Let's talk about "Hybrid tax"

[Thimagryn]

You are missing the point buddy here. It is not about if "pures are as viable as hybrids in other activities" but fact, that hybrids were actually hybrids outside the raiding environment. That's why hybrid tax exists.

The tax also exists in TBC when Hybrids were still viable in all other roles. We still weren't the best tank or best DPS but we held our own and didn't have to fight other classes to get the gear we need to do it.

The tax is not the problem. It's the fact that the tax was too heavy.

[ManiaCCC]

The tax also exists in TBC when Hybrids were still viable in all other roles. We still weren't the best tank or best DPS but we held our own and didn't have to fight other classes to get the gear we need to do it.

The tax is not the problem. It's the fact that the tax was too heavy.

I am not sure if tax was the issue or just that balancing in Vanilla was horrid.

[Thimagryn]

I am not sure if tax was the issue or just that balancing in Vanilla was horrid.

The tax wasn't the problem considering it still exists in TBC and the problems many bring up were already addressed.

The balancing was horrid, but it seems like a lot of people like it that way since all it meant was the meta was shifted from Spec-based Roles to Class-based Roles. If you were Hybrid, then no matter what else you did, your main role is 'Support' because your stats generally mean shit and your single abilities like Innervate and Mark of the Wild offered more to the party than your actual DPS (mainly pre 1.8).

I don't want 1.12 to be the mainline patch for Vanilla to start on, but a lot of the issues that the latest patch addressed should apply from the start.

[CECILOFS]

Couple of things I wanted to add to this debate:

1. Vanilla WoW had a Lead Designer named Jeff Kaplan (Tigole) who is now on the Overwatch team. He came from Everquest and had a personal vendetta and hatred for Paladins in particular and hybrids in general. This personal vendetta affected the class design in Vanilla. in later expansions his ideas were overruled by other developers in light of player feedback.

2. In vanilla the true hybrid class was Warrior, since they could either tank or dps. They were the best tanks and (varying by patch) competent or top damage. In PvP they could also wreck face with Arms spec, so long as they had a pocket healer or two. They paid no hybrid tax since they weren't considered hybrids, while reaping all the benefit. This was considered fine by most players.

3. "Hybrid" was really a code word for "Healer". The healer tax is that if you had heals, you had to heal. Healing items had +healing, NOT +spell power, so they didn't benefit you at all outside of group content. Gear for DPS and tanks would benefit you outside of group content.

4. In threads like this I would like to see a rule that the poster has to identify their main class for vanilla (Mine was Druid). I suspect that most of the people who were fine with the "hybrid tax" played pure classes or warriors. People who actually played hybrids are more likely to understand the frustration with their class, unless they genuinely only ever wanted to heal. Personally I didn't mind healing sometimes, but not all the time. And being forced into it with no way to break out of the pidgeon hole was incredibly frustrating. We were sold a lie because the class select screen did not tell us that we would be healbots.

5. In terms of utility, most Hybrid utility was also brought by healing specced hybrids. For example, after the patch that changed Innervate from a 31pt Resto talent, every Druid had Innervate and Combat res. That meant the only utility a Feral or Boomkin brought was a small % crit buff to their group. I personally am fine being more of a support class (Loved Elemental in BC when I did less damage but buffed the Warlocks and Mages) as long as you actually get to play that role. If you did meaningful dps, gave the rest of the group a buff AND were able to off-heal for meaningful amounts, or off-tank for a portion of a fight, I would be totally fine with that. However, fights were not designed that way - you did one thing and one thing only, making the Hybrid Tax a slap in the face to hybrids.

6. You can argue against homogenization if you want, but in retail WoW not everyone plays Hybrids regardless of them being competitive in damage and often having more utility. Therefore the argument "Why would I play a Rogue if a druid can do as much damage?" is demonstrably FALSE. The reason is because people like playing Rogues and don't want to have to bother with tanking or healing. You won't ever get a raid full of hybrids because not that many people play hybrids. However you may see a dearth of hybrids in the relaunch of classic wow due to poor class balancing aka the "hybrid tax" (And by this I mean even fewer than were in Vanilla WoW).

