6.2 Buffs/Nerfs

[Twinkielock 15]

Demo took it in the shorts

 

General

• Corruption now deals 12% more damage.
• Shadow Bolt now deals 25% less damage.

Affliction

• Agony now deals 12% more damage.
• Unstable Affliction now deals 12% more damage.

Demonology

• Mastery: Master Demonologist has decreased in effectiveness by 4%.
• Chaos Wave now deals 25% less damage.
• Doom now deals 25% less damage.
• Hand of Gul’dan now deals 25% less damage.
• Soul Fire now deals 25% less damage.
• Touch of Chaos now deals 25% less damage.

[Lockybalboa 618]

This is their first pass, but it is still moronic. Across all the classes 90% of the changes are just brain dead moronic. 

[Anja 0]

Yes, while the Demonology changes are particularly excessive and blind, there are more than a few bad decisions overall in those preliminary patch notes.

I would not be surprised to see some of them reverted, however I do expect we will still eat some Demonology nerfs.

[Alkeir 1]

What do they just not want me to play demonology? ;_;

[Anja 0]

What do they just not want me to play demonology? ;_;

 

It would not have been unwise to anticipate a nerf to our AoE, probably to Chaos Wave.

This, however, is surprising and unwarranted.

[Alkeir 1]

It would not have been unwise to anticipate a nerf to our AoE, probably to Chaos Wave.

This, however, is surprising and unwarranted.

Our singletarget is already lackluster, this nerf even makes it worse. The only reason our AOE is so prevalent is due to the way the fights in BRF are designed...that doesn't mean the spec as a whole needs to be absolutely rekt... :(

[Curinir 4]

My thoughts on this is that if this does go through, Warlocks will not be doomed as a result of this patch. First of all, Affliction is getting a nice buff and might be somewhat playable. This will almost certainly be the class of choice, at least until people start getting tier sets and their Warlock trinkets off of Archimonde. Yes, that's right, class specific trinkets. I found an intresting link on wowhead that lists the tier bonuses and trinket effects for the upcoming patch.

 

The tier bonuses are as follows:

 

•  Item - Warlock T18 Affliction 2P Bonus: Damage done by your Drain Soul has a 30% chance to extend the duration of your Dark Soul: Misery by 5 sec.
•  Item - Warlock T18 Affliction 4P Bonus: While Dark Soul Misery is active, your Drain Soul damage also refreshes the duration of your Haunt effect on the target.
•  Item - Warlock T18 Demonology 2P Bonus: Your Soul Fire increases the damage done by your Demons by 5000% for until cancelled.
•  Item - Warlock T18 Demonology 4P Bonus: When Molten Core occurs, you have a 30% chance to summon a Demon from the void to assist you in battle.
•  Item - Warlock T18 Destruction 2P Bonus: Reduces the cast time of your Chaos Bolt by 2.5 sec.
•  Item - Warlock T18 Destruction 4P Bonus: Your Chaos Bolt has a 1% chance to not consume an Ember.

 

Affliction set bonuses seem very unoriginal to me, however it has ridiculous potential to create some serious damage. 25, 30, or even a 35 second long Dark Soul phase seems quite wonderful, and then to have Haunt lengthened on top of that? I'm not complaining here.

 

Demonology.... I can't imagine 5000% being the actual number for the two piece, however this assures me that they are trying to revert Demonology back to a more pet oriented class, almost like Beast Mastery. However, the fact that you need a 2 piece bonus to start dealing real damage again, I find a little rude. As far as the 4 piece goes, I imagine it will be just like the current Inner Demon we get, except more powerful.

Destruction is quite interesting here, instant cast Chaos Bolts make movement quite a bit easier on this spec, however you still have to remain pretty rooted while casting Incinerate to generate your embers. It feels more and more like we are being herded toward Charred Remains and Chaos Bolt doing 70% and upwards of your damage. The 4 piece is cool, but 1% isn't too huge.

 

Trinket bonuses go as follows:

 

 Boss 13 - Warlock Trinket:

•  Epidemic: Reduces the duration and period of Agony, Unstable Affliction, and Corruption by 7%.
•  Swarm of Gul'dan: Hand of Gul'dan has a 13% chance to also summon 3 Wild Imps.
•  Flamelicked: Incinerate increases the critical strike chance of your spells against that target by 1% for 10 sec, stacking up to 5 times.

