More Pruning... What's left for disc?

[rylai21]

Yes you lose heal <snip>

You do not lose Heal when speccing into CoW on beta. It's just a stand-alone spell now.

[Deleted]

You do not lose Heal when speccing into CoW on beta. It's just a stand-alone spell now.

Huh. Neat! Just a thought - if people are concerned about the amount of healing given through a CoW / SS build, could SS be moved into the L100 choices and Words of Mending moved to L75?

[Darkener]

Huh. Neat! Just a thought - if people are concerned about the amount of healing given through a CoW / SS build, could SS be moved into the L100 choices and Words of Mending moved to L75?

Thought the same thing, but wouldn't Disc feel cheated if a "new" Level 100 talent was just a baseline spell they used to have?

Incidentally, the cap on DA and SS are still 60% of max health, even though health was not squished as much as healing. The cap on CoW is 50%.

[Jimjam38]

When i see changes to MW monks like

Surging Mist Heals the lowest health party or raid member within 45 yards for [ 1 + 201.64% of Spell Power 1;]. Generates 1 Chi. If cast while channeling Soothing Mist, Surging Mist will be instant cast and heal that target over all others. 6.4% of Base Mana. 40 yd range. 1.5 sec cast.

essentially, the glyph effect is now baseline, it makes me question their motives for removing the smart component of atonement, which they justified as "a reduction of smart heals across the board" or something like that. Seems a lot like disc was the only one that got nerfed, but I haven't looked into the state of the ground aoe's in wod. Seems like blizzard is just extracting revenge on disc as per the bnet forums instructed.

[Deleted]

When i see changes to MW monks like
essentially, the glyph effect is now baseline, it makes me question their motives for removing the smart component of atonement, which they justified as "a reduction of smart heals across the board" or something like that. Seems a lot like disc was the only one that got nerfed, but I haven't looked into the state of the ground aoe's in wod. Seems like blizzard is just extracting revenge on disc as per the bnet forums instructed.

Discipline will either receive a sudden and very severe overhaul that makes the spec distinct from Holy while correctly balancing shields - all without any prior inclination that things were not yet finished or, perhaps more realistically, Atonement will see an improvement in smart healing intelligence. Or WoD comes out and Discipline doesn't work.

Should add why. Aside from a passive ability exclusive to Discipline that increases all direct healing (which would compensate slightly), improving Atonement / Holy Nova is the best way to increase Discipline output without impacting Holy.

[Kitmajere]

Would mastery buffing healing as much as it does absorbs be enough of a bandaid? Or just a good start? >,< [That is assuming a numbers tuning pass makes PoM and T90 less awful at the least, if not holy nova too. Oh, and give me binding heal back and make atonement not suck quite so much, kk thx.]

[Jimjam38]

Would mastery buffing healing as much as it does absorbs be enough of a bandaid? Or just a good start? >,< [That is assuming a numbers tuning pass makes PoM and T90 less awful at the least, if not holy nova too. Oh, and give me binding heal back, kk thx.]

No, that would break scaling. Disc would remain useless for the first tiers or so then as soon as we returned to endgame and got enough mastery/crit everything would break. And it would still be an awkward to play, unenjoyable spec

[Kitmajere]

Well, remember, scaling won't be as strong -- no reforging, very few gems, and much of our crit is coming from consumables which don't scale.

Edit: The answer is, we don't know the answer. But it would be a starting point. They could even reverse the mastery so that it buffs healing more than absorbs so that absorbs don't get out of hand. Having a mastery which buffs healing across the board is not on its own broken -- druids have had it for quite some time.

[Jimjam38]

Discipline will either receive a sudden and very severe overhaul that makes the spec distinct from Holy while correctly balancing shields - all without any prior inclination that things were not yet finished or, perhaps more realistically, Atonement will see an improvement in smart healing intelligence. Or WoD comes out and Discipline doesn't work.

Should add why. Aside from a passive ability exclusive to Discipline that increases all direct healing (which would compensate slightly), improving Atonement / Holy Nova is the best way to increase Discipline output without impacting Holy.

Yes, I agree, the most obvious fix would be to atonement, or, baring that, holy nova. I still think they need to return at least Train of Thought, if not Strength of Soul as well, and I'm extremely dissatisfied with the pathetic excuse for inner focus that they made the Archangel perk into. Removing renew for disc makes sense, but I don't understand why they made binding heal another holy only ability, when they already have the holy word spells, renew and CoH. A whole heap of poor changes that reflect an innate lack of understanding of disc from the devs who made them.

I can't foresee it working without either completely reverting to how disc works mechanically currently on live, which I doubt they'll do, or a stupidly unbalanced buff to atonement that will cause scaling issues towards the final tier, or a complete rework of the spec. The other potential is that they introduce some new mechanic with the critical strike attunement, much like they have to solve the MW monk uplift/ReM issue.

