Change Pandaren Racial (Please)

Community General Discussion
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TL;DR - The way Epicurean currently works only provides a player a buff after:

  • They purchase food with in-game gold
  • They spend 10 seconds sitting and eating
  • The buff falls off with death

I propose this racial get reworked to maintain player power balance while removing some of the “hassles” of the current buff.

Meditative Focus - Pandaren’s deep focus provides a 1% increase to a secondary stat (Haste, Crit, Mastery, or Versatility). Your highest stat is always chosen
I like this as it maintains power balance

If the player stacks Haste they will never get more than a Gnome/Goblin
If the player stacks Crit they will never get more than a Worgen/Blood Elf
If the player stack Versatility they will never get more than a KT / Highmountain

The buff is passive (i.e. no gold cost) and it is present all the time (i.e. won’t fall off for a death). Additionally, I find it to fit nicely as the theme of Pandaren’s … there deep focus allows them to gain the buff they desire (stack) the most.

I believe the Pandaren racial “Epicurean” (100% food buff bonus) should be changed. Before I provide my proposal I want to limit this discussion to racial buffs that directly impact player power (i.e. damage, & healing). There are really 5 categories of player power racial abilities in WoW:

Passive Primary Stat Increase

  • Draenei - Increase Primary by +23
  • Mechagnome - Priary stat stacking w/ combat up to +40

Passive Secondary Stat Increase

  • Gnome / Goblin - 1% Haste
  • Worgen / BE - 1% Crit
  • KT / Highmountain- 1% Versatility
  • NE - 1% Haste -or- 1% Crit
  • Human - 2% additional secondary stat ratings (from all sources)
  • Dwarf / Tauren - 2% Crit damage

Passive Damage Increase

  • Undead - Shadow Damage
  • Nightborne - 1% magic damage
  • VE - 5% additional damage for 12 seconds every 60 seconds

On-Use

  • DI - Increased primary stat for 8 seconds every 120 seconds
  • Mag’har - secondary stat for 15 seconds every 120 seconds
  • Orc - Increased AP for 15 seconds every 120 seconds
  • Troll - Increased haste for 10 seconds every 180 seconds
  • LFD - AoE Holy Damage
  • Zandalari - Embrace the Loa
  • Vulpera - Bag of Tricks

On-Consumable

  • Pandaren - 100% Food Buff
  • Least Costly buff is Pre-Mixed Pot of Noodles - 2G for 20 - gives 0.5% Versatility after 10 seconds
  • Most Costly buff is Feast of Gluttonous Hedonism - approximately 1,200G - gives 20 extra primary stat after 10 seconds

The benefit of the Pandaren player power buff relatively to other player power racials:

  • Very flexibly as you can choose your stat buff based on your food selection

The drawbacks of the Pandaren player power buff relatively to other player power racials:

  • Only buff that costs in-game gold
  • The buff takes 10 seconds of eating to accrue and only lasts up to 60 minutes
  • The buff falls off with death
  • The buff is less than every other class
    Pre-Mixed Pot of Noodles only provides 0.5% versatility compared to KT/Highmountain which get a passive 1%
    Gluttonous Hedonism only provides 20 primary stats compared to Draenei’s passive 23 and Mechagone stacking to 40

The above “drawbacks” may seem trivial but (in my opinion) they should not exist at all.
While in-game gold is rather easy to come by it should not cost a Pandaren players 1,200G to have the less player power than a Draenei.

In my opinion the largest drawback here is the 10 seconds of time to accrue the buff.

  • This pain point can be felt in both PvE and PvP environments:
    In Mythic+ every second counts as you race against the timer. If you die, you cannot afford to “sit” for 10 seconds to re-buff
    In BG’s you will likely die (multiple times) and you often cannot wait 10 seconds to get back and help your team

I propose the Pandaren “Epicurean” racial be changed to the following:

Pandaren gain an increase of flat 1% to a secondary stat where the highest stat is always selected

I believe this solves all of the drawbacks:

  • No time commitment to accrue the buff
  • No gold commitment to buy the buff
  • Numerically/Player-Power equivalent to 7 other races (Gnome, Goblin, Worgen, BE, KT, Highmountain, & NE)

It would still maintain the benefit of of being a flexible racial buff.

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Yea I definitely agree with this as you outline is it rather unfair having to use food to gain your races only stat bonus while other races get passive secondary stat and primary stat bonuses. Honestly I’d just like to see each race get a similar treatment to make passives more fair.

For example each race should have:

  • One stat increase or dmg/healing increase passive
  • One profession passive (gather herbs/mine faster)
  • Two defensive passives (1% less damage below 50% health take and 1% less shadow damage).
  • One racial ability that is generally useful (for example human, troll and NE have cool racial ability I want to press).
  • One flavorful useful passive (like gaining move speed indoors, taking reduced fall damage etc)
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Wait…you eat food before engaging raid bosses anyway…so not much of a time waste.

And in m+, well just don’t die then.

Panda also has top tier sleeping punch in pvp. The only place that ability matters.

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I think it would be a good time right now for some pizza.

This thread made me hungry.

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Wait but the racial is actually one of the best raiding racials.

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Wait…you eat food before engaging raid bosses anyway…so not much of a time waste.

And in m+, well just don’t die then.

Panda also has top tier sleeping punch in pvp. The only place that ability matters.

Yes, you do eat before raiding which is why my post makes no mention of raiding. I don’t think this racial has a shortfall in raiding; I believe the shortfall is in M+ and PvP for the reasons listed above.

Wait but the racial is actually one of the best raiding racials.

