Another good round of changes.
Now…if they could just fix AM/RA to work for Slayer…
Feedback - 06/25/2024 Beta Build
General
Rallying Cry 15% → 10% Nerf. Damn it, they noticed 
Makes sense that this finally happened, but please consider providing some sort of buff / alternative talent to Rally for 5-man content. I made some suggestions/comments in this regard in my first post in this thread in case this is something you guys are considering taking a swing at.
Uproar change to 45 seconds reduction is good, but further exasperates the issues inherent to the gateway nodes of the class tree. With this change, warriors intending to take both Uproar and Thunderous words must now choose between giving up one of the torments, the 5% damage node, or a point in armored to the teeth. The problem is between armored to the teeth and the weapon specialization node, there is a significant amount of power, possibly enough to consider dropping one of the capstone talents in the class tree. This is just a result of how fundamentally imbalanced this gateway row is. Please find a way for us to not have to choose between talents like Thunderous Words and Uproar vs. passive damage nodes. The whole row needs a rebalancing and with this change alongside changes to spear, it may be more crucial than ever.
Champion’s Might no longer requires us to stand in the evil circle. Thank you so very much for this change. I’m sure the team is keenly aware of the resounding joy that echoed across the warrior community as we read this note.
Piercing Challenge. It’s a buff, but, this talent is still pretty weak unfortunately. It remains unlikely to be played and may need more changes (alongside a rebalancing of the gateway nodes for reasons explained above)
A relatively minor final point in the grand scheme of things, but one that I can’t help but vent about somewhat. The removal of Blood and Thunder and baking in of its functionality into Thunder Clap, is good, particularly for the Mountain Thane talent economy, but I’m not really a fan of the approach that was taken to resolve this issue. My admittedly mild annoyance here stems from the existence of Rend as an independent button. I think the weirdness here is most visible when we consider the case of Protection Warriors, who have to talent into Rend, an active ability that they will never use in order to unlock the functionality of Blood and Thunder. So, now, there just exists an extra ability in the spellbook, that Protection Warriors are fully intended to never bind under any circumstance. For experienced players, this is a none issue, though a bit weird to keep in the game (alongside Shield Block/Slam for DPS warriors) when you consider that you guys just put a bunch of effort into revamping the visual design of the spellbook, partly to modernize, but also to add clarity. My frustration is mostly for new players, who are being essentially decieved into a belief that this is an ability they might have to actually think about as demonstrated by the occasional posts in the warrior discord (protection channel) of new warrior players wondering when they should be using Rend (Never!).
For Arms, the Damage gap between Rend and Thunderclap is so small that when talented into Thunder Clap, the vast majority of warriors will simply choose not to bind Rend (in AOE, placing it on the same keybind). For some, that is enough to close the matter, but if a button exists that everyone recommends you never press, then it begs the question of why that button should even exist. I want to be clear that the solution here isn’t to buff rends single-target damage, because then we are just falling back into the button bloat problem, but please take an honest look at the role of this keybind and whether it even needs to exist. Bring back blood and thunder as a talent and have it replace Rend for both Protection and Arms in their individual spec trees. For Arms, this technically means having to talent Thunder Clap in single target, but Arms is not lacking for extra talent points in its single-target builds (Although please consider changing the top right corner of the class tree, plently of feedback has been given in this thread and elsewhere about the problematic pathing in this area). Sorry and thanks 
Mountain Thane
Thanks for changing Keep Your Feet on the Ground. I’m concious of the fact that this is technically a nerf, but I appreciate that I might actually get at least some chance of playing Steadfast as the Peaks now
Colossus
This isn’t necessarily about any particular changes that happened for Colossus (at least for the DPS specs), but i want to mention it anyways. For Colossus Arms, particularly in AOE situations, not so much in ST, the cooldown of Demolish seems to kind of be all over the place. As this is a somewhat uncertain time in regards to rotational priorities, its hard to evaluate just how much desync is occuring for Demolish and whether its necessarily out of control. But, I find myself frequently running into situations where either colossus smash or demolish are 20+ seconds away from one another and If I don’t hold one or the other, the spells just are in a permanent state of “two ships passing in the night”. I wish I could have given feedback earlier in the cycle that Demolish should maybe have been a followup ability to Colossus Smash to avoid such issues, but I might not have made that recommendation given that these issues became more prevalent post adding Cleave and Execute as abilities that stack up Colossal Might.
