Warlock patch 5.4 discussion

[nightfalls]

Oh there are ways they could work around it, but I'd rather they just redesigned it so it wasn't refreshing dots at all - it was useful back in Cata (to an extent, even then it was a bit meh), but with the way dot gaming is so vital to play these days, it doesn't mesh with that one bit, especially when we have SB:SS - it's just an outdated relic of an older system that has been left lying around instead of fixing to work when everything else was retooled, we need a different movement filler or the one we have tweaking.

I can agree with that. So how about this for an affliction Fel Flame?

Deals 762 to 841 (+ 75% of SpellPower) Shadowflame damage to an enemy and causes all of your periodic Affliction damage effects to instantly deal 50% of their normal periodic damage.

Since Fel Flame is slower than MG, you would get less DoT damage, about a 33% penalty. The extra ticks of course can also proc Nightfall.


Anyway my other point was that an SWG talent is not a bad talent to have alone, if your class doesn't absolutely need KJC to be competitive. So this was sort of comparing to shadow priests and mages (who both have a bit more instants), where you would have a usable movement filler as well as an optimal filler. I don't know what to think about MF, but AV of course is just garbage. Maybe next expansion they can put out good talents instead.

[Banawani]

I really do think KJC needs to be changed in some way; it's just much too strong. That said, this is most definitely not the time to be changing a class so drastically, this should be reviewed in the next expansion and not halfway through a raid tier. It's absurd.

From a destruction perspective, making incinerate a movable cast sounds like a good solution. Affliction could have Malefic grasp and Demo Shadowbolt (I haven't played either spec so this could be completely wrong, just throwing ideas out there).

I really hope Blizzard delays this, I had enough of re-learning my class each patch with my Mage where I had to switch spec every patch. I don't want to be forced to alter my playstyle for my Warlock so late in an expansion.

It's really not that strong, as without it you have to plant to DPS, which is where half of Aff's DPS comes from. Planting and casting MG. Add the 2pc to that and you have to get that talent to have any hope of being competitive and all this after Blizzard said they want more flexibility with talent choices.

If MG was a moveable cast, there'd be no point in ever getting KJC.

[Deleted]

Don't be silly..
shamans: Lightning bolt + SWG
mage: icelance, scorch, Cone of cold, Frost Nova, Arcane Barrage and Arcane explosion
moonkin : sunfire/moonfire (dots) starsurge proc from said dots. typhoon (not used in pve rotation). starfall
warlock: fel flame/RoF/shadowfury (meta form) chaos wave/touch of chaos/doom/corruption + KJC

All mostly weak fillers while locks enjoy(ed) total mobility.

We paid for it with much slower mobility - no one is arguing that destruction or demonology need KJC, it's affliction.

Affliction has it's two instant dots and fel flame, all of which can be a dps LOSS if you're running high procs, we need SOMETHING to be able to cast.

They should have let KJC remain a passive, but only affect MG, DS, incinerate and shadow bolt, the snare is enough of a drawback.

I can agree with that. So how about this for an affliction Fel Flame?

Deals 762 to 841 (+ 75% of SpellPower) Shadowflame damage to an enemy and causes all of your periodic Affliction damage effects to instantly deal 50% of their normal periodic damage.

Something like that, there are a myriad of mechanics that could fix it, from applying it's own dot (just tuned enough that it's not worth more than using MG in your normal rotation), working similarly to MG where it triggers existing dot ticks, adding dot duration but not refreshing it's values (though as I said earlier, would need tweaking to not be something you can spam for 100% crit 100% of the time) or simply hitting harder, it just needs to not be a spell where you can turn 100% crit dots into garbage, but have no other alternatives bar potentially lifetapping.

Having only one filler option doesn't work when it can be a dps loss to use it if you need to move at the wrong time, at least not unless you want your playerbase left with a button that you can totally press, but it's a bad choice to make - the right choice is to press nothing, which is obviously completely counter intuitive and icky feeling for a raider.

Fel flame should either be reworked, a second filler should be added, or blizzard should work KJC out in a way that it's not as broken as they seem to feel it is, but they're evidently having trouble.

