Big Shadowpriest feedback thread on the Beta forums

[Annesh]

Yeah, it really wouldn't be that hard to balance. You could reduce the movement debuff, reduce the damage, or increase the channel time with the same number of ticks. All of these would still be a buff against the melee train (as most specs have interrupts/closers now so it would be easily countered at the same time). However, I can see how it can be OP with the tentacles and the new 87 spell. Have to see how it plays out, but as it stands right now we have the weakest CC of all casters.

We do have the weakest CC and I want that changed, but setting it up so a melee class has to use some kind of cooldown, even a short one, to counter a spammable, channeled slow with no casting or travel time, is imbalanced. Plus that just sounds so boring - you can kite the melee all day long, as long as you don't stop channeling Flay. He can use his little gap closers or whatever but you just have to use your own CDs to counter those, and get range again to continue the madness.

Here are a couple of my thoughts, pulled from the thread on the beta forum.

Binding Darkness: Your Mind Spike slows its target by 25%, stacking up to 2 times and lasting 10 seconds.

Crippling Pain: Targets of your Shadow Word: Pain or Holy Fire are afflicted with Agony, reducing their movement speed by 50% for 10 seconds. This effect can only occur once every 6 seconds.


I would kill for some kiting ability, just a little bit, but I just don't think turning Flay into our kiting spell is the right choice.

By the way, Mages can't do that. Frostbolt has a casting time AND a travel time. Also they're squishier than we are; they're supposed to be better at kiting. I just wish, on a scale of 1 to 10, if they're an 8 that we were at least a 3 or 4, rather than a 1.

[Dawn Falcon]

Mages, especially frost mages, have a dozen ways to slow you including cooldowns...and MF triggers DR.

How about a glyph which simply makes the MF slow linger for 6 seconds? And a minor glyph which removes it entirely.

[Karei]

Bleh I never wanted ravens, I'm a Shadow priest, not a Raven priest. What do Ravens have to do with shadows, darkness, psychic powers, vampiric magic, the invisible moral line between light and dark, etc?

Can I has your babies?

More serious now. Projectiles goddammit. In all fairness I still don't know what Blizz were thinking when they came up with their design of half crippled apparitions. Thank god they're inanimate or they'd be dying of old age.

[smokeajay]

We do have the weakest CC and I want that changed, but setting it up so a melee class has to use some kind of cooldown, even a short one, to counter a spammable, channeled slow with no casting or travel time, is imbalanced. Plus that just sounds so boring - you can kite the melee all day long, as long as you don't stop channeling Flay. He can use his little gap closers or whatever but you just have to use your own CDs to counter those, and get range again to continue the madness.

Here are a couple of my thoughts, pulled from the thread on the beta forum.

Binding Darkness: Your Mind Spike slows its target by 25%, stacking up to 2 times and lasting 10 seconds.

Crippling Pain: Targets of your Shadow Word: Pain or Holy Fire are afflicted with Agony, reducing their movement speed by 50% for 10 seconds. This effect can only occur once every 6 seconds.


I would kill for some kiting ability, just a little bit, but I just don't think turning Flay into our kiting spell is the right choice.

By the way, Mages can't do that. Frostbolt has a casting time AND a travel time. Also they're squishier than we are; they're supposed to be better at kiting. I just wish, on a scale of 1 to 10, if they're an 8 that we were at least a 3 or 4, rather than a 1.

And melee have counters to our counters.

Warriors have Heroic Leap + Charge + Bladestorm. DKs have ranged silence + DG + CoI. Rogues have Blind + CoS + Smoke bomb + Sprint + Vanish. I'm not even sure about Feral. Ret will have Fist of Justice + Freedom + Burden of Guilt + Emancipate. Enhancement has Spirit Walk + Ranged Interrupt + tons of snares + ghost wolf form.


I know I am forgetting quite a few things. Melee already have the tools to adapt to this ability and our counters to theirs. And like I said, one downfall to the glyph could be that it reduces the MF snare to 25% and melee snares are 50%. That means they can still easily reach us as they will still be moving faster than us. It will just take them a bit longer.

And melee that closes on us will know to refresh their snare before we counter their closer.

