[Balance] Legion Discussion

[Deleted]

ITT: people taking balance serious when melee specs are easily doubling range DPS output atm. Crying about the current balance, no one is going to take you seriously. I agree that lvl 100 talents suck, but they have sucked since their inception and will not change considering PTR for prepatch is already up.

[Juvencus]

ITT: people taking balance serious when melee specs are easily doubling range DPS output atm. Crying about the current balance, no one is going to take you seriously. I agree that lvl 100 talents suck, but they have sucked since their inception and will not change considering PTR for prepatch is already up.

It's not only the numbers.

The Eclipse Bar was hated by many. Personally I liked it and I see it as the glue that holds the spec together. All (most) abilities interact with it and it interacts with the abilities and mechanics. My view on the Legion Moonkin is that by losing Eclipse it went from an omelette to eggs, no pun intended, scattered around the kitchen. There is no cohesion in the spec's mechanics and it simply does not offer an engaging playstyle for me.

[Nerxyrall]

The nerf to FOE will actually be nullified if you run AC and re-strategize MoonMoon spells. You'll have AC available for every each FOE, timing may work favorably if you don't use any MoonMoon spells :: You get 2 full cycles, and you'd hold your second cycle of MoonMoon for FOE.

Opener would be dumping all MoonMoon spells, FOE, then AC accordingly. This will set up the rest of the encounter/dungeon. When FOE has 45sec left on cooldown, you need to dump all MoonMoon charges (cast a single Full Moon outside of FOE). When FOE comes up, you should have 3 charges of MoonMoon (or starting on Half Moon + 10-15sec left on Charge #3). FOE #2 will have all MoonMoon spells and AC available.
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DPS benefit in single-target was nerfed by 50%, but the syncing on timers probably cuts that down to 33% effective DPS loss or so (over Starsurge, mind you, still ahead of Starsurge). Just a wild guess on numbers. Still crazy AOE damage, and probably neutral overall.

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Keep in mind, builds are in the pipeline, so feedback now normally isn't acted upon for a few builds.

That were my thoughts too. every Nerf still sucks....
But still on the PTR (no beta) Moonkin feels really kinda weak. Of course Moon-Spells will change that to an extent...

Can anybody tell me how effektive the 100talents are against each other after the nerf?
Stellar Drift and Nature´s Balance still seem really weak. Even in their fields aka singel target(council fights maybe) NB and spread targets SD. If they are some adds clumped sometime in the fight FoE still seems the better choice....

[Siglius]

ITT: people taking balance serious when melee specs are easily doubling range DPS output atm. Crying about the current balance, no one is going to take you seriously. I agree that lvl 100 talents suck, but they have sucked since their inception and will not change considering PTR for prepatch is already up.

Afaik melee have been nerfed across the board this patch, next raidtesting will be interresting to see if ranged can keep up.

[Deleted]

Every single time this comes up you fail to comprehend the issue. Either that or you deliberately misconstrue the issue. ... I wonder why you even bother to participate in alpha/beta discussions when your opinion is "it's supposed to be broken so who cares?"

As I've said multiple times, I understand it just fine, I just disagree. I don't think it is broken, that is your opinion. Am I not allowed to disagree? I know it is very controversial for a beta thread not to be 100% "GG game is broken, better unsubscribe/reroll", but maybe, just maybe, you should consider that not every single thing in a game that is played by millions of people online is designed just to your personal liking. I'm all for changes for the better, I personally think the FoE CD increase is a step in the wrong direction (so is the removal of OKF) and I am not a fan of SD, NB or StFl. I think our utility or defensives need a massive buff. I'm not saying we should not ask for changes were necessary, but I am allowed to disagree WHERE a change is necessary.

Besides, complaining about numbers when some specs are still doing twice as much as others and tanks are beating half the dps (and healers) is just pointless. Tuning is not finished until after first week of hcs.

[Synbaby]

Are there any guides yet up anywhere for builds/stats/rotations for after patch? I am thinking about going back to my boomie for Legion, and I just installed ptr so I want to get in and try it out. Haven't main'd boomkin since cata

[Deleted]

Are there any guides yet up anywhere for builds/stats/rotations for after patch? I am thinking about going back to my boomie for Legion, and I just installed ptr so I want to get in and try it out. Haven't main'd boomkin since cata

I doubt anybody is going to do anything for the prepatch (no artifact ability changes a lot), but there will be guides up for legion closer to release.

[Mystikal]

Am I missing something with Healing Surge? It seems a bit strange that a spell with half the cast time of Healing Touch is healing for nearly 20% more. Is there some limiting mechanic that I am unaware of? I haven't played any Shaman specs on beta yet.

[Keiyra]

Am I missing something with Healing Surge? It seems a bit strange that a spell with half the cast time of Healing Touch is healing for nearly 20% more. Is there some limiting mechanic that I am unaware of? I haven't played any Shaman specs on beta yet.

