Can't Add New Abilities Every Expansion ...

[Soon-TM]

Why? I guess to reduce the skill gap?

I guess so. Which is frankly dumb, considering that there are now four !@#$ing raid difficulties to choose from.

[Gardoc]

If you get spell locked, you either didn't stop casting to avoid a boss ability, or failed to successfully juke a pvp spell interrupt by interrupting your own cast on purpose. Therefore, you made a mistake. You cannot "randomly" become spell locked. If you made a mistake, your consequence is being unable to cast spells for 3-5 seconds. Be glad you're not stunned.

And consequence of this is lowering skill cap and dumbing down the class. Instead of reacting properly to the situation, you can't do nothing. So there's no difference between a good and a bad player, because neither of them can't react to this situation.

[Deleted]

yeah i know that, but that still means minor changes to classes, nothing big or huge, but its obvious there is still some changes coming and minor changes can change a whole spec.

Yeah, I think that's true; some tweaks should still be expected, as we've always seen from the design team.

The only thing I find disagreeable in your statement is that there might be some minor changes that alter a whole spec. I just don't see that happening, given the statement that "... we're close to finished with... the look and feel for most specs" (and including the history of previous testing cycles). The MO is pretty sensible, in that the overarching design is completed pre-alpha, it's tweaked within the alpha/early beta cycle, and then refined and tuned during the late beta.

Ultimately, I think the Warlords development pipeline told us that this team isn't interested in feedback about the nuts and bolts of their specs and how they function - merely how they might be slightly amended, or how talents work. Testers can have an influence on the trim colour of the car, or maybe the type of seats (from a pre-determined choice of two), but certainly not the clutch, brakes or accelerator.

I think once we understand that, we can provide more actionable feedback.

As a result, my testing has largely revolved around just how amazing straight-back orcs are.

Answer?

Frigging, super, top-tastically amazing. Maybe a smidgen more.

And consequence of this is lowering skill cap and dumbing down the class. Instead of reacting properly to the situation, you can't do nothing. So there's no difference between a good and a bad player, because neither of them can't react to this situation.

I think you've misunderstood. If you reacted properly, you can still cast... Compared to reacting improperly, and being silenced.

[Yatagarasu]

Lets just all agree that apart from a few exceptions class design in bfa looks extremely boring, and exceptions usually confirms the rule. They still have some time,but I doubt anything will be done and we will be playing same thing for another 1-2 years like in Legion. Not that legion builds were bad, not at all, it just became boring thats all. And there is no need for 3 new abilities, just maybe change some passives or add 1 ability into rotation. My frost dk main will not be my main anymore if it remains the same, no, even worse than legion, because fdk has so much utility,defense and damage from artifact. Bye-Bye Sindragosa...

[Gardoc]

Yeah, I think that's true; some tweaks should still be expected, as we've always seen from the design team.

The only thing I find disagreeable in your statement is that there might be some minor changes that alter a whole spec. I just don't see that happening, given the statement that "... we're close to finished with... the look and feel for most specs" (and including the history of previous testing cycles). The MO is pretty sensible, in that the overarching design is completed pre-alpha, it's tweaked within the alpha/early beta cycle, and then refined and tuned during the late beta.

Ultimately, I think the Warlords development pipeline told us that this team isn't interested in feedback about the nuts and bolts of their specs and how they function - merely how they might be slightly amended, or how talents work. Testers can have an influence on the trim colour of the car, or maybe the type of seats (from a pre-determined choice of two), but certainly not the clutch, brakes or accelerator.

I think once we understand that, we can provide more actionable feedback.

As a result, my testing has largely revolved around just how amazing straight-back orcs are.

Answer?

Frigging, super, top-tastically amazing. Maybe a smidgen more.


I think you've misunderstood. If you reacted properly, you can still cast... Compared to reacting improperly, and being silenced.

