GC's tweet for lack of a dps burst cd for shadow priests

[Falsified]

Our return value for haste is fine compared to intelect, but if you compare the direct value of haste of SP and a lock, you will see some huge gap. Our best secondary stat doesn't even scale better than their lowest secondary stat.
A better fit than MB's cd scaling with haste is changing the resource system to be similar to embers, fits better with mastery. But blizzard will never change something like that on a last minute note, so the only thing we can hope for is a +dmg on a couple of spells when 5.2 hits.

[lolalola]

Thanks for the excellent write-up Lolalola

I think we've covered most of the math we need, now we just need to know how to get him to look at it and see why we're concerned.

Unfortunately there is a discrepancy in the compare leading to at least my data being inaccurate:

I went to simulationcraft.org and it said Raid Results

• T14H Patchwerk-style
• T14N Patchwerk-style (no elite items or legendary gems, no professions, neutral race)

I'm sharing here only my findings on the spriest differences but a quick glance through various other suggested the situation is not unique. Here shadow's compare finding:

1) No elite is in my opinion unrealistic. Protector heroic isn't that hard on normal.
2) No legendary is possibly unrealistic. You can assume the player had the sha-touched gem around the same time as BiS Normal.
3) No professions is by definition unrealistic. Everyone who raids T14N and is BiS has 2 crafting professions. In the T14H profile they use engineering and blacksmithing.
4) Neutral race (nelf) is unrealistic. Nelf provides no stat increase. In the T14H profile they use troll.
5) Spec different (N 110202, H 120102); irrelevant.

Elite and gem we can argue about. Spec difference on Patchwerk wouldn't matter AFAICT. However at the very least the N and H must use the same race and same professions!

I don't know why SimC has this irregularity its not reassuring. If we are to present mr Crab with numbers we must make sure they are correct even though he'd dismiss SimC numbers.

There was also someone recently who posted on MMOC data from WoL the 75-100% marks (so that excludes both those who played very good and very bad) and compares these.

[Varabently]

People like big buttons that make them hit harder. Spriests seem to be doing fine in PvP, so I think they want to be careful giving them more buttons. You get a mini burst everytime DP is up, which is fairly often.

[snaxattax]

Our return value for haste is fine compared to intelect

if you compare our pp values for our secondaries (all are around 1.6) to other classes it really isn't. most classes have ~4 pp value for their main stat, which we have. however, most other classes get around 2-2.2 for at least two of their secondaries- which is why most other specs don't gem straight red - with warriors being the big outlier there getting 3-3.2 pp for crit. we scale way worse with secondary stats than just about any other spec right now.

[lolalola]

I don't think mind blast scaling with haste is a great idea. This is a melee mechanic on a caster. When you put that on a rogue, you hasten the entire rotation. Similar (with integer breakpoints) on a ret. For shadow, I think it deforms the rotation, and leads to confusing breakpoints that will affect different shadows unevenly.

That is, if correctly done, a good thing. Changing breakpoints, while complex, has the potential advantage of not touching PvP because the PvP spriests cannot reach them with their PvP gear at least not in that specific season. We do not want to boost shadow in PvP, we want to boost shadow in PvE. Although the recent nerfs on shadow PvP may warrant boost on both PvE and PvP.

1)- Sim a few specs, including shadow, in 476 gear. Make sure to NOT include outliers such as arcane and affliction, and also not to include things that likely aren't comparable, like pure melee (mutilate). So check balance, elemental, fire, BM, destro, whatever.

If you want to compare all ranged, do that. If you want to include all DPS, do that. If you want to exclude bad specs (about which you'll QQ), do that. Be open and clear about what you are comparing. That's exactly what we're doing.

The devs don't trust sims, but if you can show that shadow is scaling worse than similar specs as gear level increases (and there's no reason to assume 5.2 would change this), they would look into it. They would likely take it a lot more seriously because instead of it being "the sim of the fire mage versus the sim of the marksman hunter" or whatever, you're using the same sim (shadow priest, or fire mage) twice, and only looking at the delta. That's a much narrower point.

Its exactly what we've been doing here except we used T14N BiS versus T14H BiS. Unfortunately, SimC's profiles at least for shadow are not the same which at the very least matters for race and profession.

I think the scale factor analysis leaves out some things, and you definitely don't want to cherry pick stuff like "affliction and arcane", which are the only two specs GC has stated that are DEFINITELY too high and will be nerfed. I think the sim stuff you are running is the right path.

If you are referencing to the past it makes no sense to exclude viable specs which were performing the best because these specs were used in real-life raiding which makes them valid in a hindsight compare. Your silly worst spec in rogue wasn't used because... well, it wasn't viable. The only point I'll give you is that it may be possible the spriest was sitting out and the rogue as well because even their best spec was too shit for progression on the fight. Unfortunately, you weren't intelligent enough to describe your argument like that instead you had to rant about your rogue and cry about the weapons. GC's plans on the future regarding specs like arcane and affliction are beyond our control, and we're comparing 5.0/5.1 T14N/T14H right now.

