Originally Posted by
Protoman
I will just echo what others have said in saying that I don't think you have fully absorbed all the new changes or the impact they will have on us in the game. You do have a few relevant points, but some are wrong or not really important...
Relevant:
-MW5. Nothing YET has been done to make this more central, or higher priority other then 200% crit.
-Feral Spirits. Nothing done YET, but it is still beta and they went thru a major change. If all goes well, they will scale dynamically with AP/crit/haste from us, and smarter AI that assists us.
-Haste/Resource. It's true they haven't done much to make this stat more effective, especially during cd's like BLust, other then linking it w/ another cd like Ascendence or Stormlash. Resource sort of ties into this, but being based off Mana and CD's is perfectly fine for most part. An additional resource on top of Mana could be interesting, like Holy Power, or my idea with "Shock Blast", but we function fine without it and MW5 already gives us some flexibility. Haste having more influence would be good though.....stuff like stronger flame shock or searing totem damage and scaling w/ haste, maybe a Killing Machine style proc off melee attacks, or Haste reducing the cd of SS or Shocks. You do have a point about refunding cd's when your attack gets missed/dodged/parried ...especially LL.
-Searing Totem. Same with wolves, this hopefully will go thru an update for AI and scaling. I dislike the Searing Flames mechanic as well, I think it should stack thru Flame shock, but I highly doubt Blizz will ever change their minds on this one unfortunately. Better AI will atleast make it easier and less annoying to use.
-Execute. I think your point about MS is useless, not every class should bring this debuff and in group BG's you tend to focus on one target at a time so you usually have the debuff applied anyways by some other class. But an Execute would be nice, we don't have much controlled burst or ways to "pool resources" to link a few attacks together. Extra CD's will help, but some way to finish off an opponent at <30% HP would be really great. Something like "When target is below 30% HP, your next ES will do 200% more damage and auto crit, can only happen once every 30 sec).....our version of "hammer of wrath" basically.
Not Relevant:
-Rotation/hardcasting. Our rotation is perfect, plus new cd's and single drop totems will make it congested as is. We don't need anything new. Hardcasting will most likely go away since we won't have many spare gcds left, and hopefully MW5 will give incentive to use only at 5 stacks.
-Gap closer/MS. We got plenty of ways to close gap, we don't need instant cause we have good ranged damage, ranged snare/root, interrupt, and dispels. Classes with instant gap closer lack those tools. MS is not something we need either, in group BG's the focus target is likely to have debuff applied regardless by some other class. We bring purge and wind shear which are just as good as MS.
-Defenses. We have alot more defenses, Bulwark totem specifically is on a 1min cd and good vs melee, plus SR at 1min, and stronger healing with wolves and MW5 via glyphs, as well as superior kiting abilities. We are generally strong vs casters and weak vs melee, but we do have more defenses against them now, ES reducing physical damage is another example.
-Passive damage. We still do majority of our damage as Active damage abilities. If you nerf passive damage, you nerf Haste's effect even more. Every melee class has passive damage which is why you gotta try to stay on the target, that's the main challenge for us in PVP. We have tons of snares/roots plus talented FB will give you a sprint plus perma snare to easily stay on the target. You underestimate how much passive damage other melee have, for example a rogue/feral can only apply their snares with passive damage and need to keep them in range for combo points. A Warrior also needs to be in range to snare and build rage. DK's spend a rune to snare meaning less dps once they reach target, and Killing machine procs from auto attacks.