Class Tree and by extension, Class Identity Crisis
I’ve been mulling over the issue with the Priest talents compared to the other classes and I’d like to share what I believe is a core driving wedge within the class identity which affects the theme and in doing so, effects the abilities and there interaction as a whole.
It is my belief for a while now and in seeing how the Priest Class talent tree has been handled that the Priest class has a very glaring identity crisis. It doesn’t know what it wants to be.
The Priest class is divided into 3 specializations…
- Holy
- Discipline
- Shadow
Holy
- Holy imo is a mix between Angelic (Prayer/praying) type of abilities and Narru gifts and themes.
- Holy represents the light side.
Discipline
- Discipline is a mix of inner strength of will and tapping into the dark side.
- Discipline represents the balance and therefore walks between the light and dark side.
Shadow
- Shadow is a mix of imposing your will onto others weak minds with our (mind magic) and taking life essence from enemies (vampirism) and only recently has Void magic with old god influence been introduced and thus I think the cause of many problems.
- Shadow represents the embracing of the dark side and going full on void… or does it?
Currently shadow is being pushed heavily into the Old God theme wrapped around the “void” shell. But I would argue that is not thematically accurate.
Identity History
- Naaru
- From the inception of the Naaru in The Burning Crusade expansion, we learned that they can transform into a type of “Void” version of themselves.
- We see further evidence of this in Warlords of Draenor expansion (Dark Star event) and once again in Legion (Priest order hall campaign).
- Yet in Legion the Shadow Priest got a complete redesign that focused on void and more particularly, Old Gods.
Cosmic Forces Chart
But if you look at the wow cosmic forces chart, you can see that the Holy and Void are opposites.
Does this mean that the Void version of a Naaru jumps across the other side of the cosmic forces chart? It doesn’t appear that way as we have been shown that it’s more of a lifecycle that can go back and forth.
The point being, if Shadow is supposed to be at a complete opposite side of the cosmic forces chart to Holy, then that explains why currently the 2 specializations really have little in common and this manifests itself into the current Class tree. When you compare the other class trees, they make a lot more sense as they have a whole slew of shared abilities.
However, if the Void version of the Naaru is still on the light side of the cosmic forces chart as it’s just in a life/death phase of itself, then I think that should reflect in the class and by extension Shadow itself.
If Holy is inspired/impacted by angelic and Naaru themes, then shadow should have similar themes but only the dark side.
However Void or rather “Void Lords” as depicted on the cosmic forces chart and Old God themes have no connection to Holy or Discipline.
- Cult of Forgotten Shadows Identity
Discipline’s “Shadow” themed abilities and I would argue the lore behind them don’t really point at Void Lords or Old God roots. Instead they more closely relate back to the cult of the forgotten shadow
Balance between Light and Shadow
While the undead generally hate users of the Holy Light, are hurt by it, and have learned how to use the Shadow, they also preach that there must be a balance between Light and Shadow, and that they must learn the Light as well, but never forget they were born from the Shadow.
Where as Shadow could more relate to this excerpt…
The cult preaches balance, mandating that shadow priests must never forget the dangers of falling too deep into the dark energies they manipulate, for it is often too hard to find one’s way back to the Shadow from the deep reaches of the darkness.
- Modern era Identity
So I shared all that in order to bring attention to the mess that is the current priest talents which I think is a conflict of an identity crisis that results in the specializations fighting each other instead of having common ground like the other classes have to draw upon.
We are Priests, not Occultists. If Void Lord / Old God type of theme needs to be present in Shadow, it should only exist in a small form, not be the sole theme of the specialization. At least from both a lore perspective and a gameplay perspective when we are supposed to share similarities with the rest of our class specializations.
In a way it can work if we think about each spec having 2 primary sides (themes) that cross over to one another.
- Holy
- Angelic / Naaru
- Inner will / inner strength
- Discipline
- Inner will / inner strength
- Shadow / dark side of Naaru / Holy
- Shadow
- Shadow / dark side of Naaru / Holy
- Void magic
Ideas and things to consider
Take our past abilities (now PvP talents)
- Archangel
- Dark Archangel
These are both similar in theme that can work in the class tree. Even as a choice talent between the 2. 1 for healing and mana regen and the other for damage and haste buff.
Or consider this, most of the abilities we gained throughout various expansions have found there way as talents. Most of those talents have been segregated in one way or another as follows…
- Removed
- Inner Will
- Mind Spike
- Class tree
- Prayer of Mending
- Shadow Word: Death
- Shadow Fiend
- Mass Dispel
- Leap of Faith
- Holy Tree
- Binding Heal
- Symbol of Hope
- Divine Hymm
- Discipline Tree
- N/A
- Shadow Tree
- Mind Sear
Examples of abilities that can be brought back as class abilities.
-
Mind Spike
I would at least say we can bring back Mind Spike as a class ability and just like Shadow has access to Smite as a class ability yet will most likely never use, Holy can have access to Mind Spike yet might not ever use. But both Discipline and Shadow can incorporate that ability and how it interacts with dots and Mind Blast (3 stacks of 30% critical chance to Mind Blast on target) into talents contained within their specializations talent trees. This can give the class more on demand burst ability and in Shadows case, we can get Surge of Darkness & Clarity of Power In order to get back that type of build/play style we had access to in WoD.
In addition, further class and specialization talents can make use of this ability and empower/modify it to have additional interactions with a type of play style this type of ability can offer. -
Mind Sear
I can also see the case for moving Mind Sear into the Class tree as well which opens for similar treatment that Mind Spike could add in that each spec can have its own custom uses it can bring to the table in altering or enhancing Mind Sear… one example is using Mind Sear in a way that instead of ticking damage… it can do healing ticks. Or apply renews to all friendly targets or have a cap on it. Those can be Holy tree talents. Discipline can have a choice talent that allows Mind Sear to be a DPS ability but add some synergy to its other talents or it can be a damage mitigation ability for example, reduces damage done by targets affected by x% while channeling or reduce damage taken by x% if used like Holy’s version when affecting friendly targets.
The result is that we can start building similarities back into the class again quite easily if the class didn’t have this conflicting wedge of thematic undertones.
To conclude:
I fear that this new talent system is both causing and will continue to cause problems moving forward as long as we have this identity crisis within the specializations where in the case of Shadow, the spec has become very “alien” to its brothers which I think current talent tree evidence indicates that the design has ran itself into a corner and can’t come up with logical ideas that make sense from both a lore and a gameplay perspective while being meaningful and remaining faithful to the class roots.
This is I think why the talents in the class tree really don’t offer much choice and instead just provides an illusion of choice.
Shadow Identity
One thing that comes to mind that is both evident in our current abilities and can be in our theme is the aspect of Death or more specifically, the angel of death… or rather the Archangel of Death.
This is when I think of Malthael from Diablo and his becoming the Archangel of Death. Still an Angel, but using death magic. I think this is what the shadow priest identity / theme should aspire to. This will then make sense from an ability and lore perspective to have similarities between each spec.
