well im just thinking, after that news from eyonix, and the fact that next patch our mana conservation is crazy anyway. That more dmg should be used over mana conservation.
Well, at least in my opinion.
I'd rather drop Improved Reincarnation, that is simply due to the fact that I haven't ankh'd in 2 months during a PVE encounter(which will surely change when Sunwell hits). The change to totems could be a long time away, I really wouldn't expect it for a while and it's still hella mana intensive, so I'll be keeping points in Totemic Focus. I'm pretty sure that if I really tried I could still burn through a mana pool in 2.3, we'll see once it comes out though.
One thing that is kinda annoying is how we are stuck with hunters with mail. Weapon skill was useless for hunters (well, beside ranged ones which was useless for us) and expertise will be useless for hunter. I guess that means that there wont be any mail with expertise on it, so if we want it we need to go for leather. That on other hand might take 3-4 drops before we even get chance to get it (as it goes to rogues first).
Enough rambling, what i was interested in was does Flame Shock dot effect proc the new totem? Unless i missed it i have not seen that mentioned?
Here's my issue with the upcoming twisting change - it removes the ability for enhance shaman to put forth extra effort to get a small but significant boost in their party's performance.
With no twisting, a shaman needs to:
1) Play the combat metagame: Position himself behind the mob if possible, select the right target, watch aggro, and watch for environmental damage.
2) Stormstrike once every 10 seconds.
3) Shock once every 6 seconds.
All melee dps has to be concerned with point #1, so I will disregard this for comparison purposes. My issue is with points #2 and #3.
Our actions are completely predictable. If you're on target, you know exactly what you're going to be doing 10, 20, 30, etc seconds from now, and 6, 12, 18, etc seconds from now. You know that you will be casting 0.1 stormstrikes per second, and 0.17 shocks per second, for a grand total of .27 actions per second.
In fact, the only decisions you'll be making that other melee aren't are:
1) to check for totem auras - are totems active, and are you in range?
2) many people don't play this game, but "do I stormstrike while my wf cd is active, or do I wait".
Compare this to what rogues do.
First, due to Ruthlessness, Relentless strikes, and Combat Potency (or Mutilate if they're that spec), a rogue does *not* necessarily know what he will be doing in x seconds, even on a stationary target. He will be managing his energy and combo points, while doing the standard melee metagame. Moreover, the rogue will be using rupture every 16 seconds, Slice n Dice every 16 seconds, and sinister striking 4 or 5 times every 16 seconds.
That's 6 actions every 16 seconds (to be conservative), which is 6/16 = .375 actions per second. Compare that to the .27 actions per second that we have in a non-twisting scenario. They are doing 40% more than we are in combat, and actually making decisions, not just pressing predetermined buttons: SS, FS, SS, ES, FS, SS... ... ...
I did not like twisting when I started. It required a lot more effort for a small gain. It grew on me, however, and I've enjoyed the feeling that by expending a lot more effort, I'm helping my group achieve that extra x% that could make a difference in the encounter.
The upcoming twisting change will have the result of limiting us to making close to 0 non-deterministic decisions, and take away the ability to interact with combat as much as we are now. I think that's a shame, especially for an advantage that Blizzard has called "not a big deal".
So, there's my piece. The mod downloads have been removed, as I wouldn't want people to start twisting now since the ability is going away. I sincerely hope that Blizzard adds some additional proactive mechanic to let shamans feel like we have more control over how well we and our group performs.
Rob - I see what you're saying about the 28% Astral Winds value. I went to change that and realized that all the math below that will need to be changed as well, but I really don't understand where Panny got some of those values since he skipped a lot of the derivation when he posted it here. Can you lend a hand and clear up what that section should look like now?
Technical limitations coupled with "not a big deal" implies to me that it will be changed in the distant future. I'm not going to get back into the moral discussion over it, but the "I told you so" is very misplaced, we all new it very likely wasn't intended =P
One thing that is kinda annoying is how we are stuck with hunters with mail. Weapon skill was useless for hunters (well, beside ranged ones which was useless for us) and expertise will be useless for hunter. I guess that means that there wont be any mail with expertise on it, so if we want it we need to go for leather. That on other hand might take 3-4 drops before we even get chance to get it (as it goes to rogues first).
