Dragonflight Season 1 DPS Rankings Launch Week - Heroic Vault of the Incarnates

Live Geposted 20.12.2022 um 03:38 von Anshlun

Warcraft Logs Heroic Raid statisticsDisclaimers and SourceRaid Statistics Page on Warcraft Logsincomplete picture of balance

Specs considered underpowered are generally played less and tend to appear weaker than they are.

This happens as many performance-oriented players tend to play the strongest spec or class, increasing the gap between top and bottom specs even further.

Position of specs for the 95th percentile might be skewed by alternative strategies and parse funneling. For that, we're including the chart showing all percentiles' results to paint a better picture for all specs.

Tier acquisition will skew how balance looks for the first weeks of Season 1, until the Inspiration Catalyst opens on Week 6.

Class Writer OpinionWindwalker MonkWindwalkers are enjoying quite a lot of success at the start of Season 1 of Dragonflight, and this should come as a surprise to no one. As we are, historically, Windwalkers are incredibly strong in situations where there are multiple targets present, which encompasses all of Mythic+ and nearly all of the raid bosses in Vault of the Incarnates. As predicted, Windwalker single target is decent, although you have to look at a fight like Terros to see that. Looking at "Damage to Bosses" on WarcraftLogs will place Windwalkers very low on the charts because very few Windwalkers are focusing on boss damage in these raid fights. Windwalkers currently have to give up quite a lot of Single Target damage to "specialize" in AOE, and visa versa, making some of these charts misleading.

The most visible reason for this is the strength of Berührung des Todes and the benefits of the Fatale fliegende Guillotine and Verbotene Technik talents which turn Berührung des Todes into an AOE explosion of damage. On top of that, Windwalker AOE damage itself is very strong, with Berührung des Todes damage being the icing on the cake, even if its often blamed for Windwalkers being "OP" (which it isn't; it's very strong, but not "overpowered"). Anyone who's played Windwalker has likely been frustrated by the small delay that comes between when Berührung des Todes should be usable and when it is actually usable, as this can very often mean targets are dead before you can get it off to its maximum value, depending on the difficulty and your group's capabilities. Personally, I was very frustrated by this problem now that Berührung des Todes is such a huge part of our damage, but for now, that is the price of success, and many players will gladly pay that price to be powerful.

The "3% nerf" to Windwalkers that was announced last week is likely to have very little affect on Windwalker's strength as this nerf will not effect Berührung des Todes, limiting the effect of this nerf to much less than 3% depending on the situation. Where this 3% will be felt the most (and it won't really be *felt* at all) is in Single Target where Windwalker has much less damage to give up before things become concerning and where the (evil S word) problem may rear its ugly head without Blizzard intervention.

Overall the current situation looks great for Windwalker, but I'd personally be cautious against prognosticating too far ahead for how things will look a week, a month, or a tier, from now.
Assassination Rogue
Assassination Rogue is performing incredibly well in Vault of the Incarnates, and it looks great in Mythic+ as well! The core of Assassination has not changed much going into Season 1 from the previous Seasons, but we have received a lot of new spells and general tuning that allows us to thrive in the current environment.

In Raids, Assassination is at its core still great due to the standard Rogue utility spells such as Finte reducing the damage taken from a wide range of boss mechanics, Mantel der Schatten to remove nasty debuffs and ignore some of the hardest parts of a fight, and Atrophisches Gift as the new powerful raid utility. However, the main reason you'll see Assassination is the incredible single-target damage. Assassination thrives when it can freely hit a boss and mostly ignore the short-lived cleave and aoe. Drachengehärtete Klingen with Verstärkendes Gift and Giftbombe provides a lot of consistent damage that translates into a strongly tuned machine. Sadly our AoE and Cleave potential doesn't shine in raids where the spawned adds don't live long enough to take advantage of.

