Do Priests actually like Surrender to Madness?

[Jessicka]

I was really surprised to see Ion raving about how cool StM was and that it had great class fantasy etc etc. In the Q&A last night, as I'm personally not a big fan of it, and I don't think I've met anyone who is. Over on the Warlock forums obviously there's some animosity that SPriests got the attention first, but there's enough of us Alting SPriest to basically defend that on the premise that StM really is that bad.

Just curious to know what you guys actually thought about it?

[Waytomoo]

Yes, I like it a lot. Actually it was one of the reasons I started playing, and continuing to play, shadow this expansion.

[Deleted]

I do and I don't. I enjoy the way it plays, and like the risk / reward it gives. However the fact the the whole spec suffers because of one talent is a shame.

[Arachnofiend]

I like the absurd amounts of haste you get for going deep into voidform; pressing buttons fast is why I DPS.

I think the talent has caused more problems than it's worth, however.

[Rhoe]

I'm not a priest main this expansion, but I mained it in TBC and MoP and usually consider it for every new expansion. StM and the void form nonsense is part of the reason I don't play spriest this expansion. It may be fun in raids, but spriest is just miserable to play for leveling, WQing and dungeons now imo. It feels lame that it's barely putting out more damage than my disc spec if I'm not rushing from mob to mob to get more out of void form, and that's really not my preferred way of playing casual content. I wish they'd change that boring lvl 100 talent to instead remove void form and increase your powerlevel outside of it, simply to make the grinding content bearable. Spriest always seemed to be about good sustained damage before, so why does it have to be the most bursty spec in the game now?

[Deleted]

I think the talent has caused more problems than it's worth, however.

This. The constant tweaking and balancing of everything around it is sad. The problem really is that any talent that causes you to die due to a slight fuck up has to be the top performer across all the classes, otherwise if it wasn't doing the top DPS, why would you play it?

[Cheze]

I think the idea is neat but I hate the way it actually plays, and it's also obviously a nightmare for them to balance

[bloodmoth13]

Im on the fence here, i dont want to use it personally, but i just really like they they went ahead and did it, its cool as fuck lore wise, surrendering your mind entirely to madness, paying the ultimate price for power, its just really cool, but optional power is mandatory in competitive gaming

[Kynario]

I'm not a priest main this expansion, but I mained it in TBC and MoP and usually consider it for every new expansion. StM and the void form nonsense is part of the reason I don't play spriest this expansion.

Agreed.

I played a sPriest (and Disco as an off-spec) in Vanilla, TBC and WoTLK. I switched in Cataclysm to a Protection Paladin after I felt they changed shadow, my favourite spec, more than I liked with all the new talents and spells. This is subjective of course, but I just enjoyed it less...
Remember when sPriests were more like Affliction Warlocks with debuffs like Devouring Plague, and you'd apply Vampiric Embrace to each mob to also heal the party for crazy amounts? They've changed the class fantasy so much. Now it's mostly just tentacles, tendrils and shadow orbs... Not a big fan of it.

[BadguyNotBadGuy]

I fucking love the numbers i can dish out when using it, even suboptimally. I fucking hate the way the rest of the spec feels mediocre compared to it, and how it ends up balanced around it, effectively meaning that whatever happens, not using it will still be substantially worse than using it.
My biggest issue is how the other two level 100 talent are utter garbage, and either make the spec shitter (Mind Spike) or not actually give us much benefit (Legacy of the Void).

If Legacy at least passively but slowly generated insanity upto 70 or something while out of voidform, i would actually enjoy the spec much more. As it is now, i dont really want to play the spec and be forced to StM.

[Yunyuns]

I'm not allowed to post links, so I'll copy/paste what I wrote on BNet forums :

Billy was a human raised in northshire Abbey, receiving a faithfull education, learning the power of Light and becoming a priest who will spread the faith and help the people in needs.
He grew up and went in missions all around the world, healing people in Eastern Kingdoms, Kalimdor, Outland, Northrend, Pandaria, and Draenor.

But when the Legion came in, it was too much. He saw so much deaths, faced so much horrors, that he lost his faith. He turned a bit dark, and started using his power to attack and damage instead of helping and healing. No longer he believed in Light, but started to praise the Shadow.

He is now going in front of ennemies more and more powerful. Becoming confident in his talent with Shadow, and in need of better power, he tried to go beyond.

So, he started using the power of the Void.

But Void is an unnatural thing for a human being. Their energy is unstable, that's why Billy can't always use it, he needs to recover is sanity from time to time.

