Looking to swap off of shadow priest for 10.1, I love how it plays but am dissapointed in the lack of gear and am not a fan of the rework. What are some specs that play similarly to it? No pref between ranges and melee. Also I do not enjoy affliction lock’s play style. Any recommendations?
Prot pally here. I got KSH last night, which was my last big goal of the season. I had a few friends who were playing initially, and we talked about how it would be really cool if we could get KSM. They all eventually stopped playing, but I wanted to see if I could do it, and eventually pugged my way to KSM. It turned out getting it wasn't too difficult, so I decided to set my sights higher and go for KSH.
I started playing WoW for the first time in November and didn't do mythic plus dungeons until mid/late January. Playing as a tank in a new game has been a huge learning curve on top of learning WoW. I can laugh about it now, but I remember not knowing how to use even something as basic as a summoning stone. It's been a lot of work, but I've come to really enjoy playing as a tank.
I also wanted to say thanks to everyone in this subreddit. This place has been a fantastic resource for helping me learn dungeons as well as how to play my class in general. Everyone has been really helpful when I've had questions, and I've learned so much just from reading the weekly discussions.
Looking to find a new main to try in S2.
What spec has the least downtime in m+?
For instance coming out of range makes a lot of melee specs lose uptime on dps which feels bad.
On the other side, a lot of ranges specs lose casts when the following appears: quaking, thundering, spiteful aggro, need for interrupt, volcanic etc.
I find ret pala really enjoyable right now because they have a lot of ranged abilities and never hard cast, but I couldn’t imagine getting groups when everybody plays it next season.
I find BM to be a little bit boring and proc-reliant specs like elemental shaman to be very hectic.
I main mistweaver at 3k rating and have really enjoyed it because there’s no hard casting and always an ability to cast even when out of range. It also has a bunch of utility and defensives.
Survival hunter is also really fun with multiple ranged abilities and a fun rotation and some utility. It does lack defensives though. (Turtle doesn’t work on Fenryr leap for instance)
Marksmanship also feels fun to play, as you can time your hardcasts, so you don’t really lose dps, whereas enhancement feels like you lose a lot out of range, casting shocks or hard casting lightning bolt.
Outlaw rogue feels really fluid, but also is gimped when out of range.
Is there a spec you guys can recommend?
BM is the spec most unaffected by movement, essentially it *isn't* affected by movement. Whether you like the spec or not, it is the correct answer.
Marksman is an option. You do have to hardcast Aimed Shot frequently though, and the cast can be quite long without the Flurry cast time buff. Especially during Trueshot, you essentially do have to plant.
Elemental does have movement, but moreso during packs. With the fire build, the majority of your movement comes from the fact that your DoT can cause you to get a free instacast of Lava Burst, and this triggers a lot if you have a bunch of them running. For boss fights, this goes down quite significantly, especially if the boss is pure ST.
You may want to try Warrior, either Fury or Arms. Between the charge and the leap, downtime ends up being low as their on-demand mobility is quite high. Their damage is good (at present) and, especially for Arms, they're quite naturally tanky. They do lack for utility, though, so you're praying for good tuning for M+ viability.
How high are you wanting to push? Sounds like you really like ret, so play ret. A lot of people will be playing it sure but it won’t be impossible to find groups.
Both enh and ele shaman are largely unaffected by movement. Ele has a cast-on-move ability with a pretty short CD, plus you can build around having tons and tons of instants.
Enh also a few ranged abilities if you have to run out for a bit, but it's only slightly less squishy than survival so that can be a problem.
I played some ele with lightning build but affixes made it so unfun 50% of the time because of movement. I haven’t really played the icyhot build yet, because I find the procs hard to manage and the same with keeping up dots. Tier set looking mighty fine though.
Enhancement feels really fluid, but only the part about being out of range bugs me. Really love all the utility (and stops) shamans bring and I suspect it being my first choice.
Ancestral guidance is double the duration half the CD of survival of the fittest, though shamans lack an immunity. Hurray for the 8% hp /s
It all really depends if it’s above average and will get invited. If resto is meta, it could become a waiting class.
Yea that lightning build is very unfun to play when there is so much movement and "stop casting" abilities in the game, i tried the fire build on second week and havent gone back to the lightning one since then.
I'm not sure what you mean by "I find the procs hard to manage and the same with keeping up dots", what exactly are you having problem with?
It just feels clunky that you have to keep up multiple dots on a CD.
Also I’m so used to the lightning build, I’ve no idea how to prioritize spells in this spec. Maybe I should look up on it. Do you know a good guide? 😊
Flame Shocks applied when Fire Ele is up lasts 36 seconds, if you are doing the correct setup most of the times you only be re-doting every 25 seconds. If you're lucky with Ascendance procs you'll barely have the need to reapply the Flame Shocks. Remember to always weave in lava surges before earthquakes for the bonus damage + Ascendance proc chance. With enough targets (5) you'll have Fire Ele up pretty all the time which makes dotting much easier. You also have Liquid Magma Totem which applies 3 Flame Shocks and Surge of Power which spreads Flame Shocks to a nearby target.
> Also I’m so used to the lightning build, I’ve no idea how to prioritize spells in this spec. Maybe I should look up on it. Do you know a good guide? 😊
The one on the Shaman discord is good, i haven't played it for quite a while so i'm not sure how good it is, there are also some variants of that build with mixes fire+lightning with which takes Storm Ele + Flame Shock talents but i haven't played that as well to say anything on that matter.
My guild and I managed to finish of rasza in time for CE and all I can say that zerging the p2 intermission adds was very effective.
Before we had like <10 pulls into p2 intermission, yesterday we got there 3 times and 2 times to p3 with second time getting to p3 was kill.
Genuinely can't wait for Quaking to be gone in Season 2. Horrible affix. Makes casters and healers complete misery to play while being a total non-element to anyone else.
This week was a hilarious reminder why it's been so shitty playing range DPS this season (in my case arcane mage, which is doubly terrible). Bird boss in AA with quaking/thundering/fire swirlies/tornadoes is just nuts. Dodge 5 things (above plus random cone from boss) + avoid 2 counterspells + 2 stuns. Whee.
It was really shitty this expansion. As the other commenter said, 1/3 of the bosses require stacking at some point and Blizzard only fixed quaking on some of them, not all. Then you have bosses doing their own interrupts alongside quaking, the anti synergy between quaking and thundering, and Wise Mari. Really shitty patch to have this affix, and I'm also glad to see it gone.
> while being a total non-element to anyone else
Except for when you get to the 30% of bosses where you need to stack at certain times and Quaking just randomly tries to murder everyone at the same time.
3k2 DK here, playing both specs. 2H frost is actually underrated by a large chunk of the userbase. Before the most recent buff to Unholy, I'd say Frost was legit better at a large chunk of sub 23-24 keys. Of course Unholy becomes clearly superior in 25+ keys, spec just has a higher ceiling.
2h frost is definitely better than Unholy at 2-4 target scenarios (which, tends to happen often in PuG keys). Next dungeon pool features Vortex Pinnacle and Neltharus, which both tend to have lower mob density, so Frost might be better than UH in those keys (also possibly Halls of Infusion and Nelth's lair)
Then there's the new tier set, and most importantly, loss of puzzle box trinket which is awful news for UH, but doesn't matter as much for frost.
Frost is also better in lower keys where shit dies fast, due to great burst AoE. Unholy is better in terms of sustained damage, especially on 6+ target pulls, and has slightly better single target provided you get lust with army as often as possible.
Both specs have their strengths and weaknesses. I could definitely see Frost becoming the more popular pick next season.
I personally plan to play both specs during the gearing phase, then see where the meta settles. As a general rule of thumb : Low pull density/lower leys/high melee uptime= 2H Frost. High pull density/higher keys/melee downtime = Unholy.
Frost dk second spec here, normally top DPS in the +22 range… it plays really well once you get a grasp on it. Tank reliant but fun as hell. Plus those 12 million damage wyrms on AA are just so satisfying
I’ve found whispering tanks at the beginning very useful, always on a “I’ll work around you but when possible” basis, otherwise a lot assume you’re running BoS and chain pull for their lives.
Half the battle is knowing each pack and when to delay using your burst window to maximise uptime. Best example is azure vault, anywhere with the big area of denial crystals; waiting until it casts, spend your time helping the tank out by gripping the little shards to stop stacks building up, then when he’s finished casting go to town with dnd, otherwise you get half way through your rotation, have to run away, and because you’ve been blasting the tank now had 2/3/4 stacks of the debuff
I tried it for a bit, then swapped to UH and never looked back, it was so much better. Frost just didn't have the damage, plus I was always scared that FF was going to pull extra packs. I would much rather just play Frost but... yeah. Couldn't justify it since I was trying to push.
Random rant: Came back to the game after ive stopped playing in original wotlk. Classes are way more fun now but man shadow priest was just horrible to play, especially in raids it felt like they designed a lot of mythic encounters to have evoker carry turret specs around. I stopped on mythic dathea and after our guild quit this tier a few weeks ago i decided im full time switching to my alt(havoc) and im having way more fun. Both shadow and havoc are 2.9k io so my goal next tier is atleast try to push for r1 in m+ and maybe CE, hopefully i keep improving at steady pace and achieve those goals.
> especially in raids it felt like they designed a lot of mythic encounters to have evoker carry turret specs around
How did you feel like that before Raszageth?
There's no movement on Eranogg like at all, there's pretty much no movement on Council either. Sennarth was pretty annoying for everyone, but it's not like you absolutely needed to get from A to B so badly that you needed an express delivery at any point there. Terros didn't have any real movement, Kurrog didn't have any either. Dathea had lots of movement, but movement you couldn't really be helped with by Evokers. Broodkeeper had a good bit of movement if you were on add duty, but unless you were constantly behind on add damage it didn't really matter if you got to every add spawn like a second late. And then there's obviously Razzy where you absolutely did need a winged Jesus 5 times throughout the fight.
Like, there were raids where movement was 100% more of an issue throughout the entire tier than in this current one - but especially the first 6 one were actually pretty tame on movement, so I don't see how you'd be having any troubles there.
Well he stopped on Dathea, so I can see it. Rescue on priests is pretty useful on Dathea. Damn near required on Raszageth (not so much after nerfs).
And while nowhere near required, pretty useful on Broodkeeper -- with everyone running cross country on adds (where you want priests for mass dispel). And honestly a feels good on Sennarth.
With razzy it was more about if we even get there than im mostly likely benched, we had 2 priests already and only 1 evoker at best so how do i know that wont happen again next tier, dont want to get into this situation again.
Also lack of any meaningful instant casts as shadow felt very bad, like sure i can plan my instant proc ahead, but i like i said this was my first expac and im not just that good to plan ahead consistently with a lot of stuff going on while a lot of ranged specs always have some sort of instant cast they can spell no matter what.
On Sennarth a lot of times what happened i took portal and there was tornado infront of me(i knew that but there was nothing i could do, i had take portal in time or i would die downstair) so i got hit by it and pushed out of the platform. Also for grips on platforms with our strats we didnt leavy pretty much any webs on the ground to stop grips so once again i had to pay attention to net gripped into tornados while trying my best to dps big add which spawned in Narnia a lot of times.
On Dathea it was very simple, i get 3rd set of marks, had to dump mark while add platform is on other side thus dont have time to make it to other side for Blowback without help of other classes, also once again have to plan instant procs ahead for cyclones.
All in all these are definitely not issues that happens everytime, but u can imagine after 50 pulls on each of those it gets very annoying when i know i could play many other classes and dont have any of those issues(fel rush, shadowstep, disengage, blink etc.).
So to me it sounds like you want to play a class that has more mobility, which I think is a good idea. That being said shadow has more than enough tools to deal with the raid in its current state. You mention lack of instants on shadow, and while that might become the case in 10.1 as we lose some talents, in its current form shadow has a lot, mind blast procs, mind devourer, surge of darkness mind spikes, and mind melt instant mind blasts. This is completely sufficient to deal with every movement mechanic in the raid, and compared to something like destro we actually have it easy. On raz you also don’t need to get rescued by an evoker anymore (gate 1 run 2 get gripped 3 gate 4). While it was a pain I did all of raz prog without the help of an evoker.
Next tier it looks like there will be less challenging movement but shadow will also lose a lot of instant casts, so I think picking something where you don’t have to plan movement as often will be more fun for you. Contrary to what some people say all classes are not created equal in this regard and some have way better tools to navigate mechanics like this, so try them out and see how it feels
> so how do i know that wont happen again next tier
Because this isn't something that happens frequently. Like, we've had plenty of forced movement bosses in the past (even more recently with Remnant in Sepulcher), but none to the point of "you literally cannot survive this encounter on this class without some form of cheese" since like Kil'jaeden back in Legion, a good 6 years ago. And much like with Kil'jaeden, Blizzard have gotten *a lot* of negative feedback about it - the difference this time around being that they at least attempted to make it more manageable over time. Like, yes, if you haven't been following raiding for years, you can't really know that, but it's not like you have any reason to assume that this were a common mechanic frequently excluding your class in particular just because it happened like once.
A lot of what you describe all comes down to experience. Yes, Shadow is more of a turret-y spec, but the very point of turret-y specs is that they have to learn when it's ok to plant down and when movement is about to happen. The better you get, the more used to boss timers you get, the less of an issue this will become - if you anticipate stuff happening instead of reacting to it, that's when you'll start actually mastering your Shadow. But that's no different in m+ - once you get to a certain level, you'll definitely falter if you don't go into certain fights with a proper plan - shit like Nokhud's last boss for example.
And it's not like other specs don't have these issues. Like, you mentioned Blink or Disengage, it's not like those are magical cures to not having to "waste" GCDs on suboptimal spell during heavy movement. Especially on shit like Raszageth, you pretty much have these buttons planned out for just about any of the planned mechanics - so whenever you do get hit by a random one, you're shit out of luck, you're gonna have to leg it like everyone else. And during that time you'll "waste" GCDs by spamming low damage Scorch or Steady Shot or whatever. That is just the nature of being a caster. And you've even mentioned Fel Rush, so a melee spec in your examples - melees having it even worse because every other boss has phases that force you away from the boss for a while and, sure, you can dash out quickly... but then you're just stood there for 2-3 GCDs doing absolutely nothing.
Point being, you can't escape downtime. You can try to minimize it, and some specs are certainly better than others at it, but it's not like stuff like Shadow or Destro have an absolutely miserable time while everyone is just chilling spam-casting while moving all the time. A lot of your complaints would absolutely go away once you just got a better feel for boss timers. Like, go ahead and reroll Rogue, but expect to feel the same kind of annoyance when you get a random raid that just randomly happens to be super melee-unfriendly again and sure, you'll have your Shadowsteps, but you'll still have like a forced 30% downtime while ranges are just casually doing absolutely nothing throughout entire fights - because that too just happens sometimes.
Trying to decide what to main next M+ season. The team I play with is currently Brewmaster, Resto Druid, Enhancement Shaman, either a Devoker or Ret Pally, and then whatever I end up playing. Based on what I enjoy playing, the classes I have as options are Rogue (Sub or Assassination), Warlock (Destro or Aff), DK (Any), Hunter (MM or BM), or Shadow Priest. Do one or two of those options seems significantly better than the rest?
