Shadowlands - Covenant Class and Signature Abilities Preview

[Gurg]

Oh, so chosing a covenant will not be based on what you like, but what you sim best for your spec.

This is going to suck, unless you can pursue a different covenant allegiance after you're done or advanced with your first.

They NEED to let you go for all covenants and let you switch between them if they want this to be appealing.
And even so, it will be very non alt friendly... but we are already used to this right?

My suggestion to them would be to: Make the class specific abilities an unlockable TALENT in the same row if you complete all that covenant content, and let you unlock them all. So when you finish the content of all 4 covenants you have 4 talents to choose on the same row.

Well, Blizzard preaches that choice of covenant is up to players, but sadly we all know thats not how this game works.
So yes, by the looks of it - Covenant choice sadly depends on your main spec.

For instance, like i mentioned earlier, look at DKs "Swarming Mist" Covenant ability and then look rest of them. Swarming Mist looks like obvious choice in all cases. Or warriors "Conqueror’s Banner" ability for group play or "Condemn" for soloing. Conqueror’s Banner looks far too good for most cases again due to sheer utility.

They did say that you can switch Covenants, and progress with new one keeping the progress on old. However it will not be easy, nor cheap, as its not intended for us to swap Covenants frequently.
In addition, all covenant cosmetics are covenant locked so you wont be able to use covenant transmog that you earned if you are not specced into that covenant.

Honestly, Covenants should be scrapped in their current form.
My idea was that we should get another talent row with unlockable talents as we cap covenant progression - with 4th Covenant being class wide ability.
Picking and sticking a covenant would provide boost to talent that you unlocked via that covenant, with minor boots to other talents as well. mostly passive.
This way you would experience all zones and covenants, but also have a goal for your progression. In addition, not having "optimal" covenant wouldn't hurt as much as it is in current iteration.

[Kallisto]

Well, Blizzard preaches that choice of covenant is up to players, but sadly we all know thats not how this game works.
So yes, by the looks of it - Covenant choice sadly depends on your main spec.

For instance, like i mentioned earlier, look at DKs "Swarming Mist" Covenant ability and then look rest of them. Swarming Mist looks like obvious choice in all cases. Or warriors "Conqueror’s Banner" ability for group play or "Condemn" for soloing. Conqueror’s Banner looks far too good for most cases again due to sheer utility.

They did say that you can switch Covenants, and progress with new one keeping the progress on old. However it will not be easy, nor cheap, as its not intended for us to swap Covenants frequently.
In addition, all covenant cosmetics are covenant locked so you wont be able to use covenant transmog that you earned if you are not specced into that covenant.

Honestly, Covenants should be scrapped in their current form.
My idea was that we should get another talent row with unlockable talents as we cap covenant progression with 4th Covenant being class wide ability.
Picking and sticking a covenant would provide boost to talent that you unlocked via covenant, with minor boots to other talents as well. mostly passive.
This way you would experience all zones and covenants, but also have a goal for your progression. In addition, not having "optimal" covenant wouldn't hurt as much as it is in current iteration.

It is how the game works, just not how the "OMG THIS ONE DOES 1DPS MORE I NEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED TO HAVE IT!" fixation that certain aspecs of the player base have. They need to just fucking chill out and realise that small dps boost isn't going to make or break their kill. If their raid lead is being a bitch about it tell him to go fuck himself.

[Lurker1]

It is how the game works, just not how the "OMG THIS ONE DOES 1DPS MORE I NEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED TO HAVE IT!" fixation that certain aspecs of the player base have. They need to just fucking chill out and realise that small dps boost isn't going to make or break their kill. If their raid lead is being a bitch about it tell him to go fuck himself.

I fully agree with you in what you said here people are just reaching here imho!

[SoundOfGuns]

To make the game less stale over a longer period of time. But I agree it feels bad to lose stuff.

Its also already the exact problem everyone expected. For example i do not have a choice as a Holy-Pala (obviously assuming this stays the way it is) because nothing but Kyrian is worth pursuing, from what i currently know. So i do not get to make a choice based on what i will enjoy or what i will want for transmogg.

Now OBVIOUSLY this might be subject to change, but it already seems like the choice will be 100% decided by what is viable for raid content and if they change talents during the expansion, people got to switch factions which Plizzard for whatever reason wants to make difficult to pull off.

[Gurg]

It is how the game works, just not how the "OMG THIS ONE DOES 1DPS MORE I NEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED TO HAVE IT!" fixation that certain aspecs of the player base have. They need to just fucking chill out and realise that small dps boost isn't going to make or break their kill. If their raid lead is being a bitch about it tell him to go fuck himself.

I somewhat agree. Ofc, before everything, this is all subject to change.

