WoW: Forever Nov 9 Hotfixes: 50% More Dungeon XP
Blizzard's second batch of WoW: Forever hotfixes is a bigger deal than the first. Dungeon kill XP is up 50%, The Drowned City was hitting about 30% harder than intended, crowded zones were thinned out, and Warlocks who learned the Felsteed early can finally ride other mounts.
Blizzard's first WoW: Forever hotfix list was mostly small cleanup: tooltips, spawns and stuck quests. The second one changes how you level. The November 9 batch, which Blizzard added to its running Forever hotfix page on November 10, 2026, raises dungeon experience by half, fixes a damage bug that made The Drowned City hit about 30% harder than designed, and thins out the zones where players were stacked on top of each other. If you missed the first list, our November 5-6 hotfix breakdown covers it; nothing below repeats it.
Header art from Blizzard's WoW Weekly post for Forever's launch week.
The three changes you will feel
| Change | What Blizzard's list says | Who it affects |
|---|---|---|
| Dungeon XP | Experience from all enemy kills in dungeons increased by 50% | Anyone leveling through dungeons |
| The Drowned City | Creatures were doing about 30% more damage than intended; fixed | Groups running The Drowned City |
| Zone population | Population lowered in zones with significant congestion, with an even bigger change on the PvP ruleset | Players in congested zones, PvP ruleset most of all |
The dungeon XP line is the headline. It applies to every enemy kill in every dungeon, per the wording, not to a single instance. Blizzard gave no reason for it in the notes.
The population change carries one of the batch's two developer notes. Blizzard says it made the change bigger on the PvP ruleset "following feedback from players that they felt overcrowded," and that it will keep monitoring and adjust further. It does not say which zones or by how much. If you are not sure which ruleset you are on, our WoW: Forever explainer covers the four that launched.
Dungeon fixes
The Drowned City got the most attention. On top of the 30% damage bug, Blizzard tuned down one encounter, Deathless Marrow:
| Deathless Marrow change | Amount |
|---|---|
| Health of the creatures in the encounter | -25% |
| Deathless Sorcerer's Fireball damage | -25% |
| Deathless Watcher's Charge damage | -50% |
| Deathless Guardian's Shield Slam cast frequency | About -50% |
Combined with the damage bug fix, those are large cuts to one encounter. The notes give no numbers for anything else in The Drowned City.
Elsewhere:
- Alcaz Prison: Zarla Ober now drops loot.
- Blackfathom Deeps: fixed a bug that could stop you releasing your spirit after dying.
- Blackrock Depths: the throne room doors now open after a wipe on Emperor Thaurissan, and Heart of the Mountain can be looted more than once.
- The Shaper's Terrace: Vitrix, Snowtalon and Cinder now drop loot and higher-level skinning materials, and Cinder spawns correctly after you use the Archival Panel.
- Stratholme: you can no longer mount inside it.
- Dungeon drops: Waylaid Crates and Craftsman's Writs were not dropping inside dungeons; that is fixed.
Class fixes
Most entries are bug fixes rather than tuning. The ones with a real gameplay effect:
| Class | Fix |
|---|---|
| Warlock | Completing "Summon Felsteed" now grants the right riding skill. If you finished it before the hotfix, summoning the Felsteed once grants apprentice riding, so you can use other mounts |
| Warlock | Incinerate is no longer available to non-Destruction specializations |
| Mage | Arcane Concentration's proc chance now splits across the cast and every bolt; it was granting 10% on the cast and on each bolt |
| Mage | Flamestrike's ground ticks no longer consume Clearcasting |
| Shaman | Lightning Overload now deals the correct damage for Lightning Bolt |
| Priest | Shadowform no longer breaks when you cast Fear Ward, and Power Infusion now persists on allies |
| Paladin | Consecration no longer stops dealing its increased damage after targets inside it despawn |
| Druid (Feral) | Feral Charge (Cat) puts you in combat immediately, Natural Instinct applies to Lacerate and Pounce, and the Pounce stun shows on the enemy |
| Hunter | Fixed Hunters sometimes pulling enemies from very far away just by targeting them |
Read the Arcane Concentration line carefully: it is a fix, but splitting one chance across the cast and bolts, where it used to roll 10% on each, should mean fewer procs overall. Blizzard does not give the new per-bolt figure. The Incinerate line likewise takes away a spell some Warlocks had by mistake.
