I thought this thread was about m+ /shrug
Not trying to bash anyone, it's just that your post is a good one to reply to:
B) is not fun to switch to holy to do quests that require mass AoE, also is not fun to do the daily Heroic as holy just because it's higher Dps than shadow. I know is not high end progression, but it's still part of the game. Shadow has big big mechanical issues, and their niche is very small (fights with long living adds and long execute phases, where they can become OP). Mythic+ can be good only if you do it in certain weeks with guildies and tanks that know how to chain pull, so you can keep some stacks from one pack to another. Some weeks, when ST is highly needed, you won't get invited.
The other 2 good AoE council specs (balance and afflock) do not have this issue, also they can tunnel more ST dmg while doing very good AoE.
C) SP is good in guilds where you are either good friends with officers or people know what you are capable of. If, during progression, you struggle to reach Execute phase, SP will probably be the first to warm the bench.
D) This is a must
E) the term Meleecraft was never intended to be used in PvE ... PvE favors range due to mechanics. The term is only used to describe melee superiority in PvP (and it's usually at low, medium rating where melees become a roadblock). Nefing VT also nerfs shadow survivability, coupled with very low mobility and how easy it is to interrupt a caster from actually casting ... it's just a bad combo for SPs, our burst is also very easy to shut down due to the ramp-up nature of it
PS: Forgot to add that movement is very punishing for SPriests. We also don't have any burst, si if a certain mechanic requires you to blow everything for 10 seconds, well SPs need to plan ahead with 30 seconds. And if the fight forces you to move, and there are not enough adds, and you don't have the right stat balance to proc Apparitions you will exit void form instantly.
Personal note: i despise SP at the moment, once you reach 40 stacks, the gameplay becomes a spam of buttons with punishing results ( ping can also fuck you up badly)
Last edited by Ashgaan; 2017-12-07 at 09:57 AM.
excellent response. I'd like to touch on a few things.
A) your note about execute range. I don't believe this is as big of a problem. as the final phases in progression are generally the hardest (not always, but more often than not). In those situations, I'd venture to guess the raid leads would accept their slightly lower initial damage for their superior damage in execute range. I may be wrong here, but from experience, that's usually the case.
B) Movement is pretty bad, but luckily the high haste demands, coupled with their short cast times and instant void bolt, allow some leeway amongst the higher tier players. Once again, not always, but so far Antorus doesn't seem too bad for movement, although I may be blanking here on a fight
C)melee craft. I didn't know where it came from, ty for that. Not sure if the person I was responding to knew that either, I'd have to go back and look.
D) the mythic+ issues, I kinda understand. but at the same time, you can cater the group around them, and bring 2 AOE classes to speed through the trash while letting the SP focus mainly on bosses.
all in all, you did raise a few good points
Sylvaeres-Azkial-Pailerth @Proudmoore
Shadow is not good at bosses in mythic+ either though, especially not if it's not a high tyrannical key as we don't have cooldowns so generally other classes will simply outburst us even on bosses. I'm not saying shadow is completely terrible in mythic+, I've done my fair share of high level keys but I'd be lying if I said that my group would not have been better off with pretty much any other class, and that's with a group that tries to play around me, for people pugging it's much worse.
Anyone saying that shadow has been in a bad spot for raiding this expansion is pretty silly and I really enjoyed the spec a lot but it definitely has issues, while it's fine for specs to have strengths and weaknesses I feel in shadow's case they are a bit too extreme. If we compare shadow to affliction warlock for example, probably the class closest to our playstyle, they don't have nearly the same weaknesses we do and as such generally perform better overall in pretty much all types of content. Their niche is the same and they are about as strong as us at it but when it comes to aoe where we may as well not exist they are still one of the best and even single target they top us, although admittedly not by nearly as much(but they do have access to a simply spec switch and suddenly they have a top spec for that as well).
For next expansion they really just need to give us shorter ramp up time and a way to spread our dots and then balance our damage around that rather than us having to go into high voidforms without any downtime between/in fights.