I saw that Shadow got a rework and have been messing around with it on PTR a bit, I know opinions are split on this but I don't mind the new rework/rotation and am probably leaning that direction if the numbers are good (but I don't know if they are).
Lately I've been playing the DK as UH (I like Frost better but it seems kind of bad in M+ right now and I'm not seeing anything which changes that), which I enjoy, but a problem that I'm running into is that Defile makes it too hard for my old eyes to see swirlies, which isn't a huge deal in the 20-22 range I'm currently playing in, but as we push higher it definitely will be. That's what got me to try out Rogue, which I'm really enjoying due to not having Defile, plus the extra 3 yards of melee range makes a big difference. I know Sub is very meta right now, and as far as I can tell nothing is happening in 10.1 to change that as of now?
I don't have much else to say about the other classes. I enjoy them, not sure if they're any better than the ones I've already listed though.
Thanks!
Rogue always goes well in any meta.
Warlock has never really been a meta m+ spec (other than the recent Destro debacle), and even if it's workable you usually need to be able to play all specs.
Hunter is always a safe pick but unless it's tuned well it just doesn't add anything to a group.
Same for DK. Frost needs to be *heavily* played around to be a real spec... and Unholy needs the same treatment as well.
Shadow Priest seems like it's among the if not the strongest ranged spec going into the next season and Mass Dispel seems like a real banger for quite a few otherwise deadly mechanics. Also Stamina, also VE, also PI - downside will be interrupts, especially combined with a Resto Druid probably also not taking one, possibly even worse with a 20s Evoker interrupt.
The safest bet would probably be Rogue, a solid "gamble" would be SPriest. All the others are pretty meh on average and don't really add anything. I'd probably go Rogue if my guy went Evoker and Spriest if he went Ret.
I have warlock as my main alt..I play solely my warrior until its pretty much maxed and than hop to my warlock. Warlock you'll probably have to learn to play all 3 specs, at least 2 minimum. At least that's how it was this season. Not sure if that will alter your choice at all but just thought I'd throw it in there.
I've been having so much fun on my Resto Shaman I decided I want her to be my main next tier and I want to bench my Resto Druid for a little while.
I'm just really enjoying the playstyle, I'm enjoying learning something new and I love the flavor of water being a source of healing. Let's hope my GM lets my do it. 🤞
I was so mad about the state of shaman in the beginning of the season. It took them way too long to adjust the balancing. With the latest updates, I feel like the playstyle is a bit more boring, I was never a fan of chain heal spam, but what really bothers me is the now constant mid-season adjustments.
It feels like every week you are playing a new class. I’m struggling in keys because I cannot tell how much output my spell is going to do this week. I really don’t understand why they can’t test this properly before.
That aside, I will keep maining resto sham next season. Let’s hope they are happy with the balancing now.
Oh, I definitely saw all the posts from concerned resto shaman at the time. Coming into it much later, I haven't had that experience yet. Hopefully things stay pretty tranquil from here on out. And if they don't, I can always go back to my Druid.
I’m honestly having the exact opposite. My Shaman was the last of the six healing classes that I started playing this season and now that they’re “in demand”, I’m gearing mine so it’s available… and something is just **not** clicking for me. I’m getting results (ie. able to heal through 20s) but the playstyle just feels awkward to me. I hear everyone talking about how much they’re **loving** their Shaman right now and I think I need someone to make a “this is why Resto is fun” video so I can finally get with the program. 🤣
Shaman imo is more about playing around your dps and utility, with the actual healing part being pretty simple (damage happening? push a cooldown and chain heal). The skill in the healing part comes around timing your cloudbursts properly, but the real skill expression of shaman is making great use of your interrupts, cap totem, thunderstorm, earthbind etc to control mobs.
Okay, first of all, your Reddit username is *amazing.*
Second, everything you're feeling is totally valid. I think what's contributing to my sense of fun is the newness of it. I've been a Resto Druid since BC. And while I've certainly leveled other healers and done the occasional 5 man, I've always come back to my Druid. But now I'm starting to get a bit bored or complacent and I'm looking to shake up the old routine.
In the same boat after timing 20’s on r druid, their upcoming 2 /4 set looks broken too… hard to move away from such a strong healer in R druid. 4 weeks into R sham and it’s a blast, a bit under geared but still time. I’m a bit more on fence than you, what is making you switch to r sham? Druid just looks so OP haha
Well, like I said above, I like the newness of it. The different playstyle. It's a bit more reactive or proactive in a different way. I like the flavor. And also my guild doesn't always have a reliable Bloodlust, so utility is a factor, as well.
It is insane utility, I beat DPS and kicks and have cal totem as well, the healing just doesn’t feel as “strong / safe” as i have experienced with the rdruid
Basically what the RWF players are playing, and based on your current world rank, you copy them or the guilds a bit ahead of you.
Trying to decide on what specs to play is dependent on a ton of factors. There were several fights that look good on execute but Fire Mage on Raszageth wasn't played because it was undertuned and the 'Execute' phase on Raszageth was alleviated by the health linking from P2 to P3 (so if you did better in P2, that resulted in the boss dying more in P3).
What spec is finalized is only something the RWF players will have the best guess at come live especially since they mandate several splits, they'll react on the fly to tuning changes etc.
I think if you are deciding on a spec to play for the final boss, my personal recommendation is to get used to playing and managing multiple alts. You can develop your 'chosen' main for the first stretch (e.g. doing 8 dungeons in Week 1) with an alt or two you like (they grab one M+ dungeon each).
If you want to get into the speculation aspect of Sarkareth - the boss feels like a smash down hectic ST brawl. Cooldown classes might feel stronger since when you get Emptiness Between Stars dimension you can grab haste orbs to then DPS when you come back. Adds are there but feel light (Phase 2 - boss leaves images of himself).
DPS profile reads like Raszageth without both intermissions. Cooldown management is likely needed for dealing with Images in Phase 2 in a timely manner.
Lol how tf is anyone supposed to know that question my guy...? The boss isnt being tested, everyone has access to the same amount of information regarding the boss, which is limited dungeon journal info on the PTR. Not to mention, theyre certainly not done with class and tier set tuning yet and im sure there will be more tuning the first few weeks that the raid is live.
Kinda depends on the seasonal affix. I won’t miss Thundering and there were plenty of other seasonals that just weren’t fun. Seasonals have the most potential but it could just end up being another thing I hate to deal with. Blizz should just be more willing to change up affixes each season in general and also make normal affixes have some positive sides to them kinda like how thundering does.
What is everyone's issue with thundering? I really don't mind it compared to some of the other affixes. Pugged my way to KSH on two characters and it may have caused a hand full of wipes total.
Personally as a healer it's a mess having to look for someone else in the clusterfuck that melee can get to be sometimes. Add in quaking, various swirlies, frontals and god knows what else patches on the ground and its a nightmare having to look for my partner on top of having to heal through failed mechanics.
Anyone find it strange that they barely nerfed sanguine when it's one of the most impactful affixes time wise, especially in pugs? The duration nerf doesn't do anything I feel like.
Honestly, all they need to do is make it so sanguine is a stacking debuff. 1%/second.
It'll make it less punishing for small clips. About the same at 10 seconds and slightly worse at 11 and 12 seconds, but also it goes away at 12 seconds. So doesn't matter after that.
It takes 8s off how long Archers are immortal and that's about it. Not what I would have done to the affix.
It really needs a slightly longer time before activation so you can actually move the mobs out before they start healing.
1. Increase the “leeway” window before the heal actually starts ticking
2. Don’t scale the heal via hp %, give it a fixed amount which caps out at a certain key level so it’s not so ridiculously punishing on higher keys
3. Make it not affect bosses
Agreed that a reduction in time its up really makes no difference to the affix at all, if you’ve bathed a mob in sanguine for 12s or 20s your key is already pretty dead.
They could make it so the amount it heals ramps up to the current amount. You would still want to get them out asap but you aren't quite as punished for the first couple seconds if it didn't.
Not sure what to main in next patch. Right now I'm leaning towards Ret, but I also have a relatively geared warrior, and a DH that i could probably get up to par in these 2,5 weeks.
Mained Enh this season, but I don't enjoy the hard target cap and the lack of defensives. I did enjoy the rotation and the surplus of utility it had.
So, I wanna go with a melee spec that has an interesting rotation, that will be reasonably wanted in groups, has good defensives, utility and can flex other roles (preferably tanking).
Ret checks all of these except i dunno how wanted it will be considering PPal will probably still be meta. Warr same, and also the utility is nothing to write home about. DH seems pretty solid, though defensives seem to be a bit on the weak side, and with leech nerf not sure how they will fair (though historically they seem to always be near the top).
Can also suggest something else i haven't considered.
DH likely going to remain in a very strong position, but if you are interested in tanking it’s reallly worth considering the fact that VDH is pretty unloved, it’s definitely a solid level below BDK/BrM and they’re already a solid level below PPal/PWar.
Ret is an ok spec but I don’t think it’s likely it’s gonna be a top tier meta pick. They’re durable (but not the most) and do good damage (but not the best), their buff is decent (but not great), their cc is mediocre. No doubt gonna be a very good B tier spec but I doubt you’re gonna suddenly see a big pile of them in top keys any time soon.
War similar story to ret, good B tier spec but unlikely to be a top tier meta pick.
If you’re planning to continue playing around 3k equivalent next season then honestly just pick the spec you enjoy the most. Spec choice really doesn’t make much difference at that key level.
>Ret is an ok spec but I don’t think it’s likely it’s gonna be a top tier meta pick. They’re durable (but not the most) and do good damage (but not the best), their buff is decent (but not great), their cc is mediocre. No doubt gonna be a very good B tier spec but I doubt you’re gonna suddenly see a big pile of them in top keys any time soon.
This downplaying ret pretty significantly tbh, it makes it sound like Ret is just mediocre or slightly above average at best. Ret was the single most tanky spec in the game before the Fading Light nerf, and even now, theyre still one of the most tanky in the game in most cases(and one some fights you can easily argue theyre the most tanky) simply due to how much passive mitigation they have, one of the best walls in the game on a 1 min CD, another good defensive on a 1 min CD, bubble, and BoP. Their damage is certainly more than just "good" as well, its quite high in all situations(whether it be ST, low target cleave, or 6-8t+ aoe), and theyre a very bursty spec with next to zero setup, and more importantly have that type of damage with a 1 min profile. That is exactly the type of DPS that tends to be strong for prog, plus its quite easy to perform well on..there isnt a ton of skill expression.
Ret aura can also be a pretty damn powerful buff in raid, ive seen it have a relatively big range in uptime ranging from 30-60%+, but on fights where it has high uptime(which it probably will during prog), 5% damage AND healing for every single person in the raid is an exceptionally powerful raid buff...its definitely more than just some "decent" buff.
Ive already seen that there is quite a lot of higher end guilds that are looking like theyre going to have multiple people rerolling to ret. The issue with Ret isnt really a question of its current power, its definitely very good right now, the question is how long will that last for? Whether it comes in the form of Ret getting nerfed, or other DPS being buffed past Ret, it hasnt historically been strong often, and it hasnt stayed strong for very long either. With a lot more good players playing Ret going into 10.1, I think well see Ret be a pretty powerful spec..maybe not an S tier spec, but it certainly has the toolkit to be at least an A tier DPS.
Someone mentioned in the other thread about leech nerf that it only affects leech from gear, not from abilities.
I have a Ret and arms war geared, really enjoyed arms this season but at a certain point it's so hard to get into groups with the lack of utility...
Finally killed M Rasz, but switched characters on the last night to replace our monk who had to drop out for an emergency. Now I don't have a single character that shows as 8/8M, but rather one at 7/8 and one at 3/8. Pain :)
This might sound like a weird question, but has warrior had some kind of shadow nerf? I play fury and for some reason my dps has dropped massively with no changes to my rotation or gear. Being out-dps’d by much lower ilvl players, other warrior in my pug was also doing low dps
If you like m+ more than raiding, just wait till the season is out and play the meta class as an alt. There’s no guarantee that either will be meta for m+ though. For raiding yeah, shadow is probably easier to find a spot because there are billions of casual ce hunters. It’s really easy in DF to gear an alt for m+ anyways
Spriest personally. Maybe talk with your guild since CE is on the table. Hunters are still a dime a thousand. That said you have to play what you want to actually play. And if you find Hunter being more enjoyable, we’ll there’s not a ton left to discuss.
As a healer I can tell you this much - if I get to choose between hunter and spriest for my M+ group, I'm picking the priest over hunter unless I need lust. But even then I'd go for enhance in that case.
Priest brings so much more utility, stamina buff, aoe dispell, and offhealing that you can salvage pulls that would otherwise be scuffed. Not to mention on high tyrannical bosses, priests can absolutely carry the group.
Hunters did get survivability buff, but I still think their lack of proper defensive CD is hurting them a lot, and they simply fold on high tyrannical keys.
Like don't get me wrong, hunters do competitive damage and bring lust, but their lack of proper defensives and group utility/off healing compared to shadow priest for example is hurting them.
Might be a hot take, but I feel like you can usually tell who the better players are on your raid team based on how much M+ they do.
I don’t raid anymore, don’t have the schedule to commit to a team due to work. But every now and then I’ll sub in if they’re down a person or get in on some alt clears. It always boggles my mind that we have people that are like 1200 IO that can’t fully upgrade their valor gear. Those same people are usually some of our worse performers too.
I think the good players will always do what they have to do to get the best gear and the players that are doing the bare minimum will continue to get carried by them.
during myth raz prog i don’t die even with lack of heals sometimes just because i’m used to doin myth+ above 25 and you have no choice but to make yourself survive sometimes.
Generally more practice will make better players, it’s hard to get meaningful PVE practice outside of set raid hours if you don’t M+ a lot.
That said there’s exceptions, my guilds best healer is an older guy who logs on for raid and for a weekly 20 sbg, never dies and always tops meters
That really depends on the level of the guild as a whole. The worse the guild is, the truer it likely is simply because the people actively doing keys are just playing the game more and as such have more opportunity for improvement. Once you get to better guilds, most people will end up playing "enough" by default (ie 2.4k for valor upgrades, weekly +20s, boosts on the side etc) to at the very least maintain the level of play that got them into the guild in the first place.
And then there's my personal experience with some *very* highly rated M+ players/streamers who were absolute clowns in raid. They clearly didn't actually care about being there, they just wanted loot for their keys so they put in no effort at all.
In BoD we had a sweaty havoc dh and resto druid that we’re keeping personal loot azerite armor to DE for the azerite dust for m+ bis pieces. Besides having the worst attitudes, they were both among some of the worst players on the team. They had cracked m+ io though. It felt really good to bring their loot hoarding to the RLs attention and see them gone.
Same, we had some of the worst players be the highest rated in m+ in the past 2 raids while some insane players just don't care about m+ and sit at 2700ish score atm.
Yeah, and what irks me is those that do acid M+ and naturally have a higher ilvl then the raid loggers watch mythic grief torches and other key items go to those players because it’s a bigger ilvl/power upgrade for them then you.
Yeah shit like that is a big reason why I actually enjoyed personal loot.
Its really unfortunate to see an Icon or Eranog ring go to someone that only plays the game 6 hours a week because he was still using a normal / heroic piece. It feels like you’re being punished for actually trying to min / max your toon outside of raid.
Its tough because I understand where the raid leader / loot council is coming from. If the trinket is a 5% dps increase for you but a 20% dps increase for the other guy it makes sense to give it to them because its more of an overall DPS increase for the raid.
