Warlock patch 5.4 discussion

[TyrianFC]

The slow effects is relevant in every fight

No it's not. Simply use Burning Rush to negate the slow completely and it's not relevant anymore.

[Shauni]

Then remove Burning rush because everyone takes it and is clearly OP

See what I did here ?

On topic, good dev' idea. Let's hope our multidotting doesn't skyrocket and trigger a new nerf :/

[Deleted]

No it's not. Simply use Burning Rush to negate the slow completely and it's not relevant anymore.

On progress fights (progress in the sense that healing is intense) running around with Burning Rush would make you look like an absolute banana. But sure, if you have a healer assigned to making up for your poor play, then that's great for you.

Nowadays I offer my Burning Rush services for a price, for healer WOL rankings. If healer#1 pays me, I will run in his and preferably only his range with Burning Rush permanently active. For a fee, ofcourse.

Use Burning Rush while undergearing Meg hc or Jin'rokh hc at your peril.
One of many reasons warlocks are so sought after is our ability to require very little healing. That goes in the sink if you run around with Burning Rush on, turning you into a hunter without deterrence.

[Gorthan]

No it's not. Simply use Burning Rush to negate the slow completely and it's not relevant anymore.

You can't use it everytime, you loose health and at least a gcd, countering partially the benefit. BTW the slow effect is not a big a deal, i agree, we can manage it somehow.
But you are just avoiding to face all the facts that prove that KJC is no not OP.

[Deleted]

People don't seem to get it. It's not that KjC is OP or NOT. It's about the fact that blizzard doesn't like the mechanic for warlocks.

[Deleted]

That's the beauty of warlock design right now, all goes well together and you have to think about what you do - think of the example above: speed debuff when casting while moving, use burning rush to negate it, but if you use burning rush then you tanke dmg so it is not always an option ... and so on.

Warlock design works and it is not op. More and more I think Ghostcrawler is bad for the game, espacially since I follow him on twitter. They gave us KJC for a reason, not just in 5.1 but since 5.0. So they knew we would be able to cast while moving. And it all works out just fine.

I can't get my brain to understand why they would destroy this design b/c they fear we might get too used to it ...

[Pyrhos]

What is the hesitation to allow fillers to be used on the move, and keeping the proposed cool down model?

Nukes would have be hard cast, or used during KJC (if spec'd into it). Incinerate, shadow bolt, Malefic grasp/Drain Soul able to be cast like scorch; make all nukes a 3 second cast (Haunt, Chaos Bolt, Soul Fire) that scale with haste and any current procs.

As it is incinerate is not an overly powerful spell, and with the proposed changes to MF haunt will play a larger role. All three spells would suffer from movement in execute, with destro being effected the least (as it is already).

This would allow for the lower movement DPS that blizzard is looking for, while not altering the classes dramatically in the middle of the expansion.

[Deleted]

This would allow for the lower movement DPS that blizzard is looking for, while not altering the classes dramatically in the middle of the expansion.

It's what I'd hoped they'd go for, purely for that reason.

I don't think KJC is a talent we should keep, I don't believe moving constantly is something the class needs or should have, but when we have ONE tier left and a lot of the changes blizzard are trying to make to avoid the KJC nerf being so brutal (haunt on the move guys! Fel flame with a cast time!) just seem to show they know they want to remove KJC, but don't have a complete solution to give in exchange - that's without looking at the elephant in the room that our lvl 90 talent tier as a whole is, that thing needs some serious changes, not just KJC and, inexplicably, MF nerfing - AV is the biggest problem there.

I'd rather they gave us the bandaid fix of making filler only castable, then did a rework of our lvl 90 talents and any movement issues that ensue / pvp connotations (is malefic grasp worth keeping etc?) for the next expansion after they've had time to think up a decent solution, not the one tier we have left while seemingly throwing darts to figure out solutions.

[Pyrhos]

I'd rather they gave us the bandaid fix of making filler only castable, then did a rework of our lvl 90 talents and any movement issues that ensue / pvp connotations (is malefic grasp worth keeping etc?)

As a whole I think that is just it - they are only going to devote so much time to the rework - and we as a community need to do our best to guide to a real solution other than "NO JUST LEAVE HOW IS PLZ". The cooldown change would be fine, if it was balanced with filler spells going baseline as movement, especially with nukes becoming more prevalent with affliction as they are with the other specs.

[cabana]

I'm really not digging his comments on chaos bolt. Is he unaware of how flat it is now in pvp?

[Hegemonia]

I'm really not digging his comments on chaos bolt. Is he unaware of how flat it is now in pvp?

Flat is the exact word - it doesn't scale at all. It used to hit for the same amount when the gear was far worse if you normalize it for the nerf in the beginning of MoP.

We have Obliterates, Eviscerates, Colossus Smash, Powershots, you name it, hit higher than CB and this is kind of ridiculous.

[Brusalk]

I'm really not digging his comments on chaos bolt. Is he unaware of how flat it is now in pvp?

Care to post screenies or the like of his comments? (Or at least links) I'm curious what he's saying.

[kendro1200]

I can't get my brain to understand why they would destroy this design b/c they fear we might get too used to it ...

It's not because we'll get used to it (many of us already are used to it), they're changing it because they apparently loathe the concept of warlocks casting a full rotation while moving because that's what "hunters do". Piss poor excuse, terrible reason to gut fun from a way of playing a class, and removes an element of thought when playing the game, but choices made for irrational reasons are always piss poor.

[Count Zero]

People don't seem to get it. It's not that KjC is OP or NOT. It's about the fact that blizzard doesn't like the mechanic for warlocks.

