If auto attacks didn't exist?

[Kithelle]

I like auto attacks, but currently their design is extremely boring, bland, unimaginative. Does any class/spec actually have auto attack interactions??? Like I know feral used to apply a disease with auto attacks. I feel like they slowly removed all of this. Maybe just rogue poisons? DK rune, but only one is used basically and it's just a buff, could press a button (horn of winter) instead honestly.

Other than Enhancement Shaman and Warriors building Rage not really

[kail]

It would be interesting, obviously it would have to come with plenty of reworks. I did like GW2 style of auto-attacks where various class/weapon combinations had their auto completly different. Some were a basic cleave, others applied dots or other debuffs, some even healed. Some were monotonous while others had a 1-2-3 combo if it lasted to the 3rd consecutive attack.

At the end of the day, I am impartial as WoW currently fleshed out most specs to have some level of activity for close to an entire encounter. Rare scenarios like low haste ret palladin had any downtime.

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Depends on your spec and what point in the expansion you are, but they are usually 4 or 5 in line of damage done vs other abilities, so a significant chunk.

Auto attacks actually account for why haste had become so highly rated.

Haste in general just affects everything. Autos, resource regen, GCD, and HoT/DoT ticks. It may not hold as much value for every speck but it simply allows everyone to do their action sequence faster in every regard.

[spalernTJ]

Warriors, Enhancement Shamans and DH(demon blades) all produce their rescorces from their Auto-attacks.

That being said, it wouldn't be that hard to move their proccs and resource generation to their main filler either. Enhancement shaman; Rockbiter. Arms warriors; Slam, Demon hunters... No idea never played them.

Same goes for most specs with "AA" dependent proccs, you can move those procs somewhere else. Why do so much of a character's power have to sit on a gameplay mechanic that is more or less completely out of the hands of the player? Heck, Auto attacking could be a "special" thing too. Arms warriors dealing damage only through abilities would make sense, death's knights too, Enhancement shamans as well. The only ones where I can see "Auto Attacking" truly being a fitting element, is stuff like Rogues and Feral druids, where attacking "fast" makes sense.

Depends on your spec and what point in the expansion you are, but they are usually 4 or 5 in line of damage done vs other abilities, so a significant chunk.

Auto attacks actually account for why haste had become so highly rated.

The more power they put into Auto Attacking, the more they have to drag from your active abilities. It might also make Haste a little less dominant overall, maybe allowing more player choice in stats.

[Maleific]

I like auto attacks, but currently their design is extremely boring, bland, unimaginative. Does any class/spec actually have auto attack interactions??? Like I know feral used to apply a disease with auto attacks. I feel like they slowly removed all of this. Maybe just rogue poisons? DK rune, but only one is used basically and it's just a buff, could press a button (horn of winter) instead honestly.

Off the top of my head, outlaw rogue mastery, sudden death (unholy), runic attenuation (frost), warrior rage gen, omen of clarity?

[Nihilist74]

I would prefer that auto-attack did not exist and that they had an attack button instead that attacked once every time you press it. Auto-attack is boring as hell.

[Schattenlied]

Yes, remove auto attacks, fold their damage into "builder" abilities that currently hit like wet noodles (Paladin's Crusader Strike currently does less damage per hit than an auto attack, for some stupid reason).

[Razion]

Autos not only give a lot of animation life in-between GCD abilities, but they can also be used to facilitate gameplay with mechanics like resource generation, or spec-specific procs. It's so essential and fun and core to so many specs I often wonder why ranged dps also doesn't have it. They should be able to use shoot with their staves, wands, 1h maces, or whatever else as well while casting certain spells much in the same way that hunters do now. Perhaps they can differentiate which ones need to be standing still to use their auto-attack shoot, and which classes can auto-shoot on the move to differentiate more between classes or specs. An auto-attack kind of heal for healers as well would also be pretty cool. Currently ranged magical dps and healers don't really care about the damage on their weapons, and this would also be a good way to make them care about that a little bit.

[StillMcfuu]

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The more power they put into Auto Attacking, the more they have to drag from your active abilities. It might also make Haste a little less dominant overall, maybe allowing more player choice in stats.

I would say the opposite actually. Abilities are affected more by other stats, auto attacks are most effected by haste because it just means more and for most specs auto attacks proc something, which again further emphasizes more.

Abilities on the other hand tend to have synergies, usually based on crit, or mastery.

If you look at early expansion stat priority vs last expansion which barely emphasized white damage, you can see the difference.

Class that emphasized other stats, switched to haste due to white damage being 2 or 3 in priority. Raw weapon damage actually made a huge difference too because of white damage. Which in legion wasn't that huge of a difference, ideal stats being more important, but now an ilvl upgrade for weapons is almost always the choice.

