Replace Rune Regen Tier - Concrete Analysis

[LCDArcade]

**Please forgive me, I know that there is already a giant thread on this but I felt that one more couldn't hurt given the complexity of my arguments not to mention it's kind of hard for people to sort through a 80 page thread; So please just bare with me**

Over the past few weeks now there has been numerous discussions via Twitter and MMO champion that I have been reading and discussing why the devs specifically Ion Hazzikostas(WatcherDev) and Chadd Nervig (Celestation) are defending the Death Knights rune regeneration tier claiming it adds and changes our play styles and mixes up our rotation; all of which is false.

These abilities are all essentially passive. How can a passive ability add gameplay or mix up a rotation? The intent of a passive ability is that it's an extra skill that I don't have to manage and can forget about. How does getting an extra rune every "x" seconds from BT add to my gameplay? How does having a 45% chance to regenerate a rune upon Frost Strike change my rotation? It doesn't because I'm still going to be hitting Obliterate and then FS. It doesn't mix anything up at all.

I understand the you guys want provide us with variety so that if a DK likes the feeling of 100% increased rune regeneration for a few seconds over getting 1 rune every few seconds then he can pick a talent to fit that play style. The negative part of that philosophy is that you are encouraging the player to not play to their highest potential. A top player or a logical player is always going to pick the one that yields the highest damage increase overall. In a PvE setting why would I pick the talent that makes me do less damage over the other options? As a PvP player there is only ever one option no matter what your spec because at the end of the day RNG is always bad thus making BT the only option that allows you to get a rune at will most likely for NS.

Going into Mists of Pandaria you guys set out to make talents interesting and fun, and this talent tier doesn't accomplish either of those two principles. Three passive talents choices that are all RNG are not fun nor interesting because they are all just ignored. In fact most of our talents are that way, some taken from previous abilities we already had as baseline and others that are again RNG or passive.
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Blood Tap - No one in their right mind uses this ability the way it was meant to be as manual activation and macroed activation both provide the same exact DPS result. Why would I waste the time managing the button when I can get the same result from a macro. This ability is just straight up passive.

Runic Empowerment - A static passive ability that gives us a chance to regenerate one rune just like Blood Tap. The only difference being I'm not getting an extra button to put on my bar that doesn't matter anyway. The result being that getting a confirmed rune with BT is always better than relying on RNG which could result in less runes than BT.

Runic Corruption - By far the worst of the 3 talents currently making it a less desired choice overall. While both Blood and Unholy can pick and choose between all three it all again leads back to which one results in the highest damage or survivability.

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This talent tier needs to be scrapped and handled the following way. Proceed to make Blood Tap baseline again just as it was in Wrath of the Lich King and in Cataclysm but its original state so that way it can no longer be macroed and again is just a clickable skill. This allows all three specializations to benefit from the on demand rune regeneration that we all use currently anyways.

Runic Corruption and Runic Empowerment need to be baked into a single talent and the one you get is based on your specialization. Many other classes talents worked like this and I'm not sure why the same design hasn't been incorporated into any of the Death Knight talents. Blood and unholy get runic corruption and frost gets RE just like it is meant to be. Frost has always used RE and always will. The other and better option is to turn them into glyphs so that every DK can still have access to them which is what you guys wanted anyways but without wasting 3 perfectly good talents spots.

There are just so many other amazing talents that could be put in place of this static tier. Here are some cool example talents I came up with.

Void Grip - Change the function of your Death Grip based on your specialization.

• Blood - Gorfiend's Graps now deals "x" shadow damage and all enemies are fixated to you for 3 seconds.
• Frost - Pull the target to your location freezing it in place for 6 seconds. The target takes "x" shadowfrost damage for the duration. Damage other than the death knights diseases breaks the stun.
• Unholy - Your Death Grip no longer pulls the target to your location but instead summons void tendrils that roots the target in place for 10 seconds dealing "x" damage for the duration.

Shadow Power - Turn your signature attack into a even more powerful version.

