Lauren had been on the move ever since the Broken Shore. At the moment, she was at the Stormwind Cathedral, theoretically resting in between battles, but the familiar trappings of prayers and holy symbols weren't providing the comfort they had in the past.
It was that scream. Highlord Fordring, suspended in the air by Gul'dan's fel magic, begging the Alliance and Horde forces to stay away, it was a trap, and then came that scream as the life was ripped from him.
Tirion's last words, over and over in her head - "the Light will protect me," but it hadn't, and something broke inside her as the Highlord's body fell unceremoniously into that pit.
Lauren tossed and turned fitfully on her cot, trying not to scratch at her scabbed-over cuts. Outside, she could hear the weeping and wailing of new widows and orphans. How was she supposed to sleep, knowing that the demons would come again, would kill again, and they'd never stop?
She took a breath, wincing a bit at the slight pain it caused her bruised ribs. Again, the scream, "the Light will protect me," and everywhere around her soldiers were dying, and she was screaming herself, Lightborn wings of vengeance flaring out from her back, her blessed hammer pounding again and again into the enormous demon's chest, and then everything was a blur of fel fire and rage and terror. She barely remembered King Varian sounding the retreat, or how she'd managed to hold on as the Fel Reaver yanked at the gunship, or the boat to Westguard Keep to report back to the other Templars.
All she could focus on was the terror in Tirion's scream when she watched the Light fail for the first time in her entire life.
Lauren got up and paced around the tiny recovery room. There was a pattern to how often the Legion attacked. Likely it took them a short while in the Twisting Nether to regenerate. It wouldn't be much longer before she was sent back to Westfall to beat back another wave of demons.
She picked up her hammer, the very one her father'd given her all those years ago before she'd gone off to train with the Silver Hand. She thought of everything she'd fought against with that hammer in her hands, and all of a sudden Lauren fell to her knees and cried, an angry, broken kind of crying that was weeks of fear and doubt and constant fighting finally catching up with her. It hit her, then, that she was alone, no father to comfort her, no lover to kiss away the pain, no one to just...be there for her.
She thought of Anthai, all fire and rage and probably the one she was closest to out of all of them, but Anthai couldn't know what it meant to be a paladin, to believe in the Light, to feel its warmth and blessing. The other paladins might understand, but even though she'd fought alongside them since Draenor, she still felt like a bit of an outsider, conscripted out of necessity to replace Anthai on the Black Watch. She admired them, trusted them, would fight and die for any of them, but...she didn't feel like they were her friends. Whom could she talk to about this despair inside her, who would understand what it meant to see the Light shatter like that? The Justicar? No, she was near to bursting with child. Jen'nerik, who'd taught her Draenei techniques to strengthen her battle prowess? But she wasn't a part of the Silver Hand, and for that matter, could the Draenei even relate to the fragile mortality of humans?
"Father, I am so lost," Lauren whispered to her hammer, tears streaming down her face. "I don't know what to do. I don't know how to fight this."
She sat there, the tears subsiding after a while as a kind of bleak, numb exhaustion set in.
Then the alarm bells began to ring. "The Legion strikes at Sentinel Hill!" a guard bellowed. "Champions of the Alliance, make your way to Westfall!"
Lauren stood up, steadied herself and donned her armor. She leaned over to pick up her hammer and stopped.
"The Light will protect me!"
Would it?
She didn't know anymore. She thought of all the men and women who'd died at the Broken Shore, who'd died to these incessant demon invasions. Of the look on King Anduin's face as he stared at the effigy of his father in front of his throne, knowing Varian's body wasn't there because there had been nothing left of the body to entomb.
Lauren straightened herself. She had to do this. Even if it meant she would never stop. Even if it meant they would be worn down eventually. Even if it meant they would lose. Because she couldn't not even try, no matter what doubts and fears plagued her.
Because she was a paladin. And that still meant something.
Maybe the Light couldn't protect everyone. But she would. She would try.
Lauren laid her hammer on the table and armed herself with sword and shield.
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The last of my Silver Proving Grounds runs, now with more gun. Between this, and my previous two round-ups, this should (finally) cover all bases (until Demon Hunters show up, anyway).
After everything, I have to say that this patch has made me dramatically rethink my feelings about some classes/specs. Melee DPS, In particular, seem more fun, colorful, and dynamic than they were in the past. For the limited experience that Iâve had, itâs hard for me to say that there are any âbadâ classes.
However, Iâm not completely comfortable with the push to make tanks and healers also maximize their damage output, yet. Healing and Tanking are distinct roles, and players typically pick these roles to play them, not that role + the DPSâ role, too. (However, if youâre going to push for class homogeneity, I suppose giving everyone solid damage abilities is probably smarter than giving everyone solid tanking and healing abilities).
Quick summary:
Druid (Feral/Guardian): Feral is trash at AOE but otherwise fine (unless itâs PVP, in which case theyâre probably broken), Guardian might be the best tanking tank spec Iâve played so far with a well-rounded combination of passive and active abilities.
