Ability Pruning= WoW heading to console

[ImpTaimer]

Technically there's no reason that WoW can't be made to run on an Xbone or PS4. They both use x86 architecture. The whole "consoletard" stigma is due to developers forcing/advocating the use of gamepads for traditionally point-and-click games with digital movement.

Every single Sony home-console from PS1 to PS4 has had mouse support (but developers had to support it). Xbox, on the other hand, won't support it for console play, only streaming/navigation.

Sad part is console version of Diablo 3 is still the definitive version... for all the wrong reasons.

[Time Sage]

they'd need to cut all classes back to 4 buttons.

Not gunna happen. PC users will rage.

XIV runs on a controller. You can have dozens of ablities asgined to 8 buttons.

[snusrage]

How could you ever do raiding with a controller? or pvp for that matter

go look at a brogram called switchblade it was around in cata and in wrath you used a xbox controller for it

[Karon]

go look at a brogram called switchblade it was around in cata and in wrath you used a xbox controller for it

switchblade was retarded. Xpadder is the way to go.

[Usagi Senshi]

I don't think WoW would be a good console game. The reason why FFXIV even works remotely well on console is because its GCD is 2.5 sec opposed to WoW's 1.5-1 sec GCD.

Not only that, WoW has ground targeted abilities and a fair amount of off-GCD abilities.

Some classes in FFXIV get faster GCDs and there are many ground-targeted and and a shitload of off GCD abilities as well and it still works fine.

You guys keep moving that goalpost and its hilarious. WoW would work perfectly fine on consoles.

[Jtbrig7390]

How could you ever do raiding with a controller? or pvp for that matter

Look at FFXIV on ps3/ps4.

I can have over 4 bars(6max I do believe) with 16 skills or marco's in each bar and play using a controller just fine. If WoW was to hit consoles it would need a ingame system that works like DBM.

[snusrage]

switchblade was retarded. Xpadder is the way to go.

hey it was not that bad xD it worked for what it did

[Glorious Leader]

Ok here is why it wouldn't work today.

With things like DBM a simple yet unforgiving one mechanic boss raids would be cleared within a month. This would essentially put raiding as even more simple as LFR. Seriously in another thread you're calling for mythic style tier drops to be accessable without raiding and now this? Do you even play wow or do you want to play a one button game with no actual use of the brain?

Best games are hard, they challenge they make people think, they don't cater to drooooooooooool one button hurray win types.

Actually it's not clear that "best games are hard". That's a value judge and not one that's supported well. Most blizzard games are in fact ridiculously easy and that's why they were popular. Diablo 2 wad not a hard game by any stretch.

Simple yet unforgiving may mean that current heroic/mythic raiders would be finished the raid rather soon. Boo hoo. For everyone else this would be an opportunity to have a more appealing version of the game available to them. I'd be to be able.to think while playing wow and while raiding. The current encounter design is not conducive yo this at all.

[Jtbrig7390]

Actually it's not clear that "best games are hard". That's a value judge and not one that's supported well. Most blizzard games are in fact ridiculously easy and that's why they were popular. Diablo 2 wad not a hard game by any stretch.

Simple yet unforgiving may mean that current heroic/mythic raiders would be finished the raid rather soon. Boo hoo. For everyone else this would be an opportunity to have a more appealing version of the game available to them. I'd be to be able.to think while playing wow and while raiding. The current encounter design is not conducive yo this at all.

To add to this what is best is subjective anyway. If we are going off of sells numbers then "Casual" games win buy a country mile. But like I said best is subjective.

[papajohn4]

Some classes in FFXIV get faster GCDs and there are many ground-targeted and and a shitload of off GCD abilities as well and it still works fine.

You guys keep moving that goalpost and its hilarious. WoW would work perfectly fine on consoles.

I totally agree..those who think it cannot be done they have not played ffxiv on consoles...only thing that would bother me is the default ui since the possibilities to allow addons would be minimal...

[Tharkkun]

How is that a question?

