Raid composition will still matter to some extent, but without this change, it would have overwhelmed every other aspect of raid planning (as we added new capabilities to each of 30 different talent trees). You no longer need to rigidly control the melee/spellcaster balance of your raid, or make sure every group has all the critical buffing classes, etc. This change has many class balance implications.
IMPORTANT! Before we are done, we will thoroughly test the performance of every class. It should not be assumed that one class' current performance relative to others in beta is final. Some classes (and specializations) will need to be reduced in power and some increased. Many may feel the change has more impact on class X than class Y. We will address all of those concerns via our internal testing and community feedback.
There are thirty or so different categories into which buffs and debuffs fit. Here you will find a comprehensive list of the changes made broken down by category and which spells/talents are in that category.
* Armor Debuff (Major): Acid Spit (exotic Hunter pet), Expose Armor, Sunder Armor
* Armor Debuff (Minor): Faerie Fire, Sting (Hunter pet), Curse of Recklessness
* Physical Vulnerability Debuff: Blood Frenzy, (2nd Talent Spec TBA)
* Melee Haste Buff: Improved Icy Talons, Windfury Totem
* Melee Critical Strike Chance Buff: Leader of the Pack, Rampage
* Attack Power Buff (Flat Add): Battle Shout, Blessing of Might
* Attack Power Buff (Multiplier): Abomination's Might, Trueshot Aura, Unleashed Rage
* Ranged Attack Power Buff: Hunter's Mark (only Hunters benefit, so no need to exclude against other class abilities)
* Bleed Damage Increase Debuff: Mangle, Trauma
* Spell Haste Buff: Wrath of Air Totem
* Spell Critical Strike Chance Buff: Moonkin Aura, Elemental Oath
* Spell Critical Strike Chance Debuff: Improved Scorch, Winter's Chill
* Increased Spell Damage Taken Debuff: Ebon Plaguebringer, Earth and Moon, Curse of the Elements
* Increased Spell Power Buff: Focus Magic, Improved Divine Spirit, Flametongue Totem, Totem of Wrath, Demonic Pact
* Increased Spell Hit Chance Taken Debuff: Improved Faerie Fire, Misery
* Percentage Haste Increase (All Types): Improved Moonkin Aura, Swift Retribution
* Percentage Damage Increase: Ferocious Inspiration, Sanctified Retribution
* Critical Strike Chance Taken Debuff (All types): Heart of the Crusader, Totem of Wrath
* Melee Attack Speed Slow Debuff: Icy Touch, Infected Wounds, Judgements of the Just, Thunderclap
* Melee Hit Chance Reduction Debuff: Insect Swarm, Scorpid Sting
* Healing Debuff: Wound Poison, Aimed Shot, Mortal Strike, Furious Attacks
* Attack Power Debuff: Demoralizing Roar, Curse of Weakness, Demoralizing Shout
* Stat Multiplier Buff: Blessing of Kings
* Stat Add Buff: Mark of the Wild
* Agility and Strength Buff: Strength of Earth Totem, Horn of Winter
* Stamina Buff: Power Word: Fortitude
* Health Buff: Commanding Shout, Blood Pact
* Intellect Buff: Arcane Intellect, Fel Intelligence
* Spirit Buff: Divine Spirit, Fel Intelligence
* Damage Reduction Percentage Buff: Grace, Blessing of Sanctuary
* Percentage Increase Healing Received Buff: Tree of Life, Improved Devotion Aura
* Armor Increase Percentage Buff: Inspiration, Ancestral Healing
* Cast Speed Slow: Curse of Tongues, Slow, Mind-numbing Poison.
In each category, you can only benefit from the most powerful spell granting that effect. For example, Fel Intelligence grants spirit and intellect, both weaker than Arcane Intellect and Divine Spirit. If a player has Fel Intelligence and receives a stronger Arcane Intellect buff, he will gain the intellect value from Arcane Intellect and the spirit value from Fel Intelligence.
