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  1. #21
    Quote Originally Posted by garicasha View Post
    Dungeon that bricked the most keys: +5 sec to timer
    In addition to concerns others brought up like differing affixes, etc., this doesn't really even make sense. Most keys (particularly among the "majority" you mention below the 20+ range) aren't bricked due to the timer. They're caused by poor play, lack of communication, butt pulls, DCs, etc. Adding to the timer is mostly going to "balance" things for groups that are mechanically solid but can't push enough damage or get set back by wiping on a particular trash pack/boss- which is more of a high end concern overall.
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  2. #22
    Merely a Setback FelPlague's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by garicasha View Post
    In coming expansions I really think it’d be wise to have mythic+ auto-adjusted a very small amount each week.

    The servers would keep stats on completion rates and wipe data, then at the end of the week something like:

    Dungeon that bricked the most keys: +5 sec to timer
    Dungeon completed the most: -5 secs
    Boss that caused the most wipes: -1% heath and damage
    Boss that caused the fewest wipes: +1 health and damage
    Dungeon attempted the least: -1% to trash health

    The idea being that making frequent tiny adjustments early is way better than waiting 6 weeks and then having these big balance changes, adding or removing 1-2 minutes from the timer, etc.

    It would also push the hardest and easiest dungeons closer to the middle in terms of difficulty much sooner.

    There could be limits, too, this wouldn’t make all dungeons the same length.

    The 20, 25+ crowd might want more static health values, this change is more intended for the majority
    Cool, except... people would abuse this system, purposfully bricking specific keys of specific dungeons over and over on specific weeks to make their next weeks run easier to push, especially as if you brick a key, it stays the same dungeon but drops a level, so you could literally enter dungeon, exit, reset, and do that over and over and over and over all day and boom hundreds.
    Quote Originally Posted by Varodoc View Post
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  3. #23
    In addition to concerns others brought up like differing affixes, etc., this doesn't really even make sense. Most keys (particularly among the "majority" you mention below the 20+ range) aren't bricked due to the timer. They're caused by poor play, lack of communication, butt pulls, DCs, etc. Adding to the timer is mostly going to "balance" things for groups that are mechanically solid but can't push enough damage or get set back by wiping on a particular trash pack/boss- which is more of a high end concern overall.
    True, casual players running 2's - 9's aren't going to benefit significantly from an extra couple seconds. But I think the overall idea of recently released dungeons being tuned small amounts each week is still better than the four to six-week waiting period we've typically seen when a minute or two will get added to a timer or a boss will get nerfed.

    Here's my opinion of what happened in Shadowlands Season 1 for dungeons that gave the highest ilvl reward from the Great Vault:

    Tier 1:
    Spires
    Necrotic Wake
    Plaguefall
    Mists

    Tier 2:
    ToP I feel was more affected by affixes than the other dungeons, with its narrow corridors, 5 bosses, and relative lack of freedom for route
    Halls of Atonement, as a shorter dungeon, was very easy some weeks (sanguine, inspiring, etc.) and very easy to complete but difficult to time on others (bolstering, fortified)

    Tier 3:
    De Other Side
    Sanguine Depths

    So in season 1 IMO there was a pretty clear delineation that Spires and Mists were significantly easier than DoS and SD pretty much regardless of week. Especially if Pride got screwed up on the second boss of SD. That boss clearly wiped far more groups than say, third boss of HoA (the chick that summons ghosts who's a total joke) and it would've been completely reasonable for SD Boss 2 to have his damage and health reduced and the third boss of HoA to be buffed a little. And that one new website that aggregates completion percentages backed up the fact that SD and DOS had significantly lower completion %'s than the other dungeons on pretty much every week. And it would have been appropriate to take a few seconds off the Mists or Spires timers and add them to DoS or SD.

