New Ion Hazzikostas intervew

[Super Kami Dende]

Being able to change gear around—to have the trash set, the set for this boss, the defensive set for this boss, in some ways it makes decisions less interesting, because there’s clearly a single right answer for each of those niche situations, versus thinking about the dungeon in its totality and coming up with a balanced solution for that.

"Makes decisions less interesting....so we take away all the decisions and lock you into a single spec/gear for the entire run"

Wut? Does he actually believe this bullshit? What is this unhealthy fixation with taking away options and decisions and choices?

Of course you would completely miss his point just to get your daily outrage out.

They aren't taking away decisions at all. That is his entire point, if you know that you just have to use a certain set for each different encounter that is literally having no decisions since you are literally just using the one set you know you have to. But having to make a set that will work over the entire Dungeon without changing does require far more decisions, since you have to decide what part of the dungeon is more important to gear towards, which talents will have a greater impact against certain bosses/trash etc etc.

[Deleted]

Being able to change gear around—to have the trash set, the set for this boss, the defensive set for this boss, in some ways it makes decisions less interesting, because there’s clearly a single right answer for each of those niche situations, versus thinking about the dungeon in its totality and coming up with a balanced solution for that.

"Makes decisions less interesting....so we take away all the decisions and lock you into a single spec/gear for the entire run"

Wut? Does he actually believe this bullshit? What is this unhealthy fixation with taking away options and decisions and choices?

I hate the direction they're taking a lot of things with pruned abilities and simplified class design, but Ion is completely right on that point. Having 2 sets of gear, one heaving in stat X and one heavy in stat Y because X is best for ST and Y is best for AOE and pressing a gear swap button between packs / bosses isn't a decision or a choice, it's just optimal.

Having to think about what the dungeon consists of and what affixes you have that week and making a gear set that has a mix of what's best for the job IS a decision and a choice that has some degree of impact, though if Blizzard are making ilvl king in all circumstances, which is another thing said in the interview, I guess only trinkets will matter.

Even IF you want to pretend that swapping on the fly is optimal, Legendaries are gone, there's nothing remotely interesting to gear swap for bar stat priorities, which are also killed via ilvl being king - at most you lose trinkets, right?


Ilevel being king and mythic opening up cross-realm so quickly are things that worry me, but gearswapping in a M+ is one of the most idiotic things to get mad about this interview, let alone expansion.

[Onikaroshi]

Of course you would completely miss his point just to get your daily outrage out.

They aren't taking away decisions at all. That is his entire point, if you know that you just have to use a certain set for each different encounter that is literally having no decisions since you are literally just using the one set you know you have to. But having to make a set that will work over the entire Dungeon without changing does require far more decisions, since you have to decide what part of the dungeon is more important to gear towards, which talents will have a greater impact against certain bosses/trash etc etc.

And what the rest of your team is good at. If anything the "press button, change gear, because boss" crowd is more of the "durr...which end is pointy?" So much more to plan around.

[shaunika123]

Of course you would completely miss his point just to get your daily outrage out.

They aren't taking away decisions at all. That is his entire point, if you know that you just have to use a certain set for each different encounter that is literally having no decisions since you are literally just using the one set you know you have to. But having to make a set that will work over the entire Dungeon without changing does require far more decisions, since you have to decide what part of the dungeon is more important to gear towards, which talents will have a greater impact against certain bosses/trash etc etc.

yeah, for the first 2 days of the expac
then you go on discord "guys whats best gear combo for m+"
find your answer and stick with that for 2 years.

insane choices.

whereas on the fly adapting, even with premade gears, requires actual thought and recognition.

it also made the dungeon feel less monotonous and more dynamic, since different gearsets altered your playstyle at least somewhat, so you were always doing stuff differently.

anyone who thinks that the reason its being removed is not to cater to casuals who are too lazy to make gearsets and swap them during a dungeon, is deluding themselves.

oh and for "esports lul" reasons.

not to mention many classes will be absolute garbage without it. because certain stuff bandaided their AOE/ST into being good.

[Keltas]

They're not really "rare" though. People have 5/6 of the same slot, its the trading that BS.

Trading is absolutely needed for raid pieces, otherwise you could go entire tiers without getting an azerite slot filled (which would feel like shit).


But dungeons need azerite gear to drop from them. The weekly chest is a single piece a week, and there is a very very real chance you go the ENTIRE expansion without getting a specific piece. With how strong certain traits are, and how weak others are, it's going to mirror early legendaries.

X person will get the amazing piece and do 10+% more dps week one, while X person in the same guild gets a garbage piece (or no piece) and does substantially less, purely because of RNG. It felt terrible, it'll still feel terrible, and they will take 3+ patches to fix it again and say "well it just didn't work out like we wanted".

