Legion M+ vs BFA M+ Which was Better

[Bigbazz]

In Legion Blizzard came up with a bunch of things on the basis of "how can we make dungeons more annoying for players"... In BFA they decided they needed to up their game and make things even more annoying, in 8.3 no small part of this is provided just by the existence of corruption effects. Legion M+ were slightly less annoying than BFA M+, and the dungeons themselves were better.

Anyone who has done a +5 mask vision knows that "annoying" is the name of the game these days, putting the player at the mercy of largely random annoyances that are mostly just annoyances but if the stars align they can kill you. Of course in visions you can just outgear them to the point they are no longer dangerous, then all that remains is annoyance, and that is a bit like M+ dungeon farming in BFA.

[tehealadin]

I preferred Legion. I did them on my DK tank and lock. Maybe it was because I preferred how they played more than the content. Was able to do fairly high keys, found myself somewhat gimped right now due to relying on pugging. Though I probably preferred the Legion dungeons. Though I do like WM.

[crakerjack]

I liked Legion more. There's multiple factors that play into why I like Legion more, but I'd say my main reason is dungeon layout/theme. I'm not a fan of the BFA dungeons. They were fine at first, but they grew old fast.

[Twdft]

Anyone who has done a +5 mask vision knows that "annoying" is the name of the game these days, putting the player at the mercy of largely random annoyances that are mostly just annoyances but if the stars align they can kill you.

Almost nothing of the stuff in 5 mask runs is random. The time at which a madness activates is random, but all of it is telegraphed. You get increasing circles under you, just step out. Images and extra mobs don't spawn on you, you have time to walk away/cc. You have enough time before 5 bugs to jump, the fire is visible before going off and you can stop moving to prevent it from going off (I even use it controlled to move faster). Split personality telegraphs early enough that you can stop moving and look where the exit is.

Come to think about it... what exactly is largely random about 5 mask runs?

[Mardux]

Almost nothing of the stuff in 5 mask runs is random. The time at which a madness activates is random, but all of it is telegraphed. You get increasing circles under you, just step out. Images and extra mobs don't spawn on you, you have time to walk away/cc. You have enough time before 5 bugs to jump, the fire is visible before going off and you can stop moving to prevent it from going off (I even use it controlled to move faster). Split personality telegraphs early enough that you can stop moving and look where the exit is.

Come to think about it... what exactly is largely random about 5 mask runs?

Potions and chests, that’s it. Nothing that will hinder anyone from completing a 5mask fullclear with time to spare.

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I preferred Legion. I did them on my DK tank and lock. Maybe it was because I preferred how they played more than the content. Was able to do fairly high keys, found myself somewhat gimped right now due to relying on pugging. Though I probably preferred the Legion dungeons. Though I do like WM.

It helps when you’re playing a nigh unkillable tank.

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In Legion Blizzard came up with a bunch of things on the basis of "how can we make dungeons more annoying for players"... In BFA they decided they needed to up their game and make things even more annoying, in 8.3 no small part of this is provided just by the existence of corruption effects. Legion M+ were slightly less annoying than BFA M+, and the dungeons themselves were better.

Anyone who has done a +5 mask vision knows that "annoying" is the name of the game these days, putting the player at the mercy of largely random annoyances that are mostly just annoyances but if the stars align they can kill you. Of course in visions you can just outgear them to the point they are no longer dangerous, then all that remains is annoyance, and that is a bit like M+ dungeon farming in BFA.

Bfa keys are no more annoying than legion keys. And nothing of consequence is random in visions. Lol

[Ashina]

BFA implemented M+ better with seasonal affixes as a standout feature but BFA dungeons are wildly inferior to Legion dungeons. So I'm picking Legion.

