Preach Developer Interview with Ion Hazzikostas - Patch 9.1

[cateran100]

Low point.

This xpac literally has more players than the last 4xpacs.

My guid has gotten 200 new members in the last month. Returning players.

Logic is not really strong with you, huhh? What do you think, from where is that "200 new member" came from? Yes..mostly disbanded guilds..why? Mostly not enough player to play as guild...Why? Because people leaving the game....

[Low Hanging Fruit]

A lot of people in this thread that are always like "Preach? Who is Preach?"

Well I guess they know now.

[munkeyinorbit]

Err.. how exactly does SL do shit for casual players then?

The Anima grind is waaaayy too high and character progression stops at around ilvl 200 or so.

Keep in mind m+ is not casual friendly, nor is trying to get into raid pugs.

The anima grind is not too much. It is a non mandatory activity that is suppose to take you the expansion to complete. If you want it over in a couple of weeks you're doing it wrong.

Yes m+ is. You don't have to be doing 14s to get upgrades. How about 4s. Can you manage a 4? One a week? Keep in mind you're not a casual if you refuse to do group content. Youre not actually playing the game.

[ohwell]

This dude has no idea what he's talking about.

Nothing about what he said was incorrect if the math behind the ilvls being 1% is accurate.

[Biggles Worth]

When he mentioned working on getting Torghast into a good spot. Like we're almost? half ways into the expansion, the heck you mean you're working on getting it to a good spot. Should've been there from the start, wtf this aint rocket science

[ohwell]

Err.. how exactly does SL do shit for casual players then?

The Anima grind is waaaayy too high and character progression stops at around ilvl 200 or so.

Keep in mind m+ is not casual friendly, nor is trying to get into raid pugs.

M+ is totally casual friendly. Just stop. It's LITERALLY what casuals did previously just with a timer.

[Low Hanging Fruit]

I will say this though. That if skill is the all powerful deciding factor like most people that really play this game even decently well know.. then worrying about peoples gearing situation isn't such a big deal. I mean if you got 226 and they got 220 and you are still dunking on them everytime down the floor it probably doesn't matter if they get 220 pretty easily.

[Erous]

I disagree. Maximizing your damage as a healer while making sure your raid is still alive is a lot of fun. I hope blizzard agrees with my point of view and not yours. If you don't want to dps then fine don't dps. You have that choice I guess?

You're right, I guess it solves a lot of problems with raid comp. Some tanks right now can solo heal themselves through an encounter. Some healers can make a joke of some dps classes. I imagine, at some point, the trinity meta of tank > dps > heals gets removed and you just have "class." I do hope you get that wish at some point. At the same time, I hope you are one of the decision makers that gets to have the conversation with other "dps" "classes" on who needs to focus on what specialty when needed.

[Osmeric]

Saying something is a "skill issue" is misleading. It's also an issue that the game is designed so that skill differences have a large effect.

It would instead have been possible to simplify rotations to the extent that skill becomes less important. The devs made the deliberate choice not to do that, so the large gap is something they themselves share responsibility for.

[munkeyinorbit]

So you want the rewards from Torghast, but don't want to run it. I guesds they should mail you BiS gear then too huh?

I think he wants to be able to open the app on his phone and pick up the gear that way. Why bother logging in at all.

[Gaidax]

I will say this though. That if skill is the all powerful deciding factor like most people that really play this game even decently well know.. then worrying about peoples gearing situation isn't such a big deal. I mean if you got 226 and they got 220 and you are still dunking on them everytime down the floor it probably doesn't matter if they get 220 pretty easily.

Given same skill the difference would be 6%.

That's hardly an insurmountable gap of multiple times that the streamer loaded the question with.

No matter how some try to twist it, the reality is that Ion was spot on with 1% for 1 ilvl. It legit checks out in simulation.

[munkeyinorbit]

Have to see if the new raid motivates me to play again. Doubt it tho.

I want more solo content: Flex mythic raid. Solo queue for rated pvp modes etc.

After 3 disbanded mythic raids and dozens of rbg groups I came to the conclusion that
Endgame is begging groups to invite you, which is not fun.

Groups do tend to not invite the bad players. I never have to beg for a group. I just let my experience speak for me.

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A casual player has every reason to care about cosmetics... and the costs are way too high.

Also being bad or not is irrelevant, fact is mythic+ is not really what casual players do.

So again, what does SL offer for casual players? So far it's only taken things away.

I guess you missed all of those cosmetics and the gear handed to you so you can get into group content and do your WQs easier. They are literally doing the opposite of what you are saying. They are giving you things to do to get items you want in a determinalistic way. They have given you the best catch up gear since LK to enable you to do your "farming" faster AND to get you in the door to do basic group content to get better gear. It has given everything that casuals have wanted. Is doing a M 3 too hard for you? One of those a week? You can even fail it if you want to and you'd still get an upgrade.

