Change and Effects
On the latest build of the 9.2 PTR, the Vengeance 4 piece set bonus
贪婪之饥 has been changed from extending
献祭光环 if active or granting 2 seconds of it if not, to reducing the cooldown of either
献祭光环 or
邪能毁灭 by one second per lesser
灵魂残片 absorbed.
This change fixes 2 major issues with the previous set:
- The cancelaura interaction with our talent 爆燃 no longer exists, so we can no longer gain absurd stacks of 盲者信念 making us effectively immortal in all situations.
- We can no longer get infinite uptime on a single 献祭光环, so our damage doesn't scale as high from 滋长炼狱.
However, the new set does still introduce some new issues and reinforces some existing issues with the base spec as well.
- There is a major resource conflict on our GCDs
- Optimizing for damage or defensiveness can lead to degenerate gameplay
- It adds multiple layers of randomness to our spec, whether directly or indirectly
Strengths and Weaknesses
We can summarize the strengths and weaknesses in this set quite simply: The new 4 set is still borderline overpowered in large scale AoE while offering very little benefit on ST or low target AoE.
Random factors
There are 3 primary sources of randomness created by this set:
- Each soul absorbed will randomly reduce the cooldown of either 献祭光环 or 邪能毁灭 if both are on cooldown. If only one is on cooldown, that spell will always get its cooldown reduced
- Soul spawns from both the 2-set and 爆燃 are percent chance to proc and contribute to resource conflict in our rotation
- 黑眼之赐 is a percent chance to proc and affects our rotation
Single Target
In ST, the set offers less of a damage boost than the current Shards of Domination system by an order of magnitude. Considering that our ST damage is among the lowest, if not the lowest of all tanks, this poses an issue when dealing with a high DPS co-tank such as Protection Paladin as we are unable to hold agro properly when they have cooldowns available. Currently, the Blood set offers around 15-20% of our overall damage on ST, while
献祭光环 provides about 8-10%. With the increased uptime from the new 4 set, we can expect to see about a 30% increase in uptime in most situations meaning the estimated value of the set bonus is somewhere around a 3% DPS increase when played to maximize the value of GCDs and
滋长炼狱 ticks by only pressing
献祭光环 when it expires. This does require us to track the duration rather than pressing
献祭光环 as soon as it's available, as using it immediately resets the stacks of
滋长炼狱.
Defensively, it is a decent gain, as we can expect to see an increase in
恶魔变形 uptime from ~26% to ~35% when played normally, with up to ~43% when playing for maximum defensiveness. However, in most situations, much of this uptime would be wasted as we don't want to be using it for melees over tankbusters unless the encounter is a high uptime patchwerk-like encounter similar to
腐臭吞噬者 where we want as much uptime as possible. In that case however, we would have to use a specialized build that does even less damage, by taking
喂食恶魔 and never using
献祭光环 or spending any resources on
灵魂裂劈 or
幽魂炸弹, as well as cancelaura on our
邪能毁灭 casts.
Small AoE (2-9 Targets)
On low target counts, the set bonus is decent, but not super strong. We can expect to sustain approximately 4 souls every other GCD from all sources combined, allowing for a good amount of damage from
幽魂炸弹, as well as decent sustain from the extra souls spawned and increased
恶魔变形 uptime. In this case, pressing
献祭光环 early is no longer as much of a detriment, as the bonus souls generated from
爆燃 allow for more
幽魂炸弹, making up the lost damage from the final ticks of
滋长炼狱 while providing increased cooldown reduction. Similar to ST, waiting until the ticks run out is slightly better defensively, as it provides more cooldown reduction on
邪能毁灭 allowing for more
恶魔变形 uptime.
Large AoE (10+ Targets)
Once we get to 10 targets and beyond, this is where the set bonus becomes borderline overpowered. Due to the 2-set bonus scaling with number of targets, we effectively generate enough souls every GCD to press nothing but
幽魂炸弹 and refresh
极乐敕令,
献祭光环, and
邪能毁灭 as necessary, never pressing our single target generator as it simply isn't needed anymore. The extra souls generated also provide more cooldown reduction, allowing us to sustain upwards of 50% uptime on
恶魔变形, increase our versatility by significant amounts during
盲者信念 windows, and provide significant amounts of healing, making us more durable on larger target counts, while becoming vulnerable as target count diminishes from enemies dying.
