fredag den 30. september 2011

4.3 PTR builds and shaman setbonus – Soo much loooooove.


So according to various posts this is currently the 2- and 4-set bonuses which is what we restoration shamans can look forward to in 4.3. 

·  Restoration, 2P -- After using Mana Tide Totem, the cost of your healing spells are reduced by 25% for 15 sec.
·  Restoration, 4P -- Increases the duration of Spiritwalker's Grace by 5 sec, and you gain 30% haste while Spiritwalker's grace is active.

Let us look at the 2-set bonus first, okay – Mana Tide should be used either for heavy burst healing situations or for regn. a lot from a Telluric Currents build. I like the set bonus in some way, but I do have an issue and that is: If the bonus is made with a focus on fights with sudden bursts of damage, and that quite a lot of mana will be required to spend to keep people alive, well – 25% less mana spend on spells is nice, however, you will need to repositioning your Healing Stream totem before “the big bang” since it is simply way too much healing wasted if it isn’t up. I know that Blizzard wants to make the totems mechanics more interesting, but compared to the druids innervate? And yes, I clapped my small fat hands when I read about the Wild Growth “adjustment”, but I do have some issues with the bonus being tied to Mana Tide.

The 4-set bonus is quite interesting, and is effectively a 2min on demand heroism for you and you only, but you will also have to think more about how you use Spiritwalker’s Grace – Do you use it for movement or for pure throughput? That will depend on the fight, but I think this is a very important step in order to put shamans more in line with the other healers, and a throughput CD is what I have longed for ever since I parted with my paladin just before Firelands, and whenever I pressed “Tree of Life” on my druid.  

I think that compared to the other healers that we have received some quite useful set-bonuses, and in spite of our 2-set is pretty much alike all the way around, well – if this goes live, dr00l – we won the 4-set. Druids – Chance to get more OH ? Priests – Chance to Absorb more or Holy Word uselessness (yey ? I hardly know anything about holy), and Paladins – More healing on your AoE spell which is now becoming a cast.

Restoration Changes for 4.3 as of ptr. 14732.
  • Ancestral Healing got an extra effect - heals you cast increase allies' maximum health by 10% of the amount healed, up to a maximum of 10% of their health.
  • Cleansing Waters - The heal effect can only occur once every 6 seconds.
  • Riptide healing effect has been increased by 50%, from 3725 to 5585.
Cleansing Waters – Is a PVP change from my point of view, and I honestly doesn’t give a rats ass about it.
Riptide – I suspect that due to the changes to the healing received by the healing over time effect, and the fact that our mastery, haste, crit levels rise that most people will aim for 2005 for the extra tick or 1858 for goblins. Since Riptide usually is in top #5 of my healing spells I welcome this change very, very, very much.
Now, let us talk about the elephant on acid which just entered to room and went bonkers and forced the developers to give the restoration shamans steroids, superpowers and changes to Ancestral Healing.
Assuming this effect stacks, you will during heavy AoE situations with people clustered up and you spamming Healing Rain on CD while filling with Chain Heals and EFL rolling on everyone along with the 2-5% extra crit you will get from the higher itemlevles (This is my estimate, I could be quite off, but if this goes live I will assume that crit will become a far, far more interesting stats) and the rising HP levels to 150k – 170k for “none tanks” that is just 15-17k more effective health (When the stars align, and assuming this stacks with the various 4-set bonuses which the tanking classes will be granted … Well, I assume there is some heavy AoE fights ahead and since restoration druids just got the shaft in regards to Wild Growth, which in some way is fair enough because they are getting close to being able to spam Rej. more or less constantly and not really having to look at their mana bar.
Or – We could be paired with Disc priests and thrown on tank healing since I assume tanks will hit close to 280.000-300.000 HP and with our “magic”, well – I assume you know I mean.

I have my doubts if there isn’t coming some kind of restrictions or changes to this because it make a shaman quite mandatory for a raid, however, on the other hand – Burn druids know your place !



tirsdag den 20. september 2011

My response to the shaman feedback thread.


In response to the shaman feedback thread on EU and US forums, this is what I had on my mind.

What type of content do you focus on?
 PVE

If PvE, what type of PvE?
Semi-hardcore Raiding 25man.

What are your biggest quality-of-life issues?
Searing Totem. The shamans incapability to compete with resto druids / priests at raid healing whenever people are spread due to Chain Heals jump range. The need to apply Earth Shield due to Nature's Blessing whenever "hard" single target healing is require for more than 4 casts - 18% makes us competitive tank assistants, but an almost 20% increase if Earth Shield isn't on the target is way too much !