I'd personally like to see an integration of some shadow abilities into the atonement play style to give disc an 'in between shadow and holy' feel.

While I'm not at all a fan of introducing unique secondary resources to every spec like blizzard seem to be doing, but if they were to completely rework disc I would like to see it become somewhat like balance druids, where you shift between holy and shadow abilities (maybe we'd see dark archangel again ) that work with some overarching atonement/eminence type mechanic.

Okay now I'm getting carried away, so let me continue. Archangel would increase healing done, while dark archangel increased damage done. The holy side might increase absorbs and the shadow side would increase direct healing through atonement, but the absorbs side would always be the stronger pure throughput. Actually, the more i think/write about this, the more it just sounds like the direction they've taken MW Monks. But that's fine, lets do that, MW Monk in WoD currently looks like the most fun healer spec to play anyway. The absorbs would still keep it distinctly different to MW monks.
I feel like I've just gone and solved all the problems with disc and that Celestalon should drop whatever he's doing and come personally thank me.
If only...

[Floopa]

When i see changes to MW monks like
essentially, the glyph effect is now baseline, it makes me question their motives for removing the smart component of atonement, which they justified as "a reduction of smart heals across the board" or something like that. Seems a lot like disc was the only one that got nerfed, but I haven't looked into the state of the ground aoe's in wod. Seems like blizzard is just extracting revenge on disc as per the bnet forums instructed.

hint: SM is a horrible spell to cast.

all monks just spam RJW atm because it's like 5 million times better

they could buff SM by 100% and it would still never see the light of day cus ultimately healing aoe + generating chi > healing single target + generating chi

[Deleted]

hint: SM is a horrible spell to cast.

all monks just spam RJW atm because it's like 5 million times better

they could buff SM by 100% and it would still never see the light of day cus ultimately healing aoe + generating chi > healing single target + generating chi

I'm guessing that is kind of their point. SM isn't good at the moment, so it is buffed to try and make it more equivalent, right? It might not end up being fantastic but the intention is there.

The situation with Discipline in the current beta is that Atonement is horrible and does far too little healing but can't be skipped over (I presume SM can?) due to how horrendously front loaded and utterly essential Archangel is becoming.

I'm guessing you are talking about the situation in beta by the way when referring to RJW over SM

I'd personally like to see an integration of some shadow abilities into the atonement play style to give disc an 'in between shadow and holy' feel.

Something as simple as:
Atonement healing may only occur from targets currently afflicted by your Shadow Word: Pain
Could work for now. By introducing that the complaint that Atonement is just pushing Smite or buttons on CD is mitigated as there is now a component of DoT tracking as well.

Personally, I hate secondary resources as all too often they feel clumsy and poorly implemented - just look at the still changing situation of Balance and combo points not to mention the complaints that Shadow Orbs have generated. Discipline also already has a pseudo secondary resource via Evangelism / AA.

[Floopa]

I'm guessing that is kind of their point. SM isn't good at the moment, so it is buffed to try and make it more equivalent, right? It might not end up being fantastic but the intention is there.

The situation with Discipline in the current beta is that Atonement is horrible and does far too little healing but can't be skipped over (I presume SM can?) due to how horrendously front loaded and utterly essential Archangel is becoming.

I'm guessing you are talking about the situation in beta by the way when referring to RJW over SM

penance generates evangelism right?

just use it twice in 30 sec and you have 5 stacks. doesn't seem too difficult. SM is just a horrible spell, it's hpm is woeful.

[Deleted]

penance generates evangelism right?

just use it twice in 30 sec and you have 5 stacks. doesn't seem too difficult. SM is just a horrible spell, it's hpm is woeful.

On live, Penance generates one stack per offensive cast but this might have changed. If it is generating three stacks per cast, that could work in addition to HF but does nothing to solve the "Chakra" issue facing Discipline.

There is also the issue of offensive vs defensive Penance. Without a good smart heal intelligence, offensive Penance is really reduced in efficacy.

[Floopa]

On live, Penance generates one stack per offensive cast but this might have changed. If it is generating three stacks per cast, that could work in addition to HF but does nothing to solve the "Chakra" issue facing Discipline.

There is also the issue of offensive vs defensive Penance. Without a good smart heal intelligence, offensive Penance is really reduced in efficacy.

this is a good thing

you're trading healing now for healing later. also i wouldn't compare evangelism/archangel to chakra, holy priests would probably gag you and tie you up. that being said maybe you're into that stuff XD

[Deleted]

this is a good thing

you're trading healing now for healing later. also i wouldn't compare evangelism/archangel to chakra, holy priests would probably gag you and tie you up. that being said maybe you're into that stuff XD

Depends on the day of the week! Tie-up Tuesdays!

