Most Useless Talents
by Mike D'Anna 
Mar 13th 2006 at 9:44PM
Every player has those actions or spells for your character that basically do nothing but take up valuable action
bar slots. For my hunter, I can safely say I've used Eagle Eye maybe one time since I got it, and Eyes of the Beast gets
about as much playtime, as well.There's an interesting thread on the official site debating the usefulness of various abilities; it seems every class has a long list of things that only serve to gum up the works. I know my Paladin has never used several of his seals in battle, and more than one of my blessings go unused for the most part, too. In fact, I deleted many of them from my action bars a while back. After all, you can't have too much space for emotes!
Filed under: Polls, Analysis / Opinion, Odds and ends, Blizzard
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Argent Mar 14th 2006 4:27AM
oddly enough, i happen to think eyes of the beast is a very useful ability - it's just utterly fantastic for pet pulls. i haven't raidded enough with my hunter to weigh in on the relative merits of the improved version. it might help with long distance pulls, like flamegor.
with my paladin, if there is one thing i noticed is that a lot of people (at least early one) don't really understand what to do with certain abilities and thus just remove them from their bars and forget all about them.
the classic examples for me were blessing of light and blessing of sacrefice. we were pretty deep into molten core when i finally convinced people that using the former constantly and the latter situationally was crucial to our progress. now, that sort of thinking is taken for granted because we understand the relative usefulness of both spells more fully.
as far as truly useless talents go -- improved retribution aura kinda sticks out for me in the paladin trees. i can't say i've ever met anyone who got that. pallys also have a bunch of pretty situational/borderline crappy talents (lasting judgements, eye for an eye) that may or may not be worth the points sepnt, but imp ret aura just kinda takes the cake.
Nick Mar 14th 2006 6:53AM
Throwing weapon spec for rogues is by far the winner.
Mike Mar 14th 2006 7:57AM
I never use Bloodrage or Slam with my Warrior. Neither are on my action bars.
I feel like Improved Thunder Clap is a bit of a waste, but then again I only use Thunder Clap very situationally.
I could see where Booming Voice could be sort of counterproductive, having a Demoralizing Shout pull enemies from further away that you were trying to keep out of the fight.
I can't see ever using Dual Wield Spec because you rarely ever see Warriors sporting the dub-dub. Usually they're tanking (/w a shield) or off-tanking (/w a two-hand). Although I guess you could put some points in Dual Wield Spec if you wanted to off-tank or go DPS with two weapons.
AareDub Mar 14th 2006 9:20AM
I'll agree with not using slam with my warrior, but I use bloodrage all the time. I also dual wield, but that might change when I hit 60.
Blake Mar 14th 2006 9:20AM
I think i speak for all rogues when i say that we have some increadibly useless skills and talents. Just to name a few, imp distract and any of the talents to imp poisons. some skills are useless too, like Garrote and find/disarm traps (unless your into alot of pvp)
Theres more but then again maybe im just not using them right? all i use is Hemo and slice and dice : ) lol.
slybri Mar 14th 2006 9:26AM
A lot of these talents are filler for the talent trees to get you to the 31 point talents. I usually steer clear of them on my toons and go for a mixed tree build that doesnt use the 31 point talent. Go for the ones that actually make a difference.
A lot of these talents sound useful but in actual practice don't do much, like the warlocks Improved Drain Soul. Some of them just don't work out at all , like the Warlocks Aftermath.
Some of the talents are really oddly placed. LIke the mages Presence of Mind, which is more useful than the 31 point talents but is a 21 point talent. Or the paladins Blessing of Kings, which used to be a 31 pt. but is now an 11pt talent. Some of them are essential for the class, like the mages Improved Arcane Explosion, but are placed to far down for all builds to use.
You gotta wonder what Blizz is thinking (and rethinking) with some of these talent trees.
dave Mar 14th 2006 9:45AM
My girlfriend is a hunter and I am always asking her to use Eagle Eye, usually in Arathi Basin to figure out where those pesky horde are zerging next. Aside from that, she used Eagle Eye a bunch when camping for Broken Tooth (she finally got him, too).
On my priest, smite never got touched (though as we all know, this will probably change). On my warlock, so far I haven't used anything higher than Rank 1 of Curse of Recklessness. I actually find that most spells have a use, if only once in a blue moon. Things like Curse of Weakness are marginally useful to throw on a hunter's pet if you have the time, Mind Soothe on a priest is nice for sneaking past pulls and looks like in 1.10 it might become a decent way of trying to escape by being able to get closer to a mob, etc. Even abilities like Expose Armor on a rogue get talked about as having some limited usefulness. These are certainly not class-defining abilities, but I feel like most have some purpose.
That being said, Improved Firestone in the 'locks talent tree is totally useless. As is Improved Enslave Demon, Improved Health Funnel, Improved Drain Life, ...
TheLimper Mar 14th 2006 10:28AM
Throwing Weapon Specialization?
Improved Distract?
Improved Garrote?
These are 3 of the MOST useless talents, period.
Premeditation?
Deserves special mention as an absolutely atrocious 31 point talent.
Kang Mar 15th 2006 3:55PM
As a mage, I can state without any uncertainity that all the abilities between a level 10 mage and his Presence of Mind and Evocation should be removed! :P
Seriously, though: Improved Dampen Magic. The ability it acts upon is only really useful in a small number of situations anyways.