[Prot] WoD/Legion Alpha Discussion

[YourPalFleisch]

I'm all for that too. That is not what we have in Legion.

[Gallahadd]

Well that's worrying...

Check the blue post on the front page.m says they've already started damage tuning. As in "we're done with the mechanics, it's now just getting the numbers right"

There goes the last hope that they'd patch in some complexity.

[Melsiren]

Well that's worrying...

Check the blue post on the front page.m says they've already started damage tuning. As in "we're done with the mechanics, it's now just getting the numbers right"

There goes the last hope that they'd patch in some complexity.

The gods have spoken.
Our kings have left us.
All hope is lost.

[Dastuross]

Well that's worrying...

Check the blue post on the front page.m says they've already started damage tuning. As in "we're done with the mechanics, it's now just getting the numbers right"

There goes the last hope that they'd patch in some complexity.

That is very worrying, i'd hoped blizz would listen when pretty much the entire mythic prot paladin community was screaming that things needed to change.

[Melsiren]

That is very worrying, i'd hoped blizz would listen when pretty much the entire mythic prot paladin community was screaming that things needed to change.

R.I.P Serph.
R.I.P HA

We need to make our own version of https://www.heroicstrike.org/

[Dastuross]

R.I.P Serph.
R.I.P HA

We need to make our own version of https://www.heroicstrike.org/

Someone get on it, i'll make it my homepage for all of legion.

[arcuro]

comeing here as a main mythic Brewmaster tank i wonder how prot paladin plays in legion. i read here one ore another and all i can get is that this specc is doomed.. well same here for brewmaster. all is gimmed and backed into a 2-macro-specc (literally) with uninspired talents and bad or redundant artefact traits. 0 Utility 0 control over my playstyle... its sad

so i wonder hoe my twink prot pala words?
1) how is the "rotation"? is it fluid? are there a lot of gaps were you wait for your cooldowns?
2) glorious WoD aside, are there talents right now, that are plain out awfull?
3) do you think you have control over your survivability or are you 100% dependet of the skill of your healer (like Brewmaster...)


well i realy want to know how prot pala is in a short info. i knwo we all love Mop and WoD tanking as i do. it is and was the best tanking experience. but right now how does prot pala play in legion?

thanks for any good info to compare with my brewmaster

[bicycle]

1) how is the "rotation"? is it fluid? are there a lot of gaps were you wait for your cooldowns?

Press Judgment on cooldown.

Press Avenger's Shield on cooldown.

Macro SOTR and LOTP into both of the above.

Congrats, you have mastered defensive prot paladin gameplay.

[celinamuna]

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1 - AS
2 - BH
3 - J
4 - SotR
5 - LotP
N - Cons

[Fusoya]

which is fine, like many others in this thread I've come to terms that Prot Pally, and maybe even WoW are just not for me any more.

I have filled up my ragequit bingo card, where may I redeem my prize?

[celinamuna]

I have filled up my ragequit bingo card, where may I redeem my prize?

I mean most ppl aren't even rage quitting.
It's simply getting bored of the game, which isn't fun on farm, and only fun on prog when you're not raging at other things.

[Melsiren]

I mean most ppl aren't even rage quitting.
It's simply getting bored of the game, which isn't fun on farm, and only fun on prog when you're not raging at other things.

Shhhhh...

Don't ruin the magic for Fusoya.

[Dastuross]

I mean most ppl aren't even rage quitting.
It's simply getting bored of the game, which isn't fun on farm, and only fun on prog when you're not raging at other things.

Very true, if it wasn't for the fact i took a year break from raiding i'd be burned the fuck out atm and probably quitting the game atleast untill legion.

[Gephyrophobia]

So is holy power convoluted or simple?



Yeah, the peak for the common pleb. Been a prot paladin since the middle of BC, and the first time I started to really enjoy my role was MoP haste stacking and vengeance cheesing.

You're right about one thing though. Blizzard decided to listen to people like you and undo all class progress they made in the last six years. I'd honestly have no issue with the state of prot pallies if there was a single tankspec in legion that had some semblance of complexity to it.

which is fine, like many others in this thread I've come to terms that Prot Pally, and maybe even WoW are just not for me any more.

