WoW XIX: This is my Artifact. There are many like it, but this one is mine.

[turbo164]

I assume no conveniently placed baskets in the area either?

[The Glyphstone]

That was actually how I started. It doesn't help much because a lot of the detectors are right there next to the NPCs you need to talk to. Literally within a dozen yards. So if you don't land literally on top of the person, usually you're getting caught, and then you either run back and get caught in the cycle of inching closer and dying again; or you take the rez sickness penalty, hearth back to portal room, take portal to vinyards, and try parajumping again. Either way no good options.

Why would you need to die more than once? You just have to land relatively near the target, then sprint past them into the bushes behind the terrace. Even if the NPCs chase you in and kill you (they usually won't, the elves have pathing issues and don't like going into the terraced garden plots or underwater), you make one arduous spirit walk to rez out of sight in the plants, then disguise and walk up to the NPC. Getting out again is one Stonehide Leather Barding (support your friendly neighborhood Leatherworker today!) and a frantic charge to the harbor, see aforementioned dislike of chasing you underwater.

The frustration's understandable, but I think even Warrior's got enough of a toolkit to avoid dying more than once in that segment. It's still somewhat bad design, you shouldn't have be guaranteeing a death as part of a fetch quest, but it's not 'designer death by rusty spork' bad.

[Psyren]

So I nabbed Truthguard on my Prot Paladin. And that has to be the most boring artifact quest I've done yet. Go here, click graves, beat up some skeletons until you find the right one, he sends you to some supposedly-epic-but-not-really trial dungeon that he failed to complete, and which I thought would test my limits. But no, it has exactly two challenges - stand in front of the door and pop a cooldown, then go inside and fight a melee boss with caster cohort that you could have probably soloed, but they give you two ineffectual companions anyway. Done, enjoy your artifact, now get out.

Like, did the Ashbringer and Tyr's Hand (neither of which I've gone after yet) use up all of the budgeted awesome, and there was none left over for the protdins?

[Delusion]

Did I tell you yet how much I love the ability to do class trials?

Tried MM hunter, but didn't like how the spec plays at all. Which is a shame, because the hidden appearance of the MM artefact is IMO the best looking artefact skin in the game. But hey at least that cuts down what I will boost to just either Affli lock or Resto druid. And then if I choose Affli lock I will need to choose wether to roll human or Belf. Belf because I'd like to see the horde side of the story and belfs are prettier. Human because most of my friends play alliance and all my other characters are alliance.

[Antonok]

So raid numbers for Emerald Nightmare are in (for the most part). And holy crap there is some serious balancing needing to be done.

Tank wise they're all pretty much on par with each other outside Prot Warriors who are stupidly overtuned, though everyone but Blizzard knew that.

DPS wise is where the numbers make you go huh?. Just to give you an idea, frost mage is at the bottom of the heroic numbers sitting at just under 200k DPS. Arms warrior sitting at the top, is hitting around 350k DPS.

Healers seem to be the most balanced between the roles. The numbers from them are more or less even (only an overall 30k HPS difference between top and bottom).

So if Blizzard keeps their word, be expecting a rather large balance pass this Tuesday.

[Requizen]

I wouldn't expect it that fast. 7.1 probably isn't too far off, I'm expecting them to wait for more than a single raid lockout before making sweeping changes. Maybe we'll see some flat number bumps for the gutter specs, but nothing really massive.

[Djinn_in_Tonic]

Tank wise they're all pretty much on par with each other outside Prot Warriors who are stupidly overtuned, though everyone but Blizzard knew that.

As a Paladin who recently ate a very noticeable nerf to my self-healing, this frustrates me no end to see.

[The Glyphstone]

Has anyone done numbers passes to determine the DPS thresholds for Normal/heroic EN yet? Ilyg'noth is the DPS Check boss of the raid, and I'm curious what the minimum DPS-per-person figure is to beat his berserk.

[Antonok]

I wouldn't expect it that fast. 7.1 probably isn't too far off, I'm expecting them to wait for more than a single raid lockout before making sweeping changes. Maybe we'll see some flat number bumps for the gutter specs, but nothing really massive.

hey look! Tuning pass coming Tuesday

RIP Arms and Havoc. Rejoice all ye locks, frost mages, and frost DKs.

Fury Warriors, you may continue to sob silently in the corner. may anxiously await the changes as they seem to have been lost in transition somewhere, but you did get changed.

Ok Fury got buffed, not by a whole lot, and no changes to your survivability.

[The_Jackal]

hey look! Tuning pass coming Tuesday

RIP Arms and Havoc. Rejoice all ye locks, frost mages, and frost DKs.

Fury Warriors, you may continue to sob silently in the corner. may anxiously await the changes as they seem to have been lost in transition somewhere, but you did get changed.

Ok Fury got buffed, not by a whole lot, and no changes to your survivability.