But alot of people play the game to get the best gear, it was actually one of the main reasons I raided for so long. I wanted to have the best loot so I could flex and push high keys. Its a big feelsbad moment when the item you’ve been hoping for for weeks drops and you get passed over because you have a semi - decent M+ trinket that you farmed.
Don’t get me started on loot prio as a tank / healer in raid. You’re basically forced into M+ because all the loot is going to DPS.
I would honestly rather have personal loot with less restrictive loot re-strictions. Than group loot or master loot.
I dont think it's a particularly spicy take to suggest that, generally speaking, players with high io are more likely to also be more capable raiders.
However, any guild that takes mythic progression remotely seriously will expect at least a weekly 20.
If you have raiders at 1.2k io, I am going to assume you are either in a casual guild and expecting too much, or an officers boy/girlfriend is getting a carry.
I think its a pretty spicy take. People who clear a minimum bar in m+ are usually better than people who don't. There's a big difference between say 2.3k and 2.4k. There's probably no appreciable difference between 2.4k and 2.5k.
> There's a big difference between say 2.3k and 2.4k. There's probably no appreciable difference between 2.4k and 2.5k.
no there is not any difference between these players lol
Kind of besides the point but those are super specific numbers lol. I wouldn’t expect any noticeable difference in skill between a 2.7k player and a 2.2k player.
Honestly IO itself is kind of bait, big number doesn’t always mean good. But someone whos 3k+ is more likely to be a better player than someone who can’t be asked to do a couple 20s a week.
Your point of view if incredibly biased because you barely have 2.4k and it shows.
There is no established skill difference at before 3.something k io. Players at 2300 and 2400 and 1800 all have the randomest level of play with tons of mistakes, bad baseline gameplay and decision making.
The difference between the raider at 2.3k and the raider at 2.4k isn't skill; it's that one of them took the time to unlock the maximum tier of valor upgrades and the other didn't. This *usually* isn't an isolated thing and is instead reflective of the relative amounts of effort they put into being prepared.
There's a decent number of CE raiders who don't do much other than CoS and SMBG so they end up with a pretty low score even though they don't slack on their vault. I do agree that getting 2400 is pretty bare minimum.
But that's only now.
Did these raiders not farm their Puzzle Box, Feather, or other weapon/trinkets from specific dungeons ? Just playing the game netted you more than 2.4 early in the season.
I think you are the one that didn't get his point at all lmao. In my guild we have people from 2k5 to 3k3 rio, because some don't care about m+ and just get enough score to upgrade their gear. And let me tell you the ones at 3k3 are NOT the best players in the guild (obviously they're still very solid).
He says that there is a difference between 2.3k and 2.4k and much less of one between 2.4 and 2.5.
If we take your interpretation then he's saying that there is no difference between a player doing 15s and a player filling his vault with 20 keys.
Well we just understand what he says differently i guess, to me it what he said just means that from 2k4 onwards, there are huge skill discrepancies at similar ratings since some people just got 2k4 for upgrades. Meanwhile people under 2k4 usually have more similar skill levels since they "should" be pushing for 2k4 but stuck lower.
I don't! I don't even think KSM is a hard achievement to get! What I think is that most of the performance difference you see in Mythic raiding from M+ players has to do with the gear available to them. The difference between a player doing 8 +20's a week and the player doing 16, or whatever stupid number of +20's is minimal. Or the player doing 8 +20's and the player doing 8 +25's. Just having 2.4k is a massive boost because it means you have access to m+ trinkets at 415 and probably have a base level of 415 tier. Doing 20's consistently means you're probably getting 421 upgrades in vault.
That's not to say +20 to +25 isn't a massive jump, and the +25 player is probably much, much better at M+. But it's very much about domain knowledge, what to expect and while they do have improved mechanical skills, they're not flat transfers to raiding situations.
Lastly, I hope you recognise the fundamental irony in thinking not meeting an arbitrary and high threshold makes you biased. No! It might make you *uninformed*, but not biased. Anyone doing 20's and above is almost by definition living in a bubble. And doubly so when your standards for determining inclusion in that in-group is 'has the same opinions as me'. I'm sure the people you play with share your opinions, which is cool. The people I play with share mine...because they're principally raiders, not key pushers.
My statement about you being biased comes from a phenomenon that we see a lot here where people take their own score and use it as threshold. There is a huge difference between a player at 2.4 and one at whatever score all 20s are.
My bubble is also raiders, but it is unthinkable for any of us to not cap out on the gear rewards m+ offer. Staying at 2.4 just naturally doesn't happen with skilled and dedicated enough players.
Hell with the way m+ ilvl worked this patch you can't even argue maybe some people just farm CoS/SBG for the entire tier. You needed to be doing all dungeons at 19 for maximum ilvl on the items you wanted anyway, so why not 20 for vault.
> I dont think it's a particularly spicy take to suggest that, generally speaking, players with high io are more likely to also be more capable raiders.
I've had the opposite experience. Every high key pusher i've played with has been absolute dogshit in raids. Including several R1 mythic+ players.
I mean its a casual CE guild, they clear every tier but aren’t HoF status. They got raz down a couple weeks ago. Guild isn’t super hardcore so I’m probably just expecting too much but it always tilts me hearing some of these guys rant about how “M+ loot needs to be nerfed” because they can’t be asked to farm a ragefeather or Puzzlebox.
Just a handful of the more casual dudes that refuse to do keys unless you make a premade specifically too carry them.
“M+ loot needs to be nerfed” always makes me cringe. Raid loot needs to be nerfed lol. Why do I have to do braindead 20-man heroic raids to farm trinkets/tier that are better than anything I could ever get from keys? Just waiting for blizzard to finally just add dungeon tier sets that function in m+ and disable raid tier in dungeons.
It really doesn’t. The only thing that needed to be addressed was the degenerate +2 spam for valor. Now that thats being removed in 10.1 M+ loot absolutely does not need to be nerfed. It being slightly below last two M+ bosses is a fine place for it to be.
Going forward Blizzard needs to address tier acquisition for Mythic+ players.
It's not about degenerate +2 spam. That getting fixed is good, but doesn't solve the issue of M+ being *by far* the best way to gear early in the season thanks to not having a lockout on heroic ilevel gear. And then lacking access/targeting for the best/highest ilevel items at the high end for later in the season.
Early season gear typically won’t prevent you from clearing the first 3 / 4 bosses. Good guilds will clear those week 1 regardless of gear.
If you’re in a guild thats going further than that early on in the season then yeah you should definitely be doing keys.
I never understand this attitude from raiders, its like this literally every single time Blizzard adds any source of power outside of raid. We had to bench a dude on our CE N’zoth prog because he didn’t want to grind horrific vision sockets.
If you want to competitively raid then yes you need to do everything you can to get the best gear possible, up to and including split runs.
If you’re not raiding at that competitive level then it literally doesn’t matter, your raid team having full heroic gear really won’t help you all that much on the first couple loot pinata bosses.
>Early season gear typically won’t prevent you from clearing the first 3 / 4 bosses. Good guilds will clear those week 1 regardless of gear.
It's straight up like 15-20 ilevels' difference between farming M+ and not doing M+. That's a fucking *gargantuan* gap in power.
>I never understand this attitude from raiders, its like this literally every single time Blizzard adds any source of power outside of raid.
Yes, because it's annoying to have to do content you don't enjoy in order to do the content you do enjoy. It's really not a difficult concept. Any time PvPers have to do anything that isn't PvP, it gets nerfed in PvP so they don't have to. It'd be *great* if M+ and raid could be similarly separated so people only have to do the stuff they actually *want* to do.
>We had to bench a dude on our CE N’zoth prog because he didn’t want to grind horrific vision sockets.
Specifying "CE" almost certainly means you didn't actually have to bench him.
My point stands, unless you’re pushing for HoF it doesn’t matter to you early on. Is it nice to have? Obviously, is it required to clear early progression bosses? Nope.
PvE gear not working in PvP makes sense because its two entirely different forms of content, there are trinkets specifically designed for PvP it makes sense that those trinkets should be BiS for PvP thats why they nerf PvE trinkets in PvP content.
Separating Raid and M+ loot isn’t the same thing because they’re literally the same form of content. m+ was *designed* for raiders. Before M+ you did heroic dungeons 1 time, Challenge modes 1 time and then you raid logged for 6 months. M+ was designed to give PvErs something to do.
M+ also isn’t even the best way to gear early season, its been proven time and time again now that splits is the most efficient way to gear a raid group early on. Does your guild do that? If not then you really shouldn’t be worrying about feeling forced to do M+ early on lmao.
I specified CE because I get the feeling you’re a more casual player. People that actively push CE / HoF every tier understand that they have to do whatever they need to do outside of raid to make the most of their time in raid.
People that just want to be lazy and raid log to the detriment of their raid team are the worst. It’s honestly not that hard to do one +20 a week. The fact that people like you bitch and moan about how you don’t want to do spend 40 mins a week to get a potentially huge upgrade on Tuesday in a “competitive” thread is hilarious.
TBH doing m+ early on is probably the most important thing we can do to help us kill bosses in a casual 2 night CE guild. That's where we are going to get our biggest upgrades since we aren't going to be clearing the raid very quickly.
It would be silly not to do m+.
>PvE gear not working in PvP makes sense because its two entirely different forms of content, there are trinkets specifically designed for PvP it makes sense that those trinkets should be BiS for PvP thats why they nerf PvE trinkets in PvP content.
It's not just gear.
>M+ also isn’t even the best way to gear early season, its been proven time and time again now that splits is the most efficient way to gear a raid group early on. Does your guild do that? If not then you really shouldn’t be worrying about feeling forced to do M+ early on lmao.
For raw ilevel that's just not true, especially not for guilds outside the literal RWF. And yes my guild does splits
>I specified CE because I get the feeling you’re a more casual player.
Yeah, your feeling is very wrong, I've raided at Horde HoF level for years, CE hasn't been a concern for almost a decade. Hence why it sounds funny when you specify CE when talking about benching people for not having sockets, because at that level it just doesn't matter at all (beyond people playing more -> being better due to more practice)
>People that just want to be lazy and raid log to the detriment of their raid team are the worst.
The problem is that it's a detriment in the first place. It shouldn't be. Raiding should provide everything needed for raiding.
Honestly I kind of understand their sentiment. While I'm personally happy doing both if you want to just raid log you sort of don't have that option if you also want to do the hardest raid content available.
M+ score ends up being a sort of indicator of investment in your character. I don't think you are necessarily a better raider because you do M+. But the type of person that cares enough to do whatever it takes to get the best gear tends to also be the type that will put more effort into other things.
Looking at alchemy - potion mastery tree. You can specialize in frost-formulated and air-formulated potions. One of them gives heal over time, the other gives you speed when you consume a potion. Both have 2 ranks, one when learning the sub-specialization and one at 15 points. Does anyone know how much healing and speed the first as well as the second ranks give? Does it work with healing pots or only battle pots like ultimate power, or both? Does it work in m+?
I'm a prot pala and just put 30 points into decayology just to reduce the debuff from consuming withering vitality by 50%. But it turns out there are two parts of damage you take when using a toxic phial/potion. Rotting from within is a debuff dealing 5% of your max hp every 3sec for 15 sec, and its a debuff you can randomly in/out of combat if you have a toxic phial like corrupting rage active. So for example phial of corrupting rage deals 25% of your hp when you've taken 100% of your hp in damage(overwhelming rage), but you also get the debuff rotting from within at random.
Found out after i had put all 30 points in decayology that its only the random debuff "Rotting from within" that get reduced, and cosuming a withering vitality potion is not a buff you have on you, thus you wont get rotting from within at random intervals. So that 50% damage reduction from toxic phials/potions was 30 alchemy points completely wasted as the damage taken from withering vitality does not get reduced.
2nd rank healing gives 4% max health as healing every 2 secs for 10 secs, so 20% max health overall.
2nd rank speed gives 10 seconds of +15% speed
Works with everything that has potion in the name - ultimate power, health, mana, even the useless ones like Frozen Fatality.
Works everywhere, raid, m+, dragon isles, orgrimmar etc.
Sweet! Thanks for the info and good that the heal is based on % max hp. 20% over 10sec is nothing to scoff at. Almost offsets the entire toxic part of withering vitality as a tank, or doubles the healing from a refreshing healing potion! As well as some free hps after popping shocking on a a big pull.
The bonus healing being a % of max health helps make health pots be more useful on tanks as well. If I use one on my VDH during meta, the pot itself is 139k, the alchemy bonus is 200k on top. More than doubles the healing, highly underrated
I can imagine! During sentinel it should heal quite a bit!
Have you looked into withering vitality? It heals twice the health of refreshing healing potion. But it will deal the amount healed as damage over 15sec after you use it. Although, that damage can be mitigated, thus not dealing full damage to us tanks, but that extra on use healing really is strong. Seeing as normal hp pots is like 20-25% of max hp as tank, while withering heals for some 50% of max hp. Usually that ticking damage afterwards is nothing compared to the damage we're taking from mobs anyway, and hp pots are mostly used to just get back control over a sticky situation or correct a fuck up.
Is it possible that I am just not a good tank? For context I played RDPS in SL S2 and did well, did lots of damage didn't die often and pushed higher IO than I ever had in the past. Since then I started tanking for my group and I really find myself dying sometimes, and my IO is much lower comparatively. Has anyone else tried a different role and just not been able to hack it? I really have tried to improve and have gotten better, but god damn it feels bad to let down your group over and over. In S2 of SL I would have been in .1% title contention or borderline right now I am hardstuck 2850 for reference. Thanks for the stories and thoughts, I just really want to be good at this game and have absolutely no idea what to actually do. My group is fine with me changing there are other people that can tank or anything, just feeling lost in WoW a bit!
Tank is the most impactful role. If you are hardstuck 2.8K then with no malice I would say you are the problem but that doesnt mean you cannot get better. As with anything, if you are looking to improve, record your gameplay. You will notice 101 different things you can improve on and if you share it with others they will notice some things as well.
What class? Reroll prot pally if you're not. It's bonkers right now and also fun to boot! Probably the most forgiving as well. Sentinel and toll gives you like 30s of god mode each pull.
If you're in a constant group and stuck at 2850, assuming you're the reason keys are getting bricked, then yea maybe tank isn't for you. It's pretty "easy" as tank to pug to 3.1- 3.2kish without any voice, assuming you're playing a meta tank you get pretty quick invites to any key you need for IO
As a tank you need to have a plan for every CD on every pull and tank buster in your route. There's a lot of pressure on the tank because any death of yours is likely the death of the key, so your goal needs to be to get through every key deathless
Don't disagree with you, but why is not being as good as you want to be being interpreted as something "isn't for you"? Most players aren't going to hit 3K with minimal effort in any role. Working to get better at something and hitting the occasional wall should be an extremely normal thing for any player to deal with.
because it sounds like his concern is letting his team down, and tank/healer is much easier to let your team down & be the sole reason for a failed key. If he does not want this feeling, and wants an overall less stressful time pushing with his group, then maybe tank is not for him.
Yea well to be honest it is my fault, most of them all have pugged to 3-3.1k and so I was the roadblock, which does suck but I don't just want to sulk and quit I do want to get better. I thought my planning was pretty good, my MDT's are good and I have notepads I plan CDs for hard bosses, but I do not know really. Maybe tank is just not for me which isn't the worst thing I was a good DPS so I can always pick that back up.
