[6.0] Shadow Priest Discussion

[Deleted]

I'm not happy with Surge of Darkness now having a 10% change to procc from DT, down from 20%. Those proccs are pretty much the only interesting thing that feels at least a bit interactive in our CoP rotation apart from execute range. :/

[Spirthealer]

Insanity has been changed to cause consuming Shadow Orbs to transform Mind Flay into Insanity for 2 seconds per Shadow Orb consumed.

This changes nothing for shadow as you have to use 3 orbs any ways for DP, so all they did was changed what skill u use to get it........

[Nestar]

This changes nothing for shadow as you have to use 3 orbs any ways for DP, so all they did was changed what skill u use to get it........

It changes it to a buff on you as opposed to a debuff on the mob that causes Insanity to occur. This also means we should now be able to DP one target and Insanity another.

[Spirthealer]

It changes it to a buff on you as opposed to a debuff on the mob that causes Insanity to occur. This also means we should now be able to DP one target and Insanity another.

hmmm ok now, I do see the bonus that. thank you

[Nestar]

hmmm ok now, I do see the bonus that. thank you

The more important change here was allowing insanity from orbs spent on stuff other than DP. Until this change taking VEnt actually hurt insanity uptime, as did casting Horror. The target switching is just a nice Quality of Life bonus.

[Calamari]

Actually, since both CoP and AS increase your orb generation rate (faster MB CD+instant casts), or Apparitions->Orbs - it actually increases the synergy of Insanity+CoP and Insanity+AS (more Orbs = more insanity), but not Insanity+VE.

Guess one way they could go about fixing it is making Insanity hit about 10% harder on targets affected by VE. On multidot we'd likely choose Surge of Darkness anyway, but would help keep VE+Insanity a valid choice for single target.

[Blackmorgrim]

The proc rate nerf for SoD was something I actually thought was needed. SoD shouldn't beat Insanity in a single target fight, SoD technically shouldn't beat mindbender in single target either. On two targets it should be about even, maybe a little better depending on mastery. On three is should be a clear winner. On four targets, gcd locking might bring it back down depending on which level 100 you take. The 20% proc was meant for when it was only VT that proc'ed it. Now if only SI got bumped up to maybe 7-8% it might be a little more competitive with PI and ToF. You also have to be a little conservative there because of the feedback loop between SI and SoD.

AS for instance would probably take mindbender on 4 targets, since you generate so many orbs at high crit, that your entire rotation devolves into refreshing SWP, casting DP, and using MB as a filler.

Mindbender at this point should be tuned against Insanity. As it is right now, its actually pretty close to Insanity when you forget an Insanity build still has shadowfiend. For a tuning benchmark I think I figured Mindbender needs to do around (1/2 of shadowfiend+20 ticks of mindflay)/12 per hit. Then you'd probably reduce the damage by 10-15% to compensate for the fact its a fire and forget ability and can be combined with cooldowns like PI or berserking. Not to mention it adds even more sustained burst to an already bursty spec.

Still think Mind Flay might need to have its damage increased 50-100%.

[Deleted]

* Twist of Fate now only triggers from healing for Discipline and Holy Priests, and only triggers from damage for Shadow Priests.

It's also means that the ToF trick at the pull no longer works

[Blackmorgrim]

It's also means that the ToF trick at the pull no longer works

That's exactly the reason it was done.

[Yvaelle]

Mindbender should do something more interesting IMO - it should have some rotational benefit, something like:

Mindbender - 1m cooldown - 12 second duration - Every third attack generates a Shadow Orb.

I think it attacks around 10 times baseline, so with some haste you would get 12, that's ~3 baseline, and 4 with entry raid gear - maybe 5 near the end of the expansion with 50% haste, and potentially six during a proc peak.

That would make it the clear choice for a Council fight, where we don't have a ton of time for non-Pain / DP / MB spells - as Blackmorgrim mentioned - and it would also allow help us generate the needed early orbs (particularly in conjunction with Mind Harvest) to get our DP's or VEnt's rolling.

It would also give it a dash of utility for PvP - SoD is great because it gives you free, uninterruptable procs for when you are being trained, and Insanity is top burst if you have a Mage+Tree babysitting you with peels all game - but a Mindbender build would allow us to have bursts of not just damage, but utility via Psychic Horror.