The only saving grace is that there is potentially multiple pieces with the same traits, but it's not common and more of an outlier.

Edit: And the chance to just outright not get a piece at all for months is pretty easily possible too. Imagine going into the second tier with a blue or lfr helmet after 14 weeks.

Not allowing people to grind out the pieces they want/need is just fucking stupid. They need to stop doing it. It feels bad for everyone. There is no logical reason or explanation to fuck people over like this.

[rhorle]

seriously if you've played wow for 14 years you've lived in an era where you had one shot for an item every week and only 2 dropped for 40 people.

The rogue in my guild during TBC never saw the gruul trinket drop the entire expansion.

[Aerisot]

I can't believe it has been 14 yrs sinc eth game game out and Guilds still don't have a Garrison of their own.

[Onikaroshi]

Ilevel being king and mythic opening up cross-realm so quickly.

Ilvl will never be king for all specs/classes, there's just no way and they should probably just stop trying. And I don't think Mythic will open cross realm as quickly as you think, it'll still be months, specially with 100 alliance guilds as part of the requirement. Though I don't really see how that impacts anything besides "MY SERVER!"

[rhorle]

whereas on the fly adapting, even with premade gears, requires actual thought and recognition.

You mean where you go on discord and say "Guys what is the best gear sets for M+?". Yep so totally different.

[Onikaroshi]

Trading is absolutely needed for raid pieces, otherwise you could go entire tiers without getting an azerite slot filled (which would feel like shit).


But dungeons need azerite gear to drop from them. The weekly chest is a single piece a week, and there is a very very real chance you go the ENTIRE expansion without getting a specific piece. With how strong certain traits are, and how weak others are, it's going to mirror early legendaries.

X person will get the amazing piece and do 10+% more dps week one, while X person in the same guild gets a garbage piece (or no piece) and does substantially less, purely because of RNG. It felt terrible, it'll still feel terrible, and they will take 3+ patches to fix it again and say "well it just didn't work out like we wanted".

The only saving grace is that there is potentially multiple pieces with the same traits, but it's not common and more of an outlier.

Edit: And the chance to just outright not get a piece at all for months is pretty easily possible too. Imagine going into the second tier with a blue or lfr helmet after 14 weeks.

Not allowing people to grind out the pieces they want/need is just fucking stupid. They need to stop doing it. It feels bad for everyone. There is no logical reason or explanation to fuck people over like this.

Oh, M+ should definitely drop them up to heroic level from the end chest, its just retarded they're taking it this way. "They should be rare!" they are MAJOR slot pieces and there is no alternative! You know what is a huge difference between Azerite gear and legendaries/tier? If I don't have a legendary or a tier piece, I still have an EQUIVALENT ilvl piece for that slot... in BfA, nope, have fun with your 340 shoulders when you're in 385 everything else.

[shaunika123]

The rogue in my guild during TBC never saw the gruul trinket drop the entire expansion.

I was like that with the dagger from kelthuzad in wrath.

oh and the one time chromatically tempered blade dropped in vanilla was when I had to miss the raid.

- - - Updated - - -

You mean where you go on discord and say "Guys what is the best gear sets for M+?". Yep so totally different.

but you have to actively use them
not just fire and forget at the start

see the difference?

its not rocket science obviously
but its more than literally nothing.

Oh, M+ should definitely drop them up to heroic level from the end chest, its just retarded they're taking it this way. "They should be rare!" they are MAJOR slot pieces and there is no alternative! You know what is a huge difference between Azerite gear and legendaries/tier? If I don't have a legendary or a tier piece, I still have an EQUIVALENT ilvl piece for that slot... in BfA, nope, have fun with your 340 shoulders when you're in 385 everything else.

are people not realizing that if m+ dropped it then raiding would be like infinitely less rewarding?
also im pretty sure azerite traits are stronger than 20-30 ilvl worth of agility.

[Zantos]

Being able to change gear around—to have the trash set, the set for this boss, the defensive set for this boss, in some ways it makes decisions less interesting, because there’s clearly a single right answer for each of those niche situations, versus thinking about the dungeon in its totality and coming up with a balanced solution for that.

This dudes a moron. Has he not had a reality check lately? Heres a hint: some classes do better on aoe fights then others By design with certain stats. Its that simple. Those stats aren't necessarily designed for situations and using them could hinder a class. He wants to talk about making decisions less interesting? How about looking at the talent system. We have classes with rows that have Zero choice. They have 1 talent that is good and That is it for that entire row. They shout about how there are "three choices". No, thats the illusion of choice. Realistically, you will drastically hinder your capabilities by choosing one of the bad ones.