A personal story: I made my epic mount money grinding pages in Silithus. It took at least a month playing a few hours every day. I was resto specced because it was too costly to spec back and forth for raids, where I was expected to heal. I had some Feral gear so I would farm in cat form. It was agonisingly slow. I would see Rogues and Mages around killing mobs in 1 or 2 hits and having almost no downtime. When I asked my guild for help, there was no response. Why would they? Farming with me would literally slow them down for no benefit (Kill mobs a bit faster, but have to share drops so overall slower progression). I even saw a Rogue from my guild farming there and they didn't want to join me (That player was particularly selfish in fairness). They were all too happy for me to heal them come raid time though. All too happy to give me healing leather and congratulate me on being able to heal them better.

If BC hadn't come along and changed the paradigm I definitely would have quit WoW.

[Mage in Pajamas]

Couple of things I wanted to add to this debate:

4. In threads like this I would like to see a rule that the poster has to identify their main class for vanilla (Mine was Druid). I suspect that most of the people who were fine with the "hybrid tax" played pure classes or warriors. People who actually played hybrids are more likely to understand the frustration with their class, unless they genuinely only ever wanted to heal. Personally I didn't mind healing sometimes, but not all the time. And being forced into it with no way to break out of the pidgeon hole was incredibly frustrating. We were sold a lie because the class select screen did not tell us that we would be healbots.

I played a Mage in Vanilla, and I actually had the most fun in 5 mans. Rather than 'wear blinders' I always kept an eye to my sheep to re-sheep when necessary. I also kept a position near the healer, so I could Frost Nova mobs if he pulled threat. I was also the principal spell-counter, since that skill was not baseline in every class. And, de-cursing was a thing until Cata iirc.

So of course I was not a hybrid class, but I thought of my role as more than just a dps-bot. I think that's the feeling Blizz was going for: having trade-offs, or pluses and minuses for each class. I think they struck the right balance with Mage but missed the mark on some other classes.

[CECILOFS]

I played a Mage in Vanilla, and I actually had the most fun in 5 mans. Rather than 'wear blinders' I always kept an eye to my sheep to re-sheep when necessary. I also kept a position near the healer, so I could Frost Nova mobs if he pulled threat. I was also the principal spell-counter, since that skill was not baseline in every class. And, de-cursing was a thing until Cata iirc.

So of course I was not a hybrid class, but I thought of my role as more than just a dps-bot. I think that's the feeling Blizz was going for: having trade-offs, or pluses and minuses for each class. I think they struck the right balance with Mage but missed the mark on some other classes.

Good post. There was more to the "pure" DPS classes than just DPS too. Look at all that utility! Mages also got portals and water. I am sure it was painful having to make water all the time but it is another reason they were wanted in groups.

[bmjclark]

Honestly the biggest problem with the hybrid tax in vanilla is that the hybrids don't even bring a whole lot of utility as their dps spec that they can't bring as a healing spec. Ret paladins bring literally nothing to the table, shamans bring some stronger totems as enhance but not really so much stronger that they're worth dropping a dps for, you might as well just have your resto shaman drop the weaker totems. Ele shamans bring nothing. Boomkins/ferals bring a 5% crit buff to 4 dps (buffs weren't raid wide remember). Shadow priest brings 15% shadow damage and are really the only hybrid worth having 1 of. Meanwhile the hybrids do significantly less damage than an actual pure damage dealer.

TBC largely fixed the issues by making hybrids do more reasonable damage and also bring more substantial buffs.

[bufferunderrun]

The tax also exists in TBC when Hybrids were still viable in all other roles. We still weren't the best tank or best DPS but we held our own and didn't have to fight other classes to get the gear we need to do it.

The tax is not the problem. It's the fact that the tax was too heavy.

the tax in tbc was basically half and half, while it's true that more spec got balanced for raiding is totally untrue that all were viable, it was a better situation than classic was but not even nearly comparable to today level o viability.