[Venteus]

From my perspective it seems like melee are designed to counter casters, and casters are designed for PvE.

[Annesh]

And melee have counters to our counters.

Warriors have Heroic Leap + Charge + Bladestorm. DKs have ranged silence + DG + CoI. Rogues have Blind + CoS + Smoke bomb + Sprint + Vanish. I'm not even sure about Feral. Ret will have Fist of Justice + Freedom + Burden of Guilt + Emancipate. Enhancement has Spirit Walk + Ranged Interrupt + tons of snares + ghost wolf form.

All things with cooldowns, to counter our spammable, zero travel time, 40 yard range kiting option. The only thing that would have a chance would be enhance with ghost wolf, immune to the slow.

I know I am forgetting quite a few things. Melee already have the tools to adapt to this ability and our counters to theirs. And like I said, one downfall to the glyph could be that it reduces the MF snare to 25% and melee snares are 50%. That means they can still easily reach us as they will still be moving faster than us. It will just take them a bit longer.

And melee that closes on us will know to refresh their snare before we counter their closer.

The fact is, if we have the ability to instantly apply our slow, and continue channeling it as long as we want, then melee will have to jump through hoops just to connect for long, and we're not supposed to be Frost mages. It doesn't matter if the snare is reduced, or our run speed is decreased while channeling flay, or any little caveats like that. What matters is this: if it allows us to move equal speed or faster than the melee, it's overpowered. If they still move faster, then we don't gain anything and it's too weak. At best we'll move a little slower, and we gain a better ability to delay the inevitable, which is a buff but a weird and awkward one, and I'd like it to be something concrete and reliable, while still keeping our kiting ability comfortably weaker than hunters and frost mages.

---------- Post added 2012-04-16 at 10:29 PM ----------

Can I has your babies?

Well, okay, but the boys will grow up to be socially inept neckbeards, and the girls will be scary cosplaying animus.

More serious now. Projectiles goddammit. In all fairness I still don't know what Blizz were thinking when they came up with their design of half crippled apparitions. Thank god they're inanimate or they'd be dying of old age.

Yes plx, make Shadowy Apparitions look like a dark shadowpriesty single tick of Arcane Missiles. One orb = one missile, two orbs = two missiles. You get the idea.

Maybe the Apparitions can apply a 5-6 second snare, 20% per Orb. I freaking love that, let's make it happen.

By the way, my thread is all buried and lonely now. Can someone bump it for me :x

[smokeajay]

All things with cooldowns, to counter our spammable, zero travel time, 40 yard range kiting option. The only thing that would have a chance would be enhance with ghost wolf, immune to the slow.




The fact is, if we have the ability to instantly apply our slow, and continue channeling it as long as we want, then melee will have to jump through hoops just to connect for long, and we're not supposed to be Frost mages. It doesn't matter if the snare is reduced, or our run speed is decreased while channeling flay, or any little caveats like that. What matters is this: if it allows us to move equal speed or faster than the melee, it's overpowered. If they still move faster, then we don't gain anything and it's too weak. At best we'll move a little slower, and we gain a better ability to delay the inevitable, which is a buff but a weird and awkward one, and I'd like it to be something concrete and reliable, while still keeping our kiting ability comfortably weaker than hunters and frost mages.

---------- Post added 2012-04-16 at 10:29 PM ----------



Well, okay, but the boys will grow up to be socially inept neckbeards, and the girls will be scary cosplaying animus.



Yes plx, make Shadowy Apparitions look like a dark shadowpriesty single tick of Arcane Missiles. One orb = one missile, two orbs = two missiles. You get the idea.

Maybe the Apparitions can apply a 5-6 second snare, 20% per Orb. I freaking love that, let's make it happen.

By the way, my thread is all buried and lonely now. Can someone bump it for me :x

Perhaps applying a "Weakened Speed" debuff applied to the attacker after PW:S is fully absorbed. It would have to be a significant debuff with a short duration to be useful.

[Dawn Falcon]

Yes plx, make Shadowy Apparitions look like a dark shadowpriesty single tick of Arcane Missiles. One orb = one missile, two orbs = two missiles. You get the idea.

Heck - if the concerns burst (and I can see it might be), make it a 8s DoT (based on the number of orbs, not a stack, so you can't directly refresh it). There, not overwhelming in PvP and just as useful in PvE.

