[Balance] Legion Discussion

[Myztikrice]

I'm not sure I'd consider Balance Druids to be "easy" to play. In practice, the "rotation" (ie. Not really a rotation) is rather straight forward and pretty simple. But maximizing DPS in practice is really not easy at all. Between properly managing empowerments and pooling astral power for movement, among other things (foE is another thing all together, I find it personally to be a very difficult talent to use), I don't personally find it very easy to put out solid numbers.

But as you mention it depends individually on what you would consider "easy".

Maybe in the default UI... but with a proper weak aura setup it's not hard at all. You have 1-2 Starsurges and 2 dots to cast on the move. Knowing when movement is happening is an encounter issue, not a 'Boomkin isn't easy' issue, and they have lots of tools to counteract it. Your cooldown requires no thought. Use it at the beginning and stack it with Lust, or use it at the beginning and use it again when they Lust at the last 30%. My two trinkets being damage proc trinkets means my rotation doesn't even change

[Cyous]

Maybe in the default UI... but with a proper weak aura setup it's not hard at all. You have 1-2 Starsurges and 2 dots to cast on the move. Knowing when movement is happening is an encounter issue, not a 'Boomkin isn't easy' issue, and they have lots of tools to counteract it. Your cooldown requires no thought. Use it at the beginning and stack it with Lust, or use it at the beginning and use it again when they Lust at the last 30%. My two trinkets being damage proc trinkets means my rotation doesn't even change

I'd like to see you play properly with Stormsingers and Emerald Dreamcatcher. Of course "the basics" are easy -- it's designed that way. Literally all specs are easy to play. What makes it difficult is the experience and skill to actually min/max against the environment. We have a lot of tools, which means players have a lot to monitor. Maximum Complexity is defined as "minimum number of steps taken to achieve the task." Pooling Astral Power isn't too bad, but that's one more step. Holding off DOT refreshes until the very last moment to sync with forced movement is other step. Reacting to procs which force you to play differently, that's another step. Finding a good spot to cast during mechanics, such as the first boss in EN,. that's other step.

It's not easy for the average player, just as rogues are painfully easy to play in PVE, but they have a huge skill cap in PVP. It all depends on how complex you want to make it, and how it will impact your results, and all within a given environment.

[Ifeanychukwu]

Would someone mind lookin at my logs and telling me if there's anything I can do to improve? I just set up WoL tonight so I don't know how to use it really. Downed heroic Nythendra with a pug. Would appreciate some feedback.

http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/m...2#Ifeanychukwu

Here's my armory if that's important.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/characte...hukwu/advanced

[huth]

Somewhat minor, but i've found that both Remulos and Broll only scale with Attack Power when taken as combat allies. Could somebody check on Mylune?

[Adramelch]

Would someone mind lookin at my logs and telling me if there's anything I can do to improve? I just set up WoL tonight so I don't know how to use it really. Downed heroic Nythendra with a pug. Would appreciate some feedback.

http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/m...2#Ifeanychukwu

You should swap to warcraftlogs. WoL is essentially obsolete.

[ZarrBH]

Warcraft Logs gives a minor indication of talents based on buffs and casts. I saw a log where a Moonkin cast Moonfire and Sunfire a total of 5 times but there was 95+% uptime and he never died. Clearly he had Nature's Balance

honestly i keep up my dots almost 100% of the time with natures balance almost and only cast it a few times as well

if there is more than one boss just track your dots your not focusing that way and if one is about to go off just make sure to use that empowerment.

[Ifeanychukwu]

You should swap to warcraftlogs. WoL is essentially obsolete.

Well as I said I've never used either. But thanks for the input I guess....

[Adramelch]

Well as I said I've never used either. But thanks for the input I guess....

It wasn't meant as a slight to you or anything. You'll just have more people helping you if you swap to warcraftlogs. I, for one, don't remember how to find things in WoL anymore.

That said, from a very quick glance, you've wasted a couple Lunar Empowerments.

[Lens Hunter]

So my current rings are

i845
1081 Haste
721 Vers

i850
1154 Haste
682 Mastery
(Socket)

Opened my chest this week and got

i870
1257 Crit
622 Vers

Why do I feel like its not an upgrade?

[Adramelch]

It's not. Ilvl on jewelry means virtually nothing.

[dami1337]

Guys quick question from a recreational player. How do I keep track of doting multiple targets and renewing the dots in the best way? E.g. there are 2 bosses, I dot both at the start. How can I be best reminded that the 2nd boss needs a renewal of a dot?

Anything via weak auras, do I miss something in elvui, etc?

I use elvui & the Astral Power Pro Bar (Cyous).

Thanks for the help!

[Irefusetodie]

Guys quick question from a recreational player. How do I keep track of doting multiple targets and renewing the dots in the best way? E.g. there are 2 bosses, I dot both at the start. How can I be best reminded that the 2nd boss needs a renewal of a dot?

