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  1. #201
    Merely a Setback Teriz's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ranjit View Post
    In defence of Eliot123, from a resto perspective ("here he goes again"), that's exactly how last 2 expansions looked like. Underwhelming, clunky, battling with a design that is not fitted to modern day raids, while producing subpar numbers. Then, a 10/20% across the board hotfix. Rince, repeat.

    I'm with you on the HST. I would love some QoL introduced. I would love talent overhaul because there's literally NONE choices involved for a healer. I wish for a mastery rework, but that is the only revolutionary change i think is needed.

    Do i agree with all their design ideas? No, but there are ones i can understand - like the one totem per element limitation. I don't like it, i don't agree it's needed, but i can see the viewpoint. But frankly, if a spec requires a flat out buff across the board every tier content OR it drops 40-50% behind, there isn't much you can say to rationalise it.
    The reasoning behind one totem per element is that Blizzard didn't want you to be able to use 2 similar aura buffs at the same time. Similar to Paladin aura buffs. You had to choose between Stoneskin totem, or Strength of Earth totem.

    Those buffs are gone now, so the reasoning behind that limit is gone. There's really no logical reason for that limit to remain in place except to add perceived depth to the class. Just like Shocks being on shared CDs. Other classes get revampled, or get resource systems, Shaman get to keep Vanilla design philosophies.

  2. #202
    Mechagnome Cai's Avatar
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    Here is how I see Totems of same element locking each other out...

    Here is a Shaman he has 2 cds, in the form of totem, he can't use both at once because they are same element so he can only use 1 cd at a time.

    Here is a Druid he has 3 cds, since each cd locks the other so it can't be used til the duration of the previous cd is done.

    Here is a Hunter he has 2 cds, both cds cannot be active at the same time so have to wait to use the second cd til first ones duration is finished.

    If you look at this. it doesn't make since to have cd's lock each other out/

    SINCE Totems are CDs now why should they lock each other out just because they share a common element?

    Totem Persistence is a wonderful Talent, it gets rid of this restriction except fire totems (should include fire totems).

    Why does it make since anymore to have this restriction? Legacy, nostalgia, punishment for using a cd too soon, because blizz says so?

  3. #203
    Quote Originally Posted by Fleugen View Post
    I don't see why not using two earth totems is such a deal breaker to you.

    I find that it'd be overpowered if I could drop Earthbind together with Tremor and Earth Elemental. I find that it'd be overpowered if I could drop Windwalk, Grounding, and Capacitor Totem at the same time. I find that it'd be overpowered if I could drop Searing, Magma, and Fire Elemental totem at the same time. Healing Stream, Healing Tide, and Mana Tide anyone? That doesn't sound completely ridiculous in the slightest!

    The restriction is still in place because it'd be FUCKING STUPID to remove it when Shamans have the most utility out of any class, restricted ONLY by the type of totem it is. It's not just because of the buff totems.

    - - - Updated - - -



    Point me to another class who can use a Tranquility-like spell (Healing Tide) whilst slowing the entire enemy group (Earthbind), dealing damage (Name a Fire totem), remove AND make the raid immune to movement impairing effects (Windwalk), followed by an AoE stun (Capacitor), contributing extra passive smart healing to the group (Healing Stream), extending their burst period by an extra minute (Earth Elemental), ALL THE WHILE NOT STOPPING DAMAGE ON THE BOSS FOR MORE THAN A GLOBAL.

    You can't? Well gee, maybe it's cause all those totems pretty much cover the utility of EVERY class in ONE.
    I dont see where you dont see it, as people have continuously pointed the problematic out.

    What would be overpowered in not losing a 1m duration pet to a completely unrelated, 6s duration fear breaker. It makes no fucking sense. If you think it's overpowered to not get totally screwed over with unreasonable restrictions that make no sense whatsoever, then maybe you should go back to the dream world you're clearly out of.

    What overpowered advantages would we get out of being able to ground a spell while having CPT down? I'd call that interesting totem synergy, grounding protecting CPT from spells and helping it actually go off. What's overpowered in not removing EET because you're feared? You make no sense.
    Fire totems, sure, exclude them no one cares, most people dont even ask for those at the same time. The heck, most ask for the removal of Magma Totem and even Searign Totem. The point is about utility, not that MT/ST deal a lot of damage, and certainly wouldn't be overpowered.

    restricted ONLY by the type of totem it is.
    ...and being immobile, and being unusable while silenced, and being destroyable (5hp usually)...really? Do you even play as shaman, or pvp as one for that matter?

    Druids can spam instant hots and have them tick while casting tranqulity. How many classes can do that? Can you tell me one class that has an entire toolkit that is impossible to counter? I can: rogues. Their entire cooldown kit can be used while silenced, is not punished by movement, undestructible, not dispellable and doesn't exclude other cooldowns. Classes are supposed to have unique flavor. For shamans that unique flavor is totems. Saying it'd be wrong for shamans unique flavor to not be unique is beyond stupid. I'm neither asking druid hots to get dispelled upon hitting tranquility, or having shape shifting remove snare/root, or nerfing rogue cooldowns. I'm just asking for blizz being consequent in homogenisation. They've had others benefit from it, but hardly us. Totems are supposed to be a big utility toolkit, they are supposed to be versatile. Deal with it. And the big gap shamans had on utility shrank a lot over the years too.
    Rogues can stack CP on themselves now, warriors have no longer stance restrictions. The reason is simple: These "interesting" type of mechanics sucked. People hated them. They were neither fun nor just.

    You name rather ridiculous, once upon a time scenarios in which shamans would be op (which they wouldn't even be). How often do you aoe snare in pve at all? Or at the same type as using an aoe heal for that matter? And what would be overpowered about it? It'd be a net gain in pve, and it's normal in pvp to be able to snare and heal at the same time. In raiding it's not even relevant considering a hunter, mage or similar can snare equally good or better and take care of it for you. As for pvp, you just stomp totems. All of them. A lot. Yep, that's gonna piss shamans off alright. But being destroyable is no real restriction next to 1totem/element anyway, right? HST wont be smart healing in WoD, and considering EET as "burst" is an insult to the intelligence of everyone in this thread, esp looking at the 90% nerf come WoD.

    And yes we do stop damage on the boss. It's called GCD.
    Last edited by Omanley; 2014-06-05 at 09:18 PM.
    Quote Originally Posted by Angoth
    I'm sorry that Blizzard won't just gift wrap awesome in a cup and let you drink your fill.

  4. #204
    Mechagnome Cai's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fleugen View Post
    Because it allows Shaman to effectively carry the utility of just about every other class in a non-overpowered manner. The only raid cooldown we're missing really is a movement speed increase.

    Shaman was the first class to have Lust, and the only class to have it until Cata. (Hell, it's STILL known just as Lust for everyone from back in BC when every Shaman knew Lust except Draenei, who had Heroism.) We bring the most buffs for a single class. (Three; Mastery, Spell Power, and Haste [Melee for Enh, Spell for Ele/Resto]) We bring a Tranquility knock off with Healing Tide (Resto only in WoD), a Shadowfury knock off with Capacitor, Piercing Howl knock off with Earthbind, we're the only class with a spell redirect with Grounding, we're the only class to have a small smart heal without interrupting our normal rotations through Healing Stream, we're the only class to have a raid health-redistribution effect through Spirit Link as Resto, we're the only class with a raid-wide fear break through Tremor, we're the only class with a short-cooldown ranged interrupt, AND we're one of the two classes that can be both ranged and melee DPS depending on what the fight asks for.

    NO OTHER CLASS brings that much utility. It is restricted only by totems of the same element overwriting each other. The fact that they gave us a talent to allow the use of two of each type (save fire, which coincidentally contains most of our DPS enhancing totems) is nothing short of amazing.
    I agree that we have a lot of utility but how would using earthbind and earth elemental be overpowered? how would using Spiritlink with Capacitor be overpowered? How would Mana Tide and Healing Tide be overpowered? The only combination currently that could be considered OP is Searing and Fire Elemental, but could being key word since searing totem does crap for damage wouldn't make Fire totems OP either if could be used at same time.