Convoluted wasn't the best choice of word; perhaps. Unnecessary UI monitoring.

What "class progress"? They've lost like 60% of their playerbase from "hardcorifying" the game. Remember when there was a single raid difficulty, an upgrade was an upgrade, every class was relatively simple, and the game had a metric fuckton of players? This isn't Dark Souls. Reforging and "every single spec needs a new skill at 83" or whatever level, and "let's overhaul warriors from being fun to all about raging blow RNG" along with ruining a bunch of other specs, followed by the introduction of active mitigation all killed the game. WoD's new core system tweaks like reforging being gone and all of that were all a step toward fixing the damage, but then they added no content on top of the stupid ass 20 man only mythic decision. Legion might actually save WoW. It might be too little too late, however.

Sadly.

I'm of the opinion that there should be a way to have tanking engaging for both you and me; someone that wants a less complex and engaging way of playing to allow them to focus more on other aspects of gameplay (as you've said, interesting boss mechanics and what-not), and someone that can autopilot the spec and the boss mechanics and thus wants more complex gameplay involving trade-offs and meaningful decision-making (think Seraphim with Harsh Words during HM Mythic progression).

I can see where you're coming from, and perhaps I was too quick to jump on the "oh boy, another terribad player come to ruin tanking for me," so apologies for that. However, based off some of your statements, I cannot put much stock into your arguments (see: "Playing my class shouldn't be a fucking challenge," "Which is awesome. I can use it when I need it without pooling anything," "I'm the type of guy that could play the exact same spec without a single change indefinitely and not be bothered by it at all,") as these all lead to a state of the game I do not wish to see come about. That is not speaking from a selfish point of view, rather, I fully believe that this attitude will lead to stagnation and reward-without-effort gameplay, thereby pushing grind-gameplay and participation-awards.

Something I can agree with you on is that the game's combat system is severely out-dated. I did find GW2 way too simple to fully enjoy though, as I struggled to find a class/spec that had enough complexity and depth to keep me engaged for more than a few hours. In a perfect world, a merge between the two could be quite good.

GW2 is just "okay". Wildstar's core combat system was a lot better, but they ALSO made the WoW mistake of trying to build an MMO for the hardcore and look: it failed spectacularly. I respect your opinion, but I can also look at it cynically like you as, "oh look, another tryhard defending what nearly ruined tanking for me a few years back." There's two sides to every coin. For you guys to be happy they had to piss off a lot of us old school tanks. You may think your way is "better" but you're not going to convince people that don't like active mitigation and resource juggling to like it based on "it makes it challenging". I chose to tank specifically because it's the easiest role. You can hate me for that, but that's not my problem.

I only even bothered to start posting in this thread because there's not enough people happy with the changes defending them in the midst of all the buttmad circlejerk doomsaying.

[Deleted]

Very true, if it wasn't for the fact i took a year break from raiding i'd be burned the fuck out atm and probably quitting the game atleast untill legion.

That, and burnout aside, the game just sucks up a ridiculous amount of time (particularly at the top 100 level) for something that's "just a hobby". Most of the people who started playing the game as 10-12 year olds in Vanilla like me are about to hit their mid-20s and the responsibilities just pile on each year. Progress easily takes 30+ hours out of your week if you raid 4+ days and prepare meticulously/have officer responsibilities. It is literally like having an extra-part time job down to the point where you can't just not show up when you're not feeling it.

Besides, idk who the fuck would ever ragequit the game over individual classes. I mean, it annoys me as much as anyone when the devs of a game butcher something, but I've always played WoW in particular for the teamwork aspect - quitting over individual classes not being an ideal experience would be like refusing to go to the movies because they butter their popcorn. It makes part of the experience really shitty, sure, but it hardly ruins everything.

[Deleted]

I respect your opinion, but I can also look at it cynically like you as, "oh look, another tryhard defending what nearly ruined tanking for me a few years back." There's two sides to every coin. For you guys to be happy they had to piss off a lot of us old school tanks.

