Were the classes the biggest mistake in BfA?

[ymn]

Playing your class is what you're doing 100% of the time in the game (unless you're saving turtles) - this area has been on a downward spiral for many years now. But as it reached the bottom - it became apparent to almost everyone and not just the select few for which the game is not made.

As a wise man once said "WoW was awesome because its makers made a game they want to play - now it's not that awesome because it's a game they made to sell".

There are a few redeeming factors in BfA (and let's not act like everything is horrible):
- Raids
- Zones
- Alt-gearing (anyone who played Legion in the first couple of tiers knows how HARD it was to re-roll/have an alt)

The systems they've made do not complement each other and have clearly been created purely on paper without playthrough (this is either due having a poor QA/playtest environment, not listening to feedback from the aforementioned or both). I could go on and on, but it has been summed up in a number of threads.

[Polarthief]

In my opinion, the biggest mistake was, and will always be the Azerite handling.

Definitely this. After refusing to back down, they said in 8.2, "EVERYTHING will be on the neck", which I read as "no more Azerite armor, all traits are in the neck now".
Instead, we're getting a brand new (shitty) system on top of Azerite that has gone unchanged since beta.

That said, Class Design is also abysmal. I tried every ranged spec (the role I've mained since BC) and for once decided I'd try a new role because I just hated all of them.

This expansion has been so bad and will easily go down as the second worst expansion (to WoD of course). They're also trying to WoD-ify 8.2 by rushing it out so they can get to 9.0 ASAP.

As a wise man once said "WoW was awesome because its makers made a game they want to play - now it's not that awesome because it's a game they made to sell".

I mean in recent years, it has had devs that literally play with a tablet and are super casual. A quote has never been more fucking true that it hurts sooooo bad.

[Boricha]

No longer having a class I enjoy was my main reason for quitting BFA. It had many other problems like the convoluted azerite system with lame traits, IEs and warfronts being boring and pointless, dungeons being too trash centric, etc... but I'd probably have stayed subbed like I did for most of WoD just to spam pvp if I still enjoyed my characters.

[Cena]

Ok, let's not give any feedback, then. Is this better? What are the discussions for?
Just because the fun for every person can be subjective, does not mean that part of the fun should be forgotten, you call it complain when it's a discussion and feedback, there's a big difference between one and another.

I have explained and structured my post on the matter, what does annoy me and what doesn't, do i need to go further deep into detail and put spec to spec, class design management what is wrong so it's not a complaint?

Yes details on what is mechanically wrong with classes and how uniqueness can be structured would be a better feedback. Lots of details and mathematical models wouldn't be a bad idea actually. If Blizzard doesn't have what it takes to design classes, then its up to us who understand it better to provide them the details.

[Shakana]

Yes details on what is mechanically wrong with classes and how uniqueness can be structured would be a better feedback. Lots of details and mathematical models wouldn't be a bad idea actually. If Blizzard doesn't have what it takes to design classes, then its up to us who understand it better to provide them the details.

I might do that tbh. There's a lot of stuff i can resume for classes that are in need on their specs. I don't want people to think i invalidate their post because i don't agree with them or they don't agree with me, i will explain the most i can. I basically want a fast paced action gameplay and feel i have the full control of my class that lets me take my own decisions of how i will play strategically and have a good reaction times to every situation, which brings me the need of wanting the complexity in class design, right now classes feel a reduced homogenization and poor, where we all have the same tools, certain specs were once before just better at using certain tools than others which made the classes play so different and unique. I'm all up to discuss but making that big thread will probably take me even some hours, since i have every alt, except paladin. Classes are how we interface with the game, it's very important to see this and i even wish that specs were well developed and didn't need to be propped by the traits on the azerite.

- - - Updated - - -

Some classes in WoW feel a lot worse than others.

As a mage main since 2005 I honesty enjoy my class in BfA, not as much as Legion of course but close. for me I really hated MoP mages personally.

But as someone who also has a lot of alts, the classes I feel really suffered are Paladins, shamans and Hunters. Even though I feel Hunters have been regressing since MoP, but survival hunters are a pretty nice change. Those three classes feel really bad now to how I remember them and just not as fun.

I cannot speak for the other classes so I know nothing about Monks, Druids, Warlocks, Priests.

LEast we not forget classes themselves have been feeling empty for a long time, since MoP changed the talent systems. Leveling a fresh alt now days is a pain, it;s not fun, its not rewarding and it feels like a chore or hurdle than an actual experience.

Say what you want about the old talent trees and if they gave you rewards every level or if it was the illusion of rewarding, it was something, and right now we got nothing. From level 100 onward is a dead zone. Leveling feels like a prison sentence and you are just serving your time until the end.

