Blizzcon New Class Why No Caster?

[Illidari]

Honestly the only future class I see that doesn't trample all over existing classes is the Tinker. The Tinker has a pretty long history in the Warcraft franchise, and it has established lore in both opposing factions. There was even a Tinker hero in WC3 just like Death Knights and Demon Hunters.

I wouldn't mind seeing Goblins and Gnomes getting some love after the Elves got Demon Hunters.

[Hctaz]

This seems like the most likely outcome of a class discussion, based on the Argus cinematics. And it could easily be a Mail class which is really really really absolutely very much and totally needed. It would be silly to make anything but a mail class based on the number of classes we have on the other armor types. And 2 leathers in a row was too much!

More likely they're just going to replace Survival with a Void Ranger modeled after Alleria. That's my guess.
It'll be a shadow and DoT themed spec. Probably with some physical or frost damage in there somewhere.

[Aqua]

Here for the bard, but I know the edgelord population who shat all over pandaren would get sand in their vagina's again because it's too light hearted for their grimdark perception of WoW. (lol)

[Hammerfest]

I am all for new specs as well, but I think there are a couple more new classes that need to be introduced.
New classes often bring good changes to existing classes, not bad.
When DKs were introduced, Blizzard had to step up their game for Warlock.
Up until then, Warlock tried to be Death Knight'ish with Death Coil and whatnot.

When Demon Hunters were introduced, Blizzard had to step up their game for Warlock yet again.
Metamorphosis didn't belong to Warlocks. So what would?

If Blizzard adds Dark Ranger, Black Arrow will find its way to its rightful owner and Blizzard will have to think up proper abilities for Hunter.

What other classes besides Warlocks were positively affected in your view?

[Nurvus]

What other classes besides Warlocks were positively affected in your view?

Every class.

Adding Monks forced Blizzard to step up their "agile class" fantasy and work harder on Rogues to make them both relevant.
Even more so by adding Demon Hunters.

And "Perfect Imbalance" is actually a thing.
Take League of Legends. Dozens of champions. Lots of fun to be had. Can't point out a single comp or champion that beats everything. Plenty of room for creativity.

More classes/specs = more room for creativity.

In Legion, the class fantasy improved by a lot.
However, because of the Legendary + Trait + Honor Talent shitfest, Blizzard "pruned" way to freaking much, and in some cases the spec, regardless of how "cool" the concept is, feels barebones.
Beastmastery and Survival come to mind.
I think their concept is awesome. But Survival feels unfinished (because Blizzard didn't know wtf to do with the Traps, Explosions, etc) and Beastmastery is too simple.

I think, however, that a lot of players confuse Concept, Design and Tuning.

[Hammerfest]

Every class.

You have great points.

[chubbybunny]

Maybe they'll do what the classes are like in Runes of magic, and have hybrid versions.... You start off as 1 class, say a warrior, and then a sub-spec later on like a priest, so a warrior priest, then a 3rd sub-spec, like a mage.. so a warrior mage priest...

Or just change it so depending on what weapon you are using will depend on what set of attacks you can do like GW2

[Nyel]

... So there's a lot of lore to support Necromancy in WoW.

- can raise lots of Skeletons to support your existing troops: DK check
- Unholy Frenzy, which is especially powerful on Abominations and Frost Wyrms: DK check
- Cripple can also help stop enemies that are trying to run away or severely limit the enemies ability to attack: DK check (okay it's not called Cripple because other classes already have Cripple)

Or what else did you want to show me with your link? Death Knights are WoWs "Necromancer" class. They can do everything that Necromancers potentially could do. There is lore support for Necromancy, yes, but "playable Necromancers" in World of Warcraft are Death Knights.

- - - Updated - - -

More classes/specs = more room for creativity.

In Legion, the class fantasy improved by a lot.
However, because of the Legendary + Trait + Honor Talent shitfest, Blizzard "pruned" way to freaking much, and in some cases the spec, regardless of how "cool" the concept is, feels barebones.