The above "filler only" option seems fairly suitable, affliction reaps some nice benefits, still needs to stop for UA / Haunt (which is a fair bit of damage). Destro gets a minor benefit, which is fitting since they have a fair bit of instants to play with - I run without AV on Horridon which can require a fair bit of movement, there's always ROFs, conflags or fel flames to be using without gimping yourself. Demo gets very little benefit by making it SB only, not giving it to soul fire, but they're already very mobile thanks to meta, so they don't need it.

[sorix]

We paid for it with much slower mobility - no one is arguing that destruction or demonology need KJC, it's affliction.

Affliction has it's two instant dots and fel flame, all of which can be a dps LOSS if you're running high procs, we need SOMETHING to be able to cast.

They should have let KJC remain a passive, but only affect MG, DS, incinerate and shadow bolt, the snare is enough of a drawback.

you do realize the simc guy did the numbers and its actually a larger dps loss for destruction.. destruction has no insta spells besides conflag, rof and fel flame, which is a mana hog.. so, in those 15s if i have to cast while moving, i can cast 5 chaosbolts (if i pool my embers... HAHAHA) or 6-9 incinerates (if my backdrafts are up).. if i have to move when that is on cooldown, i can cast 3 spells and 2 of them will drain my mana.. so i guess on durumu during maze, i can just.. umm.. cast for 15s and the other time im following the maze, just run around.. heroic horridon sounds like fun too.. avoiding all kinds of crap while im running to gates..

[aevitas]

Okay as others have saied... Wth am I ging to cast on high mouvement fights as destruction? Like in durumu's maze for example.. I think all classes should just be able to cast while moving, it's one of the reasons I returned to WoW. Not being able to do so unless you stand still is just a flaw in design, think of Lei-Shen for example, you would spent almost more time running than casting especially in P3..

This is bad, it better not go through :/


Edit: sorry for retarded spelling, auto-correction is on on my ipad

[nightfalls]

you do realize the simc guy did the numbers and its actually a larger dps loss for destruction

He means it's a DPS loss over doing nothing. Of course it will be (and should be) a DPS loss over a standstill rotation. Also:

1) Most casters (except elemental shamans) will lose DPS during Durumu mazes.
2) You still have KJC cooldown which will cover at least half of the maze and will be up for every maze (and light spectrum at that).

[Deleted]

It's really not that strong, as without it you have to plant to DPS, which is where half of Aff's DPS comes from. Planting and casting MG. Add the 2pc to that and you have to get that talent to have any hope of being competitive and all this after Blizzard said they want more flexibility with talent choices.

If MG was a moveable cast, there'd be no point in ever getting KJC.

As Affliction you are most likely correct; as I said, I don't have much experience with the spec. That said I don't particularly see why Affliction shouldn't be mobile, it always was when dot's actually did damage. Malefic grasp would become easier to manage if it were able to be casted while moving but it would also allow warlocks to be shutdown somewhat which is what I assume Blizzard wanted when they nerfed dot damage.

For Destruction though, you're very wrong. Destruction has nothing else par Conflagrate to cast while moving, and the majority of fights in this expansion have been heavy-movement. It will be a heavy kick to the teeth.

[Deleted]

you do realize the simc guy did the numbers and its actually a larger dps loss for destruction.. destruction has no insta spells besides conflag, rof and fel flame, which is a mana hog.. so, in those 15s if i have to cast while moving, i can cast 5 chaosbolts (if i pool my embers... HAHAHA) or 6-9 incinerates (if my backdrafts are up).. if i have to move when that is on cooldown, i can cast 3 spells and 2 of them will drain my mana.. so i guess on durumu during maze, i can just.. umm.. cast for 15s and the other time im following the maze, just run around..

Maybe it's more important for destro than I thought, but I'm struggling to see how what you posted goes against what I posted, that destro should have incin available while on the move? You don't need chaos bolt. I'd also take any simc numbers pertaining to movement with a pinch of salt, the issue isn't so much that x amount of movement is bad, it's that if that movement happens to be required when you're running highly procced dots, you can screw yourself - affliction if forced to move shortly after UVOLS procs, can be shafting themselves out of a lot of damage if they happen to fel flame and refresh with weaker dots.

heroic horridon sounds like fun too.. avoiding all kinds of crap while im running to gates..