It is a Chakra situation though - no Archangel and all healing is insufficient but with Archangel things become manageable. I guess the most distinct difference is that with "incorrect" Chakra some spells were at least baseline while with Archangel off, all healing sources suffer.

Trading healing now for healing later is nice and theory but requires actually gaining the resource to allow the later healing! If offensive Penance is too weak by virtue of the lower healing and smart heal lobotomy then there isn't a tradeoff to be made - you would (nearly) always Penance defensively just as 1 out of 25(? - a large number w/e) times now Penance is used offensively.

[Jimjam38]

hint: SM is a horrible spell to cast.

all monks just spam RJW atm because it's like 5 million times better

they could buff SM by 100% and it would still never see the light of day cus ultimate healing aoe + generating chi > healing single target + generating chi

Are you talking about on the Beta or on live?

Because in Beta, each chi spent in fistweaving stance grants a stack of vital mists, which made the glyph rather mandatory, to the change makes sense, and the use of surging mist will be much more common when you're generating free, instant surging mists at almost the same rate as you generate mana tea.
Also,
RJW only generates chi when it heals a minimum number of people, so in spread fights thats a straight up mana waste. In WoD single target is expected to be more necessary, and if people aren't stacked or aoe healing isnt required, then surging is going to see the light of day.
Also,
RJW requires the talent to be taken, and SCK is far less mana efficient than RJW, making its use in non-aoe situations extremely mana heavy and kind of stupid when the other two talents are desired, and so surging will again see the light of day
Also,
SM is still the quick, strong single target heal, so buffing it by 100% would make it very powerful indeed, probably healing for far, far more than any other healer's equivalent, so it probably would see the light of day... a lot.
Also,
my point was about the lack of nerfs to smart heals other than atonement, not what everyone's preferred chi generator is.

[Floopa]

Are you talking about on the Beta or on live?

Because in Beta, each chi spent in fistweaving stance grants a stack of vital mists, which made the glyph rather mandatory, to the change makes sense, and the use of surging mist will be much more common when you're generating free, instant surging mists at almost the same rate as you generate mana tea.
Also,
RJW only generates chi when it heals a minimum number of people, so in spread fights thats a straight up mana waste. In WoD single target is expected to be more necessary, and if people aren't stacked or aoe healing isnt required, then surging is going to see the light of day.
Also,
RJW requires the talent to be taken, and SCK is far less mana efficient than RJW, making its use in non-aoe situations extremely mana heavy and kind of stupid when the other two talents are desired, and so surging will again see the light of day
Also,
SM is still the quick, strong single target heal, so buffing it by 100% would make it very powerful indeed, probably healing for far, far more than any other healer's equivalent, so it probably would see the light of day... a lot.
Also,
my point was about the lack of nerfs to smart heals other than atonement, not what everyone's preferred chi generator is.

wrong on both accounts. both sck + rjw now generate 1 chi whenever, no 'target requirement' now to generate the chi. SM is horrible because of this change. 1 SM = RJW healing 1 person. of course RJW costs 2.5* the amount SM does, but if you're healing 3 targets then you're basically coming out ahead + as a MW you're always able to heal melee.

also forget crane stance as a thing: it's useless and not gonna happen, it's not going to be viable in any raid situation (and i don't count farm as making crane stance useful).

all smart heals took the nerf, i dont see what your point is. the surging mist thing was a QoL change because it was dumb we had to target individual people while dpsing.

[Deleted]

3 stack offensive atonement and stack generation from some select heals will really help discipline out. Smart atonement isn't really going to help. The numbers are too low and bringing atonement back to the way it was is clearly contrary to the new design philosophy.

Discipline needs some more passives and procs and it needs less absorbs and more heals.

[Deleted]

Healers in wow:

Big heal
Medium heal
Fast heal
HoT
Aoe big heal
Aoe medium heal
Fast aoe heal
Aoe HoT
Single shield
Aoe shield

This is why I don't play a fucking priest for healing.

[Deleted]

3 stack offensive atonement and stack generation from some select heals will really help discipline out. Smart atonement isn't really going to help. The numbers are too low and bringing atonement back to the way it was is clearly contrary to the new design philosophy.

Discipline needs some more passives and procs and it needs less absorbs and more heals.

Unpopular opinion here, but I really don't think there is an issue with Atonement as a filler heal. It was different and it was something that really set Discipline apart and made it feel new, refreshing and distinct enough from the other healers. The biggest fear I have with putting Evangelism generation onto select heals is that it would really water Discipline down and return it to feeling very much like Holy with a few different extras. Discipline in MoP stood alone with a totally different play style and this was, partially, thanks to Atonement.