[Priest] Ask a Beta Tester! MoP edition

[Prod]

I agree that the 3rd tier is questionable at the moment, especially since Mindbender still looks so out of place there for Holy/Disc. But for the 5th tier, it looks fine to me. Twist of Faith is better for bosses like Chimaeron where it's pretty much cruise control until you hit the execute phase where things get more serious (or for healers, everyone is sub 20% all the time). Outside of having a critical execute phase, Divine Insight is better, especially for Holy which gets improved AoE function for PoM. As for Power Infusion, there's just really no comparing that to the other talents, specifically because it can be used as a buff on other members.

[Gamdwelf]

Am I the only one who realizes the 3rd and 5th tiers precisely fail Blizzard's vision for the new talent system? They're talents that directly increase DPS, so those two tiers don't present a meaningful decision - whichever offers the best DPS will be the "right" choice.

Plus now we once again have to rely on crapparitions, and the Glyph of Dark Binding got a heavy nerf.

Yesterday was amazing, but today is kinda bleh.

Not really, if a tier has damage choices all 3 are damage choices that can be used different ways so that you have to make a choice. And all classes have at least one damage tier I'm pretty sure.

[Kaesebrezen]

Am I the only one who realizes the 3rd and 5th tiers precisely fail Blizzard's vision for the new talent system?

The problem with priests is that we have 2 healing specs, and 1 DD spec.

What other themes for a tier could you have given priests? More self-survival? Healers don't need that. A 2nd CC-tier? That's boring and may end up with too much CC (and druids are QQing about that already). More Movement?. One tier of that is enough.

But regardless of that, to tune the numbers of just 3 talents in each tier is a lot easier than the number we have now. Unless you have talent whose number can't be tuned (in that case it's the "new" Divine Insight). The new DI can't be buffed (if to weak) in any form, but on the other hand nerfing PI (will make it worse then live) or ToF (which is only active for 20% of the fight) will make those two feel pretty weak.

I'd say Divine Insight will be redesigned again very soon.

[Dawn Falcon]

Why the bonk? Before my 2 weeks of business trips

It's now a gheal replacement.

---------- Post added 2012-05-03 at 06:36 PM ----------

I'd like to ask how this constitutes as no self healing?

Renew and PoM are cost mana and GCD's, or we can use cooldowns. How does this equate to the current situation? It's far fewer options.. (to be fair, given our lack of options when moving casting renew on ourselves isn't a BAD idea, but the glyph is still a waste).

And sigh @ the new changes. We're back at needing to stand close, but with even LESS mobility!

[Themos]

The problem with priests is that we have 2 healing specs, and 1 DD spec.

What other themes for a tier could you have given priests? More self-survival? Healers don't need that. A 2nd CC-tier? That's boring and may end up with too much CC (and druids are QQing about that already). More Movement?. One tier of that is enough.

You clearly don't PvP much.

And druids should pipe down. I was messing around on my Resto druid alt in beta and it was ridiculous
Typhoon, Wild Charge, Force of Nature, and Ursol's Vortex is just a stupidly broken combo. I was a one man army reaping destruction on Thrallmar, and it took many other 85s to get rid of me.

Anything you can do with the Priest talents doesn't come even close.

[Kaesebrezen]

You clearly don't PvP much.

So how did you come to that conclusion going out from "2 CCs may be too much" vs. "the 2 CC combination from druids is stupidely broken"?

[Prod]

The problem with priests is that we have 2 healing specs, and 1 DD spec.
What other themes for a tier could you have given priests? More self-survival? Healers don't need that.

We just need more talents with effects that vary depending on the spec. I'm hoping that Archangel is next on the chopping block for talents that need to be reworked for different specs. That and Mindbender which is still so out of place.

[KomlinEx]

I think an easy fix for the apparitions would be to just grant the shadow orb whenever they spawn. The fact that you can only have 3 means it wouldn't happen too often because they'd take a while to reach the target. That being said, it would give us a fairly balanced way to have DP or horror without them being too powerful. Taking into account the mastery, would the double ticks of VT also contribute to the chance for MB to proc?

As for dark binding, I really like how they added PoM,. I'd rather use as many instant casts as possible while in SF for healing. Leap of Faith is meh IMO. Odds are you will be saving someone rather than yourself when you use it so losing shadowform for a second wouldn't matter as much. I'd throw in binding heal, personally.

[Kelesti]

I agree that the 3rd tier is questionable at the moment, especially since Mindbender still looks so out of place there for Holy/Disc. But for the 5th tier, it looks fine to me. Twist of Faith is better for bosses like Chimaeron where it's pretty much cruise control until you hit the execute phase where things get more serious (or for healers, everyone is sub 20% all the time). Outside of having a critical execute phase, Divine Insight is better, especially for Holy which gets improved AoE function for PoM. As for Power Infusion, there's just really no comparing that to the other talents, specifically because it can be used as a buff on other members.