    Also what does bringing passive buffs have to do with totems? Sure Shaman bring 3 different buffs plus BL but none of that has anything to do with totems sharing a lockout due to elements. Hunters can effectively bring every buff to a raid does that mean they shouldn't be able to use multiple cds at once?

    Give me a solid reason why totems should share a lockout due to sharing elements? and because it is OP isn't a reason. We have a talent that lets us do that, except fire totems. Afaik nobody has complained that shaman can drop 2+ water/air/earth totems.

  5. #205
    Mechagnome Cai's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Fleugen View Post
    You conveniently ignore that I listed three of each totem.

    We already have a talent that lets us put down two of each totem type. (Except fire. Which they tested and conveniently determined to be overpowered, so they took fire out of the talent.) I listed three because removing the restriction on totem types means you can put down ALL of your totems of each type. Like I said in my last post, if you think Earth Elemental being tied to a totem is stupid, feel free to argue that and I'll side with you on it. But using Earthbind and Tremor together with Windwalk, Capacitor, and Grounding means you're slowing the enemy group, freeing your group of all snares and slows, absorbing the next spell as well as breaking your group out of all fear/sleep/charm effects. Hell, some people already argue that things like Bubble and Ice Block are too overpowered and you're basically suggesting giving just that to Shamans and THEN SOME.

    Slowing a group (Or better yet, SNARING a group with Earthbind) while Capacitor is up uses two cooldowns right now, and can be hard to land even at the best of times. That's a necessary detriment. Snaring a group while freeing your entire group and preventing damage and stunning the enemy group and recovering significant amounts of health leaves no detriment.
    Everything you are saying now is completely possible with Totemic Presistence. So if it is OP how come blizz hasn't changed the talent? Also Name one class that would have a hard time reacting to all that utility at once?

  6. #206
    So you don't see how it's unreasonable whatsoever to expect a Shaman to be able to snare a group of people, break and become immune to all snares, ground the next spell cast, AoE stun the snared group, heal for a shit load, recover it's mana, break all fear/charm/sleep effects, AND deal damage at the same time?

    Because that's just the cooldowns I could think of off hand. We actually have more.
    You're just listing all the things the class can do. I can do that with a Warrior. They can snare, aoe stun, aoe fear, aoe spell reflect, use rallying cry, recover it's rage, break immunities, break fear, apply a healing debuff and deal damage all at the same time.

    Can it still be used to damage mobs? Yes? Then it heightens your damage, regardless of how little it does. It's a passive pet who hits the boss when it's abilities are turned off. I said it EXTENDS your burst, not that it WAS burst, and if you don't consider throwing down Earth Elemental immediately as Fire Elemental fades then I apologize to your raid on behalf of you, because you don't know how to play your class clearly.
    It definitely does not extend any burst. Earth Elemental will not keep your dps from dropping after Fire Elemental dies. There is no extension. It's just a free shitty dps ability to drop.

    We already have a talent that lets us put down two of each totem type. (Except fire. Which they tested and conveniently determined to be overpowered, so they took fire out of the talent.) I listed three because removing the restriction on totem types means you can put down ALL of your totems of each type. Like I said in my last post, if you think Earth Elemental being tied to a totem is stupid, feel free to argue that and I'll side with you on it. But using Earthbind and Tremor together with Windwalk, Capacitor, and Grounding means you're slowing the enemy group, freeing your group of all snares and slows, absorbing the next spell as well as breaking your group out of all fear/sleep/charm effects.
    I highly doubt they thought dropping 2 fire totems would be deemed overpowered. They just didn't want all the DPS shamans flocking to that talent because it would be the only talent that increased damage. Even if we were able to drop all 3 fire totems down at the same time it probably wouldn't even amount to a 1% dps gain. Also, I don't think you know what "at the same time means". That's 10.5 seconds of globals at a minimum.

    Hell, some people already argue that things like Bubble and Ice Block are too overpowered and you're basically suggesting giving just that to Shamans and THEN SOME.
    So you're saying that's its over powered because we have to use 7 abilities perfect to do a little bit more than a single ability? Also I wouldn't even compare Bubble and Ice Block with our abilities. They're not even the same thing.

  7. #207
    Quote Originally Posted by Fleugen View Post
    So you don't see how it's unreasonable whatsoever to expect a Shaman to be able to snare a group of people, break and become immune to all snares, ground the next spell cast, AoE stun the snared group, heal for a shit load, recover it's mana, break all fear/charm/sleep effects, AND deal damage at the same time?
    Earthbind stomped, Windwalk stomped, Grounding stomped, Capacitor stomped, Healing Tide/Stream stomped, Mana Tide stomped, Tremor stomped...and using all at once just means you wasted most of your tools for nothing, gg. You blow "not being punished for no reason" out of proportion into "YOU'LL HAVE ALL YOUR BUFFS UP AL THE TIME". Which is not the case. A rogue can pop Blind, Vanish, Evasion, stuns, Cloak of Shadows, Combat Readiness, Smoke Bomb an Sprint all right after each other, for the most part not clipping any effects. Would it make sense to do that? No.
    So no, I dont see a problem with it. At best, the resttriction is a noob-protection fence to prevent bad players wasting everything in one go. You continue to ignore totem immobility, totem destroyability and them not working on silence, and that's why your arguments fail. You treat totems as the holy grail of mechanics, and 1totem/element as the one thing stopping them from being overpowered. Just destroying totems defeats all your scenarios, and all hopes you'll have as a shaman.

    ...And from a pve standpoint, all the above are nothing but plusses on the raid anyways.
    Aside from having six more cooldowns available for use? Not much.
    Wait, what? Last I checked I didn't anything new. You're again in your herp-derp world of players mashing every button as soon you put them in front of a keyboard. Utility is used when needed, not when ready (heals/absorbs in pve would be an exception). Your scenarios of using everything at the same time wont happen unless there's a scenario where:
    You are chased by a group of people that need bo the silenced/stunned constantly, have to deal with continuing aoe fears and aoe snares/roots on the raid, all the while having to deal with insane damage on the raid and strong spells that need to be grounded. Will never, ever happen.

    It doesn't though. Totems like Windwalk being in the Air totem slot screws with that. Totems like Earth Ele screw up utility. I'd be happy to throw them off the totem rotation, but to say remove all totems because of one problem totem is even more ridiculous than pretending it's caused any issues at all.
    Your suggestion would be just as restrictive, and wouldn't even make sense thematically, as air is traditionally affiliated with movement. And I never said to remove totems. I said their drawbacks need to be revised. The 1totem/element drawback links all totems together, hence it needs to go in any case. Stuff like being destroyable or immobile needs to be decided based on totem effects. It is pretty much impossible to balance totems in a fair way with the 1totem/element rule, because you assume every totem is super strong and hence needs to cancel others. Totems are not that strong though. Comparable abilities of other classes traditionally pull ahead, even when ignoring totem drawbacks.

    Yes, I play a Shaman. No, I don't PvP. Never liked it, never will.
    Then how do you justify opposing changes that, first and foremost, plaque pvp? It's like you're opposing abortion as a womanizer who has impregnated multiple women.: "I dont suffer from it, but I'd be damned if others didn't suffer from it".

    You obviously cannot relate to pvp'ers having to throw big parts of their utility out of the window for nothing. In WoD we'll gain Storm Elemental Totem in the wind slot. It'll clog up the air totem spot and clash with CPT, grounding, windwalk and (for resto) Spirit Link.
    SET will likely be the best choice in arena, and many will feel compelled to take PE to complement it. As an enh, you'll be forced to go WWT again for the most part also, so having it AND PE/SET will basically force you to take Totemic Persistance to avoid that clash. With PE, EET will provide useful ability and will clash a lot with other earth totems. If SBT is also taken, even more clashes and feeling even more forced into Persistance. Good going, you're basically being forced into 5 talents just through the way totems are designed.

