Greetings Raiders, Tinkerers, Harbingers, and Wardens,

We believe we’ve found the last few root causes of the disconnects caused by conflicting game caches. We appreciate your patience with this one, and I can tell you the team here put in a lot of extra time to uncover and understand these legacy bugs.

PTR Game Installers

• https://www.battle.net/download/getInstallerForGame?os=win&locale=enUS&version=PTR&gameProgram=WARCRAFT_3
• https://www.battle.net/download/getInstallerForGame?os=mac&locale=enUS&version=PTR&gameProgram=WARCRAFT_3

BUG FIXES

• Fixed more desynchronization causes from cached data

Hail Warchiefs, Lichs, Commanders, and Keepers,

Happy holidays! We’re thrilled to be back; it’s going to be an exciting year.

BUG FIXES

• Damage mitigated by Hardened Skin will now correctly be reduced to 3 at a minimum, up from 1
• The second pulse from the Taunt ability will no longer fire if the Mountain Giant is dead or affected by ability disabling effects

Known Issues

• Potentially fixed Arranged Teams to work with port forwarding (due to technology constraints this can only be tested on Live)
• We are still homing in on the root cause for desyncs. Cached data results in mismatches when switching between game types - like playing a custom game and then playing ladder. Restart the game when switching between game types to lower your risk of disconnects (we’ve also seen the caching issues between some custom maps).

BALANCE UPDATES

Hero Balance Changes

Keeper of the Grove
Entangling Roots

• Cast range decreased from 800 to 600

Developer Notes
Entangling Roots is of high utility to the Keeper’s kit. This change is intended to add a bit more risk to its use without reducing its effectiveness. The spell now has the same range as the Keepers auto attack, which should increase the opportunity for counterplay.

Alchemist
Acid Bomb

• Level 1: Decrease primary damage from 8 to 6 per second (Total damage 120 to 90; Secondary damage 5 to 4 per second)
• Level 2: Decrease primary damage from 13 to 11 per second (Total damage 195 to 165; Secondary damage 8.5 to 7 per second)
• Level 3: Decrease primary damage from 18 to 17 per second (Total damage 270 to 255; Secondary damage 12 to 11 per second)

Developer Notes
Alchemist provides awesome AoE healing, has high hit points, is powerful enough to pick off units, and debuffs opponents effectively. Heroes generally shouldn’t check every box for potential roles… Reducing Acid Bomb’s single target damage better focuses him in a support role - recent tweaks to Healing Spray cemented him as a great alternative healer for any race, and those effects have been positive to gameplay.

Human Balance Changes

Defend

• Piercing damage reduction increased from 50% to 65%. The in game tooltip will show this as 50% damage taken to 35%.

Developer Notes
There has been a drop off in the use of Defend after changes with the 1.30 balance update. This change is intended to restore usage. Its original behavior relied on RNG rather than a flat damage modifier. We anticipate there may need to be adjustments to the percentage, so we will be keeping an active eye on how the new Defend performs.

Night Elf Balance Changes

Mountain Giant
Base Stats

• Food cost increased from 6 to 7
• Cargo size increased from 2 to 4

Developer Notes
Mountain Giants are imposing, disruptive, heavy tanks with great siege potential. That potential becomes absolute in large packs. They were never intended to be a massed unit. Increasing food cost will make adding additional giants past the first few cut more heavily into a player’s army makeup as well as push them into higher upkeep faster. Additionally by increasing cargo size they will match the Siege Engine, a fellow high durability siege damage unit.

Glaive Thrower
Vorpal Glaive

Developer Notes

The Vorpal Glaive upgrade has been bugged for some time:

• The main target of the Glaive Thrower always takes full damage
• The area of effect from the Glaives changes from a circle into a line
• Glaives can kill trees

The main target takes full damage, as if the projectile were a homing shot, but the Glaive doesn’t follow said target. Instead it hits the ground like it missed, and does line damage where it impacts. If we fix Vorpal Glaive to adhere to reduced damage of siege weapons to units, then researching the upgrade feels like a nerf when it exchanges radial damage for line damage.