    Season 2 was in slightly better shape because a lot of balancing had been done. Mists definitely got harder and SD got easier, which brought in two of the bigger outliers. But I'm pretty sure DoS still has a noticeably lower completion % on all weeks than the other 7 dungeons. Here I actually looked it up and sure enough: https://bestkeystone.com/statistics/dungeons for this storming week, granted it's the top 5000 runs so it's mostly 20+ keys, but Necrotic Wake is cleared 95% of the time and DoS is cleared 65%. Even a year in to the expansion DoS is still failed quite a bit more than the other options.

    Now for the other point of people intentionally bricking keys:
    --People will do exploitative things, however
    ----Some basic countermeasures wouldn't be difficult to build in
    ----The benefits again, are so small. Even assuming no countermeasures, I'm proposing balance changes so small (+5, maybe +10 seconds) that it would take months of intentionally bricking keys to move the timer even 60 seconds.
    ------And if a dungeon is so hated that people are willing to waste their time intentionally bricking their keys on it for months...there's a good chance the dungeon deserves it!
    --And I don't want to get bogged down in specific suggestions so much as the big picture for smaller more frequent balance changes.

    I also think people are so used to the status quo of certain dungeons just being harder than others that they're being a little resistant to a different way of doing things. If DoS had been getting minor automatic tuning adjustments for the last year I highly doubt you'd see a gap of 95% completion for NW and 65% for DoS this far in to the expansion.
    Last edited by garicasha; 2021-12-21 at 09:58 PM.
    Raid bosses will always be very similar so long as encounter design requires DPS to always be pumping 100%.

  4. #24
    Quote Originally Posted by FelPlague View Post
    Cool, except... people would abuse this system, purposfully bricking specific keys of specific dungeons over and over on specific weeks to make their next weeks run easier to push, especially as if you brick a key, it stays the same dungeon but drops a level, so you could literally enter dungeon, exit, reset, and do that over and over and over and over all day and boom hundreds.
    It also doesn't really help... at higher keys most dmg mobs do is mostly irrelevant. You play till the game breaks and it auto kills you.

  5. #25
    Quote Originally Posted by Alroxas View Post
    invalidated because of gear from a previous raid tier
    That weak argument has already been answered; you don't have to get gear from old content; it could be just a switch for a feat of strength for when a guild has nothing else to do.


    Quote Originally Posted by Alroxas View Post
    if you believe you could do better, why don't you go work for them
    Terrible ad hominem argument; me not being a dev is irrelevant. Again: devs being bad at their only job is not an excuse.

  6. #26
    Herald of the Titans Alroxas's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by epigramx View Post
    You don't have to get gear from old content; it could be just a switch for a feat of strength for when a guild has nothing else to do.
    Funny you don't have to get gear for TimeWalking yet people do it anyway because WoW is very much a game about optimization to the nth degree.

    The TW Mage Tower is a great illustration of old content being reintroduced to the current playerbase and then all the "extra" development time required because:

    a) some encounters were overtuned.
    b) some older items provided bonuses that far exceed what players' power level should be
    c) some items straight up disabled because again it would allow players to exceed the power level they should be at.

    And that's just for 7 scenarios. Imagine the amount of work required to update and maintain every single raid tier each time a new raid tier is added. Blizzard doesn't have unlimited resources and the beancounters aren't going to ok this kind of work if the return on investment isn't high.

    Quite frankly, if given the choice: most players would rather have new raids/new dungeons/new content then to go back and redo old content even if it was scaled up to be as challenging as it was back in the day.
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  7. #27
    Quote Originally Posted by Alroxas View Post
    Funny you don't have to get gear for TimeWalking yet people do it anyway because WoW is very much a game about optimization to the nth degree.

    The TW Mage Tower is a great illustration of old content being reintroduced to the current playerbase and then all the "extra" development time required because:

    a) some encounters were overtuned.
    b) some older items provided bonuses that far exceed what players' power level should be
    c) some items straight up disabled because again it would allow players to exceed the power level they should be at.

    And that's just for 7 scenarios. Imagine the amount of work required to update and maintain every single raid tier each time a new raid tier is added. Blizzard doesn't have unlimited resources and the beancounters aren't going to ok this kind of work if the return on investment isn't high.

