Beta Opt-In

To opt in for the beta, make sure that you have uploaded your system specs. Just follow this link to get the ball rolling.

Professions

Blizzard posted a Professions Preview. Here's my digest!

Blacksmithing, Leatherworking, and Tailoring

• Many of the green (and possibly some blue) items made during the process of leveling these professions will contain random stats. In most examples, two stats on these items will be set, and two will be random. The idea with these items is to mix up the skill leveling items so you're not just, for example, creating 10 pairs of boots that are all exactly the same.
• Superior-quality items that require more materials than other recipes in the same skill range provide multiple skill-ups. For example, if a recipe takes three times the reagents, it will give you three skill-ups.
• We didn't feel like we were getting much flexibility from specializations, so they have been removed for all three of these professions. The intent was to help people diversify their profession to feel different from that of other players, but through other professions we've found systems that work better to this end, such as simply making recipes available that you can earn over time.
• To follow up the previous change, all items that required a specialization are now useable by anyone.
• Tailoring the high-end Cataclysm items will center around a single cloth type that can be crafted through five different recipes -- each with their own material components and a long cooldown.
• All three professions will create their starter sets of PVP gear, which will be upgraded with new recipes every season. In general, these are meant to keep pace as an entry-level PvP set below whatever the current Hero Point set is.

I'm fairly displeased with bullet number two. I feel that the item itself was the only motivation needed to craft it. If an item required more mats, it was likely that the item was more desirable. The desire for the item provided the motivation to craft it (and subsequently use it). I feel like this type of change plays into the hands of those with deep pockets. The more you can afford to spend on expensive materials, the faster you can level up your skill. I do not see how this is of any big benefit to the new player or the cash-strapped player.

Scaling recipes for PvP? Will I have to relearn and/or buy them every time? Or will they automatically click over to the new version in my spellbook? I sure hope I don't have to buy them every season or you will see me buying none of them. Let another more interested person stay current there.

I'm glad to see the specializations go. They were minute at best and didn't really differentiate the population, as Blizzard observed. I do worry for Engineering, though. Will several items that used to be Engineering playthings will be open to the general public? I think that takes a great deal of appeal away from the profession. Which leads me to...

Engineering

• Engineering is still being designed, but expect new unpredictable gadgets to use on yourself or enemies. Toys, explosives, and even a new vanity pet or two. Oh, and powerful mechanical bows and crossbows in addition to guns.
• In general, we want Engineering to remain a tradeskill mainly focused on creating fun or useful gadgets for the engineer, but we are exploring options for items that can be sold to other players for profit.

At least they realize what the pull of Engineering would be. I would love to see more of the Engineering craftables available to slackers like myself, who are too lazy to level Engineering. However, the rational part of me is glad that they might not be. Now. . . what can I buy from an Engineer to blow myself up with? Damned goblins!

Inscription

• With the large number of class changes coming with Cataclysm, many existing glyphs will see new functionality.
• Minor glyphs are woefully uneven from one class to the next right now, so they're a focus for us to clean them up and try to ensure that everyone has minor glyphs they're excited about.
• New Darkmoon Cards will be added, with hopes they'll all be as awesome as the Greatness card.
• We'll be adding more major glyphs as well, but in the hopes of making them as balanced as possible, we'll likely wait until after the expansion ships to add any for the new abilities in Cataclysm.
• New and more desirable off-hand and relic recipes will be added.

The cynicism embedded within me is hard to contain. While I am glad that they are changing some glyph functionality, I get this feeling that we will go live with a glyph that still reduces pushback on wrath. They are "focusing" on cleaning up minor glyphs and want us to be excited about it. I'll be excited if my minor glyph changed what my spells looked like. I enjoy the convenience of the current minor glyphs but I am not excited about them in the least. I choose them because they are functional, not fun.

As far as the off-hands and relics are concerned, will these be more desirable than what was crafted before? Or more desirable than what we have now. If it's the former, I fart in their general direction. If it is the later, I might actually be interested. Here's to hopin', eh?

Jewelcrafting

• Some gem colors have changed! Hit is now blue. Mastery and Dodge are yellow. Intellect is now red. These simple changes have created a much more diverse matrix of gem cuts.
• New Jewelcrafting dailies will be introduced.
• Many cuts are being added to support the new Mastery stat.
• Some new Cataclysm jewelry recipes have completely random properties, and can sometimes create superior and epic versions.
• Jewelcrafters will have some fun new (and potentially lucrative) vanity items, including fist weapons, rhinestone sunglasses, monocles, and stardust (sprinkle on players for entertainment).

That seems very vague. I wonder if we would treat mastery as we treat Spellpower today. Will we be seeing all yellow gems with the occasional green to activate our meta and orange to include spellpower for socket bonuses? If Blizzard isn't careful, their "diverse matrix" of gem cuts might be reduced to "whatever has mastery on it". I also didn't realize that fist weapons were vanity items. I guess I'll go delete my vanity rogue, since he will be even worse now.

There's more stuff on the gathering professions and their respective "specials", but you can read up on that in the link near the top. All I will say is that, now that we can craft the special hides from gathered skins, Leatherworking should become much more accessible than it was previously (until you could buy Arctic Fur with orbs). Fishing will still be used for making top of the line foods. Damn miners get a chance at gems while gathering. Skinners get a chance of intestinal spray and/or blood splatter, yielding +1 to stench and repulsiveness. Go skinning (6:1 conversion rate on skins to heavy skins)! We will also see the release of three new levels of bandages, hopefully correcting the scaling problem that we tend to see as an expansion grows older. And sorry, Graylo, but just say no to bandages that scale with HP. It sounds good, but it creates a booger of a deal in PvP.