Zealot - mastery tree rework discussion

[AxelF]

I've been eagerly awaiting the arrival of cc in the hope that it might provide an opportunity to have a look at the mastery tree layout of two of my favourite classes - Rune Priest and Zealot, which honestly are just a total mess at the moment.

I don't think this is a balancing issue, more a quality of life change so I've stuck it here - please move if you think another forum is more appropriate. I think heal RP/Zealots are in a really good place right now, although there's no real logic to which tree your mastery points go into, or what core abilities are boosted by each tree.

The dps spec though is seriosuly hampered by the mastery tree layout. This is not an attempt to buff either spec (though dps spec will be more viable in solo, group and WB play) but more a quality of life change for each spec, and an attempt to make the tree layout more logical. I'd be really interested in the thoughts of other RPs/Zealots. See here viewtopic.php?f=15&t=27346 for the RP discussion.

The problem as I see it is that the Zealot mastery trees are completely jumbled together - I heard a suggestion that they were originally meant to be split into ST, AoE and something else, but even that looks a bit dubious. Below is the current mastery tree layout with a quick note about what each ability does and what each trees contains.



Next is my proposed layout of the mastery trees - I've tried to reorganise them into heal, utility and dps focussed trees.



3 points
No change

5 points
Rearrangement of the Rituals to suit heal and utility trees, dps tree is left with chance for shield on hit.

7 points
No change. Swirling Vortex in the DPS tree is very lacklustre for a 7 point tactic and I feel needs a total rework, but that's for a separate balance forum discussion.

9 points
Only change is in the Witchcraft (now utility) tree, where Mirror of Madness has come down from 13 points. Damage values can be adjusted accordingly if needed. Storm of Ravens has been moved out to the dps tree. Boon of Tzeentch in the Alchemy tree I feel needs a total rework to something more heal focussed, but that's for a separate balance forum discussion. The tooltip also shows 150% of the damage as healing compared to the RP's 100%, not sure if this is just a tooltip error though.

11 points
Changer's Touch and Tzeentch's Grip swapped places - the 'shield on heal' Tzeentch's Grip fits much more naturally in a heal tree, and likewise 'heal debuff on crit hit' ought to be in the dps tree.

13 points
Probably the biggest changes - Aethyric Shock (stagger) moves from the heal tree to the utility tree, Winds of Insanity moves from the dps tree to the heal tree. Storm of Ravens - the Zealot's main ST dps ability moves from the 9 point spot in the utility tree to the 13 point spot in the dps tree. Damage can be adjusted upwards as a result, and even better (if possible?) the 10% strikethrough that was added to the Transference tactic could be tied to this ability (activated by unlocking this ability, though not sure if this is possible? Ideally the strikethrough would remain aaplicable to all dps abilities though, not just Storm of Ravens).

15 points
Unchanged.

As mentioned, DPS Zealots will see the biggest benefit from these changes, as currently their three main abilities - ST damage, AoE damage and heal debuff are split across all three mastery trees. Bringing them together will hopefully make DPS Zealot a more viable option. Right now the choice is between a strictly WB-orientated spec that takes the AoE damage spell and heal debuff which is absolutely useless outside of a WB setting as you have no real ST damage options; or a useful solo/small group spec that takes the ST damage ability and heal debuff that then has no role in a WB setting as you cannot provide meaningful AoE DPS.

This is an attempt to bring some sense to the mastery trees though that will then allow balancing to take place - I don't think it's worth proposing changes to individual abilities at the moment before some bigger scale reorganisation happens. This isn't about single specs having access to all the useful toys (with the exception of the DPS tree granting access to all of the DPS abilities, though that doesn't seem unreasonable!). See below for comparison of common current and proposed available specs.

Spoiler:

This is the common heal spec at the moment for RR 60:

RoR.builders - Zealot

It grants access to the increased crit chance on flah heal tactic, AP rune, stagger and chance to grant a shield on heal tactic.

Alternatively you could go with:

RoR.builders - Zealot

Which loses the stagger but gives access to Winds of Insanity, with a few points left over. This spec can be used whatever your RR.