[Kithelle]

Off the top of my head, outlaw rogue mastery, sudden death (unholy), runic attenuation (frost), warrior rage gen, omen of clarity?

I forgot about the Outlaw mastery....been a LONG time since I played one.

[Thekri]

Off the top of my head, outlaw rogue mastery, sudden death (unholy), runic attenuation (frost), warrior rage gen, omen of clarity?

Beast Master Hunters use it to Proc barbed shot reloads as well. There are a couple other small interaction like that, but they could easily move all those to abilities.

[shadowmatrix]

Isn't white damage already very tiny compared to every abilities?

For some classes, like fury warrior and rogue, it is a decent portion of their attack animations.

[Driahtvacahtve]

I like autoattacks. They are the basics of combat that makes it feel like fighting tbh.
A warrior swings his weapon and lands a hit. *Mortal Strike*, *Slam* etc are just fancy names for swing your weapon and smack someone with it.
If anything I'd want more emphasis on autoattacks. More different animations for example, more damage variety..
I'm playing an RPG, not an arcade fighting game.
Quite the contrary I feel like the 10 different versions of *do single target damage in melee to X* are what make no sense.
As if any warrior in the world (hell fantasy or not) ever thought "Okay, now I'm gonna SLAM the target and then next I'll hit him with a MORTAL STRIKE only to then hit with a COLOSSAL SMASH unlike the previous hits where I was just poking him gently.."

[huth]

There's something to be said for emphasising your character's actions 1:1 with your inputs. Auto attacks also shift the feeling of certain specs like Arms warriors, where often auto attacks queue up along side other animations and make you feel like you're effortlessly swinging a stick instead of a big weighty weapon.

Well, of course. The weapon would be useless if you couldn't do that. A lot of sticks that size would actually be heavier than a proper 2h sword.

[Mirishka]

Just a fun little thought I had. If the idea of "Auto Attack" used primarily by Melee DPS and Hunters were removed, and Blizzard would have to make their abilities stronger to compensate, how do you think you would feel? Theoretically, if they removed it right now and balanced it so you did the exact same DPS as you do now, your yellow numbers would just be higher, while white numbers would be gone, would that be weird? I think it could bring more "oomph" to certain attacks and abilities..

How could it be balanced? If you could choose any boost to base stats to compensate, what would you choose? Attack power? Crit / Haste / mastery?

In terms of gameplay, would you notice if your auto attacks were gone? I guess it would look weird for duel wielding classes, since their auto attacks are quick and happens constantly. But what about slow two handers? Aren't most of their auto attack animations cancelled by abilities to begin with?

They tried this with monks and it was garbage.

[Sylar Hao]

Autoattack has always felt very silly to me. You are a 2H character and you can auto+ability+ability+auto+ability... 5 weapon attacks in only 4.5 sec. It's even more silly on hunters, specially using bows or crossbows, how do you shoot 5 arrows with different effects in such a shot time, where's all the process of picking an arrow, placing it, aim and shoot? Yes, it's a game and what not... but it looks very ridiculous, nobody can do that with a weapon almost the same size as you.

Autoattacks should only happen on the empty times all your abilities are on CD or after a short delay after your last ability. At least to make it more aesthetical and interesting to play.

[Qstall]

when they announced monks, they wanted to introduce them as a class without auto attacks. tbh I was kinda excited, but they scrapped it, as it did not feel right, apparently.

[Mirishka]

Autoattack has always felt very silly to me. You are a 2H character and you can auto+ability+ability+auto+ability... 5 weapon attacks in only 4.5 sec. It's even more silly on hunters, specially using bows or crossbows, how do you shoot 5 arrows with different effects in such a shot time, where's all the process of picking an arrow, placing it, aim and shoot? Yes, it's a game and what not... but it looks very ridiculous, nobody can do that with a weapon almost the same size as you.

Autoattacks should only happen on the empty times all your abilities are on CD or after a short delay after your last ability. At least to make it more aesthetical and interesting to play.

"This fantasy game with dragons and bipedal cows and talking pandas is not realistic ahhh mah gad!!"

[Lorgar Aurelian]

it would be pretty awful Swtor has no auto attacks and it makes combat feel really stiff.

[schwarzkopf]

I think auto attack caters for the increased movement requirement of melee classes, in an attempt to make them a similar skill level to ranged classes.

However - some ranged classes have auto attack - and that probably needs to go.

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"This fantasy game with dragons and bipedal cows and talking pandas is not realistic ahhh mah gad!!"

There is a difference between realistic content and realistic actions.

We expect the latter and get bored easily by the former.

[Ahovv]

Auto attacks have always been really fucking dumb in any MMO.