Brian Holinka Leaving World of Warcraft Team

[Torais]

One of the devs that was truly sluggish and dragged his feet to do his job. Quite sad to watch it happen over six + months of alpha testing.

Indeed. I will not pretend to say I know what goes on inside the mind of the man but he always came off as someone that had no real passion for the position he ended up in. There was little drive or will to innovate and the few creative surges the team did display under his leadership often ended in failure (Again, Ashran being the best example) with a complete disregard to any feedback until the damage had long been done, if at all.

Holinka seemed to have little respect for PvP in WoW and even less for the PvP community as a whole. His entire time as leader looked like he knew the exact bear minimum his team needed to achieve to keep the powers that be satisfied and never really drive those under him to push any further. He never really engaged with the community and the few interactions he did manage seemed highly forced to say the least.

In all honesty, I hope whatever role Blizzard have "promoted" him to is one he finds some actual interest in. I think it would be better for him, Blizzard and the player community that the reins of leadership are passed over to someone who actually gives a damn about the ship he is captaining.

- - - Updated - - -

O my god, i logged today and PvP is fucking better! All classes are well balanced, the tuning of CC is fantastic.... everything have a great peace both in bg and arena. And what do you think about the 10 new battleground... O my god i never had so much fun in my WoW life... Now i can both enjoy my ranged and melee classes the same... And let's not talk about the new PvP set and the extra equip you get from Rated BG and top tier Arena, so wonderful...................

Oh what do you say? Nothing changed? But but the one and only evil master Holinka is moved, now everything shuold be magically ok?

Don't be dense. With the rate the wheels turn within Blizzard (read: very, VERY slowly), any change of leadership will not be noticeable for months. It may not even be until next expansion we see any tangible changes (assuming there is one) even if the new leader is more up to the task than Holinka was.

[Mafic]

The point of the template system was to hit the ground running and make tweaks without waiting for PVE tuning which happens the last month before launch of an expansion. But Holinka chose to wait till pre patch to mine the live servers for data to make tuning changes and then when the expansion launched.

Had Holinka started template tuning six months earlier PVP in Legion would have been more reasonable.

Holinka's goal to cater to PVE players to do more PVP backfired.

[Ateo]

Very well said.

A leader is ALWAYS responsible for the actions of his team, for good or ill. As the Lead Developer for PvP, leadership was his very role on the PvP team. As a result we have one of two scenarios; 1) Either he was fully aware of the negative impact on many of his team's actions during his time in the position (Ashran, anyone?) and signed off on them anyway making him arrogant and seeing the feedback of the player base beneath him. 2) Or he failed to manage his team properly and was not fully aware of the problems and badwill among the PvP they were causing meaning he was an inept and/or a weak leader.

You can pick which scenario you think took place but it really matters little because the end result is still the same. Personally, I found him egotistical and amazingly unhelpful with his dealings with the PvP community but I am far more interested in labours of the PvP team. Or in the case of the last few expansions, the near utter lack of them.

Whatever you think of Holinka though, the fact remains that this whole "one person is not responsible for what happens" bit that Blizzard has spouted and lapped up by countless fan-drones is complete and utter BS. As the leader of a team, he is at least partially responsible for EVERYTHING that comes out of that team. I dare anyone to name any real industry in the workplace where this does not hold true. You simply cannot be a leader while at the same time not be held accountable for the results of your team.

Amen, finally someone with a brain!

[Schattenlied]

What cash cow dude? Overwatch and Hearthstone are the big dogs now. I wouldn't be surprised if HoTs makes more money than WoW too. WoW is a dying game with a huge staff, and hasn't been their main source of income for a while now.

Overweatch only makes sales from base game sales and the couple of people who actually buy crates, hearthstone, sure, they sell card packs, whatever... If WoW even only has 1 million subs (and we both know it's more than that), it's still raking in $180,000,000 per year baseline, plus expansion sales, plus faction/server transfers/namechanges/chash shop pets&mounts/lvl 100 boosts...

If you think either OW or HS are taking in more money than WoW you are out of your mind.

[Ulfric Trumpcloak]

Overweatch only makes sales from base game sales and the couple of people who actually buy crates, hearthstone, sure, they sell card packs, whatever... If WoW even only has 1 million subs (and we both know it's more than that), it's still raking in $180,000,000 per year baseline, plus expansion sales, plus faction/server transfers/namechanges/chash shop pets&mounts/lvl 100 boosts...

If you think either OW or HS are taking in more money than WoW you are out of your mind.

Don't post nonsense man, just look up the numbers. I'm sure you know how to use google. Overwatch was over 1b in revenue, after just one year...

[makketota]

Pfffhahahahahahahaha. Oh man, that's worth the laugh of a lifetime. Thanks guy, you deliver pure gold.

