wow Warlock Changes in the War Within Beta: August 2nd

[Staff 1,488]

Warlocks are getting some more changes, as Blizzard try to adjust Rain of Fire's prevalence in the single-target rotation. 

Warlock (Source)

Greetings Destruction Warlocks.

Due to an increase in the Soul Shard generation available to Destruction, we are seeing that Rain of Fire is overtaking the role of Chaos Bolt as the primary damaging ability in single-target encounters. To address this, we have deployed the following changes to Beta:

Destruction

• Pyrogenics now increases damage taken from your Fire spells by 3% (was 5%).
• Avatar of Destruction now generates 1 Soul Shard Fragment every 1 second (was 0.5 seconds).
• Summon Infernal now generates 1 Soul Shard Fragment every 1 second (was 0.5 seconds).

Diabolist

• Destruction
  • Infernal Bolt now generates 2 Soul Shards (was 3 Soul Shards).

We will continue to watch and test and make further adjustments if needed.

Thank you for the feedback!

[TheRagingwolf 258]

I love this game. However, I will never understand why all this tweeking of abilities happens constantly. If we are to have true balance, then there should be equal overall damage output, so long as other things are equal. For example, take any two base classes such as warlock and rogue. There is no reason why there abilities, when used in an optimal rotation, should not output the same amount of damage. Now, of course, that leaves room for "well, what is optimal for this spec rogue/warlock?". Yeah, that's the challenge of a game like this, learning how to use your chosen class correctly.

And, of course, there are stat modifiers such as gear, flasks, enchants, etc. But we're talking about the base classes, with no manipulation. It seems the devs in charge of class tuning are missing the boat completely as every xpac, every patch, we see more of these changes that are seemingly random and without much "science". Seriously, they just need to set a baseline damage output for all classes and build each ability based on that output, then let the players find their way to the optimal numbers.

Oh, and the same baseline principal can be applied to tank threat and heal output. Set the baseline, disperse that amount as desired to the various class abilities, then allow the players to find the baseline and build upon to maximize their chosen class. Seems simple enough.

[Fungo 6]

So they nerf soulshard generation and fire damage, but that is going to nerf bolt too. I don't get it.

[Calin 50]

1 hour ago, TheRagingwolf said:

I love this game. However, I will never understand why all this tweeking of abilities happens constantly. If we are to have true balance, then there should be equal overall damage output, so long as other things are equal. For example, take any two base classes such as warlock and rogue. There is no reason why there abilities, when used in an optimal rotation, should not output the same amount of damage. Now, of course, that leaves room for "well, what is optimal for this spec rogue/warlock?". Yeah, that's the challenge of a game like this, learning how to use your chosen class correctly.

And, of course, there are stat modifiers such as gear, flasks, enchants, etc. But we're talking about the base classes, with no manipulation. It seems the devs in charge of class tuning are missing the boat completely as every xpac, every patch, we see more of these changes that are seemingly random and without much "science". Seriously, they just need to set a baseline damage output for all classes and build each ability based on that output, then let the players find their way to the optimal numbers.

Oh, and the same baseline principal can be applied to tank threat and heal output. Set the baseline, disperse that amount as desired to the various class abilities, then allow the players to find the baseline and build upon to maximize their chosen class. Seems simple enough.

Am I to understand this correctly that as an example, you would want incinerate to do the same damage as mutilate, and then chaosbolt should be the same as envenom? 
Cause this wouldn't work in an actual encounter due to cast time, dots, and a million other factors. 

What you're describing as "seems simple enough" is very very complicated, which is exactly why they are constantly pushing tweaks

[vandel 3]

1 hour ago, Fungo said:

So they nerf soulshard generation and fire damage, but that is going to nerf bolt too. I don't get it.

I think, and i could be wrong here, that shards were generated too fast to be consumed by chaos bolt without overcapping/ wasting fragments. Rain of fire is instant cast so doesnt have the same issue 

[Kadath76 6]

4 hours ago, Calin said:

Am I to understand this correctly that as an example, you would want incinerate to do the same damage as mutilate, and then chaosbolt should be the same as envenom?

He actually said:
 

Quote

Set the baseline, disperse that amount as desired to the various class abilities

so, no, he doesn't want any specific ability a from class A to do the same exact damage of ability b from class B, he would just like the overall damage to be the same, which seems fine to me

[Fungo 6]

3 hours ago, vandel said:

I think, and i could be wrong here, that shards were generated too fast to be consumed by chaos bolt without overcapping/ wasting fragments. Rain of fire is instant cast so doesnt have the same issue 

Ok that would make sense.

[TheRagingwolf 258]

11 hours ago, Calin said:

Am I to understand this correctly that as an example, you would want incinerate to do the same damage as mutilate, and then chaosbolt should be the same as envenom? 
Cause this wouldn't work in an actual encounter due to cast time, dots, and a million other factors. 

What you're describing as "seems simple enough" is very very complicated, which is exactly why they are constantly pushing tweaks

It's that mindset that causes things to be more complicated than necessary. As I said, the OVERALL BASELINE DAMAGE OUTPUT is the same regardless of class. You're trying to confuse individual abilities with the overall. And no, my idea is not "very very complicated". It's far more simple than pulling arbitrary numbers from ones backside (really guys? we can't say a-r-s-e?) and saying you're doing your best to balance.

Set the overall baseline the same across the board, disperse as desired, and the rest is up to the player.

Edited August 3 by TheRagingwolf