I know Ion has spoken about changing the leveling experience, and hell, I am aboard for anything because outside of taking all talents and spells we got now away it cannot be any worse than it is. Something needs to change, I don;t know what, but something

Mages are a special case, i actually need to take some time to talk about mages, i didn't play my mage as much as other classes but i know how it's going in BfA.
Ye, hunter as survival, totally got better but still when you think of a hunter most of the people think about ranger, bows, pets, MM for a lonewolf ranger, BM if you enjoy pets. Survival is for the people that love that kind of "lancer" hunter that well, survive setting traps and live the action closer to the danger and still surviving. And they made it a mix of a melee with a bit more "range", you can even like pets but be closer to the danger, on the contrary of the BM where you mostly kite more and just command your pet to do all the work for you maintaining yourself at distance. Survival is not bad, i tried it this xpac and actually liked it, more than i expected.

[Otimus]

Extreme monumental lack of launch content and the azerite system were the biggest flaws. For the most part, the class design isn't as big of a deal. It's really only going to draw the ire of the really hardcore and mid-core player base. (and frankly, most of those are just going to work around the bad design anyways. They always do. For some it's worse than it's ever been, I know, but you know it's mostly true.) Having nothing anyone wants to do is going to be a problem for everyone from the most casual, to the most hardcore, coupled with the core mechanical draw of the expansion being undercooked, and frankly, at least in my opinion, pretty damned boring. That's the stuff that actively tanks sub numbers and kills player interest. It's why something like WoD failed despite not having outright abysmal class design. (The counter point to this could be that MoP had good class design AND loads of content, GOOD content, content for every skill level, too, and still wound up failing in the end too, which I don't know what in the fucking world that proves, but there's probably some conclusions to be had there.)

[Shakana]

Extreme monumental lack of launch content and the azerite system were the biggest flaws. For the most part, the class design isn't as big of a deal. It's really only going to draw the ire of the really hardcore and mid-core player base. (and frankly, most of those are just going to work around the bad design anyways. They always do. For some it's worse than it's ever been, I know, but you know it's mostly true.) Having nothing anyone wants to do is going to be a problem for everyone from the most casual, to the most hardcore, coupled with the core mechanical draw of the expansion being undercooked, and frankly, at least in my opinion, pretty damned boring. That's the stuff that actively tanks sub numbers and kills player interest. It's why something like WoD failed despite not having outright abysmal class design. (The counter point to this could be that MoP had good class design AND loads of content, GOOD content, content for every skill level, too, and still wound up failing in the end too, which I don't know what in the fucking world that proves, but there's probably some conclusions to be had there.)

In agreement about MoP, had really good class designs even after losing the tree talent they made it work and WoD was good too.
Blizzard really needs to fix their philosophy of going forward. As you level you lose more than you gain, there's not much you feel you're going forward and making progress, what is the point of level to 120 when you feel you were better as 110? Get more rng loots? Go do warfronts that you do first time to get nothing much after a certain ilvl and only do for the caches from the quests and do the same thing over and over? Doing island to reach a cap of azerite and get mounts that takes eternities to drop due to rng and maps of the population that you have no idea who might pop up? Do world quests for the farming that you already did with AP on Legion? Having war campaigns that seems the horde is going against alliance when in the end it's even horde going against Sylvanas and initiate a rebellion after the promoting cinematic being horde vs alliance, when everything that made the people scream for the horde in that cinematic was immediately defamed by the in-game play war campaign and having no horde faction proud in our actions even less after Garrosh? To do raids that not even the bosses are that much important (before Azshara which i so want to fight, all raids for me were bad, Uldir only fun i had was at G'hunn) going BoD to kill a king that was actually so sweet and clumsy and fight Jaina so she can escape after killing the King? In Legion you had Xavius, Helya, Gul'dan, Kil'Jaeden (that were actually villains and we had to stop them) and Argus, seat of the Pantheon that were absolutely amazing with the titans there. Compare those bosses with Battle for Azeroth and tell me where this raids are any good? PvP vanishes everyday more, who loves PvP will still play it regardless, it's another atmosphere, going actually against other players doesn't even make you feel the story as PvE and it's actually fun always to fight someone that is not a NPC/boss. BfA lacks in so many ways, i know, it's not only the classes but for me it has been for the simple reason that is the way i comunicate with the world and play the content that ain't even that great as i stated.

[Watchers]

Pretty much the situation for me. The classes just are not fun to play. They feel clunky, slow and it all feels like a big step backwards.

Legion wrecked my favorite class and spec, BM hunter, but I found a lot of fun in my Elem shammy and WW monk. Legion removed a lot of abilities but had other class mechanics that made it fun to play. WW monk was very energetic and fast paced. Elem shammy felt like a hard hitting cannon with good buildup. Now both classes feel slow and hit like a wet noodle with none of the uniqueness they used to offer.

