Preach Interview with Ion Hazzikostas

[Voidwielder]

Except you're never gonna be locked out of the endgame raiding. Peopla are taking it to the outmost extremes when this only affects less than 0.1% of the playerbase

I had people whisper me I had the wrong talent for M+ 10 run as a healer (I sort of did but I knew better).

[JacobMarley]

It seems like preach really just wants to go FPS style for characters. Every DK is a DK they all work the same they all have the same stuff and no differences at all. I can sort of see that at the highest level play the desire for that but that seems like if they got what they actually seem to want it would make a boring game.

That's not what he's saying at all.

He's saying fair enough to have that level of character choice between plays to make us unique, but why make it such a pain in the arse to change your mind?

[Uurdz]

I know that before working at blizz Ion was a competitive raider back in the old days... does anyone know if his job at the time was in politics or law? Because his way of answering questions reminds me of that... It's so unnatural.

His way of answering questions is how a senior corporate leader talks.

[Trinkie]

I had people whisper me I had the wrong talent for M+ 10 run as a healer (I sort of did but I knew better).

And that's why those people are jokes. Just like people think only the MDI top tier comp meta is the only way they can clear their +15 each week.

[damonskye]

This is very refreshing... Ion is being given extremely hard questions to answer, instead of pick-and-choose fluff questions about lore or whatever. Preach is going for the really important stuff players want to know.

Blizzard should have this conversation with Preach every year. It's necessary for both the fans and for the designers.

[Frolk]

2 pages, and no personal attacks against Preach, im kinda shocked the haters havnt come out of the woodworks yet.

[McNeil]

Preach has been pretty straightforward. If he isn't careful then they won't do interviews with him anymore.

[Onikaroshi]

And that's why those people are jokes. Just like people think only the MDI top tier comp meta is the only way they can clear their +15 each week.

You mean I DON'T need to run a comp for a 25+ in a 15??????? /s

[Voidwielder]

And that's why those people are jokes. Just like people think only the MDI top tier comp meta is the only way they can clear their +15 each week.

You can say it is silly because it is but that's not the point. Gatekeeping happens even at the mid-level and unless you have a steady, solid group of friends - and let's be honest, most people don't - yeah, you are at a big disadvantage.

[Cede]

It's an interesting interview and I think both sides have good points. I think the biggest takeaway here is that Preach speaks for people who want classes (for example, all Hunters of one spec in a raid) to be near-identical and for mechanics/rotation to determine how successful the player is, while Ion wants individual players to have differences beyond that (not RNG based but different abilities and modifiers).

The problem with the way Ion claims to see things is that isn't how the game has been played since basically BC with gem choices or LK and glyphs. Pick an expansion and a system and the players have ALWAYS gravitated to throughput being more important than personal identity. The highest throughput has always won out over personal identity for the VAST majority of players.

They are making a gigantic mistake here and it's a shame to see it unfold in real time. They have gone from if they can't balance it they will scrap it to it's a layer of personal identity and it's staying that way. What a shame.

[apelsinjuice]

You mean I DON'T need to run a comp for a 25+ in a 15??????? /s

well its a big community problem, with all these resources, websites, addons, MDI, streamers/youtube/content creators and website tools like https://mplus.subcreation.net/index.html, if your spec is not in the A tier list you wont even get invited to +10s anymore because everyone is looking at sites like this thinking they are pro doing +25

[Ezyah]

Preach has been pretty straightforward. If he isn't careful then they won't do interviews with him anymore.

I'll be honest, i dont know why Ion accepted the itw in the first place as it was obvious that was going to happen.

They both have different vision of the game and no way it's gonna change.

[Sluvs]

The problem with the way Ion claims to see things is that isn't how the game has been played since basically BC with gem choices or LK and glyphs. Pick an expansion and a system and the players have ALWAYS gravitated to throughput being more important than personal identity. The highest throughput has always won out over personal identity for the VAST majority of players.

