wow Target Caps in Shadowlands

[Stan 5,240]

Large pulls have become a prevalent tactic in the game, so Blizzard has capped most melee AoE abilities that previously attacked all targets to only attack up to four/five targets in Shadowlands, and here's how it plays out in practice.

Most of the AoE abilities that inflict Physical damage are now capped, so if your tank pulls a large group of mobs, the ability will not attack all the mobs that were pulled.

The general consensus is to make Melee DPS excel in situations with 4 to 5 targets and Ranged DPS against 5 or more targets.

[leapingshadow 50]

Looks good but I fear it won't be enough. For sure a step in the right direction since pulling 50% of the enemy forces and killing them from range with ring of peace in a choke-point was going to get boring real quick.

[durdyenglish 298]

Seems like a step in the right direction. From a fantasy and a mechanical perspective, it logically empowers large-scale effects like Rain of Fire, etc. It also doesn't make sense that a melee class would be able to hit 20 enemies with one sword swing - fantasy game or not.

I like that it puts an emphasis on brute force for small packs and and emphasis on grandeur for large packs. I imagine dungeons will be organized and tuned to allow for player choice depending on group composition. 

Edited July 27, 2020 by durdyenglish
typo

[Terrorsquid 0]

Is this going to affect legacy content, such as raids/dungeon runs for transmogs ?

[Asakash 22]

2 minutes ago, Terrorsquid said:

Is this going to affect legacy content, such as raids/dungeon runs for transmogs ?

I guess it will, as it will be implemented into the the class mechanics.

However, i guess your concern would be, that you can't run old dungeons as fast, if you only hit 5 targets? I think, this shouldn't be a problem, as, and i might be wrong here, i believe, that all melee specs still have abilitys that hit all targets, like the whirlwind for warriors, just not the hard hitting ones.

My guess is, that this would still be enough, to run through legacy content.

[fattycop 1]

2 hours ago, durdyenglish said:

Seems like a step in the right direction. From a fantasy and a mechanical perspective, it logically empowers large-scale effects like Rain of Fire, etc. It also doesn't make sense that a melee class would be able to hit 20 enemies with one sword swing - fantasy game or not.

I like that it puts an emphasis on brute force for small packs and and emphasis on grandeur for large packs. I imagine dungeons will be organized and tuned to allow for player choice depending on group composition. 

Did you watch the clip? The whole group was melee, and the tank even did roughly double the rets dps. Unholy DK still has uncapped scourge strike in DnD, which is a sword strike hitting like 20 mobs. Where a paladin has divine storm, which literally summons light to spin around you, but is target capped. So even from a logic perspective (which is stupid for balance) that makes no sense.

[Ragingwolf 310]

I still don't like this.......as a Tanking perspective and a melee dps perspective.  The groups that I do form together are mostly melee with the exception of a BM Hunter.  Hardly ever a Warlock, Mage, S.Priest, or Ele.Shaman.  Never a Boomkin either.  These are just specializations/classes that several in my Guild hardly ever want to play when it comes to doing keystones.  This just makes me feel as if I'm going to gamble away more survivability as a Tank to push out more dps because of this cap restriction with the pending of affixes and key level.  

I'll have members that will actually research and study their classes of what is and will be in changing in Shadowlands and adjust accordingly.  Then............then I have those that refuse and will stick to old bad habits. eg) not moving away from ground mechanics, getting hit by cleaves, breaking cc, body pulling, or my all time favorite not interrupting the caster mob when it's about to polymorph a member or about to heal the other mobs around it.

*sigh* this change is a nuisance but something I'm going to have learn to work with with the new keystone season in Shadowlands.

[Yojiro 30]

Wonder how long it will take before blizz reverts this stuff again, almost every single expansion blizzard starts talking about target capping AoE or certain specs having "different strength at different target amounts" but in practice it always turns out the same, specs that are supposed to be strong at few targets are just 'Ok' or 'meh' and useless at high amount of targets while specs that are strong at many targets are also good at few targets rendering 'cleave specs' or lower capped AoE specs nearly useless until blizz removes the target cap again, or if the cleave specs actually do well at their job they inevitably get nerfed into the ground on other points to balance it out (WoD windwalker monk being a great example, unrivaled at council bossfights and deadweight at almost everything else)

On paper the idea is good but Blizzard fails at the execution almost every time.

Also I think a lot of these problems could be resolved through enemy or dungeon design rather than simply slapping an AoE cap on there.

[SidonisAntares 290]

As long as mob layouts in dungeon design reflect this then sure, however it will also be necessary to go back through TBC on up and trim elite packs with more than 5 mobs based on previous design, in order not to punish those leveling or timewalking.  And as @fattycop mentioned, the tuning needs to be across the board. Divine Storm should be doing more than than tank AoE, and ability combinations like Scourge Strike/Clawing Shadows + Death and Decay shouldn't be excluded from the cap unless you're going to allow them to do the same with Crusader Strike while standing in Consecration.

[durdyenglish 298]

6 hours ago, fattycop said:

Did you watch the clip? The whole group was melee, and the tank even did roughly double the rets dps. Unholy DK still has uncapped scourge strike in DnD, which is a sword strike hitting like 20 mobs. Where a paladin has divine storm, which literally summons light to spin around you, but is target capped. So even from a logic perspective (which is stupid for balance) that makes no sense.

Probably a tuning issue at this point, I was speaking to the concept of it.

[Whiterhino 31]

I hope this doesnt work in old content. That'd be so bad. No reason to "timegate" old content with aoe caps.