Maces

[Zarathustra]

I have entirely too many alts, though not nearly as many as some of the Lurkers. At or near level 60 I've got a Druid, Rogue, Warrior, and Warlock. In the wings I've got a mage, hunter, and priest to whom I've not yet devoted enough time to pass the 20s.

Now, with my Druid as my main, I haven't done a lot of hardcore instance running with my alts. I've ended up trying out some uncommon builds, and have had a good time. My warrior brought a few things to light regarding itemization and talents.

The concept with my Warrior was built around Mace Specialization. "Hey," I thought, "free stuns 6% of the time, with no ppm limit? Sign me up!" Without listing the entire talent distribution, the build is working straight down to Mace Specialization through Impale, grabbing useful skill talents on the way. The rest was put into Fury for rage generation and dual-wield bonuses.

As I said, I haven't done a lot of instance running with him. I've run the Baron a few times in order to tank for friends who needed one (which nowadays can be covered by feral gear on my Druid), Scarlet Strat for the 5-man quests, and have done Tribute runs with him a few times. The result is that he's yet to find a good set of maces. I made him a hammersmith and crafted a Masterwork Stormhammer, and his offhand is a Blesswind Hammer of Power.

This brings me to the issue of itemization. With my rogue, I've seen green daggers with required levels all the way to 59 (have one "of the Tiger" right now). While I was levelling my Druid, I went through a few 2H maces "of the Eagle" at the high end of the spectrum, and a couple staves as well. I've found green swords and axes in the upper 50s for friends' characters.

1H Maces end at Blesswind Hammers. Level 50 required. If I'm wrong here, please enlighten me, but I've yet to see a single green hammer over level 50. This includes drops I've seen personally and AH browsing. It just doesn't happen. Blizzard is making efforts to enhance the game for the "casual" gamer, yet anyone that specs their rogue or warrior for 1H maces and doesn't hit the instances is going to be hard-pressed to find one. It just seems odd that all the other weapon types seem to drop at higher item levels (with exceptions such as polearms and fist weapons), yet 1H maces do not. Perhaps this is a bug that has simply never been addressed?

The second is Mace Specialization. Axe and dagger (for rogues) specializations always add a critical hit chance. Sword specialization always adds an extra attack chance. Mace specialization sometimes adds a chance to stun, but at higher levels there seem to be more and more enemies (especially quest enemies) that are immune.

The only two remedies for Mace Specialization are to either completely rethink its implementation, or make it a special stun that lies outside the realm of normal stun immunities. The latter of the two would definitely push maces ahead of the other weapons, so I doubt that'd happen anytime soon (thankfully). Perhaps a chance to land a crushing blow of some sort?

Two items for discussion, then:

1. Are Blesswind Hammers as good as it gets in the realm of greens? Is this a bug or feature?

2. What can be done to Mace Specialization to make it more viable?

[Artega]

Mace Specialization is the worst of the four specs by far. You're much better off taking Two-Handed Weapon Specialization (or preferably switch over to axes or swords.)

It is not limited by a ppm, but it is in the same diminishing returns category as Charge, Intercept, War Stomp, and Concussion Blow are, meaning that it becomes increasingly redundant the more of those abilities you use in a fight. If you are Alliance, it is a veritable waste of talent points, since the stun is uncontrollable and nearly 100% likely to be suffering diminishing returns to start with, and all Orcs will have an additional 25-40% chance to resist the stun.

To improve it? Make it its own class of diminishing returns and prevent it from being resisted.

[Quark]

The itemization of maces is also seriously lacking compared to swords. Rogues have the same problem.

[Gorthag]

Actually this is a major pet peeve of mine, it seems like _every_ other weapon line is lacking in item depth compared to swords. I'm a polearm fan but the only epic polearm worth getting until last patch was the High Warlord's Pig Sticker. Now there's the Halberd of Smiting, but that's it, no upgrade in sight in either MC or BWL. I'm personally hoping the Silithus 20 and 40 man have more polearms, maces and fist weapons rather than another half-dozen swords.

[Rinnhart]

So long as it's not more fricken daggers.

[Quark]

So long as it's not more fricken daggers.
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I don't know what fantasy world you live in, but dagger itemization sucked until Fang of the Faceless was made, and is now really only getting "better" because they're nerfing every dagger of 1.8 or slower speed, thus finally making Barman's worse compared to other later daggers.

