Discipline's proposed 2-set seeks to reduce some mana costs of ramping by mixing in free and instant cast
s. If you were playing
福音, then this would mean that you would have to choose between the longer duration
救赎s from
全神贯注 with the
坚定意志 legendary or the free
救赎s. In this instance you would always choose the longer
救赎s but if you were to play
灵魂护壳 then you could mix those free
s in for some okay discounts.
The 4-set effectively increases
苦修s damage by forcing the damage buff after
真言术:耀 casts and increasing its value.
苦修 is generally not a powerhouse ability with covenant abilities carrying the majority of our burst healing this expansion. No word yet of "stacking" this damage buff from back to back
真言术:耀s, as is common in a raid ramp up, is also strange. It almost feels like there could be some promotion of
悔罪者 legendary but you'd sacrifice
坚定意志 in a raid environment which seems like a non-starter.
Both bonuses seem more well-suited for a 5man environment than a raid environment, which isn't the worst thing in the world considering Disc's constant dominance in a raid environment and some mana struggles on high keys compared to other healers. Since Discipline is so frequently shackled to one build of ramping in a raid, this also shows how shackled the spec is to specific legendaries and talents to properly function.
The 2-set sounds very helpful for dungeons and just alright in raids, not something that would make or break you, but likely would allow you to be a bit more mobile and assist slightly more with spothealing on progression raiding to those in need. The 4-set adds some increased value to
苦修 but it really needs to have a stacking buff that can allow for a supercharged
苦修 from back to back
真言术:耀s. Casting two in rapid succession has been part of Discipline's kit ever since their 7.2.5 remake back in Legion, so not having a stacking buff for this set bonus is extremely strange.
In dungeons where you almost never cast
真言术:耀 back to back, this will be a nice damage increase and offer some better efficiency of
救赎 healing but more is needed for Discipline to be able to more reliably heal the party via dealing damage.
The 2-set needs a solution to the
全神贯注/
坚定意志 question. Longer atonements to equal the legendaries' value would be excellent and still meet the intended purpose of greater mana efficiency both for raiding and Mythic+, as longer
救赎s will also mean less casts of
/
真言术:盾 are needed to refresh the buff on tank(s). The 4-set needs a stacking buff and should also deal more overall damage. These bonuses seem to be replacing Shards of Domination and ought to feel very powerful, but at the moment
苦修 is a wet noodle and almost doubling the damage is a good start but far from feeling like the power packing triple volley of old Legion days. In a time where healer damage is at its peak of attention in the community, Discipline (and other healers) should feel like they can compete with the massive damage other healers bring.
Holy Priest's bonuses continue to double-down on the spec's strengths and gives a sort of illusion of choice for the spec heading into 9.2. The 2-set gives you a buff increasing the cooldown reduction for
圣言术:静 or
圣言术:灵 depending on the next ability cast,
快速治疗/
治疗术 reducing the former and
治疗祷言 reducing the latter. The issue though, is that the spec is so incredibly focused into healing with
快速专注 these days that being able to mix in
治疗祷言s for
圣言术:灵 feels so niche and out of place for the spec as it stands today.
The 4-set, draws upon the conduit
共鸣圣言 and again sets up this illusion of choice. Do you spend this buff on a weak
治疗祷言 or just continue slamming the
治疗术 button to kingdom come and likely cementing your place as the top spot-healer in the raid group? There's really no choice to it but the bonus makes it look like there actually is one.
Despite my negativity on the return of these set bonuses, the gameplay looks to be a natural progression for the spec, you cast
治疗术 a lot thanks to the
快速专注 legendary and now everything is going to be more efficient. You'll be able to cast more
圣言术:静s which MIGHT allow you to fit in
圣言术:赎 in more optimal timings or an additional cast on a lengthy encounter but doesn't really seem to be changing the game from what the Holy rollers know.
For Mythic+, like raid, you continue to slam down what you're good at with the spec -- having a MASSIVE turnaround from its incredibly poor single target healing efficiency in dungeons in BFA, to being able to spam their tank and party with
治疗术s and
圣言术:静s for ages before having to be concerned about mana. It is a reasonable boost that synergizes (and copies) existing conduits like
共鸣圣言 and
圣言演说, but doesn't really add anything new to the table.
If these are the proposed bonuses for Holy, I'd really like to see them take another look at
希望象征, as I believe its more than fair to say that the utility experiment that went underway with Symbol's defensive cooldown reduction has been an abject failure in helping the spec improve its standing in competitive raiding and a second look is needed, perhaps just channeling the spell giving raw damage reduction this time.
Shadow has received a tier set which is focused around the mechanic of
黑暗思维. This is a
心灵震爆 which is both instant, and can be cast during
精神鞭笞. On first impression, this tier set is interesting but not without problems. The three major problems the set has are a lack of AoE value, unintuitive rotational complexity, and added punishment for moving.
Problems
AoE
With sets for 9.2 being important for all endgame content, a tier set being entirely Single Target is problematic. While most other tier sets being introduced in 9.2 focus on providing additional stats, resources, or free spells with AoE value, Shadow's does not. Shadow does not spend
黑暗思维 within its AoE rotation above 5 targets, and even if the new 4 piece
活体暗影 adds enough value to change that, Shadow still lacks GCDs within its tightly packed AoE rotation to use them. Shadow's primary AoE tool
does not interact with the new tier set at all, and Shadow's AoE rotation is already resource capped so the increased resource generation from additional
黑暗思维 procs does not have any value.
