Posts with tag cooldowns

Every week, WoW Insider brings you Lichborne for blood, frost, and unholy death knights. In the post-Cataclysm era, death knights are no longer the new kids on the block. Let's show the other classes how a hero class gets things done.

So you know your rotations. You know your gear priorities. You know what to reforge, which buttons to hit, and how to stay out of the fire. These are all good things. Yet still, you feel like you're missing something. Maybe you feel like you could crank out another 1-2k DPS on some fights. Maybe you feel like your health keeps dropping a little low when you tank.

Sometimes, the problem with problems like these is that it's not a big glaring thing you're forgetting (nor is it forgetting to drop your favorite lucky vanity item). Sometimes, it's just that you need to tighten up your play just a little bit. This week, we're going to take a look at a few simple tricks that hopefully a lot of you can use just to shore up your play and go the extra mile.

Every week, WoW Insider brings you Spiritual Guidance for discipline, holy and shadow priests. Dawn Moore covers healing for discipline and holy priests, while her archenemy Fox Van Allen dabbles in shadow. Dawn also writes for LearnToRaid.com and produces the Circle of Healing Podcast.

Some time last year on Spiritual Guidance, I wrote an article on macros for healing priests. Overall, it was a simple approach to the topic, touching on some basics like binding consolidation, communication, and a couple of utility macros. The article generated a lot of discussion, and several readers submitted some quality macros for their fellow priests.

Since a few of those macros are now outdated and I've added a few new macros to my spellbook in the interim, I thought now would be a good time to revisit the topic and look at what I've dug up in the past few months. Since these were accumulated over time, I haven't kept track of all the original authors of these macros, so if you see something in here you wrote, feel free to shake your fist at me.

Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand poobah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related.

Following up from last week's piece on when to wipe, I want to take a closer look at healing priority in Cataclysm. Last year, I wrote an article discussing the different factors to consider when choosing your healing targets.

I guess the question to ask is: Have things changed since then?

Here are all the factors to consider:

• Inbound heals
• Cooldowns used
• Imminent damage
• Key players
• Accessibility

There are bound to be others, but that's the main idea. Target priority hasn't changed much in Cataclysm. The question I continue to receive is what a player should actually do in terms of spell use. Let's do some healing analysis, and I'll walk you through what I do. Just do keep in mind that healing can have multiple right answers. Figure out what works for you and is effective for your raid group.

Several players and Community Manager Lylirra shared some discussion today on the official World of Warcraft forums about the cooldowns of novelty items crafted through the archaeology profession.

In the thread, the original poster suggested that the cooldowns of certain novelty items were too long in comparison to others and that Blizzard should consider fixing the discrepancies. The poster used Pendant of the Scarab Storm and Bones of Transformation as an example, noting that both items have a vanity effect that lasts 20 seconds but a cooldown difference of 90 minutes.

Lylirra responded, explaining that the cooldowns, though seemingly random, were chosen with specific issues in mind. She explains that with the Pendant of the Scarab Storm specifically, developers were concerned that the item's effect might strain certain players' computers.

Archaeology Items' Cooldowns

The current cooldown was chosen deliberately, but I can see why you might think otherwise (100 minutes is kind of strange for a cooldown time).

Anyway, summoning a harem of scarabs can be pretty taxing on some systems, so there were some initial concerns about putting the pendant on a short cooldown. Based on the feedback we've received, though, we're looking into reducing it. We agree that the effect is pretty cool and would be nice to use it more frequently.

source

Personally, a little lore logic behind the items might be nice as well. How is it that my character can summon a god every 3 minutes, but it takes 10 minutes to round up some sassy dwarven ladies?

---

Every week, Raid Rx will help you quarterback your healers to victory! Your host is Matt Low, the grand pooh-bah of World of Matticus and a founder of No Stock UI, a WoW blog for all things UI-, macro- and addon-related. If you're looking for more healing advice, check out the Plus Heal community and the new healing, raiding, and guild management podcast, Matticast.

No beating around the bush today. There were some upcoming healer changes that were announced earlier in the week. I can tell you as of right now, I'm worried about the Power Word: Shield change -- not because I think discipline priests will remain overpowered, but because holy might go the route. I'll explain that later on in the post.

The main focus of today's post is defensive cooldowns for shaman and druids. I'm sure a number of players don't believe there's a need for the two classes to get defensive cooldowns, but in order to compete for utility, I think druids and shaman would benefit greatly from having those spells available. The argument here is that since the four healers are approximately the same across the board (from a throughput perspective), the edge might be given to paladins and priests because of the additional cooldowns they have to offer. Shaman and druids might end up being even more attractive in 10-player raids.