I wish your first sentence would be true. In Legion we see that more specs don't result in more creativity, as you said. Most specs are super boring because they're too similar to other specs. You said Survival feels "unfinished" and out of ~ 25 specs I played in Legion it's still the most fun spec in game (for me).

[HeiAggra]

ppl have been asking for a ranged class that uses mail, easy. Tinker. 3 specs tank dps ranged and healer.
The loot it would drop would upgrade the mechasuit.

[Deleted]

100% a new class will come (of course not in 8.0) becouse new race/class appeal the majority of audience aka sell copy of exp.

Probably next class will be something of completely new and i think whit the upcoming expansion they will start to create the lore around to release it in a later one.

[gushDH]

Most likely because melee is an easier thing to appeal to people. It's more direct, you just go on and hit stuff. Caster is a different kind of enjoyment, taking your time to plan a bit more ahead.

[Deleted]

Why no caster?

Maybe because we already covered 90% of cloth caster user with the current ones?

Fire dude : Mage Lock Shammy
Frost dude : Mage
Arcane dude : Mage Boomkin
Shadow dude : Lock Spriest
Chaos dude : Lock
Nature dude : Shammy Boomkin
Wind dude : Shammy


Enough cloth caster.

Make a new mail ranged

[Deleted]

Also we need a new caster that isn't a real caster so no magic involve, ergo tinker is the most plausible if they want to put a new non re harshed caster

[MasterHamster]

WoWs classes and specs cover pretty much the entire spectrum at this point. What's left is Tinker, deploying auto-turrets, siege engines as cooldown dps "mounts", and throwing out explosives for AoE.


Or they could add another leather melee with a "focus" ish resource to do dps, we haven't got enough of those!

[Bas Prime]

ppl have been asking for a ranged class that uses mail, easy. Tinker. 3 specs tank dps ranged and healer.
The loot it would drop would upgrade the mechasuit.

Besides, that I agree, that Tinker would fit in that category, it would be unwise to create a class just because "we have only 2 classes using mail" or "we only have one class using a bow"
They need a great theme for the class, cool extras and then they can fit it into the amor and weapon types, even in the trinity.

[Deleted]

what would you like to see for example?
you say caster, but how about suggesting what type & what spells?

Bard / Skald type of caster. Wears mail, and uses instruments. Caster DPS (Dissonance DPS resource akin to Rage) and Healer (Harmony resource akin to Combo points) specs, probably a magically based tank spec (like the DK).

[Nurvus]

I wish your first sentence would be true. In Legion we see that more specs don't result in more creativity, as you said. Most specs are super boring because they're too similar to other specs.

Sorry, but pretty much every single spec gameplay - regardless of how poorly tuned or (un)complex - represents the spec concept better than ever.
Not boring because of concept, but because they're barebones, due to the pruning "necessary" to the introduction of Traits, Legendaries and Honor Talents.

You said Survival feels "unfinished" and out of ~ 25 specs I played in Legion it's still the most fun spec in game (for me).

I like the spec. Just imagine if it was finished!
Outside of the Mongoose Fury gameplay (Flanking Strike, Mongoose Bite, Eagle's Fury) every other ability is purely a filler - completely disconnected and completely ignores Mastery and Haste.
Blizzard failed to give most abilities in the spec a reasonable purpose.
Most talent choices are "whatever"...
Those 110 Talents are just laughable comparing to nearly every other spec in the game.
Because of the broken scaling, a fresh 110 Survival Hunter may have a HUGE amount of its damage come from traps, dragonsfire grenade, etc, while a ToS geared Survival Hunter gets a minuscule amount of damage from those abilities because high Mastery and Haste just makes Mongoose Fury gameplay completely take over.

