Patch 3.3 PTR: Area-of-effect damage cap change
by Dominic Hobbs 
Oct 9th 2009 at 2:00PM
When you hit a single mob or player with a spell, or some kind of crude inertia-based impact utensil, the game will work out how much damage that target takes. This is based on the various offensive properties of you and the spell or utensil, as well as the defensive properties of your target. The same is true for area-of-effect (or AoE) abilities, though these tend to do less damage to a single target. Add in some more targets and, while it's still fun to do lots of damage to one of them (with the casting and the poking with sticks), you may have a chance to do damage to all of them at once. Let's say that you can do 2500 damage to a single target with one spell or stab, but can only do 1000 damage to a single target with your AoE ability. If you have five targets that you can hit with your AoE, then that will do a total of 5000 damage. Already we're having more fun than just beating on the one target.
So we're doing 1000 damage to every target and as we keep adding targets we keep doing more total damage. The current AoE damage cap is on that total amount of damage. Once we reach that total then we simply can't do any more. If more targets are added then the amount we do to each is reduced, to keep our total on the cap limit. The change in Patch 3.3 PTR doesn't have a value for the total damage you can do. Instead it works out how much damage you would do to ten targets and limits you to that. This means that your AoE spells will do the normal amount of damage to a group of ten or less targets but as soon as you add an eleventh (or more) your damage per target is reduced. To quote the patch notes:
In other words, if a spell does 1000 damage to each target, it would hit up to 10 targets for 1000 each, but with more than 10 targets, each target would take 1000 damage divided by the number of targets. 20 targets would be hit for 500 damage each in that example.Depending on the current AoE damage cap this change might mean we do more or less damage to a large group of targets (probably less). What it does mean is that the damage cap is more predictable, and more scalable. We'll be able to know at what point our AoE abilities start losing power by counting the targets and this will adjust as we increase in level and improve our gear.
Patch 3.3 is the last major patch of Wrath of the Lich King. With the new Icecrown Citadel 5-man dungeons and 10/25-man raid arriving soon, patch 3.3 will deal the final blow to the Arthas. WoW.com's Guide to Patch 3.3 will keep you updated with all the latest patch news.Filed under: Guides, Analysis / Opinion, Patches, Druid, Warrior, Warlock, Shaman, Rogue, Priest, Paladin, Mage, Hunter, Death Knight
Reader Comments (Page 2 of 3)
Amun Oct 9th 2009 5:01PM
I think there needs to be some kind of cap, but it shouldn't affect mages. =p
I think this is bad news on the whole -- a cap should only exist to make exploits harder, not to make AOE worth less.
Turtlehead Oct 10th 2009 2:44AM
"There shouldn't be an AOE cap. If someone can get 50 targets in the attack radius then all 50 should take the complete hit instead of 1/5 of a hit."
I couldn't find a current link to the video but a mage soloed 93 at-level mobs. He could have done more had there been more. This isn't crazy-but-slow prot pally AoE grinding: it took under two minutes with 99% of the damage done in under thirty seconds. THAT is why caps were added. Without a cap the only limit is the pull. If that's done well everything is standing in the same spot and it takes the same mana & time to kill 100 as to kill 1. As happy as the idea makes my inner mage it was broken.
korruptor Oct 9th 2009 2:16PM
love the screenshot!!
Como Oct 9th 2009 2:19PM
Not gonna lie, everyone in a while it is fun to just spam aoe and see your dps jump to 30k. And I agree with narai. If our tank has enough gear to tank a trillion whelps on ony I should be able to go in and dps them all at the same time. Chain pulling is fun and makes old content go faster. Our guild could probably pull all of the spider wing in naxx with 3 or 4 of our tanks so why can't we have some fun aoe damage in depreciated content? It's not like this gives me an unfair adavantage and I can't think on one situation where on current content we could avoid fight mechanics by using a mass pull strat. idk it's a small thing and won't affect me in game but it seems like it is a non-issue and they are changing things for the sake of changing things.
The other side is they may have a reason for this in icecrown but I can't think of anything it may be at the time.