Hunter: MONGOOSE BITE! BLACK ARROW! DIRE BEASTS! EXPLODEY THINGS! YOU CAN BE A DARK RANGER! 10/10 best class forever. So, when do we get a true tank spec, Blizz?
Monk: Brewmaster is meh. Mistweaver is interesting but Iâm not sure how good it will be. Windwalker is silly (but fun). ORAORAORAORAORAORAORAORA...
Rogue: Assassins are fine nerds. Subtley is odd for nerds. Outlaws are fun and all the awesome, attractive, cool kids play Outlaw.
Druid (Feral/Guardian): Feral is trash at AOE but otherwise OK (unless itâs PVP, then itâs probably broken as hell because this game canât do anything without breaking PVP). Guardian might be the best, most well-rounded tanking tank spec so far, while also somehow being the most straightforward.
As before, Feral plays a lot like Rogues do, with Combo points building up to big Finishers. However, Feral is all about the bleeds, and the energy, and the bleeds, and waiting for energy. and more bleeding. Blood coming from everywhere.
Itâs a gameplay style that I really enjoy in single-target but canât stand in multiple-target situations, but I guess thatâs not the Feral Druidâs thing. Theyâre like cats, they charge in on a single prey and take it down before moving on to the next.
Unfortunately, this makes having to deal with multiple targets almost unbearable because youâll find yourself waiting for energy more often than not. Basically, you have to get close and spend a lot of energy to kill an enemy more slowly, Alternatively, you could try just tapping targets with your bleeds, but the damage benefit from bleeds is really only gained by using other single-target abilities on bleeding targets. For most other specs, one can just spam two or three AOE abilities in sequence and win.
Also, and this might be a personal thing, but I feel like Tigerâs Fury would have been better as a passive buff - either a passive boost in focus or a random proc that gives you focus back, say, on auto-attacks or critical hits or some thing. It may play completely different at max level, but for now it feels under-tuned for PVE content.
Guardian, on the other hand, has been a lot of fun for me. Its spread of damage reduction and healing abilities are very straightforward and simple - no gimmicky âstand here to healâ or âstep on this to do thatâ or âwait for X and then press Yâ - Druid tanking was probably the easiest of all to pick up and roll with.
if you have rage, you spend rage on doing damage or reducing damage. If youâre taking physical damage, use a physical damage reduction skill - magical damage, use a magic damage resistance skill. if youâre taking a LOT of damage, pop a cooldown that cuts that damage in half. If you screwed up your timing on that, no worries - you get two charges. Also, youâve got a HoT. Also, youâve got a lot of health, whiich increases the health gained by your HoT.
Iâd almost say that Druid is âtoo goodâ but then I realize that itâs mobility is almost nothing. And while itâs ability to gain aggro and do damage is pretty easy, it wasnât terribly overwhelming at this level. Weâll probably be seeing bear druids top AOE charts with all the other tanks, but on single target fights I can foresee their DPS being dramatically lower than other tanks.
Hunter: MONGOOSE BITE (is back)! BLACK ARROW (makes sense now)! DIRE BEASTS (are freaking ridiculous)! EXPLODEY THINGS (RIP Explosive Shot, long live Explosive Shot)! 10/10 best class forever.
So, when do we get a true pet-tanking spec, Blizz?
For real, Survival is fine melee deeps but I think it would have been better as a pure pet-tanking spec (something we may see in the future).
Also, while streamlining for BM and MM was over-all for the best, they are also sort of weird parallels of each other:
- Marksmanship gives you focus easy, as both Arcane Shot and Multi-Shots give you focus (!!!! WHY?), but it takes forever to spend it since only hard-cast Aimed Shots and proc-dependent Marked Shots (Hi, Noon) typically use focus. This is remedied by taking other focus-using shots, like Black Arrow, Barrage, and Murder of Crows - great talents for leveling but not sure if theyâll still be good for end-game. You also can get Piercing Shot, which does more damage based on how much focus you burn (which is super nice, considering how much focus you can wind up with).
- Beast Mastery lets you spend focus easy with Kill Command and Cobra Shot... and Multishot, too, for some reason. However, you can occasionally be waiting for focus because no ability gains it for you, directly. Dire Beasts increase your rate of focus gain, with the rate increasing for each beast procâd. Itâs possible to have a lot procâd at the same time, and I imagine that there will be a soft haste-cap where you wonât be able to run out of focus for any given ability on any given GCD as long as you maintain uptime on Dire Beasts whenever possible.
Between the two ranged hunter specs, I find Beast Mastery to be more fun, but mostly because you eventually wind up lobbing Dire Beasts at the target like they are single-use, temporary Pokemon. Additionally, a lot of talents and abilities have great synergy with Dire Beasts, making Beast Mastery pretty powerful as a result. However, I get the impression that Beast Mastery will be the high-skill-cap, high-gear DPS spec, I imagine Marksmanship will be the more boring and much easier âpress 2 buttons, win DPSâ spec.