[cateran100]

Tbh it's always been a skill issue. The guys in the lower gear are usually worse at the game but they have this inflated ego where they think they are actually good. They aren't and that's why their gear is worse. That's why they get rekt.

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If you read two lines lower he stated that there are multiple ways of doing it to get the maximum rewards. Two lines lower.

Read it..does not say anything about "playing well"..5 star, need 4 to reach the next level...Stating it can be quick or slow but it was like this until now as well..So let me ask again: What is "playing well" in Torghast? Until now it was when you finished successfully....what is gonna be from 9.1? If you not dies? Or just once per floor? Or not using any food/potion? Or need to smash X amount of objects/floor? WHAT IS PLAYING WELL?

[munkeyinorbit]

Maybe, just maybe, some players don't like repeating same short dungeon, which can be done on average in 30 minutes, 20 times with added artificial difficulty and would like something else to do?

You are not alone. Today's developers don't understand that either and are focused only on raiding/m+ community. Ion even said in interview that 20 item level difference is a skill issue.

Then they wonder why people leave WoW en masse.

It's because they get angry when faced with the truth. Being told that they are unskilled hurts . It's a fact, the guy with 20 ilvls on you is better than you at the game.

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I mean, there is certainly a decent gap between 200 and 226, but 213 and 226? Nyah...

I too was a bit surprised about preach talking about gear gap, it's really not THAT huge as he tried to say.

Average non-weapon item going from 213 to 226 is what 0.3-0.5% more simmed DPS? And weapon would be 2-3%. Gap between Heroic geared and Mythic player DPS-wise is what, 10%? That's hardly mythic players doing "times the DPS" of Heroic, unless that "times" is *1.1.

Hard sell to claim gear gap is so insane here, so I'm with Ion on this - git gud.

It's almost like saying that there's a 13% difference in power between 213 and 226

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"Making world quests take longer was a design choice to switch time spent doing world quests vs travel time. Previous expansions players spent way more time traveling between quests over doing them."

I loled, what we have now is more time in world quests and more time in travel time (with removal of flight whistle)

So much bullshit all around, never change Ion

I agree. This is such a bs response. This is an actual reason he should be fired. They fucked up and now he's spinning it like he's doing us a favor. BOOOOOO.

[Gaidax]

It's almost like saying that there's a 13% difference in power between 213 and 226

That's hardly the double or triple the power streamer lead that loaded ass question with. Ion answered what really is happening, you may not like it, but reality is that skill is a MUCH bigger factor in power gaps.

If a mythic player does double the damage of heroic one given same class - it's a legitimate skill issue first and foremost.

No amount of whining and crowd pleasing BS will change that. Ion said exactly what needed to be said, because it was simply the truth and IMO, he was too nice about it, given the question.

[Culex]

Ya...I'm not coming back for this garbage.

[Delano]

For a supposed smarty smart math nerd Ion sure doesn't understand basic math. Or much of anything, apparently.

[zhimm1011]

this guy has no clue... please for Old Gods sake get a development team that has actually played the game

[munkeyinorbit]

Power level from item rating has not changed even since Wrath. 1 item level is basically the equivalent of 1%.
If there is such a big gap between players 20 item levels apart, it is more likely a skill issue.

Not even remotely true, 20 item level increase overall is a 100% DPS increase this expansion.

Also he just completely ignored PVP cuz its basically dead now.

LOL. Are you really seeing 100% difference? Hahahaha. It is a skill thing buddy. First place for you to start is to see if you're actually using a weapon. Check to see if it's using you're preferred stat. If you're a druid for example, check that it's int or agi. A staff can't have both. Then google "how do I dps as a <insert class>"

[kiramon]

Given same skill the difference would be 6%.

That's hardly an insurmountable gap of multiple times that the streamer loaded the question with.

No matter how some try to twist it, the reality is that Ion was spot on with 1% for 1 ilvl. It legit checks out in simulation.

Perhaps. Or perhaps it's that the itemization of gear you acquire int he game (let's say, 197 gear) is poorly itemized compared to 220 gear; since most people don't get BIS gear while gearing up their character only to replace it with BIS gear. I think if you were to scale up purely the 197 gear to 220 you'd end up at a 29% difference.

That being said,

Let's look at your logs.

Shriekwing ilvl211: 3100
Shriekwing 225: 5400

Huntsman ilvl214 - 6200
Huntsman ilvl226 - 9200


Hungering Destroyer ilvl214 - 4029
Hunger Destroyer ilvl228 - 6106


Sunking ilvl 215 - 5410
Sunking ilvl228 - 7300

Inerva 217 - 4928
Inerva 228 - 7590




I won't go on. I mean, man, you sucked a whole lot more between those 9 ilvls on inerva. Good thing you got good in that month difference.