6.0 Warrior changes discussion thread

[Secondwind]

Yes, I'm sure Rage generation would be rebalanced along with that. I brought that up in my Alpha thread, but I don't think its a big deal for Arms since they rarely proc Enrage anyways.

For comparison, on live enrage makes a difference of about 1 rage per second on average. So it's not awful, but it's also pretty easy to tune around.

And I don't think that randomized rage gain is absolutely necessary for the spec, but I can see the desire for it remaining in some form.

edit:

For example; make it deal less damage to cleaved targets but full damage on the primary (Howling Blast).

I agree, and that's basically what my backup suggestion boiled down to (making slam hit all targets in aoe for half damage while SS is up).

I also think it will be a lot easier to balance with Slam as the weaker filler than it was as the hard hitter. If we were talking about Execute hitting all targets in an aoe, it'd be considered pretty OP, and I think that's where most of the discussion of OP slam aoe comes from, rather than from the WoD perspective of a much weaker slam.

I still like Sweeping Strikes being a larger source of AoE and remove the extra mechanics, instead of Sweeping Strikes simply being there to enable another ability to AoE; but that is just me.

I agree. Having SS as the go-to ability to change up your rotation into AoE mode I think is a fun idea and has great gameplay value.

As an aside, I also generally like the idea of having Arms as a weapon master that can adapt to suit various different needs, with Slam being a tool that changes to fit what you are currently doing. Like SS making Slam into an AoE, imagine we had 1-2 other buttons that shared a cooldown with SS, that modified what Slam did when we used them. It's a much more dramatic change, but one that I think if handled right could have a lot of deep gameplay and interesting decision making, evoking the same sort of feelings as stance dancing without some of the clunkiness.

[Archimtiros]

Agree

Stop agreeing with me! It's strange and I don't like it!

The "evolving slam mechanic" is pretty neat, though like you say would be a huge revamp. Honestly, since Classic I never understood why they didn't do this with stances.

Imagine if some of our rotational buttons were stances instead, such as a "Sweeping Strikes Stance" and a "Colossus Smash Stance". We could bounce between them based on what we were trying to do. Obviously they both would have bonuses and drawbacks to balance.

[Secondwind]

Stop agreeing with me! It's strange and I don't like it!

No! You stop agreeing with me!

Imagine if some of our rotational buttons were stances instead, such as a "Sweeping Strikes Stance" and a "Colossus Smash Stance". We could bounce between them based on what we were trying to do. Obviously they both would have bonuses and drawbacks to balance.

I was thinking something like 3-4 abilities on a shared 15 second cooldown, off the GCD, which modify our abilities in different ways. I would avoid having an ability for Single Target killing. Make each ability come into play when you have a specific niche you want to shift into for a short period of time. Let's say each one of these abilities has a passive that affects all abilities, modifies Slam in some way, and modifies one other ability in another way.

For example SS gives all abilities the 50% cleave, Slam is special in that its cleave gets to hit everything, and Execute is special in that its cleave hits harder.

You could then have a defensive ability on that same cooldown that provides some DR. Then have it modify Die by the Sword in some way, and have it give Slam a shield-barrier style absorb tied to it.

You could have a mobility ability on that shared cooldown that increases your move speed (not too much just 10-15%), has Slam reduce the cooldown on your HLeap/Charge, and modifies charge to let you use it without a target (just dashing forward the 30 yards or whatever)

You could have an anti-caster ability that reduces CC durations and makes Slam into an offensive dispel and makes pummel silence if you successfully interrupt.

The downside for each of these is the rage cost to activate them, and that having one active means the other can't be active. If you decide to go defensive, you're losing out on mobility. If you activate mobility when you don't need it, you wasted rage for no reason. If you activate anti-caster, you're losing the ability to go on the defensive for a few seconds. It would add a lot of skill to choosing if and when to activate your abilities.


I dunno I'm just spitballing. It's probably really unbalanced in PVP and adds a bunch of new buttons. This is one of the ideas wild enough I know it has basically no chance of going in. But it's fun to think about.

[Archimtiros]

No! You stop agreeing with me!

I dunno I'm just spitballing. It's probably really unbalanced in PVP and adds a bunch of new buttons. This is one of the ideas wild enough I know it has basically no chance of going in. But it's fun to think about.

