The big thing cyouskin was able to clarify that the 100% bonus to aoe damage that is provided by lunar eclipse only effects the AOE of starstrike, not starfall. So your aoe damage whether in solar or lunar isnt that far off. This was something I was very happy to hear.
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That is good to hear.
I like how people are saying they will be shelving their druids and then people saying âItâs only alpha!â when the fact of the matter is blizz needs to be pressed hard about these things. The people shelving their druids know whats up in the fact if its broken in alpha its broken at launch and takes 2 patch cycles or an whole expac for them to fix the issues. Even then they break things more.
As for the âItâs only alpha!â people stuff like this again needs to be dealt with now or blizzard gets very lazy with it and moves on. Give them no quarter as they will not lift a finger later to do it when they are âdoneâ
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Well at the moment the mechanics seem to all be there, it will come down to tuning if the spec feels good or bad to play. Like if our fillers do no damage even in eclipses and starsurge is the only hard hitter then the spec is gonna feel really clunky. However if they tune it properly it will actually feel really nice and fluid.
Again tuning that will take them a whole patch cycle to complete. They have done this before a simple hotfix amount of work is left to one of the big patches as fillers to show âhey look contentâ I have seen this SO much its sad.
They need to have the eclipse chance not be fully on RNG shoulders. It should work like the mages fireball crit passive. If you donât get an eclipse you have a higher chance. See when it comes to chances with blizz 99% is really 50%. Look back at the garrison boats. If you had it at 99% you failed half the time and lost both ships. Iâve had abilities with 25% chance and iâll go a few mobs before i get a proc from such things with so called decent RNG chance.
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I believe Cyrous said there is a bad luck protection to eclipses saying that he never went more then 4 casts per eclipse.
Also about the it takes a whole patch well that is because noone was talking about tuning during the alpha or beta they were all just complaining about This does not feel fun to play.
So maybe people instead of trying to tell them they liked the mechanics of the previous expansion maybe they should actually talk about tuning now in the beta/alpha and hopefully they will fix it now and not later.
Not quite 4. We donât know how itâs handled, but we have a few ideas. You shouldnât be out of Eclipse for more than 4-6 casts though. Youâd have to be very unlucky otherwise. Ideally, itâd work like a Deck. Think of 5 cards in the deck, and 1 card is your Eclipse proc. âDraw/Procâ and it misses (1/5)⊠remove that card from the deck (4 cards in deck now). You cast again, and it misses (1/4)âŠremove that card from the deck. Letâs say you get 4 misses, and we started with 5 cards⊠this means your 5th cast is guaranteed to be the right card.
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Yea. I feel like they really need a set of surveys sent out for different classes and not a small one. Many many pages.
They also need to better outsource ideas. Not just anyone honestly. Example look at what modders do for most games by trying to balance what the developers of those games didnât do so well. Just using it as a small example.
I know there is a lot of passionate people out there with good ideas but they get drowned out by people who want stuff from anime or other games in wow. Or the devs just wanna live in an echo chamber.
Its an even bigger problem for feralâŠthe tiny minority wanting Bloodtalons to stay like it is is flooding forum so nothing else will ever be noticed.
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Itâs because they donât seem to know how to compartmentalize these things. Issue is they fired to many people to help deal with it so they have limited help here. Those who are staffed to the forums just usually delete posts and such and post blue text (Which everyone flocks to spam their questions)
So a lot of classes are gonna be boned next expac. They then will get it right and then go âHey we need to rework this classâ aka they will break whats not broken.
The reality your not facing is this⊠the majority of people dont want eclipse back. Whether you think itâs good or not almost everyone I speak to about it on every forum and youtube agree that itâs a bad design choice. I understand you like it but you are the minority. Assuming this druid your posting on is your main it looks like you havent even played boomkin in bfa minus leveling it up.
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Please, please, PLEASE donât change Balance to this spam 1 button for X seconds nonsense.
Current live Balance empowermentâs give you something to react to while this eclipse thing seems like it introduces way more problems than it doesnât even solve, because what was wrong with empowerments again?
Also, this looks like a terrible system for PVP. Imagine trying to keep up eclipse while getting CCd then interrupted and locked out of whichever one youâre casting. It seems like itâs designed with only dungeons and raids in mind and even then, boring AF!
Please rethink this Eclipse idea or make it work totally different than the current Alpha itteration.
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^^ Sry, meant to post the above on my druid ^^
All the top Balance Druids universally agree that this Eclipse mechanic is good for the spec. All the big-name streamers and content creators Iâve had the opportunity to talk with have gone from âMehâ to âHey, this is actually pretty fun.â (Itâs not just me who likes Eclipse.) It needs iteration, sure, but itâs undeniably more versatile than an Empowerment mechanic. In fact, Empowerments may have the single biggest detriment to the flexibility of Balance Druid gameplay in BFA.
Unlike Preach and Bellular, we have a lot of insight to the details reason why changes are made, or what changes still need to be made. We also reflect on what makes something feel bad, or feel good.
Shadowlands Eclipse has sore points. Itâs what weâre testing and trying to figure out the âactualâ reasons to why it feels sore. We try to identify what we like, what we think we want, and what we feel isnât good for the gameplay.
Eclipseâs Sore Points:
- Not being in Eclipse doesnât feel good.
