If they made a new class in the future, what would it be?

[Teriz]

Wrathion was speaking about burning legion that we have known from ateast wc3.

And most people assumed that a Demon Hunter class would come with a Burning Legion expansion.

Glyph of demon hunting was a wLock glyph that used illidans model. Altho it was cool but its not evidence for demon hunters same with regalia

Which makes sense because the Warlock class held the key Demon Hunter ability Metamorphosis.

[Thundering]

A Cleric would be fun!

[Aydinx2]

Priests literally say words of power, prayers or even sing a hymns to restore HP or mana to allies.
Yes technically not using music, but it's probably the closest we have.

[nocturnus]

Grappler.

No magic, no weapons, just porrada; smashing, breaking limbs, joints and ligaments.

[Aydinx2]

They need to add a tank in the game, and there aren't any Cloth or Mail tanks yet.

Priest Cleric:
Prevent damage through self-absorbs and debilitating the enemy.
Carry a 1h mace/dagger and a shield.
Essentially a Discipline priest in terms of theme and utility.
Can mindcontrol an add for a short moment (5-10 seconds) as a big damage prevention CD.

Shaman Earthwarden:
Self-sustaining with a mix of temporarily reducing damage taken and selfhealing.
Abilities focus on Earth (since that element is badly represented across all current specs).
1h mace/axe and a shield.

[KrayZ33]

Except a group of Goblins and Gnomes using Tinker abilities from HotS. All of the rest of the IE teams were using derivatives of existing WoW abilities.

Nuh-uh.
But that's enough from me talking to a crazy guy. I'm just gonna leave.
The way you see connections between two things is horribly misleading and basically just ignoring everything that doesn't fit your agenda.

I wasted more time than I'd like to admit here.

[Teriz]

Nuh-uh.

Great response. Howabout you actually check out the island expedition teams and realize how wrong you are. There's plenty of existing WoW NPC abilities that could fill up the ability set of those Tinker groups, but they chose HotS abilities instead. HotS abilities are rare throughout WoW, but for some reason there's a huge dump of them in ONE set of Island Expedition teams? Yeah, totally means nothing....

[Ielenia]

It's your opinion that it's "bastardized".

I'll repeat what I wrote, since you just repeated what you wrote without addressing what I wrote:

It's not my opinion that the original WC3 ability is much more powerful than any of the versions we got in WoW.

Except none of the Tinker's abilities appear in the engineering profession, so how can you use that argument against the Tinker?

Because the engineering profession is one feature of the game that focuses and deals purely with high-end technology. The engineering profession allows to create and employs rockets and bombs (a tinker feature), it can create and pilot mechs into combat (a tinker feature), it can create and use a device that constantly deploys walking bombs (a tinker feature) and can use engineering to upgrade himself (a tinker feature).

Post #2823.

I read through your post, and nothing answered my argument: we have no "dark ranger ability kit" because the dark ranger class does not exist. The hunter class is not the dark ranger class.

Wailing Arrow is currently in WoW and is used by Dark Ranger NPCs.

Okay. One more. Still a far cry from eleven like you claim.

I would say that 11 abilities gives us a pretty good idea of what the Dark Ranger kit would look like.

Way less than eleven, and no, it would not.

The point is that there's multiple versions of Black Arrow. There's the classic WC3 version, the Hunter version before Legion, the Legion version of the spell, the HotS version, etc. The other point is that it isn't always linked to Dark Rangers. Sometimes it's linked to Hunters and Rangers.

But it's not a hunter ability. It doesn't fit the class concept, theme and fantasy. Hell, metamorphosis fit the warlock class's concept, theme and fantasy, AND it was an integral part of one of the class' specs, and still Blizzard did not hesitate to remove it. So why do you think saying "hunters once upon a time had Black Arrow" has any weight? What makes you think Blizzard would think twice before removing an ability that the hunter no longer possesses?

The Mount's scale might be too large.

That's your opinion. We have toys and consumables that make the player character much bigger than it already is, sometimes doubling their size, but it still can walk past doorways.

[Teriz]

I'll repeat what I wrote, since you just repeated what you wrote without addressing what I wrote:

Okay, but in the context of WoW, Dark Ranger Black Arrow isn't stronger than Hunter Black Arrow.