Survival is another beast altogether (see what I did there). Survival is actually an amalgamation of several mechanics and all of them are fun. Harpoon Toss is like an Inverse Death Grip/Charge, pulling you toward the enemy and immobilizing the enemy. Flanking Attack (or whatever itâs called) is sort of like a close-ranged Kill Command with a pet taunt, allowing the playerâs pet to tank hits from an enemy while the hunter lays on the damage. Lacerate is a bleed, Mongoose Bite is a quickly-building, bursty instant damage ability, and Raptor Strike is your go-to focus spender. Survival also gets somewhat solid AOE, with a Cleave and Explosive Trap ability, as well as others that can be talented in.
The fact that Survival Hunter keeps the traps that the other specs lost is bittersweet, though - the traps are fun to use, but they seem lost on Survival Hunter because itâs kit is otherwise pretty strong without them (other than in AOE, where Explosive Trap is a lunk chunk of your damage). Also, there may be other melee classes with better CCs , but the hunterâs main advantage is that it can throw its traps, instead of just casting them on a given target. Iâd much rather have Freezing Trap on my MM or BM hunters, where I can toss one, MD the other adds to the tank, and then keep tabs on my trap from across the battlefield.
I also need to point out that - while a lot of Hunter changes were good and necessary - some of the changes have left Hunters definitely worse off. The loss of CC and AOE abilities from traps is the biggest difference that I have noticed, and apparently our beloved Stampede has been reworked. Iâve known and felt these changes the hardest, especially in 5-man instances and TWing, but Iâm sure thereâs more.
Iâm placing the blame for these changes squarely on PVP. Nobody who has run a heroic or mythic or timewalking dungeon with a hunter has said âYou know what? I wish this hunter just had a few less CCs, theyâre making things way too easy/hard for me!â. Thatâs because a hunter that knows their class and knows their role can use their abilities well, and a hunter that doesnât can still contribute with their damage.
However, in PVP, if a hunter has and uses these abilities - well, most of them honestly have pretty easy counters. For the longest time, in fact, Hunters have been the most counter-able class by the most other classes. The problem is who they are used against - if someone is hit by these abilities and knows how to deal with them, they can wipe the floor with almost any given hunter. However, if you donât know what to do to a hunter who has disengaged or dropped traps or put you in an iceblock, then youâre just going to go yap about it on the forum.
Seriously, there is no rage quite like the rage of a WoW player whoâs been killed by a hunter. Itâs like thereâs an implied âHUMILIATION!â voice calling out because, dude, you got killed by a Hunter. What the hell?
Add this to the fact that other classes have seen dramatic reductions and streamlining of their abilities, and the PVP nerfs for Hunters are pretty much inevitable, but also a bit easier to swallow, as well.
Hunter is my favorite class overall and the class of my main. I made it a point to test Hunter last through the Silver Proving Grounds, so that iâd have a firm idea of what other classes played like before comparing my hunter to them (rather than going vice-versa and perhaps unfairly comparing them to my Chosen One). Hunter is still my favorite, but I can also see how the patch-stick has knocked some of the sharper edges off my beloved Hunter.
Monk: Brewmaster is meh and weird, literally and figuratively doing a lot of juggling. Mistweaver is an interesting concept with a neat execution, but potentially flawed in the long term. Windwalker is silly (but fun).
As mentioned elsewhere, Brewmaster Monk is at a definite loss without Guard (which seems to belong to Warriors now, under the name âIgnore Painâ, but I digress). However, I think Brewmasters ARE OVERALL BETT-... well, no, theyâre definitely overall worse, but probably not as much as people might think.
See, Guard was a fun ability, but I donât think it ever became what was intended of it. Brewmaster was supposed to be about the combination of Staggered damage and other mitigation keeping it tanky, while unmitigated or un-staggered damage would still hurt, a lot. "Giant Absorb every 30 seconds that doubles your effective healthâ doesnât really fit into that scheme, nor does it need to in order for the scheme to work.
Unfortunately, some of the things that I think would have made Brewmaster effective (without Guard) have also gone away. It doesnât have the same self-healing or group-healing abilities that it had. Nor does it have the same damage mitigation abilities that it had. itâs kind of a 2 steps forward, 3 steps back situation, so I can understand players feeling like Brewmaster just isnât as good as it was.
What it does have is lots of Staggering, and lots of mobility, and a healthy amount of damage. It doesnât rely on Combo Points- Chi anymore, so your main abilities all merely cost Energy and have short cooldowns. instead of Chi.For example, you have (shared) charges of Ironskin and Purifying Brew.
Ironskin increases the amount of damage you stagger, and Purifying Brew cleanses 50% of your staggered damage. At times, this is a hilarious combination, as you basically shrug off lots of damage, and then purge the damage that youâre intended to take from staggering. At first, it seems pretty smart.
Unfortunately, itâs really easy to get into a situations where you need to both mitigate incoming damage, but also need to cleanse staggered damage that you have taken. This is where the shared charges fall a bit short, for me - I wouldâve rather seen them either operate off of different resources (energy for one, charges for the other, etc), had a more see-saw effect (Purifying reduces the cooldown on Ironskin, and vice-versa), or even triggering a self-heal when one or the other is activated (which relieves some pressure when one needs both and has neither).