    Totems being destroyable, that is old design that you can feel free to complain about. I will agree with you wholeheartedly. Unusable while silenced is how it's supposed to be; Shamans are spellcasters. Spells are stopped by Silence. Immobile is the intended use. I don't see why that needs to be changed.
    Well, totems are imbued items, like our weapons. They are physical objects. It makes sense the original way around, actually.

    And you can only talk about totems being undestroyable across the board being fine, while 1totem/element being removed would be unreasonable if you have no insight at all about pvp, as you admitted just now. PVP is where utility matters the most. Just being able to provide satisfactory dps and not dying is usually enough to have a place there. Enh not having as good selfhealing is basically not important in pve, it makes no difference, if the healers do their job. in pvp, it makes a lot of difference though.
    Basically, saying you dont pvp disqualifies you for the most part when argueing about totem design. You simply dont use many/most of them, most of the time. Pve'ers complain about having lost their nest of totems. As a pvp'er you plant totems all the time meanwhile.

    Shamans with Riptide, Priests with Renew, Monks with Renewing Mist... So every healer.
    Except resto has to glyph riptide for that, and loses 75% of it's initial damage for that. I'm not familiar with other healer's aoe healing though? Which one aside from druids/shamans has that tranquility like channeled aoe heal to make this comparisson?

    Stun the rogue.
    Stun the shaman => cant use totems. Your argument is beyond dumb, sorry. There is no counter to rogue utility. You cant stun a rogue after he blinded you, nor after he vanished. Same goes for CoS. Try stunning a rogue with CPT after he popped Sprint, I'd like to see you try.

    I don't get what you're saying here. Yes, it's wrong for a unique part of a class to not be unique. If it's not unique, how in fucks name can you call it unique?
    Shaman's uniqueness is totems. Totems aren't unique. They dont provide anything other classes cant. They provide it with lots of drawbacks, that's it. Totems used to be unqiue to deserve unique drawbacks. They are now homogenisized stuff with crap on top. Glad you see my point though.

    And the big gap is still huge.
    Nope, just looking at rogues, or hunters, or mages, or warlocks...etc. you see how much strong utility they gain ever x-pack. Your POV is skewed to only doing pve, where totem's aoe utility seems like the non-plus ultra. PVE is a group effort though. No one is disadvantaged by shamans providing a lot there, nor any other class. In pvp, it is different though.

    What I'm saying is, Druids can HoT and run around and do whatever they want, that's their thing. Unique because they have the most HoTs restricted only by their mana consumption. Rogues have a heavy opening combo, that's their thing. Unique because once it starts, it's very hard to stop, but once it ends they're left with little to work with.
    Except rogues continue to be strong after their opener with all their cooldowns. By the time everything is on cd, cds are being finished one after another.
    What's shamans thing though? Being easily counterable? Kinda sucks in comparison, really. Quantity doesn't matter much without quality. And totems lack quality. Shaman's "thing" sucks, period.

    Shamans have their thing. They have the most utility of any other class, restricted only by how much can be used at a time. You call that wrong, I call that working as intended.
    Again, you neglect immobility, destroyability, and silence. You obviously lack insight in the matter, why continue?
    I get it, fine, in pve, you can get by with totems short comings. They suck in pvp though. You dont pvp, so you dont experience this suckyness. You believe they'd be overpowered if improved, but they'd be merely balanced in pvp, and since you dont press totem disadvantages not nearly enough in pve, such changes wouldn't make much difference either.

    I use it enough to warrant having it. I would not enjoy it being taken from me just because people want the totem system gone because the reason I enjoy my shaman is I have a lot of situational utility. Mages can AoE stun, but they can't heal. Hunters as well. They can't break movement snares on the raid.
    You missed the point. The point is: There are no encounters in pve in which you would benefit from the removal of thise restriciton. As an emphasisis on me being right Totemic Persistance is mostly ignored as a talent. And you make no sense in losing aoe snares, as I more than once no stated, I do not wish for totems to be gone, but their restriction system. The point of situational utility means you use it only when needed, hence you usually dont run into problems with totems cancelling each other out.
    A common example of when there are problems is pvp (which you do not take part in so again, why continue?).

    I can do all the above. It doesn't have to happen often for me to pick the class because it CAN do it.
    That's not the point. Again, the point is that the removal of the restriction would not affect pve and be overpowered, but it would greatly help pvp. Frankly I dont get why you so cling to this completely pointless restriction. It serves no balancing purpose.

    Can it still be used to damage mobs? Yes? Then it heightens your damage, regardless of how little it does. It's a passive pet who hits the boss when it's abilities are turned off. I said it EXTENDS your burst, not that it WAS burst, and if you don't consider throwing down Earth Elemental immediately as Fire Elemental fades then I apologize to your raid on behalf of you, because you don't know how to play your class clearly.
    Nerfed to 1/10 of it's damage, it'll probably not even be worth the GCD it costs you, so no, it'll likely not highten your damage in WoD. And it does not extend burst if it does not provide it, nor does it somehow increase the duration of Ascendence, or FET or whatever.

    Again, if you're mad about totems being destroyable, complain about that, not the 1 totem of each element system. I'd gladly take your side and argue with you that totems being destroyable kind of fucks with everything, especially considering how little health they have.
    Sure, let's see what every other class will rage more about. I give you a little clue: It's not the 1totem/element thing they'll rage about. Suddenly being unable to destroy any totem will never fly. You seem to dismiss pvp as unimportant just because you dont play it, that's where your fault lies.

    However, when we use one GCD for Fire Elemental, that Fire Elemental casts spells for itself. When we use one GCD for Healing Stream Totem, it proceeds to heal with no added effort on our part. When we use one GCD for Earthbind, we don't do anything and everything around the totem is slowed. We are free to continue attacking. Just as a Druid is able to continue healing.
    When a druid casts a hot, the hot proceeds to heal for it's duration, nothing different. HST is essentially a destroyable hot. Fire Elemental is essentially a destroyable dot. Wether Fire Elemental does more damage on auto hits and loses it's abilities, or stays as is, it's essentially a hot.
    And earthbind is essentially a destroyable Freezing Trap. They will all continue doing their thing. Wether you strap the effect on a totem or not doesn't change anything of the nature of the spell.

    Our Totems are utility HoTs essentially. Just as you wouldn't tell Blizzard to remove HoTs, you shouldn't tell Blizzard to remove Totems.
    Just in the part above, you praise totems for doing their own thing and being independent from a shaman, and now they are suddenly hots/dots, no different from other classes' stuff. Make up your mind.

    And if you value any sort of utility, which if you didn't then there's another 10 classes out there that do everything we can do without as much utility... Then you wouldn't tell Blizzard to remove the totem restrictions because if they did, they'd remove most of our utility along with it, or just restrict all our utility in ways that work exactly like the current totem restrictions anyway.
    Why would they remove most of our utility? They removed warrior stance restrictions which was huge, without removing shield block, or other spells? Reasoning with "Blizz would do that if they actually did that" is complete hypothethical and holds no ground as an argument.
    Quote Originally Posted by Angoth
    I'm sorry that Blizzard won't just gift wrap awesome in a cup and let you drink your fill.

  8. #208
    Deleted
    I think it is wrong to say that being able to use all totems are the same time would be overpowered. The reasons I'm against it are different.

    1 - The primary reason, it forces us to make more intelligent choices, picking the best suited totem for the current situation, not just every totem to address every situation. Nothing to do with being overpowered that we can address every situation (both because we don't have a totem for everything and because I don't think it would be overpowered because as people have said, you use everything and you have nothing left). Choices bring restrictions, but that doesn't have to be a bad thing.

