Bring the player, not the class

[mage21]

According to the Q&A, this is one of the Blizzard team's messages: "The team wants you to look at your raid composition and be happy that there is a certain class there".

Is this a reversal of their "Bring the player, not the class" philosophy? How do people feel about that?

[Lady Dragonheart]

Appreciation =/= requirement.

It's like Brez, it's awesome, and it great to have one in the group, but several classes can do it, not just one.

[Sluvs]

According to the Q&A, this is one of the Blizzard team's messages: "The team wants you to look at your raid composition and be happy that there is a certain class there".

Is this a reversal of their "Bring the player, not the class" philosophy? How do people feel about that?

Hear the Q&A, they address exactly this point.

[Deleted]

Is this a reversal of their "Bring the player, not the class" philosophy? How do people feel about that?

Yes, it is. I don't care. It's not something entirely new if you've paid any attention to the game since that statement was made.

[Teri]

The whole buff matrix for Wotlk/Cata/Pandaria 10 mans was crazy :P

[Xtrm]

I assume you didn't watch the Q&A because they addressed this around the exact same time they were talking about raid composition. They said the "bring the player, not the class" mentality was taken too far and was started back in TBC due to class requirements for certain bosses. They'd rather have you take a slightly less ilvl Warlock than a high ilvl fourth Hunter.

[mage21]

I assume you didn't watch the Q&A because they addressed this around the exact same time they were talking about raid composition. They said the "bring the player, not the class" mentality was taken too far and was started back in TBC due to class requirements for certain bosses. They'd rather have you take a slightly less ilvl Warlock than a high ilvl fourth Hunter.

No I didn't. This is great additional info.

Edit: looks like this info has been added to the front page.

[Wingspan]

I assume you didn't watch the Q&A because they addressed this around the exact same time they were talking about raid composition. They said the "bring the player, not the class" mentality was taken too far and was started back in TBC due to class requirements for certain bosses. They'd rather have you take a slightly less ilvl Warlock than a high ilvl fourth Hunter.

I read that quote and it seems to be missing the forest for the trees.

If you are bringing a 4th Hunter, then you are obviously already bringing the class... So making you give up a Hunter and take a Warlock instead is only for one reason (so they can balance classes crappier and still make you take crappy classes with you).

This is not to mention that part of the drive behind the original concept was being able to play with friends, which will not work so well if that 4th Hunter is a friend but the Warlock is just someone you need.

Regardless of all that, with what I have heard about the shrinking high-end raiding pool of players, should they really be going back to a system that might require very specific characters in specific specs?

[MoanaLisa]

"Bring the player, not the class" was their nod to "Get Better if you want to do everything".

That's over.

The homogenization of classes that went along with it was disastrous for the game and they've been trying to unwind it ever since Street left.

I get it that they thought for a long time that people would enjoy the game more if they had incentives to play better but that was little but ham-handed social engineering that went directly counter to why the game was created in the first place: easy to play, hard to master, a game that millions can play successfully, a casual alternative to the other MMO's of the time.

Good riddance.

[albionesp]

This game is not about bringing the player at the moment. Its about bringing the op class with the BiS legendaries. Thats all, a blind can see that.

[Silver Forte]

I know some people think if a class is undertuned or whatever for the current patch, they don't want it in their raids or mythics. My guild's second-in-command just told someone in our discord not to make a demon hunter, but to make a hunter, because we need ranged. He said he wanted to play a hunter and she told him in sincerity that he couldn't until we at least get one more ranged.

[Talvindius]

It's pretty dumb to stack classes that fill a similar role, that was the point they made in the Q&A.

Bringing 14 warlocks, 2 bear tanks and 4 resto druids to a mythic raid sounds ridiculous regardless of how good the players are.

That's the situation Blizz doesn't want.

[Marrilaife]

The problem isn't "some classes bring some utility you might want", the problem is the whole debate kinda started from the fact people are using boomkins / resto druids to innervate-feed disc priests and mw monks because they're non-viable outside of innervate feed, so instead of fixing priests and monk healers (while they're already much less popular than druid / shaman / paladin healer comp), they're like "oh we want you to appreciate Todd the boomkin".

This is as bad as aspect of the fox. Utility is fine, fox / innervate isn't because it distorts the whole group dynamic. Fox was affecting the ranged dps bucket, innervate is affecting healer setup. It was fine when boomkins brought stampeding roar, but they wanted ferals to be more unique? Guess what ferals are still not wanted because of prevalence of guardian tanks who bring stampeding roar anyway and because there are so many other melee classes that are better than ferals (utility shouldn't mean your dps kit suffers).

Do I mind dps warriors bring commanding shout and warlocks bring gateway? Nope, this doesn't affect how viable / nonviable are other classes. I do mind innervate if it means mw monks / disc priests are reliant on innervate and weak when they can't get it.

[Kantoro]

Bring the player with the correct Legendaries, not the <whatever else there is>.

[Bugg]

It's pretty dumb to stack classes that fill a similar role, that was the point they made in the Q&A.

Bringing 14 warlocks, 2 bear tanks and 4 resto druids to a mythic raid sounds ridiculous regardless of how good the players are.

That's the situation Blizz doesn't want.

Really?
And you know this based on... their actions OR words?

[callipygoustp]

According to the Q&A, this is one of the Blizzard team's messages: "The team wants you to look at your raid composition and be happy that there is a certain class there".

Is this a reversal of their "Bring the player, not the class" philosophy? How do people feel about that?

Good! Now if they would stop trying to balance pvp they'd be in really good shape.

[Alvito]

Bring the artifact wpn and legendary items.

[Spiral Mage]

Of course they want every class to feel valuable and meaningful.
That doesn't contradict: Bring the player, not the class.
It can just mean if you play X class, your raid should still feel good about bringing you.
Both for your playing and your class choice.
There's nothing wrong with wanting it to be both.

[Talvindius]

Really?
And you know this based on... their actions OR words?

You clearly didn't watch the video, they did address it.

But it's OK you don't have to watch something to comment foolishly on it.

[Bugg]

Words are cheap. Bye.