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  1. #41
    Quote Originally Posted by Jaggler View Post
    I agree that some trees are still kinda confusing, but it's also the first iteration of them. As we saw with hunter, they are willing to drastically change them. I just wouldn't compare trees that have been developed over 3 expansions to the first alpha pass of the new ones.
    Yes, but this is a reply to a longer series of comments made by the person I replied to.
    The person I am replying to is stating that the mage talent trees are not utter garbage in their current state and that they're better than Classic's versions.

    I'm suggesting that Classic's versions are much superior in terms of focused identity, and that the mage trees do need some dramatic overhauling in order to be as effective. Small tweaks are not going to fix some of the problems that the mage trees have as he has suggested.

  2. #42
    This is way more active abilities than I'd like tbh.

    What are touch of the magi and radiant spark doing in the same tree in the same spot together? That's just bloat.
    Last edited by Nitros14; 2022-07-29 at 07:11 AM.

  3. #43
    Ooof, I really don't like the Mage trees. Arcane is the best of them, but still quite boring. But Fire and Frost are just... almost exactly as they are now. Hardly anything new and the major gameplay loop will still be the same. I'm pretty annoyed by this, they could have went so much further.
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  4. #44
    Warchief Lulbalance's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chromeshellking View Post
    I looked at the talent/class tree for arcane and im just...Am I crazy? is it really as bad as I think it is?
    It's pretty bad. But there's a lot of copium in here that's softening it a bit.

  5. #45
    I hope the chaincasting pyroblast build becomes viable. It looks unique and what you want from a talent tree and the synergies seems to work well together.

    Other than that though...eh.
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  6. #46
    Quote Originally Posted by Lulbalance View Post
    It's pretty bad. But there's a lot of copium in here that's softening it a bit.
    It's just depressing more than anything. It's pretty clear whoever made these talent trees aren't really passionate about Mages. Fire tree is built well, but even there you have talents that are major puzzles why do they exist, because nobody will pick them or they are simply bad. Like Wildfire, half of that spell is completely useless as you do nothing with 108% crit. Or why is a fully single target talent like Molten Skyfall behind Flame Patch? Why is Conflagrate still there or Imp. Flame Barrier. As is the way the talents are structured for max ST DPS you won't pick Pheonix Flames. And why are we back to 3 second Blaster Master as didn't Infernal Cascade change to 2 stacks for 5 seconds due to the feedback that Blaster Master didn't feel good, because it made you do some weird stuff with the 3 second duration and we have less fireblasts to use without the Mechagon Bracers.

    Frost is the worst offender, which could possibly be amended with some sideways connections, but biggest offender there is that they gave us finally some Mastery scaling with Hailstones, but it is in such location that if you pick 2 cap stones that aren't picking Glacial Spike you can't get 2/2 of Hailstones. Also I do hope they give a longer timer for Arctic Piercing, 6 seconds is way too short as you need to crit your Frostbolt to refresh it hence as Glacial Spike or any other build that frequently uses some other cast than Frostbolt, you'll be doing way less Ice Lance damage. And they finally gave us a possibility to not much Brain Freeze, only to put the 2nd stack of Flurry in such a spot that is a semi-decent dps loss.

    I actually think outside of there being only one playstyle, the Arcane tree is the most finished of them all(if you don't count the mana gem shenanigans). Most of the nodes are one pointers and you basically only have to move Arcane Orb location to somewhere that you could actually pick it and everything is close to fine.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by Kumorii View Post
    I hope the chaincasting pyroblast build becomes viable. It looks unique and what you want from a talent tree and the synergies seems to work well together.
    The biggest problem is that it's on a choice node with possibly the strongest single point in the tree. But from what I've heard it doesn't actually decrese SKB combustion duration, so that's good I suppose. Just getting a 5 second combustion instead a 12 second combustion with mastery conversion is really really rough.

  7. #47
    Stood in the Fire Chromeshellking's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by mrgreenthump View Post
    It's just depressing more than anything. It's pretty clear whoever made these talent trees aren't really passionate about Mages. Fire tree is built well, but even there you have talents that are major puzzles why do they exist, because nobody will pick them or they are simply bad. Like Wildfire, half of that spell is completely useless as you do nothing with 108% crit. Or why is a fully single target talent like Molten Skyfall behind Flame Patch? Why is Conflagrate still there or Imp. Flame Barrier. As is the way the talents are structured for max ST DPS you won't pick Pheonix Flames. And why are we back to 3 second Blaster Master as didn't Infernal Cascade change to 2 stacks for 5 seconds due to the feedback that Blaster Master didn't feel good, because it made you do some weird stuff with the 3 second duration and we have less fireblasts to use without the Mechagon Bracers.

    Frost is the worst offender, which could possibly be amended with some sideways connections, but biggest offender there is that they gave us finally some Mastery scaling with Hailstones, but it is in such location that if you pick 2 cap stones that aren't picking Glacial Spike you can't get 2/2 of Hailstones. Also I do hope they give a longer timer for Arctic Piercing, 6 seconds is way too short as you need to crit your Frostbolt to refresh it hence as Glacial Spike or any other build that frequently uses some other cast than Frostbolt, you'll be doing way less Ice Lance damage. And they finally gave us a possibility to not much Brain Freeze, only to put the 2nd stack of Flurry in such a spot that is a semi-decent dps loss.

