wow Battle for Azeroth Beta Build 26707 Talent Changes

[Stan 5,022]

An overview of the latest changes implemented to the game in the latest Beta Build 26707.

Welcome to the latest overview of talent updates added to the game in the latese Beta Build 26707. Following the most recent Class discussions, there are plenty of Balance Druid, Discipline Priest and Protection Paladin updates.

We updated our Battle for Azeroth Class Changes to correspond with all changes listed below, and you can find more information about Battle for Azeroth by visiting our Expansion Hub. Our coverage of Beta Build 26707 includes new Azerite Traits, Battle Pet Updates, Dark Iron Dwarf & Mag'har Orc Unlock Requirements, BfA Pathfinder Update & Mythic Keystone Seasons.

Druid

Dev comments on the Balance Druid rework can be found here.

Balance

• Eclipse - new baseline ability.
• Empowerments - new baseline ability.
• Twin Moons - new level 75 talent.
• Starlord is now a level 90 talent (down from 15) + changed functionality.
• Stellar Flare is now a level 90 talent (down from 75).
• Blessing of the Ancients (level 90 talent) removed.
• Stellar Drift is now a level 90 talent (up from 100).
• Nature's Balance is now a level 15 talent (up from 100) + changed functionality.
• Shooting Stars is now a level 100 talent (down from 90).
• New Moon is now a level 100 talent (down from 90).

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	Nature's Balance	Warrior of Elune	Force of Nature
30	Tiger Dash	Renewal	Wild Charge
45	Feral Affinity	Guardian Affinity	Restoration Affinity
60	Mighty Bash	Mass Entanglement	Typhoon
75	Soul of the Forest	Twin Moons *new*	Incarnation: Chosen of Elune
90	Starlord	Stellar Drift	Stellar Flare
100	Shooting Stars	Fury of Elune	New Moon *new*

Monk

Windwalker

• Summon Black Ox Statue (level 60 talent) removed.
• Power Strikes (level 100 talent) removed.
• Good Karma - new level 60 talent.
• Spiritual Focus - new level 100 talent.

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	Eye of the Tiger	Chi Wave	Chi Burst
30	Celerity	Chi Torpedo	Tiger's Lust
45	Ascension	Fist of the White Tiger *new*	Energizing Elixir
60	Tiger Tail Sweep *new*	Good Karma *new*	Ring of Peace *new*
75	Inner Strength *new*	Diffuse Magic	Dampen Harm *new*
90	Hit Combo	Rushing Jade Wind *new*	Invoke Xuen, the White Tiger
100	Spiritual Focus *new*	Whirling Dragon Punch	Serenity

Paladin

Protection

Blizzard (Source)

A few changes to Protection in an upcoming build. Mostly focused on smoothing out issues in the core rotation and active mitigation.

• Consecration no longer buffs Shield of the Righteous and Light of the Protector.
• Consecration cooldown 4.5s (from 9s) and duration 12s (from 9s), but you can only have one down at once
• Mastery: Divine Bulwark reduces all damage you take while in Consecration (instead of increasing Shield of the Righteous effectiveness)
• Avenger's Shield increases the effects (damage and armor) of your next Shield of the Righteous by 20%.
• Consecrated Hammer will be replaced with a new Level 15 talent.

Listing all at once because they're all pieces of the same goals. First, Avenger's Shield is back to having some baseline defensive value, which pulls the rotation together by making you care about both hit and Hammer of the Righteous other than for pickups/damage.

Second, Consecration is easier to work with. If you don't have to move, you have to replace it less often, and if you do have to move, you can replace it much more quickly. While standing in Consecration still has some value, your core buttons no longer rely on it, and the loss of mitigation from being outside it is much smaller than Legion. It also provides a small source of baseline magic mitigation.

Finally, the gap between Shield of the Righteous uptime and downtime, in terms of mitigation, is less dramatic. The previous mastery made that gap get wider and wider as the expansion went on, leading to the problem of increasing moments of vulnerability when active mitigation was down. Shield of the Righteous will now have more consistent value across the expansion. The spec will be tuned expecting slightly lower Shield of the Righteous strength and uptime compared to Legion, which helps avoid the problem where there were windows of very poor mitigation compared to other tanks.

