WoW SoD Class Tuning Explained

As part of the class tuning, Druids will experience notable enhancements to their Starsurge ability. This includes a substantial increase in damage by 182%, a reduction in cooldown from 10 seconds to 6 seconds, and a decrease in mana cost from 3% to 1% of the base mana. These adjustments aim to make Starsurge more potent, accessible, and efficient for Druid players.

In WoW Season of Discovery, the Priest class, previously considered notably weak, is set to undergo substantial improvements. Two key abilities, Priest Homunculi and Void Plague, are receiving significant damage buffs to address their previous shortcomings.

The damage of Priest Homunculi is slated to increase by an impressive 100%. Simultaneously, Void Plague is receiving a 200% boost in damage, further solidifying its role as a great tool for Priests.

Moreover, the balancing of the Priest class is being solidified with enhancements to Twisted Faith. This talent will now increase the damage output of Mind Blast and Mind Flay by 50% on targets afflicted with Shadow Word: Pain. This marks a considerable power-up from the previous 20%, providing Priests with more strategic options and making their rotation more dynamic in the upcoming season.

Hunters are going through significant changes in this class tuning, representing the most extensive adjustments among all World of Warcraft classes. Adjustments include both buffs and nerfs, targeting concerns such as the scaling of pet spells, the relative weakness of physical abilities, and the excessive durability of Hunter Pets due to the hunter's armor and stamina.

One major change involves Flanking Strike, which now benefits from weapon enhancements like sharpening stones. It is also now subject to the global cooldown and treated as a proper melee attack. This means it can now take advantage of attack power and various combat modifiers, including dodge, parry, block, crit, and hit. However, it is worth noting that Flanking Strike is now prevented by Pacify and requires a weapon to be equipped. The pet damage from Flanking Strike is also appropriately treated as a melee attack, gaining the same benefits as the hunter's damage.

Additionally, adjustments have been made to Hunter pet attack values to ensure better scaling with Hunter attack power. 

Developers’ notes: Pets that cast spells such as scorpid poison or Lightning Breath were scaling too well and pets using physical abilities were scaling too little. We’ve now normalized the amount of attack power gained, to scale with the focus cost of individual pet abilities. This means that abilities with a higher focus cost, that are cast less often, will receive more benefit from attack power per attack than abilities with a lower focus cost that can generally be used more often. Overall this should level out the damage and reduce situations where some abilities were scaling too much or too little with hunter attack power.

• Scorpid poison now distributes the additional damage it gains from attack power evenly over each stack of Scorpid Poison on the target.

Developers’ notes: Previously, Scorpid poison received most of its benefit from the Hunter’s attack power in the very first stack. Now the additional damage gained from the controlling hunter will not be gained until the full 5 stacks of poison are on the target. This increases the ramp time a bit and makes it less immediately deadly in PvP.

• Pets now receive a smaller portion of a hunter’s armor and stamina.

Developers’ notes: Hunter pets were gaining far too much durability from hunter stats, to the point where some pets could get more than double the health and armor of a well-geared level 25 player. We still want dedicated hunters to have the ability to tank certain dungeon and raid encounters, but pets shouldn’t be so effective that they become the objectively correct choice.

• Aspect of the Lion has been redesigned and will now function as an Aura.

Developers’ notes: This means that it is possible to have Aspect of the Lion up in addition to another aspect, such as Aspect of the Hawk. As an offset to the lower amount of damage that some hunter pets will deal, and to make talents such as Improved Aspect of the Hawk more attractive to Hunters using Aspect of the Lion, we’re shifting Aspect of the Lion into an aura rather than an aspect. This change will go into effect with scheduled weekly maintenance tomorrow, but the tooltip will not yet change. In a later hotfix, we’ll rename relocalize Aspect of the Lion to “Heart of the Lion” and update the tooltip.

Rogues will get some serious Saber Slash buffs in SoD. Saber Slash's damage is now classified as Bleed and benefits from the Mangle debuff, which means that creatures immune to Bleeds won't be affected by Saber Slash.

Moreover, there are changes to the interaction between Saber Slash, Shiv, and Main Gauche with Remorseless Attacks - they will consume Remorseless Attacks.

Saber Slash's tool tip has been corrected without any dmg reduction.

Shamans, were low on the World of Warcraft SoD Tier Lists, but are currently facing improvements. Lava Lash, a key ability, is receiving substantial buffs in both damage and mana cost, offering a more promising outlook for this class. Lava Lash damage is increasing from 100% to 150% weapon damage, while the mana cost is being reduced from 4% to 1% of base mana. Additionally, the chance for Overload to trigger is getting a boost from 33% to 50%, adding more consistency to the ability's effects. Shamans now benefit from a 10% increased chance to hit while dual-wielding, which is great in battle. The Boon of Blackfathom World Buff is getting some adjustments to include a 3% spell hit and a 25 spell power buff, in addition to its existing physical damage and movement speed effects.

Developers’ notes: Spellcasters in general are struggling a bit in BFD, mostly due to poor scaling without spellpower and a higher requirement of spell hit to reliably hit creatures 2+ levels above the caster. Keep those Chronoboons handy and don’t stand in the fire and lose your buff!