Wrath of Lich King Stuff (was 'Blizzcon' thread) - Page 173

Leviathon · 06/12/08, 11:11 PM

Originally Posted by Addled

Shaman 51 point talents from Shamans: 51 point talents and other stuff.

My immediate impression is a bit underwhelmed, to say the least. Elemental 51 point is nice, Enhance 51 point is a ripoff of Force of Nature (I really hope that these spirit wolves have special abilities, like the mage Water Elemental being able to cast a 2nd FN), and resto is downright weak. 2200 damage is less than half of a normal boss's melee swing.

New pet for shamans? I don't see a duration or cooldown mentioned.

The air elemental is probably just like the fire elemental and earth elemental totem although maybe it will just be a normal summon.

I look forward to having my shaman summoning spirit wolves like the far seer's in Warcraft 3. Now to hope they do more than just attack.

orcsgotbooty · 06/12/08, 11:17 PM

Originally Posted by Sillia

It isn't fair to compare content that's 11 months old to content that's new. Kara was new in TBC when it was released in january; by the time season 3 rolled around and S1 weapons went to honor, it had been out for 11 months. I don't mind old content getting outdated after it's had its time in the sun, I think it's perfectly fine that now the drops in kara aren't the awesome sauce that they were back in March or April of 07. However, when Karazhan was progression content for a lot of people, the drops there were useful. When ZA was progression content for a lot of people, the drops there weren't as useful. That's the discrepancy I've been talking about.

I was talking about when S1 was the arena season, even then you could go 0-10 every week and get your weapons, I should have made my post more clear I guess.

PSGarak · 06/12/08, 11:18 PM

It's reasonable to expect Spirit Link to scale with spellpower. That talent is also a mana buff for ret paladins, and, naturally, allows you to tank-heal with chain heal.

Ja7us · 06/12/08, 11:23 PM

Originally Posted by PSGarak

It's reasonable to expect Spirit Link to scale with spellpower. That talent is also a mana buff for ret paladins, and, naturally, allows you to tank-heal with chain heal.

Kinda... unless it's off the GCD, it seems like it would be pretty awkward to use. I wonder how it picks its secondary targets.

Addled · 06/12/08, 11:24 PM

Originally Posted by Shakes

I found this interesting ...

Blessing of the Eternals (35 points in Restoration) - 2 points - Increases the critical effect chance of your spells by 2%/4% and increases the bonus healing from your Earthliving Weapon by 5%/10%.

Earthliving weapon = healfury?

I think Earthliving weapon is something like extra +healing, then a chance on heal cast to add a HoT effect to your healing target. Can't find it at the moment, but I saw it on the wiki site.

Vaeys · 06/12/08, 11:29 PM

Originally Posted by Addled

I think Earthliving weapon is something like extra +healing, then a chance on heal cast to add a HoT effect to your healing target. Can't find it at the moment, but I saw it on the wiki site.

51730 Earthliving Weapon Rank 1 Imbue the Shaman's weapon with earthen life. Increases healing done by $51940$s2 and each heal has a 20% chance to proc Earthliving on the target, healing an additional $51940s1 over $51940d. Lasts 30 minutes.

Judging by one of the elemental talents, it seems like Flametongue is being changed to increase spell damage (instead of the original effect?).

Leviathon · 06/12/08, 11:32 PM

Originally Posted by Vaeys

51730 Earthliving Weapon Rank 1 Imbue the Shaman's weapon with earthen life. Increases healing done by $51940$s2 and each heal has a 20% chance to proc Earthliving on the target, healing an additional $51940s1 over $51940d. Lasts 30 minutes.

Judging by one of the elemental talents, it seems like Flametongue is being changed to increase spell damage (instead of the original effect?).

Basically they want to give a weapon buff to resto and elemental shamans that will actually benefit them.

Addled · 06/13/08, 12:01 AM

Originally Posted by Leviathon

Basically they want to give a weapon buff to resto and elemental shamans that will actually benefit them.

Yes, Earthliving fixes the major problem with resto shamans, that they have no HoTs. It' s a bit of an indirect solution, but I'm not complaining. I hope Earthliving has a reasonably long effect; 15-20 second length on the Earthliving HoT would be enough to keep the effect on most of the time.