What makes playing your class more fun?
Being the jack of all trades. Being able to dish out damage in form of Fire Elemental and Lightning Bolts, if specced into Telluric Currents, and not being penalized for it in terms of mana instead of standing around as e.g. druids /wanking whenever the incoming damage is low. The +100k crits with mastery build.
Water Shield and in spite of it might sometimes be an aggravating thing to do, then I still like the idea of you have to make a choice a) Regn. or b) Heal. Furthermore, it does also make it important to look forward in the fight when you got 2 stacks and you got a free GCD or if you always wait to it has expired to refresh it. Totems - I like the uniqueness in spite of the fact that almost every buff is covered.

What makes playing your class less fun?
The frustration of our mana compared to other healers and a "usefulness" of Mana Tide (Which should be changed to something like the priests Shadowfiend and buffed in terms of regn.). The AI of Fire Elemental / Searing Totem. How we are penalized in our capability of raidhealing whenever people aren't stacked. A lack of self cooldown except Stoneclaw Totem (If glyphed).
Being the jack of all trades does sadly also lead to the fact that we are not exceptional at anything and you have to struggle in order to do your assignment which another class will be able to do with far less effort.

How do you feel about your “rotation”? (Rotation is the accepted order in which abilities are used to maximum efficiency.)
I am currently pleased with the amount of spells at our disposal except Chain Heal and its range or lack of so to speak. I like the idea of Tidal Waves, Unleashed Element, positioning of totems for maximum usage. Perhaps a little to focused on keeping Riptide on cooldown, but then again Holy Shock, Wild Growth and Pennance performs the same role - more or less.

What’s on your wish list for your class? Change to Chain Heal to something like Wild Growth or Prayer of Healing or just a buffed range in order to make it competetive and not a waste since it will only hit 2 people. A buff to our regn. model so that we are brought in line with the other healers or a minor buff to the regn. given from Telluric Currents. A "on use" cooldown as Avenging Wrath or any form of increased throughput for X amount of time like Palas - Divine Favor / Avenging Wrath, Druids - Tree of Life, Discs - Power Infusion. Because one of the major issues I have is that I am not capable of increasing my throughput whenever it is needed except for keeping Healing Rain on CD and hope that I positioned it perfectly and hope people have learned that blue is good.
Healing Stream Totem becomming raidwide instead of party wide.

What spells do you use the least? Chain Heal and Healing Surge.


This is what I posted, but as time has passed I have been thinking a little more about it, and what could be done to bring shamans more “in line” with the other healers.
I think the biggest issue is Chain Heal, and the lack of usage on bosses where you cannot be sure it will hit 4 targets (This is where I usually throw out a GHW instead), and the regn. model which is modeled around Water Shield and the change to Resurgence which with our current crit percentages just gives too little regn. back, and that has “forced” a lot of shamans who doesn’t like Telluric Currents to take the talent, however, I am one of the shamans who love the talent and I don’t mind dishing out damage !
Nonetheless, one of the things which I think would bring shamans most “easily” into line with the other healers would be a “burst” cooldown like Avenging Wrath / Divine Favor / Tree of Life, because the only reason e.g. druids are so high on the meter is ToL WG – RG – Tranq – WG RG – Lb Lb Lb – RG on Clearcast and WG, which if they got Shard of Woe, which on a side topic gives them a ludicrous amount of MP5 and with the amount of extra HoT ticks it just gets too good whenever you use it along with ToL. Where as shamans “peak” when people are low and they got HR on the ground and smashing their CH key, but there is no “I NEED MOAR HEALING” button, and I do truly believe that it would bring shamans in line.
Furthermore, make Healing Stream Totem raidwide – that would also bring us “more” in line.  

tirsdag den 13. september 2011

Snipehealing – Meter whoring ?

Being the person who diehes out the most healing per second (HPS) does not mean that you are the best healer e.g. a resto druid can hit his Rej. and WG spells constantly on the raid, but that doesn’t help to kill the boss if he is assigned as a primary healer on a tank, and despite he will be pulling higher numbers of recount / skade and world of logs  then he is more of a disadvantage than an asset to your group. However, there is also another side, and that is the people who only focuses on their assignment and ignores his or hers opportunities to help out with e.g. raid healing or tank healing when you are assigned to the raid, and some will call it snipe healing and that is just utter bollocks. People who claim “snipe healing” or “meter whoring” is usually the people who does not have this urge to do their job and then help out wherever he can and thereby optimizing the possibility that the boss will hit 0 HP before your raid. 