You've misunderstood. I'm talking about reaction to being kicked. And kick is not silence.
Great example is WotLK frost mage vs frost mage duel. It was all about baiting kick in the school of magic you wanted. For instance you could start damaging by casting arcane blast, which dealt a lot of damage after two stacks (but cost you a lot of mana), but you were risking getting locked in arcane, which meant no blink/cs for you, so the other mage could deep freeze and shatter you, which was huge burst. Or you could bait kick in frost, pop icy veins for reduced push back and evocate yourself to full health. Or you could track enemy cs cooldown, damage him with frostbolts and the second he got his cs you suddenly started casting scorch and before he realized that you are no longer casting frostbolt, he locked you in fire. And the list goes on.
All these things are removed now and the skill cap is removed with them. Now the only interesting thing about kicks is fake casting.

[Pandragon]

I got the most triggered when they removed abilities because people "don't use them very often" like void shift for priest and clash for brewmaster. These were actually amazing abilities that were clutch in certain situations; just because the majority doesn't use them often/properly doesn't mean they shouldn't exist..

The only place where Clash was clutch was in pvp. In 1 RBG I used it to pull the EFC away from my teams flag, get me closer, leg sweep him to stun and rolled into the cap for the win.

Generally, Clash was completely useless. It didn't work on anything immune to cc. It didn't even work on bosses, it basically just acted as a second taunt to initially pull a boss. It was buggy. It was also completely redundant as monks have so much movement to begin with.

[Monte Baldo]

With all technical abilities Blizzard has, it never occurred to them to ask the player base what they want? To me 90% of the player base would NOT mind playing with the same abilities all the time instead of learning to play their class anew every expansion.

[Cosmic Janitor]

They should have just added another talent tier. Instead of giving the legion skills/talents in a way that allows you to choose between them, you essentially get to choose the new stuff or some of the very important old stuff.

[Gaidax]

I think their reasoning is fine. We already had Cata which was basically having a baggage of shit gathered from years of rampant adding stuff, which resulted in completely nonsensical priority lists, which more resembled a catfight gameplay as opposed to some coherent theme and gameplay going on.

I like lean specs that make sense and don't have this moar abilityz hard-on, been there and did not like that mess any.

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With all technical abilities Blizzard has, it never occurred to them to ask the player base what they want? To me 90% of the player base would NOT mind playing with the same abilities all the time instead of learning to play their class anew every expansion.

Ahah, from my 13 years playing WoW - playerbase has no fucking idea what it wants. It sure likes to pretend it does though.

[Monte Baldo]

Ahah, from my 13 years playing WoW - playerbase has no fucking idea what it wants. It sure likes to pretend it does though.

Look at this website for example, do you even dare to say that this a good representation of the player base? Of course not. It is just a very small minority fighting over things the majority isn't even interested in. I want to even make this bold claim: 90% of the playerbase plays 2 hours per week at max and is content with anything Blizzard will give them. So if Blizzard doesn't change abilities but puts all those hours in a better story, they would be as happy.

[Niwes]

dont know how many ppl also played this game since 13 years without interuption, but they handled all that stuff in vanilla, TBC, Wotlk, Cata and MoP very well.

And also on or after first expansion they had too many abilities, if they just added ones. Most of the time they just restructured a lot on the classes. And that was a big part of the fun and hype for new xpacs. They always did that relatively well (very well overall, with some expections at certain classes). they dont talk about such problems they talk today, even when at this time there was already the same starting bases given.

So, why is this ?

Its just about greed, milking the cow and cost effective development. as long as they loose not more players (or more profit through less players, but with more tokens and services income) as long they can stretch stuff and look how it goes. all that ability bloat problem nonsense is just a halfassed explanation to not say „we look how less we can invest while also producing same profit“.

its marketing. thats all. ironically themselfes proofed in the past often enough, that there is in reality no such problem. but hey, we will see us in BfA anyway, right ?

