Originally Posted by
Mithgroth
On topic:
I'm starting to worry about seriously being missed because of all the shitstorm going on about Warrior & BM burst and mage CC. Most of the PvP'ers complaining about it and it's understandable that Blizzard is taking high priority on this issue, however I see -almost- no mention of any shaman discussion going on.
Even if we are fine in every aspect on what/how we are doing -although some claim we are, I don't see how everything can be fine-, I don't see how come there are no attempts to improve things, or make them cooler.
Not even a single cosmetic minor glyph, or an icon change. As a shaman I feel so desperate and sad that there are no positive changes (doesn't have to be a direct buff, or not an obvious PvE encounter fix, that's aimed to fix the fight, not the shaman).
On CPT:
CPT is not junk: We had no CC before. Then they gave us hex and bind elemental (so rarely used). Today's WoW requires even more control, but we should be thankful that we have at least one addition to our arsenal. 5 second AoE stun is welcomed by anyone, and shamans got it, it's great.
CPT is not fine: CPT is very good indeed, but it is obviously not fine as it is now. 45 second cd makes up for 5 seconds stun duration, it is pretty balanced as it is in terms of effect / cooldown. However, it really requires improvements and QoL changes to be useful enough:
- Totemic Projection becomes mandatory to use it. In PvP, nobody's going to stand in range of it, you have to be the one stunning them. And making a talent mandatory is flawed design. The most perfect talent example is Warlock's pet tier. Assumed that they produce the same dps, it just alters the playstyle and depends on your choice. Only CPT alone itself makes TP such a mandatory choice because it is not going to work %90 of the time without it.
- A X class ability should be usable by an averagely skilled x class player. If top tier shamans can use it very well, and most others can't, it does not mean the ability is fine and everyone else needs to L2P. It's more of a stress source than fun in my experience, and I really wonder what do you love about it as its current state, since -as I said- it effects your talent choices on its own, and furthermore pushes you to pick a glyph just to be more reliable -explained below-.
-------***** The most important issue for QoL change *****-------
- While you are trying to aim it, your mouse turns into TP's AoE pointer, which is a circle about 2-yard radius. When you try to aim it 30-yards away, it becomes too hard to predict 8-yard effect area on a moving target, while in the mean time you have to count for the arming time and hit it exactly on the right milisecond to land it. I don't see how this is "skill-cap" instead of just annoying. In the heat of combat, count to x, place it in the very right spot at the very right time, and try to predict 8-yards AoE, it's just asking too much for an AoE stun which is already balanced by its own long cooldown . It's not reliable enough, hitting with CPT shouldn't be a bonus, it should be one of our tools that we use for control.
-------***** The most important issue for QoL change *****-------
- Glyph feels plain wrong. Glyphs should alter and tweak a spell further instead of making them more reliable to use. The ability itself should be decent enough to be useful. Similar to talents, glyphs should be playstyle choices. CPT glyph feels like a bug-fix now. Because CPT isn't a reliable stun and too difficult to execute properly on its own (see the reasons above), glyph becomes mandatory if you intend to use it in your arsenal. This is just plain wrong because it contradicts with Blizzard's revamped talent and glyph logic. Also, "making a spell more reliable to use" isn't the same as "altering your playstyle by adding CPT".
There are tons of ways to make the ability more appealing, everybody probably have some ideas.
Even the existance of these ideas points out that it should be discussed by people and some improvements are required for the spell.