Proposed Fix to Madness (Especially for the Sin)

[ZooMzy]

After running some tests and numbers over the various abilities and wondering why Madness was such a low parsing and mostly ineffective spec, I think I have come up with a solution.

 

Now, the recent changes with Devour greatly enhance the capability of the spec in PvP, especially for the assassin/shadow tree variation. However, there is still one lacking element that I have seen in regards to how well this spec does in a PvE environment:

 

No real burst damage, at least for the sin. The assassin variation is entirely dependent on getting the raid boss to below 30% health, and that's when the spec picks up in it's damage output with the help of Assassinate and the talent in the tree. But in all reality, the spec is completely subpar with other DPS classes before that 30% mark and can only do slightly better when below that mark (Rough optimization on my part, it probably is weaker than made out to be), barely being able to hit 4 mins on a 500k burn in nearly full 78 augmented gear with 3 pieces of 72s (Tested with an unmodified, 1 million health operations boss dummy).

 

Of course, the spec is group type damage through DoTs, similar to how Lethality shines so well in PvP with Madness starting to get that appeal thanks to Devour. However, the lacking element between the two is that instead of having a burst move like Cull in Lethality, the assassin gets an increase buff in damage for targets below 30% along with the class ability execution Assassinate. This naturally makes them weak in a situation involving long boss fights, but I did notice that the Madness Sorc has the same type of build with the Crushing Darkness proc being very similar to the Cull. Which, is the underlying problem, since the assassin variation clearly has it too.

 

With mostly 78s and some 72s fully augmented in an even mixture between purple Overkill and Resolve Augment 28s (20 End, 32 Power or Willpower), my Crushing Darkness states the baseline damage for the attack begins with 4043-4258 kinetic damage opening, followed by an additional 3255 kinetic DoT. Channeling the move ten times in total, this is the number sheet I got for the opener:

 

1) High Critical = 2422

2) High Critical = 2379

3) Global CD bug

3) High Critical = 2310

4) Non Critical = 1377

5) Resisted

5) Resisted

5) Non Critical = 1377

6) Non Critical = 1363

7) Resisted

7) High Critical = 2379

8) Non Critical = 1319

9) Non Critical = 1317

10) Non Critical = 1320

 

Now, as you can see, the problem is that an attack that guarantees baseline 4k at a minimum with the gear I hold, the overall non critical result of the attack is nearly 4 times as less than the stat stated by the main attack window. Taking a look at the DoT next, I decided to try my luck with how CD does overall.

 

Throwing a Crushing Darkness onto the test dummy again, where the opening was a very generous critical of 2529, and each tick also did not crit with a (luckily) consistent 347 without the proc relics, I have discovered the problem is not the following DoT (which in total equaled 2776, not much less than the baseline 3255 stated by the attack) but the opening. The first tick of Crushing Darkness is the problem, where it is not hitting nearly for the amount promised by the attack itself.

 

Of course, this is obviously because of the fact that it is kinetic damage, making it much weaker than it's supposed to be. However, this is the reason why the spec is considered to be weak in nearly every operation boss fight, and here's what I propose:

 

Change the type of damage for the opening tick for Crushing Darkness, yet keep the following DoT as kinetic

 

Personally, I would suggest energy as the change, due to the advantage for armor to resist it somewhat as well. But having a really hard hitting move as kinetic damage is a gimp, and it is a major problem due to the fact that it's the centerpiece for the Madness rotation. So unless the opening tick sees more damage (which, would definitely make it overpowered against light armor targets in PvP), I would suggest just changing the kinetic type to energy for the opening tick, and the DoT can remain the same.

 

Of course, this would increase a move that originally hits for 1.3k into an average of 4k, so here's the proposed solutions I have thought of to prevent Madness from becoming OP from it:

 

Make the proc come less frequent

 

Self explanatory, having a proc for a free CD that hits for an opening of 4k that can only be obtained every, IE, 15 seconds, would be much more preferable to a CD that hits for an opening tick of 1.3k every 7.5 seconds.

 

Weaken Discharge for the Assassin, Affliction for the Sorc

 

Again, this is just a basic idea. But if one DoT becomes more potent and powerful, you can possibly create more balance by weakening the other DoTs in the tree such as Discharge and Affliction respectively.

 

Community's thoughts? Would love to see a dev response too, but I welcome any and all feedback based on the long post I have made!