I went back and looked at my old MoP screens and realised how many abilities and functions our characters have lost. Then I looked at my gameplay videos and I saw all the buttons I actively pressed during a fight. I have nothing of that now. It's press one button, then stare at the countdown and then press another. It's slow, it's unmotivating, it's just not fun.

It hurts.

This happened to all classes sadly

[Zandalariprelate]

Warrior and Warlock feels fine to me, I even enjoy more the current warlock than Legion but sometimes I got the feeling something is missing like a button or some passive that makes x skill instant available.

[Kalisandra]

I agree. I think the reason for this is, we aren't classes anymore, we're just specs. I'm no longer a Mage, I'm just a Frost Mage. I'm no longer a Priest, I'm just a Shadow Priest. We have no ability to flex as we need to, we're just stuck with the spec we choose and lose literally all flavor of the other specs almost entirely.

I was thinking about this when levelling my arcane mage the other day. She has no non-arcane spells, aside from Frost Nova, as far as I can recall. The other two specs have quite a lot of arcane spells because that's where most of a mage's utility ism but even they now lack out-of-school attacks. Once upon a time a Mage was someone who knew all three schools of (mage) magic, and they specialised in one (or not, with some of those old builds) while retaining their basic spells that all mages had.

The current method of having specs essentially be classes that just happen to share a few spells with their classmates is why we have really odd things like Resto Shamans' Lava Bursts and Lightning Bolts hitting harder than Elementals', and the latter's DPS being made up from Mastery procs, Earth Shocks, and so on. It's nonsensical.

[Memnok]

Every single class I played felt as if at least one button is missing from the rotations and some passive effects to spice things up. Every single one. But they still insist on "the class design from legion was done without the artifacts in mind, thats why it does not matter for bfa if we remove the artifacts and only do very minor reworks"

I don't think its a one more button thing, more buttons won't make uninteresting abilities interesting, just being complicated also doesn't make specs interesting. I've been playing a Havoc Demon Hunter most of BFA, and it probably has the fewest buttons of spec in the game atm. At the same time it is also one of the more enjoyable specs for me to play. There is no downtime you have something that you can do every global. My only complaint about them would be that the rotation is the same while in Meta.

[Kalisandra]

As for PVE, a guy only wanted to play paladin because it offers the less buttons to press possible, even experimenting DH he said that DH has more buttons than ret paladin. And that for me, just makes me not find paladin fun. Not much mobility + GCDs, i don't think i would like it. I only tried a bit paladin this xpac leveling but leveling ain't the same as high level. So i just don't really think i can comment on that besides what i said and see, this being said now, in PvP, their bubble is the only thing that saves them indeed, they are plate but they seem like cloth wearers when the cloth kites them, a mage is made so they can kite melee, well, paladin and dks have some good stuff but their lack of mobility makes them lose way too much, and the time they shine is when they finally get close to a caster and can just wings on and use all the burst and might.

The thing is, back in MoP, Ret had an insane number of buttons, especially in PvP and high-end PvE where their utility came into play, and even their base rotation had a fair number of buttons. However, aside from the Holy Power spenders none of it was resource limited - if it was off CD and you needed it, you pushed the button, so it was manageable with practice. These days a huge amount of that utility is gone, and the rotation is simpler too (and has no AoE/cleave that isn't from Holy Power or from a talent and on annoying cooldown), and with mobility and survivability far more than limited then pre-Legion (and those feed into each other, because without one, you really need the other) Ret today can be pretty frustrating for long-time fans. Oh, and Ret lost a lot of range off most of its attacks too, something that helped with the poor mobility. So now Ret has terrible mobility (arguably the worst since Vanilla), no reach, poor survivability outside of bubble, and also less CC than it used to have. Oh, and far fewer ways to get out of CC, roots, and snares than it used to have as well.

[Shakana]

I was thinking about this when levelling my arcane mage the other day. She has no non-arcane spells, aside from Frost Nova, as far as I can recall. The other two specs have quite a lot of arcane spells because that's where most of a mage's utility ism but even they now lack out-of-school attacks. Once upon a time a Mage was someone who knew all three schools of (mage) magic, and they specialised in one (or not, with some of those old builds) while retaining their basic spells that all mages had.

The current method of having specs essentially be classes that just happen to share a few spells with their classmates is why we have really odd things like Resto Shamans' Lava Bursts and Lightning Bolts hitting harder than Elementals', and the latter's DPS being made up from Mastery procs, Earth Shocks, and so on. It's nonsensical.

