If they nerf the Halo stack then they need big baseline healing increases to bring Holy in line with other healers as reports say that both priest specs are under tuned by quite a lot.
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Itâs kind of a shame Oracle is under-powered because I like a lot of the kit that it brings to Disc M+. Longer atones, bigger shields, faster feathers, Radiance spam - it sounds fun. Gets Disc away from Shadow ramping, makes it more flexible for the chaos of M+.
Oracle would be awesome if premonition was a series of auras instead of a 1-minute cool down with a rotation. Could force the game play and feel less complicated.
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They work on spec flow first and then class balance. Itâs entirely possible that itâs not nerfed until the last week of beta.
The problem with this is that so much of the tree is focused on effects granted by Halo casts that thereâs absolutely no way theyâll be able to get the flow correct if Halo remains so powerful. Something so powerful (or weak) needs to be adjusted to the âintendedâ strength, or close enough to it, quickly so that it can be determined if all the other elements work with their current values or even work as intended at all.
Just as an example - there is now way to test âspec flowâ for discipline using Twight Equilibrium right now because it is designed around being able to weave light and shadow spells, which discipline is completely incapable of doing. Voidweaver is either casting all light spells or all shadow spells at any given time, so there is no value in Twilight Equilibrium at any value. So letâs assume the priest is a masochist and wants to play oracle - how much bonus damage does Smite need from Twilight Equilibrium for the talent to be useful? 100%? 300%? 1000%?
How does it impact the flow of the spec if Twilight Equilibrium is useable with discâs current design? We donât know because its value is so far away from what it needs to be that it canât be tested.
I see what you mean. Though, I doubt any value of Twilight will ever be taken by Oracle Disc. The setup seems to favor an Ultimate Penance build where you spam Radiance and Smite in order to spam Penance in order to spam Ultimate Penance.
Which kind of feeds into the point - Voidweaver has nearly zero ability to use the talent, and oracle doesnât want to use the talent. Assuming its design works (it doesnât), thereâs no way to know how powerful it needs to be to be competitive, what situations itâs competitive in, and no way to test how positively or negatively it affects gameplay if it is competitive.
Similarly with Resonant Energy - how powerful does the buff need to be to make it valuable after 5 seconds? Should it be valuable after 10 seconds? If so, how valuable? Does it almost start behaving almost like a one-button disc ramp if Haloâs heal is low enough that the buff being fully stacked is more valuable when a big damage event hits than Haloâs actual healing? Is that desirable gameplay?
We donât know because Halo is so obscene that it will be nerfed and we donât know what will be buffed or how those buffs play into Resonant Energyâs value (or lack thereof).
I sound like a broken record, but were stuck in limbo until we get actual Priest tree changes. Right now Disc/Holyâs performance in the beta is pretty bad. Disc is far below Holy because Holy has the busted Archon Halo. Mistweavers/Hpals are way ahead of everyone else (20% or more).
Weâve only had 3 talents overhauled in the General Tree and 1 talent change in the Shadow the entire alpha/beta so far. Disc/Holy are just twiddling their thumbs waiting for their needed overhauls.
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Yeah, Priest and Shaman Row 8/9/10 class and spec trees are easily the bottom 2 game wide.
I would rate shaman at the worst(massive lack of connectivity, poor pathing, lots of 2 point talents in r9, and several r9 dead ends, seriously who does that), followed closely holy(r 9/10 are just⌠a joke for some thing that was âredesignedâ at the cost of -7% healing no more than 3 months before the beta), and then Disc(our spec tree has DID, r1-7 is mostly well organized and flows, then r8/9/10 is a totally disconnected jumbled mess).
At least our class tree is only âmehâ having the dubious honor of the most r9 2 pointers of all classes, but is somewhat saved by good connectivity and adequate pathing.
Overall though I donât really think any amount of rebalance can truly save Oracle. As Capslockfury said higher up, it is just too disjointed and awkward to ever be truly good.
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Oracle might have some potential in M+ and PvP, but outside of a few niche situations itâs pretty much dead in the water.
Archon is also better for leveling / world questing because you can pull big packs of mobs and AOE them down with Halo and Empyreal Blaze.
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Going against the grain, but I see potential in Oracle, for Disc, with changes.
First, if the numbers arenât there, theyâre not there, and the spec is dead. I donât know which knobs need turning but all reports are the spec is underpowered compared to an already underpowered Archon (relative other healers).
Second, Premonition: it kind of fails the fantasy of âpredicting the futureâ, as you canât waste time, cycles, and uses just to fit a niche Premo to a niche combat situation. But, if they force the cycling and ignore the thematics, it could be an okay ability- in a âFlexing your healing style to fit your proc to address a generic damage situationâ way. Thisâll work if all three Premonitions are equal- but they arenât.
Insight is awesome and if every Premo was just Insight it would be an awesome ability. Extremely flexible, and works with anything and everything a Disc wants to do. Iâm imagining an Ult Pen â Insight Radiance â Insight Pen â Insight Radiance â Pen â Radiance super combo, with the next Ultimate Penance on the horizon.
Piety works. 10% healing is okay, not great, but universally helpful. Redistributing overhealing works well with both Radiance and Atonement bursts. For all the situations where 2-3 party members are taking damage but you end up healing all 5.
Solace is the sore spot. Disc is not built to focus a single target, and in this day and age single target healing is just not very common. And when it does show up, itâs a particular situation that youâd want Solace on demand, and not locked behind a cycle. Itâs probably most crippled compared to the other two by being restricted to a single target- if it just empowered your next 3-5 direct heals, it might be functional. As is, I think you just press and forget it while cycling to the better 3 Premos.
