In all the hoo-ha about the big changes on the PTR, a few smaller changes have slipped through.

Here’s one I’m keen about.

Turn Evil
This is The Spell Formerly Known As Turn Undead (Rank 3). It’s effectively the same, except now it applies to demons as well as undead (and, as a result, is subject to diminishing returns and lasts 10 seconds in PvP).

This is an excellent change.

This quiet little change is mostly getting attention for its arena implications, but its effect on PvE is just as interesting. Previously, warlocks have been the only classes able to CC most demons (excluding hunter traps), and it’s made life hard for those guilds without many warlocks.

Now, well… don’t have enough warlocks for Magtheridon? Never fear! Your pallies can team up to keep a few infernals busy – enough to trim down the ranks of infernals beating on your squishies, at any rate. This change reduces guild reliance on a specific class for specific encounters, and that’s always a good thing in my opinion. (Encounters that require a specific class balance are made of fail; we’re not all hardcore guilds who can snap up recruits whenever they like, nor force guildies to play something other than what they want to.)

You can’t chain fear with Turn Evil/Turn Undead, because it’s got a 20 second duration and a 30 second cooldown. Two pallies teaming up can chain fear between them, of course, and you don’t need to be able to chain fear to keep a mob under control with it. You just have to use your environment and your other abilities to spend those ten seconds in between fears, to keep the mob under control.

• Use Hammer of Justice to buy six seconds, and reposition further away – then taunt the demon to you when the stun breaks, and re-fear while it’s running over.
• Delay a demon by taunting it back and forth between two healer pallies a reasonable distance apart; it’ll spend a lot of its time running back and forth, using up those dead seconds until your Turn comes off cooldown again. (The second pally could also fear it if necessary, but RD is an instant whereas TE has a 1.5 second cast time, so it’s less of an interruption to your other tasks.)
• Pretend you’re a hunter and kite. Slap on Righteous Fury for extra agro gen, pump a couple of Exorcisms into the demon (and Holy Shocks if you’re a healadin), then fear it. You should be top of its agro list by now, so it’ll definitely come back to you when fear breaks, so just make sure you’re standing a good long way away so it’ll take a while to get back to you. Use environmental obstacles so it has to path around to get to you, if possible.
• If you have a hunter with a spare pet, get them to put it on the demon as a backup tank. The demon will only be beating on the pet for ten seconds at a time, so the pet won’t die, and it’ll keep the demon busy til your fear comes up again.

If you’ve got any other good ideas about how to make the most of Turn Evil, please leave a comment! I’m looking forward to playing with the spell.