Should a druid assigned to the raid not help out with hots on the tanks ? Should a paladin not use Holy Radiance in the raid when being on the tank or Light of Dawn? Should a shaman not use Healing Rain if they are assigned to a tank? Or should they not keep a Riptide on the tank if they are on raid heaing ? Should a disc. priest retain her/himself from throwing a shield on the raid members who is dangerous low on HP with a large AoE attack incoming?

Healing is all about teamwork and if your assignment(s) is safe then why wouldn’t you help put the others?
Furthermore, meter whoring or snipe healing is mostly due to that person a) is faster than person b) to heal the person who has taken damage and in spite of it might not be person a)s primary objective isn’t it every healers objective to get people who is on a low percentage HP to a safe percentage (90-100%). However, there is also a huge difference between meterwhoring on farm and on progress and let me explain why. On progress your mana is usually stretched to the limit and you have to make decisions at the end about who you want to “save” and if you wasted all your mana on people who already had a Rej. on them or a Wild Growth or Riptide then you making your raid suffer due to mana and healing is always a limited resource during progress whereas farm is where you got the 5-10ilvls higher and most guilds use the same amount of healer while the DPS is several thousand higher which means that you got more resources when you start the fight and due to the fight lasts less time – well, you can do the math. 

However, I hate doing farm bosses with the same amount of healers because I like to be challenged and with the same amount of healers you hardly have to think about using your efficient or your inefficient spell.
We started out with 6 healers on Shannox, 7 on Beth’tilac and 6 on Lord Rhyolith (We had to switch to 5 during our first kill due we lacked damage) and 6 on Alysrazor. We are currently running with 5 on Shannox and unless people play like retards we could take one more away. We did accidently use 6 healers for Beth’tilac and it wasn’t really an issue and I will bet my socks that we could do it with 5 without making it hard.
Alysrazor is a retard check and something which our melee sadly fails to realize that Brushfire, Tornadoes and interrupts is important, but it is easily 4 healable if people can minimize their damage and you use your raid cooldowns during “burn phase”.
 
I wouldn’t touch the 5 healers we use on Baleroc due to every fucking week someone fucks up and we need the “backup” and extra healing.
Majordomo – We started out with 5 when we initially started and took it with 4 and honestly 3 is sufficient and will be slightly challenging. 

Ragnaros – well, we use 4 healers and Paragon used 3 and some guilds uses 5 (which is now safe due to the recent HP nerf), nonetheless the most of the damage there is controllable and people are usually responsible for their own death “Hello Mr. Englufing” or “Suuuuurfing the Lava Wave yeah – oh dead”
The phase with Molten Elements can be a little tricky, however, a large part lies in positioning of the seeds and the usage of raid cooldowns without people being fatter than usually and like the engulfing animation (Which I do hope that the retard who designed it gets fired at, burned and then pissed upon)
In regards to Ragnaros he just emphasizes how good Shard of Woe still is and that it almost is a necessity for the healers in order to cope with the healing requirements, and that leads me onto the silly design of it and the amount of Regn. it is worth for a resto druid in regards to a resto shaman and how much it boots the HPs – I doubt hardly any restoration druids with a WoL rank above 50 (On HMs) without SoW since it is so much regn. that you can reforge all your spirit to either mastery or haste, and with the 1min use you can quite easily get an extra tick on Wild Growth which during Tree of Life is amazing.

I saw a post on MMO-champion where we were encouraged to post what is good / bad in regards to all the classes and my focus is of course on resto shamans.
People complain that they need to put down a totem every 5th minute? Sure, because you are bad and forget it – I enjoy that part and it also means that you have to think about where you put your totem unless you want to reposition it all the time.
Water Shield needs to be refreshed too much and it is annoying to refresh it as often as we must. I disagree – It makes the choice more interesting – Get Water Shield up vs. casting a heal, why would you want to simplify everything it is just retarded and seems like people
wants the Wrath Model – press a + b before start and then continuously 1 until the boss is dead.

I currently only have one issue with resto and that is Chain Heal and the jump range is way too low in regards to the design of the encounters. And I would enjoy that it A) Becomes a heal like a druids WG – Covers a group like a priests Prayer of Healing or simply increase the range with 5-10 yards in order to make it competitive.
 

fredag den 9. september 2011

It is "just" farm, and making bosses harder ?


It is ”just” farm bosses. 

My guild has been on 6/7 HM 25man for a while now, and with them progressing on Ragnaros HC (4 healers – pala, druid, priest and shaman) and due to I had IRL stuff to do during the first week of progress I passed my spot to our other shaman, but back to the title. 