Dont forget that historically some specs were literally ignored in PUG or progression environment for far less.
My fear is that these abilities will either break or rise some specs in the community that they will be default choice for content.
For instance for M+ Rogue for shroud, Bannerslave warrior Tank or DPS look like default choice so far. Tank is better due to warriors AoE dps.

Next, if you look at two abilities that i kept mentioning, "Swarming Mist" for DKs (AoE DoT, Dodge and Runic regen) and "Conqueror’s Banner" for warriors (movement speed buff for warrior and attack speed+max HP for party when placed) they simply look far too good to pick anything else, specially warriors banner that is party/raid utility which can help people squeeze that few extra % of DPS to push the boss in next phase or down it.
Hunters have a covenant ability that give them 100% line of sigh ignore.

Now, why would you, for instance, bring rogue which is extremely selfish class, DH if its not stupidly broken as they are now or enhance shaman when you can fill their slots with bannerslave warrior which already provide decent utility trough shouts?
Depending on the power of the buff, early progression will literally have few bannerslave warriors which will try to chain as much banners as they can.
Further more, warrior's Condemn Covenant ability is also extremely good choice.

And thats the point of people not being satisfied. just by looking at them balance and design of abilities feels quite bad with some abilities look far too good to pick anything else.
So good that, for instance, you would roll (or be pushed to roll) bannerslave warrior instead of lets say DK since it will be easier to PUG, but also contribute more in same slot.

On top of that, not only that some covenant abilities look like default choices for some specs, you will be also locked in that covenants "outdoor ability" and transmog that you might not actually like at all.

Honestly, im already starting to think which will be my main for next exp. with Mist DKs and bannerslave warrs currently being on top of the list.

[tru]

*YAAaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaawwwwwn*

This is worth an entire expansion...?

Bruh.... i read through that and i came here just to do that!

...YAAWWWWWWWWWWWWWWWNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNNN

[Niwes]

Thats a really, really weird train of thought you gave here. Jumping from "stop with the rental systems that fuck with classes on a fundamental level" to your rant post is mikd boggling.

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If it's only for outdoor content it might as well not exist... Like pvp talents.

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If they rebalance it, you just need to reroll. Simple as that.

yeah. „simple as that“. after they said it will be a big task to switch Covenant, since it should be a strong decision. which is
- a) the reason why ppl are upset (do you not read any post ?)
- b) leads to the next grind shit, they said they wanna move away from

... ofc... simple as that.

or was this sarcasm ?

[Gurg]

yeah. „simple as that“. after they said it will be a big task to switch Covenant, since it should be a strong decision. which is
- a) the reason why ppl are upset (do you not read any post ?)
- b) leads to the next grind shit, they said they wanna move away from

... ofc... simple as that.

or was this sarcasm ?

Yep. From my understanding as well as my personal opinion - people complain that they will be pushed into selecting BiS covenant which they might not like thematically at all.
If covenant balance change mid-patch/mid-expansion, which can happen, people which choose to be optimal (or are forced to be) will be pushed into tasking job of switching covenants, after which into pure grind for covenant progression and talents.

This then defaults to idea that you will have to grind trough all 4 covenants as early on as you can, like it or not, simply to reduce the grind IF covenant balance changes or some covenant abilities look better for one boss mechanic during progression.

Watching world first race with covenants will be FUN!
Theres a chance that people will spend more time switching covenants between bosses than actually time on bosses. xD

[bloodykiller86]

We don't have to be gods.

We should still have classes that feel fun to play, and if I LOST abilities from one expansion to another, all I'm going to think the entire leveling experience (and then some) will be "man, I wish I had (lost ability), because I remember when I could use it in this exact scenario."

This isn't fun. It feels like regression. We don't want our power to feel so high we can destroy literally everything, but losing abilities we had prior ISN'T fun.

......you realize that happened EVERY SINGLE EXPANSION prior to this new design philosophy of "rental" abilities lol because they would redesign the talents for every spec every damn time. And shit i think Fury is the best its ever been, best rotation flow theyve had in a lonnnnnnnggggg time

Also at the end of an expansion thats exactly what i want. i want to feel like a god once i get pretty much BiS lol

[pfbe]

That Kyrian Druid ability sounds awfully familiar...

[Relapses]

Thats a really, really weird train of thought you gave here. Jumping from "stop with the rental systems that fuck with classes on a fundamental level" to your rant post is mikd boggling.

The only thing that's "mind boggling" here is that you think that Blizzard would unveil a system at BlizzCon, spend six months continuing to iterate on it, then once revealing it to the playerbase decide, "Nah, let's make it a fucking talent instead." This is the kind of backwards thinking you see employed by players who don't want Blizzard to ever try anything new, they just want the game to stay forever in exactly the state they preferred it most. (And for whatever reason, that seems to be MoP for most of the people on this forum.) It won't happen no matter how angry "rental powers" make you feel -- suggesting it should is just a waste of your time and everybody else's.