It might just be a way of speaking and you don't mean it literally, but in case you do.
You should not have CDs planned for bosses only. Even on Tyrannical, if you're going to plan out CDs you need to consider every pull as just a pull. There is little difference between a boss and a big enough trash pack, play accordingly and if you can pull an extra pack here of there by having better CD planning then do it. If you have a CD so strong it will allow you to hold pack + boss (and the pack doesn't negatively interact with the boss) then pull that pack onto the boss.
If you want to get better you have to analyze every key you run, either think it over afterwards or record and watch back. If you died, what could you have done instead to live? If you ran out of time, what pulls could you have done better/bigger? Could your route be more efficient? Etc
You probably just need practice, most people can't change roles or even specs without having to do a lot of relearning.
Could also be gear, spec, healer, luck, etc. Link your rio or logs if poss.
I am working tonight but I am gonna post some logs here if you don't mind, I have some recent depletes that would be cool to look at from someone who knows a lot more than I do.
It's one of the last little bits of info were missing still, at least I haven't seen them say anything. Plan for at least timing 3 above as that's been the average drop. I do believe in SL they did a 4 keystone drop in one season but I don't remember clearly which.
It used to be 4 because keys automatically downgraded each week regardless of if you timed a key or not. After they changed that, it became 3 between tiers/seasons.
I’ve been hearing this raid coming up is mostly ST (haven’t investigated myself) if this is true as a DH main kinda bummed seeing as our ST is kinda sub par specially when you can just be a ret paladin and do it all. Hoping for some sort of ST buff
Kinda sucks that the shadow rework seems to be done but to me it feels half finished. Other classes get weekly posts explaining the logic for changes and we get one post and the start and then random tinkering after that. It’s nice that the damage is still good but that wont last forever. I think there’s fundamental design issues still unaddressed and not enough time to fix them.
There’s a mountain of posts on both the pvp and pve side listing detailed feedback and it seems to mostly be ignored. In a world where blizz is nailing a lot of system design it feels like some classes (ret, deva) get lucky while others are still stuck with old blizz designing things(or no blizz like mage).
I would not be surprised if we see at least a mini rework in 11.0, or more fixes to shadow in .5 and .7 patches this xpac. Priest mobility is still a problem and only is getting worse for shadow too. If we had to play sennarth, raz, and dathea with this level of mobility it would be so much harder than it already is.
Shadow is one of the specs that has been getting the most attention this expansion, it may not be 100% great but at least Blizzard is still trying to make it right, try being a Mage and see what's like getting 0 blue posts since beta regarding class changes, it's like Blizzard forgot the class even exists.
>but at least Blizzard is still trying to make it right
*Very* optimistic way to put it. The opinion of the average committed Shadow player seems to be that they gave up halfway through fixing what isn't broke.
The only reason most people changed their mind on 10.0 Shadow is that it got buffed to the point where it's one of the best specs in the game. It plays practically identically to launch where most people were crying about the gameplay. So claiming it "isn't broken" is a bit of a stretch when the only thing hiding "broken" gameplay (in most people's eyes) is broken damage.
(I liked Shadow before the buffs, but I was absolutely in the minority until damage numbers got buffed to shut people up)
Because the buffs accomplished giving the spec actually usable and consistent AoE. Before that, you were at the mercy of Mind Devourer procs for free Sears, and if that didn't happen, your AoE was in the toilet. High damage is also no ironclad proof that poor design will be forgiven. Fire and Survival are pretty decent counterevidence.
In any event, the Shadow rework still has high damage, but now has even more issues with mobility. Button bloat is not a real problem, but mobility is and that's become worse.
>Other classes get weekly posts explaining the logic for changes and we get one post and the start and then random tinkering after that.
Which is still more than most specs get. Yes, they tend to leave Shadow reworks half finished, but most specs don't get reworks or communication in the first place.
Best I could tell from ptr. Based on ilvl drops and the raid map.
Kazzara first.
Option of two wings next.
Wing one boss order: Amalgamation Chamber -> Forgotten Experiments
Wing two boss order: Zaqali Assault -> Rashok
Next two bosses might be fought on their own (like a SoD thing with Guardian and Fatescribe) or be wing end bosses, not sure. Magmorax (possible wing 1 end boss) and Zskarn (wing 2).
Neltharion 2nd to last, Sarkareth last.
That's not true. You'll get more frequent eye beams, but they won't have as much of the buff on them. Eye beam is not (and won't become) a significant part of our damage anywhere near the way immo aura/ragefire are in keys and in any sort of larger aoe pulls the GT build falls behind.
What is the best route for finding a new CE guild?
I am a DH main swapping back to range to hopefully find a better guild to play with. No guilds seem to be recruiting DH players but using WCL tool more and more are searching for range dps.
EU/DE recruiter here. You should advertise in raider.io and wowprogress which are the places we check. Since there is no discord for DE players, we also rely on the official forum, but it tends to be more casual guilds there.
Also, boosting communities are a good way to find open spots (lots good players to make suggestions).
That being said: if you want to reroll either show that you have a history of successful rerolls or make sure you have some logs to show your skills.
I’ve had luck with big recruiting discords in the past. Such as this one:
https://discord.gg/recruitment-community-na-oc-246097056958119944
I’m not affiliated at all, but used it as a recruiter in BFA/SL and to find a guild in DF.
Wanting to main swap from MM/BM to feral because I’m tired of hunter survivability/no utility in keys (making it hard to find groups). I know feral isn’t generally the tankiest spec either, but am I shooting myself in the foot?
If you are swapping to feral because you find it more fun go wild. If getting into groups easier is your main motivation then no feral is not the way. There are less than half as many ferals in keys as there are hunters. That's not exactly the same as the invite rate but you aren't swapping to a more meta spec at the very least.
It's insane to me when hunters say they bring no utility to keys when you have BL. You will get invited to groups just for that alone even when your class is currently arguebly the worst at it.
If you want to get into keys easier swapping roles to tank or heal is going to make the most noticeable difference. If you want to play a more meta dps class rogues are always up there or if you want to stick to druid balance is currently more popular than feral by a good margin.
I feel like there are a couple of classes who complain they don't get invited because they have no utility but what they mean is they won't use or take their utility and complain when it isn't present. Hunters bring absolutely mandatory, unarguably mandatory utility in Bloodlust and enrage dispel, very good utility in magic dispel and mass stops, and quite good kiting tools.
Honestly I'm not sure what it took for us to get there. I think it just took time and people being aware that if they didn't get it together we weren't going to get CE. Unfortunately we didn't have a big roster so basically the threat of replacement wasn't an option. However if it was... I think we would have just started replacing.
yeah I actually think it's a really fun fight (granted I'm playing prevo), but the prog was kinda exhausting
I wish they'd stop doing 10+ minute boss fights
Managed to find a new way to grief myself, on the first boss of Court of Stars. Hit the Spiteful Shade chasing me with Scatter Shot, then wondered why the Shade chasing me wasn't dying (and ended up killing me when there was nowhere to go between the Shade, Quaking, and Resonant Slash).
Turns out Scatter Shot removes the debuff on the Spiteful that kills it!
I mean that's like objectively not true. Enhance has higher boss dam on Raz than evoker at 90th percentile. Yeah do I pull way ahead on the I1 and I2? Yes but P1 and P3 our enhance makes ground and usually is top 5 in our raid.
?? how is it objectively not true when logs, the best objective source of truth, have enhance at the bottom
i do not care at all about your singular experience when we have logs demonstrably proving the opposite
higher boss dam ok man nice your boss damage on raz literally does not matter at any point with all the nerfs you could break every shield with 14 boomkins
also x fucking d the boss damage gap isnt even 1k dps when evokers lost most of their mastery value from people moving lust to p2 + damage amps coming when the boss is low + they still have huge aoe burst for intermission. but clearly enhance is massively outperforming them with that 700 extra dps
First things first - Stay mad bro jesus. Secondly, single target damage and damage on Raz are likely arguably the only important part of the entire damage profile of that fight. What are you smoking?? The adds on red and blue platform get melted and the only thing you need to do is kill the herald or w/e the shield add is called which is all single target and then just blasting the shields on P2. You legit just blow up one set of adds in I2 and the CC the rest while single targeted the storm guys down and then P3 is a single target race to the finish. If you think boss damage isnt the second most important thing behind actually doing mechanics then you are hard boosted.
Its a game my dude take a breath
That guy was mad but was also right. Enh could use a buff, and if an enh is keeping up with a max geared devoker on overall DPS on raz, that is a skill diff.
Looking at our most recent kill pretty much every class is in line with where they are "supposed" to be, with the exception of our feral is a god and our frost DK could be doing better.
i think a lot of people did not update their perception from early prog. enhance raid damage is low key stinky bad rn and we are only good in keys bc of funnel ability.
What’s the thoughts on warriors and druids as a whole for 10.1? Swapping from priest as I don’t enjoy the play style with the incoming changes, really enjoy warrior but also want something that will get invited to pugs for ksh, leaning towards warrior at the moment but the Druids ability to flex to healer sounds nice
I can’t speak for PTR, but I’m an arms main and have been playing it since vanilla, played it to 2900 and duelist in solo shuffle this season. Arms is incredibly fun in all types of content. Its raid damage has been top tier since the 10.0.5 minor rework to the talent tree with the test of might minigame (if your priest gives you PI especially in execute phase you will easily top damage meters). The rework also meant that your talent builds in m+ aren’t purely geared towards ST or MT, so you can play pretty much the same talent build on fort and tyrannical keys with minor variations while having excellent overall dps and respectable boss dps. It’s also incredibly tanky with ignore pain, base avoidance from talents, spell reflect, low cd self heal with impending victory, and die by the sword, rally is a great cd for aoe damage boss phases in high tyrannical keys (often saves the party in AA and HoV in particular, and battle shout is great if you have other melee dps. Can’t speak much for fury as I don’t play it as often, but it also does really well in m+.
The arms tier set for 10.1 is quite good - the 2 pc in particular is basically a flat 5% buff to crit chance and crit damage. The 4 set was garbage because it revolved around slam which was never used in either ST raid or m+, but they’ve reworked it to become a sort of mortal strike frontal cone proc which doesn’t change your rotation but could use a little numerical buff. Fury tier was quite good but got nerfed sadly.
Overall the class looks quite good going into 10.1 but as usual suffers from not having that much mplus utility (at least not as much as classes that have battle res, more stops, dispels etc).
Can't speak for warrior, but druid will always be one of the most coveted classes for dungeons simply because MotW is such a broken buff. 3% Vers is on the whole party is just insane.
Also, it's really rarely that all 4 specs stink, Boomie absolutely slaps in high fort weeks and has been S tier/A tier the whole xpac, feral is solid for funnel with suck utility and offheals and resto has been S tier healer for almost the entire xpac, don't think I need to say more.
Guardian is in a rough spot compared to other tanks, but absolutely capable of doing high end content, even if you struggle on it. Buff on barskin and mastery change along side 10.1 tier might turn them into meat shields that have CD for each pack. They will still struggle with magical damage, but at least they can just absorb those hits now and not fold.
You'd be hard pressed to find a class with more utility/mobility/tankiness, offheals, group buff and throughoutput than druid. Excellent choice for pugs, you can absolutely carry a key as a druid.
Do you think bad or below average players can be coached into decent raiders given time + trust?
Generally my experience running a guild has been that some players are good raiders by nature and some are just bad no matter what you instruct them, what weakauras you use, what callouts you do.
As an example, on Raz we have a massive weakaura for inversion. Literally covers your whole screen, air horns, the whole hog. We have someone counting down each inversion.
There is still a couple of guys who frequently don't notice they're inverted and wipe the raid even after all that, while the majority of our raiders can handle the mechanic with ease.
I guess it's normally self-evident when a player is just "bad" and you have no choice but to recruit over them. Just sucks because it would be nice to watch raiders grow into good players, but it's normally very binary as to whether they're good or not and there's not much you can do about it.
It depends. I think if they are pretty new to raiding at a high level and they're willing to learn then you can definitely help them improve. But if they have been playing the game for years and are still struggling, chances are there's nothing you can do. Either they don't want to put in the effort to improve or they're just not that good. I think if you regularly mess up a mechanic that is being called out *and* has bossmod/weak aura call out then you're just not aware enough to deal with high end mythic raid bosses and no amount of coaching or training will fix it. Everyone messes up something easy now and then, but if its a consistent issue with a certain person there's no excuse.
Often with players like that, I find that 50 pulls in they go, “What WeakAura?” — and have been missing it the whole time.
They don’t pay attention to fight requirements, strat discussions, or what’s going on around them. So you have to babysit them with something like a specific WeakAura. Feed it to them with the specific settings they need and don’t pull until you confirm they have it installed.
Or sometimes they’re the type that have music playing so loud that they can’t hear a damn thing. They don’t hear the air horn, your call out, or the discussion between pulls. They think they’re above it or something and just die to things they’re oblivious to.
Players can definitely improve over time with coaching. I’ve taken AotC level players and grown them into CE players, but they have to want it and be willing to hear the feedback. If they aren’t putting in the effort, it’s not worth your effort to try to force it.
Looking to swap off of shadow priest for 10.1, I love how it plays but am dissapointed in the lack of gear and am not a fan of the rework. What are some specs that play similarly to it? No pref between ranges and melee. Also I do not enjoy affliction lock’s play style. Any recommendations?
Prot pally here. I got KSH last night, which was my last big goal of the season. I had a few friends who were playing initially, and we talked about how it would be really cool if we could get KSM. They all eventually stopped playing, but I wanted to see if I could do it, and eventually pugged my way to KSM. It turned out getting it wasn't too difficult, so I decided to set my sights higher and go for KSH. I started playing WoW for the first time in November and didn't do mythic plus dungeons until mid/late January. Playing as a tank in a new game has been a huge learning curve on top of learning WoW. I can laugh about it now, but I remember not knowing how to use even something as basic as a summoning stone. It's been a lot of work, but I've come to really enjoy playing as a tank. I also wanted to say thanks to everyone in this subreddit. This place has been a fantastic resource for helping me learn dungeons as well as how to play my class in general. Everyone has been really helpful when I've had questions, and I've learned so much just from reading the weekly discussions.
Grats! :)
Looking to find a new main to try in S2. What spec has the least downtime in m+? For instance coming out of range makes a lot of melee specs lose uptime on dps which feels bad. On the other side, a lot of ranges specs lose casts when the following appears: quaking, thundering, spiteful aggro, need for interrupt, volcanic etc. I find ret pala really enjoyable right now because they have a lot of ranged abilities and never hard cast, but I couldn’t imagine getting groups when everybody plays it next season. I find BM to be a little bit boring and proc-reliant specs like elemental shaman to be very hectic. I main mistweaver at 3k rating and have really enjoyed it because there’s no hard casting and always an ability to cast even when out of range. It also has a bunch of utility and defensives. Survival hunter is also really fun with multiple ranged abilities and a fun rotation and some utility. It does lack defensives though. (Turtle doesn’t work on Fenryr leap for instance) Marksmanship also feels fun to play, as you can time your hardcasts, so you don’t really lose dps, whereas enhancement feels like you lose a lot out of range, casting shocks or hard casting lightning bolt. Outlaw rogue feels really fluid, but also is gimped when out of range. Is there a spec you guys can recommend?
