MMO-Champion BlueTracker - Developer Goals for Riptide?

2008-09-29 21:21:00

I'd like to hear from the developers what range of utility they wanted Riptide to have in a resto palate of heals.

I ask this because I just got done healing the dragon boss fight in the Nexus. An easy fight to be sure, but a reminder of the kind of fights that resto shamans really dislike in the 5man setting (ala Magister's Terrace). While I was heartened to have a HoT that would allow me to remain mobile and avoid the debuff as I was running around, I was frustrated by the weakness of the heal as well as the cooldown lasting a bit too long to feel comfortable in the fight.

Is this heal intended to stand on its own or is it always meant as a means to buffing chain heal?

If it is meant to stand on its own, well, it doesn't really. I can point to this nexus fight as an example where with a bump in the coefficient, half or no cooldown and reduced mana cost it would make all the difference in healing viability.

Maybe we're so close to receiving the final changes for Riptide that this is a mute topic, but I'd like to know the intended utility of the heal. Then we'll really know what to complain about. ;)

As a side note, I've been partial to the ideas that have been tossed about regarding splash HoTs created by a Riptide affected chain heal. To my mind, the extra healing would be much better transfered from the 25% boost of the CH to splash HoT targets nearby each CH bounce. That, or have Riptide add another chain heal target with a total of five if you're glyphed.

Happy developering,
Singo

2008-10-03 22:00:47

Re: Developer Goals for Riptide?

Riptide probably isn't going to be a crazy awesome raiding tool *unless* you're in a fight with a lot of movement, in which case it does its job very well. It is situational, but we actually made a lot of the new spells situational because almost every class already had bread and butter abilities well before LK.

Now, I think it does shine in 5-player dungeons, PvP or in 10-player raids, depending on how many hot-based healers you have. The initial heal could probably be a bit larger. That is something we may change after some more testing.

I know Resto hasn't gotten as much attention as other shaman specs in this forum, but honeslty we think it's because you work pretty well. Players have gotten made when I've said that before, but particularly in raids, everyone knows what they're going to get from a Resto (CH and Earth Shield) and I don't think that is going away.