But there's no concession when you face the Legion. No sacrifice is too big. He needs to control the Void's energy longer, so he can be more useful for his friends.

So he makes a pact with the Old-Gods.

They will unleash his true potential, make him understand better how Void's energy works, so he'll become more powerful than any human being before. But he knows it's not a two-way trip. At the moment he will accept this deal, he will be infused with powers that a human body can't handle. So he will have a moment of pure power, and it'll require all of his concentration to use that power and not let it consume his body.

But will come a moment when all of his efforts won't be enough. And he'll die. But he is ready for this sacrifice, and he will delay this moment as long as he can. That's what facing the Legion means for him.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

This is what I see every time I look at a Shadow Priest using Surrender To Madness.

For me, it's the best class-specific design ever made in WoW. It's so deep, it's one of the only spec where you feel the background story while playing.

I'm not saying it has the perfect gameplay, I'm not saying it's easy to play, or too hard, or whatever. I'm just saying that having a gameplay that have implications lore-wise is insane !

Even that "reaching 3rd Void Torrent" goal that you have in each fight is amazing. It's like your character feels that he is going mad and he will die soon, but for the sake of his friends he is ready to put his madness further and further and give everything to do that extra damage that'll help them knock the boss down.

I know that some people think it's too hard to play, or not fun and I understand them. But... Man, this gameplay design is genius.

So, what I wanted to say : please don't change the Shadow Priest and S2M gameplay too much. Don't change the insanity generation or this kind of things. Don't try to make S2M a niche choice. If needed, put some caps on Mass Hysteria or whatever you want to lower the best players' damage, but Blizzard, this gameplay is the most meaningfull gameplay you ever made, so please don't destroy it.

Let's make the Old-Gods wait again before Billy finally give them his soul.

Thank you.

[Deleted]

I dont play StM mostly because I don't like to die during every boss encounter. As much as I really like the fluff behind the talent I think it is broken. I prefer LotV with more of crit rating rather than haste (atm 879ilvl 34%crit/24%haste/45%mastery) and im able to dish out some nice dmg on most fights. To counter the post above I see LotV Billy as a priest who was finally able to harness void powers and use them at his liking

[Usernameforforums]

Screw spriest... 700k and casting while moving while any other range turret doing sub 500 fucking ridiculous

[Alanar]

I always like the talents that have high uptime, something I can use often to make the most use and fun out of it, waiting for a 10 min cd or realy linger on it takes away my fun.

So no I don't.

[Poltr]

It was fun for a bit but in dungeons it's useless and raiding it is annoying to use. Use it well and you do stupid (unbalanceable) damage.. screw it up and you'd have been better off sitting for that pull.

[BadguyNotBadGuy]

Screw spriest... 700k and casting while moving while any other range turret doing sub 500 fucking ridiculous

Another person who doesnt understand....

[Cromatus]

No, I don't like being the one trick pony.

[MasterHamster]

Chose not to play Priest as my ranged/healer as a result of S2M, knew it'd throw the spec into a neverending spiral of buffs and nerfs and aimless redesigns throughout Legion because such All-in talents that scale are horrible for balance. That together with class/spec design being more focused on having strengths vs weaknesses made sure Shadow would be Meh everywhere but high-end bosses.

Using S2M feels exciting, probably more exciting than any other ability in the game, but it is inherently broken. And the other two talents are about as thrilling as the opening 20 minutes of 2001 A Space Odyssey

Adding it was a mistake, and I hate to see how every single time Blizzard talks about Shadow, its now related to S2M. Every single time. Because S2M is the root of the problem.

[Jessicka]

My take on this? People demand something special, unique and out of the box....until they get it.

I think I would be one of the players that cannot handle it to the full potential, so I chose Legacy of the void. And that is another great thing. Two talents in the last tier that actually give you a choice (for the people who say the new talent trees do not offer choice)

I can empathise with picking LotV, I was disappointed to discover cancelling Void Form also reset your Insanity; I thought it could have had some really interesting gameplay given more control like that. I still like how it plays though.

[Deleted]

The concept is great and StM was the reason I rolled a spriest for legion . What @Yunyuns said in his RP is all nice and great but after plying with StM and raiding with it for over 2 months now I feel is boring .... What I mostly do in raids is wait for the correct moment to pop StM , then if nothing goes wrong I rock . Thing is I could be asleep for the rest of the fight and that gets boring . When you play StM nothing else matters outside of it , talents , cooldowns , rotation , movement must all align right for a good StM . Also since StM is popped at the end is all and great for farm fights but not that good for progression . After my time with StM I found out that I agree with

I think the talent has caused more problems than it's worth, however.