[Bigbazz]

Almost nothing of the stuff in 5 mask runs is random. The time at which a madness activates is random, but all of it is telegraphed. You get increasing circles under you, just step out. Images and extra mobs don't spawn on you, you have time to walk away/cc. You have enough time before 5 bugs to jump, the fire is visible before going off and you can stop moving to prevent it from going off (I even use it controlled to move faster). Split personality telegraphs early enough that you can stop moving and look where the exit is.

Come to think about it... what exactly is largely random about 5 mask runs?

The split personality telegraphs, but lets say you get knocked back into it at the moment they spawn and lets say the knockback hits you through the gap. Great, pro move guys looking good. But what if it knocks you into the image and through the graces of bad luck you just so happen to end up in a CC chain, or what if at a certain moment you need to move, but you've just stacked your chains up because you had to move already just prior and so now you're forced to eat something that you're very aware of, that you're very willing and desperately trying to avoid but you can't?

By themselves they are nothing more than simple annoyances, they become exceptionally dangerous as they interact with each other where the roll of the dice can kill you. Of course if you're geared it doesn't matter, if you're doing a 5 mask run at ilvl 450 or lower your chance of dying from poor RNG or any mistake (even a mistake that with the benefit of hindsight you could avoid) is very high, but if you're an optimised ilvl 470+ player (which most raiders/M+ skilled players fall into the catagory) they are trivial, mobs die so quickly you will never see any dangerous combination, and if you did you could survive it most of the time.

Circumstances and outcomes of the masks and general vision mechanics are largely random, even if most of them by themselves can be dealt with predictably. Even then, what if you get a fire moment proc and you heroic leap in one direction and get knocked back in the opposite direction to the heroic leap and end up stunned by the pink corrupted slow image? (had that happen). Or what if you move in a direction and you get knocked into the terrain and end up stuck in a bit of scenery (had that happen).

I had been doing vision clears with aweful gear, in low end gear it's comparable to Mage Towers on launch, but more annoying. In high end gear (which I'm yet to reach at 465 but I'm already finding this) it's no different than walking to the fridge and back, except with annoying gnats biting at you and making you itch.

Bfa keys are no more annoying than legion keys. And nothing of consequence is random in visions. Lol

By themselves they are not random, the combinations of things you will have to deal with and the consequences in a moment to moment basis is random. There is nothing predictable about having to deal with "x" combination combined with "x" mob ability + corruption effect.. The directions/timing of knockbacks.

BFA keys are more annoying, you're having an opinion that you're entitled to, it's just a wrong one!

[Mardux]

Legion was way better. And for the sole reason that the Legion dungeons was way more fun and interesting than the BfA ones. I also prefer that Tyrannical and Fortified should be the last affix. It's been pretty much hit and miss with the keystone level 10 affixes in Bfa. Festering bad, AoE good, Emissary bad, Awakening good. And you could change gear inside while doing the run so you could swap for bosses vs trash. Miss that option.

And, Court of Stars >>>>> any dungeon.

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Whats improved in BfA when it comes to mythic +? Its all opinions, so if people think Legion m+ was better than there is no objective argument against that.

If it’s all opinions, why are you treating yours as if they are facts?

“It’s all opinions, so if people think bfa mythic+ was better [than] there is no objective argument against that.”

By your logic, you can’t argue against anyone who likes bfa more than legion. Funny how that works.

And what was so bad about the ghuunies? Aside from the fact that the dps needed to use their brain for 2 seconds to cc the infested mobs instead just “hur dur I aoe gud”. You literally just had cc them, pull everything that wasn’t infested and aoe it down. Then pull all the infested mobs and aoe them down.

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The split personality telegraphs, but lets say you get knocked back into it at the moment they spawn and lets say the knockback hits you through the gap. Great, pro move guys looking good. But what if it knocks you into the image and through the graces of bad luck you just so happen to end up in a CC chain, or what if at a certain moment you need to move, but you've just stacked your chains up because you had to move already just prior and so now you're forced to eat something that you're very aware of, that you're very willing and desperately trying to avoid but you can't?

