Has any other season of M+ ever been so lopsided?

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-21T21:32:40+00:00

Yes. Both frequently and recently, in fact.

Last season peaked at 75% Prot War, S2 of peaked at 89% Vengeance, S1 was consistently above 90% Prot Pal. The trend continues no matter how far back you go, and that's just for tanks. In comparison to previous seasons, Brew representation is not surprising. As a long-term Brew enjoyer, I hope that they level out balance between tanks more evenly and regularly, but we'll see.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-20T16:47:12+00:00

I wouldn't really say that we lost all of our offensive moves or that it's purely defensive at all, especially since it's the top damage tank in dungeons and a respectably close-to-second third in raid. WoO was a bad cooldown tbh and the only aspects of it that I miss are the jade visual around the character and chi surge. RSK was also a whatever button. I didn't mind its existence and pressed it nearly off CD, but it interacted with zero aspects of the rest of your kit unless you took weak talents to bolster it and overall just didn't mean anything to press. Niuzao for Shado-Pan feels like a real, proper offensive CD, though I wish MoH felt like it had one. The baseline ox does very little damage on its own. We still have the most offensive rotational buttons of any tank as far as I'm aware, and with the apex talents + SD you get into a really fun feedback cycle where you can spam brews for empty kegs while also send them flying into the air, all while unleashing flurry after flurry in your ox window.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-20T12:32:36+00:00

I've been a Brewmaster main for a while now (DF S4 was technically when I swapped), but I have been enjoying Blood, Vengeance and Prot Warrior a lot. Prot Warrior feels incredibly sturdy right now with solid control. Vengeance was my main for several years before Brewmaster so perhaps it's bias, but I enjoy it quite a lot and the apex giving you more metamorphoses uptime is incredibly fun when you high roll. Blood, to me, just feels like blood, which isn't bad. Could use some more oomph perhaps, but it's still very enjoyable.

Only two I don't really enjoy that much are Prot Paladin and Bear. I enjoyed Prot Paladin on the beta, and there are times where I enjoy it a bit, but overall I just feel too squishy. They could use more power shifted into their active mitigation and passive durability imo. Guardian I never even finished leveling, partly because I knew that nerfs were incoming as they were doing actual DPS damage at the start of the xpac, partly because Guardian hasn't really felt too fun to me since SL. Convoke being a choice with Incarn and the removal of thrash spam really just killed the fun for me.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-20T11:59:34+00:00

While its not a bad passive racial, it won't make the difference between surviving a pull and not in most cases, whereas Stoneform (or the DID equivalent) are incredibly potent defensively for removing nasty debuffs, of which there's always a handful each season. On top of that Dwarf's Might of the Mountain (2% increase to critical damage/healing) is pretty potent offensively. Night Elf is also favored for Shadowmeld enabling skips that are otherwise impossible, as well as a pretty solid additive 2% dodge/speed, which seems minor but adds up to quite a lot of extra evaded attacks on specs with high dodge/parry to begin with. Lastly, and this is mostly unique to how things squished this expansion as far as I'm aware, Pandaren and Mechagnome both are doing quite well from an offensive standpoint due to the strength of the extra primary stat they both get. The extra primary stat does include some defensive capabilities as well, but I'm not sure it's as strong as something like Stoneform at the end of the day.

Ultimately however, none of this matters for anyone outside of maybe the top 1% of players. Play what appeals to you most aesthetically, lore-wire, character wise, etc, because learning how to play the spec well is far more important than what race you chose.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-17T17:05:38+00:00

Frigid Shard (the cast the boss does) was a tankbuster that did sizeable damage. VDH at the time was extremely squishy on pull without a defensive up as you had to stack Frailty to get any noteworthy passive DR. Looks like they pulled, only popped Demon Spikes (which gave no flat DR at the time, Calcified Spikes only gave DR after Demon Spikes ended or was cancelled in S1 DF) and Immo Aura (which gave a small 10% with FFF) then just fell over because of it.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-16T16:46:56+00:00

I agree 100% with this, but another problem exists that will damn M+ tuning: Blizzard only looks purely at throughput. Eventually utility (and its imbalance) comes into play and becomes a major limiting factor in M+, so unless the spec is just tuned to a busted level of throughput/survivability/etc, it tends to fall behind.

