[Enhancement] Future Legion Resources

[Deleted]

Done an updated look at talents as of the most recent build since my first pass is quite outdated:

How do you like Enhancement? Is it fun? (And what has your experience with Havoc been like?)

[wordup]

How do you like Enhancement? Is it fun? (And what has your experience with Havoc been like?)

I really enjoy Enhancement on the Alpha barring a few small quirks. It's got a lot of different aspects to its play & it has a relatively good flow (especially with Boulderfist) and you have a lot more control over your damage than you originally did in the first pass, largely due to the extra gen with BF and the SS cost reduction down to 40 that happened a while back.

Havoc is pretty fun too (though a little broken) & again has a lot of different tools for situations that are very strong. Some of the experience is helped a bit by the JCing gems breaking the crit aspect which makes it feel more OP, but in general the specs flow isn't as good as Enhancement, but its burst and battlefield control is pretty much unparalleled in lower number content such as dungeons.

[Sarkol]

Can you expand on 'Battlefield control' a tad wordup?

[wordup]

Can you expand on 'Battlefield control' a tad wordup?

Stuns, control over movement, ability to single out & burn a priority target or switch to a full AoE burn without much wind up time (though it's tied more to CDs).

[EnhAcidity]

I really enjoy Enhancement on the Alpha barring a few small quirks

What would you like to see changed and how would you change them?

[wordup]

What would you like to see changed and how would you change them?

Right now our defense is extremely low (lower than I think is reasonable across the board) so I'd like to see that represented somewhere in the talent tree. Other than that, I think there's a few small issues with Crash Lightning hitbox, Feral Spirit is a painfully weak cooldown and definitely needs a bump, Hailstorm & FoA both need some number tweaking, and the value of Mastery vs. alternatives may need a little bit of a look since it is significantly better than all other stats. The proc-centric gameplay further down the line may be frustrating because it can lead to huge chains of burst damage whilst also getting nothing and feeling useless, but that's more prediction (and arguably countered by LvL being relatively strong right now as well).

[Coffeh]

Right now our defense is extremely low (lower than I think is reasonable across the board) so I'd like to see that represented somewhere in the talent tree. Other than that, I think there's a few small issues with Crash Lightning hitbox, Feral Spirit is a painfully weak cooldown...

Two birds with one stone: put Feral Spirits back to 30 second duration and return the heal to the ability.

[wordup]

Two birds with one stone: put Feral Spirits back to 30 second duration and return the heal to the ability.

That has absolutely no effect on our active defense. Healing from an offensive cooldown is not pro-active defense (i.e. a DR) nor anything that has ever been significant when we had it, so that wouldn't fix anything in regards to defense.

[Deleted]

I'd honestly like HS to not cost mana while MS is used on it. Going oom pulling mobs outdoor is painfull af.

[Imnick]

You really don't want a significant part of your defensive kit to be tied to an offensive cooldown, or you will rarely get to use it when you need it.

[Raiju]

I'd honestly like HS to not cost mana while MS is used on it. Going oom pulling mobs outdoor is painfull af.

Fun fact between my shadow mend spamming I didn't notice PW:S for shadow not only costs less mana but covers more damage (with no risk of self harm), the only drawback being the 4 second CD. This is on top of them having a raid CD (VE does 50% of your damage as healing on raid members comparable to soul leech smart targeting) and obviously dispersion. At least it doesn't bypass effects like necrotic anymore.

OT: I really miss the lack of ticking damage for enhancement. I don't need a lot, but the lack of flameshock / searing totem (yes, even that). Currently relying on Fury of Air for my makeshift dot despite ascendance being really nice for 'boss' mobs. Survival is definitely an issue but I think that's been clear ever since SR got removed.

[Arson]

Two things bug me about the enhancement shaman on the alpha at the moment.
1. I feel terribly squishy, to the point where I just spam heal myself in every pull at level 110
2. It's great that totemic projection is baked into the totems, but I feel it is a very disruptive gameplay having target reticules. I wish blizzard would add an option to place the totems on mouse cursor. A lot of other games have this option.

[Deleted]

You really don't want a significant part of your defensive kit to be tied to an offensive cooldown, or you will rarely get to use it when you need it.

also to note, enh in wotlk was the same as BM in BC: CD up = all mighty immortal god, CD down = sack of health points on legs.

