Yea they removed it when PL was reintroduced, but PL did solve the issue of Shadow not having access to consistant and good AoE. Its just that its all we have now and its just bleh imo.
2 Likes
Were we taking PL in PvP? Feels like it can be skipped at this point going forward.
1 Like
PL isnât aoe itâs cleave. It isnât an area affect damage. Shadows only aoe is slam.
Shadow is target capped unlike most classes. Because we donât have AOE, and now we donât have good cleave.
3 Likes
Please Blizzard! This Psychic Link nerf is far to heavy handed and will make us unviable in m+, please revert this change closer to 45% percent of damage done converted to save my spec from never getting invited to any group. These last to weeks it was hard to get into m0s and now itâll be even worse!
5 Likes
Wether you call it AoE or Cleave it served that purpose.
And PL has been far to dominant in both Cleave and AoE scenarios.
For the PvP folks. These notes mean we get NONE of the buffs but tha last bullet point (the big nerf that the buffs needed to compensate) is live in PvP. So these are PvP nerfs to shadow priest.
Also to heavy handed in PvP. We recieved none of the buffs and only the big nerf.
Psychic link was a nigh irrelevant part of shadows PvP damage profile, and the thing that makes shadow S tier in PvP wasnât even touched.
1 Like
First of all⌠ânighâ lol wtf are u from 16th century England?
psychic link is consistently in my top damage profile in 3s and almost always 1 or 2 in bgs.
That getting nerfed by 40% with no compensation 100% will effect shadow priest in PvP.
Shadow word death will continue to do more damage to me in PvP than my enemies. And it shouldâve been buffed in PvP also. Same with mind blast.
4 Likes
I leveled a warlock to 90 first and thought i was kinda squishy if i wasnt demo. Tried Shadow priest to be my second 90 and was kicking butt from lvl 80-83 in tww mythic gear. I thought the complaints here were stupid and players sucked at shadow.
Then I dungeoned from 83-86 as healer went back to shadow to quest⌠and HOLY %^$& its bad. I actually died questing because i pulled 3 on accident and watched my dots do NOTHING as voidweaver. Legit needed all cds to be âmoderatlyâ affective. Jumped on my monk brewmaster/windwalker and i could legit not die and destory an entire area at once with zero cds/effort.
6 Likes
Based on target dummy numbers, with current gear in Void Weaver it is a 1 target +20% for VW, 2 target +2%, 3 target -6.4%, 4 target -11%, 5 target -15%, 6 target -17% and keeps getting bigger you go. The sweet spot to keep current damage was between 35-40% psycic link numbers.
We had âmidâ multi-target before this. The changes the way they stand are going to crush M+ week 1 invites to pug M+. Hope you all have some friends or heal; otherwise, it is going to be an auto-decline week-one pug experience as the Shadow Priest reputation is already damaged due to last seasonâs poor showing and now the poor showing from pre-season.
3 Likes
The way PL works now just doesnât fly. Buffing our single target messes with multi-target and vice versa. I suggest a # of targets component that determines the PL % transfer.
2 targets start at 20%, and every additional target increases the transfer towards 40% as an asymptote, where 6+ basically flattens to ~40%.
P(x) = 40 - 20 * 2.115^-(x-1) would give us:
2T at 20%
3T at 30.5%
4T at 35.5%
5T at 37.9%
6T at 39.0%
âŚ
12T at ~40.0%
13T at ~40.0%
Based on my numbers and the proposed changes we retain the single target ~20% buff, 2 target ~2% buff, and keep our âmidâ multi-target from before the changes.
You then can generalize this formal for future tuning as:
T = top end %
B = determines lower percent by T-B (e.g. T=40, B=10, lowest PL% = 30), B<T
R = rate of ramping, R>1
X = number of targets beyond the first (e.g. x=1 is 2 target), x>=1
P(x) = T - B*R^-(x-1)
We then have 3 knobs, 2/3 target dmg strongly correlated to B, max pack damage limited by T, and R for how fast the damage ramps. Higher R ramps faster at lower targets. Lower R ramps slower.
Internally this can be a lookup table to reduce calculations as as we hit the asymptote just plopping in 0.40 or 0.3999 is fine. The calculations can be a static-pre build to formulate the table.
Example tooltip:
Your direct damage spells inflict 20% to 40% of their damage on other targets afflicted by your Vampiric Touch within 40 yards, increasing as more targets are affected.
- Simple mental model: Casual players immediately understand âstarts at 20%, increases with more targets.â That is enough to grasp the behavior without doing math.
- Sets expectation correctly: It tells them 2-target cleave is weaker than large-pack cleave, so the spell does not feel inconsistent or bugged.
- Preserves discoverability: Players can still feel the scaling naturally in gameplay. The tooltip gives the direction of scaling without burying them in numbers.
Additional optional flavor visibly. Reduce the default shadowy appearance of shadow form. As more targets are afflicted by VT, increase the shadowiness. Visibly, looks powerful and reflects the damage you are doing. Literally being driven to madness.
8 Likes
I can actually get behind something like this. Would help with scaling issues between raid cleave and m+.
I just want to point out that, in PvP. There are no buffs. So alll of those negatives are compounded by the fact that there were no buffs added. Only the big PL nerf. Thank you for doing the math. Can you do it with PvP enabled? I would love it if you could.
1 Like
Shadow main since B.C.
Absolutly trash to nerf link to 20%, 40% would be more proper, with an 50% increase to the diameter of tentacle slam (tanks kite it out of range too easily)
Makes me sad cause mechanically SP hasnât felt this smooth/fun to play since wrath.
1 Like
Tried playing without PL in BGs this morning and shifted to Shattered Psyche plus mastermind. Basically making my Mind Blasts into what SW: Death should be, high damage instant attacks but without the blow back.
Also went with three idols for the ghosts and the extra insanity generation. Many more SW: Madness casts this way. I achieved my highest overall damage consistently since the patch started.
I play Archon and this made me feel like Iâm playing faster and with a little more ST burst. It also works just fine for VW too. Probably better bc of void blast but I like playing Archon more.
As if Bliz would ever do more than napkin math to balance shadow. Itâs never happened before..
1 Like
So the Idea is that a 10% base buff + 20% on all ST abilities is supposed to compensate for AOE receiving 20% of ST damage instead of 60%? The math is not mathing.
Theyâre probably try to not make Psychic Link as dominant anymore hopefully.
But if that was the case they shouldâve buffed Apparitions aswell.
I guess this is just the first week of tuning for Season 1, more will probably come after the first HC week and so on.
Single target should be decent, but aoe will be abysmal, and AoE was already on thin ice.