[Quark]

Okay, to elaborate on this further:

You seem to think there's an overabundance of good daggers in the end game. I am of the mind that Blizzard really messed up dagger itemization. Here's my reasoning:

It starts in BRD. If you know to attack a mob that people wouldn't know to attack unless they were told ahead of time, or just really curious, you have a chance at Barman Shanker. Congratulations, you're done. Yep, that's it. Until you reach MC (or now Zul'Gurub) there's no dagger upgrade. Don't believe me?

LBRS - Keris of Zul'Serrak. Faster than Shanker, has the same annoying proc, and worse damage (since it's faster).

Scholomance - Specter's Blade. Basically same damage range as Shanker, faster. Therefore worse, unless you're fighting against undead. And let's not forget, it's freaking hard to get this weapon. You need either an epic-riding paladin or a crazy shaman.

Stratholme - Bonescraper. Strictly offhand weapon. Use it in main hand only to deliberately gimp yourself.

Dire Maul - Distracting Dagger. Defined 'Off Hand'.

UBRS - Nada.

There's all the instances. How about BGs?

Arathi Basin - Nada.

Warsong Gulch - Sentinel's Blade. 1.7 Speed is a deadzone for daggers. Nice stats, but still can't keep up in damage.

Alterac Valley - Glacial Blade/Electrified Dagger. This is a toss up. You lose yellow damage but gain white damage. Take out the proc and it makes it worth it over Shanker. Lobo is an upgrade, and rightly so. It's epic. Of course, many servers never see AV, so it's not a good argument to use.

Anything else? Heartseeker, forever stuck in 1.7 land. At lower attack powers it's better than some of these blues, but at highers it's worth much less.

Final list (in my opinion):
Glacial Blade
Barman Shanker
Specter's Blade
Keris of Zul'Serak
Heartseeker
Sentinel's Blade

So out of all these possibilities you're still left with a dagger from a level 54 instance. Note that I'm not arguing class balance / overall class damage or anything here. There is absolutely no item progression going on here. Since 60 is supposed to be a game of item progression instead of character progression, where is it?

Admittedly, 1.8 fixes one of my pet peeves and helps mitigate this problem by changing the way some instant attacks work. Damage Range is still the number one factor, but now overall dps matters more too. So how does it turn out?

Glacial Blade
Specter's Blade
Heartseeker - stats make it better than those below
Barman Shanker / Keris of Zul'Serak - near equal, both have annoying procs. I'd slightly take Keris because it's proc also lowers mob DPS, and has sligtly better white damage.
Sentinel's Blade - damage range still lacking, but a much closer last now.

So you still don't have a clear upgrade that's a straight drop. It is much, much better after the patch. But Glacial Blade and Specter's Blade are either really hard or impossible to get, and Heartseeker is cost prohibitive. There's only one dagger on that entire list that's from an "end game instance" and it's just about equal to the farmable dagger still.

[savaughn]

Okay, to elaborate on this further:

You seem to think there's an overabundance of good daggers in the end game.  I am of the mind that Blizzard really messed up dagger itemization.  Here's my reasoning:
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I understand what you're getting at. I can't really agree, though. Not only has Blizzard already implemented something on the test server to fix the problem, there aren't that many classes that have it better than rogues for itemization. The only real problem was that the shanker was overpowered - which is being fixed. And even that comes out of BRD.

By comparison, you have to get into Molten Core before you get a mage 1h upgrade after Maraudon.

[Rinnhart]

Quark, at least dagger rogues got upgrades with the Battlegrounds. You may not see AV much on Stormrage, but the rogues on KJ with Lobotomizer's aren't a drastic minority and I'd imagine it's the same on any other server with a reasonably high population.

And so far Paladins have been royally #$%&ed on BG weapons. We've got the Unstoppable Force, and that's it. Go, go Valordins! We can't use the one decent 1-handed weapon because it's a dagger, and can't use either caster reward from Arathi because one's a dagger and the other's a fricken staff.

[Artega]

Quark, at least dagger rogues got upgrades with the Battlegrounds. You may not see AV much on Stormrage, but the rogues on KJ with Lobotomizer's aren't a drastic minority and I'd imagine it's the same on any other server with a reasonably high population.

And so far Paladins have been royally #$%&ed on BG weapons. We've got the Unstoppable Force, and that's it. Go, go Valordins! We can't use the one decent 1-handed weapon because it's a dagger, and can't use either caster reward from Arathi because one's a dagger and the other's a fricken staff.
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You get a less wicked-looking version of Frostbite. It's a mace. You get a 1h upgrade.

[Rinnhart]

You get a less wicked-looking version of Frostbite.  It's a mace.  You get a 1h upgrade.
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Lateral, at best.