- - - Updated - - -

- can raise lots of Skeletons to support your existing troops: DK check
- Unholy Frenzy, which is especially powerful on Abominations and Frost Wyrms: DK check
- Cripple can also help stop enemies that are trying to run away or severely limit the enemies ability to attack: DK check (okay it's not called Cripple because other classes already have Cripple)

Or what else did you want to show me with your link? Death Knights are WoWs "Necromancer" class. They can do everything that Necromancers potentially could do. There is lore support for Necromancy, yes, but "playable Necromancers" in World of Warcraft are Death Knights.

Death Knight for me doesn't really fit with skeletons. Just because Blizzard gave cosmetic changes doesn't mean anything.
I think Death Knight should really focus on its core concepts - Unholy, Blood and Frost.
They should get Blood DPS back as a 4th spec, inspired in its WotlK version & Deathbringer Saurfang.
Unholy should focus on the diseases, zombies, abominations, etc.

Necromancer in WoW should be more representative of what we have in Diablo 2 - which is also present in Warcraft in its entirety.
Essentially, focusing on:
- all sorts of different Skeletons (not zombies), including ranged, caster, melee, giant, etc;
- Bone spells as ranged dps; curses, Bone Wall, Bone Prison, etc.

Lore-wise, Death Knights came after Necromancers and are supposed to be the "new generation Necromancers", but there can be a different path for "pure" necromancers to follow - and we have seen plenty of NPCs designated as Necromancers with some of the abilities I described above.

[Khallid]

why...why have we had 3 melees added to the game but not a single caster?

will this Blizzcon finally be the time where they announce a new caster? it's been 13 years since release and no caster was added ever since.
what makes designing a caster so much more challenging than designing a melee? or did a caster simply never fit the lore of an expansion?
do they think that they have exhausted all options for a playable caster in the WoW universe?

what would you like to see if they were to add a new caster?

Historically WoW gets a new class every two expansions. Since Legion got the Demon hunters, the next expansion is likely to get a race, not a class.

Whenever a new class gets introduced, it should be a mail user, no matter the role. It's ridiculous that there's only 2 classes that wear mail and they keep adding leather classes.

[Nurvus]

You have great points.

I'm sure you don't consider the pruning somehow associated with new classes, do you?

Blizzard wanted to reduce homogenization.
Yet, Heroism / Bloodlust / Ancient Hysteria are all given to vanilla classes.
What OP ability stolen from previous classes did new classes get?
Smoke Bomb is one of my favorite ability designs in the entire game, and was not removed because of the introduction of another class.
To be honest, I don't understand why it was removed at all...
Warlocks' Metamorphosis only made sense removing, it felt like Blizzard both a) didn't know what to do with Demonology and b) weren't considering Demon Hunters.
It was only added as a "Here's a candy and shut up about Demon Hunters".

Pet gameplay has always been utter shit.
Pets were always passive except for utility until Kill Command and Water Jet came along.
Now, with Dire Beast, Dire Frenzy, and Empower Demons, Implosion, etc, we have more pet interaction than ever.
Improving one spec/class promts Blizzard to make sure the other isn't left behind.
Does Blizzard always succeed? No.

So I'm quite curious to learn why you disagree.
What makes adding new classes bad?
Blizzard could never balance Vanilla WoW classes, which had mind-numbingly simple rotations and limited CC, etc.
It can't get worse than that!

So adding new classes doesn't make it worse - instead it makes it less likely that there is a best class or composition in Arena.

[Lionhearte0]

why...why have we had 3 melees added to the game but not a single caster?

will this Blizzcon finally be the time where they announce a new caster? it's been 13 years since release and no caster was added ever since.
what makes designing a caster so much more challenging than designing a melee? or did a caster simply never fit the lore of an expansion?
do they think that they have exhausted all options for a playable caster in the WoW universe?

what would you like to see if they were to add a new caster?

36 specs
6 tank specs
6 healer specs (counting disc)
12 melee dps specs
13 ranged dps specs (10 magical, 3 physical, counting disc)

looks like we're fine