Mists of Pandaria class design/gameplay philosophy

[Voidism]

Hey!

I often see people (like myself) saying MoP design is superior to anything that came after it. To those people I was wondering, what made it good in your opinion? What do you miss?

I miss my priest spell like Cascade, also having shadow version of it. Granted, shadow was pretty weak on single target encounters but I had fun. Disc gameplay and healing overall is also something I miss dearly. Also my destro warlock. Hard hitting Chaos Bolts. Vengeance mechanic for tanks!

The combat was "quicker" overall and that's something I miss.

[Nerovar]

Well, you had glyphs + the new talents and everything passive from the old talent trees was basically automatically baked into your specs. Combined with the new abilities this made the classes probably feel the strongest they've ever been in the history of the game. There were many niche things and most classes had a few abilities that were really wonky in terms of balance but incredibly fun to use. Back then it seemed like the devs really had some kind of vision for the classes.
The pace of the game was overall much faster but most classes had self-heal and/or very strong defensive capabilities (including CC) like ember tap, second wind, conversion to counterbalance this. This made up for very fun active gameplay and a level of involvement that we'll probably never see in this game (or any other MMO) ever again.
If BfA is like a game of chess, MoP is a game of 3d speed chess.


ps: does anyone remember stuff like Symbiosis? Or Dark Apotheosis (our Demo lock had much fun running around as a flag carrier using this glyph in RBGs)? Fun times

[oland138]

I liked how soul link was when MoP launched. It was unique, and it was dangerous to just leave it on. But then of course it got changed because people only want their GCDs to contribute to damage.

[Malikath]

as a warlock, being able to change demons on the fly and self-heal from our meta resource.
as a shaman, being able to move-and-cast my filler and not be an absolute turret.
as a hunter i liked the remaining favorable distinctions between the pet species, such as flying snake's lighting bolt spam.

[Voidism]

Or Dark Apotheosis (our Demo lock had much fun running around as a flag carrier using this glyph in RBGs)? Fun times

Oh yeah, loved that glyph!

[Arakakao]

Also, let's not forget about Smite Priests being viable.

[Trustworthy]

MoP was my personal favorite in terms of class design and rotation. As a hunter I really miss Blink Strikes where your pet would teleport to the target you were attacking instead of right now where a hunter's pet will stroll slowly around a ledge/obstacle to attack their target.

I remember a lot of casters having some sort of decent filler during heavy movement fights which created a more fun experience overall imo.

[Voidism]

MoP was my personal favorite in terms of class design and rotation. As a hunter I really miss Blink Strikes where your pet would teleport to the target you were attacking instead of right now where a hunter's pet will stroll slowly around a ledge/obstacle to attack their target.

I remember a lot of casters having some sort of decent filler during heavy movement fights which created a more fun experience overall imo.

Yeah, like destro warlock being able to incinerate while moving! And that Fel Flame ability for all specs.

[Shadowferal]

The aesthetic style was probably the best of all.
I mean who didn't like "Story time" with Lorewalker Cho?

[jellmoo]

The aesthetic style was probably the best of all.
I mean who didn't like "Story time" with Lorewalker Cho?

It's such a simple thing, but this is probably the biggest reason I love MoP. Having Lorewalker Cho as our personal storyteller and narrator gave us the perfect intro to the various myths and legends of the land, and provided a great thread that connected the stories of each zone.

[Keesasha Reborn]

As an elemental shaman, i feel like MoP was the best time EVER Lighting bolt while casting and reforging and the crazy stat inflation made the spec play amazingly in SoO!

[Nadiru]

Class design and gameplay philosophy was, in a word, "options."

[Nefarious Tea]

It's such a simple thing, but this is probably the biggest reason I love MoP. Having Lorewalker Cho as our personal storyteller and narrator gave us the perfect intro to the various myths and legends of the land, and provided a great thread that connected the stories of each zone.

Not to mention that Jim Cummings (Cho's VA) is absolutely legendary.

- - - Updated - - -

Class design and gameplay philosophy was, in a word, "options."

Yeah, it's most certainly weird that with all the options we had in MoP, including the introduction of flex raiding, that we essentially had... none in WoD.

[EskwyreX]

Enhancement Shaman was the epitome of fun for me during MoP. Bursty af, great cooldowns, awesome utility, insane AoE. THrowing out a Healing Tide and an Ancestral Guidance at the start of Malkorok HC during initial burst healed absolutely every bubble to full instantly, topping 1m+ HPS. Loved it.

[Boricha]

MoP had my favorite PvE class design, but PvP balance was all over the place until the very end. Even at the end, MoP was the birth of "go's" in arena. Still, I enjoyed RBGs in MoP quite a bit.

Shadow Priest was incredibly fun and versatile. Fire mage using alter time to get back procs and extend combustion was awesome. Burst of Speed on Rogue was hilariously OP but I loved it. BM Hunters had the craziest opener I've ever seen. Destro Lock with the original KJ's Cunning was amazing. It was imo the best version of Monk we've ever had. I remember haste levels becoming absurd by the end as well, which makes everything more fun. MoP gave most classes the ability to do every aspect of the game well while still maintaining strong class fantasy.

[xZerocidex]

PvP in Mist felt like it was more based on skill, everyone could do everything but it was down to knowing when you had to utilize your toolkit.

When I PvP as a Hunter back then, you had to save your burst for Warrior's second wind phases otherwise you probably won't kill him. Having 2 deterrence was amazing, instead of using them for defensive purposes if you had it glyphed for reflection you could pretty much redirect a Chaos Bolt back at them turning their own spells against them to win.

Class design in Mist gave players creative ways to play their classes, despite I didn't care for the new tree it was pretty amazing.

[Wondercrab]

To me it felt like the culmination of the philosophy of "bigger, better, crazier, cooler" that we'd been seeing in class updates released with new expansions. After MoP they started backtracking on that to try and design classes in a way that was more balanced, more straightforward, and in some ways more like Vanilla (with the class identity thing they focused on in Legion). I always felt like Vanilla was one end of the spectrum and MoP was the other, with what we have now feeling like a muddy in-between that fails to capture what was truly fun about either. Things like the glyph of demon hunting in MoP were insane and awesome despite not having many practical applications in high-end content. Classes had huge toolkits that let them do pretty much anything -- not so great for class diversity, but amazing in terms of actually making your class feel fun, fluid, and flexible, with a lot of depth to be wrung out of the gameplay.

The devs were very clearly committed to a strong design philosophy with classes in MoP, and they polished it up to perfection. Since then it hasn't felt like they really know what to do with classes.

[Nnyco]

The only problem i had with mop tbh was how ranged dps were so extremly mobile that they made melee dps obsolete unless they totally abused some mechanic todo insane dps like unholy in tot.

[Khain]

Not a fan. Everybody felt like a superhero but the balance was awful, ranged was so good and mobile that made most melee obsolete, the healing was stupid, everything was smartheals, tanks toping heal and dps meters, it was the pinnacle of class homogenization.

[Socialhealer]

Not a fan. Everybody felt like a superhero but the balance was awful, ranged was so good and mobile that made most melee obsolete, the healing was stupid, everything was smartheals, tanks toping heal and dps meters, it was the pinnacle of class homogenization.

You say that but look what happened to people who think like this^.

They made Warlords of Draenor!! worst fucking garbage class design ever, did you try elemental in MoP then WoD? fucking hell blizzard should have paid me $15 a month for that horse shit unfun garbage design.

You should stand still for 15 seconds during ascendance casting non stop lava burst with zero mobility, this will place you behind EVERYONE on the meters, WOWOWOW fucking epic please more of this!