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[WoW]Druids: CLOSED SLIGHTLY EARLY
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GC's logic that something is WRONG with ToL as it currently stands is sound, but removing it I believe is wrong, and so does the majority of dedicated resto druids in the community. It's not just me.
I've been resto since I rolled in vanilla (stupidly levelled as one, even). If blizzard wants one caster form spec, it's a new development. Hots costing less in tree form, more spirit in tree form, imp. tree form aura, Gift of the Earthmother, etc. all exist as talents because of tree form. Now, they're removing a lot of "passive talents" from all trees. Maybe they're deciding that with these talents no longer there that Tree Form has less tying it to the spec. So instead of replacing these talents with something that makes the spec interesting, they give us a perma-trinket. Which, in some ways, is kinda cool but it changes the theme of the class.
If that fits their design plan, fine. I won't like it, and I'll probably bitch the whole way through Cataclysm, but it's not something I'm going to quit the game over. I just think that there should have been a more creative solution to this problem.
Mmmmm....toasty.
You know what's a solution to that (even though it'd probably give the art dept. a massive stroke)? Have the forms show key pieces of the armor - weapons, shoulder armor, helms. Since they're streamlining the tiers to have matching designs, just with different colors of skins, this could be easier than before with the rainbow-of-colors gear in BC and Vanilla. Once you have a certain ilevel shoulder/helm/weapon, it will be displayed on the model in some way. Sticks harnassed to the back of the cat/bear, shoulder armor moulded to size, crescent moon shining in the middle of the forehead, etc...
Mmmmm....toasty.
Can I get a jpeg of a "jump to conclusions map"
No one has any idea about how ToL will be implemented. Saying it's a "perma-trinket" is a total shot in the dark. It could be that druids go into ToL after hopping 5 times, and typing LOLOL. No. One. Knows.
No one even knows what it'll do.
They're changing ToL so that resto druids can do something else while healing without taking a fairly large penalty. They don't know what they're changing it to. It might be a straight buff to healing. There might be no buff to amount healed but your heals gain some sort of extra feature. It has not yet been decided.
If you're going to whine, and claim to stand for a whole bunch of people you've never met (Diorinix), at least have something concrete to whine about.
How about putting that quote in full context, hm?
It says right there - Tree of Life is changing from a passive talent to a cooldown based talent, similar to metamorphosis. The mechanics of what the cooldown does is what's speculative.
As for speaking for what others think and believe - go read any resto-druid related blog and read the responses. Check out the wow forums where a larger group of druids are speaking out AGAINST losing tree form versus the ones who flat out think it sucks.
I'm trying to have a rational discussion for keeping tree form in game. I've acknowledged that there are some serious issues with its current incarnation and that changes need to be made. I've also been trying to encourage others to discuss other kinds of solutions than cooldown based (ie trinket proc) removal.
Maybe you should be the one to read before making holier-than-thou statements.
Mmmmm....toasty.
Though someone did have the best quote ever to describe the reactions to the previews:
Change: scaring people since forever
I get what you're saying man (and I agree) but we really don't have any idea of what's gonna happen when it all shakes out.
All this reactionary "dey took our trees!" bullshit is ridiculous. But, hey, WoW.
Calling Tree a trinket is selling it short. Cooldowns are way more powerful and interesting than tinkets just by the nature of being designed for a specific class.
I would look to see ToL as an offensive cooldown where the druid turns into a massive Ent and starts smashing heads together. You don't need a boost to healing if you stop incoming raid damage by killing shit.
Here's some of my guesses of things they could make the tree cooldown do (these aren't necessarily exclusive from each other either, mix and match):
-Make you stationary but decrease incoming damage/increase armor
-Make all of your Direct Heals into HoTs
-Make all of your HoTs into instant direct heals
-Make all of your heals apply a (possibly stacking) buff that does something (reduce damage, increase healing, etc)
-Make all of your HoTs apply a (possibly stacking) buff that does something (reduce damage, increase healing, etc)
-Give off an aura that does something (reduce damage, increase healing, etc)
-Make your HoTs jump from person to person like 4pT10
-Make your direct heals apply a HoT
-Make your direct heals splash to nearby people
-Increase the duration of your HoTs
-Become immune to heals (not damage) and your heals use your HP instead of your Mana
There's a ton of different things they could do with tree that'd be useful in cooldown format that isn't "hay it's a trinket!".