[Gurg]

The only thing that's "mind boggling" here is that you think that Blizzard would unveil a system at BlizzCon, spend six months continuing to iterate on it, then once revealing it to the playerbase decide, "Nah, let's make it a fucking talent instead." This is the kind of backwards thinking you see employed by players who don't want Blizzard to ever try anything new, they just want the game to stay forever in exactly the state they preferred it most. (And for whatever reason, that seems to be MoP for most of the people on this forum.) It won't happen no matter how angry "rental powers" make you feel -- suggesting it should is just a waste of your time and everybody else's.

Yeah, completely agree with you.
They dont need to scrap it, they just need to make those abilities less covenant locked and faaar more in line with one another.
Compare, for instance, DKs, then Warriors, then DKs, warriors and Rogues. You can clearly see quite big difference there, right?

For instance, my idea was that we should get another talent row with unlockable talents as we cap covenant progression with 4th Covenant being class wide ability. Or simply get new "Covenant" ability on lvl 51, 54, 57 and 60.

Picking and sticking a covenant would provide boost to talent/spell that you unlocked via covenant and further boosted via covenant talent tree, with minor passive boost to other expansion talents/spells.
This way you would experience all zones and covenants, but also have a goal for your progression. It wouldnt be such a big pain to switch covenants but you will need to grind their progression as it is current plan. In addition, not having "optimal" covenant wouldn't hurt as much as it is in current iteration.

When expansion ends you will still have the reason for new characters to go trough Shadowland's covenants to gain access to talent row.

As for MoP - that was last good expansion that used old design model of item sets, powerful trinkets and daily quest grind. PvP vendors too.

[Ielenia]

Either I'm not understanding your point or you're not understanding mine. I agree with you that the giant rock mobs, which were in the intro zone, were less powerful than the blood elves in Netherstorm, which were in a later zone. That feels good to me. That's a good way to make us lose power at the start of an expansion - just make our enemies stronger by using levels at the same time as our secondary stats get weaker. The difference in levels means a level 119 is stronger than a level 111, it's just that the mobs he's fighting are also stronger too because their level is higher as well, AND the reduction in power from our secondary stats means it's a bigger challenge as we go on. That feels good. It feels like we're progressing on to bigger challenges and we need to step our game up.

I don't feel that way. Before level scaling, few things would bother me more during leveling than having to stop questing in a zone, and having to leave before even reaching half-way through its main arc because I've out-leveled the zone, and it no longer gave me worthwhile XP. For context: during this XP boost period, I level a character from 110 to 120... in Tiragarde Sound, alone. If it wasn't for level scaling, I'd have to hop through a fixed leveling path (let's assume TS -> Drust -> Stormsong), always stopping before even reaching half-way through its main arc before moving to the next zone.

In contrast, in BFA the way it worked was you just got weaker and weaker as you leveled. The mobs didn't change. Fighting a mob at 111 was easier than fighting the same mob at 119. That feels shitty. I agree that it's all a gameplay illusion, but to me that's important. It's important to feel progress through difficulty and not just "ok you killed x mobs so I'm going to tune the knob up a bit". In BFA it felt like they were just weakening us and we had to fight to get back to where we were, not that we had progressed on to harder challenges.

I'm curious: do you hold the same opinion regarding Legion?

[judgementofantonidas]

They don't even have all the abilities fleshed out and we're supposedly 7-8 months from release? I'm glad there's some information to work with, but it definitely is alarming when they don't even have the abilities ready at the very least.

7/8 months is shit load of time

[Hinastorm]

They listen to everyone they collect feedback and act on it - but their feedback loop is roughly about 2 years long (from x.0 release to x.0 release). It's the downside of very old style waterfall development, but given the legacy nature of their platform, I'd guess that's the best they can do.

Lately (in BFA) they've been experimenting with shorter feedback loops by introducing a new system in each major patch (x.1, .x.2 etc) and then trying to make corrections in the next major patch - this is why we've had so many "rental" systems in BFA. Even in this case, they're not able to completely "phase out" a bad system mid-expac, so it only works partially.

Whatever system you're going to see on Alpha now, is what will end in 9.0 release - even if everyone universally hates the idea. You can't reverse the waterfall. You need to get to the bottom (release) then climb back up and do the ride again.

So right now, they're collecting two kinds of feedback, 1) "how to tune this existing system they've just released" and 2) "did people like it, should we do something similar in 10.0"

Hmm. I mean, WoW is a big game, and these big systems take months to make/tweak. I don't *really* see how they could do much any differently, at least not without having to tack on more months until the next expansion each time they want to change something.

