DK healing was absolutely overpowered. It needed adjustment. It did not need a 60% reduction to our primary form of survival. That was an overreaction and will result in abysmal performance for anyone other than Rank 1 DKs.
I was really looking forward to playing DK this season. Unfortunately, as seems to be par for the course, Blizzard dunked us before we got a chance to shine. I saw the nerfs last week and tried to remain optimistic but after playing a few games this morning - its clear this class won’t have a spot in the meta unless the upcoming changes nerf every other class.
The last three expansions have been miserable for DK in Season 1. Death Strike is the core of Death Knight’s viability. This is because we’re a low mobility class that gets to trade damage for self healing. This was a core design principle in WoW PvP - the classes with healing had lower mobility. As of the past half decade or so - it seems this principle has been totally abandoned.
When DK self healing becomes too weak to survive even a single person, the class falls off fast. Almost every other melee spec heals for more than DKs now. DHs, Fury Warriors, Rogues, Ferals, Guardians, Enhance (? Not sure about this one after the nerfs). Oddly enough - the two melee specs who should have the most healing, Rets and DKs, seem to have the least?
My take on reasonable changes to adjust DK healing would’ve been the following:
- Revert the 50% nerf to healing based on damage done if the damage was done by players/pets.
- Nerf Will of the Necropolis. I probably would’ve gone further and dropped it to 10-15% reduction under 30% HP.
- Remove the Spellwarden PvP Talent. Honestly this one always felt weird. DKs don’t have problems with magic damage - we didn’t need a passive damage reduction to spells. Its way too strong and its interactions with our new talents are overpowered. Just remove this thing from the game.
- Imp Death Strike talent nerf, AMS reduction and Abom Limb nerfs were fine.
I know this seems like an echo chamber / screaming into a void at this point but, this is one of the only avenues we have to give feedback. Please don’t give us another expansion with bad DKs in Season 1.
I really hope someone at Blizzard reconsiders these changes before the holiday - otherwise there won’t be a Christmas for Death Knights 