Prod, don't forget though, that unlike other execute-type talents, if there's an add, you get to carry that execute as a buff instead of a debuff, bringing it with you onto the boss after the target dies.

That's huge.

I agree that the third tier's the mess, and most of it being from Mindbender over anything else.

[h3lladvocate]

Prod, don't forget though, that unlike other execute-type talents, if there's an add, you get to carry that execute as a buff instead of a debuff, bringing it with you onto the boss after the target dies.

That's huge.

I agree that the third tier's the mess, and most of it being from Mindbender over anything else.

I need to test this, but I wonder if the passive healing from DP Glyph of VT would proc Twist of Faith if you yourself were sub 20%. Would make for more procs more often on heavy damage fights as well.

[Dawn Falcon]

Prod, don't forget though, that unlike other execute-type talents...

I might have asked this before, but is there an ICD?

[Delmortis]

I need to test this, but I wonder if the passive healing from DP Glyph of VT would proc Twist of Faith if you yourself were sub 20%. Would make for more procs more often on heavy damage fights as well.

Just testing this by building 1 shadow orb then falling until I was < 20% health and casting DP on a mob while naked (so I didn't 1 shot the thing). It didn't proc Twist of Fate from the heal (or the dmg obviously).

---------- Post added 2012-05-04 at 08:27 AM ----------

Also updated SimulationCraft to 15662. Currently the best combo on a single target fight with 4pc T13 is Mindbender and Twist of Fate (and that's without doing anything tricky with Twist of Fate). The FDCL/Twist of Fate combo was a close second. It would likely gain a bit if you could off-dot, but lose a fair bit once we drop 2pc T13.

[Unholypriest]

I might have asked this before, but is there an ICD?

Twist of Fate has no ICD atm.

[Deleted]

why fix something that wasn't broken in the first place? Atm priest r totally fubar on beta. They managed to break disc making it utter useless even though it was working fine before they tryed to "fix" it. Same thing happens each expansion they try to redo everything and then rebalance.

DONT fix what isnt broken pls blizztard

[nobodysbaby]

why fix something that wasn't broken in the first place? Atm priest r totally fubar on beta. They managed to break disc making it utter useless even though it was working fine before they tryed to "fix" it. Same thing happens each expansion they try to redo everything and then rebalance.

DONT fix what isnt broken pls blizztard

I have to agree on this. Both specc's.

Priests isues imo is Lightwell, PoH being groupbased and GS being "slow" and not proccing (even though GS is a tad better on reaction than before). Also Holys Chakra stances have little if no meaning in this game, it's a limit to what we can do, not a buff to anything.

They are certainly working on the wrong areas.

One thing that was making Disc fun and powerful was being able to predict and pre-shield. With a CD to PW:S and a casttime to SS that is pretty much gone, and that was also the biggest thing making Holy & Disc completly different.

[Danner]

Mithranlas:

Know that this is beta. It is the time when the developers are trying out various things; just to see if it is working or not. The current experiment as far as Disc priests are concerned is "Can spirit shell replace Greater Heal?". It's an interesting question, and was probably worth a test on the beta servers. Will they keep that change? I don't know. I'm not convinced myself, but that's probably more to do with Spirit Shell feeling lackluster than actually replacing Greater Heal. Ultimately I don't think I care enough about either spell as Disc.

Instead of complaining about change, complain about what you don't like about the change. Feedback like "This all sucks, I preferred the 1970s" is not useful feedback. Instead, give detailed feedback!

Do you miss any mechanics compared to live? Explain why you miss them, and what they added versus what they cost to maintain.
Are there any mechanics you think SHOULD be changed? Why don't you like the mechanic?
Do you find the new spells useful? Why or why not? What can be done to change them to make it work? Alternately, why do you think the new spells are a lost cause? "Because they suck" is not a reason. "Because it is not healing for enough", or "because it's not actually fitting any usecase, leaving the spell unused" or "because I don't like the way the color of the spell effect matches my eyes" are valid reasons.
Are any of your spells underpowered? Numbers are easy to change, but you still should give some feedback as to why they should be changed.

If I could go back to the Cata Beta, I'd argue that Heal wasn't healing for enough to be useful in any content you aren't seriously overgearing, and not actually efficient at all, and is virtually always replaced by Greater Heal - That would be good feedback. The devs probably wouldn't have listened due to being stuck in "lalala lightwell has always been awesome"-land, but it's feedback that should have been raised. Now is your chance to change the game. Raise that feedback properly

[scandore8472]

Am I the only one who realizes the 3rd and 5th tiers precisely fail Blizzard's vision for the new talent system? They're talents that directly increase DPS, so those two tiers don't present a meaningful decision - whichever offers the best DPS will be the "right" choice.

