Raid Composition: Major Changes to Buffs

[Trixie]

http://blue.mmo-champion.com/12/9336795 ... cking.html

With the release of upcoming content patch players will see a change in the way we allow buffs and debuffs to stack exclusively in a raid. For the most part, what this change means is that many buffs and debuffs that were previously allowed to stack together no longer can, and that many buffs and debuffs that only a single talent specialization could bring can now be brought by multiple different specializations. The philosophy behind this change shows up in many of the changes we have made in Wrath of The Lich King, such as when we made almost all buffs raid-wide. We want players to be able to form raids and parties based on who they want to play with, rather than who has the correct talents and abilities to min-max their raid performance.

Raid composition will still matter to some extent, but without this change, it would have overwhelmed every other aspect of raid planning (as we added new capabilities to each of 30 different talent trees). You no longer need to rigidly control the melee/spellcaster balance of your raid, or make sure every group has all the critical buffing classes, etc. This change has many class balance implications.

IMPORTANT! Before we are done, we will thoroughly test the performance of every class. It should not be assumed that one class' current performance relative to others in beta is final. Some classes (and specializations) will need to be reduced in power and some increased. Many may feel the change has more impact on class X than class Y. We will address all of those concerns via our internal testing and community feedback.

There are thirty or so different categories into which buffs and debuffs fit. Here you will find a comprehensive list of the changes made broken down by category and which spells/talents are in that category.

* Armor Debuff (Major): Acid Spit (exotic Hunter pet), Expose Armor, Sunder Armor
* Armor Debuff (Minor): Faerie Fire, Sting (Hunter pet), Curse of Recklessness
* Physical Vulnerability Debuff: Blood Frenzy, (2nd Talent Spec TBA)
* Melee Haste Buff: Improved Icy Talons, Windfury Totem
* Melee Critical Strike Chance Buff: Leader of the Pack, Rampage
* Attack Power Buff (Flat Add): Battle Shout, Blessing of Might
* Attack Power Buff (Multiplier): Abomination's Might, Trueshot Aura, Unleashed Rage
* Ranged Attack Power Buff: Hunter's Mark (only Hunters benefit, so no need to exclude against other class abilities)
* Bleed Damage Increase Debuff: Mangle, Trauma
* Spell Haste Buff: Wrath of Air Totem
* Spell Critical Strike Chance Buff: Moonkin Aura, Elemental Oath
* Spell Critical Strike Chance Debuff: Improved Scorch, Winter's Chill
* Increased Spell Damage Taken Debuff: Ebon Plaguebringer, Earth and Moon, Curse of the Elements
* Increased Spell Power Buff: Focus Magic, Improved Divine Spirit, Flametongue Totem, Totem of Wrath, Demonic Pact
* Increased Spell Hit Chance Taken Debuff: Improved Faerie Fire, Misery
* Percentage Haste Increase (All Types): Improved Moonkin Aura, Swift Retribution
* Percentage Damage Increase: Ferocious Inspiration, Sanctified Retribution
* Critical Strike Chance Taken Debuff (All types): Heart of the Crusader, Totem of Wrath
* Melee Attack Speed Slow Debuff: Icy Touch, Infected Wounds, Judgements of the Just, Thunderclap
* Melee Hit Chance Reduction Debuff: Insect Swarm, Scorpid Sting
* Healing Debuff: Wound Poison, Aimed Shot, Mortal Strike, Furious Attacks
* Attack Power Debuff: Demoralizing Roar, Curse of Weakness, Demoralizing Shout
* Stat Multiplier Buff: Blessing of Kings
* Stat Add Buff: Mark of the Wild
* Agility and Strength Buff: Strength of Earth Totem, Horn of Winter
* Stamina Buff: Power Word: Fortitude
* Health Buff: Commanding Shout, Blood Pact
* Intellect Buff: Arcane Intellect, Fel Intelligence
* Spirit Buff: Divine Spirit, Fel Intelligence
* Damage Reduction Percentage Buff: Grace, Blessing of Sanctuary
* Percentage Increase Healing Received Buff: Tree of Life, Improved Devotion Aura
* Armor Increase Percentage Buff: Inspiration, Ancestral Healing
* Cast Speed Slow: Curse of Tongues, Slow, Mind-numbing Poison.

In each category, you can only benefit from the most powerful spell granting that effect. For example, Fel Intelligence grants spirit and intellect, both weaker than Arcane Intellect and Divine Spirit. If a player has Fel Intelligence and receives a stronger Arcane Intellect buff, he will gain the intellect value from Arcane Intellect and the spirit value from Fel Intelligence.

