Sunday 5 September 2010

Almost a pet class

So, there are some amusing changes currently on the Beta regarding Shadow Priests. The new PvP talent, Sin and Punishment, has been developed further with elements that PvE players will enjoy. And I really hope it stays the way it currently looks.

Obviously, all those pesky things like crit rating and haste rating will be harder to acquire in Cataclysm and will result, therefore, in us having less of them percentage-wise. But, still, what? 20 second reduction on Shadowfiend just from critting with Mind Flay? In 9-10 crits, assuming a 15% crit chance, you've reset the cooldown. That's ... We're going to be swimming in mana, and more than ever will we be using Shadowfiend for the damage it will deal rather than the mana it provides. Archangel will result in high uptime on a large mana restore...

But maybe I am thinking about this the wrong way. I have had the growing concern that Mind Spike is going to replace a great amount of Mind Flay's damage in Cataclysm. Expressing this as a "concern" is a slightly silly thing to do, of course. Think about it: Mind Blast will have a 6.5 second cooldown in Cataclysm. That means that, between each Mind Blast, you can fit two Mind Spikes and a Mind Flay, with a bit of dead space (0.5 seconds plus hasted excess).

At this stage of the beta, I posit that this will be the best way to DPS: The Mind Spikes will give the subsequent Mind Blast an extra 60% chance to crit on that target and cause it to be instant. The Mind Flay will refresh SW: P and keep Evangelism ticking over, ready to be consumed by Archangel when you're at five stacks. (Look at the disparity between Evangelism and Archangel, by the way. Archangel isn't a nuke button; it's a "Use whenever you get five stacks" button. 15% on all damage rather than 10% on periodical damage? No-brainer.) You then have a half-GCD's worth of dead space. You can fill that with a DoT refresh, another Mind Spike, or a Shadow Word: Death if that proves to be good with its relevant talent.

And if this is the correct way to go, we'll need all that extra mana. Mind Spike is almost twice as expensive as Mind Flay.

Looking forward to it, in either case.

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