Enough rambling, what i was interested in was does Flame Shock dot effect proc the new totem? Unless i missed it i have not seen that mentioned?
No, it doesn't. But talking about shocks. I thought a bit about optimal, but not too complicated spell rotations.
I tried that one on the PTR, including WF/TA Totem Twisting:
SS, ES, WF, TA, WS, FS, SS, WF, TA, ES, WS
It fits into one /castsequence macro and you have one free GCD (or without the last WS two) free for other things. Even with the heavy PTR lag, I did shock at average every 7.4 sec in a 20 min test, fighting a Servant of Grol. Mana was absolutely no problem, wasn't able to drop below 4k. My DPS was 1433.
The only problem is, that the distance between the second WF totem and the next one after the first Earth Shock is a bit too long (11.5 s or more). But you could change it to:
SS, ES, WF, TA, WS, FS, SS, WS, WF, ES, TA
This would increase the uptime of WF, but would decrease the uptime of TA and puts your shock before the next aggro-reduce phase.
Here's my issue with the upcoming twisting change - it removes the ability for enhance shaman to put forth extra effort to get a small but significant boost in their party's performance.
With no twisting, a shaman needs to:
1) Play the combat metagame: Position himself behind the mob if possible, select the right target, watch aggro, and watch for environmental damage.
2) Stormstrike once every 10 seconds.
3) Shock once every 6 seconds.
All melee dps has to be concerned with point #1, so I will disregard this for comparison purposes. My issue is with points #2 and #3.
Our actions are completely predictable. If you're on target, you know exactly what you're going to be doing 10, 20, 30, etc seconds from now, and 6, 12, 18, etc seconds from now. You know that you will be casting 0.1 stormstrikes per second, and 0.17 shocks per second, for a grand total of .27 actions per second.
In fact, the only decisions you'll be making that other melee aren't are:
1) to check for totem auras - are totems active, and are you in range?
2) many people don't play this game, but "do I stormstrike while my wf cd is active, or do I wait".
Compare this to what rogues do.
First, due to Ruthlessness, Relentless strikes, and Combat Potency (or Mutilate if they're that spec), a rogue does *not* necessarily know what he will be doing in x seconds, even on a stationary target. He will be managing his energy and combo points, while doing the standard melee metagame. Moreover, the rogue will be using rupture every 16 seconds, Slice n Dice every 16 seconds, and sinister striking 4 or 5 times every 16 seconds.
That's 6 actions every 16 seconds (to be conservative), which is 6/16 = .375 actions per second. Compare that to the .27 actions per second that we have in a non-twisting scenario. They are doing 40% more than we are in combat, and actually making decisions, not just pressing predetermined buttons: SS, FS, SS, ES, FS, SS... ... ...
I did not like twisting when I started. It required a lot more effort for a small gain. It grew on me, however, and I've enjoyed the feeling that by expending a lot more effort, I'm helping my group achieve that extra x% that could make a difference in the encounter.
The upcoming twisting change will have the result of limiting us to making close to 0 non-deterministic decisions, and take away the ability to interact with combat as much as we are now. I think that's a shame, especially for an advantage that Blizzard has called "not a big deal".
So, there's my piece. The mod downloads have been removed, as I wouldn't want people to start twisting now since the ability is going away. I sincerely hope that Blizzard adds some additional proactive mechanic to let shamans feel like we have more control over how well we and our group performs.
Yeah, im disappointed that they are changing totem twisting. Its one of those things that seperate the good from the bad, and its gonna be alot more boring to be enhance when it changes.
Out of curiosity and absolute fear of skimming 160 pages of this thread, is there a point with slow weapons that stacking Haste and moving to say Rockbiter or Flametongue on your weapons would generate more dps than a slow swinging Windfury method?
I only ask because A: I have an alt that can do 10 mans on occasion and ZA is a possible outlet for gear for him. B: ZA is dropping a lot of haste gear on us.
Here's my issue with the upcoming twisting change - it removes the ability for enhance shaman to put forth extra effort to get a small but significant boost in their party's performance.
I strongly agree that Enhancement (and Elemental) need depth added to the class. The other hybrids have dps cycles and reactive abilities. We simply spam abilities on cooldowns and in the end there is very little difference between a good and a bad player.
I do not think totem twisting satisfies this need. Anything that can be 'solved' with a cast sequence macro is not interesting or complicated enough to add real depth.
