I am no Shamblewing or Kinndyvoker, but I have managed to become one of the few Devastation Evokers playing at this rating right now. The class forum has been sparse this season and I figured I would throw this up in case anyone has questions. I can’t speak to premade 3v3, but I can do my best to share what I’ve learned about playing the spec in Solo Shuffle.
My dragonboi is Somyr of Area 52. Also 2450 as Agumentation and 1875 as Preservation.
What PVP talents do you usually run with? Do you like taking the flame walls that they never fixed? What do you do when you are trained by war, dk / war, ret? and how do you deal with locks and their infinite number of shields?
Unburdened Flight is a universal lock. I’ve tried different variations for the remaining two slots, but what I’ve settled on generally is either Obsidian Mettle or Nullifying Shroud, and then whatever is going to be the most impactful between Scouring Flame, Chrono Loop, Dreamcatcher, and Time Stop.
In the case of the first choice it just depends on what is most threatening to my goes. Generally I use Obsidian Mettle, but if I’m against a druid healer and a warlock I’ll probably use Nullifying Shroud as they love to use hard CC to stop my goes in specific. I find stacking them to be, on average, overkill. I’m also ok with absorbing non-spammable CC like warrior stuns since they don’t actually last long enough to diffuse my go, which is why against warriors or rets or demon hunters I’m all about OM.
For the second group of choices I use Scouring Flame most of the time, and then Chrono Loop if I am in a situation where I want to have more offensive power and Scouring won’t be terribly useful (like against shaman/war/DH, for example). I like Dreamcatcher for situations where I think I need a ton of extra defensive power and when I’m not playing with a warlock or priest. Being able to cycle DRs between a melee zug attacking you is massive breathing room even if it breaks early. Time Stop is the most finnicky to use because no one knows what it does. It’s very easy to waste your allied CDs with it. I generally take it when there is very, very serious threat of one-shots going out (like against enh shaman), and then I try my best to use it as high as possible to lower the chances of overlap.
I don’t for Solo Shuffle, no. If we were a more populated spec it might be different, but it runs into a similar issue as Time Stop where it feels like you screw your own team over just as much as the enemy team in many cases. Hypothetically I would take it any time I’m playing with a melee and against one or more ranged, as that should be a situation where you get amazing relative benefit out of the extra LoS. In practice I stopped using it after a week of giving it a chance. I use it for BGs because it definitely has the highest fun factor of all the honor talents.
This is a multi-pronged issue for most people, I imagine. You need to be making sure that you’re getting your own offensive set up, because if you’re putting out no pressure it amplifies the pressure that’s coming in. You also need to breathe and be ok with there being a melee burrowing into your rectum. It’s icky and gross and you really wish it weren’t happening, but sometimes that’s life and we just have to be stoic about it. To that end, you do not want to be using Hover willy-nilly. Don’t waste Hover when you could have just repositioned by walking. Don’t use Hover just to move in half circles around a ranged character. Don’t use Hover if the melee train is on you but not putting out critical damage.
A common scenario for me is that the game starts and I find a good Landslide into Deep Breath, and then I get jumped on. At this point I use Obsidian Scales (with OM) and I just plant. Melee are on me but I am blasting and I have my wall up. My healer has me. If the incoming damage is particularly heinous then maybe Renewing Blaze is also needed. It’s only once my wall drops and I have expended most of my first go that it’s time to even consider using Hover.
So now that you’re in the Hover phase you have to consider what to actually do with it. For starters, make sure your dash isn’t getting interrupted. If a warrior is barreling into you you’re going to want to let him use Charge first because he will root your dash if the timing is such. Let him root you, and then once the root is over dash away. You can’t be slowed so you will escape. If you let him root you you’ll still get to move away, but it’ll be with him following you and maintaining uptime.
From this point you are on the move and can cast while moving, so what comes next is moving to the right place. If you are the target of the melee zug it means you have the most control of anyone in the game. You have the power to move the melee zug wherever it pleases you, and by extension force the movement of their healer. If you’re playing with a caster the classic is to kite the melee back and forth in front of your partner DPS such that they maintain 100% freecasting uptime, and hopefully at the same time you’re making it easy for your own healer to be at their own pillar while healing both of you. You can also just drag them behind a pillar, entirely away from their healer. This will often get smarter melee to peel off you entirely and give you breathing room to reset, and if they don’t you can beat them down in peace with your team. The thing not to do is to dash hither and yawn, randomly, in the open, and in ways that causes your team to have to chase the action as much or more than the enemy team.
Little kiting tricks can be like using Wing Buffet as you’re about to turn the corner on a pillar, or when you’re on a z-axis map knocking them off the edge with it. On such maps you also can’t forget that you can use Verdant Embrace for its movement and move between levels.
I know I use wrote an essay here, but if I had to summarize it I would say to learn when you need to kite and when you can trade blows, and when you do need to kite, kite with purpose.
Warlocks generally feel strong against us IME. You have to make as much use of Unravel as possible, though don’t cancel a Disintegrate cast for it. Don’t blow spells into their reflect shield. Get good at using Cauterizing Flame at the right time. If a WW monk has Weakness on him during his go, you dispelling that is the biggest damage button you have. If your team is taking lots of damage and your healer has Tongues up, get that off. If your warrior is having his go kited, get rid of the Exhaustion. You then need to pound the warlock. If you give them breathing room they will feel immortal by being able to cycle these defensives, but if you deal with them efficiently you do have the ability to put them in the dirt. You are just unlikely to succeed if you’re giving them time to chill between damaging them.
Alternatively you can attack their teammate. If you’re playing with another caster you’ll probably want to fight around the warlock instead of directly into them. If you’re fighting with a melee then you’re probably going the warlock. I’ve already talked about aiding your melee with decursing, but another way that “efficiently handling” warlock defenses can look like is to Resuce you and your melee to the warlock’s portal when he ports. This goes for many situations actually, because Rescue can be used to great effect as an additional gap closer for your melee partners.
I thought you meant IO at first and i was like “Damn is it really that bad pugging it out as Devastation?”
Ha, no. Well, maybe it’s that bad. I’ve heard getting into groups as Dev is rough since people are all like, “wHy ARen’T YoU aUG?” I am speaking of the shuffling solos though, where Dev isn’t unrepentant trash, but is tied for the worst in the low B tier by my estimate. Also just unpopulated and the people that used to give great advice don’t seem active anymore. Better devokers remain, but none that post on the forums so far as I can tell.