Because the engineering profession is one feature of the game that focuses and deals purely with high-end technology. The engineering profession allows to create and employs rockets and bombs (a tinker feature), it can create and pilot mechs into combat (a tinker feature), it can create and use a device that constantly deploys walking bombs (a tinker feature) and can use engineering to upgrade himself (a tinker feature).

Except the Tinker is a hero concept, not a profession concept. None of what you mentioned is designed to accomplish class roles, and none of the Tinker's abilities exist in the Tinker class. So no, it's not the same thing as what we're saying about with Black Arrow. Black Arrow was a class ability, not an item that required mats to be crafted.

I read through your post, and nothing answered my argument: we have no "dark ranger ability kit" because the dark ranger class does not exist. The hunter class is not the dark ranger class.


Okay. One more. Still a far cry from eleven like you claim.


Way less than eleven, and no, it would not.

So you're going to be dishonest and pretend that those HotS abilities don't exist because they're not in WoW, despite examples of classes in WoW taking abilities from that source.

Okay.

But it's not a hunter ability. It doesn't fit the class concept, theme and fantasy. Hell, metamorphosis fit the warlock class's concept, theme and fantasy, AND it was an integral part of one of the class' specs, and still Blizzard did not hesitate to remove it. So why do you think saying "hunters once upon a time had Black Arrow" has any weight? What makes you think Blizzard would think twice before removing an ability that the hunter no longer possesses?

Vereesa isn't a Hunter? Hunters didn't have Black Arrow in their spell book for almost a decade?

I'll say it again; Black Arrow could return to the Hunter class at any point in the future. Especially since the Dark Ranger class is now off the table.

That's your opinion. We have toys and consumables that make the player character much bigger than it already is, sometimes doubling their size, but it still can walk past doorways.

That's fine. I have no problem with players being able to pilot large mechs into battle.

[Unbelievable]

Feel free to explain the differences. Those abilities do exactly what you're requesting.



Except Dark Rangers and PotMs have nothing to do with each other ability wise or lore wise. Also their abilities are housed in multiple classes.



You mean this;

http://classic.battle.net/war3/orc/u...chdoctor.shtml

That concept was completely merged into the Shaman class, just like Shadow Hunters. Witch Doctors are essentially Troll Shaman.



If you blatantly ignore the majority of the Hunter class' history in WoW where Black Arrow was present.....



https://www.wowhead.com/item=49665/pandaren-monk

Life Drain
Heal for 15% of damage dealt by Sylvanas to enemies with 3 stacks of Banshee's Curse. Healing is double against Heroes.

Banshee's Curse
Basic Attacks infect enemies with Banshee's Curse for 3 seconds, stacking up to 3 times. Deal 25% more damage to enemies with 3 stacks.

Predator's Thirst Ferocity Passive
Unlimited range
Requires Hunter (Ferocity, Ferocity, Cunning, Tenacity)
You and your pet gain 10% Leech.

Black Arrow
Level 30 Marksmanship hunter talent
40 Focus
15 sec cooldown
Instant cast
Requires Ranged Weapon
Fires a Black Arrow at the target, dealing (640% of Attack power) Shadow damage over 8 sec and summoning a Dark Minion to taunt it for the duration.
When you kill an enemy, the remaining cooldown on Black Arrow will reset.

Call Pet
Hunter ability
Instant cast
Call an active Pet to your side.

Mind Control
Level 36 priest ability
30 yd range
0.5% of base mana
1.8 sec cast
Controls a mind up to 1 level above yours for 30 sec. Does not work versus Demonic, Mechanical, or Undead beings. Shares diminishing returns with other disorienting effects.

Tame Beast
Level 13 hunter ability
30 yd range
Channeled
Tames a beast to be your companion. If you lose the beast's attention for any reason, the taming process will fail.
You must dismiss any active beast companions and have an empty Call Pet slot before you can begin taming a new beast. Only Beast Mastery specialized Hunters can tame Exotic Beasts.

