Ghostcrawler posts on 4.2 class balance

http://us.battle.net/wow/en/blog/2956383

Shaman

• We previously nerfed Water Shield via hotfix because shaman were gaining too much mana in PvP when attacked (especially by pets to discourage drinking). The 4.2 change is just a more elegant implementation of the same nerf that should keep the same mana per time as they have currently.
• We recognized Fire Nova had some usability issues so we increased its throughput and added the Flame Shock refresh mechanic to help ease some of the inconvenience. This is a new mechanic and one we are still evaluating.
• We introduced the Glyph of Unleashed Lightning to help shaman feel less punished by movement in both PvP and PvE. The impact of changes like this are very difficult to model.
• We nerfed Mana Tide for the same reason we nerfed Innervate — it was just providing too much mana for the group’s healers as a whole. We didn’t want to decrease the benefit to the shaman, so we redesigned / added the talent of Resurgence to help offset the nerf to them personally

Being an Elemental kinda guy, I’m going to ignore the first and last one because they don’t affect me.

It’s good to know that the Fire Nova changes are being monitored. I still think that it’s a bit of an awkward system to manage, and could stand to have things tweaked and limited, because I can see things getting a bit silly with never-ending dots and high numbers of novas going out. The question is really whether we’ll get to any of those extreme points or not, and how long the ramp up time is. Too long, and we’ll be under the curve, but too short and things will be a bit over powered.

Likewise, the introduction of Unleashed Lightning will most likely get reviewed after 4.2 is released. I still believe that it’s going too far, and we’ll turn into running, jumping lightning bolt machines, but we’ll see how it goes. I’m still thinking that a better way to handle the Movement Problem is to rejig the Spirtwalker’s Grace duration/cooldown, or change it so that it has no cooldown/duration but rather a toggle with a damage/healing reduction.

In any case, those words “still evaluating” and “very difficult to model” make me think that there is some hope for improvements after 4.2 is released.

Advertisement