I'm still wondering what sort of stat decay there is past 70 for hit, crit, agi, int, haste. The only documented change i have seen is @70 it now takes 40 AGI/1% crit
You won't have to look far, not even past the first page of threads!
There is an entire thread dedicated to this with some very good information courtesy of Whitetooth, here.
There will be one stat, spellpower, which effects both healing and damage spells. Obviously it will effect healing spells more then damage (as the current +healing is cheaper budget wise then spell damage), a 1:1.9 factor probably (1:2 for easy calculations).
In the old version Mental Quicknes gave spellpower, so 1k AP would give 300 spellpower, which would be 300 spelldamage in old terms and 300*1,9=570 +healing.
After the change it gives spell damage and healing, so 1k AP will give 300 spelldamage (nothing changes here) but only 300 +healing, a -48% nerf here.
Except that the coefficients are all internalized. So saying it gives a percentage of damage/healing or saying it gives spellpower means the exact same thing.
If it said it gives 30% of spell damage and 15% of spell healing then it would be a 48% nerf but otherwise I am betting it is just an error in the talent calculator since it has no bearing whatsoever on how the actual talent functions.
To clarify: When you equip an item with 200 spell power in the beta, you get 200 damage and 200 healing on the character model, not 200 damage and 380 healing.
With a large amount of enhance pvp viability evidently tied to spectral transformation, I was wondering if any testers would suggest that ghost wolf be usable indoors?
I was actually discussing this with some other beta testers yesterday. Their opinion was that it would unbalanced to have GW indoors even if added to a deep enhancement talent, I didn't see it that way. But an offered alternative of theirs was to make a talent that changes Frost Shock from 50% slow on the target to a (50 - x)% slow on the target and (50-x)% move speed bonus to the shaman. (e.g, 25% slow and 25% speed bonus)
In PvP it would keep the same scaling of movement between target and shaman (although it would definitely be a reduction in capability if you were frost shocking to keep the target away from someone else like a healer) and in PvE it would let you frost shock a mob and then more rapidly run to the next mob.
I was actually discussing this with some other beta testers yesterday. Their opinion was that it would unbalanced to have GW indoors even if added to a deep enhancement talent, I didn't see it that way. But an offered alternative of theirs was to make a talent that changes Frost Shock from 50% slow on the target to a (50 - x)% slow on the target and (50-x)% move speed bonus to the shaman. (e.g, 25% slow and 25% speed bonus)
In PvP it would keep the same scaling of movement between target and shaman (although it would definitely be a reduction in capability if you were frost shocking to keep the target away from someone else like a healer) and in PvE it would let you frost shock a mob and then more rapidly run to the next mob.
Personally I like the GW indoors option more.
Then you can't frost shock chace epic mounted players any more.
200%*0.5 = 100%
200%*0.75 != 100% * 1.25
Not big difference but I like it when I can kill player who think frost shock still have dimishing returns.
Edit: When running 100%speed and enemy running 50%speed you run twice as fast. But when yuo run 125%speed and enemy run 75%speed you only run 66.7% faster. I hope they don't do anything what could turn up nerf when they try buff us.
If i remember correctly it was about feral's swiftness and not travel form(if you want to make comparison between the two).
Just to point it out that it does not give the chance to use a form not usable before indoor, just gives the benefit of a talent indoor as well as outdoor that now is limited to outdoor only.
True, however the talent for Feral Swiftness grants 30% movement bonus to cat form, ghost wolf is 40. I could definitely see a talent that said Ghost Wolf now works indoors and but suffers a 10% reduction in movement bonus, bringing it in line with cat form. In our case I feel this would be balanced by ghost wolf being used for movement, whereas ferals are actively DPSing in their form.
If i remember correctly it was about feral's swiftness and not travel form(if you want to make comparison between the two).
Just to point it out that it does not give the chance to use a form not usable before indoor, just gives the benefit of a talent indoor as well as outdoor that now is limited to outdoor only.
Yes, but the difference is that your arena rating could go tits up if you happen to get Dalaran sewer 5x in a row due to the fact that your class+spec is being balanced around the notion of breaking snares/roots on demand. You need access to that form (gw) to access the talent (spectral transformation).