 

Starting with Affliction, I don't really understand this. Unless I am reading it wrong, Affliction is getting a nerf with this trinket. What I am hoping Blizzard meant to say was it increases the damage instead.

 

Demonology has a higher chance to generate Imps now, which will also greatly contribute to the 25% of DPS that you are going to lose. I like this a lot, and it almost grants a slight bit of hope for Glyph of Imp Swarm, since you will be getting extra Imps without your passive generation of Imps.

 

Destruction is getting a handsome buff here with this trinket. Incinerate generating extra critical strike is going to make for some insane Chaos Bolts.

 

So overall, looking at the three specs, Affliction and Destruction are becoming pretty mean on their own once you get gear. However, before tier I imagine our numbers will be toward the bottom of the Simcraft charts. Demonology will also be very set bonus dependent, but once you get the set bonus, this will probably reemerge as a decent spec based on pet control. Stepping back and taking a look at the big picture here, I think we will be a-okay this tier. I haven't looked at the dungeon journals too in depth yet (which are also on wowhead), but we have plenty to look forward to. The end is not coming.

 

 

P.S. Here is a link to the wowhead page with the tier and trinkets in case you are interested! 

 

http://www.wowhead.com/news=247153/6-2-ptr-spell-changes-new-follower-abilities-tier-18-set-bonuses-archimonde-trin

[Anja 0]

My thoughts on this is that if this does go through, Warlocks will not be doomed as a result of this patch.

 

Certainly not; the other two specs will be playable.

There is definitely a lot of (arguably justified) backlash against the tentative Demonology nerfs, but people should keep in mind that they are not yet live. It also remains to be seen how potent the set bonuses will be in offsetting these nerfs should they make it live.

The class will survive, as it always has.

 

 

Affliction set bonuses seem very unoriginal to me, however it has ridiculous potential to create some serious damage. 25, 30, or even a 35 second long Dark Soul phase seems quite wonderful, and then to have Haunt lengthened on top of that? I'm not complaining here.

 

They seem to be very potent for single-target, low-movement encounters, or at least in an encounter where the opportunity to stand still presents itself in tandem with a DS cooldown.

However, it is worth noting the number of those types of encounters so far into this expansion.

 

Demonology.... I can't imagine 5000% being the actual number for the two piece

 

I would imagine that the majority of the numbers are simply placeholders.

 

It feels more and more like we are being herded toward Charred Remains and Chaos Bolt doing 70% and upwards of your damage.

 

We are already headed this way as more Mastery becomes present on gear; that is the inevitability of gear scaling and how it impacts Chaos Bolt for us. The set bonus will certainly afford Destruction a little bit more mobility, and that is a welcome thing.

 

 

 

•  Epidemic: Reduces the duration and period of Agony, Unstable Affliction, and Corruption by 7%.

Starting with Affliction, I don't really understand this. Unless I am reading it wrong, Affliction is getting a nerf with this trinket. What I am hoping Blizzard meant to say was it increases the damage instead.

 

I would assume what it means is that the duration and the period between ticks are both reduced, which is actually pretty nice.

[Lockybalboa 618]

Interesting find. I just finished writing a rant on my guild forums about the stupidity of the ring proc idea. Class trinkets, although kind of cool, seem like an equally bad idea due to the balance issues.

 

Also, I think what they mean with the aff trinket is that the time between ticks is reduced along with the over all time of the dot. So basically an old school haste proc, I think.

[Anja 0]

 I just finished writing a rant on my guild forums about the stupidity of the ring proc idea.

 

I find the ring design more egregious than the Demonology nerfs, to be honest.

:-(

[Lockybalboa 618]

I find the ring design more egregious than the Demonology nerfs, to be honest.

:-(

 

 

The DPS one is a moronic idea on a LOT of levels. Depending on just how the ring proc rotated between raid members it could range from "Stop eating glue" level of stupid to "Im sorry, Hitler, your art isn't good enough for this school" level of bad idea.

