Subtlety PTR Notes

[Valentyn]

I am quite disappointed in the loss of flickering shadows. I enjoyed studying each boss and learning when would I would be safe to proc it, deplete all my energy and then sprint for 3 seconds with attack turned off, to me it really felt like class fantasy how we could disappear from the fight and return to do more damage (and hit a lot harder with shoulders!). Would've prefered at least 30 seconds off of vanish CD .

I wholeheartedly agree! It made me competitive against 910 Assa rogues in my raid as 906 Sub one.
Also, it's great in world content when you get that stupid "In Combat" bug, and can't enter stealth.

Nevermind the nerf to Gloomblade of all things, and that second nasty nerf to Enveloping Shadows.
Currently we knock off 3 seconds of Shadow Dance for each CP spent, the old PTR was 1.5s, now it's 1.0; and it's a talent now, along with adding another Shadow Dance charge.

So since we have no real way to speed up ShD without that, we need more DPS outside of dance, and yet they're nerfing Nightblade ( no longer gets a buff from SoD -30%dmg ), and Flickering Shadows.

It's rather strange, and still makes me think they have absolutely no idea what they want for Subtlety; they keep making large changes all over.

[Todesbote]

It's rather strange, and still makes me think they have absolutely no idea what they want for Subtlety; they keep making large changes all over.

You could put this quote in an envelope and send it to the Legion Beta Forum Subtlety feedback thread from early 2016 and it would just fit right in. They are clueless about what they are trying to do and it ends up as a messy band-aid spec that is all over the place.

[Mafic]

They literally don't know what they are doing. Patch 7.2.5 is going to be a dud like patch 7.1.5 because they don't listen to player feedback.

[Bowshewicz]

Did any theorycrafters sim this through in the previous PTR build? Cause this isn't nerfing 1 thing, this is across the board gutting everything. The numbers must've been insane.

The numbers were insane. There's a thread floating around here where a rogue was able to hit for 12 million damage with a Death from Above. Combined with the buffs to damage in Shadow Dance, to Shadowstrike damage, to Backstab damage, even more free Shadowstrike crits, etc, etc, I think subtlety is going to be in a really good place -- at least as far as the numbers we put up.

Unfortunately, I'm not sure if any of the big names in theorycrafting have gotten to it yet though.

[elfporn]

Its more than a 50% nerf on fights you could reliably use it. A bit more than slight.

Heh for some reason i thought vanish was a 1min cd when i said that.

[Deleted]

Looks like legendary shoulders are gonna be beyond useless for subtlety in 7.2.5, rip those who don't got wrists yet.

I recently got the bracers to pair with the shoulders. Do i now need to chase the boots for the next patch? And how good are the sub bracers currently?

[Valentyn]

You could put this quote in an envelope and send it to the Legion Beta Forum Subtlety feedback thread from early 2016 and it would just fit right in. They are clueless about what they are trying to do and it ends up as a messy band-aid spec that is all over the place.

Too true! It all fell on deaf ears; and the thing is the first build for 7.2.5 was what so many people wanted in Subtlety. Yet here they are again, making large blanket changes.

The spec was the least played all expansion; especially at Heroic and Mythic raiding levels; and it only saw an "upsurge" after the original Blue post regarding changes for 7.2.5.

Not sure what the heck they want to do; as originally they wanted to make the spec more accessible; now they almost got there; and now big nerfs, and ability/trait changes that affect not only the "class fantasy", but the base mechanics and gameplay. Nevermind DPS.

[Todesbote]

Unfortunately, I'm not sure if any of the big names in theorycrafting have gotten to it yet though.

Re-modelling a spec that has been changed so drastically is a lot of work. I bet if you were the guy who maintains APLs for Subtlety you would also prefer waiting until Blizzard have arrived at something that has at least a chance to go live. It sucks to put in hours of work over nothing because Blizzard decides to remove/redesign talents and spells on a weekly basis.

[Bowshewicz]

Agreed, and I didn't mean that in a judgmental way towards our theorycrafters.

[honung]

Can people stop freaking out about "nerfs" on the PTR? Current DPS numbers on the PTR are largely irrelevant, they are very obviously in the design stage. Tuning will come later when the spec is finished. If gameplay changes hurt the spec's DPS, it will be increased elsewhere to compensate. Flickering Shadows Vanish disappearing doesn't mean that your DPS will be lower. What you should discuss is the mechanic itself, and personally I'm very glad it's gone, though I think Flickering Shadows should probably be 30 seconds on Vanish rather than 15, as it feels a little underwhelming at the moment.

I wholeheartedly agree! It made me competitive against 910 Assa rogues in my raid as 906 Sub one.
Also, it's great in world content when you get that stupid "In Combat" bug, and can't enter stealth.

Nevermind the nerf to Gloomblade of all things, and that second nasty nerf to Enveloping Shadows.
Currently we knock off 3 seconds of Shadow Dance for each CP spent, the old PTR was 1.5s, now it's 1.0; and it's a talent now, along with adding another Shadow Dance charge.

