Hard to remember when shadow priests were fun to play. Ever since this conflation with void came about in Legion, it seems like people are having recency bias, typical band-wagoners.
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Shadow in wrath was my first and favorite dps spec…that said orbs that came later never felt right to me and I just didn’t play my shadow during those years because that gameplay style didn’t resonate with me personally. Legion was the first time I picked it back up again, tbh I think voidform is extremely fun, compelling and rewarding to play. I just think it needs minor iterations/tuning and protections against borrowed power issues. I also believe allot of the community pain points stems from “bad” borrowed power like mass hysteria and COI that amplified ramp to unacceptable levels as well as “good” borrowed power like the iris beam and breath that could plug holes in non-raid combat situations.
Sorry it was meant as sarcasm since a majority of our damage comes from VOIDFORM and not SHADOWFORM. Sorry if that wasn’t clear.
I remember damn well when SHADOWPRIESTS were fun to play.
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I knew exactly what you meant…that said…I could easily be just as spiteful about orbs being presented as ‘the rightful shadow’ when I got shafted out of wrath shadow priest. Ideally should stop overhauling things because all it does is screw a group of people- and I get that because it happened to me. But I don’t agree that trend should continue.
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I enjoyed shadow orbs and I also enjouy VF, I suggested the below in another thread, would something like this work?
Since they will not remove Voidform could they just add 2 ways to activate VF? One could be with Void Eruption, this could be our AOE version where it works the same as now but they add that it applies SW:P & VT to up to 10 targets where the primary target dots tick at 100% and the other targets dots tick at 50%.
The second way to enter VF would be DP and this would be our single target method where they could buff DP’s current damage but this would provide us with 15% Haste and 5% Crit or Mastery. This would last during VF and for 20 seconds after and entering a new VF would remove this buff unless you use DP to enter VF again.
We would still gain haste stacks in both versions of VF mentioned above.
I am not a theory crafter so all these numbers are not set in stone, just wondering if something like this would work if they are going to keep Voidform
This is what they were going for with Dark Void; the reason it only does pain is because getting double dots out that way is a bit too OP. I think talents is the better place to address ways to address gameplay to the content being tackled. I’ve already suggested a iris beam being migrated to a talent for us as it’s been very helpful addressing the mythic+ pain points in BFA vs Legion.
I also mentioned Breath major as being a huge boost to outdoor content and visions; we are gaining back sw:death that overalps allot with breath. Until I play BETA myself I’m not sure yet if it’s quite useful enough to fill that niche for us.
I’m not comfortable with statements like ‘Void Form is never fun,’ since I don’t think that’s strictly true.
VF can be fun when it works, I had some fun with the one minute cycle towards the end of Legion, the absurd levels of haste made it fairly entertaining. The key aspect of that is the ‘when it works’ part. It doesn’t work in world content and any other short fight (by which I mean that it doesn’t feel good, not that it’s literally incapable), but long fights where it actually gets to flex its muscle and doesn’t get interrupted, it’s not bad.
I do think BfA’s version of VF has had fewer of those moments compared to Legion, and I think that’s largely down to the lesser amounts of haste. I never really got to the same level of…insane mashiness that I did in Legion.
That’s more or less why I’m interested in one last version of VF gameplay, that Ryeshot and Nyelle have kind of outlined before. I don’t think the design is inherently flawed, but how it’s been implemented has been. If they implement changes like what they’ve proposed, I might stick around for one more round of the carousel, but I’m not terribly optimistic.
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I feel like the change from wrath era to shadow orbs in cata on-ward was not nearly as big of a change than the literal overhaul voidform was. Granted hindsight is 20/20, but shadow orbs era priest is wayyyy closer to what wrath played like than void form does now. So really, blizz and voidform have shafted you (and all of us) more than you know 
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I personally think everyone is quick to yell doomsday, theirs still plenty of time of changes and tuning to happen, it’s quite clear the devs have read alpha forums, and general Priest forums and would have gotten the hint VF needs to be reworked/changed or removed.
Give it time people, we don’t need the same people spamming the threads over and over again, god I can name the exact people, it’s still early, obviously Shadow needs work to be done, obviously it’s going to take time.
No where have they said they are done with Shadow Priest, if anything I’m sure they are more aware of the problems then ever.
But harassing and spamming the forums doesn’t do anything, if anything it just shows how childish priest players are… we are all passionate about the class we play, trust me I understand, but going on this crusade of spamming forums isn’t helping.
I enjoy Void Form, It seriously makes Shadow Priest unique, regardless how you look at it. But give Blizzard time to make meaningful changes, I’m sure their has to be a lot of thought in making changes to shadow.