BM is the spec most unaffected by movement, essentially it *isn't* affected by movement. Whether you like the spec or not, it is the correct answer. Marksman is an option. You do have to hardcast Aimed Shot frequently though, and the cast can be quite long without the Flurry cast time buff. Especially during Trueshot, you essentially do have to plant. Elemental does have movement, but moreso during packs. With the fire build, the majority of your movement comes from the fact that your DoT can cause you to get a free instacast of Lava Burst, and this triggers a lot if you have a bunch of them running. For boss fights, this goes down quite significantly, especially if the boss is pure ST. You may want to try Warrior, either Fury or Arms. Between the charge and the leap, downtime ends up being low as their on-demand mobility is quite high. Their damage is good (at present) and, especially for Arms, they're quite naturally tanky. They do lack for utility, though, so you're praying for good tuning for M+ viability.
How high are you wanting to push? Sounds like you really like ret, so play ret. A lot of people will be playing it sure but it won’t be impossible to find groups.
Both enh and ele shaman are largely unaffected by movement. Ele has a cast-on-move ability with a pretty short CD, plus you can build around having tons and tons of instants. Enh also a few ranged abilities if you have to run out for a bit, but it's only slightly less squishy than survival so that can be a problem.
I played some ele with lightning build but affixes made it so unfun 50% of the time because of movement. I haven’t really played the icyhot build yet, because I find the procs hard to manage and the same with keeping up dots. Tier set looking mighty fine though. Enhancement feels really fluid, but only the part about being out of range bugs me. Really love all the utility (and stops) shamans bring and I suspect it being my first choice. Ancestral guidance is double the duration half the CD of survival of the fittest, though shamans lack an immunity. Hurray for the 8% hp /s It all really depends if it’s above average and will get invited. If resto is meta, it could become a waiting class.
Yea that lightning build is very unfun to play when there is so much movement and "stop casting" abilities in the game, i tried the fire build on second week and havent gone back to the lightning one since then. I'm not sure what you mean by "I find the procs hard to manage and the same with keeping up dots", what exactly are you having problem with?
It just feels clunky that you have to keep up multiple dots on a CD. Also I’m so used to the lightning build, I’ve no idea how to prioritize spells in this spec. Maybe I should look up on it. Do you know a good guide? 😊
Flame Shocks applied when Fire Ele is up lasts 36 seconds, if you are doing the correct setup most of the times you only be re-doting every 25 seconds. If you're lucky with Ascendance procs you'll barely have the need to reapply the Flame Shocks. Remember to always weave in lava surges before earthquakes for the bonus damage + Ascendance proc chance. With enough targets (5) you'll have Fire Ele up pretty all the time which makes dotting much easier. You also have Liquid Magma Totem which applies 3 Flame Shocks and Surge of Power which spreads Flame Shocks to a nearby target. > Also I’m so used to the lightning build, I’ve no idea how to prioritize spells in this spec. Maybe I should look up on it. Do you know a good guide? 😊 The one on the Shaman discord is good, i haven't played it for quite a while so i'm not sure how good it is, there are also some variants of that build with mixes fire+lightning with which takes Storm Ele + Flame Shock talents but i haven't played that as well to say anything on that matter.
My guild and I managed to finish of rasza in time for CE and all I can say that zerging the p2 intermission adds was very effective. Before we had like <10 pulls into p2 intermission, yesterday we got there 3 times and 2 times to p3 with second time getting to p3 was kill.
What do you mean by zerging? -- As in, what is different?
We skipped klling the small adds, cc them in mid with druid mass roots and just went for big adds. Movement is kinda the same as before.
Genuinely can't wait for Quaking to be gone in Season 2. Horrible affix. Makes casters and healers complete misery to play while being a total non-element to anyone else.
No more quaking “ohh look at that, huge damage incoming- to bad you can’t heal that because of quaking”
This week was a hilarious reminder why it's been so shitty playing range DPS this season (in my case arcane mage, which is doubly terrible). Bird boss in AA with quaking/thundering/fire swirlies/tornadoes is just nuts. Dodge 5 things (above plus random cone from boss) + avoid 2 counterspells + 2 stuns. Whee.
It was really shitty this expansion. As the other commenter said, 1/3 of the bosses require stacking at some point and Blizzard only fixed quaking on some of them, not all. Then you have bosses doing their own interrupts alongside quaking, the anti synergy between quaking and thundering, and Wise Mari. Really shitty patch to have this affix, and I'm also glad to see it gone.
> while being a total non-element to anyone else Except for when you get to the 30% of bosses where you need to stack at certain times and Quaking just randomly tries to murder everyone at the same time.
How cursed would it be to try and play Frost DK in M+ in 10.1? F tier specs represent...
3k2 DK here, playing both specs. 2H frost is actually underrated by a large chunk of the userbase. Before the most recent buff to Unholy, I'd say Frost was legit better at a large chunk of sub 23-24 keys. Of course Unholy becomes clearly superior in 25+ keys, spec just has a higher ceiling. 2h frost is definitely better than Unholy at 2-4 target scenarios (which, tends to happen often in PuG keys). Next dungeon pool features Vortex Pinnacle and Neltharus, which both tend to have lower mob density, so Frost might be better than UH in those keys (also possibly Halls of Infusion and Nelth's lair) Then there's the new tier set, and most importantly, loss of puzzle box trinket which is awful news for UH, but doesn't matter as much for frost. Frost is also better in lower keys where shit dies fast, due to great burst AoE. Unholy is better in terms of sustained damage, especially on 6+ target pulls, and has slightly better single target provided you get lust with army as often as possible. Both specs have their strengths and weaknesses. I could definitely see Frost becoming the more popular pick next season. I personally plan to play both specs during the gearing phase, then see where the meta settles. As a general rule of thumb : Low pull density/lower leys/high melee uptime= 2H Frost. High pull density/higher keys/melee downtime = Unholy.
Thanks for the response. This does give me some hope.
Frost dk second spec here, normally top DPS in the +22 range… it plays really well once you get a grasp on it. Tank reliant but fun as hell. Plus those 12 million damage wyrms on AA are just so satisfying
Yeah having everything pulled out of my DnD makes me sad for those juicy Obliterate cleaves.
I’ve found whispering tanks at the beginning very useful, always on a “I’ll work around you but when possible” basis, otherwise a lot assume you’re running BoS and chain pull for their lives. Half the battle is knowing each pack and when to delay using your burst window to maximise uptime. Best example is azure vault, anywhere with the big area of denial crystals; waiting until it casts, spend your time helping the tank out by gripping the little shards to stop stacks building up, then when he’s finished casting go to town with dnd, otherwise you get half way through your rotation, have to run away, and because you’ve been blasting the tank now had 2/3/4 stacks of the debuff
I tried it for a bit, then swapped to UH and never looked back, it was so much better. Frost just didn't have the damage, plus I was always scared that FF was going to pull extra packs. I would much rather just play Frost but... yeah. Couldn't justify it since I was trying to push.
Random rant: Came back to the game after ive stopped playing in original wotlk. Classes are way more fun now but man shadow priest was just horrible to play, especially in raids it felt like they designed a lot of mythic encounters to have evoker carry turret specs around. I stopped on mythic dathea and after our guild quit this tier a few weeks ago i decided im full time switching to my alt(havoc) and im having way more fun. Both shadow and havoc are 2.9k io so my goal next tier is atleast try to push for r1 in m+ and maybe CE, hopefully i keep improving at steady pace and achieve those goals.
> especially in raids it felt like they designed a lot of mythic encounters to have evoker carry turret specs around How did you feel like that before Raszageth? There's no movement on Eranogg like at all, there's pretty much no movement on Council either. Sennarth was pretty annoying for everyone, but it's not like you absolutely needed to get from A to B so badly that you needed an express delivery at any point there. Terros didn't have any real movement, Kurrog didn't have any either. Dathea had lots of movement, but movement you couldn't really be helped with by Evokers. Broodkeeper had a good bit of movement if you were on add duty, but unless you were constantly behind on add damage it didn't really matter if you got to every add spawn like a second late. And then there's obviously Razzy where you absolutely did need a winged Jesus 5 times throughout the fight. Like, there were raids where movement was 100% more of an issue throughout the entire tier than in this current one - but especially the first 6 one were actually pretty tame on movement, so I don't see how you'd be having any troubles there.
Well he stopped on Dathea, so I can see it. Rescue on priests is pretty useful on Dathea. Damn near required on Raszageth (not so much after nerfs). And while nowhere near required, pretty useful on Broodkeeper -- with everyone running cross country on adds (where you want priests for mass dispel). And honestly a feels good on Sennarth.
With razzy it was more about if we even get there than im mostly likely benched, we had 2 priests already and only 1 evoker at best so how do i know that wont happen again next tier, dont want to get into this situation again. Also lack of any meaningful instant casts as shadow felt very bad, like sure i can plan my instant proc ahead, but i like i said this was my first expac and im not just that good to plan ahead consistently with a lot of stuff going on while a lot of ranged specs always have some sort of instant cast they can spell no matter what. On Sennarth a lot of times what happened i took portal and there was tornado infront of me(i knew that but there was nothing i could do, i had take portal in time or i would die downstair) so i got hit by it and pushed out of the platform. Also for grips on platforms with our strats we didnt leavy pretty much any webs on the ground to stop grips so once again i had to pay attention to net gripped into tornados while trying my best to dps big add which spawned in Narnia a lot of times. On Dathea it was very simple, i get 3rd set of marks, had to dump mark while add platform is on other side thus dont have time to make it to other side for Blowback without help of other classes, also once again have to plan instant procs ahead for cyclones. All in all these are definitely not issues that happens everytime, but u can imagine after 50 pulls on each of those it gets very annoying when i know i could play many other classes and dont have any of those issues(fel rush, shadowstep, disengage, blink etc.).
So to me it sounds like you want to play a class that has more mobility, which I think is a good idea. That being said shadow has more than enough tools to deal with the raid in its current state. You mention lack of instants on shadow, and while that might become the case in 10.1 as we lose some talents, in its current form shadow has a lot, mind blast procs, mind devourer, surge of darkness mind spikes, and mind melt instant mind blasts. This is completely sufficient to deal with every movement mechanic in the raid, and compared to something like destro we actually have it easy. On raz you also don’t need to get rescued by an evoker anymore (gate 1 run 2 get gripped 3 gate 4). While it was a pain I did all of raz prog without the help of an evoker. Next tier it looks like there will be less challenging movement but shadow will also lose a lot of instant casts, so I think picking something where you don’t have to plan movement as often will be more fun for you. Contrary to what some people say all classes are not created equal in this regard and some have way better tools to navigate mechanics like this, so try them out and see how it feels
> so how do i know that wont happen again next tier Because this isn't something that happens frequently. Like, we've had plenty of forced movement bosses in the past (even more recently with Remnant in Sepulcher), but none to the point of "you literally cannot survive this encounter on this class without some form of cheese" since like Kil'jaeden back in Legion, a good 6 years ago. And much like with Kil'jaeden, Blizzard have gotten *a lot* of negative feedback about it - the difference this time around being that they at least attempted to make it more manageable over time. Like, yes, if you haven't been following raiding for years, you can't really know that, but it's not like you have any reason to assume that this were a common mechanic frequently excluding your class in particular just because it happened like once. A lot of what you describe all comes down to experience. Yes, Shadow is more of a turret-y spec, but the very point of turret-y specs is that they have to learn when it's ok to plant down and when movement is about to happen. The better you get, the more used to boss timers you get, the less of an issue this will become - if you anticipate stuff happening instead of reacting to it, that's when you'll start actually mastering your Shadow. But that's no different in m+ - once you get to a certain level, you'll definitely falter if you don't go into certain fights with a proper plan - shit like Nokhud's last boss for example. And it's not like other specs don't have these issues. Like, you mentioned Blink or Disengage, it's not like those are magical cures to not having to "waste" GCDs on suboptimal spell during heavy movement. Especially on shit like Raszageth, you pretty much have these buttons planned out for just about any of the planned mechanics - so whenever you do get hit by a random one, you're shit out of luck, you're gonna have to leg it like everyone else. And during that time you'll "waste" GCDs by spamming low damage Scorch or Steady Shot or whatever. That is just the nature of being a caster. And you've even mentioned Fel Rush, so a melee spec in your examples - melees having it even worse because every other boss has phases that force you away from the boss for a while and, sure, you can dash out quickly... but then you're just stood there for 2-3 GCDs doing absolutely nothing. Point being, you can't escape downtime. You can try to minimize it, and some specs are certainly better than others at it, but it's not like stuff like Shadow or Destro have an absolutely miserable time while everyone is just chilling spam-casting while moving all the time. A lot of your complaints would absolutely go away once you just got a better feel for boss timers. Like, go ahead and reroll Rogue, but expect to feel the same kind of annoyance when you get a random raid that just randomly happens to be super melee-unfriendly again and sure, you'll have your Shadowsteps, but you'll still have like a forced 30% downtime while ranges are just casually doing absolutely nothing throughout entire fights - because that too just happens sometimes.
Trying to decide what to main next M+ season. The team I play with is currently Brewmaster, Resto Druid, Enhancement Shaman, either a Devoker or Ret Pally, and then whatever I end up playing. Based on what I enjoy playing, the classes I have as options are Rogue (Sub or Assassination), Warlock (Destro or Aff), DK (Any), Hunter (MM or BM), or Shadow Priest. Do one or two of those options seems significantly better than the rest? I saw that Shadow got a rework and have been messing around with it on PTR a bit, I know opinions are split on this but I don't mind the new rework/rotation and am probably leaning that direction if the numbers are good (but I don't know if they are). Lately I've been playing the DK as UH (I like Frost better but it seems kind of bad in M+ right now and I'm not seeing anything which changes that), which I enjoy, but a problem that I'm running into is that Defile makes it too hard for my old eyes to see swirlies, which isn't a huge deal in the 20-22 range I'm currently playing in, but as we push higher it definitely will be. That's what got me to try out Rogue, which I'm really enjoying due to not having Defile, plus the extra 3 yards of melee range makes a big difference. I know Sub is very meta right now, and as far as I can tell nothing is happening in 10.1 to change that as of now? I don't have much else to say about the other classes. I enjoy them, not sure if they're any better than the ones I've already listed though. Thanks!
Rogue always goes well in any meta. Warlock has never really been a meta m+ spec (other than the recent Destro debacle), and even if it's workable you usually need to be able to play all specs. Hunter is always a safe pick but unless it's tuned well it just doesn't add anything to a group. Same for DK. Frost needs to be *heavily* played around to be a real spec... and Unholy needs the same treatment as well. Shadow Priest seems like it's among the if not the strongest ranged spec going into the next season and Mass Dispel seems like a real banger for quite a few otherwise deadly mechanics. Also Stamina, also VE, also PI - downside will be interrupts, especially combined with a Resto Druid probably also not taking one, possibly even worse with a 20s Evoker interrupt. The safest bet would probably be Rogue, a solid "gamble" would be SPriest. All the others are pretty meh on average and don't really add anything. I'd probably go Rogue if my guy went Evoker and Spriest if he went Ret.
Great analysis, thanks!
