WoW Forever beta development notes, October 8: City of Dalaran dungeon, more dungeon XP and Rage fixes

Blizzard updated the World of Warcraft: Forever beta on October 8, 2026 and posted the change log the same day in its WoW Forever Beta Development Notes thread. Blizzard's Beta Realm Maintenance post set the beta realms to go down for maintenance at 9:00 a.m. PDT that morning.

Everything below is a summary of that post. These are beta notes, so any value here can change again before launch.

Blizzard's notes do not name a client build. Our build watch first recorded beta client 1.60.1.70291 on October 8, the same day as the maintenance. The WoW Forever patch timeline lists that build and links our diff of it. Matching the notes to that build is our inference, not a Blizzard statement.

Dungeons and experience

• The new City of Dalaran dungeon is now available for testing.
• Experience earned from killing creatures in dungeons is increased by approximately 20%.
• Fixed a bug that reduced XP for players grouped with higher-level players who were killing lower-level enemies. The penalty used to be based on the highest-level party member; it now uses only each player's own level, which Blizzard says is the Classic Era behavior.
• If a party member is at a vastly higher level than the enemy, nobody in the party gets XP, as before.
• Blizzard expects these two changes together to dramatically increase dungeon XP for most players.
• Players can again swap multiple weapons within the same global cooldown, for example with a macro.

Rage from taking damage

Blizzard fixed several bugs in how Warriors and Druids gain Rage from damage taken and says the typical Warrior or Druid should now gain more Rage.

• The calculation used the player's health instead of an expected creature's health, which gave less Rage when wearing more Stamina gear.
• Increased damage from critical strikes and crushing blows was not handled correctly.
• Damage absorbs are now ignored when calculating Rage, as if no absorb were active.
• Rage gains were previously balanced around Warriors having 50% Armor. They are now rebalanced around values in the 20% to 40% range, varying by level.

Class changes

Several classes get rank adjustments to early spell ranks (Wrath, Frostbolt, Fireball, Arcane Missiles, Smite, Lesser Heal and Heal, Lightning Bolt, Shadow Bolt) so that each new rank grows more evenly and is always an upgrade. Other notable changes:

• Druid: additional Rage from landing critical strikes raised to 100% (was 75%).
• Druid: Bear Form and Dire Bear Form threat bonus raised to 50% (was 30%).
• Druid: Thorns base damage returned to Vanilla values; spell power ratio reduced to 6% (was 13.3%).
• Druid: Predatory Instincts is renamed Natural Instinct and also increases spell healing by 12/25% of Intellect.
• Druid: Mana Potions now work in Bear, Dire Bear and Cat Form, and Cat Form no longer reduces maximum health.
• Hunter: Disengage now has its intended doubled threat reduction. Survival's Expose Prey lasts 10 sec (was 5).
• Paladin: Retribution Aura base damage returned to Vanilla values (about a 33% reduction); spell power ratio reduced to 6% (was 13.3%).
• Paladin (Protection): Reckoning can trigger at most once every 1.5 seconds.
• Priest (Discipline): Penance damage and healing reduced to fix a bug that treated it as a 3-second channel instead of 2 seconds; Rank 1 mana cost up 50%; healing up on ranks 2 and 4.
• Warlock: the current pet is stunned while a new pet is being summoned.
• Warrior (Arms): Deep Wounds is again required to reach Impale.
• Warrior and Druid: Demoralizing Shout and Demoralizing Roar now generate some threat on every affected target.

Items, PvP and professions

• Various dungeon quest rewards were lowered from Rare to Uncommon quality, with stats adjusted to match.
• Wolfshead Helm now grants 5 additional Energy when Shifting Power is used; the Rage part is unchanged.
• The new Gelkis and Magram quests in Desolace, starting with "Valley of Bones", now require level 35 (was 30). Their rewards were retuned, and Blizzard says an upcoming hotfix will make them require level 35 to equip.
• Several Enchanting wands and Minor Wizard Oil have new vendor sell prices, from 5c (Novice's Practice Wand) to 25s (Greater Eternal Wand).
• PvP: critical strikes no longer have reduced efficacy against players.
• PvP: the Shipwreck Cove capture point now appears in the correct location.
• Armor Kits that grant Attack Power no longer grant double Ranged Attack Power.

Systems and interface

• Cooldown Manager now supports all classes, racial abilities and trinkets. Consumables come in a later patch.
• Gamepad: the Gamepad Action Bar now uses Edit Mode, and its settings must be set again there.
• Legacy System (beta only): every beta player was granted completion of the Legacy Challenge, worth 16 Legacy Points. The cheapest Legacy talent re-spec now costs 1s.
• Voice Chat can use Discord Voice, set by the party leader, and Group Finder postings can pick an in-game voice mode.
• Quest types now show as text in the Quest Log, Quest Tracker and quest dialogue, and the Quest Tracker shows quest level requirements.
• Classic looting behavior is back: creatures that dropped no loot can still be interacted with.

Quest fixes

The notes list more than twenty quest fixes across zones such as the Barrens, Desolace, Durotar, Duskwood, Teldrassil and Tirisfal Glades, mostly faster respawns, map markers and level adjustments. In Tirisfal Glades, quests and creatures around Shadowvale and Bandarion Keep were raised in level so they no longer turn green before players reach them. The full list is in Blizzard's post.

Known issues new with this build

• Skyborne druid bear and travel form textures are updated, but cat form, some Zephras Isle creatures and some mounts and pets will be updated in a future build.
• Hunters with the Ferocity talent will not see their pet's higher critical strike chance on the character sheet. Blizzard says this is visual only.
• Some icons in the Professions window appear broken.