[7.2] Legion Shadow Priest Guide and Discussion

[Quttan]

Overall these are buffs across the whole spec, and a slight nerf off the top end.

Does that take into account the loss of Lingering Insanity?

[Djriff]

Current Lingering Insanity is gone, that's why the talent for it now exists. Honestly will just make getting into VF a bit slower, now a huge impact overall.

Does that take into account the loss of Lingering Insanity?

Yes

[Ilfayt]

Can you elaborate a bit on this. The way Im reading Lingering Insanity Talent suggests current lingering insanity is gone? So when we exit VF w/o that talent we drop back to base haste?

Yes, that's the way it seems. Practically all Insanity gen(non-voidform) up by 25-50% though, so a lot of your 'downtime' from losing that haste will be negated even if you don't pick the new Lingering Insanity. It'll be a nerf to non-voidform damage, but not really to Insanity gen from what I can tell. Which if you get more voidform uptime overall, and longer(non-S2M) voidforms for most of the specs, that's okay. Lingering Insanity will be there as an even quicker return to Voidform/damage boost option, and stacking it with Legacy will lead to some astronomically high Voidform uptime from what I can gather.

All in all, it looks like we'll spend more time in voidform with these changes, which is in itself a buff even if they didn't change any damage numbers. Voidform>non-voidform all the way.

[kalaratic]

the change to lingering insanity means the shoulders are going to get changed as well. hopefully they don't fuck that up

[Ilfayt]

Current Lingering Insanity is gone, that's why the talent for it now exists. Honestly will just make getting into VF a bit slower, now a huge impact overall.


Yes

Actually, I'm curious to see how much the baseline insanity generation boosts, which are pretty much 100% of non-voidform's Insanity gen make up that difference. I'm downloading PTR as soon as I can to mess around with it and the different specs for myself.

[Naga Coatl]

New trait that replaces Mind Sear damage now appears to add VT to the SW: P ticks, allowing us to have very nice cleave.

Void Lord -> Lingering Insanity means that RoS now has an actual competitor, especially with SW: D being brought up to 15 insanity per cast at base.

Sorry but I can't understand. How is our new cleave 'nice'? It appears almost the same as before, but instead of using Sear on 2+ target we will simply use MF. Isn't also an insanity generation nerf?

Also I don't understand the Void Lord Change. Basically they created a RoS competitor by removing a baseline mechanic and making it optional? That's not exactly what I imagined when they talked about buffing underused talents and making stuff baseline. I hope I am missing something here...

[davesignal]

Void Lord always seemed to sim much better than Reaper of Souls or Void Ray for LoTV, so hopefully the new Lingering Insanity is balanced better than that.

[Deleted]

Overall these are buffs across the whole spec, and a slight nerf off the top end.

Well i dont think the changes to S2M + changes overall is just a slight nerf... seems a pretty big one on top end. And I dont know the bosses in nighthold but the buffs we had are pretty useless on nyendra, ursoc, mythic eye, 2 of the bosses in valor. They are good for m+ indeed but from a raid pov the changes so far are horrible.

And yeah taking away Lingering Insanity and put it on a talent to compete with ros seems like a joke to me.

[Vampiregenesis]

Better aoe , nerf to s2m and buff to legacy of the void , i think im going shadow priest for 7.15 looks great to me. I couldnt do mythic+ as shadow and i hated s2m.

[Deleted]

Better aoe , nerf to s2m and buff to legacy of the void , i think im going shadow priest for 7.15 looks great to me. I couldnt do mythic+ as shadow and i hated s2m.

Yeah, they nerfed your best ability, you better hit that Shadow Priest in 7.1.5

[Deleted]

Better aoe , nerf to s2m and buff to legacy of the void , i think im going shadow priest for 7.15 looks great to me. I couldnt do mythic+ as shadow and i hated s2m.

S2M will still be much better than LOTV so the buff to lotv is pretty much pointless. No reason to pick a shit talent when u have another one that is better.

If you wanted to play shadow you shoul've done it now that its really good.

[Tanned]

I read this as a huge nerf.

The loss of Lingering Insanity is massive. Your between Voidform time increases and your damage during the time is much less (because your dots are now ticking for less). Mind Flay causing SW:P to cleave is a cleave buff during high stack STM. Otherwise its a nerf. STM down to 100% from 150% together with the AS nerf means that we're going to have trouble with 2 VoiTs, let alone 3.

The Legendar Ring was changed so that your first Mind Flay after entering Voidform spreads DoTs. This is a nerf as far as I'm concerned. The Shoulders were unchanged. The Bracers damage buff was doubled to 4%. The Belt was unchanged. No Shadow Specific new legendary added.