[Juicebox]

I'm so tired of them neglecting Shadow, I might just roll something else after 5-6 years of playing mine.
The Shadow Apparitations are the worst though. Like people say, on live where it's a proc we're not really in control of, it's fine. It's something that just happens and we don't care about them being slow cause it's a just a bonus.
But when we're supposed to use them as our main nuke it's just lack lusting. It's not just a minor bonus anymore, but it still feels like it is.

[Volitar]

So I pretty much just now finished leveling my priest and I really like how shadow plays and all of the sudden its gone. Shadow on beta feels overly clunky and just bad.

[Annesh]

Seems like they're getting a ton of feedback for Shadow and everyone's saying the same things, so I'm actually confident it'll get changed. I just hope it gets changed into something actually good.

[Karei]

Knowing how Blizz handles Spriests (based on previous experiences) I fear we'll get the shaft till somewhere halfway the expansion...

[Emotears]

Hello ladies and gents, I have a feedback post on shadow priests up now that slightly resembles this one ie WALL OF TEXT lol
I would appreciate you having a browse and letting me know what you think and what you agree/disagree with.

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/forum/topic/4427668765

[Mur.]

A glyph to change apparition graphics would be a great idea. Although I think it is one of the graphically more unique things spriest has.

I almost want them to try something really new and crazy with shadow priest. Like creating illusions of the target that they must kill, ala Old Kingdom. Right now when you're playing against a spriest there's just not enough smoke and mirrors gameplay, it's just another glasscannon caster. Spectral guide is a step in the right direction, but I think you should be invlunerable for the duration/able to cast/the illusion can take more damage. As long as it still feels different to Dispersion.

Less burst, moar dots and more illusionary/mindfuck spells.

[Worshaka]

I love basisly negative people are. I've been playing a spriest since bc, they have gotten better and more powerful every expasion. In very basic terms our DPS has gone from not even remotely competitive (utility only) to just behind to extremely competitive and sometimes OP. The start of Cata I was able to do 22K which was sometimes a good 5K above anyone else in my guild. We even got nerfs to compensate for us being too OP.

So I'd like to know what you base your claim on? Spriests are one of the few class/specs that have continually gotten what they asked for.

Of course I speak from a PvE point of view, I'm not sure they are all that in PvP but even in that environment they are much better than they used to be.

---------- Post added 2012-04-18 at 11:07 AM ----------

We do have the weakest CC and I want that changed, but setting it up so a melee class has to use some kind of cooldown, even a short one, to counter a spammable, channeled slow with no casting or travel time, is imbalanced. Plus that just sounds so boring - you can kite the melee all day long, as long as you don't stop channeling Flay. He can use his little gap closers or whatever but you just have to use your own CDs to counter those, and get range again to continue the madness.

Here are a couple of my thoughts, pulled from the thread on the beta forum.

Binding Darkness: Your Mind Spike slows its target by 25%, stacking up to 2 times and lasting 10 seconds.

Crippling Pain: Targets of your Shadow Word: Pain or Holy Fire are afflicted with Agony, reducing their movement speed by 50% for 10 seconds. This effect can only occur once every 6 seconds.


I would kill for some kiting ability, just a little bit, but I just don't think turning Flay into our kiting spell is the right choice.

By the way, Mages can't do that. Frostbolt has a casting time AND a travel time. Also they're squishier than we are; they're supposed to be better at kiting. I just wish, on a scale of 1 to 10, if they're an 8 that we were at least a 3 or 4, rather than a 1.

Are you insinuating that melee's gap closers aren't cooldowns? Of course not all are but they are hardly powerful ones, things like charge, sprint, heroic leap, repentace, death grip... you're not making a very balanced argument.

---------- Post added 2012-04-18 at 11:08 AM ----------

I'm so tired of them neglecting Shadow, I might just roll something else after 5-6 years of playing mine.
The Shadow Apparitations are the worst though. Like people say, on live where it's a proc we're not really in control of, it's fine. It's something that just happens and we don't care about them being slow cause it's a just a bonus.
But when we're supposed to use them as our main nuke it's just lack lusting. It's not just a minor bonus anymore, but it still feels like it is.

