Why are PvP Talents still a thing?

[kubaje]

Don't get me wrong, I don't want Blizz to trash them, but there is absolutely no reason for them to be PvP only.

Nowadays everyone and their mom or even grandma are complaining about how terrible most classes feel. Most classes are lacking tools for certain situations or have really awkward mechanics in BfA. Except PvPers. Somehow they are a lot less likely to complain about how their classes feel.

Ever tried healing a M+ as disc in Grievious-Weeks? Yeah, I'd rather jump off a cliff than try to do that. Well, guess what. There is a PvP Talent which greatly increases the healing of Power Word: Radiance and makes it instant cast. Combining this PvP Talent with the right Azerite Traits would actually make it so much less of a pain in the ass.

Let's take a look at SPriest. A class that has nothing to cast while moving. If only you could get into Voidform to at least use Voidbolt while moving. I'm sorry, got to cast Void Eruption. For no real reason. If only there was a talent to make it instant cast... like the PvP Talent.

Same thing for Demo Locks and the Master Summoner Talent. Have you tried burst healing someone with a single target heal as a MW Monk? Really awkward situation, because you have to use your AoE heal to ST heal people. Again, PvPers have the solution to that awkward gameplay in Surging Mist. Why can't Rogues pick Shiv for PvE Situations? The list goes on and on.

You get the point. Classes feel a hell of a lot better in PvP and those Talents aren't game breaking. Probably 99% of them wouldn't even need to be changed for PvE usage.


PvP Talents were implemented to reduce the "ability bloat" and to incentivize people to use War Mode (i guess). Well, neither of those worked out. Classes feel dull and without the 30% XP buff there wouldn't be a single Alliance player using War Mode. So basically they have no reason to exist the way they do right now.

This change wouldn't fix all the flaws the game has but it's a small fix which Blizzard already has in the game, only with a stupid restriction.

[arkanon]

Don't get me wrong, I don't want Blizz to trash them, but there is absolutely no reason for them to be PvP only.

Nowadays everyone and their mom or even grandma are complaining about how terrible most classes feel. Most classes are lacking tools for certain situations or have really awkward mechanics in BfA. Except PvPers. Somehow they are a lot less likely to complain about how their classes feel.

Ever tried healing a M+ as disc in Grievious-Weeks? Yeah, I'd rather jump off a cliff than try to do that. Well, guess what. There is a PvP Talent which greatly increases the healing of Power Word: Radiance and makes it instant cast. Combining this PvP Talent with the right Azerite Traits would actually make it so much less a pain in the ass.

Let's take a look at SPriest. A class that has nothing to cast while moving. If only you could get into Voidform to at least use Voidbolt while moving. I'm sorry, got to cast Void Eruption. For no real reason. If only there was a talent to make it instant cast... like the PvP Talent.

Same thing for Demo Locks and the Master Summoner Talent. Have you tried burst healing someone with a single target heal as a MW Monk? Really awkward situation, because you have to use your AoE heal to ST heal people. Again, PvPers have the solution to that awkward gameplay in Surging Mist. Why can't Rogues pick Shiv for PvE Situations? The list goes on and on.

You get the point. Classes feel a hell of a lot better in PvP and those Talents aren't game breaking. Probably 99% of them wouldn't even need to be changed for PvE usage.


PvP Talents were implemented to reduce the "ability bloat" and to incentivize people to use War Mode (i guess). Well, neither of those worked out. Classes feel dull and without the 30% XP buff there wouldn't be a single Alliance player using War Mode. So basically they have no reason to exist the way they do right now.

This change wouldn't fix all the flaws the game has but it's a small fix which Blizzard already has in the game, only with a stupid restriction.

Balance. MY most hated word when it comes to WoW. I honestly believe the communities demands for perfect balancing, and blizzards pursuit of it, is what has watered the classes down to next to nothing. Balancing in pvp is a very different thing Vs pve. If they wanted to add the talents you suggest into pve, everything would need to be completely re balanced, and would be much harder to balance. Im not making excuses, but thats the reason.

[Kralljin]

While i'm not neccessarily against the idea, the issue is that at least in PvE certain classes are supposed to have weaknesses.

How this affects PvP is to the class designers (perhaps) a secondary concern, they just let the PvP people handle things from there and they choose to add PvP abilities and talents how they see fit.

The SP thing is the perfect example, not being able to do dps while moving is working as intended for Blizzard, we had this discussion on the Elemental Front, the lack of mobility due to the removal of Gust of Wind is working as intended for Blizzard.

Another thing is simply Balance, the example with Shiv shows that, Shiv's primary use in PvE would be to dispel Enrage effects, where are Enrage effects mostly present?
M+, do Rogues need more tools in order to excel in M+ content? I doubt that.


