DR on interrupts are out out, Hemo rogues are in.
Talents, patch 2.3 November 6th, 2007This is why I can’t be bothered to play on PTRs, constant changes and going from deep depression to happiness. Blizzard introduced DR on silence and spell interrupt mechanics just to revert it today.
After further discussion about the change in patch 2.3 which adds diminishing returns to silencing effects, we’ve decided to revert the change. Though we do feel that being chain school locked is a problem and plan to address it at some point in the future, we weren’t comfortable with the amount of testing this particular change received.
I’m really happy that they reverted that change, as I finally organized a warrior/rogue/pally 3v3 team just yesterday (yeah, not the best setup every, but skilled and geared players are not growing on trees, and I’d rather have a skilled rogue at my side then a newbie lock, frost mage or ele shammy). In this setup it’s all down to locking down a healer, we have to rotate those pummels, kicks, intercepts and kidney shots just right, with DR on interrupts it would make things much more complicated, to say the least. Sure healers should have survivability, but it doesn’t mean they should be freaking immortal. Blizzard see locking a school with spell interrupts as a problem, and that’s a good thing. I was talking with my rogue about this, and there are two pretty obvious solutions, the easiest way would be to keep interrupts on DR, but instead of making casters go immune, just make them interrupt the cast with 0 sec lockdown, this however still leaves a problem of short interrupts reducing the effectiveness of longer ones (”damn my counterspell is now going to last 4 seconds because you idiot wanted to earth shock before!”). The other way would be, simply, to put everything on separate DRs, that can be a bit problematic from technical PoV as far as I can imagine tho. Either way, we have to keep in mind that Blizzard will eventually do something with interrupts, and it’s not going to be a warrior buff.
From other changes on PTR, seems Blizzard is really trying to make Subtlety tree a viable one again. First they touched high tier talents such as shadow step (which is basically an intercept with bonus damage now) and cheat death, but it was not what people were waiting for, combat rogues were not giving their AR for shadow step. And so they took care of Hemo. First, the debuff was buffed (yeah, I know how that sounds) to whooping 36 damage (even for me bashing a Hemo’ed guy with 3.6 two-hander 36 more damage is 10 dps = 140 attack power, nothing to laugh at). Then rogues started to beg for slower maces from arena, as it turned out Hemo used to be not-normalized attack, thus benefiting a lot from having a really slow main-hand. And just when rogues started to QQ after figuring out that Hemo might be normalized on PTRs, Blizzard introduced the killer and made Hemo a 125% weapon damage attack, ouch!
I guess not all of you folks are Rogue experts (neither am I), but to explain those changes in the shortest possible way to “wtf are all those talents” warriors, Hemo can now compete with Sinister Strike, it turns out to be a really good and energy effective attack, and with preparation in the house, we are looking at double-vanish, double-sprint, double-AR Rogue killer. I can imagine Ming is still creaming his pants by now.
I’m considering few new options for 2.3, basically I need a 3v3 spec that will produce the best synergy with my rogue friend. The best build for such team would be 35/23/3 now, but nothing is for sure come 2.3. I’ll most likely want to grab Blood Frenzy, to boost the rogue a bit, as he will be boosting me with Hemo (yeah, it’s not shadow priest + warlock, but always something) and I’ll most likely want to grab TM. I’m a big fan of 33/28 atm, and a big fan of Improved Slam, but since disarm immunites are gone come 2.3, I’ll love to drop some disarm bombs here and there, people were too lazy to use disarm at 60 before TBC (and cried whenever someone did use it, heck, I think we all were called a cheater for using disarm in warrior-warrior duels at some point), and never bothered in TBC since we all (almost) got weapon mastery or weapon chains. Having those two talents is pretty limiting my choice, 35/23/3 would be the way to go now, but in 2.3 I’m thinking about going full arms, and there are at least few interesting options to consider.
