When the new expansion for World of Warcraft launched back in November of 2008, everyone was incredibly excited to try out their new Death Knight, the first new character class to hit the game since the game launched in 2004 and an admittedly very cool looking and sounding option for nearly anyone that enjoyed either casting or melee play. Three months later, many players are still using their Death Knights, but there is also a sharp uptake in the number of changes being made to the class and the perceived usefulness of any one spec for the class. Here are a few of the more pronounced changes that have been coming:

Class Balancing

The first thing that most players said when they first tried out their Death Knights was how overpowered the class obviously was. Powering through five, six, or seven enemies at a time with a ghoul and gargoyle by your side, self healing options, and a whole lot of armor made the game very easy in solo mode. Northrend was a little harder, but not much and when Season 5 started up, it was evident that the Death Knight would remain overpowered in many ways.

So, balancing out that power has been a major issue for Blizzard and a goal of many recent patches. The game continues to throw new changes into the mix as the class loses some talents, gets others restructured and others buffed to make up for nerfs. PvP balance is still highly on the Death Knight’s side and it is expected that changes to the class in PvE will probably not happen any time soon.

Number of Death Knights

With caps on realms and creation of Death Knights currently lifted, even more of them started to show up on different servers. However, the number of actual Death Knights being played has leveled out a bit as many players have gone back to mains or alts as new content has dwindled. The game will continue balance out as well as players realize how hard the Death Knight can be to play and as many players start making changes to their basic account makeups.

The Death Knight remains a major draw for many players and will maintain its dominance on many servers for weeks and months to come and has many players already salivating to know what the next major Hero Class will be.

The Death Knight is the ultimate new character class in World of Warcraft.

One of the many new goals that players have been striving to accomplish in World of Warcraft since Wrath of the Lich King was launched is the acquisition of large sums of mounts – upwards of and beyond 100 different mounts now available and rewarded with achievements. In the past this would have seemed nearly impossible but as the game has made certain restrictions more lax for lower content, developed new ways to get other mounts and now offers a slew of great rewards for certain accomplishments, there are dozens of new options that casual players and hardcore alike may not have had in the past.

The Lower Level Content

In the 3.0.8 patch, Blizzard made it so that players could easily and quickly get many lower end mounts that were not available to them before by opening up all racial mounts to all other players in the same faction. This immediately means that all players will have access to 15 mounts at Level 30 and another 15 mounts at Level 60. Of course, being able to afford that many mounts is a completely different matter altogether.

Higher Level Content

Flying mounts are becoming easier to acquire now as they are cheaper and slightly more available in many ways than they were in the past. Hard to snag reputation mounts are now slightly easier as well as the game slackens up a lot on some of the requirements needed to reach up to the top levels of a reputation – such as in Netherwing Ledge.

Other Options

Additional options now include crafted mounts such as the hogs that Engineers can now create, the slew of new reputation mounts in Northrend such as the various different kinds of mounts in the form of Mammoths. You will also be able to get new mounts from raid bosses like Sartharion and Malygos with different reins dropping from each at the difficulty levels you face off against them.

While there are not exactly 100 different kinds of mounts in the game, there are various types, colors, and speeds of each and there are plenty of options for boosting your mount count. With over 30 available before Level 60, and dozens more available before Level 70, the ability of nearly anyone to go in and build up huge stables of new mounts and pets is becoming more inclusive than anyone ever expected.

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Tanking has always been at the upper echelon of raiding. Those players who can effectively tank in a raid are those that are ultimately destined to be the most popular in their guilds, the most watched in a raid and the most appreciated when the group experiences success. But, with recent changes to the rules of tanking and a whole new class thrown into the mix, the question of who can tank and when has become more and more relevant – so who exactly is best at tanking and why?

The Top of the Mix

The top of the pile always has been and probably always will be the Protection Warrior. With the top AoE threat in the game, the best armor, and the most effective means of maintaining their life in a close fight, a Protection Warrior is the best around. However, the gap between the top and number two has been narrowed considerably of late and raids no longer feel compelled to ensure every group has at least two of these warriors around to handle their bosses.

AoE Tanking All Mixed Up

In the past, there were only a handful of abilities out there that could AoE threat a group of mobs meaning that Prot Warriors were all but required for all groups. Now, every tanking class has at least one AoE threat ability, regardless of how well it works and can effectively tank for a group. That, along with stat amalgamation and gear restrictions easing up has made it so that Plate armor is less specialized and more capable of working across multiple borders.

Off Tanks No More

Along with Protection Warriors, Feral Druids, Protection Paladins, and now Frost Death Knights are all proving to be highly effective in the tanking realm. With their new AoE threats, the ability to stay alive longer with more inclusive gear, and the new ability to boost certain stats for Druids in Dire Bear form, tanking is generally more effective and all four of these specs can be a main tank if played well enough. Death Knights are arguably the hardest to maintain because they rely on avoidance more than absorption to handle damage and because they must heal themselves to stay alive (no shield), but top Death Knights have proven themselves more and more worthy as they have practiced and developed their strategies.

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