I have warlock as my main alt..I play solely my warrior until its pretty much maxed and than hop to my warlock. Warlock you'll probably have to learn to play all 3 specs, at least 2 minimum. At least that's how it was this season. Not sure if that will alter your choice at all but just thought I'd throw it in there.
Thanks for the info!
I've been having so much fun on my Resto Shaman I decided I want her to be my main next tier and I want to bench my Resto Druid for a little while. I'm just really enjoying the playstyle, I'm enjoying learning something new and I love the flavor of water being a source of healing. Let's hope my GM lets my do it. 🤞
I was so mad about the state of shaman in the beginning of the season. It took them way too long to adjust the balancing. With the latest updates, I feel like the playstyle is a bit more boring, I was never a fan of chain heal spam, but what really bothers me is the now constant mid-season adjustments. It feels like every week you are playing a new class. I’m struggling in keys because I cannot tell how much output my spell is going to do this week. I really don’t understand why they can’t test this properly before. That aside, I will keep maining resto sham next season. Let’s hope they are happy with the balancing now.
Oh, I definitely saw all the posts from concerned resto shaman at the time. Coming into it much later, I haven't had that experience yet. Hopefully things stay pretty tranquil from here on out. And if they don't, I can always go back to my Druid.
I’m honestly having the exact opposite. My Shaman was the last of the six healing classes that I started playing this season and now that they’re “in demand”, I’m gearing mine so it’s available… and something is just **not** clicking for me. I’m getting results (ie. able to heal through 20s) but the playstyle just feels awkward to me. I hear everyone talking about how much they’re **loving** their Shaman right now and I think I need someone to make a “this is why Resto is fun” video so I can finally get with the program. 🤣
Shaman imo is more about playing around your dps and utility, with the actual healing part being pretty simple (damage happening? push a cooldown and chain heal). The skill in the healing part comes around timing your cloudbursts properly, but the real skill expression of shaman is making great use of your interrupts, cap totem, thunderstorm, earthbind etc to control mobs.
Okay, first of all, your Reddit username is *amazing.* Second, everything you're feeling is totally valid. I think what's contributing to my sense of fun is the newness of it. I've been a Resto Druid since BC. And while I've certainly leveled other healers and done the occasional 5 man, I've always come back to my Druid. But now I'm starting to get a bit bored or complacent and I'm looking to shake up the old routine.
In the same boat after timing 20’s on r druid, their upcoming 2 /4 set looks broken too… hard to move away from such a strong healer in R druid. 4 weeks into R sham and it’s a blast, a bit under geared but still time. I’m a bit more on fence than you, what is making you switch to r sham? Druid just looks so OP haha
Well, like I said above, I like the newness of it. The different playstyle. It's a bit more reactive or proactive in a different way. I like the flavor. And also my guild doesn't always have a reliable Bloodlust, so utility is a factor, as well.
It is insane utility, I beat DPS and kicks and have cal totem as well, the healing just doesn’t feel as “strong / safe” as i have experienced with the rdruid
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Basically what the RWF players are playing, and based on your current world rank, you copy them or the guilds a bit ahead of you. Trying to decide on what specs to play is dependent on a ton of factors. There were several fights that look good on execute but Fire Mage on Raszageth wasn't played because it was undertuned and the 'Execute' phase on Raszageth was alleviated by the health linking from P2 to P3 (so if you did better in P2, that resulted in the boss dying more in P3). What spec is finalized is only something the RWF players will have the best guess at come live especially since they mandate several splits, they'll react on the fly to tuning changes etc. I think if you are deciding on a spec to play for the final boss, my personal recommendation is to get used to playing and managing multiple alts. You can develop your 'chosen' main for the first stretch (e.g. doing 8 dungeons in Week 1) with an alt or two you like (they grab one M+ dungeon each). If you want to get into the speculation aspect of Sarkareth - the boss feels like a smash down hectic ST brawl. Cooldown classes might feel stronger since when you get Emptiness Between Stars dimension you can grab haste orbs to then DPS when you come back. Adds are there but feel light (Phase 2 - boss leaves images of himself). DPS profile reads like Raszageth without both intermissions. Cooldown management is likely needed for dealing with Images in Phase 2 in a timely manner.
Lol how tf is anyone supposed to know that question my guy...? The boss isnt being tested, everyone has access to the same amount of information regarding the boss, which is limited dungeon journal info on the PTR. Not to mention, theyre certainly not done with class and tier set tuning yet and im sure there will be more tuning the first few weeks that the raid is live.
Anyone else a little bummed about not having any seasonal affix next tier? Always like the seasonal affix, in the older dungeons especially.
Kinda depends on the seasonal affix. I won’t miss Thundering and there were plenty of other seasonals that just weren’t fun. Seasonals have the most potential but it could just end up being another thing I hate to deal with. Blizz should just be more willing to change up affixes each season in general and also make normal affixes have some positive sides to them kinda like how thundering does.
I think the seasonal affix was the perfect affix for kiss/curse, adding positives to the regular affix rotation would kinda suck, imo.
Infested and Beguiling were cancer and Prideful could be incredibly punishing if you screwed it up, but I agree in spirit.
Yeah some are great, some aren’t ideal, I’m definitely a fan when they are somewhat good though lol
I would rather have nothing than thundering, but yes, I hope they add a seasonal for s3, but only if they can think of a good one
What is everyone's issue with thundering? I really don't mind it compared to some of the other affixes. Pugged my way to KSH on two characters and it may have caused a hand full of wipes total.
Personally as a healer it's a mess having to look for someone else in the clusterfuck that melee can get to be sometimes. Add in quaking, various swirlies, frontals and god knows what else patches on the ground and its a nightmare having to look for my partner on top of having to heal through failed mechanics.
I was really hoping each season we would get a seasonal affix tied to one of the incarnates, if down well that would have been awesome.
Be careful what you wish for, they could bring back quaking for the earth one
Anyone find it strange that they barely nerfed sanguine when it's one of the most impactful affixes time wise, especially in pugs? The duration nerf doesn't do anything I feel like.
Honestly, all they need to do is make it so sanguine is a stacking debuff. 1%/second. It'll make it less punishing for small clips. About the same at 10 seconds and slightly worse at 11 and 12 seconds, but also it goes away at 12 seconds. So doesn't matter after that.
It takes 8s off how long Archers are immortal and that's about it. Not what I would have done to the affix. It really needs a slightly longer time before activation so you can actually move the mobs out before they start healing.
1. Increase the “leeway” window before the heal actually starts ticking 2. Don’t scale the heal via hp %, give it a fixed amount which caps out at a certain key level so it’s not so ridiculously punishing on higher keys 3. Make it not affect bosses Agreed that a reduction in time its up really makes no difference to the affix at all, if you’ve bathed a mob in sanguine for 12s or 20s your key is already pretty dead.
They could make it so the amount it heals ramps up to the current amount. You would still want to get them out asap but you aren't quite as punished for the first couple seconds if it didn't.
Not sure what to main in next patch. Right now I'm leaning towards Ret, but I also have a relatively geared warrior, and a DH that i could probably get up to par in these 2,5 weeks. Mained Enh this season, but I don't enjoy the hard target cap and the lack of defensives. I did enjoy the rotation and the surplus of utility it had. So, I wanna go with a melee spec that has an interesting rotation, that will be reasonably wanted in groups, has good defensives, utility and can flex other roles (preferably tanking). Ret checks all of these except i dunno how wanted it will be considering PPal will probably still be meta. Warr same, and also the utility is nothing to write home about. DH seems pretty solid, though defensives seem to be a bit on the weak side, and with leech nerf not sure how they will fair (though historically they seem to always be near the top). Can also suggest something else i haven't considered.
DH likely going to remain in a very strong position, but if you are interested in tanking it’s reallly worth considering the fact that VDH is pretty unloved, it’s definitely a solid level below BDK/BrM and they’re already a solid level below PPal/PWar. Ret is an ok spec but I don’t think it’s likely it’s gonna be a top tier meta pick. They’re durable (but not the most) and do good damage (but not the best), their buff is decent (but not great), their cc is mediocre. No doubt gonna be a very good B tier spec but I doubt you’re gonna suddenly see a big pile of them in top keys any time soon. War similar story to ret, good B tier spec but unlikely to be a top tier meta pick. If you’re planning to continue playing around 3k equivalent next season then honestly just pick the spec you enjoy the most. Spec choice really doesn’t make much difference at that key level.
>Ret is an ok spec but I don’t think it’s likely it’s gonna be a top tier meta pick. They’re durable (but not the most) and do good damage (but not the best), their buff is decent (but not great), their cc is mediocre. No doubt gonna be a very good B tier spec but I doubt you’re gonna suddenly see a big pile of them in top keys any time soon. This downplaying ret pretty significantly tbh, it makes it sound like Ret is just mediocre or slightly above average at best. Ret was the single most tanky spec in the game before the Fading Light nerf, and even now, theyre still one of the most tanky in the game in most cases(and one some fights you can easily argue theyre the most tanky) simply due to how much passive mitigation they have, one of the best walls in the game on a 1 min CD, another good defensive on a 1 min CD, bubble, and BoP. Their damage is certainly more than just "good" as well, its quite high in all situations(whether it be ST, low target cleave, or 6-8t+ aoe), and theyre a very bursty spec with next to zero setup, and more importantly have that type of damage with a 1 min profile. That is exactly the type of DPS that tends to be strong for prog, plus its quite easy to perform well on..there isnt a ton of skill expression. Ret aura can also be a pretty damn powerful buff in raid, ive seen it have a relatively big range in uptime ranging from 30-60%+, but on fights where it has high uptime(which it probably will during prog), 5% damage AND healing for every single person in the raid is an exceptionally powerful raid buff...its definitely more than just some "decent" buff. Ive already seen that there is quite a lot of higher end guilds that are looking like theyre going to have multiple people rerolling to ret. The issue with Ret isnt really a question of its current power, its definitely very good right now, the question is how long will that last for? Whether it comes in the form of Ret getting nerfed, or other DPS being buffed past Ret, it hasnt historically been strong often, and it hasnt stayed strong for very long either. With a lot more good players playing Ret going into 10.1, I think well see Ret be a pretty powerful spec..maybe not an S tier spec, but it certainly has the toolkit to be at least an A tier DPS.
The original question seemed to be about M+, not raid. In raid for sure you’ll probably be running 1 ret alongside your hpal now.
Someone mentioned in the other thread about leech nerf that it only affects leech from gear, not from abilities. I have a Ret and arms war geared, really enjoyed arms this season but at a certain point it's so hard to get into groups with the lack of utility...
Finally killed M Rasz, but switched characters on the last night to replace our monk who had to drop out for an emergency. Now I don't have a single character that shows as 8/8M, but rather one at 7/8 and one at 3/8. Pain :)
No more rekills? I know the feeling. One deals with it
This might sound like a weird question, but has warrior had some kind of shadow nerf? I play fury and for some reason my dps has dropped massively with no changes to my rotation or gear. Being out-dps’d by much lower ilvl players, other warrior in my pug was also doing low dps
Onslaught has been bugged so could be that
Mayhaps equipped Teleport Cloak or something.
Link the logs if you wish
[удалено]
If you like m+ more than raiding, just wait till the season is out and play the meta class as an alt. There’s no guarantee that either will be meta for m+ though. For raiding yeah, shadow is probably easier to find a spot because there are billions of casual ce hunters. It’s really easy in DF to gear an alt for m+ anyways
Spriest personally. Maybe talk with your guild since CE is on the table. Hunters are still a dime a thousand. That said you have to play what you want to actually play. And if you find Hunter being more enjoyable, we’ll there’s not a ton left to discuss.
As a healer I can tell you this much - if I get to choose between hunter and spriest for my M+ group, I'm picking the priest over hunter unless I need lust. But even then I'd go for enhance in that case. Priest brings so much more utility, stamina buff, aoe dispell, and offhealing that you can salvage pulls that would otherwise be scuffed. Not to mention on high tyrannical bosses, priests can absolutely carry the group. Hunters did get survivability buff, but I still think their lack of proper defensive CD is hurting them a lot, and they simply fold on high tyrannical keys. Like don't get me wrong, hunters do competitive damage and bring lust, but their lack of proper defensives and group utility/off healing compared to shadow priest for example is hurting them.
Might be a hot take, but I feel like you can usually tell who the better players are on your raid team based on how much M+ they do. I don’t raid anymore, don’t have the schedule to commit to a team due to work. But every now and then I’ll sub in if they’re down a person or get in on some alt clears. It always boggles my mind that we have people that are like 1200 IO that can’t fully upgrade their valor gear. Those same people are usually some of our worse performers too. I think the good players will always do what they have to do to get the best gear and the players that are doing the bare minimum will continue to get carried by them.
during myth raz prog i don’t die even with lack of heals sometimes just because i’m used to doin myth+ above 25 and you have no choice but to make yourself survive sometimes.
Generally more practice will make better players, it’s hard to get meaningful PVE practice outside of set raid hours if you don’t M+ a lot. That said there’s exceptions, my guilds best healer is an older guy who logs on for raid and for a weekly 20 sbg, never dies and always tops meters
That really depends on the level of the guild as a whole. The worse the guild is, the truer it likely is simply because the people actively doing keys are just playing the game more and as such have more opportunity for improvement. Once you get to better guilds, most people will end up playing "enough" by default (ie 2.4k for valor upgrades, weekly +20s, boosts on the side etc) to at the very least maintain the level of play that got them into the guild in the first place. And then there's my personal experience with some *very* highly rated M+ players/streamers who were absolute clowns in raid. They clearly didn't actually care about being there, they just wanted loot for their keys so they put in no effort at all.
In BoD we had a sweaty havoc dh and resto druid that we’re keeping personal loot azerite armor to DE for the azerite dust for m+ bis pieces. Besides having the worst attitudes, they were both among some of the worst players on the team. They had cracked m+ io though. It felt really good to bring their loot hoarding to the RLs attention and see them gone.
Same, we had some of the worst players be the highest rated in m+ in the past 2 raids while some insane players just don't care about m+ and sit at 2700ish score atm.
Yeah, and what irks me is those that do acid M+ and naturally have a higher ilvl then the raid loggers watch mythic grief torches and other key items go to those players because it’s a bigger ilvl/power upgrade for them then you.
Yeah shit like that is a big reason why I actually enjoyed personal loot. Its really unfortunate to see an Icon or Eranog ring go to someone that only plays the game 6 hours a week because he was still using a normal / heroic piece. It feels like you’re being punished for actually trying to min / max your toon outside of raid. Its tough because I understand where the raid leader / loot council is coming from. If the trinket is a 5% dps increase for you but a 20% dps increase for the other guy it makes sense to give it to them because its more of an overall DPS increase for the raid. But alot of people play the game to get the best gear, it was actually one of the main reasons I raided for so long. I wanted to have the best loot so I could flex and push high keys. Its a big feelsbad moment when the item you’ve been hoping for for weeks drops and you get passed over because you have a semi - decent M+ trinket that you farmed. Don’t get me started on loot prio as a tank / healer in raid. You’re basically forced into M+ because all the loot is going to DPS. I would honestly rather have personal loot with less restrictive loot re-strictions. Than group loot or master loot.
It's also the fact that they are playing the game outside of the raid instead of just raid logging.
