Mythic Keystone Reward Increases, Curious Coin Drop Rate Increased, Class Balance

[Deleted]

Buff specs B and C to 100 DPS (in theory). The sims will then show 100, 100, 100, which means that many players can change to B or C without looking dumb because they chose a DPS loss.

There are many potential reasons to switch to B or C: you may like their theme better, you may be tired of playing A for six months straight, or they have some utility that you feel could give more depth to your playstyle.

I think most people just want to feel they can play their favourite spec without making a "bad" decision.

[ElDoorO]

The first thing you have to address is how such a discrepancy happened in the first place.
Until you have that fixed -- any "fixes" will only be temporary and, likely, just continuing frustration for everyone.

I'm not interested in theorycrafting how to fix it until I'm confident that such a fix is genuinely aimed towards finding balance in the long run -- not just a stop-gap until they find "oh, whoops, now it's 70/100/150".

[Deleted]

I dont cry often but the Game is inbalanced as never before. It takes away alot of fun. I play since beginning but if they keep traveling that road of inbalancness i have to depart.
Even asking such a question is insulting imo.

[Granyala]

Interesting game balance design question that we commonly deal with, but I'd love to hear you all's thoughts on

My answer:

Buff to parity according to theoretical simulations. Adjust further as needed once players start providing real data.

Since they are the creators of this game, I'd expect them to have VERY accurate simulation programs / bots, so it all comes down on how players cope with the classes mechanics.

[Phagelives]

Interesting game balance design question that we commonly deal with, but I'd love to hear you all's thoughts on

My answer:


Since they are the creators of this game, I'd expect them to have VERY accurate simulation programs / bots, so it all comes down on how players cope with the classes mechanics.

BUT that would make sense for a gaming company like blizzard entertainment but i think there own data is out of wack again, like back in cata 4.2 ish time frame when they admited to having there own software out of date. but again i think its more of human pride of not wanting to be proven wrong with their players.

[Averrix]

Glad they upped the drop rate of curious coins. I was getting like one sometimes two a month. You would of never been able to get that mount.

[Granyala]

BUT that would make sense for a gaming company like blizzard entertainment but i think there own data is out of wack again, like back in cata 4.2 ish time frame when they admited to having there own software out of date. but again i think its more of human pride of not wanting to be proven wrong with their players.

Even if so, as long as they could fix it via numbers tuning, I'd expect them to do so within a week, 2 weeks tops.

It's hilarious that they let classes be OP or UP for an entire tier.

Though, they also admitted that they buff according to popularity, so I'd imagine that output parity is not their only factor to consider.

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Glad they upped the drop rate of curious coins. I was getting like one sometimes two a month. You would of never been able to get that mount.

Been playing actively since Legion started. Done World boss every week.

My priestess has

3

coins.

[BannedForViews]

You completely missed the point of that whole question

No, I answered the fucking question. If you think there is any other answer, you're wrong.

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So since the pros who do Spec A are actually playing at +20%, it means that if they switch to Spec C, they are now doing 120%... meaning the specs are now, 100, 100, 120%. See the issue there?

I see that you're poor at math. If the specs do 100, 80, and 70 at max performance, and you buff B by 25% and C by 43%, you will have A, B, and C all doing 100dps. That is how math works. Now compare those buffs to his "actual" performance and you will see them performing at 100, 87.5, and 71.5. But people will realize how big a buff those specs actually got, and some will test it, and eventually people will find out they are all comparable.

Then what will REALLY happen is people will exploit each spec depending on the fight it performs the best at, so they can do 120dps. But whatever nonsense math you tried using above makes no sense.

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The problem is that the community uses measures of class balance that solely display the 100/70/50 numbers, and when they buff the lower specs in theory to be 100/100/100 people don't switch back because they believe that the buffs only bring them to 100/90/71. That results in overwhelming feedback that the spec that is perceived as 71, which they know beyond doubt to perform at 100, is in desperate need of buffs.

Overbuffing has its own problems.

This just isn't true though, at all. First, there is always some tryhard that is juicing every last bit out of every spec. Millions of people play this game and there are 24 dps specs. If you think that every great player wasn't playing frost mage or affliction warlock, you're just completely wrong. Because of this, there will always be those massive outlier parses when a spec gets buffed. People will notice this and use it to make informed decisions about swapping specs.

Secondly, even if the above weren't true, people like to test out changes to see just how good they are. Someone who plays fire might think arcane seems more fun and want to check and see if the buffs make it competitive.

Thirdly, even if THAT weren't true, we have publicly available sims which attempt to show what a class will do given specific inputs, so you don't even need a real person to do anything to realize how strong a buff is.


To think that the community is so stupid that they can't tell where things should be and how good buffs are is massively insulting. They honestly think we're all idiots and they are geniuses. Guess what, some of us are a whole hell of a lot smarter than they are.

[MakeMeLaugh]

Celestalon being Celestalon, ugh.... Just buff B and C, how hard is it? Do you need another 10 months of PTR to try again?

