Saturday, August 15, 2009

3.2.2 SoC Mechanic Clarification: No Proc From DS

GC has just weighed in on the new functionality of SoC. As a reminder, this is the current wording of the SoC change in the PTR Patch Notes:

Seal of Command: This ability now chains to strike up to 2 additional targets when it is triggered by an attack.


Just now GC posted the following clarification:

The idea was always that Seals were a choice. We have just iterated on them so much this patch that one of them kept coming up as the only real Seal. Hopefully this latest design will work out.

If an attack procs a seal of command then that seal of command can chain onto up to two different targets.


That is correct, with one clarification. It must be a single-target attack. If the attack is already multi-target like Divine Storm, then only the damage procs, not the cleave.


Now that's a real downer. Okay, perhaps 12 Cleaving procs of SoC would have been too much, but now we'll never know. It's still your go-to trash/AoE Seal, but it still won't have the punch of DS's synergy with SoB. Ditto Hammer of the Righteous.

As for "he idea was always that Seals were a choice", pull the other one GC, it's got bells on. Seals haven't been structured as a genuine choice for DPS since 1.0, and the 3.0 changes made any on the fly decisions regarding Seals near impossible due to the high mana cost. Place some more Dev time in all three of the DPS Seals, give them more flavour and differentiate them, if you want us to swallow that line.

And how about a minor glyph to reduce the mana cost of swapping? Eh?

P.S. Tauren Paladins Bitches!

2 comments:

Anonymous 15/08/2009, 10:28  

I'd say make seal swapping free. If picking a seal is about identifying what the best effect for the situation is, focus design on finding that effect, not managing arbitrary hits to the mana pool.

This has the added effect of letting people who run out of mana switch seals right away. Think of all the people who aren't awesome!

It seems to me that seals having a cost is mostly leftovers from where each judgement used the seal up, and that was about all Paladins had to do.

On the other hand, I guess that this opens up a big potential space to make paladins feel hybridish again. With a utility seal or two, I could see running across different fighting styles during different boss phases, or opponents in PVP. This is a possible downside because hybrids seem to get hit pretty hard.

Free the seals!

Duali 15/08/2009, 13:43  

Tauren paladins for the fuckin win.

I think had they limited the cleave to 1 extra proc on DS it would've been a better decision. I haven't gotten to play the PTR with this change so I don't know how its performing compared to SoR with 5/5 SotP, but the fact that it's even questionable if its more dps or not is still problematic. If we have to sink a talent point into it, then I don't think there should be much work for the mathletes in helping us make that decision.

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