In Mythic+, we have also received some love in the form of a new cooldown with Willkürliches Gemetzel. Aside from being strong on its own to spread Erdrosseln from stealth (with Verbessertes Erdrosseln) and Blutung, Willkürliches Gemetzel also enables a consistent spam of a freshly buffed Blutroter Sturm in AoE. While this won't keep up with the strongest of AoE classes like Windwalker, it actually is still quite strong. We of course also bring our strong priority and single-target damage in the form of Königsmord and Blutige Klingen which helps out a lot in some harder pulls or on particularly overtuned dungeon bosses.

Assassination has received some nerfs recently, most notably to Blutige Klingen. While it did get hit very hard (cooldown increased from 45sec to 3min), this was actually warranted and it remains a competitive option in both Raid and Mythic+. We've also received some very minor nerfs on top of that, but none of them actually change our position in the meta, the rotation, or even talent options. While it's always a shame to see nerfs to your class, I'm actually quite pleased with how targetted Blizzard has been to over-performing talents, rather than simply nerfing the spec as a whole. It keeps our talent options open and Assassination is showing a healthy balance in many aspects. I really could not hope for much better currently, and I'm excited to see how the expansion progresses for us past this first week of data.
Outlaw Rogue
Outlaw Rogue is off to a strong start going into the Dragonflight raid with its great single target, and great AoE damage with a raid. The raid overall has a pretty large focus on sustained and multiple add waves with encounters such as Kadros Eiszorn, Bruthüterin Diurna, and Eranog. Although the spec does look really strong on Warcraft logs a lot of what makes it look exceptionally strong is the lack of some of the harder encounters being excluded where Outlaw falls off a bit. One of the big issues Outlaw continues to face when going into raids and comps begin to optimize is that it competes with other specs with that are better equipped to focus on either type of damage profile. While Outlaw does "Great AoE and Single Target" its far from the best on either. If you want giga AoE specs like Windwalker or Havoc are just straight-up stronger, and if you want giga single target Assassination and Subtlety are stronger at that too.

Overall though, due to the raw strength of Klingenwirbel and strong defensive tools in Finte, Von der Schippe springen and Mantel der Schatten Outlaw should continue to be an overall great pick for raids as it excels everywhere and currently is super fun to play. Some of you may have noticed that there are nerfs coming out, a 3% damage nerf to abilities, and a nerf to the talent Schallende Klarheit. This overall is around a 2% damage nerf, and the nerf to Schallende Klarheit has basically no effect on the spec so its viability should continue to be about as strong as it is this week.
Subtlety Rogue

Subtelty Rogue - Overlooked?

Subtlety is positioned in a top spot when looking at the Warcraftlogs Statistic.
While it is one of the best performers, it only accounts for around 1% of all played damage dealers in the raid.
I will shortly try to explain why this is the case and discuss what strengths and weaknesses Subtlety offers and why it might be a good spec to pick up.

Why is Subtlety Rogue not popular?

There are many reasons for that, but the biggest one is that Rogue in general is one of the classes with a low player count.
Rogue specializations always compete with each other for attention within this group of players, and which one is played will often come down to the relative strengths of all three depending on the encounter.
While the above can be evaluated using data points from Simulation or Statistics, encounter design, raid composition, experience, and personal comfort can impact this decision.
Outlaw, for example, was the strongest-tuned specialization for Rogue for a very long time during the Dragonflight pre-patch and beta period and remains strong even after multiple nerfs.
Individuals spent time learning it for this reason and would need to invest more time when switching, the benefit of doing so must outweigh the effort which is not the case currently for a lot of players.

How strong is Subtlety Rogue in Vault of the Incarnates?

The strength of Subtlety lies in its single target and AoE damage output. The specialization provides frequent burst windows and is fairly flexible in talent choice.
Changing a few talent points from the Single Target Talent Build can quickly change your damage profile to fit the encounter.
Adding Replizierende Schatten increases the damage in cleave and multi-target with a small trade-off in single-target output and Shurikentornado provides a strong cooldown for fights with adds.
The nature of the spec also allows you to funnel damage, while this isn't relevant in most encounters it is a niche that can be useful in some.
All of the above lead to a very strong toolkit and there is no fight in the raid so far that seems bad for the specialisation.