Pft, you started it. Guess we will just have to agree to disagree.

That's why I was going with 2-3 "stances" that modify some/all abilities rather than a multitude of abilities, but more or less the same concept. They've said its very unlikely that we will ever again see large sweeping class changes the way Warlocks were overhauled. I am inclined to believe that since the "class development" team has been reduced to about 3 people from the... I think 8 or so roundtable it used to involve. I personally loved that things got changed a bit each expansion. Old abilities got culled or combined, new abilities replaced them. It gave the feeling of growing in power, adopting new techniques over time, hell leveling up!

But just as many people dislike it, because they get too hung up on what they first played and it has nostalgic feeling for them, regardless of whether the changes are good or bad (I don't think anyone can really complain about the Warlock overhauls). I imagine it relates to people being overly comforted by the familiar and generally afraid of change.

All that aside, it is pretty taxing on all teams to implement that many new spells/abilities, effects, etc; so I'm sure that is part of the reason as well.

[Deleted]

Talents: still convinced that the tier designs suck.

I still think it should be -

Shockwave, Dragon Roar, Bladestorm.
Avatar, Bloodbath, New CD (like Deadly Calm).

Storm Bolt goes baseline.

That is exactly what i think fury needs for its talents.
The other thing i would change is the 30% bloodthirst extra crit chance. At 30% for the beginning of the xpan it would seem good but as tiers continue and the goals of the fury rotation remain the same that being that we want as high an uptime on enrage as possible, 30% will just become annoying. I would think a 40-50% increase to crit chance would feel and work much better

[Archimtiros]

That is exactly what i think fury needs for its talents.
The other thing i would change is the 30% bloodthirst extra crit chance. At 30% for the beginning of the xpan it would seem good but as tiers continue and the goals of the fury rotation remain the same that being that we want as high an uptime on enrage as possible, 30% will just become annoying. I would think a 40-50% increase to crit chance would feel and work much better

Kind of the other way around. At the beginning it sucks because its unreliable, as gear improves it becomes more reliable. I still think it could be higher than 30% though.

That said, we need to sit down and figure out exactly what our Crit will look like in T17. We keep forgetting that pretty much every buff is a secondary stat. Flasks, Food, Enchants, Gems. I doubt we will get up to 30% unbuffed crit (60% total, which I think is about the ideal number for intro Fury), but we could be close.

[Jalopy]

Storm Bolt goes baseline.

Literally never happening unless they take away the stun component.

[Darkfriend]

Literally never happening unless they take away the stun component.

Im fine with that. Stunning things in PVE sucks most of the time.

[Beefkow]

Literally never happening unless they take away the stun component.

Yar yar, lets keep the stun because who cares about pvp????

Anyhow, i just wish they could bring back the woltk/bc/classic fury warrior, i really wish that fury warriors didn't have to rely on bloodthirst.

Guys... bloodthirst used to hit like a truck! that was actually fun.

[Secondwind]

I'm just going to reitterate that Stormbolt was introduced with the extra damage against stunned targets because it was intended to be competitive on a tier about damage dealing cooldowns. Its damage is high enough that it competes with (and, for Fury, beats) out those cooldowns in raw damage dealt.

It isn't going to go baseline. Hell, it shouldn't exist with damage as high as it has with its new talent tier placing. With all their talk about removing cooldown stacking, it makes literally no sense that they would keep Stormbolt and let it be stacked with Avatar/Bloodbath as well as Reck. Seriously, if it goes live resembling what it does now, I'll do something suitably humiliating to express my disbelief.

[Deleted]

Im fine with that. Stunning things in PVE sucks most of the time.

"Stormbolt now deals 400% weapon damage, regardless of the targets immunities"

Somehow... I can't see that working out too well in Arena

I'll do something suitably humiliating to express my disbelief.

Run around Stormwind naked with nothing but a tophat

[Deleted]

Anyhow, i just wish they could bring back the woltk/bc/classic fury warrior, i really wish that fury warriors didn't have to rely on bloodthirst.

Oh god, please no. Fury was boring as §$%$ back then.

Guys... bloodthirst used to hit like a truck! that was actually fun.

