Eyonix has been on a roll recently, posting about many 1.8 changes.

First off, Upcoming Instant Melee Attack Change, which changes damage calculations to use a fixed value for weapon speed. Effectively, this will nerf "slow" daggers.

Next, Racial Trait: Perception - Perception will now be usable from stealth. (Which isn't terribly helpful, but - whatever.)

Finally, we have For the Warlocks!, where Eyonix details a bunch of warlock changes. (Honestly, none of them look that impressive. Have to wait for 1.8 test to be certain, though.)

And, as an added bonus, Eyonix explains how +Spell Hit gear works.

Since the Blizzard forums prunes posts after a given amount of time, the full text of the comments are duplicated below.

Upcoming Instant Melee Attack Change

The mechanics of most instant melee attacks will be modified to improve item balance upon the release of patch version 1.8. Currently, instant melee attacks do damage based on the damage range of the weapon, plus a bonus for the player‘s attack power. This bonus is then multiplied by the speed of the weapon. As a result, slow weapons do more damage than is intended, and fast weapons are considered inferior by most players. We are changing the way the attack power bonus is calculated for instant attacks. This change will NOT affect attack power calculations for normal melee attacks. Instead of multiplying by the speed of the weapon, the attack power bonus will be multiplied by a fixed number pulled from the following table:

Two-handed weapons: 3.3
Daggers: 1.7
All other one-handed weapons: 2.4

As a direct result of this, many weapons will shift position in their relative power. In particular, many epic (purple) quality items will now be more powerful than slower superior (blue) weapons. For the purpose of instant attacks, the Arcanite Reaper and the Barman Shanker will drop slightly in relative power, while Typhoon and Alcor‘s Sunrazor will increase in power.

We expect to see the total damage output of a Mortal Strike warrior go down about 4% with the Arcanite Reaper, and up about 4% with Typhoon. We expect the total damage output of a Backstab rogue to go down about 2% with the Barman Shanker and up about 2% with Alcor‘s Sunrazor.

This change was not made to reduce the power of instant attacks, but to correct the relative imbalance of weapon itemization. At a given level requirement, epic quality weapons should always be more powerful than superior quality weapons.

Please also note that all normal weapon swings will be completely unaffected by this change. The following abilities are affected by the design change: Sinister Strike, Ambush, Backstab, Whirlwind, Mortal Strike, and Overpower.

Racial Trait: Perception

Just a small note, the Human racial trait Perception, which you can activate to dramatically increase stealth detection for up to 20 seconds will be useable while stealthed upon the release of the next content patch.

For the Warlocks!

I've been working closely with several of the designers over the last several weeks discussing a variety of the subjects and relaying much of the feedback appearing on our discussion boards. Primarily, our meetings have focused on each of the nine classes. In short, I wanted to take a moment and share with each of you - "The Warlocks", the information specifically discussed pertaining to your class. I sincerely hope you enjoy both the read and information presented!

We realize that some of you have expressed dissatisfaction with the soul shard system, and have even gone so far to request its complete removal. It should be noted that we are pleased with the system overall, however, are in the process of taking a very close look at each spell and ability requiring a shard to ensure that it's one which merits such a cost. Another thing that may aid the Warlock in this area is a system we're investigating which is designed to provide the Warlock with a replacement shard should the little demon become lost due to lag or any otherwise unintended circumstance.

While it doesn't necessarily address the soul shard "farming" issue, the upcoming Soul Shard bag should assist with the management factor, and allow for better item organization.

Moving on to more specific information, in patch version 1.8 (next patch) some changes have been made which should serve the Warlock well in the ways of additional defense, as the topic of Warlock defense/escape utility has been hot for a while now.

• Death Coil - The cooldown on this spell has been reduced to two minutes and there will now be a short duration (3 sec), non-diminishing fear effect applied to the target. The mana cost has been increased so the spell is less efficient for purposes of DPS.
• Pyroclasm — Now gives a chance to stun when Rain of Fire, Hellfire and Soul Fire hit the target.

Concerning Damage over Time Spells (DoTs), in patch 1.8 we‘ve lowered the duration of Corruption and Curse of Agony, increasing the damage per tick. Rest assured that the total damage over the entire duration is identical. Once this change is in effect, players should notice an increase to the frequency at which these DoTs apply their maximum potential for damage, especially in PvP encounters which often end quickly.

Two other improvements you can expect with the next patch include the talent Bane, which will now reduce the casting time of Soul Fire and Immolation spells in addition to Shadow Bolt. The second improvement affects Intensity, which will now reduce the chance to be interrupted while casting Rain of Fire, Hellfire and Soul Fire spells.

End Game Warlock pets have been the center for concern and players should be pleased to know that both the DoomGuard and Infernal are slated to see improvements upon the release of patch 1.9. These End-game pets were originally designed to defeat two even con mobs at 60, however, overall creature power has increased, and therefore we recognize the need to ensure the power of these pets remain on par with our original design philosophy. Internally, they've already been given a very noticeable boost, and are now being tested by our Quality Assurance Department.

It should be noted that with the next patch we've also slightly reduced the critical damage bonus of Ruin. This change is very small and shouldn't impact overall Warlock DPS to a noticeable degree. While I realize that this change will not be seen as an improvement, I did feel it important to be fair and inform you the moment I became aware.

+Spell Hit Chance

I've seen a number of threads recently on the boards pertaining to +spell hit chance and I've gathered some information for you which I hope will dispel some of the confusion. Please feel free to post your comments in a reply to this thread.

+1% spell hit chance increases the base chance for a spell to land against a target by 1%

If your target is the same level as you, a spell has a base chance to hit of 96%.

If the target is +1 level compared to you: 95%

+2 levels: 94%

+3 levels: 83% if the target is a mob, 87% if the target is a player.

+4 levels: mob: 72% player: 80%

+5 levels: mob: 61% player: 73%

Etc...

If you wear a +1% spell hit chance item, the above percentages will increase by 1. +2% gives +2.

Etc...

For binary spells only, there is an additional modifier for the resistance of the victim to your particular spell school: fire, frost, shadow, nature, arcane. That modifier is multiplied by your hit chance to get your actual chance to land. This is done with binary spells only, because they never do partial damage.

Example:

Eyonix the Mage (level 60) fires a frost bolt at Yeti of Doom (level 63). Eyonix is also wearing a total of +6% spell hit gear. Yeti of Doom has frost resistance such that he takes 50% from level 60 frost attacks. So, here‘s the hit calculation:

0.83 (83% for +3 levels mob) + 0.06 (+6% spell hit) = 0.89

0.89*0.5 (50% damage from frost) = 0.445.

The game will roll a number between 0 and 1, and if it‘s less than 0.445, the frost bolt will hit for full damage. Otherwise, a resist message will appear.

2nd Example:

After the resist, Eyonix decides to fire a fireball at Yeti of Doom. Eyonix still has +6% spell hit. Fireball is not a binary spell. Here‘s the calculation:

0.83+0.06= 0.89

The game will roll a number between 0 and 1, and if its less than 0.89, the fireball will hit. Otherwise, a resist message will appear. After the fireball lands, the game will then apply spell resistance to determine a partial resist, if any. Assuming the yeti also has 50% fire resistance, on average, 50% of the damage will be resisted.

I hope that illuminates the impact of +spell hit gear on magical combat.