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Q u o t e:


It's quite easy, get a warrior and a shaman who bursts down the mobs before your dots have a chance to work >.<

Edit: Here you go, the recipe for failure

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Well then you should engage brain and just cast MB/MF and sear packs instead of doting up targets that die so fast? If I ever got 1400 DPS in an heroic I would quit the priest class.

Have faith my dear priests. Steve will return and guide us all to the deep depths of damage and utility where no warlock nor keyboard-smashing mage have been before. We shall overcome! We shall conquer! We shall show the others the countdown of doom! Believe for Steve!

I don't think just SWP haste scaling would be enough, but understand that reducing duration of the other two DoTs could be problematic with having to be recast more often and haste altering cast sequence even more. Mind Flay is probably the most haste scaling spell we have, so I think a boost to Mind Flay damage would do a good job at increasing haste scaling, even so much to make it a viable option to use over Mind Blast when we have Bloodlust.

I don't really care as a result if Mind Sear is nerved to the level of similar AoE like Blizzard/FoK etc.

You do realize that single target dps + sdw pain buffing is not quite logical, right? Buffing dots will mean slight dps increase vs 1 target and a much bigger dps increase on 2-3 targets, just below the border where you switch to aoe instead of multi dotting.
Not argueing that spriests should not be buffed, they lack at least 1000 dps or something, but if you want to buff single target dps, what you have to look at is the disease dot (as that can only be up on one target at a time) or simply mind fly/mind blast. Plus lets face it - everyone prefers big crits on nukes instead of big dot ticks anyway! :)

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Q u o t e:
You do realize that single target dps + sdw pain buffing is not quite logical, right? Buffing dots will mean slight dps increase vs 1 target and a much bigger dps increase on 2-3 targets, just below the border where you switch to aoe instead of multi dotting.
Not argueing that spriests should not be buffed, they lack at least 1000 dps or something, but if you want to buff single target dps, what you have to look at is the disease dot (as that can only be up on one target at a time) or simply mind fly/mind blast. Plus lets face it - everyone prefers big crits on nukes instead of big dot ticks anyway! :)

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I don't think that would be a problem, really Multi Dotting is hard to carry out effectively in most situations and at the moment I think just keeps us on par with other classes in a raid encounter rather than it being something of advantage.

But I do believe it would be better to just increase the scaling of Mind Flay since it benefits from haste the most already and is a significant proportion of our damage, and if your haste is high enough, should rule out prioritising mind blast over it particularly Mid-cast, meaning you don't lose DPS from clipping etc.

My biggest issue with the changes mentioned so far is that they look nice but actually not fix anything.

'Glyph to get haste benefit on SWP'

A regular spriest dps spread (assuming one does 6000 dps) is something like:

41% MF (2460 dps)
17% VT (1020 dps)
16% DP (960 dps)
14% MB (840 dps)
12% SWP (720 dps)

Let's now say that SWP benefits from haste and assume a generous amount of haste, 30%. For simplicities sake I'll not do the calculations, but lets just assume that 30% haste gives 30% more dmg! Now, our SWP will do 130% of 720 dps, 936 dps, a nice ~216 increase for free.

This seems nice, but:
Will this solve our problem of a missing single-target 1000-2500 dps? no :(
Will this create more dps on multiple mobs? yes (but juggling a hasted SWP+VT on mobs is not going to be easy)

Why not give shadowpriests a significant boost on the spells we can only use on 1 target?

For example:
25% on MF (615 dps)
25% on DP (240 dps)
25% on MB (210 dps)

Suddenly the gain would be 1065 dps and shadowpriests would be sort of competitive again.

PS: A glyph to give the target you Mind Sear damage would be useful as well, right now it is only beneficial to aoe groups of 4 or more.

about dot scaling with haste, instead of the dot ticking faster as in meaning the need of recasting it more often, couldn't they do so that if the dot ticks for 21 sec, that with more haste you got the faster the dot ticks in the meaning of seconds, the dot will still tick for 21 seconds but it will tick more times. Instead of every 3 sec it will tick every 2.50 sec depending on how much haste you got, but it will still tick for 21 sec. You know what i mean?

This is a step in the right direction, but it's certainly not going to make us competative in icecrown unless it's added to all of our DoT spells.

(although I'm under the impression that our 4 set T10 is a massive dps increase)

Haste on SW:P is going to be a 2 - 2.5% damage buff at most, depending on your haste rating. It's not much of a comform when you're 15-20% behind other hybrids.

Adding haste also on VT and DP is more tricky, because you have to recast them more often so you lose MF channeling time. It also makes the rotation hard(er). In theory it would be about 6-9% buff, again depending on haste rating, but due to harder rotation gain is more likely to be less than that. So still not quite enough.

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Q u o t e:
about dot scaling with haste, instead of the dot ticking faster as in meaning the need of recasting it more often, couldn't they do so that if the dot ticks for 21 sec, that with more haste you got the faster the dot ticks in the meaning of seconds, the dot will still tick for 21 seconds but it will tick more times. Instead of every 3 sec it will tick every 2.50 sec depending on how much haste you got, but it will still tick for 21 sec. You know what i mean?