Smaller entries: the Cooldown Manager stops showing Berserk and shows Lacerate for Druids, shows Seals correctly for Paladins and shows only Thunderclap's cooldown for Warriors. Idol of Ferocity stops listing Mangle, Hunter pets Vulgara the Insatiable and the Shrieklings of Zephras move to the correct pet families, and Shaman Improved Ghost Wolf holds the Night Watchman's Torch again. Tauren Cultivation now goes on cooldown only after the cast completes.
Items, quests and PvP
The item fix worth knowing about is the Pouch of Violet Dust. Blizzard's own post on the toy says it turns a campfire purple and extends all camp benefits by 1 hour, for a 2-hour total, shared with everyone resting there. The hotfix fixes a bug that stopped players getting that extra hour. Per the same post, the toy is a Twitch Drop for watching four hours of eligible WoW streams between November 4 and November 12, 2026 at 4:30 pm PST. It only works during the WoW: Forever Launch Celebration event, which Blizzard says expires in early December, and is then removed from collections.
Other item fixes: Berdun's Trusty Rifle no longer has random stats and is no longer Bind-on-Equip, Nifty Stopwatch no longer shares a cooldown with Dash, Blink, Sprint and other movement abilities, and Gloves of Holy Might now work as intended.
In PvP, Blizzard removed an invisible wall on the roof of the Alliance base in Warsong Gulch. Its note: "Please be careful up there."
The quest list is long. In short:
- Quest items for "The Monster Surfaces," "Croaky's Head" and "Elmpaw's Head" are now available to everyone in a party.
- Fixed blockers on "The Deathstalkers" (Astor Hadren now gets angry enough to fight), "Jom-jom's Escape," "Ever After" (the door teleports you), "Unwelcome Guests," "A Recipe for Death," "Fetch 'n' Fletch" and the Rogue quest "Mission: Possible not Probable."
- Henrig Lonebrow's Journal respawns faster for "Lonebrow's Journal" and has moved slightly down the road; look for a similar skeleton.
- Players below level 60 can now loot the Hyjal Owl Nests on "Feathers in Flight."
A few world and creature fixes round it out: the Camp Taurajo to Thunder Bluff flight path no longer clips through objects, Young Diemetradons in Un'Goro Crater no longer spawn at level 58 instead of 51 to 52, and Ivar the Foul and Ferocitas the Dream Eater respawn faster.
What the list does not tell you
- No reason for the XP change. Blizzard states the number, not the intent, so do not read it as a signal about future leveling-speed changes.
- No zone names for the population cut. "Various zones" is all the notes say.
- No Midnight entries for November 9. Blizzard's separate Midnight hotfix page still had nothing newer than November 6 when I checked on November 10.
- The page keeps changing. Blizzard renamed the Forever page to "November 9, 2026" and put the new day on top of the earlier ones, and says it will be updated as more hotfixes go in. Trust the live page over this summary if they differ.
Frequently Asked Questions
What changed in the WoW: Forever hotfixes on November 9, 2026?
Did WoW: Forever increase dungeon XP?
Why can my WoW: Forever Warlock not ride other mounts after getting the Felsteed?
Is The Drowned City easier in WoW: Forever now?
What did the Pouch of Violet Dust hotfix fix in WoW: Forever?
Keep Reading
- Blizzard — WoW: Forever Hotfixes - November 9, 2026 (dungeon XP, Drowned City, population, class, item and quest fixes)
- Blizzard — Set Your Campfire Ablaze with the Pouch of Violet Dust! (Twitch reward window, camp benefit duration, removal after the launch event)
- Blizzard — Hotfixes: November 6, 2026 (Midnight hotfix page, no November 9 entries as of November 10)
- Blizzard — The Adventure Begins in WoW: Forever (WoW Weekly; source of the header art)
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