In vanilla the hybrid tax was there because blizzard balanced out their flexibility in all the various aspect of the game.

[Thimagryn]

the tax in tbc was basically half and half, while it's true that more spec got balanced for raiding is totally untrue that all were viable, it was a better situation than classic was but not even nearly comparable to today level o viability.

In vanilla the hybrid tax was there because blizzard balanced out their flexibility in all the various aspect of the game.

Well let's discuss this then.

Which classes/specs were not viable for raiding for Hybrids, what patch cycle/raid was affected, and what is the expectation (your opinion) of what Hybrid Tax should be in terms of viability.

The thing about Hybrid Tax is that it's basically on anyone that has a heal spell. As some have mentioned, even Warriors are hybrids considering they can Tank and DPS in the same way that a Hybrid would be able to Tank and DPS. The difference is the tax is on those who have heals, considering a Warrior DPS is not being taxed (heavily) just because they can put on a shield and off-tank when the situation calls for it. For Hybrid DPS/Tank, the gameplay doesn't support them healing while performing a DPS/Tank role. Shapeshifting alone takes up 30% of our mana! Heals take up too much mana or are infrequent enough that they aren't sustainable when you need heals.

To be clear, I'm not saying Hybrids should deal equal DPS to a Warrior or Pures because 'they can't heal in their DPS specs'. I'm pointing out that 'flexibility' doesn't exist when a Hybrid DPS/Tank can't heal effectively (or at all). The stats simply don't support flexible healing gameplay. If it did, then we can talk, but until my Feral Druid can cast his free-heal procs in Cat Form or shapeshift doesn't take mana, then there's no reason to have heavy Hybrid Tax as it existed pre-1.12. The Int and Spirit on Pally/Druid gear doesn't make off-healing viable, and the Str/Dex doesn't help healing at all. It's a 2-way tax for a gameplay style that simply doesn't exist.

https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads...1#post48668908

This post outlines the problem clearly. We are being taxed for something we can't even do but everyone thinks that we can.

The direction in TBC happened to be 'Hybrid DPS can't effectively heal, therefore we won't tax their gear with Int/Spirit and give them stats they can use'. This included making each point of Str and Agi give 2 pts of damage (like pures) rather than the hybrid tax of 1. If 'Hybrid DPS should only be flexible Support because they have heals' is the core design we want to keep, then I think Hybrid DPS should be redesigned to effectively perform heals while DPSing. Right now in Vanilla, neither of that exists, and the design doesn't support any Hybrid gameplay other than pure Healer (pre 1.12). The tax needs to be addressed, that's the point because the design doesn't support it.

The tax was not only on Tank/DPS but also on Healers (Str/Dex wasted on gear, lack of +heal plate/leather early on), which made our core support abilities the only reason to be brought since we were so inefficient at everything else we did. That would be like putting a tax on Mages for having Polymorph CC, then bringing them to raids only because they offered that unique CC. It's not a case of 'well everyone is not viable' or 'not everything is equal and fair'; rather it's an arbitrary design tax where it doesn't exist elsewhere. Mages can't heal, true. But neither could Hybrid DPS.

[Soon-TM]

^

They (hybrids) could, though. Especially in PvP, where chickens and enhance shammies were able to global people without using CDs and could heal decently. Spriests were also very strong in PvP.

[Thimagryn]

^

They (hybrids) could, though. Especially in PvP, where chickens and enhance shammies were able to global people without using CDs and could heal decently. Spriests were also very strong in PvP.

PVP is a slightly different conversation though since it's affected differently by Hybrid Tax. With PVP, it's a case of what works and what doesn't. Roles aren't clear-cut and versatility/flexibility is promoted, whereas in PVE flexibility isn't as effective due to the Holy Trinity structure. You are expected to perform a role, and if you aren't able to perform any role effectively you are deemed 'Support'.

