Throughout raid testing in the Dragonflight beta, we have noticed that healing has felt too powerful in level 70 content. This has largely been the result of the impact that 10 additional talent points can have on player damage and healing throughput at level 70.
Generally, we increase player health at the same rate as throughput. This ensures that the pace of the game feels relatively consistent across all levels. One recent example is the covenant renown reward, Deepening Bond, that increased player Stamina by 10% to offset the power gains of Covenant abilities, soulbinds and conduits. After further analysis and playtesting, we have decided that in an upcoming build we will bake the 10% increase to Stamina from Deepening Bond into the base stats of level 60 characters to offset power gained from the new talent system and change Deepening Bond to an increase to movement speed in the Shadowlands.
When damage mitigation abilities and healing are too strong relative to player health, the only way to threaten players is to make enemy damage very high and spiky. If healers can very quickly top off their teammates and mana isn’t a limiting factor, enemies have to be tuned to have the capacity to do burst damage that kills players before healers can react. That isn’t very satisfying gameplay. Increasing player health gives players more time to react to incoming damage, and it make players’ choices about cooldowns and mana management more meaningful.
To address this, we are increasing player stamina and creature damage by 40% at level 70 . This has an effect on the power of healing in PvP, so we will subsequently evaluate and consider adjusting the PvP trinket set bonus values and the tuning of Dampening in Arena. We’re also looking at how this change affects the balance of percentage-based healing versus other healing spells, and we’ll make targeted adjustments there if necessary.
We look forward to your feedback and experiences with these changes on the Dragonflight beta. Thank you!