We need new combat abilities that are not just used on cooldowns. There has to be right and wrong times to use them so that there is a difference between someone who knows what they are doing and one who does not.
Unless we get a talent that converts our mana bar into an energy bar I don't see how it would be possible to give us the same type of system. Its not like a mage does anything different either, they have a few spells they can cast non stop, and others that are on cycled cooldowns. The only dps classes who have true depth are those with an energy bar.
@Aett - you're wrong. Flat out wrong, no other way to put it. Moogle and I had both been saying for almost a year now that the twisting was obviously not intended, was not a creative use of game mechanics, and was going to get fixed. Thats what the "told ya so" was about, and it was definitely justified.
Here's my issue with the upcoming twisting change - it removes the ability for enhance shaman to put forth extra effort to get a small but significant boost in their party's performance.
With no twisting, a shaman needs to:
1) Play the combat metagame: Position himself behind the mob if possible, select the right target, watch aggro, and watch for environmental damage.
2) Stormstrike once every 10 seconds.
3) Shock once every 6 seconds.
All melee dps has to be concerned with point #1, so I will disregard this for comparison purposes. My issue is with points #2 and #3.
Our actions are completely predictable. If you're on target, you know exactly what you're going to be doing 10, 20, 30, etc seconds from now, and 6, 12, 18, etc seconds from now. You know that you will be casting 0.1 stormstrikes per second, and 0.17 shocks per second, for a grand total of .27 actions per second.
In fact, the only decisions you'll be making that other melee aren't are:
1) to check for totem auras - are totems active, and are you in range?
2) many people don't play this game, but "do I stormstrike while my wf cd is active, or do I wait".
Compare this to what rogues do.
First, due to Ruthlessness, Relentless strikes, and Combat Potency (or Mutilate if they're that spec), a rogue does *not* necessarily know what he will be doing in x seconds, even on a stationary target. He will be managing his energy and combo points, while doing the standard melee metagame. Moreover, the rogue will be using rupture every 16 seconds, Slice n Dice every 16 seconds, and sinister striking 4 or 5 times every 16 seconds.
That's 6 actions every 16 seconds (to be conservative), which is 6/16 = .375 actions per second. Compare that to the .27 actions per second that we have in a non-twisting scenario. They are doing 40% more than we are in combat, and actually making decisions, not just pressing predetermined buttons: SS, FS, SS, ES, FS, SS... ... ...
I did not like twisting when I started. It required a lot more effort for a small gain. It grew on me, however, and I've enjoyed the feeling that by expending a lot more effort, I'm helping my group achieve that extra x% that could make a difference in the encounter.
The upcoming twisting change will have the result of limiting us to making close to 0 non-deterministic decisions, and take away the ability to interact with combat as much as we are now. I think that's a shame, especially for an advantage that Blizzard has called "not a big deal".
So, there's my piece. The mod downloads have been removed, as I wouldn't want people to start twisting now since the ability is going away. I sincerely hope that Blizzard adds some additional proactive mechanic to let shamans feel like we have more control over how well we and our group performs.
I hate totem twisting, its one of the most retarded "use of broken machanics" ever.
I rarely do it, mainly because when i've killed illidan 3+ times I'm not interested in excelling by 0.1% of total raid dps or 1% its boring and repetative, and far easier to slip into auto pilot, spam 2 and 3 and q and e every 2 minutes.
Admittedly I would like to have more to do, but like Malan said, unless we get a energy bar that is not going to happen.
This isn't a shaman only situation, most dps classes have the same issues.
Frost Mages comes to mind with frost bolt every 2.5 second (0.4 actions per second). Personally I don't think actions per second is a very good way to compare versatility.
It's quite obvious that we are only supposed to use one element totem at a time. What I don't understand is why it's hard to fix. Changing the temporary enchant to 6 seconds or even change it to 4 seconds and the refresh to 3 should destroy twisting pretty much. Perhaps they feel it would be to easy to loose the buff when a mob destroys the totem or something.
Enhancer -Ace2- (Totem Timers, configurable AEP, Enhancement Itemization Points, GemPicker and more) RaidSpy -Ace2- (Prints out the checks done by raid officers in chatframe)
Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy. - Benjamin Franklin
Anything that can be 'solved' with a cast sequence macro is not interesting or complicated enough to add real depth.
