Winter's Chill and Imp Scorch.Follow

For those of you who haven't read the story on the main page, I suggest you go read it now. Here's a link. I'll highlight the points I wish to discuss.





So, this removes any possible need to cross spec a mage to get both WC and Imp Scorch. IMO a good thing, but it equates to a utility hit for us(though everyone seems to be taking a hit to their synergy as well). Though, considering they look to be non-school specific now, that may actually make them a net increase.

The second thing I'm curious about, is how do you feel about the change to Imp Scorch? Used to be a damage increase, now it's a crit increase. Assuming numbers stay the same(10%), better in your opinion? Worse?

And before anyone emoplodes, read the entire article. We're not the only ones getting changes like this. For instance, Imp Shadowbolt and Shadowweaving(Lock and Spriest abilities) are now self only damage increases, removing a lot of the synergy between the two.

First thought is, why would anyone take a Shadow Priest on a raid now if you have other options. They have lower DPS and their mana regen got widened to raid but it's effectiveness nerf'd. Our WE fully talented and inscribed will do much better. They also buffed mana regen abilities for hunters and pallies. Hopefully this make more spots for mages in raids to replace Shadow Priests.

2nd thought:

Changing it from increasing crit from increasing dmg seems like a nerf to me. It probably isn't, but that was always a must have in my fire builds and pvp fire builds, now I don't know.

At first I was very pessimistic about the change. It essentially encourages only one mage slot per raid.

But then I got to thinking harder on it. Really they want to limit the amount of "slotting" required in raids in the first place, so while there may only be one "required" slot for a mage, there are 15 other slots that are free-for-all, where you can put good quality players in rather than having to leave good players on the sideline because of a "have to have" debuff.

Obviously the change to Imp Scorch is going to negatively affect Fire DPS based on current beta talents, but I'm inclined to think that Blizzard knows this and will adjust the talents for the PTR release to buff the base damage. The most important thing is not to look at that blue post and try to apply it to current game or even current beta. These changes are part of the PTR build, which we haven't seen yet.

I'm not a huge fan of it as I believe I will probably be crit-capped as it is. That + burnout can lead to some problems. Raid buffed I am around 42% crit. + 10% I am over cap (50% iirc) so that + gems/gear could really fudge with how things work... that + how hot streak will work, the lack of salvation, etc, I pray that we will be able to shed threat pretty easily other than critting for 6k a few times right off the bat.

Umm, not really. I mean each spell that is hitting the mob can/should be adding a stack of winter's chill increasing the chance to crit against it... although they should be dying in 2 or 3 spells anyway (especially if frostbite procs = shatter crit of a frostbolt/fireblast [until icelance]).

About the lack of Salvation.

My understanding is that the 30% from salv is being added to tanks right off the bat.

Bear Form, Defensive Stance, and Righteous Fury will have their old talented threat increases added to the base ability AND an additional 30%.

I could be mistaken as I haven't been following Beta terribly closely except for a couple of classes, but as I understand it that's how Blizz is fixing the necessity of Salvation.

Probably true, though it may also work when dispelled too.

The change from damage to crit is a direct and indirect nerf. First damage is there every time, crits are at the mercy of the RNG. Second as was mentioned above, if you are riding the aggro boundary having too much crit can become problematic. Your alternatives are either leave a bigger margin, or dump aggro more frequently, either way you leave DPS on the table.

As for making DPS more generic goes. I think that whether this is good or bad now depends on how well blizzard anticipates the utility decision process of the RL. If they manage to achieve balance so that classes are equally represented in raids this is a good thing, if not it will be bad for the classes who come in second. At this point in the release cycle WotLK has way to far to go to make any kind of prediction.

Edited, Sep 4th 2008 5:11pm by MrFredII

i'm personally quite grateful for the the improved water elemental. it is mages who, from W3, should have been given the role of raid mana battery. i've always been quite miffed that mages never got a mana aura but priests were given an invaluable dps role. i also declare it high time that shadow synergy be nerfed, and not a moment too soon. with salvation being folded into tank threat generation, i'm not worried about the crit increase at all. all this together means that frost is now a viable and valuable raid spec.

it has been publicly stated that just because northrend and the lich king's hideout are winter-themed doesn't mean we should fear another molten core situation where a particular school of damage will be rendered useless. i maintain a skeptical hopefulness.

about the more general problem of buff stacking... raids as a whole are getting a lot less interesting. as classes get more more homogeneous, the question stops being "what does my class bring to the raid?" than "what kind of gear do i have?". in essence, players are no longer capable of bringing a valuable and unique role, they are merely excluded from content based solely on the amount of time they've played. and with blizzard's apparent drive to make the game for children, there remains few serious challenges left save pvp. what of those of us who would prefer to have an entertaining and varied pve experience?

this is a symptom of blizzard's developers being lazy. they don't want to have to work for their money, so instead they make everyone the same to save themselves the trouble of inter-class balance and the complexity of designing raid encounters.

i'm entirely against the buff-stacking changes even if it does improve everyone's function. i do think auras and totems should have always been raid-wide buffs (and im not just saying that because i have a resto druid), but if my buff cancels someone else's, then why not just bring a lot of whichever class is the most powerful at that moment? hybrids are taking over because specialists (mages, warriors, rogues, warlocks) no longer have a unique class role to justify their existance.

it's been trending that way for a while i suppose. at first, dps was cheap and a dime a dozen. good tanks were impossible to find, but you only needed one or two per raid. which made tanks THAT much MORE rare. despite certain classes failing to show up in frequent raid rosters, those same classes were topping the charts in pvp because that's all they could do even if they were best at it.

i don't want my gameplay to be restricted just because i chose to play a mage years ago. i adore my mage. i wouldn't stop playing her for all the gold in china. but i also like to pve. why should i have to give up one or the other? i want my unique buff slot back please. i want a reason to be a mage beyond my personal attachment to my character. because as much as i love my mage, the raid leaders don't care. and neither, apparently, do the developers.

Edited, Sep 7th 2008 9:55pm by LaFey