Yes, they do. They are both Rangers. They both use bows, magical arrows and spells.
"Rangers were eventually cancelled as a hero unit. Most of their abilities were given to the Priestess of the Moon instead, and their model was reused for the in-game appearances of Sylvanas Windrunner and Jennalla Deemspring. Shandris Feathermoon uses a night elf version of the Ranger. When the The Frozen Throne expansion was released, Cold Arrows was given to Naga Sea Witches, renamed to Frost Arrows and given a new icon.

Oh, you mean like how the Demon Hunter abilities were housed in multiple classes? yeah... that thing.

Witch Doctors:
"Witch doctors are semi-playable as troll priests (with shadowy magic, ritualistic chants and spiritual guidance), shamans (with wards being replaced by totems), and warlocks (with curses, soul harvesting, haunt)."
When the Shaman can do all that, please let me know.

"If you blatantly ignore the majority of the Warlock class' history in WoW where Metamorphosis was present...."
You forget to mention that Hunters never had Life Drain or Charm.

Not from Vanilla with Chen's Empty Keg?

Especially since the Dark Ranger class is now off the table.

I missed the part where you speak on Blizzard's behalf.

[HateTrain]

Ugh. UGGGGHHHHHHHH. It HURT to catch up on the last 10 pages of this thread. I'ma go lay down.

[jellmoo]

On the subject of mech size:

While this would be a very un-Blizzard like thing to do (and therefor, in my opinion, unlikely), but what if the solution to mech scaling was to have rather different mechs depending in race?

For example, Gnomes and Goblins have more obvious mechs as seen in game. Mechs and Shredders. Draenei (whether regular or Lightforged, as the case may be) would use something more akin to a suit of Iron Man armor than a mech they sit. Functionally and mechanically identical, just the scale would make it closer to what the other races have. Dwarves could have something unique like a mech with the legs replaced with tank treads. And so forth...

Each race having a solution that lets them pilot something cool and unique, but keeping them in a very similar size frame. If we look at a Highmoutain Tauren as our goalpost of about as big as we want to go, I think that there is still a lot of room to do something pretty cool.

[Triceron]

On the subject of mech size:

While this would be a very un-Blizzard like thing to do (and therefor, in my opinion, unlikely), but what if the solution to mech scaling was to have rather different mechs depending in race?

For example, Gnomes and Goblins have more obvious mechs as seen in game. Mechs and Shredders. Draenei (whether regular or Lightforged, as the case may be) would use something more akin to a suit of Iron Man armor than a mech they sit. Functionally and mechanically identical, just the scale would make it closer to what the other races have. Dwarves could have something unique like a mech with the legs replaced with tank treads. And so forth...

Each race having a solution that lets them pilot something cool and unique, but keeping them in a very similar size frame. If we look at a Highmoutain Tauren as our goalpost of about as big as we want to go, I think that there is still a lot of room to do something pretty cool.

It would be closer to the idea of Druids having unique forms for each race, which is completely possible with a modular system applied to the mechs for customization. Just treat it similar to how player classes already have barbershop options for hair, horns, ears etc. You want rockets on the top, sure. Another race gets hammer arms instead of shredder claws, sure.

I would avoid the change from legs to tank treads though; changes of that degree require completely new animation sets and that's a big red flag when it comes to making things compatible. That's also why I would suggest the Mechs to be the same proportion, and relatively the same size. Walking animations get really messy when sped up or down to keep foot-planting matched up, like if you scaled up a gnome to giant size they walk soooo slloowwwlly because their actual walk speed is the same.

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Exactly.
Why add one as an allied race (Dark Iron) and the other as a customization option (Wildhammer). I'll tell you why. I did a "Races and their real-life equivalents thread" in the lore forum. The Wildhammer are scottish, just like the Bronzebeard. However, the Dark Iron are another ethnicity (first, i thought them to be Celtic, based on their black facial tattoos but, now i'm leaning towards Germanic tribes - watch History Channel's Barbarians rising and Netflix's Barbarians).

Orcs are, most likely, based on Mongolian/Turkic tribes (the unification of different tribes, and the invasion into europe, under Ghengis Khan, is like the Orcs tribes uniting and invading human lands; or the battle of Shattrath City mirroring the Battle of Constantinopole, as the Draenei are based on the Byzantine), Barbarian depictions (Conan the Barbarian) and Prehistoric living conditions (huts made of animal bones).

