Vanilla Talent System

[Faenskap]

Vanilla system was never complex. All you had to do, is to take correct talents from cookie cutter build or else you had terribly build character. In the end, it was shit, I much prefer what we have now as it gives us some degree of choice.

Yeah... that +2% damage done from Curse of Agony was really inspiring and fun. Or something.

I will just quote this person and say "I agree!" because I do.

Where exactly is the complexity in "increases shadow damage by 5/10/15/20/25 %", or balance druids' "increases melee (!) damage by [enter numbers]"? It's not fun, interesting or inspiring.

In the end, you'd end up with the cookie cutter build. You do have choices these days, and you can change talents depending on boss encounter, enemy arena comps etc.

[Etheric]

Why not both? Have the current talent tree for main abilities and then a secondary talent tree for modifying abilities/your character.

Coming.
My understanding is the artifact thing is basically the old talent system (dumb increase of ability damage with a new spell there and there). Just without the ability to make hybrid choices.

[Deleted]

I don't think it's a fair comparison to talk about boring talent selection back then and now. When WoW launched we didn't have so many fansites, so many communities, etc. Many people actually tried the builds themselves and tested things out. For a while in Molten Core I had a diversity of builds. Heck our MT throughout Naxx in Vanilla used a build that no one understood (something like 10/16/24) and he tanked everything up to Saphiron successfully.

I think people that played Vanilla argue that back then the community was actually choosing, you had diversity, and let's be realistic the main reason most probably was that we didn't min/max correctly back then. Today you end up seeing less diversity in talents than then because there are more resources and information, not so many are on par, and that ends up with everyone just choosing very similar builds and rotations.

My personal opinion: the Vanilla talents worked back then, the current ones work better now.

[ARhaine]

The only nice thing I can say about the old talents, was that really rarely you could get an opportunity for a weird hybrid spec, like the Holy/Disc max haste Prayer of Healing spec for TONS of AOE heals back in WotLK (around TotC).
Otherwise, the new talents are superior, because they allow you to finetune your character for specific purposes and encounters.

[Deleted]

Vanilla System was the beste since it didn't favor People who masterted it too heavy. What are guilds now? They are looking for People who have keybindings and certain addons. This is demise.

[Mister K]

Vanilla system was never complex. All you had to do, is to take correct talents from cookie cutter build or else you had terribly build character. In the end, it was shit, I much prefer what we have now as it gives us some degree of choice.

Yeah... that +2% damage done from Curse of Agony was really inspiring and fun. Or something.

As a Holy Paladin in WotLK, the options were amazing for PvP and even PvE at times depending on the encounter.

I mean stacking Stamina for SP and running around like a Raid Boss or towards the end of expansion early in into Cata stacking broken ass Resilience even. Or Flash of Light spam build with flashes healing like Holy Light on steroids and of course, the good old fashioned Shockadin build in early WotLK, late TBC.

I miss those days and it's partly a reason why I no longer play the game. The new system, while technically "better" does not allow for this.

I am not sure about other classes however for Rets, the new system is much better. Rets were, not that great during TBC, WotLK and partly even in Cata.

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Vanilla System was the beste since it didn't favor People who masterted it too heavy. What are guilds now? They are looking for People who have keybindings and certain addons. This is demise.

Vanilla fights were simplistic. I agree, requiring addons is probably not the best thing (specially DBM and alike). Blizzard is now balancing and developing fights centered around addons rather than the players. Keybindings? Damn right guilds should be making sure their team has the Keybindings to support the "high-end play". To be honest, if player can perform/outperform with no existent keybindings then by all means, however this is a rare case (inb4 r1 glads or top guild clickers). However this thread is not discussing Addons/Keybindings but the Talent system.

[Deleted]

There were certain bosses in AQ and Naxx we would hearth out and respec for. The only difference nowadays is you just change your final tier talent and possibly a few more before you pull the boss. Either way, we were switching back and forth between 1-2 fully set in stone builds. Again, it didn't add diversity in the slightest, if you wanted to be optimal, (which 95% of players do) you would need to be a very specific build.

You didn't need to respec for AQ. Naxx I'm not sure, our guild only killed the first 5 bosses or so.

[Deleted]

I loved the old talent system like crazy. Loved the mix between balance and feral in pvp or resto/balance hybrid in raids

[Gestopft]

People arguing it's "more complex" are wrong, it's an illusion. You don't have as much control as they would like to imagine as you're being force-fed the better specs if you want your character to be at its maximum potential.

To min-max is essentially a choice to relinquish personal choice, putting potential over preference.

If someone makes the choice to give up choice, it seems silly for them to then complain about lack of choice. As long as a talent has a measurable effect on performance, their choice is already made.

[Deleted]

You didn't need to respec for AQ. Naxx I'm not sure, our guild only killed the first 5 bosses or so.