For better and worse, they are on a timeline.

[FelPlague]

Hey man, there's 2 extremist sides on this board. Those that defend blizzard regardless and those that shit on blizzard regardless. Don't group me up with people and I won't with you. I like WoW and just because I have some actual criticism/concern doesn't make me some WoW-bashing hater. I didn't remotely say anything about blizzard being lazy or shadowlands is the end of WoW. I merely said it's a little alarming. Get your bullshit slandering out of here, doesn't do shit for anyone.

"This alpha is not a 100% complete version of the game, wow this is so alarming!"
Surprise, the alpha is not the complete version of the game, not everything is going to be in it, welcome to the alpha/beta for literally every fucking game ever.
content is not complete
woooooooooooooow

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They don't even have all the abilities fleshed out and we're supposedly 7-8 months from release? I'm glad there's some information to work with, but it definitely is alarming when they don't even have the abilities ready at the very least.

7-8 months to set up a few abilities?
Wow how long do you think it takes to come up with these ideas. an entire office of 100 people sit there for an entire day in silence before someone yells out "THE HUNT" then they all go home, and then the next day they say "IT DOES NATURE DAMAGE!" Then they go home, then come back the next day. "INCREASES FURY"

so on so forth?

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Here we go again, boys.

The dude is literally complaining that "The alpha is missing abilities" as if we will go 7-8 months and these abilities will still not exist
grow up
there is some credence to the "its only alpha, its only beta, its only patch X.0"
but this is literally not even alpha yet, and people are crying "wtf there is missing content wow there is no way its gunna be ready!"

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This doesn't look very fun. Every spell is like stacking three on use azerite neck traits into a single ability, albeit more class specific. Just messy imo and too decoupled from the core of the class/the regular spells. Wish they had something similar to the on use effects on legion legendarys instead, or just scratched the system entirely, and focused on making the core of the classes fun.

"Decoupled from the regular classes, i wish they were sometign similiar to the effects on the legion legendaries"
you mean like bonus fire damage.
and this ability costs 1 less soulshard?
yeah those were sooooo amazing...

[crakerjack]

7/8 months is shit load of time

7-8 is a decent amount of time assuming there's no setbacks. The issue is that everything in 2020 is pretty much setback due to the coronavirus. It's impossible to give precise input when you can't compare abilities. If you only have W and X abilities to compare, you can't provide valid feedback unless you have Y and Z abilities to compare it to. Sure you can compare W and X abilities a billion times, but all feedback changes when 2 new abilities are added to compare. Hell monks are still missing 3. There's time, I'll agree with that, but I'm worried Blizzard is behind the ball.

At blizzcon they barely discussed covenant abilities. Hell they barely even discussed covenants. I'm excited for Shadowlands, but the pacing just feels off compared to prior expansions. We don't know if they're behind schedule or ahead, WE DON'T KNOW. So all we can do is speculate and if there's any correlations to be made between most businesses and their production/efficiency during this whole quarantine, it's that production/efficiency has taken a hit. Using what's tangible, correlations indicate that it's likely Blizzard will fall behind for as long as this whole covid-19 thing lasts. So if they were ahead of schedule, they're likely now on normal schedule and if they were behind schedule, they're now further behind schedule. You can argue blizzard was ahead of schedule prior to the whole covid-19 outbreak, but more than not, WoW expansions have been pushed back rather than moved ahead.

I'm not saying WoW is dying or that this setback will be the final nail in the coffin, but I'm not going to exaggerate and pretend that 7-8 months is enough time.

[Ielenia]

I do agree that there should be some reason to finish a zone before going onto the next one.

Which is why level scaling is a good thing.

Otherwise you'd be stuck in a zone that gives piss-poor experience just so you could unlock the next zone to level on.

[Wheeler]

Nice you think i care about those content.And your feelings is still not my problem.

Yeah, I don't know what we're even talking about here if you don't do any of the actual content the game has to offer. You're immune from criticism on it if you don't do any of it - but the flip side to that is your opinion on any of it is absolutely worthless. It'd be like you giving your opinion on global warming as it impacts the Sahara desert. Completely unqualified to answer.

[PenguinChan]

I'm hoping when you 'Ally' with a covenant it'll work like other MMORPGs where they allow you to sever that alliance and retain that rank - but go to another covenant and build up reputation with them. And if you want to go back, you can - but obviously a CD between switches. They should also make Covenants account-bound or have highly accelerated catch-up on alts no matter which covenant you choose to side with.

I know both of these go against the grain where Blizzard wants you to stick to one character and play as much as possible but I'm hoping it happens. We'll see.