Celestalon seeks advice on class balance

[Roar-Powah]

There are a lot easier ways to balance classes, typical Blizzard thinking that they know best and not listening to feedback, you reap what you sow. How do these devs have a job still i don't understand, how about hire dedicated devs per class as they would solve a lot of issues. How about stop using fucking Twitter to communicate with the player base as it's very hard to get the desired meaning in a tiny message. How the hell are you meant to have a discussion at 160? characters at a time. If the ceo of Blizzard had some balls this game wouldn't be in the shape it is, being nice only gets you so far in life.

[Deleted]

Thank to god, players have no voice in dev decision, otherwise this game would have been worse.

[Roar-Powah]

Thank to god, players have no voice in dev decision, otherwise this game would have been worse.

I think the game would've been in better shape that what it is now, at least we wouldn't have classes that feel like they belong in a moba with how little buttons you need to play them now.

[Foj]

In my experience, people who don't understand selection bias ... don't understand selection bias. Nor are they likely to in the future, until it works against them.

The point Celestalon is making is that when the best players are able to select the "best" class/spec/talent/whatever, the data that comes from the other "garbage" classes/specs/talents/whatevers is corrupted because the representation of skill is affected by the very thing people are trying to measure. The underperforming options underperform even more, statistically, because the better players have abandoned them. They abandon them so quickly, in the day of the meta, that they might well have overlooked alternate play styles that are less obvious but still competitive. Basically, you are optimal, or garbage, and there is no room to experiment or do what you would actually prefer to do.

Basically, most things that are garbage in WoW are garbage because they're a tiny bit worse, not because they are hugely worse.

And more to the point, if you were to 30% buff a spec that was underperforming by 30%, you would actually be 30% buffing a spec that was underperforming by 15%, and by doing that you would have turned the other two specs to garbage.

[schwarzkopf]

My advice:
1. Ignore requests from the community
2. Look at your internal logs, check out how many people are using a class, how well different spells are doing and how often people are using different abilities.
3. Look at the exceptions, those classes/specs/abillities that are over represented, or underrepresented.
4. Work out WHY...

You will know your system is balanced when classes/specs and abilities are all used within a couple of standard deviations of each other.

You will never know your system is balanced when people stop complaining - because the universe will have died a heat death long before that day.

[Epoch]

There are a lot easier ways to balance classes, typical Blizzard thinking that they know best and not listening to feedback, you reap what you sow.

The above isn't new, it has been going on for years. Even though it isn't as bad as it was in the days of kalgan and his warrior bias. This unfortunately happens when people with giant undeserved egos get put in a position of power.

How do these devs have a job still i don't understand, how about hire dedicated devs per class as they would solve a lot of issues.

When activision took over, it became "what can we do for the most $$?" Such as will happen when any corporation gets involved. Want your class / spec fixed even though their is sufficient proof that it's under performing? Not happening, we are instead going to keep buffing certain classes which we favor. Want an answer on why certain specs made for aoe outdps specs designed for st on single target fights? We are putting in mobile auction house, pet battles and different colored appearances!!!!!!

Devs that got hired have a contract for a set amount of time, and unless they royally screw something up which digs into the profits of blizzard activision, or they quit, they won't be going anywhere. Or if they talk about a certain green fire.

They wouldn't even have to hire devs per class, although that would be a good idea since they are attempting to balance (screw up) classes / specs which they themselves have never played. All they have to do is hop in discord and converse with theorycrafters for each class / spec. Said theorycrafters have been doing their jobs for years anyways. Certain devs obviously have enough free time to post on social media.

How about stop using fucking Twitter to communicate with the player base as it's very hard to get the desired meaning in a tiny message. How the hell are you meant to have a discussion at 160? characters at a time. If the ceo of Blizzard had some balls this game wouldn't be in the shape it is, being nice only gets you so far in life.

Twitter is no different then the forums when you consider the fact that devs on twitter reply to what they want to and ignore what they don't want to talk about (usually the more popular things they will reply to, unless a certain class spams social media and wow forums until devs notice they screwed up something.) Other then having less characters to respond in, posting on Twitter gives the illusion that they care enough to converse with their playerbase which results in free pr.

You're assuming their is 1 person at the head of the company, there may be. More than likely, with any corporation their is a board of directors. When you have a board of directors all they care about is making more $. The only time blizzard cares about its playerbase is when their is enough of an outcry (social media spam / bad pr) which they can't ignore.

[Deleted]

I think the game would've been in better shape that what it is now, at least we wouldn't have classes that feel like they belong in a moba with how little buttons you need to play them now.

Sure because in previous expansion there were so much buttons and so much rotation

Vanilla and Tbc shadowbolt spam or frostbolt spam


Wow very much complicated

[Deleted]

First of all buy a keyboard and a mouse, put the tablet away. Most of us play with a keyboard and mouse, you should too.

[jayinjersey]

you seem to be shitting on his scenario when you arnt even reading it



the dps is FOR REAL 100 80 70
but because all the good players go to the first (since its better) it LOOKS LIKE
its 100 70 50

so if they buff 70+ 30 and 50+ 50 to make all three 100, but then the players go back to all 3
then people go back it will be 100 110 and 120
then its even more fucked up, everyone goes to 120 and then it becomes

70 90 120

then how do you balance?

Oh I read it...and I'm shitting on it cause it is, to quote Marisa Tormei in My Cousin Vinny, a "Bullshit Question"


It doesn't matter what all the best players play for anything other than perspective, in his example the 100 70 50...but they should never balance based on whatever sim they use (which they have always said is better than ours) and if those numbers come to 100 80 70 you fix the other two.

If then the good players switch to the other spec, they should never be able to get past that 100.
If they do get it past 100, the sim used to come up with the 100 number needs to be looked at.


Again...it is never this simple and it is still a Bullshit Question

[stigz]

First players ask the Devs to communicate more. And when they do, and try to explain the actual development process, they get called whiners. No wonder they don't want to communicate and do stuff their own way.



Good to hear that you know how everything works.

Jesus. I bet you'd defend them even if they banned you for pressing spacebar too many times.

"They're right. My jump spams could have caused someone a seizure."