PVE conditions are different in that if you're tanking a mob, you're tanking that mob. You need the right stats to prevent getting crushed (or to survive it), you likely have dedicated healers on you, and PVE Elites being fought over minutes greatly devalues the usefulness of cooldowns. As a Bear Druid, if I fight a Mage I can stun and free-heal away their burst damage and change the fight; where power-shifting while off-tanking only puts the raid at risk and the long cooldown on free-heal isn't worth risking. The hybrid tax isn't applied the same way, and even then it varied greatly from patch to patch in Vanilla.

Boomkins weren't even viable pre 1.8, so even your example only applied to the latter half of Vanilla and nothing prior to that. A significant part of the discussion is addressing hybrids in the first half of Vanilla.

[Dragonzbane]

The significant time commitment that went into leveling a character from level 1 to 60 cuts both ways. You can't claim that it was all dread for the hybrid classes only, that they would hit 60 and not be able to do much more than healing in raids, except for the token one off shadow priest or enhance shaman. The initial goal was to make the class as a whole desirable for raid spot, not just the particular specc. How fun would it have been to level your rogue or mage to level 60, and see 10 raid spots go off to the paladins, 3 of whom are filling your desired DPS spot.

Everyone who actually played a Hybrid class for anything other than Healing can say exactly that.
Did you do any Progression Raiding on a Hybrid Class?

I was in a Guild pushing for server firsts all the way through the end of Naxx when our 3 MT Warriors left to farm gear to level in BC with.

You're argument about DPS classes losing spots is as much of a fallacy now as it was then.

There has never been a Progression Raid that stacked Paladins for example.
We have seen Locks and Rogues Stacked at different points throughout the years.

And once you consider that Warriors were a Hybrid Class and the only one that could really play more than one roll through 90% of Vanilla, it makes any argument for other Hybrid classes fall apart.

If all three paladin speccs are equally viable, in line with that of other melee dps such as rogues and fury warriors and in line with tanks such as protection warrior and feral druid. Paladins will inevitably start picking up more raid spots, as they are already claiming a sizable amount of healing spots by default.

Warriors are Hybrids.
Why could they Tank or DPS when other Hybrids couldn't?

You sound like someone that never played Vanilla or played a Warrior.
(Or Rogue or Mage)

So leveling to 60 with your paladin only to realize you can only heal, is not any worse than leveling your rogue to 60 realize your class is severely overpopulated. Where only the most dedicated and skilled Rogues can even hope to be invited to a guild should they not be in one already. But even if you end up being invited to one, you're pretty much forced to bend over backwards to keep your spot. At least until you get some history with your guild.

Failed argument, again.

[Soon-TM]

PVP is a slightly different conversation though since it's affected differently by Hybrid Tax. With PVP, it's a case of what works and what doesn't. Roles aren't clear-cut and versatility/flexibility is promoted, whereas in PVE flexibility isn't as effective due to the Holy Trinity structure. You are expected to perform a role, and if you aren't able to perform any role effectively you are deemed 'Support'.

PVE conditions are different in that if you're tanking a mob, you're tanking that mob. You need the right stats to prevent getting crushed (or to survive it), you likely have dedicated healers on you, and PVE Elites being fought over minutes greatly devalues the usefulness of cooldowns. As a Bear Druid, if I fight a Mage I can stun and free-heal away their burst damage and change the fight; where power-shifting while off-tanking only puts the raid at risk and the long cooldown on free-heal isn't worth risking. The hybrid tax isn't applied the same way, and even then it varied greatly from patch to patch in Vanilla.

Boomkins weren't even viable pre 1.8, so even your example only applied to the latter half of Vanilla and nothing prior to that. A significant part of the discussion is addressing hybrids in the first half of Vanilla.

The problem is twofold: 1) if you buff hybrid specs for PvE, they will mop the floor with everyone else in PvP. And 2) assuming that 1) is solved somehow, what percentage of pure DPS should a hybrid have? If it's less than 100%, there is still no reason to bring him over a pure. If it's 100%, pures are rendered obsolete in PvE, since they tend to have way less utility than hybrids. It's not as simple as "just buff Ret cuz MUH DEEPZ".

[Thimagryn]

1) Pvp and pve can be balanced separately. They have the tools to manage this. No reason why cat dps abilities have to deal the same damage to mobs as to players.

