Pruning, remember when this game was so popular because it required skills.

[Thelin]

The game requires skill now. Skill does not come from a sheer number of abilities, it comes from careful positioning and using abilities at the right time.

false. This game requires very little skill. Not that Vanilla/TBC were that much more difficult, but you did not have add-ons at that time until later in BC, nor did you have in game mechanics to tell you when to move or when shit was casting. This game has been heavily pruned and watered down over the years. Hell you used to have complete sets of gear for resist fights, had to reach hit cap, stack the right class balance, right gear, right buffs, etc.

I still remember having to get every world/zone buff @ 60 to beat the kel'thuzad in NAXX. Not many guilds accomplished that due to the difficulty of NAXX at 60 and the fact that it was introduced so late.

[burlap]

It's super cute when people bitch about the pruning because it's literally not a thing.

- - - Updated - - -

false. This game requires very little skill. Not that Vanilla/TBC were that much more difficult, but you did not have add-ons at that time until later in BC, nor did you have in game mechanics to tell you when to move or when shit was casting. This game has been heavily pruned and watered down over the years. Hell you used to have complete sets of gear for resist fights, had to reach hit cap, stack the right class balance, right gear, right buffs, etc.

I still remember having to get every world/zone buff @ 60 to beat the kel'thuzad in NAXX. Not many guilds accomplished that due to the difficulty of NAXX at 60 and the fact that it was introduced so late.

You're confusing difficulty with tediousness.

[Thelin]

It's super cute when people bitch about the pruning because it's literally not a thing.

- - - Updated - - -



You're confusing difficulty with tediousness.

I never said those were difficult, I was just explaining different things they've moved away from. This game has never been and will never be difficult. Certainly not with Macro's and add-ons that manage your cooldowns so you get the perfect cast off. I also never complained about "pruning"/whatever you wanna call them removing talents/skills/specs/whatever, its unavoidable with a game that's this old.

However Naxx at 60 was actually in fact a difficult instance.

[Turaska]

Do you really attribute WoW's popularity to skills? how incredibly dim. WoW was popular at those time periods because of the content, not because of how many buttons you had to press.

[Nnyco]

haha 5button rotation instead of 4 is more skilled? luls

[Nhiosis]

Hunters literally had a 1-click macro for playing. Warlocks were spam shadowbolt.

Feral was complex, but not even near as complex as it was in Cata/MoP/WoD.

You have no idea what you're talking about.

Not talking PVE. We all know that's never been complex rotation wise

Read everything I said next time

[Deleted]

Me neither.

I decided it was time to deliver the truth about this game to all the god damn WoD and MoP babies already.




Look at this Graph carefully first. As you can see WOW was at its most popular during Wrath of the lich king. Now lets see about that huge amount of skills that brought all those nerds to the yards.

http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=105151

http://www.warcraftmovies.com/movieview.php?id=121407

So yeah, go pruning go.

Yeah, pruning. People can't press 5 buttons correctly, much less 10. Lets cry more over things that happened years ago and had no effect.

[Synadrasa]

Multiple gladiator (S1 to S-last-Season-of-Cata) and triple rank 1 (S3, S7, S8) gladiator on multiple chars here. If you do not recognise, that there are a ton of abilities gone you better call jesus to give you back your eyesight.

Just an extract:
WotLK as Restoration-Druid:

Abilities
Rejuv - still here
Regrowth - still here
Lifebloom - still there
Healing Touch - still there
Entangling roots - still there
Remove Curse - gone/merged into one button
Remove Poison - gone/merged into one button
Abolish Poison - gone
Hibernate - gone
Nature's Grasp - gone/automatically cast on Ironbark
Faerie Fire - gone
Hurricane - gone
Bash - now talent
Maim - gone
Tiger's Fury - gone
Pounce - gone
Ravage - gone
Rake - gone
Shred - gone/changed to mangle
Lacerate - gone
Feral Charge (was talent) - now Talent with others
Demoralizing Shout - gone
Enrage - gone
Taunt - gone

A minus of about 15 abilities.

And for talents (that affected gameplay a lot)
Dispel-Protection - gone
OOC (was talent) - now baseline
NS (was talent) - now baseline
Swiftmend (was talent) - now baseline
Living Seed (was talent) - now baseline
Revitalize (was talent) - gone
Tree of Life (was talent) - now talent/revamped
Wild Growth (was talent) - now baseline
Insect Swarm (was talent) - gone
Nature's Grace - gone

Weapon-Switch (e.g. switching for spirit-staff with less spellpower) - gone
Bandaging - gone/worthless? (not sure about this one, haven't touched arens in WoD)

And what did we get? Ursol's Vortex, a ress, Efflorescence, Ironbark and Affinities that give back (some) abilities taken before.

