KSM S2 Requires both Tyrannical and Fortified.

[erifwodahs]

So certain combinations will always be harder=dead. Just as much as certain specs will always be worse and shunned. So I don't think it's bad to have an incentive to attempt the challange. The alternative is status quo.

I mean but there is a difference where you one shield hakkar or two shield it on +20 and where you get fucked up completely and if you wipe it's a deplete.
Wiping on forty on trash when u used CDs - u still skill something and can do safe pull after, loosing few minutes. Wiping on boss after using CDs means you will have to do all the same, but without CDs and somehow make it.
We have had SD on 20s where you wipe fully two times and have some other random deaths finishing it timed with 19 deaths total as long as you are efficient about that - it's fine. Obviously you probably wouldn't pull that in ToP, but still. Wipe on a boss on tyra - well, you are fucked.

Also I appreciate the fact that at some point you have to play where you don't wipe of you won't time it. But that point on Tyra is sooner while dungeon being very significantly harder too. Especially that a lot of Tyra affix combinations won't let you win a lot of time on trash.

- - - Updated - - -

this change is just to drive more "engament" metrics as higher m+ keys is dead on tyrannical weeks

I would love to do keys every week and not feel like this week were are significantly more fucked. Harder? Sure. I don't mind pushing keys on grevious/sang/bolster weeks it's harder but still doable, but tyra is whole different thing when you are above 20s

[Relapses]

this change is just to drive more "engament" metrics as higher m+ keys is dead on tyrannical weeks

lol - yeah, Blizzard clearly wants to push "engagement metrics" in the top 1% of the top 1% of key pushers.

...all 12 of them.

You can't be serious.

[Tziva]

It just has to be balanced - one week shouldn't be much harder than other.

I don't think it's reasonable to expect that every week be balanced to equal difficulty, and I'm not sure it's possible. I think some variation in the challenge from week to week makes things interesting (especially when they impact different dungeons differently so something that might have been really hard last week is easier this week, and vice versa), but having a full 50% of weeks being unappealing isn't great.

(to be clear, I'm not saying you were demanding all weeks be identically balanced, just commenting generally on the statement)

this change is just to drive more "engament" metrics as higher m+ keys is dead on tyrannical weeks

I don't know that this is true, even from the most cynical of lenses. If you look at the stats on raider.io, there are less keys done in Tyrannical, but not a lot less. And, I mean, the people who skip Tyrannical weeks tend to be high key pushers who have already long passed earning KSM after the early season; it isn't a motivator to them anyway so isn't going to have any impact on engagement there. The average joe who is doing keys for vault isn't really doing them high enough for the difference between weeks to be anything more than just a nuisance rather than a roadblock.

Also if they were really concerned about engagement, they could just fix the affixes so that way even people that don't care about KSM or play beyond KSM would be more enthusiastic to play every week.

[Glorious Leader]

I don't think it's reasonable to expect that every week be balanced to equal difficulty, and I'm not sure it's possible. I think some variation in the challenge from week to week makes things interesting (especially when they impact different dungeons differently so something that might have been really hard last week is easier this week, and vice versa), but having a full 50% of weeks being unappealing isn't great.

(to be clear, I'm not saying you were demanding all weeks be identically balanced, just commenting generally on the statement)


I don't know that this is true, even from the most cynical of lenses. If you look at the stats on raider.io, there are less keys done in Tyrannical, but not a lot less. And, I mean, the people who skip Tyrannical weeks tend to be high key pushers who have already long passed earning KSM after the early season; it isn't a motivator to them anyway so isn't going to have any impact on engagement there. The average joe who is doing keys for vault isn't really doing them high enough for the difference between weeks to be anything more than just a nuisance rather than a roadblock.

Also if they were really concerned about engagement, they could just fix the affixes so that way even people that don't care about KSM or play beyond KSM would be more enthusiastic to play every week.

Then I dont really see the impetus for this change. If it isn't designed to get more people to participate (I.e engagement) then why the hell do this? pure sadomasochism? For the record if it is about trying to entice players to play on thise weeks i think it will backfire horrible.

[Crimson Spears]

Then I dont really see the impetus for this change. If it isn't designed to get more people to participate (I.e engagement) then why the hell do this? pure sadomasochism? For the record if it is about trying to entice players to play on thise weeks i think it will backfire horrible.

It seems like they are desperate to draw out content further and further while offering less and less... if this was done during legion i doubt it would make such a reaction but combined with nerfing loot drops. People just dont want to be fucked with.

[Tziva]

Then I dont really see the impetus for this change. If it isn't designed to get more people to participate (I.e engagement) then why the hell do this? pure sadomasochism? For the record if it is about trying to entice players to play on thise weeks i think it will backfire horrible.

