Upcoming Shadow Priest Changes - 8.1.0

[Muddler]

I'm almost certain Voidform is designed by the same guy who created Chakra. He was finally reigned in after several expansion, with that design abomination killed and buried. Unfortunately, he decided to have his revenge by creating something even more obnoxious. There's probably someone else who genuinely believes it's a great idea but just needs a little polish - which will take couple more expansions after which they'll delete the thing and re-invent the wheel once more.

I heard Voidform was Celestalon's baby.

[Relapses]

Long long time ago I was the guy that said, give it time its only BETA, that was expansions ago, at this point I sincerely don't understand what in the god name the dev team is going, I would really love to see the armory and the archivements of some one then, SP/elemental and other classes

Lets be honest, we will not get a rework, best case scenario next expansion at best we will get % add on some numbers if we are lucky , all i hope by the time we get the dmg boost, shadow priest will not have the reputation of LOL SHADOW, slowly is getting there

Yeah man, I held onto Shadow through MoP and WoD (though I admittedly had plenty of alts) and told myself I was gonna double down and master Shadow for Legion. I got max level, got shit Legendary RNG then my internet shit the bed and I had to take a break before we started progression in Emerald Nightmare. I came back for Nighthold, conveniently missing the entirety of the time that Shadow was OP due to S2M. I held out through Nighthold progression (despite being ~.3 months behind everybody else for the AP grind). The grinding eventually burnt me out and I quit as we were beginning to work on Gul'dan.

I really wanted to like Shadow but Legion's version of the spec just... wasn't fun. And I had already burnt myself trying to stay competitive at a disadvantage and I didn't have it in me to reroll for the expansion.

It's just a shitty situation all around and I really feel for anybody who decided to main the spec this expansion.

[Ophenia]

Another +20% damage increase for Void Torrent (now 360% instead of 300%). They really want us to be entirely static right

[krl]

Another +20% damage increase for Void Torrent (now 360% instead of 300%). They really want us to be entirely static right

Not enough to push shadow into Sub Rogues ST damage territory.

[dmfg]

Yeah man, I held onto Shadow through MoP and WoD (though I admittedly had plenty of alts) and told myself I was gonna double down and master Shadow for Legion. I got max level, got shit Legendary RNG then my internet shit the bed and I had to take a break before we started progression in Emerald Nightmare. I came back for Nighthold, conveniently missing the entirety of the time that Shadow was OP due to S2M. I held out through Nighthold progression (despite being ~.3 months behind everybody else for the AP grind). The grinding eventually burnt me out and I quit as we were beginning to work on Gul'dan.

I really wanted to like Shadow but Legion's version of the spec just... wasn't fun. And I had already burnt myself trying to stay competitive at a disadvantage and I didn't have it in me to reroll for the expansion.

It's just a shitty situation all around and I really feel for anybody who decided to main the spec this expansion.

I feel you, I too stuck with it all the way until late Antorus. I actually really liked the void form gameplay, but couldn't deal with the weaknesses that resulted from it especially on Argus progress. Finally rerolled warlock for BfA.

Shadow needs to become its own class, with a voidform spec, a DOT/Shadow orb spec (any of the popular versions) and a CoP spec to stop it becoming completely unviable on certain fights. I don't think Shadow can survive being a super niche spec with no other DPS option. I don't even know what it's supposed to be good at any more.

[RsinRC]

Shadow
Psychic Link Mind Blast now Shadow Word: Void deals 20% of its damage to all targets afflicted by your Vampiric Touch within 40 yards. PvP Talent. PvP Talent. Requires Priest. Requires level 40+.

Thoughts? does that mean when you choose Shadow Word: Void it replaces mind blast or like (tin foil) they're replacing mind blast with SWV?

[Foolicious]

I don't think they are replacing anything. The tooltip of Psychic link always says mindblast and does not change when you use shadow word:void.
Most likely just a fix to include shadow word:void.

[Jedimindtrx]

I feel you, I too stuck with it all the way until late Antorus. I actually really liked the void form gameplay, but couldn't deal with the weaknesses that resulted from it especially on Argus progress. Finally rerolled warlock for BfA.

