The end of specializations?

[Doctor Funkenstein]

Surely in a way, but I dont want a spec locked (one path) talent tree.
Think more like the essence system where you can put in talents.

Yeah, no, you're talking about how the game used to be. Period.

[Razion]

Surely in a way, but I dont want a spec locked (one path) talent tree.
Think more like the essence system where you can put in talents.

So then, wouldn't this basically be existing talent trees, only spec-agnostic, so basically a removal of all but one row for a number of classes, with the total number of rows at that reduced by two? This is admittedly a lot easier to balance, but overall there is considerably less customization on your play-style overall if each spec doesn't have its own set of talents to choose from..

[Bumkin]

So basically like wow originally used to be? yes i like it

[huth]

<eats popcorn>

<looks over at vanilla where it was precisely what the original poster described>

<looks at the paladin>

Mmmmmhmmm.

<continues eating popcorn>

But then you'd still have specialisations, so it cannot be what the original poster described. I hope you didn't pick the bag with the yellow popcorn, either.

You have achieved choice.

You don't hae to make an arms war like the current arms war. You can make an arms war with a sword and shield if you wish, becauseaybe you do more than just log for raids and what that extra defence for some solo content.

The beuity for flexibility is you can choose but you not interfering with others freedoms not to choose the same thing you did.

Unless you want to actually be able to be competent, then you do. We've been through that already. What you're describing isn't choice, just options.

[Kumorii]

What if blizzard removed the specialization switching in SL or beyond? Your just your chosen class.

- You have access to most skills your class has to offer. (at max lvl)
- The talent system gets super expanded with multiple rotation/gameplay and role defining choices. *
- Yes, you prob. will have more abilities then buttonslots, but is that really so bad? You just have to make a skill selection.
- Gear and chosen talents define your main (LFG)party-role, when making a manual group you can do whatever you like.

* Example: choose between the two versions of Metamorphosis as a Demon Hunter.
* Example: choose between Jade statue and Ox statue as a monk.


Would you like a system like this and have access to more class skills.


EDIT:



The point is there wont be fire or frost mages, just mages. You might preffer fire over frost because you are currently running with lots of crit gear, but still be able to cast Blizzard and frost nova to slow down a pack then nuke one down with a frost lance and a Pyroblast. Sure Masteries need to be adjusted to account for the multiple damage types.



No not really, I was more thinking in the line of the essence system you can select what you think is best for you or the current situation.



Nope, if you only pick dps talents/skills you should seriously lack in defensive or healing power. You can make a hybrid spec and do a bit of both.
Pure dps classes just have more options to play their class or tailor their rotation for the situation/encounter/dungeon.


Easy fix: Lets say you can choose 15* traits/talents:
For every dps talent you pick you deal 2%* more damage.
For every healing talent you pick your healing is increased by 2%*.
And for every defensive talent damage you take is reduced by 2%*.

* example values

Not sure what you trying to fix because nothing will be changed with this.

- The talent system gets super expanded with multiple rotation/gameplay and role defining choices. *

so essentially people will spec accordingly to whatever role they want to play, almost like specializations. Instead of swapping an entire spec you just need to swap lots of talents instead. It just makes it much more of a hassle without bringing anything new.

[Moonoxx]

I played during the time we had talent tree "choice" - and I can tell you we really didn't. I ran the same talent spec 99% of the time and only cast abilities relevant to those talents. There were even spells part of your talent system that you didn't use cause it was a DPS loss, so you pretty much only spammed 2 abilities.

So it's only really providing the illusion of choice for super casual players that aren't playing properly, but for the people interested in proper gameplay and raiders/etc we'll be running cookie cutter specs and specific spells.

This change would have no effect at all on me then, I'd be running the optimal talent tree the entire time.

The only customisation I want back is reforging.

[This One Time At Bandcamp]

Love the idea, but it wouldnt really change much.

When would a DPS DH ever pick Tank Meta?
When would a DPS Shaman ever pick Earth Shield over Lightning Shield?

Imo we should keep specializations but update the talent system.

[HateTrain]

I don't know about any of this, but if it gets me back Gladiator Stance/Sword & Board DPS, I'll totally support it.

[Monster Hunter]

But then you'd still have specialisations, so it cannot be what the original poster described. I hope you didn't pick the back with the yellow popcorn, either.



Unless you want to actually be able to be competent, then you do. We've been through that already. What you're describing isn't choice, just options.

not really, could easily be the BIs build for a class or spec is neither fire or frost but a combination of 2 or 3, but bis actually depends again on the situation and the fight and not being tied into blizzard current stringent spec system that locks you down would allow people to be flexible to the situation.

i think your conflating the old idea of spec's which was originally just a categorisation of talents to the modern idea of spec's which is the thing your locked down into by blizzard.

in a post locking down talent system, there would be specs i guess but in name only, no guarentee the bis would look anything like a current arms warrior or fury war for warrior. but then you would at least be able to choose how you want your war to look and play.

