Lightning and Madness Sorcerer/Telekinetics and Balance Sage Set Bonus Discussion

I waffled a bit about chiming in on these threads, because I've lost a lot of faith in the dev team recently, but I finally fell down on the side of saying something…

The fact that the old (Dread Master) 4-piece set bonus exists in the game has caused an enormous set of problems for this tier's gearing. The old alacrity proc wasn't designed with respect to the new function of alacrity, particularly not with the way that alacrity interacts with buff durations (i.e. alacrity increases DPS not just through improving time and cooldown availability, but also by reducing CDs/ICDs without reducing buff duration). In fact, the old Dread Master 4-piece is worth a solid chunk of the target "5% increase" all by itself, even without including the 2-pc which comes along with it!

So this is a problem for balance reasons, and honestly not one that's going to go away in 4.0. I wouldn't be surprised to see the old 4pc remain BiS at level 65, despite being 10 levels behind, and since all the old operations are getting buffed to 65 with their gear drops replaced, a significant advantage will be held by anyone who will have gotten Dread Master gear prior to 4.0 dropping.

The old 4-pc also provides a subjective satisfaction that the new 6pc set bonus (or even the 4pc) just doesn't provide. It's a very active set bonus, in that it alters the rotation in a palpable and dynamic way (due to the way it causes ability CDs and proc ICDs to drift, quite literally randomly). The new 4pc feels fun in a similar way, but not to the same extent, and its conflict with Mental Alacrity/Polarity Shift certainly doesn't help.

In short, the old 4pc is numerically vastly, vastly superior to the new set bonuses, and it results in a subjective feel which is also dramatically better. Its continued existence in the game makes this whole conversation about new set bonuses largely irrelevant. The best thing for Bioware to do would be to disable the Dread Master (and all previous tiers!) 4pc set bonus, providing a clean slate in 4.0. Then, bring the alacrity proc back in the level 65 set bonuses in some form, if only for the dynamism it provides. 2% alacrity every 20 seconds is way too powerful (unless it's the only set bonus), but something in that direction would be much appreciated. It certainly would be more interesting than the very-forgettable 6pc that we have now.

On another sidebar, the 4pc set bonus as it is currently designed massively, massively favors TK/Lightning over Balance/Madness, even when you account for the delay that TK/Lightning is forced to impose on the proc-reduced Potency/Recklessness due to the alignment with Mental Alacrity/Polarity Shift. Disturbance/Lightning Strike just isn't used anywhere near as frequently as TK Burst/Lightning Bolt. A far superior set bonus would be an effect involving Mind Crush/Crushing Darkness, which is basically the only ability that both specs use at the same rate, though the double-tick procs in TK/Lightning and the damage boosts in Balance/Madness do make this sort of thing rather complex.

+1 to what KBN said.

Hypothetically, if the new 6 piece bonus gives an extra charge of recklessness, its better than the current 6pc but it is still not good enough. Sorcs need extra alacrity. Its just essential. Without it, every ability takes at least 1.4 secs to cast which makes lightning slow and boring to play, and also too immobile. If you can't put it in the set bonus either double the alacrity proc in the discipline tree, or lower the base cast time of all lightnings abilities.