Season 4 of WoW Dragonflight is now live: an overview of all the important new features

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The fourth season of the latest WoW add-on starts today and brings a whole host of changes to the game. We summarize the most important things

2024 The next big addon for World of Warcraft is already in the starting blocks, but until The War Within is released, you can still let off steam in Dragonflight . The addon enters its fourth season today and brings a whole host of new features to the game, big and small.

We’ll give you a brief overview of everything that has changed. Our colleagues from MeinMMO will tell you what you should tackle first, especially today.

Start times: When did Season 4 start?

Season 4 of Dragonflight officially started on April 24, 2024 If you want to take a look, you should have plenty of time to do so. As a rule, a World of Warcraft season always lasts around six months. For Season 4, this will also depend entirely on when The War Within actually starts

 

The most important contents of Season 4

Since Season 4 is the final season of Dragonflight, Blizzard is firing on all cylinders once again and is pushing the difficulty level up considerably. It is therefore a so-called fateful season, as we know it from Shadowlands, for example. This affects raid instances in the expansion:

  • Every two weeks, a Dragonflight raid is awakened. The respective raid then comes up with even more powerful enemies and even more valuable loot. This is how the raids rotate:
    • Week 1 & 2: Vault of Incarnations
    • Week 3 & 4: Aberrus, Crucible of Shadows
    • Week 5 & 6: Amirdrassil, Hope of the Dream
    • Week 7+: All raids are awakened
  • When you play a raid during the season, you can earn level badges and exchange them for new set items. A novelty of Season 4 was that the community decided on the sets themselves.
  • Those who take on awakened bosses during Season 4 can earn an Ancient Bronze Ingot each week by defeating them. You can then exchange the ingots for weapons or the mount Jigglesworth.
  • The item level is increased, but you can also use special scales of awakening to upgrade legendary items.
  • The dungeon system in the endgame has been fundamentally revised. Essentially, not so many difficulty levels will no longer be relevant, instead everything will be a little earlier, a little harder. For example, the timer for mythic keystone dungeons has been removed and the heroic difficulty level has been raised to the previous level of Mythic 0. This continues right through to Mythic+.

Further changes to the game can be found in the official patch notes on the second page of this article. These include adjustments to many classes, changes to the dungeons and raids as well as specific changes to PvP. The corresponding patch 10.2.6. was already installed on April 21.

The patch notes

CLASSES

Developer’s note: In Season 4, we are reducing the overall power of some healers to better meet our customization goals and increase the comparative effectiveness of Holy Paladins, Preservation Callers, and Holy Priests without further increasing the abilities of healers.

  • DRUID
    • Restoration
      • All healing done is reduced by 5 %. This change does not apply to PvP situations.
  • MONK
    • fog caster
      • All healing done is reduced by 13 %. This change does not apply to PvP situations.
  • PRIEST
    • Discipline
      • Developer’s note: As part of our goal to improve the balance of healers in raids, we would like to reduce raid healing for Discipline Priests without impacting other content.
      • ‘Apology’ now converts 35 % of damage to healing (was 40 %).
      • Penance’s healing outside of raids is increased by 70 % (up from 50 %).
  • SHAMAN
    • Restoration
      • All healing done is reduced by 5 %. This change does not apply to PvP situations.

