Blizzard Entertainment has provided an update on the development cycle of World of Warcraft: The Burning Crusade Classic.
The game is scheduled to enter its next content phase later this month, with the next PvP season, season three, on pace to begin on Jan. 18. With the arrival of the new season, players can expect some major tuning updates to the PvP sector of TBC Classic, especially in regard to Arena matches.
“Looking back at Season 2, we’ve analyzed the queue data and found that some queue times are taking longer than we’d like to see,” Blizzard said in a post to the official World of Warcraft forums earlier today. To combat the lengthy queue times found across the board in the last PvP season of TBC Classic, Blizzard is expanding the range of possible opponents for players when searching for matches. Moving forward, players will have a wider pool of teams to face off against when queueing up for a match, theoretically expediting the matchmaking process.
Blizzard also clarified that “teams with similar ratings who queue at the same will be prioritized to match against each other.”
Changes to certain items will also be coming to the PvP scene in season three, with one item receiving a nerf and five more receiving total bans from Arena matches. In the upcoming season, the Mage-only Trinket Mind Quickening Gem will only provide 100 Haste, a substantial decrease from its previous rating of 330.
Furthermore, Nigh-Invulnerability Belt, Dazzling Longsword, Silent Fang, the Skull of Impending Doom, and the Gnomish Net-o-Matic Projector will all be completely unequippable in season three Arena matches. Each of these items include a significant on-hit or on-use effect that Blizzard deemed worth removing from the competitive PvP picture.
The Burning Crusade Classic PvP season three is set to launch on Jan. 18 in the U.S.