Similar to Shadowdance when Rogues can both burst and multi-CC as needed, a Mindbender build would allow a Priest to throw out a Horror on the healer, drop a DP and their procs into a kill target, and then Horror again. Or if their teammate is dying, pop Mindbender 'defensively' to get out simultaneous horror-peels. Or when getting tunneled by enemy melee, pop mindbender to multi-dot DP on them to gain some great self-healing.

That would give it a unique niche in both PvP and PvE



Edit: OH! Does Mindbender scale with Mastery? Because it definitely should! I'll test in the morning, 3am now - time to go pray to Elune, in bed

[Theed]

Mindbender should do something more interesting IMO - it should have some rotational benefit, something like:

Mindbender - 1m cooldown - 12 second duration - Every third attack generates a Shadow Orb.

I think it attacks around 10 times baseline, so with some haste you would get 12, that's ~3 baseline, and 4 with entry raid gear - maybe 5 near the end of the expansion with 50% haste, and potentially six during a proc peak.

That would make it the clear choice for a Council fight, where we don't have a ton of time for non-Pain / DP / MB spells - as Blackmorgrim mentioned - and it would also allow help us generate the needed early orbs (particularly in conjunction with Mind Harvest) to get our DP's or VEnt's rolling.

It would also give it a dash of utility for PvP - SoD is great because it gives you free, uninterruptable procs for when you are being trained, and Insanity is top burst if you have a Mage+Tree babysitting you with peels all game - but a Mindbender build would allow us to have bursts of not just damage, but utility via Psychic Horror.

Similar to Shadowdance when Rogues can both burst and multi-CC as needed, a Mindbender build would allow a Priest to throw out a Horror on the healer, drop a DP and their procs into a kill target, and then Horror again. Or if their teammate is dying, pop Mindbender 'defensively' to get out simultaneous horror-peels. Or when getting tunneled by enemy melee, pop mindbender to multi-dot DP on them to gain some great self-healing.

That would give it a unique niche in both PvP and PvE



Edit: OH! Does Mindbender scale with Mastery? Because it definitely should! I'll test in the morning, 3am now - time to go pray to Elune, in bed

Agree Mindbender needs something else. Mindbender is also not a viable choice in pvp because it can be slowed, rooted, feared and stunned.

VEnt does not fit into the level 100 tier. The other two are about faster orb generation while VEnt costs orbs. Nothing has been done about it's dispel protection in pvp and im almost certain nothing will be done about it.

[Calamari]

Agree Mindbender needs something else. Mindbender is also not a viable choice in pvp because it can be slowed, rooted, feared and stunned.

VEnt does not fit into the level 100 tier. The other two are about faster orb generation while VEnt costs orbs. Nothing has been done about it's dispel protection in pvp and im almost certain nothing will be done about it.

Aside from being very weak for a 1 minute dot.. it's just not very exciting to have another dot that does nothing aside from a slow trickle of damage, you put it up and refresh it once a minute and other than that it has almost 0 impact on our gameplay, as opposed to Spirits/Clarity which make a massive difference in playstyle.

Also, since Devouring Plague can still snapshot, with enough int procs and a crit it will deal more damage within ~6s than Entropy deals over a WHOLE MINUTE. That's just plain silly.

Would be really cool if VE provided something else than a dot entirely, for example increasing the haste of our other dots/Mindflays/Mind Sears on the target by ~20% for 1 minute or something, and providing a small personal Vampiric Embrace to the SP to make up for the lower orb generation and thus lower plague self heals.

[Deleted]

Even with these changes I don't think Entropy is a good talent.

It still does too weak damage, gives no extra advantages other than making the rotation more annoying.

On multiple targets it has potential, but they need to add in some ramp up in damage of the dot, the longer it's on the more damage it deals.

And CoP used properly in council type bosses should theoretically pull ahead with SoD anyway.

-

The problem with Entropy is they can't buff it too much or it will be too competitive and replace DP.

Then again 1 DP does the same dmg over 6 seconds than Entropy does over a minute.

-

Fixes they could consider :

Entropy replaces Devouring Plague. Each time you use void entropy on a target that already has void entropy on it, it will deal the remaining dot damage as instant damage before applying the new void entropy. Every consecutive void entropy increases the next void entropy's damage by 2%, stacking up to 10 times.

OR

Each time you deal a devouring plague to a target affected by void entropy the duration of void entropy will be refreshed to it's maximum duration and will also increase it's damage dealt by 3%, stacking up to 10 times.

-

It shouldn't take much effort for blizzard to be very creative with entropy to make it more exciting than just a stupid dot.

