Background
For anyone who wasn’t paying attention, on Friday Ion engaged in an AMA on Reddit. Many people were able to submit a question, including me. Because it was, by a landslide, the most frequent complaint or question that we had in Discord, my question was about Touch of Karma.
Are defensives like Touch of Karma and Shield of Vengeance intended to be a major part of a specs damage? For example, it’s easy to find Windwalker raid parses of a variety of skill levels where Touch of Karma is 10-15% or more of their overall damage.
Do you think that’s healthy for the game?
Are there plans to address this?
And I was lucky enough to have my question answered:
No, we don’t think that’s healthy. It’s a similar situation to the gameplay AMS used to yield for Death Knights. Defensives with a backlash component are an interesting space to explore, but when your “defensive” gameplay turns into actively seeking out sources of damage, that’s pretty degenerate.
So that we have official acknowledgement of a problem we’ve been having, the next step is to explore solutions.
The Problem
I talked about this in my last article where I looked at how Windwalker’s performed relative to other specs, and how much of that damage was from Touch of Karma. The average from the 80 parses of data that I looked at was that Touch of Karma provided around 8.8% of the damage for the top 10 parses on each of the 8 bosses in Uldir. On some parses it provided as much as 15.63% or as low as 2.87% of the overall damage. This is largely because of the power of Good Karma which increases Touch of Karma‘s potential from 50% of our health to 100% of our health.
This took Touch of Karma from a nice, but small, chunk of added damage for using it as a defensive, to a mandatory offensive cooldown that requires you to take damage to get the most out of it. This leads to Windwalkers everywhere standing in mechanics they should be avoiding, not moving out as fast as they should, or even taunting targets away from the tank in order to consistently get the most out of Touch of Karma. Many people felt that this was an unhealthy way to play, and prompted an overly risky playstyle. I’m sure untold hundreds of Windwalker deaths in the past few weeks have been caused by Windwalkers trying to maximize their Touch of Karma damage and underestimating the damage or overestimating the shield.
The Solutions
So the clear solution to Touch of Karma doing too much damage is to reduce its damage. Now the “how” of that has a few options. If Blizzard decides that Touch of Karma does too much damage, but doesn’t want to get rid of the mechanic, they could simply reduce it back to 50% of our health, either by eliminating or changing Good Karma, or perhaps cutting the amount of both of them so that it redirects 50% in total. The more extreme options are to remove the mechanic entirely. Lets explore those options.
Good Karma Changes
When Touch of Karma redirected 50% of our health, like in Legion, it was seen as a very minor problem. One that added some flavor and a way to get a little bit extra damage when you are needing to save your life. Frequently we were recommended to use Touch of Karma as a defensive unless you knew you didn’t need it. With the advent of Good Karma, it became too much of our damage to ignore, and it became as used as any other offensive cooldown, so it makes sense that the easiest way to fix it is to return it to the old way. There are some ways that this can be accomplished:
- Remove Good Karma as a talent and replace it with Dave (Ox), since that is what we had in Legion. Dave has found some very nice niches.
- Remove Good Karma and replace it with a Xuen themed trait. Currently, in that row all three talent specs have RoP and TTS. Brewmasters have Ox and Mistweavers have Song, so it would make sense for Windwalkers to have a utility trait that was themed after our Celestial. If Blizzard wanted to keep it a DPS talent, then perhaps we empower ourselves with the strength of Xuen, so that our single target abilities become AOE abilities for a short period of time, where burst AOE is an area that Windwalkers were formerly strong in, but now much weaker. Another idea mentioned by Sasquatch was that we would get a Xuen themed talent that increased the power and radius of Windwalking, similar to Stampeding Roar.
- Make Good Karma a PvP talent and replace the PvE talent with one of the above.
- Return it to providing a self-heal its Artifact Trait form from Legion (trait). This would give us an additional self-heal, something that we’re lacking in Battle for Azeroth, and further its defensive usefulness.
- Have it increase Touch of Karma‘s absorb, but not the damage. The best way to do this would be to cap the absorb at 100% of our health, but cap the damage out at 50%. If the damage was simply half of the health absorbed, which would seem simpler, this would create a situation where Windwalkers are forced to continue the same dangerous playstyle, but for even less reward.