[Lucavian]

What if blizzard removed the specialization switching in SL or beyond? Your just your chosen class.

- You have access to most skills your class has to offer. (at max lvl)
- The talent system gets super expanded with multiple rotation/gameplay and role defining choices. *
- Yes, you prob. will have more abilities then buttonslots, but is that really so bad? You just have to make a skill selection.
- Gear and chosen talents define your main (LFG)party-role, when making a manual group you can do whatever you like.

* Example: choose between the two versions of Metamorphosis as a Demon Hunter.
* Example: choose between Jade statue and Ox statue as a monk.


Would you like a system like this and have access to more class skills.


EDIT:



The point is there wont be fire or frost mages, just mages. You might preffer fire over frost because you are currently running with lots of crit gear, but still be able to cast Blizzard and frost nova to slow down a pack then nuke one down with a frost lance and a Pyroblast. Sure Masteries need to be adjusted to account for the multiple damage types.



No not really, I was more thinking in the line of the essence system you can select what you think is best for you or the current situation.



Nope, if you only pick dps talents/skills you should seriously lack in defensive or healing power. You can make a hybrid spec and do a bit of both.
Pure dps classes just have more options to play their class or tailor their rotation for the situation/encounter/dungeon.


Easy fix: Lets say you can choose 15* traits/talents:
For every dps talent you pick you deal 2%* more damage.
For every healing talent you pick your healing is increased by 2%*.
And for every defensive talent damage you take is reduced by 2%*.

* example values

This punishes hybrids or pure classes. Either they give the same number of options per role or they give the same number of options per class. Let's say the first is true:

So paladins have 3 talents for healing, 3 talents for dps, and 3 talents for tanking they can choose from row 1.
Warlocks have 3 talents for dps they can choose from row 1. Unless they balance this extremely well the paladin will have more options cause whatever % more damage they get from taking a dps talent might not weigh as strongly as the defensiveness or healing capability of another talent they otherwise choose. In otherwords, they have far more options than the warlock.

Now let's suppose the second is true:
Warlocks have 3 talents, each for dps on row 1.
Paladins also have 3 talents, 1 for tanking, 1 for dpsing, and 1 for healing. Now the paladin doesn't actually get any choice because if they want to dps they have 1 option.

In either situation one type of character is penalized over the other. This system your proposing would only work fairly if every class had access to all available roles or only a single role.

[Monster Hunter]

Love the idea, but it wouldnt really change much.

When would a DPS DH ever pick Tank Meta?
When would a DPS Shaman ever pick Earth Shield over Lightning Shield?

Imo we should keep specializations but update the talent system.

first example solo farming elites, or pvp.

secound example would be handy on fights like mythic maut to have earth shield.

[Aresk]

As a druid already carrying around 5 sets of gear (Guardian, Resto, Balance, solo Feral, PvP Feral) and having to constantly deal with adjusting talents/essences, the only way I could see this working is if they remove the "rested" restriction on talent/essence change and give a bunch of load-out slots (similar to the D3 armory) to make managing everything easier. In a raid and tank gets disconnected? Someone has to change their load-out to replace them (instead of just changing specs in today's world). Swapping from raid to mythic+? Need to change up all these talents. Oh wait, the affixes are those? Make some more adjustments. It's a whole lot of bookkeeping for what will boil down to a system very similar to what we have now in terms of actual gameplay. There will be more choices, and there will be significantly more trap choices. While it could work, I personally think the drawbacks outweigh the benefits.

[Monster Hunter]

This punishes hybrids or pure classes. Either they give the same number of options per role or they give the same number of options per class. Let's say the first is true:

So paladins have 3 talents for healing, 3 talents for dps, and 3 talents for tanking they can choose from row 1.
Warlocks have 3 talents for dps they can choose from row 1. Unless they balance this extremely well the paladin will have more options cause whatever % more damage they get from taking a dps talent might not weigh as strongly as the defensiveness or healing capability of another talent they otherwise choose. In otherwords, they have far more options than the warlock.

Now let's suppose the second is true:
Warlocks have 3 talents, each for dps on row 1.
Paladins also have 3 talents, 1 for tanking, 1 for dpsing, and 1 for healing. Now the paladin doesn't actually get any choice because if they want to dps they have 1 option.

In either situation one type of character is penalized over the other. This system your proposing would only work fairly if every class had access to all available roles or only a single role.

there is no rows.

just a bucket of talents and X number of slots, say 10 slots. every class has the same number of slots to fill with either dps, defensive or healing talents and abilities to supplement the base class kit and customise it.