[Alanar]

Agree Mindbender needs something else. Mindbender is also not a viable choice in pvp because it can be slowed, rooted, feared and stunned.

VEnt does not fit into the level 100 tier. The other two are about faster orb generation while VEnt costs orbs. Nothing has been done about it's dispel protection in pvp and im almost certain nothing will be done about it.

I am affraid nothing will be done.. maybe we get some damage buff but we all know that's not gonna cut it.

ps: thanks Theed and Yvealle for retweeting lol, just noticed.. made a twitter account just to write to them will little bit of hope.

[Deleted]

The proc rate nerf for SoD was something I actually thought was needed. SoD shouldn't beat Insanity in a single target fight, SoD technically shouldn't beat mindbender in single target either.

Yeah, I agree with Insanity beating SoD on single target, with a buffed MF I can live with the SoD nerf. As long as it's without detriment to cast MF or MFI after casting DT in our CoP rotation there should still be enough proccs.

[Zoulis]

Also since DP's duration is reduced by haste, a clear cut 6sec MFI is pretty nice instead of the half assed MFIs we were getting now :P Maybe DP phase isn't so underwhelming now, yeeey

[Deleted]

Yeah, I agree with Insanity beating SoD on single target, with a buffed MF I can live with the SoD nerf. As long as it's without detriment to cast MF or MFI after casting DT in our CoP rotation there should still be enough proccs.

If anything, SoD and SI should proc more often when you play with CoP imo.

[Twintop]

Also since DP's duration is reduced by haste, a clear cut 6sec MFI is pretty nice instead of the half assed MFIs we were getting now :P Maybe DP phase isn't so underwhelming now, yeeey

Insanity from spending orbs is hasted at a rate of 2/haste, I.E.: 3 orbs from DP will still only grant you 4 GCDs (just as it does now).

[Blackmorgrim]

Aside from being very weak for a 1 minute dot.. it's just not very exciting to have another dot that does nothing aside from a slow trickle of damage, you put it up and refresh it once a minute and other than that it has almost 0 impact on our gameplay, as opposed to Spirits/Clarity which make a massive difference in playstyle.

Also, since Devouring Plague can still snapshot, with enough int procs and a crit it will deal more damage within ~6s than Entropy deals over a WHOLE MINUTE. That's just plain silly.

Would be really cool if VE provided something else than a dot entirely, for example increasing the haste of our other dots/Mindflays/Mind Sears on the target by ~20% for 1 minute or something, and providing a small personal Vampiric Embrace to the SP to make up for the lower orb generation and thus lower plague self heals.

WARNING: Number heavy

Actually for 1 gcd, VEnt actually beats DP baseline, 729% SP vs 675% SP. Since we get 5% haste from shadowform, technically VEnt starts at 765.45%, and it gains another 36.45% per minute every 5% haste.

In single target, VEnt's benefit will be reduced. It takes 22 GCDs to get VEnt rolling. It wil be another 21 GCDs until our next DP. (assuming no SI)
With this in mind it means our first 3 orbs spent on VEnt effectively have a worth of:
(36.45%*(Fight length in GCDs-22)/2-DP)

If we say the average fight is 6 minutes, that's 360 seconds or 240 GCDs at 0 haste.
So our first VEnt is worth 36.45*(240-22)/2-675 = 3298.05% SP gain minimum! So, at 0 haste, in single target, our VEnt is effectively trading in 1 DP for ~5.9x the damage.
Say we have 50% haste, the fight is now 360 GCDs long.
So that's 36.45*(360-22)/2-675 = 5485.05% SP gain, or we trade in 1 DP for ~9.1x the damage.

When we have 2 targets: (going to keep 50% haste to show potential with haste stacking)
First VEnt still has the same gain, because we will be able to alternate DPs between two targets easily.

So that's 36.45*(360-22)/2-675 = 5485.05% SP gain on VEnt1, but since the 2nd one is started 44 gcds later... the next gain is:
36.45*(360-44)/2-675 = 5084.1% SP

So between the two, that's a 10569.15% SP gain. That's the equivalent of over 15 DPs so you're losing 2 DPs, and gaining 17.

At 3 targets- 15252.3% SP gain ~22.5 DPs of damage
At 4 targets- 19534.5% SP gain ~29 DPs of damage

If you're still skeptical...