I’m not sure how you come up with “one of the best” as it is numerically behind Draenei and Mechagnome for every class. Depending on what class/spec you are the strength of the racial varies; I cannot find a class/spec where this is “one of the best” (Bloodmallet)

To be clear, I don’t think this racial is bad at raiding. To be even more clear, I don’t think the racial is “under powered” in terms of performance. My issue/proposal is how convenience of the racial (i.e. gold cost and time).

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Using a Feast gives Pandaren +40 to Main Stat which is better than every other Race except Mechagnomes.

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Using a Feast gives Pandaren +40 to Main Stat which is better than every other Race except Mechagnomes.

So this isn’t entirely fair. The feast gives +20 stats to every race and then gives Pandaren an extra +20 for the total of 40 you quote.

The problem with your logic is that the other racial bonus are in addition to the feast.

For example Draenei get +23 stats all the time + 20 for the feast for a total of 43. While Pandaren only get +40 stats

I am not under the opinion that Pandaren are under-buffed or weak. My proposal is to achieve roughly the same amount player power without the clunky requirements (10s sitting per death and gold cost)

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Heh. I think Tauren get a small buff to their stamina. :stuck_out_tongue:

And a tiny bit of crit damage (not crit chance, crit damage)

So I still say your all doing better than tauren.

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So, at most. You get +20 Primary from Food eating Feast of Gluttonous Hedonism relative to other races that gained that food buff.

Both Draenei and Mechagnomes have healing racials. I believe Pandaren racial is a CC that is debatably more useful than the two mentioned. A trade-off, perhaps?

Also, I wonder how it works with Exact Preparation should a pandaren becomes a Venthyr, using Nadjia as the Pandaren’s soulbind of choice.

How is that any different from a Human Racial?

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Tauren and Dwarf share the same racial of +2% crit damage. Depending on the class, spec, and character critical strike chance the value of the racial changes but is always competitive with Pandaren and sometimes better.

Again, I am not arguing for a buff to the amount of Pandaren player power. Dwarf and Tauren don’t need to spend 1200G to get there racial buff nor do they need to sit for 10 seconds after every death. This is my what I’m trying to change

They human racial of +2% of all secondary stats. So let’s say you have 200 rating of every secondary stat you get +4 (2%) rating of all secondary stats

I’m proposing if a Pandaren has 10% crit, 15% haste and mastery, and 20% vers that character would get a 1% increase to the highest which would make the 20% versatility go to 21%

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Ah, I see. So 1% additional secondary stat to any highest secondary.

The Human Spirit is worded oddly, I think it’s “You gain 2% more secondary stat rating”. Which is 2 extra secondary rating for every 100 secondary rating.

I think Epicurean needs a buff more than a rework. If the food buff maintenance is a problem, you can simply make it work like a flask buff for Pandarens only rather than using the feast every time.

The Well Fed buff changes every expansion as well as Epicurean’s viability with it.

As for being slightly behind Draenei and Mechagnomes, I think there is a tradeoff as their on-use racials are less useful than Quaking Palm. Plus I’m not sure Epicurean works with Exact Preparation from Nadjia Soulbind.

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I would be OK with the solution of food working like flasks for Pandaren. That solution would tackle my main problem (10s to get a buff). That solution would still fail to address the gold concern (albeit a smaller concern).

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If you’re really concerned for your bang for your bucks for a well fed buff as a Pandaren, making it work like a Flasks that don’t fall off, increase the duration of it as well as instantly gaining the food buff when you eat as a Pandaren. Much like Alchemists with Flasks.

… But that wouldn’t make sense of the name of the buff as if you instantly get the “Well Fed” buff when you just start eating it. :sweat_smile:

At the end of the day, we’re all paying gold to increase our character’s effectiveness. Some are more expensive than others.

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I made this same thread at some point way earlier this year. It’s super annoying to use in PVP for sure, especially casual BGs where you’re likely to die pretty often.

And especially because being a panda is like having a global taunt at all times, especially an Alliance panda.

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I like the food buff. It’s like having a couple extra sockets. I can wear a higher piece of gear and balance my missing stat by eating. Pandaren also get quaking palm which is a pretty useful racial.

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That punch is a free interrupt in M+.

If you have a Pandaren Rogue and ANYTHING gets cast, he’s doing it wrong.

lmao.

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Again, I think my point is being missed here. I tried to limit the discussion to:

I want to limit this discussion to racial buffs that directly impact player power (i.e. damage, & healing).

Quaking palms is great, I have no problem with this. Other racial on-use abilities are great too:

  • Gnomes Escape Artist is wonderful
  • Dwarf/DI bleed/magic/poison removal is fantastic
  • Human’s Every Man For Himself also extremely useful
  • Draenei heal can be excellent
    … etc.

I’ll try to summarize once more:

For direct player power, I do not think Pandaren players should be required to sit for 10s and spend in-game gold to obtain the same direct player power as every other race including races with good situational on-use racials (i.e. gnome, human, dwarf, … etc.)

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I think you have a good point. It’s a matter of preference. With this food buff you get a variety of different possible buffs depending on what kind of food you eat, instead of 1 fixed buff. Since I always eat anyway I don’t see it as an extra effort.

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I agree with this, it was my one “pro” for the racial as it exists today … very flexible! My proposal attempts to maintain the flexibility (i.e. 1% increase to the stat you stack the most) while remedying the negatives of 10s sitting in timed content (i.e. M+ and PvP) and expenditure of in-game gold.

The other proposed solution (which I think would work) would be to make the food buff cause Pandaren’s to immediately benefit from the well-fed effect (i.e. removing the 10s sitting penalty) and allow the well-fed effect to persist through death (limiting the amount of gold spend to obtain equivalent player power to other races)

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