Let’s take 45/5/11 build, and think how to adjust that to 3v3. First, do I need Last Stand? Hell, it’s a nice talent, but I’m not going to be nuked as bad in 3v3 as I would be in 5v5, and I’ll get a similar mechanic with the new trinket for 35k honor (burn in hell for adding even more honor farming in this game, I don’t even feel guilty for watching movies while idling in AV anymore). So Last Stand is out, and with Last Stand I can also remove Toughness and Imp. Blood Rage, 8 points in bank. What to do with those 8 points? What is the biggest pain in the ass for having only 5 points in Fury? I don’t know about you, but Piercing Howl is one of my best friends, so BAM we got 45/11/3, still 2 points to use. What to put those into? Personally, I like Blood Craze, so I’ll steal one point from Arms and get 3/3 Blood Craze, still got everything important in Arms including 3/3 improved hamstring, and so we have it - 44/14/3. The thing I like about that build, is that no one I know is even considering that shit, it can be a pretty darn exotic thing, and It can actually work. There is some psychological barrier that stops people from going 11+ in fury without getting enrage, well, only time will tell how I’ll do on arenas without it. Having AM, UW and ER I’ll have the absolutely best rage generation from damage done, and with imp MS, blood frenzy, 5/5 2h spec and either sword or axes (worry not, I’ll write something about maces soon) my single target dps should be nothing to laugh at, where others will fail due to being ignored, this build will shine. Madness? Well, SL/SL warlock seemed to be Madness at first as well. No risk, no reward.
It’s almost 1am here, publishing without checking grammar or spelling (well, not like I ever do that anyway).
Terhix
November 6th, 2007 at 3:18 pm
Hey there!
I’m new to your blog, but after a day of browsing your posts I have to say they’re really interesting. As I heard of your idea about deep arms specc, I was intrigued.
As a matter of fact, I’am one of those “Endless Rage is a trash talent”-guys XD
But I’m not dumb. I know I trend to take false conclussion, but I don’t refrain from changing my point of view. What I’ve read about it really sounds good and I’m thinking of trying it when 2.3 hits.
But my build will be a little different, since I don’t want to miss 2 talents in fury: Piercing Howl and Commanding Presence. Piercing Howl is just too great to miss and as someone whose Team consists, coincidentally, of a Pally, Rogue and Warrior (me) like yours, I just don’t want to miss those 25% more AP.
Therefore I’m probably going 42/16/3 (don’t want to miss TM, too). Blood Frenzy, to boost his and my dps (like you said) and Improved Hamstring to protect the healer (we group with a priest as healer rather often, too). Besides I prefer Impr. Demo Shout over Unbridled Wrath, but I have to admit I never tried UW myself, so I don’t know if it’s worth it. In my point of view, some more mitigation vs hunters, rogues, warriors and other AP based damage dealers is more beneficial than some more damage. (As you said somewhere before, a dead teammate deals no damage ^^)
I also have to thank you for your analysis of Axe Specc and how much resilience affects it effectiveness, since I was unsure about this topic until yesterday. I was planing on switching to mace or sword specc, but I think I’ll remain an axe swining orc some more time.
I’ll be checking your blog periodically from now on.
Greetings,
Kesshin
November 6th, 2007 at 3:41 pm
You might want to read further in this post, I’m talking about 44/14/3 with TM and Piercing Howl, BC instead of commanding tho.
I might drop UW for Booming Voice, will see how I’ll do with rage gen when I finally upgrade my gear (day 1 of S3 is going to be Christmas for me).
Either way, as I always say, theorycrafting is not good enough, it all has to be tested in game.
November 6th, 2007 at 10:17 pm
I’ve read the whole post, my comment wasn’t specifically focused just on this blog post, but on all concerning the deep arms specc you’ve done latley.
Well, I’ve thought a little about it and the argument that you’re unable to make use of the 1 second shorter cooldown on ms because you’re cc’ed alot in the arena kept gnawing on me. So I’ve played around a little bit, and after watching Serennia winning a duel vs a rogue just because of Last Stand, I tried something strange: 36/14/11
I’ve also included Blood Craze in this one, for higher survivability in 5v5 arena. Altogether, this specc is designed for 5v5.
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(I’ve just copied the numbers, as I don’t want to screw up you’re layout and I don’t know how to make a link with an other label as the URL)
One thing I’m considerate is if this specc lack’s damage, since it neither has enrage nor improved ms. What do you think about it?
Regards,
Kesshin
November 6th, 2007 at 10:59 pm
Dueling rogues is the worts possible way to estimate eventual viability (or lack of it) with a build. Things that are awesome for duels might not be as awesome for team play on arena. Blood Craze is not giving good enough survivability to be worth it in 5v5, it’s pretty cool in 3v3 or 5v5 tho. After 2.3 45/5/11 can be a decent 5v5 build, it lacks piercing howl, but it has the dps for when you are ignored and last stand for when you are nuked.
And about being CC, it’s not only limiting imp MS, it also limits Flurry for hybrid builds, there are plenty 33/28 warriors in top arena teams, and they do just fine, situations when you are standing next to your enemy bashing him in the face without going out of melee range are pretty often.