Patch 3.0.2 - On Debuffs, Buffs, and Raid Stacking

[Marrakech]

Misery = 3% Hit, doesn't stack with Imp. Faire Fire (and boonkins are needed for the Earth & Moon Debuff)
Shadow Weaving = Self Buff only
VT = Nerfed. Equal to Ret Pallys and or Survival Hunters

So with less utility than a Ret Pally, Survival Hunter, or Boonkin then why bring a Shadow Priest?

Are Shadow Priests being nerfed out of the raid and sent back to PvP? Certainly seems that way...

Indeed; unless big changes are made shadowpriests are now OBSOLETE.

For those that didnt know Shadowpriests brought 4 raid utility/buffs in BC:

- Misery (now obsolete as boomkins bring a debuff more than 2 times better, and have imp faerie fire which does exactly what the new misery does)
- Shadow Weaving (now only buffs yourself, NOONE ELSE IN THE RAID)
- Vampiric Touch (now given to hunters and retridins)
- Vampiric Embrace (no news as of yet)

So 3/4 of our raid buffs have been smashed to pieces then s**ted on.

Would you take a shadowpriest WHO CANNOT BUFF THE RAID IN ANY WAY; or a survival hunter/ retridin who have a wealth of raid buffs ALONG SIDE the mana utility that made shadowpriests unique?

Yes, unless vampiric embrace gets a buff (more than just raid-wide) shadowpriests will not be taken to raids.

[Firemist]

as a warlock this makes sad... debuff class... yea right...

"lets make everyone do everything!"

:

[Karpalo]

They just removed all cross stacking synergy from all caster classes. Physical classes can get optimal buffs pretty much with 3 utility classes.

[Tigercat]

Like hunters and rogues, right Karpalo?

Cue up the eyeroll

[lemuever17]

One more question, in mana battery group, how about the water elemental?

[Archdmon]

They pretty much took a hacksaw and chopped off every class' uniqueness and shaped them all into one lame class.

[Karpalo]

Like hunters and rogues, right Karpalo?

Cue up the eyeroll

yeah pretty much.

Well it all comes down to what class is the single most effective single target dps class. Then you just pick classes to buff it`s performance and you got perfect setup.

[Ordius]

Fire mages/locks just lost 15% raid dmg

[PaleFolklore]

All classes seem dull now.

[Merin]

It's less of stack discouraging and more forced with how min/maxing works. Also, with how fucking arbitrary it is, with certain specs replacing completely random specs, all it will do is punish a different set of classes.

Maybe if they would jsut try to actually put some work in to balance, some design in to think up some new buffs/utility and told their raid designers to stop fucking balancing around raids having 5 Shaman, this wouldn't be a problem.

[Marrakech]

Shadowpriest
Misery: Causes spells cast at the target to have +3% spell hit. (nerfed from +5% spell dmg on target)

Boomkin
IMP FF: Causes spells cast at the target to have +3% spell hit.
Earth and Moon: Increases spell damage taken from all schools by 13% on the target.


They gave boomkins what the shadowpriests needed for a raid spot and buffed it.
They gave HIGHER DPS/MORE RAID BUFFING classes (hunter & retadin) our mana battery effect.
They nerfed shadow weaving to buff only the shadowpriest himself.


Shadowpriests are now pvp only.

[Karpalo]

Unless they got some plans to fix the broken scaling of the shadowpriests someway.

[Shakari]

Oh great so now it seems there basically removing all scalability from the debuffs and party buffs....
Now its gonna be who you know that gets you raid spot not what you can do ... joy.

[Karpalo]

"We want players to be able to form raids and parties based on who they want to play with, rather than who has the correct talents and abilities to min-max their raid performance.

Raid composition will still matter to some extent, but without this change, it would have overwhelmed every other aspect of raid planning (as we added new capabilities to each of 30 different talent trees). You no longer need to rigidly control the melee/spellcaster balance of your raid, or make sure every group has all the critical buffing classes, etc. This change has many class balance implications."

I somehow got feeling this will lead in ridicilously easy encounters in wotlk or other way they could go with this is that all classes, so called old "heavy utilitys" will be almost on toe to toe with the traditional heavy dps classes dps wise.

[Spl4sh3r]

One question about the Shadowpriest whine....

Does anyone of you have a Hunter/Paladin/Priest at level 80 and have tested the changes? Do you know each of the classes DPS at level 80? Does anyone of you raid level 80 dungeons? If no is your answer....what the h*ll are you whining about? If yes is your answer....show us the facts that prove it!

[Marrakech]

One question about the Shadowpriest whine....

Does anyone of you have a Hunter/Paladin/Priest at level 80 and have tested the changes? Do you know each of the classes DPS at level 80? Does anyone of you raid level 80 dungeons? If no is your answer....what the h*ll are you whining about? If yes is your answer....show us the facts that prove it!

Theres some pretty solid proof (ie. numbers) on shadowpriest.com showing the SEVERE lack of dps compared with any other hybrid class in the current wotlk beta.

[Spl4sh3r]

@Marrakech

Learn the forum rules and don't qoute the post above you....and one question have these raid buff changes gotten to the beta?

[Karadros]

My world is changing and I don't like it.
As a warrior, I can no longer bitch at the slackadins for not buffing me with Might. Or... does that mean that I won't have to use my new raid-wide shout, because the equal-but-longer Blessing would override it?

Sure I may be locked into the Warrior train of thinking, whereby half our talents seem to counter what our class is meant to be about... but this seems plum daft. Blizzard appears to have effectively nullified their new stance of raid-wide buffs, by having half of them overwrite the other half.

...or am I missing something? It is 5am here after all.

[Karpalo]

Apparently they are being added in next build. Maybe blizzard will realize that all serious players are generally min/maxers. Those dps spreadsheets are not in da intarwebs for no reason.

Blizzard just got greedy now. They want more casuals in game but all MMOGRP games are focusing around the hardcore players liked it or not. If they quit game is good as dead.

[Vesena]

Playing around with theorycrafting a bit, I think a raid of

Balance Druid
Feral Druid
Fire Mage
Protection Paladin
Retribution Paladin
Holy Priest
Enhancement Shaman
Resto Shaman
Warlock of any Spec
Protection Warrior
Arms Warrior

covers every buff, leaving ~6 healing slots and ~8 DPS slots to be filled by whichever class you like. I'd be interested to know if anyone can narrow it down even further.