Shakes · 06/13/08, 12:03 AM

Originally Posted by Vaeys

Judging by one of the elemental talents, it seems like Flametongue is being changed to increase spell damage (instead of the original effect?).

I hope it's as well as the original effect, or even better lightning bolt is getting push back resist, because I like having the current flametongue to help take off the last bit of a mobs health when soloing.

Originally Posted by Addled

Yes, Earthliving fixes the major problem with resto shamans, that they have no HoTs. It' s a bit of an indirect solution, but I'm not complaining. I hope Earthliving has a reasonably long effect; 15-20 second length on the Earthliving HoT would be enough to keep the effect on most of the time.

The weakness of a resto shaman is not having any instant cast heals, not lack of HoTs.

Prinsesa · 06/13/08, 12:09 AM

Ancestral Awakening - Requires 40 Points - 3 points - When you critically heal with your healing wave or lesser healing wave, you summon an ancestral spirit to aid you, instantly healing the lowest target within 40yds for 20%/40%/60% of the amount healed.

I love this! This is exactly the kind of thing that gives me high hopes for Blizzard's gear homogenization plans. Ele and Resto sharing Ele gear with a ton of spell crit? Suddenly Resto has a great use for spell crit.

EDIT: Reading through more of the changes, apparently Elemental Focus is going to include Healing Wave and its Lesser version, which is HUGE, as it pretty much makes it Illumination for Shaman.

2200 damage is less than half of a normal boss's melee swing.

Keep in mind that that's probably the level 60 rank of the spell. We can probably expect another 2-4 ranks going up to 80.

Earthliving weapon = healfury?

No indications of a totem version, though.

===

Going back to the Titan's Grip discussion, I think it's important to note that using Nature's Swiftness to turn a cast spell into an instant will still reset the swing timer, even for a Shaman, whose instant Shocks do not reset the swing timer. Of course, Blizzard could also make an exception specifically for Bloodsurge.

Vaeys · 06/13/08, 12:14 AM

Originally Posted by Shakes

I hope it's as well as the original effect, or even better lightning bolt is getting push back resist, because I like having the current flametongue to help take off the last bit of a mobs health when soloing.

The talents in enhancement which increase damage done by Flametongue weapon haven't changed, so I'd presume that it's keeping the damage (unless they haven't been updated)... though Flametongue Totem is still included in the Improved Weapon Totems talent. No mention on if FT totem increases spell damage as well, but then it would conflict with Totem of Wrath, so I'd assume not?

Shakes · 06/13/08, 12:15 AM

Originally Posted by Prinsesa

No indications of a totem version, though.

I'd be kinda disappointed if there wasn't a totem version. It'd be nice to have a earth totem worth dropping if you're in the healer group.

PSGarak · 06/13/08, 12:26 AM

Flametongue Weapon Totem is a fire totem. Hence the overlap with Totem of Wrath.

flyingtoastr · 06/13/08, 12:27 AM

Originally Posted by Prinsesa

Reading through more of the changes, apparently Elemental Focus is going to include Healing Wave and its Lesser version, which is HUGE, as it pretty much makes it Illumination for Shaman.

Yeah, now that Shamans have the two "big deals" for pallys (Illumination and Cleanse) I'm curious as to what Blizzard is going to do about pallys. And apparently my hope for a new version of Blessing of Sacrifice is being given to Shamans as well.

I am looking forward to the pally changes even more now.

Shakes · 06/13/08, 12:51 AM

Originally Posted by PSGarak

Flametongue Weapon Totem is a fire totem. Hence the overlap with Totem of Wrath.

I'm talking about earthliving as a totem. Strength of Earth is the only good earth totem buff, and it'd be awesome to have something for non-melee in that slot.

• frmorrison · 06/13/08, 1:03 AM

Originally Posted by flyingtoastr

Yeah, now that Shamans have the two "big deals" for pallys (Illumination and Cleanse) I'm curious as to what Blizzard is going to do about pallys. And apparently my hope for a new version of Blessing of Sacrifice is being given to Shamans as well.

I am looking forward to the pally changes even more now.

The Resto changes do help Shaman be much more well-rounded (instead of spam brain heal), however the cleanse ability curse instead of magic, however magic is more important.

