New Shammy Changes

[Jaycub]

What about keeping it the way it is now but at full 5 mechanic on top of the bonuses you get the insta cast modifier but it resets your mechanic back to zero? Would that not solve the complaints about it being a nerf due to losing insta casts?

Also unless anything has changed since t3 cap don't you still have to stop to cast something with full mechanic anyways because of some limitation or whatever tied to insta casting abilities with a cast time normally?

[Ghostweed]

@Jaykub

Yes, keep insta cast alive and add gork/mork switch w/o cd (CD here makes it a nerf, keep in mind that its different than Change da plan on BO).

Yes, u have to stop for a split second, something like 0,1 s or u switch to walk. Did u know that u can cast all "stationary" spells while walking (u still need to stop for 0,1s at the begonning of the casting tho)? This way u can gheal on the move or BB fleeing target - but its still very situational and bit tedious to manage.

[Qwack]

What about keeping it the way it is now but at full 5 mechanic on top of the bonuses you get the insta cast modifier but it resets your mechanic back to zero? Would that not solve the complaints about it being a nerf due to losing insta casts?

Also unless anything has changed since t3 cap don't you still have to stop to cast something with full mechanic anyways because of some limitation or whatever tied to insta casting abilities with a cast time normally?

This is a good suggestion. So basically Waaagh is on an incremental decline when at 4 or take it to 5 and you can insta cast and drop a full stack back to 0. I think its definitely worth testing out and may solve the whole Insta Rez, GHeal thing. Plus the 5 stack you don't need is really annoying atm.

[Qwack]

Ive said it before and I going to say it again:
Any change that force shamy into static caster is baddue to the cloth armor and close to none CC. No insta cast = death and no lifetaf aint going to save it.

Yes, u can push out more dps for even less survivability. Yes u can gheal more if u stand still. But u cannot moral pump through insta Da big Waagh anymore, u cannot insta cast BB fused with Hurst it dont it and switch the tide on the run, u canot insts res w/o tactic anymore, no insta gheal/big heal ,u cannot switch mork/gork on the fly. = less planning, more gheal spamming..i say its nerf :-/

No insta rez is HUGE. I forgot to mention that in my original post. When I play DPS Shammy I am always on Rez duty should the need arise because the Waaagh is always there for it. Overall, that makes the new changes a nerf.

[Azarael]

Been trying to hold back on commenting but I can't any more.

Friendly reminders that:

- If you are heal AM or Shaman, you should not be complaining about lack of instant rez or heal, because you don't have DPS stacks to power them. I cannot believe people are bringing this up, so I'm going to repeat it for emphasis: If you're heal AM/Shaman, you weren't getting instant cast group heals or rez anyway - unless you blew 5 DPS spells to power it. If that's the kind of action economy that floats your boat, then I don't know what to say. Somehow the other healers manage to get by on a 3 second rez and yours is still 1.8 second cast with ANY VALUE OF DPS POINTS.

- If you are DPS AM or Shaman, you should not be complaining about not being able to drop one (1) poor scaling group heal on the move for every 5 DPS spells, because your healing in general was buffed by an incredible amount.

- If you are heal AM or Shaman, you should not be complaining that the changes nerfed your move healing.

Old move healing: HoTs, G'FI, any heal (with 5 DPS spells having been cast!)
New move healing: HoTs, G'FI, I'TT! (with any heal stack), FoDG (with any heal stack)

- If you are hybrid AM/Shaman, I don't know why you'd even complain because the mechanic not only solves your MAD, it gives you massive bonuses for flipping between 1 DPS and 1 Heal stack.

- Instant cast at 5 mechanic is absolutely pointless, because as aforementioned, heal AM/Shaman didn't and don't accumulate DPS stacks and DPS AM/Shaman didn't and don't accumulate heal stacks. Not only that - it ruins the mechanic, because when I have 5 stacks of heal built up, I want to use them on I'TT or FoDG on the move, or on 5 damage spells. I do not want them consumed for an instant cast effect, that absolutely destroys the mechanic.

I think with this latest patch, some people need to stop viewing the changes through the prism of "how they played before" and judge absolutely anything that impacts on how they played before as a "nerf" while conveniently disregarding all the benefits provided by the mechanic and how they outweigh the losses. Here I am sitting wondering if I've overbuffed AM/Shaman, and yet when you read the forum, there are people thinking the class was nerfed!

