Balance T18 - BiS Progression Discussion

[Kilma]

I did some tests on beta.

Ilvl 700 ilvl equipped with our class trinket and recently buffed Shadowmoon Insignia. (361 M - 1243 Int : up from 991)
Full raid buffs, Flask, Food

~7.5 min fight


2pc Bonus now procs off DoT ticks rather than just application.
83% starfall trinket seems pretty sweet ST.

I'm guessing they are trying pets on DoT tick mechanically before they nerf the damage atm. I can't see this going live doing 20%+ of our dmg.

[wyrdone64]

I did some tests on beta.

Ilvl 700 ilvl equipped with our class trinket and recently buffed Shadowmoon Insignia. (361 M - 1243 Int : up from 991)
Full raid buffs, Flask, Food

~7.5 min fight


2pc Bonus now procs off DoT ticks rather than just application.
83% starfall trinket seems pretty sweet ST.

I'm guessing they are trying pets on DoT tick mechanically before they nerf the damage atm. I can't see this going live doing 20%+ of our dmg.

Too bad. I wouldn't mind a tier bonus that is 20% of our damage.

[lappee]

Seems like they want proper play is going to be more important, which is good, while still making mastery the stat to go, which personally I find a good idea.

"Proper" play has very little in it, difference between best and worst SS casts is less than 4% at 5k mastery (live scaling). Not to even mention that you cant cast SS at "optimal" times because we're not in a vacuum makes the difference even less. As long as you cast your SS during the first 3 seconds of being in eclipse and you're all good.

Moonkin dps is literally all about procs and playing the encounter mechanics (and whoring).

So mastery is even more of a "get as much as possible stat. And I already have 2500 versus about 500-700 of every other stat. Well whatever.

It wasnt the best stat on PTR before these changes, I guess they just want our attunement stat to be the best no matter what.

They buffed the Boomkin Class trinket - 705 one is 83% now - 720 is 95% - 735 is over 100%? Not sure if its gonna stay.

Seed of Creation

Well, thats interesting. Its definitely going to be the best trinket for pretty much every fight there is.

I'm guessing they are trying pets on DoT tick mechanically before they nerf the damage atm. I can't see this going live doing 20%+ of our dmg.

Its definitely going to get nerfed proc chance, we'll see whether its going to be RPPM or ICD.

also I didnt see the mastery scaling change on PTR yet

[Frostyfire14]

Probably a dumb question, but how do we test the bonuses and trinkets? Vendor on PTR?
2

[wyrdone64]

I'm glad it might be possible to hit 100% chance on the trinket with just warforged on heroic. That makes the trinket far more appealing for mythic progresison.

That being said, I still wish it was just 100% at all tiers and it just adjusted the DAMAGE of the ensuing starfall, with higher ilevel versions doing more damage.

[huth]

At the very least, it'd fix the pointless values on the Mythic version. I hope they don't leave it like that.

Probably a dumb question, but how do we test the bonuses and trinkets? Vendor on PTR?
2

Yes. Flaskataur provides.

[theburned]

"Proper" play has very little in it, difference between best and worst SS casts is less than 4% at 5k mastery (live scaling). Not to even mention that you cant cast SS at "optimal" times because we're not in a vacuum makes the difference even less. As long as you cast your SS during the first 3 seconds of being in eclipse and you're all good.

Moonkin dps is literally all about procs and playing the encounter mechanics (and whoring).

First of all as you've previously stated mastery is our main burst stat, so it's that aspect that should be taken into consideration. Then it's also a lot of different levels of play, where I assume your arguements bases on early or late lunar while you have to consider solar empowerments as well.

[Alame]

I'm not sure how much this can be considered a "Progression" set as about half the items drop in the latter half of the instance. It seems like the only gear you've excluded in the name of it being for progression is Archimonde gear, and by the time you're doing Archimonde your progression is mostly over anyway.


It really seems like Boomkins are an afterthought this tier. Our 4pc is boring, our Class trinket is all kinds of screwed up, and they've gone from moderate nerfs to huge buffs in the span of one balancing sweep.

Time will tell I guess.

[Gapezilla]

Nah that's just blizzard balancing like they always do. It's been proven their internal testing is shody at best, considering they do sweeping nerfs/buffs to many specs that are simply fine and don't need them over and over and over again, as well as launching bosses with buggy mechanics and at times in completely broken states time and time again. They also buffed warlocks best spec on ptr (affi) massively and nerfed their worst (demo) for no apparent reason, as well as confirming they think shadow priests are awful (hint: they're far from it) in that recent blue post. It's kind of a joke really.