- Fishing for procs doesnât feel good on the pull.
- Starfall not extending Eclipse feels wrong.
Eclipse Good points:
- Resource pooling increases the skillcap and promotes critical-thinking.
- Eclipse feels good while itâs active.
Longterm Issues:
- Core rotation is too simple. But should be improved through talents.
- Astral damage double-dipping on Eclipse bonuses pigeonholes all potential playstyles around a 3min cooldown.
Empowerments have been described as âa speed limit on fun.â If you capped at 3 stacks, then Starsurge again, you wasted damage. If youâre always going to have an Empowered cast, then whatâs the point of Empowerments?
Empowerments effectively put a limit our Astral Power generation (in terms of combat flow). Because of this, Shooting Stars needed a DR to stay balanced. New Moon couldnât generate anymore Astral Power without a huge amount of wasted resources.
But we could always increase Astral Power costs? â No, the combat flow becomes more punishing if you waste any generated resources (Astral Power). It also limits the decision-making of the player. You wonât be able to pool Astral Power for movement as reliablyâŠbasically, all the emergent gameplay of Balance Druid gets thrown out.
Can Eclipse in Shadowlands be better? Absolutely. But it offers the best long-term gameplay. It offers the most potential for versatile builds as well. Balance Druid gameplay has been about periods of high damage and low damage for the past decade. As Blizzard iterates on existing and potentially new talents, we will continue to provide feedback towards the sore points of the gameplay.
This isnât about any personâs opinion being right or wrong. Itâs a discussion as to why changes are made, and why things feel good or bad; and understanding why feel we as such.
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Like Cyous mentioned, the current state of Empowerments is very limiting and makes the spec incredibly boring in my opinion. You donât really have to think about what button youâre pressing since the difference between having an empowered cast vs. non-empowered is almost unnoticeable. They add very little gameplay-wise. You gain nothing from pooling them and even overcapping is a minimal damage loss.
I think the current changes are a step in the right direction to make the spec more well-rounded and promote better play. Am I saying itâs perfect ? Definitely not. But as it stands the current balance druid iteration of build/spender with empowerments is pretty bare and the only saving grace is Streaking Stars.
In regards to the âterrible system for PVPâ comment, I donât see how it would be a big deal honestly since the uptime on Eclipse is high, on top of being a 10s buff. Currently the only hard hitting ability in our kit is Starsurge with the rest of the kit tickling enemies at best.
I canât speak for everyone but in regards to the top rated balance players, I can guarantee that most donât enjoy the iteration of BfA as itâs, for a lack of a better word, braindead.
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When I was working with Towelliee, he summarized the changes in Alpha pretty well â âItâs no longer about pressing the flashing button.â
Supatease feels is a sore point too. Iâll agree to that note. I think having a PVP Talent for âDream of Cenariusâ (Regrowth procs Solar Eclipse or Lunar Eclipse) would server to fix that issue.
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So far it definitely sounds more interesting than what we have now. As ppl pointed out, its pretty much WotLK boomie, which i personally liked. However, what i still miss, is big a$$ starfire crits 
Now with Starsurge thatâs never gonna happen again, which kinda sucks. Iâd rather instead have only starfall (on a cd for example) be strong on aoe and viable on single target, and make our wraths and starfires be able to hit like trucks when theyâre in the proper eclipse state, with insect swarm replacing sunfire.
Starsurge just feels way too much like a destro lock ability to me, as you build up resources to spend it on the big boom.
Why not add the unique Boomkin Full Moon instead of Starsurge as baseline? I think thatâd be much more interesting, since you needed to build up the spell by itself without any resource bar to unleash our very own special, thematic nuclear boomkin Moon bomb.
It would feel super fun and exciting, and more class thematic when you got to that point of being in lunar eclipse, popping starfall, casting big crit Starfires and unleashing a 3 stack Full Moon on your doomed enemy.
Yet instead we have this boring feeling, build and spend (feeling the same like every other classes combat) AP for instant gratification lidl faerie chaos bolts. If you wanna give us power while moving, let the dmg be in the dots and upfront moonfire dmg, with occasional casting while moving with starfall.
That way casting spells will feel way more satisfying, as boomkins are at their core a caster, so why not make that feel bada$$ instead of shooting of instant starsurges built up slowly by pretty, but underwhelming noodle starfires and wraths?
Starfire and Wrath are two very iconic Moonkin spells since itâs inception. Make them mean something again! Let em be able to pop off like they should and make our enemies shiver when they see that we got one off, or even moreso when itâs a Full Moon!
It would feel so great to embody that which is the BOOMkin by blowing people up with hard hitting spellcasts and mean dots, and give people some respect again for our casted abilities!
I for sure would be flapping ever happily after if that were to be a thing again.
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whats wrong with incarnation for pvp? it activates both eclipses for 30 seconds and gives a haste and crit buff. sounds like, as on live it will be the definite pvp talent on that row. iâm all for having even another way to activate eclipse in pvp though
nothing wrong with that specifically, but getting into eclipse in the first place is kinda tough if youâre being interrupted and CCâd through it.
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full moons cast time makes it very prohibitive to use in pvp. even if the buffed it, it needs to be faster to be useful in pvp. sounds like you wanna be a fire mage casting greater pyroblast