We want to address these issues by having the projectile correctly track and impact the main target of the Glaive Thrower. This embraces a distinctive behavior from other siege weapons, helping with our goal of pushing each race to have their own identity. We hope to have Glaives tracking their targets and ready for the next balance patch – though the updates are not included in this PTR.

GAME INSTALLATION

• https://us.battle.net/account/download/
• Ensure you are logged in, and browse to Classic Games
• Download and run the Reign of Chaos or The Frozen Throne installers
• Enter your legacy keys or login to Battle.net if you own Reforged

Greetings Raiders, Tinkerers, Harbingers, and Wardens,

We’ve got some balance updates and bug fixes for your enjoyment over the holiday.

PTR Client Installers

• Windows https://www.battle.net/download/getInstallerForGame?os=win&locale=enUS&version=PTR&gameProgram=WARCRAFT_3
• Mac https://www.battle.net/download/getInstallerForGame?os=mac&locale=enUS&version=PTR&gameProgram=WARCRAFT_3

BUG FIXES

• Damage mitigated by Hardened Skin will now correctly be reduced to 3 at a minimum, up from 1
• The second pulse from the Taunt ability will no longer fire if the Mountain Giant is dead or affected by ability disabling effects

BALANCE UPDATES

Hero Balance Changes

Keeper of the Grove
Entangling Roots

• Cast range decreased from 800 to 600

Developer Notes
Entangling Roots is of high utility to the Keeper’s kit. This change is intended to add a bit more risk to its use without reducing its effectiveness. The spell now has the same range as the Keepers auto attack, which should increase the opportunity for counterplay.

Alchemist
Acid Bomb

• Level 1: Decrease primary damage from 8 to 6 per second (Total damage 120 to 90; Secondary damage 5 to 4 per second)
• Level 2: Decrease primary damage from 13 to 11 per second (Total damage 195 to 165; Secondary damage 8.5 to 7 per second)
• Level 3: Decrease primary damage from 18 to 17 per second (Total damage 270 to 255; Secondary damage 12 to 11 per second)

Developer Notes
Alchemist provides awesome AoE healing, has high hit points, is powerful enough to pick off units, and debuffs opponents effectively. Heroes generally shouldn’t check every box for potential roles… Reducing Acid Bomb’s single target damage better focuses him in a support role - recent tweaks to Healing Spray cemented him as a great alternative healer for any race, and those effects have been positive to gameplay.

Human Balance Changes

Defend

• Piercing damage reduction increased from 50% to 65%. The in game tooltip will show this as 50% damage taken to 35%.

Developer Notes
There has been a drop off in the use of Defend after changes with the 1.30 balance update. This change is intended to restore usage. Its original behavior relied on RNG rather than a flat damage modifier. We anticipate there may need to be adjustments to the percentage, so we will be keeping an active eye on how the new Defend performs.

Night Elf Balance Changes

Mountain Giant
Base Stats

• Food cost increased from 6 to 7
• Cargo size increased from 2 to 4

Developer Notes
Mountain Giants are imposing, disruptive, heavy tanks with great siege potential. That potential becomes absolute in large packs. They were never intended to be a massed unit. Increasing food cost will make adding additional giants past the first few cut more heavily into a player’s army makeup as well as push them into higher upkeep faster. Additionally by increasing cargo size they will match the Siege Engine, a fellow high durability siege damage unit.

Glaive Thrower
Vorpal Glaive

Developer Notes

The Vorpal Glaive upgrade has been bugged for some time:

• The main target of the Glaive Thrower always takes full damage

• The area of effect from the Glaives changes from a circle into a line

• Glaives can kill trees

The main target takes full damage, as if the projectile were a homing shot, but the Glaive doesn’t follow said target. Instead it hits the ground like it missed, and does line damage where it impacts. If we fix Vorpal Glaive to adhere to reduced damage of siege weapons to units, then researching the upgrade feels like a nerf when it exchanges radial damage for line damage.

We want to address these issues by having the projectile correctly track and impact the main target of the Glaive Thrower. This embraces a distinctive behavior from other siege weapons, helping with our goal of pushing each race to have their own identity. We hope to have Glaives tracking their targets and ready for the next balance patch – though the updates are not included in this PTR.