• Consecrated Hammer (level 15 talent) removed.
• Redoubt - new level 15 talent.

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	Holy Shield	Redoubt *new*	Blessed Hammer
30	Crusader's Judgment	First Avenger	Bastion of Light
45	Fist of Justice	Repentance	Blinding Light
60	Retribution Aura	Cavalier	Blessing of Spellwarding
75	Final Stand	Unbreakable Spirit *new*	Hand of the Protector
90	Judgment of Light	Consecrated Ground	Aegis of Light
100	Last Defender	Righteous Protector	Seraphim

Priest

Discipline

Here's a blue post clarifying the latest Discipline changes on Beta, outlining some future changes for the Priest specialization.

Blizzard (Source)

Quick clarifications (all still subject to ongoing change), since this build was in a slightly intermediate state.

• Sins isn't correctly working in this build. The buff appears, but isn't increasing damage or Atonement.
• Tuning is pretty preliminary, but for context on the 75 row, Contrition is likely too strong, because it skews the choice between the modes of Penance too much. Contrition's heal should be weaker than a Penance Atonement, so that it's still a choice about doing more group healing vs. focusing on one target.
• Also on the 75 row--we're currently planning to replace Orison with Shadow Covenant.
• Luminous Barrier is still intended to replace Power Word: Barrier, as before.
• Current plan is to buff Shadow Mend a bit, as mentioned yesterday. Less sure about Power Word: Shield after reviewing more. Shadow Mend was more strongly propped up by Grace.

We're seeing all the feedback on relative balance of talents within a row, but I don't want to make any claims or promises on which talents might eventually land higher/lower. We just rearranged a lot, and whatever I say will probably be proven wrong once we give a more thorough look and heavier testing happens on beta.

• Grace (level 100 talent) removed and implemented as Mastery: Grace.
• Sins of the Many - new level 75 talent.
• Lenience is now a level 100 talent (down from 75).

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	Castigation	Twist of Fate	Schism
30	Angelic Feather	Body and Soul	Masochism
45	Power Word: Solace	Shield Discipline	Mindbender
60	Psychic Voice	Shining Force	Dominant Mind
75	Sins of the Many *new*	Orison *new*	Contrition *new*
90	Purge the Wicked	Divine Star	Halo
100	Lenience *new*	Luminous Barrier *new*	Evangelism

Warlock

Affliction

• Shadow Embrace is now a level 90 talent (down from 15).
• Nightfall is now a level 15 talent (up from 90).
• Deathbolt is now a level 90 talent (down from 15).
• Drain Soul is now a level 15 talent (up from 90).

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	Nightfall	Drain Soul *new*	Haunt
30	Writhe in Agony	Absolute Corruption	Siphon Life
45	Demon Skin	Burning Rush	Dark Pact
60	Sow the Seeds	Phantom Singularity	Vile Taint *new*
75	Darkfury *new*	Mortal Coil	Demonic Circle
90	Shadow Embrace *new*	Deathbolt *new*	Grimoire of Sacrifice
100	Soul Conduit	Creeping Death *new*	Dark Soul: Misery *new*

Demonology

• Grimoire of Service (level 100 talent) removed.
• Grimoire: Felguard is a new level 100 talent.

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	Dreadlash *new*	Demonic Strength *new*	Biliescourge Bombers *new*
30	Demonic Calling	Power Siphon *new*	Doom *new*
45	Demon Skin	Burning Rush	Dark Pact
60	From the Shadows *new*	Soul Strike *new*	Summon Vilefiend *new*
75	Darkfury *new*	Mortal Coil	Demonic Circle
90	Soul Conduit	Inner Demons *new*	Grimoire: Felguard *new*
100	Sacrificed Souls	Demonic Consumption *new*	Nether Portal *new*

Destruction

Warrior

Fury

More changes will be implemented for the Warrior specialization in a future Beta Build and you can find more details in the Fury discussion here.