Well, thats what arms is for. At least they try to make the specs different.

[Deleted]

I'm still wearing the same gear that my toon transferred with, except swapping out galakras for skeer's. I do have significantly more haste because exp/crit gems were converted into haste/crit.

I checked the video and as the rest said seems very responsive gameplay but i think crit numbers are skewing the overall picture. It looks a lot more awesome than it will be cause you are hitting a lvl85 dummny (not so important) but you got 43.85% crit. That would maybe be the feel in WoD end tier but not when we start

[Deleted]

Oh god, please no. Fury was boring as §$%$ back then.


Well, thats what arms is for. At least they try to make the specs different.

Boring? Meh, I guess it`s a question of taste. There`s nothing more boring than saving rage and dumping it all on a CSmash and then waiting to do the same, over and over again...

- - - Updated - - -

Oh god, please no. Fury was boring as §$%$ back then.


Well, thats what arms is for. At least they try to make the specs different.

As for arms, in TBC we had slamspec arms and it did great damage. I don`t see why bloodthirst has to be made into a gimpy shit-tier ability with only one job of proccing raging blow just to balance the specs.

[nerocell]

As for arms, in TBC we had slamspec arms and it did great damage. I don`t see why bloodthirst has to be made into a gimpy shit-tier ability with only one job of proccing raging blow just to balance the specs.

Arms in TBC was pretty annoying to play in PvE, with slam 0.5 cast when you couldn't auto attack during the cast.

Kind of the other way around. At the beginning it sucks because its unreliable, as gear improves it becomes more reliable. I still think it could be higher than 30% though.

That said, we need to sit down and figure out exactly what our Crit will look like in T17. We keep forgetting that pretty much every buff is a secondary stat. Flasks, Food, Enchants, Gems. I doubt we will get up to 30% unbuffed crit (60% total, which I think is about the ideal number for intro Fury), but we could be close.

And if it don't change: Item - Warrior T17 Fury 2P Bonus (New) Increases the critical strike chance of Bloodthirst by 10%.

[Pua]

Anyways, I never called you stupid, I called your argument stupid. Feel free to report that if you don't like it. I even said (twice in fact) that it was not a rant aimed at you directly but a rant aimed at people who use the word "iconic" to defend anything about a class that they like, regardless of whether or not it makes an impact on the game or not. You even said "apology accepted" yet here you are, getting upset because I disagreed with the way you presented your argument (even though I never actually disagreed with the subject of the argument).

Let me put it like this; if you're going to call someone stupid (or their argument), you'd better be ready to accept that they're going to argue about it. There was nothing stupid about my point regarding Titan's Grip. Nothing. That implies what I said was without thought or reasoning, neither of which is the case. As for the anxiety it's causing you, I've no idea what's confusing you. You clearly cannot accept an opinion that differs from yours, hence your resolution is the most simple-minded one imaginable.

"Your point is stupid".

Go spend some time conversing with people in the real world and see just how far that attitude gets you.

I also think you need to go back and look up the definition of objective. Your entire argument was you liked something because it feels class defining to you. How is that an objective argument in any way? That's subjective... and the total opposite of objective.
But I digress because that is another completely stupid argument that I am not going to get into.

Ah, another stupid argument and one you've labelled as such because you didn't understand what I posted. Your choice to then go on and say that I "clearly didn't read anything [you] posted" is absolutely laughable. I've been clear, from the very first post you chose to quote and cry about, that my preference for Titan's Grip was exactly that - a preference. Should I have written "subjective" in that post just to clarify it for you? My point is that you are trying to objectively dismiss something you can't get your little head around, and you can't. You can't because I'm not buying the floppy logic you're selling. I would have been perfectly comfortable if you'd simply said you disagreed with my point, something that should have been obvious in my first comment on the subject.

But, no. As is typical with your type, you chose to present your own argument as objective and thus ignore anything that didn't fit in with your view. Nobody with a brain or even the most rudimentary of social skills would be impressed by this.

You clearly didn't read anything I posted because I never took issue with TG. I only took issue with using "iconic" as an excuse to try and make your point. It's a failed argument because damn near everything spell or ability can be called iconic to one class or another. And don't talk about derailment when you are the one who brought it up in the first place.