Combat specific weapons say hi. Your dagger doesn't drop, you have two dead specs. Your fist doesn't drop, you have one dead spec. Nowhere close to suboptimal reforges on all int cloth gear.

More importantly, this is a hateful and uninformed opinion. All specs deserve to be viable, especially all pure specs, as damage as all pure classes can do. Goofy math that pretends sub doesn't exist and mutilate doesn't exist on Garalon and Combat doesn't exist on Vizier will be seen through by literally any non super biased source as being goofball biased bullshit.

You don't need deception and lies to ask for buffs to an under performing spec like shadow, so don't go there.

First of all its just open data, and I provided 2 types of data analysis. An absolute analysis of every DPS spec, and a relative compare of viable DPS specs on a class-by-class basis which is realistic in a progression context (more realistic than assuming a warrior will play arms on Garalon). So readers are free to pick the one they find more valid. If you want to call that deception, by my guest (even though I'm completely open about the methodology used), but lies suggests the data is invalid and that burden of proof lies in your hand. You disagree with one of the two methodologies chosen. Fair enough. That's at worst deception, not lies.

Plus, really we're not taking into account how easy or difficult it is to gather gear (casters do NOT have it easy in this regard). If we would (you're bringing it up, hi!), hunters would sim higher during progression. They're very easy to gear up: monopoly on weapons, only compete with enhancement on mail, which leaves them only to compete on trinket, cloak, and tier pieces. A rogue does not compete with any other class on agility daggers. You complain you didn't get your dagger yet they're easier than acquiring tier pieces or leather or agi cloak or trinket. Either you have a lot of rogues in your raid team, you're a lot on standby when them daggers drop, or you're just an unlucky sod.

Also, it appears from Yvaele's first data analysis mutil rogue does scale well with gear.

Specifically, I think the reason you should have a compare point without counting affliction and arcane isn't because they are pures (that bonus is much smaller than the edge those two have)- it's because of:
https://twitter.com/Ghostcrawler/sta...88907180613632

We are analyzing 5.0 and 5.1, not 5.2.

Comparing yourself to stuff that they think is too high will just make them say "Oh, it'll be FINE once we fix the overpowered specs". You need to show that you need buffs compared to the specs that they think are fine currently, which thus far appears to be everything but those two.

We should include them in our analysis, but not only include them. E.g. I'm very curious how well the other 2 spirit-based ranged DPS classes scale from 463 or 476 -> T14N -> T14H -> T15N -> T15H.

[Syenite]

...Why have a solution that skews that with uneven rewards that you may not be able to realize (aka, a shorter mind blast cooldown can crash into the rest of the rotation- you could end up having to use another ability and not actually get to cast your mind blast any faster because even though it was off cooldown, you were doing something else like casting or watching a global spin)....

Did you pull that part out of thin air?
We spend a solid 50% of our time channeling mindflay - which is being stopped the second you have to re-dot - or have to do something else. Chances are quite good that this "something else" could end up being a mind blast. I dont see how a priority based dps "rotation" gets screwed over by high DPET spells being available more frequent. You will at all times just hit the button providing the most dmg - and if a button off cd gets to sit its just fine - cause you had something more important to do.

[sarcasm ]
Hell, lets just revert the changes made for melee to gain more resourses from haste? Cause as you stated, it may cause you to have to perform a finishing move just when something else needs to be reapplied? [/sarcasm]

[zito]

People like big buttons that make them hit harder. Spriests seem to be doing fine in PvP, so I think they want to be careful giving them more buttons. You get a mini burst everytime DP is up, which is fairly often.

Here is what you do.

You never stop attacking the spriest if you are facing one. Spriest is fucked. GG you win.

Welcome to the past 3 expansions and why priest/frost is preferred in any situation.

[Lopina]

OK, so Blizz doesn't want us to have actual DPS cooldown (even though they claim we do have it).

I'm ok with that as long as something is done for our PvE single target damage, without touching PvP.

What I had in mind is this:

Mind Flay is the spell we cast the most in PvE.
Mind Flay is the spell we cast the least in PvP.

So, the obvious solution is to do something with Mind Flay to buff our PvE damage. Since Mind Flay is single target spell, there's no risk of increasing out AoE potential.

Buffing Mind Flay base damage or Spell Power multiplier should also be untouched so people don't start exploiting it in PvP. That being said, we don't want Mind Flay to put some buff on the SPriest that buffs damage. So, the target afflicted with Mind Flay gains a debuff. An old one. Named Shadow Weaving. The same one we had from Vanilla till WotLK.

Each time your Mind Flay deals damage it has a 20% chance to increase the Shadow damage you deal by 2% for 15 sec. Stacks up to 5 times.

With 1 modification. It shouldn't affect players, which mean no chance to mess with PvP.

There.

