[MoP Balance] T14 Set-Bonus Discussion

[exochaft]

The only REAL issue i have with the balance 4pc is that it is identical to the T6 2pc. Now i don't know if blizzard has ever flatout re-used a set bonus before, but that just seems silly to me.

Eh, kind of. Feral set bonuses for bears have concentrated on Lacerate threat/damage a few times. While the wording wasn't exactly the same, it was either Lacerate does more damage or more threat (both of which basically do the same thing).

you need to take into consideration the large majority of people who play this game aren't hardcore raiders...They don't know what a class forum is, they don't know their class inside and out, and quite frankly, they're not trying to. This isn't blizzard calling the community stupid, it's just how blizzard tends to operate with their tier set bonuses.

Not exactly sure what you're expecting of blizzard but I find it funny you sit here and consistently QQ without offering any type of reslution. "blizzard sucks because i say so" doesn't really have much validity to it.

Another point to keep in mind is that some of the other classes are receiving a LOT more changes than druids. I'd have to say from a druid point of view, not too much is drastically changing since many of our changes were just baking talents/glyphs into our abilities. Warlocks, for example, are receiving a pretty hefty overhaul. Beyond just individual classes, the interactions between healers and tanks is definitely being changed (with the whole new active mitigation system and healer changes). While I haven't dabbled into all of the classes on the beta quite yet, I'm fairly certain paladins are happy they aren't getting a major overhaul like they have almost every expansion.

As you've mentioned, a large portion of the player base isn't hardcore raiding or will even care about max/min and theorycrafting. While some of us are relearning our classes on the beta, many people will not even known about all the changes until the pre-expansion patch goes live. Beyond this, Blizz never releases life-altering set bonuses in the first tier. They're always semi-bland in how they operate, because people are still learning how their classes operate with expansion changes, and people have to want to abandon their tier for the next raid tier.

[NightZero88]

They're always semi-bland in how they operate, because people are still learning how their classes operate with expansion changes, and people have to want to abandon their tier for the next raid tier.

Unfortunately Blizz has done a poor job this tier at least in regards to resto. I am still using my T12 despite having a full set of t13 sitting in my bank because T12 bonuses outweigh the stat gains. That is poor design.

[Keiyra]

Unfortunately Blizz has done a poor job this tier at least in regards to resto. I am still using my T12 despite having a full set of t13 sitting in my bank because T12 bonuses outweigh the stat gains. That is poor design.

Heroic 391 T12 vs Normal 397 T13 yeah - not sure bout heroic 391 T12 vs Heroic 410 T13

I agree though that tier 13 was not nearly as fun/good as tier 12 bonus wise, for resto.

[Juvencus]

i'll keep it short
2piece: basic damage increase
4piece: most likely going to affect our decision making, aka interesting one.

I might be stupid but I don't see how 4p changes the way we apply dots or anything else for that matter. We would let them run their course before and we will with the 4p.

[exochaft]

Unfortunately Blizz has done a poor job this tier at least in regards to resto. I am still using my T12 despite having a full set of t13 sitting in my bank because T12 bonuses outweigh the stat gains. That is poor design.

Not saying it's always executed perfectly, as this has happened in the past, as well.

The first tier in an expansion is easy in this regard, because you have more reason to make them bland. Every tier beyond the first in an expansion is harder, especially when Blizz started adding multiple ilvl's of the same tier. While Blizz wants to make them more interesting and potentially alter how you operate, making such changes can end up being too powerful (which usually ends up in nerfing the set bonuses if the problem is too great). In this case, you'll still break T12 4pc eventually, but even if you break it statistically before you'd want to, you'll still operate without noticing much difference. If it were the case if you break T12 4pc and suddenly resto druids aren't viable healers or drastically less effective, that'd be a bigger issue.

[Jibjabb]

I might be stupid but I don't see how 4p changes the way we apply dots or anything else for that matter. We would let them run their course before and we will with the 4p.

It doesnt it just raises the DPE of them. Rotation will still be the exact same as nukes auto refresh dots until the next eclipse now and you always are going to reapply the dot once an eclipse is reached anyways it has no impact. I find the bonus pretty underwhelming, DoT damage in general is supposed to be lower so its hard to see how much of an DPS increase it will be.

[huth]

i'll keep it short
2piece: basic damage increase
4piece: most likely going to affect our decision making, aka interesting one.

Unless it affects whether we recast it in the space between one Eclipse ending and the next beginning, no, it won't. Even then, it's not much of a decision. DoT ends before entering next Eclipse? Recast it.(Keep in mind that we keep Sunfire until we enter Lunar, not just until we leave Solar)

[timbaLt]

Ghostcrawler Port :There are a lot of class changes for players to get used to in a new expansion. Immediately jumping into set bonus that make rotations more interesting is sort of wasted design space because players often aren't even used to their normal rotations yet. We typically start an expansion with pretty simple set bonuses and work our way up to more elaborate ones.