[Deleted]

Interesting game balance design question that we commonly deal with, but I'd love to hear you all's thoughts on

I assume 100/100/100 across the tier (or raid like we have it now with EN&ToV/NH) is the goal here? I mean what exactly are we supposed to understand under the therm "balance" and what kind of numbers exactly are we talking about here? If we talk about overall averages, inlcuding all skill groups and gear I think we can consider those numbers to be as accurate as the numbers I will get when measuring the speed of my breath when I exhale while standing at the beach with moderate wind speeds. Unless we don´t categorize those numbers in a way where gear and performance (or lack thereof compared to the baseline dps) have there own categories I don´t see a way to solve this issue since ballancing across such a wide range will cause major imballances within the arguably overall ballanced data. I mean you can´t be honestly suggesting here that gear is making you struggle to ballance specs, cmon ^^ Once you have those numbers properly categorized you can ballance the specs which are mostly played by "lesser skilled players" in a way that makes them more forgiving, ideally without changing the feel of the spec. If proper skill ceiling adjustments have been made and the numbers reflect the numbers you originally inteded bump the spec to 90 and everyone should be satisfied...

But honestly, I think most of us are tired of numbers at this point and we all would love to see people who play our classes a LOT and have a lot of understanding for the classes as well as the community behind being responsilbe for doing class/spec changes based on common sense and not some numbers that are pulled out of a massive chunk of data. I think that you guys are doing a great job at ballancing the classes as good as possible when looking at the raid data etc., but I think that taking into the consideration what happens on let´s say our discord class channels would be benefiting for everyone. Especially because a lot of what makes a good spec isn´t going to be shown in any data and that is the way the spec feels. Right now I am mostly playing the 80dps spec (even tho I am usually quiet the min/max type of person), because like almost anyone else I find the 100dps spec incredibly unsatisfying to play. Looking at what some elitists talk about specs may be considered as something that doesn´t apply to the majorty of players and makes it basically uninteresting for ballancing purposes but it´s those elitist people that will write the guides which in the end will be followed by the majority.

Sorry for bad englando, I am sick right now and barely can focus, yet can´t sleep -.-

[thatmikeguy]

Should not be 100 vs 90, 100 vs 80 or 70 and it's not balanced period.

[tiptopmemer]

The blue haired retard strikes again!

[Deleted]

Or just l2p your class stupid mmo c garbage?


there is a reason if he is a dev and you are trash on a forum

[Maximelene]

So many idiots here unable to understand the theorical/practical difference of the topic. That's sad.

[Niwes]

BandForViews is absolutelly correct.

And Celestalion is one of the biggest idiots i ever saw working at blizz. No glue why someone decided that this stupid should be responsible for classes. This guy isnt stupid in general. But he is that kind of developer that viewing all just that deep in his math stuff (and dev/design stuff) that he isnt able to see the more overall relations of things. he is the same type as the guys having a doctor of IT science and go developing. you know, that ppl most real devs wont work with bc of .., "that stupid genius"...

[Deleted]

You see, this is the reason for such idiotic, moronic and retarded outcomes on live servers.
How many times do we have to tell you devs - look at graphs on warcraftlogs website after a patch goes live and tune the classes accordingly. AND CONSTANTLY. Dont try to "predict" or "guess" a balance on some fictional situations, like these number examples 100 80 70 50...

[Lightbull]

You buff B by 25% and C by 43% so they all do 100 dps. How is this even a question. It doesnt matter if the other 2 speds still slightly underperform against A as long as they theoretically can do the same. Then the players are able to decide which they prefer and making a meaningful choice instead of playing what is required for big numbers. No wonder he is so shit at his job.

You physically cannot have every spec do exactly the same amount of DPS. At least one spec is going to be better than the other specs, and everyone will flock to that spec. On top of that, some specs have their own utility that separates them from the other specs that may be more valuable to a raid. So saying "just make it 100/100/100" isn't a good answer.

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So many idiots here unable to understand the theorical/practical difference of the topic. That's sad.

That's why they are not game developers.

[Granyala]

You physically cannot have every spec do exactly the same amount of DPS.

I agree with you in reality: WoWs encounters and classes are too complex to have 100% balance in every conceivable situation, besides: balance like that would necessitate extreme homogenization and at that point I would ask: "Why have different classes at all? Just so I can shoot a green frostbolt instead of a blue one?"
I much prefer the "every class has their strengths and weaknesses" concept or go a step further with support-roles like SPriest back in TBC.

However:

(Assume the specs have their niches, but these numbers are across a whole raid tier on average. Most other classes are at 100.)

Suggests that it is supposed to be possible in this hypothetical scenario. If it is possible, then my answer of "how to proceed" applies. Balance according to simulations, see how actual humans cope with your mechanics and adjust further as needed.

Still: even if all classes were at 100 (as indicated: an average over the ENTIRE TIER, including bosses they suck and rock at). People would still bitch.

I agree with Celestalon that it is an interesting question though. We are always quick to ask "why didn't you balance on PTR bro?!" when that is not possible. PTR simply does not provide enough raw data, esp since the whole casual player segment is missing.

[Deleted]

That's from the weekly chest, thank you. Is that also from the Mythic+ chests after you clear the dungeon? (Doubt it).

I can confirm this is NOT the case, did an arcway15 just now and got 870 loot.

[stgeorge78]

Blizzard should just fire everyone involved with class balance. Leave the designers but they can only change the design of a spec once per expansion.

Then add a process that takes all the days activities and determines the class balance. Then next day it bumps those who are too low up by 1% and those who are too high down by 1%. I guarantee after a month there will be great balance for similarly skilled players at a similar ilvl. At the same time of that processing it should tick a "pro" indicator up 1 for everyone who is doing above the average dps for their spec & ilvl and a "bad" indicator down 1 for everyone who is doing below the average dps for their spec & ilvl.

Then create a special dev-monitored class feedback forum where only players with +100 pro indicator or higher can participate. If anyone trolls in that forum, they get removed permanently.