I think it is designed to encourage participation in Tyrannical more, but on more amorphous terms than objective engagement metrics (which raider.io stats sems to indicate are not that different). Players have been bitching about Tyrannical for a long time, and I wouldn't be surprised if they just felt that obligating folks to do each dungeon in that affix is a simple "solution" to what they see as a community perception issue rather than an actual balancing issue.

That said, I don't think it's soley about targeting participation either. I wouldn't be surprised if they just had a vision that it was the "best" way to design their scoring system. The community has commented for a long time that they think the weights of different affix combinations should be factored into score based on their challenge level, which isn't really that contentious of an idea. On some level, it makes sense to have both give an independent score to differentiate between the difficulty levels and to reflect more "well rounded" players. And if they go that approach, it sort of has to follow that both would be required for KSM, otherwise the score they'd have to assign to the achievement to exclude Tyrannical would be ridiculously off from the current requirements.

But they also probably didn't feel it was that big of a deal, either. The people that are very into M+ are going to get KSM regardless of the new requirement (it will just take more weeks), so the only people that it really affects are super casual m+ players who crank out KSM and then stop, and these players probably aren't who they have in mind when designing their approach to keystones anyway.

[Glorious Leader]

so the only people that it really affects are super casual m+ players who crank out KSM and then stop, and these players probably aren't who they have in mind when designing their approach to keystones anyway.

Its possible that this is far larger chunk of the people running m+ than say guys who run high keys for the sake of running high keys. Even if it isn't this change is still baffling because guys who ran keys because they enjoyed keys and liked to push were probably more likely to do it on tyrannical because well they really were in it for challenge. The people least likely to run tyrannical will not be motivated by this change nor the lackluster reward provided for their efforts.

[dacoolist]

If you run m+ you automatically get the KSM mount and achieve now.

Keystone master used to be tough.. before the insane amount of nerfs.. and gear people have today.. So S2 requiring 15 for fort and tyrannical mean nothing to people who run 15's every week for the weekly vault.

If you're angry that S2 requires this, you'd be angry if it didn't

[kaminaris]

Why wouldn't it? I don't get it. The threats in the dungeon are differently seeded and thus you may need to adjust resource allocation and pull order. Why is providing that variety a nonsensical design approach?
And what would be the better alternative? More impactful stuff, like, more seasonal affixes?

Because flat modifiers on top of yet another flat modifiers are garbage design.

Affixes should be either kiss-curse design so stuff like: you can't jump but your [primary skill] deals 50% more damage. OR it's more elaborate affix like seasonal affixes that actually DO affect gameplay.

Why would you ever design "affixes" that all they do is to kick you in nuts?

[Fenrys]

I don't mind Tyrannical, however, the current system (of unified score for tyr/fort) severely discourages me from running keys on Tyr weeks, as normally I can only do keys around 1-2 lower than fort weeks. Adding a separate score for tyr to fort eliminates this issue. Sure, I'm still doing lower keys than on fort, but I can get score from them so there is incentive.

[erifwodahs]

I don't think it's reasonable to expect that every week be balanced to equal difficulty, and I'm not sure it's possible. I think some variation in the challenge from week to week makes things interesting (especially when they impact different dungeons differently so something that might have been really hard last week is easier this week, and vice versa), but having a full 50% of weeks being unappealing isn't great.

(to be clear, I'm not saying you were demanding all weeks be identically balanced, just commenting generally on the statement)

Certainly not the perfect equal difficulty just rather balanced - if I have enough DPS to clear a +20 and have 5mins left on forty, affixes should allow me to do it on tyra too. As you said, 50% unappealing weeks is not that great. Especially when the hard week has affixes which also slows you down on trash too it really is a dead week.

[Rageonit]

Because flat modifiers on top of yet another flat modifiers are garbage design.

Affixes should be either kiss-curse design so stuff like: you can't jump but your [primary skill] deals 50% more damage. OR it's more elaborate affix like seasonal affixes that actually DO affect gameplay.

Why would you ever design "affixes" that all they do is to kick you in nuts?

Even if the end result of flat modifiers is just different damage/health numbers on different mobs, it does force you to relocate resources, rethink talents and other power sources, modify your path etc. etc., making m+ into a more varied experience. That's not even up to debate, you HAVE TO do those things on higher levels to succeed. You liking/not liking that kind of design has nothing to do with its actual influence on the metagame. Yes, Fort/Tyr affixes rotation does make the game more interesting. Whether or not you could design affixes that make it even more interesting is a completely different matter. But Blizzard already does that: that's why you have second, third & seasonal affixes.