• Blood - Death Strike turns into Soul Strike a powerful strike that causes 30% additional healing and absorbs from Blood Shield.
• Frost - While wielding a two-handed weapon Obliterate turns into Obliteration, a massive strike that deals "x" shadowfrost damage. While dual wielding Frost Strike turns into Razor Slash a powerful strike that costs 3 less Runic Power.
• Unholy - Scourge Strike turns into Corrupted Strike a powerful strike that corrupts the target dealing "x" shadow damage over 8 seconds. This effect can only activate once every 30 seconds.

Vile Spirits - Summon three vile spirits with "x" health that attack nearby enemies for 12 seconds. Each spirit explodes dealing "x" shadow damage to nearby enemies within 5 yards when they die or the duration expires.

All of my example talents are fun, and are used in different situations. There would never be one that you would pick throughout the entire expansion like we do now with a rune regen talent; This is way talents are suppose to function which is to offer choice.

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Those were just the tip of the iceberg and i'm sure we could all agree when I say my 3 talents ideas sound a hell of a lot better than those rune regen talents right? Other people could come out with better stuff than I could. Let me know what you guys think and post your suggestions.

[Deleted]

the rune regen tier is nicely balanced, so just give us all one of them and provide glyphs for the other 2 then everyones happy

[Deleted]

They dont even need to be baseline, just speed up base rune regen for all three specs and thats it.

[Deleted]

They need to be baseline because they WERE baseline and most dks were perfectly happy with that in Cata. Making them talents was a cop out to indirectly nerf DKs as while other classes got more powerful abilities with their talents we had a whole talent tier wasted with this passive former baseline shit.

They act as filler because our rune system is so screwed we have large amounts of downtime.

Each spec requires and works best with one of the talents as it always had done and they should get it baseline to promote spec playstyle difference.

I mean locks don't have to choose between soul shards, demonic fury and embers in their talents, why the hell should we?

[Schizoide]

They dont even need to be baseline, just speed up base rune regen for all three specs and thats it.

I really do disagree with this. I like the active feedback loop introduced with the runic power triggers in Cataclysm and feel it makes gameplay more compelling or just plain "fun". Most specs don't have that; only DKs (with the rune regen talents), Paladins (who choose the Divine Purpose talent), and Rogues (with Relentless Strikes) have this kind of feedback loop.

I do want one of them baseline, and that should be Runic Corruption. It's the obvious default talent because it's always passive, no matter what. If players want manual Blood Tap, that makes sense as a talent, which allows it to offer a clear performance gain over Runic Corruption. Same deal for Runic Empowerment, although I don't see leaving runes unused as positive gameplay the devs should want to encourage. Alternatively they could be offered as minor glyphs, although I could see Blood Tap being mandatory for PvP if it continues to give Death runes.

[Baphomette]

They need to be baseline because they WERE baseline and most dks were perfectly happy with that in Cata. Making them talents was a cop out to indirectly nerf DKs as while other classes got more powerful abilities with their talents we had a whole talent tier wasted with this passive former baseline shit.

This isn't true at all. A LOT of talents were formerly baseline to one spec of a class or another (notably: Druid L15, Hunter L30/L45, Mage L15/L60, Pally L45, Rogue L30, Shaman L30, Warlock L30, Warrior L60/L75). Sometimes they took one ability from each spec and let players choose which one they wanted, and sometimes they took all three from one spec and made people choose which single one of those they wanted. A lot of people were not happy to choose which two abilities they weren't keeping in 5.0.

[Forgettable]

Proceed to make Blood Tap baseline again just as it was in Wrath of the Lich King and in Cataclysm but its original state so that way it can no longer be macroed and again is just a clickable skill.

Are you insane? This would be an absolutely infuriating (not to mention technically impossible) change.

Also your talent suggestions just do damage. One would mathematically be better. That's not fun at all.

Currently the rune regen tier is about as close to balanced as possible, and statistics prove that DKs across all skill levels use them *almost* evenly. I don't see why we need to change what's not broken.

[Knough]

I go for Runic Empowerment because I like it, I've not read up on what I should pick, and I do fine; I'd much rather talents like that than, as an example, Warrior tier 75, none of which I ever use, none of which are fun?
As the devs have stated, there's massive variation in what DKs choose, and they're all fairly close.
Yay.