2) TBC answered that. Not a perfect model by any means, but it was viable, fun and still had hybrid tax and support. Thats the kind of class parity we're talking about, but it doesn't have to use the TBC model or mechanics to achieve it. Also pures have plenty of utility like CC, self sustain, damage avoidance and more. Would you tax a mage's dps because they have polymorph? CC is also utility. So are soulstones. So is portal summons and city portals. So is magefood.

If buffing hybrids having DPS was a bad thing, then everyone would be shitting on TBC and Wrath. Hybrid tax was not something that made Vanilla good or something positive to be remembered. It was about the hard effort you put in.

[bufferunderrun]

Well let's discuss this then.

Which classes/specs were not viable for raiding for Hybrids, what patch cycle/raid was affected, and what is the expectation (your opinion) of what Hybrid Tax should be in terms of viability.

The thing about Hybrid Tax is that it's basically on anyone that has a heal spell. As some have mentioned, even Warriors are hybrids considering they can Tank and DPS in the same way that a Hybrid would be able to Tank and DPS. The difference is the tax is on those who have heals, considering a Warrior DPS is not being taxed (heavily) just because they can put on a shield and off-tank when the situation calls for it. For Hybrid DPS/Tank, the gameplay doesn't support them healing while performing a DPS/Tank role. Shapeshifting alone takes up 30% of our mana! Heals take up too much mana or are infrequent enough that they aren't sustainable when you need heals.

To be clear, I'm not saying Hybrids should deal equal DPS to a Warrior or Pures because 'they can't heal in their DPS specs'. I'm pointing out that 'flexibility' doesn't exist when a Hybrid DPS/Tank can't heal effectively (or at all). The stats simply don't support flexible healing gameplay. If it did, then we can talk, but until my Feral Druid can cast his free-heal procs in Cat Form or shapeshift doesn't take mana, then there's no reason to have heavy Hybrid Tax as it existed pre-1.12. The Int and Spirit on Pally/Druid gear doesn't make off-healing viable, and the Str/Dex doesn't help healing at all. It's a 2-way tax for a gameplay style that simply doesn't exist.

https://www.mmo-champion.com/threads...1#post48668908

This post outlines the problem clearly. We are being taxed for something we can't even do but everyone thinks that we can.

The direction in TBC happened to be 'Hybrid DPS can't effectively heal, therefore we won't tax their gear with Int/Spirit and give them stats they can use'. This included making each point of Str and Agi give 2 pts of damage (like pures) rather than the hybrid tax of 1. If 'Hybrid DPS should only be flexible Support because they have heals' is the core design we want to keep, then I think Hybrid DPS should be redesigned to effectively perform heals while DPSing. Right now in Vanilla, neither of that exists, and the design doesn't support any Hybrid gameplay other than pure Healer (pre 1.12). The tax needs to be addressed, that's the point because the design doesn't support it.

The tax was not only on Tank/DPS but also on Healers (Str/Dex wasted on gear, lack of +heal plate/leather early on), which made our core support abilities the only reason to be brought since we were so inefficient at everything else we did. That would be like putting a tax on Mages for having Polymorph CC, then bringing them to raids only because they offered that unique CC. It's not a case of 'well everyone is not viable' or 'not everything is equal and fair'; rather it's an arbitrary design tax where it doesn't exist elsewhere. Mages can't heal, true. But neither could Hybrid DPS.

again you still focus only on raiding that is wrong from vanilla pow, an hybrid had advantage for example in pvp or levelling or farming golds today this isn't worth the loss of 1-2% of dps but back then it was valuable so it was taxed.

the direction tbc went is the progressive reduction of those rpg game aspec in favor of raiding, every spec has progressively lost some ability in favor of more viability to where we are today, everyone is able to raid and everything beside raid amount to a chore. Today hybrid are not worth more than pure, first because everything beside raiding is absolutely dull, second because gear come in great quantity so you don't need any resourceful trick to accomplish a duty and last because alts are so common that it's basically more efficient to have a different character for a different role than respeccing the main.

