Interview Highlights
As this is just a highlight, we may miss a few points. Be sure to watch the full interview for the full context of each question and answer!
Evolution of Evoker
- Always wanted to add on to Evokers and tell more of their story, especially through Emberthal’s growth and journey.
- Players noticed that we didn’t fully explore Black dragonflight in Evoker, so wanted to push that aspect further.
- Wanted to lean into the essence of a mid-range caster, and explore the teamwork and weyrns of the dracthyr.
- Doing this outside of launch, gave the opportunity to really do something we hadn’t done before and answer a lot of the questions that this new playstyle raises. Wanted to be confident in Augmentation.
Why a DPS?
- Wanted to make sure they could fulfill the promise of buffing your allies and increasing their damage, without disrupting the dynamic of dungeons and raids
- As a damage dealer, we could go wild with the tuning and let players apply impactful buffs without just nodding to it.
Potential for More Support Specs
- We’re always looking for opportunities to add more to the game, but it has to be the right moment. Dragonflight and returning to the Dragon Isles presented that moment.
- Interested to see community’s reaction to Augmentation first, and if there is support for more of this playstyle. It’s something they’ll seriously discuss.
Combat Log Hooks & Performance
- Want to ensure that players have the tools to improve. That’s a big concern.
- Upfront we have quick things like the Ebon Might bar on the UI to give simple feedback to the player.
- Combat log hooks are in progress but they’re a massive undertaking and it’s very new for WoW. Several are already working and are able to be attributed to the Augmentation Evoker. Many more coming and you’ll be seeing more of that this week.
- Looking to have bulk of these out with 10.1.5, but will continue to improve beyond that.
Augmentation in LFG & PvP
- There are no additional rules on dungeon or PvP queuing for Augmentation.
- The current balance of personal damage vs. buffing is still being iterated on, but the plan is having two Augmentation Evokers queued in the same dungeon should still be successful.
- If you’re doing a +20, then probably having multiple Augmentation Evokers won’t be as successful. Similar to bringing the same as any spec in WoW.
- Augmentation’s share of damage to buffing will likely be shifted fairly significantly in PvP. The gameplay is just so different, but the tools exist to adjust that.
Augmentation Utility & Defensives
- Approachability is huge for Augmentation. Part of that is making it more survivable, but they’ll still need allies to be successful.
- Group utility essential to this new role to make it appealing. Defensives they’ll keep an eye on for tuning, but overall happy with the package.
- We’d consider making adjustments if groups run no-healer with Augmentation. Larger investment to pick up more of that healing in the talent tree.
Competition with Devastation
- Balance will be a large part of this. Have the tools to make adjustments especially for differences in dungeon and raid.
- It’s a concern, but we’ll continue to monitor and be vigilant. It’s also a factor of what allies you’re buffing for Augmentation.
Personal Damage vs. Buffs
- Having the majority of your benefit be based on your allies performance and your buffs on them is the target for Augmentation. Support in name and reality.
- 20% personal damage sounds lower than they’d prefer.
- Still want players to be successful outdoors and automatically buffing players around you even if not partied is part of that.
- Having a more straightforward simple rotation is intentional. Picking allies to buff, positioning, and cooldown management are meant to be the depth of the class.
- Part of the approachability is making the gap between the ceiling and floor not as wide. There’s definitely some mastery involved that will improve performance, but if you just focus on Ebon Might uptime you’ll still be contributing fairly significantly.
- Wanted to avoid micromanaging groups in raid for Augmentation Evoker. Most things ended up being auto-targeted or proximity as a solution.
- Ebon Might prefers targets with your Prescience.
- There isn’t an optimal number of Augmentation Evokers they’ve targeted for raid. Augmentation shouldn’t be necessary and should be a choice. At most, you can run 1 for every 4 other dps if you’re trying to min-max around Augmentation, but it’s not something they expect.
Stats & Itemization
- Continuing to look at secondary stats. Mastery has already been nerfed once and will likely be nerfed again.
- Need to ensure secondaries aren’t as valuable as main stat but that nothing is a dead stat either. Expect more tuning.
- Itemization should matter for Augmentation as much as it does for other classes. Should scale throughout the course of a tier and the entire expansion.
Miscellaneous
- Additional talent tree changes are coming including the class tree that address some survivability issues for all Evokers. Don’t expect a major shift though.
- Augmentation was created from an excitement for this new playstyle and not so much as a reaction or challenge to the Game 1 vs Game 2 situation. Interested to see community reaction.
- No release date yet for Patch 10.1.5 Fractures in Time, but they’re working hard to get it out soon.