What I didn't see is something to deal with spell damage instead of healing, so I guess the devs want you to use the post 70 ranks of heals.

Everyone but the Pally has a HoT now, waiting on Paladin talents.

thevidon · 06/13/08, 1:09 AM

For pvp being able to take of curses is insanely huge for shaman.

Right now Curse of Tongues owns shaman in any arena.

PsyBomb · 06/13/08, 1:21 AM

Originally Posted by thevidon

For pvp being able to take of curses is insanely huge for shaman.

Right now Curse of Tongues owns shaman in any arena.

being able to go Unstoppable is fairly major in PvP, as well. I can't wait to se how the builds start working out, but i can't find a working calculator anywhere.

flyingtoastr · 06/13/08, 1:45 AM

Originally Posted by PsyBomb

being able to go Unstoppable is fairly major in PvP, as well. I can't wait to se how the builds start working out, but i can't find a working calculator anywhere.

Here ya go!

Enjoy.

PsyBomb · 06/13/08, 1:56 AM

thanks. looks like fun for resto time, I'm not familiar enough with Elemental or Enhancement to do a proper build for them, but I like what I see for Resto... I like it a lot. My build follows:

Yarr! Tools :: Shaman 8472

Then again, I missed the Elemental Shields talent. It's hard to shake loose the points in here.

Macblade · 06/13/08, 2:04 AM

Definitely seem they are trying to make both ele and enhc more PVP viable. Imp Sham Rage and astral shift. I'm also happy they branched out with the weapon spec ideas. That would be really tiresome to have yet another mace stun spec running around. Unless they are having it affect only the MH weapon or only the weapon it ties too I'd guess that the driving force in selecting weapons would be to never have two of the same type-so you always have at least 2 of the 3 weapon spec buffs going.

Wouldn't take that site for gospel though Thunder tooltip says 200yd knockback. That would be interesting.

flyingtoastr · 06/13/08, 2:13 AM

If that Fist buff (debuff?) affects raid bosses it is going to be absolutely massive. It will be incredibly easy to take them to 0 assuming the current trend with armor penetration remains.

PSGarak · 06/13/08, 2:23 AM

I've been thinking for a while now that they should just consolidate the weapon-specs for all classes that have them. I wonder if they'll do it for rogues and arms warriors too.

Rasputin · 06/13/08, 2:25 AM

Originally Posted by Macblade

Definitely seem they are trying to make both ele and enhc more PVP viable. Imp Sham Rage and astral shift. I'm also happy they branched out with the weapon spec ideas. That would be really tiresome to have yet another mace stun spec running around. Unless they are having it affect only the MH weapon or only the weapon it ties too I'd guess that the driving force in selecting weapons would be to never have two of the same type-so you always have at least 2 of the 3 weapon spec buffs going.

Wouldn't take that site for gospel though Thunder tooltip says 200yd knockback. That would be interesting.

I dont know, I find Astral Shift to be a bit underwhelming. I'm not a shaman, so maybe I'm missing something here. I don't see a 3 second BoP on a 30 second cooldown that requires two consecutive crits to be overly exciting. It seems like it would be a pretty rare occurrence in most PvP situations, especially when you consider resilience into the equation. Perhaps it interacts with resilience in the same way Eye for an Eye does, allowing non-crits a chance to proc the effect. Even so, requiring a pair of critical hits to activate seems a little much.

Feorthas · 06/13/08, 2:41 AM

I don't mean to interrupt from the Shaman/Rogue conversation too much but the new tooltip for Hungering Cold (Death Knight, 51pt Frost) indicates that it considers enemies frozen for the duration of the spell (or until they're hit--it's kinda unclear), giving Death Knights a way to make use of their 'does XYZ when target is / something is frozen' effects as well as allow them to provide a boost to frost mages.

New Tooltip:
Hungering Cold
Rank 1/1
Requires 50 points in frost Talents
10 Runic power
Instant, 1 min cooldown
Unleases all available runic power to eradicate all heat from around the Death Knight, freezing enemies within 10 yards and preventing them from performing any action for 2 sec per 10 runic power. Enemies are considered frozen, but any damage will break the ice.

edit: apparently this is a change from the May 30th patch that didn't receive a whole lot of discussion back then.