Hi All, We had a small server issue preventing the Battle.net button from activating. It should be fixed now and we will endeavor to fix the underlying problem to prevent it happening again. Thanks, Classic Games

RT @NargaLifestream: Actually @Alexey_Aoki did two costumes of Arthas. Here is a comparison between first and latest version. Costume made…

Hail Warchiefs, Lichs, Commanders, and Keepers,

It’s great to see so many custom lobbies being hosted. There has been some unexpected fallout when the number of lobbies hits 100. This patch is intended to address those issues. Keep the feedback and reports coming.

As many of you have pointed out: this is a process that takes active participation and some patience from the community, and we appreciate everything you’re doing to help us get the patch into the best possible state. Happy holidays.

SPECIFIC CHANGES AND IMPROVEMENTS

• Custom game lobby list can exceed 100

@FGerard_ @Blizzard_Ent The original game should be available now on your https://t.co/oFeR0J2TnO account page - ch… https://t.co/NJhbVejyQh

@Lugia_Blizz @Blizzard_Ent Seems like the Butcher would be a fan of that Meat Wagon mount! 🍖

@OnlyHumanJ @Blizzard_Ent 🙌

Unlock 🔓 rewards in other @Blizzard_Ent games when you pre-purchase the Spoils of War edition of Warcraft III: Refo… https://t.co/8BpdMpXMpF

RT @Back2Warcraft: IT'S TIME - Let's write history together! https://t.co/HzSKHC3HY0 #WGLWinter Grand Final, one Bo7 for the Championship…

RT @Back2Warcraft: LIVE - https://t.co/HzSKHC3HY0 The coronation of a new @Warcraft3 World Champion is just hours away! Moon has the ch…

"My life for the Horde!" ✊ Watch the original Grunt transform into its glorious 4K version! Which unit update fr… https://t.co/1wF8WFR1ud

RT @Back2Warcraft: LIVE - https://t.co/HzSKHC3HY0 WGL Winter - Semifinals The two best #Warcraft3 players of all time face each other for…

Magness:

Where i report death threats in wc3? I got the replay where i send it

Send it to me: [email protected]

Hail Warchiefs, Lichs, Commanders, and Keepers,

A new patch just in time for the weekend to improve the stability of the client and reduce issues playing your favorite maps.

BUG FIXES

• Tab focus on custom games menu
• Fixed bug causing one of the desync’s
• Joining a game no longer results in double game join
• Players joining after a computer slot will not fail to start the game
• Players no longer need to join games twice
• Improved desync check in attempt to reduce number of desyncs

KNOWN ISSUES

• We are aware of the issue of joining games around 1200 PST and are actively investigating the problem.

Note: Arranged teams still require port forwarding for 1.30.2. The current patch only removes the need for port forwarding for custom games, but dont worry, good things are coming.

Thanks,
Classic Games

RT @UgriWC3: WGL 1/4 Finals. If you could not watch all the games, you can still read our recap! With Moon, Lyn, Infi, Foggy & LawLiet @W…

The WGL Winter 2018 semifinals start Friday at 11 a.m. CET / 2 a.m. PST! 👀 Check out the top 5 games so far from… https://t.co/TwTOhxjf0b

Hail Warchiefs, Lichs, Commanders, and Keepers,

The Classic Team has been working hard behind the scenes to fix as many issues as possible. This is the second client patch to start addressing some of the core issues.

SPECIFIC CHANGES AND IMPROVEMENTS

• Error dialogs include error code and better text strings
• Hide map download dialog on successful download

BUG FIXES

• Reverted change to way desyncs are checked in 1.30.2 to help reduce likelihood of false desyncs
• Map upload is more successful

KNOWN ISSUES

• One team maps cant be played due to client validation

NOTE ON MATCHMAKING

• We will be deploying a server fix to address this later today.

NOTE ON HOSTBOT LATENCY

• In game latency is measured as the total time it takes a request to go from the server to the client, through the client processing queue and back to the server. Some prior hosting bots used to half this time by default only measuring the time from the server to client.

Thanks,
Classic Games

NightRaven:

People from EU can’t download the game at the moment

Do not know about that. Can you send me more details [email protected]