As Matticus has just reported, Daelo and the Dev Team have unveiled a new mechanic that tanks and healers are going to experience in Icecrown Citadel.
The new mechanic is a skill called “Chill of the Throne”, and it’s applied to all enemies in the zone:
The spell, called Chill of the Throne, will allow creatures to ignore 20% of the dodge chance of their melee target.
Healers have grown accustomed to the heart-attacks caused by massive spike damage and carefully timed cooldowns. There is a thrill accompanied with the notion of needing to stay on top of things to an extreme degree like that. However, the reality is “Can the dps kill the boss before the healer runs out of mana spamming their biggest heals?” We’re pigeon-holed into praying and hoping our heals land at the right time so our main tank doesn’t eat two 25k hits in a row.
Chill of the Throne allows the size of the hits to become smaller, rather than huge hits that hit every so often (via a tank’s mitigation). If RNG fails, a tank is dead. We, as healers, now get to heal a steady stream of damage, instead of breaking down with panic attacks.
Where does this go from here?
Devs have been talking about introducing a way to incorporate expertise in new bosses. Although it seems that system isn’t viable for Icecrown, we may be able to see it in Cataclysm. The idea is for bosses to scale in skill, not just in health and damage done. This could definitely open up more possibilities for damage management in the future.
Sounds very interesting. I was never a fan of huge spike damage, at least not on a constant basic. I think it makes healer’s jobs far too difficult 🙂
.-= We Fly Spitfires´s last blog ..Can Your iPhone Do This? =-.
Oh look, it’s Sunwell Radiance all over again. 😐 I bet they end up doing it every “end raid of an xpac” >.>
I think it’s fantastic. Insane spike damage is simply a royal pain.
Oh, and I’m sure they’ll figure out a way of working around the need for this in future expansions.
Kithain, if they redesign the stats in cataclysm to not have such a bad inflation, they won’t have to do it again… but that would require them to keep inflation in check while still giving us meaningful rewards… so, I think you’re right, lol.
.-= Lissanna´s last blog ..I blame Syrana =-.
TBH tanks and avoidance aren’t the role/state they could do this with, i was fully expecting to see a change to either +hit or +crit based on the level of the raid too.
Considering the description of hit is “increases your chance to hit a target of level 80 by x%”, i’ve always been meaning to (but too lazy to actually bother) to see if I actually have a 17% chance to be resisted on a +3 level or if i just need the equivilent of 17% gear against my own level to not miss a boss at +3 levels. Pretty sure the mischance of 17% is correct i’ve just always thought it was rather odd wording.
As a tank, I’m not overly fond of this. I see what they’re doing, but I don’t agree with it. I’ll be very interested in learning how my healers deal with this, as reactions I meet are pretty mixed, especially from the druid camp.
Latest blog about my more in-depth thoughts on the matter:
http://artisanelitist.blogspot.com/2009/10/learning-by-doing.html
.-= Barricade´s last blog ..Learning by doing. =-.
Indeed, what I’ve noticed in Coliseum 25 Hard is that as a tank healer I MUST spam the tank ceaselessly, and still the tank can die due to a double whammy.
This a a bit frustrating, and not very interesting… like a race with no turns, but pedal to the metal all the way…
Anything that makes things less random and, above all less boring, is welcome.
I think this is a really interesting change too, because it opens up a more strategic healing style for our beloved healers.
.-= Gravity´s last blog ..Icecrown pwns you for 20%, and healing in Cataclysm =-.