    I actually think outside of there being only one playstyle, the Arcane tree is the most finished of them all(if you don't count the mana gem shenanigans). Most of the nodes are one pointers and you basically only have to move Arcane Orb location to somewhere that you could actually pick it and everything is close to fine.

    - - - Updated - - -



    The biggest problem is that it's on a choice node with possibly the strongest single point in the tree. But from what I've heard it doesn't actually decrese SKB combustion duration, so that's good I suppose. Just getting a 5 second combustion instead a 12 second combustion with mastery conversion is really really rough.

    So at least im comforted to know that I take one look at it and even still having not played in years I can see how horrid it is.
    Fate is one you forge with your own two hands.

  8. #48
    General mage tree directly contradicts their design goals for dragonflight talents. It's that bad.
    Here is Ion's quote:
    And the question we kept running into is, well, there are right answers here. There are mathy answers, and players are always going to take the throughput option. The option that increases their damage per second, healing per second, survivability as a tank over that little bit of utility, that extra distance on Blink or reduced cooldown on interrupt if we put them as head-to-head choices. And so, let's not. Or even in the hybrid sense, right, there’s a cool fantasy we want to chase and recapture of the idea that you’re a Ret Paladin. But are you Ret Holy or Ret Prot? Well, if you could just be Ret Ret, I just wanna be really good at damaging things, you’re gonna do that. And so, we’re actually creating more interesting and nuanced decision spaces by separating the types of trees.
    And mage tree is literally almost all about throughput. You can't even take shimmer without sacrificing 4% crit or haste. There is no choice whatsoever if you want 2 capstone traits. And you have to take garbo traits that do nothing on the way. I hope it will be reworked so that you can have all throughput you want and you choose between different utility like in good general class trees(shaman, evoker).

  9. #49
    Stood in the Fire Chromeshellking's Avatar
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    I think after taking time to look at it I would have allowed the options to the player to either fully invest every point they saw fit into whichever tree they wanted. Full hardcore raid spec? You can. Some solo play builds? Sure a bit of 80/20 or 20/80 you got it.

    That way it was as flexible as they so made it out to be. Instead of what it is.
    Fate is one you forge with your own two hands.

  10. #50
    Well I did expect some changes to Mage in this alpha build, but surpricingly not really anything. Tempered Flames got buffed though so it doesn't suck ass anymore, it just sucks. Think they need to add pyroblast into Fireball rank 2 and make the combustion duration reduction to 30% so it's 7s vs 12 secs not 6 vs 12 as it's now. Also probably increase the added crit to 20%. That way it might be competitive with Fireball with a completely different damage profile. But loosing 6 seconds of combustion and having 6.6% longer cast time and not gaining from Fireball stacking buff(while still having to pick it or imp Flamestike).. Yeah dunno. There might be a world where it's decent with Firestarter now, but if we want execute it's still too weak.

    And Frost got it's talent not found talent, but I think it may have been better as 2/2 that did nothing before. It's situational and where we are already starved for points and not picking perpetual winter, we definately are never picking this unless we go full AoE build without ever wanting to cast Frostbolt, then it's as useless as Perpetual Winter and Glacial Assault while being 1 less point used to get Comet Storm. Might be somewhat useful in PvP though, just PvP mages wanted more damage based on Ice Lance and Flurry so they do more burst, not another Frostbolt buff.

    Other than that there seems to be no changes. All the 3 pointers are still there, no routing improvements. Maybe next week they might act on feedback, copium.

    Quote Originally Posted by Chromeshellking View Post
    I think after taking time to look at it I would have allowed the options to the player to either fully invest every point they saw fit into whichever tree they wanted. Full hardcore raid spec? You can. Some solo play builds? Sure a bit of 80/20 or 20/80 you got it.

    That way it was as flexible as they so made it out to be. Instead of what it is.
    It'd be nice. Or even a tree where most of the things you pick you want to pick would be good.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Actually on the topic of Perpetual Winter, I think I did miss before how bad the talent is. You are pretty much giving up damage on the tree to have a QoL change to possibly not much a Brain Freeze proc. Not only is a weak damage talent, but the biggest change they made to Frost in Dragonflight was to make Flurry charge based and you need this talent to make it even work differently than it currently is on Retail. It should definately be baked into Brain Freeze.

  11. #51
    Is rune of power finally dead or did they make it a baseline spell?

  12. #52
    Quote Originally Posted by Celement View Post
    Is rune of power finally dead or did they make it a baseline spell?
    Sadly it's still in the mage tree. You can pick incanters' flow or rune of power.

  13. #53
    Quote Originally Posted by Nitros14 View Post
    Sadly it's still in the mage tree. You can pick incanters' flow or rune of power.
    Depressing guess I'm still running lock

  14. #54
    Here is my own try of the class tree
    (I like the rogue tree a lot.^^)

    https://imgur.com/a/3IIU29Q

    Dmg/Throughput shouldnt compete with utility. This is basically a no choice option.
    I moved all the utility to the pre 20 points area and all the dmg talents into the last third area. This way its mainly about utility - and only the last part is about dmg, which should be easier to balance

    (Moved some utility talents, and also some "generic" dmg talents from the spec trees to the class tree.)