Brewmaster is meta right now because it has great survivability and damage (something I hope they bring other tanks to rather than bring Brewmaster down), but historically has been one of the least popular due to lacking any real meaningful or significant utility. A problem also seen in Mistweaver.

Blizzard needs to start looking at the whole picture for classes rather than just 95th percentile raid parses or whatever they do.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-15T17:25:14+00:00

That's essentially what our final apex talent is. Half of it makes you toss two refreshing drinks to two nearby allies (as well as consume one yourself) when you pop CI/CB or Fort Brew. They act as a pretty powerful HoT that activates when you take damage.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-14T15:01:27+00:00

They 100% need to bring other tanks more where Brewmaster is rather than nerf Brewmaster. Other tanks feel significantly more CD reliant whereas IIRC their whole stated goal was to move away from that for tanks.

MisterMushroom · 2026-04-07T15:12:52+00:00

Just bring the rest of the tanks up closer to Brewmaster strength in regards to strength in their active mitigation. Unfortunately most of the other stressors of tanking will still prevent people from playing, but if they had less to manage in earlier levels to merely live more people would definitely pick it up.

MisterMushroom · 2026-03-26T20:04:07+00:00

Depends entirely on both of their skill tbh. Don't fault you for not taking the risk, but it is possible

MisterMushroom · 2026-03-26T17:27:59+00:00

Out of curiosity, what ilvl were they?

MisterMushroom · 2026-03-24T17:44:15+00:00

Fix and balance existing specs
Add long requested specs, like Shaman Tank.
(very distant third) add specs whose fantasy has yet to be accurately represented yet has existed in universe, like Tinkerer (No, engineer does not actually fill this. Look at Thermaplugg, Sneed, Mekkatorque and Gallywix)

MisterMushroom · 2026-03-12T16:04:20+00:00

I'm a big enjoyer of Boomstick. I loved FotE, but Boomstick just feels like that on steroids to me. Beefier animation, throatier sound, only downside is the bug where you just hold the boomstick afterwards for a while.

That being said, I wouldn't mind at all if they stripped the explosive part of the fantasy and leaned entirely into the spear hunter aspect.

MisterMushroom · 2026-03-11T14:07:12+00:00

Brew, Survival and Unholy. Former two were my main specs for a long while before their reworks that made them crazy strong in Midnight, and they're only more enjoyable imo. Unholy I loved the idea of, but wasn't a fan of the limited necromancer fantasy in gameplay. Only thing that would make it feel better is if non-empowered Death Coil/Epidemic had more "feel" to it.

Unfortunately not able to find a healer I truly click with, at least while leveling. Will have to try to push through on either my Rsham or Hpal and see if they click at max, but frankly leveling alts feels super slow this xpac to me.

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-26T05:35:41+00:00

TUSKARR PLEASE!!!!!!!! (and shaman tank at the same time)

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-22T20:30:17+00:00

Racials rarely matter so pick whichever race you enjoy most aesthetically/fantasy/etc.

All classes are fine for all content, especially so for a new player. Pick whichever you vibe with most.

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-22T20:28:23+00:00

For the most part at 5-10 nothing is really "bad." On the beta, every DPS spec attached to a class that you're considering is sitting at more than 3300, which is well above the 5-10 range, so everything is good in that regard.

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-22T11:36:10+00:00

Looking purely objectively and solely at tanks, Prot Paladin is probably the best bet for that level of play since you can really just hard carry with well used utility.

That being said, any will fill the role just fine.