DUNGEONS AND RAIDS

  • RAIDBROWSER
    • Resurrection spells that can be cast in combat now use the same split-charge system as other raid difficulties on Raid Browser difficulty.
    • Groups tackling Raid Browser difficulty will now begin combat with six charges for Resurrection spells that can be cast in combat, gaining a charge every 90-150 sec depending on group size.
  • ABERRUS, CRUCIBLE OF SHADOWS
    • Echo of Neltharion
      • ‘Volcanic Heart’ now targets 4&nbspplayers on Mythic difficulty (was 5).
  • VAULTS OF THE INCARNATIONS
    • Raszageth
      • Hurricane Swing’s knockback power has been reduced by 10 % on all difficulties.
      • Increased the cast time of Lightning Devastation to 4 sec (was 3 sec).
      • Flame Shield has been reduced by 23 %.
      • Reduced the healing absorption of Shattering Shell by 20 %.
  • TWILIGHT OF THE ETERNAL: HARD MODE
    • Twilight of the Eternal: Hard Mode has been optimized and rewards have been updated accordingly.
    • Hard Mode has no timer and rewards heroes with an item from the Heroic track. Hard mode is intended to be more challenging than the dungeon’s normal Mythic difficulty.
  • ACADEMY OF ALGETH’AR
    • General
      • ‘Arcane Rain’ of the enchanted scepter has been removed.
        Enchanted Scepter’s
      • ‘Mystic Strike’ can no longer be interrupted.
      • Spectral Herald’s Arcane Bolts damage has been reduced by 50 %.
    • Encounters
      • Kraas
        • Reduced the frequency of Firestorm to 8 sec (was 5 sec).
        • The initial damage of Wild Pick has been reduced by 13 %.
        • Regular damage of Wild Pick has been reduced by 33 %.
        • Fixed an issue that could cause Deafening Shriek to be removed after being interrupted.
      • Vexamus
        • The regular damage of Mana Bomb has been reduced by 20 %.
        • There is now a small delay before Corrupted Mana deals damage to players within the area of effect.
      • Echo of Doragosa
        • New Mythic Mechanic: Unleash Energy – The Echo of Doragosa fires powerful arcane energy, causing all player characters to take arcane damage and opening an Arcane Rift at several nearby locations.
        • The cast time of Astral Breath has been increased to 3 sec (was 2 sec).
  • THE AZURE VAULT
    • General
      • The timer for Mythic+ has been extended by 2 min.
      • Crystal Fury
        • Piercing Shard now has a pre-spell effect.
        • The impact range of Stinging Shard has been reduced by 25 %.
      • Summoned Whip’s Mystic Vapors are now cast less frequently.
      • The cast time of Arcane Cultivator’s Moody Growth has been increased to 3.5 sec (was 2.5 sec).
      • Unstable Curator’s Heavy Tome is now cast less frequently.
      • Breaker of the Draconids
        • Removed the knockback from Shoulder Smash.
        • Shoulder Smash now deals physical damage and increases physical damage taken by 10 %.
        • Shoulder Slam is now cast less frequently.
    • Encounters
      • Leymor
        • ‘Breaking Rift’ now follows the currently targeted player character.
      • Azure Blade
        • ‘Overwhelming Energy’ now only deals periodic damage every 2.5 sec (was 2 sec).
      • Umbrelskul
        • ‘Crushing Miasma’ has been removed from Mythic difficulty.
        • ‘Crystallize’ now pulses with Arcane damage while the crystal is shielded.
        • The Crackling Vortex now has a larger movement radius.
        • Detonating Crystals and the Hardened Crystal now appear closer to Umbrelskul’s location.
        • Fixed an issue where detonating crystals were not appearing.
  • BRACKENFELLCAVE
    • General
      • Weakening ‘Siechen’
        • is no longer stackable.
        • Regular damage has been reduced by 16 %.
        • The speed reduction has been increased to 10 % (was 2 %).
        • Movement speed reduction has been increased to 10 % (was 2 %).
      • Purulent Decay Singer
        • The health of the Totem of Decay has been reduced by 20 %.
        • Fixed a bug that caused Siege cast from a Totem of Decay to deal more regular damage than Siege from other sources.
      • Foulbow Stalker
        • Renamed Rot Bow Ranger.
        • ‘Shooting’ now has a cooldown of 6 sec.
        • ‘Contaminated Flesh’ has been renamed to ‘Rotten Flesh’ and now dispels poison.
      • Former of Brackenfell, Summon Whip, and Touch of Decay have been removed.
      • Stinkbreath
        • Reduced the radius of Fierce Whirlwind to 6 meters (was 7 meters).
        • Stinking Breath now sets alignment when targeting a player character.
          Stink Breath now has a visual effect when cast.
      • Wilting oak
        • The visual effect of casting Necrotic Breath has been updated.
        • Adjusted the width of Necrotic Breath’s cone to match the new visual effect.
      • Removed the Organ Stabber’s Withering Poison.
