It’s still a useless dead hero spec. Devastation is the only spec in game with a dead in the water from day one hero spec. Why can’t they make it work? Why won’t they? Why is it ok for us to only really have one choice for hero specs? I don’t understand.
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I’ve done 1.74M overall in stone vault and 1.91M on necrotic wake as Flameshaper. It is, and has been, perfectly viable. It also comes with an external defensive that’s basically a 50% DR for the tank.
I’ll say it falls short on some raid encounters - like Mythic Broodtwister where Deep Breath is the best tool for add phases. Scalecommander buffs Deep Breath and has CDR so you can use it every add phase.
But outside of encounters that specifically tailor to a 50 second add phase or 3 target cleave that are too separated to hit with pyre, Flameshaper is just fine. In fact, any boss fight with a burn phase where bosses take bonus damage falls in favor of Flameshaper - see Ingra Maloch in mists of tyrna scythe.
Your post is just a wine session.
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My post is a wine session? Frak you. I’ve tried flameshaper many times and it’s not only clunky to make it work right but the damage just wasn’t there. And before you start spouting more troll buzz phrases like git gud and skill issue, maybe ask yourself why every guide doesn’t recommend flameshaper and why none of the top dev players are flameshaper based on raider io info. I made this post because I really want to play flameshaper but it falls too far behind scale commander and dev dps is already middle of the pack as it is. I adore evokers especially devastation and I want this spec to be great and have real choices. ATM, we don’t really have choices. We use one hero spec and two talent builds.
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Not every spec or talent setup will be the topmost %. If you enjoy flameshaper then play it.
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flameshaper is horrible to play, the whole setup before being able to use engurf is tedious, I would particularly like to see a complete overhaul of this hero talent tree, maybe even imagine something else to replace it.
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I think they ought to axe Fulminous Roar in favor of restoring the talent that extends the duration of Flame Breath when using Engulf.
This would make the new Scorching Embers a lot easier to utilize as you’d be able to extend the duration on a max empowered Flame Breath DoT to get more use out of the 40% damage buff it provides because at present you scarcely have enough time to get two engulfs off before it’s gone.
Wouldn’t be a total fix but I feel like it would be a simple way to both make the spec both feel better to play and perform better as well.
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One time my friend who plays arcane mage told me someone whispered him in a pug raid and told him he had a “wrong” talent build and he should look at a guide. His response was “I have 3500 io. I don’t need this pug with 2000 io telling me to look at a guide written by someone with 3000 io.”
This whole phenomenon of people running to guides to copy/paste talents is the most cancer thing I’ve ever seen. The guide writers aren’t Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John. All guides have done is spur a bunch of boomkins who’ve never heard of “eclipse” wondering why they have tank damage and a create torrent of mistweaver monks with 3 casts of enveloping mists all key. Maybe read your spells as you learn them, choose the talents you like, and play the game instead of letting some dude on a third party website play it for you.
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The damage definitely is there, most people are just overthinking it.
Like, the Preheat guide of using Tip the Scales for Fire Breath? That is only really good on Dragonrage (and made better with our next tier set, not our current) but casting it at level 2 instead tends to be enough outside of Dragonrage so you can get shattering star up for it, because the only downside of using a level 4 Fire Breath means you can only cast two Engulfs immediately before the DoT is used up, anything else and you miss it and outside of dragonrage bursting with double-engulfs, most of the setup for the in-between CD engulfs should be prepared passively by your normal rotation.
Damage is definitely there.
From a design standpoint, it still feels very odd to play. When you have something like Scalecommander that flows effortlessly with bombardments and it’s CDR on deep breath, it’s a bit jarring to then swap to Flameshaper which feels like it was haphazardly thrown together and forced to fit.
My primary gripe is their AOE profile. Why haven’t we tuned Flameshaper around Firestorm? It’s a cool ability that could be amazing with small tweaks to its functionality.
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Part of the awkwardness is definitely that it takes 3 dots to make engulf do max damage. When it should be the other way around tbh.
Engulf should deal a flat amount of damage and “ignite” your dots, making them deal more damage.
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I saw WoWhead recommended Flameshaper for single target raiding since it’s slightly better than Scalecommander’s ST, but slightly wasn’t really enough convince me since I would lose AoE, HOWEVER I do like the other aspects of Flameshaper such as the extra maneuverability granted to Hover.
I copied the build and I plan on trying it out, just so I can familiarize myself with it enough to know when it could potentially be better than Scalecommander.
Also Wine =/= Whine. That hurt to read, since wine sessions are a good thing and whine sessions are not.
Edit: Just saw an upcoming increase to Firestorm damage, so maybe it will finally become something worth having with the Flameshaper talents.
The general consensus was Scalecommander still won on on everything that had more than one target, even if only briefly but on pure ST they were very close but that was with sims using our S2 tier set and I believe before a set interaction was fixed with Shattering Star.
I’m going to be testing a few things in practice to see if I can make things work, it seemed to work pretty well in Nerubar Palace though for AoE it would be a little trickier.
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While this is an interesting idea, it is much more difficult to tune properly and wouldn’t really offer anything over the current situation. You would still need to have at least 3 dots rolling for maximum benefit, and Dev isn’t really meant to be a Dot watcher.
Something that would be really neat to me, would offer some interesting interactions, and would make the tree feel more cohesive in my eyes, would be if you could cast engulf mid-disintegrate without breaking the channel - sort of how Monks can cast vivify while channel healing without breaking the channel.
This would accomplish 2 or 3 things depending on your perspective, especially if you leave the ‘cap’ at 3 dots.
- You would be able to cast 1 less ‘setup’ spell since Disintegrate counts as a dot.
- It would create some interplay with the arguably most Iconic spell for dev.
- Pulse Lasers are cool [Picture the monument destroying laser from the motherships in Independence Day].
Conceptually Flameshaper seems fun, but in comparison with Mass Disintegrate and maneuverability with deep breath, it just can’t beat Scalecommander
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Ya, SC is a complete blaster.
Flameshaper is simply designed terribly. After some play testing, it’s in dire need of significant QOL changes and a shift away from DOT based Engulf Setups.
It’s ridiculous and the most punishing play style in the game (no room for error or expression).
Have any of you guys tried it in any form of pvp? Unrated to rated for flameshaper? Just asking is all.
It’s garbage in PvP due to nerfs to Engulf iirc.
Shaper pvp wise is very viable I played it a bunch in shuffles id say it is better now than last season for overall dmg but not as good compared for its sudden burst dmg but still plenty viable in pvp and I believe it’s starting to crank numbers in pve on pure ST fights which is a plus for dev to be able to play something new
I think my problem with flameshapper is that the tree feels clunky. The whole setup before using engurf is just plain bad. I really wish the tree was better and I hope they continue the work they started in 11.1 by improving the tree.
Pvp wise I don’t think shaper has changed at all there’s 2 ways to play it both are perfectly viable and yield numbers close enough that it doesn’t completely matter which way you play it as long as you’re good enough