So since we have no real way to speed up ShD without that, we need more DPS outside of dance, and yet they're nerfing Nightblade ( no longer gets a buff from SoD -30%dmg ), and Flickering Shadows.

It's rather strange, and still makes me think they have absolutely no idea what they want for Subtlety; they keep making large changes all over.

No, Deepening Shadows is still a baseline passive. On live you get 3 seconds per combo point from Deepening Shadows. On PTR you get 1.5s baseline, and an extra 1s if Enveloping Shadows is picked, which makes 2.5s.

Did you play on the PTR? Removing Nightblade from Symbols was a fantastic change in my opinion, it was awkward to get a Pandemic Finality Symbols Nightblade. They also added Backstab to it which helps with combo point generation outside of Stealth.

[Hobbes0773]

Can people stop freaking out about "nerfs" on the PTR? Current DPS numbers on the PTR are largely irrelevant, they are very obviously in the design stage. Tuning will come later when the spec is finished. If gameplay changes hurt the spec's DPS, it will be increased elsewhere to compensate. Flickering Shadows Vanish disappearing doesn't mean that your DPS will be lower. What you should discuss is the mechanic itself, and personally I'm very glad it's gone, though I think Flickering Shadows should probably be 30 seconds on Vanish rather than 15, as it feels a little underwhelming at the moment.


No, Deepening Shadows is still a baseline passive. On live you get 3 seconds per combo point from Deepening Shadows. On PTR you get 1.5s baseline, and an extra 1s if Enveloping Shadows is picked, which makes 2.5s.

Did you play on the PTR? Removing Nightblade from Symbols was a fantastic change in my opinion, it was awkward to get a Pandemic Finality Symbols Nightblade. They also added Backstab to it which helps with combo point generation outside of Stealth.

THANK YOU! My god people need to figure out how PTRs work and how to not cry after every perceived nerf.

[Valentyn]

THANK YOU! My god people need to figure out how PTRs work and how to not cry after every perceived nerf.

Or you know, they should, and give all the feedback they want if they're not happy with something. It's for testing after all.

Blizzard ignored everything during the Alpha and Beta, and without feedback we'll end up in a similar position. It doesn't matter if you think it's "crying".

Subtlety is a tiny spec when it comes to playerbase; and we need people to actually voice their opinions, here and on blizzard forums.

[Mafic]

There is no discussion of numbers the last few pages. It is that they are going the wrong direction with Sub (again).

[Bowshewicz]

It sounds like sub is going to play a lot like it did in WoD, which is something that quite a few of us have explicitly hoped for. I'm cautiously optimistic to see something that's mechanically similar to that while maintaining the class fantasy we have currently.

[Valentyn]

It sounds like sub is going to play a lot like it did in WoD, which is something that quite a few of us have explicitly hoped for. I'm cautiously optimistic to see something that's mechanically similar to that while maintaining the class fantasy we have currently.

While being viable in Mythic Plus, and other content. WoD Sub would be rather lacklustre in there the way it was.

[Shivers1]

Can people stop freaking out about "nerfs" on the PTR? Current DPS numbers on the PTR are largely irrelevant, they are very obviously in the design stage. Tuning will come later when the spec is finished. If gameplay changes hurt the spec's DPS, it will be increased elsewhere to compensate. Flickering Shadows Vanish disappearing doesn't mean that your DPS will be lower. What you should discuss is the mechanic itself, and personally I'm very glad it's gone, though I think Flickering Shadows should probably be 30 seconds on Vanish rather than 15, as it feels a little underwhelming at the moment.


No, Deepening Shadows is still a baseline passive. On live you get 3 seconds per combo point from Deepening Shadows. On PTR you get 1.5s baseline, and an extra 1s if Enveloping Shadows is picked, which makes 2.5s.

Did you play on the PTR? Removing Nightblade from Symbols was a fantastic change in my opinion, it was awkward to get a Pandemic Finality Symbols Nightblade. They also added Backstab to it which helps with combo point generation outside of Stealth.

I'm not too worried about the numbers at the moment.

What is making me concerned is the fact that the developers have suddenly gotten such a hard-on for lowering dance up-time, when we don't actually have a meaningful rotation outside of dance (and there's no indication from the blue posts that they intend to change this).

As someone who plays sub you can probably appreciate how boring and sluggish it feels to be stuck on zero charges. Now imagine that for 50%+ of the fight.

If their plan is to make us into another two-button spec I may as well go assassination so I can at least do competitive damage (probably).

[shaunika123]

I'm not too worried about the numbers at the moment.

What is making me concerned is the fact that the developers have suddenly gotten such a hard-on for lowering dance up-time, when we don't actually have a meaningful rotation outside of dance (and there's no indication from the blue posts that they intend to change this).