Calling Titan's Grip iconic isn't an "excuse" for anything. There you go with that defensive language again, prompted by the anxiety caused by the fact that you're not talking to someone who's impressed by your garbled debating style. Not every spell can be called iconic to one class or another, and you've completely skipped over the context I painted Titan's Grip into in order to make my point even clearer to you. No, why get involved with the discussion when you can ignore it (you did), chastise me for not reading your post (I did), and then blame me for derailing the thread when it was you who chose to moan when I presented my subjective preference to a completely different poster.

Don't threaten me when you didn't read or understand my argument in the first place. You aren't going to win that one "bro". Fair enough?

Lolz. Sure thing, bro.

Is it worth leaving an ability in game that provides little to no depth? (even if it has a psychological feeling)

That's a great question.

I've often spoken about this very topic in game and via other online media, and I think it's potentially where the game has lost a bit of its heart since the end of Wrath. We're talking about almost wholly subjective qualities when talking about these psychological preferences and, I believe, they have a place in the game. The majority of players, in my estimation of course, do want to feel some sort of connection to their class. At the top end of performance in both PvP and PvE, players will invariably play what's best rather than what they like most. The top raiding guilds have rosters full of highly-geared alts that are often wheeled out for progression, and many of these players don't have a "main" the way I recognise the term. Performance is all that matters.

For most everyone else, performance is important but the feel of their class, their class identity, is what's more important. An example of this could be the much debated Colossus Smash. Take these two points:

1) I hate Colossus Smash. Fury warriors should be unstoppable berserkers, an unrelenting whirlwind of muscle and steel.
2) I love Colossus Smash. Fury warriors should be building up to that unstoppable assault that the attack provides.

Now clearly, both of these views are in contradiction; but they're both perfectly valid ways for an individual to feel about a class, and may well play a part in the spec being taken up by an individual player. That makes it fundamentally important and something the designers should look to make the most of via their design, yet it has nothing whatsoever to do with actual gameplay or success. I get the distinct impression that those who do or don't like Colossus Smash may well do so because it fits their "vision" of how the spec should play.

They want depth of gameplay. If you recall, I said a couple times that Enrage could be reworked to better fit Arms, even if it is so simple as allowing Slam to proc it. There could very easily be a few ways to add more depth to the spec because right now it adds exactly zero. It isn't about "more procs to track"; abilities need to fall into one of three categories to be valid; they need to be useful, provide depth and/or enjoyable. I don't think Flurry fits any.

Useful
Pretty obvious - I would put this in the vein of things like Utility. They could have removed BzR completely instead of just removing Enrage portion, but it gives us utility and thus is useful. Obviously this falls into the context of balancing; can't champion adding everything under the sun because it could be useful, but you get my point.

Depth
Again, obvious - Colossus Smash adds depth, even if some people don't like it. The relationship between Crit, Mastery, Enrage and Raging Blow for Fury provides depth; it doesn't for Arms, hence why I was championing for its removal or redesign.

Enjoyment
Here is where people will get confused - You can call that psychological feeling from Flurry "enjoyable"... but is it really? You don't notice it proc, so the only thing you ever "feel good about it" is when you specifically think about it, or when you happen to glance through your spellbook.
Of course, enjoyment is very broad, even something as simple as a visual proc can add enjoyment and maybe that would be enough to save Flurry; but right now it has 0 enjoyment.

Despite my clear disagreement with you at the start of this post, I think everything quoted above is thoughtful, eloquent and enjoyable to read.

[Deleted]

Arms in TBC was pretty annoying to play in PvE, with slam 0.5 cast when you couldn't auto attack during the cast.



And if it don't change: Item - Warrior T17 Fury 2P Bonus (New) Increases the critical strike chance of Bloodthirst by 10%.

Annoying? You just needed a swing timer and used slam right after your swing finished. Inbetween hits you used ms/ww/refreshed Bshout/used DW.

