Eyonix delivers: Focused Will, Natural Perfection, and Discipline
by Eliah Hecht 
Oct 30th 2007 at 10:50PM
It goes on! In a post titled "Focused Will: The Saga Continues" (has Eyonix been reading WoW Insider? What up, drake!), we get another update on the new Discipline talent slated for patch 2.3:Feedback was read, gathered and the designers are fully aware of all that you've provided. As a result, we're making an adjustment to the talent so instead of seeing this morning's version of focused will in the next PTR push, you'll see:
"After taking a critical hit you gain the Focused Will effect, reducing all damage taken by 1/3/5% and increasing healing effects on you by 4/7/10% for 6 seconds. Stacks up to 3 times."
This is up from 1/2/3% reduced damage and 4/8/12% increased heals earlier today, although it stacked up to five times then. The associated change to the Druid talent Natural Perfection has been similarly buffed:
We've read through a great deal of feedback and are making another adjustment to the natural perfection talent which you'll see in the next PTR data push.
"Now also grants the Natural Perfection effect after being critically hit, reducing all damage taken by 1/3/5% for 6 seconds. Stacks up to 3 times."
It used to be 1/2/3% and five stacks as well. In related news, Eyonix has gotten a look at the Discipline tree in store for Wrath of the Lich King, and while his post is short on details, it does make me all warm and tingly.
He had promised earlier today that a post on Disc was forthcoming, and here it is:
Yesterday I took an extensive review of what we have in store for discipline (though it will see many changes between now and release) in Wrath of the Lich King. For quite some time I've been providing the designers with feedback from the community, as well as my own thoughts and ideas. Though it may not always be apparent every member of our team works very hard communicating all aspects of player feedback.
With that being said, the current iteration of the tree literally blew my mind. I was in the class designers office in under a minute discussing the changes like I was a nine year old child who was given a sneak peak of an entire set of unreleased Garbage Pail Kids cards. I can't say much but I will say this:
The tree will stand on its own two feet.
It will be viable in PvE.
You will notice impact from player feedback
In a reply to a player who asked "How are we supposed to be excited with this change? Is this going to fix the fact that we need to invest into two trees just to heal?", Eyonix simply said:
That's the goal :)
That's what I like to hear! In my opinion, that is one of the biggest flaws with the Priest class, if not the single biggest. No other class needs two trees to heal. It's too bad that it's taking them until Wrath to fix that, but better late than never. And it would certainly be nice for Disc to be PvE-viable. Let the speculation begin: how are they going to change Disc? Will it be another viable healing tree, or a damage tree, or what?
Filed under: Druid, Priest, Patches, News items, Talents, Wrath of the Lich King
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
Jack Oct 30th 2007 11:27PM
These changes make this resto druid happy :D
romen Oct 31st 2007 4:24AM
Ow pls yes make it PvE usable. tired of shadow. toob ad it wil be done so late tho.
EmperorTuna Oct 31st 2007 5:31AM
I feel hated as a shaman in comparison. Still, I guess I can't completely complain.
Junzim Oct 31st 2007 7:05AM
Yay! Focused trees!
tim Oct 31st 2007 7:56AM
my guess is that they'd make discipline more like paladin-type healing. being able to heal even while being whacked on, and focusing on short heal types.
while holy will be for the big fat heals.
amasen Oct 31st 2007 9:45AM
As an arena warrior and arena priest, this change will do nothing for my priest. I see a healbot priest. He is still dead. So what if he has +10% healing, I just added -50% healing to him.
Also 6 seconds is a joke... If your to get crit that many times in 6 seconds... 5% dmg reduction won't matter, your going to die.
rafe.brox Oct 31st 2007 10:17AM
I hope the rest of the tree isn't so useless; as a thirty-point talent, Focused Will is an *insult.*
In PvE, the priest should seldom be the victim of a critical hit in the first place - six percent of never ain't that often, folks. And, in the PvP world, as was pointed out - if you're getting multiple-critted within a handful of seconds, you're taking a dirt nap.
I'm disgusted and disappointed, to be perfectly frank, and want unfettered access to whatever mind-altering substance Drysc is using to be so thrilled about it.
Bah f*ing Humbug.
baylow Oct 31st 2007 11:56AM
@ 6 and 7
You're being shortsighted and lacking complete knowledge of the mechanics of "on crit" and "stacking" abilities.
A) On-crit abilities can proc when you are not crit. I.E you don't need to be crit 5 times for this to get all 5 stacks, it can proc off of normal hits to as long as you have S1 + S2 gear and about 400ish resiliance to make it a fair amount
B) Stack effects refresh the stack on each application.. so it's 3 crits in 18 seconds. Thing about how many times you get hit per second, factor in the amount of % crit the attacker has, then question how likely it is that you wont constantly have 3 stacks of this ability up after 18 seconds in combat.
Eliah Hecht Oct 31st 2007 12:02PM
To clarify Baylow's comment A: on-crit abilities activate whenever you would be crit if you didn't have any resilience. So if the resilience check prevents you from being crit, you still get the full benefit of any on-crit abilities you might have.
This wasn't always the case; it was changed a few patches ago to keep people from avoiding resilience.
rafe.brox Oct 31st 2007 12:45PM
While I appreciate the criticism and clarification, my general thumbs-down for this talent (which is pretty much aimed solely at PvP players, despite Eonix' enthusiasm to the contrary) remains.
I think it's a ten-point worthy talent, at best. Make it speed up casting time and decrease spell cost (I dunno about anyone else, but when I focus, I work faster and harder) - make it do *something* meaningful for the PvE crowd.
There are entirely too many On-Crit-effect talents in the Priest trees that we're all but required to waste points on already; adding more isn't the right answer.
Maybe the rest of the retooled Discipline tree doesn't suck decrepit Papal wang, and they're NDA'd to the point where they can only release the half-assed crazy corners of the reworking. Frankly, I'd like to see a couple healing spells (even inefficient ones) thrown into the Disc so that a Disc/Shadow build would be more viable (or if you get kicked while casting a Holy spell, you wouldn't be completely SOL while that cools down - "oh, look, my only "heals" are fear and PW:S... goody....").
Twelve thousand mana and a potty mouth, that's me. ;-)