7.2.5 is coming on Tuesday, and both classes I main are getting some big changes!
Contents
Vengeance
Class Changes
- Baseline
- Soul Cleave now costs 25 to 50 Pain (was 30 to 60), and now heals for 6.6 times Attack Power per 25 Pain spent.
- Allows more effective pooling of Pain for Soul Cleaves. Before, 100 pain could get you one big and one medium Soul Cleave. Now it will get you two big Soul Cleaves, for a bigger burst of healing.
- Also makes using Soul Cleave less damaging to the rest of our rotation, allowing us to use it for soul-consumption without throwing away most of our pain.
- When Soul Fragments are created that exceed the cap of 5 active fragments, the oldest fragment is now automatically consumed if it is within 60 yards of the Demon Hunter. If it is more than 60 yds from the Demon Hunter, it despawns.
- These auto-consumed soul fragments still grant all those fancy consume effects like Painbringer and Fueled by Pain.
- This change really benefits things like Fracture spam, where you can squeeze in your dps during your window of opportunity and still get sweet benefits from souls.
- Lesser Soul Fragment generation from Shear has been increased by 10%.
- Demon Spikes can only be extended to a maximum of three times its base duration.
- Barely comes into play for us except when we’re using Demonic Infusion. If your Demon Spikes is near 18 seconds, don’t use another.
- Damage of all abilities, including talents, increased by 15%.
- Immolation Aura periodic damage increased by an additional 22%.
- Soul Cleave now costs 25 to 50 Pain (was 30 to 60), and now heals for 6.6 times Attack Power per 25 Pain spent.
- Talents
- Blade Turning Parrying an attack increases your Pain generation of your next Shear by 70%.by 20% for 5 sec.
- Demonic Infusion: Cooldown changed from 2 min cooldown to 1.5 min cooldown
- Feast of Souls healing increased by 20%.
- Fracture Cost increased to 30 pain, up from 20.
- Fracture spam got a whole lot better with the Soul Fragment change, so I imagine this change was just to keep it in line.
- Spirit Bomb Now will launch ALL your soul fragments for a large amount of AoE damage and leech debuff. Also has a cool new animation.
- Usage will be similar to Soul Cleave now, since it acts like a proper finisher.
- It’s a proper consumer, meaning you’ll get all those sweet soul fragment benefits too.
Tier 20 Bonuses
- T20 Vengeance 2P Bonus: When you consume a Soul Fragment, all enemies within 10 yards deal 5% less damage to you for 6 sec.
- T20 Vengeance 4P Bonus: After using Soul Cleave, you gain 2000 Versatility for 8 sec.
The 2-piece is especially exciting, it’s a better Painbringer. Four-piece is nice, but not as game changing.
Legendaries
- Soul of the Slayer. Ring. Grants Fallout for free.
- I wouldn’t call it game-breaking, but I imagine it would be nice in AoE content like mythics, where both Fallout and Burning Alive are useful.
- Oblivion’s Embrace. Legs. Demon Spikes and Empower Wards gain 1 additional charge.
- I’m actually very excited for this and hope to get it early. I’ve written before on the value of charges to reduce risk, and that’s this legendaries only purpose. As vengeance is an especially risk-prone tank in mythic raids, having an extra buffer will help overcome bad luck or randomness. If I get this legendary, I’ll probably use it for hard-hitting progression bosses that risk tank death, but use something else for farm content or bosses that stress other tank utility.
Brewmaster
Class Changes
- Baseline
- Brewmaster passive armor bonus increased to 25% (was 15%).
- Ironskin Brew increases Stagger by 35% (was 40%).
- Purifying Brew now clears 40% of your damage delayed with Stagger (was 50%).
- Ironskin Brew can only be extended to a maximum of three times its base duration.
- Our ability to build up minute+ Ironskin Brew duration made brewmasters too good at fights with tank swaps, which was most fights in Nighthold. This brings it down to reasonable levels.
- This is an indirect nerf to Black Ox Brew, which was primarily used to start fights off with that long-duration Ironskin Brew right away. Now you’ll have to use that talent more sparingly, so that you never use a brew when you’re near 24 seconds.
- Blackout Strike’s cooldown is no longer affected by Haste.
- This was done to kill the Blackout Combo high-haste playstyle that used Blackout Kick every other ability, leaving awkward gaps. Now Blackout Kick should always be every third ability (more or less).
- Dragonfire Brew (Artifact trait) now also increases the duration of Breath of Fire by 100%.
- Hot Blooded (Artifact trait) now reduces damage taken by 1% per rank (was 2%).
- These two Breath of Fire changes go hand in hand, making the damage reduction debuff up all the time, but also cutting its power in half.
- Yes, this removes the defensive benefit of Salsalabim’s legendary chest.
- Mastery: Elusive Brawler is now also triggered by hitting with Blackout Strike and Breath of Fire.
- The goal behind this change was to add some defensive benefit to these two key parts of our rotation. It shouldn’t really change the way you use them, as long as you were using them regularly before.
- Staggered damage cannot exceed 1000% of your maximum health.
- Staggering Around (Artifact trait) has been redesigned: Purifying Brew clears an additional 1/2/3/4% of the damage delayed by Stagger.
- Staggering Around was a broken trait that was nearly useless before, since it increased Stagger on Fortifying Brew when we were usually past 100% stagger anyway. Now it has a much better effect. Still can’t compete with Face Palm or Hot Blooded, but at least it’s better than before.
- Fortifying Brew increases Stagger % by 10% (was 20%).
- Talents
- Chi Wave healing increased by 73%.
- Elusive Dance now increases Purify % by 20% (was 15%).
- High Tolerance now grants 8/12/15% Haste (was 5/10/15%).
- These two talents that compete with Blackout Combo were buffed to be more in line with their more popular sibling.
- They also should be more beneficial even at low stagger, meaning that they might see more use in places like dungeons or raid bosses that don’t always hit the monk.
- Blackout Combo now reduces the cooldown of your next Breath of Fire by 3 seconds, down from 6.
- Invoke Niuzao, the Black Ox now deals 50% increased damage.
- Rushing Jade Wind‘s duration has been increased by 50% for Brewmasters only.
- It should be less of a pain to squeeze into our rotation now.
- Special Delivery proc chance increased to 100% (was 30%), and damage reduced by 70%.
Tier 20 Bonuses
- T20 Brewmaster 2P Bonus Consuming a brew has a 100% chance to generate a Gift of the Ox Healing Sphere.
- T20 Brewmaster 4P Bonus When a Gift of the Ox Healing Sphere is consumed, your current Stagger amount is lowered by 5%.
Legendaries
- Soul of the Grandmaster Ring. Grants Mystic Vitality.
- This is a very niche legendary in my eyes. I can see a combination of Mystic Vitality + Dampen Harm being useful for fights with both magical damage and burst damage, which we see in raids sometimes. But it’s not a generically useful trinket.
- Stormstout’s Last Gasp Shoulder. Keg Smash gains 1 additional charge and deals 25% increased damage.
- One extra charge doesn’t mean much except for some extra burst. However, that 25% damage increase on our hardest-hitting ability is definitely a big deal, making this legendary a very strong choice for dps, especially in Mythics.
- Salsalabim’s. Not a new legendary, but as its defensive benefit is nearly obsolete, it won’t be such a game-changer anymore. It’ll still be a very good choice in AoE content for damage.
Other Stuff
- Tomb of Sargeras will be coming in a week! My quick and dirty boss guide will be here: (it won’t be properly finished until closer to the release)
- Wowhead’s summary of all the other stuff.