    2 - It brings flavor to the class. Totems are bound to the Element that provides their power. Without Elemental restrictions you lose this, just as if a Druid in Bear form could cast all the abilities they can in Moonkin form, or if a Moonkin could use Mangle. This is a lesser issue for us because you would still have some of the Elemental connection through the look of the totems (red vs blue vs brown vs white) but it would lose a lot of its meaning

    3 - From a balance point of view, we are not weak because of the restrictions. At no point have we ever been dropped from a Raid because we couldn't use Earthbind Totem at the same time as Tremor Totem. This did actually use to be the case when we had stat sticks that meant if a raid required utility you were often better off bringing another class who could do both at the same time, but since they were removed it isn't the case anymore. In PvP it does actually weaken the class, but when you look at the issues with Elemental and Enhance in PvP (Resto I think is fairly okay in PvP - I've seen many pro teams running Resto recently) you see issues in other areas completely (mainly to do with sticking to targets/escaping them). Removing the Element restrictions wouldn't address those issues at all, and as such neither PvP or PvE from a balance point of view warrant the change either.

    Reply to Omanley

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    So no, I dont see a problem with it. At best, the resttriction is a noob-protection fence to prevent bad players wasting everything in one go. You continue to ignore totem immobility, totem destroyability and them not working on silence, and that's why your arguments fail. You treat totems as the holy grail of mechanics, and 1totem/element as the one thing stopping them from being overpowered. Just destroying totems defeats all your scenarios, and all hopes you'll have as a shaman.
    I have addressed these issues on multiple occasions.

    Totem Mobility - I think Totemic Projection should be baseline, however beyond that I think totem mobility is fine, they are meant to be ground placed abilities.

    Totems being killable - Totems are also undispellable. They require you to work around the fact that they can be killed. With Totemic Projection baseline this would be even easier because LoS would be easily abuse-able. I think this is actually the reason Totemic Projection isn't baseline to begin with.

    Totems being Silenced - As are most spells. We are casters, silences stop casters using spells. I see no issue with this at all.

    Totems being perfect - They are in no way perfect, that have clear weaknesses. That does not make them bad however. It is not simply black or white.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Then how do you justify opposing changes that, first and foremost, plaque pvp? It's like you're opposing abortion as a womanizer who has impregnated multiple women.: "I dont suffer from it, but I'd be damned if others didn't suffer from it".
    I'm sorry but what? Not only is that highly insensitive, it is downright ignorant and wrong. How you can compare the two issues is utterly outrageous. I really do not want to derail this thread, but comments like these are going to end up with a flame war that will get this thread closed.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    You obviously cannot relate to pvp'ers having to throw big parts of their utility out of the window for nothing. In WoD we'll gain Storm Elemental Totem in the wind slot. It'll clog up the air totem spot and clash with CPT, grounding, windwalk and (for resto) Spirit Link.
    SET will likely be the best choice in arena, and many will feel compelled to take PE to complement it. As an enh, you'll be forced to go WWT again for the most part also, so having it AND PE/SET will basically force you to take Totemic Persistance to avoid that clash. With PE, EET will provide useful ability and will clash a lot with other earth totems. If SBT is also taken, even more clashes and feeling even more forced into Persistance. Good going, you're basically being forced into 5 talents just through the way totems are designed.
    That is where choice comes in. If your comp heavily relies on a certain portion of your utility, then you should set your build around it. If SET causes too many issues for your comp, then you don't use it. That doesn't mean the ability itself is bad. Blizzard have even said themselves they are okay with some talents never being taken in certain situations, as long as they are taken in others.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Except resto has to glyph riptide for that, and loses 75% of it's initial damage for that. I'm not familiar with other healer's aoe healing though? Which one aside from druids/shamans has that tranquility like channeled aoe heal to make this comparisson?
    Divine Hymn.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Stun the shaman => cant use totems. Your argument is beyond dumb, sorry. There is no counter to rogue utility. You cant stun a rogue after he blinded you, nor after he vanished. Same goes for CoS. Try stunning a rogue with CPT after he popped Sprint, I'd like to see you try.
    With Totemic Projection it would certainly be possible to do so. Easy? No, but a 5 second AoE stun that you can use from Range shouldn't be easy, or it would be overpowered.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Shaman's uniqueness is totems. Totems aren't unique. They dont provide anything other classes cant. They provide it with lots of drawbacks, that's it. Totems used to be unqiue to deserve unique drawbacks. They are now homogenisized stuff with crap on top. Glad you see my point though.
    Except Totems are utterly unique. The abilities that are bound to the totems might not be, but the totem mechanic itself is unique. I repeat, the Totem mechanic has clear weaknesses (being killed being the main one), but also clear advantages that constantly seem to be ignored (not needing LoS, being undispellable).

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Nope, just looking at rogues, or hunters, or mages, or warlocks...etc. you see how much strong utility they gain ever x-pack. Your POV is skewed to only doing pve, where totem's aoe utility seems like the non-plus ultra. PVE is a group effort though. No one is disadvantaged by shamans providing a lot there, nor any other class. In pvp, it is different though.
    I'm sorry but this is a grass is always greener arguement. If you looked at what changes Warlocks, Mages and Hunters are getting (just to look at 3) you will see they are actually all losing a significant amount of utility, especially in PvP with the amount of abilities that are getting Diminishing Returns added to them.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Except rogues continue to be strong after their opener with all their cooldowns. By the time everything is on cd, cds are being finished one after another.
    What's shamans thing though? Being easily counterable? Kinda sucks in comparison, really. Quantity doesn't matter much without quality. And totems lack quality. Shaman's "thing" sucks, period.
    You are continuing to make statements like they are facts. Yes, if you drop a totem right in front of the enemy they can kill it, but that doesn't make everything we do 'easily counterable', or that every one of our totems is now useless and thus our class is useless. The effects on every single one of our totems (minus the fire totems and probably HST) are all extremely powerful if used correctly. Just because it isn't faceroll to do that doesn't make the entire mechanic bad.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Again, you neglect immobility, destroyability, and silence. You obviously lack insight in the matter, why continue?
    I get it, fine, in pve, you can get by with totems short comings. They suck in pvp though. You dont pvp, so you dont experience this suckyness. You believe they'd be overpowered if improved, but they'd be merely balanced in pvp, and since you dont press totem disadvantages not nearly enough in pve, such changes wouldn't make much difference either.
    1 - Please stop with attacks on the knowledge of players. A player doesn't need to be a 10 Season long Glad to be able to comment on the abilities they have

    2 - I just commented on those 3 points, and none of the points countered anything stated, if you copy/pasted that into their post would that suddenly make their post valid?

    3 - I agree with you about them being overpowered if improved. I'm not sure that they would be. However, I disagree with you that they are underpowered unless they are.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    You missed the point. The point is: There are no encounters in pve in which you would benefit from the removal of thise restriciton. As an emphasisis on me being right Totemic Persistance is mostly ignored as a talent. And you make no sense in losing aoe snares, as I more than once no stated, I do not wish for totems to be gone, but their restriction system. The point of situational utility means you use it only when needed, hence you usually dont run into problems with totems cancelling each other out.
    A common example of when there are problems is pvp (which you do not take part in so again, why continue?).
    You don't run into this issue with Air totems and Earth Totems in PvE really, but you do with Fire and Water Totems, as they are throughput focused, which is what matters much more in PvE. Blizzard clearly stated back when they were testing being able to use multiple totems of the same element that multiple Fire Totems was broken, and the same issue exists with Water Totems and HST. Remove HST and there would be less of an issue (very rarely would you want to use both HTT and MTT anyway, as you would want to use MTT before the big heal phase came), but with it in there remains a choice to be made.

