Blizzcon 2015 Discussion

[Thisgame]

so they basically want to make arcane easier?

I would say the answer is yes in a sense. I think the more correct way of saying it is that they want to make it less punishing to mistakes?

[Curnivore]

so they basically want to make arcane easier?

I would say the answer is yes in a sense. I think the more correct way of saying it is that they want to make it less punishing to mistakes?

More intuitive I'd say. Right now it requires 3rd party theorycrafting to know the breakpoints of mana before even starting playing. With this it might only need that for the niches of mini burns.

[Rinoa]

I'm not sure if easier is necessarily the goal, but less convoluted for sure. I think Curnivore makes a good point. In order to find out how to conserve properly you basically need to go to a third party site, and that's not what Blizzard wants in their class design if we look at things in a historical sense.

[nathyiel]

Here's my first TC post. It's on Glacial Spike the previewed talent. There's so much to say about it so expect a long post.

Introduction
Here is my first attempt of theorycrafting for Legion. I’m starting with Glacial Spike. It’s a new talent but it really look like Deep Freeze for those who played Cataclysm. I loved this spell and the feeling of power with its 6-digits numbers. A little too big as it have been nerfed hard soon after launch.
What make these new version interesting is the way it work .

Data

• Glacial Spike: 3s cast, need 5 icicles for cast, massive damage + 5 icicles damages, freeze for 4s (break on damage).
• Icicle : generated by Frostbolt, store damage equal to mastery value of Frostbolt damage, last 30s.

Stat Analysis
Haste value will be great as both Frostbolt and Glacial Spike are casted.
Mastery won't be that interesting as it depend on Frostbolt damage.
Critical will be good because of the high damage of Glacial Spike. Shatter cap is less a factor.
The way the talent work promote Haste. Mastery and Crit value will depend on what can generate Icicle, if it include spell that use shatter or not, etc.


Shatter
It haven’t been stated if Glacial Spike benefit from shatter or not? Logically it should on non-immune target as it freeze too but I will consider it’s not the case so it will include fight against Elite/Boss too.

Giving Shatter to it can be interesting. It can make balance in PvP easier by removing it from possible Deep Freeze's like combo. The contrary is true too.
Give it a way to obtain "act as if the target were frozen" might be interesting as it might help balance in PvE. It also give consistency in that the crit chance will be the same regarding of the mob immunity to freeze. It can make a good perk for Artifact Weapon


Rotation Analysis
Depending of the value of Frozen Orb and Ice Lance with Finger of Frost, the rotation may look like this:

1. Frozen Orb
2. Glacial Spike
3. FoF-Ice Lance
4. Frostbolt

Without haste, it will be a Glacial Spike after 5 Frostbolt and 2 instants spell (Ice Lance/Frozen orb) for around 16s cycle. At 25% haste, the cycle duration drop to ~13s.


Any spell cast that not generating Icicle will result in delaying Glacial Spike cast.
The maximisation of the up-time can lead to bad gameplay (only Frostbolt and Glacial Spike) without care. A way to keep the rotation inline can be to make Ice Lance be able to generate Icicle too with Artifact perks or talent. Even a chance to proc it might be able to keep Frozen Orb/Ice Lance interesting to cast, if the proc chance isn't to low.
It will promote to take only talent/perks with passive effect and spell that generate Icicle. It's not really a bad things for Talent but it will require some specific attention with Artifact perks to not result in making a spell useless because of not wasting GCD on it result in a DPS gain.

Looking at how it work with a spell like Water jet is a good example. The spell in it-self have little impact as the rotation already include a lot of Frostbolt cast. But the resulting Finger of Frost can go to waste if the value of FoF-Ice Lance gcd is too low compared to the gain on global DPS for not casting it.

The possibility to remove Water Elemental with talent, may be impacting depending on how the damage shift is done. If it's done by extending Icicle generation to other spell (Ice Lance ?) and a small damage boost, then it will result in an huge synergie and might make it a *mandatory* talent to take with Glacial Spike. It may depend on other talent choice.


Damage
The presentation show damage to be *Massive*. So we can expect it to hit hard but how much.
It’s way to early for number but comparison can be made.
It have a 15s equivalent cooldown, half of Comet Storm/Ice Nova. Another factor will be its position on the talent. In the mid row, it will like to say this spell is good but there’s more powerful talent. On the last row, it’s more a talent that have a big impact on the gameplay so expect big damage of it. The word Massive may be a good hint for the latter.
On the rotation, the previous analysis show that it need to be better than Frostbolt and at least equal to Ice Lance. Because of its cast time, it should have bigger damage than Ice Lance or it won’t be interesting to use. But I can’t be too much ahead without breaking the rotation, without additional effect on Ice Lance.
Result : GS = 2*FoF-IL
For comparison with actual spell, it should make it somewhere in-between BF-FFB and IN on main target.

Should icicle damage be add or not?
I would have say no as icicle damage will be done in all case. But it should be taken into account for determining spell priority.


Questions

• Are Glacial Spike’s crit chance increased by Shatter?
• Did it replace Deep Freeze if it still exist?
• Can it have “act as frozen” at some point (talent/artifact)?
• Will we have a way to instant cast it ?
• If Splitting Ice effect is kept, how will it work for icicle with the Glacial Spike talent ?

Personal note
Icicle will need an UI update : change it into a resource when the talent is taken or show an UI alert at 5 stacks. It will also require a specific animation, other or in addition to the usual big frozen crystal.

It will be very sensitive to movement with the 3s cast, unless Ice Flow still exist. The 3s cast duration seem ok but might depend on other factor to test like rotation feeling, interaction with other talents/perks, type of fight and expected haste on gear. The cast time will give it an huge Risk/Result ratio in PvP.

As it have no cooldown, it will be very haste hungry, resulting in an huge impact on gameplay. It will give a dynamic rotational feeling. That's not bad after an expansion about micro-management of proc and short cooldown. If a talent like Comet Storm is still here, it might be interesting make the comparison.

I'm really curious to see what are the other talent and the perks from the Artifact weapon.

[Caimion]

Correct me if I'm wrong, but the way I read it you can't cast any FoF-Ice Lances while you're building up icicles to use Glacial Spike, since casting an Ice Lance will make you lose all your icicles. This seems to lend itself to a strict Frostboltx5 - Glacial Spike - dump FoF-Ice Lance - Frostboltx5 - Glacial Spike - dump FoF-Ice Lance, etc. type of rotation, not a priority list as you gave.

Edit: Oh, nevermind, forgot to read the passive on the GSpike talent.

[nathyiel]

Yep, the description is a little tricky if read too quickly. I will add it for clarification.

The most important things to note about this talent is that it change the whole rotation. And if "Massive" is real for the damage then it will be central in the rotation.

I'm clearly curious what will be other talent. Seem like we will have a whole row of talent that play around our mastery with one that will change it completely.