Blizzard
Hey all,
We'll be bringing down the PTR realms today in order to deploy a new 7.2.5 build. Please note that this build is an RC and as such Character Copy will be disabled. No ETA for today's push but I'll update this thread if things look like they're going to take longer than usual (~4-6 hours).
As always, I'll leave this thread open for discussion as long as conversations remain civil and adhere to the forum guidelines.
Thanks for your patience everyone! Earthquake no longer scales with haste (as of build), but the blue post by Sigma states they're increasing Earth Shock's damage to compensate, and will find a balancing sweet spot for Earthquake. Nonetheless the current damage buff doesn't counteract the loss in ticks which by itself is a heavy loss in the chance to knock an enemy down--which was a strength in Mythic+
Blizzard
Sorry for the confusion on this. The intended set of changes was:
1) Earth Shock buffed (didn't make into build, still planned)
2) Earthquake no longer scales with haste, but buffed to compensate.
Earthquake was double-dipping haste, because its damage per cast scales with haste and Maelstrom generation also scales with haste. That's not necessarily something that always needs an immediate fix, but when it encroaches so heavily on Earth Shock (let alone occasionally surpassing it), that's more of a problem. Trying to pull the two spells apart numerically could have delayed the problem a bit, but even the fact that they're close enough for this is to be an ongoing question is a red flag.
The size of the compensatory buff to Earthquake is open to adjustment if needed, and rigorous feedback on what's a reasonable amount of haste currently used on an "average" Earthquake can help there. It's inevitable that an Earthquake stacked with e.g. Bloodlust and Whispers in the Dark will go down in damage, but an unbuffed one should be able to come up slightly.