In most cases, fully-talented players will have exactly equal power on the strength of these buffs and debuffs. Fel Intelligence is an example of where one ability is weaker than others. The buffs in the "Increased Spell Power Buff" category are also not all the same potency, as they scale and grow in radically different ways. In virtually every other case, however, the buffs are equal. This means, for example, that fully-talented Battle Shout and Blessing of Might now grant the exact same amount of attack power.
In addition to this change, we also needed to address the "mana battery" roles in a raid. The mana regeneration effect they grant is no longer limited to their own party, and it no longer depends on the amount of damage they deal. Each time they trigger the mana regeneration effect, 10 people in their raid group will receive a buff which causes them to regenerate 0.5% of their maximum mana each second. This buff, Replenishment, will be given preferentially to raid members with the lowest mana, but will re-evaluate which raid members receive it each time it is fired. Replenishment is provided by Shadow Priests, Survival Hunters, and Retribution Paladins.
Finally, we have modified Heroism and Bloodlust to affect the entire raid. However, all affected raid members will be unable to cast or benefit from Bloodlust/Heroism for 5 minutes.
Below you will find a list of the changes to abilities which exhibit new behavior regardless of the exclusive categories. The changes usually mean the old behavior was removed and replaced by the new behavior. Numbers listed are for maximally-talented versions. Here is that list of changes:
* Improved Scorch: Increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Winter's Chill: Also increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Elemental Oath: Grants 5% spell crital strike to raid members.
* Improved Moonkin Aura: Grants 3% haste of all types.
* Earth and Moon: Increases spell damage taken from all schools by 13% on the target.
* Misery: Causes spells cast at the target to have +3% spell hit.
* Shadow Weaving: Buffs only self.
* Improved Shadow Bolt: Buffs only self.
* Expose Weakness: Buffs only self.
* Shadow Embrace: Buffs only self.
* Blood Pact: Grants health instead of Stamina.
* Fel Intelligence: Has replacement ranks that grant flat values of Intellect and Spirit.
* Frost Aura: Excludes properly against all other resistance buffs.
* Grace: Reduces damage taken by target by 3%.
* Rampage: Increases melee and ranged critical strike chance by 5% for the raid.
* Improved Faerie Fire: No longer benefits melee and ranged hit chance, only spell hit.
* Hunter's Mark: No longer increases attack power bonus from attacks against the target.
* Improved Hunter's Mark: No longer grants melee attack power.
* Sting (Hunter pet): Now acts as a minor armor debuff.
* Waylay: Attack speed reduction changed to 20%.
* Icy Touch: Only slows melee attack speed (not ranged or spell).
* Tree of Life: No longer grants healing based on spirit, grants 3% increased healing received to raid.
* Demonic Pact: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
* Focus Magic: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
* Totem of Wrath: Now grants a flat amount of spell damage, and all enemies in its radius have an increased chance of being struck by criticals.
* Heroism: Cannot be recast while caster has Exhausted debuff, and those with Exhausted debuff cannot be affected by it.
* Bloodlust: Cannot be recast while caster has Sated debuff, and those with Sated debuff cannot be affected by it.
* Vampiric Touch: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on dealing damage.
* Hunting Party: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on specified shots.
* Judgements of the Wise: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on Judging.
They're rolling a lot of the unique benefits that classes bring to the raid and rolling it all into one set of buffs that cancel out the weaker ones.
All I can say is: GG SPriests
Glad I'm not raiding for wotlk.
quote:
* Improved Hunter's Mark: No longer grants melee attack power.
I'm not even playing right now but...
Does this mean that it's not giving anyone the "causes 100% of your Hunter's Mark ability's base attack power to apply to melee attack power as well" as it states on the talent? Doesn't this mean it's completely pointless to buy the skill now?
quote:
Norim the Stumpy had this to say about Captain Planet:
I'm not even playing right now but...Does this mean that it's not giving anyone the "causes 100% of your Hunter's Mark ability's base attack power to apply to melee attack power as well" as it states on the talent? Doesn't this mean it's completely pointless to buy the skill now?
I'm assuming that the entire talent is changed to simply add more ranged AP rather than give melee AP.