100% keybinds is already something that, looking at the big picture, hardly anyone does at all. It's also completely unnecessary. Again: it is doable, but the question isn't if it's humanly possible to pull it off, but if it's practicable. It is possible to do. But it also takes dedicated practice and quite some time to get it down. With more than questionable benefit. It's an extreme. A self-imposed specialist discipline, but by no means a valid standard control scheme for a game that's supposed to be playable by all kinds of folks.

Like I said: the game is supposed to be very easy to pick up and very intuitively playable. Blizzard would never ever go with a highly demanding control scheme as the default for the game to be even playable at all. The fact that some people can come up with, and master some obscure, difficult or convoluted method of playing the game does not mean that this method could serve as a standard way of playing the game.

It just isn't something that could be expected from the playerbase to put up with. The game has to be playable even by the most primitive means, like WASD + 100% clicking. It's up to the individual to refine their method over time, at their own pace. Or perhaps never evolve at all.

You could have 1 function assigned to each button and easily pickup and play the game. If other games can do it then so could WoW. Plus if you're going to play WoW on a console you'd be expecting this. Blizzard might even have default assignments for all your abilities across each class set.

Then advanced players could open up their config and bind additional combinations. You're equating being able to play WoW with being able to play it at the highest skill level. That's not necessary for someone picking up the game.

Plus I know tons of people who can't play a game with a keyboard and mouse where a controller comes naturally. The first time I played a FPS with a mouse in the late 90's I was dumbfounded. Almost 20 years later I can barely play a FPS on a console.

[shoegazing]

EDIT: moving the link to the top of the post: http://imgur.com/a/wrlfv


How will your action bars look when Legion comes out? Many players are excited because they will have access to more abilities than ever, and I am excited for those players. The expansion as a whole looks very good and there are a great many things to be excited for. For subtlety rogues however, which has been my main spec for 11 years, we are receiving an unprecedented ability prune that makes even the ability prune in WoD look small by comparison.

So, to demonstrate visually just how much of my spec is being pruned, I made an album on imgur. Here's what I did: I took screenshots of what my bars look like with different modifier key combinations and then I blocked out all buttons which are being removed in Legion. When abilities are getting obvious replacements (like rupture --> nightblade and ambush --> shadowstrike) I left them alone. I did accidentally block out smokebomb and I probably could have left it because it is remaining as a level 100 PvP talent, but since this will be a mandatory talent choice anyway and essentially deletes an entire tier of choices from our trees, I don't feel too bad about this mistake. Regardless, smokebomb is just a single button on these bars so it doesn't make much difference at all. The effect is pretty much the same either way.

Anyway, here it is if you want to have a look:

http://imgur.com/a/wrlfv

In order, the modifier combinations are [nomod], [mod:alt], [mod:ctrl], [mod:shift], [mod:shift,alt], and [mod:shift,ctrl]

I left out [mod:alt,ctrl] and [mod:shift,alt,ctrl] but they are pretty much the same story as before if not worse. These bars contain macros like @focus step dance sap and @focus step MfD kidney shot so most of these are being pruned as well.

I've been really, really excited for Legion since it was announced. I'm excited for Artifacts, I'm excited for the new PvP Honor System, I'm excited for PvP talent trees, I'm excited for stat templates in PvP, I'm excited for the Emerald Nightmare, I'm excited for Demon Hunters, I'm excited for the cool abilities and talent choices that many of my alts are getting.

But I can't be excited for Legion as a whole when this many abilities, including all of the ones which are my favorites to use, are being removed from the spec that has been my main for the past 11 years.

Thank you for reading & thanks in advance for having a productive and civil conversation.

- - - Updated - - -

Is streamlining the game for new/boosted players the reason they're doing this? Because that's horrible in its own way.

My GF is a complete non-gamer, so when she wanted to try WoW there was no way I was going to let her boost a character. Not only would it be unfair to drop all that complexity on her at once without giving her time to learn it gradually, but why on Earth would I want to rob her of the experience of seeing and hearing Elwynn Forest for the first time?

