Developer Q&A - Ion Hazzikostas

[Sungamnori]

> Someone that is dedicated to a spec should have a small advantage over someone who is constantly switching.

and

> It's important to remember that tanks bring different things to the fight.
> When evaluating tanks, keep in mind what they are bringing to a fight as part of their toolkit.

In otherwords, fuck tanks. You have different toolkits, so you'll get to tank some fights but not others. Which means you need to swap back and forth between tank and dps and back every raid. So fuck you, you don't get the advantage that people who play one spec get.

[Doomchicken]

The topic was targeting specific items. Make that happen via badges. Simple.

Cool, that way instead of 100 threads about the same two vanilla questions we'll get 100 threads bitching about how having to do certain content to get badges like what happened during MoP. Awesome, can't wait.

[shoooter]

Why do they insist on spending a year tuning these failed systems that they will obviously just be throwing away a year later. Unfortunately Azerite, warfronts, and island expeditions all suck. They need to focus their effort on something else.

And why should someone who sticks to one spec have given advantage? The advantage should come from your own personal dedication. What a brazen example of being told we must play the game exactly how they’ve envisioned it.

[Lexia]

Welcome to the World of IonCraft. Grit your teeth, the next year and a half is going to suck.

[IIamaKing]

Cool, that way instead of 100 threads about the same two vanilla questions we'll get 100 threads bitching about how having to do certain content to get badges like what happened during MoP. Awesome, can't wait.

Thats NOT what happened in Mists. People complained that they had to farm Valor Points AND rep. VP came from anywhere really, I got a lot of mine from Dailies and Pet Battles. The complaint was never having to do certain things for VP it was that they had to earn the VP AND the "right" to buy an item for the first time in wow.

Points from many activities and non rep locked vendors, BOOM problem solved.

[Dizzeeyooo]

Why do they insist on spending a year tuning these failed systems that they will obviously just be throwing away a year later

because that is how wow class design works now - they "can't" add things to base specs, because in 10 years they might have to prune abilities again, and that would just be terrible, so instead they invent new temporary systems each expansion that are designed to be removed when the expansion ends

[Doomchicken]

Thats NOT what happened in Mists. People complained that they had to farm Valor Points AND rep. VP came from anywhere really, I got a lot of mine from Dailies and Pet Battles. The complaint was never having to do certain things for VP it was that they had to earn the VP AND the "right" to buy an item for the first time in wow.

Points from many activities and non rep locked vendors, BOOM problem solved.

Bullshit dude. People on here were bitching about feeling "forced" to do Scenarios and LFR for badges. Yeah, there were people bitching about the rep and shit too, but it's not like VP was this awesome thing that was beloved by everyone, because it wasn't.

[Oziemaster]

Bullshit dude. People on here were bitching about feeling "forced" to do Scenarios and LFR for badges. Yeah, there were people bitching about the rep and shit too, but it's not like VP was this awesome thing that was beloved by everyone, because it wasn't.

It was better than this shit rng we have on every piece of gear that drops. At least give me a way to target an item that I want ffs. I want to feel like I have control over my character instead of the devs thinking for me.

[Stickiler]

What a brazen example of being told we must play the game exactly how they’ve envisioned it.

Well, no shit buddy. It's their game, if you don't like it, go play something else. The game still exists, so they're providing something a lot of people want to play, so their vision must be pretty good.

[IIamaKing]

Bullshit dude. People on here were bitching about feeling "forced" to do Scenarios and LFR for badges. Yeah, there were people bitching about the rep and shit too, but it's not like VP was this awesome thing that was beloved by everyone, because it wasn't.

I did forget that early on, clearing a raid didn't cap you, so there was some complaining there. But the loudest and most persistent, throughout the Xpac was rep tied to VP vendors.

Regardless of that, Any sort of player control over loot would be better than the shitty rng fest presented to us now.

Currency from many source on a weekly cap, vendors that sell gear not tied to rep, would be a wounderful thing to return.

[Eleccybubb]

Bullshit dude. People on here were bitching about feeling "forced" to do Scenarios and LFR for badges. Yeah, there were people bitching about the rep and shit too, but it's not like VP was this awesome thing that was beloved by everyone, because it wasn't.

Sorry but Valor completely outdoes the system we have today. Tying it to rep was meh but still Valor and Justice were the two perfect systems which were literally what bad luck protection is.

Valor guarantees me a reward after a set time. Even if it takes 2 weeks.

The current system of "bad luck protection" is... YOU MIGHT GET A REWARD AFTER TIME.

They really should take a look at how FF14 handles it's bad luck protection because quite frankly.... WoW doesn't have any.

An example from FF14. EX Primals drop a decent weapon. Current one is 385. But it's one weapon per kill. HOWEVER it also drops an item and when you get 10 of that item you can go buy a weapon from a vendor.

That is GOOD bad luck protection. WoWs is the complete opposite and pretty much "hey you might get an item that is better or not or you might get an item after time has passed".

[Spotnick]

I have no clue how people in California can wear a tuque designed to keep your head warm when it's freezing outside in the winter cold.

[WhiteUsedSocks]

Don't expect a Worgen or Goblin update before next Expansion. They've literally lied through their teeth about the Worgen/Goblin model update coming since WoD.