- - - Updated - - -

Reducing the game from nearly 40 classes down to 12 does not seem very appealing to me.

Spec identity is much more interesting than class identity, in my opinion.

its not a reduction. its an expansion. instead of a strict 40, you have how ever many combinations you can make with the available talents to define how your base class plays.

[Monster Hunter]

But then you'd still have specialisations, so it cannot be what the original poster described. I hope you didn't pick the back with the yellow popcorn, either.



Unless you want to actually be able to be competent, then you do. We've been through that already. What you're describing isn't choice, just options.

options require choices. whats Bis on a pathwerk fight isn't BIS every where, but a lot of the time its the only option because our options are extremely limited now. you take the BIS patchwerk dps set up and yea it will be OK for most things, but is it really BIS for Maut or Hive? for some classes its still bis cos theres no options out side of it better not because it would be BIs if they had a wider array of options there class has as a whole.

look at battle shaman, thats kinda become a thing by accedent on blizzards part, but it shows when some flexibility is given to us as players even by mistake, as players we can redefine whats bis by looking at the fight and the whole group comp.

- - - Updated - - -

Sure, and when they first announced going back to class focus, I assumed that they'd bring back the talent trees.

They aren't. Blizzard doesn't do big projects / changes like that to the game anymore since a few expansions ago...

And at worst, if they do implement something like this, I imagine they'll just change our current talent trees to have 1 talent per spec on each row, so for example at level 15 mage: Frost Talent, Fire Talent, Arcane talent.

It's going to be lackluster. Let's avoid pushing their lazy asses / limited resources into that direction. They're all about cutting costs nowadays.

i did hope tbh that these past talent like systems were a trial of a proper talent replacement. alot of them resemble talent systems from other games. maybe they want to test out the weird tree like system there using for covenants in SL before making a bigger change and this adding back of abilitys is just the start, testing the waters.

i can only hope. because wows been very binary and stale since the new trees came in, only broken up now and then with things like essance choices and what ever weird builds we can actualy make by breaking the confines of the system like battle shaman and dagger outlaw.

[talwynn]

But being a brain surgeon dosnt make you forget the basics of other displines.

The idea of spec in wow has as blizz said, gone way way way way to far. And it started with the mop talents as that bound people to a specifically deified view of a spec that also changed over time so now we have alot of people dissatisfied as the current view isn't the moo view or wod view of that spec and many more upset because a warrior is a warrior and they rolled a warrior and feel really contrived being out in a box of only 3 specific types of blizz approved warrior. Where as befor they could define what warrior was to them.

Picking 3% more hit is really captivating gameplay. Plus people will still gravitate towards whatever build will provide them the best numbers/chance of winning in whatever area they are trying to do.

[Monster Hunter]

Picking 3% more hit is really captivating gameplay. Plus people will still gravitate towards whatever build will provide them the best numbers/chance of winning in whatever area they are trying to do.

no ones saying bring back hit or +stat talents.

and yes people will pick the best talents for the best situations, this gives people more options on whats bis for that situation so the answer wont always be the same OK build for nearly every situation. people forget the BIS on the net is for patchwerk.

[Ragnarohk]

People talking about "roles" are mostly forgetting that most "role" part is your gear.

Not anymore. For example, as a druid You only get like 2 bear abilities if you aren't Guardian.

[Cosmic Janitor]

Pointless idea. WoW's specs are way too specialized as they are currently. Many specs have completely different resource mechanics within a class, you'd either need to needlessly redesign every class from the ground up or you'd need to add a talent that just locks you into a spec specific mechanic again. If you think this through it becomes immediately apparent that this is just a very, very stupid idea.

[Monster Hunter]

Not anymore. For example, as a druid You only get like 2 bear abilities if you aren't Guardian.

but they gave back taunt.......but wtf is the point of having that when my pala cant swap to a sword and shield without not being able to cast half his stuff when hes ret.


weapon locking ability's BTW...is absolute bullshit.

- - - Updated - - -

Pointless idea. WoW's specs are way too specialized as they are currently. Many specs have completely different resource mechanics within a class, you'd either need to needlessly redesign every class from the ground up or you'd need to add a talent that just locks you into a spec specific mechanic again. If you think this through it becomes immediately apparent that this is just a very, very stupid idea.

you mean like shadow priest, ret paladin and shamman. spec specific resources they added to fix a problem they created by making the locked down spec design in the first place.....

[jzhbee]

I wouldnt enjoy a "jack of all trades" approach. How I see it, having 3 distinct specializations adds more gameplay, by allowing three different unique playstyles per class, fully fleshed out (at least they have been in the past). A lot of systems that have a large selection of traits end up with "I have one or two primary abilities and a shit ton of passives to prop those abilities up." Which is extremely boring.

I dont think your system would work how you are envisioning it.