Solution to the whole covenant problem.

[Kathranis]

I'm pretty sure they're sticking with the "Hard Covenant Choice" at the very least through 9.0. They seem quite committed to the idea of it being a decision on par with Race and Class.

There's always going to be an optimal choice, but they're going to tune the numbers so that they're all within a certain range. This is probably ultimately going to mean that you'll get some Class/Covenant combos that have shitty active abilities but really strong Soulbinds and vice versa.


If that doesn't work I'm pretty sure that some time around 9.1 they'll just introduce some new system that allows you to gain access to the abilities and Soulbinds of the other Covenants. I don't see them "solving" the "problem" of Covenants purely through systems if they do decide to make a change. It'll be justified through gameplay and story somehow.

Maybe you'll be able to form "Pacts" with the other Covenants and funnel some of your Renown into them.

Or maybe it'll be something really simple, like the Covenants will band together as the "Umbral Accord" or something and build a new hub Sanctum in the Maw or whatever other new zone is introduced, and in that hub you'll be able to mentor under the other Covenants to learn their abilities and soulbond with their members while still remaining loyal to your chosen Covenant.

That would make sense from a "choice" and "RPG" standpoint while also not devaluing the original Covenant implementation. It would feel like a natural result of the story progressing.

[Dracullus]

Covenants have 2 problems atm.

1. the gems. I'm 70% sure the solution to this is just gonna be to have a library of unlockable gems that you can freely switch between.

I don't think Blizzard will even fight over it. Probably they just copied artifact weapon with conduits as relics without serious thought that people will be really pissed.

[Tesshin83]

I don't want to deal with grinds. I have the ability to wrestle with the fact that respecing per boss is a choice and killing 10000 world mobs does not make it more or less of a choice.

Try a different genre of gaming. Grinding has been the core gameplay of mmorpgs for almlst 20 years.

[ClassicPeon]

I don't think Blizzard will even fight over it. Probably they just copied artifact weapon with conduits as relics without serious thought that people will be really pissed.

Bellular forgot to mention the library solution to Ian in their interview. I think thats the only logical solution to both issues(not having to farm shitton of the same gems that fill up your inventory, vs not having to farm 1-3 of each gem to fill up your inventory)

[Vakir]

That would make sense from a "choice" and "RPG" standpoint while also not devaluing the original Covenant implementation. It would feel like a natural result of the story progressing.

Even though, let's be honest, the real reason for them doing it was they were just stalling to enforce people swapping between them as they continue to make tuning adjustments well after launch. Even though they know it's a mistake to not do it from the beginning, they're either too stubborn or actively, maliciously stalling to make the system "compelling" for longer amounts of time than needed. Just like non-exponential growth on AP back in 7.1. Just like Wakening Essences. Just like Residuum. Just like Echoes for account-wide Essences. Just like Echoes for Corruptions.

It's so scummy, and the people in here who don't seem to understand it (not necessarily you) are the usual suspects and are clueless as to how it 1. will impact them negatively even if they think it won't and 2. are clueless to how selfish they are to undervalue how negatively it impacts people who do want to play their best in multiple types of content.

The actual solution is to make Covenant abilities swappable. Period. Perhaps to arrange the choices in some kind of...row...where you pick one option...but can change them in rest areas. Novel idea. What should we call them?

And the fact that they said they'll do it as a last resort means they'll inevitably do it - but they're going to pointlessly stall before they do to reap those sweet, sweet MAUs for the 0.5 patch they add it in.

Try a different genre of gaming. Grinding has been the core gameplay of mmorpgs for almlst 20 years.

Grinding for that ideal upgrade, getting renown each week, reputation, rare mounts, etc. are perfectly well and good. They're a cornerstone of the game.

Pretending that Covenants will work since you can just grind to change when certain abilities favor certain styles of gameplay (PvE vs. PvP, Mythic+ vs. Raiding, etc.) or certain situations is asinine. They say they don't WANT players to change and "pick the one they like," so saying it's a natural part of the MMO cycle for them to fuck this up THAT badly to encourage it because "well, it's a grind" is just bad faith.

[LorDC]

The easiest and most sensible solution is to split fluff from throughput and make players able to swap covenant abilities on the fly (with the same restrictions as talent swapping) while making campaign/reputation/renown/transmog/toy/whatever else choice permanent.
Casuals can have their permanent choice.
Hardcore players can continue to tune their character to whatever activities they want.
Even lorewise our character is enough of a special snowflake right from the moment they enter Shadowlands.

[Kathranis]

The actual solution is to make Covenant abilities swappable. Period. Perhaps to arrange the choices in some kind of...row...where you pick one option...but can change them in rest areas. Novel idea. What should we call them?

Honestly I don't really agree. I don't think there's anything wrong with having more high level choices on the same level as race and class. I've been thinking of it in terms of a "subclass" since they announced it.