Every week, WoW Insider brings you Encrypted Text for assassination, combat and subtlety rogues. Chase Christian will be your guide to the world of shadows every Wednesday. Feel free to suggest a topic you'd like to see covered!

Rogues are the cooldown class. You've heard it before. For the entire lifetime of World of Warcraft, rogues have been defined by their cooldowns. Vanish and Blind were the key ingredients to the infamous Roguecraft videos, while Shadowstep and Adrenaline Rush defined an entire expansion's worth of arena matches. Preparation, the cooldown-eliminating cooldown, has been considered to be the most powerful ability in a rogue's arsenal.

Aside from the low-level ability Recuperate, all three of our new Cataclysm abilities are cooldowns. We have a plethora of both defensive and offensive cooldowns, and knowing when to use them becomes key in defining the difference between a good rogue and a great one. While it may seem simple to pop CDs as soon as they're ready to be used again, defensive cooldowns are much more complex. Offensive CDs can be coordinated with external effects to increase their potency significantly. Many cooldowns ride the line between the offensive and defensive categories, as they're viable for each purpose.

Insider Trader is a column about professions by Basil "Euripides" Berntsen, who also writes Gold Capped about how to make money using the auction house. Email Basil your questions.

The state of all the professions in Cataclysm is still in a bit of flux, but at least most of the recipes have been added to the beta now. Like most professions, tailoring post-Cataclysm is going to look very similar to the way it looks now. Sure, all the numbers are higher, but the structure of the profession is basically the same.

One of the key differences, however, is that while tailoring has historically required mostly cloth and vendor trash for recipes, it is now a serious consumer of "volatile" elementals. Look through the recipes you start doing in Wrath of the Lich King and you'll see mostly bolts of Frostweave. You still need the new type of cloth (Bolt of Embersilk Cloth); however, virtually every single recipe you'll want to train on, as well as most of the actually useful (and valuable) recipes, are going to involve Volatile Water, Volatile Fire, Volatile Life, and Volatile Air. This is also true of the other gear-crafting professions, leatherworking and blacksmithing; however, tailoring had one thing going for it that other professions didn't: Unraveling.

Stop me if you've heard this one. You're taking on some dragon. Some really powerful spell is about to hit you and the rest of the raid. You don't have any cooldowns to use because you had to pop them earlier. The tank who is busy yelling obscenities at said dragon just took a massive fireball to the face and is down in the red. You know for a fact that the next blow is going to be lethal and you have maybe 2 seconds to react.

If you move, you may well have condemned your tank to death. If you stay and heal, you'll end up taking some damage which could be lethal.

Normally, this isn't that big of a deal, but we're in an age where we have so many informative addons that tell us which attacks successfully hit a player and when it happened. What's worse is that this data means the difference between staying and getting cut from a raid (or a guild).

This is a topic of one of the emails that I received from a healing shaman.

So what is a healer to do? Is he wrong for making the decision to take avoidable damage to keep the raid or the tank alive? Is he better off just taking the damage so that he doesn't look bad? Either way, you're damned if you do and you're damned if you don't. Lots of players don't understand that these are some of the decisions that have to be made.

Addons 101 is a four-part series for beginners dedicated to understanding what an addon is, how they enhance the gameplay experience of World of Warcraft, some popular addons in certain categories, and popular venues in which to research, download and find addons.

Addons 101 has covered a lot of ground for new players looking to get into addons for the first time. We have discussed what addons are and why you would want them, and we have gone over some of the basic elements of the World of Warcraft user interface and how they can be improved upon. I hope that some people have gained some knowledge into addons and have had their fears alleviated somewhat -- addons won't hurt you, I promise!

This week, Addons 101 looks at what I call the other essentials. These are interface elements that have become important over the lifetime of WoW but are not intrinsically understandable just by looking at the user interface the game presents you with. Before I start, let me say that Blizzard has taken steps in the right direction on many of these items, but addons still do the job better, for the most part. We will discuss terms, recommend certain addons and hopefully give some good explanations for any questions that might be had. As always, if you're an interface and addon newbie, I'm more than happy to field questions at mat@wow.com (remember the one "t").

Rich Maloy lives and loves enhancement. Enhance is his main spec, his off spec, and his off-off spec. The other trees are there purely for his amusement. Whatever your shaman's spec, get your questions ready for the Totem Recall shaman roundtable on Raid Warning coming July 13. Send your questions in now to be answered by the top shaman from around Azeroth.