Shadow needs to become its own class, with a voidform spec, a DOT/Shadow orb spec (any of the popular versions) and a CoP spec to stop it becoming completely unviable on certain fights. I don't think Shadow can survive being a super niche spec with no other DPS option. I don't even know what it's supposed to be good at any more.

I was thinking this exact same thing. Shadowpriest needs to be a Shadowpriest, and I'm referring to the old identity. Next expansion, they can make their own edgy void mage.

There is a niche that I feel SP can be king of and that's the vampiric caster. It's kind of ridiculous how great boomies are in M+. I usually went guardian affinity but then went resto affinity, and the ability to have ysera's gift + wild growth + rejuv + swiftmend, in combination with a Bres, plus all their other toolkit makes them great utility. I was thinking how SP's should be the kings/queens of leeching for the group. Similar to the niche that discpriest are great damaging healers. SPs could be the great leecher similar to how blood dk's are leech tanks.

If you were just to gauge it off a dps meter, it goes DPSers, disc priests, tanks
Similarly, it could be healers, shadowpriest vampiric healing (more than current sanlayn), and then tanks regen.

How can this be done?
VE has a passive mechanic to it. 0.5% -1% of ST dmg or 10-20% of Mindflay's dmg or 1-5% of VT's dmg. So many options, so much wishful thinking and armchair deving.

Back to reality, glad were buffed, I guess.

[Lulbalance]

I will say this: yes if a class/specc cant compete in the cream of the cream then there is a problem, because all those players play consistently good and thus minimises the human factor.
and I recommend less huffing of your own farts.

What is that spelling? do you mean 'minimizes'?!

There are 3 teams with spriests on the roster for Blizzcon, what are you talking about man, lol.

[Yvaelle]

I heard Voidform was Celestalon's baby.

Technically it was mine, but yea I emailed my design to him, spammed the forums and twitter, he apparently liked it because it happened.

Now I just want it dead though, it's so far from what I originally proposed.

My proposal was:

* Spriests no longer have mana
* Spriests have two resources, Willpower and Insanity
* Willpower increases DOT & Channel haste with each DoT tick, up to 100% (became Mass Hysteria)
* Insanity is a heat mechanic, your best spells inflict Insanity, you don't want to hit 100 accidentally
* Insanity spells included Devouring Plague, Mind War (became Void Torrent), Psychic Horror, an AOE spell I forget (think it was just a powerful Mind Sear but we didn't channel it, just slap it on your target and cast other things in the meantime)
* If you hit 100 Insanity, you trigger Dark Apotheosis (became Surrender to Madness)
* Dark Apotheosis causes you to lose 10% max health per second, move slowly, wipes all your DoTs from all targets
* During Dark Apotheosis you can spam Insanity-inflicting spells because you are already insane, DA lasts 10 seconds
* When Dark Apotheosis ends, if we survive, we cannot generate Willpower for 60 seconds
* Other bits: I removed Flash Heal, PW: Shield, Mass Dispel, but gave us Purify/Purge, and wanted to buff our vampiric self-healing a lot


So what we wanted to do was build up our Willpower with DoTs, until eventually we're machine gunning DoT ticks and Mind Flay channels into things. Mind Flay 3s channel baseline would hit the GCD at max caps, which feels great on like Alysrazor flying where you can get a feel for what I had in mind.

The idea with Insanity was meant to be that we had these super powerful spells, but we had to practice discipline when using them, or we'd trigger Dark Apotheosis - generally a terrible thing for any sustained fight, since we'd lose 100% DoT & Channel haste = ruined fight for our DPS.

If the raid was going to wipe or something unless an add died, or the boss was about to enrage, you would intentionally trigger Dark Apotheosis so you could kill yourself but destroy your target.

The Willpower ramp-up was actually intended to be quite long, like 60-90 seconds, but the intention was this would mean we'd be balanced as one of the best for raid DPS and chain-pulling in dungeons, since Willpower stacks had a 15s duration, so long as we didn't leave combat longer than that we could potentially maintain full Willpower through a raid boss or whole dungeon with chain pulls.

