Do anyone think that blizzard has done enough to simplify shadow priest as a whole?
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I like everything about current shadow priest except how Shadow Crash feels to press.
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There’s still a mountain of critical problems in the core design for the class and talents, but those have been talked to death and will continue to be.
If we’re stuck with our current double standard an we’re talking purely what exists right now, I still want Mindgames to have a reason to exist. Maybe make it force trigger your idols when you cast it or make it fire off five apparitions, but it needs to do something other than Biggest Mind Blast to justify existing, especially when it’s so weak that neither holy nor disc take it.
Void Torrent feels bad as it is currently. Its original iteration was neat because its static 4-second duration was useful with OG Voidform and having crazy haste cranking up the tick rate but not reducing the duration was cool. Today, with a 3-second channel on a 30 second cooldown, I think they need to just make it Biggest Mind Flay and scale the duration to haste. It feels good to press, but not so good to press that I want to spend 10% of my playtime channeling it.
Surge of Insanity needs to be instant cast or cast while moving if we pretend that MFI exists. Going back to SWP spam on the move feels terrible.
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Disc would have taken it - they just nerfed the damage on it so badly for Disc specifically that it doesn’t really make sense to (It does half the damage for Disc).
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Exactly - they have it tuned so low for disc that it isn’t desirable. I think it does like 5% more damage than Mind Blast or something like that? It’s efficient for the mana being that it’s a marginally stronger Mind Blast plus a 75% Flash Heal for a bit over half Flash Heal’s cost, but disc has so many buttons to hit already that adding another one just isn’t helpful when it’s tuned so low. They clearly want it that way because they haven’t buffed it at all.
Mindgames feels like it’s part of the priest kit because Blizzard decided every class must have at least one Shadowlands option and Mindgames is the easiest to tune around and doesn’t offer any problematic gameplay.
Mind games is an amazing ability. And very shadow priest themed. Doing damage to heal and messing with opponents minds is what shadow priests are all about.
How many abilities have mind in the priests kit?
While it would be nice if it synergized with the kit better, like you said. Reversing damage into healing and healing into damage is very strong in pvp. And i hope this ability stays forever.
channeling insanity mind flays while moving would be sick.
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I feel like mindgames would be cool as a channel that charges in available duration.
Say the max is 6 second channel that charges at a rate of 1 second every 30 seconds. So every 3 minutes you can channel for 6 seconds if you want all at once for a beefy mind games debuff (maybe cool to use during cc in pvp as it could be balanced around the fact the priest is doing no other direct damage during the cast). Unlike other spells that work on charges etc. you could use it as a filler for any duration and it would maintain its remaining duration if you have to cancel cast.
I really don’t get why mind flay isn’t a longer baseline channel. Not that it comes up often when you can use it twice in a row but doubling the potential duration and then consequently making talents like surge of insanity affect mind flay in a similar manner of what I mentioned above with mind games, so every time you dp you get 3 seconds of surge but you’re free to cancel cast the baseline longer mind flay channels and it only cuts the duration you used off. I’m not very fond of the direction they’re trying to push the spec with tier where you potentially spam dp without using all of your surges, although it seems like an inevitable end of the spec this expansion given how limited you are in dumping insanity and how powerful builders are becoming.
Let’s be real here previously shadow priest had way to much stuff going on and it was a complicated spec to get into for the general public and with the revamp I am seeing more shadow priest then say before. Simplifying shadow priest will do more good then harm and I do like the direction they are heading in.
It’s thematically strong, but in practice it’s just a big Mind Blast. I’d much prefer that they make it deal zero damage and amp up the damage reversal bit so that it’s purely a defensive tank assist tool in PvE and can be used as an offensive or defensive tool in PvP and give shadow talent flexibility at the bottom of the class tree.
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You still have to press more than 1 button so not, they’ll get there eventually though.
I wouldn’t call shadow simplified. Legion’s shadow was extremely simple outside playing StM (dot things, make insanity bar go up), just not rewarding for people that didn’t play difficult content. I’d argue that current shadow is more complicated than what they were trying to “simplify” it from; it’s just more similar to other casters. It’s just a reskinned builder/spender with a cooldown like basically every other caster.
I agree with others that mindgames is not an interesting ability. It’s a bigger MB with a bigger CD.
i wonder what would make you think current shadow is more complicated than Legion Shadow. I do agree that Legion Shadow was very simple but thats because the Void Form gameplay didn’t allow for anything complicated. Current one imo is just as simple without the VF gameplay.
I feel like shadow priest has fallen so far from what it’s been, but I will say after coming back from a 3 expansion break mind games is the only thing I like about shadow priest.
Randomness. Legion shadow had literally zero randomness outside of gear procs. It had a perfectly set, strict rotation with interesting interactions with pausing insanity drain via dispersion and Void Torrent. It was simple, yet IMO extremely rewarding to play properly. You really felt it when you nailed your rotation with a deep Voidform, yet with Lingering Insanity and Legacy of the Void you didn’t feel terrible when you didn’t get a great Voidform. Compare that to messing up an Icy Veins as frost where you’re just a dead spec until IV comes back up.
Current shadow has 2 major procs and is basically just a 2 minute builder spender. 10.0 and 10.1 shadow both feel pretty decent in their own ways, but IMO they don’t compare to Legion. It was just SO much more fun.
Cast while moving would be a good improvement that keeps the theme.
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This Shadow Priest has stopped playing and unsubbed because of the changes. I guess sacrificing a dedicated few for the many is what they wanted to do. I’m sure I’ll check back in a couple of expansions, but for now, they made too many unfinished, not well thought out changes.
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Let’s be honest, this has been an issue for Spriest for just about every expansion.
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randomness isnt what makes a spec complex, it is a part of the engagement category and depending on how often procs happen theres is little engagement(current shadow has low “randomness” to it). RNG doesnt make a spec complex especially when it devolves to “button lights up so you press the glowing button”, i’d argue that its the opposite and hand holding more than anything.
i dont think legion shadow was funy, just gimicky. The only time where you felt any kinda of pressure in the spec was in the surrender to madness window which was like 40s. The rest of the fight and content you did with Legion shadow it felt painfully horrible(even legion mage tower for shadow was a joke, ignore the fight and just burn through it with surrender to madness).
I think you are overbuffed and need to be nerfed with a bat
As an ex long time spriest main: I absolutely hate what they did to shadow.
I want my button bloat back, 10.0.7 was my favorite itteration of Shadow ever, shadow crash should be like vile taint, not slow moving where tanks just walk out of it half the time, 2 charges and uncapped so we don’t waste 10-15 seconds just applying dots in a mass pull in high keys while every other class excluding 2-3 pulls 500k+ burst, I miss mind sear, I miss the very fast playstyle it had, I miss literally everything about it. I don’t like this version of shadow and find it way too simple, as do most of the Shadow Priests I have talked to that have also been long time mains.
BFA/Legion Shadow was awesome, the VF minigame was great, SL SP was kinda clunky, but 10.0.7 was SO much fun. First time I had ever gotten legendary and pink parses and the 10.1 rework made me literally delete my priest for the first time ever. This rework is absolutely abysmal for me, I get some like it, but from what I’ve read and seen most are neutral or don’t like it.
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