Tier Set Tuning Coming With Weekly Reset

We’re currently working on the following adjustment to Elemental Shaman, which we intend to make live with scheduled weekly maintenance on Tuesday, March 8 in this region.

Shaman

• Elemental
  • Storm Elemental’s Wind Gust effect gained from casting Lightning Bolt or Chain Lightning now has a maximum stack of 10 (was 20). Additionally, if you cast Storm Elemental again while having a Storm Elemental active, the Wind Gust buff will be reset.

The ability to maintain Storm Elemental at long duration and high uptime allows for extended periods of Lightning Bolts with a cast time of less than 0.6 seconds. Players have reported that this is uncomfortable to play, and we believe it might pose a significant accessibility concern. For that reason, we would rather entirely avoid having a class talent allow cast times which are this short, to avoid similar problems in the future. We are reducing the maximum cast time reduction that can be granted by Storm Elemental. In addition, recasting a Storm Elemental while a Storm Elemental is already active will reset the stacks of Wind Gust.

We’ve worked through the following adjustments to Balance and Feral Druids, which we intend to make live with scheduled weekly maintenance on Tuesday, March 8 in this region.

Druid

• Balance
  • (2) Set Bonus: Entering a Lunar Eclipse now creates a Fury of Elune at 20% effectiveness (was 25% effectiveness).
  • (4) Set Bonus: While in an Eclipse, the cost of Starsurge and Starfall is reduced by 15% (was 20%).

The synergy of the Balance tier set with some of Balance’s options made it perform a bit higher than intended. We want to bring Balance in-line with other tier set bonuses while still rewarding those synergistic choices. These changes should keep the power of Balance’s tier set bonus, but rein in some of the higher outputs we’ve seen.*

Druid

• Feral
  • (2) Set Bonus: Berserk’s cooldown is now reduced by 0.7 seconds per combo point spent (was 0.5 seconds).
  • (4) Set Bonus: Sickle of the Lion’s damage is increased by 25%.

We really appreciate all of the feedback on the Feral set and feel that we should take some time to explain these changes. When previously tuning this bonus, we took multiple factors into account: the synergy of the set with other legendaries, its synergy with Feral’s kit, the AOE component, and more. Since we last made adjustments during PTR testing, we’ve gotten a chance to incorporate a great deal of the feedback provided and take a fresh look at the numbers and we found that – as players rightly called out – there was a disconnect in how impactful this bonus was in situations such as single-target encounters.

Our goal with these changes is to keep Feral being a strong option in single-target encounters while increasing their AOE throughput. We will continue to actively watch discussions about this, and we want to say again: thank you for the feedback, and we appreciate the community’s patience as we take care with the tuning of this spec.

We’re currently working on the following adjustment to Unholy Death Knight’s 4-piece set bonus, which we intend to make live with scheduled weekly maintenance on Tuesday, March 8 in this region.

• (4) Set Bonus: Your minions deal 10% increased damage (was 5%). When Soul Reaper’s secondary effect triggers, this bonus increases to 50% for 8 seconds (was 25%).

Unholy’s Tier Set bonus is intended to differentiate the spec from Frost by amplifying one of its niches; strong windows of single-target burst & high-value execute damage. The initial tuning of the bonus was simply too low to make good on that promise, especially when compared to the baseline single-target power other similar bonuses brought to the table.

We’re currently working on the following adjustment to Beast Mastery Hunter’s 4-piece set bonus, which we intend to make live with scheduled weekly maintenance on Tuesday, March 8 in this region.

• (4) Set Bonus: The set bonus now reads as – Kill Command critical hits empower your next Cobra Shot or Multi-Shot, increasing the damage and cooldown reduction of Cobra Shot by 40% or causing Multi-Shot to grant an additional 6 seconds of Beast Cleave.

We are adding additional functionality to the 4-piece bonus for Beast Mastery Hunters. When your Kill Command critically strikes, it now empowers either your next Cobra Shot with the existing functionality, or causes your next Multi-Shot to cause your next Beast Cleave to last 6 seconds longer. This should allow you to focus more on Barbed Shot, Cobra Shot, and Kill Command in AoE situations and worry less about using a Multi-Shot every 4 seconds to keep the Beast Cleave buff active.

We’re currently working on the following adjustment to Affliction Warlock’s set bonuses, which we intend to make live with scheduled weekly maintenance on Tuesday, March 8 in this region.

• (2) Set Bonus: Malefic Rapture’s damage is now increased by 25% (was 15%).
• (4) Set Bonus: Shadow Bolt now has a 30% chance and Drain Soul now has a 20% chance to make your next Malefic Rapture cost no Soul Shards and cast instantly (was 20% and 10% respectively).

Affliction’s set bonus wasn’t providing enough of an impactful reward for executing its mechanic. These increases should increase the throughput of Affliction’s tier set and we hope that these changes will bring its output in line with other set bonuses.

We’re currently working on the following adjustment to Fury Warrior’s set bonuses and Glory legendary, which we intend to make live with scheduled weekly maintenance on Tuesday, March 8 in this region.

• (2) Set Bonus: Raging Blow damage reduced to 10% (was 15%).
• (4) Set Bonus: Duration of Recklessness granted reduced to 3 seconds (was 4 seconds).
• Glory (Necrolord Runecarving Power): The amount of Rage spent to extend Conqueror’s Banner increased to 30 for Fury Warriors (was 20).

Fury’s tier set was stronger than intended and we will be reducing the power of both the 2-piece and 4-piece to better fit within our goal for tier bonuses. In addition, we will be increasing the amount of Rage required to extend Conqueror’s Banner duration while the Glory legendary is equipped. The overall uptime of Conqueror’s Banner with the Glory legendary, Set Bonus (and conduits) was much higher than intended. We hope with these changes that the overall feel of all covenant Fury builds remain intact but with much more reasonable output.