I feel that too, you and @Thetruth1400 are correct in saying that we aren't classes anymore but specs. It feels like that for a long time now even in Legion that i was talking all good about. This has been a constant thing. It's not fun when you have talents that you can't choose and on the top of that, the specs that are there to not be able to play with them even if what we like about a class is that dead spec. It's really sad.

[Poppincaps]

I think BM is in the best spot it's ever been design wise. Same with Havoc DH (although that's not saying much as it's a new spec). I find MM to be an atrocious mess that has the weirdest flowing rotation I've ever played. SV is great but it's melee and them changing a ranged spec to melee was the worst decision they ever made.

All in all, some classes are great, some classes are ok, some are bad. It's very subjective.

[Micronetic]

Warrior and Warlock feels fine to me, I even enjoy more the current warlock than Legion but sometimes I got the feeling something is missing like a button or some passive that makes x skill instant available.

I hate the BfA warlock, am playing this class since Cata and it never felt worse than now for me. And that's why I did the same as the poster here:

No longer having a class I enjoy was my main reason for quitting BFA. It had many other problems like the convoluted azerite system with lame traits, IEs and warfronts being boring and pointless, dungeons being too trash centric, etc... but I'd probably have stayed subbed like I did for most of WoD just to spam pvp if I still enjoyed my characters.

[Shakana]

The playstyle of classes being bad doesn't really resonate with me as a complaint, beyong maybe remembering an ability or two that were fun central parts ofa rotation, and now no longer are because of nerfs or the ability no longer being in the game.

Lately however I started to consider issues with the game at a much larger scale: the expansion cycle.

Every patch it feels as if previous content is made obsolete, not only does it make the game feel really small, it also causes the fact that there can be no sense of continual character growth. While AP systems have been a very feeble hearted solution to that, the major meaningfukl upgrades to your AP growth still came from patches. Eventually we get conditioned to this patch cycle and start just waiting around for the next content to comw around, because effort in current content is just going to get washed away. Its even worse at the end of expansions.

Wow needs to step away from expansion cycles and patches that cause content to become outdated. They neef to start thinking about systems that allow for conyinuous character growth, so people can play the game without feeling like a pendulum of irrelevance is hanging above their heads.

This is never gonna happen though because the content and expansion cycle is probably more effective for quick bursts of increased revenue.

I think the main reason for that is that they see it worked for ONE expansion and they think people will be ok with the same system on a brand new expansion, which is not the case because yes it worked for Legion but BfA is a whole new different expansion and progression and sense of going forward is made by changes and not a edit of the previous expansion. Not a good cycle to follow. Like WoD brought mission table and they brought it to Legion, i know who didn't like the mission table and it's almost a tiring vision to see in Legion again. Then in BfA, we have another mission table. That is like the cycle you're talking about but i gave the mission table as an example, It doesn't feel fresh or a brand new expansion, it feels a loss with modified system but really similar and decay in quality as it no longer makes sense for the expansion.

[Weeps]

Biggest mistake of them all is the GCD bullshit.
And the homogeneous specs

[Asaliah]

there is only one class that is truly unique in term of ability, flavor and utility: rogue.

since the beginning of wow it's the best class finger in the nose

[Alkizon]

Ok, let's not give any feedback, then.

Hah. How it wasn't seem strange, but my friend already 2 years ago, when we just met and started first talk about all of these themes, said, literally: "It seems the only way to be heard - is silent". Absurd, but after some explanations it began to seem that perhaps it's really could help, only idea itself is quite utopian.

In a nutshell, idea is in kind of information boycott. If you're an active player, continue to play, but silently, if you don't play, then stop any active activity on forum (read only), no topics or comments on Twitter or social networks. No more beta tests and reviews from community... Give it six months or a year of informational starvation, no scandals (lack of even this form of PR), nothing... But, firstly, it's unrealistic to silence all community at once (here I don’t mean trolls, rather intellectual activity, in absence of which “evil will swallow itself with time”). Secondly, it's Classic preparing process now, and silence (even if we assume that no one hears us) still seems to me rather unfortunate decision.

Although, how this not being sad, but friends comment very coldly on what is happening in this direction and sometimes tease (remembering things like sharding, loot distribution system and some other developer flaws) over my futile attempts to somehow influence situation, explain situation's flaws to everyone else (actually laughing at their! own! comments). On the other hand, they never intended to play it, because they are very offended by devs (even I mentioned this, for character models and other disgrace) back then, therefore I would like to treat this with a share of healthy skepticism (though, it's not much from big evilness, rather because they like to joke a lot about anything, which is especially noticeable with looking from side at how they communicate with each other). Probably this is why druid helps me to get warlock talking about specific current changes from time to time (or maybe he is just using me (but I don’t mind) because this looks like they have promised not to discuss it with each other anymore, and third person in some sense nullifies terms of this agreement).

[Aigilas]

yes 10/char