#0 - Jan. 14, 2009, 7:12 a.m.
[quote]
Let me be clear, THIS CLASS NEEDS AN OVERHAUL FROM THE GROUND UP! These issues you've highlighted are merely side issues. The sad fact is that the talents that locks have access to are terrible. They're the second-hand talents from the local thrift shop, the left over ones in the bargain bin.
Just make a few comparisons:
Metaform vs Boomkin (Druid) - Boomkin is permanent, ours is a trinket. Nuff said really, the rest about evens out.
Improved Shadowbolt vs Concussion (Shaman) - ISB will give your non-dot shadow spells a 10% damage boost for 12 seconds or 4 spells, whichever comes first, after you've critted with SB. This is lame. The only spells it affects are SB, haunt, Shadowburn, Shadowflame and Shadowfury, of which only SB doesn't have a CD. Concussion gives shammies a flat out 10% damage bonus on their lightning and chain lightning. I mean, what the hell? Why do we have such a retarded talent? It will only proc off a crit and will then only last for the next 4 bolts within 12 seconds! The shammy gets the same bonus permanently. Conclusion: Blizzard hates locks.
Aftermath vs Impact (Mage) - Aftermarth is further up the tree and requires less talents! The only thing we have to trade-off to get this massive bonus is usefulness! Bargain! Seriously, daze is sh!t, and a 10% chance of dazing is even sh!tter. Stun is massively useful. Impact = good, Aftermath = crap.
Curse of Exhaustion vs Slow (Mage) - Both require dedication to their respective trees (no one goes at least 21 points deep into affliction to pick up CoEx without going the rest of the way). Slow can only affect 1 target, CoEx uses up the curse slot on the target. Slow lasts 25% longer, has a 20% greater effect and also slows attack and cast speeds by 60%. Conclusion: CoEx = poor man's Slow.
Lock pet cast times vs hunter/DK - Um, hunters can bring their pets out instantly. Only if their pet is dead does it take 10 seconds. They can spend two talent points in a second tier talent to reduce that cast time to 4 seconds. Death Knights bring out their temporary pet (which they really don't even need) instantly. They can spec to get a permanent (and powerful) pet which is also an instant cast AND can be used on players, with the only downfall being it has a 5 min CD. For a lock it takes two talents in a fourth tier talent to reduce the 10 sec cast time to 6(!) seconds and a further talent point in a third tier talent to get an activated ability on a 15 minute cooldown that reduces that cast to 0.5 seconds! Why the hell doesn't it make it instant I hear you ask. Why, it's so that you can get stunned, silenced or countered during the cast process and therefore waste your 15 min cooldown of course! DK's have instant pets. Hunters have either instant pets or a 4 sec cast, sometimes a 10 second cast time if the player really doesn't want to put 7 talent points into BM. Locks can have a 0.5 sec cast time once every 15 minutes and a 6 sec cast time otherwise if they've splurged at least 17 points into demo and decided to waste 3 of those on Fel Dom and "Master Summoner" (compared to what I ask). Otherwise they're stuck with 10 second casts. Oh, and Fel Dom uses up a slot on your action bars. Conclusion: Blizzard likes to waste locks time (as is further evidenced by the fact we have to shard farm).
Chaos Bolt vs Arcane Barrage (Mage) - CB is a slightly more powerful Incinerate on a 12 sec cooldown. Great, so we get to throw it into our PvE rotation. Wonderful. AB is a very powerful PvP tool. Hmm, I wonder which is better? Honestly, I have no clue what justification there is for calling it "Chaos" Bolt in the first place. It doesn't do chaos damage (ie, unavoidable/unmitigatable) and it's used once every 12 seconds in a lock's rotation like clockwerk. Not terribly chaosy.
Shadowburn/Conflagrate vs Fire Blast (Mage) - Right, here we have a tier 3 talent and a tier 7 talent against a tier .... 0 ... that's right, Fire Blast is a basic spell. SBurn has a 15 sec CD, costs a shard and does shadow damage which therefore means it doesn't benefit from any fire boosting talents in the tree. Conflagrate does fire damage so does benefit, but it has a 10 sec cooldown, can't be cast unless you have an immolate up on the target and even then it dispels your immolate. Fire Blast on the other hand benefits from the other talents in the fire tree, has only an 8 sec CD, has no prerequisite spells, costs no shards and dispels none of your spells. On top of all that it does more damage than either Shadowburn or Conflagrate.
