So after taking some time and testing the changes on the ptr (at least those that could be tested and were not broken), I figured I would share my thoughts.
NEW ANIMATIONS/VFX
Although I am not a fan of the new asc model, it kind of grew on me while using it, especially with the Windstrike animation. Each other animation was a slam dunk from my PoV.
Stormbringer changes:
Some pretty small nerfs and some nice new effects. Overall I think it is pretty positive overall, but a few issues need addressing.
General msw gain nerfs:
Those seem pretty minor and to be expected, I hardly felt any impact from those.
Lightning Conduit/Electroshock:
Both of those had minimal impact but at least they were an upgrade over the slow. Lightning Conduit felt abit TOO random to be of particular use.
Nature’s Protection:
A plain win, nothing bad about it. Both in terms of flavor and from what we needed.
Surging Currents:
At higher gear levels might have a use because it makes our heal hit like Lay on Hands. Do not know if that can survive with current tuning and the balance team goals.
Arc Discharge:
It feels like a roundabout way of adding another proc instead of just making tempest give you X msw charges. The gameplay remains the same of using LB/CL after tempest, we just need to track another buff for some weird reason. Oh and it does not interact with the other parts of our hero spec.
Totemic Changes:
Overall very happy with the changes to the hero talent tree. A big plus now is that it has a clear identity that works off the elementalist playstyle.
Reactivity:
This is one the best new additions. Although hot hand was bugged, it still felt amazing. I expect when hot hand is fixed, it will feel even better.
Whirling Elements:
Fire and Air seem a pretty good fit and make the hero spec play pretty well. Earth is kind of a miss, as I do not feel that good about using flame shock as a rotational button. Maybe adding that functionality on another ability?
Imbuement Mastery:
Nice passive damage, but at least it is thematic, and makes our imbues more important.
Spec Tree Changes:
Generally the area where I am more worried with the current changes. Most of them do not “feel” that good, and I cannot really understand the reasoning behind them.
Flowing Spirits/Witch Doctor’s Ancestry nerf:
Ok for the elephant in the room: The “good” part for Flowing spirits is that the wolves are not random but spawn off certain abilities used. This is a pretty good effect but overall this talent feels like a “non choice”.
What I mean by that is that we already have a steady spawn of wolves with witch doctors (which is getting nerfed for some reason), and it feels like a “similar” playstyle between those 2. Fails as a choice since we will just sim which is “better” and our rotation will not be impacted much by that choice.
Overall I dislike both the nerf, and do not see the new talent providing much of a new “addition” to how the spec plays.
Lightning Spark:
While a good idea, it kind of fails on the fact that it is random. Spreading flame shock is a nice effect to have on the start of a pull, not so much as an rng proc inside the fight. I believe if that was on a “timer” it would work much better, by being able to “pool” it and use it at the start.
Molten Thunder:
Great general addition, although the proc is pretty low. Might be a good idea to make each stormsurge to reduce cd by X seconds.
Ice Strike:
Overall I think this is the worst change together with the Witch Doctor’s nerf. Ice strike removes a rotational ability that had good interactions with our spec, just to make it a random proc that hardly interacts/changes our rotation. I think that there are other abilities that could be “pruned” and their effects being rolled to other abilities (looking at flame shock).
Thorim’s invocation:
Pretty positive choices. Nothing bad to say here.
Primal Maelstrom:
Primordial Wave already has too much power on the single talent point, while the 3 points below are hardly worth taking. I think nerfing them does almost nothing, since they already were not getting picked.
Generally I believe that the hero spec changes are a pretty good hit, while the spec tree changes kind of miss the mark. At least I hope that feedback (not only mine but from many other better, long term shamans), is heard in the following weeks.
A big plus now is that it has a clear identity that works off the elementalist playstyle.
I disagree. Hero talents should never force you out of the playstyle you chose in your spec talent tree. Totemic needs to work with both base playstyles - elementalist and storm.
Don’t get me wrong though. I am okay with Stormbringer/Totemic leaning towards one side more than the other, but at their core both should be playable regardless of the chosen base build (storm/elementalist).
With the 11.0.5 changes this is not the case. The two new Hot Hands interactions (Whirling Elements: Fire & Reactivity) should be toned down, removed or should somehow buff Stormstrike as well.
The reason I am against that idea is that with how complex enh is, designing and balancing 4+ subspecs for the spec will not turn out that good.
To be clear this is just my opinion and I understand if you feel differently, but seeing how disjointed totemic feels at live, I think that they should focus on refining the playstyle (that they currently put really good ideas forward).
Same reason that I believe that its ok for storm to be designed around storm instead of elementalist (even though it can be played by both).
Those are imho the most successful new addition on the ptr. They make totemic/lava lash interact with WF (through sundering), give a nice flow to an otherwise random proc, and are interesting enough to be played around.
It’s not like there is another place in the talent/hero trees to play with an effect like that (especially not in the stormbringer tree).
Well, they can surely do just that and think up something for the Storm build as well.
Honestly, Enhance having two fundamentally different playstyles is the root of the problem. The two specs (Elementalist/Storm) shouldn’t be so different that you basically opt out of spells that would normally be core rotational abilities. Sure, you could argue that the resulting build diversity is a huge positive, but no one can deny that this leads to the problems they are currently working on from a design standpoint.
If they don’t work this out, players who loathe the Hot Hands / Elementalist playstyle will only have one hero talent tree to use instead of two. IMO, that’s unacceptable and no other class (to my knowledge) has this restriction.
I do not see this as a problem. We had both builds in DF and I was happy the first 2 tiers where we could play both of them (even through one was better in certain scenarios).
But that is the design goal of having different hero specs. If the playstyle of one does not suit you, you can choose the other.
I cannot really follow what your ideal scenario is. From my pov talents exist to interact with each other and make “builds”. Each spec has 2-3 different “builds” that exist in their spec tree (sometimes both competitive, and sometimes only one is competitive), and hero specs came and are “building” upon those builds.
For shaman to not have those “fundamentally different” playstyles, means that one of them is “deleted” while the other becomes the “default”. I do not think that this case would be better than what we have.
We had both builds in DF and I was happy the first 2 tiers where we could play both of them (even through one was better in certain scenarios).
Yeah, and it worked flawlessly, because we didn’t have hero talent trees then.
But that is the design goal of having different hero specs. If the playstyle of one does not suit you, you can choose the other.
Not really though. If I play e.g. Frost DK I can play either of the two hero talent specs and the base toolkit works flawlessly for both of them. I can freely choose my hero talents regardless of the talents I chose in the frost tree. Enhancement is an outliner in this regard.
I cannot really follow what your ideal scenario is.
The ideal scenario is that both hero talent trees are fully functional with both Storm and Elementalist. And - as I already said - if the developers want Storm to lean towards Stormbringer and Elementalist to lean towards Totemic that’s fine with me. But two core nodes only working with Hot Hands is too much.
I do not think that this case would be better than what we have.
I don’t think so either, but they have to design hero talents for both playstyles if they want to keep them.