Blizzard's Balance Philosophy

[Santas]

"Upsetting the meta" that is the excuse that Blizzard keeps making for poor balance and/or slow changes. You have a few specs that dominate the scene while others remain in the dust for months, sometimes years. Then you got decisions that make no sense, for instance.. demonology had an undocumented change in 9.0.5 where the pets deal more damage under certain circumstances, that barely made the spec VIABLE let alone powerful then you have the Venthyr Rogue ability which is going to go live in a couple of days in a broken state (it can one shot people in PvP by itself) and the list goes on, it's just one hot mess.

tldr: it's quite annoying seeing your favorite spec being undertuned for months on end just so that Blizzard doesn't upset the meta, or maybe because the class has one viable spec and that's somehow good enough. I just don't get it, do you agree with said philosophy as a player? I'm curious.

[KOUNTERPARTS]

What, you don't like watching the Veng DH, Disc Priest/Resto Sham/Holy Paladin, Fire Mage, Balance Druid, Outlaw Rogue/WW Monk/UH DK meta in every single dungeon of the MDI?

[ClassicPeon]

Not nerfing convoke into the ground yet is the worst balance i've seen since classic wow

[Soon-TM]

Not nerfing convoke into the ground yet is the worst balance i've seen since classic wow

I concur. CtS is busted, and needs to be reined in asap. It isn't as if boomkins are trash outside of CtS either, so the minor nerf mentioned in the PTR notes is just... Effectively non-existent.

[christinmccutie1212]

i about to get back into wow again --- how confused am i going to be?

[Soon-TM]

i about to get back into wow again --- how confused am i going to be?

That kind of questions is heavily frowned upon by the mods here. Just an advice

[christinmccutie1212]

i need real advice i am about to start playing again and i need a new computer im trying to get suggestions for what works well nowadays

[T-34]

"Upsetting the meta" that is the excuse that Blizzard keeps making for poor balance and/or slow changes. You have a few specs that dominate the scene while others remain in the dust for months, sometimes years. Then you got decisions that make no sense, for instance.. demonology had an undocumented change in 9.0.5 where the pets deal more damage under certain circumstances, that barely made the spec VIABLE let alone powerful then you have the Venthyr Rogue ability which is going to go live in a couple of days in a broken state (it can one shot people in PvP by itself) and the list goes on, it's just one hot mess.

tldr: it's quite annoying seeing your favorite spec being undertuned for months on end just so that Blizzard doesn't upset the meta, or maybe because the class has one viable spec and that's somehow good enough. I just don't get it, do you agree with said philosophy as a player? I'm curious.

What if the majority of the playerbase enjoys playing the current meta classes and specs and you are just a minority?
Whom should Blizzard appease? The minority or the majority?
What if the price for better balance would be much more homogenization between classes and specs? Is that a price you would be willing to pay?

[Thunderball]

Not nerfing specs people are playing right now I totally agree with. Convoke should be nerfed for PvP and that's it, waiting until a balance pass until a major patch.

Some specs underperforming has nothing to do with balance. It's all about class designers - they are also players which play popular specs so they're going to devout more attention there. So in short I would love fringe specs to be tuned properly but it has nothing to do with balance.

[ClassicPeon]

What if the majority of the playerbase enjoys playing the current meta classes and specs and you are just a minority?
Whom should Blizzard appease? The minority or the majority?
What if the price for better balance would be much more homogenization between classes and specs? Is that a price you would be willing to pay?

We havent had balance this bad since warlocks in MoP.

Balance druids are currently fury warrior vanilla levels of op on some encounters

[Thunderball]

What, you don't like watching the Veng DH, Disc Priest/Resto Sham/Holy Paladin, Fire Mage, Balance Druid, Outlaw Rogue/WW Monk/UH DK meta in every single dungeon of the MDI?

What does MDI have to do with balance?

- - - Updated - - -

We havent had balance this bad since warlocks in MoP.

Balance druids are currently fury warrior vanilla levels of op on some encounters

Not even close.

[T-34]

We havent had balance this bad since warlocks in MoP.

Balance druids are currently fury warrior vanilla levels of op on some encounters

I am in no way suggesting that classes/specs are well balanced right now, but my questions are still relevant.
And regarding boomkins:
Limit used 4 unholy dk's, 3 hunters, 2 holy paladins, 2 warlocks and 2 boomkins on its Denathrius Mythic kill...

On Stone Legion Generals mythic Limit used:
5 hunters, 3 UHD, 2 resto shaman, 2 holy paladins.... and 1 boomkin

[ClassicPeon]

I am in no way suggesting that classes/specs are well balanced right now, but my questions are still relevant.
And regarding boomkins:
Limit used 4 unholy dk's, 3 hunters, 2 holy paladins, 2 warlocks and 2 boomkins on its Denathrius Mythic kill...