Combined with the loss of CCs, Effigy, and other core abilities, and I think that overall, Brewmaster is in kind of a worse place than it once was, which is a shame. I still think Monk is fun to play, and I get the feeling that it will be very good in raids, but I think it will require a lot more work to get Brewmaster tank to be âOKâ, versus the amount of work it would take to make any other Tank to be âGreatâ.
Mistweaver, on the other hand, is a lot more fun to me, and much more interesting as a healer.
Mistweavers are good âstreamâ healers - they can heal a steady amount of damage over time, but they may have some trouble with lots of big bursts of damage. Most of their abilities trigger passive healing through a channeled spell, and with the right talent choices, you can move while channeling this spell, and it isnât broken unless you use some other ability (or get interrupted somehow, maybe).
This results in your Monk basically becoming the World of Warcraft equivalent to a Team Fortress 2 Medic or Overwatchâs Mercy, and itâs amazing.
You channel streams of health into your targeted party member in order to sustain them through the fight. You can improve mana efficiency by casting fewer, weaker heals and letting the stream do all the healing. Or you can improve output by casting more, stronger heals, and letting the healing gains from synergizing spells boost your overall healing done.
While Mistweaver seems optimally tuned against streamed damage, there are also good cooldowns for those âoh shitâ moments of big burst damage. These spells are notably much less efficient, though. And while Fistweaving is gone, Mistweaver monks do benefit from using their melee abilities while they wait for mana to recuperate, since their attacks cost no mana. However, most monks are probably going to want to stream their healing as much as possible.
That said...
...Itâs worth pointing out that this is functionally very similar to something Druids already do - heals over time - except Druids do it much, much better. Druids can place a heal over time on multiple targets, move while casting at least three of their best spells, and can attack from range or chill out and replenish their mana when theyâre not casting heals.
The difference, really, is that Monks have to focus their healing, rather than laying out a bunch of instant-cast spells to build healing over time. So I canât say that this style of healing is actually going to be more popular or functionally better than what Restoration Druids already do. We may see Monks getting a buff or Druids getting nerfed, or certain situations where the Monkâs healing cheeses some mechanic that would otherwise cripple a Druid.
Iâm not trying to make too many comparisons, here, but this is a hard one to avoid. If the Druid can already do what a Mistweaver Monk does, but does it better, and for more targets, then what, exactly, does the Mistweaver bring to the table, thatâs worthwhile? Iâm not sure, yet.
Finally, thereâs Windwalker and honestly this spec is just silly. Youâre basically a fighting game character. You may have a bad-ass weapon but youâre going to be using your fists and feet all the time. You get bonus damage for not using the spamming the same abilities over and over again, which leads to whacky chains of smashing different buttons. I had the overwhelming urge to say âBREAD AND BUTTER!â and start watching Evo 2016 streams. Itâs ridiculous.
For being a silly spec, though, it is a lot of fun. The âfighting game characterâ aesthetic is way more enjoyable for Monk than I thought it would be, and it makes me happy that the spec favors mixing up your attacks with combinations rather than just spamming your highest-priority available attack at all times.
Iâm not usually a fan of melee DPS specs, but Iâm a fan of Windwalker.
The only thing itâs missing is a solid Jump + Dive-Kick move, but for that, we have the Rogueâs Death From Above, so...
Rogue: Assassins are fine nerds. Subtley is odd for nerds. Outlaws are fun and all the awesome, attractive, cool kids play Outlaw. (Star)
Iâll stand by this until the day I cheat death.
Rogues are easily my least favorite class in WoW (which is sad because Rogues are one of my favorite classes in D&D)Â
I donât like that they are melee DPS but donât have a tank spec. I donât like their squishiness (unless itâs PVP in which case theyâre ridiculously resistant/evasive and immune to all things). I donât like PVPing as one or against one. I just generally donât care for them under any circumstances.
And yet, Iâm finding myself enjoying Rogue more, in this incarnation.
This is all thanks to Outlaw, because Assassination is basically more of the same and Subtlety is basically âShadowdancer Prestige Class! But not as cool.â
Assassination is the âpoison pokey murder bleedy stabby stabbyâ spec and itâs perfectly serviceable. It retains the most âclassic rogueâ elements, like poisons and stealth attacks, and it does pretty good damage over all, split evenly between your bleeds and your poisons.
Once upon a time this was the spec of PVP assholes everywhere, and it might still be. I donât know. I donât care. It hits hard in single-target and has decent-enough AOE. If you feel like just tearing things up, this is the spec for you.
Subtlety is the âcloaky dagger shadow magic spoopy creppyâ spec and itâs a much better concept than execution. Really, itâs kind of a mess.
The big problem is that shadowdancing doesnât feel like youâre leaping into or out of the shadows to strike your foe where they are vulnerable.