The other talents:
Why is the bonus to PW: Shield just flat out 5% weaker than Void Weaver? Unfair.
Waste No Time/Miraculous Recovery: TBH, I might struggle-bus play Oracle just for this node.
Preemptive Care: Good, flat buff to Atonement maintenance.
Save the Day will see hyper-niche raid usage, otherwise Feathers is flat out better.
Assured Safety is not great at all, by design. The Mendings donât fire until the shield is used up, by which time their help is questionable. Half my shields are thrown at people already suffering, to save them from immediate fatal damage, or to snub upcoming damage, after which any residual is usually topped up with Atonement. It really only helps when you can predict a very heavy burst on 1-2 targets. Furthermore, thereâs no Mending synergy anywhere else in Disc, so the Mendings will always be fairly weak.
Most of the other nodes are pretty straightforward and unremarkable.
I think most Disc will take Perfect Vision.
Then thereâs Clairvoyance- and I just donât see this as the power spike most other final hero nodes get. You might not even use the Solace, as youâll be busy using the other procs. The best that can be said about it is getting Insight 2 out of 4 rather than 1 out of 3. Beyond that- where is the power? How is it competing with Voidweaver, where half the nodes synergize to pump up shadow Atonement healing- for free? How will Disc not run OOM with the heavy-healing pump Oracle encourages? I donât think 15% savings on Radiance is going to cut it.
Somehow, I think the major sore point is Solace, and it feels like the âHolyâ buff in the otherwise Disc rotation.
Oracle received an updated:
- Preventive Measures now also increases damage dealt by Penance, Holy Fire, Smite, and Holy Nova by 15%.
Pretty sure this is a no brainer for Disc since itâs literally just a flat atonement healing increase.
For Holy itâs just a flat +15% damage bonus which scales with Empyreal Blaze. I donât think even with this damage boost itâll match the power of Archon Halo in damage/healing.
For leveling/world questing the extra damage boost from Oracle would be better.
If this is the measure of âbuffâ they think will get Oracle up to useable, then expect MASSIVE reductions to VW and Archon during this weekâs mentioned âclass tuning passâ. Sigh.
Iâm just expecting were going to get the Shaman treatment⌠maybe new changes by next week.
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The last blue is just another middlefinger. Same treatment we got pre DF. No changes for an eternity and then only stuff nobody cares or wants. It gets old tbh. Some of the worst and some of the most boring herotrees and (i´m focused on Holy) and basically no changes to the spec. Salvation still on the long CD we got for last Tierset which already was uncalled.
It just does not feel good to play Holy. Lightweaver is a unfun, horrible Style for M+. Give us last Tier as 2 pointer, one point for one more Holyword, 2 for 2. Or bake it into Miracleworker with another point. First point is MW as we know, second gives us 2 Holywords to bank on proc basis.
Beta keys were so unfun - if i´m forced into LW for M+ and Holy will also be bottom for Raid again, i´m done with this game.
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It is becoming exceedingly amusing that Blizzard does this expansion after expansion, admitting they canât (or wonât) fundamentally change things during an expansion and that theyâll make sure to address them before the next expansionâŚand then, inevitably, rather than getting ahead of problem by starting on priest during alpha or early beta, they leave it for the very last possible moment to do anything, ârun out of timeâ again, leave massive problems that canât/wonât be resolved during the expansion and need to be left for the next expansionâs beta, and promise to solve those problems next time.
I know Blizzard doesnât hate any classes and doesnât mean to play favorites, but theyâve sure got a funny way of showing it when mage is on their second full rework in a year and has gotten on the order of 10x-15x as many changes every week as priest has gotten across all of TWW development.
Itâs just comical at this point.
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Yeah, looking at the patch notes it feels like there are 2 designers working on arcane and 1 more on fire. Priest and shaman are lucky if we get a half hour of attention per week⌠combined.
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At least in the DF beta we got an actual initial alpha talent tree for Priests that was pretty much panned by everyone. The Priest dev ended up leaving the company so we didnât get anything until right before the expansion launch. This is why Disc/Shadow got overhauled in 10.1 and 10.2.
Holy got a minor overhaul in 10.2.6, but needs a complete tree update at this point.
What happened this time around is when Oracle was announced it was so widely panned that it probably made Blizzard go back and take the entire Priest class back to the drawing board. We only got 8 weeks left which means probably 6 beta updates then they lock it down to a release build.
I´ll never forget the Powerword: Middlefinger Update from DF beta where the just said we won´t get vault, any more mobility, get our knock pruned while giving it to others etc.
At least the earlier tree had me hyped for benedictus but then they moved it down as capstone and made it choice with Miracleworker so we can´t ever use it⌠Would have been at least something for the missing mobility.
Holy just does not get anything fun or even necessary. And now we are left with sh*tty herotrees, a once per fight Salvation, a still nerfed massdispell and our Tier gone. I completely refuse to play Lightweaver, it´s horrible. AoE comes in and you have to cast ST, what a joke. With tier you could prepare and safe proccs. Now it just sucks bigtime again.
I know that sounds overly salty but at this point, i am.
I´d guess they either never got a new dev for Priest, or they have one that doesn´t know his job.
Either way, it´s giga frustrating as Holypriestmain.
I didnât have as much of an issue with the âno Vault of Heavensâ until Mythic Raz with her pushback that required a daisy chain of an Evoker rescuing a Priest who then Lifegrips another Priest. Then you had Mythic Tindral with roots and Priests canât get out of those. If you didnât immune the roots you were dead because a tornado would run you over.
So yeah: Iâd love root removal and Vault of Heavens if theyâre going to start loading fights up with this kind of required junk. I donât like needing to be babysat by another person.
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