That’s true. It’s a damage boost and QoL, but ideally it would be more than just that. It does feel like this spec has more flat damage boosts than interesting interactions when compared to Diabolist.
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Supposedly this actually has happened a couple of times over Dragonflight, but I think if they were going to do it with Hero talents it already would have been the move with Oracle given PI’s infamous unpopularity is something they’ve acknowledged multiple times (though, granted, it’s been acknowledged in a “too bad” kind of way).
Obviously Destruction is in a weird spot in that it it pretty badly needs a rework beyond what a few QoL buffs or hero talents can provide. And given how disparate both the fantasies and mechanics are of Destruction and Affliction, making something that bridges the gap is a tough ask. However I’d have figured they’d do something a little more agnostic instead of something so directly affliction based.
Just in something extremely brief as an example: Shadow Bolt and Incinerate replaced with Hellbolt which deals shadowflame damage, benefits with all modifiers to both. Central mechanic could literally be called “Unleash Hell” which procs from soulshard generators (as Diabolist is the spender tree, make Hellcaller the generator tree). Give it a couple of interactions with each spec, and a capstone to summon a rain of shadowflame. Perhaps in that rain, DoT damage is increased to even it out between affliction and Destruction.
The ideas and possibilities are there, but as people above have stated: I’m not sure how the current iteration can be salvaged from a Destro PoV.
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The name Hellcaller implies that this tree would be the destruction primary tree and it does not feel like destruction at all. This tree is riddled with boring passive talents and does not fit thematically with the name. Very disappointed.
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this talent tree is way too strong it has a straight steroid on everything its insane the dmgs we can pull off if this goes live would be insane but again, WHERES MY DESTRO FANTASY? re-name it to dot-caller my god plz it wouldn’t piss me off this hard
Yeah, I think we can tell that you’re upset given the crazy rants. I don’t think this really fits the title Hellcaller either, but there are some things that could be redesigned to help that out.
As for performance, we don’t actually know how well this spec will do when it goes live because we don’t know how much damage Wither does baseline and a vast majority of the tree is based around that damage.
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Hello!
We’ve seen some confusion regarding some of the Hellcaller talents. Please know that:
- Cataclysm and Seed of Corruption will apply Wither.
- Wither is instant cast for Destruction and Affliction.
Thank you for the thoughts so far!
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there are stuff that are for sure :
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Destro is a spec that it gets out of control pretty fast when it receives steroids from anything,
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tree is plagued with it like 10% crit dmgs 100% increase dmgs on wither and the talent that makes your CB consume immolate dmgs, the insane amount of haste that you get from malevolence, and the flat 10% crit buff you get by clicking the node
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cataclysms apply whiter
knowing this you know that this talent tree will be able to make destro a top teir spec or beyond broken depending on the tunning.
but thematically it’s horrendous for the spec there’s no way to fix this they need to rework the tree, and there’s nothing that can be saved from here, I guess the capstone is fine but it resolves around wither too much and if you re-do the tree don’t know how it gonna end up but for sure it needs to burn in fire and never be mentioned again
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This is some good news. Having another instant cast spell for destruction could help a lot with mobility.
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This does make it feel ever so slightly better for Destruction, as it adds an instant cast we did not previously have. Does not alleviate the concerns I’ve initially raised, though.
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I do know how destruction damage ramps up with lots of targets because of uncapped AoE. However, this hero tree doesn’t necessarily mean it will be absolutely broken. Especially since that all depends on how other classes are doing. This hero spec could boost our dps to 5 million, but that means nothing if the other specs are doing 6 million on average. We can’t say that this spec will be busted until we get actual testing.
But yes, I agree that this is lacking thematically for destruction. Since some nodes behave differently for affliction and destruction, they could change how the baseline effects of wither works for each spec.
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As someone who used to love Destro on my warlock alt I am very disappointed by Hellcaller.
I would like to add my voice to all those saying that Destro really has the short end of the stick both thematically and gameplay wise in both Hero talents.
In fact looking at all the talents released so far I have reached that point where I feel that Blizzard really needs to bite the bullet and change hero talents to single spec as the few cross spec wins like frostfire mage seem badly outnumbered by thematic mismatches and forced blandness because of being for both specs. The fact that so many of the talents in all the trees read Spec A has spell X modified; spec B has spell Y modified shows that they are already 1/2 way there in practice.
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thx for the clarification!, now if you could clarify or point out where the destruction part of the tree is in it would make my whole day thx alot!
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Since some nodes have different effects based on whether you are playing as affliction or destruction, could this be done for the base Wither effect? That might require too much balancing, but I have an idea.
Affliction can keep the current ramping Wither DoT but we could change it for destruction. If instead of a ramping DoT, the stacks could store up damage that are detonated and deal damage when hit with something like Chaos Bolt or a shard spender.
If you were fighting a group of enemies, you’d be building up your stacks of Wither on the targets and then detonate them with Chaos Bolt. Use Havoc to hit several enemies at once and now you’re setting off a chain reaction of explosions.
To me that feels more in line with the theme of destruction while still keeping the Wither mechanic as a whole.
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Was kinda excited until the capstone when I saw the words “Malefic Rupture”. I have no idea how this awful, widely disliked ability is surviving another expansion.
And really, its simple how to fix it. Make Wither, which actually sounds cool, replace Rupture instead of Corruption. The very few locks who like Rupture can just use the other tree.
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I’m not really moved by much on that tree. Nothing new and imaginative. More of the same stuff that is really kind of lackluster.
The exception is “Aura of Enfeeblement”, I like talent.
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I do like the overall idea of the tree. I do feel the lack of theme for Destro, which Diabolist also doesn’t provide, but instant cast wither replacing immolate yet used for the same purpose (and benefiting from immolate talents) is a win.
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Pretty disappointing.
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Didn’t mind having a Demo/Destro choice - Diabolist - that aesthetically favors Demo, as opposed to something like Frostfire that visually merges the specs, but both Destro choices having very little to no Destro flavor seems like a substantial design oversight.
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Even putting the first criticism aside, this tree looks >SUPER< boring. Maybe I’m just biased against Affliction but what are we actually getting to play with? Replacing an existing DoT with a DoT that occasionally procs another DoT? That’s it? That’s what a “Hellcaller” does?
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both trees now make cataclysm even more important, will there be a change to the position of this talent or are we finally getting this baseline?
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There is no reason to believe Wither damage ramps up with stacks. The stacks seem to be solely intended for blackened souls, which already does… pretty much exactly what you just suggested. Wither is a ticking time bomb with dot damage glued on.
I do have a few questions about Blackened Souls, though.
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What damage adds stacks? Do periodic ticks add them, or just direct casts?
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Will rain of fire add stacks, or is destro expected to take fire and brimstone for aoe stacking?
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Does every seed detonation add a stack if using sow the seeds?
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Can you continue to add stacks while wither is acute and counting down?
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Does wither go acute just once at 20% health or is it constant sub-20%?
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Does blackened soul damage count as periodic for the purposes of things like haunted soul or wrath of consumption?
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Let’s hope Soul Harvester is the saving grace for Affliction… 
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