    Quite frankly, if given the choice: most players would rather have new raids/new dungeons/new content then to go back and redo old content even if it was scaled up to be as challenging as it was back in the day.
    Again: devs being bad at their only job is not an excuse.

  8. #28
    Herald of the Titans Alroxas's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by epigramx View Post
    Again: devs being bad at their only job is not an excuse.
    Sure or folks can view your opinion as: A gross mischaracterization due to the lack of understanding of the systems (both in-game and in-company) in WoW/Blizzard.

    What if Devs could fix issues but Management doesn't want to spend the time and resources to do so? Is it then still "bad" devs or a lack of "will" to expend resources?
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  9. #29
    Quote Originally Posted by garicasha View Post
    In coming expansions I really think it’d be wise to have mythic+ auto-adjusted a very small amount each week.

    The servers would keep stats on completion rates and wipe data, then at the end of the week something like:

    Dungeon that bricked the most keys: +5 sec to timer
    Dungeon completed the most: -5 secs
    Boss that caused the most wipes: -1% heath and damage
    Boss that caused the fewest wipes: +1 health and damage
    Dungeon attempted the least: -1% to trash health

    The idea being that making frequent tiny adjustments early is way better than waiting 6 weeks and then having these big balance changes, adding or removing 1-2 minutes from the timer, etc.

    It would also push the hardest and easiest dungeons closer to the middle in terms of difficulty much sooner.

    There could be limits, too, this wouldn’t make all dungeons the same length.

    The 20, 25+ crowd might want more static health values, this change is more intended for the majority
    No. Horrible idea.

    If the dungeon is hard. Keep it hard. If you can not do it, than simply get better.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by garicasha View Post
    I don't think that'd be as much of a problem as people think. MMO-champ is this vocal minority of 1% of the players, and people doing 15, 20, 25+ keys are way overrepresented here. And certainly some people, especially at higher keys, would be willing to brick a key to mess with the stats. But that's the thing; if you balance a tiny amount...I mean it would take thousands of people intentionally bricking their key to move the timer a whopping five seconds...people have better things to do.

    But if one dungeon was really hated, that's why I'm talking about auto-balancing it...reduce the health of the trash, increase the timer, do whatever and then people won't hate it as much anymore.

    I'm guessing that for every person willing to brick a key there's 10 casuals running +4s, +5s, +2s, etc., that couldn't possibly care less about which key they have.

    I have posted similar ideas in the past I think and it wasn't really that popular. But ask yourself...is the way that the devs balance the game now so good it couldn't be improved upon? I mean even if it's not automatic, I still think that fine-tuning dungeons 1-3% every week right after release is better than waiting a few months and significantly changing the difficulty. Again, except at the bleeding edge where the player's desires are somewhat different. (And the toughest low level keys are not necessarily the toughest high level keys.)
    Actually mmo-c has the vocal minority of most prople not being able to complete +5. You give to much credit to people.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by epigramx View Post
    That's just an unjustified desire of yours; it's completely subjective; why don't we delete "old content" if it's just 1 day old if we are that subjective.



    That's a non-argument; 'timewalked' runs would have a switch.


    Devs being bad at doing their only job isn't an excuse.
    In all 3 responses you just 100% reiterated why you should never be in charge of any video game system.

    - - - Updated - - -

    Quote Originally Posted by epigramx View Post
    That weak argument has already been answered; you don't have to get gear from old content; it could be just a switch for a feat of strength for when a guild has nothing else to do.




    Terrible ad hominem argument; me not being a dev is irrelevant. Again: devs being bad at their only job is not an excuse.
    You literally avoided the comment by making an excuse. Devs are fine, you're the one who is bad at the game; I suspect.

    Or you simply are to ignorant to understand how the gaming industry works and you actually believe devs have any word or say on what goes into a game. If you think that I have a HUGE surprise for you.
    Last edited by Utrrabbit; 2021-12-23 at 06:10 PM.