My initial impressions with Colossus were very positive, and while I remain largely a fan, I can’t help but feel that between adding Cleave and Execute to the priorities of Colossus that it has just become Slayer with an extra button while playing essentially the exact same, which is somewhat a shame when you consider the contrast between Mountain Thane Fury’s playstyle relative to Slayer Fury. In Hindsight, I think I would have preferred more interesting gameplay differences akin to Fury from Colossus relative to Slayer Arms. But, since Slayer already works well for Fury and Arms, and Colossus seems to also be somewhat ill-recieved by Prot Warriors relative to Mountain Thane, it may be worth considering reworking this particular Hero tree in the future to address these issues, as I imagine it might be a bit late now.
A final note, theres some concern among Arms warriors about the potential for wide swings in performance based on luck with Demolish criting or not. Relatively large hitting abilities/trinkets are always somewhat disliked for this reason (See all the complaints about Beacon to the Beyond from tanks in particular in season 2 as evidence). I would recommend either making demolish not be able to crit and tune it around that or have it be guranteed to crit (which makes sense given the name Demolish) and tune it around that. I mostly only recommend the second option, because crits = dopamine, even if they are fake.
Arms
Seasoned Soldier Area of effect damage was nerfed from 10% to 5%. I understand that the intent of this nerf was not specifically directed at arms, but rather a gamewide reduction in the strength of Leech and Avoidance. That being said, I am concerned about the position that Arms is placed in relative to Fury, a historically tankier spec, and by a reasonable margin, at least passively, which did not get nerfed. My intent here isn’t to get fury nerfed, as relative to the other two plate classes, that have recieved their reworks, fury is looking to be weaker that Retribution and DK dps defensively. In the interest of not further widening the gap that already exists between Arms and Fury (particularly when considering that Arms tends to trend very high on Death percentage in raid content), it might be worth considering entirely removing the Area of effect damage effect of Seasoned Soldier and replacing it with a % stamina or % DR bonus to arms as a stopgap to maintain parity with Fury until such a time as a hollistic gamewide defensive pruning occurs, which has been hinted at by Morgan Day and Ion Hozzikostas. When such a pruning occurs, removing such a temporary bonus can be considered more fairly alongside every spec in the game, without weakening Arms relatively weak defensive position (relative to Fury, but also in general) for the forseeable future.
One of the benefits of Uproar’s reduction to 45 seconds is that it now more naturally aligns with Skullsplitter’s cooldown, allowing us to easily fit in two Skullsplitter’s between each Roar. That being said, skullsplitter continues to do very insignificant damage on its own for an ability with such a name, so a buff here may be warranted. Or a rename to “Mild Bonk”, pick your poison.
Dreadnaught caught some additional buffs this patch, both directly, and by fixing some of the overpower talents, but unfortunately, it still continues to contribute a relatively low amount of damage. As I play more of Arms, particularly Colossus in AoE, I am becoming less convinced that Dreadnaught should be buffed despite this mainly due to the fact that as Dreadnaught becomes stronger, it begins to compete more strongly in priority with Mortal Strike and Execute. Since both those single-target abilities translate to Demolish CDR, while overpower doesn’t, I am concerned that buffing dreadnaught could result in some counterintuitive gameplay. I’ve been a longtime advocate for Cleave replacing Mortal Strike, as that would have solved pretty much all these issues (alongside many others), but its probably too late for that request. That being said, Dreadnaught both cannot persist in such a weak state and also probably shouldn’t be buffed, because it could cause convoluted priorities. A bit of an oxymoronic situation. I’ve considered a potential solution that I haven’t fully thought through, but might be worth considering nonetheless. It might be good to move Dreadnaught from Triggering off of Overpower and instead having it trigger from Mortal Strike. This both resolves the priority issue, because Overpower returns to being a single-target filler, while keeping demolish the central goal of the rotation, because in AoE Cleave, Mortal Strike (with Dreadnaught) and Execute will always be a higher priority than Overpower, and all of them contribute to Colossal Might stacks and thus Demolish CDR. Another benefit to this solution is that it will feel less wasteful, and possibly not at all wasteful depending on tuning, to use Martial Prowess Stacks on Mortal Strike instead of Cleave (If on CD) in AOE, since they would presumably contribute to Dreadnaught damage. Obviously this would require some retuning to Dreadnaught, but it does resolve competing priority issues. Again, not fully fleshed out, but I leave that to you.