Plus now we once again have to rely on crapparitions, and the Glyph of Dark Binding got a heavy nerf.

Yesterday was amazing, but today is kinda bleh.

You're getting glyphs and talents confused. Glyphs aren't suppose to be a dps/healing increase under their new design and provide a choice; and the talent trees weren't suppose to be cookie cutter, and provide a choice. They've failed at both so far with priests glyphs and talents.

I'm not big on shadow, but healing has the same problem with the 3rd and 5th tiers. They don't provide a meaningful decision. FDCL is the obvious choice in the 3rd tier because it's the only throughput and mana talent. Same with PI, it's the only choice in the 5th tier because again, it's the only throughput and mana talent.

---------- Post added 2012-05-04 at 09:14 AM ----------

Mithranlas:

Know that this is beta. It is the time when the developers are trying out various things; just to see if it is working or not. The current experiment as far as Disc priests are concerned is "Can spirit shell replace Greater Heal?". It's an interesting question, and was probably worth a test on the beta servers. Will they keep that change? I don't know. I'm not convinced myself, but that's probably more to do with Spirit Shell feeling lackluster than actually replacing Greater Heal. Ultimately I don't think I care enough about either spell as Disc.

I think the results of the experiment is that Spirit Shell can replace Greater Heal, in some situations. SS should supplement Gheal, not replace it completely. Without Gheal, disc becomes what holy pally's were in LK, niche tank healers. SS isn't a viable spell that can be used to spot raid heal because another healer will heal it before it's heal goes off. Without Gheal, penance MUST be reserved to top off the the tank when damage exceeds SS mitigation.

I think the role for spirit shell lies somewhere between heal and Gheal. Ideal rotation for tank healing would be something like spirit shell, spirit shell, PW:S, and a greater greater heal to top the tank off.

[Ananan]

Someone suggested a while ago (sorry, I can't remember who) that if you cast a second Spirit Shell on a target that already has one, the first Spirit Shell could pop and trigger its heal, so it would never have to stack. If you want to keep Spirit Shell as a Greater Heal replacement I think that would solve most problems really, and even add a little bit of crit scaling (assuming that the heal can in fact crit).

[scandore8472]

Someone suggested a while ago (sorry, I can't remember who) that if you cast a second Spirit Shell on a target that already has one, the first Spirit Shell could pop and trigger its heal, so it would never have to stack. If you want to keep Spirit Shell as a Greater Heal replacement I think that would solve most problems really, and even add a little bit of crit scaling (assuming that the heal can in fact crit).

That's a terrible idea, you'd need to cast it twice for it to heal someone who needs healing. Fundamentally, SS can never fully replace GH as they are completely different kinds of spells. Scaling issues aside, sometimes it's better to heal someone than to shield them.

Here's a few examples why it can't replace GH

Scenario 1
Spirit Shell falls off, and the tank takes damage before you can cast another SS
You PW:S, then penance the tank, then cast another spirit Shell.
PW:S gets fully absorbed, spirit shell doesn't, resulting in a waste of mana, and SS overhealing.

Scenario 2
Spirit Shell falls off, and the tank takes damage before you can cast another SS
You PW:S, then penance the tank
You wait for PW:S to be absorbed, then cast SS. Mean while the tank takes damage and drops to 75% health between PW:S breaking and SS landing
Penance is on CD and you don't want to waste mana by using FH to top the tank off, so you stack a second SS, the to keep tank safe, and toss up renew until penance comes off CD.
Healer 2 sees the tank needs to be topped off, and heals the tank. This wastes their mana because even though the tank is sitting at reduced health, the 100k shield you just put on them will last until your penance comes off CD.

Scenario 3
A raid member takes damage, and the tank is safe
You can't penance, because you NEED to reserve it for the tank.
You cast SS
Healer 2 sees that person needs healing, and heals them.
You've wasted mana because your SS now over heals.

If blizzard is hell bent on making us use SS, then the CD on penance needs to be removed or lowered drastically.

[Sakamae]

why fix something that wasn't broken in the first place? Atm priest r totally fubar on beta. They managed to break disc making it utter useless even though it was working fine before they tryed to "fix" it. Same thing happens each expansion they try to redo everything and then rebalance.

DONT fix what isnt broken pls blizztard

If nothing changed forever....it would result in a very boring and static game. Blizzard changes things to keep it interesting, and to keep their player base obviously. We need to remember there has never ever been this many people in Beta testing before now. We are seeing information and changes much faster and earlier than usual. We still have 3-4 months (imo) before MoP will be released. Now is the time they SHOULD be testing new things, as opposed to later when it's too late. Some things will work and make it to live....many many things won't. That's what BETA means and how it works. Blizzard is far from finished with MoP.