[Ten]

I've been messing around with enhancement (was my main in WoD) as am contemplating whether to stay

Positives

• Love the apparent flexibility we have in our rotation through talent choices. I really hated the pigeon holing in WoD. Earthen Spike, Crashing Storm, Empowered Stormlash will all be useful depending on whether its AoE, cleave or single target which is great
• Good mobility with spirit walk, feral lunge AND ghost wolf for rapid target switching
• Doomhammer abilities feel meaningful. I've enjoyed having the artifact far more than i thought i would
• Rotation can be made less proc-based than today, which is nice IMO
• Pick windsong/boulderfist and hailstorm and gameplay becomes all about self-buff management which I like and can be fun (having to keep 3-4 self buffs up at a time) but if you like procs you can go back to more of the old style with hot hand and tempest

Challenges

• Rockbiter maelstrom generation feels weak. Boulderfist seems a little too mandatory IMO, but hopefully they fix that with balancing. given numbers in alpha atm you need to cast rockbiter 2.5 times more frequently than boulderfist for same maelstrom generation which feels like a lot when playing)
• Sustained AoE - I assume that will be all about pooling maelstrom before using crashing storm and fury of air. Cooldown on crash lightning though means we won't be that "active" during the aoe phase, which will feel VERY different and may take some getting used to and will push us more into boulderfist as way of maintaining fury of air (you need to spam rockbiter to maintain fury of air otherwise)
• As others have mentioned we feel v squishy
• We now have almost no use for totems at all - which seems like a really wierd place to be in (though i am happy cos the core rotation is a lot more solid)
• Will be interesting to see how they balance the burst vs. sustained damage. Hopefully they tone down the reliance on burst for good competitive dps. At the moment, popping Doom Winds frequently leads to double stormlash procs. When that happens, stuff just melts as you effectively spam Stormstrike 3-4 times in a row. Its great that it is meaningful and we really notice it, it feels a bit OTT, so i would shift some damage into baseline rotation

[garonne]

Challenges
[*]Rockbiter maelstrom generation feels weak. Boulderfist seems a little too mandatory IMO, but hopefully they fix that with balancing. given numbers in alpha atm you need to cast rockbiter 2.5 times more frequently than boulderfist for same maelstrom generation which feels like a lot when playing)[*] Sustained AoE - I assume that will be all about pooling maelstrom before using crashing storm and fury of air. Cooldown on crash lightning though means we won't be that "active" during the aoe phase, which will feel VERY different and may take some getting used to and will push us more into boulderfist as way of maintaining fury of air (you need to spam rockbiter to maintain fury of air otherwise)

by design, rockbiter is the spammable gameplay where you'll always have something to do, its for the ppl who dont like wait times.

[Sarkol]

by design, rockbiter is the spammable gameplay where you'll always have something to do, its for the ppl who dont like wait times.

I've watched a lot of Enhance videos, and Boulderfist seems almost GCD capped anyway, if not completely. Maybe it's hard to tell the flow while watching, but Enhance seems to always have something to press even with that talent. Seems very few times you need to use both charges.

[garonne]

I've watched a lot of Enhance videos, and Boulderfist seems almost GCD capped anyway, if not completely. Maybe it's hard to tell the flow while watching, but Enhance seems to always have something to press even with that talent. Seems very few times you need to use both charges.

you're not wrong, but thats because of crash lightning, hailstorm, procs and/or earthen spike, especially CL in aoe/cleave. however at the base rotation when you have nothing else to press with no procs, aoe etc, you'd spam rockbiter.

[wordup]

you're not wrong, but thats because of crash lightning, hailstorm, procs and/or earthen spike, especially CL in aoe/cleave. however at the base rotation when you have nothing else to press with no procs, aoe etc, you'd spam rockbiter.

In honesty even assuming 100% optimal MP usage (which obviously reduces wasted GCDs) you still don't cap out on globals without using excess FT casts (you lose out on around 3%~ of your globals roughly by taking Boulderfist at roughly all haste levels; which is really low considering the talents intended idea, as you're pretty much as GCD locked as you were without). On the other hand, every global spent on Rockbiter is worth well over double that of Rockbiter, plus the buff. Makes Rockbiter oriented builds in which you don't take Boulderfist pretty much worthless right now.

[garonne]

In honesty even assuming 100% optimal MP usage (which obviously reduces wasted GCDs) you still don't cap out on globals without using excess FT casts (you lose out on around 3%~ of your globals roughly by taking Boulderfist at roughly all haste levels; which is really low considering the talents intended idea, as you're pretty much as GCD locked as you were without). On the other hand, every global spent on Rockbiter is worth well over double that of Rockbiter, plus the buff. Makes Rockbiter oriented builds in which you don't take Boulderfist pretty much worthless right now.

this should be adjustable through tuning tho, no? maybe raised the cd on boulder fist to 8 sec (ballpark figure) and tune the modifiers as well as MS generated or even buff Rockbiter's damage itself and/or its MS generated. general idea tho is the gameplay could be kept.

[wordup]

this should be adjustable through tuning tho, no? maybe raised the cd on boulder fist to 8 sec (ballpark figure) and tune the modifiers as well as MS generated or even buff Rockbiter's damage itself and/or its MS generated. general idea tho is the gameplay could be kept.

The idea should be more to nerf down the bonus damage of Boulderfist & also potentially the buff added, than alter its CD as that would only further the downtime (and we can rewind a year and see how many whined about the downtime then)