  10. #30
    Quote Originally Posted by Alroxas View Post
    I mean if you believe you could do better, why don't you go work for them and make it better? Or better yet start your own MMORPG and have it out last WoW. The rest of us will be waiting.
    This is such a non-argument. You don't have to be a chef to know when something is too salty.
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  11. #31
    Quote Originally Posted by epigramx View Post
    I get your argument and I agree in part but there's a solution. Keep it as a feat of strength only (no loot and no points); that way you can prove skill without feeling the necessity to do it yet (only when the guild has nothing else to do and always optional).

    The true problem here is a development one I believe; it would be hard to actually keep it stable; if they keep changing core systems and borrowed powers all the time then even the mage tower gets weird imbalances (as we saw recently).
    Remember titanforging in Legion? I remember numerous complaints in Nighthold of people feeling "forced" to keep running mythic Ursoc in Emerald Nightmare because he dropped some of the best trinkets if they titanforged enough. It created a lot of negative feelings.

  12. #32
    because adjusting over and under performing abilities in dungeons, raids, and classes is too much to ask. just like it's too much to expect a dev team to keep a freaking google doc with sections for each department of game design to update each day that way all they have to do for patch notes is copy/paste.

  13. #33
    Herald of the Titans Alroxas's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by oplawlz View Post
    This is such a non-argument. You don't have to be a chef to know when something is too salty.
    Eh... but what is too salty when a dish is supposed to be salty? Can one tell the degree to which saltiness is supposed to be within the parameters of the dish in question?

    Or translated to the current discussion: epigramx states that the devs are bad at their jobs. I counter that it's impossible to really know if the devs are truly bad at their jobs or the situation of WoW development is just very very difficult.

    For instance, we know that WoW has built in code that's over a decade old. How long did it take to just code in some extra bag space for the original inventory? And how many bugs did that create?

    Moreover, it's not just the developers fault when things go poorly. For instance, I could see Azerite armor being pitched in management/director level meetings as a good system on paper but implementation showed a lot of flaws from as early as PTR testing. But management went with the release of Azerite armor and it wasn't until a later patch that a different system (HoA) was used. Can you really blame Devs for a decision made by Management? What do you want the Devs to do in that kind of scenario?
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  14. #34
    That's just not going to happen.
    The scoring is what should be being balanced.

    Hard to believe the geniuses over at RaiderIO didn't figure it out, but not every dungeon is the same difficulty every week or compared to every other dungeon.

    There needs to be a score that considers affixes, and if they want to take it all the way, global success rate from the previous time the affix set appeared.

    Blizzard at least appears as if they recognize this by separating Tyranical and Fortified as they did, but RaiderIO being so lazy really set the whole system back a long ways.

    In terms of balancing dungeons, I get why that seems like the more logical choice instead, but that is just not going to work on the scale you think it would need to work on. Way too many moving parts, and its only inviting the "Why is this dungeon harder this week wtf" complaints you already see with affixes in place.
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  15. #35
    Herald of the Titans Alroxas's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by aceperson View Post
    because adjusting over and under performing abilities in dungeons, raids, and classes is too much to ask.
    Take a step back and consider what you just said. How many specs are there? How many core rotational abilities (we'll exclude utility abilities for this thought experiment) does each spec have. Now consider gear interactions to rotations (including legendaries and unqiue effect trinkets) and lastly factor in raid encounter design.

    It's a herculean task.

    Quote Originally Posted by aceperson View Post
    just like it's too much to expect a dev team to keep a freaking google doc with sections for each department of game design to update each day that way all they have to do for patch notes is copy/paste.
    I mean sure it would be nice to have developer thoughts on sweeping changes but it would be a time waste to document every reason why some ability was tuned X%.
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  16. #36
    Quote Originally Posted by Alroxas View Post
    Eh... but what is too salty when a dish is supposed to be salty? Can one tell the degree to which saltiness is supposed to be within the parameters of the dish in question?

    Or translated to the current discussion: epigramx states that the devs are bad at their jobs. I counter that it's impossible to really know if the devs are truly bad at their jobs or the situation of WoW development is just very very difficult.