For certain bosses you really did, I mean dealing the correct amount of frost damage on Viscidus in the nuke phase as fire was actually near impossible. There were 3 bosses in Naxx that a few classes had to.

[Deleted]

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Vanilla fights were simplistic. I agree, requiring addons is probably not the best thing (specially DBM and alike). Blizzard is now balancing and developing fights centered around addons rather than the players. Keybindings? Damn right guilds should be making sure their team has the Keybindings to support the "high-end play". To be honest, if player can perform/outperform with no existent keybindings then by all means, however this is a rare case (inb4 r1 glads or top guild clickers). However this thread is not discussing Addons/Keybindings but the Talent system.

That is the same. I had a friend who would always do his own "hybrid" thing in classic and TBC. He never played the game long period because he also had swstats and whatever followed. This game was about following ONE-BEST-IN-TALENTS build. Situations were rarely a problem.. But it was always about what you did with the one single available build. And Keybindings etc was something that was hopefully done before of this state of the game.

[rshamrock]

i agree love blade talen trees

[Orby]

I do miss the idea of looking forward to level, every level than wait every 15 to 20 levels. Even if every level gave us something that was pointless it was still some choice. I don't mind the current talent system I just wish there was more to it.

[Vetis]

Just wanting to hear opinions, I personally think the current Talent System is over simplified and gives us much less diverse characters, but I know a lot of people complained about the Vanilla system being too complex, even though it gave us a TON of different combos and diversity.

I'm trying to make a basic MMO, and am planning on a talent system similar to Vanilla's where you get points each level up to spend wherever you want on the different trees (with tiers that unlock)

What do you guys prefer now? Current, vanillas, or a different rendition?

that's the problem really; it didnt give that much freedom. Just 0.2% increase in a stat for the next 5 levels. There were few usable builds for each class. there was no diversity - warrior? you tank and so on.

[papajohn4]

because now there are not cookie cutter builds right? Min-maxers always had and still have cookie cutter builds. Casual players, pvp players, dungeon players and solo farmers had much more fun choices and builds with the old talent system...

that's the problem really; it didnt give that much freedom. Just 0.2% increase in a stat for the next 5 levels. There were few usable builds for each class. there was no diversity - warrior? you tank and so on.

DW Fury was fine for raiding...he was just too gear dependant.. but with the right gear he was very good dps for raids...

[Waffen]

Not true. In a 40 man raid up till Naxx, you needed maybe 15 people who knew what they are doing. The rest could be more or less clueless and bosses still would die. Tbh, the first time when I noticed a need for min maxing anything was Brutallus in SWP Up until then having more less an idea what buttons to press would make bosses die.

Yeah, suppose that's partially true. The gap definitely did show when Guilds got to Naxx and many elite raiding guilds collapsed under the weight of the people sand bagging. Good refute!

[skribzy]

Which of you warlocks has 2 of 3 improved healthstone?

[Rilas13]

Yeah Vanilla gameplay in general was much more interesting for most people.

Warrior= spam Sunder
Mage=spam Fireball/Frostbolt
Paladin= Buff players(Two buttons, 3 if you had kings!)

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I do miss the idea of looking forward to level, every level than wait every 15 to 20 levels. Even if every level gave us something that was pointless it was still some choice. I don't mind the current talent system I just wish there was more to it.

Artifact weapons do that, the progression even keeps going past 110.

[Yimereh]

I think people put too much emphasis on the talent system as an issue when I think game immersion is more of an issue. I'd rather a simplified talent systems for the classes themselves and a mini talent system(maybe only 3 choices) for each ability that you have that you have to find in the game from trainers or other unique circumstances.

Then I'd like my shaman to smack his head in a way that ends his crippling retardation and he realizes that he uses fire and ice abilities all the time so he could probably sit down and learn how to use fireball and frost bolt which are like the most basic caster abilities in any game. Re-introduce a bit of a spell rank system and allow other classes to go out into the old world & new world to learn them but at a significant resource cost(I'm talking mana/energy/rage not gold or money) they can rank those abilities up but never to the point of an actual class specialist, maybe up to half as good but with twice the cost and twice the cooldown(this can be fluctuated).

That alone would give players more real ways to customize their class and integrate fun shit into their rotation in pvp & pve for diversity sake. It's a very easy way to add tremendous amounts of useful content without a lot of work and while it would introduce new balancing issues, but we've been beta testing WoW for over 10 years now, it would make the game better in the long run.

[Raiju]

Yeah Vanilla gameplay in general was much more interesting for most people.

Warrior= spam Sunder
Mage=spam Fireball/Frostbolt
Paladin= Buff players(Two buttons, 3 if you had kings!)

spam sunder isn't accurate and you (hopefully) know it, and as for 1 button spam? Those became more frequent in wod than they had been since tbc :|