[Challenge]

[COLOR="#FF0000"]

Runic Corruption - By far the worst of the 3 talents currently making it a less desired choice overall. While both Blood and Unholy can pick and choose between all three it all again leads back to which one results in the highest damage or survivability.

STOOOOOOP, this is 1000000000000% inaccurate. People stop staying this.

OK people say that BT provides the "highest damage" because its true, however its literally less than 1% gain when played perfectly and properly, which is near impossible, so its unrealistic. Which is why its macro for virtually the same effect as RE and non macroed BT. Thats it. THATS IT.

Corruption is actually by far the most popular talent due to its simplicity, and you dont have to manage anything while keeping synced runes.

I cannot stand to see another person who says that any one of these talents are above the others or under another, THEY ARE ALL THE SAME IT DOESNT MATTER WHICH ONE YOU PICK, IT DOES NOTHING TO YOUR GAMEPLAY, YOU WILL PERFORM VIRTUALLY 98% THE SAME WITH MACROED BT, RE, OR RC THAT IS THE PROBLEM

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And can we please stop making this thread every 2 days

[Maxweii]

And can we please stop making this thread every 2 days

Seeing as new names pop up and make them, or older names pop up and do the same thing they always do with making these threads.... Yeah I think it will be a long time until we stop hearing about this.

[Schizoide]

I'm fine with all the threads, because I really do think it's a problem. Admittedly less of a problem than Killing Machine, but it is a problem.

I hope whoever gets into alpha will be just as active in the alpha forums too.

I really thought they would launch alpha today, but I guess they're further behind in development than even I thought-- and I thought they were in the weeds since 2013. Instead they gave the valor buff. Not a good sign for WoD releasing closer to September than December, that's for sure.

[Challenge]

I'm not ok with all the threads when the OPs make false statements.

Especially those who write to cele on twitter about it saying X is better or they feel that it is a complelling gameplay choice, and it makes proving our case harder to the devs

[Deleted]

Are you insane? This would be an absolutely infuriating (not to mention technically impossible) change.

Also your talent suggestions just do damage. One would mathematically be better. That's not fun at all.

Currently the rune regen tier is about as close to balanced as possible, and statistics prove that DKs across all skill levels use them *almost* evenly. I don't see why we need to change what's not broken.

yeah because every dk that parses high on sites like warcraftlogs runs RE and RC...

oh wait.

[Challenge]

yeah because every dk that parses high on sites like warcraftlogs runs RE and RC...

oh wait.

Thats only the case with frost death knights, which pretty much anyone with a respectible ilvl has gone unholy by now.

[Deleted]

I do want one of them baseline, and that should be Runic Corruption.

What would be the difference between this and build-in base rune regen rate increase?

[Schizoide]

All the stuff in the paragraph immediately preceding the line you quoted.

[Hand Banana]

All they need to do to make the tier interesting is add an additional buff with each one. Runic corruption: in addition to its current effects it also gives you 10% move speed and attack speed for 5 seconds on activation (stacking with everything). Runic Empowerment: When activated, increases haste, mastery, or crit, whichever is highest by 5% for 5 seconds. BT: whatever. You could make one of the 3 be the best for total rune regen, but the additional benefit like mastery from another might outweigh it. Or have one of the 3 make your next Oblit/festering cleave nearby targets so even though it provides less total regen it could be better if you need more multitarget damage. Could easily have pvp applications too, like reducing cc effects or removing a slow. A little creativity would be nice.

[Deleted]

I like the active feedback loop introduced with the runic power triggers

Runic Corruption. It's the obvious default talent because it's always passive

What would be that exciting element of having passive RC instead of boosting rune regen by 50-80% permanently?

[Maxweii]

What would be that exciting element of having passive RC instead of boosting rune regen by 50-80% permanently?

If they boosted passive regen that much then haste would be near useless as then it would probably be made to not affect rune regen as it's already so low. Combined with how it doesn't speed up our dots, haste would become the shit of all shit stats.

[Schizoide]

No reason haste couldn't still work with a 50%+ faster base regen. But you would lose that feedback loop, and I think that's worth keeping.