Their own design contradicts their thought philosophy. They need to stick to one mindset and leave it be. Stop flip flopping between "its ok to excel in one aspect and be ok in another and players need to choose the best set up for each situation" to the other extreme of "theres a cookie cutter for that and its bad." It removed reforging and what we got this expansion was the failure mindset of "higher ilevel should be better". They will see like they did last time. No, its not better. Certain classes rely heavily on certain stats and an ilevel boost without that certain stat is worse for them.

[Onikaroshi]

are people not realizing that if m+ dropped it then raiding would be like infinitely less rewarding?

Datamined raid traits point to raid traits working better in raids, IE raid to get raid gear.

[Nutrition]

I was like that with the dagger from kelthuzad in wrath.

oh and the one time chromatically tempered blade dropped in vanilla was when I had to miss the raid.

- - - Updated - - -



but you have to actively use them
not just fire and forget at the start

see the difference?

its not rocket science obviously
but its more than literally nothing.





are people not realizing that if m+ dropped it then raiding would be like infinitely less rewarding?

I don't think the decision was tied to raiding... I least I cant see the logic of it if it was since mythic + and raiding go hand in hand.

[shaunika123]

I don't think the decision was tied to raiding... I least I cant see the logic of it if it was since mythic + and raiding go hand in hand.

do they? should they?
I dont like m+ and I love raiding

I like to fight intricate long bossfights with exciting mechanics not a 40 minute timer and trash mobs. (IM not trying to belittle m+ here, I know they're hard on high levels, but they're not what I enjoy)

if M+ offered a literal infinite amount of azerite pieces whereas a raid offered at most what? 8 chances a week?
then by the time you do your 9th m+ you're already overtaken raids in efficiency, and its not hard to do 9 m+
that's like one day.

hardcore players could get like 4-5 times the chances a week easily, compared to raiding.
that would be horrible HORRIBLE design.

that would mean the best way to gear for raids is not by raiding. that's not good design.

not to mention that m+ doesnt give the most reward for the highest difficulty
if you're on 10+ you can just spam that without ever having to go further and itll yield more loot than pushing keys, which is again why it shouldnt give the best source of reward.

[Soon-TM]

Exactly this.

Also toxicity is a myth.

It is not, not at all. At least not in my experience, so I just run high keys with guildies and avoid all the PuG drama.

[Kyux]

Being able to change gear around—to have the trash set, the set for this boss, the defensive set for this boss, in some ways it makes decisions less interesting, because there’s clearly a single right answer for each of those niche situations, versus thinking about the dungeon in its totality and coming up with a balanced solution for that.

"Makes decisions less interesting....so we take away all the decisions and lock you into a single spec/gear for the entire run"

Wut? Does he actually believe this bullshit? What is this unhealthy fixation with taking away options and decisions and choices?

People will just approach it with a different decision space in mind.

And what space would that be? Instead of deciding on gear and making dymanic decisions and swaps on the fly and incorporating THAT into the UI and gameplay, all we'll do is just equip the one, single most-powerful and all around set possible and ignore everything else. There won't be ANY decisions to make besides "Is this drop higher iLVL than what I'm wearing?" or "Is my spec the community approved and tested most optimal"?

What a joke.

Because instead of having multiple sets and you know when you switch each one out, you have to evaluate the whole dungeon beforehand and make a bigger call. You have to decide whether, based on your group and affixes, you want to be better at AoE or single target or burst or whatever. The alternative is that you will definitely have options for each as they arise and it's no longer a decision being made but you will swap X set out at A point, and Y set at B point and so on. Ion is right. This does create more choice.

[Nutrition]

do they? should they?
I dont like m+ and I love raiding

I like to fight intricate long bossfights with exciting mechanics not a 40 minute timer and trash mobs.

if M+ offered a literal infinite amount of azerite pieces whereas a raid offered at most what? 8 chances a week?
then by the time you do your 9th m+ you're already overtaken raids in efficiency, and its not hard to do 9 m+
that's like one day.

hardcore players could get like 4-5 times the chances a week easily, compared to raiding.
that would be horrible HORRIBLE design.

that would mean the best way to gear for raids is not by raiding. that's not good design.

It would mean gearing for raids would be the equivalent of running heroic 5 mans in tbc...

It isn't a hard task to do a cap run.

[clevin]

but you have to actively use them
not just fire and forget at the start

see the difference?

its not rocket science obviously
but its more than literally nothing.

It's close to nothing. Here's what we're talking about:

Create outfits in Outfitter. At boss with ST mechanics? Choose ST outfit. On trash, need AOE? Press button to get AOE outfit.

How compelling is that? Because that is what everyone is whining over.

[Mafic]

I can't believe it has been 14 yrs sinc eth game game out and Guilds still don't have a Garrison of their own.

Yeah personal/guild housing should have been something done at some point.