[Ghostweed]

Well u are right at the most of the things, but let me cherry pick 2 problems while playing as DPS:

1) no insta rez - the stack is here, but i have to stop for 1,8 sec and i dont like being static.

2) Im sorry, but with all respect u are wrong on "how to play dps shamy". Ofc u have those heal stacks! U spam HoT everywhere, u bubble up, u use Gork fix it on the run (This was ur best buff to shammy!!!). The point is to :

a) prepare for dps burst rotation (insta infused BB or uber Bunch of Waaagh or powered Bleed for me).
b) get to M2 in no time through insta moral pump bomb (so u can spam BB/gheal on demand)

Anyway ur are right, i keep on holding to the "old playstyle", as i tryied to polish it as much as posibble.

[Azarael]

Let us assume I am wrong about DPS AM/Shaman flow (I don't tend to play DPS).

The mechanic's still a buff - because if you're in heal stacks, all of the DPS spells you're going to unload have either -40% AP cost and -40% cast time, or they have 25% additional damage. If you're in DPS stacks, the heals that you're unloading have the same adjustment, including shields and cleanse (cooldown) AND they're upleveled to level 40 AND they have more stat contribution than before.

I mean, don't get me wrong - part of the purpose of Experimental Mode is to see if people do believe exactly what they're saying, by gauging how many people are making use of the new mode. But I think I need to make clear that the intent overall was to buff these classes, not to nerf them - so some of the reaction surprises me, especially in light of fixes in today's patch to I'TT! healing and reliability and FoDG.

[roadkillrobin]

I've played and tried around with pretty much all the changes done atm. And there is NOTHING with these changes that increase my effectiveness as a healing Shaman. It's actually a straight up nerf to my keep seige morale pump build as i no longer can use my Gedoff! at instant cast to supress fire from the balcony in a keep seiges when attacking keeps. I played around with a Fury of the Green groupheal build for a couple of hours and even with being able to cast this one on the move and effictivly have a groupheal on the move it was much less effective then just spreading out hots while running.
I understand that you're trying to help the class, but i feel there wasn't enough research goin into here what builds people are using, when they are using em and why they are using em. The main ORVR warband build will get hit by the nerfbat if these changes go trough. If you need help what classes need for warband setting just ask for help. I feel like there isn't much talking about this at all from the development tbh but theree are classes in the game that are straight up not wellcome in a compteive warband style of playing. Much like how Maguses/Engies feels in scenarios/roaming pre experimental changes.

Edit: Current warband buiild
http://waronlinebuilder.org/#career=sha ... :5306:5317:

[Jaycub]

>i no longer can use my Gedoff! at instant cast to supress fire from the balcony in a keep seiges when attacking keeps.

Is this really your only argument? It takes 1.2 seconds longer to knock people off a keep wall. Also just ignore everything az outlined for you 3 posts above.

[Qwack]

Let us assume I am wrong about DPS AM/Shaman flow (I don't tend to play DPS).

The mechanic's still a buff - because if you're in heal stacks, all of the DPS spells you're going to unload have either -40% AP cost and -40% cast time, or they have 25% additional damage. If you're in DPS stacks, the heals that you're unloading have the same adjustment, including shields and cleanse (cooldown) AND they're upleveled to level 40 AND they have more stat contribution than before.

Yes the above is true and the buff on paper looks good if the combat flow was a constant balance tween damage or heals like 1,1 or 5,5 or 9,9. But the real combat dynamics are much more chaotic than that. A full damage rotation is necessary to kill anything and once a DPS Shammy has a 5 stack heal without anything to heal it really is hindered now. Also, I can't stress enough how important it is to have Insta Rez, Insta Group Heal or Insta BB ready for a DPS Shammy. With all Waaagh instas gone, and having to manually work down a 5 stack heal waaagh even if nothing needs healing just to rebuild Damage Waaagh, and losing some "on the run" motion... one has to carefully consider if it this really is a net buff. Im leaning to this overall being a slight nerf, but I have more testing to do.

This honestly is not an opinion based on nostalgia. Personally, I really am trying to make this new stuff work because there are some real gems in it, but we can't ignore the unintended consequences and that's why we are testing it and providing feedback.