It feels weird. It feels clunky. it feels like youâre filing your taxes. It feels like submitting a form in order to get a permit to use a single ability that grants additional damage for your other abilities for a just long enough period of time to forget that you need to file another form to use that ability again to do continue doing damage.
It may be potentially very powerful but it feels like crap and it plays like crap and I really donât like it at all. And the AOE sucks, too. I mean, they donât even get Kiling Spree as baseline, to make up for it. Why the heck not?
Really, the best and only spec that matters for Rogues right now is Outlaw because it makes you into a pirate. We didnât have a pirate class in WoW and we needed one. Now we have it, and itâs awesome.
Now, you donât NEED to be a pirate - you can just be a dude with a pistol and a sword. You can be that guy from âWhiskey in the Jarâ, producing your pistol and rapier and getting money. Either way, you can be way more awesome as Outlaw than as Assassination or Subtlety.
Outlaw is very simple to play but has an interesting level of depth. On the surface, you really only have 4 abilities that need used - your Sabre Slash is your default combo builder, which has a chance to proc a free use of your Pistol Shot (Shout Out to âInvisible Pistol RPersâ! ;) )Â . Your Pistol Shot is another combo builder, which fires your pistol, slows the target, and has a 20 yard range. You spend your combo points on Slice and Dice (same as before) and Evis- I mean, Run Through. For AOE, you still have Blade Flurry, which inflicts all of your single-target damage on targets nearby you.
So far, so good, right?
Where it gets interesting for Outlaw is in the talent selection - there are talents that increase the chance of gaining a free Pistol Shot proc, or to gain more combo points when it does proc, or to gain more energy, or to increase your melee range, or to have cannons from an invisible pirate ship fire at the target, or to roll dice and get a random buff.
Overall, Iâd say Outlaw is the spec I enjoy the most, especially considering that I donât typically enjoy Melee DPS as much as I enjoy tanking or ranged DPS. The only thing Iâd like to see is a better alert system on Roll the Bones, to let players know what random buff they have and for how long. Otherwise, itâs a lot of fun, and easily my favorite of the Rogue specs.
As mentioned in my previous post, Iâm examining each spec through the Silver Proving Grounds in order to get a feel for their performance and test their different play styles. A quick summary:
Mage: All specs are fine. All of the essential spells are there, but really the most fun is playing with Shimmer and Displacement.
Paladin: Overall, not bad, but not great. Holy is OK. Prot is terrible. Ret isnât the most exciting thing ever, but itâs not half bad, either.
Shaman: Mostly good to great! Elemental and Resto have been streamlined for the better (though RIP Earth Shield). Enhancement is a lot of fun.
More below the cut:
Mage: All specs are fine. All of the essential spells are there, but really the most fun is playing with Shimmer and Displacement, basically making your mage into Tracer, in WoW form. There is one problem, though: A lot of the specs feels really eerily similar to each other.
Hereâs what I mean -
Arcane mage: You have a big instant-cast spell that blows things up real good, but you have to activate it by building up Arcane Charges with your weaker spells in order to get the most damage.
Fire mage: You have a big instant-cast spell that blows things up real good, but you have to activate it with procs of âHeating Upâ from your weaker spells / spell crits, in order to get the most damage.
Frost mage: You have two big instant-cast spells that blow things up real good, but you have to activate them with âFingers of Frostâ / âMind Freezeâ procs from your weaker spells - or a cooldown, in FoFâs case - in order to get the most damage- do you see a pattern, here?
Basically all of the specs play very, very similar to each other and the biggest differences really are either the visuals, or the spells that donât really get much PVE usage (like slow, cone of cold, etc.).
There are some subtle variations to the rotations: Arcane uses mana as a real resource and needs to balance damage output with mana consumption, Fireâs proc-tastic gameplay is still heavily influenced by crit gear, and Frostâs talent choices can dramatically change the way that spec plays by eliminating the Water Elemental, manually triggering your Icicles, and other spells. All of the specs feel a little âfasterâ, as well.
But otherwise they all seem to follow the same basic idea of âbuild-up spell > build-up spell > insta-cast procâ. In the past, you could talent each spec to play very, very differently from each other - right now, you can talent them to play basically the same as each other. I can foresee three-mage multiboxers playing all three specs, with the same keybinds, simultaneously.
Paladin:Â Overall, not bad, but not great. Holy is OK. Prot is terrible. Ret seems meh to somewhat okay for damage for now. Itâs not terribly exciting but if you like easy mode melee DPS then youâll be well-served by your Ret Paladin.
The biggest loss is that everyone who doesnât main a paladin basically has no excuse not to be able to beat one, any more, though.
