You are 100%, Blizzard removed the only 2 things that make me stay alive in PVP agains warrior and rogues focus, I am a causal player and I enjoy random BGs (btw which as a horde, looose a lot), but don’t have the time like in the past to get all the gladiator gear. I got some gear but there are warrior and rogues in the bgs that focusing me as a healer, and rapture and “train of thoughts” were the only 2 things that keep me alive.
as soon as I try to cast 1 single penance, the kick interrupt and use all the coldowns, now here the PVE myth folks saying “meh, I didn’t even used it… it is all about me”
if you want to pve so bad, go holy. leave disc alone.
Warriors even got a Berzerker rage buff. I’ve played Disc and Rogue since beta neither class is the class I picked at the starting screen and frankly PVE has completely destroyed PVP and time a PVE player asks for anything I will just support the opposite screw them.
Every expansion, Blizzard goes through the same fallacy.
“Healing is too binary”.
Class designers raise health caps.
Encounter designers raise mob health.
Healing is still binary.
Health buffers are powerful because the encounter designers cannot accept a world where healing is easier. Smoothing the incoming damage profile is objectively easier to heal: gives more time to react, broadens options to handle damage, and allows more room for error.
Easier healing creates easier dungeons creates less deaths and less challenge. Encounter designers ramp up damage in response to maintain the challenge. They always revert back to binary health bars. And so health buffers are always powerful.
Rapture doesn’t need to be removed. The encounter design team needs to get with the program.
Both specs (all specs) should function in all content. The problem is how insane the difference is between casual and hardcore content.
PvP talents should be designed to replace or add functionality for a spec to fill in the gaps the base spec doesn’t have. But they don’t really do that for some reason.
I hate when anyone is told to go play X spec for Y content.
Admittedly, I’m not a disc aficionado, nor do I play it extensively. But I’ve gotten it to KSH-level play the past few seasons, so I have a general idea for overall playstyle and effectiveness.
On paper, I am not loving these changes. There’s a lot of changes to a lot of the existing synergies between talents and spells, and I’m not sure I like the changes. It feels like an over correction for how dominant Voidweaver is for disc.
Now, I will admit that Disc current has a pretty insane 20-ish second burst AoE healing profile. It can meet almost all major healing checks, and is perhaps a little too available. Other healers have to cycle their CDs and don’t have access to such an effective combination that the current iteration of Mind Blast, Mindbender, Radiance and Penance offers.
First, I’m not loving the removal of Rapture. Disc notoriously has a lousy ST healing profile, which this hurts even further. On top of this, it significantly reduces the frequency of CD reduction for Pain Suppression, further hurting Disc’s ST healing capabilities.
They mention they intend to reduce the CDs Disc needs (personally, after the DF rework I feel Disc already has one of the simpler assortment of CDs, but I digress). But then at the same time they’re pushing Ultimate Penitence and Evangelism, two CDs not typically used in M+, which seems antithetical to the removal of Rapture in the first place.
I also think the nerf to void summoner by removing the CD reduction from Smite is puzzling. When this playstyle emerged in DF I felt it was rewarding and well received. I’m not sure why this is being messed with. Perhaps it’s to make other unused talents more appealing (like Twilight Equilibrium, Ultimare Penitance, etc), but they could have simply made those talents more attractive on their own merit without messing with an existing build/playstyle.
I just saw the change to Void Summoner and I’m kind of mixed. The issue last expansion and this expansion is that the more haste you get the more that just spamming nothing but Smite becomes the prio.
Also, my guess is they’re trying to get us to lean into Oracle more to use Piety as a cooldown to fill in gaps that would normally be filled with Shadow Covenant.
What do you mean? You will still be doing a lot of Atonement healing with Oracle, especially as a means. They put the talent in where if you fire at an ally with Penance, it does 3 bolts at enemies, if you use it on enemies it fires 3 bolts at allies. They’re literally giving you both versions of Penance at the same time.
Not to mention if you want Rapture you go Oracle anyways because you can still use Rapture by just pressing PW:S and then Premonition and then 3 more PW:S casts again right after for 4 of the 5 Rapture shields at buffed up amounts.
Also, Rapture, itself, was terrible for the game. I will admit it fits Disco Priests to a T with the shielding but it’s seriously demented for balancing, and it’s just another CD to push. This game literally gives everyone, I mean everyone, enough CDs to press already. I’m 100% on board with them removing 90% of the CDs in this game because every spec doesn’t need 2-5 CDs, especially healers. That’s why there’s so much burst damage happening in this game, because every healer has 3-5 CDs to compensate so they gotta make huge burst damage to force those CDs out.
With less CDs that means more base healing or damage in base abilities and thus they can change damage profiles from ultra mega beefy burst to sustained damage profiles with less spikes and more constant damage coming in to keep challenging healers.
This, too, and it’s no wonder Disc was a big meta healer for keys. Again, though, it just doesn’t feel good for the game.
It’s not unique anymore now is it? You have HPaladins doing the same thing and Monks fistweaving. If you want it to be unique those 2 need to stop being Disco Priests, too. You also have Evokers doing well with DPS healing, you have Druids able to talent in to Wrath spam healing for smart heals, though that’s not an efficient way to play that spec, and I think the only healer that can’t DPS heal much is Holy.
