[TomHuxley]

Source: Mecer 2) Is the debuff going to be the same between 25man and 10man raids? Strict 10man tanks have worse gear, can we expect this debuff to scale accordingly.

No, the part that scales in 10 mans is how hard the boss hits and how much HP they have (just like now). The point of the change is this: as we all know, high avoidance has led to bosses hitting like oncoming trains, because when you only get hit 40% of the time the boss has to hit really hard to make that hit dangerous (and as a result healers have to be able to spam large heals).

Now I don't believe they are going to drastically alter this equation before Cataclysm (and as was mentioned boss hits and healer spam didn't exactly go down in SWP) BUT, you can only play this game for so long. Through Ulduar and into ToC some bosses have been able to 2-shot players in progression gear, but as avoidance numbers continue to go up eventually bosses cannot pose a significant threat to the tank unless they can one-shot them, and of course at this point boss encounter design becomes problematic. You can't make success or failure totally RNG (which would happen if a boss could one shot the tank), but with avoidance levels approaching 70%+ there would be little choice (actually, they could put in large amounts of AoE or some other constant damage magic, but this would strongly constrain encounter design).

So Ice Crown radiance just solves the mathematical problem of how hard vs how often a boss has to hit to be life threatening in the face of too much avoidance.

[Reev]

If we're really lucky, this also means that they'll get rid of the Icehowl Headbutts and the Anub Freezing Strikes for ICC, since they won't need as much avoidance control. Those always just seemed more annoying to me than anything.

[Synapse]

Source: Reev If we're really lucky, this also means that they'll get rid of the Icehowl Headbutts and the Anub Freezing Strikes for ICC, since they won't need as much avoidance control. Those always just seemed more annoying to me than anything.

That's would be what Sunwell became, which recalls to my Brut example(ty worldi). I'd love to see that again, since i'm an avoidance whore and that would make avoidance actually useful and powerful.

[Xianth]

Source: Kazeyonoma wow... wasn't avoidance DR implemented to prevent this sort of thing? sigh

Supposedly, but we already have nearly as much dodge as we did in BT gear so they obviously fucked up the scaling somewhere.

Can't say i'm suprised by this, especially as they've already remarked about avoidance being too high due to them accommodating much better gear via hard modes.

[Mecer]

Source: Reev If you're going from 60% avoidance on a DK to 40%, you still have 40% chance every 2 seconds to proc runestrike. You may get a couple of swings in a row where you won't proc this, but then you'll get a few in a row where you do, and can go nuts dropping your RP. This only really becomes a problem if your avoidance drops so low that your procs can't keep up with your RP generation. If you have a really bad string (hello warrior rage starvation), you always have death coil as a backup.

Deathcoil does not even compare to the threat Runestrike generates. 1.2k vs 3-4k damage with a threat modifier. A 20% drop in avoidance does not necessarily mean a 20% drop in threat, but it will be noticeable.

I understand the 'warrior rage starvation' but that doesnt make either situation right.

[Reev]

Oh I know Deathcoil doesn't compare, I was just thinking of another place to dump RP in the worst case scenario that you don't avoid enough attacks. It's moot, anyway, I imagine, since Deathcoil isn't off the GCD, like Rune Strike.

[Stymie]

Source: Synapse This is interesting, because on the biggest "zomg heal the tank is dead oh jesus this hurts so much" boss was Brutallus, whose ideal tanking gear was the old "get this much EH, then go go go avoidance". We might very well see a comeback of avoidance.

Except back then, certain classes had a harder time hitting that EH soft cap. Now, to be fair -- I don't do hard modes anymore. I tank 25 mans, used to do the hardcore thing (up to M'uru pre-nerf) but I don't have a desire to go back to it. So, perhaps it won't affect me that much.

However, for the demon realm on Kalecgos, or for Brutallus, more than a handful of warrior MTs (myself included) were volunteering their tank role to a Feral or DK due to EH discrepancies. Our guild had three primary tanks, one Warrior, one Feral, one Pally. The "all-around" approach of the warrior left me lower on EH even though I had the best gear over-all.