Anything via weak auras, do I miss something in elvui, etc?

I use elvui & the Astral Power Pro Bar (Cyous).

Thanks for the help!

I have never used Elvui so I don't know if they have this, but you should have boss frames. If you don't, you can always just make a /focus macro and use your focus frame to track dots.

[Taalyn]

Personally either ElvUI or Bigwigs (not sure which) gives me bars for each boss and by default shows my DoTs. I glance over at the bar every now and then to look at the Dot durations. On Il'gynoth it also gives me bars for the Dominator tentacles but not the other two tentacles so I'm not quite sure what the default settings are. I liked it and left it alone.

[Kyanion]

It's not. Ilvl on jewelry means virtually nothing.

Yeah I can echo this, got an 885 crit/versa ring that is slightly weaker than an 840 haste/crit ring I have. That was really depressing.

[Myztikrice]

I'd like to see you play properly with Stormsingers and Emerald Dreamcatcher. Of course "the basics" are easy -- it's designed that way. Literally all specs are easy to play. What makes it difficult is the experience and skill to actually min/max against the environment. We have a lot of tools, which means players have a lot to monitor. Maximum Complexity is defined as "minimum number of steps taken to achieve the task." Pooling Astral Power isn't too bad, but that's one more step. Holding off DOT refreshes until the very last moment to sync with forced movement is other step. Reacting to procs which force you to play differently, that's another step. Finding a good spot to cast during mechanics, such as the first boss in EN,. that's other step.

It's not easy for the average player, just as rogues are painfully easy to play in PVE, but they have a huge skill cap in PVP. It all depends on how complex you want to make it, and how it will impact your results, and all within a given environment.

I do not consider any thought process beyond 'stand still and DPS' to mean a spec is hard to maximize effectively. There are timers for Rot and every group always positions them away from the boss, and there is always a section of the map clear of goo for the Heart phase. Like I said earlier, you have two instant casts and two dots to refresh that greatly minimize any thinking required on movement. I am not factoring in a hard to get legendary item less than 5% of the playerbase has into a spec's complexity.

[Alame]

Guys quick question from a recreational player. How do I keep track of doting multiple targets and renewing the dots in the best way? E.g. there are 2 bosses, I dot both at the start. How can I be best reminded that the 2nd boss needs a renewal of a dot?

Anything via weak auras, do I miss something in elvui, etc?

I use elvui & the Astral Power Pro Bar (Cyous).

Thanks for the help!

There's an addon called Enemy Grid that will create a list of targets & can be configured to show active DoTs & Durations for each. I heard from a guildie Blizzard was planning on breaking this addon however, so it might stop working in the near future.

Otherwise your unitframes addon (I use Shadowed Unit Frames, I believe Elvui has a built-in module) should have options to enable Boss bars, which can also be configured to show active DoTs & Debuffs.

- - - Updated - - -

I am not factoring in a hard to get legendary item less than 5% of the playerbase has into a spec's complexity.

You need to. If you're talking about the class from a theoretical standpoint than the availability of a legendary doesn't matter.

The fact that we need to RNG 1 of 8 incredibly rare legendary drops in order to get a proc that brings the class to an interesting level of complexity is a design problem in itself - and one that's totally against most of Blizzards design principles - but that's a throwback to my complaints over how Balance design went this expac.

[wing5wong]

Guys quick question from a recreational player. How do I keep track of doting multiple targets and renewing the dots in the best way? E.g. there are 2 bosses, I dot both at the start. How can I be best reminded that the 2nd boss needs a renewal of a dot?

Anything via weak auras, do I miss something in elvui, etc?

I use elvui & the Astral Power Pro Bar (Cyous).

Thanks for the help!

As previously mentioned - elvui offers great indicators for both boss frames and nameplates.

[Mystikal]

Just going back to an earlier comment, I can confirm that Starsurge does not proc M&S. However, Starfall *does* proc it, so I'm assuming it's a bug with Starsurge, rather than Starfall.

[ChickenChaser]

Ways to fix Emerald Dream helm.....

Starsurge now cost 35 (down from 40)
Emerald Dream helm now reduces AP cost by 5 per stack down from 10.


We would gain 15kish Single target for all us struggling without helm and the Helm would go from a 12% dps gain to like a 5% (In line with other legendaries)

I mean our class still has tons of other problems that need to be fixed but That is how you fix the Helm now pay me $50,000 a year Blizzard I just fixed something you couldn't in 6 months of PTR testing.

[Dumdidum]

Starting today I will be able to equip Dreamcatcher + Oneth and Im not quite sure if its a dps gain to drop Dreamcatcher stacks for the free starfall or if I should just hold on to the free starfall until I drop stacks anway (wasteing potential further procs) and I think Incarnation should still be better than Stellar Flare, but not quite sure on this either.
Any thoughts?