Ion is amazing.

[Schattenlied]

Don't post nonsense man, just look up the numbers. I'm sure you know how to use google. Overwatch was over 1b in revenue, after just one year...

Yes, that includes base game sales, base game sales are the vast majority of that... After those, it's not bringing in much else, WoW is a steady stream of high income.

[Ulfric Trumpcloak]

Yes, that includes base game sales, base game sales are the vast majority of that... After those, it's not bringing in much else, WoW is a steady stream of high income.

Overwatch made significantly more money than wow. I'm done with this discussion.

[Schattenlied]

Overwatch made significantly more money than wow. I'm done with this discussion.

Once again, from base game sales in it's first year of existence, which means pretty much everyone who wants a copy has one by now, and after those sales what has it got for revenue? Crates? Yeah, because tons of people buy those right? I'm sure OW will totally still outpace WoW in revenue without the base copy selling craze to keep it afloat.

Who is posting nonsense now?

[grettin]

Once again, from base game sales in it's first year of existence, after those sales what has it got for revenue? Crates? Yeah, because tons of people buy those right? I'm sure OW will totally still outpace WoW in revenue without the base copy selling craze to keep it afloat.

Who is posting nonsense now?

I know at least two people irl who buy 50 quids worth of crates every event. You underestimate the stupidity(gullibility?) of console gamers.

[Schattenlied]

I know at least two people irl who buy 50 quids worth of crates every event. You underestimate the stupidity(gullibility?) of console gamers.

meanwhile I know absolutely no one who buys crates, despite knowing a good many people who play OW... It's like in game credits in any free to play game, there is a very small number of the population, the whales, that buy a lot of them, and the vast majority of the game's players buy nothing at all.

[Deleted]

Very well said.

A leader is ALWAYS responsible for the actions of his team, for good or ill. As the Lead Developer for PvP, leadership was his very role on the PvP team. As a result we have one of two scenarios; 1) Either he was fully aware of the negative impact on many of his team's actions during his time in the position (Ashran, anyone?) and signed off on them anyway making him arrogant and seeing the feedback of the player base beneath him. 2) Or he failed to manage his team properly and was not fully aware of the problems and badwill among the PvP they were causing meaning he was an inept and/or a weak leader.

You can pick which scenario you think took place but it really matters little because the end result is still the same. Personally, I found him egotistical and amazingly unhelpful with his dealings with the PvP community but I am far more interested in labours of the PvP team. Or in the case of the last few expansions, the near utter lack of them.

Whatever you think of Holinka though, the fact remains that this whole "one person is not responsible for what happens" bit that Blizzard has spouted and lapped up by countless fan-drones is complete and utter BS. As the leader of a team, he is at least partially responsible for EVERYTHING that comes out of that team. I dare anyone to name any real industry in the workplace where this does not hold true. You simply cannot be a leader while at the same time not be held accountable for the results of your team.

I agree, but in the end, it's a video game. A very very succesfull videogame. A videogame still running and making a lot of money since 2004.

Again i totally agree that a Leader takes responsability of his team. Heck, it's a leader (and takes a lot of money) for a reason.

But whishing death? Someone literally wrote that he will shit on his grave? Really he did something to deserve this hate?

[Deleted]

Lets see what game he fucks next.

[Deleted]

Wait, why are BGs ruined by taking gear out of the equation? I thought that was what everyone wanted? Fair, skill-based PvP?

Well as a RPG player, I hate action based "skill" stuff. It should be about planning, strategy, designing your character, not button smashing.

[Glaziola]

Im happy for Holinka, good for him. I hope he continues to work hard for what he is passionate. Im also looking forward where the Wow dev team will take us in the upcoming content.

[Deleted]

can't blame him, the level of abuse he gets for pvp issues rooted in shitty spreadsheet raiding focused class design that he has absolutely nothing to do with would make anyone want to leave

Brilliantly worded. I don't even play WoW anymore but reading all the idiots post and moan about how they could do a better job with balance and game design, like it's is easy as flicking a switch, is absolutely effin cringe worthy. PVP has been imbalanced to some degree or another since Vanilla and always will be. The next guy in line must be a glutton for punishment.

I hope he is much happier in his new position away from all the salty tools.

[Gravity2015]

put him in charge of D3 pvp

[xindralol]

that's good news. been waiting for this for the last 5 years. maybe next xpansion is gonna be beast again.

[Doctor Funkenstein]

Wait, why are BGs ruined by taking gear out of the equation?

Because it wasn't. Downplayed, yes, but not taking out of the equation. Not by a long shot.

[Gadzooks]

metzen was not on the original team

Say what? Metzen was one of the handful of people who came up with the idea of wow, and was it's creative director from day one.