So just looking at the (Restoration)Druid there is a huge difference in amount of abilities. So if you watch a good video from for example Sonny, a druid that utilised nearly the whole toolkit available, you can't not see the difference.
Sure, the overall skill and awareness of people doing pvp has increased a lot (for example fake-casting was only used by higher rated players whereas you see fake-casting on 1800ish teams from cata on) but the toolkit as well as the skill-cap has decreased substantially.



Exactly. In PvE there have always been multiple specs for different setups and modes (2v2, 3v3, 5v5) and no single one was "the best".#

/edit: Just realised that I compared with BC instead of WOTLK, so another factor are multiple ranks of spell iirc and some other shit

Did you really make this post? Literally half those abilities are feral spells which you can still pick up from feral affinity like shred, rake, rip, ferocious bite, swipe and +15% movement speed. You're really complaining about taunt as a resto druid in pvp? And insect swarm? Which was made into sunfire which is baseline? When you mention the pruned abilities you have to mention the abilities they were replaced with or you come off as a bit disingenuous. Where is the ursol's vortex that is baseline now? Or Flourish? How about the fucking displacer beast? I don't remember resto druids with a fucking blink. And btw revitalize is a pvp talent or did you forget to look at the new honor talents as well? With pvp talents there is definitely more impactful abilities than in wotlk.

[lopus]

WotLK of the memories of AoE fest and sergs ... best time to be a casual, I dont like pruning, i miss when as a hunter i could control my pet and scout ahead , or warlocks abilities to detect demons and see invisible things (mages) etc.. but not sure that was the only reason for the decline.

[Gorgodeus]

false. This game requires very little skill. Not that Vanilla/TBC were that much more difficult, but you did not have add-ons at that time until later in BC, nor did you have in game mechanics to tell you when to move or when shit was casting. This game has been heavily pruned and watered down over the years. Hell you used to have complete sets of gear for resist fights, had to reach hit cap, stack the right class balance, right gear, right buffs, etc.

I still remember having to get every world/zone buff @ 60 to beat the kel'thuzad in NAXX. Not many guilds accomplished that due to the difficulty of NAXX at 60 and the fact that it was introduced so late.

In Vanilla, we had dmg meters, threat meters, Decursive, and boss mod add-ons, so no, they did not come "later in BC". Naxx 40 was not hard at all. It was simply a long arduous grind to get the resist gear.

[minteK917]

So many MoP babies lol.

[Ravnac]

Did you really make this post? Literally half those abilities are feral spells which you can still pick up from feral affinity like shred, rake, rip, ferocious bite, swipe and +15% movement speed. You're really complaining about taunt as a resto druid in pvp? And insect swarm? Which was made into sunfire which is baseline? When you mention the pruned abilities you have to mention the abilities they were replaced with or you come off as a bit disingenuous. Where is the ursol's vortex that is baseline now? Or Flourish? How about the fucking displacer beast? I don't remember resto druids with a fucking blink. And btw revitalize is a pvp talent or did you forget to look at the new honor talents as well? With pvp talents there is definitely more impactful abilities than in wotlk.

My last paragraph covers nearly all of your remarks (Vortex, Flourish you don't take in PvP, Displacer is kind of a replacement to Feral Charge; Charge could interrupt, displacer can be used without a target so it's hard to say what's better). I mentioned the affinities giving back some of the lost utility.
Taunt was important in PvP because you could taunt pets before getting hit by traps to break them.
Sunfire <=> Insect Swarm I must have forgotten, my bad.
The Revitalize from PvP-Tree had nothing to do with the one from WotlK/BC. The BC one had a chance to get the target of the Rejuv Energy/Mana so hotting people at 100 % did give you a DPS gain - something you had to consider because mana was much more limited than in 5.x and 6.x. And if you look at the honor talents you see that except for Cyclone (iconic to druid pvp, you have to spec it now), Thorns (was baseline, talent now) and Overgrowth everything is passive and except from maybe HoT-ing low health pets to get a haste buff I can barely see anything that's soo impactful.

However Naxx at 60 was actually in fact a difficult instance.

It was not. I raided competitive in Naxx that time (German 2nd or sth we had on Kel'Thuzad) with a whole bunch of keyboard turners in the raid. The only hard thing was going ham on consumeables and world buffs if you felt you could do the kill. The whole raiding back then was atrocious. Like the almost "requirement" of SIX TO EIGHT FUCKING WARRIORS with 4pc-Tier-3 to not have your taunts miss on Horsemen.