In most cases, fully-talented players will have exactly equal power on the strength of these buffs and debuffs. Fel Intelligence is an example of where one ability is weaker than others. The buffs in the "Increased Spell Power Buff" category are also not all the same potency, as they scale and grow in radically different ways. In virtually every other case, however, the buffs are equal. This means, for example, that fully-talented Battle Shout and Blessing of Might now grant the exact same amount of attack power.

In addition to this change, we also needed to address the "mana battery" roles in a raid. The mana regeneration effect they grant is no longer limited to their own party, and it no longer depends on the amount of damage they deal. Each time they trigger the mana regeneration effect, 10 people in their raid group will receive a buff which causes them to regenerate 0.5% of their maximum mana each second. This buff, Replenishment, will be given preferentially to raid members with the lowest mana, but will re-evaluate which raid members receive it each time it is fired. Replenishment is provided by Shadow Priests, Survival Hunters, and Retribution Paladins.

Finally, we have modified Heroism and Bloodlust to affect the entire raid. However, all affected raid members will be unable to cast or benefit from Bloodlust/Heroism for 5 minutes.

Below you will find a list of the changes to abilities which exhibit new behavior regardless of the exclusive categories. The changes usually mean the old behavior was removed and replaced by the new behavior. Numbers listed are for maximally-talented versions. Here is that list of changes:

* Improved Scorch: Increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Winter's Chill: Also increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Elemental Oath: Grants 5% spell crital strike to raid members.
* Improved Moonkin Aura: Grants 3% haste of all types.
* Earth and Moon: Increases spell damage taken from all schools by 13% on the target.
* Misery: Causes spells cast at the target to have +3% spell hit.
* Shadow Weaving: Buffs only self.
* Improved Shadow Bolt: Buffs only self.
* Expose Weakness: Buffs only self.
* Shadow Embrace: Buffs only self.
* Blood Pact: Grants health instead of Stamina.
* Fel Intelligence: Has replacement ranks that grant flat values of Intellect and Spirit.
* Frost Aura: Excludes properly against all other resistance buffs.
* Grace: Reduces damage taken by target by 3%.
* Rampage: Increases melee and ranged critical strike chance by 5% for the raid.
* Improved Faerie Fire: No longer benefits melee and ranged hit chance, only spell hit.
* Hunter's Mark: No longer increases attack power bonus from attacks against the target.
* Improved Hunter's Mark: No longer grants melee attack power.
* Sting (Hunter exotic pet - Wasp): Now acts as a minor armor debuff.
* Waylay: Attack speed reduction changed to 20%.
* Icy Touch: Only slows melee attack speed (not ranged or spell).
* Tree of Life: No longer grants healing based on spirit, grants 3% increased healing received to raid.
* Demonic Pact: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
* Focus Magic: Now buffs raid instead of debuffing monsters.
* Totem of Wrath: Now grants a flat amount of spell damage, and all enemies in its radius have an increased chance of being struck by criticals.
* Heroism: Cannot be recast while caster has Exhausted debuff, and those with Exhausted debuff cannot be affected by it.
* Bloodlust: Cannot be recast while caster has Sated debuff, and those with Sated debuff cannot be affected by it.
* Vampiric Touch: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on dealing damage.
* Hunting Party: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on specified shots.
* Judgements of the Wise: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on Judging.

[zubad]

wait so...they changed what was looking like a good reason to bring more than one mage to raids... Winter'schill and imp scorch are the same thing? What the....

[Seanabob]

http://blue.mmo-champion.com/12/9336795321-302--on-debuffs-buffs-and-raid-stacking.html

* Improved Scorch: Increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Winter's Chill: Also increases spell critical strike chance against the target.
* Improved Moonkin Aura: Grants 3% haste of all types.
* Earth and Moon: Increases spell damage taken from all schools by 13% on the target.
* Misery: Causes spells cast at the target to have +3% spell hit.
* Totem of Wrath: Now grants a flat amount of spell damage, and all enemies in its radius have an increased chance of being struck by criticals.
* Vampiric Touch: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on dealing damage.
* Hunting Party: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on specified shots.
* Judgements of the Wise: Grants Replenishment mana regeneration buff to up to 10 raid members on Judging.

[/quote]

I dont fully understand the shadowpriest one. Is it the ten closest to the priest? and it doesnt say anything about stacking or not stacking with other mana regtenerative effects like i heard they were doing away with?

