PSA: AOE abilities might be target-capped in Shadowlands

[klaps_05]

They can make any design decisions as they like. But lets be fair and think what these changes will lead to. Take a look at the existing evidence - live meta. Certain classes like guardian druid, holy priest, arcane mage, etc. are branded as BAD by the community and your chance to get an invite to a random pug with them is extremely small. This is mostly due to the community knowing these classes cant do what the top classes can, e.g. rogue, dh, fire mage, prot warrior, resto druid, etc.

The information on the above is mostly from streams, MDI, public posts. Now imagine Shadowlands: each class will essentially be categorized. You are now either a 5cap/8cap/Uncapped DPS. While previously classes were declined because they didnt bring a utility or enough DPS, we now have a picking order: Uncapped > 8cap > 5cap. I dont mind changes, but lets not pretend these changes will not massively affect any of the classes which cant dish it out big time.

And yes, some classes have had cap for a long time. Guess where on the totem-pole they are - yes, at the bottom.

[Quaade]

you do realise some have cap since tbc right? so it works good for over a decade but now it have to stop... why? bcs it endangers "superiority" of one button AOE classes like DH?

Yes and some have none which makes the none vastly better for the meta playstyle than others.

My DH that has a lower ilvl than my Fury main crushes her on AoE DPS since Eyebeams, Blade Dance, and the Aura is uncapped and many times a pull is often more than 5+ mobs.

So yeah, either all or none. If there are cap restraints on some there should be on al,l or the ones that have a cap should have it removed because the current is BS from a design perspective in the "bring the players instead of the class" philosophy.

[exochaft]

you do realise some have cap since tbc right? so it works good for over a decade but now it have to stop... why? bcs it endangers "superiority" of one button AOE classes like DH?

If anything, removing caps on abilities actually made situations worse. Going into BfA, Blade Flurry for Outlaw rogues went from having a target cap to not having one at all... and it's pretty evident what happened as it came the de facto class to bring for sustained stacked cleave by a mile. I remember when I saw the patch notes for the change, and I immediately thought "well... that'll be OP", turns out it was. Only reason it doesn't seem as OP right now is because the game currently has layers of OP systems that mask it to some degree, where you get some corruptions and suddenly you're the god of stacked AoE cleave.

I still remember when Blizz put in diminishing returns on AoE because of similar issues occuring in TBC, as it was right around Sunwell when this occurred (noticed it when we were world PvPing and abilities like Rain of Fire were suddenly hitting less per tick when on large groups of Horde). Since then, there are have been hard and soft caps on AoE where everyone had their niche. While the concept of "abilities with no target cap will have drop-off damage after X targets" seems new to some, it really was introduced a LONG time ago and still exists to some degree in BfA.

There's also the concept of artificial target caps for cleave/AoE, where you literally cannot put up enough DoTs on every target after a certain amount, so your cleave/AoE strength artificially has a cap even if the spells/abilities involved don't limit the number of targets. This generally applies to classes like moonkins where not only can you only get all your DoTs up on a limited number of targets before they fall off, but also the ramp-up time is very long to the point that the damage only becomes strong when things live for a very long time. While Starfall does hit everything, right now it's only even worth casting on massive groups where other classes with no target caps would still demolish you. You're limited by your ability to cast as well as how long the mobs will survive (and whether it's worth it versus priority targeting). While this system works well for DoT classes, such solutions really don't work for classes with one-button cleave/aoe abilities (like Blade Flurry) where how long mobs live and how fast you can pump out spells limits how many targets you can hit.

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They can make any design decisions as they like. But lets be fair and think what these changes will lead to. Take a look at the existing evidence - live meta. Certain classes like guardian druid, holy priest, arcane mage, etc. are branded as BAD by the community and your chance to get an invite to a random pug with them is extremely small. This is mostly due to the community knowing these classes cant do what the top classes can, e.g. rogue, dh, fire mage, prot warrior, resto druid, etc.

The information on the above is mostly from streams, MDI, public posts. Now imagine Shadowlands: each class will essentially be categorized. You are now either a 5cap/8cap/Uncapped DPS. While previously classes were declined because they didnt bring a utility or enough DPS, we now have a picking order: Uncapped > 8cap > 5cap. I dont mind changes, but lets not pretend these changes will not massively affect any of the classes which cant dish it out big time.

And yes, some classes have had cap for a long time. Guess where on the totem-pole they are - yes, at the bottom.

This is a very legitimate concern in tons of aspects of the game, however there are solutions to adjust this to some degree.

For example, I have a sneaking suspicion outside of a few abilities, tanks will still have unlimited targeting abilities with their core AoE abilities. Immediate reaction would probably be "zomg, tanks are going to be top damage!", which is again a fair concern, but Blizz has already mentioned they plan to put in diminishing returns on AoE abilities with no caps. So while you could, for example, Swipe five mobs for 1000 each, maybe you will Swipe ten mobs for 500 each (or less) as a bear... as long as there is no point where diminishing returns stops penalizing a number of target, you can get it to where mass pulling is actually counter productive. This is especially true if the scaling isn't linear and more mobs incurs a higher damage penalty to where you'd do more effective DPS, for example, at 5 targets than 6 and above.

