cooldown reduced from 5 to 3 minutes.
– Unholy Aura buffed but no longer stacks with similar effects.
– New animation and graphic for chains of ice.
– Changing prescence does not seem to give you the buff for your prescence, although you do receive the intended effect.
– Death Knight can learn new aura that allows water walking by freezing its path. Works while mounting.
– Having a temporary pet ghoul seems to be listed under your portrait ala Shaman totem instead of a buff now.
-Looks as if bloodworms got nerfed again, to only 9% proc at maxed talent.
-Icy Touch has a new debuff icon. (not sure what was bad about the last one.)
-Plague Strike’s debuff is now called “Blood Plague” and has a different debuff icon.
Windfury and other shaman self-weapon buffs can no longer be applied to any of our weapons. (bug?)

Other:

-Zul’Drak now has it’s very own music
-The Violet Hold now requires a key to allow entry
– Antonidas has a Statue now at the Antonidas memorial in Dalaran.
– The cupcake/pie vendor in Dalaran has changed titles again to

and now sells pies and cakes.
– Big statue near the flight master in Dalaran
– New Blacksmith recipes in Dalaran
– New Grand Master Engineering recipes including Porta-Mailbox
– Thunder Capacitor has a new icon. its damage has been buffed up to 1181 – 1371. It also appears to be broken, the charges won’t stack past 1.
– Badges of Justice no longer appear in your bank or bag. You can find them under Miscelaneous tab.
-The quest: “The Jig Is Up” to kill Jonah Sterling has been fixed, and is very easy to solo.
-The flight path map now looks like an actual blank continent instead of a huuuge mini-map.
-No female taunka yet. At least not in Camp Winterhoof.
– New Howling Fjord music? Definitely hearing music i’ve never heard before, while questing outside of Camp Winterhoof, before all I heard was the damn braveheart music over and over, this new one is more melodic.
– The emote /cower will keep your character cowering until he moves now, instead of a very brief cower emote the character would perform pre-patch.
– Upon right-clicking any player’s portrait, you now are given the option to “set focus” as an option at the top.
– The addon “Autoprofit” works again, you can once again sell all your junk in one click. Woohoo!
-Some have reported that Badges of Justice have been taken out of player inventory, and added to the token menu, other players seem to not have full access to the token menu yet.
-Enemy cast bars now work correctly.
-Upon running back to your corpse when dieing, your corpse is not marked with a gray slab or a brown coffin anymore, but a red flag with a yellow ‘!’ on it.
-Barber Shops work as intended now.
-Paladins seem to be complaining that their abilities aren’t effectively damaging, tanking, or healing anything. Not sure what’s different there.
-The Kalu’ak (walrus people) have been given voices, and their disposition is…. fishy.
– There are Silver Covenant NPC’s at the outpost in Crystalsong along with a non-functional flight master
– You can no longer inspect a member of the opposing force. No more checking on Allies to see what specc they are if you are the Horde.
– Malmortis quest is fixed
– Mounting in major cities is now fixed
– Halls of Stone and Halls of Lightning are now in Storm Peaks, no more teleporter at Violet Citadel in Dalaran
– Talbuk graphics fixed

9pm EST: All beta testers should know that the beta servers are currently down.  Blizzard is about to unleash a new build.  From what could be watched in the Gamona interview video at Leipzig today, rumor is the level cap will be risen to 80.  More details or confirmation once servers are back up. Make sure to visit Blizzplanet for any updates.—read more.

Gradina: We will be taking down the Beta realms at 2:30PM Pacific time today August 21th 2008 to update to the latest build.

We expect this process to take from six to eight hours.

Thank you for your patience!