    [QUOTE=Omanley;27483682]That's not the point. Again, the point is that the removal of the restriction would not affect pve and be overpowered, but it would greatly help pvp. Frankly I dont get why you so cling to this completely pointless restriction. It serves no balancing purpose.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Nerfed to 1/10 of it's damage, it'll probably not even be worth the GCD it costs you, so no, it'll likely not highten your damage in WoD. And it does not extend burst if it does not provide it, nor does it somehow increase the duration of Ascendence, or FET or whatever.
    This point I agree with. I think its pretty clear that Blizzard don't want us using Earth Elemental as a throughput ability, but rather as a tank for when we are on our own. It will likely not do enough damage to be worth the GCD it costs to cast, and that is fine.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Sure, let's see what every other class will rage more about. I give you a little clue: It's not the 1totem/element thing they'll rage about. Suddenly being unable to destroy any totem will never fly. You seem to dismiss pvp as unimportant just because you dont play it, that's where your fault lies.
    I do play PvP (not particularly well mind, only up to ~2k, but I do) and I enjoy the extra choices that the totem restrictions cause you to make.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    When a druid casts a hot, the hot proceeds to heal for it's duration, nothing different. HST is essentially a destroyable hot. Fire Elemental is essentially a destroyable dot. Wether Fire Elemental does more damage on auto hits and loses it's abilities, or stays as is, it's essentially a hot.
    And earthbind is essentially a destroyable Freezing Trap. They will all continue doing their thing. Wether you strap the effect on a totem or not doesn't change anything of the nature of the spell.
    If Fire Elemental is 'essentially a destroyable DoT' then so are Warlock pets, Mage Elemental's or Hunter Pets. You can kill of those just like you can kill a Fire Elemental. You can dispel a HoT just like you can dispel any buff, and you can protect HST just like you can protect any totem. If the enemy takes the time to switch to your totem, especially HST, then that alone may have caused it to do it's job.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Just in the part above, you praise totems for doing their own thing and being independent from a shaman, and now they are suddenly hots/dots, no different from other classes' stuff. Make up your mind.
    In a PvE situation there really is no difference between totems and buffs. The difference only lies within PvP, where the opponent you are facing will actively try and counter your abilities, rather than in PvE where only you try and counter theres.

    Quote Originally Posted by Omanley View Post
    Why would they remove most of our utility? They removed warrior stance restrictions which was huge, without removing shield block, or other spells? Reasoning with "Blizz would do that if they actually did that" is complete hypothethical and holds no ground as an argument.
    I think the point they are making, whilst inaccurate because they have no evidence to prove that Blizzard would actually do anything, is that if we had all the utility we do, but without any of the restrictions that them being on totems brings, then we would likely be very overpowered, especially considering that if spells like MTT, SlT and Earthbind had no way to be countered they would be extremely strong abilities.
    Last edited by mmoc63fa3da953; 2014-06-06 at 12:42 AM.

  9. #209
    This thread highlights why I'm rolling a different casting class next expansion (probably Druids). I've never seen a community so opposed to change as the Shaman community. You have so many saying everything is fine that Blizzard views the real concerns as nothing more than a " loudness from a few people".

  10. #210
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Rhamses View Post
    This thread highlights why I'm rolling a different casting class next expansion (probably Druids). I've never seen a community so opposed to change as the Shaman community. You have so many saying everything is fine that Blizzard views the real concerns as nothing more than a " loudness from a few people".
    Personally, I like change, when it is done for the right reasons. The reason I'm against some of the change suggested in this thread is because it is, in my eyes, either change for the sake of change because 'everyone else has had more than us', or changing something that I find a core mechanic for the class I play, and that I enjoy. Its not change itself I am arguing against, just the reasons for the changes suggested.

    However, if you personally remain unsatisfied with the state of Shaman, please do reroll. More power too you. I've also rolled a Druid with my free character boost from my pre-order, though he is currently going to be a mining/herbalism bot, atleast until WoD, I already had a Hunter for a raiding alt.

  11. #211
    Quote Originally Posted by Rhamses View Post
    This thread highlights why I'm rolling a different casting class next expansion (probably Druids). I've never seen a community so opposed to change as the Shaman community. You have so many saying everything is fine that Blizzard views the real concerns as nothing more than a " loudness from a few people".
    To be fair I've seen this movie in every xpac so far. Every single character area is flooded with QQ and in the end Blizzard does what they think is best, based on feedback and a team of people payed to do this (and they have been doing it for a looong time).

    There's one guy in the Warrior section that I just noticed and I specifically recall arguing with him A LOT during MoP beta because he made some really shitty suggestions and thought he knew better than everyone else, with the usual attitude. It's been what, 1 year, since then and the guy is still posting here and paying that subscription.
    Cairne wanted to thank him again, to offer encouragement, praise for a task so successfully completed. For being able to bear such burdens. But Saurfang was an orc, not a blood elf, and lavish compliments and effusion would not be welcomed or wanted.

  12. #212
    Deleted
    Well at least we got updated ghost wolf models...finally.

  13. #213
    Quote Originally Posted by Undefetter View Post
    Personally, I like change, when it is done for the right reasons. The reason I'm against some of the change suggested in this thread is because it is, in my eyes, either change for the sake of change because 'everyone else has had more than us', or changing something that I find a core mechanic for the class I play, and that I enjoy. Its not change itself I am arguing against, just the reasons for the changes suggested.

    However, if you personally remain unsatisfied with the state of Shaman, please do reroll. More power too you. I've also rolled a Druid with my free character boost from my pre-order, though he is currently going to be a mining/herbalism bot, atleast until WoD, I already had a Hunter for a raiding alt.
    I don't know, you seem smug and your reasoning is flawed in almost every post you make, as well as being unaware of the incoming changes to shamans and the changes to other classes in addition to having a limited view of even current mechanics of other classes. You take a contrary position without directly addressing the questions of the other poster and all this combines to make you appear to be someone vehemently against change because it is...change.

    And frankly the re-roll comment just adds to this impression.

    WoD is going to push a lot of change.

    The stated goals: 1. reduce utility 2. reduce mobility 3. reduce button bloat. 4. reduce burst openers 5. reduce spam healing (change to triage)

    Now, as a player of the game I can see that as change that will hit all classes and specs. I'm rational, I get that. As a shaman however, I can see that many of those stated goals will directly diminish a lot of the niche that we fill across all three specs, a niche I might add that could be considered our greatest strengths both in PVE and PVP.

    During a time of change like this, when the core of what your class brings to the game is being changed, it is perhaps only common sense to reflect on the overall design of the class in context of those changes. So we watch, we read, we wait, and we see that many of these goals are being hit with shaman, but not so much with other classes. We see utility being added to some specs, we see less being taken from others, and we know that our core design directly contradicts the stated goals.

    Just some food for thought.

  14. #214
    Quote Originally Posted by Rhamses View Post
    This thread highlights why I'm rolling a different casting class next expansion (probably Druids). I've never seen a community so opposed to change as the Shaman community. You have so many saying everything is fine that Blizzard views the real concerns as nothing more than a " loudness from a few people".
    Very much indeed THIS.

    Its typically one of those people:
    -The "elitist" Shamans who keep throwing the "L2p stop QQ" statements.
    -Shamans who find themselves performing very well due to a major skill difference within their guild raiding roaster, and are claiming Shamans are very find and competitive as a direct result, ignoring high level raiding/pvp.
    -People who play Shamans as alts in the timeless isle/random bg's and come here to drop their wisdom and argue with people who provided actual constructive posts...
    -Blizzard fanboys going with the very old "its only alpha, wait for beta/launch"

    I personally mostly see such posts in the Shaman forums, whether its here or in the official forums, no wonder we're not getting any attention from Blizzard.
    Last edited by Odintdk; 2014-06-06 at 11:42 AM.