Without diving more into ad hominem, you admitted to being satisfied with no change over the course of the game's life cycle. WoW is a game driven forward by patches and expansions that introduce change to already existing elements of the game, while introducing a few new ones (never more than what's already in the game, for example one or two races or a class per expansion). By doing so they prevent the game from stagnating as players naturally reach a point where they've mastered every current challenge of the game and keep players invested in their current class(es) by adding vertical class scaling rather than only horizontal, a conscious design philosophy in use by GW2. To break it down into layman's terms, a player starts by leveling up to 60, vertically learning the basics of the game and investing in a class. At level 60, they expand horizontally into different elements of the game but within the same power-level and class. Simply adding new content on top of this horizontal ceiling would keep players invested to a degree, but the developer would be reliant on ever-increasingly levels of difficulty in new content, resulting in a level of content that requires a massive time investment in learning obsolete content before being open to new or returning players, as well as ultimately reaching a point where everything has been done and the only way forward is to make pointlessly difficult content (think Dark Souls cranked up to 11 in WoW).

WoW uses a balance of both vertical and horizontal scaling, through vertical expansion in expansion sets and horizontal expansion in patches and content tiers. Instead of having the above example, what we have today is rather a "blank slate" of sorts when an expansion is reached and a constant cycle of change. No class you play will remain or feel the same between expansions, and tiers will in a way slightly (or dramatically) change how you play the class in current content. As an example, compare release-WoD Mistweaver Monks to Tier 18 Mistweavers in playstyle; certain elements remain but the use of 4-set and the levels of Spirit available to them changes how you'd go about playing them, and this is usually for the better. Usually; Protection Paladins went through a dramatic change during release-WoD to Blackrock Foundry, one I don't think was for the better as it felt like a step backwards in class design purely based on knee-jerk balancing.

Change is what keeps the game alive, and it is intended that way. WoW's longevity is based on expansions and patches, therefor change is a necessity when designing new content and not something that should ever be discarded in favor of currently successful iterations of game elements. As a side note, this is where I feel Blizzard has always had major design flaws; learning from successful and unsuccessful elements - a very good example of this would be Warriors in the MoP to WoD transition. But to get back on point, change is the driving force of the game. Players don't necessarily re-learn classes from scratch when a new expansion is released (though it may feel so at times, certainly if you skip one or two expansions) but rather learn new elements to the class or unlearn previous ones in favor of new ones. The idea is that, once you've come very close to mastering a class in skill-appropriate content (so Heroic raiding if you're fairly casual, bleeding edge Mythic if you're hardcore, etc.), the game changes your class slightly by introducing new aspects or changing existing ones, forcing you to start mastering a new set of elements while also providing you with new content to do that in.

Change is going to happen, for better or for worse, and all of us accept that. The game has to bring new challenges to it, as the majority of players have long mastered the very basic tanking present during Wrath (for reference, I did not reach max level in TBC nor played in Vanilla, so I cannot comment on those). For tanking specifically, and for the other roles to varying degrees, the game has shifted from uptime-maintenance to time-windows. Good play constituted keeping 100% uptime on X during Wrath, and now good play constitutes making best use of the time-windows, limited resources to spend on active mitigation instead of pressing Judgment before buffs/debuffs fall off. Uptime-maintenance, especially 100% uptime-maintenance, has extremely limited interaction possibilities and a very low ceiling, while time-windows expand interaction possibilities much more. I feel like I've gone off on a tangent incredibly so I'll not dive into comparing the two, but ultimately time-windows allow the devs to create a lot more horizontal content for classes while also allowing for much higher ceilings of play. The danger is forcing players of the class to jump to that ceiling as it's the only way to successfully play the class in current content, when they don't want to.

You may think your way is "better" but you're not going to convince people that don't like active mitigation and resource juggling to like it based on "it makes it challenging". I chose to tank specifically because it's the easiest role. You can hate me for that, but that's not my problem.

I do think my (our) way is better; meaningful decision making and higher ceilings allow for more strategic and skill-based play, thereby challenging the player to constantly having to learn and improve to keep up with the pace of the game without leaving the more casual players behind by providing easier alternatives. Holy Shield and Seraphim are two great examples of this.

