would like to see Cinderstorm from Legion take Pyroclasm’s place on the talent tier, and Pyroclasm become baseline. This gives Fire an actual reason to press Pyroblast instead of only pressing it when it Hot Streak procs. NGL, it kinda kills class fantasy to have a button that is never pressed unless you have a proc… esp considering that it has absolutely zero benefit to pressing it and actually casting it. Flurry for Frost Mage has the same problem…
Devs, please, explain the idea behind giving a class an ability that has no benefit at endgame from actually casting said ability but instead waiting for it to proc?
I’m sure there are a lot of specs of different classes that have this same problem and it trivializes the idea of having a “choice” on what to press and when…
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What’s wrong with having a button that you only press under certain circumstances? In your example, I still wouldn’t cast pyroblast unless I have a pyroclasm proc. I still wouldn’t cast pyroblast under any other circumstance. You haven’t solved anything with this suggestion.
If Pyroclasm procs you hard cast Pyroblast. It gives the spell a powerful feeling. Pyroblast when pressed from the Hot Streak proc doesn’t feel much more powerful than Fireball. It isn’t at all living up to it’s previous iterations or class fantasy. When you think of Pyroblast do you think of 5k more damage than a crit Fireball? My Fireball crits for about 25-35k if I don’t have any cooldowns used. Pyroblast procs hit for about 35-45k if I don’t have any cooldowns used. It doesn’t feel good, and that is the point. Making Pyroclasm baseline gives Pyroblast a good feeling, but not at the expense of trading off Meteor.
You said the point was to eliminate the situation where you only cast a spell if you have a proc - this doesn’t change anything. You would only cast pyroblast if you had a pyroclasm proc.
I don’t know what a pyroblast “should” feel like as it’s not a real life thing. It has had several iterations throughout WoW’s lifetime and so I’m not tied to any one version of it. I can say that for me, personally, I don’t like hugely large cast times on spells and prefer to be more mobile.
I feel like it was clear what I meant, but if it wasn’t then that is on me. I do not like having abilities that are only pressed as Instant Cast and only when I get a proc. Instant casts like Fireblast that deal damage are fine because they make sense and feel good for class fantasy. Pyroclasm, while it is a proc, makes Pyroblast feel better because it makes it hit hard. It is actually hard casted when you get that proc. That doesn’t mean we take away the instant Pyroblasts from Hot Streak. I’m just saying that it would be nice and make sense to have a reason to actually cast our spell that is supposed to be a hard hitter.
It is very much a “real life thing”, and it SHOULD feel that way because the whole point of an MMO is class fantasy and player action combined with the narrative of the story. Previous iterations of Pyroblast always had it being our hard hitter spell that dealt massive damage. Being that Greater Pyroblast is a PvP talent only and now going to a 15 second cooldown there will be no benefit to using it in many scenarios including PvP in SL. In fact, as of right now in current not many mages are using Greater Pyroblast with the exception of those who do random BGs and those who play MLx in arena. Outside of those 2 scenarios Greater Pyroblast has been made a lesser choice due to corruptions and essences. That doesn’t even cover that % based abilities are bad for the game and toxic in general which is entirely another topic that I don’t feel like getting into.
My point was made. You don’t have to agree with it and this post wasn’t aimed towards you. Many Fire Mages feel like I do. Fire seems to get the short end of the stick a lot when it comes to feeling smooth as a spec instead of clunky. It also tends to be even worse at the start of expansions.
The whole point is that giving us a reason to cast abilities other than Polymorph, Fireball, Scorch, and Ring of Frost would be nice.
I guess I’m confused - where in real life do people cast pyroblast so I could know what it should feel like?
I cannot speak to PvP right now as I haven’t done anything competitive in a very long time. I do agree that % based abilities are bad for the game. I have to say, though, you use a lot more abilities in PvP than just those four. I can’t say I’ve heard many people ask for more abilities to have long cast times as that’s just begging to be kicked.
I still feel that your original point was flawed and had nothing to do with damage. At no point in the post did you mention the damage or wanting it to hit harder - it was 100% based on the argument that only hitting a button only with a proc didn’t make sense to you. You even used flurry as another example.
I never enjoyed the pyroclasm play style in Legion but part of that may be because the bracers were one of the very last legendaries I got. Never got used to the feel of it. I hate hard casting flamestrike in m+ and pyroclasm is just another long cast that could be interrupted due to mechanics. I prefer the instant cast nature of it.
I just said we keep the instant casts off of Hot Streak but it would be nice to have a reason to actually cast it. In PvP (which is what I mostly play) it’s pretty boring just pressing Fireball. Greater Pyroblast is a toxic ability. I would love for Pyroclasm to become baseline so we have reasons to press big damage buttons. It was fun in Legion for a lot of us. I want Pyroblast to be fun to use again. In it’s current iteration it isn’t and it makes the spec feel lacking the charm that older versions of Fire had.