Like, Iâm 90% convinced that people complaining about Retribution right now (or, really, any Paladin at any time) are just a displaced PVPers or end-game raiders who can no longer count on their class to carry them through everything:
âWhat? Are you saying... my character... can take damage... and DIE?!?!â
âYou mean I can use my cooldowns... and NOT automatically become the highest DPS/heals the raid?â
âBut.. But.. My own sparkly butt doesnât propel me through the battlefield at light speed anymore!â
âTHE HORROR!!!â Â
That is to say, Paladins being tuned down to anywhere near âmediocreâ or even âbadâ in any sense is a huge nerf for everyone involved. Every spec of Paladin has gotten to be an invincible CC-spamming death machine since Vanilla. For a period of time, it was the only spec that could kill people just by standing adjacent to them. Paladins are a hybrid class that has created players who think they must be indispensable at everything, forgetting that usually a jack of all trades is a master of none. But now, for the first time in their history, âmaster of noneâ is about where Paladins are now - pretty OK at everything but not super great or even better than the specialists at any one thing.
And for the first time in my WoW playing career, I actually feel kind of bad for Paladins. High-end content almost demands teams of specialists, not well-rounded generalists. The fact that Paladins donât really excel at any one niche anymore is a devastating blow to a class that used to be the best at virtually everything.
Holy is the only spec that I felt was playing as it should (your targets benefit from being close to you for heals, and you benefit from being close to the action). Itâs pretty balanced as far as throughput and efficiency, and there are just enough tools in the kit for Holy paladins to do their job and keep people alive, even if theyâre not necessarily dropping healing bombs everywhere or shielding everyone to high heavens. Basically, if you heal when people are damaged and you smack things with your weapon when everyone is fine, then thatâs about as good as it gets.
Protection is proper screwed. There are players who will probably disagree, and Iâm sure after a certain gear threshold it will be fine for some folks, but in my opinion it just doesnât do well - not enough innate mitigation, not enough active damage mitigation, not enough self-healing, not enough cooldowns with a reasonable duration - just a whole lot of not enough. Youâre obligated to stand in Consecration in order to get the most out of all of your abilities, which feels more like a constraint that other tanks just donât have. Youâre not just âlessâ effective when youâre not on Consecration - youâre outright ineffective. Players with lots of gear will probably experience different results, but Protection is just not in a great place and Iâm probably going to leave it be for Legion.
Retribution looks fine, somewhat. The rotation isnât a clunky mess (or as clunky a mess as it was). Thereâs a combination of spells and melee attacks and each one does good damage with little downtime. They have some self heals, some genuine âRetributionâ abilities, and Greater Blessings look like what Blizz originally intended for Buffs before they decided to standardize them (and then make them go away). It needs Divine Steed as a standard spell, but really, arenât all Paladins in need Divine Steed as a standard spell?
If nothing else, Paladins should have sparkly butts that propel them at light speed on a 22.5 second cooldown. I think thatâs fair.
Anyway, theyâre probably not topping any charts, but thatâs OK. Thatâs OK. IT IS OKAY, PEOPLE. YOUâRE NOT AS SPECIAL ANYMORE AND THATâS FINE. ASHBRINGER.
Of course, Iâm probably going to regret my words when a buff patch comes that makes paladins ridiculously godly at everything again. Oh well.
Shaman:Â Mostly all good changes and improvements. Elemental and Resto have been streamlined for the better (though RIP Earth Shield). Enhancement is a lot of fun.
I always liked Elemental but Iâve also had a love-hate relationship with the sheer number of buttons I had to push to achieve the beastly damage it can do. There used to be several long and short-term cooldowns to consider, set-up spells to use, and youâre trying to weave these all in between random procs and stacks of Fulmination (RIP).
Honestly, though, as much as I love being able to eek out a huge damage spike now and then, there gets to be a point where doing ranged DPS feels like filing your taxes with the number of steps and procedures you have to follow. Right now, Elemental feels less like that, and more like setting things on fire, and then electrocuting them, and then.. uh... well, I really donât know what âEarth Shockâ is supposed to do or look like. Maybe hit them with a rock?
Either way, your big deal is keeping Flame Shock up on a target, while alternating between Lightning Bolt and Lava Burst while you build up enough Maelstrom power for Earth Shock. Thatâs... pretty much it. Simple, but sweet.
Iâm still getting a grip on Enhancement but the one thing I can say is that it is pretty powerful and pretty fast. Iâm getting the impression that Blizz wants its dual-wielding specs to play fast and furious, and it wants the two-handed specs to play steady and methodical. All things considered, those are good, general themes to go with - your ambidextrous guys try to cause death by a thousand cuts, while your big-weapon guys just focus on landing fewer, more devastating hits. The thing is that, Enhancement included, dual-wielding specs feel the most bursty, and the single-weapon specs feel like steady, streamed damage.
Restoration Shaman seems to have lost Earth Shield and its Riptide/Earthliving/Healing Surge Heal Bomb combo, but Iâm glad to report that Riptide/Healing Surge does just as well, takes fewer buttons to cast, and is generally just a better, more streamlined approach to taking your tank from dying to healthy. I miss Earth Shieldâs ability to keep persistent heals on the tank even when Iâm targeting others, but I find that Healing Rain, Chain Heals, and totems actually fill that niche just as well, and if youâre using them already, anyway, then it shouldnât be a problem.Â
Other than that, not much else to say - I feel like the things theyâve taken from Resto Shaman, theyâve given back more than enough to keep it worthwhile.