Our main nuke? I've yet to see a shadowy apairtion hit for the 150K my MB can at times, nor does it do 20% of my total damage like MB or VT can. Try 3 or 4% I think you should roll something else because you seem to have no knowledge of the spriest class.

[Karei]

I love basisly negative people are. I've been playing a spriest since bc, they have gotten better and more powerful every expasion. In very basic terms our DPS has gone from not even remotely competitive (utility only) to just behind to extremely competitive and sometimes OP. The start of Cata I was able to do 22K which was sometimes a good 5K above anyone else in my guild. We even got nerfs to compensate for us being too OP.

So I'd like to know what you base your claim on? Spriests are one of the few class/specs that have continually gotten what they asked for.

Of course I speak from a PvE point of view, I'm not sure they are all that in PvP but even in that environment they are much better than they used to be.

---------- Post added 2012-04-18 at 11:07 AM ----------



Are you insinuating that melee's gap closers aren't cooldowns? Of course not all are but they are hardly powerful ones, things like charge, sprint, heroic leap, repentace, death grip... you're not making a very balanced argument.

---------- Post added 2012-04-18 at 11:08 AM ----------



Our main nuke? I've yet to see a shadowy apairtion hit for the 150K my MB can at times, nor does it do 20% of my total damage like MB or VT can. Try 3 or 4% I think you should roll something else because you seem to have no knowledge of the spriest class.

And yet there is truth in his words. It may not be our 'main nuke' so to speak but it's a resource using ability. If in this line of thinking you compare it with Templar's Verdict from Pallies that also uses resources our so-called 'signature ability' hits for a sack of spuds and is incredibly retarded in the way it behaves. Apparitions move like a tortoise, esulting in people just being able to outrun them, or resulting in them not hitting targets they are cast on because the target dies too soon. Plus, in order to make then more mobile they give us a glyph that makes them float. Sorry but no glyph can change a broken mechanic into something worthwhile. Change them into projectiles and be done with it. People can't outrun it then and you get rid of using a glyph that shouldn't even have to be used in the first place if the damn ability did what it was supposed to do.

[Juicebox]

Our main nuke? I've yet to see a shadowy apairtion hit for the 150K my MB can at times, nor does it do 20% of my total damage like MB or VT can. Try 3 or 4% I think you should roll something else because you seem to have no knowledge of the spriest class.

I understand it's hard for you to grasp but SA is basically our main nuke on beta at this moment. It's what you spend your orbs on, hence it being our main nuke.
Yes, it currently does bad damage compared to others, but; We build up our shadow orbs with MB, releasing them with SA.
Our main nuke needs to be powerful to FEEL like a main nuke. You can claim it's not our main nuke all you want, but no matter its damage, it is.

I got more knowledge of this class than you probably have of all classes added together, not to be mean. Seeing you pulling numbers out of nowhere suggests to me that you're the one without a clue. 3-4% from SA isn't even close to what it is on beta, it's actually higher.

[Ananan]

Does anyone know what kind of damage apparitions could be allowed to do before dropping Mind Flay and filling with SWP and apparitions would take over? That puts a real cap on how much damage we will ever see them do.

I have a strong feeling that we'll see some sort of redesign to the whole orb-apparition model though. I really don't see how the developers could be happy with the current beta version.

[Annesh]

Does anyone know what kind of damage apparitions could be allowed to do before dropping Mind Flay and filling with SWP and apparitions would take over? That puts a real cap on how much damage we will ever see them do.

I have a strong feeling that we'll see some sort of redesign to the whole orb-apparition model though. I really don't see how the developers could be happy with the current beta version.

It's entirely possible no one working on the beta is unhappy with it, maybe because no one plays a shadowpriest so no one cares.

[deviantcultist]

My Shadowpriest is really dear to me. As far as I've seen, the only changes at this stare are psyfiend, tendrils, mind spike proc (talent), void shift, new apparition mechanic and the lovely datamined Dark Star (probably replaces divine star for shadowpriests). ----> http://mop.wowhead.com/spell=122121

Compared to my warlock or other classes, shadowpriest seems to be lagging behind in terms of both efficiency and fresh material.