Do you really attribute WoW's popularity to skills? how incredibly dim. WoW was popular at those time periods because of the content, not because of how many buttons you had to press.

That's the exact point. The game was not harder back then, not better back then, it was just more popular. Don't fucking ever listen to anything Kungen says again.

[Knolan]

^ P. much this.

It was especially bad with hybrids.

"Hmm, I'm a feral druid; I think I'll stay caster form and spam wrath for dps!"

While I miss feral / enhancement being great healers at <lvl60 5-mans, I can't help but agree with that most classes became better off with this more focused specialization.

MoP Heart of the Wild at the start of the expansion, use it then spam wrath in caster form... it was actually the best tactic =p

I will say that I hate the pruning with all my strength, I loved the times I had to shapeshift to bash / interrupt with charge, it felt like a druid. I also had a LOT of fun playing random BGs during MoP, I had a lot of skills to use in several situations.

Need to run away? nature's grasp.
Facing hunter, roots + hybernate on the pet to reduce damage.
Stunned? barkskin.
Low life? Bear form + ursoc.
Other emergencies? Symb ability or HotW and become a God healer.

Now if I am in a bg facing, say, a warlock, and a rogue comes out of stealth and stuns me, I am dead if i don't have a trinket.

This is the main reason I stopped playing.

[Pull My Finger]

Only people who have absolutely no clue base "complexity" on the number of skills on the action bar.

Most of the new specs have some kind of interesting additional mechanic and some type of little "inside game" built into them that make the playstyles pretty involving and interesting. If you're an idiot who just pushes buttons when they're off CD, it might seem simple or "dumbed down" to you, but because you're the "dumb" factor in the equation. There might be fewer colorful icons on your bar, but there's more thinking, planning and adapting. I can see how people who like to look at pictures, but have an aversion to mental activity would feel that the new specs are missing something.

Blizzard has done a great job with the redesigns. Most of the stuff is just about in the right spot between fluidity, design elegance and fast pacing, but with enough depth to keep it variable, interesting and provide a certain range for optimization that separates an OK player from a really knowledgeable one.

[cherryblak]

sorry to burst the bubble.. but this isn't a "skill" game at all... well, outside of high end arena - i'll pay that. it's about learning/knowledge of systems, encounters, mechanics.. so call that "skill" if you like, but really it's not. Quake champions, Tekken, Streetfighter.. skill games. Still WoW is an awesome fun game though - and whatever everyone crys about at the end of the day it's the best iteration it's ever had, disagree ? go setup and play your own vanilla server.. see how many people join you vs live ?

[Saberstrike]

MoP Heart of the Wild at the start of the expansion, use it then spam wrath in caster form... it was actually the best tactic =p

I will say that I hate the pruning with all my strength, I loved the times I had to shapeshift to bash / interrupt with charge, it felt like a druid. I also had a LOT of fun playing random BGs during MoP, I had a lot of skills to use in several situations.

Need to run away? nature's grasp.
Facing hunter, roots + hybernate on the pet to reduce damage.
Stunned? barkskin.
Low life? Bear form + ursoc.
Other emergencies? Symb ability or HotW and become a God healer.

Now if I am in a bg facing, say, a warlock, and a rogue comes out of stealth and stuns me, I am dead if i don't have a trinket.

This is the main reason I stopped playing.

So you stopped playing when you stopped being a god class that can do everything.

See, this is exactly why pruning happened in the first place. Everyone had an answer for everything and the game has devolved into 'which class has just a bit more numbers'. In an ideal world each class will have something special they do that no one else can, meaning every class is viable and different.

The problem is... Well. Druids. Their class fantasy is being good at everything, which just does not fit into a game where each class is meant to be good at one thing and bad at others. I foresee druids being overpowered for the entirety of this expansion, as well -- because god forbid resto isn't top dog for more than a week.

If anything, druids require more pruning. Particularly removal of bear form / root shifting to help them get on with the times where they aren't allowed to have four viable tank healing dps specs.

[Deleted]

I remember the skill you needed in BC for all the classes

Holy Paladin: Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light,....
Elemental Shaman: Chain Lightning, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt,Chain Lightning, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt,
Warlock: Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt,Shadow Bolt,

Oh YEAH THAT SKILL YOU NEEDED HOLY FUCK

Get rid of your shitty nostalgia, really.