With people getting better and better gear while killing the bosses more and more often you would assume that the bosses becomes easier and easier, and the amount of wipes each week should go down and only be contribiuted to by DCs or retard players. However, currently for my guild farm mode has become a pain with other bosses than STAND STILL AND DERPS. 

On Shannox people aren’t trying to get away from Rageface with Blink, Teleport, Sprint, Dash or whatever which after 3 minutes means that Rageface is two shotting people – Brilliant, people die and the kill gets uncontrolled because you want to stand still and do derps, Good Job. 

Alysrazor – It is a retard check, and we fail several times each week. Melee eats Brushfire as if it was fucking candy, and is more focused on their recount than interrupting the adds.
Meteors seems to come as a surprised every time for our ranged DPSers or at very least for 5 out of 7 of them. Lava Worms spawn randomly and is impossible to see when they spawn – oh wait, fixed positions and a big fucking animation – IT IS HARD. Using 3 Combat Resurrections before the “burn phase” and then we got people who still haven’t figured out how to avoid tornadoes because it is a random mechanic. This piss easy boss takes 3-4 wipes every fucking week and the abilities seems to come as a surprise for people every damn week.
It seems to be a general attitude that farm is easy and I can play with 60% of what I can while watching telly and not paying any attention to the screen. And it is pissing me off that people are unable to just focus every 10th minute when we reach a boss and then focus for 5-9 minutes.

Then there always is Baleroc, which we always needs 5-9 wipes on because healers is retarded and tanks aren’t thinking about how we can make the fight easier. This week we got a druid and a warrior tank, and they started out with the warrior taking Decimation and the druid tanking – WHY ? Why on earth would you take the Block tank to take Decimation it is fucking retarded. Let us make it harder to kill the damn boss !
Then there is the healers and their capability to do their job, and ability to stack Vital Sparks. We got a restoration druid who seems to have problems with anything else than standing still and keeping Wild Growth on CD while spamming Rejs. on the raid, and the druid has still not figured out the importance of getting a decent amount of Vita Spark stacks when you need to switch to the tank. Usually when I play my shaman I start on the ranged, where a shadow priest is soaking the first for the full duration, and with heroism I get between 50-60 stacks depending on how retarded I play. It costs med 30% of my mana, but I gain the advantage of being able to throw out more HWs while on the tank and thereby it is an investment which pays of. However, if you are on the melee who switches after 13-14 stacks you should still get 30-40 minimum (When they switch it is outmost stupid not to jump to the shadow priest and spam 3-4 heals on that guy since he will be at +15 stacks at the current point), however, with heroism the druid was able to get 15 stacks.. yes 15 and then switched to the tank where I was purely using GHW because our paladin wasted his CDs. My “switching buddy” decided that he needed more stacks and waited till after the second shard, which meant that at the time that I was released from tank duty (Always fun to heal 3-400k HP tank with 40k normal GHW and 100K crits when the stars align) which meant that I was at 10.000 mana when I was supposed to heal the shard people. That it was a kill is beyond my understanding because people play like retards on acid who only got one arm, but that might explain the +100 wipes to the seriously hard ability Engulfing on Ragnaros HC – forward, backwards what TO DOOOOOO.

This brings me on to another part, and that is that we run with the philosophy “Bring the player not the class”, but that does apparently also mean that there is no need to use the utilities that the different healing specs give for a given encounter – let’s say Ragnaros. 

On Ragnaros they run with a holy paladin on the tanks supported by a restoration shaman, who by the way also is assigned to the majority of the right sides raid members. And on the left we got a restoration druid a long with our priest who has decided that he should play discipline. However, is that optimizing your healing assignments? Hardly, a discipline priest is in my opinion the strongest tank healer, and with the “bursts” given by Traps a shield of 30-40K just smoothes out the damage, and furthermore if a priest throws out overhealing that crits it is not entirely wasted, however, does a shaman throw out overhealing it is wasted except if he crits and AA heals a target.
Furthermore, a shaman is best used on people who is standing close together, which our melee does so HR will become useful along with CH which also will give the shaman room for some Lightning Bolts to regn. a little with TC which gives more “room” for high burst healing due to higher mana.
But hey – there is no reason to make the boss easier, and it is not like Divine Aegis is utterly wasted on raidhealing if people doesn’t take damage within 15 seconds, which most of them will not. This brings me on to our restoration druid who seems to think that everything can be mended with a Rej. even if it merely 10.000 damage which needs to be healed up, and that means that Rej. on a fight like Ragnaros is +50% overhealing which is a lot, and when you complain about mana and fail to see that you might need help.  

That will be the end of my rant in this post.