This is pretty much why I agree that totem twisting is silly in addition to the fact it clearly wasn't something that the developers intended (it wasn't even possible until SR). It demands massive GCD usage that pretty much traps the shaman in to doing nothing else and there isn't any real skill involved other than just tapping a button every so often. Actions per second is a silly metric when you're not pressing different buttons. If you feel this is skill, you are probably going to be better off playing drums in Rock Band in a month or so.
What I don't understand is why it's hard to fix.
It's probably easy enough to make most totems /cancelaura before they die, the problem is the WF buff is currently 10 seconds and not dispellable. If they shorten up the pulse duration they're increasing the load on the servers by a not insignificant amount, which I'm sure they don't want to do.
Originally Posted by CheshireCat
Eh, my nostalgia goggles aren't as good as they used to be.
Nice to see some direct acknowledgement of concerns. I wonder if they're looking into the viability of weapon imbues. It would be nice to get some talented means of making Flametongue more viable now that we have some spelldamage to back it up. We're really in a good place now, only real major changes that could happen that I can see would be active threat reduction, SS 6s, or a WF CD reduction.
Also I'm honestly glad that totem twisting isn't intended, it's just more of a chore than anything.
- Yeah, I too didn't think that twisting would last, but I'm surprised how soon after a lot of people really started using it that it got the devs attention Druids have been powershifting as a common way of (slightly) increasing dps before patch 2.2 changed it, so it's been months if not a lot longer.
- My issue with us versus mage damage rotations is that at least they're constantly doing something.
In a 6 minute patchwerk scenario we will again be idly sitting at our keyboard, where we have 40 * 6 = 240 global cooldowns, we will be using:
108 out of our 240 global cooldowns. We will be maxed out at actively participating by either inputting attack/totem commands, or watching spell casts, less than half of the fight.
A mage (or elemental shaman, or hunter, or whatever) will be using global cooldowns or activating their spell casts or threading their shots close to 100% of the time.
I think the rotation of ABx3->AM->scorch is pretty good already. Its usually after the AM is casted, then I will decide what to cast next depending on whether Clearcasting proc.
1) They actually make decisions based on clearcasting procs. Something like that would be kind of nice.
2) in the rotation mentioned:
AB = 2.5 second cast
AM = 5 second cast
Scorch = 1.5 second cast.
Mages that are getting 0 clearcasts, not making any decisions, *still* have more to do in a patchwerk fight than we do, even when you count our totem dropping. Even if you look just at global cooldowns, and forget that in between them they're at least watching a cast bar, they're more involved than we are.
I don't know what to say - I really enjoyed having more opportunity to affect the fight, and hope it is instated in some way for us in the future.
This is pretty much why I agree that totem twisting is silly in addition to the fact it clearly wasn't something that the developers intended (it wasn't even possible until SR). It demands massive GCD usage that pretty much traps the shaman in to doing nothing else and there isn't any real skill involved other than just tapping a button every so often. Actions per second is a silly metric when you're not pressing different buttons. If you feel this is skill, you are probably going to be better off playing drums in Rock Band in a month or so.
This is where we differ.
I have been managing GCDs with respect to shocks, SS, twisting, while at the same time delaying stormstrike if the WF cooldown is almost over. The only cast sequence I have is the WF/GoA totem (rest at 8 sec).
For me, I got to choose how to use my global cooldowns, I wouldn't just mash a button that would SS/Totem1/Totem2/Shock macro. That is leaving dps on the table.
I would SS when appropriate, which would sometimes mean that I have to delay either a shock or a totem drop. That's a choice I have to make. Do I delay the SS in order to keep WF on the group? Do I delay the shock? Do I drop the WF totem and then spend the mana to let the GoA totem be dropped later? Do I drop the WF totem, let WF refresh itself at the 5 second mark and *then* drop the GoA to get back into a normal cycle?
I'd agree that if the only thing twisting does is add another 6 words to a macro, then I really wouldn't care if it went away or not. However, in my mind the optimal way to play the game with twisting involved making many more choices than before because of GCD juggling, so I enjoyed the complexity it added with the commensurate, if small, dps gains for the raid.