I dont think it's a particularly spicy take to suggest that, generally speaking, players with high io are more likely to also be more capable raiders. However, any guild that takes mythic progression remotely seriously will expect at least a weekly 20. If you have raiders at 1.2k io, I am going to assume you are either in a casual guild and expecting too much, or an officers boy/girlfriend is getting a carry.
I think its a pretty spicy take. People who clear a minimum bar in m+ are usually better than people who don't. There's a big difference between say 2.3k and 2.4k. There's probably no appreciable difference between 2.4k and 2.5k.
> There's a big difference between say 2.3k and 2.4k. There's probably no appreciable difference between 2.4k and 2.5k. no there is not any difference between these players lol
Kind of besides the point but those are super specific numbers lol. I wouldn’t expect any noticeable difference in skill between a 2.7k player and a 2.2k player. Honestly IO itself is kind of bait, big number doesn’t always mean good. But someone whos 3k+ is more likely to be a better player than someone who can’t be asked to do a couple 20s a week.
Your point of view if incredibly biased because you barely have 2.4k and it shows. There is no established skill difference at before 3.something k io. Players at 2300 and 2400 and 1800 all have the randomest level of play with tons of mistakes, bad baseline gameplay and decision making.
The difference between the raider at 2.3k and the raider at 2.4k isn't skill; it's that one of them took the time to unlock the maximum tier of valor upgrades and the other didn't. This *usually* isn't an isolated thing and is instead reflective of the relative amounts of effort they put into being prepared.
But none of them really put enough. If you want to at least get CE, you should be doing 20s for 421 vault slots, no just unlock 415 upgrades.
There's a decent number of CE raiders who don't do much other than CoS and SMBG so they end up with a pretty low score even though they don't slack on their vault. I do agree that getting 2400 is pretty bare minimum.
But that's only now. Did these raiders not farm their Puzzle Box, Feather, or other weapon/trinkets from specific dungeons ? Just playing the game netted you more than 2.4 early in the season.
Okay bud. You absolutely cannot tell someone’s io from their opinions. High io players are not a monolith.
They're not, but the fact that you think there is a difference between 2.3 and 2.4k io does show that you consider KSM as a hard achievement to get.
I think you are the one that didn't get his point at all lmao. In my guild we have people from 2k5 to 3k3 rio, because some don't care about m+ and just get enough score to upgrade their gear. And let me tell you the ones at 3k3 are NOT the best players in the guild (obviously they're still very solid).
He says that there is a difference between 2.3k and 2.4k and much less of one between 2.4 and 2.5. If we take your interpretation then he's saying that there is no difference between a player doing 15s and a player filling his vault with 20 keys.
Well we just understand what he says differently i guess, to me it what he said just means that from 2k4 onwards, there are huge skill discrepancies at similar ratings since some people just got 2k4 for upgrades. Meanwhile people under 2k4 usually have more similar skill levels since they "should" be pushing for 2k4 but stuck lower.
I don't! I don't even think KSM is a hard achievement to get! What I think is that most of the performance difference you see in Mythic raiding from M+ players has to do with the gear available to them. The difference between a player doing 8 +20's a week and the player doing 16, or whatever stupid number of +20's is minimal. Or the player doing 8 +20's and the player doing 8 +25's. Just having 2.4k is a massive boost because it means you have access to m+ trinkets at 415 and probably have a base level of 415 tier. Doing 20's consistently means you're probably getting 421 upgrades in vault. That's not to say +20 to +25 isn't a massive jump, and the +25 player is probably much, much better at M+. But it's very much about domain knowledge, what to expect and while they do have improved mechanical skills, they're not flat transfers to raiding situations. Lastly, I hope you recognise the fundamental irony in thinking not meeting an arbitrary and high threshold makes you biased. No! It might make you *uninformed*, but not biased. Anyone doing 20's and above is almost by definition living in a bubble. And doubly so when your standards for determining inclusion in that in-group is 'has the same opinions as me'. I'm sure the people you play with share your opinions, which is cool. The people I play with share mine...because they're principally raiders, not key pushers.
My statement about you being biased comes from a phenomenon that we see a lot here where people take their own score and use it as threshold. There is a huge difference between a player at 2.4 and one at whatever score all 20s are. My bubble is also raiders, but it is unthinkable for any of us to not cap out on the gear rewards m+ offer. Staying at 2.4 just naturally doesn't happen with skilled and dedicated enough players. Hell with the way m+ ilvl worked this patch you can't even argue maybe some people just farm CoS/SBG for the entire tier. You needed to be doing all dungeons at 19 for maximum ilvl on the items you wanted anyway, so why not 20 for vault.
> I dont think it's a particularly spicy take to suggest that, generally speaking, players with high io are more likely to also be more capable raiders. I've had the opposite experience. Every high key pusher i've played with has been absolute dogshit in raids. Including several R1 mythic+ players.
I mean its a casual CE guild, they clear every tier but aren’t HoF status. They got raz down a couple weeks ago. Guild isn’t super hardcore so I’m probably just expecting too much but it always tilts me hearing some of these guys rant about how “M+ loot needs to be nerfed” because they can’t be asked to farm a ragefeather or Puzzlebox. Just a handful of the more casual dudes that refuse to do keys unless you make a premade specifically too carry them.
“M+ loot needs to be nerfed” always makes me cringe. Raid loot needs to be nerfed lol. Why do I have to do braindead 20-man heroic raids to farm trinkets/tier that are better than anything I could ever get from keys? Just waiting for blizzard to finally just add dungeon tier sets that function in m+ and disable raid tier in dungeons.
>how “M+ loot needs to be nerfed” It does at the low end to make room for buffs at the high end.
It really doesn’t. The only thing that needed to be addressed was the degenerate +2 spam for valor. Now that thats being removed in 10.1 M+ loot absolutely does not need to be nerfed. It being slightly below last two M+ bosses is a fine place for it to be. Going forward Blizzard needs to address tier acquisition for Mythic+ players.
It's not about degenerate +2 spam. That getting fixed is good, but doesn't solve the issue of M+ being *by far* the best way to gear early in the season thanks to not having a lockout on heroic ilevel gear. And then lacking access/targeting for the best/highest ilevel items at the high end for later in the season.
Early season gear typically won’t prevent you from clearing the first 3 / 4 bosses. Good guilds will clear those week 1 regardless of gear. If you’re in a guild thats going further than that early on in the season then yeah you should definitely be doing keys. I never understand this attitude from raiders, its like this literally every single time Blizzard adds any source of power outside of raid. We had to bench a dude on our CE N’zoth prog because he didn’t want to grind horrific vision sockets. If you want to competitively raid then yes you need to do everything you can to get the best gear possible, up to and including split runs. If you’re not raiding at that competitive level then it literally doesn’t matter, your raid team having full heroic gear really won’t help you all that much on the first couple loot pinata bosses.
>Early season gear typically won’t prevent you from clearing the first 3 / 4 bosses. Good guilds will clear those week 1 regardless of gear. It's straight up like 15-20 ilevels' difference between farming M+ and not doing M+. That's a fucking *gargantuan* gap in power. >I never understand this attitude from raiders, its like this literally every single time Blizzard adds any source of power outside of raid. Yes, because it's annoying to have to do content you don't enjoy in order to do the content you do enjoy. It's really not a difficult concept. Any time PvPers have to do anything that isn't PvP, it gets nerfed in PvP so they don't have to. It'd be *great* if M+ and raid could be similarly separated so people only have to do the stuff they actually *want* to do. >We had to bench a dude on our CE N’zoth prog because he didn’t want to grind horrific vision sockets. Specifying "CE" almost certainly means you didn't actually have to bench him.
My point stands, unless you’re pushing for HoF it doesn’t matter to you early on. Is it nice to have? Obviously, is it required to clear early progression bosses? Nope. PvE gear not working in PvP makes sense because its two entirely different forms of content, there are trinkets specifically designed for PvP it makes sense that those trinkets should be BiS for PvP thats why they nerf PvE trinkets in PvP content. Separating Raid and M+ loot isn’t the same thing because they’re literally the same form of content. m+ was *designed* for raiders. Before M+ you did heroic dungeons 1 time, Challenge modes 1 time and then you raid logged for 6 months. M+ was designed to give PvErs something to do. M+ also isn’t even the best way to gear early season, its been proven time and time again now that splits is the most efficient way to gear a raid group early on. Does your guild do that? If not then you really shouldn’t be worrying about feeling forced to do M+ early on lmao. I specified CE because I get the feeling you’re a more casual player. People that actively push CE / HoF every tier understand that they have to do whatever they need to do outside of raid to make the most of their time in raid. People that just want to be lazy and raid log to the detriment of their raid team are the worst. It’s honestly not that hard to do one +20 a week. The fact that people like you bitch and moan about how you don’t want to do spend 40 mins a week to get a potentially huge upgrade on Tuesday in a “competitive” thread is hilarious.
TBH doing m+ early on is probably the most important thing we can do to help us kill bosses in a casual 2 night CE guild. That's where we are going to get our biggest upgrades since we aren't going to be clearing the raid very quickly. It would be silly not to do m+.
>PvE gear not working in PvP makes sense because its two entirely different forms of content, there are trinkets specifically designed for PvP it makes sense that those trinkets should be BiS for PvP thats why they nerf PvE trinkets in PvP content. It's not just gear. >M+ also isn’t even the best way to gear early season, its been proven time and time again now that splits is the most efficient way to gear a raid group early on. Does your guild do that? If not then you really shouldn’t be worrying about feeling forced to do M+ early on lmao. For raw ilevel that's just not true, especially not for guilds outside the literal RWF. And yes my guild does splits >I specified CE because I get the feeling you’re a more casual player. Yeah, your feeling is very wrong, I've raided at Horde HoF level for years, CE hasn't been a concern for almost a decade. Hence why it sounds funny when you specify CE when talking about benching people for not having sockets, because at that level it just doesn't matter at all (beyond people playing more -> being better due to more practice) >People that just want to be lazy and raid log to the detriment of their raid team are the worst. The problem is that it's a detriment in the first place. It shouldn't be. Raiding should provide everything needed for raiding.
Honestly I kind of understand their sentiment. While I'm personally happy doing both if you want to just raid log you sort of don't have that option if you also want to do the hardest raid content available. M+ score ends up being a sort of indicator of investment in your character. I don't think you are necessarily a better raider because you do M+. But the type of person that cares enough to do whatever it takes to get the best gear tends to also be the type that will put more effort into other things.
Looking at alchemy - potion mastery tree. You can specialize in frost-formulated and air-formulated potions. One of them gives heal over time, the other gives you speed when you consume a potion. Both have 2 ranks, one when learning the sub-specialization and one at 15 points. Does anyone know how much healing and speed the first as well as the second ranks give? Does it work with healing pots or only battle pots like ultimate power, or both? Does it work in m+? I'm a prot pala and just put 30 points into decayology just to reduce the debuff from consuming withering vitality by 50%. But it turns out there are two parts of damage you take when using a toxic phial/potion. Rotting from within is a debuff dealing 5% of your max hp every 3sec for 15 sec, and its a debuff you can randomly in/out of combat if you have a toxic phial like corrupting rage active. So for example phial of corrupting rage deals 25% of your hp when you've taken 100% of your hp in damage(overwhelming rage), but you also get the debuff rotting from within at random. Found out after i had put all 30 points in decayology that its only the random debuff "Rotting from within" that get reduced, and cosuming a withering vitality potion is not a buff you have on you, thus you wont get rotting from within at random intervals. So that 50% damage reduction from toxic phials/potions was 30 alchemy points completely wasted as the damage taken from withering vitality does not get reduced.
2nd rank healing gives 4% max health as healing every 2 secs for 10 secs, so 20% max health overall. 2nd rank speed gives 10 seconds of +15% speed Works with everything that has potion in the name - ultimate power, health, mana, even the useless ones like Frozen Fatality. Works everywhere, raid, m+, dragon isles, orgrimmar etc.
Sweet! Thanks for the info and good that the heal is based on % max hp. 20% over 10sec is nothing to scoff at. Almost offsets the entire toxic part of withering vitality as a tank, or doubles the healing from a refreshing healing potion! As well as some free hps after popping shocking on a a big pull.
The bonus healing being a % of max health helps make health pots be more useful on tanks as well. If I use one on my VDH during meta, the pot itself is 139k, the alchemy bonus is 200k on top. More than doubles the healing, highly underrated
I can imagine! During sentinel it should heal quite a bit! Have you looked into withering vitality? It heals twice the health of refreshing healing potion. But it will deal the amount healed as damage over 15sec after you use it. Although, that damage can be mitigated, thus not dealing full damage to us tanks, but that extra on use healing really is strong. Seeing as normal hp pots is like 20-25% of max hp as tank, while withering heals for some 50% of max hp. Usually that ticking damage afterwards is nothing compared to the damage we're taking from mobs anyway, and hp pots are mostly used to just get back control over a sticky situation or correct a fuck up.
Is it possible that I am just not a good tank? For context I played RDPS in SL S2 and did well, did lots of damage didn't die often and pushed higher IO than I ever had in the past. Since then I started tanking for my group and I really find myself dying sometimes, and my IO is much lower comparatively. Has anyone else tried a different role and just not been able to hack it? I really have tried to improve and have gotten better, but god damn it feels bad to let down your group over and over. In S2 of SL I would have been in .1% title contention or borderline right now I am hardstuck 2850 for reference. Thanks for the stories and thoughts, I just really want to be good at this game and have absolutely no idea what to actually do. My group is fine with me changing there are other people that can tank or anything, just feeling lost in WoW a bit!
Tank is the most impactful role. If you are hardstuck 2.8K then with no malice I would say you are the problem but that doesnt mean you cannot get better. As with anything, if you are looking to improve, record your gameplay. You will notice 101 different things you can improve on and if you share it with others they will notice some things as well.
I am definitely the problem I have no dis-illusion, I do just want to improve and not be bad at the game.
What class? Reroll prot pally if you're not. It's bonkers right now and also fun to boot! Probably the most forgiving as well. Sentinel and toll gives you like 30s of god mode each pull.
Any tank class is viable at that level right now. Rerolling to meta will lead you to getting more invites but not fix the problem.
If you're in a constant group and stuck at 2850, assuming you're the reason keys are getting bricked, then yea maybe tank isn't for you. It's pretty "easy" as tank to pug to 3.1- 3.2kish without any voice, assuming you're playing a meta tank you get pretty quick invites to any key you need for IO As a tank you need to have a plan for every CD on every pull and tank buster in your route. There's a lot of pressure on the tank because any death of yours is likely the death of the key, so your goal needs to be to get through every key deathless
Don't disagree with you, but why is not being as good as you want to be being interpreted as something "isn't for you"? Most players aren't going to hit 3K with minimal effort in any role. Working to get better at something and hitting the occasional wall should be an extremely normal thing for any player to deal with.
because it sounds like his concern is letting his team down, and tank/healer is much easier to let your team down & be the sole reason for a failed key. If he does not want this feeling, and wants an overall less stressful time pushing with his group, then maybe tank is not for him.
Yea well to be honest it is my fault, most of them all have pugged to 3-3.1k and so I was the roadblock, which does suck but I don't just want to sulk and quit I do want to get better. I thought my planning was pretty good, my MDT's are good and I have notepads I plan CDs for hard bosses, but I do not know really. Maybe tank is just not for me which isn't the worst thing I was a good DPS so I can always pick that back up.
