Season of Discovery Phase 7 PTR development notes - Updated January 17

Ahead of this weekend’s Naxxramas test, we’ve redesigned the difficulty system.

• Each Quarter of Naxxramas can be Empowered by using the orbs in the main lobby. Empowering a Quarter:
  • Enables a new mechanic inside that Quarter, and
  • Increases the difficulty across the entire instance, regardless of which Quarter is empowered.
• After interacting with the orbs, there is a 15 minute cooldown before enabling or disabling that orb again.
• To tackle this dangerous new content, you’ll want a new set of trinkets: “The Seal of the Dawn”.
• Players can get the Seal of the Dawn by talking to Kug Softjaw inside Naxxramas.
  • The Seal of the Dawn empowers new “Sanctified” gear that can be discovered from Scourge Invasions or while inside Naxxramas.
  • The Seal of the Dawn can be improved by collecting “Remnants of Valor” from Scourge Invasions or while inside Naxxramas.
  • The power gain from the Seal of the Dawn is immense. Players are expected to obtain Sanctified Gear and improve their Seals of the Dawn to tackle higher difficulties of Naxxramas.

We’ve opened the Classic Era PTR for initial Season of Discovery Phase 7 testing.

This PTR is a very early version of our next patch and is mostly aimed at testing build stability, but there will be a small amount of new content to test. The content present on this initial PTR is not the only content coming in Phase 7.

• A new set of shoulder enchants allows you to utilize a single extra set bonus effect drawing from those found on sets in Molten Core, Blackwing Lair, Temple of Ahn’Qiraj, Ruins of Ahn’Qiraj, and Zul’Gurub.
• From December 20 - 23, we’re opening a very early version of Naxxramas in Season of Discovery. While this version of Naxxramas is still in development and is not fully complete, we want to give this a few rounds of PTR testing and get it into your hands as early as possible before the holidays. The only difficulties available in Naxx are the default, 2, 3, 4 and 5. Difficulties above 5 are not available on PTR. Tuning is largely placeholder. Confirming the difficulty via a ritual currently only requires one player. This will require more on release. Expect trash and bosses to have inconsistent health and damage values. These are not indicative of final numbers, coming later. Loot drops are not yet implemented.
• The most dedicated PTR explorers may find a few other surprises out in the world that hint at some other new content coming in Phase 7 and beyond.
• The quests from Kug Softjaw to upgrade the Seal of the Dawn currently all require a single Remnant of Valor. This is placeholder. Expect future quests to require more per hand-in.
• Shoulder enchants should be functional, but the quest to obtain them is not active. The NPC/Vendor we use on PTR should sell them directly.