Touch of Karma Changes
Another option beyond changing the Good Karma talent is to rework Touch of Karma entirely. It has been a spell that Windwalkers have had since the beginning, so it would be a shame to see it go, but that is simply an option. Here are some ways it can be changed:
- Remove the damage portion entirely. This could allow Good Karma to add the damage portion back, while adding 50% to the absorb, so that the end result is 100% absorb and 50% damage redirection. Without Good Karma talented, it would merely be a decent baseline defensive cooldown. The damage out portion could also be replaced with the healing DoT from Legion, so that you could absorb 50% of your health and then heal back 100% of the damage taken over time, this would make it an incredibly strong defensive ability for sustained damage. Good Karma could also then simply double the effectiveness of the baseline spell.
- Cut the damage portion down to a smaller value, then Good Karma can add to that amount, but still lower than currently.
- Work purely off of spell damage, so that tanking a boss and taking melees won’t be a problem anymore.
- Continue to put the DoT on the target but explode for all remaining damage at the end of the the duration, so that any damage not absorbed will be dealt.
- Absorb damage, but not redirect it, and THEN explode for any shield left. So if the shield is up to 100% of your health and you take 75% in damage, it absorbs that, and the remaining 25% explodes back to the target.
- Have the cooldown reduced by the amount left. If only 50% of the shield is used, then the cooldown comes back 50% faster. If 25% used, then it comes back 75% faster.
Kuya’s Ideas
When I decided to put this together, I asked a few well known, knowledgeable, and logical Windwalkers to provide some ideas. Kuya went a little bit overboard and provided me with over a dozen ideas, even going so far as to give his ideas names. So rather than sprinkle his in, he gets his own section. What follows is all his:
Change Touch of Karma the effect to a self absorb shield for 50% of your maximum HP that lasts 8 seconds and when the shield expires you gain a HoT effect that heals you for 25% of the damage taken while the shield was active over 8 seconds. Reasoning here is because of the scaling changes being able to deal a % of your max HP as damage is always going to be strong that even if they do remove Good Karma there is still a slight chance you will want to utilize the “Good Karma” playstyle to increase your throughput but now it would put you at a greater risk.
Replace Good Karma with another utility talent, Few ideas here:
- Heavy Handed Strikes – Your Fists of Fury now applies Disable
- Paralyzing Reach – Paralysis gains 20 yds range (for a total of 40 yds) and no longer costs energy.
- One With The Wind – Windwalking no longer applies to allies but instead increases your movement speed by an additional 25% (total of 40%).
- Xuen’s Guidance – Windwalking increases movement speed by an additional 5% and its range is increased to 20 yds (currently 10 yards)
- Mass Paralysis – Paralysis now applies to enemies within 5 yards of your target as well.
- Neverending Paralysis – Paralysis no longer has a cooldown or a target limit.
- Summon White Tiger Statue – Summons a White Tiger Statue at the target location for 15 min, granting allies within 15 yards your Windwalking effect.
- Force of Spirit – Crackling Jade Lightning now has a 100% chance to knock your target and nearby enemies back and no longer costs energy but also no longer does damage and has a 40 second cooldown.
- a) Windwalk – Windwalking now also has an active effect with a 3 min cooldown which increases the range and effect of Windwalking by 300% for 8 seconds. (Ends up being 30 yards and 30% move speed)
- b) Windwalk – You shroud yourself in mist temporarily making yourself stealthed for 3 seconds and increasing your movement speed by 60%. Windwalk ends when you take or deal damage. 45 sec cooldown.
Replace the Good Karma talent with a whole brand new idea that utilizes Karma but for your group, its a work in progress but i like to call it: Ring of Karma
This causes Touch of Karma to no longer deal damage but affects an area for 8 seconds, when your allies stand in the Ring of Karma 50% of all damage taken by them is redirected to you. To counteract this somewhat when you cast Ring of Karma you gain an absorb shield for 100% of your health. 3 min cooldown.
I thought many of these ideas were good, or at least good starting points with some numbers tweaking. I’m especially fond of Summon White Tiger Statue, since Windwalkers have been asking for a Xuen totem since their inception, if not before.
Compensation
So it should go without saying, but I’m still going to say it, as I wrote in the last article, right now Windwalker’s damage is somewhat heavily dependent on the contribution. Based on the numbers I looked at, the average Touch of Karma did around 8.8% of the Windwalker’s total damage, but can easily be upwards of 10% or 15%. That is not a negligible amount, and without it, Windwalkers fall toward the bottom, if not out of, the average range. Because of this, something would have to be done about our damage so that we don’t plummet.