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thats isnt exactly new

blizzard came out and said that the number 1 reason that people leave the game since the beginning of the game is changing their classes/specs


Now why blizzard, even after saying that, goes with the buffonerry to change classes every xpac with assumptions like "its boring" or "not enough buttons to press" its beyond me.

if you look at the last few xpacs, the time blizzard was focused on longterm paying customers and a stable customer base is loooong over. they realized years ago that ppl get older and leave the game for various reasons. but every day a new 12-16 year old guy is born. so they instead cater to the „we play the game 6-9 months and leave forever“ crowd, with more easy accesible structures. thats the reason why many ppl feel like wow become an action adventure instead mmorpg, and why classes are more easy, simpler, more accesible.

ppl have to understand that these days companies like blizz, and especially blizz, focus on quarter numbers, short distance big hits, enduring changing player bases and cost effective development. instead on long term investment and a stable loyal customer base.

[Deleted]

You've misunderstood. I'm talking about reaction to being kicked. And kick is not silence.
Great example is WotLK frost mage vs frost mage duel. It was all about baiting kick in the school of magic you wanted. For instance you could start damaging by casting arcane blast, which dealt a lot of damage after two stacks (but cost you a lot of mana), but you were risking getting locked in arcane, which meant no blink/cs for you, so the other mage could deep freeze and shatter you, which was huge burst. Or you could bait kick in frost, pop icy veins for reduced push back and evocate yourself to full health. Or you could track enemy cs cooldown, damage him with frostbolts and the second he got his cs you suddenly started casting scorch and before he realized that you are no longer casting frostbolt, he locked you in fire. And the list goes on.
All these things are removed now and the skill cap is removed with them. Now the only interesting thing about kicks is fake casting.

The problem here is twofold:

1) You've changed the subject.
2) A mage versus mage duel isn't an especially compelling argument for... Well, for anything really.

but every day a new 12-16 year old guy is born.

Haha, I read that really wrong the first time and got a good laugh about it. I know what you mean.

But, ultimately, your point is pretty solid. When Ion Hazzikostas referenced the cyclical approach to subscription maintenance a few years back, he effectively confessed that the goal wasn't to keep people subscribed for the duration of an expansion. When you understand that, a lot of design decisions make more sense.

That said, the first part of your post doesn't really make any sense. Good or bad class design simply isn't influenced by economics.

[glowpipe]

Having way to many abilities is not fun for anyone. But neither is being stuck with basically the same class for ages

[Gardoc]

The problem here is twofold:

1) You've changed the subject.
2) A mage versus mage duel isn't an especially compelling argument for... Well, for anything really.


Haha, I read that really wrong the first time and got a good laugh about it. I know what you mean.

But, ultimately, your point is pretty solid. When Ion Hazzikostas referenced the cyclical approach to subscription maintenance a few years back, he effectively confessed that the goal wasn't to keep people subscribed for the duration of an expansion. When you understand that, a lot of design decisions make more sense.

That said, the first part of your post doesn't really make any sense. Good or bad class design simply isn't influenced by economics.

The subject is still the same - "kick = not being able to cast anything" is not a good kind of punishment as it removes skill cap and the mage vs mage duel is a great example of that.

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Having way to many abilities is not fun for anyone. But neither is being stuck with basically the same class for ages

The problem is that WoW never had "too many abillities". But now we're stuck with not enough abillities and that isn't fun either.

[Niwes]

The problem here is twofold:

1) You've changed the subject.
2) A mage versus mage duel isn't an especially compelling argument for... Well, for anything really.


Haha, I read that really wrong the first time and got a good laugh about it. I know what you mean.

But, ultimately, your point is pretty solid. When Ion Hazzikostas referenced the cyclical approach to subscription maintenance a few years back, he effectively confessed that the goal wasn't to keep people subscribed for the duration of an expansion. When you understand that, a lot of design decisions make more sense.

That said, the first part of your post doesn't really make any sense. Good or bad class design simply isn't influenced by economics.

i agree to „good or bad class design isnt influenced by economics“ overall. but i have 2 points here:

1)
if you invest less enough into class design, so you just can not longer guarantee enough quality, it ofc influences class design. bad class design CAN (not must) be ofc the result of low investment and therefore is dependent on economics.