Como Oct 9th 2009 2:21PM
After reading new comments while typing, clearly as a rogue, I never bothered to read up much on aoe mechanics ;)
If it's a nerf though I still think its kinda dumb
JKWood Oct 9th 2009 5:41PM
Maybe if we would stop dragging lowbies through content on our 80s and make them get a proper group, we would see less changes like this. Just a thought.
pchnts8 Oct 9th 2009 2:47PM
So this is a nerf. But the more interesting story is why it is being nerfed. Which leads to speculation... Maybe Ony is too easy to manage if you have massive AoE. Maybe they are designing an encounter in Icecrown and realized that this is an issue, so they are are pre-nerfing it to avoid the QQ that would happen if they did it later. Or maybe large scale PvP alla Wintergrasp is a little out of control if you have an army of moonkins chain-starfalling (wipe out an entire army in a 30yd radius and never have to target a single thing). The mind does wander.
JKWood Oct 9th 2009 5:46PM
See my reply to Como's comment.
Blake Oct 9th 2009 2:23PM
Resto druids make me cry
Varo Oct 9th 2009 5:42PM
If you haven't tried to solo the Jenkins achievement, now might be a good time....
Tolkfan Oct 9th 2009 2:43PM
Has Blizzard ever given a reason for those aoe caps? Is it technical, or just part of some silly "aoe philosophy"? if you manage to hold enough mobs in one place for aoe, fine! I also dont get why whirlwind, divine storm, bladestorm and a few other spells have a target limit. It's just silly.
Quon Oct 9th 2009 4:26PM
Faxmonkey is the reason ;P
http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=5767167495196384205#
13:10
Hasteur Oct 9th 2009 2:47PM
*hands Blizzard a [Delicious QQ Beverage]*
I'll miss the ability to obliterate the enemy with Seeds of Corruption and the subsequent "Oh ****" from the resultant agro, but if your purpose is to get non-tanks pigeonholed into the 1~3 targets at a time mentality then Mission Accomplished.
nread Oct 9th 2009 3:05PM
I suspect, as someone else mentioned, that they are tweaking it because of something in the future. They never particularly liked how easy it was for us all to just AoE every pack of trash. One possible scenario, for example; All the minions amassed in Icecrown seem like a pretty big hint of what we'll have to face to get to ole' Lich head. If that is the case, they may be using a new cap to force us to use more strategy to waves of minions coming at us. I'm picturing Stratholme meets Troll rush event. If they force us to have a cap of targets (essentially), then just pulling willynilly would be more detrimental than beneficial, before we have adequate gear at least.
Brian Oct 15th 2009 10:08PM
If we have AOE caps, give the bosses/enemies aoe caps.
and turn off aoe caps in BG. If we can AOE a whole 40 man raid we should be allowed to without diminishing returns
onetrueping Oct 9th 2009 3:41PM
This is incorrect, Dennis. The problem was that, at higher gear levels, the damage to each individual creature by an AoE spell was increasing, which meant that the overall damage started to diminish earlier. Depending on how this scales, there is a specific point where damage from the new AoE system will pass that from the old system, improving the DPS of AoE battles significantly and hugely buffing AoE tanks.
onetrueping Oct 9th 2009 3:42PM
Gah! Reply function of evil!
krave_me Oct 9th 2009 3:53PM
On 25 ONY i was pulling 24k dps on the whelps and it wasnt slowing down... they died before i could get higher and wasnt using cooldowns... I dont think there was much of a problem with where it was and even if it does scale its not going to make much of a difference
Malfural Oct 9th 2009 3:57PM
Did Blizzard miss a 0 in the explanation? I think it should be "10000 damage divided by the number of targets" in the example, since it is 1000 per target up to 10 targets.
Sean Oct 9th 2009 4:00PM
Aside from this AoE nerf making encounters like Onyxia's whelps more difficult, this has another downside: running people through low level instances. Scarlet Monastery is a popular place to run people through. You grab the whole instance and AoE it down. Now even that will be more difficult. Blizz, if it isn't broken, don't fix it.