 

The tank one is enough worse. The 10% vert is meh, the copied healing is meh, the damage reduction is basically useless. I would rather have the healer proc as a tank then I would the tank proc.

 

The healing proc is basically on the same level as the DPS proc, but less destructive.

 

I hope that this idea is TOTALLY scrapped and we get something that works. If any kind of iteration of this idea goes live, we're screwed on a LOT of levels.

[spikeysquad 50]

Some numbers are probably just place holders but oh well it's a new major patch so of course we all must switch specs again (or feels that way anyhow recently). Time to get practising though I do fear falling asleep whilst doing so...  

[Peelyon 416]

Just wanted to pop my head in to put my pennies worth about the ring.  

 

You wonder who comes up with these ideas sometimes.  

 

"Right we need something new exciting and different for the legendary guys...."

 

*silence*

 

"Come on someone must have some ideas"

 

*silence*

 

"Really, noone has any ideas?"

 

*hand up at the back*

 

"Uhm...maybe we should share procs between the group so its feels like everyone isnt the same all the time"

 

.........tumbleweed

 

"Anyone got anything better?......sold!"

[HollyC 9]

As someone who doesn't have time to raid (I'm out of the house for practically all of the afternoon and early evening until 10 PM Eastern Time on Tuesdays, most Thursdays, and some Fridays) and isn't part of a raiding guild, I'm concerned about some of the comments in this discussion. While I agree that even though it's preliminary, the list of 'apparently total' nerfs to Demonology are too far in excess, some of the commentary has me a little non-plussed.

 

"RIP demonology locks, brewmaster monks and windwalker monks?" Is this supposed to mean that even in dungeons, just queueing as one of those specs will result in everyone and their grandma doing a vote kick? That everyone and their grandma will run to respec to "FOTM?" Look folks, I'll admit that as a non-raider, I really don't understand the dynamics of a raiding environment, but one thing I've never believed, and never will believe, if the lives of my whole family depended on it, that just being a particular class or spec, all by itself and no other reason, warrants being kicked from every group you try to join or worse, blacklisted across an entire server. Someone who knows every in and out of a supposedly 'lesser spec' can't be a total failure, and someone who feels awkward enough with a FOTM probably isn't going to zerg everything in sight with it?  I even accept the idea that each encounter is more susceptible to one spec vs. another, and the best players will switch in and out as they advance through a raid or dungeon. But "I was fire when fire wasn't cool" (talking about my mage here) and I survived.

 

Could someone please explain to me what this whole panic button thing is about, even though cooler heads have already called for calm and tried to assure everyone that the sky isn't falling? (By the way, FWIW, I thank those of you that have done that.)

Edited April 14, 2015 by HollyC

[Lockybalboa 618]

If you don't raid then 95% of the changes to any class of any kind will be mostly, if not totally, irrelevant. You CAN do 5 mans, PvP (to a point), solo, farm, play the AH, quest, etc. as just about any class in any spec if you are willing to put in the time required. A healing pally will find finishing Lore Master a much slower prospect then a Demo Warlock, but doable none the less.

 

If you DO raid then depending on what level you raid at balance is VERY important. If you raid LFR, balance is again almost totally irrelevant since you can do LFR with basically anything. The higher level of raiding you do the more important balance becomes. At the top most levels class stacking and class dropping becomes very common, there were many top end warlocks that did not see world race progression kills because warlock was just to far behind. The few that did see top end kills all said it was only because they out geared the rest of their raid by 5+ illvl.

 

Balance is a numbers game, since this is the first pass we can assume these notes are mostly crap and the final numbers will be different then what we see here - so the sky is falling screams and gnashing of teeth is not warranted.

 

However, what I and others are concerned about is less the numbers behind the change but the fact that there is a change at all.

 

Such as, Aspect of the Fox and Amp Magic. Why add them just to remove them a patch later? They don't harm the game, they add a layer of mechanics and usefulness without being over powered. You CAN stack them if you REALLY wanted to but there isn't really anyone that is doing that to break anything.