Meanwhile, the Mag'har Orcs are based on the Huns, and Grommash is, most likely, based on Atilla the Hun, as you can see the parallels between the Warsong invasions into Ogre lands (Ogres are based on ancient rome) and the Huns invasions into Roman Empire. Why this clan and not the others, you might ask? look at the racials, mount and heritage armor - all are pointing to Warsong. That's why they weren't a customization option.

Interesting assessment, I never really looked at races that way. Good research and analysis.


I will say one thing though; I don't think Blizzard is making such close parallels when considering what can be added as Allied Race and what wouldn't be. Real life cultures are only used to harmonize a fictional race into WoW; give it flavour. There's really no statute of limitation on what they can deviate from, what they can invent, and what they can just consider absolutely agnostic to human culture.

Whatever you consider the Night Elf culture to derive from, they can make an infinite spinoff races from. Even if we consider them 'British' and every other Elf race as a 'Colony', we wouldn't be able to make cultural considerations for every Elf variation that exists; it'd be a stretch to apply them in that way when they're so attuned to magic and keen on changing their names as soon as they're faced with a new type of magic.

I'd say the choice for Allied Race consideration is more aligned to what they can get away with using the same skeletal systems they have right now. I always thought it was completely ridiculous that they had to write in the Mag'har from an alternate universe back into the story in such a convenient manner when we already have plenty of Mag'har within the current timeline; like anyone who came with Garrosh over from Outland. But I guess this is the 'Rule of Cool' design that Blizzard is known for, however ridiculous it may be.

[jellmoo]

It would be closer to the idea of Druids having unique forms for each race, which is completely possible with a modular system applied to the mechs for customization. Just treat it similar to how player classes already have barbershop options for hair, horns, ears etc. You want rockets on the top, sure. Another race gets hammer arms instead of shredder claws, sure.

Good point. To whatever degree, having a measure of customization would be important. Cosmetic options could feature some uniform choices (like say colour) as well as individualized racial choices. What would work on a Shredder might not look good on a Draenei suit, for example. Ultimately, I think the idea of having a different solution per race kind of piggybacks on the idea of Zandalari Druids having very unique models for their various forms. Only taking it a steo further.

I would avoid the change from legs to tank treads though; changes of that degree require completely new animation sets and that's a big red flag when it comes to making things compatible. That's also why I would suggest the Mechs to be the same proportion, and relatively the same size. Walking animations get really messy when sped up or down to keep foot-planting matched up, like if you scaled up a gnome to giant size they walk soooo slloowwwlly because their actual walk speed is the same.

I'm not so sure. Functionally it's identical. Normalized move speed and keeping the hit box the same means that the option is purely cosmetic. The only difference is the appearance, and actually tank treads are even easier to do since you aren't matching foot speed at all. And really, odds are for the legs we're just piggybacking existing animation rigs anyway, so it shouldn't be all that huge of an issue.

But yeah, they are going to have a slower walk, for sure. If we have everything at roughly Tauren size, then everything should be walking at roughly Tauren speed. Of course, this can be mitigated outside of combat by having some sort of travel form option.

[Triceron]

I'm not so sure. Functionally it's identical. Normalized move speed and keeping the hit box the same means that the option is purely cosmetic. The only difference is the appearance, and actually tank treads are even easier to do since you aren't matching foot speed at all. And really, odds are for the legs we're just piggybacking existing animation rigs anyway, so it shouldn't be all that huge of an issue.

Well, there is more nuance to tank treads than one might think.

I mean are we talking about Tank Treads and Leg animations being 1:1 in turn speeds, in jumping animations, in crouch, swim, Walk up stairs, Walk down stairs, etc etc? Bipedal walks can be left fairly generic and would work for most of this stuff. You don't need to pitch the character on an angle when moving up a ramp for example, the animations can be left 'floaty' but it's a degree that will never be noticeable. If you have tank treads on a 'Bipedal' Mech going up ramps, then either the treads have to be shortened or have to be rotated slightly to avoid any major crashing into stairs or ramps. And then you'd need a system that complies with animation blending for different states while standing on a ramp, like if you wanted to jump and land in that rotated/shortened tread position. Or they could not care at all and let things crash, but that would just make the mech look incomplete and half-assed; not ideal for getting people to take up that customization option if it isn't very functional.