I'm not against the idea, however it needs to be more selective about those abilities than just "They solve issue X", this mindset led to homogenization of classes and specs where Blizzard just solved class Balance / design issues by throwing new spells on classes.

In my opinion, abilities like Hammer of Reckoning are a good example to be made baseline, abilities that really hold some class flavour and are useful.

[kubaje]

Balance. MY most hated word when it comes to WoW. I honestly believe the communities demands for perfect balancing, and blizzards pursuit of it, is what has watered the classes down to next to nothing. Balancing in pvp is a very different thing Vs pve. If they wanted to add the talents you suggest into pve, everything would need to be completely re balanced, and would be much harder to balance. Im not making excuses, but thats the reason.

That would be true if there was power gain or game breaking abilities, which there isn't in most cases.

Giving players an option to make Void Eruption instant cast wouldn't need any adjustments. Same goes for "Call Dreadstalkers". Or Shiv for rogues.

I feel like PvP Talents are what Blizzard wanted the main Talents to be. Giving you a way to customize your Character with abilites that are interesting and fill your class without making or breaking it.

- - - Updated - - -

While i'm not neccessarily against the idea, the issue is that at least in PvE certain classes are supposed to have weaknesses.

How this affects PvP is to the class designers (perhaps) a secondary concern, they just let the PvP people handle things from there and they choose to add PvP abilities and talents how they see fit.

The SP thing is the perfect example, not being able to do dps while moving is working as intended for Blizzard, we had this discussion on the Elemental Front, the lack of mobility due to the removal of Gust of Wind is working as intended for Blizzard.

Another thing is simply Balance, the example with Shiv shows that, Shiv's primary use in PvE would be to dispel Enrage effects, where are Enrage effects mostly present?
M+, do Rogues need more tools in order to excel in M+ content? I doubt that.


I'm not against the idea, however it needs to be more selective about those abilities than just "They solve issue X", this mindset led to homogenization of classes and specs where Blizzard just solved class Balance / design issues by throwing new spells on classes.

In my opinion, abilities like Hammer of Reckoning are a good example to be made baseline, abilities that really hold some class flavour and are useful.

I wouldn't say SPriest design is working as intended. It doesn't matter if Blizzards philisophy is that they don't want everyone to have everything. When you can do absolutely nothing relevant while moving, your class feels terrible. Whenever a class feels terrible, Blizzard failed and their philosophy is worth absolutely nothing.
It's not even that SPriests can't do anything while moving. They can't when they aren't in Voidform. Entering Voidform requires you to stand still to cast Void Eruption. That just feels terrible, especially when you know you could do it while moving in PvP.

Shiv isn't an issue either. There is a problem when only a single class has a mechanic like that. Giving rogues an enrage dispel on a 12 sec CD wouldn't change the meta whatsoever. Shivs 70% snare is also a great effect that makes the ability worthwhile without being OP.

Those are just the extreme examples. Most PvP Talents are passive without huge impact on classes, yet they make them a lot more fun, interesting and most importantly they give you options to customize your character.

[Kralljin]

I wouldn't say SPriest design is working as intended. It doesn't matter if Blizzards philisophy is that they don't want everyone to have everything. When you can do absolutely nothing relevant while moving, your class feels terrible. Whenever a class feels terrible, Blizzard failed and their philosophy is worth absolutely nothing.

For all intents and purposes, the current design philosophy is closer to the Vanilla one than in Cata / MoP, where as said above, Blizzard very often just resorted to giving class alternative versions of spells from other classes to solve their issues.

I think Blizzard is right in their approach to give classes both strength and weaknesses, but the issue is that Blizzard sits flat in their ass when it comes to the strength and weaknesses of certain specs.

Elemental as example, the low mobility of (Elemental) Shaman is intended, the rather average defense as well.
Their strengths? Oh well that's a good question, maybe in 8.1, or not, maybe just ST buffs.

The counter example are Havoc Demon Hunters, what in the world is their intended weakness?
Great mobility.
Great Defense.
Good Burst.
Good Cleave.
Good AoE.
Raid Support Tools.

Their philosophy is in my opinion not the problem, their execution is flat out horrible.

Shiv isn't an issue either. There is a problem when only a single class has a mechanic like that. Giving rogues an enrage dispel on a 12 sec CD wouldn't change the meta whatsoever. Shivs 70% snare is also a great effect that makes the ability worthwhile without being OP.

And in my opinion this just doesn't make sense, sorry.