The “easy” thing would be to apply this damage into our Windwalker Aura. If the Effect #1 and #2 were to be changed from -27% to -15%, this would offset Windwalker’s damage loss, although slightly higher wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world and would help Windwalkers stay strong as our damage isn’t likely to scale quite as well as many other specs.
Other things that would be nice would be for some of that damage to be rolled specifically into Rising Sun Kick to boost our single target damage, Spinning Crane Kick to boost the painfully low AOE damage from it closer to previous Legion levels, and/or Fists of Fury to eliminate or lessen the Swift Roundhouse trait’s effect on our playstyle.
Secondary Consequences
Other things that many people may not consider when discussing these ideas is that currently Touch of Karma and Good Karma do more than just provide us with damage. They are also a HUGE reason why Versatility is our strongest stat, as it is the only secondary stat that benefits both Touch of Karma and Touch of Death. This was changed toward the middle of Legion as Windwalkers were the only spec that did not have 100% benefit from Versatility. Without Touch of Karma damage, or less of it, we’d value Versatility less, and its likely that other stats would pass it sooner, whereas currently it takes quite a lot for Versatility to be less desirable than Mastery or Critical Strike.
They also have an effect on our primary stats, as neither Touch of Karma nor Touch of Death benefit from Agility, but do benefit from Stamina, another fabulous uniqueness of Windwalkers. This leads us to get much less out of Agility than many other Agility specs, and the benefit from Stamina has never quite made up for the loss. By reducing the damage contribution from Touch of Karma, we’d see a larger % of our overall damage benefit from Agility, bringing us closer in line with other specs.
There is also the case of the Azerite Trait, Strength of Spirit which, for Mistweavers and Brewmasters give them a ticking heal while Fortifying Brew is active. Although this heal is incredibly low, it is a similar mechanic to some of the above suggestions.
Some of the above suggestions would also hurt Windwalker’s survival tools, although others would help, or at least modify it. Many of these suggestions would also have an effect on PvP, so consideration needs to be made there so that PvP does not suffer.
Overall, I think many, if not all, of the above suggestions would be a decided improvement to the health and playstyle of Windwalkers, so as long as there is adequate compensation and consideration of the consequences that reach beyond the current issue, then I think positive change is possible.
If you like the content that I, and the others at PeakofSerenity provide, then please support us through Patreon and PayPal. If you have any questions you can ask in Discord.
You can also check me out on Twitter, YouTube, and Twitch, where I stream all my raids as well as some article writing and more.
GOOD Karma
I think the idea of the less damage you take the more damage it does is interesting (although you will have to change the name from “Touch of Karma” to “You should’ve hit me when you had the chance”).
I have always been a fan of abilities that situationally can be used 2 very different ways. Dps cooldown OR a defensive, but not both. This would make those who are dps min/maxing avoid damage, literally the opposite of what it is now.
I also liked one of Kuya’s last ideas to just remove the damage, add in the heal and replace good karma with the 3 second invis + sprint. Mainly because I can imagine a crazy cool looking wind animation for it.
I honestly think that almost every change above is an improvement to both the fun and health of the spec! Well done!
The only logical change to the whole Karma-problem is to remove the damage component entirely, because even if the damage reflection only made up to 1% of overall damage I’d still try and maximize the additional damage.
And I will not be the only one doing so; a damage component tied to a defensive cooldown will lead to that cooldown being abused for damage. Always. Lowering the amount reflected will not get rid of that unhealthy playstyle.
So my idea is simple:
1) Remove the damage component entirely and re-introduce the healing aspect of Karma like in Legion (this time baseline for 50%), with “Good Karma” healing for 100% of the taken damage (up from 50% baseline).
2) Buff ONLY the single target skills of WW by ~8% (or the appropriate number).
Boom, problem solved, no more WW’S purposely standing in mechanics at all (and that’s what counts for a healthy playstyle, as you said “quite literally”) and Karma being a full-fledged defensive CD with an inbound self-heal component that you can choose to improve.
this would be simply the best solution.
Thank you for asking the question. I hope they will make it better than it is currently 🙂
I had this discussion with some friends yesterday and we came up with the idea to make Touch of Karma a pvp talent and give back Fortifying Brew as a “proper” defensive, but change the 20% increased hp/reduced dmg taken to maybe 30% reduced dmg taken, so it won’t be used offensively for ToD.