[kaminaris]

Even if the end result of flat modifiers is just different damage/health numbers on different mobs, it does force you to relocate resources, rethink talents and other power sources, modify your path etc. etc., making m+ into a more varied experience. That's not even up to debate, you HAVE TO do those things on higher levels to succeed. You liking/not liking that kind of design has nothing to do with its actual influence on the metagame. Yes, Fort/Tyr affixes rotation does make the game more interesting. Whether or not you could design affixes that make it even more interesting is a completely different matter. But Blizzard already does that: that's why you have second, third & seasonal affixes.

That is cool and all, but it doesn't make gameplay better, nor more interesting, nor more fun. Now with a score split its even worse.
I knew their implementation will be bad but holy crap, blizz outdone themselves.

Tyrannical and fortified simply should not exist.

[Crimson Spears]

That is cool and all, but it doesn't make gameplay better, nor more interesting, nor more fun. Now with a score split its even worse.
I knew their implementation will be bad but holy crap, blizz outdone themselves.

Tyrannical and fortified simply should not exist.

I mean your free to ignore it. You can just do 24+ on every dungeon when tyrannical isn't active...

Every change now seems designed to extend time played while stretching out rewards. Blizzard has to stop being afraid of letting players beat their game.

[Rageonit]

That is cool and all, but it doesn't make gameplay better, nor more interesting, nor more fun. Now with a score split its even worse.
I knew their implementation will be bad but holy crap, blizz outdone themselves.
Tyrannical and fortified simply should not exist.

It does make gameplay more interesting, by introducing more variety to run preparation & execution. Whether you find it fun or not is irrelevant; each and every player will find something else fun - for example, I find the different requirements of Fort/Tyr fun. Sadly, there are no rights or wrongs here; you repeating over and over that it's not fun won't change that.

[Alroxas]

If you run m+ you automatically get the KSM mount and achieve now.

A wee bit hyperbole ain't it?

[netherflame]

+15 Fort + Tyrannical timed to get the recolored mount.

Interesting change, disappointing reward.

https://www.wowhead.com/news/season-...AUOj-DX37wApJs

Freezing cold take, if you don't like it then dont do it. This change was needed despite what the majority of the community thinks, M+ has become stale because its basically dead on tyrannical weeks since nobody wants to challenge themselves doing those keys.

[Tziva]

Freezing cold take, if you don't like it then dont do it. This change was needed despite what the majority of the community thinks, M+ has become stale because its basically dead on tyrannical weeks since nobody wants to challenge themselves doing those keys.

I have a hard time buying the "people don't want a challenge" argument when there is literally no purpose to doing keys over 15 for any other reason except challenge. If you really think the community dislikes Tyrannical because they find it too hard, why do you think people are doing hundreds of thousands of keys in that range? A huge portion of the M+ community is entirely devoted to the idea of pushing themselves through harder and harder content for no reason other than for the challenge.

Also, if you look at the stats for keys, Tyrannical doesn't drop in any significant numbers until you get above +22, which really is only a fraction of the keys done, and really only represents a fraction of the population. People complain about Tyrannical a lot and it is unpopular, but the actual numbers seem to indicate it doesn't stop people from actually doing keys. Total affix combinations including all the lower affixes seem to have a much bigger impact on amount of keys done (for example, Tyr/Bust/Explosive week had about 100k more keys done than Fort/Sanguine/Grievous the week after), but even then, the dropoff doesn't really occur until you get to higher keystones.

[kaminaris]

It does make gameplay more interesting, by introducing more variety to run preparation & execution. Whether you find it fun or not is irrelevant; each and every player will find something else fun - for example, I find the different requirements of Fort/Tyr fun. Sadly, there are no rights or wrongs here; you repeating over and over that it's not fun won't change that.

It doesn't. That's the thing. Your mindset is that "just because it makes a slight difference its better than nothing".

While in grand scheme of things, it takes up a slot that could have been otherwise MUCH more interesting. In other words, you have accepted a bad implementation because its better than nothing.

And the funny thing is, blizzard absolutely CAN do better as they shown in some of the anima powers in torghast. Just the players has accepted half assed solutions.

[Glorious Leader]

Freezing cold take, if you don't like it then dont do it.

I mean I kinda hope people adopt this attitude. If the entire purpose was to beat people into participating in tyrannica weeks I kinda hope it back fires on them and m+ particiation either tanks as a whole or just doesn't increase during those affixes.. Again the reward is just a reskin of the already existing mount. Who cares? Like they couldn't have picked a worse way to try and encourage participation in those affixes.