  15. #215
    Quote Originally Posted by Undefetter View Post
    I think it is wrong to say that being able to use all totems are the same time would be overpowered. The reasons I'm against it are different.
    1 - The primary reason, it forces us to make more intelligent choices...Choices bring restrictions, but that doesn't have to be a bad thing.
    There is no intelligent choice in having to cancel a 1m duration Primal EET to break a fear. That's simply not true. It's simply unfair and doesn't make sense.
    2 - It brings flavor to the class. Totems are bound to the Element that provides their power.
    Shamans have a bazillion things bound to the elements already. Totems might as well spiritual (acestors/spirits) tools merely enhancing the shamans' capabilities of comuning with the spirits in general, including elements. I dont see flavor in it, really. Especially after so many totems were removed, or made spec specific. Just taking water totems for example, where ele/enh will be only left with Healing Stream. This very fact alone makes 1/3 of Totemic Persistance obsolete already for enh/ele.

    3 - From a balance point of view, we are not weak because of the restrictions...In PvP it does actually weaken the class, but when you look at the issues with Elemental and Enhance in PvP (Resto I think is fairly okay in PvP - I've seen many pro teams running Resto recently) you see issues in other areas completely (mainly to do with sticking to targets/escaping them). Removing the Element restrictions wouldn't address those issues at all, and as such neither PvP or PvE from a balance point of view warrant the change either.
    If we are weakened by it, as you said, then us being weak is definately partly because of totems. Players that stick to destroy totems are a huge weakness. Not having that absorb or heal, because being destroyed, not having those long time duration buffs because you had to clip for a tremor...definately part of being subpar. I'm not saying it is the only thing pulling shamans down. Mobility is definately also part of this. But totems aren't neglectable in their drawbacks. Immobile totems should also have a part in shamans having mobility issues.

    Totem Mobility - I think Totemic Projection should be baseline, however beyond that I think totem mobility is fine, they are meant to be ground placed abilities.
    Not saying anything other than that is needed, though I think it kinda restrictive in game design to create dozens of abilities that have to be good as ground placed. At some point you'll start putting effects on totems that shouldn't even be immobile, like pets (elemental totems, searing totem), freedom and cc breakers (WWT and TT) or charge up effects (capacitor). Allowing totems like Windwalk to be mobile would actually add value to the aoe effect a very short duration, 1m cd fear breaker.

    Totems being killable - Totems are also undispellable.
    Dispellable is the lesser evil, by a big margin. Few can offensive dispell, everyone can stomp totems. Adding the additional extravagance of having to hide totems and hrow them behind pillars doesn't make it any more attractive. Especially considering that many totems have short range and need to be very near the enemy, like Capacitor, Earthbind/grab and Healing Tide, or require LoS. And many totems can be compared to abilities that can neither be destroyed OR dispelled, like Spell Reflect, Berserkers Rage, Hunter/Mage/Warlock/Death Knight pets (have much more hp than the totem the elementals are bound to), Freezing Trap, Shadow Fury etc.

    Totems being Silenced - As are most spells. We are casters, silences stop casters using spells. I see no issue with this at all.
    Totems are physical objects, and as such can be destroyed. Double standards. If totems are silenceable, why cant they be dispelled? They are NOT spells. Blizz is double dipping into weaknesses here.
    being perfect - They are in no way perfect, that have clear weaknesses. That does not make them bad however. It is not simply black or white.
    Totems have more weaknesses than any other mechanic ingame, and would have to have the strongest effects to compensate, that's what balance means. Totems are weak, period.

    I'm sorry but what? Not only is that highly insensitive, it is downright ignorant and wrong. How you can compare the two issues is utterly outrageous. I really do not want to derail this thread, but comments like these are going to end up with a flame war that will get this thread closed.
    It's an analogy. An extreme one but the basic message behind it fits: It is foolish to argue against others affected by something you cannot commend on. A man cannot comment on the pains of childbirth and have the right to tell women what to do with their bodies, just an example. Meanwhile, someone who doesn't pvp and escapes 90% of the bad aspects of totems can hardly comment on those.
    That is where choice comes in. If your comp heavily relies on a certain portion of your utility, then you should set your build around it. If SET causes too many issues for your comp, then you don't use it. That doesn't mean the ability itself is bad. Blizzard have even said themselves they are okay with some talents never being taken in certain situations, as long as they are taken in others.
    SET doesn't cause issues for your comp, but yourself.
    The ultimate talents consist of a dmg cd (that is probably weak because it's an aoe ability, and even if it's not, can be cancelled easily by destroying the totem it's on) and a random target, weak, passive damage.

    Obviously everyone would go for a 1m duration dmg/duration elemental, that also provides knocking-into-the-air strikes and a movementspeed aura if PE'd. As such everyone would consider taking PE. As enh WWT is a given most of the time also. Basically forces Persistance as a totem talent, which makes SBT more attractive towards other talents. Shamans are their own worst enemies by design, hostile players only take advantage of it.
    Divine Hymn.
    Okay, so two out of 6 healing specialisations. Certainly not the "every healer" scenario he was talking about.

    With Totemic Projection it would certainly be possible to do so. Easy? No, but a 5 second AoE stun that you can use from Range shouldn't be easy, or it would be overpowered.
    2s longer than Shadow Fury, at the expense of a longer cooldown, and 5 additional seconds of charge up. Far to high a price to pay. They need to at least add Porjection and CPT glyph baseline to it. I could live with that.

    Except Totems are utterly unique. The abilities that are bound to the totems might not be, but the totem mechanic itself is unique. I repeat, the Totem mechanic has clear weaknesses (being killed being the main one), but also clear advantages that constantly seem to be ignored (not needing LoS, being undispellable).
    And it is only the effects that matter. And totems are also restricted by being out of LoS heal, snare, stun or damage through walls are not working different on totems than on players. Being undispellable does not even nearly make up for being destroyable. Again, totems are, across the board, weaker than anything else in the utility department. They need individual treatment. Slapping all of it together is simply dumb from a design-POV. They do a lot of VERY different stuff, and need completely individual design to compare and compete to similar stuff.

    I'm sorry but this is a grass is always greener arguement. If you looked at what changes Warlocks, Mages and Hunters are getting (just to look at 3) you will see they are actually all losing a significant amount of utility, especially in PvP with the amount of abilities that are getting Diminishing Returns added to them.
    That's CC though. Admittedly could be put in the utility folder, esp considering CPT. Shamans are affected by those changes too, just saying. Our cc will be combined with that of others, and be more often affected by DR. Also, I just checked mage changes, and they hardly lost utility outside of shared DR's, and the loss of one dps cd and two spells made into talents. They also gain stuff like a 12% extra heal raidbuff, and blink resets after using frost nova. To lazy to prove you wrong going into detail on everything. If you're stating the huge utility loss of everyone, go into detail.

    You are continuing to make statements like they are facts. Yes, if you drop a totem right in front of the enemy they can kill it, but that doesn't make everything we do 'easily counterable', or that every one of our totems is now useless and thus our class is useless. The effects on every single one of our totems (minus the fire totems and probably HST) are all extremely powerful if used correctly. Just because it isn't faceroll to do that doesn't make the entire mechanic bad.
    I dont see where Grounding is extremely powerful when compared to Spell Reflect, or Tremor compared to Berserker's Rage, or Earthbind to Freezing Trap. Comparable abilities provide equal or stronger utility, for the most part, without the drawbacks.

    1 - Please stop with attacks on the knowledge of players. A player doesn't need to be a 10 Season long Glad to be able to comment on the abilities they have
    I never stated otherwise. But if you never pvp at all because it sucks anyway, you cant comment on a pvp issue, really. You need to be able to think from a pvp'er POV, if you want to prove them wrong. Being a pve'er only does not confront you all the time with all the drawbacks. It's like saying Hex being fine, only that it works completely different in pvp than in pve. A raid mob doesn't destroy CPT, a player does. Saying totems are fine because you're in an environment where their sucky nature doesn't have to bother you is nothing you can take serious.

