Preach Interview with Ion Hazzikostas

[Enter Name Here]

just be really toxic about covenant choice
maybe arbitrarily kick people you don't like and reason with their covenant

the more people quit over this behaviour the faster they resort to easy swaps


in the end, their ultimate concern is money

[Vakir]

Ion said it's easy for you to change your choice that you've made. The "hard" part is going back to the one you left.

Yeah, I'm aware. Same problem. It will absolutely still inform judgment from PUGs. And even guildies. And still creates dissonance for people who want to optimize but don't want to pal around with vampires.

There's a million problems and they know it. Just gotta hold them accountable.

[Musta]

I think they will break sometime further into beta. They are seeing the massive backlash and they dont want another flop like BFA

[Biggles Worth]

Yeah, I'm aware. Same problem. It will absolutely still inform judgment from PUGs. And even guildies. And still creates dissonance for people who want to optimize but don't want to pal around with vampires.

There's a million problems and they know it. Just gotta hold them accountable.

Gotchya. I was looking through all the covenants, soulbinds for classes and the such, it really is going to be a shame to not play with all of them. Such a waste.

[Asheeva]

I think they will break sometime further into beta. They are seeing the massive backlash and they dont want another flop like BFA

There isn't a "massive backlash". It's a loud minority. As far as opinions go it's actually really mixed.

[Swnem]

This was actually a really good " interview". It's true that the format was more like a conversation or a debate, but this interview was extremely informational about where the game came from and is heading in. The goals of the dev team and where they take an optimistic view, even though it doesn't always pan out. I don't agree, but i understand and appreciate their effort. This openness to talk about the design process was amazing and i wish more interviews were like this rather than short question and answer format.
At least there is clarity now and we know where we are expected to find the fun and it's not the same as before. Legion really changed the game. It wasn't just a class revamp it was a game design paradigm change. We are in a second era of WoW. Now, that is clearer than ever.

[Vakir]

Gotchya. I was looking through all the covenants, soulbinds for classes and the such, it really is going to be a shame to not play with all of them. Such a waste.

I kinda understand Soulbinds being exclusive and I can accept them if they really, really need to appease the "RPGs are only RPGs if my story choices severely impact power, even though no well-designed modern RPG has done this ever" crowd. But abilities? Yeah, kinda lost cause. The rest is great alt replayability!

[Ryonas]

Isn't it weird how there was no such thing as raiding in any game before WoW did their character pruning, and classes became identical, but with different color spell effects? Wait...there WAS raiding before that, and it was fun? Are you saying that not every god damn thing has to be perfectly streamlined and min/maxed at all times in order for a raid to get a boss killed? Huh? The point of a game should be the enjoyment of the players, and absolutely NO consideration should EVER be given to idiotic shit like "e sports" or fucking streaming video of other people playing the game?

Huh, this is all absolutely unbelievable. Wild.

[heheszek]

Maybe choosing talents should be permanent too. it d be so good for RPG aspect.
Every one would be so different
It actually makes sense .. learning and adjusting Ur body for feral affinity after long quest chain and to revert IT to follow diff. Path would take way longer or shouldnt be even possibile in some scenarios.
Its just few % of DPS and huge for char identity. And Ur friend with no hands beating you in a duel is healthy for RPG aspect(because before he started playing he s read milion tutorials how to look and be like a pro). Why would you event care if Ur not top 0,2%

[Rolenn]

Just search Gurgthock on Mal'ganis in warcraftlogs, he's a prolific green parser. Get used to the game being garbage, it doesn't matter to the guy who's getting free carries in mythic.

[Nathasil]

Reading this interview summary made me actually MORE worried about covenants.

I think the comparison with Legendaries is appropriate. And while in Legion certainly players were kicked out of cutting edge content for not having the right legendary, there was NO WAY to get your best legendary in a guaranteed fashion before the system allowed you to get all legendaries easily. Most leaders understood this. Somebody not having his BIS legendaries was not "at fault" for underperforming...he simply was not lucky enough. With covenants, this is completely different. If Option A is the best for your spec...and you pick Option B...you are not unlucky. You ARE at fault. And most leaders will see it exactly this way.

[kodemonkee]

I think they will break sometime further into beta. They are seeing the massive backlash and they dont want another flop like BFA

Most people of my guild are saying this thing has flopped even before release and many won't pre-order or even buy SL, many are going to quit. This says a lot. And that we jumped into Beta this week makes me worry too.