Under this propsed rework, a standard mastery spec for heal Zealot at RR60 might look like:



Giving access to the increased crit chance on flah heal tactic, AP rune, Winds of Insanity, chance to grant a shield on heal tactic and also Mirror of Madness. It would also benefit from the fact that points spent in the heal tree now boost heal abilities rather than a mish mash of heal and DPS abilities.

Alternatively you could go with the following:



Which loses Winds of Insanity and Mirror of Madness but still grants access to the stagger.

For a DPS spec, your current options at RR60 are something like:

RoR.builders - Zealot

This gives you a ST DPS ability, AP Ritual, increased crit chance on two DPS abilities, heal debuff on crit hit tactic and Demon Spittle debuff tactic. Crucially though it lacks an effective AoE DPS ability.

RoR.builders - Zealot

This gives you an AoE DPS ability, AP Ritual, increased crit chance on two DPS abilities, heal debuff on crit hit tactic and Demon Spittle debuff tactic. Crucially though it lacks an effective ST DPS ability.

With the new rearranged trees, a RR60 DPS spec might look like:



Giving access to the ST and AoE damaging abilities, Demon Spittle debuff tactic, heal debuff on crit hit tactic, AP Ritual, and Mirror of Madness. As with the heal spec, it would benefit from the fact that points spent in the DPS tree now boost DPS abilities rather than a mix of everything.

These are not intended to be the best specs necessarily, it's just to show that there are still choices to be made - you can't have everything in one spec.

[Dankmeme]

Just why???

[AxelF]

1) Trees are a mess atm - if you were designing the class now there's no way you'd arrange them like that. It'd be like giving tanks three 2H abilities and putting one in each of the three mastery trees.

2) Because there's no 'heal' or 'dps' tree the core abilities are associated to the three trees seemingly randomly, if you want to boost your core heal or dps abilities there's no one or two trees to put points in.

3) Some of the abilities need reworking and balance proposal suggestions, but there's little point while the trees are such a mess - you could design a new heal related ability but what if it ends up in the middle tree? Healers need to already spec high in left and right trees.

4) Will allow for more viable DPS spec without having to respec every time you want to switch between WB and solo/small group play. The other heal classes' trees are laid out much more sensibly with one or two DPS focused trees and one or two heal focused trees.

[live4treasure]

Not an expert in zealot by any means, but I wanted to ask, viable for what content specifically? I ask because I've heard from many people that DPS RP and Zealot are the only viable heal/dps hybrids for large scale pvp, albeit at the cost of small scale.

[Ramasee]

Original Design is left tree is single target, middle tree is over time (mostly single target), right tree is for AoE.

Zealots/runepriests have the best set of base abilities between the healer types, and suffer the poor tree design because of it.

There might be a better way to discuss this for both classes. Start a balance discussion about whether or not the trees as a whole need to be rearranged. The community can weigh in on the matter. Then if we believe they should be entirely redesigned rather than tweaked, we can discuss what each of the three trees should look like. From there, discussion can delve into more specifics about what abilities belong where and why and when.

[AxelF]

There are a couple of current 'viable' dps builds and this would be more of a quality of life change. The spec with an AoE dps ability and heal debuff is great on an organised warband but basically prevents you from doing anything else without respeccing as you have no ST dps abilities worth talking about, so you're useless for solo/small group roaming.

Likewise the spec with ST dps ability and heal debuff is great for soloing/small groups, but no decent WB will take you as you've no AoE damage worth talking about.

They're the only heal class with its dps abilities spread over all three trees, and this reorganisation will allow for further tweaks like new potential 15 point abilities. Currently which tree would have the dps ability at the top, and which the heal ability? Also in the current state, putting in a 15 point dps ability would prevent you from taking two of the classes' three current dps tools.

[Valfaros]

Playing dps zealot for quite some time and this looks terrible. How is this any better now damaging abilitys are even more scattered around.
To your builds:
First build: Why would you want MoM in a healing build.
Second build: This looks more useful.
But why are you presenting 2 healing builds? You state yourself healing zealot is fine and I agree. Having all heal abilitys in the heal tree is probabbly a buff what for if it's in a good place.
Damaging builds: Well either you go ST DPS or you go AoE. Since either you spec a little bit more deff to be able to withstand closer ranges or you go full glass canon and be able to deal ST DPS. I don't really know what your builds are but ....