    What are your thoughts ?

  15. #55
    Quote Originally Posted by dileria View Post
    What are your thoughts ?
    Still doesn't really remove the annoyances of picking power on the end caps and points are competing between utility and dps. I'd rather have all the power in the middle and end caps being utility which you have to choose between and then spec trees having the dps/playstyle choice, much like Shaman talents are. Like let's say 3 end caps would be Greater Invis, Cauterize and Cold Snap. You can have 2 but not all 3.

    Also there are severe restriction on movement. No way to move from track to another in the middle part. So you have to pick spells that you never want at the start. Also you put RoP behind a 3 pointer stat talent. Nobody ever is going to not take RoP or Incanter's.. They are so strong. Also why is there so many 3 pointers? They are just bad and soak point so you can't get interesting choices. Way it is structed you are using 6 points in the middle to get to the 3rd tier, but you have to take completely different 6 points if you want Fevered Incantation + RoP for example. Hence you could only use 8 points in the start(maybe somewhat interesting as you mostly have to only take 1-4 bad talents to get where you are going), only 6 talents in the middle that you couldn't care less what they read as, because you are forced to take them to get to the power you need.

    I don't really think this is a major improvement of the mage general tree. I do think the Mage general tree is fixable by just removing all the 3 pointers, possibly reducing some 2 pointers to 1 pointers. Some additional connections between rows like adding a route from Shimmer/Ice floes to Flow of Time. And just adding loads more talents and connections that change the way we play to have choices. Right now there just is no choice and you have to pick stuff you never use to get to the stuff you want.

  16. #56
    Power in the Middle and Utility in the end does not work. You would just keep putting points into the middle until you have all power nodes and only afterwards start investing the remaining points into utility/the end.
    (Check hunter - utility in the start / middle ; Power in the end)

    The new warlock tree is out now. The class tree has very few dmg talents. Only 3 dmg talents in the start /middle part -> mandatory.
    The other dmg talents are in the end too (not even row 8 - only row 9 and 10)

    my concept was inspired by the rogue tree. (choosing 2 paths in the middle in preparation for the end part - in the end are 5 short routes, and by choosing 2 paths in the middle one can enable 4 out 5 routes at the end to choose from)
    Those 3-Point Talents need to be changed - i agree with you. I put them in as roadblocks, to force a choice with the middle paths...but this needs to be done with more finesse than just putting 3 Point-Talents in.
    __

    You mentioned the shaman class tree. That class tree has only ~6 dmg talents. And all of those are easily obtainable. So there is no "real" choice dmg wise - which is fine by me, because the shaman class tree is mainly about utility options and not about dmg options.

    I think blizzard didnt figure out yet, wether the class tree should modify your power or only your utility. Many power talents in the class tree are there only because every spec uses the same spell in some way (serpent sting, or avenging wrath for example) - im not sure if this is smart.

    Mage has very few power talents / spells, which are used by all specs.
    They also have no common dmg resource unlike other classes with multiple damage specs (Hunter Focus, Warlock Shards, Rogue Energy / Combo Points, Warrior Rage, DK Runes/Runic Power...even Paladin has Holy Power as a common resource)

    RoP is a spell used by all specs ... so it is in the Class Tree ;/
    "Nobody ever is going to not take RoP or Incanter's.. They are so strong." ...well that is tuning.
    I see it in this way.
    RoP = burst heavy,
    Shifting Power = burst often,
    Incanter/Expanded Potential = high constant dps (this needs to be ahead of the other choices by a small margin)
    ....depending on the fight (and spec) all choices can make sense.

    If this is too hard to balance, than make the class tree all about tankyness, mobility, and crowd control/utility - and not about Power / DPS. This is a question of design philosophy by Blizzard i think.

  17. #57
    Quote Originally Posted by Celement View Post
    Depressing guess I'm still running lock
    What's wrong with RoP? It rewards foresight/knowing a fight.

  18. #58
    The Lightbringer Lollis's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Caprias View Post
    What's wrong with RoP? It rewards foresight/knowing a fight.
    It fucking sucks that's what's wrong with it. Being forced to funnel practically all of your damage during one tiny window in which you cannot move is horrible gameplay and I really really hope that Incanter's Flow is going to be a genuinely competitive alternative. Give use some actual sustain damage so that RoP isn't required, hell I'd even take both IF AND RoP being completely removed..
    Speciation Is Gradual

  19. #59
    Quote Originally Posted by Caprias View Post
    What's wrong with RoP? It rewards foresight/knowing a fight.
    It's just cumbersome. It isnt the worst thing in the world but its tedious enough that I rather play another class then deal with it.

  20. #60
    Oof, another build and no changes. I know there is time, but when there is literally no communication from Blizz and talents in all Mage trees are universally disliked is starting to be a bit conserning, especially when other class devs are communicating almost daily.

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