Childrens NPC and critters got update but not goblin/worgen :thinking:
Blizzard pref NPC/mount/critter over worgen/goblin players. I dont get it XD

[420 NoScope]

"The team did internal tests with full raid groups queuing for Warfronts. The problem is that with a full raid group you would steamroll the map objectives and get far ahead of the base building and other pacing mechanism. If you get too far ahead of the pacing, it isn't as fun."

I find it more fun to play with friends, rather than leave it to chance in a queue where people might decide to just AFK and get rewards.

maybe that's just me.

[NoiseTank13]

"Brewmaster and Death Knights have too much survivability."

Sigh. RIP.

[Marrilaife]

Err. Allied Race Death Knights? Am I missing something?

He said they won't update DK starting questline to allow allied races which means no change to starting zone = allied races can never be dks. Rip dreams. He said "maybe in the future" so probably somewhere between the worgen model update, dance studio and heat death of universe.

Ion is so weird about this. He just really, really wants people to stick to one spec

Because it flows from their assumption that somehow people who play one and only one character and spec are more wedded to that character and that they need to encourage this.

You know what's the best way to encourage this?
Actually balancing your goddamn specs you put into the game.
When you have specs like marksmanship that have more restrictions, less utility and lower dps than beastmastery, who in their right mind would stick to a spec like that?
When you have people dedicated to their prot warrior, shadow priest or feral druid and they keep getting decline after decline from m+ and raiding guilds?

I miss the times when people believed doesn't matter which spec you play, as long as the player behind it knows how to play. At the moment fotm spec > skill.

> Someone that is dedicated to a spec should have a small advantage over someone who is constantly switching.

and

> It's important to remember that tanks bring different things to the fight.
> When evaluating tanks, keep in mind what they are bringing to a fight as part of their toolkit.

In otherwords, fuck tanks. You have different toolkits, so you'll get to tank some fights but not others. Which means you need to swap back and forth between tank and dps and back every raid. So fuck you, you don't get the advantage that people who play one spec get.

Worse, you get into a situation a dps gears 1 toon while a tank has to gear 2-3 and only see specific fights on specific classes and never get a full raid clear on 1 toon. We had a situation like that during Antorus, 1 of the tanks was bringing blood dk alt because encounter demanded it, and he was very sad he could never complete the mythic tier set on his main. He was tied to forever swap to blood dk on the fight that dropped the helmet.

Most guilds keep some backup dps to rotate in and out depending on demands of the fight, but most guilds do not keep backup tanks. In most guilds, a tank is a tank. If a fight requires a blood dk, a brewmaster or a vengeance demon hunter, you don't tell your tank to swap to dps and your dps to swap to tank to cover that role. No, the tank has to prep an alt and relog it for that fight.

In a perfect world every tank has similar survivability, every tank has different utility that helps on some encounters, but you can still do them with other tanks.

In a world of warcraft the disparities between tank survivability are huge (monk never dies while pressing 1 button, but some other classes have to perfectly time their active mitigation and be babysat by healers when they're out of charges), and the utility is a problem, either some utility is so important it becomes essential (like that mass grip on Aggramar) or some tanks never bring anything of interest to the raid (when was the last time you wanted a warrior tank for some specific utility?)

[Biggles Worth]

Don't let the door hit you on the way out? I mean what do you want people to say to that? If you aren't happy with a game, stop playing it.

Nice try Blizzard.

[Nathiest]

So did anyone ask Lore how his transitioning was going?

[probert]

Welcome to the World of IonCraft. Grit your teeth, the next year and a half is going to suck.

They're spending more and more time trying to design fixes for Azerite abilities, which tells me they're in too deep to abort the design altogether.

As for the next 18 months, its more like 21 months as it'll be 2 years until the next expansion. Good news is that I won't be gritting my teeth...i'll be playing Black Ops 4 and (most likely) Red Dead Redemption 2.

As far as I'm concerned, Blizzard owes us money for giving us half an expansion that was a bug ridden mess.

i'm willing to call it now: BFA is the worst expansion in WoW history. Warlords of Draenor had a lack of end game content and garrisons were a mistake, but class balance and progression was at least predictable and relatively balanced. Nothing is working in BFA right now except for dungeons and raiding, and thanks to mythic+ the class deficiencies are amplified.

[Doomchicken]

Sorry but Valor completely outdoes the system we have today. Tying it to rep was meh but still Valor and Justice were the two perfect systems which were literally what bad luck protection is.

Valor guarantees me a reward after a set time. Even if it takes 2 weeks.

The current system of "bad luck protection" is... YOU MIGHT GET A REWARD AFTER TIME.

They really should take a look at how FF14 handles it's bad luck protection because quite frankly.... WoW doesn't have any.

An example from FF14. EX Primals drop a decent weapon. Current one is 385. But it's one weapon per kill. HOWEVER it also drops an item and when you get 10 of that item you can go buy a weapon from a vendor.

That is GOOD bad luck protection. WoWs is the complete opposite and pretty much "hey you might get an item that is better or not or you might get an item after time has passed".

I think you guys are missing a key point here. I am not DEFENDING the current system, I'm more pointing out how flawed the VP system truly was, ergo going back to a flawed system is NOT the answer. The current system isn't good, I get that, but if they're going to fix this they need to try new ideas, or the main reason I've quoted eleccybubb here for how FF14 does it, to steal better ideas from someone else.