The more you nerf avoidance, the more class gaps in EH make a difference. As others said, they put in this change in SWP but did not, by any means, scale back boss damage or frequency of damage -- but still increased it drastically. I'm curious to see how hard of hits I'll be taking in ICC.

[Synapse]

Source: Stymie Except back then, certain classes had a harder time hitting that EH soft cap. Now, to be fair -- I don't do hard modes anymore. I tank 25 mans, used to do the hardcore thing (up to M'uru pre-nerf) but I don't have a desire to go back to it. So, perhaps it won't affect me that much. However, for the demon realm on Kalecgos, or for Brutallus, more than a handful of warrior MTs (myself included) were volunteering their tank role to a Feral or DK due to EH discrepancies. Our guild had three primary tanks, one Warrior, one Feral, one Pally. The "all-around" approach of the warrior left me lower on EH even though I had the best gear over-all. The more you nerf avoidance, the more class gaps in EH make a difference. As others said, they put in this change in SWP but did not, by any means, scale back boss damage or frequency of damage -- but still increased it drastically. I'm curious to see how hard of hits I'll be taking in ICC.

That's all just putting scalings at manageable levels... with lower avoidance they can actually let us USE avoidance. I'm fine with that...I just wish they weren't so workaroundish.

Following another GC post, it seems that they realized that their solution of using one scaling for two stats(damage against dr and avoidance) just won't work forever. Seems what they'll do is let bosses scale stats like expertise and hit too. I'm all for it as long as it's consistent and not... "maelstrom radiance".

[Insahnity]

Here's my take on things:

EVERYBODY loses threat on this change.
-Paladins get less mana from dodges (Hello glyphed 2/2 SA),
-DKs get less Runestrikes (and for those who specced into it, ScentOfBlood just got a kick in the nuts),
-Warriors and Bears don't get rage from dodges. This is an important source when trying to tank 2-4 mobs, which is in between a single hard hitting boss (incoming damage generates the rage) and the large number of small mobs (Large AoE DPS results in rage generation). The 2-4 don't hit hard enough to generate enough rage on incoming damage and you don't do enough mass damage to generate rage on hit.

As for survivabilty:
-Paladins will no longer be able to hit 102+% avoidance + mitigation, but because of this dodge is not as big a component of their survival tools.
-Warriors will REALLY get screwed with the lowest EH of the lot. This impacts them more than paladins, and I predict will result in more instagibs. Gearing for avoidance will exacerbate their EH woes.
-DKs are balanced around having higher dodge (and parry) to try and compensate for a lack of block. The remaining is supposed to be covered by various mechanisms based on the trees (Blood self healing, frost through physical mitigation, and Unholy through magic mitigation and avoidance). if you nerf dodge (even though equally amongst all tanks), the value of these alternate mechanism goes up. Personally, I see this as pushing unholy tanks closer to being unviable (think raiding frost mages, it wont matter with two other viable tank specs), and with the low EH of frost, Blood tank population is going to go up.
-Druids I think will be the best off. Already they are the EH kings, and they don't rely as much on dodge as people think, the name of the game is armor and big HP pool, and to a lesser extent Savage Defense (which is why Blizzard has been steadily chipping away at bear EH and armor values since around 2.0 rather than tinkering with AGI->Dodge co-efficient).

Without further changes, I predict the following:
-Bears will resurface as the hardmode kings
-Paladins will go back to Hyjal-Alliance-Base encounter popularity
-Less skilled warriors will go from borderline benched to guaranteed bench, as their skills at using active skills to mitigate damage will become evident, rather than passive traits that all other tanks enjoy (especially bears and paladins)
-DKs will respec as blood, the last diehard Unholy raiding tanks will be forced to switch unless they produce a magic gimmick fight, and frost tanks will be for high threat DK tanks fights due to DW (which I think will be easier to reach viability with the accompanying 1h SSG addition).