Reducing DoT timers though is plain stupid...

I don't see how 3 extra seconds on a DoT and 20% increased damage on a spell you'll now be using every time you go into Lunar is very interesting, honestly.

That's not saying that our rotation right now is super interesting.

[Ranklune]

That's not saying that our rotation right now is super interesting.

Honestly I don't think our rotation will ever get interesting. Though, that's not what we're discussing here :-)

[Shyzhi]

Honestly I don't think our rotation will ever get interesting. Though, that's not what we're discussing here :-)

I think it will be intresting with Celestial Alignment. Seeing as we can choose when to slap into a burst (say for adds shrooms / Starfall bonus damage?) seem nice to me :P, i aint been moonkin all that long so.. correct me if im wrong. But... come MoP our dot refreshes itself anyway while we are casting so... what does 3secs matter? I think all the druid set bonus's are abit wank really.... Most people KNOW there rotations so.. why are they making it so we dont get "confused" they been the same since TBC (more or less) :/

[Skyepic]

Honestly I don't think our rotation will ever get interesting. Though, that's not what we're discussing here :-)

Think it depends on how you use the word "interesting". Pretty sure Boomkins are the only class that doesn't have an ability that individually contributes for more than 30% of their total damage. The "interesting" portion of our rotation should come from the fact that we are balanced and effectively use all our abilities almost evenly. Maybe it's just me but i have yet to play a class and say to myself "wow that class has a really fun and interesting rotation!". And i don't think that will ever happen, because realistically rotations need to be easy enough for the casuals and "noobs" to understand them. Survival probably has the most "fun" rotation to me, but i'd certainly put boomkins in a close 2nd.

Obviously it's Grass is Greener syndrome which i totally understand, but honestly, you can QQ all you want that the boomkin rotation isn't "interesting", but at the same time, who does have a super interesting rotation that's better than all the others?

[Defang]

I think they are purposely making the first tier set of the expansion lackluster so we'll be inclined to upgrade it as soon as the next tier hits. Hopefully by now they will avoid the pitfall of making a set bonus so good we can't get rid of it. (I'm looking at you T8/T11/T12)

[Keiyra]

Maybe it's just me but i have yet to play a class and say to myself "wow that class has a really fun and interesting rotation!". And i don't think that will ever happen, because realistically rotations need to be easy enough for the casuals and "noobs" to understand them. Survival probably has the most "fun" rotation to me, but i'd certainly put boomkins in a close 2nd.

Unholy DK's don't really have a rotation per se, but they are a lot of fun to play imo (and i normally prefer casters over melee). Boomkin i enjoy, but its CD lacks oomph, and an execute ability would be nice i suppose.

[Skyepic]

Unholy DK's don't really have a rotation per se, but they are a lot of fun to play imo (and i normally prefer casters over melee). Boomkin i enjoy, but its CD lacks oomph, and an execute ability would be nice i suppose.

played unholy for about 2 months in Dragon Soul and then hated it. Only reasons i played Unholy:

1. Was continually having awful RNG as frost.
2. Was 100% new to me
3. Gurthtalak is overpowered

[zakaluka]

We don't know haste conversion at 90 yet, do we? Whether the first haste threshold will be reachable? How long dots will last relative to eclipse duration at first-tier raid breakin? Seems like 4p could wind up being a necessity for high double dot uptime, even on just a single target, depending on all those things. Beta testing results at 87 don't seem like they'd shed enough light on this subject.... Since you haven't felt the full weight of haste devaluing yet.

Isn't this discussion a bit speculative? There are still plenty of variables we haven't pinned down...

[Skyepic]

We don't know haste conversion at 90 yet, do we? Whether the first haste threshold will be reachable? How long dots will last relative to eclipse duration at first-tier raid breakin? Seems like 4p could wind up being a necessity for high double dot uptime, even on just a single target, depending on all those things. Beta testing results at 87 don't seem like they'd shed enough light on this subject.... Since you haven't felt the full weight of haste devaluing yet.

Isn't this discussion a bit speculative? There are still plenty of variables we haven't pinned down...

assuming scaling stays in the general area, first 2 breakpoints will probably be reached in the first tier and then 1 breakpoint for each tier after. Granted not sure what haste breakpoints have to do with this. Not sure what your 2nd question is asking. Our main nuke refreshes our DoT so it lasts until we reach our next eclipse? Haste won't have much of an effect on our 4PC. With the changes they made to MF/SF the only benefit we're looking at right now is 1-2 extra DoT ticks after we switch to the next eclipse. Which is only gunna increase the DPE of MF/SF by like 20-30K.