It would be nice to have a baseline “general purpose” defensive ability that reduces all dmg taken by a small amount, rather than having to pick between Diffuse Magic and Dampen Harm between bosses and dungeons.
I would like to see Good Karma and Touch of Karma removed from PvE talent trees, for PvP it makes perfect sense. Its damage can be rolled in our regular dps abilities, FoF hits like a wet noodle for instance. Its place can be taken by either a stampeding roar type effect, or a permanent movement speed increase on our windwalking passive, like the ring we had in Legion.
Keep up the good work. A few more nerfs now and I’ll just stop playing my monk entirely.
Well it’s a good thing that these changes would have to come with buffs to compensate, unless you are strictly concerned with nerds, and not the whole picture.
Buffing FoF and simply changing good karma to the legion version makes the most sense to me. It solves the ToK damage problem, the lack of self healing problem, the low AoE problem, The swift roundhouse “problem” (I think traits that change playstyle are fun, but whatevs), while making one of our most iconic abilities come back into the limelight.
Lots of good ideas put forward here, but in everything listed here I still just want the self healing component back… I have missed it.
Many good ideas here, but what I miss most is the self-heal component. If they simply changed the talent to heal for the damage absorbed, I’d be happy. No need to overcomplicate this.
I think FoF in general could get a baseline 70% short snare on targets hit, not as a talent. It would not only lessen the harm of removing FoF stun in PvP, but also give a little extra to Windwalker in dungeons, having a significant snare and widening the everclosing gap between us and Demon Hunters.
Good write up, and I was glad to see your question addressed in the AMA.
On topic, the Xuen statue or the “damage remaining > explosion” changes sound like winners to me. Statue would bring commonality to the specs but keeping Good Karma and tweaking the behavior gives us a little more reliable control over our damage without having to put ourselves in danger!
===
I don’t know if you’ve seen yet – but the latest hotfixes dropped Swift Roundhouse by 55%! Oof, indeed. Thunderous Blast was also affected, and now I’m not even sure what traits to look for moving forward. Not that I assume they’re garbage, I just think I’ll be lower this week than last which is simply unfortunate.
Any thoughts on trait changes?
Hopefully, we won’t have to wait long for updates on Karma and our damage.
Touch of Karma itself does not need to be changed from what it has always done. It is as iconic to our spec as SEF has become in recent years. Touch of Karma’s current problem is simply a numbers issue, and I think the only reasonable changes to the ability as a whole inside and outside of talent changes would be reverting it to either Legion’s version to boost our self healing or keeping it a 100% absorb but only redirect 50% of the damage taken. The reason for the 100% absorb is because we lost Zen Meditation going in to Legion and gained Karma’s heal effect as a trait, but with that gone we’re back to how we were in WoD but even worse-off because of no ZM.
Either one of the above options would fix the issue, but I personally prefer Legion’s healing instead of making it more difficult to get Karma’s full benefit WHEN you decide to use it for damage. And yes, those situations will always exist. They always have, and will continue to because that’s simply how the ability works. It fits our playstyle of taking advantage of opportunities and having both options and optimization is not a bad thing. People suggesting to remove damage from ToK entirely are out of their minds when it is currently just a tuning issue.
As for the most notable suggestion, “remaining absorb = explosion” makes no sense, from both a gameplay and thematic standpoint. First of all it’s in the name, what is karmic about hurting someone who hasn’t laid a finger on you? Second, it would feel like trash and would be used offensively even more than it is now. Pull the boss, hit karma for damage, use it on CD unless it’s going to save your life.
Providing we see the removal of Good Karma as a trait and the ability becoming 100% absorb with reduced damage or Legion’s version, I don’t want Black Ox Statue back. It’s useful for niche scenarios and farming mobs, sure. But it makes no sense being available to Xuen disciples and isn’t a class-neutral ability like Leg Sweep or Ring of Peace is. I think a boost to Windwalking would be the most fun, but a re-imagining of the Xuen statue that was initially in the MoP beta many years ago might be the most interesting. Windwalking is a low enough of a % by default that I don’t really see the use of a statue giving it much benefit on its own, but having the statue “sap” movement speed of enemies in an area and increase Windwalking’s effect for say 5% for every mob sapped up to a cap would both be a fun talent to use and provide extra utility on-par with Ring of Peace, fitting the theme of the talent row being CC.
Lastly I’d like to say that while I have always loved the idea of us getting Windwalk and would hope to see us get it one day, I don’t really see it fitting in with what the CC row is aiming for.