[Pua]

1.if you are in a respectable guild or an high rated arena team you will never use gladiator stance this is not just me it also high end warr(you can use it not a bad talent it just useless at any situation and i thought it batter to respec it batter choice)
2.didn't talk from a gameplay perspective from an ability perspective overpower sound a lot batter and have batter animation
3.the little changes make the spec so Sterile and make it lack of fun (in mop) they getting further away from it intended design (in wod) which contradict there new goal
4.it not about the tune it about "target at 20% motherfucker you so dead" instead "oh i have a full rage bar batter execute to dump rage"
5.lol
6. the utility they removed can really change a fight (you would probably die if you aggro the boss with the removal of shield wall for the guy above me also no dk have the best talent tree not affect there dps at all wich is how it suppose to be)
7.i don't disagree with the pruning i just say they went overboard with it because the basic rotation is ms>cs>slam>execute when you near cap

1) The only place you potentially won't find gladiators is in mythic raiding or 2.2k and upwards of the arena. I fully expect you'll see them, and lots of them, absolutely everywhere else. Want to put a store-bought pet on it?

2) I admit, I preferred Overpower because it had additional mechanics to it that Slam didn't.

3) Yeah, I take your point about warriors not necessarily fitting the fantasy of the class but that's not an objective criticism.

4) I'm not really sure what you're complaining about. Sudden Death was originally tied to Execute in WotLK, when Arms was at its very best to play (IMHO).

5) Indeed.

6) Utility had gotten ridiculous across the board, and scaling it back was the only solution. Everyone is getting hit by this, yet DPS warriors will still have plenty.

7) Let's wait on the next iteration.

[Archimtiros]

Let me put it like this; if you're going to call someone stupid (or their argument), you'd better be ready to accept that they're going to argue about it. There was nothing stupid about my point regarding Titan's Grip. Nothing. That implies what I said was without thought or reasoning, neither of which is the case. As for the anxiety it's causing you, I've no idea what's confusing you. You clearly cannot accept an opinion that differs from yours, hence your resolution is the most simple-minded one imaginable.

"Your point is stupid".

Go spend some time conversing with people in the real world and see just how far that attitude gets you.

Again, that isn't what I said and you continue to misconstrue the very basics of what I was saying; I said the argument of iconic is stupid, not the fact that you like TG because you like TG; you were very clear about your preference... which had absolutely nothing to do with what I posted; yet you continue to act as if I am directly attacking you and your preferences. Your post was an outlet for said rant and I even pointed out twice that it wasn't even aimed at you specifically. I even apologized for the rant. An apology which you accepted! But here you are, two days later still losing your head over it.

Second you know anything about me, or the "real world" I live in. If you did, this would be a very different and very one sided conversation. So stop trying to throw extra insults out. You notice I didn't attack or insult you once, which is a lot more than I can say for you.

You realize this is the third or fourth time you've gotten into a mega rant at someone because they said something you didn't like.
You ever hear the expression, "you walk down the street and run into an asshole, you just met an asshole. You walk down the street and meet nothing but assholes... you're the asshole!" (don't be impressed, I stole it from a TV show ).

This isn't trying to belittle you, this is me pointing out that you continuously get into long winded arguments with everyone who doesn't agree with you. I called your argument stupid, and pointed out the reasoning for it. Get over it. I could do the same thing "on the street" and there isn't a thing you could or would do about it that would end in your favor. Just like there isn't anything you can do here. You presented your argument and I presented mine. The matter is now closed.

And I still don't understand where you are getting anxiety out of this.
There has been no fear, unease or worry on my half; just dealing with someone insisting on turning every disagreement into a personal attack and trying to start a flame war. This forum isn't for you to be a hot head, fling insults and seek justice on behalf of your bruised ego; and this conversation is over.

/back on topic please

-Please refrain from posting memes-

[Pua]

This isn't trying to belittle you, this is me pointing out that you continuously get into long winded arguments with everyone who doesn't agree with you.

Which is why I spent the second half of my post agreeing with a lot of the points you made because they were intelligent and well constructed. Clearly, I only want to argue.

Unlike telling me that "I don't know you" and, as such, would find a real life conversation very one-sided. You haven't the slightest clue who I am either, Archimtiros. We can, however, fix that; I live in the UK so, if you're ever here, I'd like to take you out for a drink or two. The invitation, such as it is, is open-ended.

Until then, let's not try Internet puffery. It doesn't wash and we're both above it.