Interactions
Covenants
Kyrian is a clear winner here for covenants in any multi-target situation, as the versatility and fury provided by
盲者信念 allows for a near-infinite cycle of spenders as well as providing fairly consistent damage reduction. Venthyr may be competitive in single target, potentially surpassing Kyrian, but is not as consistent.
Talents
We'll have a few talent builds depending on the situation, but the major change is that
爆燃 becomes significantly stronger than the other talents in its row, and
幽魂炸弹 will likely become the standard.
This should be the standard, most flexible build for most situations. It provides a good mix of damage and survivability. In extremely high fortified keys where large pulls are still possible, it may be preferred to switch to
喂食恶魔 for more defensive uptime as the loss of damage isn't particularly high in AoE.
This talent build would provide the most uptime on
恶魔变形 at the cost of nearly all DPS. Oddly enough, the third row becomes entirely useless because you would never press any button other than
极乐敕令, cancelaura
邪能毁灭, or
裂魂 to maximize soul generation for extra uptime.
This is the same as our current standard build for high uptime on
烈火烙印 which works better on magic damage fights.
Legendaries
With the way everything is currently going, assuming we run Kyrian and the standard talent build for most situations, we will continue to use
拉瑟莱克的污秽 for maximum damage in ST,
炽热灵魂 for magical defense with the brand build, and adding
黑眼之赐 for maximum
恶魔变形 uptime. If Venthyr ends up being stronger, we'll likely use
黑眼之赐 and hope for high rolls to maximize the
罪孽烙印 extension.
Our most effective legendary in AoE will likely become
黑眼之赐 as the GCD conflict causes us to be unable to spend most of our fury as generating and spending souls becomes more important. This means that
灵魂裂劈 doesn't get used, making
拉瑟莱克的污秽 and
炽热灵魂 provide very little value. Despite being random, with the number of rolls being increased due to the cooldown reduction from the set, we can generally expect around 4-5 resets in a 6 minute boss encounter, and it becomes generally more reliable in keys.
Resource and GCD conflict
Due to the influx of fury from
盲者信念 and more uptime on
献祭光环, as well as the increase in souls from
燃烧之饥 and
爆燃, we will often find ourselves overcapping fury due to being unable to spend quickly enough before receiving more. In addition, the extra souls mean we are pressing
幽魂炸弹 rather than
灵魂裂劈, reducing the value of our legendaries that depend on
灵魂裂劈. On top of this, due to the extra resources, we have neither spare GCDs nor need for our generators (
裂魂 or
破裂) in AoE situations. While it's possible to play without
幽魂炸弹, it becomes net neutral with using a legendary such as
拉瑟莱克的污秽, but at the loss of potentially gaining more from other legendaries. On the other hand, in Single Target, we alternate between feast and famine in a standard build, being flooded with resources which we lack free GCDs to spend during the
盲者信念 window, and being somewhat starved outside that window. Alternatively, if playing a more defensive build, we simply ignore all resources and maximize generating souls as much as possible, which is rather degenerate gameplay.
Final Thoughts
With no other changes to our spec, this set bonus will be lackluster in raid, cementing our status as the lowest DPS/threat tank, while providing little useful defensive benefit. Without a gimmick such as the kiting strategies used in
纳斯利亚堡, and the strength of Havoc, I don't expect Vengeance to be a favored pick in raid with this set. I'd like to see a more significant bump to our damage, whether it's from this set or from spec changes.
In Mythic+, the situation is completely different. This set will be a large increase in both survivability and damage and I expect Vengeance to be quite enjoyable, especially when pulling larger packs as the set scales powerfully and we do get a shakeup to our selected talents and legendaries which is a first for Shadowlands.
All in all, this set bonus is somewhat more balanced than the previous one, but is a bit lackluster on lower target counts and seems slightly lacking, especially when compared with other tank sets. The new layers of randomness are also not ideal for tanking, though they can be played around.