wow Demon Hunter Shadowlands Major Class Changes: July 1st

[Starym 3,779]

 

Here come some major Demon Hunter changes in the latest Shadowlands build, as both specs get a lot of attention. Havoc has a lot of changes relating to Eye Beam and Fury generation, and gets a new talent, while Vengeance gets some less subsatantial but still very relevant tweaks.

DH Changes July 1 (source)

Fair tidings Illidari. The next build of the Shadowlands Alpha will have a number of changes based on your feedback. We’re generally happy with the core kit of both Demon Hunter specializations, but want to improve talent diversity.

Havoc

• Demonic Appetite - Consuming a soul fragment no longer reduces the cooldown of Eye Beam.

• Cycle of Hatred - When Chaos Strike refunds Fury, it will reduce the cooldown of Eye Beam (was Metamorphosis ) .

  • Developers’ notes: We’ve reconsidered the addition of Eye Beam cooldown reduction to Demonic Appetite, believing it will make that talent a dominant choice in the row. Instead, we’re placing that benefit on Cycle of Hatred, which is competing against other options for AOE damage.

• Insatiable Hunger : Demon's Bite deals 20% more damage and generates 5 to 10 additional Fury.

  • Developers’ notes: Since this ability only increased the maximum additional Fury that Demon’s Bite could generate, it was possible to frequently see no noticeable benefit. The talent will now always result in at least 5 extra Fury generated.

• Immolation Aura now generates 20 Fury when cast.

• Burning Hatred : Immolation now generates an additional 60 Fury over 12 seconds.

  • Developers’ notes: We added Immolation Aura back to Havoc baseline because it was a nice mid-tier AOE damage ability that could be shared across the specs. Player feedback made it clear that Fury generation was an important part of the ability, so we moved the initial burst of Fury to the main ability. The Fury generation over time will remain in the talent.

• Fel Mastery has been replaced with a new talent, Unbound Chaos.

• Unbound Chaos: While Immolation Aura is active, your inner demon slams into nearby enemies at the end of your Fel Rush , dealing Chaos damage.

  • Developers’ notes: Fel Mastery was a simple buff to Fel Rush damage that required frequent reorientation to your target and as a result primarily saw play alongside Momentum. By binding the damage bonus to Immolation Aura, we feel like the talent can be taken on its own or alongside Momentum.

Vengeance

• Immolation Aura and Fiery Brand tooltips were changed to show the total amount of damage done over the duration of the spell.

• Soul Cleave damage increased 20%.

  • Developers’ notes: We often see feedback that Soul Cleave is a low priority button because the passive consumption of soul fragments means no healing is lost if it isn’t pressed, and Spirit Bomb offers more damage and healing per soul fragment. We made a change already that adds additional healing to Soul Cleave for each orb consumed, but also we’re increasing the damage of Soul Cleave as well. We’d like to see Spirit Bomb used intermittently to apply Frailty, but Soul Cleave to be the spec’s primary source of healing and damage.

• Agonizing Flames no longer increases the damage of Immolation Aura . It now increases its duration by 50%.

  • Developers’ notes: Increasing the duration of Immolation Aura increases the value of the talent’s movement speed buff and creates synergy with other talents like Infernal Armor and the re-design of Charred Flesh mentioned below.

• Feast of Souls healing increased by 25%.

  • Developers’ notes: This talent is intentionally straightforward, offering an option that makes Vengeance’s primary consumer Soul Cleave better. It’s a fine option, but may need additional tuning to close the gap with the more active options in the row.

• Charred Flesh has been redesigned: Immolation Aura damage now increases the duration of your Fiery Brand by 0.5 seconds.

  • Developers’ notes: Fire damage alone was not an attractive option when compared to the other options in the row. This interaction with Immolation Aura can significantly increase the uptime of a key defensive ability while also increasing its overall damage. This creates interesting synergies with anything that modifies Fiery Brand or Immolation Aura such as the talents Agonizing Flames and Burning Alive.

Please continue to reply with your thoughts on Demon Hunters in Shadowlands!

 

More Shadowlands Class Changes

Death Knight	Mage	Rogue
Death Knight 9.0.1 Class Changes	Mage 9.0.1 Class Changes	Rogue 9.0.1 Class Changes
Demon Hunter	Monk	Shaman
Demon Hunter 9.0.1 Class Changes	Monk 9.0.1 Class Changes	Shaman 9.0.1 Class Changes
Druid	Paladin	Warlock
Druid 9.0.1 Class Changes	Paladin 9.0.1 Class Changes	Warlock 9.0.1 Class Changes
Hunter	Priest	Warrior
Hunter 9.0.1 Class Changes	Priest 9.0.1 Class Changes	Warrior 9.0.1 Class Changes