In an unexpected turn of events, the latest patch 3.2 build on the PTR is giving Val’anyr a buff, and something of a nerf to accompany it. If you didn’t see it in the official notes, here’s the detail regarding Val’anyr before I dig into it:

• Val’anyr, Hammer of Ancient Kings: This item’s stats and level have been increased to match the power level of healer weapons coming from the Coliseum 25-person normal difficulty instance. In addition, each time Val’anyr is equipped, Blessing of Ancient Kings will be placed on a 45-second cooldown before it can occur.

Well, now! What is this? Blizzard scaling up a Legendary? Unheard of… until now! You could call it a pleasant surprise, but it’s more pleasant than surprising. Val’anyr’s raw stats were never very impressive. In fact, when the weapon stats were first revealed, a lot of people were rather underwhelmed! The proc is downright incredible, enough to give it more longevity than you’d ever expect, but the stats themselves were only a bit better than other weapons you found in Ulduar. Considering the weapon is a Legendary, that’s more than a little bit odd. Legendaries are often (but not always) heads and tails above the competition in their tier of gear stat-wise. I could be completely off-base, but I’m pretty sure that’s what they’re trying to fix. A legendary weapon shouldn’t last you forever (or even an entire expansion), but it should probably last you at least half a tier of raiding, shouldn’t it?

Continue reading Val’anyr being scaled up in patch 3.2

Filed under: Patches, Analysis / Opinion

Val’anyr being scaled up in patch 3.2 originally appeared on WoW.com on Fri, 10 Jul 2009 21:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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