[Synadrasa]

My last paragraph covers nearly all of your remarks (Vortex, Flourish you don't take in PvP, Displacer is kind of a replacement to Feral Charge; Charge could interrupt, displacer can be used without a target so it's hard to say what's better). I mentioned the affinities giving back some of the lost utility.
Taunt was important in PvP because you could taunt pets before getting hit by traps to break them.
Sunfire <=> Insect Swarm I must have forgotten, my bad.
The Revitalize from PvP-Tree had nothing to do with the one from WotlK/BC. The BC one had a chance to get the target of the Rejuv Energy/Mana so hotting people at 100 % did give you a DPS gain - something you had to consider because mana was much more limited than in 5.x and 6.x. And if you look at the honor talents you see that except for Cyclone (iconic to druid pvp, you have to spec it now), Thorns (was baseline, talent now) and Overgrowth everything is passive and except from maybe HoT-ing low health pets to get a haste buff I can barely see anything that's soo impactful.



It was not. I raided competitive in Naxx that time (German 2nd or sth we had on Kel'Thuzad) with a whole bunch of keyboard turners in the raid. The only hard thing was going ham on consumeables and world buffs if you felt you could do the kill. The whole raiding back then was atrocious. Like the almost "requirement" of SIX TO EIGHT FUCKING WARRIORS with 4pc-Tier-3 to not have your taunts miss on Horsemen.

Having a root that doesn't break from damage is not impactful? Heals removing snares? Casting entangling roots on a melee to reduce their dmg by 25%? How about getting free rejuvenations in bear form while healing for 50% of the dmg you took in the last 5 sec through frenzied regen while stacking ironfur? I don't remember that being possible in wrath. And btw taunt is baseline for resto anyways.

I mean I could list 10 spells that never existed in wrath, it's not that hard. All you are doing is proving the game has change not that the game was pruned and it's less complex.

[minteK917]

I remember the skill you needed in BC for all the classes

Holy Paladin: Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light, Flash Light,....
Elemental Shaman: Chain Lightning, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt,Chain Lightning, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt, Lightning Bolt,
Warlock: Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt, Shadow Bolt,Shadow Bolt,

Oh YEAH THAT SKILL YOU NEEDED HOLY FUCK

Get rid of your shitty nostalgia, really.

I hope this is not pointed toward the OP....

[bloodmoth13]

The game requires skill now. Skill does not come from a sheer number of abilities, it comes from careful positioning and using abilities at the right time.

Yeah this.

Fighting games require a ton of skill to execute, most only have 4 buttons, but its the combinations that require skill, not the number of buttons. If you need to add more buttons to make the gameplay more challenging then your not a very imaginative designer.
Heck some of the best games had minimum buttons, many old platformers would just have movement, a jump button and 1 shoot button, they could still be very challenging due to the design of the game instead of the input, skill came from interaction with enemies, not mere clunky controls.
The way i see it is would solving a rubix cube everytime you want to reload improve a shooting game? it would make the game more challenging but that input has nothing to do with the interplay between you and your opponent and only serves to artificially complicate the game and inflate its barrier of entry without adding depth.

I do think that the game can go too far, was it MoP or WoD arms that sucked? anywho i think MINIMUM each spec needs 1 aoe button and 3 rotational buttons, with talents to add to the rotation up to a max 6 rotational buttons and 3 aoe, anything more than that and you are stuffing the action bars for no reason and its just awkward to fit them onto your castbar.

Hell the fact that most high level players overwrite basic move keys to fit their abilities onto reasonable keybinds i think is proof enough that the number of abilities was getting out of hand, I got around this by binding my 6 rotational buttons to my left and right mouseclick, aoe onto mousewheeldown, defensive on R/F and utility/CDs on 1-4, couldnt imagine how other players cope without doing what i do. having to move your hand across your keyboard is probably the worst feeling ever.

Abilities that essentially serve the same function ought to be merged, having 5 defensive CDs that you rotate every 30 s is awful, may as well have 1 ability on a 30s CD providing that they all gave the same bonus, or one BIG CD and 1 small CD. Or the infamous 3 charge warrior that anyone with a brain macrod into a single ability, charge, intercept and intervene. Merging those abilities didnt lower the skillcap, it only lowered the skillfloor and removed the discrepency between those who macro and those who dont.

Having 5 dps abilities that function the exact same, say 2s cast time spells with no variance ought to be merged, having abilities with unique input styles and timing however should be encouraged. Procs, short CDs, builders, spenders and DoTs, instant, channeled, cast time are all unique, having 2 at most of any given 2 is fine, but i think when you have 3 of a type you are getting into prune this shit territory