      • ‘Bloody Bite’ of the Brackish War Scourge has been removed.
        Removed
      • ‘Bloody Bite’ from the Clawfighter.
      • Removed the Rot Speaker’s rot-calling totem.
    • Encounters
      • Hackklaue’s warband
        • Robbery Instincts’ speed bonus has been reduced to 5 % (was 10 %).
        • Marked for Slaughter damage frequency has been increased to 1 sec (was 0.5 sec).
        • Rattling Frenzy damage reduced by 21 %.
        • Rattling Frenzy duration reduced to 15 sec (was 45 sec).
  • HALLS OF INFUSION
    • General
      • A dungeon checkpoint has been added after defeating the slithering Goliath.
      • Normalized the appearance rate of the incoming tsunami during the gauntlet.
      • ‘Containment Beam’ from containment devices deals 42 % less damage.
      • Primalist Stormsinger
        • ‘Gust of Wind’ and ‘Thunderstorm’ have been removed.
        • New ability: ‘Thunderclap’ – Deals Nature damage to all player characters within 7 meters of the impact.
      • The visual edge effect of Primalist Earthshaker’s Shaking Earth no longer disappears into terrain.
    • Encounters
      • Guardian Irideus
        • ‘Titan’s Fist’ now has a visual effect when cast.
        • ‘Energy Overload’ now has a visual edge effect around the affected player character.
        • ‘Energy Field’ now gradually grows to its full size.
      • Khajin the Indomitable
        • Added visual edge effects for ‘Ice Chunks’ that will trigger ‘Avalanche’.
      • Urtificial Tsunami
        • ‘Cast Out’ is now triggered at 60 % health (previously 100 % energy).
  • NELTHARUS
    • General
      • Each burning chain can only be used once.
      • The burning chain now stuns all enemies within range and increases their damage taken by 50 % for 5 sec.
    • Encounters
      • Chargath
        • Removed the damage pulses from Fiery Focus near Chargath.
        • Fiery Focus now channels damage to the current target.
        • ‘Shackle Chain’ now lasts on defeated player characters.
        • Chain of Shackles now causes a small knockback when the effect is applied to a player character.
      • Warlord Sargha
        • ‘Curse of the Dragon’s Hoard’ is now stackable.
        • Curse of the Dragon’s Hoard duration reduced to 30 sec (was 5 min).
        • Removed Azure Stone of Power.
  • THE ATTACK OF THE NOKHUD
    • General
      • Longbow of the Nokhud
        • ‘Multiple shot’ has been removed.
        • Rain of Arrows is now cast less frequently.
      • Nokhud Beastmaster’s Hunt Prey damage bonus has been reduced by 25 %.
      • Defiled Ohuna’s Foul Wind initial damage has been reduced by 30 %.
      • Ukhel Beastcaller’s Desecrating Roar frequency has been reduced by 25 %.
      • Removed Thunderfist of the Nokhud’s Storm Shock.
        Removed
      • ‘Storm Lightning’ from the Primalist Storm Speaker.
    • Encounters
      • Balakar Khan
        • ‘Storm Winds’ is now only triggered every 10 sec. during the interruption (previously every 6 sec.).
  • RUBIN LIFE BASIN
    • General
      • ‘Stone floor’ of the primeval terra guardian has been removed.
      • Primalist Flame Dancer
        • ‘Conflagration’ now has a 1 sec delay before dealing damage around the caster.
        • Damage at the end of channeling Flame Dance has been reduced by 25 %.
    • Encounters
      • Kyrakka and Erkhart Sturmader
        • Inferno Core duration increased to 4 sec (was 3 sec).
        • Inferno Core’s regular damage has been reduced by 25 %.
        • The number of targets of Flame Spit has been reduced to 2 (was 3).
  • ULDAMAN: LEGACY OF TYR
    • General
      • The timer for Mythic+ has been shortened by 1 minute.
    • Encounters
      • The Lost Dwarves
        • Fiery Surge damage reduced by 75 %.
        • Significantly reduced the frequency of Fiery Surge by 33 % for one dwarf, 50 % for two dwarves, and 100 % for three dwarves.
        • The maximum radius of Burning Pitch has been reduced to 6 meters (was 10 meters).
        • Fiery Surge and Burning Pinch now scale correctly with the Keystone level.
        • Fixed an issue that caused Heavy Arrow to damage pets.
      • Shieldguard Kralldras
        • The initial damage of Earthen Shard has been reduced by 20 %.
        • The regular damage of Earthen Shard has been reduced by 12.5 %.
      • Ascheron
        • Reduced the duration of Burning Heat to 6 sec (was 10 sec).
        • Adjusted the visual effect of Seeker’s Flame to no longer disappear into the terrain.

PVP

  • Honor gained in the Lightning Battlefield Brawl now counts towards the PvP track in the Great Treasury.
  • MONK
    • Mistcaster
      • The healing conversion of Ancient Teachings has been reduced to 375 % in PvP (was 412 %).
  • PRIEST
    • Discipline
      • In PvP, the healing of Apology has been increased by 35 % (up from 15 %).