Every healing class is getting new spells for cataclysm, except for druids, because they thought druids already had enough healing spells to fit every niche. They wanted to give resto druids something new to click, and they'd been planning on making one of the three talent trees stay in caster form anyway. The logical solution therefore was to make tree form something temporary that's activated during combat, and add interesting new abilities to it. All the old ToL abilities will be turned into always-active-regardless-of-form so you actually don't lose anything at all. You can cast any spells you want without losing your ToL buffs now, plus you get something new and interesting rather than just another healing spell to fit a certain niche. You may be bitching now, but once you actually get to see what it does you'll probably be praising the developers' wisdom and creativity.
Just a few more ideas for what ToL will do:
-All of your healing spells will proc Efflorescence as described for Regrowth crits
-All raid members will benefit from your Barkskin spell (crossing my fingers for this one)
-Your other CDs will be refreshed (Tranquility, Nature's Swiftness, Innervate, Barkskin)
If Blizzard makes it "While in tree form, your heals are 30% stronger" then I'll start bitching. Because not only is that lazy, it's just boring.
It puts Seal of Many Mouths with about twice as much mitigation points as Devium's Eternally Cold Ring. I find it hard to believe my survivability will be that much better if I roll on a DPS items. Yeah it has a lot of agility... but man. Hell, it lists the DPS agility cloak from ToC Insanity Tribute as one of the best tanking cloaks.
It all seems very odd to me.
I feel like all you people that are pro-change play tauren. Personally I think my night elf is ugly (and I didn't even roll a male - that'd be way worse). Shoulder armor usually sucks, and I'm either wearing a boring skirt or leggings. Most boots out there seem to recycle the same old 'Yarr swashbuckler!' model, which is also disproportionate and not aesthetically pleasing in the least. I mean, let's be honest - WoW is not the most popular MMO for its graphic quality.
However, tree form is stylized, funny, and pulls of a solid look with the poly limit. Not only do I love using it to not have to stare at my character outside of Dalaran, but I love it for its goofy expressions. My character is cowering in terror as a tree? Awesome! I just got impaled? Sweet, look at my little tree dude dangling there all funny. I am entertained!
I played a NE Hunter for all of classic. I am sick of night elves. But as a NE druid, I don't feel like I'm playing a night elf because I never see the model. And I like it that way.
TLDR; Minor glyph plz.
Druid turns into a tree thing, and gets rooted. An AoE centered on them works like Tranquility, and flowers and shit also grow up in the effected area, like 20yd radius. Let it be a very constant HoT, like 100hp every 0.1sec for 15 seconds. After 15sec, druid's back to normal. (I pulled those numbers out of my ass, but healing 15k over 15sec on every raid member within 20yd seems powerful enough to be like 5min cooldown).
But for me, all that really matters is what worgen druids are gonna look like in bear/cat/moonkin.
I mean, shadowmeld+flight form, obviously. But soloing old instances, and you accidentally pull a pack of stuff that'd take 5 minutes to kill? No problem! Just feign d--SHADOWMELD.
I just don't see how a third sprint is really gonna beat that. But I may yet be swayed by worgen graphics - not only have they not released the cat and bear forms, they haven't released the female form either.
On the flip side, I stopped playing resto in BC when dreamstate died and I HAD to use tree form. I hated it (and still would if I had to use it. Now I'm feral dps/ feral tank).
Anyway, my point is that just because people don't care enough to post on the forums about it, does not mean that they don't agree with people that do. A lot of resto druids are NOT going to like this change.
Hopefully the new mechanic will be interesting and fun to play. In my mind, until there's a beta that proves their ideas are awful, this development team has earned the benefit of the doubt.
On the other hand, I will be leveling a priest or shaman as well in case they crap the bed.
WoW... WoW never changes.
There's actually a bunch out there already, despite the lack of official models.
Agreed, and very reasonable.
Is healing any more varied than it was before? I stopped just before the cooldown on Wild Growth. I am guessing nothing has really changed besides that.
Your last sentence is just nonsense as well and doesn't have to do with anything anyone is saying.
Also, you talk about how boots look? Tauren don't even wear them.
edit: because we get awesome tier sets
Well, at least someone had the same thought I did when I saw that response with that avatar/sig... and I was going to ask if it was what it looks like it is, but I hoped not.
That's just Caedere's bag.