That is just like the bogus decision to give DH's a dispel (altough on a CD), why?
Aren't Mages, Warlock / Hunter (with pet), Priest and Shaman already enough to dispel magic? Did we need another one on top of that?
Not even mentioning Blood elves here.

Both Hunters (who should just get Tranq. Shot back) and Druid can dispel Enrage effects, that is enough in my opinion.
Therein lies the actual value, that the ability to dispel enrage effects is actually rather uncommon, thus both Hunters and Druid feel way more useful if an Enrage effect is present.
The more classes can do something, the less special the ability feels.

[kubaje]

I don't want each class to do everything, that's a topic for a different discussion. Ditching the idea only to not give rogues Shiv isn't really helpful either, especially if it only affects M+. You can't look at M+ only and then decide. M+ is only a really small part of the game with an uncertain future.

What I'm asking for isn't a philosophy changes. I'm asking for Blizz to give us things that we already have, without the restriction of being only usable in PvP. None of those abilites are broken in PvP or the Open World.

[agentsi]

Blizzard has openly stated if you refuse to take a specific tank, or a specific healer, or a specific DPS because of an affix, that affix needs to be changed. And the OP is right. Trying to heal on a grievous week with disc, is pretty much a nightmare. You only have 3 actual skills that heal directly, and if there is no mob to DPS, you only have one AoE heal. Which btw is very low healing, health wise, and has a 20 second cooldown. On the flip side, Holy priest has like 4 AoE heals, that are all great, and only one has a cooldown. I'm okay with class/spec roles being more defined, but that shouldn't alienate the player who decides to play one of them.

[Xirrohon]

Would like to see them go away. For a Hybrid class there are way too many damn buttons now, esp when you take into account Focus and Arena macros.

[Soon-TM]

Their philosophy is in my opinion not the problem, their execution is flat out horrible.

When you normalize DPS (or HPS, or mitigation) without normalizing utility, what you described is bound to happen. Their "philosophy" falls flat on its ass. There is always "that" one class that has awesome tricks and gadgets, on top of the same DPS than everyone else.

[Khaza-R]

I think PvP talents should have been incorporated into both PvE and PvP. Overall a lot the talents make the classes feel much better and enjoyable to play

They should have just called them "War Talents" or some shit and made them unlockable to everyone by completing Warfronts. Would have killed two birds with one stone

[Kralljin]

I don't want each class to do everything, that's a topic for a different discussion. Ditching the idea only to not give rogues Shiv isn't really helpful either, especially if it only affects M+. You can't look at M+ only and then decide. M+ is only a really small part of the game with an uncertain future.

This entirely ignores the second point i made, it undermines the fantasy of druids and hunters.
You give more flavor to rogues but at the same time take it away from Druid and Hunters, that is the problem with these types of abilities and homogenization.

None of those abilites are broken in PvP or the Open World.

Well of course, that's where they are active.

However, a lot of PvP talents aren't meant for serious PvE Content, there's a reason why skills like Moonkin Aura or Skyfury Totem are PvP talents.
The power level of the PvP Talents in PvE Content varies greatly, that imbalance may be acceptable in the outdoor if you have warmode active but some simply aren't meant for PvE (And i'm not talking about those that deal % based damage).

That is why in my opinion abilities that are clearly output focused shouldn't become neccessarily baseline abilities, unless you want to re balance a spec according to it.
Shiv by itself isn't even the issue, the problem is the Enrage dispel attached to it (which it didn't have originally), however that would become the primary use of the ability outside of PvP, which as explained above hurts the flavor of Hunters and Druids.

[kubaje]

That is why in my opinion abilities that are clearly output focused shouldn't become neccessarily baseline abilities, unless you want to re balance a spec according to it.
Shiv by itself isn't even the issue, the problem is the Enrage dispel attached to it (which it didn't have originally), however that would become the primary use of the ability outside of PvP, which as explained above hurts the flavor of Hunters and Druids.

While I agree with you on Moonkin Aura, I greatly disagree on Skyfury Totem. Those kinds of abilities are actually what shamans are known for. Remember the pre Wrath Windfury Totem? Great ability poorly implemented. This is actually what we need to give classes more flavor.

I also think you greatly overestimate the value of the enrage dispel. That ability is the last thing I assosiate my druid with. Its use cases are also extremely limited and barely ever even usable outside of M+ in raging weeks.

[Kralljin]

While I agree with you on Moonkin Aura, I greatly disagree on Skyfury Totem. Those kind of abilities are actually what shamans are known for. Remember the pre Wrath Windfury Totem? Great ability poorly implemented. This is actually what we need to give classes more flavor.

The problem is the current form of the ability, it just devolves into bringing 3 Shaman to every raid that then rotate Skyfury.