As someone who plays sub you can probably appreciate how boring and sluggish it feels to be stuck on zero charges. Now imagine that for 50%+ of the fight.

If their plan is to make us into another two-button spec I may as well go assassination so I can at least do competitive damage (probably).

sub doesnt really use more buttons than assa does tho

SS= MUT
NB=rup
EVI= enve
symbols=garrote
shadow dance= kingsbane
shadow blades= vendetta
Sstorm=FoK

did i forget anything?

[Deleted]

sub doesnt really use more buttons than assa does tho

SS= MUT
NB=rup
EVI= enve
symbols=garrote
shadow dance= kingsbane
shadow blades= vendetta
Sstorm=FoK

did i forget anything?

That comparison though is a bit off. Else we could say Boomkin and Outlaw are the same, both using keyboards, did I forget anything? Not trying to "insult" you with this, but guess you get what I mean.

While both specs got to watch out for other stoff meanwhile, Assa is easier to execute. For example: Surge of Toxins, it's a fixed timer after any finisher - doesn't matter how many CPs you used. It is getting used to it and then kinda pro-active planning.

Sub on the other hand has many, many random factors and is therefore more re-active.

Some examples:
The one bonus CP on Shadowstrike when Nightblade is on the target - it is based on a chance, therefore nothing you could forecast. In addition to that, Sub generates CPs on auto-attacks - by "random". There is some weakaura stuff with which you could get a bit more detail how likely it is, that it will proc when etc. but still, you couldn't tell beforehand guaranteed that you will get them now, or on the next swing. (getting more and more probable on each swing and is never procing on the first swing (or first swing after the last proc - but that in detail would be a bit too much off-topic.)

Our artifact has a trait that this passive could even proc 2 CPs instead of 1 - so that's irregularity on another irregularity even.

We get irregular energy in return by using Shadowstrikes by another artifact trait and so on and so on.

Premeditation (talent) grants Shadowstrike 1 additional CP - always. If shadowblades is up, you always build 1CP more.

So Shadowstrike with the help of other passives/traits/talents could for example grant you 4 CPs + at the same time the auto attack could proc the 1 or even 2 CPs. That's 1 button click and out of a sudden you sit there with 6CPs instead of 4 - and maybe even got 25 Energy in return by using Shadowstrike. Finishers granting energy, CP overflow, if not done right that is fast getting out of hand - and the spec isn't like "Not so bad, Jimmy, next GCD you gonna pick the right choice" - it is far more like "I'M SICK OF YOUR SH**, LARRY!"

Assa is business management. Most you can anticipate and the minor irregularities are still mostly in your own hands: Mutilate crits granting 3 or even 4 CPs for example. Actually, with a bit of crit rating it is very likely that you will get 3 or 4 CPs and not just 2. (30% crit chance for example would be statistically: 9% for a double crit, 2x 21% for either crit-noncrit or noncrit-crit and 49% chance to get only 1 CP.)
You used it for 55 energy, bought yourself more than a second to check the amount of CPs and then planning the next step. If you lose track on your timers and cooldowns meanwhile, you didn't pay enough attention - bad boy!

Sub is crisis management - between a bunch of 5 year old children, starting to throw your things at each other and you. Either you love your job, or hate it. When people watch you from a distance, they think: "Poor boy".

Both specs have stuff to keep in mind and almost the same amount of hotkeys in theory, but the execution works different.

Btw. @Shivers1: Even worse, imagine Nightblade without the current 2p bonus - with it's ordinary debuff duration! And almost just Backstabs to build up CPs due to having less Dance Uptime. Squeezing in between Eviscerates outside of Shadow Dance seems to be... less likely.

But hey, blizzard got a plan! When did they ever disappoint us? Right? :|

[Jaronicity]

There's definitely a lot of chatter lately revolving around the "rotation" when not dancing and how braindead and bland it is shaping up to be so MAYBE (large maybe) Blizz will react to the comments. I have no doubt that they read the PTR posts. They just dismiss things that don't fit their vision without any discussion at all. Would be nice to hear something regarding this point. Numbers are numbers and can always be raised or lowered, but man, sitting there not dancing just spamming GB or BS without anything to press except Eviscerate (sometimes refreshing NB) #feelsbadman. Would love if they built in some form of proc ability.

[Faildevil]

Depends on talents:
Combo point management is not harder with sub than with Assa. Energy regeneration is way more "off" if you take goremores bite into account. I still have not found a way to not capping energy with this under shadow blades buff.
I think they would have to make Sub deal substantial more damage than assa if they want more people to play it at this point.

And regarding the "numbers do not count on PRT: We all have heard that a hundret times now.
"shh, don't overract, we will fix dmg/mechanics, it's still alpha"
"shh, don't overract, we will fix dmg/mechanics, it's still beta"
"shh, don't overract, we will fix dmg/mechanics, it's still ptr"
"so sorry, we forgot fixing it, here, have a lollipop and a band aid"