I hope they tinker with the Frost presence bonuses to compensate, specifically increase the armor multipler to be closer to that of bears rather than paladins/warriors.

What I was wondering is why they don't use other tools at hand. Specifically, magic damage is a great tool. Magic Damage unilatery ignores dodge/block/parry as well as armor. If they want further granularity, they could make environmental damage to nullify spell deflect/spell reflect through the use of a short range (5-10 yard) magic damage aura (a permanent poison cloud, etc.). If you don't want to screw over melee DPS, either a magic damage cleave (think Koralon) or a frontal magic cone attack that occurs often. I'd also recommend the use of either rarer magic schools (frost and fire resist is in WOTLK gear, so go with arcane/shadow/nature, most especially arcane since there is no resist aura for it), or rotating magic damage so you can't gear for it specifically (LW patches).

[Synapse]

Just a couple things...

Source: Insahnity Here's my take on things: EVERYBODY loses threat on this change. -Paladins get less mana from dodges (Hello glyphed 2/2 SA), As for survivabilty: -Paladins will no longer be able to hit 102+% avoidance + mitigation, but because of this dodge is not as big a component of their survival tools. Without further changes, I predict the following: -Paladins will go back to Hyjal-Alliance-Base encounter popularity

Paladin mana intake won't change. WIth 1/2 SA and glyph of divine plea, an incoming dps of about 1k or 2k is more than enough to keep our rotations going at full mana easily.
The value of dodge won't change. We'll still love avoidance over blocking due to the sheer difference between blocking and avoiding an attack.
Also... I doubt paladins will be pigeonholed into "let's tank the ghouls" again. Their tanking capabilities are affected just as much as the others are.

Source: Insahnity What I was wondering is why they don't use other tools at hand. Specifically, magic damage is a great tool. Magic Damage unilatery ignores dodge/block/parry as well as armor. If they want further granularity, they could make environmental damage to nullify spell deflect/spell reflect through the use of a short range (5-10 yard) magic damage aura (a permanent poison cloud, etc.). If you don't want to screw over melee DPS, either a magic damage cleave (think Koralon) or a frontal magic cone attack that occurs often. I'd also recommend the use of either rarer magic schools (frost and fire resist is in WOTLK gear, so go with arcane/shadow/nature, most especially arcane since there is no resist aura for it), or rotating magic damage so you can't gear for it specifically (LW patches).

They already did. That's Anub'arak and Gormok for you. The thing is that if all the challenging damage is unavoidable...what's the point of avoidance? Avoidance can and will be useful if it's always kept at manageable levels. Same for EH. They want tanks to be able to choose whether they want more EH, or more Avoidance given the limits that keep the encounter hard. If they can always keep both avoidance, spike damage and damage intake at adequate levels... a high avoidance tank would be just as much desirable as a high eh tank. The idea i mentioned on the previous post reflects that.

[drae]

GC blames having to institute "Icewell Radiance" on adding an extra tier of gear to TOC for hardmode kills. I say, YOU SHOULD HAVE ONLY INCREASED EH THEN! noob.

He also figures it wont be a problem for DK threat generation until DK's are forced to not press rune strike on each cooldown.

They literally decided to implement this LAST NIGHT. He makes it sound like they were sitting around a pizza going "guys, we have to figure out how to fix avoidance in IC before we can go home tonight" and some guy was like "Icewell radiance. I wanna go play halo 3". "GENIUS! lets go home."

Official Wow Tanking Forum Thread browse the blues, some peoples reactions are hilarious.

[drae]

and just wow at the number of people viewing this thread!

[drae]

Actually, doesn't this make the pally T10 set-bonus amazing? That 12% dodge isn't affected by DR right? Meaning for them Icewell radiance is like... 8%?

Nerf them, then effectively buff them again....

Somehow I wonder if the left hand has any idea what the right is doing over there at blizzard.