Hm? As far as I'm aware, KJC shouldn't be used on Horridon as is, unless I'm getting the wrong end of the stick here.

[Arrogant Bastard]

He means it's a DPS loss over doing nothing. Of course it will be (and should be) a DPS loss over a standstill rotation. Also:

1) Most casters (except elemental shamans) will lose DPS during Durumu mazes.
2) You still have KJC cooldown which will cover at least half of the maze and will be up for every maze (and light spectrum at that).

Hunter's too.

So it is acceptable for Hunters and Elemental Shaman; but, not for Warlocks?

Hell the suggestion to only allow filler spells to work with KJC would be better than this. However, seeing how Elemental can cast its filler without a talent/glyph makes it appear to be a junk deal.

[Brusalk]

We paid for it with much slower mobility - no one is arguing that destruction or demonology need KJC, it's affliction.

Affliction has it's two instant dots and fel flame, all of which can be a dps LOSS if you're running high procs, we need SOMETHING to be able to cast.

They should have let KJC remain a passive, but only affect MG, DS, incinerate and shadow bolt, the snare is enough of a drawback.



Something like that, there are a myriad of mechanics that could fix it, from applying it's own dot (just tuned enough that it's not worth more than using MG in your normal rotation), working similarly to MG where it triggers existing dot ticks, adding dot duration but not refreshing it's values (though as I said earlier, would need tweaking to not be something you can spam for 100% crit 100% of the time) or simply hitting harder, it just needs to not be a spell where you can turn 100% crit dots into garbage, but have no other alternatives bar potentially lifetapping.

Having only one filler option doesn't work when it can be a dps loss to use it if you need to move at the wrong time, at least not unless you want your playerbase left with a button that you can totally press, but it's a bad choice to make - the right choice is to press nothing, which is obviously completely counter intuitive and icky feeling for a raider.

Fel flame should either be reworked, a second filler should be added, or blizzard should work KJC out in a way that it's not as broken as they seem to feel it is, but they're evidently having trouble.

The above "filler only" option seems fairly suitable, affliction reaps some nice benefits, still needs to stop for UA / Haunt (which is a fair bit of damage). Destro gets a minor benefit, which is fitting since they have a fair bit of instants to play with - I run without AV on Horridon which can require a fair bit of movement, there's always ROFs, conflags or fel flames to be using without gimping yourself. Demo gets very little benefit by making it SB only, not giving it to soul fire, but they're already very mobile thanks to meta, so they don't need it.

Keep in mind that for Destro most of the current mobility is provided by RoF every 4-7 seconds, which they want to remove as a part of the rotation in 5.4.

[NytemareRulez]

they should have changed KJC so it only affected our filler spells, that would have made sense, to change it the way they did was stupid. we had only 1 choice b4, now we will do equally well without a lvl 90 talent as we would with a lvl 90 talent, so i guess something good did come out of it, now we dont need to pick a lvl 90 talent.

It funny, but it hurt that this is so true as it stands, only class in the game who doesn't need to take 90 talent

[Grizelda]

People are coming up with 15 different things to comp locks for the proposed KJC nerf. Do you really think that Blizz will make such a sweeping class overhaul? Or is it more likely that we're just going to get the nerf and call it a day?

I understand if some less mobile classes harbor a grudge (Spriests I'm looking at you). But the solution isn't to nerf KJC to the point of ruin. Turret casting is outdated. The game has changed. Encounters have changed. Its how things are done now. It's way more fun to be mobile. Encounters are way more fun now.