Last week we covered the Lower Spire of ICC and how enhancement shaman (or any damage-dealing class, for that matter) can maximize their cooldown usage. This week we'll use the 25% buff and power-clear the rest of the instance.

Rotface

Regular and Heroic Another fight where Heroism off the start is the best way to go. The oozes come out faster the lower his health gets, so my theory is to get as much damage on target early on. At the end, things are hectic and too much damage is lost as too many people are running around or dead. You can pre-pot here to have another Potion of Speed available to use later on in combat. An early Hero makes cooldown management easy; use at the beginning and then again at every opportunity.

We're taking a break from bare-bones basics this week to address a topic that pops up for fresh level 80s who are still adjusting to their new curve of power. When is the best time to use long-cooldown abilities, trinkets or anything else that provides a massive, temporary boost in power? (The quick, easy answer: Regularly. Unused abilities that you're saving "just in case" tend to remain ... well, unused.) Things get more complicated, though, when you're juggling cooldowns in a raid group that's savvy to the benefits of a well-timed Heroism (Alliance) or Bloodlust (Horde). When is the right time to go for broke?

Dear Glorious WoW.com Writers,

I have a question on my mind that I suspect a lot of other people have on their minds as well. Should DPS pop their cooldowns/trinkets during Bloodlust or after Bloodlust? I would think you should stack your cooldowns with Bloodlust because you get the effect of them plus 30% haste, increasing their effect by that much. On the other hand, maybe the wiser option is to use cooldowns after bloodlust, so you have the effect of the Bloodlust then the effect of the cooldowns, which spreads it out a little more. What are factors in deciding to use cooldowns with Bloodlust or after Bloodlust? Does mana limits factor in to this at all? I can't find a straight answer on the internet anywhere, and was hoping you could provide me with one.

Thank you,
Bownzy of Blackwing Lair (US)

Join us for a quick roundup of thoughts from WoW.com staffers, after the break.

Addon Spotlight focuses on the backbone of the WoW gameplay experience: the user interface. We'll look at everything from bags to bars, buttons to DPS meters and beyond -- your interface folder will never be the same! This week, we look at a different style of cooldown, debuff and buff tracker.

In a previous Addon Spotlight, I reviewed Sexycooldown, a timeline-style buff/debuff/cooldown timer that brings with it functionality and an awesome look and feel. This week, I wanted to showcase another of my new favorite addons that performs certain tasks similar Sexycooldown/ForteXorcist, but does so in a different style. A few emails that I have received have asked for a bar-style cooldown and debuff tracker. Well, here is your answer: NeedToKnow. I've tried my absolute best to avoid a dumb joke about "you're on a need-to-know basis," but you do need to know about NeedToKnow! NeedToKnow.

Nethaera hit the forums this morning, asking for feedback from tanks around the globe. Ghostcrawler has been having a lively discussion with tanks (most specifically protection warriors) recently, and now they seem to be formalizing the discussion for the wider audience.

Nethaera

We're currently working on the tanking cooldowns for tanks in Cataclysm. We're interested in feedback from the community on what makes cooldowns fun and useful. For example, what is the sweet spot in cooldown duration between an ability with such a short cooldown that you must mash it constantly versus an ability with such a long cooldown? Which current abilities are fun? Putting aside any rose-colored glasses, were there cooldowns in Burning Crusade or classic WoW that you miss in Lich King? What, in your minds, should the role be for talents and glyphs. For example, if glyphs shouldn't reduce cooldowns, what can they do?

source

Nethaera goes on to remind people that this thread isn't the place for balance discussions necessarily, and certainly not a place to debate who's overpowered. This feedback also won't dictate exactly what the developers will do, it will simply help them make the right decisions. Do you have an opinion? Then head on over to the forums and make it known! Politely, of course.

AddOn Spotlight focuses on the backbone of the WoW gameplay experience -- the user interface. Everything from bags to bars, buttons to DPS meters and beyond -- your AddOns folder will never be the same! This week, we get real sexy.

Timers for spells is an imperative addon for many classes that rely on steady rotations of DoT management and keeping debuffs up on enemies. DPS can be greatly altered by the careful balance of spell effects lasting for certain periods of time on enemies. There are a lot of good timers out there for spells and abilities, but today I want to introduce you to my favorite. If this addon is old news to you, and you already know how powerful it can be, help out the less fortunate! If you're new to his wonderful piece of code, stay a while and listen, as I sing a love song to SexyCooldown.