Spell Variance Returning in Shadowlands

Originally Posted by taishar68

This is a very minor change that will not have a major impact to anyone.



So expect a sea of criticism in 1...2...3...

Then why change it? No one was complaining about the Legion system, so what is the benefit here?

Originally Posted by chaud

Spell Variance in Shadowlands

Originally Posted by Blizzard (Blue Tracker / Official Forums)

In an upcoming build, most non-periodic abilities on all classes will have a small amount of variance on the damage or healing of each individual use.

This was standard behavior in WoW for many years (and has its roots in familiar mechanics from many RPGs), but recently was lost as a side effect of some under-the-hood mechanical changes. We’re restoring this behavior now to bring back the small bit of texture, and avoid the result where using the same spell repeatedly results in exactly the same 3- or 4-digit number every time.

We’re keeping the amount of variance small (5% currently), so that the impact on total performance, over the course of a combat with many events, is negligible.

It's absolutely comical that no one realized this was even gone because of the ludicrous amount of RNG procs going on in the game right now. Damage was so insanely random anyway.

"Your spells and abilities have a chance to _________."

"Your spells and abilities have a chance to _________."

"Your spells and abilities have a chance to _________."

"Your spells and abilities have a chance to _________."

"Your spells and abilities have a chance to _________."

"Your spells and abilities have a chance to _________."

Originally Posted by Belloc

Considering how critical strike already works, this is basically already the case. That said, I don't see why this change was necessary or even desireable.

Considering how essences, azerite armor, trinkets, talents and corruptions work you mean.

I dont see the point of this change but its not that bad I think. Its just odd that they bring more rng on damage into the game when Preach just told Ion a few days ago directly to his face that players hate it when they press the same buttons and get different results all the time.

Originally Posted by huth

It isn't likely. It's required. Do you even know what an average is?

You're going to have to point out where it's required that the amount change has to balance out when they're treating each individual application of Variance as an individual use rather than as a set of data.
Say the average is a 100 damage because that is the amount the ability says it will deal every time but then Spell Variance is applied and low rolls and you get 95, then you cast again and it low rolls again for 97, then 96, 97, 95, 98, 101, 96 and so on since it's treating each individual cast as it's own independent action regardless of what the average damage is and it's randomly deciding a positive or negative application to the average. Basically Blizzard can decided how often it swings regardless of how variance is supposed to function.

Originally Posted by schwarzkopf

We can, I did them ... the answers are of the order of 1^-10.

So you figured out how often Blizzard wants classes to low roll, high roll, be close to the damage listed on the ability and their desired weighting for when each significant change in damage occurs as well as how they're applying the 5% variance to damage? That aside your statistic is based off the improbable chance of even being able to reach +/-2% based on the fair assumption that damage will equally swing above and below the average, I've just been trying to make the case that isn't likely to happen because Blizzard rng.

I have no problem with this.

Originally Posted by Railander

i main affliction and i don't like snapshotting.

in paper it's great, it promotes skill and knowledge.

in practice, you download an addon that will light up your buttons to the most optical mathematical dps boost when clipping that no human can match against.

also its a balance nigthmare,it will be like early legion shadow again,the top players do insane dmg wile the averege players are well...averege,so they will end up nerfing it so the top players dont do double or triple the dps of others as they did in mop,and those averege players will go down to the bottom

im all for skilled play being rewarding,but the way the game works with dotsnaping simply results in those rly good players doing 2-3 times more dps than the OTHER best players of other classes,and 5-6 times more than the averege players of their own class

Originally Posted by Pengalor

Then why change it? No one was complaining about the Legion system, so what is the benefit here?

I think Blizzard believes that, if you're a newbie mage throwing a bunch of fireballs at a mob, seeing 16, 14, 15 pop up instead of 15, 15, 15 is more immersive, because that makes the world feel more like a simulation than a deterministic engine.

The fact that it also makes empirical data gathering for theorycrafting purposes more time consuming is probably considered by the current dev team to be more of a feature happy coincidence than a bug.

Originally Posted by Casperite

Who asked for it? Every single person who said things shouldn't have changed last two expansions. It is going back to what it was before Legion, seems exactly what I see people here asking for.

Lol quote needed of someone saying they wish to see variance back. That was a heck of a spin!

Originally Posted by Belloc

In other words, it's a completely unnecessary change. Additionally, it will have a minor impact on everyone.

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Considering how critical strike already works, this is basically already the case. That said, I don't see why this change was necessary or even desireable.

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I don't think this change should have been made, but I'm going to yell at you for using that line. It 100% does not matter whether players ask for something or not. Developers do not and should not design games based on what players ask for. People need to stop saying "nobody asked for this!"

Yes, nobody asked for this is a legitimate statement. No, games shouldn't be designed around just what people want (good luck getting anyone to agree), but when an odd change comes out of nowhere, I throw that statement (that apparently triggers you) out there, to say that it was not from the result of the backlash or suggestions of the community.