What encounters is Subtlety Rogue strong in?

The elephant in the room is Assassination.
Assassination comes with an incredible execution phase due to the Rezept der Zoldycks talent and for this reason, becomes a strong choice on any pure single target boss or encounters with a tight enrage timer.
Subtlety performs quite well on single-target fights and remains a strong option, but it is likely that the number of parses will remain low due to the reasons stated above.
Luckily most of the fights in the raid have adds or multiple targets, and this is an area that subtlety can compete and potentially beat Outlaw as the best option.
The best fight for Subtlety is likely The Primal Council (Kadros Eiszorn) and Statistics already show it on top.
It will be in general interesting to see how things develop and if Subtlety will see more play on fights with additional targets.

Mythic, Statistics, and Nerfs

While statistics of the heroic version of the raid give a rough indication of balance, it is also misleading.
Rogue in general performs well in heroic because of raid design. Mechanics rarely force you away from the boss and are predictable.
Mythic can easily change this and additional mechanics quickly lead to higher downtime, worse positioning, and lower output as a consequence.
The Balance Changes (nerfs) seem like a consequence of the performance in heroic but don't seem to take this into consideration.
To me, it seems too early for balance decisions given the low amount of data available from mythic content.
However, the nerfs seem to be on the weaker side and should only lead to around 2.5% reduction in output and hence be barely noticeable.

Final Words and Conclussion

To wrap things up, I think Subtlety is an underrated choice that offers a dynamic toolkit that brings additional benefits the other two Rogue options don't offer.
The burst damage with Geheimtechnik and Kaltblütigkeit as well as the option to opt into an AoE cooldown with Shurikentornado or higher cleave damage with Replizierende Schatten make it easy to adjust to the needs of encounters.
The rotation is fun, and even if the position of Rogue or Subtlety in the Warcraftlogs statistic goes down, I recommend everyone to try it out.
Dragonflight Season 1 DPS Rankings - Heroic Vault of the Incarnates During the Week of December 13th

Overall Damage

Damage to Bosses

Overall Damage

Damage to Bosses

Position

Spec and Class

Population Size

Outlaw Rogue

12207

Subtlety Rogue

1480

Assassination Rogue

6126

Windwalker Monk

12015

Enhancement Shaman

9513

Marksmanship Hunter

17415

Arcane Mage

15347

Retribution Paladin

6115

Fury Warrior

17484

Elemental Shaman

5236

Havoc Demon Hunter

19531

Frost Death Knight

5524

Demonology Warlock

22115

Balance Druid

14917

Feral Druid

4455

Devastation Evoker

11632

Survival Hunter

357

Beast Mastery Hunter

9605

Unholy Death Knight

7087

Affliction Warlock

645

Destruction Warlock

3098

Arms Warrior

1154

Shadow Priest

7300

Frost Mage

4454

Fire Mage

1022

Class Guides for Dragonflight Season 1For more information on every spec during the Dragonflight Season 1, check out our Class Guides!

Blood DKFrost DKUnholy DK

Havoc DHVengeance DH

Guardian DruidFeral DruidBalance DruidRestoration Druid

Devastation EvokerPreservation Evoker

BM HunterMM HunterSurvival Hunter

Arcane MageFire MageFrost Mage

Brewmaster MonkMistweaver MonkWindwalker Monk

Holy PaladinProtection PaladinRetribution Paladin

Discipline PriestHoly PriestShadow Priest

Assassination RogueOutlaw RogueSubtlety Rogue

Elemental ShamanEnhancement ShamanRestoration Shaman

Affliction WarlockDemonology WarlockDestruction Warlock

Arms WarriorFury WarriorProtection Warrior

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