“People suggesting to remove damage from ToK entirely are out of their minds when it is currently just a tuning issue.”
And that’s where you just don’t seem to understand the issue in general.
It’s not about “numbers” when talking about Karma.
It’s about the unhealthy and completely dumb fact that you purposely have to misplay and soak bad mechanics to boost your damage.
Even if only 50% would be reflected, you want to miss out on that ~65k damage every 90 seconds at the moment ? Yeah i bet you won’t.
And I won’t either.
Numbers-tuning won’t change the kamikaze-playstyle as long as the possibility still exists to abuse this “defensive” cooldown as a damage-boost.
1) Remove the damage component and re-introduce it as a speccable PvP-talent.
2) Make Karma heal you instead like in Legion.
3) Compensate for damage on all single target skills.
It’s really not that hard.
Except it’s only being brought up as an issue now in recent months after the change, despite the ability existing in such a format since its conception in 2012. I agree that Karma should not make up as much of our damage that it does now, but it shouldn’t do no damage either.
It’s been proven in the history of the game multiple times that every time something has been changed regarding Karma it has always been that it was doing too much damage. We had a legendary cape that made Karma much more powerful than it was even now for the entirety of Legion and this was still AFTER the nerf to it. This is made evident by the fact that Karma dealing damage is NOT a problem, Karma doing too much IS. This outrage regarding Karma is only coming to light now because it is too strong currently, the community is making a problem out of Karma itself which is just complicating the situation. You have never seen the level of backlash regarding it in the past as you have now because the community is bangwagoning on something they honestly don’t really understand.
Anyone that actually plays the game that raids or does high end M+ should know that Karma usage isn’t so black and white. Are you going to use Karma on the first boss of King’s Rest and stand in the avoidable knockback the boss does, or do you save it to both mitigate damage and stick to the boss when you get the debuff, using this in combination with your high mobility to drop it seconds later to what would be considered a smart play? What about something like Mythic Vectis where you can basically use Karma on CD AND benefit the raid while making the most out of the ability by getting infection from a nearby party member?
Karma is a defensive CD first and foremost, and should be used as one. It also happens to have an offensive aspect to it that promotes smart usage, and you know what? If you use it in that way, you should be rewarded for good decisions. Karma’s damage should be used as a bonus to doing something right, smart play is what Windwalker has always been about. I have no idea if people are playing selfishly and not considering the good of the group or their healer’s well being. As previously mentioned, yes – there will be times where you do not need its defensive abilities and you have the option to make use of it. Is that itself not a smart decision? Using resources you have to your advantage that would otherwise go to waste? Should it make up as much damage as it does now? Probably not. Should it reward you for using mechanics to your benefit and smart counterplay? Absolutely.
I get what you’re trying to say, but that doesn’t change simple facts, for example:
“Karma is a defensive CD first and foremost, and should be used as one.”
Reality is just something else.
As long as you have the possibility to boost your damage via Karma+kamikaze (not even having to waste a gcd for it) players will abuse Karma for offensive means. Those that don’t simply don’t want to min/max and aren’t part of this discussion.
Whether or not Karma has always been this way it is now doesn’t make things better. or changes anything regarding the toxic gameplay you’re forced into IF you want to squeeze out the last bit of possible damage of WW.
The second simple fact is that you always have Dampen Harm / Diffuse Magic for a full-fledged defensive cooldown, so that’s another reason to just fire Karma for damage all the way.
I don’t want to depend on boss mechanics to deal my full damage potential and Karma IS part of that, whether it deals 100%, 50% or 10% of the soaked amount.
That needs to go in PvE at least, because it’s a plain stupid gameplay concept on so many levels.
There are a multiplicity of reasons why ToK/GK are a problem now and weren’t so much in previous expansions. The point is whether it’s a unhealthy mechanic whether it’s not super obvious or crazy obvious like in this expansion.
I agree that we should be rewarded for intelligent use of our abilities but making us actively go against damage mechanics to maximise our damage is just silly.
It’s not whether the replacement is a damage ability, whether they baseline a heal and drop the the damage from Karma. Whatever the change is, the whole point will be to stop people who are trying to maximise their damage from jumping into fire. Only way to do that is to remove it or change how the damage mechanic works so that it’s not requiring you to take more damage.
Sure, some fights you don’t have to do that because there is a damage window that hits everyone that lines up with your cooldown but unless it meets all that criteria and does 100% of your bubble, the problem will remain, even if they wind the damage back.