[Drye]

Look, you can't buff mf with out devaluing FDCL. For some reason this is an extremely hard thing to comprehend. If you buff mf you need to buff every other lvl 45 talent. and right now, other than sw:I, the rest of those talent are fairly equal dps wise.

[Lopina]

But isn't MF the only place where PvP and PvE overlap the least?

[Drye]

But isn't MF the only place where PvP and PvE overlap the least?

Again, we have a very complex dmg break down. You simply can not buff one thing and magically fix everything.

[lolalola]

Your suggestion reminds me of something affliction has or had. Eradication or Shadow Trance or what was it called. It was a debuff which increased shadow damage. Or maybe I'm confused.

If you increase Mind Flay damage you break some mechanics in T3/T5. Lets see:

FDCL -> These procs / GCDs are used instead of Mind Flay, therefore the damage while specced into this goes down. This talent is already hit by Glyph of Mind Spike.
MB -> 1 GCD a min. Compared to FDCL, less affected.
SWI -> Haven't looked much into the new mechanic. As far as I understood its a passive talent which just procs on DP. Should work in synergy with more Mind Flay damage.

Remember SWI is introduced as a third alternative in T3. The other 2 are roughly equal. Blizzard did a good job in this regard.

ToF -> ToF doesn't care either way.
PI -> Doesn't care either.
DI -> The only one of T5 which is affected. More GCDs and procs means less time to Mind Flay.

ToF and DI are currently competitive, PI isn't, so touching Mind Flay makes DI worse in relation to ToF, but makes PI better in relation to DI.

This is just a rough sketch. To find out exactly what the change means number-wise we'd have to sim and such.

[Lopina]

Do you realize Shadow Priests had this talent from Vanilla to WotLK.

It's not something stolen from affliction. Old talent gave you a 20% chance when you cast a Shadow spell on target to apply a stacking(5) debuff on the target that increased your Shadow damage.

And yes, it does devalue FDCLa bit, but once you setup 5 stacks of the debuff you get +10% Shadow dmg from all sources (VT, SW:P, DP, MB, MF, MS), all you need to do is keep it refreshed. And since we already spend too much time channeling MF, I don't believe that should be a problem.
Same goes for DI.

[Falsified]

I wouldn't call DI a competitive talent. There are no fights were we are competitive and with which we have DI. ToF is the only thing making us competitive this tier. You are just comparing ToF and DI directly on single target, DI might edge out ToF in these scenarios but in reality they are just bad talents for single target damage, both of them:P

[Yvaelle]

Again, we have a very complex dmg break down. You simply can not buff one thing and magically fix everything.

A buff to 30% damage on Shadowform up from 20% would be a simple fix, it would result in an 8.33% buff to our damage - and we're 11% below the median damage - so on single target we'd still be slightly below average, but on multi-dot we'd be above average - that sounds right to me. It also doesn't affect PvP, because the 100% nerf to DP's burst is a far greater nerf than a 8.33% overall buff for what matters in pvp (burst).

[Drye]

A buff to 30% damage on Shadowform up from 20% would be a simple fix, it would result in an 8.33% buff to our damage - and we're 11% below the median damage

It might fix our scaling. Would have to really see. That plus the DP change might be enough. But we would have to see if something like that played out.

[Magpai]

There are no "on use" trinkets in this tier,

What? I'm using one on my warlock.

[Falsified]

There are no good on use trinket. I think that's what he meant:P

[Drye]

What? I'm using one on my warlock.

There are zero good ones.

[lolalola]

And yes, it does devalue FDCLa bit, but once you setup 5 stacks of the debuff you get +10% Shadow dmg from all sources (VT, SW:P, DP, MB, MF, MS), all you need to do is keep it refreshed. And since we already spend too much time channeling MF, I don't believe that should be a problem.
Same goes for DI.

The only thing we're currently good for is our off healing, our Mass Dispel, and maybe Void Shift for the rest we don't shine anywhere (compared to others who bring more) and severely lack in single target movement which your suggestion addresses.

Your proposal would bring us near to the median (except for the ramp up time which is important if you start with pre-pot, burst CDs, and heroism) but would only work in single target and movement (if the debuff lasts long enough). Target switching it has the ramp up time problem which DoTs also have by their nature. MultiDoT, AoE/cleave it doesn't affect. Keep in mind we're currently the worst multiDoTer when compared to the other multiDoT classes (this isn't the same as AoE or cleave which we plain suck at).

Given the PvP nerf perhaps mr Crab now has the guts to simply up the shadowform damage by 10% which is a quick and dirty fix, but still doesn't solve the scaling which seems worse than our competitors (which means a sensible loot council passes the gear to those who scale better). Now from what I heard the affli lock and arcane mage will get nerfed. I'll believe it when I see it. It is interesting to see what happens with moonkin and elemental, because these 2 classes are in a similar boat as ours.

One problem I have with your suggestion is it isn't simple and elegant. It further complexes the spec and play, and honestly "it doesn't work on players" is plain weird. But then again changing haste caps, or making haste scale with MBl would also require mechanic change.