Well the way I envision is that you just choose how much power you want to lean on one side or the other. You won’t get locked out.
You want more power in Periodic damage? Cool, index more into those.
You want more power in Non-Periodic damage? Cool, index more into those.
There is no exclusion, there is only a power dynamic shift in how you want to do damage.
So yes, more like feral druid spec tree and less like elemental.
Yea, that’s probably a better example.
Just like druids have 2 distinct primary cooldowns to choose from, so would Shadow that would lean heavily on one damage profile or the other. With other supporting talents that lean one way or the other based on how you want to play and what spells you want to put more priority on using.
This is reasonable. In regards to earlier comments with shadow word: pain usage, how do you propose shadow word: pain should be tuned, such that you don’t want to use it in movement, but it be worth casting while planted, assuming misery is not talented. A cast time?
referring to these comments mostly
Personally, I think manually casting Shadow Word: Pain should be the lowest priority spell to cast. To the point you should never cast it… but it’s there if you must.
This is within the world where misery still exists.
Outside Misery, then it just should just do more damage since you need to spend the GCD to cast.
The entire reason why Misery exists is to speed up Shadow by cutting your dot application down by 50%. This was needed prior to DF because we didn’t have a method to apply dots on mass with a single spell.
I think people are too used to the current model where you can get all your dots out in a single GCD and as such, seem to think Misery is problematic for some reason?
Prior to DF, we need to spend a lot more GCDs to both dot everything up and maintain dots… although this too has become a forgotten memory since the introduction of Voidform and it’s ability to extend dots with Void Bolt.
This is the problem. We got too many things that conflict and overlap with eachother and everyone is picking the newest iteration and thinking anything else needs to be scrapped outright. But I question that just because something is new, does not make it better or superior. Case in point, Shadow Crash is a terrible spell from a mechanical standpoint. It is riddled with issues but it is often discussed only because it has become the spell blizzard decided to apply our dots with. So we are forced to use it because of efficiency, not because it’s a good spell to use.
Edit:
Just to be clear, I think we should have other spells to use during movement. Not SW:P as that should just be like VT in that you can’t it and maintain it. You should never have to cast it on move as that moment should be reserved for a proc of instant cast damage from Mind Blast, Mind Spike, Shadow Word: Death or Void Bolt.
Okay i think I understand now, what you’re concerned about is refreshing shadow word: pain very early during periods of movements, not that shadow word: pain is being casted during movement at all.
There seems to have been confusion on this between you and Tradu. What he was saying earlier was to refresh shadow word: pain if it needs refreshed while you are moving, potentially delaying the refresh until later on the timer to have an additional spell you can use on the move without losing damage (as you want to refresh shadow word pain anyway)
Personally, I think the main issue is the need for a mass dot applicator at all. As the spec is currently, with our mastery and psychic link, we simply dont do aoe damage until dots are applied. Due to this, it feels bad to take longer to dot as it introduces ramp time-- hence why misery is so loved.
Of course, on smaller target counts, such as single target or only 2 or 3 targets, this ramp time is significantly shorter, so the need for a mass applicator is reduced. Tradu mentioned earlier that a talent to replace misery in this range would be nice, as the global investment is reduced, so casting shadow word: pains manually is less of an issue. And with more opportunities to press shadow word pain (due to the dot nearing expiration), more instant casts are introduced into the gameplay
(and of course, if you have instant mind blasts and the like, those would get casted before refreshing shadow word: pain)
Maybe?
I dunno, I always just cast VT and then SW:P prior to Misery.
With Misery, I just free up a keybind and never touch SW:P because you need to apply VT anyway so just cast that instead.
If the concern is that you don’t have time to cast a VT and by extension also get your SW:P refreshed then that is where I point to our displacement issues.
This is why Spectral Guise was great for PvP.
If we had a way to displace ourselves or hide from the enemy or both then trying to find time to cast SW:P only to shortly after to cast VT to refresh because you will want/need to is a moot point.
