Blizzard’s World of Warcraft: Shadowlands has had a rather successful launch in the last month, with more content being pushed out week after week. This latest reset, coming yesterday, brought the appearance of the new Storming affix.
Blizzard added in a few new affixes and took some others out for Mythic+ keys, such as the new Prideful seasonal affix that’s only active on keys +10 and higher. Currently, the new Storming affix is available for keys +7 or higher, so not all keys will see it.
Overall, it’s not a massive gameplay change, as it does what several others have already done but in its own flavor. There isn’t a massive difference between Storming and Volcanic or Quaking.
That said, Storming has its own disruptive method. Players will occasionally have a small tornado spawn where they’re standing, telegraphed by the animation of swirling winds beneath them for a short duration before the tornado spawns entirely.
Once it does, players caught in its range are knocked into the air for a short time, taking a decent chunk of damage as well. Unfortunately, it isn’t over there – the tornado will then begin to travel in a rather large circle, continuing to knock up anything in its path before despawning.
This can make Mythic+ dungeons extremely difficult for melee fighters of all roles, though especially DPS. Players frequently need to leave melee range to avoid being knocked up and taking heavy damage, which can drastically lower DPS over the course of a dungeon.
This is especially worsened by the fact that many can spawn at once, making it so that players are dodging three or more tornadoes while still trying to deal damage. Sometimes this can be mitigated by tanks moving mobs away from the tornadoes, but not all fights can be moved in such a way.
It doesn’t affect ranged classes too much, especially ones like Hunters that can cast the majority of their abilities on the go. Ranged classes can typically take a few steps away and let the tornado have its fun alone in a circle without posing much of a threat.
Tanks will want to avoid these tornadoes, of course, but it shouldn’t affect threat generation too much. It’s best to move a fight away from the tornadoes when possible to allow melee players to play as unmitigated as possible.
Overall, it’s a more annoying version of Volcanic, which needs players to move from a spot or risk being knocked up or damaged all the same as Storming does. The lingering tornadoes make it significantly more annoying, and many are already hoping that Blizzard lowers the duration and/or size of the spawned hazards.