On Stone Legion Generals mythic Limit used:
5 hunters, 3 UHD, 2 resto shaman, 2 holy paladins.... and 1 boomkin

Druids are VERY good in raids.

They are stupidly OP in m+ and pvp.

Do the math

Look at their sustained single target and their burst single target(shriekwing for single target for example). Look at their insane aoe.

The only reason they arent more represented is that a lot of the fights arent fitting them THAT well right now. And still, they are represented.

[T-34]

Druids are VERY good in raids.

They are stupidly OP in m+ and pvp.

Do the math

Look at their sustained single target and their burst single target(shriekwing for single target for example). Look at their insane aoe.

The only reason they arent more represented is that a lot of the fights arent fitting them THAT well right now. And still, they are represented.

So they are OP in raids even though people don't stack them? I guess there is a reason that you aren't the RL of Limit.
Hmm, if you check out the pvp leaderboards then you see more warriors, priests, palas, mages than druids among those with highest ranking. I wonder why they didn't listen to your wise words...
Yes, druids are very strong in PvP against bad players, not so much against competent players.

Balance is very strong in M+, but they still aren't stacked.
And if you look at 20+ keys then more mages are brought than balance druids.
If you look at at 15+ keys then more hunters are brought than balance druids.

Don't make conclusions based on feelz, make them based on data.

[Razion]

Without shakeups, specs stay at the bottom and never get brought to anything, ever.

Shake ups are needed throughout tiers/seasons so the game doesn't stagnate.

[Tronski]

That kind of questions is heavily frowned upon by the mods here. Just an advice

Everything is frowned upon by the mods here.

- - - Updated - - -

"Upsetting the meta" that is the excuse that Blizzard keeps making for poor balance and/or slow changes. You have a few specs that dominate the scene while others remain in the dust for months, sometimes years. Then you got decisions that make no sense, for instance.. demonology had an undocumented change in 9.0.5 where the pets deal more damage under certain circumstances, that barely made the spec VIABLE let alone powerful then you have the Venthyr Rogue ability which is going to go live in a couple of days in a broken state (it can one shot people in PvP by itself) and the list goes on, it's just one hot mess.

tldr: it's quite annoying seeing your favorite spec being undertuned for months on end just so that Blizzard doesn't upset the meta, or maybe because the class has one viable spec and that's somehow good enough. I just don't get it, do you agree with said philosophy as a player? I'm curious.

The sucky thing about Blizz's balance philosophy is that it only ever is enjoyed by the top 1% of the playerbase, because in their eyes it's more important that everything is balanced at max attainable gear level rather than at the median. But it doesn't really matter all that much, it'll be imbalanced across gear levels either way.
With a roughly 25% span (171-226) in max lvl ilvl, and the way gear has to be tuned to be even more powerful the higher the ilvl so that those cheeky normal raid geared doesn't just clear mythic, you're bound to never experience balance unless they bring in templates.

[Azerate]

Some specs are always gonna be better than others. It's impossible to make everything balanced without removing what differentiates them.

If you care so much about the meta, just reroll. If you don't - play whatever you like and it's fine. Really.

With a roughly 25% span (171-226) in max lvl ilvl, and the way gear has to be tuned to be even more powerful the higher the ilvl so that those cheeky normal raid geared doesn't just clear mythic, you're bound to never experience balance unless they bring in templates.

Lol

[ClassicPeon]

So they are OP in raids even though people don't stack them? I guess there is a reason that you aren't the RL of Limit.
Hmm, if you check out the pvp leaderboards then you see more warriors, priests, palas, mages than druids among those with highest ranking. I wonder why they didn't listen to your wise words...
Yes, druids are very strong in PvP against bad players, not so much against competent players.

Balance is very strong in M+, but they still aren't stacked.
And if you look at 20+ keys then more mages are brought than balance druids.
If you look at at 15+ keys then more hunters are brought than balance druids.

Don't make conclusions based on feelz, make them based on data.

i....
Cant you read?

Like can you literally not read?

Its kinda hard to communicate with you if you cant read. Should probably not be on a forum mate

Druids are VERY good in raids.

So they are OP in raids

???

[Tronski]

Lol

What was funny about this?

[Nitros14]

I think inconveniencing flavour of the month players by making them re-roll monthly with constant balance changes to make bad specs good would definitely be a good thing for everyone but them.

You would actually be able to feel like you could play anything because if it's bad it won't be soon.