It may seem very hypocritical of me to write about change like this, but it's important to note that throughout my arguments I've always advocated that the game could and should cater to both sides of the coin, and that I am not opposed to change itself but rather to the specific changes. I want the game to change otherwise I will become bored and quit, however the design direction is in my opinion very flawed and is moving towards a participation-award state. It won't make me quit. It might make me quit the class; to be honest it kind of already has, as I'm not playing Paladin for the "feel" or "fantasy" or "loyalty," I'm playing it because I enjoy the resource management and making use of Seraphim and Harsh Words (RIP). I'm also a massive DPS whore. Come Legion I'll be playing all of the tanks except Guardian, and then picking whichever I find provides the highest challenge-to-result ratio. Meaning not the one that gets the highest numbers by pressing the least amount of buttons, which Paladin seems to be. I don't play WoW to play Paladin, I play WoW to kill dragons with a group of people. As PtS put it; I've always played WoW in particular for the teamwork aspect.

I only even bothered to start posting in this thread because there's not enough people happy with the changes defending them in the midst of all the buttmad circlejerk doomsaying.

Don't cop out now, o Dark Knight!

[Gephyrophobia]

Without diving more into ad hominem, you admitted to being satisfied with no change over the course of the game's life cycle. WoW is a game driven forward by patches and expansions that introduce change to already existing elements of the game, while introducing a few new ones (never more than what's already in the game, for example one or two races or a class per expansion). By doing so they prevent the game from stagnating as players naturally reach a point where they've mastered every current challenge of the game and keep players invested in their current class(es) by adding vertical class scaling rather than only horizontal, a conscious design philosophy in use by GW2. To break it down into layman's terms, a player starts by leveling up to 60, vertically learning the basics of the game and investing in a class. At level 60, they expand horizontally into different elements of the game but within the same power-level and class. Simply adding new content on top of this horizontal ceiling would keep players invested to a degree, but the developer would be reliant on ever-increasingly levels of difficulty in new content, resulting in a level of content that requires a massive time investment in learning obsolete content before being open to new or returning players, as well as ultimately reaching a point where everything has been done and the only way forward is to make pointlessly difficult content (think Dark Souls cranked up to 11 in WoW).

WoW uses a balance of both vertical and horizontal scaling, through vertical expansion in expansion sets and horizontal expansion in patches and content tiers. Instead of having the above example, what we have today is rather a "blank slate" of sorts when an expansion is reached and a constant cycle of change. No class you play will remain or feel the same between expansions, and tiers will in a way slightly (or dramatically) change how you play the class in current content. As an example, compare release-WoD Mistweaver Monks to Tier 18 Mistweavers in playstyle; certain elements remain but the use of 4-set and the levels of Spirit available to them changes how you'd go about playing them, and this is usually for the better. Usually; Protection Paladins went through a dramatic change during release-WoD to Blackrock Foundry, one I don't think was for the better as it felt like a step backwards in class design purely based on knee-jerk balancing.

Change is what keeps the game alive, and it is intended that way. WoW's longevity is based on expansions and patches, therefor change is a necessity when designing new content and not something that should ever be discarded in favor of currently successful iterations of game elements. As a side note, this is where I feel Blizzard has always had major design flaws; learning from successful and unsuccessful elements - a very good example of this would be Warriors in the MoP to WoD transition. But to get back on point, change is the driving force of the game. Players don't necessarily re-learn classes from scratch when a new expansion is released (though it may feel so at times, certainly if you skip one or two expansions) but rather learn new elements to the class or unlearn previous ones in favor of new ones. The idea is that, once you've come very close to mastering a class in skill-appropriate content (so Heroic raiding if you're fairly casual, bleeding edge Mythic if you're hardcore, etc.), the game changes your class slightly by introducing new aspects or changing existing ones, forcing you to start mastering a new set of elements while also providing you with new content to do that in.

This is why I would prefer all classes stay the same outside of number tweaking to keep them balanced as new content and level caps are reached, while devoting said dev time to "changing" our classes be put into new classes. If you like your class, you can stick with it. If you want a new flashy experience, there's a new class on the horizon for you.