2)
„good“ or „bad“ class design is a bit vague. an objectively bad class design could exist, even with a super striped down 3 button class, when it is clunky or not well thought etc. in this case it is really „bad“ class design.

but some ppl call a good, wellformed, nonclunky super striped 3 button class a „bad“ design, because it is boring, they do not like it, or they do not like simple classes in general. that is a subjective „bad“ class design and dependent on the point of view.

first variant, is not discussable. but the second variant could be a design descission for the same reasons we talked about before: cost effective development and easier and faster accesibility for new or enduring changing players. if they focus on that way of designing the game, then maybe is „bad“ just bad from our point of view (and from mine it is) but not bad objectively or in general.

so, what some call „bad class design“ CAN be just a totally calculated design descission by blizzard, that profit them more money and fits more into their modern structure of handling the playerbase. but we will never know, because we have no data.

[Deleted]

1)
if you invest less enough into class design, so you just can not longer guarantee enough quality, it ofc influences class design. bad class design CAN (not must) be ofc the result of low investment and therefore is dependent on economics.

But that's not the reality.

The class design team has reputedly never been larger, and they're all paid competitive salaries. There are other teams that have an input now, too, such as QA, production and of course the PvP, encounter and systems designers. It's not a lack of investment that's causing the problem.

On the flip side, your class is your avatar in the game world - therefore, it influences every aspect of the game, no matter your preference. If the design is bad across the board, then it's possible that a player will unsubscribe because the entire experience is tainted as a result of it. It's just not practical, or in line with the circumstantial evidence, to suggest that a lack of investment is hurting class design.

2)
„good“ or „bad“ class design is a bit vague.

It is, yeah. What's fun for one person isn't necessarily fun for another. That having been said, there are numerous examples of objectively bad class design.

- When a spec is proc-dependent, rather than proc-enhanced.
- When a spec has filler abilities that conflict with one another.
- When a spec has unintended AoE spells as part of the rotation.
- When a spec has procs that are a DPS loss.

There are more, but these are just some examples. In the near recent history, some specs have had almost all of these problems and were still not given significant work until the expansion was over. The issue is that the game now has a total of 36 specs that the designers are trying to make work, which is something the original team didn't have to contend with, and they're also looking to make each unique and play slightly differently.

What frustrates me, ultimately, is the amount of solid, logical and constructive feedback that gets ignored. It might be an issue of how that feedback is relayed to the design team, or whether the investment is worth the payoff, but it's annoying nonetheless.

so, what some call „bad class design“ CAN be just a totally calculated design descission by blizzard, that profit them more money and fits more into their modern structure of handling the playerbase. but we will never know, because we have no data.

I'm sorry, I just don't buy into this.

Suggesting that objectively bad class design is a calculated decision by the bean-counters crosses the threshold into hyperbole.

[nexellent]

Of course you can, but at the end of the day it is their game and they're free to do what they want. Sometimes complaining can be influencial when it's in mass, but a majority of the time it's just typical of the player base to whine about everything.



From that perspective I totally understand, as I found it strange they didn't add a row of 120 talents (as I do think we're due a new row by now). Although they are adding stuff back in, things are still subject to change. But i'll 100% go and see what war mode is like with that new row.

it’s not their game, all the old devs are long gone, and it’s clear the current devs have no respect for the game they inherited.

[THEORACLE64]

it’s not their game, all the old devs are long gone, and it’s clear the current devs have no respect for the game they inherited.

That still makes it their game tho. They're the developers, they develop it. Of course different leads are going to have different views on how the game goes, but that's the name of the game when new people come and go. It's the same with anything.

[Niwes]

but blizzard is doing this shit since day 1 vanilla

this is COMPLETELY false. or you have played a TOTALLY another game the last 13 years, than i did.

[Nefarious Tea]

And consequence of this is lowering skill cap and dumbing down the class. Instead of reacting properly to the situation, you can't do nothing. So there's no difference between a good and a bad player, because neither of them can't react to this situation.

The difference is that the good player won’t get into that situation in the first place. If I land a kick on a mage in pvp you shouldn’t be able to just keep casting.