In conversation with a few friends who don't want KJC to stick around, I was accused of a lack of skill when it comes to stutter stepping to cast.
It turns out that these locks didn't want to use it because they die when they use it. They are unable to coordinate the snare mechanic. They didn't want to be "forced" into taking it by prevailing wisdom.
Two were keyboard turners and clickers so they were not exactly getting the best use out of it anyway. Clearly, casting while running (and dealing with the snare) requires skill, the same way that planning out an encounter and when to stutter step requires skill.
One of the locks in said conversation was not even currently subscribed. Just nostalgic for the way things used to be.
The other two played locks as alts and were Spriests with an axe to grind.

Turret casting is dead. Let's get with the times. Give all casters the version of KJC we have now.

[NytemareRulez]

MMOC has been complaining about blizzard not knowing what they're doing with warlocks ever since MOP launched and Xelnath was booted (Though I frankly don't like what Xel did to affliction either, so eh).

Most peoples problem isn't with the class thematics though, these nerfs aren't making us "less demonic", they're just making us less enjoyable to play and even weaker in pvp, where we're already on our knees. Thematically demo is pretty damn demon-y (though I prefered it as a pet class, I hate meta), destruction is less of a mage than ever, and affliction is still pretty none-mage-y, even if it has turned from being the most unique feeling spec to a shadowpriest wanabe.

blizzard seems to have some major problems with warlock direction, but it's mechanics more than feeling like they're not their own class.



PVP buffs? We've got a 10% passive damage reduction taken away from us (that was only given to us recently), KJC nerfed, MF nerfed and we got Howl as baseline and an optional breath snare in return - am I missing something, or is that not a particularly fair tradeoff on the pvp front?

Don't get me wrong, we've been asking for one of those CC talents to be made baseline for a while and I'm glad they're listening, but it seems that we've got the one that's least asked for (I usually see either shadowfury or deathcoil being asked for, not sure I've EVER seen Howl asked for - personally I lean on deathcoil since it's always useful, even in pve), but they're handing us a dime while taking our wallet.

I have met just could be better, like make us a tanking class with it. I would take all these nerfs anyday if they were to play us a tank class finally, so far in each exp I seen a fight that a lock can tank better then tank themselves (well have not done much raiding in MOP so don't know about that yet), In Vanillia we had the twins fight in AQ 40, BC we had Blind guy in SSC, in WOTLK I think there was a fight in Naxx horsemen or something, in Cat (didn't raid much so I can't remember it), and now in MOP I sure if not right now, by the time expansion ends there will be some fight locks tank better at.

[Deleted]

Using KJC on Horridon is a huge DPS loss, but unless your guild struggle to kill him, you can go with pretty much anything.

On topic though, I couldn't care less for the KJC nerf, but the MF nerf really hurts.

We had two talents, that were taken quite often - KJC and MF - and one that wasn't that used. What I expected was for them to try and improve AV and instead, they nerfed those two talents quite hard.

To be honest, I don't really care for our 90 lvl talents anymore and I'm also increasingly envious about druids', paladins' and shamans' talents. Some of them are very original and creative and it must be a treat to be able to choose from those. I must admit I don't really have the same feeling about our talents.

The most interesting tier for us in my opinion is probably 45 lvl tier. All very useful and to some extent unique abilities.

Lvl 75 looks interesting on paper but in reality there's really not much of a choice. GoSac is viable only because of a trinket abuse for demo, pure single target for affli and SB/Havoc abusive fights for destro. GoSup and GoServ are roughly equal but to be honest, who wouldn't take GoSup, when you can get one prettier/cooler looking/more insteresting pet instead of a second dude for 20 secs you've been stuck with for 8 years (yeah I know, it's mainly aesthetics). But GoServ also comes with the cost of more micromanagement of your CDs and the DPS difference (in other words the reward) resulting by doing that is marginal at best.

I really wish I could look at more of our talent tiers and say..."Well this is a interesting talent, I look forward to trying it out"... like I do when I look on talents of classes I mentioned earlier.

I say (and I know it's not going to happen) - just scrap the current lvl 90 talents and give us some interesting to choose from:

Hintity hint hint hint Atrocity, Cataclysm

[NytemareRulez]

Boomkins and Shadow Priests also had their passive damage reduction removed. what are Blizzard smoking?????