I understand where you’re coming from but last time we waited for the big changes (we waited for about 3 months) we got DP.
when you go camping you keep the fire burning even if dawn is about to break.
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I’ve said this before in some of the earlier feedback threads, but here is a pretty simple way to have both void form and orb-type playstyle.
- void erupt and void bolt become separate abilities but with a shared cd (general change i think they should implement regardless of anything)
- new talent that lets you use void erupt and void bolt outside void form, they would cost insanity
- new “old” talent, vamp touch ticks have chance to give you bonus damage procs that can be used on void erupt/bolt and have them not cost insanity
Shore up DP to be like it was in MoP/Wod (aka short duration faster damage) and i think you got something pretty decent.
considering I stopped playing my shadow priest completely with orbs…because it added funky builder/spender style mechanics on a straight forward dot spec never felt right to me. I’m pro void-form btw…incase you missed that about me.
I don’t want to see another overhaul; unlike losing what i lost before- this time I don’t have an alternative to what I’ve come to love playing.
Shadow never should have been a builder/spender spec, orbs is what they did because shadow needed something more- but they couldn’t think of anything good so we got a rogue/warlock/feral mechanic slapped on.
You’ll never sell me on the most played out dps design in the entire game with dozens of alternative specs that offer that to players who desire that.
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If you want to get technical, with the introduction of Shadow Orbs, it didn’t play like that. When you casted Mind Blast or Mind Spike, it consumed all orbs to increase base damage of either or spell you just used to consume orbs & it gave you a window of I think 15 sec of increased DOT damage from all sources.
In reality, you just needed to cast 1 mind blast with 1 or more orbs to get the playstyle you liked from wrath to work in having maximum dot damage. You were also able to snapshot that window in that you can refresh dots right before buff went away.
The issue with Cata Orb mechanic is you were fishing for orbs via mind flays and Shadow Word: Pain ticks as you had no actual definitive method to gain them until 4 set DS with Shadow Fiend granting 3 orbs each time he attacked.
Shadow Orbs Passive
You have a x% chance for your Shadow Word: Pain and Mind Flay spells to grant you a Shadow Orb each time they deal damage. Casting your Mind Blast or Mind Spike spell consumes all Shadow Orbs, increasing damage of that spell by 0% per Shadow Orb, and granting 0% increased damage on your periodic Shadow spells for 15sec. You can have up to a maximum of 3 orbs.
It was only in MoP and WoD that it actual became more of a builder spender playstyle.
Personally I enjoyed Cata, it was my height of Shadow Priest play.
But I also found MoP and WoD fun in their own rights.
When raiding, you were not concerned with getting more then 1 orb to consume, just having at least 1 orb. So on pulls you can get unlucky sure, but once you got going, you were fine for the rest of the fight.
Only outside of Raids did you need/want to get 3 orbs to burst things down but it was a bonus more so than a requirement.
I still don’t think mop or wod orbs feels like a builder spender. You have 1 way to make orbs (2 in execute) and those spells have codoens themselves. Devouring plague was more like a cooldown that gained triple reduction from haste in mop. Wod reasonably similar.
It was bland on its own, 100% agreed there. But it never really felt like a conventional builder spender. Especially when you look at the damage breakdown and see how well distributed it was across all your spells, almost like it didn’t fit the conventional builder spender model at all.
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Uhhh… I don’t usually like to tell people they are dead wrong but you are so beyond wrong it’s not even funny.
Last expansion they literally ignored about 1500 pages of feedback about all the things wrong with voidform, what can help, changes needed etc… They did absolutely ANYTHING with that feedback and still gave us that mess of a spec.
They’re doing the same thing again. Are you seriously telling us not to worry after that debacle and that we should just wait and see what happens?
No, the way to get your changes made is to be loud and vocal about it.
Voidform sucks and I hope they get rid of it. I actually hope they burn it with fire. I used to enjoy being a shadow priest so much. Guess i’ll be a healer this xpac again… Unless they decide to ignore those specs too, in which case i’ll probably just reroll.
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I’m not dead wrong, they have even said they read the forums and ion even said and I quote, “Priests are on our radar”.
So no, I’m not dead wrong all I’ve said is facts you take that how you will…
Theirs still plenty of time for things to happen and change or be tuned, obviously this isn’t a quick band aid fix and taking a little more thought.
Having the same 10 people comment on every post and create spam posts is hardly being vocal about it…
Technically they gave us COI in 8.0.1 due to that feedback, but that ended up backfiring when the DOT nerfs came in due to raid performance.
You think this because…
It will fit your narrative and agenda to paint us as spammers, raging mob, minority.
As you said if Ion and Blizz are reading these forums we are gonna share our opinion just like you can, so rather then try to silence us just express yours.
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Have you ever played a DH?
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