As for it benefiting us in multi dotting. It would have to be a very very very specific situation. It would have to be 4-5+ mobs and the DoT would have to run it's full duration. Anything less than 5 mobs and you can manually refresh MF/SF with starfire/Wrath so there's a good chance u won't get the last few ticks from the extended duration anyway. The only thing the 4pc does atm is increase the DPE of our DoT, but given the fact we auto refresh it just by doing our rotation, it kinda completely negates the affect of the bonus.

[zakaluka]

Not sure what your 2nd question is asking. Our main nuke refreshes our DoT so it lasts until we reach our next eclipse?

Yes, but after you switch eclipse, your old dot runs its course and eventually rolls off.
(1) eclipse interval (heavily influenced by total haste)
(2) total dot duration (depends where breakpoints are)
should go hand in hand to determine total uptime on moonfire/sunfire. If blizzard tunes all the factors appropriately, 4p with some set haste might just be a requirement to approach 100% uptime for both dots on a single target. I'm not talking about multi dotting here. Improving DPE is good, but DPE and uptime are two different beasts entirely.

MF/SF DPE also lower as the eclipse interval shrinks, again very haste dependent. o.O DPET however should remain rather constant between each haste breakpoint.

Fact is we have no idea what the haste conversion at 90 will be. I don't have beta access so I'm not sure, but isn't all testing being done at 87 still on the beta realms? If this is so nobody has played the spec with haste scaled back fully for its conversion factor at endgame yet. Meaning eclipse interval will be longer and dots could have fewer ticks at early endgame, until you stack enough gear.

[huth]

I doubt we'll come anywhere remotely close to 100% DoT uptime during T14. That would require a full cycle of significantly less than 30 seconds, something that even in T13 gear is hard to do.

Moonfire/Sunfire DPE is infinite. They don't generate any energy, but they do damage. Not sure what you're trying to get at there.

I also doubt that we're going to do much multi-dotting in MoP. Hurricane does a lot more DPS than the MF DoT.

[zakaluka]

In the land of Balance, does DPE mean damage per energy? I'm used to it meaning damage per execution. Damage per execution of MF and SF should behave strangely against haste under the new model. When you reach a haste threshold, you probably gained no more than 1 tick per cycle. Even though the dot gets refreshed many times over that 20 second period. So the DPE of MF and SF will barely change by reaching a haste threshold.

But regarding eclipse interval: eclipse cycles are very, very short in beta right now because of glyphs. All that feedback about not having eclipse mobility kicked in. There are a lot of videos floating around, but the one I'm looking at right now demonstrates a 40 second cycle (beginning of solar to beginning of solar on a single target, even juked one cast). At raid breakin that'll probably be longer -- figure 45 sec? Both dots default to 12 seconds; at first haste threshold 13 seconds, buffed by the 4p 16 seconds. If you got your normal eclipse cycle down to 34 seconds you could trim off re-dotting entirely from your single target rotation for a 32-second cycle with 100% double dot uptime. With the 4 piece bonus, I'm guessing that happens at around 17% haste.

It's a guess. There's about 1 second of slop for where the previous haste threshold is on MF/SF.

This is all rather beyond the point, which was that increasing dot duration will improve dot uptime even on a single target. Reaching 100% uptime on both dots would be too huge a threshold, because you'd never have to re-apply either of them. I kind of doubt blizzard intends for it to be reachable. It's just an idea.

Anyway, there are single target implications to the 4p bonus. Not just for multi-dotting, which seems to be how many people are reacting. Even if it just lets you get a really high (not 100%) uptime.

---------- Post added 2012-05-01 at 12:16 AM ----------

It's really hard to say where the second MF/SF haste thresholds would wind up under this 4p bonus, since it gives both of them 7.5 ticks by default. That number would shed some light on whether 100% dot uptime is possible. Something I'm curious about, but again I'm betting the answer is no.

Some interesting things to think about here...

[Skyepic]

yeah i dunno where Damage Per Energy came from but i don't think that is even a real thing, or has much relevance. Measuring MF/SF in DPE is pretty much irrelevant now with the constant refresh. I highly doubt our DoT uptimes will ever get passed 70% on a single target.

Wouldn't a full cycle have to be roughly 28 seconds with the 4pc to never have to re-dot entirely? Your final cast to change will refresh the DoT to 16 seconds, so you'll have 16 seconds to get back to the other eclipse (14 seconds) and then 2 seconds to cast your main nuke to refresh the DoT before it falls off. I could be wrong but i don't think we'll be having 14 second eclipse transitions.

Haste thresholds are more than likely going to be a thing of the past for us. We might take them into consideration slightly, but since the whole point of haste thresholds was the drastic change in DPE of a DoT and now DPE is useless i don't see haste thresholds being a big deal for moonkins in MoP