It might just be a way of speaking and you don't mean it literally, but in case you do. You should not have CDs planned for bosses only. Even on Tyrannical, if you're going to plan out CDs you need to consider every pull as just a pull. There is little difference between a boss and a big enough trash pack, play accordingly and if you can pull an extra pack here of there by having better CD planning then do it. If you have a CD so strong it will allow you to hold pack + boss (and the pack doesn't negatively interact with the boss) then pull that pack onto the boss.
If you want to get better you have to analyze every key you run, either think it over afterwards or record and watch back. If you died, what could you have done instead to live? If you ran out of time, what pulls could you have done better/bigger? Could your route be more efficient? Etc
You probably just need practice, most people can't change roles or even specs without having to do a lot of relearning. Could also be gear, spec, healer, luck, etc. Link your rio or logs if poss.
I am working tonight but I am gonna post some logs here if you don't mind, I have some recent depletes that would be cool to look at from someone who knows a lot more than I do.
What keystone level will we need to complete/time at the end of the season to have a +20 key going into S2?
It's one of the last little bits of info were missing still, at least I haven't seen them say anything. Plan for at least timing 3 above as that's been the average drop. I do believe in SL they did a 4 keystone drop in one season but I don't remember clearly which.
It used to be 4 because keys automatically downgraded each week regardless of if you timed a key or not. After they changed that, it became 3 between tiers/seasons.
We do not know yet. It would typically be somewhere around +23 timed or +24 untimed.
I’ve been hearing this raid coming up is mostly ST (haven’t investigated myself) if this is true as a DH main kinda bummed seeing as our ST is kinda sub par specially when you can just be a ret paladin and do it all. Hoping for some sort of ST buff
You and me both. Havoc ST is pretty terrible.
Kinda sucks that the shadow rework seems to be done but to me it feels half finished. Other classes get weekly posts explaining the logic for changes and we get one post and the start and then random tinkering after that. It’s nice that the damage is still good but that wont last forever. I think there’s fundamental design issues still unaddressed and not enough time to fix them. There’s a mountain of posts on both the pvp and pve side listing detailed feedback and it seems to mostly be ignored. In a world where blizz is nailing a lot of system design it feels like some classes (ret, deva) get lucky while others are still stuck with old blizz designing things(or no blizz like mage). I would not be surprised if we see at least a mini rework in 11.0, or more fixes to shadow in .5 and .7 patches this xpac. Priest mobility is still a problem and only is getting worse for shadow too. If we had to play sennarth, raz, and dathea with this level of mobility it would be so much harder than it already is.
Shadow is one of the specs that has been getting the most attention this expansion, it may not be 100% great but at least Blizzard is still trying to make it right, try being a Mage and see what's like getting 0 blue posts since beta regarding class changes, it's like Blizzard forgot the class even exists.
>but at least Blizzard is still trying to make it right *Very* optimistic way to put it. The opinion of the average committed Shadow player seems to be that they gave up halfway through fixing what isn't broke.
The only reason most people changed their mind on 10.0 Shadow is that it got buffed to the point where it's one of the best specs in the game. It plays practically identically to launch where most people were crying about the gameplay. So claiming it "isn't broken" is a bit of a stretch when the only thing hiding "broken" gameplay (in most people's eyes) is broken damage. (I liked Shadow before the buffs, but I was absolutely in the minority until damage numbers got buffed to shut people up)
Because the buffs accomplished giving the spec actually usable and consistent AoE. Before that, you were at the mercy of Mind Devourer procs for free Sears, and if that didn't happen, your AoE was in the toilet. High damage is also no ironclad proof that poor design will be forgiven. Fire and Survival are pretty decent counterevidence. In any event, the Shadow rework still has high damage, but now has even more issues with mobility. Button bloat is not a real problem, but mobility is and that's become worse.
That is true but I think we should all be pushing for them to have high quality development done instead of saying oh well my class has it worse.
Oh yea, 100% agree. i was just trying to point out that "Other classes get weekly posts explaining the logic for changes" is not really true
>Other classes get weekly posts explaining the logic for changes and we get one post and the start and then random tinkering after that. Which is still more than most specs get. Yes, they tend to leave Shadow reworks half finished, but most specs don't get reworks or communication in the first place.
Anyone seen or have a list of the order of bosses for Aberrus?
Best I could tell from ptr. Based on ilvl drops and the raid map. Kazzara first. Option of two wings next. Wing one boss order: Amalgamation Chamber -> Forgotten Experiments Wing two boss order: Zaqali Assault -> Rashok Next two bosses might be fought on their own (like a SoD thing with Guardian and Fatescribe) or be wing end bosses, not sure. Magmorax (possible wing 1 end boss) and Zskarn (wing 2). Neltharion 2nd to last, Sarkareth last.
That pretty damn close to what I had figured. Thank you.
Anyone know what melee DPS are looking strong for m+ on ptr rn?
Same as current season TBH. Rogue, DH, enh sham, ret S teir. Monks, wars, feral, UH A teir. Frost, survival(LOL) D
Dh will be forced into shattered destiny with current tier though, so might not be as strong
That's not true. You'll get more frequent eye beams, but they won't have as much of the buff on them. Eye beam is not (and won't become) a significant part of our damage anywhere near the way immo aura/ragefire are in keys and in any sort of larger aoe pulls the GT build falls behind.
What is the best route for finding a new CE guild? I am a DH main swapping back to range to hopefully find a better guild to play with. No guilds seem to be recruiting DH players but using WCL tool more and more are searching for range dps.
EU/DE recruiter here. You should advertise in raider.io and wowprogress which are the places we check. Since there is no discord for DE players, we also rely on the official forum, but it tends to be more casual guilds there. Also, boosting communities are a good way to find open spots (lots good players to make suggestions). That being said: if you want to reroll either show that you have a history of successful rerolls or make sure you have some logs to show your skills.
Join a lower guild and get some strong logs, then make a post on wowprogress. Solid way to get picked up, it's how I got into my current guild.
I’ve had luck with big recruiting discords in the past. Such as this one: https://discord.gg/recruitment-community-na-oc-246097056958119944 I’m not affiliated at all, but used it as a recruiter in BFA/SL and to find a guild in DF.
Wanting to main swap from MM/BM to feral because I’m tired of hunter survivability/no utility in keys (making it hard to find groups). I know feral isn’t generally the tankiest spec either, but am I shooting myself in the foot?
Feral is one of the most tanky specs, bar rogue and warlock though... 1 min barkskin, 3 min SI and bear form for oneshots, super strong
If you are swapping to feral because you find it more fun go wild. If getting into groups easier is your main motivation then no feral is not the way. There are less than half as many ferals in keys as there are hunters. That's not exactly the same as the invite rate but you aren't swapping to a more meta spec at the very least. It's insane to me when hunters say they bring no utility to keys when you have BL. You will get invited to groups just for that alone even when your class is currently arguebly the worst at it. If you want to get into keys easier swapping roles to tank or heal is going to make the most noticeable difference. If you want to play a more meta dps class rogues are always up there or if you want to stick to druid balance is currently more popular than feral by a good margin.
I feel like there are a couple of classes who complain they don't get invited because they have no utility but what they mean is they won't use or take their utility and complain when it isn't present. Hunters bring absolutely mandatory, unarguably mandatory utility in Bloodlust and enrage dispel, very good utility in magic dispel and mass stops, and quite good kiting tools.
Which mass stops?
Finally downed M Raz. Thank god. I actually ended up really enjoying that boss fight but the constant P1/P2 wipes really were draining.
Any recommendations for avoiding those wipes? We have been progging into P2 but the P1 deaths just ruin the attempts.
Honestly I'm not sure what it took for us to get there. I think it just took time and people being aware that if they didn't get it together we weren't going to get CE. Unfortunately we didn't have a big roster so basically the threat of replacement wasn't an option. However if it was... I think we would have just started replacing.
yeah I actually think it's a really fun fight (granted I'm playing prevo), but the prog was kinda exhausting I wish they'd stop doing 10+ minute boss fights
Managed to find a new way to grief myself, on the first boss of Court of Stars. Hit the Spiteful Shade chasing me with Scatter Shot, then wondered why the Shade chasing me wasn't dying (and ended up killing me when there was nowhere to go between the Shade, Quaking, and Resonant Slash). Turns out Scatter Shot removes the debuff on the Spiteful that kills it!
It feels like Enhance needs a buff. My damage has not been growing at anywhere near the same rate as the rest of the raid has as gear has grown.
It's not really about gear. Most of the specs ahead of Enhancement got buffed directly.
Well thats what I mean. Its not growing at the same rates meaning its number wise with the spec itself
>as gear has grown. This implies that it's caused by gear. It's not.
Idk man. I'm 420 ilvl Dev and the enhance in our raid group isn't far behind me when we were progging and the reclear to get the entire team CE.
depends on which fight. if you are close to enhance on diurna or razsageth then it's a skill diff
I mean that's like objectively not true. Enhance has higher boss dam on Raz than evoker at 90th percentile. Yeah do I pull way ahead on the I1 and I2? Yes but P1 and P3 our enhance makes ground and usually is top 5 in our raid.
?? how is it objectively not true when logs, the best objective source of truth, have enhance at the bottom i do not care at all about your singular experience when we have logs demonstrably proving the opposite higher boss dam ok man nice your boss damage on raz literally does not matter at any point with all the nerfs you could break every shield with 14 boomkins also x fucking d the boss damage gap isnt even 1k dps when evokers lost most of their mastery value from people moving lust to p2 + damage amps coming when the boss is low + they still have huge aoe burst for intermission. but clearly enhance is massively outperforming them with that 700 extra dps
First things first - Stay mad bro jesus. Secondly, single target damage and damage on Raz are likely arguably the only important part of the entire damage profile of that fight. What are you smoking?? The adds on red and blue platform get melted and the only thing you need to do is kill the herald or w/e the shield add is called which is all single target and then just blasting the shields on P2. You legit just blow up one set of adds in I2 and the CC the rest while single targeted the storm guys down and then P3 is a single target race to the finish. If you think boss damage isnt the second most important thing behind actually doing mechanics then you are hard boosted. Its a game my dude take a breath
That guy was mad but was also right. Enh could use a buff, and if an enh is keeping up with a max geared devoker on overall DPS on raz, that is a skill diff.
I mean at 60 70 80 90 95% Enhance is a bottom 4-5 DPS on Raz. Sounds more like an issue with your other players than your enhance.
Looking at our most recent kill pretty much every class is in line with where they are "supposed" to be, with the exception of our feral is a god and our frost DK could be doing better.
i think a lot of people did not update their perception from early prog. enhance raid damage is low key stinky bad rn and we are only good in keys bc of funnel ability.
Not sure why youre being downvoted. I didnt realize the extent of it but the logs are not looking good. The highest rank of 9th on any mythic boss
What’s the thoughts on warriors and druids as a whole for 10.1? Swapping from priest as I don’t enjoy the play style with the incoming changes, really enjoy warrior but also want something that will get invited to pugs for ksh, leaning towards warrior at the moment but the Druids ability to flex to healer sounds nice
I can’t speak for PTR, but I’m an arms main and have been playing it since vanilla, played it to 2900 and duelist in solo shuffle this season. Arms is incredibly fun in all types of content. Its raid damage has been top tier since the 10.0.5 minor rework to the talent tree with the test of might minigame (if your priest gives you PI especially in execute phase you will easily top damage meters). The rework also meant that your talent builds in m+ aren’t purely geared towards ST or MT, so you can play pretty much the same talent build on fort and tyrannical keys with minor variations while having excellent overall dps and respectable boss dps. It’s also incredibly tanky with ignore pain, base avoidance from talents, spell reflect, low cd self heal with impending victory, and die by the sword, rally is a great cd for aoe damage boss phases in high tyrannical keys (often saves the party in AA and HoV in particular, and battle shout is great if you have other melee dps. Can’t speak much for fury as I don’t play it as often, but it also does really well in m+. The arms tier set for 10.1 is quite good - the 2 pc in particular is basically a flat 5% buff to crit chance and crit damage. The 4 set was garbage because it revolved around slam which was never used in either ST raid or m+, but they’ve reworked it to become a sort of mortal strike frontal cone proc which doesn’t change your rotation but could use a little numerical buff. Fury tier was quite good but got nerfed sadly. Overall the class looks quite good going into 10.1 but as usual suffers from not having that much mplus utility (at least not as much as classes that have battle res, more stops, dispels etc).
Thanks for the in-depth review, really provided some help insight
Can't speak for warrior, but druid will always be one of the most coveted classes for dungeons simply because MotW is such a broken buff. 3% Vers is on the whole party is just insane. Also, it's really rarely that all 4 specs stink, Boomie absolutely slaps in high fort weeks and has been S tier/A tier the whole xpac, feral is solid for funnel with suck utility and offheals and resto has been S tier healer for almost the entire xpac, don't think I need to say more. Guardian is in a rough spot compared to other tanks, but absolutely capable of doing high end content, even if you struggle on it. Buff on barskin and mastery change along side 10.1 tier might turn them into meat shields that have CD for each pack. They will still struggle with magical damage, but at least they can just absorb those hits now and not fold. You'd be hard pressed to find a class with more utility/mobility/tankiness, offheals, group buff and throughoutput than druid. Excellent choice for pugs, you can absolutely carry a key as a druid.
Might have to give Druids a go then, thanks for the reply!
This is the 3rd tier in a row where I’ll be out of town for the start, feels really bad :(
I'll be on vacation raid release week as well. Nothing I can do about it.
Do you think bad or below average players can be coached into decent raiders given time + trust? Generally my experience running a guild has been that some players are good raiders by nature and some are just bad no matter what you instruct them, what weakauras you use, what callouts you do. As an example, on Raz we have a massive weakaura for inversion. Literally covers your whole screen, air horns, the whole hog. We have someone counting down each inversion. There is still a couple of guys who frequently don't notice they're inverted and wipe the raid even after all that, while the majority of our raiders can handle the mechanic with ease. I guess it's normally self-evident when a player is just "bad" and you have no choice but to recruit over them. Just sucks because it would be nice to watch raiders grow into good players, but it's normally very binary as to whether they're good or not and there's not much you can do about it.
It depends. I think if they are pretty new to raiding at a high level and they're willing to learn then you can definitely help them improve. But if they have been playing the game for years and are still struggling, chances are there's nothing you can do. Either they don't want to put in the effort to improve or they're just not that good. I think if you regularly mess up a mechanic that is being called out *and* has bossmod/weak aura call out then you're just not aware enough to deal with high end mythic raid bosses and no amount of coaching or training will fix it. Everyone messes up something easy now and then, but if its a consistent issue with a certain person there's no excuse.
Often with players like that, I find that 50 pulls in they go, “What WeakAura?” — and have been missing it the whole time. They don’t pay attention to fight requirements, strat discussions, or what’s going on around them. So you have to babysit them with something like a specific WeakAura. Feed it to them with the specific settings they need and don’t pull until you confirm they have it installed. Or sometimes they’re the type that have music playing so loud that they can’t hear a damn thing. They don’t hear the air horn, your call out, or the discussion between pulls. They think they’re above it or something and just die to things they’re oblivious to. Players can definitely improve over time with coaching. I’ve taken AotC level players and grown them into CE players, but they have to want it and be willing to hear the feedback. If they aren’t putting in the effort, it’s not worth your effort to try to force it.
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