[Synapse]

Source: drae Actually, doesn't this make the pally T10 set-bonus amazing? That 12% dodge isn't affected by DR right? Meaning for them Icewell radiance is like... 8%? Nerf them, then effectively buff them again.... Somehow I wonder if the left hand has any idea what the right is doing over there at blizzard.

It's no different than a dodge trinket...just bigger. It's not a permanent bonus either, it just procs when you trigger DP. DP will roll for as long as you're in melee, but the dodge bonus goes away.
Going by how each % of avoidance is better than the previous, this set bonus got nerfed by proxy.

[swelt]

It's Deja Vu all over again!

[Darksend]

preface: have not read any of this thread

statement: There is absolutely ZERO REASON to bring anything but a druid tank if this goes in.

I am a druid tank in a server first progression guild and I have been crying and trying to get my class nerfed since I started ulduar hard modes. We ran with a warrior and druid MTs and the difference between who was tanking was so noticeable.

The last time they did this everyone pointed at brutallus. Guess what, the best way to tank brutallus was in pure avoidance gear. Even with radiance a druid was able to get 60% avoidance after radiance.

In this case however druids were already the weakest class for avoidance. With idol proc up I have ~43% dodge in a raid fully buffed. Even though I also have 64K hp, healers hate healing me because a paladin alt in my guild with 50K hp fully raid buffed can block every hit and takes such predictable damage that they love healing him.

THIS CHANGE WILL AFFECT HEALERS MUCH MORE THAN IT WILL EFFECT TANKS. The goal is to make damage on tanks predictable rather than healers thumb in but or with 200K overhealing after 4 straight dodges. Rage will also be a lot more consistent, but DK threat might suffer from lack or runestrikes, and paladins will lose the ability to block every hit which is a substantial part of their EH. As far as druids, if we plan on only doing ICC, we may consider perminantly dropping ferocity if we know we do not have a ret or prot paladin.

off topic:

Also, if you're going to give mobs expertise, can you please make a spell or some kind of method to determine the level of expertise without us having to do parses? Yes. We would probably just let you see the numbers directly. I consider it a design flaw that players have to experiment to determine thinks like hit and expertise cap We're all for experimentation and theorycrafting, but we don't think it's fair to require some players to go out and do a lot of work to generate specific numbers that all players feel like they need to know.

This is probably the thing that stood out the most in all of this.

[Hamburglar]

Ghostcrawler's posts are all maddening. He has no idea what he's talking about and he's getting all defensive now dealing with the posters.

[Meeks]

Source: drae Actually, doesn't this make the pally T10 set-bonus amazing? That 12% dodge isn't affected by DR right? Meaning for them Icewell radiance is like... 8%? Nerf them, then effectively buff them again.... Somehow I wonder if the left hand has any idea what the right is doing over there at blizzard.

The community is 99% sure you get 12% dodge when you hit divine plea, not every time is refreshed. Divine plea is also on the GCD meaning we take a threat loss(prob deserved) by messing up our rotation to hit DP.

This also makes the bonus much weaker than it was because base avoidance is lower so the set bonus provides a smaller net effect.

[Omok]

Source: Hamburglar Ghostcrawler's posts are all maddening. He has no idea what he's talking about and he's getting all defensive now dealing with the posters.

I disagree. I think he is right on the mark, and this is the best change to tanking and healing the game has probably ever seen. Long overdue.

[Junkyard]

Source: Hamburglar Ghostcrawler's posts are all maddening. He has no idea what he's talking about and he's getting all defensive now dealing with the posters.

I can vouch for this I got banned for saying I didn't like his leadership, and where the Dev team has led the game. One question that should be posed here is which tanking class does this hurt the most? I would guess the highest avoidance tanks currently, and does this truely make stam king without any arguement. I do have another question sunwell radiance was put into place because of rogues from what I recall of videos of rogues in T6 gear being unhittable, and seeing one tank Illidan. Isn't that why sunwell radiance came into the game? If thats true we have 2 very different reasons for this radiance compared to the sunwell version.