[Trixie]

I dont fully understand the shadowpriest one. Is it the ten closest to the priest? and it doesnt say anything about stacking or not stacking with other mana regtenerative effects like i heard they were doing away with?

It will apply the regen buff to 10 people in the raid. They said they would like it to be on the people who have lowest mana. That buff will not stack.

To get 20 people in the raid with that buff at all times you would need two regen buffs in any combination:
--2 spriest
--1 spriest, 1 ret pally
--1 ret pally, 1 survival hunter
--2 ret pallys

To get everybody in the raid to have the regen you'd need three of these casters. Since you're almost guaranteed to have 5 classes that don't use mana (warriors, deathknights, rogues, feral druids) you will only ever need (be able to use) two regen players.

[Seanabob]

These shadowpriest changes make no sense to me....like at all...[Misery] Why change it to 3% hit for a 5 point talent that was not broken to begin with?...[Shadow Weaving] Making it a self DPS booster doesn't fix our DPS bliz, you fucking tards, it ruins the synergy we had with warlocks and would have had with DKs. If you want to fix our DPS then fix our fucking [Mind Flay] scaling, dont ruin a couple of perfectly fine talents...THEN when you think about it, OH 3% hit is a good thing! right? Howeverr it doesnt stack with Balance Druids imped FF...YAY! Soooo not only are we getting nerfed to hell with this whole VT on 10 people and it being based on ones mana, We're losing the only other 2 things we were brought into a raid for! Misery and Shadow Weaving!!!Seriously bliz, fuck you..Fucking moronic talents ([Dispersion] 3min CD Reduces damage by 90% and increases Health and Mana by 6%/second. 5 second duration) on a fucking class that doesnt have mana problems and give all the other hybrids some awesome AoE instant cast type shit, IE Shamans Thunderstorm or whatever. Or a Boomkins Typhoon.... It used to be fun to play shadowpriests..........fucking bullshit....god dammit...cant wait to roll my deathknight

[Trixie]

These shadowpriest changes make no sense to me....like at all...[Misery] Why change it to 3% hit for a 5 point talent that was not broken to begin with?...[Shadow Weaving] Making it a self DPS booster doesn't fix our DPS bliz, you fucking tards, it ruins the synergy we had with warlocks and would have had with DKs. If you want to fix our DPS then fix our fucking [Mind Flay] scaling, dont ruin a couple of perfectly fine talents...THEN when you think about it, OH 3% hit is a good thing! right? Howeverr it doesnt stack with Balance Druids imped FF...YAY! Soooo not only are we getting nerfed to hell with this whole VT on 10 people and it being based on ones mana, We're losing the only other 2 things we were brought into a raid for! Misery and Shadow Weaving!!!Seriously bliz, fuck you..Fucking moronic talents ([Dispersion] 3min CD Reduces damage by 90% and increases Health and Mana by 6%/second. 5 second duration) on a fucking class that doesnt have mana problems and give all the other hybrids some awesome AoE instant cast type shit, IE Shamans Thunderstorm or whatever. Or a Boomkins Typhoon.... It used to be fun to play shadowpriests..........fucking bullshit....god dammit...cant wait to roll my deathknight

Um...

With the current change to VT they can massively buff Shadow Priest damage without having to worry about it totally trivializing content through overpowered mana regen. This change to VT is actually very very good.

Misery seems unfortunate, I'll give you that.

Shadow Weaving not synergizing with warlocks is unfortunate but I'd expect it to be increased from the current percent to something much stronger. It's also nice that it is becoming a self-buff since you won't lose it as you switch targets and it won't count against the debuff limit on a mob (yes, some raids have debuffs drop off depending on which class balance they bring).

[Bawse]

One that pisses me off is that Heroism although raid wide , has a 5 min cooldown raid wide. Meaning no more chaining Heroism's

[Trixie]

One that pisses me off is that Heroism although raid wide , has a 5 min cooldown raid wide. Meaning no more chaining Heroism's

Something had to be done. Raid Leaders across the world had become addicted to Hero/Bloodlust like it was heroin. There isn't a night that goes by where I don't try to stack shaman (admittedly for their totems as well).

It's not much fun for me to tell somebody they need to waitlist because they're playing the "wrong" class.

[Seanabob]

So from what i got as far as the VT debuff is we're going to be giving out a fixed amount of mana right? based on the recieving parties mana pool? what im trying to say about that is one of the main reasons i enjoyed playing my shadow priest is because i loved the challenge of keeping my parties mana full. So now unless they seriously make us top tier dps capable i cannot seriously see a shadowpriest making a raid over a holy priest. Thats why i am mad, we will have almost no place in future end game content as of right now. We're a low dps low utility caster....