Your new tree well to put it kind sucks. Let's assume at all times you want RoI. So if you spec for aoe now there is now way for you to get. CT + CA + WoI + SD a common and strong pick before impossible now.
So for AoE your changes already are meh.

For ST it's even worse with SoR at such a high position you can't take a usefull 13p abilty now. Yes MoM the worst 13p ability in the universe is now 9p but it's still bad and while I used it for a few weeks I couldn't find a way to effectifly use it except for harrasing a rp currently running away which would have died anyway. Now for ST it's impossible to get SoR + CD + BoT + (AS or transference, if you have anni like me you can actually get them both). While SD is nice if you get it on a glassy ST dps zealot you face quite often death even with guard therefore not really something I would pick. You are in all cases better to group up with a waaagh bo which are quite rare but on some occasions I could get my bo to do it.

Now let's not talk about builds but skills in general and why their new position seems strange.
What is WoI doing in the heal tree. Even though it might be usefull to a healer it's an aoe ability.
Why is SoR justified to be so expensive it's not any better than other channels from other classes.

In most cases you need RoI. Now to get it you have to skill into a tree only offering MoM or the stagger. While the stagger is nice it again makes SoR impossible to get.

Then what is BoT doing in the heal tree yes it heals but it's useless to a healer furthermore it's also the hardest hitting ability a dps zealot has.
Now it's the only ability in the whole tree worth getting for dps zealot which makes it unjustified to skill because you loose to many other skills.

DPS zealot already has to get as much abilitys as possible from his trees since he only has 5 damaging (including the dot) core skills. Which is one of the problems I have with it and which is why I still wear anni.

The old setup was pretty clear while different from other classes. It was Single Target no matter heal or dmg, dots and hots and aoe. The trees are quite fine I think and atm there are quite a few builds possible. I would say the aoe dps build and the heal builds work very well while the ST builds underperforms a bit. The only thing which would improve st dps zealot would be some skills dps skills getting core.

[peterthepan3]

This looks like a proposal to me....

[Valarion]

I do embrace any kind of change that can make some sense of the sheer mess that is the Zealot AND RP trees. While zealot is in an "ok" place oveall, some tactics are terribly underpowered and need some minor love.

After leveling both of these classes I still cant figure out wtf weed Mythic was smoking. I mean where the holy F is the heal tree?

[roadkillrobin]

I'll try to explain why Zealots and RP Mastery trees look the way they do.
It's part of the design of the healer classes all together.

All healer classes mechanics were designed to be hybrids where to fully utilize the classes you would swap from healing to use damage/debuff skills every now and then into your rotation.

Archmage/Shaman have their 5-1 mechanic. 5 Heals which all powers upp a dps spell.
DoK/WP have their resource gain mechanic. Heal- Heal - Smash - Smash - heal- heal

RP/Zealot came without the Rune of Breaking/Harbinger. They were designed to be a free choise of cast and instead of representing weakness/strenght from a mechanic the strenght is the free choise of skill type but limited by the situational mastery you have chosen.

The reason this was implemted badly is partly due to TTK doesn't allow for healers to really waste GCD/AP to use skills at the rate it was designed for and partly that the game wasn't built for Deft Defender and Parry/Block rates + Hold The Line which means the free cast often goes wasted.

The implementation of Rune of Breaking and Harbinger toggle fixed 1 issue but complety trashed the whole class concept. I would look into fixing these skills instead and instead of being a toggle maybe it should be something that activates as a passive mechanic somehow.

Example: All Alchamy heals have a 25% chance of Triggering Harbinger of Alchamy - Next Alchemy spell will be casted using healing statistics and also vice verse All Alchamy dps skills have a 25% chance to triggering Harbinger and next Alchemy heal uses dps statistic. Without changing the primary stat that the current toggles does.