    2 - I just commented on those 3 points, and none of the points countered anything stated, if you copy/pasted that into their post would that suddenly make their post valid?
    You're talking like these drawbacks are neglectable. And yes, they counter everything. Fleugen stated the only restriction was 1totem/element, which was simply not true and perfectly showcasing a lack of insight. Only a pure pve would suggest the only drawback would be that. In his scenario shamans could pop everything an d be op, completely neglected that a shamans' entire toolkit can be taken care of in a couple of seconds of auto hit/shot, wanding or spamming ice lance, moonfire or what have you. Immobility on a mobil effect like freedom, a pet, or a charged effect is a definite counter to a lot of arguments.

    3 - I agree with you about them being overpowered if improved. I'm not sure that they would be. However, I disagree with you that they are underpowered unless they are.
    Shaman totems are fine in pve, and against people that ignore them, and if you dont talent into them.

    You don't run into this issue with Air totems and Earth Totems in PvE really, but you do with Fire and Water Totems, as they are throughput focused, which is what matters much more in PvE. Blizzard clearly stated back when they were testing being able to use multiple totems of the same element that multiple Fire Totems was broken
    It wasn't broken, it was an estimated single digit (1-2%?) dps gain over having none at all. Hardly broken. They didn't want ele/enh min/maxers taking Persistance by default in pve regardless of how low the dps gain was, nothing more.
    , and the same issue exists with Water Totems and HST. Remove HST and there would be less of an issue (very rarely would you want to use both HTT and MTT anyway, as you would want to use MTT before the big heal phase came), but with it in there remains a choice to be made.
    You basically defeat your own point. You rarely use them together, but apparently it is a broken thing, an "issue". Both abilities are cooldowns, stacking those allows for more heal overall, so what? If it is broken, Persistance would allow that broken thing and be heads above the other talents.
    [QUOTE=Omanley;27483682]That's not the point. Again, the point is that the removal of the restriction would not affect pve and be overpowered, but it would greatly help pvp. Frankly I dont get why you so cling to this completely pointless restriction. It serves no balancing purpose.

    I do play PvP (not particularly well mind, only up to ~2k, but I do) and I enjoy the extra choices that the totem restrictions cause you to make.
    This doesn't match the quote you used at all. The quote was elaborating that there would be an uproar in pvp is all totems were undestroyable (they wouldn't even give them a percentage of our base hp after all), while few would complain if shamans could use their totems more freely. My post was about Fleugen's..."interesting" assumption on what would fly and what not.

    If Fire Elemental is 'essentially a destroyable DoT' then so are Warlock pets, Mage Elemental's or Hunter Pets. You can kill of those just like you can kill a Fire Elemental. You can dispel a HoT just like you can dispel any buff, and you can protect HST just like you can protect any totem. If the enemy takes the time to switch to your totem, especially HST, then that alone may have caused it to do it's job.
    Except you can ignore killing the Fire Elemental, and destroy the totem instead, which has MUCH less health. You can protect HST, but it requires effort. You dont have to protect hots in the first place, because few can remove them in the first place. The time required to take out cooldowns of 1minute and higher is often a couple of seconds, and it destroys a lot of a shaman's utility...hardly served it's job.

    In a PvE situation there really is no difference between totems and buffs. The difference only lies within PvP, where the opponent you are facing will actively try and counter your abilities, rather than in PvE where only you try and counter theres.
    Yes, and nothing is even remotely close to being as easily counterable as totems are. That's why. Totems are to restricted. The better the opponent, the more worthless totems become. Especially when encountering someone who has played shamans him/herself, not matter which class he is, he will know how much losing totems will hurt you, and how easy it is to dismantle your toolkit, bit by bit.

    I think the point they are making, whilst inaccurate because they have no evidence to prove that Blizzard would actually do anything, is that if we had all the utility we do, but without any of the restrictions that them being on totems brings, then we would likely be very overpowered, especially considering that if spells like MTT, SlT and Earthbind had no way to be countered they would be extremely strong abilities.
    MTT, yes. Earthbind, no. EBT is comparable to Freezing Trap, what disadvantage has it compared to EBT, and what would make EBT op if it where like Freezing? Talenting it into Earthgrab, sure, a disadvantage might be in order, but EBT isn't op without drawbacks, from a equality focused POV.
    Quote Originally Posted by Angoth
    I'm sorry that Blizzard won't just gift wrap awesome in a cup and let you drink your fill.

  16. #216
    Quote Originally Posted by Fleugen View Post
    Point me to another class who can use a Tranquility-like spell (Healing Tide) whilst slowing the entire enemy group (Earthbind), dealing damage (Name a Fire totem), remove AND make the raid immune to movement impairing effects (Windwalk), followed by an AoE stun (Capacitor), contributing extra passive smart healing to the group (Healing Stream), extending their burst period by an extra minute (Earth Elemental), ALL THE WHILE NOT STOPPING DAMAGE ON THE BOSS FOR MORE THAN A GLOBAL.

    You can't? Well gee, maybe it's cause all those totems pretty much cover the utility of EVERY class in ONE.
    Druids.
    warlocks
    dks
    mages
    hunters
    rogues
    warriors
    monks

    Also every class has at least half of what you listed and is 2x stronger and more effective.
    Also you can't count Earth Elemenental as part of your burst as it does crap damage and will be doing even less damage in wod. It is a damage reduction/healing increase cd on a stick that takes at least 2 gcds to use. Which means you have to have it out beforehand for it to be effective.

    Furthermore you need to understand the distinction between utility and effective utility. Most of our utility is worthless unless we are on top of the mobs or we take totemic projection. Which taking projection makes us take 2 GCDs to use our utlity.

    Shamans basically have a garage full of cars with no wheels on them. They look cool and have a lot of potential but they don't go anywhere.

  17. #217
    Deleted
    Not going to quote the above post because posts are getting to a silly length now, so I'm just going to bullet point my points instead

    1 - Cancelling your EET for a fear break is an intelligent choice because you have to work out which is more beneficial to you. If you don't mind being feared for the duration, but your EET is serving a key purpose to you then you save Tremor for later. You have to weigh up the pros of what you gain vs the cons of what you lose. That is what the entire element restriction mechanic is about

    2 - When I say flavor I'm not talking about the balance of the abilities at all. Totems are meant to be physical objects we use to bind Elementals of varying power to our plane of existance until they break free/we release them, and then we cannot/choose not to bind them again for a period of time (cooldowns + spell durations in flavor form). We only bind one water elemental at a time to prevent angering the Neptulon and his fellow Water Elementals.

    3 - The totem mechanic's weakness is in no way negligible, but you consistantly ignore their benefits. Everything doesn't have to be 1 too 1 either. It's fine if portions of a class are weaker than similar portions of other classes, as long as they have strong portions too. Totems have got weaknesses and are likely weaker than they would be if they were flat ground placed abilities with no totem (well not likely, they would be a lot stronger, as their would have no downside at all). That does not mean however that they are therefor bad. Mechanic don't have to be as powerful as they could possibly be to make then well designed. In fact the opposite is often true.

    Totem Mobility - Our Elementals are as mobile as they need to be, hell even on Garrosh if you drop one of your Elementals on the outside plane and then get sucked in with you and follow you through the 'upstairs' plane (I'm not sure of its correct name off the top of my head). I've had that happen to me several times and never once had them bug out. It is infinitely better than it used to be.

    Our CC breakers work like a counterpart to how auras work (because that is what totems were originally designed to be counterparts too, now they just do more than only things auras would do as persistent auras are not very interesting), and as such I see no reason why they need to be mobile. Again, of course it would be better if they were I don't argue with that, I just disagree that is has to be done in order for them to be of sufficient value. Capacitor totem is basically a bomb we place on the ground, and with Totemic Projection it would work fine imo.

    Totems being killable - Being dispellable probably is a less potent weakness than being killable by everyone, but that is partially countered by both the sheer number of them that we have, the sheer variety of them that we have and also the fact that we are one of the classes that can do the dispelling. This is something that starts getting into the discussion of the entire class rather than just one portion of the class, which at the end of the day is the thing that matters. Mages can also dispel, but we can heal. Going down this track is probably a bad idea from my PoV because its going to cause a lot of further debate, but I suppose that is a good thing. The whole class matters, not just the single mechanic it has, when defining the strength of a class.