Well, their fix for weapon itemization was to make slow offhand more appealing for warriors seems. Or maybe the fix was side affect of it. That is for everyone to decide as optimist/pessimist
Concerning fixing the twisting, seeing how long it took to fix WF totem (according to them they wanted to do it at TBC launch, so from there to mid august) i would not be suprised if it remained as is for quite some time.
Here's my preliminary idea for depth added to enhancement shamans, removing the internal cooldown from wf and to fix itemization issues (slow/slow is best). Also keeping the option to have a burst damage for PvP:
Windfury would no longer have a 20% chance to proc and 3 sec internal cooldown. Instead it would give you an AP buff stacking on every successful hit with the weapon that has the wf imbued. This stacking buff would have a maximum limit.
You would have a skill to "use wf" that removes this buff and uses it as the AP bonus for one extra hit with the main hand weapon. You could use it every time the GCD expires but it wouldn't be clever. The more you wait, the harder the extra hit gets and faster weapons would stack up the buff faster. This should be balanced somehow to make sure you do equal dps with fast and slow weapons at any given base stats.
I know this is not the thread for bringing up ideas and sorry about that, I'm just having the same problems you mentioned before and I'm curious what you think about this solution.
I think part of the reason they are slow in changing twisting is that there may be further totem system changes in the future that would be impacted by any minor change now. A couple issues could be solved simultaneously that makes doing any change now insignificant. Air totem bloat, GCD being overly punishing on totem dropping, mobility concerns, etc are all more pressing problems.
I completely agree. And what is worse: if we do nothing our dps will still be about 80% of what it could be if we were extremely active and manage all cooldowns well. In other words, we are far more gear dependent than other classes simply because gear is basically what defines our dps. In my guild we have great hunters and awful hunters, and we know which is which because skill and rotation make a big difference there. Rogues have the same thing.
Heck, before I made EJ my forum "home" I used to be active in the Blizzard boards, and at that time there was a lot of complaining about how high our dps was (this was pre linked wf cooldowns), and I've always felt that it was basically a matter of comparing a moronic enh shaman to a moronic rogue.
Totem twisting was what allowed me to feel like I was bringing something extra over random enh shaman #4, as it is an awfully passive class. Im hoping the new spell damage changes will at least add some variety to the mix, as we will be able to heal better or nuke from afar in those melee unfriendly fights.
@Aett - you're wrong. Flat out wrong, no other way to put it. Moogle and I had both been saying for almost a year now that the twisting was obviously not intended, was not a creative use of game mechanics, and was going to get fixed. Thats what the "told ya so" was about, and it was definitely justified.
I personally have never argued that it was intended, and never have believed it was. Whether it's intended or not is completely independent of whether or not it's worth doing. I found it A: creative and B: a use of game mechanics, and was therefore a creative use of game mechanics, but that is just my opinion. Go ahead and feel vindicated if you want.
The World of Warcraft Armory
So this guy is on a 2000+ 5v5 team, and reportedly (according to a side comment he made on a wow forum post) playing on the arena team as a 42/19 enhance build. First time I've seen that. The World of Warcraft Armory
Interestingly enough he's also on a team with no warrior.
I think it was obvious that this wasn't an intended mechanic, and it's also obvious that everyone knew that, including the people who twisted religiously. It is a creative use of game mechanics, there is no denying that. People realized that WFT gave a 10s buff and dropped another totem, and there's creativity involved in that process. Eyonix says that it's not "based on what the term is usually intended to imply," meaning (to me) that it's not a creative use of "intended" mechanics, but it's also still not an exploit (as he says).
Personally, I knew that this would be removed, so I never made an effort to integrate it into my raid DPS cycle; I didn't want to get used to seeing myself do better on DPS and then have it taken away. On the other hand, I immediately saw the value of doing it in certain situations. Kael'thas phase 4, for example, you're going to have to use Tranquil Air at times since your damage is scaling and the tank's threat abilities are not. Tidewalker is another time when I've had to drop TA. I'm perfectly happy doing that, but when the rogues are like "hey WF noob", I start twisting... and that sort of thing, I think, leads to people going "hmm, maybe I should be twisting GoA on regular fights anyway" -- I know it did in my case. Perhaps the Spirit Weapons buff will make it wholly unnecessary for me to twist, but I'm guessing that I'll still see the need to at least drop TA during SRs and at the start of touchy-threat fights.
10/18/07, 4:33 AM
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