So covenants are balanced and fully implemented. Good to know.
Balancing is probably close to where it usually is, right before an xpac, which is to say, it's all over the fucking place. They usually get to the point of good enough (for them) right before the first week of the mythic raid, and 4+ specs just get left out in the cold. I suspect the same thing will happen with covenants; they will get 80% of them working, across the classes, and call it a day.
You can kind of see what works mechanically, and what doesn't; if it looks like a cluncky ability, it has a good chance of being left for dead, if it goes live next month. Obviously, don't pick those covenants.
For example, the rogue Kyrian ability (
Echoing Reprimand):
It just sucks, mechanically. It picks a combo point between 2 and 4 to empower, but landing on 2, 3, or 4 combo points is heavily dependent on the RNG.
Assassination, in particular, has its main builder (
Mutilate) give 2 combo by default and the other two (
Shiv &
Garrote), 1 combo point abilities, in the rotation, have cooldowns. Otherwise, you have to use AoE, and hope you only hit one target. Not to mention, every crit gives double the combo because of
Seal Fate.
Outlaw almost always starts with 1 combo point due to
Ruthlessness, and if they roll
Broadside in
Roll the Bones, they are close to fucked, if trying to land on the 2 or 4 empowered combo, for the duration.