This weaves into making encounters more dangerous, as in BfA the danger-to-reward ratio for mass pulling using classes with no AoE caps is small. If you make those mass AoE class worse and worse with more targets, the danger aspect skyrockets as the mobs are going to live a lot longer than if you only pulled a handful with such diminishing returns as mentioned above.

Another way to encourage certain gameplay is with how you balance cleave abilities alongside all the others. I can't remember the exact changes they're proposing thus far per ability, so I'm just going to assign random numbers: let's say that Cleave is going to hit 5 targets max, what should it's relative power be? In order to keep some semblance of power balance, target limited cleaving abilities should usually hit harder than no cap AoE abilities. So if Blade Flurry has no target cap, Cleave should dominate Blade Flurry in the 1-5 target range, but lag behind the gains Blade Flurry beyond the 6th target. Doesn't mean an Outlaw rogue should suddenly be doing more AoE damage than a warrior at a 6th target necessarily (but it could potentially), however the warrior should have the clear advantage on damaging priority targets up to 5.

In this same light, you really need to ensure classes that have limited AoE/cleave are the clear winners in priority target killing at the very least. If you have a class that dominates the AoE/cleaving by a mile, and only lags on ST/priority damage by like 5%, you're going to have issues. However, this discussion leads to a whole other aspect of class design, but I think I can simply state that classes shouldn't be able to respond to every scenario extremely well... which means it's on Blizz to design classes/specs/talents/etc. so you can choose what you want to do as well as design content where only one meta is not needed/desired.

[ShmooDude]

They can make any design decisions as they like. But lets be fair and think what these changes will lead to. Take a look at the existing evidence - live meta. Certain classes like guardian druid, holy priest, arcane mage, etc. are branded as BAD by the community and your chance to get an invite to a random pug with them is extremely small. This is mostly due to the community knowing these classes cant do what the top classes can, e.g. rogue, dh, fire mage, prot warrior, resto druid, etc.

The information on the above is mostly from streams, MDI, public posts. Now imagine Shadowlands: each class will essentially be categorized. You are now either a 5cap/8cap/Uncapped DPS. While previously classes were declined because they didnt bring a utility or enough DPS, we now have a picking order: Uncapped > 8cap > 5cap. I dont mind changes, but lets not pretend these changes will not massively affect any of the classes which cant dish it out big time.

And yes, some classes have had cap for a long time. Guess where on the totem-pole they are - yes, at the bottom.

There aren't going to be any "uncapped" abilities anymore. That's the point. The newer abilities ignored this rule (looks like you knew about this, but for those that don't):

Since patch 2.2.0, most area effect damage effects have an 'area damage cap' which limits the potency of the spell if used against a large number of targets simultaneously. As of patch 5.2.0, the current area damage cap is 20 targets. This means AoE spells will deal the listed damage to each target up to and including 20 targets, reaching their maximum total damage output when striking 20 targets. Against more than 20 targets, the spell will deal the amount of damage it would deal against 20 targets, split evenly among all targets hit. For example, if an AoE hits each target for 10,000 damage, it would deal 10,000 per target against up to 20 targets. Against 25 targets, however, it would deal only 8,000 damage per target, as the spell would cap at 200,000 damage done (20 x 10,000). For more than 20 targets, the damage done will be equal to (DamagePerTarget x 20/NumberOfTargets).

I suspect that most abilities will still follow these rules, though they may use some sort of diminishing returns effect like they did on Twilight Destruction:

Deals normal damage on up to 5 targets.
Deals 50% reduced damage to targets 6 through 10.

... and I'd bet that they'll lower the damage cap back to 10 targets (it was 10 before 5.2 where it was buffed to 20)

Thus you'll end up with 2, 5, 8 and 10 effectively (and maybe a few more I'm forgetting).

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And just because an ability hits more targets won't necessarily make it better. If the 5 target ability hits for 200 damage and the 10 target ability only hits for 50, the 5 target ability is clearly better.

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One thing people seem to overlook, especially in regards to comparing it to ARPGs like Diablo 3 or Path of Exile is that those games DO have a target cap. The target cap is the number of enemies that can fit in the area.

WoW has no collision detection, so it has no soft cap like this. So a limit has to be imposed in an artificial manner instead (target or damage cap).

[Aphrel]

a damage cap is a better solution than target cap.

Im fine with this change.

[gorkos]

Wouldn't it depend on how its implimented? In the past they have made aoes do less damage the more targets exist. (And I think that was also mentioned in the blue post) if Mr warrior can only hit 5 targets for full damage but Johnny mage can hit 5 for 100% but at 10 targets its 50% damage is it a big deal.?

[Dangg]

Massive change, but their explanation makes sense. Let's see how it plays like in game.

[Dug]

Why not just change your design philosophy on dungeons. Smaller groups that are way tougher. So much so that pulling two or three would be a death sentence even for very geared and experienced players.