    For instance, we know that WoW has built in code that's over a decade old. How long did it take to just code in some extra bag space for the original inventory? And how many bugs did that create?

    Moreover, it's not just the developers fault when things go poorly. For instance, I could see Azerite armor being pitched in management/director level meetings as a good system on paper but implementation showed a lot of flaws from as early as PTR testing. But management went with the release of Azerite armor and it wasn't until a later patch that a different system (HoA) was used. Can you really blame Devs for a decision made by Management? What do you want the Devs to do in that kind of scenario?
    I don't disagree with you, but as a consumer the difference between the actual developers and the development studio is non existent. It's kind of an all-encompassing word for your average player. As a developer myself (not in the game industry thank god) I know it feels shitty, but that's just how it is.

    OT:
    Blizzard as a company has handled balance poorly for a very long time. There's no reason they shouldn't have continued the early model of having kind of a class representative for every class in the game. It should be an independent salaried position with constant community interaction. That's certainly not on the devs, management decided either not to invest in such a resource or that they wanted to keep their hands deep in every design decision personally. I wasn't there, so I can't say which, but the game has suffered for it.
    Quote Originally Posted by Kaleredar View Post
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  17. #37
    Quote Originally Posted by oplawlz View Post
    Blizzard as a company has handled balance poorly for a very long time. There's no reason they shouldn't have continued the early model of having kind of a class representative for every class in the game. It should be an independent salaried position with constant community interaction. That's certainly not on the devs, management decided either not to invest in such a resource or that they wanted to keep their hands deep in every design decision personally. I wasn't there, so I can't say which, but the game has suffered for it.
    This sounds like the type of imaginary nonsense people construct to cope with the game moving in a direction they didn't like. Is there any proof that there were salaried "class representatives" or that "management decided not to invest" in such a position?

  18. #38
    Quote Originally Posted by Alroxas View Post
    Take a step back and consider what you just said. How many specs are there? How many core rotational abilities (we'll exclude utility abilities for this thought experiment) does each spec have. Now consider gear interactions to rotations (including legendaries and unqiue effect trinkets) and lastly factor in raid encounter design.

    It's a herculean task.



    I mean sure it would be nice to have developer thoughts on sweeping changes but it would be a time waste to document every reason why some ability was tuned X%.
    i want to touch on the google doc first cause i think you misunderstood what i said. it's not a document meant to explain reasons. it would just be a list of changes that are done daily. that way nothing should be left out of patch notes.

    as for the tuning part, it wouldn't be that hard to see classes that are over and under represented and buff/nerf them by 1% with the global aura that is already implemented. extremely fine tuning would be impossible, i agree. but they could easily fix massive variety in average dps for each spec with a minor weekly buff or nerf.

  19. #39
    Quote Originally Posted by Relapses View Post
    This sounds like the type of imaginary nonsense people construct to cope with the game moving in a direction they didn't like. Is there any proof that there were salaried "class representatives" or that "management decided not to invest" in such a position?
    No no, those dedicated positions never existed, I'm saying they should have. What did exist were devs and community managers that kind of championed several classes. It's not about specific changes being bad or good, it's about the wild balance swings (and misses) that simply wouldn't happen if you had someone whose sole concern was their assigned class. It's not like blizzard couldn't afford to have 9-12 people on staff for that purpose.
    Quote Originally Posted by Kaleredar View Post
    Nah nah, see... I live by one simple creed: You might catch more flies with honey, but to catch honeys you gotta be fly.

  20. #40
    Quote Originally Posted by oplawlz View Post
    No no, those dedicated positions never existed, I'm saying they should have. What did exist were devs and community managers that kind of championed several classes. It's not about specific changes being bad or good, it's about the wild balance swings (and misses) that simply wouldn't happen if you had someone whose sole concern was their assigned class. It's not like blizzard couldn't afford to have 9-12 people on staff for that purpose.
    Nobody on this forum has any idea how Blizzard works internally so it's a bit dismissive to simply assume that because classes aren't designed in a way you personally approve that they don't have people whose job description is essentially exactly what you described.

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