It's a lot of technical stuff we don't really think about but I do since I deal with this kinda stuff all the time in modding and at work. Sometimes an idea is much better on paper than it seems until you try it out and you realize there's like a dozen different little things like a Dance animation or a Death animation that completely throws a wrench in the works.

[jellmoo]

Well, there is more nuance to tank treads than one might think.

I mean are we talking about Tank Treads and Leg animations being 1:1 in turn speeds, in jumping animations, in crouch, swim, Walk up stairs, Walk down stairs, etc etc? Bipedal walks can be left fairly generic and would work for most of this stuff. You don't need to pitch the character on an angle when moving up a ramp for example, the animations can be left 'floaty' but it's a degree that will never be noticeable. If you have tank treads on a 'Bipedal' Mech going up ramps, then either the treads have to be shortened or have to be rotated slightly to avoid any major crashing into stairs or ramps. And then you'd need a system that complies with animation blending for different states while standing on a ramp, like if you wanted to jump and land in that rotated/shortened tread position. Or they could not care at all and let things crash, but that would just make the mech look incomplete and half-assed; not ideal for getting people to take up that customization option if it isn't very functional.

It's a lot of technical stuff we don't really think about but I do since I deal with this kinda stuff all the time in modding and at work. Sometimes an idea is much better on paper than it seems until you try it out and you realize there's like a dozen different little things like a Dance animation or a Death animation that completely throws a wrench in the works.

Well, just a side note to say that I'm absolutely not married to the idea. It just popped into my head and I thought it would be cool as a fan of Dwarves and their siege tanks.

I would think that they would have to be 1:1 just for the sake of balance. Ideally, the only real difference is the visual. You move at the same ratem turn at the same rate, jump, crouch, etc... Now, off hand I can't think of an elegant way to handle stairs other than to just let the treads roll over them uninterupted, which isn't amazing, but is probably niche enough not to be immersion breaking. Though, to be fair, this is how Wow currently handles Druid forms, as it doesn't go up or down stairs any different than a bipedal character model.

The simplest solution might be to simply piggyback on existing vehicles/mounts that us treads and use them as the basis.

[Unbelievable]

Interesting assessment, I never really looked at races that way. Good research and analysis.


I will say one thing though; I don't think Blizzard is making such close parallels when considering what can be added as Allied Race and what wouldn't be. Real life cultures are only used to harmonize a fictional race into WoW; give it flavour. There's really no statute of limitation on what they can deviate from, what they can invent, and what they can just consider absolutely agnostic to human culture.

Whatever you consider the Night Elf culture to derive from, they can make an infinite spinoff races from. Even if we consider them 'British' and every other Elf race as a 'Colony', we wouldn't be able to make cultural considerations for every Elf variation that exists; it'd be a stretch to apply them in that way when they're so attuned to magic and keen on changing their names as soon as they're faced with a new type of magic.

I'd say the choice for Allied Race consideration is more aligned to what they can get away with using the same skeletal systems they have right now. I always thought it was completely ridiculous that they had to write in the Mag'har from an alternate universe back into the story in such a convenient manner when we already have plenty of Mag'har within the current timeline; like anyone who came with Garrosh over from Outland. But I guess this is the 'Rule of Cool' design that Blizzard is known for, however ridiculous it may be.

Night Elves are predominantly Japanese, based on their Pagoda buildings and Torii structures. Moreover, Illidan has a japanese look to him, and Malfurion has a japanese-styled kilt.
Blood elves, from what i could gather, are based around Koreans and their Phoenix king title (see: Avatar's fire nation).
Nightborne have french sounding names, so their rebellion, upper-lower class rivalry, love for wine and masquerade parties could be a reference to french revolution era.
Void elves have Magister Umbric (Which, is latin for Shadow - Umbra). So, my best guess was Italic latin.

You can see this even being applied to the Shadowlands races:
Kyrian - heavily greek.
Necrolords - Margrave and Baron were european titles. Not quite sure which country, though.
Sylvar - possibly Irish, based on the mythology being used.
Venthyr - Vampires are, most likely, Romanian and their names may imply on that.