Alternatively, you can make overpower generate Colossal Might, but at that point, everything does, and that’s a bit silly. Otherwise, maybe remove Dreadnaught and tune AoE accordingly, though I can’t promise that would be received well .
The state of arms seems to be unusually divisive and I suspect this is a result of both the cd desync issue in combination with players feeling like they have to hit ST buttons like MS/Exe frequently in AoE to maximize CDR gains. Turning Mortal Strike into a pseudo-aoe with dreadnaught could resolve at least the second issue.
Quick reminder to please address Execute rage generation. Gameplay feels miserable and counter to the stated goals for rage generation.
Fury
Playing around with the Slayer Fury post-AM fix, I have mostly positive thoughts in terms of the gameplay loop. It feels powerful and impactful all around and I’m excited for the prospect of playing with this throughout TWW. All of that being said, It’s been brought up countless times in this thread, but cooldown desync across both Arms/Fury has become untenable across the board and this is very apparent when playing Slayer in AoE. I don’t know how much can be done this close to release to fix these issues, but I suspect that this is going to be the warrior bogeyman problem that everyone constantly complains about (though not as fervently) for the entire expansion akin to Champion’s Might from Spear for all of dragonflight and most of shadowlands. I understand that cooldown reduction effects have always been a staple of warrior design and I support the idea, but I’m not sure it was the right call to introduce competing systems of CDR across Colossus Demolish and Slayer Bladestorm, because it has created a problem for both specs.
In the event of future reworking to the warrior class as a whole, I once again encourage consideration to a return towards anger management applying generically to all our offensive cds and updating talents like Reckless Abandon / Spiteful Serenity to better compete with that vision for Anger Management. The strength of Anger Management is in its nature of giving us flexible timings for frequent damage events that other classes struggle to fill as consistently. When mobs spawn on a short frequency, we’ve historically shined in being able to find ways to align our cooldowns to every such event in ways that make us stand out compared to other classes. But, there’s a different strength in allowing interesting talent choices that allow us to adapt to more generic timings, when such frequent damage events are not happening. I think in a world where Anger Management applies to all our CDs, it could be interesting to have Reckless Abandon / Spiteful serenity move to transform our cds into 2 min cds with appropriate buffs to better allow synergy with many of the other 2 minute classes (Priest PI / Aug Ebon Might) as well as give us more dynamic options to dictate our damage profile on a per boss basis. Obviously, in a world with such a buffed AM, if RA/Spiteful did not change our cd timings, then they would need to be buffed/changed to better compete with this new AM. Universal AM worked in the past and I’m confident it can be made to work again. It would resolve a lot of gripes with the spec that have been created with the new talent tree system. Besides, I keep seeing everyone else’s rework give them something completely OP. It’s our time.
8 Likes
I do not even remotely deny that Archi does a lot for warriors as a whole, nor am I saying that he should just stop posting in the thread. But having every piece of feedback in a thread have to be Archi-approved™ is not a positive thing.