Maybe if you chose your Covenant on the character creation screen instead of in-game people would feel differently about it.

[facefist]

Best case scenario would be if one covenant was clearly better than the others, and Blizz would not touch the balance after release.

That way min-maxers can always have the optimal one, while people who prefer other things can have their choice. This would obviously lead into those people not being invited for hard content, but that only means they got their meaningful choice that has consequences.

Or then they should clearly distinguish between different content. One covenant best for pve, one for pvp, one for open world or something like that. Tbh it would probably feel the most RPG way of doing it for me.

[Vrinara]

I think we should make posts about this when the game is actually out of beta.

[Rorke]

lol @ people who still think these Diablo devs have ethics and morals. They're putting in the covenant system so they can artificially waste your time and use it as content when they "fix it" for each patch cycle.

Some of you will never learn though.

[Eazy]

Covenants should've had their unique abilities to be just visually different.

[ClassicPeon]

I think we should make posts about this when the game is actually out of beta.

Why in the world would you wait for it to be late to change before making a post like this?

- - - Updated - - -

lol @ people who still think these Diablo devs have ethics and morals. They're putting in the covenant system so they can artificially waste your time and use it as content when they "fix it" for each patch cycle.

Some of you will never learn though.

Can you please just make a thread for yourself where you can spend 90% of your waking hours being angry at blizzard?

We arent interested in your emoness

[Engal]

Covenants have 2 problems atm.

1. the gems. I'm 70% sure the solution to this is just gonna be to have a library of unlockable gems that you can freely switch between.

2. The covenant abilities. I think the class wide abilities should probably not be available in instanced content(pvp or pve) but the class specific ones should. It would feel horrible to have to shift your actual rotation everytime you enter or exit instanced combat. I think those abilities or something we are going to have to learn to live with and just hope they arent too unlanaced on release.

There is one big problem I'll see with covenant.

Once the game ship and the end game content is unlocked, blizzard better not touch or nerf any of those abilities.

Some people would have chosen a covenant based on the optimal dps things they can have with it, if another one suddenly become better... I'd not go on the blizzard official forum for a month.

[Echocho]

There isn't a problem. The only problem is the top mythic raiders having this compulsion about being 100% optimal for every possible situation in the game.

[ClassicPeon]

There isn't a problem. The only problem is the top mythic raiders having this compulsion about being 100% optimal for every possible situation in the game.

But thats simply not true.
I mean objectively this just isnt true at all.

[Runstarr]

The solution is for people to stop crying before actually seeing them play out in beta.

[NineSpine]

But thats simply not true.
I mean objectively this just isnt true at all.

You’re right. It isn’t top mythic raiders whining about this. It’s tryhards who are crying that icyveins is going to tell them to choose a covenant that they don’t want to.

[WskyDK]

There isn't a problem. The only problem is the top mythic raiders having this compulsion about being 100% optimal for every possible situation in the game.

They want to be optimal for their chosen gameplay.

What a lot of people fail to realize is that an ability that’s 2% better than another may not matter much on an individual level, suddenly becomes mandatory for cutting-edge progression when multiplied a dozen+ times.

The simplest solution would be to allow players to change powers at-will.

The next easiest would be to have your choices locked for everywhere except mythic raids.

The ahead of the curve ach could also allow players to change powers while zoned into a mythic raid (and would revert once out-these would save similar to how skills and such do now for dungeon queuing). Let them min-max to their heart’s content.


Edit: hell, you could even setup a Vantus-like restriction where you’re only able to do it once a week/per boss.

[Elias01]

The easiest and most sensible solution is to split fluff from throughput and make players able to swap covenant abilities on the fly (with the same restrictions as talent swapping) while making campaign/reputation/renown/transmog/toy/whatever else choice permanent.
Casuals can have their permanent choice.
Hardcore players can continue to tune their character to whatever activities they want.
Even lorewise our character is enough of a special snowflake right from the moment they enter Shadowlands.

That sounds boring. Being power.locked is far more fun than just getting some vannity items.

[WskyDK]

Honestly the complaint is not about 2% differences.
The complaint is because in the past couple of expansions, we have had vastly bigger deltas than just 2%. The difference between having your BiS Legendary and a crappy one in Legion was significant (and for some specs gameplay was just crap with poor legendaries). Same with bad Azerite early in BfA, and very, very bad with corruptions for months in 8.3 until we got Echoes. So people have every reason to doubt Blizzard's ability to balance shit.

As someone who got shafted the first half of legion, I know that pain all too well. I only used 2% for illustrative purposes since the common line of thought when it comes to balancing stuff is “oh, they’re only x% difference, it doesn’t actually matter”.

I get Blizzard wants to make the choices semi-permanent, and for most people covenants are going to be a fire-and-forget choice.

With how often Blizz tweaks/nerfs abilities/borrowed power they’re going to cause so many more problems than it’s worth.