It’s still there, it’s split with Howl but it still has a cast time even when talented and I’m pretty sure howl still won’t work with the talent that makes targets tremble in place. So neither feels all that great anyways. Even in PvP they feel… rough lmao.
I’ve always wished Warlocks could get a choice node between Door of Shadows and Gateway. Selfish vs Party oriented teleporting. Soulburn Door of Shadows could also make it instant cast. Not something we’ll ever see but a man can dream.
They have this idea that Drain Life is a Warlock Class spell… when in reality it has always been a Affliction spell. If they want a self heal for the class as a whole they really seem to want to lean into healthstones. Let that be the class heal and give Aff back Drain Life.
I always liked the idea of healthstones being the general heal for the class and then each spec having it’s own flavor of self healing. They kinda had this in MoP.
Aff would naturally have it through Drain Life being the filler and talents could amp and shift the spell in cool ways. Demo could call forth a demon that siphons life from targets for them. Desto had ember tap… give destro the version that healed over time on a CD for a shard or 2.
It’s all things we’ve had before or an idea that honestly kinda speaks for itself… more dreaming though I suppose.
EDIT: I’ve gotten away from the topic of the thread though. While they are answering some surface level concerns for the class. Largely the deeper issues aren’t being touched much. I’m still trying to reserve for outrage for final alpha phase forward though.
I believe the Devs are reading this post while enjoy their coffee on Monday morning.
Are they gonna give health funnel back? Having drain life be the only means to heal our pet is dumb
I’m also really not seeing the vision for demo. Even with their overhaul, implosion is still confusing to use, and it’s not clear when it’s a damage gain or loss because we have multiple talents that buff imp damage and our spells, but not implosion.
Honestly all it feels like is being left in the same spot with less buttons. This doesn’t look like an improvement. It doesn’t appear more fun or engaging. It’s lessened across the board and there’s no major gain to justify it
I don’t think it’s confusing when to use implosion in the new rework. It’s clear they just want you to hit it in AoE when you hit max imps. They added a talent that makes implosion do 5% extra damage per imp spent. For 45% at 9 imps and 60% with ancient imps. EoG is the clear indicator of “hey you’re not doing AoE anymore, use implosion to continue doing AoE”
The problem is that people just don’t like the spell generally. Having your resource to do big AoE tied to sacrificing creatures rubs people the wrong way. If it were just a stacking buff on our character, that we expended to do AoE, I doubt people would have as much of an issue with it.
At the moment we currently don’t know if that’s the case with implosion (since tuning comes later obviously).
The issue stems from the fact that now that imps have a significant duration, and multiple different modifiers added to them (including tyrant taking up almost 35% of a new imps life span) you can see how implosion can get confusing
Think as a new player really quickly:
These are some of the stock questions we get asked about in the demonology channel in the lock discord routinely on new patch launches (although implosion is a bit more confusing now than in midnight)
None of these factors are present for a lot of the melee specs where you have a) a single target spender that you always hit at 1 - 2 targets and b) An aoe ability that you hit no matter what the variables, as well as in cooldowns.
Exactly. They claim this overhaul is to reduce confusion and yet, we’re still asking the same question as before “When do I Implode??”
It honestly feels like Blizzard haven’t thought this through
It can actually be a slightly more confusing because as the commenter above me posted, for brand new players it can be distilled down to “implode at max imps”, but the issue is that it might be the wrong thing to do.
It’s only the people that are truly curious (the more active players) that actually ask the question “when do I implode” when the base game might be leading them astray or it’s not extremely clear
Agreed. A new player is most likely going to assume more imps = better to implode, and they’re very unlikely to look or question beyond that
Another point I find confusing is moving the Felguard to the talent tree. They say it’s to reduce confusion and make the Felguard a clear choice, but a new player could very easily see it and think “Oh that’s a different demon… I like my succubus so I’ll just keep that.” And skip over the Felguard.
And they’ll be completely unaware that the Felguard isn’t a choice for demo, it’s the only choice. There is no choice, it’s mandatory.
The more I read about these changes the more I’m confused by them.
I also think if they’re going to make something as integral as the Felguard a talent, it needs to be placed much higher up where it has to be chosen.
Sure, these variables exist just like for any resource based class wondering if they should spend the resource now on the dying pack. Or do you hold the resource for the next one? That’s down to discretion of the player.
However, the intent with the overall design direction is clear. Need AoE? Max imps? Implode. There is no ambiguity like there is now in TWW. Your spender shifting from AoE to ST and a cap on gaining imps is a clear indication of WHEN to hit the button. Maybe they should just make Implosion only available at max imps to further streamline the game if that design direction still isn’t filtering through to people.
Other variables around talents such as with Doomguard summoning comes down ultimately to theorycrafting just like the game always has. Now, if Blizzard fumbles the actual tuning of the spells then that’s a whole other thing.
Tyrant is a can of worms onto itself. I still feel like it’s never fit well into the spec since it’s introduction. Feels very similar to Darkglare. Either everything you do only serves to make the CD worth hitting or it’s weak enough that the extension doesn’t feel good enough to warrant being our CD in the first place. Both need to be addressed with the new changes to each spec anyways.