[Soon-TM]

1) Pvp and pve can be balanced separately. They have the tools to manage this. No reason why cat dps abilities have to deal the same damage to mobs as to players.

2) TBC answered that. Not a perfect model by any means, but it was viable, fun and still had hybrid tax and support. Thats the kind of class parity we're talking about, but it doesn't have to use the TBC model or mechanics to achieve it. Also pures have plenty of utility like CC, self sustain, damage avoidance and more. Would you tax a mage's dps because they have polymorph? CC is also utility. So are soulstones. So is portal summons and city portals. So is magefood.

If buffing hybrids having DPS was a bad thing, then everyone would be shitting on TBC and Wrath. Hybrid tax was not something that made Vanilla good or something positive to be remembered. It was about the hard effort you put in.

There is nothing wrong with either BC or WotLK, but that's simply non-Vanilla gameplay. Hybrids were progressively buffed DPS wise, and nerfed utility wise, and voilà Legion. You don't want Classic to be a patchwork of features from all the following xpacs, do you?

[Thimagryn]

There is nothing wrong with either BC or WotLK, but that's simply non-Vanilla gameplay. Hybrids were progressively buffed DPS wise, and nerfed utility wise, and voilà Legion. You don't want Classic to be a patchwork of features from all the following xpacs, do you?

I don't understand what part of the utility was nerfed, could you elaborate? Having played a Hybrid throughout and having focused on Feral since Vanilla, I don't necessarily see what utility was lost in having gained a boost in DPS. I was still able to quick-cast heals, still able to off-tank in Feral, still able to pop innervates (even though it was less needed since everyone got mana replenish mechanics) and still able to decurse, root and hibernate.

- - - Updated - - -

again you still focus only on raiding that is wrong from vanilla pow, an hybrid had advantage for example in pvp or levelling or farming golds today this isn't worth the loss of 1-2% of dps but back then it was valuable so it was taxed.

Which is inconsistent to the game in general considering the tax exists on raid gear. It's a major component to why hybrids suffer early raids in Vanilla - lack of proper itemization. This actually got better in later raids in Vanilla so the tax is inconsistent to your argument here.

"Welcome to end game! You got here first! Now suck it up cuz you won't be able to perform your role because your gear from here on will suck. Have fun buffing other classes in raids!"

I'm focusing on raids because that is where the hybrid tax affects the most. And no, the utility doesn't boost killing speed at all considering a Rogue and Mage are way more efficient at taking down mobs while Druids are balanced out by having less downtime because we can heal but kill at a slower speed. Again, the DPS tax is already integrated by the fact that our DPS stats gain less per point than a Pure (until later patch changes).

[Charge me Doctor]

Well let's discuss this then.

Which classes/specs were not viable for raiding for Hybrids, what patch cycle/raid was affected, and what is the expectation (your opinion) of what Hybrid Tax should be in terms of viability.

Before one-handers rebalance that happened in 1.5 or 1.8 ret paladins actually could do decent amount of damage (compared to other melee), because they were able to use two-handers.

[Soon-TM]

Hybrids in Vanilla: decent heals, strong utility, bad damage.

Hybrids in BC: crutch heals, strong utility, mediocre damage.

Hybrids in WotLK+ : trivial, then non existent heals, no utility (in the sense that all their unique utility tricks were given to pures as well) good damage.

Hybrids in Legion: they don't exist, for all intents. E.g. Ret Paladin can't heal, can't buff, can't offtank.

It was a quite logical progression, i.e. no slippery slope bonkers.

[Charge me Doctor]

Hybrids in Vanilla: decent heals, strong utility, bad damage.

Hybrids in BC: crutch heals, strong utility, mediocre damage.

Hybrids in WotLK+ : trivial, then non existent heals, no utility (in the sense that all their unique utility tricks were given to pures as well) good damage.

Hybrids in Legion: they don't exist, for all intents. E.g. Ret Paladin can't heal, can't buff, can't offtank.

It was a quite logical progression, i.e. no slippery slope bonkers.

Selfless healer. You are so wrong