So if it does nothing, people didn't ask for it, why add it? Ion was JUST talking about how the servers can't handle all the procs and such in combat, why add a variance system that won't do anything except maybe stress the servers a little more.

Originally Posted by Darknessvamp

You're going to have to point out where it's required that the amount change has to balance out when they're treating each individual application of Variance as an individual use rather than as a set of data.
Say the average is a 100 damage because that is the amount the ability says it will deal every time but then Spell Variance is applied and low rolls and you get 95, then you cast again and it low rolls again for 97, then 96, 97, 95, 98, 101, 96 and so on since it's treating each individual cast as it's own independent action regardless of what the average damage is and it's randomly deciding a positive or negative application to the average. Basically Blizzard can decided how often it swings regardless of how variance is supposed to function.

And if you keep going, the average of your rolls will get ever closer to 100. That you can construct a specific outcome where your short-term average is below the long-term average is completely meaningless beyond proving that there is indeed a variance. You're essentially presupposing that Blizzard is using a faulty RNG.

Variance also doesn't "get applied" to anything. Variance is the deviation from the average.

I don't need to point out anything. You need to learn math and statistics, because you're making beginner's mistakes.

Originally Posted by Demeisen

I think Blizzard believes that, if you're a newbie mage throwing a bunch of fireballs at a mob, seeing 16, 14, 15 pop up instead of 15, 15, 15 is more immersive, because that makes the world feel more like a simulation than a deterministic engine.

The fact that it also makes empirical data gathering for theorycrafting purposes more time consuming is probably considered by the current dev team to be more of a feature happy coincidence than a bug.

The effect isn't really very meaningfull for theorycrafting, especially if we already know the variance. The amount of data gathering needed for various procs will eclispse that needed to handle the variance anyway.

Originally Posted by Exkrementor

Considering how essences, azerite armor, trinkets, talents and corruptions work you mean.

I dont see the point of this change but its not that bad I think. Its just odd that they bring more rng on damage into the game when Preach just told Ion a few days ago directly to his face that players hate it when they press the same buttons and get different results all the time.

Actually I noticed. Thought I thought it was an intended change.

Most people didn’t even know it was gone.

Originally Posted by Autoriot

So if it does nothing, people didn't ask for it, why add it?

Because it was something that the game already had and that was essentially removed by accident. This is more of a bugfix than a change.

Originally Posted by Aeluron Lightsong

Weapon speed doesn't need to be a thing, it wasn't really that important.

Wrong. Abilities that used weapon damage, such as MS and Seal of the Crusader could pretty much one-shot players the slower you're weapon. There's a reason 4.0 second swings have only been used once or twice., and super fast weapons were great for things like aggro or poison application.

so.. what does this do, exactly? not sure if i get cause it seems pointless

Originally Posted by Swnem

Well, you say that, but for an insignificant difference, it still consumed resources. It's pretty illogical and likely will have a performance cost as it's another dice to roll with every cast.

*shrugs* you can call uneeded criticism, but it's an uneeded change that probably cost more than it's worth. But, whatever. The change itself doesn't bother me. Just that blanket you cast to all criticism sounds well... wrong. Actually, it would make more sense to deactivate them all and gain some performance but what do i know? I should just comply eh?

My comment was just a sardonic take on the fact that, unless you isolate a single specific instance where a single spell does 5% less damage, and that loss causes a wipe that causes a guild to give up and disband, the change is largely insignificant, but people will still criticize it, because it’s what we do.

I was not trying to imply that all criticism is bad or unnecessary.

Originally Posted by Darknessvamp

So you figured out how often Blizzard wants classes

I didn't need to figure out - I read the words, the words Blizzard said.

Originally Posted by Pengalor

Then why change it? No one was complaining about the Legion system, so what is the benefit here?

Barring a deeper explanation from Blizzard, I can assume it is just for flavor.

I don't really care, but it's funny how all the people who were whining about different things, the game losing its rpg aspect being one thing, are now crying about all the rpg aspects returning to wow.

This is how you show someone's just complaining for the sake of complaining. You fulfill all their wishes.

Originally Posted by Syegfryed

so.. what does this do, exactly? not sure if i get cause it seems pointless

Basically, instead of a spell always dealing 1000 base dmg, it will now go back to dealing a random number between 950 and 1050.

I don't quite see why this is changed again. The only thing it might affect are one to three people dps checks in raid encounters (like a few paladins trying to get everyone out of jaina ice blocks). It will affect perfect play negatively and might very rarely save bad pulls where a person is dead.

We're finally losing the 15 individual procs on gear and it feels like they have to start scaling some more, seemingly pointless, randomness in. Explaining it as "this is how wow worked before so we'll arbiteraly change it back" seems like a pretty bad reason.

I don't think it'll change much. The thing that bothers me is that this came up in one of their meetings, someone brought it up and they agreed to put it back in. Surely there was a problem that they were looking solutions to? What would that be? Too little variability from pull to pull? Or is it just like weapon oils and class buffs, just existing to exist.