No, I think you are wrong on this. I don’t need to feel powerful to have fun. I need for the spec to make sense to have fun. I’m sick of everyone being only about numbers. Stop comparing your stuff to everyone else. That’s what’s not healthy about this game and about this community. Stop comparing them, period. As long as people don’t die, you’re fine, that’s literally all there is to it.
I want to have healers actually being healers and not DPS, that’s very dumb to me. You didn’t pick a healer to do damage, you picked them to heal. Discipline goes against that in every regard because it’s direct healing was complete garbage and now it won’t be.
I’m fine with them buffing others up, but again, it should make sense for the game for the role you play.
I don’t enjoy seeing tanks being powerful healers, just like I don’t enjoy seeing DPS doing the healer’s jobs, either. I don’t enjoy seeing the healer doing the DPS’ job, either. Again, stick to the role you selected. It’s weird that Healers are coming around to wanting to DPS, go play a DPS then.
This is what made people enjoy disc. ITs EASY. That concerns me since disc used to be the spec for people that liked some complicated play. What Cath said was spot on, its beyond easy to heal with no effort. Its like WoD pws spam again and topping charts. I cant for the life of me understand why people like easy op. Go watch David Gogins lol
Its like Holy has take disc position as the more complicated spec in keys
You guys are out of it saying attonement is easy. I play with mostly casual people myself and most of them can’t play disc because attonement healing is very hard for them to get used to.
Don’t confuse having an easy time doing hps with brainless rotation and frequent burst in vw for attonement being too easy.
Disc has been bottom of the barrel a lot in m+ since legion. It has been the case up to df where they finally started to balance attonement healing for raid vs group differently, and even then, it’s seemed ‘ok’ up until very recently.
We have to wait for the PTR to come up next week or the week after before we can get a rough idea of where Disc stands.
They moved a lot of power out of Shadow Covenant + Entropic Rift and buffed Disc’s baseline damage. Oracle may beat out VW in overall dps, but it has to be tested. If Oracle is the play the new Rapture will be Premonition of Insight.
Disc’s dps is probably still going to be nerfed down compared to where it is now and Holy will be about to outdps Disc imho.
Rapture is removed, but Evangelism is back, and that makes Disc a lot stronger for raid healing.
Radiance also will have a 40 yrd range and Divine Procession lets you extend Atonement’s by 3s with Smite casts which are both good QOL improvements.
Disc isn’t going to be meta anymore, but it’s still going to be good.
Oracle does far, far less atonement healing than voidweaver. That’s why oracle is flaming trash until at least 11.1. This upcoming build will cause it to do much more atonement healing, but still far less than voidweaver, and oracle needs access to far more regular AoE healing than Premonition, Evangelism, and uppies provide.
As for double Penance? Penance’s power is wrapped up in Harsh Discipline, Shadow Covenant, and Weal and Woe right now. The damage of an unbuffed Penance, which is what oracle gets now, is only a little more than double a Smite. Yes, but it’s nowhere near as powerful as you imply.
I take no issue with Rapture’s removal - I take issue with the continuous erosion of priest’s unique tools, many of which are given in whole to other classes for no apparent reason, while priest lacks access to basic tools.
I also have no desire to play oracle. I don’t care about voidweaver (or archon) as they show the usual lack of interest Blizzard shows priest, but they clearly do care about oracle and that’s frustrating because oracle is easily the worst hero class they came up with. It’s pretty amazing that they took a huge swing with a whole new ability and whiffed so hard that the class gets a 40% buff it its overall performance baseline and it’s still by far the worst healer in the game.
It’s dismaying that they’re not trying to solve the problem and are instead just pumping up oracle’s raw numbers until people are forced to play it because it does bring something to the class while voidweaver brings nothing.
And? thats atonement healing. I have done more hps overall and in bursts as oracle then i have done as VW
You are saying if we smite smite smite then oracle falls behind. Thats a simplistic way to view healing.
What i have found is easier hps as VW and thats why people like it. People these days dont want to actually put in effort. Thats why disc finally has so many people playing it. Disc has been op before in keys but never as many people playing it. Cause VW is so damn easy. VW players are horrified at the thought of maybe having to play oracle cause oracle requires actual effort
Its not about effort sadly,its what voidweaver has and oracle doesn’t.
Voidweaver has a hero tree talent named voidheart which is a flat 20% more atonement when you mindblast ( which means when you want your healing to move bars) AND 15% more scov value on mindbender because there is a bug that currently allows mindbender to act as shadowfiend .
Oracle has none of that. You see quickly whats the real reason oracle cannot compete with voidweaver in any scenario. Voidweaver will always do more if they dont adress this big difference.
I disagree. Its exactly about effort. Disc was always seen as a complicated spec, that very few even when it was op turned up to play. Now with its MB PWR penance smite smite smite boom game play, every space cadet and his aunty can play it. This makes it fun and accessible at a decent lvl
VW will do more what? dps? hps?
I believe oracle can match VW in its hps but not its dps. Issue is oracle hasnt been widely tested so people are just throwing out hyperbole without actually testing it. In keys obviously. Ive played both at a 10 lvl. Sadly not above cause im cucked by my tank friend who wont stick to a tank and keeps rerolling so i only do a few a week, but ive seen keys weeks done at a 12 lvl which is high enough to not be useless and maybe with these changes maybe better then this season
I play oracle at lvl 13-14 in keys. And requires a lot of brainpower/timings and great play to just survive. Far far harder and much much less rewarding than voidweaver. Its like enabling hardmode for no rewards