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It doesn't make any sense, 21/2.5 is not an even number of ticks. Increasing the dot damage by haste% would be much more simple if you don't want to change the duration.

I choosed to turn off my dmgmeter and such after some time in Ulduar. I didn't look at logs or anything either. Why? Because a Shadowpriest is still an awsome class to play, despite the low numbers on various logs.

It feels incredibly demoralising to multidot 2-3 targets and maintain perfect dot-upkeep while juggling between 6-7 different spells with various different cooldowns, cast times, and durations - only to see you're number 12 on the dmgmeter.

But it can be incredibly good for the moral to multidot 2-3 targets and maintain perfect dot-upkeep while juggling between 6-7 different spells with various different cooldowns, cast times, and durations - and then just leave it at that. Don't ask for the dmgmeters or anything. Just leave it at the thought that you played to the best of your class' ability. Whatever dps ranking that may result in is often out of your control anyway (it comes down to Blizzard's game balance), so knowing that it's very likely you'll be ranked low I prefer not to look at that stuff anymore :P
It makes the spec so much more fulfilling :)

I will say though that I expect some changes going into 3.3 and Cataclysm.

First off, it's an insanely hard spec to play to its maximum performance. In a fight with 2 adds it's arguably the hardest spec of all. You're juggling between 6-8 spells depending on the situation. And of those the 3 of them are DoTs with different durations, casttimes, and ways of applying (SW:P with MF, DP only on one target, etc.). Then you have MB which has a smaller cooldown, so you always have to keep an eye on that. And then you have your MF which is a channeled spell - because having to pay attention to more things is just what you want :P
Ultimately you're keeping an eye on MB cooldown, duration of your MF, the duration of VT and DP. And then you have to make sure to also keep your Shadowfiend on cooldown as well. And all that's jsut for 1 target. Imagine when it's 3 or 4 different targets...It explains why Mind Sear was so well recieved, it's just a nice break from the otherwise overwhelmingly complex spell rotations.

And the worst part of all this is that if you do a perfect spell rotation for the entire fight, and the fight seems almost made for the sake of making a Shadowpriest shine, then you might end up in the middle of your dpsmeter. That's the worst part currently. If a Feral Druid beats the living snot out of a boss then it shows. If a Shadowpriest does really well then he'll be average. If he does anything below really well, then he'll be the worst of the lot.

I'm pretty curious about how they'll make this haste thing work out as far as complexity goes. Even if it'll just be working on SW:P then that already complicates mutidotting even more, which is what a Shadowpriest currently relies on to produce good results. And just having SW:P scale with haste won't result in a huge dps increase (unless they make it scale insanely well, which I doubt). So like GC has said, they might make VT and DP scale with haste as well. But then I just fear that the already insanely complex Shadowpriest rotation becomes impossible to play. I can't see how they will nail that down without either phasing some of our spells out, MB for example, or by making it easier to refresh those other dots (VT, DP). So I guess I'm expecting something in that regard. Because having SW:P scale with haste won't move mountains. And having all dots scale with haste will make the spec insane to play as far as rotation goes, which then requires additional changes to the spells to make the rotation easier.

The 4pt10 is not as much of an increase as you might hope for.

Remember shadowpriests are living in a 5.5s MB cooldown for their damage. MF comes in either MF3 or MF2 (as MF1 would be below a GCD and therefor not feasable).

Casters get 8% 'passive' haste (totem+moonkin/ret), lets assume someone gets 22% haste from gear (needs ~720 rating orso) for a total of 30% haste. This makes MF take 3/1.3 = 2.31s to cast (and GCD 1.15s). With the 4pt10 it would be 2.5/1.3 = 1.92s per MF.

Now lets look at the MB cooldown timeframe. Right now we have some options during each MB cooldown:

MF3+MF3+MF2 (2.31 + 2.31 + 2/3*2.31 = 6.15s) (easy enough to time)
MF3+MF3+GCD (2.31 + 2.31 + 1.15 = 5.7s) (you need to refresh VT/DP or possibly have SWD up?)
MF3+MF2+MF2 (2.31 + 1.54 + 1.54 = 5.38s) (slightly less easy to time)

After the 4pt10 this will become:

MF3+MF3+MF3 (1.92 + 1.92 + 1.92 = 5.76s)
MF3+MF2+MF2+GCD (1.92 + 1.92*2/3 + 1.28 + 1.15 = 5.64s)

This will make the rotation easier when we don't have buffs to refresh and more annoying when we do have them.

Now, the important part, the dps we gain. When we had a dot to refresh we could cast 6MF and other wise 8MF, now we can do 7MF (with dot) and 9MF. Yay! we indeed gain dps because we have 1 tick more MF, but how much?

Lets assume the best day scenario, you gain 1 MF per each 6 you used to do; that would mean MF would do 1/6*100% = 16.67% more dmg. From a previous post we saw that on 6000 DPS 41% (2460) would come from MF. So this would be in the *best* of cases a buff of 410 dps (just under 7%).