By themselves they are nothing more than simple annoyances, they become exceptionally dangerous as they interact with each other where the roll of the dice can kill you. Of course if you're geared it doesn't matter, if you're doing a 5 mask run at ilvl 450 or lower your chance of dying from poor RNG or any mistake (even a mistake that with the benefit of hindsight you could avoid) is very high, but if you're an optimised ilvl 470+ player (which most raiders/M+ skilled players fall into the catagory) they are trivial, mobs die so quickly you will never see any dangerous combination, and if you did you could survive it most of the time.

Circumstances and outcomes of the masks and general vision mechanics are largely random, even if most of them by themselves can be dealt with predictably. Even then, what if you get a fire moment proc and you heroic leap in one direction and get knocked back in the opposite direction to the heroic leap and end up stunned by the pink corrupted slow image? (had that happen). Or what if you move in a direction and you get knocked into the terrain and end up stuck in a bit of scenery (had that happen).

I had been doing vision clears with aweful gear, in low end gear it's comparable to Mage Towers on launch, but more annoying. In high end gear (which I'm yet to reach at 465 but I'm already finding this) it's no different than walking to the fridge and back, except with annoying gnats biting at you and making you itch.



By themselves they are not random, the combinations of things you will have to deal with and the consequences in a moment to moment basis is random. There is nothing predictable about having to deal with "x" combination combined with "x" mob ability + corruption effect.. The directions/timing of knockbacks.

BFA keys are more annoying, you're having an opinion that you're entitled to, it's just a wrong one!

Yeah, that’s still not “roll of the dice”. It’s all still telegraphed and if you chose not to pay attention or chose to pull shit that can knock you into “fire” because you chose not to position yourself so it wouldn’t happen, that’s on you.

[Twdft]

The split personality telegraphs, but lets say you get knocked back into it at the moment they spawn

Nothing random about getting knocked back. Knock back doesn't just happen, you let it happen to you.

[Bigbazz]

Yeah, that’s still not “roll of the dice”. It’s all still telegraphed and if you chose not to pay attention or chose to pull shit that can knock you into “fire” because you chose not to position yourself so it wouldn’t happen, that’s on you.

I just don't think that's necessarily realistic, even if you're technically correct. Example, melee rarely get to choose their positioning after the pull, your position will be decided partially by the card you're dealt. You move to avoid stuff, if you want to interrupt you have to move to the target, if you get knocked back you have to move back to the target while navigating the effects in play. And often cases you may pull more mobs than necessary and 9/10 that's fine but maybe 1/10 the stars align and you get fucked in the ass and end up in a situation where the solution to one problem is directly responsible for creating another.

It's also not all equal between specs, I've done so far as Arms, Fury, Outlaw, Frost DK, Ret and BM Hunter.. The difference between doing visions on a melee vs a hunter is night and day, because a large bulk of annoyances are effectively removed or trivialised for BM, and for example bosses like Mrs Windrunner where the entirety of the fight as a melee is trying to get her to LOS around a pillar long enough to dps her before she covers the ground in shit or teleports off again, as a ranged the only thing you have to deal with are the sanity eyes.

As you gear and increase research all the mechanic combinations are effectively removed from the visions as nothing lives long enough to be dangerous, but RNG plays a huge role in your success when you're not trivialising the content. It's the worst kind of difficulty because they are combining annoyances you have to deal with, with annoyances designed to prevent you dealing with them.

And my point is, it's an annoying way of adding difficulty. You may like that kinda difficulty and that's cool, but it's not for me.

Nothing random about getting knocked back. Knock back doesn't just happen, you let it happen to you.

I wasn't talking about the fire movement? Though the fire movement works strangely sometimes, as I said I've had it knock me in the opposite direction to where I cast heroic leap, also had it knock me in the correct direction but where I got stuck in terrain with the camera inside the terrain.

Totally predictable bro.