Maybe I'm just under thinking this, but I'm having a hard time understanding what the major unbalancing factor would be. Hardly relevant in 5mans, not much change in raids, previous arenas are already outdoors...
The "Good god!" as far as I can see is enhancement shaman would be far better WSG flag carriers than they are now, and would be able to kite people in the flag rooms.
Did they actually say that there will be indoor arenas? I mean, tagged as indoors(not just looking indoors). They could just make eveyr arena outdoor anyway for balance purposes, so make GW castable indoor would just overpower it in BGs. Not like I care too much about BG balance but well, some people might find it annoying. Then again I guess it's almost the same thing with ferals in BGs now that they made feral swiftness work indoor.
I was actually discussing this with some other beta testers yesterday. Their opinion was that it would unbalanced to have GW indoors even if added to a deep enhancement talent, I didn't see it that way. But an offered alternative of theirs was to make a talent that changes Frost Shock from 50% slow on the target to a (50 - x)% slow on the target and (50-x)% move speed bonus to the shaman. (e.g, 25% slow and 25% speed bonus)
In PvP it would keep the same scaling of movement between target and shaman (although it would definitely be a reduction in capability if you were frost shocking to keep the target away from someone else like a healer) and in PvE it would let you frost shock a mob and then more rapidly run to the next mob.
Personally I like the GW indoors option more.
If the indoor speed is a problem just have GW not give a speed buff indoors, like the Druid catform speed talent. I can't imagine the snare/immobilize wipe is the problem.
If the indoor speed is a problem just have GW not give a speed buff indoors, like the Druid catform speed talent. I can't imagine the snare/immobilize wipe is the problem.
See above - the druid talent is going to work indoors in WLK.
In Paris they described dalaran sewers as being a small indoor arena without mounts (paraphrasing). That isn't conclusive I suppose in respect to it being tagged indoors or outdoors, as you could disable mounts and leave it outdoor.
I thought the issue blizzard had with ghostwolf working indoors before was the ability to use it in PVE. I'd use it to help level friends alts by gathering up all of a low level dungeon and kill all the mobs so friends could gear up low levels (it was also a nice cheap way to get linen if you wanted to level a tailor). I suppose with the new triple xp buff they are handing out to friends with their pyramid marketing they are less concerned about power leveling.
I'd certainly like to see the ability to at least use ghost wolf indoors if not at full speed as it would prevent spectral transformation from being strictly a PVP talent.
Nevermind, logged out with my actual raidgear, check again if you like
Agi is ~500 not 600, got a little confused with my hunter. But I switch to +20 Agi-food, so it will be ~530 AP from Agi...and that before I regem my gear.
I too fail to see why it would be imbalanced to have ghost wolf work indoors. In PvE, DPS warriors and rogues both have ways to close the gap between mobs quickly (intercept/sprint), though rogues have it a bit worse that warriors. Even retribution paladins have a run speed increase.
Given that it still requires a GCD to cast, i don't see how being able to move out of the fire more quickly would unbalance PvE. If it wasn't OP in Hyjal, it probably won't be in any other raids. Same situation for 5 mans.
As for PvP, the vast majority of significant (arena/BG) PvP encounters happen outdoors. The only indoor situation would be flag rooms in WSG. It would be fairly upsetting to find out that they withheld indoor ghost wolf just to maintain balance in one new arena.
The fact of the matter is we need some sort of accelerated gap closer in PvE. Every time I see the fury warrior in my group intercept his way to the next mob I die a little inside. I'm not sure the frost shock solution Malan mentioned would be such a great idea for PvE simply because of the extra threat it generates.
I wonder if it would be too OP to add a 3/6/9/12/15% run speed increase to Unleashed Rage in addition to the AP increase. For PvE it would simply help us/rogues/ret pallies/tanks do our jobs more effectively. For PvP it gets a bit more dicey. It would definitely create a bit more demand for enhancement in arenas, but would it be too much? Death Knights are given a similar ability in deep Unholy, so it wouldn't be out of the question in Blizzard's mind. The Death Knight version is currently only 10%, but costs only two talent points and is constantly up for everyone within 45 yards. Ours would take 5 talent points, require a crit to activate, and only reach 20 yards. I think it's a fair trade.
