What's going to happen to armor pen gear?

Q u o t e:
are we going to have gimp gear come 4.0 or are they are going to buff the ICC items in other areas?

There isn't a cut and dry sort of answer that we can give you on this just yet. There are many different factors that will need to come into account.

There is potential for anything that is currently considered Best in Slot now to not be once changes begin going in for Cataclysm.

You will also need to take into account potential changes in talents and abilities (as well as any other game related changes), and it leaves a bit of wiggle room for some theorycrafting once these changes start being discussed and experienced in more detail.

To that end though, we don't plan to leave anyone high and dry and are planning out a series of informational releases that should start giving out more detail on these sorts of changes. We'll be doing what we can to answer as many questions as possible on the changes to stats in particular since we know that it is an area that many people focus on. We also want to make sure that these changes are easy to understand and leave room for any additional developmental adjustments that are needed. As always, we'll be keeping an eye on constructive feedback and discussions as well.

Q u o t e:


Clarification on this.

Do you mean:
-We will not under any circumstances leave anyone high and dry.
OR
-We will try not to leave anyone high and dry, but if it happens, tough break for you.

More like we don't plan to, but things happen and we'll have to keep a close eye on constructive feedback and discussions on the upcoming changes to take into account their full impact. :)

Q u o t e:
Nethaera, is anything going to be done about the armor pen problem for the next arena season, or will it remain the way it is until the Cataclysm patch?

edit: LOL sorry, wrong dev =P

We still have some time until Cataclysm rolls around which means plenty of time for us to take a look at things that we feel might need a change before then. I can't promise any specific changes on Armor Pen just yet for Wrath of the Lich King, but that doesn't preclude us from taking a look at this stat sooner rather than later should we feel it needs attention prior to then. We don't want to lock ourselves into the idea that changes won't happen until Cataclysm so that if something sticks out to us as bothersome, we can do something about it if there is room in the plans for it. It's easy to fall into the, "Wait 'til Cataclysm" mantra, but we don't want to have to stay within that mold if we don't have to.