You and everyone else adapts to boss mechanics on a fight-by-fight basis to optimize performance already, Karma is just another part of ours. The last thing the game needs in general is the removal of unique mechanics and watering down existing systems further because people can’t be bothered to use everything they have.
The reality might be that people have and will continue to use Karma for pure offensive purposes, but the other side of the argument is that again, it’s not so black and white. I’m certain that if someone has a choice between either using Karma for a bit of extra damage or being faced with life-threatening survival because the encounter has that much damage going out or mechanics that need to be done such as soaks they are going to hold on to it to keep themselves alive because being dead due to your own poor decisions is the worst thing you can do as a DPS.
Karma’s default mechanic has never been an issue and doesn’t need to be one, you’re trying to twist it into one because you don’t like it and don’t want to use it. Would you stand in fire to hit a boss in a “fuck melee” moment as any other class to get off some extra damage, only to escape with a sliver of health because it’s supposedly your job to minmax in every situation even if it means making another person’s job harder that could potentially affect the group or raid’s performance in the fight as a whole due to selfish play? A monk, paladin or rogue could do just that, but there could also be consequences down the road for doing so.
I really just don’t see a point to people trying to change an ability that isn’t broken and I am baffled that suddenly a surgence of players are saying this now after it existing problem-free for as long as Karma has. I’m not sure if it is the result of a trail-off of our FOTM popularity at the end of Legion with those that decided to stay with the spec or people that are simply new in general, but it certainly isn’t something I’ve seen petitioned for in my 6 years of playing WW because it doesn’t need to be one.
Careful players will hold on to Karma to mitigate damage, risky players will use it primarily as an offensive tool, and smart players will get the full potential out of both aspects. Touch of Karma is a versatile and iconic ability to our spec that both promotes thinking and rewards good use and is honestly one of the most interesting abilities in WoW itself that should not be changed because of certain players simply not wanting to bother with a two sided coin that has the potential to buy so many things as it has past and present.
I really do not mean for this to come across as a personal attack and I apologize if it may seem that way, but I have been struggling with what feels like a large portion of the WW community as a whole in recent times to not lose sight of how unique and what Windwalkers are and have always been. I don’t want recent events and the current Karma situation to become a starting point of people changing us in to something we aren’t.
Again, I’m really getting your point, but like you I’ve practically only played WW and Monk in this game and I’ve rioted against this mechanic in good and bad times.
Especially in BFA there are things that come together when talking about Karma in general:
– first of all “Good Karma” is being brought up in the utility tier-line together with RoP and improved LS with GK doing nothing utility-wise. Reson ? Sense ? It’s like they embedded a raw damage talent in a completely wrong place you have to take to maximise your output. Give me a break.
– furthermore, as I already stated many times before, only because the ToK + GK combo is so dominant in BFA that it makes up ~10-14% or your overall damage is only the icing on the cake numbers-wise and the reason players suddenly want to discuss the problem. If I’d come up with a possible comparison I’d say catching a cold or getting measles is the same thing in general: You’re getting sick. So in my books you should get rid of both staying healthy, no matter if one is worse than the other.
There is this one thing that also another person above already pointed out:
As long as the possibility remains to squeeze out damage from any ability it will be done, especially if you’re getting used to the fight and just wait for the mechanic to appear and soak with Karma.
There is no other expression for this than “plain stupid gameplay concept” and you can’t justify it by just saying “use it wisely”, because you want to use it on cooldown for numbers.
You also stated “smart players” will use the full potential out of both aspects Karma offers.
Sure, in a perfect world, where raid wide damage for 100% of your HP is being dealt every 90 seconds that argument will be true. In all other cases (e.g. reality) your Karma comes off cooldown and you actively search for something to use it for, not for pure mitigation, because if you wanted to do that you could always pop Dampen Harm anyway.
Of course, Rogues can cheese mechanics as well with their toolkit, but at least their skills only make them immune to the mechanics, not adding raw damage through that certain skill, and that is my only complaint. Rogues don’t stand purposely in mechanics, but use their defensive cooldowns when in a real pinch.
Removing the damage component of ToK in PvE (with the possibility to skill it in PvP or just stating on the skill that it only reflects player-caused damage in general) would mean redemption.
Re-introducing the healing aspect of Legion also would shift ToK to a real defensive CD only to be used when needed.