    Of course, saying that, you can talk about the strength of a mechanic alone, especially when you believe so strongly that is has an issue, I'm just pointing out that other sections of a class can have some relevance as well.

    Totems being silenced - Totems are physical objects that we imbue with power in order to bind/we request the help of the elements to bind elemental power to them. We do not carry around in our backpack a 'Windwalk Totem' that we just drop on the floor and get that power. That isn't how it works. As for being dispelled, again they can't be dispelled because its the totem that provides the power, not us/the buff. As long as you remain within the influence of the Elemental providing power through the totem, you continually remain affected by it. Destroying the totem (either by the Shaman removing it or by it being destroyed by their enemies) releases this Elemental and ends the effect they were providing.

    PvP choices effecting Talent choice - You say 'obviously everyone will go for SET'. That isn't obvious at all. If it specifically disadvantages you in some way that causes you to be too weak to compete, then of course you wouldn't take it. If it is strong enough to counteract that weakness, then great, whats the complaint you've got this awesome new spell that is so powerful you don't need your other air totems anymore, at least whilst it is in effect.

    I disagree that taking 2 elements of the same type in your talents forces a Totem Tier choice. I think it is again still a choice. If the weaknesses of CPT and Earthbind Totem are too much for you that you feel they are too weak without Totemic Projection and that that weakness overcomes the need for both WWT being used at the same time as you have SET out then you take TP. If you feel you need your cooldowns up more often, ie you want to go for a major burst comp and if you haven't won within the first 2 minutes you will probably lose, then you might want Call of the Elements to give you a more uptime on your WWT. This choice may well end up being a no-brainer and one of them is clearly superior, but at least up till this point I have seen no evidence to say which of the three level 100 talents is the one anyone will pick, as no-one has even used them yet.

    Totems are unique - Firstly, I disagree that it is only the effects that matter. From a balance perspective in PvE it is, but in PvP we have at length discussed that it clearly isn't. From a 'feel' perspective they are clearly different. The way a class feels and the reason it plays that way are just as important to many people as how powerful an ability is.

    As for each totem needing to be looked at in isolation, I agree to a point, but also disagree. WoW is not a game of Rock-Paper-Scissors. There is nothing wrong with 1 ability being weaker than another. There is an issue if an ability has some glaring flaw/bug/whatever that needs to be addressed, and that is why change happens. However, just because 1 ability is weaker than another on a completely different class does not mean that this ability is now bad and should be removed/reworked, especially if the class that has said weaker ability has many other options that make up for it.

    Utility - So what do you define as Utility. Is CC not an portion of Utility. In my head there is the core of what your spec is meant to do (DPS = how much DPS you do, Healer = How much healing you do, Tank = How much damage you can take), then everything outside of that core is utility. That is why offhealing for a DPS Shaman is utility for them, and being able to do damage is utility for Resto. How much CC you bring is certainly utility. We bring an aweful lot of utility in many different forms. Besides, my point was simply that many classes are losing a significant amount of utility in WoD, which is certainly true, and that whilst some of that impacts us (DR), we are being left fairly untouched in comparison.

    1 too 1 comparisons - Grounding Totem absorbs any spell aimed at anyone, whilst Spell Reflect is only at the one target. Warriors can Talent for an ability that essentially is Glyphed Grounding Totem, but it is a talent for them, and has a 1 minute cooldown, vs the 35 second cooldown Grounding has when Glyphed, and the 15 second cooldown is has when not. Beserker's Rage is again, only on the player that cast it, whilst Tremor affects everyone. Earthbind Totem activates instantly, whilst Freezing Trap can end up in a situation where it doesn't get activated at all.

    1 too 1 comparisons are in the end rather silly, because that is not how the game works. Some abilities are stronger than others, but its the class they belong too as a whole that truely matters.

    Totems being broken without elemental restrictions - I've said many times, I don't think they would be brokenly overpowered at all. I just don't think removing the restriction is entirely necessary, and I enjoy the choices it causes me to make. Would I like it if the change was made? Hell yes, its a flat buff, everyone likes getting buffs. That is not my point. My point is I disagree that is it necessary, and I believe it would honestly be a shame if they did it, because I like the choices it causes me to make.

    Totems are the most counterable thing - I disagree. Hunter traps have a bigger flaw in that they actually require your enemy to activate them. If the Hunter misplays/the target outplays they can literally take 1 step to the left and counter the entire ability. A well played hunter will not allow this to happen, either with well placed abilities or with the use of external CC to ensure that the trap gets its full effectiveness. That is almost the exact same situation a totem has. Sure, totems like Earthbind and SlT do not really have this option because you have to drop them in your enemies face, but drop them in the right place and you can still protect them. Drop Earthbind behind a wall or drop it so that it is right at the end of the Warrior baring down on you and force him to take several steps away from you to kill it (in which case it has served it's job anyway).

  18. #218
    Quote Originally Posted by shammypie View Post
    Which taking projection makes us take 2 GCDs to use our utlity.
    Totemic projection is not on the GCD, you just require a GCD for the totem.

  19. #219
    Deleted
    Quote Originally Posted by Kralljin View Post
    Totemic projection is not on the GCD, you just require a GCD for the totem.
    I think the big issue with the way Totemic Projection works is you drop the totem and then you move it. It should work like trap launcher. Otherwise you end up with losing uptime of your totems, or in a couple of cases that have happened to me you accidentally pop Totemic Projection and move your totems because you are in a hurry, but you popped it too early and move everything but the totem you wanted to move because you placed it after the move.

    However, this would mean that it would only work on a totem by totem basis, rather than moving ALL your totems, which would actually be a direct nerf to the ability (unable to drop all the totems you want then move them all out of LoS), so I do understand why it works this way. I just would prefer it to be single totems.

    Another way they could do it would be to do it the trap launcher way, but remove the cooldown from TP and just allow the cooldown of the totems themselves to manage it, however this would be a flat *buff* to the spell, because you could scatter your totems and make them incredibly hard to counter. Throw your HTT 30 yards one direction, throw your MTT 30 yards in the other (think Nagrand arena, one totem behind each pillar). That would be pretty f**king sweet though mwahahahhahaa.
    Last edited by mmoc63fa3da953; 2014-06-06 at 04:07 PM.

  20. #220
    Quote Originally Posted by Fleugen View Post

    We already have a talent that lets us put down two of each totem type. (Except fire. Which they tested and conveniently determined to be overpowered, so they took fire out of the talent.) I listed three because removing the restriction on totem types means you can put down ALL of your totems of each type. Like I said in my last post, if you think Earth Elemental being tied to a totem is stupid, feel free to argue that and I'll side with you on it. But using Earthbind and Tremor together with Windwalk, Capacitor, and Grounding means you're slowing the enemy group, freeing your group of all snares and slows, absorbing the next spell as well as breaking your group out of all fear/sleep/charm effects. Hell, some people already argue that things like Bubble and Ice Block are too overpowered and you're basically suggesting giving just that to Shamans and THEN SOME.

    Slowing a group (Or better yet, SNARING a group with Earthbind) while Capacitor is up uses two cooldowns right now, and can be hard to land even at the best of times. That's a necessary detriment. Snaring a group while freeing your entire group and preventing damage and stunning the enemy group and recovering significant amounts of health leaves no detriment.
    In order to do the combo you just suggested it would take at least 5 gcds, require you to be on top of the group you are speaking off. And hope they are stupid enough to just stand there in your effects and not even bother to kill the totems doing so.

    I think what you fail to understand and everyone is trying to drill into you is that we are the only class with such restrictions. We are not arguing that high powered abilites shouldn't come with restrictions. We are saying that no other class has them so to impose them on us is asinine.

    anyway i'm done with this troll
    In order to what you just listed

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