You would have to turn into an entirely passive ability (because Totems as passive buffs are just clunkly) or give it some kind of debuff similiar to Bloodlust.

The former would downgrade the ability in my opinion, passive buffs are less exciting than active abilities.
The latter obviously is kinda strange, because then you might as well just make Bloodlust Shaman only again and you would have a similiar effect.

I also think you greatly overestimate the value of the enrage dispel. That ability is the last thing I assosiate my druid with.

It isn't just about the value, but it happens to be useful almost whenever you can use it.

While the latter is an opinion, Soothe originally had a different functionality, it reduced the aggro radius of Beasts, the ability was then later retooled to an Enrage dispel.
However i would argue that it still fits, as the ability is about calming an enemy and Druids overall are portrayed as rather serene and tranquil.

At least more fitting than the idea of ramming a knive in someones back to calm them down.

When you normalize DPS (or HPS, or mitigation) without normalizing utility, what you described is bound to happen. Their "philosophy" falls flat on its ass. There is always "that" one class that has awesome tricks and gadgets, on top of the same DPS than everyone else.

If they would actually give "that class" meaningful weaknesses, then that might counteract that.

Take rogues for example, who have been regarded as the non plus ultra as far as Melee dps is concerned for a long time.

How about they have like 20% less HP than something like Ret,Dps Warrior or DK?
It makes sense, those guys wear Plate Armor for a reason, rogues don't want to tank damage with their face anyway, they want to avoid being hit in the first place, that's why they wear Leather, Feint and CoS are decent reflection of that trade off.

Perhaps also make Cheat Death an active ability (or just plain remove it), rogues should be the last class that survive a bad situation solely caused by not being attentive to a threat.
Thieves that make mistakes get caught, which shouldn't just end with a 6min "slap on the wrist" debuff.

But no, everybody needs to have the same healthpool, everybody needs to have the same homogenized defensive toolkit, while some classes get a few cherries on top of that.

[Trend]

That would be true if there was power gain or game breaking abilities, which there isn't in most cases.

But there are cases where it would be quite breaking. Imagine the affliction lock being able to keep 5 UA's going on a raidboss nearly indefinitely.

I understand what you're saying, but I don't see any change coming.

[Powerogue]

PvP talents did work to motivate me to play war mode I suppose, but some feel so mandatory that I feel like a load of hot garbage whenever I'm doing instances and raids where I can't use them. My burst dps being obliterated into nothing on my outlaw rogue is somewhat made up for with the double self healing for sustainability, but in dungeons I don't get that, going right back to feeling like my rotation has a big fat hole in it and not having fun at all. So I skip out on dungeons and raids. I'd find myself always prioritizing the outdoor content instead because it's the only place my character felt anything resembling whole.

[Carnnezz]

The funny thing is that most of the PvP talents in game actually used to be baseline our spellbooks, useable in raids and dungeons already. Examples being Cyclone, Disarm, Dark Sim, Necrotic Strike, Leader of the Pack, Grounding Totem, etc

Those abilities were all usable in a raid setting so not sure why they have to be separated now.

[kubaje]

But there are cases where it would be quite breaking. Imagine the affliction lock being able to keep 5 UA's going on a raidboss nearly indefinitely.

I understand what you're saying, but I don't see any change coming.

How do you see that happening? That's not possible for multiple reasons.


@Kralljin

Dude you're already trying to balance and create a perfect world in which we can't have fun things. Fun always comes first. A perfect world isn't fun. In WoWs best years the game had pretty much no balance whatsoever.

Let Blizzard do the balancing.

[Trend]

How do you see that happening? That's not possible for multiple reasons.

LOL, yes it is. Already do it on outdoor bosses with wPvP on. And I do fuckton damage on a poorly equipped and hardly played lock.

[kubaje]

LOL, yes it is. Already do it on outdoor bosses with wPvP on. And I do fuckton damage on a poorly equipped and hardly played lock.

By unsing the drain life talent? You can only drain so many times before going oom and then not being able to do anything, so no, this isn't op at all. If that was possible it would have been nerfed by now for PvP balancing reasons.

[Kralljin]

Dude you're already trying to balance and create a perfect world in which we can't have fun things. Fun always comes first. A perfect world isn't fun. In WoWs best years the game had pretty much no balance whatsoever.

Let Blizzard do the balancing.

Problem is that those issues are obvious to see them from a mile away.
Making suggestions and then just go "downsides may exist but that's what the devs have to fix, right?" is a bad basis for a discussion based on a suggestion.

Even in a Vanilla Blizzard made decisions based on balance, else Undead would probably still be perma Fear, Charm and Sleep immune while also being subject to Shackle Undead.