Which is another issue.
Problem is: if it doesn't, then the penalty is much harsher than for other players, that need to move.coupled with their short cast times and instant void bolt, allow some leeway amongst the higher tier players.
In other words: you can carry shadow priests through M+.D) the mythic+ issues, I kinda understand. but at the same time, you can cater the group around them, and bring 2 AOE classes to speed through the trash while letting the SP focus mainly on bosses.
Because those other AOE classes are just as good as them -if not better- on single target, and the number of spread council fights in M+ is very limited.
This is very inaccurate, your dots should not represent more than 35-40% of your dps and will generally account for 20-27%. Or give me a log, if there is something I'm missing.
See world 1st heroic log on varimathras for example : https://www.warcraftlogs.com/reports...one&source=190
For more elaboration on my point, see my other post in the same thread.
Ok so, that parse you linked was created after the hotfix -12% nerf to dots and +3% to everything else - which accounts for part of why it's such a low % dot damage.
Additionally, the Spriest in question is running 4p T21 already (+mind blast crit damage, +more mind blast/flay/bolt crit chance, and then +more mind blast damage) and Mangaza's: obvious choice given her 4+2 sets, but worth pointing out her Mind Blast % damage will be higher than average as a result. Would not be surprised if she's also running a few +Mind Shattering relic traits.
Another bit is probably that I'm really built for DoT cleaving right now - with +Creeping Shadows and +Touch of Darkness in almost all my relic slots. Trying to transition to Mind Shattering now given the set bonuses - but since I prefer multidotting anyways I was built around those fights last tier.
It would be neutral if your DOT damage was 20% of your overall damage before the nerf (not after like your Varimathras example).For more elaboration on my point, see my other post in the same thread.
That might be true once we have 4p+2p set bonuses and +Mind Shattering in all our relic traits, but it's not going to be the experience for ~all other Spriests. Also our current 4p bonus buffs our DoT damage way more than our Mind Blast damage, so a lot of us are going to still be experiencing it as up to a 4.5% nerf single target, worse on multidot.
It's a clear single target nerf, and a bigger multitarget nerf. Maybe a nerf is justified given top guilds are stacking DoT classes this tier, but it's definitely not neutral or elegant.
I said that shadow was fucked the very first time I saw surrender to madness. No one believed me.
Now they got people away from that talent and they just tip toe around it. All they had to do was fucking DELETE IT IN THE MIDDLE OF THE XPACK NO ONE GIVES A FUCKING SHIT and replace it with something intelligent and not made by a goddamn intern.
This spec is easy to fix, they just have more ego than balls.
Oh my god the amount of whine, I swear that if I could feed off of tears I'd probably have exploded by now.
I myself did some M+ 14-18 Wednesday (after the nerfs) and was still averaging 1.6-1.8M DPS across the dungeon which was on par with everyone else. Our pure ST is ofcourse not the best, but as soon as you've got adds on the boss fights you'll be doing great regardless. Trash lives long enough at those difficulties to not make us complete garbage unless all of your mates decide to blow CDs on the same pack.
Yeah, I'm not saying we're great in M+ but jeez you guys need to get off the whine train. We're still performing well (great) in raids and this change has very little impact on our usefulness (or lack thereof) in M+.
Depends on how you define "that bad", definitely bottom tier I'd say, maybe worst class.
So you're looking at mediocre single target damage at best (if the target lives long enough) and bad AoE damage for M+, that's not really appealing outside of very specific affixes/bosses.
If you're raid geared, yes, if you just leveled up it's going to be tough.Also, by now most shadow priests have to be relatively close to atleast 12-14k haste right?
That said, as far as I understand it, if you want to use T21 you need 16k+, which rules out a lot of item upgrades.
This nerf was far more crucial than everyone thinks. It changes the situation on crucible traits and we probably have to farm new relics aswell.
Overall a stupid nerf.
Overall Shadows are still strong.
Last edited by Roccatex; 2017-12-08 at 06:29 AM.