[Ariamis]

Reading this interview summary made me actually MORE worried about covenants.

I think the comparison with Legendaries is appropriate. And while in Legion certainly players were kicked out of cutting edge content for not having the right legendary, there was NO WAY to get your best legendary in a guaranteed fashion before the system allowed you to get all legendaries easily. Most leaders understood this. Somebody not having his BIS legendaries was not "at fault" for underperforming...he simply was not lucky enough. With covenants, this is completely different. If Option A is the best for your spec...and you pick Option B...you are not unlucky. You ARE at fault. And most leaders will see it exactly this way.

This assumes we can accurately Sim every covenant, conduit, legendary, and talent decision for every single encounter - and that we discover one combination is the best outcome in all scenarios. We then need to assume those results are are consistent at all gear level, and there are no post-launch tuning adjustments.

I’m not going to pretend that there’s going to be flawless balance across every single parameter in play, but let’s be honest - We’re all talking in hypotheticals.

I don’t see anyone talking about specific abilities, and their relationship to other specific abilities, in specific scenarios. We’re all talking about hypothetical ability A being universally better than hypothetical ability B in every scenario, and how hypothetical Player B is bad for their hypothetical decision.

When we start talking at a class-level, ability-to-ability, we might have a better dialogue.

Looking solely at the Warrior abilities, Night Fae appears to be the only one that’ll end up falling behind. Good utility, but will inevitably be outpaced by the other three. The remaining three absolutely have an opportunity to fit their own niche and stand out in specific encounters without being entirely useless in others. Even in PVP, each of them will work well in some engagements, and be less than optimal elsewhere. Condemn is great to apply pressure on a target, Banner will be great when you around an objective or in a small combat area, Spear and Aftershock for control.

This appears to be the design goal, and I’m mostly comfortable with that outcome.

[Lolsteak]

This situation should be part of IQ tests or something. It should be presented to test-taker and then they have to answer if Ion is right or wrong, and if they answer that he's right you can just stop right there because you'll know that they're a retard.

Pretty much

It's kinda hard to take Ion seriously when he says shit like this

[Tesshin83]

Just search Gurgthock on Mal'ganis in warcraftlogs, he's a prolific green parser. Get used to the game being garbage, it doesn't matter to the guy who's getting free carries in mythic.

You making that judgment of just out of someones parse, proves to me that you dont understand the bascis of raiding or even many other aspects involved in raiding.

[Malikath]

Fire Ion, period.

[Tesshin83]

Most people of my guild are saying this thing has flopped even before release and many won't pre-order or even buy SL, many are going to quit. This says a lot. And that we jumped into Beta this week makes me worry too.

Seems like a guild for people who loved being hyperbolic about as much as possible. I am happy I am not part of such a guild.

- - - Updated - - -

I think they will break sometime further into beta. They are seeing the massive backlash and they dont want another flop like BFA

I wish people would stop exaggurate so much.

2% of the playerbase state their opinions on forums and comment sections. And even among that minority the opinions are split in half.

BFA wasnt a flop. It had some issues like all the other expansion. But it was no way a flop.

[RiddlePass]

Most people of my guild are saying this thing has flopped even before release and many won't pre-order or even buy SL, many are going to quit. This says a lot. And that we jumped into Beta this week makes me worry too.

Your guild sounds like a bunch of drama queens...

The whole WoW fanbase is full of drama queens. People freaking out over this even though it will only affect the top 5% of the playerbase so they can pretend like they are part of the "elite" makes me laugh so fucking hard. You're not elite, you're a casual like the rest of us, accept it. This doesn't affect you at all.

[Great Destiny Man]

BFA wasnt a flop. It had some issues like all the other expansion. But it was no way a flop.

Like any other expansion? The USPs for BfA were so weak that they either completely faded into the background (IE, Warfronts) or were actually less interesting than systems that proceeded it (azerite armour vs essences/corruption).

Other expansions have definitely had some faults but very few had problems to that extent.

[Asheeva]

Most people of my guild are saying this thing has flopped even before release and many won't pre-order or even buy SL, many are going to quit. This says a lot. And that we jumped into Beta this week makes me worry too.

I imagine this type of players like factory workers who have been working there for 10+ years but they say every day they are totally gonna quit very soon. I mean if they have an active subscription during 8.3 of all things, there is no way they won't be okay with Shadowlands.