Change is going to happen, for better or for worse, and all of us accept that. The game has to bring new challenges to it, as the majority of players have long mastered the very basic tanking present during Wrath (for reference, I did not reach max level in TBC nor played in Vanilla, so I cannot comment on those). For tanking specifically, and for the other roles to varying degrees, the game has shifted from uptime-maintenance to time-windows. Good play constituted keeping 100% uptime on X during Wrath, and now good play constitutes making best use of the time-windows, limited resources to spend on active mitigation instead of pressing Judgment before buffs/debuffs fall off. Uptime-maintenance, especially 100% uptime-maintenance, has extremely limited interaction possibilities and a very low ceiling, while time-windows expand interaction possibilities much more. I feel like I've gone off on a tangent incredibly so I'll not dive into comparing the two, but ultimately time-windows allow the devs to create a lot more horizontal content for classes while also allowing for much higher ceilings of play. The danger is forcing players of the class to jump to that ceiling as it's the only way to successfully play the class in current content, when they don't want to.



I do think my (our) way is better; meaningful decision making and higher ceilings allow for more strategic and skill-based play, thereby challenging the player to constantly having to learn and improve to keep up with the pace of the game without leaving the more casual players behind by providing easier alternatives. Holy Shield and Seraphim are two great examples of this.

It may seem very hypocritical of me to write about change like this, but it's important to note that throughout my arguments I've always advocated that the game could and should cater to both sides of the coin, and that I am not opposed to change itself but rather to the specific changes. I want the game to change otherwise I will become bored and quit, however the design direction is in my opinion very flawed and is moving towards a participation-award state. It won't make me quit. It might make me quit the class; to be honest it kind of already has, as I'm not playing Paladin for the "feel" or "fantasy" or "loyalty," I'm playing it because I enjoy the resource management and making use of Seraphim and Harsh Words (RIP). I'm also a massive DPS whore. Come Legion I'll be playing all of the tanks except Guardian, and then picking whichever I find provides the highest challenge-to-result ratio. Meaning not the one that gets the highest numbers by pressing the least amount of buttons, which Paladin seems to be. I don't play WoW to play Paladin, I play WoW to kill dragons with a group of people. As PtS put it; I've always played WoW in particular for the teamwork aspect.



Don't cop out now, o Dark Knight!

I don't see the need for classes to have decision making at all, I'd rather just smack the boss with a fun priority system and prove my "skill" by surmounting brutally difficult boss mechanics. Which wraps back around to my belief that wow's combat is shitty and old, so that's probably why I feel that way. Any "decision making" in spec gameplay is just a UI minigame to add "depth" to detract from the fact that our characters can hit the bosses hitboxes while standing nowhere near them and deal damage while auto attacking the air, and that hunters can be looking 90+ degrees away from their target and the bullets and arrows shoot sideways to hit the boss. Imagine if they overhauled the combat engine so that skills all needed to be aimed like DH's upcoming Eye Beam, and auto attacks weren't so automatic. The fact I can right click a mob and leave the room and still kill it is pathetic and trying to make that combat system more "advanced" by making you set up WeakAuras and shit so you can play properly is a load of malarkey.

We're on totally different wavelengths, friend.

[Melsiren]

LOL. This guy's logic is flawless. So if you were to play CS:GO , you'd complain that you ACTUALLY had to control your spray and not just instant headshot everything, am I right? Honestly why are you even posting here?

Because he's Blizzard's target audience..... Blizzard's target audience.

[arcuro]

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1 - AS
2 - BH
3 - J
4 - SotR
5 - LotP
N - Cons

so its completly the same with brewmaster. macro ISB to everything and whait for your CD.
Well at least you have LoH and blassings for a bit of Fun and "utility" whilse as BrM you have to run across the whole bossfight area to hope to get one fucking Goft of the Ox spawn.

hello fellow Protadins. i might join sad afk tanking mode with a feel of utility

[Dastuross]

Because he's Blizzard's target audience..... Blizzard's target audience.

Sad, but honestly true. I really hope blizz can atleast find a middle ground with this, just give us SOMETHING to actually do while we're tanking.