Fixing this issue isn't as simple as making
活体暗影 deal AoE damage as well as Single Target. While that does make the set do 'something' on AoE, its taking away globals that would otherwise be
. We'd still have to proc
活体暗影 with
黑暗思维 心灵震爆, which yields a much lower increase in AoE than it does for Single Target, where
黑暗思维 is already a core part of the rotation.
Rotation
Increasing the strength and frequency of
黑暗思维 can be thought of as an increase to the value of
精神鞭笞. Increasing the value of
精神鞭笞 has the potential to impact Shadow's rotation in a number of ways, including but not limited to...
- Removing non-procced 心灵震爆 from the rotation, as 精神鞭笞 has the potential to be stronger than 心灵震爆 in all situations.
- Wasting 黑暗思维 procs as we don't have the free globals to spend them before getting another.
- Having to deliberately fish for 黑暗思维 procs before cooldowns by spamming 精神鞭笞.
- Delaying 虚空箭 in 虚空形态.
- Wasting 狂乱值 in cooldowns, as we might not have the GCDs necessary to maintain 活体暗影 and use all of our other spells.
The bottom line is that there is potential with this set bonus for a lot of rotation changes and nuanced gameplay, though all of it is counterintuitive and likely less enjoyable to play with than the current rotation without the set bonus.
Fixing the wasted
黑暗思维 procs can be done by making the buff stack, which adds more flexibility to usage and reduces the chance you'll ever get a proc when you already have one.
The negative impact it has on the rotation is much harder to solve though as it comes from tying the strength of the tier set to
精神鞭笞, a filler spell we aim to cast as little as possible, instead of one of our higher priority spells, such as
心灵震爆, our damage over time effects, or our
狂乱值 spenders.
Movement
Increasing the value of a rotational filler spell, such as
精神鞭笞 also has a negative impact on Shadow's ability to deal damage during movement. When you move as Shadow, and don't have access to a rotational instant such as
噬灵疫病 or a
暗言术:痛 refresh, you give up casts of
精神鞭笞. This is expected as part of any DPS rotation, but the more powerful the filler spell is, the worse it feels and the more impact movement has on your dps. Even though
黑暗思维 is a proc, not only is it procced by
精神鞭笞 but it's also usable during
精神鞭笞, meaning spending
黑暗思维 whilst moving is still a loss of damage. This is a problem Shadow deals with already, but having a tier set that exacerbates it does not feel good. This problem is once again deeply rooted in the tier set's impact on
精神鞭笞.
Instead of attempting to solve any of Shadow's issues such as AoE, resource overflow, and a claustrophobic rotation, the tier set doubles down on all of them. However, based on expected time frames, it's highly unlikely that the tier set was created or iterated on after the Shadow Priest feedback written last month, so it's unlikely any of these issues were going to be addressed in the first iteration a Shadow Tier set.
Damage
Whilst making the assumption that
活体暗影 scales with secondary stats as well as multiple procs extending the duration, the combined value of
黑暗思绪 and
活体暗影 is about 12% on Single Target if we do not change our playstyle. Playstyle optimizations likely add an extra few percent. The value of this set bonus in AoE, as discussed in the problems section, is effectively zero. With how these sets are expected to be used in Mythic+, something has to change beyond just tuning to make the AoE damage comparable to that of other bonuses.
Legendaries, Talents, and Covenants
Sticking with the same initial assumptions, the new tier set has a notable impact on the viability of certain legendaries, talents, and covenants.
- 暗影烈焰棱镜 and 塔尔巴达的谋略 appear to be much closer in value, likely because of how much less space Shadow has to cast 精神鞭笞 during cooldowns when using 暗影烈焰棱镜.
- Both Kyrian and Night Fae covenants are significantly worse. They already struggle in 9.2, due to their weak covenant legendaries, but as both of their covenant spells also reduce the number of 精神鞭笞 casts in the rotation (something that used to be a good thing), they gain much less from the new tier set. This is especially bad for Kyrian, as their covenant ability 晋升者之赐 replaces 精神鞭笞 completely for its duration. Something that makes absolutely no sense.
- 虚空洪流 is also much worse for a similar reason, and appears to be the worst talent in the row for all legendaries and covenants.
- 咒罚 appears to have gained a significant amount of value, likely because it reduces the strain of GCDs in the opener, and consistently lets you proc 黑暗思维 before entering 虚空形态.
Conclusion
As mentioned earlier, this set bonus doubles down on all the negative experiences you can have whilst playing Shadow Priest. Buffing
精神鞭笞 in a rotation that already has so many powerful and interesting things to do instead of
精神鞭笞 makes it much harder to play, much more sensitive to movement, and arguably much less fun.
This is the first iteration of a Shadow set bonus for two expansions, and the first related to this new Shadowlands Shadow Priest, so it's understandable that it doesn't hit the mark. With 9.2 so far away, we would like to either see substantial changes to solve the current problems outlined with this set bonus, or for it to do something else altogether.