I'm sorry to see the change to exploit the weakness. Focused Rage was the broken talent, it was WAYYYYYY ahead of everything else.

[Seerow]

I'm sorry to see the change to exploit the weakness. Focused Rage was the broken talent, it was WAYYYYYY ahead of everything else.

ETW was way overpowered. To the point where Arms warriors were taking an ETW relic that was 15+ ilvls lower and considering it an upgrade. Nerfing it was pretty necessary.


I'm actually disappointed in the FR nerf. Yes, FR Arms is OP, and FR is way ahead of the other talent options on that row, but I'd rather see it nerfed in another way. Increase the rage cost of FR by 33% instead of nerfing the damage of FR by 25%. Same net DPS change give or take, but leaves the huge crits in tact. If it's a PVP issue, they can nerf separately for PVP now. But if I'm playing Arms I want to see absurd damage crits, I don't care if they tune it so the setup necessary to pull it off is much longer or less frequent.

[Icewraith]

They nerfed protection's rage generation instead of trying to balance ignore pain? 90% damage reduction is stupid even if it feels great to play.

Shield block is basically now twice as expensive. Great.

[Delusion]

They said that they'd likely nerf Havoc Aoe by nerfing Fel Barrage. Then they nerf almost every other AoE ability, but not fel barrage.

[ryuplaneswalker]

So I nabbed Truthguard on my Prot Paladin. And that has to be the most boring artifact quest I've done yet. Go here, click graves, beat up some skeletons until you find the right one, he sends you to some supposedly-epic-but-not-really trial dungeon that he failed to complete, and which I thought would test my limits. But no, it has exactly two challenges - stand in front of the door and pop a cooldown, then go inside and fight a melee boss with caster cohort that you could have probably soloed, but they give you two ineffectual companions anyway. Done, enjoy your artifact, now get out.

Like, did the Ashbringer and Tyr's Hand (neither of which I've gone after yet) use up all of the budgeted awesome, and there was none left over for the protdins?

Pretty much yes. most classes gets 1 or at best 2 really cool plots and scenarios for an artifact. The rest get copy pasted stuff. That is why I hate the entire concept of Artifacts. Rets get one of the most Iconic Swords in the game. Prot gets RandomMcRandom. It is incredibly obvious which ones the spent time on and which ones not, especially as you gain artifact Knowledge. Of course even as sort of cool as The Silver Hand's plot was. I wish it had not outright crapped on Human Paladin lore.

Honestly I blame ridiculous prices on the gold inflation from WoD as much as anything. When most of the hardcore crowd is sitting on well over a million from milking Garrisons for a year or two, they're willing to pay whatever to get their raid supplies. Crafters charging whatever people are willing to pay is just the nature of the beast.

HAHAHA "Hardcore crowds" don't get money from garrisons they got money from selling Heroic/Mythic runs, and even for the not "Super hardcore" guess what? Garrisons were not the best way to make money. Facerolling Cata dungeons was.

Plus the profession overhauls are great... for the people actually working their professions. The intent was to make professions more engaging and profitable, I'd argue they seem to have succeeded there.

Not really, they aren't that engaging. (grind to 110 on every character!) and they don't make that much money outside of gathering professions due to the insane requirements to actually craft anything. Jewlcrafting actually LOSES money on leveling to max which is required to craft the super epic gems. I just prospected an entire stack of Felslate and got -one- relevant gem from it. ONE high level gem from an entire 200 stack of Felslate.

Edit : OH and just to add into the "Greatness" Of professions they are the only non surumar content that has level requirements to do because making your leveling zones scalable and then making your professions require arbitrary (and yes Levels in Legion are 100% arbitrary) level grinding is consistent with how you designed everything else.

[The_Jackal]

Edit : OH and just to add into the "Greatness" Of professions they are the only non surumar content that has level requirements to do because making your leveling zones scalable and then making your professions require arbitrary (and yes Levels in Legion are 100% arbitrary) level grinding is consistent with how you designed everything else.

I agree with most of your post, but IMO, requiring reaching max level to get the best professions results is a good thing. Of course, leveling your profession to max should be a gold sink, that's what we call a barrier to entry. Now the big problem with JC (and to a lesser extent, inscription) is that they removed glyphs and sockets, for the most part, so they've gone from being a commodity that has sustained demand to a niche product that barely anyone bothers with.

I don't think Professions are anywhere close to perfect in Legion, but they're in a better place than they were. You're rewarded for crafting with more efficient recipes, which will get you the opportunity to make some real money.

[ryuplaneswalker]

I agree with most of your post, but IMO, requiring reaching max level to get the best professions results is a good thing. Of course, leveling your profession to max should be a gold sink, that's what we call a barrier to entry. Now the big problem with JC (and to a lesser extent, inscription) is that they removed glyphs and sockets, for the most part, so they've gone from being a commodity that has sustained demand to a niche product that barely anyone bothers with.