Let's not make it realistic and forget about latency, late MF2 clips, server deciding you *did* clip a tick, possible coefficient changes because the 'base spellcast is now 2.5s and not 3.0'. Usually shadowpriest setbonuses give around 250 dps, so we'd get 160 dps for free.

Is it a potentially generous setbonus? yes
Will this fix our dps? no :(

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Q u o t e:

Is it a potentially generous setbonus? yes
Will this fix our dps? no :(

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Well it's a setbonus so it shouldn't fix our dps anyway. Class changes in the patch should be what fixes our dps (assuming Blizzard thinks there's something to fix). The setbonus is just that - a bonus. Furthermore, it's the 4 piece bonus which means that you won't have it for a long while. And finally, if it's too damn good then there's always the chance that Blizzard might nerf it (so it doesn't overshadow all the other gear options too much).

Blizz needs 2 employ Xaroz as a Priest class dev!

/vote

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Q u o t e:
We do recognise that Shadow priest single-target damage is on the low side. In 3.3 we plan to have some changes coming to bring them up a bit. Most of the changes will likely be made on the glyph side of things, something along the lines of trying a glyph to let SW:P scale with haste or similar.

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I must say that the post from GC and devs about fixing haste scaling has been appreciated and recognized as a good step in the right direction.

We all wish it will be extended on all dots to get us back in pair to other hybrids and we are all looking forward to help with further testing on PTRs.

SW:P won't be enough, above maths and some different posts on both US forums and on shadowpriest.com are pretty much clear ... but it's a good start anyway.

At least we can be positive to recover few raid spots we are missing vs other hybrids that override our poor "utility" with same buffs plus a lot better dps.

/cheer

MB cooldown scale with haste... sounds cool? nuke situations your getting more MBs off then...
general buffs to all spells wouldnt be so hard...
spread it about a bit so it isnt just shadow pain ticking hard...
especially as swp can be cast on multiple mobs... think toc first boss SWP ticking on boss and rats... dps increase but not really a single target increase as mentioned.

or how about just some unique new utility so GCs posts about our awesome utlity are actually true lol

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Q u o t e:

Is it a potentially generous setbonus? yes
Will this fix our dps? no :(

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Don't forget that with the set bonus MF is getting very close to the MB DPS, infact the difference between using MB and removing MB from the rotation completely is something like 150 DPS.

Personally I would just spam MF, ignore MB and hence make the whole "rotation" easier. Trying to include MB would complicate the rotation and probably end up losing you more DPS.

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Q u o t e:


Don't forget that with the set bonus MF is getting very close to the MB DPS, infact the difference between using MB and removing MB from the rotation completely is something like 150 DPS.

Personally I would just spam MF, ignore MB and hence make the whole "rotation" easier. Trying to include MB would complicate the rotation and probably end up losing you more DPS.

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solution would mean buffing mind blast... be its lower its cd as mentioned it could be smaller based on haste... or just making it hit harder...

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Q u o t e:
We do recognise that Shadow priest single-target damage is on the low side. In 3.3 we plan to have some changes coming to bring them up a bit. Most of the changes will likely be made on the glyph side of things, something along the lines of trying a glyph to let SW:P scale with haste or similar.

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Against my better judgement, I'll try to post here.

Using some very very simple napkin math:

Napkin math on PvE haste shadowpriest damage increase:


http://www.worldoflogs.com/reports/qEfSxkUT5Bhxz1VA/details/6/?s=3572&e=3740

SW: P is about 12% of a shadowpriest's damage, so roughly 650 dps. Assuming haste makes dots faster linearly, for a well geared shadowpriest that is likely to be around a 30% increase in sw: p dps, working out to be a ~200 DPS buff.

If they buff every single shadowpriest dot by 30%, even ignoring reapplication time, you are looking at buffing 40% of a shadowpriest's damage by 30%, which works out to be around a ~800 DPS buff. The net buff would be smaller because of having to reapply dot faster, but this works out ok as a back of envelope calculation.

tl;dr version:

buffing sw: pain alone is insignificant, buffing all of them together would increase all shadowpriest damage by 800 dps or so, putting them roughly where they should be.


Later, Althor ran some analysis using far more accurate methods using simulationcraft, and he came up with exactly the same numbers.



Now, I can post a lot more detailed math, but the reaction will either be:

- Ignore this post, and reply to someone who writes something completely meaningless and poorly written to correct him.

- Point out that my numbers are theoretical, but you have the real numbers, but no, you won't share them.

- Haha, this is the EU forums, who are we kidding, noone who has any influence over Blizzard policy reads or reply to this.


The Blizzard version of class balance is probably something like:

Shadowpriest damage is very slightly too low. We will tune it up a very minor amount. No, simulations or real world numbers will not convince us, because theoretical numbers do not interest us, and real world numbers do not interest us either since we can point to different parses. We are also not interested in averages, weighted averages, std deviations, since we have the best numbers that we won't share. Tuning shadowpriest a very tiny amount will fix this, even though all sorts of mathematical analysis shows that is woefully insufficient and that scaling coefficients for shadowpriests are much lower than for any other spell caster.

Shadow priests also get some nice perks such as increased survivability, and as such they don't deserve to do as much damage as other classes, although we won't ever actually outright state this.