It’s also strange that you would point out that he directly takes things to Blizz as some big defense for this, when the evidence clearly shows that this doesn’t actually have any major impact. If it did, then the state of warrior and how they are designed would be noticeably better than other classes in general. Yet, it’s not. That could only mean one of two things:
- It doesn’t matter, or matters very little, and Blizzard rarely listens anyway
- It does matter and Blizzard pays close attention, and Archi’s vision for the class isn’t as good as you think
Generally speaking I agree with Archi on a lot of things, so I doubt strongly that it’s #2, which only leaves option 1, and he’s really not doing that much of any major impact other than write the guides (which I don’t deny the usefulness of for the community at large).
He also works for Wowhead, who knows if part or full time or if its his main source of income, but either way its literally his job to pay attention to and care about WoW all day, so saying he spends all of his free time doing it and we should just feel blessed is a bit odd. It’s a paid position that he opted in to.
Also, just because you are knowledgeable about the current design of a thing does not mean that you have good ideas about how it could be improved. While I agree with a lot of things Archi says, I fundamentally disagree with his idea of what Arms gameplay should look like and think the spec would be even more boring than it is currently on the TWW beta if he fully got his way.
Ultimately, none of this matters, and is off topic so feel free to report it and have the post removed, but I am not going to apologize or feel bad for my opinion on Archi’s exhausting posting habits, and I am going to laugh at your embarrassing parasocial relationship.
3 Likes
I wish you would do more to make Slam feel satisfying to press for Arms. Consider bringing back Crushing Assault from BfA as a talent, or anything else to make the button more appealing.
I don’t believe it’s good form to talk about this sort of thing, so I’m not going to get into detail, but you have no idea the amount of positive changes that have been implemented by the direct suggestion of highly involved community members over the years.
You can choose to believe that or not, but it is very true. Whatever anyone thinks of the state of Warrior in Dragonflight, it was infinitely better than it started in Alpha, and the current state of Warrior in TWW Beta is similarly far improved compared to what it looked like at the start of Alpha.
Ultimately though, we don’t “decide” what happens - we give input and the developers make decisions - sometimes they align, sometimes they don’t.
You don’t have the first clue what my “vision for the spec is,” nor does it really matter since I’m not the person who decides that sort of thing in the first place.
Reality is I disagreed with you about one completely insignificant thing, and you took it personally, which is just plain petty and a bad look in general.
Posting on the forums is not even remotely part of my job, I do it because I like discussing the state of things and it better informs the feedback that I give, because I want the class to be in the best place it can before launch… which should be a common sentiment for everyone involved here.
Clearly some people are going to disagree, and that’s fine, because they should be able to debate and exchange ideas like adults, not start flinging insults and making accusations because they were disagreed with.
11 Likes
What’s this referring to? Arms gameplay seems pretty well received at the moment. Visually samey especially in regards to the Hero talents but plays great as far as I can tell. Less rage is welcome and cleave change was positive.
2 Likes
Arms is super Janky, doesnt really seem to have a clear idea what it wants to be.
Hit stuff really hard with heavy attack
1 Like
Any part in particular?
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Feels good man
2 Likes
nods in zug zug
1 Like
Not to interrupt this pissing contest, but does anyone Rep PVP related issues?
I’m fairly certain Archimtiros does not pvp.
I only play wow for the Solo Que’s, and while I know they get a lot of hate I really enjoy them.
We just got a damage buff So I tried Slayer, and the damage felt Awful, I’m not exactly sure what Slayer is supposed to excel at in Arena.
I swapped to Colossus for the other games, and Demolish in a proper stun + avatar will chunk someone’s health by about half. Getting 10 stacks however is a real issue in PVP for the ability.
Mobility is worse, The damage outside of a Demolish feels meh compared to live. We still have Slam button you will never press.
The Thunderclap talent changes are fantastic, now you can easily shift that point to utility. Its easier to fill out the tree with talents you actually want for PVP.
Carry on, no flame.
4 Likes
Mud is probably the closest thing warrior has, I guess.