Healing Touch costs 10.35% base mana while surge costs 20% - both boomkin and ele/enh have tiny mana pools. They go oom after a handful of casts.
So while its 20% more healing and in nearly half the time, its also double the cost.

You are better off comparing Surge to Regrowth (which you don't get unless you have resto affinity) - which is also 1.5 sec cast, takes you out of form to cast, costs 18% mana, and still heals for 20% less than surge

Yes, boomkin offhealing aint looking pretty

[Lucrece]

Healing Touch costs 10.35% base mana while surge costs 20% - both boomkin and ele/enh have tiny mana pools. They go oom after a handful of casts.
So while its 20% more healing and in nearly half the time, its also double the cost.

You are better off comparing Surge to Regrowth (which you don't get unless you have resto affinity) - which is also 1.5 sec cast, takes you out of form to cast, costs 18% mana, and still heals for 20% less than surge

Yes, boomkin offhealing aint looking pretty

The mana cost is inconsequential, as you won't be chaining them in any realistic scenarios. At most you'll do 3-4 casts and be back on DPS form.

Here, let me find the post I gave to huth, using WoWhead numbers, to explain why it's even greater than a 20% difference.

I'm telling you that when shadowform was lost, they baked in the benefits. It's that simple. Priests largely retained their defensive features while still being able to heal without cost. You're just being a contrarian.

Others don't get the additional healing options because they already have their own defensive features that don't rely on healing. Shadowmend is stronger than Healing Touch+Regrowth+Rejuv. Have you actually played a shadow priest? Watch Theed's videos and the amount shadow mend and vampiric touch heal for.

Shadow priests recover 50% of their health with dispersion, which also reduces damage by 95% with pvp talents.

Elemental shaman's direct heal gains 45% boost from the artifact talent alone. It heals for 450% spell power at a 1.5 sec cast. Healing Touch is a 360% spell power on a 2.5 second cast, and the only thing your artifact does is give you a free one every 20 seconds.

Ele shamans also have a 12 sec cd spell interrupt, as opposed to a 1 minute cd, which allows them to handle caster burst and damage far better than a moonkin. They also have a better burst defensive in astral shift, which reduces incoming burst by 40% for 6 seconds instead of a smaller 20% for 12 seconds, making it far more valuable in PvP combat where burst windows are much more valuable than sustained damage.

Quite frankly, your comment on resto affinity means jackshit considering in WoD we already had Rejuv in Moonkin form, so we only gained a Regrowth which competes with Healing Touch in casting opportunity cost and offers less burst healing (its burst heal compared to Healing Surge at the same 1.5 sec cast time is less than half of Healing Surge's healing without taking Healing Surge's 45% artifact boost, and the total healing is a miserly 269.4% spell power, or about 60% of the healing over 12 seconds of what a Healing Surge without artifact boost heals for). Rejuv adds 60% spell power every 3 seconds.

Assuming you're being generous and cast a Regrowth+Rejuv to compare with Healing Surge, you have a total healing of 569.4% for two globals, spread over an effect of 15 seconds, while 2 Healing Surge's in two globals worth of time heals for 900% spell power without the 45% artifact boost. Add swiftmend every 30 seconds for a third global, bringing up 1269.4% spell power for 3 globals. 3 Healing Surges in 3 globals is 1350% spell power. 2 Healing Surges at 2 globals with a 45% boost is 1305% spell power. Of our 3 ideal druid globals, 2 are instant, but 2 of the 3 spells can also be dispelled/spellstolen, they take many times longer to fulfill their healing for a lesser total amount of healing, and Swiftmend is on a 30 sec cd.

So their baseline heals compared without our talented for affinity is not a comparison you want to make, because if we're NOT talking about resto affinity, our healing is even more laughable.

There you have a full numbers comparison. Our healing is pathetic compared to ele shamans, especially with their artifact bonuses.

And shadow priests with masochism, VT and shadowmend completely dwarf both ele shaman and balance druid healing, as do warlocks with drain life and their ridiculously strong shield.

Balance druid is THE single worst spec in self healing and defensives by far out of all casters. Mages naturally lack self healing outside ice block but they make up for that with far superior preemptive mitigation.

Which is far more useful than HoT's which can be dispelled, take longer to heal the full amount and still over their entire duration (as with regrowth and rejuv) heal for less than a single Healing Surge cast.

Which is absurd, because Over Time spells like DoT/HoTs should NEVER be having less output than a direct cast spell.

[Mystikal]

I understand that the mana cost is double, but half the problem with HT is its cast time - you're invariably getting beat on whilst casting it, so a good portion of the healing is negated before it even lands. Whereas with HS, you pop it very quickly and gain the full amount of healing.