On a similar note, is there any buzz around the beta community about reducing some bloat in the enhancement tree? All current enhancement PvE builds require a choice between imp WF totem and Imp Ghost Wolf, as well as the inability to reach both static shock and elemental shields which are obviously meant to compliment each other. This all assumes 5/5 reverberation and 3/3 elemental devastation. If ghost wolf were made usable indoors, imp Ghost Wolf would be a "must have" raid talent that we probably wouldn't be able to get (nor would resto/elemental). It seems like a logical step to remove improved ghost wolf, put toughness in its place, and make ghost wolf instant cast by default.
On a similar note, is there any buzz around the beta community about reducing some bloat in the enhancement tree? All current enhancement PvE builds require a choice between imp WF totem and Imp Ghost Wolf, as well as the inability to reach both static shock and elemental shields which are obviously meant to compliment each other. This all assumes 5/5 reverberation and 3/3 elemental devastation. If ghost wolf were made usable indoors, imp Ghost Wolf would be a "must have" raid talent that we probably wouldn't be able to get (nor would resto/elemental). It seems like a logical step to remove improved ghost wolf, put toughness in its place, and make ghost wolf instant cast by default.
Well here is what blizzard recently said about "bloat" -
Bloat: Bloat is another word for "I can't have everything I want!". We want every class to feel their tree is "bloated" to a degree. We want classes to have to make choices and sacrifices over good talents, because that is ultimately what makes talents interesting. If it weren't that way, we would just make it a linear progression without any choices. That said, if you feel the flow of the talents makes you spend points in something that doesn't necessarily benefit you what that build is for (i.e. spending too many "PvE" talents for a PvP build), then that can be addressed.
The problem with the enhancement tree is that at least one of our talents (Elemental Weapons and possibly Weapon Mastery) are only there as a means to undo the pre-TBC windfury nerf so that elemental and resto couldn't get big huge WF numbers without speccing into it. I'm not sure if that's still needed or not, but its somewhat annoying that Tiers 5, 6 and 7 require every talent to be taken regardless of what build you're going for.
The problem with the enhancement tree is that at least one of our talents (Elemental Weapons and possibly Weapon Mastery) are only there as a means to undo the pre-TBC windfury nerf so that elemental and resto couldn't get big huge WF numbers without speccing into it. I'm not sure if that's still needed or not, but its somewhat annoying that Tiers 5, 6 and 7 require every talent to be taken regardless of what build you're going for.
I think this problem stems from when they first defined shaman with talents they started with an empty husk and defined the hybrid abilities through talents. Paying talents for 2 handed weapons, parry etc, the ability to cast effectively was tied to a deep elemental talent. They've been slowly stripping away those requirements, but some vestiges still persist.
I'd certainly like the opportunity to vary spec a bit more and add a little more flavor to shaman. I'm talking about removing (made trainable) or bunching required talents and adding talents that could offer more variety in the way you play without being required or exactly powerful. I expect there would be problems in that they don't want to offer too much melee/spell power to resto/elemental or spell power to resto/enhance so moving talents to lower tiers doesn't seem like an option.
Yea, I had read Blizzard's stance on bloat. I personally think they are being a bit short sighted there. The flow of the talent trees are also important, regardless of what your intended role is. The differences between talent decisions within a single tree should allow the player to customize their experience in terms of added utility, convenience, survivability, etc. The current enhancement tree does a decent job of this as far differentiating PvE enhancement from PvP enhancement, but falls flat when it comes to the flow of PvE talent choices. We basically get to choose between "less damage" and "more damage" which, of course, is no decision at all.
The noticeable exclusions are 1 point in call of flame and 2 points in ancestral knowledge, with the somewhat less pressing issue of skipping elemental shields. I consider that a "less pressing" issue because it clearly serves its purpose for elemental and restoration shaman who choose to dip into enhancement. So, while I would like to have it I can understand why it is ok that I can't.