---------- Post added 2013-06-12 at 01:26 PM ----------

oh, and Mage spell co-efficients remain untouched. time for a WoW break I think.

It seems like as lock get nerfed, mages get buffed - I remember a time when Lock out did a mage, now all 3 mages specs are the top dps specs, and with 5.3 demo has lost some spots, to enhancement shaman, and other classes. It BS when one class can be the top in all 3 specs, while us locks are struggling to do anything.


Bring me back to my point of Bias, people behind the lock is showing favoritism to all the other classes(mages), and screwing locks over(showing bias)

---------- Post added 2013-06-12 at 07:58 PM ----------

Mage forum is that way >>>>>>>>>>>>>>>

Omg so true, I can't stop laughing, only a mage or some other class would think nerf were good. Those who play lock know the nerf are bad, and now it just hurts us. Instead of moving with the times, where every boss needs movement, they have gone and throw us back in time, with all the new damage, expect now the boss are moving and not standing still, so now we have all this power and can't use it for crap because of the boss fight now. Way to go Blizzard.

---------- Post added 2013-06-12 at 08:08 PM ----------

Don't be silly..
shamans: Lightning bolt + SWG
mage: icelance, scorch, Cone of cold, Frost Nova, Arcane Barrage and Arcane explosion
moonkin : sunfire/moonfire (dots) starsurge proc from said dots. typhoon (not used in pve rotation). starfall
warlock: fel flame/RoF/shadowfury (meta form) chaos wave/touch of chaos/doom/corruption + KJC

All mostly weak fillers while locks enjoy(ed) total mobility.

FF and ROF is worthless for fillers, Doom/Corruption are dots enough said there, Shadowfury is a stun only cast time it every had was a .05sec back in BC, once again not a filler spell. Chaos Wave/Touch of Chaos - hello just the name alone applies they should be instant - not require talent anyways.

Only true Fillers are MG/DS(aff), Incinerate(destro), and Shadow Bolt(Demo) those are filler spells, spell that are used only used if you have nothing else to do, so you just don't stand there. Like when you CD locked, you could just stand, or use some spell to do some more damage, every class has a filler spell/attack - far I know they do, so we locks seems to be the only class where are filler spells are crippled if we can't move.

[Ailerist]

Without KJC, welcome to being but humped into oblivion

[Docmort]

I would like to give a reminder that if you are dissatisfied with this nerf to make sure you vocally take it to the PTR forum. As much as I hate to say it QQ does work and there is a higher probability of a reversal or compromise if the opposition to these changes is immediate, wide and constant. The "wait and see it's only PTR" sentiment actually decreases the possibility of shifting Blizzard's position as it's easier for them to push past if criticism doesn't really kick up until late in the patch development cycle, we've seen it before. And if you think that Blizzard will adequately compensate our current model, which has been balanced around our ability to move and cast, for the loss of KJC that's really not going to happen, and we've definitely seen that before.

[BatteredSausage]

This change makes me rage and ill not stop raging until its changed or scrapped, i guess ill be raging for a long time to come.

[Deleted]

I would like to give a reminder that if you are dissatisfied with this nerf to make sure you vocally take it to the PTR forum. As much as I hate to say it QQ does work and there is a higher probability of a reversal or compromise if the opposition to these changes is immediate, wide and constant. The "wait and see it's only PTR" sentiment actually decreases the possibility of shifting Blizzard's position as it's easier for them to push past if criticism doesn't really kick up until late in the patch development cycle, we've seen it before. And if you think that Blizzard will adequately compensate our current model, which has been balanced around our ability to move and cast, for the loss of KJC that's really not going to happen, and we've definitely seen that before.

I can't stress enough on that!

[Armitagethethird]

For every lock saying hunters should also lose their casting while mo.ving a couple of things.

1) Almost everything we do is instant cast wit hno cast time. Very few things have a cast time with us.

2) As hunters we have always been able to move and dps. We are the original kiters of this game. Warlocks did not get kite abilities (less they just feared the mob non stop) till this expansion. You are going back to what you once were. Stop trying to drag hunters with you to a place they never were at before