[Doffen]

If it’s all opinions, why are you treating yours as if they are facts?

“It’s all opinions, so if people think bfa mythic+ was better [than] there is no objective argument against that.”

By your logic, you can’t argue against anyone who likes bfa more than legion. Funny how that works.

Yeah, funny how you draw that card when someones opinion doesn't fit your own. I didn't say my opinion is fact(where the hell do you draw that from in my post anyway? but I am telling the other poster and you that my opinion doesn't change whether you like it or not.

Its logic. I mean, what you wrote is just as valid as the thing I said, of course it is, that goes without saying. It is all opinions, so if someone like BfA m+ better then of course they think so and can't be bothered if someone else like Legion better. Except you it seems.

But if I put BfA instead of Legion in there you wouldn't waste 2 minutes of your time to even quote me in the first place, we know that.

So, that you manage to write that nonsensical babbling which was pretty much self-explanatory just because someone doesn't share your opinion tells me a lot about you. I see its a trend of yours against other posters as well. Useless.

[Argorwal]

I remember when Legion dungeons used to be complained about instead of praised on the forums.

How the times change.

Especially:

Vault
Seat
Court
Eye
Cathedral
Halls of Valor

And shade of xavious

[Doffen]

I remember when Legion dungeons used to be complained about instead of praised on the forums.

How the times change.

Especially:

Vault
Seat
Court
Eye
Cathedral
Halls of Valor

And shade of xavious

Loved them then, and love them now. Well, not so much Seat and Eye(Nelth was kinda boring too), but the rest of them I think was nice thematically and had some cool bosses and layouts.

Court of Stars is my favorite dungeon in game, and was that instantly when I first did it. Man what an awesome dungeon. Vault of the Wardens was nice too of those you listed, Cordana is one of my favorite dungeons bosses, if not the numero uno.

Of those you listed had some silly hard bosses, so there was definitely some complaints about them, me included. Hyrja on high tyrannical for instance. Fun :P

[Trend]

I remember when Legion dungeons used to be complained about instead of praised on the forums.

Not sure why it is, but most people love talking about how great things where in the past. People gush over their stupid 5 cent hamburgers and completely ignore the fact that was more relative to what they made than it would be now.

[TOM_RUS]

Some things were better in Legion, some are better in BFA...

[Alfryd]

No, no, the bolded part is completely wrong. Our damage always increases faster than our survivability (certainly for non-tanks... I am not sure about tanks, your claim might be true for them). That is the main reason one-shots were a problem in Legion - everyone had to stack avoidance and make special gear sets to survive certain bosses. In BfA Blizzard tuned the dungeons to avoid one-shots, but we start running in the same problems at very high key levels. Playing at the 20% avoidance cap is becoming important again.

In BfA healing is often less intense in higher keys because that's when groups start to do more optimal pulls and learn to avoid the avoidable damage (there are of course huge exceptions, such as tyrannical Temple boss fights). The overall incoming damage still scales up exponentially, and nothing helps us mitigate the increased damage, but groups have everything planned and under control, so healing becomes seamless. It usually has nothing to do with healer though - it's more dependent on tank doing good pulls and on DPS players controlling all dangerous casts. So the healer can focus on dealing damage more if they trust the group. In comparison, low key pugs are usually full of fiesta, and healers need to out-heal a lot of avoidable damage every other pull.

It actually felt quite different in Legion: dungeons had a lot of unavoidable damage throughout the run (trash included). So healing was always very intense, even in very high keys. That's the reason healing DPS meta was not prominent. Yes, holy paladins could always do insane damage (and that was important in some very limited parts of the dungeons, such as the necessity to burst the Mana Devourer in Upper Karazhan on tyrannical 24/25+ keys -- holy paladin's damage in the 30 sec burst window on Mana Devourer was very often higher than the burst damage of actual DPS classes, even crazier than it has ever been in BfA). But healers spent most of their time healing unavoidable damage, so their ability to deal damage was considered a luxury, not yet a necessity.