In order to max out our necessary talents in our "max PvE DPS" spec, we need to find three talent points somewhere. We could get two from dropping imp WF totem to max out ancestral knowledge, but 4% less haste for our entire raid (including ourselves) is obviously not worth it to gain the minor AP increase from blessing of kings/Mental Dexterity. Any other changes are also just trading "more DPS" for "less DPS" with no added utility, convenience, survivability, longevity, etc.
Perhaps the most annoying thing about the current enhancement tree (assuming you are going for a max DPS raid spec) is that you pretty much HAVE to put 2 points in Ancestral Knowledge to get to the second tier and then spend another point in either elemental shields or Ancestral Knowledge to even access the 4th tier. I find this frustrating because ancestral knowledge is probably the least influential talent on our DPS. With 500 intellect, 5/5 ancestral knowledge would net you 50 more attack power than if you had 0/5 points there. Blessing of Kings increases that to 60.5 AP with 5/5 AK verses 50 without AK. Actual intellect numbers and raid buffs will make this fluctuate a bit, but we are talking about a difference of maybe 30 AP for 5 talent points. It is there for resto/elemental to take on their way to elemental shields, nothing more. It seems extremely reasonable for an enhancement shaman to take those points out of AK and put them into elemental shields to increase static shock damage, but you literally cant.
The tree could be drastically improved by doing the following:
1. Move Improved Ghost Wolf to Tier 1 and put Earth's Grasp in Tier 2 (they swap places)
2. Make Mental Dexterity a 2 point talent (50%/100%) rather than a 3 point.
3. Make Mental Quickness a 2 point talent (3%/6% decrease in mana and 15%/30% of AP as spell power) rather than a 3 point.
4. Make Dual Wield Specialization a 2 point talent (3%/6%) rather than a 3 point talent.
The resulting "Max PvE DPS" spec would look like this (making sure to use your imagination to implement the above 4 changes):
We get maxed out DPS talents as well as imp Ghost Wolf (soloing) and the tree just flows better. It also has the added effect of allowing resto and elemental to waste less points going into the enhance tree as a sub spec (elemental could go 3/3 enhancing totems, 2/2 imp Ghost Wolf for soloing/PvP instead of putting two points into Ancestral Knowledge just to access the second tier, for example).
I hope Blizzard does something similar to this when shaman get their "polish" pass.
We'd like to note that we are currently in the process of revamping the mana cost of new spells, abilities and the new ranks of spells and abilities in the expansion. We are aware players feel the mana cost of certain abilities is too high, and we agree. Though I can't really go into much detail yet as the actual specifics of what's changing is still being debated internally, be rest assured your voice on the issue has been heard and it is one of our top priorities right now.
We've found the feedback from the players in Alpha and Beta to be more constructive and helpful than ever, and we hope that you continue to give feedback on your experiences in the beta.
Why would you go more then 11 points into elemental and not take Elemental Focus? Our new spells are wicked expensive and that 1 point equals basically mana-free shocks while raiding (shamanistic focus + elemental focus = 100% off the mana cost of shocks).
its somewhat annoying that Tiers 5, 6 and 7 require every talent to be taken regardless of what build you're going for.
I made a beta post about this but it died off to nonsense threads. But rows 5,6,8 are the perfect example of bloat versus choice.
Row 4 flurry versus toughness is a choice. We choose flurry arena healers might choose toughness.
Row 5,6,8 every single point is mandatory for any pve build. To a total of 21 mandatory points in 3 rows of talents. There is no choice. They are all prerequisite talents or our core utility talents. They can really do us a favor by doing some house cleaning or consolidation here.
I made a beta post about this but it died off to nonsense threads. But rows 5,6,8 are the perfect example of bloat versus choice.
Row 4 flurry versus toughness is a choice. We choose flurry arena healers might choose toughness.
Row 5,6,8 every single point is mandatory for any pve build. To a total of 21 mandatory points in 3 rows of talents. There is no choice. They are all prerequisite talents or our core utility talents. They can really do us a favor by doing some house cleaning or consolidation here.
Or you could say they are all really good talents. I would much rather have to take a bunch of good talents than have crap to choose from (see shield spec)
08/06/08, 11:55 AM