Would kind of suck for world content nowadays since that mattered more in Legion/BFA than I expected, but I'm sure we'd console ourselves with being overtuned in Raids/Mythics. We would also be stronger during progression fights, and fall off as farm bosses start dying faster than we can ramp-up our Willpower.

[Eliessa]

What is that spelling? do you mean 'minimizes'?!

There are 3 teams with spriests on the roster for Blizzcon, what are you talking about man, lol.

it's british english, dingus. another child left behind....

[krl]

What is that spelling? do you mean 'minimizes'?!

There are 3 teams with spriests on the roster for Blizzcon, what are you talking about man, lol.

Edge of insanity is killed next patch.

[Jaigar]

So funny thing I noticed: All 3 DoT casters now have windows where they are heavily punished for any interruptions.

Affliction's setup for big deathbolt is extremely punishing if interrupted
Boomkin has so much of its damage tied into Incarnation, which is a 30 second CD and you are likely to get some form of interruption during this window even if its just movement.
Shadow has long void form again, punishing any mechanics.

With 6 Azerite traits and shadow being pushed back into long void forms, its going to be overly punishing again to drop void forms. It was fine in Antorus where most of the important fights didn't have intermission phases where you couldn't attack. The 2 worst fights for it, Imonar and Argus, Imonar was a mechanics check, and Argus Shadow performed mid pack.

Shadow needs to be tuned high for 8.1 Uldir to be middle of the pack in BoD. Likely Blizzard will screw it up.

I played Shadow from TBC through Wrath, and HFC, NH, ToS, and Antorus, and I think I may just be done with it. I love the aesthetic, but the class carries an awful damage model with no payoff.

[Rezark]

What is that spelling? do you mean 'minimizes'?!

This facepalm left quite the imprint on my head lol.

[BobAwesome]

So funny thing I noticed: All 3 DoT casters now have windows where they are heavily punished for any interruptions.

Affliction's setup for big deathbolt is extremely punishing if interrupted
Boomkin has so much of its damage tied into Incarnation, which is a 30 second CD and you are likely to get some form of interruption during this window even if its just movement.
Shadow has long void form again, punishing any mechanics.

With 6 Azerite traits and shadow being pushed back into long void forms, its going to be overly punishing again to drop void forms. It was fine in Antorus where most of the important fights didn't have intermission phases where you couldn't attack. The 2 worst fights for it, Imonar and Argus, Imonar was a mechanics check, and Argus Shadow performed mid pack.

Shadow needs to be tuned high for 8.1 Uldir to be middle of the pack in BoD. Likely Blizzard will screw it up.

I played Shadow from TBC through Wrath, and HFC, NH, ToS, and Antorus, and I think I may just be done with it. I love the aesthetic, but the class carries an awful damage model with no payoff.

Shadow performed wonderfully on Argus.

[ChronoSul]

I'm almost certain Voidform is designed by the same guy who created Chakra. He was finally reigned in after several expansion, with that design abomination killed and buried. Unfortunately, he decided to have his revenge by creating something even more obnoxious. There's probably someone else who genuinely believes it's a great idea but just needs a little polish - which will take couple more expansions after which they'll delete the thing and re-invent the wheel once more.

Honestly my guess is void form came out of the demise of metamorphosis demonology locks because when meta was removed from locks that play style didn’t exist anymore and thus need a new home for fans of that play style

[Purpleisbetter]

Honestly my guess is void form came out of the demise of metamorphosis demonology locks because when meta was removed from locks that play style didn’t exist anymore and thus need a new home for fans of that play style

Dunno.
I mained Demo MoP. Long story short, as Demo u wanted meta. Every spell besides HoG was flat out better in meta plus monster mobility.
Feels the polar opposite already.

[Kent1000]

This facepalm left quite the imprint on my head lol.

Its a British(original) version of it, its spelt the same way in New Zealand/Australia (noticed how I wrote spelt instead of spelled same reason.)

[Jervaise]

it's british english, dingus. another child left behind....

Dingus

That made my day, thank you.

On topic with your quote: What an embarrassment.