As someone who mostly plays healer specs, the above is the reason I consider Legion M+ much better. In Legion, healing was a full-fledged, hard role. All the way up to +26 tyrannical keys, every time I progressed 2-3 key levels up, I ran into a boss that forced me to rethink how I heal (going from "I can yolo it" attitude, to actually understanding every little detail about how boss timings interact with my spec and abilities). In contrast, in BfA healing has become a rather passive mini-DPS&support role, requiring little to none healing expertise (with some exceptions, as usual). And this design change goes hand-in-hand with Blizzard fixing the much touted Legion "one shot" meta.

I agree that Hyrja and Xavius were too random on very high keys, but Blizzard certainly overshot in removing too much unavoidable damage from the dungeon design. For example, even Hyrja could actually have been salvaged in multiple ways. Many parts of that fight were very interesting healing wise: such as spreading quickly after Eye of the Storm is over (so that Arcing Bolt does not chain), while having the awareness to spot who's targeted by the Arcing Bolt cast and making sure you can top up that target (from the Eye of the Storm damage) to 100% HP within a second so that Arcing Bolt does not one-shot them. This type of avoidable "one-shot" is fine, and the combination of movement+awareness+cooldown planning (along with, inevitably, on-spot communication) from healers is a very good design. The only problem arised when Arcing Bolt started to one-shot from 100% HP through a personal or external damage reduction cooldown, just because of the scaling. I think the above example is indicative of what most people call "one-shots", at least at the key levels they experienced. Even a one-shot from 90% HP to 0% HP is not really a design problem yet if it can be outplayed by merely making sure that healer tops you up to 100% (which ideally overlaps with multiple other boss abilities, to make it an interesting gameplay mechanic for both the healer and the player who is targeted by the incoming damage).

I have to completely agree with this.

From the perspective of a healer, I feel like my ability to actually influence how successful the dungeon is has been removed utterly in the transition into BFA. In Legion dungeons, the unavoidable damage was a hard cap that tested my skillset and how I reacted was possibly a defining element of what determined the success of the run (note: I also mained a Disc Priest in Legion, so one of the squisher healers). Yes, I will absolutely concede that unavoidable damage that proved to be fatal felt awful (I'm thinking first boss of BRH when I had to Pain Suppression/Barrier/Pyrdaz the big AoE at 20+ to even hope to survive), and that class unbalance was rampant (didn't feel good to know that unless you played a Druid or Paladin, you were considered an non-functioning healer at high keys). But the crucial element was that there was actually things you had to heal.

BFA in my opinion has changed that. In BFA, the role of the healer has been diminished. If everything is going well, no-one should be taking damage and you should be dpsing. Not only is that boring from a healer perspective, but it's also not the role I necessarily wanted to play (also note that I did enjoy dpsing in Legion, and I do enjoy it in BFA. I just don't want it to be so prolific as it is now). Equally, in my opinion, dungeons are now designed on the individual player taking no to little damage. What this means is that the moment you say, you get two players who are less skilled and continually take damage, suddenly your role as a healer becomes very unpleasant because you're fighting a losing battle as this damage is meant to be lethal and should, in theory, kill the player that failed to avoid entirely avoidable damage. What's more is that if a player is bad, they will likely get hit by every single thing in the dungeon. Suddenly, every single trash pack and every single boss becomes an insurmountable task to baby sit this bad player at the detriment of your enjoyment.

Healing in BFA isn't pleasant anymore. I'm still doing 19-21 keys (all in pugs), and I now play what is considered a "bis" healer (changed mains from Priest to Druid). But I hate that I'm obsolete and rendered basically a support class, unless a bad player is present. Then I'm a glorified nanny who has to continually heal unpleasant damage which was designed to not be inflicted. I miss Legion - even if the implementation was whacky and could use some work, the unavoidable group wide damage was MY task as a healer to overcome. I wish Blizzard would find a medium between the two poles that we currently have.