• Wrecking Ball is now a level 100 talent (down from 45).
• Reckless Abandon is now a level 45 talent (up from 100).

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	War Machine	Endless Rage	Fresh Meat
30	Double Time	Impending Victory *new*	Storm Bolt
45	Reckless Abandon	Outburst	Avatar
60	Furious Charge	Bounding Stride	Warpaint
75	Carnage	Massacre	Frothing Berserker
90	Inner Rage	Frenzy	Bloodbath
100	Wrecking Ball	Dragon Roar	Bladestorm

Protection

• Dragon Roar is a new level 45 talent.
• Bolster (level 60 talent) removed.
• Bolster - new level 60 talent with a different functionality.

Level	Talent 1	Talent 2	Talent 3
15	Into the Fray	Punish *new*	Impending Victory
30	Crackling Thunder	Bounding Stride	Safeguard
45	Best Served Cold	Unstoppable Force *new*	Dragon Roar *new*
60	Indomitable	Never Surrender *new*	Bolster *new*
75	Menace *new*	Rumbling Earth *new*	Storm Bolt
90	Booming Voice	Vengeance	Devastator
100	Anger Management	Heavy Repercussions	Ravager

Previous Talent Changes

We're covering talent changes every Battle for Azeroth Alpha/Beta Build. Here's a history of our previews so far:

• Beta Build 26624 Talent Changes
• Beta Build 26567 Talent Changes
• Beta Build 26530 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26476 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26433 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26367 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26310 Talent Changes 
• Alpha Build 26287 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26231 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26175 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26131 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26095 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 26032 Talent Changes
• Alpha Build 25976 Talent Changes

[Yridaa 490]

Punish Sins of the ManyLenience

 

These additional stat-padding talents are very uninteractive, boring and uninspired from a gameplay perspective. Here I thought Blizzard wanted to move away from those.

[Plergoth 277]

On 5/26/2018 at 6:57 PM, Yridaa said:

These additional stat-padding talents are very uninteractive, boring and uninspired from a gameplay perspective. Here I thought Blizzard wanted to move away from those.

I think Priests will get another pass over their talents eventually, but Lenience seems like a quiet yet effective talent to have access to in a small raid environment or a battleground. Sins of the Many is a current artifact perk that will encourage min maxing in this talent form as well as assisting in speed or timed runs and is otherwise on an extremely competitive tier. I really like the sound of Punish, and will really help up levelling Warriors in Prot spec, regardless of whether they do dungeons or solo, while being a solid pick on non-add raid or boss fights. If anything, I am disappointed by the level 90 tier for Warrior; Booming Voice is underwhelming, I didn't like the feel of Devastator and Vengeance... well, it's alright. 

[Seksi 208]

As long as they are not very strong, passive options are great for new / lazy players. Its problematic when they are the strongest / on par options in the row, however, as it causes the spec to lose complexity for the sub-set of people who enjoy it (min-maxers who will take whatever is best no matter how hard it is to play).

So its generally better if the tuning on active extra buttons and other complex options is higher while passives are not useless but clearly less powerful.

[Allseye 96]

I really like the new iteration of prot. Even i didnt play it on ptr, this sounds quite ok for me. I'm glad the old bolster is gone. I think we have good options now in singletarget, ae fights as well as physical / magical fights. With new bolster we can use our rage more into IP. I knoe there are several people out there who dislike IP. But i like the playstile to support my healers in this way. Only thing what seems to miss is selfsustain. We're getting dmg in basically every situation but selheal is missing (and no, victory rush is no option in my view). But well, probably we wont be a selfsustain tank and can't solo some contenz while others can. But as long i got a healer in my back, i prefer to be a mitigation (and easy healable) tank than a spiky one. 

[PatrickHenry 293]

Redoubt seems like a strong talent choice for Prot Pally...  Tied wth First Avenger its probably about 100% uptime on that block rating.  Or will be by end game.