I don't care that the Mag'har Orcs from alternate Draenor were introduced. They gave them a twist, and are much cooler and badass than their Outland counterparts.

[Triceron]

Night Elves are predominantly Japanese, based on their Pagoda buildings and Torii structures. Moreover, Illidan has a japanese look to him, and Malfurion has a japanese-styled kilt.

But that's what I sort of mean.

This is confirmation bias. The reality is Night Elves aren't predominantly Japanese, based on their buildings and clothing. There is nothing similar at all to the culture, the language, the food, the fighting styles, anything else other than a loose architectural influence to make them look vastly different from the classic 'Western' look of Human structures back in Warcraft 3. That was the root of the influence in Warcraft 3; to make Night Elf buildings look exotic and foreign when lined up against the other factions. The Artists then looked at what they consider exotic, and they inserted some Eastern influences into their architecture. Everything else that's been designed around Night Elf history like the city of Suramar or the Temples of Elune that came after WC3 were completely different, and much more ancient Roman influenced design.

Night Elves aren't predominantly Japanese at all. They are heavily associated with fauna from the Forests, and Japan isn't known for their crows, grizzly bears and panthers; those are more known in the Pacific Northwest. Their culture is derived heavily from Druidism, and their language loosely based on the Tolkien elven languages. Their runes and tattooes are also more typical of western cultures than Japanese culture.

We're talking about an absolute mixed bag here with no real cultural dominance from any one source. And that sort of applies to most races in WoW. Of course there will be obvious ones like Pandaren, Dwarves and Trolls owing a direct homage to real life culture, but for the most part these cultures are fairly ambiguous and more rooted in the realm of fantasy rather than any real life parallel. What we consider an influence is little more than association with the roots of the mythologies they're based on; yet even then the creators themselves may not intend a direct cultural influence beyond some artist simply liking the look of 'exotic' Japanese architecture.

[TheRevenantHero]

Okay, but in the context of WoW, Dark Ranger Black Arrow isn't stronger than Hunter Black Arrow.




Except the Tinker is a hero concept, not a profession concept. None of what you mentioned is designed to accomplish class roles, and none of the Tinker's abilities exist in the Tinker class. So no, it's not the same thing as what we're saying about with Black Arrow. Black Arrow was a class ability, not an item that required mats to be crafted.



So you're going to be dishonest and pretend that those HotS abilities don't exist because they're not in WoW, despite examples of classes in WoW taking abilities from that source.

Okay.




Vereesa isn't a Hunter? Hunters didn't have Black Arrow in their spell book for almost a decade?

I'll say it again; Black Arrow could return to the Hunter class at any point in the future. Especially since the Dark Ranger class is now off the table.



That's fine. I have no problem with players being able to pilot large mechs into battle.

HotS is a completely separate game. As such, abilities in HotS only exist in that game and should not be used as part of an argument for making a WoW class. Raynor is in HotS so I guess by your logic we should expect him to show up in WoW eventually.

[razorpax]

Like I said, I have no problem with Draenei tinkers if Blizzard decides to make them an option. My issue with it was always size of mech, and the abilities, since characters like https://wow.gamepedia.com/Exarch_Orelis_(alternate_universe)]Exarch Orelis[/url] are using vastly different weaponry than Gazlowe in Island Expeditions.

However, @Triceron made some good points in his post above, so we’ll see what Blizzard does. I’ve always felt that if they were going to use Artificers, it should be LF Draenei and Nightborne as their Horde equivalent.

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Nah, they’re not going to release a class mid expansion. Consider that Death Knights got hinted at heavily in Vanilla and arrived in WotLK, Monks got hinted at in WotLK, and arrived in MoP, Demon Hunters got hinted at in MoP and arrived in Legion, and Tinkers were hinted at in BFA, so if the pattern holds, they’ll be introduced in the next expansion.

We’ll see.

Blizzard can make the abilities fit a theme just like Druid forms
The mech size isn’t even a possible issue because those mounts exist

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HotS is a completely separate game. As such, abilities in HotS only exist in that game and should not be used as part of an argument for making a WoW class. Raynor is in HotS so I guess by your logic we should expect him to show up in WoW eventually.

You are arguing with a brick wall bud
The HotS argument only goes one way for him and it’s a waste of time