They are making a gigantic mistake here and it's a shame to see it unfold in real time. They have gone from if they can't balance it they will scrap it to it's a layer of personal identity and it's staying that way. What a shame.

I dont think the bolded part has changed to be honest

[Bootynuzzler]

Funny how Ion mentioned before that their design choice for legendary acquisition in Shadowlands was inspired by the failure that it was in Legion, but he uses one of the glaring issues with Legion legendary acquisition to justify his stance on "meaningful choice". He's contradicting himself, probably willingly, because he thinks everyone else is too stupid to be right about his current design of Covenants. Yes - current - because as many people have said before me, watch him do a 180 a week before 9.3 when subs have dropped and they need new bait to reel in return customers.

[kaid]

That's not what he's saying at all.

He's saying fair enough to have that level of character choice between plays to make us unique, but why make it such a pain in the arse to change your mind?

Because if there is no friction in changing then you basically you are going with the most boring cookie cutter option of every dk is always whatever flavor of the moment is with no differentiation between them. Wow has been trending this way for a long time so some push back more to actually having some choices that matter is nice.

[TEHPALLYTANK]

I know that before working at blizz Ion was a competitive raider back in the old days... does anyone know if his job at the time was in politics or law? Because his way of answering questions reminds me of that... It's so unnatural.

Law; his background always shows when he starts with all the legalistic bullshit he starts spewing when people ask him simple and direct questions. Between his decisions and how he uses legalistic gibberish to dismiss player concerns it isn't particularly surprising how many players hate him. He talks a lot, says very little, and consistently ignores critical player feedback while pretending to care.

[Harbour]

Ion has to bring systems that bust /time played metrics, and making Covenants unswappable is an easiest way to force people to stay in the game by grinding Covenants on multiple characters of the same class.

I think no sane person would think that (having full freedom and no pressure from stock holders) Ion would design Covenants the same way.

No, in his ideal and obvious version Covenants would be unswappable in terms of cosmetics, questing and shit, but Covenant Signature ability, Covenant class ability, Soulbinds would be baked into talent rows and Essence-like system.

And it would ALSO be explained RPG-wise. Its very easy, really.

During leveling we helped all four Covenants and THATS why they allowed us to borrow their abilities in rest zones. Cosmetics and other stuff, however, is locked out with our 60 level choice.

Thats it.

[Grimbolt]

Damn an interivew with a game developer that is not hand holding.

Refreshing.

But Ion's answers are so long and goes down so many different paths that you forget the question in the first place.

[Cosmic Janitor]

well its a big community problem, with all these resources, websites, addons, MDI, streamers/youtube/content creators and website tools like https://mplus.subcreation.net/index.html, if your spec is not in the A tier list you wont even get invited to +10s anymore because everyone is looking at sites like this thinking they are pro doing +25

The problem is simply one of averages. These specs often tend to be way better and even dumbasses can manage to press their 3 buttons and make it work. On average you just will have a better time if you go for the cookie cutter build because barely anything in WoW has an extreme skill ceiling (outside of general difficulty) that prevents the top choice from being likely good in the mid or even low tiers as well.

Then you also have the fact that you have 1 go at a key. You will want to make that one go count while also not wasting too much time, so it's only natural that people maximize their chances.

[keyone01]

Ion has to bring systems that bust /time played metrics, and making Covenants unswappable is an easiest way to force people to stay in the game by grinding Covenants on multiple characters of the same class.

I think no sane person would think that (having full freedom and no pressure from stock holders) Ion would design Covenants the same way.

No, in his ideal and obvious version Covenants would be unswappable in terms of cosmetics, questing and shit, but Covenant Signature ability, Covenant class ability, Soulbinds would be baked into talent rows and Essence-like system.

And it would ALSO be explained RPG-wise. Its very easy, really.

During leveling we helped all four Covenants and THATS why they allowed us to borrow their abilities in rest zones. Cosmetics and other stuff, however, is locked out with our 60 level choice.

Thats it.

Well said.
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