Let me first say that ive really enjoyed this expansion and have bedn very happy with my evoker so far.
But the reason im pessimistic about Augmentation is very simple: support class does not work. It’ll be fun and probably imbalanced for a while, but itll get gutted. Take it from an OG shaman player. The problem is always that the utility interacts differently across all classes/specs, making some absolutely busted and benefiting others very little. Then every change impacts a large number of other specs and its just too much to balance. Maybe im wrong but I feel like ive seen this movie before.
Toolkit would be super fun and interesting as a tank and ebon might could give out less primary stat and maybe a little armor or slight absorb shield instead, but at least once its been through the wringer a couple of times and adjusted it’ll still have a place in comps. Based on the recent PTR change though, looks like it’s being angled for off healer a little.
Full disclosure, I am biased in that opinion, I was really hoping originally it was gonna be a tank spec. But based on how Augmentation currently looks I think it’d be super cool as a tank and a solid beginning of caster tanks.
Go tell that to the many other games that have support class or qualities of the same (FF14 is an example). Certainly a support is difficult to imagine in WoW but that does not mean that it is unfeasible, Augmentation is just opening the doors to changes in the way of playing that will surely come in the next expansion, changes needed to better allocate supports and make them really feasible.
WoW is stagnant, it’s part of the reason why SL lost so many people, DF didn’t attract back the people who left, this is the time to take risks and make changes.
I honestly also think it should have been a tank. They could have just tuned down the effects of the buffs (like instead of 20-30% passive versa buff have it down to only 5-10% to balance).
No one would have minded it doing only about 40% the damage of a pure dps
It would still be unique enough to fit the evoker theme of “advanced class”
It would have solved the issue of Dracthyrs still not being able to tank
My only issue with Augmentation is that it’s kind of boring and really turrety. I could tolerate one of those things being true, but i’m not fond of both at once.
Also it’s kind of clunky, specifically with prescience. It’s a good ability, but weaving it in is awkward. I think it should give a guaranteed Essence Burst instead of just 35% chance. Also it’s awkward in that you can keep it up on two people at once, so creating macros to target somebody specific will work against you since you won’t be able to give it to more than one person that way. Unless you can make a macro that will target somebody else if the intended target already has it.
Also needs more instant casts. I’m tired of evoker being marketed as super mobile and then being screwed outside of hover. At least Devastation has Azure Strike, Burnout, Shattering Star, and Pyre as instant casts. Aug just has Azure Strike and Prescience.
I’ll probably play it sometimes for the variety or when it would be majorly helpful, but Devastation will still be my main.
Unlike all other classes, Augvokers can’t be balanced on their own. Depending on your raid or dungeon group’s class composition, Augvokers will be either ridiculously overpowered or ludicrously underpowered.
My guess is this will lead to a pretty frustrating experience for everyone… especially the Augvokers. As I expect a dizzying series of buffs and nerfs as Blizzard tries and fails to achieve balance.
If Blizzard can’t make Augvoker work, I expect they will eventually convert Augvoker into a more conventional dps spec.
Now i’m just thinking of the chaos of a pug group with like 3 augmentation evokers when it first comes out and everyone wants to play it. Obviously this’d only happen in like random heroics but the thought amuses me a lil.
For the record, I think augmentation is cool, and if it pans out it’ll be a neat direction for future content.
I would very much love to be able to tank on my evoker and it’d be cool to see people doing all evoker runs. When i do keys i normally wont go if the group has more than 1 other ranged class, but i did a run today with 2 evoker dps and it actually worked pretty well. The devokers actually stayed within my heal range since they’re short range too.
Unless you can make a macro that will target somebody else if the intended target already has it.
It does technically have “smart” casting, IE it will stick it onto the nearest DPS. So at the absolute worst moment, just slamming the spell on CD will technically work.
And i guess i didn’t test it, but is it not click cast compatible? I’d probably perfer that over trying to force macros into behaving
Also needs more instant casts
This one is fully agree. Aug is the least mobile of the 3 specs.
Perhaps i missed a thread somewhere. Why is tank the main train of thought for evokers? We have never had a caster have a tank spec (Holy pally is melee, change my mind)
Is it so evokers have all 3 roles? I guess i’m just not seeing the thinking
Past being really cool to have a caster tank, after having so many classes with multiple dps specs on it and seeing some of them flounder to me its a slightly hard sell to put another dps spec on it. Evoker is a whole new thing, why not use it as a playground to shake up presumptions on comp design. And then it opens up design possibility for priest/mage/warlock/shaman/etc tank design. And yes, you could argue that’s the case of a support being added, to me it’s tough to see what exact niche it’ll fill when all other classes still bring utility of their own.
Support design seems to mostly be thus far ‘dps with its toes in healing’. Its got the buff going on, but I have to presume its going to be balanced so it doesn’t bring much more damage to a group than if you just brought a normal dps. I hope they figure out what niche support in WoW means, but sure would be cooler to have a caster tank
One of the problem of the new spec is that it’s terribly weak in solo play. Dev and Preserv are also terribly weak, which makes Evoker the only class that cannot solo elites without dying. By comparison, tank class can join 2 or three elites and easily survive, this does not compute. Evoker should have gotten a tank spec.
I played Dev at launch of the expansion, was 61 and had the 316 ilvl pieces and not only soloing elites was impossible, but having 2 or 3 mobs at the same time could mean death. Haven’t touched it since 10.0.5 though.
Compared to prot warrior or prot paladin, or other DPS like Warlock and Hunter, it wasn’t at all the same level
I also played Dev at launch and not only was I easily soloing elites up until 66, but I was pulling 5 or 6 mobs and having no trouble. That stopped once you hit 66, but that was a pretty large hurdle for a lot of classes that didn’t have a pet to tank for them, or were tanks themselves. I still didn’t die from 66 to 70, but I had to go easy on the pull everything mentality
If you were having troubles at 61 at 316 ilvl, then you had a fundamental misunderstanding of how to play the class.
Maybe I might give it another go. I am currently at 62 and around the same ilvl playing a ret paladin and I can tell you things falls much faster and I have way more self healing than Dev.
I kinda thought that if you were a glass cannon you shouldn’t be sturdy, but I can tell you that Ret is an Iron cannon…lol
