We just have gone through patch 5.3 that already patch 5.4 is knocking on the door.
Many things can change, of course and the patch hasn’t got on Public Test Realm yet but you can take a peek at the patch build anyway.
The patch 5.4 – build 17056 will be deployed to the test realm soon.
You can read the patch notes on Blizzard’s homepage, as usual, and the patch isn’t final yet. Things can change, of course.
You’d better read the upcoming changes yourselves, but I found two pretty interesting things:
New Feature: Virtual Realms
Virtual Realms are sets of realms that are fused together, and will behave exactly as if they were one cohesive realm. Players on the same Virtual Realm will be able to join guilds, access a single Auction House, join arena teams and raids, as well run dungeons or group up to complete quests.
Players belonging to the same Virtual Realm will have a (#) symbol next to their name.
I guess Blizzard found a solution about the low populated realms: Virtual realms.
Another interesting feature, I think, is:
All permanent item enhancements provided by Enchanting, Engineering, Leatherworking, Tailoring, and various vendors and quests are now able to be applied to items of any level. This means all enchantments can now be applied to heirloom items.
High level enhancements applied to items equipped by low level players have their power scaled down to be similar to enhancements intended for that level range.
Low level enhancements applied to items equipped by high level players do not grow further in power beyond their intended level range.
That might make Crusader enchant very interesting, all of a sudden.
You can read the patch notes here (EU-version) and here (US-version)