Oh, well, Grounding Totem. Iâll miss Grounding Totem, maybe, I guess.
Doing Proving Grounds with each class/spec is proving to be an illuminating experience. Iâm learning what I like and donât like about each spec.
For the record, Iâm only doing Silver Mode, just to get a feel for the class. Iâm not running hard numbers or even playing with Recount up. In reality, with my gear I should probably be able to do Gold Mode (at least) on each toon/spec, but A) you only need Silver Mode in order to use LFG, which is the group content most new players will see first and, hence, the only thing I care about, and B) I have like 11 toons, donât want to learn how/have the time to do all 10 Gold Mode waves for each and ever spec.
I just need a taste of what each spec offers, and hereâs what Iâm finding so far:
Death Knight: Pretty much every spec is good! Blood looks great, Frost is button-mashy, Unholy is very technical and strategic. All are fun.
Druid:Â Balance is better. Resto is about the same. Feral/Guardian posts pending.
Priest: Holy and Shadow seem pretty good. Discipline is a mess. Discipline is a waste. Discipline is a big, fat, mistake.
Warlock: Afflock is for nerdier nerds than I (didnât play it yet). Demonology is kinda trash but might be fun for some folks. Destro is still the spec to play. Â
Warrior: All the specs are fine. Arms could stand to be less boring. Fury is button-mashy. Protection is and always will be the only Warrior spec that matters, though - and itâs fine. I miss Gladiatior Stance.
More below the cut.
Death Knight:Â Pretty much every spec is good!
Rolling Bone Shield into Marrow Strike feels better than I thought it would. I miss having Bone Shield up as a âpreparationâ and maintanence, but rolling it into an attack means I need care about my runes. Death Strike is still the most important ability, but feels much easier to use now that itâs on RP. Blood Boilâs new animation is perfect.
While I typically play Blood because I like to tank much more than I like to melee DPS, Frost and Unholy are still pretty enjoyable. Frost DK feels much more button-mashy and Unholy feels much more technical. I imagine this is intentional, but played well it looks like either spec is capable of bringing the customary huge DK DPS numbers.
Druid: Only did Balance and Resto so far, and both are fine! Balance feels better overall and Resto feels about the same (some abilities I liked are gone but some abilities I missed are back, so itâs about a wash for me).
Balance feels like a complete improvement over what was. While I enjoyed the see-saw nature of  MoP/WoDâ˛s Boomkins, it became impossible for me to know when I was doing well or not. Having Druidâs build Astral Power with their normal abilities, then spend it on their most powerful abilities, and then having those abilities buff their normal abilities again plays really well.
Resto feels about the same, though some of the talent choices had me a bit vexxed. I miss Germination and just spamming Rejuvenate on things, but I like not needing to spend a glyph in order to place my Efflorescence where I like. Output seems pretty OK for me, as well.
Priest:Â Holy and Shadow seem pretty good. Discipline is a mess, and itâs terrible, and I hate everyone who thought it needed this change, including myself.
I have the most, strongest feelings about Disc because it was the spec that I played most on my Priest since Wrath, and was for the longest time my favorite healing spec. I donât know who decided that Discipline priests need to press more buttons to do less healing, but thatâs where they are, right now.Â
Atonement only really works as a smart heal, and it is not a smart heal anymore. The current incarnation requires players to maintain Atonement buffs on the targets they want to heal, and that buff simply doesnât last long enough, nor is the healing generated by it sufficient. Forcing players to switch between spamming Plea (or any other spells that place the Atonement buff) on party members and then spamming Smite on enemies really isnât as enjoyable or as rewarding as just spamming Power Word: Shield on allies and then spamming Smite on enemies, letting the smart heals keep everyone topped off, or occasionally dropping Flash Heals against quick bursts of damage. Instead, you have almost no snap-healing ability, and youâre pretty much locked into DPSing when you should be healing because thatâs the only significant way to heal. As such, itâs a hybrid Ranged DPS/Healing spec that does neither job well. And this makes absolutely no sense to me, because it was already a solid healing spec with a solid ranged DPS mechanic, and they changed that for no good reason.
I know the Devs were concerned that Disc was substantially better than Holy priest. Thatâs because their class design for Holy Priest was terrible. Disc priest is not made more enjoyable or more balanced by these changes, and it may even be made completely non-viable for end-game content, and I have no idea why anyone thought that was a good idea.
Fortunately, Holy Priest is alright. Having never played it much before, it plays now much more like how Disc priests used to play (sans Atonement and insta-cast spells). The best innovation with Holy is Serendipity, where your single-target heals reduce the cooldown of your single-target Holy Word, and the AOE heals reduce the cooldown of your AOE Holy Word. Holy Word spells are like Healing Bombs, and theyâre a lot of fun to use, as you can drop a significant amount of healing very quickly, but their long cooldown means you have to use them strategically. The cooldown-reduction mechanic rewards players for using the appropriate heal at the appropriate time (as opposed to Chakras, which seemed to punish players for trying to heal smarter rather than harder), and they have all the spells they need in order to provide substantial, no-frills healing.