Back to the matter at hand, I laughed because the math already had the class trinket as good at single target and niche/unreliable when you're going to want to keep starfall up during intense aoe. Now with near or above(???) 100% chance to proc it on the heroic version of the trinket its just going to be the best on every fight period... personally I'm fine with having two best trinkets as then I don't have to keep a bunch of them in my bags to switch around and it means more loot/trinkets can go to other classes who need them during progression.

[huth]

I'm not sure how much this can be considered a "Progression" set as about half the items drop in the latter half of the instance. It seems like the only gear you've excluded in the name of it being for progression is Archimonde gear, and by the time you're doing Archimonde your progression is mostly over anyway.


It really seems like Boomkins are an afterthought this tier. Our 4pc is boring, our Class trinket is all kinds of screwed up, and they've gone from moderate nerfs to huge buffs in the span of one balancing sweep.

Time will tell I guess.

The moderate nerf was before the balancing. Also, we're not the only ones with boring 4pc. In fact, all specs that have a "summons x" as their 2pc have a similar 4pc.

[Borawa]

It wasnt the best stat on PTR before these changes, I guess they just want our attunement stat to be the best no matter what.

What was the best stat on the ptr before the mastery revert and buff?

[Alame]

The moderate nerf was before the balancing. Also, we're not the only ones with boring 4pc. In fact, all specs that have a "summons x" as their 2pc have a similar 4pc.

Well yeah, the moderate nerf was their "Boomkins are a bit too strong on live" adjustment.

Then with nothing changing on live they about-face on this opinion during their balancing sweep and give substantial buffs instead.

That's concerning. Why is their balancing sweep revealing data that is significant enough to alter their balance opinion so drastically?

[wyrdone64]

Well yeah, the moderate nerf was their "Boomkins are a bit too strong on live" adjustment.

Then with nothing changing on live they about-face on this opinion during their balancing sweep and give substantial buffs instead.

That's concerning. Why is their balancing sweep revealing data that is significant enough to alter their balance opinion so drastically?

The buffs aren't that substantial. 4% nerfs across the board to all spells, and then a mastery buff that makes up for that by a small margin. Unless you think the 2 piece is going to remain as is, which it of course won't, its going to add up to a few percent buff over current boomkins, if it stays.

[Alame]

The buffs aren't that substantial. 4% nerfs across the board to all spells, and then a mastery buff that makes up for that by a small margin. Unless you think the 2 piece is going to remain as is, which it of course won't, its going to add up to a few percent buff over current boomkins, if it stays.

It's close to a 10% buff in current gear. It's almost a 20% buff in HFC gear. Factor in the 4pc and you're looking at 22-23%. Never mind the fact that it makes CA so so so much stronger.

This really isn't a small buff. 20% doesn't sound like much but even taking away our 4% base nerfs we're still looking at a 16% increase which is more than enough to put us solidly in contention for #1 DPS spec.

Saying 20% buffs almost make up for 4% nerfs is just plain silly.

[Torlarn]

Yea, 30% buff to mastery scaling is currently a 10% at least current buff after having already factored in the 4% spell damage nerf. It's nowhere near a "minor" buff.

[huth]

Well yeah, the moderate nerf was their "Boomkins are a bit too strong on live" adjustment.

Then with nothing changing on live they about-face on this opinion during their balancing sweep and give substantial buffs instead.

They are balancing us with the others on PTR. Not on live. Doing that would be silly anyway.

[Deleted]

The dmg increase depends how much mastery rating you have. Let's assume that you benefit from 80% of your mastery on average. Let's say you only have 20% mastery. Your new dmg would be 100%(before mastery is added)*0.96*(1 + 0.2*0.8*1.3) = 116% and your old dmg would be 100%*(1+0.2*0.8) = 116% (the exact same).

If we do the same with 50% mastery we get:
100%*0.96*(1 + 0.5*0.8*1.3) = 146%
100%*(1+0.5*0.8) = 140%
Which is a 4.3% increase to our damage.

With 70% mastery it is a 6.3% increase to our damage. It is not even close to a 20% buff.

[huth]

Actually, it should be 1+0.5*0.8*1.25, since it is only a 25% increase over now, not a 30% increase. Doesn't really matter how much we get buffed over PTR only values.
So compared to live, it's a 2.9% increase at 50% mastery and a 4.6% increase at 70 mastery. It's a buff, but not a huge one by any means.


For that matter, you can just drop the 100% at the start to no effect. Multiplying by 1 is somewhat silly in this case.

[Deleted]

aye, the 100% was mostly for illustrative purposes. I thought the 30% was overall, thx for correcting.

[Kitrana]

Liked the on cast mechanic on the trinket before because you could get away with movement without losing much dps also made more optimal to use sunfire/moonfire on each peak. Now it's going to be nerfed that you can have 1 max 2 dragons out at the same time, thus we will have the same dmg before the change when we are stationary but when we move we will lose much.