As long as we're balanced one way or the other, I can't really argue with Blizz since it's their game and they have to make what they think are the best decisions.

But I really, really like current KJC. Losing it won't make me re-roll because I don't like any class near as much as Warlock. But I like my Warlock more with current KJC. I'm disappointed that we're losing it just because it's not what Blizz wants for Warlocks.

Thing is, we were balanced around having it (only fights we dominate are due purely to multidot / aoe strength). I'm very scared they're not going to compensate after they take it away. Jin'Rokh is a decent amount of movement / single target fight, and no lock spec is at the top. And even on the multi-target fights we're not on top on all of them.

We're in a good-but-not-OP place, looking at real performances (WoL / Raidbots). I don't see why rebalancing can't wait until 6.0. We'll have had KJC in its current incarnation for the majority of this xpac (assuming SoO doesn't last more than 6/7 months or so), just don't understand how it took them this long to decide, "Naaahhh we don't like you doing that".

Can't help but wonder how much of it is due to people feeling like it's OP and QQing endlessly, when it's just demonstrably not.

[Deleted]

wol and raidbots were always considered trivially by blizzard, putting their internal testing Tools before anything.
Thus, facts are whatever their internal tests or theorically way they want a warlock play (standard or top end raiders), real statistics, with real people, with hundreds of raiders (and the raiders using wol are way over "standard" raider so its even worse at their level) show no OP warlock class related to any talent constantly.

Warlock perform top score on few fights but not much more as other classes (some are constantly low , they should look to them)
Demonology (ironically the least affected by kjc!) seem the best one , from a overall pov.

Tho we have to admit that the 3 warlock specs perform well (often in the top 10 and often in the top 5), but does it means something else but that blizzard managed to give 3 specs to warlock which are interesting, good at dps, to put in a nutshell, warlock class is atm on of the most fun anda real succes in term of design ?
(pve wise of course)

[Deleted]

warlock class is atm on of the most fun anda real succes in term of design ?
(pve wise of course)

You're going to have a hard time selling that one.

Affliction I preferred vastly in WOTLK Naxx, later WOTLK and Cata I preferred too - I'm really not digging MG, thought the proc play is engaging
Destruction I'm quite happy with, but worry the rotation will feel too boring when ROF goes, I've also heard some destro-lovers from earlier expansions say they don't like the new destro
Demonology I'm not really a fan of metamorphosis, although I think the current incarnation of it is better than the Cata one, I liked the spec when it was more pet-focused - not you LITERALLY becoming a demon, though I think my tastes are in the minority by far there - I don't think it's "objectively" bad, it's good, just not what I would have hoped for.

Probably a far more whiney post than the specs really deserve, but afflictions what I've played almost exclusively in raiding since classic, MOP is the first time I've EVER felt at odds with the spec, so it's a pretty big bee in my bonnet.

[Blitzn]

Very very gutted about the KJC nerf, but it's just something to get use to now. Will be like playing back in vanilla days again

[cabana]

Care to post screenies or the like of his comments? (Or at least links) I'm curious what he's saying.

Ghostcrawler: CB cast time is supposed to be a high cost to pay for its high damage.

When someone asked about shortening chaos bolt cast time with the lack of kjc in regards to pvp. But the stooge thinks it's a high damage spell still.

[Fanatik]

What is the hesitation to allow fillers to be used on the move, and keeping the proposed cool down model?

Nukes would have be hard cast, or used during KJC (if spec'd into it). Incinerate, shadow bolt, Malefic grasp/Drain Soul able to be cast like scorch; make all nukes a 3 second cast (Haunt, Chaos Bolt, Soul Fire) that scale with haste and any current procs.

As it is incinerate is not an overly powerful spell, and with the proposed changes to MF haunt will play a larger role. All three spells would suffer from movement in execute, with destro being effected the least (as it is already).

This would allow for the lower movement DPS that blizzard is looking for, while not altering the classes dramatically in the middle of the expansion.

They've considered damage penalties but the penalty is not the major problem they have with KJC. The problem they have is our mobility and they want to stop this idea that warlocks should be able to cast their full rotation on the move. Source

@Kirsty8 Currently the constant movement feels like cheating, because it sort of is, in that we didn't intend it.

@fpvalone We could keep changing the penalty every patch, but frankly we're not sure we can come up with the right one. Maybe 30% less DPS.

Also, haunt is not a "nuke", Soul Fire (Decimation) is a filler during execution, and the redistribution of damage from MF will not affect our playstyle with haunt. GC has already addressed the filler debate. Source

@Yes_I_Khan But that is like 90% of what you would want to cast anyway. Doesn't make locks less mobile.

As for other news, GC gave us a little insight on what they have in mind for Destro and the ember regen situation. Source

@Fromnowear Destro shouldn't struggle to get embers, but the point of the rotation is to build up to CB not mash it all the time.

Source

@Fromnowear I suspect we may rather buff damage than embers, since the latter just turns into spam CB, but we'll see. It's early.

And the Soul Leech 30% cap. Source

@NorpSel We find it really hard to justify a 100% cap for Soul Leech. It is brokenly overpowered at least in PvE.

Archimonde's Vengeance change in 5.4. Source

@ReconSkillet Standing in lava won't work for AV or Vengeance in 5.4. Using AV when you know a big AE is coming is more skillful.

And why changing KJC now rather than later (so we can't use the excuse hunters use). Source

@Fynzou Because we think you all would say "We had this talent for years. Why change it now? It's who we are."

[xskarma]

Good post Fanatik, nice bundeling of relevant stuff. GC usually makes sense when he says these things, it's just a shame it's after he made previous changes that *also* made sense and now have to be reverted. Guess some sense is more equal then others, or something.