Shadow is a lot of fun as a DPS spec and while I miss the Shadow Orbs, the Insanity mechanic is admittedly much cooler. It reminds me of a better version of the formerly Demonology Warlockâs Metamorphisis (RIP). Basically most/all of your abilities charge your insanity meter, and after a point you can use it to activate Voidform and use more powerful versions of your spells. You can still gain insanity while in this mode, but the insanity drain gets steeper as you go on. This is another mechanic that is pretty simple but rewards optimized gameplay without necessarily punishing the player if they do something other than stand still and spam 1.
Warlock:Â Played Destruction and Demonology. Affliction Warlocks are not made for people but actually tactical supercomputers developed by NASA, so I havenât tried them yet. Destruction is nerfed but otherwise fine, Demonology is kinda trash.
Demonology would probably be more fun if it had more CC options, but with a cast time on Fear, no Shadowfury, your other CCs locked up in specific demon summons, and no otherwise way to control said demons, I just canât recommend it. It was fun to summon a bunch of demons at once to attack things, but this mechanic just doesnât ramp up enough damage fast enough for me. There might be good end-game or PVP applications for players who can cheese the summoning mechanics and cooldowns, but this spec just isnât doing it for me right now.
Destruction is where itâs at. Itâs a straight forward game of building up shards by setting things on fire, and then spending them on chaos bolts or rains of fire, in order to set them on fire even more, I guess. Thereâs not much else to it. If you like fire and chaos (and I do!) then Destruction is the spec for you.Â
Warrior: Played all the specs. Theyâre all fine so far. I heard Bad Things about Warrior and those are probably true, but for now, you can play Arms and Fury and Prot without fear.
Arms still feels like the weakest of the bunch, which is a shame because it used to be such a grand spec. It either needs more Rage generation/management abilities, or more abilities that just donât use Rage at all, in order to keep it active and dynamic. It also needs for the most effective spec to not be the most boring one. Thatâs to say nothing about the self-healing, because Iâve literally got nothing to say about self healing for Warriors. Weâre talking Warrior DPS here. You donât heal damage. You do damage. You ignore damage. You make your damage do damage. But youâre not, as a Warrior DPS, ever expected to heal damage, ever, and nor should you. You want self-healing, go play a Blood DK (or Fury Warrior, I guess, because theyâre cheaters like that).
Fury is bloody good fun and I can see myself sticking with it into Legion. I switched from Arms to Fury in Warlords, but wound up leaving both DPS specs alone altogether for Gladiator Stance (RIP). I once told someone that the more a spec makes me feel like Iâm playing Dynasty Warriors, the better that spec is for the Warrior class. Thatâs the example that the Warrior class needs to aspire to, and thatâs where Fury Warrior is, for me - a button-mashing good time.
Protection is still my favorite Warrior spec because itâs a tanking spec and I like to tank. I like the change of âHeroic Strikeâ and âShield Barrierâ or whatever it was to âGet Angry And Do More Damageâ and âGet Angry and Take Less Damageâ. This was a change that Warriors needed, IMO.
What we didnât need was for Gladiator Stance to be taken away, those bastards. There will forever be a sword-and-board-DPS-shaped hole in my heart, where Gladiator Stance once was. Gone, but not forgotten, my friends.
Still have more Proving Grounds to do but thatâs all I have for today. Weâll see what tomorrow brings!
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Iâm dying???
So for those of you who donât know, or who arenât playing or whatever, the latest pre-expansion patch came out today (yesterday?? this morning??). And this one is focused on the Burning Legion and Demon Hunters (yay Illidan!) so like stuffâs already going down. Whereâs Varian? I would ask where Sylvanas is if I liked her at all. Is Khadgar gonna get corrupted? WHO KNOWS.
Okay but back to the patch itself. Like, itâs much more efficient in transmog and some stuff but the class overhaul is insane this expac. I logged into my warrior and there was no abilities in the main actionbar. Itâs crazy, but it seems to be working out well. Thereâs no glyphs anymore, which is kinda sad. But I was questing in Outlands on my druid and I think the Felhound modelâs been updated?? Maybe I just havenât been in Outlands in forever but somehow they seem larger and better rendered. Like I said, IDK. But it would figure since weâre gonna be seeing more of them.
I am honestly not gonna play it because it comes out right before school starts (well not right before but thatâs crunch time and Iâm gonna be working on stuff Iâd procrastinated the whole summer on). And also because itâs like a freaking drug that I got over 2 years ago and I donât want to make it a habit again. It seems promising, but at the same time I would love to see less of the Legion and more of the Naga. It seems a bit redundant having an expansion set on the orcs involving demons, and then adding more Outlands bs on top, even if itâs not set in Draenor/Outlands again. We havenât seen the Naga, or the South Seas, or hell even the Dark Below. I would much rather expand the already present world rather than add another Supernatural-esque plotline on top.
Or you could just give us more Wranduin that would be great.