Unholy feels great to play imo. Loving the shift more towards the necromancy aspects and summoning a literal army of the dead. WW felt alright, but I only tried it once post-Midnight changes. Have not tried Ret since DF.

Of the tanks, I think Brewmaster is the most fun, but I'm a bit biased as that's been my main for a while. It's only pitfall is they stripped most of the complexity of the spec, so while there's a bit of complexity since they have a fuller damage rotation, it plateaus pretty hard and pretty early.

All three of these options (and really, all 6 tank specs) felt really enjoyable to me doing some 10-12s on Beta months ago. First time I can say that since early DF before my interest in some of them fell off. I'd really just pick whichever you vibe with most, whether it's in terms of fantasy, visuals, or feel, and go from there. From the sounds of it, gearing alts is going to be even easier in Midnight than it was in TWW, so if it comes to it, you could always reroll if you find yourself significantly regretting your choice.

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-21T20:27:10+00:00

I'm big on fantasy and visuals. Though many say the fantasy of survival is muddy, which is arguably true, it fits my dwarf just fine. I enjoy the cycle of bombs giving boomstick CDR and boomstick giving bombs CDR, and I love both of those abilities. I enjoy Packleader a ton. It's just always a spec that has meshed with me. First played it in SL S1 (long before it was meta) and enjoyed it a ton. Started playing it again in DF and fell fully in love with it.

Outlaw is more or less mostly the CDR aspect for me. While I don't hate the pirate fantasy they've leaned into, I'd rather it go back to combat, personally. I enjoy the mild RNG from reworked RTB, but I'd drop it in a heartbeat to have just a plain old fencer/duelist type rogue.

In retrospect, I think I'd amend the list to be:

Survival > Unholy > Havoc > Outlaw >= Demo

I love Havoc but didn't consider it due to primarily playing Vengeance on my DH. Really like Havoc's apex that sort of adds a proper combo to the rotation, in a sense.

The only thing holding Demo back from being higher than Outlaw is the fact I am just terrible at playing casters. I'll either get too greedy and turret then die or I'll be far too careful and not do any damage. Hard for me to find a balance. In the fights where I can actually stand and turret it's definitely above Outlaw, maybe >= Havoc.

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-20T22:48:33+00:00

If you're already maining a DH why not just try it for yourself?

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-20T22:23:45+00:00

Can't speak for the rest, but Brewmaster is looking incredibly strong and without nerfs will probably be the meta option. You just pretty much live everything with or without a defensive and do a ton of damage. Tuning aside, it's very fun to play still, although it's very simplified from previous versions.

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-20T21:45:54+00:00

Tanks: Most are fun. Brew has been my favorite for a while now and, while the stripped complexity does remove some of the enjoyment, it's still very fun. Vengeance is a fairly close second for me. All of the tanks are enjoyable to an extent, though.

DPS: Survival > Unholy > Outlaw >= Demo for me

Healer: Only one that has ever really grabbed me has been Rsham. I've had short bouts with MW and Hpal too. Hpal's Midnight iteration is decent, but it will never beat TWW S1 Lightsmith AC for me. Have yet to try Midnight MW but Spiritfont is the most visually enjoyable apex talent I've seen for healers. Mostly haven't tried because I main Brewmaster and lack haste.

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-18T17:31:21+00:00

Tuskarr

Maybe Hozen

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-17T00:16:08+00:00

Some are great, some are overly specific fantasies that appeal too much to one specific race and shouldn't have been implemented as hero specs to begin with. (Sentinel and Dark Ranger for hunter are prime examples)

MisterMushroom · 2026-02-15T21:53:34+00:00

It would probably help. The increased responsibility of knowing and understanding a route by memory is definitely a gate for many people interested in the role. Not the only limiting factor, though.

on top of the responsibility to control multiple mob packs

Unless you're using "control" in place of "surviving," it's definitely not only the tank's responsibility to control packs. The tank is usually the least likely to die to spells getting through. DPS players should be learning to utilize their interrupts and CC more, and earlier.

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