Do people actually like classes in BFA?

[Doffen]

I'm having more fun playing a prot warrior in classic than a veng DH in retail; and that shouldn't be the case

Why shouldn't that be the case? If you like a thing better than the other it's just that. I loved Beastmacro Hunter in Sunwell, better than quite a few specs through the years, even if the whole idea of it is fucking stupid.

You like classic prot better than veng dh, isn't that fine? Just to tell you, I also think veng DH is boring to play. It really need some changes imo. Though Havoc is amazingly fun.

[Rotted]

started as a SP enjoyed it enough but still a bit meh

Came back 12 months later on my unholy dk and having a blast on it

[Pony Soldier]

I actually love most of them. My favorite has to be enhancement shamans. The other ones that I really enjoy are fury warriors, fire mages, outlaw rogues, and survival hunters. I must be a filthy casual because it seems, at least on here, I'm in the minority when it comes to enjoying the class and thinking they're not total shit.

Matter of fact I've come to enjoy them more than I ever did and I've been with this game since vanilla. Even more than how they were in MoP which I think is considered to be when classes were at their "best". I actually like how each class and spec has their own identity and feel to them and how it changes the way you play them. Before, classes could use the abilities of each of their spec with only a few exclusive abilities and spells to make them feel different. Some people liked having that freedom and so did I back then but once I got a feel for them and understood them I came to really enjoy them. Now I wouldn't want to play any other way.

Also I think the whole class balance mentality is overrated. I think the game would be more interesting if classes had weaknesses. Like for example a mage being more vulnerable against a rogue while they would be weak against say a warlock. By constantly trying to balance the game all because of the constant crying and bitching of the PVPers that they keep dying in BGs, I feel, is actually hurting the game. It's making the classes all feel the same. Every class has it's own stun, heal, dispel and damage reducing abilities. Nobody has an advantage over anybody so it just all feels bland. I can imagine how interesting it would be for people to actually strategize and plan out their attacks instead of just charging straight in like a mindless orc peon.

Those are my thoughts anyway.

[AkundaMrdal]

I hate what they did to MM in BFA, especially aimed shot on charges. Rapid fire is also not my favorite ability.

[krl]

I enjoy Discipline a lot, even more than Legion version. Shadow is meh, a half-done spec, its flow is even worse now with Essences. Elem is just ok. Outlaw is quite enjoyable and so is Sin, Sub is still clunky (and I resent the whole Zul debacle). I have this urge to play survival hunter but still hasn't resolved myself to do so. Fascinated by the spec.

[Didly]

You can play any spec and be viable in both PVP and PVE. The game has been as "balanced" as it's ever been from Legion onward.

Also this thread is a perfect example of why the community should be ignored when considering the future of WoW. Most of you can't talk about anything outside of your own "feelings."

How about some data? Some solid recommendations?

[Hyrja]

I like playing a frost dk and arms warrior in BFA

[LordVargK]

Edit: Warlocks were broken in MoP because they were the best at everything and had no weaknesses. That is not good class design even if it's fun to play.

You're right, I admit they were broken. But as with anything they touch, Blizzard overdid it with the nerfs. I would be perfectly fine with WoD style warlock, which played like MoP, just without the broken stuff (cast while moving, endless shields, etc...).

But in general i dislike to nerf fun. Why not buff all other classes? Why is the idea, that casters have to be an immobile glasscannon still the main designfactor for all caster classes in WoW? 15 years after classic, in a game, that more than ever revolves around movement?
PvP reasons? can't possibly be true, given the amount of gapclosers melees have today.
Balancing? maybe. Having range is an advantage. But this is compensated right now by giving melees more utility and more AoE/cleave potential.
Do we have to stand still because of Hunters, their selling point being ranged, mobile damage dealers? I would argue, that this is not true. Hunters don't feel like casters, more like ranged melee classes. So there would be much design space for a mobile caster.

Blizzard says they like to double down on strengths. After Legion, WL had no strengths left to double down on. Sustain was nerfed to the ground with the removal of leech life from the Affliction rotation and the nerfs to Soul Leech. AoE was nerfed for all Specs. Mobility? nope. Utility? Portal got heavily nerfed, Healthstones were nerfed as well (shared cd with healthpots), silences were pruned with the removal of the doomguard, stuns as well, since you also can't have the Infernal as a permanent pet anymore. Single target. Well yes, this was their niche. For all three specs. And they were (keyword 'were') good at it, provided you had the right Azerite traits and the ramp up time. That can't really be enough for a class with 3 DPS specs.

Is a class, which is only good at one thing and doesn't even excel at it anymore fun? Not really. Does it have to be OP to be fun? No, absolutely not. But at least give the Specs some variety or even better: real situational talents like in legion. Does the boss need more AoE? Spec more into AoE. More movement? Maybe take more instant spells, which might underperfom in patchwerk situations. You run M+ and need more utility? fine, take a better pet but sacrifice burst potential or overall damage. Those are the choices that made me enjoy Legion WL way more than BfA, where there's one cookiecutterbuild for nearly all scenarios. I'm not asking to revert to MoP. I understand, that that would be too much to ask. But why not Legion? What was so bad about Legion, that you had to change the class once again for the worse? I still don't understand this...

[shade3891]

Playing demon Hunter (havoc) in general it plays fine, would have liked some additional playstyle options.

I do wonder if we can expect some tanks skills in Shadowlands. Since this class made with some identity in mind.