HT should heal for as much as HS does, I feel. Its opportunity cost is so much larger and the healing rarely feels enough.

[Lucrece]

It should heal for more. Our heals should not be balanced around mana efficiency; they should have separate values for resto druids.

But then again, resto druids have been a scourge on feral and balance druids in pvp since the very beginning of the game. All the nerfs to cyclone were strictly because resto druids were strong with it whereas balance druids never got to shine with it and still ate the blanket nerfs.

Longer cast heal = more interruptible = more risk= should yield more reward. That simple.

[Keiyra]

I understand that the mana cost is double, but half the problem with HT is its cast time - you're invariably getting beat on whilst casting it, so a good portion of the healing is negated before it even lands. Whereas with HS, you pop it very quickly and gain the full amount of healing.

HT should heal for as much as HS does, I feel. Its opportunity cost is so much larger and the healing rarely feels enough.

You cant compare the slow heal to the flash heal. If you want the flash heal functionally, pick resto affinity and use Regrowth.
Clearly the only time blizzard expects you to use HT is during the artifact proc. (sarcasm, i know the proc doesn't have to do with HT)

Does it suck balls that you have talent into something to get what used to be (and is on other classes) baseline function, yes, but thats what you got. Least you get yseras passive healing in the process.

And if its for pvp, you have Protector of the Grove, Shapemender or Druid of the Claw to add to your healing capabilities in pvp

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It should heal for more. Our heals should not be balanced around mana efficiency; they should have separate values for resto druids.

I agree, but blizz has been too lazy/busy to address this so far.

[thewallofsleep]

I realize answers will be subjective, but I have a question about Balance.

How would you rate the complexity and "difficulty" of the Balance spec currently? I love my Druid, mostly for aesthetics and lore reasons, but have never tried balance. I not great with complex rotations and prefer less micromanagement if possible. I'm not a progression raider or anything, so it's more for casual play, but j still like to put out decent numbers.

Thoughts?

[striderZA]

Clearly the only time blizzard expects you to use HT is during the artifact proc.

Artifact proc?

[huth]

Artifact proc?

No idea. The only healing artifact proc casts a free heal on you when you get hit, and has nothing to do with HT.

[Lucrece]

No idea. The only healing artifact proc casts a free heal on you when you get hit, and has nothing to do with HT.

What she means is that Blizzard only expects you to use HT when it doesn't have a cast time, because the artifact proc made it instant and thus a more efficient heal, especially in PvP where a ridiculous 2.5 second cast of a heal is readily interrupted, specifically with the autokick mod pvp'ers are using that guarantees their kicks go through.

And not only does HT get interrupted easily in PvP because of its long cast time -- now that we shifted to astral power we virtually can't cast shit as it locks out the nature school which means our only viable filler, Solar Wrath, to build AP toward a starsurge since we don't get those passively or through procs anymore becomes locked out.

Moonkin is going to be thorough shit in PvP with its current defensive state and the really poor tools it has to secure hardcasts unlike warlocks who got TWO interrupt immunities, with a 40% damage mitigation, and demon skin.

Next to shamans we are the only casters without some form of damage immunity or large % reduction cd (and now Astral Shift is 40% for 8 seconds), let alone basic tools like a baseline snare and a short cd spell interrupt. Healing is all we had and they took that away as well and made it into a goddamn talent row.

[huth]

What she means is that Blizzard only expects you to use HT when it doesn't have a cast time, because the artifact proc made it instant and thus a more efficient heal, especially in PvP where a ridiculous 2.5 second cast of a heal is readily interrupted, specifically with the autokick mod pvp'ers are using that guarantees their kicks go through.

Which brings us back to the question: What artifact proc?

[striderZA]

Which brings us back to the question: What artifact proc?

Might have been referring to the old Owlkin frenzy that was incorporated as an artifact passive?

[Kyanion]

You cant compare the slow heal to the flash heal. If you want the flash heal functionally, pick resto affinity and use Regrowth.
Clearly the only time blizzard expects you to use HT is during the artifact proc.

So you advise dropping moonkin form to try and cast this heal and then wasting more time to go back into moonkin to cast a spell that isn't very good in the first place? And correct me if I'm wrong but the artifact trait is chance to heal yourself when taking damage with a fairly long CD window. It isn't on demand like the old school Nature's Swiftness + Healing Touch combo in Mop. Speaking of Mop our defensives + healing were at our best and now going into Legion we're a shell of our former selves in those 2 departments. Sad.

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Might have been referring to the old Owlkin frenzy that was incorporated as an artifact passive?

Best I can tell it is a reference to 'Touch of the Moon which is a 5% per rank to auto-cast a Healing Touch on yourself if you take damage with a 20 second CD'. If they think that is on par with some of the healing other hybrids are doing.....then yeah...