36.45*(360-44)/2-675=5084.1% SP
36.45*(360-88)/2-675=4683.15% SP
Total is 9767.25% SP

10569.15-9767.25 = 801.9% SP

Meaning you lose 801.9% SP from delaying VEnt on two targets. So, 801.9/675 = 1.188. meaning that if you delayed casting VEnt to cast DP with an int proc, that int proc would need to be at least 18.8% of your total spellpower, or it would actually be a loss. Draenic Potions of Intellect give +1000 Int, so it might be worth it on a pull where you start with 3+ shadow orbs, but on a 0 orb pull, you'd more likely be better off starting with VEnt on your first three orbs. However, keep in mind, you're losing 400.95% SP per target in the fight, so once you get upwards of 3 or more targets, delaying VEnt going up is going to take a larger toll.

Also, even at 50% haste, VEnt is only 60 gcds long, on 3 targets it takes 66 GCDs to get three up, meaning without taking PI or SI, we can't keep VEnt up on 3+ targets. (Again, 22 GCDs to get 1 up)

Example: 3 targets no SI/PI
Cast 1st- 60 GCDs left
1st- 38 GCDs, 2nd- 60 GCDs
1st- 76 GCDs, 2nd- 38 GCDs
1st- 54 GCDs, 2nd- 76 GCDs
1st- 32 GCDs, 2nd- 54 GCDs, 3rd- 60 GCDs
1st- 70 GCDs, 2nd- 32 GCDs, 3rd- 38 GCDs
1st- 48 GCDs, 2nd- 70 GCDs, 3rd- 16 GCDs <- this will fall

Taking DI on 3 targets boosts our orb generation to 3 almost every 15 GCDs (remember 3 SWPs rolling).
On average it should make maintaining all three up rather stable. (provided good RNG)

Cast 1st- 60 GCDs left
1st- 45 GCDs, 2nd- 60 GCDs
1st- 30 GCDs, 2nd- 45 GCDs, 3rd- 60 GCDs
1st- 75 GCDs, 2nd- 30 GCDs, 3rd- 45 GCDs
1st- 60 GCDs, 2nd- 75 GCDs, 3rd- 30 GCDs
1st- 45 GCDs, 2nd- 60 GCDs, 3rd- 75 GCDs
1st- 78 GCDs, 2nd- 45 GCDs, 3rd- 60 GCDs
1st- 63 GCDs, 2nd- 78 GCDs, 3rd- 45 GCDs
1st- 48 GCDs, 2nd- 63 GCDs, 3rd- 78 GCDs
1st- 78 GCDs, 2nd- 48 GCDs, 3rd- 63 GCDs

At 4 targets, SI will boost Orb generation to about 3 every 12.5 GCDs. (it won't be anywhere near as reliable as that though, there's a decent variance) At this point, you'd probably also take SoD, which would further boost the orb generation from its interaction with SI.

Cast 1st- 60 GCDs left
1st- 47.5 GCDs, 2nd- 60.0 GCDs
1st- 35.0 GCDs, 2nd- 47.5 GCDs, 3rd- 60.0 GCDs
1st- 22.5 GCDs, 2nd- 35.0 GCDs, 3rd- 47.5 GCDs, 4th- 60.0 GCDs
1st- 70.0 GCDs, 2nd- 22.5 GCDs, 3rd- 35.0 GCDs, 4th- 47.5 GCDs
1st- 57.5 GCDs, 2nd- 70.0 GCDs, 3rd- 22.5 GCDs, 4th- 35.0 GCDs
1st- 45.0 GCDs, 2nd- 57.5 GCDs, 3rd- 70.0 GCDs, 4th- 22.5 GCDs
1st- 32.5 GCDs, 2nd- 45.0 GCDs, 3rd- 57.5 GCDs, 4th- 70.0 GCDs
1st- 78.0 GCDs, 2nd- 32.5 GCDs, 3rd- 45.0 GCDs, 4th- 57.5 GCDs <- Stable, no durations falling within 12.5 GCDs

TLDR- VEnt is incredible in multitarget, and while the damage seems small, it adds up. The latest change was huge.

(Note: I realized near the end, it technically takes 21 GCDs to refresh VEnt, since DP is instant, but I wasn't rewriting all this. So just think of it as leeway space for your rotation)

[methz]

the time you spent going through all that is alarming with the knowledge that the tuning hasn't occurred yet. they're going to make VEnt stronger than DP by a pretty clear margin, or it'd be a useless talent. Also you don't take into account glyph of mind harvest.