I don't think Professions are anywhere close to perfect in Legion, but they're in a better place than they were. You're rewarded for crafting with more efficient recipes, which will get you the opportunity to make some real money.

No you aren't rewarded with crafting with more efficient recipes. The more efficient stuff for the stuff that actually matters comes from Rep and Boss Drops, and requiring max level is not a good good thing all it does is drive up prices arbitrarily, and they have not removed glyphs.

[otakuryoga]

i believe he menat they removed glyphs that actually do anything

its only cosmetic crap now

[Psyren]

hey look! Tuning pass coming Tuesday

Elemental buffs, hell yes!!!

[Antonok]

So in my quest to get a legendary, RNG decided to see fit to give me something else I wanted out of the Nightfallen cache today.

In a few days time I will be the owner of the Reins of the Llothien Prowler.

[Corvus]

The size of some of those buffs is staggering. I can't recall any so large or so many anytime recently. It makes you wonder just what went wrong in first alpha testing and then in beta when players were pointing out the problems in those specs that nothing got done about it until now.

It does beg the question why the tank nerfs are now necessary as it was those specs the tanks were beating on aoe trash mobs...

[TechnOkami]

If I had known how you can pay for WoW time with gold I would have been playing Legion since the beginning. Hell, I would have been playing WoW since they implemented that mechanic!

I'm really, really tempted to get all the content for the game I don't have plus a 1 month sub so I can essentially play the rest of the game for mostly free.

I need to see how much this all costs...

Note: I have the main game, Cata, and WotLK, I don't have Draenor or Pandaria, or Legion.

This changes everything... oh my god this changes everything... I'm so excited I can play WoW now. :D

[Antonok]

If I had known how you can pay for WoW time with gold I would have been playing Legion since the beginning. Hell, I would have been playing WoW since they implemented that mechanic!

I'm really, really tempted to get all the content for the game I don't have plus a 1 month sub so I can essentially play the rest of the game for mostly free.

I need to see how much this all costs...

Note: I have the main game, Cata, and WotLK, I don't have Draenor or Pandaria, or Legion.

This changes everything... oh my god this changes everything... I'm so excited I can play WoW now. :D

The base game now includes Pandaria and Warlords so you only need to get Legion. Blizzard has started rolling old xpacs into the base game when a new one launches, so 20 bucks gets you everything but current content.

[TechnOkami]

The base game now includes Pandaria and Warlords so you only need to get Legion. Blizzard has started rolling old xpacs into the base game when a new one launches, so 20 bucks gets you everything but current content.

Yeah I just found out about this.

*flails in excitement*

[Antonok]

Yeah I just found out about this.

*flails in excitement*

Then I should point out that you can buy a game time token from the char select screen if you have enough gold on one char. No need to buy game time. Or, if you don't, open a live support ticket and ask if you can have a few days time added so you can get a token. They're pretty cool about it. Done it a few times in the past (last being a month before Legion so I know they still do).

[Corvus]

I haven't paid a subscription fee in a year now - and between my alts I have 500-600K saved up, so it'll be a while before I have to. I didn't play the garrison-gold-pinata so I'll never be able to afford those super expensive vanity items but that means I don't have any other use for gold but for the game tokens.

[Antonok]

So the nerfs Arms, SPriest, and Havoc are getting tomorrow are a little less severe than previously announced. They actually reviewed what was being said and changed a few of them.

[The_Jackal]

So the nerfs Arms, SPriest, and Havoc are getting tomorrow are a little less severe than previously announced. They actually reviewed what was being said and changed a few of them.

PERFECT. I'm really glad they're not gutting 'Exploit the Weakness'. Getting more frequent Tactician procs is one of the most visceral and satisfying ways you'll get really feel your progression, apart from just having numbers get bigger.

[Delusion]

So the nerfs Arms, SPriest, and Havoc are getting tomorrow are a little less severe than previously announced. They actually reviewed what was being said and changed a few of them.

So Bloodlet gets nerfed by 25% instead of 66%. Thats actually reasonable. Still bit weird that the cleave talent is the best single target talent in the row, but I don't mind because its really fluid talent with MotG.

Also did first dungeons as Havoc. Really really fun, but also really hectic.

[TechnOkami]

Question: I like DoT. I REALLY like DoT.

As far as I know, Affliction Warlocks and Shadow Priests are the DoT specs of WoW.

Is one particularly better over the other?

[Requizen]

Question: I like DoT. I REALLY like DoT.

As far as I know, Affliction Warlocks and Shadow Priests are the DoT specs of WoW.

Is one particularly better over the other?

As of currently, Shadow is much better than Affliction on a numbers basis, but a patch just went out (or is going out) that is buffing Afflic and nerfing Shadow.

Also, there are some DoT melee classes. I think it's Assassination for Rogues and Unholy for DKs, though I don't know how prominently DoTs appear in their rotations currently.