 

WW Monk Hurricane kick, this was BUFFED by 25% in 6.1 and is now being NERFFED by 30% in 6.2 Again this might be a numbers game, I don't WW so I can't say for sure that it doesn't need a nerf. But nerfing it past the point where it was just buffed is bad planing. Bad design. Just bad work in general. If you already know that -25% is to low, why would you start your iterations at -30%?

 

I also feel that the demo nerfs are done not because they are needed, but because Blizzard is working with false information and ignoring it. Demo looks a lot better then it truly is on a lot of fights because of a bug in how the damage is being tracked. Zag and Reck have talked about it in our guild mumble a lot and posted about it on our forums and I think Reddit. I'm not sure if he has on Darkintentions.com or here. From what I understand what is happening is that DoTs are doing damage to targets that are dead and no longer targetable. This is usable on almost every fight in BRF atm. Because of this I think Blizzard is looking at warlocks and saying "Oh, they are fine." instead of "Oh, we suck at programming. We need to fix that."

 

The ring procs are not finalized, but they by existing show that at some point someone in power thought they might be a good idea. They are not. On no level is this idea for a ring proc good. Not in casual play, not in mid level raiding, not in bleeding edge progression. It is simply a dumb damn idea that should have never made it out of the meeting where it was spoken.

 

 

TL:DR

Yes, these are problems. Just because they are not your problems does not mean they are not problems. No, the problems are not as bad as some people will make them out to be. But they are problems.

[Mikedawg 4]

Someone who knows every in and out of a supposedly 'lesser spec' can't be a total failure, and someone who feels awkward enough with a FOTM probably isn't going to zerg everything in sight with it?  I even accept the idea that each encounter is more susceptible to one spec vs. another, and the best players will switch in and out as they advance through a raid or dungeon. But "I was fire when fire wasn't cool" (talking about my mage here) and I survived.

 

You are putting too much weight on skill. An extremely skilled player (99th percentile) player playing a bad spec will not outperform an average player who is playing a good spec, given that the average player is not idiotic. This is, of course, in a raid environment.

 

In a dungeon, of course a skilled player will be able to make any spec work. Classes are not balanced around 5-mans at all.

Edited April 14, 2015 by Mikedawg

[spikeysquad 50]

Hi HollyC,

 

Well I can try and explain a little from the way I see it. So let's say these nerfs went through. Locks will still be fine in dungeons but I tend to think the people most worried are raiders rather than the more casual players. So I wonder how many BRF raiders who have 655-703 gear do dungeons regularly so I don't think that argument is really relevant for the majority of people who are concerned. 

 

I am currently in a "casual" raiding guild. Performance doesn't matter that much to the officers but sure it helps my confidence/ego. For some people though their numbers really do matter. People get benched if they are not performing well. If another class is stronger on a certain fight they might get stacked and the other (even better) player benched. In the really top guilds players will swap around and play the class that is needed for a particular fight. So to all of the people in those kind of situations it really does have an impact. For when we start mythic with another guild there are about 30 people for 20 spots. Competition is fierce and again performance will matter.   

 

I have pugged quite a lot and sometimes then you see comments like "don't invite the shadow priest they suck" or "get more hunters/mages cuz they are OP" so again it really does affect that class. The raid leaders don't know how super duper or rubbish you are until you join. I am not saying every group or guild is like this but some are and that's enough to be an issue.

 

The other issue is the continual swapping of the strong (FoTM) spec. Blizzard keeps doing these massive buffs and nerfs and there's no continuity. One minute Destro is on top, then it was Affliction, now it is Demo. I will play all 3 lock specs because I like to perform the best I can in a raid as yes it makes me feel good but also then we are more likely to kill stuff. Though I play all 3 I definitely have a favourite and also sometimes I feel a little bored going from Demo which I admit I am not that good at (aka it is a challenge) to the others that I find not as stimulating.

 

Also people that stay with their favourite spec can really experience a huge damage decrease. I'll use probably the most extreme example but currently there's a boss called Operator Thogar who has a bunch of adds (everyone just forget priority targets for a bit). Taking the numbers directly form Warcraftlogs Demo on heroic at highest levels of skill (and gear and padding) does 75k and Affliction does 47k. In a pug even if the kill happens can you see Affliction dude not being kicked? (Pugs are pretty brutal in my opinion). In a guild that is struggling for hours on end to kill a boss; do you think they will keep Affliction dude around if they are being overrun with adds? This is why people cry. For the ones that it matters to they have to change yet again or they end up being non-competitive...