However, like you said trix, this can open the door for us being a top dpser. i had not thought of it that way. and now feel a wincy bit better

[Raidwiper]

No, it's random, placing a debuff [assigned to you] on the 10 people in the raid with the lowest mana at that instant.

If there is a second spriest, those 10 people will be skipped over [cuz they are debuffed from yours] and the 2nd spriests VT will hit the next 10 lowest at THAT instant

...and so on, and so forth.

[Trixie]

lolololol... more blue

http://blue.mmo-champion.com/10/9336801 ... iable.html

Class diversity in raid
That is pretty much the point. No class brings anything so unique that you want them to come at the expense of others. You should earn your raid spot because you know how to tank and have some decent gear and a guild who can back you up. Maybe you're a great leader or maybe you don't argue. Maybe you've got a great sense of humor or are a good guild recruiter. All of those are better reasons to get into a group IMHO than because your buff is a unique snowflake. Quite honestly I'd rather raid with my friends than some jerk who has the perfect buff. And I really don't want to send one of my friends off to reroll a level 1 dude because we both happened to choose rogues at first level six months ago and now our group is suffering for want of a buff. If you can tank, you'll get into raids.

[Trixie]

does this mean i'm getting kicked out of the guild?

Ur my perfect snowflake.

[Douma]

does this mean i'm getting kicked out of the guild?

Ur my perfect snowflake.

Cutest RP moment ever...I think so

[Visike]

What this means is the oomkins and ret pallies will get a chance (finally).

[Bannination]

What this means is the oomkins and ret pallies will get a chance (finally).

No.

[Skyshatter]

What this means is the oomkins and ret pallies will get a chance (finally).

No.

[Seanabob]

Boomkins i can see, with their plus 13% spell dmg buff...But Retadins...

What this means is the oomkins and ret pallies will get a chance (finally).

No.

[Seanabob]

Boomkins i can see, with their plus 13% spell dmg buff...But Retadins...

Malediction warlock can do the same debuff + more... and it's more reliable.

Can they really? when was this implemented?

edit: nvm, i just looked it up and jaysus..no wonder they did away with misery Oo

[Azaurosa]

Hunters got a nerf bat on that one...

IMP Hunters Mark--- no longer affects melee... the suck
Expose Weakness---- Only buffs self.... Buh Bye need for survival hunter

I really hope I read that wrong.

[Douma]

Hunters got a nerf bat on that one...

IMP Hunters Mark--- no longer affects melee... the suck
Expose Weakness---- Only buffs self.... Buh Bye need for survival hunter

I really hope I read that wrong.

If anything hunters looked like they are getting hooked up overall.

[Trixie]

Hunters got a nerf bat on that one...

IMP Hunters Mark--- no longer affects melee... the suck
Expose Weakness---- Only buffs self.... Buh Bye need for survival hunter

I really hope I read that wrong.

THe point is to not need specific classes for their buffs.
As trixie quoted above:

Maybe you're a great leader or maybe you don't argue. Maybe you've got a great sense of humor or are a good guild recruiter. All of those are better reasons to get into a group IMHO than because your buff is a unique snowflake. Quite honestly I'd rather raid with my friends than some jerk who who always claims his healthstone is on CD when standing in the fire or who pulls aggro and then claims "hey guyz, FD resisted five timez."

fixt.

[Douma]

Trooth

[Visike]

wtb new signups!

[Trixie]

wtb new signups!

I don't follow.

[Amenton]

I know this is an old thread but I can't help but wonder about certain raid compositions and balancing buffs. Esp in 10 man.

Questions:

#1
Officers, do you a specific addon for balancing all the buffs in raid like the one on mmo-champ or the in game add-on RaidComp?
Anything else besides those that you have found useful in building raids?

#2
Building a 10 man raid comp has proved very fun.....have really enjoyed the last few weeks...
The most ideal comp I have been able to come up with so far is this one:
http://raidcomp.mmo-champion.com/?c=2eg ... 0000000000

Now it only has 2 healers and my current 10 man comp would require a few people play off-specs but it has every buff covered....

And the one we ran with last week in 10 man is this one:
http://raidcomp.mmo-champion.com/?c=2uh ... 0000000000

Any suggestions on a slightly more optimal combination to maximize group dynamics/buffs/debuffs?
theorycrafting here - not gonna ask that people in my 10 man respec........yet