Additionally, I also preferred Legion's dungeon design. I like open space dungeons that allow movement in a manner where you aren't continuously worried about body pulling more mobs. I also prefer the themes of the dungeons, and the light. Has anyone noticed that BFA dungeons are so ****ing dark?

[Wedny22]

Well, there are no dungeons i HATE more then the BFA trash we got, so this is easy one...in Legion i Just didn't like Halls of Valor. Others were fine and some actually really good.
BFA on the otherhand made me Quit the game doe the first time in 15 years, and that most part of the Dungeon trash.

[Devilyaki]

I would hope they improved over time but don’t care to try them out. If they were removed from the game that be better.

[apelsinjuice]

I have to completely agree with this.

From the perspective of a healer, I feel like my ability to actually influence how successful the dungeon is has been removed utterly in the transition into BFA. In Legion dungeons, the unavoidable damage was a hard cap that tested my skillset and how I reacted was possibly a defining element of what determined the success of the run (note: I also mained a Disc Priest in Legion, so one of the squisher healers). Yes, I will absolutely concede that unavoidable damage that proved to be fatal felt awful (I'm thinking first boss of BRH when I had to Pain Suppression/Barrier/Pyrdaz the big AoE at 20+ to even hope to survive), and that class unbalance was rampant (didn't feel good to know that unless you played a Druid or Paladin, you were considered an non-functioning healer at high keys). But the crucial element was that there was actually things you had to heal.

BFA in my opinion has changed that. In BFA, the role of the healer has been diminished. If everything is going well, no-one should be taking damage and you should be dpsing. Not only is that boring from a healer perspective, but it's also not the role I necessarily wanted to play (also note that I did enjoy dpsing in Legion, and I do enjoy it in BFA. I just don't want it to be so prolific as it is now). Equally, in my opinion, dungeons are now designed on the individual player taking no to little damage. What this means is that the moment you say, you get two players who are less skilled and continually take damage, suddenly your role as a healer becomes very unpleasant because you're fighting a losing battle as this damage is meant to be lethal and should, in theory, kill the player that failed to avoid entirely avoidable damage. What's more is that if a player is bad, they will likely get hit by every single thing in the dungeon. Suddenly, every single trash pack and every single boss becomes an insurmountable task to baby sit this bad player at the detriment of your enjoyment.

Healing in BFA isn't pleasant anymore. I'm still doing 19-21 keys (all in pugs), and I now play what is considered a "bis" healer (changed mains from Priest to Druid). But I hate that I'm obsolete and rendered basically a support class, unless a bad player is present. Then I'm a glorified nanny who has to continually heal unpleasant damage which was designed to not be inflicted. I miss Legion - even if the implementation was whacky and could use some work, the unavoidable group wide damage was MY task as a healer to overcome. I wish Blizzard would find a medium between the two poles that we currently have.

Additionally, I also preferred Legion's dungeon design. I like open space dungeons that allow movement in a manner where you aren't continuously worried about body pulling more mobs. I also prefer the themes of the dungeons, and the light. Has anyone noticed that BFA dungeons are so ****ing dark?

yes as a healer main i hate how its more about doing damage than healing now and almost every healer seems to be pushed towards a dps/healing hybrid in some way or form, it feels like i spend more time doing a 1-2 button damage "rotation" on my healer than time i spend actually healing

[kebabmasterxd]

I prefer legion.

Dungeons weren't designed around MDI which is like 0.1% of the playerbase.

BFA dungeons are honestly been so tilting, there are so many rng deaths on some boss fights, some fights are dysfunctional too that players had to find a work around on like shrine of the storm 3rd boss for example.

BFA trash having to stack melee in most dungeons because mobs have like 100000 different spells to interupt.

How i see it, the entire playerbase has to have a worse time in these dungeons because of MDI.