That imo is a mobility issue, not a cast on move issue. The only reason cast on move is so important is because we lack ways to get to a safe location instantly.
That is why it’s a mobility issues. Not gameplay rotation issue imo.
Sorry for the confusion, the implication is that shadow word: pain no longer needs refreshed, and thus an instant cast in the rotation is lost (thereby losing an option for when you’re on the move)
The complaint in specifically this regard is indeed a mobility concern, not a rotation concern. Whether or not a second dot is necessary rotation wise is up to preference. (though having one dot apply both relevant dots in all cases ((as there is no alternative to misery)) makes the existence of shadow word: pain at all pretty odd and unnecessary)
Introducing more instant casts via procs like Shadowy insight would similarly solve the problem, shadow word: pain is simply being highlighted as its current purpose is unclear.
Unnecessary from a button standpoint yes, I agree.
But from a toolkit interaction? I don’t agree.
Plenty of talents can cause direct interaction with either VT or SW:P in varying ways. I don’t think it’s a good change to just merge all those interactions into a single dot spell trigger.
The idea that Shadow Word: Pain is a Shadow Word and as such shares the same type naming as Shadow Word: Death can create interactions so only your Shadow Words benefit from. The issue that we find is that some interactions would push SW:P to become a button you push again which creates this contention with Misery because you are used to not pushing it.
Instead, they should empower your Shadow Word: Death based on your Shadow Word: Pain spell.
Then by contrast, you can have Vampiric Touch add interaction with Devouring Plague as they both have that leech effect (or should) which makes them relatable.
I just simply disagree with reducing the spells into a single dot and be done with it. That’s just silly.
Like I can’t imagine taking the same route with Affliction in reducing into a single dot. They have their way to transfer dots and general deal with dot management, and Shadow has Misery. I don’t see that as much of an issue.
With misery, shadow word pain and vampiric touch are the same button (vampiric touch). This effectively means that vampiric touch may as well be considered shadow word: pain too. The only way to separate the 2 dots is to have an alternative to misery.
You can even keep the shadow word moniker by baking vampiric touch into shadow word: pain, and then giving shadow word: pain a cast time.
1 spell casts 2 dots.
Each dot is magical.
More dispelling required to remove it.
That alone is justification enough imo.
Dispels clear all magic debuffs. (outside of literally mass dispel which is like, come on, mass dispel existing is not reason enough considering youd need to have a few more dots too for it to be relevant)
Ah crap that’s right, I was thinking of dispelling enemy buffs lol.
Forgot they changed dispel a while back.
I’m used to dispel only removing 1 magic effect from friendly target or 2 from priests dispels. I miss when I as a shadow priest can dispel spam myself.
This is another reason Shadow is so easily shut down in PvP as you can just rip all dots off with 1 GCD.
Another case to add in proper dispel protection.
Indeed, although not exactly the concern the other posters in this forum had in their posts.
I’m glad we got that sorted, do you understand the desire for other posters to want an alternative to misery now?
Well there seems to be 2 arguments here
Sounds like you want a single spell. But from what I understood earlier, it’s wanting to have 2 separate spells to cast.
I personally like it the way it is and see no issues at all. It doesn’t break anything and it’s not a nuisance so I would just keep it the same.
Yea people want to have the realistic option of misery (for faster dot application) and not selecting misery (and being able to manually cast sw:p) depending on the situation.
The current situation, and shadow word: pain being removed and baked into vampiric touch is effectively seen as the same unwanted thing.
But we can do that now.
Misery doesn’t make SW:P button disappear like picking Demon Blades does to Demons Bite to Havoc Demon Hunter.
You can have Misery and manually cast SW:P all you like.
I just don’t think that tier sets should revolve around pushing SW:P to be a manual button you need to press. That’s just conflicting with the intent of Misery. I prefer Misery, so just come up with better tier set bonuses imo.