1 Like
One thing Architimos always does is ask the important question of, “Why?”. If he’s criticizing your feedback he’s trying to help you convey your feedback. Sometimes he’ll point out why your feedback may not be helpful atm (EG This talent is bugged and thats why it feels bad), but he almost never flat out dismisses people or their ideas.
If he’s critizing your feedback, he’s most likely trying to assist you, even if occasionally comes off a bit prickly.
This is such a lol. If I had one wish for the community as a whole, it would be for every spec to have someone like Archi that gives such concise, strong, well written feedback, puts up with a tremendous amount of BS, and genuinely just has a love for the game after close to two decades of the game’s life.
Everything is not always crystal clear about how feedback impacts our development (Sometimes what we want as players and what devs want don’t align), but we would be far worse without Archi championing our specs.
The only time Archi is exhausting is if you fail to have a good faith discussion with him.
While this often is an issue with individuals online, this ain’t it chief.
5 Likes
Shadow Priests have a few people like this, but unlike Warrior, the devs don’t seem to listen to the feedback.
Still waiting on Reckless Abandon to be fixed, but apart from that, fury right now to me feels very solid in terms of a gameplay loop (mountain thane). I will say however, that although the repetitive button pressing of rampage rage dumping and maximizing your API, fury still feels like it lacks a certain identity to it as opposed to arms. I personally enjoyed having the option of playing annihilator and going fully into a SMF style of auto attack based gameplay. Furthermore, although this may be an issue only I find, fury comparitive to arms feels like im hitting the mobs with pool noodles. You have all this massive setup with arms that really makes you feel like you’re about to pop off (warbreaker with rend dots up into a bladestorm/ravager/sweeping strikes + sudden death proc) and not to mention those big meaty mortal strike hits, whistle fury just feels like I’m trying to annoy the target to death. I love warrior and have always played my warrior since lich king, but apart from the topics that I mentioned above, I would have to agree with the fact that certain pieces of the puzzle that make the class fantasy stand out are just not there.
A suggestion for raid/group utility by the way (I say this as a m+ player who’s climbed to the 3300’s), would be to take note of the Necrolord ability that we had in SL with the banner, and implement that into the general warrior tree. At least something along those lines. We have a party wide berserkers rage which is good, but there is no favorability when it comes to picking up a warrior over other classes for M+ settings. As mentioned before in other threads, most hybrid classes and pure dps classes just outclass in the form of utility. Mages have multitudes of interrupts and CC, alongside a mass barrier and a invis to cheat mechanics, ench shamans provide beneficial totems (albiet small benefits), paladins have BoP, Sac, and freedom, spriest has mass dispel and PI, etc etc. Warriors need a fundemental group wide utility other than a measly 10% max hp increase to be regarded in M+ scenarios. People of high rating that I spoke to have told me that the only thing they enjoy about warriors in M+ settings is there ability to not die as easily as other classes, but in reality thats just not enough to secure a spot especially if you are pugging. A banner like the Necrolord covenant offered that maybe offers a freedom/haste increase would be nice, and you can always combo that with rallying cry to allow warriors an extra point for there general tree/if you decide to rework the general tree.
This is my first time posting on a discussion thread, so if I have made mistakes or this is extremely hard to read/understand, I apologize. I hope the message however makes sense and gets through. Thanks for reading
Hello,
It “feels” like the warrior tree for both Arms, and Prot are too expensive in terms of spending points. I am speaking primarily on the left hand side of the tree. There are “necessary” talents/abilities that cost 2 points that just seem overly (too) expensive. Can the costs be trimmed down please.
Maybe make some things just inherent like Spell Reflect and intimidating Shout, whereby we have them from the start going in?
Thank you.
Just as a follow up…
Can we get something “more” than Spell Reflect. There is SO much magic damage that just wrecks us warriors…it just is not fun. Ranged Spells/Magic just is so prevalent in the current game more so than when we were in say Vanilla…can we warriors have something to help us out in this regard?
I always wondered why Armor does not provide some mitigation against it. Not much out there even does Phys damage anymore.
Getting rekt by spells is part of my class fantasy its how warriors work in every RPG