[Djriff]

the change to lingering insanity means the shoulders are going to get changed as well. hopefully they don't fuck that up

I'm anxious for that change, that's what I have now :C

Actually, I'm curious to see how much the baseline insanity generation boosts, which are pretty much 100% of non-voidform's Insanity gen make up that difference. I'm downloading PTR as soon as I can to mess around with it and the different specs for myself.

well they equate to 50% boosts across the board, minus Void Bolt. That coupled with the StM reduction form 150% to 100% means it's a non nerf for StM and a slight buff for everything but StM.

Sorry but I can't understand. How is our new cleave 'nice'? It appears almost the same as before, but instead of using Sear on 2+ target we will simply use MF. Isn't also an insanity generation nerf?

While we do lose the nice insanity generation from sear, we gain a lot more AoE. You forget that mastery influences our dot damage which will also buff our aoe, not to mention that we don't have to do a weird aoe rotation to pop up our Tentacle Bro, we can just flay. Overall this is a buff to our aoe, but a nerf to our aoe insanity generation.

Also I don't understand the Void Lord Change. Basically they created a RoS competitor by removing a baseline mechanic and making it optional? That's not exactly what I imagined when they talked about buffing underused talents and making stuff baseline. I hope I am missing something here...

Yeah I'm interested to see what happens to it.

Void Lord always seemed to sim much better than Reaper of Souls or Void Ray for LoTV, so hopefully the new Lingering Insanity is balanced better than that.

Let's hope.

Well i dont think the changes to S2M + changes overall is just a slight nerf... seems a pretty big one on top end. And I dont know the bosses in nighthold but the buffs we had are pretty useless on nyendra, ursoc, mythic eye, 2 of the bosses in valor. They are good for m+ indeed but from a raid pov the changes so far are horrible.

Well it's not a huge loss, only VB insanity generation and AS generation is actually effected. Right now with drain changes live, it's a struggle to hit 3rd torrent still, with new changes it'll be even harder.

[davesignal]

S2M should be good, because it kills you.

But, there's no reason that LoTV can't be good too. It just has to not be better than S2M at the very highest echelons of raiding. LoTV should be better than S2M if you can't play it like a top 10% mythic raider. That's the whole high risk, high reward tradeoff.

The very best players should use S2M and excel. Everyone else should probably not be. No offense, but I very much doubt everyone using and abusing S2M right now are 'the very best players'.

[Deleted]

I can't believe that Mind Spike will be completely unchanged. At the very least, they need to clarify its interaction with the new SWP-splash mechanic. I would like to see it do all its damage on cast without the awkward stack-detonation thing, if not a numbers buff. LotV needs something more than a numbers tweak though, maybe adding a smaller passive bonus like +5% insanity/haste/crit/whatever.

I'm also perfectly happy with StM no longer being completely OP while being totally weighted towards the final 30 seconds of it. Its a crap mechanic that is impossible to balance, and the permanent risk of dying from a half-second lag spike or not realised that you tab-targeted a mob behind you and VB doesn't go off immediately is not fun or good class fantasy, its just incredibly frustrating.

[l33t]

Thanks, Blizzard, for proving me right once again. Imbeciles. No ToF turning baseline is ridiculous, removing baseline Lingering insanity and putting it as an optional against Reaper of souls - that's just your typical blizzard's idiocy turned into end levels of absurdity.

[Naga Coatl]

While we do lose the nice insanity generation from sear, we gain a lot more AoE. You forget that mastery influences our dot damage which will also buff our aoe, not to mention that we don't have to do a weird aoe rotation to pop up our Tentacle Bro, we can just flay. Overall this is a buff to our aoe, but a nerf to our aoe insanity generation.

Right, I forgot about mastery/CttV.

Still, I'm speechless about the rest of the changes. They seem... I don't know, a mess.

[Quttan]

S2M should be good, because it kills you.

But, there's no reason that LoTV can't be good too. It just has to not be better than S2M at the very highest echelons of raiding. LoTV should be better than S2M if you can't play it like a top 10% mythic raider. That's the whole high risk, high reward tradeoff.

The very best players should use S2M and excel. Everyone else should probably not be. No offense, but I very much doubt everyone using and abusing S2M right now are 'the very best players'.

LotV needs to suck compared to STM because STM's "risk" of dying demands that it be significantly better than any alternative, but since STM can't be allowed to perpetually do more damage than any other spec in the game it just ends up meaning that anything on the same row as STM needs to suck compared to other specs as well as STM. If STM didn't do significantly more damage than the other talents in its row, then dying to it wouldn't feel "worth it".

[Djriff]

Right, I forgot about mastery/CttV.

Still, I'm speechless about the rest of the changes. They seem... I don't know, a mess.

I think overall it's just a playstyle change. Lingering Insanity change will be a noticeable change though.

[Deleted]

I think overall it's just a playstyle change. Lingering Insanity change will be a noticeable change though.

Does the new mind flay cleaving thingie also means that we are going to kiss mind spike goodbye ?

I can't see how they can keep both.