[Khrux]

This thread, like most of the mmochamp forum is filled with people who dont actually play WoW anymore but just shit on the retail game and look down from their ivory tower of MoP like it was some perfect moment in time.

[Alcsaar]

Care to elaborate on why they feel awful?

Keep in mind I stopped playing in 8.1 - things may have changed, but probably not. Also I'm biased of course.

So through out BFA here are the specs I tried and had issues with:

Shadow Priest
Despite having really high sims, it was just not fun to play
1) AoE felt pretty mediocre especially in M+
2) The rotation was not that interesting
3) Void Torrent becoming a talent which NEVER got used so we basically just lost an ability from our rotation, a pretty important one

Retribution Paladin
1) I hate Holy Power as a retribution mechanic. They removed it from prot, they should have removed it from ret.
2) Nothing feels "impactful". I don't know how to describe this better, sorry. Abilities felt like they didn't hit or cause impactful amounts of damage.

Balance Druid
Balance druid was not terrribleeee but:
1) I hated that Full Moon, a very iconic ability, was moved to a talent. One that essentially NEVER got used because it didn't compare/compete to/with the other talents.
2) With out a big "oomph" ability like Full Moon, the spec felt like the damage it did was not impressive. Nothing hits "hard".

Guardian and Feral Druid
For simplicity going to combine these. I don't think I really need to say much about these. They both felt terrible. Guardian was BORING AS SHIT, Feral has the potential to be fun but is so behind everything else in effectiveness that it isn't worth playing.

A lot of specs losing their artifact abilities as baseline abilities felt terrible. They designed an expansion around artifact abilities and balanced the specs around them, then feel SurprisedPikachu when the specs feel incomplete when they're taken away.

[Alex86el]

too many abilities, for the sake of having many abilities. while not enough fun/flavorful abilities.
way too many big cooldowns on each class, for the sake of having buttons to press.
every single spec has a proc "wack-a-mole" type mechanic, meh.
every class can do almost everything, because players are spoiled meter-wh*res.

[Marxman]

You can play any spec and be viable in both PVP and PVE. The game has been as "balanced" as it's ever been from Legion onward.

It's not about balance, it's about gameplay design. How each spec actually feels to play during combat. Other than the monotony of Vanilla, I don't think it's ever been worse than right now.

[Alcsaar]

It's not about balance, it's about gameplay design. How each spec actually feels to play during combat. Other than the monotony of Vanilla, I don't think it's ever been worse than right now.

Going to +1 this. This isn't in regards to balance, its in regards to how the class/spec actually feels. The fact they all feel so simple might be the reason it seems balanced.

[Lorgar Aurelian]

What a beautiful troll post. Classes are the worst they've ever been.

- - - Updated - - -



100% agreed on this.

The funny thing that I find is that people mention how it's all matter of opinion and subjective, which is hilarious as hell for a response. When a majority of the player base absolutely despises the current class/spec design (It's a fact as the community has spoken out several times and the fact that blizzard is actually un pruning things is a giant indicator) that tends to be hard to counter with false subjective/opinion based philosophies.

That’s just not how facts work the majority agreeing on something doesn’t make it a fact. There is nothing objective about how one likes or dislikes a class and there never will be.

[Xarama]

I main a lock and hunter, and I'm not a fan of the current class design. My favorite era for class design was definitely MoP. Warlock specifically is just not fun at all, and hunter is clunky at the moment.

[LordVargK]

That’s just not how facts work the majority agreeing on something doesn’t make it a fact. There is nothing objective about how one likes or dislikes a class and there never will be.

In this case it is though: We are talking about whether classes feel/are good or bad. Good and bad are subjective. If a majority dislikes the current class design, it makes the statement "Classes are bad" true, on account of the fact, that good and bad are subjective and not constants. So yes, it is very possible to say "Class design is bad, because most of the people think it's bad".

[Echocho]

I thought I didn't but after playing Classic for 2 months the BfA classes all feel amazing to play

[CrawlFromThePit]

I'm trying to sort this out. I personally thought classes felt awful in BFA.

At Blizzcon we got no major announcement regarding reworking of classes, and it seems like a lot of people congratulated Blizzard on that....so does that mean people are happy with the classes in their current iteration with some old abilities thrown back on top?

After all, if they were to do a major talent revamp - which would be required in order to make classes feel more like classes and less like specs - wouldn't that be a "revamp" that these same people are congratulating Blizzard for NOT announcing?

I don't really understand how they take focus away from specs if they don't completely shake up talents, but no one seems to want a rework?

People are happy for a step in the right direction, as they should. The idea of life in general is not to whine complain cry and moan if you don't get exactly what you want, that's how you become hated and called a millenial.

Of course everyone wants a rework, everyone wants everything to be better all the time, but at some point we just have to be realistic and accept that begging for shit all the time doesn't really get us anywhere, not to mention who says a rework would make the classes better? *cough surv hunter cough*

[Lorgar Aurelian]

In this case it is though: We are talking about whether classes feel/are good or bad. Good and bad are subjective. If a majority dislikes the current class design, it makes the statement "Classes are bad" true, on account of the fact, that good and bad are subjective and not constants. So yes, it is very possible to say "Class design is bad, because most of the people think it's bad".

No in no case does it ever work that way. There is no objective state of good class/game design and no objective state of bad. Human opinions just don’t work that way and facts are facts because they are out side of realm of opinion.

You could say the majority of people think classes are bad and have that be objective but it still wouldn’t make the classes being bad a fact as for every single one of those people it’s subjective.