Character boosts are a fine system for people like me who have done the leveling grind too many times and know the game well enough to jump right in on a new character. I have every class at level 100 and I purchased level 90 boosts for 5 of them. But I would never recommend one for a new player.

This whole mindset that leveling doesn't matter and the endgame is the only part of the game that is relevant, and new players need to be able to jump right into the endgame is total bull!@#$.

When I think back to how much fun I had seeing the massive world for the first time, and hearing all the sounds, and doing the quests... when I think back to the first time I traveled from Eastern Kingdoms to Kalimdor (which was quite the task for a level 18 rogue) just to see Stonetalon Mountains and Ashenvale, and how blown away I was when I finally got there, and how I broke out into a cold sweat when I ran into some horde players and they came close enough to maybe see me in stealth....

When I think back to those memories, it makes me furious that Blizzard is trying get people to skip the leveling grind and jump straight into the end game. It is a disgusting thing to try to rob a new player of those first experiences....

- - - Updated - - -

Looking at wowhead's action bar simulator, we aren't getting a single new ability that isn't a direct replacement of something they're removing:

http://legion.wowhead.com/action-bars#AAbxcBAQUAAAAA

Recuperate --> Crimson Vial
Shuriken Toss (now baseline, but Smokebomb moved to talents and MfD and DFA both moved to the same talent tier so you can only select one of them)
Backstab --> Gloomblade (if talented)
Ambush --> Shadowstrike
Rupture --> Nightblade
Fan of Knives --> Shuriken Storm

Subtlety isn't getting a single new ability that isn't a direct replacement of something they're pruning.

On top of this, many abilities are being pruned without replacement:

Shadowstep (used to be the spec-defining 41 point talent in the subtlety tree, now an Assassination exclusive)
Hemorrhage (used to be a 21 point talent in the subtlety tree in Vanilla, now an Assassination exclusive)
Slice and Dice (had it since Vanilla)
Premeditation (was the 31 point subtlety talent in Vanilla)
Shadow Dance (introduced in WotLK and came to define the spec as the 51 point Subtlety talent)
Gouge (had it since Vanilla)
Blind (had it since Vanilla)
Garrote (had it since Vanilla)
Preparation (had it since Vanilla)
Shiv (had it since TBC)
Crippling Poison (had it since Vanilla)
Wound Poison (had it since Vanilla)

Am I alone in thinking that it's horrible for the game for a spec to be losing so many of its abilities without receiving replacements?

[Vash The Stampede]

Would like to see how they'll get WoW to work on a AMD Jaguar chip running at 1.6Ghz. Those 8 cores aren't going to mean jack.

[Deleted]

do mmos on console actually work in terms of sales? all i can think about is ff11 and how that bombed

[Gaidax]

WoW on Android and iOS go!

Move character by tilting a phone, cast with voice activation.

Shadow Bolt!!
Call Dreadstalkers!!
Fuck... Err.. Mortal Coil!

[Pull My Finger]

You could have 1 function assigned to each button and easily pickup and play the game. If other games can do it then so could WoW. Plus if you're going to play WoW on a console you'd be expecting this. Blizzard might even have default assignments for all your abilities across each class set.

Then advanced players could open up their config and bind additional combinations. You're equating being able to play WoW with being able to play it at the highest skill level. That's not necessary for someone picking up the game.

Plus I know tons of people who can't play a game with a keyboard and mouse where a controller comes naturally. The first time I played a FPS with a mouse in the late 90's I was dumbfounded. Almost 20 years later I can barely play a FPS on a console.

You're missing the point. It isn't about who's used to what, it's about the fact that WoW would simply be WAY more demanding to play on anything else than mouse & keyboard. It just isn't made for anything else. And "if you're gonna play it on a console you'd expect this" just isn't an argument - most certainly not from a developer standpoint. If one version isn't exactly as playable as the other, it's just not an option. Hey, here's our 11 year old game, now coming to your console! Experience it now the hard way where you'll never be able to be as good at it as if you had just played it on PC like everybody else ... yeah, sure.