 

Ultimately though it's about the level you play at and what the raids needs/want from you. As long as one spec is ok and rounded enough I will be ok but I if it goes out like this I sure will miss playing Demo in raids.

 

P.S. Increase in Affliction DoTs I like. We might have some competitive ST/MT? 

Edited April 14, 2015 by spikeysquad

[Paracel 165]

I hope that there is a big rioting crowd moving to Blizz HQ and demanding explainations, because that's what I want, too.

It's just absurd - everything from Mages x Hunters buff, Monk nerf and removal of the Fox down to our Warlock changes and new weird trinkets and tier bonuses. And I'm not even talking about the ring because I have an absolute zero of clues.

Destro tier piece is like 146% wtf for me.

Aff buffs - I'd totally agree, it feels a luckluster spec, especially with all that DoT class concept gone(read:DoTs make 0 damages and no snapshots)

Demo nerfs - that's what really puzzles me.
Why?
Are they needed?
It's just a spec that performs OK in 10 out of 10 fights of BRF, due to BRF design and AoE involved.
It's not or OP broken anywhere. Balanced, decently skillcapped and giving you a good output in reward for your skill, just like it should be.

I won't judge more untill we get closer to the patch.
We were nerfed hard when 6.0 hit and Highmaul was around, yet still managed to emerge.

Gotta see the actual fights from Hellfire Citadel.
Warlocks still have the ultimate weapon to beat anything Blizz throws at us - personal skill, strong community and 3 different specs.
They can't screw up all 3 specs. Or can they?

[Bombsauce 3]

People seem to forget this a lot about playing a pure DPS class: the 'best' spec will change from fight to fight, patch to patch, and as gear scales. Learn all of them if you ONLY want to play a damage class. I honestly don't care, I enjoy the class and will optimize based upon what is better in what situation. I think that the set/ring bonuses will factor a lot into the reasons behind these nerfs. It will more than likely be a destro for cleave aff for single target again, unless the modifier on the Demo 2 piece bonus is correct. If that is correct, look out. Serv/Serv will be extremely potent if that bonus is tuned properly. Don't get your panties in a bunch people, we'll be fine.

[Janglybits 1]

The current ring procs are a placeholder from an earlier design idea.  The Warcraft Devs Twitter account confirmed that.

[Peelyon 416]

What I dont understand is why cant they just blank it out and put "placeholder" then Janglybits.  With a small explanation saying "weve not decided yet".  A lot easier to control and explain than using a placeholder without having to resort to twitter which a lot of people still dont use.

[Anja 0]

The current ring procs are a placeholder from an earlier design idea.  The Warcraft Devs Twitter account confirmed that.

 

Indeed, what a relief!

[demonardvark 556]

The DPS one is a moronic idea on a LOT of levels. Depending on just how the ring proc rotated between raid members it could range from "Stop eating glue" level of stupid to "Im sorry, Hitler, your art isn't good enough for this school" level of bad idea.

 

 That was beautiful

[Lockybalboa 618]

The current ring procs are a placeholder from an earlier design idea.  The Warcraft Devs Twitter account confirmed that.

 

The very fact that at any point in the process someone on the team thought it was a good enough idea to put on paper, let alone in a tool tip, show scares me. 

 

I really hope the final proc is nothing even remotely like this place holder idea, but I have no faith.

[Anja 0]

As happy as I was to learn that the data mined proc was not going to make it live, I have a feeling that the future incarnation will just be an altered version of the same concept. :|

 

I really, really dislike the notion of the Legendary proc being synergistic and shared with my entire dps group, rather than a personal RPPM or some other sort of personal effect.

It is just very bad, very RNG-based, poorly-planned design to be sharing the effect among an entire group of players.

 

As "boring" as people found the cloak procs, I would absolutely take something in that vein over the speculated ring design.

At least it does not leave me at the mercy of poor rng and entirely too many variables to effectively plan around.