They better scale the living shit out of shadow priest damage or we're now out of a job. Blindy. fucked around with this message on 08-29-2008 at 11:41 AM.
"Don't want to sound like a fanboy, but I am with you. I'll buy it for sure, it's just a matter of for how long I will be playing it..."
- Silvast, Battle.net forums
quote:
Inferno-Spirit + Inferno-Spirit = 2Inferno-Spirit:
I imagine the most sensible plan would be to next make all spells and attacks cause the same dps.
Well the thing is they've got this set up so that if one caster puts up a 15% shadow damage debuff and another puts up a 10% shadow damage debuff, only the 15% applies, where right now, it means 76.5% or 75%.
So the guy who does a 15% debuff should still do less damage than a 10% debuff because he increases other's debuffs more. Also, not all classes cause the same number of buffs and debuffs, so the ones who have a wider variety of them should technically have less DPS.
quote:
Blindy. was listening to Cher while typing:
Well the thing is they've got this set up so that if one caster puts up a 15% shadow damage debuff and another puts up a 10% shadow damage debuff, only the 15% applies, where right now, it means 76.5% or 75%.So the guy who does a 15% debuff should still do less damage than a 10% debuff because he increases other's debuffs more. Also, not all classes cause the same number of buffs and debuffs, so the ones who have a wider variety of them should technically have less DPS.
If you'll notice as well, ISB is being nerfed to 15% AND only (apparently) affects the warlock who cast it.
Whee.
fuck blizzard
quote:
Blizzard posted
IMPORTANT! Before we are done, we will thoroughly test the performance of every class. It should not be assumed that one class' current performance relative to others in beta is final. Some classes (and specializations) will need to be reduced in power and some increased. Many may feel the change has more impact on class X than class Y. We will address all of those concerns via our internal testing and community feedback.
quote:
Maradon! attempted to be funny by writing:
I wonder if they'll take this moment in which they're totally overhauling every class at the same time to rework the infernal and doomguard, which they even admitted have been broken since day one.
What's fun is to get 40 people together (Waiting for a queue of AV to flush is a good time) have a single warlock summon a doom portal and have everybody click the portal at once.
It's like russian roulette!
And yes, that's the only situation it's even remotely useful in.
That was pretty awesome.
On that note, it was pretty sweet when you could spam-click the soulwell to make noise. Used to get half the raid doing that, with the other half screaming on vent to stfu (the few that had sound on anyway).
quote:
Addy spewed forth this undeniable truth:
Don't forget when summoning a soulwell looked the same as summoning a doomguard.That was pretty awesome.
On that note, it was pretty sweet when you could spam-click the soulwell to make noise. Used to get half the raid doing that, with the other half screaming on vent to stfu (the few that had sound on anyway).
Yes, doomguarding a raid was always good for cheap laughs.
quote:
Addy got all f'ed up on Angel Dust and wrote:
Don't forget when summoning a soulwell looked the same as summoning a doomguard.That was pretty awesome.
On that note, it was pretty sweet when you could spam-click the soulwell to make noise. Used to get half the raid doing that, with the other half screaming on vent to stfu (the few that had sound on anyway).
One of my old raid leaders played with sound on, and his speakers so loud you could hear his in-game sound every time he used Vent.
Upon figuring this out I macrod /train and Flash of Light to the same button and made sure to stand on top of him during every boss fight.
"We need everyone to spr-chugga chugga, chugga chugga to use our bes- WOO WOO or we're gonna wipe."
I quit playing the day he figured out how to stop that from happening.
quote:
Greenlit attempted to be funny by writing:
One of my old raid leaders played with sound on, and his speakers so loud you could hear his in-game sound every time he used Vent.Upon figuring this out I macrod /train and Flash of Light to the same button and made sure to stand on top of him during every boss fight.
"We need everyone to spr-chugga chugga, chugga chugga to use our bes- WOO WOO or we're gonna wipe."
I quit playing the day he figured out how to stop that from happening.
That was awesome. He got so pissed off and couldn't figure out who it was.
